i 
 
Dallas G-albeaith 
 
 Mrs. R. HARDING DAVIS, 
 
 Autho7- of "Waiting for the Verdict^'' " Margret Ilowtk" etc. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 B. LIPPINCOTT AND CO. 
 
 1868. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1868, by 
 J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., 
 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 
 
 Lippincott's 
 
To 7ny friends at Manasquan, I inscribe this story, in which I have tried 
 to outline their coast, and the curiously genuine, kindly hutnan life tipon it: 
 in remembrance of the hearty good-will with which they have made 7ny home 
 among them pleasant for many years. 
 
 R. H. D. 
 
 Manasquan, July 26, 1868. 
 
 t-LA rr>*>frcr 
 
Dallas Galbraith. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 " "■ I ''ELL him that it was on this coast 
 
 -L that the ship went down. Let 
 
 him send me warranty, and I can find 
 
 the treasure hidden among these rocks." 
 
 The two or three fisliermen who 
 were loading the schooner pricked up 
 their ears : there was a secret under- 
 current of meaning in the deUberately 
 worded message, perceptible to every 
 one of them ; some obscure, mysterious 
 significance which seemed suddenly to 
 oddly set apart the words and the man 
 diat spoke them from themselves and 
 tlieir everyday work. They looked up 
 from the barrels they were lifting, turn- 
 ing perplexed faces out to the great 
 plane of the sea, or along the desolate 
 coast, and then glanced shrewdly at each 
 other : they joked about it when they 
 went under the hatches, out of his hear- 
 ing ; but the jokes had but little relish 
 in them, and fell dead ; and the men went 
 on with their work after that in silence, 
 dhewing the cud of the matter, as is their 
 habit. 
 
 It was a colorless, threatening even- 
 ing out at sea ; a nipping gust driving 
 the few white sails in sight, like shiver- 
 ing ghosts, across the horizon that barred 
 the east like a leaden wall ; the masses 
 of water moving towards shore, slow, 
 sombre, dumb. But this was only the 
 
 sea: no one can tell in the quietest 
 summer day, on land, what storm or 
 disaster is hid in that womb of death 
 yonder. 
 
 On shore, the mellow October sunset 
 was shining pleasantly on the white 
 beach, up to which the yellow, fishy 
 little schooner was hauled close, and on 
 the men in their red shirts : the raw 
 wind was tempered to a bracing breeze, 
 and the waves lapped the sand and the 
 keel of the vessel, with a tamed, sleepy 
 purr. The marshes, because of the 
 heavy rains that year, still held their 
 summer coloring, and unrolled from the 
 strip of beach up to the pine woods a 
 great boundary belt of that curious, clear 
 emerald that belongs only to the sea 
 and seashore growths. Beyond this 
 belt, two or three comfortable brown 
 cows were grazing at the edge of the 
 forest, and, here and there, in the forest, 
 a whiff of smoke wavering to the sky, 
 or a good-bye red glimmer of the sun 
 on a low window, told where the houses 
 of the village were scattered. 
 
 If village it could be called. About 
 a mile from the schooner, and the little 
 buzz of life about her, rose one of the two 
 great headlands well known to all mari- 
 ners : they jut out into the sea as though 
 they were grim, warning sentinels over 
 this terrible coast of sunken breakers 
 and whitening bones. A sharp ridge 
 
 5 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 stn\ck f>-om this upper headland into the 
 background of forest, and in the circling 
 hollow wliich it formed lay the lonely 
 collection of farmers' and fishers' houses 
 then called Manasquan. A curiously 
 old-time, forgotten village, to belong to 
 the New World : shut in from any world 
 by the ocean on one side, and the inter- 
 minable pine forests at the other, through 
 which at this time only the charcoal- 
 burners had burrowed their way. 
 
 The man (a middle-aged Quaker) who 
 had sent the message which had so puz- 
 zled the fishermen, was a stranger on 
 this coast : its strange solitariness, the 
 utter silence into which it fell when 
 transient sounds had passed, oppressed 
 and stifled him. He had paced up and 
 down the hard beach all the afternoon, 
 watching with his dull, light-blue eyes 
 the Sutphens seining, and after that, the 
 loading of the schooner. It seemed to 
 him, of all corners of the world, the one 
 totally forgotten and passed by in the 
 race. He wondered if justice ever over- 
 took crime here — if even death remem- 
 bered to harvest his crop. Something 
 of this he dropped in a half-intelligible 
 way to old Doctor Noanes, who came 
 limping up from his rickety house by 
 the ridge to walk with him, wearing a 
 patronizing air towards him before the 
 fishermen, but secretly a little afraid of 
 the sharper wits of the strange Friend. 
 But he fired at the slur upon the village. 
 
 "We're of older build than New 
 York," he said, "but we've kept clean 
 of crime and c'ruption : we've held to 
 the ancient landmarks : there's no fami- 
 lies gone in and out from us since colony 
 times. Them nags of mine, now, has 
 no flash strains of blood, but their 
 grandsire carried my grandsire, Peter 
 Noanes, into the fight at Monmouth. I 
 don't ask better than that." 
 
 The Friend, who had taken oflf his 
 broad-brimmed hat, the better to catch 
 the evening air, stroked the gray wisps 
 of hair on either side of his ruddy face, 
 fixing on the dried face of his companion 
 his lack-lustre eyes. 
 
 "The men," Noanes said, "ord'narily 
 followed the water;" and he began to 
 sonorously roll out their names — Lad- 
 
 douns, Van Zeldts, Graahs, as though 
 it were the calling of the great Jewish 
 tribes or Scottish clans. His hearer was 
 forced to remind himself that there were 
 not twenty men, all told, among them. 
 A belief was creeping on him that this 
 community was a power in the land, if 
 it did act only through ships' mates 
 and the masters of coast schooners ; 
 leather-skinned, hairy-breasted men, who 
 brought back from their voyages but 
 little profit or knowledge beyond their 
 wages, and fresh stories of storms at 
 sea. 
 
 " Manasquan men be known as seamen 
 throughout the civilized world," asserted 
 the Doctor, shoving back his wig per- 
 emptorily. " Ther's Jim Laddoun ; he 
 was hired as mate in an English brig. 
 He's been as far as the Barbary Coast. 
 Them Britishers know a good thing 
 when they see it, and snap it up, quick 
 enough." 
 
 " True, true," deliberately — the atten- 
 tive gaze never lea\-ing the pupils of the 
 Doctor's eyes. It was a queer trick the 
 stranger had ; with a slight crook to one 
 side of Ills head, it gave him the look 
 of a deaf man, or one absorbed in his 
 companion's words. At any rate, it 
 usually drew out from people a good 
 many more words than they had intended 
 to speak. The old Doctor found it gave 
 a real gusto to their talks : he told his 
 best stories to the stranger — stories that 
 included the histories of the Van Zeldts, 
 Graahs — all of them. (He had silenced 
 his wfe when she echoed the village 
 wonder as to who the old, brown-coated 
 fellow was, and what secret business he 
 came to pry into. 
 
 "He's a well-bred person — the best 
 bred I've met for years. What should 
 you know of men of the worid? Do 
 you think there's nothing at Manasquan 
 which educated people think it worth 
 while to inquire into ?") 
 
 " Laddoun ? Laddoun ?" replied the 
 Friend, thoughtfully. " Thee belongs to 
 that stock thyself, Doctor ?" 
 
 Noanes gave a pleased sniff. "You 
 have a keen memory for genealogies. 
 Yes, my mother was one of them. But 
 there's only, two of the name now — the 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 mate I told you of, and the young doctor 
 at the village." 
 
 " George. A generous, genial fellow, 
 eh t Hospitable, I should say." 
 
 "Oh, I'll warrant for him ! He'll be 
 ha\nng you to feed and liquor at the inn 
 before now. He's a little too free with 
 both his money and his gab — George. 
 He keeps a dozen lazy beggars up, now. 
 But he'll mend, likely. The Laddouns 
 had always brains and pockets like 
 sieves. They're slack, — leaky." 
 
 "He has seen the world, he tells me. 
 On his brother's ship ?" 
 
 " No ; he went to lectures in York and 
 Philadelphia. I can't say that it spoiled 
 him much ; he come back, thinking bet- 
 ter of old Manasquan than ever, show- 
 ing more sense than I looked for. There 
 wasn't a child in the village that didn't 
 take a holiday when he come. George 
 is a main one for children, especially 
 when they're big and hearty. My Bob 
 used to count on him. No, I've nothing 
 against George Laddoun," reflectively. 
 
 '• There he is." 
 
 They had made a turn on the beach, 
 and were coming toward the schooner 
 with the leisurely pace befitting their age 
 and gravity. Laddoun, coming down 
 the ridge with a boyish whistle and leap, 
 stopped, with a shamed blush and laugh, 
 before his fellow-practitioner. " This 
 bracing air makes a boy of me," apolo- 
 getically, bowing to both of them. " But 
 a famous leaper like you," to Noanes, 
 "can forgive a fellow. I'd like to have 
 tried you at the standing jump, twenty 
 years ago." 
 
 " I'd have put you to your mettle, sir. 
 A pleasant-spoken dog," complacently 
 lighting his pipe as the young man went 
 on, and measuring his broad back and 
 low height critically. " A well-built fel- 
 low, say ? strong joints, and sockets well 
 oiled. D'ye see ? his limbs move easily 
 in his clothes and shoes. I'd Hke to 
 have tried a leap with him well enough. 
 But them days is over. The old lion's 
 bones is stiff." 
 
 The Quaker had paid but slight atten- 
 tion to the short, athletic figure, or its 
 loose-fitting suit of gray corduroy. If 
 he had any fancy for compelling the 
 
 secrets of other men into his own keeo- 
 ing, he apparently looked for them no 
 farther than in the pupils of the eyes. 
 George Laddoun had met him ar i^rst 
 with his pleasant, bold glance, turning it, 
 however, in a moment uneasily away. 
 The young fellow, with all his stout 
 muscle and hot blood, was easily abashed 
 as a girl. 
 
 He came up to the fishermen -wath a 
 cheery " Hillo !" 
 
 " Hillo, Laddoun !" It was young 
 Jim Van Zeldt who answered him, with 
 his hands in his pockets, shifting his cigar 
 from one side of his mouth to the other. 
 He was the owner of the vessel. The 
 other men were too busy straining over 
 a barrel which they hfted to speak. 
 
 " You've got a hefty load there," pull- 
 ing off his coat, " Take out your cigar, 
 Jim, and put your own shoulder to ! Yo, 
 ho !" as the barrel went in. He worked 
 along with the fishermen until the load- 
 ing was done, singing some students' 
 song, he had learned when abroad, in 
 a billowy, free, bass voice. Nobody 
 thanked him when the work was finish- 
 ed, and he stood perspiring more than 
 any of them, sopping his shining black 
 hair and red, handsome face. But the men 
 knev/, of course, how much better stuff 
 was in him than in that milk-faced Jim 
 "Van Zeldt, who paid them to the last 
 penny for their work, but never lifted a 
 finger to help, or cracked a joke. Jim was 
 the only man on that beach who paid 
 for work ; with the others it was all 
 "neighbor-help." Evening had come 
 on before the last load was in : a gray, 
 gusty evening, as we said — the strange 
 silence and melancholy which belonged 
 to this coast, as though the dead beneath 
 the curdling breakers would not be for- 
 gotten, growing deeper as night ap- 
 proached. Doctor Noanes was gone, 
 but Ledwith, the strange Friend, had 
 come closer to the schooner, and was 
 standing with his white, pursy hands 
 rolled into each other, behind him. watch- 
 ing the men from under the shadow of 
 his wide-brimmed hat, with the usual 
 inexpressive, abstracted look on his fat 
 face. The men resented his presence 
 with that uneasy impatience which ani- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 mals show when a strange creature not 
 of their sort is near. This man was 
 foreign to them. His dress, speech, 
 habit of silence had never been known 
 to them before ; and under these was a 
 strongei instinct of ahenism from their 
 salty, seafaring ways. It was noticeable 
 that they stood aloof from him as much 
 as might be, leaving his tall, square figure, 
 in its outlandish garb, Hke a strange 
 shadow, alone on the beach. It was 
 just before the last cord of wood was 
 taken in that he gave the message to 
 Van Zeldt. It came out of a curious 
 custom belonging to the beach. The 
 mails were carried at long intervals, and 
 even then were of most uncertain de- 
 livery. The schooners which carried 
 the fish, game and lumber up to the 
 New York markets, ran, too, at irregular 
 times — only, in fact when it suited the 
 convenience of their owners — but the 
 means of transportation they offered 
 were secure and rapid. It became, 
 therefore, a habit with the masters of 
 these vessels to make a sort of public 
 notice of their time of departure and 
 willingness to carry messages or parcels 
 to the upper harbors. There were many 
 of these little formal old customs hanging 
 about the settlement. 
 
 When Jim Van Zeldt made his an- 
 nouncement, it was responded to by no 
 one but the stranger, Ledwith, who ap- 
 parently was prepared and waiting for it. 
 
 " We'll turn off for the night now," 
 said Van Zeldt, when he had spoken, 
 looking out to the gathering shadows. 
 
 " I have a message for thee." The 
 clear, decided voice made Van Zeldt and 
 the men turn : the words which follow- 
 ed were in a lower key, slow, measured, 
 as though he weighed each by some 
 hidden meaning known to himself alone. 
 
 "When thee reaches New York, a 
 man will meet thee on the wharf, habited 
 in a dress like mine, asking for tidings 
 of the ship Terror." 
 
 " She does not ply on this coast," 
 interrupted Laddoun, with the oflT-hand, 
 peremptory tone habitual to him, which 
 expressed a thorough knowledge of all 
 matters, great and small. 
 
 The Quaker's dull blue eye did not 
 
 turn on him for an instant : yet in the 
 momentary stolid pause which he made, 
 the young man had an uncomfortable 
 sense of having been weighed and found 
 wanting. 
 
 " He wiU inquire of thee," he re- 
 sumed, in the same slow monotone, " of 
 a vessel lost years ago — the Terror: 
 tell him that it was on this coast that the 
 ship went down. Let him send me war- 
 ranty, and I can find the treasure hidden 
 among these rocks." 
 
 " I will carry the message," said Van 
 Zeldt, gravely, with no word of question 
 or surprise. Laddoun checked the ex- 
 clamation on his lips after a hasty glance 
 at the dark, solid figure, and immovable 
 face turned seaward. It sent a chill of 
 doubt and fear over his healthy body, as 
 if he had unconsciously touched the re- 
 pellant pole of an electric battery. 
 
 " The ship Terror was lost on these 
 rocks fifty years ago," he said in an un- 
 dertone to Van Zeldt, as they walked up 
 the beach together, leaving the stranger 
 still watching the melancholy sea fine — 
 "an emigrant ship, with three hundred 
 souls aboard." 
 
 "You're never at fault, Laddoun," 
 admiringly. 
 
 " There are few matters into which I 
 have not looked," smiling, and running 
 his thick white fingers through his glossy 
 hair. The little chord of vanity struck 
 had brought him altogether in tune again. 
 " But there was no treasure in her. 
 That old fellow is after Kyd's doubloons, 
 and he thinks to throw us off the scent 
 by lugging in the name of this wreck. 
 But he had need to be awake early to 
 blind George Laddoun, eh 1 or you, 
 Jim," with an encouraging tap on the 
 back. 
 
 They walked in silence up the grassy 
 break through the woods which one or 
 two wagon-ruts marked as the road, and 
 stopped where a path struck off to Van 
 Zeldt's house. Laddoun fingered, break- 
 ing the bark off a dead cedar, with an 
 unwonted softening and hesitation in his 
 look and motions. 
 
 "You'll make a quick run of it, Jim?" 
 he said. " You'll be back in time ? For 
 Thursday ?" 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 "I know, ril tr}-, Laddoun. The 
 more because Noanes tells me you're 
 going to bring but a few of us in." 
 
 "Yes. A man's married but once, 
 and he ought to have his own way about 
 it. I'll treat the village afterwards ; they 
 sha'n't complain. But there's rough 
 jokes made at our country weddings 
 tliat I don't choose my wife to hear." 
 
 With the tender inflection in his tone, 
 and quieting of his eye, there was a cer- 
 tain swelling defiance in his whole burly 
 body, which to mild Httle Van Zeldt 
 was thorouglily lordly. A man was in 
 no mean sort a hero, who could put 
 Alanasquan at arm's length thus. 
 
 " You're the right sort, George," he 
 said. " When you're settled and a house- 
 holder, you'll bring matters up to the 
 right standard hereabouts. They be to 
 follow you like sheep the bell-wether — 
 that they be." 
 
 ''It won't be to their injury, then," 
 frankly. " Things need cleaning and 
 managing as they don't know. I'll do 
 what I can for the place," loftily. "And 
 for you, Van Zeldt," putting his hand on 
 the smaller man's shoulder, as a prince 
 might caress a favored courtier. " You'U 
 not fail us on Thursday ? I want none 
 but true friends about me and Lizzy." 
 
 The pompous voice a little unsteady, 
 and the florid face losing color. "I'm 
 serious when I say that I mean to push 
 your fortune, old boy," after a pause. 
 
 " There be'n't a day when you're not 
 pushing some fellow along." 
 
 " So ? You think that of me ? Well, 
 well ! it's Httle I can do. But God help 
 us ! it sickens me to look down on any 
 man below me in the mire ; and it don't 
 need money to give help, always. For 
 you, I'll strengthen your trade up yon- 
 der. I'm not a man without mark in 
 the great cities, Jim. The world's deep 
 as weU as wide, and one can dig secrets 
 out of her in Alanasquan, and make a 
 name, as easily as where men crowd 
 together. I hke to think I'm here in 
 the woods, dragging out of nature the 
 means to fight death up yonder." The 
 whole manner of the man altered ; a 
 generous glow flushed to his temples, 
 his voice rang out earnestly. 
 
 "You mean them chemicals, Lad- 
 doun ?" after a puzzled pause. " I thought 
 that boy of yours did that work. He's put 
 his soul into the herbs and black-drops 
 he makes out of them. It's a pity, too. 
 It's trifling work, and he be genooine," 
 raising his voice, " Galbraith be ; I've 
 reason to know that. He be the kind 
 of man to anchor to." 
 
 Laddoun combed his whiskers with a 
 pleased smile. 
 
 " Yes, he's good stuff. I discovered 
 him. I made him." 
 
 Van Zeldt turned quickly, but was 
 prudently silent. Laddoun was unwa- 
 rily touching on a matter which hitherto 
 had been held secret. 
 
 " Made him as entirely as you cut 
 those decoy-birds out of poplar yonder" 
 — then stopped, with a gulp for breath, 
 as if checked by some inward sting. 
 " Well, he's useful, as you say, to collect 
 and sort materials under me. But a 
 hand — a hand. It is the head that is 
 needed in my trade," touching his nar- 
 row, high forehead with the forefinger, 
 on which shone a round purple stone. 
 " Good-bye, Van Zeldt. You will be down 
 at the shop to-night ?" 
 
 "Yes." Van Zeldt stood leaning over 
 the trunk of the fallen cedar, a generous 
 twinkle of admiration through all of his 
 insipid face, as the stout, broad figure 
 disappeared in the shadows of the 
 woods. Laddoun was moulded out of 
 such different clay from his own ! There 
 were men to command and men to 
 serve, just as there were king-fish and 
 clams in the sea yonder. 
 
 Even the cool Quaker, who had taken 
 the bearings of most men's minds with 
 those lightless blue eyes of his, had felt, 
 against his will, a sort of magnetism in 
 the young village hero under all his 
 coarse, thin varnish ; something which 
 warmed the air about him, put a hearty, 
 genial look on the face of things. Van 
 Zeldt, therefore, was not to blame, if 
 Laddoun, with his mysterious talk of 
 cities, and of secrets dragged out of 
 nature, crowned, too, wnth his lucky love- 
 making in a quarter where he had failed, 
 became to him a sort of demi-god ; and 
 if he watched even the yellow cotton 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 gloves, the high hat and boots, asserting 
 themselves blackly beyond all other hats 
 and boots, with a dumb envy and won- 
 der. Nor was poor Laddoun, either, 
 much to blame, if he accepted himself 
 at the same valuation. The men about 
 him had labeled him with the highest 
 trade mark, even when they were all 
 boys together. 
 
 He went tramping along, his heavy 
 boots crunching on the needles of the 
 pines, roaring out one of his everlasting 
 songs. He was one of those men who 
 constantly feel their blood, which hap- 
 pened in his case to be slightly thick 
 and viscous ; men with nervous lips, the 
 balls of whose eyes habitually inflate 
 and contract, and whose hds are often 
 wet with tears. His nerves were all 
 on edge now ; the days were full of zest 
 and triumph ; full of thoughts of the 
 medicines he had invented; of his wife, 
 of the place he meant to hold in the 
 village. Two or three generations back, 
 one of his Milesian ancestors had rid 
 himself of the family fortune in a few 
 years of tempestuous jollity and hospi- 
 tality ; but his blood, eyes, and uncertain 
 lips had stayed behind as heirlooms, 
 and Laddoun had them now, with all 
 that they implied. 
 
 While he was in the middle of the 
 woods he met Galbraith, whom the vil- 
 lage people called his shop-boy, but 
 whom Laddoun, in his melodramatic 
 way, had dubbed his familiar. To him, 
 as he walked home with him, carrying 
 his basket and tin cases of roots, he 
 relieved his mind of his plans : how 
 Van Zeldt was to be pushed up, and a 
 school-house got under way, and a poor- 
 con'ribution taken up before winter, and 
 also a public subscription for a testimo- 
 nial to old Doctor Noanes. 
 
 " They do such things in towns, Dal- 
 las, eh ? And I'm ruining the old fel- 
 low's practice. Besides, it will bring 
 the people together. We need unity, 
 centralization," with a sweep of his eye 
 over the hamlet, as though it covered a 
 vast community, ending with a glance 
 for approval at the tall, raw-boned lad 
 beside him, who was watching his face 
 eagerly with a bewildered look. 
 
 " I've no doubt you're right, Lad- 
 doun," he said, gently; "there are a 
 good many words I don't know the 
 meaning of yet," quietly shifting the tin 
 cases to the other arm. 
 
 " So ? Poor fellow ! It will come in 
 time," putting one hand on the bony 
 shoulders, and looking kindly into the 
 girhsh face. " Say ! Galbraith, these are 
 a cursedly old cut — ^your trowsers. I 
 must rig you out new for the wedding. 
 It's a shame I let you wear a shirt like 
 this," pulling out the ragged edge of 
 clean flannel about his neck. "I'm a 
 poor patron, they'll say." 
 
 Dallas looked down at his uncouth 
 rig, and laughed : a hearty roar of a 
 laugh. " But I'll only take what I 
 earn," said he. 
 
 " Pshaw ! there should be no such 
 talk betAveen you and me." They ex- 
 changed a swift, significant glance, which 
 gave to the boy's face for the instant a 
 curiously old, worn look. 
 
 " Why shouldn't I give to you ? 
 There's nobody in Manasquan to whom 
 I don't mean to give a lift." 
 
 " Look what you're doing ! Curse it, 
 you lout ! look there !" savagely dragging 
 Laddoun off" the path. 
 
 " What do you mean ? Nothing but 
 a lame quail ? Bah !" stooping coolly 
 over the mangled mass of bloody feathers 
 which Dallas picked up and turned over, 
 drawing quick, spasmodic breaths, which 
 made Laddoun smile as he would at the 
 rage of a child. 
 
 " Why, you young \nper ! you'U turn 
 on the hand that feeds you ?" good- 
 naturedly. "Your muscles are steel, 
 Dallas. You shook me as if I were a 
 stick. Put tliat thing down ; I did not 
 see it." 
 
 The quivering of the bird on his palm 
 seemed to madden the boy. " You did 
 not see it ? You see nothing, George 
 Laddoun. You've nobody to speak the 
 truth to you but me. It's well enough 
 to keep your eyes on the sky, nv-iking 
 plans, and let your feet and hands do 
 what they will. But murder comes of 
 it." 
 
 George Laddoun's face, againsi the 
 background of the tree on which he 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 leaned, grew suddenly of a deathly 
 white ; but he gave neither word nor 
 motion, only to lean forward, and scan 
 with half-shut eyes the boy's face as he 
 turned the quail over gently in his hand, 
 putting it to his cheek again and again, 
 as a woman would be apt to do. If 
 Galbraith had any thought beyond the 
 bird, he held it out of sight with a skill 
 which baffled Laddoun. Presently, he 
 laid it down softly. 
 
 " It's dead now," stretching out his 
 arms with a long breath. " I was rough 
 with you, Laddoun," turning to him. 
 
 "Yes," with a loud, uncadenced laugh ; 
 " I should say you were cursedly rough. 
 You forget who you are, and who I am, 
 Dallas." 
 
 " I don't forget," quietly gathering his 
 scattered roots into his basket. " But 
 you have had an easy life. Now, when 
 I see a thing put under foot like that, I 
 think I feel the lash on my own back 
 again." 
 
 "If you remember the lash, you 
 oughtn't to forget who took it off," 
 keeping the same intent scrutiny on 
 every shade of meaning in the boy's 
 face. " Whatever comes to me, there 
 are reasons why you should be true to 
 me, Galbraith." 
 
 There was nothing melodramatic in 
 Dallas to answer this touch. " You've 
 been a good friend to me, Mr. Laddoun," 
 he said, simply, "but I mean to tell 
 you the truth for all that ;" and picking 
 up his basket he jogged along in a grave 
 silence. Laddoun followed him, making, 
 with laborious efforts, indifferent remarks 
 from time to time ; but all the vivacity 
 and spirit had died out of him. He 
 tried to shut his eyes to the boy's past 
 life, and look at him with a stranger's 
 cool judgment. Was there no secret 
 hid under this old-fashioned sincerity, 
 this simple-hearted, credulous nature 1 
 There was not a child in the village who 
 would not run after the queer, lank boy 
 to make him head in the game of ball 
 or marbles, nor an old woman who had 
 not some time shared her cup of tea with 
 him. Laddoun scanned, as a man on 
 trial for his life would the faces of the 
 jury, the unmarked features of the lad. 
 
 pausing again and again on his eyes. 
 They always had baffled him. The rest 
 of the face held nothing ; it was but a 
 child's — indistinctive ; worn perhaps by 
 hunger or want, but the eyes were deep- 
 set and sparkling, full of sweet temper 
 and laughter. 
 
 Nothing more .'' Was there any power 
 of reticence in them to hold back a fatal 
 secret for life .'' 
 
 George Laddoun could not tell ; they 
 had baffled a keener inspection than his, 
 and that not long ago ; even while he 
 watched him now they turned on him, 
 steady and honest. One thing he knew, 
 that they belonged to something stronger 
 than himself 
 
 Galbraith, boy like, forgot his trouble 
 after a while ; began to whistle shrilly, 
 grubbing under the scrubby bushes for 
 roots, after his usual fashion, stopping 
 when they came to an open bit of sand 
 to set down his basket and turn summer- 
 saults to the other end. Laddoun waited 
 good-naturedly, leaning on the fence. 
 
 " Well done, Dallas !" 
 
 "I'm growing too fat — I'm not as lim- 
 ber as I was," looking down with a 
 pleased laugh. 
 
 " I'm sorry that I worried you, Gal- 
 braith," placing his hand on his shoulder 
 in a half-timid, deprecating way, very 
 different from the patronizing tap on the 
 back which was his ordinary greeting to 
 the villagers. " I'd no mind to bring 
 up old times to you. They're dead and 
 gone now." 
 
 Galbraith nodded. One of those 
 vague notions which children have cross- 
 ed his mind — a wonder whether those old 
 times were not dead and in hell ; but the 
 impression was but slight, and a moment 
 afterwards, with a loud hillo ! he was 
 rooting under some leaves for a great 
 bee-ant, like a lump of crimson velvet. 
 
 " I want you, sir, and some of your 
 brothers ! Yo, ho !" caging it in a leaf. 
 
 " Poor Dall ! There's nothing in his 
 brain but childish folly," thought Lad- 
 doun as he strode on. " He throws all 
 trouble of old times out of his mind, 
 just as water on the boil gets rid of scum 
 and dirt a-top ;" and with a sudden feel- 
 ing of relief, he began to throw snatches 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 of bass into the lilt Galbraith was 
 wliistling. With the relief his own boy- 
 ishness awakened and the habitual pro- 
 pensity to do something kind, he left 
 Galbraith squatted on the ground with 
 his ants, and hurried on to a little 
 wooden shanty, which was set down, Hke 
 all Manasquan houses, in the middle of 
 the cedars. 
 
 « The little chap's been at work since 
 dawn. I'll build his fire for him," push- 
 ing open the door and going in. In a 
 few moments a pile of wood was crack- 
 ling on the hearth, and George, rubbing 
 his hands, came out, and waving his hat 
 to Dallas, who came slowly up the path, 
 turned off towards the far farm-houses. 
 In a moment, however, the boy was 
 panting after him. 
 
 "That was downright good in you, 
 Mr. Laddoun. Come back and eat your 
 supper with me. I've made a broiler for 
 crabs, and it's famous ; you ought to taste 
 them these cold nights," pulling at his 
 coat while he spoke. 
 
 " I can't, Dallas ; I'll send some of the 
 boys down, though." 
 
 « All right ! Tell them I have the 
 crabs." 
 
 Doctor Noanes, in his buggy, mean- 
 while had driven up and stopped. " Take 
 a seat, Laddoun ; I'll give you a lift. 
 That's an honest-faced boy," when Gal- 
 braith was gone. " Yet there are queer 
 stories afloat about him," with a side 
 glance at his companion's face. It was 
 imperturbable. 
 
 " What sort of stories ?" 
 
 " That you picked him out of some 
 den of corruption. That he has a toler- 
 able black record, if one could see it." 
 
 " Any place outside of Manasquan is a 
 den of corruption, according to the talk 
 here," with a rage which struck the 
 shrewd old doctor as too sudden to be 
 real. " As for Dallas, you can see for 
 yourself what he is. There's not many 
 men could make a place for themselves, 
 as he's done, in this village. And he's 
 bare sixteen." 
 
 " He's got to be a necessary sort of 
 fellow to everybody, that's true," warmly. 
 «' I don't know his equal for nursing, or 
 coddling children. There be my Joe, 
 
 now ; when he was down with the scar- 
 let fever, nobody would serve him but 
 ' Dallas — Dallas.' So I sent for the 
 fellow, and I'll say this, that under God 
 he saved the boy. There be no woman 
 about our house, you know, and he took 
 the place of one. Still, I thought I'd 
 mention the queer stories to you. You'd 
 best contradict them." 
 
 " You are very kind." 
 
 But Noanes remembered afterwards 
 that he did not contradict them to him, 
 but remained gloomily silent during the 
 remainder of the drive. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Galbraith meanwhile went back to 
 his house, and prepared to spend the 
 evening. It was but a little, broken- 
 down shanty, that had been used by one 
 of the Sutphens as a cow-shed, until it 
 was too far gone for that, when he had 
 given it to Dallas for his help in harvest- 
 ing. The half dozen boys of the village 
 had collected and made a regular frolic of 
 helping him patch it up, and it had been 
 a sort of rendezvous for them ever since, 
 as Dallas was their leader. He kept a 
 watch for some of them now, while he 
 put away his basket and cases in a damp 
 out-shed, and pulled off his clog shoes, 
 running to the door between-times to 
 peep down the winding paths which 
 now began to shine white in the night. 
 Then he disappeared into the shed, and 
 after a prodigious noise of splashing in 
 a tub of water, came out with his toilette 
 made. A queer enough looking figure 
 when the best was done : no wonder 
 Laddoun had laughed, for the clean 
 flannel shirt had belonged to a much 
 smaller man, and gaped open at the neck 
 and ran up the arms, leaving bare the 
 broad white throat and brawny wrists : 
 the patched trousers, too, were cut off 
 by the knee, and met by a long pair of 
 women's gray stockings. But Dallas had 
 some odd notions, picked up in that 
 mysterious outside world from which he 
 came, which puzzled the two or three 
 Manasquan boys with whom he ran. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 13 
 
 The nails on his big burned hands were 
 always white and trimmed, his breath 
 sweet, the miserable clothes clean. 
 " Them be the litde marks that belong 
 to the gendemen out there," he said. 
 " I soon learned 'em. Just as you kin 
 teU the best mackerel by the signs about 
 the gills." 
 
 When he came in from the shed, he 
 attendvely surveyed himself in a broken 
 bit of looking-glass, and then sat down 
 before the fire to toast his half-frozen 
 feet, whistling softly to himself and beat- 
 ing dme on his knees. The boys were 
 long in coming, and he would go hungry 
 rather than eat the crabs alone. Per- 
 haps, however, this heroic resolve re- 
 awakened the inward gnawing, for he 
 got up hastily with the words half spoken, 
 and putting his famous broiler over the 
 clear fire, in a few moments the green, 
 spongy things were fizzing and sputter- 
 ing out a savory odor on it. He stop- 
 ped his whistle and began to pace about 
 uneasily. He wished the boys would 
 come. As for being alone in the woods, 
 he did not heed it, though he could hear 
 the cry of the panthers, he fancied, night 
 after night. But Laddoun's gun hung 
 on the wall, and there was no such marks- 
 man on the beach as Galbraith. It was 
 the sea he feared : the rising sound of 
 the surf thundering up the shore in the 
 silence made his cheek pale and a cold 
 damp come out over his forehead. His 
 terror (if terror it was) had come long 
 ago, with his first sight of it. Laddoun 
 had quizzed him about it then, and tried 
 to laugh it off. 
 
 " Most landsmen have that feeling to 
 the sea at first," he said. " It'll soon 
 wear off, Dallas, with a boy as courage- 
 ous as you." 
 
 " I'm not afraid of //," he said, slowly. 
 "It's the voices I kin hear in it, Laddoun." 
 
 Laddoun made no reply. He never 
 heard voices in it, but he guessed shrewd- 
 ly what the sickly boy meant, and never 
 spoke to him of it again. 
 
 Galbraith was no longer sickly, but 
 the dread had not worn away. When the 
 latch chcked, and a face was thrust in 
 the door, his heart jumped with relief. 
 Any living voice would drown these far- 
 
 off dead ones, if it were only litde Tim 
 Graah's. So he took his hand, and 
 pulled him in, with a boisterous welcome, 
 which sent the blood to Tim's face, for 
 he was but a little fellow, and not used to 
 nodce from the big boys. 
 
 " I come to say there was nobody 
 coming, Galbraith." 
 
 " Except yourself, little 'un. You're 
 just in time." 
 
 " Kin I eat supper with you ? Kin I 
 set the table, Dallas ?" eagerly ; for the 
 fact of a boy who lived alone, cooked 
 for himself, and worked in roots and 
 herbs and beedes, was to him what a 
 fairy story would have been, if ever he 
 had heard one. 
 
 Galbraith nodded, turning and salting 
 the crabs, and Tim proceeded to spread 
 a white cloth on the miniature table, and 
 put thereon a loaf of bread, and butter, 
 cocking his head to one side and glan- 
 cing about him at the whitewashed walls, 
 the clean boards of the floor, and the 
 little neat bed in the corner, with a sense 
 of half-ownership. 
 
 " Our house is cleaner than any in the 
 village," he said at last. " You've got a 
 lot of women's gear about you, Dallas. 
 How did that come ?" 
 
 " I was sick when Laddoun first 
 fetched me here. I'd but httle to do, 
 that winter, but creep about from house 
 to house, getting acquainted hke, and 
 the women they made much of me and 
 cured me. So when I began to house- 
 keep, they all brought me a sheet or a 
 towel, or the Hke. I've got quite a 
 stock now." 
 
 " iMy mother gave you that bed," 
 chattered the child. " She cured the 
 feathers herself. I hearn her say she 
 saw purple scars of lashes on your back, 
 and she was bound never to let you sleep 
 hard another night. Be the scars there 
 yet, Dallas ?" in a half-frightened whisper. 
 
 But Galbraith did not answer ; he had 
 not heard him, Tim supposed, being 
 busy over his cookery. He turned with 
 the crabs on a dish in a moment, and 
 set them down with a loud, forced laugh. 
 " Bring the chairs, Tim, and fall to," 
 going from door to window, nervously 
 closing them. 
 
14 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 " Be you shutting out the sound of 
 the sea ?" laughed Tim. '• You can't do 
 it Dallas. It'll toiler and toiler. I've 
 tried it in the woods." 
 
 When they were once seated at the 
 smoking supper, however, Dallas forgot 
 the sound of the sea, or whatever had 
 pursued him. He had a way of giving 
 hiraseh" up so childishly to his tun, and 
 a habit too, when serious, of showing 
 his great ignorance through incessant 
 questions, that even Tim Graah felt him- 
 self his superior. While Dallas set open- 
 mouthed, listening intently to the ston.- of 
 Jane Graah's marriage, Tim regarded him 
 as little better than a fool. One would 
 think, from his questions, he never had 
 lived where there were women before. 
 
 " Where will you live when you are 
 married, Dallas ?" the story being fin- 
 ished. 
 
 '• Here." The answer was grave and 
 prompt "There's a place up on the 
 nver nobody knows but me. I'll build 
 a house there." 
 
 « Thee has matured thy plans early," 
 said a quiet voice behind him, and turn- 
 ing, the boys saw the Quaker Ledwith 
 in the open door. " Thy supper smelled 
 savor}', Friend Galbraith. Thee must 
 blame it for making me unlatch the door 
 and come in uninvited." 
 
 Dallas colored %^-ith pleasure. "There's 
 a crab or two left," looking in the dish, 
 and then bustling off for a clean plate. 
 
 The Quaker seated himself, his thick 
 arms crossed on the little table ; his 
 square, solid figure seemed to fill up the 
 room, and Tim. from being an honored 
 guest felt himself dwindle suddenly down 
 into the usual superfluous nuisance of a 
 boy. 
 
 Ledwith remained a moment doubtful 
 after the dish was placed before him ; the 
 delicious morsel tempted him. Then he 
 pushed it from him. " I think I \N-ill not 
 eat thy bread and salt, Dallas," he said. 
 "Thee has a comfortable little house 
 here ; ven.' comfortable. But a gun, eh ? 
 One would not think thee needed defence 
 for thy house ?" 
 
 Tim, whose wide-awake gaze never 
 left the strangers fece. wondered here, 
 more and more, how, without apparent 
 
 ! motion, the stolid light-blue eyes took in 
 and noted all that was in the room ; but 
 Dallas laughed unconcernedly, clearing 
 away the dishes. 
 
 " The gun is Laddoun's." 
 
 " Laddoun's ? But thou art a keen 
 marksman, they tell me. Does thee not 
 find thy skill wasted on this beach ?" 
 
 A trace of significance crept into the 
 last words. He checked himself sud- 
 denly, coughing behind his hand, and sat 
 looking steadily in the fire, while Gal- 
 braith made some bopsh efforts to en- 
 tertain him, discussing the schools of 
 mackerel that had run in last week, and 
 the chance of a nor'easter before No- 
 vember. 
 
 '• Thee has learned the lingo of the 
 beach soon," looking up at last. " Thee 
 has got quite a salt)- flavor into thyself 
 Here's thy workshop .'' So ?" suddenly 
 facing about to a little closet immedi- 
 ately behind him. Had the man eyes 
 in the back of his head, then ? Tim 
 dragged behind them with a pale face, 
 one hand gripping Galbraith's shirt sleeve. 
 But Dallas hurried eagerly with a candle 
 after the Quaker, who stood in the recess 
 quite motionless for a moment : in that 
 moment however, he had absorbed every 
 item about him, and classed and rated 
 them. 
 
 " Shelf of old books — bought off of 
 stalls — De Candolle, Bartram, Pursh — a 
 botanist eh ? half-worn-out works on 
 chemistn,- — how many ? old treatises on 
 geolog}-. These cost a pretty penny !" 
 while Galbraith passed his hand over 
 them with an unconscious caress, brush- 
 ing the dust from one or two. •• Bottles 
 full of ore and sand. Boxes of herbs 
 and earths ; a pick — shovels. What is 
 in that cupboard?" sharply, tapping it 
 with his cane. 
 
 Galbraith opened it with a proud flush ; 
 the Quaker gave a start of surprise. "A 
 batten,- ! Chemical apparatus — manufac- 
 tured out of old \-ials and pipes. Thee 
 has a wonderlul cleverness, boy," turn- 
 ing over the queer substitutes for retorts 
 and crucibles with a smile, and sf'Caking 
 in a quick, changed voice. '• I had a fancy 
 for the study when I was a boy, but I 
 took to — to making analyses of a differ- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 15 
 
 ent sort" He turned on Galbraith as 
 he said it, measuring him from his hght 
 hair to his patched shoes. 
 
 '• Of a different sort, and I am not 
 wanting in skill, they say." 
 
 Dallas was silent ; for the first time, 
 the sharp-eyed little Tim beside him 
 noted that he began to share in his own 
 uneasy scrutiny of the stranger. He 
 drew back a step, and jealously locked 
 the door of his closet, keeping a furtive 
 glance on Ledwith, who smiled unpleas- 
 antly, stroking his fet chin with his white 
 hand. 
 
 " I won't disturb thy little make-shifts, 
 my lad. Come out. It's thee I have 
 business with." But he waited patiently, 
 with a real interest in his flabby features, 
 while Dallas carefully replaced some bits 
 of ore that had fallen on the floor. 
 
 " Now, some men in my trade would 
 call thy hobby tomfoolerj- ; but I had a 
 leaning that way once mj-self. as I told 
 tliee," complacently. '' I went through 
 college. I can see thee is one of them 
 men that was born for no other use than 
 to dig into them matters. Unless — 
 thee is stopped in the way," with a leer 
 and a wink. He took the tallow candle 
 from Dallas, and inspected him gravely 
 as he put it slowly do^^-n on the table. 
 " Kno%ving what I know of thee, Gal- 
 braith," he said, deliberately, " thee is as 
 curious a specimen of a human being as 
 ever I met And my experience in them 
 is not small." 
 
 The tall, raw-boned fellow stood in 
 the middle of tlie floor, the yellow light 
 fiill about him, looking into the Quaker's 
 face with a demeanor as grave and 
 moderate as liis own. Even to Tim 
 there was something at odds and in- 
 comprehensible in the scarecrow gear, 
 in the childish face, with lank, light hair 
 brushed behind the ears, and tlie sane, 
 grave, dark-blue eyes, into which Led- 
 with stooped and peered, and stooped 
 and peered again, his own eyes jeering 
 one moment and sternly questioning the 
 lext but without eftect Bej'ond a dis- 
 tressea surprise, there wiS no sign of 
 flinching or inward consciousness in the 
 lad. 
 
 '' Well, well !" standing upright and 
 
 rolling his hands one in the other with a 
 discomfited impatience ; *• I've hunted 
 many a rabbit in my day, and let "em 
 double as they would, I had 'em at last 
 So tliis is Laddoun's work-shop ? It's 
 here the brains are. eh ? I thought as 
 much. Some of these days the young 
 whelp ^vill make his fortime with a Lad- 
 doun's Balsam or PiU. and look for thee 
 ! to grub on in the background .' Hardly. 
 I fancy ; the brains will take their place 
 in tlie end. I see thy cards. Dallas.'' 
 
 "You are talking of what I don't 
 
 understand," said Dallas, bluntly. %\-ith a 
 
 queer quaver in his voice ; '• nor you 
 
 : either, I suspect Mr. Led-\vith. Lad- 
 
 1 doun has apparatus at the shop. I 
 
 j know nothing about balsams or pills. I 
 
 I do my work because it is the only work 
 
 I could ever understand. I'm coimted 
 
 uncommon dull at other things," simply. 
 
 " Thee has a won-derful cleverness," 
 
 with an appro\-ing snap of tlie fingers 
 
 and significant nod. as one actor might 
 
 encourage another on the boards. " But 
 
 this chemical business ; did thee learn 
 
 it tli5-self .? Is thee self-taught ?" 
 
 " No. I had a chance," shortly, turn- 
 ing away. 
 j " Thee don't care to go into thy past 
 j life, eh ? That's natiu^ Young people 
 like better to look forward than back," 
 \s-ith a shrewd smile. "I'll leave you, 
 boys, now ; good-night ! Thee had better 
 load thy weapon, Dallas ; thee might 
 need it for defence," with a chuckle. 
 
 Galbraith closed the door after him, 
 and stood for a moment beside it with 
 his back towards Tim ; when he turned 
 and came to the fire again, the look with 
 which he had met tlie Quaker ^\•as gone ; 
 here was nothing. Tim saw. but the boy 
 who had played ball with him. and cooked 
 the crabs isnth such jolly fim half an 
 hour ago. But he moved as if he were 
 tired and sick ; pulled Tim up to his 
 knees, holding his hands on his shoul- 
 ders. When the boy looked up at him 
 he saw that his eyes were fixed on the 
 fire and were red and full of tears. 
 " Tim ?" he said. 
 
 "Yes, Dallas." gently, putting his 
 fingers upon tlie big hand on his 
 shoulder. 
 
i6 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 •' Tim, why be'n't I like other boys ?" 
 
 Tim looked up bewildered, but the 
 grave, anxious countenance was bent in- 
 tently watching his own, and Dallas 
 gave him no help with his answer. 
 
 " Like Manasquan boys ?" sharpening 
 his wits. "Why so you be, Dallas. 
 Only for your house here, and your 
 crockery and bottles ; and," reflectively, 
 " then you've got no mother or sisters 
 belonging to you. AU of us has them. 
 That's a difference." 
 
 Dallas made no reply, but he suddenly 
 turned his face away. He did not hide 
 it, however, from the sharp eyes that 
 were on him. Tim's face flushed as he 
 saw it. " You're kinder than the other 
 big boys, Galbraith," quickly. " There 
 be'n't one in the village that has as 
 many friends as you. You be the only 
 one that won't lie or drink, the women 
 says. / don't heed the stories they tell. 
 Nobody heeds them. You kin look 
 anybody in the face, Dallas." 
 
 " So they tell stories, do they ?" with 
 a sad, slow smile. After a long pause, 
 he said, as if thinking aloud, " There 
 never was such good men as here, Tim. 
 I never was in a church till I came 
 here. No. Laddoun took me in that 
 first evening. I didn't understand old 
 Father Kimball, but it was so quiet 
 there, under the hill, with the trees out- 
 side. The hymn too — it was a tune 
 
 that ; well, I'd heard that tune long 
 
 ago. And coming out, the men was so 
 friendly. When Laddoun told them my 
 name, they nodded in their sober way 
 and spoke very friendly to me, first one 
 and then another, goin' through the 
 woods. I'd often thought, when I was a 
 little chap, if I could come across God, 
 He'd be something like that. Quiet 
 and friendly. Not asking where I'd 
 been, or what I'd done, or about things 
 I'd no share in bringing on myself" 
 The words came out slow, unconscious, 
 the reasonable, grave eyes still fixed on 
 the fire. " It's been the same with Man- 
 asquan people ever since," after a short 
 silence. "They've treated me as if I 
 was one of themselves. There's not one 
 of them has told me of the difference 
 between us." 
 
 Tim's black eyes grew keener. " What 
 be the difference, Dallas ?" 
 
 The simple, credulous face turned, and 
 the answer came quickly. He was talk- 
 ing to the child just as he would have 
 reasoned with himself if he had been 
 alone. 
 
 " Sometimes I think there be'n't any. 
 You boys will grow up men just like 
 them, and you say, Tim, I be like the 
 other boys. But sometimes it seems as 
 if I weren't allowed a chance like every 
 man has. It weren't by my will that I 
 was born — down there. It weren't my 
 fault that — No matter," hastily rising. 
 " I'm doing the best I can here. God 
 knows I want to be a decent, God-fear- 
 ing man like your father, or Father Kim- 
 ball. I never knowed men like them. 
 And if I'm dragged back now — It seems 
 as if there was something agin me in the 
 world. I doubt it's too strong for me," 
 lifting his arms, and letting them fall. 
 
 " You look strong enough to fight any- 
 thing, Galbraith," said Tim, encourag- 
 ingly. "Who be you afraid of ? The 
 Quaker ?" 
 
 Dallas walked to the window and 
 glanced out. "It be time you were off, 
 little 'un. It's after eight. Your folks 
 '11 be in bed, and all Manasquan besides. 
 I'll leave the light in the window. Now ! 
 Make a run for it." He stood in the 
 door to watch the little chap cross the 
 woods, giving him a cheer to keep his 
 spirits up. 
 
 The cheer and the cold sea air brought 
 himself up out of the slough, as a stroke on 
 the face will make a man feel his strength 
 all over his body. Whatever this some- 
 thing was which had been against him, 
 ordering his birth and childhood in vice 
 and poverty, it faded now out of sight. 
 
 " Strong enough to fight anything," 
 Tim had said. Was that true ? After 
 all, what had he to complain of? He 
 was a strong, athletic boy, standing in 
 the door of the home he had made for 
 himself He looked over his shoulder at 
 his bottles, picks, retorts, and laughed. 
 Nothing makes a man feel his footing so 
 sure in the world as to know his right 
 work, and have it well gripped in his 
 hands for hfe. And everybody was so 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 17 
 
 friendly about him ! From the day he 
 began to try to pick off those old stained 
 rags of his childhood, hands had been 
 held out to help him; first Laddoun, 
 and now all Manasquan, down to little 
 Tim. What did it matter for this man 
 Ledwith ? 
 
 He and his mysterious hinted threats 
 began to seem unreal as a nightmare to 
 Dallas, as he looked out into the pleasant 
 dusky shadows of the woods and the 
 starry blue overhead. It was all clear 
 enough ! The world was just what a 
 man chose to make it. There was no- 
 thing stronger than himself to drag him 
 down. Nothing I 
 
 He drew long breaths of the delicious 
 cold into his strong lungs, threw back 
 his broad chest, feeling every muscle in 
 his body stiffen. The boy's heart was 
 big and tender just then. If they would 
 suffer him, he would live among them in 
 Manasquan until he died an old, white- 
 headed man. They were all so dear to 
 him ! — so friendly ! He wished suddenly 
 for some one to tell all this to — this rush 
 of strength and happiness that made his 
 eyes wet and his cheek burn hke fire. 
 Tim was out of sight, but poor Dallas 
 sent out suddenly into the night a stir- 
 ring, boj-ish cheer. It came back loud 
 and ringing from the woods, and again 
 and again in low, cheerful echoes farther 
 off. He looked up to the bright, smiling 
 sky, wondering if God, of whom he had 
 a dim notion, was there, and had heard 
 him ; wondering whether He was behind 
 all this good luck that had come to him. 
 He stood silent a moment, thinking. 
 
 He went in and closed the door, and 
 after he had undressed, pulled the fire- 
 logs carefully apart, so as to leave the 
 room in shadow ; then he stood hesitating 
 by the bed, his face red and then pale, 
 and kneeled down at last, hiding his 
 head in his hands. But in a moment 
 he got up, all trace of color gone from 
 his face. 
 
 " I am afraid," he muttered. " I'm 
 afraid," and stretching himself in bed, 
 lay wakeful, staring out into the flickering 
 shadows, saying nothing. But the prayer 
 in the boy's dumb heart was audible to 
 God as if it had been trumpet-tongued. 
 
 To help him with his chance, to bring 
 good luck to him — good luck. To make 
 a man of him. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 A YELLOW Jersey wagon rolled up the 
 road to the squat little porch of the tav- 
 ern, where half a dozen leading Mana- 
 squan men sat smoldng in the hazy, 
 mellow warmth of the October afternoon. 
 The leathern flap was put back, and old 
 Father Kimball, who preached on this 
 beach once a month, thrust out his lean, 
 sagacious face, nodding to them ; 
 
 " How is it with you, brethren ?" 
 
 There was quite a stir and tumult ; 
 here was the first actual beginning of 
 the wedding programme. Joe Nixon, the 
 tavern-keeper, knocked on the wall to 
 give the news to the women inside, and 
 then went up to the wagon as spokesman 
 for the party. "You'd better come in, sir, 
 and take something hot. No ? Brother 
 Noanes' folks be expectin' you, I know ; 
 still—" 
 
 " You are going to have a lively week 
 of it, heh, Nixon ?" 
 
 "Jest so, Mr. Kimball. Van Zeldt's 
 schooner is to be run in this afternoon. 
 A heavy cargo, I hear. Jim's venturin' 
 in pretty deep, lately. A matter of fifty 
 dollars in silk goods, they tell me, alone. 
 Considerin' his capital, that's risky. When 
 them New York dealers get a man to 
 speculatin', it's all up with him. They 
 soon smeUed out Jim's capital." 
 
 Kimball shook his head. "I'll talk to 
 Van Zeldt. Is that all your news ?" 
 
 Nixon came closer. " There's the 
 weddin' to-morrow evenin' ; you've hardly 
 forgot that ? Your pocket'll know the 
 difference when it be over, or I'm mis- 
 taken," winking back at the men. 
 
 " That's so," said Graah, taking out 
 his pipe. " There be nothing close-fisted 
 about George Laddoun. He's got the 
 pick of the village girls, too." 
 
 "You're right there, William;" and 
 the other men nodded, and pushed down 
 the tobacco reflectively in their pipes 
 "You're right." 
 
i8 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 " The day after the weddin' the infair's 
 to be held at old Mrs. Laddoun's," con- 
 tinued Nixon, hastily gathering up the 
 reins of the conversation again ; " the 
 whole village is bid, young and old. I 
 hear Laddoun is having his con-fection- 
 ery down from New York. I don't know 
 what truth there is in that." 
 
 " I heern, too," said a man who had not 
 yet spoken, " that Van Zeldt is bringin' 
 down fireworks as his weddin' present. 
 I've read of them fireworks ; blazin' tem- 
 ples, and armies in the sky. Such as 
 we read of in the book of Revelations. 
 Seems to me that be hardly the work for 
 a church-member. It be mockin' the 
 Scriptures." 
 
 " Both them reports," said Graah, 
 severely, " came from Pete Van Zeldt. 
 He's a onreliable boy. I'd take them re- 
 ports with caution, Mr. Kimball, and not 
 venture on repeatin' them, if I was you." 
 
 " Anpvays, we're havin' stirrin' times," 
 broke in Nixon, impatiently. «' Stirrin' 
 times ! Manasquan's wakin' up. I count, 
 too, confident on George Laddoun. He 
 has the materials of a great man, Mr. 
 Kimball, that young man ; an' when he's 
 settled down, I make no doubt he'll give 
 tliis town a h'ist up such as it has never 
 had. He's known in high quarters, 
 George is, and he promises to put his 
 shoulder to the wheel in the Legislature, 
 and get that railroad down from New 
 York. By next winter, gentlemen, we'll 
 have the iron horse in Manasquan." 
 
 " I've bin hstenin' for that horse's 
 neigh a good many years," said Graah, 
 satirically. But the laugh did not fol- 
 low which he expected. 
 
 "We made no doubt of havin' that 
 railroad in my father's time," said Nixon, 
 gravely. " He had his wires all laid, as 
 you might say, ready for pullin'. He'd 
 hev give the land for a depot himself: 
 half an acre there by the cedars. But 
 he was took away suddently. Of pleu- 
 risy." 
 
 " Well, good-bye, brethren," said the 
 preacher, who had no mind to enter on 
 til is interminable railroad-field of talk, 
 every inch of which he knew by heart. 
 "I'm afraid Sister Noanes' dinner will 
 be cold." 
 
 " One minute, Mr. Kimball !" and 
 Nixon put his hand on the wagon-door 
 and began to whisper, glancing back, as 
 if for approval, at the other men, who 
 nodded and put the word from one to 
 to the other. The old man Hstened with 
 his brows knit, muttering " Umph" to 
 himself, but with a pleased smile. 
 
 " A very good thing !" he said em- 
 phatically, aloud. "A pleasant little 
 plan, and the lad deserves it, brethren. 
 Well, good morning. Wedding weather, 
 eh ?" and the yellow wagon roUed leisure- 
 ly away. 
 
 Back from the road, half hidden by 
 Graah's cedar swamp, was the old Byrne 
 place ; nothing but a strip of pasturage 
 and bit of pond, beside the house. Lad- 
 doun would come into possession of it to- 
 morrow in right of his wife. Laddoun 
 had added one hundred acres to another 
 since he left college, until he was one of 
 the largest landholders in the county. 
 
 " Chemicals, I suppose," said old Mr. 
 Kimball, with a puzzled knot in his fore- 
 head. " It's a business I don't under- 
 stand. But it pays him well." He had 
 fallen into the habit of thinking aloud in 
 his continual, long, solitary journeys. He 
 leaned fonvard to see if the Byrne house 
 was open, and saw a blue rift of smoke 
 coming from the chimney, and at the 
 same time Dallas Galbraith going into 
 the woods through the stubble-fieid. 
 " Hollo, Dallas ! Here !" he shouted. 
 
 Father Kimball had an odd liking for 
 the boy. He was more pleased to meet 
 him than he would have been anybody 
 in Manasquan. He had taken his part 
 strongly years ago, when the men at 
 Nixon's tavern began to hint at queer 
 suspicions about the strange boy that 
 Laddoun had brought among them. 
 
 " Don't I know a good tree when I 
 see it ?" he said, vehemently. " There's 
 a hundred signs beside the Scripture one 
 of fruit. Clean bark, stout limbs, the 
 leaves with a healthy rustle in them. 
 Jest so with human nature. The boy's a 
 strong, manly fellow, sound to the core." 
 He liked to watch the lad wrestle or 
 swim, as he grew older, finding him 
 difterent from the drowsy Jerseymen 
 about him — full of vitality, zealous, terri- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 19 
 
 bly in earnest in work or fun : took 
 pleasure in contrasting their nasal drawl 
 with his free, sonorous voice. Galbraith's 
 tones, by the way, were remarkable in 
 their sweep and sweetness of intonation : 
 one reason why Manasquan people were 
 always thoroughly awake when near him, 
 and, perhaps, why they were attracted to 
 him. The old man went on calling to him 
 as he crossed the field, chaffing him, and 
 Dallas shouted back answers to his jokes ; 
 not very witty, perhaps, on either side, 
 but enough to make them both laugh, 
 being in the humor for it. 
 
 " What is the meaning of this holi- 
 day rig ?" scanning Galbraith's suit of 
 blue flannel, cut in a half-sailor fashion. 
 " A present from Laddoun, eh ?" 
 
 <■' No. I bought it with my own money ; 
 Elizabeth Byrne planned and made it," 
 with a complacent glance downwards. " I 
 rather like my looks in it. I am going 
 to the house now. She's there." 
 
 " It is well for you that Laddoun's 
 wife is what she is, Dallas. You'll be 
 thrown into the machinery of that house 
 a good deal, and George — is uncertain. 
 But Lizzy — well, Lizzy's temper is like 
 the honey off of buckwheat ; it's a rough 
 flavor, but it's sweet and warranted to 
 keep. She's the surest friend you've 
 got, Dallas. And you have more than 
 you know, my lad," laughing significantly 
 as he nodded and drove oif. 
 
 " I know what Lizzy is," said Dallas 
 to himself. He had a fancy that to-mor- 
 row would be the beginning of a new 
 and the best chapter in his life. George 
 ■was uncertain in temper, and he was 
 necessarily a good deal in his power. But 
 Lizzy — But she would be waiting in the 
 door for him, and he was half an hour 
 late ; he started at a full run across the 
 stubble-field to the woods which lay be- 
 tween him and the house. 
 
 Father Kimball had said it was wed- 
 ding weather ; and Elizabeth had the 
 same fancy when she came to the door 
 to look after Dallas, and felt as if she had 
 stepped into a bath of warm, sweet-scent- 
 ed sunshine. She had been too busy all 
 day to look out, but now her house was 
 in order ; she had bathed and put on her 
 stifl, new white dress, and smoothed her 
 
 brown hair till it was like shiny satin 
 folded about her head. George Lad- 
 doun would pull it down, when ne came, 
 most likely. There was a certain quiet 
 positivism in her round, solid little per- 
 son, in the very bow of her ribbons, that 
 irritated him through all of his passion- 
 ate love. " It's a hint of backbone, that 
 don't belong to your nature, Lizzy," he 
 said. " What does a woman want with 
 backbone ?" 
 
 She was very anxious about this defect 
 of hers, as Dallas found out ; for he was 
 the only one to whom she spoke of it. 
 "It is the habit of teaching so long that 
 has made me dogmatic," she said, and 
 made constant humble efforts to cure 
 herself of it, for George's pleasure. 
 
 She had been teaching in the woods 
 school-house a good many years : sewing 
 between times, boarding with one old 
 farmers wife and another. Meantime the 
 little brown Byrne house and the land 
 lay unoccupied, just as her father left 
 them. But when she found she was 
 going to marry George Laddoun ("people 
 said, at first, Jim 'Van Zeldt, but Lizzy 
 knew better), she began to use the little 
 store of money she had laid by to repair 
 the old homestead, and make it fit for 
 his home. If it had been a palace, she 
 thought, it would better have suited that 
 princely young fellow. Dallas had helped 
 her tack carpets, put hinges on doors, 
 weed the garden beds, hang the calico 
 curtains. She forgot that he was not a 
 woman, sometimes, and talked to him as 
 if he had been. The consequence was, 
 that Galbraith often wished that Lad- 
 doun knew the girl as well as he cid, 
 and so would be more just to her and 
 tender. 
 
 She had an hour or two for him now, 
 before George came. She had a bottle 
 of wine to give her lover, but she and 
 Dallas were going to have a cozy cup of 
 tea together. She had a surprise for 
 him. One room, and that the one with 
 the widest outlook from the windows and 
 the tightest-fitting window-frames (which 
 means much on this windy coast), she 
 had set apart for the lonely boy. " I'll 
 not have him sleeping like a wild beast 
 in the woods any longer," she told Lad- 
 
20 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 doun. " Let him keep his hut for a 
 work-shop. But Dallas shall live with 
 me." 
 
 To which George assented eagerly. 
 Elizabeth never pleased him so much as 
 when she gave a little evidence of Irish 
 extravagance or hospitality. The doors 
 of his own house and heart were open as 
 a market-place ; the more that tramped 
 through them, the better; but the key 
 of Lizzy's was turned ; and when anybody 
 asked for a place at her table or in her 
 friendship, she scanned them as cau- 
 tiously from behind her bars as if it were 
 a quiet convent into which they wanted 
 to enter. So all the village heard of the 
 reserved room for Galbraith with surprise, 
 and said, with Father Kimball, that the 
 boy had made his best friend now. 
 
 " Lizzy be a queer one ; she be differ- 
 ent from Laddoun. Her likings and 
 dislikings come to be a part of herself, 
 like snails on a rock," old Graah said. 
 
 Everybody knew of the room but Dal- 
 las himself; it had been the talk of the 
 village that day that she was going to 
 surprise him with it, and they all, for 
 their own purposes, kept the secret. He 
 fancied, however, as he went by the farm- 
 houses on his way, that there was a pe- 
 culiar twinkle in the women's faces as 
 tliey called to him, an unusual fun and 
 cheerfulness, and that their voices never 
 had sounded so hearty and kind. The 
 men at Nixon's, too, as he passed, joking 
 about his clothes, did it with an under- 
 current of meaning in their lazy talk that 
 touched him, he did not know why. There 
 was not one of them to whom he had not 
 tried to be useful in his small way, in 
 their thronged fishing-times, or in the 
 sickness last year, when one or two were 
 down in every house. So, when they 
 wished him good luck, and threw an old 
 shoe after him, he thought they had, per- 
 haps, been talking of him, and found how 
 much they all were his friends. 
 
 "And so they are," said Dallas, shjdng 
 stones vehemently into the pond, with a 
 choking in his throat. " There's not a 
 man or woman in Manasquan that isn't 
 my friend. I think some one must always 
 have managed my luck for me," his face 
 grave, but not daring to look up. 
 
 Now the truth of the matter was this : 
 and it was, to make no mystery of the 
 thing, the secret of Nixon's whisper to 
 Father Kimball. Manasquan people 
 might, as George Laddoun asserted, be 
 over-boastful, and rate their village too 
 highly, but they were clannish, swore by 
 each other to the exclusion of the world, 
 and were fond, too, in a simple, generous 
 way, of humoring their favorites, of little 
 fetes, processions and the like. So when 
 it was noised about that Lizzy had set 
 apart a room for Galbraith, and meant to 
 give a home to the lad, it was quite in 
 keeping with their habits that there 
 should be a general contribution in order 
 to make the room comfortable and snug, 
 and that they should make a little glori- 
 fication of the matter by keeping it quiet 
 until Lizzy should break it to him. So 
 they all watched the tall, lank boy, in his 
 holiday suit, making his way through 
 the woods, with a genial, inward satis- 
 faction. A deserving, good creature, 
 whom the world had abused until Mana- 
 squan was shrewd enough to find out his 
 merit. 
 
 The air was sun-lit and sweet-scented, 
 as we said ; the woods through which he 
 walked were silent and motionless as 
 though they had stood in it unmoved for 
 centuries. It was the edge of a great 
 and almost unbroken wilderness that he 
 skirted, gigantic pines, -with bare, hoary 
 trunks, rising into a thick sheet of foliage 
 above. There had been times (when the 
 world turned a harsher face on Dallas 
 than to-day) when he had thought this 
 forest one of the places where Death him- 
 self hid, so monstrous were the elfish 
 growths that matted every limb, of un- 
 natural mosses, and lichens of diseased 
 ajd feverish hues. The more dead the 
 bough was, the more vivid and strong 
 was the parasite that fed on it. 
 
 But to-day his unwholesome fancy was 
 forgotten, and Galbraith suddenly stopped 
 his crunching step over the crisp needles 
 of the pines, and drew his breath with 
 quick surprise and wonder at the infinite 
 beauty over which the sunshine flickered 
 through the green, arching dome over- 
 head. The delicate Southern moss hung 
 in traihng webs of palest grayish greer 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 from ever}' bough and bit of rough bark ; 
 the dead trees were massed with a fila- 
 gree covering of purple, scarlet, of silver 
 fretted with black ; the wax-like leaves of 
 the pipsissiwa starred the path ; on every 
 side the crimson fruit of the cactus 
 opened its heated heart to the late warmth. 
 Dallas broke off" a bough which was one 
 wonderful flowering in violet and green, 
 crimped and curled leaves folded one 
 above the other, but it crumbled in his 
 hand — a lump of slimy, rotten wood. 
 
 Who was it that had so carefully turned 
 all this death into beauty ? Even where 
 a bunch of mushrooms thrust up their 
 heads, the brown needles thatched them 
 like a miniature roof, and a ray of sun- 
 light, striking obliquely through their 
 transparent stalks, glorified them into 
 clear amber pillars for the fairy temple. 
 Dallas walked on more slowly. A gi-eat 
 quiet came into his mind, up through all 
 its boyish jumble of ideas about fishing, 
 and roots, and the work he wanted to do 
 for Elizabeth. He — Whoever it was that 
 had brought all this good out of rotten- 
 ness and decay, was it He that had 
 brought him out of that miserable old 
 time into this village ? Was it ? 
 
 The lad's eyes grew curiously steady 
 and clear. The wind hinted a low, mys- 
 terious music in the pines, the sea, with 
 warm, violet waves, caressed the shore, 
 but no voices from old, miserable years 
 moaned in it. 
 
 Some of us need to be lashed with 
 defeat before we find out the real strength 
 of the man within us, but some of us, like 
 Dallas to-day, have to feel friendly hands 
 touch us, and the world's seldom-seen, 
 real, just, beautiful face clear shining into 
 our souls. Then we see what we were 
 meant to do in this life, and resolve to 
 begin at once to build with gold instead 
 of stubble. 
 
 Lizzy, when she saw Dallas coming 
 up the path, went down to meet him, 
 and looked curiously at him. He had 
 been at work with her all morning, in 
 high good-humor, quizzing her about her 
 locked Blue Beard's chamber, whistling, 
 and lilting out sailors' songs up stairs 
 and down. He was quiet and grave 
 now, as if he had come up out of church. 
 
 "No one came up with you, Dallas?" 
 
 " No." He thought it neglectful that 
 George was not with his bride this last 
 evening, so affected not to understand 
 her anxious question. 
 
 They sat down on the low steps of the 
 porch, but she could keep quiet but a 
 little while. " Dallas, where is Laddoun ?" 
 
 " I do not know, Lizzy." 
 
 " That stranger, Ledwith, has been fol- 
 lowing him about all day. I am afraid 
 of him," uneasily getting up. " He has 
 a fish's eye, dead and cold. I wanted 
 George. I have something to tell you, 
 Dallas," blushing and smiling, " and he 
 could have put it into better words than 
 L George is a good speaker, I think?" 
 timidly. 
 
 "That he is," heartily. " It's a great 
 thing to have talent, like Laddoun. If 
 one wants to do anything in the world, I 
 mean. It's just like a heavy man walk- 
 ing in the sand ; no matter where he goes, 
 the print is there, deep. Now I — " 
 
 " You ? When it comes to drawing, 
 Dallas, I think you have a true genius," 
 eagerly ; and she went into the room and 
 stopped before a miserable picture of a 
 man's head, purporting to be Laddoun's, 
 wherein the outlines were all false and 
 the features daubed with colors. Dallas 
 looked at it complacently, his hands in 
 his pockets. 
 
 " Yes. If I have any talent, it is for 
 painting, I think." 
 
 "And your experiments — your plans ?" 
 
 " Oh, that's my work," indifferently ; 
 "that all comes natural to me. If you'd 
 shut me up in jail, I'd find the way to 
 those jobs all the same. But my paint- 
 ing is a different thing." 
 
 She listened attentively. She wanted 
 him to feel that he was cared for in 
 every trifle to-night. She wanted him 
 to feel no lack of mother and sister in at 
 least this one hour of his life. She 
 guessed the starved, solitary childhood 
 he had led, and thought of the scars and 
 lashes on the lean back underneath his 
 new clothes — of the wounds which even 
 now sometimes opened and bled ; and 
 her voice trembled a little when she told 
 him to come with her and see what she 
 had hid in the Blue Beard's chamber. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 "It is someth'ng which will help you 
 to paint better ah your life," she said. 
 She stopped at the hall-door to call to 
 George's mother — a little, withered old 
 body in a clean, brown calico dress, her 
 gray hair knotted back without a cap — 
 who was putting some chickens in the 
 coop. She came up with a significant 
 smile in her eyes. 
 
 " No, Lizzy, I'll not go in with you," 
 whispering in her weak, pleasant little 
 quaver of a voice. " The lad's more of 
 a stranger to me than to you, and it 
 might damp his pleasure. He's had 
 hard roughing it in the world, I'm afraid, 
 poor child !" and she stood nodding and 
 smiling to them as they went over to the 
 low, painted pine door, and after tliey 
 had gone in, nodded and smiled to her 
 diickens, talking about it to herself. 
 
 Now they were in the room, Lizzy 
 had meant to make the matter very plain 
 to Dallas, but she forgot all that she had 
 thought to say. " We wanted our best 
 friend to come and live with us," she 
 stammered out, the tears coming to her 
 eyes ; " and that is you, Dallas. And 
 the people in the village wished you to 
 know who were your friends, and they 
 sent you these tokens — for — for your 
 home. Their names are on them." 
 
 When he turned, pale and astonished, 
 she had slipped past him and closed the 
 door behind her. She wanted him to 
 be alone, to go over the little gifts with 
 which the room was filled, from the rag- 
 carpet, which only Mrs. Laddoun could 
 weave, to the fire-irons from poor Becker, 
 the smith. She wanted him to find that 
 there was no name omitted, no man or 
 woman in the village who did not count 
 him as a friend. When she went in 
 again, which she did not do for a long 
 time, the lad was standing with his back 
 to her, looking in the fire ; and as she 
 came up to him, she saw how colorless 
 he was. He talked but little at any 
 time, and when he was deeply moved 
 was dumb, as now. Even Lizzy's sensi- 
 ble eyes grew dim when she looked at 
 him. 
 
 " I did not think the trifles would 
 matter so much to you, Dallas," touching 
 his arm gently. 
 
 He did not answer her for a minute, 
 and then said, "You don't know how 
 different it was with me back yonder. I 
 wasn't hke other boys." She turned 
 her head quickly away, fearing to pry 
 into his secret. 
 
 "It was not I who thought of this," 
 she said, with a httle heat on her face, 
 "nor Laddoun. It was Jim Van Zeldt. 
 Last summer, after the sickness, he said 
 the village owed you some sign of thanks. 
 Jim's heart's in the right place," speak- 
 ing with an effort. Lizzy was always 
 eager to do justice to the man whose 
 love she had put from her. 
 
 She saw that Galbraith would not 
 talk of it, even to her. So she turned 
 and went into the little dining-room, 
 where the table was set for supper. He 
 came out presently, and followed her 
 about in a dog-like way, trying to help 
 her, his face still and bright. 
 
 "He said hardlyaword," old Mrs. Lad- 
 doun said afterwards, "but he looked as 
 if a heart of stone had been taken from 
 him, and a heart of flesh put in him that 
 night." 
 
 The evening came on quickly. Lizzy 
 closed the doors and Ht the lamp, to 
 shut out the twilight and the rising sound 
 of the tide. Laddoun had not come. 
 His mother, who had nobody else to 
 care for, and was as nervous about the 
 man as when he had been a tottering 
 baby, put on her cloak and went in 
 search of him. Lizzy laughed at her, 
 tying her own woollen cap on her head ; 
 but after another hour had passed, she 
 grew more silent and moved about un- 
 easily, glancing out of the window, her 
 face paler. Laddoun was not wont to 
 neglect her, and this was the eve of 
 their wedding. 
 
 An hour or two before they had 
 heard loud voices down on the beach, 
 and had seen two or three men lounging 
 at intervals down through the marshes : 
 they knew Van Zeldt's schooner was in. 
 
 " But even if George had gone to 
 help unload her," she said anxiously to 
 Galbraith, "they have stopped work 
 now. The Graahs passed by half an 
 hour ago back to the house ; and there 
 are two of the wreckers," as a couple of 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 men came across the stubble-held. She 
 noticed that they walked close to the 
 fence, looking furtively at the house, 
 talking eagerly to each other. After a 
 while, Nixon and his son came up from 
 tlie beach, directly toward her gate, 
 stopped there, and debated for a moment, 
 and then turned suddenly, and went off 
 together. Lizzy stood at the door, 
 watcliing the two dark figures disappear 
 in the mist over the marsh : the wind 
 was rising, and came with shrill, fore- 
 boding cries through the pines : the sea 
 began to mutter and moan with dreary and 
 uncertain meaning. Lizzy tried to laugh 
 again at her vague dread of coming evil, 
 but told Dallas of it, frankly. 
 
 '■It is as if some one told me George 
 Laddoun never would come to me again," 
 she said. " Go and look for him, Dallas. 
 I cannot help being foolish and weak 
 to-night." 
 
 Galbraith put on his cap with a cheery 
 laugh. She thought she never had seen 
 a stronger, lighter-hearted look than that 
 in the boy's eyes. "I'll send him to 
 to you in five minutes," he said. 
 
 " Come back again, Dallas," detaining 
 him. " This is your home now, remem- 
 ber." 
 
 " Yes, I know. Home !" turning to 
 look back from the edge of the woods at 
 tlae open door and his room beyond, 
 which his firiends had made ready for him. 
 
 An hour passed, and another : the 
 supper was cold, and Lizzy had let the 
 fire die out on the hearth. She had 
 gone out, and stood leaning over the gate. 
 It was some joke they meant to play her, 
 she thought. It was impossible that 
 misfortune could come to her on her 
 wedding eve ! But she scarcely knew 
 that the night had fallen — a wide, starless, 
 melancholy night — and that the chilly salt 
 gusts of \vind from the marshes had wet 
 her face and clothes. The tide was 
 coming up with a subdued roar now, and 
 
 one storm-cloud after another was slowly 
 sweeping across the sea-horizon. 
 
 Presently, at an hour long after the 
 time when the village was ordinarily 
 asleep, she heard a step close at hand, 
 and Jim Van Zeldt came up and stood 
 beside her. She tried to smile careless- 
 ly. She would not ask her old lover for 
 news of George Laddoun. 
 
 But he did not give her time. He 
 was looking past her into the cozy little 
 house where the light was stiU burning. 
 
 " So that is your home ?" he said. Jim 
 had quiet, womanish ways, always. When 
 they were children and "promised" to 
 each other, he would have suffered her 
 to put her foot on his neck any day. So, 
 finding Laddoun more manly, she thought, 
 she had flung Jim and his love off as she 
 would a worn-out shoe. 
 
 " Yes, that is to be my home," in a 
 controlled voice. " Will you come into it, 
 Jim ?" 
 
 He did not seem to hear her. In a 
 minute he put his hand on hers where it 
 lay on the gate. It was the first time 
 for many years, and she noticed that his 
 fingers were cold and clammy. " I came 
 to bring you some bad news, Lizzy. But 
 I never hurt you in my life, and, please 
 God, I never will. I can't tell her, Mr. 
 Kimball." 
 
 " What is it ?" she said, with a hot 
 mouth, to the old preacher, who had come 
 up on the other side. 
 
 He went straight to the point, having 
 no faith in the sham of brealdng bad 
 news : " There was a great crime com- 
 mitted years ago in New York, my child : 
 some say forgery, and others murder ; 
 and they have traced the men who did it 
 to this beach. The pretended Quaker, 
 Ledwith, was a detective. His warrant 
 to arrest them came in Van Zeldt' s 
 schooner to-night." 
 
 " Who are the men ?" 
 
 " George Laddoun, Lizzy, and Dallas 
 Galbraith." 
 
PART II. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 GALBRAITH made a short cut 
 through the woods down to the 
 beach, where he thought to find Lad- 
 doun. He went shnging along with 
 nervous strides, making great leaps now 
 and then, and shouting shrilly hke a 
 madman after them. He was but a boy, 
 and the excitement and triumph of the 
 night must find vent somehow. He 
 wanted Laddoun. He would like to 
 drag the old fellow up into his room, and 
 watch his face redden and eyes shine over 
 every little gift there. It was the very 
 thing to touch George to the quick, and 
 bring the tears to his eyes. He wanted 
 the whole village to come and share in 
 tlie happiness it had given him — to see 
 how grateful he was. He felt as if he 
 were full of hot words, as if he must break 
 his silence and tell them his story, to force 
 them to care for him as he did for them. 
 
 Yet when he saw two of the men who 
 nad been kindest to him coming through 
 the woods, he hid behind a thicket, and 
 let them pass. That old nightmare of 
 bashfulness throttled him, as it is apt to 
 do boys of the best blood, and his throat 
 choked, his legs and arms grew self-con- 
 scious and heavy, and his tongue stiff. 
 
 He forgot his errand and George 
 
 Laddoun, and walked more slowly. It 
 was then, in this swell of his great joy 
 and content, that the thought which had 
 been tugging at his heart all day pressed 
 up barely into words. 
 
 " If — if my mother could see my 
 room !" he whispered, stopping quite 
 still and looking down. As he went on 
 after that, scrambling over the bay- 
 bushes, and climbing fences, he said it 
 to himself more than once — 
 
 " Mother f 
 
 He seemed to be growing more fit to 
 say it since the villagers had given him 
 this credential. The truth was, this was 
 the thought that had made him dumb 
 and pale when Lizzy first showed him 
 the room. In a moment he saw a little 
 fresh-looking woman coming into it, 
 with her gray, watchful eyes fixed ap- 
 provingly on him. He could see even 
 the dress she wore — the pale brown silk, 
 the white lace, the pearl ring on her 
 small hand ; things which at other times 
 set her far off from him, with an impass- 
 able gulf between them. But this room 
 and its meaning would have made her 
 approve him. He thought he had taken 
 a great step nearer her to-night. No 
 wonder even old Mrs. Laddoun perceived 
 that he looked as if a heart of flesh had 
 been given him instead of one of stone. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 25 
 
 Galbraith was like all other boys, ex- 
 cept in this : that the incentives which 
 first hasten them on into manhood, and 
 give them fibre and weight, were all cen- 
 tred tor him in that quiet little woman 
 whom he had left years ago. If he could 
 shift — be done with his ragged clothes, 
 his lank, awkward body and vulgar ways, 
 if God or his own effort — anything — 
 would make a gentleman of him, he could 
 go back to her. Love, money, fame, 
 were but words to him. She and the 
 world in which she lived were reali- 
 ties. 
 
 He thought, to-night, he was beginning 
 to go back to her. 
 
 Just as Dallas came out of the woods 
 into the salt grass, two men passed him. 
 The night was dark, and his steps were 
 deadened in the sand : they did not see 
 him, therefore. 
 
 " Cradock," said the smith, Becker, 
 "has been lying in hiding in the Qua- 
 kers room since yesterday. It was 
 tliought he might be needed." 
 
 Now this brought Galbraith to a sud- 
 den standstill. Cradock was the sheriff" 
 of the county : he had visited Mana- 
 squan once, years ago, and since then 
 had served as a bugbear to frighten chil- 
 dren to sleep. His coming was the por- 
 tent of some great calamity ; and Dallas, 
 who had shied many a stone at police- 
 men in New York, had so fallen into 
 Manasquan ways that he clapped his 
 hands with a sudden terror when he 
 heard of it. 
 
 " What did he hide for ?" asked the 
 other man, who proved to be Nixon. 
 
 " Laddoun would have had warning, 
 you see." 
 
 " George Laddoun be no more guilty 
 than I," said Nixon, doggedly. " I 
 wonder at you, Becker. It be easy for 
 strangers to send a dog down hill when 
 his friends give him a kick." 
 
 " Where be he gone now, then ?" tri- 
 umphantly. " When Cradock came down 
 with the New York man on the beach, 
 as the schooner ran in, Laddoun was 
 there. In his new rig, to go up to' Liz- 
 zy's. When he saw them together, he 
 turned off" up the marsh, they do say, 
 pale as a corpse. I always misdoubted 
 
 Laddoun. Where did he get the money 
 to buy the cranberry bog yonder ?" 
 
 The men passed on into the woods. 
 Dallas did not stop them, asked no 
 questions ; whatever their news might 
 portend to him — whether it brought 
 some old crime of his own or danger 
 for Laddoun out of that mysterious old 
 time, it did not stun him as it had done 
 George. He had slunk through this 
 long grass an hour or two ago, as though 
 his brain and limbs were palsied ; but 
 Dallas ran swift as a hound, and bent 
 half double, on the same path as soon as 
 the men were out of hearing. The boy 
 had the soldier-quality in him which the 
 man lacked, and sprang naturally to arms 
 on the first hint of danger, alert and de- 
 fiant. His guilt or innocence was a 
 secondary matter. 
 
 There was no indecision in his course. 
 He knew Laddoun's hiding-place. There 
 is a river, or an arm of the sea, which 
 breaks into this county for about six 
 miles — a broad, deep backwater, rather 
 than stream. Coming to its edge, Dal- 
 las ran groping along until he Ibund a 
 long, narrow-pointed tub (a sneak-boat, 
 as the fishermen call them, used for 
 duck-shooting), pushed it off" the sand, 
 shut himself up in it, and, with a vigor- 
 ous thrust or two, headed rapidly up- 
 stream. The water, curdled with the 
 rising tide, stretched up between the 
 rolling dark hills on either side, a sheet 
 of glittering, steely blue. 
 
 A short, steady pull brought him to 
 the point where the white, sandy road 
 to the post-office struck through the 
 pines : one or two crab-cribs were an- 
 chored there, and on the beach a seine- 
 reel thrust out its shadowy, empty arms. 
 This was the out-point of the village 
 travel : beyond was a region unknown 
 to the Manasquan world. In all Gal- 
 braith's root-hunting explorations of the 
 head-water country, he had never en- 
 countered a single inhabitant of the 
 sleepy Jersey village. Ben, an old clam- 
 digger — who had no name apparently but 
 Ben — had once built himself a hut a mile 
 or two above the road, but he was dead 
 years ago : so the story went, as Dallas 
 knew. The hills and defiles on either 
 
26 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 sido of the broad water up which he 
 floated were silent and untenanted as a 
 shore in Hades. Almost as spectral 
 and beautiful, also : the moon, a pale, 
 thin bow, rising low in the sea horizon, 
 threw timorous, dim lights up into this 
 far-inland valley, where the tide crept 
 and bosomed itself for a transient rest. 
 Along the shore the knobs and peaks 
 of hills grouped themselves in fantastic 
 forms, bare, save for the cover of short, 
 soft grass, sinking back into dusky, 
 wooded slopes behind. Here and there 
 one of these bald summits lifted a dead 
 tree in relief against the sky, on whose 
 topmost limb a fish-hawk sat flapping 
 its wings and keeping a tireless watch 
 over its nest. Higher up the stream, 
 where the water was quiet and less bit- 
 ter, the wooded hills crept closer to its 
 edge, sheltering little comfortable hollows 
 between them, which seemed to wait for 
 cozy homes. Before one of these Dallas 
 involuntarily lifted his oars, looking at 
 it gravely. It was the place where he 
 meant to build his own home some day. 
 There was space for large buildings and 
 a grand sweep of lawn. The boy's air- 
 built castle was not a cottage : a fine, 
 solid house instead, and its furniture 
 planned to fit the silk and pearl ring 
 which he had once seen his mother 
 wear, and which held her far oflf from 
 him. She should lose nothing when 
 she came to him. Then, remembering 
 Laddoun, he rowed on, shutting his teeth 
 fast. 
 
 Galbraith's search lasted all night. 
 At the head of the inlet, or where it 
 breaks squarely against a hill (a thin, 
 narrow creek being the only conduit 
 reaching it from the interior), the water 
 forms a shallow, umber-colored bed for 
 numberless flat, marshy islands, covered 
 with reedy, salt grass of every shade of 
 brown and saifron. Between these flats 
 Dallas poled his boat slowly, closely scan- 
 ning the banks and slopes of the hills, 
 afi^aid to call aloud lest he might wake the 
 loud, resonant echoes which wait, ready 
 and angry, along these shores, as though 
 impatient of the coniinual heavy silence. 
 
 When the dawn came, however, filling 
 the sky and even the brown water with 
 
 pink flushes, and the air with cold, de- 
 licious odors from the pines, Galbraith 
 sprang on shore, and hurried to a black 
 figure which he saw lying under a knot- 
 ted old cedar half-way up the sand. It 
 was Laddoun, asleep, his usually Acrid 
 face haggard and colorless, his shiny 
 clothes and boots filthy from dragging 
 through the mud of the marsh. He had 
 dropped down so carelessly that the t-de 
 plashed about his ankles. 
 
 "Laddoun! Laddoun!" All tie re- 
 pressed excitement or terror of the night 
 made the call vehement ; but the young 
 man turned over with a heavy snore. 
 If Laddoun was on the brink of the 
 grave, he would rehsh his cut of beef or 
 his sleep, Dallas thought. He shook 
 him savagely, remembering poor Lizzy 
 just then, and how the wedding morning 
 was dawning for her. " Mr. Laddoun ! 
 This is no time to sleep like a log," 
 dragging him up by the heavy shoulders. 
 
 George looked about him, dazed for a 
 minute, and then got up, and, turning to 
 the water, wet his face and head. 
 
 " What have you to tell me, Dallas ?" 
 looking at him at last. 
 
 " What have you to tell me ? I've 
 followed you all night to know. What 
 does Cradock want with you .? What kin 
 I do for you ?" pressing close, his chin 
 quivering and eyes on fire. " There's 
 no time to lose. What kin I do ?" 
 
 Laddoun looked at him steadily, and 
 then sat down doggedly. "You don't 
 ask me what I've done .'"' 
 
 Galbraith's face altered, and his tone 
 curiously became that of an older and 
 more reasonable man than his compan- 
 ion. " No, I don't ask. I thought it 
 was some of the old troubles back 
 there," jerking his thumb over his shoul- 
 der. "I be no judge of any man. I'll 
 do what I kin. What is the quickest 
 way of getting clear of the business ? 
 This is — " He stopped. 
 
 "It's my wedding morning, I k/iow 
 that," getting up and sitting down again 
 with an oath. " It's my ill luck, hound- 
 ing — hounding me, as usual ;" scolding 
 on, in a tone at which Dallas could 
 hardly hide a smile, listening with a 
 boy's keen sense of humor. Laddoun 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 always faced trouble with pettish ill-tem- 
 per, and, if nobody else could be found to 
 bear the blame, had his Luck ready for 
 a fag to be lashed for his sins. 
 
 Galbraith interrupted him. "Is it 
 money that's wanted.^" 
 
 Laddoun avoided his eye, jerking peb- 
 bles nervously into the water. "No. 
 It's not a debt," dryly. "I knew that 
 Quaker the minute I saw him with Cra- 
 dock. I thought, before, that his cowardly 
 phiz was familiar to me. He's Bunsen — 
 on the detective force. You know?" 
 
 Galbraith nodded. He put his hands 
 behind him presently, steadying himself 
 against the cedar, and wet his lips once 
 or twice before he spoke. Laddoun 
 watched him shrewdly. 
 
 "You've no reason to want to come 
 in his way, either?" sharply. "You've 
 been in hiding this many a year, Master 
 Galbraith." 
 
 " I don't want to come in his way," 
 gravely. "But I've not been guilty. 
 I'll let no man say that. I've not been 
 guilty." 
 
 Laddoun shifted his position uneasily. 
 It was curious that in this moment of 
 his own apparent peril his thoughts 
 seemed to be concerned exclusively w^th 
 the boy, on guard with him, as it were, 
 watching him with a mingled pity and 
 alarm. 
 
 "I'd like to know the truth about you, 
 Dallas Galbraith," he broke out. " Since 
 the day I helped dig you out. along with 
 the others, from that coal-pit in Scranton, 
 three years ago, nigh dead with the choke- 
 damp, you've been a puzzle to me. Do 
 you remember that day?" 
 
 "Yes, I remember it." 
 
 " A queer black beetle you were ! Do 
 you mind, when I'd brought you to, how 
 you begged me to hide you. to let you 
 be counted as dead or missing, to get 
 you out of Scranton? For the love of 
 God to get you out? Well, did I do it? 
 Did I share what I had with you after 
 that? Though how could I tell what 
 sort of criminal I had in hiding?" 
 
 "Yes, you did. But you did not think 
 me a criminal, Mr. Laddoun ?" passing 
 both hands over his head with a slow, 
 patient gesture. 
 
 "How could I tell? Appearances 
 were against you," hotly, lashing himself 
 into a rage. " I think I played the part 
 of a good friend to you, Galbraith. I 
 was but a poor devil of a student, but I 
 never treated you as a servant. I went 
 share-and-share with you. What I saw 
 of life, you saw." 
 
 " Yes, I saw it," under his breath ; and 
 poor Dallas wondered when it was that 
 he had grown into the knowing man he 
 was now. It was such a little while, be- 
 fore he was dragged out of that pit at 
 Scranton, that he had been a child sitting 
 lazily beside his mother while she pored 
 anxiously over his books, both of them 
 sitting down on the carpet to play mar- 
 bles with real relish and fun when the les- 
 son was learned. Such a little while ago ! 
 
 When he heard what Laddoun was say- 
 ing again, he found he was talking of some 
 of the sprees he had gone tlirough in 
 New York. 
 
 "Well," rubbing his chin with gusto, 
 "we saw life, Dallas, if we have to pay 
 for it now. But you were always a 
 puzzle to me." 
 
 "This is no time to talk of that. 
 Cradock is on your trail." 
 
 "Yes, it is the time," vehemently, 
 "For, if you were not the knowing little 
 rough I thought you, I'd rather have 
 lost my right hand than have served you 
 the trick that I've done." 
 
 Dallas looked at him. bewildered, a 
 moment. "Trick? I don't understand. 
 We can settle that afterwards. Is it 
 one of the old gambling matters, that 
 Bunsen has tracked ?" 
 
 "No," turning away. 
 
 Dallas stood deliberating. Boy as he 
 was, he had helped Laddoun out of many 
 of the drunken scrapes into which he 
 was perpetually plunging with his two 
 or three chums. It was the worst set 
 among the medical students into which 
 he had fallen ; and Laddoun was gener- 
 ous, ready to fight or pay for them to the 
 end. When he was in the mire, however, 
 he was quite as ready to howl his com- 
 plaints out loudly : his silence now, there- 
 fore, puzzled and alarmed Galbraith. 
 
 "You've land enough to clear you 
 from any debt,'' he said, in a perplexed 
 
28 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 tone, "and debt was always the worst 
 of your troubles. And I'll say this : 
 that the least part of the money was 
 spent on yourself. That be true of you, 
 Laddoun." 
 
 «I know it. But I don't begrudge 
 the help I give the fellows ! I don't be- 
 grudge it. While a man lives, let him 
 live!" the dark red mounting to his 
 handsome face and his eye sparkling. 
 "But this matter — now I'll make a clean 
 breast of it, Dallas !" flinging out his 
 hand to him. "But for God's sake be 
 merciful to a man ! I was hard pushed. 
 You know the old man we lodged with, 
 in Lispenard street? Just we two?" 
 
 "Adamson? Yes." 
 
 "Well" — mumbhng the words rapidly, 
 and sopping the sweat from his forehead — 
 "I was hard pushed. It was either the 
 money or ruin, and he was a hard old 
 file : he had not a drop of anybody's 
 blood in his veins. Now, Dallas, you 
 know he was a hard file — an old beast ? 
 More than any man I ever knew." 
 
 "Go on," drawing his breath shorter. 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 "You ought to know what I mean," 
 angrily. "You must have every word 
 spelled to you now-a-days before you'll 
 understand it. You remember a cheque 
 which you drew for me, at the Metro- 
 pohtan Bank? I paid my endorsement 
 for Pancott with it, and you settled some 
 other scores, just before we came here." 
 
 " I know. It was Adamson's cheque. 
 He owed it to you." 
 
 "So I told you," in a low voice, turn- 
 ing his back on him and going down to 
 the beach. 
 
 " Didn't he owe it to you ? He never 
 gave away a rag," with a laugh. "And 
 it certainly had the old man's name on 
 it." 
 
 "He did not sign it, Dallas." 
 
 Galbraith had leaned forward to catch 
 the half-whispered words : for a moment 
 he did not comprehend them. 
 
 Then he stood erect, the color gone 
 from his face. 
 
 " You mean that you — you — No, 
 that can't be ! You're not a thief, Lad- 
 doun." 
 
 " No, I'm not a thief," facing him. 
 
 and putting one hand on his shoulder. 
 " Be quiet. I signed the cheque, and I 
 suppose in law they'd call it forgery. 
 But I meant to pay it back to him. 
 Now you know I meant to pay it back, 
 Dallas ? Nobody that knows the sums 
 I give away, and how I spend money 
 hke water, would suspect George Lad- 
 doun of robbing the man of his wretched 
 shinplasters. It was to help Pancott I 
 took it. The old miser had thousands 
 hid away, and I thought I could make it 
 good to him some time. Do you under- 
 stand ?" 
 
 "Yes, I understand." But the lad 
 spoke stupidly, and looked at him, Lad- 
 doun saw angrily, with a sort of dumb 
 dismay. 
 
 " Never couple the name of Laddoun 
 with thief again, then," haughtily. "It 
 was a miserable business. I never did 
 replace the money. I never had it, you 
 see. And then, when we left the house, 
 I recommended a man named Parker to 
 the old fellow as a boarder, and I found 
 afterwards that Parker was a bad lot. I 
 wasn't to blame there, either. I hardly 
 knew the man. But it ended badly." 
 
 " We saw in the papers that Adamson 
 was robbed and murdered. Do you 
 mean that — ?" 
 
 " No. I don't say who did it. But 
 it never was discovered, and I know now 
 that Parker was a bad lot. It was I 
 that brought him to the old man. I 
 wish to God my hands were clear of 
 that !" gloomily. " It's my luck." 
 
 " It never was discovered," Dallas re- 
 peated mechanically, trying to steady 
 himself, pulling the cuffs down over his 
 shaking wrists. 
 
 " No." Laddoun looked at him stead- 
 ily, squaring himself before him. He 
 was ashamed that the words he had to 
 say made him quail before this insignifi- 
 cant, lank boy : he made what strength 
 and courage he could for himself out 
 of his own portly, handsome presence. 
 " No. The detectives have had it in 
 hand for months. They had a notion 
 that the party who did the forgery — 
 finished the job. But they've no proof 
 of that — not an atom," hastily passing his 
 hand over his mouth. " It's only the 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 29 
 
 suspicion. But that is enough to damn 
 a man's whole hfe." 
 
 The first shock over, the reasonable 
 look began to come up into the lad's 
 eyes. He put his hand affectionately on 
 Laddoun's arm. 
 
 " You need have no fear," with an un- 
 steady smile. "You're not the sort of 
 man, Mr. Laddoun, to be suspected of 
 murder, let them prove the forgery or 
 not. A man's character counts for 
 something in law, I reckon." 
 
 "They've no proof of the forgery 
 against me, Dallas." It cost George 
 Laddoun a harder wrench to speak the 
 words than he had thought : his mouth 
 fell weakly open when he had done, and 
 he watched the boy as a convicted felon 
 might his judge. 
 
 But Dallas only answered quietly, 
 " I'm glad of that ; mostly for Lizzy's 
 sake. What does Cradock want, then V 
 
 His stupidity provoked Laddoun ; it 
 was easier to go on. " They've no 
 proof against me. I wasn't even in 
 New York when the money was drawn. 
 You had taken other cheques, which 
 Adamson had given me, to the bank," 
 watching Galbraith's bewildered face fur- 
 tively as he spoke. 
 
 " Then it's all right," relieved. " No- 
 body would suspect a dull boy Hke me 
 of it." 
 
 " You're not counted a dull boy here, 
 and you weren't there. Old Bunsen, or 
 Ledwith, or whatever he calls himself, 
 has spread the notion through the village 
 that the head-work of the shop is done 
 by you ; and back there in Philadelphia, 
 there was none of the fellows that didn't 
 wonder at your odd knowledge of 
 chemistry and the hand you wrote. 
 You'd better use of your pen than I had. 
 It was cursedly queer in a coal-digger's 
 boy. I'll say that. Old Adamson used 
 to say, ' There's a heap of brains under 
 that boy's yaller hair.' No, you'd not 
 be counted too dull to do it." 
 
 Dallas stood still one breathless mo- 
 ment : then he came slowly towards Lad- 
 doun, a fiery heat rising to his cheeks 
 and eyes. 
 
 " You thought of that ? You made a 
 tool of me ? You brought this on me ?" 
 
 He had put his hand on Laddoun's col- 
 lar as he spoke, and when he had done 
 he flung him from him fiercely, as 
 though he had been a dog ; he did not 
 even look to see where he fell into the 
 muddy tide, but, turning away, walked 
 up the beach. 
 
 Laddoun gathered himself up without 
 either scowl or oath. He liked the boy 
 better for the blow. He stood looking 
 at him where he had seated himself on 
 the sand, his hands clasped about his 
 knees, staring down the river, up which 
 the morning ripples glistened redly. 
 
 " Galbraith !" venturing toward him 
 at last. 
 
 The boy was deaf and dumb as a 
 stone. 
 
 " Galbraith, you don't think I meant 
 harm should come to you ? As God 
 sees me, I meant to replace the money 
 and make it all square with the old man. 
 Besides," hesitating, " I didn't think 
 you'd scruple to do it, even if you knew." 
 
 Still no answer. 
 
 " You know there was a queer suspi- 
 cion about you, Dallas. Now, you know 
 there was," in a whining voice. " You 
 didn't seem to belong to your station. 
 Why would you want to be counted for 
 dead if you'd done nothing amiss ? Why 
 did you wince just now at the thought 
 of the detectives ? Why did you keep 
 so dark about them times before I dug 
 you out at Scranton ? 'S long as I've 
 knowed you, there's never a word drop- 
 ped from your lips about them times." 
 
 A change came into the lad's face — 
 an almost imperceptible change — but it 
 brought a sharp qualm to Laddoun. " If 
 I wronged you," he continued, impetu- 
 ously, " I'd give my right hand not to 
 have done you this turn. I've spent 
 my life serving others, and it seems in- 
 fernally selfish to see you in this scrape 
 and know that I can get oiT scot-free. 
 But I never meant harm to come of it. 
 It's my luck." 
 
 Dallas staggered to his feet. "I 
 don't know what's luck," he said, dully. 
 " There's something that's kept its hold 
 on me and dragged me down, down, 
 since the beginning. I'm tired of fight- 
 ing agen it I reckon it's God. But for 
 
3° 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 you, Laddoun," turning on him fiercely, 
 "if you think you"ll get off scot-free, 
 you're mistaken. You wrote me a let- 
 ter from Albany, where you'd gone on 
 a spree, saying that Adamson had given 
 you the cheque, and telHng me where in 
 your bureau to find it. IVe got that 
 letter now. It was uncommon kind, 
 and I kept it — like a fool ! I never 
 threw away a kind word." 
 
 " YouVe got that letter ?" 
 
 " Yes." Laddoun walked up to the 
 boy, looking straight into his eyes : the 
 man, like any animal driven to bay, was 
 not without a certain courage. 
 
 "It will not help you, Dallas, to bring 
 me in with you. They would take that 
 letter for a plot between us." 
 
 "You worked for your punishment, 
 and you shall have it. If the lifting of 
 my hand would clear you, I wouldn't do 
 it." 
 
 "The lifting of your hand would clear 
 me. There's no proof against me but 
 that letter." 
 
 If he had hoped by this to move the 
 boy to any sympathy, he was mistaken. 
 Dallas gave a short, savage laugh, and 
 turned off — did not look back even 
 when the sound of oars broke the still- 
 ness, and Laddoun, with an oath, cried 
 out that the men were on them. " There 
 is no use in running. Cradock is armed," 
 he said. 
 
 Dallas made no reply, but stood quiet- 
 ly, watching the boat pushing its way 
 slowly through the narrow black currents 
 between the marshy islands. 
 
 " When I saw Cradock with the Qua- 
 ker last night," said Laddoun, in a thick, 
 rapid tone, " I thought they'd scented 
 you out, Dallas. They had no proof 
 against me. I couldn't stay to see you 
 taken and know I'd brought it on you. 
 That's what I'm here for. They have 
 no warrant against me. There's no 
 proof but that letter against me." 
 
 But Galbraith was silent. The men 
 had brought the boat up to the shore at 
 last, and one after another sprang ashore. 
 There were Graah and two fishermen, 
 beside Cradock and the pseudo Quaker. 
 They all watched the two figures anx- 
 iously as they came nearer. Laddoun 
 
 put on his hat and threw back his chest, 
 bowing with a faint imitation of his old 
 pompous pohteness. 
 
 "Aha 1 they don't mean to make fight," 
 said Bunsen, in an undertone. But the 
 sheriff was looking intently at Galbraith. 
 The wind blew the boy's thin, fair hair 
 back, and there was something in the 
 childish face and reasonable, woman's 
 eyes that had its effect on the old man, 
 
 " That be'n't the face of a bad one," 
 he said, doubtfully. "You've made no 
 mistake in the lad ?" 
 
 "I've made no mistake. That fellow's 
 got more wit than you or I, in some 
 ways, innocent as he looks. Graah can 
 tell you that." 
 
 " I've got no ill word to say agin the 
 boy," said Graah, stopping short for 
 emphasis, his solid voice going up and 
 down with the swing of a pendulum. 
 " I know nothin' but good of him. An' 
 George Laddoun's my neighbor. I come 
 here to see fair play, an' so I tell you ; 
 an' if them men say they're innocent, 
 I'm on their side, constable or no con- 
 stable." 
 
 Bunsen glanced at the ponderous vil- 
 lage authority with a slight smile, and 
 passed him. Cradock touched the han- 
 dle of a pistol in his breast-pocket. 
 " Better keep clear of this matter, Mr. 
 Graah," he said. 
 
 " As if I be afeerd of his pistols !" 
 muttered the old man, aloud. But he 
 winced before the officer's indifferent 
 good-humor : it symbolized the law. 
 He and the two men stood apart, watch- 
 ing, while the others went up to Lad- 
 doun and the boy. They held their 
 breath to listen ; and no wonder. It 
 was ten years ago since Cradock had 
 made an arrest in Manasquan, and it 
 had become a date in the fireside sto- 
 ries ; and these were the village favor- 
 ites. It was as if a pestilence had broken 
 out with an hour's warning in their midst 
 
 " When he took hold of the boy," old 
 Graah said to his wife afterwards, "I 
 tell you I felt an in'ard tug an' choke, 
 just as when our Joe was nigh drowned 
 in the under-tow. I couldn't but think 
 of the sickness last summer, an' how the 
 lad went about from house to house, nor 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 31 
 
 how Ihe little 'uns made much of him. 
 I count them judges — little 'uns." But 
 in tho village gossip over the matter, 
 Graah went no farther than, " I say 
 nothin' — law's law." 
 
 Laddoun met the officer with another 
 bow. " One too many for an innocent 
 man," Cradock muttered. 
 
 '• You had business with me, gentle- 
 men V 
 
 Bunsen nodded. " Not pleasant busi- 
 ness, Doctor Laddoun. But no doubt 
 you will be able to adjust the matter 
 satisfactorily. We men of the world see 
 these things in a different light from our 
 friends here," beckoning back to the vil- 
 lagers. 
 
 Laddoun combed his whiskers, smiling 
 with a ghastly counterfeit of ease. " I 
 have no idea of the nature of the diffi- 
 culty," he stammered, not having yet 
 determined on his course of defence. 
 " Appearances may be against me, but 
 I can set it right — I can set it right." 
 
 '> Until you know the proof against 
 you, it is better to commit yourself as 
 little as possible," said Bunsen, dryly. 
 
 Laddoun's countenance steadied at 
 this. He drew from it that the proof 
 was slight, and thought the warning 
 friendly in Bunsen. He noted shrewdly, 
 too, that the detective, while he talked 
 to him, kept his eyes on Dallas with a 
 sort of critical admiration. 
 
 "They give the boy credit for the 
 brains of the concern," he thought, with 
 an odd mixture of relief and annoy- 
 ance. 
 
 Then Bunsen went over to Galbraith. 
 " I have a warrant for you," he said, 
 putting his hand on his shoulder and 
 raising his voice. The others stood 
 listening. 
 
 Dallas took the man's hand off quietly, 
 but his grip was like iron. "Til go 
 without force," he said, in a shrill, loud 
 voice, speaking, not to the officer, but to 
 Graah and the iishermen. " I took the 
 cheque to the bank. But I'm innocent. 
 Lm no thief" 
 
 He went alone before them all, and 
 took his seat in the boat. When they 
 were all in, and had begun to row down 
 stream, he put out his hand to Graah's 
 
 knee. "Mr. Graah? — " he said, in a 
 low voice. 
 
 But the law was beginning to have its 
 effect on the old man : his jaws worked 
 nervously as he chewed his plug of to- 
 bacco ; he kept his eyes turned down 
 from the lad's face, and moved his lat 
 knees with a little shuffle of rehef when 
 he took his hand away. This was the 
 last appeal that Dallas made — then or 
 afterwards. He was dumb, unless when 
 spoken to, during the time that elapsed 
 before he was removed for trial to New 
 York. Watchful, too ; his eyes turning 
 to one face after another with a look 
 which brought the tears to many of the 
 women's eyes. If they had spoken out 
 boldly the faith they had in him, God 
 knows how differently it might have 
 gone with the boy. But the shadow of 
 authority was a power in Manasquan : a 
 man once in the clutches of the law was 
 guilty till proved to be innocent. 
 
 Going down the river, the sun shone 
 out brightly. Laddoun talked to the 
 detective and Cradock, with the old af- 
 fectation of ease, about the unimproved 
 condition of the land, the chances of 
 marl in a field back of the beach ; even 
 pointing out, with a shaking forefinger, 
 the swarms of red and black-winged 
 lady-bugs on the marsh-grass. Bunsen 
 answered him pleasantly, but his attempt 
 at indifference told badly on Graah and 
 the fishermen. They scowled at him 
 doubtfully, askance. A Manasquan man 
 in Cradock's terrible grip had no need 
 to chatter of marl or bugs. 
 
 When they came to the landing-place, 
 there was a strange silence noticeable on 
 shore, by which one might know the 
 great calamity that had fallen on the vil- 
 lage. The seines were still wound on the 
 reels, the mackerel-boats empty and at 
 anchor: for the first time in many years, 
 old Calcroft, the clam-digger, was gone 
 from his post. Laddoun, glancing fever- 
 ishly from side to side, saw that the 
 front shutters of most of the wooden 
 houses were closed as they passed up 
 the long, sandy road. There was the 
 usual caucus of men on Nixon's porch, 
 but they sat in gloomy silence, staring 
 into vacancy, as the prisoners went by. 
 
32 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 There was not one of them who did not 
 hold the boy, at least, to be innocent; 
 not one of them who, if he were going 
 down in the treacherous sea yonder, 
 would not have gone out to save him. 
 But what fault have we to find with the 
 cautious Jersey villagers ? Which of us 
 has not seen some soul going down in 
 deep waters and kept a discreet, conven- 
 tional silence, when a cheerful call and a 
 hand held out would have brought them 
 to the shore ? 
 
 There was not one of their faces 
 which Dallas did not read with his slow, 
 unappealing eyes ; but Bunsen alone 
 suspected what was hid beneath the lad's 
 unnatural composure : nothing escaped 
 him, from the slow settling of the blood 
 under his nostrils to the faint breath 
 drawn at long intervals. He guessed 
 that this matter had nigh pushed the 
 boy to some strange extremity. " But 
 he must have some friend to fall back 
 on : there'll be a rope held out to him, 
 surely, at the last." 
 
 Cradock whispered to him that Dallas 
 seemed too dull and childish for such 
 work as forgery, and Bunsen contented 
 himself by pointing out his firm step, 
 different from Laddoun, who cringed 
 along beside him. "The boy's of an- 
 other strain of blood from any of these 
 people hereabout; there's breeding and 
 strength in him," and he recounted the 
 story of the chemical apparatus ; for 
 Bunsen was but like less shrewd men, 
 and was awed by any knowledge which 
 he could not possess. 
 
 He would have rated Dallas as dull 
 enough if he could have seen how ut- 
 terly he had given up all hope of ac- 
 quittal. The letter would be proof of 
 Laddoun's guilt, but not of his own in- 
 nocence, he believed, because Laddoun 
 had told him so. When Cradock spoke 
 to him, he only repeated the same words 
 mechanically: "I took the cheque to the 
 bank; but I'm not a thief" 
 
 They had but one place, two rooms 
 in the back of a vacant house, in which 
 to confine the prisoners until evening, 
 when Squire Boles, who was absent at 
 a woods' meeting, could give them a 
 hearing. Bunsen ushered them into a 
 
 narrow hall, smelling of fresh pine, on 
 either side of which was a square apart- 
 ment. 
 
 "You'd better take one room, Lad- 
 doun, and the lad the other. Mr. Cra- 
 dock will smoke a pipe with me, here. 
 Send me up some tobacco, Graah. When 
 will I leave Manasquan ?" repeating the 
 old man's whisper aloud. "Well, if 
 matters go against our friends here, as 
 soon as I can get a requisition. I've 
 had a pleasant sojourn in Manasquan," 
 patronizingly. " And by the way, Graah, 
 if any of Laddoun's or the lad's friends 
 would like a word with them, they can 
 come up. I want all things to be 
 friendly among us." 
 
 Laddoun and the boy, standing in the 
 opposite doors of the hall, heard him. 
 Dallas came forward. " I have friends," 
 he said, in a strained, distinct voice. 
 "They showed that to me last night. 
 Tell them I'm no thief" 
 
 Graah listened with his head down on 
 his breast, but made no answer. Then 
 Dallas went into the room allotted to 
 him, and sat down on a pile of boards 
 which had been left on the floor. Lad- 
 doun came inside of the door, glancing 
 back, lest he had been seen. "Gal- 
 braith !" in a shrill, desperate whisper, 
 beckoning with his hand. "For God's 
 sake ! There's no proof against me but 
 the letter. Think of Lizzy!" 
 
 " Tut, tut ! my man. This won't do," 
 and Bunsen shoved him good-naturedly 
 out of the door. But Dallas had list- 
 ened to him with an unmoved face, 
 sitting with his hands clasped about his 
 knees on the planks, the sunlight falling 
 about him. 
 
 Laddoun, locked up in the little eight- 
 by-ten room, paced to and fro like a 
 caged bloodhound. He had a real af- 
 fection for Galbraith, and between that, 
 and a consciousness which he would 
 hardly acknowledge to himself that he 
 had not "played the fair card by him," 
 the boy filled his mind more than Lizzy 
 or his own danger or shame. He swore 
 to himself half a dozen times that he 
 would call in Cradock and Bunsen and 
 make a clean breast of it — let the boy 
 off. 
 
BALLAD GALBRAITH. 
 
 33 
 
 That would be the generous thing to 
 do ; and while the heroic spasm lasted 
 Laddoun was quite capable of doing it. 
 He had his hand on the door-knob to 
 call Bunsen, when it was pushed open, 
 and the officer came in. 
 
 " I came to have a pipe and chat with 
 you, Laddoun." 
 
 The young fellow drew himself up on 
 giiard. "I don't smoke, here. It stu- 
 pefies me, and I'll keep my wits awake 
 to-day, Bunsen." 
 
 "A talk, then," seating himself lei- 
 surely on the chair which he had car- 
 ried in, his opaque eyes on Laddoun's 
 flushed face. "I'll be frank with you. 
 It's the best plan with shrewd fellows 
 like yourself" 
 
 Laddoun laughed coarsely. " Too 
 shrewd to be humbugged," he said ; but 
 he began to comb his oily whiskers with 
 renewed complacence. 
 
 « No. I show you my hand. I tell 
 you fairly that I think that boy has used 
 you. He's a deep one, and I'd like to 
 trace him back to the beginning. Tell 
 me what you know of him : it won't go 
 harder with you if you do," meaningly. 
 
 Laddoun made one or two turns, his 
 brows contracted, a half word escaping 
 him now and then. Whatever was 
 his struggle, the dead gray eyes above 
 the pipe appeared to take no cognizance 
 of it. 
 
 " I can't tell you Galbraith's antece- 
 dents," he broke out. " I helped drag 
 him out of a coal-pit in Scranton, where 
 there were a dozen diggers killed with 
 the choke-damp. It was when I was in 
 Philadelphia, and I and a lot of fellows 
 were up in the coal country on a spree. 
 Being doctors, they called on us. It 
 was at night, and I had this boy in a 
 shed by one of the heaps of coal-dust 
 •when I brought him to life. He begged 
 me to hide him and let him pass for 
 dead, and I did it. I've kept him since. 
 I think I've been a friend to Dallas Gal- 
 braith," doggedly. 
 
 " I should say you had," soothingly. 
 « Pass for dead, eh ? That hints at a 
 bad record. I judge Master Galbraith 
 had made acquaintance with men of my 
 trade before." 
 3 
 
 " It don't follow that he had, by any 
 means," sullenly. " The boy's back was 
 purple with wales and scars when I got 
 him. The men in the pits had used him 
 brutally. That's the whole secret of it." 
 
 Bunsen smoked in silence awhile, then 
 he took up another trail. " So it was 
 with you he learned the rudiments of his 
 trade — chemistry, botany, and tiie like .^ 
 He told me he had had a chance." 
 
 " He had no chance with me. It was 
 an old thing with him : I never knew 
 where he learned it. He was cursedly 
 close-mouthed. And I don't think I 
 deserved it. He'd had the training of a 
 gentleman's son, Dallas had, though he'd 
 learned the talk of the Scranton pits 
 since. But when you get below the 
 coal-soot on him, and the coal-wavs, 
 there's a boy that I don't pretend to un- 
 derstand." 
 
 " I must say that he has treated you 
 ungratefully," suggested the detective, 
 with affectionate earnestness. '• So lie 
 kept his own counsel, did he ?" 
 
 " He's showing his gratitude to-day," 
 with a bitter laugh, remembering the let- 
 ter. "As for his secrets, I never tried 
 to worm them from him. There were 
 places and people he was afraid of, as a 
 child would be of ghosts in the dark. 
 He's nothing but a child in most ways, 
 after all," in a relenting tone. " But lie 
 can keep his mind to himself, as I never 
 could do." 
 
 " Did you know that he applied for 
 entrance as student in one or two labora- 
 tories while he was with you ?" 
 
