BANCROFT 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 < 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 
 M. DEWITT 
 BOOKSELLER 
 
 eSO FOURTKBNTH ST. "* 
 OAKLAND. CAI*. 
 
fy 
 
GERALD FFRENCH'S 
 FRIENDS 
 
BY THE SAME AUTHOR: 
 
 JUDGE LYNCH ;-A Romance of the California 
 Vineyards. 
 
 CHECK AND COUNTERCHECK: A Tale of 
 Twenty-five Hours. 
 
 (With Brander Matthews.) 
 
GERALD FFRENCH'S 
 FRIENDS 
 
 o 
 
 GEORGE H. JESSOP 
 
 * 
 
 \ 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 LONGMANS, GREEN, & CO. 
 
 15 EAST SIXTEENTH STREET 
 1889 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1889 
 
 BY 
 GEORGE H. JESSOP 
 
 TROWS 
 
 PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING COMPANY, 
 NEW YORK. 
 
UFF/-FY 
 
 TO 
 
 BRANDER MATTHEWS 
 
 IN GRATEFUL ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF MUCH KIND 
 ENCOURAGEMENT AND VALUABLE ADVICE 
 
TnO 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 MR. GERALD FFRENCH'S journalistic career on 
 the Pacific Coast covered a period of five years 
 from 1873 to 1878. In this time it was his fortune 
 to meet a great many Irishmen, with several of 
 whom he became more or less intimately associated. 
 The Irish colony in California is important both in 
 numbers and influence, and Mr. Ffrench's situation 
 offered unusual advantages for .a study of the more 
 prominent peculiarities of the members of that col- 
 ony. The purpose of these chapters is to depict a 
 few of the most characteristic types of the native 
 Celt of the original stock as yet unmixed in blood, 
 but modified by new surroundings and a different civ- 
 ilization. All the incidents related in this book are 
 based on fact, and several of them are mere tran- 
 scripts from actual life, with no more material altera- 
 tion than seemed necessary to throw the veil of fic- 
 tion over the identity of the characters. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE RISE AND FALL OF THE "IRISH AIGLE," . . . i 
 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF CARRICK MEAGHER, ... 37 
 AT THE TOWN OF THE QUEEN OF THE ANGELS, . -73 
 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY, . . .105 
 
 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS . 143 
 
 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE 197 
 
THE RISE AND FALL OF 'THE 
 IRISH AIGLE." 
 
THE RISE AND FALL OF 'THE 
 IRISH AIGLE." 
 
 MR. MARTIN DOYLE, Mr. Andrew Cummiskey, 
 Mr. Peter O'Rourke, Mr. Frank Brady, and Mr. 
 James Foley were seated in the private snuggery 
 behind Mr. Matthew McKeon's sample-room on 
 Washington Street, San Francisco. It was late in 
 the evening of Thanksgiving Day, 1874, and these 
 gentlemen had met by appointment to discuss a 
 very serious and important matter of business. The 
 apartment was small and its atmosphere was chang- 
 ing into a pale blue haze. This was due to Mr. 
 McKeon's cigars, one of which was wielded by each 
 of the party. From the saloon outside muffled 
 sounds of holiday revelry stole in, swelling into 
 positive uproar when the host opened the door, 
 which he did every ten or fifteen minutes, to put 
 in his head to inquire if " the jintlemen wanted 
 anything." To each of these appeals Mr. Martin 
 Doyle made the same reply : " Nothin', Mat, noth- 
 
4 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 in' ; we're here for business, not for dhrink." And 
 the door v/as closed igain. 
 
 The truth was that all five were patriots of the 
 most advanced type, and had met to determine 
 upon the best means of freeing old Ireland from 
 the bloody and tyrannical yoke of the Saxon op- 
 pressor. It is true that " opprissor " was the word 
 used in their frequent repetition of this formula, 
 but the meaning was the same. 
 
 In spite of the periodical refusal of McKeon's 
 offers of refreshment, the table round which they 
 were seated was fairly furnished with drinkables ; 
 perhaps this circumstance emboldened them to de- 
 cline further supplies. Messrs. Cummiskey, Brady, 
 O'Rourke, and Foley paid attention to a portly 
 bottle of Kinahan's L L, the contents of which 
 they qualified in varying proportions with hot water, 
 lemon, and sugar. Mr. Doyle's tastes had become 
 so vitiated by long residence in America as to lead 
 him to prefer simple Bourbon whiskey ; but, this de- 
 tail apart, he was as true an Irishman still as on the 
 day, now some twenty-five years ago, when, a lank, 
 ungainly boy, he had entered Tapscott's office in 
 Liverpool and engaged passage for .the land of prom- 
 ise. Indeed, it was Mr. Doyle who had called 
 the present meeting together. 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLE." 5 
 
 By ten o'clock the bottles were almost empty, 
 and the cigar smoke had grown so dense that the 
 mild features of Robert Emmet, who stood in all 
 the glory of green uniform and waved a feathered 
 hat exultantly from an engraving above Mr. Foley's 
 head, could scarcely be distinguished. Mr. Martin 
 Doyle's notable scheme had been thoroughly dis- 
 cussed in all its details, and the proud projector 
 arose somewhat unsteadily. 
 
 " Fri'nds and fellow-countrymen," he began, " the 
 death-knell of Saxon opprission has nearly sthruck. 
 Ye can come in, Mat " this to Mr. McKeon, whose 
 head appeared in the doorway "ye can come in; 
 we've most finished, an' we'll be havin' a dock a 
 dorrish prisintly. Well, as I. was sayin', the Saxon 
 opprissor " 
 
 " To hell wid him ! " broke in Foley, impulsively, 
 and the rest of the company contributed a deep- 
 voiced " Amin ! " 
 
 " Misther Foley, and jintlemen," expostulated the 
 speaker, " I have the flure. We're agreed, I belave, 
 that the pin is mightier nor the sword. All in favor 
 of that proposition will signify their assint by sayin' 
 ' Aye.' Conthrary minded, ' No. ' The ayes have it, 
 and it is so orthered. Therefore, jintlemen, we 
 bein' prisint here this night do agree each to con- 
 
THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 thribute the sum of wan hunthred dollars, bein' five 
 hunthred dollars in all, to defray the immejit ex- 
 pinses of startin' a wakely journal, the same to be 
 called < The Irish Aigle.'" 
 
 Enthusiastic cheers drowned the speaker's voice. 
 He smiled, answered a pantomimic suggestion of 
 McKeon's with a nod, and, draining the glass which 
 the host handed to him, proceeded. 
 
 _" We five jintlemen here prisint, havin' the cause 
 of an opprissed people at heart, do hereby resolve 
 ourselves into a thryumvirate to solicit further con- 
 thributions from local pathriots, an' such aid in 
 the way of advertisements an' subscriptions as we 
 may be able to secure. All in favor of this plan will 
 signify the same by sayin' ' Aye.' Conthrary minded, 
 * No.' The ayes have it, and it is so orthered. Mr. 
 Foley, Mr. O'Rourke, Mr. Brady, Mr. Cummiskey, 
 and me unworthy silf, as members of the Thryum- 
 virate, will git to work. Long life and success to 
 
 1 The Irish Aigle ! ' " 
 
 As soon as the toast had been duly honored, Mr. 
 Cummiskey took McKeon aside and pointed out to 
 him the immense advantage he would reap from ad- 
 vertising his saloon in the new organ. The repre- 
 sentation which appeared to have the most weight 
 with the liquor dealer lay in these words: 
 
" THE IRISH AIGLET 7 
 
 " Ye see, Mike, the offices of ' The Aigle ' will be 
 only three dures from you and sivin from Jerry Mc- 
 Manus. Now, ye know yersilf pathriotism is dhry 
 work, and McManus knows it too." 
 
 On the strength of this argument the astute Mr. 
 Cummiskey booked a ten-dollar " ad " on the spot, 
 and laid the foundation of that generous rivalry be- 
 tween the two saloon keepers which afterward be- 
 came such an important factor in the well-being of 
 " The Irish Eagle." 
 
 The preliminary work of engaging a suitable 
 office and hiring type was undertaken by Mr. Doyle, 
 and was executed, as the legend in his own shoe- 
 store set forth, " with promptness and despatch." 
 Two weeks afterward the first number of the new 
 paper was for sale on the news-stands, glorious with 
 a rampant eagle flaunting a Celtic motto from its 
 beak. The reading matter was largely made up of 
 patriotic poems and clippings from other journals 
 of the same way of thinking, but the editorial page 
 was original thoroughly, unquestionably original. 
 The united wisdom of the Thryumvirate had been 
 expended on that effort. There breathed the fiery 
 utterances of Cummiskey, the butter-seller; there 
 sparkled the neat epigram of O'Rourke, the truck- 
 man ; there were set forth the lucid arguments of 
 
8 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 Foley, the tanner ; there the reader might trace the 
 sportive fancies of Brady, the bookbinder ; and the 
 whole bore witness to the massive genius of Martin 
 Doyle, the shoemaker. It was a great number, and 
 its appearance was duly celebrated at McKeon's by 
 the Thryumvirate, resolved for the moment into a 
 mutual admiration society. 
 
 At this meeting a new arrangement was made. 
 The paper should be edited, not by the whole com- 
 mittee acting as a body, but by the individual 
 members holding office in rotation. The five issues 
 succeeding the first came- out in this way, and lost 
 nothing in originality even if they suffered in va- 
 riety. Peter O'Rourke began the series and Frank 
 Brady brought up the rear. Each recurrent editor 
 was thoroughly satisfied with himself, but felt hurt 
 to see the line of policy he had projected during 
 his week of office ruthlessly abandoned by his suc- 
 cessor. It became evident that something must be 
 done in the interests of uniformity. The paper 
 was pulling five ways at once, and, doubtless for 
 that reason, had so far failed to deal any really fatal 
 blow at British institutions. Everyone felt this, 
 and the eyes of the nation were upon Mr. Martin 
 Doyle. That gentleman rose to the occasion, and 
 called an extraordinary meeting of the Committee 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLET 9 
 
 of Stockholders. The enterprise had been duly in- 
 corporated according to the laws of California, 
 under the name of " The Eagle Publishing Com- 
 pany." The session took place in McKeon's saloon, 
 and Mr. Doyle laid the matter before his colleagues 
 in a neat impromptu speech. 
 
 " Ireland," he remarked, " has groaned for six 
 hunthred years beneath the yoke of the Saxon op- 
 prissor." Mr. Doyle's oratory had the merit of 
 taking up his subject at the very beginning. Hav- 
 ing briefly called attention to the principal groans 
 which had been uttered by the suffering island dur- 
 ing the centuries referred to, the speaker proceeded. 
 
 " At a pravious meetin' of this honorable body it 
 was determined that the best and most immejitly 
 practical way of rightin' the wrongs of our suffering 
 counthry was to dissiminate them broadly through 
 the world ; to call on all Irishmen in ivery climate 
 under heaven to organize an' be free, an' to paint 
 the black behavior of the Saxon tyrant in the 
 brightest colors. Wid this object we started ' The 
 Irish Aigle,' the first couple of numbers of which 
 have already reached England and sthruck terror to 
 the sowls of a bloody and sowlless aristocracy. 
 But, jintlemen, we cannot disguise from ourselves 
 the fact that no tanjible result has yet been per- 
 
10 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 juced, and this I atthribute to the followin' rason, 
 namely, to wit : while we are all alike annymated 
 by the same burnin' love of freedom, we differ in 
 matters of daytail. While wan advycates the 
 sword, another is of opinyun that an open risin' 
 would at prisint be primature. We all belave in 
 organization, but no two of us has the wan notion 
 as to the manes and maning of organization. 
 Therefore the paper sez wan wake wan thing, and 
 another wake another, which is confusin' to the ig- 
 norant pathriot ; an' that many of our best pathriots 
 is ignorant, it is not you, me fri'nds, nor me will 
 deny. The ignorance of the masses is another 
 crime on the bloody bade-roll of Saxon opprission. 
 Therefore, jintlemen, what I propose is as follows, 
 namely, to wit : that we do ingage a jintleman of 
 scientific attainments an' practised litherary voca- 
 tions, to idit this journal an' say for us what we 
 have to say betther nor we can say it for ourselves, 
 an' such a jintleman I have been fortunate enough 
 to discover an' unearth. He is an Irishman, av 
 coorse ; a native of the county Westmeath, an', 
 what is more to our purpose, a graduate of Thrinity 
 College, Dublin. He is young, but sure Robert 
 Emmet was young, an' he'll come all the ch'aper on 
 that account ; an' he is racently from the ould 
 
IRISH AIGLE:* u 
 
 counthry, an' therefore posted in all the latest day- 
 tails of its sufferin's. His name is Ffrench, where- 
 fore we may assume that he is a near relative of the 
 immortal liberathor, Daniel O'Connell. Now, jin- 
 tlemin, we can arrange the business part later ; all I 
 want to do now is to take the sinse of this Thry- 
 umvirate in the ingagin' of an iditor for ' The Irish 
 Aigle.' All in favor of that proposition will signify 
 the same by sayin' ' Aye.' Conthrary minded, 'No.' 
 The ayes have it, an' it is so orthered." 
 
 There could be no doubt as to the approval with 
 which this speech was received. " A great idea in- 
 tirely," " Couldn't be betther," " A sthroke of jan- 
 ius," were a few of the phrases in which the Thry- 
 umvirate endorsed the proposal of its spokesman. 
 Mr. Doyle, with a brief " Ye'll excuse me, jintle- 
 min," and a modest consciousness of having de- 
 served well of his country, withdrew. 
 
 " Ye done grand work wid your issue of the paper, 
 Andy," remarked Mr. Foley ; " it was raally great." 
 
 " I thought it wasn't bad, Jim, till I seen yours," 
 responded Mr. Cummiskey, "an' thin I seen what a 
 man of native originality c'u'd do wid the subject; " 
 and so, like hand and glove patriots as they were, 
 each proceeded to exalt his neighbor and compla- 
 cently to drink in such dews of applause as de- 
 
12 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 scended on himself, till Mr. Doyle returned and in- 
 troduced Gerald Ffrench. 
 
 " Mr. Ffrench, jintlemen," he said ; " a man of rare 
 scientific attainments and university eddication." 
 All rose, and one after another grasped Mr. Ffrench's 
 hand. This operation was conducted silently, and 
 reminded Gerald of a chorus of conspirators in 
 opera-bouffe. As Mr. Foley, the last to advance, 
 dropped the young man's fingers, he remarked in a 
 husky whisper, and with a suggestion of emotion 
 in his voice : 
 
 " This is a great day for Ireland." 
 
 " Ye're right, it is," said Mr. O'Rourke. Then he 
 stepped to the door and called : " Mountain dew, 
 Mat, and bug juice for Mr. Doyle. Ye can drink 
 the ould stuff ? " he added, turning to Gerald. Ger- 
 ald admitted that he could, and then the conversa- 
 tion languished. All resumed their seats, and the 
 ten eyes of the Thryumvirate were levelled at the 
 young man. He bore the scrutiny uneasily, and his 
 color rose. They were " taking stock " of him. 
 
 Gerald Ffrench was about twenty-three, and a 
 fair specimen of a class of young men of which the 
 Silent Sister turns'out several hundred every year. 
 At this time he had been in America some eight 
 months ; in San Francisco less than two. He came 
 
' * THE IRISH A IGLE. " 13 
 
 of a good old Irish family, and had received the 
 younger son's portion of two thousand pounds im- 
 mediately after his twenty-first birthday. He had 
 read a little for the bar, and did not like it ; he had 
 thought of entering the army, but did not quite 
 fancy it ; on the whole, it occurred to him that he 
 could not do better than to try his fortune in the 
 United States. He left Ireland for New York, but 
 did not travel direct. He first visited London, and 
 thence passed over to Paris. He found the latter 
 city very fascinating, and remained there some time. 
 Then, as it was so close at hand, he thought it a 
 pity not to see the Vienna Exhibition, and he went to 
 Vienna and saw it. The young fellow, accustomed 
 to deny himself nothing, and with more money in 
 his pocket than he had ever possessed before, did 
 not exercise a becoming frugality. When he had 
 had enough of Europe he sailed for America, and 
 New York was scarcely less to his taste than the 
 Old World capitals. He lingered there for sev- 
 eral months, but finding himself unappreciated, he 
 started for California. He selected the route by 
 Panama, and treated the voyage over tropic seas as 
 a veritable pleasure trip. In San Francisco he re- 
 mained, possibly because he had not money enough 
 left to go farther. It was not till he had changed 
 
14 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 his last twenty-dollar piece, however, that he realized 
 his position. He had received all he was entitled 
 to and had spent it. That twenty dollars, repre- 
 sented by a fast-diminishing pile of silver, must be 
 replaced by his own exertions. For what was he 
 fitted, this young man endowed with nothing but 
 health, a good education, and a certain amount of 
 superficial experience ? He did not know. He 
 wandered about the streets and envied the black- 
 smiths and the bricklayers. He would willingly 
 have bartered his education for a good trade. Then 
 he began to write for the papers, but speedily found 
 that the qualifications which had won him an occa- 
 sional medal for composition at Trinity College 
 were of no value at all in the city department of a 
 newspaper. Again and again were his contributions 
 rejected with the curt remark, "We've no room to 
 print essays.". He offered to write editorials, but 
 was laughed at, though he felt he could have 
 amended the halting English of many of those ora- 
 cular utterances. His rounds of the journals en- 
 tailed much wear of heart and of shoe-leather, and 
 but little silver solace. Still he made a few acquaint- 
 ances, and it was one of these, an Irishman, and the 
 city editor of an evening paper, who introduced 
 him to Doyle as the very man for " The Irish Eagle." 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLET I 5 
 
 Gerald had jumped at the idea eagerly, and had 
 succeeded in impressing Mr. Doyle with a due sense 
 of his attainments. His eyes sank before those of 
 the Thryumvirate, however. A single question 
 from any one of those shrewd-looking, middle-aged 
 Irishmen might prick the bubble and display him in 
 his true colors as a man who knew no more of the 
 routine work necessary for a paper than he did of 
 casting its type. He might have reassured himself. 
 Not one was there who did not regard him as an 
 incarnate battering-ram, built expressly to level the 
 battlemented tyranny of England in the dust. 
 
 McKeon entered with the refreshments. " Will 
 ye oblige us wid the last number of ' The Irish 
 Aigle?' ;> said Mr. Doyle, solemnly. Mr. Cum- 
 miskey on the right, Mr. Foley on the left, Mr. 
 O'Rourke in front, and Mr. Brady from the rear, 
 simultaneously proffered one to their chairman. 
 
 Gerald, who had been led to study the paper by 
 the first hint of the honor in store for him, saw this 
 and hurriedly restored his own copy to his pocket. 
 The action, however, had not passed unnoticed, and 
 called forth an approving smile from the Thryum- 
 virate. Mr. Doyle took a paper from the man near- 
 est him, and waved it in the air. He was evidently 
 loaded and primed for a speech. 
 
1 6 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 " By the unanimous vote of mesilf an' colleagues," 
 he began, " you, Mr. Ffrench, are called to the id- 
 itorial chair of this journal. The stipind will be 
 siventeen dollars and a half a wake." He paused 
 to let his words have their due effect. Gerald 
 leaned back with a sigh of relief. It would go hard 
 but he could retain his position for one week at 
 least, and $17.50 looked, to him like boundless 
 wealth. The Thryumvirate was watching him. 
 He felt that he was called on to say something. 
 
 " Very liberal, most happy," he muttered ; and 
 then, as no one spoke and the silence became em- 
 barrassing, he ventured to add, " By the bye ' Irish 
 Eagle,' you know. Isn't it rather an odd name ? " 
 
 "Why?" asked Mr. Doyle, severely; and Mr. 
 Brady, who had not suggested it, hastened to add : 
 " Maybe Mr. Ffrench could think of a betther ? " 
 
 Thus appealed to, Mr. Ffrench, after some hesita- 
 tion, thought that a more personal name some- 
 thing like the " Fenian," or the He was inter- 
 rupted by a very tempest of opposition, and sat 
 appalled at the fury of the storm he had called 
 forth. 
 
 " Fenian ! " " The dhirty rats ! " " The cowardly 
 time-servers ! " " They're the curse of Ireland ! " 
 Such were the exclamations that broke from the 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLE." I? 
 
 group ; but presently Mr. Doyle's voice rose in con- 
 nected statement, dominating the confusion. 
 
 "Misther Ffrench," he said, "I'd have ye to 
 know that this organization is thorough. We are 
 no advycates of half-measures, and we propose to 
 free Ireland, if we have to swim in blood to do it. 
 We are advanced Nationalists ; we're far beyant the 
 Fenians ! We say, ' Burn London/ ' Burn Liver- 
 pool,' ' Import cholera germs into Dublin Castle ! ' 
 'Blow up Windsor Castle ! ' ' Put to the sword the 
 Houses of Parleymint' ay, Irish mimbers and all, 
 for they're no betther nor the rest, keepin' terms 
 wid the bloody Saxon opprissor. An' if an army 
 of thim half-hearted -Fenians was in it, I'd say blow 
 thim up too ; for they're no use, an' they're only 
 palterin' wid the liberty of their counthry. The day 
 of Vinegar Hill is over. It's not in the open field 
 we'll honor thim by burnin' powdther, but undher 
 their houses, undher their bridges, undher their 
 public buildin's, an' that's the mission of ' The Irish 
 Aigle.'" 
 
 Gerald's astonishment that any class of Irishmen 
 should be, as Mr. Doyle phrased it, more "ad- 
 vanced " than the Fenians, was swallowed up in 
 amazement at this vigorous denunciation. Like 
 most young Irishmen of family and education he 
 
1 8 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 had no sympathy whatever with the discontent of 
 the peasantry, and, indeed, he had only vaguely 
 heard of its existence before he came to America. 
 There, however, he had soon found, to his surprise, 
 that from the mere fact of his being an Irishman, it 
 was accepted as inevitable that he must hate Eng- 
 land and everything English. To the brother of 
 the Conservative member, Edward Ffrench of Bal- 
 lyvore Park, all this had seemed absurd enough, 
 but he had let it pass without comment. Now he 
 found himself the central figure of a knot of men 
 who talked bloodshed, and savored the word as 
 they uttered it as though it were pleasant of taste 
 men who condemned war and battle-fields as not 
 murderous enough, and who scouted as insuffi- 
 ciently villainous the most reckless organization he 
 had ever heard of. However, brief as had been his 
 newspaper experience, he had learned that in journ- 
 alism it is not seldom necessary to support one side 
 openly while secretly holding the opposite tenets. 
 This he had come quite prepared to do, and this ex- 
 plosion, murder, and sudden death horrified him for 
 a moment, till the very extravagance of the lan- 
 guage brought its own comfort. It was something 
 to laugh at, not to revolt from, this little group of 
 Irishmen proposing to wreck Great Britain from 
 
" THE IRISH AIGLE." 19 
 
 the back-room of a San Francisco saloon ; and then 
 there was the $17.50 to think of. He could not af- 
 ford the luxury of high principles. He would 
 humor the joke, and write an article on blowing up 
 the Thames, if they wanted it. It would put 
 money in his pocket and would not affect the 
 Thames. 
 
 "With regard to the title of this journal," pro- 
 ceeded Doyle, waving the sheet, " it was silicted by 
 me wid the approval of me colleagues here for the 
 followin' raisons, namely, to wit : In the first place, 
 the aigle is the emblem of America ; for we are all 
 American citizens, an' the counthry of our adoption 
 is sicond in our affections only to that of our birth. 
 In the nixt place, the aigle is universally regarded 
 as the burrud of freedom : I niver seen wan free me- 
 silf, nor any other way than in a cage at Wood- 
 ward's Garden beyant, but it is so rigarded. This 
 is c The Irish Aigle ; ' high may she soar, an' long 
 may she wave, an' deep be her talents in the black 
 heart of the Saxon opprissor ! " 
 
 As soon as the wild applause which this senti- 
 ment evoked had subsided, Mr. O'Rourke rose. " I 
 propose,' 5 said he, " that we do now adjourn to the 
 office, and install Mr. Ffrench in the iditorial chair, 
 afther havin' inthrojuiced him to our foreman. All 
 
20 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 in favor of this proposition will signify the same 
 by " 
 
 But as all rose at once, it was not considered nec- 
 essary to press the question to a vote. 
 
 The editorial offices of " The Irish Eagle " occu- 
 pied a single room at the top of a neighboring build- 
 ing. The apartment was divided into two unequal 
 portions by a board partition which did not reach 
 to the ceiling. In the outer room was the " plant" 
 of the paper, consisting of a few cases of type, a 
 roller for "pulling proofs," and half a dozen galleys. 
 There was an imposing-stone in the centre on which 
 lay the forms just as they had come back from the 
 printer. A shaky old man was distributing type at 
 one of the cases. To him Gerald was duly pre- 
 sented. " Mr. Ffrench, this is our foreman, Mr. 
 Mike Carney. Mike, this is the new iditor. Come 
 inside now, an' take charge ; " and the whole party 
 trooped into the sanctum. 
 
 It was a small place, and seemed crowded when 
 all had entered. The furniture was scanty, consist- 
 ing of a large table, a few office stools, and an ar- 
 rangement of shelves against the partition for the 
 accommodation of the unsold copies of the paper. 
 The table was littered with exchanges, and a volume 
 of the poems of Thomas Davis lay on the floor. 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLE." 21 
 
 Mr. Doyle at once proceeded to business. " The 
 paper goes to priss Fridays," he said ; " so ye see, 
 this bein' Monday, ye have no time to lose. How 
 are ye off for copy, Mike ?" 
 
 " Bad," answered the old printer. " I've a little 
 reprint, but no original matter at all." 
 
 " We'll soon remedy that," said Gerald, cheerfully, 
 with all the ready complaisance of a new hand. 
 " How many editorials do you generally have ? " 
 
 " The more the merrier," said Mr. Cummiskey. 
 " Now, here's a good subject ' The Duty of the 
 Day.' I started it mesilf." Gerald took a slip of 
 manuscript from his hand. It was written in pencil, 
 and showed many corrections and interlineations. 
 It was not easy to read, but the new editor was in 
 no position to neglect a hint. 
 
 " Since MacMurragh flourished and died a 
 traitor's death," so Mr. Cummiskey's contribution 
 began, " there has been only the one duty for Irish- 
 men, and that is vengeance." Gerald paused in 
 thought. Who was MacMurragh, when had he 
 flourished, and for what had he been hanged ? He 
 wished that his new employers would not deal so 
 much with obscure history. He ventured an ob- 
 servation. 
 
 " Undoubtedly the judicial murder of the unfortu- 
 
22 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 nate MacMurragh calls for exemplary vengeance," he 
 began. A howl of execration interrupted him. " The 
 vilyan ! The thraitor ! The bloody agint of Saxon 
 opprission ! " Evidently he was on the wrong track, 
 and MacMurragh was anything but popular. Gerald 
 read the paragraph again, but it furnished no new 
 light. " Let me see," he said, tentatively ; " what 
 was the exact date of MacMurragh's ah ahem 
 death ? " 
 
 " Elivin hundhred an' sivinty-sivin," shouted the 
 Thryumvirate as one man. Evidently MacMurragh 
 belonged to a familiar historical epoch. Gerald 
 swallowed his surprise and merely remarked, " Ah, 
 yes ; I had a dispute with Professor Galbraith once 
 on that very point. He maintained that it was 
 1 1 88, but I knew I was right." 
 
 " Av coorse ye were," said Cummiskey, triumph- 
 antly. " Sivinty-sivin, an' I'll maintain it agin the 
 wurruld." 
 
 " But," ventured Gerald, " as your article is on 
 the duty of the day, don't you think we are going 
 back rather far for an illustration ? " 
 
 " Who the divil wants an illusthration ? It's an 
 apoch : since Dermot MacMurragh bad cess to him 
 for that same invited the English into Ireland, the 
 counthry has nivir been quit of them. Our duty 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLE." 2$ 
 
 began that day, an' it hasn't changed since. It's to 
 kill ivery Englishman." 
 
 " But to do that we must organize ! " broke in 
 Foley, springing on his favorite hobby at a bound ; 
 " organize an' be free ! That's the lesson to tach 
 Irishmen to-day. Make yer first article on organi- 
 zation, Mr. Ffrench." 
 
 "With pleasure," said Gerald. "Do you advo 
 cate any particular plan of organization ? " 
 
 " Niver heed the plan. Jist organize. Whin 
 Irishmen the wurruld over are wilded into a solid 
 nevvclayus, thin the death-knell of Saxon oppris- 
 sion will be flashed abroad visible as the firmy- 
 mint. Thim's the very wurruds I stated in me 
 own iditorial on the subject." 
 
 " And a noble sintiment it is," said Mr. Doyle. 
 
 " Nobly expressed," added Gerald, with a bow to 
 Mr. Foley, thereby making that gentleman a friend 
 for life. 
 
 " Without wishin' to dictate to ye, Mr. Ffrench," 
 remarked Doyle, after a brief pause, " I'll ax if ye 
 know anything about dynamite." 
 
 " I know it is a very powerful explosive,'' said 
 Gerald, somewhat surprised, " and that it bids fair 
 to take the place of all other preparations of nitro- 
 glycerine ; but why ? " 
 
24 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 " Why ? " repeated Mr. Doyle, in a deep voice. 
 " Because what Ireland needs is a powerful explos- 
 ive ; what England will get is a powerful explosive ; 
 that's the why, an' the chief mission of ' The Irish 
 Aigle ' is to bear powerful explosives to the suffer- 
 in' children of Erin, whether they cower beneath the 
 glassears of the North or hide their woes under the 
 thropics. Come, jintlemin, that's all that's to be 
 said. We won't waste Mr. Ffrench's time any 
 longer. If ye want any information as to daytails, 
 Mike Carney's the boy to give 'em ye. Good day 
 to ye, sir." And the Thryumvirate filed out, leav- 
 ing Gerald to collect such meaning as he might 
 from the suggestions offered, and to condense them 
 into an article which should teach the Irish race 
 that the duty of the day was to organize dynamite. 
 
 As time wore on, Gerald found himself face to 
 face with a difficult task. Having entered upon his 
 duties with a tacit assumption of qualification, he 
 felt obliged to live up to the character he had 
 brought with him. This prevented him from ask- 
 ing questions, at least directly, and he was constantly 
 on the watch to pick up any unconsidered crumbs 
 of knowledge that might fall in his way. Being en- 
 gaged as an expert, he could not learn as an ap- 
 prentice, and yet the trivial details of even such an 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLE." 2$ 
 
 office as that of " The Irish Eagle " were all new to 
 him. Mike Carney quickly fathomed his ignorance ; 
 but the old printer was good-natured, and not only 
 kept the young man's secret, but made an elaborate 
 pretence of belief in him. This, of course, did not 
 impose on Gerald, who reciprocated by always ob- 
 serving the fiction of Carney's sobriety, and the two 
 got on very well together. The editor learned 
 something every day. He soon came to distinguish 
 between brevier and nonpareil, and he corrected his 
 proofs without marking errors in the middle of the 
 line as they happened to occur. The Thryumvirate 
 never suspected that an editor was being educated 
 in the office, and the tangible results, as shown in 
 the paper, were on the whole satisfactory. Gerald 
 always wrote at least three articles one on organi- 
 zation, one on the manifest duty of Irishmen, and 
 one on the theory and practice of dynamite. These 
 essays for they were nothing less abounded in 
 long words and involved sentences, and in so far as 
 they were incomprehensible to the patriots gave 
 eminent satisfaction. There could be no doubt of 
 the new editor's ability and scholarly attainments. 
 But Doyle, who had all his life been accustomed to 
 call a spade a spade, and an Englishman a bloody, 
 brutalized robber, detected a certain weakness in the 
 
26 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 academic phrases of the young collegian. " Our 
 hereditary enemies," " the despoilers of our land," 
 etc., were to the Irishman far less direct arid forcible 
 than " spawn of the Saxon thraitor," or " red and 
 pitiless monster," and Gerald's incapacity to realize 
 the fact that an Englishman of moral life or good 
 intentions is as much a creature of fancy as the 
 unicorn, was at first rather trying to the patriot. 
 " But he's young," Doyle would remark by way of 
 consolation, " and he hasn't been ground under the 
 heel of the Saxon for over forty years as I have ; " 
 which, as the speaker had been a resident in the 
 United States for a quarter of a century or there- 
 about, was quite likely to be the truth. 
 
 But, all in all, Gerald suited them very well. 
 His editorial utterances took on more of the tone of 
 his surroundings, and while still marshalling his 
 verbal three-deckers for weekly action, he contrived 
 now and then to throw a hot shot into the enemy's 
 stronghold which delighted Doyle himself. As for 
 Foley, he had sworn by the young man from the 
 first, and committed to memory long passages from 
 the paper and recited them as opportunity offered, 
 either in the bosom of his family or in McKeon's 
 saloon. Gerald soon began to enter with spirit into 
 the game of vilifying the Saxon. His common^ 
 
" THE IRISH AIGLET 27 
 
 sense told him that no harm could result from the 
 frothy nonsense, and he even took a mischievous 
 pleasure in sending his brother a copy of the paper 
 each week. These, however, were addressed by the 
 boy who wrote the wrappers. He would not have 
 identified himself with the sheet for twice his week- 
 ly salary. 
 
 This same salary was the principal thorn in young 
 Ffrench's bed of roses. It was never paid. He re- 
 ceived money, to be sure, when his necessities urged 
 him to press for it ; but it was five dollars at one 
 time, two at another sometimes only fifty cents. 
 " When the paper gets upon its legs " that was the 
 only answer he received when he asked for a settle- 
 ment. There was no regular paymaster. A request 
 addressed to Mr. Doyle, who seemed the moving 
 spirit, would call forth some such answer as, " Money ? 
 Av coorse ; why not ? Can ye get along wid three 
 dollars till to-morrow? 5 ' But to-morrow, in the 
 sense that Gerald looked for it, never came, and the 
 Eagle Publishing Company sank deeper and deeper 
 into his debt. 
 
 Indeed, the paper was not prosperous. Sub- 
 scriptions fell into arrears ; advertisers did not pay 
 up. McManus withdrew the card of his saloon al- 
 together, on the ground that McKeon received all 
 
28 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 the office patronage. Carney was forthwith pro- 
 vided with a dollar and instructed to go out and 
 invest it over McManus's bar. This he did with 
 scrupulous exactitude, but without result, unless his 
 incapacity for work during the remainder of the day 
 can be regarded as such. The change of whiskey 
 didn't agree with him, he said. The following week 
 McKeon reduced his advertisement. " As long as 
 McManus don't put his card in the paper," argued 
 McKeon, " there's no sinse in my carryin' such a 
 big ' ad.' " Truly the " Eagle " had fallen on evil 
 days. 
 
