With the advent of Burning
Daylight the whole place became suddenly brighter and cheerier.
The barkeepers were active. Voices were raised. Somebody
laughed. And when the fiddler, peering into the front room,
remarked to the pianist, "It's Burning Daylight," the waltz-time
perceptibly quickened, and the dancers, catching the contagion,
began to whirl about as if they really enjoyed it. It was known
to them of old time that nothing languished when Burning Daylight
was around.
He turned from the bar and saw the woman by the stove and the
eager look of welcome she extended him.
"Hello, Virgin, old girl," he called. "Hello, Charley. What's
the matter with you-all? Why wear faces like that when coffins
cost only three ounces? Come up, you-all, and drink. Come up,
you unburied dead, and name your poison. Come up, everybody.
This is my night, and I'm going to ride it. To-morrow I'm
thirty, and then I'll be an old man. It's the last fling of
youth. Are you-all with me? Surge along, then. Surge along.
"Hold on there, Davis," he called to the faro-dealer, who had
shoved his chair back from the table. "I'm going you one flutter
to see whether you-all drink with me or we-all drink with you.
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