 "No. But it's likely. He had a 
 natural hankering for that sort of work. 
 The fellows helped him to books. So 
 did I." 
 
 " But it needed an entrance-fee, which 
 he could not pay," he continued, his eyes 
 still on Laddoun. " He applied in one 
 place the very day before the forgery. 
 He needed money for the fee and his 
 board, if he left you. That is a proof 
 against him : it looks badly." 
 
 "Yes, it looks badly," rubbing his 
 hands nervously one over the other. 
 
 Cradock called to Bunsen just then, 
 and he rose, picking up his chair. Lad- 
 doun's imbecile hand went shaking up 
 
34 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 to his collar and his mouth, hinting at 
 his secret. 
 
 " Do you want to say anjlihing more 
 to me, Doctor?" suggested Bunsen, star- 
 ing at the opposite wall. 
 
 " I 1 No. What should I have to 
 say ?" 
 
 " Good morning, then." 
 
 "I might probably think of something 
 to mention. Will you be outside if I 
 should V 
 
 " Outside, just within call. You don't 
 think of it now ?" 
 
 "No." But the detective still held 
 the door open and waited a moment, 
 and in that moment Laddoun held his 
 own chance of manhood and Galbraith's 
 fate in the breath of his nostrils. 
 
 "No," he said, and the door was shut. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Laddoun ate a hearty dinner that 
 day. Nixon sent up the best mutton- 
 chops his kitchen could furnish to the 
 prisoners, and by the time they came 
 the young doctor was sure of Acquittal. 
 He had sent in his mother to talk to the 
 boy, and he had no doubt he would de- 
 stroy the letter. Dallas could not with- 
 stand a woman's tears. 
 
 She found him still sitting on the pile 
 of planks, his hands about his knees, as 
 he had been since morning, only that 
 the untasted meal was spread out cold 
 on its tray on the floor, and the sunshine 
 had crept farther from him to the oppo- 
 site wall. The old woman said but little, 
 and shed no tears. A great age seemed 
 to have fallen on her chirrupy little figure 
 and face since morning. She stood look- 
 ing at the floor at her feet, her gray hair 
 not so wan or old as the features it 
 framed. 
 
 Dallas rose when she came in. 
 
 " George tells me that you can clear 
 him by a word ?" 
 
 He made no answer : she would not 
 have heard him if he had. 
 
 " I can't beg it of you," steadying her- 
 self by one groping hand on the wall. 
 "I'm not strong. I've buried seven 
 
 children in my time, but there's no blow 
 been like this." 
 
 She waited a few moments, uncon- 
 scious, he saw, that he was there. 
 When she turned to the door, he took 
 her by the elbow and helped her gently. 
 She was muttering about " George," but 
 had altogether forgotten what she came 
 to ask of him. When Bunsen opened 
 the door, she made her formal, old-fash- 
 ioned little courtesy to them, and went 
 away without saying a word. But an 
 hour or two afterwards Gall^raith saw 
 her sitting on a log outside of the win- 
 dow of Laddoun's room. There she sat 
 all day, motionless. If she had gone 
 down on her knees to him, it would not 
 have made the boy's heart so sore as 
 the sight of her sitting there. 
 
 Father Kimball came up in the after- 
 noon and talked to him, but Dallas made 
 dull, irrelevant answers. He could not 
 understand the old man's words ; they 
 sounded like water falling far off, they 
 had so little meaning in this matter — 
 this pain of his. He broke into a text 
 of Scripture which the good old preacher 
 quoted, with — 
 
 " If I could prove that I was used as 
 a tool — what then ?" 
 
 Father Kimball's eye gathered its 
 quick shrewdness. " By Laddoun ? 
 I'll tell you candidly, my boy, the evi- 
 dence is strongest against you : there 
 is only the suspicion of collusion with 
 George. The cheque was drawn by you, 
 the money was paid out by you, and 
 there is abundance of testimony as to 
 your remarkable skill with your pen. 
 Even if you bring proof that Laddoun was 
 a confederate, you cannot clear yourself" 
 
 " I cannot clear myself" He went 
 on repeating these words so long to him- 
 self that, with his haggard, colorless 
 face, the old man feared he was becom- 
 ing insane. "You'd better eat some- 
 thing, Dallas," he said. "And be pa- 
 tient. If you are innocent — and I be- 
 lieve you are innocent," quickly catching 
 the boy's unsteady eye — "be patient and 
 trust in the Lord. He will deliver you 
 if you are one of his children." 
 
 " If I am found guilty," abruptly, 
 " what is the punishment ?" 
 
DALLAS GALBRALTH. 
 
 35 
 
 Father Kimball coughed once or twice 
 before he found courage to say, " Surely 
 you know, Dallas. You will be sent to 
 prison." 
 
 Dallas got up as if his joints were 
 stiffened, looking out into the sunlight : 
 his lips moved as if by machinery. « I 
 did the best I could," he said, " and it's 
 come to this." 
 
 The old man's eyes were full of tears. 
 "You can't make your own lot," he said, 
 taking Galbraith's cold hand in his. 
 "The Lord has it in care. That is, if 
 you are one of His children. Every 
 hair of your head is numbered. But if 
 you've never been converted, your good 
 intentions and works are but as filthy 
 rags, in His sight." 
 
 Dallas turned his pale face on him, 
 bewildered. Father Kimball saw that 
 he was using an unknown tongue, and 
 he suddenly turned to worldly matters. 
 
 " Have you no friends, Dallas ? No 
 father or kinsfolk .-' Fve often suspected 
 you were of better birth than Laddoun 
 knew. If it is so, tell me, my child. 
 Let me apply to them. If they have 
 influence, your whole future may depend 
 on it." 
 
 "It's all done with to-day," Dallas 
 said, as though talking to himself. 
 "If I can't clear myself, there's no 
 future for me. Do you think I'd go 
 back a jail-bird to my mother?" 
 
 He sat down again, and after that 
 seemed to hear nothing that the old man 
 said to him. When he was gone, Tim 
 Graah climbed up to the outside of the 
 window, and after Dallas had wliispered 
 a few words to him, disappeared into the 
 woods, running like a hare. Now, there 
 had not been a word spoken by either 
 of the prisoners, all day, which had not 
 reached the thick ears of the leaden- 
 faced man sitting on a chair tilted back 
 in the hall, just outside of their doors. 
 He had his own reasons for sifting their 
 secrets. 
 
 But Tim had caught sight of him. 
 He did not try, therefore, to scale the 
 window again. Instead, a bit of bark, 
 with one or two papers wrapped about 
 it, was thrown in a half hour later, and 
 fell noiselessly at Galbraith's feet. One 
 
 was the old letter from Laddoun: the 
 other a brown paper wrapping, on which 
 was printed in big text: "All us boys is 
 frends to you, Dallas. Timotliy Graali." 
 
 Dallas laughed, and colored, when he 
 read it, folded it up and hid it in his 
 shirt : then took it out to read over, laugh- 
 ing again, but with the tears coming 
 slowly down his cheeks. The other 
 paper he kept in his pocket. He did 
 not read it over again. 
 
 Just before dusk he heard a noise in 
 the hall, Bunsen and Cradock moving 
 from their chairs, and a woman's voice. 
 They opened Laddoun's door. 
 
 "No. I will see Dallas," she said. 
 
 It was Lizzy. The sight of her roused 
 him as nothing else had done: there 
 she was, with her yesterday's face, quiet 
 and steady. If the terrible blow had 
 touched her, it had left no traces. While 
 he looked at her smooth hair, the knitting 
 stuck in her black silk apron, the well- 
 blacked shoes, the w^hole matter seemed 
 like a dream, and his old self came back 
 to him. 
 
 "I'm glad you came, Lizzy," holding 
 out his hand. 
 
 But after taking it she did not speak 
 for a moment or two. Then she said, 
 cheerfully, " I came to see that you were 
 doing all that you could for yoursel£ 
 First, eat," opening a covered basket 
 which she carried. Dallas obeyed her, 
 at first from his usual submission, and 
 then, like a boy, ravenously. When he 
 had done, he pushed away the basket 
 and sat looking at her. The good taste 
 of the food, the hearty warmth of her 
 presence, made his fate loom up colder 
 and more ten'ible. It was so natural to 
 just be a boy, to eat and drink, to hve 
 a careless, jolly hfe, like the rest of 
 them. 
 
 "Now," nodding slowly, one finger 
 laid in her palm. "What proof have 
 you of your innocence ? I mean to put 
 it into shape for you." 
 
 "I have no proof. There's been 
 something agin me from the first, Lizzy. 
 I can't fight it." 
 
 "That is childish," sharply. "I be- 
 lieve in your innocence as much as — as 
 I do in Laddoun's," hurriedly. " If I 
 
36 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 were a man, I'd force justice from the 
 law. I'd never whimper." 
 
 "As you beHeve in Laddoun's?" he 
 repeated, in a slow, thoughtful under- 
 tone. 
 
 She did not answer him for a minute, 
 and he noticed that she put down the 
 basket which she was adjusting, and 
 rested her hand on the wall. "I did 
 not come here to talk of Laddoun. There 
 is no proof against him. If I did not 
 believe him to be innocent, what would 
 become of me, Dallas V 
 
 "I know, Lizzy." 
 
 "But it is you who are in danger. 
 What can I do for you ?" 
 
 Dallas was standing before her, a 
 compassionate smile on his face, as he 
 noted how her firm, hard voice clung and 
 lingered to Laddoun's name. But when 
 she spoke of himself, he grew grave and 
 quiet. "We will not talk of the chance 
 for me," he said. "There is none. It 
 has not been my fault. I wish you 
 would tell them all I am no thief. That 
 is all I can say." 
 
 Elizabeth looked at him long and 
 searchingly. " If I did not think George 
 Laddoun innocent, what would become 
 of me ?" she said, her very lips growing 
 pale. 
 
 Galbraith drew a long breath: then 
 he smiled cheerfully, and took her hand. 
 "There will be no proof against Lad- 
 doun, Lizzy," he said. 
 
 When she went out, she saw him 
 standing in the middle of the room still 
 smiling cheerfully after her. 
 
 She did not go in to see Laddoun. 
 
 Squire Boles came up to the vacant 
 house when he reached home after dark, 
 and it was there that the prisoners had 
 their hearing. The witness had been 
 at Nixon's all day; a bank clerk; a 
 quiet, bald-headed gentleman, in a shining 
 suit of broadcloth, who walked about 
 among the barefooted fishermen, watch- 
 ing them with the askance, deferential 
 courtesy of a hare let loose among a 
 gang of mastiffs on their parole. He 
 noted their grim reticence with surprise : 
 not even the landlady asked him a ques- 
 tion. They knew that Laddoun and the 
 boy's future depended on his tongue. 
 
 It was not their habit to gossip when 
 deeply moved. 
 
 People went up to the vacant house 
 after dark, and crowded into the hall, 
 silent as if they came to a funeral. 
 When the door was opened, they could 
 catch glimpses of the room in which 
 Squire Boles sat behind a high desk, 
 carried up for the occasion, his book, 
 ink and spectacles spread out under the 
 light of two tallow candles. 
 
 Cradock stood beside him, stern and 
 unsmiling, and, behind, the solid gray 
 face of the detective was dimly seen in 
 the darkness, no unfitting figure, it 
 seemed to the fishermen, to decide on 
 this matter of life and death. 
 
 "They say," they whispered to each 
 other, "that Boles' verdict be as good 
 as final. Bunsen's hinted one of them 
 be sure to get off", but it's a dead cer- 
 tainty agin the other. Which, I don't 
 know." 
 
 When Laddoun and the boy were led 
 in through a side door, the crowd with- 
 out stood on their tip-toes, trying to dis- 
 cern from their faces which was the 
 guilty one. The boy stood near the 
 open fireplace, in which a log or two 
 had been kindled, and bent forward, his 
 hands behind him, so that the light 
 flickered over his fair hair and pale, quiet 
 features : Laddoun was in shadow, but 
 they could discern his ruddy, careless 
 face and portly swagger; now and then, 
 too, he nodded and smiled to some one 
 without. 
 
 "Whichever be the guilty one," said 
 Nixon, sententiously, "he be as good as 
 dead to us. No jail-bird need show his 
 face in Manasquan agin." 
 
 His voice was loud. He saw Dallas 
 raise his hand to his collar, and as sud- 
 denly let it fall. Old Mrs. Laddoun 
 pressed her way among them into the 
 room, dropping a courtesy as she went. 
 
 " My son George be in trouble, gentle- 
 men," she said, slowly ; " my son George 
 be in trouble," with a feeble little smile. 
 They all stood aside to let her pass, and 
 many of them muttered a "God help 
 her !" 
 
 There was another woman who sat 
 outside on a bench in the corner, with 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 37 
 
 her face turned from the door. They 
 whispered among each otiier that it was 
 Lizzy. Poor little Jim Van Zeldt hung 
 about near her. He was confident that 
 Laddoun was innocent, but there was no 
 telling how the verdict would go, and he 
 wanted to be near her if she needed any 
 help. 
 
 Then the door was shut. There was 
 a profound silence outside : they could 
 hear a low, monotonous voice within, 
 and knew it was the bank clerk giving 
 his evidence. Old Father Kimball came 
 into the hall out of the woods. 
 
 " I thought you did not mean to come 
 up, brother ?" one of the men whispered. 
 
 " I could not refrain," the old man 
 said. " I could not stay away while the 
 souls of two of our brethren, as we may 
 say, are on trial." Then he walked to 
 the far window and stood with his gray 
 hair uncovered, looking out into the 
 night. They knew he was praying. 
 
 The door opened presently and Graah 
 came out. The evidence was over. 
 
 " How goes it, Graah ? how goes it ?" 
 crowding about him with pale, anxious 
 faces. 
 
 But the old man choked when he tried 
 to answer, and shaking his head hurried 
 out. 
 
 "It be the boy. He wur main fond 
 of the boy," they said. 
 
 They could see Dallas standing for- 
 ward alone, his head held up, his face re- 
 solved and pale. The old justice peered 
 over the papers, his head shaking. 
 These prisoners were his friends and 
 neighbors : he had prayed to God that 
 he might deal justly with them. In his 
 agitation he mixed all the forms of his 
 law-book together in his talk : there was 
 a cool smile on Bunsen's face listening 
 to him. 
 
 Laddoun's black, bold eyes, yet in the 
 shadow, glanced warily around. " You 
 cannot commit me on such grounds. 
 There is not warrant for even suspicion," 
 he said defiantly, wiping his mouth again 
 and again. 
 
 " Young man, we know the law," and 
 the justice shuffled his rusty wig to and 
 fro uneasily. " Is there no farther evi- 
 dence against Doctor Laddoun ? I can- 
 
 not commit him on the mere ground of 
 being this lad's employer and most kinu 
 friend. He was your friend ?" 
 
 Dallas looked up. " He helped mc 
 when I needed help," he said, slowly. 
 
 <' There is no evidence against me — 
 none," Laddoun cried, vehemently. The 
 boy turned his quiet eyes on him. There 
 was a silence for a moment : those who 
 were nearest to Dallas saw a change 
 come on his face, as though he heard a 
 cry which they could not hear. Then 
 there was a sudden flash among the 
 wood embers, and a paper which haa 
 fallen among them burned to ashes. 
 
 " Stop !" said Bunsen. " One word 
 with this. boy. Have jou no proof 
 against Laddoun, Galbraith ?" 
 
 There was a pause, broken only by 
 the crisp crackle of the fire. The crowd 
 in the hall pressed nearer, and held their 
 breaths to hear, as Dallas spoke. 
 
 " No. I have no proof" 
 
 " Then you are discharged, Doctor 
 Laddoun," said the justice. " For you, 
 Galbraith " (the boy turned and faced 
 him), "j-ou are remanded to the custody 
 of this officer, to await a requisition for 
 trial in your own State." The old man 
 got up, pushing back his spectacles with 
 a shaking hand, and then leaned forward 
 with both hands on the table. " From 
 the evidence before me, I have little 
 doubt how that trial will end. You 
 have had a chance among us to — We 
 treated you as one of our own sons. 
 But you have lost your chance among 
 men now — and — " He broke down 
 here altogether. " May God have pity 
 on you, Dallas !" 
 
 There was a sudden confusion, and 
 then as sudden silence, as Laddoun 
 turned to go out among them, a free 
 man. Bunsen nodded and congratulated 
 him. Laddoun gave a loud, uncadenced 
 laugh, which broke off abruptly. He 
 almost staggered as he walked, his face 
 purple, fumbling at his cravat. They 
 all put out their hands and pulled him 
 out into their midst ; but he .said noth- 
 ing, glancing back uneasily at Dallas. 
 Jim Van Zeldt saw Lizzy stand up as 
 Laddoun came out and was welcomed 
 back among them ; she looked at him 
 
38 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 steadily a moment, and then turned and 
 went out into the night alone. 
 
 Dallas Galbraith, with the detective's 
 hand on his shoulder, stood looking at 
 the door where their faces were massed, 
 turned again towards him for the last 
 time. 
 
 He had had his chance among them, 
 and it was gone for ever. 
 
 "I did the best I could," he said, 
 putting out his hand before him like a 
 drowning man. Then Bunsen led him 
 out through the dark side-door, and they 
 saw him no more. That was the only 
 stroke he made against the tide which 
 was washing him out — out. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 " How far to the Stone-post Farm 
 now, driver ?" 
 
 ■• Madam Galbraith owns land all 
 along the road, but the Stone-post Farm 
 is in the next county." 
 
 " She was a Dour by birth V 
 
 The driver nodded shortly. 
 
 " And is fond, I surmise, of gathering 
 her own kin about her .?" 
 
 " I reckon she is. She has the country 
 hereabouts swarming with 'em. Wim- 
 men like her, without chick or child, are 
 full of their whims." 
 
 " My own name is Dour," ventured 
 the young man, buttoning his worn kid 
 gloves nervously and coloring a little. 
 
 The driver, a short, pursy man, shot 
 a keen glance over his shoulder at the 
 , lad's pale, hatchet face, long black hair 
 pushed behind his ears, and well-kept 
 clothes. " You don't favor the old 
 Madam's stock, anyhow," indifferently ; 
 and, flicking his leader's right ear, he 
 began to whistle. 
 
 Paul Dour, who was pluming himself 
 inwardly on the keenness of his guess 
 about the old lady, lapsed into silence. 
 He felt himself vaguely to be snubbed. 
 These people of the West (as he called 
 the Ohio valley in which he was travel- 
 ing) disappointed him. It was his first 
 journey out of New England into the 
 raw, uncultured regions which form 
 
 the members of the body of which it is 
 the brain. He had intended to be chari- 
 table in his judgment of them — to insult 
 no one by his criticism — making that 
 allowance for all short-comings, social 
 or otherwise, which became a just, clear- 
 sighted philosopher of the transcendental 
 school. Now, Paul's modicum of Con- 
 cord philosophy had dribbled down to 
 him diluted through a dozen conduits. 
 Consequently it proved a very mild 
 haschish indeed : his visions were few, 
 though his mental contortions many. 
 However, he had none the less faith in 
 it. Here was the leaven which was to 
 impregnate the mass of the American 
 people. As clay ready for the hands of 
 the potter, so the swarms of thriftless, 
 inadequate slaveholders, and the brute 
 physical and moneyed force of the Mid- 
 dle States, waited for the informing New 
 England mind. Paul, like most of the 
 lads and young women who go out from 
 New England, anticipated a great deal 
 of quiet amusement, though but little 
 additional knowledge, from his venture. 
 
 But it was dull work so far. The 
 Pennsylvania Dutch he had found curi- 
 ously indifferent to the informing element 
 which was to vivify them. Could this 
 stolidity, he thought, with alarm, extend 
 farther? His self-complacency was un- 
 usually thin-skinned: every pin-prick 
 caused a painful contraction. The very 
 farm-houses which he was passing now, 
 with their solid foothold of unhewn 
 stone, their wide acres, their giant oaks 
 pre-empting the earth, as it were, and 
 all the material good that therein is, 
 annoyed him. They would better have 
 befitted his own section, the old home- 
 stead of the country, than did its flimsy 
 white wooden tenements. He missed 
 the dissatisfied, tentative disquiet to 
 which he was used, in this warm, mel- 
 low air, and in the composed faces of 
 the people. He was curiously let alone. 
 Nobody seemed to need his history or 
 his thought. The people were decent, 
 decorous, minded their own bu.,:hess. 
 But as for the conversation, what seed 
 of progress lay in chat ? Facts — facts — • 
 fiicts— he heard nothing else, f om the 
 New York auction clerk w ho had crossed 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 39 
 
 the Jersey ferry with him, to this coach- 
 load of passengers with whom he traveled 
 through the West Virginia hills. What 
 did he know of the duty on iron, or the 
 rates of grain in Chicago? Yet, he was 
 uneasy. After all, could such things as 
 these affect the daily hves, and therefore 
 tJie souls, of the great commonplace 
 masses of men, more than the subtle 
 refinements of a pure philosophy ? These 
 Western people had a strong common- 
 sense code, to which test they brought 
 all religion, pohtics, the hfe of a man, or 
 the food of a horse. It stunned and 
 batHed him. 
 
 " I fear," he said, to a fellow-passenger 
 who was mounted on top of the coach 
 beside him, "we generalize too much 
 with regard to the Western people in 
 New England. We mass them in our 
 hypotheses and conclusions. No doubt 
 there are curious inflections of character 
 in different States, owing to climatic in- 
 fluences and the like." 
 
 "There are only two influences at 
 work on men, sir — God and the devil," 
 sharply, jerking the flaps of his black 
 coat together. 
 
 "Oh!" said Paul. He scanned the 
 small, loose-moulded face of his com- 
 panion with new interest. A white 
 neckcloth and intolerant gray eye were 
 tlie salient points about him. 
 
 " I have been a laborer in this vine- 
 yard a great many years, and I find 
 nothing so pernicious as this cant of 
 influences. God has but his few mes- 
 sengers of the preached word (of whom 
 I am one of the humblest), but Satan 
 lies in wait at every corner. You must 
 forgive me, sir," more gently ; "but I un- 
 derstood from you that you were' going 
 into one of his pitfalls unawares, and it 
 is my duty to warn you. You are young 
 and ingenuous : pardon me." 
 
 "I am going to a friend's — Madam 
 Galbraith's," said Dour, with a little 
 vanity, at naming a power in the land. 
 
 The clergyman shook his head, and 
 momentarily closed his eyes. "She is 
 a relative of yours .''" 
 
 "That I cannot tell. The truth is, 
 I have never seen her, and would be 
 glad of any information you could give 
 
 me. My visit has altogether the flavor 
 of an adventure." 
 
 The clergyman opened his eyes curi- 
 ously. Bob Penly, the driver, turned 
 half-way round, whip in hand. 
 
 "I graduated in a college in Massa- 
 chusetts two weeks ago," proceeded 
 Paul. "There was a classmate of mine 
 from this neighborhood, and through 
 him I heard of her as a probable rela- 
 tive. I wrote to inquire, and for reply 
 I received an odd epistle. I have it 
 here." He drew from his pocket a 
 large sheet of thick paper, on which these 
 worc's were scrawled in a masculine hand : 
 "Sir: John Bligh. whom I know to be 
 a truthful lad, and moderate in his state- 
 ments, apprises me that you are a Dour, 
 and also a poor young man, and deserving. 
 It occurs to me that you are a grandson 
 of Peter Dour's. He emigrated from 
 this county to Vermont in my father's 
 time, for what purpose God, and his own 
 cracked brain, only knew. Whether you 
 are or not, I will be pleased if you will 
 come to the Stone-post Farm. You are 
 invited to remain during a fortnight. 
 We can in that time determine whether 
 a longer stay would be agreeable to you 
 or me. As you come for my whim, you 
 will permit me to pay for it. 
 
 \Signed'\ 
 
 " Hannah Dour Galbraith." 
 
 "John BHgh was my classmate," ex- 
 plained the lad. " He said she was an 
 eccentric old woman and wealthy, and 
 it might be the making of me. Be- 
 sides, I had never seen the West ; so I 
 came. Some men might have been of- 
 fended at her bluntness. But I liked it." 
 
 " She is a wealthy woman," said the 
 preacher, beating his knee with the let- 
 ter ; " very wealthy. She has said to 
 her soul, ' Soul, take thine ease : eat, 
 drink, and be merry.' " 
 
 " She has said it to a lot beside her 
 soul," said Penly, pulling his reins ener- 
 getically. " There's as many poor as 
 rich fed at her table." 
 
 " She paid my expenses," resumed 
 Paul, hastily. " I'm poor, as Bligh said," 
 with a frank laugh. " As for the deserv- 
 ing, I hope the old lady may find me so." 
 
 " She is not chary of her money," re- 
 
40 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 sumed the clergyman, in a tone of pa- 
 tient mildness. " She sends it where 
 her whim blows, like the wind scatter- 
 ing the leaves yonder. Yet it is the 
 Lord's : she is but a steward. Robert 
 Penly," severely. " And with it she 
 lures young men like this over her 
 threshold, where there is card-playing 
 and dancing continually. It is not for 
 me to judge," turning again to Paul, 
 " but I never pass the boundary of her 
 land, and look at the house perched on 
 the mountains, that I do not think of 
 that other Woman of old, clothed in scar- 
 let, who sat upon the seven hills, drunken 
 with the blood of the saints." 
 
 Bob made an angry cut at the off 
 horse. It was a rigid Presbyterian com- 
 munity, and Bob himself carried about 
 the bag on Sunday in a country church, 
 so that he felt his mouth in a measure 
 gagged. 
 
 " I've heerd she seldom goes to church, 
 and never gives a red to missions or the 
 like," at last he said, compromisingly. 
 
 The preacher bowed assentingly. 
 
 But Bob could not forget a loan that 
 had been made to him the winter that 
 he was down with the rheumatism, when 
 the twins were born — how the queer old 
 Madam had paid his rent, and sent in 
 pork enough to last until spring. " Take 
 that filthy plug out of your mouth, Rob- 
 ert Penly," she said, "and keep it out 
 until you have paid me." Bob burst 
 into a chuckle. 
 
 " Well, she's a law to herself, I reckon," 
 he said, " and to other folks too. Cap- 
 tain Galbraith, we call her. My wife, 
 now, thinks there's salt enough in her 
 big body to savor the whole county. 
 Doctors differ, you see, parson." 
 
 The clergyman rebuked the familiarity 
 only by silence. " I would be sorry," 
 he said, mildly, turning to Paul, " that 
 you would suppose me a common gos- 
 sip, used to malign my neighbors. But 
 tlie house to which you are going is the 
 only one in the neighborhood where the 
 amusements and corruptions of the world 
 find entrance, and Madam Galbraith' s 
 position and generosity make her exam- 
 ple weighty, as you see. Besides, the 
 power of her tongue — " he added, in a 
 
 lower voice. " Her words burn like 
 scalding drops, at times," and his pale 
 face grew a shade paler ; from some bit- 
 ter remembrance, Paul fancied. 
 
 They fell into an awkward silence after 
 that, only broken by Bob's persistent 
 whistle. The road wound circuitously 
 up and down steep hills, passing by 
 lonely farms, clusters of two-storied brick 
 houses huddled on the edge of every 
 water-course, each shouldering the name 
 of a city, then out again through the 
 great sweep of forest, in which Paul was 
 doubtful whether he might confidently 
 look to find wigwams or not. 
 
 The early November frosts had brown- 
 ed and rotted the crimson and yellow 
 leaves of the mountain foliage, and left 
 but the shape and grouping of the trees, 
 stripped of their cover of color, sharply 
 defined against the sky: an infinite study 
 of form alone. Mile after mile this rare 
 limning edged the mountain horizon, an 
 endless variety of simple, noble shapes 
 outlined in black upon an amber, crystal- 
 clear background. For the Indian sum- 
 mer still lent the red and golden tints of 
 August to the sky and to the haze which 
 hung half-way up the hills, escaping from 
 the chilled, muddy creeks below. 
 
 At one of the farm-houses the clergy- 
 man alighted, carpet-bag in hand : he 
 held up his hand to Paul, who shook it 
 heartily. 
 
 " You will not take my warning amiss ? 
 You are on the Galbraith lands now." 
 
 Dour glanced hurriedly at the wide 
 creek on one side, and the shelving moun- 
 tain-sides, blood-red with iron, on the 
 other, with a quicker beat of his pulses. 
 What if the terrible old woman made his 
 fortune, after all ? For if his inner eye 
 kept a fixed regard on the pure Central 
 Truths, his outer gray ones had as shrewd 
 respect for next year's income. 
 
 " No fear," loftily. " The old lady 
 shall not prove my Mephistopheles. But 
 we will get on admirably, I dare say. I 
 can accept all natures, provided they have 
 the human element. I3hgh had an essay 
 of mine — Psychical Axioms ; and I think 
 she has seen it, and hence my invitation," 
 blushing ingenuously in spite of himself. 
 
 The preacher shook his head. « No. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITIL 
 
 41 
 
 You're a Dour, that's all. She has 
 never been able to find kinsfolk of her 
 own name. Psychical Axioms, eh ?" 
 and with an amused laugh he notlded, 
 and, jumping the worm fence, turned into 
 a stubble-field. 
 
 " Considerin' the season, he might have 
 wished you a jolly Thanksgivin'," said 
 Bob, dryly, as the red coach lumbered 
 oif again up the hillside. 
 
 " They keep Thanksgiving to-morrow 
 at the Stone-post Farm .^" 
 
 " I reckon," with a nod that was as 
 emphatic as an oath. " Don't you be 
 misled by him," with a contemptuous 
 nod backwards to the spare black figure 
 in the field. " Parsons is good in their 
 way, but they're narrer. That's it. 
 They're narrer. They don't see with- 
 out glasses. Now Madam, she makes 
 the whole country-side keep Christmas 
 and Thanksgive along with her. I'd 
 not Hke to count the bar'ls of flour and 
 turkeys that left her place yesterday." 
 
 " No children, you say ?" 
 
 Bob shook his head. Paul was young. 
 What if this respectable old ogress found 
 him her nearest kinsman — and heir ? 
 
 " A widow V 
 
 " No. Old Mr. Galbraith, he's there. 
 It's he that says where the flour and 
 turkeys is most needed." 
 
 « I remember a Galbraith once," said 
 Paul, half aloud, reflectively. "A boy 
 of about my own age. He was tried in 
 New York when I was there in the 
 Christmas holidays. My uncle defended 
 him. But that was years ago." 
 
 " It was, now ?" Bob dearly loved a 
 story, but he scorned to betray too ready 
 an interest, the speaker being but a lad. 
 " And his name was Galbraith ? Like 
 enough. They're plenty as huckleber- 
 ries. But they're decentish folks, ord'- 
 narily. And your uncle got him off, hey ?" 
 
 " No ; he did not. It was a clear case 
 of forgery. But my uncle was curiously 
 interested in the boy, I remember." 
 Dour was silent, recalling with an effort 
 the particulars of the old, painful story, 
 but he gratified Bob with no more of it ; 
 and Penly, after filling up the time with 
 a critical squint at the scenery, stroking 
 the dust from the brown terry waistcoat 
 
 that covered his fat little paunch, and 
 glancing at his pinchbeck watch, began 
 again : 
 
 " We're a bit behind time. That near 
 horse, he's off his feed now. Well, the 
 old couple — the Madam and her hus- 
 band — had a son once. I didn't tell you. 
 But he was like a good many of youi 
 high-bred colts — he wasn't worth noth- 
 ing. They raised him too' much, hkely. 
 He was fed and slept accordin' to rule. 
 When he was a baby, she never hired a 
 nurse, I've heerd say: no woman should 
 touch him but herself So he slipped 
 the tether and made off. He married a 
 silly girl of this neighborhood and took 
 her along. It was an awful muddle." 
 
 Paul's curiosity, always alert, was 
 roused. " How did it end .'"' he said. 
 
 " I knowed young Tom Galbraith 
 well," said Bob, breaking into a com- 
 fortable trot of talk, that kept time with 
 his horses' tramp. " There wasn't a 
 man about the drinking-shops and sta- 
 bles in the county that didn't know him. 
 So I never looked to hear any good of 
 him. He took his wife acrost the moun- 
 tains, East, and there they scuffed along 
 from hand to mouth, I've heerd since, 
 till he died. There was a good deal of 
 outcome in his wife. She was a Jen- 
 nings — an orphan girl. So she fought 
 along bravely, sewin' and the like, for 
 her and the boy. She never wrote to 
 the Madam, even when the child was 
 born." 
 
 " There is a boy, then ?" said Paul, 
 coloring as his boyish visions of heirship 
 suddenly vanished. 
 
 " Yes, there was a boy. But he's 
 dead. There's somethin' cur'ous about 
 that boy's death, a mystery like, that 
 nobody knows the bottom of but the old 
 Madam. They say his mother put him 
 to dig in the coal-pits at Scranton, and 
 that the choke-damp killed him. But 
 it's a dark story through and through." 
 
 He was silent for a while, and then 
 began again in a louder voice. " Tom 
 Galbraith's boy would have been wel- 
 come here by high and low. He might 
 have drunk and flung out his money like 
 water, as his father did before him, but 
 he'd have come to nothing worse, coal- 
 
42 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 pits or not. 'Tain't in the blood. It 
 was the want of brains as ailed Tom, 
 but he was as honest as his mother ; and 
 she — well, it's likely she is an old hea- 
 then, as the parson says. But I've ex- 
 perienced the world this fifty years, and 
 she's as clean a card as I've known in 
 the pack, take her altogether." 
 
 "And Tom Galbraith's widow ?" bring- 
 ing him back to the road. 
 
 " Well, she's back now — Mary Jen- 
 nings. She's changed her name again. 
 She married a Captain Duftield, East 
 there, some do say, to save her and 
 her boy from starving, but some say it 
 was after the boy's death. I don't 
 know. I think it's likely she wanted 
 somebody to trim off her pink face and 
 curls, as poor Tom never could do. She 
 was mighty fond of her pretty face, 
 Mary Jennings was. But the story goes 
 that Duffield used her like a devil. 
 However, lie's dead. Only a month or 
 two ago. And hearin' that, the old 
 Madam sent for her. My wife says 
 slie'll be there this Thanksgiving." 
 
 " To-morrow ?" 
 
 "Yes, to-morrow. She's of a differ- 
 ent stock from the Galbraiths, you see. 
 Well," hesitating, "she's a sort of far- 
 off kin of my own. But that don't 
 matter. The old Madam would take 
 her out of the coal-pits themselves, pur- 
 vided she was honest. But she's a 
 terrible judge when a man makes a slip," 
 shaking his head. " There's things I 
 could tell you — I hope God 'ill be slacker 
 in judgment than them that's like her 
 here." 
 
 They were entering the crooked 
 streets of a little village on the side of 
 tlie hill, and Bob blew his horn shrilly. 
 
 "Now I've got a load to take up 
 here," he said confidentially to Paul ; 
 " the Rattlins. Well, they are a lot ! 
 They're going to spend Thanksgiving at 
 the Farm. Along with you. They go 
 once a year, and it lasts two weeks. 
 There's eight of them. He's a preacher, 
 Rattlin is," jerking out the sentences be- 
 tween the jarring of the wheels. "And 
 eight of them to feed. There's a tough 
 fight for you ! I hope you'll be kind to 
 the little man, sir," slacking the pace of 
 
 his horses to a walk as they went up 
 the hill. " This is his year's one holi- 
 day, I take it. He has three p'ints for 
 preaching, lyin' within fifteen miles, an' 
 he gets a bare five hundred from 'em, 
 and that but half paid in ; and preachers 
 can't turn an honest penny at odd jobs, 
 like the rest of us. Consekently, they're 
 half clothed, them Rattlins, and whole 
 starved. Lord, here he is ! Like a little 
 cricket, as usual. Good morning, sir," 
 touching his cloth cap respectfully, and 
 drawing rein. 
 
 A little man, hardly as high as the 
 wheel, stood suddenly beside it, rubbing 
 his hands, his thin cheeks red and wet 
 with perspiration. 
 
 " You did not forget us, Robert ?" 
 panting for breath. "We've been on 
 the watch for two hours. I really 
 thought you had forgotten this was 
 the day we were to go. Though 
 that's hardly likely. We've been up 
 since sunrise, so as to be quite ready. 
 We'll not detain you, Robert. Tlie 
 baggage is on the steps." 
 
 " We're behind time, sir. As I was 
 saying just now, this here horse is off 
 his feed." 
 
 " Off his feed, eh ?" an.xiously. " Let 
 me examine him," applying his ear to 
 the horse's chest. " He is hoarse, Robert. 
 He ought not to be out in this chilly 
 air. I'd recommend covering his breast 
 immediately. I have a blanket that I'll 
 lend you for the purpose. I'll make a 
 short cut across the fields for it." 
 
 "If they have one, it's about as much 
 as they do have," said Bob, looking 
 gravely after the retreating figure, with 
 the thin black summer coat fluttering 
 about it. " My wife says they all slept 
 under newspapers last winter. Not bad 
 kivers," as Paul laughed. " But the 
 world owes that little man a decent keep. 
 Why, I'll bet you it's months since he's 
 tasted meat ; and as for debt — Lord, sir, 
 they owes for their bread for months 
 back. Skinner hasn't the heart to press 
 'em. Everybody Hkes them Rattlins." 
 
 The coach had rumbled through a 
 narrow lane, and drew near to a little 
 box of a house, with the usual patch of 
 a lot beside it filled with tomatoes, be'ts, 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITIL 
 
 43 
 
 and a row of parsley. The house was 
 just closed, and Mrs. Rattlin brandish- 
 ed a key which was nearly as big as it- 
 self. The tide of Rattlins ebbed and 
 flowed about the great hair trunk that 
 was set down directly in the middle of 
 the road. When the coach came in 
 sight they hallooed and swarmed over it, 
 over the fence, the two babies scaling 
 their motlier's plump little sides until 
 she was forced to sit down and relieve 
 her own turmoil of mind by slapping and 
 kissing tliem. 
 
 " Did you ever see such a lot ?" said 
 Bob, whipping up the horses. " Did 
 you ever see such a little woman ? Ton 
 my soul, she's good enough to eat ! 
 They're all as round and fat and jolly as 
 ripe mush-millions, and how they get 
 jolliness or fat out of the skimped life 
 they lead is more than I can tell. Jest 
 as mush-millions get juice out of sandy 
 sile, likely. Well, here you are, young 
 'uns ! Jest hold the reins a minute," 
 throwing them to Paul. " I'll load this 
 wagon myself," scrambling down among 
 them, and beginning to straj) the hair- 
 enormity on behind, and to throw in 
 various odd bundles of shoes and frocks 
 tied up in gingham handkerchiefs, over 
 which Mrs. Rattlin anxiously presided, 
 while the preacher himself, with one of 
 the boys, strapped the white worn 
 blanket over the horse's chest. Then 
 he felt its ribs, and went about among 
 the other horses, his head knowingly on 
 one side, looking into their mouths, feel- 
 ing their flanks and backs, followed by 
 an admiring regiment of boys. 
 
 " You've some fine stock here, Robert, 
 fine stock ! I used to be a judge of a 
 nice animal: well, to tell the truth, I 
 owned a good mare once, myself — a 
 very good mare." 
 
 "That's the bay, Jenny, at Whit- 
 crosses," said Bob, in the deferential 
 tone which he always used to the little 
 man. "I heern she was yourn once, 
 sir." 
 
 "True, true. I often go down to 
 Whitcrosses, and she knows me yet, I 
 really believe. Yes, I was as fond of 
 Tenny as of one of these little chaps. 
 But it wasn't convenient for us to keep 
 
 her," with a momentary gravity. " But 1 
 think, Penly," energetically, "there's few 
 men can live to my age with eight chil- 
 dren, and say they have lost nothing but 
 a horse," the thin little face reddening 
 with a sudden brightness, which made 
 even Paul, up on the box, nod and smile 
 down to him, and feel a sudden warmth 
 about the air. 
 
 He had a New Englander's quick eye, 
 and he was used to petty scrapings and 
 makeshifts of economy. He could see 
 the colored shirt peeping out under 
 Ratthn's old-fashioned Hnen collar: see 
 the seams where his trowsers had been 
 turned wrongside before for the two big- 
 ger boys (worn terribly thin under the 
 knees) : he knew at a glance that the 
 pink ribbons were dyed at home which 
 fluttered over Rosy and Gerty's pretty, 
 shy faces, yonder by the fence. All of 
 their clothes were for summer wear : they 
 had no business to be wearing them now : 
 they had no business to be laughing and 
 poking fun at each other, at all; but 
 they did it, and that in a fashion which 
 showed Paul that it was a practice to 
 which they were born, and not a weak- 
 ness of the moment. The world, Bob 
 said, "didn't give them a decent keep," 
 yet they made much of the old monster 
 every day, took it by the ears, and 
 warmed their hearts over it, as if it had 
 been Kriss-Kingle himself with arms and 
 back loaded with goodies for them. 
 
 It was contagious, somehow. Before 
 he knew what he was about, Paul had 
 the reins tied and was down among 
 them, joking with Rattlin, packing in 
 baby after baby among the straw which 
 filled the bottom of the coach, scram- 
 bling over the boys, and quite aware 
 that this expedition to the Stone-post 
 Farm was such a holiday as came but 
 once or twice in a lifetime. They were 
 all in at last, even to the blushing Rosy 
 and Gerty (Paul blessed their untimely 
 gingham frocks, for how else would he 
 have a glimpse of the plump, pink arms 
 and shoulders i') Then he shut tlie door, 
 and climbed up to the top again, where 
 Mr. Rattlin and Bob were seated, and 
 away they bowled, confident that there 
 was as much fun and good-humor and 
 
44 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 chubbiness and rosy cheeks and ribbons 
 boxed up below, as any five feet square 
 of an earthly coach could hold. 
 
 The afternoon sky clouded over, and 
 the whole temper of the day became 
 gray and gusty, but Bob told his raciest 
 stories, and the horses tramped along as 
 if they had drunk spiced cordial instead 
 of water at the inn; even Paul broke 
 out into some hearty college song ; and 
 everybody, Penly and the Rattlins, girls 
 and boys, caught the chorus in time, and 
 roared it out together until the hickory 
 woods, on each side, rung. Then they 
 came to the half-way-house, where the 
 horses were changed. Presently, a great 
 cracked gong sounded, and Bob went 
 in to his dinner. Dour was half-famished 
 with his long fast, but he shook his head 
 when the landlady called to him. He 
 could not go in and leave the wistful 
 little man and his party outside nibbling 
 from their paper of stale crackers on 
 the porch. He went in to the grocery 
 and bought some cheese, however, and 
 tliey made a regular picnic of it. 
 
 "/ never take dinner at a tavern," 
 said one of the boys, coming back with 
 his hands in his pockets from gravely 
 inspecting the happy eating people within. 
 
 "Traveling is very expensive, Mr. 
 Dour," said Mrs. Rattlin. 
 
 To which Paul replied that it was, 
 and that he generally was provided with 
 crackers, and not obliged to depend on 
 the inns ; and then they all got into the 
 coach again, Paul crowding in between 
 Miss Rosy and the youngest boy. 
 
 However, at the next village where 
 they stopped, a man came out of the 
 post-office and put a bank-note in Mr. 
 Rattlin's hands. Openly, before them 
 all. He made a little speech, too, say- 
 ing that it was a small Thanksgiving 
 testimonial from some of his ilock, and 
 tliat they wished him many happy re- 
 turns of the day ; at which Mr. Rattlin 
 grew red and choked, and was as full 
 of eager gratitude as though they did 
 not owe him two quarters' salary. 
 
 "It will pay Skinner, Gerty!" Paul 
 heard Mrs. Rattlin whisper, with her 
 little joyous chirrup of a laugh. 
 
 But it did not pay Skinner; for at the 
 
 very next inn Rattlin got down with a 
 good deal of excitement in his manner, 
 and presently they were all brought in 
 to a stew of canned oysters, such as 
 seldom was eaten before : Penly and 
 Dour, the inn-keeper and all ; Mr. Rat- 
 thn himself going out with a soup- 
 plateful to the old ostler who was 
 watering the horses. Mrs. Rattlin, after 
 the first wince of chagrin in her blue 
 ej'es, was the very life of the party. This 
 carnal dissipation gave a sort of wicked 
 flavor to the day, which was very rehsh- 
 ing : they mounted into the coach, noisier 
 and more reckless than ever, to finish 
 the journey, the men going on top again. 
 
 Evening was closing in before they 
 entered the Stone-post Farm. 
 
 " You're on the old de-main now," 
 said Bob, pointing with his whip to the 
 low fences made of stone blocks, with 
 rails between, which gave a name to the 
 homestead. " You've been crossing bits 
 of the Dour land all day, spread out 
 like a spider's claws, but you're in the 
 heart of it now. The Dours were 
 among the first settlers in this West 
 Virginia country, you see : all big, strong- 
 jinted men, I've heerd: they had to 
 hold their ground agin the wild beasts 
 and Indians. Yon's the fort they built 
 in the old times for safety, when there 
 was a rising among the savages," nod- 
 ding to a low, mud-plastered range of 
 buildings on the slope to the left. " The 
 Madam, she's the last of them: she's 
 got the land, and she's got the pluck 
 and the grit of all the old Dours in one. 
 Yon's the house," pulling up to give 
 effect to the first view. 
 
 Paul looked slightingly at this type 
 of an old Western homestead, that had 
 grown up in the hollow of the mountain 
 as slowly as the gigantic oaks that stood 
 sentinel about it, and, apparently, with no 
 better defined idea of architecture than 
 they. It belonged, too, as much to the 
 ground on which it stood: the great 
 blocks of gray stone came from the 
 mountain, and the brick, turned a dull 
 brown through long rain and sun, from 
 the soil under their feet. It stretched, 
 with its barns and out-buildings, over 
 the space of a small hamlet. The land- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 45 
 
 scape, with its broad fields, frequent water- 
 courses, and sharp mountain ranges, dif- 
 fered from the miniature farms of New 
 England : to Paul's eye it lacked refine- 
 ment ; the house finished and gave ex- 
 pression to it all, as a face to a body. 
 It was liberal, large, hospitable; and it 
 was content to be nothing better than it 
 was for ages to come. 
 
 Coming nearer, Mr. Rattlin nodded 
 with keen admiration. '• That is what I 
 call a picture," he said, and Dour could 
 not contradict him. The great valley 
 below lay in shadow, but the evening 
 light rested on the mountain summit 
 and on the old house at its base. Its 
 gray and ruddy brown walls harmonized 
 so cheerfully with the natural tints of 
 the ground and rocks, that Nature, Paul 
 fancied, had thrust out welcoming hands 
 to draw it into closer companionship. 
 The warped black shingles of the roof 
 were crusted and edged with moss, and 
 the wild ivy had climbed with its per- 
 sistent three-fingered leaves over its 
 sides until they were covered with 
 masses of clear crimson. The windows, 
 deep set in the stone, began to glow red 
 from within in the chilly evening, and 
 rifts and trails of bituminous smoke 
 poured from the wide stacks of chimneys, 
 yellow and black, across the pale sky. 
 
 "There she is herself!" cried Bob, 
 pointing to a short, largely-built woman 
 crossing a field, ploughed for wheat, with 
 slow, steady pace, a stick in her hand, 
 with which she seemed to be testing the 
 depth of the furrow. "She goes about 
 her farms hke an officer on guard — the 
 Lord help Joe Driver if them furrows 
 ain't straight! She'll keep going till 
 old Death taps her on the back, I reckon, 
 some day, in her walk." But he stopped 
 joking, and put on a grave face when 
 Madam Galbraith, perceiving the coach, 
 waved her stick for it to stop, and came 
 down the hillside towards them. 
 
 Paul had time to look at her curi- 
 ously : old as she was, her step was finn 
 and ft-ee as an Indian's: her dress was 
 of coarse gray cloth, the upper part cut 
 like a man's coat, her head covered with 
 a flannel hood: she halted at a wide 
 opening in the road, and beckoned 
 
 them to come closer. Bob drove up 
 slowly. 
 
 "Who have you here, Robert Penly?" 
 in a loud, clear voice. "Tut, tut!" tap- 
 ping on the side of the coach ; a pair 
 of keen eyes, under shaggy white brows, 
 inspecting the passengers inside and out 
 rapidly. Paul kept silence, not deeming 
 it fit that his introduction should be 
 given in this informal manner. 
 
 "Mr. Rattlin, eh?" as the little man 
 jumped down and stood in front of her. 
 "You are welcome, sir. I think good 
 comes under my roof with you." She 
 bowed as she said it, with a curious 
 stately grace in her cumbersome body. 
 She passed over Dour without notice, 
 and thrust her head inside with a strange 
 anxiety, he fancied, in her face, shutting 
 her wide mouth grimly. The high-fea- 
 tured, large-boned woman, standing in 
 the rough road and twilight, had seemed 
 repellant and coarse to Dour ; but when 
 she pushed back the flannel hood, ex- 
 posing the swarthy clean skin, broad 
 forehead and deep-set eyes before which 
 he quailed, he thought it, reluctantly, a 
 grand head, and framed aptly in the 
 reverend mass of silvery gray hair. 
 
 u Ha — women folks ? women folks ?" 
 as a babble of greeting welcomed her 
 from inside. " And that's all ? Well, 
 I'm glad to see you all, youngsters. 
 You'll always seem like a girl to me, 
 Mrs. Rattlin, in spite of your brood. 
 Go on. Up to the house. It ought to 
 be like home to you by this time. If 
 you think of anything which would make 
 you give thanks more heartily, let me 
 know it ;" and patting the head of the 
 nearest boy, she turned away from them. 
 
 " Stop, Penly ! What does your com- 
 pany mean by driving such miserable 
 hacks as these ?" touching the horses 
 with her stick. " They are a disgrace 
 to the country. Stock that ought to have 
 been out to grass years ago ! Tell them 
 it must be stopped, or I'll give them 
 winter fodder for their cattle, and" — low- 
 ering her voice — " see that they miss 
 their mail contracts next year !" with a 
 cynical laugh. " Drive on, now. No, 
 Mr. Rattlin ; I beg that you will go back 
 to your seat. I'll walk alone — walk 
 
46 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 alone, and lifting her stick by way of | 
 farewell, she struck across the field again. 
 
 Young Dour smiled superciliously. 
 
 " She has been used to the charge of 
 J. large tenantry," said Rattlin, jealously. 
 " It has roughened the husk a little, 
 but she is discomposed to-day. Usu- 
 ally, it is like coming to a Christmas fire 
 TO be near her. A great, genial, tender 
 heart she has, that woman." 
 
 " She's disapp'inted," Bob broke out, 
 ''in not seeing Mary Jennings. She 
 sets such store by the memory of that 
 boy of hers that even the woman who 
 forgot him is dear to her because she 
 was once his wife." 
 
 Madam Galbraith was joined at the 
 end of the field by a gentleman, who held 
 tlie turnstile for her to pass through, 
 and then walked^* silently beside her 
 towards the house, his hands clasped 
 behind him : a tall, spare man, care- 
 fully dressed, with a few thin white 
 hairs straggling from under his hat. He 
 watched her nervous strides and pas- 
 sionate, long-drawn breaths gravely, but 
 without a word. Finally she stopped. 
 
 "James !" 
 
 " Yes, Hannah." 
 
 " The woman has not come. She'll 
 not come. It is in keeping with all of 
 her life. A pink-faced, frivolous trifler : 
 she lured Tom from me ; she hung about 
 his neck like a millstone ; she hid the 
 birth of his boy from me ; and now — " 
 She stopped, her nostrils distended and 
 white. It was her only sign of passion. 
 The little gate on which her hand rested 
 shook violently. 
 
 He put his own on it. " Hannah ?" 
 he said, " Hannah ?" gently. 
 
 Her whole burly frame seemed to 
 cower, ashamed. " I forget myself, 
 James. Let me go in a while alone." 
 
 " Tell me first what is your disap- 
 pointment .'' Why do you bring the 
 woman here ? Tom is dead, and his 
 boy — We had better bury them out 
 of sight, Hannah." The quiet gentle- 
 man passed his hand over his pale face 
 as he spoke ; it was a common gesture 
 with him, and, like all his motions, had 
 
 in it something mild and reticent ; but 
 his wife was struck by it as never before. 
 She looked at him keenly. Was it pos- 
 sible that her husband had held their 
 dead son closer to him than she. in all 
 her loud agony of grief? But James 
 Galbraith's secret thoughts were not to 
 be uncovered, even by his wife. 
 
 " I want her near me," she said. " I 
 want to touch her face because he kissed 
 it at the last : to hear her voice, because 
 it was dear to him. I am a fool, per- 
 haps, and a dotard. But the nearer I 
 come to the grave, the more I hunger 
 for something of my own. I'm an old, 
 branchless trunk. I had but my boy. 
 There's not a dog now that wouldn't be 
 nearer to me than all the world of men 
 and women if he had loved it." 
 
 He held his quiet eyes on her, calm- 
 ing her. " I understand," he said. 
 
 They entered the gate and passed into 
 a wide hall. A great coal-fire threw alter- 
 nate yellow light and shadows through 
 it. She stopped him by the arm in front 
 of it. "James," in a low, hurried whis- 
 per, "don't laugh at me. I told you 
 long ago I did not believe that Tom's 
 boy was dead. I lie awake at nights 
 thinking. What if God would give him 
 to me, a pure child as he is, to atone 
 for the mistake I made with his father ? 
 I never believed he was dead. If the 
 woman comes, I will force the truth from 
 her!" 
 
 " Yes, Hannah," mildly. 
 
 Madam Galbraith went to her own 
 room and locked herself in. It was her 
 habit when deeply disturbed. 
 
 But her husband sat quietly before 
 the fire, his delicate fingers pointed to- 
 gether, looking into the sudden flames 
 and shadows. He had no need to turn 
 a lock upon his grief. 
 
 If the simple-hearted gentleman kept 
 the boy he had lost near to him in his 
 every daily walk and thought, no man 
 knew it. His odd, fastidious, kindly 
 ways and quizzical humor apparently 
 filled up his little role in life. Even his 
 wife would have said there was in it 
 nothing more than these. 
 
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 HMflaBj 
 
 ll|IIIJIIUHM 
 
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 m 
 
 PART III 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 «"r\ONG-DONG!" The slaked house- 
 J-V fires thrust out angry jets of flame 
 to explore the darkness ; cattle stamped 
 in the stables ; cocks crowed back their 
 indignation through the unbroken night 
 at being wakened too early. "Dong- 
 dong!" Floors began to creak under 
 unwilling footsteps ; dull candles to sput- 
 ter and wink; sleepy maids to creep 
 stumbhng down from their garret roosts ; 
 the Ratthn brood chirped under their 
 quilts ; the little preacher turned uneasily 
 on his pillow ; but still the sullen clamor 
 went on. It was only the great house- 
 bell of the Stone-post Farm which usu- 
 ally stood on the hall table. It was a 
 weight for a man, and had a clank like a 
 blacksmith's anvil ; but a young woman, 
 who thrust her colorless face out into 
 one of the dark upper entries to listen, 
 fancied it had a human voice. "To 
 work! to work!" it said. "Give thanks. 
 Begin anew. Amend your mistakes. 
 Your hfe is in your own hands." The 
 woman closed her door behind her, and 
 came out into the darkness fully dressed. 
 Perhaps that was what it said. Mad- 
 am Galbraith rang the bell herself, strid- 
 ing up and down the chilly, pitch-black 
 hall, clearing her throat like a man. At 
 
 every anniversary she refreshed her soul 
 by penitence and a new code of good 
 resolutions, and dragged the household 
 out of bed a half hour earlier the next 
 morning. 
 
 Her night had been sleepless : that 
 thought of her dead scape-grace son 
 dwindled her life down before her into a 
 paltry failure. Well, there was a frag- 
 ment left: in that there should be no 
 mistakes. If she had been a man, she 
 would have worked off the rank, nervous 
 vitality of her brawny body and brain in 
 some struggle for freedom — Cretan or 
 Fenian : as it was, she haled the petty 
 world under her from b'eneath the blank- 
 ets to face their work in the middle of 
 the night. Nobody paid such wages in 
 all the country-side ; but when in these 
 moods the woman was a terrible slave- 
 driver: the stolid Dutch hands who 
 worked for her might as well stem her 
 will as a log run counter to the sea un- 
 der-tow. She called herself a catholic, 
 liberal thinker ; but her real creed in her 
 own world was, God is God ; and Han- 
 nah Galbraith is his Prophet. 
 
 Still, it hurt her that the crowd of 
 house and farm hands were sullen as 
 they gathered into one of the outer 
 kitchens and waited for her. Why could 
 they not see what was best for them ? 
 
 47 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Was not work and thanksgiving better 
 than sloth ? She went up the stairs and 
 struck with her stick two or three times 
 on a door. 
 
 "Honora!" she cried. "Don't de- 
 lay, Honora!" She was sure of the 
 httle girl's good temper if she drove her 
 all night. Then she went down to the 
 kitchen and took her position behind a 
 table, the oil lamp lighting up her hawk- 
 eyes and the shaggy white hair above 
 them. She had her farm-book and bag 
 of specie before her, and began counting 
 out their wages. 
 
 " I pay you now because a man can 
 give thanks better with a full stomach 
 and pocket. I want but a quarter day's 
 work done. I'll see that all of you have 
 something extra to thank God for. Ex- 
 cept you, John Hawley and James Lane. 
 You'll spend the day in bringing up your 
 husking. You were drunk yesterday. 
 The Lord wants no prayers or hymns 
 from a man who shirks his daily work." 
 
 She marshaled them as a general his 
 men ; some to the pantry, the field, the 
 mill, the kitchen : omitting no minutife ; 
 her voice grew loud and unctuous. The 
 petty authority gave her, evidently, a 
 great pleasure. God had put power in 
 her hands, she thought : there were hun- 
 dreds to whom her will gave comfort or 
 poverty : she did her duty well. Sud- 
 denly she hesitated, glanced uneasily 
 about her; the glance always passing 
 with marked indifference over a quiet 
 woman in clothes of a dull chocolate 
 color, who stood in the shadow. There 
 was nothing peculiar in her appearance 
 beyond the unusual want of color in the 
 solid features, but Madam Galbraith 
 ffl^ltered before the steady eyes, as 
 though she and her power had been but 
 a sham — a house of sand built on sand. 
 She shut her book and got up. 
 
 "I did not look to find you here," 
 with a manner of forced politeness. " My 
 people are used to the hardships of early 
 rising." 
 
 "It is no hardship to me," said the 
 woman, quietly. 
 
 "Open the shutters, women," in a 
 loud voice, turning away, "and go to 
 work ; go to work !" 
 
 But they hesitated — a sudden bright- 
 ening on their faces : it might have been 
 from the clear dawn that filled the room 
 through the open windows, or from Hono- 
 ra, coming in with and seeming a part of 
 it. She said good-morning as she passed 
 among them : there were none of them 
 whom her childish smile and nod did not 
 reach. They were all fond of Honora. 
 People always thought the little girl's 
 voice was different from any they had 
 heard before, and, when they had been 
 with her a little while, felt as if they had a 
 share in her, and were in some sort related 
 to her. Madam Galbraith nodded to her 
 to follow, and, when they were out in the 
 hall, led her by the hand. Honora never 
 would be other to her than the little 
 two-year-old whom she had taken from 
 her dead mother's side. They went to 
 her own especial room, where a fire was 
 burning : piles of clothes of all sizes 
 and materials lay around. Madam Gal- 
 braith loaded herself and Honora, chuck- 
 ling and talking over them like a great 
 boy on a frolic : then she covered all 
 over with shawls, and out they went into 
 the hall again, walking stealthily. She 
 had no mind that even her husband 
 should know that the poor Rattlins 
 owed their clothes to her. Only Hon- 
 ora: secrets like that suited her. 
 
 They softly laid a great bundle inside 
 of Mrs. Rattlin's door, and then hurried 
 up a dark passage toward a room where 
 Rosy and Gerty and some of the little 
 ones were chattering by candlelight like 
 a nest of pigeons. But Madam Gal- 
 braith stopped short with an angry scowl : 
 there was a swinging lamp over the door, 
 and beneath it stood the little woman in 
 the dull-colored dress, her cool eyes 
 curiously fixed on them. Madam Gal- 
 braith thrust all her parcels on Honora, 
 feeling into her very marrow like an 
 overgrown school-girl playing at Santa 
 Glaus with his pack ; but she lingered, 
 trimming the lamp, to hear the outburst 
 of girlish cries and rejoicing inside. She 
 could see, though the door was shut, 
 how Honora was already on her knees, 
 hard at work in the midst of the floor, 
 helping to dress the little ones in their 
 bright little dresses, kissing the chubby 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 49 
 
 white arms and feet, and how the Rat- 
 tlin girls, as usual, shied off", half afraid 
 of her, because she was delicately dressed, 
 and knew no more of their talk or of 
 beaux than a baby. She wanted to play 
 out her own part of Santa Claus. She 
 ■would have relished every bit of Honora's 
 fun, to the tying of the last baby's shoe. 
 While she stood gravely screwing on the 
 lamp chimney, the comely, quiet little 
 woman beside her, in her stuff dress, 
 became an intolerable weight and irrita- 
 tion. Only the day before she had 
 spoken to her husband of it : 
 
 " I am under the surveillance of my 
 housekeeper as thoroughly as though we 
 both were Jesuits, and she had all the 
 secret power of her Order to back her," 
 she said, with a nervous laugh. "She 
 looks as though she had some mean 
 nastiness of my Hfe in reserve in her 
 hands, ready to lash me with it some 
 day. Laugh as you like," annoyed, "but 
 I have something more to tell you. The 
 other day she heard Honora named as 
 my heir, and since then she has regarded 
 the child with a positive malevolence. 
 Credit me, James, that woman has 
 power to injure us. My instincts never 
 deceived me yet." 
 
 " She seems to me an altogether 
 harmless and commonplace person, Han- 
 nah." But his quiet eyes followed the 
 housekeeper whenever she came in that 
 day. He was jealous of anything that 
 concerned his niece, Honora.. 
 
 Madam Galbraith, having hung the 
 lamp carefully, turned its full light on the 
 staid figure before it, inspecting her with 
 her air of cool domination. She had a 
 habit of meeting with absolute silence 
 enemies with whom it was not worth 
 while to wrestle : it insured their defeat. 
 Even women whom she caressed were 
 dwarfed by her coarse strength, recog- 
 nized themselves as pretty, dollish, in- 
 capable, liked to get away from under 
 her eyes. But the little housekeeper 
 met her with her usual undisturbed, 
 practical air. 
 
 " Do you want me ?" knocking her 
 ash-stick on the floor. " Why do you 
 follow me about ?" 
 
 "Only for orders, madam," prompt- 
 
 ly. " Do you expect other guests to 
 
 day ?" 
 
 " I expect my — my late son's wife." 
 
 " I know that. I have kept a fire in 
 the west chamber for her for two days." 
 
 Madam Galbraith waited for a mo- 
 ment, and then would have passed her, 
 nodding slightly, but the woman put out 
 her steady hand, detaining her. There 
 was a moment's pause before she spoke ; 
 
 " 1 heard — a rumor perhaps — that her 
 son was alive and coming with her. 
 Your grandson. Shall I prepare for 
 him ?" 
 
 She looked up and quailed momenta- 
 rily before the stern regard fixed on her. 
 
 " It may have been gossip. It came 
 from some words you dropped, madam. 
 You believed him to be alive." 
 
 " There is doubtless much gossip and 
 cackling among my people over words 
 which I let fall," calmly. " But few of 
 them would venture to carry them back 
 to me again. Why do you do it ?" 
 
 The woman's face was bent thoughtfully 
 on the floor, but there was no reply. 
 
 " What is your motive ? You have a 
 motive." 
 
 " Yes. I have one," boldly. 
 
 " Come, that's better ! Be candid, 
 child. What do you want from me ?" 
 good-humored with the first hint of a 
 chance to give. 
 
 " I ? Nothing." 
 
 " Do you play the spy fi-om sheer love 
 of the part, then V^ with a sneer. 
 
 " I — a spy !" the pale, thick nostrils 
 dilating suddenly. "And yet," slowly, 
 and considering, " I deserve it, perhaps. 
 But I am a poor dissembler. Better I 
 had faced you at the first and told you 
 my errand. 1 did my work badly." 
 
 " You did it badly," with her seldom- 
 used manner of a great lady towards her 
 serf " Never burrow or mole with me, 
 woman. I cannot be hurt by it. I've 
 crushed many a snake in the road yonder 
 under my sole," glancing down at the 
 large, coarsely-shod foot. 
 
 " I never meant to hurt you," ab- 
 sently. 
 
 " You meddled from curiosity, then ? 
 Like your sex." Madam Galbraith had 
 risen into her favorite strident, lecturing 
 
5° 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 voice, and rolled the words like sweet 
 morsels under her tongue. " I boasted 
 of you as the first woman I knew who 
 did your work for your work's sake. 
 Like a man. 'When women learn to 
 work like men, they'll be paid like men,' 
 I said. And I paid you, while you 
 were thrusting your hands from sheer 
 idleness into the lives of other people. 
 From a silly hankering after romance." 
 
 The solid, brown little figure had re- 
 mained immovable during this harangue ; 
 but at the last words she looked up, 
 anxiety and pain, that would not be con- 
 trolled, breaking through her apathetic 
 face. Madam Galbraith fancied that 
 they had been so controlled beneath it 
 for years. But her voice was, as usual, 
 quiet and moderate. " Did I thrust my 
 hands into anybody's life ?" looking at 
 them as she raised them. " I think 
 sometimes there is a stain on them 
 heavier than murder. But it was not 
 my fault. Could I have kept them out ? 
 One cannot live alone. People are so 
 tangled and knitted together — together," 
 touching her breast lightly. "You are 
 at ease, thinking only of yourself, and 
 you waken some morning to find a great 
 wrong piled up against your soul in 
 which you had no part. But then you 
 give up your whole life to undo it. That 
 is no romance. It is a common, practi- 
 cal matter." 
 
 Madam Galbraith scanned her keenly 
 a moment. "American women delight 
 in giving up their lives," she began to 
 dogmatize, " for one whimsey or another. 
 They throw themselves, with half-grown 
 bodies and brains, at the feet of the first 
 fellow who makes them a pretty speech, 
 and make a god of him ; and then they 
 nurse and drudge with their children 
 until at middle age they are but hysteric, 
 sickly pests of society. And single, 
 middle-aged women, like you, undertake 
 a reform, to amend some wrong, as I 
 judge you mean to do by your incohe- 
 rent talk. That is the maddest of all," 
 raising her voice when the other would 
 have spoken. " Let criminals alone. 
 When the taint's in the blood, it will 
 break out. I never knew a vicious man 
 cured. I know — I know — The Lord's 
 
 grace. Well, that will ensure them safe 
 passage over the river yonder. But He 
 never really cleans them till they come to 
 the other side. That's my experience. 
 What do you see in my face V stopping 
 short before the searching eyes bent on 
 her. 
 
 The woman turned away with a long 
 breath. " No matter. I have under- 
 taken no reform." She continued, after 
 a slight pause, " It matters much to me 
 that you should not think my work ro- 
 mantic or foolish. It is practical — a 
 mere act of justice. But I have given 
 up something for it. I am a middle-aged 
 woman now, as you said." 
 
 " What had I to do with it ? Why 
 did you spy upon me ?" 
 
 " You had much to do with it," with 
 energy, looking her straight in the eyes, 
 without blenching. " I traced you out 
 and came here to find what manner of 
 woman you were — genuine and sound at 
 the core, or a monstrous sham, a thing 
 of straw. I came to see what your noted 
 generosity was worth. I find it a ready 
 charity when the stomachs of men are 
 ailing, but — " 
 
 " Go on," quietly. " What do I 
 lack ?" 
 
 " There are worse pangs than those 
 of hunger. To-day will test you. But 
 I believe this of you, Madam Galbraith: 
 that, in a case more pitiful than that 
 which Christ wept over, you will be as 
 merciless and cruel as the grave, igno- 
 rant and faulty as you are. I am rude. 
 But I have worked for so many years 
 to this end, and my disappointment is 
 bitter." 
 
 " To-day will test me, eh ? Then we 
 will wait until to-day is over to pass judg- 
 ment," gravely. " I think you wrong me, 
 good woman ;" and, turning from her with- 
 out farther question, she went with her 
 heavy steps down the hall. 
 
 The other looked after her earnestly. 
 " There is something greater in the wo- 
 man than I thought," she said, seeing 
 how calm her temper was. 
 
 Then she went into her own house- 
 keeper's room, full of her prim, comfort- 
 able belongings. It was not likely that 
 she would be suffered to occup} it after 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 51 
 
 what had passed, and it was, after all, her 
 only home. For two years she had been 
 here, first coming as seamstress, then 
 growing into a necessity in the house- 
 hold as Madam Galbraith's almoner, 
 Honora's teacher in embroidery, and the 
 like. Working constantly towards some 
 end which to-day would foil. One would 
 have looked for some womanish tears 
 of disappointment, now that she was 
 alone ; but she only sat down, with her 
 hands folded over her black silk apron, 
 and looked steadily in the fire, presently 
 pouring herself out a cup of tea from a 
 kettle on the hob, and sipping it slowly. 
 Then she went to the mirror and care- 
 fully brushed her shining black hair, 
 winding it in smooth folds about her 
 round head ; pinning on a clean 
 collar ; knotting the bow at the throat 
 above the chocolate dress. Not a 
 twinkle of vanity in the steady eyes ; 
 yet these little pinnings and brushings 
 and tea-drinkings had given her constant 
 comfort during the years just gone — 
 years whose strain of anxiety and loss 
 had not worn a wrinkle in the smooth, 
 pleasant face, but only blanched it slowly, 
 slowly, leaving it every day more chalky 
 and bloodless. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 •■ Now, no wood-fire can equal this, 
 in my notion. All it needs is its poet," 
 said Mr. Rattlin. 
 
 Paul Dour looked down compassion- 
 ateh' both at the fire and the little man, 
 who, in his shining black suit, new from 
 crown to toe, looked more than ever like 
 a cricket. They were on the rug before 
 the great parlor-fire, waiting for break- 
 fast. The fire lacked the poetic element 
 belonging to the wood, Paul thought, but 
 it at least was warm. The jetty, glossy 
 masses of coal were built up on a glow- 
 ing crimson bed, and out of their hearts 
 burst scarlet, yellow, violet heats, little 
 Ariel flashes of emerald and blue, light- 
 ening and vanishing before one could 
 wish them to stay ; sturdier flames of a 
 lusty saffron hue climbing tipsily up to 
 
 the great background which walled in 
 the mass of color — a mysterious cavern 
 heavily hung with black, plumy wreaths 
 of long-ago dead smoke. Caliban-like 
 faces were looking at him out of the 
 depths of white heat, and fairy leaves 
 and grottoes rose in endless fretting of 
 gray moss over the fieriest spaces. 
 
 " There's the poetry and welcome of 
 a hundred forests gone down into that 
 fire," persisted Mr. RattHn, blushing at 
 his bit of fancy. " What's your green 
 log, sputtering lonely and black, and 
 sending up sometimes a shower of hasty 
 sparks, to that V 
 
 Dour smiled superciliously. The fire 
 — the whole manage — was Western: 
 comfortable and wasteful. He weighed 
 the country and its people in his palm, 
 as it were, as though he had been here 
 for a month. He could give the essence 
 of the whole in a two-page magazine 
 article : he would like to sketch in his 
 coarse-grained hostess by one or two 
 Hogarthian lines ; for the usually good- 
 tempered youth was nettled. Madam Gal- 
 braith had given him a tremendous grip of 
 her broad, warm hand, in sign of welcome, 
 the evening before, and was altogether 
 cordial and gracious. But when he spoke 
 of his name, she stood on guard. 
 
 " Dour ? No, lad, you're none of 
 our kin. The letters spell the name, 
 maybe, but not a bone in your body 
 or blink of your eyes," tapping his 
 narrow chest, and her probing eyes scan- 
 ning him as though he had been a head 
 of cattle that she meant to buy. " Eat, 
 boy. Eat heartily for a fortnight, and I 
 can tell better what you're worth. That 
 slop-diet down East takes the healthy 
 stamina out of men's brains. Your creeds 
 and theories are as airy and bloodless as 
 ghosts, for every-day use, till they have 
 Western strength put into them." 
 
 "If the old Western women were such 
 coarse beasts, what were the young ones ?" 
 
 Pleasanter to look at, certainly : there 
 was quite a crowd of them between him 
 and the window which framed the frost- 
 touched autumnal landscape without. 
 Mrs. Rattlin smiled, delighted, over to 
 him from where she sat, regarding with 
 wonder her own crossed, idle hands : 
 
52 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 there were half-a-dozen thinly-built mat- 
 rons, in dyed second-best silks and fly- 
 away caps on their black " fronts," who 
 never had heard of transcendental phi- 
 losophy, and knew New England only as a 
 great factory of teachers and clocks, yet 
 whose faces wore that late, wise, patient 
 beauty which comes to the ugliest good 
 woman in middle age. There were Rosy 
 and Gerty, brimming over with smiles and 
 blushes and dimples, in a group of girls. 
 The poor little souls had said their thank- 
 ful prayers that morning with energy. 
 The soft, warm-colored merino dresses 
 fitted so perfectly, and were just short 
 enough to show the dainty boots be- 
 neath ; and the dear children were so 
 snug and well fed ; and there was the 
 charming young man of the coach to 
 meet ; and after whispering half the 
 night about him, they were sure he was 
 not engaged. O love ! love ! And to 
 be married, and to have a house of one's 
 own ! 
 
 Dour, however, looked loftily down on 
 them as on playful kittens. His wife 
 must be an intellectual helpmeet. All 
 the girls were gathered about one who 
 attracted him curiously. She wore a 
 delicate, lavender-colored dress, which 
 might, he thought, have been born into 
 the world ready made, to suit a fresh, 
 innocent young girl in the morning. 
 This one looked singularly fresh and 
 unhackneyed, even beside those rose- 
 buds. Rosy and Gertrude. But she 
 was painfully ill at ease, had lost her 
 color, glanced about in an evident ap- 
 palled perplexity to know what next to 
 say to them. With them, conversation 
 was brisk enough : it turned incessantly 
 upon '>he," "he" — went, came and 
 ended there. The "he" meant half 
 the young clerks and farmers in the 
 county. The talk sounded very sweet 
 and maidenly to the men in the room, 
 Paul included, and pleasant as the chirp- 
 ing of young birds in spring. 
 
 Madam Galbraith nodded good-hu- 
 moredly as she came in and heard them. 
 " Come to me, Honora. Chatter away, 
 girls. Only don't let the hare chase the 
 hounds. Come to me at once, Honora," 
 sweeping on towards the open breakfast- 
 
 room. But the young lady slid away 
 from both her and tlie girls, Paul saw, 
 and in the confusion of placing the guests 
 contrived to ensconce herself snugly 
 by her uncle ; and they two made a 
 long, comfortable meal, and were merry 
 and sharp-witted together at their leisure. 
 The little girl had no style at all, but 
 Dour determined to test what sort of 
 metal was in her for an intellectual help- 
 meet, hearing that she was Miss Dundas, 
 the declared heir of the Galbraiths. 
 
 Eat ? How they ate ! Smoking veni- 
 son, juicy beef, game, corn and wheat 
 biscuit in yellow and snowy flakes, coffee, 
 whose verj' vapor was invigorating, rising 
 in a thin smoke from the old-fashioned, 
 ball-like cups. But the damask was 
 whfte and satiny, the silver heavy and 
 glistening, the air fresh, the circling 
 faces happy. Dour found the new- 
 atmosphere, after all, fill his lungs satis- 
 factorily, and ate until every one else 
 had finished. Madam Galbraith, too, 
 formed a fitting head to the great table. 
 If her guests had been marshaled by the 
 thousands, the genial hospitahty in her 
 face would have met all their needs. 
 Now, as hostess, she was her real self: her 
 acrimony, her anger against her house- 
 keeper, her fierce, nervous watch for Tom's 
 wife, were gone, and one could compare 
 her to nothing but a generous, great fire, 
 to which all her world was free to come 
 and be warmed. Her dress transformed 
 her, too : the glistening white hair was 
 rolled into a sort of natural crown, and 
 the royal purple color which she wore 
 draped her broad, athletic frame as aptly 
 as long ago the brawny limbs of bluff 
 King Hal. 
 
 After breakfast was over, Paul dexter- 
 ously made his way through the talking 
 groups to the window where Honora 
 stood by her uncle, cutting the leaves of 
 a new book for him. Mrs. Rattlin had 
 confided to him that the young lady had 
 been given the education of a man. 
 " Latin and Greek, sir — Greek !" Be- 
 sides, it was a pleasant picture in the 
 morning sunshine — the slender, bendmg 
 figure, in its clear lavender drapery, and 
 the gray-headed old man leaning back 
 in his arm-chair, watching her through 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 53 
 
 his half-shut, kindly blue eyes. Miss 
 Dundas, too, had an unusual air that 
 attracted him, as though she were some- 
 t'hing that had been kept clean and set 
 apart — the bell of a wild columbine with 
 the dew yet upon it. But a stupid wo- 
 man was a flower without fragrance. 
 She stiffened awkwardly erect, and 
 blushed unbecomingly as he came up. 
 Her lucid eyes grew vacant. 
 
 "The very sunHght gives thanks to- 
 day, Miss Dundas." 
 
 " The sunshine ? It is good for the 
 late wheat." 
 
 Paul picked up her book. 
 
 "A Review? What a comfortable 
 age it is that we live in, when all philoso- 
 phy and science comes served to us in 
 such dainty /Az/j.-"' 
 
 "The book was for her uncle. It was 
 too heavy reading for her." 
 
 " Oh, of course, of course. Her shelves 
 now," patiently, "were no doubt filled 
 with poetry ? It was the highest utter- 
 ance of truth, after all, and most native 
 to a woman." 
 
 " No. She read no poetry. There 
 were a few old verses she learned long 
 ago, all that she cared for — " 
 
 " In modern poetry, yes. He under- 
 stood that. Because her mind had been 
 attuned to the grand Greek measures — 
 Sophocles, Y^ischylus — " 
 
 "Greek prose or poetry had been but 
 so many wearisome verbs and nouns to 
 her," with a contraction of her forehead 
 as if the very memory of them ached 
 there. " She cared for no books." 
 
 "What ! Honora here ?" cried Madam 
 Galbraith, coming between Paul and her 
 niece. " My little girl will entertain you 
 poorly, Mr. Dour," tapping on the girl's 
 head critically, as though she were a 
 puppet which she was rather proud of 
 having made. " She has had no com- 
 paniois but her uncle and myself, and 
 nevei has learned to make talk. Go, 
 Honora, bring me a nosegay — chrysanthe- 
 mums, anything. The ground's tabooed, 
 young sir. I'm always frank with young 
 men," with a shrewd smile after Honora 
 as she went out. " I've had the whim 
 of rearing one woman who will go to 
 her husband, when I find him, ignorant 
 
 of flirtation or Platonic friendship. The 
 French know how to bring up girls. 
 Young people strike out nothing but ill 
 by friction together." 
 
 Paul colored and laughed. "It is a 
 fair warning," he said. But the forbid- 
 den apples became suddenly very tempt- 
 ing to him. 
 
 " But is my little Nora altogether an 
 idiot ?" demanded Mr. Galbraith when 
 she came back, and, throwing down the 
 flowers, took up the paper-knife again. 
 " No books at all V 
 
 " None, unless when I can do no 
 better," with a decisive little nod, speak- 
 ing quick and quietly, now that she was 
 alone with him, and with a clear, fine in- 
 tonation. " They're so dead — to me. 
 But then / can do no better. Yet it is 
 something to read travels : you put a 
 window in the house and Egypt or the 
 Alps outside. But I think books are 
 but a poor sort of life." 
 
 " What is better, Nora ? You love 
 nature, eh ? your flowers, the old river 
 here .''" 
 
 " Not much. I hke to see the crops 
 come up well. But the sunsets you 
 watch, uncle, and the storms and moon- 
 light — now, they're all very much alike 
 to me." 
 
 " What do you care for, then, child ?" 
 leaning forward and watching her at- 
 tentively. 
 
 " People," laying down her book and 
 knife and looking at him gravely. 
 " They're the only things worth anything 
 in the world to me. I'd rather," a curi- 
 ous intentness coming into her brown 
 eyes, "hear Rosy and Gerty tell of 
 their lovers, or their father talk of his 
 chance of a better salary, than read any 
 poem that ever was written." 
 
 "How is that, Nora.-"' 
 
 " I don't know," slowly, as one who 
 was totally unused to put her secret 
 thoughts into words. "Books tire me 
 as much to-day as when you used to 
 call me dumb Nonny. But to hear peo- 
 ple talk brings all the good and bad in 
 me up, uncle. I think, sometimes, I 
 can see God and the devil through them, 
 and Christ walking the earth. I can 
 see in that way how all of us need 
 
54 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Him. I think, sometimes, it is in me to 
 give some great help. I seem to come 
 so near to everybody," growing slightly 
 paler, her face more intent. "But no 
 one knows I am near to them. Nobody 
 but you, uncle. If there's any words 
 here," touching her breast with a fine 
 smile, "they'll never be spoken. I'm 
 afraid I will be a very dumb woman. 
 Stupid Nonny to the end." 
 
 "I'm afraid you will, Honora. Of 
 aU women or children I ever knew, you 
 are the most reticent. Why, in all your 
 life, dear, this is the first time you have 
 spoken in this way to me. And the 
 words now come almost against your will." 
 
 She did not reply, the awkward dumb 
 spell being on her again, apparently, but 
 brought a chair and sat down beside 
 him, as usual. They were such constant 
 and gay companions that people saw in 
 Honora's face, when talking to him, a 
 most winning and potent charm, and 
 found her motions free and graceful — a 
 noiseless music. But apart from him 
 the poor girl stiffened again. 
 
 The old gentleman, with his new clue 
 to his darhng's heart, found a fresh zest 
 in her old habit of incessant question- 
 ings about the outdoor world, her keen, 
 silly interest in even the children about 
 her, her awestruck faith in the learning 
 of Mr. Dour and the beauty of Rose 
 and Gerty. 
 
 " I think he is dpris with one of them," 
 in an eager whisper. "They have so 
 many lovers ! And their manners are 
 so finished, uncle ! Pray notice." 
 
 " Quite finished, my dear. They never 
 will alter." 
 
 "I suppose not," wistfully. "But 
 that sort of thing comes by nature. 
 One need not try to gain it?" anxiously. 
 
 "No. It's too late, poor Nora," 
 laughing quizzically. "You've moulded 
 yourself on your old uncle too long. It's 
 a hopeless case. Pet." 
 
 There was a sound just then of wheels 
 crushing over the pebbly drive, and 
 within a hush and stir and significant 
 glance from one to the other as Bob 
 Penly's coach bore in sight, approaching 
 the hall-door. 
 
 The four, horses drew up with a 
 
 flourish, and Bob, jumping down, opened 
 the door and rattled down the steps for 
 a small woman, in a gray traveling dress, 
 to descend. 
 
 "Mary Jennings." But the words 
 were spoken aloud by no one. 
 
 "Tom's wife," to Madam Galbraith. 
 The woman who had stolen her son 
 from her, hidden his child, and forgotten 
 them both in the arms of another man. 
 The watching crowd about her hardened 
 her heart. Seneca should have said, 
 "One is never less a woman than when 
 with women." Had she been alone, she 
 might have put her arms about the 
 stranger's neck and given her a kiss in 
 which her dead son had part. As it 
 was, she remained standing, surrounded, 
 as it were, by her court, to awe and 
 abash the poor wretch. 
 
 "Where is my husband?" she asked. 
 "He should be here to receive Mrs. — 
 Duffield. And Honora?" She had a 
 mind that Mary Jennings should see her 
 accredited heir at once, and realize her 
 own lost chances. Honora stooped be- 
 hind the curtain, and opened the low 
 window, nodding significantly. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith got up. "Yes, my dear, 
 yes. I'll go. Let the women settle it. 
 Thank you. You are always considerate, 
 Honora," his voice shaken a great deal. 
 When he was outside, he went slowly 
 down the garden-path, forgetting to put 
 on his hat, muttering, under his breath, 
 "Well! well. To bring their quarrel 
 over his grave !" He went out into the 
 open fields on one of his long tramps, 
 and did not return until near nightfall. 
 
 Honora, behind the curtain, looked 
 after him, hesitating how to follow him 
 unseen, when her aunt summoned her : 
 
 " Miss Dundas, you will come to me." 
 At the moment the door opened and 
 Dallas Galbraith's mother stood in the 
 entrance. She cast a startled glance up 
 the wide room, which seemed to be lined 
 with strange faces, paused, and then ad- 
 vanced directly to the farther end, where 
 the stately, lion-faced old woman waited 
 for her. But the way was long, and 
 Madam Galbraith's inflexible eyes, on 
 which her own were fixed, took the 
 strength from her. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 55 
 
 She stopped, made a step or two, and 
 faltered again. There was an instant's 
 pause — too short to bring in Madam 
 Galbraith guilty of rudeness, but long 
 enough for a woman's petty cruelty — 
 when Honora Dundas went quickly for- 
 ward to her in the face of them all, very 
 pale, but composed, 
 
 " You are welcome home," she said, 
 gently, putting her arm around her. '• My 
 eyes are quicker than yours, Madam 
 Galbraith," playfully, but looking in the 
 old lady's eyes steadily. "It is your 
 daughter Mary." 
 
 It was not the first time the old lady 
 had found this pure little lump of clay, 
 which she was moulding into a proper 
 woman, turn into a bit of iron in her 
 hand. Tableau and punishment were 
 brought to the shabbiest of conclusions ; 
 but she put a good face on it, strode up 
 with her hand out, blotting the little 
 Dundas girl quite out of the matter, talk- 
 ing inwardly to herself with more vehe- 
 mence than even her energetic greeting 
 expressed : 
 
 " You are very welcome." (So ! 
 so ! Tom had some excuse !) " I did 
 not send for you unless I chose you 
 to come" (fresh as a rose, after all 
 that she has lived through !) — « unless 
 I wished you to feel at home here. Take 
 off your wrappings, child, and veil." 
 (There's a deal of outcome in that face. 
 Tom never had the upper-hand here.) 
 The quick, intelligent glance with which 
 Mrs. Duffield took in her new surround- 
 ings piqued her ; also, that lady's society- 
 bred lack of emotion. " Now we can 
 see your face, my dear," with a courteous 
 smile. '• We've all heard it was well 
 worth the seeing, eh ? And it is rather 
 late in the day for me to make acquaint- 
 ance with it — which is hardly my fault." 
 (I stung her there, I hope !) 
 
 Mrs. Duffteld untied the inside rose- 
 colored strings of her gray bonnet, and 
 lifted it off with an obliging smile, as 
 one would uncover a picture. " My 
 beauty was never of the brilliant type. 
 'Winning,' rather, both my husbands 
 thought. But it is altogether gone, as 
 you see," pausing, as if for inspection. 
 « Only my mouth and chin remain un- 
 
 impaired, I believe. May I go to my 
 own room ?" after a moment's pleasant 
 waiting. " I've reached that age when 
 one needs a little repairing before meet- 
 ing criticism," touching, with her light, 
 fluttering fingers, the flossy puffs of brown 
 hair that framed her sweet, oval face. 
 " This dear young lady will lead me 
 there, I'm sure," patting Honora on the 
 cheek. " And a cup of tea and morsel 
 of bread, if you please ? I'm quite fam- 
 ished in your mountain air," with a 
 pretty imploring motion. Then, laying 
 her hand on Honora's arm, the little 
 lady swept out of the room as naturally 
 as if it had been always her home, with 
 a half smile in her eyes for everybody 
 they fell upon, that prophesied friendship 
 as soon as they should know each other. 
 Madam Galbraith stood in the middle 
 of the room looking after her, with her 
 gray eyes nearly closed, drawing a long 
 breath, that sounded like a whistle. 
 
 " Our mountain air !" gasped one of 
 the matrons to whom Mary Jennings 
 had brought milk for many a day. 
 
 " My daughter-in-law no doubt as- 
 sumed a new face and new manners to 
 suit the world in which she lived," tartly, 
 scowling on the speaker. " But ' Tur- 
 pis Romatio Belgicus ore color,'' " she 
 added in a lower tone. She had been 
 a bit of a Latin scholar, and kept some 
 odd fragments yet with which to appall 
 weaker woman. 
 
 But inwardly she only said, over and 
 over, to herself, " Tom's wife ? Tom's 
 wife?" Her big bones and her home- 
 liness never had oppressed her as now, 
 in the presence of the daintiness of the 
 woman for whom Tom had left her ; but 
 the heart beneath them never was so 
 sore, or willing to be tender. 
 
 Honora followed up the stairs in a 
 new flutter of admiration. Mrs. Duf- 
 field tripped before her into the room, 
 threw her cloak on the bed, spread out 
 her fingers before the fire : as usual, her 
 every pose and motion was confident, 
 complete : she took possession of the 
 scene, as it were, by each, and made 
 herself first actress in it. If she had 
 been in the Sahara desert, she would 
 have done the same thing. Nora 
 
56 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 brought her her satchel, uncorked the 
 perfume-bottles for her, forgetting to be 
 shy and awkward in her eager, dumb 
 attention ; standing by her as she loos- 
 ened the waves of chestnut hair, and 
 pushed it back from her peachy cheeks. 
 This was a higher type of beauty than 
 even Rose and Gerty's ; and this man- 
 ner ! Honora secretly determined to 
 copy it diligently. 
 
 There had been a great deal of work 
 upon the details of that chamber. Even 
 the servants had caught the idea of old 
 Madam Galbraith when she superintend- 
 ed its arrangement. The lowest among 
 them knew that Tom's wife was coming 
 back forgiven to long-offended authority, 
 and did their best to express that for- 
 giveness in every pleasant little detail 
 of comfort, and to give her the idea of a 
 home. But incurious, winning little Mrs. 
 Duffield was apparently blind to offence, 
 forgiveness, or offered welcome. Her 
 gray eyes swept over the room, and 
 speedily the easiest chair was drawn to 
 the warmest corner. She changed her 
 dress for a flowing wrapper, and then 
 ensconced herself in it. 
 
 " Now, my dear girl, a footstool. Ah-h ! 
 this is comfort. I wonder, madam, are 
 they bringing my tea ? Pray, do not 
 ring ! I was just born to be a trouble !" 
 with a blush and laugh of deprecation to 
 the person she addressed, a small wo- 
 man, in a dress of dull chocolate-color, 
 with a pale, sensible-looking face, who 
 had been standing by the fire when they 
 entered. She rang for the tea, as it was 
 her place to do, being the housekeeper, but 
 she forgot her place afterward, standing 
 in the background, watching every move- 
 ment of the stranger with a curious, 
 breathless interest. 
 
 The scrutiny did not at all disturb 
 Mrs. Duffield. Mentally, perhaps, she 
 shrugged her shoulders, comparing the 
 Western servants with those of the East, 
 but she said nothing. When an over- 
 loaded tray was brought in, too, although 
 she merely pecked bits of the various 
 dishes, like a bird, she passed none by 
 untasted nor unpraised. While she was 
 eating — 
 
 "Now, my dear," to Honora, "could 
 
 you not ask that delightful, curious old 
 lady down stairs — your aunt, I believe — 
 to come up and take a cup of this de- 
 licious tea? I should so enjoy a cozy 
 chat with her ! She would find it much 
 easier to become acquainted with me 
 thus, en deshabille. What are you laugh- 
 ing at, child ?" 
 
 Honora checked her laugh, but stopped, 
 with a puzzled face, to stir the fire and 
 lower the curtains before she went to 
 execute her venturous errand. She 
 found Madam Galbraith surrounded by 
 a group of men, discussing the chances 
 of coal in a new mine she had just opened. \/ 
 Her opinion was counted as heavier 
 than that of most men in the county, 
 usually, being weighted both by money 
 and a broad, far-seeing business insight. 
 She had made herself, too, what none 
 of them were — a practical geologist. She 
 was talking vehemently when Honora 
 came in : 
 
 "Our young men go scampering off 
 to raise cattle in Texas, or lay out ague- 
 land along the Wabash, and turn their 
 backs on our own soil without once 
 looking into it. It's the richest land in 
 the Union, sir! I know it. Why, even 
 the water of my creek yonder burns with 
 fatness. Well, Honora, what is it?" as 
 she pulled her sleeve. "Wants to see 
 me, eh? In her own room?" a pleased 
 softening coming over her whole face. 
 " I see, poor child ! She wants to make 
 sure of my forgiveness," under her breath. 
 "Pray, excuse me, gentlemen." 
 
 Honora ran quickly before her. She 
 met the housekeeper coming out of Mrs. 
 Duffield's room, and found that lady sip- 
 ping her tea in an agitated manner, her 
 cheek a trifle less deep in its peach- 
 bloom. 
 
 "That is a most extraordinary woman, 
 Miss Dundas. I think she is a little de- 
 ranged. She watched me in so peculiar 
 a manner that I asked her if she had 
 business with me, and she replied that 
 she had hoped for my help, but that she 
 feared she had trusted to a broken reed. 
 She is a lunatic, evidently. I will speak 
 to Madam Galbraith about her imme- 
 diately." 
 
 " I hope you will not, Mrs. Duffield," 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 57 
 
 eagerly. "She's entirely sane. Why, 
 she's one of the few people I know who, 
 I think, have something to do in the 
 world. I'm very fond of her." 
 
 " Oh !" looking at Nora with an amused, 
 palliating smile. " But you are so young, 
 my dear ! I assure you that she is de- 
 ranged. People who think they have a 
 mission, that way, get one idea in their 
 brains and go butting their heads against 
 everybody with it. You meet plenty of 
 such people in the East. You may safely 
 set down anybody who is very much in 
 earnest as being unsound in their intel- 
 lect. But here is your aunt," rising 
 and putting out her white hand with a 
 winning smile. 
 
 "Yes, I'm here. You may go down, 
 Honora. Just ring for this tray to 
 be taken away. So you wanted to see 
 the old mother, child?" putting her big 
 arm over the other woman's shoulder 
 and looking gently in her face. 
 
 "Yes ; I thought it would be nice to 
 have you here. Do take a cup of tea. 
 I'm very fond of tea," chirruped Mrs. 
 Duffield. 
 
 " Are you, my dear ? It always seemed 
 a faddling kind of drink to me. I drink 
 water. Sometimes home-brewed ale. 
 Sit down, sit down." She placed Tom's 
 wife back among the dainty frills of the 
 blue chintz chair and looked down at 
 her a minute, as she might at a pretty 
 picture ; then sat down herself in front 
 of the fire, a hand on each knee, waiting 
 for the servant to leave the room, her 
 eyes bent thoughtfully on the floor, her 
 face growing corrugated and stern. 
 
 The door closed at last. She gave 
 herself a mastiff-like shake, turning to 
 tlie sweet-looking httle woman, who lay 
 back stirring the tea in the cup which 
 she had retained, admiring its amber 
 tint in the firelight. 
 
 " You had something to tell me, my 
 dear? 
 
 " No," nodding brightly. " Nothing 
 in especial. I thought we would talk 
 of old times or friends in the neighbor- 
 hood, perhaps. I have been a long time 
 away." 
 
 Mary Jennings ? The old lady 
 gave one haughty sniff", then checked 
 
 herself "You have suffered a great 
 deal since then, they tell me," with great 
 gentleness in her masculine tones — "a 
 great deal of poverty and want which 
 never should have been the lot of my 
 son's wife. I'm glad that you chose to 
 talk to me about it. I was afraid you 
 might have some fear of the old dragon, 
 even now." 
 
 The fresh-tinted face looked at her 
 steadily over the cup until she had quite 
 finished. " My dear Madam Galbraith," 
 Mrs. Duffield then said, calmly, "you 
 have never suff"ered poverty or want, or 
 you would know how silly it is to go 
 loack to rake up their ashes. / never 
 do it," and she lifted the spoon to her 
 lips again with a firm hand. 
 
 " You are very wise," after a moment's 
 pause. " You'll think me a brute to 
 drag it up again. I was unkind and 
 unfeeUng." 
 
 " No, no !" 
 
 " Yes, I was," dogmatically. " You 
 wished to talk to me of Tom ?" 
 
 Mrs. Dufifield was silent a moment : 
 then she drank all there was in the cup 
 hastily, as if to check some words that 
 would have risen to her lips. " No. I 
 did not wish to speak of Tom," slowly. 
 " He was a dear, good fellow, and I was 
 very fond of him. But we'll not talk of 
 him, if you please." 
 
 His mother looked at her long and 
 shrewdly. " I believe you. I believe, 
 whatever were your faults, that you were 
 fond of him and tried to do your duty to 
 him. I heard that you supported him 
 during the last years by sewing — that 
 no wife could be more faithful or for- 
 bearing." 
 
 " By sewing, or sometimes by wash- 
 ing," in a matter-of-fact tone. " There 
 was no merit about it. He was not 
 able to work, and I was ; and we had to 
 live. What a fine view of the mountain 
 gap there is from that window !" 
 
 " Not able to work ? Wliose fault 
 was that ?" in the identical bitter key 
 with which she used to rate her drunken 
 boy. " He gave up father and mother, 
 and manhood itself, for liquor. And at 
 the last to hang on to Mary Jennings' 
 hands for his food !" 
 
58 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 " Mary Jennings has never complained 
 of him. I told you I would not talk of 
 Tom, least of all malign him when he is 
 dead. He was a good, generous fellow. 
 He would have clothed me in velvets if 
 he could." 
 
 " He left it for another husband to do 
 that," savagely. 
 
 " Yes. Captain Duffield always dressed 
 me well. He had ample means, you 
 know. But it was a matter of pride 
 with him. I do not think, indeed, that 
 my second husband was what you would 
 call a generous man." 
 
 " Will you answer me some questions, 
 freely and fully .?" 
 
 " With pleasure," smiling pleasantly. 
 
 "About your past hfe. It was partly 
 for that reason I sent for you here." 
 
 The white forehead knit itself im- 
 patiently for a moment, but only for a 
 moment. She rose and placed her 
 empty cup on the mantel-shelf, and then 
 settled herself comfortably back. " I 
 will tell you anything you wish to know. 
 But let us be brief, please. I never go 
 back to find trouble, and it is so wonder- 
 fully pleasant here !" with a little shrug 
 of enjoyment through her graceful little 
 body. 
 
 " Is it, my dear ? I hope you'll find 
 it like home to you. I wish you to be 
 happy here. I think you were fond of 
 Tom." 
 
 "Oh, I am at home anywhere!" 
 cheerily. 
 
 "It was of your second marriage that 
 I wished to speak," for she had not 
 courage to utter the real question aloud : 
 now that the time had come, her heart 
 seemed to choke and halt in the ponde- 
 rous, steady beat which it had kept up 
 for sixty years. She began far off from it. 
 
 " My second marriage .'' You have 
 heard some unkind stories of Captain 
 Duffield, I suppose ?" flushing a little. 
 " There has been a great deal of gossip 
 carried back here about him, and his 
 abuse of me, but I will not discuss it. 
 He is dead now, and these very clothes 
 that I wear are paid for with his money. 
 r don't spare it in that way. I know he 
 would be better satisfied to have it so. 
 He had very good taste in dress." 
 
 "Yes. The gossip says that that 
 will account for your marrying him." 
 
 " That is unjust," after a pause. 
 
 " There is another cause given, which, 
 perhaps, is nearer the truth : that you 
 and your boy were starving, and you did 
 it for his sake." 
 
 There was no answer. Mrs. Duffield 
 had her face turned from her. 
 
 " I do not ask you this to pain you, 
 God knows ! But I have a right to 
 know something of my grandson." 
 
 " Dallas is dead." The voice sounded 
 like that of another woman. 
 
 " I do not believe that he is dead. I 
 never believed it. I am a strong woman. 
 I have great property. I can give to 
 him more love and power in the world 
 than a hundred weak women do to their 
 sons. I never believed God would leave 
 me an old, dry, barren stock. I wish to 
 know from you what manner of boy my 
 grandson is, and how you lost him, as 
 plainly and directly as you can tell me." 
 
 But Mrs. Duffield, instead of replying, 
 got up and walked to the window from 
 whence the mountain view opened, and 
 stood there, her face resting on her 
 hand, regardless of the heavy steps of 
 Madam Galbraith walking impatiently 
 to and fro. After a while she turned. 
 The old woman could see no change in 
 her face, and broke out again : 
 
 " I believe you cannot understand the 
 craving I have for that boy. He is the 
 last chance for me that my flesh and 
 blood shall live in the world. I'm a 
 lonesome old woman at times. What you 
 can understand is, that I need an heir. 
 Honora is but a chit of a girl. I grudge 
 the place to her. If my boy had lived, 
 I could have given him a position 
 stronger than any man in the West." 
 
 Mrs. Duffield seated herself again, 
 stretching out both her hands over the 
 fire, as if she were chilly. When she 
 spoke, it was with her ordinary courte- 
 ous quiet. Something was lost from 
 the quality of her voice, but Madam 
 Galbraith's ear was too coarse or care- 
 less to discern it. 
 
 " The place you could give him does 
 not import anything now," she said. 
 " That was but a small matter." 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 59 
 
 "You have not answered my ques- 
 tion," sternly. " I have a right to know 
 something of the boy." 
 
 His mother hesitated before answer- 
 ing. ''Yes, you are Tom's mother," she 
 said, at last, in a low tone. "Well, there 
 is not much to tell. When I married 
 Captain Duffield, he promised that Dal- 
 las sjiould be reared as his own son." 
 
 " Out with the whole truth ! You 
 married him to keep the boy from want. 
 Why did you not apply to me V 
 
 " No, I would not do that. I was 
 determined that Mary Jennings' child 
 never should come to you for alms. I 
 had some spirit, some pride then, before 
 my little boy died. Now — well, I think 
 the world owes me some comfort and a 
 living," with a laugh which was not 
 pleasant. 
 
 " Go on. Dallas — ?" 
 
 " Captain Duffield did not keep his 
 promise," hurriedly. " He petted and 
 fondled me at first, but he always hated 
 the boy. He was a devil ! Then, when 
 the abuse began to extend to me, Dallas 
 fancied that it was on his account — that 
 if he were gone, his mother would be 
 taken into favor again. And then — " 
 
 " What ? Why do you stop ?" 
 
 " He left me. He ran away," stand- 
 ing up and turning her face to her. 
 Madam Galbraith drew back, startled, 
 when she looked at it, and then put out 
 her hand soothingly. 
 
 " Is that all you want to know ? I 
 never have named my boy since he died 
 until this day." 
 
 " One moment. He died ?" 
 
 " I traced him to the coal-mines at 
 Scranton. I thought I saw him the 
 morning I came there, among the dig- 
 gers, but that very night there was an 
 explosion in the pits, and he was in 
 them." 
 
 Madam Galbraith did not renew her 
 offered sympathy. She went stalking 
 up and down, her arms folded, mutter- 
 ing at intervals in answer to her own 
 thoughts. Mrs. Duffield looked up at 
 her at last. " I must ask you to let me 
 have rest, Madam Galbraith. I must 
 be alone." 
 
 " Certainly. I will leave you alone, 
 
 my dear. But tell me first, did you ever 
 find that boy's body ?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 "Well, then — but no matter what I 
 think. It's all clear to me, however." 
 
 Mrs. Duffield waited until the door 
 was closed behind her : then she locked 
 and bolted it, and, throwing herself on 
 the bed, cried long and bitterly. But 
 silently, without either moan or sob : it 
 dully seemed to her as if, with her dead 
 boy, something in herself had died, for 
 which she ought to make moan as much 
 as for Dallas. She fell asleep after a 
 while, tired out ; but when, some hours 
 afterwards, the great bell sounded for 
 dinner, she arose refreshed, and began to 
 dress carefully. It was a favorite dress 
 that she wore that evening — a pale brown 
 silk, with lace on the bosom and at the 
 wrists, and at her throat a pearl clasp, 
 to match a rins; on her hand. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 There was a foot-bridge which cross- 
 ed a mountain-stream within sight of the 
 house ; and that evening, when the innu- 
 merable lights began to twinkle from the 
 windows just before dusk, a man was 
 pacing to and fro on it, with slow, grave 
 and somewhat uncertain steps. The 
 athletic build of the man — liis features, 
 cut in a few bold and fine hnes, as if by 
 a master's hand, who intended the face 
 to express a great thought, should, to 
 be in keeping, have carried with them 
 a certain elasticity, vim, buoyancy. But 
 his voice, when he bade "Good-day" to 
 some passers-by, was marked by the 
 same slow gravity and uncertainty as 
 his motions, and his look had a curious, 
 hesitating quality in it, as of a man set 
 down in an unknown world, who held 
 his own force in reserve, and tested the 
 worth of the place or people who came 
 beneath his eye. Now and then, how- 
 ever, he stretched his arms and drew 
 vigorous breaths of the nipping air, sud- 
 denly looking up to the mountain as if 
 air and mountains were new to him : keen 
 pleasure flashing into his face ; but it 
 
6o 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 was observable that he neither sang nor 
 whistled at these times, as a young man 
 would be apt to do, gayly ; that he kept 
 the fur cap which he wore closely drawn 
 over his forehead, not removing it to the 
 passers-b}-, in the country fashion ; even 
 clasping his bare hands behind him, when 
 they came up, nervously, as if his flesh 
 were in some sort disgraced, and he con- 
 cealed it even from himself. As the dusk 
 came on, he stopped from time to time, 
 shading his eyes and looking intently up 
 the road that led to the long, lighted front 
 of the Galbraith homestead; but it was 
 not until the moon began to whiten 
 the edges of the distant mountains, and 
 throw their melancholy shadows over 
 the sloping farms and glistening creeks 
 below, that he saw a small, cloaked 
 figure crossing a stubble-field toward 
 him, the only moving object in the lonely 
 twilight. 
 
 He was in the shadow when he first 
 saw her, and came hurriedly out into the 
 moonlight to meet her. It had become 
 a fault of the man, perhaps, to dislike 
 concealment — to drag everything into 
 too open a hght. The woman was short 
 and solidly built, dressed in some dull 
 brown color, as he perceived when she 
 pulled off her cloak, which she did when 
 she saw him, hastily, as if stifled and 
 feverish from repressed excitement. 
 When she came up to him, however, 
 she put out her hands without any show 
 of haste. 
 
 " Lizzy ?" 
 
 "Yes, Dallas." But in spite of her 
 quiet, her eyes passed over his face with 
 the hunger with which they might look 
 at one given back to her from the grave. 
 
 After that first greeting, they walked, 
 side by side, silently down the road to 
 the pier of the little bridge. He stopped 
 there. 
 
 " Take oflF your hood, Lizzy." 
 
 She obeyed him, going out where the 
 white light fell full on her prim figure 
 and face. Something like his old quiz- 
 zical smile came up on his face as he 
 looked over the smooth hair, the black 
 silk apron, the knitting stuck in its 
 sheath. For five years Elizabeth Byrne 
 had been planning and looking forward, 
 
 in her sensible, practical way, to this 
 night, when the boy should be free 
 again : now if had come she could have 
 cried and sobbed over him like any 
 other hysterical woman. But she only 
 took his hand up suddenly. 
 
 " It's just the old Lizzy, Dallas," and 
 then let it fall again. 
 
 He nodded gravely. Presently he 
 put out his hand, unseen by her, and felt 
 with his finger and thumb the little 
 shawl which she wore, one of Mana- 
 squan weaving, with the same slow, 
 amused smile. 
 
 " I knew I would find you as you 
 are," he said. "After the first letter 
 you sent to me, in the worst days I 
 thought of you as the one thing un- 
 altered in the world to me." 
 
 She listened eagerly, her head bent 
 down, noting every slowly-pronounced 
 word or inflection of tone, as if by it 
 she sought to read something that was 
 hid beneath. 
 
 - "I meant to tell you, Lizzy, to-night, 
 all that I owed to you." 
 
 " No, Dallas, no." 
 
 " No. Only this : that twice, when all 
 my own courage and strength were gone, 
 and I had the means in my hand to rid 
 myself of the hell I was in, I lived on, 
 only that I might not disappoint you." 
 
 " That is over. You will make the 
 best of your life now, for my sake ?" 
 
 " For my own — for my own, Lizzy," 
 with a manly heartiness in his voice 
 that warmed the blood in her heart. 
 " I'm but a young man. It came to me 
 suddenly one day, when I had been there 
 but a year, how young I was, the strength 
 and health that was in me, the long life 
 that was before me to fight down what- 
 ever it was that had dragged me back." 
 
 " The devil, Dallas," nodding senten- 
 tiously. " It is Satan who brings for- 
 tune as unjust as yours was on any man." 
 
 " Whatever it is, is strongest in the 
 world, Lizzy — call it God, or devil, as 
 you will. If a man succeeds, it is by 
 virtue of his own skill or honesty or 
 virtue ; though, in spite of these, he can't 
 keep out disease or death at the last. 
 I've had some time to think it over. 
 But I did not come here to argue theology 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 6i 
 
 with you. I determined that day to 
 make the best of my life, and I've not 
 lost an hour since in whining or in idle- 
 ness." 
 
 Whenever he spoke, she fell into the 
 same observant, watchful attitude. He 
 noted it anxiously. " Why do 3'ou listen 
 to me ?" hastily. " Have I caught the 
 prison-accent ? I used some unusual or 
 vulgar word without knowing it?" 
 
 " It was not your accent I thought of. 
 But there is a great change in it. You 
 speak English : correctly, as far as I know. 
 But with etTort — as a foreigner would." 
 
 He gave a pleased, boyish laugh. " I 
 tell you, Lizzy, I've had myself in train- 
 ing since that day. Night and day, in 
 the vilest ward of the Albany prison. 
 There has not been a look or a word or 
 a thought with which I have not tried to 
 work up out of that slough, to make a 
 man of myself. What to avoid was 
 plain enough : it was the very air I 
 breathed. The chaplain was very kind. 
 He got me off hours from work, gave 
 me books besides those which you sent 
 to me — books on my old drudgery, 
 chemistr}-, and the like. Drudgery, but 
 somehow I could not live without it." 
 
 " The five years have not been alto- 
 gether a gap in your life, then ?" 
 
 " No. But after to-night we'll speak 
 of them no more." He was silent. 
 Presently, a hickory bough, on which he 
 had been leaning, snapped, as if it were 
 a straw in his hand. He threw it down, 
 turning to her again : " So much of my 
 life was given up to — let us say justice. 
 I will not begrudge any sacrifice I made. 
 But it is done with now. To-morrow I 
 will begin again, a new man. I am 
 not so far behind my fellows." 
 
 Still the same eager watchfulness 
 when he spoke, a silent scrutiny of 
 something apart from and below the 
 meaning of what he said. He was con- 
 scious of it, uneasily. 
 
 " You find me altered, Lizzy ?" 
 
 '• I have scarcely yet seen your face," 
 evasively. 
 
 He put up his hand to remove the 
 cap, but let it fall again. "Some other 
 time," he said, hurriedly — "some other 
 time." 
 
 "Why did you never admit me to see 
 you, Galbraith.'' I came with a permit 
 three times, and was turned away by 
 your wish, they said.'"' 
 
 "Did you think I would be seen by 
 you — there? You do not understand 
 men, Lizzy," with a bitter laugh, and 
 then was silent. 
 
 He fell into this grave silence at the 
 end of every sentence, as though a diffi- 
 cult, useless task was over, of which he 
 was glad to be free. The poor Mana- 
 squan girl began to think she did not un- 
 derstand men. Five years ago, a wrong, ^, 
 wliich seemed to her more cruel than 
 death, had been done to this boy, of 
 whom she was fond; and because she 
 was fond of him, or for some deeper 
 reason, it had been plain to her that the 
 wrong must be atoned for. What she 
 had done to this end, what given up, she 
 only knew. She had looked, to-day, to 
 receive the boy, the wreck of what he 
 was, in body and mind; diseased, re- 
 vengeful, vicious, perhaps. She was 
 prepared for that. It was in her to care 
 for him during the rest of her life with 
 a mother's tenderness. It seemed to 
 her but just that she, of all other people 
 living, should do this thing. 
 
 But it was a man that was before her ; 
 strong, heady, reticent ; swayed, she saw, 
 by some dominant purpose, which she 
 could not discern ; with all his old out- 
 ward frankness, yet holding his own and 
 her secret thoughts in check. He, 
 "passing through the valley of misery," 
 had found in it a well from which he 
 drank stronger waters than any she had 
 known ; whether good or ill, she had no 
 means to know. His tone, his manner, 
 his look were unanswering to her. 
 
 "Women like me can hardly under- 
 stand a man," she broke out impetuously ; 
 " but I have instinct, hke a dog, Dallas ; 
 and though you should not say a word 
 of it to me, I know that I have made 
 a mistake. I can serve you but little. 
 You're no longer the same clay that I 
 am : you've grown beyond and outside 
 of me. My plans may do you harm, if 
 they touch you at all." 
 
 "Is it so, Lizzy? Then it is I who 
 am in fault," with a good-tempered. 
 
62 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 soothing smile. "What plans have you 
 made ? Had I a share in them ? How 
 is it that you are here ?" his tone abruptly 
 changing. " I thought of you always as 
 at — the old place. Married, perhaps," 
 with studied composure. 
 
 " No ; I am not married. Nothing 
 has happened to me of which I could 
 make a story for you. You know why 
 I wrote for you to come here ? You 
 will trust me that I did the best I knew, 
 however it may end ?" 
 
 " I trusted you, or I would not have 
 come. All the money I have made 
 there barely sufficed to buy these cheap 
 clothes and bring me here. I've 
 learned to count the cents, yonder, you 
 see." 
 
 She hesitated. "You did not receive 
 a package from me, then?" 
 
 "Yes," gravely. "But I can take 
 nothing from you but advice, Lizzy. I 
 am a man, now." 
 
 " I hope you will not let your pride 
 hinder my plans, Dallas," timidly. " Do 
 you know where you are ?" 
 
 "Yes," quietly. "I learned it to-day. 
 This is the Galbraith land, that should 
 have been my father's, and, some day, 
 mine. That is his mother's house yon- 
 der?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "You wrote that there was an open- 
 ing here for me. Did you bring me to 
 ask alms of her ?" 
 
 "Not alms. Hear reason, Dallas," 
 catching his arm. "You brought your 
 pictures with you? You believe still in 
 tlie talent you have ?" 
 
 "I've had nothing to shake my faith 
 in it," his voice growing pleased and 
 confident. " Genius or not, no prison 
 was able to bar it out from me. The 
 pictures were called wonders in their 
 way. I," hesitating, "had difficulty in 
 tlieir making." 
 
 " Madam Galbraith is a lavish patron, 
 Dallas. She is no mean judge of art, 
 they tell me. Her money rusts in her 
 hands ; and she uses it at times to edu- 
 cate poor young men. Since I have 
 known her she has sent a painter and 
 musician both to study in Rome." 
 
 He listened silently as she stammered 
 
 through. "And, as I supposed, you 
 wish me to share in her bounty?" 
 
 " I wish you to share in what is your 
 own," energetically. " You are the heir. 
 You have a right to the very sums which 
 she is squandering." 
 
 " In a word, I am the last of the Gal- 
 braiths. I heard to-day that she has 
 chosen as her heir an innocent young 
 girl. Look at this." He drew off his 
 cap and let the light fall on the close 
 shaven head and on a brass ticket which 
 he wore inside of his coat, on which 
 was engraven a number, "/am a con- 
 vict. Number seventy-nine. For five 
 years I have had no name nor place in "" 
 the world other than that label and the 
 crime attached to it. Am I in a fit case 
 to claim my inheritance ?" The grave 
 reasonableness in his voice alarmed and 
 dismayed her, being beyond her compre- 
 hension. She made a woman's answer 
 by pulling at the ticket with tears in her 
 eyes, as though the years of which it 
 was the sign could be destroyed with it. 
 It made his prison-life real to her for the 
 first time. 
 
 He put her back gently. " No ; I 
 wish to wear it still. I have a reason." 
 