 The fact was that, though all five of the original 
 promoters were enthusiastic in their self-sought mis- 
 sion, they had not calculated upon, nor could they 
 afford, the constant drain which the paper made 
 upon them. The office rent had to be paid ; also 
 the paper bill, and the weekly account for press- 
 work. Gerald and Carney were less imperative 
 items in the expense account, and they had to wait 
 accordingly. The latter was not exacting : as long 
 as he had a few " bits " to spend for liquor he 
 seemed satisfied, and Gerald was at least making a 
 living, such as it was, which was more than he had 
 been able to do before. His receipts may have 
 averaged eight dollars a week, and he paid the bal- 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLE." 2$ 
 
 ance willingly as the price of experience, confessing 
 to himself that he was only an apprentice. 
 
 An appeal to the wealthy Irishmen of the State, 
 drawn up by Gerald and signed by the Thry- 
 umvirate, did not meet with conspicuous success. 
 There were few responses. Mr. Patrick Byrne, the 
 millionaire vine-grower of San Antonio County, 
 sent a full-page advertisement of his " Golden Wine" 
 marked for one insertion, and enclosed his check for 
 two hundred and fifty dollars. But this afforded 
 only a momentary respite. The paper bill took 
 most of it ; Gerald and Carney got ten dollars 
 apiece. Evidently things could not go on in this 
 way. " The Irish Eagle " was falling after a brief 
 flight of some six months ; it was slowly starving to 
 death, and the first pound of dynamite was still un- 
 bought the lowest step of Queen Victoria's throne 
 was still unshattered. 
 
 The end was not long deferred. Gerald had just 
 finished a handsome obituary notice of Mr. Phelim 
 O'Gorman, a wealthy and prominent Irish resident 
 who had died the day before, and Mike Carney was 
 engaged in embalming the virtues of the deceased 
 in cold type, when the Thryumvirate filed slowly 
 into the editorial sanctum. There was gloom on 
 the brows of the patriots, and sorrow in their tones. 
 
30 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 Mr. Martin Doyle flung a small sheaf of advertising 
 bills on the table. " I can't collect the first cint," 
 he said, with a groan. The groan was echoed by his 
 colleagues, and the editor looked serious and sym- 
 pathetic. He felt that this was not a moment to 
 urge the question of his arrears, though during the 
 last few weeks the sum had rolled up with startling 
 rapidity. 
 
 " They wouldn't organize," remarked Mr. Foley, 
 despondently. " They might have been free by 
 this time if they'd only have organized." 
 
 " They've niglected the clare duty of the day," 
 said Mr. Cummiskey ; " an' this is what it's brought 
 us to." 
 
 Mr. Doyle cleared his throat and rose, but evi- 
 dently he did not feel equal to a rhetorical flight. 
 He only said : 
 
 " At a meetin' of the stockholders of the Aigle 
 Publishing Company, duly called an' convaned, it 
 has been decided to discontinue the publication of 
 ' The Irish Aigle' for the prisint." 
 
 The announcement did not take Gerald wholly 
 by surprise. He had been looking for something 
 of the sort. 
 
 " And what about me ? " he asked. 
 
 "This issue will be printed an' published as 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLET 31 
 
 usual," said Mr. Doyle. " It's all med up, anyhow, 
 an' goes to priss to-night. Afther that, Mr. Ffrench, 
 the company will have no further call for yer ser- 
 vices." 
 
 " You owe me, as I suppose you are aware," be- 
 gan Gerald, but a storm of indignant protests 
 drowned his voice. 
 
 " Bad cess to the dhirty money ! " " Is it yer ar- 
 rairs ye're thinkin' of whin the last hope of Irish 
 indipindance is shattered in the dust ? " " Aren't 
 we all losers together ? " and much more to the 
 same effect. Gerald waited till silence v/as restored, 
 and then attempted to renew his appeal, but Mr. 
 Doyle turned on him with oppressive dignity. 
 
 " Ye're an Irishman, Mr. Ffrench, I belave ? " 
 
 Gerald admitted his nationality. 
 
 " Very well, thin ; it's proud an' thankful ye 
 ought to be to make a thriflin' sacrifice for the land 
 of yer burruth." In moments of excitement or 
 emotion Mr. Doyle's native Doric took on a richer 
 tone. " We've all med our sacrifices for the good 
 cause. Let this wan be yours." 
 
 It was impossible for Gerald to explain to these 
 perfervid patriots that their cause was not his that 
 all his sympathies, all his habits, bound him to the 
 class they were aiming to overthrow. Out of his 
 
32 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 own mouth, or rather out of his own editorials, 
 they would have convicted him as something more 
 advanced than a Fenian ; weak, indeed, in details 
 of Irish history, but sound to the core on the great 
 question of Irish liberty. As he sat silent, vainly 
 seeking some reply to this appeal to his patriotism, 
 the Thryumvirate rose as one man and stalked from 
 the room. 
 
 From the case outside Mike Carney could be 
 heard in a flood of song : 
 
 Oh, how she swum the wathers, 
 
 The good ship Castletown, 
 The day she flung our banner forth, 
 
 The Harp without the Crown. 
 
 The old printer was occasionally patriotic in his 
 cups. Gerald likened " The Irish Eagle " to the 
 dying swan, and realized that the end was near. 
 
 The following week was one of anxious inaction. 
 Ffrench vibrated between the office and McKeon's 
 saloon ; Carney confined himself strictly to the 
 latter. The Thryumvirate was seldom visible, and 
 had it not been for a lucky accident, the editor of 
 " The Irish Eagle " would have left that paper 
 penniless. A son of the late Mr. Phelim O'Gor- 
 man, pleased with the prominence given to his 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLEy 33 
 
 father's virtues, and ignorant of the suspension of 
 the paper, entered the office one day and found 
 Gerald seated, like Marius, alone among the ruins. 
 The greater part of the edition was still unsold on 
 the shelves, and when Mr. O'Gorman, Jr., asked 
 for a few copies of the issue containing the notice of 
 his father's death, the editor was prompt to accom- 
 modate him. How many would he have ? 
 
 " How many can you spare me ? " 
 
 " All you want," answered Gerald, briskly ; and 
 young O'Gorman purchased two hundred " Irish 
 Eagles " at their regular retail price of ten cents 
 apiece, and departed, leaving Gerald with a glow of 
 gratitude in his heart and a twenty-dollar piece in 
 his pocket. He gave the defunct publishing com- 
 pany credit for this amount in his account for ar- 
 rears. 
 
 So fell " The Irish Eagle." 
 
 Gerald Ffrench turned his back on Washington 
 Street and patriotism, and took himself, his talents, 
 and his new experience to more sordid and business- 
 like journals. He began to meet with more success. 
 He had learned habits of thrift and industrious 
 routine, and he had imbibed a hearty hatred for 
 Irish Nationalists and all their ways. This last fact, 
 however, was long unsuspected by Foley, Cummis- 
 3 
 
34 THE RISE AND FALL OF 
 
 key, and the others. Mr. Martin Doyle, in partic- 
 ular, followed the career of the dethroned editor 
 with deep interest, and considered him the shining 
 light of the San Francisco press. He used to point 
 out Gerald with pride as one who "had worked 
 hard and med his sacrifices for the cause." He 
 even invited the young man to attend a banquet of 
 the Red Branch Knights on St. Patrick's day. 
 This invitation was declined, Gerald keenly recall- 
 ing that immortal anniversary the year before, and 
 his mortification when the Thryumvirate had in- 
 sisted on having " The Irish Aigle " printed in 
 green ink in honor of the day. But that was all 
 over now. Mr. Ffrench had resumed his ancestral 
 role as a " Saxon opprissor," though the scattered 
 members of the Thryumvirate were slow to believe 
 it. 
 
 Conviction came on them at last, and with crush- 
 ing force. A certain noble earl was murdered in 
 Ireland under circumstances of peculiar barbarity. 
 The victim was an old man, but he was also a 
 large land-owner, and a howl qf exultation at his 
 death and execration of his memory went up from 
 all the Irish societies. An important election was 
 at hand, and the city papers, willing to cater to the 
 Irish vote, took up the cry. The murdered earl was 
 
"THE IRISH AIGLE." 35 
 
 branded as a tyrant, tales of harrowing evictions 
 were invented and ascribed to him, and it was 
 broadly hinted that he had received no more than 
 his deserts. This was more than Gerald Ffrench 
 could stand. He had known the old gentleman 
 in former days, had dined at his table, and been 
 " tipped " by him as a school-boy. He sat down and 
 wrote a letter to " The Golden Fleece," a weekly 
 paper of wide circulation. He took the earl's mur- 
 der for a text, and told all he knew of the " wild 
 justice of revenge" as executed by a blunderbuss 
 from behind a hedge. His heart guided his pen; 
 he rang out a withering impeachment of the meth- 
 ods of his countrymen, and signed it with his full 
 name. 
 
 Mr. Martin Doyle, Mr. Andrew Cummiskey, Mr. 
 Peter O'Rourke, Mr. Frank Brady, and Mr. James 
 Foley met the same evening in the private snug- 
 gery behind Mr. Matthew McKeon's sample-room 
 on Washington Street. Mr. Doyle had a paper in 
 his hand. 
 
 " Have ye read it ? " he asked. 
 
 All admitted that they had. . 
 
 Mr. Doyle arose. " Fri'nds an' fellow-counthry- 
 min," he said, " this letther, difindin' the mimory 
 of a black-hearted landlord ; this letther, callin' the 
 
36 XISE AND FALL OF "THE IRISH A1GLE." 
 
 noblest atthribute of our common humanity, the at- 
 thribute of rivinge, a crime, was written by Gerald 
 Ffrench (groans). Is he an Irishman ? (' No, no.') 
 I don't care a trauneen if he was born in West- 
 meath ; 1 don't value it a kippeen if he was eddy- 
 cated in Thrinity College ; it's nothin' to me if he 
 did idit ' The Irish Aigle ' for filthy lukker ; I here 
 and now do brand and stiggatize him as a vile spawn 
 of the Saxon opprissor. All in favor thereof will 
 signify the same by saying ' Aye.' Conthrary- 
 minded, ' No.' The ayes have it, and it is so or- 
 thered." 
 
 All recorded their votes of censure against Gerald, 
 even Mr. Foley, who acquiesced with a shake of 
 the head, adding, " But he had grand ideas in- 
 tirely about organization." Mr. Cummiskey took 
 the suffrages of the party on the advisability of 
 waylaying the culprit some night and giving him 
 "the bating he had deserved," but this was over- 
 ruled by Mr. Doyle. " It's no use, boys," he said ; 
 "a diginerate Irishman like that wud think nothin' 
 of app'aling to the police for purtection. L'ave 
 him alone. Vingeance will overtake him, along 
 wid the rest of the accursed Saxon brood." 
 
A DISSOLVING VIEW OF CARRICK 
 MEAGHER. 
 
A DISSOLVING VIEW OF CARRICK 
 MEAGHER. 
 
 i. 
 
 PHILOSOPHERS tell us that life is a circle, but it is 
 not often a circle that rounds and completes itself 
 within the observation of a single spectator. The 
 mighty curve stretches forward and backward, but 
 even in the case of our nearest friends it is but a 
 limited zone that falls under our notice. 
 
 Many a man, whose taste has led him to observe 
 the varied figures that troop across his path, has 
 been struck with some particular face ; has watched 
 it as it lingered ; has recalled it as it vanished, and 
 has turned back to the big magic-lantern show 
 amid which we live with the feeling that here was 
 an individuality worthy to be fixed in less fleeting 
 colors. But he cannot fix it. The romancer may 
 shape and pursue through a world of selected ad- 
 ventures the being he has created ; but the observer 
 
40 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 of nature must be content with the brief glimpse 
 afforded him, as his specimen is carried across a mi- 
 croscopic field of vision. And yet this fellow- 
 mortal, of whom we know so little, may be the hero 
 of an epic, but in our hearing that epic will never 
 be sung. He may be the genius who is destined to 
 shake the world, but he has passed beyond our ken 
 ere he puts his hand to the lever. We all have had 
 peeps at possible prodigies, but before anything had 
 occurred to justify our expectation the slide was 
 withdrawn from the magic-lantern and the scene 
 changed. 
 
 It was in San Francisco, many years ago. Then 
 Big Bonanza shares went begging at twelve dollars 
 apiece; since then they have commanded thou- 
 sands ; now they are back at tens again. Poor men 
 have become rich, rich men have become poor, and 
 many who were the briskest have stepped aside out 
 of the ranks. Fifteen years have passed and that 
 is a long space on a Golden Gate calendar since 
 Gerald Ffrench was the editor of the " Irish Eagle," 
 and filled many columns of that ephemeral sheet 
 with essays on political dynamite. 
 
 One morning he had a visitor. There was a 
 sharp knock on the open door of the office, and a 
 voice inquired : 
 
CARRICK MEAGHER. 41 
 
 " Is this the office of the * Irish Aigle ' ? " 
 
 Gerald Ffrench glanced up and answered in the 
 affirmative. He was well used to callers in the edi- 
 torial sanctum, patriots from the Pajaro Valley and 
 other outlying districts, who never visited San 
 Francisco without stopping at the " Aigle " to ascer- 
 tain if, perchance, that mighty organ of the Pacific 
 coast Nationalists had fulfilled its mission, and 
 driven into the sea the British garrison 'in Ireland. 
 So, with a cheery tone as who should say, " Eng- 
 land is all right as yet ; but wait, we are not idle," 
 Gerald bade the visitor enter. 
 
 The latter came forward briskly, and dropped 
 into the other chair. Ffrench saw at a glance that 
 this was no horny-fisted farmer from Pajaro, no poli- 
 tician from Sacramento, no ditcher from the tule 
 lands. He was an Irishman, of course his pres- 
 ence in the " Eagle " office proved so much but so 
 far as Gerald could determine, he was a hitherto 
 undescribed specimen. He was a man of thirty-five 
 or thereabouts, and his light-brown hair was long 
 and dishevelled. His face was as the face of a Naz- 
 arite, for no razor had ever touched it a queer, 
 small-featured face, masked by a thicket of whisker, 
 and lit by bright, eager blue eyes. 
 
 " Are you the iditor ? " 
 
42 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 His brogue was distinct and unmistakable, and 
 yet he spoke like an educated man. Gerald was 
 puzzled. He simply bowed, and waited. 
 
 " I've been a journalist, off an' on, for a good 
 many years," the stranger went on. " I'm an Irish- 
 man by burruth, though you mightn't think it, for 
 I've been so much away from the ould counthry 
 that wandering on a foreign strand has dulled the 
 spache of fatherland." 
 
 " I think I should have recognized you for a 
 fellow-countryman, "answered Gerald, suavely, " and 
 I'm glad to meet a brother journalist, Mr. 
 Mr. 
 
 " Meagher, sir ; me name is Meagher Carrick 
 Meagher. It sounds like the name of a town, I 
 know," he went on, apologetically ; " an' so in wan 
 sinse it is, but it's my name, too." 
 
 " Have you been long in San Francisco, Mr. 
 Meagher ? " inquired Ffrench, as soon as he had in- 
 troduced himself to his new acquaintance. 
 
 " Not long, sir, not long. I came up from Callao 
 last wake in a sailing vessel. Sartin sarcumstances," 
 he went on, dropping his voice to more confidential 
 tones, "not wholly unconnected wid a distinguished 
 Peruvian family, compelled me to abandon a lukker- 
 ative position there, an' once more to clasp to my 
 
CARR1CK ME A G HER. 43 
 
 bussum that chilling but familiar phantom, the 
 wide, wide wurruld." 
 
 Meagher was a very little man, but so tiny was 
 the office and so expansive was the gesture that he 
 used to emphasize his words, that a whole flock of 
 unsold " Eagles '' came fluttering down from the 
 shelves where they roosted. With a hasty apology 
 he set about remedying the mischief he had caused. 
 As soon as he had finished he resumed his seat. 
 
 " And now, Mr. Ffrench, I've come to apply for a 
 position on the staff of the ' Irish Aigle.' " 
 
 Gerald checked the smile that rose to his lips, 
 and answered gravely. He could not but notice 
 that Meagher's garments, though whole and respect- 
 able, were worn with that indescribable touch of 
 deprecation which goes with a single suit. He had 
 caught a touch of wistfulness in the question, as the 
 little fellow put it, and he fancied that the blue 
 eyes which peered so sharply out of the tangle of 
 straw-colored hair might well owe some of their 
 eagerness to hunger. Yes, to hunger. There is 
 no city in our civilization where that torture of 
 the destitute does not follow close on empty pock- 
 ets. Gerald realized that a few weeks ago he had 
 not been many meals ahead himself, and that the 
 " Irish Eagle " had intervened only just in time. 
 
44 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 But was that patriotic bird endowed with power 
 of wing to support a double burden ? Its editor 
 might well doubt it. He shook his head, and ex- 
 plained the position to Meagher. The paper had 
 been started quite recently by a little knot of pat- 
 riots, and it was far from being a paying concern. 
 There was no staff only one young editor and one 
 old printer, and the salaries of both were already in 
 arrears. And then, by way of softening the blow 
 for that it was a blow the other's face clearly 
 showed Gerald applied the styptic generally rec- 
 ommended in California for all wounds of the mind 
 and most wounds of the body ; he invited his new 
 acquaintance to come down to the corner and have 
 a drink. 
 
 McKeon's bar looked bright and cheerful, and 
 McKeon's " free lunch " was spread with true Cali- 
 fornian prodigality. This lunch afforded as good a 
 meal as a man need ask soup, joint, vegetables, 
 bread, and cheese ; but it was " free " only in the 
 sense that all who paid for liquid refreshments were 
 welcome. To the man without a " bit " in his 
 pocket, it was only one degree more substantial 
 than a feast of the Barmecide. He could look, but 
 he could not touch. Mr. Carrick Meagher, how- 
 ever, in right of Gerald's invitation, quickly showed 
 
CARRICK ME A G HER. 45 
 
 that, brief as had been his sojourn in San Francisco, 
 he was no novice in the mysteries of a free lunch. 
 
 But appetite is intermittent, and Meagher, 
 although by no means certain when such another 
 opportunity might arise, was at last compelled to 
 desist. As the pair passed through the saloon, Mr. 
 Martin Doyle accosted Gerald and proffered fur- 
 ther hospitality, at the same time requesting the 
 favor of an introduction to his " frind." 
 
 Doyle was the president of the Eagle Publish- 
 ing Company, and the most active of the govern- 
 ing body, which, though it consisted of himself 
 and four friends, was generally known as the 
 " Thryumvirate." The introduction appeared to af- 
 ford satisfaction both to Mr. Doyle and the stran- 
 ger, and the former's invitation to " thry a drop o' 
 somethin' " was promptly and cheerfully accepted. 
 
 Meagher, fortified by a hearty meal and exhil- 
 arated by a little whiskey, became quite talka- 
 tive; but his talk was interesting even to Gerald, 
 while it seemed to hold Mr. Doyle spellbound. 
 Very soon that gentleman suggested an adjourn- 
 ment to the back-room, where, with a bottle and 
 glasses on the table and a big cigar between his lips, 
 he listened with bated breath to Meagher' s accounts 
 of where he had been and what he had seen. 
 
46 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 He was last from Peru, as he had told Gerald ; he 
 had been employed in some metallurgical works at 
 Callao, and he assured his hearers that he was a 
 first-class practical assayer and mineralogist. He 
 did not touch on the reason why he abandoned 
 the position further than to remark, with his hand 
 on his breast, " A leedy's name must be sacred ; 
 ye'll excuse me, gintlemen, if I pass that by." 
 
 Gerald found it difficult to associate with the 
 tender passion that diminutive figure and quizzical 
 little monkey face, but he was polite enough to 
 smother a laugh ; while Mr. Doyle seemed to appre- 
 ciate the situation, and to respect the other the 
 more for his reticence. 
 
 "To be sure, Mr. Meagher to be sure," said 
 honest Martin. " I admire yer delicacy. But tell 
 me, where were ye afore ye went to Peru ? " 
 
 " I was war correspondent for the Cork * Exam- 
 iner,' an' I was shut up in Paris the whole of the 
 siege." 
 
 " Do you tell me, now ? " asked the wondering 
 Doyle. At this time the great Franco-Prussian 
 struggle was fresh in people's minds, for it was^as 
 long ago as '74 that the " Irish Eagle" flourished. 
 
 " I was indade, an' a great deal of trouble I had. 
 No remittances from my paper could I get, an' many 
 
CARRICK MEAGHER. 47 
 
 a day I walked the boulevards hungry, wondering 
 what was the best thing I could do." 
 
 " An' what did ye do ? " inquired Doyle, with un- 
 abated interest, while- Gerald experienced a certain 
 relief at learning that his new acquaintance's penni- 
 less predicament was nothing new to him. 
 
 " Well, I enlisted as a mobile that was four sous 
 a day, an' a loaf of bread, and a shake-down in the 
 Prince Eugene barracks." 
 
 Gerald became grave again, as he realized that 
 this device was impracticable in San Francisco. At 
 the same time, though Meagher was very glib with 
 names, dates, and facts, the young editor began to 
 suspect that the little man was romancing. 
 
 " An* ye were a soldier ! " cried Doyle, admiringly. 
 " Did ye iver kill a Proosian ? " 
 
 rt Never saw one that 1 know of till the day they 
 entered the city. No; I was more like a kind of 
 policeman." 
 
 At this modest statement Gerald's confidence 
 rose again. If the new-comer had been merely 
 bragging, it would have been so easy to sacrifice 
 hecatombs of foes. 
 
 " Then I went a good deal wid the Irish colony 
 as many of them as were left," resumed Meagher. 
 " The name I bore was passport enough for that." 
 
48 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 " An' d'ye mane to say that ye're related to 
 the great, the immortal pathriot, Thomas Francis 
 Meagher ? " inquired Doyle, in a tone of awe- 
 stricken admiration that made Gerald a little un- 
 comfortable. A pretty end it would be to his hos- 
 pitality if his resignation were to be desired the fol- 
 lowing day, to make room for this ready-tongued 
 upstart ! 
 
 But Carrick's answer reassured him. The Irish- 
 man might be a great boaster, but he was no liar, 
 even when a lie was to his manifest advantage. 
 
 " No, I don't think I am I never could trace 
 any relationship, anyhow ; but you know yourself 
 that nobody named Meagher need stand long knock- 
 ing at an Irishman's dure." 
 
 " In troth an' he needn't ! " answered Doyle, with 
 enthusiasm ; but he cooled down as he perceived 
 how this deft and destitute little stranger had en- 
 trapped him into an admission which it might be 
 inconvenient to live up to and impossible to retract. 
 
 Carrick saw his advantage, and drove it home. 
 
 " Now, as I'm temporarily embarrassed in fact, 
 as I haven't a cint to me name," he began, and 
 Doyle shivered as he prepared to dodge the impend- 
 ing loan I've been thinking I might be able to do 
 something for your paper." 
 
CARRICK ME A G HER. 49 
 
 Doyle breathed again. This was a business pro- 
 position, which could be met on a business basis. 
 
 " Well, I dunno," he said, slowly ; " money's tight 
 an' pathriots is poor. The ' Aigle's ' not to say on a 
 payin' footin'. Besides that, Mr. Ffrench here is 
 fully aquil to all the wurruk that is to be done 
 
 " I don't doubt that at all," interrupted Carrick, 
 with a queer little bow to Gerald, " an' I wouldn't 
 presume to interfare wid him. But I've been 
 looking at the paper. It wants some fresh depart- 
 ments. What d'ye say to a Paris letter, now ? " 
 
 " I dunno," answered Doyle, slowly. " It sounds 
 big and would look big " 
 
 " To be sure it would ' From our own Paris 
 correspondent ; ' an' it would trate of Irish affairs in 
 the French capital. Paris is full of pathriots." 
 
 " Sure I know that," replied Doyle, feebly ; " but 
 I know no wan in Paris, an' " 
 
 " Ach, if that's all," interrupted Carrick, with an 
 indescribable snort of triumph, " I'll write you a 
 Paris letter ivery wake in your own office. What's 
 wanted for a letter ? That ye know the city you're 
 writin' from an' the people in it. Well, I know that 
 at laste the Irish colony, an' that's all you have to 
 care about. Then with the French papers to kape 
 me up to the time an' those I can get here I'll 
 
50 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 turn ye out such a letter as any wan of your readers 
 would swear came straight from the Boulevard des 
 Italiens, av they'd ever happened to hear of such a 
 place." 
 
 Martin Doyle wavered visibly. " An' how much 
 would ye charge for the like ? " he asked, at last. 
 
 Carrick Meagher's sharp blue eyes shot a quick 
 glance through their hairy foliage. He was evi- 
 dently settling in his own mind the maximum 
 figure which the other might be expected to stand. 
 Nevertheless, the pause was scarcely noticeable, and 
 the answer came unhesitatingly : " Three dollars a 
 letter." 
 
 " It's a go," answered Martin, knitting his brows 
 ever so little. " Now let's have wan more drink to 
 wet the bargain, an' then get to wurruk." 
 
 Carrick Meagher had gauged his man's financial 
 stature almost to an inch. If he had asked for five 
 dollars, the negotiation would have ended then and 
 there. Martin Doyle had made up his mind to 
 pay two dollars and a half per letter, but he had 
 accepted the proposition, not considering fifty cents 
 worth haggling over. 
 
 So Carrick Meagher joined Gerald Ffrench on 
 the staff of the Irish Eagle." 
 
CARR2CK MEAGHER. 5 1 
 
 II. 
 
 FOR a few weeks the Paris letters appeared regu- 
 larly. They were remarkably clever, and, notwith- 
 standing the circumstances under which they were 
 written, had an air of reality which might have im- 
 posed on readers far more critical than any for whom 
 they were intended. By degrees, however, the cor- 
 respondence grew intermittent, and finally ceased 
 altogether. Modest as was the price agreed upon, 
 it was not always paid. Indeed, any one of the 
 " Thryumvirate" would much prefer to spend two 
 dollars over McKeon's bar in treating a creditor than 
 one dollar in paying him. 
 
 Carrick Meagher, who was really a brilliant man, 
 soon fell into the ways of the new city, and, with- 
 out attaching himself to the staff of any particular 
 newspaper, was able to earn a good income by con- 
 tributing special articles to the various Sunday edi- 
 tions. He had an easy, graphic style not particu- 
 larly polished, but always readable and he was an 
 expert on various subjects. At one period of his 
 wandering life he had followed the sea, and he could 
 write with knowledge on ships and sailors. He was 
 a good practical metallurgist, and in California that 
 is a trade which always commands its price. But 
 
52 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 Carrick refused many tempting offers to resume his 
 old profession, and contented himself with writing 
 about it. His was a vagrant genius, and the inde- 
 pendent Bohemianism of the life he led suited him 
 perfectly. 
 
 Gerald and Meagher remained fast friends through 
 it all. Even after the latter had left the " Eagle," he 
 was always ready to assist its editor with his advice, 
 or even with his pen when work pressed, and this at 
 a time when the briefest article he wrote commanded 
 fifteen or twenty dollars. In his moments of des- 
 pondency he liked to entice Gerald away to some 
 congenial haunt, and there discourse of his broken 
 heart and the beautiful dark-eyed sefiorita who pined 
 for him in Lima. 
 
 " Pobre cita," he would sigh, with a languishing 
 roll of his funny little head. " The love that is sun- 
 dered by seas an' years hath nothing to live on but 
 thoughts an' tears." 
 
 Meagher was fond of interlarding his speech with 
 scraps of verse, few of which Gerald could identify, 
 while most of them were wholly unknown to him ; 
 so that he sometimes doubted whether to class these 
 adornments of his friend's conversation as quotations 
 or improvisations. 
 
 The true story of Carrick's ill-fated love may as 
 
CARRICK ME A G HER. 53 
 
 well be set down here, though Ffrench did not learn 
 it till long afterward not till H. M. S. Tenedos 
 cast anchor in San Francisco Bay, and Ffrench made 
 the acquaintance of a certain lieutenant who had 
 known Meagher in Callao. The Irishman had seen 
 the beautiful daughter of a high Peruvian official, as 
 she drove past him in her carriage on the Paseo de 
 los Descalzos. His combustible heart had taken 
 fire at once, and happening to meet her a few days 
 afterward near his place of business in Callao, he as- 
 sumed that the lady returned his affection, and had 
 merely sought the port for an opportunity of seeing 
 him. In this conviction he had gone straight to 
 Lima, called upon her father, and requested his 
 daughter's hand. The old gentleman did not look 
 with favor on the suit, and when he had consulted 
 the young girl, and ascertained that she had never 
 heard of her presumptuous wooer, he secured Mea- 
 gher's dismissal from the government smelting- 
 works in which the young man was employed, and 
 gave him to understand that his future prospects in 
 Peru were by no means rosy. Under these circum- 
 stances, Carrick found it advisable to depart, and he 
 sailed for San Francisco without a single word or a 
 second glance from the lady for whose sake he had 
 borne so much. But he always kept her memory 
 
54 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 green, and spoke of her but never by name with 
 profound emotion. 
 
 Gerald, knowing nothing of all this, sympathized 
 with his friend as one crossed in love and despoti- 
 cally separated from all he held dear ; while Car- 
 rick, his eyes suffused with tears or blazing with ex- 
 citement, according to the mood that happened to 
 be uppermost, would bewail his evil fortune or 
 drown his sorrows in whiskey, and sing almost in 
 the same breath " The Girl I left Behind Me," or a 
 French drinking-song in praise of " la dive bouteille" 
 
 The little fellow was as honest as the day, pro- 
 fusely generous, and endowed with a mind originally 
 brilliant, and now stored, by reading and travel, 
 with scraps of all sorts of unexpected and fascina- 
 ting information. These are the equipments of a 
 very agreeable companion, and such Ffrench found 
 him ; but Meagher had his drawbacks. He was 
 absurdly theatrical in speech and manner, and this 
 effect was enhanced rather than lessened by his di- 
 minutive stature he was only just over five feet 
 and by the quizzical way his little face peeped out 
 from his jungle of whisker, which nothing would 
 persuade him either to trim or shave. 
 
 But such peculiarities were of small moment. 
 Gerald soon ceased to notice them, and the two 
 
CARRICK ME A G HER. 55 
 
 spent most of their evenings in company. Carrick's 
 stories of travel and adventure, surprising as most 
 of them were, established their truthfulness by vari- 
 ous minute details which no repetition could vary. 
 He had endured many buffets from fortune. Once 
 he had been rich he had located a gold mine in 
 Mexico ; every possible test had borne witness to 
 its value, and he had almost concluded the sale of a 
 half interest for one hundred thousand dollars. But 
 on returning to his location, accompanied by the 
 experts whose report was to be final, he could not 
 find the mine. The whole face of the country had 
 changed. Carrick's claim had vanished, and the for- 
 tune he had so confidently reckoned upon lay buried 
 beneath hundreds of feet of miry, pasty water. A 
 mud volcano had come between Carrick and com- 
 petence. 
 
 On another occasion he had been enlarging on 
 the advantages of quick and straight shooting. 
 " Niver pull a pistol unless you mane to shoot," he 
 said, "an' niver shoot unless you mane to kill." 
 This maxim he illustrated, as was his custom, by 
 sundry leaves culled from the book of his experience. 
 Gerald ventured to doubt one specially " tall " feat 
 of marksmanship. 
 
 " If I had me own gun," answered Carrick. 
 
56 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 " But sure I may as well have it as not. I can afford 
 it now. Come along wid me." 
 
 He led his friend to an adjacent pawnshop, and 
 there regained possession of a revolver which he had 
 been compelled to pledge in the early days of his 
 destitution. Ffrench witnessed half an hour's prac- 
 tice in a Kearney Street shooting-gallery, and ac- 
 knowledged that Carrick had not exaggerated his 
 skill with the weapon. 
 
 The Irishman was fond of the theatre, and was 
 positively greedy of Shakespearean performances. 
 He was always in his place before the curtain rose, 
 and would sit through the five acts, motionless, 
 silent, his eyes fixed on the stage. He was very 
 critical of the acting in his favorite masterpieces. A 
 popular tragedian arrived from the Eastern States, 
 and gave, in the course of his repertory, two nights 
 of Othello, supported by a local company. Carrick 
 was present, of course. Mr. Kemble Scott played 
 lago the first evening, and Othello the second. It 
 so happened that after the latter performance Gerald 
 and Carrick Meagher, in search of refreshment on 
 their way home, wandered into the hotel which Mr. 
 Kemble Scott patronized, and there found him. 
 
 The actor had met Ffrench in New York during 
 the latter's brief and bright days of splendor. He 
 
CARRICK MEAGHER. 57 
 
 remembered the young fellow, and greeted him 
 warmly. Gerald took occasion to present his friend, 
 Mr. Meagher, and the great man acknowledged the 
 introduction with a patronizing nod ; but Carrick 
 had small sense of reverence, and absolutely no 
 discretion. He had formed a decided opinion as to 
 the merits of the two performances he had seen, 
 and was as ready to discuss them with the person 
 most concerned as he would have been to argue 
 with Herr Wagner on the future of music, or to set 
 right Professor Agassiz on a question of zoology. 
 With his wonted volubility Carrick began : 
 
 " I'm glad to mate ye, Mr. Scott. I saw your 
 two impersonations this wake."" 
 
 " Indeed ? " answered the actor, with the stereo- 
 typed smile which he reserved for the compliments 
 to which he was well accustomed. " I trust you do 
 not consider your time thrown away ? " 
 
 " Not complately," was Carrick's unexpected 
 reply. " There were plenty of good pints in your 
 representation of lago ; but your conciption of the 
 character of the dusky Moor was altogither erron-* 
 eous." 
 
 Mr. Kemble Scott was completely taken aback. 
 
 " Indeed ! " he stammered, at last. " I trust, Mr. 
 Mr. I beg your pardon, but your name escaped me." 
 
58 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 11 There's me card, sir," responded Carrick, hand- 
 ing the other the bit of pasteboard. " I know how 
 hard it is to catch a name as yet untrumpeted of 
 noisy fame, but for all that there's mine, and it's one 
 I've no call to be ashamed of." 
 
 By this time the tragedian had mastered as he 
 imagined the script on the card. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Meagre" he began ; but a bellow of 
 indignant expostulation from Carrick cut him 
 short : 
 
 " You needn't thry to make fun of me nor of an 
 honored name, becase I ventured to indulge in a 
 bit of just criticism, which, av I'd known ye were so 
 sinsitive, I'd have kept to meself." 
 
 " I beg your pardon," interposed Mr. Kemble 
 Scott, still polite, though by this time he was not 
 certain he had not to do with a madman. " I beg 
 your pardon" he scrutinized the card again 
 "but if you can pronounce M-e-a-g-h-e-r any way 
 except Meagre " 
 
 " Ye can pronounce it Mar, sir same as if it 
 'rhymed wid 'star,' which you're fond of calling 
 yourself. Mar-r-r-r, av ye plaze, wid th' accint on 
 the r, an' good-evenin' to you." 
 
