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GABRIEL CONROY. 
 
 3, 
 
 BY 
 
 BRET HARTE. 
 
 LONDON : 
 FREDERICK WA R N E AND CO 
 
 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND. 
 [All rights reserved.} 
 
JV O TICE. 
 
 This Work is Copyright in the United Kingdom, by First 
 
 Publication and special arrangement with tht 
 
 Author. 
 
PUBLISHER'S PREFACE 
 
 "GABRIEL CONROY," by BRET HARTE, is the first complete 
 Novel of this Author. 
 
 It has been partly issued in Scribners Monthly Magazine* 
 and is now published in advance of that Serial, in order that 
 the rights of Copyright which have been secured may be fully 
 maintained. 
 
 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND, 
 May 2$tk, 1876. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 BOOK I. ON THE THRESHOLD. 
 
 CHAP. PAGB 
 
 I. WITHOUT * 
 
 II. WITHIN & 
 
 III. GABRIEL 17 
 
 IV. NATURE SHOWS THEM THE WAY .21 
 
 V. OUT OF THE WOODS INTO THE SHADOW .... 24 
 
 VI. FOOTPRINTS 29 
 
 VII. IN WHICH THE FOOTPRINTS BEGIN TO FADE ... 32 
 
 VIII. THE FOOTPRINTS GROW FAINTER 34 
 
 IX. IN WHICH THE FOOTPRINTS ARE LOST FOR EVER . 38 
 
 BOOK II. AFTER FIVE YEARS. 
 
 I. ONE HORSE GULCH 43 
 
 II. MADAME DEVARGES 52 
 
 III. MRS. MARKLE 59 
 
 IV. IN WHICH THE ARTFUL GABRIEL IS DISCOVERED . 69 
 
 V. SIMPLICITY Versus SAGACITY 76 
 
vi Contents. 
 
 BOOK III. THE LEAD. 
 
 CHAP. PAGE 
 
 I. AN OLD PIONEER OF '49 86 
 
 II. A CLOUD OF WITNESSES 94 
 
 III. THE CHARMING MRS. SEPULVIDA IOO 
 
 IV. FATHER FELIPE 105 
 
 V. IN WHICH THE DONNA MARIA MAKES AN IMPRESSION III 
 
 VI. THE LADY OF GRIEF I2O 
 
 VII. A LEAF OUT OF THE PAST 131 
 
 VIII. THE BULLS OF THE BLESSED TRINITY 136 
 
 BOOK IV. DRIFTING. 
 
 I. MR. AND MRS. CONROY AT HOME 142 
 
 II. IN WHICH THE TREASURE IS FOUND AND LOST . 152 
 
 III. MR. DUMPHY MEETS AN OLD FRIEND 163 
 
 IV. MR. JACK HAMLIN TAKES A HOLIDAY 169 
 
 V. VICTOR MAKES A DISCOVERY 176 
 
 VI. AN EXPERT ' 183 
 
 BOOK V. THE VEIN. 
 
 I. IN WHICH GABRIEL RECOGNISES THE PROPRIETIES . 193 
 
 II. TRANSIENT GUESTS AT THE GRAND CONROY . . .204 
 III. IN WHICH MR. DUMPHY TAKES A HOLIDAY . . .211 
 
 IV. MR. DUMPHY HAS NEWS OF A DOMESTIC CHARACTER 222 
 V. MRS. CONROY HAS AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR . . . 230 
 VI. GABRIEL DISCARDS HIS HOME AND WEALTH . . .237 
 
 VII. WHAT PASSED UNDER THE PINE AND WHAT 
 
 REMAINED THERE 241 
 
Contents. vii 
 
 BOOK VI. A DIP. 
 
 <CHA. PAGE 
 
 i. MR. HAMLIN'S RECREATION CONTINUED . . .251 
 
 II. MR. HAMLIN TAKES A HAND 257 
 
 III. MR. DUMPHY TAKES POINSETT INTO CONFIDENCE . 267 
 IV. MR. HAMLIN IS OFF WITH AN OLD LOVE . . . .276 
 
 V. THE THREE VOICES . . . 280 
 
 VI. MR. DUMPHY IS PERPLEXED BY A MOVEMENT IN 
 
 REAL ESTATE 287 
 
 VII. IN WHICH BOTH JUSTICE AND THE HEAVENS FALL 297 
 
 VIII. IN TENEBRIS SERVARE FIDEM 305 
 
 IX. IN WHICH HECTOR ARISES FROM THE DITCH . .314 
 
 BOOK VII. THE BED ROCK. 
 
 I. IN THE TRACK OF A STORM 323 
 
 II. THE YELLOW ENVELOPE 334 
 
 III. GABRIEL MEETS HIS LAWYER 343 
 
 IV. WHAT AH FE DOES NOT KNOW 353 
 
 V. THE PEOPLE V. JOHN DOE alias GABRIEL CONROY, 
 
 AND JANE ROE alias JULIE CONROY 357 
 
 VI. IN REBUTTAL 364 
 
 VII. A FAMILY GREETING 372 
 
 VIII. IN WHICH THE FOOTPRINTS RETURN 376 
 
 IX. IN WHICH MR. HAMLIN PASSES 380 
 
 X. IN THE COLD CABIN AGAIN ........ 387 
 
 XI. THE RETURN OF A FOOTPRINT 39! 
 
 XII. FRAGMENT OF A LETTER FROM OLYMPIA CONROY TO 
 
 GRACE POINSETT 392 
 
GABRIEL CONROY. 
 
 BOOK L ON THE THRESHOLD, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 WITHOUT. 
 
 SNOW. Everywhere. As far as the eye could reach fifty 
 miles, looking southward from the highest white peak, filling 
 ravines and gulches, and dropping from the walls of canons in 
 white shroud-like drifts, fashioning the dividing ridge into the 
 likeness of a monstrous grave, hiding the bases of giant pines, 
 and completely covering young trees and larches, rimming with 
 porcelain the bowl-like edges of still, cold lakes, and undulat 
 ing in motionless white billows to the edge of the distant 
 horizon. Snow lying everywhere over the California Sierras on 
 the 1 5th day of March, 1848, and still falling. 
 
 It had been snowing for ten days ; snowing in finely granu 
 lated powder, in damp, spongy flakes, in thin, feathery plumes ; 
 snowing from a leaden sky steadily, snowing fiercely, shaken 
 out of purple-black clouds in white flocculent masses, or 
 dropping in long level lines, like white lances from the 
 tumbled and broken heavens. But always silently! The 
 woods were so choked with it the branches were so laden 
 with it it had so permeated, filled and possessed earth 
 and sky ; it had so cushioned and muffled the ringing rocks 
 and echoing hills that all sound was deadened. The strongest 
 gust, the fiercest blast awoke no sigh or complaint from the 
 snow-packed, rigid files of forest. There was no cracking of 
 bough nor crackle oi underbrush ; the overladen branches of 
 pine and fir yielded and gave way without a sound. The 
 silence was vast, measureless, complete ! Nor could it be said 
 
 B 
 
2 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 that any outward sign of life or motion changed the fixed out 
 lines of this stricken landscape. Above, there was no play of 
 light and shadow, only the occasional deepening of storm or 
 night. Below, no bird winged its flight across the white 
 expanse, no beast haunted the confines of the black woods ; 
 whatever of brute nature might have once inhabited these 
 solitudes had long since flown to the low lands. 
 
 There was no track or imprint ; whatever foot might have 
 left its mark upon this waste, each succeeding snow-fall obli 
 terated all trace or record. Every morning the solitude was 
 virgin and unbroken ; a million tiny feet had stepped into the 
 track and filled it up. And yet, in the centre of this desolation 
 in the very stronghold of this grim fortress, there was the mark 
 of human toil. A few trees have been felled at the entrance of 
 the canon, and the freshly-cut chips were but lightly covered 
 with snow. They served, perhaps, to indicate another tree 
 "blazed" with an axe, and bearing a rudely -shaped wooden 
 effigy of a human hand, pointing to the canon. Below the 
 hand was a square strip of canvas, securely nailed against the 
 bark, and bearing the following inscription 
 
 ''NOTICE. 
 
 Captain CONROY'S party of emigrants are lost in the snow, and camped 
 up this canon. Out of provisions and starving ! 
 
 -Left St. Jo, October 8th, 1847. 
 Left Salt Lake, January 1st, 1848. 
 Arrived here, March 1st, 1848. 
 Lost half our stock on the Platte. 
 Abandoned our waggons, February 2Oth. 
 
 HELP! 
 
 Our naftes are : 
 
 JOEL McCoRMicK, JANE BRACKETT, 
 
 PETER DUMPHY, GABRIEL CONROY, 
 
 PAUL DEVARGES, JOHN WALKER, 
 
 GRACE CONROY, HENRY MARCH, 
 
 OLYMPIA CONROY, PHILIP ASHLEY, 
 
 MARY DUMPHY. 
 
 (Then in smaller letters, in pencil) : 
 
 MAMIE died, November 8th, Sweetwater. 
 MINNIE died, December ist, Echo Caiion, 
 JANE died, January 2nd, Salt Lake. 
 JAMES BRACKETT, lost, February 3rd. 
 
 HELP!" 
 
Without. 3 
 
 The language of suffering is not apt to be artistic or studied, 
 but I think that rhetoric could not improve this actual record. 
 So I let it stand, even as it stood this i5th day of March, 1848, 
 half-hidden by a thin film of damp snow, the snow-whitened 
 hand stiffened and pointing rigidly to the fateful canon like the 
 finger of Death. 
 
 At noon there was a lull in the storm, and a slight bright- 
 ning of the sky toward the east. The grim outlines of the 
 distant hills returned, and the starved white flank of the moun 
 tain began to glisten. Across its gaunt hollow some black 
 object was moving moving slowly and laboriously; moving 
 with such an uncertain mode of progression, that at first it was 
 difficult to detect whether it was brute or human sometimes 
 on all fours, sometimes erect, again hurrying forward like a 
 drunken man, but always with a certain definiteness of purpose, 
 towards the canon. As it approached nearer you saw that it 
 was a man. A haggard man, ragged and enveloped in a tat 
 tered buffalo robe, but still a man, and a determined one. A 
 young man, despite his bent figure and wasted limbs a young 
 man despite the premature furrows that care and anxiety had 
 set upon his brow and in the corners of his rigid mouth a 
 young man notwithstanding the expression of savage misan 
 thropy with which suffering and famine had overlaid the frank 
 impulsiveness of youth. When he reached the tree at the 
 entrance of the canon, he brushed the film of snow from the 
 canvas placard, and then leaned for a few moments ex- 
 haustedly against its trunk. There was something in the 
 abandonment of his attitude that indicated even more pathe 
 tically than his face and figure his utter prostration a prostra 
 tion quite inconsistent with any visible cause. When he had 
 rested himself, he again started forward with a nervous intensity, 
 shambling, shuffling, falling, stopping to replace the rudely 
 extemporized snow-shoes of fir bark that frequently slipped 
 from his feet, but always starting on again with the feverishness 
 of one who doubted even the sustaining power of his will. 
 
 A mile beyond the tree the canon narrowed and turned 
 gradually to the south, and at this point a thin curling cloud 
 of smoke was visible that seemed to rise from some crevice in 
 the snow. As he came nearer, the impression of recent foot 
 prints began to show ; there was some displacement of the 
 snow around a low mound from which the smoke now plainly 
 
 B2 
 
4 Gabriel Conroy* 
 
 issued. Here he stopped, or rather lay down, before an open 
 ing or cavern in the snow, and uttered a feeble shout. It was 
 responded to still more feebly. Presently a face appeared 
 above the opening, and a ragged figure like his own, then 
 another, and then another, until eight human creatures, men 
 and women, surrounded him in the snow, squatting like 
 animals, and like animals lost to all sense of decency and 
 shame. 
 
 They were so haggard, so faded, so forlorn, so wan, so 
 piteous in their human aspect, or rather all that was left of a 
 human aspect, that they might have been wept over as they 
 sat there they were so brutal, so imbecile, unreasoning and 
 grotesque in these newer animal attributes, that they might 
 have provoked a smile. They were originally country people, 
 mainly of that social class whose self-respect is apt to be 
 dependent rather on their circumstances, position and sur 
 roundings, than upon any individual moral power or in 
 tellectual force. They had lost the sense of shame in the 
 sense of equality of suffering ; there was nothing within them 
 to take the place of the material enjoyments they were losing. 
 They were childish without the ambition or emulation of child 
 hood ; they were men and women without the dignity or 
 simplicity of man and womanhood. All that had raised them 
 above the level of the brute was lost in the snow. Even the 
 characteristics of sex were gone ; an old woman of sixty 
 quarrelled, fought, and swore with the harsh utterance and 
 ungainly gestures of a man ; a young man of scorbutic tem 
 perament wept, sighed, and fainted with the hysteria of a 
 woman. So profound was their degradation that the stranger 
 who had thus evoked them from the earth, even in his very 
 rags and sadness, seemed of another race. 
 
 They were all intellectually weak and helpless, but one, a 
 woman, appeared to have completely lost her mind. She carried 
 a small blanket wrapped up to represent a child the tangible 
 memory of one that had starved to death in her arms a few days 
 before and rocked it from side to side as she sat, with a faith 
 that was piteous. But even more piteous was the fact that 
 none of her companions took the least notice, either by 
 sympathy or complaint, of her aberration. When a few 
 moments later she called upon them to be quiet, for that 
 " baby" was asleep, they glared at her indifferently and went 
 
Without. 5 
 
 on. A red-haired man, who was chewing a piece of buftalo 
 hide, cast a single murderous glance at her, but the next 
 moment seemed to have forgotten her presence in his more 
 absorbing occupation. 
 
 The stranger paused a moment rather to regain his breath 
 than to wait for their more orderly and undivided attention. 
 Then he uttered the single word : 
 
 "Nothing!" 
 
 " Nothing S" They all echoed the word simultaneously, but 
 with different inflection and significance one fiercely, another 
 gloomily, another stupidly, another mechanically. The woman 
 with the blanket baby explained to it, " he says * nothing,' ; ' and 
 laughed. 
 
 " No nothing," repeated the speaker. " Yesterday's snow 
 blocked up the old trail again. The beacon on the summit's 
 burnt out. I left a notice at the Divide. Do that again, 
 Dumphy, and I'll knock the top of your ugly head off." 
 
 Dumphy, the red-haired man, had rudely shoved and stricken 
 the woman with the baby she was his wife, and this conjugal 
 act may have been partly habit as she was crawling nearer 
 the speaker. She did not seem to notice the blow or its giver 
 the apathy with which these people received blows or slights 
 was more terrible than wrangling but said assuringly, when 
 she had reached the side of the young man 
 
 " To-morrow, then ? ; ' 
 
 The face of the young man softened as he made the same 
 reply he had made for the last eight days to the same 
 question 
 
 " To-morrow, surely !" 
 
 She crawled away, still holding the effigy of her dead baby 
 very carefully, and retreated down the opening. 
 
 " 'Pears to me you don't do much ennyway, out scouting ! 
 'Pears to me you ain't worth shucks !" said the harsh-voiced 
 woman, glancing at the speaker. " Why don't some on ye take 
 his place? Why do you trust your lives and the lives of 
 women to that thar Ashley?" she continued, with her voice 
 raised to a strident bark. 
 
 The hysterical young man, Henry March, who sat next to 
 her, turned a wild scared face upon her, and then, as if fearful 
 of being dragged into the conversation, disappeared hastily 
 after Mrs. Dumphy. 
 
6 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Ashley shrugged his shoulders, and, replying to the group, 
 {ather than any individual speaker, said curtly 
 
 " There's but one chance equal for all open to all. You 
 inow what it is. To stay here is death ; to go, cannot be 
 worse than that." 
 
 He rose and walked slowly away up the canon a few rods to 
 where another mound was visible, and disappeared from their 
 view. When he had gone, a querulous chatter went around 
 the squatting circle. 
 
 " Gone to see the old Doctor and the gal. We're no 
 account." 
 
 " Thar's two too many in this yer party." 
 
 " Yes the crazy Doctor and Ashley." 
 
 " They're both interlopers, any way." 
 
 "Jonahs." 
 
 " Said no good could come of it, ever since we picked him 
 up." 
 
 " But the Cap'n invited the ol' Doctor, and took all his stock' 
 at Sweetwater, and Ashley put in his provisions with the rest." 
 
 The speaker was McCormick. Somewhere in the feeble 
 depths of his consciousness there was still a lingering sense of 
 justice. He was hungry, but not unreasonable. Besides, he 
 remembered with a tender regret the excellent quality of pro 
 vision that Ashley had furnished. 
 
 " What's that got to do with it ?" screamed Mrs. Brackett. 
 " He brought the bad luck with him. Ain't my husband dead, 
 and isn't that skunk an entire stranger still livin' r" 
 
 The voice was masculine, but the logic was feminine. In 
 cases of great prostration with mental debility, in the hopeless 
 vacuity that precedes death by inanition or starvation, it is 
 sometimes very effective. They all assented to it, and by a 
 singular intellectual harmony, the expression of each was the 
 same. It was simply an awful curse. 
 
 " What are you goin' to do ?" 
 
 " If I was a man, I'd know !" 
 
 " Knife him !" 
 
 " Kill him, and " 
 
 The remainder of this sentence was lost to the others in a 
 confidential whisper between Mrs. Brackett and Dumphy. 
 After this confidence they sat and wagged their heads to 
 gether, like two unmatched but hideous Chinese idols. 
 
Without. 7 
 
 " Look at his strength ! and he not a workin' man like us,'' 
 said Dumphy. " Don't tell me he don't get suthin' reg'lar." 
 
 "Suthin' what?" 
 
 " Suthin' TO EAT !" 
 
 But it is impossible to convey, even by capitals, the intense 
 emphasis put upon this verb. It was followed by a horrible 
 pause. 
 
 " Let's go and see." 
 
 " And kill him," suggested the gentle Mrs. Brackett. 
 
 They all rose with a common interest almost like enthusiasm. 
 But after they had tottered a few steps, they fell. Yet even 
 then there was not enough self-respect left among them to feel 
 any sense of shame or mortification in their baffled design. 
 They stopped all except Dumphy. 
 
 " Wot's that dream you was talkin' 'bout jess now?" said 
 Mr. McCormick, sitting down and abandoning the enterprise 
 with the most shameless indifference. 
 
 "'Bout the dinner at St. Jo?" asked the person addressed 
 a gentleman whose faculty of alimentary imagination had been 
 at'once the bliss and torment of his present social circle. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 They all gathered eagerly around Mr. McCormick; even 
 Mr. Dumphy, who was still moving away, stopped. 
 
 " Well," said Mr. March, " it began with beefsteak and injins 
 beefsteak, you know, juicy and cut very thick, and jess 
 squashy with gravy and injins." There was a very perceptible 
 watering of the mouth in the party, and Mr. March, with the 
 genius of a true narrator, under the plausible disguise of having 
 forgotten his story, repeated the last sentence "jess squashy 
 with gravy and injins. And taters baked." 
 
 " You said fried before ! and dripping with fat !" interposed 
 Mrs. Brackett, hastily. 
 
 " For them as likes fried but baked goes furder skins and 
 all and sassage and coffee and flapjacks !" 
 
 At this magical word they laughed, not mirthfully perhaps, 
 but eagerly and expectantly, and said, " Go on !" 
 
 " And flapjacks !" 
 
 " You said that afore," said Mrs. Brackett, with a burst of 
 passion. " Go on !" with an oath. 
 
 The giver of this Barmacide feast saw his dangerous position, 
 and looked around for Dumphy, but he had disappeared. 
 
8 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 WITHIN. 
 
 THE hut into which Ashley descended was like a Greenlander's 
 " iglook," below the surface of the snow. Accident rather than 
 design had given it this Arctic resemblance. As snow upon 
 snow had blocked up its entrance, and reared its white ladders 
 against its walls, and as the strength of its exhausted inmates 
 slowly declined, communication with the outward world was 
 kept up only by a single narrow passage. Excluded from the 
 air, it was close and stifling, but it had a warmth that perhaps 
 the thin blood of its occupants craved more than light or 
 ventilation. 
 
 A smouldering fire in a wooden chimney threw a faint flicker 
 on the walls. By its light, lying on the floor, were discernible 
 four figures a young woman and a child of three or four years 
 wrapped in a single blanket, near the fire ; nearer the door two 
 men, separately enwrapped, lay apart. They might have been 
 dead, so deep and motionless were their slumbers. 
 
 Perhaps some fear of this filled the mind of Ashley as he 
 entered, for after a moment's hesitation, without saying a word, 
 he passed quickly to the side of the young woman, and, kneel 
 ing beside her, placed his hand upon her face. Slight as was 
 the touch, it awakened her. I know not what subtle magnet 
 ism was in that contact, but she caught the hand in her own, 
 sat up, and before the eyes were scarcely opened, uttered the 
 single word 
 
 " Philip !" 
 
 " Grace hush ! M 
 
 He took her hand, kissed it, and pointed warningly toward 
 the other sleepers. 
 
 " Speak low. I have much to say to you." 
 
 The young girl seemed to be content to devour the speaker 
 with her eyes. 
 
 " You have come back," she whispered, with a faint smile, 
 and a look that showed too plainly the predominance of that 
 fact above all others in her mind. " I dreamed of you, 
 Philip." 
 
 " Dear Grace," he kissed her hand again. " Listen to me. 
 darling ! I have come back, but only with the old story no 
 
Within. 9 
 
 signs of succour, no indications of help from without ! My 
 belief is, Grace/' he added, in a voice so low as to be audible 
 only to the quick ear to which it was addressed, " that we have 
 blundered far south of the usual travelled trail. Nothing but a 
 miracle or a misfortune like our own would bring another train 
 this way. We are alone and helpless in an unknown region 
 that even the savage and brute have abandoned. The only aid 
 we can calculate upon is from within from ourselves. What 
 that aid amounts to," he continued, turning a cynical eye 
 toward the sleepers, "you know as well as I." 
 
 She pressed his hand, apologetically, as if accepting the 
 reproach herself, but did not speak. 
 
 "As a party we have no strength no discipline," he went 
 on. " Since your father died we have had no leader. I know 
 what you would say, Grace dear," he continued, answering the 
 mute protest of the girl's hand, " but even if it were true if I 
 were capable of leading them, they would not take my counsels. 
 Perhaps it is as well. If we kept together, the greatest peril of 
 our situation would be ever present the peril from ourselves /" 
 
 He looked intently at her as he spoke, but she evidently did 
 not take his meaning. "Grace," he said, desperately, "when 
 starving men are thrown together, they are capable of any 
 sacrifice of any crime, to keep the miserable life that they 
 hold so dear just in proportion as it becomes valueless. You 
 have read in books Grace ! good God, what is the matter ?" 
 
 If she had not read his meaning in books, she might have 
 read it at that moment in the face that was peering in at the 
 door, a face with so much of animal suggestion in its horrible 
 wistfulness that she needed no further revelation ; a face full of 
 inhuman ferocity and watchful eagerness, and yet a face familiar 
 in its outlines the face of Dumphy ! Even with her danger 
 came the swifter instinct of feminine tact and concealment, and 
 without betraying the real cause of her momentary horror, she 
 dropped her head upon Philip's shoulder and whispered, " I 
 understand." When she raised her head again the face was 
 gone. 
 
 " Enough, I did not mean to frighten you, Grace, but only 
 to show you what we must avoid what we have still strengtli 
 left to avoid. There is but one chance of escape ; you know 
 what it is a desperate one, but no more desperate than this, 
 passive waiting for a certain end. I ask you again will you 
 
io Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 share it with me? When I first spoke I was less sanguine 
 than now. Since then I have explored the ground carefully, 
 and studied the trend of these mountains. It is possible. I 
 say no more." 
 
 "But my sister and brother?" 
 
 " The child would be a hopeless impediment, even if she 
 could survive the fatigue and exposure. Your brother must 
 stay with her ; she will need all his remaining strength and all 
 the hopefulness that keeps him up. No, Grace, we must go 
 alone. Remember, our safety means theirs. Their strength 
 will last until we can send relief ; while they would sink in the 
 .attempt to reach it with us. I would go alone, but I cannot 
 bear, dear Grace, to leave you here." 
 
 " I should die if you left me,' ; she said, simply. 
 
 " I believe you would, Grace," he said as simply. 
 
 " But can we not wait? Help may come at any moment 
 to morrow/' 
 
 " To-morrow will find us weaker. I should not trust your 
 strength nor my own a day longer/' 
 
 " But the old man the Doctor ?" 
 
 " He will soon be beyond the reach of help," said the young 
 man, sadly. "Hush, he is moving." 
 
 One of the blanketed figures had rolled over. Philip walked 
 to the fire, threw on a fresh stick, and stirred the embers. The 
 upspringing flash showed the face of an old man whose eyes 
 were fixed with feverish intensity upon him. 
 
 "What are you doing with the fire ?" he asked querulously, 
 with a slight foreign accent. 
 
 " Stirring it !" 
 
 " Leave it alone !" 
 
 Philip listlessly turned away. 
 
 " Come here," said the old man. 
 
 Philip approached. 
 
 " You need say nothing," said the old man after a pause, in 
 which he examined Philip's face keenly. " I read your news 
 in your face the old story I know it by heart." 
 
 "Well?" said Philip. 
 
 " Well !" said the old man, stolidly. 
 
 Philip again turned away. 
 
 " You buried the case and papers ?" asked the old man. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
Within. 1 1 
 
 " Through the snow in the earth ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 11 Securely ?" 
 
 "Securely." 
 
 " How do you indicate it ?" 
 
 " By a cairn of stones." 
 
 " And the notices in German and French ?" 
 
 " I nailed them up wherever I could, near the old trail." 
 
 " Good." 
 
 The cynical look on Philip's face deepened as he once niDre 
 turned away. But before he reached the door he paused, and 
 drawing from his breast a faded flower, with a few limp leaves, 
 handed it to the old man. 
 
 " I found the duplicate of the plant you were looking for." 
 
 The old man half rose on his elbow, breathless with excite 
 ment as he clutched and eagerly examined the plant. 
 
 " It is the same," he said, with a sigh of relief, " and yet you 
 said there was no news !" 
 
 " May I ask what it means ?" said Philip, with a slight 
 smile. 
 
 " It means that I am right, and Linnaeus, Darwin, and 
 Eschscholtz are wrong. It means a discovery. It means that 
 this which you call an Alpine flower is not one, but a new 
 species." 
 
 " An important fact to starving men," said Philip, bitterly. 
 
 " It means more," continued the old man, without heeding 
 Philip's tone. " It means that this flower is not developed in 
 perpetual snow. It means that it is first germinated in a warm 
 soil and under a kindly sun. It means that if you had not 
 plucked it, it would have fulfilled its destiny under those con 
 ditions. It means that in two months grass will be springing 
 where you found it even where we now lie. We are below 
 the limit of perpetual snow." 
 
 " In two months !" said the young girl, eagerly, clasping her 
 \tands. 
 
 " In two months," said the young man, bitterly. " In two 
 months we shall be far from here, or dead." 
 
 " Probably !" said the old man, coolly ; " but if you have 
 fulfilled my injunctions in regard to my papers and the 
 collection, they will in good time be discovered and saved." 
 
 Ashley turned away with an impatient gesture, and the old 
 
1 2 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 man's head again sank exhaustedly upon his arm. Under the 
 pretext of caressing the child, Ashley crossed over to Grace, 
 uttered a few hurried and almost inaudible words, and dis 
 appeared through the door. When he had gone, the old man 
 raised his head again and called feebly 
 
 " Grace !" 
 
 " Dr. Devarges !" 
 
 " Come here !" 
 
 She rose and crossed over to his side. 
 
 "Why did he stir the fire, Grace?" said Devarges, with a 
 suspicious glance. 
 
 " I don't know." 
 
 " You tell him everything did you tell him that?" 
 
 " I did not, sir." 
 
 Devarges looked as if he would read the inmost thoughts of 
 the girl, and then, as if re-assured, said 
 
 " Take it from the fire, and let it cool in the snow." 
 
 The young girl raked away the embers of the dying fire, and 
 disclosed what seemed to be a stone of the size of a hen's egg 
 incandescent and glor/ing. With the aid of two half-burnt 
 sticks she managed to extract it, and deposited it in a con 
 venient snow-drift near the door, and then returned to the side 
 of the old man. 
 
 " Grace!" 
 
 " Sir !" 
 
 " You are going away !" 
 
 Grace did not speak. 
 
 " Don't deny it. I overheard you. Perhaps it is the best 
 that you can do. But whether it is or not you will do it of 
 course. Grace,, what do you know of that man ?" 
 
 Neither the contact of daily familiarity, the equality of 
 suffering, nor the presence of approaching death could subdue 
 the woman's nature in Grace. She instantly raised her shield. 
 From behind it she began to fence feebly with the dying man. 
 
 " Why, what we all know of him, sir, a true friend ; a man 
 to whose courage, intellect, and endurance we owe so much. 
 And so unselfish, sir !" 
 " Humph ! what else?" 
 
 " Nothing except that he has always been your devoted 
 friend and I thought you were his. You brought him to us,' 
 he said, a little viciously. 
 
Within. 13 
 
 " Yes I picked him up at Sweetvvater. But what do you 
 know of his history ? What has he told you ?" 
 
 " He ran away from a wicked stepfather and relations whom 
 he hated. He came out West to live alone among the 
 Indians or to seek his fortune in Oregon. He is very proud 
 you know, sir. He is as unlike us as you are, sir, he is a 
 gentleman. He is educated." 
 
 " Yes, I believe that's what they call it here, and he doesn't 
 know the petals of a flower from the stamens," muttered 
 Devarges. " Well ! After you run away with him does he 
 propose to marry you ?" 
 
 For an instant a faint flush deepened the wan cheek of the 
 girl, and she lost her guard. But the next moment she 
 recovered it. 
 
 " Oh, sir," said this arch hypocrite, sweetly, " how can you 
 jest so cruelly at such a moment ? The life of my dear brother 
 and sister, the lives of the poor women in yonder hut, depend 
 upon our going. He and I are the only ones left who have 
 strength enough to make the trial. I can assist him, for, 
 although strong, I require less to support my strength than he. 
 Something tells me we shall be successful ; we shall return soon 
 with help. Oh, sir, it is no time for trifling now ; our lives- 
 even your own is at stake ! " 
 
 " My own life," said the old man, impassively, " is already 
 spent. Before you return, if you return at all, I shall be 
 beyond your help." 
 
 A spasm of pain appeared to pass over his face. He lay 
 still for a moment as if to concentrate his strength for a further 
 effort. But, when he again spoke, his voice was much lower, 
 and he seemed to articulate with difficulty. 
 
 " Grace," he said at last, " come nearer, girl, I have some- 
 think to tell you." 
 
 Grace hesitated. Within the last few moments a shy, nervous 
 dread of the man which she could not account for had taken 
 possession of her. She looked toward her sleeping brother. 
 
 " He will not waken/' said Devarges, following the direction 
 of her eyes. " The anodyne still holds its effect. Bring me 
 xvhat you took from the fire." 
 
 Grace brought the stone - a dull bluish-grey slag. The old 
 man took it, examined it, and then said to Grace 
 
 " Rub it briskly on your blanket." 
 
14 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Grace did so. After a few moments it began to exhibit a 
 faint white lustre on its polished surface. 
 
 " It looks like silver," said Grace, doubtfully. 
 
 " It is silver !" replied Devarges. 
 
 Grace put it down quickly and moved slightly away. 
 
 " Take it," said the old man, " it is yours. A year ago I 
 found it in a ledge of the mountain range far west of this. I 
 know where it lies in bulk a fortune, Grace, do you hear ? 
 hidden in the bluish stone you put in the fire for me last night. 
 I can tell you where and how to find it. I can give you the 
 title to it the right of discovery. Take it it is yours." 
 
 " No, no," said the girl, hurriedly, " keep it yourself. Yon 
 will live to enjoy it." 
 
 " Never, Grace ! even were I to live I should not make use 
 of it. I have in my life had more than my share of it, and it 
 brought me no happiness. It has no value to me the rankest 
 weed that grows above it is worth more in my eyes. Take it. 
 To the world it means everything, wealth and position. 
 Take it. It will make you as proud and independent as your 
 lover it will make you always gracious in his eyes ; it will be 
 a setting to your beauty, it will be a pedestal to your virtue. 
 Take it it is yours." 
 
 " But you have relatives friends," said the girl, drawing 
 away from the shining stone with a half superstitious awe. 
 " There are others whose claims " 
 
 " None greater than yours," interrupted the old man, with 
 the nervous haste of failing breath. " Call it a reward if you 
 choose. Look upon it as a bribe to keep your lover to the 
 fulfilment of his promise to preserve my manuscripts and 
 collection. Think, if you like, that it is an act of retribution 
 that once in my life I might have known a young girl whose 
 future would have been blest by such a gift. Think think 
 what you like but take it ! " 
 
 His voice had sunk to a whisper. A greyish pallor had 
 overspread his face, and his breath came with difficulty. Grace 
 would have called her brother, but with a motion of his hand 
 Devarges restrained her. With a desperate effort he raised 
 himself upon his elbow, and drawing an envelope from his 
 pocket, put it in her hand. 
 
 " It contains map description of mine and locality 
 yours say you will take it Grace, quick, say " 
 
Within. 1 5 
 
 His head had again sunk to the floor. She stooped to raise 
 it. As she did so a slight shadow darkened the opening by 
 the door. She raised her eyes quickly and saw the face of 
 Dumphy ! 
 
 She did not shrink this time ; but, with a sudden instinct, 
 she turned to Devarges, and said 
 
 " I will !" 
 
 She raised her eyes again defiantly, but the face had 
 disappeared. 
 
 " Thank you," said the old man. His lips moved again but 
 without a sound. A strange film had begun to gather in his 
 eyes. 
 
 " Dr. Devarges," whispered Grace. 
 
 He did not speak. " He is dying," thought the young girl 
 as a new and sudden fear overcame her. She rose quickly and 
 crossed hurriedly to her brother and shook him. A prolonged 
 inspiration, like a moan, was the only response. For a moment 
 she glanced wildly around the room and then ran to the door. 
 
 " Philip !" 
 
 There was no response. She climbed up through the 
 tunnel-like opening. It was already quite dark and a few feet 
 beyond the hut nothing was distinguishable. She cast a rapid 
 backward glance, and then, with a sudden desperation, darted 
 forward into the darkness. At the same moment two figures 
 raised themselves from behind the shadow of the mound and 
 slipped down the tunnel into the hut Mrs. Brackett and 
 Mr. Dumphy. They might have been the meanest predatory 
 animals so stealthy, so eager, so timorous, so crouching, 
 and yet so agile were their motions. They ran sometimes 
 upright, and sometimes on all fours, hither and thither. They 
 fell over each other in their eagerness, and struck and spat 
 savagely at each other in the half darkness. They peered into 
 corners, they rooted in the dying embers and among the ashes, 
 they groped among the skins and blankets, they smelt and 
 sniffed at every article. They paused at last apparently un 
 successful, and glared at each other. 
 
 " They must have eaten it," said Mrs. Brackett, in a hoarse 
 whisper. 
 
 " It didn't look like suthin' to eat," said Dumphy. 
 " You saw 'em take it from the fire ?" 
 Yes !" 
 
1 5 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 "And rub it?" 
 
 "Yes!" 
 
 " Fool. Don't you see " 
 
 " What ?" 
 
 " It was a baked potato." 
 
 Dumphy sat dumbfounded. 
 
 " Why should they rub it ? it takes off the cracklin* skin," 
 
 said. 
 
 " They've got such fine stomachs !" answered Mrs. Brackett, 
 ith an oath. 
 
 Dumphy was still aghast with the importance of his dis 
 covery. 
 
 " He said he knew where there was more !" he whispered, 
 eagerly. 
 
 " Where ?" 
 
 "I didn't get to hear." 
 
 " Fool ! Why didn't ye rush in and grip his throat until he 
 told yer ?" hissed Mrs. Brackett, in a tempest of baffled rage 
 and disappointment. " Ye ain't got the spunk of a flea. Let 
 me get hold of that gal Hush ! what's that ?" 
 
 " He's moving !" said Dumphy. 
 
 In an instant they had both changed again into slinking, 
 crouching, baffled animals, eager only for escape. Yet they 
 dared not move. 
 
 The old man had turned over, and his lips were moving in 
 the mutterings of delirium. Presently he called " Grace !" 
 
 With a sign of caution to her companion, the woman leaned 
 over him. 
 
 " Yes, deary, I'm here." 
 
 "Tell him not to forget. Make him keep his promise. 
 Ask him where it is buried !" 
 
 "Yes, deary!" 
 
 " He'll tell you. He knows !" 
 
 " Yes, deary !" 
 
 " At the head of Monument Canon. A hundred feet north 
 of the lone pine. Dig two feet down below the surface of the 
 cairn." 
 
 "Yes!" 
 
 " Where the wolves can't get it." 
 
 " Yes !" 
 
 " The stones keep it from ravenous beasts." 
 
Gabriel. \j 
 
 " Yes, in course." 
 
 " That might tear it up." 
 
 " Yes !" 
 
 " Starving beasts !" 
 
 "Yes, deary!" 
 
 The fire of his wandering eyes went out suddenly, like a 
 candle ; his jaw dropped ; he was dead. And over him the 
 man and woman crouched in fearful joy, looking at each other 
 with the first smile that had been upon their lips since they had 
 entered the fateful canon. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 GABRIEL. 
 
 IT was found the next morning that the party was diminished 
 by five. Philip Ashley and Grace Conroy, Peter Dumphy and 
 Mrs. Brackett were missing ; Dr. Paul Devarges was dead. 
 The death of the old man caused but little excitement and no 
 sorrow ; the absconding of the others was attributed to some 
 information which they had selfishly withheld from the remain 
 ing ones, and produced a spasm of impotent rage. In five 
 minutes their fury knew no bounds. The lives and property of 
 the fugitives were instantly declared forfeit. Steps were taken 
 about twenty, I think in the direction of their flight, but 
 finally abandoned. 
 
 Only one person knew that Philip and Grace had gone 
 together Gabriel Conway. On awakening early that morning 
 he had found pinned to his blanket a paper with these words 
 in pencil 
 
 " God bless dear brother and sister, and keep them until 
 Philip and I come back with help." 
 
 With it were a few scraps of provisions, evidently saved by 
 Grace from her scant rations, and left as a parting gift. These 
 Gabriel instantly turned into the common stock. Then he 
 began to comfort the child. Added to his natural hopefulness, 
 he had a sympathetic instinct with the pains and penalties of 
 childhood, not so much a quality of his intellect as of his 
 nature. He had all the physical adaptabilities of a nurse a 
 large, tender touch, a low persuasive voice, pliant yet unhesi- 
 
 c 
 
1 8 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 tating limbs, and broad well-cushioned surfaces. During the 
 weary journey women had instinctively intrusted babies to his 
 charge ; most of the dead had died in his arms ; all forms and 
 conditions of helplessness had availed themselves of his easy 
 capacity. No one thought of thanking him. I do not think 
 he ever expected it ; he always appeared morally irresponsible 
 and quite unconscious of his own importance, and, as is fre 
 quent in such cases, there was a tendency to accept his services 
 at his own valuation. Nay more, there was a slight conscious 
 ness of superiority in those who thus gave him an opportunity 
 of exhibiting his special faculty. 
 
 "Oily," he said, after an airy preliminary toss, "would ye 
 like to have a nice dolly ?" 
 
 Oily opened her wide hungry eyes in hopeful anticipation 
 and nodded assent. 
 
 " A nice dolly, with a real mamma," he continued, " who 
 plays with it like a true baby. Would ye like to help her play 
 with it?" 
 
 The idea of a joint partnership of this kind evidently pleased 
 Oily by its novelty. 
 
 " Well then, brother Gabe will get you one. But Gracie 
 will have to go away, so that the doll's mamma kin come." 
 
 Oily at first resented this, but eventually succumbed to 
 novelty, after the fashion of her sex, starving or otherwise. 
 Yet she prudently asked 
 
 "Is it ever hungry ?" 
 
 " It is never hungry," replied Gabriel, confidently. 
 
 " Oh !" said Oily, with an air of relief. 
 
 Then Gabriel, the cunning, sought Mrs. Dumphy, the 
 mentally alienated. 
 
 "You are jest killin' of yourself with the tendin' o' that 
 child," he said, after bestowing a caress on the blanket and 
 slightly pinching an imaginary cheek of the effigy. " It would 
 "be likelier and stronger fur a playmate. Good gracious ! how 
 thin it is gettin'. A change will do it good ; fetch it to Oily, 
 and let her help you tend it until until to-morrow." To 
 morrow was the extreme limit of Mrs. Dumphy's future. 
 
 So Mrs. Dumphy and her effigy were installed in Grace's 
 place, and Oily was made happy. A finer nature or a more 
 active imagination than Gabriel's would have revolted at this 
 monstrous combination ; but Gabriel only saw that they 
 
Gabriel. 19 
 
 appeared contented, and the first pressing difficulty of Grace's 
 absence was overcome. So alternately they took care of the 
 effigy, the child simulating the cares of the future and losing 
 the present in them, the mother living in the memories of the 
 past. Perhaps it might have been pathetic to have seen Oily 
 and Mrs. Dumphy both saving the infinitesimal remnants of 
 their provisions for the doll, but the only spectator was one of 
 the actors, Gabriel, who lent himself to the deception ; and 
 pathos, to be effective, must be viewed from the outside. 
 
 At noon that day the hysterical young man, Gabriel's cousin, 
 died. Gabriel went over to the other hut and endeavoured to 
 cheer the survivors. He succeeded in infecting them so far 
 with his hopefulness as to loosen the tongue and imagination 
 of the story-teller, but at four o'clock the body had not yet 
 been buried. It was evening, and the three were sitting over 
 the embers, when a singular change came over Mrs. Dumphy. 
 The effigy suddenly slipped from her hands, and looking up, 
 Gabriel perceived that her arms had dropped to her side, and 
 that her eyes were fixed on vacancy. He spoke to her, but 
 she made no sign nor response of any kind. He touched her, 
 and found her limbs rigid and motionless. Oily began to 
 cry. 
 
 The sound seemed to agitate Mrs. Dumphy. Without 
 moving a limb, she said, in a changed, unnatural voice, " Hark I" 
 
 Oily choked her sobs at a sign from Gabriel. 
 
 " They're coming !" said Mrs. Dumphy. 
 
 "Which?" said Gabriel. 
 
 " The relief party." 
 
 " Where r" 
 
 " Far, far away. They're jest setting out. I see 'em a 
 dozen men with pack horses and provisions. The leader is an 
 American the others are strangers. They're coming but 
 far, oh, so far away !" 
 
 Gabriel fixed his eyes upon her, but did not speak. After a 
 death-like pause, she went on 
 
 " The sun is shining, the birds are singing, the grass is 
 springing where they ride but, oh, so far too far away !" 
 
 " Do you know them ?" asked Gabriel. 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Do they know us ?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 c2 
 
2O Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Why do they come, and how do they know where we 
 are ?" asked Gabriel. 
 
 " Their leader has seen us." 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 " In a dream."* 
 
 Gabriel whistled and looked at the rag baby. He was will 
 ing to recognise something abnormal, and perhaps even pro 
 phetic, in this insane woman; but a coincident exaltation in a 
 stranger who was not suffering from the illusions produced by 
 starvation was beyond his credulity. Nevertheless, the instincts 
 of good humour and hopefulness were stronger, and he pre 
 sently asked 
 
 " How will they come?" 
 
 " Up through a beautiful valley and a broad shining liver. 
 Then they will cross a mountain until they come to another 
 beautiful valley with steep sides, and a rushing river that runs 
 so near us that I can almost hear it now. Don't you see it ? 
 It is just beyond the snow peak there ; a green valley, with the 
 rain falling upon it. Look ! it is there." 
 
 She pointed directly north, toward the region of inhospitable 
 snow. 
 
 " Could you get to it ?" asked the practical Gabriel. 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Why not ?" 
 
 " I must wait here for my baby. She is coming for us. She 
 will find me here/' 
 
 " When ?" 
 
 " To-morrow." 
 
 It was the last time that she uttered that well-worn sentence ; 
 for it was only a little past midnight that her baby came to her 
 came to her with a sudden light, that might have been 
 invisible to Gabriel, but that it was reflected in her own lack 
 lustre eyes came to this poor half-witted creature with such 
 
 * I fear I must task the incredulous reader's further patience by calling 
 attention to what may perhaps prove the most literal and thoroughly 
 attested fact of this otherwise fanciful chronicle. The condition and situa 
 tion of the ill-famed " Conner Party " then an unknown, unheralded 
 cavalcade of emigrants starving in an unfrequented pass of the Sierras, 
 was first made known to Captain Yount of Napa, in a dream. The 
 Spanish records of California show that the relief party which succoured 
 the survivors was projected upon this spiritual information. 
 
Nature sJiows them the Way, 2 1 
 
 distinctness that she half rose, stretched out her thin yearning 
 arms and received it a corpse ! Gabriel placed the effigy in 
 her arms and folded them over it. Then he ran swiftly to the 
 other hut. For some unexplained reason he did not get 
 further than the door. What he saw there he has never told ; 
 but when he groped his fainting way back to his own hut 
 again, his face was white and bloodless, and his eyes wild and 
 staring. Only one impulse remained to fly for ever from the 
 cursed spot. He stopped only long enough to snatch up the 
 sobbing and frightened Oily, and then, with a loud cry to God 
 to help him to help them he dashed out, and was lost in the 
 darkness. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 NATURE SHOWS THEM THE WAY. 
 
 IT was a spur of the long grave-like ridge that lay to the north 
 of the canon. Up its gaunt white flank two figures had been 
 slowly crawling since noon, until at sunset they at last stood 
 upon its outer verge outlined against the sky Philip and 
 Grace. 
 
 For all the fatigues of the journey, the want of nourishing food 
 and the haunting shadow of the suffering she had left, the face 
 of Grace, flushed with the dying sun, was very pretty. The 
 boy's dress she had borrowed was ill-fitting, and made her 
 exquisite little figure still more diminutive, but it could not 
 entirely hide its graceful curves. Here in this rosy light the 
 swooning fringes of her dark eyes were no longer hidden ; the 
 perfect oval of her face, even the few freckles on her short 
 upper lip were visible to Philip. Partly as a physical support, 
 partly to re-assure her, he put his arm tenderly around her 
 waist. Then he kissed her. It is possible that this last act 
 was purely gratuitous. 
 
 Howbeit Grace first asked, with the characteristic prudence 
 of her sex, the question she had already asked many days 
 before that day, "Do you love me, Philip?" And Philip, 
 with the ready frankness of our sex on such occasions, had 
 invariably replied, " I do." 
 
 Nevertheless the young man was pre-occupied, anxious, and 
 hungry. It was the fourth day since they had left the hut. 
 
22 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 On the second day they had found some pine cones with the 
 nuts still intact and fresh beneath the snow, and later a 
 squirrel's hoard. On the third day Philip had killed the pro 
 prietor and eaten him. The same evening Philip had espied a 
 duck winging his way up the canon. Philip, strong in the 
 belief that some inland lake was the immediate object of its 
 flight, had first marked its course, and then brought it down 
 with a long shot. Then, having altered their course in accor 
 dance with its suggestion, they ate their guide next morning for 
 breakfast. 
 
 Philip was also disappointed. The summit of the spur so 
 laboriously attained only showed him the same endless suc 
 cession of white snow billows stretching rigidly to the horizon's 
 edge. There was no break no glimpse of water-course or 
 lake. There was nothing to indicate whence the bird had 
 come or the probable point it was endeavouring to reach. He 
 was beginning to consider the feasibility of again changing 
 their course, when an unlooked-for accident took that volition, 
 from his hands. 
 
 Grace had ventured out to the extreme limit of the rocky 
 clift, and with straining eyes was trying to peer beyond the 
 snow fields, when the treacherous ledge on which she was 
 standing began to give way. In an instant Philip was at her 
 side and had caught her hand, but at the same moment a large 
 rock of the ledge dropped from beneath her feet, and left her 
 with no support but his grasp. The sudden shock loosened 
 also the insecure granite on which Philip stood. Before he 
 could gain secure foothold it also trembled, tottered, slipped, 
 and then fell, carrying Philip and Grace with it. Luckily this 
 immense mass of stone and ice got fairly away before them, 
 and ploughed down the steep bank of the cliff, breaking off the 
 projecting rocks and protuberances, and cutting a clean, though 
 almost perpendicular, path down the mountain side. Even in 
 falling Philip had presence of mind enough to forbear clutching 
 at the crumbling ledge, and so precipitating the rock that 
 might crush them. Before he lost his senses he remembered 
 tightening his grip of Grace's arm, and drawing her face and 
 head forward to his breast, and even in his unconsciousness it 
 seemed that he instinctively guided her into the smooth 
 passage or " shoot" made by the plunging rock below them ; 
 and even then he was half conscious of dashing into sudden 
 
Nature shows them the Way. 23 
 
 material darkness and out again into light, and of the crashing 
 and crackling of branches around him, and even the brushing. 
 of the stiff pine needles against his face and limbs. Then he 
 felt himself stopped, and then, and then only, everything 
 whirled confusedly by him, and his brain seemed to partake ot 
 the motion, and then the relief of utter blankness and oblivion.. 
 When he regained his senses, it was with a burning heat in his 
 throat and the sensation of strangling. When he opened his 
 eyes he saw Grace bending over him, pale and anxious, and 
 chafing his hands and temples with snow. There was a spot 
 of blood upon her round cheek. 
 
 " You are hurt, Grace !" were the first words that Philip 
 gasped. 
 
 " No ! dear, brave Philip but only so thankful and happy 
 for your escape." Yet, at the same moment the colour faded 
 from her cheek, and even the sun-kissed line of her upper lip 
 grew bloodless, as she leaned back against a tree. 
 
 But Philip did not see her. His eyes were rapidly taking in 
 his strange surroundings. He was lying among the broken 
 fragments of pine branches and the debris of the cliff above. 
 In his ears was the sound of hurrying water, and before him, 
 scarce a hundred feet, a rushing river ! He looked up ; the 
 red glow of sunset was streaming through the broken limbs and 
 shattered branches of the snow-thatched roof that he had 
 broken through in his descent. Here and there along the 
 river the same light was penetrating the interstices and 
 openings of this strange vault that arched above this sunless 
 stream. 
 
 He knew now whence the duck had flown ! He knew now 
 why he had not seen the water-course before ! He knew now 
 where the birds and beasts had betaken themselves why the 
 woods and canons were trackless ! Here was at last the open 
 road ! He staggered to his feet with a cry of delight. 
 
 " Grace, we are saved." 
 
 Grace looked at him with eyes that perhaps spoke more 
 eloquently of joy at his recovery than of comprehension of his 
 delight. 
 
 " Look, Grace ! this is Nature's own road only a lane, 
 perhaps but a clue to our way out of this wilderness As we 
 descend the stream it will open into a broader valley." 
 
 " I know it," she said, simply. 
 
24 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Philip looked at her inquiringly. 
 
 " When I dragged you out of the way of the falling rocks 
 and snow above, I had a glimpse of the valley you speak of, 
 I saw it from there.''" 
 
 She pointed to a ledge of rock above the opening where the 
 great stone that had fallen had lodged. 
 
 " When you dragged me, my child ?" 
 
 Grace smiled faintly. 
 
 " You don't know how strong I am," she said, and then 
 proved it by fainting dead away. 
 
 Philip started to his feet and ran to her side. Then he felt 
 for the precious flask that he had preserved so sacredly through 
 all their hardships, but it was gone. He glanced around him ; 
 it was lying on the snow, empty ! For the first time in their 
 weary pilgrimage Philip uttered a groan. At the sound Grace 
 opened her sweet eyes. She saw her lover with the empty 
 flask in his hand, and smiled faintly. 
 
 " I poured it all down your throat, dear," she said. " You 
 looked so faint I thought you were dying forgive me !" 
 
 " But I was only stunned; and you, Grace, you 
 
 "Am better now," she said, as she strove to rise. But she 
 littered a weak little cry and fell back again. 
 
 Philip did not hear her. He was already climbing the ledge 
 she had spoken of. When he returned his face was joyous. 
 
 " I see it, Grace ; it is only a few miles away. It is still 
 light, and we shall camp there to-night." 
 
 " I am afraid not dear Philip," said Grace, doubtfully. 
 
 " Why not ?" asked Philip, a little impatiently. 
 
 " Because I think my leg is broken !" 
 
 " Grace !" 
 
 But she had fainted. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 OUT OF THE WOODS INTO THE SHADOW. 
 
 HAPPILY Grace was wrong. Her ankle was severely sprained, 
 and she could not stand. Philip tore up his shirt, and, with 
 bandages dipped in snow water, wrapped up the swollen limb. 
 Then he knocked over a quail in the bushes and another duck, 
 and clearing away the brush for a camping spot, built a fire, 
 
Out of the Woods. 25 
 
 and tempted the young girl with a hot supper. The peril of 
 starvation passed, their greatest danger was over a few days 
 longer of enforced rest and inactivity was the worst to be feared. 
 
 The air had grown singularly milder with the last few hours. 
 At midnight a damp breeze stirred the pine needles above 
 their heads, and an ominous muffled beating was heard upon 
 the snow-packed vault. It was rain. 
 
 " It is the reveille of spring !" whispered Philip. 
 
 But Grace was in no mood for poetry even a lover's. She 
 let her head drop upon his shoulder, and then said 
 
 " You must go on, dear, and leave me here." 
 
 " Grace !" 
 
 "Yes, Philip ! I can live until you come back. I fear no 
 danger now. I am so much better off than thcy.zxz !" 
 
 A few tears dropped on his hand. Philip winced. Perhaps 
 it was his conscience; perhaps there was something in the 
 girl's tone, perhaps because she had once before spoken in the 
 same way, but it jarred upon a certain quality in his nature 
 which he was pleased to call his " common sense." Philip 
 really believed himself a high-souled, thoughtless, ardent, im 
 petuous temperament, saved only from destruction by the 
 occasional dominance of this quality. 
 
 For a moment he did not speak. He thought how, at the 
 risk of his own safety, he had snatched this girl from a terrible 
 death; he thought how he had guarded her through their 
 perilous journey, taking all the burdens upon himself; he 
 thought how happy he had made her ; how she had even 
 admitted her happiness to him ; he thought of her present help 
 lessness, and how willing he was to delay the journey on 
 her account; he dwelt even upon a certain mysterious, 
 ill-defined but blissful future with him to which he was 
 taking her, and yet here, at the moment of their possible 
 deliverance, she was fretting about two dying people, who, 
 without miraculous interference, would be dead before she 
 could reach them. It was part of Philip's equitable self-exami 
 nation a fact of which he was very proud that he al \vays put 
 himself in the position of the person with whom he differed, 
 and imagined how he would act under the like circumstances. 
 Perhaps it is hardly necessary to say that Philip always found 
 that his conduct under those conditions would be totally 
 different. In the present instance, putting himself in Grace's 
 
26 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 position, he felt that he would have abandoned all and every 
 thing for a love and future like hers. That she did not was 
 evidence of a moral deficiency or a blood taint. Logic of this 
 kind is easy and irrefutable. It has been known to obtain 
 even beyond the Sierras, and with people who were not physi 
 cally exhausted. After a pause he said to Grace, in a changed 
 voice 
 
 " Let us talk plainly for a few moments, Grace, and under 
 stand each other before we go forward or backward. It is five 
 days since we left the hut ; were we even certain of finding our 
 wandering way back again, we could not reach there before 
 another five days had elapsed ; by that time all will be over. 
 They have either been saved or are beyond the reach of help. 
 This sounds harsh, Grace, but it is no harsher than the fact. 
 Had we stayed, we would, without helping them, have only 
 shared their fate. I might have been in your brother's place, 
 you in your sister's. It is our fortune, not our fault, that we 
 are not dying with them. It has been willed that you and I 
 should be saved. It might have been willed that we should 
 have perished in our attempts to succour them, and that relief 
 which came to them would have never reached us." 
 
 Grace was no logician, and could not help thinking that if 
 Philip had said this before, she would not have left the hut. 
 But the masculine reader will, I trust, at once detect the irrele 
 vance of the feminine suggestion, and observe that it did not 
 refute Philip's argument. She looked at him with a half 
 frightened air. Perhaps it was the tears that dimmed her eyes, 
 but his few words seemed to have removed him to a great 
 distance, and for the first time a strange sense of loneliness 
 came over her. She longed to reach her yearning arms to him 
 again, but with this feeling came a sense of shame that she had 
 not felt before. 
 
 Philip noticed her hesitation, and half interpreted it. He 
 let her passive head fall. 
 
 " Perhaps we had better wait until we are ourselves out of 
 danger before we talk of helping others," he said, with some 
 thing of his old bitterness. " This accident may keep us here 
 some days, and we know not as yet where we are. Go to 
 sleep, now," he said, more kindly, " and in the morning we 
 will see what can be done." 
 
 Grace sobbed herself to sleep ! Poor, poor Grace ! She 
 
Out of the Woods. 27 
 
 had been looking for this opportunity of speaking about herself 
 about their future. This was to have been the beginning of 
 her confidence about Dr. Devarges's secret ; she would have 
 told him frankly all the Doctor had said, even his suspicions of 
 Philip himself. And then Philip would have been sure to have 
 told her his plans, and they would have gone back with help, 
 and Philip would have been a hero whom Gabriel would have 
 instantly recognised as the proper husband for Grace, and they 
 would have all been very happy. And now they were all dead, 
 and had died, perhaps, cursing her, and Philip Philip had 
 not kissed her good-night, and was sitting gloomily under a tree ! 
 
 The dim light of a leaden morning broke through the snow 
 vault above their heads. It was raining heavily, the river had 
 risen, and was still rising. It was filled with drift and branches, 
 and snow and ice, the waste and wear of many a mile. Occa 
 sionally a large uprooted tree with a gaunt forked root like a 
 mast sailed by. Suddenly Philip, who had been sitting with 
 his chin upon his hands, rose with a shout. Grace looked up 
 languidly. He pointed to a tree that, floating by, had struck 
 the bank where they sat, and then drifted broadside against it, 
 where for a moment it lay motionless. 
 
 " Grace," he said, with his old spirits, " Nature has taken us 
 in hand herself. If we are to be saved, it is by her methods. 
 She brought us here to the water's edge, and now she sends a 
 boat to take us off again. Come." 
 
 Before Grace could reply, Philip had lifted her gaily in his 
 arms, and deposited her between two upright roots of the tree. 
 Then he placed beside her his rifle and provisions, and leaping 
 himself on the bow of this strange craft, shoved it off with a 
 broken branch that he had found. For a moment it still clung 
 to the bank, and then suddenly catching the impulse of the 
 current, darted away like a living creature. 
 
 The river was very narrrow and rapid where they had em 
 barked, and for a few moments it took all of Philip's energy 
 and undivided attention to keep the tree in the centre of the 
 current. Grace sat silent, admiring her lover, alert, forceful, 
 and glowing with excitement. Presently Philip called to her 
 
 " Do you see that log ? We are near a settlement." 
 
 A fresh.ly hewn log of pine was floating in the current beside 
 them. A ray of hope shot through Grace's sad fancies ; if they 
 were so near help, might not it have already reached the 
 
28 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 sufferers ? But she forbore to speak to Philip again upon that 
 subject, and in his new occupation he seemed to have forgotten 
 her. It was with a little thrill of joy that at last she saw him 
 turn, and balancing himself with his bough upon their crank 
 craft, walk down slowly toward her. When he reached her 
 side he sat down, and, taking her hand in his for the first time 
 since the previous night, he said, gently 
 
 " Grace, my child, I have something to tell you." 
 
 Grace's little heart throbbed quickly, for a moment she did 
 not dare to lift her long lashes toward his. Without noticing 
 her embarrassment he went on 
 
 " In a few hours we shall be no longer in the wilderness, 
 but in the world again in a settlement perhaps, among men 
 and perhaps women. Strangers certainly not the relatives 
 you have known, and who know you not the people with 
 whom we have been familiar for so many weeks and days but 
 people who know nothing of us, or our sufferings." 
 
 Grace looked at him, but did not speak. 
 
 " You understand, Grace, that, not knowing this, they might 
 put their own construction upon our flight. To speak plainly, 
 my child, you are a young woman, and I am a young man. 
 Your beauty, dear Grace, offers an explanation of our com 
 panionship that the world will accept more readily than any 
 other, and the truth to many would seem scarcely as natural. 
 For this reason it must not be told. I will go back alone with 
 relief, and leave you here in some safe hands until I return. 
 But I leave you here not as Grace Conroy you shall take my 
 own name T 
 
 A hot flush mounted to Grace's throat and cheek, and for 
 an instant, with parted lips, she hung breathless upon his next 
 word. He continued quietly 
 
 " You shall be my sister Grace Ashley." 
 
 The blood fell from her cheek, her eyelids dropped, and she 
 buried her face in her hands. Philip waited patiently for her 
 reply. When she lifted her face again, it was quiet and calm 
 there was even a slight flush of proud colour in her cheek as 
 she met his gaze, and with the faintest curl of her upper 7 : p 
 said 
 
 " You are right." 
 
 At the same moment there was a sudden breaking of light 
 and warmth and sunshine over their heads ; the tree swiftly 
 
Footprints. 29 
 
 swung round a sharp curve in the river, and then drifted slowly 
 into a broad, overflowed valley, sparkling with the emerald of 
 gently sloping hill-sides, and dazzling with the glow of the 
 noonday sun. And beyond, from a cluster of willows scarcely 
 a mile away, the smoke of a cabin chimney curled in the still 
 air. 
 
 CHAPTER VL 
 
 FOOTPRINTS. 
 
 FOR two weeks an unclouded sun rose and set on the rigid 
 outlines of Monument Point. For two weeks there had been 
 no apparent change in the ghastly whiteness of the snow- 
 flanked rocks ; in the white billows that rose rank on rank 
 beyond, in the death-like stillness that reigned above and 
 below. It was the first day of April ; there was the mildness 
 of early spring in the air that blew over this gaunt waste, and 
 yet awoke no sound or motion. And yet a nearer approach 
 showed that a slow insidious change had been taking place. 
 The white flanks of the mountain were more hollow ; the snow 
 had shrunk visibly away in places, leaving the grey rocks 
 naked and protuberant ; the rigid outlines were there, but less 
 full and rounded ; the skeleton was beginning to show through 
 the wasting flesh ; there were great patches of snow that had 
 sloughed away, leaving the gleaming granite bare below. It 
 was the last change of the Hippocratic face that Nature turned 
 toward the spectator. And yet this change had been noise 
 less the solitude unbroken. 
 
 And then one day there suddenly drifted across the death 
 like valley the chime of jingling spurs and the sound of human 
 voices. Down the long defile a cavalcade of mounted men 
 and pack mules made their way, plunging through drifts and 
 clattering over rocks. The unwonted sound awoke the long 
 slumbering echoes of the mountain, brought down small 
 avalanches from cliff and tree, and at last brought from some 
 cavern of the rocks to the surface of the snow, a figure so wild, 
 haggard, dishevelled and monstrous, that it was scarcely 
 human. It crawled upon the snow, dodging behind rocks with 
 the timidity of a frightened animal, and at last, squatting 
 behind a tree, awaited in ambush the approach of the party. 
 
3O Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Two men rode ahead ; one grave, pre-occupied, and reticent. 
 The other alert, active, and voluble. At last the reticent man 
 spoke, but slowly, and as if recalling a memory rather than 
 recording a present impression. 
 
 " They cannot be far away from us now. It was in some 
 such spot that I first saw them. The place is familiar." 
 
 " Heaven send that it may be," said the other, hastily, " for 
 to tell you the truth, I doubt if we will be able to keep the 
 men together a day longer in this crazy quest, unless we dis 
 cover something." 
 
 " It was here," continued the other, dreamily, not heeding 
 his companion, " that I saw the figures of a man and woman. 
 If there is not a cairn of stones somewhere about this spot, I 
 shall believe my dream false, and confess myself an old fool." 
 
 "Well as I said before," rejoined the other, laughing, 
 " anything a scrap of paper, an old blanket, or a broken 
 waggon-tongue will do. Columbus held his course and kept 
 up his crew on a fragment of seaweed. But what are the men 
 looking at ? Great God ! There is something moving by 
 yonder rock !" 
 
 By one common superstitious instinct the whole party had 
 crowded together those who, a few moments before, had been 
 loudest in their scepticism, held their breath with awe and 
 trembled with excitement as the shambling figure that had 
 watched them enter the canon, rose from its lair and, taking 
 upon itself a human semblance, with uncouth gestures and a 
 strange hoarse cry made toward them. It was Dumphy ! 
 
 The leader was the first to recover himself. He advanced 
 from the rest and met Dumphy half-way. 
 
 " Who are you ?" 
 
 "A man." 
 
 "What's the matter?" 
 
 " Starving." 
 
 "Where are the others?" 
 
 Dumphy cast a suspicious glance at him and said 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 " The others. You are not alone ?" 
 
 "Yes, I am!" 
 
 " How did you get here ?" 
 
 " What's that to you ? I'm here and starving. Gimme 
 sutliin' to eat and drink." 
 
Footprints. 3 1 
 
 He sank exhaustedly on all fours again. 
 
 There was a murmur of sympathy from the men. 
 
 " Give him suthin'. Don't you see he can't stand much 
 less talk ? Where's the Doctor?" 
 
 And then the younger of the leaders thus adjured 
 
 " Leave him to me he wants my help just now more than 
 yours." 
 
 He poured some brandy down his throat. Dumphy gasped, 
 and then staggered to his feet. 
 
 " What did you say your name was ?" asked the young 
 surgeon, kindly. 
 
 "Jackson," said Dumphy, with a defiantly blank look. 
 
 "Where from?" 
 
 " Missouri." 
 
 " How did you get here ?" 
 
 " Strayed from my party." 
 
 " And they are 
 
 " Gone on. Gimme suthin' to eat !" 
 
 " Take him back to camp and hand him over to Sanchez. 
 He'll know what to do," said the surgeon to one of the men. 
 " Well, Blunt," he continued, addressing the leader, " you're 
 saved but your nine men in buckram have dwindled down to 
 one, and not a very creditable specimen at that," he said, as his 
 eyes followed the retreating Dumphy. 
 
 " I wish it were all, Doctor," said Blunt, simply; "I would be 
 willing to go back now, but something tells me we have only 
 begun. This one makes everything else possible. What have 
 you there ?" 
 
 One of the men was approaching, holding a slip of paper 
 with ragged edges, as if torn from some position where it had 
 been nailed. 
 
 " A notiss from a tree. Me no "sabe," said the e*.-vaquero. 
 
 " Nor I," said Blunt, looking at it ; " it seems to be in 
 German. Call Glohr." 
 
 A tall Swiss came forward. Blunt handed him the paper. 
 The man examined it. 
 
 " It is a direction to find property important and valuable 
 property buried." 
 
 " Where ?" 
 
 " Under a cairn of stones." 
 
 The surgeon and Blunt exchanged glances. 
 
32 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Lead us there !" said Blunt, 
 
 It was a muffled monotonous tramp of about an hour. At 
 the end of that time they reached a spur of the mountain 
 around which the canon turned abruptly. Blunt uttered a cry. 
 
 Before them was a ruin a rude heap of stones originally 
 symmetrical and elevated, but now thrown down and dis 
 mantled. The snow and earth were torn up around and 
 beneath it. On the snow lay some scattered papers, a port 
 folio of drawings of birds and flowers : a glass case of insects 
 broken and demolished, and the scattered feathers of a few 
 stuffed birds. At a little distance lay what seemed to be a 
 heap of ragged clothing. At the sight of it the nearest horseman 
 uttered a shout and leaped to the ground. It was Mrs. 
 Brackett, dead. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 IN WHICH THE FOOTPRINTS BEGIN TO FADE. 
 
 SHE had been dead about a week. The features and clothing 
 were scarcely recognizable; the limbs were drawn up con 
 vulsively. The young surgeon bent over her attentively. 
 
 "Starved to death?" said Blunt, interrogatively. 
 
 The surgeon did not reply, but rose and examined the 
 scattered specimens. One of them he picked up and placed 
 first to his nose and then to his lips. After a pause, he replied 
 quietly 
 
 " No. Poisoned." 
 
 The men fell back from the body. 
 
 "Accidentally, I think," continued the surgeon, coolly; "the 
 poor creature has been driven by starvation to attack these 
 specimens. They have been covered with a strong solution of 
 arsenic to preserve them from the ravages of insects, and this 
 starving woman has been first to fall a victim to the collector's 
 caution." 
 
 There was a general movement of horror and indignation 
 among the men. " Shoost to keep dem birds/' said the irate 
 Swiss. " Killing women to save his cussed game," said 
 another. The surgeon smiled. It was an inauspicious moment 
 for Dr. Devarges to have introduced himself in person. 
 
 " If this enthusiastic naturalist is still living, I hope he'll 
 
The Footprints begin to Fade. 33 
 
 keep away from the men for some hours," said the surgeon to' 
 Blunt, privately. 
 
 " Who is he ?" asked the other. 
 
 " A foreigner a savant of some note, I should say, in his 
 own country. I think I have heard the name before 
 ' Devarges,' " replied the surgeon, looking over some papers- 
 that he had picked up. " He speaks of some surprising dis 
 coveries he has made, and evidently valued his collection very 
 highly." 
 
 " Are they worth re-collecting and preserving?" asked Blunt, 
 
 " Not now !" said the surgeon. " Every moment is precious. 
 Humanity first, science afterward," he added, lightly, and they 
 rode on. 
 
 And so the papers and collections preserved with such care, 
 the evidence of many months of patient study, privation, and 
 hardship, the records of triumph and discovery, were left lying 
 upon the snow. The wind came down the flanks of the moun 
 tain and tossed them hither and thither as if in scorn, and the 
 sun already fervid, heating the metallic surfaces of the box and 
 portfolio, sank them deeper in the snow, as if to bury them 
 from the sight for ever. 
 
 By skirting the edge of the valley where the snow had fallen 
 away from the mountain-side, they reached in a few hours the 
 blazed tree at the entrance of the fateful canon. The placard 
 was still there, but the wooden hand that once pointed in the 
 direction of the buried huts had, through some mischance of 
 wind or weather, dropped slightly, and was ominously pointing 
 to the snow below. This was still so deep in drifts that the 
 party were obliged to leave their horses and enter the canon 
 a-foot. Almost unconsciously, this was done in perfect silence, 
 walking in single file, occasionally climbing up the sides of the 
 canon where the rocks offered a better foothold than the damp 
 snow, until they reached a wooden chimney and part of a roof 
 that now reared itself above the snow. Here they paused and 
 looked at each other. The leader approached the chimney,. 
 and leaning over it called within. 
 
 There was no response. Presently, however, the caiion took 
 up the shout and repeated it, and then there was a silence 
 broken only by the falling of an icicle from a rock, or a snow- 
 slide from the hill above. Then all was quiet again, until 
 Blunt, after a moment's hesitation, walked around to the open- 
 
 D 
 
34 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 ing and descended into the hut. He had scarcely disappeared, 
 as it seemed, before he returned, looking very white and grave, 
 and beckoned to the surgeon. He instantly followed. After 
 a little, the rest of the party, one after another, went down. 
 They stayed some time, and then came slowly to the surface 
 bearing three dead bodies. They returned again quickly and 
 then brought up the dissevered members of a fourth. This done 
 they looked at each other in silence. 
 
 " There should be another cabin here," said Blunt, after a 
 pause. 
 
 "Here it is," said one of the men, pointing to the chimney 
 of the second hut. 
 
 There was no preliminary " halloo," or hesitation now. The 
 worst was known. They all passed rapidly to the opening and 
 disappeared within. When they returned to the surface they 
 huddled together a whispering but excited group. They were 
 so much pre-occupied that they did not see that their party 
 was suddenly increased by the presence of a stranger. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE FOOTPRINTS GROW FAINTER. 
 
 IT was Philip Ashley ! Philip Ashley faded, travel-worn, 
 hollow-eyed, but nervously energetic and eager. Philip, who 
 four days before had left Grace the guest of a hospitable 
 trapper's half-breed family, in the California Valley. Philip 
 gloomy, discontented, hateful of the quest he had undertaken, 
 but still fulfilling his promise to Grace, and the savage dictates 
 of his own conscience. It was Philip Ashley, who now, stand 
 ing beside the hut, turned half-cynically, half-indifferently, 
 toward the party. 
 
 The surgeon was first to discover him. He darted forward 
 with a cry of recognition, " Poinsett ! Arthur ! what are you 
 doing here ?" 
 
 Ashley's face flushed crimson at the sight of the stranger. 
 " Hush," he said, almost involuntarily. He glanced rapidly 
 around the group, and then in some embarrassment replied 
 with awkward literalness, " I left my horse with the others at 
 the entrance of the canon." 
 
The Footprints grow Fainter. 35 
 
 tt I see," said the surgeon, briskly, " you have come witb 
 relief like ourselves ; but you are too late ! too late !" 
 
 " Too late !' J echoed Ashley. 
 
 " Yes, they are all dead or gone !" 
 
 A singular expression crossed Ashley's face. It was un 
 noticed by the surgeon, who was whispering to Blunt. Presently 
 he came forward. 
 
 " Captain Blunt, this is Lieutenant Poinsett of the Fifth 
 Infantry, an old messmate of mine, whom I have not met 
 before for two years. He is here, like ourselves, on an errand 
 of mercy. It is like him !" 
 
 The unmistakable air of high breeding and intelligence 
 which distinguished Philip always, and the cordial endorse 
 ment of the young surgeon, prepossessed the party instantly 
 in his favour. With that recognition, something of his singular 
 embarrassment dropped away. 
 
 " Who are these people ?" he ventured at last to say. 
 
 " Their names are on this paper, which we found nailed to 
 a tree. Of course, with no survivor present, we are unable to 
 identify them all. The hut occupied by Dr. Devarges, whose 
 body buried in the snow we have identified by his clothing, 
 and the young girl Grace Conroy and her child-sister, are the 
 only ones we are positive about." 
 
 Philip looked at the Doctor. 
 
 " How have you identified the young girl ?" 
 
 " By her clothing, which was marked." 
 
 Philip remembered that Grace had changed her clothes for 
 the suit of a younger brother who was dead. 
 
 " Only by that ?' ; he asked. 
 
 " No. Dr. Devarges in his papers gives the names of the 
 occupants of the hut. We have accounted for all but her 
 brother, and a fellow by the name of Ashley." 
 
 " How do you account for them ?" asked Philip, with a dark 
 face. 
 
 "Ran away! What can you expect from that class of 
 people ?" said the surgeon, with a contemptuous shrug. 
 
 " What class ?" asked Philip, almost savagely. 
 
 " My dear boy," said the surgeon, " you know them as well 
 as I. Didn't they always pass the Fort where we were sta 
 tioned ? Didn't they beg what they could, and steal what they 
 otherwise couldn't get, and then report to Washington the 
 
 D 2 
 
36 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 incompetency of the military ? Weren't they always getting up 
 rows with the Indians, and then sneaking away to let us settle 
 the bill ? Don't you remember them the men gaunt, sickly, 
 vulgar, low-toned ; the women dirty, snuffy, prematurely old 
 and prematurely prolific ?" 
 
 Philip tried to combat this picture with his recollection of 
 Grace's youthful features, but somehow failed. Within the last 
 half-hour his instinctive fastidiousness had increased a hundred 
 fold. He looked at the Doctor, and said " Yes." 
 
 " Of course," said the surgeon. "It was the old lot. What 
 could you expect ? People who could be strong only in 
 proportion to their physical strength, and losing everything 
 with the loss of that ? There have been selfishness, cruelty 
 God knows perhaps murder done here !" 
 
 " Yes, yes," said Philip, hastily ; "but you were speaking of 
 this girl, Grace Conroy ; what do you know of her ?" 
 
 " Nothing, except that she was found lying there dead with 
 her name on her clothes and her sister's blanket in her arms, 
 as if the wretches had stolen the dying child from the dead 
 girl's arms. But you, Arthur, how chanced you to be here in 
 this vicinity ? Are you stationed here ?" 
 
 " No, I have resigned from the army." 
 
 " Good ! and you are here " 
 
 " Alone !" 
 
 " Come, we will talk this over as we return. You will help 
 me make out my report. This, you know, is an official inquiry, 
 based upon the alleged clairvoyant quality of our friend Blunt. 
 I must say we have established that fact, if we have been able 
 to do nothing more." 
 
 The surgeon then lightly sketched an account of the expe 
 dition, from its inception in a dream of Blunt (who was 
 distinctly impressed with the fact that a number of emigrants 
 were perishing from hunger in the Sierras) to his meeting with 
 Philip, with such deftness of cynical humour and playful 
 satire qualities that had lightened the weariness of the mess- 
 table of Fort Bobadil that the young men were both presently 
 laughing. Two or three of the party who had been engaged 
 in laying out the unburied bodies, and talking in whispers, 
 nearing these fine gentlemen make light of the calamity, in 
 well-chosen epithets, were somewhat ashamed of their own 
 ; and less elegantly, and I fear less grammatically, began to 
 
The Footprints grow Fainter. 37 
 
 be jocose too. Whereat the fastidious Philip frowned, the 
 surgeon laughed, and the two friends returned to the entrance 
 of the canon, and thence rode out of the valley together. 
 
 Philip's reticence regarding his own immediate past was too 
 characteristic to excite any suspicion or surprise in the mind 
 of his friend. In truth, the Doctor was too well pleased with 
 his presence, and the undoubted support which he should have 
 in Philip's sympathetic tastes and congenial habits, to think 
 of much else. He was proud of his friend proud of the 
 impression he had made among the rude unlettered men with 
 whom he was forced by the conditions of frontier democracy 
 to associate on terms of equality. And Philip, though young, 
 was accustomed to have his friends proud of him. Indeed, 
 he always felt some complacency with himself that he seldom 
 took advantage of this fact. Satisfied that he might have 
 confided to the Doctor the truth of his connexion with the 
 ill-fated party, and his flight with Grace, and that the Doctor 
 would probably have regarded him as a hero, he felt less 
 compunction at his suppression of the fact. 
 
 Their way lay by Monument Point and the dismantled cairn. 
 Philip had already passed it on his way to the canon, and had 
 felt a thankfulness for the unexpected tragedy that had, as he 
 believed, conscientiously relieved him of a duty to the 
 departed naturalist, yet he could not forego a question. 
 
 " Is there anything among these papers and collections 
 worth our preserving ?" he asked the surgeon. 
 
 The Doctor, who had not for many months had an oppor 
 tunity to air his general scepticism, was nothing if not de 
 rogatory. 
 
 " No," he answered, shortly. " If there were any way that 
 we might restore them to the living Dr. Devarges, they might 
 minister to his vanity, and please the poor fellow. I see 
 nothing in them that should make them worthy to survive 
 him." 
 
 The tone was so like Dr. Devarges' own manner, as Philip 
 remembered it, that tie smiled grimly and felt relieved. When 
 they reached the spot Nature seemed to have already taken 
 the same cynical view ; the metallic case was already' deeply 
 sunken in the snow, the wind had scattered the papers far and 
 wide, and even the cairn itself had tumbled into a shapeless, 
 meaningless ruin. 
 
$8 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 IN WHICH THE FOOTPRINTS ARE LOST FOR EVER. 
 
 A FERVID May sun had been baking the adobe walls of the 
 Presidio of San Ramon, firing the red tiles, scorching the black 
 courtyard, and driving the mules and vaqueros of a train that 
 had just arrived into the shade of the long galleries of the 
 quadrangle, when the Comandante, who was taking his noonday 
 siesta in a low, studded chamber beside the guardroom, was 
 gently awakened by his secretary. For thirty years the noon 
 day slumbers of the Commander had never been broken ; his 
 first thought was the heathen ! his first impulse to reach for 
 his trusty Toledo. But, as it so happened, the cook had 
 borrowed it that morning to rake tortillas from the Presidio 
 oven, and Don Juan Salvatierra contented himself with sternly 
 demanding the reason for this unwonted intrusion. 
 
 " A senorita an American desires an immediate audience." 
 Don Juan removed the black silk handkerchief which he had 
 tied round his grizzled brows, and sat up. Before he could 
 assume a more formal attitude, the door was timidly opened, 
 and a young girl entered. For all the disfigurement of scant, 
 coarse, ill-fitting clothing, or the hollowness of her sweet eyes, 
 and even the tears that dimmed their long lashes ; for all the 
 sorrow that had pinched her young cheek and straightened the 
 corners of her child-like mouth, she was still so fair, so frank, 
 so youthful, so innocent and helpless, that the Comandante 
 stood erect, and then bent forward in a salutation that almost 
 swept the floor. Apparently the prepossession was mutual. 
 The young girl took a quick survey of the gaunt but gentle 
 manlike figure before her, cast a rapid glance at the serious but 
 kindly eyes that shone above the Commander's iron-grey 
 mustachios, dropped her hesitating, timid manner, and, with an 
 impulsive gesture and a little cry, ran forward and fell upon her 
 knees at his feet. The Commander would have raised her 
 gently, but she restrained his hand, 
 
 " No, no, listen ! I am only a poor, poor girl, without 
 friends or home. A month ago, I left my family starving in 
 the mountains, and came away to get them help. My brother 
 came with me. God was good to us, Senor, and after a weary 
 tramp of many days we found a trapper's hut, and food and 
 
The Footprints are Lost for Ever. 39 
 
 shelter. Philip, my brother, went back alone to succour them. 
 He has not returned. Oh, sir, he may be dead ; they all may 
 be dead God only knows ! It is three weeks ago since he left 
 me; three weeks! It is a long time to be alone, Seiior, a 
 stranger in a strange land. The trapper was kind, and sent me 
 here to you for assistance. You will help me ? I know you 
 will. You will find them, my friends, my little sister, my brother 1" 
 
 The Commander waited until she had finished, and then 
 gently lifted her to a seat by his side. Then he turned to his 
 secretary, who with a few hurried words in Spanish, answered 
 the mute inquiry of the Commander's eyes. The young girl 
 felt a thrill of disappointment as she saw that her personal 
 appeal had been lost and unintelligible ; it was with a slight 
 touch of defiance that was new to her nature that she turned 
 to the secretary, who advanced, as interpreter. 
 
 " You are an American ?" 
 
 " Yes," said the girl, curtly, who had taken one of the strange, 
 swift, instinctive dislikes of her sex to the man. 
 
 " How many years ?" 
 
 " Fifteen." 
 
 The Commander, almost unconsciously, laid his brown hand 
 on her clustering curls. 
 
 "Name?" 
 
 She hesitated and looked at the Commander. 
 
 " Grace," she said. 
 
 Then she hesitated ; and, with a defiant glance at the secre 
 tary, added 
 
 " Grace Ashley !" 
 
 " Give to me the names of some of your company, Mees 
 Graziashly." 
 
 Grace hesitated. 
 
 "Philip Ashley, Gabriel Conroy, Peter Dumphy, Mrs. Jane 
 Dumphy," she said at last. 
 
 The secretary opened a desk, took out a printed document, 
 unfolded it, and glanced over its contents. Presently he handed 
 it to the Commander with the comment " Bueno" The 
 Commander said " Buentf* also, and glanced kindly and re 
 assuringly at Grace. 
 
 "An expedition from the upper Presidio has found traces of 
 a party of Americans in the Sierra," said the secretary, monoto 
 nously. " There are names like these." 
 
4O Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " It is the same it is our party !" said Grace, joyously. 
 
 " You say so ?" said the secretary, cautiously. 
 
 " Yes," said Grace, defiantly. 
 
 The secretary glanced at the paper again, and then said, 
 looking at Grace intently 
 
 " There is no name of Mees Graziashly." 
 
 The hot blood suddenly dyed the cheek of Grace and her 
 eyelids dropped. She raised her eyes imploringly to the Com- 
 'inander. If she could have reached him directly, she would 
 have thrown herself at his feet and confessed her innocent 
 deceit, but she shrank from a confidence that first filtered 
 through the consciousness of the secretary. So she began to 
 fence feebly with the issue. 
 
 " It is a mistake," she said. " But the name of Philip, rcy 
 brother, is there ?" 
 
 "The name of Philip Ashley is here," said the secretary, 
 grimly. 
 
 " And he is alive and safe !" cried Grace, forgetting in her 
 relief and joy her previous shame and mortification. 
 
 " He is not found," said the secretary. 
 
 " Not found ?" said Grace, with widely opened eyes. 
 
 "He is not there." 
 
 "No, of course," said Grace, with a nervous hysterical 
 laugh ; "he was with me ; but he came back he returned." 
 
 " On the 3oth of April there is no record of the finding of 
 Philip Ashley." 
 
 Grace groaned and clasped her hands. In her greater 
 anxiety now, all lesser fears were forgotten. She turned and 
 threw herself before the Commander. 
 
 " Oh, forgive me, Senor, but I swear to you I meant no 
 harm ! Philip is not my brother, but a friend, so kind, so 
 good. He asked me to take his name, poor boy, God knows 
 if he will ever claim it again, and I did. My name is not 
 Ashley. I know not what is in that paper, but it must tell 
 of my brother, Gabriel, my sister, of all ! O, Senor, are they 
 living or dead ? Answer me you must for I am I am 
 Grace Conroy !" 
 
 The secretary had refolded the paper. He opened it again, 
 glanced over it, fixed his eyes upon Grace, and, pointing to a 
 paragraph, handed it to the Commander. The two men 
 exchanged glances, the Commander coughed, rose, and averted 
 
The Footprints are Lost for Ever. 41 
 
 his face from the beseeching eyes of Grace. A sudden death 
 like chill ran through her limbs as, at a word from the Com 
 mander, the secretary rose and placed the paper in her 
 hands. 
 
 Grace took it with trembling fingers. It seemed to be a 
 proclamation in Spanish. 
 
 " I cannot read it," she said, stamping her little foot with 
 passionate vehemence. " Tell me what it says." 
 
 At a sign from the Commander, the secretary opened the 
 paper and arose. The Commander, with his face averted, 
 looked through the open window. The light, streaming through 
 its deep, tunnel-like embrasure, fell upon the central figure of 
 Grace, with her shapely head slightly bent forward, her lips 
 apart, and her eager, passionate eyes fixed upon the Com 
 mander. The secretary cleared his throat in a perfunctory 
 manner ; and with the conscious pride of an irreproachable 
 linguist, began 
 
 "NOTICE. 
 
 "TO HIS EXCELLENCY THE COMANDANTE OF THE PRESIDIO OF 
 SAN FELIPE. 
 
 "I have the honour to report that the expedition sent out to relieve 
 certain distressed emigrants in the fastnesses of the Sierra Nevadas, said 
 expedition being sent on the information of Don Jose Bluent of San Gero- 
 nimo, found in a caonn east of the Canada del Diablo the evidences of the 
 recent existence of such emigrants buried in the snow, and the melancholy 
 and deeply to be deplored record of their sufferings, abandonment, and 
 death. A written record preserved by these miserable and most infelicitous 
 ones gives the names and history of their organization, known as ' Captain 
 Conroy's Party,' a copy of which is annexed below. 
 
 "The remains of five of these unfortunates were recovered from the 
 snow, but it was impossible to identify but two, who were buried with 
 sacred and reverential rites. 
 
 "Our soldiers behaved with that gallantry, coolness, patriotism, in 
 flexible hardihood, and high principled devotion which ever animate the 
 swelling heart of the Mexican warrior. Nor can too much praise be given 
 to the voluntary efforts of one Don Arthur Poinsett, late Lieutenant of the 
 Army of the United States of America, who, though himself a voyager and 
 stranger, assisted our commander in the efforts of humanity. 
 
 " The wretched dead appeared to have expired from hunger, although 
 one was evidently a victim " 
 
 The tongue of the translator hesitated a moment, and then 
 with an air of proud superiority to the difficulties of the English 
 language, he resumed 
 
42 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 "A victim to fly poison. It is to be regretted that -mong the victims 
 was the famous Doctor Paul Devarges, a Natural, and collector of the 
 stuffed Bird and Beast, a name most illustrious in science." 
 
 The secretary paused, his voice dropped its pretentious 
 pitch, he lifted his eyes from the paper, and fixing them on 
 Grace, repeated, deliberately 
 
 " The bodies who were identified were those of Paul Devarges and Grace 
 Conroy." 
 
 " Oh, no ! no !" said Grace, clasping her hands, wildly ; " it 
 is a mistake ! You are trying to frighten me, a poor, helpless, 
 friendless girl ! You are punishing me, gentlemen, because 
 you know I have done wrong, because you think I have lied \ 
 Oh, have pity, gentlemen. My God save me Philip !" 
 
 And with a loud, despairing cry, she rose to her feet, caught 
 at the clustering tendrils of her hair, raised her little hands, 
 palms upward, high in air, and then sank perpendicularly as 
 if crushed and beaten flat, a pale and senseless heap upon the 
 floor. 
 
 The Commander stooped over the prostrate girl. " Send 
 Manuela here," he said quickly, waving aside the proffered aid 
 of the secretary, with an impatient gesture quite unlike his 
 usual gravity, as he lifted the unconscious Grace in his arms. 
 
 An Indian waiting-woman hurriedly appeared, and assisted 
 the Commander to lay the fainting girl upon a couch. 
 
 " Poor child !" said the Commander, as Manuela, bending 
 over Grace, unloosed her garments with sympathetic feminine 
 hands. " Poor little one, and without a father !" 
 
 " Poor woman !" said Manuela to herself, half aloud ; " and 
 without a husband." 
 
BOOK II. AFTER FIVE YEARS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 ONE HORSE GULCH. 
 
 IT was a season of unexampled prosperity in One Horse Gulch. 
 Even the despondent original locator, who, in a fit of depressed 
 alcoholism, had given it that infelicitous title, would have 
 admitted its injustice, but that he fell a victim to the " craftily 
 qualified" cups of San Francisco long before the Gulch had 
 become prosperous. " Hed Jim stuck to straight whisky he 
 might hev got his pile outer the very ledge whar his cabin 
 stood," said a local critic. But Jim did not ; after taking a 
 thousand dollars from his claim, he had flown to San Francisco 
 where, gorgeously arrayed, he had flitted from champagne to 
 cognac, and from gin to lager beer, until he brought his gilded 
 and ephemeral existence to a close in the county hospital. 
 
 Howbeit, One Horse Gulch survived not only its godfather, 
 but the baleful promise of its unhallowed christening. It had 
 its Hotel and its Temperance House, its Express office, its 
 saloons, its two squares of low wooden buildings in the main 
 street, its clustering nests of cabins on the hill-sides, its freshly 
 hewn stumps, and its lately-cleared lots. Young in years, it 
 Still had its memories, experiences, and antiquities. The first 
 tent pitched by Jim White was still standing, the bullet holes 
 were yet to be seen in the shutters of the Cachucha saloon, 
 where the great fight took place between Boston Joe, Harry 
 Worth, and Thompson of Angel's ; from the upper loft of 
 Watson's " Emporium" a beam still projected from which a 
 year ago a noted citizen had been suspended, after an informal 
 inquiry into the ownership of some mules that he was found 
 possessed of. Near it was a small unpretentious square shed, 
 where the famous caucus had met that had selected the dele 
 gates who chose the celebrated and Honourable Blank to 
 represent California in the councils of the nation. 
 
44 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 It was raining. Not in the usual direct, honest, perpendi 
 cular fashion of that mountain region, but only suggestively, 
 and in a vague, uncertain sort of way, as if it might at any time 
 prove to be fog or mist, and any money wagered upon it would 
 be hazardous. It was raining as much from below as above, 
 and the lower limbs of the loungers who gathered around the 
 square box stove that stood in Briggs's warehouse, exhaled a 
 cloud of steam. The loungers in Briggs's were those who from 
 deficiency of taste or the requisite capital avoided the gambling 
 and drinking saloons, and quietly appropriated biscuits from 
 the convenient barrel of the generous Briggs, or filled their 
 pipes from his open tobacco canisters, with the general sugges 
 tion in their manner that their company fully compensated for 
 any waste of his material. 
 
 They had been smoking silently a silence only broken by 
 the occasional hiss of expectoration against the hot stove, when 
 the door of a back room opened sottly, and Gabriel Conroy 
 entered. 
 
 " How is he gettin' on, Gabe?" asked one of the loungers. 
 
 " So, so," said Gabriel. " You'll want to shift those bandages 
 agin/' he said, turning to Briggs, " afore the doctor comes. I'd 
 come back in an hour, but I've got to drop in and see 
 how Steve's gettin' on, and it's a matter of two miles from 
 home." 
 
 " But he says he wont let anybody tech him but you," said 
 Mr. Briggs. 
 
 " I know he says so/' said Gabriel, soothingly ; " but he'll 
 get over that. That's what Stimson sed when he was took 
 worse, but he got over that, and I never got to see him except 
 in time to lay him out." 
 
 The justice of this was admitted even by Briggs, although 
 evidently disappointed. Gabriel was walking to the door, 
 when another voice from the stove stopped him. 
 
 u Oh, Gabe ! you mind that emigrant family with the sick 
 baby camped down the gulch ! Well, the baby up and died 
 last night." 
 
 " I want to know," said Gabriel, with thoughtful gravity. 
 
 " Yes, and that woman's in a heap of trouble. Couldn't 
 you kinder drop in in passing piid look after things ?" 
 
 " I will," said Gabriel, thoughtfully. 
 
 " I thought you'd like to know it, and I thought she'd like 
 
One Horse Gulch. 45 
 
 me to tell you," said the speaker, settling himself back again 
 over the stove with the air of a man who had just fulfilled, at 
 great personal sacrifice and labour, a work of supererogation. 
 
 " You're always thoughtful of other folks, Johnson," said 
 Briggs, admiringly. 
 
 " Well, yes," said Johnson, with a modest serenity, " I allers 
 allow that men in Californy ought to think of others besides 
 themselves. A little keer and a little sabe on my part, and 
 there's that family in the gulch made comfortable with Gabe 
 around 'em." 
 
 Meanwhile this homely inciter of the unselfish virtues of One 
 Horse Gulch had passed out into the rain and darkness. So 
 conscientiously did he fulfil his various obligations, that it was 
 nearly one o'clock before he reached his rude hut on the hill 
 side, a rough cabin of pine logs, so unpretentious and wild in 
 exterior as to be but a slight improvement on nature. The 
 vines clambered unrestrainedly over the bark-thatched roof; 
 the birds occupied the crevices of the walls, the squirrel ate his 
 acorns on the ridge pole without fear and without reproach. 
 
 Softly drawing the wooden peg that served as a bolt, Gabriel 
 entered with that noiselessness and caution that were habitual 
 to him. Lighting a candle by the embers of a dying fire, he 
 carefully looked around him. The cabin was divided into two 
 compartments by the aid of a canvas stretched between the 
 walls, with a flap for the door-way. On a pine table lay 
 several garments apparently belonging to a girl of seven or 
 eight a frock grievously rent and torn, a frayed petticoat of 
 white flannel already patched with material taken from a red 
 shirt, and a pair of stockings so excessively and sincerely 
 darned, as to have lost nearly all of their original fabric in 
 repeated bits of relief that covered almost the entire structure. 
 Gabriel looked at these articles ruefully, and, slowly picking 
 them up, examined each with the greatest gravity and concern. 
 Then he took off his coat and boots, and having in this way 
 settled himself into an easy dishabille, he took a box from the 
 shelf, and proceeded to lay out thread and needles, when he 
 was interrupted by a child's voice from behind the canvas 
 screen. 
 
 " Is that you, Gabe ?" " Yes." 
 
 " Oh, Gabe, I got tired and went to bed." 
 
 " I see you did," said Gabriel, drily, picking up a needle and 
 
46 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 thread that had apparently been abandoned after a slight ex 
 cursion into the neighbourhood of a rent and left hopelessly 
 sticking in the petticoat. 
 
 " Yes, Gabe ; they're so awfully old !" 
 
 '\ Old !" repeated Gabe, reproachfully. " Old ! Lettm' on 
 a little wear and tear, they're as good as they ever were. 
 That petticoat is stronger," said Gabriel, holding up the 
 garment and eyeing the patches with a slight glow of artistic 
 pride " stronger, Oily, than the first day you put it on/' 
 
 "But that's five years ago, Gabe." 
 
 " Well," said Gabriel, turning round and addressing himself 
 impatiently to the screen, " wot if it is?" 
 
 " And I've growed." 
 
 " Growed !' ; said Gabriel, scornfully. " And haven't I let 
 out the tucks, and didn't I put three fingers of the best sacking 
 around the waist? You'll just ruin me in clothes." 
 
 Oily laughed from behind the screen. Finding, however, 
 no response from the grim worker, presently there appeared a 
 curly head at the flap, and then a slim little girl, in the 
 scantiest of nightgowns, ran, and began to nestle at his side, 
 and to endeavour to inwrap herself in his waistcoat. 
 
 " Oh, go 'way !" said Gabriel, with a severe voice and the 
 most shameless signs of relenting in his face. " Go away ! 
 What do you care ? Here I might slave myself to death to 
 dress you in silks and satins, and you'd dip into the first ditch 
 or waltz through the first underbrush that you kem across. 
 You haven't got no sdbe in dress, Oily. It ain't ten days ago 
 as I iron-bound and copper-fastened that dress, so to speak, 
 and look at it now ! Oily, look at it now I" And he held it 
 op indignantly before the maiden. 
 
 Oily placed the top of her head against the breast of her 
 brother as a point d'appui, and began to revolve around him as 
 if she wished to bore a way into his inmost feelings. 
 
 " Oh, you ain't mad, Gabe !" she said, leaping first over one 
 knee and then over the other without lifting her head. " You 
 ain't mad !" 
 
 Gabriel did not deign to reply, but continued mending the 
 frayed petticoat in dignified silence. 
 
 " Who did you see down town ?" said Oily, not at all re 
 buffed. 
 
 " No one," said Gabriel, shortly. 
 
One Horse Gulch. 47 
 
 " You did ! You smell of linnyments and peppermint," said 
 Oily, with a positive shake of the head. " You've been to 
 Briggs's and the new family up the gulch." 
 
 " Yes," said Gabriel, " that Mexican's legs is better, but the 
 baby's dead. Jest remind me, to-morrow, to look through 
 mother's things for suthin' for that poor woman." 
 
 " Gabe, do you know what Mrs. Markle says of you ?" said 
 Oily, suddenly raising her head. 
 
 " No," replied Gabriel, with an affectation of indifference 
 that, like all his affectations, was a perfect failure. 
 
 " She says," said Oily, " that you want to be looked after 
 yourself more'n all these people. She says you're just throwing 
 yourself away on other folks. She says I ought to have a 
 woman to look after me." 
 
 Gabriel stopped his work, laid down the petticoat, and 
 taking the curly head of Oily between his knees, with one 
 hand beneath her chin and the other on the top of her head, 
 turned her mischievous face towards his. " Oily," he said; 
 seriously, "when I got you outer the snow at Starvation 
 Camp ; when I toted you on my back for miles till we got into 
 the valley ; when we lay by thar for two weeks, and me a 
 felling trees and picking up provisions here and thar, in the 
 wood or the river, wharever thar was bird or fish, I reckon you 
 got along as well I wont say better ez if you had a woman 
 to look arter you. When at last we kem here to this camp, 
 and I built this yer house, I don't think any woman could hev 
 done better. If they could, I'm wrong, and Mrs. Markle's 
 right." 
 
 Oily began to be uncomfortable. Then the quick instincts 
 of her sex came to her relief, and she archly assumed the 
 aggressive. 
 ""I think Mrs. Markle likes you, Gabe." 
 
 Gabriel looked down at the little figure in alarm. There 
 are some subjects whereof the youngest of womankind has an 
 instinctive knowledge that makes the wisest of us tremble. 
 
 "Go to bed, Oily," said the cowardly Gabriel. 
 
 But Oily wanted to sit up, so she changed the subject. 
 
 "The Mexican you're tendin' isn't a Mexican, he's a 
 Chileno ; Mrs. Markle says so." 
 
 " Maybe ; it's all the same. / call him a Mexican. He 
 talks too straight, anyway," said Gabriel, indifferently. 
 
48 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Did lie ask you any more questions about about old 
 times?" continued the girl. 
 
 " Yes ; he wanted to know everything that happened in 
 Starvation Camp. He was reg'larly took with poor Grade ; 
 asked a heap o' questions about her how she acted, and 
 seemed to feel as bad as we did about never hearing anything 
 from her. I never met a man, Oily, afore, as seemed to take 
 such an interest in other folks' sorrers as he did. You'd have 
 tho't he'd been one of the party. And he made me tell him all 
 about Dr. Devarges." 
 
 " And Philip r queried Oily. 
 
 " No," said Gabriel, somewhat curtly. 
 
 " Gabriel," said Oily, sullenly, " I wish you didn't talk so tc. 
 people about those days/' 
 
 "Why?" asked Gabriel, wonderingly. 
 
 " Because it ain't good to talk about. Gabriel dear," she 
 continued, with a slight quivering of the upper lip, "some 
 times I think the people round yer look upon us sorter queer. 
 That little boy that came here with the emigrant family 
 wouldn't play with me, and Mrs. Markle's little girl said that 
 we did dreadful things up there in the snow. He said I was a 
 cannon-ball." 
 
 " A what ?" asked Gabriel. 
 
 " A cannon-ball ! He said that you and I " 
 
 " Hush," interrupted Gabriel, sternly, as an angry flush came 
 into his sunburnt cheek, "I'll jest bust that boy if I see him 
 round yer agin." 
 
 "But, Gabriel," persisted Oily, "nobody " 
 
 " Will you go to bed, Oily, and not catch your death yer on 
 this cold floor asking ornery and perfectly ridickulus questions?" 
 said Gabriel, briskly, lifting her to her feet. " Thet Markle 
 girl ain't got no sense anyway she's allers leading you round 
 in ditches, ruinin' your best clothes, and keepin' me up half 
 the night mendin' on 'em." 
 
 Thus admonished, Oily retreated behind the canvas screen, 
 and Gabriel resumed his needle and thread. But the thread 
 became entangled, and was often snappishly broken, and 
 Gabrief sewed imaginary, vindictive stitches in the imaginary 
 calves of an imaginary youthful emigrant, until Olly's voice 
 again broke the silence. 
 " O, Gabe !" 
 
O;;e Horse Gulch. 49 
 
 " Yes," said Gabriel, putting down his work despairingly. 
 
 " Do you think that Philip ate Grace ?" 
 
 Gabriel rose swiftly, and disappeared behind the screen. 
 As he did so, the door softly opened, and a man stepped into 
 the cabin. The new-comer cast a rapid glance around the 
 dimly-lighted room, and then remained motionless in the door 
 way. From behind the screen came the sound of voices. The 
 stranger hesitated, and then uttered a slight cough. 
 
 In an instant Gabriel reappeared. The look of angry con 
 cern at the intrusion turned to one of absolute stupefaction as 
 he examined the stranger more attentively. The new-comer 
 smiled faintly, yet politely, and then, with a slight halt in his 
 step, moved toward a chair, into which he dropped with a 
 deprecating gesture. 
 
 " I shall sit and you shall pardon me. You have surprise ! 
 Yes ? Five, six hour ago you leave me very sick on a bed 
 where you are so kind so good. Yes ? Ah ? You see me 
 here now, and you say crazy ! Mad !" 
 
 He raised his right hand with the ringers upward, twirled 
 them to signify Gabriel's supposed idea of a whirling brain, 
 and smiled again. 
 
 " Listen. Comes to me an hour ago a message most 
 important. Most necessary it is I go to-night now, to 
 Marysville. You see. Yes ? I rise and dress myself. Ha ! 
 I have great strength for the effort. I am better. But I say 
 to myself, ' Victor, you shall first pay your respects to the good 
 Pike who have been so kind, so good. You shall press the 
 hand of the noble grand miner who have recover you. Bueno, 
 I am here !" 
 
 He extended a thin, nervous brown hand, and for the first 
 time since his entrance concentrated his keen black eyes, 
 which had roved over the apartment and taken in its minutest 
 details, upon his host. Gabriel, lost in bewilderment, could 
 only gasp " But you ain't well enough, you know. You can't 
 walk yet. You'll kill yourself !" 
 
 The stranger smiled. 
 
 " Yes ? you think you think ? Look now ! Waits me, 
 outside, the horse of the livery-stable man. How many miles 
 you think to the stage town ? Fifteen." (He emphasized 
 them with his five uplifted fingers.) "It is nothing. Two 
 hour comes the stage and I am there. Ha !" 
 
5O Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Even as he spoke, with a gesture, as if brushing away all 
 difficulties, his keen eyes were resting upon a little shelf above 
 the chimney, whereon stood an old-fashioned daguerreotype 
 case opeil He rose, and with a slight halting step and an 
 expression of pain, limped across the room to the shelf, and 
 took up the daguerreotype. 
 
 " What have we ?" he asked. 
 
 " It is Grade," said Gabriel, brightening up. " Taken the 
 day we started from St. Jo." 
 
 "How long?" 
 
 "Six years ago. She was fourteen then," said Gabriel, 
 taking the case in his hand and brushing the glass fondly with 
 his palm. " Thar warn't no puttier gal in all Missouri/' he 
 added, with fraternal pride, looking down upon the picture 
 with moistened eyes. " Eh what did you say ?" 
 
 The stranger had uttered a few words hastily in a foreign 
 tongue. But they were apparently complimentary, for when 
 Gabriel looked up at him with an inquiring glance, he was 
 smiling and saying, " Beautiful ! Angelic ! Very pretty !" 
 with eyes still fixed upon the picture. " And it is like ah, I 
 see the brother's face, too," he said, gravely, comparing 
 Gabriel's face with the picture. Gabriel looked pleased. Any 
 nature less simple than his would have detected the polite 
 fiction. In the square, honest face of the brother there was 
 not the faintest suggestion of the delicate, girlish, poetical oval 
 before him. 
 
 " It is precious," said the stranger : " and it is all, ha ? ; ' 
 
 "All?" echoed Gabriel, inquiringly. 
 
 " You have nothing more ?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "A line of her writing, a letter, her private papers would be 
 a treasure, eh ?" 
 
 " She left nothing," said Gabriel, simply, " but her clothes. 
 You know she put on a boy's suit Johnny's clothes when 
 she left. Thet's how it allus puzzles me thet they knew who- 
 she was, when they came across the poor child dead." 
 
 The stranger did not speak, and Gabriel went on 
 
 " It was nigh on a month afore I got back. When I did, 
 the snow was gone, and there warn't no track or trace of 
 anybody. Then I heerd the story I told ye thet a relief 
 party had found 'em all dead and thet among the dead was 
 
One Horse Gulch. 5 1 
 
 Grace. How that poor child ever got back thar alone (for 
 thar warn't no trace or mention of the man she went away 
 with) is what gets me. And that there's my trouble, Mr. 
 Ramirez ! To think of thet pooty darlin' climbing back to the 
 old nest, and finding no one thar ! To think of her coming 
 back, as she allowed, to Oily and me, and findin' all her own 
 blood gone, is suthin' thet, at times, drives me almost mad. 
 She didn't die of starvation; she didn't die of cold. Her 
 heart was broke, Mr. Ramirez ; her little heart was broke !" 
 
 The stranger looked at him curiously, but did not speak. 
 After a moment's pause, he lifted his bowed head from his. 
 hands, wiped his eyes with Olly's flannel petticoat, and went on 
 
 " For more than a year I tried to get sight o' that report. 
 Then I tried to find the Mission or the Presidio that the relief 
 party started from, and may be see some of that party. But 
 then kem the gold excitement, and the Americans took pos 
 session of the Missions and Presidios, and when I got to .San 
 San San " 
 
 " Geronimo," interrupted Ramirez, hastily. 
 
 " Did I tell ?" asked Gabriel, simply ; " I don't remember 
 that." 
 