 Lizzy sat down on a heap of stones and 
 said nothing. It did not matter whether 
 she ever spoke again, she thought. Her 
 plan had been that she would bring 
 Madam Galbraith and her heir together 
 by means of his skill as an artist, and 
 that, when occasion came, the discovery 
 would be made and he would be lifted 
 at once into the purple and sunshine ; 
 marry Honora, perhaps, and end all like 
 a fortunate fairy-tale. The plan had \ 
 seemed to her commonplace and prac- ' 
 tical : now it stood in its true light — a 
 womanish, weak, fanciful vagary. She 
 looked up when he began to speak again 
 slow and deliberately: 
 
 " I have a reason for keeping that 
 prison-life before me, and for making 
 what hasty strides I can towards fortune. 
 I can push my way in the drug business. 
 I know what the books can teach me, 
 and there's a place where I cm get a 
 foothold. But that will be slow, and 
 hard work. Now these — " he touched 
 a small roll which he carried with a sud- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITII. 
 
 63 
 
 den lightening in his face. " If I have 
 anv power, it is as an artist. If she 
 were to buy them at a liberal price, it 
 would enable me to follow my art for 
 life. It would help me sooner to my 
 other purpose." 
 
 " You will conquer both fortune and 
 fame, Dallas. Some day you will 
 marry — '' But she had put the fancy 
 about Honora aside. The man moved 
 and talked laboriously, painfully mould- 
 ing himself into some fancied likeness of 
 a gentleman. 
 
 " I have not thought of marriage since 
 I was a boy. There is a woman, if she 
 be not dead, whom I would like to see 
 before I die — when I make myself a 
 man of whom she would not be 
 ashamed." 
 
 Lizzy's heart suffered a sudden qualm 
 as she thought of his mother yonder at 
 the house, and of what she was. What 
 if she had searched out these kinsfolk 
 of his. and dragged him here to face them, 
 only to work iU ? 
 
 But she would risk it. " Are those the 
 pictures ? Come with them, then, to 
 Madam Galbraith ;" and drawing her 
 cloak about her, she went on before, 
 hastily, without giving him time to answer. 
 Dallas followed, in his usual slow, hesita- 
 ting gait, covering his pictures with his 
 coat to protect them from the dampness 
 as tenderly as a mother would her baby. 
 
 She saw him several times, as they 
 went, stoop and dig out some root \\'ith 
 his fingers, as if the old habit were too 
 strong for him ; tasting them, and smell- 
 ing the mould on his fingers with a long 
 breath : once, when he saw that she de- 
 tected him, he got up hastily with a 
 nervous laugh, saying, " I beg your par- 
 don. I begin to understand that I am 
 a free man." 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 They entered the house by a side- 
 door. The long Thanksgiving dinner 
 was over : through the basement-win- 
 dows they caught glimpses of loaded 
 tables spread for the farm and house 
 
 servants, for it was the old lady's wliira 
 that all her friends and laborers on these 
 high holidays should eat under her roof, 
 and of the same food : the best she could 
 give them. 
 
 Commg in from the solitude and dark- 
 ness without, they plunged at once into 
 an excess of light and warmth almost 
 offensive. Lizzy hurried through the 
 narrow, darkest halls to her own room, 
 Dallas following her slowly. Each open 
 door he passed framed a glowing pic- 
 ture : the deserted dining-room, gaudy 
 with china, broken fruit and dripping 
 wax-lights ; the dim, quiet library ; some 
 young girls dancing in the great hall ; 
 sad pictures, strange and unfamiliar to 
 him. How strange, or burdened with 
 wliat significance of his loss, Lizzy, in 
 her haste, did not consider, until, with 
 her hand on the lock of her own door, 
 she turned and looked at the pale face 
 of the tall man who waited behind her 
 with his bundle under his arm. She 
 drew him in, and tried in her tacdess 
 way to show how awful was the pity in 
 her heart for him. 
 
 '' I should not have brought you I-.ere. 
 I did not think how you liad lost all 
 these things." 
 
 " No matter. It will come right." 
 
 But she persisted : " I did not think 
 what it would cost you to find your 
 father's house what it is, and you a con- 
 vict. You have had hard luclc, Dallas.'' 
 
 "There is no such thing as luck. It 
 is something that fights against us. Let 
 me sell my pictures now and go." 
 
 She looked at the homely, powerful 
 face, at the coarse, ill-fitting clothes, the 
 brass ticket on his coat, and her heart 
 failed her. How could she take this 
 man down to them, and say, •' Here is 
 your son." Let him first have the 
 chance to make the man of himself he 
 purposed. 
 
 '' Give me the pictures," she said. 
 " Wait for me here." 
 
 In a few moments she opened the 
 door again. " You must go down, Dal- 
 las. Madam Galbraith will see you her- 
 self" He went before her now, grave 
 and silent. It seemed to her, as she 
 followed him with trembling, cowardly 
 
64 
 
 DALLAS GALBRALTH. 
 
 steps, that the factitious, gentlemanly air 
 which he had sought to acquire disap- 
 peared from him. She caught a glimpse 
 of the wide, firm mouth, the sane, dark- 
 blue eyes : this was more like the old 
 Dallas she knew, who used to go slinging 
 through the woods, his basket strapped 
 upon his back. 
 
 " Where am I to go ?" pausing in the 
 great hall. She pointed to the open 
 door of the library, where Madam Gal- 
 braith stood in front of a low, clear fire, 
 and then followed him, far behind. 
 
 Dallas went in alone. He stopped 
 where the shadows of the great book- 
 cases fell heavily. She was leaning for- 
 ward, her knuckles resting on the gaudily- 
 colored canvas that was spread out on 
 the table before her, while she inspected 
 it contemptuously. So this was the test 
 to which her charity was to be brought 
 before night — a case of unappreciated 
 genius ! Some needy kinsman of her 
 housekeeper's, doubtless : she had not 
 forgotten her insolence of the morning. 
 
 She looked up at the tall figure in the 
 shadow, contracting her eyes to see him 
 better. But it did not matter what he 
 was : she had nothing for him. 
 
 "You are the person who was men- 
 tioned to me as in need of assistance ?" 
 
 There was no answer for a moment. 
 
 " No. I asked for no alms." 
 
 A thin, quiet-looking gentleman, read- 
 ing by a lamp in the corner, laid down 
 his paper suddenly as Dallas spoke, look- 
 ing nervously toward him ; but, after a 
 moment's doubtful pause, adjusted his 
 spectacles again and went back to his 
 Times. 
 
 "No alms, eh?" with a satirical smile, 
 passing her forefinger over the picture. 
 "Your wings are stronger than those of 
 most young geniuses. I find them usu- 
 ally quite willing to accept a gratuity — 
 for the sake of art." 
 
 " I brought you my pictures to sell. 
 I wish to take nothing from you unless 
 I give you your money's worth." 
 
 Her manner instantly changed. She 
 took up the canvas, scanning it for a few 
 minutes attentively and not unkindly. 
 «' Then our business is speedily closed. 
 I will not buy the pictures. That is all V 
 
 " That is all." Dallas did not move 
 to reclaim them, but stood absently look- 
 ing at his father's mother, forgetting al- 
 most to breathe in his intentness. A 
 curious instinct of kinship took posses- 
 sion of him, looking at her : in his large- 
 boned, muscular bod}-, which he inherited 
 from her ; in the bluntness, the fierce 
 temper, the quick, generous blood. All 
 shame was gone from him for the mo- 
 ment, and out of his old Manasquan life 
 simple-hearted Galbraith, struggling to 
 be a man, felt himself her son, and alto- 
 gether worthy of her. 
 
 "You hope to maintain yourself by 
 your art ?" 
 
 "Yes," as if waking from a stupor, 
 " I mean to do it." 
 
 "Then I will be plain with you, young 
 man. Your fate may depend on it, and 
 some day you will thank m.e for my can- 
 dor." She paused abruptly, as the sound 
 of some one singing came from an ad- 
 joining room. The voice was a singu- 
 larly clear and natural one, the song mere 
 snatches of some old ditty, chanted care- 
 lessly, but there was a strange flavor of 
 heat and pathos in it. Madam Galbraith 
 held up her hand attentively. When it 
 ceased, she said to her husband : 
 
 " It is a wonderful gift, James. It 
 startles me, sometimes, coming from so 
 dull a child. Though Honora is afiection- 
 ate — aflTectionate," waiting with a pleased 
 smile for the approaching footsteps. Dal- 
 las and his fate, which she meant to con- 
 trol, had dropped altogether out of her 
 mind. They heeded him no more than 
 if he had been a stock standing there. 
 
 The trifling neglect woke him with a 
 shock to his real self. His place for life 
 was fixed. What was he, with the prison- 
 brand on him and through him, the mea- 
 gre education which he had acquired out 
 of odd books in the hulks, to these peo- 
 ple ? He would turn his back on them 
 and go down where he belonged. The 
 struggle was hopeless : one-third of his 
 life was gone in it already. 
 
 The door opposite to him opened and 
 the singer came in, and, with a surprised 
 look at finding the library occupied, went 
 over and stood by her uncle. Only a 
 simple, embarrassed young girl ; but it 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 65 
 
 seemed fitting to Dallas that she should 
 have sent music before her to announce 
 her coming. 
 
 Remember, he was just clear from the 
 gangs of the Albany penitentiary, made 
 up from the vilest slums of New York : 
 for five years he had not looked on a 
 young, pure woman. She came to him, 
 too, at a moment when his brain was 
 quickened unnaturally with repressed 
 thoughts and passions. The effect was 
 strange and lasting. Whatever famished, 
 \ vague longing had been in him for that 
 part of God's world which was pure and 
 tender and holy, woke at the sight of 
 her into an instant, inexorable pain ; cried 
 out within him, as the spirit which pos- 
 sessed the man whose dwelling was 
 among the tombs, with a hunger for 
 which he had no words. It was not 
 woman or love which she alone sug- 
 gested to him. She seemed to be the 
 very type of that life from which he felt 
 himself this moment to be shut out by 
 his wrong for ever. There was no trifle 
 which he did not note, the dim-lighted, 
 scholastic room that framed her, the deli- 
 cate, fleecy dress, the face, wonderful in 
 its truth and childlike content with life. 
 By some subtle instinct he understood 
 at a glance the full relation between her 
 and the old man on whose shoulder she 
 rested. He too was fit to be their 
 fHend — one of a company from which 
 all the world might be shut out. 
 
 With that thought he turned his back 
 on them suddenly. Madam Galbraitli 
 resumed her interrupted lecture, clearing 
 her throat : 
 
 " I think it but right to warn you of 
 your defeat, young man. There is not 
 a single evidence of power in these pic- 
 tures. They are weak and turgid in de- 
 sign, and faulty in execution. You have 
 not the first idea of the art. Give up the 
 palette and go to breaking stones on the 
 turnpike, and it will serve you better in 
 the end." 
 
 "Hannah !" remonstrated a mild voice 
 behind her. 
 
 She placed the picture before him by 
 way of reply. Mr. Galbraith held it to 
 the light a moment, and then shook his 
 head gravely. 
 5 
 
 " I fear that there is but little promise 
 here," gently. " Stay. What coloring 
 is tliis which you have used, sir T' 
 
 Dallas hesitated. " I worked under 
 difficulties. The colors were extracted 
 from bits of woolen cloth, earths and 
 vegetables which fell in my way." 
 
 Honora stooped over her uncle's shoul- 
 der eagerly. Madam Galbraith took one 
 canvas again with a muttered "Tut ! tut !" 
 of surprise, inspected it for a moment, 
 and then turned towards him, rapping 
 on the table. " That pleases me !" vig- 
 orously. " There's no genius there, but 
 there's wonderful persistence. I think 
 well of you, sir ! There is something 
 better than genius in a man who tries to 
 work out his worldly salvation through 
 slow patience like that. How long were 
 you in making those poor daubs .■"' 
 
 He was so long silent that they all 
 looked at him curiously. Madam Gal- 
 braith repeated the question more gently 
 than before. 
 
 " How long ?" dully, bringing his 
 thoughts back a long way. " I think 
 it was but five years that I worked at 
 them. But I was a boy when I iDegan 
 them in Manasquan — I had many friends 
 there. Now — I think much of my life 
 has gone down into those poor daubs, 
 madam; and I fear it never will conie 
 to me again." 
 
 "And you worked, thinking that they 
 were well done — that you had genius — 
 all the time ?" 
 
 " Hannah !" 
 
 "I mean to do something for the boy, 
 James. But this interests me. What 
 plans had you, if you succeeded ? What 
 did you aim at, eh V 
 
 Now, Dallas, standing among them, 
 ill-clothed, the jail-bird consciousness 
 heavy on every limb and thought, afraid 
 to speak lest some vulgar word should 
 mark him, was conscious that his secret 
 aim had been good and high. It was 
 weak and worldly to assert it — to force 
 himself up by it for a moment to their 
 level. But it was natural ; and he did it, 
 watching eagerly Madam Galbraith's eyes 
 for approval : 
 
 " I have had great difficulties, in mak- 
 ing my pictures — in making myself any- 
 
66 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 tiling I would be. I have had difficulties 
 all my life. When I painted those pic- 
 tures there were people about me whose 
 chances had been worse than mine. I 
 could not get away from the sight of 
 tliem. They were before me night and 
 day. I could not speak to them nor 
 help them." 
 
 As his voice grew steadier and changed 
 in tone, Mr. Galbraith laid down his pa- 
 per and watched him keenly ; but Dallas 
 still stood in the shadow. He went on 
 slowly, choosing his words : 
 
 " One thinks many thoughts in five 
 years of silence. It is hke going down 
 into the grave and looking back on one's 
 Hfe. I hoped to succeed in painting. 
 My pictures were called wonderful. I 
 still think there is something in them." 
 
 " Humph ! Go on." 
 
 " I never expect to marry or to love, 
 as other men do. There are reasons. 
 But one must have a plan ; and mine 
 was, when I had succeeded, to save as 
 many as I could from the difficulties which 
 I had known. I thought of taking little 
 children out of the slough where I was, 
 and doing what I could for them." 
 
 But he was rewarded by no kindling 
 in the old woman's eye. She was in- 
 tolerant of anybody's charity but her own. 
 
 " Little children, eh ? And you a hearty 
 young fellow ! Whining about the sores 
 on society ! Go to work ; marry a healthy 
 girl in your own class, and make your own 
 children what they should be. There's 
 no better work for any man or woman. 
 Now, I'll tell you what I'll do. You 
 must have some knowledge of chemistry 
 to have worked out this trumpery," point- 
 ing to the pictures. " Go to my woolen 
 mills. They are ten miles down the river. 
 I'll give you a line to the overseer. They 
 can make use of you in the dyeing de- 
 partment. A low place at first, probably. 
 But the point is here : Mr. Galbraith 
 and I employ a great many people, di- 
 rectly, and in concerns in which we are 
 stockholders — mechanics, sheep and cat- 
 tle-raisers in the West, and professional 
 men. My rule is — for he leaves the 
 business to me — that capacity only shall 
 command place. I will keep my eye on 
 you, and I am much mistaken in you if 
 
 you do not rise rapidly. You can go 
 now. Honora, have you done studying 
 those pictures .-' Ehzabeth !" 
 
 Lizzy came from the door. 
 
 "You can take the letter to the young 
 man. I will write to Mr. Vogt to-mor- 
 row." 
 
 " It does not need," said Dallas, 
 quietly, yet speaking directly to the wo- 
 man whom he knew to be his father's 
 mother, and stopping now to choose no 
 words. "It would be better for me and 
 for you if you touched my fate no far- 
 ther. I will be made and unmade no 
 more as a pupjiet. I have been thrown 
 to and fro like a football in the world by 
 one chance and another since I was born. 
 Surely it is time that what strength and 
 purpose I have should count for some- 
 thing in my life." 
 
 Madam Galbraith made no reply. 
 Something in the low, passionate tones 
 seemed to stun her with a sudden re- 
 membrance. She put out her hand to 
 silence him, looked at her husband as 
 for protection, not against Dallas, but 
 some ghost which his words had raised. 
 He went on in the same repressed voice : 
 
 " For you, some day, knowing what I 
 am, you may wish you had dealt with 
 me differently. It does not matter now. 
 You were unjust to me — unjust to my 
 talent. You jeered at the one good pur- 
 pose I had. You think you know men. 
 Yet you would have given a place of 
 trust and security to a felon." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith rose, and, putting his 
 wife quietly aside, went into the shadow 
 where Dallas stood, looking at him stead- 
 ily before he spoke. He did a strange 
 thing, too — took the man's hand in his 
 delicate fingers, and held it a moment, 
 as though he tested something by that 
 means. 
 
 " You were a convict .'"' 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " For what crime ?" 
 
 " Forgery." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith was silent a moment 
 before the next question: "Were you 
 guilty?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Why do you suffer the man to palter 
 with you, James.?" demanded Madam 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 67 
 
 Galbraith. sternly. <'A criminal never 
 before has crossed my threshold with 
 my consent. There is no hope for a 
 man who has once sinned, in my judg- 
 ment. Go to your room, Honora. This 
 is no place for you." 
 
 Dallas did not glance at the girl. " I 
 was not guilty," he reiterated, looking 
 directly into the eyes of the old man. 
 
 At that, Honora stopped, near to the 
 door, with a dreadful pity in her face, 
 close to the indistinct figure in the cor- 
 ner, that was to her, so far, little more 
 than a voice and great trouble, such as she 
 never had met with in the world before. 
 
 "You are blind !" cried Lizzy, passion- 
 ately, going up to Madam Galbraith. 
 "You are blind and cruel. You play 
 with the soul of this boy, and think it 
 is sport. But it is your own heart that 
 wiU suifer in the end." 
 
 Galbraith laid his steady hand on her 
 arm to quiet her. 
 
 " Blind I assuredly was," said Madam 
 Galbraith, calmly looking down at the 
 pale little woman before her, "not to 
 guess at the character of the man from 
 his whining philanthropy. Why, too, 
 would an honest man stand back in the 
 dark and hide his face in that manner? 
 We have had enough of this. What 
 does the man matter to us ?" But still 
 she hesitated ; for when once her hands 
 had meddled in the control of any man's 
 life, for good or ill, it chagrined her to 
 let it go. Mr. Galbraith walked slowly 
 to and fro, near to his grandson, his 
 hands clasped behind him, his head sunk 
 on his breast. He halted when Dallas 
 spoke to him, silent and watchful. 
 
 "You are right in your judgment," 
 he said, still looking steadfastly in the 
 old man's face, which seemed strangely 
 worn and gray. "Luck, as the world 
 has it, has gone against me, so far as 
 to bring me in guilty as a thief. So that 
 I matter nothing to you." For the first 
 time his eyes went wistfully about the 
 room, and rested on Honora. " I matter 
 nothing to you or yours V 
 
 Something in the man's voice held 
 them all silent : it was as if he pleaded 
 for his life with a Judge invisible to 
 them — beyond and above them. 
 
 He turned to the door at last. "Let 
 it be so. The prison was not death, as 
 I thought it would be when I went into 
 it. There are other lives, thank God. 
 than this which you live. But I wish 
 that one among you had beheved in me 
 and thought me an honest man." 
 
 Honora, standing near the door, came 
 up to him with the picture in her hand. 
 "I beheve in you," she said. 
 
 "Honora!" 
 
 But Mr. Galbraith put out his arm 
 before his wife. "Let the girl alone," 
 he said, sternly. 
 
 She did not hear them : she trembled 
 very much, though not with fear, and 
 stood silent before Dallas, who drew 
 back from her. 
 
 "I never knew there was anything 
 like — like this in the world before," 
 stretching out her hands toward him. 
 "1 can do nothing. I cannot help you. 
 Only, I believe that every word you have 
 said is true, if you care to know that." 
 
 Dallas stood erect. He thought he 
 had answered her, but, instead, his eyes 
 only devoured her face with a meaning 
 which neither he nor she understood. 
 She laid down the picture, and then, as 
 she was turning away, offered him her 
 hand — a rare sign of equality for Honora 
 to make to man or woman. He hesi- 
 tated a moment. " I think I am fit to 
 take your hand," he said, gravely, hold- 
 ing the pure, warm little palm firmly in 
 his own. 
 
 The door closed behind her. "It is 
 time this matter was ended," said Mad- 
 am Galbraith, savagely. "There is 
 nothing more to be said." 
 
 "Nothing more." He took up the 
 pictures which lay rolled on a chair, and 
 was turning away, when a curtain at the 
 opposite end of the room was pushed 
 aside, and a clear voice cried: "The 
 Colonel tells me you have been enacting 
 a bit of a tragedy. You talk loudly. 
 Had you really a dreadful convict here ?" 
 A lady, in a soft brown silk, with lace 
 edging it, and a pearl ring on her hand, 
 came in smiling, and, still hidden by the 
 sombre shadows of the nre-lighted room, 
 Dallas Galbraith faced his mother. 
 
PART IV, 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 MR. GALBRAITH came before his 
 daughter-in-law hastily. "The 
 ■ — the man is still here my dear," mildly, 
 motioning her back, " and his guilt is far 
 from certain — to my mind." 
 
 He turned to brighten the flickering 
 lamp, but succeeded in extinguishing it 
 instead, his fingers being, as usual, nerv- 
 ous and incapable. 
 
 But before his warning, Mrs. Duffield's 
 quick, comprehensive glance had de- 
 tected the dark figure in the background, 
 aaid she stopped, hesitating and shocked. 
 To find that she had been, unconsciously, 
 at once both rude and cruel, demeaned 
 her, and wrung her heart with a real 
 pain. She had seen the man draw back 
 at her words and lean for support on the 
 door-jamb. Poor wretch ! Angry tears 
 at herself rushed into her eyes. She 
 made no word of apology to him, how- 
 ever, but turned with quick tact to Mr. 
 Galbr-aith. 
 
 " I have no doubt that he is not guilty, 
 sir. You would know an innocent man 
 by instinct. While I — " 
 
 Madam Galbraith turned on her. 
 "What ought my son's wife to know of 
 crime or criminals ? Young women 
 chatter of vices now-a-days with which, 
 
 in my time, they would have been 
 counted besmirched had they but known 
 the names. Even Honora — bah !" 
 
 Her son's wife Hfted her sweet face 
 and bright eyes gently toward her, her 
 hands folded with a most nun-like sim- 
 plicity : she paused a full moment before 
 replying, taking counsel with herself, 
 how, while she made amends to the poor 
 outcast in the corner, she could send a 
 decisive lance against the old griffin wlio 
 was bent on riding her down. 
 
 Now Lizzy had no thought for any of 
 them but Dallas. In this pause she 
 tried to draw him out and away. That 
 first sight of his mother, before the light 
 grew dim, had shaken the slow, affection- 
 ate fellow in a manner which it had 
 frightened her to see. She compre- 
 hended now what secret had Iain hidden 
 in the boy's breast during the years in 
 which he had been a vagabond for this 
 woman's sake: she began to see, look- 
 ing into his pale face, turned toward 
 Mrs. Duffield, what pith and strength 
 there was in him beyond other men. In 
 another moment the hungry cry, re- 
 pressed for a life-time, would break forth, 
 and he would throw himself at the feet 
 of this shallow, selfish fool. Lizzy caught 
 his wrist with a grip as strong as iron 
 — or common sense. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 69 
 
 « Dallas ! come away from them," she 
 ■whispered. 
 
 He shook her off gently. " It is my 
 mother!" his lips hardly moving: stand- 
 ing still, listening breathlessly as the 
 sweet, decided voice of the little woman 
 was heard again, an expression of infi- 
 nite pathos and tenderness softening the 
 stern features, as if the childhood and 
 boyhood lost for her sake had returned to 
 the uncouth, hardly-used man at her first 
 familiar tone. With the stupidity of a 
 man he saw no under-meaning in her 
 words. 
 
 "What do I know of criminals ?" she 
 said. '-Why, I have felt what the temp- 
 tations are — down there. Where you 
 never have gone, dear Madam Galbraith. 
 And I have ver}' little faith in the law's 
 justice, either. Prove a man to be poor 
 and tempted, and half the jurors in any 
 court count him guilty. I have been 
 poor myself, you know. I am familiar 
 with the landmarks of that country," 
 with a piquant little nod and triumphant 
 flash of the gray eyes as the indignant 
 blood rushed into the old lady's face. 
 
 " It was my fault that my son's wife 
 should have such knowledge to boast 
 of," in a humiliated voice. 
 
 « Oh, indeed, no! You are generosity 
 itself. But a little hard on ill-doers — 
 ah ? as a just woman should be. And 
 we were sadly in the wrong — viea 
 culpa f beating her soft bosom with a 
 smile. " But I learned in that way to 
 sympathize with this poor fellow here." 
 
 There was an embarrassed silence. 
 The graceful little lady standing on the 
 hearth-rug was left master of the field. 
 The ver}-' fire-light seemed cognizant of 
 her prettiness. of the completeness of her 
 dress and delicacy and Christian com- 
 passion : touched the flush on her cheek 
 and the thoughtful bent head with bright 
 admiring gleams. What with the tears 
 in her innocent eyes, her well-fitting 
 gown, and the integrity of her position. 
 Madam Galbraith and Lizzy appeared 
 old and dour and misplaced beside her, 
 even in the eyes of the fastidious old 
 gentleman pacing nervously to and fro. 
 As for her son, the poor convict in the 
 corner, the very lightest breath she drew, 
 
 or motion of her white hand, seemed, in 
 the fervor of his admiration, a thing dis- 
 tinct and new, and touching him as nn 
 miracle would. 
 
 Presently she turned her eyes on him, 
 full of womanish tears ; for in truth she 
 was sore to think of what she had done, 
 and would have gladly made amends. 
 When their eyes met he began to tremble, 
 let fall the roll of canvas which he held, 
 and took an uncertain step toward her. 
 He put up both hands to tear off the 
 cap which covered his shaven head. 
 
 "Mother. It is I — Dallas !" he wouM 
 have cried, but the words died in his 
 parched mouth. 
 
 She watched him with alarm, the tears 
 suddenly dr\-ing up in her eyes. " Does 
 your friend wish to speak to me ?" she 
 asked of Elizabeth, with a certain sharp- 
 ness in her tone. 
 
 Lizzy ^ame in front of Dallas, putting 
 him back. " He does wish to speak to 
 you, Mrs. Duffield. but not now. Not 
 before strangers. He fancied, from your 
 kind words, that you would understand 
 and feel for him. But it will be better 
 you should see him alone." 
 
 " Oh, assuredly ! Take him away, I 
 beg of you. Another time, pray ! An- 
 other time ! Take him away." 
 
 Dallas stood irresolute a moment, 
 looking at her : then, bowing awkwardly, 
 he turned and went into the hall. 
 
 " I think you were right," stopping 
 and holding Lizzy by the arm. " I could 
 not speak to her there before strangers, 
 you know. And I meant to be some- 
 thing which she would be proud to own 
 when I came — Not that it would mat- 
 ter to her." 
 
 Lizzy did not answer : she only held 
 him by the sleeve quiet a moment. The 
 door was open, and Mrs. Duffield's mu- 
 sical voice came out energetically. " I 
 was so shocked at what I had done ! It 
 makes me feel like a coward to strike 
 anything beneath me. One might as 
 well be harsh to a servant, or crush a 
 poor toad underone's feet in the garden — 
 things that cannot retaliate, you know, 
 Madam Galbraith." 
 
 " You are a good little soul, I do b«- 
 lieve, my dear," good-humoredly. 
 
70 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 " No, I don't think I am," coloring. 
 « That poor wretch was going to make 
 a scene. I detest scenes. That is the 
 difficulty with that sort of people : they 
 never understand the gulf between us, 
 and at the least encouragement they 
 press on you with their disgusting ail- 
 ments of body and mind. It is so dread- 
 fully morbid, that sort of thing. I'm not 
 at all morbid." 
 
 " Do you hear her, Dallas ? Do you 
 hear her ?" 
 
 But he was carefully rolling up his 
 canvas with the same quiet, wistful smile. 
 " She does not know I am her son, you 
 see, Lizzy. I have no doubt that what 
 she says is very true, too. She had 
 great penetration — my mother," as they 
 went down the hall together. " I never 
 knew a woman with so clear a judgment 
 and such tender sympathies. Her very 
 voice and smile are full of mercy. Did 
 you observe ?" 
 
 Lizzy only rephed quietly that a sweet 
 voice and smile had great weight with 
 most men, thinking that Dallas was but 
 like the others : a few pink and white 
 tinges in the face and a trick of ready 
 tears would outweigh the service of a 
 homely woman's whole lifetime. Lizzy 
 sighed, and choked the sigh. 
 
 They passed through the halls again, 
 she following a long way behind. What 
 were they to do ? What were they to do ? 
 Her plans and sacrifices, her prayers for 
 him for years, had ended now in nothing. 
 This big, clumsy fellow walking before 
 her, who had grown so dear to her 
 through her pity for his wrong, had been 
 left by God to be thrust out into the 
 world to-night, to make what he chose 
 therein of his undisciplined body and 
 ill-taught brain, bringing nothing out of 
 his past life but the cheap clothes, the 
 convict's badge and the rejected pictures 
 which he carried under his arm. She 
 thought of Ishmael, thrust out from his 
 inheritance into the desert. Dallas 
 was as helpless, as ill able to fight 
 his way. 
 
 Had God never heard her, then ? 
 Did he make souls to suffer them thus 
 to drift about and rot on every changing 
 tide like bits of unclean weed ? Was 
 
 this the way in which Christ kept watch 
 over the wronged and weak ? 
 
 Her face grew more colorless. As 
 she followed him, the more immediate 
 trouble seized her : What could she do 
 with him now ? What road were they 
 to take together? Dallas solved the 
 riddle, passing quietly out of the side- 
 door and turning to the mountain-path, 
 with the air of a man the reins of whose 
 life were always well held in his own 
 hand. He stopped at the little gate. 
 
 " Good-bye, Lizzy." 
 
 " I will walk with you to the stile, 
 Dallas." She took the roll of canvas 
 from him as they went side by side, and 
 held it. She would like to have torn it 
 strip by strip and thrown it in the muddy 
 stream : she could have vented on the 
 inanimate thing all the bitterness of her 
 disappointment in men and God, who 
 were alike Wind. She had counted so 
 long on these pictures, and the gift of 
 which they were the sign. They were 
 to have been the magic key which would 
 have restored him to family and fortune — 
 assured him splendid triumphs over his 
 enemies. But they had been worth noth- 
 ing. God had not been just enough to 
 give even genius to Dallas Galbraith. 
 
 But she carried the roll quietly for a 
 few moments, and then gave it back to 
 him without a word. The stile at which 
 they stopped opened out into the fields 
 on the valley side : behind them the 
 house rose against the mountain back- 
 ground, an irregular, imposing mass of 
 shadow in the pale November moonlight, 
 its numberless deep-set, red-burning win- 
 dows giving a human life to the night 
 Occasional echoes of laughter or broken 
 snatches of music came out to them 
 where they stood. 
 
 Mountains and homestead and music 
 all symbolized in some way, and made 
 more real to her, the power and life of 
 ease and culture which he had lost. 
 
 "Why need you stop and look at it?" 
 she said, with repressed vehemence. 
 " It's too late now. You might have 
 been master here if you had kept silence 
 and not dragged out your past life before 
 them all. If you had but luck, Dallas ! 
 If there were any way yet for you to 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 71 
 
 become famous, to make a fortune and 
 triumph over them ! My God, if you 
 could triumph over them !" She turned 
 her pale, in-itable face to\vard him, stop- 
 ping astonished to see the quiet cheer- 
 fulness with which he scrutinized tlie old 
 building. 
 
 "A fortune? Fame? I had not 
 thought of that," slowly. 
 
 " That is because you know nothing 
 of life," with impatient acrimony. "/ 
 know it ! What can you do without 
 them ? Luck's against you, Dallas ! 
 As for me, I put my shoulder to the 
 wheel to no purpose. You threw your 
 fortune away to-night, and you're here, a 
 full-grown man, with neither skill nor 
 money. It seems to me, because of 
 your honesty, your life is to count for 
 nothing — no more than the thousands 
 of dull, worthless ones that crowd the 
 world. And that is God's justice !" 
 
 He looked at her attentively, not re- 
 plying for a moment or two : " No doubt 
 you are right. I scarcely know what 
 pushes men up. But money or notori- 
 ety seemed very far outside of the course 
 I planned for myself It may have been 
 the five years of enforced silence that 
 makes me see the world according to 
 my own scheme, and leave out matters 
 so essential." 
 
 But Lizzy had time while he said this 
 to fall into a passion of remorse : "At 
 any rate, you were honest. I had no 
 right to taunt you with the injustice of 
 the world to you. If you have no chance 
 for success, it was hardly my place to 
 teU you of it. I am as brutal as the 
 others in there," nodding toward the 
 house. 
 
 "You never could be unfriendly, what- 
 ever you said, Lizzy," he said, kindly. 
 But he made no answer about his chance 
 in the world. 
 
 " I am not myself to-night. It was a 
 bitter disappointment. I never looked 
 at yon house," facing the long line of 
 building, " that I did not fancy you as 
 the master of it. I thought there was 
 One who would see that justice should 
 be done — that you should have your 
 fortune and place." 
 
 He watched her, as she spoke, closely 
 
 and gravely : it had become a habit of 
 the man, possibly because, after so 
 many years of compelled silence, he 
 could not follow tlie differing voices 
 readily. He nodded, comprehending 
 her, with a slow, half-amused smile. 
 
 " I've had httle else to think of than 
 the recompense coming to you. I 
 thought you would marry Honora — " 
 She checked herself abruptly, with an 
 alarmed glance at his face, but he had 
 turned to look down the road, buttoning 
 his coat for departure, and, though she 
 waited for him to speak, he said nothing. 
 
 There was a silence for a moment or 
 two. She broke it at last: "You say 
 neither money nor fame is the end of 
 your schemes, Dallas. What is the end ? 
 What are you going to make of your 
 life ?" adding, when he did not reply, in 
 a hesitating, apologetic voice, " I am 
 more practical than you, I thought I 
 could advise you." 
 
 " ' Practical,' Lizzy ?" the dark-blue 
 eyes beginning to sparkle, and giving a 
 quick, real old Dallas laugh. "Why 
 you give me fortunes Hke a fairy god- 
 mother. Practical !" 
 
 But, with a woman's keen instinct, 
 she felt that her question had been 
 evaded, and that the steady, kind regard 
 which, after he spoke, he held fixed on 
 her face, was the sign of an impalpable 
 barrier which shut her out from him. 
 
 " First, I am going somewhere to 
 sleep and eat. I feel the need of it. 
 There is a little tavern back in the gap 
 yonder, which I saw yesterday : I will 
 stay there for the present. The Indian 
 Queen, they call it. I can find work 
 among the farmers." 
 
 After ? But she did not dare to ask. 
 His very candor with regard to his present 
 work and lodging drew the barring line 
 about him. As to the use he would try 
 to make of this life which had been so 
 bungled and misplaced, it was a matter, 
 she saw, in which God alone could 
 meddle with him in future. 
 
 " I think it is more to the purpose," 
 he continued, "to decide upon your 
 course, Lizzy. It will not be right for 
 you to remain here : my crime and dis- 
 grace will be visited on you." 
 
72 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 " It does not matter. My work is 
 done here. I have saved some money. 
 It does not matter to me now where I 
 go." 
 
 He did not seem to notice the dreary 
 voice or face. 
 
 " Who is Honora ?" abruptly. 
 
 "You saw her: she is Madam Gal- 
 braith's heir. She offered her hand to 
 you. She is a charitable little soul. 
 They have kept her in that house yonder 
 as ignorant of the sin of the outside 
 world as a babe in its cradle. She and 
 her uncle will always remember that 
 hand-shake, as if she had been an angel 
 who stooped down from heaven with 
 water to cool Dives' parched tongue." 
 
 Dallas was silent a moment. " The 
 diiference between us is great," he said, 
 quietly. 
 
 " Yes ; my plan for you there is at an 
 end." 
 
 He did not reply. They had been 
 standing on the same side of the stile 
 until now : he put his hand on it to pass 
 through, but stopped with a startled 
 glance about him. 
 
 "What is it, Galbraith ?" 
 
 "A man's steps, I fancied." 
 
 " It is probable : the workmen are 
 closing the stables about this time, and 
 passing in every direction home through 
 the fields." 
 
 But he still held his head bent 
 anxiously, with his hand behind his ear 
 to listen, and it was not until some mo- 
 ments after that he looked up with a 
 sudden breath of rehef 
 
 " My hearing plays me strange tricks 
 sometimes. When will I see you again, 
 Lizzy ?" 
 
 '< I will come to-morrow to that house 
 where you are going. I know the wo- 
 man well : I can board there for a little 
 while before I leave this part of the 
 country: that is," hesitating, "if you 
 would like to have me near you, Dallas ?" 
 
 " I have no friend but you. You are 
 going back to — the old place V 
 
 " No." 
 
 He looked at her downcast face keen- 
 ly, wonder and doubt and a new light 
 coming slowly into his own, as for the 
 first time a suspicion of the truth came 
 
 to him — that the girl, out of sheer sense 
 of justice, had given up all she had for 
 him, and left herself bankrupt. 
 
 It was hke a wide window opened 
 into a dark, unwholesome house, this 
 sudden sight of the woman's loyalty to 
 him, unflinching through his low, wretch- 
 ed luck. He realized even in that mo- 
 ment that the world would be different 
 and sweeter to him for it every day of 
 his life thereafter. But he only said, 
 simply, "You've been a good friend to 
 me, Lizzy," holding her hand a moment 
 afterward. 
 
 Downright, outwardly stupid men like 
 Galbraith have so little of that small coin 
 of affection or gratitude, those words and 
 looks, for which even women as sensible 
 as Lizzy are willing to sacrifice their lives 
 and think themselves well paid. As it 
 was, she was wonderfully comforted by 
 even this touch of appreciation. 
 
 " I began to think him insensible as 
 this log," she thought, as she watched 
 him going down the mountain-path. " I 
 thought he was too dull to care for what 
 he had lost — or — or anything else. But 
 I wronged the poor boy. Dear old Dal- 
 las !" It was so good to have something 
 come into her lonely life, to be cared for 
 and watched over. 
 
 The stile on which she leaned was 
 distant one or two fields from the house. 
 The infrequent noises had died away, 
 and the stubbled. saffron-colored slopes, 
 with their dark, crossing lines of hedges, 
 stretched in drowsy quiet to the sluggish 
 creek, glittering blackly in the moonlight 
 on one side, and on the other to the far, 
 dun-blue boundary of mountains. Only 
 an occasional whoop of an owl or the 
 trampling of horses in the stables broke 
 the silence of the night to her ear ; but 
 she saw Dallas stop suddenly in the 
 alarmed, watchful attitude of a moment 
 ago. He stood motionless, stooping 
 close to the ground — a trick, when listen- 
 ing, which he had learned in his old 
 woodcraft. Lizzy strained her ears, but 
 she heard nothing. After a moment's 
 waiting, Galbraith stood erect, glanced 
 keenly at the low patches of brushwood 
 on either side, and then, turning, came 
 swiftly back toward her. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 73 
 
 " What do you hear, Galbraith ?" 
 
 " Nothing, it is most Hkely. Come, 
 I will take you back to the house. It 
 would seem but the shadow of a sound 
 to you, perhaps, but I fancied danger in 
 it" 
 
 She went with him, slowly at first, 
 but with his strong hand on her elbow 
 he hurried her along. " Your nerves de- 
 ceive you, Dallas. I often hear strange 
 sounds and see impossible things after I 
 have been worried and in trouble." 
 
 " Why, I thought your nerves were 
 steel, little woman .?" laughing. 
 
 " Or it might have been the throb of 
 the creek-mill," she argued, perplexed 
 and out of breath. " I have heard it up 
 here on a clear night. What kind of 
 sound was it ?" 
 
 "It might have been the mill," quick- 
 ening his step. 
 
 " What danger did you apprehend ?" 
 anxiously. 
 
 " None which could not be met. I am 
 a man now," under his breath. "Here 
 you are at home again," opening the side- 
 door. " Do not come to me until I send 
 for you. Good-night, Lizzy." 
 
 His grasp of her hand was heartier : 
 there was a prompt energy in his laugh 
 and the ring of his voice, a decision in 
 every movement, which she had not seen 
 since his return. It needs danger to 
 bring a man wholly into life, after all, 
 just as pain does a woman. Lizzy, who 
 had drawn much shrewdness, knowledge 
 of men and of business, and capability into 
 herself out of these years of dull endur- 
 ance, which had nigh smothered out the 
 h'ght in Dallas Galbraith, crept up to her 
 room, shivering in a cold perspiration at 
 tliis hint of outward danger ; got down 
 cm her knees by the window, watching 
 the tall figure going quietly down the 
 path again, the vast, dusky landscape 
 that yawned about him, the mountains 
 which suddenly grew spectral and threat- 
 ening to her, uncertain from which quar- 
 ter the sudden peril would come, and 
 leaving him to face it alone. She saw 
 him halt on the foot-bridge where she 
 had met him that evening, and pace to 
 and fro with slow and grave composure, 
 as though it were a friend, and not an 
 
 enemy, he waited to meet ; with this 
 difference, however, that he untied his 
 cap and took it off, showing boldly to 
 his foe the face which he would have 
 hid from her. 
 
 The manner of the boy convinced her 
 that there was an absolute, tangible dan- 
 ger at hand: she sheltered her keen eyes, 
 scanning the fields and crooked roads 
 leading to the house ; but not a living 
 object appeared on the wide, solitary 
 space. Once she fancied she saw a 
 shadow pass and repass behind a high- 
 set Osage-orange hedge below the bridge, 
 stealthy and watchful as a panther ; but 
 the next moment it so blended and was 
 lost with the flickering shadows of the 
 trees about it that she knew she had 
 been mistaken. Which mischance of 
 poor Dallas' past hfe or ill luck of the 
 future had taken shape now to harm 
 him .'' Why could he not be left to plod 
 along like all the rest of the common- 
 place world? thought Lizzy, impatiently, 
 forgetting that about the meanest of us 
 the panther-like dangers wait in the very 
 trees and houses, in the souls of passers- 
 by, only that God's arm and sunshine 
 are between us ; and we chatter as we 
 go of sunshine and houses, and nod to 
 the passers-by, and see nothing of God 
 or the death behind. So Dallas, v/aiting 
 until late in the night for this crisis of 
 his life which he fancied was upon him, 
 began to think, at last, the valley held 
 nothing more dangerous for him than 
 the shadows of the trees, and the throb, 
 perhaps, of the mill-engine. 
 
 He went off at a steady pace toward 
 the gap where the httle Indian Queen Inn 
 lay, to get his supper and a bed. Any 
 man meeting the sturdy young fellow 
 would have found something in his look 
 and bearing, stamped there during the 
 last five years, which said that he was, 
 more than other men, master of himself — 
 that wherever his future road might lead, 
 it would be one of his own choosing. 
 
 But behind the hedge a pompous, 
 well-dressed man sat, stroking his red 
 cheeks and black beard, waiting for him 
 to go ; and in the library a quiet old 
 man was carefully writing letters ; and, 
 in her chamber, Honora sat up in bed, 
 
74 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 shivering in her night-gown, reading Jay's 
 Evening Prayers to put some rebellious 
 thoughts out of her head ; and they all had 
 his future life in their hands, moulding, 
 moulding, moulding it, and knowing no 
 more what they did than the ebatichoir in 
 the hands of the sculptor, shaping a thing 
 which will curse or bless the world. 
 
 There was a holly-tree which Dallas 
 had once planted by his old shanty 
 in Manasquan, and which was putting 
 out its slow, prickly leaves, sturdily "de- 
 termined to hve," people said, passing 
 by. Yet, after all, the sunshine came 
 from beyond the boundary of the world 
 to warm it, and the nor'easters from be- 
 yond the sea tugged to tear it from the 
 roots, and the worms crept to its heart, 
 aiad the slow juices of the soil, distilling 
 there since the world was first made, en- 
 tered into its sap, and it lay in the work 
 of one and all of them to make it a heap 
 of rotten-wood manure or a tree. 
 
 Yet, when the end came, it would be 
 seen that they had but done as they 
 were bidden. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 With quick walking Dallas could have 
 reached the Indian Queen before mid- 
 night. But he ached in every joint. 
 He had gone directly from the Albany 
 prison to the cars, and it seemed to him 
 as if the weight of all his years of con- 
 finement were still upon his limbs, drag- 
 ging him down. He lagged more and 
 more, until he came to a great wood of 
 oaks and nut-trees. There was no more 
 walking that night for Dallas Galbraith. 
 He was at home now. He sHd his feet 
 along through the dry leaves until they 
 were up to his knees. It was so long 
 since he had heard that confidential, 
 crisp crackle ! He took off his cap to 
 feel the wind on his forehead, sniffed 
 the air slowly, recognizing one familiar 
 wood-scent and then another : then the 
 cap was thrown on the ground and the 
 canvas roll thrust into the hole of a 
 hollow tree, and he began to go about, 
 his eyes brightening, his ears set, from 
 tree to tree, from the muddy bank of the 
 
 creek into the brushwood, to and fro, 
 peering, smelling, tasting. Just as a 
 man would come back after long aosence 
 to the house where he was born, and 
 hurry nervously back and forth to find tire 
 old landmarks again, and the changes 
 which had of late crept in. Here m 
 this oak was a woodpecker's nest bur- 
 rowed through the fungus : he detected 
 it yards off by the faint, vile smell, and, 
 though the moonlight was clouded, Ik 
 found two mole-keeps under paw-paw 
 bushes, and about an ash bough, like a 
 ring, the varnished nest of the orange- 
 and-purple moth. The half-dried leaves 
 hang late on the trees of this wood, as 
 it lies low in a cove of the mountains. 
 Galbraith went from one old forest mon- 
 arch to the other, his hands clasped over 
 his head in his old, bopsh habit, putting 
 his ear to their trunks to discover if 1-te 
 could now, as he once did, name the tree 
 by the rustle of its leaves, smiling quietly 
 when he found he had not yet forgotten 
 their language. It seemed to him more 
 natural than any other. 
 
 After a while, as its naturalness grew 
 on him and its voices became more and 
 more those which he used to know, he 
 leaned against a gray old oak, quite still, 
 the large-featured, pale face pressed 
 against the rough bark. A Pagan might 
 have so leaned in those long-ago first daj'a 
 of the world, entreating, from the unseen 
 oracle within, counsel on the riddle of 
 his life — the love or the hate that vexed 
 his soul nigh to death ; but I doubt if 
 to this poor fellow, as he stood, came 
 one thought of Dallas Galbraith, his 
 petty wrongs or hopes. Yet I doubt 
 also if he was conscious that any voice 
 called to him from depths far underlying 
 his own mean Hfe, though the mother 
 Nature beneath him, from whose womb 
 we all came, and whose hold we thrust 
 from us unthankfully, tried to win back 
 this boy with an especial pathetic ten- 
 derness — a tenderness akin to that other 
 unknown Parent who had given him 
 life through her. Only a great quiet 
 came presendy to him through the in- 
 articulate murmur of the forest, as it did 
 when he was a boy ; and after a while 
 he heaped some dried leaves together, 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 75 
 
 as he used so often to do, and, button- 
 ing his coat about him, lay down and 
 slept until morning. 
 
 A cold wind, fresh from the frosty 
 chambers of the east, that forced his 
 eyelids open, and made him stand up 
 and run to and fro to warm his chilled 
 blood, his face heating, his eyes kindling ; 
 he, free to go where he would. Free ; 
 the woods, the valley full of homes, the 
 terrible mountains open to him, and, be- 
 yond, the great, untried world. No low 
 plaster ceiling between him and the 
 morning of the new day slowly unfolding 
 in heaven from dazzling wet depths of 
 pearl and rose : nothing to hinder him 
 if he chose to stand idle and watch the 
 shining flakes of mist hanging over some 
 of the far-off mountain lakes, as though 
 the spirit of the water, escaping from its 
 frozen body below, suffered the glitter of 
 its plumes to be seen by the sudden day. 
 Free — altogether free. 
 
 Here went a squirrel's scratching feet 
 through the leaves ; there was the Indian 
 Creek curdling over its lead-colored slate 
 bed ; underfoot, red, trumpet and purple 
 mosses were blackening : over all, the 
 white hoar-frost. One had need to waken 
 every morning for five years in one of 
 man's reformatory schools — a slimy stone 
 cell, with a solitarj- seat in one corner and 
 a cess-pool in the other — to understand 
 what God meant by these things. 
 
 Galbraith's body was as healthy as 
 that of a savage : consequently, he had 
 sprung up from his bed on the ground 
 with a new lightness and freedom from 
 ache, and went down to the creek to 
 bathe, whistling some of the old Mana- 
 squan songs. He threw himself into the 
 water, drank it, wrestled with it, shout- 
 ing breathlessly to himself, wishing he 
 had some hearty, good fellow to keep him 
 company. How alive it was ! how it 
 flashed, and held him down, and closed 
 over him ! He came out glowing, clean 
 without as within: the slimy cell, the 
 Galbraith house, the Something that was 
 always against him, all sunken into 
 miserable dyspeptic dreams. 
 
 As he dressed, he heard far-off voices 
 calling — a traveler on the road which he 
 had deserted hailing some laborer as 
 
 he passed. Galbraith Hstened without 
 change of countenance, though the voice 
 and the steps he had heard the evening 
 before both belonged to that nameless ill- 
 luck that had dogged and mastered him. 
 It was upon his trail again: he had 
 known that last night, with the first echo 
 of the coming footsteps. But what with 
 his freedom and the old wood-life come 
 back to him, the pompous, tempting 
 voice, and the vice and misery of which 
 it was the sign, seemed as trivial and far- 
 off a matter as the song of the bird from 
 yonder maple, and to call as little on him 
 for revenge. 
 
 The Spirit of Life may wait in a sleep 
 under the bare November trees, or a 
 plunge in the wood-creek, as ready as in 
 the water of the font to wash away sin. 
 
 Galbraith took down his precious roll 
 and buttoned it up again under his coat 
 " Now for breakfast !" striking out for 
 the road again. 
 
 He was as famished as a hound after 
 a day's run : after he had leaped the low 
 fence into the road, therefore, he did not 
 stop to look back. The traveler, wto 
 had caught sight of him when he first 
 left the woods, followed him unseen. 
 There was nothing stealthy in the man's 
 walk : it was slow, weighty, grandiloquent 
 — quite in keeping with his handsome, 
 portly figure and the superfine black 
 clothes that he wore. A magnificent 
 jetty beard rolled down over his wide 
 shirt front ; big carbuncles shone in his 
 breast and wristbands ; a topaz on his 
 thick, white finger. There was nothing 
 furtive in the dead black eye with which 
 he scanned boldly the trees and moun- 
 tains, as he would have done any earthly 
 potentate, weighing their value in his 
 own private, native-American scales. 
 Most men would have gone to him for 
 charity, if they needed it, and never have 
 been turned away empty. But no wo- 
 man would have asked it from him. He 
 had grown fat and scant o' breath in late 
 years, and puffed hard with the exertion 
 of keeping the lithe young fellow before 
 him in sight. He did it, however, drop- 
 ping hastily behind a friendly tree when- 
 ever Dallas turned his head to one side 
 or the other. He stopped, at last : Gal- 
 
1^ 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 braith had gone into a low stone house 
 built under the shelter of the hill. 
 
 " There, eh ? Now, as I've run him 
 to earth, I may as well go back to town 
 for my breakfast. I'll know where to 
 find him. An infernal run I've had, 
 from Albany to this backwoods ! I 
 wish the poor devil had a bottle from 
 my champagne basket. It's poor grub 
 he'll find yonder. Never travel without 
 your own provision — that's George Lad- 
 doun's advice." Which was the current 
 of his thought as he swelled and strode 
 and panted back to town. Nobody but 
 idiots think aloud, and George Laddoun 
 had learned by this time to keep his se- 
 cret opinions to himself, even about his 
 drink and " gmb." 
 
 The Indian Queen was just waking up. 
 It was a queer little hiding-place, built of 
 triangular wedges of stone, mortared with 
 what appeared to be yellow clay, and had 
 a solid, composed look at all times, ready 
 to drop off asleep in the very middle of 
 the day. As usual with country houses, 
 tlie trees were cut away from about it, and 
 the sombre shadow of the mountain fell 
 back from it, leaving it to put on its 
 brightest good-morning face for Gal- 
 braith. Any house that was a home 
 would have seemed heartsome to him 
 just then, so strong and zealous was he 
 to begin his life over again ; but, as it 
 was, never was such a welcome as that 
 of the homely little wood-snuggery. 
 There was a broad, short porch, hold- 
 ing out a hospitable greeting, with two 
 hickory-woven rocking-chairs on it, ready 
 and waiting night and day : there was 
 an open door, and a wide kitchen within. 
 Was ever a fire like that great ruddy 
 coal monster ? Was there ever a chub- 
 bier, tidier woman than the brisk little 
 landlady turning the buckwheat cakes ? 
 Never, when Galbraith was out in the 
 world, did they cram such small spaces 
 with such promise of good cheer : the 
 very walls inside were draped in hams 
 and links of sausage, and the porch was 
 a tangled web overhead of dried peaches 
 and onions. There was a mossy pump 
 and trough with one or two cows beside 
 it — a peculiar breed of cows, surely, 
 wonderfully fat and comfortable ; and a 
 
 boy in a red shirt stood pumping, and 
 hitching up his trowsers with the 
 other hand — a singularly honest-faced 
 boy ! 
 
 Dallas came up with his heart throb- 
 bing thick and hot. It had cost him 
 little to avow himself a convict to his 
 kinsfolk last night ; but now, if these la- 
 borers had looked suspicious or askance 
 at him, it would have been like a savage 
 blow in the face. 
 
 Washington, the cow-boy, however, 
 nodded patronizingly, giving his suspend- 
 ers an additional tug of courtesy. The 
 stranger was of another quality from the 
 wagoners \y\\o made the Indian Queen 
 their half-way house to the village. 
 " You're just in time," he said, nodding 
 to the steaming cakes inside. 
 
 Peggy Beck came herself to the door. 
 "You're for breakfast, sir?" She thought 
 the pale, leisurely man in black clothes 
 coming up the steps was an itinerant 
 preacher. 
 
 It marked a turning-point in his life, 
 that this clean, honest-eyed woman 
 should courtesy to him and say, " Sir." 
 He colored high. " Yes, I will go in," 
 he said. She ushered him into a square 
 little parlor, with striped carpet on the 
 floor, puffed muslin curtains, and a table 
 in the centre, with Lalla Rookh and a year- 
 old fashion-magazine on it : she pulled 
 out another hickory rocking-chair, padded 
 with Turkey-red cushions, for him, and 
 put a match to the wood and coal in 
 the shining grate, chattering about the 
 weather, and the road, and the markets 
 down below. Dallas sat looking in the 
 fire, rubbing his hands. 
 
 When the breakfast was spread before 
 him, she brought in pen and ink, and a 
 child's copy-book with a page or two of 
 scrawled names in front. She begged 
 his pardon, but " Beck, He was used to 
 being in large hotels before He was mar- 
 ried, and He had a fancy to kerry on the 
 house on the same plan. He'd got up 
 a register, as the gentleman would see, 
 for folks as stays over night. If he 
 (Dallas) would just enter his name 
 there V pointing to a blank where she 
 had calculated there was ample space 
 for the Rev. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 77 
 
 " My name ? — my name ?"' said Dal- 
 las, slowly, looking at the book. 
 
 Peggj- nodded and smiled, and swept 
 the plate of cold cakes from the table. 
 When she peeped in, after a while, Gal- 
 braith still sat looking at the copy-book, 
 tlie unused pen in his fingers. All that 
 these years had brought to him in which 
 he had been nameless and placeless in 
 tlie world came up before him. Once 
 or twice in that time he remembered he 
 had written notes to the prison warden, 
 asking for books and the like, and had 
 signed them " Seventy-nine." There 
 was no other identity for any man in 
 that living grave than the number of his 
 tomb. 
 
 Now — He looked up at the free 
 air, the blue sky outside. The tears 
 came into his eyes as though he had 
 been a woman. Then he pulled the 
 little book toward him, and, dipping 
 the pen in the ink, wrote, slowly and 
 carefully, Dallas Galbralt/t, looking at 
 it a long time after it was done. 
 
 Pegg}- carried it without a glance into 
 the kitchen, and then hurried to satisfy 
 her curiosity. The hand was uncertain 
 and shaky for so young a man, she 
 thought ; while there was passing 
 through Dallas' brain inside some con- 
 fused, half-understood words of a bap- 
 tismal service he had once seen: "A 
 death unto sin and a new birth unto 
 righteousness." 
 
 Every trifle about him conspired to 
 add to his content. When the heart of 
 the earth is warm, one can find flowers 
 in the poorest soil. Pegg}- had laid the 
 little table with her choice china cups 
 and a white napkin — things which be- 
 longed only to that long-ago part of 
 Dallas' hfe with his mother ; for, through 
 all their want, she had held to these Httle 
 outward shows. The old innocent time 
 was coming back then. Presently, too, 
 he heard Peggy's voice calling to Wash 
 to build a fire in Mr. Galbraith's room. 
 Now, Dallas had been a boy when taken 
 from Manasquan ; after that, a convict. 
 This name belonged to a man. respected 
 among men. The title which every ruf- 
 fian bears among us thrilled the poor 
 lad's blood. It put him, somehow, on 
 
 a solid foothold, from which the future 
 lay within his grasp. It "hailed him 
 thane, that should be king hereafter." 
 
 Then a little four-year old fellow, in a 
 blue blouse (on which Peggy had just 
 pinned a white collar), came shyly in 
 and stood wistfully inspecting first Gal- 
 braith and then the breakfast-table. 
 
 "My name's Matt," he volunteered. 
 
 "Will you shake hands w^ith me, 
 Matt.?" said Dallas, gravely. But he 
 did not hold out his hand until the boy 
 had put his own red little fingers on it. 
 
 "You had no honey for breakfast. 
 Matt ?" 
 
 He shook his head solemnly. 
 
 " Nor meat .'' Then here's a chair. 
 Don't take him away, madam. I'll have 
 him here, if you please. It's a long 
 time since I've had a guest, and I'd like 
 the child to be the first. Another clean 
 plate. And a napkin. Now, Matt ! 
 You're not half so hungiy as I am, VW. 
 venture." 
 
 " Lord, sir, you'll ruin the boy !" cried 
 Peggy, chuckling with delight. "He's 
 alius too forard, Matt is." 
 
 " I used to be very fond of children," 
 said Dallas. "We will be good friends 
 in a little time." 
 
 Pegg\- went out to meet her husband, 
 making haste to cram all her news, with 
 the final "peartness of Matt,'' into his 
 progress from the hay-mow to the house. 
 When Galbraith had finished eating and 
 went out, holding the boy by the hand 
 on the porch, he found Beck waiting for 
 him — a sandy-haired, stocky fellow, with 
 his trowsers thrust into his boots. 
 
 "Morning, sir!" nodding shortly. 
 
 Dallas took ofl" his cap and faced him 
 as he replied. If discovery or insult 
 was to come, the sooner he met it the 
 better. But the close-cut hair conveved 
 no other meaning to the man's mind 
 than a new whim of the townsfolk. 
 
 "You've come from the country be- 
 low, I reckon, Mr. Galbraith. It's full 
 of your kin down thar. They do say, 
 ther's been as many as thirty Galbraiths 
 voted on election. But I don't fad 
 myself with such things. I grind my 
 own grist, / do." 
 
 "A safe plan, I think." 
 
78 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 "You're goin' out for a walk, sir? 
 Kind of colporture, now ?" 
 
 " No. I thought I detected a species 
 of marl in your soil yesterday — " 
 
 " Hey ? What say ?" 
 
 " Marl," in an explanatory tone. " And 
 I'd like to look into it. Your little boy 
 can go with me ?" 
 
 " Matt ? Well, now, what for would 
 you be bothered with Matt ? Lord, 
 Peggy, what's the odds for the child's 
 new hat ? She's like a cluckin' hen. 
 Peg is ! And you're going to look for 
 marl ? Toh be sure — toh be sure !" 
 watching him go down the hill with a 
 perplexed shake of the head. 
 
 It was near dusk before Dallas re- 
 turned. Beck and his wife were keep- 
 ing watch for him on the porch, while a 
 compact, business-like looking man, in a 
 working suit of gray cassimere, stood 
 impatiently switching his boot with his 
 whip on the lower step. His horse was 
 waiting by the post. 
 
 " Yon's he, Mr. Evans," said Peggy, 
 as Galbraith came up the hill with Matt 
 riding pick-a-back on his shoulders, the 
 two talking earnestly, as though they 
 were both men grown. 
 
 " He answers the description." The 
 stranger inspected Dallas keenly as he 
 came up and, shding Matt off, bowed in 
 his usual grave manner to the group on 
 the porch. 
 
 " Matt and I are ready for supper, 
 Mrs. Beck," he said ; and then, without 
 farther notice of any of them, sat down 
 on the steps, and began to unload, out 
 of his hat, his pockets and bundles se- 
 cured in his shirt-bosom, bits of rock, 
 earths and roots. 
 
 " It's the man," whispered Evans, 
 nodding confidently to Beck and his 
 wife. " Been pros-pecting the country 
 around, sir ? Sile's poor 's high as this. 
 Needs manure." 
 
 " You have it ready for use," without 
 looking up from his work. " I find cal- 
 careous matter through all the shale, 
 which is nothing else than marl. Im- 
 pure, but you would find it serve. I 
 am surprised that it is not used." 
 
 " Calcarous, eh ?" doubtfully, rubbing 
 his chin. "Like as not I'm not up 
 
 in them things. What I am up in," 
 briskly, " is work to be done and money 
 to pay for it I give good wages." 
 
 Beck and Peggy had retreated to the 
 kitchen for form's sake, but left the door 
 open to listen. In this sparsely-settled 
 mountain district, where every man, or- 
 dinarily, drudged on at the same work 
 from boyhood until old age, the offer 
 which Evans had come to make ap- 
 peared to them a something out of the 
 rules of nature. But Dallas, with his 
 brows knit, was sorting his stones, hav- 
 ing forgotten, apparently, there was any- 
 thing in the world outside of them. 
 
 "Look hyah, sir!" said Evans, raising 
 his voice ; " I'm on business, d'ye see ? 
 I have a stone-quarry some miles from 
 hyah, and I'm on the look-out for men 
 to work it — strong, able-bodied fellars. 
 Seems to me you're of that make." 
 
 " What's the color of your stone ?" 
 looking up eagerly. "Olive and buff? 
 How high does it lie over the coal-beds ?" 
 
 " High enough for the beasts to have 
 a devil of a pull up. As for the color, 
 you'd best come look for yourself" 
 
 " I will. Rogers suggests, I remem- 
 ber, that, in the high micaceous sand- 
 stone of this range, there is a probability 
 of finding Permian fossils. I'd be sorry 
 to neglect such a chance." 
 
 " That's as you choose. But I came 
 on business," sharply. " If you want 
 steady work till winter sets in, I'll give 
 it to you. I was directed to — that is, 
 I'll make you a fair offer." 
 
 " Work ? In the stone-quarrj' ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 While Evans waited impatiently for 
 his answer, DaUas turned over his bits 
 of coal critically, but with his wide mouth 
 shut firmly. He was going back to the 
 seaboard cities to begin life afresh, but 
 he must see Lizzy again. And his moth- 
 er? He had carried the glimpse he had 
 of her last night all day in his heart — 
 beautiful, richly clothed, gay — under all 
 his plodding meditations on coal and 
 earths. There was something in the 
 picture which gave a sore pain to his 
 simple, affectionate nature. He was glad 
 she was clothed in purple and fine linen 
 every day, but the remembrance of the 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 79 
 
 purple and linen made him feel more 
 tlian ever like Lazarus, who lay in rags 
 and sores outside of the palace gates. 
 She should not be ashamed of him. 
 She should not see or know him until 
 he was worthy of her. He would hurry 
 to the East, find his fitting work and 
 make himself a man. But, before he 
 went, he meant to steal one last look at 
 the sweet old familiar face. He must 
 take care of Lizzy, too, and — There 
 was a shadow of danger which he would 
 not fly from. But he had no money to 
 pay these good people for his board be- 
 yond to-night. 
 
 He put down his coal and turned to 
 Evans. " I'll work for you six hours a 
 day, at current prices, for two weeks, per- 
 haps longer." 
 
 "And dictate your own terms ? That's 
 not the custom with my hands. But so 
 be it ; you're a pecoolar case. I'm not 
 the owner of the quarry. You'll come 
 to work to-morrow. Only six hours, 
 eh?" 
 
 « I will not work full time," gathering 
 up his specimens composedly. " There 
 are matters that I must attend to. And 
 I want to look into the structure of this 
 bituminous trough of the AUeghenies. 
 It is new to me." 
 
 "Well, good-day. I've done my part. 
 The fellow's in a groove now, I reckon, 
 that'll take him into luck if he's the right 
 grit in him," he said, in a mysterious 
 undertone, to Beck, when he came down 
 to untie his horse, and then, tapping his 
 old felt hat, he rode off. 
 
 When he reached the brow of the 
 next hill he met a horseman coming 
 into the road from a by-path, but riding 
 so leisurely, and turning so promptly in 
 the same direction as himself, that it 
 occurred to Evans, afterward, he had 
 been lying there in wait for him. He was 
 careful to bow as they exchanged good- 
 day : he flattered himself that he knew the 
 gentleman when he saw him ; and there 
 was no mistaking the polish of this man. 
 It asserted itself from his fine open face to 
 his fashionably-made boots. There was 
 no blinding Evans in matters of this sort. 
 They fell into talk as they jogged along. 
 Such a flow of language as the stranger 
 
 had ! Such ktiowledge of the resources 
 of West Virginia, though he confessed 
 he had been here but two days ! How 
 the mysteries of " two-thirds representa- 
 tion," "black basis" and the like rattled 
 from his tongue ! 
 
 Presently, in a break of the discussion, 
 he said, carelessly: "You came up from 
 the Indian Queen ? There's a stranger 
 there — a young fellow that I used to 
 know — how is this they call him ?" 
 
 " Galbraith ?" 
 
 "True, true! His own name, eh?" 
 with an astonishment which he tried in 
 vain to hide. 
 
 " Why, what other should he have ?" 
 
 "None other. Only some men," with 
 a loud laugh, " use their names as they 
 do their cloaks — put them off and on to 
 suit the weather. Not that Galbraith is 
 one of that sort. He's an old chum of 
 mine — a clever, honest fellow. By-the- 
 bye, he has some kinsfolk in this part 
 of the State ?" 
 
 "Very far-off kin of them old country 
 people, I judge. They're well-to-do. 
 I've just hired him as hand in my stone- 
 quarry." 
 
 " You have ?" The news seemed to 
 affect the man curiously, considering its 
 trivial importance, Evans thought ; he 
 rode on in silence, a gloomy depression 
 growing visible on his face, and when 
 he spoke, did it with a nervous effort at 
 gayety. At the first cross-road he turned, 
 touching his hat courteously. 
 
 " Glad to have met you," said Evans. 
 " Call at my house if you're long in this 
 part of the country. Introduce you to 
 my wife and daughters." 
 
 "You tempt me, sir. Woman, fair 
 woman !" pressing his fat, white hand 
 to his breast. "That's the toast I drink ! 
 But I will not stay. I came here on 
 business that brought me from Califor- 
 nia, and I see it's hkely to be a miser- 
 able flash in the pan, after all." 
 
 Having left Evans, he put his horse 
 into a gallop to ride off" some secret irri- 
 tation, and apparently succeeded, for 
 when he reached the village tavern he 
 got off in his usual glow of good humor, 
 joking in a lofty way with the loafers in 
 the bar-room as he passed through. 
 
8o 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Going to his own room, he dashed off a 
 letter, part of which ran as follows : 
 
 " I trust you will not blame me for my 
 failure, McGill. No man could have 
 more influence than I to push the mat- 
 ter in New York. George Laddoun's 
 name, I will say, carries weight there. 
 But it was no go. The market's over- 
 stocked by bogus California companies : 
 the solid men laugh at the very mention 
 of ranches or mines, and the solid men 
 were what we wanted. I'm afraid it is 
 all up with us on that count. There 
 was another matter which brought me 
 home at this particular season, which I 
 did not mention to you. An old friend 
 of mine had been in trouble, and I 
 thought the time had come when I could 
 give him a helping hand. Before God, 
 Mac, I'd rather have hoisted that poor 
 wretch on to good ground again than 
 have cleared half a million by our plan. 
 But having tracked him out here, I find 
 that there is a chance of his falling heir 
 to a good estate. If that's the case, as 
 soon as he is placed we are sure of effi- 
 cient help from him. I think I deserve 
 it from him. I took the fellow out of 
 tlie gutter, though I don't like to boast 
 of such matters. If he don't do it will- 
 ingly, I've a way to leech him. I can 
 draw on him for what cash I please. 
 He has a bad record, has Dall, and I 
 fancy it would surprise his family here 
 to see it opened up. But the business 
 must necessarily be slow. I should not 
 wonder if I came out to you in the spring, 
 and let it lay over until it is ripe. Mean- 
 while — " etc., etc. 
 
 The letter was mailed that night, di- 
 rected, in Laddoun's bold, clerkly hand, 
 to J. T. McGill, San Francisco. 
 
 Meanwhile, Dallas sat eating his sup- 
 per, with Matt beside him, until that 
 small comrade's ambition gave out and 
 he fell asleep in his high chair. Beck 
 and his wife, with one excuse after 
 another, came in afterward and talked 
 until bed-time, finding Galbraith, as 
 Peggy reported, " the quietest man she 
 knowed, but with a laugh that was 
 heartenin' when it broke out. And as 
 curous to hear our talk of how people 
 
 lived hyah as if he'd been blind and deaf 
 aU his days." 
 
 Galbraith, going up to his room, found 
 white walls, a white bed and a crackling 
 fire. He put away his treasures of ore 
 and coals on the mantel-shelf with a 
 proud sense of possession, and sat look- 
 ing into the fire a long time. It seemed 
 to him as if in this pure little closet, 
 among these honest people, he was 
 launched, and had sailed a long way on 
 his new hfe, leaving the miserable shore 
 far behind. It was a new world in 
 which he found himself— one to which 
 Peggy might well guess he had long 
 been deaf and Wind. Decent, simple, 
 kindly. The old Manasquan air was 
 about him again. Then the hobby of 
 his Hfe rose uppermost in the man's 
 mind : the faces of two or three children 
 he had seen during his confinement came 
 before him, as they always did now when 
 he was alone, but this time only to make 
 the blood quicken and his eye flash. 
 
 " I'll give the httle ones a chance," 
 he muttered. " It is not so hard as I 
 thought to clear myself and them of that 
 filth of hell." 
 
 It did not seem hard to him, as he 
 undressed and lay down to sleep, to 
 make anything he pleased of them and 
 of himself Galbraith's narrow brain 
 would hardly give birth to any imper- 
 sonal scheme of philanthropy. It was 
 not love of humanity that made him a 
 reformer, but a simple love of children, 
 and a resolve, born long ago in the ex- 
 tremity of his pain, to keep back from 
 them the wolf that had so sorely torn his 
 own flesh. He did not leave himself 
 out of the question either : he meant to 
 be cultured, efficient — whatever the best 
 man was, up in that better world in which 
 he meant to take his part. There were 
 some dumb words, some vague hunger 
 within him, which he had tried to ex- 
 press in the poor daubs of pictures which 
 lay under his pillow. He touched them 
 tenderly. He believed that even yet he 
 should find language through them. 
 
 Most of all, he thought he would like 
 to go back to Manasquan some day, and 
 that the people there should know him 
 to be innocent, and be friendly with him, 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Si 
 
 as they once were. But that could never 
 be. Never. There was no way on 
 earth of clearing himself of that stain. 
 
 All of Galbraith's ambitions and plans 
 were as yet bloodless and colorless com- 
 pared to those of ordinary young men. 
 Of money, because of the peculiar cir- 
 cumstances of his life, he did not know 
 the power. Of women, since he was a 
 boy he had seen only those who were 
 harder and coarser than men. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Paul Dour, going out for a stroll in 
 the bright Indian summer morning, saw 
 Miss Dundas' horse and her uncle's 
 brought up to the gate for them to mount. 
 1 1 generally chanced that he was near when 
 it was time for Miss Dundas to mount. 
 Little, plump Gerty Rattlin was going 
 through the garden- walks cutting crimson 
 seed-vessels from the roses, and wild cot- 
 ton-pods for a berry-pot. She generally 
 was gathering berries for that pot when 
 Paul went out for a stroll. 
 
 He saw her bewitching face peeping at 
 him through the bare grape vines, a cherry- 
 colored web of chenille tied over her dark 
 curls ; so he called to her " Red Riding 
 Hood," and bade her take care lest she 
 meet the wolf in the way ; and then saun- 
 tered on more rapidly to the gate, with a 
 ver\- unnecessary heat in his cheeks, while 
 the heart began to throb under Gert}-'s 
 tight- laced jacket, as she snipped at the 
 stems with her scissors. What did he 
 mean by that ? He must mean something 
 by that. Perhaps the wolf was — Love. 
 He had such an unusual, poetic way of 
 putting things ! The little woman was 
 quite willing to meet that wolf in the 
 garden. For two weeks she had been 
 waiting for his coming, her stupid heart 
 in an agony of hope and fear. She was 
 calmer this morning. Last night Paul 
 had held her little, fat hand in his, and 
 offered to tell her fortune, '-if there were 
 a solitar}' wrinkle in the soft, rosy thing." 
 That meant even,lhing, of course ! She 
 did not go to her mother or Rose with the 
 story, as she had when John Stokes, in the 
 6 
 
 village, so nearly proposed : she laid awake 
 all night hugging the words in her heart, 
 pressing all the sweetness out of them. 
 
 She went up the hill for some brown 
 pine-cones (you could see the gate from 
 the pines). On the path she saw a bit 
 of paper in which Dour had wrapped 
 some cigars, and picked it up with a 
 frightened glance around ; the twist 
 was in it fresh from his fingers, the 
 odor was the same which hung about 
 his clothes. She held it to her cheek, 
 and then, her forehead all red and damp, 
 hid it in her bosom. The smell of Killi- 
 kinick was sweeter to her to-day than 
 attar of roses. Some day, instead of a 
 poor bit of paper, it would be himself 
 that would belong to her ! 
 
 Then rose the spectre of a Gerty Rat- 
 tlin, lean and soured and shabby. That 
 old-maid spectre has a malignant power 
 over girls of Gerty's stamp. She turned 
 from it and followed Dour direct to the 
 garden-gate. She found Honora mounted 
 when she came up, and Dour leaning on 
 the gate watching her. She wondered, 
 with a quick pang, if he noticed the 
 satiny cloth in Miss Dundas' green habit, 
 or knew the cost of the velvet hat daintily 
 set on her brown hair. As for Honora, 
 inside of the habit, she was nothing to 
 the other girl but a silly child. Paul 
 knew, by the tingling of his blood, that 
 Gerty and her berry-pot were at hand ; 
 but he could not afford to let his blood 
 counsel him in this matter. This mo- 
 ment of mounting was almost his only 
 daily chance of approaching Honora: 
 old Mr. Galbraith's quiet, amused glances 
 had few terrors to him, compared to the 
 fierce old duenna's sarcasms yonder in 
 the house. And Gerty. he thought, as 
 he cut the final notches in a willow whip 
 he was fashioning for Honora — Gerty 
 was but a beautiful domestic animal. It 
 was an intellectual helpm.eet a man of 
 his calibre needed. I3eside.s — Madam 
 Galbraith, he saw had no mind to make 
 a protege of him ; so if fate put a for- 
 tune in his way. he would be a fool not 
 to pick it up. And to marry Love and a 
 troop of semi-paupers like the Rattlins ! 
 He was no Issachar to make an ass of 
 himself for life between two such burdens. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAIJH. 
 
 All this as he shaped the pretty little 
 whip. He held it up. "See, Miss 
 Dundas. It is a wand which one of 
 the dryads has sent you." 
 
 The " silly child" looked solemn as 
 an owl down at him from her deep-set, 
 brilliant eyes. " I am very much obliged 
 to you, Mr. Dour — the dryad, I mean. 
 We are late, uncle!" nervously puUing 
 her rein and cantering off. " You see I 
 was terribly in the way," mysteriously, 
 when Mr. Galbraith reached her side. 
 " Gerty and he were out walking. It is 
 very pleasant to watch people in love," 
 with a little breath of a sigh. 
 
 "It must be very pleasant to be in 
 love such fine weather as this," said her 
 uncle, gravely, with a quizzical side glance 
 at her. 
 
 "Yes, I think so," soberly. She 
 drew off her glove, but when she took 
 the whip in her bare hand, it was yet 
 warm from contact with Dour's fingers. 
 She threw it down with a shrug of her 
 shoulders, at which her uncle smiled. He 
 always suspected the personal instincts 
 of the cool-mannered little body to be 
 more vehement and strong than a man's. 
 Yet, after all, Honora's antipathy to 
 Dour was natural. No man is an in- 
 different object to a woman who never 
 has loved. Until the needle finds the 
 pole, it sways to and fro, attracted and 
 repulsed, with many a pang. 
 
 They made a pretty picture riding 
 tlirough the woods in alternate light and 
 shadow. Paul Dour looked after them. 
 It was, after all, a great relief when his 
 efforts at gallantry with Miss Dundas 
 were safely over for the day. His jokes, 
 his elaborated wit, his delicate allusions, 
 full of college lore, seemed lO fall on 
 her brain like Puck's fairy shafts on 
 muddy clay. There was no response. 
 But wisdom counseled him to persevere. 
 An heiress who did not know her value 
 in the market was a something not to 
 be found twice in life. He put on an 
 armor of severe reserve when he turned 
 to Gerty. Before he spoke, nature, 
 however, had the dull country girl ready 
 armed with her best weapons. She 
 held up her berries, modestly blushing : 
 there was an uneasy srnile on her irxex- 
 
 pressive, baby-face terribly pathetic to 
 Dour, and the wind, or something more 
 bitter, had forced tears into her eyes. 
 It would be brutal not to praise her 
 berries. He would even walk with the 
 lonely little thing back to the house. 
 
 It was one of those days when the de- 
 parting summer turns back to give to the 
 earth a farewell embrace, full of the pas- 
 sion and pathos of remembrance. The 
 dead leaves crisped drearily beneath their 
 feet, the shadows of the branches flickered 
 on her drooping head, the soft curls, the 
 wet pink cheeks. He did not walk with 
 her to the house. There was a quiet lane 
 over which the arching trees met, shading 
 the path even where the leaves were 
 gone. Dour touched her arm and led 
 her into it. Some power stronger than 
 wisdom was at work with him, putting 
 the heiress in her true light as a weari- 
 some prig, converting the world into a 
 triumphal throne, on which he, Paul Dour, 
 sat regnant in this rare, dreamful day 
 alone, with one worshiper at his feet 
 Then some nobler impulse rose and 
 slowly mastered him. What could God 
 give him on this golden morning so 
 good as this loving woman ? He leaned 
 over her, his eyes upon her face. The 
 woody scent of the berries came up to 
 Gerty; the lane was long: she could 
 almost feel his breath on her cheek. 
 Through all the years that went before 
 or came after, that hour on the Indian 
 summer morning stood out alone for ever 
 in Gerty's shallow life. 
 
 They came to a little gate over which 
 a woodbine had cHmbed. It hung from 
 the trellis now in a black, tangled web, 
 framing the girl like a luscious bit of 
 coloring, shutting her out from the world. 
 Now, Gerty was one of those pulpy, 
 dumpling, pink-tinted girls whom even 
 women like to kiss and fondle, as they 
 do babies. It was not the philosopher 
 Paul Dour that stooped over her breath- 
 less and took her hand. It was a better 
 man, perhaps, inside of that educated 
 personage : the philosopher knew the 
 cost of marriage, now-a-days, to the 
 price of a pound of butter : all his 
 pockets were buttoned against it. 
 
 " You look now as you did the day I 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 83 
 
 first saw you, witli your hair blown about 
 your face. I thought Love himself must 
 have just such an arch, coaxing smile. 
 Whom did you love then. Gerty ?" 
 
 " Father and mother and Tony and 
 Rosy." Gerty called off the roll of the 
 Rattlins with an unsteady whisper, John 
 Stokes suggesting himself secretly to her, 
 but being rejected with scorn. 
 
 "And now, Gerty — now?" shutting 
 his lips hard as he waited for her an- 
 swer. 
 
 She turned her big, deer-like eyes to 
 him, expectant, wistful. " Who should 
 I love ?" she said, faintly. Her crim- 
 son, dewy lips were near his own ; the 
 wind blew a tress of her shining hair 
 over his face. There was a moment of 
 silence, during which Paul Dour's thin 
 features grew very pale. Then he gently 
 put down the curl, and, taking out his 
 handkerchief, brushed some dust from 
 the knees of his best black trowsers. 
 
 "It must be near lunch-time," he said. 
 "Rosy will laugh at us if we stand here 
 starving all morning." 
 
 When he had escorted her to the door 
 he strolled off, mentally clapping himself 
 on the shoulder. "You're an honorable 
 man, Paul Dour!" he said. "Most men 
 would have kissed that girl's Hps," think- 
 ing in his secret soul that he would give 
 ten years of his life for the right to kiss 
 them. Gerty ran up to her room, all 
 flushed and breathless, and, not finding 
 Rosy there, threw herself on the bed and 
 sobbed a while, getting up twice to peep 
 in the glass, to see how she had looked 
 through it all. It was so kind in Honora 
 to give her that lovely cherry-colored 
 hood ! Then she went into her mother's 
 room, and, finding her all askew and be- 
 sieged by the children, began to straighten 
 her dress and comb her gray hair, stoop- 
 ing to kiss it now and then. Some day 
 she would be rich and able to dress the 
 dear little mother in silks as rich as Mrs. 
 Duffield's ! And the children should 
 never know the hard times which she 
 and Rosy had felt. Never ! Paul was 
 the good angel who would carry them 
 all through. 
 
 Honora, meanwhile, had dragged her 
 uncle about to half the farms in the 
 
 neighborhood, as she did whenever he 
 was tractable ; sitting in the house, si- 
 lently listening to the women discussing 
 the last meeting of the Female Mite So- 
 ciety, while he gravely inspected pig-pens 
 and orchards. He rebelled, finally, when 
 Squire Pool's gate closed behind them. 
 
 " I'm going up to the mountains now," 
 solemnly. " My brain has been sub- 
 merged in gossip long enough, Honora, 
 for sound health. I think the very foun- 
 tains of it must have been broken up at 
 the last sewing-circle. You have an in- 
 satiable thirst for that thing. Pet. You 
 sit dumb, drinking it in as a sponge would 
 water. Never a drop oozes back again, 
 though. It comforts me to see tliat," 
 with a half-anxious scrutiny of her face. 
 Honora was a study of which he never 
 grew weary. 
 
 She laughed, blushing uneasily. 
 " Where will we ride, uncle .?" 
 
 " Up the mountain, if you will. • To 
 the stone-quarry. Evans has employed 
 some new men, whom I should like to 
 see." 
 
 " I'll race with you to the creek, 3'on- 
 der ?" 
 
 " Very well." Honora came in first, 
 delighted as a child, scarcely noticing 
 that the anxious look had not left her 
 companion's face when he rode up. She 
 went before, after that, singing to her- 
 self, stopping to gather ferns from the 
 overhanging rocks, calling back to him 
 now and then. They were deep in the 
 mountains, and the day was far beyond 
 noon, when a sullen thunder, echoing 
 through the peaks, warned them that 
 the quarry was at hand. 
 
 " I did not know that they were blast- 
 ing rock to-day. Ride slowly, Honora, 
 until I prevent them from lighting an- 
 other fuse." 
 
 She nodded gayly and fell back, patting 
 her pony's neck. Mr. Galbraith drew 
 his rein as he passed her, and scanned 
 her quickly from head to foot. It was 
 a speculative, critical look, as if he were 
 about to bring her before some tribunal, 
 and wished to judge of the effect which 
 she would produce. But Honora saw 
 nothing of it. He rode away slowly, 
 going round a bend of the mountain and 
 
84 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 out of sight. She grew tired, after a 
 while, of pacing her pony to and fro on 
 the httle plateau where he had left her, 
 and began to inspect a dusky, half-worn 
 path leading into the forest of gloomy 
 oaks. What woman can resist a mys- 
 terious, unknown road ? 
 
 " Maybe it is a path which the ghosts 
 of the dead Cherokees have made at night 
 in their old hunting-grounds while the 
 pale-faces are asleep among the hills," 
 thought Honora. "Or I might find 
 Giant Despair in there, or Doubting Cas- 
 tle ;" and, smiling to herself, yet with 
 her heart beating a little faster, she dis- 
 mounted, and, tying her horse to a tree, 
 threw her skirt over her arm and pushed 
 aside the prickly bushes which had 
 guarded the entrance to the path. The 
 forest which she entered extended over 
 the most desolate and solitary recesses 
 of the mountains. The path but skirted 
 its edge : the dead leaves of many years 
 were heaped on each side in rotten, yel- 
 low masses against the rocks. She made 
 her way through the gray-bearded trunks 
 of the gigantic oaks and white-ash that 
 frowned and nodded above, holding sol- 
 emn converse together up in the sunlight, 
 as they had done for centuries. Her 
 human voice or human steps made no 
 more bruit in their slow, incomprehen- 
 sible life than the worm sliding across 
 their roots. Honora was always strangelv 
 oppressed by the meanings of the dumb 
 world about her. She hurried now out 
 from the vast solitude and twilight to 
 find the open day. The very sunlight 
 seemed to have lost its every-day cheer- 
 fulness, and to belong to a world wherein 
 the earth and the sea and the sky held 
 council together as the ages passed. 
 The little girl shrank within herself in 
 the silence. She was dwarfed into some- 
 thing miserably small and shallow : she 
 thought suddenly, she knew not why, of 
 her crochet, of her whole paltry, dawd- 
 ling hfe. Coming out from the path, for 
 she dared not follow it farther, she stood 
 suddenly on a ledge of the precipice. 
 There was a silence that might be felt. 
 Was it here that these eternal hills held 
 hid their secret ? Down at her feet a 
 wide chasm opened out to the distant 
 
 horizon, a sluggish, chocolate-colored 
 stream dragging through it, shining with 
 a dull lustre in tl|p sun. On either side 
 the sky rested on the round, clayey moun- 
 tain-tops, while a sirong wind drove the 
 rack of torn, dun-colored clouds perpet- 
 ually to the west. The mountain-sides 
 had been lately drained by tempests ; 
 near her, masses of forest trees had been 
 wrenched out and fallen together, leaving 
 great, dripping wounds in the leaden 
 shale ; farther off rose the ledges of the 
 Old Red sandstone, streaked as with veins 
 of blood, and uncovered to the day but for 
 the black creepers that draped and waved 
 over the whole mountain's side. Beyond 
 was the limestone rock — a white, wan, 
 implacable rampart, lost in the far dis- 
 tance, barring out the outer world. 
 
 Honora turned her back on it all. 
 "Day unto day uttereth speech," she 
 thought, humbly, " but not for such as I." 
 
 The sun shone pleasantly on the deep 
 grass under her feet. The ledge was 
 wide and sheltered, and there, curled 
 up by the rock, sat a boy watching her— 
 a queer, quick-eyed little fellow, his 
 clothes cut like a man's. Honora went 
 up to him quickly and took his hand. 
 If she too had been a child, one would 
 have suspected that she was afraid. 
 
 " I am very glad to see you," she 
 said, with a nervous laugh. " I'm very 
 glad. It is Matt, isn't it, from the In- 
 dian Queen ? How did you come here. 
 Matt .?" 
 
 " Pick-a-back. I comes every day. 
 I don't know you, though." 
 
 "Well, that doesn't matter. You'd 
 like me if you did. What have you 
 under your hat there ?" 
 
 She sat down on a boulder beside 
 him as she spoke, glancing uneasily into 
 the woods. She was sure her uncle 
 would follow, and, to tell the truth, she 
 had not courage to go baclt into the 
 ghostly wilderness. " What have you 
 hid there. Matt .?" 
 
 Matt gravely took up his little hat, 
 and a six-inch handkerchief spread out 
 carefully beneath it, and revealed a heap 
 of bits of yellow ivory, shells and flakes 
 of shale. Honora gathered up a hand- 
 ful eagerly. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 85 
 
 " What are they, child ? Did you 
 gather tliem ? You are an uncanny little 
 body to find such things in the moun- 
 tains. There's writing on them !" hold- 
 ing the shale close to her eyes. 
 
 "He'll read it for you," said Matt, 
 composedly. 
 
 "Who'll read it.? It was the dead 
 Indians who left this letter, I think." 
 
 ^' Did they?" said Matt, to some one 
 behind her, and Honora, turning, saw a 
 tall, powerfully-built man standing on 
 tlie edge of the wilderness from which 
 she had just escaped. 
 
 "No; I do not think the dead In- 
 dians wrote it," he said, quietly to her, 
 as if continuing some conversation 
 dropped an hour before. "It is the 
 print of a fern-leaf that grew a great 
 many centuries before there were either 
 men or living animals on this continent 
 Will you let me look at it ?" 
 
 As he turned it over in his palm, 
 Honora ventured to take a breathless 
 survey of him. He was clothed in a 
 workman's gray trowsers and blouse, his 
 brawny arms and throat bare ; a hammer 
 stuck in his belt ; his motions slow and 
 powerful ; his looks and words slow, 
 thoughtful, as one unused to talk with 
 men. Since she was a child Honora 
 had been reading the countenances of 
 men and women with the hungry, un- 
 failing instinct of a hound. It was her 
 one knowledge. But this man's face 
 called to her to halt, to show her own 
 countersign. Yet he did not look at or 
 seem to regard her: she had ample time 
 to find what secret meaning she could 
 in the heavy forehead, the simple, steady 
 eyes, the benignant mouth, while he 
 stood silent holding the fossil to the 
 light. 
 
 While he stood silent, the man, Dal- 
 las, was waiting for her to read him. 
 The moment he came out from the 
 woods, though her back was toward 
 him, he remembered her. While he 
 was answering her, in his cool, lethargic 
 tone, he remembered how she had put 
 her hand once in his, and said, " I believe 
 in you." In his hand. He was a con- 
 vict then. Now he had begun his new 
 life : he had gone up on the level where 
 
 she stood. He had spoken to her, and 
 then waited to find if she would remem- 
 ber his voice. What was she to him } 
 Why need he, as he turned over the 
 poor bit of shale, grow sick at heart as 
 never before lest she should recognize 
 him ? He had seen a puzzled glimmer 
 of recollection on her face when he first 
 spoke, but it was gone when he looked 
 up keenly at her, having waited long 
 enough for her to identify him. 
 
 " I can show you a letter which the 
 Indians did leave for you to read, if you 
 care to see it," he said then, stooping 
 to turn over Matt's heap of treasures. 
 While he was searching he heard steps 
 approaching, and a gray-headed old gen- 
 tleman, his overcoat tightly buttoned 
 over his spare chest, came out from tlie 
 forest, his thin face flushed and anxious. 
 "You frightened me greatly, Nora," be 
 said, gently, not heeding the man. 
 
 Dallas stood up, and, bowing, looked 
 him directly in the face. His grand- 
 father's eyes would doubtless be more 
 vigilant and suspicious than this young 
 girl's. If he was to be dragged back 
 again into that old slough of disgrace, 
 so be it ! He had thought over his 
 whole life coolly in the last two weeks : 
 there was no way while he lived of prov- 
 ing his innocence of that crime of Lad- 
 doun's for which he had suffered the 
 penalty, and he had come to regard it 
 as he might a leprous taint which chance 
 had left on him, and which no virtue or 
 effort of his own would affect. It was 
 the unrighteous, damned spot that would 
 not out. 
 
 It would be but natural and right if 
 the old man would bid him begone from 
 the girl's presence. Again he waited in 
 silence. 
 
 But Mr. Galbraith returned his bow 
 courteously, giving him only the indiffer- 
 ent, civil scrutiny which he would bestow 
 on any stranger. When Dallas spoke, 
 too, there was no interest beyond kindly 
 attention in his manner of listening. 
 
 " I thank you for your care of Miss 
 Dundas," he said, with his formal, old- 
 school air. 
 
 At that Dallas came a step closer to 
 them. An iron band seemed lifted from 
 
86 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 his heart for ever at that moment. His 
 dark blue eyes resting on their faces 
 without constraint, filled with a cordial 
 light new to them. He was coming to 
 his own slowly, but when the time came 
 they would not reject him. 
 
 When he spoke, however, it was in 
 his usual quiet tone. " I was going to 
 show this stone to Miss Dundas. I 
 helped to open a mound by the head- 
 waters of the creek yonder yesterday, 
 and I found it on the altar in the mid- 
 dle." 
 
 He handed Honora the stone, on which 
 were cut two or three hieroglyphics : her 
 uncle bent curiously over her shoulder. 
 
 " I am ashamed to say how ignorant 
 I am in such matters. You think this 
 was deposited there by the Cherokees .'' 
 Their hunting-grounds extended so far 
 north, I believe. Or there was an ear- 
 lier tribe — the Mannahoacs : am I right V 
 
 Dallas hesitated. " I beheve," he 
 said, modestly, "it is supposed that the 
 race who erected the river mounds were 
 extinct before any known tribes of In- 
 dians hunted here. I found bits of ivory 
 with the stone, which do not belong to 
 this country." 
 
 " What nation were they, then ?" 
 
 " I never heard the name. I do not 
 know what people would have been Hkely 
 to cross the sea so early. I know noth- 
 ing of history," with a humiliated look. 
 
 "It is less shameful to be ignorant of 
 the histories of old nations than of the 
 wonders which he under our feet, to 
 which I plead guilty," said Mr. Gal- 
 braith. " Now, you, I presume, have 
 made Indian antiquities a study ?" 
 
 " No ; only as they came in my way. 
 I have been grubbing and rooting al- 
 wa3'-s," with a light-hearted laugh. " I 
 have lived among plants and earths ; I 
 mean, when I could choose my life," a 
 sudden shadow crossing his face. "As 
 for study, when I found a line in a book 
 that helped me I never forgot it, of course. 
 But I had very few books." 
 
 If he spoke from any morbid fear that 
 they would overrate him and think him 
 an educated man, it was unnoticed by 
 Mr. Galbraith, who was intent upon the 
 stone. " I have been told that in the 
 
 heart of those mounds was generally 
 deposited, about one skeleton, a liver- 
 colored dust — the ashes of burned bodies 
 sacrificed at the chief's death. Did you 
 find it there .?" 
 
 Galbraith nodded, with a quick glance 
 at Honora. 
 
 "You did not tell me that?" she said. 
 
 " I could not speak of death to you. 
 I do not know why," he answered, 
 gravely. 
 
 " Will you allow me to look at your 
 fossils ?" asked her uncle, going over to 
 Matt and sitting down beside him, leav- 
 ing them standing alone together. 
 
 Honora had laid down the lettered 
 stone, and stood looking at the light 
 fern-stamp on the shale. It seemed to 
 belong to that awful world of dumb trees 
 and mountains and the eternal silent mo- 
 tions in the sky : it was a message from 
 long-ago ages coming to her direct, into 
 her commonplace, every-day life. Noth- 
 ing like this had ever touched her before. 
 neither from books nor men. She looked 
 up at Dallas, whose eyes were fixed in- 
 tently on her face. 
 
 " Where did you find this ?" 
 
 " On the other side of the mountain. 
 The coal is written over with them." 
 
 " I have seen it burned all my life 
 and knew nothing of it. I have ridden 
 over these Indian mounds every dav. 
 / did not know that there were mes- 
 sages from nations, whose very names 
 are forgotten, in them. They were only 
 so much clay and grass to me." 
 
 Galbraith smiled. But there was no 
 smile on Honora's awed face. 
 
 "And this httle leaf grew before God 
 made man ?" touching it reverently with 
 her finger. "And you can read the his- 
 tory of the Creation written on the rocks 
 as I would in the Bible ?" 
 
 " It is written more plainly here than 
 elsewhere," said Dallas, with more than 
 his usual effort. "There is a coal basin 
 beginning here and ending in Alabama, 
 and down its sides there are marks of 
 the last drainage of that great deep which 
 covered the earth before the light was. 
 I had read of it before. I am trying to 
 spell it out for myself now. Sometimes 
 it is as plain, even to me, as the ebbings 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 87 
 
 of the sea on shore when the tide is 
 out." 
 
 " You are trying to spell it out— j^?^ .?" 
 She looked up at him steadily a moment, 
 tlien her eyes fell. Her mind was filled 
 with vague thoughts of the rarely-remem- 
 bered time when " the evening and the 
 morning were the first day," and the 
 earth came forth for ever out of dark- 
 ness, written over with the records of 
 its past life. And this poor stone-cutter 
 had taught himself to spell those records 
 out ! Now, Honora had tried to read 
 books on Geology, and dozed over them 
 many a time. But the heart and secresy 
 of the mountains was different from a 
 printed page. And this man, who seem- 
 ed to her strangely akin to Nature, and 
 offered himself to her as its interpreter, 
 took a sudden place in her heated fancy 
 apart from all other men. 
 
 All women are alike : Rosy Ratthn, 
 making a Melancthon to herself out of 
 the first di\-inity student who is civil 
 to her, or ignorant Honora, her clear, 
 thoughtful face and luminous eyes down- 
 cast before Dallas, with his gray shirt 
 and few odd bits of knowledge. This 
 workman, she thought, full of simple 
 gravity and unconscious power, was fit 
 to live on the hills and read the testimony 
 of the rocks. Something in this fashion 
 must have looked and spoken, when the 
 world was young, those •' mighty men 
 that were of old — men of renown."' 
 
 She looked up and found again his 
 eyes intent on her own. The blood 
 rushed to her face as though he had 
 read her thoughts. 
 
 Her uncle rose suddenly. '> You have 
 been very successful. How do you find 
 time to make your researches ? You 
 have been working for the last two weeks 
 with Evans, I think V 
 
 " During part of the day only. That 
 is for money," smiling. " This is my 
 true work." 
 
 '•That is true. Come, Miss Dundas, 
 it grows late. We have to thank you 
 for much pleasure, sir," bowing formally 
 and turning toward the forest. Honora 
 hesitated. Was that all .? Was she to 
 mount her horse and ride home to sup- 
 per just as on other days ? As if this 
 
 man were a common laborer — as if the 
 mountains were not suddenly inscribed 
 for her with mysterious meanings, which 
 only he could read ? Why would her 
 uncle hurry back to the shallow, vulgar 
 life at the house ? Why could she not 
 sit on the rocks for ever and hear this 
 wonderful, dreadful story of lost races 
 and lost ages ? She stood slowly tying 
 her hat while Mr. Galbraith waited for 
 her. All that he thought of this man 
 was that he "worked for Evans." She 
 understood human nature. She never 
 had looked into eyes so strong and pure : 
 it was clear to her they never had known 
 any secrets but those of Nature. When 
 she had tied and re-tied her hat, and yet 
 neither of the men spoke a word which 
 would lead to delay, she held out the bit 
 of shale to Dallas. 
 
 " It is very wonderful," she said, "and 
 you were kind to explain it to me. I 
 know so Httle." She still looked at the 
 fern, as if her curiosity were not satis- 
 fied, cunningly hoping he would leave it 
 with her. There was a little drawer of 
 keepsakes, of which no one knew but 
 herself, where she would bestow it. 
 
 But downright Dallas took it from 
 her, as he supposed she meant him to 
 do. "I am glad I could give you any 
 pleasure," he said, and turned away to- 
 ward Matt. But only to straighten 
 that drowsy urchin's head : then he fol- 
 lowed Mr. Galbraith and Honora into 
 the woods. She could hear his steady 
 step coming through the crisp leaves 
 behind her and up to her side at last, 
 just as though he did not know that he 
 wore the workmen's gray flannel, and that 
 there was a great social gulf between 
 them. It proved how difterent he was 
 from other men. 
 
 He made no motion to speak to her, 
 however, but walked silently beside her 
 until they reached the open plateau 
 where her pony was fastened : stood, 
 too, gravely on one side while her uncle 
 assisted her to mount, and bade him 
 good-bye. Dallas bowed to them both 
 without a word, and watched them go 
 down the steep path, Mr. Galbraith cau- 
 tiously leading the pony. When they 
 were going round the spur of the moun- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 tain which would shut him out of sight, 
 Honora gave a quick glance backward, 
 and saw the gray, powerful figure still 
 motionless on the ledge, his face turned 
 toward her. As she rode on she puz- 
 zled herself in vain. What was the 
 meaning of the strange look he gave her 
 at parting, different from any which had 
 ever fallen on her ? There was nothing 
 in it which could bring a blush to her 
 cheek, yet her blood was stirred as by 
 some uncontrollable instinct. What 
 could this man ask of her ? It was a 
 wistful, questioning look which an exile 
 might give when the light of his home 
 began to shine upon him far off. It 
 was as if he claimed his own. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith, meanwhile, had mount- 
 ed, and they cantered briskly down to- 
 ward the valley. The sun was near its 
 setting, and a ride of two or three hours 
 was yet before them. But Honora's 
 usual chatter was silenced ; her uncle's 
 efforts at conversation meeting the hope- 
 lessly unanswering face and monosyllables 
 which generally baffled those of Mr. 
 Dour. Mr. Galbraith looked at her at- 
 tentively. 
 
 " We will be late to-night," he said : 
 " Colonel Pervis will have reached his 
 last rubber, and Mr. Dour have talked 
 your aunt to sleep." 
 
 Honora pushed back her hair im- 
 patiently. " Such trifling wearies one 
 with the world!" she broke out. "To 
 think of men — men, spending whole days 
 tossing bits of painted card about, or 
 chopping logic about words !" 
 
 "Why, what should they do, Nora?" 
 
 " Do ? If I were not a woman, I would 
 know first what the world is which we 
 live in. It should not be so much sand 
 and coal to me, worth so many dollars 
 an acre. Why I used to think the In- 
 dian chiefs were heroes, uncle, who 
 hunted and fished over these forests, 
 compared to our traders and shop- 
 keepers. But suppose a man held in 
 his hand the key to the great earth it- 
 self, to its mines of gold and silver, and 
 could read the countless rocks, with the 
 messages from all the past centuries 
 written on them ; suppose he knew the 
 secrets of all the herbs and trees, and 
 
 could draw health or death from them. 
 That is a life for a man, I think." 
 
 " I did not know you had so complete 
 a theory of life made out," dryly. 
 
 "That seems to me a great work fo 
 a great man." 
 
 "Honora! Of whom are you think- 
 ing ?" 
 
 She started and colored, but did not 
 look at him. "Of Colonel Pei-vis and 
 Mr. Dour," she said, innocently, after a 
 moment's pause, "and of the way in 
 which they waste their lives. It is very 
 uncharitable, but you suggested it, uncle, 
 did you not V 
 
 * * ***** 
 
 Dallas Galbraith, standing on the 
 ledge of the mountain, watched them 
 until they were out of sight. He did 
 not move even then, looking with his 
 cool, steady gaze into the darkening 
 valley below. It seemed to him a great 
 chamber of peace lighted by the cheerful 
 crimson sunset, the moon hanging pure 
 and far, a mere ghost of light, in the Mae 
 distance. The vast, tranquil change of 
 day into night, the silence, the brooding 
 calm, might have made some time his 
 every-day life, so simple and native to 
 him was it all. It was all homelike : the 
 melancholy sough of the wind through 
 the far ravines, the rustle of an occa- 
 sional insect in the leaves underfoot, the 
 gurgle of some mountain spring. He 
 could see the workmen from the quarry 
 going down a path which wound round 
 a far hill-side — so far that they looked 
 like lonely gray shadows. One or two 
 of them saw him, and waved their caps 
 to him good-night. He was a favorite 
 already with them all. Dallas waved 
 energetically until they were quite out 
 of sight. No one knew what friends 
 were worth untH they had lived without 
 them ! 
 
 But it was not the sough of the wind 
 or the good-night of the men that he 
 was waiting for. Hark ! The wind was 
 against him, but surely that was the 
 echo of a horse's hoofs on the valley 
 road ! Again : and then all was silent, 
 and she was actually gone. The sound 
 had brought the cordial strength into his 
 eyes again. It was noticeable that tlie 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 89 
 
 dress and wealth which had risen up as 
 a barrier between Dallas and his mother 
 never suggested themselves to him in 
 connection with Honora. Even to 
 Dour's far-off, trained, critical eye, there 
 was a singular native freshness in the 
 girl which brought to his mind the bell 
 of a wild flower. To Dallas the wild 
 flower was near and real : its perfume 
 came home to him as did the silence and 
 calm of the mountains — a part of him- 
 self. 
 
 What more the casual meeting with 
 her had been to him, Dallas was begin- 
 ning, perhaps, now that he was left 
 alone, to spell out to himself. He sat 
 down, leaning against the rock, his hands 
 cJasped over his head in his old fashion, 
 and was quiet a long time. Then he 
 got up with a composed, resolute face, 
 like a man who saw his way at last 
 through a tangled wood. Some sudden 
 fancy seemed to strike him, for, with a 
 half smile, he went to the face of the 
 gray rock, and taking his hatchet and 
 chisel from his belt, cut the date — the 
 day of the month and year, adding neither 
 name nor initials. Then putting the 
 tools away he went back to Matt, who 
 was stretched on the ground asleep. 
 
 "Come, old fellow," said Dallas, lift- 
 ing him, " the day's late, and we have a 
 great deal of work to do — a great deal 
 of work." 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 The afternoon service was over, and 
 the sunny little country church-yard was 
 filled with groups of the neighbors, stop- 
 ping under the cedars, according to cus- 
 tom, to exchange bulletins of health 
 before they took their way across the 
 lonely fields or mounted into the clumsy 
 eld wagons and carriages that walled in 
 the fence. Honora, who had stopped to 
 talk to the sexton while he locked the 
 door of the little stone church, hurried 
 down to her uncle, who waited for her 
 by the gate. They were both bigoted 
 Episcopalians ; fasted rigorously, went 
 to church through rain or snow, to the 
 
 great spiritual satisfaction of Madam 
 Galbraith, who, poor old heathen ! hatl 
 not been there but once in two years, 
 and then had scandalized the congrega- 
 tion by lecturing the rector, on the porch, 
 about his drowsy sermon, until both she 
 and he were in a passion. 
 
 "The sun is so warm, my dear, that 
 I thought you would prefer to walk," 
 Mr. Galbraith said, as she came up. " I 
 told John to drive on." 
 
 "I'm glad of it. Mrs. Duffield rode, 
 of course? I believe she thinks it is 
 coarse for a young girl to tramp and 
 hve out of doors, as I do," anxiously. 
 
 " Does she 1 Yes ; she is gone ; Miss 
 Gerty, too. Mr. Dour watched for you, 
 but changed his mind." 
 
 "And went with Gerty ?" with a know- 
 ing nod. "That was right." 
 
 They stopped now and then to speak 
 to some of the groups of stolid-looking 
 men, asserting the day in long-tailed 
 coats and broad expanse of shirt-front, 
 and gayly-dressed women, with their 
 books in their hands — a bit of mint put 
 in to mark the place. Then, turning 
 from the main road, they took their way 
 down the hillside, the cool afternoon 
 wind fresh in their faces. jMr. Galbraith 
 fell into his usual leisurely gait in these 
 mountain walks, his hands clasped be- 
 hind him; a youthful, keen enjoyment 
 of hfe coming out on the thin, sensitive 
 face, despite its sober framing of gray 
 hair and moustache — an expression 
 which belonged alone to his out-door life, 
 as Honora knew. Nothing escaped his 
 slow blue eye. The warm light and 
 chasing veils of shadow on the bright 
 bronzed hill-slopes : the dreamy brown 
 vapor of smoke hanging over the distant 
 village, glowing into ruby where the sun 
 touched it: the two or three cows stand- 
 ing about a quiet Httle pool in a shaded 
 mountain bight. He did not point any- 
 thing out to Honora: she did not see 
 the shadows or smoke with his eyes. 
 
 After a while, however, he broke the 
 long silence. "Honora," he said, sud- 
 denly, "there is a man who has a great 
 work, according to your theory, coming 
 toward us — Pritchard. He is a geologist 
 by profession." 
 
90 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Miss Dundas ran her eye slightingly 
 over the lean, bewhiskered little man, 
 and remarked, coolly, that some people 
 made prose out of anything. 
 
 '• He is a very practical, useful fellow — 
 Doctor Pritchard," continued the old 
 gentleman. "His summer vacation is 
 over, and he goes away next week to 
 New Mexico." 
 
 "Yes, sir. I don't know what to 
 make of this plant," pulling a weed to 
 pieces, impatiently. "I've been trying 
 to study botany lately, and I never can 
 tell the stamens from the pistils." 
 
 "No, I suppose not. Pritchard is 
 attached to an exploration party sent 
 out by government. Something about 
 a railroad, I believe. But he will report 
 on the geology and flora of the country. 
 Here he is." 
 
 Miss Dundas, after a shy bow, went 
 back to her weed, while Doctor Pritchard 
 shook and reshook her uncle's hand. 
 He had the etiipressement of a French 
 dancing-master; besides, he meant to 
 go home with them to dine. Mr. Gal- 
 braith's wines were famous. 
 
 "Would you, would you, my dear sir," 
 in a fervent whisper, "allow me to pre- 
 sent a friend to Miss Dundas and your- 
 self? The gentleman walking with 
 Squire Poole, yonder ; handsome, stout — 
 yes. He is most anxious to form your 
 acquaintance : one might as well not be 
 presented at court abroad, you know, 
 as — Colonel Laddoun, it is. One of 
 those clever, generous fellows whom 
 everybody knows — yes. Met him in 
 California — lucky dog there; quite a 
 favorite in San Francisco, Miss Dundas ; 
 devoted to the ladies. You've no ob- 
 jections ?" 
 
 In a few moments they came up to 
 Laddoun, and he was presented. He 
 was unusually silent, however, to the 
 disappointment of his friend ; his oily 
 fluency of words and manner seemed 
 chilled and stiffened after the first hasty 
 glance at the old gentleman's quiet 
 face. 
 
 "He has Dallas' eyes. Which I never 
 could understand — curse him !" was his 
 secret thought, as he stepped back by 
 Honora, and made one or two heavy 
 
 efforts to fall into an easy conversation 
 with her. He grew silent in a moment, 
 however, catching the drift of the Doctor's 
 chatter. 
 
 " I go this week — yes. My stay here 
 has been delightful, socially. And your 
 country is rich in minerals — unlimited 
 wealth under your feet, sir ! An AH 
 Baba's cave, if you but knew the magic 
 words to unlock it. By the way, I am 
 taking a young man from here with me 
 as assistant. One of your neighbors. 
 A fellow that I met up in the mountains, 
 in the stone-quarry — yes." 
 
 Honora dropped her plant, and, being 
 tired, apparently, came a step forward 
 and put her hand in her uncle's arm. 
 
 " Evans mentioned the man to me," 
 pursued the little man, jerkily adjusting 
 his spectacles, "and I fell in afterward 
 with him at the opening of a mound up 
 on Indian Creek. A remarkable case 
 of a one-idea'd man, sir. The only peo- 
 ple who amount to anything, by-the-bye. 
 This fellow is a born naturalist." 
 
 " My niece and I met him near the 
 quarry, I think. I doubt not that it is 
 the same person. You remember, Hon- 
 ora .?" 
 
 " I think I do." 
 
 " Do you take him with you as a la- 
 borer ?" questioned Mr. Galbraith, po- 
 litely continuing the subject which so 
 keenly interested his companion. 
 
 "No — as an assistant. In an inferior 
 position, of course. But he will rise. 
 He will be of more assistance to me than 
 a dozen purblind coUege-bred fellows, 
 who have their opinions cut and dried 
 for them. This young man has had but 
 few opportunities, I judge ; only studied 
 the A, B, C of science, as I may say. 
 But he has the eye of a hawk and a 
 marvelous memory. Evans suggested 
 to me to take him. I was surprised 
 that the fellow had so much discern- 
 ment ; surprised — yes." 
 
 " It will be of advantage to him ?" 
 asked Mr. Galbraith. 
 
 "It will be an education such as rarely 
 offers itself to any man !" emphatically. 
 " I will extend my researches through 
 South America, in all probability. We 
 may be gone one, two, three years — " 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 91 
 
 <» So long ?" said the old man, with a 
 quiclc breath. " I thought the expedition 
 would return in the spring ?" 
 
 " I spoke of my own plans, sir," loftily. 
 « I was about to say that, if this young 
 man answers my expectation, I will in- 
 duce him to accompany me after I sepa- 
 rate from the government survey. There 
 is something in the boy which has curi- 
 ously interested me." 
 
 " It's an old trick of his !" growled 
 Laddoun, under his breath, adding, awk- 
 wardly, when he saw them look at him, 
 " I used to know the man you speak of 
 Strangers usually fancied him." 
 
 "Yes, there is something very genial and 
 attractive in him," rejoined the Doctor. 
 
 « I thought you were a stranger in 
 this part of the country. Colonel Lad- 
 doun .?" said Mr. Galbraith, looking 
 steadily at him. 
 
 Laddoun's portly body moved uncom- 
 fortably under the scrutiny of the strange, 
 yet familiar eyes. He began to toy with 
 the heavy chain hanging across his 
 waistcoat. " I am a stranger here. 
 But I knew Galbraith when he was a 
 boy." 
 
 The old gentleman's quiet gaze rested 
 on him for a moment after he had fin- 
 ished speaking, but he made him no 
 other reply. 
 
 " Galbraith ? 'Pon my word," broke 
 in Doctor Pritchard, " I forgot to mention 
 that the young man's name was the same 
 as yours. It is so common, hereabouts, 
 that it did not attract my attention." 
 
 " It is common," said Mr. Galbraith. 
 " All branches from the same family tree." 
 
 They had reached a stile where the 
 path struck aside to the village. Doctor 
 Pritchard stopped and hesitated. 
 
 "Well, Colonel Laddoun, here is our 
 road. We must bid our friends good- 
 evening, I presume." 
 
 "Good-evening, gentlemen," said Mr. 
 Galbraith, promptly, Pritchard's visions 
 of roast turkey and the Dour wines van- 
 ishing into air. " Come to us to-mor- 
 row, Doctor. Madam Galbraith es- 
 pecially desires to see you." 
 
 After they were alone he walked more 
 slowly, to accommodate his pace to Hon- 
 ora, whose step was flagging: it seemed 
 
 to have lost suddenly its accustomed 
 elastic vigor. He fancied, too, when he 
 glanced anxiously down at her, that her 
 dark eyes were more unintelligible than 
 usual. He did not disturb her, how- 
 ever, and it was not until they had 
 nearly reached the house that she spoke, 
 stopping at the very stile where Galbraith 
 and Lizzy had stood. 
 
 "New Mexico is a long way from 
 Virginia ?" 
 
 "Yes, Nora." 
 
 " I suppose Doctor Pritchard and his 
 jDarty will never return ?" 
 
 "Doctor Pritchard has no tie here, 
 you know. He was making an examina- 
 tion of the Kanawha Salines, and came 
 from there up to the mountains." 
 
 " Yes, I know." She drew a long 
 breath after a while. "It is a good 
 thing to be able to go out in the world 
 to find work and knowledge — to find 
 people who would be friends to you if 
 you knew them better. It is tiresome — 
 tiresome to be a woman, uncle !" 
 
 He put his hand gently on her brown 
 hair and stroked it for his only answer. 
 The bent head was so dear to him, and, 
 do what he would, his hand so weak to 
 guard it ! 
 
 Laddoun swaggered smoking along- 
 side of the little professor in silence. 
 It needed a walk of a quarter of a mile 
 and two or three cigars to restore his 
 usual complacent tone. Then the bitter 
 froth ran off. " I don't fancy your Gal- 
 braiths, sir ! They're ill-bred — ill-bred ! 
 It is always the case with your petty 
 country aristocracy ! What the devil 
 did the old fellow mean by looking at 
 me as if I was a thief? Does he never 
 meet a gentleman, that he must scan 
 him from head to foot as he would a 
 bullock ?" 
 
 "You're too sensitive, Colonel," laugh- 
 ed Pritchard. " That hot. Southern blood 
 of yours is always too ready to take fire. 
 You are a Southerner, aren't you ?" 
 