 With this Carrick stalked wrathfully from the 
 room muttering as he went, " I'm wrong to be 
 
CARRICK MEAGHER. 59 
 
 vexed at the poor fellow, for av he can't read an' 
 can't act it's a bad lookout for him in his ould 
 age." 
 
 Gerald lingered to offer the perplexed tragedian 
 such explanations as were possible, and this ended 
 the incident. Meagher, however, absented himself 
 from the theatre during the remainder of Mr. Kem- 
 ble Scott's engagement. Not even to see his favor- 
 ite " Hamlet " would he condone the insult offered 
 to his honored name. 
 
 Shortly after this occurrence the most lasting ef- 
 fect of which was to inspire in Carrick a settled dis- 
 taste to American actors the " Irish Eagle " folded 
 its wings, and died without a struggle. Meagher's 
 advice and assistance now became invaluable to 
 Gerald, and it was mainly owing to his friend that 
 the young editor quickly secured humbler but more 
 remunerative employment on the city press. 
 
 III. 
 
 FOR two years this oddly assorted friendship had 
 subsisted, unbroken by even the most passing cool- 
 ness, when a series of events led to a separation 
 which Ffrench has almost ceased to hope will not 
 prove permanent. 
 
60 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 Gerald was attached to a stock and- mining jour- 
 nal, and he frequently had occasion to lay under 
 contribution his friend's expert knowledge of the 
 subjects of which it treated. He was accordingly 
 always well pleased to see Carrick enter the office. 
 
 Looking in one forenoon, as he often did, Mea- 
 gher found Gerald seated, pen in hand, surrounded 
 by specimens from an Arizona mine, which it was 
 his immediate duty to panegyrize, or, in the lan- 
 guage of the street, to " boom." 
 
 The little man dropped into a seat, and heaved a 
 deep sigh. 
 
 " I dramed of my pobre cita last night," began 
 Carrick. " Ah, love for a year, a wake, a day, but 
 alas for the love that loves alway." 
 
 " Bother your pobre cita ! " exclaimed Ffrench, 
 impatiently. In these moods, as he knew from ex- 
 perience, Carrick could seldom be reckoned on for 
 counsel or assistance. 
 
 " Ah, ye're young," said Meagher, not in the least 
 offended ; for he had at the service of his friends a 
 temper which nothing could ruffle. 
 
 Gerald silently wrote on. 
 
 " What are ye doin' ? Erectin' a column ? " in- 
 quired Carrick presently, when the stillness had 
 lasted as long as his voluble nature could endure. 
 
CARRICK MEAGHER. 6 1 
 
 " Trying to," replied Gerald, briefly. " I've 
 a notice of this mine to write up for to-morrow's 
 paper." 
 
 " This mine ! " echoed Meagher, who had amused 
 himself looking over the specimens at Gerald's el- 
 bow. " These half-dozen mines, you should say." 
 
 " Well, I shouldn't, smarty ! " retorted Ffrench, 
 who had been put out by the other's unseasonable 
 love reminiscences. " These are all from one mine." 
 
 "Well, they're not; you can't fool me !" cried 
 Carrick, with an awakening of professional interest. 
 " Wan, two, three, four these specimens are faked. 
 They never came from wan mine, nor from ten 
 miles from wan another. It's a salted claim they're 
 playin' on you, my poor Gerald." 
 
 " Are you sure ? " exclaimed Ffrench, dropping 
 his pen. 
 
 " Am I sure ? " repeated Carrick, disdainfully. 
 " Do I know quartz from bitter spar, an' aither of 
 them from metallic sulphides ? What's that ? Iron 
 pyrites. An' what's that ? Quartzose gangues. An' 
 will you dar' to tell me they all came out of the 
 wan mine ? Go' long wid ye ! " 
 
 " This is serious," said Gerald. " I know Ver- 
 planck fancies this mine very much, and is going to 
 put money in it. Suppose we send for him." 
 
 it 
 
62 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 The office boy was despatched to summon the 
 proprietor of the paper ; and to him, in more tem- 
 perate language, Carrick repeated the conclusion he 
 had arrived at from his inspection of the specimens. 
 
 Mr. Verplanck knew his informant well, and had 
 often profited by his trained experience in matters 
 of mineralogy. The result of half an hour's conver- 
 sation was an order to Gerald to tear up the article 
 he had commenced, and begin another, denouncing 
 the Ida mine as one of the biggest frauds that had 
 ever been attempted on California Street. 
 
 Mr. Verplanck's virtuous indignation was whetted 
 by the fact that he had himself narrowly escaped 
 becoming a victim, and he instructed Ffrench not 
 to spare his superlatives. Before the hour of next 
 day's " Board " Ida's character was ruined. 
 
 But no man can put a stop to a nefarious scheme 
 whereby others expect to profit without making an 
 enemy of someone. The identity of the expert 
 whose timely opinion had dealt a death-blow to 
 this promising swindle was an open secret. Mea- 
 gher received profuse thanks and other more sub- 
 stantial expressions of gratitude from those whose 
 money he had saved ; but in certain quarters " curses 
 not loud, but deep " were breathed on the " meddle- 
 some little Irishman." Unfortunately, among those 
 
CARR2CK ME A G HER. 63 
 
 whose game he had spoiled were some who were 
 accustomed to carry their irritation beyond the 
 blasphemy point men whose path it was danger- 
 ous to cross, and who were not wont to stick at 
 trifles in pursuit either of profit or of vengeance. 
 
 A few nights after the exposure of the " Ida 
 swindle," as it was called, Gerald and Carrick at- 
 tended a performance at the California Theatre. 
 They had supper afterward at the Poodle Dog, and 
 it was long past midnight when they turned into 
 Mission Street, on their way home ; for the two in- 
 separables roomed together. Mission Street is a 
 lonesome neighborhood after ten or eleven at night, 
 and for block after block the friends had the side- 
 walk to themselves. 
 
 Suddenly, as they passed the corner of Fifth 
 Street, three men sprang out of a dark doorway. 
 Their feet echoed on the deserted pavement, and 
 Gerald turned just in time to see a murderous blud- 
 geon above his head. Instinctively he raised his 
 arm, and caught the blow as it descended. The 
 limb dropped to his side, numb and useless, and a 
 feeling of faintness crept over him. The loaded 
 stick was poised for a second blow. Gerald could 
 only close his eyes and wait for it. He could not 
 stir from the spot ; he could not even look to see 
 
64 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 how it fared with his companion. There was no 
 time to collect his thoughts or rally his energies. 
 Not three seconds had elapsed since he was walking 
 gayly homeward, and now he stood, maimed and 
 helpless, expecting nothing but death. 
 
 One, two sharp and clear rang out the twin 
 reports of a revolver. Ffrench opened his eyes. 
 The blow had not fallen, and the assassin lay 
 writhing at his feet, clutching the heavy "knuckle 
 duster" in his convulsive grasp. In that moment 
 the young journalist had tasted the bitterness of 
 death. 
 
 Carrick Meagher stepped across a second form, 
 prostrate like the other, but motionless, and covered 
 with his pistol a shadowy figure, still visible a 
 dozen paces off, but fast vanishing in the darkness. 
 Gerald found his tongue. 
 
 " Shoot, shoot ! " he cried, in a trembling voice. 
 " He'll be out of sight ! " 
 
 Carrick appeared to deliberate a moment, and 
 then returned the revolver to his overcoat pocket. 
 
 " An' let him go," he said, unconcernedly. " Niver 
 shoot a man unless you've got to that's always a 
 good rule. Let's look at these fellows, an' see what's 
 the matter wid 'em." 
 
 Matter enough. One lay stone dead shot 
 
CA RRICK . ME A CHER. 6 5 
 
 through the heart ; and the other, even while they 
 tried to raise him, breathed his last. 
 
 As they laid the body down, Carrick noticed that 
 Gerald did not use his left arm. 
 
 " What's wrong wid ye ? Did he get in a lick at 
 ye?" 
 
 " Yes ; I stopped the first blow with my arm," 
 answered Gerald. 
 
 " An' a good job ye did," replied Carrick. " I 
 dodged the welt that fellow med at me, an' then I 
 pulled iron. Draw quick, shoot straight them 
 two mottoes, along wid a gun you can depind on, 
 will carry a man across the wurruld." 
 
 Gerald's reply, begun in a spirit of incoherent 
 gratitude, was cut short by the sounds of footsteps 
 rapidly approaching. A policeman, attracted by 
 the pistol-shots, came up at a run. No doubt it 
 was the fear of some such interruption that had 
 impelled the assailants to choose, instead of firearms, 
 the more silent and no less deadly bludgeon. 
 
 " Here, what's the meaning of all this ? " inquired 
 the officer, as he halted. 
 
 " It manes," answered Carrick, calmly, " that 
 some of the smarties who tried to put up a job on 
 the Ida have been trying to put up a job on my 
 frind an' me, but I got the drop on them." 
 5 
 
66 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 Subsequent investigation proved that Meagher 
 had correctly divined the motive of the attempt on 
 his life at the very instant of its failure. 
 
 Other officers were summoned, and the dead 
 bodies were carried away. The policeman who first 
 appeared arrested Gerald and Carrick, and the party 
 retraced its steps to the City Hall. 
 
 Meagher was uneasy and inclined to be restive 
 under restraint. 
 
 " It's all very well for you to talk," he said, in an- 
 swer to a reassuring remark of Gerald, " but 1 don't 
 like it. I spent a whole wake in the lock-up at 
 Valparaiso by rason of a scrape that I had no more 
 to do wid than Noah's grandfather; an' I tell ye I 
 don't like it." 
 
 But their detention was brief. As newspaper 
 men, both were well known at headquarters, and, 
 late as was the hour, Mr. Verplanck and several 
 substantial citizens soon appeared in response to an 
 urgent message. Bail was quickly arranged, and 
 the friends found themselves at liberty. 
 
 "What shall we do now ?" inquired Gerald, as 
 they quitted the gloomy building on Kearney Street. 
 
 " Go home an' go to bed. What else ? " was 
 Meagher's matter-of-fact reply. " Sure it's after 
 three o'clock." 
 
CARRICK MEAGHER. 6/ 
 
 Gerald expressed his willingness to retire, but 
 positively refused to repeat the lonely tramp up 
 Mission Street. He wished to go to a hotel, but 
 it was difficult to make Carrick understand his rea- 
 sons. 
 
 " Is it the other chap you're afraid of ? " he asked. 
 " I'll bet you a dollar he's running yet. Av he'd 
 been any less scared, I'd have shot him too." 
 
 " No, it isn't the other chap I'm afraid of, but 
 have you no nerves, man ? Do you feel like pass- 
 ing the place where those fellows were shot down 
 not two hours ago?" 
 
 " Sure they're gone," answered Carrick. " Didn't 
 you see them taken out o' that before we left 
 it?" 
 
 At last Gerald carried his point, and Meagher, 
 grumbling at what he called " a sinseless bit of ex- 
 travagance," secured accommodations at the Occi- 
 dental. 
 
 The inquest completely exonerated the two jour- 
 nalists, and its revelations made a three days' hero 
 of Carrick Meagher, who, however, bore his honors 
 uneasily. As soon as the verdict of "justifiable 
 homicide " had been rendered, he was at pains to as- 
 certain that his bailers had been discharged from 
 their bond. Then he went straight to the Pacific 
 
68 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 Mail Company's offices and purchased a ticket for 
 Hong Kong. 
 
 " What do you want that for ? " inquired the be- 
 wildered Gerald, when Meagher displayed his pur- 
 chase. 
 
 " I want it to go to China wid, an' that's where 
 I'm going on the very first steamer, an' that's the 
 day after to-morrow." 
 
 " What for ? " gasped Ffrench. 
 
 "Well, several rasons. I've been longer in 
 'Frisco than I've any business to stay in any wan 
 town; then I've been over a good share of the 
 wurruld, an' niver yet seen a Jap or a Chinaman on 
 his native heath ; an' there's another rason." 
 
 " What is it ? " inquired Gerald. 
 
 " Well niver mind what it is," answered Carrick. 
 " Isn't it enough that I'm blue-moulded for want of 
 a bit of change ? Let that content you." 
 
 " But it does not content me," urged his friend. 
 " You are doing well here ; you're happy and com- 
 fortable " 
 
 "Ah," sighed Meagher, "it's little ye know. 
 Pobre cita ! " 
 
 "Well," pursued Ffrench, "she'll worry you just as 
 much in China as she does here, and you won't have 
 me to talk to. Come, take back your ticket you 
 
CAR1UCK MEAGHER. 69 
 
 can get rid of it, Pm sure and stay where you are. 
 You had no notion of this sudden flitting a week 
 ago." 
 
 "Well, I hadn't," admitted Carrick, with a burst 
 of candor. " It's this way, Gerald. There's only 
 wan thing in the wurruld I'm afraid of. If they 
 locked me up, I'd die or go out of my head. I 
 couldn't stand it." 
 
 " But why should they lock you up ? You have 
 committed no crime, and a jury has exonerated 
 you." 
 
 " I haven't much confidence in a jury," answered 
 Meagher. " I saw too much of them in Ireland 
 when I was a boy. What odds what wan jury 
 says ? Did you niver hear of a flaw in an indict- 
 ment, an' isn't it full as aisy to find flaws in an ac- 
 quittal ? No, I'll skip out to China while I'm free, 
 an' while it won't cost Verplanck nor anyone else a 
 cint, as it would av I had to be bailed again." 
 
 Gerald lost patience. 
 
 " Can't you understand ? The law says" he be- 
 gan, but Meagher interrupted him : 
 
 "What odds what the law says? It's always 
 sayin' wan thing an' manin' another. I've no use 
 for law ; I niver had, an' I hate the sight of it. I 
 can't help it ; I was born so. I'd like a country 
 
70 A DISSOLVING VIEW OF 
 
 where ivery man's hands had to keep his own head, 
 an' where there were wild bastes an' divils instead 
 of lawyers. Day after to-morrow I'll sail for China, 
 an' av ye'll come down an' see me off I'll take it 
 kindly of you, Gerald.'' 
 
 And on the day appointed he did sail. Gerald, 
 with many another friend, was on the wharf when 
 the big steamer moved out, for the little Irishman 
 had become both popular and famous. 
 
 Ffrench's eyes grew misty as he watched the 
 small familiar figure, till distance rendered it indis- 
 tinguishable. Then he turned slowly away, won- 
 dering if they two would ever meet again. He put 
 no faith in Carrick's promises to write, for he ob- 
 served that the wanderer appeared to have left no 
 correspondents behind him in the various lands he 
 had visited. Ffrench's misgivings were justified. 
 Many a mail came from the distant East, but never 
 a line in the odd, sprawling handwriting which 
 Carrick Meagher affected. 
 
 Gerald has paid more than one visit to his Irish 
 home since those " Bonanza Days of the Seven- 
 ties ; " he has made frequent sojourns in the Eastern 
 States ; but he has never met his quaint and 
 brilliant friend. He thinks of Carrick Meagher now 
 as of a dissolving view of a very strange humanity ; 
 
CARRICK MEAGHER. *J I 
 
 coming out of the unexplored darkness, shining for 
 a brief space with a fascinating lustre, and fading 
 away again into unknowable obscurity. The circle 
 of their two lives touched only at a single point. 
 
 Still Gerald cherishes the hope that he may see 
 or hear of him again. No strange and mysterious 
 individuality can arise to defy speculation without 
 bringing up in Ffrench's mind thoughts of the 
 vagrant genius who ate and lived with him for two 
 years in San Francisco. When the young jour- 
 nalist read of the White Pasha, who had so won- 
 drously appeared in the heart of Africa, he was 
 seized with a wild idea that this might be his old 
 friend. For Gerald Ffrench is well convinced that 
 this was no ordinary man, and that no common- 
 place fate awaits him. Some day or another, in 
 some strange and distant country, in some startling, 
 unexpected way, Gerald looks to see written across 
 the history of his time the eccentric signature of 
 Carrick Meagher. 
 
AT THE TOWN OF THE QUEEN 
 OF THE ANGELS. 
 
AT THE TOWN OF THE QUEEN 
 OF THE ANGELS. 
 
 THE party of sight-seers was more than an hour 
 late for dinner, but that made no difference to mine 
 host of the Pico House, who received it with smiles 
 and would listen to no apologies. The visitors se- 
 cretly exchanged congratulations, for their appetites 
 had lost nothing by the delay and they had the 
 dining-room to themselves. Mine host presided in 
 person, since these were guests that he delighted to 
 honor representatives of all the leading papers of 
 the Pacific Slope, each a living pen suggestive of 
 boundless possibilities in the way of free advertis- 
 ing. The last link had been welded in the chain 
 connecting Los Angeles with the great world ; the 
 last rail of the new extension of the Southern Pa- 
 cific Railroad had been laid ; not twenty-four hours 
 before, the first through train from San Francisco 
 had steamed into the new station, and this baker's 
 
7" AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 dozen of journalists had come down to write up 
 the new road. They were lingering to write up 
 Los Angeles, and should not the Pico House re- 
 ceive its share of favorable mention ? Certainly it 
 should, if unwearied hospitality and courteous at- 
 tention on the proprietor's part could touch the 
 hearts of newspaper men. 
 
 A merry party they were a few from Sacra- 
 mento, San Jos6, and Oakland, but the greater num- 
 ber from the Golden Gate. The vineyards and 
 orange groves of Southern California were new to 
 them ; they had been driving all day long through 
 a semi-tropical fairy land ; they were mostly young 
 men, and as happy as school-boys out for a holiday. 
 Had the host but known, it needed not this capital 
 dinner with its accompanying f usilade of champagne 
 corks to keep them in humor. Los Angeles was 
 sure of a good notice. 
 
 There is a limit to the appetite even of hungry 
 "scribes." The tables were cleared, cigars were 
 lighted, and the conversation, which had died down 
 to a dropping fire during the meal, flashed out bril- 
 liantly all along the line. The host, who was a 
 martyr to gout, after seeing that none of the ele- 
 ments for conviviality were wanting, limped off with 
 the waiters, but lingered a moment at the door to 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 77 
 
 catch the last strain of the musical honors with 
 which his health had been received. Then Los 
 Angeles was discussed with a fervor of praise that 
 must have made the angelic ears of the pretty little 
 city tingle. The strangers from the North sought, 
 from such of their number as might be supposed to 
 possess it, information on all possible and impossible 
 points the climate, the neighborhood, the antiqui- 
 ties, the beauty of the women, and the character of 
 the men. And all thought that the pioneers of '49 
 had missed their opportunity when they had se- 
 lected that sand-spit at the Golden Gate as the site 
 of the metropolis of the Pacific Slope. 
 
 Gerald Ffrench, the accredited representative of 
 the San Francisco Evening Mail, felt his honors 
 slipping from him. All day long he had been the 
 oracle of the quartette in his own particular carriage, 
 and his decision on doubtful points had been ac- 
 cepted as final. To be sure, he had never before 
 been in Southern California, but he had read up 
 exhaustively in preparation for the trip ; and most 
 Irishmen, particularly at six and twenty, are apt to 
 consider their information, whether acquired at first 
 or second hand, as something well worth having. 
 But now Graham Stokes, of the Golden Fleece, had 
 quietly assumed a monopoly of knowledge. It 
 
7 8 AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 could not be denied that Stokes had a personal ac- 
 quaintance with the country, and had lived there 
 for nearly two years, part of the time at Los An- 
 geles and part at Santa Barbara. He could speak 
 Mexican-Spanish too, and if he had been infected 
 by any of the raptures that thrilled the rest of the 
 party, he had managed to keep the fact to himself. 
 Calmly and confidently, he confuted two or three 
 of Gerald's book-made theories, and established 
 himself as king of the company, reducing the 
 younger man to silence and champagne. 
 
 Graham Stokes was not popular among his brother 
 journalists. Perhaps they did not understand him. 
 In the first place, he appeared to have a greater com- 
 mand of money than was usual among Californian 
 knights of the quill, and this was regarded as hardly 
 respectable. In the next place, he had never been 
 known to spend a dollar on anyone but himself a 
 most damning count in the indictment. Then, he 
 dressed too well, and shaved every day, and wore 
 gold eye-glasses. He never touched wine or spirits 
 in any form a circumstance so unusual at that day 
 and place as to furnish grave ground for the worst 
 suspicions. Nor could his abstinence be ascribed to 
 any morbid conscientiousness, for there was an ugly 
 story afloat that it was he who had led away poor 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS 79 
 
 Doc. Brown the very day that esteemed member of 
 the guild had obtained his envied detail on the 
 Humboldt business, and had intoxicated him so 
 grossly that the Summons superseded Brown and 
 sent another man in his place. And it was notorious 
 that Graham Stokes had secured the coveted mis- 
 sion. Here were grounds enough for unpopularity, 
 without counting that he- was a man of nearly forty, 
 while most of his compeers were under thirty, and 
 that he was very vain of his good looks, in a commu- 
 nity which assuredly did not try to make the most 
 of any favors of that kind which Heaven had granted 
 its members. Doc. Brown had characterized him, 
 not in the heat of debate, but in a judicially weighed 
 and calmly expressed opinion, as " a treacherous, 
 slimy snob," and the description had been generally 
 accepted as accurate. 
 
 Still Graham Stokes had a manifest advantage in 
 a gathering like the present. Nobody liked him, 
 but, as he was not generally understood, so he was 
 generally feared ; and he certainly knew more about 
 the subject of immediate interest than did all the 
 rest of the party put together. As the information 
 he furnished was merely of a nature to amuse curios- 
 ity and of no value for publication, he gave it freely. 
 On points of importance he exhibited a reserve 
 
8O AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 which did not escape Frank Hale, of the Union, who 
 whispered to Gerald Ffrench that he would back the 
 Golden Fleece to print the best Los Angeles letter 
 after all. This was gall and wormwood to Gerald, 
 but he contented himself with remarking that Stokes 
 seemed in such an unusually giving mood to-night, 
 that it would not be surprising if he ended by giv- 
 ing himself away. 
 
 Meanwhile Mr. Stokes, finding his audience to 
 his mind, was chatting quite amiably. He had got 
 on the subject of female beauty, always a favorite 
 with him, and proceeded to fire the imagination of 
 his hearers with glowing accounts of dark-eyed 
 senoritas, olive of complexion and lustrous of tress, 
 who had figured in the lighter passages of his life in 
 the sunny South. The man was as vain as a pea- 
 cock, and as he caressed his stubby moustache and 
 related his adventures in his peculiar falsetto voice, 
 Gerald felt as though he would have made some 
 personal sacrifice for the privilege of giving the 
 speaker one good, hearty kick. 
 
 " Here's a note for ye, Mr. Stokes," said a waiter, 
 entering the room. Mr. Stokes took the little 
 folded paper with an accession of importance. Its 
 appearance proved that he had correspondents in 
 the Town of the Queen of the Angels, and the man- 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 8 1 
 
 ner of its arrival showed that he, at least, was no 
 stranger. The waiter had accosted him by name. 
 
 " How did it come ?" he asked, leisurely opening 
 the missive, which was without envelope or seal. 
 
 " It come be hand, sor ; more betoken be a very 
 yallow hand," answered the waiter, with a grin. 
 
 Mr. Stokes cast his eye over the paper and ap- 
 peared both annoyed and perplexed. " Why, it's 
 two miles off," he muttered; "more!" Then he 
 glanced at his watch and fidgetted in his chair. Fin- 
 ally he read the note again. It was evidently of the 
 briefest. 
 
 The incident had already raised Graham Stokes 
 several degrees in the estimation of his companions. 
 The message might be commonplace, but to their 
 excited fancies it breathed of a moonlight tryst 
 under the blossom-laden orange-boughs. Graham's 
 stories had given their thoughts a turn in that direc- 
 tion. Conversation was suspended, and all waited 
 to see what would come next. The waiter stood, 
 balanced on one foot, with his eyes fixed on the ceil- 
 ing. Apparently he was whistling softly to him- 
 self, but if so it was only the ghost of a tune, for no 
 sound escaped his puckered lips. 
 
 Stokes seemed nervous and undecided. He read 
 
 the note a third time, and then, with the air of a 
 6 
 
82 AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 man who has made up his mind, he crushed it to- 
 gether in his hand and thrust it into his pocket. 
 
 " Can I have a saddle-horse, right off ? " he asked. 
 
 " To be sure, sor. Why not ? " answered the 
 waiter, without removing his eyes from the ceiling. 
 
 " Very well ; tell them to bring one round at 
 once," said Stokes ; and then, as the waiter took 
 himself and his phantom whistle toward the door, 
 he added, " what kind of a night is it ? " 
 
 The waiter paused with his hand on the latch. 
 " It's a nice night, sor." 
 
 "What do you mean by a nice night?" asked 
 Stokes, impatiently. 
 
 " There's a bit of a moon an' a nice breeze blow- 
 in'," explained the waiter. 
 
 " The fellow talks as if I was going yachting,'' 
 said Graham. " Off with you now, and have that 
 horse round in five minutes or less." 
 
 The waiter vanished, apparently whistling a quick- 
 step, and Stokes rose. Half a dozen voices were 
 heard in eager question, but he shook his head with 
 a Sphynx-like smile. 
 
 " You must excuse me, boys," he replied, in his 
 affected voice, " I never talk about such things. I 
 shall be back before eleven, and I'm really sorry to 
 leave this pleasant company ; but, of course 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 83 
 
 ' When a lady's in the case 
 You know all other things give place.' " 
 
 The men exchanged glances as the door closed on 
 Mr. Stokes. 
 
 " * He never talks about such things,' " cried Hale, 
 indignantly. " I'd like to know what else he's been 
 talking about for the last half-hour." 
 
 " He's only putting on frills," said Gerald Ffrench. 
 " I saw that note annoyed him like the deuce when 
 he first read it. Most likely it's a dun." 
 
 " I don't know the manners and customs of the 
 Los Angeles duns," remarked Tom Murphy, " but 
 if they have the winning ways to take a man from 
 the dinner-table and make him ride a couple of 
 miles to meet them, they deserve to prosper that's 
 all" 
 
 " Very likely he's written the note to himself, 
 then," suggested Ffrench ; and, as illustrative of the 
 esteem in which Mr. Stokes was held by hfs fellow- 
 workers, it may be added that this hypothesis was 
 not without supporters. 
 
 Up from the street came the sound of hoof-beats, 
 as of a horse fast ridden. All listened, and Hale 
 held up his finger. 
 
 "Well, if he's made a rendezvous with himself, 
 he's gone to keep it, that's all," exclaimed that 
 
84 AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 young gentleman, as the trampling died away in the 
 distance. " Whatever he's gone after, though, I'll 
 bet he won't have luck with it." 
 
 " Why so ? " inquired Murphy. 
 
 " Didn't you notice that we sat down thirteen at 
 table," answered Hale. " It didn't worry me any, 
 for I knew I was one of the boys. We are all 
 twelve of a kind, and Graham Stokes was the odd 
 man in this gang, if anyone was." 
 
 " Now, fellows," cried Gerald, briskly, " we're here 
 in a new town, and we haven't begun to look into 
 the night side of it yet. Come on, and let us take 
 in the sights, if there are any." 
 
 Gerald thought that Stokes, present or absent, 
 had occupied quite enough of one evening. The 
 diversion was entirely successful. Fresh cigars were 
 lighted, hats were sought for, and the journalists 
 an even dozen of them now started out to see Los 
 Angeles. 
 
 Long before eleven they were all back again on 
 the hotel piazza. They were vaguely disappointed. 
 What they had expected to see, not one of them, 
 probably, could have told ; one thing was certain, 
 whatever it was, they had not seen it. They lounged 
 in groups about the door or on the steps. The host, 
 half-sitting, half-lying in a hammock, was enjoying 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 85 
 
 the last cigar of the day and talking to Ffrench, 
 Hale, and one or two others. The waiter, his work 
 done, was standing at the foot of the steps with his 
 hands crossed behind him. He was looking up at 
 the heavens, and the silent whistle was stereotyped 
 on his lips. Perhaps he was calling the Dog Star. 
 
 " Yes, I knew him well," the host was saying in 
 answer to a question from Hale. " He didn't live 
 at my house ; but he was in and out a great deal. 
 That was six months ago." 
 
 Gerald Ffrench left the group. He was sick of 
 the sound of Graham Stokes's name. 
 
 " He lived here quite a while, didn't he ? " asked 
 Hale. 
 
 " Over a year, off and on," answered the host. 
 " He had some job in connection with the railroad. 
 I don't exactly know what." 
 
 "Was he well liked?" 
 
 The host laughed. " Those that made him pay 
 cash liked him well enough. Those that trusted 
 him didn't. I've nothing against him." 
 
 At that instant the rhythmic beat of a galloping 
 horse's hoofs was heard far up the silent street. 
 The sound grew rapidly. All looked up and the 
 host struggled into an erect attitude. Even the 
 waiter brought his eyes earthward and listened. 
 
86 AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 With flapping empty stirrups and trailing bridle, 
 a bay and white mustang came on at full speed. 
 On reaching the Pico House he wheeled in his 
 tracks so abruptly that he almost fell. Then, re- 
 covering his stride, he dashed past the building 
 toward the stables. 
 
 The host was all alert in a moment, and despite 
 his gout hobbled quickly to the end of the veranda 
 
 and looked over. " He's gone straight into the 
 
 
 yard," he said, and then, meeting the blank looks of 
 
 the group of newspaper men, to whom the riderless 
 steed suggested a tragedy, he added : " Wasn't that 
 the horse Mr. Stokes had this evening ? " 
 
 No one could answer ; no one had seen Mr. 
 Stokes ride away. Yes, the waiter had, and he 
 banished the whistle from his lips and spoke straight 
 to the point. 
 
 " The same horse, sor." 
 
 " Run round to the stable then, Pat, and tell 
 some of those greasers to come and bring their lan- 
 terns." 
 
 Pat was off like a shot, following the same road 
 the mustang had taken. 
 
 "Do you think " faltered Gerald. The 
 
 host cut him short. 
 
 " That an accident has happened ? Of course I 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 8/ 
 
 do, or why should Pedro have come back alone ? 
 At any rate, it's our business to see. I wish I could 
 go myself, but it's all I can do to walk the length of 
 this piazza." 
 
 Gerald felt faint and queer. If any serious acci- 
 dent had happened to the man whom he had been 
 hating so industriously all the evening, this visit to 
 Los Angeles would be anything but a pleasant 
 memory. The host's next words were more reassur- 
 ing. 
 
 " Of course, it mayn't be anything. Mr. Stokes 
 may have hitched the beast up somewheres, and he 
 may have broke loose and run home. Still, I don't 
 see why he should have acted so frightened, un- 
 less " The rest of the remark was lost as the 
 
 speaker leaned over the piazza railing and looked in 
 the direction of the stables. Lights were twinkling 
 there, and presently half a dozen Mexican helpers 
 appeared, carrying large lanterns and headed by Pat, 
 the waiter. The latter had put on a nondescript 
 head-covering of the sombrero order. 
 
 " What's that on your head, Pat ?" demanded his 
 employer. 
 
 " Me caubeen," answered Pat, taking it off for a 
 moment and examining it critically before he re- 
 placed it. 
 
88 AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 " I mean, are you going with the searching party ? " 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " Go if you want to," answered the host. " I'd 
 like to go myself, but '' he broke off impa- 
 tiently, and pointed up the street. " Now, boys, 
 that's the way Pedro came, and that's the way you 
 have to go to look for the seftor. Look for him 
 well. Savey ? " 
 
 " Si, seftor," answered one of the Mexicans, and 
 they started. Of course the newspaper men went 
 also. Professional duty would have impelled them, 
 even if the missing man had not been a brother of 
 the craft. 
 
 On reaching the end of the street the Mexican in 
 advance stooped and examined the ground carefully 
 by the aid of his lantern. A short scrutiny sufficed, 
 and he turned from the river and led the party 
 westward at a brisk pace. They were soon clear of 
 the town, and it was not difficult to trace the hoof 
 marks in the sandy soil, even without other light 
 than that furnished by a thin crescent of a moon. 
 Where there was any doubt the lanterns were called 
 into use. 
 
 Ffrench walked beside Pat. The waiter's eyes 
 were withdrawn from heavenly things and fixed 
 unwinkingly on the sand at his feet. His whistle 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 89 
 
 was almost audible. He was evidently pondering 
 deeply. 
 
 " What do you think of this business, Pat ? " the 
 young journalist asked. 
 
 " Bad, sor, bad, 5 ' returned the other, without rais- 
 ing his eyes. 
 
 " But. mightn't the horse have broken away from 
 some place where Mr. Stokes had hitched him ? " 
 . " He might, sor ; divil a doubt of it, an' he might 
 have tied a bit of cactus to his tail by way of keepin' 
 him from missin' the spur, but I don't think he did." 
 
 " What do you mean ? " asked Gerald, surprised. 
 " Was there a bit of cactus tied to his tail ? " 
 
 " There was, sor, an' a raal thorny bit, too." 
 
 " How do you account for that ? " asked the 
 young man. 
 
 " I don't account for it, sor ; cactus is one of them 
 things that won't bear accountin' for." 
 
 Ffrench was profoundly puzzled. Evidently 
 someone, either Stokes or some other person, had 
 sent the horse home and had taken precautions that 
 he should lose no time on the road. 
 
 They were fairly among the orange groves by this 
 time and their progress was slower, for the light of 
 the lanterns was required at every step. There had 
 been a high wind earlier in the evening, and it was 
 
90 AT 7 HE TOWN OF THE 
 
 still blowing, though with diminished force. The 
 dark branches swayed above them, intercepting the 
 moonbeams. In the open spaces between the trees 
 they could see the ground strewn with white blos- 
 soms, and the air was heavy with their fragrance. 
 The grove was filled with voices new to the visitors 
 from the north. Through the perfumed darkness 
 came the rasping song of the cicada, the harsh croak 
 of the tree-toad, and the whir of great insects that 
 dashed at the lights with a sound like a released 
 balance spring. Gerald had grown accustomed to 
 these noises and, wrapped in his own thoughts, was 
 hardly conscious of them, when suddenly another 
 tone a strange tone, and yet one that seemed oddly 
 familiar, mingled with the babble of the southern 
 night. Ffrench stopped abruptly and clutched Pat's 
 arm. The waiter had heard it too ; all had heard 
 it, and had halted instinctively. The party was 
 crossing a small opening and the young moon gave 
 light enough to show the expression of doubt and 
 disquietude on every face. 
 
 Again that sound a bubbling, gurgling groan 
 the voice of a man in agony, the cry of a drowning 
 man, and yet, even in its indistinctness, there 
 was something of the falsetto utterance which was 
 the peculiarity of poor Graham Stokes's speech. 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 91 
 
 Poor Graham Stokes ! It was thus that Gerald 
 Ffrench thought of him already ; it was thus that 
 he thought of him when, five minutes later, sick 
 with horror, he bent above the body lying dead at 
 the foot of an orange tree, with a shower of the 
 fragrant blossoms mingled snow-white and blood- 
 red above and around it, and the crescent of the 
 new moon dropping a pale shaft of light through 
 the boughs on the white, silent face. 
 