 Ramirez showed all his teeth in quick assent, and motioned 
 him with his finger to go on. 
 
 " When I got to San Geronimo, there was nobody, and no 
 records left. Then I put a notiss in the San Francisco paper 
 for Philip Ashley that was the man as helped her away to 
 communicate with me. But thar weren't no answer." 
 
 Ramirez rose. 
 
 "You are not rich, friend Gabriel?" 
 
 " No," said Gabriel. 
 
 " But you expect ah you expect ?" 
 
 " Well, I reckon some day to make a strike like the rest." 
 
 " Anywhere, my friend ?" 
 
 " Anywhere," repeated Gabriel, smiling. 
 
 " Adios" said the stranger, going to the door. 
 
 " Adios? repeated Gabriel. " Must you go to-night ? 
 What's your hurry ? You're sure you feel better now ?" 
 
 " Better?" answered Ramirez, with a singular smile. "Bet 
 ter ! Look, I am so strong !" 
 
 He stretched out his arms, and expanded his chest, and 
 walked erect to the door. 
 
 E2 
 
52 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 "You have cured my rheumatism, friend Gabriel. Good 
 night." 
 
 The door closed behind him. In another moment he was 
 in the saddle, and speeding so swiftly that, in spite of mud and 
 darkness, in two hours he had reached the mining town where 
 the Wingdam and Sacramento stage-coach changed horses. Th;- 
 next morning, while Oily and Gabriel were eating breakfast 
 Mr. Victor Ramirez stepped briskly from the stage that drew 
 up at the Marysville Hotel, and entered the hotel office. As 
 the clerk looked up inquiringly, Mr. Ramirez handed him a 
 card 
 
 " Send that, if you please, to Miss Grace Conroy." 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 MADAME DEVARGES. 
 
 MR. RAMIREZ followed the porter upstairs, and along a narrow 
 passage, until he reached a larger hall. Here the porter indi 
 cated that he should wait until he returned, and then dis 
 appeared down the darkened vista of another passage. Mr. 
 Ramirez had ample time to observe the freshness of the 
 boarded partitions and scant details of the interior of the 
 International Hotel ; he even had time to attempt to grapple 
 the foreign mystery of the notice conspicuously on the wall, 
 " Gentlemen are requested not to sleep on the stairs," before 
 his companion reappeared. Beckoning to Mr. Ramirez, with 
 an air of surly suspicion, the porter led him along the darkened 
 passage until he paused before a door at its further extremity 
 and knocked gently. Slight as was the knock, it had the 
 mysterious effect of causing all the other doors along the 
 passage to open, and a masculine head to appear at each 
 opening. Mr. Ramirez's brow darkened quickly. He was 
 sufficiently conversant with the conditions of that early civili 
 zation to know that, as a visitor to a lady, he was the object 
 of every other man's curious envy and aggressive suspicion. 
 There was the sound of light footsteps within, and the door 
 opened. The porter lingered long enough to be able to 
 decide upon the character and propriety of the greeting, and 
 then, sullenly retired. The door closed, and Mr. Ramirez 
 
Madame Dei- arges. 53 
 
 found himself face to face with the occupant of the room. 
 She was a small, slight blonde who, when the smile that had 
 lit her mouth and eyes as she opened the door, faded suddenly 
 as she closed it, might have passed for a plain, indistinctive- 
 woman. But for a certain dangerous submissiveness of 
 manner which I here humbly submit is always to be feared 
 in an all-powerful sex and an address that was rather more- 
 deprecatory than occasion called for, she would hardly have 
 awakened the admiration of our sex or the fears of her own. 
 
 As Ramirez advanced, with both hands impulsively ex 
 tended, she drew back shyly, and, pointing to the ceiling and 
 walls, said quietly, " Cloth and paper !" 
 
 Ramirez's dark face grew darker. There was a long pause. 
 Suddenly the lady lightened the shadow that seemed to have 
 fallen upon their interview with both her teeth and eyes, and, 
 pointing to a chair, said 
 
 " Sit down, Victor, and tell me why you have returned so 
 soon." 
 
 Victor sat sullenly down. The lady looked all deprecation 
 and submissiveness, but said nothing. 
 
 Ramirez would, in his sullenness, have imitated her, but his 
 natural impulsiveness was too strong, and he broke out 
 
 " Look ! From the book of the hotel it is better you should 
 erase the name of Grace Conroy, and put down your own !" 
 
 "And why, Victor?" 
 
 " She asks why," said Victor, appealing to the ceiling. "My 
 God ! Because one hundred miles from here live the brother 
 and sister of Grace Conroy. I have seen him !" 
 
 "Well" 
 
 " Well," echoed Victor. " Is it well ? Listen. You shall 
 hear if it is well." 
 
 He drew his chair beside her, and went on in alow, earnest 
 voice 
 
 " I have at last located the mine. I followed the deseno the 
 description of the spot, and all its surroundings which was in 
 the paper that I I found. Good ! It is true ! ah, you 
 begin to be interested ! it is true, all true of the locality. See ! 
 Of the spot, I do not know. Of the mine it has not yet been 
 discovered !" 
 
 "It is called ' One Horse Gulch;' why? who knows ? It 
 is a rich mining camp. All around are valuable claims ; but 
 
54 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 the mine on the top of the little hill is unknown, unclaimed ! 
 For why ? You understand, it promises not as much as the 
 other claims on the surface. It is the same all as described 
 here." 
 
 He took from his pocket an envelope, and drew out a folded 
 paper (the papers given to Grace Conroy by Dr. Devarges), 
 and pointed to the map. 
 
 " The description here leads me to the head waters of the 
 American River. I followed the range of foot-hills, for I know 
 every foot, every step, and I came one day last week to ' One 
 Horse Gulch.' See, it is the gulch described here all the 
 same." 
 
 He held the paper before her, and her thin, long fingers 
 closed like a bird's claw over its corners. 
 
 "It is necessary I should stay there four or five days to 
 inquire. And yet how ? I am a stranger, a foreigner ; the 
 miners have suspicion of all such, and to me they do not talk 
 easily. But I hear of one Gabriel Conroy, a good man, very 
 kind with the sick. Good ! I have sickness very sudden, 
 very strong ! My rheumatism takes me here." He pointed 
 to his knee. " I am helpless as a child. I have to be taken 
 care of at the house of Mr. Briggs. Comes to me here Gabriel 
 Conroy, sits by me, talks to me, tells me everything. He brings 
 to me his little sister. I go to his cabin on the hill. I see the 
 picture of his sister. Good. You understand ? It is all 
 over !" 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " Eh ? She asks why, this woman," said Victor, appealing 
 to the ceiling. " Is it more you ask ? Then listen. The 
 house of Gabriel Conroy is upon the land, the very land, you 
 understand? of the grant made by the Governor to Dr. 
 Devarges. He is this Gabriel, look ! he is in possession ! >; 
 
 " How ? Does he know of the mine ?" 
 
 " No ! It is accident what you call Fate!" 
 
 She walked to the window, and stood for a few moments 
 looking out upon the falling rain. The face that looked out 
 was so old, so haggard, so hard and set in its outlines, that one 
 of the loungers on the sidewalk, glancing at the window to 
 catch a glimpse of the pretty French stranger, did not recognise 
 her. Possibly the incident recalled her to herself, for she 
 presently turned with a smile of ineffable sweetness, and, 
 
Madame Devarges. 5 5 
 
 returning to the side of Ramirez, said, in the gentlest of voices, 
 " Then you abandon me ?" 
 
 Victor did not dare to meet her eyes. He looked 
 straight before him, shrugged his shoulders, and said " It 
 is Fate !" 
 
 She clasped her thin ringers lightly before her, and, standing 
 in front of her companion, so as to be level with his eyes, said, 
 " You have a good memory, Victor." 
 
 He did not reply. 
 
 " Let me assist it. It is a year ago that I received a letter 
 in Berlin, signed by a Mr. Peter Dumphy, of San Francisco, 
 saying that he was in possession of important papers regarding 
 property of my late husband, Dr. Paul Devarges, and asking 
 me to communicate with him. I did not answer his letter ; I 
 came. It is not my way to deliberate or hesitate perhaps a 
 wise man would. I am only a poor, weak woman, so I came. 
 I know it was all wrong. You sharp, bold, cautious men 
 would have written first. Well, I came !" 
 
 Victor winced slightly, but did not speak. 
 
 " I saw Mr. Dumphy in San Francisco. He showed me 
 some papers that he said he had found in a place of deposit, 
 which Dr. Devarges had evidently wished preserved. One 
 was a record of a Spanish grant, others indicated some valuable 
 discoveries. He referred me to the Mission and Presidio of 
 San Ysabel that had sent out the relief party for further infor 
 mation. He was a trader a mere man of business it was a 
 question of money with him ; he agreed to assist me for a 
 percentage ! Is it not so ?" 
 
 Victor raised his dark eyes to hers, and nodded. 
 
 "I came to the Mission. I sawjy0# the Secretary of the 
 former Comandante the only one left who remembered the 
 expedition, and the custodian of the Presidio records. You 
 showed me the only copy of the report ; you, too, would have 
 been cold and business-like, until I told you my story. You 
 seemed interested. You told me about the young girl, this 
 mysterious Grace Conroy, whose name appeared among the 
 dead, who you said you thought was an impostor ! Did you not?" 
 
 Victor nodded. 
 
 " You told me of her agony on reading the report ! Of her 
 fainting, of the discovery of her condition by the women, of 
 the Comandante's pity, of her mysterious disappearance, of the 
 
56 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Comandante's reticence, of your own suspicions of the birth of 
 a child ! Did you not, Victor :" 
 
 He endeavoured to take her hand. Without altering her 
 gentle manner, she withdrew her hand quietly, and went on 
 
 " And then you told me of your finding that paper on the 
 floor where they loosened her dress the paper you now hold 
 in your hand. You told me of your reasons for concealing 
 and withholding it. And then, Victor, you proposed to me a 
 plan to secure my own again to personate this girl to out- 
 imposture this imposture. You did not ask me for a percen 
 tage ! You did not seek to make money out of my needs ; you 
 asked only for my love ! Well, well ! perhaps I was a fool, a 
 weak woman. It was a tempting bribe ; possibly I listened 
 more to the promptings of my heart than my interest. I 
 promised you my hand and my fortune when we succeeded. 
 You come to me now, and ask to be relieved of that obligation. 
 No ! no ! you have said enough." 
 
 The now frightened man had seized her by the hand, and 
 thrown himself on his knees before her in passionate contrition ; 
 but, with a powerful effort, she had wrested herself free. 
 
 " No, no !' ; she continued, in the same deprecatory voice. 
 " Go to this brother, whom the chief end of your labours seems 
 to have been to discover. Go to him now. Restore to him 
 the paper you hold in your hand. Say that you stole it from 
 his sister, whom you suspected to have been an impostor, and 
 that you knew to be the mother of an illegitimate child ! Say 
 that in doing this, you took the last hope from the wronged 
 and cast-off wife who came thousands of miles to claim some 
 thing from the man who should have supported her. Say this, 
 and that brother, if he is the good and kind man you represent 
 him to be, he will rise up and bless you ! You have only to 
 tell him further, that this paper cannot be of any use to him, as 
 this property legally belongs to his sister's child, if living. You 
 have only to hand him the report which declares both of his 
 sisters to be dead, and leaves his own identity in doubt, to 
 show him what a blessing has fallen upon him." 
 
 " Forgive me," gasped Victor, with a painful blending of 
 shame and awesome admiration of the woman before him ; 
 " forgive me, Julie ! I am a coward ! a slave ! an in grate ! I 
 will do anything, Julie ; anything you say." 
 
 Madame Devarges was too sagacious to press her victory 
 
Madame Devarges. 57 
 
 farther ; perhaps she was too cautious to exasperate the already 
 incautiously demonstrative man before her. She said " Hush,' 7 
 and permitted him at the same time, as if unconsciously, to 
 draw her beside him. 
 
 " Listen, Victor. What have you to fear from this man ?" 
 she asked, after a pause. " What would his evidence weigh 
 against me, when he is in unlawful possession of my property, 
 my legally declared property, if I choose to deny his relation 
 ship ? Who will identify him as Gabriel Conroy, when his 
 only surviving relative dare not come forward to recognise 
 him ; when, if she did, you could swear that she came to you 
 under another name ? What would this brother's self-interested 
 evidence amount to opposed to yours, that I was the Grace 
 Conroy who came to the Mission, to the proof of my identity 
 offered by one of the survivors, Peter Dumphy ?" 
 
 " Dumphy !" echoed Ramirez, in amazement. 
 
 " Yes, Dumphy !" repeated Madame Devarges. "When he 
 found that, as the divorced wife of Dr. Devarges, I could make 
 no legal claim, and I told him of your plan, he offered him 
 self as witness of my identity. Ah, Victor ! I have not been 
 idle while you have found only obstacles." 
 
 " Forgive me !" He caught and kissed her hands passion 
 ately. " I fly now. Good-bye." 
 
 " Where are you going ?" she asked, rising. 
 
 " To ' One Horse Gulch/ " he answered. 
 
 " No ! Sit down. Listen. You must go to San Francisco, 
 and inform Dumphy of your discovery. It will be necessary^ 
 perhaps, to have a lawyer ; but we must first see how strong we 
 stand. You must find out the whereabouts of this girl, Grace, 
 at once. Go to San Francisco, see Dumphy, and return to 
 me here !" 
 
 " But you are alone here, and unprotected. These men !" 
 
 The quick suspicions of a jealous nature flashed in his eyes.. 
 
 "Believe me, they are less dangerous to our plans than 
 women ! Do you not trust me, Victor ?" she said, with a 
 dazzling smile. 
 
 He would have thrown himself at her feet, but she restrained', 
 him with an arch look at the wall, and a precautionary up 
 lifted finger. 
 
 " Good ; go now. Stay. This Gabriel is he married ?" 
 
 " No." 
 
58 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Good-bye." 
 
 The door closed upon his dark, eager face, and he was 
 gone. A moment later there was a sharp ringing of the bell 
 of No. 92, the next room to that occupied by Mme. Devarges. 
 
 The truculent porter knocked at the door, and entered this 
 room respectfully. There was no suspicion attached to the 
 character of its occupant. He was well known as Mr. Jack 
 Hamlin, a gambler. 
 
 "Why the devil did you keep me waiting?" said Jack, 
 reaching from the bed, and wrathfully clutching his boot-jack. 
 
 The man murmured some apology. 
 
 "Bring me some hot water." 
 
 The porter was about to hurriedly withdraw, when Jack 
 stopped him with an oath. 
 
 " You've been long enough coming without shooting off like 
 that. Who was that man that just left the next room ?" 
 
 " I don't know, sir." 
 
 " Find out, and let me know." 
 
 He flung a gold piece at the man, beat up his pillow, and 
 turned his face to the wall. The porter still lingered, and 
 Jack faced sharply round. 
 
 " Not gone yet ? What the devil " 
 
 " Beg your pardon, sir ; do you know anything about her ?" 
 
 " No," said Jack, raising himself on his elbow ; " but if I 
 catch you hanging round that door, as you were five minutes 
 ago, I'll > 
 
 Here Mr. Hamlin dropped his voice, and intimated that 
 he would forcibly dislodge certain vital and necessary organs 
 from the porter's body. 
 
 "Go." 
 
 After the door closed again, Mr. Hamlin lay silent for an 
 hour. At the end of that time he got up and began to dress 
 himself slowly, singing softly to himself the while, as was his 
 invariable custom, in that sweet tenor for which he was famous. 
 When he had thus warbled through his toilet, replacing a small 
 ivory-handled pistol in his waistcoat-pocket to one of his most 
 heart-breaking notes, he put his hat on his handsome head, 
 perhaps a trifle more on one side than usual, and stepped into 
 the hall. As he sharply shut his door and locked it, the slight 
 concussion of the thin partitions caused the door of his fair 
 neighbour's room to start ajar, and Mr. Hamlin, looking up 
 
Mrs. Markle. 59 
 
 mechanically, saw the lady standing by the bureau, with her 
 handkerchief to her eyes. Mr. Hamlin instantly stopped his 
 warbling, and walked gravely downstairs. At the foot of the 
 steps he met the porter. The man touched his hat. 
 
 " He doesn't belong here, sir." 
 
 " Who doesn't belong here ?" asked Mr. Hamlin, coldly. 
 
 " That man." 
 
 "What man?" 
 
 " The man you asked about." 
 
 Mr. Hamlin quietly took out a cigar, lit it, and after one or 
 two puffs, looked fixedly in the man's eyes, and said 
 
 " I haven't as'ked you about any man." 
 
 " I thought, sir " 
 
 " You shouldn't begin to drink so early in the day, Michael," 
 said Mr. Hamlin, quietly, without withdrawing his black eyes 
 from the man's face. "You can't stand it on an empty 
 stomach. Take my advice and wait till after dinner." 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 MRS. MARKLE. 
 
 OLLY'S allusion to Mrs. Markle and her criticism had recurred 
 to Gabriel more or less uneasily through the night, and as he 
 rose betimes the next morning and stood by the table on which 
 lay his handiwork, a grim doubt of his proficiency in that 
 branch of domestic economy began to oppress him. 
 
 " Like as not I ain't doin' my duty to that child," he said 
 softly to himself, as he picked up the garments one by one, 
 and deposited them beside the bedside of the still sleeping 
 Oily. " Them clothes are leavin' out the strength and 
 sayin' nothin' o' durability as material a trifle old-fashioned 
 and onbecomin'. Not as you requires anything o' the kind, 
 bless your pooty face," he said, apostrophizing the dewy curls 
 and slumber-flushed cheek of the unconscious child ; " but 
 mebbe it does sorter provoke remarks from the other children. 
 And the settlement's gettin' crowded. Three new families in 
 six months is rather too too " considered Gabriel, hesitat 
 ing for a word ; " rather too popylating ! And Mrs. Markle" 
 Gabriel flushed even in the stillness and solitude of his own 
 
60 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 cabin " to think of that little gal, not nine years old, speaking" 
 o' that widder in that way. It beats everything. And to- 
 think I've kept clar of that sort o' thing jest on Olly's account, 
 jest that she shouldn't have any woman around to boss her." 
 
 Nevertheless, when he and Oily sat down to their frugal 
 breakfast, he was uneasily conscious of several oddities of her 
 dress, not before noticeable, and even some peculiarities of 
 manner. 
 
 " Ez a gineral thing, Oily," he pointed out with cautious 
 generalization, " ez a gineral thing, in perlite society, young 
 gals don't sit down a-straddle of their chairs, and don't reach 
 down every five minnits to heave away at their boot-straps." 
 
 " As a general thing, Gabe, girls don't wear boots/ 7 said 
 Oily, leaning forward to dip her bread in the frying-pan. 
 
 Artfully evading the question whether high india-rubber boots- 
 were an indispensable feature of a girl's clothing, Gabriel con 
 tinued with easy indifference " I think I'll drop in on Mrs, 
 Markle on my way to the Gulch this morning." 
 
 He glanced under his eyelids at as much of his sister's face 
 as was visible behind the slice of bread she was consuming. 
 
 " Take me with you, Gabe ?" 
 
 " No," said Gabriel, " you must stay here and do up the 
 house ; and mind you keep out o' the woods until your work's, 
 done. Besides," he added, loftily, " I've got some business 
 with Mrs. Markle." 
 
 " Oh, Gabe !" said Oily, shining all over her face with gravy 
 and archness. 
 
 " I'd like to know what's the matter with you, Oily," said 
 Gabriel, with dignified composure. 
 
 " Ain't you ashamed, Gabe ?" 
 
 Gabriel did not stop to reply, but rose, gathered up his tools, 
 and took his hat from the corner. He walked to the door, but 
 suddenly turned and came back to Oily. 
 
 " Oily," he said, taking her face in both hands, after his 
 old fashion, " ef anything at any time should happen to me, I 
 want ye to think, my darling, ez I always did my best for you, 
 Oily, for you. Wotever I did was always for the best." 
 
 Oily thought instantly of the river. 
 
 " You ain't goin' into deep water to-day, Gabe, are you ?" she 
 asked, with a slight premonitory quiver of her short upper lip. 
 
 " Pooty deep for me, Oily ; but," he added, hastily, with a 
 
Mrs. Markle. 61 
 
 glance at her alarmed face, " don't you mind, I'll come out all 
 safe. Good-bye." He kissed her tenderly. She ran her 
 fingers through his sandy curls, deftly smoothed his beard, and 
 xeknotted his neckerchief. 
 
 " You oughter hev put on your other shirt, Gabe ; that ain't 
 clean ; and you a-goin' to Mrs. Markle's ! Let me get your 
 straw hat, Gabe. Wait." She ran in behind the screen, but 
 when she returned he was gone. 
 
 It had been raining the night before, but on the earth 
 beneath there was a dewy freshness, and in the sky above the 
 beauty of cloud scenery a beauty rare to California except 
 during the rainy season. Gabriel, although not usually affected 
 by meteorological influences, nor peculiarly susceptible to the 
 charms of Nature, felt that the morning was a fine one, and 
 was for that reason, I imagine, more than usually accessible to 
 the blandishments of the fair. From admiring a tree, a flower, 
 or a gleam of sunshine, to the entertainment of a dangerous 
 sentimentalism in regard to the other sex, is, I fear, but a facile 
 step to some natures, whose only safety is in continuous prac 
 ticality. Wherefore, Gabriel, as he approached the cottage of 
 Mrs. Markle, was induced to look from Nature up to Nature's 
 goddess Mrs. Markle, as her strong bright face appeared 
 above the dishes she was washing by the kitchen window. 
 And here occurred one of those feminine inconsistences that 
 are charming to the average man, but are occasionally inefficient 
 with an exceptional character. Mrs. Markle, who had always 
 been exceedingly genial, gentle, and natural with Gabriel 
 during his shyness, seeing him coming with a certain fell intent 
 of cheerfulness in his face, instantly assumed an aggressive 
 manner, which, for the sake of its probable warning to the rest 
 of her sex, I venture to transcribe. 
 
 " Ef you want to see me, Gabriel Conroy," said Mrs. Markle, 
 stopping to wipe the suds from her brown but handsomely 
 shaped arms, " you must come up to the sink, for I can't leave 
 the dishes. Joe Markle always used to say to me, ' Sue, when 
 you've got work to do, you don't let your mind wander round 
 much on anything else.' Sal, bring a cheer here for Gabriel 
 he don't come often enough to stand up for a change. We're 
 hard-working women, you and me, Sal, and we don't get time 
 to be sick and sick folks is about the only kind as Mr. Conroy 
 cares to see." 
 
62 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Thoroughly astonished as Gabriel was with this sarcastic 
 reception, there was still a certain relief that it brought to him. 
 " Oily was wrong," he said to himself; "that woman only 
 thinks of washin' dishes and lookin' after her boarders. Ef 
 she was allus like this and would leave a man alone, never 
 foolin' around him, but kinder standin' off and tendin' strictly 
 to the business of the house, why, it wouldn't be such a bad 
 thing to marry her. But like as not she'd change you can't 
 trust them critters. Howsomever I can set Olly's mind at 
 rest." 
 
 Happily unconscious of the heresies that were being enter 
 tained by the silent man before her, Mrs. Markle briskly 
 continued her washing and her monologue, occasionally 
 sprinkling Gabriel with the overflow of each. 
 
 "When I say hard-workin' women, Sal," said Mrs. Markle, 
 still addressing a gaunt female companion, whose sole functions 
 were confined to chuckling at Gabriel over the dishes she was 
 wiping, and standing with her back to her mistress " when I 
 say hard-workin' women, Sal, I don't forget ez there are men 
 ez is capable of doin' all that, and more men ez looks down 
 on you and me." Here Mistress Markle broke a plate, and 
 then, after a pause, sighed, faced around with a little colour in 
 her cheek and a sharp snap in her black eyes, and declared 
 that she was " that narvous" this morning that she couldn't 
 go on. 
 
 There was an embarrassing silence. Luckily for Gabriel, at 
 this moment the gaunt Sal picked up the dropped thread of 
 conversation, and with her back to her mistress, and profoundly 
 ignoring his presence, addressed herself to the wall. 
 
 " Narvous you well may be, Susan, and you slavin' for forty 
 boarders, with transitory meals for travellers, and nobody to 
 help you. If you was flat on your back with rheumatiz, ez you 
 well might be, perhaps you might get a hand. A death in the 
 family might be of sarvice to you in callin' round you friends 
 az couldn't otherwise leave their business. That cough that 
 little Manty had onto her for the last five weeks would frighten 
 some mothers into a narvous consumption." 
 
 Gabriel at this moment had a vivid and guilty recollection 
 of noticing Manty Markle wading in the ditch below the 
 house as he entered, and of having observed her with the 
 interest of possible paternal relationship. That relationship 
 
Mrs. Markle. 63 
 
 seemed so preposterous and indefensible on all moral grounds, 
 now that he began to feel himself in the light of an impostor, 
 and was proportionally embarrassed. His confusion was 
 shown in a manner peculiarly characteristic of himself. Draw 
 ing a small pocket comb from his pocket, he began combing 
 out his sandy curls, softly, with a perplexed smile on his face. 
 The widow had often noticed this action, divined its cause, and 
 accepted it as a tribute. She began to relent. By some 
 occult feminine sympathy, this relenting was indicated by the 
 other woman. 
 
 " You're out of sorts this morning, Susan, 'nd if ye'll take a 
 fool's advice, ye'll jest quit work, and make yerself comfortable 
 in the settm'-room, and kinder pass the time o' day with 
 Gabriel ; onless he's after waitin' to pick up some hints about 
 housework. I never could work with a man around. I'll do 
 up the dishes ef you'il excuse my kempany, which two is and 
 three's none. Yer give me that apron. You don't hev time, 
 I declare, Sue, to tidy yourself up. And your hair's comin' 
 down." 
 
 The gaunt Sal, having recognised Gabriel's presence to this 
 extent, attempted to reorganize Mrs. Markle's coirTure, but was 
 playfully put aside by that lady, with the remark, that " she 
 had too much to do to think of them things." 
 
 " And it's only a mop, anyway," she added, with severe 
 self-depreciation; "let it alone, will you, you Sal! Thar! I 
 told you ; now you've done it." And she had. The infamous 
 Sal, by some deft trick well known to her deceitful sex, had 
 suddenly tumbled the whole wealth of Mrs. Markle's black 
 mane over her plump shoulders. Mrs. Markle, with a laugh, 
 would have flown to the chaste recesses of the sitting-room ; 
 but Sal, like a true artist, restrained her, until the full effect of 
 this poetic picture should be impressed upon the unsuspecting 
 Gabriel's memory. 
 
 " Mop, indeed !" said Sal. " It's well that many folks is of 
 many minds, and self-praise is open disgrace ; but when a man 
 like Lawyer Maxwell sez to me only yesterday, sittin' at this 
 very table, lookin' kinder up at you, Sue, as you was passin' 
 soup, unconscious like, and one o' them braids droppin' down, 
 and jest missin' the plate, when Lawyer Maxwell sez to me, 
 ' Sal, thar's many a fine lady in Frisco ez would give her pile 
 to hev Susan Markle's hair ' " 
 
64 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 But here Sal was interrupted by the bashful escape of Mrs. 
 Markle to the sitting-room. "Ye don't know whether Lawyer 
 Maxwell has any bisness up this way, Gabriel, do ye ?" said 
 Sal, resuming her work. 
 
 " No," said the unconscious Gabriel, happily as oblivions of 
 the artful drift of the question as he had been of the dangerous 
 suggestiveness of Mrs. Markle's hair. 
 
 " Because he does kinder pass here more frequent than he 
 used, and hez taken ez menny ez five meals in one day. I 
 declare, I thought that was him when you kem just now ! I 
 don't think thet Sue notices it, not keering much for that kind 
 of build in a man," continued Sal, glancing at Gabriel's passively 
 powerful shoulders, and the placid strength of his long limbs. 
 " How do you think Sue's looking now ez a friend interested 
 in the family how does she look to you ?" 
 
 Gabriel hastened to assure Sal of the healthful appearance of 
 Mrs. Markle, but only extracted from his gaunt companion a 
 long sigh and a shake of the head. 
 
 " It's deceitful, Gabriel ! No one knows what that poor 
 critter goes through. Her mind's kinder onsettled o' late, and, 
 in that onsettled state, she breaks things. You see her break 
 that plate jest now ? Well, perhaps I oughtn't to say it but 
 you being a friend and in confidence, for she'd kill me, being 
 a proud kind o' nater, suthin 1 like my own, and it may not 
 amount to nothin' arter all but I kin always tell when you've 
 been around by the breakages. You was here, let's see, the 
 week afore last, and there wasn't cups enough left to go round 
 that night for supper !" 
 
 " Maybe it's chills," said the horror-stricken Gabriel, his 
 worst fears realized, rising from his chair ; " I've got some 
 Indian cholagogue over to the cabin, and I'll jest run over and 
 get it, or send it back." Intent only upon retreat, he would 
 have shamelessly flown ; but Sal intercepted him with a face of 
 mysterious awe. 
 
 " Ef she should kem in here and find you gone, Gabriel, in 
 that weak state of hers narvous you may call it, but so it is 
 I wouldn't be answerable for that poor critter's life. Ef she 
 should think you'd gone, arter what has happened, arter what 
 has passed between you and her to-day, it would jest kill 
 her." 
 
 " But what has passed ?" said Gabriel, in vague alarm. 
 
Mrs. Markle. 65 
 
 11 It ain't for me," said the gaunt Sal, loftily, " to pass my 
 opinion on other folks' conduct, or to let on what this means, 
 or what thet means, or to give my say about people callin' on 
 other people, and broken crockery, hair combs" Gabriel 
 winced " and people ez is too nice and keerful to open their 
 mouths afore folks ! It ain't for me to get up and say that, 
 when a woman is ever so little out of sorts, and a man is so far 
 gone ez he allows to rush off like a madman to get her medi 
 cines, what ez or what ezn't in it. I keep my own counsel, 
 and thet's my way. Many's the time Sue hez said to me : ' Ef 
 thar ever was a woman ez knowed how to lock herself up and 
 throw away the key, it's you, Sal.' And there you are, ma'am, 
 and it's high time ez plain help like me stopped talkin' while 
 ladies and gentlemen exchanged the time o' day." 
 
 It is hardly necessary to say that the latter part of this speech 
 was addressed to the widow, who, at that moment, appeared at 
 the door of the sitting-room, in a new calico gown that showed 
 her plump figure to advantage, or that the gaunt Sal intended 
 to indicate the serious character of the performance by a show 
 of increased respect to the actors. 
 
 " I hope I ain't intrudin' on your conversation," said the 
 widow, archly, stopping, with a show of consideration, on the 
 threshold. " Ef you and Sal ain't .done private matters yet 
 I'll wait." 
 
 " I don't think ez Gabriel hez anything more to say thet 
 you shouldn't hear, Mrs. Markle," said Sal, strongly implying a 
 recent confidential disclosure from Gabriel, which delicacy to 
 Gabriel alone prevented her from giving. " But it ain't for me 
 to hear confidence in matters of the feelin's." 
 
 It is difficult to say whether Mrs. Markle's archness, or Sal's 
 woful perspicuity, was most alarming to Gabriel. He rose ; he 
 would have flown, even with the terrible contingency of Mrs. 
 Markle's hysterics before his eyes ; he would have faced even 
 that forcible opposition from Sal of which he fully believed her 
 capable, but that a dreadful suspicion that he was already hope 
 lessly involved, that something would yet transpire that would 
 enable him to explain himself, and perhaps an awful fascination 
 of his very danger, turned his irresolute feet into Mrs. Markle's 
 sitting-room. Mrs. Markle offered him a chair ; he sank help 
 lessly into it, while, from the other room, Sal, violently clatter 
 ing her dishes, burst into shrill song, so palpably done for the 
 
 F 
 
66 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 purpose of assuring the bashful couple of her inability to over 
 hear their tender confidences, that Gabriel coloured to the roots 
 of his hair. That evening Gabriel returned from his work in 
 the gulch more than usually grave. To Olly's inquiries he re 
 plied shortly and evasively. It was not, however, Gabriel's 
 custom to remain uncommunicative on even disagreeable 
 topics, and Oily bided her time. It came after their frugal 
 supper was over which, unlike the morning meal, passed 
 without any fastidious criticism on Gabriel's part and Oily 
 had drawn a small box, her favourite seat, between her brother's 
 legs, and rested the back of her head comfortably against his 
 waistcoat. When Gabriel had lighted his pipe at the solitary 
 candle, he gave one or two preliminary puffs, and then, taking 
 his pipe from his mouth, said gently, " Oily, it can't be done." 
 
 " What can't be done, Gabe ?" queried the artful Oily, with 
 a swift preconception of the answer, expanding her little mouth 
 into a thoughtful smile. 
 
 " Thet thing."" What thing, Gabe ?" 
 
 " This yer marryin' o' Mrs. Markle," said Gabriel, with an 
 assumption of easy, business-like indifference. 
 
 "Why?" asked Oily. 
 
 " She wouldn't hev me." 
 
 "What?" said Oily, facing swiftly round. 
 
 Gabriel evaded his sister's eyes, and looking in the fire, 
 repeated slowly, but with great firmness 
 
 " No ; not fur fur fur a gift !" 
 
 " She's a mean, stuck-up, horrid old thing !" said Oily, 
 fiercely, " I'd jest like to why, there ain't a man az kin 
 compare with you, Gabe ! Like her impudence !" 
 
 Gabriel waved his pipe in the .ir deprecatingly, yet with such 
 an evident air of cheerful resignation, that Oily faced upon him 
 again suspiciously, and asked " What did she say ?" 
 
 " She said," replied Gabe, slowly, " thet her heart was given 
 to another. I think she struck into poetry, and said 
 
 ' My heart it is another's, 
 And it never can be thine.' 
 
 " Thet is, I think so. I disremember her special remark, 
 Oily ; but you know women allers spout poetry at sech times. 
 Ennyhow, that's about the way the thing panned out." 
 
 " Who was it ?" said Oily, suddenly. 
 
Mrs. Markle. 67 
 
 " She didn't let on who," said Gabriel, uneasily. " I didn't 
 think it the square thing to inquire." 
 
 "Well," said Oily. 
 
 Gabriel looked down still more embarrassed, and shifted his 
 position. " Well," he repeated. 
 
 " What didjw say?" said Oily." Then?" 
 
 " No, afore. How did you do it, Gabe ?" said Oily, com 
 fortably fixing her chin in her hands, and looking up in her 
 brother's face. 
 
 " Oh, the usual way !" said Gabriel, with a motion of his 
 pipe, to indicate vague and glittering generalities of courtship. 
 
 " But how ? Gabe, tell me all about it." 
 
 " Well," said Gabriel, looking up at the roof, " wimmen is 
 bashful ez a general thing, and thar's about only one way ez a 
 man can get at 'em, and that ez, by being kinder keerless and 
 bold. Ye see, Oily, when I kem inter the house, I sorter jest 
 chuckled Sal under the chin thet way, you know and then 
 went up and put my arm around the widder's waist, and kissed 
 her two or three times, you know, jest to be sociable and 
 familiar like." 
 
 " And to think, Gabe, thet after all that she wouldn't hev 
 ye," said Oily. 
 
 " Not at any price," said Gabriel, positively. 
 
 " The disgustin' creature !" said Oily. " I'd jest like to 
 ketch that Manty hangin' round yer after that !" she continued, 
 savagely, with a vicious shake of her little fist. " And just to 
 think, only to-day we give her her pick o' them pups !" 
 
 " Hush, Oily, ye mustn't do anythin' o' the sort," said 
 Gabriel, hastily. " Ye must never let en to any one anything. 
 It's confidence, Oily, confidence, ez these sort o' thing allus is 
 atween you and me. Besides," he went on, reassuringly, 
 " that's nothin'. Lord, afore a man's married he hez to go 
 through this kind o' thing a dozen times. It's expected. 
 There was a man as I once knowed," continued Gabriel, with 
 shameless mendacity, " ez went through it fifty times, and he 
 was a better man nor me, and could shake a thousand dollars 
 in the face of any woman. Why, bless your eyes, Oily, some 
 men jest likes it it's excitement like perspectin'." 
 
 " But what did you say, Gabe ?" said Oily, returning with 
 fresh curiosity to the central fact, and ignoring the Pleasures of 
 Rejection as expounded by Gabriel. 
 
 F2 
 
68 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Well, I just up, and sez this : Susan Markle, sez I, the 
 case is just this. Here's Oily and me up there on the hill, and 
 jess you and Manty down there on the Gulch, and mountings 
 wild and valleys deep two loving hearts do now divide, and 
 there's no reason why it shouldn't be one family and one house, 
 and that family and that house mine. And it's for you to say 
 when. And then I kinder slung in a little more poetry, and 
 sorter fooled around with that ring," said Gabriel, showing a 
 heavy plain gold ring on his powerful little ringer, " and jest 
 kissed her agin, and chucked Sally under the chin, and that's all." 
 
 " And she wouldn't hev ye, Gabe," said Oily, thoughtfully, 
 " after all that ? Well, who wants her to ? I don't." 
 
 " I'm glad to hear you say that, Oily," said Gabriel. " But ye 
 mustn't let on a word of it to her. She talks o' coming up on the 
 hill to build, and wants to buy that part of the old claim where I 
 perspected last summer, so's to be near us, and look arter you. 
 And, Oily/' continued Gabriel, gravely, "ef she comes round yer 
 foolin' around me ez she used to do, ye mustn't mind that it's 
 women's ways." 
 
 " I'd like to catch her at it," said Oily. 
 
 Gabriel looked at Oily with a guilty satisfaction, and drew her 
 toward him. " And now that it's all over, Oily," said he, " it's 
 all the better ez it is. You and me'll get along together ez com 
 fortable ez we kin. I talked with some of the boys the other 
 day about sendin' for a schoolmarm from Marysville, and Mrs. 
 Markle thinks it's a good idee. And you'll go to school, Oily. 
 I'll run up to Marysville next week and get you some better 
 clothes, and we'll be just ez happy ez ever. And then some day, 
 Oily, afore you know it them things come always suddent I'll 
 jest make a strike outer that ledge, and we'll be rich. Thar's 
 money in that ledge, Oily, I've allus allowed that. And then 
 we'll go you and me to San Francisco, and we'll hev a big 
 house, and I'll jest invite a lot of little girls, the best they is in 
 Frisco, to play with you, and you'll hev all the teachers you 
 want, and \v omen ez will be glad to look arter ye. And then 
 maybe I might make it up with Mrs. Markle " 
 
 " Never !" said Oily, passionately. 
 
 u Never it is !" said the artful Gabriel, with a glow of plea 
 sure in his eyes, and a slight stirring of remorse in his breast. 
 " But it's time that small gals like you was abed." 
 
 Thus admonished, Oily retired behind the screen, taking 
 
The Artful Gabriel is Discovered. 69 
 
 the solitary candle, and leaving her brother smoking his pipe 
 by the light of the slowly dying fire. But Oily did not go to 
 sleep, and half an hour later, peering out of the screen, she 
 saw her brother still sitting by the fire, his pipe extinguished, 
 and his head resting on his hand. She went up to him so 
 softly that she startled him, shaking a drop of water on the 
 hand that she suddenly threw round his neck. 
 
 " You ain't worrying about that woman, Gabe ?" 
 
 " No," said Gabriel, with a laugh. 
 
 Oily looked down at her hand. Gabriel looked up at the 
 roof. " There's a leak thar that's got to be stopped to-morrow. 
 Go to bed, Oily, or you'll take your death." 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 IN WHICH THE ARTFUL GABRIEL IS DISCOVERED. 
 
 NOTWITHSTANDING his assumed ease and a certain relief, 
 which was real, Gabriel was far from being satisfied with the 
 result of his visit to Mrs. Markle. Whatever may have 
 actually occurred, not known to the reader except through 
 Gabriel's own disclosure to Oily, Gabriel's manner hardly bore 
 out the boldness and conclusiveness of his statement. For a 
 day or two afterward, he resented any allusion to the subject 
 from Oily, but on the third day he held a conversation with 
 one of the Eureka Bar miners, which seemed to bear some 
 remote reference to his experience. 
 
 "Thar's a good deal said lately in the papers," began 
 Gabriel, cautiously, " in regard to breach o' promise trials. 
 Lookin' at it, by and large, thar don't seem to be much show 
 for a fellow ez hez been in enny ways kind to a gal, is thar ?" 
 
 The person addressed, whom rumour declared to have 
 sought One Horse Gulch as a place of refuge from his wife, 
 remarked with an oath that women were blank fools anyway, 
 and that on general principles they were not to be trusted. 
 
 " But thar must be a kind o' gin'ral law on the subject," 
 urged Gabriel. " Now what would be your opinion if you was 
 on a jury onto a case like this ? It happened to a friend o' 
 mine in Frisco," said Gabriel, with a marked parenthesis, " a 
 man ez you don't know. Thar was a woman we'll say a 
 
70 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 widder ez had been kinder hangin' round him off and on for 
 two or three year, and he hadn't allowed anything to her about 
 marryin'. One day he goes down thar to her house, kinder 
 easy-like, jest to pass the time o' day, and be sociable " 
 
 " That's bad," interrupted the cynic. 
 
 " Yes," said Gabriel, doubtingly, " p'r'aps it does look bad, 
 but you see he didn't mean any thin'." 
 
 "Well?" said the adviser. 
 
 " Well ! thet's all," said Gabriel. 
 
 " All !' ; exclaimed his companion, indignantly. 
 
 "Yes, all. Now this woman kinder allows she'll bring a 
 suit agin him to make him marry her." 
 
 " My opinion is," said the adviser, bluntly, " my opinion is 
 that the man was a fool, and didn't tell ye the truth nuther, and 
 I'd give damages agin him, for being such a fool." 
 
 This opinion was so crushing to Gabriel that he turned 
 hopelessly away. Nevertheless, in his present state of mind, 
 he could not refrain from pushing his inquiries further, and in 
 a general conversation which took place at Briggs's store, in 
 the afternoon, among a group of smokers, Gabriel artfully 
 introduced the subject of courtship and marriage. 
 
 " Thar's different ways of getting at the feelin's of a woman," 
 said the oracular Johnson, after a graphic statement of his own 
 method of ensnaring the affections of a former sweetheart, 
 " thar's different ways jest as thar's different men and women 
 in the world. One man's way wont do with some wimmen. 
 But thar's one way ez is pretty sure to fetch ; em alters. That 
 is, to play off indifferent to never let on ye like 'em ! To 
 kinder look arter them in a gin'ral sort o' way, pretty much as 
 Gabe thar looks arter the sick ! but not to say anythin' 
 particler. To make them understand that they've got to do 
 all the courtin', ef thar's enny to be done. What's the matter, 
 Gabe, ye ain't goin' ?" 
 
 Gabriel, who had risen in great uneasiness, muttered some 
 thing about " its being time to go home," and then sat down 
 again, looking at Johnson in fearful fascination. 
 
 " That kind o' thing is pretty sure to fetch almost enny 
 woman," continued Johnson, " and a man ez does it orter be 
 looked arter. It orter be put down by law. It's tamperin', 
 don't yer see, with the holiest affections. Sich a man orter be 
 spotted wharever found." 
 
The Artful Gabriel is Discovered. 71 
 
 " But mebbe the man don't mean anythin' mebbe it's jest 
 his way," suggested Gabriel, ruefully, looking around in the 
 faces of the party, " mebbee he don't take to wimmen and 
 marriage nat'ral, and it's jest his way." 
 
 "Way be blowed !" said the irate Johnson, scornfully. 
 " Ketch him, indeed ! It's jest the artfullest kind o' artfulness. 
 It's jest begging on a full hand." 
 
 Gabriel rose slowly, and, resisting any further attempts to 
 detain him, walked to the door, and, after a remark on the 
 threatening nature of the weather, delivered in a manner 
 calculated to impress his audience with his general indifference 
 to the subject then under discussion, melted dejectedly away 
 into the driving rain that had all day swept over One Horse 
 Gulch, and converted its one long narrow street into a ditch of 
 turbulent yellow water. 
 
 " Thet Gabe seems to be out o' sorts to-day," said Johnson. 
 " I heerd Lawyer Maxwell asking arter him this morning' ; I 
 reckon thar's suthin' up ! Gabe ain't a bad sort of chap. 
 Hezen't got enny too much sabe about him, but he's mighty 
 good at looking arter sick folks, and thet kind o' man's a power 
 o' use in this camp. Hope thar ain't anything ez will interfere 
 with his sphere o' usefulness." 
 
 " May be a woman scrape," suggested Briggs. " He seemed 
 sort o' bound up in what you was saying about women jest 
 now. Thar is folks round yer," said Briggs, dropping his voice 
 and looking about him, " ez believes that that yer Oily, which 
 he lets on to be his sister, to be actooally his own child. No 
 man would tote round a child like that, and jest bind himself 
 up in her, and give up wimmen and whisky, and keerds, and 
 kempeny, ef it wasn't his own. Thet ain't like brothers in my 
 part of the country." 
 
 " It's a mighty queer story he tells, ennyways all this yer 
 stuff about Starvation Camp and escapin'," suggested another. 
 " I never did, somehow, take eny stock in that." 
 
 " Well, it's his own look out," concluded Johnson. " It's 
 nothin' to me. Ef I've been any service to him pintin' out 
 sick people, and kinder makin' suggestions here and thar, how 
 he should look arter them, he's welcome to it I don't go 
 back on my record, if he hez got into trouble." 
 
 " And I'm sure," said Briggs, "if I did allow him to come 
 in here and look arter thet sick Mexican, it ain't for me to be 
 
72 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 expected to look arter his moril character too." But here the 
 entrance of a customer put a stop to further criticism. 
 
 Meanwhile the unfortunate subject of this discussion, by 
 clinging close to the walls of houses had avoided the keen blast 
 that descended from the mountain, and had at last reached the 
 little trail that led through the gulch to his cabin on the 
 opposite hill-side. Here Gabriel hesitated. To follow that 
 trail would lead him past the boarding-house of Mrs. Markle. 
 In the light of the baleful counsel he had just received, to 
 place himself so soon again in the way of danger seemed to 
 him to be only a provocation of fate. That the widow and 
 Sal might swoop down upon him as he passed, and compel 
 him to enter ; that the spectacle of his passing withou t a visit 
 might superinduce instant hysterics on the part of the widow, 
 appeared to his terror-stricken fancy as almost a certainty. The 
 only other way home was by a circuitous road along the ridge 
 of the hill, at least three miles further. Gabriel did not hesitate 
 long, but began promptly to ascend the hill. This was no easy 
 task in the face of a strong gale and torrents of beating rain, 
 but the overcoming of physical difficulties by the exercise of 
 his all-conquering muscles, and the fact that he was doing 
 something, relieved his mind of its absurd terrors. When he 
 had reached the summit he noticed for the first time the full 
 power of those subtle agencies that had been silently at work 
 during the last week's steady rain. A thin trickling mountain 
 rill where he had two weeks before slaked his thirst during a 
 ramble with Oily, was now transformed into a roaring cataract ; 
 the brook that they had leaped across was now a swollen river. 
 There were slowly widening pools in the valleys, darkly 
 glancing sheets of water on the distant plains, and a monoto 
 nous rush and gurgle always in the air. It was half an hour 
 later, and two miles further on his rough road, that he came in 
 view of the narrow precipitous gorge through which the Wingdam 
 stage passed on its way from Marysville. As he approached 
 nearer he could see that the little mountain stream which ran 
 beside the stage road had already slightly encroached upon 
 the road-bed, and that here and there the stage road 
 itself was lost in drifts of standing water. " It will be 
 pretty rough drivin' up that canon," said Gabriel to him 
 self as he thought of the incoming Wingdam stage, now 
 nearly due ; " mighty onpleasant and risky with narvous 
 
The Art/id Gabriel is Discovered. 73 
 
 leaders, but thar's worse things than that in this yer world," he 
 meditated, as his mind reverted again to Mrs. Markle, " and 
 ef I could change places with Yuba Bill, and get on that box 
 and Oily insideI'd do it !" 
 
 But just then the reservoir of the Wingdam ditch came in 
 view on the hill beside him, and with it a revelation that in a 
 twinkling displaced Mrs. Markle, and seemed almost to change 
 the man's entire nature ! What was it ? Apparently nothing 
 to the eye of the ordinary traveller. The dam was full, and 
 through a cut-off the overplus water was escaping with a roar. 
 Nothing more? Yes to an experienced eye the escaping 
 water was not abating the quantity in the dam. Was that all ? 
 No ! Halfway down the rudely constructed adobe bank of the 
 dam, the water was slowing oozing and trickling through a 
 slowly widening crevice, over the rocks above the gorge and 
 stage road below ! The wall of the dam was giving way ! To 
 tear off coat and all impeding garments, to leap from rock to 
 rock, and boulder to boulder, hanging on by slippery chimisal 
 and the decayed roots of trees ; to reach at the risk of life and 
 limb the canon below, and then to run at the highest speed to 
 warn the incoming stage of the danger before it should enter 
 the narrow gorge, was only the resolve and action of a brave 
 man. But to do this without the smallest waste of strength 
 that ought to be preserved, to do this with the greatest economy 
 of force, to do this with the agility and skill of a mountaineer, 
 and the reserved power of a giant ; to do this with a will so 
 simple, direct, and unhesitating, that the action appeared to 
 have been planned and rehearsed days before, instead of being 
 the resolution of the instant, this belonged to Gabriel Conroy ! 
 And to have seen him settle into a long swinging trot, and 
 to have observed his calm, grave, earnest, but unexcited 
 face, and quiet, steadfast eye, you would have believed him 
 some healthy giant simply exercising himself. 
 
 He had not gone half a mile before his quick ear caught a 
 dull sound and roar of advancing water. Yet even then he 
 only slightly increased his steady stride, as if he had been 
 quickened and followed by his trainer rather than by ap 
 proaching Death. At the same moment there was a quick 
 rattle and clatter in the road ahead a halt, and turning back, 
 for Gabriel's warning shout had run before him like a bullet. 
 But it was too late. The roaring water behind him struck him 
 
74 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 and bore him down, and the next instant swept the coach and 
 horses a confused, struggling, black mass, against the rocky 
 walls of the canon. And then it was that the immense 
 reserved strength of Gabriel came into play. Set upon by the 
 almost irresistible volume of water, he did not waste his power 
 in useless opposition, but allowed himself to be swept hither 
 and thither until he touched a branch of chimisal that de 
 pended from the canon side. Seizing it with one sudden and 
 mighty effort, he raised himself above the sweep and suction of 
 the boiling flood. The coach was gone ; where it had stood a 
 few black figures struggled, swirled, and circled. One of them 
 was a woman. In an instant Gabriel plunged into the yellow 
 water. A few strokes brought him to her side; in another 
 moment he had encircled her waist with his powerful arm and 
 lifted her head above the surface, when he was seized by two 
 despairing arms from the other side. Gabriel did not shake 
 them off. " Take hold of me lower down and I'll help ye 
 both," he shouted, as he struck out with his only free arm for 
 the chimisal. He reached it ; drew himself up so that he 
 could grasp it with his teeth, and then, hanging on by his jaw, 
 raised his two clinging companions beside him. They had 
 barely grasped it, when another ominous roar was heard below, 
 and another wall of yellow water swept swiftly up the canon. 
 The chimisal began to yield to their weight. Gabriel dug his 
 fingers into the soil about its roots, clutched the jagged edges 
 of a rock beneath, and threw his arm about the woman, 
 pressing her closely to the face of the wall. As the wave 
 swept over them, there was a sudden despairing cry, a splash, 
 and the man was gone. Only Gabriel and the woman re 
 mained. They were safe, but for the moment only. Gabriel's 
 left hand grasping an insecure projection, was all that sustained 
 their united weight. Gabriel, for the first time, looked down 
 upon the woman. Then he said, hesitatingly 
 
 " Kin ye hold yourself a minnit ?"" Yes." 
 
 Even at that critical moment some occult quality of sweet 
 ness in her voice thrilled him. 
 
 " Lock your hands together hard, and sling 'em over my 
 neck." She did so. Gabriel freed his right hand. He 
 scarcely felt the weight thus suddenly thrown upon his 
 shoulders, but cautiously groped for a projection on the rock 
 above. He found it, raised himself by a supreme effort, until 
 
The Artful Gabriel is Discovered. 75 
 
 he secured a foothold in the hole left by the uprooted chimisal 
 bush. Here he paused. 
 
 " Kin ye hang on a minnit longer ?" 
 
 " Go on," she said. 
 
 Gabriel went on. He found another projection, and 
 another, and gradually at last reached a ledge a foot wide, 
 near the top of the cliff. Here he paused. It was the 
 woman's turn to speak. 
 
 " Can you climb to the top ?" she asked. 
 
 " Yes if you " 
 
 " Go on/' she said, simply. 
 
 Gabriel continued the ascent cautiously. In a few minutes 
 he had reached the top. Here her hands suddenly relaxed 
 their grasp ; she would have slipped to the ground had not 
 Gabriel caught her by the waist, lifted her in his arms, and 
 borne her to a spot where a fallen pine-tree had carpeted and 
 cushioned the damp ground with its withered tassels. Here 
 he laid her down with that exquisite delicacy and tenderness 
 of touch which was so habitual to him in his treatment of all 
 helplessness as to be almost unconscious. But she thanked 
 him, with such a graceful revelation of small white teeth, and 
 such a singular look out of her dark grey eyes, that he could 
 not help looking at her again. She was a small, light-haired 
 woman, tastefully and neatly dressed, and of a type and class 
 unknown to him. But for her smile, he would not have 
 thought her pretty. But even with that smile on her face, she 
 presently paled and fainted, At the same moment Gabriel 
 heard the sound of voices, and, looking up, saw two of the 
 passengers, who had evidently escaped by climbing the cliff, 
 coming towards them. And then I know not how to tell it 
 but a sudden and awe-inspiring sense of his ambiguous and 
 peculiar situation took possession of him. What would they 
 think of it ? Would they believe his statement ? A sickening 
 recollection of the late conversation at Briggs's returned to 
 him ; the indignant faces of the gaunt Sal and the plump Mrs. 
 Markle were before him ; even the questioning eyes of little 
 Oily seemed to pierce his inmost soul, and, alas ! this hero, the 
 victorious giant, turned and fled. 
 
76 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 SIMPLICITY Versus SAGACITY. 
 
 WHEN Gabriel reached his home it was after dark, and Oily 
 was anxiously waiting to receive him. 
 
 " You're wet all through, you awful Gabe, and covered with 
 mud in the bargain. Go and change your clothes, or you'll 
 get your death, as sure as you're a born sinner !" 
 
 The tone and manner in which this was uttered was some 
 thing unusual with Oily, but Gabriel was too glad to escape 
 further questioning to criticise or rebuke it. But when he had 
 reappeared from behind the screen with dry clothes, he was 
 surprised to observe by the light of the newly-lit candle that 
 Oily herself had undergone since morning a decided change in 
 her external appearance. Not to speak alone of an unusual 
 cleanliness of face and hands, and a certain attempt at confin 
 ing her yellow curls with a vivid pink ribbon, there was an 
 unwonted neatness in her attire, and some essay at adornment 
 in a faded thread-lace collar which she had found among her 
 mother's " things" in the family bag, and a purple neck-ribbon. 
 
 " It seems to me," said the delighted Gabriel, " that some 
 body else hez been dressin' up and making a toylit, sence I've 
 been away. Hev you been in the ditches agin, Oily ?" 
 
 " No," said Oily, with some dignity of manner, as she busied 
 herself in setting the table for supper. 
 
 "But I reckon I never seen ye look so peart afore, Oily; 
 who's been here ?" he added, with a sudden alarm. 
 
 " Nobody," said Oily ; " I reckon some folks kin get along 
 and look decent without the help of other folks, leastways of 
 Susan Markle." 
 
 At this barbed arrow Gabriel winced slightly. "See yer, 
 Oily," said Gabriel, " ye mustn't talk thet way about thet 
 woman. You're only a chile and ef yer brother did let on to 
 ye, in confidence, certing things ez a brother may say to his 
 sister, ye oughtn't say anythin' about it." 
 
 " Say anythin' !" echoed Oily, scornfully ; " do you think I'd 
 ever let on to thet woman ennything ? Ketch me !" 
 
 Gabriel looked up at his sister in awful admiration, and felt 
 at the depths of his conscience-stricken and self-deprecatory 
 nature that he didn't deserve so brave a little defender. For a 
 
Simplicity versus Sagacity. 77 
 
 moment he resolved to tell her the truth, but a fear of Olly's 
 scorn and a desire to bask in the sunshine of her active sym 
 pathy withheld him. "Besides/' he added to himself, in a 
 single flash of self-satisfaction, " this yer thing may be the 
 makin' o' thet gal yet. Look at thet collar, Gabriel ! look at 
 thet hair, Gabriel ! all your truth-tellin' never fetched outer 
 thet purty child what thet one yarn did." 
 
 Nevertheless, as Gabriel sat down to his supper he was still 
 haunted by the ominous advice and counsel he had heard that 
 day. When Oily had finished her meal, he noticed that she 
 had forborne, evidently at great personal sacrifice, to sop the 
 frying-pan with her bread. He turned to her gravely 
 
 " Ef you wus ever asked, Oily, ef I had been sweet upon 
 Mrs. Markle, wot would ye say ?' ; 
 
 " Say," said Oily, savagely, " I'd say that if there ever was a 
 woman ez had run arter a man with less call to do it it was 
 Mrs. Markle that same old disgustin' Susan Markle. Thet's 
 wot I'd say, and I'd say it to her face ! Gabe see here !" 
 
 " Well," said the delighted Gabriel. 
 
 " Ef that school-ma'am comes up here > do you jest make 
 up to her !" 
 
 " Oily !" ejaculated the alarmed Gabriel. 
 
 " You jest go for her ! You jest do for her what you did for 
 that Susan Markle. And jest you do it, if you can, Gabe 
 when Mrs. Markle's around or afore little Manty she'll go 
 and tell her mother she tells her everything. I've heerd, 
 Gabe, that some o' them school-ma'ams is nice." 
 
 In his desire to please Oily, Gabriel would have imparted to 
 her the story of his adventure in the canon, but a vague fear 
 that Oily might demand from him an instant offer of his hand 
 and heart to the woman he had saved, checked the disclosure. 
 And the next moment there was a rap at the door of the cabin. 
 
 " I forgot to say, Gabe, that Lawyer Maxwell was here to 
 day to see ye/' said Oily, " and I bet you thet's him. If he 
 wants you to nuss anybody, Gabe, don't ye do it ! You got 
 enough to do to look after me !" 
 
 Gabriel rose with a perplexed face and opened the door. A 
 tall dark man, with a beard heavily streaked with grey, 
 entered. There was something in his manner and dress, 
 although both coniormed to local prejudices and customs, that 
 denoted a type of man a little above the average social con- 
 
78 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 dition of One Horse Gulch. Unlike Gabriel's previous evening 
 visitor, he did not glance around him, but fixed a pair of keen 
 half-humorous, half interrogating grey eyes upon his host's face, 
 and kept them there. The habitual expression of his features 
 was serious, except for a certain half-nervous twitching at the 
 left corner of his mouth, which continued usually, until he 
 stopped and passed his hand softly across it. The impression 
 always left on the spectator was, that he had wiped away a 
 smile, as some people do a tear. 
 
 " I don't think I ever before met you, Gabriel," he said, 
 advancing and offering his hand. " My name is Maxwell. I 
 think you've heard of me. I have come for a little talk on a 
 matter of business." 
 
 The blank dismay of Gabriel's face did not escape him, nor 
 the gesture with which he motioned to Oily to retire. "It's 
 quite evident," he said to himself, "that the child knows 
 nothing of this, or is unprepared. I have taken him by 
 surprise." 
 
 " If I mistake not, Gabriel," said Maxwell, aloud, "'your 
 little er girl is as much concerned in this matter as your 
 self. Why not let her remain ?" 
 
 " No, no," said Gabriel, now feeling perfectly convinced in 
 the depths of his conscience-stricken soul that Maxwell was 
 here as the legal adviser of the indignant Mrs. Markle. " No! 
 Oily, run out and get some chips in the wood-house agin to 
 morrow morning's fire. Run !" 
 
 Oily ran. Maxwell cast a look after the child, wiped his 
 mouth, and, leaning his elbow on the table, fixed his eyes on 
 Gabriel. " I have called to-night, Gabriel, to see if we can 
 arrange a certain matter without trouble, and even as I am 
 employed against you with as little talk as possible. To be 
 frank, I am intrusted with the papers in a legal proceeding 
 against you. Now, see here ! is it necessary for me to say 
 what these proceedings are ? Is it even necessary for me to 
 give the name of my client ?" 
 
 Gabriel dropped his eyes, but even then the frank honesty 
 of his nature spoke for him. He raised his head and said 
 simply-" No !" 
 
 Lawyer Maxwell was for a moment staggered, but only for a 
 moment. " Good," he said, thoughtfully ; " you are frank. 
 Let me ask you now if, to avoid legal proceedings, publicity, and 
 
Simplicity versus Sagacity. 79 
 
 scandal and allow me to add, the almost absolute certainty of 
 losing in any suit that might be brought against you would you 
 be willing to abandon this house and claim at once, allowing it to 
 go for damages in the past ? If you would, I think I could 
 accept it for such. I think I could promise that even this 
 question of a closer relationship would not come up. Briefly, 
 she might keep her name and you might keep yours, and you 
 would remain to each other as strangers. What do you say ?" 
 
 Gabriel rose quickly and took the lawyer's hands with a 
 tremulous grasp. " You're a kind man, Mr. Maxwell," he said, 
 shaking the lawyer's hand vigorously ; " a good man. It's a bad 
 business, and you've made the best of it. Ef you'd been my own 
 lawyer instead o' hers, you couldn't hev treated me better. I'll 
 leave here at once. I've been thinking o' doing it ever since this 
 yer thing troubled me ; but I'll go to-morrow. Ye kin hev the 
 house, and all it contains. If I had anything else in a way of a 
 fee to offer ye, I'd do it. She kin hev the house and all that they 
 is of it. And then nothing will be said ?" 
 
 " Not a word," said Maxwell, examining Gabriel curiously. 
 
 " No talk nothin' in the newspapers ?" continued Gabriel. 
 
 " Your conduct toward her, and your attitude in this whole 
 affair, will be kept a profound secret, unless you happen to be 
 tray it yourself; and that is my one reason for advising you to 
 leave here." 
 
 " I'll do it to-morrow," said Gabriel, rubbing his hands. 
 " Wouldn't you like to have me sign some bit o' paper ?" 
 
 " No, no," said the lawyer, wiping his mouth with his hand, 
 and looking at Gabriel as if he belonged to some entirely new 
 species. " Let me advise you, as a friend, to sign no paper 
 that might be brought against you hereafter. Your simple 
 abandonment of the claim and house is sufficient for our pur 
 poses. I will make out no papers in the case until Thursday ; 
 by that time I expect to find no one to serve them on. You 
 understand ?" 
 
 Gabriel nodded, and wrung the lawyer's hand warmly. 
 Maxwell walked toward the door, still keeping his glance fixed 
 on Gabriel's clear, honest eyes. On the threshold he paused, 
 and leaning against it, wiped his mouth with a slow gesture, 
 and said " From all I can hear, Gabriel, you are a simple, 
 honest fellow, and I frankly confess to you, but for the admis 
 sion you have made to me, I would have thought you incapable 
 
8o Gabriel Conroy, 
 
 of attempting to wrong a woman. I should have supposed it 
 some mistake. I am not a judge of the motives of men ; I am 
 too old a lawyer, and too familiar with things of this kind, to 
 be surprised at men's motives, or even to judge their rights or 
 wrongs by my own. But now that we understand each other, 
 would you mind telling me what was your motive for this 
 peculiar and monstrous form of deception ? Understand me ; 
 it will not alter my opinion of you, which is, that you are not a 
 bad man. But I am curious to know how you could delibe 
 rately set about to wrong this woman ; what was the motive ?" 
 
 Gabriel's face flushed deeply. Then he lifted his eyes and 
 pointed to the screen. The lawyer followed the direction of 
 his finger, and saw Oily standing in the doorway. 
 
 Lawyer Maxwell smiled. " It is the sex, anyway," he said 
 to himself; "perhaps a little younger than I supposed; of 
 course, his own child." He nodded again, smiled at Oily, and 
 with the consciousness of a professional triumph, blent with a 
 certain moral satisfaction that did not always necessarily accom 
 pany his professional success, he passed out into the night. 
 
 Gabriel avoided conversation with Oily until late in the 
 evening. When she had taken her accustomed seat at his feet 
 before the fire, she came directly to the point. " What did he 
 want, Gabe ?" 
 
 " Nothing partickler," said Gabriel, with an affectation of 
 supreme indifference. " I was thinking, Oily, that I'd tell you 
 a story. It's a long time since I told one. ; ' It had been 
 Gabriel's habit to improve these precious moments by relating 
 the news of the camp or the current topics of the day, artfully 
 imparted as pure fiction, but since his pre-occupation with Mrs. 
 Markle he had lately omitted it. Oily nodded her head, and 
 Gabriel went on. " Once upon a time they lived a man ez hed 
 lived and would live for thet was wot was so sing'ler about 
 him all alone, 'cept for a little sister ez this man hed, wot he 
 loved very dearly. They was no one ez this man would ever 
 let ring in, so to speak, between him and this little sister, and 
 the heaps o' private confidence, and the private talks about 
 this and thet, thet this yer man hed with this little sister, was 
 wonderful to behold." 
 
 " Was it a real man a pure man ?" queried Oily. 
 
 " The man was a real man, but the little sister, I oughter 
 say, was a kind o' fairy, you know, Oily, ez hed a heap o' 
 
Simplicity versus Sagacity. 8 1 
 
 power to do good to this yer man, unbeknownst to him and 
 afore his face. They lived in a sorter paliss in the woods, this 
 yer man and his sister. And one day this yer man hed a heap 
 o' troubil come upon him that was sich ez would make him 
 leave this beautiful paliss, and he didn't know how to let on to 
 his little sister about it ; and so he up, and he sez to her, sez 
 her, ' Gloriana' thet was her name * Gloriana,' sez he, ' we 
 must quit this beautiful paliss and wander into furrin parts, and 
 the reason why is a secret ez I can't tell ye.' And this yer 
 little sister jest ups and sez, ' Wot's agreeable to you, brother, 
 is agreeable to me, fur we is everything to each other the wide 
 world over, and variety is the spice o' life, and I'll pack my 
 traps to-morrow.' And she did. For why, Oily? Why, don't 
 ye see this yer little sister was a fairy, and knowed it all with 
 out bein' told. And they went away to furrin parts and strange 
 places, war they built a more beautiful paliss than the other 
 was, and they lived thar peaceful like and happy all the days o' 
 their life." 
 
 " And thar wasn't any old witch of a Mrs. Markle to bother 
 them. When are ye goin', Gabe ?" asked the practical Oily. 
 
 " I thought to-morrow," said Gabriel, helplessly abandoning 
 all allegory and looking at his sister in respectful awe, " thet 
 ez, I reckoned, Oily, to get to Casey's in time to take the 
 arternoon stage up to Marysville." 
 
 " Well," said Oily, " then I'm goin' to bed now." 
 
 " Oily," said Gabriel, reproachfully, as he watched the little 
 figure disappear behind the canvas, "ye didn't kiss me fur 
 good-night." 
 
 Oily came back. " You ole Gabe you !" she said, patroniz 
 ingly, as she ran her fingers through his tangled curls, and 
 stooped to bestow a kiss on his forehead from an apparently 
 immeasurable moral and intellectual height " you old, big 
 Gabe, what would you do without me, I'd like to know ?' ; 
 
 The next morning Gabriel was somewhat surprised at observ 
 ing Oily immediately after the morning meal proceed gravely to 
 array herself in the few more respectable garments that belonged 
 to her wardrobe. Over a white muslin frock, yellow and scant 
 with age, she had tied a scarf of glaring cheap pink ribbon, and 
 over this again she had secured, by the aid of an enormous tor- 
 toiseshell brooch, a large black and white check shawl of her 
 mother's, that even repeated folding could not reduce in size. 
 
 G 
 
82 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 She then tied over her yellow curls a large straw hat, trimmed 
 with white and yellow daisies and pale green ribbon, and com 
 pleted her toilet by unfurling over her shoulder a small yellow 
 parasol. Gabriel, who had been watching these preparations in 
 great concern, at last ventured to address the bizarre but pretty 
 little figure before him. " War you goin', Oily ?" 
 
 " Down the gulch to say good-bye to the Reed gals. 'Tain't 
 the square thing to vamose the ranch without lettin' on to 
 folks." 
 
 " Ye ain't goin' near Mrs. Markle's, are ye ?" queried Gabriel, 
 in deprecatory alarm. 
 
 Oily turned a scornful flash of her clear blue eye upon her 
 brother, and said curtly, " Ketch me !" 
 
 There was something so appalling in her quickness, such a 
 sudden revelation of quaint determination in the lines of her 
 mouth and eyebrows, that Gabriel could say no more. Without 
 a word he watched the yellow sunshade and flapping straw hat, 
 with its streaming ribbons, slowly disappear down the winding 
 descent of the hill. And then, a sudden and grotesque sense 
 of dependence upon the child ; an appreciation of some re 
 served quality in her nature hitherto unsuspected by him 
 something that separated them now, and in the years to come 
 would slowly widen the rift between them, came upon him 
 with such a desolating sense of loneliness that it seemed 
 unendurable. He did not dare to re-enter or look back upon the 
 cabin, but pushed on vaguely toward his claim on the hill-side. 
 On his way thither he had to pass a solitary redwood tree that 
 he had often noticed, whose enormous bulk belittled the rest 
 of the forest ; yet, also, by reason of its very isolation, had 
 acquired a certain lonely pathos that was far beyond the 
 suggestion of its heroic size. It seemed so imbecile, so 
 gratuitously large, so unproductive of the good that might be 
 expected of its bulk, so unlike the smart spruces and pert 
 young firs and larches that stood bedside it, that Gabriel 
 instantly accepted it as a symbol of himself, and could not help 
 wondering if there were not some other locality where every 
 thing else might be on its own plane of existence. " If I war 
 to go thar," said Gabriel to himself, " I wonder if I might not 
 suit better than I do yer, and be of some sarvice to thet child." 
 He pushed his way through the underbrush, and stood upon 
 the ledge that he had first claimed on his arrival at One Horse 
 
Simplicity versus Sagacity. 83 
 
 Gulch. It was dreary it was unpromising a vast stony field 
 high up in air, covered with scattered boulders of dark iron- 
 grey rock. Gabriel smiled bitterly. " Any other man but me 
 couldn't hev bin sich a fool as to preempt sich a claim fur gold. 
 P'raps it's all for the best that I'm short of it now," said Gabriel, 
 as he turned away, and descended the hill to his later claim in 
 the gulch, which yielded him that pittance known in the mining 
 dialect as "grub." 
 
 It was nearly three o'clock before he returned to the cabin 
 with the few tools that he had gathered. When he did so, he 
 found Oily awaiting him, with a slight flush of excitement on her 
 cheek, but no visible evidences of any late employment to be 
 seen in the cabin. 
 
 "Ye don't seem to have been doin' much packin', Oily," 
 said Gabriel " tho' thar ain't, so to speak, much to pack up." 
 
 " Thar ain't no use in packin', Gabe," replied Oily, looking 
 directly into the giant's bashful eyes. 
 
 " No use ?" echoed Gabriel. 
 
 " No sort o' use," said Oily, decidedly. " We ain't goin', 
 Gabe, and that's the end on't. I've been over to see Lawyer 
 Maxwell, and I've made it all right." Gabriel dropped speech 
 less into a chair, and gazed open-mouthed at his sister. " I've 
 made it all right, Gabe," continued Oily, coolly, " you'll see. 
 I jest went over thar this morning, and hed a little talk with 
 the lawyer, and gin him a piece o' my mind about Mrs. 
 Markle and jest settled the whole thing." 
 
 " Good Lord, Oily, what did you say ?" 
 
 "Say?" echoed Oily. "I jest up and told him everythm' 
 I knew about thet woman, and I never told you, Gabe, the 
 half of it. I jest sed ez how she'd been runnin' round arter 
 you ever sence she first set eyes on you, when you was 
 nussin' her husband wot died. How you never ez much 
 ez looked at her ontil I set you up to it ! How she 
 used to come round yer and sit and sit and look at you, 
 Gabe, and kinder do this et ye over her shoulder" here Oily 
 achieved an admirable imitation of certain arch glances of 
 Mrs. Markle that would have driven that estimable lady frantic 
 with rage, and even at this moment caused the bashful blood 
 of Gabriel to fly into his very eyes " and how she used to 
 let on all sorts of excuses to get you over thar, and how you 
 refoosed ! And wot a deceitful old mean disgustin' critter, 
 
 G2 
 
$4 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 she was enny way !" and here Oily paused for want of 
 breath. 
 
 " And wot did he say ?" said the equally breathless Gabriel. 
 
 " Nothin' at first ! Then he laughed and laughed and 
 laughed till I thought he'd bust! And then let "me see," 
 reflected the conscientious Oily, " he said thar was some 
 'absurd blunder and mistake' that's jest what he called thet 
 Mrs. Markle, Gabe those was his very words ! And then he 
 set up another yell o' laughin', and somehow, Gabe, I got to 
 laughin', and she got to laughin' too/' and Oily laughed at the 
 recollection. 
 
 "Who's she?" asked Gabriel, with a most lugubrious face. 
 
 " Oh, Gabe ! you think everybody's Mrs. Markle," said Oily, 
 swiftly. " She was a lady ez was with thet Lawyer Maxwell, 
 ez heerd it all. Why, Lord, she seemed to take ez much 
 interest in it as the lawyer. PVaps," said Oily, with a slight 
 degree of conscious pride as raconteur, " p'r'aps it was the way 
 I told it. I was thet mad, Gabe, and sassy !" 
 
 " And what did he say ?" continued Gabriel, still ruefully, 
 for to him, as to most simple, serious natures devoid of any 
 sense of humour, all this inconsequent hilarity looked suspicious. 
 
 "Why, he was fur puttin' right over here ' to explain,' ez he 
 called it, but the lady stopped him, and sed somethin' low I 
 didn't get to hear. Oh, she must be a partikler friend o' his, 
 Gabe for he did everythin' thet she said. And she said I 
 was to go back and say thet we needn't hurry ourselves to git 
 away at all. And thet's the end of it, Gabe." 
 
 "But didn't he say anythin' more, Oily?" said Gabriel, 
 anxiously. 
 
 " No ! He begin to ask me some questions about old times 
 and Starvation Camp, and I'd made up my mind to dis- 
 remember all them things ez I told you, Gabe, fur I'm jest sick 
 of being called a cannon-ball, so I jest disremembered every 
 thing ez fast ez he asked it, until he sez, sez he to this lady, 
 'She evidently knows nothin' o' the whole thing.' But the 
 lady had been tryin' to stop his askin' questions, and hed been 
 kinder signin' to me not to answer, too. Oh, she's cute, Gabe ; 
 I could see thet ez soon ez I set down." 
 
 "What did she look like, Oily?" said Gabriel, with an 
 affectation of carelessness, but still by no means yet entirely 
 relieved in his mind. 
 
Simplicity versus Sagacity. 85 
 
 " Oh, she didn't look like Mrs. Markle, Gabe, or any o*" 
 thet kind. A kinder short woman, with white teeth, and a 
 small waist, and good clo'es. I didn't sort o' take to her 
 much, Gabe, though she was very kind to me. I don't know 
 ez I could say ezackly what she did look like ; I reckon thar 
 ain't anybody about yer looks like she. Saints and goodness ! 
 Gabe, that's her now ; thar she is." 
 
 Something darkened the doorway. Gabriel, looking up, 
 beheld the woman he had saved in the canon. It was Madame 
 Devarges ! 
 
BOOK III. THE LEAD. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 AN OLD PIONEER OF '49. 
 
 A THICK fog, dense, impenetrable, bluish-grey and raw, marked 
 the advent of the gentle summer of 1854 on the California 
 coast. The brief immature spring was scarcely yet over there 
 were flowers still to be seen on the outlying hills around San Fran 
 cisco, and the wild oats were yet green on the Contra Costa 
 mountains. But the wild oats were hidden under a dim India- 
 inky veil, and the wild flowers accepted the joyless embraces 
 of the fog with a staring waxen rigidity. In short, the w r eather 
 was so uncomfortable that the average Californian was more 
 than ever inclined to impress the stranger aggressively with the 
 fact that fogs were healthy, and that it w r as the " finest climate 
 on the earth." 
 
 Perhaps no one was better calculated or more accustomed to 
 impress the stranger with this belief than Mr. Peter Dumphy, 
 banker and capitalist His outspoken faith, in the present and 
 future of California, was unbounded. His sincere convictions 
 that no country or climate was ever before so signally favoured, 
 his intoleration of any criticism or belief to the contrary, made 
 him a representative man. So positive and unmistakable was 
 his habitual expression on these subjects, that it was impossible 
 to remain long in his presence without becoming impressed 
 with the idea that any other condition of society, climate, or 
 civilization, than that which obtained in California, was a 
 mistake. Strangers were brought early to imbibe from this 
 fountain ; timid and weak Californians in danger of a relapse 
 had their faith renewed and their eyesight restored by bathing 
 in this pool that Mr. Dumphy kept always replenished. Un 
 consciously people at last got to echoing Mr. Dumphy's views 
 as their own, and much of the large praise that appeared in 
 newspapers, public speeches, and correspondence, was first 
 voiced by Dumphy. It must not be supposed that Mr. 
 
An Old Pioneer of '49. 87 
 
 Dumphy's positiveness of statement and peremptory manner 
 were at all injurious to his social reputation. Owing to that 
 suspicion with which most frontier communities regard polite 
 concession and suavity of method, Mr. Dumphy's brusque 
 frankness was always accepted as genuine. " You always know 
 what Pete Dumphy means," was the average criticism. " He 
 ain't goin' to lie to please any man." To a conceit that was so 
 outspoken as to be courageous, to an ignorance that was so 
 freely and shamelessly expressed as to make hesitating and 
 cautious wisdom appear weak and unmanly beside it, Mr. 
 Dumphy added the rare quality of perfect unconscientiousness 
 unmixed with any adulterating virtue. It was with such rare 
 combative qualities as these that Mr. Dumphy sat that morning 
 in his private office and generally opposed the fog without, or 
 rather its influence upon his patrons and society at large. The 
 face he offered to it was a strong one, although superficially 
 smooth, for since the reader had the honour of his acquain 
 tance, he had shaved off his beard, as a probably unnecessary 
 indication of character. It was still early, but he had already 
 despatched much business with that prompt decision which 
 made even an occasional blunder seem heroic. He was sign 
 ing a letter that one of his clerks had brought him, when he 
 said briskly, without looking up " Send Mr. Ramirez in." 
 
 Mr. Ramirez, who had already called for three successive 
 days without obtaining an audience of Dumphy, entered the 
 private room with an excited sense of having been wronged, 
 which, however, instantly disappeared, as far as external mani 
 festation was concerned, on his contact with the hard-headed, 
 aggressive, and prompt Dumphy. 
 
 " How do ?" said Dumphy, without looking up from his 
 desk. Mr. Ramirez uttered some objection to the weather, 
 and then took a seat uneasily near Dumphy. " Go on," said 
 Dumphy, " I can listen." 
 
 "It is I who came to listen," said Mr. Ramirez, with great 
 suavity. " It is of the news, I would hear." 
 
 " Yes," said Mr. Dumphy, signing his name rapidly to several 
 documents, "Yes, Yes, YES." He finished them, turned 
 rapidly upon Ramirez, and said " Yes" ! again, in such a posi 
 tive manner as to utterly shipwreck that gentleman's self- 
 control. " Ramirez !" said Dumphy, abruptly, " how much 
 have you got in that thing ?" 
 
88 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Mr. Ramirez, still floating on a sea of conjecture, could only 
 say, " Eh ! Ah ! It is what ?" 
 
 " How deep are you ? How much would you lose ?" 
 
 Mr. Ramirez endeavoured to fix his eyes upon Dumphy's.. 
 " How much would I lose ? if how ? If what ?" 
 
 " What money have you got in it ?" said Mr. Dum- 
 phy, emphasizing each word sharply, with the blunt end of his 
 pen on the desk. 
 
 " No money ! I have much interest in the success of 
 Madame Devarges !" 
 
 " Then you're not * in' much ! That's lucky for you. Read 
 that letter. Show him in !" 
 
 The last remark was in reply to a mumbled interrogatory of 
 the clerk, who had just entered. Perhaps it was lucky for Mr. 
 Ramirez that Mr. Dumphy's absorption with his new visitor 
 prevented his observation of his previous visitor's face. As he 
 read the letter, Ramirez's face first turned to an ashen-grey 
 hue, then to a livid purple ; then he smacked his dry lips 
 thrice, and said " Car&mba" then with burning eyes he turned 
 towards Dumphy. 
 
 " You have read this ?" he asked, shaking the letter towards 
 Dumphy. 
 
 " One moment," interrupted Dumphy, finishing the conver 
 sation with his latest visitor, and following him to the door. 
 " Yes," he continued, returning to his desk and facing Ramirez. 
 " Yes !" Mr. Ramirez could only shake the letter and smile 
 in a ghastly way at Dumphy. " Yes," said Dumphy, reaching 
 forward and coolly taking the letter out of Ramirez's hand. 
 " Yes. Seems she is going to get married," he continued, con 
 sulting the letter. "Going to marry the brother, the man in 
 possession. That puts you all right ; any way the cat jumps-. 
 And it lets you out." With the air of having finished the inter 
 view, Mr. Dumphy quietly returned the letter, followed by 
 Ramirez's glaring eyes, to a pigeon-hole in his desk, and tapped 
 his desk with his pen-holder. 
 
 " And you you ?" gasped Ramirez, hoarsely, " you ?" 
 
 " Oh, / didn't go into it a dollar. Yet it was a good invest 
 ment. She could have made out a strong case. You had 
 possession of the deed or will, didn't you? There was no 
 evidence of the existence of the other woman," continued Mr. 
 Dumphy, in his usually loud voice, overlooking the cautionary 
 
An Old Pioneer of '49. 89 
 
 gestures of Mr. Ramirez, with perfect indifference. " Hello ! 
 How do?" he added, to another visitor. " I was sending you 
 a note." Mr. Ramirez rose. His long finger nails were buried 
 in the yellow flesh of his palms. His face was quite bloodless 
 and his lips were dry. " What's your hurry ?" said Dumphy, 
 looking up. " Come in again ! There's another matter I 
 want you to look into, Ramirez ! We've got some money out 
 on a claim that ought to have one or two essential papers to 
 make it right. I dare say they're lying round somewhere where 
 you can find 'em. Draw on me for the expense." Mr. 
 Dumphy did not say this slyly, nor with any dark significance, 
 but with perfect frankness. Virtually it said " You're a 
 scamp, so am I ; whether or not this other man who overhears 
 us is one likewise, it matters not." He took his seat again, 
 turned to the latest comer, and became oblivious of his previ 
 ous companion. 
 
 Luckily for Mr. Ramirez, when he reached the street he had 
 recovered the control of his features, if not his natural colour. 
 At least the fog, which seemed to lend a bluish-grey shade to 
 all complexions, allowed his own livid cheek to pass unnoticed. 
 He walked quickly, and it appeared, almost unconsciously, to 
 wards the water, for it was not until he reached the steamboat 
 wharf that he knew where he was. He seemed to have taken 
 one step from Mr. Dumphy's office to the pier. There was 
 nothing between these two objects in his consciousness. The 
 interval was utterly annihilated. The steamboat did not leave 
 for Sacramento until eight that evening, and it was only ten 
 o'clock now. He had been conscious of this as he walked, but 
 he could not have resisted this one movement, even if a futile 
 one, towards the object of his revengeful frenzy. Ten hours to 
 wait ten hours to be passive, inactive to be doing nothing ! 
 How could he pass the time ? He could sharpen his knife. 
 He could buy a new one. He could purchase a better pistol. 
 He remembered passing a gunsmith's shop with a display of 
 glittering weapons in its window. He retraced his steps and 
 entered the shop, spending some moments in turning over the 
 gunsmith's various wares. Especially was he fascinated by a 
 long, broad-bladed bowie-knife. "My own make," said the 
 tradesman, with professional pride, passing a broad, leathery 
 thumb along the keen edge of the blade. " It'll split a half- 
 dollar. See!" 
 
90 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 He threw a half-dollar on the counter, and with a quick, 
 straight, down-darting stab pierced it in halves. Mr. Ramirez 
 was pleased, and professed a desire to make the experiment 
 himself. But the point slipped, sending the half-dollar across 
 the shop and cutting a long splintering furrow in the counter. 
 
 " Yer narves ain't steady. And ye try too hard," said the 
 man, coolly. " Thet's the way it's apt to be with you gents. 
 Ye jest work yourself up into a fever 'bout a little thing like 
 thet, ez if everything depended on it. Don't make sich a big 
 thing of it. Take it easy like this," and with a quick, firm, 
 workmanlike stroke the tradesman repeated the act successfully. 
 Mr. Ramirez bought the knife. As the man wrapped it up in 
 paper, he remarked with philosophic kindness "I wouldn't 
 try to do it agin this mornin'. It's early in the day, and I've 
 noticed thet gents ez hez been runnin' free all night ain't apt to 
 do theirselves justice next mornin'. Take it quietly alone by 
 yourself, this arternoon ; don't think you're goin' to do anythin' 
 big, and you'll fetch it, sure !" 
 
 When Mr. Ramirez was in the street again he looked at his 
 watch. Eleven o'clock ! Only one hour gone. He buttoned 
 his coat tightly over the knife in his breast pocket, and started 
 on again feverishly. Twelve o'clock found him rambling over 
 the sand hills near the Mission Dolores. In one of the by 
 streets he came upon a woman looking so like the one that 
 filled all his thoughts, that he turned to look at her again with 
 a glance so full of malevolence that she turned from him in 
 terror. This circumstance, his agitation, and the continual 
 dryness of his lips sent him into a saloon, where he drank 
 freely, without, however, increasing or abating his excitement. 
 When he returned to the crowded streets again he walked 
 quickly, imagining that his manner was noticed by others, in 
 such intervals as he snatched from the contemplation of a 
 single intention. There were several ways of doing it. One 
 was to tax her with her deceit and then kill her in the tempest 
 of his indignation. Another and a more favourable thought 
 was to surprise her and her new accomplice for Mr. Ramirez, 
 after the manner of most jealous reason ers, never gave her 
 credit for any higher motive than that she had shown to him 
 and kill them both. Another and a later idea was to spend 
 the strength of his murderous passion upon the man, and then 
 to enjoy her discomfiture, the failure of her plans, and perhaps 
 
An Old Pioneer of '49. 91 
 
 her appeals for forgiveness. But it would still be two days 
 before he could reach them. Perhaps they were already 
 married. Perhaps they would be gone ! In all this wild, 
 passionate, and tumultuous contemplation of an effect, there 
 never had been for a single lament in his mind the least 
 doubt of the adequacy of the c mse. That he was a dupe, a 
 hopeless, helpless dupe, was sufficient. Since he had read 
 the letter, his self-consciousness had centred upon a single 
 thought, expressed to him in a single native word, " Bobo." 
 It was continually before his eyes. He spelled it on the signs 
 in the street It kept up a dull monotonous echo in his ears. 
 " Bobo." Ah ! she should see ! 
 
 It was past noon, and the fog had deepened. Afar from the 
 bay came the sounds of bells and whistles. If the steamer 
 should not go ? If she should be delayed, as often happened, 
 for several hours? He would go down to the wharf and 
 inquire. In the meantime, let the devil seize the fog ! Might 
 the Holy St. Bartholomew damn for ever the cowardly dog of 
 a captain and the cayote crew who would refuse to go ! He 
 came sharply enough down Commercial Street, and then, when 
 opposite the Arcade Saloon, with the instinct that leads des 
 perate men into desperate places, he entered and glared 
 vindictively around him, The immense room, bright with 
 lights and glittering with gilding and mirrors, seemed quiet and 
 grave in contrast with the busy thoroughfare without. It was 
 still too early for the usual habitues of the place only a few 
 of the long gambling tables were occupied. There was only a 
 single monte bank " open," and to this Ramirez bent his steps 
 with the peculiar predilections of his race. It so chanced that 
 Mr. Jack Hamlin was temporarily in charge of the interests of 
 this bank, and was dealing in a listless, perfunctory manner. 
 It may be parenthetically remarked that his own game was 
 faro. His present position was one of pure friendliness to the 
 absent dealer, who was taking his dinner above stairs. 
 Ramirez flung a piece of gold on the table and lost. Again 
 lie attempted fortune and lost. He lost the third time. Then 
 his pent-up feelings found vent in the characteristic " Cardmba!^ 
 Mr. Jack Hamlin looked up. It was not the oath, it was not 
 the expression of ill-humour, both of which were common 
 enough in Mr. Hamlin's experience, but a certain distinguishing 
 quality in the voice which awoke Jack's peculiarly retentive 
 
92 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 memory. He looked up and, to borrow his own dialect, at once 
 " spotted" the owner of the voice. He made no outward sign 
 of his recognition, but quietly pursued the game. In the next 
 deal Mr. Ramirez won ! Mr. Hamlin quietly extended his 
 croupe and raked down Mr. Ramirez's money with the losers'. 
 
 As Mr. Hamlin doubtless had fully expected, Mr. Ramirez 
 rose with a passionate scream of rage. Whereat Mr. Hamlin 
 coolly pushed back Mr. Ramirez's stake and winnings without 
 looking up. Leaving it upon the table, Ramirez leaped to the 
 gambler's side. 
 
 " You would insult me, so ! You would ch ee at ! eh ? 
 You would take my money, so !" he said, hoarsely, gesticu 
 lating passionately with one hand, while with the other he 
 grasped as wildly in his breast. 
 
 Mr. Jack Hamlin turned a pair of dark eyes on the speaker, 
 and said, quietly, "Sit down, Johnny !" 
 
 With the pent-up passion of the last few hours boiling in his 
 blood, with the murderous intent of the morning still darkling 
 in his mind, with the passionate sense of a new insult stinging 
 him to madness, Mr. Ramirez should have struck the gambler 
 to the earth. Possibly that was his intention as he crossed to 
 his side ; possibly that was his conviction as he heard himself 
 he Victor Ramirez ! whose presence in two days should strike 
 terror to two hearts in One Horse Gulch ! addressed as 
 Johnny ! But he looked into the eyes of Mr. Hamlin and 
 hesitated. What he saw there I cannot say. They were 
 handsome eyes, clear and well opened, and had been considered 
 by several members of a fond and confiding sex as peculiarly arch 
 and tender. But, it must be confessed, Mr. Ramirez returned 
 to his seat without doing anything. 
 
 "Ye don't know that man," said Mr. Hamlin to the two 
 players nearest him, in a tone of the deepest confidence, which 
 was, however, singularly enough, to be heard distinctly by every 
 one at the table, including Ramirez. " You don't know him, 
 but I do ! He's a desprit character," continued Mr. Hamlin, 
 glancing at him and quietly shuffling the cards, " a very desprit 
 character ! Make your game, gentlemen ! Keeps a cattle 
 ranch in Sonoma, and a private graveyard whar he buries his 
 own dead. They call him the * Yaller Hawk of Sonoma/ 
 He's outer sorts jest now : probably jest killed some one up 
 thar, and smells blood." Mr. Ramirez smiled a ghastly smile, 
 
An Old Pioneer of '49. 93 
 
 and affected to examine the game minutely and critically as 
 Mr. Hamlin paused to rake in the gold. " He's artful is 
 Johnny !" continued Mr. Hamlin, in the interval of shuffling, 
 "artful and sly ! Partikerly when he's after blood ! See him 
 sittin' thar and smilin'. He doesn't want to interrupt the game. 
 He knows, gentlemen, thet in five minutes from now, Jim will 
 be back here and I'll be free. Thet's what he's waitin' for ! 
 That's what's the matter with the * Yaller Slaughterer of Sonoma ! 
 Got his knife ready in his breast, too. Done up in brown paper 
 to keep it clean. He's mighty pertikler 'bout his weppins is 
 Johnny. Hez a knife for every new man." Ramirez rose 
 with an attempt at jocularity, and pocketed his gains. Mr. 
 Hamlin affected not to notice him until he was about to leave 
 the table. " He's goin' to wait for me outside," he exclaimed. 
 " In five minutes, Johnny," he called to Ramirez's retreating 
 figure. " If you can't wait, I'll expect to see you at the 
 Marysville Hotel next week, Room No. 95, the next room, 
 Johnny, the next room !" 
 
 The Mr. Ramirez who reached the busy thoroughfare again 
 was so different from the Mr. Ramirez who twenty minutes 
 before had entered the Arcade that his identity might have 
 easily been doubted. He did not even breathe in the same 
 way ; his cheek, although haggard, had resumed its colour ; 
 his eyes, which hitherto had been fixed and contemplative, had 
 returned to their usual restless vivacity. With the exception 
 that at first he walked quickly on leaving the saloon, and once 
 or twice hurriedly turned to see if anybody were following him, 
 his manner was totally changed. And this without effusion of 
 blood, or the indulgence of an insatiable desire for revenge ! 
 As I prefer to deal with Mr. Ramirez without affecting to know 
 any more of that gentleman than he did himself, I am unable 
 to explain any more clearly than he did to himself the reason 
 for this change in his manner, or the utter subjection of his 
 murderous passion. When it is remembered that for several 
 hours he had had unlimited indulgence, without opposition, in 
 his own instincts, but that for the last twenty minutes he had 
 some reason to doubt their omnipotence, perhaps some explana 
 tion may be adduced. I only know that by half-past six Mr. 
 Ramirez had settled in his mind that physical punishment 
 of his enemies was not the most efficacious means of revenge, 
 and that at half-past seven he had concluded not to take the 
 
94 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Sacramento boat. And yet for the previous six hours I have 
 reason to believe that Mr. Ramirez was as sincere a murderer 
 as ever suffered the penalty of his act, or to whom circumstances 
 had not offered a Mr. Hamlin to act upon a constitutional 
 cowardice. 
 
 Mr. Ramirez proceeded leisurely down Montgomery Street 
 until he came to Pacific Street. At the corner of the street 
 his way was for a moment stopped by a rattling team and 
 waggon that dashed off through the fog in the direction of the 
 wharf. Mr. Ramirez recognised the express and mail for the 
 Sacramento boat. But Mr. Ramirez did not know that the 
 express contained a letter which ran as follows 
 
 "DEAR MADAM, Yours of the loth received, and contents noted. Am 
 willing to make our services contingent upon your success. We believe 
 your present course will be quite as satisfactory as the plan you first pro 
 posed. Would advise you not to give a personal interview to Mr. Ramirez, 
 but refer him to Mr. Gabriel Conroy. Mr. Ramirez's manner is such as to 
 lead us to suppose that he might offer violence, unless withheld by the pre 
 sence of a third party. Yours respectfully, 
 
 " PETER DUMPHY." 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 A CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 
 
 THE street into which Ramirez plunged at first sight appeared 
 almost impassable, and but for a certain regularity in the 
 parallels of irregular, oddly built houses, its original intention 
 as a thoroughfare might have been open to grave doubt. It 
 was dirty, it was muddy, it was ill-lighted ; it was rocky and 
 precipitous in some places, and sandy and monotonous in 
 others. The grade had been changed two or three times, and 
 each time apparently for the worse, but always with a noble 
 disregard for the dwellings, which were invariably treated as an 
 accident in the original design, or as obstacles to be overcome 
 at any hazard. The near result of this large intent was to 
 isolate some houses completely, to render others utterly inac 
 cessible except by scaling ladders, and to produce the general 
 impression that they were begun at the top and built down. 
 The remoter effect was to place the locality under a social ban, 
 and work a kind of outlawry among the inhabitants. Several 
 
A Cloud of Witnesses. 95 
 
 of the houses were originally occupied by the Spanish native 
 Californians, who, with the conservative instincts of their race 
 still clung to their casas after the Americans had flown to 
 pastures new and less rocky and inaccessible beyond. Their 
 vacant places were again rilled by other native Californians, 
 through that social law which draws the members of an inferior 
 and politically degraded race into gregarious solitude and isola 
 tion, and the locality became known as the Spanish Quarter. 
 That they lived in houses utterly inconsistent with their habits 
 and tastes ; that they affected a locality utterly foreign to their 
 inclinations or customs, was not the least pathetic and grotesque 
 element to a contemplative observer. 
 
 Before, or rather beneath one of these structures, Mr. 
 Ramirez stopped, and began the ascent of a long flight of 
 wooden steps, that at last brought him to the foundations of 
 the dwelling. Another equally long exterior staircase brought 
 him at last to the verandah or gallery of the second story, the 
 first being partly hidden by an embankment. Here Mr. 
 Ramirez discovered another flight of narrower steps leading 
 down to a platform before the front door. It was open. In 
 the hall- way two or three dark-faced men were lounging, smok 
 ing cigar iios, and enjoying, in spite of the fog, the apparently 
 unseasonable neglige of shirt sleeves and no collars. At the 
 open front windows of the parlour two or three women were 
 sitting, clad in the lightest and whitest of flounced muslin skirts, 
 with heavy shawls over their heads and shoulders, as if summer 
 had stopped at their waists, like an equator. 
 
 The house was feebly lighted, or rather the gloom of yellowish- 
 browned walls and dark furniture, from which all lustre and 
 polish had been smoked, made it seem darker. Nearly every 
 room and all the piazzas were dim with the yellow haze of 
 burning cigaritos. There were light brown stains on the shirt 
 sleeves of the men, there were yellowish streaks on the other 
 wise spotless skirts of the women ; every masculine and femi 
 nine forefinger and thumb was steeped to its first joint with 
 yellow. The fumes of burnt paper and tobacco permeated the 
 whole house like some religious incense, through which occa 
 sionally struggled an inspiration of red peppers and garlic. 
 
 Two or three of the loungers addressed Ramirez in terms of 
 grave recognition. One of the women the stoutest appeared 
 at the doorway, holding her shawl tightly over her shoulders 
 
96 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 with one hand, as if to conceal a dangerous dishabille above 
 the waist, and, playfully shaking a black fan at the young man 
 with the other hand, applied to him the various epithets of 
 "Ingrate," "Traitor," and "Judas," with great vivacity and 
 volubility. Then she faced him coquettishly. " And after so 
 long, whence now, thou little blackguard ?" 
 
 " It is of business, my heart and soul," exclaimed Ramirez, 
 with hasty and somewhat perfunctory gallantry. " Who is 
 above ?" " Those who testify." 
 
 "And Don Pedro?" 
 
 " He is there, and the Seiior Perkins." 
 
 " Good. I will go on after a little," he nodded apologetically, 
 as he hastily ascended the staircase. On the first landing 
 above he paused, turned doubtfully toward the nearest door, 
 and knocked hesitatingly. There was no response. Ramirez 
 knocked again more sharply and decidedly. This resulted in 
 a quick rattling of the lock, the sudden opening of the door, 
 and the abrupt appearance of a man in ragged alpaca coat and 
 frayed trousers. He stared fiercely at Ramirez, said in Eng 
 lish, "what in h ! next door !" and as abruptly slammed 
 
 the door in Ramirez's face. Ramirez entered hastily the room 
 indicated by the savage stranger, and was at once greeted by a 
 dense cloud of smoke and the sound of welcoming voices. 
 
 Around a long table covered with quaint-looking legal papers, 
 maps, and parchments, a half-dozen men were seated. The 
 greater number were past the middle age, dark-featured and 
 grizzled-haired, and one, whose wrinkled face was the colour 
 and texture of redwood bark, was bowed with decrepitude. 
 
 " He had one hundred and two years day before yesterday. 
 He is the principal witness to Micheltorrena's signature in the 
 Castro claim," exclaimed Don Pedro. 
 
 " Is he able to remember?" asked Ramirez. 
 
 " Who knows ?" said Don Pedro, shrugging his shoulder. 
 " He will swear ; it is enough !" 
 
 " What animal have we in the next room ?" asked Ramirez. 
 "Is it wolf or bear ?" 
 
 " The Senor Perkins," said Don Pedro. 
 
 " Why is he ?" 
 
 " He translates." 
 
 Here Ramirez related, with some vehemence, how he mis 
 took the room, and the stranger's brusque salutation. The 
 
A Cloud of Witnesses. 97 
 
 company listened attentively and even respectfully, An Ameri 
 can audience would have laughed. The present company did 
 not alter their serious demeanour ; a breach of politeness to a 
 stranger was a matter of grave importance even to these doubt 
 ful characters. Don Pedro explained 
 
 "Ah, so it is believed that God has visited him here." He 
 tapped his forehead. " He is not of their country fashion at 
 all. He has punctuality, he has secrecy, he has the habitude. 
 When strikes the clock three he is here ; when it strikes nine 
 he is gone. Six hours to work in that room ! Ah, Heavens ! 
 The quanity of work it is astounding ! Folios ! Volumes \ 
 Good ! it is done. Punctually at nine of the night he takes up 
 a paper left on his desk by his padrone, in which is enwrapped 
 ten dollars the golden eagle, and he departs for that day. 
 They tell to me that five dollars is gone at the gambling-table, 
 but no more ! then five dollars for subsistence always the 
 same. Always ! Always ! He is a scholar so profound, so 
 admirable ! He has the Spanish, the French, perfect. He is 
 worth his weight in gold to the lawyers you understand but 
 they cannot use him. To them he says ' I translate, lies or 
 what not ! Who knows ? I care not but no more.' He is 
 wonderful !" 
 
 The allusion to the gaming-table revived Victor's recollection, 
 and his intention in his present visit. " Thou hast told me, 
 Don Pedro," he said, lowering his voice in confidence, " how 
 much is fashioned the testimony of the witnesses in regard of 
 the old land grants by the Governors and Alcaldes. Good. Is 
 it so ?" 
 
 Don Pedro glanced around the room. " Of those that are 
 here to-night five will swear as they are prepared by me you 
 comprehend and there is a Governor, a Military Secretary, an 
 Alcalde, a Comandante, and saints preserve us ! an Archbishop \ 
 They are respectable caballeros ; but they have been robbed, 
 you comprehend, by the Americanos. What matters ? They 
 have been taught a lesson. They will get the best price for 
 their memory. Eh? They will sell it where it pays best. 
 Believe me, Victor ; it is so." 
 
 " Good," said Victor. " Listen ; if there was a man a 
 brigand, a devil an American ! who had extorted from Pico 
 a grant you comprehend a grant, formal, and regular, and 
 recorded accepted of the Land Commission and some one, 
 
 H 
 
98 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 eh ? even myself, should say to you it is all wrong, my friend, 
 my brother ah !" 
 
 " From Pico ?" asked Don Pedro. 
 
 " Si, from Pico, in '47," responded Victor, "a grant" 
 
 Don Pedro rose, opened a secretary in the corner, and took 
 out some badly printed, yellowish blanks, with a seal in the 
 right hand lower corner. 
 
 " Custom House paper from Monterey," explained Don 
 Pedro, " blank with Governor Pico's signature and rubric. 
 Comprehendest thou, Victor, my friend ? A second grant is 
 simple enough !" 
 
 Victor's eyes sparkled. 
 
 "But two for the same land, my brother?" 
 
 Don Pedro shrugged his shoulders, and rolled a fresh 
 cigarito. 
 
 " There are two for nearly every grant of his late Excellency. 
 Art thou certain, my brave friend, there are not three to this of 
 which thou speakest ? If there be but one Holy Mother ! it 
 is nothing. Surely the land has no value. Where is this 
 modest property ? How many leagues square ? Come, we 
 will retire in this room, and thou mayst talk undisturbed. 
 There is excellent aguardiente too, my Victor, come," and Don 
 Pedro rose, conducted Victor into a smaller apartment, and 
 closed the door. 
 
 Nearly an hour elapsed. During that interval the sound of 
 Victor's voice, raised in passionate recital, might have been 
 heard by the occupants of the larger room but that they were 
 completely involved in their own smoky atmosphere, and were 
 perhaps politely oblivious of the stranger's business. They 
 chatted, compared notes, and examined legal documents with 
 the excited and pleased curiosity of men to whom business and 
 the present importance of its results was a novelty. At a few 
 minutes before nine Don Pedro reappeared with Victor. I 
 grieve to say that either from the reaction of the intense ex 
 citement of the morning, from the active sympathy of his 
 friend, or from the equally soothing anodyne of aguardiente, he 
 was somewhat incoherent, interjectional, and effusive. The 
 effect of excessive stimulation on passionate natures like 
 Victor's is to render them either maudlin or affectionate. Mr. 
 Ramirez was both. He demanded with tears in his eyes to be 
 led to the ladies. He would seek in the company of Manuela, 
 
A Cloztd of Witnesses. 99 
 
 the stout female before introduced to the reader, that sympathy 
 which an injured, deceived, and confiding nature like his own 
 so deeply craved. 
 
 On the staircase he ran against a stranger, precise, dignified, 
 accurately clothed and fitted the " Senor Perkins" just re 
 leased from his slavery, a very different person from the one 
 accidentally disclosed to him an hour before, on his probable 
 way to the gaming table, and his habitual enjoyment on the 
 evening of the day. In his maudlin condition, Victor would 
 have fain exchanged views with him in regard to the general 
 deceitfulness of the fair, and the misfortunes that attend a 
 sincere passion, but Don Pedro hurried him below into the 
 parlour, and out of the reach of the serenely contemptuous 
 observation of the Senor Perkins's eye. Once in the parlour, 
 and in the presence of the coquettish Manuela, who was still 
 closely shawled, as if yet uncertain and doubtful in regard to 
 the propriety of her garments above the waist, Victor, after a 
 few vague remarks upon the general inability of the sex to 
 understand a nature so profoundly deep and so wildly passion 
 ate as his own, eventually succumbed in a large black 
 haircloth armchair, and became helplessly and hopelessly 
 comatose. 
 
 " We must find a bed here for him to-night," said the sympa 
 thizing, but practical Manuela; "he is not fit, poor imbecile, 
 to be sent to his hotel. Mother of God ! what is this ?" 
 
 In lifting him out of the chair into which he had subsided 
 with a fatal tendency to slide to the floor, unless held by main 
 force, something had fallen from his breast pocket, and 
 Manuela had picked it up. It was the bowie-knife he had 
 purchased that morning. 
 
 " Ah !" said Manuela, " desperate little brigand : he has been 
 among the Americanos ! Look, my uncle !" 
 
 Don Pedro took the weapon quietly from the brown hands 
 of Manuela and examined it coolly. 
 
 " It is new, my niece," he responded, with a slight shrug of 
 his shoulders. "The gloss is still upon its blade. We will 
 take him to bed." 
 
 H2 
 
IOO Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE CHARMING MRS. SEPULVIDA. 
 
 IF there was a spot on earth of which the usual dead monotony 
 of the California!! seasons seemed a perfectly consistent and 
 natural expression, that spot was the ancient and time-honoured 
 pueblo and Mission of the blessed St. Anthony. The change 
 less, cloudless, expressionless skies of summer seemed to 
 symbolize that aristocratic conservatism which repelled all 
 innovation, and was its distinguishing mark. The stranger who 
 rode into the pueblo, in his own conveyance, for the instincts 
 of San Antonio refused to sanction the introduction of a stage 
 coach or diligence that might bring into the town irresponsible 
 and vagabond travellers, read in the faces of the idle, lounging 
 peons the fact that the great rancheros who occupied the out 
 lying grants had refused to sell their lands, long before he 
 entered the one short walled street and open plaza, and found 
 that he was in a town where there was np hotel or tavern, and 
 that he was dependent entirely upon the hospitality of some 
 courteous resident for a meal or a night's lodging. 
 