 " I — I am pro-slavery. To the back- 
 bone. But as for your Galbraiths, they 
 had better take care how they insult 
 George Laddoun. I have a fact or two 
 in reserve for them that would make 
 them wince to the marrow." 
 
92 
 
 WINGS. 
 
 " You mean old James Galbraith here ? 
 A fact in reserve ?" with an astonished 
 peer over his spectacles. 
 
 "Ay: this old fellow. But let the 
 matter drop: Til keep my own counseh 
 So you're going to make the fortune of 
 that boy up at the quarry ?" 
 
 " No, not precisely. But I may put 
 him in the way to make his own." 
 
 "So ?" caressing his moustache thought- 
 fully. "Well, good-evening, Doctor," 
 with a sudden start ; " I have an engage- 
 ment which I had nearly forgotten." 
 
 " I wish you had remembered it ten 
 minutes sooner," thought Pritchard, as 
 he strode off ; "I would not have lost my 
 invitation to dinner. Well ! well ! Now 
 I thought Laddoun and the Galbraiths 
 were people just suited to each other !" 
 
 Laddoun, while his companion went 
 on slowly cogitating to the village, had 
 stopped at a little farm-house by the 
 way. " Lend me your fast trotter, 
 Billy," he said to a young fellow who 
 lounged out — one of his bar-room chums. 
 " I want to reach the Indian Queen be- 
 fore night-fall : can she make it ?" 
 
 " Yes. You need not ride her hard, 
 either, to do it. Don't spoil her paces, 
 Colonel." 
 
 "Oh, Lord bless you, no! It's not 
 this nag's paces that I mean to spoil," 
 as he mounted and patted the mare's 
 
 black neck. He rode steadily through 
 the mountain roads until the afternoon 
 had changed into dusk and night began 
 slowly to fall. When he caught sight 
 at last of the little stone inn, its windows 
 twinkling cheerfully far ahead of him, 
 he pressed his horse fiercely, as if, 
 through long brooding over his disap- 
 pointment, his blood was fairly up. 
 
 Dallas Galbraith, walking up and 
 down in front of the Httle porch in the 
 twilight, hstening occasionally to the 
 Sunday evening gossip of Peggy and the 
 boy, caught the first sound of the horse's 
 hoofs echoing down the mountain side, 
 and pointed out to Matt the fiery sparks 
 struck out on the darkness, as any one 
 whose heart is full and happy will notice 
 and be amused by a trifle. 
 
 But when the black horse and his 
 rider came nearer, Dallas stopped his 
 slow saunter and looked at them in 
 silence. Then he went up to the 
 porch. 
 
 " I am going up the road," he said 
 quietly to Peggy : " I do not know when 
 I will be back. Good-night," taking 
 Matt's hand, thrust through the railing, 
 " God bless you, Httle fellow !" For he 
 knew that the Luck which had been 
 against him all his life was upon him at 
 last in visible shape, and went to meet 
 it face to face. 
 
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 PART V. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 COLONEL LADDOUN, seeing the 
 figure coming toward him from the 
 inn, pulled up the mare, and sat stiffly 
 erect in the saddle. This fellow should 
 stand, like the beggar that he was, at 
 his stirrup. This fellow — whom he had 
 taken from the dunghill, and to whom 
 family and rank and an estate like a 
 principality came and waited until he 
 should choose to claim them. Luck 
 might be on his side, but he should see 
 that Laddoun was still master. 
 
 He swelled, he puffed, he played with 
 Bill Thorp's riding-whip as though it 
 had been a sceptre, his red lips growing 
 redder, and his black eyes arrogant and 
 defiant under the thick lids, as he watch- 
 ed Dallas coming nearer. 
 
 The twilight was distinct enough for 
 him to see him clearly. By George ! 
 how pale the fellow was ! Five years 
 of living on prison-broth and stewed 
 cocoa-shells. And Dallas used to dearly 
 love a good square meal, and would share 
 it with even a nigger ! The boy had hard 
 lines to pull, after all ! Laddoun burst 
 into a good-humored laugh, his face 
 softening as he glanced downward over 
 the baggily-clothed figure. Poor Dall ! 
 Where had he picked up that coat ? No- 
 
 body with gentlemanly instincts could be 
 tricked into making such a guy of him- 
 self ; but Galbraith was always ready to 
 be duped like a child ; and as for dress — 
 but, poor devil, it was not his fault if he 
 had no fine perceptions. 
 
 He grew uneasy after that as he wait- 
 ed. Not with remorse that he himself 
 had laid down the hard lines for the 
 boy's life, nor with gratitude because the 
 lad had put out his hand to save him 
 from the gulf into which he had fallen. 
 But he did remember, with a sudden 
 spasm of the heart under his velvet 
 waistcoat, how Dall used to admire his 
 fashionable clothes, his bow, his princely 
 manner — what a slave the fellow had 
 been to him from sheer affection. " He 
 loved me like a dog — Dallas. And be 
 never made me ridiculous trying to copy 
 me, either, like that idiot, McGill !" 
 " He was within half-a-dozen yards of 
 him now. It was the same old Dall ! 
 The steady, loping gait: mouth and nose 
 still too big for the man's face as they 
 had been for the boy's : the same inscru- 
 table expression. A thousand remem- 
 brances swarmed up unbidden at the 
 sight of him — of the journeys, the fun, 
 the scrapes they had shared in the long, 
 every-day life together : of Lizzy, who had 
 been fond of the bov. Laddoun's face 
 
94 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 kindled into that affectionate, generous 
 glo\\ which his admirers so well knew. 
 He got down with a certain hesitation 
 from his horse, holding one hand out while 
 the other rested on the saddle, as Gal- 
 braith came swift-ly toward him. He 
 stopped short, and they stood for a mo- 
 ment silent in the twilight, intently re- 
 garding each other. 
 
 Laddoun broke into a loud, uncertain 
 laugh: '-Why, Dallas, old fellow! I— 
 I'm devilish glad to see you! Ton my 
 soul I am. It makes me feel like a 
 woman. Shake hands?" 
 
 Galbraith glanced from the florid, ex- 
 cited face down to the fat, outstretched 
 hand, but made no other reply. 
 
 "You don't mean to bluiT me off? As 
 you please : George Laddoun never offers 
 his hand twice," drawing back haughtily. 
 He could not comprehend the silence of 
 the other man, nor the tense compres- 
 sion about his nostrils and jaws. Was 
 he afraid ? Or did he mean mischief.-' 
 
 "Now, Dallas, you're keeping malice," 
 he broke out, frankly. "There's nothing 
 of that in me. I've got no account of 
 old grudges. I came here to do you a 
 kindness. I came clear from California 
 to be on hand when you got free, and 
 give you a helping hand. I followed 
 you out here for that. George Lad- 
 doun's not the sort to forget old friends. 
 I'd have walked the streets of Albany 
 with you in your prison-clothes, and 
 knocked down any man who insulted 
 you." 
 
 "Yes, I understand." 
 
 " Then you need not stand off, weigh- 
 ing and measuring me. You'll find me 
 the same jolly brick — old Laddoun. More 
 heart than head about me, as every body 
 knows. Ton my soul, the sight of you 
 brought up things I've not thought of 
 for years ! There was Lizzy — now. 
 Well," after a moment's pause, "my 
 taste in women has changed, of course. 
 But there's nothing like love's young 
 dream. ' 'Twas odor fled, As soon as 
 shed.' But you never cared for the 
 sex." He felt, as he rattled over this 
 uneasily, that his hold had slipped from 
 tlie lad, never to be regained : his old 
 dupe stood farther outside and apart from 
 
 him than any other man, and the know- 
 ledge cost Laddoun, who was everybody's 
 friend, a sentimental, unaffected pang. 
 He hesitated, then cried impetuously: 
 
 " Come, Galbraith, there's my hand. 
 Friend or enemy, as you choose. You 
 know me." 
 
 " Yes, I know you, George Laddoun. 
 But keep back. Don't touch me," draw- 
 ing back as the other approached, his 
 hands clasped tightly behind him. 
 
 Laddoun was startled out of his per- 
 petual applause and patting of himself: 
 he took a quick, keen survey of Gal- 
 braith. There was a sudden qualm of 
 fear in his soggy, dull heart — something 
 in the face before him reminded him that 
 the man had had five years of solitude 
 in which "to think it over." 
 
 The road was narrow and ran along 
 the edge of a precipice. Galbraith was 
 the more athletic and better built of the 
 two. He had not spoken a word of the 
 WTong done to him ; and that looked 
 dangerous. 
 
 " If I thrust my friendship on him, it 
 will let loose the devil that he's trying 
 to hold down," the Colonel judged 
 shrewdly in the paralyzed instant that 
 followed. Then he put his foot in the 
 stirrup and slowly swung himself heavily 
 up, keeping a guarded watch on Dallas. 
 There was an aggrieved sense of injury 
 in his manner. He was quite conscious 
 that all the good feeling which had 
 brought him from California had been 
 thrown back in his face : he was not so 
 conscious, to do him justice, of his dis- 
 appointment in his plans of leeching the 
 heir of the Galbraiths, though the dis- 
 appointment was there. 
 
 Up on the mare's back, he looked about 
 at the darkening twilight and down at 
 the pale, controlled face of the man lean- 
 ing back against the rocks, as from a van- 
 tage-ground of safety. It was but a 
 boy's credulous face after all — never 
 would be anything else : there was not 
 a line of shrewdness or self-confidence 
 in it. 
 
 Laddoun pressed his horse closer to- 
 ward him. "Keep back from 30U, eh? 
 It's on the cards," half closing his eyes, 
 speculatively, " whether I leave you or 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 95 
 
 not to shift for yourself, Galbraith. I 
 can make or unmake you as I please," 
 measuring his words deliberately. " I 
 can bring you in heir of this very land 
 you stand on, or I can speak a word that 
 would cause your own mother to cast 
 you off. You've marked out a straight 
 road for yourself.'' Very well! Do you 
 think Pritchard would take you as his 
 companion if I choose to tell him what 
 you are ? Do you think that stupid 
 Beck and his wife would keep you un- 
 der their roof — let their boy go wander- 
 ing about with a jail-bird .^ You cannot 
 wash yourself clear of that." 
 
 He waited for an answer, but Galbraith 
 was motionless. At the mention of the 
 child he had only clasped his hands more 
 closely behind him. the fingers strained 
 until they were bloodless, and, turning 
 from Laddoun, fixed his eyes steadily 
 on the ground. 
 
 The fellow was insensate as a stone ! 
 
 " I hold you and your fate there, sir — 
 there !" cried Laddoun, loudly, holding 
 out his soft, open hand and patting it 
 with his forefinger. " You may scheme 
 and work to build yourself up as you 
 please. But if you throw off George Lad- 
 doun like a pauper and scoff at his friend- 
 ship, it will cost me no more than the clos- 
 ing of my palm to crush you like a worm." 
 
 Galbraith made a sudden step forward. 
 Standing in front of the horse's breast, 
 he grasped the bridle. Whatever con- 
 trol he had held over himself was gone : 
 his face was set and his eyes shone like 
 those of a wild beast. But his voice 
 was curiously quiet : 
 
 " I never mean to punish you for what 
 you did to me. I let that go. But I 
 am going to lead a new life. It is in my 
 own hands, and I warn you that it will 
 be safer not to stand in my way." 
 
 " I'd have been your friend, if you had 
 chosen," sullenly. "You're the first man 
 that ever chose George Laddoun as an 
 enemy. You never can shake me off now. 
 I'll show you to-morrow what your new 
 life is worth." 
 
 Galbraith pressed closer on him. 
 "Then I'll be free of you!" he said, 
 slowly. " I am a better man than you. 
 I count it no more crime to put you out 
 
 of my way than a snake that bit me. 
 Look out, Laddoun !" 
 
 His sudden onslaught wrenched a half 
 whine, half cry from the Colonel: he grew 
 deadly pale as he wheeled his horse about, 
 throwing Galbraith on the ground. " The 
 boy is mad," urging the powerful beast 
 full on him. " I could ride you down 
 like a dog. And I am armed. Stand 
 back ! Stand back, I say !" He brought 
 down the revolver, covering Galbraith s 
 breast. 
 
 Dallas stood one instant, watchful as 
 a panther. " If you've a pistol, you are 
 even with me," he muttered, and made 
 the spring. Catching the bridle close 
 by the horse's nostrils, he dragged her 
 by sheer strength across the road to the 
 edge of the precipice and held her there. 
 The brute's terrible cry and Laddoun's 
 yell rose together : her pawing hind-hoofs 
 struck the pebbles down into the chasm. 
 In that moment Laddoun, leaning for- 
 ward, uncocked his pistol and threw it 
 on the ground. 
 
 "I'd not V\\\ yon, Dallas !" he gasped. 
 
 Galbraith glanced at the pistol lying 
 at his feet, and up at the mare and her 
 rider, the insanity going out of his eyes, 
 like a man from whom a physical spasm 
 is passing. He pulled the horse up on 
 level ground again with difficulty, for the 
 strength given by his fury was gone, and 
 held it steady until the Colonel, trem- 
 bling and sopping the sweat from his 
 face, had slowly alighted and crept across 
 the road to where the pistol lay. Gal- 
 braith did not heed him : he stood me- 
 chanically stroking down the shivering, 
 terrified animal. 
 
 " I am the worse devil of the two. 
 There's not been a day for years when 
 I would not have been glad to see him 
 dead. And he — spared my life — spared 
 my life." 
 
 Laddoun picked up the pistol and 
 brushed it on his sleeve with an odd 
 chuckle. 
 
 " Say, Dallas, come to yourself, hey ? 
 Now, I meant you nothing but good, as 
 you might have known. I'll hold no 
 grudge against you for this bout, boy. 
 Nobody can say George Laddoun keeps 
 malice ;" and he held out his hand to the 
 
96 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 man who had tried a moment ago to 
 murder him, witli a frank smile. 
 
 But Dallas shook his head. " I'm 
 no hypocrite. You're no friend of 
 mine, Laddoun. No. You never shall 
 be." 
 
 The Colonel took off his hat and push- 
 ed his hair back, doubtfully. The boy, 
 like most half-witted people, was obsti- 
 nate as a mule — hard to manage. Was 
 the game worth the chase ? He had a 
 half mind to mount, and, washing his 
 hands of the whole matter, start back to 
 California in the morning. But then he 
 glanced up at the mountains, rich in 
 minerals, down at the broad river, through 
 tlie grazing valley. It was the estate of 
 a prince : some day to settle down as per- 
 petual prime minister to the ruler of it 
 would be no ill ending to his vagabondage. 
 It was worth another trial, at any rate. 
 
 " Let us talk the matter over quietly, Dal- 
 las," he said, earnestly. " Look at it coolly. 
 YoU'are beginning your career: circum- 
 stances have so chanced that you have 
 singularly little knowledge of the world, 
 while few men have had my opportunity 
 for mastering its ways to success. I 
 offer you my help out of sheer regard 
 for old friendship, and it seems to me 
 you are but a headstrong, hot-headed 
 fool to put it from you. That's how I 
 look at the thing. You may have an- 
 other view of the subject." He took 
 out a cigar, and, striking a match across 
 his boot, lighted it. 
 
 Galbraith, who had patted and soothed 
 the mare into quiet, handed the bridle 
 back to him. " I have no confidences 
 to make to you. I am going with Doc- 
 tor Pritchard, as you know, no doubt. 
 It would be wiser in you not to interfere 
 with me. I acted like a beast to-night, 
 and I may do it again. I haven't the 
 control of myself that you have — that 
 any man has, I suppose." He turned 
 away abruptly to go down the hill, with 
 no word of leave-taking. 
 
 There had been a bitter, humiliated 
 tone in his voice, which, Laddoun felt, 
 came from some depth in the man's na- 
 ture which he could not sound. He 
 watched him as he went slowly down 
 the hill with tlie amused admiration 
 
 which he might give to a bull-headed, 
 courageous dog. 
 
 "Now, that fellow," he thought, as he 
 critically bit the end of his cigar, "knows 
 that I did the job for which he was pun- 
 ished, yet he never blew on me, nor even 
 taunted me with it to-night. He's too 
 cursedly proud. Turns his broad back 
 on me now, not caring to think what a 
 target it is if I chose to put a bullet 
 through it! I'll have another tug with 
 him. I think I know how to fetch him 
 down. Hi ! Galbraith !" Finding that 
 he did not turn, he sprang on the horse 
 and cantered after him ; but slowly, in 
 order to allow Dallas to almost reach the 
 Indian Queen before he joined him. 
 
 Galbraith paid no attention to the 
 horse's tramp behind him : an utter, 
 overwhelming sense of defeat seemed to 
 shut him out from the world. Not an 
 hour ago, walking up and down in the 
 twilight, he had been picturing to him- 
 self the place which an educated gentle- 
 man, strong and kindly, could take in life 
 — a follower of One whom Dallas, with 
 the reverence of a child or a savage, 
 never named aloud : thinking of this ideal 
 hero, vaguely and in strange connections : 
 with miserable, vicious little children, and 
 with a pure young girl : wondering what 
 chance there would be for him in this 
 expedition with Pritchard to train him- 
 self into the Hkeness of such an one. 
 This was but an hour ago ; now, his hands 
 would be stained with murder but for the 
 manliness of George Laddoun : no brute 
 could have wallowed in more besotted 
 depth of Wind passion than he had done 
 to-night. He had gone to find the some- 
 thing that had always been against him 
 in Laddoun yonder, and the stronger, 
 viler foe in his own breast had risen and 
 dragged him down. When the Colonel 
 rode up beside him again he glanced at 
 him indifferently, as if he and his malice 
 were almost forgotten. 
 
 " I — I have had a long ride, Galbraith," 
 said Laddoun, with well-acted hesitation, 
 "and — well, to be honest, I'm hungry. 
 I suppose your landlady can give me a 
 bite of supper V 
 
 Dallas' color rose, and he Quickened 
 his steps without looking up. " You'll 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 97 
 
 be my guest, Laddoun ?" he said, civilly, 
 with an effort which the other took care 
 not to notice. 
 
 "With pleasure, my boy!" heartily. 
 "You were always a hospitable fellow. 
 The old times have come back, eh ?" 
 
 Dallas made no answer: but presently 
 as he walked he loosened his cravat as 
 though straitened for breath. They 
 went down tlie road in silence, Laddoun 
 tranquilly puffing at his cigar, a twinkle 
 of amusement in his black eyes. 
 
 " Sa3s Galbraith ! Ton my soul it's 
 too good a joke to keep !" he broke out 
 at last. " I sold you, out and out, up 
 on the hill yonder. I know you so well, 
 you see. When I threw down the pistol 
 at your feet, it wa'n't loaded ! Lord !" 
 mth a hearty laugh, " I'd have made 
 another use of it if it had been. Though 
 I'd be sorry to hurt a hair of your head, 
 Dall. But you didn't suspect me, eh .'"' 
 
 " No, I did not suspect you," calmly, 
 and with no sign of surprise or irritation. 
 
 "Well, your skull was always thick, 
 boy. But it was a neat hit to make in 
 the very jaws of death, as one might 
 say," caressing his jetty beard for a long 
 time afterward, and smiling to himself 
 The matter, on the contrary, seemed to 
 pass out of Galbraith's mind at once. 
 It mattered nothing to him what tricks 
 Laddoun played on him : it was some 
 ghastly power tugging at his heart with- 
 in with which he wrestled in silence. 
 
 " Hallo ! here we are," called the Colo- 
 nel, pulling up before the porch and 
 alighting. "And this is Mrs. Beck, eh ?" 
 taking his hat quite off as he went up 
 the steps. '• My friend Mr. Galbraith 
 has promised me that you will give me a 
 morsel of supper, madam. Pie, bread 
 and cheese, anything you have. A slice 
 of Sunday's roast goose, say." 
 
 "We had a goose for dinner," said 
 Peggy, getting up in quite a flutter. 
 '• How could you guess that now, Mr.— ?" 
 
 " Laddoun. Colonel Laddoun. This 
 is your boy .?" drawing Matt up to his 
 knee, for he had entered the little living- 
 room, and already seemed to pre-empt 
 and fill it. But Matt pulled away, and 
 went out whining to Dallas, who, after a 
 few words to Mrs. Beck, paced slowly 
 7 
 
 up and down the porch. The child 
 took his hand, and looked up in his face, 
 but Dallas avoided his eye. 
 
 It needed only a few moments for 
 Peggy to spread an appetizing cold supper 
 before the Colonel from the shelves of 
 her clean little pantry, chattering, as she 
 went in and out, of Dallas and the 
 victuals alternately, while Laddoun lis- 
 tened, with a smile on his red lips under 
 the moustache ; but there was no smile 
 in the keen, black eyes fixed on Gal- 
 braith, who, as yet, had made no motion 
 to join him at the table. He knew Dal- 
 las had an Arab sense of hospitality : if 
 he broke bread with him, he had ceased 
 to count him as an enemy. But Lad- 
 doun made no effort to bring him in : it 
 was a good test to show how they stood 
 toward each other. 
 
 When the supper was ready, therefore, 
 he ate of it alone, though every mouth- 
 ful choked him, feeling like a dog to 
 whom a bone had been thrown in 
 charity. Dallas came to the door as he 
 pushed his chair back and stood up. 
 
 " Try some of this old Monongahela, 
 Galbraith ?" eagerly — " to our better un- 
 derstanding of each other. Come." 
 
 " I will not drink with you, Laddoun. 
 You are no friend to me." 
 
 Laddoun put down the untasted glass 
 with a heat on his face which Galbraith's 
 attempt at murder had not roused in 
 him. 
 
 " As you will. You're implacable in a 
 way that I cannot understand. It's not in 
 my nature, thank God !" He closed the 
 door and came up to Dallas, who stood 
 leaning on the mantel-shelf Laddoun 
 hesitated and stammered before the 
 steady, blue eyes, doubtful how to begin 
 his last attack. 
 
 " I thought we could patch up our old 
 break over a meal together," he said at 
 last. "You used to be the prince of 
 good fellows, Dallas. I came here to- 
 night with the best intentions toward 
 you, as I said. I have discovered a 
 certain matter about you, of which I 
 think you are not aware." He paused, 
 but Dallas stood silent. 
 
 The Colonel paced slowly up and 
 down ; Mrs. Beck, outside, listening to 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 the ponderous tread that shook the httle 
 house, with the respect due to afFabiHty 
 when found encased in such superfine 
 clothes and chains of Californian gold. 
 
 "It don't matter whether we are 
 friends or foes," his sonorous bass voice 
 rising into a sort of frank, heroic rhythm. 
 " I'll do what I can for you, and then, if 
 you say the word, I'll leave you to enjoy 
 your good fortune alone. I have dis- 
 covered who you are, Galbraith," with a 
 melodramatic wave of the hand. 
 
 Dallas nodded, indifferently. 
 
 " You see those hills filled with min- 
 eral wealth, the arable slopes, the water- 
 power in those creeks ?" pointing out 
 of the window, and rolling the words 
 like a sweet morsel under his tongue. 
 " You are the heir of this estate, Dallas 
 Galbraith," with an unction as though 
 he had declared the triumph his own. 
 "You are the heir !" 
 
 " I know it," quietly. 
 
 Laddoun stopped short with amaze- 
 ment. " You know it ? And you are 
 going with Pritchard without putting in 
 your claim ? Do you mean never to 
 talce your rightful place ?" 
 
 " I do not say that," said Dallas, hesi- 
 tating. " I may come back to them when 
 I am fit for that place. Not until then." 
 
 " When you've washed off the Albany 
 smell, eh ?" with a loud laugh. "A whiff 
 of that would be damnation to your cause 
 down in the Galbraith house, I fancy. 
 The old fellow and his niece are narrow, 
 religious bigots, and the old madam would 
 cut off her own right hand if it had touch- 
 ed that of a felon's. I know the whole 
 party well," his voice swelling percepti- 
 bly. " Pritchard and old James Galbraith 
 and I are chums, in fact. He's got a 
 capital run of sherry, your grandfather ; 
 but I forgot : you don't know much about 
 wines," with a smothered laugh. " As 
 for the httle Dundas girl," putting on the 
 leer with which he was used to fascinate 
 women, " she's a nice little creature." 
 He stopped short, seeing a great and 
 uncontrollable change in Galbraith's face, 
 and then continued, more deliberately : 
 
 " In my younger days I might have 
 been tempted, perhaps. But George 
 Laddoun's too old a bird to catch now." 
 
 He waited in vain for any reply. 
 
 " How long will you be gone with 
 Pritchard ?" 
 
 " I do not know. One or four years." 
 
 " The devil !" He could not conceal 
 his chagrin and anger ; bit his under lip, 
 and then whistled, as he walked rapidly 
 up and down, to keep himself silent. 
 Even one year to a man who crowded 
 his life as he did, meant an utter change 
 of his base and relations. What was his 
 secret hold on Galbraith worth if it was 
 to be half a lifetime before he could bring 
 his lever to bear ? 
 
 "Tut, boy ! What folly is this ? I— 
 you may be six foot under ground in as 
 many months. Why should a young, 
 hearty fellow like you thrust off your Luck 
 even for a day when it comes to force 
 good fortune on you ? A year ! You 
 will come back in a year to find your 
 grandfather dead, most likely, and the 
 estate given over to that sober little 
 Honora. And she," watching him 
 shrewdly, " the property of some clever 
 chap who knows how to pick up a good 
 thing when he sees it." 
 
 Dallas raised himself up from the 
 lounging attitude in which he had list- 
 ened. " We have gone far enough," he 
 said. " My mind was made up to go 
 with Doctor Pritchard. You are wast- 
 ing time with me. I shall not alter it." 
 
 Laddoun listened attentively, remain- 
 ing thoughtful and silent a moment after 
 Dallas had done speaking, slowly looping 
 the tassel-buttons of his overcoat. His 
 face suddenly cleared. 
 
 " Well, I throw the matter up. You 
 will not take even fortune and a bride, 
 if it be my hand that points the way to 
 them. I'll bid you good-bye, Galbraith, 
 and hope you may have another friend 
 as willing and ready when you need him. 
 As for me, I will not cross your path 
 again." 
 
 " You have not pointed the way to 
 fortune nor kept me back from it, Lad- 
 doun," said Dallas, with a half smile. 
 "Your coming to-night has not altered 
 my plans or position a whit. The time 
 is over for you to affect my fortune in 
 any way. I see that. If there are any 
 enemies for me to fight, they must come 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 99 
 
 nearer and be more akin to me than you 
 are to do me harm." 
 
 The Colonel measured the cool, un- 
 demonstrative face and figure before him 
 speculatively for a moment : then he re- 
 laxed into his usual good-humored non- 
 chalance. " You will neither suffer me 
 to be foe nor friend," he said, with a 
 laugh. "So be it. Good-night. And 
 good luck, Dallas !" and swinging on his 
 glossy beaver with a half-cordial, half- 
 mocking bow, he sallied out of the room, 
 and in a moment had brought Peggy, 
 Beck and Wash about him, eager and 
 garrulous. 
 
 Dallas listened to his loud, musical, 
 hearty voice answering, flinging back 
 some parting jest to them after he had 
 mounted, and his horse's hoofs began 
 to ring down the rocky path. It sounded 
 to Galbraith like a hateful, unmeaning 
 refrain to which the words of his early 
 life had been set. To-night he found 
 that it had lost all power over him — had 
 died utterly out of his hfe ; and Hstening 
 to it, a light-hearted sense of boyish free- 
 dom altogether new to him began to 
 brighten the world. This bugbear of 
 his youth proved, w^ien fairly met, to be 
 but a paltry sham ; and then a broad, 
 easy road to the best manhood had 
 opened itself before him. As for the 
 foe within, Dallas did just as we all do, 
 and put it comfortably out of sight. 
 Original sin, or taint of the prison, or 
 whatever it was, there was a long life 
 before him in which to subdue it That 
 was an easy matter ! 
 
 What were those words of Laddoun's ? 
 '• Fortune and a bride ?" 
 
 The usually grave, composed young 
 fellow took Matt nervously up on his 
 knee, and sat glowering into the red cin- 
 ders late into the night, deaf to that small 
 man's efforts at conversation, until the 
 fire burned out, and Matt, in despair, fell 
 asleep and snored like a trumpeter. If 
 Doctor Pritchard started during tlie next 
 week, Galbraith must find some means 
 to see his mother again, himself unseen. 
 It was this visit which he thought he 
 was planning now, fancying a casual 
 meeting with her on the road. She 
 would not be alone — it was not likely 
 
 she would be alone. Well, and then ? 
 Lizzy would have thought her favorite 
 an idiot if she had known his wild, in- 
 credible fancies that night : the years — 
 the long, beautiful, healthy life from youth 
 to far-off death — which he built out of 
 that then : the chance that she would 
 not be alone. 
 
 Laddoun, meanwhile, rode briskly back 
 on the road by which he came. He 
 wanted to sleep somewhere near the 
 Stone-post Farm, that he could be there 
 bright and early in the morning. If 
 Galbraith chose to put off his chances 
 for years, he (Laddoun) would put up 
 with no such folly. He meant to take 
 the fellow and his fortune in hand at 
 once, and work them as puppets to what 
 end he chose. He would begin the job 
 to-morrow : he had no time to lose. 
 There was a pig-headed stupidity in 
 Dallas and these Western kinsfolk of his 
 which would bring the boy's affairs into 
 a hopeless muddle unless some man of 
 ability would take them up and make 
 what profit he could out of them for 
 Galbraith and himself. 
 
 He was in high spirits when he reached 
 Thorp's and called Bill out to take the 
 mare. " Not a hair turned, Billy, though 
 I put her to her mettle." 
 
 " You've got urgent business on hand, 
 it seems. Colonel ?" 
 
 "I have that!" emphatically. >' Fm 
 going to put a young fellow through in 
 a way that'll astonish the folks in these 
 parts. Going to see that he gets his 
 rights, or I'll take the wind out of the 
 sails of a certain party that I know. I 
 hate oppression, Bill.'' 
 
 "A young fellow in these parts, eh ? 
 You couldn't give names, I reckon?" 
 rubbing down the mare reflectively. 
 
 "Well, no, Billy, I couldn't. But you 
 wait. When George Laddoun's about, 
 justice 'II be done. That's my way. 
 When any of the boys want a lift down 
 in San Francisco, Colonel's the man. I 
 don't say it boastfully. It's my nature, 
 and I can't help it. Better for me if I 
 could." He went off soon after, Thorp 
 looking after him almost as much kin- 
 dled with admiration for his generosity 
 as Laddoun was for it himself 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 There was a bunch of flowers, in a 
 little vase, on Madam Galbraith's break- 
 fast-table next morning — a crimson ca- 
 mellia, with a snowy edging of violets. 
 Gerty saw it the instant she came in. 
 Mr. Dour had been down at the village 
 last night, and there was a hot-house in 
 the truck-garden there, and the bouquet 
 was beside Honora's plate. Hers was 
 on the opposite side of the table. A 
 lump rose in her throat, choking her, 
 and the dry tears began to burn in her 
 eyes. Walking home from church yester- 
 day, Paul had been barely civil to her, 
 and was it any wonder ? She had but 
 two dresses in which to make herself 
 look decent — the blue poplin and red 
 merino — while Honora had a costume for 
 every fresh humor and whim. Yet Mr. 
 Dour thought that she was his own 
 soul's true mate : he had said as much 
 one day, and quoted Plato about it. She 
 did not know much about Plato, but she 
 did know that she would be glad to be 
 his servant, to black his shoes if need 
 were ; and if he would make her his wife 
 they could live nicely on — well, just next 
 to nothing: she was a different sort of 
 housekeeper from Miss Dundas. The 
 poor fellow would never have to go about 
 then with unhemmed cravats and ragged 
 shirt-cuffs. But there was no hope of 
 that ! She believed Madam Galbraith 
 had brought him there expressly to 
 marry Honora, and they had him in their 
 toils now ; and as for her, she was grow- 
 ing old and shabby. There was quite a 
 wrinkle between her eyes lately ; and 
 how miserable the ruffle of cotton lace 
 looked about her neck beside Honora's 
 lovely worked linen chemisettes ! 
 
 She could not eat her muffin or chop 
 at all, but merely sipped wretchedly at 
 her coffee. Mr. Dour sat near her, but 
 she would not turn so much as a glance 
 toward him. She hoped she knew her 
 duty as a woman. Miss Dundas came 
 in late, just as her pony-chaise was 
 driven in front of the windows. She 
 wore a gray dress, edged with fur, and 
 carried her little fur cap and gloves in 
 her hand — all delicate and picturesque 
 
 and winning, oddly suiting the dewy, clear 
 eyes and fresh, emphatic little face: how 
 could one ever make anything out of a 
 stiff poplin look like that 1 Honora looked 
 soberly at the flowers a moment. 
 
 "Jane," she said — "Jane, there is a 
 mistake here. These flowers cannot be 
 intended for me ;" and began to chip 
 her egg in severe silence. Mr. Dour 
 scowled at her, but said nothing, old 
 Madam Galbraith's eyes being on him ; 
 and the vase was carried by Jane igno- 
 miniously to the mantel-shelf, where the 
 camellia began to wilt, and finally fell in 
 the ashes. 
 
 "You are going to drive, Honora?" 
 asked Mrs. Duffield, who was looking 
 lazily over the last week's paper. 
 
 "Yes, down to the village." 
 
 "Alone? Your ponies look mettle- 
 some, child." 
 
 " I am going alone." Miss Dundas' 
 tones were without doubt cross : the 
 flowers had made her heart beat more 
 than she chose to perceive. She could 
 not shut her eyes any longer to Mr. 
 Dour's proceedings. Poor Gerty ! It 
 was a shame ! a shame ! And yet what 
 must it be to be loved — to love ? 
 
 Whatever might be the ogre or angel 
 who made pictures before the young wo- 
 man's brain just then, they kept her sit- 
 ting at the table alone after every one else 
 was gone — eating dry toast mechanically, 
 quite unconscious of her pawing ponies, 
 and of even Mr. Dour, who had held his 
 eyes upon her during the whole course 
 of the meal. She passed him, when she 
 did rise from her breakfast, with such an 
 indifferent nod, that he turned straight 
 to the well-known blue dress in an arm- 
 chair by the fire. But little Gerty did 
 not even nod to him: indeed, her big 
 eyes, patient and sorrowful as a cow's, 
 were so intent on her tatting that she 
 did not seem to feel him touch her arm. 
 He turned from her. 
 
 "My poor camellia!" in a half -whis- 
 per, picking it up from the fender. " It 
 went far astray this morning. As the 
 heart of its owner," with a deep 
 breath. 
 
 The tatting went all wrong : the curled 
 lashes trembled on the chubby cheeks. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 "You did not mean to give it to Miss 
 Dundas, then ?"' 
 
 " No." 
 
 She looked closer at her shuttle : t\vo 
 big tears rolled from under the lashes. 
 They were too much for Paul Dour. 
 «* I meant to give nothing to Miss Dun- 
 das. Gerty," bending over her. 
 
 " I am sure it does not matter to me 
 if you gave her all the flowers in the 
 world," said Miss Rattlin, drawing her- 
 self suddenly up with the dignity of a 
 partridge. "Why should it ?" 
 
 Paul stared down at her and crumbled 
 the burned flower into bits. " To be 
 sure, why should it ?" he said vacantly, 
 and putting on his cap directly afterward, 
 he went out to look for quails, followed 
 by a saucy laugh from the fireside. He 
 was out of temper with himself. What 
 did it concern him if this silly little vil- 
 lage girl was full of vagaries ? He had 
 taken the first honors of his year: he 
 had made a pilgrimage to Concord to 
 visit Emerson, believing that he stood on 
 the foremost ramparts of thought, side 
 by side with that great seer. Sometimes 
 (especially after reading the books of that 
 great master) he was conscious of original 
 power in his own brain enough to make 
 this whole fallow country fruitful with 
 ideas. And this little jilt treated him as 
 though he were a penny whistle, on which 
 &he could blow what tune she pleased. 
 She was nothing to him. 
 
 What the devil did she mean just 
 now ? Was it possible she did not care 
 for him ? 
 
 "What are you so glum about, Dour?" 
 asked Colonel Pervis, who was with him. 
 "A woman, TU wager." 
 
 "Oh, I've done with women, long 
 ago," sourly. "I've outgrown that folly. 
 Nobody ever did understand them since 
 the old Serpent when he managed Eve." 
 
 "And even he got the worst of it at 
 last— eh ?" 
 
 Gerty, for some reason, was by this 
 time quite rosy and radiant over her 
 shuttling. She made half-a-dozen puns, 
 at which Mrs. Duffield lit'ted her dehcate 
 brows in astonishment and smiled faintly. 
 She grew very caressing to Honora, put 
 on her cap for her, and called her a dear 
 
 little thing, patronizingly, at the end of 
 every sentence. 
 
 "What a queer dress, you dear little 
 thing ! Quite Polish, isn't it, though ? 
 Gentlemen don't like anything so pro- 
 nounced, I think. Why don't you wear 
 blue ? But you can't — I forgot. Your 
 skin won't bear it. I think this is a 
 sweet shade in my poplin. ' Tender and 
 true,' that's the meaning of the color. 
 A gentleman told me so last week." 
 
 " Letters !" called Madam Galbraith, 
 taking a black leather bag from a man 
 at the door. " Half a dozen for your 
 sister, Gertrude. All from young men. 
 Tut ! tut ! Girls nowadays pass about 
 their ideas and feelings at such a rate 
 that they must be tolerably well-worn 
 coin when a husband comes to get them. 
 Here is a letter for Elizabeth, Honora. 
 I wish you would take it to her, child. 
 And speak to her of that matter," lower- 
 ing her voice. "I will not have her go, 
 d'ye understand ? I want to hear no 
 more of it. It's sheer temper in Eliza- 
 beth. And the woman has no home but 
 this. I know it." 
 
 Honora obeyed quickly, as though the 
 errand pleased her. She looked, as she 
 went, at the big, square yellow envelope, 
 with its direction in a man's crabbed 
 hand, and the queer, written postmark — 
 Manasquan. " It's a love-letter," with 
 an authoritative nod. " Maybe she has 
 another home than this, after all." Hon- 
 ora was as nervous and curious in this 
 matter of love to-day as a traveler might 
 be about a new country of which his feet 
 had just touched the shore. 
 
 " I've something for you, Lizz)'," she 
 cried, tapping at the door of the house- 
 keeper's prim little room and going in. 
 " News from a friend. The best friend, 
 perhaps," holding it over her head and 
 looking archly at Lizzy as she rose 
 soberly, brushing the bits of thread from 
 her dress before she took the letter and 
 looked at it. Surely she blushed ! 
 
 « Sit down, Honora," gravely placing 
 
 a chair. She always treated her like a 
 
 willful child, but Nora spent a large share 
 
 I of her time in Lizzy's room, knowing by 
 
 1 instinct how welcome she was to the 
 
 I lonely woman. Honora was the only 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 one in the house who had always treated 
 her as an equal. 
 
 " It's a letter from Manasquan," she 
 said, after she had glanced over it, fold- 
 ing it hurriedly. " My old home, you 
 know. It's from a friend of mine — 
 James Van Zeldt ; or he's an agent, rather, 
 I ought to say. I have a little house 
 and a lot there, and he rents them for me, 
 and twice a year he writes about them." 
 
 " Oh !" with a disappointed shrug. 
 •' Now, I had made up my mind it was 
 from a lover, Lizzy. Everybody has a 
 lover." 
 
 " He is only an agent, I assure you, 
 Honora," without a smile. " Wait ; 
 here is his letter. There is no reason 
 why I should keep Jim's letters secret, as 
 if they mattered anything to me," earnest- 
 ly, pulling it out of her pocket. " Do take 
 it, Honora. I wish you to read it." 
 
 "Well, I will then," ensconcing her- 
 self comfortably on the low window-seat. 
 The room was on the ground floor, and 
 the road leading to the door wound past 
 the low windows. The sun shone in 
 pleasantly through the frosted bushes 
 which overgrew the panes, over Honora's 
 bent head. Lizzy stood, square and 
 sober, facing her, looking beyond her 
 down the outside slope. Nora opened 
 the letter slowly. 
 
 " I suppose you are thinking of going 
 back to Manasquan, Miss Byrne," she 
 said, her color rising diffidently. " But 
 my aunt bade me tell you you must not 
 say one other word of leaving us. She 
 cannot do without you, Lizzy, and neither 
 can I." 
 
 Lizzy touched a bit of the girl's soft 
 brown hair, which hung loose, gently, 
 and then drew her hand hastily away. 
 " I did not think anybody here would 
 care for my going," she said, with a 
 pleased heat and flurry. " It has come 
 to be really like home to me," glancing 
 round at the neat little bed, the rocking- 
 chair, the teapot and solitary cup and 
 saucer beside the fire. She was think- 
 ing that it would be good if she could 
 wait here until her boy Dallas came back 
 to claim his own. It would be a very 
 hard wrench to part with Honora. She 
 was fonder than she knew of the girl. 
 
 " But I never would go back to Ma- 
 nasquan unless just to die there," she 
 said, solemnly, at which Honora looked 
 up at her with her liquid, dark eyes in- 
 stantly full of sympathy. She understood 
 it all. Poor Lizzy had buried something 
 out of her life in the old home for which 
 there was no resurrection. 
 
 " You will stay with us, and we won't 
 talk of Manasquan any more," she said, 
 gently, and was purposely a long time 
 in opening the envelope and taking out 
 Jim's awkward letter, while Lizzy stood 
 motionless. It was not altogether dis- 
 agreeable for her to look out into the 
 pleasant sunshine and think that her life 
 had been a sacrifice. She might be 
 homely and sedate and middle-aged, but 
 she was a heroine ! Quite as much as 
 the ideal woman of any novel she had 
 ever read. She had acted from the inner 
 truth of things to help others. Now, all 
 hope for herself here was over — all over. 
 She had grown old. She knew "the 
 purple glory of the morning faded." 
 
 Since she found she could do nothing 
 more for Dallas at the Stone-post Farm, 
 she naturally had looked about the world 
 for a place to which to go. It must 
 never be to Manasquan. She had been 
 young there and beloved. Her walks 
 with Laddoun on the sands in the moon- 
 light, with the eternal moan of the sea 
 making rhythm for the song in her heart, 
 came back to her. Whatever Laddoun 
 might be, that was the one gleam of 
 poetry in her life. No true woman could 
 love or be happy twice. Some day, per- 
 haps, when she felt the last hour was 
 very near, she would go back to the quiet 
 old village, and, with the moan of the 
 sea sounding in her ears, and the moon- 
 light perhaps shining down on her 
 changed face, make a fit ending to her 
 sad story. For Lizzy, like most women, 
 had drawn much of her idea of the eter- 
 nal fitness of things from the poems and 
 semi-religious novels which she read. 
 
 When she found Honora had opened 
 the letter, she said, apologetically : " It 
 is a very plain letter that Jim writes, and 
 I'm not so sure about the spelling. But 
 he is a good, kind fellow, for all." 
 
 He seemed so far outside and below 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITIL 
 
 103 
 
 the living poem in which the sea and her 
 forsaken home and the music of Lad- 
 doun's deceiving tongue had sliare. And 
 yet- 
 
 " It is a very good letter," said Hon- 
 ora. gravely, after a while. " 1 thinlc I 
 would like your James Van Zeldt more 
 tlian you do." Turning to the first page, 
 she read it again aloud : 
 
 " Manasquan, October 30. 
 « Respected Friend : I take the 
 liberty of stating to you, that the House 
 is lett : to the same parties as heretofore. 
 I remit the rent due. With regard to 
 your inquirees as to repairs : I have to 
 say there is none needed : a new Roof 
 was put on by some of the Neighbors : 
 same as regards a Pump : they desire 
 their names not to mentioned : I3ut that 
 it would be strange if you would wish to 
 make payment therfor : they have not 
 forgot old times, though they fear greatly 
 that you have so done. There is no 
 changes in Manasquan, since I wrote 
 last, except that one or two is gone. 
 Aaron Bent and the mother of your old 
 friend George. She grew feebler for 
 two years, going up and down the 
 beach incessant ; watching the far-oflf 
 sails, thinking they would bring one of 
 her boys : We found her lying quite sdll 
 there one morning, the sand blown over 
 her: We have not heard news of her 
 son George since you went away five 
 years ago last April : his property was 
 sold out then : I have thought of asking 
 you if you knew of his whereabouts. 
 There have been times when I thought 
 I would ask you to tell me if your rela- 
 tions to him had changed : but I would 
 not hurt you, Lizzy, no matter what my 
 feelings may be. You ask me about my 
 own affairs. They is prosperous. I 
 have a comfortable House and Farm. 
 I have the best poultry-yard in these 
 parts. I find it lonesome at times but 
 I am in no mind to marry, any young 
 girl hereabouts as you proposed to me 
 once. I have no more to say except 
 that if you are minded to come back 
 you'll find them as was friends — friends 
 still. Your taking part with that unfor- 
 tunate Boy will not set any one against 
 
 you. Least of all, me. But I suppose 
 you are among fashionable folk and know 
 the World. It is a long time since you 
 went away. Five years last April. I 
 often wonder if you know how long. I 
 am with respect, your friend and well- 
 wisher, James Van Zeldt." 
 
 " I am not so sure as to what you 
 would call a love-letter," said Honora, 
 meaningly, patting the letter on her 
 liand. " But he was a very genuine man 
 who wrote that, I think." 
 
 " Oh, Jim is a very honest fellow. 
 But—" 
 
 " I would like to see his farm and 
 house." 
 
 " It would not differ in any way from 
 any small plot about here. Jim is very 
 commonplace, and so are all his be- 
 longings ;" comparing, as she said it, 
 little Van Zeldt, his house and poultry- 
 yard, with the flood of moonlight on 
 the great, ebbing tide, and the tender 
 grace and glamour of Laddoun's presence 
 — a presence which had grown very real 
 to Lizzy lately, as she had fallen into the 
 habit of bringing it before her, after the 
 fashion of women, to make more bitter 
 the consciousness that her idol had been 
 but clay. It came so strongly before 
 her now that she scarcely heeded Hon- 
 ora as she rose and gave her the letter, 
 turning to the little oval mirror on the 
 wall to adjust her cap and hair. 
 
 " I am going now, Lizzy. I mean to 
 drive down to the village." 
 
 "It is a good morning for — What 
 is that V with a sudden cry, 
 
 " Why, Lizzy !" Honora caught her 
 arm. " I heard nothing. Do you see 
 ghosts in daylight ? What frightened 
 you V placing her on a chair. 
 
 " I will not sit down. It was a voice 
 I have not heard for years." 
 
 " I hear Sam whistling : he is raking 
 the leaves from the path. There is no- 
 body else there," going to the window. 
 " Your letter has put you en rapport 
 with somebody who is gone, as the me- 
 diums would say, or made you ner\'Ous. 
 That is it." 
 
 " I could not be deceived !" said Lizzy, 
 huskily, straining her eyes across the 
 
I04 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 field. Her pale, thick skin was damp 
 and iier mouth set firmly. "What shall 
 I do if he comes here, Honora ? It is 
 all over l^etween us — all over." 
 
 Mrs. Duffield's doubt of Lizzy's sanity 
 came to Nora's mind. " I do not think 
 there was any one there, dear Miss 
 Byrne," she said, soothingly. " How- 
 ever, I will go and look." 
 
 When she left the room the old mu- 
 sical voice rang out again suddenly and 
 close at hand. The gardener's mumbling 
 tones were heard in reply. Lizzy threw 
 up the window, leaning on the sill with 
 both hands, and waited. 
 
 " Get from under the horse's feet, fel- 
 low !" cried Laddoun, loudly, snapping 
 his whip over the horse's ear. " Tell old 
 James Galbraith and his wife I want them 
 — both of 'em — without loss of time." 
 
 " And who'll I say wants them ?" de- 
 liberately, dragging a mass of leaves 
 across the road. 
 
 " One that can put you and them to 
 the right-about when he chooses," sternly. 
 " One that will be met in this house in 
 a different sort of fashion a year from 
 now, I fancy." 
 
 How princely the sternness and cour- 
 age in his voice used to seem to her ! 
 She was older now. She only thought that 
 he must have been drinking, early as it 
 was in the day. The old gardener shuf- 
 fled by, grumbling and stopping to rake 
 as he went. The horse's slow footfalls 
 came nearer on the graveled road beside 
 her, so near that Moro, the old house-dog, 
 ran lazily by out of his way. She could not 
 drav/ her breath in all the cold, fresh air. 
 There was a moment's silence, and then, 
 in the full morning sunshine, Laddoun 
 rode up the path. The lover of her 
 youth, witli no tender glamour of grace 
 and youth about him, but overgrown and 
 well-to-do ; oily and coarse with low suc- 
 cesses : vulgar chains strung over his 
 gaudy waistcoat, and a vulgar leer iun- 
 der his thick eyelids. He had set his 
 hat on one side, curbed his horse, and 
 rode with a sort of triumphant pomp for 
 his own delectation, with the bearing 
 which he imagined would be that of a 
 crown prince entering on possession of 
 his kingdom. True, Dallas was the heir, 
 
 but what would Dallas ever be but his 
 tool ? He lifted his eyes with a haughty 
 indiflference. 
 
 Lizzy stood in the low window close 
 at his side. 
 
 She was squarer and more sober and 
 matter-of-fact than ever. There was the 
 very brown stuff dress which she wore 
 at Manasquan, and her knitting stuck in 
 its sheath. She and Dallas, of all the 
 world, alone knew him to be a forger 
 and a villain. 
 
 He put out both hands before him, 
 dropping the bridle, breathless and silent 
 for a moment. Then he hurled an oath 
 at her full of fury, as readily as if he had 
 been her husband all these years. 
 
 " Why did you come in my way ? 
 What are you here for V 
 
 There was no reply. The bright morn- 
 ing sunshine fell about them. The crack- 
 ling of the twigs under his horse's feet 
 sounded loud and jarring in the intense 
 silence, and his watch ticked noisily. 
 
 Lizzy put her hands to her throat. 
 "Is it Dallas?" she cried, under her 
 breath. " Do you want him ? How 
 could you think I would harm you, 
 Laddoun ! If only for the sake of old 
 times — " 
 
 " Bah !" gathering up the rein with a 
 snort of anger and disdain. "What are 
 old times to me ?" 
 
 No matter what his loss might be, 
 Laddoun, with men, never lost his tem- 
 per when the cards were against him. 
 But this was only a woman, and the 
 game had been so nearly won ! He ad- 
 justed the bridle a moment, controlling 
 himself, and then pushing the horse into 
 the bushes which separated them, scan- 
 ned her from head to foot with a cool, de- 
 hberate stare, which took note of, and 
 taunted her, as she well understood, with 
 every mark of age or homeliness. 
 
 "Old times have no significance to 
 me, Lizzy," he said. "You forget that 
 I have been abroad in the world, and 
 seen many other women since then, 
 differing from those of Manasquan." 
 
 She drew back : the quick change in 
 her face made him suddenly pause. 
 
 " I had no wish to remind you of 
 Manasq«an, George," she said, with un- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 105 
 
 natural quietness. " I said the remem- 
 brance of it would keep me from doing 
 you harm. It has not lost its signifi- 
 cance to me." 
 
 But there was a different meaning in 
 these words, lie fancied. A covert threat ; 
 and Laddoun secretly cowered before it. 
 He thought, too, he understood her game. 
 " There is no room here for you and me 
 both to work," he said, coarsely, "and 
 you've been beforehand with me. You 
 always had 'capacity,' as the Yankees 
 say. You've got the whip-hand of me 
 with Dallas now." 
 
 "Dallas is going: he will not be in 
 your way," she cried. " Let the boy 
 alone, for God's sake, George ! You've 
 done him harm enough." 
 
 Laddoun looked at her keenly in 
 silence. She was not levying black-mail 
 off Galbraith then 1 At least not for 
 the present. There might yet be time 
 to play his last card. 
 
 ''You are going to let him start on 
 this wild-goose chase then 1 The more 
 fool you. Well, my game is up. So, 
 so !" snapping his fingers with a shrug 
 which he had caught from the Mexicans, 
 his manner always being a thing of 
 shreds and patches, gathering as he 
 went. 
 
 "Good-bye, Lizzy," lifting his hat and 
 fixing his bold, black eyes on her. "It 
 was but yesterday Dall and I spoke of 
 you. But you've altered. Time tells 
 on us all, eh ?" 
 
 She was bending forward, her hands 
 resting on the window-sill, steadily look- 
 ing into his red, excited face. Laddoun 
 moved uneasily. " Do you see that it 
 is the same man as your old lover ?" 
 with a forced laugh. 
 
 « I see that it is the same." 
 
 "Yes, I'm the same old Laddoun. 
 Good-bye, Lizzy." But he bowed again, 
 and glanced back uncomfortably once or 
 t^vice at the motionless figure as he rode 
 away. He thought that he had played 
 his hand badly. She might have stood 
 his friend. " I fancied the old fire had 
 not altogether burned out when she 
 looked at me first. But Talleyrand was 
 right. She is my enemy now for life. 
 I have called her ugly and old." 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 HoNORA came back in a few mo- 
 ments : " I knew you were mistaken, 
 Lizzy. There is no one in sight whom 
 you could possibly know. There is a 
 horseman going down the avenue, a 
 stout, over-dressed man, whose very 
 shoulders assert themselves : I think it 
 is a Colonel Laddoun, whom we met 
 yesterday coming home from church. 
 He is — " an indescribable contemptuous 
 shrug finished the sentence. " He could 
 be nothing to you, Lizzy." 
 
 " No,' said Lizzy, " he is nothing to 
 me." 
 
 "You're dreadfully shaken by that 
 letter, poor thing. I did not think you 
 had been so nervous. Come out with 
 me : the cold air will make you feel as 
 if you were freshly bom." 
 
 "No. I'll He down by the fire, and 
 take some tea. That is the remedy for 
 all middle-aged people," glancing with a 
 miserable smile over the girl's shoulder 
 into the little mirror. 
 
 " Middle-aged, indeed ! Why look at 
 this," and Honora, with ready tact, pulled 
 down Lizzy's beautiful hair, and let the 
 black, glossy masses fall about her until 
 they touched the floor. "What would I 
 not give for it ? Talk of your youth 
 being gone while you have that, and your 
 smooth, pure skin ! If you'd only drink 
 less tea, and brood less over the fire, 
 your color would come back ; and you 
 ought to take care of your looks for the 
 sake of — your 'friends and well-wish- 
 ers,'" with a meaning twinkle in her 
 eyes. 
 
 But Lizzy refused to smile, cowering 
 on a stool wretchedly over the fire, paler 
 even than before. Honora began to 
 draw on her gloves, watching her doubt- 
 fully. 
 
 " Elizabeth," she said, with an authori- 
 tative nod, measuring her words 'n a 
 m-iniature imitation of Madam Galbraith, 
 " there is one sentence in that letter 
 about which I think it is my duty to 
 speak to you. I believe that I see in it 
 tiie cause of your troubles. I inferred 
 from it that you had allowed yourself to 
 become entangled in the fortunes of some 
 
io6 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 desperate character — some abandoned 
 wretch. I think that — well, I think it 
 very imprudent, Elizabeth." 
 
 Lizzy turned and looked up at her 
 with a sudden, inexphcable meaning on 
 her face. "You saw the abandoned 
 wretch, Honora, for whom I sacrificed 
 my life. You gave him your hand, and 
 told him you believed in him. He will 
 not soon forget it. The touch of your 
 hand counted for more to him than the 
 work of many of my years." 
 
 " Oh, the convict ! I remember," 
 growing violently hot and red. " I could 
 not help that. Something in the man's 
 words carried me out of myself for the 
 time. But I draw a line," her slight, 
 stately figure rising to its height : the 
 training and creed of her whole life start- 
 ing up to give fluency and force to the 
 words. " It is our duty as Christians 
 to hold out a helping hand and to speak 
 encouraging words to that class of peo- 
 ple, but to consort with them and make 
 them companions ! — It is to touch pitch 
 and to be defiled." 
 
 "You forget your Master's work," 
 rising. " He made friends of publicans 
 and sinners." 
 
 " That is a different matter," sharply. 
 The little lady, with all her radicalism, 
 did not choose that her housekeeper 
 should argue with her. " He could not 
 be tainted by contact, but a woman like 
 me or you, Elizabeth, should keep her- 
 self pure and apart. The Church's 
 ministers were left to preach His gospel," 
 sententiously. "We are to teach it too, 
 but more by example than directly : 
 surely not by mixing ourselves up with 
 the every-day life of vulgar and vile peo- 
 ple. I will be very sorry, Lizzy, if I 
 find you have been drawn into any such 
 connection. My uncle and aunt would 
 be very sorry," buttoning her gloves de- 
 cisively. 
 
 " The convict, as you call him, was 
 not guilty. He was punished unjustly." 
 
 " That may be," more dogmatically, 
 as Lizzy appeared to yield. " But your 
 own common sense must teach you that 
 five years of prison life would render him 
 unfit for an hour's companionship with 
 women of our position. Think of the 
 
 vileness which he must have drawn in 
 from the very air ! And / think a man 
 should be as pure and carefully taught 
 and religious as a woman. Like my un- 
 cle, for instance. You need not say a 
 word, Lizzy. Give the unfortunate man 
 money, or whatever kindness you please ; 
 but if you lower yourself by associating 
 with him, for however short a time, you 
 are unjust to Mr. Van Zeldt, whose wife 
 you will some time be." 
 
 " I will never be his wife ! And for 
 the unfortunate man, Honora — " Lizzy 
 stopped abruptly, the indignant, speech- 
 less tears rushing into her eyes as she 
 looked at the girl who had usurped Dal- 
 las' place ; scanning fiercely the delicate 
 figure, the flushed, high-bred face, and 
 the sunshine all about her. "You would 
 give him money and kindness .'' You !" 
 
 Honora drew back quickly as if she 
 had been struck, and was silent for a 
 moment. "You forget yourself, Eliza- 
 beth," she said, gently. ■' I will leave 
 you to rest a while," and went quickly 
 out of the room, without suffering her to 
 reply ; while Lizzy sat down on her stool 
 again, her hands clasped about her knees, 
 her back to the window, that she might 
 not see the dainty equipage and the ra- 
 diant, picturesque little heiress driving 
 off triumphant. She muttered to herself 
 something about bigotry and Pharisaism, 
 and then she turned so that she could 
 look into the mirror ; and, twisting up 
 her hair and taking off her collar to leave 
 the yellow crowsfeet in her throat bare,, 
 she studied her own age and ugliness, 
 almost forgetting Dallas. She yawned 
 nervously, chafed her wrists, cold and 
 hot shivers creeping out from one spot 
 in her side through her whole body, weak 
 tears dribbling over her cheeks uncon- 
 sciously ; going, in short, through the 
 whole process by which nature seeks to 
 relieve hysteric women of pain which 
 might else be mortal. 
 
 And Lizzy's hfe had suffered an ampu- 
 tation that day worse for a woman than the 
 loss of leg or arm. Back yonder, in the 
 youth to which she had looked steadily for 
 years, there was a gap never to be filled. 
 Moonlight and ebbing tide and the voice 
 whose sorcery had made enchantment of 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITIL 
 
 107 
 
 them, and all that these things meant to 
 her, were gone for ever. Instead, there 
 was coarse, every-day sand, a silly girl 
 and a vulgar braggart. 
 
 Yet, underneath all, there was deeper 
 dread of another loss. The people at 
 Manasquan had not seen her for five 
 years : would they all think her homely 
 and middle-aged ? 
 
 Perhaps Jim \^an Zeldt had met "other 
 and different women." 
 
 Presently she shook out her mass of 
 hair until the sun touched it : it was 
 finer and heavier than Mrs. Duffield's — 
 than even Madam Galbraith's magnificent 
 gray mane ; and her skin, too, as Hon- 
 ora said, was smooth as a child's, passing 
 her forefinger over her cheek. After all, 
 Honora was an affectionate, fine-natured 
 little thing, toned on too high a key by 
 those foolish old people, but with won- 
 derfully just perceptions for her years. 
 She was sorry she had vexed her. It was 
 not her fault that she had taken Dallas' 
 place, and as for her antipathy to what 
 she chose to consider vulgar and vile, 
 the child had sucked in such prejudices 
 with her mother's milk: they were a part 
 of her as much as her blood or voice : she 
 would never lose them while she lived. 
 
 Honora, meanwhile, being angry, 
 walked her ponies at a funeral pace, 
 aggravating to them and herself She 
 was not going to be suspected of 
 venting her temper on them ! Her un- 
 cle, coming through a cornfield up to 
 the, road, thought she would make a cu- 
 rious study for an artist as she passed 
 through the solitary landscape, sitting 
 erect in the low chaise in her odd, furred 
 costume, the reins loose in her hands, 
 her face fixed and intent. He had never 
 seen the power in the child's face before. 
 She was a something singularly discord- 
 ant and out of harmony with the faded 
 November day, in which both the chilly 
 earth and sky betrayed their weariness 
 and lack of strength. The fanciful old 
 man thought that the girl might have 
 better typified some cool spring morn- 
 ing, behind whose faint, beautiful heats 
 and dews lay prophecy of all the passion 
 and storms of the year to come. He 
 leaned over the fence unnoticed, marking 
 
 the nervous strength of her grasp, the 
 broad, white forehead, the steady, bril- 
 liant eyes, the red heat on her cheeks that 
 burned and faded with her thoughts : read- 
 ing, as a skillful botanist would in a yet 
 flowerless weed, possibilities of which 
 the plant itself knew nothing and which 
 perhaps might never be developed. 
 
 As for Honora, she was only, con- 
 scious that the world had turned the 
 wrong side to her to-day, like a grand 
 piece of embroidery of which she saw 
 only the knots and tangled ends of 
 threads, or like a wonderful harmony, 
 whose shrill treble and dissonant bass 
 only reached her. In church, or after 
 reading certain books, it was very easy 
 to plan out a part for herself in it that 
 would be like a sweet, perfect symphony ; 
 oh, very easy: she was quite sure, if she 
 had the chance, she was capable to-day 
 of any of the heroic acts of greatly good 
 women from Madam Roland down. 
 
 But when she came out of her shell for a 
 moment, and was even as good and self- 
 reliant as other girls, see the miserable 
 muddles into which she ran ! Madam 
 Galbraith scolded her, or Mr. Dour 
 made absurd love to her, or Lizzy in- 
 sulted her gratuitously, or — and then the 
 angry heat faded into a more meaning 
 pallor. That any convict who had been 
 in contact for years with thieves and 
 murderers should boast of the touch of 
 her hand! "It counted for much to 
 him." There had been a meaning smile 
 on Lizzy's face when she said this, that 
 maddened her: her pity must have 
 made her beside herself, not to see 
 that the man was young. Honora, 
 alone on the road, took off her glove 
 and wiped her little white fingers vehe- 
 mently. After this she would live to 
 herself Nobody understood her but 
 her uncle, or if any one came in her way 
 who seemed worth knowing — as a mere 
 study of human nature — they took no 
 note of her. Not as much as if she 
 were a bit of coal or a root, and went 
 away, leaving the dull, commonplace 
 world just as it was before. There was 
 small room for heroism or grand, sweet 
 symphonies of lives there ! Plod on, 
 plod on to the end. 
 
loS 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 But Honora had tried the world through 
 only nineteen clean, sweet-aired years : 
 her melancholy and despair were, after 
 all, rather appetizing: a not unwholesome 
 training with which Nature ordinarily 
 exercises the brains of girls. She suf- 
 fered her ponies to break into a trot, 
 which grew faster and faster as they 
 reached a level stretch of road, both 
 her eyes and theirs beginning to sparkle. 
 Then the sun came out behind the watery 
 yellow sky : presently she halted, detect- 
 ing an odd change in the scents of the 
 stubble-fields : then she drove up to the 
 rocks to reach a flaming branch of a 
 gum-tree, taking off her cap to put in a 
 leaf or two. The bit of color suited her 
 altered mood : the road being lonely, she 
 sang to herself some broken snatches 
 of a cheery song to which the flashing 
 hoofs of the ponies kept time. She 
 reached the mile-post in the road where 
 it separated — a by-way turning lone- 
 somely up into the hills, while the com- 
 mon broad plank-road went straight down 
 to the village. 
 
 Honora drew her reins and hesitated. 
 She was in no mood for the village wo- 
 men's questions or gossip ; or, perhaps 
 (still lashing herself for her sins), she 
 was not fit for it. She had better live 
 alone in future, as far as was possible. 
 The solitary mountain road, shut in by 
 leafless hickory woods, tempted her. She 
 waited, uncertain, a moment, and then 
 turned into it ; changing, it may be, as 
 she did so, the whole current of her life. 
 For, jogging down the path, a quarter 
 of a mile in advance, rode Laddoun ; 
 and when he saw her coming far behind 
 him, he drew into the shelter of the 
 bushes on one side and waited for her. 
 He had set his face to California on 
 Iea\-ing Lizzy. His game was up at the 
 Stone-post Farm, with her there to pro- 
 claim him a cheat and forger to the old 
 people. Galbraith might play out the 
 play as suited him. He was on his way 
 to his inn, there to take passage in the 
 evening coach for New York, when he 
 saw the glittering wheels and fiery black 
 ponies coming swiftly up the road, and 
 the slight gray figure guiding them. 
 
 He only meant, when he drew oflF, be- 
 
 ing a connoisseur in women, to treat 
 himself to a farewell look at the girl, 
 who had a witchery and freshness about 
 her beside which mere beauty was tame. 
 But in the moment of waiting, a sudden 
 inspiration came to him — a scheme which 
 he welcomed as complete and sure of 
 success. Now, Laddoun was a con- 
 firmed theatre-goer ; his brain was full 
 of hackneyed plots ; the garish light of 
 the stage colored all his ideas as thor- 
 oughly as religion would those of Honora. 
 When he fell on this plan, therefore, ut- 
 terly melodramatic and impracticable to 
 anybody else, he took a firmer seat in 
 his saddle, and set his hat confidently 
 upon his oily curls again, his sanguine 
 face beaming with delight and self-com- 
 placency. 
 
 In the brief space which elapsed be- 
 fore Honora's chaise came up abreast 
 with him, he had to elaborate his plan. 
 Given, a mystery and the chance of being 
 a heroine, and any woman living was ready 
 to throw herself soul and body into the 
 part : he would tell the girl the secret of 
 Galbraith's birth, and either out of love 
 of romance or the chance of winning Dal- 
 las, and so saving a share of the spoils 
 for herself, she would seek the boy out. 
 
 " Let him meet her again,"' thought 
 Laddoun, " and the work's done. I saw 
 how he held himself as with an iron 
 curb at the thought of her yesterday. 
 Slow, cold fellows like Dallas come to a 
 white heat under a woman's influence, 
 which men like me never reach. Let 
 him be fairly in love with the girl, and, 
 with all his boasted honesty, I'll wager 
 there'll be no word spoken of Albany to 
 the Galbraiths ! That httle episode 
 will sink out of the young man's remem- 
 brance as if a volcano swallowed it. So? 
 so .'' When they have been married a 
 few months, it will be time for me, with 
 that bit of knowledge in my hand, to 
 put on the screws." 
 
 Honora came closer : the Colonel, un- 
 seen, watched her through the hickory 
 boughs. She seemed very untainted 
 and childlike to the jaded roud ; and 
 her face, or the healthy mountain air or 
 the pleasant sunshine about him, gave 
 him a sudden twinge of disgust for the 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 109 
 
 job he had taken in hand. " I'd better 
 be otf to the ranches and McGill, and 
 let the dirty work alone." But the next 
 moment brought a subtler counselor. 
 " Where's the harm ? Dallas is a clever 
 dog and I'm throwing a fortune and a 
 good wife at his feet. There's nobody 
 else would do it for him. Curse it. if 
 I think he deserves it at my hands ! 
 Wouldn't drink with me when I took 
 him out of the very gutter, eh ? Curse 
 it, if 1 haven't a mind to throw up the 
 whole business and let him shift for him- 
 self ! If I do bring him in such a haul 
 as this, he'll hardly begrudge me my — 
 commission. No : Dall's not mean. 
 Commission : that's what it is." 
 
 By the time the ponies passed him, 
 therefore, in a slow trot, for the descent 
 was steep, it was with the gracious 
 feeling of a lordly benefactor, and quite 
 the benign air of one, that he sallied out 
 to overtake them. 
 
 " You drive well, Miss Dundas," bow- 
 ing to his saddle as he came up beside 
 her. " Your finger is as gentle and 
 steady as a man's on the rein." 
 
 Honora had given a start of annoy- 
 ance at the first sight of him, but she 
 bowed civilly. " I have always been ac- 
 customed to horses," she said, formally, 
 drawing back to one side of the narrow 
 lane and motioning for him to pass her 
 — a motion to which the Colonel was 
 blind, though he smiled under his mous- 
 tache, reining in his horse close by her 
 seat. 
 
 •• You are a lover of nature, I see ?" 
 with a profound respect in his tone and 
 manner which was unaffected. " So am 
 I — so am I. Though the zest of the 
 matter to me is, that we can put our 
 hand on mountains and sea and say, 
 'The lord of this is man.' I beg your 
 pardon, but the girth of the ofF-horse — it 
 is a httle loose. Permit me ?" 
 
 " It is quite secure, I think," said 
 Miss Dundas, dryly. 
 
 Laddoun was silent a moment, then 
 began a fresh attack. "What magnifi- 
 cent pasturage this is ! I suppose you 
 do not know whether it is included in 
 the Galbraith domain ? The estate which 
 you will inherit, Miss Dundas," with 
 
 another bow, "is larger than many a 
 German duchy, did you know ?" 
 
 " No, I did not know. The land is 
 my uncle's." Honora's brows were con- 
 tracting : her temper would bear but 
 little strain this morning. Besides, all 
 the formal reserve in which she liad been 
 reared protested against this forced 
 companionship ; and there was about 
 Laddoun that insensible air of impurity 
 which surrounds some men, which wo- 
 men breathe with difficulty. He made 
 one or two efforts to talk to her, and was 
 met by cold and colder monosyllables. 
 His black eyes glittered at the un- 
 wonted rebuff: he fingered nervously 
 the gold eagles strung over his breast. 
 There was no use in delay, nor reason 
 why he should submit to the insolence 
 of this petted girl : his business with 
 her could be brought to a speedy end : 
 a few sharp words would settle it. 
 
 "You prefer that I should ride on, 
 Miss Dundas ?" with a sudden change 
 of voice. 
 
 Honora blushed when her rudeness 
 was thus brought before her. " I was 
 out of temper this morning, I'm afraid," 
 forcing a courteous smile, " and I came 
 here for a solitary drive to cure myself 
 I am unattended, as you see." 
 
 "Yes, I saw that," coolly. "You will 
 be the better able to attend to a few 
 words which I have to say to you." 
 He turned his horse rapidly, so as to face 
 her, and laid his fat hand on the reins. 
 
 Her horses stopped. Honora gave 
 one quick glance down the lonely road, 
 up the mountain-side, growing slowly 
 deathly pale. Then she sat erect and 
 looked him steadily in the eye. " I know 
 of no subject in common between Colonel 
 Laddoun and me. If there be one, this 
 is not the place to discuss it," she man- 
 aged to say, though her heart was quak- 
 ing horribly under the Polish jacket, and 
 her own voice deafened her. 
 
 "This is the place I choose," he re- 
 joined, insolently. He stopped in genu- 
 ine admiration, magnetized by the wide 
 eyes, dark with terror and defiance, and 
 the colorless face which the extremity of 
 the moment had vivified with a rare and 
 tragic beauty. 
 
DALLAS GALBRALTH. 
 
 " I did not think there was so much 
 power in you," he said, good-humoredly, 
 after a pause. " Now, see. Miss Dun- 
 das," leaning on the edge of the Httl'e 
 carriage. " There's no need to be fright- 
 ened. I'm one that goes straight to the 
 point. I have a hard blow to give you, 
 but I'll make it as easy as I can. I 
 mean well in the end by you, as you'll 
 acknowledge some day." 
 
 She motioned for him to go on, not 
 speaking. 
 
 " I think it will be a wholesome lesson 
 for you. You carry yourself in a way 
 hardly befitting society in a country 
 where there is 'no such thing as rank. 
 You learned that from your uncle, I sup- 
 pose. But that air of distance and hau- 
 teur wouldn't go down with an old trav- 
 eler like George Laddoun !" with an an- 
 gry pause. " And it is especially unbe- 
 coming in you, because you base it on a 
 heritage to which you have no claim. 
 You are the heir of the Galbraiths, the 
 country people say. But if Dallas Gal- 
 braith should come to light, what are 
 you then ?" 
 
 " Dallas Galbraith ?" with a long, be- 
 wildered breath. " The boy who is dead ?" 
 
 " What are you then ?" persistently. 
 "A poor relation reared by charity. 
 Dallas Galbraith is not dead," his voice 
 rising. "And I — George Laddoun — 
 know the secret of his life. He has 
 been left to work in the coal-pits at 
 Scranton ; to — But the rest of his life 
 doesn't matter. He has suffered from 
 hunger and cold while you slept soft and 
 lived warm, holding his place — a place 
 which even now he won't rob you of, 
 humble fool that he is. If you were a 
 man, now that you know the truth, you 
 would bring the boy back to his place. 
 But the usual rules of honor don't obtain 
 with lovely woman," with an uneasy 
 sneer, for he began to fear he had 
 counted too largely on her readiness for 
 heroism. 
 
 Miss Dundas paid no more attention 
 to his stream of words than to the neigh- 
 ing of her ponies. She did not seem 
 conscious, either, that he had ceased to 
 speak and was watching keenly her pale 
 face and uncertain breathing. 
 
 " Do you mean," turning to him at 
 last, and speaking slowly, "that Tom 
 Galbraith's son is alive — that I can bring 
 him back to my uncle ?" 
 
 " You've Colonel Laddoun's word for 
 it that he is alive. You can bring him 
 back to-day, if you mean to do it." 
 
 She paused a moment, and then gave 
 the reins a fierce litde jerk, breaking the 
 horses into a break-neck pace down the 
 hill, bidding him follow by a commanding 
 glance. The girl, Laddoun saw, scarcely 
 knew what she was doing. She was not 
 much better fitted than a baby to master 
 the emergency in which she was placed. 
 He was not at all surprised to find, there- 
 fore, when he had urged his horse again 
 abreast of her, that the tears were run- 
 ning down her cheeks, and that she was 
 brushing them off and lashing the ponies 
 alternately with feeble strokes. '• They'i-e 
 so slow !" choking back a sob. "They 
 don't heed me a bit to-day." 
 
 "Wouldn't it be better to inquire 
 where to go. Miss Dundas ?" smother- 
 ing a laugh, for her energy had put him 
 in high good-humor. " We'll take it 
 leisurely. There's ample time to find 
 Galbraith. He has waited all his life : 
 an hour or two more won't matter, I 
 reckon." 
 
 " I wasn't thinking of /n'm. I know 
 nothing about him. But he will go to 
 the house if he is so near, and I want 
 to bring him to my uncle. I thought, 
 when you told me. What if / could take 
 Tom's son to him ? That is, if you are 
 telling me the truth." 
 
 " I am telling you the truth, Miss 
 Dundas," gently, looking steadily into the 
 glowing, wet litlle face. The look of pa- 
 thetic tenderness in it belonged to a world 
 outside of Laddoun's experience. No- 
 body but the old man who was so dear 
 to her had ever seen it there before. He 
 did not speak to her again as they rode 
 on for some distance together. It touch- 
 ed even him that her sole thought at the 
 time should be of the only friend and 
 companion she had ever had. 
 
 " I suppose, now, the death of his boy 
 was the one great loss of your uncle's 
 Hfe ?" ventured the Colonel, sympathiz- 
 ingly. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Honora started and looked at him, on 
 guard on the instant. " I never have 
 heard my uncle speak of his son," she 
 said, quietly, gathering up the reins into 
 a steadier hold. The road which they 
 traversed had narrowed into a mere lane, 
 which opened, a few rods further on, into 
 a wide stretch of pasture-land sloping 
 down to the creek. On the other side 
 tlie hills were cut by a winding cattle- 
 path. Honora looked at her watch. 
 
 " Have we far to go ?" she asked, un- 
 easily. " Mr. Galbraith has an appoint- 
 ment in the village at noon, and if he 
 sliould meet his grandson, he will cer- 
 tainly know him. I shall be too late." 
 
 '.' Dallas is not in the village. Be- 
 sides, I cannot go with you to find him 
 at all, Miss Dundas. We're not on good 
 terms, exactly. To tell you the truth, 
 he has treated me so shabbily that any 
 other man than I would give him the 
 go-by for Hfe. I'm going to Cahfornia 
 to-morrow, but I thought I'd do him this 
 good turn before I left. That's my 
 way." 
 
 Honora looked at him scrutinizingly, 
 but made no reply. He began to doubt 
 whether the little girl who guided her 
 horses with such a firm hand was alto- 
 gether the baby he had supposed, or 
 whether, if her uncle had not been 
 brought into question, she would not 
 have been plucky enough to master any 
 crisis in life. He had a mean desire to 
 bring out some fresh emotion, to play 
 on her again as on an instrument. 
 
 " Say, Miss Dundas ! You are re- 
 garded as the heir of the old people 
 j'onder. Your position will be altered. 
 You've forgotten your own part in the 
 matter." 
 
 " No ; I have not forgotten," calmly. 
 
 " Umph !" after a pause. " Will you 
 go on alone to find Dallas ?" 
 
 "Alone I Yes. Where is he ? How 
 shall I know him ? I wish to take him 
 back before four o'clock if possible. My 
 uncle will be alone then." 
 
 " By George ! You do mean to block 
 your own game, then ?" with a burst of 
 admiration. " There's no compulsion, 
 you understand ? Dall '11 never claim 
 the place unless you go after him." 
 
 " Where am I to go. Colonel Lad- 
 doun ?" coldly. " My time is short." 
 
 " So is mine. I've to reach the lower 
 ford inn by noon. You know Dallas," 
 his eyes fixed on her face. " You met 
 him once by the quarry in the moun- 
 tains. A tall, powerful young fellow, 
 with his mind set on slates and coal, 
 I'll wager, far more than on a pretty 
 face." 
 
 Miss Dundas drew the reins sud- 
 denly, so sharply that the ponies came 
 to a dead halt. She betrayed no other 
 sign of emotion. But she did not speak. 
 '• That was Dallas Galbraith, was it ? 
 Dallas Galbraith ?" she said, at last, to 
 herself 
 
 Laddoun did not answer her. He 
 was peering into her dark eyes breath- 
 lessly. So much of his chances for life 
 hung on the thought going on just now 
 in this silly girl's brain. But the face 
 was as inscrutable as Dallas' ov,-n. 
 These Galbraiths all had the rare know- 
 ledge of when not to speak or act — a 
 tremendous staying-power, in the lan- 
 guage of the turf Laddoun drew back, 
 and put his horse in a trot, baffled. The 
 ponies kept even pace with him. 
 
 "You will take the road to the right," 
 he said, when they came to the end of 
 the lane, turning to her. " That will lead 
 you to the Indian Queen. I must bid 
 you good-bye, here. Miss Dundas. Per- 
 haps I may meet you again before next 
 year — who knows ? But I'm off to the 
 gold regions now : I'll let things take 
 their course : I can neither let nor for- 
 ward them any further. You'll find 
 Dallas Galbraith at the Indian Queen." 
 
 Miss Dundas bowed — a statelier bow 
 than she ever could have learned from 
 Madam Galbraith. 
 
 " I am very much obliged to you, 
 Colonel Laddoun. You have done Mr. 
 Galbraith a great service, and I can 
 answer for his gratitude if you ever 
 choose to claim it. I will inform my 
 uncle of the place where you say he will 
 find his grandson." 
 
 "You will not go for Dallas ?" 
 
 " No ;" and with a sudden motion of 
 farewell she turned her horses toward 
 the open common and drove rapidly 
 
PASS/JVG BEYOND. 
 
 away. Laddoun looked after her in ap- 
 palled dismay : then he burst into a loud 
 laugh : 
 
 " By the Lord ! The fellow's more 
 to her than I guessed ! She is afraid 
 to meet him !" 
 
 The air grew fresh to Honora when 
 she had left him, but the short saffron 
 grass and zig-zag fences whirled past her 
 blinded eyes. She heard with a feeble 
 terror voices approaching. She was not 
 sure of herself — of a look or word which 
 she would give : the very house at home 
 and the hfe there this morning seemed 
 far off to her, and never to be regained. 
 
 One thing she knew. She had a word 
 to say to her uncle which would heal 
 that old wound in his soul for ever. No 
 one but she ever had known what his 
 dead son had been to him. She was 
 
 glad that she had never spoken that 
 son's name to him. If she could have 
 been the one to bring his boy to him ! — 
 
 But — And Honora, being alone, let 
 fall the reins and covered her face with 
 her hands, as if to shut out from her 
 own consciousness the burning heat 
 that rose from her bosom up to her fore- 
 head. 
 
 Presently she turned her ponies swift- 
 ly into the hill road. It was a lonely 
 and direct route toward the Galbraith 
 house. She must lose no time in find- 
 ing her uncle there. 
 
 But fate was against her ; for when 
 she had driven some fifty rods into the 
 narrow defile she looked up, and there, 
 coming rapidly toward her in his work- 
 man's blouse of gray flannel, was Dallas 
 Galbraith. 
 
a^ II II U> It TT 
 
 PART VI. 
 
 CHAPTER XVHI. 
 
 WHEN she saw him, Honora pulled 
 the ponies' heads round to turn 
 them backward ; anything to escape out 
 of his sight ! Then, thinking of her 
 uncle, she turned them directly back 
 again, and suffered them to go on slowly 
 toward him, leaning back, desperately 
 resolved to let matters take what course 
 they pleased. Then she pulled them up 
 to a dead halt, at which one of the poor, 
 patient things looked round at her with 
 mild wonder ; but the other, who better 
 knew the young woman's ways, only 
 gave a cynical neigh. Dallas was com- 
 ing nearer : she had the light of her new 
 knowledge in which to see him. His 
 gray clothes were both sleazy and dusty : 
 as for his face, only savage strokes of 
 ill-fortune could have cut out such spare, 
 controlled features. While she had " slept 
 soft and lived warm — " 
 
 The glittering little carriage in which 
 she sat, feeling herself every inch a 
 princess, after all, was his : the jeweled 
 whip she held like a sceptre, was his. 
 They had left him to work in the coal- 
 pits at Scranton, while she — Her very 
 clothes weighed her down and burned in 
 on her a sense of imposture. It was 
 more than she could bear. She threw 
 
 the reins loose and scrambled out of the 
 chaise, intending to go to him. Instead, 
 she stopped at the head of the nearest 
 pony and put her arms about its neck. 
 
 "Stand still, Babe, dear!" in a tone 
 not far from crying. " Don't you worry 
 me. I'm worried nearly to death." 
 cramming sugar, with which her pocket 
 was full, into its mouth. " Stand still, I 
 say ! " drawing off and stamping her 
 foot. " Don't move till I come back ; 
 I'm not so mean but that something 
 shall obey me !" at which Babe, who 
 happened to be the young and favorite 
 one of the two, rubbed his nose into 
 her palm, sympathetically, while his 
 wiser brother stamped for his share of 
 sugar, half shutting his eyes, sardoni- 
 cally. 
 
 The little gray figure fluttered along 
 the road with the desperate, uncertain 
 motion of a partridge scared from its 
 nest. There was a fallen sycamore lying 
 half across the way, filagreed over with 
 yellow and black lichen. She stopped 
 beside it, holding by its crumbling 
 branches, while Dallas came nearer — 
 hesitated — nearer — and then stood close 
 before her. The lonely mountain lane, 
 high-banked and hedged, seemed to hold 
 them together with its straightness and 
 silence ; the wind had died : the thin 
 
n4 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 sunshine on the faded grass and shelv- 
 ing hill-cuts waited. The hour, for 
 which all their lives before had been but 
 a dull, ticking prelude, struck loud and 
 clear. 
 
 If Honora, in all her years of dream- 
 ing, had known what was coming, she 
 could have been ready to give the mo- 
 ment its dramatic word of utterance. 
 Many a time afterward through her life 
 she composed the proper greeting which 
 she ought to have given him. As it was, 
 she put out one hand feebly and drew 
 it back again ; and finally — 
 
 "Are you looking for fossils and — 
 things .? " she said. 
 
 Galbraitlr put his hand involuntarily 
 to the empty green bag which was slung 
 on his back. " I have found nothing," 
 he answered. 
 
 He had found nothing for days until 
 now ; but this was all for which he had 
 looked. Honora was a very different 
 thing to Dallas than a pure, winning 
 maiden is to a society-bred lover. So 
 far, remember, he had humanized his life 
 — not his life him. The genial, divine 
 under-meaning of the work-day world 
 begins to show itself to most young 
 men in their boyish fun, in their home- 
 life, in their glimpses of fairy-land 
 through theatres and circuses, in hymns 
 (not often in sermons), and later, through 
 their love of women, art, society ; but all 
 these had always been shut out from 
 him in the coal-pits, in Manasquan and 
 in Albany. Honora, and the wealthy, 
 generous life which framed and made 
 a background, were his first open 
 glimpes of it : they seemed to contain 
 all that he had missed in the past empty 
 years. She held in her hand the magic 
 wine, ready to give him, of which his 
 life had been drained. 
 
 So that he had gone about now for 
 days through the hill-roads, in the hope 
 of finding her, with much of the same 
 awed longing, I fancy, as that with 
 which the first of the earth's people 
 looked to meet every day the angels who 
 lived in the near but unattainable hea- 
 ven. Only that a great, busy, merry 
 household like Madam Galbraith's — cul- 
 ture, books, and a young woman, tempt- 
 
 ing in her hidden beauty and fragrance 
 as an unsunned rosebud — would mean 
 far more to a healthy, strong-brained man 
 than a whole sky-full of misty angels 
 and rest. As they ought to do. 
 
 " I did not think I would see you 
 again," he said, gently. " I am going 
 to-morrow. I did not think I would see 
 you again.'' He stood far off, as if con- 
 scious of the gulf between them, never 
 to be crossed ; but he was not con- 
 scious of the untamable pleasure kind- 
 ling in his eyes. 
 
 "Yes, I'm here ; but I did not come 
 for you," hastily. " I was going home. 
 Oh ! that is not what I wanted to say ! " 
 with a sudden outburst. " I mean that 
 I know who you are. I know all. You 
 must come home." 
 
 " You know who I am ?" 
 
 " Dallas — Dallas Galbraith." 
 
 "You are ill! Sit here, on this 
 stone." 
 
 " I am not going to fall," stiffly erect, 
 with both hands on the sycamore trunk ; 
 "but I'm worried. The sun makes 
 my head ache." And after a pause : 
 " It was unmaidenly in me to come for 
 you ; but the ponies turned down this 
 road. I did not think you were here." 
 
 " Why ought you not come ? You 
 knew who I was, and you wanted to bring 
 me home. That was right, I think." 
 
 Honora, looking into his grave, be- 
 wildered face, felt her modesty in some 
 way puerile and false. " Of course it 
 was right," she said, slowly. "Just as 
 any man would have come for another." 
 
 " No," sharply ; " God knows, not 
 that !" He turned away and walked 
 hastily down the road, leaving Miss Dun- 
 das staring after him, amazed. The slow 
 fellow was beginning to reahze what 
 it meant that she knew who he was. If 
 Laddoun had betrayed him out of sheer 
 revenge, he had told her the damning 
 secret which he was trying to put out of 
 sight. Then, his whole life was blocked ; 
 all chance struck from him of home, 
 work, education, and tliat something 
 which he dared not name ; and, instead, 
 the foul load to carry for life which he 
 had borne so long for another. 
 
 But it might have been Lizzy : she 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 115 
 
 was fond and foolish : she might have 
 used this lovely lady as a lure to compel 
 him back. 
 
 He returned with quick steps and 
 passionate eyes. He had not seen be- 
 fore how lovely she was. She had taken 
 off her cap, and the damp rings of 
 brown hair fell loose about her neck, 
 framing her face. There was no gross 
 heat in Dallas' blood. The slight maid- 
 enly figure leaning against the yellow 
 trunk did not madden him as it might 
 coarser men, nor the soft rising color in 
 her mobile face. But the pure wo- 
 manly presence, so unknown to his life, 
 the tenderness, weakness, the very silli- 
 ness betrayed in her eyes, akin to that 
 of the children who were so dear to 
 him, wrung his heart with a delirious pain 
 such as only men of his nature can feel. 
 He had lived so much with men that the 
 woman in Honora was a new revela- 
 tion to him : his tliought of her already 
 began to change him, as the living breath 
 which once entered into the nostrils of 
 the dull shape of clay, and, passing 
 through its heavy limbs, made it a man. 
 
 Honora, meanwhile, had been nerving 
 herself, and proposed now to talk to him 
 of this matter in the exact business-like 
 tone which one man would use to an- 
 other. That was the way in which she 
 should have begun. 
 
 •'I want you to go home this after- 
 noon," she said. "My uncle will be in 
 the library. You must go directly in and 
 say to him : ' I am Dallas Galbraith.' I 
 meant to tell him first, but — " 
 
 " How do you know me, Miss Dun- 
 das ? Who told you my name T' 
 
 " Colonel Laddoun." 
 
 Galbraith did not speak for a moment. 
 " You said," in a strained, unnatural 
 tone, "that you 'knew all:' what did 
 Laddoun tell you of me .''" 
 
 •• Only that you had worked in the 
 coal-pits at Scranton, and had led a hard 
 life, while / took your place ; that 3'ou 
 would not make yourself known ; that 
 you were going with Doctor Pritchard 
 never to come back, leaving tne to de- 
 fraud you to the end," growing more 
 bitter and emphatic as she went on. 
 
 Finding that Galbraith stood thought- 
 
 ful, unmindful, apparently, of her assault 
 on herself, she added : " Colonel Lad- 
 doun is gone. He was not a man to 
 whom I would choose to explain any- 
 thing. But do you not blame me — do 
 you ? You can understand ?" with an 
 unconscious cadence in her voice which 
 touched him with an electric shock. 
 
 " I understand. How could I blame 
 you ? Colonel Laddoun is gone, you 
 say ?" 
 
 " Yes ; to Cahfornia. He said," with 
 an arch smile, "that you had treated him 
 shamefully ill, but that he would do you 
 this good turn before he left. I think," 
 confidentially, "he is a good-natured 
 man, after all — " her look finishing the 
 sentence with an infinite scope of mean- 
 ing. 
 
 " Yes : Laddoun is not malicious," 
 gravely. "He is quite capable of a 
 generous action. And he's gone !" with 
 a deep breath of relief which a freed 
 slave might give. The next moment he 
 remembered that the reHef was given by 
 the knowledge that he was free to act a 
 lie, to hide his real life fi-om this girl be- 
 fore him ; but he choked down that re- 
 membrance. 
 
 " We thought you were dead, you 
 know, when I was given your place," 
 Honora urged in an anxious tone, the 
 idea that gnawed her conscience assert- 
 ing itself again in the first pause. " I 
 am only a poor girl : Mr. Galbraith's 
 niece ; and he adopted me. I did not 
 know that I was an impostor. Of 
 course," lifting her head slightly, " I am 
 of as good a family as the Dours — that 
 is, yours : I only meant I had no money 
 when I said poor." 
 
 "And Madam Galbraith has educated 
 you as her heir ? Kept you from even 
 the sight or name of evil, I have 
 heard .•"' 
 
 "Yes. I believe I have been differ- 
 ently reared from other girls. She is 
 very strict, you see — very strict. She 
 does not understand little follies and 
 faults which we weaker people have, and 
 she counts them all crime. A stain is a 
 stain to her. It might as well be mur- 
 der as vulgarity in her code." Honora 
 laughed as she said this. She was 
 
ii6 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 strangely light-hearted and at ease al- 
 ready with her cousin, for so she named 
 him to herself. It seemed as if they 
 had been friends long ago. Her voice 
 had fallen into the clear, fine accords 
 with which no one but her uncle was 
 familiar, and her eyes, too, rested on his 
 with the magnetic sense of ease and 
 kinship which had only belonged hereto- 
 fore to her old friend. 
 
 " It grows late," she said, looking un- 
 easily up at the sun. " Will you let me 
 drive you to the house — home, I mean ? 
 though the ponies and chaise are yours 
 by right," blushing with a sudden hu- 
 mility. 
 
 Dallas laughed. "That Cinderella 
 chariot ? The ponies would turn into 
 mice out of sheer dismay if such a lum- 
 bering weight as I were put upon 
 them." 
 
 "Then you shall walk alongside," 
 eagerly. "It is not a great distance. 
 I can walk five miles myself, easily. 
 You must keep on just those clothes. 
 They are so artistic, so picturesque, so 
 different from Mr. Dour's black coats. 
 What if Mr. Dour had been Tom Gal- 
 braith's son !" with an appalled little 
 grimace. " And you must wait outside 
 of the library-door, while I go in — I may 
 go in and tell my uncle ?" 
 
 Galbraith smiled and came closer, 
 looking down into the excited, flushed 
 face and the brown eyes which grew 
 darker and dimmer as she went on 
 speaking : 
 
 " He is an old man — it is many years 
 since his son died. I think he is very 
 fond of me. I would like to go in and 
 say, 'I have brought you Tom's son!' 
 I have done so Httle to please him, and 
 he has been very fond of me." She 
 stopped and quietly brushed away the 
 tears that had chased the smiles alto- 
 gether from her eyes. 
 
 "But Madam Galbraith.?" asked Dal- 
 las after a pause. 
 
 Her face fell with sudden dismay. 
 « Oh ! I had not thought of her. I 
 have not planned about her," slowly. 
 " She was very fond of her son Tom, 
 but—" 
 
 " But ?" He was nearer now. She 
 
 was as artless and open-hearted as Matt, 
 he thought. But he certainly never had 
 given poor Matt the tender, amused 
 smile with which he bent over her. 
 
 " I am not so sure about those clothes," 
 she said, anxiously : " Madam Galbraith 
 does not care for the picturesque so much. 
 They would provoke her inquiry. She 
 likes to turn people over and over. And 
 then she would find out how poor you 
 have been." 
 
 " She will know that I have worked 
 in the coal-pits," soberly. 
 
 " Would — is it necessary to tell her 
 that ?" coloring ; adding hurriedly : " Un- 
 derstand me : it is not the poverty which 
 would enrage her, but the chance that 
 you had been in contact with vulgar or 
 vicious people. Her own son was very 
 dear to her ; but when he fell among 
 thieves of his own choice, she passed 
 him by on the other side. It is only 
 fair to warn you of your dangers in the 
 new country," looking up at him earn- 
 estly. 
 
 Dallas crumbled the scaly bark from 
 the trunk that lay between them, looking 
 at the ground with dreamy, speculative 
 eyes. He had not the slightest inten- 
 tion to put his foot into the new country 
 of which she talked. He was going 
 with Pritchard in the morning : he had 
 not swerved from that purpose for a 
 moment. Honora and her world were 
 not for him. "Vulgar and vicious." He, 
 the son and heir, was an illiterate boor : 
 the very names of their commonest books 
 were an unknown language to him : 
 there was no form of vice with which 
 he had not been in loathsome contact 
 for years. He meant to come back 
 from Pritchard's expedition a changed 
 man. Then he would go among them, 
 concealing nothing of the past. But, 
 meantime, there was a subtle enchant- 
 ment in this unattainable world in which 
 she lived. He could not help but stand 
 at the gate and look in. This sun was 
 bright and this chilly wind bracing: her 
 clear, sympathetic voice, her old-fash- 
 ioned, awkward, winning gestures, her 
 foolish eagerness, were hke alluring 
 music sent out to tempt him to enter 
 It could do no one harm if he stood and 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 117 
 
 looked in a while. The very careless 
 talk, this surface-touching of matters 
 which imported so mucli to him, had 
 in it something new and cheerful : a 
 healthy liglit on what had before been 
 stern and hard. 
 
 But if he came back again the man 
 he hoped to make himself — what then ? 
 Would he ever be clean in her eyes ? 
 
 •• I can understand Madam Galbraith's 
 prejudices. But you — have you the 
 same ?" he said, and then stopped ab- 
 ruptly. The question mattered too much 
 to him to be dragged out so soon 
 and lightly. But Honora shrugged her 
 shoulders and laughed: 
 
 •• I go farther than she does, perhaps. 
 Shall we walk toward the chaise ? Jack 
 thinks it is time for me to go. It's a 
 terrible thing to confess, but I will tell 
 you. honestly, I have an antipathy to the 
 poor. Yes. It's the fashion now to be 
 radical and enthusiastic over negroes 
 and unwashed white people. I'd be 
 kind to them, and give any money to feed 
 and educate them until they stood where 
 I do. But in the meantime I'll keep 
 my own hands and breath clean," with 
 a wayward motion of the delicate little 
 body. 
 
 "If you were not so young, or if you 
 had been down in the pit, you would 
 find it no matter for jest," said Dallas, 
 roughly, thinking not of himself so much 
 as the two or three innocent-faced chil- 
 dren whom he had meant to rescue from 
 the very door of hell. It seemed to 
 him, while he stood listening to this 
 sweet low voice, he was unfaithful to 
 them. He drew involuntarily away from 
 her. 
 
 Honora, startled and irritated, turned 
 to him, with a dignity which in itself she 
 felt ought to settle the matter : 
 
 " I speak with more knowledge than 
 you think, perhaps. It is not prejudice 
 with 7ne — it is conviction. My expe- 
 rience is, that just in proportion as a 
 man's outer life is stinted and degraded, 
 his tastes lower and grow coarse and 
 his feelings are blunted. It is not the 
 educated class who beat their wives and 
 fill the cock-pits down in the village, or 
 who crowded yelling about the gallows 
 
 in the county town last week !" with a 
 decisive pursing of her mouth which 
 implied that that argument was closed. 
 Finding that Dallas did not reply, she 
 added in a sharper tone, sententiously : 
 " I have no faith in making companions 
 of that class. There's nothing so con- 
 tagious as vice. If we want to help the 
 poor, the firmer we stand on our own 
 ground the stronger we will be to lift 
 them up. That is what I tell Lizzy. 
 Now there is a case just in point. She 
 is our housekeeper. She is entangled 
 with a convict in some way. Poor 
 thing! It has been the ruin of her own 
 life, I suspect." 
 
 She caught sight of Galbraith's keen 
 eyes fixed on her face, and grew more 
 bitter and strenuous from his fancied re- 
 pro val : 
 
 " She has ruined her life for him ? 
 She loved him, perhaps. I would think 
 any woman would understand that." 
 
 "I do not," sharply. "I'm no hero- 
 ine. I mean, God helping me, to make 
 myself a pure, good woman ; and I'll 
 keep out of the slough. I think Ma- 
 dam Galbraith was right in her treat- 
 ment of her son. I never would let 
 down the bars. If I were Lizzy, and 
 the man were my own brother who was so 
 covered with moral leprosy, I would help 
 him as far as I could with such a gulf 
 between us, but I would never call him 
 brother again. The dearer he was to 
 me the farther I would put him away to 
 save myself" 
 
 Dallas walked on beside her in abso- 
 lute silence. She was hot and angry — 
 more angry that he would not reply to 
 her — but she could think of nothing more 
 forcible to say. Honora was just of 
 that age when the mind is of course 
 quite clear on all social problems, and 
 the creed is fixed irrevocably. But the 
 ideas in the brain, being new and fever- 
 ish, are apt to rush out and parade them- 
 selves tumultuously. 
 
 Galbraith never had argued in his life, 
 and most probably never would. He 
 listened with a stunned, sore feeling to 
 what seemed to him puerile, senseless 
 cruelty. It was like the whizz of a lash 
 which might some day draw his own 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 heart's blood. For the moment, their 
 educations coming in sudden collision, 
 the girl's presence was as repugnant to 
 him as the touch of a dainty, malignant 
 cat would be to a rough, stupid dog. 
 
 They walked along the road for a few 
 paces, when, just as they reached the 
 ponies, Honora turned on him, her face 
 flushing crimson, her eyes indignant : 
 " What have I done ? You did not un- 
 derstand me !" she exclaimed, stretching 
 out both hands. "You thought I in- 
 cluded you in that dreadful tainted 
 rabble down below. I never even re- 
 membered you had been poor. You are. 
 a Galbraith — you are one of us. You 
 went into the coal-pits from choice !" 
 
 " I was not angry with you," said 
 Dallas, gravely. " I did not myself re- 
 member that your words would apply to 
 me. I was thinking of others whom I 
 know, and of how long they must stay 
 in the depths if it were left to you and 
 your class to take them out." 
 
 Honora laughed. " Don't be angry 
 with me, Cousin Dallas. I have rea- 
 soned that subject out thoroughly, and 
 you have not. If there's one thing I do 
 understand, it is human nature. But 
 you have lived in the woods and moun- 
 tains so long that you are visionary 
 about men. I understand how that is," 
 as though she gave him a good-boy pat 
 on the head. "That is such a grand 
 life — yours," her voice changing and her 
 dark eyes glowing with enthusiasm. "A 
 naturalist — made so by nature! I 
 thought so the day I met you by the 
 quarry. All other men's work seemed 
 less clean and noble than yours. You 
 have lived many years in the woods, 
 have you not ?" 
 
 Galbraith swung his bag to the other 
 side, that he might come closer to her. 
 The dogged, honest fellow quite under- 
 stood now what manner of bigot she 
 was, and intended to show her that 
 he did so. Weighed against the hard 
 realities of his own experience, or with 
 Lizzy's ruined hfe, or even the narrow 
 bigotry of the Manasquan fishermen, 
 she and her shallow, unfeeling philoso- 
 phy were weak and paltry. Words like 
 those could hurt him no more, he told 
 
 himself, than the buzzing of a poor wasp 
 which he could crush in his hand. He 
 meant to tell her for his sole answer 
 where he had lived and how. 
 
 If he had but done that, his hfe 
 and hers would have had a different 
 ending. 
 
 But in the instant that he stepped 
 closer to her, Honora blushed and held 
 out her hand. She thought he wanted 
 to shake hands in token of forgiveness. 
 " You know I could not have meant 
 you," she said, smiling. 
 
 The hand was warm. The soft pulse 
 beat against his own. Her breath for 
 an instant touched his face : it had a 
 faint milky smell. 
 
 That was all. 
 
 The next moment the little lady stood 
 apart, friendly and nonchalant as before ; 
 but the great lout in the gray flannel 
 turned from her and patted the pony like 
 an imbecile, heaven and earth growing 
 uncertain to him, as though he judged 
 them through the fumes of opium. 
 
 To hold her hand in his, to feel her 
 breath on his cheek, to sit down beside 
 her for ever in her life of ease and com- 
 fort ! He was as little akin to the foul 
 rabble as she, and could put his foot 
 upon their necks as well ! 
 
 Five years of misery had not moved 
 Dallas Galbraith's integrity, but at the 
 breath of a woman it shook to its foun- v 
 dation. 
 
 Miss Dundas sprang lightly into the 
 chaise. "Come !" she said. 
 
 Galbraith laid his heavy hand on the 
 low edge: "Wait!" Whatever tumult 
 raged within, his manner was,* as usual, 
 blunt and quiet. " I did not mean to go 
 and claim my place when you came to 
 me, to-day." 
 
 "No!" eagerly: "you were going as 
 a laborer with Doctor Pritchard. You 
 meant to cede your right to me. So 
 heroes act, I think !" 
 
 " I would have come back to claim it 
 some day," said downright Dallas. " But 
 I will go with Pritchard. I have been 
 like a lay figure all my life, dressed in 
 one costume or another by any chance 
 that gained power over me. The heir 
 of the Galbraiths would be as mu'^h of 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 119 
 
 a puppet as the others. This is my first 
 chance to make a man of myself." 
 
 "You shall not go with Doctor Pritch- 
 ard!" with vehemence, clasping her 
 hands on her knees, and bending for- 
 ward. " I will not hold a false place a 
 day longer !" Then her voice fell into 
 tliat soothing, coaxing cadence which is 
 only given to those women who are 
 Nature's predestined wives and mothers : 
 '• Think what you are leaving. You 
 would be welcomed as one risen from 
 tlie dead. It is your home. Your mo- 
 tlier is there — " 
 
 "Yes, my mother." 
 
 "Madam Galbraith would make her- 
 self your slave, and you would be my 
 uncle's friend; and the whole world of 
 books and art would be laid at your feet, 
 if their will could bring it to you. There 
 would not be one shadow in your way. 
 Even Colonel Laddoun is gone, and you 
 cannot deny that he has acted as a friend 
 and not an enemy," with a smile. "Your 
 kingdom is ready. You have only to 
 enter on possession." 
 
 " And you ? When I had taken your 
 place ?" 
 
 "My uncle will be my friend always,'' 
 settling herself back lightly among the 
 cushions. "And I would try to atone 
 to you for whatever wrong I have done 
 you," looking down into his eyes, inno- 
 cently enough. 
 
 There was silence for a moment. 
 "Why, would you turn back from my 
 uncle and — all of us ?" in a low voice. 
 
 Why would he? Laddoun was gone, 
 all danger of detection was over. Was 
 it a squectmish scruple in him to shrink 
 from the perpetual mask he must wear 
 if he took his place now.'' Lizzy had 
 be'en outraged at his unnecessary honesty 
 to Madam Galbraith, and even Honora 
 herself had proposed that he should hide 
 his poverty. 
 
 She turned toward him now, holding 
 the reins out: "Will you take them.^ 
 Will you come with me ?" she said. 
 
 "Give me until to-night." 
 
 " Until to-night ? Yes. Of course," 
 
 with a chagrined, disappointed look, 
 
 a man could not be expected to 
 
 change the whole plan of his life with a 
 
 moment's notice, for anybody. Here is 
 my key of the green-house," taking it 
 from her pocket: "it opens into the ap- 
 ple orchard. I will be in it at dusk and 
 take you to my uncle." 
 
 " I will meet you. If I go with Doc- 
 tor Pritchard, I must see my mother 
 again," he added in a lower tone, to 
 satisfy himself 
 
 "Yes, one would suppose you would 
 wish to do that," dryly. " Unless the study 
 of coal renders you entirely superior to 
 all human sympathies," giving the reins 
 a petulant little jerk. "Come, Babe, it 
 is time you and I were at home. Good- 
 bye, Mr. Galbraith." 
 
 "Good-bye," returning her distant 
 bow with a puzzled, anxious face. " How 
 could I have offended her V he said, as 
 she drove quickly down the hill. "I 
 wish I had Laddoun's insight into wo- 
 men! They are the most unaccount- 
 able — " shaking his head once or twice 
 as he walked slowly after her, his hands 
 behind him. 
 
 He meant to weigh his whole hfe now 
 coolly, and decide. Instead, he watched 
 the glittering rings of light on the tan- 
 colored wheels of her little chariot. 
 They were whirling her away into a joy- 
 ous, affluent life which was his by right, 
 but that the something, which had 
 always been against him, thrust out its 
 shadowy arm to bar him back. For it 
 was clear to him that if he made him- 
 self known now to his family, the history 
 of the years at Albany could never be 
 told. He did not analyze his reasons 
 for this certainty. He could have told 
 his story to old James Galbraith at any 
 moment, knowing that he would hear it 
 with a man's quiet moderation and jus- 
 tice. As for the old honess, his grand- 
 mother, Dallas smiled with the usual 
 contempt of a young man for strong- 
 minded women. But — there was not 
 courage in him to declare himself a con- 
 vict in that house ! and then he stopped 
 to drag out a great boulder from the 
 clay and hurl it down the road, as a boy 
 would do to work off some suppressed, 
 gnawing excitement. 
 
 When he came back, a gentleman, 
 thorough bred, "the prison smell," as 
 
I20 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Laddoun had said, blown off him for 
 ever, it might be different — he could face 
 the world. 
 
 But what if he let her take him to- 
 night, with her soft, rosy hand, and lead 
 him in to her uncle ? What if he kept 
 his own counsel, and let the current 
 carry him as it would ? Into home, 
 wealth and that passionate dream which 
 he did not name. He had gone into the 
 coal-pits for his mother's sake: had 
 gone into the prison for Laddoun's 
 crime. Were these things to hold him 
 down until the day of his death ? 
 
 He sat down on a patch of bronzed 
 stubble, scratched a bit of scaly rock 
 beside him with his thumb-nail to see 
 if it had iron in it, and then clasped his 
 hands about his knees and sat motion- 
 less as the tree-stumps about him. On 
 his right was the cleft in the hills through 
 which her glittering wheels had disap- 
 peared, and, as it happened, the sky 
 beyond was suffused just then with 
 a warm crystal yellow, beneath which 
 the far-off mountains lay misty and 
 peaceful. 
 
 There was the home to which she 
 called him. 
 
 To the left was the road to the west, 
 and his work. Which should he choose 
 to-morrow ? Working, he could act out 
 himself, honest, to the last syllable : here 
 he must force himself into a mould set 
 by others. As for concealing that he 
 had been a convict, the question in ethics 
 might have been called overstrained ; 
 but Galbraith could not chop ethics 
 about the matter : it did not come before 
 him at all as a question of right and 
 wrong. A church member would have 
 said, perhaps, that God was on one side 
 and Mammon on the other ; but Dallas 
 seldom thought of God in connection 
 with his own small affairs, unless, with 
 an insane blasphemy, to name Him as 
 the something strongest "which was al- 
 ways against him." Of Jesus, like most 
 men of the poorer class, he had a dread- 
 ful vague reverence ; but what had He to 
 do with his going with Pritchard .'' Old 
 Luther, fighting the visible devil with 
 brain and muscles goaded to their limit, 
 has left the si™ of the memorable con- 
 
 flict to this day ; but Dallas did not even 
 know that he was tempted. 
 
 He sat there during the long sunny 
 afternoon. When it was over, there was 
 a dull dizziness in his head, new to the 
 clean -blooded fellow who never had 
 tasted coffee or smoked tobacco. He 
 had not taken his eyes from that golden 
 haze which wrapped her home. He felt 
 the touch of her fingers on his hand and 
 the sweet breath on his cheek. 
 
 Three thousand years ago another Dal- 
 las " saw that rest was good and the land 
 that it was pleasant, and he bowed his 
 shoulder to bear, and became a servant 
 unto tribute." The story is an old one. 
 
 But Dallas gave to his temptation and 
 defence no high-sounding names. It 
 was — to be himself or some one else. 
 There was an inherent loathing in him 
 for any sort of deception or accommoda- 
 tion. It went against his grain. You 
 might as well hope for a dog to wriggle 
 like an eel through the slime, and relish 
 his employment. But he battled Avith 
 his nature, keeping his eyes on the 
 motionless, golden haze. " Rest was 
 good, and the land, it was pleasant." A 
 passionate, enervating languor, which his 
 whole Hfe never had known before, stole 
 over from it to him, and wooed him to 
 come. 
 
 The rough grit in the man (and, 
 perhaps, the unsmoked and unliquored 
 blood) proved too much for its subtle 
 enchantment. Cover the fact as he 
 would, going back meant to shoulder a 
 lie and live in daily terror of its dis- 
 covery. It meant to take up a life good 
 for others, but which was not his. It 
 meant, as he put it in his homely phrase, 
 "to go to bed early in the morning and 
 to sleep all day." 
 
 He got up at last, stifling a sigh, 
 stretching his arms and legs to rest 
 them. "She is a good, sweet woman, 
 but she is nothing to me," he muttered ; 
 and then slung his bag again briskly 
 over his shoulder and set off across the 
 hill. The fight was over. 
 
 Long after, when he told his wife the 
 story, she told him that he should have 
 asked the Divine guidance. For Dallas 
 married afterward a good, pious girl, who 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITIL 
 
 learned her religion, as her alphabet, out 
 of books. 
 
 " I didn't know much about that. But 
 it went against the grain. A man at 
 that age don't take naturally to artificial 
 living. The tiller-rope pulls at a young 
 fellow pretty strong, and generally pulls 
 him right, no matter how the current 
 sets." 
 
 "You never will understand, Dallas, 
 the difference between our carnal nature 
 and that spiritual one which comes after 
 conversion," she said, a little testily. " No 
 good action is acceptable in any young 
 man who is an unbeliever. Our own 
 righteousness is but as filthy rags." 
 
 "Very likely, my dear," said Dallas, 
 submissively. 
 
 It did not occur to her that the same 
 hand which raised the widow's son might 
 now hold the tiller-rope of a wild young 
 fellow's life ; or, in Dallas' confused talk 
 of what was natural, or "the grain," in 
 such an one, to remember that He has 
 " many kinds of voices in the world, and 
 tliat none of them is without significa- 
 tion." 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Doctor Pritchard met Dallas that 
 afternoon on the hills going back to the 
 Indian Queen. The Professor was on 
 foot also, and seated himself to wait for 
 him, looking over and smelling some bits 
 of wool. 
 
 " Good-day, Galbraith," nodding. " I 
 saw you coming. I knew the stride of 
 your long legs far off. Very fair speci- 
 mens of Sa.xony these, eh ? Pool's : 
 down in the bottom." 
 
 "I don't know anything about sheep. 
 Doctor." 
 
 " The more shame for you then, sir — 
 yes," sorting them in his pocket-book 
 and strapping it. " What are eyes, or 
 ears, or any sense given to you for but 
 feelers — suckers, to draw in knowledge 
 of all sorts perpetually .? At your age 
 I could class a sheep by a bit of its 
 wool, just as I can a man now by a glint 
 of his eye ; though that last needs some- 
 
 thing more than observation — a keen in- 
 stinct," complacently, putting his wallet 
 in his breast-pocket and rising. 
 
 He walked on, nimbly, beside Dallas, 
 tapping the ground or trees with his 
 pointed stick now and then, and whist- 
 ling to himself. There was a light- 
 hearted, rugged strength in the young 
 fellow's face which invigorated him. 
 They would have a pleasant compan- 
 ionship by and by. The old gentleman 
 had boasted so much, in the neiglibor- 
 hood, of the lucky "find" he had made 
 in Galbraith, and his own penetration 
 about it, that he began to have a sort of 
 fatherly affection for the lad. 
 
 " Is your kit all ready, sir ? We start 
 early in the morning, remember. I'll over- 
 look your outfit when we reach New York, 
 and advise you what to take. You're a 
 novice in long marches, and, my word for 
 it, your knapsack will be filled with 
 trumpery. I'll — " he hesitated. "I'll 
 advance your salary for three months in 
 New York, so that you can be all ship- 
 shape before starting." 
 
 " I'm obliged to you. Doctor Pritch- 
 ard," heartily. " I will have use for the 
 money in New York, though not for 
 clothes. I thought that some little busi- 
 ness I had to begin there must be ne- 
 glected until our return. Now I can put 
 it in shape." 
 
 "I'm glad I can serve you," said the 
 Professor, with a pleased glance up at 
 the young man's bright face. " New 
 York, umph ? I thought you belonged 
 to this part of the country, Galbraith ?" 
 
 " No ; I am a stranger here. I have 
 spent but a few weeks in New York, 
 either, and that was long ago. Five 
 years ago." 
 
 His tone betrayed a sudden and great 
 embarrassment, which the little man no- 
 ticed ; and after a moment's curious 
 pause he changed the subject with ready 
 courtesy. 
 
 " Do you observe the cinnamon-col- 
 ored vein in that rock ? Now, just be- 
 neath that — " 
 
 But Dallas had slackened his pace 
 and now stopped, putting his hand on 
 his companion's sleeve. "One moment. * 
 I am glad you spoke of New York. I 
 
DALLAS GALEBAITH. 
 
 intended to find you this evening, Doc- 
 tor Pritchard, and ask you if you would 
 not prefer to know something of my his- 
 tory before you took me into sucii close 
 companionship. I will not go with you 
 under false colors." 
 
 " Your history ?" with surprise. " It 
 is hardly necessary, boy," with a smile. 
 "A young mechanic is not likely to have 
 met with much adventure ; and as for 
 your honesty and the like, I took your 
 face for my bond at first. I know men 
 pretty thoroughly, I fancy." 
 
 Galbraith did not reply, and they 
 walked on in a silence which grew more 
 uneasy on the older man's part : he cast 
 shrewd, furtive looks at Dallas' anxious 
 face. " I trust to your honesty," he re- 
 peated, with meaning. " If there is any 
 reason why you are unfit for my com- 
 panionship, I believe you will not con- 
 ceal it. I could not trust any man far- 
 ther than that." He had a suspicion 
 that the lad might have contracted debts 
 and wanted more money in advance to 
 pay them. He was annoyed and irri- 
 tated, and meant to find out the worst 
 at once. 
 