 Blood had flowed from the mouth and still hung 
 there in bubbles ; blood, but not so much, had 
 flowed from the breast and stained the clothing 
 around the deep dagger wound which had let the 
 life out. 
 
 " Is he dead ? " asked Ffrench, breathlessly, and 
 one of the Mexicans, raising the arm of the stif- 
 fening corpse, let it fall again as he answered : 
 
 " Si, sefior, he is dead more as an hour." 
 
 " Impossible ! " Hale broke in. " We heard his 
 groans as we were crossing that glade a moment 
 ago." 
 
 Pat, who had knelt by the body, shrank away 
 from it. " He's cowld already, sor ; that must have 
 been the banshee we heerd." 
 
 A feeling of superstitious awe fell on the party. 
 The Mexicans drew away and huddled together 
 
 . 
 
92 AT 7^HE TOWN OF THE 
 
 like a flock of frightened sheep. Evidently it 
 would have required little to make them take to 
 their heels. 
 
 " Don't move," shouted Gerald, in a tone of com- 
 mand ; " we must carry this back to the hotel." 
 
 " I don't think we've any call to disturb it, sor," 
 said Pat, " until the polis comes. This is a murder." 
 
 The Mexicans caught at the idea. " Si, si, los 
 alguazils ! " they shouted and set off at full speed 
 along the road they had come. 
 
 " Here, come back, you cowardly greasers ! " 
 called Hale, and Gerald laid his hand on Pat, who 
 seemed inclined to follow their example. The 
 swinging lanterns gleamed a moment among the 
 orange trees like gigantic fire-flies, and then vanished. 
 The terrified waiter drew closer to the little band of 
 journalists, and the dead man, looking straight up 
 to heaven with his staring eyes, lay at their feet. 
 
 " It's very strange, very ! " murmured Murphy. 
 
 " It's more nor strange, sor ; it isn't right," cried 
 Pat ; and then he broke off abruptly and raised his 
 hand. " Hark ! Didn't ye hear something ? " 
 
 They had all heard it a bubbling, gurgling 
 moan, conveying in its agony an indefinable rem- 
 iniscence of the dead man's voice. 
 
 They looked at each other with blank, horror- 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 93 
 
 stricken faces. No one could tell whence the sound 
 came. Gerald bent over the body again, but there 
 was no change on that pale face, no light in those 
 ghastly, open eyes. 
 
 " Jintlemen, it isn't right, it isn't right ! " screamed 
 the poor waiter, in an agony of terror. " There's 
 sperrits about us ! For the love of the Lord, jintle- 
 men, let us go home ! '' 
 
 " Nonsense ! " said Ffrench, overcoming with a vi- 
 olent effort the strange sense of horror that seemed 
 to chill his blood ; " nonsense ! Someone must re- 
 main here till the police come. They'll be along 
 presently. Those Mexicans will give the alarm. It 
 can't be far to the city." 
 
 " All of two miles," whispered the waiter, faintly ; 
 and Ffrench recollected that the dead man had 
 spoken of a similar distance when he received the 
 summons after dinner. 
 
 " He has been lured here on some pretence or 
 other ; this murder was a planned thing. The note 
 you brought him at the hotel, Pat " 
 
 He could go no further. Again that groan of 
 mortal anguish struck on their ears; they could 
 not determine its direction. It seemed to float 
 down like the moonbeams through the blossomed 
 boughs. 
 
94 AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 " This is past a joke," said Hale, in an awe- 
 stricken whisper, falling back a step. Pat was on 
 his knees, crossing himself with trembling fingers, 
 and calling in incoherent prayer on numberless 
 saints and martyrs. 
 
 " I I think it must be fancy," hazarded Murphy, 
 but his voice shook as he said it. 
 
 "Fancy or no fancy, I'll not wait in it another 
 minnit," shouted Pat, springing to his feet. 
 
 " You can go if you want, Pat, but I think, boys, 
 it's our duty to stay where we are," observed Gerald 
 Ffrench, looking round the group. 
 
 A murmur of assent showed that the journalistic 
 spirit was staunch yet, and Pat, after taking a 
 few steps, slunk back to the others. He did not 
 dare to face the horrors of the haunted grove 
 alone. 
 
 " Oh, wirra, wirra," he moaned, " that it should 
 come to this ! I always towld him thim Mendozas 
 was a bad lot, an' what did he want to make or 
 meddle wid the likes o' them ! Maybe it's because 
 I brought him the note that he's come back to hant 
 me." 
 
 " Do you know the man who gave you the note ? " 
 asked Gerald, eagerly, scenting a clew. 
 
 " No, I niver seen him before,' 5 answered Pat ; 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 95 
 
 " he was just a common ivery day greaser, an' I 
 med no account of him. How was I to misthrust 
 that he oh, wirra, wirra, that it should come to 
 this ! " 
 
 " Who's this Mendoza you were talking about ? " 
 pursued Gerald. 
 
 " He's an ould greaser that had a bit of a ranch 
 out San Pablo way ; and he had a daughter that 
 Mr. Stokes was said to be very swate on, but sure 
 I dunno if there was anything in it ? " 
 
 " Where is the daughter now ? " 
 
 "Dead, rest her sowl, as dead as as that wan 
 there, rest his sowl, if it will rest. She tuk her life, 
 at laste that's what was said when they found her 
 floating in the bay, about six months ago." 
 
 " About six months ago ! " The men exchanged 
 glances. The date of the poor girl's suicide seemed 
 to correspond with Graham's departure from Los 
 Angeles. 
 
 "Was this before or after Mr. Stokes left?" 
 asked Ffrench. 
 
 "Just afther ! They did say that he'd promised to 
 marry Inez, and that it was because he went off that 
 she done it the Lord pardon her." 
 
 " And the old man the father ? " 
 
 " He tuk on terrible, and said that he didn't give 
 
96 AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 a trauneen for his life once his daughter was gone ; 
 but he had very hard feelins agin the man that 
 druv her to it, an' swore he'd have his rivinge 
 of him, if he'd to wait for it till the day o' judg- 
 ment." 
 
 The newspaper men consulted together. Here 
 was a clew, certainly. If Stokes had attempted to 
 play the Don Juan among these people hot- 
 blooded and hot-headed as everyone described 
 them, the explanation of the crime became simple. 
 It was easy to conjure up the vision of a gray-haired 
 father, living only in the happiness of a beloved and 
 beautiful daughter. And when her corpse floated 
 in with the tide, and the evidence of her shame fur- 
 nished reason for her death a piteous picture it 
 was not hard to imagine the fiery old Spaniard 
 nursing the thought of vengeance as his only so- 
 lace. This theory would explain everything ex- 
 cept 
 
 Again that moan, awful, weird, almost super- 
 natural in its resemblance to the voice of the dead 
 man who lay at their feet voiceless. The watchers 
 drew together for a moment, and then, with one 
 impulse, started in the direction of the sound, the 
 trembling waiter crouching along at their heels like 
 a whipped spaniel. His lips were puckered to their 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 97 
 
 habitual whistle, and seemed to accentuate, in some 
 grotesque way, the terror on his face. 
 
 Before they had gone many yards they met the 
 police, and hailed the approaching glimmer of the 
 lights among the foliage as they might have wel- 
 comed the eyes of a friend. All turned back to- 
 gether, and in a few words Gerald put Captain 
 Strong, who had come in person, in possession of 
 all he knew about the tragedy. The captain heard 
 him in silence. 
 
 " He put the letter in his pocket, you say ? " in- 
 quired the officer, when Gerald had concluded. 
 
 "Yes," replied Hale, "he crumpled it up, and 
 put it in his waistcoat pocket. I saw him." 
 
 The body had been lifted on a stretcher, and 
 Captain Strong, bending over it, secured the paper. 
 Carefully smoothing out the creases, he read it by 
 the light of a lantern which one of his men held for 
 him. 
 
 " It's written in Spanish," said the Captain ; " a 
 request for the deceased to meet the writer near the 
 western edge of Jones's orange grove this is the 
 very spot and it is signed ' Inez Mendoza ! ' Inez 
 Mendoza ! Why, that's the girl that drowned 
 herself six months ago." 
 7 
 
98 AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 " It's a decoy letter, Cap," suggested one of the 
 officers. 
 
 " That's plain enough ! But who wrote it ?" 
 
 The Captain mused a moment, and then resumed. 
 " Harkins, go down to Mendoza's ranch we're 
 half way to it now, and bring the old man to 
 town." 
 
 The policeman withdrew, and the others, raising 
 the stretcher, stepped out slowly with their ghastly 
 burden. 
 
 Pat had recovered some of his confidence with the 
 arrival of the policemen and the lights. He kept by 
 Gerald's side when they started. 
 
 " Aren't ye goin' to tell them anything about the 
 sperrit groans, sor ?" he asked. 
 
 " I don't know," replied Gerald ; " I'd like to find 
 some explanation of them myself first." 
 
 Suddenly the Captain halted, and raised his hand. 
 " Hark ! what was that ? " 
 
 They all heard it, policemen, watchers, all ! It 
 came from the grove in front of them, and sounded 
 weird and awful amid the wonted sounds of the 
 tropic night. 
 
 "We've heard it several times," gasped Murphy, 
 " and we can't make out what it is ! And it has a 
 kind of uncanny likeness to poor Stokes's voice/' 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 99 
 
 The Captain glanced sharply at the motionless 
 figure on the stretcher, and then gave the signal to 
 proceed. The groans continued, always keeping a 
 few paces in advance. 
 
 The cold sweat ran down Pat's face, and his ner- 
 vous fingers never ceased to make the sign of the 
 cross above, around, on every side of him. They 
 all seemed uncomfortable all but one old, grizzled 
 policeman and conversation sank to whispers, and 
 then died out altogether. But the moans contin- 
 ued, still in front, as if summoning them on. 
 
 " Very strange, very strange ! " said Captain 
 Strong. He was thinking aloud, but he was not 
 left unanswered. 
 
 " It is strange, Captain " the speaker was the 
 grizzled old officer who bore the feet of the corpse 
 " it is strange, but it's happened before ! " 
 
 " Happened before ! That a dead man should 
 send his dying groans on before his corpse," broke 
 in Hale ; " for that's Graham Stokes's voice, I'd 
 swear to it." 
 
 " You're right, an' you're wrong," said the old fel- 
 low, dogmatically. "This here corpse, as we may 
 call it, has died of a stab in the lungs, if I make 
 bold to mention so much in advance of the medical 
 
100 AT THE TOWN" OF THE 
 
 11 I suppose so," admitted Ffrench, whose experi- 
 ence as a reporter had often taken him to the San 
 Francisco morgue, and who could give a fairly ex- 
 pert opinion in cases of death by violence. 
 
 " Very well ! How long does it take a man to 
 die of a cut in the lung ? " 
 
 " An hour, half an hour I don't know," said 
 Gerald. 
 
 " Maybe maybe two hours ? Ay, it may be three 
 that this man has lain under that orange tree, wait- 
 ing for his death to come to him, choking in his own 
 blood and moaning in his agony." 
 
 All shuddered at the horrible picture thus vividly 
 presented. 
 
 " Did anyone hear these groans ? " went on the 
 old policeman, who had by this time a breathlessly 
 attentive audience. " No one, at least so far as 
 appears." 
 
 " I beg your pardon," said Murphy ; " we heard 
 his groans for several minutes before we reached 
 him." 
 
 " Asking your pardon, young man, you lie," re- 
 turned the old officer. " He was stiff and cold be- 
 fore you got within a mile of him. I say no one 
 heard his groans, but I don't say no thing heard 
 them." 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. IOI 
 
 " What has that to do with it, Pachett ? " asked 
 the Captain. " Whoever, or whatever heard them, 
 we hear them now," for at that moment the dismal, 
 sound was repeated. \ \'> t \ > V , '.' ;' 
 
 " Ay, and will hear them till somebody , $h0&t& : 
 that cat-bird," said Pachett, pdintiiig tt) a dark object 
 that flitted among the trees a few paces ahead of 
 the party. Ffrench recognized the flight of the Cal- 
 ifornia mocking-bird, called in local parlance the 
 cat-bird, and as he realized the man's meaning a 
 familiar verse of scripture came to his mind : 
 
 " For a bird of the air shall carry the voice, and 
 that which hath wings shall tell the matter." 
 
 " Do you mean to say ? " began the Cap- 
 tain. 
 
 " I mean to say, Cap," said the old policeman, 
 that that there bird was likely sitting in one of 
 them trees the whole time, and saw the meeting 
 and saw the murder. It's a pity we can't subpeny 
 it as a witness, but we can't. I likewise say that 
 that there bird, sitting in one of them trees, listened 
 to that man's groans for an hour or more we've no 
 way of being sure of the time and is now repeat- 
 ing the new sound he has just learned, as is the na- 
 ture of the beast. And as the sounds are not very 
 agreeable, I'll just take the liberty " and the old 
 
102 AT THE TOWN OF THE 
 
 man discharged his revolver in the direction of the 
 mocking-bird, which flew away among the trees 
 with a shrill scream that still carried with it some 
 strange reminder of the haunting moan. 
 
 The -party -exchanged glances; some of the 
 younger men' attempted to laugh, but without much 
 success. There was an effectual check to merri- 
 ment in that silent figure on the stretcher, and 
 though the mystery was dissolved, there was little 
 comfort in the thought. The bird had made them 
 realize with horrible clearness the lonely and pro- 
 tracted death agony of the murdered man. 
 
 Pat gave voice to the general feeling as he shook 
 his fist at the tree behind which the bird had van- 
 ished, and exclaimed : " Bad cess to ye, then, for an 
 onnatural, hathen fowl, an' may the first bit ye ate 
 choke ye for puttin' the heart acrass in me wid 
 fright, an' amin to ye." 
 
 The journalists had arranged to return to their 
 several papers on the following day, but the mur- 
 der of Graham Stokes postponed their departure 
 for twenty-four hours. They were obliged to wait 
 for the inquest. Ffrench met Captain Strong the 
 following morning, and asked if old Mendoza had 
 been arrested. 
 
 " No, Harkins was too late," replied the Captain. 
 
QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 1 03 
 
 " But there can be little doubt but that Mendoza 
 was the guilty party." 
 
 " Has he escaped, then ? " asked Gerald. " Have 
 you any prospect of catching him ? " 
 
 " None," answered the Captain, with a grim 
 smile. " Harkins found him lying dressed on his 
 bed, with a pistol in his hand and a bullet through 
 his heart. The thing is plain enough. He wrote 
 to Stokes, whom he evidently knew to be ignorant 
 of the daughter's death, and signed the letter with 
 her name to make sure of the effect he wished. 
 Well, it worked, and Stokes went to his death. No 
 one knows what passed between the two men, but I 
 think it is not difficult to guess. Mendoza has been 
 almost crazy since his daughter's death." 
 
 " Then there is no doubt " began Gerald. 
 
 " That your friend deceived her. I think not. 
 It is a very sad story. I always thought that Stokes 
 was a bad egg. Well, he's dead now, and his mur- 
 derer must have gone straight to his lonely house, 
 and saved the State of California the trouble of try- 
 ing him. The inquest will be at twelve. So long," 
 and Captain Strong strolled off down the street. 
 
 Gerald Ffrench found more pity in his heart for 
 the Spaniard he had never seen murderer though 
 he undoubtedly was than for the American whom 
 
104 QUEEN OF THE ANGELS. 
 
 he had dined with the night before, and had met al- 
 most daily for six months. 
 
 Not one of the journalists will admit that he was 
 frightened that night, or that any thought of the 
 supernatural ever crossed his mind, but it is remark- 
 able, in the full reports of the tragedy which ap- 
 peared in the California papers, that no mention 
 was made of the " Wandering Voice." 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD 
 COUNTRY. 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD 
 COUNTRY. 
 
 AT five o'clock the harsh east wind, that bane of 
 summer afternoons in San Francisco, had almost 
 died away. It had been blowing with more than 
 ordinary force, and the air was still full of drifting 
 particles from the sand-lots pungent, intrusive 
 atoms that made eyes smart and lips crack. But 
 the crowd, setting southward along Montgomery 
 Street, was good-humored and jovial, for was not a 
 great holiday in near prospect ? A few days more, 
 and the sun of the centennial year would rise on 
 Independence Day the Fourth of July, 1876. 
 
 Just outside the eddy of the crowd, almost in 
 the doorway of the " Evening Mail " office, Gerald 
 Ffrench stood and waited. He fidgeted and grum- 
 bled a little : that was mainly the result of im- 
 patience. He rubbed his eyes frequently, for the 
 sand-dust was penetrating ; and two gold coins 
 
108 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 which he rattled in his hand gave out a musical 
 clinking. They were both twenty-dollar pieces, for 
 this was Saturday evening and pay-day at the office 
 of the " Evening Mail." 
 
 Presently a short, thick-set man with a dark beard 
 left the building and joined him. The new-comer 
 wore a soft felt hat, a rather shabby pea-jacket, and 
 a pair of spectacles. The rest of his attire was more 
 conventional. Gerald greeted him with a reproach 
 for his delay, and the two stepped into the street, 
 moving southward with the crowd. 
 
 " It's all very well for you, Jerry," said Ffrench's 
 companion. " You can feed the cashier with theatre 
 tickets, and get your money ahead of your turn. I'll 
 bet you were paid in gold too," he added, with some 
 touch of injured feeling in his voice. 
 
 Gerald laughed, and clinked his two coins to- 
 gether. " Of course," resumed the other. " Look 
 at me ! " and from each pocket he produced a roll 
 of whity-brown paper which looked heavy, and, as 
 every California!! could tell at a glance, contained 
 forty half-dollars. 
 
 " That reminds me " said Gerald. " Wait a 
 minute, Doc." They were passing a money- 
 broker's office, and the younger man went in, leav- 
 ing the other on the sidewalk. 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 1 09 
 
 They had always called him " Doctor," this man 
 of the spectacles and shabby pea-jacket, but whether 
 of law, physic, or divinity none of " the boys '' at the 
 " Evening Mail " had ever thought to inquire. His 
 real name was Brown, and he was probably quite as 
 ignorant of the origin of his learned title as was any 
 man of the scores who addressed him by it. Pos- 
 sibly it grew out of his glasses. 
 
 " Well ? " he queried, as Gerald emerged from the 
 broker's office. 
 
 " Dollar and a quarter premium," answered 
 Gerald, who had two of the whity-brown rolls in 
 his hand besides some loose silver. 
 
 " That's it ! " said the Doctor, with an indignant 
 sniff. " Two and a half extra on your week's sal- 
 ary. Who wouldn't be in the cashier's good graces ? " 
 
 Gerald indulged in a covert smile. The pair 
 were warm friends and roomed together ; but the 
 Doctor had a habit of railing at his lot, and this 
 special complaint recurred every Saturday night. 
 It always ended in the same way, and Gerald wait- 
 ed for the suggestion that invariably closed the sub- 
 ject. It soon came. 
 
 " You're going to treat on that, I suppose ?" 
 
 By this time they had crossed Market Street, and 
 were continuing southward along Third. On an un- 
 
110 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 pretentious corner stood a grocery, its front embel- 
 lished with sacks of potatoes and baskets of vege- 
 tables, its windows crowded with cans of preserved 
 meats, sardine-boxes, and the like, and its door in- 
 vitingly open and level with the wooden pavement. 
 A ruddy eruption of signboards all over the exterior 
 announced that one P. Gerraghty dwelt within, and 
 dealt in groceries of all kinds; also in fine wines 
 and liquors and imported cigars. Evidently Mr. 
 Gerraghty was ashamed of neither his name nor 
 his business. 
 
 The two friends passed the long counter, with its 
 flour-scales and its sugar-scales, and its flourishing 
 Saturday trade in dry groceries. Gerald had re- 
 turned no answer ; the Doctor had made no further 
 remark. His suggestion was about to be acted 
 upon. 
 
 At the rear of the store proper was a snugly fitted- 
 up bar-room, and over this portion of the establish- 
 ment Mr. Gerraghty presided in person. He was a 
 tall man with a dark mustache, and had a slight 
 cast in his eye ; not exactly the person you would 
 care to meet on a lonely road at midnight, yet, 
 withal, popular with his neighbors and a political 
 power in his ward. He was standing at the end of 
 the bar in conversation with a customer. 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. Ill 
 
 This latter was an old man, low in stature, spare 
 of frame, shabbily dressed, and quite insignificant 
 in appearance. His hair was of a brick-dust hue, 
 plentifully sprinkled with gray; he wore a strag- 
 gling beard of the same color, flecked with the 
 same signs of advancing age ; he lifted a pair of 
 small, cunning eyes as the new-comers entered. 
 Evidently he recognized one of them. 
 
 " Ah, Docther, how are ye ? " he said, in the 
 broad, strongly accented tones which at once stamp 
 the speaker as born somewhere west of Dublin City 
 and east of Shannon Shore. The Doctor only 
 nodded ; the little man turned to resume his con- 
 versation with Gerraghty ; but that functionary, 
 seeing the two newspaper men range up to the bar, 
 took his place behind it. 
 
 " What's yours, Doc. ? " 
 
 " Cocktail," said that gentleman, laconically. 
 
 " Two cocktails," began Gerald, and then he hesi- 
 tated. California hospitality does not wait for an 
 introduction to proffer liquid refreshment. " What 
 will your friend take ? " he added, with a jerk of 
 the head toward the little Irishman, and in a tone 
 loud enough to be overheard by the latter. 
 
 " Thank ye ; I'll take a dhrop o' whiskey," he 
 answered, sidling between the two. A glass was 
 
112 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 set out, and the " dhrop " he took was a fair sample 
 of his national love for exaggeration. 
 
 The Doctor performed the ceremony of introduc- 
 tion. "Mr. Ffrench, Mr. Quinn." Such was the 
 brief formula. 
 
 Mr. Quinn put forth an uninviting hand not too 
 clean, very thin, with large flat nails, and a net-work 
 of sinews and veins prominent below the big 
 knuckles. 
 
 " I'm glad to mate ye," was Mr. Quinn's remark. 
 
 " You ought to know each other," said the Doc- 
 tor. " You're a Westmeath man, aren't you, Mr. 
 Quinn ? " 
 
 " That's what I am," he replied. 
 
 " Well, Jerry's from Westmeath too." 
 
 " What part ? " The clannish instinct which is so 
 strong in most Irishmen was evidently well devel- 
 oped here. 
 
 " Not a great way from Athlone," answered young 
 Ffrench, indifferently. 
 
 " Ay, but where which side ? " 
 
 "Well, I don't exactly know how to explain," 
 said Gerald, laughing good-humoredly. " You 
 never heard of a small village called Lasson, I sup- 
 pose ? " 
 
 " Heerd of it ! " shouted Quinn, apparently in a 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 113 
 
 state of wild excitement, " heerd of it ! Wasn't I 
 born there wasn't I stop, tell me " In his agi- 
 tation he clutched the lapel of Gerald's coat and 
 hung on to it, looking up into his eyes with a 
 strange, beseeching expression. " Tell me, are ye 
 anything to his honor Mr. Gerald Ffrench, o' the 
 Park?" 
 
 " Only his son, that's all," replied the young man, 
 laughing. 
 
 The effect of these words on the little Irishman 
 was grotesque enough. Dropping his hand from 
 Gerald's coat he backed out into the centre of the 
 room, and there uncovering, made so deep a bow 
 that the rim of his soft hat swept the floor. Gerald 
 looked and felt rather foolish. He had roughed it 
 too long in America to appreciate this kind of hom- 
 age, even if it had met him on his father's avenue ; 
 and here, in a San Francisco bar-room, with Doc. 
 Brown grinning at his elbow and Gerraghty rattling 
 among the glasses in front of him, it seemed par- 
 ticularly absurd and out of place. Yet what could 
 he do ? The old man was evidently sincere in his 
 hero worship and enjoyed it thoroughly. 
 
 Would the idiot keep on bowing and scraping 
 forever ? Gerald felt that the situation was becom- 
 ing intolerable. The awkward silence must be 
 8 
 
114 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 broken by some more direct means than that sup- 
 pressed chuckle of the Doctor. 
 
 " I suppose you knew my father, if you came 
 from Lasson ? " he said. 
 
 The old man stepped forward. There was a 
 singular change in his tone, a mixture of deference 
 and exultation, as he replied : 
 
 " Indade an' I did, sir ; knew him well. He was 
 me landlord no, that 'u'd be yer grandfather, rest 
 his sowl ! Yer dada was only a boy when I left 
 the ould counthry. Maybe ye mind me, sir, or me 
 father ould Luke Quinn, at the cross-roads. But 
 sure how could ye ? It's forty years since I left 
 thim parts." 
 
 Gerald intimated that his recollections did not 
 extend so far. 
 
 " An' why would you ? Pat" this to Mr. Ger- 
 raghty, who still stood behind the bar " let me in- 
 throjuice ye to Mr. Ffrench, o' Bally vore Park ; 
 wan o' the raal ould stock. I've walked over ivery 
 fut of his property whin I was a gossoon, an* I'd 
 tire Betty if I druv her over the half of it in wan 
 day." 
 
 Mr. Gerraghty did not seem very deeply im- 
 pressed, but guessing that another order for drinks 
 was imminent, he assumed a bland smile. 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 1 15 
 
 " Ye'll take adhrop o' something wid me ? " And 
 without waiting for a reply the old man went on. 
 " The best in the house, Pat, for Mr. Ffrench ! " 
 
 Mr. Ffrench found the situation more and more 
 embarrassing. He attempted to explain that the 
 property in question did not belong to him, but to 
 his brother; but this produced no sort of impres- 
 sion on Quinn. 
 
 " Sure it's all in the family ; the raal thing, the 
 grand ould stock ! Sure it's proud an' happy I am 
 to mate ye in America." 
 
 By this time the glasses had been set out again, 
 and Doctor Brown, finding that something tangible 
 was about to come of the queer scene, had laid 
 aside his grin for the present and addressed himself 
 to the serious business before him. But Quinn in- 
 dignantly pushed the whiskey-bottle aside. 
 
 " Don't ye know no betther nor that, Pat Ger- 
 raghty ? and one o' the raal Ffrenches o' Ballyvore 
 foreninst yer bar. Champagne, yer sowl ye ! " 
 
 And champagne it was, a second bottle succeed- 
 ing the first, for Mr. Quinn's hospitality was of the 
 absolute sort which takes no denial. Meanwhile 
 he plied Gerald with adulation and recounted so 
 many evidences of the former grandeur of the family 
 that the young fellow began to feel a becoming 
 
Il6 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 sense of his importance, and to realize that the pop- 
 ulation of California in general, and the editor of the 
 "Evening Mail " in particular, had not treated him 
 with the consideration due to his rank and station. 
 Even Mr. Gerraghty, under the influence of his own 
 champagne, thawed sufficiently to admit that it was 
 a fine thing to see the aristocracy travelling about 
 the world. 
 
 It needed a peremptory refusal to stop Mr. Quinn 
 at the third bottle. Doctor Brown, whose eyes 
 were beginning to snap and sparkle behind his 
 spectacles, would have offered no decided opposi- 
 tion ; but the Doctor was of very little account in 
 the present company, and twinkled but feebly, with 
 a reflected light, beside the greater luminary. 
 
 Convinced at length that he had touched the 
 limit of Gerald's conviviality, the old man produced 
 a buckskin purse and proceeded to select from a 
 goodly store of gold coins the sum necessary to de- 
 fray the cost of the entertainment. When he had 
 settled he accepted Gerald's handshake, after a faint 
 show of reluctance. 
 
 " Ye'll be here for a few days, I suppose ? " he 
 said, clinging to the hand which, now he held 
 it between his own, he seemed in no hurry to let 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 1 1/ 
 
 " Here ? In San Francisco ? Oh, yes, certainly," 
 answered Gerald, somewhat surprised. 
 
 " That's right, it's worth seein' ; an' no one can 
 show you round any betther nor I can. I've been 
 on the coast since '46, an' I mind whin ivery fut o' 
 these strates round here was nothin' but sand an' 
 sage bushes. Maybe now," he added, persuasively, 
 " ye've nothin' to do to-morrow. If ye'll mate me 
 here at eleven, I'll have Betty out. Sure Sunday's a 
 good day for a dhrive ; an' she's an illigant mare to 
 thravel, though av coorse nothin' to what ye're 
 used to. Ye ought to .see the stables at Ballyvore 
 Park, Pat. Divil such a four in hand iver was seen 
 in Westmeath." And leaving Mr. Quinn to enter- 
 tain his host with tales of the vanished glories 
 of Ballyvore, the two friends went out. As they 
 passed through the grocery they heard the old 
 man's voice : 
 
 " Gimme a dhrop o' whiskey, Pat. Champagne's 
 cowld stuff for the stomach." 
 
 Gerald did not fail to ask the Doctor for such in- 
 formation as he could furnish regarding this new 
 acquaintance. It was scanty enough. Brown had 
 met him in court, where Quinn was prosecuting a 
 case against some defaulting tenants. All Gerald 
 could learn was that the old man owned a great 
 
Il8 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 deal of real estate in the southern portion of the 
 city, and was reputed to be very wealthy. 
 
 The following day Ffrench found Quinn at the 
 hour and place appointed, and after a " wee dhrop" 
 Gerald won golden opinions from the old man by 
 asserting that he preferred whiskey to champagne 
 Betty made her appearance. She was a slashing- 
 looking bay mare, and showed plenty of fire and 
 breeding. Though the buggy was plain and the 
 harness shabby, she would have attracted the atten- 
 tion of the knowing ones in any show or fair. 
 Gerald, who had all an Irishman's love for a good 
 horse, began to look on Mr. Quinn with more favor 
 and respect. 
 
 The drive was long and pleasant. Weather 
 never interferes with an excursion in California, 
 where a glance at the calendar, not at the barome- 
 ter, tells whether rain will fall or sun will shine on 
 a given day. The old fellow was amusing, too, in 
 his own way. He was full of anecdotes about the 
 Ireland of forty years ago. He had left his native 
 land at five and twenty, and had not revisited it 
 since; nor had the possibility of change entered 
 his head. He was surprised to hear that Gerald's 
 father had died several years before, though he 
 acknowledged, on reflection, that " his honor would 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 119 
 
 be full oulder nor meself if he'd lived till now." 
 The young people of the present generation were, 
 of course, strangers to him. By and by he took 
 up a question that had occasioned Gerald some 
 surprise at their last meeting. 
 
 " An' whin are ye goin' home, sir ? " 
 
 " I don't know," said Gerald, vaguely. " I'm 
 living here, you know." 
 
 " Here ! " The old man bounded in his seat 
 from sheer amazement, and the spirited mare broke 
 into a wild gallop which it took him some moments 
 to check. Then he turned and looked at his com- 
 panion. 
 
 " I live here ; I'm working here ; I've been at it 
 for three or four years," explained Gerald. 
 
 At first the old man's face expressed boundless 
 astonishment, but gradually a cunning look came 
 into his little eyes. " Wurruk ! " he repeated ; " d'ye 
 mind that now ? Let me look at yer hands." He 
 examined Gerald's soft palms. "Yes; I thought 
 so. Sure ye don't expect me to believe the like o' 
 that, sir." 
 
 " I don't work with pick and shovel," said Gerald, 
 rather indignantly ; " but I'm working for my bread 
 just the same. I'm on the staff of the " Evening 
 Mail," like Doctor Brown." . 
 
I2O AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 " An' what d'ye do that for ? " asked Quinn. 
 The expression of bewilderment on his hatchet face, 
 enhanced by the comic confusion of his wind-blown 
 hair and whiskers, was whimsical. He looked like 
 a terrier dumfounded. Gerald laughed. 
 
 " I work because I am obliged to. Ballyvore be- 
 longs to my brother, as I told you last night." 
 
 The extraordinary fact that this young fellow 
 had to earn his living appeared to be beyond the 
 old man's power to grasp. " I thought there was 
 money enough in it for six families," he gasped, at 
 length. 
 
 " There's mighty little money in Ireland nowa- 
 days," laughed Gerald, lightly ; " and not much of 
 that comes the landlord's way." 
 
 " Get up, Betty," said the old man ; and half a 
 mile of the dusty road was passed in silence. His 
 mind was evidently occupied with reminiscences of 
 the old-time glories of Ballyvore, for by and by dis- 
 jointed utterances began to escape him. 
 
 " Goold, solid goold ! I've seen it ! Wine an' 
 whiskey, bottles no, but barrels of it. Four hun- 
 dhred acres in the domain, sixteen horses in the 
 stable, silver an' goold plate, an' the estate runnin' 
 over the best o' two baronies." He started erect 
 in his place with a jerk that set Betty capering again. 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 121 
 
 " But sure ye must have had some of it. It ain't 
 in raison." 
 
 This was a sore subject with Gerald. " I had my 
 share," he said, stiffly, "and and I spent it." 
 
 " I'll go bail ye did, like the jintleman ye are ! 
 Get up, ould woman ! " Another long stretch of 
 road lay behind the mare's swift hoofs before Mr. 
 Quinn spoke again, and then it was only to ask 
 some trivial question about the duties of a news- 
 paper man. Gerald could not help fancying that 
 his revelations about the Ireland of to-day and the 
 knowledge of his present employment had com- 
 bined to sink him several degrees in the old man's 
 favor. Not that he cared. Why should he ? 
 Quinn was a character in his way, and worth study- 
 ing. He kept an uncommonly good trotter, too ; 
 but he was poor company, manifestly ignorant, 
 and,tjudging from the place where they had first met 
 and the purpose of the several halts they had made 
 that day, probably a disreputable old drunkard 
 and certainly no fit companion for Gerald Ffrench. 
 
 Dinner at the Twelve-Mile House and a rattling 
 spin home along the San Bruno Road finished the 
 day. They drove down Market Street in the 
 gathering twilight, and Mr. Quinn pulled up be- 
 fore Gerraghty's store. 
 
122 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 " Does he live here, I wonder ? " thought Gerald, 
 as he alighted. " It looks like it." Then, resisting 
 all the old man's entreaties to step inside and " thry 
 something to lay the dust," he set out for the Cali- 
 fornia Theatre, for even Sunday night has its claims 
 on the time of a San Francisco dramatic critic. 
 
 Old Quinn grasped his hand warmly at parting. 
 He had quite conquered his diffidence in that re- 
 spect. " Look in an' see me whenever ye do be 
 passin'," he said. " I do be here the most o' the 
 time ; an' any day ye feel likehavin' another dhrive 
 behind Betty, why, only say the wurrud. It isn't 
 yer father's son that should be ridin' in thim blag- 
 gard street-cars." 
 
 II. 
 