 As he drew rein in the courtyard of the first large adobe 
 dwelling, and received the grave welcome of a strange but 
 kindly face, he saw around him everywhere the past unchanged. 
 The sun shone as brightly and fiercely on the long red tiles of 
 the low roofs, that looked as if they had been thatched with 
 longitudinal slips of cinnamon, even as it had shone for the last 
 hundred years ; the gaunt wolf-like dogs ran out and barked 
 at him as their fathers and mothers had barked at the preceding 
 stranger of twenty years before. There were the few wild 
 half-broken mustangs tethered by strong riatas before the 
 verandah of the long low Fonda, with the sunlight glittering on 
 their silver trappings ; there were the broad, blank expanses of 
 whitewashed adobe wall, as barren and guiltless of record as the 
 uneventful days, as monotonous and expressionless as the 
 staring sky above ; there were the white, dome-shaped towers 
 of the Mission rising above the green of olives and pear-trees, 
 twisted, gnarled, and knotted with the rheumatism of age; 
 there was the unchanged strip of narrow white beach, and 
 beyond, the sea vast, illimitable, and always the same. The 
 steamers that crept slowly up the darkening coast line were 
 
The Charming Mrs. Sepulvida. 101 
 
 something remote, unreal, and phantasmal ; since the Philip 
 pine galleon had left its bleached and broken ribs in the sand in 
 1640, no vessel had, in the memory of man, dropped anchor in 
 the open roadstead below the curving Point of Pines, and the 
 white walls, and dismounted bronze cannon of the Presidio, 
 that looked blankly and hopelessly seaward. 
 
 For all this, the pueblo of San Antonio was the cynosure of 
 the covetous American eye. Its vast leagues of fertile soil, 
 its countless herds of cattle, the semi-tropical luxuriance of its 
 vegetation, the salubrity of its climate, and the existence of 
 miraculous mineral springs, were at once a temptation and an 
 exasperation to greedy speculators of San Francisco. Happily 
 for San Antonio, its square leagues were held by only a few 
 of the wealthiest native gentry. The ranches of " the Bear," 
 of the " Holy Fisherman," of " The Blessed Trinity," com 
 prised all of the outlying lands, and their titles were patented 
 and secured to their native owners in the earlier days of the 
 American occupation, while their comparative remoteness from 
 the populous centres had protected them from the advances of 
 foreign cupidity. But one American had ever entered upon 
 the possession and enjoyment of this California!) Arcadia, 
 and that was the widow of Don Jose Sepulvida. Eighteen 
 months ago the excellent Sepulvida had died at the age of 
 eighty-four, and left his charming young American wife the sole 
 mistress of his vast estate. Attractive, of a pleasant, social 
 temperament, that the Donna Maria should eventually bestow 
 her hand and the estate upon some losel Americano, who would 
 bring ruin in the hollow disguise of " improvements" to the 
 established and conservative life of San Antonio, was an event 
 to be expected, feared, and, if possible, estopped by fasting and 
 prayer. 
 
 When the Donna Maria returned from a month's visit to 
 San Francisco after her year's widowhood, alone, and to all 
 appearances as yet unattached, it is said that a Te Deum was 
 sung at the Mission church. The possible defection of the 
 widow became still more important to San Antonio, when it 
 was remembered that the largest estate in the valley, the' 
 " Rancho of the Holy Trinity," was held by another member 
 of this deceitful sex the alleged natural half-breed daughter of 
 a deceased Governor but happily preserved from the possible 
 fate of the widow by religious preoccupation and the habits of 
 
IO2 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 a recluse. That the irony of Providence should leave the fate 
 and future of San Antonio so largely dependent upon the 
 results of levity, and the caprice of a susceptible sex, gave a 
 sombre tinge to the gossip of the little pueblo if the grave, 
 decorous discussion of Senores and Senoras could deserve 
 that name. Nevertheless it was believed by the more devout 
 that a miraculous interposition would eventually save San 
 Antonio from the Americanos and destruction, and it was 
 alleged that the patron saint, himself accomplished in the art 
 of resisting a peculiar form of temptation, would not scruple to 
 oppose personally any undue weakness of vanity or the flesh 
 in helpless widowhood. Yet, even the most devout and trust 
 ful believers, as they slyly slipped aside veil or manta, to peep 
 furtively at the Donna Maria entering chapel, in the heathenish 
 abominations of a Parisian dress and bonnet, and a face rosy 
 with self-consciousness and innocent satisfaction, felt their 
 hearts sink within them, and turned their eyes in mute sup 
 plication to the gaunt, austere patron saint pictured on the 
 chancel wall above them, who, clutching a skull and crucifix as 
 if for support, seemed to glare upon the pretty stranger with 
 some trepidation and a possible doubt of his being able to 
 resist the newer temptation. 
 
 As far as was consistent with Spanish courtesy, the Donna 
 Maria was subject to a certain mild espionage. It was even 
 hinted by some of the more conservative that a duenna was 
 absolutely essential to the proper decorum of a lady representing 
 such large social interests as the widow Sepulvida, although 
 certain husbands, who had already suffered from the imperfect 
 protection of this safeguard, offered some objection. But the 
 pretty widow, when this proposition was gravely offered by her 
 ghostly confessor, only shook her head and laughed. " A 
 husband is the best duenna. Father Felipe," she said, archly, 
 and the conversation ended. 
 
 Perhaps it was as well that the gossips of San Antonio did 
 not know how imminent was their danger, or how closely im 
 perilled were the vast social interests of fazfiueblo on the 3rd 
 day of June, 1854. 
 
 It was a bright, clear morning so clear that the distinct 
 peaks of the San Bruno mountains seemed to have encroached 
 upon the San Antonio valley overnight so clear that the hori 
 zon line of the vast Pacific seemed to take in half the globe 
 
The Charming Mrs. Sepulvida. 103; 
 
 beyond. It was a morning, cold, hard, and material as granite,, 
 yet with a certain mica sparkle in its quality a morning full ot 
 practical animal life, in which bodily exercise was absolutely 
 essential to its perfect understanding and enjoyment. It was 
 scarcely to be wondered that the Donna Maria Sepulvida, who 
 was returning from a visit to her steward and major-domo, at 
 tended by a single vaquero, should have thrown the reins for 
 ward on the neck of her yellow mare, "Tita," and dashed at a 
 wild gallop down the white strip of beach that curved from 
 the garden wall of the Mission to the Point of Pines, a league 
 beyond. " Concho," the venerable vaquero, after vainly en 
 deavouring to keep pace with his mistress's fiery steed, and 
 still more capricious fancy, shrugged his shoulders, and sub 
 sided into a trot, and was soon lost among the shifting sand 
 dunes. Completely carried away by the exhilarating air and 
 intoxication of the exercise, the Donna Maria with her brown 
 hair shaken loose from the confinement of her little velvet 
 hat, the whole of a pretty foot, and at times, I fear, part of a 
 symmetrical ankle visible below the flying folds of her grey 
 riding-skirt, flecked here and there with the racing spume of 
 those Homeric seas at last reached the " Point of Pines" 
 which defined the limits of the peninsula. 
 
 But when the gentle Mistress Sepulvida was within a hun 
 dred yards of the Point she expected to round, she saw with 
 some chagrin, that the tide was up, and that each dash of the 
 breaking seas sent a thin, reaching film of shining water up to 
 the very roots of the pines. To her still further discomfiture, 
 she saw also that a smart-looking cavalier had likewise reined 
 in his horse on the other side of the Point, and was evidently 
 watching her movements with great interest, and, as she feared, 
 with some amusement. To go back would be to be followed 
 by this stranger, and to meet the cynical but respectful obser 
 vation of Concho ; to go forward, at the worst, could only be 
 a slight wetting, and a canter beyond the reach of observation 
 of the stranger, who could not in decency turn back after 
 her. All this Donna Maria saw with the swiftness of feminine 
 intuition, and, without apparently any hesitation in her face 
 or her intent, dashed into the surf below the Point. 
 
 Alas for feminine logic ! Mistress Sepulvida's reasoning was 
 perfect, but her premises were wrong. Tita's first dash was a 
 brave one, and carried her half round the Point, the next was 
 
IO4 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 a simple flounder ; the next struggle sunk her to her knees, 
 the next to her haunches. She was in a quicksand ! 
 
 " Let the horse go. Don't struggle ! Take the end of 
 3 7 our riata. Throw yourself flat on the next wave, and let it 
 take you out to sea !" 
 
 Donna Maria mechanically loosed the coil of hair rope which 
 hung over the pommel of her saddle. Then she looked around 
 in the direction of the voice. But she saw only a riderless 
 horse, moving slowly along; the Point. 
 
 "Quick! Now then! 1 ' The voice was seaward now; 
 where, to her frightened fancy, some one appeared to be swim 
 ming. Donna Maria hesitated no longer ; with the recoil of 
 the next wave, she threw herself forward, and was carried float 
 ing a few yards, and dropped again on the treacherous sand. 
 
 " Don't move, but keep your grip on the riata !" 
 
 The next wave would have carried her back, but she began 
 to comprehend, and, assisted by the yielding sand, held her 
 own and her breath until the under-tow sucked her a few yards 
 seaward ; the sand was firmer now ; she floated a few yards 
 further, when her arm was seized ; she was conscious of being 
 impelled swiftly through the water, of being dragged out of the 
 surge, of all her back hair coming down, that she had left her 
 boots behind her in the quicksand, that her rescuer was a 
 stranger, and a young man and then she fainted. 
 
 When she opened her brown eyes again she was lying on 
 the dry sand beyond the Point, and the young man was on 
 the beach below her, holding both the horses his own arid Tita ! 
 
 " I took the opportunity of getting your horse out. Relieved 
 of your weight, and loosened by the tide, he got his foot over 
 the riata, and Charley and I pulled him out If I am not 
 mistaken, this is Mrs. Sepulvida?" 
 
 Donna Maria assented in surprise. 
 
 "And I imagine this is your man coming to look for you." 
 He pointed to Concho, who was slowly making his way among 
 the sand dunes towards the point. " Let me assist you on 
 your horse again. He need not know nobody need know 
 the extent of your disaster." 
 
 Donna Maria, still bewildered, permitted herself to be 
 assisted to her saddle again, despite the" consequent terrible 
 revelation of her shoeless feet. Then she became conscious 
 that she had not thanked her deliverer, and proceeded to do 
 
Father Felipe. 105 
 
 so with such embarrassment that the stranger's laughing inter 
 ruption was a positive relief. 
 
 " You would thank me better if you were to set off in a 
 stinging gallop over those sun-baked, oven-like sand-hills, and 
 so stave off a chill ! For the rest, I am Mr. Poinsett, one of 
 your late husband's legal advisers, here on business that will 
 most likely bring us together I trust much more pleasantly to 
 you than this. Good morning !" 
 
 He had already mounted his horse, and was lifting his hat. 
 Donna Maria was not a very clever woman, but she was bright 
 enough to see that his business brusquerie was either the 
 concealment of a man shy of women, or the impertinence of 
 one too familiar with them. In either case it was to be 
 resented. 
 
 How did she do it ? Ah me ! She took the most favour 
 able hypothesis. She pouted, I regret to say. Then she said 
 
 " It was all your fault !" 
 
 "How?'; 
 
 "Why, if you hadn't stood there, looking at me and 
 criticising, I shouldn't have tried to go round." 
 
 With this Parthian arrow she dashed off, leaving her rescuer 
 halting between a bow and a smile. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 FATHER FELIPE. 
 
 WHEN Arthur Poinsett, after an hour's rapid riding over the 
 scorching sand-hills, finally drew up at the door of the Mission 
 Refectory, he had so far profited by his own advice to Donna 
 Maria as to be quite dry, and to exhibit very little external trace 
 of his late adventure. It is more remarkable perhaps that 
 there was very little internal evidence either. No one who 
 did not know the peculiar self-sufficiency of Poinsett's indi 
 viduality would be able to understand the singular mental and 
 moral adjustment of a man keenly alive to all new and present 
 impressions, and yet able to dismiss them entirely, without a 
 sense of responsibility or inconsistency. That Poinsett thought 
 twice of the woman he had rescued that he ever reflected 
 again on the possibilities or natural logic of his act during 
 
io6 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 his ride, no one who thoroughly knew him would believe. 
 When he first saw Mrs. Sepulvida at the Point of Pines, he 
 was considering the possible evils or advantages of a change in 
 the conservative element of San Antonio ; when he left her, he 
 returned to the subject again, and it fully occupied his thoughts 
 until Father Felipe stood before him in the door of the 
 refectory. I do not mean to say that he at all ignored a 
 certain sense of self-gratulation in the act, but I wish to convey 
 the idea that all other considerations were subordinate to this 
 sense. And possibly also the feeling, unexpressed, however, 
 by any look or manner, that if he was satisfied, everybody else 
 ought to be. 
 
 If Donna Maria had thought his general address a little too 
 irreverent, she would have been surprised at his greeting with 
 Father Felipe. His whole manner was changed to one of 
 courteous and even reverential consideration, of a boyish faith 
 and trustfulness, of perfect confidence and self-forge tfuln ess, 
 and moreover was perfectly sincere. She would have been 
 more surprised to have noted that the object of Arthur's 
 earnestness was an old man, and that beyond a certain gentle 
 and courteous manner and refined bearing, he was unpic- 
 turesque and odd-fashioned in dress, snuffy in the sleeves, and 
 possessed and inhabited a pair of shoes so large, shapeless, 
 and inconsistent with the usual requirements of that article as 
 to be grotesque. 
 
 It was evident that Arthur's manner had previously pre 
 disposed the old man in his favour. He held out two soft 
 brown hands to the young man, addressed him with a pleasant 
 smile as " My son/' and welcomed him to the Mission. 
 
 " And why not this visit before ?" asked Father Felipe, when 
 they were seated upon the little verandah that overlooked the 
 Mission garden, before their chocolate and cigaritos. 
 
 " I did not know I was coming until the day before yester 
 day. It seems that some new grants of the old ex-Governor's 
 have been discovered, and that a patent is to be applied for. 
 My partners being busy, I was deputed to come here and 
 look up the matter. To tell the truth, I was glad of an excuse 
 to see our fair client, or, at least, be disappointed as my 
 partners have been, in obtaining a glimpse of the mysterious 
 Donna Dolores." 
 
 " Ah, my dear Don Arturo," said the Padre, with a slightly 
 
Father Felipe. 107 
 
 deprecatory movement of his brown hands, " I fear you will be 
 no more fortunate than others. It is a penitential week with 
 the poor child, and at such times she refuses to see any one, 
 even on business. Believe me, my dear boy, you, like the 
 others more than the others permit your imagination to run 
 away with your judgment. Donna Dolores' concealment of 
 her face is not to heighten or tempt the masculine curiosity, 
 but alas ! poor child is only to hide the heathenish tattoo- 
 ings that deface her cheek. You know she is a half-breed. 
 Believe me, you are all wrong. It is foolish, perhaps vanity 
 who knows ? but she is a woman what would you ?" con 
 tinued the sagacious Padre, emphasizing the substantive with a 
 slight shrug worthy of his patron saint. 
 
 " But they say, for all that, she is very beautiful," continued 
 Arthur, with that mischievousness with was his habitual method 
 of entertaining the earnestness of others, and which he could 
 not entirely forego, even with the Padre. 
 
 " So ! so ! Don Arturo it is idle gossip !" said Father 
 Felipe, impatiently, " a brown Indian girl with a cheek as 
 tawny as the summer fields." 
 
 Arthur made a grimace that might have been either of assent 
 or deprecation. 
 
 " Well, I suppose this means that I am to look over the 
 papers with you alone. Bueno ! Have them out, and let us 
 get over this business as soon as possible." 
 
 " Poco tiempo" said Father Felipe, with a smile. Then more 
 gravely, " But what is this ? You do not seem to have that 
 interest in your profession that one might expect of the rising 
 young advocate the junior partner of the great firm you 
 represent. Your heart is not in your work eh ?" 
 
 Arthur laughed. 
 
 " Why not ? It is as good as any." 
 
 " But to right the oppressed ? To do justice to the unjustly 
 accused, eh ? To redress wrongs ah, my son ! that is noble. 
 That, Don Arturo it is that has made you and your colleagues- 
 dear to me dear to those who have been the helpless victims 
 of your courts your corregidores" 
 
 " Yes, yes," interrupted Arthur, hastily, shedding the Father's 
 praise with an habitual deft ease that was not so much the re 
 sult of modesty as a certain conscious pride that resented any 
 imperfect tribute. "Yes, I suppose it pays as well, if not 
 
io8 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 better in the long run. ' Honesty is the best policy,' as our 
 earliest philosophers say." 
 
 " Pardon ?" queried the Padre. 
 
 Arthur, intensely amused, made a purposely severe and 
 literal translation of Franklin's famous apothegm, and then 
 watched Father Felipe raise his eyes and hands to the ceiling 
 in pious protest and mute consternation. 
 
 "And these are your American ethics?" he said at last. 
 
 " They are, and in conjunction with manifest destiny, and 
 the star of Empire, they have brought us here, and have given 
 me the honour of your acquaintance," said Arthur in English. 
 
 Father Felipe looked at his friend in hopeless bewilderment. 
 Arthur instantly became respectful and Spanish. To change 
 the subject and relieve the old man's evident embarrassment, 
 he at once plunged into a humorous description of his adven 
 ture of the morning. The diversion was only partially success 
 ful. Father Felipe became at once interested, but did not 
 laugh. When the young man had concluded he approached 
 him, and laying his soft hand on Arthur's curls, turned his face 
 upward toward him with a parental gesture that was at once 
 habitual and professional, and said 
 
 " Look at me here. I am an old man, Don Arturo. Pardon 
 me if I think I have some advice to give you that may be 
 worthy your heaving. Listen, then ! You are one of those 
 men capable of peculiarly affecting and being affected by 
 women. So ! Pardon," he continued, gently, as a slight flush 
 rose into Arthur's cheek, despite the smile that came as quickly 
 to his face. " Is it not so ? Be not ashamed, Don Arturo ! 
 It is not here," he added, with a poetical gesture toward the 
 Avail of the refectory, where hung the painted effigy of the 
 blessed St. Anthony ; " it is not here that I would undervalue 
 or speak lightly of their influence. The widow is rich, eh ? 
 handsome, eh ? impulsive ? You have no heart in the profes 
 sion you have chosen. What then ? You have some in the 
 instincts what shall I say the accomplishments and graces 
 you have not considered worthy of a practical end ! You are 
 a natural lover. Pardon ! You have the four S's ' Sdno, 
 solo, solicito, y secreto? Good ! Take an old man's advice, 
 and make good use of them. Turn your weaknesses eh? 
 perhaps it is too strong a word ! the frivolities and vanities of 
 your youth into a power for your old age ! Eh ?" 
 
Father Felipe. 109 
 
 Arthur smiled a superior smile. He was thinking of the 
 horror with which the old man had received the axiom he had 
 recently quoted. He threw himself back in his chair in an 
 attitude of burlesque sentiment, and said, with simulated 
 heroics 
 
 " But what, O my Father ! what if a devoted, exhausting 
 
 passion for somebody else already filled my heart? You 
 
 ' would not advise me to be false to that ? Perish the thought !" 
 
 Father Felipe did not smile. A peculiar expression passed 
 over his broad, brown, smoothly shaven face, and the habitual 
 look of childlike simplicity and deferential courtesy faded from 
 it. He turned his small black eyes on Arthur, and said 
 
 "Do you think you are capable of such a passion, my son ? 
 Have you had an attachment that was superior to novelty or 
 self-interest ?" 
 
 Arthur rose a little stiffly . 
 
 " As we are talking of one of my clients and one of your 
 parishioners, are we not getting a little too serious, Father? 
 At all events, save me from assuming a bashful attitude towards 
 the lady with whom I am to have a business interview to 
 morrow. And now about the papers, Father," continued 
 Arthur, recovering his former ease. " I suppose the invisible 
 fair one has supplied you with all the necessary documents 
 and the fullest material for a brief. Go on. I am all at 
 tention." 
 
 " You are wrong again, son," said Father Felipe. " It is a 
 matter in which she has shown even more than her usual dis 
 inclination to talk. I believe but for my interference, she 
 would have even refused to press the claim. As it is, I imagine 
 she wishes to make some compromise with the thief pardon 
 me ! the what do you say ? eh ? the preemptor ! But I have 
 nothing to do with it. All the papers, all the facts are in the 
 possession of your friend, Mrs. Sepulvida. You are to see her. 
 Believe me, my friend, if you have been disappointed in not 
 finding your Indian client, you will have a charming substitute 
 and one of your own race and colour in the Donna Maria. 
 Forget, if you can, what I have said but you will not. Ah, 
 Don Arturo ! I know you better than yourself ! Come. Let 
 us walk in the garden. You have not seen the vines. I have 
 a new variety of grape since you were here before." 
 
 " I find nothing better than the old Mission grape, Father," 
 
1 10 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 said Arthur, as they passed down the branching avenue of 
 olives. 
 
 " Ah ! Yet the aborigines knew it not, and only valued it 
 when found wild, for the colouring matter contained in its skin. 
 From this, with some mordant that still remains a secret with 
 them, they made a dye to stain their bodies and heighten their 
 copper hue. You are not listening, Don Arturo, yet it should 
 interest you, for it is the colour of your mysterious client, the 
 Donna Dolores." 
 
 Thus chatting, and pointing out the various objects that 
 might interest Arthur, from the overflowing boughs of a vene 
 rable fig tree to the crack made in the adobe wall of the church 
 by the last earthquake, Father Felipe, with characteristic 
 courteous formality, led his young friend through the ancient 
 garden of the Mission. By degrees, the former ease and 
 mutual confidence of the two friends returned, and by thetime 
 that Father Felipe excused himself for a few moments to 
 attend to certain domestic arrangements on behalf of his new 
 guest perfect sympathy had been restored. 
 
 Left to himself, Arthur strolled back until opposite the 
 open chancel door of the church. Here he paused, and, in 
 obedience to a sudden impulse, entered. The old church was 
 unchanged like all things in San Antonio since the last 
 hundred years ; perhaps there was little about it that Arthur 
 had not seen at the other Missions. There were the old .rafters 
 painted in barbaric splendour of red and brown stripes ; there 
 were the hideous, waxen, glass-eyed saints, leaning forward 
 helplessly and rigidly from their niches ; there was the Virgin 
 Mary in a white dress and satin slippers, carrying the infant 
 Saviour in the opulence of lace long-clothes ; there was the 
 Magdalen in the fashionable costume of a Spanish lady of the 
 last century. There was the usual quantity of bad pictures; 
 the portrait, full length, of the patron saint himself, so hideously 
 and gratuitously old and ugly that his temptation by any self- 
 respecting woman appeared more miraculous than his resis 
 tance ; the usual martyrdoms in terrible realism ; the usual 
 " Last Judgments" in frightful accuracy of detail 
 
 But there was one picture under the nave which attracted 
 Arthur's listless eyes. It was a fanciful representation of Juni- 
 pero Serra preaching to the heathen. I am afraid that it was 
 not the figure of that most admirable and heroic missionary 
 
Donna Maria makes an Impression. 1 1 1 
 
 which drew Arthur's gaze ; I am quite certain that it was not 
 the moral sentiment of the subject, but rather the slim, graceful, 
 girlish, half-nude figure of one of the Indian converts who 
 knelt at Father Junipero Serra's feet, in child-like but touching 
 awe and contrition. There was such a depth of penitential 
 supplication in the young girl's eyes a penitence so patheti 
 cally inconsistent with the absolute virgin innocence and help 
 lessness of the exquisite little figure, that Arthur felt his heart 
 beat quickly as he gazed. He turned quickly to the other 
 picture look where he would, the eyes of the little acolyte 
 seemed to follow and subdue him. 
 
 I think I have already intimated that his was not a reveren 
 tial nature. With a quick imagination and great poetic sensi 
 bility nevertheless, the evident intent of the picture, or even 
 the sentiment of the place, did not touch his heart or brain. 
 But he still half-unconsciously dropped into a seat, and, lean 
 ing both arms over the screen before him, bowed his head 
 against the oaken panel. A soft hand laid upon his shoulder 
 suddenly aroused him. 
 
 He looked up sharply and met the eyes of the Padre looking 
 down on him with a tenderness that both touched and exas 
 perated him. 
 
 " Pardon !" said Padre Felipe, gently. " I have broken in 
 upon your thoughts, child !" 
 
 A little more brusquely than was his habit with the Padre, 
 Arthur explained that he had been studying up a difficult 
 case. 
 
 " So !" said the Padre, softly, in response. " With tears in 
 your eyes, Don Arturo ? Not so !" he added to himself, as he 
 drew the young man's arm in his own and the two passed 
 slowly out once more into the sunlight. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 IN WHICH THE DONNA MARIA MAKES AN IMPRESSION. 
 
 THE Rancho of the -Blessed Fisherman looked seaward as 
 became its title. If the founder of the rancho had shown a 
 religious taste in the selection of the site of the dwelling, his 
 charming widow had certainly shown equal practical taste, and 
 
112 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 indeed a profitable availing of some advantages that the 
 founder did not contemplate, in the adornment of the house. 
 The low-walled square adobe dwelling had been relieved of 
 much of its hard practical outline by several feminine additions 
 and suggestions. The tiled roof had been carried over a very 
 broad verandah, supported by vine-clad columns, and the 
 lounging corridor had been, in defiance of all Spanish custom, 
 transferred from the inside of the house to the outside. The 
 interior courtyard no longer existed. The sombreness of the 
 heavy Mexican architecture was relieved by bright French 
 chintzes, delicate lace curtains, and fresh-coloured hangings. 
 The broad verandah was filled with the latest novelties of 
 Chinese bamboo chairs and settees, and a striped Venetian 
 awning shaded the glare of the seaward front. Nevertheless, 
 Donna Maria, out of respect to the local opinion, which 
 regarded these changes as ominous of if not a symbolical 
 putting off the weeds of widowhood, still clung to a few of the 
 local traditions. It is true that a piano occupied one side of 
 her drawing-room, but a harp stood in the corner. If a freshly- 
 cut novel lay open on the piano, a breviary was conspicuous 
 on the marble centre-table. If, on the mantel, an elaborate 
 French clock with bronze shepherdesses trifled with Time, on 
 the wall above it an iron crucifix spoke of Eternity. 
 
 Mrs. Sepulvida was at home that morning expecting a guest. 
 She was lying in a Manilla hammock, swung between two 
 posts of the verandah, with her face partially hidden by the 
 netting, and the toe of a little shoe just peeping beyond. Not 
 that Donna Maria expected to receive her guest thus ; on the 
 contrary, she had given orders to her servants that the moment 
 a stranger caballero appeared on the road she was to be 
 apprised of the fact. For I grieve to say that, far from taking 
 Arthur's advice, the details of the adventure at the Point of 
 Pines had been imparted by her own lips to most of her female 
 friends, and even to the domestics of her household. In the 
 earlier stages of a woman's interest in a man she is apt to be 
 exceedingly communicative ; it is only when she becomes 
 fully aware of the gravity of the stake involved that she begins 
 to hedge before the public. The morning after her adventure 
 Donna Maria was innocently full of its hero and unreservedly 
 voluble. 
 
 I have forgotten whether I have described her. Certainly 
 
Donna Maria makes an Impression. 1 1 3 
 
 I could not have a better opportunity than the present. In the 
 hammock she looked a little smaller, as women are apt to 
 when their length is rigidly defined. She had the average 
 quantity of brown hair, a little badly treated by her habit of 
 wearing it flat over her temples a tradition of her boarding- 
 school days, fifteen years ago. She had soft brown eyes, with 
 a slight redness of the eyelid not inconsistent nor entirely 
 unbecoming to widowhood ; a small mouth depressed at the 
 corners with a charming, child-like discontent ; white regular 
 teeth, and the eloquence of a complexion that followed un 
 varyingly her spirits of her physical condition. She appeared 
 to be about thirty, and had that unmistakable "married" look, 
 which even the most amiable and considerate of us, my dear 
 sir, are apt to impress upon the one woman whom we choose 
 to elect to years of exclusive intimacy and attention. The late 
 Don Jose Sepulvida's private mark as well defined as the 
 brand upon his cattle was a certain rigid line, like a grave 
 accent, from the angle of this little woman's nostril to the 
 corners of her mouth, and possibly to an increased peevishness 
 of depression at those corners. It bore witness to the fondness 
 of the deceased for bear-baiting and bull-fighting, and a possible 
 weakness for a certain Senora X. of San Francisco, whose 
 reputation was none of the best, and was not increased by her 
 distance from San Antonio and the surveillance of Donna 
 Maria. 
 
 When an hour later " Pepe" appeared to his mistress, bearing 
 a salver with Arthur Poinsett's business card and a formal 
 request for an interview, I am afraid Donna Maria was a little 
 disappointed. If he had suddenly scaled the verandah, 
 evaded her servants, and appeared before her in an impulsive, 
 forgivable way, it would have seemed consistent with his 
 character as a hero, and perhaps more in keeping with the 
 general tenor of her reveries when the servitor entered. 
 Howbeit, after heaving an impatient little sigh, and bidding 
 " Pepe" show the gentleman into the drawing-room, she slipped 
 quietly down from the hammock in a deft womanish way, and 
 whisked herself into her dressing-room. 
 
 " He couldn't have been more formal if Don Jose had been 
 alive," she said to herself as she walked to her glass and 
 dressing-table. 
 
 Arthur Poinsett entered the vacant drawing-room not in the 
 
 i 
 
H4 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 best of his many humours. He had read in the eyes of the 
 lounging vaqueros, in the covert glances of the women servants, 
 that the story of his adventure was known to the household. 
 Habitually petted and spoiled as he had been by the women 
 of his acquaintance, he was half inclined to attribute this 
 reference and assignment of his client's business to the hands 
 of Mrs. Sepulvida, as the result of a plan of Father Felipe's, or 
 absolute collusion between the parties. A little sore yet, and 
 irritated by his recollection of the Padre's counsel, and more 
 impatient of the imputation of a weakness than anything else. 
 Arthur had resolved to limit the interview to the practical 
 business on hand, and in so doing had, for a moment, I fear, 
 forgotten his native courtesy. It did not tend to lessen his 
 irritation and self-consciousness when Mrs. Sepulvida entered 
 the room without the slightest evidence of her recent disap 
 pointment visible in her perfectly easy, frank self-possession, 
 and after a conventional, half Spanish solicitousness regarding 
 his health since their last interview, without any further 
 allusions to their adventure, begged him to be seated. She 
 herself took an easy chair on the opposite side of the table, 
 and assumed at once an air of respectful but somewhat in 
 different attention. 
 
 " I believe," said Arthur, plunging at once into his subject 
 to get rid of his embarrassment and the slight instinct of 
 antagonism he was beginning to feel toward the woman before 
 him, " I believe that is, I am told that besides your own 
 business, you are entrusted with some documents and facts 
 regarding a claim of the Donna Dolores Salvatierra. Which 
 shall we have first? I am entirely at your service for the next 
 two hours, but we shall proceed faster and with less confusion 
 by taking up one thing at a time." 
 
 " Then let us begin with Donna Dolores, by all means," 
 said Donna Maria; "my own affairs can wait. Indeed," she 
 added, languidly, " I daresay one of your clerks could attend to 
 it as well as yourself. If your time is valuable as indeed it 
 must be I can put the papers in his hands and make him 
 listen to all my foolish, irrelevant talk. He can sift it for you, 
 Don Arturo. I really am a child about business, really." 
 
 Arthur smiled, and made a slight gesture of deprecation. In 
 spite of his previous resolution, Donna Maria's tone of slight 
 pique pleased him. Yet he gravely opened his note-book, and 
 
Donna Maria makes an Impression. 1 1 5, 
 
 took up his pencil without a word. Donna Maria observed 
 the movements, and said more seriously 
 
 " Ah yes ! how foolish ! Here I am talking about my own 
 affairs, when I should be speaking of Donna Dolores ! Well, 
 to begin. Let me first explain why she has put this matter in 
 my hands. My husband and her father were friends, and had 
 many business interests in common. As you have doubtless, 
 heard, she has always been very quiet, very reserved, very 
 religious almost a nun. I daresay she was driven into this 
 isolation by reason of the delicacy of her position here, for 
 you know do you not ? that her mother was an Indian. It 
 is only a few years ago that the old Governor, becoming a 
 widower and childless, bethought himself of this Indian child, 
 Dolores. He found the mother dead, and the girl living 
 somewhere at a distant Mission as an acolyte. He brought her 
 to San Antonio, had her christened, and made legally his 
 daughter and heiress. She was a mere slip of a thing, about 
 fourteen or fifteen. She might have had a pretty complexion,, 
 for some of these half-breeds are nearly white, but she had been 
 stained when an infant with some barbarous and indelible dye, 
 after the savage custom of her race. She is now a light copper 
 colour, not unlike those bronze shepherdesses on yonder clock. 
 In spite of all this I call her pretty. Perhaps it is because I 
 love her and am prejudiced. But you gentlemen are so critical 
 about complexion and colour no wonder that the poor child 
 refuses to see anybody, and never goes into society at all. It 
 is a shame ! But pardon, Mr. Poinsett, here am I gossiping 
 about your client's looks, when I should be stating her 
 grievances." 
 
 " No, no !" said Arthur, hastily, " go on in your own way.' 1 
 
 Mrs. Sepulvida lifted her forefinger archly. 
 
 " Ah ! is it so, Don Arturo ? I thought so ! Well, it is a, 
 great shame that she is not here for you to judge for 
 yourself." 
 
 Angry with himself for his embarrassment, and for the rising 
 colour on his cheek, Arthur would have explained himself, but 
 the lady, with feminine tact, did not permit him. 
 
 " To proceed : Partly because I did not participate in the 
 prejudices with which the old families here regarded her race 
 and colour, partly, perhaps, because we were both strangers, 
 here, we became friends. At first she resisted all my advances 
 
 i 2 
 
1 1 6 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 indeed, I think she was more shy of me than the others, 
 but I triumphed in time, and we became good friends. 
 Friends, you understand, Mr. Poinsett, not confidants. You 
 men, I know, deem this impossible, but Donna Dolores is a 
 singular girl, and I have never, except upon the most general 
 topics, won her from her habitual reserve. And I possess 
 perhaps her only friendship." 
 
 " Except Father Felipe, her confessor?" 
 
 Mrs. Sepulvida shrugged her shoulders, and then borrowed 
 the habitual sceptical formula of San Antonio. 
 
 " Qiiicn sabe? But I am rambling again. Now for the case."'' 
 
 She rose, and taking from the drawer of the secretary an 
 envelope, drew out some papers it contained, and referred to 
 them as she went on. 
 
 "It appears that a grant of Micheltorena to Salvatierra was 
 discovered recently at Monterey, a grant of which there was 
 no record among Salvatierra's papers. The explanation given 
 is that it was placed some five years ago in trust with a Don 
 Pedro Ruiz, of San Francisco, as security for a lease now 
 expired. The grant is apparently regular, properly witnessed, 
 and attested. Don Pedro has written that some of the wit 
 nesses are still alive, and remember it." 
 
 " Then why not make the proper application for a patent?" 
 
 " True, but if that were all, Don Arturo would not have 
 been summoned from San Francisco for consultation. There 
 is something else. Don Pedro writes that another grant for 
 the same land has been discovered recorded to another 
 party." 
 
 " That is, I am sorry to say, not a singular experience in our 
 profession," said Arthur, with a smile. " But Salvatiena's 
 known reputation and probity would probably be sufficient to 
 outweigh equal documentary evidence on the other side. It's 
 unfortunate he's dead, and the grant was discovered after his 
 death." 
 
 " But the holder of the other grant is dead too !" said the 
 widow. 
 
 " That makes it about equal again. But who is he ?" 
 
 Mrs. Sepulvida referred to her papers, and then said 
 
 " Dr. Devarges." 
 
 " Who ?" 
 
 " Devarges," said Mrs. Sepulvida, referring to her notes. 
 
Donna Maria makes an Impression. 1 1 7 
 
 " A singular name a foreigner, I suppose. No, really, Mr. 
 Poinsett, you shall not look at the paper until I have copied it 
 it's written horribly you can't understand it ! I'm really 
 ashamed of my writing, but I was in such a hurry, expecting 
 you every moment ! Why, la ! Mr. Poinsett, how cold your 
 hands are !" 
 
 Arthur Poinsett had risen hurriedly, and reached out almost 
 brusquely for the paper that she held. But the widow had 
 coquettishly resisted him with a mischievous show of force, 
 and had caught and dropped his hand ! 
 
 " And you are pale, too. Dear me ! I'm afraid you took 
 cold that morning," said Mrs. Sepulvida. " I should never 
 forgive myself if you did. I should cry my eyes out !" and 
 Donna Maria cast a dangerous look from under her slightly 
 swollen lids that looked as if they might threaten a deluge. 
 
 " Nothing, nothing, I have ridden far this morning, and 
 rose early," said Arthur, chafing his hands with a slightly 
 embarrassed smile. " But I interrupted you. Pray go on. 
 Has Dr. Devarges any heirs to contest the grant ?" 
 
 But the widow did not seem inclined to go on. She was 
 positive that Arthur wanted some wine. Would he not let her 
 order some slight repast before they proceeded further in this 
 horrid business ? She was tired. She was quite sure that 
 Arthur must be so too. 
 
 "It is my business," said Arthur, a little stiffly, but, re 
 covering himself again in a sudden and new alarm of the 
 widow, he smiled and suggested the sooner the business was 
 over, the sooner he would be able to partake of her hos 
 pitality. 
 
 The widow beamed prospectively. 
 
 " There are no heirs that we can find. But there is a - 
 what do you call it ? a something or other in possession !" 
 
 " A squatter ?" said Poinsett, shortly. 
 
 "Yes," continued the widow, with a light laugh; "a 
 * squatter,' by the name of of my writing is so horrid let 
 me see, oh, yes ! ' Gabriel Conroy.' " 
 
 Arthur made an involuntary gesture toward the paper with 
 his hand, but the widow mischievously skipped toward the 
 window, and, luckily for the spectacle of his bloodless face, 
 held the paper before her dimpled face and laughing eyes, as 
 she did so. 
 
1 1 8 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 "Gabriel Conroy," repeated Mrs. Sepulvida, "and and 
 and his " 
 
 " His sister?" said Arthur, with an effort. 
 
 " No, sir 1" responded Mrs. Sepulvida, with a slight pout, 
 " his wife / Sister indeed ! As if we married women are 
 ;always to be ignored by you legal gentlemen !" 
 
 Arthur remained silent, with his face turned toward the 
 -sea. When he did speak his voice was quite natural. 
 
 " Might I change my mind regarding your offer of a moment 
 ago, and take a glass of wine and a biscuit now ?" 
 
 Mrs. Sepulvida ran to the door. 
 
 " Let me look over your notes while you are gone," said 
 Arthur. 
 
 " You wont laugh at my writing?" 
 
 "No!" 
 
 Donna Maria tossed him the envelope gaily and flew out of 
 the room. Arthur hurried to the window with the coveted 
 memoranda. There were the names she had given him but 
 nothing more ! At least this was some slight relief. 
 
 The suddenness of the shock, rather than any moral senti 
 ment or fear, had upset him. Like most imaginative men, he 
 was a trifle superstitious, and with the first mention of Devarges's 
 name came a swift recollection of Padre Felipe's analysis of 
 his own character, his sad, ominous reverie in the chapel, the 
 trifling circumstance that brought him instead of his partner to 
 San Antonio, and the remoter chance that had discovered the 
 forgotten grant and selected him to prosecute its recovery. 
 This conviction entertained and forgotten, all the resources of 
 his combative nature returned. Of course he could not 
 prosecute this claim; of course he ought to prevent others 
 from doing it. There was every probability that the grant of 
 Devarges was a true one and Gabriel was in possession ! 
 Had he really become Devarges's heir, and if so, why had he 
 not claimed the grant boldly ? And where was Grace ? 
 
 In this last question there was a slight tinge of sentimental 
 recollection, but no remorse or shame. That he might in some 
 way be of service to her, he fervently hoped. That, time hav 
 ing blotted out the romantic quality of their early acquaintance, 
 there would really be something fine and loyal in so doing, he 
 did not for a moment doubt. He would suggest a compromise 
 to his fair client, himself seek out and confer with Grace and 
 
Donna Maria makes an Impression. 119 
 
 Gabriel, and all should be made right. His nervousness and 
 his agitation was, he was satisfied, only the result of a conscien 
 tiousness and a delicately honourable nature, perhaps too fine 
 and spiritual for the exigences of his profession. Of one thing 
 he was convinced : he really ought to carefully consider Father 
 Felipe's advice ; he ought to put himself beyond the reach of 
 these romantic relapses. 
 
 In this self-sustained, self-satisfied mood, Mrs. Sepulvida 
 found him on her return. Since she had been gone, he said, 
 he had been able to see his way quite clearly into this case, and 
 he had no doubt his perspicacity was greatly aided by the ad 
 mirable manner in which she had indicated the various points 
 on the paper she had given him. He was now ready to take 
 up her own matters, only he begged as clear and concise a 
 brief as she had already made for her friend. He was so cheer 
 ful and gallant that by the time luncheon was announced, the 
 widow found him quite charming, and was inclined to forgive 
 him for the disappointment of the morning. And when, after 
 luncheon, he callenged her to a sharp canter with him along 
 the beach, by way, as he said, of keeping her memory from 
 taking cold, and to satisfy herself that the Point of Pines could 
 be doubled without going out to sea, I fear that, without a pru 
 dent consideration of the gossips of San Antonio before her 
 eyes, she assented. There could be no harm in riding with her 
 late husband's legal adviser, who had called, as everybody 
 knew, on business, and whose time was so precious that he 
 must lie turn even before the business was concluded. And 
 then " Pepe" could follow them, to return with her ! 
 
 It did not, of course, occur to either Arthur or Donna Maria 
 that they might outrun " Pepe," who was fat and indisposed to 
 violent exertion ; nor that they should find other things to talk 
 about than the details of business ; nor that the afternoon 
 should be so marvellously beautiful as to cause them to fre 
 quently stop and admire the stretch of glittering sea beyond ; 
 nor that the roar of the waves was so deafening as to oblige 
 them to keep so near each other for the purposes of conversa 
 tion that the widow's soft breath was continually upon Arthur's 
 cheek ; nor that Donna Maria's saddle-girth should become so 
 loose that she was forced to dismount while Arthur tightened 
 it, and that he should be obliged to lift her in his arms to 
 restore her to her seat again. But finally, when the Point of 
 
12O Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Pines was safely rounded, and Arthur was delivering a few 
 parting words of legal counsel, holding one of her hands in his, 
 while with the other he was untwisting a long tress of her 
 blown down hair, that, after buffeting his cheek into colour, had 
 suddenly twined itself around his neck, an old-fashioned family 
 carriage, drawn by four black mules with silver harness, passed 
 them suddenly on the road. 
 
 Donna Maria drew her head and her hand away with a quick 
 blush and laugh, and then gaily kissed her finger-tips to the re 
 treating carriage. Arthur laughed also but a little foolishly 
 and looked as if expecting some explanation. 
 
 " You should have your wits about you, sir. Did you know 
 who that was ?" 
 
 Arthur sincerely confessed ignorance. He had not noticed 
 the carriage until it had passed. 
 
 " Think what you have lost ! That was your fair young 
 client/' 
 
 " I did not even see her," laughed Arthur. 
 
 " But she saw you ! She never took her eyes off you. 
 Adios 1" 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE LADY OF GRIEF. 
 
 " You will not go- to-day," said Father Felipe to Arthur, as he 
 entered the Mission refectory early the next morning to break 
 fast. 
 
 " I shall be on the road in an hour, Father," replied Arthur, 
 gaily. 
 
 " But not toward San Francisco," said the Padre. "Listen ! 
 Your wish of yesterday has been attained. You are to have 
 your desired interview with the fair invisible. Do you com 
 prehend ? Donna Dolores has sent for you." 
 
 Arthur looked up in surprise. Perhaps his face did not ex 
 press as much pleasure as Father Felipe expected, who lifted 
 his eyes to the ceiling, took a philosophical pinch of snuff, and 
 muttered 
 
 " Ah, lo que es el mudo / Now that he has his wish it io 
 nothing, Mother of God !" 
 
 " This \s> your kindness, Father," 
 
77/6' Lady of Grief. 121 
 
 " God forbid !" returned Padre Felipe, hastily. " Believe 
 me, my son, I know nothing. When the Donna left here 
 before the Angelus yesterday, she said nothing of this. Per 
 haps it is the office of your friend, Mrs. Sepulvida." 
 
 " Hardly, I think," said Arthur ; " she was so well prepared 
 with all the facts as to render an interview with Donna Dolores 
 unnecessary. Bueno, be it so ! I will go/' 
 
 Nevertheless, he was ill "at ease. He ate little, he was 
 silent. All the fears he had argued away with such self-satisfied 
 logic the day before, returned to him again with greater anxiety. 
 Could there have been any further facts regarding this inop 
 portune grant that Mrs. Sepulvida had not disclosed ? Was 
 there any particular reason why this strange recluse, who had 
 hitherto avoided his necessary professional presence, should 
 now desire a personal interview which was not apparently 
 necessary? Could it be possible that communication had 
 already been established with Gabriel or Grace, and that the 
 history of their previous life had become known to his client ? 
 Had his connexion with it been in any way revealed to the 
 Donna Dolores? 
 
 If he had been able to contemplate this last possibility with 
 calmness and courage yesterday when Mrs. Sepulvida first re 
 peated the name of Gabriel Conroy, was he capable of equal 
 resignation now ? Had anything occurred since then ? had 
 any new resolution entered his head to which such a revelation 
 would be fatal ? Nonsense ! And yet he could not help 
 commenting, with more or less vague uneasiness of mind, on 
 his chance meeting of Donna Dolores at the Point of Pines 
 yesterday and the summons of this morning. Would not his 
 foolish attitude with Donna Maria, aided, perhaps, by some in 
 discreet expression from the well-meaning but senile Padre 
 Felipe, be sufficient to exasperate his fair client had she been 
 cognizant of his first relations with Grace ? It is not mean 
 natures alone that are the most suspicious. A quick, generous 
 imagination, feverishly excited, will project theories of character 
 and intention far more ridiculous and uncomplimentary to 
 humanity than the lowest surmises of ignorance and imbecility. 
 Arthur was feverish and excited ; with all the instincts of a 
 contradictory nature, his easy sentimentalism dreaded, while 
 his combative principles longed for, this interview. Within an 
 hour of the time appointed by Donna Dolores, he lad thrown 
 
122 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 himself on his horse, and was galloping furiously toward the 
 " Rancho of the Holy Trinity." 
 
 It was inland and three leagues away under the foot-hills. 
 But as he entered upon the level plain, unrelieved by any 
 watercourse, and baked and cracked by the fierce sun into 
 narrow gaping chasms and yawning fissures, he unconsciously 
 began to slacken his pace. Nothing could be more dreary, 
 passionless, and resigned than the vast, sunlit, yet joyless 
 waste. It seemed as if it might be some illimitable, desolate 
 sea, beaten flat by the north-westerly gales that spent their 
 impotent fury on its unopposing levels. As far as the eye 
 could reach, its dead monotony was unbroken ; even the 
 black cattle that in the clear distance seemed to crawl over its 
 surface, did not animate it ; rather by contrast brought into 
 relief its fixed rigidity of outline. Neither wind, sky, nor 
 sun wrought any change over its blank, expressionless face. 
 It was the symbol of Patience a hopeless, weary, helpless 
 patience but a patience that was Eternal. 
 
 He had ridden for nearly an hour, when suddenly there 
 seemed to spring up from the earth, a mile away, a dark line 
 of wall, terminating in an irregular, broken outline against the 
 sky. His first impression was that it was the valda or a break 
 of the stiff skirt of the mountain as it struck the level plain. 
 But he presently saw the dull red of tiled roofs over the dark 
 adobe wall, and as he dashed down into the dry bed of a 
 vanished stream and up again on the opposite bank, he passed 
 the low walls of a corral, until then unnoticed, and a few crows, 
 in a rusty, half-Spanish, half-clerical suit, uttered a croaking 
 welcome to the Rancho of the Holy Trinity, as they rose from 
 the ground before him. It was the first sound that for an 
 hour had interrupted the monotonous jingle of his spurs or the 
 hollow beat of his horse's hoofs. And then, after the fashion 
 of the country, he rose slightly in his stirrups, dashed his spurs 
 into the sides of his mustang, swung the long, horsehair, braided 
 thong of his bridle-rein, and charged at headlong speed upon 
 the dozen lounging, apparently listless vaqueros, who, for the 
 past hour, had nevertheless been watching and waiting for him 
 at the courtyard gate. As he rode toward them, they separated, 
 drew up each side of the gate, doffed their glazed, stiff-brimmed, 
 black sombreros. t wheeled, put spurs to their horses, and in 
 .another instant were scattered to the four winds. When 
 
The Lady of Grief. 123 
 
 Arthur leaped to the brick pavement of the courtyard, there 
 was not one in sight. 
 
 An Indian servant noiselessly led away his horse. Another 
 peon as mutely led the way along a corridor over whose low 
 railings scrapes and saddle blankets were hung in a barbaric 
 confusion of colouring, and entered a bare-walled ante-room, 
 where another Indian old, grey-headed, with a face like a 
 wrinkled tobacco leaf was seated on a low wooden settle in 
 an attitude of patient expectancy. To Arthur's active fancy he 
 seemed to have been sitting there since the establishment of 
 the Mission, and to have grown grey in waiting for him. As 
 Arthur entered he rose, and with a few grave Spanish courtesies, 
 ushered him into a larger and more elaborately furnished 
 apartment, and again retired with a bow. Familiar as Arthur 
 was with these various formalities, at present they seemed to 
 have an undue signficance, and he turned somewhat impatiently 
 as a door opened at the other end of the apartment. At the 
 same moment a subtle strange perfume not unlike some bar 
 baric spice or odorous Indian herb stole through the door, 
 and an old woman, brown-faced, murky-eyed, and decrepit, 
 entered with a respectful courtesy. 
 
 " It is Don Arturo Poinsett ?" Arthur bowed. 
 
 " The Donna Dolores has a little indisposition, and claims 
 your indulgence if she receives you in her own room." 
 
 Arthur bowed assent. 
 
 " Bueno ! This way." 
 
 She pointed to the open door. Arthur entered by a narrow 
 passage cut through the thickness of the adobe wall into 
 another room beyond, and paused on the threshold. 
 
 Even the gradual change from the glaring sunshine of the 
 courtyard to the heavy shadows of the two rooms he had passed 
 through was not sufficient to accustom his eyes to the twilight 
 of the apartment he now entered. For several seconds he could 
 not distinguish anything but a few dimly outlined objects. By 
 degrees he saw that there were a bed, a prie-dieu, and a sofa 
 against the opposite wall. The scant light of two windows 
 mere longitudinal slits in the deep walls at first permitted him 
 only this. Later he saw that the sofa was occupied by a half- 
 reclining figure, whose face was partly hidden by a fan, and 
 the white folds of whose skirt fell in graceful curves to the 
 floor. 
 
1 24 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 "You speak Spanish, Don Arturo?" said an exquisitely 
 modulated voice from behind the fan, in perfect Castilian. 
 
 Arthur turned quickly toward the voice with an indescribable 
 thrill of pleasure in his nerves. 
 
 " A little." 
 
 He was usually rather proud of his Spanish, but for once the 
 conventional polite disclaimer was quite sincere. 
 
 " Be seated, Don Arturo !" 
 
 He advanced to a chair indicated by the old woman within 
 a few feet of the sofa and sat down. At the same instant the 
 reclining figure, by a quick, dexterous movement, folded the 
 large black fan that had partly hidden her features, and turned 
 her face toward him. 
 
 Arthur's heart leaped with a sudden throb, and then, as it 
 seemed to him, for a few seconds stopped beating. The eyes 
 that met his were large, lustrous, and singularly beautiful ; the 
 features were small, European, and perfectly modelled ; the 
 outline of the small face was a perfect oval, but the complexion 
 was of burnished copper ! Yet even the next moment he 
 found himself halting among a dozen comparisons a golden 
 sherry, a faintly dyed meerschaum, an autumn leaf, the inner 
 bark of the madrono. Of only one thing was he certain she 
 was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen ! 
 
 It is possible that the Donna read this in his eyes, for she 
 opened her fan again quietly, and raised it slowly before her 
 face. Arthur's eager glance swept down the long curves of her 
 graceful figure to the little foot in the white satin slipper belo\v. 
 Yet her quaint dress, except for its colour, might have been 
 taken for a religious habit, and had a hood or cape descending 
 over her shoulders not unlike a nun's. 
 
 " You have surprise, Don Arturo," she said, after a pause, 
 " that I have sent for you, after having before consulted you 
 by proxy. Good ! But I have changed my mind since then ! 
 I have concluded to take no steps for the present toward per 
 fecting the grant." 
 
 In an instant Arthur was himself again and completely on 
 his guard. The Donna's few words had recalled the past 
 that he had been rapidly forgetting; even the perfectly 
 delicious cadence of the tones in which it was uttered had 
 now no power to fascinate him or lull his nervous anxiety. 
 He felt a presentiment that the worst was coming. He 
 
The Lady of Grief. 125 
 
 :urned toward her outwardly calm, but alert, eager, and 
 vatchful. 
 
 " Have you any newly discovered evidence that makes the 
 ssue doubtful ?" he asked. 
 
 " No," said Donna Dolores. 
 
 " Is there anything? any fact that Mrs. Sepulvida has for 
 gotten ?" continued Arthur. " Here are, I believe, the points 
 she gave me," he added, and with the habit of a well-trained 
 ntelligence, he put before Donna Dolores, in a few well-chosen 
 vords, the substance of Mrs. Sepulvida's story. Nor did his 
 manner in the least betray a fact of which he was perpetually 
 :ognizant namely, that his fair client, between the sticks of 
 fan, was studying his face with more than feminine curiosity. 
 When he paused she said 
 
 " Bueno ! That is what I told her." 
 
 " Is there anything more ?" " Perhaps !" 
 
 Arthur folded his arms and looked attentive. Donna 
 Dolores began to go over the sticks of her fan one by one, as 
 f it were a rosary. 
 
 " I have become acquainted with some facts in this case 
 which may not interest you as a lawyer, Don Arturo, but which 
 affect me as a woman. When I have told you them, you will tell 
 me who knows ? that they do not alter the legal aspect of my 
 my father's claim. You will perhaps laugh at me for my re 
 solution. But I have given you so much trouble, that it is only 
 fair you should know it is not merely caprice that governs me 
 that you should know why your visit here is a barren one ; why 
 you the great advocate have been obliged to waste your 
 valuable time with my poor friend, Donna Maria, for nothing." 
 
 Arthur was too much pre-occupied to notice the peculiarly 
 feminine significance with which the Donna dwelt upon this 
 latter sentence a fact that would not otherwise have escaped 
 his keen observation. He slightly stroked his brown moustache, 
 and looked out of the window with masculine patience. 
 
 " It is not caprice, Don Arturo. But I am a woman and an 
 orphan ! You know my history ! The only friend I had has 
 left me here alone the custodian of these vast estates. Listen 
 to me, Don Arturo, and you will understand, or at least for 
 give, my foolish interest in the people who contest this claim. 
 For what has happened to them, to her, might have happened 
 to me, but for the blessed Virgin's mediation." 
 
126 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " To her who is she ?" asked Arthur, quietly. 
 
 " Pardon ! I had forgotten you do not know. Listen. You 
 have heard that this grant is occupied by a man and his wife 
 a certain Gabriel Conroy. Good ! You have heard that they 
 have made no claim to a legal title to the land, except through 
 pre-emption. Good. That is not true, Don Arturo !" 
 
 Arthur turned to her in undisguised surprise. 
 
 " This is new matter ; this is a legal point of some im 
 portance." 
 
 " Who knows ?" said Donna Dolores, indifferently. " It is 
 not in regard of that that I speak. The claim is this. The 
 Dr. Devarges, who also possesses a grant for the same land, 
 made a gift of it to the sister of this Gabriel. Do you compre 
 hend ?" She paused, and fixed her eyes on Arthur. 
 
 " Perfectly," said Arthur, with his gaze still fixed on the 
 window ; " it accounts for the presence of this Gabriel on the 
 land. But is she living ? Or, if not, is he her legally consti 
 tuted heir ? That is the question, and pardon me if I suggest 
 again a purely legal and not a sentimental question. Was 
 this woman who has disappeared this sister this sole and 
 only legatee a married woman had she a child ? Because 
 that is the heir." 
 
 The silence that followed this question was so protracted 
 that Arthur turned towards Donna Dolores. She had ap 
 parently made some sign to her aged waiting-woman, who was 
 bending over her, between Arthur and the sofa. In a moment, 
 however, the venerable handmaid withdrew, leaving them alone. 
 
 "You are right, Don Arturo," continued Donna Dolores, 
 behind her fan. "You see that, after all, your advice is 
 necessary, and what I began as an explanation of my folly may 
 be of business importance ; who knows ? It is good of you to 
 recal me to that. We women are foolish. You are sagacious 
 and prudent. It was well that I saw you !" 
 
 Arthur nodded assent, and resumed his professional attitude 
 of patient toleration that attitude which the world over has 
 been at once the exasperation and awful admiration of the 
 largely injured client. 
 
 " And the sister, the real heiress, is gone disappeared ! No 
 one knows where ! All trace of her is lost. But now comes 
 to the surface an impostor ! a woman who assumes the 
 character and name of Grace Conroy, the sister !" 
 
The Lady of Grief. 1 27 
 
 " One moment," said Arthur, quietly, " how do you know 
 that it is an impostor ?" 
 
 " How do I know it ?" 
 
 " Yes, what are the proofs ?" 
 
 " I am told so !" 
 
 " Oh !" said Arthur, relapsing into his professional attitude 
 again. 
 
 " Proofs," repeated Donna Dolores, hurriedly. " Is it not 
 enough that she has married this Gabriel, her brother ?" 
 
 " That is certainly strong moral proof and perhaps legal 
 corroborative evidence," said Arthur, coolly; " but it will not 
 legally estop her proving that she is his sister if she can do 
 so. But I ask your pardon go on !" 
 
 " That is all," said Donna Dolores, sitting up, with a slight 
 gesture of impatience. 
 
 " Very well. Then, as I understand, the case is simply 
 this : You hold a grant to a piece of land, actually possessed 
 by a squatter, who claims it through his wife or sister legally 
 it doesn't matter which by virtue of a bequest made by one 
 Dr. Devarges, who also held a grant to the same property ?" 
 
 " Yes," said Donna Dolores, hesitatingly. 
 
 " Well, the matter lies between you and Dr. Devarges only. 
 It is simply a question of the validity of the original grants. 
 All that you have told me does not alter that radical fact. 
 Stay ! One moment ! May I ask how you have acquired 
 these later details ?" 
 
 " By letter." 
 
 " From whom ?" 
 
 " There was no signature. The writer offered to prove all 
 he said. It was anonymous." 
 
 Arthur rose with a superior smile. 
 
 " May I ask you further, without impertinence, if it is upon 
 this evidence that you propose to abandon your claim to a 
 valuable property ?" 
 
 " I have told you before that it is not a legal question, Don 
 Arturo," said Donna Dolores, waving her fan a little more 
 rapidly. 
 
 " Good ! let us take it in the moral or sentimental aspect 
 since you have proposed to honour me with a request for my 
 counsel. To begin, you have a sympathy for the orphan, who 
 does not apparently exist." 
 
128 Gabriel Conrcy. 
 
 "But her brother?" 
 
 " Has already struck hands with the impostor, and married 
 her to secure the claim. And this brother what proof is 
 there that he is not an impostor too ?" 
 
 " True/' said Donna Dolores, musingly. 
 
 " He will certainly have to settle that trifling question with 
 Dr. Devarges's heirs, whoever they may be." 
 
 "True," said Donna Dolores. 
 
 " In short, I see no reason, even from your own view-point, 
 why you should not fight this claim. The orphan you sympa 
 thize with is not an active party. You have only a brother 
 opposed to you, who seems to have been willing to barter away 
 a sister's birthright. And, as I said before, your sympathies, 
 however kind and commendable they may be, will be of no avail, 
 unless the courts decide against Dr. Devarges. My advice is 
 to fight. If the right does not always succeed, my experience 
 is that the Right, at least, is apt to play its best card, and put 
 forward its best skill. And until it does that, it might as well 
 be the Wrong, you know." 
 
 "You are wise, Don Arturo. But you lawyers are so often 
 only advocates. Pardon, I mean no wrong. But if it were 
 Grace the sister, you understand what would be your advice?" 
 
 " The same. Fight it out ! If I could overthrow your 
 grant, I should do it. The struggle, understand me, is there, 
 and not with this wife and sister. But how does it come that a 
 patent for this has not been applied for before by Gabriel ? 
 Did your anonymous correspondent explain that fact ? It is a 
 point in our favour." 
 
 " You forget our grant was only recently discovered." 
 
 " True ! it is about equal, then, ab initio. And the absence 
 of this actual legatee is in our favour." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " Because there is a certain human sympathy in juries with 
 a pretty orphan particularly if poor." 
 
 " How do you know she was pretty ?" asked Donna Dolores, 
 quickly. 
 
 " I presume so. It is the privilege of orphanage," he said, 
 with a bow of cold gallantry. 
 
 " You are wise, Don Arturo. May you live a thousand 
 years." 
 
 This time it was impossible but Arthur should notice the 
 
The L ady of Grief. 1 2 9 
 
 irony of Donna Dolores's manner. All his strong combative 
 instincts rose. The mysterious power of her beauty, which he 
 could not help acknowledging, her tone of superiority, whether 
 attributable to a consciousness of this power over him, or some 
 knowledge of his past all aroused his cold pride. He 
 remembered the reputation that Donna Dolores bore as a 
 religious devotee and rigid moralist. If he had been taxed 
 with his abandonment of Grace, with his half-formed designs 
 upon Mrs. Sepulvida. he would have coldly admitted them 
 without excuse or argument. In doing so, he would have been 
 perfectly conscious that he should lose the esteem of Donna 
 Dolores, of whose value he had become, within the last few 
 moments, equally conscious. But it was a part of this young 
 man's singular nature that he would have experienced a certain 
 self-satisfaction in the act, that would have outweighed all 
 other considerations. In the ethics of his own consciousness 
 he called this " being true to himself." In a certain sense he 
 was right. 
 
 He rose, and, standing respectfully before his fair client, 
 said 
 
 " Have you decided fully ? Do I understand that I am to 
 press this claim with a view of ousting these parties ? or will 
 you leave them for the present in undisturbed possession of 
 the land?" 
 
 " But what do you say ?" continued Donna Dolores, with her 
 eyes fixed upon his face. 
 
 " I have said already/' returned Arthur, with a patient smile. 
 " Morally and legally, my advice is to press the claim !" 
 
 Donna Dolores turned her eyes away with the slightest 
 shade of annoyance. 
 
 " Bueno ! We shall see. There is time enough. Be seated, 
 Don Arturo. What is this ? Surely you will not refuse our 
 hospitality to-night ?" 
 
 " I fear," said Arthur, with grave politeness, "that I must 
 return to the Mission at once. I have already delayed my 
 departure a day. They expect me in San Francisco to 
 morrow." 
 
 " Let them wait. You shall write that important business 
 keeps you here, and Diego shall ride my own horse to reach 
 the embarcadero for the steamer to-night. To-morrow he will 
 be in San Francisco." 
 
130 Gabriel Conroy 
 
 Before he could stay her hand she had rung a small bronze 
 bell that stood beside her. 
 
 " But, Donna Dolores " Arthur began, hastily. 
 
 " I understand/' interrupted Donna Dolores. " Diego/ 3 she 
 continued, rapidly, as a servant entered the room, " saddle 
 Jovita instantly and make ready for a journey. Then return 
 here. Pardon !" she turned to Arthur. " You would say your 
 time is valuable. A large sum depends upon your presence ! 
 Good ! Write to your partners that I will pay all that no one 
 else can afford to give as large a sum for your services as 
 myself. Write that here you must stay." 
 
 Annoyed and insulted as Arthur felt, he could not help 
 .gazing upon her with an admiring fascination. The imperious 
 habit of command ; an almost despotic control of a hundred 
 servants ; a certain barbaric contempt for the unlimited revenues 
 at her disposal that prompted the act, became her wonderfully. 
 In her impatience the quick blood glanced through her bronzed 
 cheek, her little slipper tapped the floor imperiously, and her 
 eyes flashed in the darkness. Suddenly she stopped, looked 
 -at Arthur, and hesitated. 
 
 " Pardon me ; I have done wrong. Forgive me, Don 
 Arturo. I am a spoiled woman who for five years has had her 
 own way. I am apt to forget there is any world beyond my 
 little kingdom here. Go, since it must be so, go at once." 
 
 She sank back on the sofa, half veiled her face with her fan, 
 and dropped the long fringes of her eyes with a deprecating 
 and half languid movement. 
 
 Arthur stood for a moment irresolute and hesitating, but only 
 for a moment. 
 
 " Let me thank you for enabling me to fulfil a duty without 
 foregoing a pleasure. If your messenger is trustworthy and 
 .fleet it can be done. I will stay." 
 
 She turned towards him suddenly and smiled. A smile 
 ^apparently so rare to that proud little mouth and those dark, 
 melancholy eyes; a smile that disclosed the smallest and 
 whitest of teeth in such dazzling contrast to the shadow of her 
 face ; a smile that even after its brightness had passed still left 
 its memory in a dimple in either nut-brown cheek and a 
 glistening moisture in the dark eyes that Arthur felt the warm 
 blood rise to his face. 
 
 "There are writing materials in the other room. Diego 
 
A L eaf out of the Past. 1 3 1 
 
 will find you there," said Donna Dolores, " and I will rejoin 
 you soon. Thanks." 
 
 She held out the smallest and brownest of hands. Arthur 
 bent over it for a single moment, and then withdrew with a 
 quickened pulse to the outer room. As the door closed upon 
 him, Donna Dolores folded her fan, threw herself back upon 
 the sofa, and called, in a quick whisper 
 
 " Manuela !" 
 
 The old woman reappeared with an anxious face and ran 
 towards the sofa. But she was too late ; her mistress had 
 fainted. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 A LEAF OUT OF THE PAST. 
 
 ARTHUR'S letter to his partners was a brief explanation of his 
 delay, and closed with the following sentence 
 
 "Search the records for any deed or transfer of the grant from Dr. 
 Devarges." 
 
 He had scarcely concluded before Diego entered ready for 
 the journey. When he had gone Arthur waited with some 
 impatience the reappearance of Donna Dolores. To his dis 
 appointment, however, only the solemn major-domo strode 
 grimly into the room like a dark-complexioned ghost, and, as 
 it seemed to Arthur, with a strong suggestion of the Com 
 mander in Don Giovanni in his manner, silently beckoned him 
 to follow to the apartment set aside for his reception. In 
 keeping with the sun-evading instincts of Spanish Californian 
 Architecture the room was long, low, and half lighted ; the two 
 barred windows on either side of the doorway gave upon the 
 corridor and courtyard below ; the opposite wall held only a 
 small narrow, deeply embrasured loop-hole, through which 
 Arthur could see the vast, glittering sun-illumined plain be 
 yond. The hard, monotonous, unwinking glare without did not 
 penetrate the monastic gloom of this chamber ; even the insane, 
 incessant restlessness of the wind that perpetually beset the 
 bleak walls was unheard and unfelt in the grave, contemplative 
 solitude of this religious cell. 
 
 Mingled with this grateful asceticism was the quaint contrast 
 
 K2 
 
132 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 of a peculiar Spanish luxuriousness. In a curtained recess an 
 immense mahogany bedstead displayed a yellow satin coverlet 
 profusely embroidered with pink and purple silk flowers. The 
 borders of the sheets and cases of the satin pillows were deeply 
 edged with the finest lace. Beside the bed and before a large 
 armchair heavy rugs of barbaric colours covered the dark 
 wooden floor, and in front of the deep oven-like hearth lay an 
 immense bear-skin. About the hearth hung an ebony and gold 
 crucifix, and, mingled with a few modern engravings, the usual 
 Catholic saints and martyrs occupied the walls. It struck 
 Arthur's observation oddly that the subjects of the secular en 
 gravings were snow landscapes. The Hospice of St. Bernard 
 in winter, a pass in the Austrian Tyrol, the Steppes of Russia, 
 a Norwegian plain, all to Arthur's fancy brought the tempera 
 ture of the room down considerably. A small water-colour of 
 an Alpine flower touched him so closely that it might have 
 blossomed from his recollection. 
 
 Dinner, which was prefaced by a message from Donna 
 Dolores excusing herself through indisposition, was served in 
 solemn silence. A cousin of the late Don Jose Salvatierra 
 represented the family and pervaded the meal with a mild 
 flavour of stale cigaritos and dignified criticism of remote events. 
 Arthur, disappointed at the absence of the Donna, found him 
 self regarding this gentleman with some degree of asperity and 
 a disposition to resent any reference to his client's business as 
 an unwarrantable impertinence. But when the dinner was 
 over, and he had smoked a cigar on the corridor without 
 further communication with Donna Dolores, he began to be 
 angry with himself for accepting her invitation, and savagely 
 critical of the motives that impelled him to it. He was medi 
 tating an early retreat even a visit, to Mrs. Sepulvida when 
 Manuela entered. 
 
 Would Don Arturo grant the Donna his further counsel and 
 presence ? 
 
 Don Arturo was conscious that his cheek was flushing, and 
 that his counsel at the present moment would not have been 
 eminently remarkable for coolness or judiciousness, but he 
 followed the Indian woman with a slight inclination of the 
 head. They entered the room where he had first met the 
 Donna. She might not have moved from the position she had 
 occupied that morning on the couch, so like was her attitude 
 
A L caf out of the Past. 133 
 
 and manner. As he approached her respectfully, he was con 
 scious of the same fragrance, and the same mysterious mag 
 netism that seemed to leap from her dark eyes, and draw his 
 own resisting and unwilling gaze toward her. 
 
 " You will despise me, Don Arturo you, whose country 
 women are so strong and active because I am so little and 
 weak, and, Mother of God ! so lazy ! But I am an invalid, 
 and am not yet quite recovered. But then I am accustomed 
 to it. I have lain here for days, Don Arturo, doing nothing. 
 It is weary eh ? You think ? This watching, this waiting ! 
 day after day always the same !" 
 
 There was something so delicately plaintive and tender in 
 the cadence of her speech a cadence that might, perhaps, 
 have been attributed to the characteristic intonation of the 
 Castilian feminine speech, but which Arthur could not help 
 thinking was peculiar to herself, that at the moment he dared 
 not lift his eyes to her, although he was conscious she was 
 looking at him. But by an impulse of safety he addressed 
 himself to the fan. 
 
 " You have been an invalid then Donna Dolores ?" 
 
 " A sufferer, Don Arturo." 
 
 "Have you ever tried the benefit of change of scene of 
 habits of life ? Your ample means, your freedom from the 
 cares of family or kinship, offer you such opportunities," he 
 continued, still addressing the fan. 
 
 But the fan, as if magnetized by his gaze, became coquet- 
 tishly conscious ; fluttered, faltered, drooped, and then lan 
 guidly folded its wings. Arthur was left helpless, 
 
 " Perhaps," said Donna Dolores : " who knows?" 
 
 She paused for an instant, and then made a sign to 
 Manuela. The Indian woman rose and left the room. 
 
 " I have something to tell you, Don Arturo," she continued, 
 " something I should have told you this morning. It is not 
 too late now. But it is a secret. It is only that I have 
 questioned my right to tell it not that I have doubted your 
 honour, Don Arturo, that I withheld it then." 
 
 Arthur raised his eyes to hers. It was her turn to evade his 
 glance. With her long lashes dropped, she went on 
 
 " It is five years ago, and my father whom may the Saints 
 assoil was alive. Came to us then at the Presidio of San 
 Geronimo, a young girl an American, a stranger and helpless. 
 
1 34 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 She had escaped from a lost camp in the snowy mountains 
 where her family and friends were starving. That was the 
 story she told my father. It was a probable one was it not?" 
 
 Arthur bowed his head but did not reply. 
 
 "But the name that she gave was not a true one, as it 
 appeared. My father had sent an Expedition to relieve these 
 people, and they had found among the dead the person whom 
 this young girl the stranger assumed to be. That was their 
 report. The name of the young girl who was found dead and 
 the name of the young girl who came to us was the same. It 
 was Grace Conroy." 
 
 Arthur's face did not move a muscle, nor did he once take 
 his eyes from the drooping lids of his companion. 
 
 " It was a grave matter a very grave matter. And it was 
 the more surprising because the young girl had at first given 
 another name the name of Grace Ashley which she after 
 wards explained was the name of the young man who helped 
 her to escape, and whose sister she had first assumed to be. 
 My father was a good man, a kind man a saint, Don 
 Arturo. It was not for him to know if she were Grace Ashley 
 or Grace Conroy it was enough for him to know that she was 
 alive, weak, helpless, suffering. Against the advice of his 
 officers, he took her into his own house, into his own family, 
 into his own fatherly heart, to wait until her brother, or this 
 Philip Ashley, should return. He never returned. In six 
 months she was taken ill very ill a little child was born 
 Don Arturo but in the same moment it died and the mother 
 died both, you comprehend both died in my arms !" 
 
 " That was bad," said Arthur, curtly. 
 
 " I do not comprehend," said Donna Dolores. 
 
 " Pardon. Do not misunderstand me. I say it was bad, 
 for I really believe that this girl, the mysterious stranger, with 
 the alias, was really Grace Conroy." 
 
 Donna Dolores raised her eyes and stared at Arthur. 
 
 "And why?" 
 
 " Because the identification of the bodies by the Expedition 
 was hurried and imperfect." 
 
 " How know you this ?" 
 
 Arthur arose and drew his chair a little nearer his fair client. 
 
 "You have been good enough to intrust me with an im 
 portant and honourable secret. Let me show my appreciation 
 
A Leaf out of the Past. 13-$ 
 
 of that confidence by intrusting you with one equally important. 
 I know that the identification was imperfect and hurried, be 
 cause / was present. In the report of the Expedition you will 
 find the name, if you have not already read it, of Lieutenant. 
 Arthur Poinsett. That was myself." 
 
 Donna Dolores raised herself to a sitting posture. 
 
 " But why did you not tell me this before ?" 
 
 " Because, first, I believed that you knew that I was Lieu 
 tenant Poinsett. Because, secondly, I did not believe that you 
 knew that Arthur Poinsett and Philip Ashley were one and the 
 same person." 
 
 " I do not understand," said Donna Dolores slowly, in a 
 hard metallic voice. 
 
 " I am Lieutenant Arthur Poinsett, formerly of the army,, 
 who, under the assumed name of Philip Ashley, brought Grace 
 Conroy out of Starvation Camp. I am the person who after 
 ward abandoned her the father of her child." 
 
 He had not the slightest intention of saying this when he- 
 first entered the room, but something in his nature, which he 
 had never tried to control, brought it out. He was neither 
 ashamed of it nor apprehensive of its results ; but, having said 
 it, leaned back in his chair, proud, self-reliant, and self-sustained. 
 If he had been uttering a moral sentiment he could not have 
 been externally more calm or inwardly less agitated. More 
 than that, there was a certain injured dignity in his manner, as 
 he rose, without giving the speechless and astonished woman 
 before him a chance to recover herself, and said 
 
 " You will be able now to know whether your confidence 
 has been misplaced. You will be able now to determine what 
 you wish done, and whether I am the person best calculated to 
 assist you. I can only say, Donna Dolores, that I am ready to 
 act either as your witness to the identification of the real 
 Grace Conroy, or as your legal adviser, or both. When you 
 have decided which, you shall give me your further commands, 
 or dismiss me. Until then, adios /" 
 
 He bowed, waved his hand with a certain grand courtesy, 
 and withdrew. When Donna Dolores raised her stupefied 
 head, the door had closed upon him. 
 
 When this conceited young gentleman reached his own 
 room, he was, I grieve to say, to some extent mentally, and, if 
 I may use the wor 1, morally exalted by the interview. More 
 
136 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 than that, he was in better spirits than he had been since his 
 arrival. From his room he strode out into the corridor. If 
 his horse had been saddled, he would have taken a sharp 
 canter over the low hills for exercise, pending the decision of 
 his fair client, but it was the hour of the noonday siesta, and 
 the courtyard was deserted. He walked to the gate and looked 
 across the plain. A fierce wind held uninterrupted possession 
 of earth and sky. Something of its restlessness, just at that 
 instant, was in Arthur's breast, and, with a glance around the 
 corridor, and a momentary hesitation, as an opening door, in a 
 distant part of the building, suggested the possibility of another 
 summons from Donna Dolores, he stepped beyond the walls. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE BULLS OF THE BLESSED TRINITY. 
 
 THE absolute freedom of illimitable space, the exhilaration of 
 the sparkling sunlight, and the excitement of the opposing 
 wind, which was strong enough to oblige him to exert a certain 
 degree of physical strength to overcome it, so wrought upon 
 Arthur, that in a few moments he had thrown off the mys 
 terious spell which the Rancho of the Blessed Trinity appeared 
 to have cast over his spirits, and had placed a material 
 distance between himself and its gloomy towers. The land 
 scape, which had hitherto seemed monotonous and uninspiring, 
 now became suggestive ; in the low dome-shaped hills beyond, 
 that were huddled together like half-blown earth bubbles raised 
 by the fiery breath of some long-dead volcano, he fancied he 
 saw the origin of the mission architecture. In the long sweep 
 of the level plain, he recognised the calm, uneventful life that 
 had left its expression in the patient gravity of the people. In 
 the fierce, restless wind that blew over it a wind so persistent 
 and perpetual that all umbrage, except a narrow fringe of 
 dwarfed willows defining the line of an extinct watercourse, 
 was hidden in sheltered canons and the leeward slopes of the 
 hills he recognised something of his own restless race, and 
 no longer wondered at the barrenness of the life that was 
 turned towards the invader. " I daresay," he muttered to 
 himself, " somewhere in the leeward of these people's natures 
 
The Bulls of the Blessed Trinity. 1 37 
 
 may exist a luxurious growth that we shall never know. I 
 I wonder if the Donna has not" but here he stopped ; angry, 
 and, if the truth must be told, a little frightened at the per 
 sistency with which Donna Dolores obtruded herself into his 
 abstract philosophy and sentiment. 
 
 Possibly something else caused him for the moment to 
 dismiss her from his mind. During his rapid walk he had 
 noticed, as an accidental, and by no means an essential feature 
 of the bleak landscape, the vast herds of crawling, purposeless 
 cattle. An entirely new and distinct impression was now 
 forming itself in his consciousness namely, that they no 
 longer were purposeless, vagrant, and wandering, but were 
 actually obeying a certain definite law of attraction, and were 
 moving deliberately toward an equally definite object. And 
 that object was himself! 
 
 Look where he would ; before, behind, on either side, 
 north, east, south, west, on the bleak hill-tops, on the slope of 
 the/tf/rtfo, across the dried-up arroyo, there were the same con 
 verging lines of slowly moving objects towards a single focus 
 himself ! Although walking briskly, and with a certain definite- 
 ness of purpose, he was apparently the only unchanging, fixed, 
 and limited point in the now active landscape. Everything that 
 rose above the dead, barren level was now moving slowly, irre 
 sistibly, instinctively, but unmistakably, towards one common 
 centre himself! Alone and unsupported, he was the helpless, 
 unconscious nucleus of a slowly gathering force, almost im 
 measurable in its immensity and power ! 
 
 At first the idea was amusing and grotesque. Then it 
 became picturesque. Then it became something for practical 
 consideration. And then but no ! with the quick and un 
 erring instincts of a powerful will, he choked down the next 
 consideration before it had time to fasten upon or paralyse his 
 strength. He stopped and turned. The Rancho of the 
 Blessed Trinity was gone ! Had it suddenly sunk in the earth, 
 or had he diverged from his path ? Neither ; he had simply 
 walked over the little elevation in the plain beside the arroyo 
 and corral, and had already left the Rancho two miles behind 
 him. 
 
 It was not the only surprise that came upon him suddenly 
 like a blow between the eyes. The same mysterious attraction 
 had been operating in his rear, and when he turned to retrace 
 
138 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 his steps towards the Mission, he faced the staring eyes of a 
 hundred bulls not fifty yards away. As he faced them, the 
 nearest turned, the next rank followed their example, the next 
 the same, and the next, until in the distance he could see the 
 movement repeated with military precision and sequence. 
 With a sense of relief, that he put aside as quickly as he had 
 the sense of fear, he quickened his pace, until the nearest bull 
 ahead broke into a gentle trot, which was communicated line 
 by line to the cattle beyond, until the whole herd before him 
 undulated like a vast monotonous sea. He continued on 
 across the arroyo and past the corral until the blinding and 
 penetrating cloud of dust, raised by the plunging hoofs of the 
 moving mass before him, caused him to stop. A dull rever 
 beration of the plain a sound that at first might have been 
 attributed to a passing earthquake now became so distinct 
 that he turned. Not twenty yards behind him rose the advance 
 wall of another vast, tumultuous sea of tossing horns and 
 undulating backs that had been slowly following his retreat ! 
 He had forgotten that he was surrounded. 
 
 The nearest were now so close upon him that he could 
 observe them separately. They were neither large, powerful, 
 vindictive, nor ferocious. On the contrary, they were thin, 
 wasted, haggard, anxious beasts, economically equipped and 
 gotten up, the better to wrestle with a six months' drought, 
 occasional famine, and the incessant buffeting of the wind 
 wild and untamable, but their staring eyes and nervous limbs 
 expressed only wonder and curiosity. And when he ran to 
 ward them with a shout, they turned, as had the others, file by 
 file, and rank by rank, and in a moment were, like the others, 
 in full retreat. Rather, let me say, retreated as the others had 
 retreated, for when he faced about again to retrace his steps 
 toward the Mission, he fronted the bossy bucklers and inex 
 tricable horns of those he had driven only a few moments ago 
 before him. They had availed themselves of his diversion 
 with the rear guard to return. 
 
 With the rapidity of a quick intellect and swift perceptions, 
 Arthur saw at once the resistless logic and utter hopelessness 
 of his situation. The inevitable culmination of all this was 
 only a question of time and a very brief period. Would it 
 be sufficient to enable him to reach the casa ? No ! Could 
 he regain the corral? Perhaps. Between it and himself 
 
The Bulls of the Blessed Trinity. 1 39- 
 
 already were a thousand cattle. Would they continue to re 
 treat as he advanced ? Possibly. But would he be overtaken 
 meanwhile by those in his rear ? 
 
 He answered the question himself by drawing from his waist 
 coat pocket his only weapon, a small " Derringer," and taking 
 aim at the foremost bull. The shot took effect in the animal's 
 shoulder, and he fell upon his knees. As Arthur had expected, 
 his nearer comrades stopped and sniffed at their helpless com 
 panion. But, as Arthur had not expected, the eager crowd 
 pressing behind overbore them and their wounded brother, 
 and in another instant the unfortunate animal was prostrate 
 and his life beaten out by the trampling hoofs of the resistless, 
 blind, and eager crowd that followed. With a terrible intuition 
 that it was a foreshadowing of his own fate, Arthur turned in 
 the direction of the corral, and ran for his very life ! 
 
 As he ran he was conscious that the act precipitated the 
 inevitable catastrophe but he could think of nothing better. 
 As he ran, he felt, from the shaking of the earth beneath his 
 feet, that the act had once more put the whole herd in equally 
 active motion behind him. As he ran, he noticed that the 
 cattle before him retreated with something of his own precipi 
 tation. But as he ran, he thought of nothing but the awful 
 fate that was following him, and the thought spurred him to an 
 almost frantic effort. I have tried to make the reader under 
 stand that Arthur was quite inaccessible to any of those weak 
 nesses which mankind regard as physical cowardice. In the 
 defence of what he believed to be an intellectual truth, in the 
 interests of his pride or his self-love, or in a moment of passion, 
 he would have faced death with unbroken fortitude and calm 
 ness. But to be the victim of an accident ; to be the lament 
 able sequel of a logical succession of chances, without motive 
 or purpose ; to be sacrificed for nothing without proving or 
 disproving anything ; to be trampled to death by idiotic beasts, 
 who had not even the instincts of passion or revenge to justify 
 them ; to die the death of an ignorant tramp, or any negligent 
 clown a death that had a ghastly ludicrousness in its method, 
 a death that would leave his body a shapeless, indistinguish 
 able, unrecognisable clod, which affection could not idealize 
 nor friendship reverence, all this brought a horror with it so 
 keen, so exquisite, so excruciating, that the fastidious, proud, 
 intellectual being fleeing from it might have been the veriest 
 
140 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 dastard that ever turned his back on danger. And superadded 
 to it was a superstitious thought that for its very horror, per 
 haps, it was a retribution for something that he dared not 
 contemplate ! 
 
 And it was then that his strength suddenly flagged. His 
 senses began to reel. His breath, which had kept pace with 
 the quick beating of his heart, intermitted, hesitated, was lost ! 
 Above the advancing thunder of hoofs behind him, he thought 
 he heard a woman's voice. He knew now he was going crazy ; 
 he shouted and fell ; he rose again and staggered forward a 
 few steps and fell again. It was over now ! A sudden sense 
 of some strange, subtle perfume, beating up through the acrid, 
 smarting dust of the plain, that choked his mouth and blinded 
 his eyes, came swooning over him. And then the blessed 
 interposition of unconsciousness and peace. 
 
 He struggled back to life again with the word " Philip" in 
 his ears, a throbbing brow, and the sensation of an effort to do 
 something that was required of him. Of all his experience of 
 the last few moments only the perfume remained. He was 
 lying alone in the dry bed of the arroyo ; on the bank a horse 
 was standing, and above him bent the dark face and darker 
 eyes of Donna Dolores. 
 
 " Try to recover sufficient strength to mount that horse," she 
 said, after a paijse. 
 
 It was a woman before him. With that innate dread which 
 all masculine nature has of exhibiting physical weakness before 
 a weaker sex, Arthur struggled to rise without the assistance 
 offered by the small hand of his friend. That, however, even 
 at that crucial moment, he so far availed himself of it, as to 
 press it, I fear was the fact. 
 
 " You came to my assistance alone ?" asked Arthur, as he 
 struggled to his feet. 
 
 " Why not ? We are equal now, Don Arturo," said Donna 
 Dolores, with a dazzling smile. ' ' I saw you from my window. 
 You were rash pardon me foolish ! The oldest vaquero 
 never ventures afoot upon these plains. But come ; you shall 
 ride with me. There was no time to saddle another horse, and 
 I thought you would not care to let others know of your 
 adventure. Am I right ?" 
 
 There was a slight dimple of mischief in her cheek, and a 
 quaint sparkle in her dark eye, as she turned her questioning 
 
The Bulls of the Blessed Trinity. 141 
 
 gaze on Arthur. He caught her hand and raised it respect 
 fully to his lips. 
 
 "You are wise as you are brave, Donna Dolores." 
 
 " We shall see. But at present you must believe that I am 
 right, and do as I say. Mount that horse I will help you if 
 you are too weak and leave a space for me behind you 1" 
 
 Thus adjured, Arthur leaped into the saddle. If his bones 
 had been broken instead of being bruised, he would still have 
 found strength for that effort. In another instant Donna 
 Dolores' little foot rested on his, and she lightly mounted 
 behind him. 
 
 " Home now. Hasten ; we will be there before any one will 
 know it," she said, as she threw one arm around his waist, with 
 superb unconsciousness. 
 
 Arthur lifted the rein and dropped his heels into the flanks 
 of the horse. In five minutes the briefest, as it seemed to 
 him, he had ever passed they were once more within the 
 walls of the Blessed Trinity. 
 
BOOK IV. DRIFTING. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 MR. AND MRS. CONROY AT HOME. 
 
 THE manner in which One Horse Gulch received the news of 
 Gabriel Conroy's marriage was characteristic of that frank and 
 outspoken community. Without entering upon the question 
 of his previous shameless flirtation with Mrs. Markle the 
 baleful extent of which was generally unknown to the camp 
 the nearer objections were based upon the fact that the bride 
 was a stranger and consequently an object of suspicion, and 
 that Gabriel's sphere of usefulness in a public philanthropic 
 capacity would be seriously impaired and limited. His very 
 brief courtship did not excite any surprise in a climate where 
 the harvest so promptly followed the sowing, and the fact, now 
 generally known, that it was he who saved the woman's life 
 after the breaking of the dam at Black Canon, was accepted as 
 a sufficient reason for his success in that courtship. It may be 
 remarked here that a certain grim disbelief in feminine coyness 
 obtained at One Horse Gulch. That the conditions of life 
 there were as near the perfect and original condition of mankind 
 as could be found anywhere, and that the hollow shams of 
 society and weak artifices of conventionalism could not exist 
 in that sincere atmosphere, were two beliefs that One Horse 
 Gulch never doubted. 
 
 Possibly there was also some little envy of Gabriel's success, 
 an envy not based upon any evidence of his superior courage, 
 skill, or strength, but only of the peculiar " luck," opportunity, 
 or providence, that had enabled him to turn certain qualities 
 very common to One Horse Gulch to such favourable account. 
 
 " Toe think," said Jo. Briggs, " thet I was allowin' only 
 thet very afternoon to go up that canon arter game, and 
 didn't go from some denied foolishness or other, and yer's 
 Gabe, hevin' no call to go thar, jest comes along, accidental 
 
Mr, and Mrs. Conroy at Home. 143 
 
 like, and, dern my skin ! but he strikes onto a purty gal and a 
 wife the first lick !" 
 
 " That's so," responded Barker, " it's all luck. Thar's thet 
 Cy. Dudley, with plenty o' money and wantin' a wife bad, and 
 ez is goin' to Sacramento to-morrow to prospect fur one, and 
 he hez been up and down that canon time outer mind, and no 
 dam ever said ' break' to him ! No, sir ! Or take my own 
 case ; on'y last week when the Fiddletown coach went over the 
 bank at Dry Creek, wasn't I the fust man thar ez cut the leaders 
 adrift and bruk open the coach-door and helped out the pas 
 sengers ? And wot passengers ? Six Chinymen by Jinks 
 and a Greaser ! Thet's my luck." 
 
 There were few preliminaries to the marriage. The consent 
 of Oily was easily gained. As an act of aggression and provo 
 cation towards Mrs. Markle, nothing could offer greater 
 inducements. The superior gentility of the stranger, the fact 
 of her being a stranger, and the expeditiousness of the courtship 
 coming so hard upon Mrs. Markle's fickleness commended 
 itself to the child's sense of justice and feminine retaliation. For 
 herself, Oily hardly knew if she liked her prospective sister ; 
 she was gentle, she was kind, she seemed to love Gabriel but 
 Oily was often haunted by a vague instinct that Mrs. Markle 
 would have been a better match and with true feminine in 
 consistency she hated her the more for it. Possibly she tasted 
 also something of the disappointment of the baffled match 
 maker in the depths of her childish consciousness. 
 
 It may be fairly presumed that the former Mrs. Devarges 
 had confided to no one but her lawyer the secret of her 
 assumption of the character of Grace Conroy. How far or 
 how much more she had confided to that gentleman was known 
 only to himself ; he kept her secret, whatever might have been 
 its extent, and received the announcement of her intended 
 marriage to Gabriel with the superior smile of one to whom all 
 things are possible from the unprofessional sex. 
 
 " Now that you are about to enter into actual possession," 
 said Mr. Maxwell, quietly buttoning up his pocket again, " I 
 suppose you will not require my services immediately." 
 
 It is said, upon what authority I know not, that Madame 
 Devarges blushed slightly, heaved the least possible sigh as she 
 shook her head and said, " I hope not," with an evident sin 
 cerity that left her legal adviser in some slight astonishment. 
 
144 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 How far her intended husband participated in this confidence 
 I do not know. He was evidently proud of alluding to her 
 in the few brief days of his courtship as the widow of the 
 " great Doctor Devarges," and his knowledge of her former 
 husband to some extent mitigated in the public mind the 
 apparent want of premeditation in the courtship. 
 
 " To think of the artfulness of that man," said Sal, con 
 fidentially, to Mrs. Markle, "and he a-gettin' up sympathy 
 about his sufferin's at Starvation Camp, and all the while 
 a-carryin' on with the widder of one o' them onfortunets. No 
 wonder that man was queer ! Wot you allowed in the innocents 
 o' yer heart was bashfulness was jest conscience. I never let 
 on to ye, Mrs. Markle, but I allus noticed thet thet Gabe 
 never could meet my eye." 
 
 The flippant mind might have suggested that as both of 
 Miss Sarah's eyes were afflicted with a cast, there might have 
 been a physical impediment to this exchange of frankness, but 
 then the flippant mind never enjoyed the confidence of this 
 powerful young woman. 
 
 It was a month after the wedding, and Mrs. Markle was 
 sitting alone in her parlour, whither she had retired after the 
 professional duties of supper were over, when the front door 
 opened, and Sal entered. It was Sunday evening, and Sal 
 had been enjoying the brief recreation of gossip with the 
 neighbours, and, as was alleged by the flippant mind before 
 alluded to, some coquettish conversation and dalliance with 
 certain youth of One Horse Gulch. 
 
 Mrs. Markle watched her handmaid slowly remove an 
 immense straw "flat" trimmed with tropical flowers, and then 
 proceed to fold away an enormous plaid shawl which repre 
 sented quite another zone, and then her curiosity got the better 
 of her prudence. 
 
 " Well, and how did ye find the young couple gettin' on, Sal?" 
 
 Sal too well understood the value of coyly- withheld informa 
 tion to answer at once, and with the instincts of a true artist, 
 she affected to misunderstand her mistress. When Mrs. Mar 
 kle had repeated her question Sal replied, with a sarcastic 
 laugh 
 
 " Axin yer pardin fur manners, but you let on about the 
 young couple, and she forty if she's any thin'." 
 
 " Oh, no, Sal," remonstrated Mrs. Markle, with reproachful 
 
Mr. and Mrs. Conroy at Home. 145 
 
 accents, and yet a certain self-satisfaction ; " you're mistaken, 
 sure." 
 
 " Well," said Sal, breathlessly slapping her hands on her lap, 
 " if pearl powder and another woman's har and fancy doin's 
 beggiles folks, it ain't Sal ez is among the folks fooled. No, 
 Sue Markle. Ef I ain't lived long enough with a woman ez 
 owns to thirty-three and hez ef it wuz my last words and God 
 is my jedge the neck and arms of a gal of sixteen, not to 
 know when a woman is trying to warm over the scraps of forty 
 year with a kind o' hash o' twenty, then Sal Clark ain't got no 
 eyes, thet's all." 
 
 Mrs. Markle blushed slightly under the direct flattery of Sal, 
 and continued 
 
 " Some folks says she's purty." 
 
 " Some men's meat is other men's pizen," responded Sal, 
 sententiously, unfastening an enormous black velvet zone, and 
 apparently permitting her figure to fall into instant ruin. 
 
 " How did they look ?" said Mrs. Markle, after a pause, 
 recommencing her darning, which she had put down. 
 
 " Well, purty much as I allowed they would from the first. 
 Thar ain't any love wasted over thar. My opinion is thet he's 
 sick of his barg'in. She runs the house and ev'ry thing that's 
 in it. Jest look at the critter ! She's just put that thar Gabe 
 up to prospecting all along the ledge here, and that fool's left 
 his diggin's and hez been running hither and yon, making 
 ridiklus holes all over the hill jest to satisfy thet woman, and 
 she ain't satisfied neither. Take my word for it, Sue Markle, 
 thar's suthin' wrong thar. And then thar's thet Oily " 
 
 Mrs. Markle raised her eyes quickly, and put down her 
 work. " Oily," she repeated, with great animation " poor 
 little Oily \ what's gone of her ?" 
 
 " Well," said Sal, with an impatient toss of her head, " I 
 never did see what thar wuz in that peart and sassy piece for 
 any one to take to leastwise a woman with a child of her 
 own. The airs and graces thet thet Oily would put on wuz 
 too much. Why, she hedn't been nigh us for a month, and the 
 day afore the wedding what does that limb do but meet me 
 and sez, sez she, ' Sal, ye kin tell Mrs. Markle as my brother 
 Gabe ez goin' to marry a lady a lady/ sez she. ' Thar ain't 
 goin' to be enny Pikes about our cabin.' And thet child only 
 eight years ! Oh, git out thar ! I ain't no patience !" 
 
 L 
 
146 Gabriel Conroy, 
 
 To the infinite credit of a much abused sex, be it recorded 
 that Mrs. Markle overlooked the implied slur, and asked 
 
 " But what about Oily ?" 
 
 " I mean to say," said Sal, " thet thet child hain't no place 
 in thet house, and thet Gabe is jest thet weak and mean 
 spirited ez to let thet woman have her own way. No wonder 
 thet the child was crying when I met her out in the woods 
 yonder." 
 
 Mrs. Markle instantly flushed, and her black eyes snapped 
 ominously. " I should jest like to ketch " she began quickly, 
 and then stopped and looked at her companion. " Sal," she 
 said, with swift vehemence, " I must see thet child." 
 
 "How?" 
 
 The word in Sal's dialect had a various, large, and catholic 
 significance. Mrs. Markle understood it, and repeated briefly 
 
 Oily I must see her right off !" 
 
 "Which?" continued Sal. 
 
 " Here," replied Mrs. Markle ; " anywhere. Fetch her 
 when you kin." 
 
 " She wont come." 
 
 " Then I'll go to her," said Mrs. Markle, with a sudden and 
 characteristic determination that closed the conversation, and 
 sent Sal back viciously to her unwashed dishes. 
 
 Whatever might have been the truth of Sal's report, there 
 was certainly no general external indication of the facts. The 
 newly married couple were, to all appearances^ as happy and 
 contented, and as enviable to the masculine inhabitants of One 
 Horse Gulch as any who had ever built a nest within its 
 pastoral close. If a majority of Gabriel's visitors were gentle 
 men, it was easily attributed to the preponderance of males in 
 the settlement. If these gentlemen were unanimously extrava 
 gant in their praise of Mrs. Conroy, it was as easily attributable 
 to the same cause. That Gabriel should dig purposeless holes 
 over the hill-side, that he should for the time abandon his 
 regular occupation in his little modest claim in the canon, was 
 quite consistent with the ambition of a newly-married man. 
 
 A few evenings after this, Gabriel Conroy was sitting alone 
 by the hearth of that new house, which popular opinion and 
 the tastes of Mrs. Conroy seemed to think was essential to his 
 new condition. It was a larger, more ambitious, more expen 
 sive, and perhaps less comfortable dwelling than the one in 
 
Mr. and Mrs. Conroy at Home. 147 
 
 which he has been introduced to the reader. It was projected 
 upon that credit which a man of family was sure to obtain in 
 Oi.e Horse Gulch, where the immigration and establishment of 
 families and household centres were fostered even at pecuniary 
 risks. It contained, besides the chambers, the gratuitous 
 addition of a parlour, which at this moment was adorned and 
 made attractive by the presence of Mrs. Conroy, who was 
 entertaining a few visitors that, under her attractions, had pro 
 longed their sitting until late. When the laugh had ceased 
 and the door closed on the last lingering imbecile, Mrs. Conroy 
 returned to the sitting-room. It was dark, for Gabriel had not 
 lighted a candle yet, and he was occupying his favourite seat 
 and attitude before the fire. 
 
 " Why ! are you there ?" said Mrs. Conroy, gaily. 
 
 Gabriel looked up, and with that seriousness which was 
 habitual to him, replied 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 Mrs. Conroy approached her lord and master, and ran her 
 thin, claw-like fingers through his hair with married audacity. 
 He caught them, held them for a moment with a kindly, 
 caressing, and yet slightly embarrassed air that the lady did not 
 like. She withdrew them quickly. 
 
 "Why didn't you come into the parlour?" she said, ex 
 amining him curiously. 
 
 " I didn't admire to to-night," returned Gabriel, with grave 
 simplicity, " and I reckoned you'd get on as well without me." 
 
 There was not the slightest trace of bitterness nor aggrieved 
 sensitiveness in his tone or manner, and although Mrs. Conroy 
 eyed him sharply for any latent spark of jealousy, she was 
 forced to admit to herself that it did not exist in the quiet,, 
 serious man before her. Vaguely aware of some annoyance in 
 his wife's face, Gabriel reached out his arm, and, lightly taking 
 her around her waist, drew her to his knee. But the very 
 act was so evidently a recognition of a certain kind of physical 
 and moral weakness in the creature before him so professional 
 so, as Mrs. Conroy put it to herself, " like as if I were a 
 sick man," that her irritation was not soothed. She rose 
 quickly and seated herself on the other side of the fireplace. 
 With the same implied toleration Gabriel had already dis 
 played, he now made no attempt to restrain her. 
 
 Mrs. Conroy did not pout as another woman might have, 
 L 2 
 
1 48 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 done. She only smiled a haggard smile that deepened the line 
 of her nostril into her cheek, and pinched her thin, straight 
 nose. Then she said, looking at the fire 
 
 " Ain't you well ?' ; 
 
 " I reckon not not overly well." 
 
 There was a silence, both looking at the fire. 
 
 " You don't get anything out of that hill-side ?" asked Mrs. 
 Conroy at last, pettishly. 
 
 " No," said Gabriel. 
 
 " You have prospected all over the ridge ?" continued the 
 woman, impatiently. 
 
 " All over !" 
 
 " And you don't find anything ?" 
 
 " Nothin'," said Gabriel. " Nary. T'het is," he added with 
 his usual cautious deliberation, "thet is, nothin' o'any account. * 
 The gold, ef there is any, lies lower down in the gulch, whar I 
 used to dig. But I kept at it jest to satisfy your whim. You 
 know, July, it was a whim of yours," he continued, with a cer 
 tain gentle deprecatoriness of manner. 
 
 A terrible thought flashed suddenly upon Mrs. Conroy. 
 Could Dr. Devarges have made a mistake ? Might he not 
 have been delirious or insane when he wrote of the treasure ? 
 Or had the Secretary deceived her as to its location ? A swift 
 and sickening sense that all she had gained, or was to gain, 
 from her scheme, was the man before her and that he did not 
 love her as other men had asserted itself through her trem 
 bling consciousness. Mrs. Conroy had already begun to fear 
 that she loved this husband, and it was with a new sense of 
 yearning and dependence that she in her turn looked depre- 
 catingly and submissively into his face and said 
 
 " It was only a whim, dear I dare say a foolish one. It's 
 gone now. Don't mind it !" 
 
 " I don't," said Gabriel, simply. 
 
 Mrs. Conroy winced, 
 
 " I thought you looked disappointed," she said after a pause. 
 
 " It ain't that I was thinkin' on, July ; it's Oily," said 
 Gabriel. 
 
 There is a limit even to a frightened woman's submission. 
 
 " Of course," she said, sharply ; " Oily, Oily again and 
 always. I ought to have remembered that." 
 
 " Thet's so," said Gabriel with the same exasperating quiet. 
 
Mr. and Mrs. Conroy at Home. 149 
 
 " I was reckonin' jest now, ez there don't seem to be any like- 
 liness of you and Olly's gettin' on together, you'd better 
 separate. Thar ain't no sense goin' on this way, July no 
 sense et all. And the worst o' the hull thing ez thet Oily ain't 
 gettin' no kinder good outer it, no way !" 
 
 Mrs. Conroy was very pale and dangerously quiet as Mr. 
 Conroy went on. 
 
 " I've allers allowed to send that child to school, but she 
 don't keer to go. She's thet foolish, thet Oily is, thet she 
 doesn't like to leave me, and I reckon I'm thet foolish too 
 thet I don't like to hev her go. The only way to put things 
 square ez this " 
 
 Mrs. Conroy turned and fixed her grey eyes upon her 
 husband, but she did not speak. 
 
 " You'd better go away," continued Gabriel, quietly, " for a 
 while. I've heerd afore now that it's the reg'lar thing fur a 
 bride to go away and visit her mother. You hain't got no 
 mother/' said Gabriel thoughtfully, " hev ye ? that's bad. 
 But you was a sayin' the other day suthin' about some business 
 you had down at 'Frisco. Now it would be about the nateral 
 sort o' thing for ye to go thar fur two or three months, jest till 
 things get round square with Oily and me.' ; 
 
 It is probable that Gabriel was the only man from whom 
 Mrs. Conroy could have received this humiliating proposition 
 without interrupting him with a burst of indignation. Yet she 
 only turned a rigid face towards the fire again with a hysterical 
 laugh. 
 
 ' Why limit my stay to two or three months ?" she said. 
 
 " Well, it might be four," said Gabriel, simply " it would 
 give me and Oily a longer time to get things in shape." 
 
 Mrs. Conroy rose and walked rigidly to her husband's 
 side. 
 
 " What," she said huskily, " what if I were to refuse ?" 
 
 Gabriel looked as if this suggestion would not have been 
 startling or inconsistent as an abstract possibility in woman, but 
 said nothing. 
 
 "\Vhat," continued Mrs. Conroy, more rapidly and huskily, 
 "what if I were to tell you and that brat to go ! What," she 
 said, suddenly raising her voice to a thin, high soprano, ''what 
 if I were to turn you both out of this house my house ! off 
 this land my land ! Eh ? eh ? eh ?" she almost screamed, 
 
350 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 emphasizing each interrogatory with her thin hand on Gabriel's 
 -shoulder, in a desperate but impotent attempt to shake him. 
 
 " Certingly, certingly," said Gabriel, calmly. " But thar's 
 somebody at the door, July," he continued quietly, as he rose 
 ; slowly and walked into the hall. 
 
 His quick ear had detected a knocking without above the 
 truculent pitch of Mrs. Conroy's voice. He threw open the 
 -door, and disclosed Oily and Sal standing upon the threshold. 
 
 It is scarcely necessary to say that Sal was first to recover the 
 use of that noble organ, the tongue. 
 
 " With chills and ager in every breath it's an hour if it's 
 iive minutes that we've stood here," she began, " pounding at 
 that door. ' You're interrupting the young couple, Sal,' sez I, 
 ' comin' yer this time o' night, breakin' in, so to speak, on the 
 holiest confidences/ sez I ; ' but it's business, and onless you 
 hev thet to back you, Sarah Clark,' I sez, 'and you ain't a 
 woman ez ever turned her back on thet or them, you ain't no 
 call there.' But I was to fetch this child home, Mrs. Conroy," 
 continued Sal, pushing her way into the little sitting-room, 
 " and " 
 
 She paused, for the room was vacant. Mrs. Conroy had 
 disappeared. 
 
 " I thought I heerd " said Sal, completely taken aback. 
 
 " It was only Gabe," said Oily, with the ready mendacity of 
 swift feminine tact. "I told you so. Thank you, Sal, for 
 seeing me home. Good night, Sal," and with a dexterity that 
 smote Gabriel into awesome and admiring silence, she abso 
 lutely led the breathless Sal to the door and closed it upon her 
 before that astonished female could recover her speech. 
 
 Then she returned quietly, took off her hat and shawl, 
 and taking the unresisting hand of her brother, led him back 
 to his former seat by the fire. Drawing a low stool in front of 
 him, she proceeded to nestle between his knees an old trick 
 of hers and once more taking his hand, stroked it between 
 her brown fingers, looked up into his face, and said 
 
 " Dear old Gabe !" 
 
 The sudden smile that irradiated Gabriel's serious face 
 would have been even worse provocation to Mrs. Conroy than 
 his previous conduct. 
 
 " What was the matter, Gabe ?" said Oily ; " what was she 
 saying when we came in ?" 
 
Mr. and Mrs. Conroy at Home. 151 
 
 Gabriel had not, since the entrance of his sister, thought of 
 Mrs. Conroy's parting speech and manner. Even now its full 
 significance did not appear to have reached him. 
 