 " I am an ignorant man, as you know, 
 but I think I am not unfit to be your 
 companion," said Galbraith, slowly, and 
 then was silent again until they had 
 walked several rods. He stopped then, 
 deliberately. " I prefer to tell you my 
 story. Doctor Pritchard, but there is no 
 necessity for me to do it. There is not 
 a chance that you would find it out in 
 any other way. There is but one man 
 who could have betrayed me, and he is 
 gone. I would like you to understand 
 that, out of justice to me." 
 
 " What the devil are you telling it for, 
 then ?" 
 
 Dallas half laughed. " I hardly know. 
 I did not mean to do it until this after- 
 noon ; but I would feel more comfort- 
 able if you knew it." 
 
 " Knew what ?" irritably. He began 
 to suspect his penetration had been de- 
 ceived. 
 
 " Knew that during the three weeks I 
 was in New York long ago I was put 
 on my trial for a penal offence, and 
 found guilty. Stop — hear me out," rais- 
 
 ing his hand. " I served out my time 
 in the Albany State prison. That is all 
 I have to accuse myself with. I was 
 innocent. You jmist believe me. I was 
 innocent !" for now that he had made 
 the inner self comfortable by his confes- 
 sion, he recognized that his chance for 
 making a man of himself outwardly was 
 slipping from him for ever. 
 
 The Doctor was leaning back against 
 the hill-side, his small features full of 
 rage and scorn — not at Galbraith's vil- 
 lainy, but that he had drawn him into a 
 mistake. " Served out your time in the 
 Albany prison ! Of course you were in- 
 nocent ! Was there ever a scoundrel 
 who could not pipe that tune ? Don't 
 explain to me ! I'll sift this matter to 
 the bottom. I'll teach you to foist your- 
 self on honest men. And drawing his 
 salary in advance ! By the Lord ! 
 Drawing his salary in advance !" 
 
 Galbraith made no answer, while the 
 little man fumed and scolded, turning 
 back on his first assertions with renewed 
 zest. "Why, I've endorsed you, sir! 
 I've talked of you far and near. I made 
 myself accountable, as one might say, 
 for you, and I have a jail-bird on my 
 hands ! But I'll sift the matter ! You 
 need not suppose you can dodge John 
 Pritchard. Who was the man who could 
 have betrayed you, did you say ?" 
 
 " Colonel Laddoun. You seem to 
 have forgotten that I have betrayed my- 
 self, and that voluntarily." 
 
 " Colonel Laddoun is gone. You took 
 good care there should be no witness 
 against you. He said, I remember, that 
 he knew you thoroughly." 
 
 " Yes. No man could tell the story 
 with more meaning than Laddoun," with 
 a bitter smile, which exasperated Pritch- 
 ard the more. 
 
 "Your sneer is singularly out of place, 
 sir, it appears to me," with what he felt 
 to be telling sarcasm, "inasmuch as he 
 kept your secret. I would have been 
 glad," with an ironical laugh, "if his con- 
 sideration had extended to me also, be- 
 fore he permitted me to make you my 
 companion for a year." 
 
 " It is not yet too late," said Dallas, 
 speaking with difficulty. " You can dif- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 123 
 
 charge me now. I — I told you in time." 
 He stopped abruptly. 
 
 The Professor eyed him keenly. 
 Against his will, he had felt, through his 
 passion, that the jail-bird, as he called 
 him. stood higher than he — was a graver, 
 more moderate, juster man. He saw, 
 now, Galbraith's effort at control, and 
 knew, in spite of it, that the lad suffered. 
 This chance of work was the last plank 
 to which the poor wretch clung, perhaps. 
 
 But what man of sense, he thought, 
 justly enough, would risk a year's com- 
 panionship with a felon ? and what sort 
 of a story was this to get abroad after 
 he had picked out the fellow — talked, 
 boasted of him ? 
 
 '•• No, it is not too late," he growled, 
 with a decisive rap of his stick on the 
 ground. "You are discharged. Of 
 course vou are discharged. And I am 
 not one to change my mind about it. I 
 never changed my mind in my life. I'm 
 not a woman, thank God ! I'll take care 
 that your character is known to honest 
 men. My word for it, Evans never 
 knew it." 
 
 Dallas stepped in front of him as he 
 was turning off. Disappointment had 
 hardened his face and lowered his voice ; 
 but, after all, the heartiness and strength 
 in them, which had first impressed 
 Pritchard and warmed his heart to the 
 lad, were there, and he could not be 
 blind to them. 
 
 " You will not tell my story here, sir," 
 he said, sternly. " If I chose to confide 
 it to you, because I would take no unfair 
 advantage of you, you have no right to 
 blast my name with it." 
 
 <' Tut ! tut ! You lay down the law 
 of morality for me, do you ?" 
 
 " Nor had you any right to believe 
 one half of my assertion and set aside 
 the other," Dallas proceeded. " I would 
 not have been so unjust, if I stood where 
 you do." 
 
 " Truly ! you would not ? The mat- 
 ter's closed, sir," pulling his hat on with 
 an air of determination. " Innocent or 
 guilty, I hardly choose to make a con- 
 vict my daily associate. Not another 
 jvord. The matter's closed." He started 
 off down the road, every step ringing 
 
 out uncompromisingly, while Dallas 
 stood looking after him, leaning against 
 the rock. 
 
 At the foot of the hill the Doctor 
 stopped, hesitated a moment and back 
 he came, hotter, more out of breath and 
 angrier than before. 
 
 "'What is the whole of this cursed 
 story ? What do you hold it back for ? 
 Have you nothing to say for yourself, 
 eh ?" 
 
 " I was a boy, and was made a cat's- 
 paw of by another man. I presented a 
 check which he had forged. It was 
 made payable to me." 
 
 "'Where is your proof .^" 
 
 " I have none," standing erect and 
 raising his voice. " No matter what 
 manner of man I make of myself, I 
 never can go back to the town where I 
 lived and be called anything but a thief. 
 I would rather those people believed in 
 me as they once did, than — But what 
 is the use of talking about it to you .'"' 
 
 " Don't be so hasty, young man. 
 There may be a great deal of use in it. 
 So they believed in you, did they? That 
 would be a terrible story if it was true. 
 Not that I have the least faith in it, though. 
 Who was the man, by the way ?" 
 
 Dallas hesitated : " I will not tell you 
 his name. Not that I want to keep his 
 secret. I'd be glad if the whole world 
 knew him for what he is. But what is 
 the use ? You would but doubt me the 
 more." 
 
 " You are the best judge of the mat- 
 ter, certainly. Well, good-day, Mr. Gal- 
 braith. I have quite made up my mind. 
 You are discharged. It's the first time 
 my instinct ever deceived me in a man." 
 
 " It did not deceive you now, Doctor 
 Pritchard ;" and Dallas gave a low, nerv- 
 ous laugh, so like a woman's that it 
 startled the old man. He only glowered 
 more gloomily, however, and set off 
 again rapidly down the hill ; and this 
 time he did not come back. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 When Dallas reached the Indian 
 Queen, half an hour later, Matt met him, 
 
124 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 breathless, at the foot of the hill. " I've 
 been watching for you all day !" secur- 
 ing a hand. " You're a-going to-morrow, 
 sure ?" 
 
 "Yes, I'm going." 
 
 "They're packing up for you in there." 
 The " they" meant Mrs. Beck and Lizzy 
 Byrne, who came now to the window 
 and nodded smiling, each cheek as red 
 as a poppy leaf She had a smoothing- 
 iron within an inch of her chin, testing 
 its heat. Peggy had just finished the 
 white shirts she had been making for 
 Dallas, and Lizzy had been helping her 
 to "do them up." The two women had 
 been in a fever of anxious preparation 
 all day ; for Miss Byrne had been over 
 at the Indian Queen several times since 
 Dallas' advent, to see her old friend, Mrs. 
 Beck. She told her that she had many 
 friends in common with Mr. Galbraith, 
 and gradually seemed to share in Peggy's 
 fervent interest in the young man. 
 
 Indeed, Mrs. Beck had confided to 
 her husband in the barn-yard, while she 
 was milking that very morning, that " if 
 Miss Elizabeth was ten years younger, 
 she thought something might come of it. 
 She was very tidy-looking still, and it 
 was high time she was settling." 
 
 The news of her boarder's appoint- 
 ment to go with Doctor Pritchard had 
 put the good woman in an ecstasy of 
 delight and triumph. Evans, indeed ! 
 She knew, from the first, he was none 
 of Evans' sort ; and now the United 
 States was sending him out on their own 
 especial business. She had no doubt 
 that the President had had his eye on 
 him ever since he came to the Indian 
 Queen. She told Beck that even Miss 
 Byrne, who was so common-sensed 
 usually, was more excited about it than 
 she. It was Miss Byrne who explained 
 to her how high the position really was, 
 and how it would bring his name into 
 the papers, and how the eyes of the 
 whole country would be upon him. "It 
 would be such a splendid triumph over 
 his enemies," she said — "such a tri- 
 umph !" and was so fluttered whenever she 
 talked of it that she was ready to cry. 
 
 When Dallas came up with Matt and 
 sat down on the kitchen door-step open- 
 
 ing on the porch, Peggy was putting the 
 last stitches of darning in his woolen 
 socks, and Lizzy was stooping again over 
 the shirt-front, white and glossy as satin 
 paper. 
 
 " I took Beck's carpet-bag, Mr. Gal- 
 braith," said Pegg}', clipping her words 
 because of the haste of the occasion. 
 " Yours is too small to hold a cat curled 
 up. Them jars on the table have to go 
 in yet. They're peach leather — dry, you 
 see. Y'ou've got to stew it. It'll be 
 good for a snack out on the Plains, 
 spread on your bread. I've no doubt 
 the Doctor'll like a bite of it too. He's 
 a notion of good living ; for, as lean as 
 he is, you ought to have seen him drink 
 my apple-molasses. Miss Byrne, when 
 he come to call on Mr. Galbraith." 
 
 "We've nearly done," said Lizzy. "I 
 think these shirts will last until you 
 come back. If you come, as you pro- 
 mised, at the end of a year," looking up 
 at him. 
 
 "I'll come at the end of the year," 
 said Dallas. 
 
 " I don't know," broke in Matt, medi- 
 tatively, "whether I'd like a shaggy pony 
 best or not. There's gobs of ponies 
 about hyur. I was thinking of a real 
 crocodile in a box. D'ye hear, Mr. Gal- 
 braith ?" 
 
 "Hear to the child! You'd better 
 ask for a mocking-bird, if Mr. Galbraith 
 means to bring you anything. Croco- 
 dile, indeed? You asked me what I'd 
 rather have from them queer countries, 
 sir. Well, I was thinking, since Miss EHz- 
 abeth told me of fuchsias there growin' 
 twelve feet high and cactuses in propor- 
 tion, that if you could bring an original 
 root — you see? — I'd take the premium at 
 the county fair, then, I reckon." 
 
 "I'll bring more roots than you'll 
 plant," said Dallas; "and the bird for 
 Matt." For the world was broad, he 
 thought, and roots, and birds, and work 
 were to be found outside of New Mexico. 
 He had not the heart to tell these wo- 
 men that, instead of the honorable work 
 over which they were glorying, he was 
 going out to-morrow without a penny or 
 a friend in the world. He wondered 
 that he was not dejected himself about 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 it — that while he was trying to compre- 
 hend the great chance lost to him. he 
 was wrestling with Matt with one hand, 
 and looking into the busy, warm, little 
 kitchen, laughing at Peggy's jokes. It 
 seemed to Lizzy that for years he had 
 not been so light-hearted : all his old, dry, 
 quiet humor, which used to keep Mana- 
 squan alive, had come back to him. 
 
 "Are you so glad to go?" she said, 
 half reproachfully, when Mrs. Beck 
 had gone out: "One would think you 
 h.ad your fate in your own hands at 
 last, and could make yourself what you 
 pleased." 
 
 " I have less reason to be glad than 
 you suppose. But the world is young, 
 and so am I." 
 
 "Yes, that is true, Dallas." 
 
 "There is no use in moping and 
 whining over a rough tumble at the out- 
 set." He had dropped his load some- 
 how, she saw, and was exhilarated as a 
 boy with this odd setting forth so late in 
 life to seek, not fortune, but education. 
 
 " I will stay all night, Dallas," she 
 said. " I would like to be the last to 
 bid you God-speed, in the morning." 
 
 " I am glad of that, Lizzy," his eyes 
 sparkling. " I have some faith in omens, 
 after all." 
 
 "Yes, Miss Byrne will stay," bustled 
 in Mrs. Beck, catching the last words. 
 " Beck's arranged to take a half day to- 
 morrow, and we'll all have breakfast to- 
 gether, and see you off regularly. Maybe 
 now, you'd rather have had the chickens 
 and waffles for supper to-night ? They're 
 just as easy cooked as not. It would 
 seem more like a feast ; but I doubted 
 if Matt'd hold out so late, and you're 
 never contented without the boy." 
 
 "No. I'll not be separated from my 
 chum when the time for the last chicken 
 comes, you may be sure. Besides, I 
 cannot stay at home this evening," rising 
 hastily. " I have a — a person to meet, 
 on business, at nightfall. I will not be 
 late. I have but a few words to say." 
 
 " I'll tell "Wash to saddle the old 
 mare," said Mrs. Beck, as he ran up the 
 stairs to clean away the dust. 
 
 " No, no. I can outwalk Jinny any 
 iay," he called back, and a moment 
 
 afterward they heard him tramping hur- 
 riedly to and fro overhead. 
 
 " I wonder who the 'person' is?" said 
 Peggy, drawing down her brows over 
 lier darning. "He's great at making 
 friends for as silent a man — Mr. Gal- 
 braith. There's hardly an evenin' that 
 a batch of the men from the quarry ain't 
 up, talkin' over their affairs to him. 
 People's drawed to him nateral-like. As 
 for Beck, he's told him more of his early 
 life than ever he did me, for as long as 
 I've been his wife. Gracious!" as Dal- 
 las appeared again, freshly dressed : 
 " goin' out in gray flannel again ! These 
 white shirts is aired as dry as a bone. 
 I'd go out as become me — once. I'd 
 let 'em see you was employed by the 
 government. Them's your quarry clothes, 
 Mr. Galbraith. Jest slip on one of these 
 new ones, now." 
 
 Dallas hesitated : "The gray are quite 
 clean, and some people — artists — would 
 like this dress best." But he waited a 
 moment, uneasily pushing back his short 
 hair before he put on his cap. Up stairs 
 he had stood, for the first time in his life, 
 perhaps, critically looking at himself in 
 the square litde mirror. There was no 
 help for it ! He was hopelessly big, and 
 bony, and homely. 
 
 "Well, what does it matter?" he said, 
 cheerfully. "Who will look at the flan- 
 nel, after all — or at me ?" giving Matt a 
 final toss as he went out, calling back 
 good-night, and that they were not to 
 wait for him. Lizzy followed him to the 
 door to look after him, her eyes full of 
 motherly pride : no man ever had so 
 much purity and vigor in his face as her 
 boy, she thought. 
 
 " Jest see how he goes !" said Pegg)', 
 coming to her elbow. "These young 
 ones think they can carry the world on 
 their shoulders ! Dear ! dear ! Much 
 they know of life ! If you'll just take 
 his things in the other room. Miss Lizzy, 
 I'll have supper ready in no time." 
 
 Lizzy obeyed, a little annoyed. What 
 right had Peggy to complain and talk 
 about wants in life ? watching the hearty 
 litde woman going about, swiftly bringing 
 order out of confusion. Hadn't she a 
 husband and child that she loved, and a 
 
126 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 little house of her own ? Presently the 
 table was set, the egg stirred into the 
 coffee, the sausages frying on the side 
 or the fire. Peggy disappeared, and 
 coming back in a new blue cahco gown, 
 sat down to rock Matt to sleep in her 
 arms, big boy as he was. The evening 
 light slanted in warmly : Matt was a 
 clean, pretty little chap : his mother's 
 face was young and bright : the picture 
 had a certain homely beauty of its own. 
 It touched poor Lizzy with a sense of 
 hunger and desolation. She had missed 
 her birthright of love, and home, and 
 child. One could bear, she thought, to 
 to be always the broken thread in the 
 web, the solitary looker-in at the home- 
 picture, if one had but a dream of their 
 own to hide and be comforted withal. 
 But her dream, the nauseating story of 
 ■ moonlight and ebbing tide, by this time, 
 made her only sick to remember. 
 
 A sudden fancy seized her. What if 
 she went back to Manasquan and waited 
 there while Galbraith was gone ? There, 
 at least, was home. She could have 
 her own seat by her own fire, and cozy 
 little supjDers, too, which old friends, who 
 knew her when she was a baby, would 
 come and eat with her. Jim Van Zeldt 
 sometimes. Poor Jim ! She gave a mel- 
 ancholy smile : Well, well ! Every heart 
 knew its own weight ; and it would not 
 make her less tender with him to feel 
 tliat she had made his so heavy. If he 
 came to sit with her, sometimes, they 
 would keep silence for ever on this old 
 wound, and by and by it would be healed, 
 and they would grow to be old, gray 
 friends. It seemed to her very like a 
 poem or a novel, the picture of them 
 both sitting quietly on either side of the 
 hearth, year after year, with this secret 
 between them. This space that never 
 might be passed, and the sea sounding 
 in the distance like a wail over that 
 which might have been and never was. 
 
 The melancholy " situation " pleased 
 Lizzy, who was, as we know, sensible 
 and practical beyond all women : it put 
 her unconsciously in a thoroughly good 
 humor. With this vision of Van Zeldt, 
 made miserable for life by her, and sitting 
 night after night until he grew gray con- 
 
 templating his misery, she did not feel 
 herself utterly cut adrift, or that she had 
 lost her birthright among women. When 
 Beck came in to supper, he found Matt 
 snugly tucked away in bed, and Miss 
 Byrne in the best spirits, drawing the 
 flaky biscuits from the oven, while 
 Peggy made the coffee. 
 
 " This is hearty !" he said, giving 
 Peggy a sounding kiss, and then they 
 sat down as snug and cozy as could be. 
 Lizzy quoted to herself something about 
 " harts ungalled," looking at Peggy, 
 and how some may laugh, and some 
 must weep, and that so runs the world 
 away. But she ate very heartily of the 
 biscuit and sausage, being hungry ; and 
 was, Mr. Beck said that night, for a 
 wonder, the best of company : he always 
 thought her, before, as dry as a chip. 
 
 Familiar as Galbraith was, by this 
 time, with the shortest roads leading to 
 his grandfather's house, it was dusk be- 
 fore he came in sight of the long rows 
 of glittering windows with their back- 
 ground of mountain, and the unrolling, 
 ash-colored drifts of smoke overhead. 
 He stopped at the great gate to take out 
 the key which Honora had given him, 
 and at the moment a man's footsteps 
 came down the carriage - road within, 
 stumbling over first a boulder and then a 
 stump, and Doctor Pritchard's wiry voice 
 broke out in an unwonted oath. 
 
 On he came, grumbling : "Just what 
 might be looked for under that woman's 
 management ! Slip-shod and violent ! 
 If her horses know how to double these 
 snags, they have more wit than herself! 
 So, ho ! You're here, eh ?" with a sort 
 of snarl, which had in it something of 
 mortification. He stopped, held the open 
 gate with one hand and barred the way, 
 looking up steadily at Galbraith. 
 
 " Well, I'm not sorry, on the whole, 
 to have met you. I've made up my 
 mind to say nothing of that matter be- 
 fore I go : I've been thinking it over. 
 I believe you're repentant, and God for- 
 bid I'd throw a stone in the way of any 
 man who is trying to get back to the 
 right road." His sandy eyebrows 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITLL 
 
 127 
 
 twitched, and his contracted eyes were 
 fixed on Dallas. 
 
 '' I am not repentant," broke in the 
 young fellow, roughly. " Unless you 
 force me to repent of my stupidity in 
 telling my story to you. The truth must 
 have been rare in your life. Doctor 
 Pritchard, you know so little how to 
 use it." 
 
 " So you bandy words about it, do 
 you ?" putting out his hand to stop 
 him ; and when Dallas paused, remaining 
 uneasily silent for a moment. " I tell 
 you, young man, I have not been vexed 
 in this way for years ! I never was de- 
 ceived before in a man when I relied 
 on instinct. There's not a line in your 
 face that will warrant you in being a 
 humbug. I've been in at the Stone- 
 post Farm-house. I've been talking to 
 old James Galbraith about you." 
 
 " You have been there ? Did you tell 
 my story to James Galbraith?" said Dal- 
 las, in an altered voice, and suddenly 
 standing still. 
 
 " I did not tell it. I — well, I cannot 
 rid myself of likings and prejudices so 
 easily as some men. I found that Mr. 
 Galbraith was impressed by you as I 
 had been, though he's crotchety — a 
 phrenologist. I don't wait to rap on a 
 man's skull to know if I trust him or 
 not. Well — good-bye, Galbraith, good- 
 bye !" making way for him to pass as 
 hastily as he had detained him. " I be- 
 lieve you are truly repentant. I will keep 
 your secret. I will leave this place in 
 the morning, never to return, in all prob- 
 ability, and if you can make friends 
 here, I'll not stand in your way." 
 
 " Good-bye, Doctor Pritchard." Dal- 
 las looked after the jerky, lean figure 
 going down the road with a wrench at 
 his heart. It was the first friend he had 
 gained since he began his new life — 
 gained and lost. The Professor, on his 
 part, walked quickly, uncertainly, a few 
 steps, then slackened his pace : " I do 
 not believe the fellow will stay here 
 when I'm gone, to be disgraced by hav- 
 ing been left in the lurch. I wonder 
 if he has any friends in the world. He's 
 reformed — if he ever was guilty. Tut ! 
 tut!" and secretly rating John Pritchard 
 
 for a fool, he hurried on to the brow of 
 the next hill. Then it occurred to him 
 to wish that he had heard Galbraith's 
 story through, at any rate : he hesitated, 
 half turned back, peering down into the 
 gathering twilight. But he was too late • 
 the road was vacant ; and the Doctor 
 went gravely on to his lodging in the 
 village. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 Dallas, passing among the crooked 
 apple trees in the orchard, came direct 
 to a long, low parallelogram of a house 
 with glass sides that ran along the upper 
 edge. He never had seen forcing or 
 green-houses, but he thought that this 
 must be one. Unlocking the door, he 
 entered, stumbled over the crocks in a 
 dark tool-house, and then — came into 
 fairyland. Two or three lamps made a 
 haze like moonlight over the rising levels 
 of flowers and orchids which stretched 
 I into far-off shadows. It was a new ex- 
 perience to Galbraith. Outside was 
 foggy, nipping November: within, the 
 dim, suggestive lights of a damp, sultry 
 summer night, its passionate perfumes 
 and rank green foliage, which here and 
 there took a soul to itself in a sud- 
 den flame of scarlet blossoms or white 
 hlies. 
 
 Now, it was certainly not Madam 
 Galbraith's habit to light her green- 
 house with the chamber lamps. If 
 Honora had not been, in her own opin- 
 ion, so practical and thoroughly honest 
 a young woman, one might have sus- 
 pected her of " setting the stage." 
 
 Scene — Fairyland. Enter Titania. 
 
 If she had done it, she chose her au- 
 dience badly. For a moment Dallas 
 stood bewildered with the enchantment 
 of color and fragrance, " over-canopied 
 with sweet musk-roses and with eglan- 
 tine ;" then he pushed his hat back on 
 his head and thrust his hands into his 
 pockets, going about with a puzzled, 
 eager whistle, peering — not at the flow- 
 ers, but the earth in which they grew. 
 
128 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Musk-roses did not belong to Novem- 
 ber ; and here was the gray moss of the 
 sea-woods, which could not possibly take 
 root in this alluvial soil ; and the knobby 
 prickle-bush of the Jersey sands, which 
 never would flower for him, bursting into 
 a glory of red, voluptuous flowers ; and 
 those must be the Japan lilies, and that 
 the famous Espiritu-Santo flower, of 
 which he had read, but never hoped to 
 see. All these in summer bloom in No- 
 vember among the Ohio hills ! As for 
 enchantment, or a possible Titania, that 
 was hardly within the scope of Dallas' 
 brain. 
 
 " So money can do this, eh ? Money P'' 
 was what he said, with a transient fancy 
 that it was hardly worth while to waste 
 years in search of knowledge in Mexico 
 and Japan, when a hand stretched out 
 full of dollars could bring Mexico and 
 Japan under his nose. AU seasons of 
 the year in one. 
 
 Now, Honora was waiting in the dark 
 behind the little glass door in the corner. 
 She had had time to realize the crisis in 
 life which this night was to herself and 
 him ; and I leave it to any woman if it 
 was not unbearable, at the very moment 
 when she was going to appear like the 
 fairy queen to usher him into his inher- 
 itance and make herself a beggar, to see 
 this fellow go sniffing and thrusting his 
 fingers into a parcel of pots, muttering, 
 "One-third loam; one, wood-ashes ; the 
 remainder — what the deuce is the re- 
 mainder y 
 
 "The man was a machine — a log !" 
 Honora was not the first woman who 
 had said so. 
 
 " He would surely recollect why he 
 had come in a minute, however;" and 
 she waited, smiling, her hand on the 
 latch. But when, so far from recollect- 
 ing anything about it, he pressed on 
 through the flowers into the forcing- 
 room and prodded and tested t/iat earth, 
 and then stood spell-bound over the beds 
 of miserable httle sprouts, she opened 
 the latch with a snap and came down 
 into fairyland. He neither saw nor 
 heard her, though he had turned back 
 again and was stooping over an aqua- 
 rium. What could he find in the forlorn 
 
 perch and sun-fish to bring such eager- 
 ness into his eyes or the hard, com- 
 pressed look into his mouth ? 
 
 " Do you understand the language of 
 the fishes as well as of the rocks, Mr. 
 Galbraith ? They are mine, but I always 
 found them tiresome enough," with the 
 impatient snap of the latch echoing in 
 her voice. 
 
 Dallas started and looked up. He 
 never had seen any vision like that of 
 the young girl that stood before him, her 
 unassertant beauty thrown into relief by 
 the art of rose-colored drapery and deli- 
 cate laces. She knew that he had not, 
 and that as long as he lived the picture 
 would be one which he would remember. 
 But Dallas had his own old-fashioned, 
 self-taught notions of deference, and af- 
 ter the first glance of wondering delight 
 he bowed to her gravely and turned back 
 to his fishes. 
 
 " It is quite new to me — this contri- 
 vance for studying their habits," he said. 
 "And there is a balance of animal and 
 vegetable life here that is curious and ad- 
 mirable. It is all a new world to me," 
 with a look which comprised the forcing- 
 rooms, flowers, and Honora fancied, her- 
 self. 
 
 " Is it ?" with a pleased little flutter. 
 " I thought you would like it ! You are 
 coming to claim your birthright, you 
 know ; coming to take your place for 
 life among us ; and it would never do 
 for that to happen in the dining-room 
 among the dishes, for instance, or the 
 parlor. You are a naturalist ; so I 
 thought this was the proper place for 
 you to come home. Nature welcoming 
 you back, I thought. Now, if Madam 
 Galbraith knew, she'd as soon as not 
 meet you — well, on the stairs. What 
 were you thinking of, looking at those 
 fishes ? Could you tell me ?" 
 
 To her surprise, Dallas hesitated. " I 
 would rather not have told you. Miss 
 Dundas ; but it does not matter. I was 
 thinking of all that money was worth to 
 a man. I never understood it as I have 
 done since I came into this house to- 
 night." 
 
 " Money ?" said Honora, bewildered. 
 "They are not worth so much — these.' 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 129 
 
 with a slighting motion of her hand to- 
 ward the flowers. 
 
 '• No, I suppose not," thoughtfully. 
 " But it is the facility for study ; as if 
 science was mapped out and brought 
 under your very eyes — put into your 
 hand. You do not know how new it all 
 is to me, Miss Dundas," with an embar- 
 rassed laugh, which died into sudden 
 silence. 
 
 "These plants and tanks, and the 
 knowledge of which they are hints, are 
 commonplace things to you, but they are 
 like glimpses to me of a world where I 
 never have been," Dallas said after 
 a while, in a heavy, unwilling tone, as 
 though the words were forced out by 
 some uncontrollable mental pressure. "A 
 world where knowledge is the very air 
 you breathe. You, and men and women 
 like you, were born in it. I did not 
 know, until to-night, how far outside I 
 was ;" and again his eyes turned from 
 tlie face before him with an indescribable, 
 wistful, hungry look about him, as though 
 measuring the life which he had missed 
 and the few years left in which to master 
 it. 
 
 " You — you overrate the distance be- 
 tween us, Mr. Galbraith," said Honora, 
 awkwardly. " These things seem very 
 insigniticant to me." 
 
 " Because you are used to their mean- 
 ings. I am a very ignorant man. Miss 
 Dundas. To-night I feel as a man might 
 who had spent his hfe in making brick, 
 when he sees a great, finished temple for 
 tlie first time." 
 
 Honora understood him. She turned 
 away, pretending to pick the dead leaves 
 from a bush, feeling that he forgot her 
 presence as soon as he had done speak- 
 ing. For a man to live to that age and 
 find himself to be ignorant — hopelessly 
 behind all other men — then the sting 
 would enter the soul, she thought. As 
 she snipped the leaves away, this loss 
 and pain of Dallas' seemed to be more 
 to her than any of her own which she 
 had ever known. Her breast began to 
 throb and the scalding tears swelled to 
 her eyes. That frightened her. What 
 ailed her ? What was Dallas Galbraith 
 to her 1 Why should she, with her 
 
 French ideas of decorum, have met him 
 here alone — have taken his fate into her 
 own hands ? It was now as if his soul 
 was her soul, the mere thought of his 
 loss wrenched her with such sharp pain ; 
 for the tears were bitter, wrung them- 
 selves out of her very heart. She never 
 had made even her uncle's inner self her 
 own in this fashion. 
 
 The terror of that consciousness which 
 comes to every woman some time in life 
 overtook Honora. She hid from it- 
 She would not name it to herself " Dal- 
 las Galbraith is nothing to me — nothing 
 to me ! I brought him here for love of 
 justice — to give him his place—to make 
 myself a beggar," she told herself, vehe- 
 mently. Presently she turned to him : 
 she thought he did not look at her, but 
 Dallas knew that all the flush and sparkle 
 had died out in her ; saw even the clutch 
 with which her fingers held on the bench 
 at her side. He was as sensitive to a 
 change in her mood or looks, and as 
 stolidly dumb about it, as that flowerless 
 cactus was to the heat and shadows of 
 the sun which warmed it. 
 
 It was a lucky fancy, she thought, to 
 bring him here. If he had determined 
 to persevere in his stupid resolve not to 
 make himself known, the signs of wealth 
 in-doors would not have touched or 
 tempted him ; but here the grappling- 
 hooks had taken a firm hold of him. 
 
 " You understand now," she said, 
 "what wealth will give you. With 
 money a man can educate — can make 
 himself what he will." 
 
 " I do understand. It is a great 
 power. The man is a fool who slights 
 it." 
 
 He stood in the door which swung open 
 into the orchard as he spoke, looking 
 gravely out into the gathering twilight 
 Honora, a step or two within, waited. 
 When he glanced hurriedly in, the tem- 
 pered silvery light, the green distance, 
 the lilies and perfume, the woman's deli- 
 cate figure draped in rose-colored mist, 
 and her face, which gave life to the whole, 
 all seemed to wait for him, expectant, al- 
 luring, eager. It was but to keep silence 
 about that one foul misadventure — to lie, it 
 might be, once or twice, and to enter on 
 
I30 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 possession of what was to him a royal 
 inheritance. Within there, knowledge 
 would come in the very air, breathed in 
 the midst of ease and luxury. Within, 
 there would be a chance — poor, improb- 
 able, but yet a chance — to win her. 
 
 Without, there was an aimless journey 
 into the world, without a penny in his 
 pocket or a friendly face to meet, to con- 
 quer knowledge in poor, meagre morsels, 
 struggling for life at the same time. 
 
 There was an undue share of mulish 
 perverseness in Galbraith's blood. At 
 this prospect, without any show of rea- 
 son, his muscles stiffened and he began 
 to breathe free. Honora and her world 
 became less fair to him. 
 
 " Will you come in V she said, softly. 
 " Home is waiting for you. It will be 
 the old story of the prince found among 
 the herdsmen. But we will keep the 
 secret to ourselves of the coal-pits at 
 Scranton," growing hurried and unsteady 
 when she saw that he did not move. 
 She remembered then that the choice for 
 him to make was for life, and stood si- 
 lent. Once she half held out her hand, 
 and then let it fall, trembling. It mat- 
 tered more to her life than his, she 
 thought, after all, whether he went away. 
 When he remained silent, looking out 
 steadily, she spoke to him again : " Will 
 you come in ?" 
 
 " No," slowly, looking her in the face 
 as he spoke. " It is not home to me. 
 I will come back when I am fit to take 
 my place among you." 
 
 She shook her head: "You will never 
 come ; or it will be too late. Death may 
 come to any of us." 
 
 "And you may be gone. You will do 
 as other women do — marry." 
 
 "That may be," with a laugh, but 
 growing suddenly pale. 
 
 "It would be but natural," with a long 
 breath, turning away. He was grave 
 and stern, as though it was his own 
 death and not life he was planning. 
 
 "If you have decided to follow your 
 whim, then, and go — " 
 
 " It is not a whim," slowly. " It 
 seems even to me hke the choice of a 
 madman. You suppose I do not know 
 what I am giving up. I do know. 
 
 Chances which — which you would never 
 think of. Miss Dundas. These things 
 matter more to a man than a woman." 
 
 " You have your own reasons, doubt- 
 less," coldly. 
 
 " I have this reason," turning to her 
 quickly : " I have not moral courage nor 
 strength enough now to live among you 
 and be myself— to tell my own story hon- 
 estly and boldly. Later, it may be differ- 
 ent. If it is not, I never will return. 
 And then there is a sort of gloss and 
 polish over all the world you live in — an 
 imitation of each other, a hiding of one's 
 self It is hateful to me ; but if I went 
 among you now, I know that I would 
 try to gain it. I would begin to borrow 
 my opinions on this side and on that. I 
 would soon be quite contented to smother 
 up all my past life for ever." 
 
 Honora listened intently. "Am /false 
 and factitious ?" she said, leaning forward 
 in her eagerness for his reply. 
 
 Dallas hesitated. But the sincere 
 eyes before him commanded the answer : 
 " I had an odd feeling about you, Miss 
 Dundas, since the day I first met you," 
 he said, smiling. " Something of that 
 with which one wants to strip the husk 
 and silk from an ear of corn and find the 
 kernel inside. But the husk and silk 
 with you — " 
 
 " Are borrowed. Now that is true !" 
 earnestly. " I've tried to give myself 
 a good character so long, you under- 
 stand. I did not suspect you of shrewd- 
 ness. But no matter ! Have you told 
 me all of your reasons for going?" 
 
 " No. I have been hampered all my 
 life, and I want to feel my own feet un- 
 der me. I would rather earn my bread 
 and butter than sit down as your new- 
 found prince to have my lap filled with 
 gold. And I believe I would rather, 
 when it comes to the choice, hammer 
 out for myself bits of knowledge up on 
 the hills yonder than receive it all here 
 without any effort. It is a vain and a 
 doltish feeling, but I must work it out 
 I am a born boor, perhaps." 
 
 "Then that is all. I can do no 
 more," said Honora. 
 
 "If it is possible, I wish to see my 
 mother before I go." 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 '31 
 
 " She is not here. Colonel Pervis 
 drove her to town this morning. She 
 will be back to-morrow." 
 
 They both were silent after that. 
 There was no reason why Dallas should 
 stay longer. His choice was made. 
 Honora, drawn back a little, her eyes 
 dropped on the floor, waited, he thought, 
 only to say good-bye. But he did not 
 say good-bye. He never knew, after- 
 ward, how long he stood there, or of 
 what he thought as he gazed at the 
 downcast face. She knew, without look- 
 ing at him, and turned from him with a 
 shiver : 
 
 " I must leave you now. If you will 
 go ?" 
 
 " Yes, I will go." 
 
 " Do you wish me to keep your 
 secret ?" 
 
 " Yes : until I come back." 
 
 A faint heat began to rise in Honora's 
 cheeks. If she could not take this hero 
 by the hand and lead him in to her un- 
 cle, it was something to know that he 
 had gone out like an old Crusader into 
 the world seeking the true knighthood — 
 something to hold his secret in her hand, 
 a tie between themselves alone, some day 
 to draw him gently back to claim his own. 
 It was romance and mystery enough to 
 comfort any woman. 
 
 " You may trust me," she said, in a 
 whisper, a precaution which she had 
 Beglected before. 
 
 Another silence, in which he waited. 
 But still she did not look at him. 
 
 «' When will you come back ?" 
 
 '• In a year. I will try what strength 
 I have, and if I succeed, I will come 
 and claim my place." 
 
 " If you do not succeed ?" 
 
 " Then I will come to you to say 
 farewell, Miss Dundas, for ever. I will 
 ask you to forget that I ever crossed 
 your path." 
 
 He came closer to her, involuntarily, 
 as he spoke. The dreadful constraint 
 and weight which oppressed him when- 
 ever he tried to drag his secret thoughts 
 to the light were upon him. He looked 
 down from his grave, square height on 
 Honora where she stood : her hands 
 were clasped and resting on a heap of 
 
 dead moss. They were so bloodless that 
 he wondered, vaguely, if they were not 
 icy cold, and went on hurriedly stumbling 
 through his words : " You must not 
 think I have not seen the sacrifice you 
 would have made. I am not so ignorant 
 that a noble, true woman — " 
 
 There he stopped. Her bosom was 
 heaving, her chin quivering as Matt's 
 did when he choked back the tears. 
 Galbraith made one step that brought 
 him beside her. Could it be that it cost 
 her anything for him to go ? 
 
 The white, cold hands were very near 
 him. He clasped his own behind him 
 resolutely. He had no thought of her 
 as the beautiful, richly-dressed lady ; 
 but he did remember that the taint of 
 the prison was on his flesh, and until 
 she knew it he had no right to touch 
 her. 
 
 " I will keep your secret," she said, 
 "and a year from now I will look for 
 you to come back. Good-bye, Cousin 
 Dallas." She held out her hand, and 
 when he did not take it looked wonder- 
 ingly up at him. 
 
 Poor Dallas ! All that he knew was 
 the face upturned to his. He had failed to 
 recognize the fairy queen in her elaborate 
 silken sheen. A woman was a woman 
 to him ; and in this swift moment he 
 absorbed every trifling detail that set 
 this one apart from others, and gathered 
 it all into his honest, stupid heart, to feed 
 on hereafter. This gown she wore, he 
 thought, was the very color of the inside 
 of the shells he used to find at low tide ; 
 and her eyes were dark and brown as 
 the kelp washed up on the shore : the 
 old friendly Manasquan life came up as 
 the echo of a far-off" home-song. Her 
 eyes were full of tears. She was very 
 near to him — nearer than any living be- 
 ing. On the night he first saw her 
 he knew that, when, from the world from 
 which he was shut out, she had held her 
 hand down to him. Before he came 
 back, she would marry — in her own class. 
 Not a convict. 
 
 But with the quiet assurance of real 
 love, he knew himself to be near to her — 
 nearer to her than any other man could 
 ever be. Now, he was intolerably alone ; 
 
132 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 — the old stain would shut him for ever 
 into a solitary life. 
 
 " Good-bye," she said. 
 ] For his answer he took her in his 
 I arms and kissed her. 
 
 He quickly put her down, white with 
 indignation, and drew back from her. 
 " You think me rude and vulgar. I am 
 sorry. I could not help it." He added 
 earnestly : " It does not seem wrong or 
 vulgar to me." 
 
 Honora made an imperious gesture 
 of dismissal: "Go! I — I am sorry." 
 
 These words went like a knife to Gal- 
 braith's heart. She had trusted him as 
 an equal, and now she thought him a 
 boor. He looked at her a moment sor- 
 rowfully enough, bowed without speak- 
 ing, and went slowly down the hill. " But 
 I was not wrong nor vulgar," he said, 
 doggedly to himself. While Honora, 
 when he was gone, buried her face in her 
 hands and laughed hysterically. Could 
 Colonel Pervis or Mr. Dour have done 
 this thing ? But they were thorough-bred 
 — gentlemen. How could one know 
 what to expect. from a wild man of the 
 woods ? It was as if one had laid hold 
 on Behemoth ; and then she sat down 
 among the flower-pots and sobbed and 
 cried until her heart was sick. 
 
 The Indian Queen, long before Gal- 
 braith's return, was sound asleep in the 
 moonlight. Even Turk, the watch-dog, 
 who regarded robbers as one of the illu- 
 sions of his youth, was as usual stretched 
 on the porch snoring, his head between 
 his paws. Dallas sat down on the mossy 
 pump-trough : his brain was on fire, the 
 close air of the house choked him. Why 
 should a man be shut up in a box until 
 after he was dead ? After all, any house 
 was a jail ! He must have the free air 
 to think over his future life clearly. 
 But he did not think at all. That he 
 ought to be miserable was plain enough. 
 No man could be in a worse case. To- 
 morrow he must go out to face the world, 
 penniless and untaught, with the leprous 
 mark of the prison upon him, awaking 
 suspicion against him in the kindest, 
 broadest, human sympathy. The wo- 
 man who already counted for more than 
 
 all the world to him he had driven fi-om 
 him, to-night, irretrievably. 
 
 " It is a dark day," said Dallas. 
 
 There was heat in the man's long 
 jaws which had not been there since the 
 old IVIanasquan days. The grave, dark- 
 blue eyes were sparkling and alive. 
 " Hillo, Turk !" he called ; and when 
 the dog came sleepily to him he pulled 
 him up and wrestled with him, laughing, 
 and with no gentle hand, as if life, and 
 youth, and good-fellowship were brimful 
 in his heart, and he must find some liv- 
 ing thing to caress, if it were but a dog. 
 When Turk went off again, surly, to his 
 nap, Galbraith stood up, stretching his 
 long arms restlessly, looking down the 
 road and then up at the sky. He could 
 not sleep. Of all his strong, brawny 
 body there was but one conscious point 
 — his mouth, on which a touch lay light 
 and warm. Had he found in it to-night 
 that cordial which his hard early life had 
 never tasted ? Or was he simply one of 
 those men who never know when fate 
 has worsted them ? 
 
 However that may be, the Dallas Gal- 
 braith who walked vehemently up the 
 hill to the woods, only to throw himself 
 down under a beech tree, was ten years 
 a younger man than the one who had 
 gone out from the Indian Queen this 
 morning. The luck which was against 
 him had vanished out of his sight. As 
 for the disaster that closed in upon him 
 on every side, the thought of it only 
 roused in him the hot, buoyant glow with 
 which he used to fight his way along the 
 beach through the nor'-easters that wet 
 him to the skin. He was going to live 
 out of doors now, thank God ! He had 
 done with houses. He began to troll 
 out one of the old fishing-songs, and his 
 magnificent voice echoed through the 
 woods like a trumpet-note of victory. 
 He was so busy with his own fancies 
 and his song that he did not hear 
 the rolling wheels of a buggy on the 
 road. 
 
 " Ho, Galbraith ! Galbraith ! There's 
 nobody fool enough to be shouting in the 
 woods at midnight but that fellow ! Gal- 
 braith, I say!" 
 
 The shouting suddenly ceased, and in 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 '33 
 
 a moment Dallas came down into the 
 road, falling into his usual grave compo- 
 sure when he saw who had summoned 
 him. 
 
 '' You are late abroad, Doctor Pritch- 
 ard ?" resting his hand on the whip-rest 
 of the buggy. 
 
 " Yes ; but the night is the same as 
 the day to me. It will be to you when 
 you are as old a campaigner. I — I'm 
 atraid we will have rain to-morrow." 
 
 " It is likely." 
 
 " Yes ; those woolly clouds are a bad 
 sign." Tlien the Doctor flicked his 
 whip, and finding a knot in the lash 
 picked it out, while Dallas watched him. 
 He could not help it that his heart beat 
 fast or his breath choked him. What if 
 the road was going to open level before 
 his feet t What if, after all the fierce 
 temptation, he had done right and yet 
 not lost his chance? 
 
 '• I drove over purposely to see you, 
 Galbraith," hesitated the Doctor. 
 
 Dallas nodded in silence. 
 
 " I was going to the Indian Queen, 
 but I heard yoM up there. You must 
 carry a light heart, lilting in that fashion 
 in the middle of the night. Well, I've 
 been thinking over that matter — the 
 story you told me, eh ?" 
 
 Dallas stroked the old horse softly. 
 
 " I'm glad to find you are in a better 
 mood, Galbraith. You were angry and 
 disrespectful this morning. A young 
 man. first of all, should master his tem- 
 per. You prevented me from seeing the 
 thing clearly. Now, when I came to 
 think it over — " 
 
 " You determined to trust me," quietly 
 suggested Dallas when the pause grew 
 awkward. " I do not think you will re- 
 pent it." 
 
 " I have determined to trust myself," 
 hastily. " I never found my judgment 
 mislead me yet. And Mr. Galbraith has 
 formed the same opinion of you ; though 
 that weighs but little with me. He's a 
 phrenologist. There was Colonel Lad- 
 doun — as clever, gentlemanly a fellow as 
 ever lived — yet the Galbraiths would 
 have none of him. No : James Gal- • 
 braith's opinion does not count for much 
 with me. But I've determined to risk 
 
 it all on my judgment of your face, Gal- 
 braith. Convict or not, I'll take you 
 with me to-morrow, if you will go." 
 The respect which he felt for the young 
 man betrayed itself involuntarily in his 
 tone more than his words. 
 
 "Yes, I will go. I am glad you 
 trusted me." There was a heartiness 
 and feeling in his voice which took the 
 Doctor by assault. 
 
 "Give me your hand, boy !" suddenly, 
 stooping forward. " I believe your story, 
 every syllable. Some men have damna- 
 ble usage in this world. I'll do what I 
 can to set it right for you." 
 
 The men shook hands, and then, as 
 men do when a word of earnest feeling 
 escapes them, began, in a hasty, ashamed 
 way, to talk of the horse and the chances 
 of rain. " We'll make an early start," 
 said Pritchard, " I'll take this road and 
 call for you at the Queen by eight o'clock 
 — sharp. Well, good-bye," pulling his 
 reins. " Don't leave your voice behind 
 you, either. It's good company on a 
 long day's tramp — a tenor voice like 
 your's. I know ; I have heard good 
 music in my time. Well, good-night !" 
 looking back, after he had driven a little 
 way, with a nod and smile again to re- 
 assure the young fellow. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 Mr. Dour, the next morning, rose as 
 usual with the dawn, for the young man 
 was in reality a hard-plodding student. 
 Gerty, as fresh and sweet as a spice- 
 pink, always was the first of the house- 
 hold to break in on him in the library ; 
 but to-day Miss Dundas came in for a 
 book. Paul sprang to meet her, per- 
 suading himself he was glad of the rare 
 chance, for his suit was lagging in this 
 quarter ; but Miss Dundas was pre- 
 occupied and grave, in haste to get a 
 book from the top shelf, which proved to 
 be Humboldt's "Cosmos," and two or 
 three others which she thought she 
 would need for reference. She was as 
 worn and her eyes were as sunken as 
 though she had spent all night over 
 
134 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 them. She was a very homely young 
 woman, Dour thought, as she went out 
 loaded, and he took up his book again ; 
 and then he dropped it, considering 
 whether brain-power did or did not tend 
 to injure the ideal woman, and whether 
 women were not, after all, only meant to 
 furnish the element of repose in this 
 hurly-burly of life, to caress away care 
 from their husband's brows, and to bring 
 up children. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith laid down his paper 
 when Honora came into his little study 
 and began to sweep the sewing from her 
 own table in the corner and to pile up 
 her books. He could read the titles 
 from where he sat. 
 
 " Are you going to study, my dear ?" 
 
 " I thought I'd try and learn — some- 
 thing," with a despairing energy, sitting 
 down with her chin in her hands, and 
 beginning at the first chapter. The 
 clock ticked for half an hour before she 
 spoke. 
 
 " I've laid out a system for myself, 
 uncle. Do you think, if I read and took 
 notes, and all that, I could make myself 
 worth anything in — well, in a year V 
 
 " It is probable. Have you had an 
 especial call toward the natural sci- 
 ences ?" 
 
 There was a little pause : " One must 
 begin somewhere. That seems to be 
 the only knowledge of weight. Lan- 
 guages and metaphysics — that sort of 
 indoors learning makes men like Mr. 
 Dour." 
 
 " And farming and hunting, men like 
 Colonel Pervis." 
 
 " I would be very sorry for the world 
 if they were the only types of men — 
 very sorry, indeed !" tartly, dropping her 
 forehead in her hands and going to work 
 again. 
 
 Mrs. Rattlin, at breakfast, suggested 
 that Honora "looked poorly. Most 
 young girls had something in their spines. 
 A white of ^g^, now, beaten up in raw 
 whisky, was excellent before meals." 
 Madam Galbraith growled assent, and 
 looked keenly at her niece from under 
 her shaggy brows, as though she saw a 
 change in her deeper than the dark scor- 
 ing under the eyes. The eyes them- 
 
 selves were full of meaning, steady and 
 reticent as never before. The shy awk- 
 wardness had given place to a languid 
 grace, which had a subtle charm for the 
 eyes of the old lady. When she spoke 
 to the people about her, she neither 
 stammered nor hesitated as usual, but it 
 was as indifferently as if they belonged 
 to a world to which she had long since 
 bidden good-bye. Her very voice was 
 new to Madam Galbraith — natural, and 
 with clear, fine cadences. 
 
 " What has altered Honora ?" she 
 demanded sharply of her husband, after 
 breakfast. "There's a peculiar steadi- 
 ness that comes to a woman when she is 
 married or betrothed. I see it in her 
 now. She has done with copying others. 
 She is herself foj the rest of her life. 
 What has she been doing ?" 
 
 " I do not know, Hannah. Studying 
 Humboldt, I believe," tranquilly. 
 
 " Some one ought to know," anx- 
 iously. " I must take better care of the 
 child." 
 
 The old gentleman lighted a cigar and 
 went out to the garden walk, looking 
 in each time that he passed the window 
 at the light flickering over his darling's 
 head, bent again over the books. The 
 change in her face was that of a beautiful 
 life dawning out of chaos, he thought, and 
 went on turning his wife's rough idea 
 over in his fanciful way. Love coming 
 in to a woman's nature was like the last 
 stroke of an artist's pencil to the land- 
 scape ; there was the background wait- 
 ing — a bit of heaven and a bit of earth : 
 promise of summer or promise of storms. 
 Then the solitary human figure came 
 in, and the motionless drama took in- 
 stant life, shape, meaning. The pic- 
 ture was finished for ever. Time would 
 make no essential change — only to dim 
 the hues, perhaps. Having finished 
 his cigar and his meditation together, 
 he went up to the window and opened 
 it: 
 
 "Are Babe and I left out of the plans 
 for the year 1 Come and ride with me, 
 Nora." 
 
 " I don't think I have time. You 
 see, uncle, I have been living in a world 
 where knowledge was the very air I 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 135 
 
 breathed ; and you have no idea how 
 dumb I am. My head does ache horri- 
 bly !" giving the "Cosmos" a push and 
 coming to the window. 
 
 " Yes ; go put on your habit. I am 
 going down the river-road. I will meet 
 Doctor Pritchard somewhere there, and 
 bid liim good-bye." 
 
 Honora put up both hands to shelter 
 her fi\ce from the sun. " No, I will not 
 ride this morning," in a low voice. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith pulled his spectacles 
 down over his eyes to look at her. 
 "The air is from the mountains," he 
 persisted. " I thought it would be but 
 friendly to meet Pritchard and bid him 
 God-speed. It is a long, dangerous 
 journey the foolish old fellow has under- 
 taken." 
 
 " You had better go with your uncle, 
 Honora," said Mrs. Rattlin, who came 
 up just then, patting her on the shoulder 
 in her motherly way. 
 
 But, to her dismay, the tears began to 
 roll down the girl's pale cheeks. " I 
 wish you would not worry me, uncle !" 
 she sobbed. " How could you ask me 
 to do that ? How could you ? I did 
 not know it was a dangerous journey." 
 
 "Go take your ride, Mr. Galbraith," 
 said Mrs. Rattlin, quietly. " Don't be 
 uneasy about Honora. It's her spine. 
 Girls are all weakly, nervous things now- 
 a-days. Go and he down a while, Ho- 
 nora dear." 
 
 But Honora shpped away from them 
 both, and went down, slowly, to the gar- 
 den — to the orchard — into the green- 
 house. As she watched her uncle's 
 horse coming to the door, ready for him 
 to mount, the tears dried and her face 
 began to burn hot as the cactus-blooms 
 behind her. In a little while he would 
 be on the hill-road, where Doctor Pritch- 
 ard must pass. 
 
 A quarter of an hour afterward, when 
 Mr. Galbraith stopped his horse to un- 
 fasten the gate, there stood Miss Dun- 
 das waiting, eyes and cheeks aflame. 
 
 " I cut some flowers for you, uncle." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith saw that his green- 
 house had been altogether rifled. "But 
 I like out-door flowers best, you know, 
 Nora." 
 
 " You need not keep them then," 
 eagerly. "Give them to your friend, 
 Doctor Pritchard, if you choose." 
 
 " From you, Honora ?" 
 
 " No, uncle. My name must not be 
 mentioned there," with sudden emphatic 
 gravity. 
 
 After Mr. Galbraith's horse had trotted 
 down the road, she leaned a long time 
 on the gate, thinking. She was sure 
 that Dallas would guess that she had 
 cut the flowers for her uncle. She pic- 
 tured him, gaunt and hollow-eyed, this 
 morning, at the thought of her displeas- 
 ure, manoeuvring to possess himself of 
 one — hiding it, wearing it, as a knight of 
 old was wont to wear his lady's colors, 
 until he came back at the end of the 
 year, having won his golden spurs, to 
 claim — his own. 
 
 Dallas at that moment was finishing 
 his breakfast. He always hked a hearty 
 breakfast. It was a question whether 
 he or Matt had done most justice to the 
 chickens, and waffles, and cream-gravy. 
 As for Lizzy and Mrs. Beck, they ate 
 but little, and with that little Peggy lit- 
 erally mingled her tears. Mr. Beck, last 
 night, had given them vague ideas of the 
 vast wildernesses waiting to be explored 
 by Dallas, and they had sat up until near 
 dawn to talk of it. 
 
 " Miss Byrne took it worse than my 
 wife," said Beck, when they went up for 
 Galbraith's luggage. "One 'ud think 
 your road was beset by cannibals, by the 
 way she watches you. Women beats 
 all. If you stick an idee in their heads 
 as bare as a broom-stick, they'll have it 
 up and flourishin' like a green bay tree 
 in no time." 
 
 " I don't know much about them," 
 said Galbraith, indifferently. He had no 
 time to speculate on women or their 
 idiosyncrasies. There were some bits 
 of rock which he wanted to take with 
 him for comparison, and he had not yet 
 chosen them. He began to choose and 
 pack them now. 
 
 Now that he had his work in hand, it 
 was curious how the image of Honora, 
 over which he had been brooding for 
 
136 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 days, faded far into the background. 
 A beautiful dream, to be summoned in 
 lonely hours, perhaps ; but now the spar 
 must be packed. There were no hol- 
 lows about his eyes. Ten minutes after 
 he had found his work for life was ready 
 for him last night, he had lain down and 
 slept soundly. It made Lizzy angry to 
 know that he was sleeping like a log in 
 the next room. 
 
 " Now, that is the difference between 
 men and women," she said. 
 
 " Why, it is only for a year, Lizzy," 
 he said, wringing her hand good-bye, 
 when Doctor Pritchard came at last, and 
 Beck and Washington were storing away 
 the valise in the buggy. 
 
 "Only a year! Oh, Dallas! But a 
 year is nothing to you. You will inherit 
 a great fortune — you will marry — " 
 
 " No woman would marry a convict. 
 There is no need to remind me of that," 
 sternly. 
 
 " There is no need to tell her," 
 eagerly. 
 
 " I've no time to be thinking of mar- 
 riage now, Lizzy. Good-bye — God bless 
 you ! I don't forget all you've done for 
 me." 
 
 " Time's up, Galbraith !" shouted the 
 Doctor. He was looking down with 
 dismay at Mrs. Beck's store of luncheon 
 and jam jars. 
 
 Dallas nodded, packing them in. 
 « Hush. Humor her. We can throw 
 it out easily enough. One moment;" 
 and he ran back to leave a package in 
 his room for Matt. 
 
 In that moment Doctor Pritchard saw 
 Mr. Galbraith ride up, quickly, over the 
 brow of the hill, and he drove on to 
 speak to him. He fancied the old gen- 
 tleman was curiously distrait and* anx- 
 ious. He looked beyond the Doctor, 
 at Dallas when he came out on the 
 steps again and they all gathered about 
 him. 
 
 " That is your assistant, Pritchard ?" 
 he said. 
 
 " Yes ; that is my young friend. I 
 use that word advisedly," with a half- 
 defiant tone. " I take him on the re- 
 sponsibility of my instinct, sir. His his- 
 tory is nothing to me." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith hesitated : "You have 
 heard his history then ?" 
 
 " From himself. Without reserva- 
 tion." 
 
 There was a strange lightening in Mr. 
 Galbraith's face, which struck even the 
 unobservant Professor as odd. He 
 found, too, that one or two remarks 
 which he made were unheard by the 
 old gentleman, so intently was he re- 
 garding the group on the porch, and 
 listening to an occasional word from 
 Dallas. 
 
 " The lad," he said, at last, " has the 
 gift of attaching all kinds of people to 
 him. It belonged to — to another of the 
 Galbraiths." . 
 
 " Yes ; but he has the gift of at- 
 taching himself to his work, which is 
 better. I have been pleased to see how, 
 since his proper profession opened to 
 him, he has taken hold of it — like a tree 
 that finds itself in its native soil. Friends 
 nor women will not hold this young fel- 
 low back, sir. They will be outside 
 matters to him. His work will be the 
 air he breathes." 
 
 "You think the discipline good for 
 him, then ?" anxiously. 
 
 " It is not good — it is necessary. As 
 air to breathe," crustily. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith turned his quiet, critical 
 eyes on the irritable little man beside 
 him, as though sounding his nature in 
 reference to some secret thought of his 
 own : then, satisfied, they went back to 
 the tall figure on the porch and the face 
 of the younger man. There was an odd 
 likeness of meaning between them. He 
 wondered if there were any virtue in 
 the earth's secrets that kept the souls 
 of men, who were born to dig them out, 
 clean and honest. 
 
 " It is better the boy should go," he 
 said, slowly, as Dallas, having bidden 
 Matt the last hearty good-bye, came to- 
 ward them, and for the first time saw his 
 grandfather. Mr. Galbraith pressed his 
 horse forward a step and half held out 
 his hand, but seeing that Dallas stopped, 
 he bowed without speaking. 
 
 " Now, tliat fellow does not mean to 
 be uncivil," said the Doctor, quickly. 
 " He will not shake your hand because 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 137 
 
 you don't know his historj'. There is 
 no sham about him." 
 
 " I understand." Mr. Galbraith spoke 
 nervously, with an unusual repressed ex- 
 citement in his thin face. "But I should 
 like to have taken the boy by the hand. 
 I hope you will be kind to him, Pritch- 
 ard ?" 
 
 " No fear. Well, good-bye. That is 
 a new specimen of acacia in your bou- 
 quet. Oh, many thanks ! Good-bye. 
 Come, Galbraith." 
 
 As Dallas sprang into the buggy and 
 they drove away, the spare military 
 figure on horseback was the last that he 
 saw. It seemed to typify the hfe and 
 kindred on which he had turned his 
 back. We see ourselves and our neigh- 
 bors as we are but two or three times in 
 life, and then with electric, irrevocable 
 insight. This old graybeard, with his 
 delicate fingers and sad, sensitive eyes, 
 tliat would look on the wealth and edu- 
 cation for which Dallas schemed with 
 long-used indifference, was a something 
 which the young man never could be- 
 come. He sat silent beside Dr. Pritch- 
 ard until they had driven a mile or two, 
 and then, stooping, began to finger the 
 package of tools without which the Pro- 
 fessor never traveled. 
 
 " You like your trade, Galbraith ? Not 
 sorry to give civilization the good-bye for 
 a while, eh ?" 
 
 " I suppose a man cannot serve two 
 masters ?" 
 
 « Not such a man as you." 
 
 « Then I like my trade." 
 
 He took up the flowers which the 
 Doctor had let fall. He was sure that 
 Honora had cut them for her uncle, and 
 touched them with a blush like a boy, as 
 though their leaves had been her cheeks 
 and hair. She might belong to the same 
 world as her uncle, but, if he came back, 
 she would come into his, he thought, 
 with quiet assurance. After a while he 
 pulled one or two of the blossoms to 
 pieces to find out to what class and 
 order they belonged, and when they all 
 drooped in the heat, he threw them 
 away. Dallas never had a keepsake in 
 his hfe. 
 
 Crossing a ridge of the lower hills, 
 
 Doctor Pritchard drew up his horse 
 " There is the Galbraith homestead. 
 Take your last look at it. You are a 
 branch of that stock, I believe ?" 
 
 " More of kin than of kind," said 
 Dallas, under his breath. 
 
 But the Doctor caught the words : 
 " Oh, of course. But a man's no less a 
 man on account of difference of rank. 
 That is a noble old house. It sits upon 
 the mountain hke a crown." He waited 
 to allow the horse to breathe, for the 
 pull up the hill had been hard. 
 
 Now, the domestic instinct was strong 
 in Dallas, however wanting in sentiment- 
 alism women would have thought him. 
 He had given to even his prison cell a 
 home look. He could not forget that 
 the solemn mountain-landscapes and the 
 house yonder in their midst were his 
 home — had been the birth-place of his 
 ancestors for generations. He alone 
 was cast out — a vagabond upon the 
 earth. Doctor Pritchard broke the si- 
 lence with words that oddly jarred upon 
 him. He put his hand on Dallas' knee, 
 and said, earnestly ; 
 
 " I heard you promise to come back 
 here in a year, Galbraith ; and I meant, 
 as your friend, when we were alone, to 
 protest against it. What can you have 
 in common with these people ? Why 
 would you give up your work when it 
 was just begun V 
 
 " There is something in common be- 
 tween us," said Dallas, but vaguely, for 
 a moving object on the road before them 
 had caught his eye: a low phaeton, with 
 two figures in it. At the sight of one 
 of them, his heart stood still. " There 
 are reasons why I should come back — 
 there are reasons," he repeated, slowly, 
 looking at it. 
 
 "I do not ask your confidence,' of 
 course," testily : " I only give you prac- 
 tical, common-sense counsel. You have 
 told me your story : you say there is no 
 way for you to prove your innocence, 
 and I tell you your only chance is to 
 devote yourself to-day to your profes- 
 sion, and to rid yourself of every vestige 
 of your past life — make yourself new 
 aims and a new world. There is no 
 hope for you there," motioning to the 
 
138 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH, 
 
 mountains and homestead. "There is 
 not one man or woman there who would 
 believe in yow as I have done, with the 
 story clinging to you." 
 
 Dallas did not answer. He could not 
 take his eyes from the delicate woman 
 leaning back in the phaeton which rap- 
 idly approached them. 
 
 " No !" pursued the Doctor, energeti- 
 cally, motioning toward the great west- 
 ern valley which opened before them. 
 "There lies your true path. I don't 
 want to see the man in you spoiled by 
 the influence of people whom you have 
 left here. Take your work and go out 
 with it. Let there be no looking back 
 to the flesh-pots of Egypt." 
 
 "It is not my work that keeps me 
 from them," cried Dallas, the fair, laugh- 
 ing face of his mother coming nearer and 
 nearer. " It is the stain that is on me ; 
 and it was no fault of mine." 
 
 « But it will shut you out from them 
 for ever," coolly. "What if you had 
 gone to any of them, as you did to me, 
 and said ' I am a convict ' ?" 
 
 Dallas did not speak, but he took off" 
 his cap, and, leaning forward, looked into 
 the woman's face that was now close 
 upon them. The Doctor noticed that 
 he drew his breath heavily : his face be- 
 came the poor vehicle of some great 
 emotion. What could Mrs. Duffield 
 know of the man ? 
 
 Colonel Pervis, who drove her, pulled 
 up his horses with a jerk : " Off", Doc- 
 tor? 'Westward the star of science 
 takes its way,' eh ?" with a furtive, in- 
 quisitive glance at the workman beside 
 him. 
 
 Mrs. Dufiield also saw Dallas, but 
 without looking at him. It was a noble, 
 singular head, she thought ; and the 
 rolhng gray collar and bare throat were 
 wonderfully artistic. She stretched out 
 her pretty little hand to the Doctor. 
 " We will miss you so much !" she said, 
 gently. " But you will find your way 
 back to us some day, I am sure." 
 
 " Will I find you here, if I do ?" 
 
 "Yes. I am at home now. This 
 life suits me." Her hand lay on the red 
 cushion, close to Dallas. For years he 
 never had slept without holding it close 
 
 to his breast. The brown hair — there 
 was a httle gray in it now — how he used 
 to tug at it and tangle it while she sewed 
 at the slop-shop work ! How patient 
 she was, laughing when he brought the 
 tears to her eyes ! He could see a 
 faint scar across her forehead : it was 
 there that Duffield struck her that night 
 when she held him in her lap to keep 
 off" the savage blows. That night he 
 went to the coal-pits. He knew that the 
 only chance for life for her was to be rid 
 of him. 
 
 If he could but touch her ! She was 
 not a dainty lady to him : she was only — 
 mother — mother. His hand, holding his 
 cap, was near to hers. The strong, 
 brawny man grew weak and blind. He 
 dared not touch it. 
 
 The stain was between them. 
 
 She looked beyond him, as though he 
 had been vacant air, to his companion. 
 
 The Doctor's kind heart could not 
 bear that any one should be neglected. 
 " My young friend goes with me," he 
 said. " You must wish him God-speed 
 He is one of your own people." 
 
 Colonel Pervis mumbled some com- 
 monplace, and Mrs. Duffield promptly 
 held out her ever-ready hand. She 
 looked up with a smile, and their eyes 
 met. A strange, confused trouble came 
 into her face ; it grew pale : she drew 
 back the outstretched hand. 
 
 " Shall I tell her that I am a convict ?" 
 said Dallas, in a quiet whisper, turning 
 to the Doctor. But the boy's look made 
 Pritchard think that he had suddenly 
 gone mad. 
 
 " Tut ! tut ! I will drive on, Colonel 
 Pervis. Good-day, Mrs. Duffield. You 
 are insane on this matter, Galbraith." 
 
 " Stay !" Dallas laid his hand on the 
 Doctor's wrist and brought the horse to 
 a sudden halt. He looked at the phaeton 
 which was driving rapidly away. " I may 
 never come back," he said, \yith a loud 
 uncadenced laugh, " and she — she is — " 
 
 " What is she, Galbraith ?" 
 
 "This life suited her." Should he 
 bring his disgrace on her ? 
 
 " She was a friend of mine once," he 
 said, loosing his hold on the reins. 
 
 " You had better sink all friendships. 
 
DA r-DREAMING. 
 
 139 
 
 There lies your work. I warn you," 
 pointing forward. 
 
 Mrs. Duffield was silent and pale so 
 long as to alarm her companion. " Do 
 you know that young man, Colonel Per- 
 vis ?" she asked at last. 
 
 " No. But we can easily hail the 
 Doctor again," with uneasy solicitude, 
 for she was a woman whom every man 
 was anxious to serve. 
 
 « No." 
 
 " He reminded you of some one ?" 
 anxiously. 
 
 She bowed, her face turned from him. 
 
 " A friend, perhaps ?" 
 
 " A friend who is dead." 
 
 Colonel Pervis was silent. As they 
 turned toward the Galbraith homestead, 
 she looked hurriedly back, and in the 
 rapidly widening distance she saw the 
 two adventurers going down into the 
 valley of the west, whose rising mists 
 enveloped them, making them dim and 
 shadowy to her sight as the image of 
 the dead boy who would come no more, 
 nor send her tidings. 
 
PART VII. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 APRIL. 
 The conventional April — bright- 
 eyed and tearful, "with flesh-like colum- 
 bine bedight, beneath whose feet the 
 curied streams soft chidings kept," — was 
 shut up between the leathern backs of 
 some old English books on Mr. Gal- 
 braith's favorite shelf of the Hbrary. 
 
 This was her American sister. Mud 
 and dyspepsia, lagging brains and heavy 
 feet announce her coming in lieu of haw- 
 thorn blooms. 
 
 The winter months, Honora thought, 
 looking out of the Ubrary window, had 
 been tedious enough, but spring had 
 thawed out and dragged to light all the 
 uncomely background of the heavens 
 above and the earth beneath. The world 
 had quarreled with both winter and sum- 
 mer, and would be reconciled to neither. 
 The insolent light bared all the dirty 
 patches of snow on the mountain-sides ; 
 the sullen creeks bogged with the win- 
 ter's ice ; the gaping clayey land-slides ; 
 the trees stood like black and pulpy 
 sponges, motionless in the sickly cold 
 wind. A veil of vapory green had fallen 
 pityingly on the great slope before her, 
 but beneath it, she knew, was mire. 
 
 Her uncle came to the window out- 
 
 side, his long boots covered with mud, 
 from a tramp through the hills : he held 
 up a bunch of red maple buds and the 
 pale emerald cups of the water-arum for 
 her to see, and then looked up at the 
 sun glinting through the saffron waves 
 of smoke which the wind drove about 
 overhead. Honora tapped impatiently 
 for him to come in. She wondered that 
 he could always be busied with such 
 trifles. Did nobody but herself see how 
 awful a thing it was to be alive ? She 
 had been dabbling in Carlyle lately. 
 
 Beside this, the winter months had 
 left some vehement, hard lines on Miss 
 Dundas' face. Her secret had proved 
 heavy and galling ; and since the rough 
 fellow, in his laborer's dress, had turned 
 his back on her that night and left her 
 to keep his place, she had been con- 
 scious of a gaping vacuity in her life un- 
 felt before. If she had been a man, she 
 would have had politics or a trade or 
 profession — some interest below and 
 broader than her own petty cares — to sink 
 them in. As it was, she sewed. She 
 did not find in the needle that infallible 
 medicine for a woman's mind diseased 
 which men consider it. Cosmos had 
 proved a failure. On the third day of 
 trial, Mr. Galbraith found her asleep over 
 the first chapter before noon. Then 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 141 
 
 Hcnora took to religion. She went to 
 the church to pray every morning ; 
 began to meddle with the Irish house- 
 maids, and to shake their faith in the 
 I'irgin ; tried to bring Lizzy, who was a 
 staunch Baptist, to a confusion of spirit 
 about the truth of Episcopal succession. 
 It was a matter of deadly earnest to her ; 
 for it was a real void in her own life she 
 was trying to fill with her prayers and 
 proselvtings and thirty-nine articles. 
 Perhaps she found most comfort in her 
 secret nightly supplications for Dallas. 
 For was he not a poor w^anderer ? 
 Should no man care for his soul ? In 
 church she used to put his name into 
 the prayer for the President. She was 
 very sincere, thinking it was only his 
 salvation she cared for. 
 
 Her uncle silently noted it all, and 
 felt a deep, tender pity for her. There 
 was no career open for women but that 
 of wife and mother ; and until that came 
 to them, he thought that even the least 
 morbid among them suffered from un- 
 used power and mental hunger — sat 
 alone and gnawed their own flesh, as the 
 woman in that horrible tale of the Flem- 
 ish prison. But he would have been 
 ready to strike any one who would pro- 
 pose that Honora should find work and 
 happiness outside of this tardy husband. 
 He had a most delicate appreciation of 
 woman's sphere, and drew the limits 
 narrowly. 
 
 Honora saw liim a few moments later 
 come into the adjoining room in his 
 dressing-gown and slippers, and put the 
 buds and calla in a vase upon his wife's 
 table. She took them up and sniffed 
 at them. "Very pretty, James, but 
 scentless." 
 
 " Now, to me they have a delicate 
 perfume." 
 
 " Your senses are keener than mine. 
 I wish I could find the comfort in such 
 things that you do." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith did not reply. 
 
 " But I never could. A frog could not 
 find honey even in a field of clover," for- 
 cing a laugh. " So — " taking up her pen 
 agj.in ; but she dipped it in the ink two or 
 three times before beginning her writing, 
 looking thoughtfully at the poor buds. 
 
 " Is it the old work, Hannah ?" 
 
 " Yes ; it is a description of the oil- 
 wells and site for the town. That which 
 young Dour wrote from hearsay was too 
 flattering. I want to deceive nobody. 
 I want no capital put into the concern 
 on false expectations." 
 
 " Capitalists have not come forward 
 very promptly, have they ?" 
 
 " No. But they'll come. Dour has 
 brought me notices of the undertaking, 
 clipped from the New York papers. 
 Very favorable. I suspected him of 
 writing them ; but he protested that the 
 thing is talked of Avidely. I'll have no 
 puffing," driving her pen energetically 
 across the broad sheet, while Mr. Gal- 
 braith settled himself in his easy-chair, 
 drawing his gown over his knees, fold- 
 ing his thin hands and falling into his 
 usual dreamy scrutiny of the fire. 
 
 She looked up presently : '• Dour 
 came last night, James." 
 
 " I saw him. It is a long journey. 
 What is his object ?" 
 
 " Honora, I fancy," with an abrupt 
 laugh. " Ostensibly, to offer his services 
 in the laying out of the town. I may 
 make use of him : he's shrewd and gov- 
 ernable. It's hard to find men who are 
 governable," without observing the quiz- 
 zical glance which her husband shot at 
 her. " He has made up his mind to 
 address Honora, I suspect. Not that 
 he cares a straw for you, child," raising 
 her voice as Miss Dundas came in. 
 " But he thinks it an easy way to turn a 
 penny. Send him to me: I'll put him 
 to the right-about properly !" turning 
 her paper, with a snort of defiance. " If 
 I'm wrong, though, and he marries the 
 little Rattlin girl, I'll make his fortune 
 for him." 
 
 " I would think, my dear, you would 
 find quite enough occupation in your 
 derricks and town without playing Provi- 
 dence to all the lovers you stumble over." 
 Madam Galbraith vouchsafed no 
 direct reply. Presently, stopping to 
 consult a map, she put her pen behind 
 her ear, and said that " Dour was a fair- 
 enough specimen of a mediocre New 
 Englander, clear-sighted and shrewd, if 
 he could rid his brain of the smattering 
 
142 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 of Transcendentalism which it never was 
 made to comprehend. That's the trouble 
 among any people when a great thinker 
 Hke Emerson goes from among them 
 into his own path on the mountains. 
 All commonplace men feel called upon 
 to follow him, and there they go scram- 
 bling about in the darkness like silly 
 sheep." 
 
 " I think," said Honora, anxiously, 
 after a pause, « it is only fair to set good 
 as well as evil before Mr. Dour. I will 
 bring Gerty up on a visit." 
 
 "Just as you please, child," indiffer- 
 ently. " Don't talk to me. I have these 
 lots all confused. Give me the pins, 
 quick. I can do nothing without pins." 
 
 Honora came closer, giving her, from 
 a hard, square cushion, red and blue- 
 headed pins, which the old lady stuck 
 viciously into a square, parti-colored 
 map, stopping to ponder over each as it 
 went in. 
 
 Everything in the room was growing 
 hard and square, Honora thought, look- 
 ing drearily around, under the spell of 
 Madam Galbraith's new hobby. It was 
 her especial sanctum, and used to be 
 warm, genial, disorderly — the very heart 
 and core of the house. It had fallen 
 under line-and-plummet rule now — was 
 as blank as the maps of her proposed 
 town on the wall, or as the ground ' on 
 the river flats on which it was to be 
 built. It seemed to be the old lady's 
 fancy that her office should wear a busi- 
 ness-like aspect, severe enough to awe 
 the largest capitalist, if that tardy man 
 ever appeared. The worn, old Turkey 
 carpet, on which Tom Galbraith had 
 played when he was a child, had been 
 replaced by hempen mats ; piano, sew- 
 ing, portraits and flower-pots had been 
 swept away as useless lumber ; the 
 square, white ceiling stared down at the 
 square, earth-colored floor, with only a 
 table, squarer than either, to break the 
 blank between ; and at the table sat the 
 stout, brawny old woman, bending over 
 her maps, as though it were the one 
 chance between her and death. 
 
 Her mass of silvery hair, which used 
 to be framed about her face with a curi- 
 ous artistic effect, was skewered back in 
 
 a tight knot, and the face itself reflected 
 in its unyielding mould the figures over 
 which she had been brooding for months. 
 One could hardly believe that a baby's 
 fingers had ever touched that hard 
 hawk's beak ; for in the fierce energy 
 of even her repose there was something 
 of the traits of a bird of prey. 
 
 She pulled out and put in the pins 
 slowly, rubbing her knobbed forehead, 
 bewildered : " District A, that is the 
 rolling-mill ; C, dwellings ; D ? — there is 
 assuredly a mistake about D — " 
 
 "Can I assist you, Hannah?" Mr. 
 Galbraith rose reluctantly, hesitating be- 
 fore coming closer. 
 
 " It is the first time you have offered 
 to do it, James," with grave reproach. 
 " The whole country-side has taken part 
 in my great work, while you have been 
 dreaming, as usual, over your Dante and 
 Jean Paul." 
 
 " But I know so little of oil," sitting 
 down and picking up the map as daintily 
 as though it were greasy. 
 
 " I am very sorry, James, if you con- 
 found my undertaking with a vulgar oil 
 speculation. To be sure, I saw no rea- 
 son why the Dour lands should not yield 
 oil as well as any in the country. So 
 the wells were sunk : there they are- 
 red pins. I've no doubt they'll yield 
 three hundred barrels a day. I do not 
 hold them as a means of selfish aggran- 
 dizement. We have enough. So will 
 Honora have. The town is laid out as 
 you know : the cotton and rolling-mills 
 are nearly built. The oil-wells will be 
 a sort of support — backbone to the whole. 
 I see no reason why there should not be 
 a town on the Dour lands — I mean, why 
 Western Virginia should not be de- 
 veloped." 
 
 " No — certainly not," abstractedly, ex- 
 amining the maps, while Honora watched 
 his face anxiously. 
 
 "I am glad," pursued Madam Gal- 
 braith, with complacency, "that you 
 allow me at last to explain my scheme 
 to you. I'm no reformer, James, but Fd 
 like, before I die, to look at a commu- 
 nity of people who owed their advance 
 in well-being entirely to me. To me. 
 I'd hke to leave such a community on 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 143 
 
 the Dour lands. You understand ? I 
 bring here industrious emigrants, furnish 
 them with comfortable dwellings and re- 
 munerative work : they repay me the 
 money advanced as they earn it. I have 
 drawn into the scheme as many of the 
 neighboring farmers as I could : the 
 hands in the house and farm have put 
 all of their savings into it." 
 
 " But the large capitalists ?" 
 
 " Well, to be honest, James, I have 
 made use of no means to bring them in. 
 I don't want them. Then we should 
 have a board of directors, with their 
 delay and fal-lal. Why, / should not 
 even have a vote. As it is, the men I 
 have employed are controllable. Quite 
 controllable." 
 
 " A is the rolling-mill ? Is it stocked ?" 
 
 "Yes. I drew on the Western lands 
 for that." 
 
 " You have not sold the Western lands, 
 Hannah ?" 
 
 '• Certainly," sharply. " You signed 
 the deeds in March." 
 
 " You bring so many papers to me to 
 sign," mildly. 
 
 " I sold them at a sacrifice, I confess. 
 But I required the ready money. I 
 found the undertaking more costly than 
 I expected. Stocks and mortgages were 
 readily transferred, but with land and 
 cattle, of course, I parted this season at 
 a disadvantage." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith's cheeks flushed under 
 the gray whiskers. He was silent for a 
 moment : " Do I understand you that 
 you have invested all your property in 
 this scheme ?" 
 
 " Excepting the Stone-post Farm and 
 homestead. Why, it is but throwing 
 out minnows to bring in whales. It will 
 bear an interest of a hundred per cent, 
 though I did not think of the profit. 
 You appear surprised, Mr. Galbraith ?" 
 
 He delayed his answer for an instant. 
 
 " I did not know how extensive your 
 plans were, Hannah," quietly. "Here 
 is Mr. Dour. This map will be more 
 intelligible to him than to me, perhaps," 
 ceding his place at the table to the 
 young man, who returned his old-fash- 
 ioned bow but slightly. A henpecked 
 scholar was a creature with which Paul 
 
 Dour had no sympathy. Finding that 
 he could not catch Honora's eye, he 
 bent zealously over the maps. He had 
 come back intending first to win Madam 
 Galbraith's favor : when the fairy god- 
 mother was secured, he could bring him- 
 self to marry the stupid Cinderella. 
 
 " The plat marked D is incorrect, Mr. 
 Dour." 
 
 " We will amend that, madam — we 
 will amend that," with oily fluency. "But 
 about the proposals that I brought with 
 me. as we are upon the subject. You 
 positively reject New England colonists ? 
 That appears to me a singular prejudice. 
 They are the very leaven of any settle- 
 ment. These men, too, will pay their 
 own way — " 
 
 " Precisely. /'</ rather pay their way. 
 Debt's the surest yoke on any man's 
 neck. I'll have none of your headstrong 
 radicals. Sir, if you please, I'll leaven 
 my colony in my own fashion." 
 
 Dour forced a complaisant smile. 
 
 " A German population, such as that 
 which already forms the nucleus of the 
 settlement, is what I would prefer. But 
 moral — moral. I'll have neither man 
 nor woman who cannot show a fair re- 
 cord. We'll have no room for prisons 
 or courts, so we'll start vvith an honest 
 brotherhood. I have not left this matter 
 to Mr. Rattlin's oversight I've made a 
 point of knowing the antecedents of 
 every settler myself, and if he cannot 
 show a clean record, as I said, I make 
 short work with him." 
 
 " Certainly. Indubitably you are 
 right" His truckling assent flowed in 
 ready chorus to every dogmatic sentence. 
 
 Honora, meanwhile, stood looking 
 down at them with an appalled, helpless 
 dismay. While she had been brooding 
 all winter over her secret, deaf and blind 
 to all that went on about her, the royal 
 robes in which Dallas was to be clothed 
 on his return were being changed into 
 flimsy rags. She had an unutterable 
 contempt for Madam Galbraith's busi- 
 ness knowledge ; and it was Dallas' in- 
 heritance with which she was gambling, 
 in order to rule over a herd of Dutch 
 laborers. It was Dallas' rights against 
 which the foolish old woman and this 
 
144 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 truckling, time-serving Dour were con- 
 spiring. 
 
 She had a knightly, chivalric sense of 
 protection for the hardly-used fellow, ob- 
 stinate and unmalleable though he had 
 been in her hands. In her own cham- 
 ber, with maidenly blushes and tears, 
 she prayed night after night that he 
 might be brought _into the fold of the 
 church ; and now she was ready to fight 
 as vehemently for his acres and stocks. 
 
 But her secret ? Her hps were 
 closed. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith had gone back into the 
 library and seated himself at the win- 
 dow, beside the chess-board, on which 
 he had left an unsolved problem. He 
 spent many silent, happy hours every 
 day working out variations of the same 
 old gambits : now, however, he was 
 looking absently over the board into the 
 bare woods outside. When he heard Ho- 
 nora's hasty step following him, he began 
 hurriedly to move his pawns. 
 
 She put her hand on his shoulder, 
 standing behind him, motioning him 
 to listen to the murmur of voices 
 inside. " Do you know what that 
 means, sir — all that mad scheming and 
 flattery ? It means ruin — beggary." 
 
 " No, no, child," promptly, as though 
 he had expected her attack, but without 
 looking at her. " Madam Galbraith 
 has great skill in affairs — great skill. 
 You should have confidence in her." 
 
 « I ? What is it to me ? I am not 
 thinking of myself. You have no confi- 
 dence in her business judgment. You 
 have no faith in this new scheme, sir — 
 none." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith looked up at her : 
 " Honora !" 
 
 " No, you have none," steadily ; " and 
 yet you suffer her to undermine the 
 ground under our feet, until at a touch 
 we will all sink into ruin — we and these 
 poor wretches at the wells, and — and — 
 Oh, if I could but tell you what I know !" 
 
 Mr. Galbraith averted his eyes from 
 her face, moving a red' knight slowly to 
 and fro. 
 
 " I am in a sore strait, uncle," in a 
 calmer tone. " I must stand and see a 
 great wrong done, and I dare not speak 
 
 the word that would stop it. I beg of 
 you not to slight my warning. I am not 
 a child." 
 
 " No ; you are a child no longer, 
 Nora." 
 
 Some graver thought was in his mind 
 than the ruin she prophesied. She drew 
 back as though she understood it. They 
 both were silent. 
 
 "You must remember," he said, at 
 last, looking at her with a shrewd smile, 
 " that you base your fears upon your 
 own contempt of my wife's skill in busi- 
 ness. I do not know how that may be. 
 You women are always the harshest judges 
 of one who undertakes a man's work, 
 cry out for a career as you will. Eh, 
 Nonny ? But I have not been so blind 
 and deaf to this scheme as you suppose, 
 though I had no idea that all of her 
 property was involved in it. No ; I did 
 not comprehend its extent until to-day." 
 He paused abruptly. 
 
 "You comprehend it now?" eagerly, 
 " and you mean to interfere ?" 
 
 " No ; I wiU not interfere, Honora." 
 
 " Not if you believed as I do, that it 
 would end in beggary ?" 
 
 " No, my dear ; not even then." 
 
 Miss Dundas bent on the slow, gentle 
 eyes a look of amazed pity. 
 
 " If—" she hesitated — " if there were 
 a natural heir to whom the property 
 would revert ? In that case — " 
 
 " In no case will I lift my finger to 
 thwart my wife," replacing the chessmen 
 with the quiet, indolent motion habitual 
 to him ; and then turning to her : " The 
 property is hers, Honora. I was a poor 
 young fellow when I met and loved Han- 
 nah Dour. I had but a small annuity — 
 enough to feed and clothe me — to buy a 
 book or print now and then. I have the 
 same now — no more. When I asked 
 her to be my wife, it was with the con- 
 dition that I should gain nothing through 
 the marriage other than her great love. 
 The Dour estate — its income or its 
 privileges — was to be no more to me 
 than to the merest stranger crossing its 
 boundary. Our marriage has, therefore, 
 been a very true one. But if I had not 
 enforced that condition, I should have 
 been a pensioner upon her bounty ;" and 
 
DALLAS GAI^BRAITH. 
 
 145 
 
 the thin, high-bred features colored 
 painfully. 
 
 " I understand," said Honora, gently. 
 
 He opened the box and began to care- 
 fully set the quaint old figures in their 
 velvet case. 
 
 "You did not solve your problem, 
 uncle ?" stooping to help him. 
 
 " No ; my head aches. This south- 
 erly wind, I suppose." He took hold 
 of her busy fingers with a half-quizzical, 
 half-sad smile. " Money weighs heavily 
 in hands as young as these, Nora. You 
 think life ought to be like an English 
 novel, in which virtue is always rewarded 
 in the end by a shower of gold ? When 
 one is an old graybeard like me, one 
 knows that it is only the surface-crops 
 in life which wealth can buy. The real 
 treasures lie far below." He closed the 
 box and pushed it from him. " Now, as 
 to that imaginary heir of the Dours" — 
 falling into his favorite, speculative tone 
 — "if there were such an one, there are 
 many better gifts in God's hand for a 
 young man than large property. Dis- 
 cipline, for instance, or hard fortune to 
 wrestle with, until every thew and sinew 
 is strengthened, and — but what is the use 
 of defining the good and ill of the world 
 for young people ? It is a lesson which 
 every man has to learn afresh in the bit- 
 terness of his soul." 
 
 « Discipline ?" Miss Dundas thought 
 the heir of the Dours had secured his 
 share of it. When she would have spo- 
 ken Mr. Galbraith avoided her eye. 
 
 " Tut ! tut ! Where have I mislaid 
 my book ? You did not see it, my dear V 
 putting on his spectacles and peering 
 about on taWes and book-shelves. 
 
 " Ronsard, uncle ? It is here." 
 
 " Ah, true. Thank you. It is a book 
 you must never read, Nora. As false 
 a guide in literature as in love." He 
 composed himself, however, in his chair, 
 put his slippered feet to the fire and 
 opened the squat, black volume, with an 
 air of tranquil enjoyment. Miss Dundas, 
 with an impatient glance at him, wan- 
 dered uneasily back into the other room. 
 The progressive party there had received 
 a reinforcement. Mr. Rattlin was pa- 
 cing to and fro, his hands clasped under 
 10 
 
 the tails of his thin black coat, a satis- 
 fied smile on his face. Beck, from the 
 Indian Queen, sat a little apart from the 
 table, in a suit of Sunday black clothes 
 and a wide expanse of shirt front, which 
 altogether appeared to have unmanned 
 him. He sat bolt upright, swinging his 
 hat between his wide-open knees. Ma- 
 dam Galbraith was writing. 
 
 " There is your receipt, Mr. Beck," 
 she said, handing him a slip of paper. 
 " It is not a certificate, because there is 
 no company yet formed ; but your divi- 
 dend is secure. I am good for it." 
 
 Beck read the paper, took up a pinch 
 of white ashes from under the grate to 
 sprinkle on it to dry the ink, and then 
 stowed it carefully away in his wallet. 
 " I reckon I'm satisfied with mv backer," 
 he chuckled. " Them's my savin's since 
 I first did a stroke of work. I was 
 afeard of banks, and we kept 'em in an 
 old tea-pot. That's so. They growed 
 very slow ; especially as Matt's a'most 
 raised an' '11 be needin' schoolin' soon. 
 I'd like to give him a start ahead of 
 what me and Peggy had. So it seemed 
 kind a providential when the madam 
 opened up this way for us to make a for- 
 tune out of hand. But it cost Peggy 
 and me a tug to give up the old Queen, 
 for all, sir," for Mr. Rattlin had stopped 
 and was hstening patiently. 
 
 " No doubt, Mr. Beck — no doubt. I 
 had no idea that we were so attached to 
 our own little house until we left it last 
 week : we quite forgot that the roof 
 leaked, and that the children have grown 
 so big that they threaten to split it open 
 like a locust's back. It was just adapted 
 to my wife and me when we were mar- 
 ried. But there are eleven of us now, 
 all told." 
 
 " You've given up your old place to 
 go to the wells, Mr. Rattlin ?" said Dour, 
 joining them, with an embarrassed effort 
 at ease. 
 
 "Yes. The whole country is in a 
 ferment. Emigrants are arriving daily 
 and going to the wells. There is great 
 work to be done fhere — the field is white 
 for the harvest. When Madam Gal- 
 braith summoned me, I heritated long 
 before going. The responsibility will be 
 
146 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 heavy. It ought to have been laid upon 
 a different man. I doubt often, now, if 
 I was not presumptuous," anxiously. 
 
 " You have no reason to doubt," said 
 Dour, putting his hand heartily on 
 Mr. Rattlin's stooped shoulders. His 
 heart warmed to Gerty's father. It 
 would have warmed to the very dog of 
 the house in which she lived ; though 
 she was but a silly girl, and his life lay 
 quite in another sphere from hers. 
 
 There was no sham in the humble 
 fear of the little man, but he quickly 
 checked its utterance. What right had 
 he to be chattering of himself or his 
 fitness ? " It is a great work, Mr. Dour, 
 which Madam Galbraith has undertaken 
 so late in life." 
 
 " She is a shrewd woman. At the pres- 
 ent price of even doubtful oil stock — " 
 
 " She had no eyes upon oil, sir," 
 eagerly, "nor profit. It is a care for 
 souls. She was frank with me as to her 
 motive. ' Let me feed the bodies of 
 these men, Mr. Rattlin,' she said ; ' give 
 them work, cheerful homes, education, 
 and they are much more ready for you 
 to lead into the kingdom of heaven.' 
 She may be right," meditatively. "As- 
 cetic religion was pushed very far — very 
 far — by the Papists. I doubt its effi- 
 cacy. Now, we Protestants — " 
 
 " She is a shrewd woman," repeated 
 Dour, quietly. 
 
 " You think she is right, then ? Well, 
 there is a great deal to be done," cheer- 
 fully. " Church, Sunday-school and 
 weekly lectures to be inaugurated. I'm 
 glad our friend Beck here has moved to 
 the town, and put his shoulder to the 
 wheel. His example may do much." 
 
 " I've put my shoulder to because / 
 mean to rise ile," said Beck, sturdily, 
 buttoning his coat. " My dooty is to 
 Peggy and Matt. As for the Dutch and 
 their souls, that's a horse of another 
 color. I don't know it No disrespect 
 to you. Mr. Ratdin." 
 
 " No, Beck, certainly not," watching 
 him make his bow and exit with a good- 
 humored smile. " Beck is a neighbor 
 of mine in our new village. He has put 
 all he has into the scheme." 
 
 Dour was looking down at the litde 
 
 cheerful cricket of a man with a nervous- 
 ness singular in the self-possessed, trig, 
 ready youth. " Is your new home as 
 pleasant as the old one ? That was a 
 very peculiar house, I think." 
 
 " Why, my dear sir, there are a dozen 
 like it within a stone's throw ! The new 
 one is infinitely superior. And I have 
 bought my mare back — Jenny — from 
 Whitcross. You've heard me speak of 
 Jenny V 
 
 " Is Mrs. Rattlin well ? And— the 
 children ?" with a quaking in his narrow 
 chest for which he could have scourged 
 himself 
 
 " Well, no. Tony has a weakness in 
 one leg — a fall, we fear — and the baby 
 is just over the measles. There have 
 been changes among us since you left 
 us, Mr. Dour, and there will be greater 
 soon, I fear. Come down. I would 
 like to show you Jenny. We felt as if 
 an old friend had come back again — " 
 
 Madam Galbraith came up, and, beck- 
 oning to Mr. Rattlin, led him away for 
 consultation. There was a grave respect 
 in her manner to him which she showed 
 to no one else. Mr. Dour was left alone, 
 more startled than he chose to own. 
 What changes could be coming among 
 the Rattlin brood .? Tom was going to 
 school, perhaps, or the twins were ail- 
 ing. If they were not so cursedly 
 healthy and such hearty feeders, a man 
 need not be afraid of marrying the whole 
 family. 
 
 He turned sharply around on pretty 
 Mrs. Duffield, who had halted in the 
 open door, taking in the hard, earnest 
 room and hard, earnest people in it, with 
 an amused, placid glance : " Mr. Rattlin 
 spoke of impending changes in his 
 family, just now. Do you know what 
 they are, Mrs. Duffield ?" 
 
 " One of his daughters is to be mar- 
 ried, I believe. Rosa, Gertrude — what 
 are their names ? If you will close that 
 window, Mr. Dour, I think I will come 
 in," composing herself in Madam Gal- 
 braith's chair with a little shiver. 
 
 The old lady turned on hearing their 
 voices. " If you are persuading my 
 daughter-in-law to join in our scheme," 
 she said, sharply, "your efforts are 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 147 
 
 wasted, Mr. Dour. She is the only 
 member of my household who stands 
 aloof. I was much gratified, by the way, 
 to-day " — to Mr. Rattlin — " when a wo- 
 man whom I have employed for years 
 put her earnings into my hands. A 
 canny Jersey woman, too — my house- 
 keeper. She had, apparently, entire con- 
 fidence in my judgment, as, I must say, 
 even the business men of the county ap- 
 pear to have." 
 
 But Mrs. Dufiield, quite unconscious 
 of being lashed over Lizzy's shoulder, 
 drew back her soft lilac dress, lest the 
 fire should fade it, and putting up her 
 dainty feet on a footstool, leaned back 
 and surveyed them all with the critical 
 good-humor of the spectator of a comedy. 
 
 Mr. Rattlin came up to her. " Mad- 
 am Galbraith hopes to do a great work 
 among these people," he said, anxiously. 
 " I still think you will help us. If you 
 would try to make one soul among them 
 purer and better. At your age, and 
 childless — " 
 
 " I ought to be laying up treasure in 
 heaven," with herpleasant, indolent smile. 
 ■• But I object to helping you, personally, 
 on principle, Mr. Ratthn. It hardens 
 one terribly to work among the poor. 
 Your managers of almshouses and asy- 
 lums always degenerate into machines. 
 They've no sympathy with the sensitive, 
 acute pain which you feel, looking on 
 misery from far off. I grew calloused 
 enough when I lived among the poor 
 unfortunates. I took in washing dur- 
 ing my first husband's life-time, you 
 know. I was quite convinced then that 
 I had no call to be a reformer." 
 
 Madam Galbraith brought her pon- 
 derous body between her and the fire. 
 She had been watching the insouciant 
 little lady with angry eagerness from 
 under her heavy brows. It gave her 
 little comfort that the whole of the coun- 
 ty acknowledged her leadership, so long 
 as this Mordecai disregarded her within 
 her very gates. " One would think you 
 would wish to see your native State de- 
 veloped," she said, in an acrid tone. 
 " Your patriotism — " and there stopped. 
 
 Mrs. Duffield waited courteously for 
 her to finish. " I have no call to be a 
 
 reformer," she repeated, with vivacity. 
 " As for patriotism, I have not an atom 
 in my veins — not an atom." 
 
 Mr. Dour, who had been standing 
 gloomily by the window, roused himself 
 to join Madam Galbraith. " But you 
 must have some esprit de corps, Mrs. 
 Duffield," he said. " You are one of us. 
 We have put all we have into this ven- 
 ture. We are in the same ship to- 
 gether—" 
 
 "Then I'll — 'paddle my own canoe,'" 
 sang the sweetest and most liquid of 
 voices. It was one of her attractive 
 little ways, to embroider her talk with 
 snatches of songs (with no high notes 
 to show the crack in her tones). But 
 she was too indolent to be vivacious or 
 winning long. She bent forward with a 
 steady look, as if determined to put a 
 stop to her annoyance for ever. " I 
 wish Madam Galbraith success," with a 
 grave little bow. " May she find her 
 subjects submissive ! But, my dear Mr. 
 Rattlin, never talk to me about the poor. 
 There is a class of people to whom 
 such talk is jarring and morbid. Their 
 religion comes to them through good 
 clothes, good music, gentle, aesthetic 
 emotions. I think I am one of them. 
 We are the right hand of the world ; and 
 if you are the left, you should not let us 
 know the good you do." 
 
 Mr. Rattlin looked bewildered at the 
 ironical smile on her lips. It disap- 
 peared as she turned to Mr. Dour : " My 
 little property would be of no value in 
 your great undertaking. But it is in- 
 vested in State securities, and yields me 
 six per cent, in gold. It is very com- 
 fortable to have it in gold." 
 
 " But in oil—" 
 
 " The flow of brine will not account 
 for the late stoppages in your wells," a 
 keen glint in her eyes. " When the 
 pulse is uneven, the man is sick — sick, 
 Mr. Dour." 
 
 There was a sudden silence as this 
 bombshell fell. Dour looked anxiously 
 at Madam Galbraith. "Paraffine!" she 
 growled, contemptuously, taking up a 
 map. 
 
 " But the paraffine cannot clog my six 
 per cent in gold," retorted Mrs. Duf- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 field, arching her golden-brown eye- 
 brows significantly. " Come, Honora, 
 let us go. We are without the camp," 
 putting her arm about Miss Dundas. 
 
 She did not speak again until they 
 had reached her own room, and she had 
 given Honora a chair near her softly- 
 cushioned lounge. Then she walked 
 restlessly to the window and back again, 
 a look of almost anxiety on her fair face. 
 " I can read defeat and disaster written 
 on the very walls of this house," she 
 said, at last. " It seems as if it were 
 God's will that no family should stand 
 long secure in this country. There is a 
 sort of leprosy attacks all large fortunes. 
 After a generation or two they all 
 moulder — moulder. But one does not 
 care to be in the falling house." She 
 seated herself a moment after, arranging 
 herself comfortably with her usual good- 
 tempered calm. 
 
 There were no signs of defeat or de- 
 cay in the wide, dainty room to which 
 the firelight gave such warmth and snug- 
 ness. It was curious to note how Ma- 
 dam Galbraith had gradually sacrificed to 
 it the best which the house could afford 
 of beauty or taste. Not that she had 
 any fondness for the httle woman, who 
 sank into her luxurious home as nat- 
 urally as a bird into its nest ; nor that 
 the said little woman would have given 
 one shrug of discontent if they had 
 lodged her on bare floors. 
 
 The room had taken meaning, also, 
 since she came. There were engravings, 
 sketches, rare pieces of glass, all man- 
 ner of delicate souvenirs from guests 
 who, when gone, had sent back some 
 trifle to give her pleasure. Yet they all 
 loved Honora better. 
 
 But Honora was not one of the 
 world's bits of useless porcelain which it 
 delights to set aside and guard. 
 
 "You have no faith in my aunt's 
 foresight, then ?" Miss Dundas said, 
 gloomily, after a long silence. 
 
 Mrs. Duffield gave a most expressive 
 wave of her fingers. She had drawn 
 her work-basket toward her and was 
 twisting a cord about a blue velvet Nor- 
 mandy cap, which was the only cover- 
 ing which she permitted on her hair. 
 
 "Pah !" she said. " But what of that ? 
 She is like an old, untamed animal. It 
 would be death to her to balk her." 
 After pausing a moment to look criti- 
 cally at her cap, she continued, gravely : 
 " But these poor souls for whom she in- 
 tends conversion ! Now, positively, Ho- 
 nora, I would as soon be gored into hea- 
 ven by a herd of wild buffaloes." 
 
 Miss Dundas sat motionless, her face 
 toward the fire, for some time. When 
 she spoke, she did not look at her com- 
 panion. " If I could tell you all that 
 was at stake, you would interfere. There 
 is a secret — " 
 
 Mrs. Duffield gave her a quick, search- 
 ing glance. The girl's great and sup- 
 pressed agitation would have made any 
 other woman curious ; but Mrs. Duf- 
 field put up her hand with positive 
 alarm. " My dear girl, choose anybody 
 for your confidant but me. I really can- 
 not be annoyed by this matter ; and as 
 for secrets, I never had one of my own 
 in my life. They are childish, silly." 
 
 " You will not interfere, then ?" 
 
 " Certainly ;z^/," taking up her work 
 again. Honora had risen and stood re- 
 garding Dallas' mother with impatient 
 scorn. " Then I wash my hands of it !" 
 she said, bitterly. " What can I do 
 alone ?" 
 
 "Very little, my dear," tranquilly. 
 " You are quite wise not to vex yourself" 
 After a pause she looked up : " When 
 you are as old as I, you will have learned 
 the sense of being a mere spectator in 
 the world. This dear old lady did not 
 control her nature in her youth, and it is 
 sweeping her headlong to ruin in her 
 age. That is inevitable. Why should 
 I throw myself in the way? Now, why 
 should I, Honora ?" with a gentle ap- 
 peal. " When you meet that which is 
 inevitable never make a single struggle 
 against it — not if it brings your own 
 death to you. Die if you must, but 
 there is no need that you should be 
 weak and foolish. I have something for 
 your uncle here," changing her tone, 
 and bringing from a closet some bunches 
 of foreign grapes, which she heaped on 
 a plate, with leaves under them. " Now 
 give me that rose, my dear. An old 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 149 
 
 friend sent them to me. There. Will 
 you take them to him ? They will give 
 flavor to his book, perhaps." 
 
 «• I will take them," said Honora, un- 
 derstanding that she and the trouble of 
 the house were dismissed together. 
 
 When Honora had left her uncle, he 
 dropped Ronsard on his knee as though 
 he had suddenly lost all relish for his 
 monstrous welding of bad Greek and 
 French, and sat listening intently to 
 every inflection of his wife's harsh voice. 
 He had studied her voice for forty years : 
 he had learned through it her secret 
 thoughts and passions as surely as men 
 measure the far-off heights and depths 
 of a mountainous, unsafe country by a 
 breath of vapor. No man ever brought 
 to such study the patience and strength 
 of this meek, gentlest of gentlemen ; and 
 having found the mastery over her, he 
 had lield his controlling hand steadily. 
 Only Hannah Dour knew from what pit- 
 falls and gulfs of passion that inflexible 
 hand had saved her. 
 
 He understood, as few men do, a cer- 
 tain ebb and flow in the souls of some 
 women, half physical, half spiritual — an 
 abnormal swell, a flood-tide of the mys- 
 terious life within, which, in a woman 
 of Madam Galbraith's age, nervous and 
 childless, drifts the body like a weed 
 close upon the boundaries of life and 
 death. He had noted lately the signs 
 of its rising : the dead, inactive lassitude 
 of brain, alternating with unnatural vigor. 
 Listening now to her inarticulate tones, 
 he judged her more justly than those 
 who heard her words, or than she did 
 herself It was not greed that possessed 
 her, as Dour thought, nor love of power, 
 nor the hope of saving souls. 
 
 " She must not be thwarted," he said 
 at last, rising, decisively. " If the end 
 be beggary, she must not be thwarted. 
 Unless — " Going into the room, he 
 found her alone, the maps pushed from 
 her. and her hands pressed into her fore- 
 head. 
 
 He sat down beside her. " You are 
 tired, Hannah ?" he said, quietly. 
 
 " I am very tired, James !" 
 
 « I wish you would rest. What if 
 you put this w^hole tangled business 
 
 aside and forget both it and yourself for 
 a while .'' A sea voyage, or that explor- 
 ing journey through the West we used 
 to plan when we were young — " 
 
 "We are not young now, James. It 
 is not far from the end." She took her 
 hands down and looked at him. " If I 
 had been a man, 1 would have made my 
 mark upon the world. But when I am 
 gone, there will not be a sign on the earth 
 that I have lived." 
 
 " Does that cost you so much V with 
 a strange smile. 
 
 "There is not an hour of the day 
 when it is not present to me." She 
 stood up pointing to the distant moun- 
 tains and broad river : " T will do what 
 I can. That is the Dour land. I am 
 the last of many generations. I will 
 write my name on it so that time itself 
 shall never wipe it out." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith hesitated before he 
 spoke, as if the words he meant to utter 
 were a forlorn hope which he threw in 
 her way : " If our boy — if Tom were here 
 you would not care for this work." 
 
 " How can I tell," wiping her fore- 
 head. The old tenderness had gone out 
 of her eyes : they were firm and grasp- 
 ing as a hawk's swooping on its quarry. 
 " He was but one — I am going to save 
 many souls. I am called to do a great 
 work. I must have something to fill up 
 this gap," hoarsely, laying her hand or 
 her broad breast. '< Do not stop me 
 James, do not stand in my way." 
 
 " I will not stand in your way, Han 
 nah," he replied, gently. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 When Mr. Rattlin made his adieux 
 to the stern old woman bending over her 
 maps, Mr. Dour followed him out. "Tl] 
 walk down the avenue with you," he 
 said. But he went no farther than the 
 door. When they were outside, he 
 glanced up at the massive hous« acd 
 then at the wide sweep of landscape, re- 
 peating a lesson he had taken pains to 
 learn, that when he married Miss Dun- 
 
150 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 das all this would be his. What was it 
 to him which of the preacher's little 
 daughters was to be married ! 
 
 Yet, when Mr. Rattlin had gone, he 
 followed him to the brow of the hill, 
 looking after him, with a homesick long- 
 ing which shamed him. That Gerty 
 should marry ! Why, there had not 
 been a moment when he was gone that 
 she had not been in his thoughts, a win- 
 ning, tender presence. And at the very 
 moment she had been giving her soft 
 hps to the touch of another man ! 
 
 In the few days that followed, Mr. 
 Dour became prime councilor with 
 Madam Galbraith. He was so defer- 
 ential to her, so regardless of Honora, 
 that the old lady accused herself with 
 injustice. " He has no folly about mar- 
 riage in his head," she said. "And he 
 will make a very fair business man — un- 
 der control, of course." The truth was, 
 there were certain gaps and weak places 
 in the schemes of her own imperial in- 
 tellect, the patching of which she left 
 to meaner minds, taking it for granted 
 that they knew their place. 
 
 Paul, on the contrary, wrote to his 
 mother : " Many persons prophesy dis- 
 aster, being prejudiced by the old lady's 
 visionary, violent character. But oil is 
 oil and capital is capital. They are 
 secure. She has the sense, too, to leave 
 all important arrangements to me and 
 others, comprehending the difference be- 
 tween a man's intellect and a woman's. 
 I think she has a plan for marrying me 
 to her niece. I would have the business 
 capacity, and she the capital — a usual 
 partnership. But marrying is very far 
 from my thoughts." He had no mind 
 to take anybody into his confidence. As 
 soon as he could see his way clear he 
 meant to marry Miss Dundas. 
 
 Honora, meanwhile, had driven down 
 to the wells to bring Gerty up, as she 
 proposed. The Rattlins swarmed, at 
 present, in a half-finished house full of 
 raw carpenter- work and wet paint. 
 "You need not wait for me, Honora," 
 said Gerty, loftily. "Papa will take me 
 up if I determine to go." Then she 
 went into her mother's room, and sat 
 down : " There is no use in bringing out 
 
 my clothes, mother. There's only the 
 faded old merino with the patch on the 
 elbow. That's the beginning and end," 
 with a laugh which brought the tears 
 into Mrs. Rattlin's eyes. For Madam 
 Galbraith, in her great scheme, had for- 
 gotten her usual box of spring clothes, 
 which imported so much to the poor 
 preacher's household. 
 
 Mrs. Rattlin did take down the faded 
 merino, and turned it over hopelessly. 
 " If it had not been for the dresses we 
 had to buy for Rosy — " 
 
 " I don't begrudge Rosy her few Httle 
 things or her happiness," said Gerty, 
 pushing back the hair from her pale 
 cheeks. " I didn't mean that, mother. 
 But it's hard that my whole life should 
 depend on the want of clothes." 
 
 "If your dress makes any difference 
 to him, he's not worthy of you, Gerty," 
 rejoined Mrs. Rattlin, hotly. "In my day, 
 true love didn't come and go with gowns." 
 
 " I suppose Honora wants me there 
 as a foil," said Gerty, spitefully. " But 
 he never cared for her when I was there, 
 as lovely as her things were this winter. 
 He cared for me." She came and put 
 her arms about her mother's neck, and 
 cried there silently. She had grown 
 quiet and gentle as never before during 
 the winter months, while Rosy was 
 making ready for her wedding. Her 
 mother was the only one to whom she 
 talked of Dour or her hope in him. The 
 two women had waited day after day 
 since he returned, for him to come, the 
 aching pain as sharp in the mother's 
 heart as in the child's. They had walked 
 together every evening beyond the der- 
 ricks to the point where they could see 
 the Galbraith house on the hill-side. 
 Even that was some comfort to Gerty, 
 her mother fancied. The girl raised her 
 head at last, and taking the old merino, 
 hung it up quietly. " I cannot go. It's 
 all over," she said, under her breath. 
 
 " Oh, my darling ! your day will come. 
 Cannot you trust a little in the Lord ?" 
 
 " What does He care for a girl's shabby 
 clothes ? No, mother ; Rosy shall be 
 married and happy, and I'll stay and 
 help you with the children. I'll be 
 an old maid and sew and do kitchen- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 '5' 
 
 work on to the end, as I've begun, and 
 grow old and die, and wake up in hea- 
 ven alone — alone !" sitting down on 
 Tony's trundle bed and hiding her eyes, 
 sobbing. " I think I'll go and walk 
 a while," she said at last ; and putting 
 on her worsted hood, to hide her eyes, 
 she went out, while Mrs. Ratllin sat 
 down to patch Joe's trowsers, with a 
 great weight at her heart. When a girl 
 Hke Gerty misses her chance of mar- 
 riage, what is there to give her to fill up 
 her life ? What is there .-• 
 
 It was a cheerful morning. Down by 
 the muddy meadow-creek the willows 
 began to look like pale-green mists held 
 motionless in the air, and here and there 
 under her feet a bluebell or dandelion 
 peeped up from under last year's grass ; 
 but Gerty hurried on, blind to them, into 
 the crowded lanes, which crept outward, 
 crooked as a spider's claws, from the 
 oil-wells. She passed under the shadow 
 of the great derricks, stopped to look at 
 tlie green mass in the enormous tanks, 
 and then walked more slowly through 
 the rows of unfinished wooden houses 
 and the swarms of workmen and Dutch 
 emigrants, all chattering, eager, busy. 
 She crept along still more slowly by the 
 towering, half-built factories, the tent- 
 like roofs of the rolling-mills, bitter 
 speculation in her chubby, doll-face. 
 For Gerty was weighing the value of 
 mills and oil against that same doll-face. 
 They were Honora's fortune. Gerty 
 was dumb when her father talked of the 
 love of God shown in Madam Gal- 
 braith's gigantic scheme of philanthropy ; 
 but its percentage the girl could under- 
 stand well enough. It was her rival. 
 There was not a sign in the long 
 battle between Paul Dour's avarice and 
 love that the giddy, kittenish cherub (as 
 he thought her) beside him had not 
 keenly seen and noted. She passed 
 drearily out of the town, and looked 
 back into the crowd and heat, with its 
 overhanging cloud of black smoke. It 
 was only to Gerty a great engine, which 
 dragged the triumphant car of the bril- 
 liant little heiress. Then she thought 
 of her one faded dress, and her soul was 
 bitter within her. 
 
 Outside of the nucleus of life which had 
 suddenly appeared in their midst, the 
 hills fell back into their old melancholy 
 silence and solitude. Gerty, leaving the 
 town a few rods behind her, was utterly 
 alone. It was a narrow cattle-path 
 which she had followed, through a cleft 
 of the hills. She sat down on some dry 
 rocks which shelved down on the banks 
 of the creek : there were the ruins of an 
 old mill below her, the sun shining 
 brightly on the broken, mossy wheel and 
 charred rafters. Dour, walking down 
 the same path an hour before, on his 
 way to the town, had stopped to notice 
 the picturesque beauty of the place ; 
 but Gerty saw nothing, unless it was 
 the cHnging folds of the ill-fitting yellow 
 dress she wore and the faded, cherry- 
 colored hood which she took from her 
 head. Her clothes were only the sign of 
 her life — all faded and worn out together. 
 She crouched down, remembering the 
 dinner uncooked at home, looking wist- 
 fully at the bright water's drip, drip. 
 To the poor little Rattlin girl, forced 
 back from love, marriage and mother- 
 hood to unending sewing and kitchen- 
 work, life was as vacant, and the 
 rest of " muddy death " as alluring, 
 as to Ophelia. But Gerty only stood 
 and looked at it After an hour she 
 stood up to go back to the sweeping and 
 dish-washing. Then it was that she 
 heard a quick, decided step on the beaten 
 path, and sat down on one of the mill 
 logs until the intruder should pass on. 
 The step came nearer : the man gave 
 a hoarse cough. She got up, put out 
 one hand, as if she would have fallen, 
 and then cowered down lower than be- 
 fore, forgetting her clothes, her misery 
 — herself. 
 
 It was Dour's first visit to the town. 
 He knew every dollar invested in it 
 through Madam Galbraith's books, and 
 the probable capacity of each well from 
 Mr. Finn, the expert whom she had em- 
 ployed to oversee their opening — had 
 gone over maps and accounts with the 
 lingering tenderness of an heir-at-law 
 taking stock of his future possessions. 
 But he had not before found courage to 
 see, touch, handle them. This chubby 
 
152 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 figure in the yellow dress would not be 
 thrust from the secret recess of his 
 heart, though it was more terrible to him 
 there than any skeleton. 
 
 He had pushed through the crowd, 
 smelled the oil and surveyed the mills 
 and the drays loaded with pig-metal, 
 with the same light shining on them all 
 which Gerty had seen. They were Ho- 
 nora's fortune. 
 
 They were his price. 
 