 THE " Glorious Fourth " came and went, marked 
 by unwonted splendor and noise all over the Union, 
 and underscored with black in the private annals of 
 Doctor Brown, who was called upon to surrender 
 his desk at the "Evening Mail." That gentleman's 
 turn for conviviality and his talent for chronic fault- 
 finding had combined to embroil him with the 
 managing editor, and he had received an intimation 
 that his resignation would be in order. Brown had 
 never saved a cent in his life, and Gerald realized 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 12$ 
 
 with some misgivings that his forty dollars a week 
 would for the present be called upon to support two 
 instead of one. He was walking down Third Street 
 on the following evening, in a somewhat despondent 
 frame of mind, when he was loudly called by name 
 from the door of Mr. Gerraghty's grocery. 
 
 Old Quinn had evidently been celebrating the 
 birthday of his adopted country after his own fash- 
 ion, and he had not done celebrating yet. His 
 small eyes were ablaze with excitement, his shirt 
 was rumpled, his attire otherwise in disorder, and 
 his " Misther Ffrench, Misther Ffrench ! " sounded 
 hoarse and strident. 
 
 Gerald would willingly have passed on, but 
 this was not to be. The little man haled him into 
 the group that surrounded the door of the grocery, 
 and proceeded to introduce him by name to every 
 member of the party, with a running commen- 
 tary on the splendors of Ballyvore and an enthu- 
 siastic indorsement of the young fellow himself as 
 " wan o' the raal ould stock." 
 
 This was a disagreeable experience. The old 
 man was undeniably the worse for liquor ; most 
 likely, as he had abundant leisure and more money 
 than he knew what to do with, drunkenness was 
 his normal condition. Gerald extricated himself 
 
124 ANT OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 with some difficulty from these maudlin attentions, 
 and continued on his way. Clearly Mr. Quinn was 
 not an acquaintance to be cultivated. 
 
 Yet it was difficult to avoid meeting him. Ger- 
 ald lived in Howard Street, and naturally had to 
 pass Gerraghty's door at least twice a day, and 
 Gerraghty's was evidently the old man's head- 
 quarters. Sometimes he would be in the saloon, 
 sometimes in front of the grocery ; but, as he 
 had said himself, he was there " most o' the 
 time." In the course of a few weeks he had 
 fully digested the idea of Mr. Ffrench's servile 
 position for so he evidently considered it and 
 set himself with a faithful persistence that was 
 almost touching to lighten its burdens by every 
 means in his power. Unlimited liquor appeared to 
 the old fellow the simplest and most direct allevia- 
 tion ; and as Gerald could not always fence success- 
 fully with such persistent hospitality he soon found 
 himself drinking more than was good for him. 
 Loans of money were frequently proffered, in sums 
 ranging from five to one hundred dollars, but these 
 Gerald invariably declined. Finally one day it 
 was the 1st of August, and an appointment had 
 been made in which Betty was involved the old 
 man's liberality took a flight as magnificent as it 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 12$ 
 
 was unexpected. Gerald found him, as had been 
 arranged, in Gerraghty's saloon. He was por- 
 ing over a morning paper, but looked up as the 
 young fellow entered. " I was gettin' the news," 
 he said, with an odd expression, half of doubt, half 
 of bravado, the significance of which Gerald did 
 not at the moment understand. 
 
 " Have you ? There's not much in the papers 
 to-day," he answered. 
 
 " There is not. You've read them, I suppose ? " 
 inquired Quinn. 
 
 " Yes, I looked them over at breakfast." 
 
 " An' now what sthruck ye in them ? What 
 was the biggest bit of news ye could find ? " 
 
 " Nothing," said Gerald, laughing. " Did you 
 find any ? " 
 
 " Divil a wurrud," answered Quinn with a sigh. 
 
 This kind of colloquy was not unusual. The old 
 man seemed to be an attentive reader of the papers, 
 and he rarely met Gerald without asking him his 
 opinion on the news of the day. 
 
 " It seems to me you never find much news, Mr. 
 Quinn," remarked Ffrench. 
 
 "What's the raison I don't ? Sorra much has 
 happened this twenty years that I can't tell ye." 
 The old man spoke rather warmly and seemed 
 
126 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 hurt and indignant. After a few minutes he went 
 out to fetch the buggy, and Gerald turned to Ger- 
 raghty, who occupied his usual place behind the 
 bar. 
 
 " What's the matter with Mr. Quinn ? He 
 seems out of sorts this morning." 
 
 Gerraghty had a friendly feeling for Gerald, in 
 whom he recognized a source of profit only to be 
 gauged by the young man's capacity for liquids. 
 Before answering he peeped round the bar to as- 
 sure himself that Quinn was out of ear-shot. 
 
 " The ould fellow can't read," he said with a grin. 
 
 " Can't read ! " repeated Gerald, profoundly as- 
 tonished. " Why, I see him reading the paper 
 every day." 
 
 " Ye see him houlding it ; but divil a line of it 
 can he spell. He can't neither read nor write ; an' 
 when he has business at the Hibernia Bank he has 
 it fixed so that they let him in ten minutes before 
 the doors are opened, so that no one won't see him 
 make his mark. Oh ! he's quare." 
 
 " But what does he take the papers for ? " asked 
 Gerald, to whom this revelation was almost incred- 
 ible. 
 
 " So as to fool you an' others like you. Oh, he's 
 cute ; but ivery wan who knows him well sees how 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. I2/ 
 
 it is. No one dar' hint as much to him though. 
 Whisht ! here he's comin'." And Quinn entered. 
 
 His ill humor had already evaporated and they 
 started in good spirits. This time their course lay 
 among the small residence streets which abound in 
 that neighborhood. It was the first of the month, 
 and the old man was out collecting his rents. He 
 visited a number of the little frame houses which 
 are crowded together in that populous quarter and 
 returned from each with a double handful of silver. 
 A large bag which lay under the seat of the wagon 
 grew rapidly in bulk and weight as the day ad- 
 vanced. It was plain that the old fellow's wealth 
 was no fable. 
 
 " How much are you worth, Mr. Quinn ? " asked 
 Gerald, in a moment of pardonable curiosity. 
 
 The old fellow leered at him with a cunning ex- 
 pression. " I'll tell ye," he said, " for maybe ye'll 
 need to know wan o' these days. A little over a 
 quarter of a million." Gerald gasped. He knew 
 Quinn was well to do, but had never imagined that 
 his means approached such a figure. The other 
 noted his astonishment with evident satisfaction. 
 
 " I suppose you must have struck it rich in the 
 diggings in the old days ? " Ffrench remarked by 
 way of saying something. 
 
128 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 " I never struck a pick in the ground in Californy, 
 an' I w'u'dn't know the color if I seen it," said 
 Quinn. Then he closed his left eye, and laid his 
 head on one side like a disreputable but preternatu- 
 rally wise old magpie. " What's the use o' goold ? 
 Ye can spind that, but ye can't spind land. When 
 I come here all this was sand-hills. I bought it by 
 the acre, and I've sowld a good share of it by the 
 fut. There's nothin' like land," he ejaculated with 
 a fervor that was almost pious in its intensity. " See 
 here, Masther Gerald! Is yer brother married ? " 
 
 " No," answered Gerald, not a little surprised by 
 the sudden question. " Why ? " 
 
 " It's a sin an' a shame, sir, that you should be 
 wastin' yer life here among a lot of rayporthers not 
 fit to black the boots o' the likes o' ye. It's home 
 ye ought to be, an' livin' like a jintleman." 
 
 "On what would I live like a gentleman if I 
 were at home, I'd like to know ? " inquired Gerald, 
 laughing. 
 
 " Och, if that's all, yer honor, ye can have five 
 thousand dollars to-morrow ten, if five isn't 
 enough ; an' more whin that's done. Go home, 
 yer sowl ye, an' go into Parleymint ye've the 
 brains to do it ; an' if it's only money's wantin', 
 come to ould Luke Quinn." 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 1 29 
 
 There was no mistaking this offer. It was made 
 in sober earnest, and the old man's sincerity was 
 unquestionable. It was difficult for Gerald to make 
 him understand the impossibility of such a scheme, 
 but he did comprehend that his generous proposal 
 was not accepted ; and the refusal seemed to cut 
 him to the heart. Despite all the efforts of the 
 younger man, the drive was finished in silence. 
 
 That day Gerald wrote to his sister and asked 
 her to find out what she could about a family named 
 Quinn, who had lived near Lasson in his grand- 
 father's time, and had been tenants on the estate. 
 He also attempted a little missionary work with the 
 old man, and tried to get him away from Gerraghty's 
 saloon and its unfailing rounds of drinks. Old 
 Quinn's health was far from robust, and the young 
 man could not help noticing the growing effects of 
 this incessant dissipation. His success was not con- 
 spicuous; but he fancied he was of some service, 
 and the old man took the interference in good part. 
 This and the remembrance of Quinn's hearty, disin- 
 terested generosity combined to raise him consider- 
 ably in Mr. Ffrench's estimation. 
 
 It was not till near the end of August that Doctor 
 Brown heard of a fresh opening for his talents. He 
 was offered a place on the " Sacramento Union," 
 9 
 
I3O AN OLD MAN FROM r FHE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 and he was to start at once. But here a difficulty 
 presented itself. It would require about twenty dol- 
 lars to settle up various little matters and pay the 
 fare. Gerald, who had been supporting both himself 
 and his friend for nearly two months, had no cash on 
 hand and none to hope for till salary day. The 
 Doctor had made an ineffectual attempt to borrow, 
 and now it seemed as if the poor fellow must lose a 
 good chance for want of a paltry twenty dollars. 
 Gerald determined to put his dignity by and ask 
 Quinn for the money. 
 
 He found the old man in Gerraghty's and prompt 
 to accommodate him. " Twinty, is it ? " he said 
 " no, but fifty. Come wid me, an' I'll get it for ye 
 at wanst." This rather surprised Gerald, who knew 
 that Quinn habitually carried large sums about him. 
 However he accompanied the old fellow, assuming 
 that he would take him to the Hibernia Bank, 
 where he kept an account. Not so, however. They 
 crossed Third Street, and proceeded along one of 
 the narrow thoroughfares in which Mr. Quinn's 
 house property lay. 
 
 He was in high good humor. The question of 
 the loan had brought up the subject of money, al- 
 ways a favorite topic with a man who has plenty. 
 He narrated how many appeals were almost daily 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 131 
 
 made on his purse, and explained with a crafty leer 
 how he avoided them. 
 
 " Only yisterday," he said, " that fellow wid the 
 specs the Docther, ye call him wanted to sthrike 
 me for twinty. D' ye think he got it ? Not much. 
 I've no money for the likes o' him." Gerald, who 
 had several times been on the point of explaining 
 that the loan he solicited was for the Doctor's use, 
 congratulated himself that he had not spoken. 
 
 "Not but what he has a great rispict forme," 
 pursued Quinn. " They do all have the hoight o' 
 rispict for me round these parts. When I towld 
 the Docther that money was tight an' I c'u'dn't 
 raise the like, sez he, ' Quinn, ye're an ould misan- 
 thrope,' sez he. I mind the wurrud well, for I med 
 him say it over two or three times ; " and the old 
 fellow grinned in his appreciation of this peculiar 
 compliment. 
 
 By this time they were in Jessie Street. 
 
 " Be aisy now," said Quinn, " I'll bring ye the 
 money in two shakes of a mare's tail." And he ran 
 nimbly up the steps of one of the frame houses 
 which owned him as lord. 
 
 He returned presently, evidently greatly chagrined 
 and discomfited. * W'u'd ye belave it," he exclaimed 
 angrily; "here it is within two days o' the first o' 
 
132 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 the month, an' the dhirty mane spalpeen won't 
 gimme a thrifle of a few dollars in advance o' the 
 rint that '11 be due the day afther to-morrow." 
 
 Gerald hastened to assure him that if he had not 
 the money by him it was no manner of consequence, 
 that he had no intention of occasioning his kind 
 friend any inconvenience, and much more in the 
 same strain, but the old man cut him short by run- 
 ning up the steps of another house. The same re- 
 sult followed ; and it was not till he had failed in 
 four several attempts to borrow the amount among 
 his tenants that he drew the faded buckskin purse 
 from his pocket, and, pouring a mingled mass of 
 gold and silver into his shaking hand, entreated 
 Gerald to take whatever he required. Gerald 
 selected a twenty-dollar piece, thanked him, and 
 withdrew, much marvelling at the old man's busi- 
 ness methods. 
 
 III. 
 
 THIS oddly assorted friendship continued with- 
 out interruption throughout the winter of 1876. A 
 quarrel had nearly arisen when Gerald after a few 
 weeks brought back the twenty dollars and at- 
 tempted to return it. The old man seemed so 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 133 
 
 sincerely hurt and grieved that Gerald relented and 
 pocketed his pride and his gold-piece together, pre- 
 ferring to remain under an obligation which, after 
 all, he could not cancel, rather than wound Quinn 
 in what was seemingly the only sensitive point of 
 his nature. Emboldened by this triumph, the old 
 man recurred to his favorite scheme of " making a 
 jintleman o' Masther Gerald ; " but here the young 
 man was immovable, and the other discontinued 
 his persuasions with a sigh that " the likes o' him 
 should have to wurruk." 
 
 In due course Gerald received an answer from his 
 sister. After the usual quota of home gossip and 
 news, he came upon this paragraph : 
 
 " There are no Quinns on the place now. There 
 was a family on the Athlone side of Lasson, but 
 they were cleared out in grandpapa's time. Mr. 
 Brooke remembers them well, though, and speaks 
 of old Luke Quinn as the worst tenant, and most 
 inveterate poacher on the property. The son was a 
 worse scamp than the father, and went to America. 
 Mr. Brooke says he must be quite an elderly man 
 if he hasn't been hanged. The old man gave no 
 end of trouble to grandpapa, who was finally com- 
 pelled to take up the farm. Mr. Brooke thinks 
 that old Quinn was transported afterward, but he 
 isn't sure. What on earth do you want with all 
 
134 AN- OLD MAN- FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 this queer Old World history ? Are you going to 
 write a book ? " 
 
 And so the letter branched out to other topics. 
 
 Undoubtedly the wealthy Mr. Quinn of San Fran- 
 cisco was no other than the scapegrace son of a 
 worthless father, and the respectable agent of Bally- 
 vore seemed to think that if he was still alive it was 
 only because the hangman had neglected his oppor- 
 tunities. " It's a strange world," reflected Gerald ; 
 " but whatever he may have been before I was born, 
 he has loyalty to the old name now, and a soft spot 
 in his heart for the old country." 
 
 Mr. Ffrench was surprised to find that he had 
 learned to like the old man before the last clouds 
 had rolled away from the spring of 1877. The mixt- 
 ure of shrewdness and simplicity ; the transparent 
 pretence of education, at which he had long ceased 
 to smile; above all, the evident pride and delight 
 which Quinn took in his society all appealed 
 strongly to the warmer side of his nature. The old 
 man still introduced him to his friends as " wan o' 
 the raal ould stock," and prosed away in his cups 
 about the splendors of Ballyvore; but the cadet of 
 that ancient house was growing accustomed to this. 
 The two drove together every Sunday, saw each 
 other at least once every day, and patronized Ger- 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 135 
 
 raghty at frequent intervals, to the entire satisfac- 
 tion of that enterprising grocer. 
 
 One day it was early in June Gerald, on his 
 way home, missed the familiar figure from the door 
 of the grocery. He gave the matter little thought 
 at the moment, but when another day passed with- 
 out his seeing Quinn, he stepped into the store to 
 inquire. 
 
 Poor old man ! He had met with an accident on 
 the road the previous day had been thrown from 
 his buggy and picked up insensible. Gerraghty did 
 not know whether he had a " load " at the time, but 
 opined that he had. Anyhow, he was in a bad way. 
 The saloon-keeper spoke feelingly, as one who de- 
 plored the possible loss of his best customer, and 
 Gerald became seriously uneasy. He would go and 
 see Quinn at once. Gerraghty furnished the ad- 
 dress, and advised him to carry a bottle of whiskey 
 to the patient ; but this he declined. 
 
 As he walked toward Mission Street he remem- 
 bered with some surprise that he had never yet 
 visited Quinn in his own home. He did not even 
 know whether the old fellow was married or single, 
 though negative evidence naturally inclined him to 
 the latter vjew. They had always met in the street 
 or in Gerraghty's store, which was odd considering 
 
136 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 how closely the bonds of their strange intimacy had 
 been drawn in the past year. But here was the 
 number, only a few doors up Mission Street, and his 
 hand was on the bell. It was answered by a civil- 
 spoken Irishwoman, who, in reply to his inquiry, 
 showed him into a room on the ground floor. As 
 he entered, a Mr. Conley, a lawyer with whom he 
 had some slight acquaintance, passed out. Gerald 
 was surprised at the warmth with which this gentle- 
 man shook his hand, and he fancied he caught the 
 words " lucky fellow" in the whispered greeting; but 
 he had no time to speculate on their application. 
 Poor old Quinn lay on the bed a cheap, uncom- 
 fortable-looking bed, quite in character with the ill- 
 furnished, cheerless room. He looked thin and 
 shrunken under the coverlet, and very weak. A 
 stranger, evidently a physician, turned from the bed- 
 side as Gerald entered, but the old man beckoned 
 him back and feebly extended his hand toward his 
 visitor. 
 
 " Docther," said he in a faint, hoarse whisper, " I 
 want to inthrojuice ye. This is me fri'nd," there 
 was an emphasis of indescribable pride about this 
 word, and he repeated it " me fr'ind Mr. Ffrench 
 o' Ballyvore Park. Wan o' the raal ould stock, sir, 
 an' the grandest in the barony." 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY, 137 
 
 " Oh, hush, hush, Quinn ! " cried Gerald, deeply 
 shocked. The old man's adulation seemed to him 
 ghastly and unnatural at such a time. The doctor 
 acknowledged the introduction by a curt nod, and 
 taking up his hat and gloves moved toward the door. 
 "You mustn't try to talk much, Mr. Quinn; I'll 
 look in again in a couple of hours," he said, and 
 went out. 
 
 " How did this happen ?" asked Gerald, drawing 
 a chair to the bedside and taking the thin old hand 
 in his own ; " and why didn't you send to let me 
 know ? " 
 
 " It was a poor place to bring you to, Masther 
 Gerald, an' I didn't like ; but sure I'm glad to see 
 you now you are in it." 
 
 " But why should a man of your means live like 
 this ? " The question leaped to Gerald's lips, but 
 remained unspoken. As he looked he realized that 
 it mattered little where the old man should live 
 or die now. 
 
 " An illigant place entirely," muttered old Quinn, 
 " and he come to see me ! Ah, Masther Gerald, it's 
 aisy seem' you're wan o' the raal ould stock." 
 
 He was silent a moment, and then began again. 
 " Arrah, bad cess to ye, Betty ; wasn't trottin' good 
 enough for ye, but ye must turn to an' kick the 
 
138 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY, 
 
 wagon over? " Another pause. " Masther Gerald, 
 Masther Gerald, avick ! " 
 
 " What is it, Quinn ? " 
 
 " I had Counsellor Conley here just now doin' 
 some writin' for me. I write an illigant hand, but 
 I'm wake wid this thrubble." 
 
 " I saw him, Quinn. What about it ? " 
 
 " We didn't get to finish. Rache me it there, 
 av ye plaze. See it beyant ? " 
 
 Gerald found a large legal-looking sheet of paper 
 lying on the table among cigar-butts and broken 
 glasses. He handed it to the old man. 
 
 " Yer honor can finish it for me, as well as an- 
 other. All it wants is me name. Write it down 
 at the ind." 
 
 The first line of the document, boldly engrossed 
 in large letters, caught Gerald's eye. He read it 
 at a glance : " Last will and testament of Luke 
 Quinn." He stared aghast. 
 
 " Sign your name ? " said the young man. " I 
 can't do that." 
 
 " An' why not, whin I give ye 1'ave ? Sure 
 who'll be a haporth the wiser ? '' 
 
 " I can write it, but we must have witnesses ; 
 and you must touch the pen and say over some 
 form, which I have forgotten." 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 139 
 
 " Och, what's the use of all that botheration ? 
 The lawyer would ha' finished it for me, only I was 
 wake and c'u'dn't go on. Whisper, Masther Ger- 
 ald, avick. Write ' Luke Quinn ' at the bottom o' 
 that, an' it'll be the betther for ye." 
 
 " But indeed, Quinn, it would be impossible," 
 said Gerald, sorely put out by the old man's help- 
 less pleading. " It would mean no more than if it 
 had never been written, and would only get me 
 into trouble." 
 
 " Who's to know ? " urged Quinn. " Whisper 
 till I tell ye no one will misthrust but I wrote it 
 meself ; no one knows me hand, an' me writin's 
 the very moral o' yer own anyway : ye cVd make 
 twins o' thim." 
 
 Gerald could hardly repress a smile. The old 
 man continued to urge and entreat, but, as may be 
 imagined, without result. Finally he said : " Put 
 it back thin ; I'll 1'ave it till to-morrow. Maybe 
 I'll be well enough to do it meself by that time. I 
 won't kape ye here any longer, Masther Gerald. I 
 think I c'u'd doze a bit." 
 
 Gerald withdrew, promising to look in the first 
 thing in the morning ; and, having ascertained from 
 the woman of the house that Mr. Quinn was in 
 good hands, returned home. He could not help 
 
140 AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 
 
 laughing at the old man's attempt to sign his will 
 by proxy, but he was uneasy and anxious never- 
 theless. 
 
 The same evening Mr. Conley called upon him 
 and told him that his old friend had died in his 
 sleep, probably about an hour after Gerald had left 
 the bedside. "And do you know," added the 
 lawyer, "you came as near inheriting three hun- 
 dred thousand dollars as a man can come and not 
 get it?" 
 
 " How was that ? " asked Gerald, listlessly. 
 The news of Quinn's death, though not unex- 
 pected, had come upon him with the suddenness 
 of a shock, and affected him deeply. 
 
 " I'll tell you," said Mr. Conley. " It must be 
 six months ago that Quinn instructed me to draw 
 up his will. He left you everything, but from that 
 day to this he never would sign it." 
 
 " Why not?" asked Gerald. He readily guessed 
 the cause, but he was determined to keep the old 
 man's secret. 
 
 " Sometimes one reason, sometimes another. 
 When he met with this accident he sent for me 
 post-haste to bring the will. Did he sign ? Not a 
 bit of it. He was too weak, he said. I offered to 
 call in witnesses and fill in the signatures in his 
 
AN OLD MAN FROM THE OLD COUNTRY. 141 
 
 presence in the usual way. He became bitterly in- 
 dignant. * What, make me mark!' he said. 'I 
 never did that in me life, and I won't begin now.' 
 I was just leaving when you came in." 
 
 " Where will his money go ? " asked Gerald. 
 
 " Oh, to his relatives in Ireland, I suppose," said 
 the lawyer. " That kind of man always has 
 plenty." 
 
 The following Sunday there was a big funeral 
 an Irish funeral, with scores of carriages and un- 
 limited whiskey. Gerald Ffrench attended, and so 
 did Mr. Gerraghty Doctor Brown was in Sacra- 
 mento. Gerald's eyes were a little misty as the 
 earth fell on the coffin a very handsome coffin 
 with a silver plate. The old man had grown on 
 him wonderfully, and he missed him more than he 
 could have believed possible. 
 
 The contest over Luke Quinn's property is going 
 on still in the California courts. Every Quinn in 
 the State is represented by counsel, but flowers are 
 not often seen on the old man's grave. It is only 
 occasionally that Gerald Ffrench's Sunday stroll 
 takes him in the direction of Lone Mountain. 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS, 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 i. 
 
 " NOT another step, Dr. Lynn," said Gerald 
 Ffrench, stopping the old gentleman at the little 
 gate in the hedge which divided the Rectory lawn 
 from the churchyard, " I won't have you coming any 
 farther." 
 
 " My dear boy," returned the rector with a kindly 
 smile, " I am still in my own domain and I won't be 
 dictated to. Besides, the little walk will do me good. 
 I shall see you at least as far as the lower road." 
 
 The gate swung behind them and they threaded 
 the narrow path among the grave-stones. It was 
 an obscure little country burying-ground and very 
 ancient. The grass sprang luxuriant from the mol- 
 dering dust of three hundred years, for so long at 
 least had these few acres been consecrated to their 
 present purpose. Gerald stopped once or twice to 
 decipher, as far as the failing light of the January 
 
 10 
 
146 7WE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 afternoon would permit, the inscription on a stone 
 near the path. 
 
 " You won't find many new-comers/' observed 
 the rector. " A few of course : the years must 
 bring their changes, and you have been away let 
 me see " 
 
 " Six years," said Gerald, with a half sigh, as he 
 recalled the hopes that had withered, the ambitions 
 that had faded, the pleasures that had vanished, and 
 the residuum that had lingered from six years of ac- 
 tive, breathing life. And yet he was only twenty- 
 seven. 
 
 At twenty-one he had left the home-nest, behind 
 those trees which broke the horizon line in the north. 
 His wanderings had led him far afield. He had fall- 
 en into the whirring machinery of life, and the ma- 
 chinery had jarred and hurt him. Now he had come 
 home for a few weeks of rest and pleasure. He 
 knew it could not be for long, for he had, with in- 
 finite pains and labor, carved for himself a little 
 niche in the world's great gallery, and he could 
 not afford to leave it empty. In other words, he 
 was a young journalist, holding a good position on 
 a San Francisco daily paper, and he was enjoying 
 what was left of a three months' vacation in Ire- 
 land. And three weeks of that scanty remainder 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 147 
 
 would be consumed in travelling back to his duty. 
 All these reflections entered into the young man's 
 sigh and gave it a touch of pathos. 
 
 " Well, I won't go any farther," said Dr. Lynn, 
 halting at the boundary wall, spanned by a ladder- 
 like flight of wooden steps which connected the 
 churchyard with the little by-road. " I'll say good 
 evening, Gerald, and assure you I appreciate your 
 kindness in coming over to spend a long day with 
 a stupid old man." 
 
 " I would not hear thine enemy say that," quoted 
 Gerald with a light laugh. " I hope to spend 
 many another day as pleasantly before I turn my 
 back on old Ireland." He ran up the steps as he 
 spoke, and stood on the top of the wall looking 
 back to wave a last greeting before he descended. 
 Suddenly he stopped. 
 
 " What's that ? '' he asked, pointing down among 
 the graves. 
 
 The rector turned, but the tall grass and taller 
 nettles concealed from him the object, whatever it 
 might be, which Gerald had seen from his tem- 
 porary elevation. 
 
 " It looks like a coffin ;" and coming rapidly 
 down again the young man pushed his way through 
 the rank growth. The clergyman followed. 
 
148 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 In a little depression between the mounds of 
 two graves lay a plain coffin of stained wood. It 
 was closed, and an attempt to move it showed that 
 it was not empty. A nearer inspection revealed 
 that the lid was not screwed down in the usual 
 manner, but hastily fastened with nails. Dr. Lynn 
 and Gerald looked at each other. There was 
 something mysterious in the presence of this coffin 
 above ground. 
 
 " Has there been a funeral interrupted or any- 
 thing of that kind ? " asked Gerald. 
 
 " Nothing of the sort. I wish Bolan were here. 
 He might have something to say about it." 
 
 Bolan was the sexton. Gerald knew where he 
 lived within a stone's throw of the spot and 
 volunteered to fetch him. Dr. Lynn looked all 
 over the sinister black box, but no plate or mark of 
 any kind rewarded his search. Meanwhile young 
 Ffrench sped along the lower road to Bolan's 
 house. 
 
 The sexton was in, just preparing for a smoke in 
 company with the local blacksmith, when Gerald 
 entered with the news of the uncanny discovery in 
 the churchyard. Eleven young Bolans, grouped 
 around the turf-fire, drank in the intelligence and 
 instantly scattered to spread the report in eleven 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 149 
 
 different directions. A tale confided to the Bolan 
 household was confided to rumor. 
 
 Blacksmith and sexton rose together and accom- 
 panied Gerald to the spot where he had left Dr. 
 Lynn, but Dr. Lynn was no longer alone. The 
 rector had heard steps in the road ; it was a con- 
 stabulary patrol on its round, and the old gentle- 
 man's hail had brought two policemen to his side. 
 There they stood, profoundly puzzled and com- 
 pletely in the dark, except for the light given by 
 their bull's-eye lanterns. But the glare of these 
 lanterns had been seen from the road. Some peo- 
 ple shunned them, as lights in a graveyard should 
 always be shunned ; but others, hearing voices, had 
 suffered their curiosity to overcome their misgiv- 
 ings, and were gathered around, silent, open- 
 mouthed, wondering. So stood the group when 
 Gerald and his companions joined it. 
 
 In reply to general questions Bolan was dumb. 
 In reply to particular interrogations, he did not 
 hesitate to admit that he was " clane bate." Ger- 
 ald, seeing that no one had ventured to touch the 
 grim casket, hinted that it would be well to open 
 it. The crowd, which had been mostly collected 
 by the young Bolans, not finding such a feast of 
 horror as the highly-colored narratives of the sex- 
 
ISO THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 ton's family had led it to expect, appeared to favor 
 the suggestion. There was a dubious murmur and 
 a glance at the constables as the visible representa- 
 tives of the powers that be. The officers tightened 
 their belts and seemed undecided, and Dr. Lynn 
 took the lead with a clear, distinct order. " Take 
 off the lid, Andy," he said. 
 
 " An' why not ? Isn't his riverince a magis- 
 thrate ? Go in, Andy, yer sowl ye, and off wid it.' 5 
 Thus the crowd. 
 
 So encouraged, the blacksmith stepped forward. 
 Without much difficulty he burst the insecure 
 fastenings and removed the lid. The constables 
 turned their bull's eyes on the inside of the coffin. 
 The crowd pressed forward, Gerald in the front 
 rank. 
 
 There was an occupant. A young girl, white 
 with the pallor of death, lay under the light of the 
 lanterns. The face was as placid and composed as 
 if she had just fallen asleep, and it was a handsome 
 face, with regular features and strongly defined 
 black eyebrows. The form was fully dressed, and 
 the clothes seemed expensive and fashionable. A 
 few raven locks straggled out from beneath a lace 
 scarf, which was tied around the head. The hands 
 crossed beneath the breast were neatly gloved. 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 1 51 
 
 There she lay, a mystery, for not one of those pres- 
 ent had ever seen her face before. 
 
 Murmurs of wonder and sympathy went up from 
 the by-standers. " Ah, the poor, thing!" "Isn't 
 she purty ! " " So young, too ! " " Musha, it's the 
 beautiful angel she is be this time." 
 
 " Does anyone know her ? " asked the rector ; and 
 then, as there was no reply, he put a question that 
 was destined for many a day to agitate the neigh- 
 borhood of Drim and ring through the length 
 and breadth of Ireland : " How did she come 
 here?" 
 
 The investigation made at the moment was un- 
 satisfactory. The grass on all sides had by this 
 time been trampled and pressed down by the curious 
 throng, and such tracks as the coffin-bearers had 
 made were completely obliterated. It was clearly 
 a case for investigation by the coroner, and when 
 that official arrived and took charge, the crowd 
 slowly dispersed. 
 
 Gerald walked home immersed in thought. He 
 was late for dinner at Ballyvore Park, and his 
 brother and sister plied him with questions when 
 he explained the cause of his delay. But he could 
 not hazard even a conjecture in the way of explana- 
 tion. A dead girl had been found, and no one, 
 
152 THE LAST OF 7 WE COSTELLOS. 
 
 neither Dr. Lynn nor any one else, could tell who 
 she was or whence she came. 
 
 The inquest furnished no new light. Medical 
 testimony swept - away the theory of murder, for 
 death was proved to have resulted from organic dis- 
 ease of the heart. The coffin might have been found 
 at any time within thirty-six hours, for it could 
 not be shown that anyone had crossed the church- 
 yard path since the morning previous; indeed, 
 a dozen might have passed that way without seeing 
 that which Gerald had only discovered through the 
 accident of having looked back at the moment that 
 he mounted the wall. Still, it did not seem likely 
 that an object of such size could have lain long un- 
 noticed, and the doctors were of opinion that the 
 woman had been alive twenty-four hours before her 
 body was found. 
 
 In the absence of suspicion of any crime and the 
 medical examination furnished none interest cen- 
 tred in the question of identity; and this was suffi- 
 ciently puzzling. 
 
 The story got into the newspapers into the 
 Dublin papers afterward into the great London 
 journals, and was widely discussed under the title 
 of " The Drim Churchyard Mystery," but all this 
 publicity and a thorough investigation of the few 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 1 53 
 
 available clues led to nothing no one was missing ; 
 widely-distributed photographs of the deceased 
 found no recognition, and the quest was finally 
 abandoned, even in the immediate neighborhood. 
 The unknown slept beneath the very sod on which 
 they had found her. 
 
 Gerald Ffrench, who, like most good journalists, 
 had a strongly-developed detective instinct, alone 
 kept the mystery in mind, and worked at it inces- 
 santly. He devoted the few remaining weeks of his 
 stay in Ireland to a patient, systematic inquiry, 
 starting from the clews that had developed at the 
 inquest. He had provided himself with a good 
 photograph of the dead girl, and a minute, carefully- 
 written description of her apparel, from the lace 
 scarf which had been wound round her head, to the 
 dainty little French boots on her feet. These last 
 were Brussels-made, and stamped with the maker's 
 name. The jacket had come from a London furrier, 
 and the dress a plain black silk, but of fashionable 
 cut, and expensively trimmed was from one of the 
 great Paris shops the Magasin du Louvre. The 
 first examination had exhausted all these sources of 
 information without result. None of the tradesmen 
 in the three capitals indicated could remember to 
 whom they had sold these articles, especially as it 
 
154 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 was impossible to furnish an approximate limit of 
 time. Railway officials and hotel-keepers, supplied 
 with the photographs, could not say that they had 
 ever seen the original in life. Even the coffin a 
 cheap, ready-made affair could be traced to no 
 local dealer in such wares. A chatelaine bag, slung 
 around the waist of the dead girl, had evidently 
 been marked with initials, for the leather showed 
 the holes in which the letters had been fastened, 
 and the traces of the knife employed in their hurried 
 removal. But the pretty feminine trifle was empty 
 now, and in its present condition had nothing to 
 suggest, save that a determined effort had been 
 made to hide the identity of the dead. The linen 
 on the corpse was new and of good material, but 
 utterly without mark. Only a handkerchief, which 
 was found in the pocket, bore a coat-of-arms ex- 
 quisitely embroidered in the corner. The shield was 
 covered with a particular pattern in blue and white, 
 on which were three ornamental crosses in gold, and 
 above was displayed the head and shoulders of a 
 knight as a crest. Gerald, whose smattering of 
 heraldry told him so much, could not be sure that 
 the lines of the embroidery properly indicated the 
 colors of the shield, but he was sanguine that a 
 device so unusual would be recognized by the 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 155 
 
 learned in such matters ; and, having carefully 
 sketched it, he sent a copy to the Herald's College, 
 preserving the original drawing for his own use. 
 The handkerchief itself, with the other things found 
 on the body, was, of course, beyond his reach. 
 