 " I disremember, Oily/' he replied, looking down into Olly's 
 earnest eyes, "suthin' or other ; she was techy, thet's all." 
 
 " But wot did she mean by saying that the house and lands 
 was hers ?" persisted the child. 
 
 " Married folks, Oily," said Gabriel, with the lazy, easy 
 manner of vast matrimonial experience, "married folks hev 
 little jokes and ways o' thar own. Bein' onmarried yourself, 
 ye don't know. ' With all my worldly goods I thee endow,' 
 thet's all thet's what she meant, Oily. * With all my worldly 
 goods I thee endow.' Did you hev a good time down there ? ; ' 
 
 11 Yes," said Oily. 
 
 " You'll hev a nice time here soon, Oily," said Gabriel. 
 
 Oily looked incredulously across the hall toward the door of 
 Mrs. Conroy's chamber. 
 
 " Thet's it, Oily," said Gabriel, " Mrs. Conroy's goin' to 
 Frisco to see some friends. She's thet bent on goin' thet 
 nothin' 'ill stop her. Ye see, Oily, it's the fashion fur new married 
 folks to kinder go way and visit absent and sufferin' friends. 
 Thar's them little ways about the married state, that, bein' 
 onmarried yourself, you don't sabe. But it's all right, she's 
 goin'. Bein' a lady, and raised, so to speak, 'mong fashi'n'ble 
 people, she's got to folly the fashi'n. She's goin' for three 
 months, mebbe four. I disremember now wot's the fashi'n'ble 
 time. But she'll do it, Oily." 
 
 Oily cast a penetrating look at her brother. 
 
 " She ain't goin' on my account, Gabe ?" 
 
 " Lord love the child, no ! Wot put thet into your head, 
 Oily ? Why," said Gabriel with cheerful mendacity, " she's 
 been takin' a shine to ye o' late. On'y to-night, she was 
 wonderin' whar you be." 
 
 As if to give credence to his words, and much to his inward 
 astonishment, the door of Mrs. Conroy's room opened, and the 
 lady herself, with a gracious smile on her lips and a brightly 
 beaming eye, albeit somewhat reddened around the lids^. 
 crossed the hall, and, going up to Oily, kissed her round 
 cheek. 
 
 " I thought it was your voice, and although I was just going 
 to bed," she added gaily, with a slightly apologetic look at her 
 
152 Gabriel Conroy* 
 
 charming dishabille, " I had to come in and be sure it was you. 
 And where have you been, you naughty girl ? Do you know I 
 shall be dreadfully j ealous of this Mrs. Markle. Come and 
 tell me all about her. Come. You shall stay with me to-night, 
 and we wont let brother Gabe hear our little secrets shall we ? 
 Come !" 
 
 And before the awe-struck Gabriel could believe his own 
 senses she had actually whisked the half- pleased, half-frightened 
 child into her own room, and he was left standing alone. Nor 
 was he the less amazed, although relieved of a certain unde 
 fined anxiety for the child, when, a moment later, Oily herself 
 thrust her curly head out of the door, and, calling out, " Good 
 night, old Gabe," with a mischievous accent, shut and locked 
 the door in his face. For a moment Gabriel stood petrified 
 on his own hearthstone. Was he mistaken, and had Mrs. 
 Conroy's anger actually been nothing but .a joke? Was Oily 
 really sincere in her dislike of his wife ? There was but one 
 apparent solution to these various and perplexing problems, 
 and that was the general incomprehensibility of the sex. 
 
 " The ways o' woman is awful onsartin," said Gabriel, as he 
 sought the solitary little room which had been set apart for 
 Oily, " and somehow I ain't the man ez hez the gift o' findin' 
 them out." 
 
 And with these reflections he went apologetically, yet, to a 
 certain extent, contentedly, as was his usual habit, to bed. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 IN WHICH THE TREASURE IS FOUND AND LOST. 
 
 As no word has been handed down of the conversation that 
 night between Oily and her sister-in-law, I fear the masculine 
 reader must view their subsequent conduct in the light of 
 Gabriel's abstract proposition. The feminine reader to whose 
 well-known sense of justice and readiness to acknowledge a 
 characteristic weakness, I chiefly commend these pages will 
 of course require no further explanation, and will be quite 
 ready to believe that the next morning Oily and Mrs. Conroy 
 were apparently firm friends, and that Gabriel was incontinently 
 snubbed by both of these ladies as he deserved. 
 
Treasure Found and L ost. 153 
 
 " You don't treat July right," said Oily, one morning, to 
 Gabriel, during five minutes that she had snatched from the 
 inseparable company of Mrs. Conroy. 
 
 Gabriel opened his eyes in wonder. " I hain't been 'round 
 the house much, because I allowed you and July didn't want 
 my kempany," he began apologetically, "and ef it's shortness 
 of provisions, I've fooled away so much time, Oily, in pros- 
 pectin' that ledge that I had no time to clar up and get any 
 dust. I reckon, may be, the pork bar'l is low. But I'll fix 
 thet straight soon, Oily, soon." 
 
 ; ' But it ain't thet, Gabe it ain't provisions it's it's O \ 
 you ain't got no sabe ez a husband thar !" burst out the direct 
 Oily at last. 
 
 Without the least sign of resentment, Gabriel looked thought 
 fully at his sister. 
 
 " Thet's so I reckon thet is the thing. Not hevin' been 
 married afore, and bein', so to speak, strange and green-handed, 
 like as not I don't exactly come up to the views of a woman ez 
 hez hed thet experience. And her husband a savang ! a 
 savang ! Oily, and a lamed man." 
 
 " You're as good as him !" ejaculated Oily, hastily, whose 
 parts of speech were less accurately placed than her feelings, 
 " and I reckon she loves you a heap better, Gabe. But you 
 ain't quite lovin' enough," she added, as Gabriel started. 
 " Why, thar was thet young couple thet came up from Simp 
 son's last week, and stayed over at Mrs. Markle's. Thar was 
 no end of the attentions thet thet man paid to thet thar woman 
 fixin' her shawl, histin' the winder and puttin' it down, and 
 askin' after her health every five minnits and they'd sit and 
 sit, just like this" here Oily, in the interests of domestic 
 felicity, improvised the favourite attitude of the bridegroom as 
 far as the great girth of Gabriel's waist and chest could be 
 " clipped" by her small arms. 
 
 " Wot ! afore folks ?" asked Gabriel, looking down a little 
 shamefully on the twining arms of his sister. 
 
 " Yes in course afore folks. Why, they want it to be 
 known that they're married." 
 
 " Oily," broke out Gabriel, desperately, " your sister-in-law 
 ain't thet kind of a woman. She'd reckon thet kind o' thing 
 was low." 
 
 But Oily only replied by casting a mischievous look at her 
 
154 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 brother, shaking her curls, and with the mysterious admonition 
 " Try it !" left him, and went back to Mrs. Conroy. 
 
 Happily for Gabriel, Mrs. Conroy did not offer an oppor 
 tunity for the exhibition of any tenderness on Gabriel's part. 
 Although she did not make any allusion to the past, and even 
 utterly ignored any previous quarrel, she still preserved a certain 
 coy demeanour toward him, that, while it relieved him of an 
 onerous duty, very greatly weakened his faith in the infallibility 
 of Olly's judgment. When, out of respect to that judgment, he 
 went so far as to throw his arms ostentatiously around his wife's 
 waist, one Sunday, while perambulating the single long public 
 street of One Horse Gulch, and that lady, with great decision, 
 quietly slipped out of his embrace, he doubted still more. 
 
 " I did it on account o' wot you said, Oily, and darn my 
 skin if she seemed to like it at all, and even the boys hangin' 
 around seemed to think it was queer. Jo Hobson snickered 
 right out." 
 
 " When was it?" said Oily. 
 
 " Sunday." 
 
 Oily, sharply" Where ?" 
 
 Gabriel" On Main Street." 
 
 Oily, apostrophizing heaven with her blue eyes ' Ef thar 
 ever was a blunderin' mule, Gabe, it's YOU !" 
 
 Gabriel, mildly and thoughtfully " Thet's so." 
 
 Howbeit, some kind of a hollow truce was patched up 
 between these three belligerents, and Mrs. Conroy did not go 
 to San Francisco on business. It is presumed that the urgency 
 of her affairs there was relieved by correspondence, for during 
 the ne it two weeks she expressed much anxiety on the arrival 
 of the regular tri-weekly mails. And one day it brought her 
 not only a letter, but an individual of some importance in this 
 liistory. 
 
 He got down from the Wingdam coach amid considerable 
 local enthusiasm. Apart from the fact that it was well known 
 that he was a rich San Francisco banker and capitalist, his 
 "brusque, sharp energy, his easy, sceptical familiarity and general 
 contempt for and ignoring of everything but the practical and 
 material, and, above all, his reputation for success, which 
 seemed to make that success a wholesome business principle 
 rather than good fortune, had already fascinated the passengers 
 who had listened to his curt speech and half oracular axioms. 
 
Treasure Found and Lost. 155 
 
 They had forgiven dogmatisms voiced in such a hearty manner, 
 and emphasized possibly with a slap on the back of the listener. 
 He had already converted them to his broad materialism less, 
 perhaps, by his curt rhetoric than by the logic of his habitual 
 business success, and the respectability that it commanded. It 
 was easy to accept scepticism from a man who evidently had 
 not suffered by it. Radicalism and democracy are much more 
 fascinating to us when the apostle is in comfortable case and 
 easy circumstances, than when he is clad in fustian, and con 
 sistently out of a situation. Human nature thirsts for the 
 fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but would 
 prefer to receive it from the happy owner of a latch-key to the 
 Garden of Eden, rather than from the pilferer who had just 
 been ejected from the premises. 
 
 It is probable, however, that the possessor of these admirable 
 qualities had none of that fine scorn for a mankind accessible 
 to this weakness which at present fills the breast of the writer, 
 and, I trust, the reader of these pages. If he had, I doubt if 
 he would have been successful. Like a true hero, he was 
 quite unconscious of the quality of his heroism, and utterly 
 unable to analyse it. So that, without any previous calcula 
 tions or pre-arranged plan, he managed to get rid of his 
 admirers, and apply himself to the business he had in hand 
 without either wilfully misleading the public of One Horse 
 Gulch, or giving the slightest intimation of what that real 
 business was. That the general interests of One Horse Gulch 
 had attracted the attention of this powerful capitalist that he 
 intended to erect a new Hotel or " start" an independent line 
 of stage-coaches from Sacramento, were among the accepted 
 theories. Everybody offered him vast and gratuitous infor 
 mation, and out of the various facts and theories submitted to 
 him, he gained the particular knowledge he required without 
 asking for it. Given, a reputation for business shrewdness 
 and omnipresence in any one individual, and the world will 
 speedily place him beyond the necessity of using them. 
 
 And so in a casual, general way, the stranger was shown 
 over the Length and Breadth and Thickness and Present and 
 Future of One Horse Gulch. When he had reached the 
 further extremity of the Gulch he turned to his escort " I'll 
 make the inquiry you ask now." 
 " How ?" 
 
156 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " By telegraph if you'll take it." 
 
 He tore a leaf from a memorandum-book and wrote a few 
 lines. 
 
 " And you ?" 
 
 " Oh, I'll look around here I suppose there's not much 
 beyond this ?" 
 
 " No ; the next claim is Gabriel Conroy's." 
 
 "Not much account, I reckon?" 
 
 " No ? It pays him grub !" 
 
 " Well, dine with me at three o'clock, when and where you 
 choose you know best. Invite whom you like. Good-bye !' ; 
 and the great man's escort, thus dismissed, departed, lost in 
 admiration of the decisive promptitude and liberality of his guest. 
 
 Left to himself, the stranger turned his footsteps in the 
 direction of Gabriel Conroy's claim. Had he been an admirer 
 of Nature, or accessible to any of those influences which a 
 contemplation of wild scenery is apt to produce in weaker 
 humanity, he would have been awed by the gradual transition 
 of a pastoral landscape to one of uncouth heroics. In a few 
 minutes he had left the belt of sheltering pines and entered 
 upon the ascent of a shadowless, scorched, and blistered 
 mountain, that here and there in places of vegetation had put 
 on the excrescences of scoria, or a singular eruption of crust, 
 that, breaking beneath his feet in slippery grey powder, made 
 his footing difficult and uncertain. Had he been possessed 
 of a scientific eye, he would have noted here and there the 
 evidences of volcanic action, in the sudden depressions, the 
 abrupt elevations, the marks of disruption and upheaval, and 
 the river-like flow of debris that protruded a black tongue into 
 the valley below. But I am constrained to believe that the 
 stranger's dominant impression was simply one of heat. Half 
 way up the ascent he took off his coat and wiped his forehead 
 with his handkerchief. Nevertheless, certain peculiarities in 
 his modes of progression showed him to be not unfamiliar with 
 mountain travel. Two or three times during the ascent he 
 stopped, and, facing about, carefully re-surveyed the path 
 beneath him. Slight as was the action it was the unfailing 
 sign of the mountaineer, who recognised that the other side of 
 a mountain was as yet an undetermined quantity, and was pre 
 pared to retrace his steps if necessary. At the summit he 
 paused and looked around him. 
 
Treasure Found and Lost. 157 
 
 Immediately at his feet the Gulch which gave its name to 
 the settlement, and from which the golden harvest was 
 gathered, broadened into a thickly wooded valley. Its 
 quivering depths were suffused by the incense of odorous 
 gums and balms liberated by the fierce heat of the noonday 
 sun that rose to his face in soft, tremulous waves and filled the 
 air with its heated spices. Through a gap in the canon to the 
 west, a faint, scarcely distinguishable line of cloud indicated 
 the Coast Range. North and south, higher hills arose, 
 heavily terraced with straight colonnades of pines, that made 
 the vast black monolith on which he stood appear blacker and 
 barer by contrast. Higher hills to the east one or two peaks 
 and between them in the sunlight odd-looking, indistinct, 
 vacant intervals blanks in the landscape as yet not filled in 
 with colour or expression. Yet the stranger knew them to be 
 snow, and for a few moments seemed fascinated gazing at 
 them with a fixed eye and rigid mouth, until, with an effort, he 
 tore himself away. 
 
 Scattered over the summit were numerous holes that ap 
 peared to have been recently sunk. In one of them the 
 stranger picked up a fragment of the crumbled rock and 
 examined it carelessly. Then he slowly descended the 
 gentler slope towards the west, in the direction of a claim 
 wherein his quick eye had discovered a man at work. A 
 walk of a few moments brought him to the bank of red clay, 
 the heap of tailings, the wooden sluice-box, and the pan and 
 shovel which constituted the appurtenances of an ordinary 
 claim. As he approached nearer, the workman rose from the 
 bank over which he was bending, and leaning on his pick, 
 turned his face to the new-comer. His broad, athletic figure, 
 his heavy blonde beard, and serious, perplexed eyes, were un 
 mistakable. It was Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " How are ye ?" said the stranger, briskly extending a hand, 
 which Gabriel took mechanically. ** You're looking well ! 
 Recollect you, but you don't recollect me. Eh ?" He laughed 
 curtly, in a fashion as short and businesslike as his speech, and 
 then fixed his eyes rather impatiently on the hesitating Gabriel. 
 
 Gabriel could only stare, and struggle with a tide of thick- 
 coming remembrances. He looked around him ; the sun was 
 beating down on the old familiar objects, everything was 
 unchanged and yet this face, this voice 
 
158 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " I am here on a matter of business," continued the stranger 
 briskly, dismissing the question of recognition as one unessen 
 tial to the business on hand " and what have you got to 
 propose ?" He leaned lightly against the bank and supported 
 himself by thrusting Gabriel's pickaxe against the bank, as he 
 waited a reply. 
 
 " It's Peter Dumphy," said Gabriel, in an awe-stricken voice. 
 
 " Yes. You recollect me now ! Thought you would. It's 
 five years and over ain't it? Rough times them, Gabriel 
 warn't they ? Eh ! But you're lookin' well doin' well, too. 
 Hey ? Well what do you propose to do about this claim ? 
 Haven't made up your mind hey ? Come then I'll make a 
 proposition. First I suppose your title's all right, hey ?' ; 
 
 It was so evident from Gabriel's dazed manner, that apart 
 from his astonishment at meeting Peter Dumphy, he did not 
 know what he was talking about, that Dumphy paused. 
 
 " It's about these specimens," he added, eyeing Gabriel 
 keenly, " the specimens you sent me." 
 
 " Wot specimens ?" said Gabriel, vaguely, still lost in the past, 
 
 "The ones your wife sent me all the same thing, you 
 know." 
 
 " But it ain't," said Gabriel, with his old truthful directness. 
 " You better talk to her 'bout thet. Thet's her look-out. I 
 reckon now she did say suthin'," continued Gabriel, medita 
 tively, " about sendin' rock to Frisco to be tested, but I didn't 
 somehow get to take an interest in it. Leastways it's her 
 funeral. You'd better see her." 
 
 It was Mr. Dumphy's turn to be perplexed. In his perfect 
 misapprehension of the character of the man before him, he 
 saw only skilful business evasion under the guise of simplicity. 
 He remembered, moreover, that in the earlier days of his pros 
 perity as Dumphy and Jenkins, Commission Merchants, he was 
 himself in the habit of referring customers with whom he was 
 not ready to treat, to Jenkins, very much as he had just now 
 been referred to Mrs. Conroy. 
 
 " Of course," he said, briskly ; " only I thought I'd save time, 
 which is short with me to-day, by coming directly to you. May 
 not have time to see her. But you can write." 
 
 " Thet's so," said Gabriel, " p'r'aps it's just as well in the 
 long run. Ef ye don't see her, she'll know it ain't your fault. 
 I'll let on that much to her." And having disposed of this un- 
 
Treasure Found and L ost. 159 
 
 important feature of the interview, he continued, " Ye haven't 
 heard naught o' Grace ye mind Grace ? Dumphy ! a purty 
 little girl ez was with me up thar. Ye ain't heerd anything o ; 
 her nor seen her, may be hev you ?" 
 
 Of course this question at such a moment was to Mr. 
 Dumphy susceptible of only one meaning. It was that Mrs. 
 Conroy had confessed everything to Gabriel, and that he wished 
 to use Dumphy's complicity in the deceit as a lever in future 
 business transactions. Mr. Dumphy felt he had to deal with 
 two consummate actors one of whom was a natural hypocrite. 
 For the first time in his life he was impatient of evil. We 
 never admire truth and sincerity so highly as when we find it 
 wanting in an adversary. 
 
 "Ran off with some fellow, didn't she? Yes, I remember. 
 You wont see her again. It's just as well for you ! I'd call 
 her dead, anyway." 
 
 Although Dumphy was convinced that Gabriel's interest in 
 the fate of his sister was hypocritical, he was not above a Chris 
 tian hope that this might wound a brother's feelings. He 
 turned to go. 
 
 "Can't you come back this way and hev a little talk about 
 ol' times ?" said Gabriel, warming toward Dumphy under the 
 magic of old associations, and ignoring with provoking uncon 
 sciousness the sting of his last speech. " There's Oily ez 'ud 
 jest admire to see ye. Ye mind Oily? the baby, Grace's little 
 sister, growed a fine likely gal now. See yer," continued 
 Gabriel with sudden energy, putting down his pick and shovel, 
 " I'll jess go over thar with ye now." 
 
 " No ! no !" said Dumphy, quickly. " Busy ! Can't ! 'Mother 
 time ! Good-day ; see you again some time. So long !" and he 
 hurriedly departed, retracing his steps until the claim and its 
 possessor were lost in the intervening foliage. 
 
 Then he paused, hesitated, and then, striking across the sum 
 mit of the hill, made his way boldly to Gabriel's cottage. 
 
 Either Mrs. Conroy was expecting him, or had detected him 
 coming through the woods, for she opened the door to him 
 and took him into her little parlour with a graciousness of de 
 meanour and an elaboration of toilet that would have been 
 dangerous to any other man. But, like most men with a de 
 servedly bad reputation among women, Mr. Dumphy always 
 rigidly separated any weakness of gallantry from his business. 
 
160 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Here only for a few moments. Sorry can't stay longer. 
 You're looking well !" said Mr. Dumphy. 
 
 Mrs. Conroy said she had not expected the pleasure of a per 
 sonal interview ; Mr. Dumphy must be so busy always. 
 
 "Yes. But I like to bring good news myself. The speci 
 mens you sent have been assayed by first-class, reliable men. 
 They'll do. No gold but eighty per cent, silver. Hey ! 
 P'r'aps you expected it." 
 
 But Mr. Dumphy could see plainly from Mrs. Conroy's eager 
 face that she had not expected it. 
 
 " Silver," she gasped " eighty per cent !" 
 
 He was mystified, but relieved. It was evident that she had 
 not consulted anybody else, and that he was first on the ground. 
 So he said, curtly 
 
 " What do you propose ?" 
 
 " I don't know," began the lady. " I haven't thought " 
 
 " Exactly/' interrupted Humphy. " Haven't got any pro 
 position. Excuse me but" (taking out his watch) "time's 
 nearly up. Look here. Eighty per cent.'s big thing! But 
 Silver Mine takes Gold mine to run it. All expense first no 
 profit till you get down. Works, smelting cost twenty per 
 cent. Here's my proposition. Put whole thing in joint-stock 
 company. 100 shares. Five millions capital. You take fifty 
 shares. I'll take twenty-five dispose of other twenty-five as 
 I can. How's that ? Hey ? You can't say ! Well think of it !" 
 
 But all Mrs. Conroy could think of was two and a half 
 millions ! It stared at her, stretching its gigantic ciphers across 
 the room. It blazed in golden letters on cheques it rose on 
 glittering piles of silver coin to the ceiling of the parlour. 
 Yet she turned to him with a haggard face, and said 
 
 " But this this money is only in prospective." 
 
 " Cash your draft for the sum ten minutes after the stock's 
 issued. That's business." 
 
 With this certainty Mrs. Conroy recovered herself. 
 
 " I will talk with my husband," she said. 
 
 Mr. Dumphy smiled palpably, openly, and shamelessly. 
 Mrs. Conroy coloured quickly, but not from the consciousness 
 Mr. Dumphy attributed to her, of detected cunning. She had 
 begun to be ashamed of the position she believed she occupied 
 in this man's eyes, and fearful that he should have discovered 
 her husband's indifference to her. 
 
Treasure Found and Lost. r<3f 
 
 " I've already seen him," said Mr. Dumphy, quietly. 
 
 The colour dropped from Mrs. Conroy's cheeks. 
 
 ** He knows nothing of this," she said, faintly. 
 
 " Of course," said Dumphy, half contemptuously, " he said 
 so ; referred to you. That's all right. That's business." 
 
 "You did not tell him you dared not " she said, 
 
 excitedly. 
 
 Mr. Dumphy looked curiously at her for a moment. Then 
 he rose and shut the door. 
 
 ' ; Look here," he said, facing Mrs. Conroy in a hard 
 matter-of-fact way, "do you mean to say that what that 
 man your husband said, was true? That he knows 
 nothing of you ; of the circumstances under which you came 
 here ?" 
 
 " He does not I swear to God he does not," she said, 
 passionately. 
 
 It was inexplicable, but Mr. Dumphy believed her. 
 
 " But how will you explain this to him ? You can do nothing 
 without him." 
 
 " Why should he know more ? If he has discovered this 
 mine, it is his free of any gift of mine as independent of 
 any claim of mine as if we were strangers. The law makes 
 him the owner of the mine that he discovers, no matter on 
 whose land it may be found. In personating his sister, I only 
 claimed a grant to the land. He has made the discovery 
 which gives it its value ! Even that sister," she added, with a 
 sudden flash in her eyes "even that sister, were she living, 
 could not take it from him now !" 
 
 It was true ! This woman, with whose weakness he had 
 played, had outwitted them all, and slipped through their 
 ringers, almost without stain or blemish. And in a way so 
 simple ! Duped as he had been, he could hardly restrain his 
 admiration, and said, quite frankly and heartily 
 
 " Good that's business." 
 
 And then ah me ! this clever creature this sharp ad 
 venturess, this Anonyma Victrix began to cry and to beg him 
 not to tell her husband! 
 
 At this familiar sign of the universal feminine weakness 
 Dumphy picked up his ears and arts again. 
 
 " Where's your proof that your' husband is the first dis 
 coverer?" he said, curtly, but not unkindly. "Wont that 
 
 H 
 
1 62 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 paper that Dr. Devarges gave his sister show that the doctor 
 was really the discoverer of this lead ?" 
 
 " Yes ; but Doctor Devarges is dead, and I hold the paper." 
 
 "Good!" He took out his watch. "I've five minutes 
 more. Now look here. I'm not going to say that you haven't 
 managed this thing well you have ! and that you can, if you 
 like, get along without me you can ! See ! I'm not going 
 to say that I went into this thing without the prospect of 
 making something out of it myself. I have ! That's business. 
 The thing for you to consider now is this : understanding each 
 other as we do, couldn't you push this thing through better 
 with my help and helping me than to go elsewhere ? Under 
 stand me ! You could find a dozen men in San Francisco who 
 would make you as good an offer and better ! But it wouldn't 
 be to their interest to keep down any unpleasant reminders of 
 the past as it would be mine. You understand ?" 
 
 Mrs. Conroy replied by extending her hand. 
 
 " To keep my secret from every one from ////," she said 
 earnestly. 
 
 " Certainly that's business !" 
 
 Then these two artful ones shook hands with a heartfelt and 
 loyal admiration and belief for each ether that I fear more 
 honest folks might have profited by, and Mr. Dumphy went off 
 to dine. 
 
 As Mrs. Conroy closed the front door Oily came running 
 in from the back piazza. Mrs. Conroy caught her in her arms 
 and discharged her pent-up feelings, and, let us hope, her 
 penitence, in a joyful and passionate embrace. But Oily 
 struggled to extricate herself. When at last she got her head 
 free, she said, angrily 
 
 " Let me go. I want to see him." 
 
 " Who Mr. Dumphy ?" asked Mrs. Conroy, still holding the 
 child, with a half-hysterical laugh. 
 
 " Yes. Gabe said he was here. Let me go, I say !" 
 
 "What do you want with him?" asked her captor, with shrill 
 gaiety. 
 
 " Gabe says Gabe says let me go, will you ? Gabe says 
 :he knew " 
 
 " Whom ?" 
 
 " My dear, dear sister Grace ! There ! I didn't mean to 
 liurt you but I must go !" 
 
Mr. Dumphy meets an Old Friend. 163 
 
 And she did, leaving the prospective possessor of Two and 
 a Half Millions, vexed, suspicious, and alone. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 MR. DUMPHY MEETS AN OLD FRIEND. 
 
 PETER DUMPHY was true to his client. A few days after he 
 had returned to San Francisco he despatched a note to Victor, 
 asking an interview. He had reasoned that, although Victor 
 was vanquished and helpless regarding the late discovery at 
 One Horse Gulch, yet his complicity with Mrs. Conroy's earlier 
 deceit might make it advisable that his recollection of that 
 event should be effaced. He was waiting a reply when a card 
 was brought to him by a clerk. Mr. Dumphy glanced at it 
 impatiently, and read the name of " Arthur Poinsett." Autocrat 
 as Dumphy was in his own counting-house and business circle, 
 the name was one of such recognised power in California that 
 he could not ignore its claims to his attention. More than 
 that, it represented a certain respectability and social elevation, 
 which Dumphy, with all his scepticism and democratic assertion, 
 could not with characteristic shrewdness afford to undervalue. 
 He said, " Show him in," without lifting his head from the 
 papers that lay upon his desk. 
 
 The door opened again to an elegant-looking young man, 
 who lounged carelessly into the awful presence without any of 
 that awe with which the habitual business visitors approached 
 Peter Dumphy. Indeed it was possible that never before had 
 Mr. Dumphy's door opened to one who was less affected by 
 the great capitalist's reputation. Nevertheless, with the natural 
 ease of good breeding, after depositing his hat on the table, he 
 walked quietly to the fireplace, and stood with his back toward 
 it with courteous, but perhaps too indifferent patience. Mr. 
 Dumphy was at last obliged to look up. 
 
 " Busy, I see," yawned Poinsett, with languid politeness. 
 " Don't let me disturb you. I thought your man said you were 
 disengaged. Must have made a mistake." 
 
 Mr. Dumphy was forced to lay aside his pen and rise, in 
 wardly protesting. 
 
 " You don't know me by my card. I have the advantage, I 
 M 2 
 
164 Gabriet Conroy. 
 
 think," continued the young man, with a smile, " even in the 
 mere memory of faces. The last time I saw you was let me 
 see five years ago. Yes ! you were chewing a scrap of buffalo 
 hide to keep yourself from starving." 
 
 " Philip Ashley," said Mr. Dumphy, in a low voice, looking 
 hastily around, and drawing nearer the stranger. 
 
 " Precisely," returned Poinsett, somewhat impatiently raising 
 his own voice. " That was my nom de guerre. But Dumphy 
 seems to have been your real name after all." 
 
 If Dumphy had conceived any idea of embarrassing Poinsett 
 by the suggestion of an alias, in his case, he could have dis 
 missed it after this half-contemptuous recognition of his own 
 proper cognomen. But he had no such idea. In spite of his 
 utmost effort he felt himself gradually falling into the same 
 relative position the same humble subordination he had 
 accepted five years before. It was useless to think of his 
 wealth, of his power, of his surroundings. Here in his own 
 bank parlour he was submissively waiting the will and pleasure 
 of this stranger. He made one more desperate attempt to re 
 gain his lost prestige. 
 
 "You have some business with me, eh? Poinsett!" He 
 commenced the sentence with a dignity and ended it with a 
 familiarity equally inefficacious. 
 
 " Of course," said Poinsett, carelessly, shifting his legs before 
 the fire. " Shouldn't have called otherwise on a man of such 
 affairs at such a time. You are interested, I hear, in a mine 
 recently discovered at One Horse Gulch on the Rancho of the 
 Blessed Innocents. One of my clients holds a grant, not yet 
 confirmed, to the Rancho." 
 
 " Who ?" said Mr. Dumphy, quickly. 
 
 " I believe that is not important nor essential for you to know 
 until we make a formal claim," returned Arthur, quietly, " but 
 I don't mind satisfying your curiosity. It's Miss Dolores 
 Salvatierra." 
 
 Mr. Dumphy felt relieved, and began with gathering courage 
 and brusqueness, "That don't affect " 
 
 " Your mining claim ; not in the least," interrupted Arthur, 
 quietly. "I am not here to press or urge any rights that we 
 may have. We may not even submit the grant for patent. 
 But my client would like to know something of the present 
 tenants, or, if you will, owners. You represent them, I think ? 
 
Mr. Dumphy meets an O Li Friend. 165 
 
 A man and wife. The woman appears first as a spinster, 
 assuming to be a Miss Grace Conroy, to whom an alleged 
 transfer of an alleged grant was given. She next appears as 
 the wife of one Gabriel Conroy, who is, I believe, an alleged 
 brother of the alleged Miss Grace Conroy. You'll admit, I 
 think, it's a pretty mixed business, and would make a pretty 
 bad showing in court. But this adjudicature we are not yet 
 prepared to demand. What we want to know is this and I 
 came to you, Dumphy, as the man most able to tell us. Is the 
 sister or the brother real or are they both impostors ? Is 
 there a legal marriage ? Of course your legal interest is not 
 jeopardized in any event" 
 
 Mr. Dumphy partly regained his audacity. 
 
 " You ought to know you ran away with the real Grace 
 Conroy," he said, putting his hands in his pockets. 
 
 " Did I ? Then this is not she, if I understand you. Thanks .' 
 And the brother " 
 
 " Is Gabriel Conroy, if I know the man," said Dumphy, 
 shortly, feeling that he had been entrapped into a tacit 
 admission. " But why don't you satisfy yourself?" 
 
 " You have been good enough to render it unnecessary," said 
 Arthur, with a smile. " I do not doubt your word. I am, I 
 trust, too much of a lawyer to doubt the witness I myself have 
 summoned. But who is this woman ?" 
 
 " The widow of Dr. Devarges." 
 
 " The real thing?" 
 
 " Yes, unless Grace Conroy should lay claim to that title and 
 privilege. The old man seems to have been pretty much 
 divided in his property and affections." 
 
 The shaft did not apparently reach Arthur, for whom it was 
 probably intended. He only said, " Have you legal evidence 
 that she is the widow ? If it were a fact, and a case of ill-treat 
 ment or hardship, why it might abate the claim of my client, 
 who is a rich woman, and whose sympathies are of course in 
 favour of the real brother and real sister. By the way, there is 
 another sister, isn't there ?" 
 
 " Yes, a mere child." 
 
 "That's all. Thank you. I shan't trespass further upon 
 your time. Good-day." 
 
 He had taken up his hat and was moving toward the door. 
 Mr. Dumphy, who felt that whatever might have been Poinsett's 
 
1 66 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 motives in this interview, he, Dumphy, had certainly gained 
 nothing, determined to retrieve himself, if possible, by a stroke 
 of audacity. 
 
 " One moment," he said, as Poinsett was carefully settling 
 his hat over his curls. " You know whether this girl is living 
 or not. What has become of her ?" 
 
 " But I don't/' returned Poinsett, calmly, " or I shouldn't 
 come to you " 
 
 There was something about Poinsett's manner that prevented 
 Dumphy from putting him in the category of "all men," that 
 both in his haste and his deliberation Mr. Dumphy was apt to 
 say " were liars." 
 
 "When and where did you see her last?" he asked, less 
 curtly. 
 
 " I left her at a hunter's cabin near the North Fork while I 
 went back for help. I was too late. A relief party from the 
 valley had already discovered the other dead. WJien I returned 
 for Grace she was gone possibly with the relief party. I always 
 supposed it was the expedition that succoured you." 
 
 There was a pause, in which these two scamps looked at each 
 other. It will be remembered that both had deceived the relief 
 party in reference to their connexions with the unfortunate dead. 
 Neither believed, however, that the other was aware of the fact. 
 But the inferior scamp was afraid to ask another question that 
 might disclose his own falsehood ; and the question which 
 might have been an embarrassing one to Arthur, and have 
 changed his attitude toward Dumphy, remained unasked. Not 
 knowing the reason of Dumphy's hesitation, Arthur was satisfied 
 of his ignorance, and was still left the master. He nodded 
 carelessly to Dumphy and withdrew. 
 
 As he left the room he brushed against a short, thick-set 
 man, who was entering at the same moment. Some instinct of 
 mutual repulsion caused the two men to look at each other. 
 Poinsett beheld a sallow face, that, in spite of its belonging to a 
 square figure, seemed to have a consumptive look ; a face 
 whose jaw was narrow and whose lips were always half-parted 
 over white, large, and protruding teeth; a mouth that appa 
 rently was always breathless a mouth that Mr. Poinsett 
 remembered as the distinguishing and unpleasant feature 01 
 some one vaguely known to him professionally. As the mouth, 
 gasped and parted further in recognition, Poinsett nodded care- 
 
Mr. Dnmpuy meets an Old Friend. 167 
 
 lessly in return, and attributing his repulsion to that extra 
 ordinary feature thought no more about it. 
 
 Not so the new-comer. He glanced suspiciously after Arthur 
 and then at Mr. Dumphy. The latter, who had recovered his 
 presence of mind and his old audacity, turned them instantly 
 upon him. 
 
 "Well ! What have you got to propose?" he said, with his 
 usual curt formula. 
 
 " It is you have something to say; you sent for me" said his 
 visitor. 
 
 " Yes. You left me to find out that there was another grant 
 to that mine. What does all this mean, Ramirez ?" 
 
 Victor raised his eyes and yellow fringes to the ceiling, and 
 said, with a shrug 
 
 " Quien sabe ? there are grants and grants !" 
 
 " So it seems. But I suppose you know that we have a title 
 now better than any grant a mineral discovery." 
 
 Victor bowed and answered with his teeth, " We, eh ?" 
 
 " Yes, I am getting up a company for her husband." 
 
 " Her husband good !" 
 
 Dumphy looked at his accomplice keenly. There was some 
 thing in Victor's manner that was vaguely suspicious. Dumphy, 
 who was one of those men to whose courage the habit of success 
 in all things was essential, had been a little shaken by his signal 
 defeat in his interview with Poinsett, and now became irritable. 
 
 " Yes her husband. What have you got to propose about 
 it, eh ? Nothing ? Well, look here, I sent for you to say that 
 as everything now is legal and square, you might as well dry up 
 in regard to her former relations or your first scheme. You 
 sabe?" Dumphy became slangy as he lost his self-control. 
 "You are to know nothing about Miss Grace Conroy." 
 
 " And there is no more any sister, eh only a wife ?" 
 
 " Exactly." 
 
 " So." 
 
 "You will of course get something for these preliminary 
 steps of yours, although you understand they have been use 
 less, and that your claim is virtually dead. You are, in fact, in 
 no way connected with her present success. Unless unless,"' 
 added Dumphy, with a gratuitous malice that defeat had engen 
 dered, " unless you expect something for having been the 
 means of making a match between her and Gabriel." 
 
i68 Gabriel cr 
 
 Victor turned a little more yellow in the thin line over his 
 teeth. " Ha ! ha ! good a joke/' he laughed. " No, I make 
 no charge to you for that ; not even to you. No ha ! ha !" 
 At the same moment had Mr. Dumphy known what was pass 
 ing in his mind he would have probably moved a little nearer 
 the door of his counting-room. 
 
 " There's nothing we can pay you for but silence. We may 
 as well understand each other regarding that. That's your interest ; 
 it's ours only so far as Mrs. Conroy's social standing is concerned, 
 for I warn you that exposure might seriously compromise you in a 
 business way, while it would not hurt us. I could get the value 
 of Gabriel's claim to the mine advanced to-morrow, if the whole 
 story were known to-night. If you remember, the only evi 
 dence of a previous discovery exists in a paper in our posses 
 sion. Perhaps we pay you for that. Consider it so, if you 
 like. Consider also that any attempt to get hold of it legally 
 or otherwise would end in its destruction. Well, what do you 
 say ? All right. When the stock is issued I'll write you a 
 cheque : or perhaps you'd take a share of stock ?" 
 
 " I would prefer the money," said Victor, with a peculiar 
 laugh. 
 
 Dumphy affected to take no notice of the sarcasm. " Your 
 head is level, Victor," he said, returning to his papers. " Don't 
 meddle with stocks. Good day !" 
 
 Victor moved toward the door. " By the way, Victor," 
 said Dumphy, looking up, calmly, " if you know the owner of 
 this lately discovered grant, you might intimate that any litiga 
 tion wouldn't pay. That's what I told their counsel a mo 
 ment ago." 
 
 "Poinsett?" asked Victor, pausing, with his hand on the 
 door. 
 
 " Yes ! But as he also happens to be Philip Ashley the 
 chap who ran off with Grace Conroy, you had better go and see 
 him. Perhaps he can help you better than I. Good day." 
 
 And, turning from the petrified Victor, Mr. Dumphy, con 
 scious that he had fully regained his prestige, rang his bell to 
 admit the next visitor. 
 
169 
 
 CHAPTER IV, 
 
 MR. JACK HAMLIN TAKES A HOLIDAY. 
 
 FOR some weeks Mr. Hamlin had not been well, or, as he 
 more happily expressed it, had been " off colour." The cele 
 brated Dr. Duchesne, an ex-army surgeon, after a careful diag 
 nosis, had made several inquiries of Jack, in a frank way that 
 delighted Mr. Hamlin, and then had said, very quietly 
 
 " You are not doing justice to your profession, Jack. Your 
 pulse is 75, and that wont do for a man who habitually deals 
 faro. Been doing pretty well lately, and having a good time, 
 eh ? I thought so ! You've been running too fast, and 
 under too high pressure. You must take these weights off the 
 safety valve, Jack better take the blower down altogether. 
 Bank your fires and run on half steam. For the next two 
 months I shall run you. You must live like a Christian." 
 Noticing the horror of Jack's face, he added hastily, " I mean 
 go to bed before midnight, get up before you want to, eat more 
 and drink less, don't play to win, bore yourself thoroughly, and 
 by that time I'll be able to put you back at that table as strong, 
 and cool as ever. You used to sing, Jack ; sit down at the 
 piano and give me a taste of your quality. * * * There, that'll 
 do ; I thought so ! You're out of practice and voice. Do that 
 every day, for a week, and it will come easier. I haven't seen 
 you stop and talk to a child for a month. What's become of 
 that little boot-black that you used to bedevil ? I've a devilish 
 good mind to send you to a foundling hospital for the good of 
 the babies and yourself. Find out some poor ranchero with a 
 dozen childen, and teach 'em singing. Don't mind what you 
 eat, as long as you eat regularly. I'd have more hopes of you, 
 Jack, if I'd dragged you out of Starvation Camp, in the Sierras, 
 as I did a poor fellow, six years ago, than finding you here in 
 these luxurious quarters. Come ! Do as I say, and I'll stop 
 that weariness, dissipate that giddiness, get rid of that pain, 
 lower that pulse, and put you back where you were. I don't 
 like your looks, Jack, at all I'd buck against any bank you 
 ran, all night." 
 
 From which the intelligent reader will, I hope and trust, per- 
 reive that this popular doctor's ideas of propriety resided 
 wholly in his intentions. With the abstract morality of Ham- 
 
170 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 lin's profession as a gambler he did not meddle ; with his com 
 petency to practise that profession only was 1 .e concerned. In 
 deed so frank was he in his expression, that a few days later he 
 remarked to a popular clergyman, " I must put you under the 
 same treatment as I did Jack Hamlin do you know him ? a 
 gambler and a capital fellow ; you remind me of him. Same 
 kind of trouble cured him as I will you." And he did. 
 
 The result of which advice was that in two weeks Mr. Jack 
 Hamlin found himself dreadfully bored and ennuye, but loyal 
 to his trust with his physician, wandering in the lower coast 
 counties. At San Luis Rey, he attended a bull-fight, and was 
 sorely tempted to back the bull heavily, and even conceived the 
 idea of introducing a grizzly bear, taking all the odds himself, 
 but remembered his promise, and fled the fascination. And so 
 the next day, in a queer old-fashioned diligence, he crossed the 
 coast range, and drifted into the quiet Mission of San Antonio. 
 Here he was so done up and bored with the journey and the 
 unpromising aspect of the town, that he quietly yielded his 
 usual profane badinage of the landlord to his loyal henchman 
 and negro body-servant, " Pete/' and went to bed at the soli 
 tary "Fonda," in the usual flea-infested bedroom of the Spanish 
 California inn. 
 
 " What does she look like, Pete ?" said Jack, languidly. 
 
 Pete, who was familiar with his master's peculiarities of 
 speech, knew that the feminine pronoun referred to the town, 
 and responded with great gravity 
 
 " De fac' is, Mahs Jack, dah dont peah to be much show 
 heah foh you. Deys playin' three-card monte in the bah room, 
 but 'taint no squar game. It 'ud do you no good, it might jess 
 rile you. Deys a fass pinto hoss hitched to a poss in de yard 
 a hoss dat de owner don't seem to undei stand nohow. If you 
 was right smart agin, I might let you go down thar and get a 
 bet outer some o' dem Greasers. But 'twont do nohow. Deys 
 a kind o' school Sunday-school, I reckon nex doah. Lots 
 o' little children saying prayers, singin' and praisin' de Lord, sah." 
 
 " What day is this ?" asked Jack, with sudden trepidation. 
 
 "Sunday, sah." 
 
 Jack uttered a plaintive groan and rolled over. 
 
 " Give one of these children a. quarter, and tell him there's 
 another quarter waiting for him up here." 
 
 " You wont get no child to fool wid dis day, Mahs Jack, 
 
Mr. Jack Hamlin takes a Holiday. 1 7 1 
 
 shuah. Deys bound to get licked when dey goes. Folks is 
 mighty hard on dem boys, Sunday, sah ; and it's de Lord's 
 day, Mahs Jack." 
 
 Partly for the sake of horrifying his attendant, who notwith 
 standing his evil associations, was very devout, Jack gave way 
 to violent denunciation of any system of theology that withheld 
 children from romping with him any day he might select. 
 
 "Open that window," he groaned, finally, "and shove the 
 bed alongside of it. That'll do. Hand me that novel. You 
 needn't read to me to-day ; you can finish that Volney's 
 * Ruins' another time." 
 
 It may be remarked here that it had been Jack's invalid 
 habit to get Pete to read to him. As he had provided himself 
 with such books as were objectionable to Pete, as they were 
 always utterly incomprehensible when filtered through his 
 dialect, and as he always made the reader repeat the more 
 difficult words, he extracted from this diversion a delicious 
 enjoyment, which Pete never suspected. 
 
 " You can go now," he said, when Pete had arranged him 
 comfortably. " I shan't want you this afternoon. Take some 
 money. I reckon you wont find any church of your kind here, 
 but if anybody interferes with you, jest lambaste him ! If you 
 can't do it, jest spot him, and / will !" (Mr. Hamlin never 
 allowed anybody but himself to object to his follower's religious 
 tendencies.) " Have a good time, Pete ! Don't tangle yourself 
 up if you can help it. The liquor about here is jest pizen." 
 
 With this parting adjuration Mr. Hamlin turned over and 
 tried to devote himself to his book. But after reading a few 
 lines the letters somehow got blurred and indistinct, and he 
 was obliged to put the book down with a much graver recollec 
 tion of the doctor's warning than he had ever had before. He 
 was obliged to confess to a singular weariness and lassitude 
 that had become habitual, and to admit that he had more pain 
 at times than as he put it " a man ought to have." The 
 idea of his becoming blind or paralysed dawned upon him 
 gradually, at first humorously; wondering if he couldn't deal, 
 faro as well without the use of his legs, for instance, which 
 were of no account to a man under the table ; if there could not 
 be raised cards for the blind as well as raised letters. The idea 
 of feeling a " pair" or a " flush" amused him greatly, and then 
 he remembered more gravely poor Gordon, who, becoming 
 
1172 . Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 gradually paralysed, blew his brains out. " The best thing he 
 could do," he soliloquized, seriously. The reflection, how 
 ever, had left such a depressing effect upon his mind that the 
 exaltation of liquor for a moment seemed to be the proper 
 thing for him ; but the next moment, remembering his promise 
 to the doctor, he changed his mind, and with an effort his 
 reflections. 
 
 For relief he turned his paling face to the window. It gave 
 upon a dusty courtyard, the soil of which was pulverized by 
 the pawing of countless hoofs during the long, dry summer ; 
 upon a tiled roof that rose above an adobe wall, over which 
 -again rose the two square whitewashed towers of the Mission, 
 church. Between these towers he caught a glimpse of dark 
 green foliage, and beyond this the shining sea. 
 
 It was very hot and dry. Scarcely a wave of air stirred the 
 curtains of the window. That afternoon the trade-winds which 
 .usually harried and bullied the little Mission of San Antonio 
 did not blow, and a writhing weeping willow near the window, 
 -that whipped itself into trifling hysterics on the slightest 
 pretext, was surprised into a stony silence. Even the sea 
 beyond glittered and was breathless. It reminded Jack of the 
 mouth of the man he met in Sacramento at the hotel, and again 
 .had quarrelled with in San Francisco. And there, absolutely, 
 was the man, the very man, gazing up at the hotel from the 
 : shadows of the courtyard. Jack was instantly and illogically 
 furious. Had Pete been there he would at once have sent an 
 insulting message ; but, while he was looking at him, a sound 
 "rose upon the air which more pleasantly arrested his attention. 
 
 It was an organ. Not a very fine instrument, nor skilfully 
 .played ; but an instrument that Jack was passionately fond of. 
 I forgot to say that he had once occupied the position of 
 organist in the Second Presbyterian Church of Sacramento, 
 until a growing and more healthy public sentiment detected an 
 incongruity between his secular and Sunday occupations, and a 
 prominent deacon, a successful liquor-dealer, demanded his 
 resignation. Although he afterward changed his attentions to 
 a piano, he never entirely lost his old affections. To become 
 the possessor of a large organ, to introduce it gradually, edu- 
 -eating the public taste, as a special feature of a first-clasf 
 gambling saloon, had always been one of Jack's wildest 
 .ambitions. So he raised himself upon his elbow and listened. 
 
Mr. Jack Hamlin takes a Holiday. 173 
 
 He could see also that the adjacent building was really a 
 recent addition to the old Mission church, and that wha 
 appeared to be a recess in the wall was only a deeply embra 
 sured window. Presently a choir of fresh young voices joined 
 the organ. Mr. Hamlin listened more attentively ; it was one 
 of Mozart's masses with which he was familiar. 
 
 For a few moments he forgot his pain and lassitude, and lying 
 there hummed in unison. And then, like a true enthusiast, 
 unmindful of his surroundings, he lifted his voice a very 
 touching tenor, well known among his friends and joined in, 
 drowning, I fear, the feebler pipe of the little acolytes within. 
 Indeed, it was a fine sight to see this sentimental scamp, lying 
 sick nigh unto dissolution through a dissipated life and infamous 
 profession, down upon his back in the dingy ctiarfo of a cheap 
 Spanish inn, voicing the litanies of the Virgin. Howbeit, once 
 started in he sang it through, and only paused when the anti- 
 phonal voices and organ ceased. Then he lifted his head, and,. 
 leaning on his elbow, looked across the courtyard. He had 
 hoped for the appearance of some of the little singers, and had 
 all ready a handful of coin to throw to them, and a few of those 
 ingenious epithets and persuasive arguments by which he had 
 always been successful with the young. But he was disappointed. 
 
 " I reckon school ain't out yet/' he said to himself, and was 
 about to lie down again, when a face suddenly appeared at the 
 grating of the narrow window. 
 
 Mr. Hamlin as suddenly became breathless, and the colour 
 rose to his pale face. He was very susceptible to female beauty, 
 and the face that appeared at the grating was that of a very 
 beautiful Indian girl. He thought, and was ready to swear, 
 that he had never seen anything half so lovely. Framed in the 
 recess of the embrasure as a shrine, it might have been a 
 shadowed devotional image, but that the face was not so 
 angelically beautiful as it was femininely fascinating, and that 
 the large deeply fringed eyes had an expression of bright 
 impatience and human curiosity. From his secure vantage 
 behind the curtain Mr. Hamlin knew that he could not be seen, 
 and so lay and absorbed this lovely bronze apparition which 
 his voice seemed to have evoked from the cold bronze adobe 
 wall. And then, as suddenly, she was gone, and the staring 
 sunlight and glittering sea beyond seemed to Mr. Hamlin to 
 have gone too. 
 
174 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 When Pete returned at sunset, he was amazed and alarmed 
 to find his master dressed and sitting by the window. There 
 was a certain brightness in his eye and an unwonted colour 
 in his cheek that alarmed him still more. 
 
 " You ain't bin and gone done nuffin' agin de doctor's orders, 
 Mahs Jack ?" he began. 
 
 " You'll find the whisky flask all right, unless you've been 
 dippin' into it, you infernal old hypocrite/' responded Jack, 
 cheerfully, accepting the implied suspicion of his servant. 
 " I've dressed myself because I'm goin' to church to-night, to 
 find out where you get your liquor. I'm happy because I'm 
 virtuous. Trot out that Volney's ' Ruins,' and wade in. 
 You're gettin' out o' practice, Pete. Stop. Because you're 
 religious, do you expect me to starve ? Go and order supper 
 first! Stop. Where in blank are you going? Here, you've 
 been gone three hours on an errand for me, and if you ain't 
 .runnin' off without a word about it." 
 
 " Gone on an errand foh you, sah ?" gasped the astonished 
 Pete. 
 
 " Yes ! Didn't I tell you to go round and see what was the 
 kind of religious dispensation here ?" continued Jack, with an 
 unmoved face. " Didn't I charge you particularly to observe 
 if the Catholic Church was such as a professing Christian and 
 the former organist of the Second Presbyterian Church of 
 Sacramento could attend? And now I suppose I've got to 
 find out myself. I'd bet ten to one you ain't been there at all !" 
 
 In sheer embarrassment Pete began to brush his master's 
 clothes with ostentatious and apologetic diligence, and said 
 
 " I'se no Papist. Mahs Jack, but if I'd thought ' 
 
 " Do you suppose I'm going to sit here without my supper 
 while you abuse the Catholic Church the only church that a 
 gentleman " but the frightened Pete was gone. 
 
 The Angelus bell had just rung, and it lacked a full half 
 hour yet before vespers, when Mr. Hamlin lounged into the 
 old Mission church. Only a few figures knelt here and there 
 mere vague, black shadows in the gloom. Aided, perhaps, 
 more by intuition than the light of the dim candles on the 
 high altar, he knew that the figure he looked for was not 
 among them ; and seeking the shadow of a column he calmly 
 waited its approach. It seemed a long time. A heavy- 
 looking woman, redolent of garlic, came in and knelt nearly 
 
Mr. Jack Hamlin takes a Holiday. 1 7 5 
 
 opposite. A yellow vaquero, whom Mr. Hamlin recalled at 
 once as one he had met on the road hither, a man whose 
 Spanish profanity, incited by unruly cattle, had excited Jack's 
 amused admiration dropped on his knees, and with equally 
 characteristic volubility began a supplication to the Virgin. 
 Then two or three men, whom Jack recognised as the monte- 
 players of the " Fonda," began, as it seemed to Jack, to bewail 
 their losses in lachrymose accents. And then Mr. Hamlin, 
 highly excited, with a pulse that would have awakened the 
 greatest concern of his doctor, became nervously and magneti 
 cally aware that some one else was apparently waiting and 
 anxious as himself, and had turned his head at the entrance of 
 each one of the congregation. It was a figure Jack had at 
 first overlooked. Safe in the shadow of the column, he could 
 watch it without being seen himself. Even in the gloom he 
 could see the teeth and eyes of the man he had observed that 
 afternoon his old antagonist at Sacramento. 
 
 Had it been anywhere else Jack would have indulged his 
 general and abstract detestation of Victor by instantly picking 
 a quarrel with him. As it was, he determined upon following 
 him when he left the church of venting on him any possible 
 chagrin or disappointment he might then have, as an excite 
 ment to mitigate the unsupportable dreariness of the Mission. 
 The passions are not so exclusive as moralists imagine, for 
 Mr. Hamlin was beginning to have his breast filled with wrath 
 against Victor, in proportion as his doubts of the appearance 
 of the beautiful stranger grew stronger in his mind, when two 
 figures momentarily darkened the church porch, and a rustle 
 of silk stole upon his ear. A faint odour of spice penetrated 
 through the incense. Jack looked up, and his heart stopped 
 beating. 
 
 It was she. As she reached the stall nearly opposite she 
 put aside her black veil, and disclosed the same calm, nymph- 
 like face he had seen at the window. It was doubly beautiful 
 now. Even the strange complexion had for Jack a bewilder 
 ing charm. She looked around, hesitated for a moment, and 
 then knelt between the two monte-players. With an almost 
 instinctive movement Jack started forward, as if to warn her of 
 the contaminating contact. And then he stopped, his own 
 face crimsoned with shame. For the first time he had doubted 
 the morality of his profession. 
 
176 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 The organ pealed out ; the incense swam ; the monotonous 
 voice of the priest rose upon the close, sluggish air, and Mr. 
 Jack Hamlin dreamed a dream. He had dispossessed the 
 cold, mechanical organist, and seating himself at the instru 
 ment, had summoned all the powers of reed and voice to sing 
 the paeans ah, me ! I fear not of any abstract Being, but of 
 incarnate flesh and blood. He heard her pure, young voice 
 lifted beside his ; even in that cold passionless commingling 
 there was joy unspeakable, and he knew himself exalted. Yet 
 he was conscious even in his dream, from his own hurried 
 breathing, and something that seemed to swell in his throat, 
 that he could not have sung a note. And then he came back 
 to his senses, and a close examination of the figure before him. 
 He looked at the graceful shining head, the rich lace veil, the 
 quiet elegance of attire, even to the small satin slipper that 
 stole from beneath her silken robe all united with a refine 
 ment and an air of jealous seclusion, that somehow removed 
 him to an immeasurable distance. 
 
 The anthem ceased, the last notes of the organ died away, 
 and the lady rose. Half an hour before Jack would have 
 gladly stepped forward to have challenged even a passing 
 glance from the beautiful eyes of the stranger ; now a timidity 
 and distrust new to the man took possession of him. He even 
 drew back closer in the shadow as she stepped toward the pillar, 
 which supported on its face a font of holy water. She had 
 already slipped oft" her glove, and now she leaned forward so 
 near he could almost feel her warm breath and dipped her 
 long slim fingers into the water. As she crossed herself with 
 the liquid symbol, Jack gave a slight start. One or two drops 
 of holy water thrown from her little fingers had fallen on his 
 face. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 VICTOR MAKES A DISCOVERY. 
 
 HAPPILY for Mr. Hamlin, the young girl noticed neither the 
 effect of her unconscious baptismal act, nor its object, but 
 moved away slowly to the door. As she did so, Jack stepped 
 from the shadow of the column, and followed her with eyes of 
 respectful awe and yearning. She had barely reached the porch, 
 
Victor makes a Discovery. 177 
 
 when she suddenly and swiftly turned and walked hurriedly 
 back, almost brushing against Mr. Hamlin. Her beautiful 
 eyes were startled and embarrassed, her scarlet lips parted and 
 paling rapidly, her whole figure and manner agitated and dis 
 composed. Without noticing him she turned toward the co 
 lumn, and under the pretext of using the holy water, took hold 
 of the font and leaned against it, as if for support, with her 
 face averted from the light. Jack could see her hands tighten 
 nervously on the stone, and fancied that her whole figure 
 trembled as she stood there. 
 
 He hesitated for a moment, and then moved to her side ; 
 not audaciously and confident, as was his wont with women, 
 but with a boyish colour in his face, and a timid, half-embar 
 rassed manner. 
 
 " Can I do anything for you, Miss ?" he said, falteringly. 
 " You don't seem to be well. I mean you look tired. Shan't 
 I bring you a chair ? It's the heat of this hole I mean, it's 
 so warm here. Shan't I go for a glass of water, a carriage ?" 
 
 Here she suddenly lifted her eyes to his, and his voice and 
 presence of mind utterly abandoned him. 
 
 " It's nothing," she said, with a dignified calm, as sudden and 
 as alarming to Jack as her previous agitation " nothing/' she 
 added, fixing her clear eyes on his, with a look so frank, so 
 open, and withal, as it seemed to Jack, so cold and indifferent, 
 that his own usually bold glance fell beneath it, " nothing but 
 the heat and closeness; I am better now." 
 
 " Shall I " began Jack, awkwardly. 
 
 " I want nothing, thank you." 
 
 Seeming to think that her conduct required some explana 
 tion, she added, hastily 
 
 " There was a crowd at the door as I was going out, and in 
 the press I felt giddy. I thought some one some man 
 pushed me rudely. I daresay I was mistaken." 
 
 She glanced at the porch against which a man was still 
 leaning. 
 
 The suggestion of her look and speech if it were a sugges 
 tion was caught instantly by Jack. Without waiting for her 
 to finish the sentence, he strode to the door. To his wrathful 
 surprise the lounger was Victor. Mr. Hamlin did not stop for 
 explanatory speech. With a single expressive word, and a 
 single dexterous movement of his arm and foot, he tumbled 
 
 N 
 
178 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 the astonished Victor down the steps at one side, and then 
 turned toward his late companion. But she had been equally 
 prompt. With a celerity quite inconsistent with her previous 
 faintness, she seized the moment that Victor disappeared to 
 dart by him and gain her carriage, which stood in waiting at 
 the porch. But as it swiftly drove away, Mr. Hamlin caught 
 one grateful glance from those wonderful eyes, one smile from 
 those perfect lips, and was happy. What matters that he had 
 an explanation possibly a quarrel on his hands ? Ah me ! I 
 fear this added zest to the rascal's satisfaction. 
 
 A hand was laid on his shoulder. He turned and saw the 
 face of the furious Victor, with every tooth at a white heat, and 
 panting with passion. Mr. Hamlin smiled pleasantly. 
 
 " Why, I want to know !" he ejaculated, with an affectation 
 of rustic simplicity, " if it ain't you, Johnny. Why, darn my 
 skin ! And this is your house ? You and St. Anthony in part 
 nership, eh ? Well, that gets me ! And here I tumbled you off 
 your own stoop, didn't I ? I might have known it was you by 
 the way you stood there. Mightn't I, Johnny ?" 
 
 " My name is not Johnny Cardmba 1" gasped Victor, almost 
 beside himself with impatient fury. 
 
 "Oh, it's that, is it? Any relation to the Cardmbas of 
 Dutch Flat ? It ain't a pretty name. I like Johnny better. 
 And I wouldn't make a row here now. Not to-day, Johnny ; 
 it's Sunday. I'd go home. I'd go quietly home, and I'd beat 
 some woman or child to keep myself in training. But I'd go 
 home first. I wouldn't draw that knife, neither, for it might 
 cut your fingers, and frighten the folks around town. I'd go 
 home quietly, like a good nice little man. And in the morning 
 I'd come round to the hotel on the next square, and I'd ask 
 for Mr. Hamlin, Mr. Jack Hamlin, Room No. 29; and I'd go 
 right up to his room, and I'd have such a time with him such 
 a high old time ; I'd just make that hotel swim with blood." 
 
 Two or three of the monte players had gathered around 
 Victor, and seemed inclined to take the part of their country 
 man. Victor was not slow to improve this moment of adhesion 
 and support. 
 
 " Is it dogs that we are, my compatriots ?" he said to them 
 bitterly ; " and he this one a man infamous !" 
 
 Mr. Hamlin, who had a quick ear for abusive and interjacu- 
 latory Spanish, overheard him. There was a swift chorus of 
 
Victor makes a Discovery. 179 
 
 " Cardmba /" from the allies, albeit wholesomely restrained by 
 something in Mr. Hamlin's eye which was visible, and probably 
 a suspicion of something in Mr. Hamlin's pocket which was 
 not visible. But the remaining portion of Mr. Hamlin was 
 ironically gracious. 
 
 " Friends of yours, I suppose ?" he inquired, affably. 
 <( ' Cardmbas* all of them, too ! Perhaps they'll call with you? 
 Maybe they haven't time and are in a hurry now ? If my room 
 isn't large enough, and they can't wait, there's a handy lot o' 
 ground beyond on the next square Plaza del Toros, eh? 
 What did you say? I'm a little deaf in this ear." 
 
 Under the pretence of hearing more distinctly, Jack Hamlin 
 approached the nearest man, who, I grieve to say, instantly 
 and somewhat undignifiedly retreated. Mr. Hamlin laughed. 
 But already a crowd of loungers had gathered, and he felt it 
 was time to end this badinage, grateful as it was to his sense of 
 humour. So he lifted his hat gravely to Victor and his friends, 
 replaced it perhaps aggressively tilted a trifle over his straight 
 nose, and lounged slowly back to his hotel, leaving his late 
 adversaries in secure but unsatisfactory and dishonourable pos 
 session of the field. Once in his own quarters, he roused the 
 sleeping Pete, and insisted upon opening a religious discussion, 
 in which, to Pete's- great horror, he warmly espoused the 
 Catholic Church, averring, with several strong expletives, that 
 it was the only religion fit for a white man, and ending some 
 what irreverently by inquiring into the condition of the pistols. 
 
 Meanwhile Victor had also taken leave of his friends. 
 
 " He has fled this most infamous !" he said ; "he dared not 
 remain and face us ! Thou didst observe his fear, Tiburcio ? 
 It was thy great heart that did it !" 
 
 " Rather he recognised thee, my Victor, and his heart was 
 that of the coyote." 
 
 " It was the Mexican nation, ever responsive to the appeal 
 of manhood and liberty, that made his liver as blanched as 
 that of the chicken," returned the gentleman who had retreated 
 from Jack. " Let us then celebrate this triumph with a little 
 glass." 
 
 And Victor, who was anxious to get away from his friends, 
 and saw in the prospective aguardiente a chance for escape, 
 generously led the way to the first wine-shop. 
 
 It chanced to be the principal one of the town. It had the 
 
 N 2 
 
a So Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 generic quality that is, was dirty, dingy, ill-smelling, and 
 yellow with cigarette smoke. Its walls were adorned by various 
 prints one or two French in origin, excellent in art, and 
 defective in moral sentiment, and several of Spanish origin, in 
 famous in art, and admirable in religious feeling. It had a 
 portrait of Santa Anna, and another of the latest successful 
 revolutionary general. It had an allegorical picture represent 
 ing the Genius of Liberty descending with all the celestial 
 machinery upon the Mexican Confederacy. Moved apparently 
 by the same taste for poetry and personification, the proprietor 
 had added to his artistic collection a highly coloured American 
 handbill representing the Angel of Healing presenting a stricken 
 family with a bottle of somebody's Panacea. At the further 
 extremity of the low room a dozen players sat at a green-baize 
 table absorbed in monte. Beyond them, leaning against the 
 wall, a harp-player twanged the strings of his instrument, in a 
 lugubrious air, with that singular stickiness of touch and reluc- 
 tancy of finger peculiar to itinerant performers on that instru 
 ment. The card-players were profoundly indifferent to both 
 music and performer. 
 
 The face of one of the players attracted Victor's attention. 
 It was that of the odd English translator the irascible stranger 
 upon whom he had intruded that night of his memorable visit 
 to Don Jose. Victor had no difficulty in recognising him, 
 although his slovenly and negligent working-dress had been 
 changed to his holiday antique black suit. He did not lift his 
 eyes from the game until he had lost the few silver coins placed 
 in a pile before him, when he rose grimly, and nodding brusquely 
 to the other players, without speaking left the room. 
 
 " He has lost five half-dollars his regular limit no more, 
 no less/' said Victor to his friend. " He will not play again to 
 night !" 
 
 " You know of him ?" asked Vincente, in admiration of his 
 companion's superior knowledge. 
 
 " Si !" said Victor. " He is a jackal, a dog of the Ameri 
 canos," he added, vaguely intending to revenge himself on the 
 stranger's former brusqueness by this depreciation. "He affects 
 to know our history our language. Is it a question of the 
 fine meaning of a word the shade of a technical expression ? 
 it is him they ask, not us ! It is thus they treat us, these 
 heretics ! Caramba F 
 
Victor makes a Discovery. I&F 
 
 " Caramba!" echoed Vincente, with a vague patriotism super- 
 induced by aguardiente. But Victor had calculated to unloose 1 
 Yincente's tongue for his private service. 
 
 " It is the world, my friend," he said, sententiously. 
 " These Americanos come they here often ?" 
 
 " You know the great American advocate our friend Don 
 Arturo Poinsett ?" 
 
 " Yes," said Victor, impatiently. " Comes he ?" 
 
 " Eh ! does he not ?" laughed Vincente. " Always. Ever. 
 Eternally. He has a client a widow, young, handsome, rich, 
 eh ? one of his own race." 
 
 " Ah ! you are wise, Vincente !" 
 
 Vincente laughed a weak spirituous laugh. 
 
 " Ah ! it is a transparent fact. Truly of a verity. Believe 
 me !" 
 
 "And this fair client who is she?" 
 
 " Donna Maria Sepulvida !" said Vincente, in a drunken 
 whisper. 
 
 " How is this ? You said she was of his own race." 
 
 " Truly, I did. She is Americana. But it is years ago. She 
 was very young. When the Americans first came, she was of 
 the first. She taught the child of the widower Don Jose 
 Sepulvida, herself almost a child ; you understand ? It was the 
 old story. She was pretty, and poor, and young ; the Don 
 grizzled, and old. and rich. It was fire and tow. Eh ? Ha ! 
 Ha ! The Don meant to be kind, you understand, and made 
 a rich wife of the little Americana. He was kinder than he 
 meant, and in two years, Cardmba / made a richer widow of 
 the Donna." 
 
 If Vincente had not been quite thrown by his potations, he 
 would have seen an undue eagerness in Victor's mouth and 
 eyes. 
 
 " And she is pretty tall and slender like the Americans, eh ? 
 large eyes, a sweet mouth ?" 
 
 " An angel. Ravishing !" 
 
 " And Don Arturo from legal adviser turns a lover !" 
 
 " It is said," responded Vincente, with drunken cunning and 
 exceeding archness ; " but thou and I, Victor, know better. 
 Love comes not with a brief! Eh ? Look, it is an old flame, 
 believe me. It is said it is not two months that he first came 
 here, and she fell in love with him at the first glance. 
 
1 82 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Absurdo ! Dispardtado ! Hear me, Victor ; it was an old 
 flame ; an old quarrel made up. Thou and I have heard the 
 romance before. Two lovers not rich, eh ? Good ! Separa 
 tion ; despair. The Senorita marries the rich man, eh ?" 
 
 Victor was too completely carried away by the suggestion of 
 his friend's speech, to conceal his satisfaction. Here was the 
 secret at last. Here was not only a clue, but absolutely the 
 missing Grace Conroy herself. In this young Americana 
 this widow this client of her former lover, Philip Ashley, he 
 held the secret of three lives. In his joy he slapped Vincente 
 on the back, and swore roundly that he was the wisest of men. 
 
 " I should have seen her the heroine of this romance my 
 friend. Possibly, she was at mass ?" 
 
 " Possibly not. She is Catholic, but Don Arturo is not. She 
 does not often attend when he is here." 
 
 "As to-day?" 
 
 " As to-day." 
 
 " You are wrong, friend Vincente," said Victor, a little im 
 patiently. " I was there ; I saw her." 
 
 Vincente shrugged his shoulders and shook his head with 
 drunken gravity. 
 
 " It is impossible, Senor Victor, believe me." 
 
 " I tell you I saw her," said Victor, excitedly. " Borrachon ! 
 She was there ! By the pillar. As she went out she partook 
 of agua bendita. I saw her ; large eyes, an oval face, a black 
 dress and mantle." 
 
 Vincente, who, happily for Victor, had not heard the epithet 
 of his friend, shook his head and laughed a conceited drunken 
 laugh. 
 
 " Tell me not this, friend Victor. It was not her thou didst 
 see. Believe me, I am wise. It was the Donna Dolores who 
 partook of agua bendita and alone. For there is none, thou 
 knowest, that has a right to offer it to her. Look you, foolish 
 Victor, she has large eyes, a small mouth, an oval face. And 
 dark ah, she is dark !" 
 
 " ' In the dark all are as the devil,' " quoted Victor, impa 
 tiently, " how should I know ? Who then is she ?" he demanded 
 almost fiercely, as if struggling with a rising fear. " Who is 
 this Donna Dolores ?" 
 
 " Thou art a stranger, friend Victor. Hark ye. It is the 
 half-breed daughter of the old Commander of San Ysabel. Yet, 
 
An Expert. 183 
 
 such is the foolishness of old men, she is his heiress ! She is 
 rich, and lately she has come into possession of a great grant, 
 very valuable. Thou dost understand, friend Victor ? Well, 
 why dost thou stare ? She is a recluse. Marriage is not for 
 her ; love, love ! the tender, the subduing, the delicious, is not 
 for her. She is of the Church, my Victor. And to think that 
 thou didst mistake this ascetic, this nun, this little brown novice, 
 this Donna Dolores Salvatierra for the little American coquette. 
 Ha ! Ha ! It is worth the fee of another bottle ? Eh ? Victor, 
 my friend ! Thou dost not listen. Eh ? Thou wouldst fly, 
 traitor. Eh ? what's that thou sayst ? Bobo ! Dupe thyself !" 
 
 For Victor stood before him, dumb, but for that single 
 epithet. Was he not a dupe ? Had he not been cheated again, 
 and this time by a blunder in his own malice? If he had 
 really, as he believed, identified Grace Conroy in this dark- 
 faced devotee whose name he now learned for the first time, 
 by what diabolical mischance had he deliberately put her in 
 possession of the forged grant, and so blindly restored her the 
 missing property ? Could Don Pedro have been treacherous ? 
 Could he have known, could they all Arthur Poinsett, Dumphy, 
 and Julie Devarges have known this fact of which he alone 
 was ignorant? Were they not laughing at him now? The 
 thought was madness. 
 
 With a vague impression of being shaken rudely off by a 
 passionate hand, and a drunken vision of a ghastly and pas 
 sionate face before him uttering words of impotent rage and 
 baffled despair, Vincente, the wise and valiant, came slowly 
 and amazedly to himself lying over the table. But his late 
 companion was gone. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 AN EXPERT. 
 
 A COLD, grey fog had that night stolen noiselessly in from the sea, 
 and after possessing the town had apparently intruded itself in 
 the long low plain before the hacienda of the Ranch o of the 
 Holy Trinity, where it sullenly lingered even after the morning 
 sun had driven in its eastern outposts. Viewed from the Mis 
 sion towers, it broke a cold grey sea against the corral of the 
 hacienda and half hid the white walls of the hacienda itself. It 
 
184 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 was characteristic of the Rancho that under such conditions T 
 at certain times it seemed to vanish entirely from the sight, of 
 rather to lose and melt itself into the outlines of the low foot 
 hills, and Mr. Perkins, the English translator, driving a buggy 
 that morning in that direction was forced once or twice to stop 
 and take his bearings anew, until the grey sea fell and the 
 hacienda again heaved slowly into view. 
 
 Although Mr. Perkins' transformations were well known to 
 his intimate associates, it might have been difficult for any 
 stranger to have recognised the slovenly drudge of Pacific 
 Street in the antique dandy who drove the buggy. Mr. Per 
 kins' hair was brushed, curled, and darkened by dye. A high 
 stock of a remote fashion encompassed his neck, above which 
 his face, whitened by cosmetics to conceal his high complexion, 
 rested stiffly and expressionless as a mask. A light blue coat 
 buttoned tightly over his breast, and a pair of close-fitting 
 trousers strapped over his japanned leather boots completed 
 his remarkable ensemble. It was a figure well known on Mont 
 gomery Street after three o'clock seldom connected with the 
 frouzy visitor of the Pacific Street den, and totally unrecognis 
 able on the plains of San Antonio. 
 
 It was evident, however, that this figure, eccentric as it was, 
 was expected at the hacienda, and recognised as having an im 
 portance beyond its antique social distinction. For when Mr. 
 Perkins drew up in the courtyard, the grave major douw at 
 once ushered him into the formal, low-studded drawing-room 
 .already described in these pages, and in another instant the 
 Donna Dolores Salvatierra stood before him. 
 
 With a refined woman's delicacy of perception, Donna 
 Dolores instantly detected under this bizarre exterior some 
 thing that atoned for it, which she indicated by the depth of 
 the half-formal courtesy she made it. Mr. Perkins met the salu 
 tation with a bow equally formal and respectful. He was evi 
 dently agreeably surprised at his reception, and impressed with 
 her manner. But like most men of ill-assured social position 
 he was a trifle suspicious and on the defensive. With a grace 
 ful gesture of her fan the Donna pointed to a chair, but her 
 guest remained standing. 
 
 " / am a stranger to you, Senor, but you are none to me,'* 
 she said, with a gracious smile. "Before I ventured upon the 
 boldness of seeking this interview, your intelligence, your expe- 
 
An Expert. 185* 
 
 rience, your honourable report was already made known to me 
 by your friends. Let me call myself one of these even before 
 I break the business for which I have summoned you." 
 
 The absurd figure bowed again, but even through the pitiable 
 chalk and cosmetics of its complexion, an embarrassed colour- 
 showed itself. Donna Dolores noticed it, but delicately turned 
 toward an old-fashioned secretary ; and opened it, to give her 
 visitor time to recover himself. She dre\v from a little drawer 
 a folded, legal-looking document, and then placing two chairs 
 beside the secretary, seated herself in one. Thus practically 
 reminded of his duty, Mr. Perkins could no longer decline the 
 proffered seat. 
 
 " I suppose," said Donna Dolores, " that my business, 
 although familiar to you generally although you are habitually 
 consulted upon just such questions may seem strange to you, 
 when you frankly learn my motives. Here is a grant purporting 
 to have been made to my father the late Don Jose Salva- 
 tierra. Examine it carefully, and answer me a single question- 
 to the best of your judgment." She hesitated, and then added 
 " Let me say, before you answer yes or no, that to me there 
 are no pecuniary interests involved nothing that should make-, 
 you hesitate to express an opinion which you might be called 
 upon legally to prove. That you will never be required to give. 
 Your answer will be accepted by me in confidence ; will not, as- 
 far as the world is concerned, alter the money value of this 
 document will leave you free hereafter to express a different 
 opinion, or even to reverse your judgment publicly if the 
 occasion requires it. You seem astounded, Seiior Perkins. 
 But I am a rich woman. I have no need to ask your judgment 
 to increase my wealth." 
 
 " Your question is " said Mr. Perkins, speaking for the- 
 
 first time without embarrassment. 
 
 " Is that document a forgery ?" 
 
 He took it out of her hand, opened it with a kind of pro 
 fessional carelessness, barely glanced at the signature and seals, 
 and returned it. 
 
 " The signatures are genuine," he said, with business-like- 
 brevity ; then he added, as if in explanation of that brevity ? 
 " I have seen it before." 
 
 Donna Dolores moved her chair with the least show of un 
 easiness. The movement attracted Mr. Perkins' attention. Jr 
 
1 86 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 was something novel. Here was a woman who appeared 
 actually annoyed that her claim to a valuable property was valid. 
 He fixed his eyes upon her curiously. 
 
 "Then you think it is a genuine grant?" she said, with a 
 slight sigh. 
 
 " As genuine as any that receive a patent at Washington," 
 he replied, promptly. 
 
 "Ah!" said Donna Dolores, simply. The feminine inter 
 jection appeared to put a construction upon Senor Perkins' 
 reply that both annoyed and challenged him. He assumed 
 the defensive. 
 
 " Have you any reason to doubt the genuineness of this 
 particular document ?" 
 
 " Yes. It was only recently discovered among Don Jose's 
 papers, and there is another in existence." 
 
 Senor Perkins again reached out his hand, took the paper, 
 examined it attentively, held it to the light and then laid it 
 down. " It is all right," he said. " Where is the other ?" 
 
 " I have it not," said Donna Dolores. 
 
 Senor Perkins shrugged his shoulders respectfully as to 
 Donna Dolores, but scornfully of an unbusiness-like sex. 
 " How did you expect me to institute a comparison?" 
 
 " There is no comparison necessary if that document is 
 genuine," said the Donna, quickly. 
 
 Senor Perkins was embarrassed for a moment. " I mean 
 there might be some mistake. Under what circumstances is it 
 held who holds it ? To whom was it given ?" 
 
 " That is a part of my story. It was given five years ago to 
 :a Dr. Devarges I beg your pardon, did you speak ?" 
 
 Senor Perkins had not spoken, but was staring with grim 
 intensity at Donna Dolores. " You said Dr. Devarges," he 
 repeated, slowly. 
 
 "Yes. Did you know him?" It was Donna Dolores' turn 
 to be embarrassed. She bit her lip and slightly contracted her 
 eyebrows. For a moment they both stood on the defensive. 
 
 " I have heard the name before," Mr. Perkins said at last, 
 -with a forced laugh. 
 
 "Yes, it is the name of a distinguished savant" said Donna 
 Dolores, composedly. " Well he is dead. But he gave this 
 grant to a young girl named named " Dolores paused as if 
 to recall the name " named Grace Conroy." 
 
An Expert. 187 
 
 She stopped and raised her eyes quickly to her companion, 
 but his face was unmoved, and his momentary excitement 
 seemed to have passed. He nodded his head for her to 
 proceed. 
 
 "Named Grace Conroy," repeated Donna Dolores, more 
 rapidly, and with freer breath. " After the lapse of five years a 
 woman an impostor appears to claim the grant under the 
 name of Grace Conroy. But perhaps finding difficulty in carry 
 ing out her infamous scheme, by some wicked, wicked art, she 
 gains the affections of the brother of this Grace, and marries 
 him as the next surviving heir." And Donna Dolores paused, 
 a little out of breath, with a glow under her burnished cheek 
 and a slight metallic quality in her voice. It was perhaps no 
 more than the natural indignation of a quickly sympathizing 
 nature, but Mr. Perkins did not seem to notice it. In fact, 
 within the last few seconds his whole manner had become 
 absent and preoccupied ; the stare which he had fixed a moment 
 before on Donna Dolores was now turned to the wall, and his 
 old face, under its juvenile mask, looked still older. 
 
 " Certainly, certainly," he said at last, recalling himself with 
 an effort. " But all this only goes to prove that the grant may 
 be as fraudulent as the owner. Then, you have nothing really 
 to make you suspicious of your own claim but the fact of its 
 recent discovery ? Well, that I don't think need trouble you. 
 Remember your grant was given when lands were not valuable, 
 and your late father might have overlooked it as unimportant''' 
 He rose with a slight suggestion in his manner that the inter 
 view had closed. He appeared anxious to withdraw, and not 
 entirely free from the same painful pre-absorption that he had 
 lately shown. With a slight shade of disappointment in her 
 face Donna Dolores also rose. 
 
 In another moment he would have been gone, and the lives 
 of these two people thus brought into natural yet mysterious 
 contact have flowed on unchanged in each monotonous current. 
 But as he reached the door he turned to ask a trivial question. 
 On that question trembled the future of both. 
 
 " This real Grace Conroy then I suppose has disappeared. 
 And this Doctor Devarges" he hesitated at the name as 
 something equally fictitious " you say is dead. How then did 
 this impostor gain the knowledge necessary to set up the claim ? 
 Who is she ?" 
 
1 88 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Oh, she is that is she married Gabriel Conroy under the 
 name of the widow of Dr. Devarges. Pardon me ! I did not 
 hear what you said. Holy Virgin ! What is the matter ? You 
 are ill. Let me call Sanchez ! Sit here !" 
 
 He dropped into a chair, but only for an instant. As she 
 turned to call assistance he rose and caught her by the arm. 
 
 " I am better," he said. " It is nothing I am often taken in 
 this way. Don't look at me. Don't call anybody except to 
 get me a glass of water there, that will do." 
 
 He took the glass she brought him, and instead of drinking 
 it threw back his head and poured it slowly over his forehead 
 and face as he leaned backward in the chair. Then he drew 
 out a large silk handkerchief and wiped his face and hair until 
 they were dry. Then he sat up and faced her. The chalk and 
 paint was off his face, his high stock had become unbuckled, 
 he had unbuttoned his coat and it hung loosely over his gaunt 
 figure ; his hair, although still dripping, seemed to have become 
 suddenly bristling and bushy over his red face. But he was 
 perfectly self-possessed, and his voice had completely lost its 
 previous embarrassment. 
 
 " Rush of blood to the head," he said, quietly ; " felt it 
 coming on all the morning. Gone now. Nothing like cold 
 water and sitting posture. Hope I didn't spoil your carpet. 
 And now to come back to your business." He drew up his 
 chair without the least trace of his former diffidence, beside 
 Donna Dolores. " Let's take another look at your grant." He 
 took it up, drew a small magnifying glass from his pocket and 
 examined the signature. " Yes, yes ! signature all right. Seal 
 of the Custom House. Paper all regular." He rustled it in 
 his fingers. " You're all right the swindle is with Madame 
 Devarges. There's the forgery there's this spurious grant." 
 
 " I think not," said Donna Dolores, quietly. 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " Suppose the grant is exactly like this in everything, paper, 
 signature, seal and all." 
 
 " That proves nothing," said Mr. Perkins, quickly. " Look 
 you. When this grant was drawn in the early days there 
 were numbers of these grants lying in the Custom House like 
 waste paper, drawn and signed by the Governor, in blank, only 
 wanting filling in by a clerk to make them a valid document 
 
An Expert. 189 
 
 She ! this impostor this Madame Devarges, has had access 
 to these blanks, as many have since the American Conquest, 
 and that grant is the result. But she is not wise, no ! I know 
 the handwriting of the several copyists and clerks I was one 
 myself. Put me on the stand, Donna Dolores put me on the 
 stand, and I'll confront her as I have the others." 
 
 " You forget," said Donna Dolores, coldly, " that I have no 
 desire to legally test this document. And if Spanish grants are 
 so easily made why might not this one of mine be a fabri 
 cation ? You say you know the handwriting of the copyists 
 look at this." 
 
 Mr. Perkins seized the grant impatiently, and ran his eye 
 quickly over the interlineations between the printed portions. 
 " Strange !" he muttered. " This is not my own nor Sanchez ; 
 nor Ruiz ; it is a new hand. Ah ! what have we here a 
 correction in the date in still another hand? And this 
 surely I have seen something like it in the office. But where ?" 
 He stopped, ran his fingers through his hair, but after an effort 
 at recollection abandoned the attempt. " But why ?" he said, 
 abruptly, " why should this be forged ?" 
 
 "Suppose that the other were genuine, and suppose that 
 this woman got possession of it in some wicked way. Suppose 
 that some one, knowing of this, endeavoured by this clever 
 forgery to put difficulties in her way without exposing her." 
 
 " But who would do that?" 
 
 " Perhaps the brother her husband ! Perhaps some one," 
 continued Donna Dolores, embarrassedly, with the colour 
 struggling through her copper cheek, " some one who did 
 not believe that the real Grace Conroy was dead or 
 missing !" 
 
 " Suppose the devil ! I beg your pardon. But people don't 
 forge documents in the interests of humanity and justice. And 
 why should it be given to you ?" 
 
 " I am known to be a rich woman," said Donna Dolores. 
 "I believe," she added, dropping her eyes with a certain proud 
 diffidence that troubled even the preoccupied man before her, 
 " I believe that is I am told that I have a reputation for 
 being liberal, and and just." 
 
 Mr. Perkins looked at her for a moment with undisguised 
 admiration. " But suppose," he said, with a bitterness that 
 
Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 seemed to grow out of that very contemplation, " suppose this 
 woman, this adventuress, this impostor, were a creature that 
 made any such a theory impossible. Suppose she were one 
 who could poison the very life and soul of any man to say 
 nothing of the man who was legally bound to her ; suppose she 
 were a devil who could deceive the mind and heart, who could 
 make the very man she was betraying most believe her guilt 
 less and sinned against ; suppose she were capable of not even 
 the weakness of passion ; but that all her acts were shrewd, 
 selfish, pre-calculated even to a smile or a tear do you think 
 such a woman whom, thank God ! such as you cannot even 
 imagine do you suppose such a woman would not have 
 guarded against even this ? No ! no !" 
 
 " Unless," said Donna Dolores, leaning against the secretary 
 with the glow gone from her dark face and a strange expression 
 trembling over her mouth, " unless it were the revenge of some 
 rival." 
 
 Her companion started. " Good ! It is so," he muttered 
 to himself. " / would have done it. I could have done it I 
 You are right, Donna Dolores." He walked to the window 
 and then came hurriedly back, buttoning his coat as he did so, 
 and rebuckling his stock. " Some one is coming ! Leave this 
 matter with me. I will satisfy you and myself concerning this 
 affair. Will you trust this paper with me ?" Donna Dolores 
 without a word placed it in his hand. " Thank you," he said, 
 with a slight return of his former embarrassment, that seemed 
 to belong to his ridiculous stock and his buttoned coat rather 
 than any physical or moral quality. " Don't believe me entirely 
 disinterested either," he added, with a strange smile. " Adios" 
 
 She would have asked another question, but at that instant 
 the clatter of hoofs and sound of voices arose from the court 
 yard, and with a hurried bow he was gone. The door opened 
 again almost instantly to the bright laughing face and coquettish 
 figure of Mrs. Sepulvida. 
 
 " Well !" said that little lady, as soon as she recovered her 
 breath. " For a religiously inclined young person and a 
 notorious recluse, I must say you certainly have more mascu 
 line company than falls to the lot of the worldly. Here I ran 
 across a couple of fellows hanging around the casa as I drove 
 up, and come in only to find you closeted with an old exquisite. 
 
An Expert. 191 
 
 Who was it another lawyer, dear ? I declare, it's too bad. I 
 have only one !" 
 
 " And that one is enough, eh ?" smiled Donna Dolores, 
 somewhat gravely, as she playfully tapped Mrs. Sepulvida's fair 
 cheek with her fan. 
 
 " Oh yes !" she blushed a little coquettishly " of course ! 
 And here I rode over, post haste, to tell you the news. But 
 first, tell me who is that wicked, dashing-looking fellow outside 
 the courtyard ? It can't be the lawyer's clerk." 
 
 " I don't know who you mean ; but it is, I suppose," said 
 Donna Dolores, a little wearily. " But tell me the news. I 
 am all attention." 
 
 But Mrs. Sepulvida ran to the deep embrasured window and 
 peeped out. " It isn't the lawyer, for he is driving away in his 
 buggy, as if he were hurrying to get out of the fog, and my 
 gentleman still remains. Dolores !" said Mrs. Sepulvida, 
 suddenly facing her friend with an expression of mock gravity 
 and humour, " this wont do ! Who is that cavalier ?" 
 
 With a terrible feeling that she was about to meet the keen 
 eyes of Victor, Donna Dolores drew near the window from the 
 side where she could look out without being herself seen. Her 
 first glance at the figure of the stranger satisfied her that her 
 fears were unfounded ; it was not Victor. Reassured, she drew 
 the curtain more boldly. At that instant the mysterious horse 
 man wheeled, and she met full in her own the black eyes of 
 Mr. Jack Hamlin. Donna Dolores instantly dropped the 
 curtain and turned to her friend. 
 
 " I don't know !" 
 
 " Truly, Dolores ?" 
 
 " Truly, Maria." 
 
 " Well, I believe you. I suppose then it must be me f" 
 
 Donna Dolores smiled, and playfully patted Mrs. Sepulvida's 
 joyous face. 
 
 " Well, then ?" she said, invitingly. 
 
 " Well then," responded Mrs. Sepulvida, half in embarrass 
 ment and half in satisfaction. 
 
 "The news !" said Donna Dolores. 
 
 " O well," said Mrs. Sepulvida, with mock deliberation, 
 " it has come at last !" 
 
 " It has ?" said Donna Dolores, looking gravely at her friend. 
 
Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 11 Yes. He has been there again to-day." 
 
 " And he asked you," said Donna Dolores, opening her fan 
 and turning her face toward the window. 
 
 " He asked me." 
 
 " And you said " 
 
 Mrs. Sepulvida tripped gaily toward the window and looked 
 out. 
 
 I said " 
 
 " What ?" 
 
 " NO 1" 
 
BOOK V. T HE VEIN. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 IN WHICH GABRIEL RECOGNISES THE PROPRIETIES. 
 
 AFTER the visit of Mr. Peter Dumphy, One Horse Gulch was 
 not surprised at the news of any stroke of good fortune. It 
 was enough that he, the great capitalist, the successful specu 
 lator, had been there ! The information that a company had 
 been formed to develop a rich silver mine recently discovered 
 on Conroy's Hill was received as a matter of course. Already 
 the theories of the discovery were perfectly well-established. 
 That it was simply a grand speculative coup of Dumphy's 
 that upon a boldly conceived plan this man intended to build 
 up the town of One Horse Gulch that he had invented " the 
 lead" and backed it by an ostentatious display of capital in 
 mills and smelting works solely for a speculative purpose ; that 
 five years before he had selected Gabriel Conroy as a simple- 
 minded tool for this design ; that Gabriel's Two and One Half 
 Millions was merely an exaggerated form of expressing the 
 exact wages One Thousand dollars a year, which was all 
 Dumphy had paid him for the use of his name, and that it was 
 the duty of every man to endeavour to realize quickly on the 
 advance of property before this enormous bubble burst this 
 was the theory of one-half the people of One Horse Gulch. 
 On the other hand, there was a large party who knew exactly 
 the reverse. That the whole thing was purely accidental ; that 
 Mr. Peter Dumphy being called by other business to One 
 Horse Gulch, while walking with Gabriel Conroy one day had 
 picked up a singular piece of rock on Gabriel's claim, and had 
 said, "this looks like silver;" that Gabriel Conroy had 
 laughed at the suggestion, whereat Mr. Peter Dumphy, 
 who never laughed, had turned about curtly and demanded in 
 his usual sharp business way, "Will you take Seventeen 
 Millions for all your right and title to this claim?" That 
 
 o 
 
194 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Gabriel " you know what a blank fool Gabe is !" had 
 assented, " and this way, sir, actually disposed of a property 
 worth, on the lowest calculation, One Hundred and Fifty 
 Millions." This was the generally accepted theory of the 
 other and more imaginative portion of One Horse Gulch. 
 
 Howbeit within the next few weeks following the advent of 
 Mr. Dumphy, the very soil seemed to have quickened through 
 that sunshine, and all over the settlement pieces of plank and 
 scantling thin blades of new dwellings started up under 
 that beneficent presence. On the bleak hill sides the more 
 extensive foundations of the Conroy Smelting Works were laid. 
 The modest boarding-house and restaurant of Mrs. Markle was 
 found inadequate to the wants and inconsistent with the 
 greatness of One Horse Gulch, and a new hotel was erected. 
 But here I am anticipating another evidence of progress 
 namely, the daily newspaper, in which these events were re 
 ported with a combination of ease and elegance one may envy 
 yet never attain. Said the Times : 
 
 "The Grand Conroy House, now being inaugurated, will be managed 
 by Mrs. Susan Markle, whose talents as a chef dc cuisine are as well known 
 to One Horse Gulch as her rare social graces and magnificent personal 
 charms. She will be aided by her former accomplished assistant, Miss 
 Sarah Clark. As hash-slinger, Sal can walk over anything of her weight 
 in Plumas." 
 
 With these and other evidences of an improvement in 
 public taste, the old baleful title of " One Horse Gulch" was 
 deemed incongruous. It was proposed to change that name 
 to " Silveropolis," there being, in the figurative language of the 
 Gulch, " more than one horse could draw/' 
 
 Meanwhile, the nominal and responsible position of Super 
 intendent of the new works was filled by Gabriel, although the 
 actual business and executive duty was pericrmed by a sharp, 
 snappy young tellow of about half Gabriel's size, supplied by 
 the Company. This was in accordance with the wishes of 
 Gabriel, who could not bear idleness ; and the Company, 
 although distrusting his administrative ability, wisely recognised 
 his great power over the workmen through the popularity of 
 his easy democratic manners, and his disposition always to 
 lend his valuable physical assistance in cases of emergency. 
 Gabriel had become a great favourite with the men ever since 
 hey found that prosperity had not altered his simple nature. 
 
Gabriel recognises tlie Proprieties, 195 
 
 It was pleasant to them to be able to point out to a stranger 
 this plain, unostentatious, powerful giant, working like them 
 selves and with themselves, with the added information that 
 he owned half the mine, and was worth Seventeen Millions ! 
 Always a shy and rather lonely man, his wealth seemed to 
 have driven him, by its very oppressiveness, to the society of 
 his humble fellows for relief. A certain deprecatoriness of 
 manner whenever his riches were alluded to, strengthened the 
 belief of some in that theory that he was merely the creature 
 of Dumphy's speculation. 
 
 Although Gabriel was always assigned a small and insigni 
 ficant part in the present prosperity of One Horse Gulch, it 
 was somewhat characteristic of the peculiar wrongheadedness of 
 this community that no one ever suspected his wife of any 
 complicity in it. It had been long since settled that her 
 superiority to her husband was chiefly the feminine charm of 
 social grace and physical attraction. That, warmed by the 
 sunshine of affluence, this butterfly would wantonly flit from 
 flower to flower, and eventually quit her husband and One 
 Horse Gulch for some more genial clime, was never doubted. 
 " She'll make them millions fly ef she hez to fly with it," was 
 the tenor of local criticism. A pity, not unmixed with con 
 tempt, was felt for Gabriel's apparent indifference to this pro 
 phetic outlook ; his absolute insensibility to his wife's ambiguous 
 reputation was looked upon as the hopelessness of a thoroughly 
 deceived man. Even Mrs. Markle, whose attempts to mollify 
 Oily had been received coldly by that young woman even 
 she was a convert to the theory of the complete domination of 
 the Conroy household by this alien and stranger. 
 
 But despite this baleful prophecy, Mrs. Conroy did not fly 
 nor show any inclination to leave her husband. A new house 
 was built with that rapidity of production that belonged to the 
 climate, among the pines of Conroy's Hill, which on the 
 hottest summer day still exuded the fresh sap of its green 
 timbers and exhaled a woodland spicery. Here the good taste 
 of Mrs. Conroy flowered in chintz, and was always fresh and 
 feminine in white muslin curtains and pretty carpets, and here 
 the fraternal love of Gabriel brought a grand piano for the use 
 of Oily, and a teacher. Hither also came the best citizens of 
 the county even the notabilities of the State feeling that 
 Mr. Dumphy had, to a certain extent, made One Horse 
 
 o2 
 
196 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 respectable, soon found out also that Mrs. Conroy was at 
 tractive ; the Hon. Blank had dined there on the occasion of 
 his last visit to his constituents of the Gulch ; the Hon. Judge 
 Beeswinger had told in her parlour several of his most effective 
 stones. Colonel Starbottle's manly breast had dilated over 
 her dish-covers, and he had carried away with him not only a 
 vivid appreciation of her charms capable of future eloquent 
 expression, but an equally vivid idea of his own fascinations, 
 equally incapable of concealment. Gabriel himself rarely 
 occupied the house except for the exigences of food and 
 nightly shelter. If decoyed there at other times by specious 
 invitations of Oily, he compromised by sitting on the back 
 porch in his shirt sleeves, alleging as a reason his fear of the 
 contaminating influence of his short black pipe. 
 
 " Don't ye mind me, July/' he would say, when his spouse 
 with anxious face and deprecatory manner would waive her 
 native fastidiousness and aver that " she liked it." " Don't ye 
 mind me, I admire to sit out yer. I'm a heap more com 
 fortable outer doors, and allus waz. I reckon the smell 
 might get into them curtings, and then and then," added 
 Gabriel, quietly ignoring the look of pleased expostulation with 
 which Mrs. Conroy recognised this fancied recognition of her 
 tastes, " and then Olly's friends and thet teacher, not being 
 round like you and me allez and used to it, they mightn't like 
 it. And I've heerd that the smell of nigger-head terbacker do- 
 git inter the strings of a pianner and kinder stops the music. 
 A planner's a mighty cur'us thing. I've heerd say they're as 
 dilikit and ailin' ez a child. Look in 'em and see them little 
 strings a twistin' and crossin' each other like the reins of a six 
 mule team, and it 'tain't no wonder they gets mixed up 
 often." 
 
 It was not Gabriel's way to notice his wife's manner very 
 closely, but if he had at that moment he might have fancied 
 that there were other instruments whose fine chords were as 
 subject to irritation and discordant disturbance. Perhaps only 
 vaguely conscious of some womanish sullenness on his wife's 
 part, Gabriel would at such times disengage himself as being 
 the possible disorganizing element, and lounge away. His 
 favourite place of resort was his former cabin, now tenantless 
 and in rapid decay, but which he had refused to dispose of, 
 even after the erection of his two later dwellings rendered it 
 
Gabriel recognises tlie Proprieties. 197 
 
 an unnecessary and unsightly encumbrance of his lands. He 
 loved to linger by the deserted hearth and smoke his pipe in 
 solitude, not from any sentiment, conscious or unconscious, 
 but from a force of habit, that was in this lonely man almost as 
 pathetic. 
 
 He may have become aware at this time that a certain 
 growing disparity of sentiment and taste which he had before 
 noticed with a vague pain and wonder, rendered his gradual 
 separation from Oily a necessity of her well-doing. He had 
 indeed revealed this to her on several occasions with that 
 frankness which was natural to him, He had apologized with 
 marked politeness to her music teacher, who once invited him 
 to observe Olly's proficiency, by saying in general terms that 
 he "took no stock in chunes. I reckon it's about ez easy, 
 Miss, if ye don't ring me in. Thet chile's got to get on with 
 out thinkin' o' me or my 'pinion allowin' it was wuth thinkin' 
 on." Once meeting Oily walking with some older and more 
 fashionable school friends whom she had invited from Sacra 
 mento, he had delicately avoided them with a sudden and 
 undue consciousness of his great bulk, and his slow moving in 
 tellect, painfully sensitive to what seemed to him to be the 
 preternatural quickness of the young people, and turned into a 
 by-path. 
 
 On the other hand, it is possible that with the novelty of 
 her new situation, and the increased importance that wealth 
 brought to Oily, she had become more and more oblivious of 
 her brother's feelings, and perhaps less persistent in her endea 
 vours to draw him toward her. She knew that he had attained 
 an equal importance among his fellows from this very wealth, 
 and also a certain evident, palpable, superficial respect which 
 satisfied her. With her restless ambition and the new life that 
 was opening before her, his slower old-fashioned methods, his 
 absolute rusticity that day by day appeared more strongly in 
 contrast to his surroundings began to irritate where it had 
 formerly only touched her sensibilities. From this irritation 
 she at last escaped by the unfailing processes of youth and 
 the fascination of newer impressions. And so day by day and 
 hour by hour, they drifted slowly apart. Until one day Mrs. 
 Conroy was pleasantly startled by an announcement from 
 Gabriel, that he had completed arrangements to send Oily to 
 boarding-school in Sacramento. It was understood, also, that 
 
198 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 this was only a necessary preliminary to the departure of her 
 self and husband for a long-promised tour of Europe. 
 
 As it was impossible for one of Gabriel's simple nature to 
 keep his plans entirely secret, Oily was perfectly aware of his 
 intention, and prepared for the formal announcement, which 
 she knew would come in Gabriel's quaint serious way. In the 
 critical attitude which the child had taken toward him, she was 
 more or less irritated, as an older person might have been, with 
 the grave cautiousness with which Gabriel usually explained 
 that conduct and manner which was perfectly apparent and 
 open from the beginning. It was during a long walk in which 
 the pair had strayed among the evergreen woods, when they 
 came upon the little dismantled cabin. Here Gabriel stopped. 
 Oily glanced around the spot and shrugged her shoulders. 
 Gabriel, more mindful of Olly's manner than he had ever been 
 of any other of her sex, instantly understood it. 
 
 " It ain't a purty place, Oily," he began, rubbing his hands, 
 " but we've had high ole times yer you and me. Don't ye 
 mind the nights I used to kem up from the gulch and pitch in 
 to mendin' your gownds, Oily, and you asleep ? Don't ye mind 
 that ar dress I copper fastened ?" and Gabriel laughed loudly, 
 and yet a little doubtfully. 
 
 Oily laughed too, but not quite so heartily as her brother, 
 and cast her eyes down upon her own figure. Gabriel followed 
 the direction of her glance. It was not perhaps easy to re 
 create in the figure before him the outre little waif who such a 
 short time such a long time ago had sat at his feet in that 
 very cabin. It is not alone that Oily was better dressed, and 
 her hair more tastefully arranged, but she seemed in some way 
 to have become more refined and fastidious a fastidiousness 
 that was plainly an outgrowth of something that she possessed 
 but he did not. As he looked at her, another vague hope that 
 he had fostered a fond belief that as she grew taller she would 
 come to look like Grace, and so revive the missing sister in his 
 memory this seemed to fade away before him. Yet it was 
 characteristic of the unselfishness of his nature, that he did not 
 attribute this disappointment to her alone, but rather to some 
 latent principle in human nature whereof he had been ignorant. 
 He had even gone so far as to invite criticism on a hypothetical 
 case from the sagacious Johnson. " It's the difference atvveen 
 human natur and brute natur," that philosopher had answered 
 
Gabriel recognises the Proprieties. 199 
 
 promptly. " A purp's the same purp allez, even arter it's a 
 grown dorg, but a child ain't it's the difference atween reason 
 and instink." 
 
 But Oily, to whom this scene recalled another circumstance, 
 did not participate in Gabriel's particular reminiscence. 
 
 " Don't you remember, Gabe," she said, quickly, " the first 
 night that sister July came here and stood right in that very 
 door ? Lord ! how flabergasted we was to be sure ! And if 
 anybody'd told me, Gabe, that she was going to marry you 
 I'd, I'd a knocked 'em down," she blurted out, after hesitating 
 for a suitable climax. 
 
 Gabriel, who in his turn did not seem to be particularly 
 touched with Olly's form of reminiscence, rose instantly above 
 all sentiment in a consideration of the proprieties. " Ye 
 shouldn't talk o' knockin' people down, Oily it ain't decent 
 for a young gal," he said, quickly. " Not that I mind it," he 
 added, with his usual apology, " but allowin' that some of them 
 purty little friends o' yours or teacher now, should hear ye 1 
 Sit down for a spell, Oily. I've suthin' to tell ye." 
 
 He took her hand in his, and made her sit beside him on the 
 rude stone that served as the old doorstep of the cabin. 
 
 " Maybe ye might remember," he went on, lightly lifting her 
 hand in his, and striking it gently across his knee to beget an. 
 easy confidential manner, " maybe ye might remember that I 
 allers allowed to do two things ef ever I might make a strike 
 one was to give you a good schoolin' the other was to find 
 Grace, \f so be as she was above the yearth. They waz many 
 ways o' finding out many ways o' settin' at it, but they warn't 
 ?ny ways. I allus allowed that ef thet child waz in harkenin* 
 distance o' the reach o' my call, she'd hear me. I mout have 
 took other men to help me men ez was sharp in them things, 
 men ez was in that trade but I didn't. And why ?" 
 
 Oily intimated by an impatient shake of her head that she 
 didn't know. 
 
 " Because she was that shy and skary with strangers. Ye 
 disremember how shy she was, Oily, in them days, for ye was 
 too young to notice. And then, not bein' shy yourself, but 
 sorter peart, free and promisskiss, ready and able to keep up 
 your end ot a conversation with anybody, and allus ez chipper 
 as a jay-bird why, ye don't kinder allow that fur Gracy as I 
 do. And thar was reasons why that purty chile should be shy 
 
.zoo Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 reasons ye don't understand now, Oily, but reasons pow'ful and 
 strong to such a child as thet." 
 
 " Ye mean, Gabe," said the shamelessly direct Oily, " that 
 she was bashful, hevin' ran away with her bo." 
 
 That perplexity which wiser students of human nature than 
 Gabriel have experienced at the swift perception of childhood 
 in regard to certain things left him speechless. He could only 
 stare hopelessly at the little figure before him. 
 
 "Well, wot did you do, Gabe? Go on!" said Oily, 
 impatiently. 
 
 Gabriel drew a long breath. 
 
 " Thar bein' certing reasons why Gracey should be thet shy 
 reasons consarning propperty o' her deceased parients," boldly 
 invented Gabriel, with a lofty ignoring of Olly's baser sug 
 gestion, " I reckoned that she should get the first word from 
 me and not from a stranger. I knowed she warnt in Californy, 
 or she'd hev seen them handbills I issued five years ago. What 
 did I do ? Thar is a paper wot's printed in New York, called 
 the Herald. Thar is a place in that thar paper whar they print 
 notisses to people that is fur, fur away. They is precious words 
 from fathers to their sons, from husbands to their wives, from 
 brothers to sisters, ez can't find each other, from " 
 
 " From sweethearts to thar bo's," said Oily, briskly ; " I 
 know/'' 
 
 Gabriel paused in speechless horror. 
 
 " Yes," continued Oily. " They calls 'em ' Personals.' 
 Lord ! I know all 'bout them. Gals get bo's by them, Gabe !" 
 
 Gabriel looked up at the bright, arching vault above him. 
 Yet it did not darken nor split into fragments. And he hesi 
 tated. Was it worth while to go on ? Was there anything he 
 could tell this terrible child his own sister which she did not 
 already know better than he ? 
 
 " I wrote one o' them Pursonals," he went on to say, dog 
 gedly, " in this ways." He paused, and fumbling in his waist 
 coat pocket, finally drew out a well-worn newspaper slip, and 
 straightening it with some care from its multitudinous enfold- 
 ings, read it slowly, and with that peculiar patronizing self- 
 consciousness which distinguishes the human animal in the 
 rehearsal of its literary composition. 
 
 "Ef G. C. will communicate with sufferin' and anxious friends, she will 
 confer a favour on ole Gabe. I will come and see her, and Oily will rise 
 
Gabriel recognises the Proprieties. 201 
 
 s;p and welcome her. Ef G. C. is sick or don't want to come she will write 
 to G. C. G. C. is same as usual, and so is Oily. All is well. Address 
 G. C. , One Horse Gulch, Californy till further notiss." 
 