 He had not seen the golden shekels 
 before for which he meant to sell himself. 
 Their ring and glitter touched him home. 
 He was no longer Madam Galbraith's 
 feed clerk : he was an absolute dictator. 
 He was quite satisfied to stand off from 
 oil and iron and accept Finn's fluent as- 
 sertions and the mill-master's guarded 
 estimate. Dour told himself that his 
 was the controlling faculty which en- 
 abled him to use the brains of these men 
 as tools — to convert their knowledge into 
 capital for himself While he was tip- 
 toeing complacently through the street, 
 swinging his cane, his nattily-brushed 
 coat buttoned about his narrow chest, 
 Mr. Rattlin hailed him : " Why, bless me, 
 Dour ! Come over, man ; I want you to 
 see the mother, and Jenny, our mare. 
 Did I tell you I had got her back from 
 Whitcross ?" 
 
 Dour followed him only to the stable : 
 he would not be drawn farther. But 
 through the window he saw the shabby 
 dining-room, the huddle of unwashed 
 children, the meagre dishes upon the 
 table, and a flood of disgust rose within 
 him, and quite overwhelmed that old 
 love, he thought. 
 
 He made short work of it with Jenny 
 and her light-hearted little master. Mr. 
 Rattlin never thought of his daughters 
 but as children, nor introduced them into 
 his conversation ; and when Dour would 
 have asked with indifference which of 
 them was going to leave her home, some- 
 thing rose in his throat and choked 
 him. 
 
 Yet he was awkward and silent while 
 Mr. Rattlin dilated over Jenny, held the 
 little man's hand a moment at parting, as 
 •■hough bidding to him, or something 
 which lay behind him, a last good-bye. 
 
 and when he left him, did not go back 
 to the town, but turned to the mill-path 
 and walked hurriedly toward home. The 
 sooner he was out of danger the better, 
 he told himself. He would propose to 
 Miss Dundas to-night. 
 
 Looking up with the thought, he saw 
 a plump little woman, in a faded hood, 
 shrinking behind one of the beams of 
 the mill, as if to avoid him. Inside of 
 his tact, philosophy, measurements of 
 pig-metal and oil, there was a sudden 
 terrible throb. 
 
 He walked straight to her. 
 
 Paul Dour knew a hundred women 
 prettier, more companionable, more win- 
 ning than this untidy girl in yellow : 
 what nerve or cord or magnetic fluid was 
 there between his heart and hers that 
 gave him that wrench and brought him 
 to her against his will ? Who will tell 
 us the history, before we were born, of 
 that living creature within us which goes 
 about to find its mate in all imprac- 
 ticable places, deaf to reason .? It drag- 
 ged Paul close to Gerty : it spoke 
 through his eyes and mouth ; it tried to 
 drive his calculations out of his head, as 
 though they had been vile money- 
 changers in the temple. 
 
 "Gerty!" he said. "Will you not 
 speak to me, Gerty .?" 
 
 " I am very glad to see you, Mr. 
 Dour." Her dignity would have im- 
 pressed us, perhaps, as much as that of 
 a pullet, but it forced this astute fellow 
 back with actual pain. 
 
 "Why do you hold your hands 
 clasped ?" putting his fingers on them. 
 " Will you not trust me ? In memory of 
 our old friendship." 
 
 " That is dead and gone." 
 
 "It was not killed by me. You are 
 as — you are the same to me that you 
 ever were. You are the same, Gerty." 
 He held her closely-shut hands and drew 
 her slowly, passionately toward him. 
 Whether from art or real despair and 
 jealousy of Honora, or physical weari- 
 ness from her hysteric sobbing, Gerty 
 remained cold as marble — her fat cheeks 
 pale, her wide, brown eyes meeting his, 
 sad and fearless. The bird was not in 
 his reach ; and, after all, it was the only 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 53 
 
 tKing in the world which his heart had 
 roally coveted. 
 
 He pushed her from him : " You have 
 found some one who is more to you than 
 I. I know that you are to be married." 
 
 " No ; it is Rosy. There was a man 
 who loved me very much," with a cer- 
 tain childish gravity, "and he would 
 have made me his wife this winter ; but 
 I would not choose that degradation." 
 
 " Why is it degradation ?" 
 
 " I did not love him." She was hold- 
 ing back the tears under her strait lids, 
 and did not see the effect which her 
 quiet words had upon her hearer. 
 
 " Poor Gerty ! Your ideas of honor 
 are out of date," with a cynical laugh. 
 " A woman has only her hand to sell : 
 she ought to make as good a bargain as 
 I issible with it. See ; your clothes and 
 bread and butter for life depend upon 
 your manying. That is the result of our 
 admirable social system. And mine 
 also," he added, secretly, warning him- 
 self back from the precipice. 
 
 " I know that," simply accepting his 
 sneer as truth. " But I did not love 
 him," and again her eyes were raised to 
 his. 
 
 " Perhaps he would not have given 
 }'0u a comfortable home?" 
 
 " Oh, yes ; he is in a good business — 
 John Stokes. I should have lived in an 
 elegant cottage and been dressed very 
 nicely. But he was nothing to me." 
 
 Dour balanced himself against a 
 fallen log, looking with keen, not unten- 
 der, speculation into her silly face. 
 " And yet you have hard lines down 
 there, Gerty ? Eleven of you ? Little 
 to eat and less to wear ? Don't be an- 
 gry, child ; I don't mean to hurt you, 
 God knows." 
 
 " It is a poor home. We are tired 
 and overworked — all of us," with some 
 spirit. " But I love them all there. I will 
 not marry a man whom I do not love." 
 
 There was nothing very new or mag- 
 nanimous in Gerty's words, but they 
 struck Dour as a lofty strain of music 
 belonging to a life higher than the one 
 he had chosen. But then the little wo- 
 man, witli her brown hair and appealing 
 eyes, her rounded, peachy-tinted figure. 
 
 in its miserable dress, down to the very 
 feet in the worn slioes, was a something 
 different from anything else in this vul- 
 gar world. And, beside, he was en- 
 raged at John Stokes to the breaking of 
 his head if he had been a fighting man. 
 As he was not, Gerty's scorn was grate- 
 ful to him. 
 
 "Catholics can go into a nunnery 
 when they're tired and lonely ; but we 
 Protestants must drag on at home, where 
 we are not needed. I am going to do 
 that, to help with the work and the chil- 
 dren. It will all come to an end some 
 day," said Gerty, with the old, quiet, for- 
 lorn gesture, pushing back her hair with 
 both hands. Dour could not speak : he 
 looked down at her in silence. If he 
 had not loved her, there would have been 
 something terribly pathetic in the sight 
 of this poor little woman, cast out of 
 any rightful place in the world because 
 she would not marry for a home. If he 
 had not loved her, he would have used 
 the case as a telling argument in favor 
 of giving to girls trades or professions as 
 well as boys — have argued that there 
 was less indelicacy in a woman selling 
 goods and groceries than selling herself 
 for a livelihood. As it was, his soul 
 was dumb within him. 
 
 She looked up at him at last. " I must 
 go now. Good-bye, Mr. Dour." 
 
 " Good-bye, Gerty. Am I never to 
 see you again .'"' 
 
 He meant to give her up, then ? But 
 she was too tired and worn-out for the 
 certainty to bring forth more than a low 
 sob. "It would be better if I did not 
 see you again, I suppose. Good-bye." 
 
 But he did not move. " Will you give 
 me your hand ?" 
 
 She hesitated and then held it out. 
 He clasped it hard in both his own, 
 standing motionless, his face bent on the 
 ground. When she would have moved, 
 he said, with a frown : " Give me a mo- 
 ment. I do not want to repent here- 
 after." She looked wonderingly at him, 
 not knowing that within that oddly- 
 shaped, narrow head, curiously flat a-top, 
 her future fife was being decided — his 
 reason, habits, ambition on one side, and 
 that incomprehensible, living creature 
 
154 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 on the other, who would not be 
 thwarted. 
 
 Suddenly it dawned upon her that it 
 was her own fate which hung uncertain 
 before his half-shut, calculating eyes. 
 She did not move nor speak. 
 
 How hot the sun glared ! Paul, look- 
 ing up presently, gave a pitying smile 
 when he saw her face. " Poor Gerty !" 
 he said, gently. 
 
 " You have no right to pity me !" she 
 flamed out. " You belong to Miss Dun- 
 das. You mean to marry Honora !" 
 
 " I did mean to marry her," he said, 
 quietly. " Hush, child. Do not talk to 
 me. I am trying to do what is best for 
 you and me both." He left her and 
 walked uneasily down the road : then, 
 coming abruptly back, he said, with more 
 passion and fire than his meagre, thin 
 lips seemed capable of expressing : " I 
 think you have no right to doubt me. I 
 mean to give up this great chance of my 
 life because I love you, Gerty. I mean 
 to marry you. You ivill marry me .?" 
 remembering that he had not asked 
 her. 
 
 Gerty had often planned her coy, re- 
 luctant consent, but now she said : " Oh, 
 yes, Paul," meekly enough, and then fell 
 into an ignominious sobbing, with joy as 
 sharp as pain. 
 
 " Why, what are you crying for, 
 child ?" sitting down and taking her 
 in his arms, and for a moment forgetful 
 of anything but the womanly beauty and 
 softness and tenderness with which he 
 meant to fill up his life. The distant 
 sight of the gallows-like derricks over 
 her shoulder put him in mind, however, 
 of all which he had given up for this 
 beauty and softness. 
 
 " Of course," releasing her, " I must 
 turn my back on this part of the coun- 
 try. There's no chance for me now 
 here." 
 
 " Shall we go home now ?" timidly. 
 " I'd hke to tell mother and ask her 
 blessing." 
 
 " Oh, time enough for blessings, dear. 
 I was going to explain to you, Gerty, 
 tliat having lost this chance, I have noth- 
 ing tangible to take hold of If you'll look 
 over this book" — puUing out a leather- 
 
 covered pass-book — " here are my last 
 year's expenses put down to a cent. 
 Just run them up. What, with teaching 
 for six months and five magazine papers, 
 I covered them. You see, just covered 
 them." 
 
 " Dear Paul, if you were a beggar, in 
 the worst of rags and tags, I would love 
 you just as well," energetically, patting 
 one of his hands between her own. 
 
 " Oh, I've no doubt. But love don't 
 pay board-bills, darling Gerty," looking 
 impatiently over her head. 
 
 She had no conception of the sacri- 
 fice he had made ! None whatever ! 
 
 " What I wished to say to you was, 
 that it must be a long time, perhaps, be- 
 fore I could claim you as mine. I'll go 
 West. I'll make a comfortable home for 
 you before I ask you to share my lot." 
 
 " I would live in a hovel," whispered 
 Gerty, trying to make amends, for she 
 had a vague consciousness that she had 
 been found lacking in some appreciation 
 of her lover's perfections. 
 
 "It will not be necessary for us to 
 live in a hovel, Gertrude. Very good 
 land can be pre-empted in Kansas, and a 
 snug house built for a couple of hundred 
 dollars. We'll try Kansas. It will need 
 but a few dollars to set us up in kitchen 
 ware. We will go to your mother novT 
 for our blessing," with an indulgent 
 smile down at her. 
 
 " I've no doubt mother would divide 
 the parlor things with us. I shouldn't 
 like to have only a kitchen. Though I 
 suppose we would not have many callers 
 in Kansas," said Gerty, wistfully. 
 
 Paul stopped — held her oif at arm's 
 length, and laughed nervously, as this 
 woman never could have laughed. " What 
 a baby you are !" he said. " Kiss me, 
 Gerty ;" and then strained her to him 
 passionately. He had made his choice : 
 he must make the best of it. They 
 walked on in silence : he paused again : 
 turned her round, facing him : " You do 
 not doubt my love, Gertrude ?" 
 
 " No, Paul." 
 
 " Never doubt it. It is real," with 
 one forefinger on his shirt front. " I 
 have sacrificed much to it. It is a won- 
 derful study. It is not you who are in 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 155 
 
 my heart, as the vulgar phrase it." After 
 a meditative pause : "It is a foreign 
 element within. Underlj'ing and antago- 
 nistic to the ego. You merely called it 
 into action. There is no limit to the 
 heights of heroism and self-abnegation 
 to which it may lead. Difterent triumphs 
 from those achieved by money." 
 
 " I thought you considered money a 
 very good thing ?" said Gerty, anxiously. 
 
 '» There are two sides to every great 
 truth," said Dour, snappishly. "Money 
 helps me to develop my inner self, and 
 is good. But if love and poverty de- 
 velop it also and lift me higher, they 
 are iDetter." 
 
 " Oh !" said Gerty. So as they walked 
 along she leaned on his arm and looked 
 up in his face, and Dour felt the develop- 
 ment of his inner self a very pleasant 
 process, although the oil-wells lay be- 
 hind. 
 
 " Young man ! — Mr. Dour ! Halt ! — 
 a word with you, if you please !" Dour 
 stopped with a guilty start as the well- 
 known large figure in gray came out of a 
 by-lane and beckoned him toward her 
 with her staff. She nodded kindly to 
 Gerty with a glance at her flushed, tear- 
 stained face. "Stay where you are, 
 child. My business is with this lad. 
 If the girl's mother is unfit to take care 
 of her, I will take her place," lowering 
 her voice when Dour came up : " What 
 is that young woman to you, sir ?" 
 
 " My friend." 
 
 « Tut ! tut !" with disgust. " You are 
 too sensible a man to prate of friendship 
 with a young, attractive woman at your 
 age. She must be something more to you 
 or nothing. Stop !" when he would have 
 spoken. " I have watched your course 
 with Gerty. I had a plan that you 
 should marry her. It is perhaps my 
 habit to lay plans for others," with a 
 half smile. " She is a good girl and a 
 pretty girl, and for her father's sake I 
 mean that she shall not go penniless to 
 her husband. I thought that you would 
 be a very proper husband for her, though 
 you have your faults. You need train- 
 ing. But I will not have her trifled 
 with. There must be no more strolling 
 through mountain lanes. I will not have 
 
 her name or her affections tampered 
 with." 
 
 A proper husband for Gerty ? Verily 
 here was an end to his vision ! " Miss 
 Rattlin is my affianced wife," said Dour, 
 with a distant bow, making the best 
 of it. 
 
 " Eh ? How ! I think well of you, 
 Dour," striking her stick unto the ground. 
 " Come, give me your hand, little one. 
 You are an honester fellow than I thought 
 you, sir. I tell you, candidly, I had my 
 eye on you. If you had given this little 
 girl the go-by, you would have left my 
 house as penniless as you came into it. 
 But from to-morrow I appoint you my 
 overseer — secretary — what you please. 
 We'll not quarrel about names. But 
 you shall have plenty to do, and no 
 cause to complain of your salary. I 
 give it to you for Gerty's sake. Mind 
 that. I'll give the child an outfit myself 
 Now, off with you both, and talk it 
 over." 
 
 " Why, she did not want you to marry 
 Honora after all," said Gerty, glancing 
 up shrewdly under her curly lashes. 
 
 " It appears not." He did not speak 
 for a long time, and then stooped and 
 kissed her heartily. Gerty knew that in 
 the kiss he accepted her and the situation 
 for ever. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 Slow spring : slow summer ; and at 
 last — November. 
 
 Honora, absorbed with the one thought 
 which possessed her whole being by this 
 time (because of her anxiety for her un- 
 cle, she told herself), keeping up her in- 
 cessant watch for a gray-coated figure 
 coming over the hills, who was to deliver 
 him from impending ruin, could not see 
 that Lizzy too grew uneasy and restless, 
 until one day, when Elizabeth, grown 
 desperate for the want of definite 
 knowledge about Dallas, attacked Mr. 
 Galbraith in the library while Honora 
 was within hearing. 
 
 "There was a man from the Indian 
 
156 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Queen, sir, who went with Dr. Pritchard 
 on his expedition. He promised he 
 would return in a year. Can he do it ? 
 We do not know about the railroads 
 down there." 
 
 " It is most unlikely that he could 
 do it, or that he will," with an unwonted 
 impatience in his tone. " If his work 
 suits him, it is more probable that he 
 will return after three years than one." 
 After Lizzy left the room, he looked up 
 and saw Honora standing by the win- 
 dow. " No doubt those two silly women 
 look for the fellow to turn his back upon 
 his work and post from New Mexico to 
 report himself, like Lord Lovel, a year 
 from the hour he set out. As if a man 
 allowed his life to hinge on sentimental 
 promises like a school-girl !" 
 
 " But he will come," said Miss Dun- 
 das to herself On Wednesday of the 
 next week the year would be over. She 
 fancied Dallas returning ; counting the 
 hours as she was doing, taking out the 
 flower which doubtless he carried with 
 him constantly, feeling that its faint per- 
 fume brought him close to home and — 
 to her. 
 
 Madam Galbraith had by chance fixed 
 upon that very day for the celebration at 
 once of Gerty's wedding and of the suc- 
 cess of her colony. She chose that the 
 little girl should be married from the 
 Galbraith house, and the whole neigh- 
 borhood was bidden to rejoice with her. 
 The town also was to hold a holiday. 
 There was to be a dinner for the work- 
 men from the wells and mills (all of 
 which were in full operation), and at 
 night a dance in the town-hall and a 
 public meeting outside. She scattered 
 her money like an Irish king : gave un- 
 limited orders for feasting and drinking : 
 the speechifying and the praise of Han- 
 nah Dour necessarily would follow ; and 
 whether it came from her equals or from 
 Dutch or Irish laborers, praise was 
 sweet in her nostrils. " It is not only 
 tlie happiness of the little girl's life I 
 want to commemorate," she said to her 
 husband, "but the success of mine. I 
 have done a great work for Humanity. I 
 have scored my name deep. It wiU last 
 as Ions: as the land endures." 
 
 The day came. 
 
 The sun, she thought, never had 
 flashed over the mountains and valleys 
 of the Dour lands with such victorious 
 splendor. Surely God saw a great work 
 done and approved it — set his seal upon 
 her as one of the leading spirits of the 
 age. The petty, joyous excitement in 
 the house jarred upon her. She ordered 
 her carriage and prepared to drive down 
 to the colony, feasting her eyes, as she 
 stood on the steps, with the great column 
 of smoke rising from it to the skies, as 
 though it were a thank-offering to her, 
 going up perpetually. 
 
 " I will go with j-ou," said Honora, 
 joining her. 
 
 Madam Galbraith was annoyed, but 
 the girl looked ill and restless, and she 
 did not refuse her. But she wanted to 
 be alone. Even her husband was in her 
 way lately. He was weak, idle, ineffi- 
 cient. He was no help-meet for her in 
 this her enduring work. She had no 
 companion : she thought, with a vague 
 remembrance, of the lion who was bom 
 alone. 
 
 She drove in absolute silence — Ho- 
 nora, rousing herself now and then to 
 look at the stately figure in its purple 
 dress beside her, the imperious, hard 
 face, the gray crown of hair shining in 
 the sun, wondering what welcome she 
 would give to Dallas when he came. For 
 to-night he would be here. At dusk, 
 when the moon rose, he would come to 
 the door of the green-house and bid her 
 remember that the year was over and he 
 had kept his word. 
 
 They reached the town. It had grown 
 rapidly as a fungus. Streets and lanes 
 of the snug, four-roomed wooden houses 
 had sprung up as by magic. Madam 
 Galbraith alighted and walked slowly 
 through her dominions, her eye brilliant, 
 her wide nostrils dilated. If the black 
 mills and great tanks of oil had been the 
 beautiful Utopia of a dream, her triumph 
 could not have been greater. 
 
 " It is a noble work for Humanity !" 
 she said to Mr. Rattlin, trotting by her 
 side. 
 
 "Yes, when the school-house is fin- 
 ished and a good teacher secured — " 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 IS7 
 
 " All in good time ! Don't begin to 
 worry, I beg," impatiently. " Yes," sur- 
 veying the crowds surrounding the tables 
 spread in the woods, " I think I have 
 the taculty of managing men in masses 
 — hereditary, probably. The Dours are 
 of German descent, accustomed always 
 to the control of large tenantries." 
 
 Honora's eyes were dull : she could 
 not see that the men about her differed 
 from any other laborers, or understand 
 how their two or three months' residence 
 on the Dour ground had advanced either 
 tliem or Humanity. 
 
 " I hope the mills and oil may turn 
 out well," she said. " Otherwise it will 
 be worse for these poor creatures, who 
 have risked their all." 
 
 Madam Galbraith turned on her. 
 " What is that, Honora ? Do you think 
 the Lord will not protect a work for 
 Him ? You had better look over Gerty's 
 cottage while I continue my walk." 
 Miss Dundas turned gladly enough into 
 a pretty little house, which the old lady 
 had furnished for Dour and his wife, and 
 Mr. Rattlin managed to join her. They 
 went from one room to another, the little 
 man saying nothing, by which Nora 
 knew how full his heart was. She did 
 not know why the little menage — meant 
 for two — the two easy-chairs on either 
 side of the fire, with their prophetic, 
 happy meaning, even the little cooking 
 utensils and cozy table, thrilled her with 
 such tender warmth. Nor why she 
 blushed and started when Mr. Rattlin 
 spoke to her, as if she were the bride and 
 the beloved ! They could hear the 
 cheering in the woods when Madam 
 Galbraith entered them. 
 
 '• They are roasting an ox whole and 
 two sheep. It is a regular barbecue," 
 said Mr. Rattlin. " Gerty will be very 
 happy here, I think ? You must come 
 another day and see how snugly our own 
 house looks now. Madam Galbraith 
 promises positions for the boys in the 
 works as soon as they are of age to fill 
 them. I think the hard times are over 
 for us now, Miss Dundas." 
 
 "I'm glad," said Nora, holding out 
 her hand, with sudden tears in her 
 eyes. 
 
 " Ye.s, it has been a long fight," he said, 
 under his breath. " Shall we lock up 
 the house and go back to the farm ? 1 
 do not believe Madam Galbraith will 
 miss us. Gerty will want me." 
 
 It was noon before they reached the 
 house again. Gerty was watching for 
 her father — ran to meet him and hung on 
 his arin. As the time for her marriage 
 had come nearer, she clung like a baby 
 to both mother and father, was petulant 
 with Dour, and scarcely gave a look to 
 the pretty dresses with which her ward- 
 robe was filled. 
 
 Honora looked drearily at the slow- 
 creeping shadows. " Evening will never 
 come, I think," she said, with a sigh. 
 
 "It comes so fast to me !" said Gerty, 
 looking up into her father's face and draw- 
 ing him oflT for a solitary walk, telling 
 him how much she meant to do for 
 Tony and Joe and the girls, and that 
 perhaps it would have been better never 
 to have married, and that no home could 
 be as happy as this one that she left. 
 Mr. Rattlin, seeing Dour coming to find 
 her, waited for him and gave her over to 
 him, trying to joke, with a choking in 
 his heart. But he never forgot those 
 words of Gerty's. Years afterward the 
 old father and mother used to talk of 
 what it cost her to part from them. 
 They had not thought the child loved 
 them so much. 
 
 At any other time, Nora would have 
 been in the thickest of the heat of pre- 
 paration — the very spur and life of it ; 
 but now she went restlessly through the 
 halls and reception-rooms, which the 
 women were hanging with evergreen 
 and flowers — into the state dining-room, 
 where the long table was glittering with 
 silver and glass — into the kitchen, where 
 Peggy Beck and two other amateurs, with 
 the regular cook, held highest carnival of 
 all. Everywhere that she went was 
 Lizzy, in her brown dress, her face hot, 
 busy, eager and silent It was no wed- 
 ding or success of a colony for which 
 she prepared : it was the coming home 
 in triumph of her boy — the heir. Her 
 years of patient waiting were over. He 
 had conquered a name and was coming 
 to take his rightful place. There was 
 
158 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 not a flower she plucked or a dish she 
 cooked which was not meant to take its 
 part in doing him honor. Perhaps the 
 dishes filled a larger part than the flow- 
 ers in her mind ; for Lizzy had grown 
 more and more into the housekeeper's 
 mould. 
 
 " I thought you would have come 
 down to flavor the creams, Honora. No 
 one can do that like you. Did you see 
 the tables ? There will be a light colla- 
 tion and a hot supper afterward. Ma- 
 dam Galbraith left it all to me. What 
 with flowers and confectionery and 
 colored ices, the table will look like 
 fairies' work. What do you think of 
 the supper-rooms ? I want to make the 
 house an utter contrast to the dreariness 
 out of doors, to please — the bride." 
 
 " I'll see if those creams are right," 
 said Honora. There was no reason 
 why she should shut herself out from life 
 and its business because a man was 
 coming home who most probably cared 
 nothing for her. She stopped, too, to 
 give her opinion with regard to the stuff"- 
 ing of the turkeys, at which Peggy 
 laughed when she had gone. 
 
 Then she went up again to the library, 
 where her uncle was pacing to and fro, 
 as if he, too, waited and watched. Ho- 
 nora looked out of the window. What 
 if a storm should come ? But Dallas 
 would not heed a storm, and the sky 
 was cloudless. Her uncle did not no- 
 tice her. He had brought in that pretty 
 curly-headed boy of Peggy Beck's, and 
 seated him with a picture-book, and 
 then forgotten him. He had made a pet 
 of the child lately. She wondered if, in 
 this turmoil and rejoicing, his thoughts 
 had not wandered away to his own dead 
 son, who never would wake to merry- 
 making or love again. If he only knew 
 that Tom's boy was near at hand — com- 
 ing to him to-night ! 
 
 The day lagged, slower and slower, as 
 evening approached. The house, the 
 people about her, passed before her 
 feverish, exaggerating senses as pictures 
 in a vivid dream. She caught a glimpse 
 of Dallas' mother from time to time as 
 she passed her room — a room in which 
 tliere was perfect quiet She lay on a 
 
 lounge before the clear, red fire, turning 
 over the crisp pages of a freshly-cut 
 book. Whatever storm of joy or sor- 
 row might rage about her, Mrs. Duffield 
 remained, like Gideon's fleece, miracu- 
 lously dry and white and cool. 
 
 Evening was here at last. To Ho- 
 nora a strange hush, a waiting pause, 
 seemed to have fallen on the great house 
 and the darkening landscape without, 
 though it was only, in fact, that lonely 
 silence which precedes dusk in solitary 
 mountain countries. Yet even when, 
 later, the house was lighted, so that it 
 shone like a beacon over the hills, and 
 filled with guests, the laughter and crowd 
 and music seemed to her but a prelude 
 for that which was to follow. She had 
 been foolish in her prophecy of ruin : it 
 was a great inheritance to which Dallas 
 came home to-night. 
 
 Gerty was married. The plump little 
 body wore tulle, which moss roses caught 
 and drew back from her white neck and 
 arms, and Mr. Dour stood there, sallow and 
 black-coated, beside her. Rosy and Mrs. 
 Rattlin, who sat sobbing in the big arm- 
 chair, with half of the Rattlins quartered 
 on her lap, thought there never had been 
 such a pageant before ; but the little 
 cricket of a preacher who married them, 
 standing on his tip-toes, leaning on the 
 back of a chair, his voice choking as he 
 talked, carried his child's life to the very 
 feet of God, with every word he spoke 
 struggling for a blessing upon it. 
 
 But to the rest of the guests the com- 
 monplace little girl and her marriage 
 were secondary affairs. Everybody knew 
 that the wedding was but an, opportunity 
 to celebrate Madam Galbraith's success 
 and chant paeans thereon. She knew it 
 herself: her very dress unconsciously 
 asserted triumph — the clinging purple 
 velvet showed the grand poise and mo- 
 tion of her Hmbs. In her very coarse- 
 ness and rugged strength she seemed 
 better fitted to be the product and expo- 
 nent of the land she meant to develop. 
 Her old friends, perhaps, missed some- 
 thing of the old heartiness in her wel- 
 come: it was an ovation to which they 
 had come, rather than a feast. 
 
 The supper- rooms were open, though 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 159 
 
 Lizzy had delayed until the appointed 
 hour was past. Honora met her wan- 
 dering uneasily through the corridors, 
 but hurried on without a word. It was 
 her first chance of escape. The broad 
 hall was darkened. At the far end there 
 was a window and balcony without, 
 which commanded an outlook over the 
 Dour lands for miles. At the other end, 
 the open door framed the wide, brilliant 
 room, the flowers and feast, and the lion- 
 headed old woman who made the centre 
 of the picture. There was a man stand- 
 ing on the dark balcony when Honora 
 went out. It was her uncle, who made 
 room for her silentl}'. Who could lie 
 wait for ? She forgot that he was there, 
 however, in her eager scrutiny of the 
 dim slopes and winding road. But no 
 gray-coated figure coming over the hills 
 rewarded her. 
 
 It was a dark night : the moon was 
 obscured by a wet, ash-colored mist that 
 covered the heavens, the wind soughed 
 shrilly through the far defile of the 
 mountain with a melancholy, foreboding 
 wail. They stood silent side by side. 
 It was long past the hour when Dal- 
 las should have come. She could see 
 the door of the greenhouse which she 
 had set open and the ray of light stream- 
 ing out through the dark orchard — all in 
 vain. 
 
 If he were living, he would have kept 
 his word. She pictured him lying dead 
 in the long, rank grass of the Plains. 
 Dead! 
 
 " It grows late," said her uncle, turn- 
 ing in, she fancied, with a sigh. 
 
 Colonel Pervis stepped up behind 
 them : " Where have you been in hiding, 
 Mr. Galbraith ?" touching him on the 
 shoulder. " I just rode up from the 
 wells. They are holding a regular car- 
 nival there — have adjourned to the 
 woods to hold the meeting, and kindled 
 fires of pine-knots on tripods. It is not 
 often a woman can reap such success 
 from her work, \yhat is that singular 
 light ? There, down by the river. It 
 changes place." 
 
 " I see nothing." 
 
 " A dull, red point in the fog. Too 
 low for the moon. Ah ! I perceive that 
 
 they are about to drink Madam Gal- 
 braith's health within there !" 
 
 Mr. Galbraith turned and through the 
 glittering vista saw his wife's swarthy, 
 powerful face kindled with a flush such 
 as he never had known there before. 
 She stood up and bowed silently over 
 the glass which she held to her old 
 neighbors and friends. She did not 
 miss her husband in this crowning mo- 
 ment of triumph, or look for him to share 
 in it. Yet if the consciousness of the 
 diflTerence in wealth between them, which 
 day by day had put her farther from him, 
 gave him any fierce pang, there was no 
 sign of it in his mild, observant face. 
 
 The red, luminous point in the far 
 river fog kindled and shot up into the 
 sky a swift stream of light which broke 
 into a shower of starry sparks. Colonel 
 Pervis hastily crossed the hall. " They 
 send you greeting from the colony, Ma- 
 dam Galbraith," he said. " They have 
 signal rockets. Will you look at them ? 
 The effect is wonderfully fine in the 
 mist." 
 
 She rose, followed by most of the 
 guests. She was greedy of every token 
 of homage to-night. " That was well 
 done — well done," she said, smiling, as 
 she swept through the darkened passage. 
 
 As she looked toward the Avindow, 
 the western sky burst into a horror of 
 flame. 
 
 " Keep her back ! For God's sake, 
 keep her back !" cried Colonel Pervis. 
 
 There was a moment's silence ; and 
 then, in the distance, a low foreboding 
 roar, as the winds from the defiles of 
 the mountains rushed in to fill a sudden 
 vacuum. Her husband drew her gently 
 away. 
 
 " The oil-wells are on fire !" he said : 
 " May God have mercy on the women 
 and children to-night !" 
 
 Fire ! All through the long night the 
 valley to the river gaped open in the 
 darkness, a bed of seething, surging 
 flames. Madam Galbraith alone, on the 
 balcony of the house, set like a watch- 
 tower far up the mountain, looked stead- 
 ily down at the end of her work. Her 
 friends had forgotten her in this hour of 
 
i6o 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 terror. She saw Honora hurry to her 
 uncle's side as he headed the men and 
 set off hastily through the night. Mrs. 
 Duffield calmly bade farewell to the last 
 guest, then changed her dress, and sum- 
 moning Lizzy and the servants, quieted 
 them with a look. " There will be lives 
 lost yonder," she said, " and there is no 
 place for those poor wretches but this 
 house. It must be made fit to receive 
 them." She worked quietly all night, 
 and the first wounded man that was 
 brought in was laid on her own bed. 
 
 Madam Galbraith heard through the 
 night, from time to time, the slow tread 
 of men carrying a body into the house, 
 and the rush and whispers of the women 
 as they received it : even the silly little 
 bride was at work among them. But she 
 had no help to give. She shut the door 
 behind her. She must be alone to see 
 the end of her work. 
 
 From its first centre the fire went 
 creeping, creeping, in rills, in pools of 
 bloody heat reflected bloodily from the 
 sky. Pillars of flame of a ghastly green- 
 ish hue rose where solitary wells burned 
 and threw a spectral light out to the 
 very horizon, where the mountains circled 
 in their awful shadow, silent and solemn 
 spectators. She fancied they knew how 
 poor and mean her work had been. For 
 the light laid bare the little settlement 
 Hke a mere fleck on the vast landscape : 
 a paltry thing seen far off and in the 
 glare of the devouring tide that had been 
 sent to sweep it away : the great derricks 
 and tanks stood for a moment bars of 
 shadows like black straws before the 
 flame and then vanished : the shed-roofs 
 of the mills crisped and crackled, as 
 though made of paper, in the first sweep 
 of the terrible flood, disappearing in the 
 shower of fiery seed that sowed destruc- 
 tion in far-off fields. For wherever they 
 fell, the ground, saturated with oil, slowly 
 smouldered and sent forth its tiny, creep- 
 ing stream of fire. The very Dour land 
 had turned against her to burn out her 
 name, which she would have v/ritten 
 upon it. 
 
 She was too far removed for even the 
 roar of destruction to reach her, and the 
 meaning of the scene stood out in fiercer 
 
 characters against the intense silence. 
 She thought that the Hand tliat traced 
 upon the wall the fate of the idolatrous 
 king wrote her ruin on her own land in 
 these letters of fire. 
 
 If, in her old age, she had set aside 
 the simple duties of home to make her- 
 self a name ; if she had driven out the 
 love of husband and friends from her 
 heart, and given it up to a hard, inexor- 
 able power, which she called the love of 
 humanity and of God, God himself 
 brought her to-night to sudden and ter- 
 rible reckoning. 
 
 As the night passed the fog deepened, 
 but the horrible gulch of heat and light 
 through its centre assumed new and fan- 
 tastic forms in the slow, silent fury, open- 
 ing vexed depth after depth, as though 
 the fountains of the great deep of hell 
 were to be bared at last. Her eyes were 
 fixed on the dark mass where the town 
 had stood, and about which the crowd 
 swarmed, looking like black ants in the 
 glare. Then they disappeared. The 
 fire had touched the loaded rafts that lay 
 along the shore, and in a moment the 
 river, covered with oil, was a winding 
 stream of flame, and cut its way through 
 the darkness to the far horizon. 
 
 No trace of her work was left. It 
 had all gone down into the night and 
 silence. The very springs, which were 
 to have been the life-blood of her 
 schemes, were ebbing to feed the fire 
 that had defeated her. Over all, the 
 stench and soggy, sulphurous clouds 
 drifted and settled slowly and heavily. 
 
 The damp north wind gave sign of 
 morning ; a sickly light struggled up the 
 east ; the flames paled before it, but did 
 not lose in strength or volume. 
 
 Madam Galbraith went out into the 
 hall. Lizzy met her and stopped, not 
 saying a word, when she saw what one 
 night had done : it was an old, broken, 
 feeble woman who stood before her. 
 Hardly knowing what she did, she put 
 both her hands pityingly on the gray 
 hair, wet with the night dews. Her 
 sober eyes were full of tears. The old 
 lady rested one heavy hand on her 
 shoulder. 
 
 "Yes, child— yes. The men you 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 i6i 
 
 brought liere last niglit — were they — 
 \vere they — " 
 
 " No, not dead. There are no hves 
 lost, but many wounded. But — all is 
 gone, madam." 
 
 " He has not laid the charge of mur- 
 der on my soul," she muttered. 
 
 " Take heart," said Lizzy, hotly. 
 "You purposed a noble work. You shall 
 not reproach yourself with an accident." 
 
 •' You talk like a child. There's no 
 such thing as accident," with a touch of 
 her old asperity. But that momentary 
 flash in the gray embers died down. 
 She stood motionless, looking about her 
 with dull, aimless eyes. 
 
 " I think I will go to my own room and 
 sleep," she said, and sat down heavily 
 as she spoke. The incertitude and use- 
 lessness of old age seemed to have 
 fallen upon her. Honora came up the 
 hall, and, running to her when she saw 
 her, put her strong litde arm about her. 
 The girl's countenance was pinched, but 
 strong, new meanings had come into it. 
 She looked at Madam Galbraith. and 
 then at Lizzy : 
 
 ■' I will take her among the people. 
 That is best for her." 
 
 She led her passively down the great 
 staircase and suddenly out into the 
 court, crowded with outcasts — a mass of 
 miserable, sooty, half-clothed men and 
 women, who were thronging up the hall 
 and into the barns and out-houses, car- 
 r}-ing their children and the wretched, 
 greasy beds, quilts, clothing — poor bits 
 of debris — they had saved from the 
 wreck. Overhead the pale dawn bright- 
 ened slowly, hesitating before it unveiled 
 the full desolation, the unclean ruin of 
 that night. 
 
 Her husband, Mr. Rattlin and Dour, 
 their clothes torn and blackened with the 
 night's work, hurried toward her : she, 
 standing on the dirty stones of the court- 
 yard in her royal purple and rich lace, 
 seemed to curiously belong to a different 
 life from them all. She did not reply to 
 them when they spoke to her again and 
 again ; but Honora saw that the vigor 
 and incisive insight was coming back 
 into her hawk-eye. Her jaws were 
 stiffening into their accustomed stern 
 11 
 
 set. She looked at the little preacher 
 suddenly : 
 
 " Your house is gone, sir ? Your oc- 
 cupation's gone ? Just as life was be- 
 ginning to clear for you ?" 
 
 " Yes, the house is gone. But. thank 
 God," rubbing his hands, "the children 
 were here with their mother ; and I 
 saved Jenny, too ; though I ought not 
 to think of a beast in the face of such 
 suffering as this." 
 
 "And this was your wedding night?" 
 turning sharply on Dour. " Your chance 
 of fortune is lost — " 
 
 The young man put his hand gently 
 on her withered fingers. " Gerty and I 
 are young. There's a long life before 
 us." 
 
 "Yes — yes." slowly. "James, I have 
 a word to say to these people. Call 
 them." Mr. Galbraith beckoned, and in 
 a moment the crowd had turned and be- 
 gan to gather into the court-yard. She 
 went forward slowly, her full strength 
 coming back to her, apparently, as she 
 noted shrewdly every miserable, discon- 
 tented face. A level ray of morning 
 light fell full on the commanding figure 
 and the silvery hair ; but a subtle loss 
 and defeat in her face rebelled against 
 her old air of command, and gave it the 
 lie. 
 
 " My friends — back, back ; don't 
 crowd on me : I have difficulty in find- 
 ing breath — my friends, this has been a 
 hard night for you. I know that all you 
 had you put into my venture. You shall 
 not lose it. I think there was a Jonah 
 in the boat, or it would not have gone 
 down. God knows the secret thoughts 
 of us all. He knows who was false to 
 his duty. It is right the punishm.ent 
 should fall where it is due. I wish to 
 say to you that it is my intention to fulfill 
 my promises to you, whether oral of 
 written, to the last farthing. I gave my 
 word that your capital should be forth- 
 coming, whether the experiment suc- 
 ceeded or not. You were to lose noth- 
 ing. I renew the promise now — " 
 
 " Madam Galbraith — " 
 
 <• Stand back, Colonel Pervis ! My 
 friends — " 
 
 " This is sheer madness," laving his 
 
1 62 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 hand on her arm. " These people have 
 no legal claim upon you. Give them 
 what you will out of your charity, but 
 you shall not beggar yourself with any 
 such Quixotic promise while I stand by. 
 The law will not hold you bound by 
 mere verbal engagements which you may 
 have made." 
 
 » It is my wordih^X you scoff at. I 
 pledged it to these people. What is the 
 law to me ?" Her voice was unnaturally 
 gentle, and her eyes fixed upon his were 
 dangerous. Pervis drew back. "You 
 forget yourself," she said, quietly. 
 " My old friend," turning coolly to the 
 people, "underrates, probably, my re- 
 sources. You shall be fully repaid. You 
 shall have what temporary shelter and 
 aid we can give ; and as your claims are 
 made out, present them. They'll be 
 verified to the last shilling, however," 
 sharply; " I'll have no cheating. Remem- 
 ber that." 
 
 She waved her hand, dismissing them. 
 Beck, who had stood closest and most 
 eager, threw up his hat as she moved 
 back, giving a hearty American cheer. 
 
 But the majority of her hearers, from 
 lack of comprehension of the language 
 or disheartened with the night's horror, 
 scarcely understood her meaning, and 
 began to gather up their loads again, 
 apathetically. 
 
 Colonel Pervis, his bluff face red, 
 stood in her way : " It is not yet too 
 late. You must hear me. You do not 
 know how far your estate is involved, 
 Madam Galbraith. You cannot fulfill 
 this engagement you have made. The 
 sale of the homestead farm, even, and 
 the house itself, will not suffice." 
 
 " Has it come to that 1 The sale of 
 this farm? Do you mean that I must 
 alienate the Dour land ?" 
 
 " If you keep your promise, you leave 
 yourself not six feet of ground in which 
 to make your grave, and then it will not 
 be enough." 
 
 " Alienate the Dour land ? And for 
 such a rabble as that ?" She stood a 
 morrecit while they waited about her : 
 once or twice she looked into her hus- 
 band's face, as if for counsel. But he 
 gave none. 
 
 She looked up, slowly scanning the 
 wide sweep of valley and mountain, over 
 which the rising sun threw steady light 
 and broad shadows. There was not a 
 far-off peak, a misty water-course, a 
 green pasture, which she did not note. 
 Never, even to the alien eyes about her, 
 had her heritage seemed so fair. Then, 
 standing in the court-yard, she glanced 
 up at the massive, mossy walls of the 
 homestead. 
 
 " I will keep my promise. Let it go." 
 
 Honora broke into a low, exhausted 
 weeping and crept away, but the old wo- 
 man's wrinkled face, though bloodless, 
 did not flinch. They all stood apart 
 from her, until she turned and looked 
 into her husband's face : 
 
 " James ?" 
 
 " You did right, Hannah." 
 
 She put her hand on his arm, and 
 leaning on him, he led her into the 
 house. It was a sight which even their 
 old friend Pervis had never seen before : 
 they usually walked side by side, but 
 apart. 
 
 " I am a beggar," she said, when they 
 stood alone in the great doorway. 
 
 There was a new expression on his 
 thin face. "Then, my wife, there is 
 nothing between us now," he answered, 
 looking down at her. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 The mountains threw their great 
 melancholy evening shadows over the 
 dreary landscape : here and there, where 
 wells stood apart, the fires burned unap- 
 peased, continuous volumes of foul smoke 
 drifting away east, west, north, south to 
 bear tidings of disaster. 
 
 Mrs. Duffield, who had been looking 
 gravely from the hbrary window, closed 
 the curtains and turned to meet Colonel 
 Pervis. " The new expression of wretch- 
 edness on the grand face of this land- 
 scape is curiously out of keeping," she 
 said. " Have you succeeded. Colonel 
 Pervis?" 
 
 " Yes. I have found shelter for the 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 163 
 
 majority of the people on the other side 
 of the river. I have made, also, a rapid 
 rdsunit? of Madam Galbraith's aftairs." 
 
 "And they are in as hopeless a con- 
 dition as you thought ?" taking down a 
 boxwood screen to shelter her face from 
 the fire. 
 
 "Worse — worse! She brought all 
 she had to this hobby and topjjled it in. 
 By the Lord Harry ! When a wo- 
 man goes into business — I beg your 
 pardon — but, now, you must have seen, 
 Mrs. Duffield, what women in business 
 are. Screws or spendthrifts." 
 
 " Pray, sit down, Colonel. It tires 
 me to see you tramping up and down in 
 that manner." 
 
 "I'll take a glass of wine," going to 
 the sideboard. " I'm fagged out. Try 
 a little of this hock, Mrs. Duffield. It's 
 very delicate." 
 
 " I have had my tea. I never omit 
 taking my tea at the regular hour, hap- 
 pen what may." She waited tranquilly 
 until he came back and drew himself up 
 on the hearth-rug fussily, his back to the 
 fire, tucking his coat-tails under each 
 arm. 
 
 " Well, there is no chance of escape. 
 If the estate was brought to the ham- 
 mer to-morrow, it would not cover her 
 liabilities and reheve half of the absolute 
 suffering of these people. There is a 
 young fellow down at the fire who gave 
 me some practical hints to-day. He 
 advises buying land for them out West. 
 Shipping off all but those who are 
 not able to make their way in a new 
 country." 
 
 Mrs. Duffield nodded approvingly. 
 
 "He remarked that there seemed to 
 be no capital to run the mills again, and 
 the land is too poor to support so large 
 a number as small farmers ; and as for 
 the infernal wells — why, even if they 
 don't burn themselves out, their yield, it 
 appears, has been but half that which 
 Finn stated. This young fellow got the 
 truth from him to-day. He's a cool 
 hand ! And he's posted : he only needs 
 to look at the soil or oil to know all 
 about it. He's been at work down there 
 all night and to-day. Those poor people 
 have quite made a leader of him." 
 
 " To the West ?" thoughtfully. " Does 
 Madam Galbraith consent to that .''" 
 
 " Why should I speak of it to her ? 
 How can we send them to the West .' 
 When her liabilities are paid, after the 
 estate is brought to the hammer — " 
 stopping to cough. 
 
 " Yes. I understand," hastily. 
 
 " But you do not understand the ex- 
 tent of that absurd engagement. These 
 people were, in general, respectable me- 
 chanics, with more or less means. They 
 are left without a stick to shelter them. 
 She has engaged to restore them the full 
 amount that they lost — the full amount." 
 
 Mrs. Duffield changed her position 
 and lifted the hand-screen again before 
 she spoke. Her cheeks were flushed a 
 little, even with its use. "There is a 
 small sum of money," she said, " which 
 I would be glad to appropriate to carry- 
 ing out Madam Galbraith's wish. Colo- 
 nel Pervis ; provided that you will not 
 mention to her, or to any one, indeed, 
 that you received it." 
 
 " Certainly not — assuredly not — if you 
 desire it. I am sure you would give to 
 the extent of your power to these poor 
 creatures, Mrs. Duffield." 
 
 " I want to help them — well, yes. 
 And I wish Madam Galbraith to be 
 gratified in fulfilling her promise. You 
 will have no difficulty in converting these 
 into money," handing him a sealed en- 
 velope. 
 
 Colonel Pervis withdrew with the 
 package to the lamp : then hurried back, 
 stammering, with excitement, " Why, 
 madam ! these are bonds. This is the 
 bulk of your property !" 
 
 She made no answer, other than an 
 annoyed frown, which knit her placid 
 brows for a moment. He stood staring 
 curiously at her : 
 
 " It is incredible. I never was so 
 astonished in my life ! Why, positiveh', 
 do you know, I have fancied that you 
 were even a little hard on the poor some- 
 times ? And as for Madam Galbraith — 
 I did not know that two women ever had 
 so deep a feeling for each other. You 
 must pardon me, but this is so extra- 
 ordinary a — " 
 
 She hesitated, and then said, calmly : 
 
1 64 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 " You forget that I am Tom Galbraith's 
 wife. It was for me that he left his 
 mother ; it was for my sake that he did 
 not return to her to die. I know now 
 what the loss was to her. I think if I 
 can make her old age happier and 
 more honorable by this sacrifice, it is but 
 a small atonement. Besides, I know a 
 dozen ways of earning my own living. 
 I've been used to doing it," with an in- 
 dolent smile ; " and, after all, one needs 
 but a trifle. Tea and toast and fruit 
 — I eat very little more than that ; and 
 one can dress in muslin quite as becom- 
 ingly as in silk." 
 
 But the Colonel tapped the envelope 
 stupidly with his thumb, as if he had 
 been deaf to her explanation. " But it 
 is all you have — all," looking down at 
 the fair, perfectly well-dressed little wo- 
 man. " And this will not be enough. A 
 mere drop in the ocean — " 
 
 " Let it go as far as it will, then," ris- 
 ing and laying down the screen. " I 
 think my husband — " she stopped, and 
 was silent so long that he looked won- 
 deringly at her. She went on, with an 
 effort : " Tom would wish me to do it for 
 his mother. I thought last night that he — 
 No matter ! We women have our fan- 
 cies, you know, Colonel." He thought 
 a nervous quiver passed over her face ; 
 but so used was he to its constant, care- 
 less calm, he concluded it must have 
 been but the flicker of the firelight. She 
 took up her book, and bidding him good- 
 night, moved to the door. But he stood 
 before her : 
 
 " But you don't consider, madam ! 
 Don't put this responsibility on me. 
 You'll be sorry for it to-morrow, and 
 then you'll think I've robbed you. Why, 
 you haven't even got a receipt ! 'Pon 
 my soul, I never was in such a strait in 
 my life. Take back the cursed thing, 
 there's a good soul ! You'll be sorry for 
 it to-morrow. You haven't considered." 
 
 " I will not be sorry," looking him 
 full in the eyes. " I never did anything 
 without considering it. Tom would wish 
 me to help his mother. And — I loved 
 my husband, Colonel Pervis," in a low 
 tone. 
 
 The bluff old fellow was silent. He 
 
 bowed low to her as he opened the door, 
 the hot, generous blood dyeing his face 
 as if it had been the secret of his own 
 heart which had been dragged out. He 
 buttoned up the package in his breast- 
 pocket, and then absently walked to the 
 sideboard as Dour came in : 
 
 "Take a jorum of brandy, Dour. 
 No 1 Here's a mess of sweets and 
 cake — women's stuff". Have nothing — 
 'm ? Well, here's luck ! I'll be hanged," 
 he broke out, " if women aren't the in- 
 fernalest contradictions ! Cake and tea 
 and muslin — there's the objects of im- 
 portance to them. And they'll fling 
 around fortunes like half-pence." 
 
 Dour assented, sitting with his legs 
 stretched out, looking sourly in the fire. 
 He could not but be gentle with the 
 worsted old woman up stairs, who had 
 been his ruin ; but he could not forget 
 that he was here with a penniless wife 
 on his hands and his chances gone. 
 
 The Colonel took up his hat and looked 
 out through the darkened hall, which 
 was as silent as the grave. A gloom, 
 heavier than death, had fallen on the 
 house. " Lord ! Lord !" he said, with a 
 miserable yawn ; "the good old times are 
 gone for ever here, I reckon. I must go 
 home and put something in the safe, and 
 I'll ride down to the wells and hunt up 
 that young fellow. I've taken a mon- 
 strous liking to him, Dour. Queer 
 where I've seen him before. I can't 
 remember. I didn't like to ask his 
 name." He went out, taking the short- 
 est way to the stables. 
 
 As he opened the hall-door, a man 
 came up to him in the darkness. A 
 horse stood a few paces off, from which he 
 had apparently just dismounted. Some- 
 thing in his manner roused the colonel's 
 quick suspicion : he held his military 
 cloak closely about the lower part of his 
 face, concealing it, and stopped a few 
 paces back in the shadow. The voice, 
 too, was strained and unnatural. 
 
 He bowed vidth a sort of flourish ; 
 "You are one of the family, sir ?" 
 
 " Well, no ; not exactly. But I can 
 take that place, I suppose." 
 
 "There was a wedding here last 
 nicht ?" 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 i6s 
 
 "Yes, there was a wedding." 
 
 "It was that of young Galbraith, I 
 presume ?" 
 
 The Colonel hesitated, perplexed : 
 "There is but one Galbraith — the old 
 man. Any one belonging to this neigh- 
 borhood should know that," with a keener 
 look of suspicion. 
 
 " But the heir ? James Galbraith's 
 son — grandson .''" 
 
 "Tom Galbraith is dead years ago, 
 and his son died when he was a boy." 
 
 The man had pressed closer in his 
 breathless eagerness, leaning forward, 
 where a stream of light fell from a side 
 window, unconscious that the cloak had 
 slipped down on his shoulders. It was a 
 gaunt, hollow-jawed face that was ex- 
 posed, marked with purple blotches, the 
 flat, dead black eyes unnaturally bright. 
 " That fellow's been a hard drinker and 
 had his daj'," the Colonel had time to 
 think in the pause that followed; "but 
 Death's got a hold on him now." So 
 shght and unwholesome, in fact, was the 
 tenure by which the man seemed to hold 
 upon the world that the Colonel drew back 
 with a vague, uncomfortable dread. The 
 dark, wretched night without seemed to 
 have taken shape in this darker, more 
 wretched shadow. 
 
 " Do you mean to say that Dallas 
 Galbraith is not here ?" 
 
 " I do mean to say it. I know no 
 such person." 
 
 "Then I am too late." He stood 
 erect, fumbling, a moment after, uncer- 
 tainly at his breast, as though in pain, 
 and was turning away, when a thought 
 seemed to strike him. He caught Per- 
 vis by the arm. " For God's sake, don't 
 deceive me," he cried. " Dall may be 
 
 hiding from me. I've dragged myself 
 back from California to see him. Look 
 at me !" thrusting out his bony, emaci- 
 ated hands : " they are like birds' claws. 
 That fever did for me, they say. Bah ' 
 I've got the strength of a dozen men 
 yet, and, hving or dead, I must see Gal- 
 braith. Don't deceive me." 
 
 "I've no wish to deceive you. my 
 friend," gently. " The man you want is 
 not here." 
 
 He drew back incredulously: "I'll 
 soon verify that. If he's not here, I'll 
 find where he is. I've laid my plans, and 
 ril end them in m}' own way. A man 
 who fights with Death, as I've done, and 
 gets the upper hand, is not to be balked 
 like a boy." 
 
 There was something in the melo- 
 dramatic tone and stride of the man, as 
 he went back to the horse, that struck 
 Colonel Pervis as not unfamiliar. " If 
 that braggart, Laddoun, were dead, his 
 ghost would come bullying back in that 
 fashion," he thought. " But no liv- 
 ing man could so alter. This fellow 
 looks as if he had been down through 
 hell." 
 
 Going for his horse, after the man 
 had disappeared, he stopped suddenly. 
 " Why, Dallas Galbraith is the boy who 
 is dead !" he said, aloud. The Colonel 
 was a brave man, but he quickened his 
 walk to the stables. The events of the 
 previous night and the jorums of brandy 
 had no effect upon him, he told himself; 
 nor was he superstitious. But when men, 
 with the mark of death on them, came at 
 night searching for dead men in a house 
 as cursed with calamity as this, evil must 
 follow. There were signs which no wise 
 man would slight. 
 
PART VIII. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 " "I T fHY did you not bring the young 
 VV man here, Colonel Pervis ?" 
 "Well, really. Madam Galbraith ! I— 
 I wouldn't risk presenting him to ladies 
 without permission. He has not that 
 — that certain gentlemanly ease — that 
 je 7te sais quoi — you understand ?" 
 
 " Bah ! Gentlemanly ease ! I un- 
 derstand that the fellow has common 
 sense and information, which I need. 
 What is his ease to me ? The wisest 
 practical advice we have received in this 
 matter are these hints which you have 
 brought us from him. I desire that you 
 will bring him here immediately, Colonel 
 Pervis." 
 
 The Colonel took his slippered feet 
 from the fire, glancing out at the driving 
 storm of sleet and hail that hid even 
 the near mountains from sight. " Well, 
 to tell you the truth, madam, there's no 
 use in going, for the man won't come. 
 I saw him last night (after I had that 
 talk with you, Mrs. Duffield, you know), 
 and I asked him to come up and ex- 
 plain to Mr. Galbraith about that West- 
 ern land. But he was too busy among 
 the people. ' I intend to go up,' he 
 said ; ' but my first duty is here.' And 
 really he had a quiet, cool, hearty way 
 
 with him which brought order out of the 
 confusion in a miraculous manner." 
 
 " He had no business to meddle with 
 the people without direction and appro- 
 val from me," said Madam Galbraith. 
 She sat before a table heaped with maps 
 and account-books, which she had been 
 turning over all morning with a secret 
 feeble bewilderment. 
 
 Colonel Pervis laughed : « I fancy 
 this young fellow puts his shoulder to 
 any cart that is in the mire, without 
 caring whether Hercules approves or 
 not." 
 
 «' What is his name, did you say ?" 
 
 " He did not mention it, and I didn't 
 ask him. He is not a person whom one 
 would annoy with curiosity. I've an in- 
 distinct impression that I saw him before 
 somewhere. By George ! Mrs. Duf- 
 field, I know where I saw him before ! 
 The young man who went with Pritch- 
 ard ! We met them on the road. You 
 remember ?" 
 
 "Yes, I remember." With the re- 
 membrance an uneasy shadow seemed to 
 fall on her. She never had forgotten 
 the chance encounter : the thought of 
 it chafed angrily an old sore wound 
 carefully covered from sight for these 
 many years. She could not endure that 
 any living man should bear a likeness to 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 167 
 
 her dead boy. It violated and made 
 common that which was beyond all else 
 sacred to her. 
 
 She rose and went to her own room 
 presently, fearing that the man would 
 appear unexpectedly, and wishing as 
 usual to spare herself unnecessary pain. 
 
 But the Colonel was excited about 
 his discovery. He waited impatiently, 
 hearing Mr. Galbraith's light, measured 
 step in the hall. The two men had been 
 at work all night, estimating the losses 
 and drawing up schedules of the prop- 
 erty for sale. Land, houses, stock to the 
 last implement, were inexorably noted 
 down, and the lists quietly despatched to 
 the printers. In the morning, at Mrs. 
 Dufifield's suggestion, they gave the 
 books to Madam Galbraith, hoping to 
 employ her with fancied usefulness. 
 
 Colonel Pervis hardly waited until 
 Mr. Galbraith entered the room : " The 
 young man whom I mentioned to you so 
 favorably last night — I have discovered 
 who he is, Mr. Galbraith !" 
 
 " Ah 1 Who, Pervis ?" indifferently, 
 for the colonel's heats and enthusiasms 
 were of daily recurrence. 
 
 " A young fellow who went with 
 Pritchard to New Mexico. I remember 
 his face perfectly." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith, who had advanced 
 half-way across the room, stopped, as 
 though the words had been a blow, look- 
 ing fixedly at Pervis a moment : then 
 turning suddenly he went to a bookcase, 
 and stood with his back to them while 
 he took down and replaced uncertainly 
 volume after volume. A few moments 
 after, Madam Galbraith closed her great 
 folio decisively : 
 
 "What is the use of it? It is like 
 reading the log-book of a ship after the 
 vessel has gone to pieces on the rocks. 
 When this storm abates. Colonel Pervis, 
 I desire that you will bring that young 
 man up. I will consult him about the 
 soil out yonder and the direct routes, 
 should we decide to purchase." 
 
 " Hannah !" She looked up, rising 
 quickly, when she saw her husband's 
 changed face. 
 
 «' What is it, James ?" hurriedly. 
 « Have you heard of any good news ? 
 
 Is there any chance for us to save the 
 land ?" adding, with a feeble apologetic 
 smile when he did not reply immediately, 
 " I'd be glad to think the old ship was 
 not a wreck after all." 
 
 " I was not thinking of the land. I 
 only had a vi^ord to say to Pervis in re- 
 ference to this young man." 
 
 " Oh !" She walked to the window, 
 looking out at the storm with gloomy 
 indifference. 
 
 " I wish, Colonel — if my wife con- 
 sent," glancing nervously at her — " that 
 you would not convey to him any desire 
 of ours that he should come here. We 
 did not accept him in the days when we 
 had position and wealth to give, and 
 now that we are destitute and apt to be 
 a burden in our old age, we will force 
 no man into our — our misfortune. But 
 I think he will come of his own will," 
 he said, looking out into the plains and 
 high drifts of unlightened snow. 
 
 Both his wife and Colonel Pervis 
 turned and looked at him silently, so 
 great was the unwonted agitation in his 
 voice and the causeless brightening of 
 his thin face. The same thought sug- 
 gested itself to both : the quiet scholar 
 had grown morbid and jealous, dragged, 
 as he had been, from his long retirement 
 and forced to face the coarse realities of 
 the past few days. 
 
 The Colonel rose. " Of course, my 
 dear sir, I will do as you wish," sooth- 
 ingly. " But the lad is a very simple, 
 genuine fellow — the last sort of person 
 with whom one would observe ceremony. 
 No polish — you comprehend : none 
 at all." 
 
 Madam Galbraith came back to the 
 table and drew her books hastily up 
 again : " It surely matters little whether 
 the young man comes or not," her iras- 
 cible, black-browed face lowering. " Loss 
 of property can hardly sink us so low, 
 James, that the opinion of any man can 
 affect or touch us." Mr. Galbraith said 
 nothing, but paced up and down the long 
 apartment in his old manner ; but his 
 step was nervous and quick, and tliere 
 was a health and light-heartedness in his 
 frosty face and blue eye new to them. 
 
 Colonel Pervis uneasily went to the 
 
1 68 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 door : " I'll go to the stables. Those 
 fellows have come to appraise the horses. 
 You wish them all sold, madam ? There 
 is no exception ?" 
 
 She raised her hand impatiently and 
 shook her gray head. When he had gone, 
 she growled : " They ought to be told 
 that tlie breed is a famous one to draw 
 the horse-jockeys," with savage bit- 
 terness. "They have been in the Dour 
 stables for generations. My father would 
 have sold his child as soon as one of 
 them. / have swept them all off— for 
 that drove of paupers yonder !" 
 
 Defeat had not metamorphosed Han- 
 nah Dour into a weaker or sweeter- 
 natured woman. The vase was broken, 
 never to be the same again ; but the 
 fragments yet lay useless, rough and un- 
 sightly. Some kindlier element than 
 her life yet knew was needed to bring 
 them into harmony again. Her husband 
 came up abruptly to her side and pushed 
 the books away from her. 
 
 " No, James. It is better for me to 
 study my loss," looking up irritably at 
 him. But he had turned from lier already, 
 and his eyes again wandered over the 
 gray wastes outside. 
 
 " Your power and your loss are both 
 dead and gone. That story's told. But 
 there may be another chance, Han- 
 nah — " She did not answer, watching 
 his abstracted face with a startled wonder. 
 There was something in it wliich she had 
 not seen there for many years ; the look 
 that belonged to Tom, and Tom alone. 
 Before she had taken the boy into her 
 own charge as the heir of the Dours, and 
 thrust his father back from him. Many 
 a time she had seen that same forbear- 
 ing, amused, tender smile lighten through 
 the reserved face and betray the boy's 
 heart underneath, when he and Tom 
 romped on the hay together, or walked 
 hand in hand over the stubble. 
 
 Tom was dead — in a profligate's 
 grave. 
 
 " There is no chance in the future for 
 either you or me, James," she said, in a 
 low, forced tone. " You might as well 
 hope for that decayed old trunk yonder 
 to break into fresh leaves again and to 
 bear fruit." She walked rapidly away 
 
 from him as she spoke, and stopped as 
 suddenly, her great, gaunt body cower- 
 ing over the lire. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith did not speak : he waited 
 patiently by the window till the driving 
 wind lulled, and the noonday sun glinted 
 feebly upon the white wastes, over which 
 came no sign of moving figure. The 
 sun was lost in an impenetrable distance 
 of gray and cold as the short winter 
 afternoon wore slowly on into evening ; 
 and yet no shadow had crossed the 
 fields ; but still the wistful, thin, wliite- 
 moustachioed face which old age had 
 touched only on the surface waited 
 patient behind the dim pane. Before 
 nightfall, he thought the shadow would be 
 seen upon the snow, and then — Why, 
 that lad's simple, grave face, alive Avith 
 unsuspicious strength and kindliness, 
 over which there was no polish — that 
 was his own face when he was a boy ; 
 and the clear, genial voice — that was 
 Tom's : when it would ring out again in 
 this dreary house to-night, all that had 
 been lost out of his Hfe would come back 
 to him. Tom's son, coming over that 
 vast waste of snow, seemed to come up 
 from out of his long-ago youth, to bring 
 from that old enchanted land the days of 
 hard work, sound rest, silly, happy jokes 
 and laughter. The days before the shadow 
 of a great fortune tamed and cowed him, 
 and faded all the zest and pleasure 
 out of life. The fortune was gone, thank 
 God ! At last, in his old age, a man's 
 portion of wife and child was coming 
 to him. 
 
 As the sun went down into inexplor- 
 able regions in the west of gray and 
 cold, toward the close of the winter af- 
 ternoon, a little skiff put across the 
 river, from the jjoint where the houses 
 were in which the people had found 
 refuge, to the flat where the town had 
 stood. When it grounded on the beach 
 the two men who were in it sprang 
 ashore, and after making it fast walked 
 slowly over the burnt district, halting by 
 the black gaps in the snow where the 
 fires still raged with horrible fumes and 
 stench. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 169 
 
 « This was the best of the wells," said 
 Mr. Rattlin by one of them, smelling 
 some of tlie soot, \\-ith a funereal shake 
 of tlie head. " Dear, dear ! You are 
 going up to the Galbraith homestead this 
 evening, I tliink you said ?' 
 
 "Yes; I am going there." He had 
 been looking eamesdy at the distant 
 hea\-}- pile of building ridged blackly 
 against the white mountain-side ; but 
 when Mr. Rattlin spoke averted his 
 eyes from it quickly. 
 
 " They must be kinsfolk of yours : 
 there are innumerable Galbraiths here- 
 abouts." 
 
 '• They are kinsfolk," quietly. They 
 left the wells and turned into what 
 had been the town, as the masses of 
 charred, black rafters told them, and here 
 and there the unsightl}- ruin of what had 
 been a cozy little dwelling not yet de- 
 cently buried beneath the screening 
 snow. Mr. Rattlin grew more and more 
 silent. 
 
 " This cottage was built for my daugh- 
 ter Gertrude," he said, touching ■nnth his 
 foot a sooty heap of boards and plaster, 
 on which covdd yet be seen a bright, 
 pretty paper. " She was married that 
 night It was not a happy beginning of 
 life." 
 
 It was the first time he had spoken 
 of his own loss to any one ; but his 
 heart had warmed strangely to this quiet 
 young feUow, who had thrown him- 
 self into tliis pit of suffering as if it 
 were the simplest, naturalest thing to 
 do, and had helped so many out with his 
 cool head and strong hands. Perhaps 
 his bo}-ish credulity had made him too 
 pitiful — an easy dupe to imposture. But 
 Mr. Rattlin was not the man to see that, 
 or to blame it if he saw. There had 
 been something in the boy's manner 
 also for which no pit}- could account, 
 as though he felt himself in some way 
 guilty of tlieir misfortune and bound to 
 atone for it. 
 
 Mr. Ratdin stopped a few paces 
 farther on, glancing up hesitatingly at 
 his tall, grave companion : " This was 
 our own house. Mr. Galbraith. We are 
 not young people — my wife and I — yet 
 this was really our first true start in life. 
 
 We had a great many plans laid. We 
 have had to abandon them." 
 
 Dallas watched the little man steadily, 
 measuring him apparendy by some men- 
 tal scale, while he stood looking down 
 at the ruin as though he had walked over 
 a grave. 
 
 " You have no church now, then ?" 
 said Galbraith. 
 
 " No ; my old place is filled. It was 
 but a small country' parish. But it is 
 filled. I have work enough ready to my 
 hand among tliose people yonder, as you 
 see." 
 
 "Yet I am disposed," Dallas said, 
 with hesitation. '• to ask you to under- 
 take more. There are some children — 
 three or four : I took them a year ago to 
 tr}- to make decent men and women of 
 them. Baptist Methodist or Catholic — 
 they can settle that matter for themselves 
 when they're older, but my plan was to 
 give them a home : to let them see a 
 mother in her home and hear of Christ 
 They're out of the New York slums — 
 you understand ; they were going very 
 straight down into heU. But they're fine, 
 brave boys at bottom." He stopped, 
 breathless. 
 
 ^Ir. Rattlin did not smile at his igno- 
 rance or contradictions. " I under- 
 stand !" catching the breast of Dallas' 
 coat and looking eagerly up into the 
 homely, flushed face. "You want to 
 save them. I'll do what I can to help 
 you — I'll do what I can." 
 
 " There are only three or four, and 
 there are thousands left. But my salary 
 was not large. Out of it I gave a cer- 
 tain sum to pay for their boarding. I 
 can be sure of the same amount next 
 year. Now. will you take it and them ? 
 I paid for them last year — " naming a 
 certain sum. 
 
 "Why, that would be enough for me 
 to rent one of those little farms back on 
 the McDowell hill l" and Mr. Rattlin's 
 eyes sparkled in spite of himself •• It 
 is productive land and cheap. We could 
 live comfortably on it I'll do what I 
 can for the boys, with God's help." 
 
 "There's good stuif in them, or I 
 wouldn't ask you to tn,-," said Dallas 
 earnesdy, as they walked on together 
 
l-'O 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 « 1 've had the plan at heart a long while : 
 evf-r since — a time when I was thrown 
 in contact with them." He gave another 
 quick, doubtful glance at the towering 
 house apart among the mountains and 
 became suddenly silent. 
 
 Mr. Rattlin spoke at last with embar- 
 rassment : "I think I'll go and tell my 
 little woman the good news. You don't 
 know how good this news is to us, Mr. 
 Galbraith. I had plenty of work in 
 view, but really there was no good pros- 
 pect of food or clothes. And there are 
 eleven of us. Very hearty eaters, too, 
 thank God ! I can work among these 
 emigrants all the same now." 
 
 " Look out for your farm to-morrow, 
 then, and let me know when you have 
 secured it," said Dallas, heartily. "I'll 
 send for my boys when you are ready. 
 We'll make good farmers and mechanics 
 of them some day." But when he had 
 done speaking, he fell, as before, into 
 thoughtful silence, as though some darker 
 shadow than this old helpful fancy rose 
 before him and darkened his thoughts. 
 They passed out of the town. 
 
 <' There lies your road." Mr. Rattlin 
 pointed to the liae marked by the fences 
 through the snow. " You can reach the 
 homestead before dark." But Dallas, 
 after a slight hesitation, walked on slowly 
 by his side. " It is like going into the 
 house of the dead to me," pursued the 
 little man. « There has no such utter 
 ruin fallen on any family in my know- 
 ledge. Though they could have saved 
 a comfortable fortune if it had not been 
 for this last sacrifice to fulfill a shadowy 
 sort of engagement. But that washed 
 away every stain on their honor. It was 
 worth the money." 
 
 " They are a family who cling closely 
 to their honor .'"' 
 
 " With reason. It is a matter, in- 
 deed, in which we all take pride for 
 them. They were the first white set- 
 tlers among these hills, and since old 
 John Dour there has never been one of 
 the name who would cheat an enemy or 
 betray a friend. Hard drinkers and 
 fighters sometimes, but clean-blooded — 
 clean-blooded." 
 
 The prolonged silence of the young 
 
 man caused Mr. Rattlin to look at him 
 curiously. " You came here from New 
 Mexico on this pilgrimage to the Gal- 
 braith homestead, I think you said ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " It is not often we find a young man 
 so persistent in purpose," smiling. 
 
 " It is an old purpose with me." He 
 stopped, with one hand on the fallen 
 bars leading into the road. « I think 1 
 will leave you now. It is time I was on 
 my way," in the same slow tone, which 
 gave to his hearer the constant impres- 
 sion that, for some reason, he held his 
 natural, boyish impulses, his tastes and 
 fancies in a hard, inflexible leash until 
 the time should come to loose them. 
 
 " Good-bye, Mr. Galbraith," cheerily. 
 "You've given me good news to carry 
 home. God bless you." 
 
 " I am glad you said that," quickly. 
 «' Good-bye." He stepped over the bars 
 and struck into the road. Another man, 
 irresolute as Dallas as to whether, after 
 his long journey from New Mexico, he 
 would after all finish his pilgrimage, 
 would have stopped to deliberate, left 
 alone in the untrodden road while the 
 little black figure of the preacher disap- 
 peared over the snow. But he, deliber- 
 ating, went steadily on with his swing- 
 ing, unhesitating gait. How old was the 
 purpose which he came now to fulfill ruj 
 man but himself could ever know. 
 
 To come to his mother when he 
 should have made himself fit to say — I 
 am your son. 
 
 The record of his daily, hourly strug- 
 gles to that end, in the mines, in prison, 
 out in the free, healthy life of the last 
 year, she would never read. It belonged 
 to that inner chamber in the breast of 
 this man, where, as in that of every other, 
 the soul, whose face no friend has ever 
 seen or shall see, sits alone inside of 
 tears and laughter, and keeps silence. 
 The day had come when he could speak 
 the word so long held back. He was a 
 man among men. He was the last of 
 the Dour race ; he could throw his 
 young, healthy strength into their sunken 
 fortunes and bring them to firm ground 
 again. Out on the Plains at night, when 
 all in the corral were asleep, how often 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 171 
 
 he had planned this final home-coming 
 of his life — to Honora, to the old peo- 
 ple, to his mother. It seemed easy to 
 him then, when they would all he to- 
 gether, to tell them of that first mis- 
 chance of his life, caused by Laddoun's 
 villainy. It would be as simple and in- 
 difiercnt a matter to them as it had be- 
 come to himself. 
 
 But here — with the prestige of the old 
 house before him and the awe of the 
 clean-blooded, untainted race — he hesi- 
 tated, with the long-ago sick loathing of 
 that fall of his wakening from its sleep. 
 He had gone through his long journey 
 only to find the same foul slough wait- 
 ing for him at the end : the clean name 
 he had won for himself must be dragged 
 through it before he could reach his 
 mother and Honora, who stood waiting 
 at the other side. 
 
 IMr. Galbraith from his window had 
 seen Dallas, a mere black speck in the 
 distance, growing distincter as he came 
 across the snow : a tall, broad-shoul- 
 dered figure now — the boy at last. But 
 at this point he stopped irresolute, his 
 hand on the gate ; the breath of the 
 poor old watcher in the window came 
 heavy and thick. Why, thought Gal- 
 braith, should he drag back the old in- 
 famy on himself? A good part of his 
 solitary life was gone : why not let the 
 rest be solitary ? That free life in the 
 woods had suited keenly to his taste, 
 and was shameless. Why not go back 
 to it? 
 
 As he looked up, an odd procession 
 met his eye : the horses, carefully blan- 
 keted, were being led down the hill, and 
 outside of the stables stood the wagons, 
 carriages, the cumbrous old family coach, 
 ready to be taken away for sale. Carts 
 were heaped with tools and farming im- 
 plements and the trunks and rubbish be- 
 longing to the servants : the cattle were 
 gone, the doors of the empty outhouses 
 swung to and fro in the wind. Mere 
 hints of the ruin that lay beneath, of 
 how utterly dead that aflfluent, beautiful 
 life was which had awed him a year ago. 
 But one object touched Dallas with real 
 pity : a small, tan-colored pony chaise, 
 swathed in sooty cloth and being drag- 
 
 ged away by a stolid Dutchman. It was 
 Honora's own especial possession, from 
 which she used to look down like a 
 princess : now the poor little girl was 
 dethroned, beggared. And within tliere 
 was the old man and woman who had 
 come to want in their days of feebleness 
 and gray hairs ; and he, Dallas, was 
 about to skulk oflT like a coward and 
 leave them to their fate ! His own flesh 
 and blood. 
 
 "Hillo ! I knew you'd come !" shouted 
 Colonel Pervis' breezy voice, as he clam- 
 bered heavily down a ladder from a tool- 
 loft, wrapped in a shaggy coat. " Here's 
 a wreck for you ! Here's desolation ! 
 I've put in the day taking stock of this 
 infernal iron-ware. Where are you for 
 now ? Going in to see the family ?" 
 
 "Yes, I'm going in." 
 
 " I'll follow you directly. There's a 
 lot to be done here, and having no son, 
 you see, they depend on their friends." 
 He stopped, with one hand on the lad- 
 der, looking after Dallas and pointing 
 him out to old Henkel, the coachman. 
 " Do you see that young fellow in the 
 gray overcoat going up the steps, Joe ? 
 He's been out among the Indians — 
 farther in a year than you and I in our 
 lives. His very walk and talk has a 
 whiflF of the prairie in it to me. I relish 
 it. It's quite outside of this regular 
 life of ours." 
 
 " He kerries hisself like ]\Ir. Tom, 
 sir," leaning round the fence to catch 
 the last glimpse of Dallas. 
 
 " Tom ! Stuff and nonsense ! You're 
 as blind as an owl, Henkel !" But after- 
 ward, as he went through the dusty grana- 
 ries, paper and pencil in hand, he muttered 
 occasionally to himself: "Tom Gal- 
 braith ? What if the old woman takes 
 that notion ? Tom Galbraith, eh ?" 
 
 Dallas went up the broad stone steps, 
 and pushing open the weighty hall door, 
 entered without touching the lion's head 
 of a knocker which scowled at him. It 
 seemed natural for him to go in and out 
 there : it was his home. No more 
 skulking through dark side-passages or 
 green-house doors : he was done with 
 concealment. He carried his story with 
 him : it was not his fault if it was fouled 
 
172 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 and blotted : that was done by a Hand 
 outside of himself: where he had writ- 
 ten it, it might be weak and paltry, but 
 it was well-intentioned and honest. 
 
 The light was dim in the broad, high- 
 roofed hall, for the November afternoon 
 was fast merging into dusk : there was 
 no sound within the closed doors on 
 either side ; but from the barn-yard 
 without he heard the rattle of the wind- 
 lass and a man singing some old country 
 ditty as he drew water from the well. 
 The sound grated strangely on the mel- 
 ancholy silence and the choking weight 
 which oppressed his breath. Moro, the 
 old house-dog, got up from the wolf- 
 skin on which he lay asleep, and came 
 drowsily up to the stranger standing 
 motionless by the door, sniffed about 
 him critically, then rubbed his approval 
 against his legs, looking up at him. The 
 very dog, Dallas thought, had the anxious 
 shadow of disaster upon him. "Poor 
 fellow ! Poor fellow !" stroking his 
 shaggy head. But his voice was hoarse 
 and unnatural, even to himself: he was 
 suddenly silent. 
 
 He waited a while without moving, but 
 no door opened : only the ticking of the 
 great clock that stood on the dim, broad 
 stairs yonder told off the minutes. Moro 
 a-ept back to his wolf-skin and lay down 
 again to sleep. Dallas, after another 
 moment's pause, chose the farthest door 
 at random, and going toward it with his 
 slow, steady step, put his hand upon the 
 lock. But he did not open it. 
 
 What was it that waited for him at 
 the other side of that thin oaken plank ? 
 The mother he had lost so long — a 
 home — the only woman he had ever 
 loved ? Or the old solitary hfe, with the 
 damning disgrace on his head, heavier to 
 bear than before ? 
 
 It was his mother who sat inside by 
 the clear, red fire. She came often to 
 this quiet little room : not for the books 
 on the hanging shelves, as she asserted, 
 but because of a picture which hung 
 over the mantel-shelf It was little Tom 
 Galbraith in his boyish finery of velvet 
 trowsers and blouse, his arm over his 
 pony's neck. " It is very like my son 
 Dallas," she had told Madam Galbraith 
 
 the first time she saw it, looking at it 
 with steady eyes. " Only I was glad to 
 dress him in corduroy. And Dallas had 
 no pony : many a mile he trudged bare- 
 foot to carry home the clothes I had 
 washed." It was the only bitter reproach 
 the old lady had ever heard from her 
 lips, and she made no retort to it. After 
 that she never saw Mrs. Dufifield glance 
 toward the picture. Yet there was not 
 a day when she did not come and sit 
 alone, looking at it with her calm, un- 
 fathomable eyes, as she was doing now. 
 Her trunks were packed, her arrange- 
 ments all made to go to-morrow quietly, 
 and, far out of the knowledge of Madam 
 Galbraith, begin the world over again. 
 
 " I have no regret for what I have 
 done," she told Colonel Pervis an hour 
 before. " I beg that you will consider 
 the matter as settled," and going into 
 this room, closed the door behind her. 
 Yet Colonel Pervis — none of them — 
 could know, as she did, what this life 
 was to which she had chosen to go 
 back. 
 
 Dallas knew. Her boy, who was dead. 
 
 She, too, heard the clock ticking 
 through the dreary November afternoon 
 as she sat, her hands folded, her eyes on 
 the child's eyes, a different meaning 
 upon her face from those which even 
 her nearest friends had ever found there. 
 She stood up at last at the sound of a 
 step outside, and with her hand on the 
 back of her chair, gave it a quick, part- 
 ing glance, as if she asked for pity. 
 She was but a weak httle woman after 
 all, and in heart, perhaps, was miserably 
 solitary. 
 
 " I shall be quite alone out there, 
 now," she said, putting her fingers up to 
 her pale lips. " I will not have you, my 
 little boy, now." 
 
 She turned as the door opened on its 
 noiseless hinges, and a tall man, in a 
 gray coat and planter's hat, who stood 
 without, after a quick glance through 
 the room, came in and paused in tlie 
 shadow, looking at her. It required a 
 moment's breath to bring Mrs. Dufiield 
 to her ordinary calm composure. The 
 room was not Hght enough for her to de- 
 tect the likeness which had troubled her, 
 
DALLAS GALBRATTH. 
 
 ^7Z 
 
 but her quick glance recognized at once 
 the finely-sliaped head, the homely, noble 
 features, which had first pleased her ar- 
 tistic eye. 
 
 '■ You are Doctor Pritchard's friend ? 
 You wish to see Madam Galbraith ?" 
 recovering her ordinary shallow, pleas- 
 ant voice. 
 
 The man closed the door behind him 
 and came toward her, removing his hat. 
 
 " No," he said, slowly, " I did not 
 come to see Madam Galbraith." 
 
 She began to speak again, hesitated 
 and stopped. Her nerves were un- 
 strung, and some old echo in the hoarse, 
 choked tones sent the blood with a 
 frightful throb to her heart. Dallas 
 stood silent, his hat in his hands, look- 
 ing down at her. He would not frighten 
 her. She was so weak and frail ! He 
 could see the gray hair and sunken tem- 
 ples. How long they had been apart ! 
 
 OGod! Mother— mother! 
 
 But he did not speak a word, holding 
 his hat tight clenched, the burning tears 
 welling up slowly into his eyes. He came 
 out, now, trembhng, into the clear fire- 
 light, where she could see him plainly. 
 
 " I am one of the Galbraiths," he 
 said ; " and I have been told that I was 
 like your husband." 
 
 She leaned with one hand lightly on 
 the table. The dulled grating of the 
 well-chain was heard without : the cold 
 November daylight fell through the win- 
 dows in a square patch beside him upon 
 the worn carpet. He saw and heard 
 even those trifles in that moment as he 
 waited. 
 
 "Like my husband?" as one in a 
 dream. But her keen eyes read his face. 
 There was a sudden, strange change in 
 her look, as though some vital chord 
 within had been roughly jarred. <' No ; 
 you do not resemble my husband," she 
 said, with a strong effort to regain her 
 usual calm courtesy. " But — I will go 
 out, if you will pardon me. There is a 
 likeness to some one whom I have lost, 
 and it — it pains me." Then she lost 
 herself utterly. 
 
 " It was my httle boy !" she cried, 
 flinging her hands up toward the picture. 
 "He is dead now — dead!" 
 
 He kneeled down at her feet in the 
 blaze of the firelight : he pushed his 
 hair with both hands from his face. 
 " Mother !" he said, in a whisper. <' He 
 is not dead. It is I, mother." 
 
 She made no sign or cry: even in that 
 moment her habit of self-control bound 
 her strongly : she put her cold hands on 
 his cheeks, drew his head closer, looking 
 steadily into the long-ago familiar eyes, 
 until her own grew slowly blind. 
 
 « Dallas ?" the name was wrenched at 
 last like a sob out of the heart where it 
 had been so long hidden. " Dallas !" 
 
 Then she stooped and would have 
 kissed him, but her head fell a dead 
 weight on his shoulder. He took he 
 in his arms and placed her on the chair 
 rubbing her hands, her arms and fore 
 head like a frantic man, but without say- 
 ing a word. Neither mother nor son ever 
 found the ordinary relief in words or 
 outcry for the deeper passions in their 
 hearts. When her eyes opened at last 
 and the sense came slowly back to them, 
 he brought her a goblet of water from 
 a side table. " It's not as clear water as 
 that from our famous well in Chester, 
 mother," he said cheerfully, to reassure 
 her. 
 
 Her face lighted at that remembrance 
 of every-day life : she drew him down 
 with one hand beside her as she lay 
 back on the chair, but then did not speak 
 to him for a long time, her eyes hun- 
 grily wandering over his face, her hand 
 passing with a pathetic anxiety through 
 his thick hair, down his close-shaven 
 cheeks, examining his hard, muscular 
 hands, while she shook her head with a 
 sad smile. "Why, this is a man, and 
 I don't know him. Dallas, I don't know 
 him ! And yet — it's the same old Dal- 
 las, after all." 
 
 "Yes, mother, the same old Dallas." 
 If there were any way to make her feel 
 and believe that before the story was 
 told! 
 
 " And you remember the well ?" with 
 a laugh, the tears in her eyes. "Where 
 you planted the gourd-vine ? We were 
 very happy in Chester. I think that 
 was our happiest time, Dallas ?" Again 
 their eyes met with a meaning which no 
 
174 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 bystander could have understood. There 
 was a history between them which 
 neither of them had ever yet put into 
 words. Nor would they ever do it. 
 
 " That is all over now, and I have 
 come back to you, mother. To-morrow 
 we will begin the world afresh." He 
 stood up as he spoke : he thought he 
 could tell the secret better standing : he 
 was conscious of a heavy constraint 
 upon him, paralyzing his thoughts, his 
 tongue and very limbs. 
 
 '•Sit down, dear, sit down," putting her 
 soft hands on his sleeve. " Do not go 
 to the others. Let me have you to my- 
 self for a little while." 
 
 « I am not going. There is some- 
 thing I must say to you — " 
 
 "Anything you will, Dallas. You've 
 the same odd turn in your voice still, my 
 son, though it's coarser. It makes me 
 feel as if I were a young woman, with 
 my boy helping me with the work again, 
 to hear you talk. Oh dear ! I thought 
 that sort of feeling was dead and gone 
 for ever for me .'"' with a nervous, al- 
 most girlish laugh. 
 
 Was this the time to open to her the 
 disgrace which she would count as worse 
 than death ? " What were you going to 
 tell me ?" she asked, presently recollect- 
 ing herself 
 
 " Nothing, mother. It can wait." He 
 brought a chair and sat facing her, while 
 the clock ticked slowly through the hour. 
 They talked very little. If she had been 
 curious and anxious out of very excess 
 of tenderness, as other women would 
 have been, some chance word might 
 have broken the spell. But the past or 
 future always had but small place in 
 Mrs. Duffield's life. Dallas was there. 
 The power of laughter and tears in which 
 the heart had some share, which used to 
 belong to Mary Jennings, had come 
 back with her boy, she thought, to her. 
 That was all the reference she made to 
 the past. 
 
 He had been out with Doctor Pritch- 
 ard ? She knew when he was a boy 
 that he was born a naturalist : no won- 
 der he had preferred his present profes- 
 sion to the law or medicine. He would 
 go on with the same sort of work, she 
 
 supposed .'' If she might ad\-ise, he 
 would do so : a man should never sli^jht 
 a true vocation. 
 
 "And there"s nothing here, Dallas, 
 for your future — nothing at all. If you 
 had come to us a year ago, with your 
 strong sense and coolness, you might 
 i have put a check to your dear grand- 
 mother's pig-headedness. But as it is, 
 I it has run her into the mire," with an 
 odd, downward gesture. " Me, too. 
 All paupers alike !" with a merry little 
 laugh. " Only that now," with sudden 
 revulsion of feeling. "/ have — I have — " 
 putting his hand up to her eyes and 
 holding it there quietly. The hot tears 
 that wet it, she speaking not a word, 
 gave to Galbraith the idea of unutterable 
 depths in his mother's love. But when 
 was a woman so wanting in curiosity ? 
 As though it were altogether the natural 
 and proper thing for a boy in the coal- 
 pits to be offered the choice of the pro- 
 fessions ! Poor little mother ! What 
 did she know of the world ? and Dallas 
 kissed her, a twinkle of amusement in 
 his blue eyes, and, being a man, loved 
 her a hundred times better for her inno- 
 cent silHness. 
 
 But how could he tell the truth to 
 such silliness and love ? Besides, by 
 some instinct, he felt that with all her 
 tenderness she was the coolest, most im- 
 partial critic, as far as her knowledge 
 went, that he had ever faced. Her sot. 
 was here, a man and a gentleman : that 
 she seemed to accept as a matter of 
 course. But — what order of man and 
 gentleman ? He felt that she was test- 
 ing the coin to know if it were genu- 
 ine. She did not recognize him by in- 
 tuition, as Honora had done. He grew 
 paintully conscious of his hardly-learned 
 accent, his long legs and arms, and blunt 
 manner, as he used to be when he first 
 left the prison. He knew the moment 
 when her anxiety on this score gave way 
 to satisfaction, even to triumph. 
 
 " You are not like your father except 
 in mere outward feature," she said, when 
 they stood together, surveying him from 
 head to foot. " That is, not after I knew 
 him. Poor Tom frequented places which 
 you know nothing of, and low company 
 
arid rib 
 
 You ^-; 
 
 there a 
 da55 — ': 
 with he 
 sen arf 
 von en 
 
 •srha.: I 
 
 iceEl L 
 
 Ke 
 f erce : 
 
 Ezh: V 
 
 Ferh^-- 
 
 DALLAS GAL-BRAITH. "5 
 
 -L^k o:n h-z;. Yon are the 'Jast Dorr, jc- ?.— ; yy^ 
 Lther. r^' --""-> , are Tchu's sec: tc-c are thie fcrl-Tm h-ipe 
 leizer: cf "-ha,t cs' a slien hccs-e. as well as rnj hrie 
 -; h:5 breast bov." bsrtor±iz his ccst a&d 5— ■occ-h:g 
 it co-sm with bcth ha-rcs. Then she 
 crew 'z^ssis. G-Detlj. the cc-lor rlsics to 
 ber &:«- -It is a kzs time since I 
 did f-^:?r ->r jctL" Not-ing cx^uld he 
 mere sitnpie than, tiie actkc arid the 
 ~e :'rr words : w^hT shc^d th^ej T-r'T-Jsn hiaa as 
 is an nr-thing: had done before ? 
 
 - I "2 never sire vc'ti p^-i. Tii<?~!er. as 
 
 -iK^.i a Gc«d sees rt.e." he said, hastnj adding 
 
 h:rse. wiihin himse-f that to-ntorrS'W. whes 
 
 hi the they bad beamed to know each cdha- 
 
 '.'."hT better, he wctdd so set the izatter heibre 
 
 -. - : n- ber that it shonjd seent cf no ni-c-re im- 
 
 : -d zortznce than so—* dnjcish disease of 
 
 e 'a-h-.-h he r5<: V^e biees ctrred. 
 
 ner e^ 
 
 .-es 
 
 £r^^ 
 
 -z 
 
 rride. 
 
 - 
 
 \\"ay 
 
 do 
 
 :e. mr son?" 
 
 
 tt ccn 
 
 s--: 
 
 tns cf 
 
 h. 
 
 : — T 
 
 sr: 
 
 :--"•■ 
 
 ter 
 
 rpeatcG. wtt:i an : 
 I win ?t) to mr 
 
 fr.-= h-' 
 
 kn:w t: 
 
 '- Yoa wi. 
 
176 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 would never come back in that way — not 
 in that way." 
 
 "You're nigh onto froze, miss," said 
 Joe, anxiously. " You're face 'pears as 
 blue as if you were dead. I'll send one 
 of the gals to you with somethin' warm." 
 
 But she passed him swiftly and stead- 
 ily up the stairs. The poor little thing 
 had been so faithful with her secret, and 
 knew herself now to be slighted and neg- 
 lected so cruelly. She rushed into her 
 room and locked and double-locked the 
 door. She could dully hear voices in the 
 room below. Dallas was there. 
 
 It was she who was to have brought 
 him home. He had forgotten her and 
 her silly plans ! And she had been 
 wasting her prayers and her tears on 
 him ! She had thought of him as lying 
 dead on the Plains. He dead on the 
 Plains ! She doubted if he had ever 
 been there at all : in all probability he 
 had been in business over in Ohio. He 
 was as unfeeling, cold-blooded, as a frog 
 — a stone ! He was their heir — their 
 son : now that he had come she was to 
 be left out and forgotten. He was in 
 his rightful place, beside the very hearth 
 where his father had played when a boy ; 
 they were giving him all the sacred love 
 they had kept for him, and she was a 
 poor outcast, up here, freezing to death. 
 She lay on the hearth-rug, sick with her 
 disappointment and rejected love. She 
 would not answer when Lizzy knocked at 
 the door with her hot tea ; nor would she 
 get up to put any wood on the fire, until it 
 went out. What did it matter .? What 
 did anything matter any more ? Life was 
 a great mistake, a misery. For the cur- 
 rent of the little girl's wishes in life had 
 been checked, and all of God's great 
 world of order was but mocking, blind 
 mischance in her eyes. And through all, 
 the kiss he had left upon her lips was 
 there, bitter as gall. Had he not forgot- 
 ten her ? Cast her off.'' 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 It was not into the library that Hen- 
 kel brought Dallas, but, by orders, to 
 
 Mr. Galbraith's especial room beyond. 
 The first sight of it, as Joe threw open 
 the door, gave him the idea that it was 
 prepared to welcome some one. There 
 was an indefinable air of expectation in 
 the glowing fire, the early-lighted lamps, 
 the bright-tinted geraniums and roses in 
 the windows, making a frame for the 
 winter landscape without, over which 
 the gray, cold evening was closing. A 
 tall, spare old gentleman, carefully 
 dressed with gray hair and moustache 
 trimmed in military fashion, shading his 
 pale, aquiline features, turned to meet 
 him as the door opened. " That is my 
 grandfather — the man whom I resem- 
 ble," thought Dallas, with an inward 
 laugh at his mother's partial eye ; yet he 
 went toward him, with none of the em- 
 barrassment which, despite his love, 
 separated him from her. The clothes, 
 habits, education, out of which women 
 make such impregnable barriers, are 
 slight matters between men who choose 
 to meet. 
 
 " A gentleman, sir," said Joe, linger- 
 ing under pretence of stirring the fire. 
 
 "That will do, Henkel. I am glad to 
 see you," motioning him forward with a 
 courteous bow ; but Dallas noticed that 
 the attempted smile faded on his nervous 
 jaws, and that the withered hands trem- 
 bled as they rolled a chair nearer the 
 fire. They both stood silent until the 
 door shut behind the tardy servant. In 
 the moment the remembrance came back 
 to Dallas with a sudden force of the 
 night when he, a convict, had stood in 
 the library wafching this old man, with 
 Honora, and feeling a secret kinship and 
 equality with them, deeper than blood 
 and apart from all the others. He had 
 come back to claim it now. 
 
 When they were alone he went up to 
 the chair beside which Mr. Galbraith 
 stood. He held out his hand to Dallas 
 mechanically. 
 
 " No, not yet," putting it aside, smil- 
 ing. " There should be something more 
 than mere ceremony when we meet, I 
 think. When I have told you my 
 name — " 
 
 " Why should you ?" 
 
 Dallas drew back startled. "You 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 77 
 
 knew me from Doctor Pritchard to be a 
 Galbraith ?" after a bewildered moment. 
 
 " No." 
 
 Their eyes met for the first time. 
 
 " There is but one of the Galbraiths 
 whom you resemble," said his grand- 
 father, with a strong effort at his ordi- 
 nary composure. " But I perceived that 
 resemblance when I met you — on the 
 mountain." 
 
 Dallas was silent, Hstening. But his 
 cheerful, candid eyes, the rugged sim- 
 plicity of his face and manner, even in 
 repose, seemed to be like a fresh well 
 opened to the old man, so visibly did he 
 gather strength and spirit with each mo- 
 ment's scrutiny of the boy. He came 
 forward a step, looking at him in abso- 
 lute silence. 
 
 " I have been waiting for you to come 
 ever since that day," he resumed, con- 
 trolling the agitation in his voice. " It 
 is a long time. I knew if you were the 
 man I thought you, you would come at 
 last. Now that I see you, I know how 
 much I have all my life wanted you — 
 needed you — " He lost all command of 
 himself here. " You're very like your 
 father," he said, putting his hands on 
 Dallas' broad shoulders for a moment, 
 and then he turned away and walked 
 hastily to the window, standing with his 
 back to the room. 
 
 When he came back he took the boy's 
 hand : " You are welcome home, Dallas. 
 Not for your father's sake alone, under- 
 stand. Blood is a bond that won't last 
 if there's no other. But I've learned to 
 know you since that day on the moun- 
 tain, and I welcome you for your own 
 sake, as well as — as his who is gone." 
 
 Dallas colored, like a boy, with gratifi- 
 cation, having an old-fashioned fear and 
 reverence for gray hair. But he did not 
 reply directly, any kind of sentiment 
 being a foreign language to him, which 
 he spoke with difficulty. « I'm glad that 
 you have felt the need of me," he said, 
 heartily ; " though I don't see how that 
 could have been until now. Now, I think, 
 I can be of use," glancing out at the 
 miserable signs of ruin, from the disor- 
 dered outbuildings to the yet smouldering 
 fires. 
 
 12 
 
 Mr. Galbraith drew the great chaii in 
 front of the fire and seated the young 
 fellow in it: "Before I take you to my 
 wife, I wish to show you something," 
 fumbling with one hand in his pocket. 
 " I have never allowed even Honora to 
 look at it. But you — I thought all sum- 
 mer that I would show it to you as soon 
 as you came." His fingers shook as he 
 placed a small morocco case before Dal- 
 las and opened it, disclosing an ivory 
 miniature, the likeness of a handsome, 
 ruddy-faced man. "You know who it 
 is, dear boy ?" lowering his voice. 
 
 Dallas bowed gravely. He had no 
 very tender remembrance of his father : 
 it was the old man's sorrow laid thus 
 bare before him which made his eyes 
 dim as he looked at the face. Mr. Gal- 
 braith took it from him gently, polishing 
 it with his hand. " Whenever you wish 
 to look at it, Dallas, come to me. I 
 carry it with me. There is no other 
 likeness of him after he was grown and 
 — he was my only child." He glanced 
 once or t^vice, before he put it away, from 
 the face of the son he had lost to that 
 of the one who had just come to him, 
 with a quiet tenderness passing that of 
 woman. 
 
 Dallas was not blind to it. He sat, 
 with a hand on each knee, looking stead- 
 ily into the fire. There had been but 
 little sign of emotion in this meeting 
 with his grandfather, but something in 
 the few words and shake of the hand 
 had stirred his honest soul to its depths. 
 The strong domestic instincts of the 
 man asserted themselves. AH his life 
 he had been a vagabond : to-day he had 
 reached home. These people were his 
 people : the blood in the veins of this 
 old man was in his veins ; but they were 
 old, and poor, in need of him : he was 
 strong, had the world freshly in his 
 grasp. His niche was ready. As for 
 that old, hard Luck of his, let it pass : 
 surely it had had its day. When he 
 thought fit to tell them of it, they would 
 know his innocence — as he knew it. 
 There was so much weight in the in- 
 stinct of the same flesh and blood. But 
 now, when disaster closed in on them 
 on every side, should he bring this dis- 
 
178 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 grace, unknown before, to level them 
 with the dust ? 
 
 Mr. Galbraith, turning, saw that the 
 young man had risen, and was following 
 him in his walk up and down the room 
 with a pained, far-reaching look, that went, 
 he saw, into something far beyond the 
 present moment. He halted, then came 
 up to the fire, resting his arm on the 
 mantel-shelf, and his chin on his hand. 
 <' You have some trouble ?" he said gen- 
 tly, though he was not able to conceal 
 tlie latent anxiety in his voice. " You 
 must remember that you are with your 
 own people now, Dallas. Your troubles 
 are theirs." ^ 
 
 How could Dallas know the effort 
 which the words cost the man who had 
 held himself apart all his Hfe, morbidly 
 afraid of intrusion ? " I have no secrets 
 but those which would be the heavier 
 for sharing," he said, turning away with 
 a dogged shake and something of his 
 grandmother's surliness. " It would be 
 hard indeed if your boy's son brought 
 trouble to your door now ! Shall we go 
 to find Madam Galbraith .?" with a hasty 
 change to an indifferent tone. 
 
 "Yes." But he did not move, though 
 Dallas stood waiting ; his powerful figure 
 and grave, sincere face in relief against 
 tlie gray window light. Perhaps because 
 it was a picture that pleased him the old 
 man watched it with such breathless in- 
 tentness. As for Dallas, he hardly no- 
 ticed the silence. The secret burned in 
 his heart, where he tried to conceal it, 
 like vile, extraneous matter in healthy, 
 quick-growing flesh. If he could but 
 utter and be free from it ! He had al- 
 most forgotten it, it had so dwindled into 
 insignificance in the free, hearty, natural 
 life of the last year, but once back 
 among these stifling houses into which 
 men boxed themselves, it assumed its 
 old, unwholesome, foul proportions. He 
 knew his own strength better now : it 
 could not make him less a man ; but 
 what would it be to his mother — to these 
 old people, whose good name was the 
 only tower of strength left them ? Was 
 it a gift for Tom's boy to bring them in 
 their day of calamity ? At least let him 
 have a day to consider. To-morrow — 
 
 "You have nothing to tell me, my 
 dear boy ? Nothing ?" The gentle- 
 man's great love for and hope in his 
 son seemed with this eager question to 
 come from his heart out into his face, 
 and to animate his whole body, show- 
 ing themselves in a strained, painful 
 wistfulness very pathetic to see in 
 any old man. But Dallas, still ponder- 
 ing over his miserable secret, did not 
 see it. 
 
 " No ; I have nothing to tell," he said, 
 gravely. 
 
 There was a moment's silence. The 
 clock without began to strike the hour 
 slowly in a hard, metallic clang. Dallas 
 raised his head, listening with an anxious, 
 boyish fancy in his brain. " If I do not 
 cast off my burden before that hour has 
 struck, I will carry it for ever, and bear 
 its weight alone to the grave," he 
 thought. His grandfather watched him, 
 as though he saw and understood the 
 vague fancy from its birth. 
 
 If in that moment, when the eyes of 
 the old scholar and gentleman, grown 
 clear and sad as Truth in their long ex- 
 perience of hfe, were upon him, Dallas 
 had dared to be true ; if he had been brave 
 enough to meet the earnest faith that 
 silently summoned his own, the ghosts 
 of all the dead years of his loneliness, 
 of his prison, would have vanished with 
 the striking of that hour, and returned 
 to vex him no more. 
 
 But he was silent, and the chance 
 slipped by him. "To-morrow" — he 
 thought, with guilty haste, pushing by 
 his fancy as childish — " to-morrow," and 
 the last note rang with a reverberating, 
 melancholy peal, and died away. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith took his arm down with 
 a stifled sigh. " We will go now," he 
 said. But the pathetic tenderness had 
 gone from his face. They crossed the 
 hall together. He paused, with his hand 
 on the library door. " My wife is a 
 strong and nervous woman," he said- 
 " I do not wish to give her a sudden 
 shock. It would be better that she 
 should discover you herself— if you are 
 willing .'"' 
 
 Dallas bowed, and they entered, the 
 young fellow feehng the same half-pity, 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 179 
 
 half-dread of the woman he was going 
 to meet that he might for an old tooth- 
 less lioness. She was walking slowly 
 up and down the dim, long room, her 
 hands clasped behind her, but halted for 
 them to approach. Discerning, perhaps, 
 some agitation in the stranger's move- 
 ment or gesture, and fancying it pro- 
 ceeded from fear of herself, her old, 
 hard-scored face softened and kindled 
 into that rare look with which, differ- 
 ently from any other woman, she was 
 wont to welcome strangers. 
 
 '• You are the friend of Colonel Per- 
 vis, of whom he has told me ?" without 
 waiting for them to speak, and holding 
 out her hand in the genial Virginian 
 fashion. " I thank you for coming. You 
 are very welcome." It was her whim 
 to be gracious, and the cordial tone, the 
 sensitive, ^fine smile on the grand old 
 face, the indescribably winning manner, 
 affected Dallas, long unused to educated 
 women, like a strong, sudden note of 
 music from an unknown instrument. 
 Who had been so blind as to call this 
 woman coarse .'' Mr. Galbraith fell be- 
 side his wife, passive as usual. 
 
 " Our friend belongs to our own family, 
 Hannah," he said, quietly. 
 
 " The Dour ? No, Galbraith. It is 
 a large stock and a strong one," smiling, 
 "But I am the last of the Dours. That 
 fire has burned down to a single flame, 
 which a puff of wind may extinguish for 
 ever." 
 
 " It is a fire which has burned clear 
 to the end," rejoined her grandson, em- 
 phatically, feeling himself in every grain 
 of his big body a Dour and an honest 
 man. He met Mr. Galbraith's eyes bent 
 steadily on him. 
 
 " I thank you, sir," she said, with a 
 stately bow. " I perceive that you have 
 heard the story of my family. It is well 
 known in this neighborhood." They 
 walked together up the room, Madam 
 Galbraith, when they came within the 
 glow of the firelight, inspecting the stran- 
 ger with her usual keen scrutiny. She 
 remained silent while they seated them- 
 selves, and Mr. Galbraith rang for lights 
 — silent so long that he leaned forward 
 and looked in her face anxiously. She 
 
 drew herself up erect in her chair, with 
 a long breath. 
 
 " It is nothing, James. There is a 
 strange family resemblance among you 
 Galbraiths, and — it is nothing." But 
 she averted her eyes from Dallas and 
 listened when he spoke, as though be- 
 neath the courtesy of her manner she 
 concealed pain. 
 
 " You have taken much interest. Colo- 
 nel Pervis tells me, in my poor colony .?" 
 she said, with an effort. " There was 
 the ruin there of the most promising 
 scheme ever developed in this country." 
 
 " I doubt that, madam," promptly. 
 Dallas felt his own ground under his 
 feet now, and was himself again. " From 
 all that I can learn, the elements of fail- 
 ure were always there. The fire only 
 hastened it." 
 
 " I do not understand you," coldly. 
 " Pray explain yourself." 
 
 " That oil is of the poorest quality," 
 blundered on Dallas. " The mills should 
 have been supplied with fuel from the 
 neighborhood to enable them to compete 
 in low prices with those higher up the 
 river, and your coal was suffered to be 
 untouched in the hills." 
 
 "True. I did not think of that," 
 she muttered. " But that is a small 
 matter. I was in haste to gain the great 
 end." 
 
 " There was the trouble," bluntly. 
 " There was no one to direct the small 
 matters which ensure success. No one. 
 There were hands, capital, and, I sup- 
 pose, a visionary enthusiasm. But any 
 one can see there was no scientific or 
 practical knowledge. It is a terrible 
 calamity to have brought upon those 
 people. There has been great suffering 
 among them — great suffering !" speaking 
 in a stern undertone and looking fix- 
 edly in the fire, his thoughts being with 
 the people far more than with her. 
 
 The angry heat had been rising slowly 
 in Madam Galbraith's face. " If I have 
 unwillingly brought suffering upon them, 
 I have atoned for it," she said. " You 
 do not understand, probably, being a 
 stranger in the place, what I have done 
 to atone." She sat fiercely silent and 
 motionless, the firelight shining on her 
 
i8o 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 pale face and gray hair : she was proudly- 
 conscious in every throb of her heart 
 that she was a beggar, that she had sacri- 
 ficed her all to keep her honor unspotted ; 
 but she was too proud to boast of it. 
 
 " I did not intend to reflect upon you 
 personally, madam," said Dallas, gently. 
 " I did not know even that you were the 
 only originator of the scheme. I under- 
 stood you had given up your property to 
 liquidate your debts to these people. 
 That was all proper and right, of course. 
 But unfortunately real estate is not 
 money, and does not supply their imme- 
 diate need. Their distress has been ex- 
 treme, as no doubt you know." 
 
 She rose impatiently and began again 
 her restless walk up and down the room. 
 Now she knew the fire had been sent 
 expressly from God to humble her — 
 Hannah Dour. Great had been her pun- 
 ishment, and her atonement not small. 
 But this man set aside both as of the 
 same import as the lack of clothes and 
 food among those stolid Dutch boors. 
 Any other young fellow she would have 
 dismissed contemptuously ; but a vague 
 something in this man's voice and words 
 touched her with a mysterious power, as 
 though it was herself that met her in 
 another form. 
 
 " My friends," she said, with ironical 
 gentleness, "have not pressed home upon 
 me the wants of these persons. They 
 tliought it better to convince me that 
 the amount of sacrifice I made for them 
 was Quixotic and unreasonable." 
 
 " It appeared to me only just," said 
 Dallas, simply. 
 
 " Your ideas of honesty are singularly 
 strict, young sir !" with a short laugh. 
 
 " Honesty !" Dallas rose to his feet, 
 the blood rushing to his heart, leaving 
 his face deadly pale ; again he caught the 
 sight of the wistful, mild eyes keeping 
 their steady watch upon him. In a mo- 
 ment they restored him to himself. He 
 answered them with a smile. " I never 
 tested my honesty," he said, in the dry, 
 humorous voice which had become lately 
 habitual to him. " It never was strongly 
 tempted. But I inherited it, and the 
 quahty should be good." 
 
 Madam Galbraith made another turn, 
 
 and then beginning to fear that she had 
 been inhospitable, she came back and 
 resumed her seat as Mrs. Duffield en- 
 tered the room. Dallas glanced hastily 
 at the opening door, his color rising : it 
 was not his mother whom he expected 
 to see. 
 
 " Colonel Pervis mentioned some of 
 your views as to the future establish- 
 ment of these people to me," she re- 
 sumed, with a distant gravity. " They 
 showed excellent judgment for a person 
 of your age — excellent. Have you con- 
 sidered the probable worth of the coal- 
 beds t The Dour land is a mine of 
 wealth." 
 
 " It is good arable land " said Dallas, 
 thoughtfully : " very good. As to the 
 coal — it hardly ranks so high as that a 
 few miles farther up the river. I can 
 bring you specimens of both, and ex- 
 plain the difference." 
 
 "You appear to have made the subject 
 an especial study ?" dryly. 
 
 He hesitated a moment. "Necessa- 
 rily," with a half laugh : " I was a 
 miner." 
 
 She was turning over one of her 
 books of maps as he spoke, and con- 
 tinued to do so, but a secret significance 
 in his answer seemed, in the silence 
 which followed, to creep gradually into 
 her mind : with her finger on the book 
 she looked up slowly like one who hears 
 a far-off call. Then she glanced at 
 Dallas with a terrified, wild doubt, a wild 
 denial in her face. The book fell from 
 her trembhng hand to the floor : her 
 husband came quietly and stood behind 
 her chair. 
 
 " Galbraith .?" she muttered to herself, 
 " Galbraith ?" Then she raised herself 
 slowly and leaned with both hands on 
 the table. Dallas rose and came toward 
 her where the light fell full upon his 
 face. " You were a miner .-* Where ?" 
 she said. 
 
 " In the coal-pits. At Scranton." 
 
 "James !" 
 
 " I am here, Hannah." 
 
 " Who is this man ?" 
 
 He looked at her as a physician might 
 have done before he answered her. The 
 hard contour of her face was harder 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 iSl 
 
 than ever before, yet there was a cer- 
 tain terrible womanish pallor about the 
 fierce eyes and stern, set mouth. It 
 deepened as she looked at Dallas, and 
 at his mother's fair, beaming face as she 
 came to him and put her arm about his 
 neck. 
 
 »• Do you not know, Hannah ? I told 
 you there was a new life coming to us 
 which would atone for all the past. I 
 have brought you Tom's boy." 
 
 '• Why, / told you he was not dead !" 
 loudly, with a flash of triumph. 
 
 There was an embarrassed pause. 
 "He is very like our son, I think, my 
 dear. Before he — went from us," said 
 her husband gently. 
 
 jMadam Galbraith's drj- lips moved, but 
 she did not speak. She motioned Dal- 
 las closer: "You are sure there is no 
 imposture in the young man, James ? 
 You have received a proper account of 
 his hfe from him ? He should have 
 brought — brought credentials." Then, 
 without waiting for a reply, she held out 
 her hands to him: " My son 1" she cried, 
 feebly, >• my son !" 
 
 When she touched Dallas and saw 
 clearly her dead boy again in him. she 
 pushed him away, trembling violently — 
 " Go, go, I want to be alone." 
 
 At the door Dallas turned, looking 
 back at the woman who, through all her 
 life, had played a man's rough part, and 
 he saw that she had fallen on her knees 
 to the floor, but her face was covered 
 with her hands and hidden from him by 
 her gray hair. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 CoLOXEL Pervis walked up and 
 dov.-n the brightly-lighted hbrary late 
 that evening, rubbing his hands. "Where 
 is the boy ? God bless him ! Where 
 is he ? I little thought who I was bring- 
 ing to you I" stopping beside Mr. Gal- 
 braith, his red face beaming down on 
 him. " And you think he resembles his 
 father, eh ? Now — do you know ? — he 
 »eems to me altogether different. Tom 
 
 was a yielding fellow, j-et not easily read ; 
 he had a liglit, playful way of slurring and 
 glossing over his own opinions, so that 
 you never could be sure of them. But 
 this boy is like a bit of limestone rock. 
 You know him all througli when you 
 see his face. That singular downright- 
 ness strikes you at once in him. He 
 has it from Madam Galbraith, I think." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith listened eagerl)-. and 
 with evident great pleasure : " You're 
 right, Pervis, you're right : no man could 
 doubt a face hke that. Yes, he is like 
 his grandmother," with an almost boyish 
 laugh of keen amusement. "And tliere 
 will be ahttle rubbing between the rocks, 
 if I am not mistaken, before long." 
 
 "All the better! all the better!" be- 
 ginning his walk up and down again. 
 " She needs something to rouse her. 
 She'll live her youth over again in this 
 boy. and so will you. By George ! It 
 seems as if the old times had come 
 back to this house, after all. The verj- 
 sen'ants are wild about it down below. 
 The fire's forgotten. I ought to have been 
 here at the discovery. But I was called 
 down to the village suddenly, and when 
 I got back it was Lizzy that told me. 
 The murder was out. She has got up 
 a supper fit for a prince, and when I 
 stopped at the door, getting a sniff of 
 the partridges, she came out, her face 
 red and the tears in her eyes for joy : 
 she said, 'It is the heir that has come 
 back. Colonel Pervis. His name is 
 Dallas. I haven't seen him yet, but 
 they say he's difi"erent from any of the 
 Galbraiths. Better than any of them, 
 quite diff"erent. Like a king among 
 them.' By George ! you might have 
 knocked me down with a breath !" 
 
 Mr. Galbraith listened to the story 
 with a curiously grave attention, but 
 made no answer. The Colonel's excited 
 brain went off speedily on another track. 
 " This boy has no money, eh ? Oh. of 
 course not, poor fellow ! What a cursed 
 beast that Duffield must have been ! 
 Only if he had happened to have a few 
 odd thousands, they'd have come in 
 luckily just now. Where is he, by the 
 way ?"' 
 
 "In his own room. His grandmotlier 
 
[82 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 is with him. Pervis," he continued after 
 a pause, with the embarrassed manner 
 in which he always broached a subject, 
 " therv, is a matter of business which I 
 would hke arranged before Dallas comes 
 into the family councils. It will be his 
 wish that Madam Galbraith's engage- 
 ment shall be kept : the land must go. 
 But the house in which my wife and son 
 were born I cannot part with. You 
 shall bid it in for me, with two or three 
 acres immediately about it." 
 
 The Colonel's face brightened. " Can 
 you do it ? Your annuity — " 
 
 " It will take it all. But it will be 
 our home now, to the end — oiirs^'' with 
 an unconscious emphasis on the word. 
 "And I'll go to work. I can make 
 enough by my pen to support us. I 
 never had a wife and boy to work for 
 before." 
 