 While awaiting an answer from the Herald's Col- 
 lege, young Ffrench was by no means idle. His 
 brother's dog-cart was at his service, and, in com- 
 pany with Larry, the groom, the young man made 
 an active canvass of the neighborhood. He was 
 far from satisfied with the way the local author- 
 ities had gone to work. In matters beyond his 
 scope in the inquiries that had been made in dis- 
 tant cities he was content to take the information 
 thus obtained, but it was not in this direction he 
 looked to find his clue. He built great hopes on 
 the embroidered handkerchief, and was astonished 
 when the coroner pooh-poohed it as a means of 
 identification. He also thought that the search for 
 the undertaker, who had supplied the last shelter 
 for the beautiful dead, had been too lightly given 
 over. He had a theory, of course ; what detec- 
 tive, professional or amateur, ever started on a quest 
 without one ? Gerald's theory was that the girl had 
 died suddenly, and her companions, probably for- 
 eigners, ignorant of the laws of the country and un- 
 
156 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 willing to be embarrassed by them, had procured a 
 coffin, and left the deceased for burial at the nearest 
 graveyard. This would argue that the woman had 
 died somewhere in the immediate vicinity, and it 
 was on this hypothesis that Gerald was working. 
 He considered that it would have been impossible 
 to convey the body for any considerable distance, 
 either by road or rail, without attracting attention, 
 and he could imagine no possible reason why any- 
 one should have attempted so troublesome a task, 
 If she had met a violent death, it might be another 
 matter ; but testimony at the inquest had been clear 
 on that point. 
 
 And so Edward Ffrench's tall chestnut horse, Shan 
 Van Vocht, whirled the light dog-cart over the 
 muddy Westmeath roads most days during Gerald's 
 last week or two in Ireland, and the young journal- 
 ist had ample opportunity during these excursions 
 to ponder over all the phases of his search in si- 
 lence, or to discuss them with Larry, the groom. 
 
 But it all led to nothing. If the coffin had been 
 procured in the vicinity, none of the local under- 
 takers would admit the transaction, and Gerald was 
 reduced to hope that the embroidery on the hand- 
 kerchief might supply the missing clew, and he 
 chafed inwardly as day after day went by with- 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 1 57 
 
 out bringing any answer from the Herald's Col- 
 lege. 
 
 It came at last, not very long before the ap- 
 proaching close of his vacation forced him to leave 
 Ireland. Gerald found the long-expected letter 
 awaiting him on his return from one of his fruitless 
 quests. Eagerly he tore it open, but what he read 
 only seemed to make the mystery deeper. 
 
 The arms had been readily recognized from his 
 sketch, and the college, in return for his fee, had 
 furnished him with an illuminated drawing, showing 
 that the embroidery had been accurate. The shield 
 was " vair, three cross crosslets in bend, or." Crest, 
 " a demi-knight ppr." Motto, " Nemo me impune 
 lacessit." The bearings and cognizance were those 
 of the noble family of Costello, which had left Ire- 
 land about the middle of the seventeenth century 
 and had settled in Spain. The last representative 
 had fallen some sixty years ago at the battle of Vi- 
 toria, in the Peninsular War, and the name was now 
 extinct. So pronounced the unimpeachable author- 
 ity of the Herald's College. 
 
 From this Gerald concluded that the handker- 
 chief had been marked by some one accustomed to 
 copy blazonries ; he thought it likely that the work 
 had been done in a French convent. 
 
158 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 And yet he had seen those very arms embroidered 
 on a handkerchief which had been found in the 
 pocket of a nameless girl, whose corpse he himself 
 had been the first to discover some two weeks be- 
 fore in the lonely little bury ing-ground at Drim. 
 What was he to think? Through what strange, 
 undreamed-of ramifications was this affair to be 
 pursued. 
 
 A few days before the date fixed for his depart- 
 ure, Ffrench walked over to the Rectory to say good- 
 by to Dr. Lynn. The old gentleman had christ- 
 ened Gerald as a baJDy, had lectured him as a boy, 
 and had been a good friend to him ever since, and 
 the young man was not ungrateful. But this time 
 his visit had an object beyond the ostensible one of 
 courtesy. Gerald knew that the rector was an au- 
 thority on county history, and thought it possible 
 that the old gentleman could tell him something 
 about the Costellos, a name linked with many a 
 Westmeath tradition. He was not disappointed, 
 and the mystery he was investigating took a new 
 interest from what he heard. The Costello had 
 been one of the midland chieftains in Cromwell's 
 time ; the clan had offered the most determined re- 
 sistance, and it had been extirpated, root and branch, 
 by the Protector. The estate of Ballyvore had once 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 1 59 
 
 formed portion of the Costello property, and had 
 been purchased by Gerald's ancestor from the 
 Cromwellian Puritan to whom it had been granted 
 on confiscation. 
 
 The young man was now deeply interested in 
 the inquiry, and to it he determined to devote every 
 moment of the time he could still call his own. 
 
 But the last week of the young journalist's visit 
 home slipped away without result, and one fine 
 morning Larry drove him into Athlone to take the 
 train for Queenstown. 
 
 " Ye'll not be lettin' another six years go by with- 
 out comin' home agen, will ye, sir ? " said the groom, 
 who was really concerned at Gerald's departure. 
 
 " I don't know, " answered Gerald ; " it all de- 
 pends. Say, Larry ! " 
 
 " Sir ! " 
 
 " Keep an eye out, and if anything turns up 
 about that dead girl let me know, won't you ? " 
 Ffrench had already made a similar request of his 
 brother, but he was determined to leave no chance 
 untried. 
 
 " An' are ye thinkin' o' that yet, an* you goin' to 
 America ? " asked Larry, with admiring wonder. 
 
 " Of course I'm thinking of it. I can't get it out 
 of my head," said Gerald, impatiently. 
 
160 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 " Well, well, d'ye mind that, now ? " remarked 
 the groom, meditatively. " Well, sir, if anything 
 does turn up, I'll let ye know, never fear ; but sure 
 she's under ground now, an' if we'd been goin' to 
 larn anything about the matter we'd ha' had it 
 weeks ago." 
 
 Gerald shook hands with the faithful Larry at 
 parting, and left a sovereign in his palm. 
 
 The groom watched the train moving slowly out 
 of the station, then he spun the coin in the air, 
 caught it, and spat on it " for luck," as he explained 
 to himself. When the train was out of sight, he 
 climbed back into the dog-cart and shook the reins 
 over Shan Van Vocht's chestnut back. 
 
 " It's a mortial pity to see a fine young jintleman 
 like that so far gone in love with a dead girl." 
 
 This was Larry's comment on his young master's 
 detective tastes. 
 
 Meanwhile Gerald Ffrench, speeding southward 
 through the varied scenery of Munster, was taking 
 himself seriously to task. 
 
 " I must drop all this nonsense," he reflected, " or 
 I won't be fit for work again when I get back. It 
 is a mystery, and it has baffled me. Well, lots of 
 mysteries are never solved, and I suppose this will 
 be one of them. I must think of something else. 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. l6l 
 
 I wonder if the 'Frisco boys will be glad to see me 
 when I turn up again ;" and so, being in a smoking 
 carriage, he lit his pipe, and gradually forced his 
 mind into other channels. 
 
 At Queenstown he bought a paper and looked 
 over it while the tender was carrying him in 
 company with many a weeping emigrant to the 
 great steamer out in the bay. From time to time 
 the journals still contained references to the subject 
 which was uppermost in Gerald's thoughts. The 
 familiar words, "The Drim Churchyard Mystery" 
 caught his eye, and he read a brief paragraph, which 
 had nothing to say except that all investigations 
 had failed to throw any light on the strange busi- 
 ness. 
 
 " Ay, and will fail," mused Ffrench as the tender 
 came alongside the steamer, "at any rate, if any- 
 thing is found out it won't be by me, for I shall be 
 in California, and I can scarcely run across any clews 
 there." 
 
 And yet, as Gerald paced the deck and watched 
 the bleak shores of Cork fading in the distance, his 
 thoughts were full of the banished Costellos, and 
 he wondered with what eyes those exiles had 
 looked their last on the old Head of Kinsale a 
 
 quarter of a millennium ago. Those fierce chieftains, 
 n 
 
1 62 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 to whom the Ffrenches, proud county family as 
 they esteemed themselves, were but as mushrooms ; 
 what lives had they lived, what deaths had they 
 died, and how came their haughty cognizance, so 
 well expressing its defiant motto, on the handker- 
 chief of the nameless stranger who slept in Drim 
 Churchyard Drim, the old, old graveyard Drim 
 that had been fenced in as God's acre in the days 
 of the Costellos themselves. Was it mere chance 
 that had selected this spot as the last resting-place 
 of one who bore the arms of the race ? Was it 
 possible the girl had shared the Costello blood ? 
 
 Gerald glanced over his letter from the Herald's 
 College and shook his head. The family had been 
 extinct for more than sixty years. 
 
 II. 
 
 GERALD FFRENCH went back into harness on his 
 arrival in San Francisco more readily than he had. 
 anticipated. He liked his work and returned to it 
 refreshed from his three months' vacation. He 
 found it easy to relegate the jolly days in hunt- 
 ing-field or at cover-side to their proper place in his 
 life mere pleasant memories to be talked over 
 with the companions of the hour of idleness and 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 163 
 
 dismissed at the call of duty. It was more difficult 
 to banish recollections of Drim churchyard and 
 what he had found there, and this subject, though 
 Gerald kept it to himself, was often present in his 
 thoughts, and filled much of his leisure time with 
 the purposeless speculation it engendered. Pur- 
 poseless, because he had exhausted conjecture dur- 
 ing the long journey over ocean and continent, and 
 there was scarcely a theory, possible or impossible, 
 which he had not mentally tested and dismissed. 
 Still the grim riddle and its hidden solution exer- 
 cised a fascination upon the young man which he 
 strove in vain to resist. Often, in the solitude of 
 his own room, he would enliven the pipe he was 
 accustomed to smoke before retiring by producing 
 from his desk the only tangible evidence which this 
 baffling case had left in his hands the photograph 
 of the dead girl and the illuminated shield he had re- 
 ceived from the Herald's College. These he would 
 lay before him, while he went step by step over the 
 whole of the strange story with which they were 
 connected. He opened every letter that he received 
 from home with a vague hope that something new 
 might have come to light. But there was never 
 even a reference to the mystery. The whole mat- 
 ter had evidently dropped from the gossip of the 
 
1 64 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 country side, and the old burying-ground at Drim 
 shrouded its secret well. 
 
 About two months after Gerald's return to Cali- 
 fornia a despatch was received from the " Evening 
 Mail's " regular correspondent in Marysville, relat- 
 ing the particulars of an encounter between the 
 Mexican holders of a large ranch in Yuba County 
 and certain American land-grabbers, who had set up 
 a claim to a portion of the estate. The matter was 
 in course of adjudication in the Marysville courts, 
 but the claimants, impatient at the slow process of 
 the law, had endeavored to seize the disputed land 
 by force. Shots had been fired, blood had been 
 spilled, and the whole affair added nothing to Yuba 
 County's reputation for law and order. The matter 
 created some talk in San Francisco, and the " Even- 
 ing Mail," among other papers, expressed its opinion 
 in one of those trenchant personal articles which are 
 the spice of Western journalism. Two or three days 
 later, when the incident had been almost forgotten 
 in the office, the city editor sent for Gerald Ffrench. 
 
 " Ffrench," said that gentleman as the young man 
 approached his desk, " I've just received a letter 
 from Don Miguel y y - something or other. I 
 can't read his whole name, and it don't much mat- 
 ter. It's Vincenza, you know, the owner of that 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 1 65 
 
 ranch where they had the shooting scrape the other 
 day. He is anxious to make a statement of the 
 matter for publication, and has come down to the 
 Bay on purpose. Suppose you go and see what he 
 has to say ? He's staying at the Lick." 
 
 The same morning Gerald sent up his card, and 
 was ushered into the apartment of Don Miguel Vin- 
 cenza, at the Lick House. 
 
 The Seftor was a young man, not much older 
 than Gerald himself. He had the appearance and 
 manners of a gentleman, as Ffrench quickly discov- 
 ered, and he spoke fluent, well-chosen English with 
 scarcely a trace of accent, a circumstance for which 
 the interviewer felt he could not be sufficiently 
 grateful. 
 
 " Ah, you are from the ' Evening Mail,' " said the 
 young Spaniard, rising as Gerald entered ; " most 
 kind of you to come, and to come so promptly. 
 Won't you be seated ? Try a cigar ? No ? You'll 
 excuse me if I light a cigarette. I want to make 
 myself clear, and I'm always clearest when I'm in a 
 cloud." He gave a little laugh, and with one twirl 
 of his slender fingers he converted a morsel of tis- 
 sue paper and a pinch of tobacco into a compact 
 roll, which he lighted and exhausted in half a 
 dozen puffs, as he spoke. 
 
1 66 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 u This man this Jenkinson's claim is perfectly 
 preposterous," he began, " but I won't go into that. 
 The matter is before the courts. What I want to 
 give you is a true statement of that unfortunate 
 affair at the ranch ; with which I beg you to believe 
 I had nothing whatever to do." 
 
 Seflor Vincenza's tale might have had the merit 
 of truth ; it certainly lacked that of brevity. He 
 talked on rolling a fresh cigarette at every second 
 sentence and Gerald made notes of such points as 
 he considered important, but at the conclusion of 
 the Spaniard's statement the journalist could not 
 see that it differed from the published accounts, and 
 he told the other as much. 
 
 " Well, you see," said Vincenza, " I am in a deli- 
 cate position. It is not as if I were acting for my- 
 self. I am only my sister's agent my half-sister's 
 I should say poor little Catalina " and the 
 speaker broke off with a sigh and rolled a fresh 
 cigarette before he resumed. " It's her property, all 
 of it, and I cannot bear to have her misrepresented 
 in any way." 
 
 " I understand," said Gerald making a note of the 
 fact. " The property, I suppose, passed to your sis- 
 ter from " 
 
 " From her father. I was in the land of the liv- 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 167 
 
 ing some years before he met, and wooed, and won 
 my widowed mother. They are both dead now 
 and Catalina has none but myself to look out for 
 her except distant relatives on the father's side, 
 who will inherit the property if she dies unmarried 
 and whom she cordially detests." 
 
 Gerald was not particularly romantic, but the idea 
 of this fair young Spaniard, owner of one of the 
 finest ranches in Yuba County, unmarried, and hand- 
 some, too, if she were anything like her brother, in- 
 flamed his imagination a little. He shook'hands 
 cordially with the young man, as he rose to go, and 
 could not help wishing they were better acquainted. 
 
 " You may be sure I will publish your statement 
 exactly as you have given it to me, and as fully 
 as possible," said Gerald. Before the young heir- 
 ess had been mentioned the journalist had scarcely 
 seen material enough in the interview for a para- 
 graph. 
 
 It is fair to presume that Sefior Vincenza was 
 satisfied with the treatment he received in the 
 " Evening Mail," for a polite note conveyed to 
 Ffrench the expression of his thanks. 
 
 So that incident passed into the limbo of for- 
 getfulness, though Gerald afterward took more in- 
 terest in the newspaper paragraphs, often scant 
 
1 68 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 enough, which told of the progress of the great 
 land case in the Marysville courts. 
 
 A curt despatch, worded with that exasperating 
 brevity which is a peculiarity of all but the most 
 important telegrams, wound up the matter with 
 an announcement that a decision had been reached 
 in favor of the defendant, and that Mr. Isaac Hall, 
 of the law firm of Hall & McGowan, had returned 
 to San Francisco, having conducted the case to a 
 successful issue. Gerald was pleased to hear that 
 the young lady had been sustained in her rights, 
 and determined to interview Mr. Hall, with whom 
 he was well acquainted. Accordingly, after two or 
 three unsuccessful attempts, he managed to catch 
 the busy lawyer with half an hour's spare time on 
 his hands, and well enough disposed to welcome 
 his young friend. 
 
 " Mr. Hall," said Gerald, dropping into the spare 
 chair in the attorney's private room, " I want to ask 
 you a few questions about that Marysville land case." 
 
 " Fire ahead, my boy ; I can give you twenty 
 minutes," answered the lawyer, who was disposed 
 to make a great deal more of the victory he had 
 won than the newspapers had hitherto done, and 
 who was consequently by no means averse from an 
 interview. " What do you want to know ? " 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 169 
 
 " Hard fight, wasn't it ? " began the journalist. 
 
 " Yes," replied Mr. Hall, " tough in a way ; but 
 we had right on our side as well as possession. A 
 good lawyer ought always to win when he has those ; 
 to beat law and facts and everything else is harder 
 scratching ; though I've done that too," and the old 
 gentleman chuckled as if well satisfied with him- 
 self. 
 
 " That's what your opponents had to do here, 
 I suppose," remarked Gerald, echoing the other's 
 laugh. 
 
 " Pretty much, only they didn't do it," said the 
 lawyer. 
 
 " I met Vincenza when he was down last month," 
 pursued Gerald. " He seems a decentish sort of a 
 fellow for a greaser." 
 
 " He's no greaser ; he's a pure-blooded Castilian, 
 and very much of the gentleman," answered Hall. 
 
 " So I found him," assented Gerald. " I only 
 used the < greaser ' as a generic term. He talks Eng- 
 lish as well as I do." 
 
 " That's a great compliment from an Irishman," 
 observed Mr. Hall, with another chuckle. 
 
 " I suppose the sister's just as nice in her own 
 way," went on Gerald, seeing an opportunity to 
 satisfy a certain curiosity he had felt about the 
 
1 70 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 heiress since he first heard of her existence. " Did 
 she make a good witness ? " 
 
 "Who ? What sister ? What the deuce are you 
 talking about ? " asked the lawyer. 
 
 " Why, Vincenza's sister, half-sister, whatever she 
 is. I understood from him that she was the real 
 owner of the property." 
 
 " Oh, ay, to be sure," said Mr. Hall, slowly ; 
 " these details escape one. Vincenza was my 
 client ; he acts for the girl under power of attorney, 
 and really her name has hardly come up since the 
 very beginning of the case." 
 
 " You didn't see her, then ?" asked Gerald, con- 
 scious of a vague sense of disappointment. 
 
 " See her ! " repeated the lawyer. " No ; how 
 could I ? She's in Europe for educational advan- 
 tages ; at a convent somewhere, I believe." 
 
 " Oh," exclaimed Gerald, " a child, is she ? I had 
 fancied, I don't know why, that she was a grown-up 
 young lady." 
 
 " I couldn't tell you what her age is, but it must 
 be over twenty-one, or she couldn't have executed 
 the power of attorney ; and that was looked into at 
 the start, and found to be quite regular." 
 
 " Rather late in the day to be going in for educa- 
 tion, isn't it ? " remarked Gerald. 
 
THE LAST OF THE COST EL LOS. \Tl 
 
 " Not at all," answered the lawyer. " What op- 
 portunities could she have had in Yuba County ? 
 Indeed, now I think of it, the girl must be about 
 two-and-twenty, for they went to Europe last year, 
 and she waited till she was of age and able to ar- 
 range her affairs personally before she would start." 
 
 " I see," said Gerald, slowly ; but the topic had 
 started Mr. Hall on a fresh trail, and he broke in : 
 
 " And preciously they must have arranged them. 
 Do you know we came within an ace of losing, all 
 through their confounded careless way of keeping 
 their papers ? " 
 
 " How did they keep them ? " inquired Gerald, 
 listlessly. The suit appeared to be a commonplace 
 one, and the young man's interest began to wane. 
 
 " They didn't keep them at all," exclaimed Mr. 
 Hall, indignantly. " Fancy, the original deed 
 the old Spanish grant the very keystone of our 
 case, was not to be found till the last moment, and 
 then only by the merest accident ; and where do 
 you suppose it was ? " 
 
 " I haven't an idea," replied Gerald, stifling a yawn. 
 
 "At the back of an old print of the Madonna. 
 It had been framed and hung up, as an ornament, I 
 suppose, heaven knows when ; and by and by some 
 smart Aleck came along and thought the Mother 
 
1/2 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 and Child superior as a work of art, and slapped it 
 into the frame over the deed, and there it has hung 
 for ten years, anyhow." 
 
 " That's really very curious," said Gerald, whose 
 attention began to revive as he saw a possible col- 
 umn to be compiled on the details of the case that 
 had seemed so uninteresting to his contemporaries. 
 
 " Curious ! I call it sinful positively wicked," 
 cried the old gentleman, wrathfully. " Just fancy 
 $200,000 hanging on the accident of finding a parch- 
 ment in such a place as that." 
 
 " How did you happen to find it ? " asked Gerald. 
 " I should never have thought of looking for it there." 
 
 " No, nor any other sane man, 5 ' sputtered the law- 
 yer, irritated as he recalled the anxiety the missing 
 deed had caused him. " It was found by accident, 
 I tell you. Some blundering, awkward, heaven- 
 guided servant knocked the picture down and broke 
 the frame. The Madonna was removed, and the 
 missing paper came to light." 
 
 " And that was the turning-point of the case ? 
 Very interesting, indeed," mused Gerald, who saw 
 in the working out of this legal romance a bit of de- 
 tective writing such as his soul loved. " I suppose 
 they'll have sense enough to put it in a safer place 
 next time." 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 1/3 
 
 " I will, you may bet your life. I've taken charge 
 of all the family documents, and if they get away 
 from me they'll do something that nothing's ever 
 done before," and the old lawyer chuckled with re- 
 newed satisfaction as he pointed to the massive safe 
 in a corner of the office. 
 
 " So the deed is there, is it ? " asked Gerald, fol- 
 lowing Mr. Hall's eyes. 
 
 " Yes, it's there. A curious old document, too ; 
 one of the oldest grants I have ever come across. 
 Would you like to see it ? " and the lawyer rose and 
 opened the safe. 
 
 It was a curious old document, drawn up in 
 curious old Spanish, on an old, discolored piece of 
 parchment. The body of the instrument was unin- 
 telligible to Ffrench, but down in one corner was 
 something that riveted his attention in a moment, 
 and seemed to make his heart stand still. 
 
 There was a signature in old-fashioned, angular 
 hand-writing, " Roderiguez Costello y Ugarte," and 
 opposite it a large, spreading seal. The impression 
 showed a knight's head and shoulders in full armor, 
 and below it the shield, vair, with three cross cross- 
 lets, or ; and the motto : 
 
 "Nemo me impune lacessit." 
 
1/4 THE LAST OF THE COSTRLLOS. 
 
 Point for point the identical blazonry which Ffrench 
 had received from the Herald's College in England ; 
 the shield that he had first seen embroidered on the 
 dead girl's handkerchief at Drim. 
 
 " What's the matter with you ? Didn't you ever 
 see an old Spanish deed before, or has it any of the 
 properties of a Medusa's head ? " inquired Mr. Hall, 
 noticing Gerald's start of amazement and intent 
 scrutiny of the seal. 
 
 " I've seen these arms before," said the young 
 
 man, slowly. " But the name " he placed his 
 
 finger on the signature. " Of course I knew Vin- 
 cenza's name must be different from his half-sister's ; 
 but is that her's?" 
 
 " Ugarte ? Yes," replied the lawyer, glancing at 
 the parchment. 
 
 "I mean the whole name," and Gerald pointed 
 again. 
 
 " Costello ! " Mr. Hall gave the word its Spanish 
 pronunciation Costelyo and it sounded strange 
 and foreign in the young man's ears. " Costello, 
 yes, I suppose so, but I don't try to keep track of 
 more of these Spaniards' titles than is absolutely 
 necessary." 
 
 " But Costello is an Irish name," said Gerald. 
 
 " Is it ? You ought to know. Well, Costelyo 's 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 1 7$ 
 
 Spanish ; and now, my dear boy, I must positively 
 turn you out. I have just half an hour for my clerk 
 to fill me full before I attend a reference." 
 
 Gerald went straight home without returning to 
 the office. He unlocked his desk and took from it 
 the two results of his first essay in detective craft. 
 Silently he laid them side by side and scrutinized 
 each closely in turn. The pale, set face of the 
 beautiful dead, as reproduced by the photographer's 
 art, told him nothing. He strove to trace some 
 resemblance, to awaken some memory by long 
 gazing at the passionless features, but it was in vain. 
 Then he turned to the illuminated shield. Every 
 line was familiar to him, and a glance sufficed. It 
 was identical in all respects with the arms on the 
 seal. Of this he had been already convinced, and 
 his recollection had not betrayed him. Then he 
 placed the two the piteous photograph and the 
 proud blazonry in his pocket-book, and left the 
 room. He went straight to the office of the " Even- 
 ing Mail " and requested a week's leave of absence. 
 This was obtained, not without some difficulty and 
 a few sharp words ; but it was obtained, which was 
 all Ffrench cared about. The same evening he 
 took his place on the Sacramento train en route 
 for Marysville. 
 
1/ THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 III. 
 
 IT is a long eighteen miles from the capital of 
 Yuba County to the village of San Luis, near 
 which, as Gerald ascertained, the Ugarte ranch is 
 situated. There was no public conveyance to the 
 village, but Gerald found little difficulty in obtain- 
 ing a team at a Marysville livery stable, pledging his 
 word and his credentials as an " Evening Mail " cor- 
 respondent for its safe return. With minute instruc- 
 tions as to his route, which resolved themselves 
 into a direction to leave Marysville by the south 
 and keep the straight track till it went no farther, 
 he started. The drive, as a drive, was far from en- 
 joyable. It was near the close of the long, dry 
 California summer, and the red dust lay inches 
 thick in the road, whirling up in blinding clouds 
 under the horses' feet, and settling on the traveller's 
 garments, in his hair, in his eyes, with an intrusive 
 persistence. Every bush by the way bore on arid 
 branches a burden of offensive particles. Gerald 
 was compelled to cough the dust out of his throat 
 and rub it from his eyes at least a dozen times for 
 every mile of that weary journey, and the level red 
 track stretched for six long leagues across the 
 parched tule lands of Yuba. 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. IJJ 
 
 It was growing dusk as young Ffrench drove into 
 San Luis. The village consisted of a plaza, four 
 rows of irregularly built houses, with wide intervals 
 between them, all 'fronting on a large dusty square. 
 The buildings were of wood, some painted a star- 
 ing white, some displaying the natural tints of the 
 discolored timber. There might have been two 
 score of them in all. One, dignified by a broad 
 veranda, was labelled " Hotel," and, on the opposite 
 side of the plaza, above a door, swung a rudely 
 painted sign, representing two drunken men endeav- 
 oring to .support one another, with the legend be- 
 low, " Los Dos Amigos." This was evidently the 
 liquor shop of the place, for its windows were 
 adorned with whiskey labels and brewery chromos. 
 There was not much sign of life in the square ; a 
 few men lounged about or sat smoking on the sides 
 of a large horse-trough which, surmounted by a 
 pump, occupied the centre. They seemed indolent 
 and indifferent, and took little notice of Gerald as 
 he pulled up in a cloud of dust and tried to single 
 out some one to question. 
 
 " Can you tell me whereabouts is the Ugarte 
 ranch ? " asked Gerald, choosing a man who stood, 
 hands in pockets, leaning against the pump. " It's 
 somewhere near here, isn't it ? " 
 
 12 
 
1 78 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 " Tends on what yer call near," said the individual 
 addressed, bringing one hand and a huge twist of to- 
 bacco into sight. He gnawed a piece from the mass 
 and then cast a critical eye over Gerald's equipage. 
 " Ye've come a right smart piece I'm thinking?" 
 
 " From Marysville," answered Ffrench. 
 
 " Ay, them plugs shows it," remarked the man, 
 and relapsed into silence. 
 
 " Can't you tell me where the Ugarte ranch is ? " 
 repeated Gerald, after a moment's silence. 
 
 " Who'd yer wan ter see there ? Yincenza ? " 
 asked the other. 
 
 It was at the tip of Gerald's tongue to tell the 
 fellow to mind his own business, but he restrained 
 himself. 
 
 " Yes, Vincenza," he answered. 
 
 " Wai, let's see ! Yer take that there road run- 
 ning out by the corner, and keep the sun at yer 
 back till yer get ter the foot of the mesa " 
 
 " How far is it ? " interrupted Gerald, to whom 
 this elaborate direction suggested distance. 
 
 " Matter o' twelve miles," replied the other, indif- 
 ferently. 
 
 Ffrench cast a look of despair at his weary 
 horses. It was evidently impossible to take them 
 much further, and besides, night was falling. 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 179 
 
 " Twelve miles ! " he said. " I'll have to wait till 
 to-morrow." 
 
 "Ay, do, stranger," cried the other, brightening 
 up into a faint show of interest. " Put yer team 
 up at the livery stable, get a shake-down for your- 
 self at the hotel, and come over to Los Dos Ami- 
 gos after supper. I'll scare yer up a game of monte, 
 or something to keep yer amoosed, or I'll bust try- 
 ing." 
 
 Without committing himself to any acknowl- 
 edgment of this hospitable proposition, Gerald 
 drove slowly across the plaza toward the stable. 
 A horsy looking young fellow, who stood before 
 the entrance chewing a straw, came forward and, to 
 Ffrench's intense astonishment, accosted him by 
 name, and in the broad, familiar dialect of-Western 
 Leinster. 
 
 " May I never ate another bit if it isn't Masther 
 Gerald Ffrench," he said. "Well, well, well, but 
 it's good for sore eyes to see ye. Come out here, 
 Steve, and take the team. Jump down, Masther 
 Gerald, an' stretch yer legs a bit. It's kilt ye are 
 entirely." 
 
 A swarthy little Mexican appeared as Gerald 
 alighted and led the tired horses into the stable. 
 Then the young journalist took a good look at the 
 
ISO THE LAST OF THE COS7"ELLOS. 
 
 man who seemed to know him so well, and endeav- 
 ored, as the phrase goes, to " place him." 
 
 The face seemed familiar a sharp, thin, close- 
 shaven face, with small, gray eyes, and bushy, black 
 brows, and about the cheeks and chin that peculiar 
 blue tint which is the silent protest of a banished 
 beard. He felt he had seen the man more than 
 once, but where, or when, or under what circum- 
 stances he could not for the moment determine. 
 The other did not leave him long in doubt. 
 
 " Ye don't mind me, yer honor, an' how wud ye ? 
 But I mind yerself well. Sure it's often I druv ye 
 and Mr. Edward, too. I used to wurruk for Mr. 
 Ross, o' Mullingar. I was Denny, the post-boy 
 Dennis Driscoll, yer honor ; sure ye must know me." 
 
 "Oh, yes, to be sure; I remember," said Gerald, 
 as recollection slowly dawned upon him. "But 
 who'd have thought of finding you in a place like 
 this ? I didn't even know you had left Ross's sta- 
 bles." 
 
 " Six, sivin months ago, yer honor." 
 
 " And have you been here ever since ? I hope 
 you are doing well," asked Gerald. 
 
 " Iver since, sor ; an' doin' finely, wid the blessin' 
 o' God. I own that place," pointing to the stable, 
 " an' four as good turnouts as ye'd ax to sit behind." 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. l8l 
 
 " I'm glad of it," cried Gerald, heartily. " I like 
 to hear of the boys from the old neighborhood do- 
 ing well." 
 
 " Won't ye step inside, sor, and thry a dhrop o' 
 something ? ye must be choked intirely wid the 
 dust." 
 
 "I don't care if I do," answered Gerald. " I feel 
 pretty much as if I'd swallowed a lime-kiln." 
 
 A minute later the two were seated in Denny's 
 own particular room, where Gerald washed the dust 
 from, his throat with some capital bottled beer, 
 while his host paid attention to a large demijohn, 
 which contained, as he informed the journalist in an 
 impressive whisper, " close on to a gallon o' the raal 
 ould stuff." 
 
 " And how did you get such a start ? " inquired 
 Gerald, with some curiosity. " I didn't even know 
 you were going to America, and I think you drove 
 me once at least while I was at home last winter." 
 
 " I did, sor ; an' it's little I thought o' goin' to 
 Ameriky thin, an' as for this little contimptuous 
 place, I'd niver heerd tell of it. It's a quare 
 story." 
 
 " Suppose you tell it me," said Gerald, pouring 
 out a fresh supply of beer. 
 
 The other held the demijohn in an affectionate 
 
1 82 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 embrace, as though it were a valued friend, while he 
 tilted a fair amount of whiskey into his glass. 
 
 " A quare story," repeated Denny ; " an' if I was 
 in ould Ireland, divil an open wud I open me 
 mouth about it ; but here, in these outlandish parts, 
 what odds does it make ? There was a foreign 
 jintleman thravellin' in Ireland last winter" 
 
 " Was his name Vincenza ? " inquired Gerald, 
 starting from his seat as the possibilities of the com- 
 ing revelation were borne in upon him. 
 
 " That was his name,'' answered Denny, " though 
 I didn't know it at the time. Is yer honor ac- 
 quainted wid him ? " 
 
 " Yes no I have met him," said Gerald, angry 
 at himself at haying allowed the exclamation to es- 
 cape him. " But what has he to do with your being 
 here?" 
 
 " Everything," answered Denny, with a grin. 
 " He's a great rich jintleman an' owns all the land 
 round here for moiles. He brot me up here wid 
 him, an' bought me these turnouts an' set me up in 
 business." 
 
 " That was very kind of him," commented Gerald ; 
 " it isn't every gentleman you drive does as much 
 for you." 
 