 " Read it over again," said Oily. 
 
 Gabriel did so, readily. 
 
 " Ain't it kinder mixed up with them G. C.'s ?" queried the 
 practical Oily. 
 
 " Not for she," responded Gabriel, quickly, " that's just what 
 July said when I showed her the ' Pursonal.' But I sed to her 
 as I sez to you, it taint no puzzle to Gracy. She knows ez 
 our letters is the same. And ef it 'pears queer to strangers 
 wots the odds ? Thet's the idee ov a * pursonal.' Howsom- 
 ever, it's all right, Oily. Fur," he continued, lowering his voice 
 confidentially, and drawing his sister closer to his side, " ifs 
 bin ansered ! n 
 
 "By Grace?" asked Oily. 
 
 " No," said Gabriel, in some slight confusion, " not by Grace, 
 exactly that is but yer's the anser." He drew from his bosom 
 a small chamois-skin purse, such as miners used for their loose 
 gold, and extracted the more precious slip. " Read it," he 
 said to Oily, turning away his head. 
 
 Oily eagerly seized and read the paper. 
 
 " G. C. Look no more for the missing one who will never return. Look 
 at home. Be happy. P. A." 
 
 Oily turned the slip over in her hands. " Is that all ?" she 
 asked in a higher key, with a rising indignation in her pink 
 cheeks. 
 
 "That's all," responded Gabriel; "short and shy- that's 
 Gracy, all over." 
 
 " Then all I got to say is it's mean !" said Oily, bringing her 
 brown fist down on her knee. " And that's wot I'd say to that 
 thar P. A. that Philip Ashley if I met him." 
 
 A singular look, quite unlike the habitual placid, good- 
 humoured expression of the man, crossed Gabriel's face as he 
 quietly reached out and took the paper from Olly's hand. 
 
 " Thet's why I'm goin' off," he said, simply. 
 
 " Goin' off," repeated Oily. 
 
 " Goin' off to the States. To New York," he responded, 
 " July and me. July sez and she's a peart sort o' woman in 
 her way, ef not o' your kind, Oily," he interpolated, apolo- 
 
202 Gabriel Conroy, 
 
 getically, " but pow'ful to argyfy and plan, and she allows ez 
 New York 'ud nat'rally be the stampin' ground o' sich a high- 
 toned feller ez him. And that's why I want to talk to ye, 
 Oily. Thar's only two things ez 'ud ever part you and me, 
 dear, and one on 'em ez this very thing it's my dooty to 
 Gracy, and the other ez my dooty to you. Et ain't to be 
 expected that when you oughter be gettin' your edykation 
 you'd be cavortin' round the world with me. And you'll stop 
 yer at Sacramento in a A i first-class school, ontil I come 
 back. Are ye hark'nin', dear ?" 
 
 " Yes," said Oily, fixing her clear eyes on her brother. 
 
 " And ye ain't to worrit about me. And it 'ud be as well, 
 Oily, ez you'd forget all 'bout this yer gulch, and the folks. 
 Fur yer to be a lady, and in bein' thet brother Gabe don't want 
 ennythin' to cross ye. And I want to say to thet feller, Oily, 
 1 Ye ain't to jedge this yer fammerly by me. fur the men o' that 
 fammerly gin'rally speakin' runs to size, and ain't, so to speak, 
 strong up yer,' ; ' continued Gabriel, placing his hands on his 
 sandy curls ; " * but thar's a little lady in school in Californy ez 
 is jest what Gracy would hev bin if she'd had the schoolin'. 
 And ef ye wants to converse with her she kin give you pints 
 enny time.' And then I brings you up, and nat'rally I reckon 
 thet you ain't goin' back on brother Gabe in 'stronomy, 
 grammar, 'rithmetic and them things." 
 
 " But wot's the use of huntin' Grace if she says she'll never 
 return ?" said Oily, sharply. 
 
 " Ye musn't read them ' parsonals' ez ef they was square. 
 They're kinder conundrums, ye know puzzles. It says G. C. 
 will never return. Well, 'spose G. C. has another name. 
 Don't you see ?" 
 
 " Married, maybe," said Oily, clapping her hands. 
 
 " Surely," said Gabriel, with a slight colour in his cheeks. 
 "Thet's so." 
 
 " But s'pose it doesn't mean Grace after all ?" persisted Oily, 
 
 Gabriel was for a moment staggered. 
 
 " But July sez it does," he answered, doubtfully. 
 
 Oily looked as if this evidence was not entirely satisfactory. 
 
 " But what does * look at home' mean ?" she continued. 
 
 " Thet's it," said Gabriel, eagerly. " Thet reads ' Look at 
 little Oily ain't she there?' And thet's like Gracy allus 
 thinkin' o' somebody else." 
 
Gabriel recognises the Proprieties. 203 
 
 "Well," said Oily, " 111 stop yer, and let you go. But wot 
 are you goin' to do without me ?" 
 
 Gabriel did not reply. The setting sun was so nearly level 
 with his eyes that it dazzled them, and he was fain to hide 
 them among the clustering curls of Oily, as he held the girl's 
 head in both his hands. After a moment he said 
 
 " Do ye want to know why I like this old cabin and this 
 yer chimbly, Oily ?" 
 
 " Yes," said Oily, whose eyes were also affected by the sun, 
 and who was glad to turn them to the object indicated. 
 
 " It ain't because you and me hez sot there many and many ; 
 a day, fur that's suthin' that we ain't goin' to think about any 
 more. It's because, Oily, the first lick I ever struck with a 
 pick on this hill was just yer. And I raised this yer chimbly 
 with the rock. Folks thinks thet it was over yonder in the 
 slope whar I struck the silver lead, thet I first druv a pick. 
 But it warn't. And I sometimes think, Oily, that I've had as 
 much square comfort outer thet first lick ez I'll ever get outer 
 the lead yonder. But come, Oily, come ! July will be wonderin' 
 whar you is, and ther's a stranger yonder comin' up the road, 
 and I reckon I ain't ez fine a lookin' bo ez a young lady ez 
 you ez, orter to co-mand. Never mind, Oily, he needn't know 
 ez you and me is any relashuns. Come !" 
 
 In spite of Gabriel's precautionary haste, the stranger who 
 was approaching by the only trail which led over the rocky 
 hillside perceived the couple, and turned toward them interro 
 gatively. Gabriel was forced to stop, not, however, without 
 first giving a slight reassuring pressure to Olly's hand. 
 
 " Can you tell me the way to the hotel the Grand Conroy 
 House I think they call it ?" the traveller asked, politely. 
 
 He would have been at any time an awe-inspiring and 
 aggressive object to One Horse Gulch and to Gabriel, and at 
 this particular moment he was particularly discomposing. He 
 was elaborately dressed, buttoned and patent-leather booted in 
 the extreme limit of some bygone fashion, and had the added 
 effrontery of spotless ruffled linen. As he addressed Gabriel 
 he touched a tall black hat, sacred in that locality to clergy 
 men and gamblers. To add to Gabriel's discomfiture, at the 
 mention of the Grand Conroy House, he had felt Oily stiffen 
 aggressively under his hand. 
 
 " Foller this yer trail to the foot of the hill, and ye'll strike 
 
J2O4 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Main Street ; that'll fetch ye thar. I'd go with ye a piece, but 
 I'm imployed," said Gabriel, with infinite tact and artfulness, 
 .accenting each word with a pinch of Olly's arm, " imployed by 
 this yer young lady's friends to see her home, and bein' a 
 partikler sort o' fammerly, they makes a row when I don't 
 come reg'lar. Axin' your parding, don't they, Miss ?" and to 
 stop any possible retort from Oily before she could recover 
 from her astonishment, he had hurried her into the shadows of 
 the evergreen pines of Conroy Hill. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 TRANSIENT GUESTS AT THE GRAND CONROY. 
 
 THE Grand Conroy Hotel was new, and had the rare virtue of 
 comparative cleanliness. As yet the odours of bygone dinners, 
 and forgotten suppers, and long dismissed breakfasts had not 
 possessed and permeated its halls and passages. There was no 
 distinctive flavour of preceding guests in its freshly clothed and 
 papered rooms. There was a certain virgin coyness about it, 
 and even the active ministration of Mrs. Markle and Sal was 
 -delicately veiled from the public by the interposition of a bar 
 keeper and Irish waiter. Only to a few of the former habitues 
 did these ladies appear with their former frankness and 
 informality. There was a public parlour, glittering with gilt 
 framed mirrors and gorgeous with red plush furniture, which 
 .usually froze the geniality of One Horse Gulch, and repressed 
 its larger expression, but there was a little sitting-room beyond 
 sacred to the widow and her lieutenant Sal, where visitors were 
 occasionally admitted. Among the favoured few who pene 
 trated this arcana was Lawyer Maxwell. He was a widower 
 and was supposed to have a cynical distrust of the sex, that 
 was at once a challenge to them and a source of danger to 
 himself. 
 
 Mrs. Markle was of course fully aware that Mrs. Conroy had 
 .been Maxwell's client, and that it was while on a visit to him 
 she had met with the accident that resulted in her meeting with 
 Gabriel. Unfortunately Mrs. Markle was unable to entirely 
 satisfy herself if there had been any previous acquaintance. 
 Maxwell had declared to her that to the best of his knowledge 
 
Guests at the Grand Conroy. 205 
 
 there had been none, and that the meeting was purely acci 
 dental. He could do this without violating the confidence of 
 his client, and it is fair to presume that upon all other matters 
 he was loyally uncommunicative. That Madame Devarges had 
 consulted him regarding a claim to some property was the only^ 
 information he imparted. In doing this, however, he once 
 accidentally stumbled, and spoke of Mrs. Devarges as " Grace 
 Conroy." Mrs. Markle instantly looked up. " I mean Mrs. 
 Conroy," he said, hastily. 
 
 " Grace that was his sister who was lost wasn't it ?" 
 
 " Yes," replied Maxwell, demurely, " did he ever talk much 
 to you about her?'' 
 
 "No-o,"said Mrs. Markle, with great frankness, "he and 
 me only talked on gin'ral topics ; but from what Oily used to- 
 let on, I reckon that sister was the only woman he ever 
 loved." 
 
 Lawyer Maxwell, who with an amused recollection of his 
 extraordinary interview with Gabriel in regard to the woman 
 before him, was watching her mischievously, suddenly became 
 grave. " I guess you'll find, Mrs. Markle, that his present 
 wife amply fills the place of his lost sister," he said, more 
 seriously than he had intended. 
 
 " Never," said Mrs. Markle, quickly. " Not she the 
 designin', crafty hussy !" 
 
 " I am afraid you are not doing her justice/' said Maxwell, 
 wiping away a smile from his lips, after his characteristic habit, 
 " but then it's not strange that two, bright, pretty women are 
 unable to admire each other. What reason have you to charge 
 her with being designing?" he asked again, with a sudden 
 return of his former seriousness. 
 
 "Why, her marryin' him," responded Mrs. Markle, frankly; 
 "look at that simple, shy, bashful critter, do you suppose 
 he'd marry her marry any woman that didn't throw herself 
 at his head, eh ?" 
 
 Mrs. Markle's pique was so evident that even a philosopher 
 like Maxwell could not content himself with referring it to the 
 usual weakness of the sex. No man cares to have a woman 
 exhibit habitually her weakness for another man, even when he 
 possesses the power of restraining it. He answered somewhat 
 quickly as he raised his hand to his mouth to wipe away the 
 smile that, however, did not come. "But suppose that you 
 
206 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 and others are mistaken in Gabriel's character. Suppose all 
 this simplicity and shyness is a mask. Suppose he is one of 
 the most perfect and successful actors on or off the stage. 
 Suppose he should turn out to have deceived everybody even 
 his present wife !" and Lawyer Maxwell stopped in time. 
 
 Mrs. Markle instantly fired. " Suppose fiddlesticks and 
 flapjacks ! I'd as soon think o' suspectin' thet child," she said, 
 pointing to the unconscious Manty. " You lawyers are allus 
 suspectin' what you can't understand !" She paused as Maxwell 
 wiped his face again. " What do you mean anyway why don't 
 yer speak out ? What do you know of him ? ;> 
 
 " Oh, nothing ! only it's as fair to say all this of him as of 
 her on about the same evidence. For instance here's a 
 
 simple ignorant fellow " 
 
 " He ain't ignorant," interrupted Mrs. Markle, sacrificing 
 argument to loyalty. 
 
 "Well, this grown up child ! He discovers the biggest lead 
 in One Horse Gulch, and manages to get the shrewdest 
 financier in California to manage it for him, and that too after 
 he has snatched up an heiress and a pretty woman before the 
 rest of 'em got a sight of her. That may be simplicity ; but 
 my experience of guilelessness is that, ordinarily, it isn't so 
 lucky." 
 
 " They wont do him the least good, depend upon it," said 
 Mrs. Markle, with the air of triumphantly closing the argument. 
 It is very possible that Mrs. Markle's dislike was sustained 
 and kept alive by Sal's more active animosity, and the strict 
 espionage that young woman kept over the general movements 
 and condition of the Conroys. Gabriel's loneliness, his 
 favourite haunt on the hillside, the number and quality of Mrs. 
 Conroy's visitors, even fragments of conversation held in the 
 family circle were all known to Sal, and re-delivered to Mrs. 
 Markle with Sal's own colouring. It is possible that most of 
 the gossip concerning Mrs. Conroy already hinted at had its 
 origin in the views and observations of this admirable young 
 woman, who did not confine her confidences entirely to her 
 mistress. And when one day a stranger and guest, staying at 
 the Grand Conroy House, sought to enliven the solemnity of 
 breakfast by social converse with Sal regarding the Conroys, 
 she told him nearly everything that she had already told Mrs. 
 Markle. 
 
Guests at the Grand Conroy. 207 
 
 I am aware that it is alleged that some fascinating quality in 
 this stranger's manner and appearance worked upon the sus 
 ceptible nature and loosened the tongue of this severe virgin, 
 but beyond a certain disposition to minister personally to his 
 wants, to hover around him archly with a greater quantity of 
 dishes than that usually offered the transient guest, and to 
 occasionally expatiate on the excellence of some extra viand, 
 there was really no ground for the report. Certainly, the 
 guest was no ordinary man ; was quite unlike the regular 
 habitues of the house, and perhaps to some extent justified this 
 favouritism. He was young, sallow-faced, with very white 
 teeth and skin, yellow hands, and a tropical, impulsive manner, 
 which Miss Sarah Clark generally referred to as " Eyetalian." 
 I venture to transcribe something of his outward oral expres 
 sion. 
 
 " I care not greatly for the flapjack, nor yet for the dried 
 apples," said Victor, whom the intelligent reader has at once 
 recognised, " but a single cup of coffee sweetened by those 
 glances and offered by those fair hands which I kiss ! are to 
 me enough. And you think that the Meestrees Conroy does 
 not live happily with her husband. Ah ! you are wise, you 
 are wise, Mees Clark, I would not for much money find myself 
 under these criticism, eh ?" 
 
 " Well, eyes bein' given to us to see with by the Lord's holy 
 will, and it ain't for weak creeturs like us to misplace our gifts 
 or magnify 'em," said Sal, in shrill, bashful confusion, allowing 
 an underdone fried egg to trickle from the plate on the coat- 
 collar of the unconscious Judge Bees winger, "I do say when a 
 woman sez to her husband, ez she's sworn to honour and obey, 
 ' this yer's my house, and this yer's my land, and yer kin git,' 
 thar ain't much show o' happiness thar. Ef it warn't for 
 hearin' this with my own ears, bein' thar accidental like, and 
 in a sogial way, I wouldn't hev believed it. And she allowin' 
 to be a lady, and afeared to be civil to certain folks ez is ez 
 good as she and far better, and don't find it necessary to git 
 married to git a position and could hev done it a thousand 
 times over ef so inclined. But folks is various and self praise 
 is open disgrace. Let me recommend them beans. The 
 pork, ez we allus kills ourselves fur the benefit o' transient 
 gests, bein' a speciality." 
 
 " It is of your kindness, Mees Clark, I am already full. And 
 
208 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 of the pork I touch not, it is an impossibility," said Victor,, 
 showing every tooth in his head. " It is much painful to hear 
 of this sad, sad affair. It is bad and yet you say he has- 
 riches this man. Ah ! the what is the world. See, the great 
 manner it has treated those ! No, I will not more. I am, 
 sufficient now. Ah ! eh ! what have we here ?" 
 
 He lowered his voice and eyes as a stranger the antique 
 dandy Gabriel had met on Conroy's hill the evening before, 
 rose from some unnoticed seat at a side table, and uncon 
 cernedly moved away. Victor instantly recognised the card 
 player of San Antonio, his former chance acquaintance of 
 Pacific Street, and was filled with a momentary feeling of sus 
 picion and annoyance. But Sal's sotto voce reply that the 
 stranger was a witness attending court seemed to be a reason 
 able explanation, and the fact that the translator did not seem 
 to recognise him promptly relieved his mind, When he had 
 gone Sal returned to her confidences : " Ez to his riches, them 
 ez knows best hez their own say o' that. Thar was a party yet- 
 last week gents ez was free with their money, and not above 
 exchanging the time o' day with working folk, and though it 
 ain't often ez me or Sue Markle dips into conversation with 
 entire strangers, yet," continued Sal, with parenthetical tact 
 and courtesy, " Eyetalians, furriners in a strange land bein' 
 an exception and them gents let on thet thet vein o' silver on 
 Conroy's hill hed been surveyed and it wazent over a foot 
 wide, and would be played out afore a month longer, and thet 
 old Peter Dumphy knowed it, and hed sold out, and thet 
 thet's the reason Gabriel Conroy was goin' off jest to be out 
 o' the way when the killapse comes." 
 
 " Gabriel ! going away, Mees Sal ? this is not possible !" 
 ejaculated the fascinating guest, breathing very hard, and 
 turning all his teeth in a single broadside upon the susceptible 
 handmaid. At any other moment, it is possible that Sal might 
 have been suspicious of the stranger's excitement, but the 
 fascination of his teeth held and possessed this fluttering 
 virgin. 
 
 " Ef thar ever waz a man ez had an angelic smile," she 
 intimated afterwards in confidence to Mrs. Markle, " it waz 
 thet young Eyetalian." She handed him several dishes, some 
 of them empty, in her embarrassment, and rejoined with an 
 affectation of arch indignation, "Thank ye fur sayin' * I lie,' 
 
Guests at the Grand Conroy, 209 
 
 and it's my pay fur bein' a gossip and ez good ez I send but 
 thar's Olympy Conroy packed aWay to school fur six months, 
 and thar's the new superintendent ez is come up to take Gabriel's 
 situation, and he a sittin' in a grey coat next to ye a minit ago ! 
 Eh? And ye wont take nothin' more? Appil or cranbear' 
 pie ? our own make ? I'm afeerd ye ain't made out a dinner !" 
 But Victor had already risen hurriedly and departed, leaving 
 Sal in tormenting doubt whether she had not in her coquettish 
 indignation irritated the tropical nature of this sensitive Italian. 
 " I orter allowed fur his bein' a furriner and not bin so free. 
 Pore young man ! I thought he did luk tuk back when I jest 
 allowed that he said I lied." And with a fixed intention of 
 indicating her forgiveness and goodwill the next morning by an 
 extra dish, Sal retired somewhat dejectedly to the pantry. She 
 made a point, somewhat later, of dusting the hall in the vicinity 
 of Victor's room, but was possibly disappointed to find the door 
 open, and the tenant absent Still later, she imparted some of 
 this interview to Mrs. Markle with a certain air of fatigued 
 politeness and a suggestion that, in the interest of the house 
 solely, she had not repressed perhaps as far as maidenly pride 
 and strict propriety demanded, the somewhat extravagant 
 advances of the stranger. "I'm sure," she added, briskly, 
 " why he kept a lookin' and a talkin' at me in that way, mind 
 can't consave, and transients did notiss. And if he did go off 
 mad, why, he kin git over it." Having thus delicately conveyed 
 the impression of an ardent Southern nature checked in its 
 exuberance, she became mysteriously reticent and gloomy. 
 
 It is probable that Miss Clark's theory of Gabriel's departure 
 was not original with her, or entirely limited to her own expe 
 rience. A very decided disapprobation ot Gabriel's intended 
 trip was prevalent in the gulches and bar-room. He quickly 
 lost his late and hard-earned popularity ; not a few questioned 
 his moral right to leave One Horse Gulch until its property was 
 put beyond a financial doubt in the future. The men who had 
 hitherto ignored the proposition that he was in any way re 
 sponsible for the late improvement in business, now openly 
 condemned him for abandoning the position they declared he 
 never had. The Silveropolis Messenger talked vaguely of the 
 danger of " changing superintendents" at such a moment, and 
 hinted that the stock of the company would suffer. The rival 
 paper for it was found that the interests of the town required 
 
2io Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 a separate and distinct expression had an editorial on "ab 
 senteeism," and spoke, crushingly, of those men who having 
 enriched themselves out of the resources of One Horse Gulch, 
 were now seeking to dissipate that wealth in the excesses of 
 foreign travel. 
 
 Meanwhile, the humble object of this criticism, oblivious in 
 his humility of any public interest in his movements or inten 
 tions, busied himself in preparations for his departure. He 
 had refused the offer of a large rent for his house from the new 
 superintendent, but had retained a trusty servant to keep it 
 with a view to the possible return of Grace. " Ef thar mout 
 ever come a young gal yer lookin' fur me," he said privately to 
 this servant, " yer not to ax any questions, partiklaly ef she 
 looks sorter shy and bashful, but ye'll gin her the best room in 
 the house, and send to me by igspress, and ye needn't say 
 any thin' to Mrs. Conroy about it." Observing the expression 
 of virtuous alarm on the face of the domestic she was a 
 married woman of some comeliness who was not living with 
 her husband on account of his absurdly jealous disposition 
 he added hastily, "She's a young woman o' proputty ez hez 
 troubil about it, and wishes to be kep' secret," and, having in 
 this way thoroughly convinced his handmaid of the vileness of 
 his motives and the existence of a dark secret in the Conroy 
 household, he said no more, but paid a flying visit to Oily,, 
 secretly, packed away all the remnants of his deceased mother's 
 wardrobe, cut (God knows for what purpose) small patches 
 from the few old dresses that Grace had worn that were still 
 sacredly kept in his wardrobe, and put them in his pocket- 
 book ; wandered in his usual lonely way on the hillside, and 
 spent solitary hours in his deserted cabin ; avoided the sharp 
 advances of Mrs. Markle, who once aggressively met him in 
 his long post-prandial walks, as well as the shy propinquity of 
 his wife, who would fain have delayed him in her bower, and 
 so having after the fashion of his sex made the two women who 
 loved him exceedingly uncomfortable, he looked hopefully for- 
 "ward to the time when he should be happy without either. 
 
211 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 IN WHICH MR. DUMPHY TAKES A HOLIDAY. 
 
 IT was a hot day on the California coast. In the memory of 
 the oldest American inhabitant its like had not been experi 
 enced, and although the testimony of the Spanish Californian 
 was deemed untrustworthy where the interests of the American 
 people were concerned, the statement that for sixty years there 
 had been no such weather was accepted without question. The 
 additional fact, vouchsafed by Don Pedro Peralta, that the 
 great earthquake which shook down the walls of the Mission of 
 San Juan Bautista had been preceded by a week of such 
 abnormal meteorology, was promptly suppressed as being of a 
 quality calculated to check immigration. Howbeit it was hot. 
 The usual afternoon trade-winds had pretermitted their rapid, 
 panting breath, and the whole coast lay, as it were, in the hush 
 of death. The evening fogs that always had lapped the wind- 
 abraded surfaces of the bleak seaward hills were gone too ; the 
 vast Pacific lay still and glassy, glittering, but intolerable. The 
 outlying sand dunes, unmitigated by any breath of air, blistered 
 the feet and faces of chance pedestrians. For once the broad 
 verandahs, piazzas, and balconies of San Francisco cottage 
 architecture were consistent and serviceable. People lingered 
 upon them in shirt-sleeves, with all the exaggeration of a novel 
 experience. French windows, that had always been barred 
 against the fierce afternoon winds, were suddenly thrown open ; 
 that brisk, energetic step, with which the average San Fran 
 ciscan hurried to business or pleasure, was changed to an idle, 
 purposeless lounge. The saloons were crowded with thirsty 
 multitudes, the quays and wharves with a people who had 
 never before appreciated the tonic of salt air ; the avenues 
 .leading over the burning sand-hills to the ocean all day were 
 'thronged with vehicles. The numerous streets and by-ways, 
 ; abandoned by their great scavenger, the wind, were foul and 
 i ill-smelling. For twenty-four hours business was partly for 
 gotten ; as the heat continued and the wind withheld its 
 customary tribute, there were some changes in the opinions 
 and beliefs of the people ; doubts were even expressed of the 
 efficacy of the climate ; a few heresies were uttered regarding 
 business and social creeds, and Mr. Dumphy and certain other 
 
 p2 
 
212 Ga briel Con roy. 
 
 financial magnates felt vaguely that if the thermometer con 
 tinued to advance the rates of interest must fall corre 
 spondingly. 
 
 Equal to even this emergency, Mr. Dumphy had sat in his 
 office all the morning, resisting with the full strength of his 
 aggressive nature any disposition on the part of his customers 
 to succumb financially to the unusual weather. Mr. Dumphy's 
 shirt-collar was off ; with it seemed to have departed some of 
 his respectability, and he was perhaps, on the whole, a trifle 
 less imposing than he had been. Nevertheless, he was still 
 dominant, in the suggestion of his short bull neck, and two 
 visitors who entered, observing the deshabille of this great man, 
 felt that it was the proper thing for them to instantly unbutton 
 their own waistcoats and loosen their cravats. 
 
 " It's hot," said Mr. Pilcher, an eminent contractor. 
 
 " You bet !" responded Mr. Dumphy. " Must be awful on 
 the Atlantic coast ! People dying by hundreds of sunstroke ; 
 that's the style out there. Here there's nothing of the kind ! 
 A man stands things here that he couldn't there." 
 
 Having thus re-established the supremacy of the California 
 climate, Mr. Dumphy came directly to business. "Bad news 
 from One Horse Gulch !" he said, quickly. 
 
 As that was the subject his visitors came to speak about a 
 fact of which Mr. Dumphy was fully aware he added, sharply, 
 " What do you propose ?" 
 
 Mr. Pilcher, who was a large stockholder in the Conroy 
 mine, responded, hesitatingly, " We've heard that the lead 
 opens badly," 
 
 " D n bad !" interrupted Dumphy. " What do you 
 
 propose ?" 
 
 " I suppose," continued Mr. Pilcher, "the only thing to do 
 is to get out of it before the news becomes known." 
 
 " No !" said Dumphy, promptly. The two men stared at 
 each other. " No !" he continued, with a quick, short laugh, 
 which was more like a logical expression than a mirthful 
 emotion. " No, we must hold on, sir ! Look yer ! there-'s a 
 dozen men as you and me know, that we could unload to 
 to-morrow. Suppose we did ? Well, what happens ? They 
 go in on four hundred thousand that's about the figures we 
 represent. Well. They begin to examine and look around ; 
 them men, Pilcher" (in Mr. Dumphy's more inspired moods 
 
 
Mr. Dumpliy takes a Holiday. 2 1 3 
 
 he rose above considerations of the English grammar) " them 
 men want to know what that four hundred thousand's invested 
 in ; they ain't goin' to take our word after we've got their 
 money that's human nature and in twenty-four hours they 
 find they're sold ! That don't look well for me nor you 
 does it?" 
 
 There was not the least assumption of superior honour or 
 integrity indeed, scarcely any self-consciousness or sentiment 
 of any kind, implied in this speech yet it instantly affected 
 both of these sharp business men, who might have been 
 suspicious of sentiment, with an impression of being both 
 honourable and manly. Mr. Pilcher's companion, Mr. Wyck, 
 added a slight embarrassment to his reception of these great 
 truths, which Mr. Dumphy noticed. 
 
 " No," he went on ; " what we must do is this. Increase 
 the capital stock just as much again. That will enable us to keep 
 everything in our hands news and all and if it should leak 
 out afterwards, we have half a dozen others with us to keep 
 the secret. Six months hence will be time to talk of selling ; 
 just now buying is the thing I You don't believe it ? eh ? 
 Well, Wyck, I'll take yours at the figure you paid. What do 
 you say ? quick !" 
 
 Mr. Wyck, more confused than appeared necessary, declared 
 his intention of holding on ; Mr. Pilcher laughed. Mr. 
 Dumphy barked behind his hand. 
 
 "That offer's open for ninety days will you take it? No ! 
 Well, then, that's all !" and Mr. Dumphy turned again to his 
 desk. Mr. Pilcher took the hint, and drew Mr. Wyck away. 
 
 " Devilish smart chap, that Dumphy !" said Pilcher, as they 
 passed out of the door. 
 
 " An honest man, by !" responded Wyck. 
 
 When they had gone Mr. Dumphy rang his bell. " Ask Mr. 
 
 Jaynes to come and see me at once. D n it, go now ! You 
 
 must get there before Wyck does. Run !" 
 
 The clerk disappeared. In a few moments Mr. Jaynes, a 
 sharp but very youthful looking broker, entered the office 
 parlour. " Mr. Wyck will want to buy back that stock he put 
 in your hands this morning, Jaynes. I thought I'd tell you, 
 it's worth 50 advance now !" 
 
 The precocious youth grinned intelligently and departed. 
 By noon of that day it was whispered that notwithstanding 
 
214 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 the rumours of unfavourable news from the Conroy mine, one 
 of the heaviest stockholders had actually bought back, at an 
 advance of $50 per share, some stock he had previously sold. 
 More than that, it was believed that Mr. Dumphy had taken 
 advantage of these reports, and was secretly buying. In spite 
 of the weather, for some few hours there had been the greatest 
 -excitement. 
 
 Possibly from some complacency arising from this, possibly 
 from some singular relaxing in the atmosphere, Mr. Dumphy at 
 two o'clock shook off the cares of business and abandoned 
 himself to recreation refusing even to take cognizance of the 
 card of one Colonel Starbottle, which was sent to him with a 
 request for an audience. At half-past two he was behind a pair 
 of fast horses, one of a carriage-load of ladies and gentlemen, 
 rolling over the scorching sandhills towards the Pacific, that 
 lay calm and cool beyond. As the well-appointed equipage 
 rattled up the Bush Street Hill, many an eye was turned with 
 envy and admiration toward it. The spectacle of two pretty 
 women among the passengers was perhaps one reason, the fact 
 that everybody recognised in the showy and brilliant driver, 
 the celebrated Mr. Rollingstone, an able financier and rival of 
 Mr. Dumphy's, was perhaps equally potent. For Mr. Rolling- 
 stone was noted for his " turnout/' as well as for a certain 
 impulsive South Sea extravagance and picturesque hospitality 
 which Dumphy envied and at times badly imitated. Indeed, 
 the present excursion was one of Mr. Rollingstone's famous 
 fetes champ'drcs, and the present company was composed of the 
 elite of San Francisco, and made self-complacent and appre 
 ciative by an enthusiastic Eastern tourist. 
 
 Their way lay over shifting sand dunes, now motionless and 
 glittering in the cruel, white glare of a Californian sky, only 
 relieved here and there by glimpses of the blue bay beyond, 
 and odd marine-looking buildings, like shells scattered along 
 the beach, as if they had been cast up and forgotten by some 
 heavy tide. Further on, their road skirted the base of a huge 
 solitary hill, broken in outline by an outcrop of gravestones, 
 sacred to the memory of worthy pioneers who had sealed their 
 devotion to the " healthiest climate in the world" with their 
 lives. Occasionally these gravestones continued to the foot of 
 the hill, where, struggling with the drifting sand, they suggested 
 a half-exhumed Pompeii to the passing traveller. They were 
 
Mr. Dumphy takes a Holiday. 2 1 5 
 
 the skeletons at the feast of every San Francisco pleasure- 
 seeker, the memento mori of every picnicing party, and were 
 visible even from the broad verandahs of the suburban pavilions, 
 where the gay and thoughtless citizen ate, drank, and was 
 merry. Part of the way the busy avenue was parallel with 
 another, up which, even at such times, occasionally crept the 
 lugubrious procession of hearse and mourning coach to other 
 pavilions, scarcely less crowded, where there were "funeral 
 baked meats," and sorrow and tears. And beyond this again 
 was the grey eternal sea, and at its edge, perched upon a rock, 
 and rising out of the very jaws of the gushing breakers, a 
 stately pleasure dome, decreed by some speculative and enter 
 prising San Francisco landlord the excuse and terminus of this 
 popular excursion. 
 
 Here Rollingstone drew up, and alighting, led his party into 
 a bright, cheery room, whose windows gave upon the sea. A 
 few other guests, evidently awaiting them, were mitigating their 
 impatience by watching the uncouth gambols of the huge sea- 
 lions, who, on the rocks beyond, offered a contrast to the 
 engaging and comfortable interior that was at once pleasant and 
 exciting. In the centre of the room a table overloaded with 
 overgrown fruits and grossly large roses somewhat ostenta 
 tiously proclaimed the coming feast ! 
 
 " Here we are !" said Mr. Dumphy, bustling into the room 
 with that brisk, business-like manner which his friends fondly 
 believed was frank cheerfulness, " and on time, too !" he 
 added, drawing out his watch. " Inside of thirty minutes 
 how's that, eh ?" He clapped his nearest neighbour on the 
 back, who, pleased with this familiarity from a man worth five 
 or six millions, did not stop to consider the value of this 
 celerity of motion in a pleasure excursion on a hot day. 
 
 " Well !" said Rollingstone, looking around him, " you all 
 know each other, I reckon, or will soon. Mr. Dumphy, Mr. 
 Poinsett, Mr. Pilcher, Mr. Dyce, Mr. Wyck, Mrs. Sepulvida 
 and Miss Rosey Ringround, gentlemen ; Mr. and Mrs. Raynor, 
 of Boston. There, now, that's through ! Dinner's ready. Sit 
 down anywhere and wade in. No formality, gentlemen this 
 is California." 
 
 There was, perhaps, some advantage in this absence of cere 
 mony. The guests almost involuntarily seated themselves 
 according to their preferences, and Arthur Poinsett found him- 
 
216 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 self beside Mrs. Sepulvida, while Mr. Dumphy placed Miss 
 Ringround a pretty though boyish-looking blonde, slangy in 
 speech and fashionable in attire on his right hand. 
 
 The dinner was lavish and luxurious, lacking nothing but 
 restraint and delicacy. There was game in profusion, fat but 
 Savourless. The fruits were characteristic. The enormous 
 peaches were blowsy in colour and robust in fibre ; the pears 
 were prodigious and dropsical, and looked as if they wanted to 
 be tapped ; the strawberries were overgrown and yet immature 
 rather as if they had been arrested on their way to become 
 pineapples ; with the exception of the grapes, which were 
 delicate in colour and texture, the fruit might have been an 
 ironical honouring by nature of Mr. Dumphy's lavish drafts. 
 
 It is probable, however, that the irony was lost on the 
 majority of the company, who were inclined to echo the 
 extravagant praise of Mr. Raynor, the tourist. " Wonderful ! 
 wonderful !" said that gentleman ; " if I had not seen this I 
 wouldn't have believed it. Why, that pear would make four of 
 ours." 
 
 " That's the way we do things here," returned Dumphy, with 
 the suggestion of being personally responsible for these abnor 
 mal growths. He stopped suddenly, for he caught Arthur 
 Poinsett's eye. Mr. Dumphy ate little in public, but he was 
 at that moment tearing the wing of a grouse with his teeth, and 
 there was something so peculiar and characteristic in the 
 manner that Arthur looked up with a sudden recollection in 
 his glance. Dumphy put down the wing, and Poinsett resumed 
 his conversation with Mrs. Sepulvida. It was not of a quality 
 that interruption seriously impaired ; Mrs. Sepulvida was a 
 charming but not an intellectual woman, and Mr. Poinsett took 
 up the lost thread of his discourse quite as readily from her 
 eyes as her tongue. 
 
 " To have been consistent, Nature should have left a race of 
 giants here," said Mr. Poinsett, meditatively. " I believe," he 
 added, more pointedly, and in a lower voice, " the late Don 
 Jose was not a large man." 
 
 " Whatever he was, he thought a great deal of me !" pouted 
 Mrs. Sepulvida. 
 
 Mr. Poinsett was hastening to say that if " taking thought" 
 like that could add a " cubit to one's stature," he himself was 
 in a fair way to become a son of Anak, when he was inter- 
 
Mr. Dumphy takes a Holiday. 
 
 rupted by Miss Rosey. ''What's all that about big men? 
 There are none here. They're like the big trees. They don't 
 hang around the coast much ! You must go to the mountains 
 for your Goliahs." 
 
 Emboldened quite as much by the evident annoyance of 
 her neighbour as the amused look of Arthur Poinsett, she went 
 on, " I have seen the pre-historic man ! the original athletic 
 sharp ! He is seven feet high, is as heavy as a sea-lion, and 
 has shoulders like Tom Hyer. He slings an awful left. He's 
 got blue eyes as tender as a seal's. He has hair like Samson 
 before that woman went back on him. He's as brave as a 
 lion and as gentle as a lamb. He blushes like a girl, or as 
 girls used to ; I wish I could start up such a colour on even- 
 double the provocation !" 
 
 Of course everybody laughed it was the usual tribute of 
 Miss Rosey's speech the gentlemen frankly and fairly, the 
 ladies perhaps a little doubtfully and fearfully. Mrs. Sepulvida, 
 following the amused eyes of Arthur, asked Miss Rosey 
 patronizingly where she had seen her phenomenon. 
 
 " Oh, it's no use, my dear, positively no use. He's 
 married. These phenomena always get married. No, I didn't 
 see him in a circus, Mr. Dumphy, nor in a menagerie, Mr. 
 Dyce, but in a girls' school !" 
 
 Everybody stared ; a few laughed as if this were an amusing 
 introduction to some possible joke from Miss Rosey. 
 
 "I was visiting an old schoolmate at Madame Eclair's- 
 Peiision at Sacramento ; he was taking his little sister to the 
 same school," she went on, coolly, "so he told me. I love 
 my love with a G, for he is Guileless and Gentle. His name 
 is Gabriel, and he lives in a Gulch." 
 
 " Our friend the superintendent I'm blessed," said Dyce, 
 looking at Dumphy. 
 
 " Yes ; but not so very guileless," said Pilcher, " eh, Dyce ? :? 
 
 The gentlemen laughed ; the ladies looked at each other 
 and then at Miss Ringround. That fearless young woman was- 
 equal to the occasion. 
 
 " What have you got against my giant ? Out with it !'' 
 
 ^ " Oh, nothing," said Mr. Pilcher; "only your guileless, simple 
 friend has played the sharpest game on record in Montgomery 
 Street." 
 
 " Go on !" said Miss Rosey. 
 
218 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Shall I ?" asked Pilcher of Dumphy. 
 
 Dumphy laughed his short laugh. " Go on." 
 
 Thus supported, Mr. Pilcher assumed the ease of a graceful 
 raconteur. " Miss Rosey's guileless friend, ladies and gentlemen, 
 is the superintendent and shareholder in a certain valuable silver 
 mine in which Dumphy is largely represented. Being about to 
 leave the country, and anxious to realize on his stock, he 
 contracted for the sale of a hundred shares at $1000 each, with 
 our friend Mr. Dyce, the stocks to be delivered on a certain date 
 ten days ago. Instead of the stock, that day comes a letter 
 from Conroy a wonderful piece of art simple, ill-spelled, and 
 unbusinesslike, saying, that in consequence of recent disappoint 
 ment in the character and extent of the lead, he shall not hold 
 Dyce to his contract, but will release him. Dyce, who has 
 already sold that identical stock at a pretty profit, rushes off to 
 Dumphy's broker, and finds two hundred shares held at $1200. 
 Dyce smells a large-sized rat, writes that he shall hold Gabriel 
 to the performance of his contract, makes him hand over the 
 stock, delivers it in time, and then loads up again with the 
 broker's 200 at $1200 for a rise. That rise don't come 
 wont come for that sale was Gabriel's too as Dumphy can 
 tell you. There's guilelessness ! There's simplicity ! And 
 it cleared a hundred thousand by the operation." 
 
 Of the party none laughed more heartily than Arthur Pom- 
 sett Without analysing his feelings he was conscious of being 
 greatly relieved by this positive evidence of Gabriel's shrewd 
 ness. And when Mrs. Sepulvida touched his elbow, and 
 asked if this were not the squatter who held the forged grant, 
 Arthur, without being conscious of any special meanness, could 
 not help replying with unnecessary significance that it was. 
 
 " I believe the whole dreadful story that Donna Dolores 
 told me," said she, "how he married the woman who per 
 sonated his sister, and all that the deceitful wretch." 
 
 " I've got that letter here," continued Mr. Pilcher, drawing 
 from his pocket a folded sheet of letter paper. " It's a curiosity. 
 If you'd like to see the documentary evidence of your friend's 
 guilelessness, here it is," he added, turning to Miss Ringround. 
 
 Miss Rosey took the paper defiantly, and unfolded it, as the 
 others gathered round her, Mr. Dumphy availing himself of 
 that opportunity to lean familiarly over the arm of her chair. 
 The letter was written with that timid, uncertain ink, peculiar 
 
Mr. Dumphy takes a Holiday. 219 
 
 to the illiterate effort, and suggestive of an occasional sucking 
 of the pen in intervals of abstraction or difficult composition. 
 Saving that characteristic, it is reproduced literally below : 
 
 " i, Hoss Gulch, Argus the loth. 
 
 "DEAR SIR, On acount of thar having ben bad Luck in the Leed 
 witch has droped, I rite thes few lins hopping you air Well. I have to say 
 we are disapinted in the Leed, it is not wut we thougt it was witch is wy I 
 rite thes few lins. now sir purheps you ixpict me to go on with our contrak, 
 and furniss you with 100 shars at I Thousin dolls pur shar. It issint wuth 
 no I Thousin dols pur shar, far frummit. No sir, it issint, witch is wy 
 I rite you thes few lins, and it Woddent be Rite nor squar for me to tak it. 
 This is to let you off Mister Dyce, and hopin it ant no trubbil to ye, fur I 
 shuddint sell atal things lookin this bad it not bein rite nor squar, and 
 hevin' tor up the contrak atween you and me. So no more at pressen from 
 yours respectfuly G. CONROY. 
 
 "P. S. You might mind my say in to you about my sister witch is loss 
 sens 1849. If y u happind to com acrost any Traks of hers, me bein' away, 
 you can send the sam to me in Care of Wels Farko & Co., New York Citty, 
 witch is a grate favor and will be pade sure. G. C." 
 
 " I don't care what you say, that's an honest letter," said 
 Miss Rosey, with a certain decision of character new to the 
 experience of her friends, " as honest and simple as ever was 
 written. You can bet your pile on that." 
 
 No one spoke, but the smile of patronizing superiority and 
 chivalrous toleration was exchanged by all the gentlemen 
 except Poinsett. Mr. Dumphy added to his smile his short 
 characteristic bark. At the reference to the writer's sister, 
 Mrs. Sepulvida shrugged her pretty shoulders and looked 
 doubtingly at Poinsett. But to her great astonishment that 
 gentleman reached across the table, took the letter, and 
 having glanced over it, said positively, "You are right, Miss 
 Rosey, it is genuine." 
 
 It was characteristic of Poinsett's inconsistency that this 
 statement was as sincere as his previous assent to the popular 
 suspicion. When he took the letter in his hand, he at once 
 detected the evident sincerity of its writer, and as quickly 
 recognised the quaint honesty and simple nature of the man he 
 had known. It was Gabriel Conroy, all over. More than 
 that, he even recalled an odd memory of Grace in this frank 
 directness and utter unselfishness of the brother who so plainly 
 had never forgotten her. That all this might be even recon 
 cilable with the fact of his marriage to the woman who had 
 personated the sister, Arthur easily comprehended. But that 
 
220 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 it was his own duty, after he had impugned Gabriel's character, 
 to make any personal effort to clear it, was not so plain. 
 Nevertheless, he did not answer Mrs. Sepulvida's look, but 
 walked gravely to the window, and looked out upon the sea. 
 Mr. Dumphy who, with the instincts of jealousy, saw in 
 Poinsett's remark only a desire to ingratiate himself with Miss 
 Rosey, was quick to follow his lead. 
 
 " It's a clear case of quien sabe anyway," he said to the 
 young lady, " and maybe you're right. Joe, pass the cham 
 pagne." 
 
 Dyce and Pilcher looked up inquiringly at their leader, who 
 glanced meaningly towards the open-mouthed Mr. Raynor, 
 whose astonishment at this sudden change in public sentiment 
 was unbounded. 
 
 " But look here," said that gentleman, " bless my soul ! if 
 this letter is genuine, your friends here these gentlemen 
 have lost a hundred thousand dollars ! Don't you see ? If 
 this news is true, and this man's information is correct, the 
 stock really isn't worth " 
 
 He was interrupted by a laugh from Messrs. Dyce and Pilcher. 
 
 " That's so. It would be a devilish good thing on Dyce !" 
 said the latter, good-humouredly. " And as I'm in myself 
 about as much again, I reckon I should take the joke about as 
 well as he." 
 
 " But," continued the mystified Mr. Raynor, " do you really 
 mean to say that you have any idea this news is true ?" 
 
 " Yes," responded Pilcher, coolly. 
 
 " Yes," echoed Dyce, with equal serenity. 
 
 "You do?" 
 
 " We do." 
 
 The astonished tourist looked from the one to the other 
 with undisguised wonder and admiration, and then turned to 
 his wife. Had she heard it ? Did she fully comprehend that 
 here were men accepting and considering an actual and present 
 loss of nearly a quarter of a million of dollars, as quietly and 
 indifferently as if it were a postage stamp? What superb 
 coolness ! What magnificent indifference ! What supreme 
 and royal confidence in their own resources. Was this not 
 a country of gods ? All of which was delivered in a voice 
 that, although pitched to the key of matrimonial confidence, 
 was still entirely audible to the gods themselves. 
 
 
Mr. Dumphy takes a Holiday. 221 
 
 " Yes, gentlemen," continued Pilcher; "it's the fortune of 
 war. T'other man's turn to day, ours to-morrow. Can't 
 afford time to be sorry in this climate. A man's born again 
 here every day. Move along and pass the bottle." 
 
 What was that ? 
 
 Nothing apparently, but a rattling of windows and shaking 
 -of the glasses the effect ot a passing carriage or children 
 running on the piazza without. But why had they all risen 
 with a common instinct, and with faces bloodless and eyes 
 fixed in horrible expectancy ? These were the questions which 
 Mr. and Mrs. Raynor asked themselves hurriedly, unconscious 
 of danger, yet with a vague sense of alarm at the terror so 
 plainly marked upon the countenances of these strange, self- 
 poised people, who, a moment before, had seemed the incar 
 nation of reckless self-confidence, and inaccessible to the 
 ordinary annoyances of mortals. And why were these other 
 pleasure-seekers rushing by the windows, and was not that a 
 lady fainting in the hall ? Arthur was the first to speak and 
 tacitly answer the unasked question. 
 
 "It was from east to west," he said, with a coolness that he 
 felt was affected, and a smile that he knew was not mirthful. 
 " It's over now, I think." He turned to Mrs. Sepulvida, who 
 was very white. " You are not frightened ? Surely this is 
 nothing new to you ? Let me help you to a glass of wine." 
 
 Mrs. Sepulvida took it with a hysterical little laugh. Mrs. 
 Raynor, who was now conscious of a slight feeling of nausea, 
 did not object to the same courtesy from Mr. Pilcher, whose 
 hand shook visibly as he lifted the champagne. Mr. Dumphy 
 returned from the doorway, in which, to his own and every 
 body's surprise, he was found standing, and took his place at 
 Miss Rosey's side. The young woman was first to recover her 
 reckless hilarity. 
 
 " It was a judgment on you for slandering Nature's noblest 
 specimen," she said, shaking her finger at the capitalist. 
 
 Mr. Rollingstone, who had returned to the head of his table, 
 laughed. 
 
 " But what was it ?" gasped Mr. Raynor, making himself at 
 last heard above the somewhat pronounced gaiety of the party. 
 
 " An earthquake," said Arthur, quietly. 
 
222 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MR. DUMPHY HAS NEWS OF A DOMESTIC CHARACTER. 
 
 " AN earthquake !" echoed Mr. Rollingstone, cheerfully, to his 
 guests ; " now you've had about everything we have to show. 
 Don't be alarmed, madam," he continued to Mrs. Raynor, who 
 was beginning to show symptoms of hysteria, " nobody ever 
 was hurt by 'em." 
 
 " In two hundred years there hasn't been as many persons 
 killed by earthquakes in California as are struck by lightning 
 on your coast in a single summer," said Mr. Dumphy. 
 
 " Never have 'em any stronger than this,' ; said Mr. Pilcher, 
 with a comforting suggestion of there being an absolute limita 
 tion of Nature's freaks on the Pacific coast. 
 
 " Over in a minute, as you see," said Mr. Dumphy, " and 
 hello ! what's that ?" 
 
 In a moment they were on their feet, pale and breathless 
 again. This time Mr. Raynor and his wife among the number. 
 But it was only a carriage driving away. 
 
 " Let us adjourn to the piazza," said Mr. Dumphy, offering 
 his arm to Mrs. Raynor with the air of having risen solely for 
 that purpose. 
 
 Mr. Dumphy led the way, and the party followed with some 
 celerity. Mrs. Sepulvida hung back a moment with Arthur, 
 and whispered 
 
 " Take me back as soon as you can !" 
 
 " You are not seriously alarmed ?" asked Arthur. 
 
 " We are too near the sea here," she replied, looking toward 
 the ocean with a slight shudder. " Don't ask questions 
 now," she added, a little sharply. " Don't you see these 
 eastern people are frightened to death, and they may over 
 hear." 
 
 But Mrs. Sepulvida had not long to wait, for in spite of the 
 pointed asseverations of Messrs. Pilcher, Dyce, and Dumphy, 
 that earthquakes were not only harmless, but absolutely pos 
 sessed a sanitary quality, the piazzas were found deserted by the 
 usual pleasure-seekers, and even the eloquent advocates them 
 selves betrayed some impatience to be once more on the open 
 road. 
 
 A brisk drive of an hour put the party again in the highest 
 
Nezvs of a Domestic Character. 223 
 
 spirits, and Mr. and Mrs. Raynor again into the condition of 
 chronic admiration and enthusiasm. 
 
 Mrs. Sepulvida and Mr. Poinsett followed in an open buggy 
 behind. When they were fairly upon their way, Arthur asked 
 an explanation of his fair companion's fear of the sea. 
 
 " There is an old story/' said Donna Maria, " that the Point 
 of Pines you know where it is, Mr. Poinsett was once 
 covered by a great wave from the sea that followed an earth 
 quake. But tell me, do you really think that letter of this 
 man Conroy is true ?" 
 
 " I do, ; ' said Arthur, promptly. 
 
 " And that there is a prospect that the stock of 
 this big mine may de pre ciate in value ?" 
 
 " Well possibly yes !" 
 
 " And if you knew that I had been foolish enough to put a 
 good deal of money in it, you would still talk to me as you did 
 the other day, down there ?" 
 
 " I should say," responded Arthur, changing the reins to his 
 left hand that his right might be free for some purpose good 
 ness knows what ! " I should say that I am more than ever 
 convinced that you ought to have some person to look after you." 
 
 What followed this remarkable speech I really do not know 
 how to reconcile with the statement that Mrs. Sepulvida made 
 to the Donna Dolores a few chapters ago, and I therefore dis 
 creetly refrain from transcribing it here. Suffice it to say that 
 the buggy did not come up with the char-a-bauc and the rest of 
 the party until long after they had arrived at Mr. Dumphy's 
 stately mansion on Rincon Hill, where another costly and 
 elaborate collation was prepared. Mr. Dumphy evidently was 
 in spirits, and had so far overcome his usual awe and distrust 
 of Arthur, as well as the slight jealousy he had experienced an 
 hour or so before, as to approach that gentleman with a degree 
 of cheerful familiarity that astonished and amused the self- 
 sustained Arthur who perhaps at that time had more reason 
 for his usual conceit than before. Arthur, who knew, or 
 thought he knew, that Miss Ringround was only coquetting 
 with Mr. Dumphy for the laudable purpose of making the 
 more ambitious of her sex miserable, and that she did not care 
 for his person or position, was a good deal amused at finding 
 the young lady the subject of Mr. Dumphy's sudden confi 
 dences. 
 
224 GabrieC Conroy. 
 
 " You see, Poinsett, as a man of business I don't go as 
 much into society as you do, but she seems to be a straight up 
 ^md down girl, eh ?" he queried, as they stood together in the 
 vestibule after the ladies had departed. It is hardly necessary 
 so say that Arthur was positive and sincere in his praise of the 
 young woman. Mr. Dumphy by some obscure mental process, 
 taking much of the praise to himself, was highly elated and 
 perhaps tempted to a greater vinous indulgence than was his 
 habit. Howbeit the last bottle of champagne seemed to have 
 obliterated all past suspicion of Arthur, and he shook him 
 warmly by the hand. " I tell ye what now, Poinsett, if there 
 are any points I can give you don't you be afraid to ask for 
 'em. I can see what's up between you and the widow honour 
 you know all right, my boy she's in the Conroy lode pretty 
 deep, but I'll help her out and you too ! You've got a good 
 thing there Poinsett and I want you to realize. We under 
 stand each other, eh ? You'll find me a square man with my 
 friends, Poinsett. Pitch in pitch in ! my advice to you is to 
 just pitch in and marry the widow. She's worth it you can realize 
 on her. You see you and me's so to speak ole pards, eh ? 
 You rek'leck ole times on Sweetwater, eh ? Well if you mus' 
 go, goo'-bi ! I s'pose she's waitin' for ye. Look you, Poinsy, d'ye 
 see this yer posy in my buttonhole ? She give it to me. Rosey 
 did ! eh ? ha ! ha ! Wont tak' nothin' drink ? Lesh open n'or 
 bo'll. No ? Goori !" until struggling between disgust, amuse 
 ment, and self-depreciation Arthur absolutely tore himself away 
 from the great financier and his degrading confidences. 
 
 When Mr. Dumphy staggered back into his drawing-room, a 
 servant met him with a card. 
 
 "The gen'lman says it's very important business, and he 
 must see you to-night," he said, hastily, anticipating the oath 
 and indignant protest of his master. " He says it's your business, 
 sir, and not his. He's been waiting here since you came back, sir." 
 
 Mr. Dumphy took the card. It bore the inscription in pencil, 
 " Colonel Starbottle, Siskiyou, on important business." Mr. 
 Dumphy reflected a moment. The magical word " business" 
 brought him to himself. "Show him in in the office," he 
 said, savagely, and retired thither. 
 
 Anybody less practical than Peter Dumphy would have 
 dignified the large showy room in which he entered as the 
 library. The rich mahogany shelves were filled with a hete- 
 
News of a Domestic Character. 225 
 
 rogeneous collection of recent books, very fresh, very new and 
 glaring as to binding and subject ; the walls were hung with 
 riles of newspapers and stock reports. There was a velvet- 
 lined cabinet containing minerals all of them gold or silver 
 bearing. There was a map of an island that Mr. Dumphy 
 owned there was a marine view, with a representation of a 
 steamship also owned by Mr. Dumphy. There was a mo 
 mentary relief from these facts in a very gorgeous and badly- 
 painted picture of a tropical forest and sea beach, until inquiry- 
 revealed the circumstance that the sugar house in the corner 
 under a palm tree was " run" by Mr. Dumphy, and that the 
 whole thing could be had for a bargain. 
 
 The stranger who entered was large and somewhat inclined 
 to a corpulency that was, however, restrained in expansion by 
 a blue frock coat, tightly buttoned at the waist, which had the 
 apparent effect of lifting his stomach into the higher thoracic 
 regions of moral emotion a confusion to which its owner lent 
 a certain intellectual assistance. The Colonel's collar was very 
 large, open and impressive ; his black silk neckerchief loosely 
 tied around his throat, occupying considerable space over his 
 shirt front and expanding through the upper part of a gilt- 
 buttoned white waistcoat, lent itself to the general suggestion 
 that the Colonel had burst his sepals and would flower soon. 
 Above this unfolding the Colonel's face, purple, aquiline-nosed, 
 throttle-looking as to the eye, and moist and sloppy-looking as 
 to the mouth, uptilted above his shoulders. The Colonel 
 entered with that tiptoeing celerity of step affected by men who 
 are conscious of increasing corpulency. He carried a cane 
 hooked over his forearm ; in one hand a large white handker 
 chief, and in the other a broad-brimmed hat. He thrust the 
 former gracefully in his breast, laid the latter on the desk where 
 Mr. Dumphy was seated, and taking an unoffered chair 
 himself, coolly rested his elbow on his cane in an attitude of 
 easy expectancy. 
 
 " Say you've got important business ?" said Dumphy. "Hope 
 it is, sir hope it is ! Then out with it. Can't afford to waste 
 time any more here than at the Bank. Come ! What is it ?" 
 
 Not in the least affected by Mr. Dumphy's manner, whose 
 habitual brusqueness was intensified to rudeness, Colonel 
 Starbottle drew out his handkerchief, blew his nose, carefully 
 returned apparently only about two inches of the cambric to 
 
 Q 
 
-226 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 his breast, leaving the rest displayed like a ruffled shirt, and 
 <began with an airy gesture of his fat white hand. 
 
 " I was here two hours ago, sir, when you were at the er 
 festive board. 1 said to the boy, ' Don't interrupt your master. 
 A gentleman worshipping at the shrine of Venus and Bacchus 
 -and attended by the muses and immortals, don't want to be 
 interrupted.' Ged, sir, I knew a man in Louisiana Hank 
 Pinckney shot his boy a little yellow boy worth a thousand 
 dollars for interrupting him at a poker party and no ladies 
 present ! And the boy only coming in to say that the gin 
 house was in flames. Perhaps you'll say an extreme case. 
 Know a dozen such. So I said, 'Don't interrupt him, but 
 Avhen the ladies have risen, and Beauty, sir, no longer dazzles 
 and er gleams, and the table round no longer echoes the er 
 light jest, then spot him ! And over the deserted board, 
 with er social glass between us, your master and I will have 
 our little confab.' " 
 
 He rose, and before the astonished Dumphy could interfere, 
 crossed over to a table where a decanter of whisky and a carafe 
 of water stood, and filling a glass half-full of liquor, reseated 
 himself and turned it off with an easy yet dignified inclination 
 towards his host. 
 
 For once only Mr. Dumphy regretted the absence of dignity 
 in his own manner. It was quite evident that his usual brusque- 
 ness was utterly ineffective here, and he quickly recognised in 
 the Colonel the representative of a class of men well known in 
 California, from whom any positive rudeness would have pro 
 voked a demand for satisfaction. It was not a class of men 
 that Mr Dumphy had been in the habit of dealing with, and he 
 :sat filled with impotent rage, but wise enough to restrain its 
 "verbal expression, and thankful that none of his late guests 
 were present to witness his discomfiture. Only one good effect 
 was due to his visitor. Mr. Dumphy through baffled indigna 
 tion and shame had become sober. 
 
 " No, sir," continued Colonel Starbottle, setting his glass 
 upon his knee, and audibly smacking his large lips. " No, 
 'sir, I waited in the er ante-chamber until I saw you 
 j>art with your guests until you bade er adieu to a 
 certain fair nymph Ged, sir, I like your taste, and I call 
 snyself a judge of fine women 'Blank it all,' I said to myself, 
 *,Blank it all, Star, you ain't goin' to pop out upon a man just 
 
News of a Domestic Character. 227 
 
 as he's ministering to Beauty and putting a shawl upon a pair 
 of alabaster shoulders like that !' Ha ! ha ! Ged, sir, I 
 remembered myself that in '43 in Washington at a party at 
 Tom Benton's I was in just such a position, sir. 'Are you 
 never going to get that cloak on, Star ?' she says to me the 
 most beautiful creature, the acknowledged belle of that whole 
 winter '43, sir as a gentleman yourself you'll understand 
 why I don't particularize * If I had my way, madam,' I said, 
 * I never would !' I did, blank me. But you're not drinking, 
 Mr. Dumphy, eh? A thimbleful, sir, to our better acquaintance." 
 Nor daring to trust himself to speak, Mr. Dumphy shook his 
 head somewhat impatiently, and Colonel Starbottle rose. As 
 he did so it seemed as if his shoulders had suddenly become 
 broader and his chest distended until his handkerchief and 
 white waistcoat protruded through the breast of his buttoned 
 coat like a bursting grain of " pop corn." He advanced slowly 
 and with deliberate dignity to the side of Dumphy. 
 
 " If I have intruded upon your privacy, Mr. Dumphy," he 
 said, with a stately wave of his white hand, " if, as I surmise, 
 from your disinclination, sir, to call it by no other name, to 
 exchange the ordinary convivial courtesies common between 
 gentlemen, sir, you are disposed to resent any reminiscences 
 of mine as reflecting upon the character of the young lady, sir, 
 whom I had the pleasure to see in your company if such be 
 the case, sir, Ged ! I am ready to retire now, sir, and to give 
 you to-morrow, or at any time, the satisfaction which no gentle 
 man ever refuses another, and which Culpepper Starbottle has 
 never been known to deny. My card, sir, you have already ; 
 my address, sir, is St Charles Hotel, where I and my friend, 
 Mr. Dumphy, will be ready to receive you." 
 
 . " Look here," said Mr. Dumphy, in surly but sincere alarm, 
 " I don't drink because I've been drinking. No offence, Mr. 
 Starbottle. I was only waiting for you to open what you had 
 on your mind in the way of business, to order up a bottle of 
 Cliquot to enable us to better digest it. Take your seat, 
 Colonel. Bring champagne and two glasses." He rose, and 
 under pretence of going to the sideboard, added in a lower 
 tone to the servant who entered, " Stay within call, and in 
 about ten minutes bring me some important message from the 
 Bank you hear ? A glass of wine with you, Colonel. Happy 
 to make your acquaintance ! Here we go I" 
 
 Q2 
 
223 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 The Colonel uttered a slight cough as if to clear away his 
 momentary seventy, bowed with gracious dignity, touched the 
 glass of his host, drew out his handkerchief, wiped his mouth, 
 and seated himself once more. 
 
 " If my object," he began, with a wave of dignified depre 
 ciation, " were simply one of ordinary business, I should have 
 sought you, sir, in the busy mart, and not among your Lares 
 and Penates, nor in the blazing lights of the festive hall. I 
 should have sought you at that temple which report and com 
 mon rumour says that you, sir, as one of the favoured sons of 
 Fortune, have erected to her worship. In my intercourse with 
 the gifted John C. Calhoun I never sought him, sir, in the 
 gladiatorial arena of the Senate, but rather with the social glass 
 in the privacy of his own domicile. Ged, sir, in my profession, 
 we recognise some quality in our relations even when pro 
 fessional with gentlemen that keep us from approaching them 
 like a Yankee peddler with goods to sell !" 
 
 " What's your profession ? asked Mr. Dumphy. 
 
 " Until elected by the citizens of Siskiyou to represent them 
 in the legislative councils I practised at the bar. Since then I 
 have been open occasionally to retainers in difficult and deli 
 cate cases. In the various intrigues that arise in politics, in 
 the more complicated relations of the two sexes in, I may 
 say, the two great passions of mankind, Ambition and Love, 
 my services have, I believe, been considered of value. It has 
 been my office, sir, to help the steed of vaulting ambition er 
 er over the fence, and to dry the er tearful yet glowing 
 cheek of Beauty. But for the necessity of honour and secrecy 
 in my profession, sir, I could give you the names of some of 
 the most elegant women, and some of the first the very first 
 men in the land as the clients of Culpepper Starbottle." 
 
 " Very sorry," began Mr. Dumphy, " but if you're expecting 
 to put me among your list of clients, I " 
 
 Without taking the least notice of Dumphy's half-returned 
 sneer, Colonel Starbottle interrupted him coolly : " Ged, sir ! 
 it's out of the question, I'm retained on the other side." 
 
 The sneer instantly faded from Dumphy's face and a look of 
 genuine surprise took its place. 
 
 " What do you mean ?" he said, curtly. 
 
 Colonel Starbottle drew his chair beside Dumphy, and lean 
 ing familiarly over his desk took Mr. Dumphy's own penholder 
 
Ncivs of a Domestic Character. 229 
 
 and persuasively emphasized the points of his speech upon 
 Mr. Dumphy's arm with the blunt end. "Sir, when I say 
 retained by the other side, it doesn't keep me from doing the 
 honourable thing with the defendant from recognising a 
 gentleman and trying to settle this matter as between gentle 
 men." 
 
 "But what's all this about? Who is your plaintiff?" roared 
 Dumphy, forgetting himself in his rage. 
 
 " Ged, sir it's a woman of course. Don't think I'm 
 accusing you of any political ambition. Ha ! ha ! No, sir. 
 You're like me ! it's a woman lovely woman I saw it at a 
 glance ! Gentlemen like you and me, don't go through to fifty 
 years without giving some thought to these dear little creatures. 
 Sir, I despise a man who did. It's the weakness of a great 
 man, sir. ;; 
 
 Mr. Dumphy pushed his chair back with the grim delibera 
 tion of a man who had at last measured the strength of his 
 adversary and was satisfied to risk an encounter. 
 
 " Look here, Colonel Starbottle, I don't know or care who 
 your plaintiff is. I don't know or care how she may have been 
 deceived or wronged or disappointed or bamboozled, or what 
 is the particular game that's up now. But you're a man of the 
 world, you say, and as a man of the world and a man of sense, 
 you know that no one in my position ever puts himself in any 
 woman's power. I can't afford it ! I don't pretend to be 
 better than other men, but I ain't a fool. That's the difference 
 between me and your clients !" 
 
 " Yes but, my boy, that is the difference ! Don't you see ? 
 In other cases the woman's a beautiful woman, a charming 
 creature, you know. Ged, sometimes she's as proper and 
 pious as a nun, but then the relations, you see, ain't legal ! 
 But hang it all, my boy, this is YOUR WIFE !" 
 
 Mr. Dumphy with colourless cheeks, tried to laugh a reck 
 less scornful laugh. " My wife is dead !" 
 
 " A mistake Ged, sir ! a most miserable mistake. Under 
 stand me. I don't say that she hadn't ought to be ! Ged, sir, 
 from the look that that little blue-eyed hussy gave you an hour 
 ago there ain't much use of another woman around, but the 
 fact is that she is living. You thought she was dead, and left 
 her up there in the snow. She goes so far as to say you know 
 how these women talk, Dumphy, Ged, sir, they'll say anything 
 
230 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 when they get down on a man she says it ain't your fault if 
 she wasn't dead ! Eh ? Sho ?" 
 
 "A message, sir, business of the Bank, very important, "said 
 Dumphy's servant, opening the door. 
 
 " Get out !" said Dumphy, with an oath. 
 
 " But, sir, they told me, sir " 
 
 " Get out ! will you ?" roared Dumphy. 
 
 The door closed on his astonished face. " It's all a mis 
 take," said Dumphy, when he had gone. " They died of 
 starvation all of them while I was away hunting help. I've 
 read the accounts." 
 
 Colonel Starbottle slowly drew from some vast moral eleva 
 tion in his breast pocket a well-worn paper. It proved when 
 open to be a faded, blackened, and bethumbed document in 
 Spanish. " Here is the report of the Commander of the Pre 
 sidio who sent out the expedition. You read Spanish ? Well. 
 The bodies of all the other women were identified except your 
 wife's. Hang it, my boy, don't you see why she was excepted ? 
 She wasn't there." 
 
 The Colonel darted a fat forefinger at his host and then 
 drew back, and settled his purpled chin and wattled cheeks 
 conclusively in his enormous shirt collar. Mr. Dumphy sank 
 back in his chair at the contact as if the finger of Fate had 
 touched him. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MRS. CONROY HAS AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR. 
 
 THE hot weather had not been confined to San Francisco. 
 San Pablo Bay had glittered, and the yellow currents of the 
 San Joaquin and Sacramento glowed sullenly with a dull 
 sluggish lava-like flow. No breeze stirred the wild oats that 
 drooped on the western slope of the Contra Costa hills ; the 
 smoke of burning woods on the eastern hillsides rose silently 
 and steadily ; the great wheat fields of the intermediate valleys 
 clothed themselves humbly in dust and ashes. A column of 
 red dust accompanied the Wingdam and One Horse Gulch 
 stage-coach, a pillar of fire by day as well as by night, and 
 made the fainting passengers look longingly toward the snow- 
 
An Unexpected Visitor. 231 
 
 patched Sierras beyond. It was hot in California; fe\v had 
 ever seen the like, and those who had were looked upon as 
 enemies of their race. A rashly scientific man of Murphy's 
 Camp who had a theory of his own, and upon that had pro 
 phesied a continuance of the probable recurrence of the earth 
 quake shock, concluded he had better leave the settlement 
 until the principles of meteorology were better recognised and 
 established. 
 
 It was hot in One Horse Gulch in the oven-like Gulch, on. 
 the burning sands and scorching bars of the river. It was hot 
 even on Conroy's Hill, among the calm shadows of the dark- 
 green pines on the deep verandahs of the Conroy cottage orn'e^ 
 Perhaps this was the reason why Mrs. Gabriel Conroy, early 
 that morning after the departure of her husband for the mill,, 
 had evaded the varnished and white-leaded heats of her own 
 house and sought the more fragrant odours of the sedate pines, 
 beyond the hill-top. I fear, however, that something was due 
 to a mysterious note which had reached her clandestinely the 
 evening before, and which, seated on the trunk of a prostrate 
 pine, she was now reperusing. 
 
 I should like to sketch her as she sat there. A broad- 
 brimmed straw hat covered her head, that although squared a 
 little too much at the temples for shapeliness was still made 
 comely by the good taste with which aided by a crimping- 
 iron she had treated her fine-spun electrical blonde hair. 
 The heat had brought out a delicate dewy colour in her usually 
 pale face, and had heightened the intense nervous brightness of 
 her vivid grey eyes. From the same cause, probably, her lips, 
 were slightly parted, so that the rigidity that usually cha 
 racterized their finely chiselled outlines were lost. She looked 
 healthier ; the long flowing skirts which she affected, after the 
 fashion of most petite women, were gathered at a waist scarcely 
 as sylph-like and unsubstantial as that which Gabriel first 
 clasped after the accident in the fateful canon. She seemed a 
 trifle more languid more careful of her personal comfort, and 
 spent some time in adjusting herself to the inequalities of her 
 uncouth seat with a certain pouting peevishness of manner that 
 was quite as new to her character as it was certainly feminine 
 and charming. She held the open note in her thin, narrow,, 
 white-tipped fingers, and glanced over it again with a slight 
 smile. It read as follows : 
 
232 G air id Conroy. 
 
 " At ten o'clock I shall wait for you at the hill near the Big Pine ! You 
 shall give me an interview if you know yourself well. I say beware ! I 
 am strong, for I am injured ! VICTOR." 
 
 Mrs. Conroy folded the note again, still smiling, and placed 
 it carefully in her pocket. Then she sat patient, her hands 
 clasped lightly between her knees, the parasol open at her 
 feet the very picture of a fond, confiding tryst. Then she 
 suddenly drew her feet under her, sideways, with a quick, 
 nervous motion and examined the ground carefully with sincere 
 distrust of all artful lurking vermin who lie in wait for helpless 
 womanhood. Then she looked at her watch. 
 
 It was five minutes past the hour. There was no sound in 
 the dim, slumbrous wood, but the far-off sleepy caw of a rook. 
 A squirrel ran impulsively halfway down the bark of the nearest 
 pine and, catching sight of her tilted parasol, suddenly flattened 
 himself against the bark, with outstretched limbs, a picture of 
 abject terror. A bounding hare came upon it suddenly and had 
 a palpitation of the heart that he thought he really never should 
 get over. And then there was a slow crackling in the under 
 brush as of a masculine tread, and Mrs. Conroy, picking up 
 her terrible parasol, shaded the cold fires of her grey eyes with 
 it and sat calm and expectant. 
 
 A figure came slowly and listlessly up the hill. When 
 within a dozen yards of her, she saw it was not Victor. But 
 when it approached nearer she suddenly started to her feet with 
 pallid cheeks and an exclamation upon her lips. It was the 
 Spanish translator of Pacific Street. She would have flown, 
 but on the instant he turned and recognised her with a cry, a 
 start, and a passion equal to her own. For a moment they 
 stood glaring at each other breathless but silent ! 
 
 "Devarges !" said Mrs. Conroy, in a voice that was scarcely 
 audible. " Good God !" 
 
 The stranger uttered a bitter laugh. " Yes i Devarges ! 
 the rr,n who ran away with you Devarges the traitor ! De 
 varges the betrayer of your husband. Look at me ! You 
 know me Henry Devarges ! Your husband's brother ! your 
 old accomplice your lover your dupe !" 
 
 "Hush," she said, imploringly glancing around through the 
 dim woods, " for God's sake, hush !" 
 
 " And who are you," he went on, without heeding her, 
 " which of the Mesdames Devarges is it now ? Or have you 
 taken the name of the young sprig of an officer for whom you 
 
An Unexpected Visitor. 233 
 
 deserted me and maybe in turn married ? Or did he refuse 
 you even that excuse for your perfidy ? Or is it the wife and 
 accomplice of this feeble-minded Conroy ? What name shall 
 I call you ? Tell me quick ! Oh, I have much to say, but I 
 wish to be polite, madame ; tell me to whom I am to speak !" 
 
 Despite the evident reality of his passion and fury there was 
 something so unreal and grotesque in his appearance in his 
 antique foppery, in his dyed hair, in his false teeth, in his 
 padded coat, in his thin strapped legs, that this relentless 
 woman cowered before him in very shame, not of her crime 
 but of her accomplice ! " Hush," she said, " call me your 
 friend ; I am always your friend, Henry ! Call me anything, 
 but let me go from here. For God's sake, do you hear? 
 Not so loud ! Another time and another place I will listen," 
 and she drew slowly back, until, scarce knowing what he did, 
 she had led him away from the place of rendezvous toward the 
 ruined cabin. Here she felt that she was at least safe from the 
 interruption of Victor. " How came you here ? How did you 
 find what had become of me? Where have you been these 
 long years ?" she asked, hastily. 
 
 Within the last few moments she had regained partially the 
 strange power that she had always exerted over all men except 
 Gabriel Conroy. The stranger hesitated, and then answered 
 in a voice that had more of hopelessness than bitterness in its 
 quality, " I came here six years ago, a broken, ruined, and dis 
 graced man. I had no ambition but to hide myself from all 
 who had known me, from that brother whose wife I had stolen, 
 and whose home I had broken up from you you, Julie ! 
 you and your last lover from the recollection of your double 
 treachery !" He had raised his voice here, but was checked 
 by the unflinching eye and cautionary gesture of the woman 
 before him. " When you abandoned me in St. Louis, I had 
 no choice but death or a second exile. I could not return to 
 Switzerland, I could not live in the sickening shadow of my 
 crime and its bitter punishment. I came here. My education, 
 my knowledge of the language stood me in good stead. I 
 might have been a rich man, I might have been an influential 
 one, but I only used my opportunities for the bare necessaries 
 of life and the means to forget my trouble in dissipation. I 
 became a drudge by day, a gambler by night. I was always a 
 gentleman. Men thought me crazy, an enthusiast, but they 
 
234 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 learned to respect me. Traitor as I was in a larger trust, no 
 one doubted my honour or dared to question my integrity. 
 But bah ! what is this to you ? You !" 
 
 He would have turned from her again in very bitterness,. 
 but in the act he caught her eye, and saw in it, if not sympathy, 
 at least a certain critical admiration, that again brought him to 
 her feet. For despicable as this woman was, she was pleased 
 at this pride in the man she had betrayed, was gratified at the 
 sentiment that lifted him above his dyed hair and his pitiable 
 foppery, and felt a certain honourable satisfaction in the fact 
 that, even after the lapse of years, he had proved true to her 
 own intuitions of him. 
 
 "I had been growing out of my despair, Julie," he went on, 
 sadly ; " I was, or believed I was, forgetting my fault, forget 
 ting even you, when there came to me the news of my brother's 
 death by starvation. Listen to me, Julie. One day there 
 came to me for translation a document, revealing the dreadful 
 death of him your husband, my brother do you hear ? by 
 starvation ! Driven from his home by shame, he had despe 
 rately sought to hide himself as I had accepted the hardship 
 of emigration he, a gentleman and a man of letters with the 
 boors and rabble of the plains, had shared their low trials and 
 their vulgar pains, and died among them, unknown and unre 
 corded." 
 
 " He died as he had lived," said Mrs. Conroy, passionately, 
 " a traitor and a hypocrite ; he died following the fortunes of 
 his paramour, an uneducated, vulgar rustic, to whom, dying, he 
 willed a fortune this girl Grace Conroy. Thank God, I 
 have the record ! Hush ! what's that ?" 
 
 Whatever it was a falling bough or the passing of some 
 small animal in the underbush it was past now. A dead 
 silence enwrapped the two solitary actors - } they might have 
 been the first man and the first woman, so encompassed were 
 they by Nature and solitude. 
 
 " No," she went on, hurriedly, in a lower tone, " it was the 
 same old story the story of that girl at Basle the story of 
 deceit and treachery which brought us first together, which 
 made you, Henry, my friend, which turned our sympathies into 
 a more dangerous passion. You have suffered. Ah, well, so 
 have I. We are equal now." 
 
 Henry Devarges looked speechlessly upon his companion, 
 
An Unexpected Visitor. 235. 
 
 Her voice trembled, there were tears in her eyes, that had re 
 placed the burning light of womanly indignation. He had 
 come there knowing her to have been doubly treacherous to 
 her husband and himself. She had not denied it. He had 
 come there to tax her with an infamous imposture, but had 
 found himself within the last minute glowing with sympathetic 
 condemnation of his own brother, and ready to accept the yet 
 unoffered and perfectly explicable theory of that imposture. 
 More than that, he began to feel that his own wrongs were 
 slight in comparison with the injuries received by this superior 
 woman. The woman who endeavours to justify herself to her 
 jealous lover, always has a powerful ally in his own self-love, 
 and Devarges was quite willing to believe that even if he had 
 lost her love, he had never at least been deceived. And the 
 answer to the morality of this imposture was before him. Here 
 was she married to the surviving brother of the girl she had 
 personated. Had he had Dr. Devarges ever exhibited as 
 noble trust, as perfect appreciation of her nature and sufferings ? 
 Had they not thrown away the priceless pearl of this woman's 
 love through ignorance and selfishness ? You and I, my dear 
 sir, who are not in love with this most reprehensible creature, 
 will be quick to see the imperfect logic of Henry Devarges, 
 but when a man constitutes himself accuser, judge, and jury of 
 the woman he loves, he is very apt to believe he is giving a 
 verdict when he is only entering a nolle prosequi. It is probable 
 that Mrs. Conroy had noticed this weakness in her companion, 
 even with her preoccupied fears of the inopportune appearance 
 of Victor, whom she felt she could have accounted for much 
 better in his absence. Victor was an impulsive person, and 
 there are times when this quality, generally adored by a self- 
 restrained sex, is apt to be confounding. 
 
 " Why did you come here to see me ?" asked Mrs. Conroy, 
 with a dangerous srnile. " Only to abuse me ?" 
 
 " There is another grant in existence for the same land that 
 you claim as Grace Conroy or Mrs. Conroy," returned Devarges, 
 with masculine bluntness, " a grant given prior to that made to 
 my brother Paul. A suspicion that some imposture has been 
 practised is entertained by the party holding the grant, and I 
 have been requested to get at the facts." 
 
 Mrs. Conroy's grey eyes lightened. " And how were these 
 suspicions aroused ?" 
 
236 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 "By an anonymous letter." 
 
 " And you have seen it ?" 
 
 " Yes ; both it and the handwriting in portions of the grant 
 are identical." 
 
 " And you know the hand ?" 
 
 " I do ; it is that of a man now here, an old Californian 
 Victor Ramirez !" 
 
 He fixed his eyes upon her ; unabashed she turned her own 
 clear glance on his, and asked, with a dazzling smile, "But 
 does not your client know that, whether this grant is a forgery 
 or not, my husband's title is good ?" 
 
 " Yes ; but the sympathies of my client, as you call her, are 
 interested in the orphan girl Grace." 
 
 " Ah !" said Mrs. Conroy, with the faintest possible sigh, 
 -" your client, for whom you have travelled how many miles ? 
 is a woman." 
 
 Half-pleased, but half-embarrassed, Devarges said, " Yes." 
 
 "I understand," said Mrs. Conroy, slowly. "A young 
 woman, perhaps a good, a pretty one ! And you have said, ' I 
 will prove this Mrs. Conroy an impostor,' and you are here. 
 Well, I do not blame you. You are a man. It is well per 
 haps it is so." 
 
 " But, Julie, hear me !" interrupted the alarmed Devarges. 
 
 " No more !" said Mrs. Conroy, rising, and waving her thin 
 white hand, " I do not blame you. I could expect I deserve 
 no more ! Go back to your client, sir, tell her that you have 
 seen Julie Devarges, the impostor. Tell her to go and press 
 her claim, and that you will assist her. Finish the work that 
 the anonymous letter-writer has begun, and earn your absolu 
 tion for your crime and my folly. Get your reward you 
 deserve it but tell her to thank God for having raised up to 
 her better friends than Julie Devarges ever possessed in the 
 heyday of her beauty. Go ! Farewell ! No ; let me go, 
 Henry Devarges, I am going to my husband. He at least has 
 known how to forgive and protect a friendless and erring 
 woman." 
 
 Before the astonished man could recover his senses, elusive 
 as a sunbeam, she had slipped through his fingers and was 
 gone. For a moment only he followed the flash of her white 
 skirt through the dark aisles of the forest, and then the pillared 
 trees, crowding in upon each other, hid her from view. 
 
Gabriel Discards his Home and Wealth. 237 
 
 Perhaps it was well, for a moment later Victor Ramirez, 
 flushed, wild-eyed, dishevelled, and panting, stumbled blindly 
 upon the trail, and blundered into Devarges' presence. The 
 two men eyed each other in silence. 
 
 " A hot day for a walk !" said Devarges, with an ill-concealed 
 sneer. 
 
 " Vengeance of God ! you are right, it is," returned Victor. 
 " And you ?" 
 
 " Oh, I have been fighting flies. Good day 1" 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 GABRIEL DISCARDS HIS HOME AND WEALTH. 
 
 I AM sorry to say that Mrs. Conroy's expression as she fled 
 was not entirely consistent with the grieved and heartbroken 
 manner with which she had just closed the interview with 
 Henry Devarges. Something of a smile lurked about the 
 corners of her thin lips as she tripped up the steps of her 
 house, and stood panting a little with the exertion in the 
 shadow of the porch. But here she suddenly found herself 
 becoming quite faint, and entering the apparently empty house, 
 passed at once to her boudoir, and threw herself exhaustedly 
 on the lounge with a certain peevish discontent at her physical 
 weakness. No one had seen her enter ; the Chinese servants 
 were congregated in the distant wash-house. Her housekeeper 
 had taken advantage of her absence to ride to the town. The 
 unusual heat was felt to be an apology for any domestic 
 negligence. 
 
 She was very thoughtful. The shock she had felt on first 
 meeting Devarges was past ; she was satisfied she still retained 
 an influence over him sufficient to ' keep him her ally against 
 Ramirez, whom she felt she now had reason to fear. Hitherto 
 his jealousy had only shown itself in vapouring and bravado ; 
 she had been willing to believe him capable of offering her 
 physical violence in his insane fury, and had not feared it, but 
 this deliberately planned treachery made her tremble. She 
 would see Devarges again ; she would recite the wrongs she 
 ihad received from the dead brother and husband, and in 
 Henry's weak attempt to still his own conscience with that 
 
Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 excuse, she could trust to him to keep Ramirez in check, and 
 withhold the exposure until she and Gabriel could get away. 
 Once out of the country she could laugh at them both ; once 
 away, she could devote herself to win the love of Gabriel, 
 without which she had begun to feel her life and schemes had 
 been in vain. She would hurry their departure at once. Since 
 the report had spread affecting the value of the mine, Gabriel, 
 believing it true.- had vaguely felt it his duty to stand by his 
 doubtful claim and accept its fortunes, and had delayed his 
 preparations. She would make him believe that it was Dumphy's 
 wish that he should go at once; she would make Dumphy 
 write him to that effect. She smiled as she thought of the 
 power she had lately achieved over the fears of this financial 
 magnate. She would do all this but for her physical weakness. 
 She ground her teeth as she thought of it : that at such a time 
 she should be and yet a moment later a sudden fancy flashed 
 across her mind, and she closed her eyes that she might take 
 in its delusive sweetness more completely. It might be that it 
 wanted only this to touch his heart some men were so strange 
 and if it were, oh, God ! she stopped. 
 
 What was that noise ? The house had been very quiet, so 
 still that she had heard a woodpecker tapping on its roof. But 
 now she heard distinctly the slow, heavy tread of a man in one 
 of the upper chambers, which had been used as a lumber-room. 
 Mrs. Conroy had none of the nervous apprehension of her sex 
 in regard to probable ghosts or burglars she had too much of 
 a man's practical preoccupation for that, yet she listened 
 curiously. It came again. There was no mistaking it now. 
 It was the tread of the man with whom her thoughts had been 
 busy her husband. 
 
 What was he doing here? In the few months of their mar 
 ried life he had never been home before at this hour. The 
 lumber-room contained among other things the disjecta membra 
 of his old mining life and experience. He may have wanted 
 something. There was an old bag which she remembered he 
 said contained some of his mother's dresses. Yet it was so 
 odd that he should go there now. Any other time but this. 
 A terrible superstitious dread a dread that any other time she 
 would have laughed to scorn, began to creep over her. Hark ! 
 he was moving. She stopped breathing. 
 
 The tread recommenced. It passed into the upper hall, and 
 
Gabriel Discards his Home and Wealth. 239 
 
 came slowly down the stairs, each step recording itself in her 
 heart-beats. It reached the lower hall and seemed to hesitate ; 
 then it came slowly along toward her door, and again hesitated. 
 
 Another moment of suspense, and she felt she would have 
 screamed. And then the door slowly opened, and Gabriel 
 stood before her. 
 
 In one swift, intuitive, hopeless look she read her fate. He 
 knew all ! And yet his eyes, except that they bore less of the 
 usual perplexity and embarrassment with which they had habi 
 tually met hers, though grave and sad, had neither indignation 
 nor anger. He had changed his clothes to a rough miner's 
 blouse and trousers, and carried in one hand a miner's pack, 
 and in the other a pick and shovel. He laid them down 
 slowly and deliberately, and seeing her eyes fixed upon them 
 with a nervous intensity, began apologetically 
 
 " They contains, ma'am, on'y a blanket and a few duds ez 
 I allus used to carry with me. I'll open it ef you say so. But 
 you know me, ma'am, well enough to allow that I'd take 
 nothin' outer this yer house ez I didn't bring inter it." 
 
 "You are going away," she said, in a voice that was not 
 audible to herself, but seemed to vaguely echo in her mental 
 consciousness. 
 
 " I be. Ef ye don't know why, ma'am, I reckon ez you'll 
 hear it from the same vyce ez I did. It's on'y the squar thing 
 to say afore I go, ez it aint't my fault nor hiz'n. I was on the 
 hill this mornin' in the ole cabin." 
 
 It seemed as if he had told her this before, so old and self- 
 evident the fact appeared. 
 
 " I was sayin' I woz on the hill, when I heerd vyces, and 
 lookin' out I seed you with a stranger. From wot ye know 
 .o' me and my ways, ma'am, it ain't like me to listen to thet wot 
 ain't allowed for me to hear. And ye might hev stood thar 
 ontel now ef I hadn't seed a chap dodgin' round behind the 
 trees, spyin' and list'nin'. When I seed thet man I knowed 
 him to be a pore Mexican, whose legs I'd tended yer in the 
 Gulch mor'n a year ago. I went up to him, and when he seed 
 me he'd hev run. But I laid my hand onto him and he 
 stayed !" 
 
 There was something so unconsciously large and fine in the 
 slight gesture of this giant's hand as he emphasized his speech, 
 that even through her swiftly rising pride Mrs. Conroy was 
 
240 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 awed and thrilled by it. But the next moment she found her 
 self saying whether aloud or not she could not tell " If he 
 had loved me, he would have killed him then and there." 
 
 " Wot thet man sed to me bein' flustered and savage-like, 
 along o' bein' choked hard to keep him from singin' out and 
 breakin' in upon you and thet entire stranger ain't fur me 
 to say. Knowin' him longer than I do, I reckon you suspect 
 'bout wot it was. That it ez the truth I read it in your face now, 
 ma'am, ez I reckon I might hev read it off and on in many 
 ways and vari's styles sens we've been yer together, on'y I waz 
 thet weak and ondecided yer." 
 
 He raised his hand to his forehead here, and with his broad 
 palm appeared to wipe away the trouble and perplexity that 
 had overshadowed it. He then drew a paper from his breast. 
 
 "I've drawed up a little paper yer ez I'll hand over to 
 Lawyer Maxwell, makin' over back agin all ez I once hed o' 
 you and all ez I ever expect to hev. For I don't agree with 
 that Mexican thet wot was gi'n to Grace belongs to me. I 
 allow ez she kin settle thet herself, ef she ever comes, and ef 
 I know thet chile, ma'am, she ain't goin' tech it with a two- 
 foot pole. We've allus bin simple folks, ma'am though it 
 ain't the squar thing to take me for a sample and oneddicated 
 and common, but thar ain't a Conroy ez lived ez was ever 
 pinted for money, or ez ever took more outer the kompany's 
 wages than his grub and his clothes." 
 
 It was the first time that he had ever asserted himself in her 
 presence, and even then he did it half apologetically, yet with an 
 unconscious dignity in his manner that became him well. He 
 reached down as he spoke and took up his pick and his bundle, 
 and turned to go. 
 
 " There is nothing then that you are leaving behind you ?" 
 she asked. 
 
 He raised his eyes squarely to hers. 
 
 "No," he said, simply, "nothing." 
 
 Oh, if she could have only spoken ! Oh, had she but dared 
 to tell him that he had left behind that which he could not take 
 away, that which the mere instincts of his manhood would have 
 stirred him to tenderness and mercy, that which would have 
 appealed to him through its very helplessness and youth. But 
 she dared not. That eloquence which an hour before had been 
 ready enough to sway the feelings of the man to whom she had 
 
What Passed under the Pine. 241 
 
 been faithless and did not love, failed her now. In the grasp 
 of her first and only hopeless passion this arch-hypocrite had 
 lost even the tact of the simplest of her sex. "She did not 
 even assume an indifference ! She said nothing ; when she raised 
 her eyes again he was gone. 
 
 She was wrong. At the front door he stopped, hesitated a 
 moment, and then returned slowly and diffidently to the room. 
 Her heart beat rapidly, and then was still. 
 
 " Ye asked just now/'' he said, falteringly, " ef thar was any 
 thing ez I was leavin' behind. Thar is ef ye'll overlook my 
 sayin' it. When you and me allowed to leave fur furrin parts, 
 I reckoned to leave thet housekeeper behind, and unbeknowed 
 to ye I gin her some money and a charge. I told her thet if 
 ever thet dear chile Sister Grace came here, thet she should 
 take her in and do by her ez I would, and let me know. Et 
 may be a heap to ask, but ef it 'tain't too much I I shouldn't 
 like yer to turn thet innocent unsuspectin' chile away 
 from the house thet she might take to be mine. Ye needn't 
 let on any thin' thet's gone ye needn't tell her what a fool I've 
 been, but jest take her in and send for me. Lawyer Maxwell 
 will gin ye my address." 
 
 The sting recalled her benumbed life. She rose with a harsh 
 dissonant laugh and said, " Your wishes shall be fulfilled 
 if " she hesitated a moment "/am here." 
 
 But he did not hear the last sentence, and was gone. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 WHAT PASSED UNDER THE PINE AND WHAT REMAINED THERE. 
 
 RAMIREZ was not as happy in his revenge as he had antici 
 pated. He had, in an instant of impulsive rage, fired his mine 
 prematurely, and, as he feared, impotently. Gabriel had not 
 visibly sickened, faded, nor fallen blighted under the exposure 
 of his wife's deceit. It was even doubtful, as far as Ramirez 
 could judge from his quiet reception of the revelation, whether 
 he would even call that wife to account for it. Again, Ramirez 
 was unpleasantly conscious that this exposure had lost some of 
 its dignity and importance by being wrested from him as a 
 confession made under pressure or duress. Worse than all, he 
 
 R 
 
242 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 had lost the opportunity of previously threatening Mrs. Conroy 
 with the disclosure, and the delicious spectacle of her discom 
 fiture. In point of fact his revenge had been limited to the 
 cautious cowardice of the anonymous letter-writer, who, stabbing 
 in the dark, enjoys neither the contemplation of the agonies of 
 his victim, nor the assertion of his own individual power. 
 
 To this torturing reflection a terrible suspicion of the Spanish 
 translator, Perkins, was superadded. For Gabriel, Ramirez 
 had only that contempt which every lawless lover has for the 
 lawful husband of his mistress, while for Perkins he had that 
 agonizing doubt which every lawless lover has for every other 
 man but the husband. In making this exposure had he not 
 precipitated a catastrophe as fatal to himself as to the husband ? 
 Might they not both drive this woman into the arms of another 
 man ? Ramirez paced the little bedroom of the Grand Conroy 
 Hotel, a prey to that bastard remorse of all natures like his 
 own, the overwhelming consciousness of opportunities for 
 villany misspent. 
 
 Come what might he would see her again, and at once. He 
 would let her know that he suspected her relations with this 
 translator. He would tell her that he had written the letter 
 that he had forged the grant that 
 
 A tap at the door recalled him to himself. It opened pre 
 sently to Sal, coy, bashful, and conscious. The evident agita 
 tion of this young foreigner had to Sal's matter-of-fact compre 
 hension only one origin a hopeless, consuming passion for 
 herself. 
 
 " Dinner hez bin done gone an hour ago," said that arch 
 virgin, "but I put suthin' by for ye. Ye was inquirin' last 
 night about them Conroys. I thought I'd tell ye thet Gabril 
 hez bin yer askin' arter Lawyer Maxwell which he's off to 
 Sacramento altho' one o' Sue Markle's most intymit friends 
 and steddeyist boarders !" 
 
 But Mr. Ramirez had no ear for Gabriel now. 
 
 " Tell to me, Mees Clark," he said, suddenly turning all his 
 teeth on her, with gasping civility, " where is this Senor 
 Perkins, eh ?" 
 
 " Thet shiny chap ez looks like a old turned alpacker 
 gownd !" said Sal ; " thet man ez I can't abear," she continued, 
 with a delicately maidenly suggestion that Ramirez need fear 
 no rivalry from that quarter. " I don't mind and don't keer 
 
What Passed under the Pine. * 243 
 
 to know. He hezn't bin yer since mornin'. I reckon he's up 
 somewhar on Conroy's Hill. All I know ez thet he sent a 
 message yer to git ready his volise to put aboard the Wingdam 
 stage to-night. Are ye goin' with him ?" 
 
 " No," said Ramirez, curtly. 
 
 " Axin' yer parding for the question, but seein' ez he'd got 
 booked for two places, I tho't ez maybe ye'd got tired o' plain 
 mounting folks and mounting ways, and waz goin' with him," 
 and Sal threw an arch yet reproachful glance at Ramirez. 
 
 "Booked for two seats," gasped Victor; "ah ! for a lady 
 perhaps eh, Mees Clark ? for a lady ?" 
 
 Sal bridled instantly at what might have seemed a suggestion 
 of impropriety on her part. " A lady- like his imperance 
 indeed ! I'd like to know who would demean theirselves by 
 goin' with the like o' he ! But you're not startin' out agin 
 without your dinner, and it waitin' ye in the oven ? No ? La ! 
 Mr. Ramirez, ye must be in luv ! I've heerd tell ez it do take 
 away the appetite ; not knowin' o' my own experense, though 
 it's little hez passed my lips these two days, and only when 
 tempted. " 
 
 But before Sal could complete her diagnosis, Mr. Ramirez 
 gasped a few words of hasty excuse, seized his hat and hurried 
 from the room. 
 
 Leaving Sal a second time to mourn over the effect of her 
 coquettish playfulness upon the sensitive Italian nature, Victor 
 Ramirez, toiling through the heat and fiery dust shaken from 
 the wheels of incoming teams, once more brushed his way up 
 the long ascent of Conroy's Hill, and did not stop until he 
 reached its summit. Here he paused to collect his scattered 
 thoughts, to decide upon some plan 9f action, to control the 
 pulse of his beating temples, quickened by excitement and the 
 fatigue of the ascent, and to wipe the perspiration from his 
 streaming face. He must see her at once; but how and 
 where ? To go boldly to her house would be to meet her in 
 the presence of Gabriel, and that was no longer an object; 
 besides, if she were with this stranger it would not probably be 
 there. By haunting this nearest umbrage to the house he 
 would probably intercept them on their way to the Gulch, or over 
 hear any other conference. By lingering here he would avoid 
 any interference from Gabriel's cabin on the right, and yet be 
 able to detect the approach of any one from the road. The 
 
 R 2 
 
244 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 .spot that he had chosen was, singularly enough, in earlier 
 days, Gabriel's favourite haunt for the indulgence of his noon 
 tide contemplation and pipe. A great pine, the largest of its 
 fellows, towered in a little opening to the right, as if it had 
 drawn apart for seclusion, and, obeying some mysterious 
 attraction, Victor went toward it and seated himself on an 
 abutting root at its base. Here a singular circumstance 
 occurred, which at first filled him with superstitious fear. The 
 handkerchief with which he had wiped his face nay, his very 
 shirt-front itself- suddenly appeared as if covered with blood. 
 A moment later he saw that the ensanguined hue was only due 
 to the dust through which he had plunged, blending with the 
 perspiration, that on the least exertion still started from every 
 pore of his burning skin. 
 
 The sun was slowly sinking. The long shadow of Reservoir 
 Ridge fell upon Conroy's Hill, and seemed to cut down the tall 
 pine that a moment before had risen redly in the sunlight. 
 The sounds of human labour slowly died out of the Gulch 
 below, the far-off whistle of teamsters in the Wingdam road 
 began to fail. One by one the red openings on the wooded 
 hillside opposite went out, as if Nature were putting up the 
 shutters for the day. With the gathering twilight Ramirez 
 became more intensely alert and watchful. Treading stealthily 
 around the lone pine tree, with shining eyes and gleaming 
 teeth, he might have been mistaken for some hesitating animal 
 waiting for that boldness which should come with the coming 
 night. Suddenly he stopped, and leaning forward peered into 
 the increasing shadow. Coming up the trail from the town 
 was a woman. Even at that distance and by that uncertain 
 light, Ramirez recognised the flapping hat and ungainly stride. 
 It was Sal perdition ! Might the devil fly away with her ! 
 But she turned to the right with the trail that wound toward 
 Gabriel's hut and the cottage beyond, and Victor breathed, or 
 rather panted, more freely. And then a voice at his very 
 side thrilled him to his smallest fibre, and he turned quickly. 
 It was Mrs. Conroy, white, erect, and truculent. 
 
 " What are you doing here ?" she said, with a sharp, quick 
 utterance. 
 
 " Hush !" said Ramirez, trembling with the passion called 
 up by the figure before him. " Hush ! There is one who has 
 just come up the trail." 
 
What Passed under the Pine. 245 
 
 "What do I care who hears me now? You have made 
 caution unnecessary," she responded, sharply. " All the world 
 knows us now ! and so I ask you again, what are you doing 
 here?" 
 
 He would have approached her nearer, but she drew back, 
 twitching her long white skirt behind her with a single quick 
 feminine motion of her hand, as if to save it from contami 
 nation. 
 
 Victor laughed uneasily. "You have come to keep your 
 appointment ; it is not my fault if I am late." 
 
 "I have come here because for the last half-hour I have 
 watched you from my verandah, coursing in and out among 
 the trees like a hound as you are ! I have come to whip you 
 off my land as I would a hound. But I have first a word or 
 two to say to you as the man you have assumed to be." 
 
 Standing there with the sunset glow over her erect, graceful 
 figure, in the pink flush of her cheek, in the cold fires of her 
 eyes, in all the thousand nameless magnetisms of her presence, 
 there was so much of her old power over this slave of passion, 
 that the scorn of her words touched him only to inflame him, 
 and he would have grovelled at her feet could he have touched 
 the thin three fingers that she warningly waved at him. 
 
 " You wrong me, Julie, by the God of Heaven ! I was wild, 
 mad, this morning you understand for when I came to you 
 I found you with another ! I had reason, Mother of God ! I 
 had reason for my madness, reason enough ; but I came in 
 peace, Julie, I came in peace !" 
 
 " In peace/'' returned Mrs. Conroy, scornfully ; " your note 
 was a peaceful one, indeed !" 
 
 " Ah ! but I knew not how else to make you hear me. I 
 had news news you understand, news that might save you, 
 for I came from the woman who holds the grant. Ah ! you 
 will listen, will you not ? For one moment only, Julie, hear 
 me, and I am gone !" 
 
 Mrs. Conroy, with abstracted gaze, leaned against the tree. 
 " Go on," she said, coldly. 
 
 "Ah! you will listen then!" said Victor, joyfully; "ana 
 when you have listened you shall understand! Well. First 
 I have the fact that the lawyer for this woman is the man who 
 deserted the Grace Conroy in the mountains the man who 
 was called Philip Ashley, but whose real name is Poinsett." 
 
246 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Who did you say ?" said Mrs. Conroy, suddenly stepping 
 from the tree, and fixing a pair of cruel eyes on Ramirez. 
 
 "Arthur Poinsett an ex-soldier, an officer. Ah, you do 
 not believe I swear to God it is so !" 
 
 "What has this to do with me?" she said, scornfully, 
 resuming her position beside the pine. "Go on or is this 
 all?" 
 
 " No, but it is much. Look you ! he is the affianced of a 
 rich widow in the Southern Country, you understand? No 
 one knows his past. Ah, you begin to comprehend, lie does 
 not dare to seek out the real Grace Conroy. He shall not 
 dare to press the claim of his client. Consequently, he does 
 nothing !" 
 
 " Is this all your news ?" 
 
 " All ! ah, no. There is one more, but I dare not speak it 
 here," he said, glancing craftily around through the slowly 
 darkening wood. 
 
 "Then it must remain untold," returned Mrs. Conroy, 
 coldly ; " for this is our last and only interview." 
 
 " But, Julie !" 
 
 " Have you done ?" she continued, in the same tone. 
 
 Whether her indifference was assumed or not, it was effec 
 tive. Ramirez glanced again quickly around, and then said, 
 sulkily, " Come nearer, and I will tell you. Ah, you doubt 
 you doubt? Be it so." But seeing that she did not move, he 
 drew toward the tree, and whispered " Bend here your head 
 I will whisper it." 
 
 Mrs. Conroy, evading his outstretched hand, bent her head. 
 He whispered a few words in her ear that were inaudible a foot 
 from the tree. 
 
 " Did you tell this to him to Gabriel?" she asked, fixing her 
 eyes upon him, yet without change in her frigid demeanour. 
 
 " No ! I swear to you, Julie, no ! I would not have told 
 him anything, but I was wild, crazy. And he was a brute, a 
 great bear. He held me fast, here, so ! I could not move. 
 It was a forced confession. Yes Mother of God by force !" 
 
 Luckily for Victor the darkness hid the scorn that momen 
 tarily flashed in the woman's eyes at this corroboration of her 
 husband's strength and the weakness of the man before her. 
 " And is this all that you have to tell me ?" she only said. 
 
 " All I swear to you, Julie all." 
 
What Passed under the Pine. 247 
 
 "Then listen, Victor Ramirez," she said, swiftly stepping 
 from the tree into the path before him, and facing him with a 
 white and rigid face. " Whatever was your purpose in coming 
 here, it has been successful ! You have done all that you 
 intended, and more ! The man whose mind you came to 
 poison the man you wished to turn against me has gone ! 
 has left me left me never to return ! he never loved me ! 
 Your exposure of me was to him a godsend, for it gave him 
 -an excuse for the insults he has heaped upon me, for the 
 treachery he has always hidden in his bosom !" 
 
 Even in the darkness she could see the self-complacent 
 flash of Victor's teeth, could hear the quick, hurried sound of 
 his breath as he bent his head toward her, and knew that he 
 was eagerly reaching out his hand for hers. He would have 
 caught her gesturing hand and covered it with kisses, but that, 
 divining his intention, without flinching from her position, she 
 whipped both her hands behind her. 
 
 " Well you are satisfied ! You have had your say and 
 your way. Now I shall have mine. Do you suppose I came 
 here to-night to congratulate you ? No, I came here to tell 
 you that insulted, outraged, and spurned as I have been by my 
 husband. Gabriel Conroy cast off and degraded as I stand 
 here to-night / love him I Love him as I never loved any 
 man before ; love him as I never shall love any man again ; 
 love him as I hate you ! Love him so that I shall follow him 
 wherever he goes, if I have to drag myself after him on my 
 knees. His hatred is more precious to me than your love. Do 
 you hear me, Victor Ramirez ? That is what I came here to 
 tell you. More than that listen ! The secret you have whis 
 pered to me just now, whether true or false, I shall take to 
 him. I will help him to find his sister. I will make him love 
 me yet if I sacrifice you, everybody, my own life, to do it ! 
 Do you hear that, Victor Ramirez, you dog ! you Spanish 
 mongrel ! you half-breed. Oh, grit your teeth there in the 
 darkness I know you grit your teeth as you did to-day when 
 Gabriel held you squirming under his thumb ! It was a fine 
 sight. Victor worthy of the manly Secretary who stole a dying 
 girl's papers ! worthy of the valiant soldier who abandoned 
 his garrison to a Yankee pedlar and his mule ! Oh, I know 
 you, sir, and have known you from the first day I made you 
 my tool my dupe ! Go on, sir, go on draw your knife, do ! 
 
248 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 I am not afraid, coward ! I shall not scream, I promise you \ 
 Come on !" 
 
 With an insane, articulate gasp of rage and shame, he sprang 
 towards her with an uplifted knife. But at the same instant 
 she saw a hand reach from the darkness and fall swiftly upon 
 his shoulder, saw him turn and with an oath struggle furiously 
 in the arms of Devarges, and, without waiting to thank her 
 deliverer, or learn the result of his interference, darted by the 
 struggling pair and fled. 
 
 Possessed only by a single idea, she ran swiftly to her home. 
 Here she pencilled a few hurried lines, and called one of her 
 Chinese servants to her side. 
 
 " Take this, Ah Fe, and give it to Mr. Conroy. You will 
 find him at Lawyer Maxwell's, or iff not there he will tell you 
 where he has gone. But you must find him. If he has left 
 town already, you must follow him. Find him within an hour 
 and I'll double that" she placed a gold piece in his hand. 
 " Go at once." 
 
 However limited might have been Ah Fe ; s knowledge of 
 the English language, there was an eloquence in the woman's 
 manner that needed no translation. He nodded his head 
 intelligently,, said, " Me shabbe you muchee quick," caused 
 the gold piece and the letter to instantly vanish up his sleeve, 
 and started from the house in a brisk trot Nor did he allow 
 any incidental diversion to interfere with the business in hand. 
 The noise of struggling in the underbrush on Conroy's Hill 
 and a cry for help only extracted from Ah Fe the response, 
 " You muchee goto-hellee no foolee me ! ; ' as he trotted un 
 concernedly by. In half an hour he had reached Lawyer 
 Maxwell's office. But the news was not favourable. Gabriel 
 had left an hour before, they knew not where. Ah Fe hesi 
 tated a moment, and then ran quickly down the hill to where 
 a gang of his fellow-countrymen were working in a ditch at the 
 roadside. Ah Fe paused, and uttered in a high recitative a 
 series of the most extraordinary ejaculations, utterly unintel 
 ligible to the few Americans who chanced to be working near. 
 But the effect was magical ; in an instant pick and shovel were 
 laid aside, and before the astonished miners could comprehend 
 it the entire gang of Chinamen had dispersed, and in another 
 instant were scattered over the several trails leading out of One 
 Horse Gulch, except one. 
 