 Pervis listened attentively without the 
 expected outburst. " Thank God !" he 
 said, after a while, with a good deal of 
 quiet feeling. " You don't know what 
 it cost me, Galbraith, to see the old 
 house taken from you, and to think I 
 had been such a poor, thriftless devil I 
 had no help to give. I'll attend to it. 
 You want it kept quiet between us, I 
 understand ?" 
 
 "Yes : Madam Galbraith would doubt- 
 less object." 
 
 " Hush ! she is here !" opening the 
 door for the old lady, who came in with 
 a stately step. One point in her dress 
 caught the eyes of both men as soon as 
 she entered. It was a shawl which Tom 
 had given her — one of his few presents, 
 for he was not thoughtful about such 
 trifles. The day he left them to marry 
 Mary Jennings she had folded it away, 
 and it never had left its hiding-place 
 until to-night. 
 
 " I thought you would be with us to- 
 night, old friend !" she said, as the Colo- 
 nel shook her hand, looking into her ra- 
 diant face. 
 
 " Why, you are yourself again, Ma- 
 dam Galbraith ! It reminds me of the 
 days when Hannah Dour in her stiff 
 brocade and I in knee-breeches led the 
 dances in this very room ; or the night 
 when Master Tom was baptized. I 
 
 think that was the crowning-point of your 
 life. Lord ! what a night that was ! I 
 never sat down to such a supper. What 
 an inheritance that child was born to !" 
 
 " My son Dallas," with a proud lin- 
 gering on the words, "has no inherit- 
 ance but honor. And that he gives to 
 us, as we to him. I have had a long 
 talk with the lad," as she seated herself, 
 with a certain majestic port not used of 
 late. " He is not altogether a Dour. 
 That is better," with a half sigh. '^ I 
 was glad to find you in him, James," 
 looking at her husband. " But he is 
 headstrong — headstrong. He needs con- 
 trol. Well, well, the boy is young. He 
 has been giving me the history of his 
 life." Mr. Galbraith turned suddenly 
 toward her, but did not speak. 
 
 " Poor fellow ! He has had hard 
 times, no doubt," said the Colonel. 
 "And he gave you the history of his 
 life .?" 
 
 " Of course ; I asked it from him. 
 It's a sad story, though he makes the 
 best of it. In the coal-pits, in Philadel- 
 phia, among medical students, down at 
 a fishing village on the coast, and in the 
 stone-quarry here. I imagine he offered 
 a strange contrast to the poor people 
 with whom he was thrown, everywhere — 
 like a prince in disguise. There are 
 some other particulars which, he said, 
 he would give to us all to-morrow. The 
 village, by the way, was Manasquan, 
 and he knew Miss Byrne there. He 
 asked to be shown to her room to see 
 her. I liked that. The Dours were 
 always noted for their gentle considera- 
 tion for the poor. Where is Honora ?" 
 looking hastily around, as if she missed 
 something. 
 
 " She is not well," her uncle replied. 
 " She will come down later in the even- 
 ing. Has any one remembered to order 
 up wine ? We will drink the lad's health 
 in some of the old hock we put away 
 when Tom was born, Hannah." 
 
 " I've been thinking of that," the Colo- 
 nel broke out, eagerly. " I'll go myself. 
 I know the very bottles." 
 
 It was Tom's room which they gave 
 to his son. The largest and warmest 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 183 
 
 chamber in the house, always kept in 
 perfect order, as though its occupant 
 might return to-morrow, but in which no 
 one had slept since he left it. For days 
 before Mr. Galbraith had been busy in 
 it, adding to it such fanciful, dainty fur- 
 nishing from his own store as he thought 
 might please a young man's fancy. 
 
 Dallas, when Madam Galbraith left 
 him alone, took quick, observant note of 
 it all. His valise, which they had sent 
 for, lay on the floor, and he proceeded 
 gravely to dress in a fine suit of gray 
 cloth, the shirt collar turned down from 
 the shapely throat and knotted with 
 black ribbon, remembering how some 
 one, whom he did not name, had thought 
 such a garb artistic. 
 
 The mellow light of the room, the soft 
 carpet, the luxurious toilet appointments, 
 had a strange effect upon Dallas. They 
 were his, and they barred him inside of 
 a new class. Out on the Plains he had 
 been with gentlemen, and met them as 
 their equal ; but that was under the 
 broad sky, where all God's creatures 
 stand on one plane. But this was in 
 civilization, where the invisible lines 
 were strictly drawn. The long fight was 
 over ; he stood on a level with educated 
 men and women : inside of their world 
 at last, however little fitted for it. When 
 he had dressed, he went out through the 
 long halls to find Lizzy, one or two ser- 
 vants escorting him, others peeping at 
 him through half-open doors — a welcome 
 on every face. It was home — his home. 
 Through the windows he passed he 
 could catch glimpses of the wide moonlit 
 sweep of valley and mountain. It was 
 the Dour land. He meant some day to 
 buy it back again — every acre. There 
 was nothing which he was not strong 
 and patient enough to do to-night. 
 
 Yet under all was the picture of a 
 group of fishermen's cabins : in one of 
 them a little homely chamber, opening 
 out into pine woods, the sound of the 
 sea far off^a chamber whose rude fur- 
 nishing had been made for him by friendly 
 hands. There was not one of these 
 cabins whose threshold to-day he would 
 be suffered to pass : not one of these 
 men's hands which would not now point 
 
 at him for a convict and a thief. No 
 money, no strength nor patience, could 
 buy back the power to enter that poor 
 little room again as he had left it. Lizzy 
 met him outside of the housekeeper's 
 room and drew him hastily in, shutting 
 the door. 
 
 " Why did you come here ? Why did 
 you seek for me ? Oh, Dallas, you have 
 risked it all !" But she could hardly 
 breathe in her joy and triumph. " It's 
 all over — what I've worked for so long. 
 You have come home at last." 
 
 " Yes, I've come home at last," 
 quietly. 
 
 " There is little to inherit," looking 
 anxiously into his face. " But this is 
 your rightful place." 
 
 "Do you remember that little room at 
 Manasquan, which the people fitted up 
 for me, Lizzy ?" abruptly. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " I never can go back there. Never." 
 
 " What does that matter ?" angrily. 
 " You are ungrateful to God for all He 
 has given you. Why, the whole house 
 is filled with joy and thanksgiving be- 
 cause He has been so good to you, and 
 you cry out for that trifle, which you 
 cannot have." 
 
 " I know. There have been times, 
 even to-night, when, because I could not 
 have it, this house has been intolerable 
 to me. I'd rather go back once more to 
 old Graah and the fishermen, and know 
 they'd clap me on the shoulder and make 
 the friend of me they did then, than in- 
 herit all this estate that is lost. But I 
 can never do that." 
 
 " No, you can never do it. So, for 
 God's sake let it go ! It is better that 
 all remembrance of it should pass out 
 of your hfe. It's the sight of me that 
 has done it I will go back to Mana- 
 squan." 
 
 " No, Lizzy, you shall not leave me." 
 
 " Yes, I will go. There is not an hour 
 which is not fraught with danger, now 
 that you have acknowledged your ac- 
 quaintance with me. Any chance word 
 may betray all." 
 
 " You do not think I am going to live 
 always under cover of this lie ? I will 
 tell my whole story to-morrow. I wanted 
 
i84 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 to draw my breath first. It is a hard 
 blow to give them — my mother." 
 
 Lizzy stared into his face aghast. Then 
 she recovered herself. "It is a blow 
 which you will never give, Dallas Gal- 
 braith. I know you better than you do 
 yourself. You are dogged and obstinate, 
 but you never hurt a worm. That old 
 Manasquan life is dead to you — dead. 
 You will not bring up its ghost for no 
 purpose but to torture these women?" 
 putting her hand on his shoulder. 
 
 Dallas drew a heavy breath, and pres- 
 ently wiped his forehead, looking down 
 at the little woman from his height in 
 despair. 
 
 " I wish to God I had stayed out on 
 the Plains, and not tangled myself up 
 with a parcel of women ! Why can't 
 they look at a thing in a common-sense, 
 practical way ? There is no reason why 
 it should torture them. I am innocent. 
 I feel like a baited bull with women, 
 Lizzy! I don't understand them." 
 
 Lizzy bit her lip. " Oh yes, you do, 
 Dallas ! You've great power over wo- 
 men. There is Honora. I do not know 
 when you knew her ; but I know this," 
 she paused, lowered her voice, and ended 
 the sentence in a whisper. 
 
 Dallas blushed, as Honora would have 
 done. " Whether it be true or not, yoti 
 have no right to tell me that," quickly. 
 <' It is her secret." 
 
 " Oh, of course, I am wrong. It is 
 no difference whether it is my love for you 
 that makes me anxious or not. Take 
 your own way," holding his wrist in both 
 her hands. "See, Dallas ! I've come to 
 love you as if you were my son in all 
 these years, and now you will undo all 
 that I have done. But go on — go on ! 
 It does not matter to you if you break 
 that girl's heart," watching him furtively. 
 " She has grown thin and pale waiting 
 and waiting for you. But what of that t 
 Your whim will be gratified." 
 
 " I would rather you did not speak 
 again to me of Miss Dundas, Lizzy," 
 with the old quiet authority, which no- 
 body resisted. But Lizzy saw the red 
 spot burning in his cheek, and knew her 
 purpose was gained. 
 
 " Go on, now ; they will be impatient 
 
 for you. You had better tell them to- 
 night," giving her nail an additional blow 
 on the head. " It is a pity to give them 
 even this little glimpse of happiness 
 after all their trouble. Oh. Dallas ! if 
 you but knew what you were to your 
 mother or — Look at poor Honora's 
 worn face to-night, and see what you 
 read there." 
 
 " I shall not tell them until to-mor- 
 row. Good-night, Lizzy,'' holding out 
 his hand. 
 
 Lizzy's eyes sparkled when the door 
 shut behind him. " He's safe," nod- 
 ding as she pinned her working napkin 
 in front of her again. " The whole 
 estate waiting for him last year would 
 not move him, but that silly girl's pale 
 face will do it. Dallas is as stubborn as 
 a mule against fate, but he's a fool in 
 the hands of a woman." 
 
 Meanwhile Dallas, going through the 
 wide halls, felt the pulse throbbing in 
 every vein of his body. He had not a 
 doubt of Lizzy's story. He had never 
 learned the conventional rule that women 
 must be sought, pursued, wooed. The 
 man was born for the woman— the woman 
 for the man. Honora loved him. That 
 seemed to him natural and right. Did he 
 not love her ? And the poor lonely girl 
 had watched and waited for him 1 Well, 
 had he not thought of her constantly out 
 on the Plains?— constantly— quite for- 
 getting the digging and the hard study and 
 the buffalo hunts, and Pritchard's stories, 
 and his own frohcs with the younger 
 men, which had put her out of his head 
 for weeks together. 
 
 " Pale ? Worn ?" He hurried for- 
 ward, his hand almost trembling when 
 he turned the latch of the library door. 
 He would go to her before them all and 
 claim her as his. She never should 
 know sorrow or pain again. 
 
 But when he opened the door, her 
 face was not among those which turned 
 to meet him. The room had taken on 
 itself a new cheerfulness to-night, never 
 seen there before. Colonel Pervis thought 
 as he bustled about, making himself 
 high master of ceremonies. Even Dal- 
 las knew what happy hearts he had made 
 among the group gathered about the 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 165 
 
 bright fire. They were all there : Ma- 
 dam Galbraith triumphant in her chair 
 of state : his grandfather examining his 
 famous old fowling-piece, which he meant 
 to bestow on Dallas, listening with a 
 quiet smile to the ColoneFs jokes ; his 
 mother, for once thoroughly alive, cheer- 
 ful, saucy, winning ; Dour and his 
 chubby little, over-dressed wife ; and Mr. 
 Rattlin, first in one corner and then an- 
 other, telling the story of his good 
 fortune. 
 
 Madam Galbraith stroked her heavy 
 chin wlien she heard it, trying to con- 
 ceal her gratification. " Half of his 
 salary, eh ? I am very glad this imme- 
 diate relief has come to you, Mr. Rat- 
 tlin, and that it has come through this 
 source. I recognize more and more of 
 the Dour traits in my son Dallas. Have 
 you heard this story, James ?" raising 
 her voice and repeating it for the benefit 
 of the whole party. '• I will assist you 
 in 3-our choice of a farm, Mr. Rattlin, 
 and advise Mrs. Rattlin how to set mat- 
 ters in order," she added aside at the 
 close. 
 
 They all waited for Dallas, watching 
 the door, and there was a sort of thrill 
 and hush among them, as though they 
 had not seen him before, when he came 
 in among them. An unusual, powerful 
 face. Dour thought as he rose to meet 
 him, full of Nature's original meanings : 
 even the clothes seemed to have less 
 power to diminish the natural expression 
 of the free, athletic figure than they had 
 upon men in town. The contagion of 
 excitement had roused Dour into un- 
 usual heartiness, but he shook hands 
 with Dallas the second time with cordial 
 pleasure, because he found him to be the 
 manner of man he was. 
 
 She was not there, Dallas thought, 
 glancing around. She was too ill to 
 come. This was his doing ! 
 
 Supper was announced. "We are 
 waiting for Miss Dundas," said Madam 
 Galbraith, rising. " Send to her room 
 to know if she is able to come down." 
 A colder chill crept to Dallas' heart. 
 Before the servant could obey her, how- 
 ever, the door opened. , 
 
 « I am here, John," said a sweet, clear I 
 
 voice, and Honora, radiant as youth 
 itself, a rose in her hair, and the richest 
 and most dazzling of robes setting off 
 her piquant beauty, came floating up tlie 
 room. " Will nobody present me to my 
 cousin Dallas .''" she said, stopping with 
 outstretched hands before him, and look- 
 ing up into his face like a bewildering 
 fairy. 
 
 Dallas gave one quick glance over the 
 little figure— saw the cool, observant 
 eyes, the healthy pink cheeks, the little, 
 soft, peach-tinted hands held out steadily : 
 then he took one of them in his own 
 cold fingers, and let it fall, as though it 
 had been a hot bit of iron. 
 
 "Honora is so frank and cordial," 
 whispered Gerty, admiringly, to Mrs. 
 Duffield. " It is sweet in her to dress 
 her hair with flowers and to put on her 
 Paris-made dress in honor of Mr. Gal- 
 braith. It's the very apple of Honora's 
 eye — that brocade." For Gerty, who 
 wanted now with all her heart to see all 
 the poor young girls married, thought 
 she might speak a good word for Nora 
 with this new hero's mother. Mrs. Duf- 
 field gathered herself up from her loung- 
 ing attitude and favored Miss Dundas 
 with an unusually keen survey. The red 
 on that young lady's cheeks was oddly 
 stationary, and she had put on with her 
 brocade a certain gayety and aplomb 
 which were as foreign to the simple girl 
 as would have been the cruel suavity of 
 Lady Macbeth's welcome to her guests. 
 The mother's jealous eye found in it 
 miching malicho for her stupid boy. 
 
 " You are late in welcoming your 
 cousin, Honora," said Madam Galbraith, 
 severely. 
 
 Miss Dundas had walked toward the 
 fire, and was engaged in teasing a Mal- 
 tese cat on the rug with the toe of her 
 slipper : she looked up brightly at this, 
 however. " Oh, / welcomed him long 
 ago. Down, Barba ! Poor pussy ! 
 Cousin Dallas," she added, indifferently, 
 as she stroked the cat, " was here a year 
 ago, and I accidentally discovered who 
 he was." 
 
 " Dallas made himself known to you 
 a year ago !" exclaimed Madam Gal- 
 braith, towering fiercely over her. whue 
 
1 86 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 his mother sat listening, her eyes on the 
 floor, but growing suddenly very pale. 
 
 " Oh, no ; I discovered him. I re- 
 member that I urged him quite earn- 
 estly to remain with you, dear aunt. 
 But he declined. He was going on an 
 expedition for — coal, I believe, and when 
 he had done with coal he intended to 
 come back to his mother and family. 
 Go away, Barba. I can't play any 
 more," knitting her brows anxiously as 
 she brushed off the marks of his paws 
 from her skirt. There was a painful 
 silence. 
 
 " I hope you found the coal success- 
 fully, Cousin Dallas," said Honora, cour- 
 teously, smiling and turning her hard, 
 brown eyes full on his. " I used to be 
 very anxious about you— dreadfully anx- 
 ious ! It was quite a rehef, I assure 
 you, to hear to-day that you had arrived 
 safely," with a civil little bow as she 
 turned to Gerty ; and, dismissing the 
 matter as finished, began to explain, in 
 answer to her queries, that the pansies 
 on her sash were embroidered and not 
 woven. 
 
 "There is something here that I do 
 not understand." 
 
 « It is nothing, Madam Galbraith," 
 said Mrs. Duffield, rising. "Did not 
 John say that supper was served ? Dal- 
 las, give your arm to your cousin Ho- 
 nora." Which Dallas did, walking stiffly 
 down the hall in grave silence, while the 
 little girl's silk rustled and glistened at 
 his side, and her civil voice went on 
 chattering what he called unfeeling bal- 
 derdash, and now and then a milky 
 breath touched his face. He would like 
 to have struck off the soft, round arm and 
 the hand that peeped out from its laces 
 and nestled on his wrist, and have rushed 
 away where he would never see her 
 again. Out on the Sierra Madre, Dallas 
 had stood his ground with a hearty cheer 
 when the Comanches attacked their little 
 party and the odds were hopeless, and 
 had come out of the fight as fresh as 
 though he had been taking a plunge in 
 the breakers. But the light touch of 
 this Httle hand, this shrill, polite, treble 
 ringing in his ears, unmanned him. The 
 old hurt, neglected feeling of his boy- 
 
 hood choked him : he knew himself to 
 be ignorant, a boor ; the tears of morti- 
 fication and self-contempt were not fai 
 from his eyes. Loved him ? This pure, 
 dainty lady, whose every new word or 
 motion marked more and more sharply 
 the gulf between them ! Why, in spite 
 of her courtesy, he saw plainly that she 
 had forgotten that he was alive. And 
 he, hke a vain puppy, had believed her 
 ill and pining for his sake ! 
 
 When they were seated side by side 
 there were one or two points which Ho- 
 nora made clear for herself, taking ad- 
 vantage of the first buzz and noise about 
 them. She had not forgotten that he 
 had come back at the appointed time. 
 There was a hope in that. Perhaps she 
 wronged him altogether ! 
 
 "You have been down at the wells 
 for several days, Colonel Pervis tells 
 me ?" 
 
 " Yes ; I came back the night of the 
 fire. I would have come to the farm 
 sooner to see — my mother. But I was 
 needed down there. To-day was the first 
 tinne I thought I could be spared." 
 
 The hard glitter went out of her eyes. 
 "The night of the fire ? That was just 
 a year since you left us," her voice fal- 
 tering a little. 
 
 " About a year, I believe," indiffer- 
 ently. Why was she trying to make 
 civil talk for him ? He ought to thank 
 God if he never saw her face or heard 
 her voice again ! 
 
 " Lizzy," she began again, writing with 
 her fork nervously on her plate — " Lizzy 
 and Mrs. Beck said you promised to re- 
 turn in a year. They were quite cer- 
 tain you would come." 
 
 " It was exceedingly foolish in Lizzy 
 to keep any such arrangement in mind," 
 impatiently. "A man cannot hold to 
 such visionary plans out in the wilder- 
 ness. One has not steam-cars there to 
 come and go at his nod." 
 
 " Yet you came ?" with a timid, shy 
 smile. 
 
 " Yes," in his solidest, most matter- 
 of-fact tone. " Doctor Pritchard secured 
 an appointment for me in this part of 
 the country, and I came back to accept 
 it. It happened to bring me back at the 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 187 
 
 end of the year, otherwise I should 
 hardly have been so punctual. I did not 
 tell you, sir," to his grandfather, " that 
 I am to assist in the geological survey 
 of some of the Middle States. It will 
 give me steady employment for several 
 years." 
 
 Honora chipped at the white slice of 
 pheasant before her, as calm outwardly 
 as any ideal fine lady, but for a few 
 moments some inward pain made her 
 blind and deaf to all about her. 
 
 After a while she looked up, her un- 
 flinching eyes going slowly around the 
 table. They were all changed ; she felt 
 that. This long-lost boy had wakened 
 a genial, deep life in the house that 
 had never been there before, with all its 
 cheerfulness and hospitality. It was 
 like the kindling of a Christmas fire in 
 a cold, bright room. 
 
 The wind was howling without and 
 the sleet and hail beating against the 
 windows, but they only laughed when 
 the storm drowned their voices, looking 
 toward Dallas — always looking toward 
 Dallas, their new-found idol. Whether 
 he spoke or moved, she could read the 
 quick response in all the attentive, lov- 
 ing faces. 
 
 She could tell them what their idol 
 was! Stone — stone; like any dumb 
 and deaf image of a man that the hea- 
 then set up for a god. A woman might 
 wear her heart out in his service, she 
 could tell his mother : she might sacri- 
 fice her life at his feet, and he would 
 stare over her head stolid and blind to" 
 the end ! She would like to give his 
 dull heart a stab ! She would like to do 
 it now — now. To test if there were 
 any life or feeling or love in it for any- 
 thing beyond his roots and ores. 
 
 Mrs. Duffield, who kept a quiet watch 
 upon the girl, saw an indescribable wea- 
 riness stealing over her face, strangely 
 at variance with the gay, unfading patch 
 of color in each cheek. She poured out 
 a glass of wine and sent it to her by 
 a servant ; but Honora left it untouched 
 before her, looking at it in a moment 
 with eyes whose brilliant defiance rival- 
 ed its sparkle. She was strong enough : 
 she did not need it to keep her in accord 
 
 with them, though they were warm and 
 cordial and happy, and she was shut 
 out. 
 
 How delicious the supper was, and 
 was there ever so cheerful a room ? 
 The very old smoky landscapes in their 
 frames seemed to glow and brighten : 
 Madam Galbraith was subdued and 
 gentle as never before — the old scholar, 
 on the contrary, full of life and quiet 
 humor, telling some of those old stories 
 which it was Honora's rare treat to hear; 
 and Dour was genial, proposed Dallas' 
 health in an apt little speech, to which 
 Gerty listened with her heart in her 
 throat. She had quite a matronly, conv 
 posed manner now — poor Gerty — with a 
 sunny stillness in her eyes, at which Ho- 
 nora turned to look again and again. 
 At the door, Honora saw Lizzy's face 
 from time to time : she, too, was looking 
 at Dallas. Dallas seemed to fiU up the 
 measure of life for them all to-night ! 
 Even the servants gave him their alle- 
 giance at first sight — stumbled over each 
 other in their zeal to wait upon him, 
 until old Henkel put them all aside and 
 took up his own station behind his chair. 
 
 Dallas' conscience, meantime, began 
 to harass him for his rude neglect of 
 the brilliant little beauty beside him : 
 he took heart o' grace, therefore, and 
 told her that she wore the flower which 
 he cared for the most in her hair. 
 " Though it has a half-sister, which is 
 called by some Indian name, that I like 
 even better than the jessamine," he 
 added. " I used to find it under the 
 dead pine needles in the woods when I 
 was a boy." 
 
 " You have associations with flowers, 
 then ?" said Honora, with a sudden hope- 
 ful flurry. " I have kept flowers to mark 
 every part of my life. I have them all 
 pressed and put away." 
 
 " I have but one ; but that is very 
 precious," he rejoined, in his deliberate, 
 grave way. " I have kept it for a long 
 time. I have it here, I think," putting 
 his hand in his breast pocket. She half 
 turned her head toward him, a soft color 
 stealing over her neck and throat differ- 
 ent from the flame in her cheeks. '• It 
 is a specimen of a Scotch heath, which 
 
i88 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 I found on the top of a mountain in 
 Colorado. There can be no mistake in 
 it. Doctor Pritchard called it a freak of 
 Nature, but I consider it a hint of a 
 law not yet understood. There are no 
 freaks in Nature. Would you like to 
 look at it." 
 
 " Yes. It is very curious, very curi- 
 ous, indeed !" She let the brown little 
 wisp fall on the cloth after the most in- 
 different of glances, giving it a twist 
 with her fingers which crumbled it to 
 pieces. Dallas did not touch it and said 
 nothing. What unaccountable tempers 
 were these of which women were pos- 
 sessed ! What possible harm could the 
 poor little heath have done to the wo- 
 man ? But it was the heath without 
 doubt : a moment after as they rose from 
 the table, she affected to perceive for the 
 first time what she had done. 
 
 " I'm sorry to have destroyed the one 
 thing you held as precious, Mr. Gal- 
 braith," she said, laughing, and took 
 pains to brush the bits down on the 
 floor with a virulent haste, as though it 
 had been a live thing which had hurt 
 her. 
 
 When the house was still that night, 
 Mr. Galbraith heard an uneasy step 
 steahng up and down the corridor out- 
 side of his door, and presently Honora's 
 knock. She came directly up to him 
 and began, without stopping to take 
 breath : "I have made up my mind now, 
 uncle : I must go away. I must go at 
 once." 
 
 He took off his spectacles without 
 looking at her, folded them, put them in 
 their case more deliberately than usual, 
 she fancied. She herself took his book 
 and pushed it far over on the table. 
 " That is the Bible. I've tried it. It 
 has no meaning in it to-night for me." 
 
 But even this blasphemy, which chilled 
 her as soon as she had fairly spoken 
 it, did not discompose Mr. Galbraith. 
 "So you are going away? Sit down, 
 Nonny." 
 
 But she preferred to stand. The fine 
 tint was off of her cheeks ; instead of 
 the delicate embroidered silk, she wore 
 a dingy gray wrapper : it was the dead 
 
 chrysalis from which the butterfly had 
 escaped for ever, she thought. 
 
 " I am going to earn my own living, 
 uncle." 
 
 " You are going to earn your own liv- 
 ing, my dear? In what way?" 
 
 "You don't mean to oppose me, then ?" 
 stopping short in her sobs. 
 
 " I mean to oppose you in nothing 
 that will give you happiness, Honora." 
 
 " I thought," after a chagrined pause, 
 " you would have been distressed — sur- 
 prised, at least. But one would sup- 
 pose you had been sitting here waiting 
 for me to come and say just these 
 words." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith bent forward suddenly 
 to stir the fire. She could not see his 
 face. " I thought it not improbable that 
 you would come in to-night, Nora ;" add- 
 ing, after a pause : "As for your making 
 your own living, that idea is a common 
 epidemic now among women. In old 
 times they worked off pain or discon- 
 tent in a pilgrimage to the Holy Sepul- 
 chre, or hied them to a nunnery, but 
 now they rush out of doors to try and 
 turn an honest penny, or sometimes to 
 obtain the right to vote in the fall 
 elections." 
 
 It was some time before Miss Dundas 
 answered him. She felt that she had in 
 some way been effectually balked in mid- 
 career, and could not readily find her 
 way again. " It is selfish in me to de- 
 sert you now, when you need me most," 
 she began, " after all our life together. I 
 know it wounds you." 
 
 " It does not wound me, Nora. I 
 shall not call it selfish. Study your o\m. 
 happiness first, my child." 
 
 " Of course, I know I'm not at aU 
 fitted to make my own way. I don't 
 know what I could teach, and I am not 
 acquainted with business. Gerty knows 
 more of that than I. She has been in 
 town shopping many a time. I never 
 was. But I will do what I can," gulp- 
 ing down the sobs heroically. " The 
 very air of this house is insufferable to 
 me." 
 
 " I hoped it would have been cheer- 
 fuller for you. my child, now that Dallas 
 is come. He seems to be unusually 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 189 
 
 fresh and youthful in his feeHn;:;s. His 
 hearty laugh makes me feel like a boy 
 again." 
 
 « Cousin Dallas ?" with an effort of 
 recollection. "Ah, true, he will be here 
 this winter. He will be a great comfort 
 to you, no doubt. He is so tender, so 
 full of fine sensibilities. But I don't 
 think he would feel much interest in me. 
 I am not a relation, and neither a frog 
 nor a fish. No, uncle, I've made up my 
 mind. Let the consequences be what 
 they may, I'll go." 
 
 " You shall do as you will, Honora. 
 When you have discovered your voca- 
 tion, I will make your way clear for 
 you." 
 
 The tears were dried in Miss Dundas' 
 eyes, and, though she knew that miser- 
 able she was and ought to be, they would 
 not flow again. " I thought you would 
 have tried to control me. But I would 
 not have been controlled. I owe it to 
 myself not to remain where I am sus- 
 pected of feelings which I know no- 
 thing of" 
 
 " I never controlled a woman in my 
 life, my dear." 
 
 " I may as well say good-night. I 
 suppose it is all settled now," with a 
 sigh. "Here is your book again." 
 
 " Good-night, my child. Honora !" 
 as she reached the door, " of course I 
 desire that you will take time to assure 
 yourself of your own wishes. In a 
 month we will talk again of this matter. 
 You must give me so much time." 
 
 "A month? Yes, dear!" She ran 
 quickly back and put her arms about his 
 neck, kissing his gray hair with the fer- 
 vid, bright tears in her eyes. " Of course 
 I'll wait a month, as you wish it. But I 
 am quite determined to go. You mustn't 
 oppose me. Yet I — I — did not wish to 
 leave you and the dear old house just at 
 once," holding his head on her breast, 
 her face all tears. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith, when she was gone, 
 opened his book again, laughing quietly 
 to himself But after an hour had gone 
 by. there was a sound in the far side of the 
 house, at the first hearing of which he 
 rose anxiously, and with unusual haste, 
 put on his overcoat and hat and went 
 
 out. There was a long sheltered walk 
 along the western side of the huuse 
 which the drifting snow had left bare, 
 and up and down this a heavy step kept 
 regular, monotonous time through the 
 keen whistle of the wind. Mr. Galbraith 
 stopped, waiting for the dark figure, 
 which was at the farthest end of the 
 stone pavement, to turn and come to- 
 ward him. The steady timed footfall, 
 the heavy build of the man, a certain 
 business-Hke decision in his movement, 
 came in sudden contrast in the old man's 
 mind to the vehement heat and passion 
 of the girl from whom he had just 
 parted. 
 
 " Dallas !" 
 
 The young man came toward him, 
 hastily drawing him into the shelter of 
 the house. " I am an unlucky dog," he 
 said : " I am afraid that I have kept you 
 awake. Whether I wake or sleep, I 
 seem to run my head against some dead 
 wall of civilization." 
 
 " Why can you not sleep, Dallas ?" 
 As soon as the involuntary question was 
 asked, he seemed to repent, and turned 
 hastily to look down the grayish-white 
 slopes of the valley and up at the black 
 forests on the mountain-side, as a man 
 might do who seeks to avoid the sight 
 of a dreaded spectre near at hand. 
 
 "It is the payment for my vagabond 
 habits," said Dallas. Assuredly there 
 was no spectre of aught that was dead 
 or unclean in this face or hearty, sponta- 
 neous voice. " I have slept so long with 
 nothing between me and the sky that I 
 wake at night now, in a house, stifled : 
 the ceihng, I fancy, is my coffin-lid." 
 They had turned the corner of the house, 
 and came to the open side-door. Dallas 
 paused within the entrance. " I ought 
 to tell you," he added, trying to preserve 
 the same careless tone, but making it. in 
 spite of himself strenuous and artificial, 
 "that I came to the conclusion to-night 
 I was an irreclaimable vagabond. I am 
 going back to my old life again, and at 
 once. There are many reasons," laying 
 his hand on Mr. Galbraith's arm, when 
 he would have spoken, "which make me 
 ill at ease with even the kindest and 
 most loving human beings. There is a 
 
190 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 repugnance between us which is no fault 
 of mine. I include you, sir, and my 
 mother.'' 
 
 The old man, standing in the shadow 
 of the doorway, bowed his head at- 
 tentively. 
 
 " I prefer speaking of this to you. 
 Men can understand men. I have 
 thought it over coolly to-night, and I 
 feel that I have reached that age when 
 a man cannot afford to temporize with 
 his life. Whatever path he chooses, if 
 he would accomplish anything in it, he 
 must pursue it doggedly to the end. It 
 is time for me to be done with looking 
 back and vain regrets." 
 
 "You mean to leave us, then, my 
 son ?" It was noticeable that, wander 
 where his eye would, it never even now 
 rested on the face of the younger man, 
 though the moon, rising between two 
 mountain peaks, threw it into strong 
 relief "You have chosen your path, 
 Dallas ?" 
 
 " I think I have chosen, finally." Yet 
 even as he said it there was doubt sub- 
 tly conveyed in the grave tone. " I was 
 born for my work. I seem for any other 
 purpose to be dull and incompetent. 
 When I turn from it I am thrown back. 
 I don't complain. It is a man's work, 
 and I have had delight in it — a keen de- 
 light. But other men, young men, start- 
 ing with me, have been able to live out 
 a man's whole life. They are citizens, 
 sons, husbands, fathers. I am shut in 
 upon myself" He paused, but Mr. Gal- 
 braith asked no question and made no 
 sign. "When I stretch out my hand 
 for any share in these things, there is a 
 shadow at my side which bars me out 
 from them. I am not talking with a 
 young man's exaggeration," he added, 
 hurriedly. " It is a real power — as real 
 to me every hour I live as Death will 
 be some day. I mean to yield to it. 
 It is a boy's part to fight and struggle 
 and whine for what can never be 
 mine!" 
 
 " It is a boy's part to yield ! Drag 
 your enemy to the light. It will prove 
 to be but a shadow after all." But the 
 energetic appeal, wrenched as it seemed 
 to be from the old man's tranquil lips in 
 
 spite of himself, did not move Dallas. 
 He shook his head quietly as he drew 
 Mr. Galbraith back into the screen of the 
 wall. 
 
 " I know what is against me," calmly. 
 "And, after all, I'm no more fitted to be 
 a husband or father than a buffalo is to 
 live in a farm-yard. I would grow tired 
 of any home and any wife in a month, 
 with the old gnawing hunger to be dig- 
 ging in the woods again. Roots and 
 earths I can understand. I do not need 
 to be a sham to them." 
 
 " There is no use, then, in fighting 
 against your nature." 
 
 " No." Yet he stood irresolute, look- 
 ing into the dark hall. Within there lay 
 the home and wife which he had come 
 back so far to find ; and if he turned his 
 back on them now, it was for the last 
 time. " If a man dared to be himself 
 in there," he said, thoughtfully. " I'll 
 tell you !" with his finger on Mr. Gal- 
 braith's breast, and blundering out the 
 words, for any kind of speculation was 
 new ground for Dallas. " Out there on 
 the frontier, gentlemen and trappers and 
 roughs used to camp and eat together 
 and ask no questions. You take a man 
 for what he is : he's a good shot, or he's 
 a plucky devil, or he's free with his 
 whisky and corn-bake — you take him at 
 best, you understand ? And as for what 
 went behind, what does that concern you ? 
 But here in Society, as you call it — 
 Christian Society — a man is weighed and 
 measured and marked, and, it seems to 
 me, by narrow scales, sir — narrow scales. 
 There's not an opinion he may have, or 
 a whim of temper or ignorance of man- 
 ner, that is not carped at and noted and 
 set down," bitterly. "And if he has 
 made a slip in his youth — " He stopped 
 abruptly. 
 
 " Yes, my son ?" laying both hands 
 softly on his shoulder. 
 
 " Or if, not being guilty, there is a 
 doubt upon him — such as has come upon 
 many men — I know such cases — when 
 there is no way to shake it off and prove 
 his innocence — " 
 
 "Then, Dallas?" 
 
 " There is no hope for him," after a 
 moment's silence. " There is no Christ 
 
 \ 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 191 
 
 among us now-a-days to look below the 
 hard luck or below the guilt." 
 
 The storm was rising with the moon, 
 driving the wind with shrill sighs down 
 the defiles ; the sallow clouds overhead 
 rolled and heaped themselves in bul- 
 warks along the west ; the sharp grains 
 of sleet began to strike against their 
 faces. " Let me take you in, sir," said 
 Dallas, with a change of tone. " This 
 wind is piercing." 
 
 " One moment, my son, I will not 
 argue with you as to this matter of which 
 you have spoken to me. I am not fitted 
 to argue with or to influence any one, I 
 fear. Do I understand that this feeling 
 has prompted you to leave us, and 
 go back finally to your old course of 
 life ?" 
 
 " That seems to me best, and I have 
 thought it over coolly to-night." 
 
 " It shall be as you wish. You are 
 a man — you are a stronger man than I. 
 I cannot judge for you. But give me a 
 little while longer to learn to know Tom's 
 boy," taking his hand as a woman might 
 have done. " You say there are reasons 
 which make it painful for you to come in 
 daily contact with us. I ask you, Dal- 
 las, to bear the pain. Stay with us a 
 month — a week longer." They had 
 
 reached the door of Mr. Galbraitlrs 
 chamber. 
 
 " I will stay for the time you wish," 
 said Dallas, pressing the delicate, wiin- 
 kled hand in his own blacksmith's fin- 
 gers. " Perhaps for a week or two I 
 can be of use to you." He opened the 
 door and bade him good-night, repeating 
 cheerfully, " I'll stay." He was glad the 
 old gentleman had not attempted to 
 argue with him. He was wise to see 
 that Dallas was the best judge of what 
 was the right course for him. But lie 
 would humor the old man's fancy. He 
 was weak and old. 
 
 As for Honora — and here Dallas put 
 his arm across his breast — she could not 
 hurt him again : he was quite willing 
 that she should despise him, know that 
 he was a convict. He saw the differ- 
 ence between them now. He would re- 
 main the boor that he was ; and she — 
 she was the finest, frailest work of— 
 Society. 
 
 As for his secret, they all might 
 know it now. He was done with them 
 — done with the world. Let them think 
 as they would of him. 
 
 He would tell them the story — to- 
 morrow. 
 
PART IX. 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 « A ND that was the end of John 
 /x Dour !" And Madam Galbraith, 
 as was her wont at the close of a long 
 story, cleared her throat, jerked down 
 her stomacher and brought herself gen- 
 erally into stately order. 
 
 " But Nicholas ? You said there was 
 a brother Nicholas ?" 
 
 " How ?" with a pleased chuckle. 
 "You're an insatiate fellow for old 
 family gossip, Dallas. I never could in- 
 duce my son Tom to listen to any of 
 it. Well, Nicholas — " and she went on, 
 her listener following her intently. It 
 was a cold winter morning, the sun 
 sparkling on the frozen creeks and rivers 
 below, and giving a glittering edge to the 
 bellying, bronze-colored vapors about the 
 horizon. There was a long balcony 
 across the upper part of the house, from 
 which the Dour landscape, as she called 
 it, with its mountains and hollows, in all 
 its changes of light and shade, could best 
 be seen. It had been her daily habit, 
 since she could walk, to walk there. She 
 could give you the age of every tree 
 within a year : when the crops failed on 
 the Dour land, that year of our Lord 
 was set down as a defaulter in time — the 
 sun was delinquent in the chief work he 
 19a 
 
 was sent to do. It was the land of the 
 Dours : there were they born ; there they 
 lay buried. As for the United States or 
 any world outside of it, they were of as 
 much value as the rim to the cup — so 
 much and no more. 
 
 She and Dallas stalked up and down 
 there side by side — their hands behind 
 their backs — every morning, whether it 
 rained or shone. He always went to 
 find her and bring her out for this walk. 
 These dead Dours were his people, and 
 for so many years he had stood alone. 
 He never tired of them. When they 
 had done with the dead Dours, they 
 took up their land. 
 
 « There's no better soil than that strip 
 of bottom east of McGruger's, in Amer- 
 ica," nodding toward it. " Why don't 
 you speak, Dallas ?" 
 
 " Because it's made ground, and badly 
 made. In five years it will only be fit 
 for sheep-grazing." 
 
 She rapped angrily with her staff: 
 " Sheep-grazing ! That is on a par with 
 your saying there were no indications of 
 gold on the North Bluff. Quite on a 
 par ! Why don't you speak, Dallas ?" 
 
 " There are no indications. There's 
 lead in the hills beyond, or I'm much 
 mistaken." 
 
 " Lead ? There never was lead heard 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 193 
 
 of on my land ! I'll go in, if you please ; 
 I'll go in. I cannot bear this perpetual 
 contradiction. My son Thomas never 
 contradicted me. Young people in those 
 days knew their position better and their 
 information. It is in my old age that I 
 must be taught my ignorance. Ignorance 
 of the Dour land ! You'll be sorry for 
 this, boy, when your own hair is gray." 
 
 " I am sorry now," earnestly, holding 
 her as she was entering the door. "You 
 know, madam, I have no wish to oppose 
 you, even in this trifle." 
 
 " Trifle ? You have strange ideas as 
 to what constitutes a trifle ! You mean 
 to acknowledge that there are indications 
 of gold, then ?" 
 
 " No, madam. There is no gold there, 
 and never will be ;" and Dallas' jaws shut 
 as tightly as the old woman's before him. 
 " How can I say what I know to be false ?" 
 
 "As you please, sir; as you please," 
 and, drawing her breath heavily like a 
 horse, she went into the open door of 
 the upper hall. Dallas continued his 
 walk to the window of his own room, 
 and going in, shut himself up and sat 
 down with his feet on tlie table. " Gold, 
 indeed ?" picking up certain bits of ore 
 that lay scattered about. " I'd like to 
 buy back the land and prove that there 
 is lead in it, and that that bottom is fit 
 for nothing but sheep-pasture. It ought 
 to be mine. We Dours are all buried 
 there," looking down at a little enclosure 
 on the same mountain as that on which 
 the house stood. 
 
 There was a tap at the window : " Hil- 
 lo, Dallas !" 
 
 Dallas took down his feet, and said, 
 " Hillo !" 
 
 "There's the last deed, thank the 
 Lord. When a thing's dead, let's bury 
 it out of sight — the sooner the better," 
 said Colonel Pervis, throwing down some 
 papers on which the letters ranged them- 
 selves square and black as mutes in a 
 funeral procession. "And there goes 
 the last of the Dour land, except these 
 half-dozen acres about the house. It has 
 gone for a song." 
 
 "It could be bought back again as 
 cheaply, you think ?" 
 
 " Have you a mind to buy it, Gal- 
 13 
 
 braith ?" quickly. « That would be a 
 noble task to set yourself now in your 
 youth." 
 
 "I? No. I'm but a vagabond, liv- 
 ing from hand to mouth." 
 
 " You persist in your determination, 
 then, to turn your back on the Dours 
 and the Dour land before long, do you ?" 
 
 Dallas did not speak for a moment : 
 " I promised Mr. Galbraitli to remain for 
 a month, and it is nearly over now. It is 
 time I was gone." 
 
 The Colonel folded and squared the 
 papers before him, keeping a sidelong 
 watch on the young man. " A month 
 only 1 It seems as though you had 
 always been here. Your niche was kept 
 so vacant and so ready for you, you see ! 
 You fitted in like a keystone to the arch. 
 It's an unaccountable move for a young 
 man to turn his back upon his home — a 
 man in your case." 
 
 " I could almost believe I had been 
 always here," said Dallas, under his 
 breath, glancing around. Some people 
 stamp themselves at once upon their sur- 
 roundings. Tom's room was changed ; 
 had taken on itself the impress of its 
 new occupant in a curious degree. Colo- 
 nel Pervis, having tied up his documents 
 with red tape in what he considered a 
 thoroughly legal manner, his head know- 
 ingly on one side, began wandering 
 about, his hands in his pockets, staring 
 up at the hanging-shelves filled with 
 ores, the papers tacked on the walls, 
 gummed over with lichen and shavings 
 of different woods. 
 
 " So you're going just as you've got 
 things ship-shape about you ? Though 
 you could pick up this rubbish anywhere. 
 But it's your meat and drink. A woods 
 now is a completer thing to you than the 
 best furnished parlor, I reckon !" with a 
 subdued awe. " And you're going never 
 to come back, Dallas ?" 
 
 " I did not say that. I'd be glad to 
 think of this room and my place here 
 always kept vacant and ready for me, 
 and that I could come back to it when I 
 pleased, from year to year." He too got 
 up and went around from shelf to shelf, 
 but in a lagging, lethargic way, setting 
 straight and dusting his specimens. 
 
194 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 The Colonel's curious questions had 
 taktn, as it were, the life and color from 
 all that was around him. He felt him- 
 self to be suddenly heavy and dull as 
 the lump of mud mixed with iron that he 
 held in his hand. He was going. Had 
 he not determined to go that night, in 
 spite of his grandfather's entreaties ? 
 Nothing had occurred since then to 
 alter his position Nothing. When 
 the time came to say farewell, he would 
 tell them his story ; and after he was 
 gone, perhaps the sting of it would grow 
 less sharp to them, and they would be 
 glad to have him come some time, con- 
 vict as he was, and sleep in his own 
 room for a night, and to remember how, 
 if Fate long ago had been juster to him, 
 this might have been always his happy 
 home. The month would be over in a 
 few days. He had not told them his 
 secret, thinking he might surely be free 
 from it for that little time — time enough 
 only to take breath in this sweet, pure 
 air of home before, like the Wandering 
 Jew, he took up his curse and began 
 again his solitary pilgrimage. He had 
 something of the feeling of a man whose 
 days are checked and counted off, mea- 
 sured out by some inexorable disease ; 
 less pity for himself than yearning ten- 
 derness for these whom he must leave 
 behind — a hungry longing to be dear to 
 these healthy, fortunate people who were 
 so dear to him. In the little time left 
 him he thought they should feel that he 
 was their son, bone of their bone, in 
 every word or action by which he could 
 bring them near or show the affection 
 that choked his stupid heart and brought 
 the tears to his grave blue eyes. 
 
 At that moment the thump, thump of 
 Madam Galbraith's stafT was heard out- 
 side, and then a single authoritative sum- 
 mons to the door. Poor Dallas had it 
 open almost before the knock, and met 
 her with a heated, anxious countenance 
 and outstretched hand. Her face, which 
 was black as a thunder-cloud, instantly 
 cleared : 
 
 '• Why, how's this ? Glad to see the 
 old dragon, hey? Well, I'll come in, 
 though I only was in search of Colonel 
 Pervis. He has some papers for me to 
 
 sign, I suspect. What are you hiding 
 them for, sir ?" sternly, taking her 
 seat, bringing up an inkstand and put- 
 ting it down in front of her with a bang 
 that made the Colonel wink. " I know 
 it is the last of my land I am to sign 
 away. Am I an h)'steric girl, do you 
 think, that the news must be broken to 
 me piece by piece ? Give me a pen, my 
 son." 
 
 Now, the truth was that the Colonel 
 had stopped in Dallas' room from sheer 
 cowardice before he took the papers to 
 her. Nobody knew in what mood she 
 would complete her sacrifice — whether in 
 fury against herself and Fate, or gloomy 
 silence. Pervis, behind her chair, drew 
 a long breath, and rolled up his eyes 
 thankfully when the Hannah Dour Gal- 
 braith was scored in free, deep characters 
 across the whole bottom of the page. 
 She threw down the pen and looked up 
 at Dallas, her hard, long upper lip trem- 
 bling as slie laughed hoarsely : 
 
 '^ Tut ! tut ! why it is only so much 
 earth and water gone," rising as she 
 spoke and putting her hand on Dallas' 
 shoulder. " But I have something left 
 which nothing can take away." 
 
 Even Colonel Pervis, whose observa- 
 tion was as headlong as his tongue, 
 noticed the singular silence in which 
 Galbraith received this half appeal. He 
 was unusually gende with her, however, 
 after that, leading her down the stairs to 
 the dining-room, where the usual cozy 
 luncheon-table was set, and Mr. Gal- 
 braith and Honora awaited them. So 
 gentle that Madam Galbraith, who did not 
 usually dally long in regions of tender- 
 ness, presumed on it. She always had 
 an irresistible propensity to lash a quiet 
 horse to find what spirit was in him. 
 
 " Dallas was surprised, James," she 
 said graciously, glancing at the pale face 
 of the young man on the opposite side of 
 the table — "very much surprised, when 
 I mentioned to him Edward Dour's the- 
 ory that there was gold in the North 
 Bluff. He doubted it, in fact; but I 
 have no doubt from his manner now he 
 is convinced of his mistake, and regrets 
 that he differed with me." 
 
 The horse was alive to the la.sh. His 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 195 
 
 secret, his affectionate resolves all for- 
 gotten, went whistling down the wind. 
 " Edward Dour or any man who tried to 
 con\-ince you of tliat was worse than a 
 fool, madam : he was a knave. It is 
 preposterous. Look at the formation 
 of the soil — " 
 
 « Now, Dallas," said Mrs. DufSeld, 
 putting her blue-veined little hand pre- 
 remptorily on his Hps, "if you bring your 
 hobbies on the table, nobody can eat a 
 mouthful, and this custard of Honora's 
 is dehcious. Adjourn the soils, my 
 dear. Cannot you yield to your grand- 
 mother ?'' she added in a vexed whisper. 
 
 " I hope to the Lord he'll not : every 
 blow brings them closer together," ejacu- 
 lated the Colonel in the same tone, while 
 Dallas sat obstinately silent. The storm, 
 however, soon passed by, clearing the 
 air. It was an old matter by this time : 
 there were such storms between them at 
 everj- meal. After a while Dallas began 
 to notice how cheerful the fire was. flash- 
 ing over the snug htde room, while the 
 winter landscape lay drearily outside. 
 Then the little part)- about the table 
 drew closer together when he began to 
 talk, and ate and laughed with fresh en- 
 joj-menL They were careless and happy 
 and sure of each other, as they had not 
 been before they were shipwrecked to- 
 gether. 
 
 Otherwise, the shipwreck had made 
 but little change. The great Dour land- 
 scape yet lay without, no matter what 
 hold the flimsy bank-notes of other men 
 might affect to laj- upon it : the house 
 w^as unchanged ; there were still the 
 chairs placed at the table for the friends 
 ■who might happen to come in, and the 
 friends were always there to fill them ; 
 there were one or two quiet old servants 
 instead of the old crowd and confusion ; 
 but the dishes had a flavor beyond any 
 which spices could give. Honora had 
 taken Lizz)-'s place. And it is wonder- 
 ful what human interest and poetry one 
 finds in a beefsteak if hands we love 
 have seasoned it ; especially if it be a 
 tender cut and done to a turn. 
 
 There had been so much to tell and 
 show to their new-found son, to make 
 him familiar with his home, that the 
 
 great loss and consequent changes had 
 been slurred over every day until they 
 were almost forgotten. His grandfather 
 had haunts and walks which he must 
 know ; Madam Galbraith had her legends 
 of each to tell when they came home ; 
 there were the old neighbors and friends 
 — neighbors and friends for many gen- 
 erations — who were clamorous to know 
 the boy and to hand him around through 
 a long succession of dinner-parties and 
 oyster-suppers. There was a thorough- 
 ness of geniality in the old fellows and 
 their wives with which Dallas struck a 
 quick accord. 
 
 "The boy's one of ourselves, sir!" 
 cried Squire Pool, enthusiastically to his 
 grandfather, giving the verdict of the 
 county. « He fell into our ways from 
 the first day as if he were born among 
 us, and wasn't chock full of such queer, 
 out-of-the-way learning. The county 
 has cause to be proud of him, sir. He's 
 healthy and hearty, sir, as few of our 
 young fellows are now-a-days; and he 
 hkes a joke, Dallas does," confidentially, 
 "as quiet as he looks. Now. some of 
 them stories he told at our house was 
 capital. When you'd think "em over, 
 you'd see how keen they were." 
 
 They gave Dallas no time for think- 
 ing of himself He was up before dawn 
 and do«-n among the emigrants with his 
 grandfather and Pervis, ser\-ing as an 
 interpreter between them and these 
 coarser folk, -with whom his S}-mpathy 
 seemed, Per\-is said, as close as that of 
 blood. The Galbraith funds were all ex- 
 hausted : homes and emplo)Tnent in the 
 West had been found for the larger num- 
 ber of the colony, but there had lingered 
 a crowd of WTetches, the most unable 
 and helpless. For them, until Dallas 
 went to work to plan and contrive, there 
 was apparently no help. Madam Gal- 
 braith had given all she had. and now 
 washed her hands in innocency. Her 
 husband, when he was among them, 
 stripped himself of his ver}- clothing in 
 his nervous trembling compassion ; but 
 at home, with his feet to the fire and his 
 book in hand, he was apt to philosophize 
 about them coolly, regarding them as a 
 vague abstraction — one of the unclean 
 
196 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 masses that make up this dull, unan- 
 swerable puzzle of a world. Colonel 
 Pervis God-blessed his soul, and grew 
 hot and cold, and rode madly about the 
 neighborhood, drumming up baskets of 
 provisions for them, and then, conscience- 
 clear, sat down composedly to his whist 
 and jorum of brandy. " What more 
 could he do ? Wasn't he a shiftless 
 devil, that never had taken care of 
 himself?" 
 
 But there was not one of the sordid, 
 hungry faces which this healthy, hearty 
 young fellow, whose laugh was so in- 
 fectious and whose jokes were so capital, 
 did not carry with him night and day 
 with a motherly tenderness — an aching at 
 heart that could only grow out of his own 
 hard mischance in life. With this weight 
 to carry, he had been living altogether 
 outside of himself, and until to-day, when 
 the last man was comfortably settled, he 
 had no chance to go back and probe and 
 speculate upon his old foul secret, and 
 how he should reconcile it to his new 
 life. 
 
 They used to ride back from the wells 
 to breakfast, and then his mother claimed 
 him for long walks or visits to the neigh- 
 bors : she lost all her apathy when he 
 was beside her ; went about fair, smil- 
 ing, triumphant, quite content to be 
 silent so long as he would speak ; or his 
 grandfather established him in an arm- 
 chair in the library beside his own. The 
 old gentleman had gathered Dallas' books 
 on geology together, and was studying 
 them with a boy's freshness. Honora 
 used to stop outside of the door and 
 listen to their eager voices and Dallas' 
 occasional hearty burst of laughter, and 
 go away a little colder and stiller, and 
 with dryer eyes than before. For, what- 
 ever he might be to others — whether she 
 saw his eyes full of pity or twinkling 
 with amusement at Madam Galbraith's 
 absurdities ; whether she donned her 
 dazzling little dress and enacted the 
 dazzling little role she first played, or 
 sat humbly stitching in the corner, like 
 the poor dependant she felt herself to 
 be — Dallas stood aloof from her, cold, 
 grave, regardless. 
 
 He had forgotten the stain upon him 
 
 with others, but with her he had nevei 
 forgotten it. 
 
 She sat opposite to him at the table 
 to-day, the light from the window at 
 his back throwing the delicate little 
 figure and thoughtful face, so full of 
 sweet, untold meanings, into relief, 
 while the others were in the shadow of 
 the dull wintry day. He looked at her 
 alone as he talked, her figure being thus 
 in relief, and for the same reason, per- 
 haps, remembered how he had stood 
 apart from her, never forgetting the 
 stain. He was very thankful that he 
 had done this. 
 
 As the firelight burned redder and 
 warmer, and the home within grew more 
 and more homelike and familiar, he 
 looked out at the driving snow and the 
 solitary wastes sloping toward the west, 
 where his path lay : the feeling of thank- 
 fulness strengthened within him. Luxury 
 would not have tempted him. But it 
 would have been so easy to rest here, in 
 this homely old house ; so easy to forget 
 that he was a solitary outcast, with these 
 two or three people who loved him to 
 work for ; so easy to have been tempted 
 to strive with all the strength of his 
 manhood to draw this pure little girl to 
 him — to win her to lay her head on his 
 breast, to lie there for ever, his wife. 
 
 She looked up at that moment, laugh- 
 ing and blushing, when her uncle spoke 
 to her. Because his life lately had been 
 so healthy and vigorous, and free from 
 all morbid pain, the shadow of the Al- 
 bany years lay the heavier now on Dal- 
 las. It lay like some foul disease, with 
 which his healthy self had nothing to do. 
 The old heavy throbbing began in his 
 breast, with which his heart used to 
 count out the slow hours in prison, each 
 one nearer death : he looked at her a 
 moment, and then rose suddenly. He 
 was very thankful that he had never 
 crossed the space between them — very 
 thankful ! 
 
 Mr. Galbraith followed him to the 
 window, where he stood with his hands 
 behind him, leaning his head against the 
 pane. " We will have heavy snows this 
 winter," he said, cheerfully. " It will be 
 long before I can go with you on your 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 197 
 
 tramps, Dallas. But in the spring you 
 must let me take my hammer and chisel 
 and follow aftftr you. I'm a good walker 
 for my age. Very good," glancing down 
 at his thin legs complacently. 
 
 "You forget, sir," speaking slowly, 
 « I gave myself but a month to remain 
 here, and that is nearly over." 
 
 He had not turned his head to look 
 ■at the old man when he spoke, and for 
 a httle while he heard only the sleet 
 beating against the window-pane : then 
 his grandfather put his hand on his arm : 
 " There is nothing here which could cause 
 you to alter your purpose, Dallas .''" 
 
 " Nothing." 
 
 "There is no effort which I could 
 make that would do away with this ne- 
 cessity which urges you ? Consider, my 
 son." 
 
 " I have considered. There is no 
 chance of any change while I live. 
 None." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith stood beside him quite 
 silent, but Dallas moved away restlessly. 
 He could not bear the reproach of the 
 presence of this old man, not one of 
 whose days had been tainted even with 
 suspicion. 
 
 " Ho, Dallas !" called the Colonel, 
 looking up from his newspaper. " By- 
 George, my memory's going ! Beck 
 asked me to desire you to ride over to 
 the Queen, on particular business, early 
 this morning." 
 
 " I will go now. It is not yet too 
 late," glad of the escape. But when he 
 reached the hall and had shut the door 
 behind him, he halted. Honora stood 
 in the large bay-window at the farther 
 end, quite alone, her hands clasped 
 above her eyes, watching so intently the 
 driving snow that she had not heard his 
 step. 
 
 He was going : he meant to put a 
 barrier between them that never could 
 be passed. But before he went ? Other 
 men drew the women they loved to 
 them for life, made them their own, 
 body and soul. If he could but hold 
 her hand once in his ! But once! It was 
 not much to come near her in these few 
 days, before they parted for ever, to 
 take away a few kind looks and words. 
 
 So thankful was he that he had never 
 forgotten the bar between them that he 
 felt he deserved a reward. He laid 
 down the cloak that he carried, anc' 
 went toward her with quick, resolute 
 steps. It was the first time he had 
 come near her of his own free will since 
 the first day he came ; yet, being a 
 woman, and hearing him behind her 
 now, she did not turn or look at him, 
 but drew aside with a smile, to make 
 room for hinx in the narrow recess, as 
 naturally as though they had been hourly 
 companions, though he noticed that an 
 uncontrollable shiver passed over her. 
 It was she, too, who spoke first after 
 they had stood for some time silent, side 
 by side. 
 
 " You are going to ride over to the 
 Indian Oueen, I think you said ?" 
 
 " Yes?' 
 
 " Lizzy is there : she is going to-mor- 
 row. I bade her good-bye ; but will 
 you give her my dear love ? Will you 
 tell her again that I know what a good 
 friend she has been to me V 
 
 " Yes. I will tell her." 
 
 The silence between them, which 
 these surface-words did not seem to 
 break for some strange reason, seemed 
 full of meaning to Miss Dundas — her 
 color, her ordinary strength and vigor 
 left her : it was as though she saw a 
 warning presence which held them apart; 
 the ghost, the shadow of a something of 
 which the reality was never to hve, 
 never to be known to them. She tried 
 to thrust it aside with any sound of 
 words, without caring for their meaning: 
 
 " I will never see her again. I never 
 have been outside of these hills. Friends 
 who go away are lost to me for ever. Cut 
 you will see her ? She is going back to 
 Manasquan. and you have lived there. 
 You can go back again to see the mists 
 come up over the marshes, and the sea 
 break on the beach : Lizzy has told me 
 of it. It is good to be a man, to come 
 and go where you will. There is noth- 
 ing to keep a man from his friend unless 
 death part them." 
 
 "No, I can never go back to i\rana- 
 squan." 
 
 She glanced quickly up at him There 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 was no morbid shadow in the face 
 turned to hers, nor feverish discontent. It 
 was that of a resolute, young and strong 
 man, with great possibilities in it for 
 happiness and achievement, looking down 
 calm and uncomplaining upon the friend 
 from whom death had parted him. He 
 had accepted the death. There was in 
 his look the memory of much that had 
 been, of all that might have been ; but 
 there was no promise of anything to 
 come. 
 
 She understood the meaning of the 
 look fully. 
 
 " I am a man free to come and go as 
 I will," he said. "Yet I can never go 
 back to Manasquan. I meet men and 
 women who I know can only be my 
 friends after I am dead. There are 
 hands which I can never touch." and his 
 eyes, she thought, rested on hers, where 
 it lay close beside him. 
 
 " A man," said Honora, with a slight 
 pause upon the word, " can do what he 
 will. His life is in his own hand." 
 
 " I thought that when I was a boy," 
 said Dallas. " But there is something 
 which goes before you through life, and 
 rules your way. Miss Dundas. It is not 
 tangible, even as the pillar of cloud. 
 But you follow it. You follow it, if it 
 leads you through the fire or the sea." 
 He was silent, not waiting for her to 
 speak, apparently, but because the sub- 
 ject was closed and ended, and there 
 was as little use in farther words as in 
 moans over a grave. 
 
 The dry white flakes fell without 
 steadily. Honora, who was never to be 
 his wife, from whom he was thankful he 
 had held himself as a stranger, was be- 
 side him : her soft dress touched his 
 foot, her breath clouded the panes. 
 Once he had felt her breath, and knew 
 how sweet it was. 
 
 "A man," he said deliberately, as 
 though reciting a lesson, •' will learn to 
 obey and keep within the lines ruled to 
 him. He will not come near the woman 
 he loves if he knows it is forbidden, 
 though no other can take her place to 
 nim. He would not come near her. He 
 would not touch her hand, though it lay 
 beside him." 
 
 She drew away her hand involuntarily. 
 His whole countenance changed at that : 
 he caught it in his own with a breath- 
 less, half-famished look, smoothed and 
 stroked it as it lay in his own tanned 
 palm, narrow and fine and milky-tinted, 
 
 " I am going away, Honora," drawing 
 her toward him. " I want to hold your 
 hand once, and hear you say that you are 
 my friend. I want to remember that 
 when I am gone." 
 
 " You may remember it. I am your 
 friend," in a measured voice. 
 
 " How can you be ? How could 3'ou 
 know me ? Other men have been able 
 to come close to you and try to show 
 you the best that is in them — to change 
 their tastes and habits to suit your 
 fancies. But I — " 
 
 " I know you better than any other 
 human being does. Cousin Dallas," with 
 a dry. bitter tone. 
 
 " What do you know of me ?" hur- 
 riedly letting her hand fall, which had 
 rested in his as passive as the handle of 
 a machine. She adjusted her disordered 
 sleeve with it as mechanically and pre- 
 cisely as if it had been a machine. 
 
 " We are cousins, you know, and you 
 have been the object of interest in all 
 eyes : it is not unnatural that I should 
 have noticed you curiously." 
 
 " No ; it is not unnatural. What do 
 you know of me ?" 
 
 Honora gave an abrupt laugh, in 
 which there was no sweetness, and 
 which seemed to rob her cheek of its 
 slight color. " I know you to be earnest 
 and zealous in your work. You ought 
 to be. What heart or soul you have has 
 gone down into it." 
 
 "Into my work? And my mother 
 and kinsfolk ?" 
 
 " God gave them to you, and 3'Ou 
 make the best of them. They were 
 none of your choosing. You do your 
 duty." 
 
 " But I do not go out of my path to 
 find love or friendship ?" 
 
 " No. You go out of your beaten 
 track only for ores and reptiles. Where 
 they are concerned, I have seen you 
 eager, or angry, or glad as other men. 
 But only then." 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 199 
 
 " And if love came to me ?" 
 
 " You would receive it as that stone 
 wall does the poor creeper yonder. You 
 would give it support and protection. 
 But an answering life, never. A few 
 moments ago, before you came to me, I 
 was thinking of you, when I looked at 
 that rock and the miserable vine — " 
 
 Dallas, always blind as a mole to any 
 but the barest meanings, studied the 
 passionate little face before him for a 
 while, finding nothing but the indifferent 
 contempt of her words in it. He began 
 to button up his coat slowly. 
 
 '• Well !'' stifling a sigh in his big 
 breast. "It doesn't matter ; though I 
 did not think you would judge me so 
 hardly, Miss Dundas. I know you so 
 well that I thought you would be just to 
 me, perhaps, when I was gone." 
 
 " I am just. I am your friend." 
 
 " No ! no ! I know what friendship 
 is better than you. After all, I would 
 have been a tenderer, more loyal woman 
 than you." 
 
 " You are going. Cousin Dallas ?" see- 
 ing that he took up the cloak. 
 
 " Only to the Queen. On Monday I 
 •will go to the West." The fastenings 
 of the cloak were intricate. She watched 
 him for a minute, and then turned her 
 head, looking out of the window. 
 
 " I — I have not vexed you. You are 
 not going the sooner because of what I 
 have said ?" 
 
 " Not a day sooner. I intended to go 
 on Moiida}^" The cloak was fastened 
 at last, and he came up to her side again. 
 She turned quickly, and held out her 
 hand. He took it, holding it an instant 
 and looking in her face steadily. " I 
 could make you think differently of me, 
 Miss Dundas. But I will not. Why 
 should I ?" 
 
 The little hand which had laid in his 
 passive as a machine, was alive now, 
 burning and trembling, but he released 
 it quietly and drew back. 
 
 " You do not intend to try to alter my 
 opinion, then ?" with a quick breath, that 
 sounded like a sob. 
 
 " It I could change it by the turning 
 of my finger, I would not do it," vehe- 
 mently. " I hold my life in my own 
 
 hands, as you said : I will not be dis- 
 honest." 
 
 A moment after she saw him riding 
 down the avenue through the snow — a 
 black, powerful, obstinate figure, against 
 which the wind blew and the soft flakes 
 drifted in vain. 
 
 " If I could take her to my arms to- 
 morrow, I would not do it," were the 
 words which he said again and again to 
 himself " I hold my life in my own 
 hands." 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 Matt was perched in the window of 
 the stable-loft, among the hay, watching 
 for Dallas, when he rode up, and Beck 
 himself came out from the door below, 
 his green wamus on and pitchfork in 
 hand, and gave him a cheer. " It's Lizzy 
 that sent for you, sir : she's got a sudden 
 notion of bein' off to Manasquan. But 
 I'm mighty glad you're here to look over 
 things, now that they're in order. What 
 do you think of them pigs, now ? Gen- 
 uine Berkshire, they are. Well, sir, it's 
 a relief to get back to the Queen, bless 
 her copper-colored phiz — a relief Beggy 
 and me got the money the madam give 
 us changed into specie, and it's back in 
 the tea-pot. I kin hardly get the smell 
 of them infernal wells out of my nose 
 even yet," rooting among the pigs as 
 though inhaling the odors of Araby the 
 Blest. " Hyur's the old woman now." 
 
 Peggy came bustling out, her apron 
 over her head. " Lord bless us ! is it 
 you at last, Mr. Galbraith ? In with 
 you, Matt, and ask Miss Lizzy to put the 
 coffee on the boil. Beck's been on the 
 tenter-hooks all day, clearin' up and 
 watchin' for you to inspect the place. 
 The Queen don't seem the natural 
 Queen without you, sir, for all. We've 
 got a nice turkey-poult for dinner, 
 waitin' an' ready." 
 
 " I'm very glad to hear it," said Gal- 
 braith, heartily. " I did not eat any 
 luncheon for some reason or other, and 
 this ride through the snow makes a man 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 ravenous. Good-day, Wash. How are 
 you, Lizzy ?" sitting down on the porch 
 to unstrap his leggings. But, in spite of 
 his noisy greeting, Lizzy hngered in the 
 doorway, looking at him. She fancied 
 the heartiness was artificial, and that 
 there were unusual dark hollows under 
 her boy's eyes. She followed him 
 closely when he came in, swinging 
 Matt on his shoulder, and beginning to 
 romp with him, evading her, while Beck 
 made his toilet outside by pulling off his 
 boots, and Peggy hurried up the dinner, 
 peeping in the lids of various stew-pans : 
 
 " The tomaytoes is done to a turn ; 
 but the potatoes is dried, I'm afeard. 
 But this celery — Oh, you know they 
 were goin' to sell off the celery the day 
 after Beck come up to take the house 
 agen ? Seemed kind o' providential ; 
 throughout it's bin providential since the 
 day you set foot on them there steps, 
 Mr. Galbraith." Peggy stopped in the 
 middle of her neat little kitchen, tapping 
 off her words with a shining pewter 
 spoon in one hand, the stove at her 
 back, with its half-dozen savory steams 
 rising in a cloud. " I often says to 
 Beck, ' Do you mind the day when Mr. 
 Galbraith first come up them steps, and 
 wrote his name in our register ?' There's 
 been changes since then. Changes !" 
 
 " I would like to look at that register, 
 Peggy," said Dallas, suddenly lowering 
 Matt on the floor. " Have you it 
 there ?" She gave it to him, dusting it 
 on her apron, and he turned over the 
 leaves to the page where his name was 
 written in unsteady characters. It was 
 the first time he had taken his name and 
 place on leaving the prison. Next week 
 he was going out from them again, and, 
 beyond the name, what had he gained ? 
 The stain was on him heavy now as 
 then. 
 
 " What is it, Dallas ?" 
 
 '• Nothing of moment, Lizzy," closing 
 the book. " Only that for some of us 
 the chance of change is over." 
 
 Lizzy turned away hastily. " That is 
 better, Dallas," she said. " I want no 
 change, but rest now." She went into 
 the other room presently, and Mrs. Beck 
 whispered to Dallas that she had been 
 
 " low " ever since a letter came last night 
 Dallas thought rather that the long 
 season of anxiety and work was begin- 
 ning to tell on her. She had been worn 
 and listless of late : the salt sea-air and 
 drowsy sun yonder would revive her 
 again. She came out again in quite a 
 glow of cheerfulness, however, and 
 helped Peggy place the dishes on the 
 table, and sat beside Matt, joking with 
 him as she cut choice bits of turkey for 
 him. He must come and see the cozy 
 little house where she would live quite 
 alone, where you could see the white 
 surf roll in on the beach, and the fisher- 
 men drawing their nets along the edge. 
 Wouldn't she be afraid to live there 
 alone ? How she laughed at that ! Why 
 she had been alone these many years^ 
 many years. Would she be afraid of the 
 sea or of the woods ? Very few people 
 there in Manasquan remembered she was 
 alive: they would soon forget her alto- 
 gether in her queer brown house in the 
 trees : she would live on, she told Matt, 
 and on, till she got to be a little, white- 
 haired old woman, and then some morn- 
 ing they would come to find her, and she 
 would be gone. 
 
 Perhaps somebody would say then, 
 "Why, we used to know her when her 
 cheeks were red and her hair was black." 
 Though, perhaps, they would have for- 
 gotten to say even that. 
 
 They did not join very heartily in her 
 laugh after this, and Beck fell to work 
 slashing fiercely at the other side of the 
 turkey, and piled up all their plates 
 afresh. Then Lizzy, in another tone, 
 told Peggy she was quite serious in 
 wishing Matt to come and spend the 
 summer with her, and she wanted her 
 and her husband to come ; and then she 
 glanced at Dallas with a sudden white 
 face, and was silent. 
 
 He looked up at her quietly, and 
 smiled. She had carried his trouble a 
 long time. His shoulders were broad 
 enough to bear it all now. 
 
 Peggy's dinner was so good that it 
 Winded her to anything beyond. " Beck, 
 give Mr. Galbraith some cranberry-jelly; 
 his plate's quite clear. I kerried over a 
 pot or two of my apple-butter to Mrs. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Rattlin yesterday, knowin' all her stores 
 went in the fire. Dear ! dear ! but 
 they're snug over there. It ud do your 
 heart good ; and Miss Gerty, she declared 
 she'd take a crock for herself. She's 
 getting ready to house-keep. Her man 
 has gone into business in Ohio. He's 
 a thin-hlooded feller, but he's mighty 
 clever." 
 
 " He's ahead of the telegraph, that 
 Dour," said Beck, with a significant 
 shake of the head, his drumstick in 
 hand. " He's shouldered the Rattlins 
 heartily, though, with all his sharpness. 
 Now, Peggy, my woman, whar's yer 
 puddin' V 
 
 The pudding disappeared to the last 
 crumb. The table was cleared, and 
 Peggy seated by the clean hearth at her 
 sewing, when Lizzy beckoned Dallas out 
 to the little porch. " I sent for you to 
 say good-bye, Galbraith." 
 
 " You are going back to the old place, 
 Lizzy ?" 
 
 " Yes. Every hour I stay here adds 
 to your risk of detection. Besides, I'm 
 not well. By night or day I hear a 
 sound like the roll of the surf, beat, 
 beat. It drives me mad. I think it 
 must be the homesickness, as Peggy 
 calls it," with a faint smile. " I had a 
 letter from Father Kimball yesterday, 
 and since then the surf has called louder 
 and louder." She took an enormous 
 yellow envelope from her pocket as she 
 spoke, and opened it. 
 
 " May I read it, Lizzy ?" She stood 
 beside him as he sat on the bench por- 
 ing over the old-fashioned writing, smil- 
 ing now and then to himself A single 
 name belonging to those old Manasquan 
 days had a curious power over him, she 
 saw ; brought out his hidden self— the 
 old Dallas, who used to go rooting 
 through the woods, trolling out fishing 
 songs. He had forgotten, in his eager- 
 ness, the gulf that lay between himself 
 and them. 
 
 " So Becker has added a room to the 
 smithy .?" muttering as he read. "And 
 Tim Graah's mate on a schooner ? So ! 
 so ! Tim's almost a man by this time ; 
 and the railroad's looked for next year. 
 To be sure, and will be till the day of 
 
 judgment. There's a salt smell in the 
 very paper, Lizzy," turning it over v^ith 
 an odd homesick look. " I- am glad for 
 you that you are going back to Mana- 
 squan. There's no other place in the 
 world so quiet and so friendly. No 
 other." After a little pause he read to 
 the end : " Kimball says that Van Zeldt 
 is married. Lizzy. Do you know his 
 wife ?" as he carefully folded the letter, 
 and gave it back to her. 
 
 " Jenny Noanes ? Yes, she was a 
 rosy-cheeked little girl, who used to 
 come to the Point to pick huckleberries 
 in the fall. Very pretty ! Oh, veiy 
 pretty !" 
 
 " Too young for Jim, then, I would 
 say." 
 
 " Just the right age, Dallas ; just the 
 right age," emphatically. " Men don't 
 grow old as soon as women. They like 
 fresh roses and fresh hearts," with a 
 laugh that stopped too short, looking 
 over the unending white slopes growing 
 gray in the twilight. 
 
 " You are cold, Lizzy, and ill. Go in. 
 I am glad you're going home." 
 
 " Yes ; it is my home." 
 
 " I do not forget that you never would 
 have left it but for me. If it had not 
 been for me, your life would have been 
 — like that of other women. I have 
 not many words, Lizzy, but I never 
 forget." 
 
 Lizzy did not seem to hear him. She 
 walked to the end of the porch, where 
 the wind blew freely on her sober, color- 
 less face : one would have fancied some 
 raging fever burned under the pallor and 
 steadiness which sought some outward 
 storm to contend with. " You are going 
 to remain here, Dallas ?" she said, 
 suddenly. 
 
 He hesitated. It was not easy to tell 
 her that her sacrifice had been in vain — 
 that after all he was to be the vagabond 
 and wanderer, to save whom she had 
 given her all. 
 
 « No, Lizzy, I am going. The ship 
 yonder is low in the water already. I 
 will not stay in her to make a wreck of 
 her altogether." 
 
 " Thank God !" with a long breath of 
 relief. She hurried toward him, and 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 caught his wrists. "Will you go at once, 
 then ?" 
 
 Dallas stared down on her. " Go ? 
 Why, you brought me here. You would 
 have had me marry — " 
 
 " That is all over ! There's no hope 
 for you, do as we will." As she spoke 
 she glanced again and again over her 
 shoulder into the darkening twilight. 
 There was a leafless forest stretching its 
 black and grim phalanx down the hill 
 to the frozen creek below : up the road 
 were scattered bare trees, lifting their 
 dusky, spectral arms with a mute appeal. 
 She watched them as she spoke, as 
 though some shadow she dreaded would 
 appear from them. On the hill-road, 
 down which Dallas, once standing where 
 he did now, had seen Laddoun's black 
 horse striking out fiery sparks in the 
 night, the snow lay deep and soft. But 
 in the strained silence he fancied he 
 heard muffled footfalls coming closer, 
 closer. 
 
 " Is it the dead you fear ?" he said, 
 half smiling, touching Lizzy to rouse her. 
 
 She rubbed her hand slowly over her 
 forehead. " I do not know. We people 
 from the sea hear voices and see faces 
 which no one else can know. He is on 
 your track, Dallas. He is on your track." 
 
 Dallas drew back. "There is but 
 one man who can do me harm. You 
 mean Laddoun ?" 
 
 " I mean Laddoun. I do not know 
 whether he be dead or alive." 
 
 " It does not matter. Death will 
 make small change in George, I fancy. 
 Is he here ?" 
 
 " I heard to-day that he had been seen 
 here a few weeks ago, looking for you. 
 Do you understand, Dallas ? Looking 
 for you. And there is a rumor of his 
 death, last summer, in California. How- 
 ever he comes, dead or alive, he has a 
 power which you cannot fight against. 
 Oh, Dallas, I could not live to see you 
 trodden to the dust here ! I thank 
 God that you are going." 
 
 He turned on her : " You think I 
 would turn my back on Laddoun V and 
 then began walking up and down the 
 porch in the slow, swinging gait which 
 she well knew. 
 
 " Now he's winding up his soul in 
 obstinacy, and all the powers in heaven 
 or hell would not move him," she mut- 
 tered in appalled dismay. She caught 
 him by the sleeve as he passed : " Dallas ? 
 Dallas ?" 
 
 He stopped. "I have my hfe in my 
 own hands. I am an honest man ; 
 and, by God's help, I mean to take my 
 place and marry the wife I love, as other 
 honest men do. I'll be baited and bulhed 
 by no ruffian, though he rise from his 
 grave to do it. The matter's closed, 
 Lizzy. We will not talk of it again." 
 
 She leaned against the railing of the 
 porch until he had gone in to bid Peggy 
 and Beck good-bye, and, coming out 
 again, had mounted his horse. Then 
 she went down and put her hand up on 
 the pommel : " Dallas !" 
 
 "Go on, Lizzy," kindly. But a new 
 expression in his usually patient eyes 
 reminded her how many years he had 
 been baited by that old ill-luck as by a 
 hound from hell, and that now he had 
 suddenly turned upon it. But his man- 
 ner to her was very gentle. " What is 
 it, Lizzy ?" he said again. 
 
 " I only wished to say to you, dear 
 boy," trembling as she said it, " that dis- 
 covery now is sure, and that witli Hono- 
 ra's prejudices she never would marry 
 you with that old stain upon you." 
 
 He sat erect on the horse, perfectly 
 motionless while she spoke, and then 
 said dehberately : " I mean to have my 
 right, my home, and wife, and position, 
 as other men. I shall not consider the 
 cloud over me or Honora's prejudices. 
 They are matters for which I am not 
 responsible." 
 
 " And Laddoun ?" 
 
 When he did not reply to her she 
 leaned forward to see his face : the blood 
 forsook her own. " There is murder in 
 your heart, Dallas Galbraith !" 
 
 He put away her hands with unnatural 
 quietness : " You vex yourself with vaii> 
 terrors. I see my path quite clear to tht: 
 end. Laddoun will never cross it again. ' 
 
 There was a thin flaking of ice about 
 the horse's mouth — he stooped to clear it 
 away : the gentler his touch to the dumb 
 animal, the more Lizzy, with a woman's 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 203 
 
 keen instinct, shrank before the secret 
 purpose hicklen beneath his grave calm 
 with a clear but unnameable terror. She 
 saw him and his life with a keen flash of 
 insight — how long he had worn the halter 
 about his neck ; that Laddoun had 
 pressed him hardly, was riding him down 
 to death ; that beneath the Galbraith cre- 
 dulous, gentle temper the Dour blood 
 ran in his veins untainted, fierce, relent- 
 less, untamed in him by any religious 
 teaching. She remembered his old 
 grandmother's words : " I have crushed 
 many a snake under my foot that threat- 
 ened to sting me." And this man, 
 genial, hearty, single-minded, would do 
 the same if driven to the wall, with a 
 gentler face and colder, more steely will. 
 She looked again and again from him up 
 to the hill-roads drifted deep with snow 
 and growing gray in the twilight, listen- 
 ing for muffled footsteps. What if they 
 came now .? What if they met him 
 3-onder in the sohtude of the night 
 among the mountains ? 
 
 There was no surer sign of the terror 
 with which his inflexible will had inspired 
 her than the fact that not by word or 
 motion did she seek to interfere further 
 with his purpose. When he drew up his 
 rein and held out his hand to her, she 
 only sobbed over it, holding it close to her 
 wet face, praying to the God of whom he 
 knew so little for her dear boy. But she 
 said not a word beyond good-bye. 
 
 "Good-bye, Lizzy." He put his 
 fingers for one moment on her head. 
 Long afterward she remembered the 
 touch. It was different from anything 
 Dallas had ever said or done to her. 
 It made her wonder whether, dull and 
 insensible as she thought him, the years 
 gone and the kindness which lay be- 
 tween them had not borne a deeper 
 meaning to Dallas Galbraith than even 
 to her, woman as she was. She would 
 have been glad to think it. But what 
 did it matter ? He wa.'^ gone. The soft 
 echo of his horse's steps had died out 
 speedily: no others came to fill the 
 silence, though she listened until late in 
 the night, trembling as she listened. They 
 were all gone on their separate paths. 
 She was left behind. The world was 
 
 full of crossing paths, whereon love, and 
 pain, and danger lurked ; but she had 
 only to creep into her quiet corner now 
 and wait for the end. No steps came 
 and went in which she had a part. There 
 were now no voices in the distance call- 
 ing on her to follow. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 It was Honora to whom the muffled 
 steps came that night up through the 
 snow, heavy and firm, tending to their 
 end, she thought, steadily as Fate itself. 
 When we are young as Honora there is a 
 meaning in every passing step to us : we 
 know not in what disguise the lictor will 
 come — who brings to us the royal robe and 
 crown of which we dream. Some legend 
 hngers with us of the world from which 
 we came, by which we know that Fate 
 touches us in the fingers of every beg- 
 gar — that every hand holds out to us the 
 leaves of healing or of death. It is as 
 we grow old that we grow wise — or 
 blind. 
 
 Dallas, coming into the library, found 
 it vacant, though he had seen Honora's 
 slight shadow passing to and fro behind 
 the curtained windows as he came up 
 the walk without. He closed the door 
 behind him and laid down the cap which 
 he still carried, and then, after a mo- 
 ment's pause and a long breath, he went 
 to the door of the little breakfast-room 
 beyond and opened it. She was there, 
 and alone, dressed in some soft crimson 
 stuff", standing by the fire, her sewing in 
 her hand as she had hastily gathered it 
 up when he frightened her, for she had 
 fled from him, she did not know why ; 
 yet in the moment that elapsed as he 
 crossed the floor to her side, some sud- 
 den instinct told her that the man ap- 
 proaching her was himself pursued. 
 
 He took the work from her hand and 
 laid it down : " I have a few words to 
 say to you, and I wish nothing to come 
 between us until you have heard me." 
 She bowed and seated herself in a great 
 arm-chair slowly, to gain time, while he 
 
204 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 leaned with one hand on the table, re- 
 garding her through his half-shut eyes. 
 There was no flash of sultry passion, 
 with which a young man might look 
 upon as fair a woman as Honora when 
 he loved her. But there was a keen ap- 
 preciation in the homely, nobly-moulded 
 face of all that was true and beautiful in 
 that world of which she was to him the 
 secret and only portal. The clean blood 
 in his strong body might flow tempe- 
 rately, unquickened by her touch ; but 
 there was a hunger in his eyes that told 
 how his nature cried out for her ; how 
 all the singular, life-long desire which 
 possessed the honest, loving fellow, 
 beyond other men, for a home, for chil- 
 dren, for the something genuine and 
 pure denied to him and given to all 
 others, had found its issue in her ; how 
 his secret soul, kept closely covered and 
 difficult of access, had been reached by 
 her, was alive, kindled to the quick at 
 last with that enduring, sturdy affection, 
 that jealous honor which a man feels but 
 once in his hfe, and then for his wife, 
 and for the woman whom he loves. 
 
 Yet Dallas did not speak. The beau- 
 tiful city was before him ; but he did not 
 forget that to gain it he must creep into 
 it like a thief in the night, disguised and 
 false. 
 
 " You gave me your verdict upon me, 
 to-night, Miss Dundas," he said, forcing 
 a careless tone, which he lost at the out- 
 set. " I wish you now to know me as I 
 am. I would be glad if I could open my 
 hear c for you to read, and all of my life." 
 
 There was an under-current of thought 
 with these words. 
 
 Was it showing her his true self to 
 drag out the vile character which society 
 had put upon him ? Was it the justice 
 to hnnself which he would have shown 
 another man ? Let it sleep for a while. 
 It was Dallas Galbraith who wooed the 
 woman he loved, not Laddoun's victim. 
 
 He continued, his face lightening after 
 this curiously: "You thought me un- 
 feeling and colder than other men. Per- 
 haps that may be so I do not know 
 other men : I only know myself You 
 will pardon me if I speak of myself a 
 'ittle longer ?" coloring:. 
 
 " I will pardon it," without raising hei 
 eyes. 
 
 " The old life I knew before I came 
 here. Miss Dundas, was different from 
 yours," choosing his words slowly, keep- 
 ing down, she saw, .beneath their mode- 
 ration, a strong emotion. "Its weight 
 has been upon me : it is upon me still. 
 If you knew it all, you would perhaps 
 forgive those deficiencies in manner and 
 speech in which I seemed to you less 
 deferential than other men." 
 
 She would have spoken, but he put 
 his hand up asking for silence : it seemed 
 as though the constraint once broken 
 which he had enforced upon himself, his 
 only safeguard was gone : 
 
 " I have dragged that old life about 
 with me like the dead seed which clings 
 to some living plants." He did not see 
 the smile which she hid at this under a 
 nervous cough, but went on with such a 
 pallor in his firm face, such terrible vehe- 
 mence under his dehberate tone, that she, 
 looking up at him, felt the smile freeze 
 upon her lips. This was no love-making 
 amidst summer and roses. The man 
 led her, behind him, into the narrow 
 straits which lie between life and death, 
 where his soul, she knew, had already 
 fought through many a combat, and had 
 sometimes been worsted. 
 
 "It hangs over me like the dead, ill- 
 smelling seed upon the Hving plant," he 
 repeated. " Though I owed that old 
 life nothing, I did not grow out of it. 
 It was foisted on me by others. It is 
 unjust that it should chng to me and 
 poison the air about me for ever." 
 
 " Let it go," she interrupted him. 
 " What is your past life to us, Cousin 
 Dallas ? You come to us as you are. 
 Besides, I know more of it than you 
 think, and what is it ? You were mise- 
 rably poor — you are self-taught." 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 But it daunted poor little Honora that 
 this encouragement, which came with 
 many maidenly blushes, roused in him 
 no answering heat. On the contrary, it 
 cooled him : he turned away even to 
 the window from which could be seen 
 the snow-covered mountains, up which 
 the distant roads wound, and the sombre 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 205 
 
 speculation in his eyes was something in 
 which she had no share. The next mo- 
 ment he was by her side : 
 
 " I have been ridden by a spectre 
 long enough !" countenance and voice 
 full of vehement fire. " To-night I 
 have done with it," with a curious ges- 
 ture, as though he threw a yoke from his 
 neck. There was a heaj) of cushions 
 on the floor : he sat down on them at 
 her feet, and looked up in her face. 
 
 The old locust tree at the window beat 
 with its bare branches against the pane, 
 impatient of the silence : the hot coals 
 fell in red showers and grew gray and 
 cold, but Honora did not speak. The 
 Dallas Galbraith at whom she glanced 
 shyly through her veiling lash.es was a 
 man whom she had seen before, but as 
 through a glass darkly. It was as if he 
 had brought his soul into his face for 
 her to read. The spectre was gone, and 
 whatever pure meaning lay between them 
 secretly came out now, not dreading the 
 light. The man and woman seeking 
 each other in soul and body, met, and 
 were not ashamed. 
 
 What words they spoke were hardly 
 conventional. When her flushed cheek 
 and quick breath showed that the silence 
 grew painful, Dallas took the nervous, 
 trembling hands in his : 
 
 "You always knew I loved you, Ho- 
 nora ?" 
 
 '•Yes, Dallas," in a weak little 
 whisper. 
 
 " But you ? I know how rough and 
 untaught I am. And yet I thought you 
 cared for me." 
 
 " I could not help it," putting her 
 hands over her face with a stifled sob 
 or two. 
 
 There was a bit of fine, reddish-brown 
 hair which in some way curled itself 
 about Dallas' fingers just then. He 
 suddenly drew her down to his breast, 
 and putting away her hands, kissed the 
 dew)- red lips again and again. 
 
 The wind sighed its warning, the 
 dead branches beat the pane, and the fire 
 flash.ed and faded in vain. The one rare, 
 healing cordial of the world had come to 
 Dallas' hps at last— -the life of this life, 
 and tlie only thing of which we are sure 
 
 when we are dead. The poor, stupid 
 naturalist, who had blundered over it 
 unlooked for, had power to drink as deep 
 a draught as the crowned Ceesar, or the 
 divine Florentine who sought it through 
 heaven and hell. God's wine of love, 
 as of sunshine, waits on the roadside for 
 the beggar who is willing, for the mur- 
 derer on his way to the scaflx)ld. 
 
 But Dallas, finding it, saw no scaffold 
 or shadow beyond : sitting beside this 
 woman, reading in her soul that it knew 
 no world outside of his, his life seemed 
 to him suddenly full and complete. 
 There was no pain or danger coming, 
 no change lurking in the distance. He 
 traced the outline of the small, purely- 
 cut face with his forefinger as if learning 
 a sweet lesson by heart, kissed the 
 closed lids to waken the liquid light of 
 the brilliant eyes ; and when he looked 
 into them, thought the world a sum- 
 mer-garden, secure, warm, beautiful. A 
 delicious, childish feeling — a ^curity — 
 which had never come to him in his 
 life before. The home in which he had 
 rooted himself so firmly, his mother, the 
 fond old people who made the home 
 complete, his friends outside. Matt, the 
 boys he was trj-ing to help, — they all 
 came vaguely into his consciousness, 
 framed the picture of his wife, and made 
 it more tender and more real. 
 
 He had been conscious of the rough 
 grit and clay in his own character — Ho- 
 nora would take it aAvay. He knew how 
 ignorant and irreligious he was ; yet 
 sometimes, when at his work, he had 
 been on the verge of awful visions, 
 wherein God and His world had almost 
 been made known to him. His wife, 
 with her pure, holy touch, would lead 
 him within the veil. 
 
 He said something of this to her. It 
 was when she rose and asked him to 
 take her to her uncle. Dallas pushed 
 back the hair from- her forehead, and 
 turned her face up to his. " I put my 
 life in your hands, Honora," he said 
 solemnly. " When you are my Avife you 
 must lead me in the right paths, here 
 and hereafter," lowering his voice. " I 
 will be guided by you." 
 
 '•Oh," DaUas! as if I could find 
 
206 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 fault with you. There is nothing I 
 would have changed. Though I often 
 have thought," knitting her brows anx- 
 iously, " that if you would go into busi- 
 ness, and only break rocks and pull 
 plants to bits in your leisure hours "i 
 You will not be vexed with me ? It is 
 a noble work to interpret the rocks ; but 
 when it comes to frogs and fishes — " 
 
 " Of course, Honora, I shall never 
 give up my work," with emphasis. "You 
 must marry my hobby for plants and 
 frogs, if you marry me," forcing a smile. 
 
 She changed color, but laughed: "We 
 will talk of that some other time, then. 
 But now you will come to church with 
 me, and read a little book I will give 
 you .'' Only an explanation of our belief. 
 Our faith must be the same, Dallas." 
 
 "Well — yes. I'll read it," with a 
 perplexed frown. "In fact, I have read 
 it : I saw how you valued it. It was 
 but a show of opinions to me, Honora," 
 in his doggedest tone. " Out in the 
 woods yonder I have seen something at 
 times altogether strong and good under 
 all the beauty and contrivance ; but I 
 do not see Him in those opinions of the 
 preachers. He is both narrow and cruel, 
 according to them. As for church, the 
 crowd, and the dress, and the forms 
 drive good thoughts away from me. It 
 is in quiet and alone I would find Him, 
 il at all ; and I would rather not receive 
 Him second-hand through the brains of 
 other men. I'm afraid I never will be a 
 church-goer, Honora." 
 
 Honora looked at him steadily. In 
 that early moment there reached her the 
 consciousness which generally comes 
 after years of married life, of the insolu- 
 ble differences of character and of creed 
 which love can never destroy. She had 
 a foresight keen as intuition : there was 
 not a struggle which might come between 
 her prejudices and his obstinacy which 
 was not plain to her. She hesitated a 
 moment, and then with a loving faith, 
 different from any that yet had shone in 
 her eyes, she held out both hands to him. 
 «' After all, we will go to Him on the same 
 path," she said quietly. 
 
 Dallas opened the library door, and 
 at the same moment Mr. Galbraith, his 
 
 tall figure tightly buttoned, and blue with 
 cold, came in from the outer hall. 
 
 " It's a nipping night, Dallas," rub- 
 bing his hands as he hurried to the fire : 
 then he stopped suddenly on seeing their 
 faces as they stood together. Honora 
 ran to him. " So, little one ?" he said 
 slowly, putting his arm about her. " So ?" 
 
 Dallas stopped in the shadow by the 
 door. There was not the keen flash of 
 pleasure in his grandfather's face which 
 he had thought to see there. It was 
 anxious, almost stern, as he stooped 
 over Nora with his old habitual motion, 
 stroking her hair. 
 
 " You know the story we have come 
 to tell you, I think, sir," said Dallas. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith turned to him with 
 quick attention, but made no answer. 
 
 It happened that Dallas had stopped 
 in the same place where he had stood a 
 year before, a convict. The fire, as then, 
 burned low, and the light was dim. It 
 brought the scene back before him so 
 real, that the old sense of being con- 
 demned and trampled under foot re- 
 turned as bitter as it had been before. 
 
 " The first time I saw you and Honora 
 together," he said, boldly, " I felt that if 
 I had no weight to carry unknown to 
 other men, I had a right to be a nearer 
 friend to either of you than any man be- 
 side. If I have justified that right to 
 you, sir, I ask 3'ou to give her to me." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith's silence lasted so long 
 that Honora, in a frightened, pale flurry, 
 began to pat his cheeks and put her 
 arms about his neck, and with womanly 
 tact to fill up the pause before Dallas 
 should notice it. " You know, uncle dear, 
 when first we met Dallas in the moun- 
 tain by the quarry. He seemed quite 
 different to me then from — I mean — " 
 blushing crimson. "I — Though I 
 don't suppose he noticed me!''' 
 
 "In the mountain by the quarry ?" 
 the searching look still upon him. 
 
 Dallas was silent. He had crept over 
 the wall like a thief in the night to win 
 his prize, and the sense of meanness and 
 defeat secretly dragged his soul in the 
 dust. But was this a time to bring out 
 his secret ? To thrust her from him 
 when she was in his hands ? 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 207 
 
 Honora, after trying to read her 
 uncle's face, gave an audible sob. 
 
 " Yes ; Nonny. yes," hurriedly. " I 
 have no right, Dallas, to keep you from 
 the wife whom God has given to you. 
 But she has been my darling so long ! 
 ■I could have wished — " interrupting him- 
 self hastily. " If you can touch her 
 hand to-day feeling that you are, as you 
 say, worthy of her love, in God's name 
 take it." 
 
 For a moment Dallas did not move. 
 But Honora, with a swift motion, at 
 once indignant and shy, which brought 
 a smile from both men, went Xc. him and 
 put her hand in his : " Worthy ! worthy ! 
 Why, he is your own son Dallas ! You 
 are cold, cruel ! I did not think that you 
 would turn against us and make every- 
 thing wretched, as you are doing." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith answered with a sad 
 smile : " I am not cold, God knows, 
 Honora. So be it, then : I think God 
 will bless you." He turned, and was 
 passing them to go out, but suddenly 
 stopped before them. " I'm an old man, 
 Dallas ; but I have never known a happy 
 marriage where there was not perfect 
 confidence. The world has no right, 
 perhaps, to your secrets. But your wife 
 should know the worst which is within 
 your breast before she lays her head 
 there." He wrung the boy's hand, and 
 left them. 
 
 Dallas gave a short, surly laugh : "Are 
 you afraid of any secret viper which I 
 have hidden, Honora ?" 
 
 But Honora did not laugh : " I sup- 
 pose every one will give us advice. I 
 thought he was going to say whose duty 
 it will be to give up when we differ." 
 
 " Differ, Nora ! There will never be 
 a thought on which we will not be one ! 
 Do you not feel that .'"' 
 
 '■ Oh. of course I feel it," with a queer 
 little smile. "Still it is as well to know 
 that it is right for the woman to give up 
 in case of emergencies." But she spoke 
 as if she was tired and jaded. Her 
 uncle's coldness had hurt and disap- 
 pointed her perhaps more than she chose 
 to tell. " And I was startled, too, by an 
 odd feeling which I had, Dallas," she 
 said, thoughtfully ; " though one often 
 
 fancies that we have gone through parts 
 of our lives before, long ago. But when 
 you stood there in the shadow of the 
 book-cases, and I went to you and put 
 my hand in yours, it seemed to me as if 
 it was not for the first time. It con- 
 fuses me — " passing her hand wearily 
 over her eyes. 
 
 Dallas took it down. " Such fancies 
 are common, my darling," he said hastily, 
 and began to tell her how dear she was 
 to him — how in all the days of that wild 
 hfe on the Plains his heart had cried 
 out for her. But even while he spoke 
 he glanced uneasily over her shoulder to 
 where the mountains lay gray and spec- 
 tral in the night, up which the deserted 
 roads wound. There was not an hour 
 in which the chance of detection did not 
 dog him : it had its voices echoing 
 Lizzy's cry, " He is on your track — on 
 your track !" It would lay in wait for 
 him even here, in his wife's love. 
 
 As the image of his old enemy rose 
 up before him, his face hardened, and an 
 ugly look came into his eyes that boded 
 ill for Laddoun. Whatever of good there 
 was in the man that had raised him 
 above all the vice and folly of his early 
 years, was, under the present temptation, 
 the strongest element in him for evil. 
 The very persistence and obstinacy that 
 had beaten down the demons that would 
 have held him fast, would now beat down 
 to death the man who stood between him 
 and the bountiful, more generous life that 
 opened before him. 
 
 The time for revenge, if it had ever 
 been, had gone now ; but the determi- 
 nation to suffer no more was more 
 cruel in him than any spirit of ven- 
 geance could have been. 
 
 And all the worse for Laddoun. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 " And when is it to be, my son V 
 Madam Galbraith patted Dallas' hard 
 hand with her own bony, wrinkled fing- 
 ers, looking at it as she might have done 
 at her baby's long ago. She broke into 
 
2o8 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 a hurried, abrupt laugh now and then, 
 but the water stood in her eyes. 
 « To-day, if Honora is willing." 
 " To-day ! Upon my soul, boy, you 
 carry on your wooing as they did in the 
 days of the old Indian-fighters ! To-day? 
 James, do you hear the lad ? Call Ho- 
 nora. She shall consent, she shall con- 
 sent ! I will take your part, Dallas !'" 
 with smothered delight. She rapped 
 with her hickory staff on the floor, and 
 sat up erect in the bed, the white night- 
 gown, with its broad frills, making the 
 swarthy countenance and gray hair more 
 strong and unwomanly. Since the fail- 
 ure of her great scheme a singular dis- 
 ease mastered her now and then — a 
 sudden, uncontrollable weakness and 
 lack of nervous power. It was the 
 price she paid for the savage control 
 with which all her life she had held her 
 body down : when it refused to serve 
 her now, she uttered no complaints, but 
 stretched herself out without a pillow on 
 her hard mattress, and lay there in si- 
 lence, looking not unlike the grim, hard- 
 beaked Crusaders in the old churches, 
 stiffened into stone on top of their 
 graves, waiting their call. 
 
 " I must get up," pounding more ve- 
 hemently with her staff. " I am myself 
 again. It is the thought that I shall 
 keep you with me always, my son, that 
 has cured me. When your children 
 come to put their hands on me, I will 
 grow young again, and the old dragon 
 may live for ever. Who knows ?" with 
 a nervous laugh. 
 
 Mrs. Duffield came in with Honora. 
 There were dark hollows under her eyes, 
 as though she had not slept through the 
 night. Early this morning she had gone 
 into Honora's room, and dressed her ac- 
 cording to her own taste, putting the 
 little bunch of mignonette, which she 
 wore every morning the year round, on 
 the girl's bosom instead of her own ; 
 and then she herself had donned a cap. 
 Only a square bit of lace, but significant 
 to her as a nun's veil. When Dallas 
 came up to them, she watched him and 
 Honora, blushing like a girl, so forgetful 
 of herself, her eyes so full of happy 
 tears, that it was his mother to whom 
 
 Dallas gave his good-morning kiss, and 
 not his bride. 
 
 " Honora," going straight to his point 
 as usual, " I know nothing of the usual 
 customs, but I do not understand why a 
 mob of strangers should come to hear 
 us say we love each other, nor why we 
 should not say it at once if it be true. 
 I wish you to allow me to send over for 
 Mr. Rattlin this evening, and he will 
 say a prayer over us to keep away the 
 ill-luck for ever. And. so our story 
 will end." He would not even touch 
 her hand before them all ; but his look 
 was a caress before which she drew 
 back. 
 
 Now Honora had meant to spend two 
 or three months in fasting and preparing,, 
 making herself inwardly pure before she 
 began her new life. It was an old fancy 
 she had. 
 
 " It is all arranged, Honora," said the 
 old lady, impatiently, reaching over for 
 her dressing-gown. " I want to see my 
 boy happy. I like his manner of wooing; 
 though of course, if you object, we will 
 hear what 3'ou have to say." 
 Honora said nothing. 
 " You shall do as you wish, my dar- 
 ling," Dallas whispered. 
 
 " I wish to please you," after a pause, 
 with a subjugated sigh. 
 
 " Then it's all settled !" Madam Gal- 
 braith grew purple with dehght and ex- 
 citement. " Honora is generally bid- 
 dable. Go out, good people, all of you. 
 I must be up and dressed. A wedding 
 in the house at a day's notice ! Ah, 
 Dallas, so the Dours used to carry it in 
 the old time !" 
 
 Mrs. Duffield touched Honora's cold 
 cheek when they were outside, and then 
 kissed it — a most rare sign of feeling : 
 "Go now: you want to be alone, child. 
 I will attend to your dress — everything. 
 I am your mother now." 
 
 In ten minutes Madam Galbraith re- 
 called lier. "/ dress in military time, 
 my dear." Already she had the floor 
 and bed covered with the contents of 
 sundry presses and enormous closets. 
 " We must see what we can do for the 
 young people, eh ? Glorious, sunshiny 
 weather ! I think my plans were tol- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 209 
 
 erably successful," chuckling, as she un- 
 locked drawer after drawer. 
 
 " You do not mean — " 
 
 <> That I brought them together ? As- 
 suredly. / saw the propriety of it the 
 very day that Dallas arrived. I wanted 
 him to marrj.- among his own people. 
 And Honora is very suitable, very easily 
 controlled. What do you think of these 
 cameos ? I'll give the child all my jewelry. 
 Only a married woman should wear jew- 
 elry. And I have some silks and velvets, 
 never cut, here. But, tut ! tut ! velvet and 
 silk ! the poor children will be paupers !" 
 
 " Dallas will be quite able to support 
 his wife," proudly. 
 
 " Yes ; he's as solid as granite. A 
 very different character, my dear, from 
 my other son, Thomas," stopping with 
 an awkward cough as she remembered 
 to whom she spoke, and ringing the bell 
 violently : " Send for Mrs. Beck imme- 
 diately. The house must be set in 
 order and supper prepared. And good 
 Mrs. Rattlin. I'll feel more at ease 
 when I have my staff about me. Come, 
 my dear, and see what I have laid away 
 for Honora." 
 
 Mrs. Duffield followed, nothing loth. 
 Any true woman finds a press full of fine 
 linen as fair a sight as a field of daisies. 
 Up and down the old woman dragged 
 her, nothing slacking in her zeal, bring- 
 ing to light great stores of which nobody 
 knew but herself, repeating again and 
 again : " I put by for the child as if she 
 had been my own. I little thought it 
 would all come back to Tom's boy." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith found her seated at 
 noon, exhausted, before a heaped table 
 of old lace, which she had been sorting. 
 There was a light in her face which had 
 not been there since the days when they 
 were first married. She made him sit 
 down beside her, putting her hand on his 
 knee, chattering gossip like any girl. 
 
 " The fellow has your desire to shut 
 out the world when he is in gi-eat pain 
 or joy, I see. Morbid, but I understand it. 
 Well, we'll have the county in another 
 time. I've nothing to give the children 
 but this poor housewifery, James." 
 
 " There will be the old house and bit 
 of land wlien we are gone, Hannah." 
 14 
 
 "Yes. That is yours." She sat 
 thoughtful a long time, and then turning 
 to him, said : " I am glad it is yours. I 
 never have spoken to you of it before, 
 James, but the happiest day of my life 
 was that when I first slept under my hus- ' 
 band's roof, and knew that 1 was depend- 
 ent on his work for the very bread 1 ate." 
 
 The old scholar stroked his gray beard 
 softly, and made her no reply. But 
 walking up and down the room in his 
 accustomed habit that evening, he hum- 
 med a tune — some gay old song which 
 he used to sing in the days when he was 
 a gallant young fellow, and meant to con- 
 quer the world, giving furtive, proud 
 glances toward his wife. Never, in her 
 fairest days, had she seemed so womanly 
 to him as now. 
 
 Of course, the house was in a ferment 
 all day long. The sun outside shone 
 brightly— within, the fires flashed and 
 crackled. There was not a woman, from 
 motherly Mrs. Rattlin to Jinny the scul- 
 lerj'-maid, whose heart did not beat fast 
 as though she was the bride, and who 
 did not find time in the high-tide of pre- 
 paration to run in now and then to Ho- 
 nora with some tender offer of service. 
 Mrs. Duffield wandered about the house, 
 for the first time in her life irresolute 
 and incapable. 
 
 Colonel Pervis found her toward dusk 
 in the dining-room. He had taken charge 
 of the whole affair, and with the glee of 
 a dozen boys in his red face, was going 
 in and out, and up and down the country- 
 side, under high-pressure power, scatter- 
 ing the news far and wide. He steamed 
 into harbor for a moment to the side- 
 board, and finding the pretty little widow 
 alone, leaning her head on her hand, 
 thought, as he drank ofl^ his hastily-made 
 cobbler, that whatever heart she had was 
 bound up in that boy, and that she was 
 cursedly cut loose from her moorings 
 to-day. 
 
 " By George, madam !" wiping his 
 moustache, " I think when povertv came 
 into the door of this house good-luck 
 besieged the windows !" 
 
 Her eyes sparkled. " With Dallas ? 
 But I wished to speak to you, Colonel 
 Pervis. It must be evident to you that 
 
210 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 I cannot stay with the good-luck. I 
 cannot be the drone of the hive. We 
 count the cost here now from day to day 
 necessarily, and my son will have enough 
 weight to carry with a wife, and half of 
 his income gone to the orphans with Mr. 
 Rattlin." 
 
 The Colonel concocted another cob- 
 bler, and muttered something about in- 
 fernal folly. " I mean," he added has- 
 tily, aloud, "that there is a drop of 
 Quixotic blood in Dallas. Very re- 
 markable in so practical a fellow." 
 
 " There are very few persons who can 
 comprehend my son," complacently. 
 "But I must go. I trust to you to 
 make the explanations here as easy as 
 possible for me." 
 
 " I'll smooth matters over for you," 
 putting down his glass and corking the 
 bottles, with his back to her, in silence, 
 as if at a loss for words. Then he came 
 up to the table by which she sat, and 
 stood, balancing his portly body on heel 
 and toe, twisting the end of his whiskers. 
 " I'll smooth matters ; but it must be in 
 my own way. I've a conscience of my 
 own, Mrs. Duffield. I'm your friend, 
 madam ; and you know when you were 
 a child your friends crossed you for your 
 own good." Here, his courage oozing 
 out altogether, he stopped to cough. 
 
 " I do not know what you mean, Colo- 
 nel Pervis," coldly. 
 
 " I mean that I've carried these 
 cursed bonds until they burned my 
 pocket, and I'll carry them no longer !" 
 throwing the envelope on the table. 
 " I beg your pardon, madam ; but, upon 
 my soul, the flesh is wearing off my 
 bones with the responsibility of them." 
 
 " Do you tell me," rising haughtily, 
 " that you have not applied my money, 
 as I desired, to the use of the sufferers ?" 
 
 " Not a red cent of it ! I say now, 
 Dallas and you may play Don Quixote if 
 you like, but you'll have to find another 
 Sancho Panza. It's not in John Per- 
 vis. Now, don't say a word !" backing 
 to the door, his hand up. " Get some- 
 body else. Dour's your man. But, 
 thank God, I've washed my hands of 
 them !" 
 
 " You had no right to thwart me, sir," 
 
 her fair flesh flushing to her verj' bosom, 
 red with anger. But the Colonel was gone, 
 and the door shut hastily behind him. 
 The next moment she saw him hurrying 
 to the stables, and laughed nervously. 
 She took up the envelope presently, 
 which smelled horribly of tobacco and 
 brandy : she tore it off", and turned over 
 wistfully the blue-lettered papers. Then 
 she went slowly to her own room, looked 
 out of the window for a while, and then, 
 in an absent, careless way, unlocked a 
 private drawer and put them in their old 
 place, hanging the key to her chatelaine. 
 
 She went down a few moments after, 
 and was sweeter and more sunny-tem- 
 pered than ever before. Madam Gal- 
 braith had never known her so affec- 
 tionate. She even put her peachy 
 cheek to the old lady's hard jaws, and 
 whispered, " Don't be uneasy about the 
 children. There'll be a little to give 
 them when I'm gone, you know." 
 
 The secret, however, burned Pervis' 
 brain as the bonds had his pocket, and 
 before night he confided it to Madam 
 Galbraith. " She did not care for the 
 poor wretches a picayune," he said. 
 "It was to gratify your whim that she 
 would have beggared herself" 
 
 " To satisfy me, eh ? I did not think it 
 was in Tom's wife." The old woman 
 made no other remark. But she went 
 away hastily to find James. She never told 
 Mrs. Duffield that her secret was known ; 
 but she called her " Mary" that day for 
 the first time in her hfe ; and to the day 
 of her death she gave Mary the daugh- 
 ter's place which she had never held 
 before. 
 
 The sun went down redly, leaving 
 long bars of ruby light arching up the 
 sky. The snow was crisp under Dallas' 
 feet as he came slowly down the hill- 
 road and stopped in the gate leading 
 into the woods, looking at the house 
 before he went in. The long rows of 
 windows shone warmly in its massive 
 front against the mountain-shadow, as 
 they had done on the night when he first 
 came to this gate, haggard and shaven, 
 from his felon's cell in Albany. Now he 
 was going in as a master, to be a help- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 HI 
 
 ful citizen, caressed and obeyed in his 
 home — the fairest woman, he thought, 
 that God ever made, to nestle in his 
 bosom as his wife. He had gone, on 
 this, the day of all days of his life, to the 
 poor wretches at the wells and to the 
 children whom he had tried to save, as 
 some men would have gone to church, 
 and now was coming home. 
 
 Now, Dallas was no thinker : he 
 never speculated on the meaning of his 
 own life or that of others : he was very 
 seldom conscious, until he saw their 
 effects in his action, of the deep, vital 
 forces that had their ebb and flow in his 
 soul. But a strange thing happened to 
 him to-day. As the sun went down he 
 glanced about the horizon to find indi- 
 cations of snow, and then going through 
 the woods, mechanically broke off, as he 
 went, bits of the twigs or bark, examin- 
 ing them. There was a space blown 
 bare of snow beside the trunk of a dead 
 ash, and turning up the ground with his 
 foot, he picked out some seeds of weeds, 
 and stripped off the scaly layers in which 
 they were sheathed : in the dead wood, 
 too, breaking off the bark, there were 
 the larv^ of a dozen different kinds of 
 beetles and moths waiting for the snow 
 to be gone to spring into hfe. 
 
 As Dallas threw them down carelessly, 
 something — the red sunbeam, perhaps, 
 flickering in his eyes — brought before him, 
 as by second-sight, the vision of the great 
 world in which he hved, whose bosom 
 was filled with illimitable myriads of 
 seeds and larvae waiting for summer to 
 begin their appointed lives, the least of 
 them to be ruled, useful and instinct 
 with beauty — of the long procession of 
 animal and vegetable lives since Time 
 began, whose most trivial feature was 
 governed by law. He stopped, sat down 
 on the crumbling trunk. Perhaps both his 
 brain and heart were quickened and tender 
 to-day, for with electric force an insight 
 into the meaning of all the knowledge 
 he had ever gained came to him : as an 
 artist brings his ideal from the canvas, 
 and oil, and paint — a thought that 
 has always been in them, but not of 
 them. For the first time, Dallas saw 
 the order beneath the life of the larvas, 
 
 of the snow that killed it, of the summer 
 that called it into being. The old Jew- 
 ish account of the creation had always 
 been to him a child's fable beside tlie 
 story written on the rocks. But to-day 
 he seemed to catch a glimpse of an in- 
 finite truth that underlaid these grop- 
 ings after God of the world's earlier 
 days, as well as the clearer insight of 
 later time — an eternal Right, of which 
 the order and disorder of the world were 
 but chance glimpses that came to us. 
 A living something behind the dead 
 stone, the birth of the animal and its 
 decease — the something in which this 
 dead wood would live again. Crumb- 
 ling it in his fingers, even he could see 
 creative skill in it — ^justice, and a terrible 
 human element, beyond justice. 
 
 What if this Right held human lives 
 also ? His own, with its paltry, every- 
 day chances ? 
 
 Dallas Galbraith rose and bared his 
 head. His face was pale, and awe- 
 struck as the savage who sees his God 
 in the sunshine. What if his own life 
 had been underlaid by the same eternal 
 strength ? What if there had been in it no 
 wrong, no chance, which was not ordered 
 by the same loving purpose ? He went 
 on slowly, his lips set, his thoughts 
 turned inward, as never before, to find 
 what manner of man he was, and to test 
 what Circumstance had done to him. 
 
 If it had not been for the bitter pov- 
 erty without, would he ever have clung 
 so desperately to his real work, and 
 made himself a man by mastering it ? 
 If it had not been for those years in the 
 convict's cell and the stain on him now, 
 would he have met fate with such stub- 
 born endurance ? would he have known 
 the patient tenderness for the wretched 
 and the guilty which made him now like 
 a woman before them '^. 
 
 Never. He could see the uses of it 
 all now. He raised his head and walked 
 on, his step elastic, his heart throbbing, 
 full and light. Immeasurable content 
 wrapped him as the beautiful world 
 floated to her rest in the sunshine. It 
 is so easy as we enter heaven to under- 
 stand the discipline of earth ; and Dallas, 
 with his hand upon the door of home, 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 thought his final reward had come. If 
 Laddoun never crossed his path again, 
 he could see how the ill-luck which he 
 fe.ncied had always been against him 
 had borne its part in this all-embracing 
 order, this good, which you could call 
 God if you would. If he came again — 
 and the old cloud came into Dallas' eyes. 
 One can so much more readily see God 
 in the flood that destroyed the world 
 tlian in the accident which crosses our 
 own purpose. 
 