 " It isn't ivery jintleman I dhrive puts as quare a 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 183 
 
 job on me as he done. Now, listen, Masther 
 Gerald, an' tell me what ye think o' this." Denny 
 moistened his lips with a few drops of the " ould 
 stuff," cleared his throat, and proceeded. " The jin- 
 tleman Mr. Vincenza, as I know him to be now 
 was thravellin' wid his sister, as purty a young lady 
 as iver I seen, an' they cum to Mullingar on the 
 evenin' thrain from Dublin, last January it was. I 
 was at the station wid Mr. Ross's close carriage, for 
 it was a rainy night, waitin' for any fare I might 
 pick up off o' the train. Mr. Vincenza comes up to 
 me an' he sez, sez he, ' D'ye know where Drim is, 
 me boy ?' ' Why not, sir ? ' sez I, as why shouldn't 
 I. Wid that he wint back and brot the young lady 
 out o' the station. She was donny and wakely, it 
 seemed, an' she kept a lanin' on his arrum. The 
 two were colloquin' together in some foreign lingo 
 I knew nothing about, but it was plain to be seen 
 that she was hell-bent to go to Drim, an' he wanted 
 to stay in Mullingar that night. Well, to mek a 
 long story short, she had her way, and they got into 
 the carriage, he helpin' her, for he was mighty tinder 
 of her. I started an' druv along middlin' aisy, an' 
 whin I was about a mile on t'other side o' Kinnegad 
 I heerd some one callin' to me out o' the carriage, 
 * Stop, dhriver, stop ! ' so I pulled up and the jintle- 
 
1 84 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 man opened the dure and got out. Sez he, ' Get 
 down driver,' sez he, ' me sister's tuk very bad.' 
 That's the way I come to know she was his sister. 
 Before that I tuk thim for husban' an' wife. Well, 
 she was mortial bad, surely wake an' faint, an' roll- 
 in' her eyes terrible. I'd unhooked wan o' the car- 
 riage lamps an' held it for light. Well, to mek a 
 long story short, she died thin an' there, an' I was 
 that scared I didn't know which side o' me was up- 
 permost. The jintleman tuk on terrible, an' kissed 
 her dead face, an' called her all sorts o' soft names in 
 his foreign lingo. At last he straightens up, an' he 
 sez to me, ' Dhriver,' sez he, 'this is a bad business.' 
 * Ye're right, sir, it is,' sez I. ' I was afraid of some- 
 thin' like this,' sez he, ' she had heart disease an' it's 
 killed her.' ' It's a mortial pity thin, sir,' sez I, for 
 her face was as calm and paceful as an angel's, an' 
 she luked beautiful in the lamp-light. Wid that he 
 fell to cryin' an' kissin' her agen, an' then he sez, sez 
 he, ' D'ye know of any undertaker in the neighbor- 
 hood where we cud git a coffin for the poor thing ? ' 
 sez he. c I do sir,' sez I ; for I thought o' Fergus 
 Farrell, just outside o' the town o' Kinnegad, not 
 half a mile from where we was that minit." 
 
 "Fergus Farrell!" interrupted Gerald. "Did 
 you get that coffin from him ? " 
 
THE' LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 185 
 
 "We did that, sor; from no one else." 
 " The confounded liar," muttered Ffrench, for the 
 aforesaid Farrell was one of those whom he had 
 cross-questioned in his canvass of the Westmeath 
 undertakers ; but Denny's story had reached an in- 
 teresting point, so Gerald only spared time for a sin- 
 gle malediction, and then urged the other to proceed. 
 "We found Farrell, sir, an', after a bit of a talk 
 betune the foreign jintleman an' himself, a coffin 
 was brot out an' the young lady was put in it. The 
 jintleman tuk his knife an' ripped somethin' off the 
 bag she wore at her side, and then Farrell nailed the 
 coffin down. It 'ud do full as well, he said, an' it 
 'ud take a long time to screw it. Then the jintle- 
 man gave Fergus money a whole fistfuL o' notes 
 an' I thought it was a big price for a coffin, but I 
 sed nothin'. They put it on the dhrivin sate, be- 
 case they cudn't get it inside. I didn't like it 
 much, but the jintleman sed I should be well ped 
 and so, you see, I was. ' Where to now, sir,' sez I. 
 1 To Drim Churchyard,' sez he, an' off I went. I 
 thought it was mighty quare, the whole thing, but 
 it was the best o' me play to say nothin'. Whin 
 we got to Drim, I druv in be the lower road ; it was 
 close onto midnight be that time, an' we lifted the 
 coffin over the wall where the steps is, an' set it 
 
1 86 THE LAST OF THE COS TELL OS. 
 
 among the grass a little back. Then the jintleman 
 knelt down by it in the wet and done a little 
 prayin', I judge, and he got up an' sez, ' She'll rest 
 there where she wished to rest,' and then we went 
 back to the carriage. 'Aren't ye goin' to bury her, 
 sir,' sez I. ' No,' he sez, ' others must do that. I 
 have no time,' an' wid that he climbed up on the 
 box nixt to me, though it was pourin' rain. 'Back 
 to Mullingar,' he sez, an' away we druv. Well, the 
 whole way he was tellin' me what an' illegant place 
 Ameriky is, an' how he was goin' straight back, an' 
 wouldn't I like to come. There was no end to what 
 he was goin' to do for me. He swore a big oath 
 there was nothin' wrong in this night's wurruk, that 
 he loved his sister better nor his life, an' that he'd 
 done all he had done becase it was her last wish. 
 Well, to mek a long story short, before we got to 
 Mullingar I was hot to go back wid him to Ameriky. 
 He said we must start at wanst, but that med no 
 odds to me, for I'd none belongin' to me. Well, he 
 got off at the railway station, an' towld me to come 
 to him there as soon as I'd druv back the carriage; 
 an' he ped a good price for his dhrive. Well, I guv 
 in the carriage, and towld the masther that I was 
 goin' away for a few days, an' then I kem to the 
 station. We tuk the early mornin' thrain for Ath- 
 
THE LAST OF THE COST ELL OS. l8/ 
 
 lone, an' from that down to Queenstown, where 
 we caught the steamer the very same day. An' I'm 
 doin' well here, an' have niver regritted comin'." 
 
 " A very curious story, indeed, Denny," said Ger- 
 ald. " Do you remember what day of the week all 
 this happened ? " 
 
 " I do sir, for it was a Tuesday night we left the 
 young lady in Drim, an' we tuk the Wednesday's 
 'steamer at Queenstown." 
 
 " So," reflected Gerald, " they were on the broad 
 Atlantic when I saw the coffin among the grass that 
 Wednesday evening." 
 
 " Denny," resumed Ffrench, after a short silence, 
 during which he had written a few lines on his card, 
 "couldn't your helper what do you call him ?" 
 
 " I call him Steve, sor, for short, but his real 
 name is Stefano." 
 
 " Well, couldn't he ride over to the Ugarte ranch 
 and give this card of mine to Senor Vincenza ? " 
 
 " Why not, sor but wait now. Ye're not goin' 
 to tell Mr. Vincenza all I've towld ye, sor, for he's 
 kept his wurrud be me, an' I'd ha kep mine be him 
 an' niver whispered all this only, ye see, it was a 
 quare thing, an' it bothered me, an' bein' as I have 
 a great rispict for yer family, Mr. Ffrench an' " 
 
 " Make your mind quite easy, Denny," said Ger- 
 
1 88 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 aid. " You've done no harm in telling me this. As 
 you say, it happened in Ireland and this is Califor- 
 nia. I came out on purpose to see Mr. Vincenza 
 here, I'll read you my card. All it says is, " Please 
 come over to San Luis as soon as possible ; most 
 important business." 
 
 Half an hour later a mustang loped out of the 
 square and vanished in a cloud of dust. Stefano 
 was in the saddle and he carried Ffrench's card in 
 his pocket. 
 
 Sefior Vincenza appeared the following morning 
 just as Gerald had finished breakfast. The ranchero 
 remembered the representative of the " Evening 
 Mail" and greeted him cordially, expressing his sur- 
 prise at Gerald's presence in that part of the coun- 
 try. The Spaniard evidently imagined that this 
 unexpected visit had some bearing on the recently 
 decided law-suit, but the other's first words dis- 
 pelled the illusion. 
 
 " Sefior Vincenza," Ffrench said, " I have heard a 
 very strange story about your sister, and I have 
 come to ask you for an explanation of it." 
 
 The young Spaniard changed color and looked 
 uneasily at the journalist. " What do you mean ? " 
 he asked. " I do not understand you. My sister 
 is in Europe." 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 189 
 
 " Yes," answered Gerald, " she is in Europe in 
 Ireland she fills a nameless grave in Drim Church- 
 yard." 
 
 Vincenza leaped to his feet, and the cigarette he 
 had lighted dropped from his fingers. They were in 
 Gerald's room at the hotel, and the young man had 
 placed his visitor so that the table was between 
 them. He suspected that he might have to deal 
 with a desperate man. Vincenza leaned over the 
 narrow table, and his breath blew hot in Ffrench's 
 face as he hissed : " Carrambo ! What do you 
 mean ? How much do you know ? " 
 
 " I know everything. I know how she died in 
 the carriage on your way from Mullingar, how you 
 purchased a coffin and bribed the Kinnegad under- 
 taker to silence ; how you laid her, in the dead of 
 night, among the weeds in the graveyard ; how you 
 cut her name from the chatelaine bag, and did all 
 in your power to hide her identity. Do you recog- 
 nize that photograph ; have you ever seen that coat 
 of arms before ? " and Ffrench drew the two cards 
 from his pocket and offered them to Vincenza. 
 
 The Spaniard brushed them impatiently aside 
 and crouched for a moment as if to spring. Gerald 
 never took his eyes off him, and presently the other 
 straightened up, and, sinking into the chair behind 
 
190 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 him, attempted to roll a cigarette. But his hand 
 trembled and half the tobacco was spilled on the 
 floor. 
 
 " You know a great deal, Mr. Gerald Ffrench. 
 Do you accuse me of my sister's murder ? " 
 
 " No," answered Gerald. " She died from nat- 
 ural causes. But I do accuse you of fraudulently 
 withholding this property from its rightful owners, 
 and of acting on a ' power of attorney ' which has 
 been cancelled by the death of the giver." 
 
 There was a moment's silence, broken only by a 
 muttered oath from Vincenza as he threw the unfin- 
 ished cigarette to the ground, and began to roll an- 
 other this time with better success. It was not 
 till it was fairly alight that he spoke again. 
 
 11 Listen to me, young man," he said, "and then 
 judge me as you hope to be judged hereafter with 
 mercy. My sister was very dear to me I loved her 
 oh, God, how I loved her ! " His voice broke and 
 Gerald, recalling certain details in Denny's narrative, 
 felt that the Spaniard was speaking the truth. It 
 was nearly a minute before Vincenza recovered his 
 self-command and resumed. 
 
 " Yes, we were very dear to each other ; brought 
 up as brother and sister, how could we fail to be ? 
 But her father never liked me, and he placed re- 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 1 91 
 
 strictions upon the fortune he left her so that it 
 could never come to me. My mother our mother 
 had died some years before. Well, Catalina was 
 wealthy ; I was a pauper, but that made no differ- 
 ence while she lived. We were as happy and fond 
 a brother and sister as the sun ever shone upon. 
 When she came of age she executed the ( power of 
 attorney ' that gave me the charge of her estate. She 
 was anxious to spend a few years in Europe. I was 
 to take her over, and, after we had travelled a little, 
 she was to go to a convent in France and spend 
 some time there, while I returned home. But she 
 was one of the old Costellos, and she was anxious to 
 visit the ancient home of her race. That was what 
 brought us to Ireland." 
 
 " I thought the Costello family was extinct," ob- 
 served Gerald. 
 
 " The European branch has been extinct since 
 1813, when Don Lopez Costello fell at Vitoria ; 
 but the younger branch, which settled in Mexico 
 toward the end of the eighteenth century, survived 
 until a few months ago ; until Catalina's death, in 
 fact, for she was the last of the Costellos." 
 
 " I see," said Gerald. " Go on." 
 
 " She was very proud of the name, poor Catalina, 
 and she made me promise, in case anything hap- 
 
192 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 pened to her while we were abroad, that she should 
 be laid in the ancient grave of her race in the 
 churchyard of Drim. She had a weak heart, and 
 she knew that she might die suddenly. I promised. 
 And it was on our way to the spot she was so anx- 
 ious to visit that death claimed her only a few 
 miles from the place where her ancestors had lived 
 in the old days, and where all that remains of them 
 has long moldered to dust. So you see, Mr. 
 Ffrench, that I had no choice but to lay her there." 
 
 " That is not the point," insisted Gerald. " Why 
 this secrecy ? Why this flight ? Dr. Lynn, I am 
 sure, would have enabled you to obey your sister's 
 request in the full light of day you need not have 
 thrown her coffin on the ground, and left to 
 strangers the task of doing for the poor girl the last 
 duties of civilization." Gerald spoke with indig- 
 nant heat, for this looked to him like the crudest 
 desertion. 
 
 " I know how it must seem to you," answered 
 Vincenza, " and I have no excuse to offer for my 
 conduct but this. My sister's death would have 
 given all she possessed to people whom she disliked. 
 It would have thrown me, whom she loved, penni- 
 less on the world. I acted as if she was still liv- 
 ing, and as I am sure she would have wished me to 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 193 
 
 act ; no defence, I know, in your eyes ; but consider 
 the temptation." 
 
 " And did you not realize that all this must come 
 out some day ? " asked Ffrench. 
 
 " Yes, but not for several years. Indeed, I can- 
 not imagine how you have stumbled on the 
 truth." 
 
 And Gerald, remembering the extraordinary 
 chain of circumstances which had led him to the 
 root of the mystery, could not but acknowledge 
 that, humanly speaking, Vincenza's confidence was 
 justified. 
 
 "And now that you have found this out, what 
 use do you intend to make of it ?" asked the 
 Spaniard, after a pause. 
 
 " I shall publish the whole story as soon as 
 I return to San Francisco," answered Gerald, 
 promptly. 
 
 " So, for a few hundred dollars, which is all that 
 you can possibly get out of it, you will make a beg- 
 gar of me ? " 
 
 " Right is right," said the young Irishman. 
 " This property does not belong to you ? " 
 
 " Will you hold your tongue or your pen for 
 $50,000 ? " asked the Spanard, eagerly. 
 
 " No, nor for every dollar you have in the world. 
 13 
 
194 THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 
 
 I don't approve of your practice, and I won't share 
 your plunder. I am sorry for you personally, but I 
 can't help that. I won't oust you. I will make 
 such use of the story as any newspaper man would 
 make, and so I give you fair warning. You may 
 save yourself if you can." 
 
 " Then you do not intend to communicate with 
 the heirs," began Vincenza, eagerly. 
 
 " I neither know nor care who they are," inter- 
 rupted Gerald. " I am not a detective, save in the 
 way of my profession, and I shall certainly not 
 tell what I have discovered to any individual till 
 I give it to the press." 
 
 "And that will be ?" asked the Spaniard. 
 
 " As soon as I return to San Francisco," answered 
 Ffrench ; " it may appear in a week or less." 
 
 " Thank you, Seflor : good morning," said Vin- 
 cenza, rising and leaving the room. 
 
 Three days later Seftor Miguel Vincenza sailed 
 on the outgoing Pacific Mail Steamer, bound for 
 Japan and China. He probably took a consider- 
 able sum of money with him, for the heirs of Cata- 
 lina Costello y Ugarte found the affairs of the de- 
 ceased in a very tangled state, and the ranch was 
 mortgaged for nearly half its value. 
 
 Gerald Ffrench's story occupied four pages of the 
 
THE LAST OF THE COSTELLOS. 1 95 
 
 next issue of the " Golden Fleece," and was widely 
 copied and commented upon over two continents. 
 Larry, the groom at Ballyvore, read the account in 
 his favorite Westmeath " Sentinel," and, as he laid 
 the paper down, exclaimed in wonder : 
 " Begob, he found her ! " 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 " YES, you kin hev breakfast ; but about a team 
 -wall, I'll see." 
 
 Thus spoke the clerk of the Eureka House, a 
 young man of aggressive manners, whose stubbly 
 black hair stood out from his head as if bristling 
 defiance toward every point of the compass. He 
 looked harassed, and had laid aside his coat. This 
 might be the usual way of welcoming the coming 
 guest in Humboldt County, but Gerald Ffrench did 
 not appreciate it. He was fresh from twenty-four 
 hours of an ocean not always so pacific as its name, 
 and the floor seemed to heave under his feet like* the 
 deck of the little steamer that had brought him 
 from San Francisco. He silently accepted the di- 
 rection of the clerk's finger and entered the dining- 
 room. 
 
 The regular breakfast-hour at the Eureka House 
 was past and the long table had been cleared off, ex- 
 cept at the extreme end, where a little oasis of doubt- 
 
200 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 ful tablecloth dotted with dishes relieved the barren 
 expanse of stained redwood. Thither Gerald was 
 marshalled by a communistic-looking waiter, who 
 simplified the young gentleman's choice of viands 
 by remarking, " There's beefsteak." 
 
 " Nothing else ? " inquired Ffrench, dropping into 
 his place with a half-bow to a gentleman already 
 seated opposite. 
 
 " And coffee," said the waiter. 
 
 " Beefsteak and coffee be it," answered Gerald, 
 seeking vainly for a napkin. Then, as he raised his 
 eyes from" the futile search, he became conscious 
 that his fellow-guest was regarding him intently 
 across the narrow table. 
 
 " You'll know me again if you see me, my friend," 
 thought young Ffrench, and then, being little 
 troubled with false modesty, he returned the stare 
 with interest. 
 
 The other drummed lightly on the board with 
 his knife and never wavered in his unwinking gaze. 
 He was a big man, with broad shoulders and mighty 
 chest ; and if his length of limb were at all propor- 
 tionate to his apparent height as he sat, his stature 
 should be almost gigantic. A pair of blue eyes 
 lighted up a shrewd, good-natured face, clean shaven 
 except on the chin, whence depended a long auburn 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 2OI 
 
 beard. His age might have been fifty or more, and 
 his costume was the most elaborate that Gerald had 
 yet seen in Eureka ; for not only did the stranger 
 boast a white collar and a neck-ribbon, but a frock 
 coat of black cloth was buttoned across his broad 
 breast. There is something reassuring in a frock 
 coat, especially on the outskirts of civilization. If it 
 is not worn by a gambler it is pretty sure to be the 
 property of a self-respecting man, and the garment 
 in question, though of country cut and too wide for 
 its wearer, big as he was, had its effect on the young 
 traveller. 
 
 Finding this wordless communion of eyes grow- 
 ing intolerable, Gerald broke the silence with a 
 casual remark suggested by the service of the hotel. 
 
 " You come in by the Pelican, I suppose ? " said 
 the big man, wholly ignoring young Ffrench's ob- 
 servation, and settling down, with obvious enjoy- 
 ment, to a system of cross-examination. 
 
 Gerald admitted that he had so come. 
 
 " A great steamer the Pelican, entirely," resumed 
 the other. " She was built for a blockade-runner, 
 I suppose you know." 
 
 " I didn't know," answered the younger man ; 
 "but I should say she was quick enough and un- 
 comfortable enough for anything." 
 
202 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 " Comfort ! " sniffed the big fellow, with an inde- 
 scribable inflection of contempt. " But I suppose 
 ye're used to it down the coast. You come from 
 eh?" 
 
 " I came from the bay yesterday," answered Ger- 
 ald ; and then, divining from the other's look of 
 bewilderment that this description of the city of the 
 Golden Gate might not be so all-sufficing in 
 Northern California as in the southern counties, 
 he added, " from San Francisco, you know." 
 
 " Oh, ay, Frisco ! We don't know nothin' of 
 any other bay here but Humboldt Bay, an' I was 
 just wonderin' what kind o' fish you might be," said 
 the stranger, breaking into a hearty jolly bass 
 laugh that was pleasant to hear. He threw back 
 his great head and showed every one of an enviable 
 set of teeth as he roared at his own little joke with 
 a simplicity that was not without its attraction. 
 But at this moment the waiter entered, and the 
 gentleman's mirth abruptly ceased. He seemed to 
 case himself in a visible armor of dignity, as if 
 ashamed that he had so unbent, and he addressed 
 the attendant in his gruffest tones. 
 
 " That's the steak, eh ? Very well. Now tell 
 Partridge to bring my team around in twenty min- 
 utes." 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 2O3 
 
 " I will, Mr. Kearney," answered the waiter, slap- 
 ping Gerald's portion down with a fine air of indif- 
 ference and moving toward the door. 
 
 "Say!" Ffrench called after him. "Do you 
 know if that clerk of yours has made up his mind if 
 he can let me have something to drive to Tacara ? " 
 
 The waiter evidently heard, for he looked back, 
 but he left the room without condescending to 
 reply. Gerald turned to his plate with a muttered 
 oath and was conscious of a growing desire to kick 
 somebody that cub of a waiter, for instance. The 
 coffee was vile and the steak utterly unmanageable. 
 Ffrench enviously watched his neighbor gnawing 
 placidly through the tough, leathery mass and 
 drinking the liquid libel without a wiy face. The 
 young traveller was in anything but a good temper, 
 and yet he could hardly help smiling as he noticed 
 how comically the red beard wagged in unison with 
 the regular motion of the big man's jaw. Presently 
 the latter paused a moment. 
 
 " From Frisco, eh ? " he remarked, slowly. " Now 
 I wouldn't wonder if ye come up after ducks." 
 
 " Well, I didn't," retorted Gerald, snappishly. 
 " There are plenty of ducks there." 
 
 " So there are, so there are," said Mr. Kearney, in 
 the soothing tone he might have adopted to a frac- 
 
204 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 tious child ; " but there ain't much except ducks 
 here ducks an' redwoods." 
 
 " Perhaps I came after the redwoods," replied 
 Gerald, amused in spite of himself at the other's 
 manner. 
 
 " Well, ye might. Goin' lumberin', eh ? " 
 
 " No. I'm a correspondent of the San Francisco 
 ' Evening Mail,' and I've come here to write up the 
 lumber industry." 
 
 " So, a correspondent," Mr. Kearney pronounced 
 the word as if the young journalist had been impli- 
 cated in divorce proceedings, " a correspondent ; 
 an' ye want to go to Tacara ? " 
 
 " Yes, if I can get a team or even an answer 
 in this hole," replied Ffrench, his indignation boil- 
 ing to the surface again. 
 
 " Well, I'm goin', an' I'll drive ye over with pleas- 
 ure." 
 
 " No ! will you really ? I'll be very much ob- 
 liged," answered Gerald, eagerly. 
 
 " No obligation in life," returned the big man. 
 " Ye're as welcome as the flowers in May ; an' as 
 I'm in the lumber business there myself, maybe I 
 can give you a few points will come in handy." 
 
 Ffrench expressed himself, as he felt, very grate- 
 ful for this timely and unlooked-for kindness. 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 2O5 
 
 " Finish your food, then, an' we'll start," said 
 Kearney} whose empty plate bore witness that he 
 practised what he preached. 
 
 " Finish my food ! " cried 'Gerald, hotly. " I've 
 had all the leather I want for one morning. " 
 
 " Ah, ye're used to comfort down the coast," re- 
 marked Mr. Kearney, meditatively, as he rose. Ger- 
 ald, though above middle height, felt like a pigmy 
 beside the big man as the latter dropped a great 
 hand familiarly on his shoulder and half steered, 
 half pushed him toward the door. Before they left 
 the dining-room Kearney paused a moment. 
 
 " I've had comforts, too, an' like 'em," he said. 
 " I was down to Frisco once an' dined at the Poodle 
 Dog restoorant ; " and with a chuckle at the recol- 
 lection of a pleasant event in his life he passed out 
 into the office. 
 
 Gerald paused a moment to pay for the breakfast 
 he had not eaten, and the warlike clerk remarked, 
 with ill-dissembled delight, that no team could be 
 had till evening " maybe not then." 
 
 Gerald did not attempt to disguise the satisfac- 
 tion with which he retorted that if there were 
 twenty teams he would not take one of them, and 
 catching up his light valise he left the Eureka 
 House. The clerk looked after him with a vindic- 
 
206 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 tive expression, as if debating whether it was worth 
 while to pursue and chastise the parting guest ; 
 but seeing the young man take his place in Mr. 
 Kearney's carriage, he subsided behind the counter, 
 conscious that there was no prospect of another 
 stranger till the next arrival of the Pelican, three 
 days hence. 
 
 The stout road-wagon was drawn by a good-look- 
 ing pair of American horses in California so called 
 as distinguished from mustangs and they drove 
 through Eureka at a rapid pace. Mr. Kearney 
 pulled up at the outskirts of the town in front of a 
 small general store. 
 
 " Catch on to them lines," he remarked, handing 
 the reins to his companion ; "I'll keep ye no time 
 waiting." And he swung his bulky form out of the 
 wagon, which rebounded when relieved of his 
 weight. With a single gigantic stride he crossed 
 the narrow sidewalk and vanished in the shop. He 
 reappeared after a brief interval with sundry pack- 
 ages in his hands and a small bundle of gaily 
 painted toy balloons attached to his button-hole. 
 
 " D'ye know what them are for ? " he inquired as 
 he set the team in motion. 
 
 " I should say you have some little folks at 
 home," answered Gerald, smiling. 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 2O/ 
 
 " I have a boy, sir," replied Kearney, beaming 
 with delight. " The cutest little beggar in the 
 State o' California, an' that's sayin' a big word. But 
 sure what call have I to be talkin' about him ? 
 Won't you see him yourself ? " 
 
 Gerald expressed the happiness he would feel at 
 making the young gentleman's acquaintance. 
 
 " I don't know : ye come from Frisco, an' ye see 
 more down there nor we do ; but I'd back him agen 
 any lad o' his age an' weight under the canopy ; and 
 as for learnin' but there ! Jimmy shall have every 
 chance, so he shall. It isn't up here among the red- 
 woods that I'm going to raise him." 
 
 " Fine country, though," remarked Gerald, look- 
 ing around him. They were clear of the town by 
 this time, and on a steep, miry road, which skirted 
 the shores of the bay, making frequent turns to 
 avoid the long " tide-waters " which ran up to the 
 very foot of the wooded hills bordering the track to 
 the right tall, abrupt hills, clothed to their sum- 
 mits with the gigantic redwoods that make the 
 wealth of Humboldt County. 
 
 It was a bright autumn morning, succeeding a 
 week of almost incessant rain, and the atmosphere 
 was so clear that the range of vision seemed limit- 
 less. The air was calm and still, but up among the 
 
2O8 UNDER THE REDWOOD 7'REE. 
 
 lofty forest tops there was an incessant trembling 
 and rustling, as though a breeze were stirring there. 
 At every turn of the road a little pond disclosed 
 itself: none of the deeply shaded hollows seemed 
 to be without one some far off, sending a gleam of 
 silver through the columned forest, others almost 
 at the roadside, and not a few communicating with 
 the tide-water. Wild-fowl of all kinds dotted the 
 surface of these miniature lakes, or filled the air 
 with their clangor as they rose, disturbed by the 
 passing vehicle. Gerald thought he had never seen 
 such a woodland landscape, and grew enthusiastic 
 in its praise. 
 
 " It is fine," admitted Kearney, letting his eye rove 
 a moment over forest and water, and then bringing 
 it back to the matter in hand the care of his team 
 over a road-bed as rough as the channel of a moun- 
 tain torrent. " It is fine ; but no place to rear a 
 youngster, for all that.'' 
 
 " Why not ? " asked Ffrench. 
 
 " No eddication whoa ! gently there, my beau- 
 ties an' I believe in eddication as I believe in 
 lumber ; there's nothin' in the world to beat it, if 
 it's sound." 
 
 " You're quite a philosopher, Mr. Kearney," re- 
 marked Gerald. 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 2O9 
 
 The big man turned square round in his seat and 
 looked his companion in the face. 
 
 "Am I labelled, or what's the matter with me 
 that ye know me ? " he asked. 
 
 " I heard the waiter at your most exclusive hotel 
 address you by name," answered Gerald, laughing. 
 
 " It's none o' my hotel ; if it were well, since 
 you're so wise, won't you make me as wise as your- 
 self?" 
 
 " Certainly," said the journalist. " My name is 
 Gerald Ffrench ; very much at your service." 
 
 " Ffrench ! Ye ought to be an Irishman by that," 
 remarked Kearney. 
 
 " Certainly ; I was born in the county West- 
 meath," replied the young man. 
 
 " D'ye mind that now ? Give me yer hand, Mr. 
 Ffrench. I'm always proud to meet a countryman 
 in these out-o'-the-way parts." 
 
 " You're from the old country, then ? I might 
 have guessed as much." 
 
 " Well, you might," returned the other. " I'm 
 from the townland o' Crogher, barony o' Maghara- 
 felth, county o' Limerick, an' my name is Michael 
 James Kearney, an' I've never been ashamed of any 
 o' them. God save Ireland ! " 
 
 As the conclusion of this speech seemed to be in 
 14 
 
2IO UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 the nature of a doxology, Gerald did not feel called 
 upon to make any reply, nor did his companion ap- 
 pear to expect one. Indeed, his whole attention 
 was for the moment occupied by his horses, which, 
 startled at the sudden appearance of a small boy 
 from behind one of the giant redwood trunks, began 
 to plunge and rear in a rather alarming manner. 
 
 " Stand still, Tom ! Whoa, Jerry ! " cried Kear- 
 ney, quickly bringing the frightened team under 
 subjection. Then he turned his attention to the 
 immediate cause of the confusion. 
 
 " Well, Jimmy, is that yerself ! Jump aboard, my 
 boy, an' see what I've brought ye from Eureka." 
 
 " Hurrah ! I see something anyway," answered 
 Jimmy, whose sunburned features, beneath a shock 
 of red hair, bore a curious resemblance to those of 
 Mr. Kearney. The child, whose age might have 
 been seven or eight, climbed into the wagon with 
 the agility of a monkey, and immediately grasped 
 at the little plump of balloons, which, to Gerald's 
 intense though secret amusement, had danced and 
 floated above Mr. Kearney's head all the way from 
 Eureka. 
 
 " Have some behavior, Jimmy ! " expostulated 
 that gentleman in a bass whisper ; " don't you see 
 some one there ? " 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 211 
 
 " Who is he, Dad ? " inquired Jimmy, not the 
 least abashed, and without taking the trouble to 
 moderate his voice. " Tisn't the new ox-hand, is 
 it?" 
 
 " No, it's a gentleman," answered his father ; and 
 then, turning to Gerald with a smile, half-deprecat- 
 ing, half-embarrassed, and wholly winning, he 
 added, " Ye see, I told ye this was no place to raise 
 a boy." 
 
 " I think you've raised as fine a boy as I've 
 clapped eyes on for many a day," rejoined Ffrench, 
 heartily. " You'll take me round to-morrow and 
 show me where I can get a shot at a duck, won't 
 you, Jimmy ? " 
 
 " I will ; an' if Dad will let me, I think I can find 
 you a bear," cried the youngster, eagerly. 
 
 This was more than Gerald had bargained for, 
 but he contented himself with saying, " Oh, we'll 
 look for the duck first ; " and then added, as an 
 after-thought, " but surely your father doesn't let 
 you go where you'd meet such dangerous game ? " 
 
 " Yes, he does, when he goes himself," answered 
 young Nimrod. " There isn't much he doesn't let 
 me do, anyhow." 
 
 There was something of apology in Mr. Kear- 
 ney's tone as he hastened to explain his son's in- 
 
212' UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 dependence by his invariable formula, " You see, 
 this ain't no place to raise a boy, anyhow." 
 
 The drive from Eureka had been long, though 
 pleasant, and Gerald, arguing from the presence of 
 the child that his destination was at hand, vent- 
 ured to ask if it was much farther to Tacara. He 
 was emboldened by observing that the road, which 
 had run through a sylvan solitude for many miles, 
 now showed occasional signs of life a logger's hut 
 peeped here and there from among the trees, a 
 wreath of smoke curled up from the hillside, and 
 occasionally the bark of a dog broke the silence as 
 the wagon passed. But though not without cir- 
 cumstantial evidence of human habitation, the re- 
 gion seemed to Gerald as wild and desolate as 
 ever. Therefore he was the more surprised at Mr. 
 Kearney's answer. 
 
 " Tacara ! We passed through it ten minutes ago." 
 
 Gerald gasped : 
 
 " Those cabins and 
 
 " Yes, that's all the Tacara there is to it." 
 
 " Where am I going then ? '' 
 
 " Home with me, I hope," said Mr. Kearney, 
 heartily ; " and if ye can enjoy yerself as I'd like to 
 have ye, it's not very soon ye'll be wantin' to leave 
 me." 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 21$ 
 
 Here was a hearty invitation, most opportunely 
 extended. Gerald was glad to accept it in the 
 spirit in which it was offered, the more so as he had 
 gathered that Mr. Kearney was the great lumber 
 dealer of the district, and in fact the founder and 
 maintainer of Tacara. From no such point of van- 
 tage as Kearney's house could the journalist have 
 hoped to study the staple of Humboldt. 
 
 The team drew up before a spacious, substantial 
 residence, built of wood, indeed, as was every house 
 within a circuit of fifty miles, but well finished, 
 with glazed windows and shingled roof, and offer- 
 ing plain evidence of comfort. Ffrench attempted 
 a few words of modest disclaimer before entering, 
 but Mr. Kearney cut him short. 
 
 "What nonsense ye're talking! Ye've come out 
 here to write up the redwoods ; where better could 
 ye go than into the thick o' them ? Ye'll see little 
 and hear nothin' else ; an' as for the trouble what 
 trouble ? It's glad I am to have a countryman an' 
 a man of eddication to talk to ; an' come in with 
 ye without another word." 
 
 Gerald found himself in a low, square hall, panelled 
 in unstained timber of the country, and communi- 
 cating with the rest of the house by doors of the 
 same material. The evening was chilly, and a fire 
 
214 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 of logs was burning brightly. The floor was cov- 
 ered with the skins of bear and of several species of 
 wildcat. Half a dozen rifles and shot-guns de- 
 pended from a rack on the wall. It was a comfort- 
 able apartment, and as the tired traveller seated 
 himself and stretched his toes toward the welcome 
 blaze he could not but acknowledge that his lines 
 had fallen in pleasant places. 
 
 Presently Jimmy reappeared. He had insisted 
 on accompanying the man who had driven the team 
 to the stable, and he came back full of the exu- 
 berant life of youth and perfect health. He was 
 anxious to pilot Gerald forth before dark in search 
 of a duck, but to this the young man would in no 
 wise consent. He preferred to sit by the fire and 
 chat with his host, whom he found a singularly 
 well-informed man, allowing for the limitations his 
 secluded life had imposed. With every detail of 
 lumbering he was naturally familiar ; and as this 
 was the subject of conversation, Gerald was perhaps 
 inclined to give him credit for more intelligence 
 than he really possessed. The correspondent's note- 
 book was called into frequent use ; he learned all 
 the history of the great trees from the moment 
 they were attacked with saws and axes on their 
 lonely hillsides, till, having been dragged down by 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 21$ 
 
 yokes of oxen from their steep fastnesses, one log 
 at a time, they were passed through the saw-mill on 
 the level or floated down the nearest tide-water to 
 the bay. 
 
 Presently a substantial supper made its appear- 
 ance quail, wild duck, and the remains of a cold 
 rabbit-pie, flanked by a large wheaten loaf and a jug 
 of capital cider. As soon as full justice had been 
 done to these good things the host produced pipes 
 and a bottle of whiskey, and over these the inter- 
 view was concluded, to Gerald's pleasure and profit. 
 Mr. Kearney as he rose invited the young man to 
 visit the saw-mill on the following morning. 
 
 " Ye'll have a walk through two or three mile 
 o' redwood forest to get there," said the big man, 
 " an' that's an experience worth havin' ; an there ye 
 can see how the cattle start some o' them big logs 
 down to tide-water, an' an' in fact, ye'll have lots 
 to see, an' I won't ask no better fun than showin' 
 ye. An' now good-night to ye, for the sun never 
 sees me in bed any mornin' barrin' Sunday." 
 
