bargain, I ll warrant. Come wet your whistle again. Here's happy days!"
With a deep draught he pledged the toast.
"And here's wishin' ye luck in yer little game with the Devil tonight."
Stoppering the flask, he leered at the girl.
"There's a pretty bridegroom for ye, my gal," then addressing again the thing in his hand, "How'd ye like to be spliced to this lass, me lad?"
Crouching, she retreated toward the inner chamber. Awful as it was, it could hold no worse terrors than that evil old man with the flask and the skull. But he followed, continuing his ghastly soliloquy.
"What right good bedfellows yu'd make. Her with her red cheeks and ye with yer old yaller bones."
The ballast of whisky suddenly shifted in his wicked old brain and his mirth changed to anger at her.
"Come, you close-mouthed jade, swing yer clapper. Yur sour-faced sweetheart on the ship below would only beat ye, and the Chesterfield Kid's only a quarter o' a man. Jilt 'em both, I say."
He thrust the jowl nearer her face.
"Now here's the proper bridegroom for ye. Won't never lay a finger on ye. Just give ye them soul-kisses ye read about, warm enough to yer way o' thinkin'?
"Come, a good kiss for the handsum bridegroom."
Again he lifted the skull towards her face. The grinning thing was within an inch of her blanching lips. A scream rent the air, and she sank unconscious on the floor of the cavern.