 He went in with a softened, gentle 
 step. The open rooms were lighted and 
 dressed with evergreen ; but there was a 
 great silence in the house. He met Mr. 
 Rattlin, who wrung his hand with all the 
 heart that filled his httle body. He met his 
 mother, placid and lovely, in a pure dress 
 of white, and she put her arms about his 
 neck and kissed him. He ran lightly up 
 to his own luxurious chamber, bathed 
 and dressed. It was his wedding-night. 
 Every sight and sound, the far-off laugh- 
 ter and voices, the very cold water, as it 
 touched him, wakened in him a keen 
 sense of dehght. His feet had touched 
 ground at last. Under all thoughts of 
 home or the sweet woman's life which 
 was to run henceforth in the same chan- 
 nel with his own, was a deep, abiding 
 sense of security, of good. 
 
 Provided, Laddoun never returned. 
 
 They were all gathered in the library 
 when he came down. There were no 
 shadows in it now. The last rays of the 
 red sunset looked long through the 
 western windows this evening, with 
 their kindly good-bye — soft astral lamps, 
 like globes of moonlight, shone here and 
 there. The great, many-colored coal 
 fire burned cheerfully. Otherwise, there 
 was no change here ; only the little home 
 fKirty that gathered about the fire every 
 evening ; and Dallas went in and sat 
 down among them. 
 
 " Of all the weddings I ever have 
 seen," Mr. Rattlin said to him, with sup- 
 pressed feeling, " yours, Dallas, seems to 
 me to be the tenderest and most solemn ; 
 as if it were from the every-day, home 
 life here that this new, beautiful flower 
 of love had bloomed." 
 
 Presently her uncle went to bring 
 
 Honora ; and then Peggy, and Beck, and 
 old Henkel, and the servants silently 
 came in and filled up the background. 
 When Mr. Galbraith opened the door 
 again, Dallas went to meet him and the 
 pure little girl dressed in white that he 
 held by the hand. They said afterward 
 that Honora never looked so like her 
 dead mother as she did on that night. 
 
 "You are not afraid to give her to 
 me ?" Dallas asked in a whisper, his blue 
 eyes meeting the old man's steadily. 
 
 " I am not afraid," he answered, but 
 with whitening hps, and detached his 
 hand from her fingers. " Go, Honora. 
 God make you true to each other, my 
 children." 
 
 It seemed to Dallas that then the 
 prayer had been said which made them 
 one. He scarcely heard the words 
 which Mr. Rattlin uttered over them. 
 The invisible something which held 
 them all was warm and close about him 
 as the sunshine to the bird that floats in 
 it; and the old man's love had in some 
 way spoken for it and made it real. 
 
 The rosy glow died out of the west 
 while they were crowding about Dallas 
 and his little wife, kissing them, laughing 
 and crying, joking foolishly as people 
 with over-full hearts will do. The sud- 
 den winter twilight came on. " Close 
 the shutters, Henkel," said Colonel Per- 
 vis. " I've no faith in omens, Dallas, 
 my boy, or I would be vexed by a 
 shadow that seemed to peer at you from 
 that window at your back when you took 
 Honora's hand in yours — a man's 
 mocking face, white as death. I see 
 now that it was but the waving of the 
 branches outside in the lamplight. By 
 the Lord, there it is again !" 
 
 " I see nothing," said Madam Gal- 
 braith. 
 
 But Honora clung to Dallas with a 
 cry of terror, for he had pushed her be- 
 hind him, as if to save her from some 
 peril that menaced them, and bent for- 
 ward, going to the window slowl}', step 
 by step — following, one might think, 
 some ghost that had beckoned him and 
 disappeared in the night. 
 
 They crowded to the other windows. 
 " I see nothing but the shadows of the 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 213 
 
 woods ; there is no foreboding in them. 
 Why do you prophesy ill-hick for Dal- 
 las ?" cried Madam Galbraith angrily, 
 for she had faith in omens. 
 
 Dallas turned quickly. "Why, it 
 is nothing," he said. " No, you shall 
 not go out to search, Colonel Pervis. 
 If it is ill-luck that haunts me in the 
 shadow you have seen, why, then it — 
 is but a shadow." 
 
 He laughed, and after a moment 
 laughed again. But they, looking at 
 
 him, seeing such strange matter in his 
 face, and how suddenly cruel the eyes 
 had grown, did not laugh with him. 
 Honora, feeling how cold and clammy 
 was the hand she held, drew it the 
 closer in her own ; and she and the 
 grave old scholar, whose love had made 
 their insight deeper than the others, 
 knew that the young husband had also 
 seen the shadowy face ; and they knew 
 with unerring instinct that Dallas Gal- 
 braith, hunted down, stood at bay. 
 
PART X. 
 
 THERE was a little toll-gate about 
 half-way down the hill from the 
 Galbraith house. Old Potter, the keeper, 
 had let fall the rail, and fastened up doors 
 and windows for the night, and, with his 
 wife, was brewing a whisky-stew over 
 tlie fire, to cheer their hearts before they 
 betook themselves to bed, when the door 
 was roughly shaken, and through the 
 moaning of the wind a man's voice was 
 heard outside. 
 
 Potter thrust his gray poll through the 
 square window : " Who's abroad in this 
 storm ?" 
 
 " Open the door, Dick, curse you ! and 
 let me in. Can Bessy give me a place to 
 sleep ? I — I'll go no further to-night." 
 
 " For God's sake. Colonel !" He 
 opened the door, and catching hold of 
 the dark figure that lay half helpless 
 against it, helped him in, his wife push- 
 ing up the cane settee in front of the 
 fire, exchanging significant glances to- 
 gether as they took off his dripping 
 cloak and wet leggings, and seated him 
 in the hottest place. The man swore 
 savagely at them and at the storm, with 
 a fierce cough between-times, that racked 
 and tore his breast, wringing out great 
 mouthsful of blood. When the paroxysm 
 was over, he fell into a silent exhaustion, 
 holding his knees with his hands, his 
 
 head fallen on his breast, and his eyes 
 set on the fire. The fleshless, sunken 
 face, with its ghastly blotches, was 
 adorned with black, glossy hair and 
 whiskers, carefully trimmed, and the 
 white teeth and hard, black eyes shone 
 at times with a jaunty, cruel sneer. His 
 clothes, of fine mulberry-colored cloth, 
 worn threadbare, hung baggily on a 
 bulky, emaciated figure : a purple ring 
 flamed on his forefinger. Old Potter 
 scanned him from head to foot medita- 
 tively, and then shook his head, turning 
 away : 
 
 " You're welcome to a bed. Colonel 
 Laddoun. But you ought to be in the 
 hands of your friends, accordin' to my 
 thinkin'." 
 
 Laddoun burst into a loud, hollow 
 laugh. " I'm a hale, hearty young fel- 
 low ! It needs more than doctors' croak- 
 ing to kill George Laddoun these twenty 
 years ! I've been with one of my 
 friends. He's a gallant young bride- 
 groom to-night." 
 
 " You've been up at the house ? Did 
 you see the heir ?" cried the old woman. 
 
 " The heir, eh .'' Yes, I saw him. I'll 
 drink his health with you, if you Hke," 
 looking toward the steaming saucepan. 
 Potter poured him out a bowlful and he 
 drank greedily, without waiting for them, 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 smacking his lips as he set it down. 
 "The lieir !" with a chuckle. " You'd not 
 believe I crawled here from Panama to see 
 that friend of mine, so dear he is to me ? 
 They told me I was going under : every 
 cursed quack croaked death to me, and 
 I meant to settle with him while I was 
 above ground. I'm loyal to my friends — 
 loyal !" swelling and flourishing his bony 
 hand with something of his old swagger. 
 A terrible trembling seized him before he 
 had done speaking. 
 
 '' Have you settled with him yet ?" 
 said old Dick, steadying and seating him 
 again. 
 
 "No. When I'm stronger I'll bring 
 our story to an end. I'm growing 
 stronger. You think so, Dick ?" holding 
 his shirt-sleeve and looking breathlessly 
 at him, as though a sudden doubt 
 wrenched him like a spasm. 
 
 " Of course, of course, Colonel dear," 
 whined Bessy. " Go to bed now — that's 
 a good soul. Don't you fash yourseli 
 about gettin' stronger." 
 
 But Laddoun looked sharply into the 
 old man's face. " What do you say. 
 Potter ? Why, I've gained two pounds 
 in the last month, eh .'"' 
 
 Dick turned away from the pitiful at- 
 tempt at a smile. " Come to bed, Colo- 
 nel," soothingly. " You're a man. You 
 oughtn't to be afeard to face the truth. 
 If you owe no man nothin', why need 
 you be afeard ?" 
 
 Laddoun was silent, staggered to his 
 feet after a while, and suflfered old Dick 
 to lead him out of the room ; but when 
 he regained his breath, Bessy heard him 
 between his chattering teeth cursing 
 Potter as having linked himself to the 
 rest to drag him into the grave. He 
 went to sleep in good spirits, however, 
 having drunk another bowlful of hquor, 
 telling them he was a hearty young dog, 
 as he would prove before long. 
 
 But in the middle of the night he was 
 heard crying feebly for Dick. The two 
 men were closeted together for a long 
 time ; and when Potter came out he was 
 very pale and carried a small copper case 
 in his hand, which he stored carefully 
 away. '• The Colonel thinks it's nigh 
 over with him," he told his wife, " and 
 
 he gave me this. In case of his sudden 
 death, I'm to deliver it into Madam Gal- 
 braith's own hand. Living or dead, he 
 says he will be square witli her grandson. 
 I doubt there's a shameful story between 
 them, too, that don't belong to common 
 day." 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 The winter which followed Dallas 
 Galbraitli's marriage seemed to have 
 gathered into itself the rage of many 
 years. Old men in that region tell 
 strange tales even now of its fierce 
 and unprecedented storms — how for 
 weeks together the sun was lost from 
 the heavens, that lowered in a leaden, 
 unbroken plane over the great Valley of 
 the Ohio ; how the wind cut a way for 
 its mad fury through tlie vast forests, 
 gorging the hill-passes that had barred 
 out the besieging storms of a hundred 
 years ; how by night and b}' day it went 
 wailing and shrieking, like some mad, 
 damned soul let loose, through the 
 mountain defiles, over the desolate 
 stretches of snow, the frozen rivers — 
 past the windows of the lonely farm- 
 houses, making the dwellers within 
 shiver and creep closer together, as 
 though some human creature in deadly 
 straits cried to them for help which they 
 dared not give. 
 
 For weeks no living being could ven- 
 ture abroad, so deep were the pitfalls 
 beneath the soft, dazzling, treacherous 
 waste. The great Galbraith ruin, colony 
 and wells, was blotted out from the 
 landscape. Nothing was left but the 
 vast volume of snow that threatened to 
 bury once and for all the solemn moun- 
 tains, petulant rivers and commonplace 
 farm-houses under its calm monotony, 
 gentle and inflexible as death. 
 
 As Christmas drew near, however, 
 and the storm abated for a few days, tlie 
 men in the hills began to creep out and 
 dig paths from one dwelling to the other. 
 There was a sort of hilarious warmth 
 shut into every farm-house. The snow 
 
2l6 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 augured well for the crops of next year ; 
 and then the poorest log-house in these 
 mountains had its smoke-house filled 
 with pork and onions, its stores of dried 
 fish and fruit. It was good to have a 
 respite from work, to sit down and enjoy 
 their keenest delight in Hfe — well-cooked 
 victuals : the ox-faced men sat knitting 
 blue woollen socks with the women 
 about the kitchen hearths until early 
 dusk, when the fires were slaked, and 
 they went to bed, full of the same sort 
 of happiness as the bears in their bur- 
 rows yonder. 
 
 Colonel Pervis and Mr. Rattlin, with 
 Dour, forced their way up to the Gal- 
 braith homestead one day, arriving late 
 in the afternoon, when a threatening 
 tide of cloud, rising from the north, 
 foreboded a fiercer outbreak of the 
 storm. They were powdered with snow, 
 their faces red as blood, and the icicles 
 formed on their beards ; but they shouted 
 like school-boys on a frohc when they 
 reached the massive, warmly-lighted pile 
 of buildings half-way up the mountain, 
 and began to thunder at the outer gate. 
 The whole family came out to welcome 
 them. Two weeks had passed since 
 they had had a glimpse of the outer 
 world. 
 
 "We fought our way up inch by 
 inch," said Colonel Pervis, as they stop- 
 ped to breathe and stamp off the snow. 
 " We were determined to bring Dallas 
 the treasures he gathered in New 
 Mexico. The box arrived weeks ago. 
 Gently, Henkel, gently ! Mr. Dallas' 
 fame and fortune may lie in that case." 
 He pushed Joe away, and anxiously 
 helped Dallas carry it in. 
 
 One would have thought the fame and 
 fortune of the whole party lay in the 
 case, to see the breathless zeal with 
 which they dusted the snow from it 
 and hung over Dallas as he pried off the 
 boards. They hfted it on the great hall 
 table ; and the Colonel and his com- 
 panions, warmed by a visit to the fire 
 and sideboard, crowded up with the 
 others. 
 
 Dallas' color went and came as he 
 put the boards on the floor. " All my 
 specimens are here," he said. " There 
 
 are some I never could replace. I can 
 hardly hope they are not broken." 
 
 " Henkel, you can call the people in to 
 look, if you wish," said Madam Gal- 
 braith, as though speaking down from a 
 height. " These are things which your 
 young master collected for the instruc- 
 tion of the government, you understand.'"' 
 The people, not very far off, speedily ap- 
 peared, open mouthed. 
 
 There was a moment of silent sus- 
 pense. Dallas stopped, with his hand 
 on the first wrapper, and looked about 
 uneasily. 
 
 " I am here," said Honora, touching 
 his elbow. 
 
 He smiled, drew up a chair for her, 
 and then lifted the wrappers. Mr. Ratt- 
 lin, who knew no more about the stones 
 or dried plants than if they had been 
 Indian hieroglyphics, came up close, the 
 heart in his spare little body beating hot 
 and fast. It was the faces of the little 
 home group that touched him. The in- 
 tentness, the awe, the pride with which 
 they looked at Dallas. The breathless 
 anxiety with which they followed every 
 motion of his fingers as he unwrapped 
 each specimen ; the buzz of rehef when 
 it was found safe ; the reverence with 
 which they listened to his explanations. 
 As he laid each one down, his mother 
 and Honora ("their sleeves pinned care- 
 fully up for fear of breakage) carried 
 them up to another table nearer the fire, 
 holding their breath until they laia them 
 safely down. Mr. Galbraith, his spec- 
 tacles on and a pile of books before him, 
 was at his elbow, with pencil and paper, 
 noting every word down eagerly. 
 
 " I have been studying lately under 
 my son," he said to Mr. Rattlin, by way 
 of explanation. " But I have only mas- 
 tered the rudiments of his profession, sir. 
 I wish I could have advanced a little 
 farther before this box arrived ;" and then 
 back again, with renewed zeal, to the 
 case, to his books, and to Dallas as su- 
 preme and final authority. 
 
 Madam Galbraith sat stiffly erect in 
 her purple dress, troubling herself very 
 little about the box. but greedily drinking 
 in every word that Dallas spoke — one 
 minute swelling with triumph and pride, 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 217 
 
 then turning sharply to watch if the 
 others were Hstening — even to Henkel 
 and his troop. It was not enough that 
 her ship had come home to her for ever 
 in this boy : slie wanted the wliole world 
 to see how fair and good a ship it was, 
 and to envy her the freight it carried. 
 
 As for Dallas himself, he must have 
 been a very log if the fond, admiring 
 glances that followed him had not roused 
 him out of his ordinary gravity. Be- 
 sides, this was his own ground, which he 
 had conquered for himself, of whose 
 wonderful richness they knew nothing. 
 It was not strange that he used forcible, 
 apt words as he talked, or that his wliole 
 countenance became transfigured with a 
 magnetic, whole-souled energy which 
 they had never seen in him before, and 
 which kindled his enthusiasm in them 
 all. There were a hundred adventures, 
 too. that the specimens brought to his 
 remembrance, which, when told with all 
 his queer, dry humor, brought down 
 peals of laughter. 
 
 Dour watched him with unusual re- 
 spect. " I never knew the real man be- 
 fore to-day," he said aside to Mr. Rattlin. 
 
 Night closed in suddenly, with a low, 
 foreboding sough of the wind through 
 the defiles. " The storm's risin', sir," 
 Henkel said once or twice, under his 
 breath, as he came in to heap the fire 
 with coal, shying carefully back from a 
 dried infant alligator which lay stretched 
 upon the hearth. But nobody heeded 
 the warning. Doors and windows were 
 barred fast : the great boulders of jetty 
 coal broke into miniature volcanoes, 
 spouting jets of flame that rushed up the 
 wide chimney, carrying defiance to the 
 night without. What did the storm mat- 
 ter to them ? This mysterious knowledge 
 of Dallas and his former life, of which 
 they had gained but shadowy glimpses, 
 was made real to them to-night, and 
 every one of them felt that they had a 
 share in his glory. 
 
 Supper was announced just as they 
 unrolled the last package. " I wish the 
 empty box taken to my room, Henkel," 
 said Honora, whispering to Dallas that it 
 had been made by his own hands, and that 
 she had an odd attraction to anything that 
 
 belonged to the time when she was not his 
 wife. " I am jealous of the story of every 
 moment of those years," she said, pas- 
 sionately, at which Dallas only laughed, 
 stooping to sweep the paper and dry 
 moss into the box. Some new insight into 
 life, which in the last few weeks had come 
 to him, had done much to blot out his 
 morbid fears. The danger, delayed so 
 long, was almost forgotten : he was a 
 citizen, a man who would be of weight 
 in his State — a husband : these things 
 were real — the shadowy face that threat- 
 ened him had been but an unhealthy 
 megrim. 
 
 Colonel Pervis announced once or 
 twice that the pheasants would be cold. 
 He had been out secretly to watch that 
 they were properly basted. But Dallas 
 and Honora must arrange and label their 
 stones, and alligators, and jointed snakes. 
 Mr. Rattlin brought them coffee, but had 
 to take it back again untouched. 
 
 The others sat long over the bril- 
 liantly-lighted supper-table. No great 
 gala-night in the old house had ever 
 been so full of triumph as that homely 
 supper, with the toast given in a low 
 voice by the Colonel : " To our boy, who 
 would bring higher honor than wealth to 
 the old stock." 
 
 Madam Galbraith replied to it for- 
 mally, standing. She said that Dallas 
 was a Dour — that the field of physical 
 science was one on which the Dours had 
 never before entered. But wherever 
 they went they won renown. That this 
 night, if she might be allowed to relate 
 a family tradition, reminded her of that 
 on which old Major Peter Dour came 
 home, wearing the sword which Wash- 
 ington had given him on the battle-field 
 for a charge which no other officer would 
 have dared to make. The trophies which 
 her son Dallas had wrested from Nature, 
 through perils as extreme, were as hon- 
 orable as that sword in her eyes. Though 
 she was an old woman, and must be for- 
 given if she talked feebly. She was rest- 
 ing heavily on her knuckles. She stop- 
 ped abruptly here, her swarthy features 
 contorted, and sat down without fin-shing. 
 
 Meanwhile, the wind moaned unheeded 
 over the white plain down in the valley, 
 
2l8 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 where the power and wealth of the Dours 
 lay buried, and beat fiercely against the 
 walls of the old house, as with wild 
 warning of worse disaster. At times, 
 when the wail of the storm drowned 
 their voices, and shook the very founda- 
 tions of the house, which were built upon 
 the solid rock, Madam Galbraith looked 
 around with a complacent, reassuring 
 smile. She knew her walls to be im- 
 pregnable. 
 
 But Honora ("who was sadly lacking 
 in the old woman's kind of stamina) felt 
 her heart quake and her teeth chatter 
 with every fresh blast. She looked out 
 of the unshuttered window at the far end 
 of the hall with a great show of courage, 
 and drew back hastily. The Northern 
 Lights flamed up the sky with a red, un- 
 natural glow : black, spectral shapes 
 moved through the driving storm from 
 horizon to horizon — whether mist or 
 avenging spirits who could say .'' The 
 old trees near at hand waved their 
 branches with shrill moans like ghosts 
 in pain ; but the mountains, beaten by 
 tlie tempest, drew farther back with their 
 secret, which no man has ever known, 
 and wrapped themselves deeper in their 
 eternal, melancholy calm. 
 
 Honora had no idea of secrets in 
 storm or mountains. She found herself 
 alone in the wide, dimly-lighted hall ; and 
 Dallas, who had gone to his own room 
 to wash the dust from his hands, heard 
 her little feet pattering quickly after him, 
 and laughed to himself 
 
 The chamber was large, cheerful, softly 
 lighted. " I was afraid," she said simply, 
 and knelt down on the rug to wait for 
 him. 
 
 When he came to her she got up, 
 standing on tip-toe to gravely adjust his 
 cravat. "You bare your throat like a 
 sailor," she said. 
 
 It was a foolish httle chance. But 
 years afterward, when the great change 
 had come, and he knew her as a differ- 
 ent woman, the little brown figure on 
 tip-toe would seem to stand before him 
 again. The scared face and beautiful 
 eyes close to his — the cold hands seek- 
 ing this silly pretext to steal about his 
 neck and cling there. Years afterward 
 
 the picture remained as of one whom he 
 had lost on that night, and who would 
 never return to him again. 
 
 They found the whole party gathered 
 in the hall when they came down. Be- 
 ing in the centre of the house, the storm 
 was less audible here than in the outer 
 rooms : " Besides," added the Colonel, 
 " we cannot separate Dallas from his 
 treasures." 
 
 It was a great gloomy hall, with a 
 heavy, arched ceiling of unpainted beams, 
 the curtaining shadows of which were 
 scarcely disturbed by even the noonday 
 sun. The walls were hung with branch- 
 ing antlers, lynx and bear skins, Indian 
 quivers and tomahawks — an index to the 
 old histories of the Dours. 
 
 They had all made up their minds, 
 however, that it should be cheerful : they 
 dragged in easy-chairs, carried in lamps, 
 heaped up mountains of coal on the fire 
 at the far end ; yet, after all, the illumi- 
 nation was but a nebulous glow, that 
 only threw heavier, flickering shadows 
 into the dark cavity behind. But in the 
 perverse, gay humor which had taken 
 possession of them all, they turned their 
 backs on the darkness and storm, and 
 told stories and sang songs — Dallas and 
 Honora together, while the Colonel 
 growled out a bit of bass now and then, 
 and Henkel and the women loitered in 
 the dining-room to listen. When they 
 came to some old Scotch ballads, the 
 whole party joined in the chorus, Mr. 
 Rattlin's shrill treble piping over all. 
 The beat of the sleet and hail and the 
 wail of the wind were so incessant 
 without that tliey had ceased to notice 
 them, and looked up in surprise when 
 Dallas suddenly grew silent, and, rising, 
 walked uneasily to and fro. 
 
 " Does the storm so disturb you, my 
 son ?" 
 
 " No wonder if it did," said Colonel 
 Pervis, stooping to the hearth to drop 
 some apples he had roasted into a great 
 pitcher of toddy, and anxiously watching 
 them swim in the golden-brown, steam- 
 ing liquid. " The moan of that north- 
 easter is almost human to-night. I could 
 have sworn a while ago, if it had been 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 219 
 
 possible, that I hea^d a voice witliout. 
 I saw by your face, Dallas, that you 
 heard it." 
 
 As if to give meaning to his words, a 
 hoarse, inarticulate cry broke into the 
 muttering of the storm, for off and dis- 
 cordant. 
 
 " It comes from the northern pass," 
 said Madam Galbraith : " the wind in 
 that gully has a voice like the Banshee, 
 full of incomprehensible pain. No living 
 being could be abroad to-niglit. Come, 
 Dallas, let us have another song." 
 
 " In a moment. Go on without me : 
 Honora will lead you." He went 
 hastily through the dark hall to the 
 window. 
 
 Dour looked after him sharply : " Mr. 
 Galbraith's face is ghastly. One would 
 tliink that he beheved in the Banshee, 
 and had heard his own death-note." 
 
 " He is like all persons who live close 
 to Nature," Honora rejoined sharply : 
 " his whole system is affected by slight 
 atmospheric changes." She began at 
 once to sing some careless, ringing air, 
 where the voice turned back on itself, 
 as it were, and made a sudden refrain of 
 a clear, triumphant note, dropped before, 
 so contagious that they all caught and 
 echoed it. But her eyes never left her 
 husband. 
 
 Dallas glanced back as he heard the 
 joyous catch : a colder, heavier weight 
 came with it to add to whatever dread or 
 pain it was that oppressed him. He 
 paused a moment, then pushed aside the 
 curtain and looked out. 
 
 There was the plain of deep snow, 
 sheeted with ice ; there was the storm 
 sweeping steadily by, white -winged, 
 moaning for its prey ; there were the 
 black, bare forests, bent dumbly before 
 it, and the gigantic shadows of the moun- 
 tains bracing each other in the far 
 horizon. There was nothing more. 
 
 He waited a while, and then, recover- 
 ing from his stooping posture, stood for 
 a moment curiously erect. He was 
 turning to go back to them when a 
 shadow, in a deep pitfall of snow, which 
 he had thought was a log, moved. 
 
 It was no log : it was a broad, power- 
 fully-built man. 
 
 His back was toward the house : the 
 hail had blinded, and the faint echo of 
 the song bewildered him. He had 
 fought his way thus far, nigh to death 
 as he was, to sink down at the threshold. 
 There was no cry now — not even a 
 moan : his hands stretched feebly out, 
 and the paralyzed motion of his head, 
 showed that his strength was nearly 
 gone. If it had been Colonel Pervis 
 who saw him, and the man had been his 
 worst enemy, he would have rushed out 
 breathless and carried him in tenderly as 
 a child. But Dallas Galbraith drew the 
 curtain close, that no light should escape, 
 and, with his hands clasped behind him, 
 leaned his forehead against the pane 
 and watched him in his last struggle. 
 He knew, as though he saw them, what 
 bloated features were those under the 
 broad-brimmed hat — what black, flinty 
 eyes. 
 
 The song within went on gayly. 
 Without, the sky darkened and sank 
 heavily overhead ; but a chance ray from 
 the low, watery moon fell on the black, 
 broad figure that every moment sank 
 deeper, inch by inch, in the snow, and 
 grew more still. 
 
 Dallas Galbraith had never been more 
 cool and warily self-possessed than now, 
 when his life hung in the balance of a 
 moment. The thoughts even came to 
 his brain moderate and deliberately. 
 Deepest of all, there was the fact that, 
 end as this might, there was no God — 
 no good. Nothing but the inexorable 
 Something, which all his life had forced 
 him deeper, step by step, into ruin, when- 
 ever he had been true to his best self 
 There was no power outside of himself 
 to whom he could look up. 
 
 He pushed back his fair hair, and 
 looked in at the group in the circle of 
 ruddy light about the fire. There was 
 home for him — warm, loving, healthful, 
 until death : there was a man's place 
 among men. His wife's voice at that 
 moment came to him in a pleading little 
 air, which she had sung to him so often 
 that it had grown full of '.ender, secret 
 meanings to them both. He watched 
 her steadily with his quiet blue eyes, 
 while a clammy sweat broke sk ivvly uh 
 
220 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 his body. He thought he could hear 
 Laddoun's jeering voice telling her that 
 it was upon a felon's breast her head lay- 
 last night — that it was a felon's lips which 
 she had kissed with such passion. There 
 were some old words of hers which he 
 had never forgotten : " Though he were 
 dear to me as my own soul, if he were 
 guilty I would put him from me." 
 
 There was no way now to disprove his 
 guilt : his long concealment would but 
 make it sure. 
 
 He turned from her. 
 
 The man's head had fallen heavily on 
 his breast — he had ceased to struggle. 
 It did not need that Dallas should even 
 raise his hand to thrust him back, and 
 be done with the peril and the old 
 foul life for ever. Let him but drop the 
 curtain, and go quietly back to the cheer- 
 ful fireside. 
 
 The night and storm were doing his 
 work for him. The cry would never be 
 heard again. In the morning there would 
 be but a stiff clod of matter — harmless : 
 tliat could tell no tales. 
 
 He waited in silence. The wind had 
 lulled ; the snow fell heavily, softly ; he 
 could detect but faint resistance in the 
 dark figure, which it strove to bury, flake 
 by flake. 
 
 Yet if he drew yonder bolt and let 
 the beacon-hght stream through the 
 open door? In another moment Lad- 
 doun would be in their midst. 
 
 He clasped his hands more tightly be- 
 hind him, and stood as motionless as a 
 stone ; but he closed his eyes : he had 
 no wish to see him die. 
 
 Then there was a lightning flash and 
 heat through Dallas' veins — a throb of 
 the sturdy, honest, gallant heart, that had 
 made him what he was. He put his hand 
 out, drew the bolt, and let the flood of 
 red light flash out into the night ; and 
 then, after he had seen the man look up, 
 and with a desperate struggle gain his 
 footing, he went quietly back to the fire, 
 and stood among the others, for one brief 
 moment more, their equal and com- 
 panion. 
 
 Let the old hard Luck that had followed 
 him always, that now struggled into life 
 at his door, enter and do its worst. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 Before they could speak to him, the 
 fierce blaze of the fire, quickened by the 
 cold entering air, flashed up into a sud- 
 den and more powerful brilliance, illu- 
 minating the great hall, and chasing be- 
 fore it the sombre shadows that had 
 lurked in corners unseen and unfelt. It 
 threw into strong relief the figure of a 
 man, framed in the massive portal of the 
 door. 
 
 So wan and gaunt he was ; so strangely 
 unreal, ghostly and pallid ; so worn with 
 disease, battered of Fate and abused by 
 the storm through which he had dragged 
 himself, that the questions with which 
 they had greeted Dallas died suddenly 
 into silence ; and, as if each one there 
 confronted visible Death in his most 
 spectral shape, they rose in confusion, 
 and stood regarding the ghasdy figure of 
 the guest who came to trouble their en- 
 joyment. 
 
 The fire shot up into a triumphant 
 gleam — then fell apart in drifts of saffron 
 smoke, and the shadows filled again the 
 heavy arches overhead, pictured them- 
 selves upon the walls, and made still 
 more unreal the hving shadow which 
 the doorway framed. He came forward, 
 dripping and staggering as he came, un- 
 til he stood among them, leaning with 
 one hand on the table, while the other, 
 upon whose thin forefinger burned a 
 gaudy purple stone, toyed feebly vnth 
 the glossy black beard that grew on his 
 lean, colorless face, luxuriant as lichen 
 upon dead wood. Madam Galbraith has- 
 tened toward him ; but before she could 
 speak he had turned to Dallas, upon 
 whose arm Honora had laid her hand, 
 with no look of fear now, but of a quiet 
 protection for him against an evil of 
 which she already knew the depth and 
 danger. 
 
 There was an effort, piteous to see, 
 for the old grace and swagger in Lad- 
 doun's sweeping bow. But his smile 
 had lost the mellowness of youth now, 
 and was a hard, stage-grin, and the 
 rotund voice was but a hoarse quaver : 
 
 " You do not know me, Dallas ?" 
 
 " I know you, Laddoun." 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 « I am not welcome ?" 
 
 " No, you are not welcome." 
 
 They faced each other in silence. 
 Then Laddoun turned his back to them 
 all, with a peculiar choking in his throat 
 which chilled their blood as they heard 
 it : "I saved your life there, in Scran- 
 ton," he said. "And it's almost up with 
 me now. But no matter ! I regret — I 
 did not mean to have intruded, madam." 
 His jaws fell weakly open and his eyes 
 were glazed ; but the ringed hand waved 
 with the old suave flourish. 
 
 Madam Galbraith, her countenance 
 red with anger, put her hands on his 
 elbows and gently seated him in her 
 own chair. " My son was not bred in 
 my house," she said, her stem eye on 
 Dallas, " or he would know that its doors 
 were never closed upon a man ill and 
 needy, were he my worst enemy." 
 
 Laddoun tried to reply, but the words 
 failed him. He pointed dramatically to 
 his deathlike face, made a feeble effort 
 to tear open his thin, soaked coat and 
 waistcoat, and then sank down in a 
 helpless, soggy mass at their feet. 
 
 When Dallas stooped to lift him, Ho- 
 nora stood before him, her eyes flashing 
 and her features pinched. "You shall 
 not," she said : " I know who he is. 
 If / could bring him to life with one 
 touch of my finger, I would not do it, 
 Dallas." 
 
 He put her gently aside, and, with the 
 other men, laid the bulky, inanimate 
 body on a lounge. " It's that poor 
 braggart, Laddoun," muttered Pervis, as 
 he poured out a goblet of the hot liquor. 
 " He was on your trail before, Dallas. 
 What's the grudge between you, eh ? 
 If I could get a mouthful of this down 
 his throat, it would bring life to him 
 again." 
 
 " He has been lodging at the toll-gate 
 with old Dick Potter," said Mr. Rattlin, 
 tugging at his boots. " He came there 
 late one night, weeks ago. and has been 
 too ill to be removed. He must have 
 been mad to dare the storm to-night." 
 
 " He is not mad," said Dallas, quietly. 
 " His errand is to me, and he thought 
 he was near the end. But he will not 
 die until it is accomplished." 
 
 The other men worked in silence after 
 that, with furtive, grave glances at the 
 young man's patient, stern face. Some- 
 thing in it, more terrible tlian death, 
 awed them, and made them wish that the 
 morning had come. 
 
 The man was so emaciated ?nd so ex- 
 hausted by his long fight with the storm 
 that they thought it best not to remove 
 him to another room. Madam Galbraith 
 herself made a bed upon the lounge, 
 while Dallas, helped by the others, strip- 
 ped off his wet garments and wrapped 
 him in blankets. Honora alone was 
 idle. She was, hke all women, tender 
 enough by instinct. But when their 
 prejudices are roused, they are, unlike 
 men, pitiless as death. She watched 
 the poor wTetch struggling for breath, 
 and Dallas' resolute efforts to help him, 
 as though she had been a bar of steel. 
 
 Then she went to the window and 
 stood there, where she could not look at 
 him. 
 
 He did not revive as they had hoped. 
 The long, dark hours crept by : the 
 storm without had grown silent ; there 
 was a vague consciousness upon them 
 all that it had done its worst when it 
 drove this poor, human wreck to their 
 door, to work out what evil yet lay in 
 him before the end. But as the night 
 deepened, and he yet lay unconscious, 
 the firelight flickering upon the livid face 
 and glossy beard, they began to move 
 with more hushed footsteps, to watch un- 
 easily from time to time for the first gray 
 hint of dawn. The awe of that inevit- 
 able Shadow which waited to claim them 
 all had fallen upon them : conscious that 
 it stood now in their midst, and that its 
 victim did not know that the call for him 
 had come. 
 
 It seemed best to them that his last 
 hours should be quiet : they sat around 
 the fire, therefore, gravely silent or 
 speaking only in whispers. But Dallas 
 worked with him unwearied — at first to 
 drive out by force the remembrance of 
 the murder that had been in his heart. 
 But when he felt the hands and feet 
 grow cold under his hold, and saw the 
 gray, unmistakable shadow steal over the 
 face, the memor}' of these later years was 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 blotted out. He was the boy Dallas 
 again. For how many years this man 
 had been his open-handed friend, his 
 hearty companion ! 
 
 " George !" he called once, when he 
 thought the eyes moved. " George !" 
 But the silence of the grave mocked 
 him, and after that he did not speak 
 again. 
 
 When the sickly light of the first dawn 
 glimmered through the window and 
 struck the roof, however, Laddoun's 
 torpor was broken : he stirred and 
 opened his small, black eyes, and after 
 staring dully around, they rested on 
 Dallas. 
 
 " My errand was to you," he said. 
 
 Madam Galbraith moistened his 
 parched lips, and they hfted him up to 
 a sitting posture, and then drew back 
 and left Dallas alone before him. Lad- 
 doun began to speak, but pausing, mo- 
 tioned to a bottle of brandy on the table. 
 Dallas poured out a glassful for him. 
 
 " Hah !" wiping his lips, " that has 
 body to it. I'm not as strong as I 
 should like to be, madam," to Mrs. Duf- 
 field, slowly, as though the words were 
 drawn from a well that was nearly dry. 
 " I need bracing. If I had seen you, I 
 should have certainly drunk my — my old 
 toast — Lovely woman. George Laddoun 
 has been a gallant man in his day — 
 devoted to the ladies." 
 
 Mrs. Duffield bowed and drew far- 
 ther back, very pale. 
 
 The black, shining eye, missing her, 
 wandered restlessly, and fixed itself on 
 Mr. Galbraith. 
 
 The well was nearly dry now, but the 
 old ceaseless rattle and jingle went on. 
 "It is the walk, sir, that made me re- 
 quire a stimulant. The fatigue was se- 
 vere. But I am rewarded by the honor 
 of your acquaintance. It is an honor — 
 long-deferred. My business was with 
 your son — " 
 
 « We will leave you, Dallas," Mr. 
 Galbraith said to him aside, hastily. 
 «' We can do nothing for him, and it is 
 more fitting that you should hear the 
 last words of this man alone." 
 
 Laddoun's jealous eye was on them, 
 reading Mr. Galbraith's words by the 
 
 motion of his lips : he raised his hana 
 authoritatively. 
 
 Dallas detained them by a sign : 
 "Let no one go out. The secret has 
 been kept too long," he said. " If the 
 end is to come, let it be now." He 
 gave one quick look around for Honora, 
 but she stood still motionless by the 
 window, her back toward them. He 
 took a glass of water and drank it 
 slowly, and then, leaning with one arm 
 upon the mantel-shelf, looked down at 
 Laddoun. 
 
 The slow, patient years of endurance 
 and toil were over, and the sum of it all 
 was placed in the hands of this half- 
 drunken, dying wretch, to make or mar 
 for ever, at his pleasure. 
 
 God's justice ! 
 
 Laddoun, with the blanket gathered 
 about his throat, nodded critically as he 
 inspected Dallas. "A pale, dramatic 
 face, and lights up well with passion !" 
 he would have said, but his breath was 
 gone. He was considering the scene 
 with regard to its stage effect. He had 
 often planned it, but not so well as 
 chance had done. He looked up at the 
 wan glimmer of dawn on the high, dusky 
 arches, at the woman's figure by the 
 window, at the silent group in the glow 
 of firelight, at Dallas; then with a smile 
 of content stroked his jetty beard, and 
 glanced down at it. Then he sipped 
 the brandy slowly, and so gathered, as 
 it were, and nursed his strength. 
 
 " Will I fill your glass ?" asked Colo- 
 nel Pervis. 
 
 He looked into the goblet doubtfully : 
 there were but a few drops left. " No 
 more, sir. Do you know I believe that 
 will be the last drink for George Lad- 
 doun ? And he's been a jolly dog !" 
 with a sorrowful quaver. " No — no more. 
 Dallas !" 
 
 " I am here, Laddoun." 
 
 " Dallas !" he said, struggling to sit 
 erect and to form his words after some 
 coherent plan long in his mind. " There 
 are some men who go out of this world 
 with their accounts unsquared. But it 
 seems to me that life should end like a 
 play. When this cursed fever got the 
 better of me in Panama, I determined 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 223 
 
 that it shouldn't cut off George Lad- 
 doun's life as commonplace and mean- 
 ingless as a dog's. I've been trying all 
 my life to write a play, but the managers 
 wouldn't take it. This is a better play 
 than any I could write ; it brings us all 
 in — all of us. Why are your faces all 
 so cursed white? Do you think that old 
 Death has come to drop the curtain 
 now ? Death and justice at the end ! 
 Yes! it's like a play. Like a play!" 
 
 They saw that the man's mind had 
 wandered away into incoherency, and 
 that he had lost the thread upon which 
 he began. 
 
 Dallas stooped and touched his fore- 
 head : " Do you know me, George ?" 
 
 "Yes, Dall, I know you. Will you 
 give me the brandy again ?" 
 
 " It is in your hand." 
 
 A weak smile trembled on his lips as 
 he slowly sipped it, measuring tlie amount 
 with a melancholy shake of the head. 
 " It's the last — the wine of life for me, sir !" 
 to Colonel Pervis ; " and it runs low," 
 looking at it in silence, as if he told off 
 by the remaining drops the minutes of 
 his life. It seemed as if by this tawdry, 
 dramatic symbol alone the narrow space 
 of sight and sound which barred the 
 man from the eternal Silence beyond was 
 made real to him. He turned to Dal- 
 las at last, still holding the goblet in his 
 hand. 
 
 " For you, Galbraith," with a sudden, 
 loud energy. " I came here from Panama 
 to fulfill my purpose for you. McGill 
 told there that I had grown insane in 
 brooding over it. Curse him ! Who's 
 Joe McGill, to judge a gentleman ? I 
 mean before I die to take the mask off 
 that you've worn — to show you as you are 
 to your friends and your wife. It's pro- 
 per work for George Laddoun. The 
 Dours are a genteel, high family." 
 
 " The man speaks with great good 
 sense, though his meaning is obscure," 
 said Madam Galbraith, aside. 
 
 Mr. Rattlin suddenly came before 
 them all, and put his hands on Lad- 
 doun's shoulders. His natural solemn 
 voice jarred strangely against the inces- 
 sant cracked hectoring of the other. 
 " My friend, in God's name be silent ! 
 
 Dallas Galbraith is known to us all. 
 Nothing you can say will harm him here. 
 But, for yourself. Colonel Laddoun, the 
 time is short." 
 
 He blenched for a moment : " Well, 
 my little man, I know that," rallying 
 with a good-natured, miserable laugh. 
 " I'll be found game when the time 
 comes. Don't chouse me out of my 
 plan. I've known this man as you 
 never knew him. He would have turned 
 me out to-night to die like a beast. Yet 
 I took him out of the coal-pits. I 
 clothed and fed him ! For years he had 
 no friend but me," with a sort of hyste- 
 rical sob. 
 
 "Is this true, Dallas ?" Madam Gal- 
 braith touched him on the breast as she 
 spoke. 
 
 " It is true." 
 
 The sudden flash of strength gone, 
 Laddoun had sunk back in a heap as 
 though he were disjointed, covering his 
 face with one hand. Dallas went up to 
 him and took it down, holding it in his 
 own : " George, the play's almost over, 
 as you said. Is it worth while to ask 
 you to be just ? In an hour it will be 
 too late. I've borne this weight many 
 years without complaining ; but — " he 
 grew so hoarse as to be almost inaud- 
 ible — " the truth will matter something 
 to me now." 
 
 " You've no proof of your innocence," 
 a flash of cunning in the black eyes. 
 
 " No. I have no proof" He looked 
 slowly around upon their faces, resting 
 on his wife at last. " I don't try to 
 move you, Laddoun, but you are taking 
 something from me to-night which will 
 never come to me again." Some hidden 
 meaning in the quiet, moderate words 
 made their hearts stand still, as though 
 they heard the cry of a soul for its life to 
 God. 
 
 Laddoun looked up, and the eyes of 
 the two men met. The sickly morning 
 light glimmered down the walls, touched 
 the strange birds and beetles into bril- 
 liant hues, and dimmed the red flame of 
 the fire, but the silence was unbroken. 
 
 Then Laddoun wiped his mouth with 
 the back of his hand, his eyes wandei 
 ing guiltily. "What would you have 
 
224 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 me do ?" querulously. " Damn mj-self ? 
 Here — now ? I will leave the world an 
 honorable man. As I've lived." 
 
 Dallas went back to his own place 
 without a word. "It was the last 
 chance," he muttered after a while, and 
 stood alone, apart from them all, looking 
 at no one. 
 
 Laddoun lifted the brandy and trem- 
 blingly wet his lips. " I have more to 
 tell," he said, loudly. 
 
 But Dallas' hand was already pressed 
 to a warm, steady little breast, and a wo- 
 man's voice filled the silence, rational and 
 quiet : " Why should you say more, Col- 
 onel Laddoun? Did you drag yourself 
 here, a dying man, only to tell us that Dal- 
 las Galbraith was ignorant, poor — was for 
 years a convict in Albany ? Is that all? Is 
 that the whole of your poor revenge ?" 
 
 " Honora ?" Dallas dragged his wife 
 round until she faced him. It was no 
 longer the silly, petulant, lovable girl 
 whom he saw. She was gone, and 
 never after this night returned. It was 
 a woman, beautiful, with noble patience, 
 that met his gaze, her great brown eyes 
 brilliant as with new life. She caught 
 his coat with both hands, and spoke to 
 him. Alone. Laddoun was forgotten. 
 
 " I know it, Dallas. I have known it 
 a long time. I have so loved and 
 trusted you that I never asked you 
 whether you were innocent or guilty. 
 What did that matter to me ? I know 
 you as you are now, my husband !" 
 
 She would have kissed him, but he 
 did not move to kiss her : he stood 
 breathing heavily and staring blindly 
 down into her face, parting the hair on 
 her forehead mechanically. Looking into 
 his eyes, she had a glimpse, for the first 
 time, into the soul of this log of a man 
 whom she had married. She knew 
 something then of the pain he had 
 borne there, the awful tenderness and 
 patience which lay hidden there, never 
 to see the light. She saw there, too, 
 the strength she had brought to him. 
 It was well she had that comfort, for he 
 spoke no word of it to her. 
 
 He looked up at last. " He is dying, 
 Honora," he said, and putting her aside, 
 went toward him. 
 
 He was dying. He lay back on the 
 blankets, the hand fallen by his side 
 which held the goblet, the brandy drop- 
 ping slowly on the floor. Mr. Galbraith 
 was gone, but the other men were busy 
 about him. Dallas felt rather than saw 
 the constraint and cold civility with 
 which, as by one impulse, they moved 
 aside to let him pass. 
 
 Madam Galbraith was on her knees 
 before Laddoun, with no gentle purpose 
 of ministering to him, but intent on 
 dragging by force the secret from his 
 miserable soul ere it took its flight. 
 Her gray hair ai i proud face, that 
 spoke in that moment, as never before, 
 the clean blood of generations, were 
 brought close to his foul breath as he 
 whispered huskily. 
 
 " I cannot hear you," her black eyes 
 flashing savagely. " Give the man a 
 stimulant. Is that the tale you came to 
 tell, that my son was a felon ?" 
 
 Laddoun nodded, and tried to pull the 
 blankets over his shivering feet. 
 
 " I must have the whole truth," 
 making no effort to assist him. 
 
 He began to speak, and, making but 
 an inarticulate sound, pointed apologeti- 
 cally to his throat, trying to smile cour- 
 teously. With the Shadow that waited 
 behind him, its blindness and chill upon 
 his eyes and lips, Laddoun could not 
 forget that this was a great lady — a wo- 
 man who led society — who spoke to him. 
 
 Madam Galbraith rose and looked 
 down on him, fierce and hungry as a 
 balked bird of prey. Mr. Rattlin would 
 have put her aside : " He is near death, 
 madam. Let me pray with him." 
 
 " What Popish folly is that ? Do you 
 think a life like his is to be glossed over 
 by a twinge of fear at the end ? What is 
 the soul of a wretch like that compared to 
 the honor of my family, that is at stake ?" 
 
 Mrs. Duffield stood before her. '• My 
 son Dallas," she said, in a hard, metal- 
 lic tone, "will tell you that this story, 
 which Honora has accepted so readily, 
 i.s folse — false. You will not refuse to 
 credit him ?" 
 
 " Why should I credit him ?" in a 
 voice which, from its low key and con- 
 centration of bitterness, was audible 
 
DALLAS GAI^BRAITH. 
 
 225 
 
 through the whole apartment. "The 
 time has passed for Dallas Galbraith to 
 speak. He has stolen his place and his 
 wife. It is too late !" 
 
 Dallas, who heeded her words no more 
 than a stone the wind that blew against 
 it, had lifted Laddoun into an easier 
 posture, and, in obedience to his signs, 
 was loosening the gaudy, red cravat and 
 wetting his lips, ceasing when he found 
 that he shut his eyes drowsil}^, as though 
 for a quiet slumber. 
 
 But Madam Galbraith stooped nearer 
 to the closing eyes, pale as though Death 
 had touched her als' ■. " The truth be- 
 fore you go !" she cned. 
 
 The soul seemed to come back to the 
 graying, rigid features, and linger in 
 obedience to the imperious summons : 
 « I — I came back from Panama to tell 
 you. But I lost the cue to-night some- 
 how. It was better than any play I 
 wrote. But I never could finish my last 
 act successfully. Take this lump off my 
 breast, Dallas. It's cold." 
 
 The Shadow was so near, its inex- 
 orable hand so open and visible now 
 upon its prisoner, that even the fierce 
 old woman drew back awed and dumb. 
 
 Laddoun's eyes rested by chance on 
 Dallas, and brightened into a look 
 strangely foreign to them — both genuine 
 and cordial. The bo3-'s nature, asleep 
 so long, wakens again, according to the 
 old superstition, and looks through the 
 most hackneyed, vilest face at the last, 
 when Death comes to bare all secrets. 
 
 " I've been a good friend to you, Dall. 
 I'll— I'll drink with you." He lifted the 
 glass which, according to his fancy, held 
 the last wine of his life, with an effort to 
 his mouth, but the last drop had dripped, 
 untasted, on the floor. He looked at it. 
 " Spilled, eh ? And now — for my secret !" 
 But the weight was too heavy on his 
 breast, that never should be lifted : the 
 last act would never be finished : he 
 turned his head to one side. " No mat- 
 ter ! You know — down there at Mana- 
 squan, Laddoun was — was a jolly dog." 
 
 The morning light shone in blankly. 
 They waited a moment, but the soiled 
 linen and ruby buttons on his breast did 
 not stir. Mr. Rattlin bent over him 
 
 and took the glass from his hand ; and, 
 if, as he closed the black eyes, still with 
 the pleasant smile in them, he followed 
 the soul of the jolly dog with a prayer 
 upon its for-ever silent journe}-, who can 
 blame him ? 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 The softest morning hght is melan- 
 choly when it falls into a room disor- 
 dered with last night's work or pleasure. 
 But it was a cold, unflinching day that 
 suddenly bared the great hall at whose 
 end the little group were huddled. They 
 had suffered the fire to go out, and the 
 hearth was strewn with blackened cinders 
 and soot : plants and ores, the poor 
 trophies of Dallas' life, were scattered 
 underfoot — their previous proud signifi- 
 cance gone from them for ever : tlie 
 dead man lay in their midst, stiff, on 
 his untidy blankets. 
 
 They left him neglected for the time, 
 watching the living figure which had for 
 them a sadder significance — the gaunt, 
 gray old woman, who stood on the ashes 
 of the hearth upon which for the first 
 time had fallen dishonor. Even Dallas, 
 forgetting himself, looked at her with 
 pity. But Honora, though sick to death 
 at heart, began to pick up the scattered 
 plants with proud composure, as if she 
 could show by that means that her hus- 
 band was the same to her. She chose 
 to ignore altogether the dead man and 
 the blow he had struck. 
 
 Mr. Galbraith came in, nervously 
 turning his head from the body on the 
 lounge, going up to his wife, who stood 
 beside it. She did not move v.hen he 
 spoke to her. She held her hand- on 
 her whitening, bearded upper lip, and 
 drew heavy sighs, as a man does who 
 struggles to control some cleaving pain 
 within. There was an ominous silence, 
 which no one dared to break. At last 
 Mr. Galbraith's mild voice was heard : 
 
 " I was a coward to desert you. my 
 dear boy. But I knew what this man 
 came to tell. I have known it a long 
 time. I could not see you degraded on 
 
226 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 my own hearth. I do not know how 
 much was told to-night. But I am sure, 
 Dallas," trying to speak cheerfully, " that 
 you can make it all plain to us now ?" 
 
 Madam Galbraith did not raise her 
 eyes, but she waited motionless, holding 
 her breath. Honora stood quietly lis- 
 tening. But Dallas was silent. 
 
 " You believed in his innocence ?" said 
 Mr. Rattlin, anxiously. " You had, 
 doubtless, proof of it, sir ?" 
 
 " No ! I have but his word. That 
 is enough for me." 
 
 " It is not enough for me," said Ma- 
 dam Galbraith, in a hoarse thunder. 
 " Poverty and death find lodging under 
 this roof — I cannot keep them out. But 
 Q'ime — never !" 
 
 Colonel Pervis stepped forward to 
 Dallas with a forced heartiness and cor- 
 diality, more galling than open suspi- 
 cion : " It will all come right," clapping 
 him on the shoulder. " Many a man is 
 sent unjustly to those Eastern prisons 
 by the cursed blockheads of jurymen. 
 Dallas has proof that he was unjustly 
 sentenced, no doubt." 
 
 But Dallas stood, bigger, more im- 
 movable, more dumb than ever. The 
 light fell directly upon him, and the 
 wind from the open window blew the 
 fair hair back from his broad forehead, 
 his blue eyes turned gravely from one 
 speaker to the other. But with the first 
 sound of Madam Galbraith's bitter voice, 
 her own fierce obstinacy rose to meet 
 her in his cooler blood. His lips were 
 .sealed. 
 
 His mother came up and shook his 
 arm violently: " Speak to them, Dallas !" 
 
 He stooped and kissed her dry lips, 
 and held her with one arm close to his 
 breast. When he looked up he found 
 they all stood waiting. Even Madam 
 Galbraith had come forward a step, her 
 eyes upon him. 
 
 He turned from them to his own moth- 
 er's. " I have nothing to say," he replied, 
 in a clear, quiet voice. " The only proof 
 of my innocence was with the man who 
 lies dead there. I shall find no fault with 
 him now. He is dead. I have no proof. 
 I ask no man to trust my word." 
 
 The stern old woman was for a mo- 
 
 ment stunned and breathless. If he had 
 succumbed to her, if he had but once 
 acknowledged her as either judge or 
 mother, the heart of her within might 
 have spoken through the flinty pride. 
 But she looked into his cold eyes and 
 obdurate face, her own growing each in- 
 stant more wan and hard. At last she 
 raised her hands and motioned him 
 back : " Let him go, James. He has 
 deceived me once. I do not trust his 
 word. When he can prove his inno- 
 cence he will find home ready for him." 
 
 Then she sat down by Laddoun and 
 covered her head with her hands, more 
 cowed, more defeated in her life than 
 he in his death. 
 
 The next moment Dallas stood with- 
 out the door, a little brown figure close 
 beside him. Mr, Galbraith had fol- 
 lowed him : he was the paler of the two. 
 He chafed his thin, long hands unceas- 
 ingly together : " You shall not leave 
 my roof, dear boy ! This is your 
 home !" repeating the words again and 
 again, until they lost all force. 
 
 But Dallas answered loudly, his eyes 
 unnaturally bright : " No, it is not my 
 home ! What ! are you here still Ho- 
 nora ? Go back ! You are no wife of mine. 
 It was not a felon that you married !" 
 
 " We are going together, Dallas," 
 quietly. 
 
 " I have no home for you. I am 
 branded like Cain. I know what my 
 ruin is, now that I have brought it on 
 you !" 
 
 " We will make a home. Come, let 
 us make ready and be gone." 
 
 Mr. Galbraith stood apart, looking 
 dully at her, leaning against the stone 
 wall of the house, unconscious of the 
 fierce wind that blew his gray hair back. 
 " Honora !" he said, feebly, " my child, 
 will you leave me V 
 
 "When Dallas can prove his inno- 
 cence we will both come back," she said 
 cheerfully. " That will be in a little while ! 
 Only a little while, uncle !" smiling, as 
 she gulped down her tears. 
 
 But her hopeful voice n^used no echo 
 in either of the men, who had fought 
 against Circumstance longer than she. 
 
 " You are very right to go with your 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 227 
 
 husband, my dear," faltered the old man. 
 " I do not blame you. You'll both be 
 happier away. I would not have urged 
 }ou to stay, Dallas," holding out his 
 hand, " but you and Nora are all I have. 
 Madam Galbraith"s prejudices are power- 
 ful, and your — your character is forcible, 
 my son. I am not a strong man. I 
 have not the power to reconcile you that 
 I could wish." Honora stood watching 
 him as he turned away. In the last 
 hour he had become, she thought, an 
 old, broken man. She put up her hands 
 to her eyes to shut him out from her 
 sight. Then she slowdy followed her 
 husband. 
 
 It was Honora who gathered Dallas' 
 clothes and books together, talking cheer- 
 fully while he sat silent, watching her. 
 She planned where they should go for 
 the little while before his innocence 
 would be proved. Every little keep- 
 sake which her uncle had given her she 
 collected carefully. But her clothes, 
 which had always been chosen by Ma- 
 dam Galbraith, she left behind. 
 
 " You shall buy me what I want," she 
 said. Poor, purblind Dallas had no idea 
 of the fiery, implacable little heart beat- 
 ing steadily in her bosom, which de- 
 spaired that Fate, or God, or anything 
 but herself would ever understand the 
 man she loved or do him justice. She 
 turned, quite cool and self-possessed 
 and gracious, to Mr. Dour when he 
 came in to bid Dallas good-bye. Dour's 
 memory was quickened, and he recol- 
 lected Dallas' trial now, though he did 
 not advert to it. He fully believed him 
 guilty. But, in his just, philosophic 
 way, he rather liked to count the step- 
 ping-stones of their dead selves on 
 which men had risen, particularly if they 
 were foul and unusual stones. He 
 talked to Dallas with precisely his old 
 manner and an added tinge of curiosity, 
 which only drove the blood colder to 
 Dallas' heart, and induced Honora to 
 follow him privately to the hall as he 
 left them, and to tell him that they had 
 all the evidence of her husband's inno- 
 cence, and were going now to make it 
 public. 
 
 Colonel Pervis did not come near 
 
 tlicm. He thought the boy guilty, and 
 knew he could not hide it. He shut 
 himself up in the dining-room alone, and 
 paced up and down in dead silence, with- 
 out even an oath to relieve him. He 
 poured out a glass of brandy, and put it 
 down untasted, sick at heart and stom- 
 ach. The door opened and Mrs. Duf- 
 field came in, going straight up to him 
 with a strangely set step and manner, 
 which made him stop and stare at her, 
 a curious alarm on his florid face. 
 
 She was dressed in her cloak and 
 hood. 
 
 " You are going out, madam ? The 
 weather is inclement." 
 
 " I am going with my son Dallas," in 
 her ordinary calm tones. " I will take 
 passage to California by the next 
 steamer." 
 
 " California .'"' 
 
 She nodded with perfect composure, 
 her eye as clear and keen as ever. But 
 the Colonel noted certain blue marks 
 about the firm mouth, as if a cold hand 
 had touched her. " I am a practical 
 woman, as you know. These dying ac- 
 cusations and tragical emotions may per- 
 tain naturally to the lives of Madam Gal- 
 braith and my son. They are Dours. 
 But I am an ordinary, business person. 
 I reduce the matter to reason. My son 
 is innocent— w^e know that !" 
 
 "Innocent? Assuredly. Madam, pray 
 take a chair." The blue marks were 
 widening and deepening. The cold hand 
 was gaining ground. One could fancy 
 it was stretched out from her heart 
 within, and that there there was no 
 warmth. 
 
 " No, I will not sit down, thank you. 
 If Dallas is innocent, there must be 
 proof of it. I think I said that in a case 
 like this one must act from reason, not 
 feeling. He said Laddoun had such 
 proof I shall follow — " She put up her 
 hand uncertainly to her eyes, hesitated 
 and stopped. After a while she looked 
 up. Colonel Pervis came a step nearer. 
 The cold hand had left its mark heavily, 
 indeed. 
 
 " I have lost the thread of what I was 
 going to say." 
 
 " You said you would follow — " 
 
228 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 " Follow Laddoun. I will trace him 
 back and find the proof. I am Dallas' 
 mother. I'll not tire." 
 
 Her head fell forward. The Colonel 
 caught her as she sank down, her flesh 
 very cold, and the heart quite still 
 within. 
 
 He rang the bell : " Take Mrs. Duf- 
 field to bed," when the women came. 
 '" She'll not be apt to leave it for some 
 time," he muttered to himself " ' My 
 son is innocent,' eh 1 God help the 
 women ! How they do hang on to the 
 last !" and he resumed his miserable 
 lounge through the room. 
 
 Honora and her husband were left 
 a long time alone. When they were 
 almost ready to go, there was a tap at the 
 door, and Mr. Rattlin came in. His 
 insignificant little face was like a cordial 
 to starving men. It broke down that 
 iron-faced Httle Honora, who, after the 
 first glance at it, began to cry quietly 
 over the valise she was packing. 
 
 " Well, children, I have the sleigh. 
 Are you ready 1 We will just reach the 
 farm in time for lunch, and then we can 
 talk over our plans." 
 
 " We are not going home with you, 
 dear Mr. Rattlin. We will not bring our 
 disgrace \.o yojif sobbing out loud now. 
 
 But Dallas had risen and held out his 
 hand : " You think me innocent, then, 
 sir ?" 
 
 " I know it, Galbraith ! Our religion 
 is not that of our Master if it does not 
 teach us to have faith in each other as 
 well as in God. I know you are in- 
 nocent." 
 
 " Does your religion teach you that 
 justice always comes in this world ?" 
 
 He hesitated, and shook his head : 
 " We will not talk of that. Your mother 
 is ill. It is best for you not to see her. 
 Ycm will come home with me ?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Have you any plan ? I will not 
 urge you. Do what will give yourselves 
 most comfort." 
 
 When they did not answer him, he 
 walked away to the window to give them 
 time. " I will go to my work," Dallas 
 said at last. " Something can be done, 
 
 even before spring. Unless I lose the 
 appointment when this discovery is made 
 known." 
 
 " I have a letter here which I ne- 
 glected to give you last night." He laid 
 it on the table and went out hurriedly, 
 fearful that even his kindness would be 
 jarring and intrusive. 
 
 " Honora," said Dallas, as she foldfed 
 her little keepsakes ; " how did you 
 know — that — " 
 
 She blushed crimson, and did not re- 
 ply for a moment : " I remembered — 
 the convict that Lizzy brought here." 
 
 Dallas was silent. Then he took her 
 head between his hands and turned it 
 toward him as she knelt on the floor. 
 "If you had known it before we were 
 married, Honora?" 
 
 She looked at him steadily with both 
 a laugh and tears in her eyes. " I 
 remembered the convict that Lizzy 
 brought — long ago." 
 
 " And you married me ?" 
 
 " I loved you, dear," burying her head 
 in his breast. 
 
 It was only when they rose to go out 
 that Dallas remembered the letter. It 
 was square and large, with the postmark 
 Manasqtian scrawled in one corner. He 
 opened it, and found on the thick sheet 
 of paper within only these words, in a 
 formal hand : 
 
 " To Dallas Galbraith : 
 
 " Sir : EHzabeth B3Tne desires that 
 you will come to her without delay. Of 
 her claim on you, you are the best judge. 
 Her need of you is a matter of Hfe and 
 death. Joseph Kimball." 
 
 " Who is Joseph Kimball, Dallas ?" 
 touching him when he stood silent. 
 
 " A good old man, Honora. A friend 
 of mine before I lost friends." 
 
 " Lizzy is ill or in great trouble. We 
 will go to her." 
 
 " Yes." But he stood folding the 
 letter slowly, a deeper shadow on his 
 face. The world outside to Dallas was 
 blatant with his shame. He was going 
 out to meet it. But it gave him a 
 keener pang than any he had borne to 
 think of carrying back his old weight of 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 229 
 
 disgrace to the simple people to whom 
 his perverse affection yet clung. He 
 roused himself in a moment. " We will 
 go to Manasquan," he said. " I know 
 what Lizzy's claims upon me are." 
 
 Honora saw that the halls and cham- 
 bers were curiously vacant when they 
 passed out. The very servants avoided 
 them. Her uncle stood at the doorway 
 to bid them good-bye. He held Dallas' 
 hand and tried to speak, but the words 
 died on his tongue. Mr. Rattlin ran 
 alongside of the sleigh as it dragged 
 heavily along, talking fast and cheerfully, 
 until he sank hip-deep in snow. Then 
 he stood watching them, waving his hat, 
 his little face red and his eyes wet. 
 
 So they went out, quite alone, into the 
 waste of snow. 
 
 The gray - headed old gentleman 
 watched the black spot creeping out 
 of sight across the white plain. If he 
 had been a less unable, unready man, 
 he thought vainly, he might have com- 
 manded their fate to a difierent ending. 
 
 Mr. Ratthn, who had joined him, 
 sighed when they were no longer to be 
 seen. 
 
 "Justice will come at last," he said. 
 
 " It may be. Yet Justice is slow. I 
 fear that I shall never see my son again." 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 Solitude : every hour deeper soli- 
 tude and silence. It seemed to Honora 
 that the mountains of the West and her 
 old home-life belonged to another and 
 distant world. She could not tell how 
 long she had been sitting, packed in 
 buffalo skins, in this rough, queer sled, 
 ghding noiselessly over the snow, with 
 Dallas, silent, at her side, and the silent 
 driver in front. The lonehness and un- 
 broken monotony began to weigh upon 
 her brain. This might be the entrance 
 into Hades. Were they to go down for 
 ever into these dead plains of snow, 
 with the dead plains of sand beneath — 
 into these unbroken, spectral forests of 
 stunted and distorted trees, that even in 
 
 daylight stretched out their black arms 
 like the skeletons of mocking dwarfs, 
 but in the cold moonlight grew almost 
 human in their deformity and despairing 
 motion ? The very sky overhead was 
 new to her — of thin, wet texture, kin- 
 dling at sunset into shifting hues of such 
 strange brilliancy th&t she fancied they 
 curtained from her some untried world, 
 into which she was about to enter. 
 
 Honora had traveled but little : she 
 had borne lately great but repressed 
 suffering ; she grew superstitious, watch- 
 ful of trifles. Her watch had stopped : 
 when she wished to know the time the 
 driver turned his back to the watery sun 
 and measured his shadow on the snow. 
 Every hour she saw they left the world 
 of society and inventions farther behind, 
 going down into this place where Nature- 
 lay with bared and awful face. She 
 knew by instinct that some stupendous 
 reality was hidden yonder. Its shadow 
 fell everywhere. The driver, the few 
 charcoal-burners whose lonely huts they 
 passed, were stolid and ignorant, but 
 men strangely grave and sincere. 
 
 She began to perceive a wonderful 
 freshness and hghtness in the air. The 
 earth beneath her throbbed with a slow, 
 dreadful pulse, and then she heard an in- 
 articulate wail, the like of which had never 
 chilled or dissatisfied her life before. 
 
 At last they crept down to the beach, 
 and she saw the sea. Then she under- 
 stood that the loneliness and monotony 
 which had oppressed her was but the 
 spell cast upon the land by this soHtary 
 creature, whose cry of pain began with 
 the song which the morning stars sang 
 together. 
 
 All day they skirted the coast : she 
 said nothing to Dallas, but she could not 
 remove her eyes from the inexplicable, 
 sombre, perpetual motion, which seemed 
 to her counter and alien to the order of 
 the world. If she had ever secretly 
 called God unjust, this thing made the 
 thought audible for her. It was the out- 
 cry of the world's misery against the 
 Hand that ruled it. There was in it 
 something which the doctrine of fatalism 
 that she had found in her Thirty-nine 
 Articles could not answer. 
 
230 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 Ddtlas, after the sun had passed noon, 
 noticed how haggard and careworn she 
 was, watching the sea ; but he had no 
 •way to comfort her. He knew it was 
 his ill-fortune that had brought ruin on 
 her. He got out of the sled, and went 
 before it, through the marshes and up 
 into the towering pine forests. They 
 were near Manasquan now. 
 
 He walked slowly, not to lose sight of 
 Honora's face, looking out from the furs. 
 It was beginning to have that galled 
 yet obdurate look which he found on his 
 own. It was very bitter to Dallas to see 
 it. For himself, he had bent his broad 
 back to the yoke long ago. The Power 
 that drove him down, down continually, 
 was stronger than he, but he was too 
 strong to fret and jibe against it. Yet 
 there was a malignant humor in this im- 
 placable Fate, which had set before him 
 always the choice, and when he clung to 
 the right had paid him with heavier 
 strokes. Even this simple duty of 
 coming to Lizzy was to bring on himself 
 the bitterest pain of all. 
 
 For he knew now what this fishing 
 village and its people were to him. There 
 was not a headland, nor tree, nor osprey's 
 nest which he did not remember. There 
 were only a few miles yet to walk before 
 they reached the village. In that time 
 his bitterness wore away under the re- 
 cognition of the old sights and sounds. 
 There was no change in them to break 
 the old boyish glamour with which he saw 
 them. He came alongside of the sled 
 now and then to speak a {q.^^ words and 
 then hurry on ; and Honora saw a curi- 
 ous change in him : his step was elastic ; 
 he laughed at times nervously ; he had 
 forgotten, for the first time since she 
 knew him, his grave control. She knew 
 that great, live pain and the remembrance 
 of singular happiness lay beneath his 
 simple, abrupt talk. 
 
 '• I have found my name on four 
 trees," with a laugh. " I was fond of 
 seeing it then in big, bold letters. There 
 are places were it has been scraped 
 away — where it was cut with othersy 
 
 She laid her hand on his, but did not 
 speak. 
 
 Again, after a longer absence, he came 
 
 back and walked beside her, silent for a 
 long time, though she looked at him once 
 or twice inquiringly. 
 
 " You can see the smoke of one or 
 two of the village houses from here, off 
 by the headland yonder. It is not a vil- 
 lage, only scattered farm-houses and fish- 
 ermen's huts." 
 
 She was not to be put aside by his as- 
 sumed carelessness. Something in the 
 woods yonder, she knew, had wrung the 
 heart terribly of the simple, dogged 
 fellow. 
 
 "What did you see, Dallas?" she said, 
 under her breath. 
 
 He glanced down at her quickly: "A 
 little hut I used to live in. I went to 
 find it. I built it myself." 
 
 " Some one else has occupied it ?" 
 
 " No. It is vacant. No one else 
 would care to live in it. They are a 
 superstitious people here." He stopped, 
 but Honora was waiting. 
 
 " What was it, Dallas ?" 
 
 "It is better that you should know it. 
 I found the walls scrawled over with my 
 name, and a word added. Always the 
 same word. The boys of the village had 
 done it. I know now of what crime I 
 am held guilty here." She took his 
 hand in both her own, holding it a long 
 time before he spoke again. " The man 
 in whose name Laddoun's cheque was 
 drawn was old and hved alone. He was 
 found robbed and dead soon after. Be- 
 fore Laddoun and I had left the city." 
 
 " And these people beheve you guilty? 
 They wrote murderer after your name on 
 the walls ? They will call it after you 
 when you go among them ?" She looked 
 slowly over the distant houses as she 
 spoke. If the look of the quiet, little 
 gentlewoman could have swept Mana- 
 squan and its people into death, she 
 would not have spared it. 
 
 " Perhaps they will do it. It would 
 be but natural," in his moderate, just 
 tone. " My story has passed into the 
 legends of the village, and the boys 
 have exaggerated it. It was they who 
 wrote my name there. The boys !" 
 He turned his head away with the word. 
 She understood. It was here, in Mana- 
 squan, that he himself had been young. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 231 
 
 All the healthy, happy associations of his 
 life were with the boys here. They 
 wrote him murderer on their walls : the 
 little children were frightened to sleep 
 with his name. 
 
 She held her shut hand tight across 
 her breast : "Shall we go on, Dallas ?" 
 
 " Yes. It is right to go. Even this 
 will have an end." 
 
 She ventured after a while to touch the 
 flap of his overcoat as he walked beside 
 her, holding her hand up toward the 
 rigid, pale face, shadowed by the plant- 
 er's hat. " I am here, Dallas. You are 
 not alone." 
 
 " I know," quickly, smiling down at 
 her. But the smile was soon gone and 
 she forgotten. The wife could not atone 
 for the man's place and good name, lost 
 for ever. He remained silent after that, 
 keeping beside her, his hand on the 
 edge of the sled. They passed some 
 of his old haunts, but he did not even 
 turn his head toward them. 
 
 It was a veiled, gray afternoon, a 
 west wind edging the great violet flood 
 of the sea with yellow foam. Dallas, 
 with every step, felt the familiar scene 
 press closer upon his pained senses. 
 There was an unwonted silence : the 
 very surf beat softly on the sand ; the 
 fishermen's boats, pulled above high-tide 
 mark, were unridden by the usual red- 
 shirted loungers ; doors and windows 
 were closed in the farm-houses that they 
 passed. There was old Doctor Noanes' 
 red cottage back in the pines — still the 
 great place of the village ; and there were 
 Jim Van Zeldt's roomy porches about 
 his lead-colored house, the pillars shaped 
 like anchors. But they were all deserted 
 and empty. When they reached Nixon's 
 low, little tavern by the roadside, Dallas 
 looked quickly to see the old group, 
 Graah and Becker, and the rest, sitting 
 nursing their knees and smoking as 
 usual ; but even the little bar within 
 was vacant — the fire covered, and the 
 cat asleep before it. 
 
 They were avoiding him purposely : 
 they meant to let him come and go 
 without seeing a single old familiar face. 
 He thought that he had steeled himself 
 thoroughly, but this wrenched him to 
 
 the heart. He turned to the driver 
 j (who w-as a stranger to him, not a 
 Alanasquan man) : " Did they know I 
 was coming here to-day ? IMy name is 
 Galbraith." 
 
 The fellow nodded with a furtive 
 glance, and turned his tobacco in his 
 mouth ; " Dallas Galbraith ? They 
 know you be coming. They got your 
 I letter. I was to meet you." 
 ! Dallas drew back. " There is the 
 house to which I am going," he said. 
 " You can see Elizabeth's place through 
 the trees," to Honora, with an effort at 
 his usual composed tone. She should 
 not see how little of a man he was — that 
 his old friends had yet power to wring 
 his heart so sorely. But the driver, 
 with sudden energy, drove past the open- 
 ing to the Byrne place, and drew up his 
 sled in front of a low pine house in the 
 very midst of the woods. 
 
 '• It was here I was bid to stop. You 
 be expected, as I told you." 
 
 It was the house in Avhich they had 
 confined and tried him — he saw that at 
 a glance : saw, too, that the room inside 
 was filled, as then, with the villagers. 
 There was a crowd of brawny fishermen 
 upon the steps, who, the moment the 
 sled stopped, closed around him. He 
 knew them all — the young Graahs, the 
 old man himself, Calcroft the clam-dig- 
 ger, all the others of the seining gang 
 — at their head, Cradock the sheriff. 
 Their red faces all wore a certain air of 
 excitement and expectation, but they did 
 not recognize him by a word or look. 
 They began to lift the buffalo-robes from 
 about Honora civilly enough. 
 
 " Be keerful of the lady, William," 
 muttered old Graah. 
 
 Dallas looked keenly into the crowded 
 little hall. There was not a silent, anx- 
 ious face there which he did not know. 
 Behind his wooden desk sat Squire 
 Boles, as he had done on that old night 
 long ago when Dallas had lost the 
 chance among men which had never 
 come to him again. Back of the old 
 Squire stood Father Kimball, and on 
 the other side the detective Bunsen. 
 
 A nameless, undefined fear came to 
 Dallas at the sight of this man. He 
 
233 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 turned quickly : " Stay here, Honora. I 
 will go in and know why I have been 
 summoned here. These men," looking 
 steadily into old Graah's face, " are not 
 my friends, but they will care for my wife 
 kindly." 
 
 Graah's heavy face began to work for 
 a word, but before it came Honora had 
 sHpped down beside her husband: "I 
 will go with you, Dallas." 
 
 They went up the wooden steps to- 
 gether, the men following close and 
 silently. At the door Dallas stopped 
 and turned to Honora, with a sudden 
 perception of the truth. Bunsen had 
 contrived to fasten the murder upon 
 him, and had entrapped him here by 
 means of these old fishermen. Even in 
 that moment his first thought was for his 
 wife. Before he could speak, Cradock 
 stooped and whispered to her, and with 
 a wild, terrified look at Dallas, she drew 
 back from him into the crowd, and left 
 him standing alone. 
 
 The instant her touch left his arm 
 the man's combative instinct started up 
 and fully armed him. He was no longer 
 the boy to yield without a struggle. He 
 went forward quietly to the very place 
 by the window where he had stood be- 
 fore to be judged. 
 
 The old Squire stood up, his rusty 
 wig pushed from his forehead, fumbling 
 at the leaves of a yellow register. The 
 crowd closed behind Dallas. There was 
 a breathless silence. 
 
 " Dallas, Dallas Galbraith !" in the 
 shrill voice of a crier in court. 
 
 " I am here." 
 
 " We have waited for you." He wiped 
 his wrinkled lips as if they were dry, and 
 began in a strained, formal tone : " It is 
 six years since you were heard before 
 me on a criminal charge, and, being 
 found guilty, were committed to the 
 charge of this officer. Six years ! I 
 think it is six" — beginning to turn over 
 the leaves with trembling fingers. 
 
 The long pause of waiting was too much 
 for Dallas' fortitude ; he bent forward, his 
 head on his breast, his hands clutched on 
 the bench in front of him ; he turned to 
 look for Honora, but red blotches swam 
 In the air before him. The crowd about 
 
 him pressed closer ; they brooked delay 
 with less patience than he ; there was a 
 rising, indignant murmur — i. woman's 
 voice outside, in a smotheicd cry. 
 
 The old man's hands trembled still 
 more — the book fell from them. " I — I 
 cannot do this," he cried. " Father 
 Kimball, it is your place to tell Dallas 
 Galbraith why we have brought him 
 among us again." The old preacher, 
 whose shrewd gray eye had never wan- 
 dered from Dallas' face, left his post has- 
 tily, and came toward him, Bunsen keep- 
 ing step close behind him. He laid his 
 hand on Galbraith's shoulder : 
 
 " My friends and neighbors," he said, 
 in a low, husky voice, "you all know 
 why we have come here to-day? It is 
 to say to this boy, who once went in and 
 out of our homes, and was very dear to 
 us all, that we have proof now that he 
 was innocent of the great crime laid to 
 his charge ; that we have done him a 
 great and grievous wrong ; that there is 
 not one of us now who, when his own 
 boy comes to manhood, would not be 
 glad to find him as stern in his integrity 
 and as loyal to his fellow-men as Dallas 
 Galbraith." He choked and broke down 
 here — wrung Dallas' hand. " Thank God 
 I see you at home again, dear boy !" he 
 muttered, and drew back to give way to 
 the crowd who pressed behind. 
 
 But when they saw Dallas' face, they 
 stood still, awed and silent. They had 
 not guessed before how deep the hurt 
 had been to the gruff, reserved boy, nor 
 what these few words had brought to 
 him. His wife came up before them all, 
 and laid her head on his breast, and 
 Lizzy caught his hand and sobbed over 
 it. But Honora did not sob or cry. 
 
 " They have been talking to me of you, 
 Dallas." she whispered, watching him 
 anxiously. "There never were friends 
 such as these of yours at Manasquan." 
 
 The simple words made it real to him. 
 He looked about at them a moment in 
 silence, and then the past miserable years 
 seemed to fall from him at once like a 
 worn-out garment. It was the old, sim- 
 ple face of the boy Dallas that looked 
 up at Squire Boles, and his hearty voice 
 that rung out like old times : 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 233 
 
 " Do you mean that my innocence is 
 proved? Stand back, Jim Van Zeldt — 
 you too, Tim Graali. I know you both. 
 But I'll take no man's hand until I 
 know I am proved to be honest." But 
 he kept his hand on little Jim Van 
 Zeldt's shoulder, and there was not one 
 of them all that his blue eyes did not 
 take note of and welcome as he waited 
 for Boles' slow reply — the same eyes 
 which the children used to love, spai^k- 
 ling and cordial. 
 
 "We have better testimony for your 
 acquittal tlian we had of your guilt," he 
 began, with a formal cough. 
 
 But Doctor Noanes pressed forward : 
 " Let Bunsen speak, Boles, and set this 
 matter right. He has the gift of the 
 lawyers' lingo, and all we know is, that 
 we are cursedly ashamed of ourselves, 
 and want to welcome this old fellow to 
 his place among us again." 
 
 " You are quite right, Mr. Galbraith," 
 Bunsen began, quite fluently, being 
 primed and ready. " A convict is not 
 to be proved innocent, as he has been 
 found guilty, by a show of circumstantial 
 evidence. But in your case there is the 
 fullest proof, I am glad to say. I have 
 here " — taking out a large letter, the en- 
 velope of which bore a great blot of wax, 
 sealed with a crest — " I have here the 
 declaration of George Laddoun, made 
 and sworn to in Panama, during his ill- 
 ness there some months ago, in the 
 fear, I imagine, of immediate death. 
 You can read it at your leisure. It is 
 full and complete, even to the story of 
 the letter you destroyed for Lizzy's sake, 
 which contained the proof against him. 
 He remarks," with a twitch in his fat, 
 unexpressive face, "that he had always 
 tried to instill into you true chivalric and 
 gentlemanly ideas, and that your conduct 
 about that letter showed that his efforts 
 had not failed in effect." Bunsen handed 
 the letter to Dallas, who folded it and 
 held it in his hand. 
 
 " You'll not read it now, eh ? Some 
 people have that feeling about them as 
 is lately dead. You'll find it character- 
 istic. There's a lot of fine writing and 
 swagger in it ; but as for remorse, not a 
 bit of it. He had made a lucky stroke 
 
 this year in a silver mine, with a man 
 named McGill. He says he leaves his 
 whole property to you. He meant, also, 
 to make his way North if he was strong 
 enough, and let the closing act of his 
 life — the grand finale — be one of repara- 
 tion to you. ' Dall,' he says, ' is among 
 well-bred people. They will appreciate 
 a heroism of which few men beside 
 George Laddoun would be capable.' 
 But," with a graver tone, "the fellow 
 was sincere at bottom ; for, lest he 
 should never live to reach you, he 
 directed this paper to be forwarded, 
 when he left Panama, to Mr. Kimball. 
 That is the story. Except," with a 
 bow, " that our friends here sent for me, 
 anxious to wipe away every stain upon 
 your name, and that, if you will entrust 
 me with the declaration, I will lay it be- 
 fore the Governor of New York, and 
 see that you are cleared from all dis- 
 honor and restored to your privileges as 
 a citizen." Bunsen, having finished his 
 speech, held out his hand to Dallas. 
 
 But what was he to do with all their 
 hands ? This outbreak of excitement 
 had been pent up for weeks, and when 
 the barrier of reserve was once broken 
 down between these silent, grave people 
 and the silent, grave lad who had secretly 
 been their hero so long, who was going 
 to control the fever ? 
 
 Not Squire Boles, who, after trying to 
 overlook the crowd with a judicially 
 pleased demeanor, scrambled down from 
 his high stool and made one in the tide 
 that ebbed and swelled about Dallas, 
 getting near enough now and then to 
 exchange a hearty word with "the 
 lad," and then finding himself drifted out 
 to the outskirts again, seizing on Nixon 
 or Cradock, adjusting his wig and as- 
 suring them that he never had known so 
 memorable a day in Manasquan, and 
 that the circumstances deserved to be 
 chronicled in some permanent manner 
 for the benefit of our children. 
 
 Not the New York detective, for, 
 after he had smiled patronizingly on 
 them once or twice, he strolled down to 
 the deserted tavern and helped himself 
 freely to apple-jack. They all breathed 
 freer when he was gone. 
 
234 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 After all, Dallas was more akin by na- 
 ture to these fishermen than to anybody 
 else in the world, and through all the 
 tumult of jokes and tears and questions 
 with which they welcomed him back, 
 there was silently among them a deep 
 and tender recognition of this. He and 
 his wife quite belonged to themselves, in 
 spite of Honora's delicate bearing and 
 the renown which Dallas had won in the 
 world ; of which renown Lizzy had given 
 them a picture, not lacking in high colors 
 we may be very sure. They were proud 
 of the one and of the other as things be- 
 longing to Manasquan, as much as Jim 
 Van Zeldt's new schooner or the railroad 
 which would soon be built, but which 
 never will be. 
 
 There was no time for idleness. They 
 had been waiting for weeks, ever since 
 the letter came, for this great day, and 
 now that it was here, not a man, woman 
 or child of them all but was determined 
 to express all the enjoyment out of it 
 which they had planned. Every one of 
 them must separately shake hands with 
 Dallas, and make a prepared speech, 
 which generally ended in a choke and 
 clearing of the throat, and separately ob- 
 tain some item about New Mexico and 
 its wonders to talk over hereafter ; and 
 give him a sketch of their own family 
 history since he went away, ending with, 
 " But come over, lad, and bring your 
 good lady, and see for yourself There 
 is not a house on the Point that isn't 
 ready for a home for you both." Then, 
 although they had all already been talk- 
 ing to Honora, every one must be sol- 
 emnly presented to her in due form by 
 Dallas himself 
 
 She had won great respect from the first 
 by her firm, reticent face and steady self- 
 control. Father Kimball had been seen 
 to nod approvingly after watching her ; 
 and old Graah took Dallas aside to tell him 
 confidentially that his " little woman was 
 one of them that would do to anchor to ; 
 and far from ill-lookin' — very far." 
 
 But when old Rachel Noanes and one 
 or two of the Quaker women and fishers' 
 wives took Nora to one corner and be- 
 gan telling her of all that Dallas had 
 been in the village after he first came 
 
 among them, a poor boy, bringing up 
 Joe Noanes as one of the children he 
 had saved from death in the year of the 
 great sickness, their homely affection 
 and praise was too much for Honora. 
 She tried to speak, but only sobl:ied 
 aloud, holding their hard hands tight, 
 saying, when she could articulate, that 
 " no one knew what Dallas was ! And 
 his life had been so hard — so hard !" 
 The women silently petted her, and the 
 men turned away affecting not to see ; 
 but the little womanly outbreak won all 
 their hearts. 
 
 When she came among them again, 
 smiling, they treated her with a tender, 
 grave deference, glancing askance at her 
 flushed, tear-marked face, telling each 
 other that " Dallas' good lady was a first- 
 class beauty. There could be no doubt 
 of that, with them as were judges !" 
 
 When it grew near sunset there was a 
 little stir among them. Doctor Noanes, 
 as one might say, was called to the chair ; 
 that is to say, after straightening his 
 brown coat, he stood with his back to the 
 stove and with a preparatory hem, raised 
 his voice and told Dallas that there 
 had been considerable argument among 
 them as to where he should make his 
 home among them, " Each one of your 
 old friends countin' his claim better 
 than the others'. Graah, here, held on 
 to his rights like the bull-dog he is, and 
 I was toler'bly stiff-necked myself But 
 it was arranged at last that you should 
 go home with Lizzy here to-night. She 
 wants to have you to herself a bit. We 
 thought that was only fair. But to-mor- 
 row all friends will meet at my house for 
 a bite of dinner. Eh .? And after that 
 we'll hand you both around as we choose. 
 You have to submit." 
 
 There was a sort of admiring murmur 
 at this light way of mentioning the grand 
 banquet which Mrs. Noanes had been 
 engaged in preparing for days, and then 
 the little assemblage broke up and went 
 out into the pleasant winter evening, the 
 rays of the setting sun streaming redly 
 through the pines. When they were out 
 in the great woods, Honora was sur- 
 prised to see what a handful of them 
 there were, all told. 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 235 
 
 They all escorted them to tlie wind- 
 ing path that led to Lizzy's place, and 
 then stopped and bade them good-night, 
 lingering to hear Father Kimball's part- 
 ing words, as if he spoke for them all : 
 
 " We know, Dallas, that your work is 
 in the West, but we hoped that you 
 would give us part of every year. There 
 is no one here who seems to belong to 
 us so much as you. You must give 
 your summers to us." 
 
 '• I will do that. Manasquan is home 
 to me." 
 
 He noticed a curious anxiety on their 
 faces until he had spoken, and then a 
 quick exchange of significant, approving 
 glances, which made him fancy there 
 was some hidden meaning in the ques- 
 tion. But he forgot it when they were 
 all gone, and he turned to follow Lizzy, 
 who went before with Honora, leading 
 the way to her solitary home. Even his 
 slow eyes noticed how her native air had 
 brought the color to her cheeks again 
 and the waiting laugh to her eyes. She 
 had put off her dingy chocolate dress, 
 and wore a pretty, neat-fitting one of 
 blue, and a bit of blue ribbon twisted in 
 her beautiful hair, in honor of his com- 
 ing. Honora, as they walked side by 
 side quite silent, watched her with a 
 keen, anxious scrutiny. She had guessed, 
 as women will, Lizzy's secret. She knew 
 that she had been a faithful friend to 
 Dallas. But could his triumph have 
 driven from her mind the lover she had 
 lost years ago 1 Had she forgotten the 
 musical voice and the moonlight and the 
 ebbing tide ? Could a woman forget ? 
 In Honora's creed, for a dead love there 
 was no resurrection, and no flower that 
 grows on the earth was fit to cover its 
 perpetually yawning grave. 
 
 To reach the Byrne house they passed 
 the outskirts of Jim Van Zeldt's great 
 farm. It was a pleasant, comfortable 
 homestead, even in winter — the best kept 
 and fullest in the village. Jim himself, 
 in his sailor clothes, was at the gate 
 waiting for them to come up. A puny 
 little fellow, Honora thought (who mea- 
 sured the world of men by Dallas' 
 brawny build), but with a rare genuine- 
 ness in his look and bearing — eood ■ 
 
 j sense and fidelity. Honora had not for- 
 gotten how long he had been true to 
 Lizzy before he married. But ooor 
 Lizzy had the grave of her sacred old 
 love to guard, of course ! Though it 
 was a pity — glancing from trusty, cheer- 
 ful Jim to the snug house behind him. 
 Lizzy quickened her pace nervously as 
 they came near, as though she would 
 have hurried by. 
 
 But that dull, tactless Dallas stopped 
 short, taking Van Zeldt's outstretched 
 hand. " Well, Jim, old fellow, you're 
 grown into a staid citizen and house- 
 holder, they tell me .'"' 
 
 '•Yes, Galbraith." 
 
 " And your wife — Jenny Noanes ? The 
 prettiest and best girl in the county, eh ?" 
 
 How pale Lizzy grew at that ! Ho- 
 nora, angry at Dallas' stupidity (which 
 was certainly growing upon him every 
 day), tried to draw her away. But Jim 
 stood in the road before them. 
 
 " My wife," he said, sturdily, regard- 
 less of either her paleness or trembling, 
 '■'■is the prettiest and best woman in the 
 world^ — to me. But it is not Jenny 
 Noanes." He put out his hand and took 
 Lizzy's in his own. " I served for her 
 as long as Jacob did for Rachel, madam," 
 he said, smiling. 
 
 Honora stood aghast, but stupid Dal- 
 las had them both by the hands before 
 Jim had done speaking, shaking them 
 again and again, the words tumbling 
 out headlong with delight : " I guessed 
 it the minute I saw Lizzy ! I remem- 
 bered your cousin, Long Jim Van Zeldt, 
 as we used to call him, and thought he 
 was a good deal more likely than you to 
 make a fool of himself with Jenny 
 Noanes. And you're happy at last, dear 
 girl ? Honora, are you never going to 
 understand ?" 
 
 " 1 am beginning now," humbly, giving 
 Jim a feeble, bewildered, congratulatory 
 smile. 
 
 "And here is home," said Lizzy, open- 
 ing the gate, the tears coming to her 
 bright eyes as she saw Dallas enter it 
 
 They thought they never had known 
 the real Lizzy before. She was so 
 cheerful and winning and pretty a wife, 
 so full of odd, attractive little devices- to 
 
236 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 make every moment different from and 
 pleasanter than any that had gone before. 
 The house was not a chilHng model of 
 neatness, as Honora would have feared. 
 It was all in use — bright, warm, just dis- 
 ordered enough to be cozy and comfort- 
 able. And Lizzy and Jim himself seemed 
 to have reached their last wish in life 
 when they had Dallas and his wife under 
 their roof at last, to give them the best 
 of their home and its welcome. 
 
 Honora went up to Lizzy as they sat 
 by the supper-table waiting for Dallas 
 and Van Zeldt to come in from their in- 
 spection of the stock. "It is so com- 
 fortable and good that you are married," 
 she said heartily, and put her arms about 
 her neck and kissed her. " It is a great 
 deal better than—" 
 
 " Than what, Honora ?" with wonder- 
 ing face. 
 
 "Than anything I had planned for 
 you, dear." She really could not bring 
 the idea of plump, smiling Lizzy at the 
 head of her well-filled tea-table and that 
 perpetually yawning grave of a dead love 
 together at all. 
 
 " Yet it scarcely seems natural to see 
 you here, Lizzy," said Dallas, as they 
 lingered talking over the table. " The 
 house in which you lived will always be 
 my remembrance of a home in Mana- 
 squan." He was silent suddenly. 
 
 Lizzy and her husband exchanged a 
 quick, significant glance : they remem- 
 bered doubtless the chamber in it that 
 had been made ready for Dallas, and 
 in which he had never been suiTered 
 to sleep. A sad quiet fell on them all. 
 They could not forget how many years 
 of his life had been wasted. After they 
 rose from supper, Lizzy went to Dallas, 
 where he stood by the window, and 
 touched him gently : 
 
 "The little room — you remember, 
 Dallas r 
 
 " Yes, I remember." 
 
 "When Jim and I knew that the time 
 was coming that you could go into it 
 again, we arranged it just as it was on 
 that first night. It was Jim's plan then, 
 you know," with a blush. " There is 
 nothing missing — not the least of the 
 
 gifts they gave you to show how true 
 friends they were to you. The house is 
 sold. I have this home now, and I 
 parted with the other. ■ But it is vacant, 
 and we have the use of it for to-night. 
 We arranged your room. We thought 
 you would like, if it were but for once 
 only, to see the old gifts, and to think 
 that of all the friends who gave them 
 there is not one lost to you." 
 
 " I would like it, Lizzy." But he kept 
 his face turned from her. 
 
 "We will go now, then," quickly. In 
 a few moments they were on their way. 
 When they came to the Byrne place, 
 Honora noticed that the out-buildings 
 surrounding the house were in sin- 
 gularly good repair, the house itself 
 covered with vines which would shelter 
 it in summer : behind it were Dallas' 
 old interminable pine woods, and in 
 front the sea rolled in with slow, lapping 
 murmur on the yellow beach. But Dal- 
 las saw nothing. He walked with his 
 head down, silent — his breath coming 
 heavily. 
 
 In all his prison-life he had thought 
 of that homely room as of the one place 
 from which he was barred. It had come 
 to signify to him the manly honor, the 
 trust, he had lost. Some day he might 
 reach the door of heaven, but the door of 
 that little chamber, with all its meaning, 
 was shut for ever upon him. 
 
 Now it was open to him. 
 
 He did not even see that Lizzy had 
 had the house brilliantly lighted, as for 
 an illumination. It had been furnished 
 for the owner, like the other houses of 
 the neighborhood, with plain homespun 
 carpets and such simple wooden furni- 
 ture as the village workmen could make. 
 Lizzy and Jim waited outside. 
 
 " There is no one there," they said. 
 "You must go in alone." 
 
 He went in, taking Honora by the 
 hand, as one child would another. The 
 door of his old room was open : a fire 
 burned, as on that night long ago, on the 
 hearth. There were the old, homely 
 gifts : nothing missing or decayed : the 
 name of the giver on each. He went 
 about the room slowly without a word, 
 putting his fingers on one and then an- 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 237 
 
 other, as though each dumb, tender 
 touch brought back a friend again, long 
 dead, to life. 
 
 But when he came to the little table 
 in front of the fire, he stood still, and 
 after a moment covered his eyes with 
 his hand. For there, as on an altar, lay 
 the Bible open, and beside it a deed of 
 the house and farm, and on the fly-leaf 
 was written : 
 
 "To Dallas Galbraith and Ho- 
 
 NORA HIS WIFE, FROM THE PEOPLE OF 
 MaNASQUAN, in token of the LOVE 
 THEY BEAR THEM." 
 
 There was an arrival at Nixon's tav- 
 ern two or three days after that. There 
 had been an arrival expected in Mana- 
 squan for some time. William and Aaron 
 Platzek were looked for during this month 
 or the next to harvest their winter crop 
 of furs on this coast for the New York 
 market. But the two men who stepped 
 out of Joshua Sutphen's sled, in front 
 of the little porch, were not the pelt- 
 hucksters : that was plain to all of the 
 group assembled smoking around the 
 fire in the httle bar-room. They had 
 never been seen on this beach before. 
 One was a stout, florid man, with eye- 
 brows, whiskers and frogged overcoat 
 alike fierce, black and assertant ; the 
 other a tall, spare, gray-headed old gen- 
 tleman, with pale, delicate face and hands, 
 a hook nose, keen, kindly eyes. 
 
 Nixon, after reconnoitering the arrival 
 in perfect silence through the window for 
 some minutes without rising, knocked 
 the ashes from his pipe leisurely, laid it 
 on the bricks of the chimney, and with 
 a preparator}^ jerk of his suspenders 
 went out and shut the door behind him. 
 After a short colloquy, in which the stout 
 man was violent, the old gentleman 
 silent and anxious, and Nixon stolid as 
 the log against which he leaned, the 
 strangers turned off" irresolutely, and Joe 
 came back and relighted his pipe. 
 
 No one spoke, these fishermen who 
 smoked the winter away there being as 
 incurious and stoical as Indians. At 
 last Nixon chuckled aloud : " They'll 
 not make much of a run here. I 
 becalmed their boats, / reckon." 
 
 " How so, Joseph ?" 
 
 " They were inquiring for Dallas Gal- 
 braith. But I knowed nothin' of Dallas 
 Galbraith. How could I tell what was 
 their errand with the lad V with a shrewd 
 nod. 
 
 " Seems as if you be a little too keer- 
 ful, Nixon,'- said Becker. 
 
 " How did I know," sententiously, 
 "but the news of the property Lad- 
 doun's left him had got abroad .'' Tliere 
 be quite an extra lot of sharpers in New 
 York this winter, I judge by the papers, 
 and they'd think nothin' of runnin' down 
 the lad even here, and fleecin' him. I 
 thought of that, instant. You don't 
 catch a weasel asleep when that weasel 
 be Joe Nixon." 
 
 " That's so, Joseph. You were right 
 there," knitting their brows solemnly. 
 
 They decided that " Dallas should be 
 warned immediate," but went on smoking 
 for the next two hours, chewing the cud 
 of the matter. 
 
 The strangers stood undecided upon 
 the road for a few moments. 
 
 " It is not possible that we can have 
 missed them, after all," said the younger 
 man. " Of all the dead, forgotten cor- 
 ners of the world, this is the queerest. 
 I'll go to some of these houses and see 
 if I can find Dallas." 
 
 " I think I will try the woods." His 
 long, uncertain search and this last dis- 
 appointment had told on the frail, old 
 man more than even his companion 
 knew. But the search was almost over, 
 for before he had threaded the winding 
 paths in the sand through the dark pines 
 for more than half an hour, he saw a 
 broad-shouldered fellow on his knees 
 digging with a trowel, while a little wo- 
 man in a water-proof cloak and hood 
 held a basket ready to receive the treas- 
 ure, whatever it was. He went up softly 
 behind them and touched them. 
 
 " Children, it is time for you to come 
 home," he said. His throat was dry and 
 husky, and he could scarcely articulate. 
 But they would have understood if he 
 had not spoken at all. 
 
 Colonel Pervis met them coming 
 through the woods soon after, the old 
 man in the middle, holding them both 
 
23S 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 as if afraid if he let them go they miglit 
 vanish out of his sight ; so unHke were 
 the three to each other, so sharply lined 
 the outer differences between them, each 
 difference but holding them closer to- 
 gether : so gay and tender, yet so full 
 of sorrowful remembrances, the integral 
 bond between them, that even the Colo- 
 nel dully recognized them as a rare and 
 strangely united little company, whose 
 fellowship of instincts together was a 
 something which few men were born 
 able to understand. 
 
 He broke in on them like a thunder- 
 storm: "God bless you, Dallas! Thank 
 the Lord, I see you again ! And Honora 
 has taken to digging, too ? You've told 
 them all about it ?" anxiously, in an audible 
 aside. 
 
 " No, I forgot to mention the partic- 
 ulars. I could think of nothing but the 
 children. But Dallas knows that he is 
 clear. That is the essential part." 
 
 " Oh ! that is essential of course. 
 But the property ? Is it possible you 
 did not mention the property ? Lad- 
 doun's will, Dallas. He left it with Dick 
 Potter at the gate, and it establishes 
 your innocence, and — are you listening, 
 Honora ? — and leaves you I don't know 
 how much money and his share in a 
 silver mine. Now don't be excited, boy. 
 It's not a great fortune, but it's enough 
 to bring back the old times to the Stone- 
 post farm. You'll live at your ease for 
 the rest of your life. By George ! We'll 
 have a carouse that'll waken the county 
 when we get home !" 
 
 The Colonel's outbreak found no echo. 
 They walked in silence for a little while, 
 when Dallas said, gravely turning to his 
 grandfather : " I have considered tliis 
 matter with Honora, sir, and our feeling 
 is the same with regard to the money. 
 I hope you will understand the decision 
 we made about it." 
 
 " I think I understand it now, Dal- 
 las," with a smile, looking at him. 
 
 Dallas' face brightened and he nodded. 
 « No," he said, soberly. " I have no ill- 
 will to Laddoun, God knows. But I 
 could not live in idleness and eat the 
 bread and butter that were bought with 
 his money. He gave it to me as an act 
 
 of reparation. If I use it to save othei 
 boys from that hell where he thrust me, 
 it will be such an act of reparation, I 
 think. But it is not mine." 
 
 The Colonel's jaw fell : " You don't 
 mean it, Dallas ! It's one of your dry 
 jokes, that's all ! You've not caught 
 Dour's mania about the development of 
 the inner self through poverty ? He 
 talks of founding an inner-developing 
 brotherhood, to wear sackcloth and live 
 on split peas ; but you're madder than 
 he is." 
 
 Dallas laughed : " I can't join Dour. 
 I'm always a better man after a good 
 dinner and with a decent coat on my 
 back, and I may try to be a rich man 
 3'et. But — No matter. We are at 
 home now," pausing at the door of their 
 own house. For Honora had insisted 
 on making it their home at once. Much 
 to the delight of the people, who took 
 care that she should not want the mate- 
 rial for housekeeping, though they would 
 hardly suffer her to break bread under 
 her own roof 
 
 Their hospitality reached its climax 
 when Mr. Galbraith and Colonel Pervis 
 were formally made known to them and 
 were installed at once as guests of the 
 village. It was a week before they went 
 back, taking Dallas and Honora with 
 them ; and in that time there was not a 
 fisherman or wrecker in Ocean county 
 with whom the Colonel was not on terms 
 of intimacy and mutual confidence. He 
 matched their seafaring exploits by his 
 bear stories, swort that apple-jack was 
 the best native drink in the States, took 
 a demijohn of it home, and promised to 
 come back every summer — a promise 
 which he religiously kept. 
 
 The group about the bar-room fire 
 chuckled over their pipes when he was 
 mentioned. " Colonel's thorough-grit," 
 they said. " But the old gendeman, 
 he's got the real strain of blood. Same 
 as Dallas." 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 Thanksgiving-day. It came under 
 Madam Galbraith's jurisdiction at irregxi- 
 
DALLAS GALBRALTH. 
 
 239 
 
 lar times, for it was her fancy to keep it, 
 not by the governor's appointment, but 
 along with Nature, when the barns were 
 still empty, but the fields full of corn, wlien 
 the purple plums yet dotted the rank grass 
 of the orchard, and the ungathered crim- 
 son peaches grew mottled with black un- 
 der the bee's sting. She had chosen in 
 these last few years to give thanks, not 
 when both summer and summer's work 
 were done, and the air shivered with com- 
 ing winter, but on one of those October 
 days when, from very excess of warmth 
 and life, the world and man are at rest 
 and quiet. 
 
 "It is not for the use of the earth we 
 should praise Him, Dallas," she would 
 say, " but for the hint it gives us of 
 His gi-eat glory." 
 
 He humored her in this whim as in 
 every other. She was full of such fan- 
 cies now, in all of which they detected a 
 meaning unselfish and genuine. 
 
 This Thanksgiving-day was late in 
 the month, for they had waited for Dal- 
 las to return, who had been gone for 
 months, "digging," as Honora loosely 
 stated, in the West. The wind from the 
 north was cold, but the west was burn- 
 ing with a golden sunset, which mellowed 
 the outhne of the mountains and valley — 
 a landscape which is one of the most 
 masculine and articulate with meaning 
 in the world. But this low afternoon 
 light softened it : the mountains drew 
 farther away in rhelancholy gray shadow, 
 while, wherever a rough little water-course 
 ran through the valley, a soft thread of 
 mist hung over it, bright with the change- 
 ful hues of the opal, and, as though the 
 ground tried to vie with the water, its 
 dullness and brownness burst in this 
 sunlight into a sweet madness of color 
 and perfume, such as belong in the 
 Western States only to the low-lying in- 
 land bottoms. Color unmatched in purity, 
 Mr. Galbraith thought, from the brilliant 
 dyes of the massed forests on the dis- 
 tant hill-sides to the browns and purples 
 of the feathery moss and lichen that 
 hung from the stone walls of the house. 
 
 Four years had passed since Dallas 
 was married — the epoch from which his- 
 tory was dated in that house. Four 
 
 years since Madam Galbraith's colony 
 had failed. Nature, whose charity al- 
 ways covers before it cures, had hid the 
 charred, unsightly signs of her folly un- 
 der this moss and lichen before she ab- 
 sorbed them back into the earth. You 
 could see the green heaps from the bal- 
 cony of the old homestead of the Dours, 
 set like a watch-tower on the side of the 
 mountain. Madam Galbraith stood there 
 now. She glanced at the mossy piles, 
 but with only a passing frown : there 
 were cheerfuller objects in the quiet 
 landscape. For they had kept the day 
 in the old royal fashion at the farm, and 
 the groups of friends and neighbors were 
 making their way home through the 
 winding roads and shady lanes in the 
 pleasant evening light. Colonel Pervis 
 stood at the gate speeding them on their 
 way, his hat off, the wind blowing back 
 his hair from his face. There was a 
 good deal of gray in the hair now, but 
 his voice was as loud as ever, and his 
 face as red and hearty. It would have 
 been like putting out the fire in the hos- 
 pitable house of the Galbraiths to miss 
 the Colonel from its hearth. 
 
 She stooped to wave her hand to 
 Peggy Beck and her husband in their 
 snug carry-all, turning into the lonely 
 road leading to the Queen. They have 
 both grown stouter and jollier with time, 
 and the heavy recklessness with which 
 Beck talks of stocks, and the trim rib- 
 bons in Peggy's bonnet, hint that the 
 store in the old tea-pot is not diminished. 
 Matt, a manly, curly-headed lad, is left 
 behind playing with a frank-faced little 
 fellow on the lawn. Madam Galbraith 
 turns from everything else to watch 
 them. 
 
 One can see in this clear light as she 
 stoops that the shining white mane of 
 hair, rolled like a crown about her head, 
 is dimmed in the last few years — that 
 her uncouth, unwomanly frame is more 
 rawboned and swarthy than before, ^'et 
 the imperious grace which gave magnetic 
 power to her youth and beauty lingers in 
 the ungainly body, like the music ct a 
 song' of which the words are forgotten. 
 Matt and the boy with whom he plays find 
 a companion in her, who will make their 
 
240 
 
 DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 remembrance of childhood enchanted 
 ground for them when she and childhood 
 belong only to remembrance. She hkes 
 best to talk to them. They find in her a 
 childish love of laughter and fun which 
 does not belong to younger, graver peo- 
 ple : a store of odd, old superstitions, 
 strange, pathetic fancies, which, it seems, 
 she has always nourished, come to light 
 as she grows older. They learn, day by 
 day, from her, too, an awful reverence for 
 God, outside of all the creeds of the 
 churches. 
 
 The stony scales of the shell are 
 worn away, it is so old ; and the deli- 
 cate tints are bared in which the living 
 creature within has hid itself so long. 
 
 Four years have passed since she 
 stood on the same place in her flash of 
 triumph only to witness her defeat — to 
 see her Hfe's scheme swept away by the 
 torrent of flame in a single night— to see, 
 when the morning dawned, black ruin 
 traced on every mountain side, every val- 
 ley and field. 
 
 But now the mountain sides, valleys 
 and fields are full of a noble stir and 
 life, which make her old heart beat with 
 a pride of which the Dour blood knew 
 nothing. For in these years all traces of 
 the ruin and waste have been blotted out, 
 and from the shaded roads and fields 
 there floats up the sound of voices, 
 whose meaning makes the ancient do- 
 minion of the Dours shine fair in her 
 eyes as the garden of the Lord. 
 
 For so she idealizes Dallas' great 
 charity. 
 
 But to him and the workers in it, it is 
 practical and difficult enough. She can 
 see from where she stands the house 
 where Mr. Rattlin lives with his troop of 
 boys. It is almost a hamlet now in the 
 woods, with school, workshops and farm 
 out-buildings. There is no machine- 
 management in it, even Mrs. Duffield 
 acknowledges, adding that it is because 
 neither Mr. Rattlin nor Dallas have any 
 metallic force. They are imposed upon, 
 and that often, but they go on steadily, 
 studying each boy's capacity, educating 
 him from that hint, furnishing him with 
 tools, or land, or capital, and bidding 
 him, in God's name, work his own way. 
 
 Dour is engaged in the work with the 
 energy and foresight of a genuine New 
 Englander. He shows a great deal of 
 sound judgment and tact in his manage- 
 ment : he is a spiritualist now, has suf- 
 fered Emerson to grow dusty on his 
 shelves, and talks no more of the disci- 
 pline of poverty upon the inner life. On 
 the contrary, he eats heartily, has grown 
 fat, and is laying up a snug sum in rail- 
 road bonds. 
 
 Dallas has no railroad bonds : he has 
 not yet begun to make himself a rich man. 
 He travels and digs and analyzes as con- 
 stantly as other men breathe ; but such 
 work as his is not well paid — in money. 
 
 It is probable that he will dig and an- 
 alyze to the end. 
 
 He sits now on the grassy slope in 
 front of the great entrance, in the gray, 
 loose clothes in which he feels himself 
 at home. A powerful man, with broad 
 chest, white throat, grave, far-seeing 
 eyes and a ready, tender smile. One 
 can detect a curious likeness in his face 
 to that of an older, weaker man who 
 sits on the bench behind him. They are 
 seldom apart, though they talk but little 
 when together. Yet one is restless and 
 uneasy when the other is away. Mr. 
 Galbraith, even, has grown so infatuated 
 with Dallas' pursuits that he goes with 
 him on his shorter journeys. 
 
 Presently, when the sun was low and 
 threw the long shadows of the walnut 
 tree across the warm grass, Honora 
 came through them and sat down beside 
 her husband. Her uncle stroked the 
 soft brown hair, and Dallas took her 
 hand in his — a soft hand and a strong 
 one. So the little company of the old 
 times was complete. Yet there was a 
 change in them, as though life, in son- 
 way, widened and sweetened for them all, 
 turned into a new and broader current. 
 
 After a while, the boy who was Ma- 
 dam Galbraith's friend came running 
 and stood among them, and then, look- 
 ing in their faces, one could know the 
 cause of their change — that in these 
 years gone God had chosen for them 
 from His treasure-house the best gift 
 of all. 
 
 The sun was almost down. Through 
 
DALLAS GALBRAITH. 
 
 241 
 
 the twilight they caught the echo of a 
 quiet, cheery song, and looked at each 
 other smiling. It was Dallas' mother 
 singing to herself when she thought no 
 one heard her. Her voice was broken : 
 she never sang, even for the boy, dear 
 as he was to her. Mr. Rattlin passed 
 them, a little grayer, a little stouter — 
 a change in his dress that showed the 
 world had gone well with him. No hap- 
 pier face, for that Nature could not 
 make. Then the evening grew quite 
 still, the solemn shadows lengthening 
 over the genial, ruddy light. 
 
 The little preacher paused at the gate, 
 looking back at them. The holy mean- 
 ing of the day was upon him still, and 
 seemed to give to the eyes of the old 
 man who walked so close to his Master, 
 doing His work so quietly, a prophetic 
 insight. God had taken thought for him 
 and his unused strength, and late in the 
 day had given to him a share in a great 
 work. In tlie 3-ears to come he saw him- 
 self gathering to the land of the old, clean- 
 blooded Dours, from prison, from city 
 den and almshouse, the wronged and 
 the outcast, learning through him a bet- 
 ter, more gracious life than their youth 
 had ever known — learning- through him 
 a certain way to that God which they 
 had never known. 
 
 Yet though the simple follower of 
 Christ had given his whole heart to his 
 work, and would be very dear to the lit- 
 tle outcasts, they will have another friend 
 whom they will love far better — the 
 strong, healthy man yonder, reticent to 
 all others, but to them frank, cheerful 
 and outspoken ; a strange, pathetic ten- 
 derness in his care for them — coming 
 closer to them than any other man could 
 ever do, through some instinct or secret 
 f his life to them unknown. 
 
 <' So it will always be in these years to 
 come. God has fitted him for this 
 work," he said, lingering, as he looked 
 back at Dallas. " He has been down 
 like- his Master in the depths from 
 which he would save them, and has 
 learned there some secret which I can 
 never know." 
 
 The air is growing chilly and rustles 
 the leaves of the great .sycamores which 
 10 
 
 darken the front of the house. But 
 through them they see the ruddy light 
 of the open windows, and the Colonel 
 within, glancing over the supper-table, 
 and stirring the fire to make all ready 
 for the evening. Madam Galbraith on 
 her balcony, and Mrs. DufReld from her 
 window, are both looking for the boy be- 
 fore they go down. For over all the wo- 
 men in the house Master Dour Galbraith 
 is king. 
 
 He waits for his grandfather, however, 
 taking away the old man's cane and putting 
 the delicate, withered hand upon his 
 own curly head, walking very stiffly and 
 slow, fancying that all the strength of 
 the party lies in his own little body. He 
 gives one hand to his mother also as 
 they go, she being a woman and needing 
 help. So they walk, very gravely, to the 
 house, not daring to smile to each other 
 lest the child should see them and be 
 disheartened. 
 
 But Dallas lingers behind. The 
 golden light of the evening, as it bathes 
 the valley and far-off mountains, the 
 old homestead set against the hills, and 
 the retreating figures, falls upon him 
 with a great calm. It seems to him a 
 thanksgiving. The meaning of the day 
 grows clearer to him here in the open 
 air ; and owing to his habits and odd 
 bent of thought, all the solitary places 
 in the world with which he is familiar 
 become curiously present to him, and 
 take part in this quiet glow — the vast 
 flats of the West, trailed with black buf- 
 falo herds, the rank, strong-smelling Mis- 
 sissippi bayous, the drowsy Manasquan 
 village, with the sea lashing its silent 
 stretches of gray sand. 
 
 He knows but little of any book but 
 that which these open to him. But year 
 by year he spells more clearly the mean- 
 ing which underlies its letters — the 
 Eternal Order, in which no atom fails of 
 its work in the sure justice and help 
 which each renders to the other. 
 
 The inevitable Good at last. 
 
 He turns to go in. There is a grave 
 yonder in that hill-gap which will not 
 take its part in the great Thanksgiving 
 day. And yet he looks at it with doubt- 
 ing eyes. Good as well as evil were 
 
242 
 
 DALLA S GA LB I? A I T/7. 
 
 shut out from the world in Laddoun's 
 grave. There are dewy mosses and 
 sweet flowers which have taken tlie 
 place of the unwholesome body. Is it in 
 the soul of man alone that the evil, use- 
 less and unalterable elements of God's 
 universe lie ? What slow processes are 
 His in that well-veiled secresy of Death ? 
 Nature in her great charity covers before 
 she cures. 
 
 And as he goes to his home in the 
 quiet evening, his own life becomes 
 present to Dallas Galbraith as never be- 
 fore, in all its full and completed mean- 
 ing ; and seeino; in that home, in his 
 
 wife and child, only another name for 
 God's tenderness to him, feeling how his 
 old wrong had softened his heart toward 
 all hurt people, all those who had sinned 
 and been oppressed with the burden of 
 untoward fate, he knows the share his 
 life has borne in the great scheme of 
 order — knows that as the strange 
 flower upon the peak of the Sierras was 
 evidence of an unknown, immutable law, 
 so in the story of the humblest man 
 there is no such thing as luck or chance 
 — that God is under the hardest circum- 
 stance, and that God is good. 
 
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