What Passed under the Pine. 249 
 
 That one was luckily taken by Ah Fe. In half an hour he 
 came upon the object of his search, seated on a boulder by the 
 wayside, smoking his evening pipe. His pick, shovel, and pack 
 lay by his side. Ah Fe did not waste time in preliminary 
 speech or introduction. He simply handed the missive to his 
 master, and instantly turned his back upon him and departed. 
 In another half hour every Chinaman was back in the ditch, 
 working silently as if nothing had happened. 
 
 Gabriel laid aside his pipe and held the letter a moment 
 hesitatingly between his finger and thumb. Then opening it, 
 he at once recognised the small Italian hand with which his 
 wife had kept his accounts and written from his dictation, and 
 something like a faint feeling of regret overcame him as he 
 gazed at it, without taking the meaning of the text. And then, 
 with the hesitation, repetition, and audible utterance of an 
 illiterate person, he slowly read the following : 
 
 ' ' I was wrong. You have left something behind you a secret that as 
 you value your happiness, you must take with you. If you come to Con- 
 roy's Hill within the next two hours you shall know it, for I shall not 
 enter that house again, and leave here to-night for ever. I do not ask you 
 to come for the sake of your wife, but for the sake of the woman she once 
 personated. You will come because you love Grace, not because you care 
 for 
 
 " JULIE." 
 
 There was but one fact that Gabriel clearly grasped in this 
 letter. That was that it referred to some news of Grace. 
 That was enough. He put away his pipe, rose, shouldered 
 his pack and pick, and deliberately retraced his steps. When 
 he reached the town, with the shamefacedness of a man who 
 had just taken leave of it for ever, he avoided the main 
 thoroughfare, but did this so clumsily and incautiously, after 
 his simple fashion, that two or three of the tunnel-men noticed 
 him ascending the hill by an inconvenient and seldom used 
 by-path. He did not stay long, however, for in a short time 
 some said ten, others said fifteen minutes he was seen again, 
 descending rapidly and recklessly, and crossing the Gulch dis 
 appeared in the bushes, at the base of Bald Mountain. 
 
 With the going down of the sun that night, the temperature 
 fell also, and the fierce, dry, desert heat that had filled the land 
 for the past few days fled away before a fierce wind which rcse 
 with the coldly rising moon, that during the rest of the night 
 
2$o Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 rode calmly over the twisting tops of writhing pines on Conroy's 
 Hill, over the rattling windows of the town, and over the 
 beaten dust of mountain roads. But even with the night 
 the wind passed too, and the sun arose the next morning upon 
 a hushed and silent landscape. It touched, according to its 
 habit, first the tall top of the giant pine on Conroy's Hill, and 
 then slid softly down its shaft until it reached the ground. 
 And there it found Victor Ramirez, with a knife thrust through 
 his heart, lying dead I 
 

 BOOK VI. A DIP. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 MR. HAMLIN'S RECREATION CONTINUED. 
 
 WHEN Donna Dolores after the departure of Mrs. Sepulvida 
 missed the figure of Mr. Jack Hamlin from the plain before 
 her window, she presumed he had followed that lady and 
 would have been surprised to have known that he was at that 
 moment within her castle, drinking aguardiente with no less a 
 personage than the solemn Don Juan Salvatierra. In point of 
 fact, with that easy audacity which distinguished him, Jack had 
 penetrated the courtyard, gained the hospitality of Don Juan 
 without even revealing his name and profession to that usually 
 ceremonious gentleman, and after holding him in delicious 
 fascination for two hours, had actually left him lamentably in 
 toxicated, and utterly oblivious of the character of his guest. 
 Why Jack did not follow up his advantage by seeking an inter 
 view with the mysterious Scnora who had touched him so 
 deeply I cannot say, nor could he himself afterwards determine. 
 A sudden bashfulness and timidity which he had never before 
 experienced in his relations with the sex, tied his own tongue, 
 while Don Juan with the garrulity which inebriety gave to his, 
 poured forth the gossip of the Mission and the household. It 
 is possible also that a certain vague hopelessness, equally novel 
 to Jack, sent him away, in lower spirits than he came. It is 
 not remarkable that Donna Dolores knew nothing of the visit 
 of this guest, until three days afterwards, for during that time 
 she was indisposed and did not leave her room, but it was 
 remarkable that on learning it. she flew into a paroxysm of 
 indignation and rage that alarmed Don Juan and frightened 
 her attendants. 
 
 " And why was 7 not told of the presence of this strange 
 Americano ? Am I a child, holy St. Anthony ! that I am to be 
 kept in ignorance of my duty as the hostess of the Blessed 
 
252 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Trinity, or are you, Don Juan, my duena ? A brave caballero, 
 who, I surmise from your description, is the same that pro 
 tected me from insult at Mass last Sunday, and he is not to 
 4 kiss my hand ?' Mother of God ! And his name you have 
 forgotten ?" 
 
 In vain Juan protested that the strange caballero had not re 
 quested an audience, and that a proper maidenly spirit would 
 have prevented the Donna from appearing, unsought. 
 
 " Better that I should have been thought forward and these 
 Americanos are of a different habitude, my uncle than that 
 the Blessed Trinity should have been misrepresented by the 
 guzzling of aguardiente /" 
 
 Howbeit, Mr. Hamlin had not found the climate of San 
 Antonio conducive to that strict repose that his physician had 
 recommended, and left it the next day with an accession of 
 feverish energy that was new to him. He had idled away three 
 days of excessive heat at Sacramento, and on the fourth, had 
 flown to the mountains and found himself on the morning of 
 the first cool day at Wingdam. 
 
 "Anybody here I know?" he demanded of his faithful 
 henchman, as Pete brought in his clothes, freshly brushed for 
 the morning toilette. 
 
 " No, sah !" 
 
 " Nor want to, eh ?" continued the cynical Jack, leisurely 
 getting out of bed. 
 
 Pete reflected. " Dere is two o' dese yar Yeastern tourists 
 dem folks as is goin' round inspectin' de country down in 
 de parlour. Jess come over from de Big Trees. I reckon 
 dey's some o' de same party dem Frisco chaps Mass 
 Dumphy and de odders haz been unloadin' to. Dey's mighty 
 green, and de boys along de road has been fillin' 'em up. It's 
 jess so much water on de dried apples dat Pete Dumphy's 
 been shovin* into 'em." 
 
 Jack smiled grimly. " I reckon you needn't bring up my 
 breakfast, Pete, I'll go down." 
 
 The party thus obscurely referred to by Pete, were Mr. and 
 Mrs. Raynor, who had been " doing" the Big Trees, under the 
 intelligent guidance of a San Francisco editor who had been 
 deputized by Mr. Dumphy to represent Californian hospitality. 
 They were exceedingly surprised during breakfast by the en 
 trance of a pale, handsome, languid gentleman, accurately 
 
Mr, Hamliris Recreation Continued. 253 
 
 dressed, whose infinite neatness shamed their own bedraggled 
 appearance, and who, accompanied by his own servant, ad 
 vanced and quietly took a seat opposite the tourists and their 
 guide. Mrs. Raynor at once became conscious of some negli 
 gence in her toilette, and after a moment's embarrassment 
 excused herself and withdrew. Mr. Raynor, impressed with 
 the appearance of the stranger, telegraphed his curiosity by 
 elbowing the editor, who, however, for some reason best known 
 to himself, failed to respond. Possibly he recognised the pre 
 sence of the notorious Mr. Jack Hamlin in the dark-eyed 
 stranger, and may have had ample reasons for refraining from 
 voicing the popular reputation of that gentleman before his 
 face, or possibly he may have been inattentive. Howbeit, after 
 Mr. Hamlin's entrance he pretermitted the hymn of Cali 
 fornia praise and became reticent and absorbed in his morning 
 paper. Mr. Hamlin waited for the lady to retire, and then, 
 calmly ignoring the presence of any other individual, languidly 
 drew from his pocket a revolver and bowie-knife, and placing 
 them in an easy habitual manner on either side of his plate, 
 glanced carelessly over the table, and then called Pete to his side. 
 
 " Tell them," said Jack, quietly, " that I want some large 
 potatoes : ask them what they mean by putting those little 
 things on the table. Tell them to be quick. Is your rifle 
 loaded?" 
 
 " Yes, sah," said Pete, promptly, without relaxing a muscle 
 of his serious ebony face. 
 
 " Well take it along with you." 
 
 But here the curiosity of Mr. Raynor, who had been just 
 commenting on the really enormous size of the potatoes, got 
 the best of his prudence. Failing to make his companion re 
 spond to his repeated elbowings, he leaned over the table 
 toward the languid stranger. " Excuse me, sir," he said, 
 politely, " but did I understand you to say that you thought 
 these potatoes sjnall that there are really larger ones to be 
 had?" 
 
 " It's the first time," returned Jack, gravely, "that I ever was 
 insulted by having a whole potato brought to me. I didn't 
 know it was possible before. Perhaps in this part of the 
 country the vegetables are poor. I'm a stranger to this sec 
 tion. I take it you are too. But because I am a stranger I 
 don't see why I should be imposed upon." 
 
254 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Ah, I see/' said the mystified Raynor, " but if I might ask 
 another question you'll excuse me if I'm impertinent I 
 noticed that you just now advised your servant to take his gun 
 into the kitchen with him ; surely " 
 
 " Pete," interrupted Mr. Hamlin, languidly, " is a good nigger. 
 I shouldn't like to lose him ! Perhaps you're right maybe I am 
 a little over-cautious. But when a man has lost two servants by 
 gunshot wounds inside of three months it makes him careful.'* 
 
 The perfect unconcern of the speaker, the reticence of his 
 companion, and the dead silence of the room in which this 
 extraordinary speech was uttered, filled the measure of Mr. 
 Raynor's astonishment. 
 
 " Bless my soul ! this is most extraordinary. I have seen 
 nothing of this," he said, appealing in dumb show to his com 
 panion. 
 
 Mr. Hamlin followed the direction of his eyes. " Your 
 friend is a Californian and knows what we think of any man 
 who lies, and how most men resent such an imputation, and I 
 reckon he'll endorse me !" 
 
 The editor muttered a hasty assent that seemed to cover 
 Mr. Hamlin's various propositions, and then hurriedly with 
 drew, abandoning his charge to Mr. Hamlin. What advantage 
 Jack took of this situation, what extravagant accounts he gravely 
 offered of the vegetation in Lower California, of the resources 
 of the country, of the reckless disregard of life and property, 
 do not strictly belong to the record of this veracious chronicle. 
 Notwithstanding all this, Mr. Raynor found Mr. Hamlin an 
 exceedingly fascinating companion, and later, when the editor 
 had rejoined them, and Mr. Hamlin proceeded to beg that 
 gentleman to warn Mr. Raynor against gambling as the one 
 seductive, besetting sin of California, alleging that it had been 
 the ruin of both the editor and himself, the tourist was so struck 
 with the frankness and high moral principle of his new acquaint 
 ance as to insist upon his making one of their party, an invita 
 tion that Mr. Hamlin might have accepted but for the inter 
 vention of a singular occurrence. 
 
 During the conversation he had been curiously impressed 
 by the appearance of a stranger who had entered and modestly 
 and diffidently taken a seat near the door. To Mr. Hamlin 
 this modesty and diffidence appeared so curiously at variance 
 with his superb physique, and the exceptional strength and 
 
Mr. Hamlin's Recreation Continued. 255 
 
 power shown in every muscle of his body, that with his usual 
 audacity he felt inclined to go forward and inquire " what was 
 his little game ?" That he was lying in wait to be " picked up" 
 the reader must really excuse me if I continue to borrow Mr. 
 Hamlin's expressive vernacular that his diffidence and shyness 
 was a deceit and intended to entrap the unwary, he felt satisfied, 
 and was proportionably thrilled with a sense of admiration for 
 him. That a rational human being who held such a hand 
 should be content with a small ante, without "raising the other 
 players," but I beg the fastidious reader's forgiveness. 
 
 He was dressed in the ordinary miner's garb of the Southern 
 mines, perhaps a little more cleanly than the average miner by 
 reason of his taste, certainly more picturesque by reason of his 
 statuesque shapeliness. He wore a pair of white duck trousers, 
 a jumper or loose blouse of the same material, with a low- 
 folded sailor's collar and sailor-knotted neckerchief, which 
 displayed, with an unconsciousness quite characteristic of the 
 man, the full muscular column of his sunburnt throat, except 
 where it was hidden by a full tawny beard. His long sandy 
 curls fell naturally and equally on either side of the centre of 
 his low, broad forehead- His fair complexion, although greatly 
 tanned by exposure, seemed to have faded lately as by sickness 
 or great mental distress, a theory that had some confirmation 
 in the fact that he ate but little. His eyes were downcast, or 
 when raised were so shy as to avoid critical examination. 
 Nevertheless his mere superficial exterior was so striking as to 
 attract the admiration of others besides Mr. Hamlin ; to excite 
 the enthusiastic attention of Mr. Raynor, and to enable the 
 editor to offer him as a fair type of the mining population. 
 Embarrassed at last by a scrutiny that asserted itself even 
 through his habitual unconsciousness and pre- occupation, the 
 subject of this criticism arose and returned to the hotel verandah, 
 where his pack and mining implements were lying. Mr. Ham 
 lin, who for the last few days had been in a rather exceptional 
 mood, for some occult reason which he could not explain, felt 
 like respecting the stranger's reserve, and quietly lounged into 
 the billiard-room to wait for the coming of the stage-coach. 
 As soon as his back was turned the editor took occasion to 
 offer Mr. Raynor his own estimate of Mr. Hamlin's character 
 and reputation, to correct his misstatements regarding Cali- 
 fornian resources and social habits, and to restore Mr. Raynor's 
 
256 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 possibly shaken faith in California as a country especially 
 adapted to the secure investment of capital. 
 
 " As to the insecurity of life," said the editor, indignantly, 
 " it is as safe here as in New York or Boston. We admit that 
 in the early days the country was cursed by too many adven 
 turers of the type of this very gambler Hamlin, but I will ven 
 ture to say that you will require no better refutation of these 
 calumnies than this very miner whom you admired. He, sir, 
 is a type of our mining population ; strong, manly, honest, 
 unassuming, and perfectly gentle and retiring. We are proud, 
 sir, we admit, of such men eh ? Oh, that's nothing only the 
 arrival of the up-stage !" 
 
 It certainly was something more. A momentarily increasing 
 crowd of breathless men were gathered on the verandah before the 
 window and were peering anxiously over each other's head to 
 ward a central group among which towered the tall figure of 
 the very miner of whom they had been speaking. More than 
 that, there was a certain undefined restless terror in the air, as 
 when the intense conscious passion or suffering of one or two 
 men communicates itself vaguely without speech, sometimes even 
 without visible sign to others. And then Yuba Bill, the driver 
 of the Wingdam coach, strode out from the crowd into the bar 
 room, drawing from his hands with an evident effort his im 
 mense buckskin gloves. 
 
 " What's the row, Bill ?" said half a dozen voices. 
 
 " Nothin'," said Bill, gruffly ; " only the Sheriff of Calaveras 
 ez kem do\yn with us hez, nabbed his man jest in his very 
 tracks." 
 
 "When, Bill?" 
 
 " Right yer on this very verandy furst man he seed !" 
 
 "What for?" "who?" " what lied he bin doin' ?" "who is 
 it ?" " what's up ?" persisted the chorus. 
 
 " Killed a man up at One Horse Gulch, last night," said 
 Bill, grasping the decanter which the attentive bar-keeper had, 
 without previous request, placed before him. 
 
 " Who did he kill, Bill ?" 
 
 "A little Mexican from 'Frisco by the name o' Ramirez." 
 
 " What's the man's name that killed him the man that you 
 took ?" 
 
 The voice was Jack Hamlin's. 
 
 Yuba Bill instantly turned, put down his glass, wiped his 
 
Mr. Hamlin takes a Hand. 257 
 
 mouth with his sleeve, and then deliberately held out his great 
 hand with an exhaustive grin. " Dem my skin, ole man, if it 
 ain't you ! And how's things, eh ? Yer lookin' a little white 
 in the gills, but peart and sassy, ez usual. Heerd you was- 
 kinder off colour, down in Sacramento lass week. And it's 
 you, ole fell, and jest in time ! Bar-keep hist that pizen over 
 to Jack. Here to ye agin, ole man ! But I'm glad to see ye !'* 
 
 The crowd hung breathless over the two men awe-struck 
 and respectful. It was a meeting of the gods Jack Hamlin- 
 and Yuba Bill. None dare speak. Hamlin broke the silence, 
 at last, and put down his glass. 
 
 " What," he asked, lazily, yet with a slight colour on his- 
 cheek, '' did you say was the name of the chap that fetched 
 that little Mexican ?" 
 
 " Gabriel Conroy," said Bill. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 MR. HAMLIN TAKES A HAND. 
 
 THE capture had been effected quietly. To the evident 
 astonishment of his captor, Gabriel had offered no resistance, 
 but had yielded himself up with a certain composed willingness 
 as if it were only the preliminary step to the quicker solution 
 of a problem that was sure to be solved. It was observed r 
 however, that he showed a degree of caution that was new to 
 him asking to see the warrant, the particulars of the discovery 
 of the body, and utterly withholding that voluble explanation 
 or apology which all who knew his character confidently 
 expected him to give, whether guilty or innocent a caution 
 which, accepted by them as simply the low cunning of the 
 criminal, told against him. He submitted quietly to a search 
 that, however, disclosed no concealed weapon or anything of 
 import. But when a pair of handcuffs were shown him, he 
 changed colour, and those that were nearest to him saw that he 
 breathed hurriedly, and hesitated in the first words of some 
 protest that rose to his lips. The sheriff, a man of known 
 intrepidity, who had the rapid and clear intuition that comes- 
 with courageous self-possession, noticed it also, and quietly put 
 the handcuffs back in his pocket. 
 
 s 
 
258 Ga bricl Conroy. 
 
 " I reckon there's no use for 'em here ; ef you'' re willin' to 
 take the risks, / am." 
 
 The eyes of the two men met, and Gabriel thanked him. In 
 that look he recognised and accepted the fact that on a motion 
 to escape he would be instantly killed. 
 
 They were to return with the next stage, and in the interval 
 Gabriel was placed in an upper room, and securely guarded. 
 Here, falling into his old apologetic manner, he asked per 
 mission to smoke a pipe, which was at once granted by his 
 good-humoured guard, and then threw himself at full length 
 upon the bed. The rising wind rattled the windows noisily, 
 and entering tossed the smoke-wreaths that rose from his pipe 
 in fitful waves about the room. The guard, who was much 
 more embarrassed than his charge, was relieved of an ineffectual 
 attempt to carry on a conversation suitable to the occasion by 
 Gabriel's simple directness 
 
 " You needn't put yourself out to pass the time o' day with 
 me," he said, gently, " that bein' extry to your reg'lar work. Ef 
 you hev any friends ez you'd like to talk to in your own line, 
 invite 'em in, and don't mind me." 
 
 But here the guard's embarrassment was further relieved by 
 the entrance of Joe Hall, the sheriff. 
 
 " There's a gentleman here to speak with ) r ou," he said to 
 Gabriel, " he can stay until we're ready to go." Turning to 
 the guard, he added, " You can take a chair outside the door 
 in the hall. It's all right, it's the prisoner's counsel.''' 
 
 At the word Gabriel looked up. Following the sheriff, 
 Lawyer Maxwell entered the room. He approached Gabriel, 
 and extended with grave cordiality a hand that had apparently 
 wiped from his mouth the last trace of mirthfulness at the door. 
 
 " I did not expect to see you again so soon, Gabriel, but as 
 quickly as the news reached me, and I heard that our friend 
 Hall had a warrant for you, I started after him. I would have 
 got here before him, but my horse gave out." He paused, and 
 looked steadily at Gabriel. " Well ! ; ' 
 
 Gabriel looked at him in return, but did not speak. 
 
 " I supposed you would need professional aid," he went on, 
 with a slight hesitation, "perhaps mine knowing that I was 
 aware of some of the circumstances that preceded this affair." 
 
 " Wot circumstances ?" asked Gabriel, with the sudden look 
 of cunning that had before prejudiced his captors. 
 
Mr. Hauilin takes a Hand. 259 
 
 "For Heaven's sake, Gabriel," said Maxwell, rising with a 
 gesture of impatience, " don't let us repeat the blunder of our 
 first interview. This is a serious matter.; may be very serious 
 to you. Think a moment. Yesterday you sought my pro 
 fessional aid to deed to your wife all your property, telling me 
 that you were going away never to return to One Horse Gulch. 
 I do not ask you now why you did it. I only want you to 
 reflect that I am just now the only man who knows that 
 circumstance a circumstance that I can tell you as a lawyer is 
 somewhat important in the light of the crime that you are now 
 charged with." 
 
 Maxwell waited for Gabriel to speak, wiping away as he 
 waited the usual smile that lingered around his lips. But 
 Gabriel said nothing. 
 
 " Gabriel Conroy," said Lawyer Maxwell, suddenly dropping 
 into the vernacular of One Horse Gulch, " are you a fool ?'"' 
 
 "That's so," said Gabriel, with the simplicity of a man 
 admitting a self-evident proposition. " Thet's so ; I reckon I 
 are." 
 
 "I shouldn't wonder," said Maxwell, again swiftly turning 
 upon him, " if you were !" He stopped, as if ashamed of his 
 abruptness, and said more quietly and persuasively, " Come, 
 Gabriel, if you wont confess to me, I suppose that I must to 
 you. Six months ago I thought you an impostor. Six months 
 ago the woman who is now your wife charged you with being 
 an impostor ; with assuming a name and right that did not 
 belong to you ; in plain English, said that you had set yourself 
 up as Gabriel Conroy, and that she, who was Grace Conroy, 
 the sister of the real Gabriel, knew that you lied. She sub 
 stantiated all this by proofs ; hang it," continued Maxwell, 
 appealing in dumb show to the walls, " there isn't a lawyer 
 living as wouldn't have said it was a good case, and been ready 
 to push it in any court. Under these circumstances I sought 
 you, and you remember how. You know the result of that 
 interview. I can tell you now that if there ever was a man 
 who palpably confessed to guilt when he was innocent, you 
 were that man. Well, after your conduct there was explained 
 by Oily, without, however, damaging the original evidence 
 against you, or prejudicing her rights, this woman came to me 
 and said that she had discovered that you were the man who 
 had saved her life at the risk of your own, and that for the 
 
 s2 
 
260 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 present she could not, in delicacy, push her claim. When 
 afterwards she told me that this gratitude had well, ripened 
 into something more serious, and that she had engaged herself 
 to marry you, and so condone your offence, why, it was woman 
 like and natural, and I suspected nothing. I believed her 
 story believed she had a case. Yes, sir ; the last six months 
 I have looked upon you as the creature of that woman's foolish 
 magnanimity. I could see that she was soft on you, and 
 believed that you had fooled her. I did, hang me ! There, if 
 you confess to being a fool, I do to having been an infernal 
 sight bigger one." 
 
 He stopped, erased the mirthful past with his hand, and 
 went on 
 
 " I began to suspect something when you came to me 
 yesterday with this story of your going away, and this disposal 
 of your property. When I heard of the murder of this stranger 
 one of your wife's witnesses to her claim near your house, 
 your own flight, and the sudden disappearance of your wife, 
 my suspicions were strengthened. And when I read this note 
 from your wife, delivered to you last night by one of her 
 servants, and picked up early this morning near the body, my 
 suspicions were confirmed." 
 
 As he finished he took from his pocket a folded paper and 
 handed it to Gabriel. He received it mechanically, and 
 opened it. It was his wife's note of the preceding night. He 
 took out his knife, still holding the letter, and with its blade 
 began stirring the bowl of his pipe. Then after a pause, he 
 asked cautiously 
 
 " And how did ye come by this yer?" 
 
 " It was found by Sal Clark, brought to Mrs. Markle, and 
 given to me. Its existence is known only to three people, 
 and they are your friends." 
 
 There was another pause, in which Gabriel deliberately 
 stirred the contents of his pipe. Mr. Maxwell examined him 
 curiously. 
 
 "Well," he said, at last, "what is your defence?" 
 
 Gabriel sat up on the bed and rapped the bowl of his pipe 
 against the bedpost to loosen some refractory encrustation. 
 
 " Wot, 5 ' he asked, gravely, " would be your idee of a good 
 de-fence? Axin ye ez a lawyer having experin's in them 
 things, and reck'nin' to pay ez high ez eny man fo' the same. 
 
Mr. Hamlin takes a Hand. 261 
 
 svot would you call a good defence?" and he gravely laid 
 himself down again in an attitude of respectful attention. 
 
 " We hope to prove," said Maxwell, really smiling, "that 
 when you left your house and came to my office the murdered 
 man was alive and at his hotel ; that he went over to the hill 
 long before you did ; that you did not return until the evening 
 after the murder was committed, as the ' secret' mentioned 
 in your wife's mysterious note evidently shows. That for 
 some reason or other it was her design to place you in a 
 suspicious attitude. That the note shows that she refers to 
 some fact of which she was cognizant and not yourself." 
 
 " Suthin' that she knowed, and I didn't get to hear," trans 
 lated Gabriel, quietly. 
 
 " Exactly ! Now you see the importance of that note." 
 
 Gabriel did not immediately reply, but slowly lifted his 
 huge frame from the bed, walked to the open window, still 
 holding the paper in his hands, deliberately tore it into the 
 minutest shreds before the lawyer could interfere, and then 
 threw it from the window. 
 
 " Thet paper don't 'mount ter beans, no how !" he said, 
 quietly, but explanatively as he returned to the bed. 
 
 It was Lawyer Maxwell's turn to become dumb. In his 
 astonished abstraction he forgot to wipe his mouth, and gazed 
 at Gabriel with his nervous smile as if his client had just per 
 petrated a practical joke of the first magnitude. 
 
 " Ef it's the same to you, I'll just gin ye my idee of a 
 de-fence," said Gabriel, apologetically, relighting his pipe, 
 "allowin 1 o' course that you knows best, and askin' no 
 deduckshun from your charges for advice. Well, you jess 
 stands up afore the jedge, and you slings 'em a yarn suthin' 
 like this : ' Yer's me, for instans,' you sez, sez you, ' ez 
 gambols gambols very deep jess fights the tiger, wharever 
 and whenever found, the same bein' onbeknownst ter folks 
 gin'rally, and spechil te my wife, ez was July. Yer's me been 
 gambolin' desprit with this yer mail, Victyor Ramyirez, and 
 gets lifted bad ! and we hez, so to speak, a differculty about 
 some pints in the game. I allows one thing, he allows another, 
 and this yer man gives me the lie and I stabs him !' Stop 
 hole your hosses !" interjected Gabriel, suddenly, " thet looks 
 bad, don't it? he bein' a small man, a little feller 'bout your 
 size. No ! Well, this yer's the way we puts it up : ' Seving 
 
262 Gabriel Conroy 
 
 men seving friends o' his, comes at me, permiskis like, one 
 down, and nex' comes on, and we hez it mighty lively thar fur 
 an hour, until me, bein' in a tight place, hez to use a knife and 
 cuts this yer man bad !' Thar, that's '"bout the thing ! Now 
 ez to my runnin' away, you sez, sez you, ez how I disre- 
 members owin' to the 'citement that I hez a 'pintment in 
 Sacramento the very nex' day, and waltzes down yer to keep 
 it, in a hurry. Ef they want to know whar July ez, you sez 
 she gits wild on my not comin' home, and starts that very 
 night arter me. Thar, that's 'bout my idee puttin' it o' course 
 in your own shape, and slingin' in them bits o' po'try and 
 garbage, and kinder sassin' the plaintiff's counsel, ez you know 
 goes down afore a jedge and jury.' " 
 
 Maxwell rose hopelessly, " Then, if I understand you, you 
 intend to admit " 
 
 "Thet I done it? In course !" replied Gabriel; "but," he 
 added, with a cunning twinkle in his eye, " justifybly 
 justifyble homyside, ye mind ! bein' in fear o' my life from 
 seving men. In course," he added, hurriedly, " I can't 
 identify them seving strangers in the dark, so thar's no harm 
 or suspicion goin' to be done enny o' the boys in the Gulch." 
 
 Maxwell walked gravely to the window, and stood looking 
 out without speaking. Suddenly he turned upon Gabriel with 
 a brighter face and more earnest manner. " Where's Oily?" 
 
 Gabriel's face fell. He hesitated a moment. "I was on my 
 way to the school in Sacramento whar she iz." 
 
 " You must send for her I must see her at once !" 
 
 Gabriel laid his powerful hand on the lawyer's shoulder. 
 "She izn't that chile to know anythin' o ; this. You hear?" 
 he said, in a voice that began in tones of deprecation, and 
 ended in a note of stern warning, 
 
 "How are you to keep it from her?" said Maxwell, as 
 determinedly. " In less than twenty-four hours every news 
 paper in the State will have it with their own version and 
 comments. No; you must see her. She must hear it first 
 from your own lips." 
 
 " But I can't see her just now," said Gabriel, with a 
 voice that for the first time during their interview faltered in 
 its accents. 
 
 "Nor need you," responded the lawyer, quickly. "Trust 
 that to me. / will see her, and you shall afterwards. You 
 
Mr. Hainliii takes a Hand. 263 
 
 need not fear I will prejudice your case. Give me the 
 address! Quick!" he added, as the sound of footsteps and 
 voices approaching the room, came from the hall. Gabriel 
 did as he requested. " Now one word," he continued, 
 hurriedly, as the footsteps halted at the door. 
 
 "Yes," said Gabriel. 
 
 "As you value your life and Olly's happiness, hold your 
 tongue.'"' 
 
 Gabriel nodded with cunning comprehension. The door 
 opened to Mr. Jack Hamlin, diabolically mischievous, self- 
 confident, and audacious ! With a familiar nod to Maxwell 
 he stepped quickly before Gabriel and extended his hand. 
 Simply, yet conscious of obeying some vague magnetic in 
 fluence, Gabriel reached out his own hand and took Jack's 
 white, nervous fingers in his own calm massive grasp. 
 
 " Glad to see you, pard !" said that gentleman, showing his 
 white teeth and reaching up to clap his disengaged hand on 
 Gabriel's shoulder. " Glad to see you, old boy, even if you 
 have cut in and taken a job out of my hands that I was rather 
 lyin' by to do myself. Sooner or later I'd have fetched that 
 Mexican if you hadn't dropped into my seat and taken up 
 my hand. Oh, it's all right, Mack !" he said, intercepting the 
 quick look of caution that Maxwell darted at his client, " don't 
 do that. We're all friends here. If you want me to testify 
 I'll take my oath that there hasn't been a day this six months 
 that that infernal hound, Ramirez, wasn't jest pantin' to be 
 planted in his tracks ! I can hardly believe I ain't done it, 
 myself." He stopped, partly to enjoy the palpable uneasiness 
 of Maxwell, and perhaps in some admiration of Gabriel's 
 physique. 
 
 Maxwell quickly seized this point of vantage. "You can 
 do your friend here a very great service," he said to Jack, 
 lowering his voice as he spoke. 
 
 Jack laughed. " No, Mack, it wont do ! They wouldn't 
 believe rne ! There ain't judge or jury you could play that 
 on 1" 
 
 " You don't understand me," said Maxwell, laughing a little 
 awkwardly. " I didn't mean that, Jack. This man was going 
 to Sacramento to see his little sister " 
 
 " Go on, ;; said Jack, with much gravity ; " of course he was. 
 I know that, * Dear brother, dear brother, come home with 
 
264 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 me now !' Certainly. So'm I. Goin' to see an innocent little 
 thing ; bout seventeen years old, blue eyes and curly hair ! 
 Always go there once a week. Says he must come ! Says 
 
 she'll " he stopped in the full tide of his irony, for, looking 
 
 up, he caught a glimpse of Gabriel's simple, troubled face and 
 sadly reproachful eyes. " Look here/' said Jack, turning 
 .savagely on Maxwell, " what are you talking about anyway ?" 
 
 " I mean what I say," returned Maxwell, quickly. " He 
 was going to see his sister a mere child. Of course he can't 
 go now. But he must see her if she can be brought to him. 
 Can you will you do it ?" 
 
 Jack cast another swift glance at Gabriel. " Count me in," 
 2ie said, promptly ; " when shall I go ?" 
 
 "Now at once." 
 
 " All right. Where shall I fetch her to ?" 
 
 " One Horse Gulch." 
 
 " The game's made," said Jack, sententiously. " She'll be 
 there by sundown to-morrow." He was off like a flash, but as 
 swiftly returned, and called Maxwell to the door. "Look 
 here," he said, in a whisper, " p'r'aps it would be as well if the 
 sheriff didn't know I was his friend," he went on, indicating 
 Gabriel with a toss of his head and a wink of his black eye, 
 "because, you see, Joe Hall and I ain't friends. We had a 
 little difficulty, and some shootin' and foolishness down at 
 Marysville last year. Joe's a good square man, but he ain't 
 above prejudice, and it might go against our man." 
 
 Maxwell nodded, and Jack once more darted off. 
 
 But his colour was so high, and his exaltation so excessive, 
 that when he reached his room his faithful Pete looked at him 
 in undisguised alarm. " Bress us it tain't no whisky, Mars 
 Jack, arter all de doctors tole you ?" he said, clasping his hands 
 in dismay. 
 
 The bare suggestion was enough for Jack in his present 
 hilarious humour. He instantly hiccuped, lapsed wildly over 
 .against Pete with artfully simulated alcoholic weakness, tumbled 
 him on the floor, and grasping his white woolly head, waved 
 over it a boot-jack, and frantically demanded " another bottle." 
 Then he laughed ; as suddenly got up with the greatest gravity 
 and a complete change in his demeanour, and wanted to know, 
 severely, what he, Pete, meant by lying there on the floor in a 
 tate of beastly intoxication ? 
 
Mr. Hainlin takes a Hand. 265 
 
 " Bress me ! Mars Jack, but ye did frighten me. I jiss 
 allowed clem tourists downstairs had been gettin' ye tight." 
 
 " You did you degraded old ruffian ! If you'd been 
 reading Volney's ' Ruins,' or reflectin' on some of those moral 
 maxims that I'm just wastin' my time and health unloading to 
 you, instead of making me the subject of your inebriated reveries, 
 you wouldn't get picked up so often. Pack rny valise, and chuck 
 it into some horse and buggy no matter whose. Be quick." 
 
 " Is we gwine to Sacramento, Mars Jack?" 
 
 " We ? No, sir. /'/// going alone ! What I'm doing now, 
 sir, is only the result of calm reflection of lying awake nights 
 taking points and jest spottin' the whole situation. And I'm 
 convinced, Peter, that I can stay with you no longer. You've 
 been hackin' the keen edge of my finer feelin's ; playin' it very 
 low down on my moral and religious nature, generally ringin* 
 in a cold deck on my spiritual condition for die last five years. 
 You've jest cut up thet rough with my higher emotions thet 
 there ain't enough left to chip in on a terr-cent ante. Five 
 years ago," continued Jack, coolly, brushing his curls before 
 the glass, " I fell into your hands a guileless, simple youth, in 
 the first flush of manhood, knowin' no points, easily picked up 
 on my sensibilities, and travelling so to speak, on my shape ! 
 And where am I now ? Echo answers ' where ?' and passes 
 for a euchre ! No, Peter, I leave you to-night. Wretched 
 misleader of youth, gummy old man with the strawberry 
 eyebrows, farewell !" 
 
 Evidently this style of exordium was no novelty to Pete, for 
 without apparently paying the least attention to it, he went on 
 surlily packing his master's valise. When he had finished he 
 looked up at Mr. Ilamlin, who was humming, in a heart-broken 
 way, " Yes, we must Part" varied by occasional glances of 
 exaggerated reproach at Pete, and said, as he shouldered the 
 valise 
 
 " Dis yer ain't no woman foolishness, Mars Jack, like down 
 at dat yar Mission ?" 
 
 " Your suggestion, Peter," returned Jack, with dignity, 
 " emanates from a moral sentiment debased by Love Feasts 
 and Camp Meetings, and an intellect weakened by Rum and 
 Gum and the contact of Lager Beer Jerkers. It is worthy of a 
 short-card sharp and a keno flopper, which I have, I regret to 
 say, long suspected you to be. Farewell ! You will stay here 
 
266 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 until I corae back. If I don't come back by the day after to 
 morrow, come to One Horse Gulch. Pay the bill, and don't 
 knock down for yourself more than seventy-five per cent 
 Remember I am getting old and feeble. You are yet young, 
 with a brilliant future before you. Git." 
 
 He tossed a handful of gold on the bed, adjusted his hat 
 carefully over his curls, and strode from the room. In the 
 Jower hall he stopped long enough to take asidr Mr. Raynor, 
 and with an appearance of the greatest conscientiousness, to 
 correct an error of two feet in the measurements he had given 
 him that morning of an enormous pine tree in whose prostrate 
 trunk he, Mr. Hamlin, had once found a peaceful, happy tribe 
 of one hundred Indians living. Then lifting his hat with 
 marked politeness to Mrs. Raynor, and totally ignoring the 
 presence of Mr. Raynor's mentor and companion, he leaped 
 lightly into the buggy and drove away. 
 
 " An entertaining fellow," said Mr. Raynor, glancing after 
 the cloud of dust that flew from the untarrying wheels of Mr, 
 Hamlin's chariot. 
 
 " And so gentlemanly," smiled Mrs. Raynor. 
 
 But the journalistic conservator of the public morals of 
 California, in and for the city and county of San Francisco, 
 looked grave, and deprecated even that feeble praise of the 
 departed. " His class are a curse to the country. They hold 
 the law in contempt ; they retard by the example of their 
 extravagance the virtues of economy and thrift ; they are 
 consumers and not producers ; they bring the fair fame of this 
 land into question by those who foolishly take them for a type 
 of the people." 
 
 "But, clear me," said Mrs. Raynor, pouting, "where your 
 gamblers and bad men are so fascinating, and your honest 
 miners are so dreadfully murderous, and kill people, and then 
 sit down to breakfast with you as if nothing had happened, 
 what are you going to do ?" 
 
 The journalist did not immediately reply. In the course of 
 some eloquent remarks, as unexceptionable in morality as in 
 diction, which I regret I have not space to reproduce here, he, 
 however, intimated that there was still an Unfettered Press, 
 which " scintillated" and " shone" and " lashed" and " stung" 
 and " exposed" and " tore away the veil," and became at 
 various times a Palladium and a Watchtower, and did and was 
 
Poinsett taken into Confidence. 26? 
 
 a great many other remarkable things peculiar to an Unfettered 
 Press in a pioneer community, when untrammelled by the- 
 enervating conditions of an effete civilization. 
 
 "And what have they done with the murderer?" asked Mr. 
 Raynor, repressing a slight yawn. 
 
 " Taken him back to One Horse Gulch half an hour ago. 
 I reckon he'd as lief stayed here," said a bystander. " From 
 the way things are pinthY, it looks as if it might be putty lively 
 for him up thar 1" 
 
 "What do you mean ?" asked Raynor, curiously. 
 
 " Well, two or three of them old Vigilantes from Angel's 
 passed yer a minit ago with their rifles, goin' up that way/' 
 returned the man, lazily. " Mayn't be nothing in it, but it 
 looks mighty like " 
 
 " Like what ?" asked Mr. Raynor, a little nervously. 
 
 " Lynchin' ! :J said the man. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 IN WHICH MR. DUMPHY TAKES POINSETT INTO HIS 
 CONFIDENCE. 
 
 THE cool weather of the morning following Mr. Dumphy's 
 momentous interview with Colonel Starbottle, contributed 
 somewhat to restore the former gentleman's tranquillity, which 
 had been considerably disturbed. He had moreover a vague 
 recollection of having invited Colonel Starbottle to visit him. 
 socially, and a nervous dread of meeting this man, whose 
 audacity was equal to his own, in the company of others. 
 Braced, however, by the tonic of the clear exhilarating air, and 
 sustained by the presence of his clerks and the respectful 
 homage of his business associates, he despatched a note to 
 Arthur Poinsett requesting an interview. Punctually at the 
 hour named that gentleman presented himself, and was lan 
 guidly surprised when Mr. Dumphy called his clerk and gave 
 positive orders that their interview was not to be disturbed and 
 to refuse admittance to all other visitors. And then Mr. 
 Dumphy, in a peremptory, practical statement which his- 
 business habits and temperament had brought to a perfection 
 that Arthur could not help admiring, presented the details of 
 
.268 Gab rice C'onroy. 
 
 ;his interview with Colonel Starbottle. " Now, I want you to 
 help me. I have sent to you for that business purpose. You 
 understand, this is not a matter for the Bank's regular counsel. 
 Now what do you propose ?" 
 
 " First, let me ask you, do you believe your wife is living ?" 
 
 " No," said Dumphy, promptly, " but of course I don't know." 
 
 " Then let me relieve your mind at once, and tell you that 
 she is not." 
 
 " You know this to be a fact?" asked Dumphy. 
 
 " 1 do. The body supposed to be Grace Conroy's and so 
 identified, was your wife's. I recognised it at once, knowing 
 Crace Conroy to have been absent at the culmination of the 
 tragedy." 
 
 " And why did you not correct the mistake ?" 
 
 " That is my business," said Arthur, haughtily, " and I be 
 lieve I have been invited here to attend to yours. Your wife is 
 dead." 
 
 " Then," said Mr. Dumphy, rising with a brisk business air, 
 " if you are willing to testify to that fact, I reckon there is 
 nothing more to be done." 
 
 Arthur did not rise, but sat watching Mr. Dumphy with an 
 unmoved face. After a moment Mr. Dumphy sat down again, 
 and looked aggressively but nervously at Arthur. "Well," he 
 ;said, at last. 
 
 "Is that all?" asked Arthur, quietly; " are you willing to 
 go on and establish the fact ?" 
 
 " Don't know what you mean !" said Dumphy, with an 
 -attempted frankness which failed signally. 
 
 " One moment, Mr. Dumphy. You are a shrewd business 
 man. Now do you suppose the person whoever he or she 
 may be, who has sent Colonel Starbottle to you, relies alone 
 upon your inability to legally prove your wife's death ? May 
 they not calculate somewhat on your indisposition to prove it 
 legally ; on the theory that you'd rather not open the case, for 
 instance ?" 
 
 Mr. Dumphy hesitated a moment and bit his lip. "Of 
 .course," he said, shortly, "there'd be some talk among my 
 enemies about my deserting my wife " 
 
 " And child," suggested Arthur. 
 
 "And child," repeated Dumphy, savagely, "and not coming 
 -back again there'd be suthin' in the papers about it, unless I 
 
Poinsctt taken into Confidence. 269* 
 
 paid 'em, but what's that ! deserting one's wife isn't such a 
 new thing in California.'' 
 
 " That is so/' said Arthur, with a sarcasm that was none the 
 less sincere because he felt its applicability to himself. 
 
 " But we're not getting on/' said Mr. Dumphy, impatiently. 
 " What's to be done ? That's what I've sent to you for." 
 
 " Now that we know it is not your wife we must find out 
 who it is that stands back of Colonel Starbottle. It is evidently 
 some one who knows at least as much as we do of the facts ; 
 we are lucky if they know no more. Can you think of any 
 one ? Who are the survivors ? Let's see : you, myself, possibly 
 Grace " 
 
 " It couldn't be Grace Conroy, really alive !" interrupted 
 Dumphy, hastily. 
 
 " No," said Arthur, quietly, " you remember she was not pre 
 sent at the time." 
 
 " Gabriel ?" 
 
 " I hardly think so. Besides, he is a friend of yours." 
 
 "It couldn't be" Dumphy stopped in his speech, with a 
 certain savage alarm in his looks. Arthur noticed it and 
 quietly went on. 
 
 "Who 'couldn't 'it be?" 
 
 " Nothing nobody. I was only thinking if Gabriel or some 
 body could have told the story to some designing rascal." 
 
 " Hardly in sufficient detail." 
 
 " Well," said Dumphy, with his coarse bark-like laugh, " if 
 I've got to pay to see Mrs. Dumphy decently buried, I suppose 
 I can rely upon you to see that it's done without a chance of 
 resurrection. Find out who Starbottle's friend is and how 
 much he or she expects. If I've got to pay for this thing I'll 
 do it now, and get the benefit of absolute silence. So I'll leave 
 it in your hands," and he again rose as if dismissing the subject 
 and his visitor, after his habitual business manner. 
 
 " Dumphy," said Arthur, still keeping his own seat, and 
 ignoring the significance of Dumphy's manner. " There are 
 two professions that suffer from a want of frankness in the men 
 who seek their services. Those professions are Medicine and 
 the Law. I can understand why a man seeks to deceive his 
 physician, because he is humbugging himself; but I can't see 
 why he is not frank to his lawyer ! You are no exception to 
 the rule. You are now concealing from mr, whose aid you have 
 
2JQ Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 sought, some very important reason why you wish to have this 
 whole affair hidden beneath the snow of Starvation Camp." 
 
 " Don't know what you're driving at," said Dumphy. But he 
 sat down again. 
 
 " Well, listen to me, and perhaps I can make my meaning 
 dearer. My acquaintance with the late Dr. Devarges began 
 some months before we saw you. During our intimacy he often 
 spoke to me of his scientific discoveries, in which I took some 
 interest, and I remember seeing among his papers frequent 
 records and descriptions of localities in the foot-hills, which he 
 thought bore the indications of great mineral wealth. At that 
 time the Doctor's theories and speculations appeared to me to 
 be visionary, and the records of no value. Nevertheless, when 
 we were shut up in Starvation Camp, and it seemed doubtful if 
 the Doctor would survive his discoveries, at his request I 
 -deposited his papers and specimens in a cairn at Monument 
 Point After the catastrophe, on my return with the relief 
 party to camp, we found that the cairn had been opened by 
 some one and the papers and specimens scattered on the snow. 
 We supposed this to have been the work of Mrs. Brackett, who 
 in search of food, had broken the cairn, taken out the specimens, 
 and died from the effects of the poison with which they had 
 been preserved." 
 
 He paused and looked at Dumphy, who did not speak. 
 
 " Now," continued Arthur, " like all Californians I have 
 followed your various successes with interest and wonder. I 
 have noticed, with the gratification that all your friends 
 experience, the singular good fortune which has distinguished 
 your mining enterprises, and the claims you have located. But 
 I have been cognizant of a fact, unknown I think to any other 
 of your friends, that nearly all of the localities of your success 
 ful claims, by a singular coincidence, agree with the memoran 
 dums of Dr. Devarges !" 
 
 Dumphy sprang to his feet with a savage, brutal laugh. 
 " So," he shouted, coarsely, " that's the game, is it ! So it 
 seems I'm lucky in coming to you no trouble in finding this 
 woman now, hey ? Well, go on, this is getting interesting ; 
 let's hear the rest ! What are your propositions, what if I 
 refuse, hey? ?; 
 
 u My first proposition," said Arthur, rising to his feet with a 
 cold wicked light in his grey eyes, " is that you shall instantly 
 
Poinsett taken into Confidence. 271 
 
 take that speech back and beg my pardon ! If you refuse, by 
 ihe living God I'll throttle you where you stand !" 
 
 For one wild moment all the savage animal in Dumphy rose, 
 and he instinctively made a step in the direction of Poinsett. 
 Arthur did not move. Then Mr. Dumphy's practical caution 
 asserted itself. A physical personal struggle with Arthur would 
 bring in witnesses witnesses perhaps of something more than 
 that personal struggle. If he were victorious, Arthur, unless 
 killed outright, would revenge himself by an exposure. He 
 ;sank back in his chair again. Had Arthur known the low esti 
 mate placed upon his honour by Mr. Dumphy he would have 
 been less complacent in his victory. 
 
 ** I didn't mean to suspect you" said Dumphy at last, with a 
 forced smile, " I hope you'll excuse me. I know you're my 
 friend. But you're all wrong about these papers ; you are, 
 Poinsett, I swear. I know if the fact were known to outsiders 
 it would look queer if not explained. But whose business is 
 it ? anyway, legally, I mean." 
 
 "No one's, unless Devarges has friends or heirs." 
 " He hadn't any." 
 " There's that wife !" 
 " Bah ! she was divorced !" 
 
 11 Indeed ! You told me on our last interview that she really 
 was the widow of Devarges." 
 
 " Never mind that now," said Dumphy, impatiently. " Look 
 here ! You know as well as I do that no matter how many 
 discoveries Devarges made, they weren't worth a d n if he 
 hadn't done some work on them improved or opened them." 
 " But that is not the point at issue just now/' said Arthur. 
 41 Nobody is going to contest your claim or sue you for 
 damages. But they might try to convict you of a crime. 
 They might say that breaking into the cairn was burglary, and 
 the taking of the papers theft." 
 
 " But how are they going to prove that?" 
 " No matter. Listen to me, and don't let us drift away from 
 the main point. The question that concerns you is this. An 
 impostor sets up a claim to be your wife ; you and I know 
 she is an impostor, and can prove it. She knows that, but 
 knows also that in attempting to prove it you lay yourself 
 open to some grave charges which she doubtless stands ready 
 to nnke." 
 
272 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 u Well, then, the first thing to do is to find out who she is, 
 what she knows, and what she wants, eh ?" said Dumphy. 
 
 " No," said Arthur, quietly, " the first thing to do is to 
 prove that your wife is really dead, and to do that you must 
 show that Grace Conroy was alive when the body purporting 
 to be hers, but which was really your wife's, was discovered. 
 Once establish that fact and you destroy the credibility of the 
 Spanish reports, and you need not fear any revelation from 
 that source regarding the missing papers, And that is the 
 only source from which evidence against you can be procured. 
 But when you destroy the validity of that report, you of course 
 destroy the credibility of all concerned in making it. And as 
 I was concerned in making it, of course it wont do for you to 
 put me on the stand." 
 
 Notwithstanding Dumphy's disappointment he could not 
 help yielding to a sudden respect for the superior rascal who 
 fhus cleverly slipped out of responsibility. " But," added 
 Arthur, coolly, " you'll have no difficulty in establishing the 
 fact of Grace's survival by others." 
 
 Humphy thought at once of Ramirez. Here was a man 
 who had seen and conversed with Grace when she had, in the 
 face of the Spanish Commander, indignantly asserted her iden 
 tity and the falsity of the report. No witness could be more 
 satisfactory and convincing. But to make use of him he must 
 first take Arthur into his confidence ; must first expose the 
 conspiracy of Madame Devarges to personate Grace, and his 
 own complicity with the transaction. He hesitated. Never 
 theless he had been lately tortured by a suspicion that the late 
 Madame Devarges was in some way connected with the latter 
 conspiracy against himself, and he longed to avail himself of 
 Arthur's superior sagacity, and after a second reflection he 
 concluded to do it. With the same practical conciseness of 
 statement that he had used in relating Colonel Starbottle's in 
 terview with himself, he told the story of Madame Devarges' 
 brief personation of Grace Conroy, and its speedy and feli 
 citous ending in Mrs. Conroy. Arthur listened with unmis 
 takable interest and a slowly brightening colour. When 
 Dumphy had concluded he sat for a moment apparently lost in 
 thought. 
 
 "Well?" at last said Dumphy, interrogatively and impa 
 tiently. 
 
Poinsett taken into Confidence. 273 
 
 Arthur started. "Well," he said, rising, and replacing his 
 hat with the air of a man who had thoroughly exhausted his 
 subject, ' : your frankness has saved me a world of trouble." 
 
 k< How?" said Dumphy. 
 
 "There is no necessity for looking any further for your 
 alleged wife. She exists at present as Mrs. Conroy, alias 
 Madame Devarges, alias Grace Conroy. Ramirez is your 
 witness. You couldn't have a more willing one." 
 
 " Then my suspicions are correct." 
 
 " I don't know on what you based them. But here is a 
 woman who has unlimited power over men, particularly over 
 one man, Gabriel ! who alone, of all men but ourselves, 
 knows the facts regarding your desertion of your wife in 
 Starvation Camp, her death, and the placing of Dr. Devarges' 
 private papers by me in the cairn. He knows too of your 
 knowledge of the existence of the cairn, its locality, and con 
 tents. He knows this because he was in the cabin that night 
 when the Doctor gave me his dying injunctions regarding his 
 property the night that you excuse me, Dumphy, but no 
 thing but frankness will save us now the night that you stood 
 listening at the door and frightened Grace with your wolfish 
 face. Don't speak ! she told me all about it ! Your presence 
 there that night gained you the information that you have used 
 so profitably; it was your presence that fixed her wavering 
 resolves and sent her away with me." 
 
 Both men had become very pale and earnest. Arthur 
 moved toward the door. " I will see you to-morrow, when I 
 will have matured some plan of defence," he said, abstractedly. 
 " : We have" he used the plural of advocacy with a peculiar 
 significance " 7 M' have a clever woman to fight who may be 
 more than our match. Meantime, remember that Ramirez is 
 our defence ; he is our man, Dumphy, hold fast to him as you 
 would to your life. Good day." 
 
 In another moment he was gone. As the door closed upon 
 him a clerk entered hastily from the outer office. "You said 
 not to distrub you, sir, and here is an important despatch wait 
 ing for you from Wingdam." 
 
 Mr. Dumphy took it mechanically, opened it, read the first 
 line, and then said hurriedly, "Run after that man, quick ! 
 Stop ! Wait a moment. You need not go ! There, that 
 will do !" 
 
274 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 The clerk hurriedly withdrew into the outer office. Mr. 
 Dumphy went back to his desk again, and once more devoured 
 the following lines : 
 
 " WINGDAM, yth, 6 A.M. Victor Ramirez murdered last night on Con- 
 roy's Hill. Gabriel Conroy arrested. Mrs. Conroy missing. Great ex 
 citement here ; strong feeling against Gabriel. Wait instructions. FITCH." 
 
 At first Mr. Dumphy only heard as an echo beating in his 
 brain, the parting words of Arthur Poinsett, " Ramirez is our 
 defence ; hold fast to him as you would your life." And now 
 he was dead gone ; their only witness ; killed by Gabriel the 
 plotter ! What more was wanted to justify his worst suspicions ? 
 What should they do ? He must 'send after Poinsett again; 
 the plan of defence must be changed at once ; to-morrow might 
 be too late. Stop ! 
 
 One of his accusers in prison charged with a capital crime ! 
 The other the real murderer for Dumphy made no doubt 
 that Mrs. Conroy was responsible for the deed a fugitive from 
 justice ! What need of any witness now ? The blow that 
 crippled these three conspirators had liberated him ! For a 
 moment Mr. Dumphy was actually conscious of a paroxysm of 
 gratitude toward some indefinitely Supreme Being a God of 
 special providence special to himself ! More than this there 
 was that vague sentiment, common, I fear, to common huma 
 nity in such crises that this Providence was a tacit endorsement 
 of himself. It was the triumph of Virtue (Dumphy) over Vice 
 (Conroy et al.). 
 
 But there would be a trial, publicity, and the possible expo 
 sure of certain things by a man whom danger might make reck 
 less. And could he count upon Mrs. Conroy's absence or 
 neutrality ? He was conscious that her feeling for her husband 
 was stronger than he had supposed, and she might dare every 
 thing to save him. What had a woman of that kind to do with 
 such weakness ? Why hadn't she managed it so as to kill 
 Gabriel too ? There was an evident want of practical complete 
 ness in this special Providence that as a business man Mr. 
 Dumphy felt he could have regulated. And then he was seized 
 with an idea a damnable inspiration ! and set himself briskly 
 to write. I regret to say that despite the popular belief in the 
 dramatic character of all villany, Mr. Dumphy at this moment 
 presented only the commonplace spectacle of an absorbed man 
 of business ; no lurid light gleamed from his pale blue eyes ; 
 
Poinsctt taken into Confidence. 275 
 
 no Satanic smile played around the corners of his smoothly 
 shaven mouth ; no feverish exclamation stirred his moist, cool 
 lips. He wrote methodically and briskly, without deliberation 
 or undue haste. When he had written half a dozen letters he 
 folded and sealed them, and without summoning his clerk took 
 them himself into the outer office and thence into the large 
 counting-room. The news of the murder had evidently got 
 abroad ; the clerks were congregated together, and the sound 
 of eager, interested voices ceased as the great man entered and 
 stood among them. 
 
 " Fitch, you and Judson will take the quickest route to One 
 Horse Gulch, to-night. Don't waste any time on the road or 
 spare any expense. When you get there deliver these letters, 
 and take your orders from my correspondents. Pick up all 
 the details you can about this affair and let me know. What's 
 your balance at the Gulch, Mr. Peebles ? never mind the exact 
 figures !" 
 
 " Larger than usual, sir, some heavy deposits !" 
 
 "Increase your balance then if there should be any d d 
 fools who connect the Bank with this matter/'' 
 
 " I suppose," said Mr. Fitch, respectfully, " we're to look 
 after your foreman, Mr. Conroy, sir ?" 
 
 " You are to take your orders from my correspondent, Mr. 
 Fitch, and not to interfere in any way with public sentiment. 
 We have nothing to do with the private acts of anybody. 
 Justice will probably be done to Conroy. It is time that these 
 outrages upon the reputation of the California miner should be 
 stopped. When the fame of a whole community is prejudiced 
 and business injured by the rowdyism of a single ruffian," said 
 Mr. Dumphy. raising his voice slightly as he discovered the inte 
 rested and absorbed presence of some of his most respectable 
 customers, " it is time that prompt action should be t taken." 
 In fact, he would have left behind him a strong Roman flavour 
 and a general suggestion of Brutus, had he not unfortunately 
 effected an anti-climax by adding, " that's business > sir/' as he 
 retired to his private office. 
 
 T2 
 
276 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MR. HAMLIN IS OFF WITH AN OLD LOVE. 
 
 MR. JACK HAMLIN did not lose much time on the road from 
 Wingdam to Sacramento. His rapid driving, his dust bespattered 
 vehicle, and the exhausted condition of his horse on arrival, 
 excited but little comment from those who knew his habits, 
 .and for other criticism he had a supreme indifference. He 
 was prudent enough, however, to leave his horse at a stable 
 on the outskirts, and having reconstructed his toilet at a 
 neighbouring hotel, he walked briskly toward the address 
 given him by Maxwell. When he reached the comer of the 
 street and was within a few paces of the massive shining- 
 door plate of Madame Eclair's Pensionnat^ he stopped with a. 
 sudden ejaculation, and after a moment's hesitation, turned 
 on his heel deliberately and began to retrace his steps. 
 
 To explain Mr. Hamlin's singular conduct I shall be obliged 
 to disclose a secret of his, which I would fain keep from the 
 fair reader. On receiving Olly's address from Maxwell, Mr. 
 Hamlin had only cursorily glanced at it, and it was only on 
 arriving before the house that he recognised to his horror that 
 it was a boarding-school, with one of whose impulsive inmates 
 he had whiled away his idleness a few months before in a 
 heart-breaking but innocent flirtation, and a soul-subduing but 
 clandestine correspondence, much to the distaste of the correct 
 Principal. To have presented himself there in his proper 
 person would be to have been refused admittance or subjected 
 to a suspicion that would have kept Oily from his hands. For 
 once, Mr. Hamlin severely regretted his infelix reputation 
 among the sex. But he did not turn his back on his enter 
 prise. He retraced his steps only to the main street, visited a 
 barber's shop and a jeweller's, and reappeared on the street 
 again with a pair of enormous green goggles and all traces of 
 his long distinguishing silken black moustache shaven from his 
 lip. When it is remembered that this rascal was somewhat 
 vain of his personal appearance, the reader will appreciate his 
 earnestness and the extent of his sacrifice. 
 
 Nevertheless, he was a little nervous as he was ushered 
 into the formal reception-room of the Pensionnat, and waited 
 until his credentials, countersigned by Maxwell, were sub- 
 
Mr. Hamlin is Off with an Old Love. 277 
 
 mitted to Madame Eclair. Mr. Hamlin had no fear of being 
 detected by his real name ; in the brief halcyon days of his 
 romance he had been known as Clarence Spifflington, an 
 ingenious combination of the sentimental and humorous which 
 suited his fancy, and to some extent he felt expressed the 
 character of his affection. Fate was propitious ; the servant 
 returned saying that Miss Conroy would be down in a moment, 
 and Mr. Hamlin looked at his watch. Every moment was 
 precious ; he was beginning to get impatient when the door 
 opened again and Oily slipped into the room. 
 
 She was a pretty child, with a peculiar boyish frankness of 
 glance and manner, and a refinement of feature that fascinated 
 Mr. Hamlin, who, fond as he was of all childhood, had certain 
 masculine preferences for good looks. She seemed to be 
 struggling with a desire to laugh when she entered, and when 
 Jack turned towards her with extended hands she held up her 
 own warningly, and closing the door behind her cautiously, 
 said, in a demure whisper 
 
 "Shell come down as soon as she can slip past Madame'o 
 door." 
 
 " Who ?" asked Jack. 
 
 " Sophy." 
 
 "Who's Sophy?'' asked Jack, seriously. He had never 
 known the name of his Dulcinea. In the dim epistolatory 
 region of sentiment she had existed only as " The Blue 
 Moselle," so called from the cerulean hue of her favourite rai 
 ment, and occasionally, in moments of familiar endearment, as 
 44 Mosey." 
 
 " Come, now, pretend you don't know, will you? ; ' said Oily, 
 evading the kiss which Jack always had ready for childhood. 
 44 If I was her, I wouldn't have anything to say to you after 
 that !'' she added, with that ostentatious chivalry of the sex 
 towards each other, in the presence of their common en em}-. 
 44 Why, she saw you from the window when you first came this 
 morning, when you went back again and shaved off your 
 moustache ; she knew you. And you don't know her ! It's 
 mean, ain't it ? they'll grow again, wont they ?" Miss Oily 
 referred to the mustachios and not the affections ! 
 
 Jack was astonished and alarmed. In his anxiety to evade 
 or placate the duenna, he had never thought of her charge 
 his sweetheart. Here was a dilemma ! 44 Oh yes !" said Jack 
 
278 Gabriel Conroy, 
 
 hastily, with a well simulated expression of arch affection, 
 " Sophy of course that's my little game! But I've got a 
 note for you too, my dear," and he handed Oily the few lines 
 that Gabriel had hastily scrawled. He watched her keenly, 
 almost breathlessly, as she read them. To his utter bewilder 
 ment, she laid the note down indifferently and said, "That's 
 like Gabe the old simpleton !" 
 
 " But you're goin' to do what he says," asked Mr. Hamlin, 
 " ain't you ?" 
 
 " No," said Oily, promptly, " I ain't ! Why, Lord ! Mr. 
 Hamlin, you don't know that man ; why, he does this sort o' 
 thing every week !" Perceiving Jack stare, she went on, 
 " Why, only last week, didn't he send to me to meet him out 
 on the corner of the street, and he my own brother, instead o' 
 comin' here, ez he hez a right to do. Go to him at Wingdam? 
 No ! ketch me !" 
 
 " But suppose he can't come," continued Mr. Hamlin. 
 
 "Why can't he come? I tell you, it's just foolishness and 
 the meanest kind o' bash fulness. Jes because there happened 
 to be a young lady here from San Francisco, Rosey Ringround, 
 who was a little took with the old fool. If he could come to 
 Wingdam, why couldn't he come here, that's what I want to 
 know ?" 
 
 "Will you let me see that note?" asked Hamlin. 
 
 Oily handed him the note, with the remark, " He don't 
 spell well and he wont let me teach him the old Muggins !" 
 
 Hamlin took it and read as follows : 
 
 "DEAR OLLY, If it don't run a fowl uv yer lessings and the Maddamsi 
 willin' and the young laddies, Brother Gab's waitin' fer ye at Wingdam, so 
 no more from your affeshtunate brother, " GAB/' 
 
 Mr. Hamlin was in a quandary. It never had been part of 
 his plan to let Oily know the importance of her journey. Mr. 
 Maxwell's injunctions to bring her " quietly," his own fears of 
 an outburst that might bring a questioning and sympathetic 
 school about his ears, and lastly, and not the least potently, 
 his own desire to enjoy Olly's company in the long ride to 
 One Horse Gulch without the preoccupation of grief, with his 
 own comfortable conviction that he could eventually bring 
 Gabriel out of this " fix" without Oily knowing anything about 
 it, all this forbade his telling her the truth. But here was a 
 
J/r. Hamlin is Off with an Old Loi'e. 279 
 
 coil he had not thought of. Howbeit, Mr. Hamlin was quick 
 at expedients. 
 
 " Then you think Sophy can see me," he added, with a 
 sudden interest. 
 
 " Of course she will !" said Oily, archly. " It was right 
 smart in you to get acquainted with Gabe and set him up to 
 writing that, though it's just like him. He's that soft that 
 anybody could get round him. But there she is now, Mr. 
 Hamlin ; that's her step on the stairs. And I don't suppose 
 you two hez any need of me now." 
 
 And she slipped out of the room, as demurely as she had 
 entered, at the same moment that a tall, slim, and somewhat 
 sensational young lady in blue came flying in. 
 
 I can, in justice to Mr. Hamlin, whose secrets have been 
 perhaps needlessly violated in the progress of this story, do no 
 less than pass over as sacred, and perhaps wholly irrelevant to 
 the issue, the interview that took place between himself and 
 Miss Sophy. That he succeeded in convincing that young- 
 woman of his unaltered loyalty, that he explained his long 
 silence as the result of a torturing doubt of the permanence of 
 her own affection, that his presence at that moment was the 
 successful culmination of a long-matured and desperate plan to 
 see her once more and learn the truth from her own lips, I am 
 sure that no member of my own disgraceful sex will question, 
 and I trust no member of a too fond and confiding sex will 
 doubt. That some bitterness was felt by Mr. Hamlin, who 
 was conscious of certain irregularities during this long interval, 
 and some tears shed by Miss Sophy, who was equally conscious 
 of more or less aberration of her own magnetic instincts during 
 his absence, I think will be self-evident to the largely compre 
 hending reader. Howbeit, at the end of ten tender yet 
 tranquillizing minutes Mr. Hamlin remarked, in low thrilling 
 tones 
 
 " By the aid of a few confiding friends, and playin' it rather 
 low on them, I got that note to the Conroygirl, but the game's 
 up, and we might as well pass in our checks now, if she goes 
 back on us, and passes out, which I reckon's her little game. 
 If what you say is true, Sophy, and you do sometimes look 
 back to the past, and things is generally on the square, you'll 
 .go for that Oily and fetch her, for if I go back without that 
 child, and throw up my hand, it's just tampering with the 
 
2 So Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 holiest affections and playing it mighty rough on as white a 
 man as ever you saw, Sophy, to say nothing of your reputation, 
 and everybody ready to buck agin us who has ten cents to 
 chip in on. You must make her go back with me and put 
 things on a specie bo sis. ' ; 
 
 In spite of the mixed character of Mr. Hamlin's metaphor, 
 his eloquence was so convincing and effective that Miss Sophy 
 at once proceeded with considerable indignation to insist upon 
 Olly's withdrawing her refusal. 
 
 " If this is the way you are going to act, you horrid little 
 thing ! after all that me and him's trusted you, I'd like to see 
 the girl in school that will ever tell you anything again, that's 
 all !" a threat so appalling that Oily, who did not stop to 
 consider that this confidence was very recent and had been 
 forced upon her, assented without further delay, exhibited 
 Gabriel's letter to Madame Eclair, and having received that 
 lady's gracious permission to visk her brother, was in half an 
 hour in company with Mr. Hamlin on the road. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE THREE VOICES. 
 
 ONCE free from the trammelling fascinations of Sophy and the 
 more dangerous espionage of Madame Eclair, and with the 
 object of his mission accomplished, Mr. Hamlin recovered his 
 natural spirits, and became so hilarious that Oily, who at 
 tributed this exaltation to his interview with Sophy, felt 
 constrained to make some disparaging remarks about that 
 young lady, partly by way of getting even with her for her 
 recent interference, and partly in obedience to some well 
 known but unexplained law of the sex. To her great surprise, 
 however, Mr. Hamlin's spirits were in no way damped, nor 
 did he make any attempt to defend his Lalage. Nevertheless, 
 he listened attentively, and when she had concluded he looked 
 suddenly down upon her chip hat and thick yellow tresses, and 
 said 
 
 " Ever been in the Southern country, Oily ?'' 
 
 " No," returned the child. 
 
 " Never down about San Antonio, visiting friends or rela 
 tions ?" 
 
The Thru Voices. 281 
 
 " No," said Oily, decidedly. 
 
 Mr. Hamlin was silent for some time, giving his exclusive 
 attention to his horse, who was evincing a disposition to 
 " break" into a gallop. When he had brought the animal back 
 into a trot again he continued 
 
 " There's a woman ! Oily." 
 
 " Down in San Antonio ?" asked Oily. 
 
 Mr. Hamlin nodded. 
 
 " Purty ?" continued the child. 
 
 " It ain't the word," responded Mr. Hamlin, seriously 
 " Purty ain't the word/' 
 
 "As purty as Sophy?" continued Oily, a little mischievously. 
 
 " Sophy be hanged !" Mr. Hamlin here quickly pulled up 
 himself and horse, both being inclined to an exuberance start 
 ling to the youth and sex of the third party. "That is I 
 mean something in a different suit entirely." 
 
 Here he again hesitated, doubtful of his slang. 
 
 "I see,'"' quoth Oily; "diamonds Sophy's in spades." 
 
 The gambler (in sudden and awful admiration), " Diamonds 
 you've just struck it ! but what to you know 'bout cards ?" 
 
 Oily, pomposambiiC) " Everything ! Tell our fortunes by 'em 
 we girls ! I'm in hearts Sophy's in spades you're in 
 clubs ! Do you know," in a thrilling whisper, " only last night 
 I had a letter, a journey, a death, and a gentleman in clubs, 
 dark complected that's you." 
 
 Mr. Hamlin a good deal more at ease through this revela 
 tion of the universal power of the four suits "Speakin' of 
 women, I suppose down there (indicating the school) you 
 occasionally hear of angels. What's their general complexion ?'' 
 
 Oily, dubiously, " In the pictures ?" 
 
 Hamlin, " Y*s ;" with a leading question, " sorter dark com 
 plected sometimes, hey ?" 
 
 Oily, positively, "Never! always white." 
 
 Jack, " Always white ?'' 
 
 Oily, " Yes, and flabby !" 
 
 They rode along for some time silently. Presently Mr. 
 Hamlin broke into song, a popular song, one verse of which 
 Oily supplied with such deftness of execution and melodious 
 ness of pipe that Mr. Hamlin instantly suggested a duet, and 
 so over the dead and barren wastes of the Sacramento plains 
 they fell to singing, often barbarously, sometimes melodiously, 
 
282 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 but never self-consciously, wherein, I take it, they approxi 
 mated to the birds and better class of poets, so that rough 
 teamsters, rude packers, and weary wayfarers were often 
 touched, as with the birds and poets aforesaid, to admiration 
 and tenderness ; and when they stopped for supper at a way 
 side station, and Jack Hamlin displayed that readiness of re 
 source, audacity of manner and address, and perfect and 
 natural obliviousness to the criticism of propriety or the limita 
 tions of precedent, and when, moreover, the results of all this 
 was a much better supper than perhaps a more reputable 
 companion could have procured, she thought she had never 
 known a more engaging person than this Knave of Clubs. 
 
 When they were fairly on the road again Oily began to 
 exhibit some curiosity regarding her brother, and asked some 
 few questions about Gabriel's family, which disclosed the fact 
 that Jack's acquaintance with Gabriel was comparatively recent. 
 
 " Then you never saw July at all ?" asked Oily. 
 
 "July," queried Jack, reflectively; "what's she like?" 
 
 " I don't know whether she's a heart or spade," said Oily, as 
 thoughtfully. 
 
 Jack was silent for some moments, and then after a pause, 
 to Olly's intense astonishment, proceeded to sketch, in a few 
 vigorous phrases, the external characteristics of Mrs. Conroy. 
 
 " Why, you said you never saw her !" ejaculated Oily. 
 
 " No more I did," responded the gambler, with a quick 
 laugh ; " this is only a little bluff." 
 
 It had grown cold with the brief twilight and the coming on 
 of night For some time the black, unchanging outlines of the 
 distant Coast Range were sharply silhouetted against a pale, 
 ashen sky, that at last faded utterly, leaving a few stars behind 
 as emblems of the burnt-out sunset. The red road presently 
 lost its calm and even outline in the swiftly gathering shadows, 
 or to Olly's fancy was stopped by shapeless masses of rock or 
 giant-like trunks of trees that in turn seemed to give way before 
 the skilful hand and persistent will of her driver. At times a 
 chill exhalation from a roadside ditch came to Oily like the 
 damp breath of an open grave, and the child shivered even 
 beneath the thick travelling shawl of Mr. Hamlin, with which 
 she was enwrapped. Whereat Jack at once produced a flask, 
 and prevailed upon Oily to drink something that sef her cough 
 ing, but which that astute and. experienced child at once 
 
The Three Voices. 283 
 
 recognised as whisky. Mr. Hamlin, to her surprise, however, 
 did not himself partake, a fact which she at once pointed out 
 to him. 
 
 ' ; At an early age, Oily," said Mr. Hamlin, with infinite 
 gravity, " I promised an infirm and aged relative never to in 
 dulge in spirituous liquors, except on a physician's prescription. 
 I carry this flask subject to the doctor's orders. Never having 
 ordered me to drink any, I don't." 
 
 As it was too dark for the child to observe Mr. Hamlin's 
 eyes, which, after the fashion of her sex, she consulted much 
 oftener than his speech for his real meaning, and was as often 
 deceived, she said nothing, and Mr. Hamlin relapsed into 
 silence. At the end of five minutes he said 
 
 ; ' She was a woman, Oily you bet !" 
 
 Oily, with great tact and discernment, instantly referring 
 back to Mr. Hamlin's discourse of an hour before, queried, 
 ''That girl in the Southern country?" 
 
 " Yes," said Mr. Hamlin. 
 
 " Tell me all about her," said Oily " all you know." 
 
 " That ain't much," mused Hamlin, with a slight sigh. " Ah, 
 Oily, she could sing !" 
 
 " With the piano ?" said Oily, a little superciliously. 
 
 " With the organ," said Hamlin. 
 
 Oily, whose sole idea of this instrument was of the itinerant 
 barrel variety, yawned slightly, and with a very perceptible 
 lack of interest said that she hoped she would see her some 
 time when she came up that way and was "going 'round." 
 
 Mr. Hamlin did not laugh, but after a few minutes'" rapid 
 driving, began to explain to Oily with great earnestness the 
 character of a church organ. 
 
 " I used to play once, Oily, in a church. They did say that 
 I used sometimes to fetch that congregation, jest snatch 'em 
 bald headed, Oily, but it's a long time ago ! There was one 
 hymn in particular that I used to run on consid'rable one c' 
 them masses o' Mozart one that I heard her sing, Oily ; it 
 went something like this ;" and Jack proceeded to lift his voice 
 in the praise of Our Lady of Sorrows, with a serene unconscious 
 ness to his surroundings, and utter absorption in his theme that 
 would have become the most enthusiastic acolyte. The springs 
 <reaked, the wheels rattled, the mare broke, plunged, and re 
 covered herself, the slight vehicle swayed from side to side, 
 
284 Gabriel Conroy, 
 
 Olly's hat bruised and flattened itself against his shoulder, and 
 still Mr. Hamlin sang. When he had finished he looked down 
 at Oily. She was asleep ! 
 
 Jack was an artist and an enthusiast, but not unreasonable 
 nor unforgiving. *' It's the whisky,'"' he murmured to himself, 
 in an apologetic recitation to the air he had just been singing. 
 He changed the reins to his other hand with infinite caution 
 and gentleness, slowly passed his disengaged arm round the 
 swaying little figure, until he had drawn the chip hat and the 
 golden tresses down upon his breast and shoulder. In this 
 attitude, scarcely moving a muscle lest he should waken the 
 sleeping child, at midnight he came upon the twinkling lights 
 of Fiddletown. Here he procured a fresh horse, dispensing 
 with an ostler and harnessing the animal himself, with such 
 noiseless skill and quickness that Oily, propped up in the buggy 
 with pillows and blankets borrowed from the Fiddletown hos 
 telry, slept through it all, nor wakened even after they were 
 again upon the road, and had begun the long ascent of the 
 Wingdam turnpike. 
 
 It wanted but an hour of daybreak when he reached the 
 summit, and even then he only slackened his pace when his 
 wheels sank to their hubs in the beaten dust of the stage road. 
 The darkness of that early hour was intensified by the gloom 
 of the heavy pine woods through which the red road threaded its 
 difficult and devious way. It was very still. Hamlin could 
 hardly hear the dead, muffled plunge of his own horse in the 
 dusty track before him, and yet once or twice he stopped to 
 listen. His quick ear detected the sound of voices and the 
 jingle of Mexican spurs, apparently approaching behind him. 
 Mr. Hamlin knew that he had not passed any horseman and 
 was for a moment puzzled. But then he recalled the fact that 
 a few hundred yards beyond, the road was intersected by the 
 "cut-off"''' to One Horse Gulch, whicli after running parallel 
 with the Wingdam turnpike for half a mile crossed it in the 
 forest. The voices were on that road going the same way. 
 Mr. Hamlin pushed on his horse to the crossing, and hidden 
 by the darkness and the trunks of the giant pines pulled up to 
 let the strangers precede him. In a few moments the voices 
 were abreast of him and stationary. The horsemen had 
 apparently halted. 
 
 " Here seems to be a road," said a voice quite audibly. 
 
The Three Voices. 285 
 
 " All right, then," returned another, " it's the ' cut-off.' We'll 
 save an hour, sure." 
 
 A third voice here struck in potentially, " Keep the stage 
 road. If Joe Hall get's wind of what's up, he'll run his man 
 down to Sacramento for safe keeping. If he does he'll take 
 this road it's the only one sabe ? we can't miss him !" 
 
 Jack Hamlin leaned forward breathlessly in his seat. 
 
 " But it's an hour longer this way," growled the second voice. 
 " The boys will wait," responded the previous speaker ; there 
 was a laugh, a jingling of spurs, and the invisible procession 
 moved slowly forward in the darkness. 
 
 Mr. Hamlin did not stir a muscle until the voices failed 
 before him in the distance. Then he cast a quick glance at the 
 child ; she still slept quietly, undisturbed by the halt or those 
 ominous voices which had brought so sudden a colour into 
 her companion's cheek and so baleful a light in his dark eyes. 
 Yet for a moment Mr. Hamlin hesitated. To go forward to 
 Wingdam now would necessitate his following cautiously in 
 the rear of the Lynchers, and so prevent his giving a timely 
 alarm. To strike across to One Horse Gulch by the " cut-off" 
 would lose him the chance of meeting the Sheriff and his 
 prisoner, had they been forewarned and were escaping in time. 
 But for the impediment of the unconscious little figure beside 
 him, he would have risked a dash through the party ahead of 
 him. But that was not to be thought of now. He must follow 
 them to Wingdam, leave the child, and trust to luck to reach 
 One Horse Gulch before them. If they delayed a moment at 
 Wingdam it could be done. A feeling of yearning tenderness 
 and pity succeeded the slight impatience with which he had a 
 moment before regarded his encumbering charge. He held 
 her in his arms, scarcely daring to breathe lest he should waken 
 her hoping that she might sleep until they reached Wingdam, 
 and that leaving her with his faithful henchman " Pete," he 
 might get away before she was aroused to embarrassing inquiry. 
 Mr. Hamlin had a man's dread of scenes with even so small a 
 specimen of the sex, and for once in his life, he ielt doubtful 
 of his own readiness, and feared lest in his excitement he might 
 reveal the imminent danger of her brother. Perhaps he was 
 never before so conscious of that danger ; perhaps he was never 
 beiore so interested in the Hie of any one. He began to see 
 things with Olly's eyes to look upon events with reierence to 
 
286 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 her feelings rather than his own ; if she had sobbed and cried this 
 sympathetic rascal really believed that he would have cried too. 
 Such was the unconscious and sincere flattery of admiration. 
 He was relieved, when with the first streaks of dawn, his mare 
 wearily clattered over the scattered river pebbles and " tailings" 
 that paved the outskirts of Wingdam. He was still more re 
 lieved when the Three Voices of the Night, now faintly visible 
 as three armed horsemen, drew up before the verandah of the 
 Wingdam Hotel, dismounted, and passed into the bar-room. 
 And he was perfectly content, when a moment later he lifted 
 the still sleeping Oily in his arms and bore her swiftly yet 
 cautiously to his room. To awaken the sleeping Pete on the 
 floor above, and drag him half-dressed and bewildered into the 
 presence of the unconscious child, as she lay on Jack Hamlin's 
 own bed, half buried in a heap of shawls and rugs, was only 
 the work of another moment. 
 
 " Why, Mars Jack ! Bress de Lord it's a chile !" said Pete, 
 recoiling in sacred awe and astonishment. 
 
 "Hold your jaw!" said Jack, in a fierce whisper, "you'll 
 waken her ! Listen to me, you chattering idiot. Don't waken 
 her, if you want to keep the bones in your creaking old skeleton 
 whole enough for the doctors to buy. Let her sleep as long as 
 she can. If she wakes up and asks after me, tell her I'm gone 
 for her brother. Do you hear ? Give her anything she asks 
 for except the Truth ! What are you doing, you old fool?'' 
 
 Pete was carefully removing the mountain of shawls and 
 blankets that Jack had piled upon Oily. " Tore God, Mars 
 jack you's smuddering dat chile !" was his only response. 
 Nevertheless Jack was satisfied with a certain vague tender 
 ness in his manipulation, and said curtly, "Get me ahorse !" 
 
 " It ain't to be did, Mars Jack ; de stables is all gone 
 cleaned ! Dey's a rush over to One Horse Gulch, all day !" 
 
 " There are three horses at the door," said Jack, with wicked 
 significance. 
 
 " For de love of God, Mars Jack, don't ye do dat !" ejacu 
 lated Pete, in unfeigned and tremulous alarm. " Dey don't 
 take dem kind o' jokes yer worth a cent dey'd be doin* 
 somefin' awful to ye, sah shuah's yer born !" 
 
 But Jack, with the child lying there peaceably in his own 
 bed, and the Three Voices growing husky in the bar-room be 
 low, regained all his old audacity. " I haven't made up my 
 
Mr. Dumphy is Perplexed. 287 
 
 mind," continued Jack, coolly, " which of the three I'll take, 
 but you'll find out from the owner when I do ! Tell him that 
 Mr. Jack Hamlin left his compliments and a mare and buggy 
 for him. You can say that if he keeps the mare from breaking 
 and gives her her head down hill, she can do her mile inside 
 of 2.45. Hush ! not a word ! Bye-bye." He turned, lifted 
 the shawl from the fresh cheek of the sleeping Oily, kissed her,, 
 and shaking his fist at Pete, vanished. 
 
 For a few moments the negro listened breathlessly. And 
 then there came the sharp, quick clatter of hoofs from the 
 rocky road below, and he sank dejectedly at the foot of the 
 bed. " He's gone done it ! Lord save us ! but it's a hangin' 
 matter yer !" And even as he spoke Mr. Jack Hamlin, 
 mounted on the fleet mustang that had been ridden by the 
 Potential Voice, with his audacious face against the red sunrise 
 and his right shoulder squarely advanced, was butting away 
 the morning mists that rolled slowly along the river road to- 
 One Horse Gulch. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 MR. DUMPHY IS PERPLEXED BY A MOVEMENT IN 
 REAL ESTATE. 
 
 MR. DUMPHY'S confidence in himself was so greatly restored 
 that several business enterprises of great pith and moment, 
 whose currents for the past few days had been turned awry, 
 and so " lost the name of action," were taken up by him with 
 great vigour and corresponding joy to the humbler business 
 associates who had asked him just to lend his name to that 
 project, and make "a big thing of it." He had just given his 
 royal sanction and a cheque to an Association for the Encou 
 ragement of Immigration, by the distribution through the sister 
 States of one million seductive pamphlets, setting forth the 
 various resources and advantages of California for the farmer, 
 and proving that one hundred and fifty dollars spent for a 
 passage thither was equal to the price of a farm ; he had also 
 assisted in sending the eloquent Mr. Blowhard and the per 
 suasive Mr. Windygust to present these facts orally to the 
 benighted dwellers of the East, and had secured the services 
 of two eminent Californian statisticians to demonstrate the 
 
288 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 fact, that more people were killed by lightning and frozen 
 to death in the streets of New York in a single year than 
 were ever killed by railroad accidents or human violence 
 in California during the past three centuries ; he had that day 
 conceived the " truly magnificent plan" of bringing the waters 
 of Lake Tahoe to San Francisco by ditches, thereby enabling 
 the citizens to keep the turf in their door-yards green through 
 the summer. He had started two banks, a stage line, and a 
 watering place, whose climate and springs were declared health 
 ful by edict, and were aggressively advertised; and he had 
 just projected a small suburban town that should bear his 
 name. He had returned from this place in high spirits with a 
 company of friends in the morning after his interview with 
 Poinsett. There was certainly no trace of the depression of 
 that day in his manner. 
 
 It was a foggy morning, following a clear, still night an 
 atmospheric condition not unusual at that season of the year to 
 attract Mr. Uumphy's attention, yet he was conscious on 
 reaching his office of an undue oppressiveness in the air that 
 indisposed him to exertion, and caused him to remove his coat 
 and cravat. Then he fell to work upon his morning's mail, 
 and speedily forgot the weather. There was a letter from Mrs. 
 Sepulvida, disclosing the fact that, owing to the sudden and 
 unaccountable drying up of the springs on the lower plains, 
 large numbers of her cattle had died of thirst and were still 
 perishing. This was of serious import to Mr. Dumphy, who 
 had advanced money on this perishable stock, and he instantly 
 made a memorandum to check this sudden freak of Nature, 
 which he at once attributed to feminine carelessness of manage 
 ment. Further on Mrs. Sepulvida inquired particularly as to 
 the condition of the Conroy mine, and displayed a disposition 
 characteristic of her sex, to realize at once on her investment. 
 Her letter ended thus : " But I shall probably see you in San 
 Francisco. Pepe says that this morning the markings on the 
 beach showed the rise of a tide or wave during the night 
 higher than any ever known since one thousand eight hun 
 dred. I do not feel safe so near the beach, and shall rebuild 
 in the spring. Mr. Dumphy smiled grimly to himself. He 
 had at one time envied Poinsett. But here was the woman he 
 was engaged to marry, careless, improvident, with a vast 
 estate, and on the eve of financial disaster through her care- 
 
Mr. Dinnphy is Perplexed. 289 
 
 lessness, and yet actually about to take a journey of two hun 
 dred miles because of some foolish, womanish whim or super 
 stition. It would be a fine thing if this man, to whom good 
 fortune fell without any effort on his part this easy, elegant, 
 supercilious Arthur Poinsett, who was even indifferent to that 
 good fortune, should find himself tricked and deceived ! should 
 have to apply to him, Dumphy, for advice and assistance ! 
 And this, too, after his own advice and assistance regarding 
 the claims of Colonel Starbottle's client had been futile. The 
 revenge would be complete. Mr. Dumphy rubbed his hands 
 in prospective satisfaction. 
 
 When, a few moments later, Colonel Starbottle's card was 
 put into his hand Mr. Dumphy's satisfaction was complete. 
 This was the day that the gallant Colonel was to call for an 
 answer ; it was evident that Arthur had not seen him, nor had 
 he made the discovery of Starbottle's unknown client. The 
 opportunity of vanquishing this man without the aid or even 
 knowledge of Poinsett was now before him. By way of pre 
 paring himself for the encounter, as well as punishing the 
 Colonel, he purposely delayed the interview, and for full five 
 minutes kept his visitor cooling his heels in the outer office. 
 
 He was seated at his desk, ostentatiously preoccupied, when 
 Colonel Starbottle was at last admitted. He did not raise his 
 head when the door opened, nor in fact until the Colonel, 
 stepping lightly forward, walked to Dumphy's side, and de 
 liberately unhooking his cane from its accustomed rest on his 
 arm, laid it, pronouncedly, on the desk before him. The 
 Colonel's face was empurpled, the Colonel's chest was efflo 
 rescent and bursting, the Colonel had the general effect of 
 being about to boil over the top button of his coat, but his 
 manner was jauntily and daintily precise. 
 
 " One moment ! a single moment, sir 1" he said, with husky 
 politeness. " Before proceeding to business er we will de 
 vote a single moment to the necessary explanations of er 
 er a gentleman. The kyard now lying before you, sir, was 
 handed ten minutes ago to one of your subordinates. I wish 
 to inquire, sir, if it was then delivered to you ?" 
 
 " Yes," said Mr. Dumphy, impatiently. 
 
 Colonel Starbottle leaned over Mr. Dumphy's desk and 
 coolly rung his bell. Mr. Dumphy's clerk instantly appeared 
 at the door. " I wish " said the Colonel, addressing himself 
 
 u 
 
290 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 to the astounded employe as he stood loftily over Mr. Dum 
 phy' s chair " I have er in fact sent for you, to withdraw 
 the offensive epithets I addressed to you, and the threats of 
 er of er personal violence ! The offence is not, yours 
 but er rests with your employer, for whose apology I am 
 er now waiting. Nevertheless I am ready, sir, to hold my 
 self at your service that is er of course after my responsi 
 bility er with your master er ceases !" 
 
 Mr. Dumphy, who in the presence of Colonel Starbottle felt 
 Hs former awkwardness return, signed with a forced smile to 
 his embarrassed clerk to withdraw, and said hastily, but with 
 an assumption of easy familiarity, " Sorry, Colonel, sorry, but I 
 was very busy, and am now. No offence. All a mistake, you 
 know ! business man and business hours," and Mr. Dumphy 
 leaned back in his chair, and emitted his rare cachinnatory bark. 
 
 " Glad to hear it, sir, I accept your apology," said the 
 -Colonel, recovering his good humour and his profanity together, 
 " hang me, if I didn't think it was another affair like that I had 
 with old Maje Tolliver, of Georgia. Called on him in Wash 
 ington in '48 during session. Boy took up my kyard. Waited 
 ten minutes, no reply! Then sent friend, poor Jeff Boomerang, 
 dead now, killed in New Orleans by Ben Pastor with chal 
 lenge. Hang me, sir, after the second shot, Maje sends for 
 me, lying thar with hole in both lungs, gasping for breath. 
 ' It's all a blunder, Star,' he says, ' boy never brought kyard. 
 Horsewhip the nigger for me, Star, for I reckon I wont live to 
 do it,' and died like a gentleman, blank me !" 
 
 " What have you got to propose ?" said Mr. Dumphy, hastily, 
 seeing an opportunity to stop the flow of the Colonel's recol 
 lections. 
 
 " According to my memory, at our last interview over the 
 -social glass in your own house, I think something was said of 
 .a proposition coming from you. That is er," continued the 
 Colonel, loftily, " I hold myself responsible for the mistake, if 
 any." 
 
 It had been Mr. Dumphy's first intention to assume the 
 xoughly offensive ; to curtly inform Colonel Starbottle of the 
 flight of his confederate, and dare him to do his worst. But 
 for certain vague reasons he changed his plan of tactics. He 
 drew his chair closer to the Colonel, and clapping his hand 
 familiarly on his shoulder, began 
 
Mr. Dumphy is Perplexed. 291 
 
 " You're a man of the world, Starbottle, so am I ? Sabe ? 
 You're a gentleman so am I," he continued, hastily. " But 
 I'm a business man, and you're not. Sabe ? Let's understand 
 each other. No offence, you know, but in the way of business. 
 This woman, claiming to be my wife, don't exist it's all right, 
 you know, I understand. I don't blame you, but you've been 
 deceived, and all that sort of thing. I've got the proofs. Now 
 as a man of the world and a gentleman and a business man, 
 when I say the game's up ! you'll understand me. Look at 
 that there !" He thrust into Starbottle's hand the telegram of 
 the preceding day, " There ! the man's hung by this time 
 lynched ! The woman's gone !" 
 
 Colonel Starbottle read the telegram without any perceptible 
 dismay or astonishment. 
 
 " Conroy ! Conroy ! don't know the ma.n. There was a 
 McConroy, of St. Jo, but I don't think it's the same. No, sir ! 
 This ain't like him, sir ! Don't seem to be a duel, unless he'd 
 posted the man to kill on sight murder's an ugly word to use 
 to gentlemen. D n me, sir, I don't know but he could hold 
 the man responsible who sent that despatch. It's offensive, 
 sir very !" 
 
 "And you don't know Mrs. Conroy?" continued Mr. 
 Dumphy, fixing his eyes on Colonel Starbottle's face. 
 
 " Mrs. Conroy ! The wife of the superintendent one of 
 the most beautiful women ! Good Ged, sir, I do ! And I'm 
 dev'lish sorry for her. But what's this got to do with our 
 affair ? O ! I see, Ged !" the Colonel suddenly chuckled, 
 drew out his handkerchief, and waved it in the air with depre 
 catory gallantry, " gossip, sir, all gossip. People will talk ! A 
 fine woman ! Blank me, if she was inclined to show some 
 attention to Colonel Starbottle Ged, sir, it was no more than 
 other women have. You comprehend, Dumphy? Ged, sir, 
 so the story's got round, eh ? husband's jealous killed wrong 
 man ! Folks think she's run off with Colonel Starbottle, ha ! 
 ha ! No, sir," he continued, suddenly dropping into an atti 
 tude of dignified severity. " You can say that Colonel Star- 
 bottle branded the story as a lie, sir ! That whatever might 
 have been the foolish indiscretion of a susceptible sex, Colonel 
 Starbottle will defend the reputation of that lady, sir, with his 
 lifewith his life !" 
 
 Absurd and ridiculous as this sudden diversion of Colonel 
 
 u2 
 
292 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Starbottle from the point at issue had become, Dumphy could 
 not doubt his sincerity nor the now self-evident fact that Mrs. 
 Conroy was not his visitor's mysterious client ! Mr. Dumphy 
 felt that his suddenly built up theory was demolished and his 
 hope with it. He was still at the mercy of this conceited 
 braggart and the invisible power behind him whoever or 
 whatever it might be. Mr. Dumphy was not inclined to 
 superstition, but he began to experience a strange awe of his 
 unknown persecutor, and resolved at any risk to discover who 
 it was. Could it be really his wife ? had not the supercilious 
 Poinsett been himself tricked or was he not now trying to 
 trick him, Dumphy? Couldn't Starbottle be bribed to expose 
 at least the name of his client ? He would try it. 
 
 " I said just now you had been deceived in this woman who 
 represents herself to be my wife. I find I have been mistaken 
 in the person, who I believe imposed upon you, and it is 
 possible that I may be otherwise wrong. My wife may be 
 alive. I am willing to admit it. Bring her here to-morrow 
 and I will accept it as a fact." 
 
 " You forget that she refuses to see you again," said Colonel 
 Starbottle, "until she has established her claim by process of 
 law." 
 
 " That's so ! that's all right, old fellow ; we understand each 
 other. Now, suppose that we business men as a business 
 maxim, you know always prefer to deal with principals. 
 Now suppose we even go so far as to do that and yet pay an 
 agent's commission, perhaps you understand me even a 
 bonus. Good ! That's business ! You understand that as a 
 gentleman and a man of the world. Now, I say, bring me 
 your principal fetch along that woman, and I'll make it all 
 right with you. Stop ! I know what you're going to say ; 
 you're bound by honour and all that I understand your 
 position as a gentleman, and respect it. Then let me know 
 where I can find her ! Understand you shan't be com 
 promised as bringing about the interview in any way. I'll see 
 that you're protected in your commissions from your client ; 
 and for my part if a cheque for five thousand dollars will 
 satisfy you of my desire to do the right thing in this matter, it's 
 at your service." 
 
 The Colonel rose to his feet and applied himself apparently 
 *o the single and silent inflation of his chest, for the space of a 
 
Mr. Dumphy is Perplexed. 293 
 
 minute. Wh^n the upper buttons of his coat seemed to be on 
 the point of flying off with a report, he suddenly extended his 
 hand and grasped Dumphy's with fervour. " Permit me," he 
 said, in a voice husky with emotion, " to congratulate myself 
 on dealing with a gentleman and a man of honour. Your 
 sentiments, sir, I don't care if I do say it, do you credit ! I 
 am proud, sir,' ; continued the Colonel, warmly, " to have made 
 your acquaintance ! But I regret to say, sir, that I cannot 
 give you the information you require. I do not myself know 
 the name or address of my client/' 
 
 The look of half-contemptuous satisfaction which had 
 irradiated Dumphy's face at the beginning of this speech, 
 changed to one of angry suspicion at its close. " That's a 
 
 d d queer oversight of yours/' he ejaculated, with an 
 
 expression as nearly insulting as he dared to make it. Colonel 
 Starbottle did not apparently notice the manner of his speech, 
 but drawing his chair close beside Dumphy, he laid his hand 
 upon his arm. 
 
 " Your confidence as a man of honour and a gentleman," he 
 began, " demands equal confidence and frankness on my part, 
 and Gulp. Starbottle of Virginia is not the man to withhold it ! 
 When I state that I do not know the name and address of my 
 client, I believe, sir, there is no one now living, who will er 
 er require or er deem it necessary for me to repeat the 
 assertion ! Certainly not, sir," added the Colonel, lightly 
 waving his hand, " the gentleman who has just honoured me 
 with his confidence and invited mine I thank you, sir," he 
 continued, as Mr. Dumphy made a hasty motion of assent, 
 " and will g<3 on. 
 
 " It is not necessary for me to name the party who first put 
 me in possession of the facts. You will take my word as a 
 gentleman er that it is some one unknown to you, of un 
 important position, though of strict respectability, and one who 
 acted only as the agent of my real client. When the case was 
 handed over to me there was also put into my possession a 
 sealed envelope containing the name of my client and principal 
 witness. My injunctions were not to open it until all negotia 
 tions had failed and it was necessary to institute legal pro 
 ceedings. That envelope I have here. You perceive it is 
 unopened !" 
 
 Mr, Dumphy unconsciously reached out his hand. With a 
 
294 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 gesture of polite deprecation Colonel Starbottle evaded it, and 
 placing the letter on the table before him, continued, " It is 
 unnecessary to say that er there being in my judgment no 
 immediate necessity for the beginning of a suit the injunc 
 tions still restrain me, and I shall not open the letter. If, 
 however, I accidentally mislay it on this table and it is returned 
 to me to-morrow, sealed as before, I believe, sir, as a gentleman 
 and a man of honour I violate no pledge." 
 
 " I see," said Mr. Dumphy, with a short laugh. 
 
 " Excuse me, if I venture to require another condition, 
 merely as a form among men of honour. Write as I dictate." 
 Mr. Dumphy took up a pen. Colonel Starbottle placed one 
 hand on his honourable breast and began slowly and medita 
 tively to pace the length of the room with the air of a second 
 measuring the distance for his principal. " Are you ready ?" 
 
 " Go on," said Dumphy, impatiently. 
 
 " I hereby pledge myself er er that in the event of any 
 disclosure by me er of confidential communications from 
 Colonel Starbottle to me, I shall hold myself ready to afford 
 him the usual honourable satisfaction er common among 
 gentlemen, at such times or places, and with such weapons as 
 he may choose, without further formality of challenge, and 
 that er er failing in that I do thereby proclaim myself, 
 without posting, a liar, poltroon, and dastard." 
 
 In the full pre-occupation of his dignified composition, and 
 possibly from an inability to look down over the increased 
 exaggeration of his swelling breast, Colonel Starbottle did not 
 observe the contemptuous smile which curled the lip of his 
 amanuensis. Howbeit Mr. Dumphy signed the document and 
 handed it to him. Colonel Starbottle put it in his pocket. 
 Nevertheless he lingered by Mr. Dumphy's side. 
 
 " The erer cheque/'' said the Colonel, with a slight 
 cough, " had better be to your order, endorsed by you to- 
 spare any criticism, hereafter." 
 
 Mr. Dumphy hesitated a moment. He would have pre 
 ferred as a matter of business to have first known the contents 
 of the envelope, but with a slight smile he dashed off the 
 cheque and handed it to the Colonel. " If er it would not 
 be too much trouble," said the Colonel, jauntily, " for the 
 same reason just mentioned, would you give that er piece 
 of paper to one of your clerks to draw the money for me ?" 
 
Mr. Duinphy is Perplexed. 29$ 
 
 Mr. Dumphy impatiently, with his eyes on the envelope, 
 rang his bell and handed the cheque to the clerk, while 
 Colonel Starbottle, with an air of abstraction, walked discreetly 
 to the window. 
 
 For the rest of Colonel Starbottle's life he never ceased to 
 deplore this last act of caution, and regret that he had not put 
 the cheque in his pocket. For as he walked to the window the 
 floor suddenly appeared to rise beneath his feet and as suddenly 
 sank again, and he was thrown violently against the mantel 
 piece. He felt sick and giddy. With a terrible apprehension 
 of apoplexy in his whirling brain, he turned toward his com 
 panion, who had risen from his seat and was supporting himself 
 by his swinging desk with a panic-stricken face and a pallor 
 equal to his own. In another moment a bookcase toppled 
 with a crash to the floor, a loud outcry arose from the outer 
 offices, and amidst the sounds of rushing feet, the breaking of 
 glass, and the creaking of timber, the two men dashed with a 
 common instinct to the door. It opened two inches and 
 remained fixed. With the howl of a caged wild beast Dumphy 
 threw himself against the rattling glass of the window that 
 opened on the level of the street. In another instant Colonel 
 Starbottle was beside him on the sidewalk, and the next they 
 were separated, unconsciously, uncaringly, as if they had been 
 the merest strangers in contact in a crowd. The business- 
 that had brought them together, the unfinished, incomplete, 
 absorbing interests of a moment ago were forgotten were 
 buried in the oblivion of another existence, which had no 
 sympathy with this, whose only instinct was to fly where they 
 knew not ! 
 
 The middle of the broad street was filled with a crowd of 
 breathless, pallid, death-stricken men who had lost all sense but 
 the common instinct of animals. There were hysterical men, 
 who laughed loudly without a cause, and talked incessantly of 
 what they knew not. There were dumb, paralysed men, who 
 stood helplessly and hopelessly beneath cornices and chimneys 
 that toppled over and crushed them. There were automatic 
 men, who flying, carried with them the work on which they 
 were engaged one whose hands were full of bills and papers, 
 another who held his ledger under his arm. There were men 
 who had forgotten the ordinary instincts of decency some 
 half-dressed. There were men who rushed from the fear of 
 
296 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 death into its presence ; two were picked up, one who had 
 jumped through a skylight, another who had blindly leaped 
 from a fourth-story window. There were brave men who 
 trembled like children ; there was one whose life had been spent 
 in scenes of daring and danger, who cowered paralysed in the 
 corner of the room from which a few inches of plastering had 
 fallen. There were hopeful men who believed that the danger 
 was over, and having passed, would, by some mysterious law, 
 never recur ; there were others who shook their heads and said 
 that the next shock would be fatal. There were crowds 
 around the dust that arose from fallen chimneys and cornices, 
 around runaway horses that had dashed as madly as their 
 drivers against lamp-posts, around telegraph and newspaper 
 offices eager to know the extent of the disaster. Along the 
 remoter avenues and cross-streets dwellings were deserted, 
 people sat upon their door-steps or in chairs upon the side 
 walks, fearful of the houses they had built with their own 
 hands, and doubtful even of this blue arch above them that 
 smiled so deceitfully ; of those far-reaching fields beyond, which 
 they had cut into lots and bartered and sold, and which now 
 seemed to suddenly rise against them, or slip and wither away 
 from their very feet. It seemed so outrageous that this dull, 
 patient earth, whose homeliness they had adorned and im 
 proved, and which, whatever their other fortune or vicissi 
 tudes, at least had been their sure inheritance, should have 
 become so faithless. Small wonder that the owner of a little 
 house, which had sunk on the reclaimed water front, stooped 
 in the speechless and solemn absurdity of his wrath to shake 
 his clenched fist in the face of the Great Mother. 
 
 The real damage to life and property had been so slight and 
 in such pronounced contrast to the prevailing terror, that half 
 an hour later only a sense of the ludicrous remained with the 
 greater masses of the people. Mr. Dumphy, like all practical, 
 unimaginative men, was among the first to recover his pre 
 sence of mind with the passing of the immediate danger. 
 People took confidence when this great man, who had so much 
 to lose, after sharply remanding his clerks and everybody else 
 back to business, re-entered his office. He strode at once to 
 his desk. But the envelope was gone ! He looked hurriedly 
 among his papers on the floor by the broken window but 
 in vain. 
 
Justice and the Heavens Fall. 297 
 
 Mr. Dumphy instantly rang his bell. The clerk appeared. 
 
 "Was that draft paid ?" 
 
 " No, sir; we were counting the money when " 
 
 " Stop it ! return the draft to me." The young man was 
 confiding to his confreres his suspicions of a probable " run" 
 on the bank as indicated by Mr. Dumphy's caution, when he 
 was again summoned by Mr. Dumphy. " Go to Mr. Poinsett's 
 office and ask him to come here at once." In a few moments 
 the clerk returned out of breath. 
 
 " Mr. Poinsett left a quarter of an hour ago, sir, for San 
 Antonio." 
 
 " San Antonio ?" 
 
 " Yes, sir they say there's bad news from the Mission." 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 IN WHICH BOTH JUSTICE AND THE HEAVENS FALL. 
 
 THE day following the discovery of the murder of Victor 
 Ramirez was one of the intensest excitement in One Horse 
 Gulch. It was not that killing was rare in that pastoral com 
 munity foul murder had been done there upon the bodies of 
 various citizens of more or less respectability, and the victim 
 in the present instance was a stranger and a man who awakened 
 no personal sympathy; but the suspicion that swiftly and 
 instantly attached to two such important people as Mr. and 
 Mrs. Conroy, already objects of severe criticism, was sufficient 
 to exalt this particular crime above all others in thrilling 
 interest. For two days business was practically suspended. 
 
 The discovery of the murder was made by Sal, who stumbled 
 upon the body of the unfortunate Victor early the next morning 
 during a walk on Conroy's Hill, manifestly in search of the 
 missing man, who had not returned to the hotel that night. A 
 few flippant souls, misunderstanding Miss Clark's interest in 
 the stranger, asserted that he had committed suicide to escape 
 her attentions, but all jocular hypothesis ceased when it became 
 known that Gabriel and his wife had fled. Then came the 
 report that Gabriel had been seen by a passing miner early in 
 the day " shoving" the stranger along the trail, with his hand 
 on his collar, and exchanging severe words. Then the willing 
 
298 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 testimony of Miss Clark that she had seen Mrs. Conroy in 
 secret converse with Victor before the murder ; then the un 
 willing evidence of the Chinaman who had overtaken Gabriel 
 with the letter, but who heard the sounds of quarrelling and 
 cries for help in the bushes after his departure ; but this evi 
 dence was excluded from the inquest, by virtue of the famous 
 California!! law that a Pagan was of necessity a liar, and that 
 truth only resided in the breast of the Christian Caucasian, and 
 was excluded from the general public for its incompatibility 
 with Gabriel's subsequent flight, and the fact that the Chinaman, 
 being a fool, was probably mistaken in the hour. Then there 
 was the testimony of the tunnel-men to Gabriel's appearance 
 on the hill that night. There was only one important proof 
 not submitted to the public or the authorities Mrs. Conroy 's 
 note picked up by Sal, handed to Mrs. Markle, and given by 
 her to Lawyer Maxwell. The knowledge of this document was 
 restricted to the few already known to the reader. 
 