 Gerald's room was small but well ventilated and 
 scrupulously clean, and his bed was comfortable 
 enough to wring from him a sigh at leaving it 
 when his host thundered at the door and a gray 
 misty light struggling through an eastern window 
 
2l6 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 showed that the day was at hand. A hearty 
 breakfast, accompanied by better coffee than young 
 Ffrench had expected to find so far from civiliza- 
 tion, occupied half an hour or so, and the sun had 
 fairly risen when they stepped out under the red- 
 woods. 
 
 Gerald never forgot that morning walk. The 
 redwood forest has little or no underbrush, and 
 the giant trunks rise sheer from the ground, un- 
 marred by branch or twig, till, spreading out a 
 hundred feet overhead, they meet to create the 
 twilight of the grove. The two men moved on 
 amid a solitude that seemed unbroken since the 
 world began ; their steps were noiseless on the soft 
 carpet of pine-needles, shed during uncounted ages 
 from the giants above them. The pillared vistas 
 extended on all sides, sombre, silent, awe-inspiring. 
 Ffrench felt as if he were traversing the aisles of 
 some cathedral, but incomparably older, vaster, 
 grander than any built by man's hands, A faint 
 murmurous sound a sound that seemed the accom- 
 paniment of silence stole down from spreading 
 boughs whose form and direction were lost in their 
 own gloom and distance. Despite the deep calm 
 that weighed on all below, a breeze was stirring in 
 the tops of the redwoods. 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD 7 'REE, 21 7 
 
 Gerald roused himself with an impatient start. 
 He was growing sentimental, and stanzas of the 
 " Talking Oak " flitted vaguely through his mind 
 and strove to adapt themselves to those "giant 
 boles," whose circumference he could scarce have 
 measured in a dozen paces. He looked at his com- 
 panion. Surely, in an experience of so many years, 
 Mr. Kearney had outworn any emotions the forest 
 was capable of inspiring in his broad breast. 
 
 Mr. Kearney was crushing the withered needles 
 beneath his massive tread, and tracking his way un- 
 hesitatingly through a labyrinth that to Gerald 
 seemed trackless. The black coat and the white 
 collar that had been donned in honor of Eureka 
 had given place to a stout flannel shirt, belted in at 
 the waist ; and the big man looked the better for 
 the change more solid and business-like. He was 
 glancing at the timber with a practical eye, oc- 
 casionally pausing to rest his hand against one of 
 the great trunks and to glance upward, as if to es- 
 timate how high it ran before branching. The 
 young journalist 'mentally compared him to a 
 butcher appraising the value of a likely beef before 
 he ordered it slaughtered. Gerald loved fine tim- 
 ber, and he spoke with this feeling strong in him. 
 
 " It seems a sin and a shame to cut down such 
 
2l8 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 trees," he said, with a touch of indignation in his 
 voice. 
 
 Kearney turned and looked at him. 
 
 " Eh ! That's the way it seems to you, I don't 
 doubt. Look deeper, man, look deeper." 
 
 Gerald stared at him in astonishment, but Mr. 
 Kearney went on. 
 
 "It's the destiny of every forest to be first cut 
 down and then cut up for the use o' man. Which 
 had the biggest share of honor the trees that was 
 left standin' in Tarshish, or them that was brought 
 to Jerusalem to build Solomon's temple ?" 
 
 Had Solomon himself in all his glory appeared 
 in one of the dim arcades he could scarcely have 
 surprised young Ffrench more than did this utterly 
 unlooked-for reasoning in the man beside him. 
 
 " For see here now," pursued Kearney, having 
 paused a moment for the answer that did not come ; 
 "this tree's a-growin' here an' has been for a 
 thousand years, maybe two ; no man knows till 
 she's cut an' shows the rings in her. Down she 
 comes to-morrow, we'll say, an' then what ? May- 
 be this wood will floor a ball-room, an' be touched 
 by pretty feet you'd sooner kiss nor the Pope's ; 
 maybe it'll build the house that the President of 
 the United States '11 be born in ; maybe a bit of 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 219 
 
 it'll be the soundin'-board of a pulpit, an' echo 
 God's word preached to the savin' of who knows 
 how many souls. Isn't that better for it nor 
 growin' an' rottin' an' shakin' pine-needles down on 
 your head an' mine ? " 
 
 By this time Gerald had found his tongue. " I 
 had no idea you were so imaginative, Mr. Kearney," 
 he said. 
 
 " I dunno as it's all imagination," answered 
 Kearney. " Maybe it is : anyhow, it's possible, an' 
 one thing's sure. Let this timber stand, an' never a 
 foot but an Injun's will pass under its shadow ; cut 
 it down, an' ye fill the bay with sails, ye put bread 
 in men's mouths, an' ye give me the means o' doin' 
 what I'm bound to do makin' a man o' Jimmy 
 such as his father never had the chance to be." 
 
 " You're right and I'm wrong," cried Gerald, some- 
 what touched by the earnest note in his host's voice 
 as he uttered the last words. " They're fine trees ; 
 but down with them, and make a ladder for your 
 boy to climb as high as you'd like to see him." 
 
 Kearney grasped the young man's hand. " Thank 
 ye, Mr. Ffrench. The boy '11 climb, an' he can't go 
 too high to please me. His mother, God rest her ! 
 was the best woman in the world, an' maybe she's 
 left some o' her nature behind her with Jimmy." 
 
220 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 " You have lost her, then ? " said Gerald, softly. 
 Somehow he felt drawn very close to this kind- 
 hearted giant, and the dim, sibilant forest seemed a 
 fitting place for an interchange of confidences. 
 
 " Ay, lost is the word," replied Kearney, bitterly. 
 " She lies somewhere out yonder where no man 
 will ever find her grave." He waved his arm with 
 a broad gesture in the direction of the ocean. 
 " Come on, Mr. Ffrench," he continued, without 
 apparent pause. " Ye've many a new sight to see 
 to-day, an' the saw-mill's the first o' them." 
 
 But when they reached the mill all was in con- 
 fusion. A new ox-hand, engaged the day before, 
 had yoked a score of oxen to a great log and started 
 it down the hill on which it had been felled, as is 
 the manner of Pacific coast lumbering. And an 
 accident had befallen not unheard of in its fashion, 
 but generally horrible in its results. The load had 
 moved freely, the ground being slippery from recent 
 rain, till a steep grade was reached. Here it broke 
 from control, and, gaining impetus as it slid down 
 the hillside, the great log plunged among the oxen, 
 killing and maiming more than half the team. 
 
 So much Kearney heard with comparative com- 
 posure. It was an accident that had happened be- 
 fore, and was not always to be prevented by any 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 221 
 
 degree of care. He expressed pity for the poor 
 oxen, and bit his lip as he cast up the pecuniary 
 loss. 
 
 " Who did ye say was in charge ? " he demanded 
 presently. 
 
 " The new ox-hand Jarl, they called him. He 
 was a Norway man," answered the foreman. 
 
 " An' how did ye come to set a new hand to move 
 a log out of any such awkward place as Oorah 
 Hill ? " asked Kearney, angrily. 
 
 " Wall, there weren't nobody else, and he was an 
 old hand. He'd been lumbering in Mendocino," ex- 
 plained the foreman. 
 
 " An' where is he now ? Let me say a word to 
 him," cried Kearney, his temper evidently getting 
 the better of him. 
 
 The foreman fell back a step and looked aghast. 
 "Why, didn't you understand?" he said. "Jarl's 
 dead ; the log went over him and crushed him 
 flatter'n a pancake." 
 
 An instant change came over the big man's face. 
 " Holy St. Patrick ! ye don't tell me," he gasped. 
 "The poor fellow, the poor fellow! I wouldn't 
 have had the like happen for well, well, well ! Mr. 
 Ffrench," he added, turning to the journalist, who 
 had been an interested listener, " I've been twenty 
 
222 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 odd years in the lumber business, an' they call it a 
 risky trade, but that's the first life I've ever lost 
 among my men." 
 
 Gerald attempted a few words of sympathy, but 
 Kearney did not seem to hear them. " Poor fellow, 
 poor fellow!" he muttered. "Well, every man's 
 time's got to come sooner or later, but that's the 
 end o' my luck." 
 
 A low wailing cry, the voice of a child sobbing 
 in the abandonment of sorrow, came from a shed 
 on the right. Kearney started as he heard it and 
 glanced nervously around. 
 
 " Whisht ! D'ye hear that ? " he asked. " Is 
 
 there a child anywhere here, or is it the " He 
 
 paused as the piteous sob again cut the silence. 
 
 " It's the child, his little girl," said the foreman. 
 " She's been taking on dreadful, and no wonder. 
 He wasn't much to look at ; but he was all she had, 
 I reckon." 
 
 " His child whose ? " asked Kearney. 
 
 " Why, Jarl's, to be sure. She come up with 
 him from Mendocino." 
 
 The big man sank down on a pile of shingles and 
 buried his face in his hands. 
 
 " My God, my God ! this is too much," he mur- 
 mured. "Is it orphans I'm makin' in me ould 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 22$ 
 
 age ? " Then he started to his feet and dashed his 
 hat to the ground with a sweeping gesture. " To 
 hell wid the oxen, to hell wid the lumber ! " he 
 shouted. " As for the poor Norway boy, there's a 
 good God above that'll look out for him, but I'm 
 goin' to see that this child won't be left an orphan. 
 Where is she ? " 
 
 He strode forward and entered the shed, Gerald 
 keeping close behind him. 
 
 All that was mortal of the poor Norwegian lay on a 
 long bench in one corner. The shockingly mangled 
 form was covered with a blanket, but the face was 
 unscathed, aud death had been too sudden to leave 
 much trace on the features. It was a commonplace 
 face of the Scandinavian type the face of a peasant. 
 
 A little girl, apparently about ten years old, was 
 seated on a low stool at the dead man's side. She 
 had flung her blue-checked apron over her head, 
 and was moaning and rocking herself to and fro in 
 an agony of grief. Very gently, very tenderly the 
 big man stooped over the child and drew the apron 
 away. She glanced up and checked her sobs at 
 first from astonishment at the sight of this great 
 bearded stranger, but she soon seemed to recognize, 
 with the intuitive welcome sorrow has for sym- 
 pathy, that she was looking at a friend. 
 
224 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 " That's right," said Kearney, soothingly. " Can 
 ye speak English, honey ?" 
 
 The little mourner nodded. Her blue eyes were 
 brightening through their tears, and with an odd, 
 womanly gesture she pushed the tangle of pale 
 wheat-colored hair back from her temples. Kearney 
 went down on one knee and lifted the girl on the 
 other. 
 
 " What's yer name, darlint ? " he whispered in a 
 tone of indescribable gentleness. Gerald could not 
 but notice how much more strongly marked was 
 the man's Irish. accent since this trouble had come 
 upon him. 
 
 " Inga," answered the child. 
 
 " Well, Inga, will ye come home wid me ? Ye 
 can't do anythin' for poor dada," he hastened to add 
 as her eyes turned toward the motionless figure on 
 the bench. " Poor dada's gone to heaven, an' all 
 that's to be done for him here I'll do." 
 
 He rose up to his full magnificent .height, still 
 holding the little girl in his arms and gathering her 
 close to his breast. 
 
 " Let me kiss my father," pleaded Inga. Her 
 speech had no trace of her foreign birth ; indeed, it 
 seemed likely she had first seen light in the New 
 World. 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 22$ 
 
 " Why not ? " said Mr. Kearney. His voice still 
 kept its caressing tone and he did not set the child 
 down, but held her so that she could press her lips 
 to those of the dead man. Then he bent over the 
 poor Norwegian and traced the sign of the cross on 
 his forehead. 
 
 " I dunno what was his way o' thinkin'," he whis- 
 pered, "but he'll be none the worse o' that anyhow." 
 
 Then, stooping his lofty head, Mr. Kearney 
 passed the low door, crossed the mill-yard, where 
 the hands all stopped to watch him, and so out into 
 the dim, cool twilight of the forest, pressing the lit- 
 tle orphan close to his breast. 
 
 Gerald was surprised at the impressible nature 
 which his host showed, and forebore for a day or 
 two to trouble him with the questions suggested by 
 the strange, new life of the lumber-camp. But the 
 big man's spirits recovered their tone very rapidly, 
 and he exhibited the same mixture of boyish light- 
 ness, shrewd business thought, and queer, unex- 
 pected imagination that had captivated Ffrench in 
 the first instance. The young man found himself 
 greatly taken with Kearney, and if he was anxious 
 to use the lumberman in the interest of the San 
 Francisco " Evening Mail," that purpose was dis- 
 tinctly second to his admiration for Mr. Kearney 's 
 
226 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 character. Meanwhile Kearney himself lived on 
 his hard-working, uneventful life. The introduction 
 of little Inga into the household must have worked 
 a greater change than Gerald was able to appre- 
 ciate, but she was a quiet, unobtrusive child, and 
 seemed content to spend her evenings looking up 
 into Mr. Kearney's face with widely opened blue 
 eyes, occasionally pushing back the masses of her 
 pale golden hair with a quaint, old-fashioned gest- 
 ure. She and little Jimmy were wonderful friends, 
 and there was always a note of compassionate ten- 
 derness in Mr. Kearney's voice when he spoke to 
 her. Probably he was more alive to the extent of 
 the child's loss than she, better cared for now than 
 ever in her life before, could possibly have been. 
 
 So passed a few days, and Ffrench collected 
 many facts of interest to the lumber trade, and shot 
 several ducks and quail and saw a black bear. He 
 was fond of wandering in the gloom of the redwood 
 forest with no companions but the children ; and 
 the strange, still atmosphere of the place, with the 
 mysterious rustle of that ever-present breeze over- 
 head, seemed to have a soothing effect even on 
 Master Jimmy's effervescent spirits. As for Inga, 
 whether it was due to her recent loss or was natural 
 to her, she was always a quiet child. 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 22? 
 
 The day after her father's funeral the little girl 
 was even more silent than usual. She sat apart, 
 weeping in corners, with her head in her hands and 
 her tangled hair dropping unheeded over her face. 
 Mr. Kearney checked Jimmy's rude play several 
 times out of consideration to Inga's feelings, and 
 the child soon retired, complaining of a headache. 
 
 The next morning Gerald, whose hours had 
 ceased to be so early as those of the rest of the 
 household, came upon Mr. Kearney, equipped in 
 black coat and white collar, climbing into his wagon. 
 
 "Hullo I Where away now?" asked the young 
 man. 
 
 " I'm goin' into Eureka/' answered Kearney. 
 " I'd ask ye to take a seat, only I've some one to 
 bring back wid me. I'm goin' after the doctor." 
 
 " Is there any one ill ? " inquired Gerald. 
 
 " N no," said Kearney, slowly. " Anyway, I 
 want the doctor to tell me whether there is or no. 
 Inga was complainin' of a headache last night, an' 
 she has a sore throat this mornin'. Get up, Tom ; 
 go along, Jerry ! " And he drove off. 
 
 " Decidedly Kearney means to do his duty by 
 the orphan," reflected Gerald, as he strolled under 
 the redwoods. " It's well for her that it was in the 
 employ of a man like that her father lost his life." 
 
228 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 Mr. Kearney returned with the doctor in the 
 afternoon, and Gerald, arriving late from the ponds 
 with a good bag of wild ducks, perceived that some- 
 thing was amiss at the house. Little Jimmy, in 
 evident spirits, was coming out of the door, fol- 
 lowed by his father. The latter carried a small bag 
 and an armful of blankets. 
 
 In a few words Mr. Kearney explained the state 
 of affairs. Inga had scarlet fever, and it was 
 thought better that Jimmy should sleep at the mill 
 for the present. 
 
 " Is she very ill ? " inquired Ffrench. 
 
 " No," answered Kearney. " The doctor says it's 
 a very mild case." 
 
 " Where did she catch it ? " asked the young man. 
 
 " Nobody knows. Down in Mendocino, where 
 they come from, I suppose," answered the lumber 
 dealer. " The doctor says it's a week, maybe two, 
 since she was where the infection was." 
 
 Kearney looked pale and worried, but Master 
 Jimmy, to whom the idea of sleeping at the mill had 
 all the attraction of a picnic, seemed much elated. 
 
 Gerald turned, and accompanied them through 
 the darkening shades of the forest. 
 
 " It's foolish I am, maybe," remarked Mr. Kear- 
 ney as he walked home with Gerald after seeing 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 22Q 
 
 the boy made comfortable for the night, " but I 
 can't help it. Sure Jimmy's all I have, an' I think the 
 world o' him ; but this is a poor place to rear a lad." 
 
 Gerald represented that Jimmy would be far 
 more exposed to infection in a city or in a great 
 school than in a retired place like Tacara, but the 
 father interrupted impatiently. 
 
 " It's not that I'm thinkin' of. We've took him 
 away from the fever time enough, please God. It's 
 not that ; it's his eddication. D' ye know, Mr. 
 Ffrench, that with a fair start that boy has a better 
 chance in life than I had ay, or you, for all your 
 Trinity College breeding ? " 
 
 " How so ? " asked Gerald. 
 
 " Because he was born in that house there under 
 the redwoods," said the elder man proudly; "be- 
 cause he was born a citizen of the sovereign State of 
 California, and is eligible to be President of the 
 United States, or will be in thirty-three years time." 
 
 Gerald forebore to remind the ambitious father 
 that many thousands are born every year with the 
 same eligibility, and Mr. Kearney repeated the 
 words several times, rolling them on his tongue as 
 if he savored them. 
 
 " President of the United States ! And why not ? 
 Isn't he born eligible ?" 
 
230 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 Little Inga made a good recovery. She was to 
 all appearance a delicate child, yet the disease 
 seemed to have taken no hold of her, and yielded 
 quickly to Dr. Granby's skilful treatment. But 
 the very day the orphan was officially pronounced 
 convalescent Gerald met his host in the woods 
 near the saw-mill, wandering bareheaded, tossing 
 his arms aloft in extravagant gesticulation, and evi- 
 dently a prey to the wildest excitement. 
 
 " Oh, don't talk to me, don't talk to me ! " moaned 
 the distracted man. " Jimmy's got the faver." 
 
 " No," said Gerald. " Oh, don't say that, Mr. 
 Kearney. Are you sure ? " 
 
 "The doctor's wid him now. He sent me out 
 because I couldn't rest aisy." 
 
 Knowing how the poor fellow was wrapped up in 
 his boy, Ffrench was fully able to appreciate his anx- 
 iety. The young man did his best to console and 
 cheer his friend, and urged Jimmy's strong constitu- 
 tion and healthy life, but the father shook his head. 
 
 " It's the strongest that have it the worst. Look 
 at that donny slip of a girl beyant, an' how she went 
 through wid it." 
 
 Ffrench urged that this was hopeful, since the 
 disease would seem to be mild in type ; but Kear- 
 ney could take little comfort from this argument. 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 " We'll see, we'll see," he said, and presently 
 re-entered the mill. Gerald did not meet him again 
 that day. 
 
 Poor Kearney's worst fears were realized. The 
 infection that had touched the delicate girl so 
 lightly laid firm hold on the sturdy lad, and day by 
 day he grew worse. Dr. Granby, an old friend of 
 the lumber dealer, almost lived at Tacara, and ex- 
 hausted all that science could do in behalf of the 
 little sufferer. All in vain ! After an illness of five 
 days Jimmy died about eleven o'clock on Monday 
 morning. 
 
 All work had been suspended at the mill during 
 the child's sickness, for it had been considered in- 
 expedient to move him back to the house, and the 
 noise of the great saws would have disturbed him. 
 Gerald, who .had done his share in nursing the little 
 patient, was with him at the last, and so, of course, 
 was his father, who had scarcely left the bedside or 
 closed an eye during those five weary days. The 
 old man he had begun to show his years since 
 Jimmy sickened was holding the sufferer's hand 
 and talking in a strain of soothing childish babble, 
 when the doctor stepped forward and drew him 
 away from the bedside. He followed his friend 
 unresistingly, supposing that Dr. Granby had some 
 
232 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 direction to give, but happening to glance back he 
 realized the great change that had come upon the 
 face of his boy. Then his grief had vent passion- 
 ate, unrestrained, violent. The whole nature of the 
 man seemed altered. Gerald had known him as a 
 decorous, kindly gentleman ; he saw him now as a sav- 
 age. Leaping back he seized the doctor by the collar 
 and pinned him with gigantic force against the wall. 
 
 " Answer me, ye thafe, answer me before I shake 
 the life out of ye ! Why did ye kill me boy ? " 
 
 Gerald sprung forward to the assistance of Dr. 
 Granby, who really seemed for the moment in per- 
 sonal peril, but the doctor was equal to the occasion. 
 Looking the frenzied man squarely in the eye, he said: 
 
 " Aren't you ashamed of yourself, Michael Kear- 
 ney, to show your black passion in the presence of 
 the dead ? I did my best for your boy, and you 
 know it." 
 
 The other relaxed his hold and glanced again at 
 the bed. He pushed the doctor aside and flung 
 himself across the little corpse with a howl of an- 
 guish that sounded scarcely human. 
 
 " Ah, Jimmy, me darlint, me beautiful boy why 
 did ye die, why did ye die ? Ochone, ochone an' 
 wirasthru ! where was ever the like o' ye so bould, 
 so hearty, so full o' sperits ? It's only a few hours 
 
UNDER THE REDIVOOD TREE. 233 
 
 that ye were runnin' around wid twice the life in ye 
 that ever I had an' ye so young, so clever, an' born 
 wid such a grand start ! Ah, why did ye die, why 
 did ye die ? " 
 
 Inexpressibly pained and shocked, Gerald tiptoed 
 over to the doctor. The stricken father was still 
 lying across the bed, and his loud lamentations sank 
 into inarticulate moaning. 
 
 "Hadn't we better get him away?" asked the 
 young man below his breath. 
 
 The doctor shook his head. " Impossible," he re- 
 plied. " We must wait till this paroxysm exhausts 
 itself. I have seen him so before when his wife 
 was drowned." 
 
 " Poor fellow ! " murmured Ffrench. 
 
 " He got over it before and he will get over it 
 again," said the doctor, " though, to be sure, he had 
 the boy then and he has no one now. I am very 
 fond of Mike Kearney. He has a noble heart, but 
 at times like these he appears at his worst. Civil- 
 ization and education came to him rather late in 
 life, I fancy, and when such a grief stirs him the 
 depths of his nature corne to the surface the nat- 
 ure of a barbarian, almost of an animal." 
 
 Again the powerful voice rose in wild and pur- 
 poseless lamentation. 
 
234 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 " All I had God help me all the life that was 
 left me, an' he lyin' there like a log. What have I 
 done that the like should come to me ? Now it 
 may go, but divil a prayer will I ever say ; for what 
 have I to pray for ? Divil resave the kind word or 
 kind thought will I ever give to anyone. The 
 whole world may go to hell for me." 
 
 He rose from the bed and drew himself up to his 
 full height. His face was very pale, and every 
 feature was working with emotion. He seemed to 
 have aged ten years in the few days that had 
 elapsed since Gerald met him. 
 
 The doctor came to his side. " Mr. Kearney," he 
 said, "you had better go home and take a little 
 rest. I will walk down to the house with you." 
 
 " Home ! " thundered Kearney ; " what sort of a 
 home have I ? Why should I go to the house 
 when it's here me little Jimmy is lyin' an' a stran- 
 ger's brat below there in his place ? Ay, but I will 
 go ; she killed him it's herself brought the death 
 to him. Begorra, I will go home, if it's only to 
 throw Jimmy's murderer out of it." 
 
 He stepped to the bedside and bent over the 
 child's form. " Good-by to ye, Jimmy, me dar- 
 lint," he whispered in a tone of infinite. tenderness, 
 " though it's little use kissin' cowld clay. Come, 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 boys ; I'm goin' home," he added, turning from the 
 bed. 
 
 A woman had been hired to act as nurse during 
 the boy's illness. Terrified by Kearney's extrava- 
 gant grief, she had been cowering in a corner of the 
 room. She now came forward, as the men left the 
 place, and busied herself in bestowing the last at- 
 tentions that little Jimmy would ever need at hu- 
 man hands. 
 
 Through the dim aisles of the redwood forest, 
 over the soft, thick carpet of withered pine-needles, 
 under the giant branches murmuring their eternal 
 monotone, the three men passed to the lonely 
 house by the tide-water. Kearney was a little in 
 advance, tossing his arms, shaking his head, gesticu- 
 lating wildly, and muttering a broken jargon, half 
 English, half Irish, that mingled discordantly with 
 the rustle of the passionless pines. Gerald thought 
 that grief had crazed the poor fellow, but suddenly 
 he turned and addressed the young man, rationally 
 enough, though in an unexpected manner. 
 
 " Mr. Ffrench, I liked ye the first time I seen ye, 
 an' I like ye yet, but ye see for yerself that ye bro't 
 no luck to me. 'Twas the first day ye come here 
 that Norway chap fell under the log the only 
 man ever I lost in five and twenty years' lumberin', 
 
236 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 an' nothin's gone right with me since. It's all led 
 up to one p'int, an' that is His voice broke, 
 but after a moment's pause he went on, controlling 
 himself with a mighty effort : 
 
 " I'll ax ye to go home, Mr. Ffrench off down 
 the coast where ye belong, or out o' Tacara anyhow. 
 In ten years' time, if I live that long, I'd like to see 
 ye ag'in ; but now I can't bear to look on your face. " 
 
 " Whatever you like, Mr. Kearney," answered 
 Gerald. " I had hoped to stay here and perhaps 
 be of use to you in the first days of your trouble, 
 in return for all your kindness to me, but if my 
 presence is painful to you 
 
 " Ye'd betther go, ye'd betther go," said Kearney, 
 huskily. " Ye'll be goin' to Eureka to-day, doctor, 
 
 I suppose ; ye've done yer d ' He checked 
 
 himself. " There's nothin' more for ye to do here, 
 an' ye'll take the young man wid ye." 
 
 They had just emerged from the shades of the 
 great trees and were entering the clearing in which 
 the house stood. Kearney was a little in advance, 
 when Gerald saw him abruptly stop and cover his 
 face with his hands. Little Inga was running from 
 the door to meet them, and she went straight to 
 the father with a loving inquiry for Jimmy. 
 
 " Take her away, take her away," he muttered 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 237 
 
 hoarsely ; " don't let me see her." Then he faced 
 round on the child, who shrank back, trembling at 
 his white face and blazing eyes. And then with 
 uplifted hand he cursed her. 
 
 " For shame, Mr. Kearney, for shame ! " cried 
 Dr. Granby, springing forward. " The little girl is 
 not to blame." 
 
 " Who said she was ? " said Kearney. " I wish 
 she had done it a purpose, an' I'd ' a' had one mo- 
 ment's happiness while I was tearin' her to pieces. 
 But out she goes the home she's brought sorrow 
 to is no place for her ; out she goes. The world's 
 big an' broad outside o' Tacara." 
 
 Astounded at such words from lips that had 
 never yet breathed aught for her but kindness, Inga 
 crouched on the ground at the old man's feet. As 
 was her way in trouble, she had flung the little 
 apron over her head and was weeping, as her heav- 
 ing shoulders testified, but weeping silently. Ger- 
 ald stepped forward. 
 
 " Mr. Kearney," he said, " when I saw how you 
 took that poor orphan from her dead father's side, 
 how you comforted her and made her future your 
 care, I thought 1 had never seen so noble a deed so 
 kindly and graciously done. But now, sir, if you 
 cast her off and break her little heart with your 
 
238 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 cruelty, I don't care who you are, I don't care what 
 your grief may be you are a brute." 
 
 Moved by the child's piteous figure, Gerald 
 spoke hotly, without weighing his words or taking 
 much thought of their consequences. As he ceased 
 speaking he drew back a step, for Kearney's eye 
 and manner were threatening, and the journalist 
 looked for an immediate assault. But the issue 
 was otherwise. 
 
 " Who's axin' to hurt the child ? Take her 
 away, do what ye choose wid her, but ye might as 
 well ax me to stare at the sun at noonday as bear 
 the sight o' her. I can't do it. She hurts me eyes, 
 she hurts me heart. I'll tell ye what, Mr. Ffrench," 
 and Kearney came to his side with eager step and 
 an almost fawning manner " can't ye take her back 
 to Frisco wid ye ? Oh, don't think of the expense 
 I'll bear that, I'll provide for her for life, only 
 don't ax me to see her. Take her wid ye. Sure 
 there must be schools or the like down the coast 
 where they'll take childher if they're well ped for it. 
 There is for boys, anyhow, for I had one in me 
 mind for Jimmy God help me, for Jimmy ; '' 
 and the strong man fairly broke down, and cover- 
 ing his face with his hands, sobbed aloud. 
 
 " Don't interfere with him, don't speak to him," 
 
UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE, 
 
 said Dr. Granby ; " that'll do him more good than 
 anything else. You go into the house and get your 
 belongings together while I go round for the wagon. 
 We'll start for Eureka at once ; and of course you'll 
 take the child, as he says." 
 
 " I don't know," murmured Gerald, helplessly. 
 " Such a charge is altogether out of my line." 
 
 " You will take her to San Francisco and put her 
 at a good school. There your responsibility ends, 
 for Kearney will certainly be as good as his word, 
 and provide for her well." 
 
 Before Ffrench could answer, Inga had come to 
 his side and slipped her little hand into his. The 
 child had the faculty of making friends in her 
 loneliness ; and Gerald, with a puzzled sense of 
 unfitness, accepted the trust. 
 
 Kearney was lying on the ground, face down- 
 ward, his whole frame shaken by emotion. He 
 seemed to be utterly regardless of what was passing ; 
 but as Gerald led the little waif toward the house, 
 he raised his head. "Ye needn't be afeard, Mr. 
 Ffrench," he said. " I'll do all that I said, an' I'll 
 write to me agent in Frisco to settle it all." Then 
 turning to Inga, who had shrunk trembling to 
 Ffrench's side at the first sound of Mr. Kearney's 
 voice, he added : " Don't be afeard, you either, 
 
240 UNDER THE REDWOOD TREE. 
 
 little girl. I've no hard feelings left for ye at all, 
 at all ; only, God forgive ye, ye've broken me 
 heart." 
 
 These were the last words Gerald heard him 
 speak. When the sound of wheels announced the 
 departure, Kearney raised his head for a moment 
 and waved his hand in farewell ; then he let his face 
 sink on the ground again and lay as still as if sleep- 
 ing. The shadows of the redwoods were growing 
 longer as the sun sank toward the west, but the 
 house was still clothed in the brightness of the 
 autumn afternoon. 
 
 " He'll be better so," the doctor said as he urged 
 the team up the steep track. " An hour's sleep, let 
 him get it how or where he can, will be worth much 
 to his tired and tortured brain." 
 
 Gerald looked back as the wagon reached a turn 
 in the road. The house was still visible, and the 
 long, dark shadow of the redwood forest had crept 
 closer to the prostrate man. The doctor stood up 
 and looked back. 
 
 "He's certainly asleep," he observed. "When 
 the sun leaves him he'll wake because of the cold." 
 
 Poor Kearney ! He would awake in time to see 
 the shadow on his home. 
 
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 an Account of the History, Administration, and Religion of that Province. By 
 H. E. JAMES of Her Majesty's Bombay Civil Service. With a Map, 10 full-page 
 illustrations, and 28 illustrations in the text. 8vo, cloth, $6.00. 
 " This volume is very readable. . . . It approaches that empire (China) from. 
 a fresh direction, and places the people and land in a new light." N. Y. Times. 
 
 "... A lucid and comprehensive account of the history, people, administra- 
 tion, and religion of that country."-^. Y. Sun. 
 
 " Readers in search of something new, students, politicians, and geographers may 
 all profit by the perusal of this book." Spectator. 
 
 "His style is pleasing and straightforward, and combines qualities which make 
 his book the best on the subject. ... As a popular and accurate description of 
 Manchuria we heartily commend this book, which in its mechanical outfit has a 
 dress worthy of its sterling contents." N. Y. Nation. 
 
 "A volume which will rank high among the most interesting books of travel pro- 
 duced in recent years. ... It describes a remarkable piece of travel lately don 
 by three Englishmen, who seem to have the true British taste lor untrodden paths, 
 together with a genuine love of hard marches and a genial unconsciousness of their 
 ditficulties and dangers. . . . The book is a most modest record of manly travel, 
 and is of permanent vaiue for its careful and accurate account of the little-known 
 country which now alone separates China from Russia." Times. 
 
 " An extremely interesting volume. . . . The reader will not find many books 
 of travel in China which contain so much new matter as is preserved in this volume." 
 
 The Astatic Quarterly Review. 
 
 EARLY ADVENTURES IN PERSIA, SUSIANA, AND BABY- 
 LONIA. Including a residence among the Bakhtiyari and other wild tribes, 
 before the discovery of Nineveh. By Sir HENRY LAYARD, G.C.B., author of 
 "Nineveh and Its Remains," etc. In two volumes, 8vo, cloth, with colored 
 frontispiece and illustrations and maps, $7.50. 
 " A stirring record of adventure." N. Y. Tribune. 
 
 . From the merely instructive point of view, Sir Henry Layard's new book 
 
 is a welcome addition to the literature of travel . . . i; abounds with interest. 
 
 It is indeed a charmingly told story of genuine adventure ... in one of the most 
 
 interesting regions of the world." London Times. 
 
 "... Full of attraction to a large circle of readers and students." Atfienceum, 
 
 PICTURESQUE NEW GUINEA. With an Historical Introduction and 
 Supplementary Chapters on the Manners and Customs of the Papuans By 
 J. W. LINDT, F.RsG.S. Accompanied with 50 full-page autotype illustrations 
 from negatives of portraits from life and groups and landscapes from nature. 
 Crown 4to, $15.00. 
 
 OUR SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY THROUGH FRANCE AND 
 ITALY. By JOSEPH and ELIZABETH ROBINS PENNELL, authors of "A 
 Canterbury Pilgrimage," etc., etc. With map and 124 illustrations by Joseph 
 Pennell. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.75. 
 " . . Very good and satisfactory of its kind, and highly diverting." 
 
 Times, New York. 
 
 "The book is charmingly made." American, Philadelphia. 
 
 "There is something of the quality of apollinaris about this pleasing book. It is 
 light and sparkling ; its descriptions will be palatable, even to those who care least 
 for books of travel." Philadelphia Ledger. 
 
 "The authors are brimful of vitality, and nothing which has a humorous side 
 escapes them." Independent, New York. 
 
 " A very pretty volume." Nation, New York. 
 
 " Profusely illustrated by charming wayside sketches, . . . and some humor- 
 ous suggestions of the more unhappv features of the journey," Christian Umon. 
 
 " A volume of uncommon and rather eccentric charm." Sun, New York 
 
 NEW YORK: LONGMANS, GREEN, & CO.