 A dozen or more theories of the motive of the deed at 
 different hours of the day occupied and disturbed the public 
 mind. That Gabriel had come upon a lover of his wife in the 
 act of eloping with her, and had slain him out of hand, was the 
 first. That Gabriel had decoyed the man to an interview by 
 simulating his wife's handwriting, and then worked his revenge 
 on his body, was accepted later as showing the necessary 
 deliberation to constitute murder. That Gabriel and his wife 
 had conjointly taken this method to rid themselves of a former 
 lover who threatened exposure was a still later theory. Towards 
 evening, when One Horse Gulch had really leisure to put its 
 heads together, it was generally understood that Gabriel and 
 Mrs. Conroy had put out of their way a dangerous and neces 
 sarily rightful claimant to that mine which Gabriel had pre 
 tended to discover. This opinion was for some time say two 
 hours the favourite one, agreeing as it did with the popular 
 opinion of Gabriel's inability to discover a mine himself, and 
 was only modified by another theory that Victor was not the 
 real claimant but a dangerous witness that the Conroys had 
 found it necessary to dispose of. And when, possibly from 
 some unguarded expression of Lawyer Maxwell, it was reported 
 that Gabriel Conroy was an impostor under an assumed name, 
 all further speculation was deemed unnecessary. The coroner's 
 jury brought in a verdict against "John Doe, alias Gabriel 
 
Justice and the Heavens Fall. 299 
 
 Conroy," and One Horse Gulch added this injury of false pre 
 tence to other grievances complained of. One or two cases of 
 horse-stealing and sluice-robbing in the neighbourhood were 
 indefinitely but strongly connected with this discovery. If I 
 am thus particular in citing these evidences of the various gra 
 dations of belief in the guilt of the accused, it is because they 
 were peculiar to One Horse Gulch, and of course never 
 obtained in more civilized communities. 
 
 It is scarcely necessary to say that one person in One Horse 
 Gulch never wavered in her opinion of Gabriel's innocence, 
 nor that that person was Mrs. Markle. That he was the victim 
 of a vile conspiracy that Mrs. Conroy was the real culprit, 
 and had diabolically contrived to fasten the guilt upon her 
 husband, Mrs. Markle not only believed herself, but absolutely 
 contrived to make Lawyer Maxwell and Sal believe also. 
 More than that, it had undoubtedly great power in restraining 
 Sal's evidence before the inquest, which that impulsive and 
 sympathetic young woman persisted in delivering behind a 
 black veil and in a suit of the deepest mourning that could be 
 hastily improvised in One Horse Gulch. 
 
 " Miss Clark's evidence," said the Silveropolis Messenger, 
 " although broken by sobs and occasional expressions of indig 
 nation against the murderer, strongly impressed the jury as the 
 natural eloquence of one connected with the tenderest ties to 
 the unfortunate victim. It is said that she was an old acquain 
 tance of Ramirez, who was visiting her in the hope of inducing 
 her to consent to a happy termination of a life-long courtship, 
 when the dastard hand of the murderer changed the bridal 
 wreath to the veil of mourning. From expressions that dropped 
 from the witness's lips, although restrained by natural modesty, 
 it would not be strange if jealousy were shown to be one of the 
 impelling causes. It is said that previous to his marriage the 
 alleged Gabriel Conroy was a frequent visitor at the house of 
 Miss Clark." 
 
 I venture to quote this extract not so much for its suggestion 
 of a still later theory in the last sententc, as for its poetical 
 elegance, and as an offset to the ruder record of the One Horse 
 Gulch Banner, which, I grieve to say, was as follows : 
 
 " Sal was no slouch of a witness. Rigged out in ten yards of Briggs' 
 best black glazed muslin, and with a lot of black mosquito netting round 
 
30O Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 her head, she pranced round the stand like a skittish hearse horse in fly- 
 time. If Sal calculates to go into mourning for every man she has to sling 
 hash to we'd recommend her to buy up Briggs' stock and take one of Pat 
 Hoolan's carriages for the season. There is a strong feeling among men 
 whose heads are level that this Minstrel Variety Performance is a bluff of 
 the Messenger to keep from the public the real motives of the murder, 
 which it is pretty generally believed concerns some folks a little higher- 
 toned than Sal. We mention no names, but we would like to know what 
 the Editor of the Messenger was doing in the counting-room of one of 
 Pete Dumphy's emissaries at ten o'clock last evening. Looking up his 
 bank account, eh ? What's the size of the figures to-day ? You hear us !" 
 
 At one o'clock that morning the Editor of the Messenger 
 fired at the Editor of the Banner and missed him. At half- 
 past one two men were wounded by pistol shots in a difficulty 
 at Briggs' warehouse cause not stated. At nine o'clock half a 
 dozen men lounged down the main street and ascended the 
 upper loft of Briggs' warehouse. In ten or fifteen minutes a 
 dozen more from different saloons in the town lounged as in 
 differently in the direction of Briggs', until at half-past nine the 
 assemblage in the loft numbered fifty men. During this interval 
 a smaller party had gathered apparently as accidentally and 
 indefinitely as to purpose, on the steps of the little two-story 
 brick Court House in which the prisoner was confined. At 
 ten o'clock a horse was furiously ridden into town, and dropped 
 exhausted at the outskirts. A few moments later a man 
 hurriedly crossed the plaza toward the Court House. It was 
 Mr. Jack Hamlin. But the Three Voices had preceded him, 
 and from the steps of the Court House were already uttering 
 the Popular mandate. 
 
 It was addressed to a single man. A man who, deserted by 
 hisfosse, and abandoned by his friends, had for the last twelve 
 hours sat beside his charge, tireless, watchful, defiant, and 
 resolute Joe Hall, the Sheriff of Calaveras ! He had been 
 waiting for this summons, behind barricaded doors, with pistols 
 in his belt, and no hope in his heart ; a man of limited ideas 
 and restricted resources, constant only to one intent that of 
 dying behind those bars, in defence of that legal trust, which 
 his office and an extra fifty votes at the election only two 
 months before had put into his hands. It had perplexed him 
 for a moment that he heard the voices of some of these voters 
 below him clamouring against him, but above their feebler pipe 
 always rose another mandatory sentence, " We command you 
 
Justice and the Heavens Fall. 301 
 
 to .take and safely keep the body of Gabriel Conroy," and 
 being a simple man the recollection of the quaint phraseology 
 strengthened him and cleared his mind. Ah me, I fear he had 
 none of the external marks of a hero ; as I remember him he 
 was small, indistinctive, and fidgety, without the repose of 
 strength ; a man who at that extreme moment chewed tobacco 
 and spat vigorously on the floor ; who tweaked the ends of his 
 scanty beard, paced the floor, and tried the locks of his pistols. 
 Presently he stopped before Gabriel and said almost fiercely 
 
 " You hear that they are coming !" 
 
 Gabriel nodded. Two hours before, when the contemplated 
 attack of the Vigilance Committee had been revealed to him, 
 he had written a few lines to Lawyer Maxwell, which he 
 entrusted to the sheriff. He had then relapsed into his usual 
 tranquillity serious, simple, and when he had occasion to speak, 
 diffident and apologetic. 
 
 "Are you going to help me ?" continued Hall. 
 
 " In course," said Gabriel, in quiet surprise, " ef you say so. 
 But don't ye do nowt ez would be gettin' yourself into troubii 
 along o' me. I ain't worth it. Maybe it 7 ud be jest as square 
 ef ye handed me over to them chaps out yer allowin' I was a 
 heep o' troubii to you and reckonin' you'd about hed your 
 sheer o' the keer o' me, and kinder passin' me round. But ef 
 you do feel obligated to take keer o' me, ez hevin' promised the 
 jedges and jury" (it is almost impossible to convey the gentle 
 deprecatoriness of Gabriel's voice and accent at this juncture), 
 "why," he added, "I'm with ye. I'm thar ! You understand 
 me !" 
 
 He rose slowly, and with quiet but powerfully significant 
 deliberation placed the chair he had been sitting on back 
 against the wall. The tone and act satisfied the sheriff. The 
 seventy-four gunship, Gabriel Conroy, was clearing the decks 
 for action. 
 
 There was an ominous lull in the outcries below, and then 
 the solitary lifting up of a single voice, the Potential Voice of 
 the night before ! The sheriff walked to a window in the hall 
 and opened it. The besieger and besieged measured each 
 other with a look. Then came the Homeric chaff : 
 
 " Git out o' that, Joe Hall, and run home to your mother. 
 She's getting oneasy about ye !" 
 
 " The h 11 you say !" responded Hall, promptly, " and the 
 
3O2 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 old woman in such a hurry she had to borry Al. Barker's hat 
 and breeches to come here ! Run home, old gal, and don't 
 parse yourself off for a man agin !" 
 
 " This ain't no bluff, Joe Hall ! Why don't ye call ? Yer's 
 fifty men ; the returns are agin ye, and t\vo precincts yet to 
 hear from." (This was a double thrust, at Hall's former career 
 as a gambler, and the closeness of his late election vote.) 
 
 " All right, send 'em up by expressmark 'em C. 6. D." 
 (The previous speaker was the expressman.) 
 
 " Blank you ! Git !" 
 
 " Blank you ! Come on !" 
 
 Here there was a rush at the door, the accidental discharge 
 of a pistol, and the window was slammed down. Words 
 ceased, deeds began. 
 
 A few hours before, Hall had removed his prisoner from the 
 uncertain tenure and accessible position of the cells below to 
 the open court room of the second floor, inaccessible by 
 windows, and lit by a skylight in the roof, above the reach of 
 the crowd, whose massive doors were barricaded by benches 
 and desks. A smaller door at the side, easily secured, was left 
 open for reconnoitring. The approach to the court room was 
 by a narrow stairway, halfway down whose length Gabriel had 
 thrust the long court room table as a barricade to the besiegers. 
 The lower outer door, secured by the sheriff, after the deser 
 tion of his underlings, soon began to show signs of weakening 
 under the vigorous battery from without. From the landing 
 the two men watched it eagerly. As it slowly yielded, the 
 sheriff drew back toward the side door and beckoned Gabriel 
 to follow ; but with a hasty sign Gabriel suddenly sprang for 
 ward, and dropped beneath the table as the door with a crash 
 fell inward, beaten from its hinges. There was a rush of 
 trampling feet to the stairway, a cry of baffled rage over the im 
 peding table, a sudden scramble up and upon it, and then, as 
 if on its own volition, the long table suddenly reared itself on 
 -end, and staggering a moment toppled backward with its cling 
 ing human burden on the heads of the thronging mass below. 
 There was a cry, a sudden stampede of the Philistines to the 
 street, and Samson, rising to his feet, slowly walked to the side 
 door, and re-entered the court room. But at the same instant 
 an agile besieger who, unnoticed, had crossed the Rubicon, 
 darted from his concealment, and dashed by Gabriel into the 
 
Justice and the Heavens Fall. 303 
 
 room. There was a shout from the sheriff, the door was closed 
 hastily, a shot, and the intruder fell. But the next moment he 
 staggered to his knees, with outstretched hands, " Hold up ! 
 I'm yer to help ye !" 
 
 It was Jack Hamlin ! haggard, dusty, grimy ; his gay feathers 
 bedraggled, his tall hat battered, his spotless shirt torn open at 
 the throat, his eyes and cheeks burning with fever, the blood 
 dripping from the bullet wound in his leg, but still Jack 
 Hamlin, strong and audacious. By a common instinct both 
 men dropped their weapons, ran and lifted him in their arms. 
 
 " There shove that chair under me ! that'll do," said 
 Hamlin, coolly. " We're even now, Joe Hall ; that shot wiped 
 out old scores, even if it has crippled me, and lost ye my valu 
 able aid. Dry up ! and listen to me, and then leave me here ! 
 there's but one way of escape. It's up there !" (he pointed to 
 the skylight), " the rear wall hangs over the Wingdam ditch 
 and gully. Once on the roof you can drop over with this rope, 
 which you must unwind from my body, for I'm d d if I can 
 do it myself. Can you reach the skylight ?" 
 
 "There's a step-ladder from the gallery," said the sheriff, 
 joyously, "but wont they see us, and be prepared?" 
 
 " Before they can reach the gully by going round, you'll be 
 half a mile away in the woods. But what in blank are you 
 waiting for ? Go ! You can hold on here for ten minutes 
 more if they attack the same point ; but if they think of the 
 skylight, and fetch ladders, you're gone in ! Go !" 
 
 There was another rush on the staircase without ; the surging 
 of an immense wave against the heavy folding doors, the blows 
 of pick and crowbar, the gradual yielding of the barricade a 
 few inches, and the splintering of benches by a few pistol shots 
 fired through the springing crevices of the doors. And yet the 
 sheriff hesitated. Suddenly, Gabriel stooped down, lifted the 
 wounded man to his shoulder as if he had been an infant, and 
 beckoning to the sheriff started for the gallery. But he had 
 not taken two steps before he staggered and lapsed heavily 
 against Hall, who, in his turn, stopped and clutched the railing. 
 At the same moment the thunder of the besiegers seemed to 
 increase; not only the door, but the windows rattled, the heavy 
 chandelier fell with a crash, carrying a part of the plaster and 
 the elaborate cornice with it, a shower of bricks fell through the 
 skylight, and a cry, quite distinct from anything heard before, 
 
304 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 rose from without. There was a pause in the hall, and then 
 the sudden rush of feet down the staircase, and all was still 
 again. The three men gazed in each other's whitened faces. 
 " An earthquake," said the sheriff. 
 
 " So much the better," said Jack. " It gives us time 
 forward !" 
 
 They reached the gallery and the little step-ladder that led 
 to a door that opened upon the roof, Gabriel preceding with 
 his burden. There was another rush up the staircase without 
 the court room, but this time there was no yielding in the door ; 
 the earthquake that had shaken the foundations and settled the 
 walls had sealed it firmly. 
 
 Gabriel was first to step out on the roof, carrying Jack 
 Hamlin. But as he did so another thrill ran through the build 
 ing and he dropped on his knees to save himself from falling, 
 while the door closed smartly behind him. In another moment 
 the shock had passed, and Gabriel, putting down his burden, 
 turned to open the door for the sheriff. But to his 
 alarm it did not yield to his pressure ; the earthquake had 
 sealed it as it had the door below, and Joe Hall was left a 
 prisoner. 
 
 It was Gabriel's turn to hesitate and look at his companion. 
 But Jack was gazing into the street below. Then he looked 
 up and said, " We must go on now, Gabriel, for for they've 
 got a ladder!" 
 
 Gabriel rose again to his feet and lifted the wounded man. 
 The curve of the domed roof was slight ; in the centre, on a 
 rough cupola or base, the figure of Justice, fifteen feet high, 
 rudely carved in wood, towered above them with drawn sword 
 and dangling scales. Gabriel reached the cupola and crouched 
 behind it, as a shout rose from the street below that told he 
 was discovered. A few shots were fired, one bullet imbedded 
 itself in the naked blade of the Goddess, and another with 
 cruel irony, shattered the equanimity of her Balance. " Un 
 wind the cord from me," said Hamlin. Gabriel did so. 
 " Fasten one end to the chimney or the statue." But the 
 chimney was levelled by the earthquake, and even the statue 
 was trembling on its pedestal. Gabriel secured the rope to 
 an iron girder of the skylight, and crawling on the roof dropped 
 it cautiously over the gable. But it was several feet too short 
 too far for a cripple to drop ! Gabriel crawled back to Hamlin. 
 
In Tencbris Servare Fidcm. 305 
 
 " You must go first," he said, quietly, " I will hold the rope 
 over the gable. You can trust me." 
 
 Without waiting for Hamlin's reply he fastened the rope 
 under his arms and half-lifted, half-dragged him to the gable. 
 Then pressing his hand silently, he laid himself down and 
 lowered the wounded man safely to the ground. He had 
 recovered the rope again, and crawling to the cupola, was 
 about to fasten the line to the iron girder when something 
 slowly rose above the level of the roof beyond him. The 
 uprights of a ladder ! 
 
 The Three Voices had got tired of waiting a reply to their 
 oft reiterated question, and had mounted the ladder by way of 
 forcing an answer at the muzzles of their revolvers. They 
 reached the level of the roof, one after another, and again 
 propounded their inquiry. And then as it seemed to their 
 awe- stricken fancy, the only figure there the statue of Justice 
 awoke to their appeal. Awoke ! leaned towards them ; ad 
 vanced its awful sword and shook its broken balance, and then 
 toppling forward with one mighty impulse, came down upon 
 them, swept them from the ladder and silenced the Voices for 
 ever ! And from behind its pedestal Gabriel arose, panting, 
 pale, but triumphant. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 IN TENEBRIS SERVARE FIDEM. 
 
 ALTHOUGH a large man, Gabriel was lithe and active, and 
 dropped the intervening distance where the rope was scant, 
 lightly, and without injury. Happily the falling of the statue 
 was looked upon as the result of another earthquake shock, 
 and its disastrous effect upon the storming party for awhile 
 checked the attack. Gabriel lifted his half-fainting ally in his 
 arms, and gaining the friendly shelter of the ditch, in ten 
 minutes was beyond the confines of One Horse Gulch, and in 
 the shadow of the pines of Conroy's Hill. There were several 
 tunnel openings only known to him. Luckily the first was 
 partly screened by a fall of rock loosened by the earthquake 
 from the hill above, and satisfied that it would be unrecognised 
 by any eye less keen than his own, Gabriel turned into it with 
 his fainting burden. And it was high time. For the hcemor- 
 
 x 
 
306 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 rhage from Jack Hamlin's wound was so great that that gentle 
 man, after a faint attempt to wave his battered hat above his 
 dishevelled curls, suddenly succumbed, and lay as cold and 
 senseless and beautiful as a carven Apollo. 
 
 Then Gabriel stripped him, and found an ugly hole in his 
 thigh that had narrowly escaped traversing the femoral artery, 
 and set himself about that rude surgery which he had acquired 
 by experience, and that more delicate nursing which was 
 instinctive with him. He was shocked at the revelation of a 
 degree of emaciation in the figure of this young fellow that 
 he had not before suspected. Gabriel had nursed many sick 
 men, and here was one who clearly ought to be under the 
 doctor's hands, economizing his vitality as a sedentary invalid, 
 who had shown himself to him hitherto only as a man of 
 superabundant activity and animal spirits. Whence came the 
 power that had animated this fragile shell ? Gabriel was per 
 plexed ; he looked down upon his own huge frame with a new 
 and sudden sense of apology and depreciation, as if it were an 
 offence to this spare and bloodless Adonis. 
 
 And then with an infinite gentleness, as of a young mother 
 over her newborn babe, he stanched the blood and bound up 
 the wounds of his new friend, so skilfully that he never winced, 
 and with a peculiar purring accompaniment that lulled him to 
 repose. Once only, as he held him in his arms, did he change 
 his expression, and that was when a shadow and a tread per 
 haps of a passing hare or squirrel crossed the mouth of his 
 cave, when he suddenly caught the body to his breast with the 
 fierceness of a lioness interrupted with her cubs. In his own 
 rough experience he was much awed by the purple and fine 
 linen of this fine gentleman's underclothing not knowing the 
 prevailing habits of his class and when he had occasion to 
 open his bosom to listen to the faint beatings of his heart, he 
 put aside with great delicacy and instinctive honour a fine gold 
 chain from which depended some few relics and keepsakes 
 which this scamp wore. But one was a photograph, set in an 
 open locket, that he could not fail to see, and that at once 
 held him breathless above it. It was the exact outline and 
 features of his sister Grace, but with a strange shadow over that 
 complexion which he remembered well as beautiful, that struck 
 him with superstitious awe. He scanned it again eagerly. 
 " Maybe it was a dark day when she sot !" he murmured softly 
 
/;/ Tenebris Servare Fidcin. 
 
 to himself; "maybe it's the light in this yer tunnel; maybe the 
 heat o' this poor chap's buzzimi hez kinder turned it. It ain't 
 measles, fur she bed 'em along o' Oily." He paused and 
 looked at the unconscious man before him, as if trying to con 
 nect him with the past. " No," he said simply, with a resigned, 
 sigh, " it's agin reason ! She never knowed him ! It's only 
 my foolishness, and my thinkin' and thinkin' o' her so much ! 
 It's another gal, and none o' your business, Gabe, and you a r 
 prying inter another man's secrets, and takin' advantage of him 
 when he's down/' He hurriedly replaced it in his companion's- 
 bosom, and closed the collar of his shirt, as Jack's lips moved- 
 " Pete !" he called, feebly. 
 
 " It's his pardner, maybe he's callin' on," said Gabriel to 
 himself; then aloud, with the usual, comforting professional 
 assent, "In course, Pete, surely! He's coming, right off 
 he'll be yer afore you know it." 
 
 " Pete/' continued Jack, forcibly, " take the mare off my 
 leg, she's breaking it ! Don't you see ? She's stumbled ! D n 
 it, quick ! I'll be late. They'll string him up before I get there !"' 
 In a moment Gabriel's stout heart sank. If fever should set 
 in if he should become delirious, they would be lost. Provi 
 dentially, however, Jack's aberration was only for a moment ; 
 he presently opened his black eyes and stared at Gabriel. 
 Gabriel smiled assuringly. "Am I dead and buried," said 
 Jack, gravely, looking around the dark vault, " or have I got 
 'em again ?" 
 
 " Ye wuz took bad fur a minit that's all," said Gabriel, 
 reassuringly, much relieved himself, " yer all right now I" 
 
 Hamlin tried to rise but could not. " That's a lie," he said, 
 cheerfully. " What's to be done ?" 
 
 " Ef you'd let me hev my say, without gettin' riled," said. 
 Gabriel, apologetically, " I'd tell ye. Look yer," he continued,, 
 persuasively, " ye ought to hev a doctor afore thet wound gets 
 inflamed ; and ye ain't goin' to get one, bein' packed round by 
 me. Now don't ye flare up, but harkin ! Allowin' I goes out 
 to them chaps ez is huntin' us, and sez, ' look yer, you kin- 
 take me, provided ye don't bear no malice agin my friend, and. 
 you sends a doctor to fetch him outer the tunnel.' Don't yer 
 see. they can't prove anythin' agin ye, anyway," continued;. 
 Gabriel, with a look of the intensest cunning, " I'll swear 1 
 took you prisoner, and Joe wont go back on his shot." 
 
 x2 
 
308 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 In spite of his pain and danger this proposition afforded 
 Jack Haralin apparently the largest enjoyment. " Thank ye," 
 he said, with a smile, " but as there's a warrant, by this time, 
 out against me for horse stealing, I reckon I wont put myself 
 in the way of their nursing. They might forgive you for 
 killing a Mexican of no great market value, but they ain't 
 goin' to extend the right hand of fellowship to me after running 
 off with their ringleader's mustang ! Particularly when that 
 animal's foundered and knee-sprung. No, sir !" 
 
 Gabriel stared at his companion without speaking. 
 
 " I was late coming back with Oily to Wingdam. I had to 
 swap the horse and buggy for the mare without having time to 
 arrange particulars with the owner. I don't wonder you're 
 shocked," continued Jack, mischievously, affecting to mis 
 understand Gabriel's silence, " but thet's me. That's the kind 
 of company you've got into. Procrastination and want of 
 punctuality has brought me to this. Never procrastinate, 
 Gabriel. Always make it a point to make it a rule, never to 
 be late at the Sabbath school !" 
 
 "Ef I hed owt to give ye,' ; said Gabriel, ruefully, "a drop o' 
 whisky, or suthin' to keep up your stren'th !" 
 
 " I never touch intoxicating liquors without the consent of 
 my physician," said Jack, gravely, " they're too exciting ! I 
 must be kept free from all excitement. Something soothing, 
 or sedentary like this," he added, striking his leg. But even 
 through his mischievous smile his face paled, and a spasm of 
 pain crossed it. 
 
 " I reckon we'll hev to stick yer ontil dark," said Gabriel, 
 " and then strike acrost the gully to the woods on Conroy's Hill. 
 Ye'll be easier thar, and we're safe ontil sun-up, when we kin 
 hunt another tunnel. Thar ain't no choice," added Gabriel, 
 apologetically. 
 
 Jack made a grimace, and cast a glance around the walls of 
 the tunnel. The luxurious scamp missed his usual comfort 
 able surroundings. " Well," he assented, with a sigh, " I 
 suppose the game's made anyway ! and we've got to stick here 
 like snails on a rock for an hour yet. Well," he continued, 
 impatiently, as Gabriel, after improvising a rude couch for him 
 with some withered pine tassels gathered at the mouth of the 
 tunnel, sat down beside him, "are you goin ; to bore me to 
 death, now that you've got me here sittin' there like an owl? 
 Why don't you say something ?" 
 
In Tcncbris Scrvare Fide in. 309 
 
 " Say, what ?" asked Gabriel, simply. 
 
 " Anything ! Lie if you want to ; only talk !" 
 
 " I'd like to put a question to ye, Mr. Hamlin," said Gabriel, 
 with great gentleness, " allowin' in course, ye'll answer or no 
 jest ez as is agree'ble to ye reckonin' it's no business o' mine 
 nor pryin' into secrets, ony jess to pass away the time ontil 
 sundown. When you was tuk bad a spell ago, unloosin' yer 
 shirt thar, I got to see a pictur that ye hev around yer neck. 
 I ain't askin' who nor which it is but ony this ez thet thet 
 thet young woman dark complected ez that picter allows her 
 to be ?" 
 
 Jack's face had recovered its colour by the time that Gabriel 
 had finished, and he answered promptly, " A d d sight more 
 so ! Why, that picture's fair alongside of her !" 
 
 Gabriel looked a little disappointed. Hamlin was instantly 
 up in arms. " Yes, sir and when I say that," he returned, 
 ' I mean, by thunder, that the whitest faced woman in the 
 world don't begin to be as handsome. Thar ain't an angel 
 that she couldn't give points to and beat ! That's her style ! 
 It don't," continued Mr. Hamlin, taking the picture from his 
 breast, and wiping its face with his handkerchief "it don't 
 begin to do her justice. What," he asked suddenly and 
 aggressively, " have jw got to say about it, anyway?" 
 
 " I reckoned it kinder favoured my sister Grace," said 
 Gabriel, submissively. " Ye didn't know her, Mr. Hamlin ? 
 She was lost sence '49 -thet's all !" 
 
 Mr. Hamlin measured Gabriel with a contempt that was 
 delicious in its sublime audacity and unconsciousness. "Your 
 sister?" he repeated, " that's a healthy lookin' sister of such a 
 man as you ain't it ? Why, look at it," roared Jack, thrusting 
 the picture under Gabriel's nose. " Why, it's it's a lady /" 
 
 " Ye musn't jedge Gracey by me, nor even Oily," interposed 
 Gabriel, gently, evading Mr. Hamlin's contempt. 
 
 But Jack was not to be appeased. " Does your sister sing 
 like an angel, and talk Spanish like Governor Alvarado : is she 
 connected with one of the oldest Spanish families in the state ; 
 does she run a rancho and thirty square leagues of land, and is 
 Dolores Salvatierra her nickname ? Is her complexion like the 
 young bark of the madrono the most beautiful thing ever 
 seen did every other woman look chalky beside her, eh ?" 
 
 " No !'' said Gabriel, with a sigh " it was just my foolish 
 ness, Mr. Hamlin. But seein' that picter, kinder " 
 
310 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 '" I stole it," interrupted Jack, with the same frankness. "I 
 ^saw it in her parlour, on the table, and I froze to it when no 
 one was looking. Lord, she wouldn't have given it to me. I 
 reckon those relatives of hers would have made it very lively 
 ;for me if they'd suspected it. Hoss stealing ain't a circum* 
 .stance to this, Gabriel," said Jack, with a reckless laugh. Then 
 with equal frankness, and a picturesque freedom of description 
 he related his first and only interview with Donna Dolores. 
 I am glad to say that this scamp exaggerated, if anything, the 
 hopelessness of his case, dwelt but slightly on his own services, 
 and concealed the fact that Donna Dolores had even thanked 
 him. " You can reckon from this the extent of my affection 
 for that Johnny Ramirez, and why I just froze to you when I 
 heard you'd dropped him. But come now, it's your deal ; tell 
 us all about it. The boys put it up that he was hangin' round 
 your wife, and you went for him for all he was worth. Go 
 on I'm waiting and," added Jack, as a spasm of pain passed 
 across his face, "and aching to that degree that I'll yell if you 
 don't take my mind off it." 
 
 But Gabriel's face was grave and his lips silent as he bent 
 over Mr. Hamlin to adjust the bandages. " Go on," said 
 Jack, darkly, " or I'll tear off these rags and bleed to death 
 before your eyes. What are you afraid of? I know all about 
 your wife you can't tell me anything about her. Didn't I 
 spot her in Sacramento before she married you when she 
 had this same Chilino, Ramirez, on a string. Why, she's 
 fooled him as she has you. You ain't such a blasted fool as to 
 be stuck after her still, are you ?" and Jack raised himself on 
 liis elbow the more intently to regard this possibly trans 
 cendent idiot. 
 
 " You was speakin' o' this Mexican, Ramirez," said Gabriel, 
 after a pause, fixing his now clear and untroubled eyes on his 
 interlocutor. 
 
 " Of course," roared out Jack, impatiently, " did you think I 
 
 ivas talking of ?" Here Mr. Hamlin offered a name 
 
 that suggested the most complete and perfect antithesis known 
 to modern reason. 
 
 " I didn't kill him !" said Gabriel, quietly. 
 
 " Of course not," said Jack, promptly. " He sorter stumbled 
 and fell over on your bowie-knife as you were pickin' your 
 teeth with it. But go on how did you do it ? Where did 
 
/;/ Tcncbris Scrvare Fidem. 311 
 
 you spot him? Did he make any fight? Has he got any 
 sand in him ?" 
 
 " I tell ye I didn't kill him !" 
 
 "Who did, then?" screamed Jack, furious with pain and 
 impatience. 
 
 " I don't know I reckon that is " and Gabriel stopped 
 
 short with a wistful perplexed looked at his companion. 
 
 " Perhaps, Mr. Gabriel Conroy," said Jack, with sudden 
 coolness and deliberation of speech, and a baleful light in his 
 dark eyes, " perhaps you'll be good enough to tell me what this 
 means what is your little game ? Perhaps you'll kindly inform 
 me what I'm lying here crippled for ? What you were doing 
 up in the Court House, when you were driving those people 
 crazy with excitement ? What you're hiding here in this blank 
 family vault for ? And maybe, if you've got time, you'll tell me 
 what was the reason I made that pleasant little trip to Sacra 
 mento ? I know I required the exercise, and then there was 
 the honour of being introduced to your little sister but perhaps 
 you'll tell me WHAT IT WAS FOR !" 
 
 "Jack," said Gabriel, leaning forward, with a sudden return 
 of his old trouble and perplexity, " I thought she did it ! and 
 thinkin' that when they asked me I took it upon myself! I 
 didn't allow to ring you into this, Jack ! I thought I thought 
 thet it 'ud all be one thet they'd hang me up afore this 
 I did Jack, honest !" 
 
 " And you didn't kill Ramirez ?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 " And you reckoned your wife did ?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " And you took the thing on yourself?'* 
 
 " I did." 
 
 " You did !" 
 
 " I did ! " 
 
 "You DID? M 
 
 " I did !" 
 
 Mr. Hamlin rolled over on his back, and began to whistle 
 " When the Spring time comes, Gentle Annie !" as the only 
 way of expressing his inordinate contempt for the whole pro 
 ceeding. 
 
 Gabriel slowly slid his hand under Mr. Hamlin's helpless 
 back, and under pretext of arranging his bandages, lifted him 
 
312 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 in his arms like a truculent babe. " Jack, he said, softly, " ef 
 thet picter of yours that coloured woman " 
 
 " Which ?" said Jack, fiercely. 
 
 "I mean thet purty creature ef she and you hed been 
 married, and you'd found out accidental like that she'd fooled 
 ye more belike, Jack," he added, hastily, "o' your own 
 foolishness than her little game and " 
 
 " That woman was a lady," interrupted Jack, savagely, "and 
 
 your wife's a " But he paused, looking into Gabriel's face, 
 
 and then added, " O git ! will you ! Leave me alone ! ' 1 want 
 to be an angel and with the angels stand.' " 
 
 "And thet woman hez a secret," continued Gabriel, un 
 mindful of the interruption, " and bein' hounded by the man 
 az knows it, up and kills him, ye wouldn't let thet woman 
 that poor pooty creeture suffer for it ! No, Jack ! Ye would 
 rather pint your own toes up to the sky than do it. It ain't in 
 ye, Jack, and it ain't in me, so help me God !" 
 
 " This is all very touching, Mr. Conroy, and does credit, 
 sir, to your head and heart, and I kin feel it drawing Hall's 
 ball out of my leg while you're talkin'," said Jack, with his 
 black eyes evading Gabriel's and wandering to the entrance of 
 the tunnel. " What time is it, you d d old fool, ain't it dark 
 enough yet to git outer this hole ?" He groaned, and after a 
 pause added fiercely, " How do you know your wife did it ?" 
 
 Gabriel swiftly, and for him even concisely, related the events 
 of the day from his meeting with Ramirez in the morning, to 
 the time that he had stumbled upon the body of Victor 
 Ramirez on his return to keep the appointment at his wife's 
 written request. 
 
 Jack only interrupted him once to inquire why, after discover 
 ing the murder, he had not gone on to keep his appointment. 
 
 " I thought it want of no use/' said Gabriel, simply ; " I 
 didn't want to let her see I knowd it." 
 
 Hamlin groaned, "If you had you would have found her in 
 the company of the man who did do it, you daddering old 
 idiot !" 
 
 " What man?" asked Gabriel. 
 
 " The first man you saw your wife with that morning ; the 
 man I ought to be helping now, instead of lyin' here." 
 
 " You don't mean to allow, Jack, ez you reckon she didtil 
 do it ?" asked Gabriel, in alarm. 
 
/;/ Tcncbrls Servare Fidem. 3 1 3 
 
 " I do," said Hamlin, coolly. 
 
 " Then what did she reckon to let on by thet note ?" said 
 Gabriel, with a sudden look of cunning. 
 
 " Don't know," returned Jack, " like as not being a d d 
 fool, you didn't read it right ! hand it over and let me see it." 
 
 Gabriel (hesitatingly) : " I can't." 
 
 Hamlin: "You can't?" 
 
 Gabriel (apologetically) : " I tore it up !" 
 
 Hamlin (with frightful deliberation) : "You DID?" 
 
 -I did." 
 
 Jack (after a long crushing silence) : " Were you ever under 
 medical treatment for these spells ?" 
 
 Gabriel (with great simplicity and submission) : " They 
 ailers used to allow I waz queer." 
 
 Hamlin (after another pause) : " Has Pete Dumphy got 
 anything agin you ?" 
 
 Gabriel (surprisedly) : " No." 
 
 Hamlin (languidly : " It was his right hand man, his agent 
 at Wingdam that started up the Vigilantes ! 1 heard him, and 
 saw him in the crowd hounding 'em on." 
 
 Gabriel (simply) : " I reckon your out thar, Jack, Dumphy's 
 my friend. It was him that first gin me the money to open 
 this yer mine. And I'm his superintendent !" 
 
 Jack : " O !" (after another pause). " Is there any first-class 
 Lunatic Asylum in this county where they would take in two 
 men, one an incurable, and the other sufferin' from a gunshot 
 wound brought on by playin' with firearms ?" 
 
 Gabriel (with a deep sigh) : "Ye mus'n't talk, Jack, ye must 
 be quiet till dark." 
 
 Jack, dragged down by pain, and exhausted in the intervals 
 of each paroxysm was quiescent. 
 
 Gradually, the faint light that had filtered through the brush 
 and de'bris before the tunnel faded quite away, and a damp 
 charnel-house chill struck through the limbs of the two refugees, 
 and made them shiver ; the flow of water from the dripping 
 walls seemed to have increased ; Gabriel's experienced eye had 
 already noted that the earthquake had apparently opened 
 seams in the gully and closed up one of the leads. He care 
 fully laid his burden down again, and crept to the opening. 
 The distant hum of voices and occupation had ceased, the sun 
 was setting ; in a few moments, calculating on the brief twilight 
 
,314 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 of the Mountain region, it would be dark, and they might with 
 safety leave their hiding-place. As he was returning, he noticed 
 a slant beam of light, hitherto unobserved, crossing the tunnel 
 from an old drift. Examining it more closely, Gabriel was 
 amazed to find that during the earthquake a " cave" had taken 
 place in the drift, possibly precipitated by the shock, disclosing 
 the more surprising fact that there had been a previous slight 
 but positive excavation on the hill side, above the tunnel, that 
 .antedated any record of One Horse Gulch known to Gabriel. 
 He was perfectly familiar with every foot of the hill side, and 
 the existence of this ancient prospecting " hole" had never 
 been even suspected by him. While he was still gazing at the 
 opening, his foot struck against some glittering metallic sub 
 stance. He stooped and picked up a small tin can, not larger 
 than a sardine box, hermetically sealed and soldered, in which 
 some inscription had been traced, but which, the darkness of 
 the tunnel prevented his deciphering. In the faint' hope that 
 it might contain something of benefit to his companions, 
 Gabriel returned to the opening, and even ventured to step 
 beyond its shadow. But all attempts to read the inscription 
 were in vain. He opened the box with a sharp stone ; it con 
 tained, to his great disappointment, only a memorandum book 
 and some papers. He swept them into the pocket of his 
 blouse, and re-entered the tunnel. He had not been absent 
 altogether more than five minutes, but when he reached the 
 place where he had left Jack, Tie was gone ! 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 IN WHICH HECTOR ARISES FROM THE DITCH, 
 
 HE stood for a moment breathless and paralysed with surprise ; 
 then he began slowly and deliberately to examine the tunnel 
 step by step. When he had proceeded a hundred feet from 
 the spot, to his great relief he came upon Jack Hamlin, sitting 
 upright in a side drift. His manner was feverish and excited, 
 and his declaration that he had not moved from the place 
 where Gabriel had left him at once was accepted by the latter 
 as the aberration of incipient inflammation and fever. When 
 Gabriel stated that it was time to go, he replied, " Yes/' 7 and 
 added with such significance that his business with the 
 
Hector arises from the Ditch. 315 
 
 murderer of Victor Ramirez was now over, and that he was 
 ready to enter the Lunatic Asylum at once, that Gabriel with 
 great precipitation lifted him in his arms and carried him 
 without delay from the tunnel. Once more in the open air 
 the energies of both men seemed to rally ; Jack became <is a 
 mere feather in Gabriel's powerful arms, and even forgot his 
 querulous opposition to being treated as a helpless child, while 
 Gabriel trod the familiar banks of the ditch, climbed the long 
 ascent and threaded the aisles of the pillared pines of 
 Reservoir Hill with the free experienced feet of the moun 
 taineer, Here Gabriel knew he was safe until daybreak, and 
 gathered together some withered pine boughs and its fragrant 
 tassels for a couch for his helpless companion. And here, as 
 he feared, fever set in ; the respiration of the wounded man 
 grew quick and hurried; he began to talk rapidly and in 
 coherently, of Oily, of Ramirez, of the beautiful girl whose 
 picture hung upon his breast, of Gabriel himself, and finally 
 of a stranger who was, as it seemed to him, his sole auditor, 
 the gratuitous coinage of his excited fancy. Once or twice he 
 raised his voice to a shout, and then to Gabriel's great alarm 
 suddenly he began to sing, and before Gabriel could place his 
 hand upon his mouth he had trolled out the verse of a popular 
 ballad. The rushing river below them gurgled, beat its bars, 
 and sang an accompaniment, the swaying pine sighed and 
 creaked in unison, the patient stars above them stared and 
 bent breathlessly, and then to Gabriel's exalted consciousness 
 an echo of the wounded man's song arose from the gulch 
 below ! For a moment he held his breath with an awful 
 mingling of joy and fear. Was he going mad too ? or was it 
 really the voice of little Oily ? The delirious man beside him 
 answered his query with another verse ; the antiphonal 
 response rose again from the valley. Gabriel hesitated no 
 longer, but with feverish hands gathered a few dried twigs and 
 pine cones into a pile, and touched a match to them. At 
 the next moment they flashed a beacon to the sky, in another 
 there was a crackling of the underbrush and the hurried onset 
 of two figures, and before the slow Gabriel could recover from 
 his astonishment, Oily flew, panting, to his arms, while her 
 companion, the faithful Pete, sank breathlessly beside his 
 wounded and insensible master. 
 
 Oily was first to find her speech. That speech, after the 
 
316 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 unfailing instincts of her sex, in moments of excitement, was 
 the instant arraignment of somebody else as the cause of that 
 excitement, and at once put the whole universe on the 
 defensive. 
 
 " Why didn't you send word where you was ?" she said, 
 impatiently, " and wot did you have it so dark for, and up a 
 steep hill, and leavin' me alone at Wingdam, and why didn't 
 you call without singin' ?" 
 
 And then Gabriel, after the fashion of his sex, ignored all 
 but the present, and holding Oily in his arms, said 
 
 "It's my little girl, ain't it ? Come to her own brother 
 Gabe ! bless her !" 
 
 Whereat Mr. Hamlin, after the fashion of lunatics of any 
 sex, must needs be consistent, and break out again into song. 
 
 " He's loony, Oily, what with fever along o' bein' shot in 
 the leg a' savin' me, ez izn't worth savin'," explained Gabriel, 
 apologetically. " It was him ez did the singin'." 
 
 Then Oily, still following the feminine instinct, at once 
 deserted conscious rectitude for indefensible error, and flew to 
 Mr. Hamlin's side. 
 
 " O, where is he hurt, Pete ? is he going to die ?'' 
 
 And Pete, suspicious of any medication but his own, 
 replied doubtfully, " He looks bad, Miss Oily, dats a fac but 
 now bein' in my ban's, bress de Lord A'mighty, and we able 
 to minister to him, we hopes fur de bess. Your brudder 
 meant well, is a fair meanin' man, Miss a toll'able miss, but 
 he ain't got the peerfeshn'l knowledge dat Mars Jack in de 
 habit o' gettin'." Here Pete unslung from his shoulders a 
 wallet, and proceeded to extract therefrom a small medicine 
 case, with the resigned air of the family physician, who has been 
 called full late to remedy the practice of rustic empiricism. 
 
 "How did ye come yer?" asked Gabriel of Oily, when he 
 had submissively transferred his wounded charge to Pete. 
 "What made ye allow I was hidnY yer? How did ye reckon 
 to find me ? but ye was allus peart and onhanded, Oily," he 
 suggested, gazing admiringly at his sister. 
 
 " When I woke up at Wingdam, after Jack went away, who 
 should I find, Gabe, but Lawyer Maxwell standin' thar, and 
 askin' me a heap o' questions. I supposed you'd been makin' 
 a fool o' yourself agin, Gabe, and afore I let on thet I knowed 
 a word, I jist made him tell me everything about you, Gabe, 
 
Hector arises from the Ditch. 317 
 
 and it was orful ! and you bein' arrested fur murder, ez wouldn't 
 harm a fly, let alone that Mexican ez I never liked, Gabe, and 
 all this comes of tendin' his legs instead o' lookin' arter me. 
 And all them questions waz about July, and whether she 
 wasn't your enemy, and if they ever waz a woman, Gabe, ez 
 waz sweet on you, you know it was July ! And all thet kind o' 
 foolishness ! And then when he couldn't get ennythin' out o' 
 me agin July, he allowed to Pete that he must take me right 
 to you, fur he said they was talk o' the Vigilantes gettin' hold 
 o' ye afore the trial, and he was goin' to get an order to take 
 you outer the county, and he reckoned they wouldn't dare to 
 tech ye if I waz with ye, Gabe and I'd like to see 'em try it ! 
 and he allowed to Pete that he must take me right to you ! 
 And Pete and thar ain't a whiter nigger livin' than that ole 
 man said he would reckonin' you know to find Jack, as he 
 allowed to me they'd hev to kill afore they got you, and he 
 came down yer with me. And when we got yer you was off 
 and the sheriff gone and the Vigilantes what with bein' 
 killed, the biggest o' them, by the earthquake what was 
 orful, Gabe, but we bein' on the road didn't get to feel I 
 jest scared outer their butes ! And then a Chinyman gins us 
 your note " 
 
 " My note ?" interrupted Gabriel, " I didn't send ye any 
 note." 
 
 "Then his note." said Oily, impatiently, pointing to 
 Hamlin, " sayuY, ' You'll find your friends on Conroy's Hill !' 
 don't you see, Gabe ?" continued Oily, stamping her foot in 
 fury at her brother's slowness of comprehension, " and so we 
 came and heard Jack's singin', and a mighty foolish thing it 
 was to do, and yer we are !" 
 
 " But he didn't send any note, Oily," persisted Gabriel. 
 
 " Well, you awful old Gabe, what difference does it make 
 li'ho sent it ?" continued the practical Oily ; " here we are, 
 along o' thet note, and," she added, feeling in her pocket, 
 " there's the note !" 
 
 She handed Gabriel a small slip of paper with the pencilled 
 words, " You'll find your friends waiting for you to-night en 
 Conroy's Hill." 
 
 The handwriting was unfamiliar, but even if it were Jack's 
 how did he manage to send it without his knowledge ? He 
 had not lost sight of Jack except during the few moments he 
 
3 T 8 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 had reconnoitred the mouth of the tunnel, since they had 
 escaped from the Court House. Gabriel was perplexed ; in 
 the presence of this anonymous note he was confused and 
 speechless, and could only pass his hand helplessly across his 
 forehead. " But it's all right now, Gabe," continued Oily, 
 reassuringly, " the Vigilantes hev run away what was left of 
 them ; the sheriff ain't to be found nowhar ! This yer earth 
 quake hez frightened everybody outer the idea of huntin' ye 
 nobody talks of ennything but the earthquake ; they even say. 
 Gabe I forgot to tell ye that our claim on Conroy Hill has 
 busted, too, and the mine ain't worth shucks now ! But there's 
 no one to interfere with us now, Gabe ! And we're goin' to get 
 into a waggin that Pete hez bespoke for us at the head oi 
 Reservoir Gulch to-morrow mornin' at sun-up ! And then 
 Pete sez we kin git down to Stockton and 'Frisco and out to a 
 place called San Antonio, that the devil himself wouldn't think 
 o' goin' to, and thar we kin stay, me and you and Jack, until 
 this whole thing has blown over and Jack gits well agin and 
 July comes back." 
 
 Gabriel, still holding the hand of his sister, dared not tell 
 her of the suspicions of Lawyer Maxwell, regarding her sister- 
 in-law's complicity in this murder, nor Jack's conviction ot her 
 infidelity, and he hesitated. But afcer a pause, he suggested 
 with a consciousness ot great discretion and artfulness, " Sup 
 pose thet July doesn't come back ?" 
 
 " Look yer, Gabe/' said Oily, suddenly, " e^ yer goin' to be 
 thet foolish and ridiklus agin, I'll jess quit. Ez if thet woman 
 would ever leave ye." (Gabriel groaned inwardly.) "Why, 
 when she hears o' this, wild hosses couldn't keep her irom ye. 
 Don't be a mule, Gabe, don't !" And Gabriel was dumb. 
 
 Meantime, under the influence of some anodyne which Pete 
 had found in his medicine chest, Mr. Hamlin became quiet 
 and pretermitted his vocal obligate. Gabriel, whose superb 
 physical adjustment no mental excitement could possibly over 
 throw, and whose regular habits were never broken by anxiety, 
 nodded, even while holding Olly's hand, and in due time slept, 
 and I regret to say writing of a hero snored. After a while 
 Oily herself succumbed to the drowsy coolness of the night, 
 and wrapped in Mr. Hamlin's shawl, pillowed her head upon 
 her brother's broad breast and slept too. Only Pete remained 
 to keep the watch, he being comparatively fresh and strong, 
 
Hector arises from the Ditch. 319 
 
 and declaring that the condition of Mr. Hamlin required his 
 constant attention. 
 
 It was after midnight that Oily dreamed a troubled dream. 
 She thought that she was riding with Mr. Hamlin to seek her 
 brother, when she suddenly came upon a crowd of excited men 
 who were bearing Gabriel to the gallows. She thought that she 
 turned to Mr. Hamlin frantically for assistance, when she saw 
 to her horror that his face had changed that it was no longer 
 he who sat beside her, but a strange, wild-looking, haggard 
 man a man whose face was old and pinched, but whose grey 
 hair was discoloured by a faded dye that had worn away, leav 
 ing the original colour in patches, and the antique foppery of 
 whose dress was deranged by violent exertion, and grimy with 
 the dust of travel a dandy whose strapped trousers of a by 
 gone fashion were ridiculously loosened in one leg, whose high 
 stock was unbuckled and awry ! She awoke with a start. Even 
 then her dream was so vivid that it seemed to her this face was 
 actually bending over her with such a pathetic earnestness and 
 inquiry that she called aloud. It was some minutes before 
 Pete came to her, but as he averred, albeit somewhat inco 
 herently and rubbing his eyes to show that he had not closed 
 them, that he had never slept a wink, and that it was impossible 
 for any stranger to have come upon them without his know 
 ledge, Oily was obliged to accept it all as a dream ! But she 
 did not sleep again. She watched the moon slowly sink behind 
 the serrated pines of Conroy's Hill ; she listened to the crack 
 ling tread of strange animals in the underbrush, to the far- oft" 
 rattle of wheels on the Wingdam turnpike, until the dark out 
 line of the tree-trunks returned, and with the cold fires of 
 the mountain sunrise the chilly treetops awoke to winged life, 
 and the twitter of birds, while the faint mists of the river 
 lingered with the paling moon like tired sentinels for the relief 
 of the coming day. And then Oily awoke her companions. 
 They struggled back into consciousness with characteristic 
 expression, Gabriel slowly and apologetically, as of one who 
 had overslept himself; Jack Hamlin violently and aggressively, 
 as if some unfair advantage had been taken of his human weak 
 ness that it was necessary to combat at once. I am sorry to 
 say that his recognition of Pete was accompanied by a degree 
 of profanity and irreverence that was dangerous to his own 
 physical weakness. " And you had to trapse down yer, sniffin* 
 
320 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 about my tracks, you black and tan idiot/' continued Mr. 
 Hamlin, raising himself on his arm, " and after I'd left every- 
 thing all straight at Wingdam and jest as I was beginning to 
 reform and lead a new life ! How do, Oily ? You'll excuse 
 my not rising. Come and kiss me ! If that nigger of mine has 
 let you want for anything, jest tell me and I'll discharge him. 
 Well ! hang it all ! what are you waitin' for ? Here it's day 
 break and we've got to get down to the head of Reservoir 
 Gulch. Come, little children, the picnic is over !" 
 
 Thus adjured, Gabriel rose, and lifting Mr. Hamlin in his 
 arms with infinite care and tenderness, headed the quaint pro 
 cession. Mr. Hamlin, perhaps recognising some absurdity in 
 the situation, forbore exercising his querulous profanity on the 
 man who held him helpless as an infant, and Oily and Pete 
 followed slowly behind. 
 
 Their way led down Reservoir Canon, beautiful, hopeful, 
 and bracing in the early morning air. A few birds, awakened 
 by the passing tread, started into song a moment, and then 
 were still. With a cautious gentleness, habitual to the man, 
 Gabriel forbore, as he strode along, to step upon the few 
 woodland blossoms yet left to the dry summer woods. There 
 was a strange fragrance in the air, the light odours liberated 
 from a thousand nameless herbs, the faint melancholy spicing 
 of dead leaves. There was, moreover, that sense of novelty 
 which Nature always brings with the dawn in deep forests ; a 
 fancy that during the night the earth had been created anew, 
 and was fresh from the Maker's hand, as yet untried by burden 
 or tribulation, and guiltless of a Past. And so it seemed to the 
 little caravan albeit fleeing from danger and death that 
 yesterday and its fears were far away, or had, in some un 
 accountable way, shrunk behind them in the west with the 
 swiftly dwindling night. Oily, once or twice, strayed from the 
 trail to pick an opening flower or lingering berry ; Pete hummed 
 to himself the fragment of an old camp-meeting song. 
 
 And so they walked on, keeping the rosy dawn and its 
 promise before them. From time to time the sound of far-off 
 voices came to them faintly. Slowly the light quickened ; 
 morning stole down the hills upon them stealthily, and at last 
 the entrance of the canon became dimly outlined. Oily uttered 
 a shout and pointed to a black object moving backward and 
 forward before the opening. It was the waggon and team 
 
Hector arises from the Ditch. 321 
 
 awaiting them. Olly's shout was answered by a whistle from 
 the driver, and they quickened their pace joyfully ; in another 
 moment they would be beyond the reach of danger. 
 
 Suddenly a voice that seemed to start from the ground before 
 them called on Gabriel to stop ! He did so unconsciously, 
 drawing Hamlin closer to him with one hand, and with the 
 other making a broad protecting sweep toward Oily. And then 
 a figure rose slowly from the ditch at the roadside, and barred 
 their passage. 
 
 It was only a single man ! A small man bespattered with 
 the slime of the ditch and torn with brambles ; a man ex 
 hausted with fatigue and tremulous with nervous excitement, 
 but still erect and threatening. A man whom Gabriel and 
 Hamlin instantly recognised, even through his rags and ex 
 haustion ! It was Joe Hall the sheriff of Calaveras ! He 
 held a pistol in his right hand, even while his left exhaustedly 
 sought the support of a tree ! By a common instinct both men 
 saw that while the hand was feeble the muzzle of the weapon 
 covered them. 
 
 " Gabriel Conroy, I want you," said the apparition. 
 
 " He's got us lined ! Drop me," whispered Hamlin, hastily, 
 " drop me ! I'll spoil his aim." 
 
 But Gabriel, by a swift, dexterous movement that seemed 
 incompatible with his usual deliberation, instantly transferred 
 Hamlin to his other arm, and with his burden completely 
 shielded, presented his own right shoulder squarely to the 
 muzzle of Hall's revolver. 
 
 " Gabriel Conroy, you are my prisoner," repeated the voice. 
 
 Gabriel did not move. But over his shoulder as a rest, 
 dropped the long shining barrel of Jack's own favourite duel 
 ling pistol, and over it glanced the bright eye of its crippled 
 owner. The issue was joined ! 
 
 There was a deathlike silence. 
 
 " Go on !" said Jack, quietly. " Keep cool, Joe. For if you 
 miss him, you're gone in ; and hit or miss I've got you sure !" 
 
 The barrel of Hall's pistol wavered a moment, from physical 
 weakness but not from fear. The great heart behind it, though 
 broken, was undaunted. 
 
 "It's all right," said the voice, fatefully. "It's all right, 
 Jack ! Ye'll kill me, I know ! But ye can't help sayin' arter 
 all that I did my duty to Calaveras as the sheriff, and 'specially 
 
 Y 
 
322 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 to them twenty five men ez elected me over Boggs ! I ain i 
 goin' to let ye pass. I've been on this yer hunt, up and down 
 this canon all night. Hevin' no possy I reckon I've got to die 
 yer in my tracks. All right ! But ye'll git into thet waggon 
 over my dead body, Jack over my dead body, sure." 
 
 Even as he spoke these words he straightened himself to his 
 full height which was not much, I fear and steadied himself 
 by the tree, his weapon still advanced and pointing at Gabriel, 
 but with such an evident and hopeless contrast between his 
 determination and his evident inability to execute it, that his 
 attitude impressed his audience less with its heroism than its 
 half-pathetic absurdity. 
 
 Mr. Hamlin laughed. But even then he suddenly felt the 
 grasp of Gabriel relax, found himself slipping to his companion's 
 feet, and the next moment was deposited carefully but ignomi- 
 niously on the ground by Gabriel, who strode quietly and com 
 posedly up to the muzzle of the sheriff's pistol. 
 
 " I am ready to go with ye, Mr. Hall," he said, gently, 
 putting the pistol aside with a certain large indifferent wave of 
 the hand, " ready to go with ye now at onct ! But I've one 
 little favour to ax ye. This yer pore young man, ez yur 
 wounded, unbeknownst," he said, pointing to Hamlin, who was 
 writhing and gritting his teeth in helpless rage and fury, " ez 
 not to be tuk with me, nor for me ! Thar ain't nothin' to be 
 done to him. He hez been dragged inter this fight. But I'm 
 ready to go with ye now, Mr. Hall, and am sorry you got into 
 the troubil along o' me." 
 
BOOK VII. THE BED ROCK. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 IN THE TRACK OF A STORM. 
 
 A QUARTER of an hour before the messenger of Peter Dumphy 
 had reached Poinsett's office, Mr. Poinsett had received a 
 more urgent message. A telegraph despatched from San 
 Antonio had been put into his hands. Its few curt words, more 
 significant to an imaginative man than rhetorical expression, ran 
 as follows : 
 
 ' ; [Mission Church destroyed. Father Felipe safe. Blessed Trinity in 
 ruins and Dolores missing. My house spared. Come at once. MARIA 
 SEPULVIDA." 
 
 The following afternoon at four o'clock Arthur Poinsett 
 reached San Geronimo, within fifteen miles of his destination. 
 Here the despatch was confirmed with some slight local exag 
 geration. 
 
 " Saints and devils ! There is no longer a St. Anthony ! 
 The temblor has swallowed him !" said the innkeper, senten- 
 tiously. "It is the end of all ! Such is the world. Thou wilt 
 find stones on stones instead of houses, Don Arturo. Where 
 fore another glass of the brandy of France, or the whisky of the 
 American, as thou dost prefer. But of San Antonio nothing ! 
 Absolutely perfectly truly nothing !" 
 
 In spite of this cheering prophecy, Mr. Poinsett did not wait 
 for the slow diligence, but mounting a fleet mustang dashed off 
 in quest of the missing Mission. He was somewhat relieved at 
 the end of an hour by the far-off flash of the sea, the rising of 
 the dark green fringe of the Mission orchard and Encinal, and 
 above it the white dome of one of the Mission towers. But at 
 the next moment Arthur checked his horse and rubbed his eyes 
 in wonder. Where was the other tower ? He put spurs to his 
 horse again and dashed off at another angle, and again stopped 
 
 v2 
 
324 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 and gazed. There was but one tower remaining. The Mission 
 Church must have been destroyed ! 
 
 Perhaps it was this discovery, perhaps it was some instinct 
 stronger than this ; but when Arthur had satisfied himself of 
 this fact he left the direct road, which would have brought him 
 to the Mission, and diverged upon the open plain towards the 
 Rancho of the Blessed Trinity. A fierce wind from the sea 
 swept the broad llano and seemed to oppose him, step by step 
 a wind so persistent and gratuitous that it appeared to Arthur 
 to possess a moral quality, and as such was to be resisted and 
 overcome by his superior will. Here, at least, all was un 
 changed ; here was the dead, flat monotony of land and sky, 
 Here was the brittle, harsh stubble of the summer fields, sun 
 baked and wind-dried ; here were the long stretches of silence, 
 from which even the harrying wind made no opposition nor 
 complaint ; here were the formless specks of slowly-moving 
 ;attle, even as he remembered them before. A momentary chill 
 came over him as he recalled his own perilous experience on 
 these plains, a momentary glow suffused his cheek as he thought 
 of his rescue by the lovely but cold recluse. Again he heard 
 the name of " Philip " softly whispered in his ears, again he 
 felt the flood of old memories sweep over him as he rode, even 
 as he had felt them when he lay that day panting upon the 
 earth. And yet Arthur had long since convinced his mind that 
 he was mistaken in supposing that Donna Dolores had addressed 
 him at that extreme moment as " Philip " he had long since 
 believed it was a trick of his disordered and exhausted brain ; 
 the conduct of Dolores towards himself, habitually restrained 
 by grave courtesy, never justified him in directly asking the 
 question, nor suggested any familiarity that might have made 
 it probable. She had never alluded to it again but had ap 
 parently forgotten it. Not so Arthur ! He had often gone over 
 that memorable scene, with a strange, tormenting pleasure that 
 was almost a pain. It was the one incident of his life, for whose 
 poetry he was not immediately responsible the one genuine 
 heart-thrill whose sincerity he had not afterwards stopped to 
 question in his critical fashion, the one enjoyment that had not 
 afterwards appeared mean and delusive. And now the heroine 
 of this episode was missing, and he might never perhaps see 
 her again ! And yet when he first heard the news he was 
 conscious of a strange sense of relief rather let me say of an 
 
/;/ the Track of a Storm. 325 
 
 awakening from a dream, that though delicious, had become 
 dangerous and might unfit him for the practical duties of his 
 life. Donna Dolores had never affected him as a real person 
 age at least the interest he felt in her was, he had always 
 considered, due to her relations to some romantic condition of 
 his mind, and her final disappearance from the plane of his 
 mental vision was only the exit of an actress from the mimic 
 stage. It seemed only natural that she should disappear as 
 mysteriously as she came. There was no shock even to the 
 instincts of his ordinary humanity it was no catastrophe 
 involving loss of life or even suffering to the subject or 
 spectator. 
 
 Such at least was Mr. Poinsett's analysis of his own mental 
 condition on the receipt of Donna Maria's telegram. It was 
 the cool self-examination of a man who believed himself cold 
 blooded and selfish, superior to the weakness of ordinary 
 humanity, and yet was conscious of neither pride nor disgrace 
 in the belief. Yet when he diverged from his direct road to the 
 Mission, and turned his horse's head toward the home of Donna 
 Dolores, he was conscious of a new impulse and anxiety that 
 was stronger than his reason. Unable as he was to resist it, he 
 still took some satisfaction in believing that it was nearly akin 
 to that feeling which years before had driven him back to Starva 
 tion Camp in quest of the survivors. Suddenly his horse re 
 coiled with a bound that would have unseated a less skilful 
 rider. Directly across his path stretched a chasm in the level 
 plain thirty feet broad and as many feet in depth, and at its 
 bottom in undistinguishable confusion lay the wreck of the 
 corral of the Blessed Trinity ! 
 
 Except for the enormous size and depth of this fissure 
 Arthur might have mistaken it for the characteristic cracks in 
 the sun-burnt plain, which the long dry summer had wrought 
 upon its surface, some of which were so broad as to task the 
 agility of his horse. But a second glance convinced him of 
 the different character of the phenomenon. The earth had 
 not cracked asunder nor separated, but had sunk. The width 
 of the chasm below was nearly equal to the width above ; the 
 iioor of this valley in miniature was carpeted by the same 
 dry, brittle herbs and grasses which grew upon the plain 
 around him. 
 
 In the pre-occupation of the last hour he had forgotten the 
 
326 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 distance he had traversed. He had evidently ridden faster 
 than he had imagined. But if this was really the corral, the 
 walls of the Rancho should now be in sight at the base of the 
 mountain ! He turned in that direction. Nothing was to be 
 seen ! Only the monotonous plain stretched before him, vast 
 and unbroken. Between the chasm where he stood and the 
 falda of the first low foot-hills neither roof nor wall nor ruin 
 rose above the dull, dead level ! 
 
 An ominous chill ran through his veins, and for an instant 
 the reins slipped through his relaxed ringers. Good God ! 
 Could this have been what Donna Maria meant, or had there 
 been a later convulsion of Nature ? He looked around him. 
 The vast, far-stretching plain, desolate and trackless as the 
 shining ocean beyond, took upon itself an awful likeness to 
 that element ! Standing on the brink of the revealed treachery 
 of that yawning chasm, Arthur Poinsett read the fate of the 
 Rancho. In the storm that had stirred the depths of this 
 motionless level, the Rancho and its miserable inmates had 
 foundered and gone down ! 
 
 Arthur's first impulse was to push on towards the scene of 
 the disaster, in the vague hope of rendering some service. 
 But the chasm before him was impassable, and seemed to 
 continue to the sea beyond. Then he reflected that the 
 catastrophe briefly told in Donna Maria's despatch had 
 happened twenty-four hours before, and help was perhaps use 
 less now. He cursed the insane impulse that had brought him 
 here, aimlessly and without guidance, and left him powerless 
 even to reach the object of his quest. If he had only gone 
 first to the Mission, asked the advice and assistance of Father 
 Felipe, or learned at least the full details of the disaster ! He 
 uttered an oath, rare to his usual calm expression, and wheeling 
 his horse, galloped fiercely back towards the Mission. 
 
 Night had deepened over the plain. With the going down 
 of the sun a fog that had been stealthily encompassing the 
 coast line stole with soft step across the shining beach, dulled 
 its lustre, and then moved slowly and solemnly upon the plain, 
 blotting out the Point of Pines, at first salient with its sparkling 
 Light-house, but now undistinguishable from the grey sea above 
 and below, until it reached the 'galloping horse and its rider, 
 and then, as it seemed to Arthur, isolated them from the rest 
 of the world from even the pencilled outlines of the distant 
 
In the Track of a S tor in. 327 
 
 foot-hills, that it at last sponged from the blue-grey slate before 
 him. At times the far-off tolling of a fog- bell came faintly to 
 his ear, but all sound seemed to be blotted out by the fog ; 
 even the rapid fall of his horse's hoofs were muffled and 
 indistinct By degrees the impression that he was riding in a. 
 dream overcame him, and was accepted by him without 
 questioning or deliberation. 
 
 It seemed to be a consistent part of the dream or vision 
 when he rode or rather as it seemed to him, was borne by the 
 fog into the outlying fields and lanes of the Mission. A few 
 lights, with a nimbus of fog around them, made the narrow 
 street of the town appear still more ghostly and unreal as he 
 plunged through its obscurity towards the plaza and church. 
 Even by the dim grey light he could see that one of the towers 
 had fallen, and that the eastern wing and Refectory were a mass 
 of shapeless ruin. And what would at another time have 
 excited his surprise now only struck him as a natural part of 
 his dream, the church a blaze of light and filled with throng 
 ing worshippers ! Still possessed by his strange fancy, Arthur 
 Poinsett dismounted, led his horse beneath the shed beside the 
 remaining tower, and entered the building. The body and nave 
 of the church were intact ; the outlandish paintings still hung 
 from the walls ; the waxen effigies of the Blessed Virgin and the 
 saints still leaned from their niches, yellow and lank, and at 
 the high altar Father Felipe was officiating. As he entered a 
 dirge broke from the choir ; he saw that the altar and its offer 
 ings were draped in black, and in the first words uttered by the 
 priest Arthur recognised the mass for the dead ! The feverish 
 impatience that had filled his breast and heightened the colour 
 of his cheeks for the last hour was gone. He sunk upon a 
 bench beside one of the worshippers and buried his face in his 
 hands. The voice of the organ rose again faintly ; the quaint- 
 voiced choir awoke, the fumes of incense filled the church, and 
 the monotonous accents of the priest fell soothingly upon his 
 ear, and Arthur seemed to sleep. I say seemed to sleep, for 
 ten minutes later he came to himself with a start as if awaken 
 ing from a troubled dream, with the voice of Padre Felipe ik 
 his ear, and the soft, caressing touch of Padre Felipe on hi? 
 shoulder. The worshippers had dispersed, the church was dark, 
 save a few candles still burning on the high altar, and for an 
 instant he could not recal himself. 
 
328 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " I knew you would come, son," said Padre Felipe ; " but 
 where is she ? Did you bring her with you?" 
 
 " Who ?" asked Arthur, striving to recal his scattered senses. 
 
 "Who? Saints preserve us, Don Arturo ! She who sent 
 for you Donna Maria ! Did you not get her message ?' ; 
 
 Arthur replied that he had only just arrived, and had at once 
 hastened to the Mission. For some reason that he was ashamed 
 to confess he did not say that he had tried to reach the Rancho 
 of the Blessed Trinity, nor did he admit that he had forgotten 
 for the last two hours even the existence of Donna Maria. 
 "You were having a mass for the dead, Father Felipe? you 
 have then suffered here ?" 
 
 He paused anxiously, for in his then confused state of mind 
 he doubted how much of his late consciousness had been real 
 or visionary. 
 
 " Mother of God," said Father Felipe, eyeing Arthur 
 curiously. "You know not then for whom was this mass? 
 You know not that a saint has gone that Donna Dolores has 
 at last met her reward ?" 
 
 " I have heard that is, Donna Maria's despatch said that 
 she was missing," stammered Arthur, feeling, with a new and 
 un supportable disbelief in himself, that his face was very pale 
 and his voice uncertain. 
 
 " Missing !" echoed Father Felipe, with the least trace of 
 impatience in his voice. " Missing ! She will be found when 
 the Rancho of the Blessed Trinity is restored when the ruins 
 of the casa, sunk fifty feet below the surface, are brought again 
 to the level of the plain. Missing, Don Arturo ! ah ! missing 
 indeed ! for ever ! always, entirely !" 
 
 Moved perhaps by something in Arthur's face, Padre Felipe 
 sketched in a few graphic pictures the details of the catastrophe 
 already forecast by Arthur. It was a repetition of the story of 
 the sunken corral. The earthquake had not only levelled the 
 walls of the Rancho of the Blessed Trinity, but had opened a 
 grave-like chasm fifty feet below it, and none had escaped to 
 tell the tale. The faithful vaqueros had rushed from the 
 trembling and undulating plain to the Rancho, only to see it 
 topple into a yawning abyss that opened to receive it. Don 
 Juan, Donna Dolores, the faithful Manuela, and Alejandro, 
 the major domo, with a dozen peons and retainers, went down 
 with the crumbling walls. No one had escaped. Was it not 
 
In the Track of a Storm. 329 
 
 possible to dig in the ruins for the bodies ? Mother of God ! 
 had not Don Arturo been told that the earth at the second 
 shock had closed over the sunken ruins, burying beyond mortal 
 resurrection all that the Rancho contained ? They were digging, 
 but hopelessly a dozen men. They might weeks hence 
 discover the bodies but who knows ? 
 
 The meek, fatalistic way that Father Felipe accepted the 
 final doom of Donna Dolores exasperated Arthur beyond 
 bounds. In San Francisco a hundred men would have been 
 digging night and day in the mere chance of recovering the 
 buried family. Here but Arthur remembered the sluggish, 
 helpless retainers of Salvatierra, the dreadful fatalism which 
 affected them on the occurrence of this mysterious catastrophe, 
 even as shown in the man before him, their accepted guide and 
 leader and shuddered. Could anything be done ? Could he 
 not, with Dumphy's assistance, procure a gang of men from 
 San Francisco ? And then came the instinct of caution, 
 always powerful with a nature like Arthur's. If these people, 
 most concerned in the loss of their friends, their relations, 
 accepted it so hopelessly what right had he a mere stranger 
 to interfere ? 
 
 " But come, my son," said Padre Felipe, laying his large soft 
 hand, parentally, on Arthur's shoulder. " Come, come with 
 me to my rooms. Thanks to the Blessed Virgin I have still 
 shelter and a roof to offer you. Ah/' he added, stroking 
 Arthur's riding-coat, and examining critically as if he had been 
 a large child, " what have we what is this, eh ? You are wet 
 with this heretic fog eh? Your hands are cold, and your 
 cheeks hot. You have fatigue ! Possibly most possibly 
 hunger ! No ! No ! It is so. Come with me, come !" and 
 drawing Arthur's passive arm through his own, he opened the 
 vestry door, and led him across the little garden, choked with 
 de'bris and plaster of the fallen tower, to a small adobe build 
 ing that had been the Mission schoolroom. It was now 
 hastily fitted up as Padre Felipe's own private apartment and 
 meditative cell. A bright fire burned in the low, oven-like 
 hearth. Around the walls hung various texts illustrating the 
 achievement of youthful penmanship with profound religious 
 instruction. At the extremity of the room there was a small 
 organ. Midway and opposite the hearth was a deep embra 
 sured window the window at which two weeks before, Mr. 
 
330 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Jack Hamlin had beheld the Donna Dolores. "She spent 
 much of her time here, dear child, in the instruction of the 
 young," said Father Felipe, taking a huge pinch of snuff, and 
 applying a large red bandana handkerchief to his eyes and 
 nose. " It is her best monument ! Thanks to her largess 
 and she was ever free-handed, Don Arturo, to the Church 
 the foundation of the Convent of our Lady of Sorrows, her 
 own patron saint, thou seest here. Thou knowest, possibly 
 most possibly as her legal adviser that long ago. by her will, 
 the whole of the Salvatierra Estate is a benefaction to the 
 Holy Church, eh?" 
 
 " No, I don't !" said Arthur, suddenly, awakening with a 
 glow of Protestant and heretical objection that was new to 
 him, and eyeing Padre Felipe with the first glance of suspicion 
 he had ever cast upon that venerable ecclesiastic. " No, sir, I 
 never heard any intimation or suggestion of the kind from the 
 late Donna Dolores. On the contrary, I was engaged " 
 
 " Pardon pardon me, my son," interrupted Father Felipe, 
 taking another large pinch of snuff. " It is not now, scarce 
 twenty-four hours since the dear child was translated not in 
 her masses and while her virgin strewments are not yet faded 
 that we will talk of this" (he blew his nose violently). 
 " No ! All in good time thou shalt see ! But I have some 
 thing here," he continued, turning over some letters and papers 
 in his desk. "Something for you possibly, most possibly, 
 more urgent. It is a telegraphic despatch for you, to my care." 
 
 He handed a yellow envelope to Arthur. But Poinsett's 
 eyes were suddenly fixed upon a card which lay upon Padre 
 Felipe's table, and which the Padre's search for the despatch 
 had disclosed. Written across its face was the name of Colonel 
 Culpepper Starbottle of Siskiyou ! "Do you know that man ?" 
 asked Poinsett, holding the despatch unopened in his hand, 
 and pointing to the card. 
 
 Father Felipe took another pinch of snuff. " Possibly 
 most possibly ! A lawyer, I think I think ! Some business 
 of the church property ! I have forgotten. But your despatch, 
 Don Arturo. What says it ? It does not take you from us ? 
 And you only an hour here ?" 
 
 Father Felipe paused, and looking up innocently, found the 
 eyes of Arthur regarding him gravely. The two men examined 
 tach other intently. Arthur's eyes, at last, withdrew from the 
 
In the Track of a Storm. 331 
 
 clear, unshrinking glance of Padre Felipe, unabashed but un 
 satisfied. A sudden recollection of the thousand and one scan 
 dals against the Church, and wild stories of its far-reaching- 
 influence a swift remembrance of the specious craft and cun 
 ning charged upon the religious order of which Padre Felipe 
 was a member scandals that he had hitherto laughed at as 
 idle flashed through his mind. Conscious that he was now 
 putting himself in a guarded attitude before the man with whom 
 he had always been free and outspoken, Arthur, after a mo 
 ment's embarrassment that was new to him. turned for relief to 
 the despatch and opened it In an instant it drove all other 
 thoughts from his mind. Its few words were from Dumphy 
 and ran, characteristically, as follows : " Gabriel Conroy ar 
 rested for murder of Victor Ramirez. What do you propose ? 
 Answer/'' 
 
 Arthur rose to his feet. " When does the up-stage pass 
 through San Geronimo ?" he asked, hurriedly. 
 
 "At midnight!" returned Padre Felipe. "Surely, my son.. 
 
 you do not intend " 
 
 " And it is now nine o'clock," continued Arthur, consulting 
 his watch. " Can you procure me a fresh horse ? It is of the 
 greatest importance, Father," he added, recovering his usual 
 frankness. 
 
 " Ah ! it is urgent ! it is a matter " suggested the 
 
 Padre, gently. 
 
 " Of life and death !" responded Arthur, gravely. 
 Father Felipe rang a bell and gave some directions to a. 
 servant, while Arthur, seating himself at the table, wrote an 
 answer to the despatch. " I can trust you to send it as soon 
 as possible to the telegraph office," he said, handing it to 
 Father Felipe. 
 
 The Padre took it in his hand, but glanced anxiously at 
 Arthur. "And Donna Maria?" he said, hesitatingly; "you 
 have not seen her yet ! Surely you will stop at the Blessed 
 Fisherman, if only for a moment, eh ?" 
 
 Arthur drew his riding coat and cape over his shoulders 
 with a mischievous smile. " I am afraid not, Father ; I shall 
 trust to you to explain that I was recalled suddenly, and that 
 I had not time to call; knowing the fascinations of your 
 society, Father, she will not begrudge the few moments I have 
 spent with you." 
 
332 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Before Father Felipe could reply the servant entered with 
 the announcement that the horse was ready. 
 
 " Good night, Father Felipe," said Arthur, pressing the 
 priest's hands warmly, with every trace of his former suspi- 
 ciousness gone. "Good night. A thousand thanks for the 
 horse. In speeding the parting guest," he added, gravely, 
 " you have perhaps done more for the health of my soul than 
 you imagine good night. AdiosF 
 
 With a light laugh in his ears, the vision of a graceful, erect 
 figure, waving a salute from a phantom steed, an inward rush 
 of the cold grey fog, and muffled clatter of hoofs over the 
 mouldy and mossy marbles in the churchyard, Father Felipe 
 parted from his guest. He uttered a characteristic adjuration, 
 took a pinch of snuff, and closing the door, picked up the card 
 of the gallant Colonel Starbottle and tossed it into the fire. 
 
 But the perplexities of the holy Father ceased not with the 
 night. At an early hour in the morning, Donna Maria Sepul- 
 .vida appeared before him at breakfast, suspicious, indignant. 
 and irate. 
 
 " Tell me, Father Felipe," she said, hastily, " did the Don 
 Arturo pass the night here ?" 
 
 " Truly no, my daughter," answered the Padre, cautiously. 
 " He was here but for a little : 
 
 " And he went away when ?" interrupted Donna Maria. 
 
 "At nine." 
 
 "And where?" continued Donna Maria, with a rising colour. 
 
 " To San Francisco, my child ; it was business of great im 
 portance but sit down, sit, little one ! This impatience is of 
 /the devil, daughter, you must calm yourself." 
 
 "And do you know, Father Felipe, that he went away 
 without coming near me ?" continued Donna Maria, in a higher 
 key, scarcely heeding her ghostly confessor. 
 
 " Possibly, most possibly ! But he received a despatch it 
 was of the greatest importance." 
 
 "A despatch !" repeated Donna Maria, scornfully. "Truly 
 - from whom ?" 
 
 " I know not, my child," said Father Felipe, gazing at the 
 pink cheeks, indignant eyes, and slightly swollen eyelids of his 
 visitor ; " this impatience this anger is most unseemly." 
 
 " Was it from Mr. Dumphy ?" reiterated Donna Maria, stamp 
 ing her little foot. 
 
In the Track of a Storm. 335. 
 
 Father Felipe drew back his chair. Through what unhal 
 lowed spell had this woman once the meekest and humblest 
 of wives become the shrillest and most shrewest of widows ? 
 Was she about to revenge herself on Arthur for her long 
 suffering with the late Don Jose ? Father Felipe pitied Arthur 
 now and prospectively. 
 
 " Are you going to tell me ?'' said Donna Maria, tremulously, 
 with alarming symptoms of hysteria. 
 
 " I believe it was from Mr. Dumphy," stammered Padre 
 Felipe. " At least the answer Don Arturo gave me to send in 
 reply only these words, ' I will return at once' was addressed to 
 Mr. Dumphy. But I know not what was the message /^received." 
 
 " You don't !" said Donna Maria, rising to her feet, with 
 white in her cheek, fire in her eyes, and a stridulous pitch in 
 her voice. " You don't ! Well ! I will tell you ! It was 
 the same news that this brought." She took a telegraphic 
 despatch from her pocket and shook it in the face of Father 
 Felipe. " There ! read it ! That was the news sent to him ! 
 That was the reason why he turned and ran away like a coward 
 as he is ! That was the reason why he never came near me r 
 like a perjured traitor as he is ! That is the reason why he 
 came to you with his fastidious airs and his supercilious smile 
 and his his O how I HATE HIM ! That is why ! read it f 
 read it ! Why don't you read it ?" (she had been gesticulating 
 with it, waving it in the air wildly, and evading every attempt 
 of Father Felipe to take it from her). " Read it ! Read it and 
 see why ! Read and see that I am ruined ! a beggar ! a 
 cajoled and tricked and deceived woman between these two 
 villains, Dumphy and Mis ter Arthur Poin sett ! Ah ! 
 Read it or are you a traitor too ? You and Dolores and all " 
 
 She crumpled the paper in her hands, threw it on the floor, 
 whitened suddenly round the lips, and then followed the paper as 
 suddenly, at full length, in a nervous spasm at Father Felipe's 
 feet. Father Felipe gazed, first at the paper and then at the 
 rigid form of his friend. He was a man, an old one with 
 some experience of the sex, and I regret to say he picked up 
 the paper first, and straightened it out. It was a telegraphic 
 despatch in the following words :- 
 
 " Sorry to say telegram just received that earthquake has dropped out 
 jlead of Conroy Mine ! Everything gone up ! Can't make further ad 
 vances, or sell stock. DUMPHY." 
 
5 34 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Father Felipe bent over Donna Maria and raised her in his 
 arms. " Poor little one !" he said. " But I don't think Arthur 
 .knew it." 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE YELLOW ENVELOPE. 
 
 FOR once, by a cruel irony, the adverse reports regarding the 
 stability of the Conroy mine were true. A few stockholders still 
 clung to the belief that it was a fabrication to depress the stock, 
 but the fact as stated in Mr. Dumphy's despatch to Donna 
 Maria was in possession of the public. The stock fell to $35, 
 to $30, to $10 to nothing! An hour after the earthquake it 
 was known in One Horse Gulch that the " lead" had " dropped" 
 suddenly, and that a veil of granite of incalculable thickness 
 had been upheaved between the seekers and the treasure, now 
 lost in the mysterious depths below. The vein was gone ! 
 Where ? no one could tell. There were various theories, more 
 or less learned : there was one party who believed in the " sub 
 sidence" of the vein, another who believed in the " interposi 
 tion" of the granite, but all tending to the same conclusion 
 the inaccessibility of the treasure. Science pointed with stony 
 iinger to the evidence of previous phenomena of the same cha 
 racter visible throughout the Gulch. But the grim " I told you 
 so" of Nature was, I fear, no more satisfactory to the dwellers 
 of One Horse Gulch than the ordinary prophetic distrust of 
 common humanity. 
 
 The news spread quickly and far. It overtook several wan 
 dering Californians in Europe, and sent them to their bankers 
 with anxious faces ; it paled the cheeks of one or two guardians 
 of orphan children, frightened several widows, drove a confi 
 dential clerk into shameful exile, and struck Mr. Raynor in 
 Boston with such consternation, that people for the first time 
 suspected that he had backed his opinion of the resources of 
 California with capital. Throughout the length and breadth 
 of the Pacific slope it produced a movement of aggression 
 which the earthquake had hitherto failed to cover. The pro 
 babilities of danger to life and limb by a recurrence of the 
 shock had been dismissed from the public consideration, but 
 this actual loss of characteristic property awakened the gravest 
 
The Yellow Envelope. 335 
 
 anxiety. If Nature claimed the privilege of at any time with 
 drawing from that implied contract under which so many of 
 California's best citizens had occupied and improved the coun 
 try, it was high time that something should he done. Thus 
 spake an intelligent and unfettered press. A few old residents 
 talked of returning to the East. 
 
 During this excitement Mr. Dumphy bore himself toward 
 the world generally with perfect self-confidence, and, if anything, 
 an increased aggressiveness. His customers dared not talk of 
 their losses before him, or exhibit a stoicism unequal to his own. 
 "It's a bad business," he would say; "what do you pro 
 pose?" And as the one latent proposition in each human 
 breast was the return of the money invested, and as no one dared 
 to make that proposition, Mr. Dumphy was, as usual, trium 
 phant. In this frame of mind Mr. Poinsett found him on his 
 return frorn the Mission of San Antonio, the next morning. 
 
 " Bad news, I suppose, down there," said Mr. Dumphy, 
 briskly ; "and I reckon the widow, though she has been luckier 
 than her neighbours, don't feel particularly lively, eh ? I'm devilish 
 sorry for you, Poinsett, though, as a man, you can see that 
 the investment was a good one. But you can't make a woman 
 understand business. Eh ? Well, the Rancho's worth double 
 the mortgage, I reckon. Eh ? Ugly, ain't she of course ! 
 Said she'd been swindled ? That's like a woman ! You and 
 me know 'em ! eh, Poinsett ?" Mr. Dumphy omitted his cha 
 racteristic bark, and winked at his visitor. 
 
 Arthur looked up in unaffected surprise. " If you mean Mrs. 
 Sepulvida," he said, coldly, " I haven't seen her. I was on my 
 way there when your telegram recalled me. I had some busi 
 ness with Padre Felipe." 
 
 "You don't know then that the Conroy mine has gone up 
 with the earthquake, eh ? Lead dropped out eh ? and the 
 widow's fifty-six thousand ?" here Mr. Dumphy snapped his 
 finger and thumb, to illustrate the lame and impotent conclusion 
 of Donna Maria's investment " don't you know that ?" 
 
 "No," said Arthur, with perfect indifference and a languid 
 abstraction that awed Mr. Dumphy more than anxiety ; "no, 
 I don't. But I imagine that isn't the reason you telegraphed 
 me." 
 
 " No," returned Dumphy, still eyeing Poinsett keenly for a 
 possible clue to this singular and unheard-of apathy to the con- 
 
336 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 clition of the fortune of the woman his visitor was about to> 
 marry. " No of course !" 
 
 " Well !" said Arthur, with that dangerous quiet which was 
 the only outward sign of interest and determination in his 
 nature. " I'm going up to One Horse Gulch to offer my services 
 as counsel to Gabriel Conroy. Now for the details of this murder, 
 which, by the way, I don't believe Gabriel committed, unless 
 he's another man than the one I knew ! After that you can 
 tell me your business with me, for I don't suppose you tele 
 graphed to me on his account solely. Of course, at first you 
 felt it was to your interest to get him and his wife out of the 
 way, now that Ramirez is gone. But now, if you please, let 
 me know what you know about this murder." 
 
 Mr. Dumphy thus commanded, and completely under the 
 influence of Arthur's quiet will, briefly recounted the particulars 
 already known to the reader, of which he had been kept 
 informed by telegraph. 
 
 " He's been recaptured," added Dumphy, " I learn by a later 
 despatch ; and I don't reckon there'll be another attempt to 
 lynch him. I've managed that" he continued, with a return of 
 his old self-assertion. " I've got some influence there !" 
 
 For the first time during the interview Arthur awoke from his 
 preoccupation, and glanced keenly at Dumphy. " Of course," 
 he returned, coolly, " I don't suppose you such a fool as to 
 allow the only witness you have of your wife's death to be 
 sacrificed even if you believed that the impostor who was 
 personating your wife had been charged with complicity in a 
 capital crime and had fled from justice. You're not such a 
 fool as to believe that this Mrs. Conroy wont try to help her 
 husband, that she evidently loves, by every means in her power 
 that she wont make use of any secret she may have that 
 concerns you to save him and herself. No, Mr. Peter Dumphy," 
 said Arthur, significantly ; " no, you're too much of a business 
 man not to see that." As he spoke he noted the alternate 
 flushing and paling of Mr. Dumphy's face, and read I fear 
 with the triumphant and instinctive consciousness of a superior 
 intellect that Mr. Dumphy had been precisely such a fool, 
 and had failed ! 
 
 " I reckon nobody will put much reliance on the evidence of 
 a woman charged with a capital crime," said Mr. Dumphy, with 
 a show of confidence he was far from feeling. 
 
The Yellow Envelope. 337 
 
 " Suppose that she and Gabriel both swear that she knows 
 your abandoned wife, for instance ; suppose that they both 
 swear that she and you connived to personate Grace Conroy 
 for the sake of getting the title to this mine ; suppose that she 
 alleges that she repented and married Gabriel, as she did, and 
 suppose that they both admit the killing of this Ramirez and 
 assert that you were persecuting them through him, and still 
 are ; suppose that they show that he forged a second grant to 
 the mine through your instigation ?" 
 
 " It's a lie," interrupted Dumphy, starting to his feet; "he 
 did it from jealousy." 
 
 "Can you prove his motives?" said Arthur. 
 
 '"' But the grant was not in my favour it was to some old 
 Californian down in the Mission of San Antonio. I can prove 
 that," said Dumphy, excitedly. 
 
 " Suppose you can ? Nobody imagines you so indiscreet as 
 to have had another grant conveyed to yon directly, while you 
 were negotiating with Gabriel for his. Don't be foolish ! / 
 know you had nothing to do with the forged grant. I am only 
 suggesting how you have laid yourself open to the charges of a 
 woman of whom you are likely to make an enemy, and might 
 have made an ally. If you calculate to revenge Ramirez, 
 consider first if you care to have it proved that he was a confi 
 dential agent of yours as they will, if you don't help them. 
 Never mind whether they committed the murder. You are not 
 their judge or accuser. You must help them for your own sake. 
 No !" continued Arthur, after a pause, ' congratulate yourself 
 that the Vigilance Committee did not hang Gabriel Conroy, 
 and that you have not to add revenge to the other motives of 
 a desperate and scheming woman." 
 
 " But are you satisfied that Mrs. Conroy is really the person 
 who stands behind Colonel Starbottle and personates my 
 wife?" 
 
 " I am," replied Arthur, positively. 
 
 Dumphy hesitated a moment. Should he tell Arthur of 
 Colonel Starbottle's interview with him, and the delivery and 
 subsequent loss of the mysterious envelope ? Arthur read his 
 embarrassment plainly, and precipitated his decision with a 
 single question. 
 
 " Have you had any further interview with Colonel Star- 
 bottle?" 
 
33$ Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Thus directly adjured, Dumphy hesitated no longer, but at 
 once repeated the details of his late conversation with Star- 
 bottle, his successful bribery of the Colonel, the delivery of the 
 sealed envelope under certain conditions, and its mysterious 
 disappearance. Arthur heard him through with quiet interest, 
 but when Mr. Dumphy spoke of the loss of the envelope he 
 fixed his eyes on Mr. Dumphy's with a significance that was 
 unmistakable. 
 
 " You say you lost this envelope trusted to your honour !" 
 said Arthur, with slow and insulting deliberation. " Lost it. 
 without having opened it or learned its contents ? That was 
 very unfortunate, Mr. Dumphy, ve-ry un-for-tu-nate !" 
 
 The indignation of an honourable man at the imputation of 
 some meanness foreign to his nature is weak compared with 
 the anger of a rascal accused of an offence which he might 
 have committed, but didn't. Mr. Dumphy turned almost 
 purple ! It was so evident that he. had not been guilty of 
 concealing the envelope, and did not know its contents, that 
 Arthur was satisfied. 
 
 " He denied any personal knowledge of Mrs. Conroy in this 
 affair ?" queried Arthur. 
 
 " Entirely ! He gave me to understand that his instructions- 
 were received from another party unknown to me," said 
 Dumphy. " Look yer, Poinsett you're wrong ! I don't 
 believe it is that woman." 
 
 Arthur shook his head. " No one else possesses the infor 
 mation necessary to blackmail you. No one else has a motive 
 in doing it." 
 
 The door opened to a clerk bearing a card. Mr. Dumphy 
 took it impatiently and read aloud, " Colonel Starbottle of 
 Siskiyou ! !J He then turned an anxious face to Poinsett. 
 
 " Good," said that gentleman, quietly ; " admit him." As 
 the clerk disappeared, Arthur turned to Dumphy, " I suppose 
 it was to meet this man you sent for me ?" 
 
 " Yes," returned Dumphy, with a return of his old brusque- 
 ness. 
 
 " Then hold your tongue, and leave everything to me." 
 
 The door opened as he spoke to Colonel Starbottle's frilled 
 shirt and expanding bosom, followed at a respectful interval by 
 the gallant Colonel himself. He was evidently surprised by 
 the appearance of Mr. Dumphy's guest, but by no means dashed 
 
The Yellow Envelope. 339 
 
 in his usual chivalrous port and bearing. " My legal adviser, 
 Mr. Poinsett," said Dumpily, introducing Arthur briefly 
 
 The gallant Colonel bowed stiffly, while Arthur, with a smile 
 of fascinating courtesy and deference that astonished Dumphy 
 in proportion as it evidently flattered and gratified Colonel 
 Starbottle, stepped forward and extended his hand. "As a 
 younger member of the profession I can hardly claim the atten 
 tion of one so experienced as Colonel Starbottle, but as the 
 friend of poor Henry Beeswinger, I can venture to take the 
 hand of the man who so gallantly stood by him as his second, 
 two years ago." 
 
 " Ged, sir," said Colonel Starbottle, absolutely empurpling 
 with pleasure, and exploding his handkerchief from his sweltering 
 breast. " Ged ! you er er do me proud ! I am er grati 
 fied, sir, to meet any friend of er er gentleman like Hank 
 Beeswinger ! I remember the whole affair, sir, as if it was yester 
 day. I do !" with an oath. " Gratifying, Mr. Poinsett, to every 
 gentleman concerned. Your friend, sir, I'm proud to meet 
 
 you I am, me ! killed, sir, second fire ! Dropped like 
 
 a gentleman, me ! No fuss ; no reporters ; no arrests. 
 
 Friends considerate. Blank me, sir, one of the finest, d 
 
 me, I may say, sir, one of the very finest er meetings in which 
 I have er participated. Glad to know you, sir. You call to 
 mind, sir, one of the er highest illustrations of a code of 
 honour that er er under the present er degrading state 
 of public sentiment is er er passing away. We are drifting, 
 sir, drifting drifting to er er political and social condition, 
 where the Voice of Honour, sir, is drowned by the Yankee 
 watchword of Produce and Trade. Trade, sir, blank me 1" 
 Colonel Starbottle paused with a rhetorical full stop, blew his 
 nose, and gazed at the ceiling with a plaintive suggestion that 
 the days of chivalry had indeed passed, and that American 
 institutions were indeed retrograding ; Mr. Dumphy leaned 
 back in his chair in helpless irritability ; Mr. Arthur Poinsett 
 alone retained an expression of courteous and sympathizing 
 attention. 
 
 " I am the more gratified at meeting Colonel Starbottle," 
 said Arthur, gravely, " from the fact that my friend and client 
 here, Mr. Dumphy, is at present in a condition where he most 
 needs the consideration and understanding of a gentleman and 
 a man of honour. A paper, which has been entrusted to his 
 
 z 2 
 
34 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 safe keeping and custody as a gentleman, has disappeared since 
 the earthquake, and it is believed that during the excitement 
 of that moment it was lost ! The paper is supposed to be 
 intact, as it was in an envelope that had never been opened, and 
 whose seals were unbroken. It is a delicate matter, but I am 
 rejoiced that the gentleman who left the paper in trust is the 
 honourable Colonel Starbottle, whom I know by reputation, 
 and the gentleman who suffered the misfortune of losing it is my 
 personal friend Mr. Dumphy. It enables me at once to proffer 
 my services as mediator, or as Mr. Dumphy's legal adviser and 
 friend, to undertake all responsibility in the matter." 
 
 The tone and manner were so like Colonel Starbottle's own, 
 that Dumphy looked from Arthur to Colonel Starbottle in hope 
 less amazement. The latter gentleman dropped his chin and 
 fixed a pair of astonished and staring eyes upon Arthur. " Do 
 I understand that er this gentleman, Mr. Dumphy, has 
 placed you in possession of any confidential statement that 
 r " 
 
 " Pardon me, Colonel Starbottle," interrupted Arthur, rising 
 with dignity, " the facts I have just stated are sufficient for the 
 responsibility I assume in this case. I learn from my client 
 that a sealed paper placed in his hands is missing. I have from 
 him the statement that I am bound to believe, that it passed 
 from his hands unopened ; where, he knows not. This is a 
 matter, between gentlemen, serious enough without further com 
 plication !" 
 
 " And the paper and envelope are lost ?" continued Colonel 
 Starbottle, still gazing at Arthur. 
 
 " Are lost," returned Arthur, quietly. " I have advised my 
 friend, Mr. Dumphy, that as a man of honour, and a business 
 man, he is by no means freed through this unfortunate accident 
 from any promise or contract that he may have entered into with 
 you concerning it. Any deposit as a collateral for its safe delivery 
 which he might have made, or has promised to make, is clearly 
 forfeited. This he has been waiting only for your appear 
 ance to hand to you." Arthur crossed to Mr. Dumphy's side 
 and laid his hand lightly upon his shoulder, but with a certain 
 significance of grip palpable to Mr. Dumphy, who, after looking 
 into his eyes, took out his cheque book. When he had filled 
 in a duplicate of the cheque he had given Colonel Starbottle 
 two days before, Arthur took it from his hand and touched the 
 
The Yellow Envelope. 341 
 
 bell. " As we will not burden Colonel Starbottle unnecessarily, 
 your cashier's acceptance of this paper will enable him to use 
 it henceforth at his pleasure, and as I expect to have the 
 pleasure of the Colonel's company to my office, will you kindly 
 have this done at once ?" 
 
 The clerk appeared, and at Mr. Poinsett's direction took the 
 cheque from the almost passive fingers of Mr. Duinphy. 
 
 " Allow me to express my perfect satisfaction with er er 
 your explanation !" said Colonel Starbottle, extending one hand 
 to Arthur, while at the same moment he gracefully readjusted 
 his shirt-bosom with the other. " Trouble yourself no further 
 regarding the er er paper. I trust it will er yet be 
 found ; if not, sir, I shall er er " added the Colonel, with 
 honourable resignation, '''hold myself personally responsible to 
 my client, blank me !" 
 
 "Was there no mark upon the envelope by which it might 
 be known without explaining its contents ?" suggested Arthur. 
 
 " None, sir, a plain yellow envelope. Stop !" said the 
 Colonel, striking his forehead with his hand. " Ged, sir ! I 
 do remember now that during our conversation I made a 
 
 memorandum, me, a memorandum upon the face of it, 
 
 across it, a name, Ged, sir, the very name of the party you were 
 speaking of Gabriel Conroy !" 
 
 " You wrote the name of Gabriel Conroy upon it ! Good ! 
 That may lead to its identification without exposing its con 
 tents," returned Arthur. "Well, sir?" 
 
 The last two words were addressed to Mr. Dumphy's clerk, 
 who had entered during the Colonel's speech and stood staring 
 alternately at him and his employer, holding the accepted 
 cheque in his hand. 
 
 " Give it to the gentleman," said Dumphy, curtly. 
 
 The man obeyed, Colonel Starbottle took the cheque, folded 
 it and placed it somewhere in the moral recesses of his breast 
 pocket. That done he turned to Mr. Dumphy. " I need not 
 say er that er as far as my personal counsel and advice 
 to my client can prevail, it will be my effort to prevent litigation 
 in this er delicate affair. Should the envelope er er turn 
 up ! you will of course er send it to me, who am er per 
 sonally responsible for it. Ged, sir," continued the Colonel, 
 " I should be proud to conclude this affair, conducted as it has 
 been on your side with the strictest honour, over the er 
 
342 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 festive board but er business prevents me ! I leave here 
 in one hour for One Horse Gulch !" 
 
 Both Mr. Dumphy and Poinsett involuntarily started. 
 
 " One Horse Gulch ?" repeated Arthur. 
 
 " me ! yes ! Ged, sir, I'm retained in a murder case 
 
 there ; the case of this man Gabriel Conroy." 
 
 Arthur cast a swift precautionary look at Dumphy. " Then 
 perhaps we may be travelling companions ?" he said to Star- 
 bottle, smiling pleasantly. " I am going there too. Perhaps 
 my good fortune may bring us in friendly counsel. You are 
 engaged " 
 
 " For the prosecution," interrupted Starbottle, slightly ex 
 panding his chest. " At the request of relatives of the murdered 
 man a Spanish gentleman of er er large and influential 
 family connexions, I shall assist the District Attorney, my old 
 friend, Nelse Buckthorne !" 
 
 The excitement kindled in Arthur's eyes luckily did not 
 appear in his voice. It was still pleasant to Colonel Starbottle's 
 ear, as, after a single threatening glance of warning at the utterly 
 mystified and half exploding Dumphy, he turned gracefully 
 toward him. " And if, by the fortunes of war, we should be 
 again on opposite sides, my dear Colonel, I trust that our 
 relations may be as gratifying as they have been to-day. One 
 moment ! I am going your way. Let me beg you to take my 
 arm a few blocks and a glass of wine afterwards as a stirrup cup 
 on our journey." And with a significant glance at Dumphy, 
 Arthur Poinsett slipped Colonel Starbottle's arm deftly under 
 his own, and actually marched off with that doughty warrior, a 
 blushing, expanding, but not unwilling captive. 
 
 When the door closed Mr. Dumphy resumed his speech and 
 action in a single expletive. What more he might have said is 
 not known, for at the same moment he caught sight of his clerk, 
 who had entered hastily at the exit of the otheis, but who now 
 stood awed and abashed by Mr. Dumphy's passion. " Dash it 
 all ! what in dash are you dashingly doing here, dash you ?" 
 
 " Sorry, sir," said the unlucky clerk ; " but overhearing that 
 gentleman say there was writing on the letter that you lost by 
 which it might be identified, sir we think we've found it that 
 is, we know where it is !" 
 
 " How !" said Dumphy, starting up, eagerly. 
 
 " When the shock came that afternoon," continued the clerk, 
 
Gabriel meets his Lawyer. 343 
 
 " the express bag for Sacramento and Marysville had just been 
 taken out by the expressman, and was lying on top of the 
 waggon. The horses started to run at the second shock, and 
 the bag fell and was jammed against a lamp-post in front of our 
 window, bursting open as it did so and spilling some letters and 
 papers on the side-walk. One of our night watchmen helped 
 the expressman pick up the scattered letters, and picked up 
 among them a plain yellow envelope with no address but the 
 name of Gabriel Conroy written in pencil across the end. Sup 
 posing it had dropped from some package in the express bag, 
 he put it back again in the bag. When you asked about a 
 blank envelope missing from your desk, he did not connect it 
 with the one he had picked up, for that had writing on it. We 
 sent to the express office just now, and found that they had 
 stamped it, and forwarded it to Conroy at One Horse Gulch, 
 just as they had always done with his letters sent to our care. 
 That's the way of it. Daresay it's there by this time, in his 
 hands, sir, all right!" 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 GABRIEL MEETS HIS LAWYER. 
 
 GABRIEL'S petition on behalf of Mr. Hamlin was promptly 
 granted by the sheriff. The waggon was at once put into 
 requisition to convey the wounded man albeit screaming and 
 protesting to the Grand Conroy Hotel, where, in company 
 with his faithful henchman, he was left, to all intents a free 
 man, and a half an hour later a demented one, tossing in a 
 burning fever. 
 
 Owing to the insecure condition of the County Jail at One 
 Horse Gulch, and possibly some belief in the equal untrust- 
 worthiness of the people, the sheriff conducted his prisoner, 
 accompanied by Oily, to Wingdam. Nevertheless, Olly's 
 statement of the changed condition of public sentiment, or 
 rather its preoccupation with a calamity of more absorbing 
 interest, was in the main correct. The news of the recapture 
 of Gabriel by his legal guardian awoke no excitement nor 
 comment. More than this, there was a favourable feeling 
 toward the prisoner. The action of the Vigilance Committee 
 had been unsuccessful, and had terminated disastrously to the 
 
344 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 principal movers therein. It is possible that the morality of 
 their action was involved in their success. Somehow the 
 whole affair had not resulted to the business interests of 
 the Gulch. The three most prominent lynchers were dead 
 and clearly in error ! The prisoner, who was still living, was 
 possibly in the right. The Silveropolis Messenger, which ten 
 days before had alluded to the " noble spectacle of a free 
 people outraged in their holiest instincts, appealing to the first 
 principles of Justice and Order, and rallying as a single man to 
 their support," now quietly buried the victims and their 
 motives from the public eye beneath the calm statement that 
 they met their fate " while examining the roof of the Court 
 House with a view to estimate the damage caused by the first 
 shock of the earthquake." The Banner favoured the same 
 idea a little less elegantly, and suggested ironically that here 
 after " none but experts should be allowed to go foolin' round 
 the statue of justice." I trust that the intelligent reader will 
 not accuse me of endeavouring to cast ridicule upon the 
 general accuracy of spontaneous public emotion, nor the in 
 fallibility of the true democratic impulse, which (I beg to 
 quote from the Messenger], " in the earliest ages of our history 
 enabled us to resist legalized aggression, and take the reins 
 of government into our own hands," or (I now refer to the 
 glowing language of the Banner), " gave us the right to run the 
 machine ourselves and boss the job." And I trust that the 
 reader will observe in this passing recognition of certain in- 
 consistences in the expression and action of these people, 
 only the fidelity of a faithful chronicler, and no intent of 
 churlish criticism nor moral or political admonition, which I 
 here discreetly deprecate and disclaim. 
 
 Nor was there any opposition when Gabriel, upon the 
 motion of Lawyer Maxwell, was admitted to bail pending 
 the action of the Grand Jury, nor any surprise when Mr. 
 Dumpliy 's agent and banker came forward as his bondsman 
 for the sum of fifty thousand dollars. By one of those strange 
 vicissitudes in the fortunes of mining speculation, this act by 
 Mr. Dumphy was looked upon as an evidence of his trust in 
 the future of the unfortunate mine of which Gabriel had been 
 original locator and superintendent, and under that belief the 
 stock rallied slightly. " It was a mighty sharp move of Pete 
 Dumphy's bailin' thet Gebe, right in face of that there ' dropped 
 
Gabriel meets his Lawyer. 345 
 
 lead' in his busted-up mine ! O, you've got to set up all night 
 to get any points to show him /" And to their mutual surprise 
 Mr. Dumphy found himself more awe-inspiring than ever at 
 One Horse Gulch, and Gabriel found himself a free man, with 
 a slight popular flavour of martyrdom about him. 
 
 As he still persistently refused to enter again upon the 
 premises which he had deeded to his wife on the day of the 
 murder, temporary lodgings were found for him and Oily at 
 the Grand Conroy Hotel. And here Mrs. Markle, although 
 exhibiting to Lawyer Maxwell the greatest concern in Gabriel's 
 trouble, by one of those inconsistences of the sex which I shall 
 not attempt to explain, treated the unfortunate accused with a 
 degree of cold reserve that was as grateful, I fear, to Gabriel, 
 as it was unexpected. Indeed, I imagine that if the kind- 
 hearted widow had known the real comfort and assurance that 
 the exasperating Gabriel extracted from her first cold and con 
 strained greeting, she would have spent less of her time in 
 consultation with Maxwell regarding his defence. But perhaps 
 I am doing a large-hearted and unselfish sex a deep injustice. 
 So I shall content myself with transcribing part of a dialogue 
 which took place between them at the Grand Conroy. Mrs. 
 Markle (loftily, and regarding the ceiling with cold abstraction) : 
 " We can't gin ye here, Mister Conroy, the French style and 
 attention ye're kinder habitooal to in your own house on the 
 Hill, bein' plain folks and mounting ways. But we know our 
 place, and don't reckon to promise the comforts of a home ! 
 Wot with lookin' arter forty reg'lar ?nd twenty-five transient 
 ef I don't happen to see ye much myself, Mr. Conroy, ye'li 
 understand. Ef ye ring thet there bell one o' the help will be 
 always on hand. Yer lookin' well, Mr. Conroy. And bizness, 
 I reckon" (the reader will here observe a ladylike ignoring of 
 Gabriel's special trouble), " ez about what it allers waz ; though 
 judging from remarks of transients, it's dull !" 
 
 Gabriel (endeavouring to conceal a large satisfaction under 
 the thin glossing of conventional sentiment) : " Don't let me 
 nor Oily put ye out a cent, Mrs. Markle a charge bein' 
 ordered by Olly's physicians and variety bein', so to speak, 
 the spice o' life ! And ye're lookin' well, Mr?. Markle ; that 
 ez" (with a sudden alarm at the danger of compliment), "so to 
 speak, ez peart and strong-handed ez ever J And how's thet 
 little Manty o' yours gettin' on ? Jist how it was thet me and 
 
346 Gabriel Conr-oy. 
 
 Oily didn't get to see ye before, ez mighty queer ! Times and 
 times ag'in" (with shameless mendacity) " hez me and thet 
 child bin on the p'int o' coming, and suthin' hez jest chipped 
 in and interfered !" 
 
 Mrs. Markle (with freezing politeness) : " You do me proud ! 
 I jest dropped in ez a matter o' not bein' able allers to trust 
 to help. Good night, Mister Conroy. I hope I see you well ! 
 Ye kin jest" (retiring with matronly dignity), "ye kin Jest 
 touch onto that bell thar, if ye're wantin' anything, and help'll 
 come to ye ! Good night !" 
 
 Oily (appearing a moment later at the door of Gabriel's 
 room truculent and suspicious) : " Afore I'd stand thar 
 chirpin' with thet crockidill and you in troubil, and not 
 knowin' wot's gone o' July I'd pizen myself !" 
 
 Gabriel (blushing to the roots of his hair, and conscience- 
 stricken to his inmost soul) : " It's jest passin' the time o' 
 day, Oily, with old friends kinder influencin' the public 
 sentyment and the jury. That's all. It's the advice o' 
 Lawyer Maxwell, ez ye didn't get to hear, I reckon, thet's 
 all ! J; 
 
 But Gabriel's experience in the Grand Conroy Hotel was 
 not, I fear, always as pleasant. A dark-faced, large-featured 
 woman, manifestly in mourning, and as manifestly an avenging 
 friend of the luckless deceased in whose taking off Gabriel 
 was supposed to be so largely instrumental, presently appeared 
 at the Grand Conroy Hotel, waiting the action of the Grand 
 Jury. She was accompanied by a dark-faced elderly gen 
 tleman, our old friend Don Pedro she being none other 
 than the unstable-waisted Manuela of Pacific Street and was, 
 I believe, in the opinion of One Horse Gulch, supposed to be 
 charged with convincing and mysterious evidence against 
 Gabriel Conroy. The sallow-faced pair had a way of meeting 
 in the corridors of the hotel and conversing in mysterious 
 whispers in a tongue foreign to One Horse Gulch and to Oily, 
 strongly suggestive of revenge and concealed stilettos, that was 
 darkly significant ! Happily, however, for Gabriel, he was 
 presently relieved from their gloomy espionage by the inter 
 position of a third party Sal Clark. That individual, herself 
 in the deepest mourning, and representing the deceased in his 
 holiest affections, it is scarcely necessary to say at once re 
 sented the presence of the strangers. The two women glared 
 
Gabriel meets his Laivyer. 347 
 
 at each other at the public table, and in a chance meeting in 
 the corridor of the hotel. 
 
 " In the name of God, what have we here in this imbecile 
 and forward creature, and why is this so and after this fashion?" 
 asked Manuela of Don Pedro. 
 
 " Of a verity, I know not," replied Don Pedro, " it is most 
 possibly a person visited of God ! a helpless being of brains. 
 Peradventure a person filled with aguardiente or the whisky of 
 the Americans. Have a care, little one, thou smallest 
 Manuela" (she weighed at least three hundred pounds), " that 
 she does thee no harm !" 
 
 Meanwhile Miss Sarah Clark relieved herself to Mrs. 
 Markle in quite as positive language, " Ef that black mulattar 
 and that dried up old furriner reckons they're going to mono 
 polize public sentyment in this yer way they're mighty mistaken. 
 Ef thar ever was a shameless piece et's thet old woman and, 
 goodness knows, the man's a poor critter enyvvay ! Ef any 
 body's goin' to take the word of that woman under oath, et's 
 mor'n Sal Clark would do that's all ! Who ez she enyway ? 
 I never heard her name mentioned afore !" 
 
 And ridiculous as it may seem to the unprejudiced reader, 
 this positive expression and conviction of Miss Clark, like all 
 positive convictions, was not without its influence on the 
 larger unimpanelled Grand Jury of One Horse Gulch, and, by 
 reflection, at last on the impanelled Jury itself. 
 
 "When you come to consider, gentlemen," said one of those 
 dangerous characters a sagacious, far-seeing juror "when 
 you come to consider that the principal witness o' the prosecu 
 tion and the people at the inquest don't know this yer Greaser 
 woman, and kinder throws off her testimony, and the prosecu 
 tion don't seem to agree, it looks mighty queer. And I put it 
 to you as far-minded men, if it ain't mighty queer ? And this 
 yer Sal Clark one of our own people." 
 
 An impression at once inimical to the new mistress and 
 stranger, and favourable to the accused Gabriel, instantly took 
 possession of One Horse Gulch. 
 
 Meanwhile the man who was largely responsible for this 
 excitement and these conflicting opinions maintained a gravity 
 and silence as indomitable and impassive as his alleged victim, 
 then slumbering peacefully in the little cemetery on Round 
 Hill. He conversed but little even with his counsel and friend, 
 
348 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Lawyer Maxwell, and received with his usual submissiveness 
 and gentle deprecatoriness the statement of that gentleman 
 that Mr. Dumphy had already bespoken the services of one of 
 the most prominent lawyers of San Francisco Mr. Arthur 
 Poinsett to assist in the defence. When Maxwell added that 
 Mr. Poinsett had expressed a wish to hold his first consultation 
 with Gabriel privately, the latter replied with his usual simpli 
 city, " I reckon I've nowt to say to him ez I hain't said to ye, 
 but it's all right !" 
 
 " Then I'll expect you over to my office at eleven to-morrow ?" 
 asked Maxwell. 
 
 "That's so," responded Gabriel, "though I reckon thet any 
 thing you and him might fix up to be dumped onto thet jury, 
 would be pleasin' and satisfactory to me." 
 
 At a few minutes of eleven the next morning Mr. Maxwell r 
 in accordance with a previous understanding with Mr. Poinsett, 
 put on his hat and left his office in the charge of that gentleman 
 that he might receive and entertain Gabriel in complete privacy 
 and confidence. As Arthur sat there alone, fine gentleman as 
 he was and famous in his profession, he was conscious of a 
 certain degree of nervousness that galled his pride greatly. He 
 was about to meet the man whose cherished sister six years 
 ago he had stolen ! Such at least Arthur felt was Gabriel's 
 opinion ! He had no remorse nor consciousness of guilt or 
 wrong-doing in that act ! But in looking at the fact in his pro 
 fessional habit of viewing both sides of a question, he made 
 this allowance for the sentiment of the prosecution, and putting 
 himself, in his old fashion, in the position of his opponent, he 
 judged that Gabriel might consistently exhibit some degree of 
 indignation at their first meeting. That there was, however, 
 really any moral question involved, he did not believe. The 
 girl, Grace Conroy, had gone with him readily, after a careful 
 and honourable statement of the facts of her situation, and 
 Gabriel's authority or concern in any subsequent sentimental 
 complication he utterly denied. That he, Arthur, had acted in 
 a most honourable, high-minded, and even weakly generous 
 fashion towards Grace, that he had obeyed her frivolous whims 
 as well as her most reasonable demands, that he had gone back 
 to Starvation Camp on a hopeless quest just to satisfy her, that 
 everything had happened exactly as he had predicted, and that 
 when he had returned to her he found that she had deserted 
 
Gabriel meets his Lawyer. 349 
 
 Hum these these were the facts that were incontrovertible ! 
 Arthur was satisfied that he had been honourable and even 
 generous he was quite convinced that this very nervousness 
 that he now experienced, was solely the condition of a mind 
 too sympathetic even with the feelings of an opponent in 
 affliction. " I must net give way to this absurd Quixotic sense 
 of honour," said this young gentleman to himself, severely. 
 
 Nevertheless at exactly eleven o'clock, when the staircase 
 creaked with the strong steady tread of the giant Gabriel, 
 Arthur felt a sudden start to his pulse. There was a hesitating 
 rap at the door a rap that was so absurdly inconsistent with 
 the previous tread on the staircase as inconsistent as were all 
 the mental and physical acts of Gabriel that Arthur was 
 -amused and reassured. " Come in," he said, with a return of 
 his old confidence, and the door opened to Gabriel, diffident 
 ;and embarrassed. 
 
 " I was told by Lawyer Maxwell," said Gabriel slowly, with 
 out raising his eyes and only dimly cognizant of the slight, 
 strong, elegant figure before him " I was told that Mr. Arthur 
 Poinsett reckoned to see me to-day, at eleven o'clock so I 
 came. Be you Mr. Poinsett?" (Gabriel here raised his eyes) 
 " be you, eh ? GOD A'MIGHTY ! why, it's eh ? why I want 
 to know ! it can't be ! yes, it is !" He stopped the recog 
 nition was complete ! 
 
 Arthur did not move. If he had expected an outburst from 
 the injured man before him he was disappointed. Gabriel 
 passed his hard palm vaguely and confusedly across his forehead 
 and through his hair, and lifted and put back behind his ears 
 two tangled locks. And then, without heeding Arthur's 
 proffered hand, yet without precipitation, anger, or indignation, 
 he strode toward him, and asked calmly and quietly, as Arthur 
 himself might have done. " Where is Grace ?" 
 
 " I don't know," said Arthur, bluntly. " I have not known 
 for years. I have never known her whereabouts, living or dead, 
 since the day I left her at a logger's house to return to Starva 
 tion Camp to bring help to yoit" (Arthur could not resist 
 italicizing the pronoun, nor despising himself for doing it when 
 he saw that the full significance of his emphasis touched the 
 man before him.) " She was gone when I returned ; where, 
 no one knew ! I traced her to the Presidio, but there she had 
 disappeared." 
 
3 So Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Gabriel raised his eyes to Arthur's. The impression of 
 nonchalant truthfulness which Arthur's speech always conveyed 
 to his hearer, an impression that he did not prevaricate because 
 he was not concerned sufficiently in his subject, was further 
 sustained by his calm, clear eyes. But Gabriel did not speak, 
 and Arthur went on 
 
 " She left the logger's camp voluntarily, of her own free will r 
 and doubtless for some reason that seemed sufficient to her. 
 She abandoned me if I may so express myself left my care, 
 relieved me of the responsibility I held towards her relatives'"' 
 he continued, with the first suggestion of personal apology in 
 his tones " without a word of previous intimation. Possibly 
 she might have got tired of waiting for me. I was absent two 
 weeks. It was the tenth day after my departure that she left 
 the logger's hut." 
 
 Gabriel put his hand in his pocket and deliberately drew out 
 the precious newspaper slip he had once shown to Oily. " Then 
 thet thar ' Personal' wozent writ by you, and thet P. A. don't 
 stand fur Philip Ashley?" asked Gabriel, with a hopeless 
 dejection in his tone. 
 
 Arthur glanced quickly over the paper, and smiled. " I 
 never saw this before," he said. " What made you think /did 
 it?" he asked, curiously. 
 
 " Because July my wife that was said that P. A. meant 
 you," said Gabriel, simply. 
 
 " Oh ! she said so, did she ?" said Arthur, still smiling. 
 
 " She did. And ef it wasn't you, who was it?" 
 
 " I really don't know," returned Arthur, carelessly, " possibly 
 it might have been herself. From what I have heard of your 
 wife I think this might be one, and perhaps the most innocent, 
 of her various impostures." 
 
 Gabriel cast clown his eyes and for a moment was gravely 
 silent. Then the look of stronger inquiry and intelligence 
 that he had worn during the interview faded utterly from his 
 face, and he began again in his old tone of apology. " For 
 answerin' all my questions, I'm obliged to ye, Mr. Ashley, and 
 it's right good in ye to remember ol' times, and ef I hev often 
 thought hard on ye, ye'll kinder pass that by ez the nat'rel 
 allowing of a man ez was worried about a sister ez hasn't been 
 heerd from sens she left with ye. And ye mustn't think this 
 yer meetin' was o' my seekin'. I kinder dropped in yer," he 
 
Gabriel meets his Lawyer. 351 
 
 added, wearily, " to see a man o' the name o 3 Poinsett. He 
 allowed to be yer at eleving o'clock mebbee it's airly yet 
 mebbee I've kinder got wrong o' the place !" and he glanced 
 apologetically around the room. 
 
 " My name is Poinsett," said Arthur, smiling, " the name of 
 Philip Ashley, by which you knew me, was merely the one I 
 assumed when I undertook the long overland trip." He said 
 this in no tone of apology or even explanation, but left the 
 impression on Gabriel's mind that a change of name, like a 
 change of dress, was part of the outfit of a gentleman emigrant. 
 And looking at the elegant young figure before him, it seemed 
 exceedingly plausible. " It was as Arthur Poinsett, the San 
 Francisco lawyer, that I made this appointment with you, and 
 it is now as your old friend Philip Ashley that I invite your 
 confidence, and ask you to tell me frankly the whole of this- 
 miserable business. I have come to help you, Gabriel, for 
 your own for your sister's sake. And I think I can do it !" 
 He held out his hand again, and this time not in vain ; with a 
 sudden frank gesture it was taken in both of Gabriel's, and 
 Arthur felt that the greatest difficulty he had anticipated in his 
 advocacy of Gabriel's cause had been surmounted. 
 
 " He has told me the whole story, I think/' said Arthur, two 
 hours later, when Maxwell returned and found his associate 
 thoughtfully sitting beside the window alone. " And I believe 
 it. He is as innocent of this crime as you or I. Of that T 
 have always been confident. How far he is accessory after the 
 fact I know he is not accessory before is another question. 
 But his story, that to me is perfectly convincing, I am afraid 
 wont do before a jury and the world generally. It involves too- 
 much that is incredible, and damning to him secondarily if 
 believed. We must try something else. As far as I can see, 
 really, it seems that his own suggestion of a defence, as you 
 told it to me, has more significance in it than the absurdity 
 you only saw. We must admit the killing, and confine our 
 selves to showing excessive provocation. I know something of 
 the public sentiment here, and the sympathies of the average 
 jury, and if Gabriel should tell them the story he has just told 
 me, they would hang him at once ! Unfortunately for him, the 
 facts show a complication of property interests and impostures 
 on the part of his wife, of which he is perfectly innocent, and 
 which are not really the motive of the murder, but which the 
 
352 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 jury would instantly accept as a sufficient motive. We must 
 fight, understand, this very story, from the outset ; you will find 
 it to be the theory of the prosecution, but if we can keep him 
 silent it cannot be proved except by him. The facts are such 
 that if he had really committed the murder he could have 
 defied prosecution, but through his very stupidity and blind 
 anxiety to shield his wife, he has absolutely fixed the guilt upon 
 himself." 
 
 " Then you don't think that Mrs. Conroy is the culprit ?" 
 asked Maxwell. 
 
 " No," said Arthur; " she is capable, but not culpable. The 
 real murderer has never been suspected, nor his presence 
 known to One Horse Gulch. But I must see him again, and 
 Oily, and you must hunt up a Chinaman one Ah Fe whom 
 Gabriel tells me brought him the note, and who is singularly 
 enough missing, now that he is wanted." 
 
 " But you can't use a Chinaman's evidence before a jury ?" 
 interrupted Maxwell. 
 
 " Not directly ; but I can find Christian Caucasians who 
 would be willing to swear to the facts he supplied them with. 
 1 shall get at the facts in a few days and then, my dear 
 fellow," continued Arthur, laying his hand familiarly and 
 patronizingly on the shoulder of his senior, "and then you and 
 I will go to work to see how we can get rid of them." 
 
 When Gabriel recounted the events of the day to Oily, and 
 described his interview with Poinsett, she became furiously 
 indignant. " And did that man mean to say he don't know 
 whether Gracey is livin' or dead ? And he pertendin' to hev 
 bin her bo?" 
 
 " In coorse," explained Gabriel ; " ye disremember, Oily, 
 that Gracey never hez let on to me, her own brother, war she 
 ez, and she wouldn't be going to tell a stranger. Thar's them 
 personals as she never answered !" 
 
 " Mebbe she didn't want to speak to him ag'in," said Oily, 
 fiercely, with a toss of her curls. " I'd like to know what he'd 
 bin' sayin' to her like his impudence. Enny how he ought to 
 hev found her out, and she his sweetheart ! Why didn't he go 
 right off to the Presidio? What did he come back for? Not 
 find her, indeed ! Why, Gabe, do you suppose as July wont 
 find jw/ out soon why, I bet any thin' she knows jest whar you 
 are" (Gabriel trembled and felt an inward sinking), " and is 
 
What Ah Fe does not know. 353 
 
 on'y waitin' to come forward to the trial. And yer you are 
 taken in ag'in and fooled by these yer lawyers ! you old Gabe, 
 you. Let me git at thet Philip Ashley Poinsett that's all !" 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 WHAT AH FE DOES NOT KNOW. 
 
 THUS admonished by the practical-minded Oily, Gabriel 
 retired precipitately to the secure fastnesses of Conroy's Hill, 
 where, over a consolatory pipe in his deserted cabin, he gave 
 himself up to reflections upon the uncertainty of the sex and 
 the general vagaries of womanhood. At such times he would 
 occasionally extend his wanderings to the gigantic pine tree 
 which still towered pre-eminently above its fellows in ominous 
 loneliness, and, seated upon one of its outlying roots, would 
 gently philosophize to himself regarding his condition, the 
 vicissitudes of fortune, the awful prescience of Oily, and the 
 beneficence of a Creator who permitted such awkward triviality 
 and uselessness as was incarnate in himself to exist at all ! 
 Sometimes, following the impulse of habit, he would encroach 
 abstractedly upon the limits of his own domain, and find him 
 self under the shadow of his own fine house on the hill, from 
 which, since that eventful parting with his wife, he had always 
 rigidly withheld his foot. As soon as he would make this 
 alarming discovery, he would turn back in honourable delicacy 
 and a slight sense of superstitious awe. Retreating from one 
 of these involuntary incursions one day, in passing through an 
 opening in a little thicket of "buckeye" near his house, he 
 stumbled over a small work-basket lying in the withered grass, 
 apparently mislaid or forgotten. Gabriel instantly recognised 
 it as the property of his wife, and as quickly recalled the 
 locality as one of her favourite resorts during the excessive 
 mid-day heats. He hesitated and then passed on, aad then 
 stopped and returned again awkwardly and bashfully. To 
 have touched any property of his wife's, after their separation, 
 was something distasteful and impossible to Gabriel's sense of 
 honour :, to leave it there the spoil of any passing Chinaman, 
 or the prey of the elements, was equally inconsistent with a 
 certain respect which Gabriel had for his wife's weaknesses. 
 
 A A 
 
354 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 He compromised by picking it up with the intention of sending 
 it to Lawyer Maxwell, as his wife's trustee. But in doing this, 
 to Gabriel's great alarm (for he would as soon have sserinced 
 the hand that held this treasure as to have exposed its contents 
 in curiosity or suspicion), part of that multitudinous contents 
 overflowed and fell on the ground, and he was obliged to pick 
 them up and replace them. One of them was a baby's shirt 
 so small ft filled the great hand that grasped it. In Gabriel's 
 emigrant experience, as the frequent custodian and nurse of 
 the incomplete human animal, he was somewhat familiar with 
 those sacred, mummy-like enwrappings usually unknown to 
 childless men, and he recognised it at once. 
 
 He did not replace it in the basket, but with a suffused 
 cheek and an increased sense of his usual awkwardness, stuffed 
 it into the pocket of his blouse. Nor did he send the basket 
 to Lawyer Maxwell, as he had intended, and in fact omitted 
 any allusion to it in his usual account to Oily of his daily expe 
 rience. For the next two days he was peculiarly silent and 
 thoughtful, and was sharply reprimanded by Oily for general 
 idiocy and an especial evasion of some practical duties. 
 
 " Yer's them lawyers hez been huntin' ye to come over and 
 -examine that there Chinaman, Ah Fe, ez is jest turned up ag'in, 
 and you ain't no whar to be found ; and Lawyer Maxwell sez 
 it's a most important witness. And war 'bouts was ye found ? 
 Down in the Gulch, chirpin' and gossipin' with that Arkansas 
 family, and totin'. round Mrs. Welch's baby. And you a growed 
 man, with a fammerly of yer own to look after. I wonder ye 
 ain't got more sabe I prancin' round in this yer shiftless way, 
 and you on trial, and accused o' killin' folks. Yer a high ole 
 XJabe rentin' yerself out fur a dry nuss for nothin' ! ;? 
 
 Gabriel (colouring and hastily endeavouring to awaken 
 Olly's feminine sympathies) " It waz the powerfullest smallest 
 "baby ye oughter get to see it, Oily ! 'Tain't bigger nor a 
 squirfbl on'y two weeks old yesterday !" 
 
 Oily (outwardly scornful, but inwardly resolving to visit tne 
 phenomenon next week) : " Don't stand yawpin' here, but 
 waltz down to Lawyer Maxwell and see that Chinaman." 
 
 Gabriel reached the office of Lawyer Maxwell just as that 
 gentleman and Arthur Poinsett were rising from a long, hope 
 less, and unsatisfactory examination of Ah Fe. The lawyers 
 liad hoped to be able to establish the fact of Gabriel's remote- 
 
What Ah Fe does not know. 355 
 
 ness from the scene of the murder by some corroborating inci 
 dent or individual that Ah Fe could furnish in support of the 
 detailed narrative he had already given. But it did not 
 appear that any Caucasian had been encountered O?r met by 
 Ah Fe at the time of his errand. And Ah Fe's memory of the 
 details he had already described was apparently beginning to 
 be defective; it was evident that nothing was to be gained 
 from him even if he had been constituted a legal witness. And 
 then, more than all, he was becoming sullen ! 
 
 " We are afraid that we haven't made much out of your 
 friend, Ah Fe," said Arthur, taking Gabriel's hand. "You 
 might try if you can revive his memory, but it looks doubtful." 
 
 Gabriel gazed at Ah Fe intently possibly because he was 
 the last person who had spoken to his missing wife. Ah Fe re 
 turned the gaze, discharging all expression from his counte 
 nance except a slight suggestion of the habitual vague astonish 
 ment always seen in the face of a newborn infant. Perhaps 
 this peculiar expression, reminding Gabriel as it did of the 
 phenomenon in the Welsh family, interested him. But the few 
 vague wandering questions he put were met by equally vague 
 answers. Arthur rose in some impatience ; Lawyer Maxwell 
 wiped away the smile that had been lingering around his 
 mouth. The interview was ended. 
 
 Arthur and Maxwell passed down the narrow stairway arm 
 in arm. Gabriel would have followed them with Ah Fe, but 
 turning toward that Mongolian, he was alarmed by a swift 
 spasm of expression that suddenly convulsed Ah Fe's face. 
 He winked both his eyes with the velocity of sheet-lightning, 
 nodded his head with frightful rapidity, and snapped and appa 
 rently dislocated every ringer on his right hand. Gabriel 
 gazed at him in open-mouthed wonder. 
 
 " All litey !" said Ah Fe, looking intently at Gabriel. 
 
 "Which?" asked Gabriel. 
 
 " All litey ! You shabbee < all litey i' She say ' ?ul litey.' " 
 
 " Who's she ?" asked Gabriel, in sudden alarm. 
 
 " You lifee ! shabbee ? Missee Conloy ! She likee you 
 shabbee ? Me likee you ! shabbee ? Miss Conloy she say 
 * all litee !' You shabbee sheliff ?" 
 
 "Which?" said Gabriel. 
 
 " Sheliff ! Man plenty chokee bad man !" 
 
 " Sheriff I reckon," suggested Gabriel, with great gravity. 
 
 A A2 
 
356 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " Urn ! Shelliff. Mebbe you shabbee him bimeby. He 
 chokee bad man. Much chokee. Chokee like hellee ! He 
 no chokee you. No. Shabbee ? She say ' shelliff no chokee 
 you.' Shabbee?" 
 
 " I see/' said Gabriel, significantly. 
 
 " She say," continued Ah Fe, with gasping swiftness, " she 
 say you talkee too much. She say me talkee too much. She 
 say Maxwellee talkee too much. All talkee too much. She 
 say ' no talkee !' Shabbee ? She say * ash up !' Shabbee ? 
 She say ' dly up I' Shabbee ? She say * bimeby plenty talkee 
 bimeby all littee !' Shabbee ?" 
 
 " But whar ez she whar kin I git to see her ?" asked 
 Gabriel. 
 
 Ah Fe's face instantly discharged itself of all expression ! A 
 wet sponge could not have more completely obliterated all 
 pencilled outline of character or thought from his blank slate- 
 coloured physiognomy than did Gabriel's simple question. He 
 returned his questioner's glance with ineffable calmness and 
 vacancy, patiently drew the long sleeves of his blouse still 
 further over his varnished fingers, crossed them submissively 
 and orientally before him, and waited apparently for Gabriel to 
 become again intelligible. 
 
 " Look yer," said Gabriel, with gentle persuasiveness, " ef 
 it's the same to ye, you'd be doin' me a heap o' good ef you'd 
 let on whar thet July thet Mrs. Conroy ez. Bein' a man ez 
 in his blindness bows down to wood and stun, ye ain't sup 
 posed to allow fur a Christian's feelings. But I put to ye ez a 
 far-minded brethren a true man and a man whatsoever his 
 colour that it's a square thing fur ye to allow to me whar thet 
 woman ez ez my relation by marriage ez hidin' ! Allowin' it's 
 one o' my idols I axes you as a brother Pagan whar ez 
 she ?" 
 
 A faint, flickering smile of pathetic abstraction and simplify, 
 as of one listening to far-off but incomprehensible music stole 
 over Ah Fe's face. Then he said kindly, gently, but some 
 what vaguely and unsatisfactorily 
 
 " Me no shabbee Melican man. Me washee shirtee ! dollah 
 and hap dozen !" 
 
357 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE PEOPLE V. JOHN DOE alias GABRIEL CONROY, AND JANE 
 
 ROE alias JULIE CONROY. BEFORE BOOMPOJNTER, j. 
 
 THE day of the trial was one of exacting and absorbing inte 
 rest to One Horse Gulch. Long before ten o'clock the Court 
 room and even the halls and corridors of the lately rehabilitated 
 Court House were thronged with spectators. It is only fair to 
 say that by this time the main points at issue were forgotten. 
 It was only remembered that some of the first notabilities of the 
 State had come up from Sacramento to attend the trial ; that 
 one of the most eminent lawyers in San Francisco had been 
 engaged for the prisoners at a fee variously estimated from fifty 
 to one hundred thousand dollars, and that the celebrated 
 Colonel Starbottle of Siskiyou was to assist in the prosecution ; 
 that a brisk duel of words, and, it was confidently hoped, a 
 later one of pistols, would grow out of this forensic encounter ; 
 that certain disclosures affecting men and women of high social 
 standing were to be expected ; and, finally, that in some 
 mysterious way a great political and sectional principle 
 (Colonel Starbottle was from the South and Mr. Poinsett 
 from the North) was to be evolved and upheld during the trial 
 these were the absorbing fascinations to One Horse Gulch. 
 
 At ten o'clock Gabriel, accompanied by his counsel, entered 
 the Court-room, followed by Colonel Starbottle. Judge Boom- 
 pointer, entering at the same moment, bowed distantly to 
 Arthur, and familiarly to Colonel Starbottle. In his otium off 
 the bench, he had been chaffed by the District Attorney, and 
 had lost large sums at play with Colonel Starbottle. Never 
 theless he was a trifle uneasy under the calmly critical eyes of 
 the famous young advocate from San Francisco. Arthur was 
 too wise to exhibit his fastidiousness before the Court; never 
 theless Judge Boompointer was dimly conscious that he would 
 on that occasion have preferred that the Clerk who sat below 
 him had put on a cleaner shirt, and himself refrained from 
 taking off his cravat and collar, as was his judicial habit on the 
 Wingdam circuit. There was some slight prejudice on the part 
 of the panel to this well-dressed young lawyer, which they were 
 pleased to specify and define more particularly as his general 
 
35 8 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " airiness." Seeing which Justice, on the bench, became more 
 dignified, and gazed severely at the panel and at Arthur. 
 
 In the selection of the jury there was some difficulty ; it was 
 confidently supposed that the prisoner's counsel would chal 
 lenge the array on the ground of the recent vigilance excite 
 ment but public opinion was disappointed when the examina 
 tion of the defence was confined to trivial and apparently 
 purposeless inquiry into the nativity of the several jurors. A 
 majority of those accepted by the defence were men of Southern 
 birth and education. Colonel Starbottle, who, as representative 
 of the peculiar chivalry of the South, had always adopted this 
 plan himself, in cases where his client was accused of assault 
 and battery, or even homicide, could not in respect to his 
 favourite traditions object to it. But when it was found that 
 there were only two men of Northern extraction on the jury, 
 and that not a few of them had been his own clients, Colonel 
 Starbottle thought he had penetrated the theory of the defence. 
 
 I regret that Colonel Starbottle's effort, admirably characte 
 rized by the Banner as "one of the most scathing and Junius- 
 like gems of legal rhetoric ever known to the California!! bar," 
 has not been handed down to me in extenso. Substantially, 
 however, it appeared that Colonel Starbottle had never before 
 found himself in " so peculiar, so momentous, so er delicate 
 a position. A position, sir, er er gentlemen, fraught with 
 the deepest social, professional er er he should not hesi 
 tate to say, upon his own personal responsibility, a position of 
 the deepest . political significance ! Colonel Starbottle was 
 aware that this statement might be deprecated nay, even 
 assailed by some. But he did not retract that statement. 
 Certainly not in the presence of that jury, in whose intelligent 
 faces he saw er er er justice inflexible justice ! er er 
 mingled and er mixed with with chivalrous instinct, and 
 suffused with the characteristic er er glow of er er !"' 
 (I regret to add that at this supreme moment, as the Colonel 
 was lightly waving away with his fat right hand the difficulties of 
 rhetoric, a sepulchral voice audible behind the jury suggested 
 " Robinson County whisky" as the origin of the phenomena 
 the Colonel hesitated to describe. The judge smiled blandly, 
 and directed the deputy sheriff to preserve order. The deputy 
 obeyed the mandate by looking over into the crowd behind the 
 jury, and saying, in an audible tone, "You'd better dry up 
 
The Trial. 
 
 thar, Joe White, or git out o' that !" and the Colonel, undis 
 mayed, proceeded.) " He well understood the confidence 
 placed by the defence in these gentlemen. He had reason to* 
 believe that an attempt would be made to show that this homi 
 cide was committed in accordance with certain er er prin 
 ciples held by honourable men that the act was retributive, 
 and in defence of an invasion of domestic rights and the sanc 
 tity of wedlock. But he should show them its fallacy. He 
 shotild show them that only a base pecuniary motive influenced 
 the prisoner. He should show them er er that the accused 
 had placed himself, firstly, by his antecedent acts, and, secondly,, 
 by the manner of the later act, beyond the sympathies of 
 honourable men. He should show them a previous knowledge of 
 certain er er indiscretions on the part of the prisoner's 
 wife, and a condonation by the prisoner of those indiscretions, 
 that effectually debarred the prisoner from the provisions of the 
 code ; he should show an inartistic, he must say, even on his 
 own personal responsibility, a certain ungentlemanliness, in the 
 manner of the crime that refused to clothe it with the er er 
 generous mantle of chivalry. The crime of which the 
 prisoner was accused might have er er been committed by 
 a Chinaman or a nigger. Colonel Starbottle did not wish to> 
 be misunderstood. It was not in the presence of er 
 Beauty " (the Colonel paused, drew out his handkerchief, and 
 gracefully waved it in the direction of the dusky Manuela and 
 the truculent Sal both ladies acknowledging the courtesy as 
 an especial and isolated tribute, and exchanging glances of the 
 bitterest hatred) " it is not, gentlemen, in the presence of an 
 all-sufficient and enthralling sex that I would seek to disparage 
 their influence with man. But I shall prove that this absorbing 
 er er passion, this er er delicious er er fatal weak 
 ness that rules the warlike camp, the er er stately palace, 
 as well as the er er cabin of the base-born churl, never 
 touched the calculating soul of Gabriel Conroy ! Look at him,, 
 gentlemen ! Look at him, and say upon your oaths, upon 
 your experience as men of gallantry, if he is a man to sacrifice 
 himself for a womam Look at him, and say truly, as men per 
 sonally responsible for their opinions, if he is a man to plao* 
 himself in a position of peril through the blandishments of e\ 
 er Beauty, or sacrifice himself upon the er er altar ot 
 Venus 1" 
 
360 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Every eye was turned upon Gabriel. And certainly at that 
 moment he did not bear any striking resemblance to a sighing 
 Amintor or a passionate Othello. His puzzled, serious face, 
 which had worn a look of apologetic sadness, was suffused at 
 this direct reference of the prosecution ; and the long, heavy 
 lower limbs, which he had diffidently tucked away under his 
 chair to reduce the elevation of his massive knees above the 
 ordinary level of one of the court-room chairs, retired still fur 
 ther. Finding himself, during the Colonel's rhetorical pause., 
 still the centre of local observation, he slowly drew from his 
 pocket a small comb, and began awkwardly to comb his hair 
 with an ineffective simulation of preoccupation and indifference. 
 
 "Yes, sir," continued the Colonel, with that lofty forensic 
 severity so captivating to the spectator, " you may comb yer 
 hair" (hyar was the Colonel's pronunciation), "but yer can't 
 comb it so as to make this intelligent jury believe that it is 
 fresh from the hands of er er Delilah." 
 
 The Colonel then proceeded to draw an exceedingly poetical 
 picture of the murdered Ramirez " a native, appealing to the 
 sympathies of every Southern man, a native of the tropics, im 
 pulsive, warm, and peculiarly susceptible, as we all are, gentle 
 men, to the weaknesses of the heart." The Colonel "would 
 not dwell further upon this characteristic of the deceased. 
 There were within the sound of his voice, visible to the sym 
 pathizing eyes of the jury, two beings who had divided his 
 heart's holiest affections their presence was more eloquent 
 than words. This man," continued the Colonel, "a repre 
 sentative of one of our oldest Spanish families a family that 
 recalled the days of er er the Cid and Don John this man 
 had been the victim at once of the arts of Mrs. Conroy and 
 the dastardly fears of Gabriel Conroy; of the wiles cf ihc 
 woman and the stealthy steel of the man." 
 
 " Colonel Starbottle would show that personating the cha 
 racter and taking the name of Grace Conroy, an absent sister 
 of the accused, Mrs. Conroy, then really Madame Devarges, 
 sought the professional aid of the impulsive and generous 
 Ramirez to establish her right to a claim then held by the 
 accused in fact, wrongfully withheld from his own sister, 
 Grace Conroy. That Ramirez, believing implicitly in the 
 story of Madame Devarges with the sympathy of an over 
 flowing nature, gave her that aid until her marriage with 
 
The Trial 361 
 
 Gabriel exposed the deceit. Colonel Starbottle would not 
 characterize the motives of such a marriage. It was apparent 
 to the jury. They were intelligent men, and would detect the 
 unhallowed combination of two confederates, under the sacra 
 ment of a holy institution, to deceive the trustful Ramirez. It 
 was a nuptial feast at which er er Mercury presided, and 
 no t er er Hymen. Its only issue was fraud and murder. 
 Having obtained possession of the property in a common 
 interest, it was necessary to remove the only witness of the 
 fraud, Ramirez. The wife found a willing instrument in the 
 husband. And how was the deed committed ? Openly and 
 in the presence of witnesses? Did Gabriel even assume a 
 virtue, and under the pretext of an injured husband challenge 
 the victim to the field of honour? No! No, gentlemen. 
 Look at the murderer, and contrast his enormous bulk with 
 the. er slight, graceful, youthful figure of the victim, and you 
 will have an idea of the er er enormity of the crime." 
 
 After this exordium came the testimony i.e., facts, coloured 
 more or less unconsciously, according to the honest prejudices 
 of the observer, his capacity to comprehend the fact he had 
 observed, and his disposition to give his theory regarding that 
 fact rather than the fact itself. And when the blind had 
 testified to what they saw and the halt had stated where they 
 walked and ran, the prosecution rested with a flush of triumph. 
 
 They had established severally : that the deceased had died 
 from the effects of a knife wound ; that Gabriel had previously 
 quarrelled with him and was seen on the hill within a few hours 
 of the murder ; that he had absconded immediately after, and 
 that his wife was still a fugitive, and that there was ample 
 motive for the deed in the circumstances surrounding the 
 prisoner. 
 
 Much of this was shaken on cross-examination. The surgeon 
 who made the autopsy was unable to say whether the deceased, 
 being consumptive, might not have died from consumption that 
 very night. The witness who saw Gabriel pushing the deceased 
 along the road, could not swear positively whether the deceased 
 were not pulling Gabriel instead, and the evidence of Mrs. 
 Conroy's imposture was hearsay only. Nevertheless bets were 
 offered in favour of Starbottle against Poinsett that being the 
 form in which the interest of One Horse Gulch crystallized itself. 
 
 When the prosecution rested, Mr. Poinsett of counsel for 
 
362 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 defence, moved for the discharge of the prisoner, no evidence 
 having been shown of his having had any relations with or 
 knowledge of the deceased until the day of the murder, and 
 none whatever of his complicity with the murderess, against 
 whom the evidence of the prosecution and the arguments of the 
 learned prosecuting attorney were chiefly directed. 
 
 Motion overruled. A sigh of relief went up from the 
 spectators and the jury. That any absurd technical objection 
 should estop them from that fun which as law-abiding citizens 
 they had a right to expect, seemed oppressive and scandalous ; 
 and when Arthur rose to open for the defence, it was with an 
 instinctive consciousness that his audience were eyeing him as 
 a man who had endeavoured to withdraw from a race. 
 
 Ridiculous as it seemed in reason, it was enough to excite 
 Arthur's flagging interest and stimulate his combativeness. 
 With ready tact he fathomed the expectation of the audience, 
 and at once squarely joined issue with the Colonel. 
 
 Mr. Poinsett differed from his learned friend in believing 
 this case was at all momentous or peculiar. It was a quite 
 common one he was sorry to say a very common one in the 
 somewhat hasty administration of the lav/ in California. He 
 was willing to admit a peculiarity in his eloquent brother's 
 occupying the line of attack, when his place was as clearly at 
 his, Mr. Poinsett's side. He should overlook some irregulari 
 ties in the prosecution from this fact, and from the natural con 
 fusion of a man possessing Colonel Starbottle's quick sympa 
 thies, who found himself arrayed against his principles. He 
 should, however, relieve them from that confusion, by stating 
 that there really was no principle involved beyond the common 
 one of self-preservation. He was willing to admit the counsel's 
 ingenious theory that Mrs. Conroy who was not mentioned 
 in the indictment, or indeed any other person not specified 
 had committed the deed for which his client was charged. But 
 as they were here to try Gabriel Conroy only, he could not see 
 the relevancy of the testimony to that fact. He should con 
 tent himself with the weakness of the accusation. He should 
 not occupy their time, but should call at once to the stand the 
 prisoner ; the man who, the jury would remember, was now, 
 against all legal precedent, actually, if not legally, placed again 
 in peril of his life, in the very building which but a few clays 
 before had seen his danger and his escape. 
 
The Trial. 363 
 
 He should call Gabriel Conroy ! 
 
 There was a momentary sensation in the coyrt. Gabriel 
 uplifted his huge frame slowly, and walked quietly toward the 
 witness-box. His face slightly flushed under the half-critical, 
 half-amused gaze of the spectators, and those by whom he 
 brushed as he made his way through the crowd noticed that his 
 breathing was hurried. But when he reached the box, his face 
 grew more composed, and his troubled eyes presently concen 
 trated their light fixedly upon Colonel StarbottH Then the 
 clerk mumbled the oath, and he took his seat. 
 
 "What is your name?" asked Arthur. 
 
 " I reckon ye mean my real name ?" queried Gabriel, with a 
 louch of his usual apology. 
 
 " Yes, certainly, your real name, sir," replied Arthur, a little 
 impatiently. 
 
 Colonel Starbottle pricked up his ears, and lifting his eyes 
 met Gabriel's dull, concentrated fires full in his own. 
 
 Gabriel then raised his eyes indifferently to the ceiling. " My 
 real name my genooine name is Johnny Dumbledee. 
 J-o-n-n-y, Johnny, D-u-m-b-i-1-d-e, Johnny Dumbledee !" 
 
 There was a sudden thrill, and then a stony silence. Arthur 
 and Maxwell rose to their feet at the same moment. "What?" 
 said both those gentlemen, sharply, in one breath. 
 
 "Johnny Dumbledee," repeated Gabriel, slowly and with 
 infinite deliberation ; " Johnny Dumbledee ez my rele name. 
 I hev frequent," he added, turning around in easy confidence 
 to the astonished Judge Boompointer, " I hev frequent allowed 
 I was Gabriel Conroy the same not being the truth. And 
 the woman ez I married her name was Grace Conroy, and 
 the heap o' lies ez thet old liar over thar" (he indicated the 
 gallant Colonel Starbottle with his finger) " hez told passes my 
 pile ! Thet woman, my wife ez was and ez waz Grace Conroy." 
 (To the Colonel, gravely :) " You hear me ! And the only 
 imposture, please your Honour and this yer Court, and you 
 gentl'men, was ME !" 
 
364 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 IN REBUTTAL. 
 
 THE utter and complete astonishment created by Gabriel's 
 reply was so generally diffused that the equal participation of 
 Gabriel's own counsel in this surprise was unobserved. Max 
 well would have risen again hurriedly, but Arthur laid his hand 
 on his shoulder. 
 
 "The man has gone clean mad ! this is suicide," whispered 
 Maxwell, excitedly. " We must get him off the stand. You 
 must explain !" 
 
 " Hush !" said Arthur, quickly. " Not a word ! Show any 
 surprise and we're lost !" 
 
 In another instant all eyes were fixed upon Arthur, who had 
 remained standing, outwardly calm. There was but one idea 
 dominant in the audience. What revelation would the next 
 question bring ? The silence became almost painful as Arthur 
 quietly and self-containedly glanced around the Court-room 
 and at the jury, as if coolly measuring the effect of a carefully- 
 planned dramatic sensation. Then, when every neck was bent 
 forward and every ear alert, Arthur turned nonchalantly yet 
 gracefully to the bench. 
 
 " We have no further questions to ask, your Honour," he 
 said, quietly, and sat down. 
 
 The effect of this simple, natural, and perfectly consistent 
 action was tremendous ! In the various triumphs of Arthurs 
 successful career, he felt that he had never achieved as 
 universal and instantaneous popularity. Gabriel was for 
 gotten ; the man who had worked up this sensation a sensa 
 tion whose darkly mysterious bearing upon the case no one 
 could fathom, or even cared to fathom, but a sensation that 
 each man confidently believed held the whole secret of the 
 crime this man was the hero ! Plad it been suggested, the 
 jury would have instantly given a verdict for this hero's client 
 without leaving their seats. The betting was two to one on 
 Arthur. I beg to observe that I am writing of men, impulsive, 
 natural, and unfettered in expression and action by any tra 
 dition of logic or artificial law a class of beings much idealized 
 by poets, and occasionally, I believe, exalted by latter-day 
 philosophers. 
 
In Rebuttal 365 
 
 Judge Boompointer looked at Colonel Starbottle. That 
 gentleman, completely stunned and mystified by the conduct 
 of the defence, fumbled his papers, coughed, expanded his 
 chest, rose, and began the cross-examination. 
 
 " You have said your name was er er Johnny er er" 
 (the Colonel was here obliged to consult his papers) " er John 
 Dumbledee. What was your idea, Mr. Dumbledee, in er 
 assuming the name of er er Gabriel Conroy ?" 
 
 Objected to by counsel for defence. Argument : Firstly, 
 motives, like beliefs, not admissible ; case cited, Higginbottom 
 v. Smithers. Secondly, not called out on Direct Ex. ; see 
 Swinke v. Swanke, opinion of Muggins, J., 2 Cal. Rep. 
 Thirdly, witness not obliged to answer questions tending to 
 self-crimination. Objection overruled by the Court. Pre 
 cedent not cited ; real motive, Curiosity. Boompointer, J. 
 Question repeated : 
 
 " What was your idea or motive in assuming the name of 
 Gabriel Conroy ?" 
 
 Gabriel (cunningly, and leaning confidentially over the arm 
 of his chair) : " Wot would be your idee of a motif?" 
 
 The witness, amidst much laughter, was here severely 
 instructed by the Court that the asking of questions was not 
 the function of a witness. The witness must answer. 
 
 Gabriel : " Well, Gabriel Conroy was a purty name the 
 name of a man ez I onst knew ez died in Starvation Camp. 
 It kinder came easy, ez a sort o' interduckshun, don't ye 
 see, Jedge, toe his sister Grace, ez was my wife. I kinder 
 reckon, between you and me, ez thet name sorter helped 
 the courtin' along she bein' a shy critter, outer her own 
 fammerly." 
 
 Question : " In your early acquaintance with the deceased, 
 were you not known to him as Gabriel Conroy, always, and 
 not as er er Johnny Dumbledee ?" 
 
 Arthur Poinsett here begged to call the attention of the 
 Court to the fact that it had not yet been shown that Gabriel 
 that is, Johnny Dumbledee had ever had any early acquain 
 tance with the deceased. The Court would not fail to observe 
 that counsel on the direct examination had restricted them 
 selves to a simple question the name of the prisoner. 
 
 Objection sustained by Judge Boompointer, who was 
 beginning to be anxious to get at the facts. Whereat Colonel 
 
366 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Starbottle excepted, had no more questions to ask, and 
 Gabriel was commanded to stand aside. 
 
 Betting now five to one on Arthur Poinsett ; Gabriel's hand, 
 on leaving the witness box, shaken cordially by a number of 
 hitherto disinteiested people. Hurried consultation between 
 defendant's counsel. A note handed to Colonel Starbottle. 
 Intense curiosity manifested by Manuela and Sal regarding 
 a closely veiled female, who enters a moment later, and 
 is conducted with an excess of courtesy to a seat by 
 the' gallant Colonel. General impatience of audience and 
 jury. 
 
 The defence resumed. Michael O'Flaherty called ; nativity, 
 County Kerry, Ireland. Business, miner. On the night of 
 the murder, while going home from work, met deceased on 
 Conroy's Hill, dodging in among the trees, for all the wurreld 
 like a thafe. A few minutes later overtook Gabriel Conroy 
 half a mile further on, on the same road, going in same 
 direction as witness, and walked with him to Lawyer Max 
 well's office. Cross examined : Is naturalized. Always voted 
 the Dimmycratic ticket. Was always opposed to the Govern 
 ment bad cess to it in the ould counthry, and isn't thet 
 mane to go back on his principles here. Doesn't know that a 
 Chinaman has affirmed to the same fact of Gabriel's alibi. 
 Doesn't know what an alibi is ; thinks he would if he saw it. 
 Believes a Chinaman is worse nor a nigger. Has noticed that 
 Gabriel was left-handed. 
 
 Amadee Michet, sworn for defence ; nativity, France. 
 Business, Foreman of La Parfait Union. Frequently walks to 
 himself in the beautiful grove on Conroy's Hill. Comes to 
 him on the night of the i5th, Gabriel Conroy departing from 
 his house. It is then seven hours, possibly more, not less. 
 The night is fine. This Gabriel salutes him, in the American 
 fashion, and is gone. Eastward. Ever to the east. Watches 
 M. Conroy because he wears a triste look, as if there were 
 great sadness here (in the breast of the witness' blouse). Sees 
 him vanish in the gulch. Returns to the hill and there over 
 hears voices, a man's and a woman's. The woman's voice is 
 that of Madame Conroy. The man's voice is to him strange 
 and not familiar. Will swear positively it was not Gabriel's 
 Remains on the hill about an hour. Did not see Gabriel again. 
 Saw a man and woman leave the hill and pass by the Wingdara 
 road as he was going home. To the best of his belief the 
 
In Rebuttal. 367 
 
 woman was Mrs. Conroy. Do not know the man. Is positive 
 it was not Gabriel Conroy. Why ? Eh ! Mon Dieu, is it 
 possible that one should mistake a giant ? 
 
 Cross Examined. Is a patriot do not know what is this 
 Democrat you call. Is a hater of aristocrats. Do not know 
 if the deceased was an aristocrat. Was not enraged with 
 Madame Conroy. Never made love to her. Was not jilted 
 by her. This is all what you call too theen, eh ? Has noticed 
 that the prisoner was left-handed. 
 
 Helling Dittmann ; nativity, Germany. Does not know the 
 deceased ; does know Gabriel. Met him the night of the i5th 
 on the road from Wingdam ; thinks it was after eight o'clock. 
 He was talking to a Chinaman. 
 
 Cross Examined. Has not been told that these are the 
 facts stated by the Chinaman. Believes a Chinaman as good 
 as any other man. Don't know what you mean. How comes dese 
 dings. Has noticed the prisoner used his left hand efery dime. 
 
 Dr. Pressnitz recalled. Viewed the body at nine o'clock on 
 the 1 6th. The blood stains on the linen and the body had 
 been slightly obliterated and diluted with water, as if they had 
 been subjected to a watery application. There was an un 
 usually heavy dew at seven o'clock that evening, not later. 
 Has kept a meteorological record for the last three years. Is 
 of the opinion that this saturation might be caused by dew 
 falling on a clot of coagulated blood. The same effect would 
 not be noticeable on a freshly bleeding wound. The hygro 
 meter showed no indication of a later fall of dew. The night 
 was windy and boisterous after eight o'clock, with no humidity. 
 Is of the opinion that the body as seen by him, first assumed 
 its position before eight o'clock. Would not swear positively that 
 the deceased expired before that time. Would swear positively 
 that the wounds were not received after eight o'clock. From 
 the position of the wound, should say it was received while the 
 deceased was in an upright position, and the arm raised as if 
 in struggling. From the course of the wound should say it 
 could not have been dealt from the left hand of an opponent. 
 On the cross examination, Dr. Pressnitz admitted that many 
 so-called " left-handed men" were really ambi-dexterous. Was 
 of the opinion that perspiration would not have caused the 
 saturation of the dead man's linen. The saturation was 
 evidently after death the blood had clotted. Dr. Pressnitz 
 was quite certain that a dead man did not perspire. 
 
368 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 The defence rested amid a profound sensation. Colonel 
 Starbottle, who had recovered his jaunty spirits, apparently 
 influenced by his animated and gallant conversation with the 
 veiled female, rose upon his short stubby feet, and withdrawing 
 his handkerchief from his breast laid it upon the table before 
 him. Then carefully placing the ends of two white pudgy 
 fingers upon it, Colonel Starbottle gracefully threw his whole 
 weight upon their tips, and leaning elegantly toward the veiled 
 figure, called " Grace Conroy." 
 
 The figure arose, slight, graceful, elegant ; hesitated a 
 moment, and then slipped a lissom shadow through the crowd 
 as a trout glides through a shallow, and before the swaying, 
 moving mass had settled to astonished rest, stood upon the 
 witness stand. Then with a quick dexterous movement she 
 put aside the veil, that after the Spanish fashion was both 
 bonnet and veil, and revealed a face so exquisitely beautiful 
 and gracious, that even Manuela and Sal were awed into 
 speechless admiration. She took the oath with downcast lids, 
 whose sweeping fringes were so perfect that this very act of 
 modesty seemed to the two female critics as the most artistic 
 coquetry, and then raised her dark eyes and fixed them upon 
 Gabriel. 
 
 Colonel Starbottle waved his hand with infinite gallantry. 
 
 " What is er your name ?" 
 
 " Grace Conroy." 
 
 " Have you a brother by the name of Gabriel Conroy ?" 
 
 " I have." 
 
 " Look around the Court and see if you can recognise him." 
 
 The witness with her eyes still fixed on Gabriel pointed him 
 out with her gloved finger. "I do. He is there !" 
 
 "The prisoner at the bar?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "He 'is Gabriel Conroy?" 
 
 "He is." 
 
 " How long is it since you have seen him ?" 
 
 " Six years." 
 
 "Where did you see him last, and under what circumstances?" 
 
 "At Starvation Camp, in the Sierras. I left there to get help 
 for him and my sister." 
 
 " And you have never seen him sic,ce ?" 
 
 "Never!" 
 
In Rebuttal. 369 
 
 " Are you aware that among the er er unfortunates who 
 perished, a body that was alleged to be yours was identified ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Can you explain that circumstance ?" 
 
 " Yes. When I left I wore a suit of boy's clothes. I left 
 my own garments for Mrs. Peter Dumphy, one of our party. It 
 was her body, clothed in my garments, that was identified as 
 myself." 
 
 " Have you any proof of that fact other than your statement ?" 
 
 " Yes. Mr. Peter Dumphy, the husband of Mrs. Dumphy, 
 my brother Gabriel Conroy, and " 
 
 " May it please the Court" (the voice was Arthur Poinsett's, 
 cool, quiet, and languidly patient), " may it please the Court, 
 we of the defence to save your Honour and the jury some 
 time and trouble are willing to admit this identification of our 
 client as Gabriel Conroy, and the witness, without further 
 corroboration than her own word, as his sister. Your Honour 
 and the gentlemen of the jury will not fail to recognise in the 
 evidence of our client as to his own name and origin, a rash, 
 foolish, and, on behalf of myself and my colleague, I must 
 add, unadvised attempt to save the reputation of the wife he 
 deeply loves from the equally unadvised and extraneous evi 
 dence brought forward by the prosecution. But we must 
 insist, your Honour, that all this is impertinent to the real issue, 
 the killing of Victor Ramirez by John Doe, alias Gabriel 
 Conroy. Admitting the facts just testified to by the witness, 
 Grace Conroy, we have no cross-examination to make." 
 
 The face of the witness, which had been pale and self- 
 possessed, flushed suddenly as she turned her eyes upon Arthur 
 Poinsett. But that self-contained scamp retained an unmoved 
 countenance as, at Judge Boompointer's unusually gracious 
 instruction that the witness might retire, Grace Conroy left the 
 stand. To a question from the Court, Colonel Starbottle inti 
 mated that he should offer no further evidence in rebuttal. 
 
 " May it please the Court," said Arthur, quietly, " if we 
 accept the impeachment by a sister of a brother on trial for his 
 life, without comment or cross-examination, it is because we 
 are confident legally confident of showing the innocence of 
 that brother by other means. Recognising the fact that this 
 trial is not for the identification of the prisoner under any 
 name or alias, but simply upon the issue of the fact, whether 
 
 JJ 13 
 
370 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 he did or did not commit murder upon the body of Victor 
 Ramirez, as specified in the indictment, we now, waiving all 
 other issues, prepare to prove his innocence by a single witness. 
 That this witness was not produced earlier, was unavoidable ; 
 that hk testimony was not outlined in the opening, was due to 
 the fact that only within the last half-hour had he been within 
 the reach of the mandate of this Court." He would call Henry 
 Perkins ! 
 
 There was a slight stir among the spectators by the door as 
 they made way to a quaint figure that, clad in garments of a 
 bygone fashion, with a pale, wrinkled, yellow face, and grey 
 hair, from which the dye had faded, stepped upon the stand. 
 
 Is a translator of Spanish and searcher of deeds to the Land 
 Commission. Is called an expert. Recognises the prisoner 
 at the bar. Saw him only once, two days before the murder, 
 in passing over Conroy's Hill. He was sitting on the door 
 step of a deserted cabin with a little girl by his side. Saw the 
 deceased twice. Once when he came to Don Pedro's house 
 in San Francisco to arrange for the forgery of a grant that 
 should invalidate one already held by the prisoner's wife. Saw 
 the deceased again, after the forgery, on Conroy's Hill, engaged 
 in conversation with the prisoner's wife. Deceased appeared 
 to be greatly excited, and suddenly drew a knife and made an 
 attack upon the prisoner's wife. Witness reached forward and 
 interposed in defence of the woman, when the deceased turned 
 upon him in a paroxysm of insane rage, and a struggle took 
 place between them for the possession of the knife, witness 
 calling for help. Witness did not succeed in wresting the 
 knife from the hands of deceased ; it required all his strength 
 to keep himself from bodily harm. In the midst of the struggle 
 witness heard steps approaching, and again called for help. 
 
 The witness' call was responded to by a voice in broken 
 English, unintelligible to witness, apparently the voice of a 
 Chinaman. At the sound of the voice and the approach of 
 footsteps, the deceased broke from witness, and running back 
 ward a few steps, plunged the knife into his own breast and 
 fell Witness ran to his side and again called for help. 
 Deceased turned upon him with a ghastly smile and said, 
 u Bring anyone here and I'll accuse you before them of my 
 murder !" Deceased did not speak again, but fell into a state 
 Cf insensibility. Witness became alarmed, reflecting upon the 
 
In Rebuttal 371 
 
 threat of the deceased, and did not go for help. While stand 
 ing irresolutely by the body, Mrs. Conroy, the prisoner's wife r 
 came upon him. Confessed to her the details just described, 
 and the threat of the deceased. She advised the instant flight 
 of the witness, and offered to go with him herself. Witness 
 procured a horse and buggy from a livery stable, and at half- 
 past nine at night took Mrs. Conroy from the hillside near the 
 road, where she was waiting. Drove to Markleville that night, 
 where he left her under an assumed name, and came alone to 
 Sail Francisco and the Mission of San Antonio. Here he 
 learned from the last witness, the prisoner's sister, Grace 
 Conroy, of the arrest of her brother for murder. Witness at 
 once returned to One Horse Gulch, only to find the adminis 
 tration of justice in the hands of a Vigilance Committee. 
 Feeling that his own life might be sacrificed without saving the 
 prisoner's, he took refuge in a tunnel on Conroy 's Hill. It 
 chanced to be the same tunnel which Gabriel Conroy and his 
 friend afterwards sought in escaping from the Vigilance Com 
 mittee after the earthquake. Witness, during the absence of 
 Gabriel, made himself known to Mr. Jack Hamlin, Gabriel's- 
 friend and comrade in flight, and assured him of the witness's 
 intention to come forward whenever a fair trial could be 
 accorded to Gabriel. After the re-arrest and bailing of Gabriel, 
 witness returned to San Francisco to procure evidence regard 
 ing the forged grant, and proofs of Ramirez's persecution of 
 Mrs. Conroy. Had brought with him the knife, and had found 
 the cutler who sold it to deceased eight months before, when; 
 deceased first meditated an assault on Mrs. Conroy. Objected 
 to, and objection overruled by a deeply interested and excited 
 Court. 
 
 " That is all," said Arthur. 
 
 Colonel Starbottle, seated beside Grace Conroy, did not, for 
 a moment, respond to the impatient eyes of the audience in 
 the hush that followed. It was not until Grace Conroy* 
 whispered a few words in his ear, that the gallant Colonel 
 lifted his dilated breast and self-complacent face above the 
 level of tha seated counsel. 
 
 "What er er was the reason why did the er er 
 deeply anxious wife, who fled with you, and thus precipitated, 
 the arrest of her husband why did not she return with you to-' 
 clear him from suspicion ? Why does she remain absent ?" 
 
 BB2 
 
3/2 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 " She was taken ill dangerously ill at Markleville. The 
 excitement and fatigue of the journey had brought on prema- 
 ture confinement. A child was born " 
 
 There was a sudden stir among the group beside Jie pri 
 soner's chair. Colonel Starbottle, with a hurried glance at 
 Grace Conroy, waved his hand toward the witness and sat 
 down. Arthur Poinsett rose. " We ask a moment's delay, 
 youi Honour. The prisoner has fallen in a fit." 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 A FAMILY GREETING. 
 
 WHEN Gabriel opened his eyes to consciousness, he was lying 
 on the floor of the jury room, his head supported by Oily, and 
 a slight, graceful, womanly figure, that had been apparently 
 bending over him, in the act of slowly withdrawing from his 
 awakening gaze. It was was sister Grace. 
 
 " Thar, you're better now," said Oily, taking her brother's 
 hand, and quietly ignoring her sister, on whom Gabriels eyes 
 were still fixed. " Try and raise yourself inter this chair. 
 Thar thar now that's a good old Gabe thar I reckon you're 
 more comfortable !" 
 
 " It's Gracey !" whispered Gabriel, hoarsely, with his eyes 
 still fixed upon the slight, elegantly dressed woman, who now, 
 leaning against the doorway stood coldly regarding him. " It's 
 Gracey your sister, Oily !" 
 
 " Ef you mean the woman who hez been tryin' her best to 
 swar away your life, and kem here allowin' to do it she ain't 
 no sister o' mine not," added Oily, with a withering glance at 
 the simple elegance of her sister's attire, "not even ef she does 
 trapse in yer in frills and tuckers more shame for her !" 
 
 " If you mean," said Grace, coldly, "the girl whose birth 
 right you took away by marrying the woman who stole it, if 
 you mean the girl who rightfully bears the name that you 
 denied, under oath, in the very shadow of the gallows, she 
 claims nothing of you but her name." 
 
 " Thet's so," said Gabriel, simply. He dropped his head 
 between his great hands, and a sudden tremor shook his huge 
 frame. 
 
A Family Greeting. 373 
 
 " Ye ain't goin' to be driv inter histeriks agin along o' that 
 crockodill," said Oily, bending over her brother in alarm, 
 *' don't ye don't ye cry, Gabe !" whimpered Oily, as a few 
 drops oozed between Gabriel's fingers ; " don't ye take on, 
 darling, afore her J" 
 
 The two sisters glared at each other over the helpless man 
 between them. Then another woman entered who looked 
 sympathetically at Gabriel and then glared at them both. It 
 was Mrs. Markle. At which, happily for Gabriel, the family 
 bickering ceased. 
 
 u It's all over, Gabriel ! you're clar !" said Mrs. Markle, 
 ignoring the sympathies as well a?, the presence of the two 
 other ladies. " Here's Mr. Poinsett'' 
 
 He entered quickly, but stopped and flushed slightly under 
 the cold eyes of Grace Conroy. But only for a moment. 
 Coming to Gabriel's side, he said, kindly, " Gabriel, I con 
 gratulate you. The acting District Attorney has entered a 
 nolle proscqui, and you are discharged." 
 
 " Ye mean I kin go," said Gabriel, suddenly lifting his face. 
 
 " Yes. You are as free as air." 
 
 " And ez to her ?" asked Gabriel, quickly. 
 
 " Who do you mean ?" replied Arthur, involuntarily glanc 
 ing in the direction of Grace, whose eyes dropped scornfully 
 before him. 
 
 " My wife July is she clar too ?" 
 
 " As far as this trial is concerned, yes," returned Arthur, with 
 a trifle less interest in his voice, which Gabriel was quick to 
 discern. 
 
 " Then I'll go," said Gabriel, rising to his feet. He made a 
 few steps to the door and then hesitated, slopped, and turned 
 toward Grace. As he did so his old apologetic, troubled, 
 diffident manner returned. 
 
 "Ye'll exkoos me, Miss," he said, looking with troubled 
 eyes upon his newly-found sister, " ye'll exkoos me, ef 1 
 haven't the time now to do the agreeable and show ye over yer 
 rjroperty on Conroy's Hill. But it's thar ! It's all thar, cz 
 Lawyer Maxwell kin testify. It's all thar and the house is open, 
 ez it always was to ye, ez the young woman who keeps the 
 house kin tell ye. I'd go thar with ye ef I hed time, but I'm 
 startin' out now, to-night, to see July. To see my wife, Miss 
 Conroy, to see July ez is expectin' ! And I reckon thar'll be a 
 
374 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 babya pore little, helpless newborn baby ony so long!" 
 added Gabriel, exhibiting his forefinger as a degree of mensu- 
 Tation, " and ez a fammerly man, being ladies, I reckon you 
 .reckon I oughter be thar." (I grieve to state that at this 
 moment the ladies appealed to exchanged a glance of supreme 
 contempt, and am proud to record that Lawyer Maxwell and 
 " Mr. Poinsett exhibited the only expression of sympathy with 
 the speaker, that was noticeable in the group.) 
 
 Arthur detected it and said, I fear none the less readily for 
 that knowledge 
 
 " Don't let us keep you, Gabriel ; we understand your feel 
 ings. Go at once." 
 
 " Take me along, Gabe," said Oily, flashing her eyes at her 
 sister, and then turning to Gabriel with a quivering upper lip. 
 
 Gabriel turned, swooped his tremendous arm around Oily, 
 lifted her bodily off her feet, and saying, " You're my own little 
 girl," vanished through the doorway. 
 
 This movement reduced the group to Mrs. Markle and 
 Grace Conroy, confronted by Mr. Poinsett and Maxwell. Mrs. 
 Markle relieved an embarrassing silence by stepping forward 
 -and taking the arm of Lawyer Maxwell and leading him away. 
 Arthur and Grace were left, alone. 
 
 For the first time in his life Arthur lost his readiness and 
 self-command. He glanced awkwardly at the woman before 
 him, and felt that neither conventional courtesy nor vague 
 sentimental recollection would be effective here. 
 
 " I am waiting for my maid," said Grace, coldly ; "if, as you 
 return to the Court-room, you will send her here, you will 
 oblige me." 
 
 Arthur bowed confusedly. 
 
 " Ycur maid " 
 
 "Yes; you know her, I think, Mr. Poinsett," continued 
 Grace, lifting her arched brows with cold surprise. "Man- 
 uela !" 
 
 Arthur turned pale and red. He was conscious of being 
 not only awkward but ridiculous. 
 
 " Pardon me perhaps I am troubling you I will go myself, 
 said Grace, contemptuously. 
 
 " One moment, Miss Conroy," said Arthur, instinctively 
 stepping before her as she moved as if to pass him, " one 
 moment, I beg." He paused, and then said, with less de- 
 
A Family Greeting. 375 
 
 liberation and more impulsively than had been his habit for 
 the last six years, " You will, perhaps, be more forgiving to 
 your brother if you know that I, who have had the pleasure of 
 meeting you since you were lost to us all I, who have not 
 had his preoccupation of interest in another even I, have 
 been as blind, as foolish, as seemingly heartless as he. You 
 will remember this, Miss Conroy I hope quite as much for 
 its implied compliment to your complete disguise, and an 
 evidence of the success of your own endeavours to obliterate 
 your identity, as for its being an excuse for your brother's 
 conduct, if not for my own. / did not know you." 
 
 Grace Conroy paused and raised her dark eyes to his. 
 
 " You spoke of my brother's preoccupation with with the 
 woman for whom he would have sacrificed anything me his 
 very life! I can I am a woman I can understand that! 
 You have forgotten, Don Arturo, you have forgotten pardon 
 me I am not finding fault it is not for me to find fault but 
 you have forgotten Donna Maria Sepulvida !" 
 
 She swept by him with a rustle of silk and lace, and was 
 gone. His heart gave a sudden bound ; he was about to follow 
 her, when he was met at the door by the expanding bosom of 
 Colonel Starbottle. 
 
 " Permit me, sir, as a gentleman, as a man of er er er 
 honour ! to congratulate you, sir ! When we er er parted 
 in San Francisco I did not think that I would have the er 
 er pleasure a rare pleasure to Colonel Starbottle, sir, in his 
 private as well as his er er public capacity of er er a 
 PUBLIC APOLOGY. Ged, sir ! I have made it ! Ged, sir ! when 
 I entered that nolle pros. I said to myself, ' Star., this is an 
 apology an apology, sir ! But you are responsible, sir, you 
 are responsible, Star. ! personally responsible !' " 
 
 " I thank you," said Arthur, abstractedly, still straining his 
 eyes after the retreating figure of Grace Conroy, and trying to 
 combat a sudden instinctive jealousy of the man before him, 
 " I thank you, Colonel, on behalf of my client and myself." 
 
 " Ged, sir," said Colonel Starbottle, blocking up the way, 
 with a general expansiveness of demeanour, " Ged, sir, this is 
 not all. You will remember that our recent interview in San 
 Francisco was regarding another and a different issue. That, 
 sir, I am proud to say, the developments of evidence in this 
 trial have honourably and er er as a lawyer, I may say, 
 
376 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 have legally settled. With the er er identification and 
 legal er er rehabilitation of Grace Conroy, that claim of 
 my client falls to the ground. You may state to your client, 
 Mr. Poinsett, that er er upon my own personal responsi 
 bility I abandon the claim. 3 ' 
 
 Arthur Poinsett stopped and looked fixedly at the gallant 
 Colonel. Even in his sentimental preoccupation the profes 
 sional habit triumphed. 
 
 " You withdraw Mrs. Dumphy's claim upon Mr. Dumphy ?" 
 he said, slowly. 
 
 Colonel Starbottle did not verbally reply, but that gallant 
 warrior allowed the facial muscles on the left side of his face to 
 relax so that one eye was partially closed. 
 
 " Yes, sir, there is a matter of a few thousand dollars that 
 er er you understand I am ex er personally respon 
 sible for." 
 
 "That will never be claimed, Colonel Starbottle," said 
 Arthur, smiling, "and I am only echoing, I am sure, the 
 sentiments of the man most concerned, who is approaching us 
 Mr. Dumphy." 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 IN WHICH THE FOOTPRINTS RETURN. 
 
 MR. JACK HAMLIN was in very bad case. When Dr. Duchesne, 
 who had been summoned from Sacramento, arrived, that emi 
 nent surgeon had instantly assumed such light-heartedness and 
 levity toward his patient, such captiousness toward Pete, with 
 an occasional seriousness of demeanour when he was alone, 
 that, to those who knew him, it was equal to an unfavourable 
 prognosis. Indeed, he evaded the direct questioning of Oily, 
 who had lately constituted herself a wondrously light-footed, 
 soft- handed assistant of Pete, until one day, when they were 
 alone, he asked, more seriously than was his wont, if Mr. 
 Hamlin had ever spoken of his relations, or if she knew of any 
 of his friends who were accessible. 
 
 Oily had already turned this subject over in her womanly 
 mind, and had thought once or twice of writing to the Blue 
 Moselle, but on the direct questioning of the doctor, and its 
 
The Footprints Remrn. 377 
 
 peculiar significance, she recalled Jack's confidences on their 
 midnight ride, and the Spanish beauty he had outlined, and so 
 one evening, when she was alone with her patient, and the 
 fever was low, and Jack lay ominously patient and submissive, 
 she began what the doctor had only lately abandoned 
 probing a half-healed wound. 
 
 " I reckon you'd hev been a heap more comfortable ef this 
 thing hed happened to ye down thar in San Antonio," said Oily. 
 
 Jack rolled his dark eyes wonderingly upon his fair persecutor. 
 
 " You know you'd hev had thet thar sweetheart o' yours 
 thet Mexican woman sittin' by ye, instead o' me and Pete," 
 suggested the artful Olympia. 
 
 Jack nearly leaped from the bed. 
 
 " Do you reckon I'd hev rung myself in as a wandering 
 cripple a tramp thet hed got peppered on a lady like her ? 
 Look yer, Oily," continued Mr. Hamlin, raising himself on his 
 elbow, " if you've got the idea thet thet woman is one of them 
 hospital sharps one of them angels who waltz round a sick 
 man with a bottle of camphor in one hand and a tract in the 
 other you had better disabuse your mind of it at once, Miss 
 Conroy; take a back seat and wait for a new deal. And 
 don't you go to talkin' of thet lady as my sweetheart it's it's 
 sacrilegious and the meanest kind of a bluff." 
 
 As the day of the trial drew near, Mr. Hamlin had expressed 
 but little interest in it, and had evidently only withheld his 
 general disgust of Gabriel's weakness from consideration of his 
 sister. Once Mr. Hamlin condescended to explain his appa 
 rent coldness. 
 
 " There's a witness coming, Oily, that'll clear your brother 
 more shame fcr him the man ez did kill Ramirez. I'm keep 
 ing my sympathies for that chap. Don't you be alarmed. If 
 that man don't come up to the scratch I will. So don't you 
 go whining round. And ef you'll take my advice, you'll keep 
 clear o' that Court, and let them lawyers fight it out. It will 
 be time enough for you to go when they send for me." 
 
 " But you can't move you ain't strong enough," said Oily. 
 
 " I reckon Pete will get me there some way if he has to pack 
 me on his back. I ain't a heavy weight now," said Jack, look 
 ing sadly at his thin white hands ; " I've reckoned on that, and 
 even if I should pass in my checks there's an affidavit already 
 sworn to in Maxwell's hands." 
 
378 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 Nevertheless, on the day of the trial, Oily, still doubtful of 
 Gabriel, and still mindful of his capacity to develop " God for 
 saken mulishness," was nervous and uneasy, until a messenger 
 arrived from Maxwell, with a note to Hamlin, carrying the 
 tidings of the appearance of Perkins in Court, and closing with a 
 request for Oily' s presence. 
 
 "Who's Perkins?" asked Oily, as she reached for her hat 
 in nervous excitement. 
 
 " He's no slouch," said Jack, senteKtiously. " Don't ask 
 questions. It's all right with Gabriel now," he added, assur- 
 ingly. " He's as good as clear. Run away, Miss Conroy. 
 Hold up a minit ! There, kiss me ! Look here, Oily, say ! 
 do you take any stock in that lost sister of yours that your fool 
 of a brother is always gabbing about ? You do ? Well, you are 
 as big a fool as he ! There ! There ! never mind now she's 
 turned up at last ! Much good may it do you. One ! two ! 
 go !" and as Olly's pink ribbons flashed though the doorway, 
 Mr. Hamlin laid down again with a twinkle in his eye. 
 
 He was alone. The house was very quiet and still ; most 
 of the guests, and the hostess and her assistant, were at the all- 
 absorbing trial ; even the faithful Pete, unconscious of any pos 
 sible defection of his assistant, Oily, had taken the opportunity 
 to steal away to hear the arguments of counsel. As the retreat 
 ing footsteps of Oily echoed along the vacant corridor, he felt 
 that he possessed the house completely. 
 
 This consciousness to a naturally active man, bored by ill 
 ness, and the continuous presence of attendants, however kind 
 and devoted, was at first a relief. Mr. Hamlin experienced an 
 instant desire to get up and dress himself, to do various things 
 ivhich were forbidden but which now an overruling Provi 
 dence had apparently placed within his reach. He rose with 
 great difficulty, and a physical weakness that seemed altogether 
 inconsistent with the excitement he was then feeling, and par 
 tially dressed himself. Then he was suddenly overtaken with 
 great faintness and vertigo, and staggering to the open window 
 fell in a chair beside it. The cool breeze revived him for a 
 moment, and he tried to rise, but found it impossible. Then 
 the faintness and vertigo returned, and he seemed to be slip 
 ping away somewhere not altogether unpleasantly, nor against 
 Ais volition somewhere where there was darkness and stillness 
 and rest. And then he slipped back, almost instantly as it 
 
The Footprints Return. 379 
 
 seemed to him, to a room full of excited and anxious people, 
 all extravagantly, and as he thought, ridiculously concerned 
 about himself. He tried to assure them that he was all right, 
 and not feeling any worse for his exertion, but was unable to 
 make them understand him. Then followed Night, replete 
 with pain, and filled with familiar voices that spoke unintelligi 
 bly, and then Day, devoted to the monotonous repetition of 
 the last word or phrase that the doctor, or Pete, or Oily had 
 used, or the endless procession of Olly's pink ribbons, and the 
 tremulousness of a window curtain, or the black, sphinx-like 
 riddle of a pattern on the bed-quilt, or the wall paper. Then 
 there was sleep that was turbulent and conscious, and wakeful- 
 ness that was lethargic and dim, and then infinite weariness, 
 and then, lapses of utter vacuity the occasional ominous im 
 pinging of the shadow of death. 
 
 But through this chaos there was always a dominant central 
 figure a figure partly a memory, and as such, surrounded by 
 consistent associations ; partly a reality and incongruous with 
 its surroundings the figure of Donna Dolores ! But whether 
 this figure came back to Mr. Hamlin out of the dusky arches 
 of the Mission Church in a cloud of incense, besprinkling him 
 with holy water, or whether it bent over him, touching his 
 feverish lips with cool drinks, or smoothing his pillow, a fact 
 utterly unreal and preposterous seen against the pattern of the 
 wall paper, or sitting on the familiar chair by his bedside it 
 was always there. And when, one day, the figure stayed longer, 
 and the interval of complete consciousness seemed more pro 
 tracted, Mr. Hamlin, with one mighty effort, moved his lips, 
 and said feebly 
 
 " Donna Dolores !" 
 
 The figure started, leaned its beautiful face, blushing a celes 
 tial rosy red, above his own, put its finger to its perfect lips, 
 and said in plain English 
 
 " Hush ! I am Gabriel Conroy's sister." 
 
380 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 IN WHICH MR. HAMLIN PASSES. 
 
 WITH his lips sealed by the positive mandate of the lovely 
 spectre, Mr. Hamlin resigned himself again to weakness and 
 sleep. When he awoke, Oily was sitting by his bedside ; the 
 dusky figure of Pete, spectacled and reading a good book, was 
 dimly outlined against the window but that was all. The 
 vision if vision it was had fled. 
 
 ' Oily," said Mr. Hamlin, faintly. 
 
 " Yes !" said Oily, opening her eyes in expectant sympathy. 
 
 " How long have I been dr I mean how long has this 
 spell lasted ?" 
 
 "Three days," said Oily 
 
 " The you say !" (a humane and possibly weak consi 
 deration for Mr. Hamlin in his new weakness and suffering, 
 restricts me to a mere outline of his extravagance of speech.) 
 
 " But you're better now," supplemented Oily. 
 
 Mr. Hamlin began to wonder faintly if his painful experience 
 of the last twenty-four hours were a part of his convalescence. 
 He was silent for a few moments and then suddenly turned his 
 face toward Oily. 
 
 " Didn't you say something aboutabout your sister the 
 other day ?" 
 
 " Yes she's got back," said Oily, curtly. 
 
 " Here ?" 
 
 " Here." 
 
 " Well ?" said Mr. Hamlin, a little impatiently. 
 
 " Well," returned Oily, with a slight toss of her curls, " she's 
 got back, and I reckon it's about time she did." 
 
 Strange to say, Olly's evident lack of appreciation of her 
 sister seemed to please Mr. Hamlin possibly because it agreed 
 with his own idea of Grace's superiority and his inability to 
 recognise or accept her as the sister of Gabriel. 
 
 " Where has she been all this while ?" asked Jack, rolling his 
 large hollow eyes over Oily. 
 
 " Goodness knows ! Says she's bin Hvin' in some fammerly 
 down in the south Spanish, I reckon ; thet's whar she gits 
 those airs and graces." 
 
In which Mr. Hamlin Passes. 381 
 
 " Has she ever been here in this room ?" asked Mr. 
 Hamlin. 
 
 " Of course she has," said Oily. " When I left you to go 
 with Gabe to see his wife at Wingdam, she volunteered to take 
 my place, Thet woz while you woz flighty, Mr. Hamlin. 
 But I reckon she admired to stay here on account of seein' 
 her bo !" 
 
 " Her what ?" asked Mr. Hamlin, feeling the blood fast 
 rushing to his colourless face. 
 
 " Her bo," repeated Oily, " thet thar Ashley, or Poinsett 
 or whatever he calls hisself now !" 
 
 Mr. Hamlin here looked so singularly, and his hand tight 
 ened so strongly around Olly's that she hurriedly repeated to 
 him the story of Grace's early wanderings, and her absorbing 
 passion for their former associate Arthur Poinsett. The state 
 ment was, in Olly's present state of mind, not favourable to 
 Grace. "And she just came up yer only to see Arthur agin. 
 Thet's all. And she nearly swearin' her brother's life away 
 and pretendin' it was only done to save the fammerly name. 
 Jest ez if it hed been any more comfortable fur Gabriel to have 
 been hung in his own name. And then goin' and accusin' thet 
 innocent ole lamb, Gabe, of conspiring with July to take her 
 name away. Purty goin's on, I reckon. And thet man Poinsett, 
 by her own showin' never lettin' on to see her nor us nor 
 anybody. And she sassin' me for givin' my opinion of him 
 and excusin' him by say in' she didn't want him to know whar 
 she was. And she refusin' to see July at all and pore July 
 lyin' thar at Wingdam, sick with a new baby. Don't talk to 
 me about her!" 
 
 " But your sister didn't run away with with this chap. 
 She went away to bring you help," interrupted Jack, hastily 
 dragging Oily back to earlier history. 
 
 " Did she? Couldn't she trust her bo to go and get help 
 and then come back fur her ? reckonin' he cared for her at 
 all. No, she waz thet crazy after him she couldn't trust him 
 outer her sight and she left the camp and Gabe and ME for 
 him. And then the idee of her talking to Gabriel about bein' 
 disgraced by July. Ez ef she had never done anythin' to spile 
 her own name, and puttin' on such airs and " 
 
 " Dry up !" shouted Mr. Hamlin, turning with sudden 
 savageness upon his pillow. " Dry up ! don't you see you're 
 
382 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 driving me half-crazy with your infernal buzzing ?" He paused^ 
 as Oily stopped in mingled mortification and alarm, and then 
 added in milder tones, " There, that'll do. I am not feeling 
 well to-day. Send Dr. Duchesne to me if he's here. Stop 
 one moment there ! good-bye, go !" 
 
 Oily had risen promptly. There was always something in 
 Mr. Hamlin's positive tones that commanded an obedience 
 that she would have refused to any other. Thoroughly con 
 vinced of some important change in Mr. Hamlin's symptoms, 
 she sought the doctor at once. Perhaps she brought with her 
 some of her alarm and anxiety, for a moment later that distin 
 guished physician entered with less deliberation than was his 
 habit. He walked to the bedside of his patient and would 
 have taken his hand, but Jack slipped his tell-tale pulse under 
 the covers, and looking fixedly at the Doctor, said 
 
 " Can I be moved from here ?" 
 
 " You can, but I should hardly advise " 
 
 "I didn't ask that. This is a lone hand I'm playin', Doctor, 
 and if I'm euchred, 'tain't your fault. How soon ?" 
 
 " I should say," said Dr. Duchesne, with professional cau 
 tion, " that if no bad symptoms supervene" (he made here a 
 half habitual but wholly ineffectual dive for Jack's pulse), "you 
 might go in a week." 
 
 " I must go now f" 
 
 Dr. Duchesne bent over his patient. He was a quick as 
 well as a patiently observing man, and he saw something in 
 Jack's face that no one else had detected. Seeing this he said, 
 " You can go now, at a great risk the risk of your life." 
 
 "I'll take it!" said Mr. Hamlin, promptly. "I've been 
 playin' agin odds," he added, with a faint but audacious smile, 
 " for the last six months, and it's no time to draw out now. 
 Go on, tell Pete to pack up and get me ready." 
 
 " Where are you going ?" asked the Doctor, quietly, still 
 gazing at his patient. 
 
 "To! blank!" said Mr. Hamlin, impulsively. Then re 
 cognising the fact that in view of his having travelling com 
 panions, some more definite and practicable locality was 
 necessary, he paused a moment, and said, " To the Mission of 
 San Antonio." 
 
 " Very well," said the Doctor, gravely. 
 
 Strange to say, whether from the Doctor's medication, or 
 
/;/ which Mr. Hamlin Passes. 383 
 
 from the stimulus of some reserved vitality hitherto unsus 
 pected, Mr. Hamlin from that moment rallied. The prepara 
 tions for his departure were quickly made, and in a few hours 
 he was ready for the road. 
 
 " I don't want to have anybody cacklin' around me," he said, 
 in deprecation of any leave-taking. " I leave the board, they 
 can go on with the game." 
 
 Notwithstanding which, at the last moment, Gabriel hung 
 awkwardly and heavily around the carriage in which the invalid 
 was Abated. 
 
 " I'd foller arter ye, Mr. Hamlin, in a buggy," he inter 
 polated, in gentle deprecation of his unwieldy and difficult 
 bulk, " but I'm sorter kept yer with my wife who is powerful 
 weak along of a pore small baby about so long the same 
 not bein' a fammerly man yourself, you don't kinder get the 
 hang of. I thought it might please ye to know that I got bail 
 yesterday for thet Mr. Perkins ez didn't kill that thar Ramirez 
 the same havin' killed hisself ez woz fetched out on the 
 trial which I reckon ye didn't get to hear. I admire to see ye 
 Icokin' so well, Mr. Hamlin, and I'm glad Olly's goin' with ye. 
 I reckon Grace would hev gone too, but she's sorter skary 
 about strangers, hevin' bin engaged these seving years to a 
 young man by the name o' Poinsett ez waz one o' my counsel, 
 and hevin 5 lately had a row with the same one o' them lovers' 
 fights which bein' a young man yourself, ye kin kindly allow 
 for." 
 
 " Drive on !" imprecated Mr. Hamlin furiously to the driver ; 
 "what are you waiting for?" and with the whirling wheels 
 Gabriel dropped off apologetically in a cloud of dust, and Mr. 
 Hamlin sank back exhaustedly on the cushions. 
 
 Notwithstanding, as he increased his distance from One 
 Horse Gulch, his spirits seemed to rise, and by the time they 
 had reached San Antonio he had recovered his old audacity 
 and dash of manner, and raised the highest hopes in the breast 
 of everybody but his Doctor. Yet that gentleman, after a 
 careful examination of his patient one night, said privately to 
 Pete, " I think this exaltation will last about three days longer. 
 I am going to San Francisco. At the end of that time I shall 
 return unless you telegraph to me before that." He parted 
 gaily from his patient, and seriously from everybody else. 
 Before he left he sought out Padre Felipe. " I have a patient 
 
384 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 here, in a critical condition," said the Doctor; "the hotel is 
 no place for him. Is there any family here any house that 
 will receive him under your advice for a week ? At the end of 
 that time he will be better, or beyond our ministration. He is 
 not a Protestant he is nothing. You have had experience 
 with the heathen, Father Felipe." 
 
 Father Felipe looked at Dr. Duchesne. The Doctor's well 
 earned professional fame had penetrated even San Antonio ; 
 the Doctor's insight and intelligence were visible in his manner, 
 and touched the Jesuit instantly. " It is a strange case," my 
 son ; a sad case/' he said, thoughtfully. " I will see." 
 
 He did. The next day, under the directions of Father 
 Felipe, Mr. Hamlin was removed to the Rancho of the Blessed 
 Fisherman, and notwithstanding the fact that its hostess was 
 absent, was fairly installed as its guest. When Mrs. Sepulvida 
 returned from her visit to San Francisco she was at first asto 
 nished, then excited, and then, I fear, gratified. 
 
 For she at once recognised in this guest of Father Felipe 
 the mysterious stranger whom she had, some weeks ago, 
 detected on the plains of the Blessed Trinity. And Jack, 
 despite his illness, was still handsome, and had moreover the 
 melancholy graces of invalidism, which go far with an habitually 
 ailing sex. And so she coddled Mr. Hamlin and gave him her 
 sacred hammock by day over the porch, and her best bedroom 
 at night. And then, at the close of a pleasant day, she said, 
 archly 
 
 " I think I have seen you before, Mr. Hamlin at the 
 Rancho of the Blessed Trinity. You remember the house of 
 Donna Dolores ?" 
 
 Mr. Hamlin was too observant of the sex to be impertinently 
 mindful of another woman than his interlocutor, and assented 
 with easy indifference. 
 
 Donna Maria (now thoroughly convinced that Mr. Hamlin's 
 attentions on that eventful occasion were intended for herself, 
 and even delightfully suspicious of some prearranged plan in 
 his present situation) : " Poor Donna Dolores. You know we 
 have lost her for ever." 
 
 Mr. Hamlin asked, "When?" 
 
 " That dreadful earthquake on the 8th." 
 
 Mr. Hamlin, reflecting that the appearance of Grace Conroy 
 was on the loth, assented again abstractedly. 
 
In which Mr. Hamlin Passes. 385 
 
 " Ah, yes ! so sad ! And yet, perhaps, for the best. You 
 know the poor girl had a hopeless passion for her legal adviser 
 the famous Arthur Poinsett ! Ah ! you did not. Well, perhaps 
 it was only merciful that she died before she knew how insincere 
 that man's attentions were. You are a believer in special 
 Providences, Mr. Hamlin ?" 
 
 Mr. Hamlin (doubtfully) : " You mean a run of luck ?" 
 
 Donna Maria (rapidly, ignoring Mr. Hamlin's illustration) : 
 " Well, perhaps /have reason to say so. Poor Donna Dolores 
 v/as my friend. Yet, would you believe there were people 
 you know how ridiculous is the gossip of a town like this 
 there are people who believed that he was paying attention to 
 ME!" 
 
 Mrs. Sepulvida hung her head archly. There was a long 
 pause. Then Mr. Hamlin called faintly 
 
 " Pete !" 
 
 " Yes, Mars Jack." 
 
 " Ain't it time to take that medicine ?" 
 
 When Dr. Duchesne returned he ignored all this little 
 byplay, and even the anxious inquiries of Oily, and said to 
 Mr. Hamlin 
 
 " Have you any objections to my sending for Dr. Mackin 
 tosh a devilish clever fellow ?" 
 
 And Mr. Hamlin had none. And so, after a private telegram, 
 Dr. Mackintosh arrived, and for three or four hours the two 
 doctors talked in an apparently unintelligible language, chiefly 
 about a person whom Mr. Hamlin was satisfied did not exist. 
 And when Dr. Mackintosh left, Dr. Duchesne, after a very 
 earnest conversation with him on their way to the stage office^ 
 drew a chair beside Mr. Hamlin's bed. 
 
 " Jack !" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 " Have you got everything fixed all right ?" 
 
 " Yes, sir." 
 
 "Jack!" 
 
 " Yes, sir." 
 
 11 You've made Pete very happy this morning." 
 
 Jack looked up at Dr. Duchesne's critical face, and the 
 Doctor went on, gravely 
 
 " Confessing religion to himsaying you believed as he 
 did 1" 
 
 c c 
 
386 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 A faint laugh glimmered in the dark hollows of Jack's eyes. 
 
 " The old man," he said, explanatory, " has been preachin* 
 mighty heavy at me ever since t'other doctor came, and I 
 reckoned it might please him to allow that everything he said 
 was so. You see the old man's bin right soft on me, and 
 between us, Doctor, I ain't much to give him in exchange. It's 
 no square game !" 
 
 " Then you believe you're going to die?" said the Doctor, 
 gravely. 
 
 11 1 reckon." 
 
 " And you have no directions to give me ?" 
 
 " There's a black hound at Sacramento Jim Briggs, who 
 borrowed and never gave back my silver-mounted Derringers, 
 that I reckoned to give to you ! Tell him he'd better give them 
 up or I'll 
 
 " Jack," interrupted Dr. Duchesne, with infinite gentleness, 
 laying his hand on the invalid's arm, " you must not think of 
 me." 
 
 Jack pressed his friend's hand. 
 
 " There's my diamond pin up the spout at Wingdam, and 
 the money gone to Lawyer Maxwell to pay witnesses for that 
 old fool Gabriel. And then when Gabriel and me was escaping 
 I happened to strike the very man, Perkins, who was Gabriel's 
 principal witness, and he was dead broke, and I had to give 
 him my solitaire ring to help him get away and be on hand for 
 Gabriel. And Olly's got my gold specimen to be made into a 
 mug for that cub of that old she tiger Gabriel's woman that 
 Madame Devarges. And my watch who has got my watch ?'* 
 said Mr. Hamlin, reflectively. 
 
 "Never mind those things, Jack. Have you any word to 
 send to anybody ?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 There was a long pause. In the stillness the ticking of a 
 clock on the mantel became audible. Then there was a laugh 
 in the ante-room, where a professional brother of Jack's had 
 been waiting, slightly under the influence of grief and liquor. 
 
 " Scotty ought to know better than to kick up a row in a 
 decent woman's house," whispered Jack, faintly. " Tell him to 
 dry up, or I'll " 
 
 But his voice was failing him, and the sentence remained 
 incomplete. 
 
In the Old Cabin again. 387 
 
 "Doc " (after a long effort). 
 
 " Jack." 
 
 " Don't let on to Pete I fooled him." 
 
 " No, Jack." 
 
 They were both still for several minutes. And then Dr. 
 Duchesne softly released his hand and laid that of his patient, 
 white and thin, upon the coverlid before him. Then he rose 
 gently and opened the door of the ante-room. Two or three 
 eager faces confronted him. " Pete/' he said, gravely, " I want 
 Pete no one else." 
 
 The old negro entered with a trembling step. And then 
 catching sight of the white face on the pillow, he uttered one 
 cry a cry replete with all the hysterical pathos of his race, and 
 ran and dropped on his knees beside it ! And then the black 
 and the white face were near together, and both were wet with 
 tears. 
 
 Dr. Duchesne stepped forward and would have laid his hand 
 gently upon the old servant's shoulder. But he stopped, fo " 
 suddenly both of the black hands were lifted wildly in tit?: 
 air, and the black face with rapt eyeballs turned toward tha 
 ceiling, as if they had caught sight of the steadfast blue beycsd. 
 Perhaps they had. 
 
 " O de Lord God ! whose prechiss blood washes de brack 
 sheep and de white sheep all de one colour ! O de Lamb ob 
 God ! Sabe, sabe dis por', dis por' boy. O Lord God for MY 
 sake. O de Lord God, dow knowst fo' twenty years Pete, ole 
 Pete, has walked in dy ways has found de Lord and Hnf 
 crucified ! and has been dy servant. O de Lord God O d, 
 bressed Lord, ef it's all de same to you, let all dat go fo' now 
 Let ole Pete go ! and send down dy mercy and forgiveness { 
 him r 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 IN THE OLD CABIN AGAIN. 
 
 THERE was little difficulty in establishing the validity of Grace 
 Conroy's claim to the Conroy grant under the bequest of Dr. 
 Devarges. Her identity was confirmed by Mr. Dumphy none 
 the less readily that it relieved him of a distressing doubt about 
 the late Mrs. Dumphy, and did not affect his claim to the 
 
 CC2 
 
3 88 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 mineral discovery which he had purchased from Gabriel and 
 his wife. It was true that since the dropping of the lead the 
 mine had been virtually abandoned, and was comparatively of 
 little market value. But Mr. Dumphy still clung to the hope 
 .that the missing lead would be discovered. 
 
 He was right. It was some weeks after the death of Mr. 
 Hamlin, that Gabriel and Oily stood again beneath the dis 
 mantled roof-tree and bare walls of his old cabin on Conroy 
 Hill. But the visit this time was not one of confidential dis 
 closure nor lonely contemplation, but with a practical view of 
 .determining whether this first home of the brother and sister 
 could be repaired and made habitable, for Gabriel had steadily 
 refused the solicitations of Grace that he should occupy his 
 more recent mansion. Mrs. Conroy and infant were at the hotel. 
 
 " Thar, Oily," said Gabriel, " I reckon that a cartload o' 
 boards and a few days' work with willin' hands, will put that 
 thar shanty back ag'in ez it used to be when you and me waz 
 childun." 
 
 " Yes," said Oily, abstractedly. 
 
 " We've had good times yer, Oily, you and me !" 
 
 " Yes," said Oily, with eyes still afar. 
 
 Gabriel looked down a great way on his sister, and then 
 suddenly took her hand and sat down upon the doorstep, 
 drawing her between his knees after the old fashion. 
 
 " Ye ain't hearkenin' to me, Oily dear !" 
 
 Whereat Miss Olympia instantly and illogically burst into 
 tears, and threw her small arms about Gabriel's huge bulk. 
 She had been capricious and fretful since Mr. Hamlin's death, 
 .and it may be that she embraced the dead man again in he* 
 brother's arms. But her outward expression was, " Gracey ! I 
 was thinking o' poor Gracey, Gabe !" 
 
 " Then," said Gabriel, with intense archness and cunning, 
 "you was thinkin' o' present kempany, for ef I ain't blind, 
 that's them coming up the hill." 
 
 There were two figures slowly coming up the hill outlined 
 against the rosy sunset. A man and woman Arthur Poinsett 
 and Grace Conroy. Oily lifted her head and rose to her feet. 
 They approached nearer. No one spoke. The next instant 
 impulsively I admit, inconsistently I protest the sisters were 
 in each other's arms. The two I.:CA looked at each other, 
 awkward, reticent, superior. 
 
In the Old Cabin again. 389? 
 
 Then the women having made quick work of it, the two men 
 were treated to an equally illogical, inconsistent embrace. 
 When Grace at last, crying and laughing, released Gabriel's 
 neck from her sweet arms, Mr. Poinsett assumed the masculine 
 attitude of pure reason. 
 
 " Now that you have found your sister, permit me to intro 
 duce you to my wife," he said to Gabriel, taking Grace's hand:; 
 in his own. 
 
 Whereat Oily flew into Poinsett's arms, and gave him a 
 fraternal and conciliatory kiss. Tableau. 
 
 " You don't look like a bride," said the practical Oily to< 
 Mrs. Poinsett, under her breath, " you ain't got no veil, no 
 , orange blossoms and that black dress " 
 
 " We've been married seven years, Oily," said the quick-eared 
 and ready-witted Arthur. 
 
 And then these people began to chatter as if they had 
 always been in the closest confidence and communion. 
 
 "You know," said Grace to her brother, "Arthur and I are 
 going East, to the States, to-morrow, and really, Gabe, he says 
 he will not leave here until you consent to take back your 
 house your wife's house, Gabe. You know WE" (there was- 
 a tremendous significance in this newly-found personal plural), 
 " WE have deeded it all to you." 
 
 " I hev a dooty to per-form to Gracey," said Gabriel Conroy r 
 with astute deliberation, looking at Mr. Poinsett, "a dooty to 
 thet gal, thet must be done afore any trans-fer of this yer 
 proputty is made. I hev to make restitution of certain papers- 
 ez hez fallen casooally into my hands. This yer paper," he 
 added, drawing a soiled yellow envelope from his pocket, 
 "kem to me a week ago, the same hevin' lied in the Express 
 Office sens the trial. It belongs to Gracey, I reckon, and I 
 hands it to her." 
 
 Grace tore open the envelope, glanced at its contents 
 hurriedly, uttered a slight cry of astonishment, blushed, and 
 put the paper into her pocket. 
 
 " This yer paper," continued Gabriel, gravely, drawing an 
 other from his blouse, " was found by me in the Empire Tunnel 
 the night I was runnin' from the lynchers. It likewise b'longs 
 to Gracey and the world gin'rally. It's the record of Dr. 
 Devarges' fust discovery of the silver lead on this yer hill r 
 and," continued Gabriel, with infinite gravity, " wipes out, so 
 
390 Gabriel Conroy. 
 
 to speak, this yer mineral right o' me and Mr. Dumphy and 
 the stockholders gin'rally." 
 
 It was Mr. Poinsett's turn to take the paper from Gabriel's 
 hands. He examined it attentively by the fading light. " That 
 is so," he said, earnestly ; "it is quite legal and valid." 
 
 "And thar ez one paper more," continued Gabriel, this time 
 putting his hand in his bosom and drawing out a buckskin 
 purse, from which he extracted a many-folded paper. " It's 
 the grant that Dr. Devarges gave Gracey, thet thet pore 
 Mexican Ramirez ez maybe ye may remember was killed 
 handed to my wife, and July, my wife" said Gabriel, with a 
 prodigious blush "hez been sorter keepin' IN TRUST for 
 Gracey !" 
 
 He gave the paper to Arthur, who received it, but still re 
 tained a warm grasp of Gabriel's massive hand. 
 
 "And now/' added Gabriel, " et's gettin' late, and I reckon 
 et's about the square thing ef we'd ad-journ this yer meeting to 
 the hotel, and ez you're goin' away, maybe ye'd make a partin' 
 visit with yer wife, forgettirr and forgivin' like, to Mrs. Conroy 
 and the baby a pore little thing that ye wouldn't believe it, 
 Mr. Poinsett, loois like me !" 
 
 But Oily and Grace had drawn aside, and were in the 
 midst of an animated conversation. And Grace was saying 
 
 " So I took the stone from the fire, just as I take this" (she 
 picked up a fragment of the crumbling chimney before her) ; 
 " it looked black and burnt just like this ; and I rubbed it 
 hard on the blanket so, and it shone, just like silver, and Dr. 
 Devarges said " 
 
 "We are going, Grace," interrupted her husband, "we are 
 going to see Gabriel's wife." Grace hesitated a moment, but 
 as her husband took her arm he slightly pressed it with a 
 certain matrimonial caution, whereupon with a quick impulsive 
 gesture, Grace held out her hand to Oily, and the three gaily 
 followed the bowed figure of Gabriel, as he strode through the 
 darkening woods. 
 
391 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 THE RETURN OF A FOOTPRINT. 
 
 I REGRET that no detailed account of the reconciliatory visit 
 to Mrs. Conroy has been handed down, and I only gather a 
 hint of it from after comments of the actors themselves. When 
 the last words of parting had been said, and Grace and Arthur 
 had taken their seats in the Wingdam coach, Gabriel bent ever 
 his wife's bedside. 
 
 " It kinder seemed ez ef you and Mr. Poinsett recog-nised 
 each other at first, July/' said Gabriel. 
 
 " I have seen him before not here ! I don't think he'll 
 ever trouble us much, Gabriel," said Mrs. Conroy, with a 
 certain triumphant lighting of the cold fires of her grey eyes. 
 " But look at the baby. He's laughing ! He knows you, I 
 declare !" And in Gabriel's rapt astonishment at this un 
 precedented display of intelligence in one so young, the 
 subject was dropped. 
 
 "Why, where did you ever see Mrs. Conroy before ?" asked 
 Grace of her husband, when they had reached Wingdam that 
 night. 
 
 " I never saw Mrs. Conroy before," returned Arthur, with 
 legal precision. " I met a lady in St. Louis years ago under 
 another name, who, I dare say, is now your brother's wife. 
 But I think, Grace the less we see of her the better." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " By the way, darling j what was that paper that Gabriel 
 gave you ?" asked Arthur, lightly, avoiding the previous 
 question. 
 
 Grace drew the paper from her pocket, blushed slightly, 
 kissed her husband, and then putting her arms around his 
 neck, laid her face in his breast, while he read aloud, in 
 Spanish, the following : 
 
 " This is to give trustworthy statement that on the i8th of May, 1848, a 
 young girl, calling herself Grace Conroy, sought shelter and aid at the 
 Presidio of San Geronimo. Being friendless but of the B. V. M. and the 
 Saints I adopted her as my daughter, \vith the name of Dolores Salvatierra. 
 Six months after her arrival, on the 1 2th November, 1848, she was delivered 
 of a dead child, the son of her affianced husband, one Philip Ashley. 
 Wishing to keep her secret from the world and to prevent recognition by 
 
392 Gabriel Couroy. 
 
 the members of her own race and family, by the assistance and advice of an 
 Indian peon, Manuela, she consented that her face and hands should be 
 daily washed by the juice of the Yokoto whose effect is to change the 
 skin to the colour of bronze. With this metamorphosis she became known, 
 by my advice and consent, as the daughter of the Indian Princess Nicata 
 and myself. And as such I have recognised in due form, her legal right in 
 the apportionment of my estate. 
 
 " Given at the Presidio of San Geronimo, this 1st day of December, 1848. 
 "JUAN HERMENIZILDO SALVATIERRA." 
 
 " But how did Gabriel get this ?" asked Arthur. 
 
 " I don't know !" said Grace. 
 
 " To whom didjiw/ give it ?" 
 
 "To Padre Felipe." 
 
 " Oh, I see !" said Arthur. " Then you are Mr. Dumphy's 
 long-lost wife ?" 
 
 " I don't know what Father Felipe did," said Grace, 
 tossing her head slightly. " I put the matter in his hands." 
 
 " The whole story ?" 
 
 " I said nothing about you you great goose !" 
 
 Arthur kissed her by way of acknowledging the justice of 
 the epithet. 
 
 " But I ought to have told Mrs. Sepulvida the whole story 
 when she said you proposed to her. You're sure you didn't ?" 
 continued Grace, looking into her husband's eyes. 
 
 "Never," said that admirable young man, promptly. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 FRAGMENT OF A LETTER FROM OLYMPIA CONROY 
 TO GRACE POINSE1T. 
 
 " the baby is doing well. And only think Gabe has 
 
 struck it again ! And you was the cause, dear and he says it 
 all belongs to you like the old mule that he is. Don't you 
 remember when you was telling me about Doctor Divergers 
 giving you that rock and how you rubed it untill the silver 
 shone, well, you took up a rock from our old chimbly and 
 rubed it, while you was telling it. And thet rock Gabe came 
 across next morning, all shining where you had rubed it. 
 And shure enuff it was sollid silver. And then Gabe says, 
 
Fragmcn t of a L ettcr. 393 
 
 says he, ' We've struck it agin, fur the chiuibly rock was 
 taken from the first hole I dug on the hill only a hundred feet 
 from here.' And shure enuff, yesterday he purspected the 
 hole and found the leed agin. And we are all very ritch 
 agin and comin' to see you next yeer, only that Gabe is such a. 
 fool ! Your loving Sister, 
 
 " OLYMPIA CONROY." 
 
 THE END. 
 
LONDON": 
 
 AVILL, EDWARDS AND CO., FBINTEKS, CHANDOS STREET, 
 COYENT GABDEN. 
 
Frederick Warne and Co., Publishers, 
 
 THE COMPANION LIBRARY. 
 
 TWO SHILLING VOLUMES. 
 
 20 Sylvester Sound. 
 
 H. COCKTON. 
 
 26 The Love Matcli. 
 
 H. COCKTON. 
 
 29 "Walter Goring. 
 
 ANNIE THOMAS. 
 
 30 On Guard. 
 
 ANNIE THOMAS. 
 
 36 Love's Conflict. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 37 Woman against Woman. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 38 Gerald Estcourt. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 39 Too Good for Him. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 41 Nelly Brooke. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 43 The Sutherlands. 
 
 SIDNEY S. HARRIS. 
 
 44 Rutledge. 
 
 SIDNEY S. HARRIS. 
 
 45 Christine. 
 
 SIDNEY S. HARRIS. 
 
 46 Lord Lynn's Wife. 
 
 SIDNEY S. HARRIS. 
 
 47 Petronel. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 48 Veronique. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 49 Her Lord and Master. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 50 Prey of the Gods. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 51 The Girls of Faversham. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 52 The Season Ticket. 
 
 SAM SLICK. 
 
 53 The Mummy. 
 
 MRS. LOUDON. 
 
 54 The Chasseur d'Afrique. 
 
 COL. WALMSLEY. 
 
 55 The Life Guardsman. 
 
 COL. WALMSLEY. 
 
 56 Branksome Dene. 
 
 COL. WALMSLEY. 
 
 57 George Geith. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 58 Austin Friars. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL, 
 
 59 Too Much Alone, 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 60 The Rich Husband. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL, 
 
 6 1 Maxwell Drewitt. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 62 Far above Rubies. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 63 A Life's Assize. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 64 The World & the Church. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 65 City and Subxirb. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 66 Phemie Keller. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 6 7 Race for Wealth. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 68 Mad Dumaresq. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 69 No Intentions. 
 
 FLORENCE MARRYAT. 
 
 70 Bright Morning. 
 
 MARIA M. GRANT. 
 
 71 Victor Lescar. 
 
 MARIA M. GRANT. 
 
 72 Artiste. 
 
 MARIA M. GRANT. 
 
 73 Aunt Prue's Railway Jour- 
 
 NEY. 
 
 MRS. GASCOIGNE. 
 
 74 Home, Sweet Home. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELU 
 
 75 Joy after Sorrow. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 76 The Earl's Promise. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELI. 
 
 77 Mortomley's Estate. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 78 Frank Sinclair's Wife. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 79 The Ruling Passion. 
 
 MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. 
 
 80 My First Love and My 
 
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 and cannot get out of order. 
 PROSPECTUSES FORWARDED FREE. 
 
 ises, iee-7, 
 
 jj- 
 
 , 1674. 
 
 ....Bathbone Place, Orcford Street 
 Hue Notre Dame dea Victoiies. 
 
 .8 Mt JCOttx Street, j iCRLBO'QlBJBf^ JTlj, Hua^r. fccw. 
 *8! Victoria Street. EDINBtrBaH~lMfouth*.Dvidt. 
 , I-ord Street. I DUBLIN-IS, suffol* Stan, ,rt.