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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Art of Disappearing, by John Talbot Smith
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Art of Disappearing
+
+Author: John Talbot Smith
+
+Release Date: January 29, 2009 [EBook #27925]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ART OF DISAPPEARING ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Clarke, Meredith Bach, and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                       THE ART OF
+                      DISAPPEARING
+
+
+                 _By_ John Talbot Smith
+
+
+                        _AUTHOR:_
+
+ "SARANAC" "HIS HONOR THE MAYOR," "A WOMAN OF CULTURE,"
+ "SOLITARY ISLAND," "TRAINING OF A PRIEST," ETC., ETC.
+
+
+             NEW YORK, CINCINNATI, CHICAGO:
+                    BENZIGER BROTHERS
+           PRINTERS TO THE HOLY APOSTOLIC SEE.
+
+
+
+
+ COPYRIGHT, 1902,
+        BY
+ JOHN TALBOT SMITH
+
+
+ _All Rights Reserved_
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+                    DISAPPEARANCE.
+
+CHAPTER                                     PAGE
+
+      I. The Holy Oils                         1
+
+     II. The Night at the Tavern               7
+
+    III. The Abysses of Pain                  16
+
+     IV. The Road to Nothingness              25
+
+      V. The Door is Closed                   33
+
+                    AMONG THE EXILES.
+
+     VI. Another Man's Shoes                  40
+
+    VII. The Dillon Clan                      55
+
+   VIII. The Wearin' o' the Green             68
+
+     IX. The Villa at Coney Island            77
+
+      X. The Humors of Election               87
+
+     XI. An Endicott Heir                    100
+
+               THE GREEN AGAINST THE RED.
+
+    XII. The Hate of Hannibal                107
+
+   XIII. Anne Dillon's Felicity              119
+
+    XIV. Aboard the "Arrow"                  128
+
+     XV. The Invasion of Ireland             137
+
+    XVI. Castle Moyna                        147
+
+   XVII. The Ambassador                      158
+
+                    AN ESCAPED NUN.
+
+  XVIII. Judy Visits the Pope                170
+
+    XIX. La Belle Colette                    177
+
+     XX. The Escaped Nun                     190
+
+    XXI. An Anxious Night                    199
+
+   XXII. The End of a Melodrama              208
+
+  XXIII. The First Blow                      218
+
+   XXIV. Anne Makes History                  227
+
+    XXV. The Cathedral                       236
+
+   XXVI. The Fall of Livingstone             248
+
+              THE TEST OF DISAPPEARANCE.
+
+  XXVII. A Problem of Disappearance          258
+
+ XXVIII. A First Test                        266
+
+   XXIX. The Nerve of Anne                   274
+
+    XXX. Under the Eyes of Hate              283
+
+   XXXI. The Heart of Honora                 296
+
+  XXXII. The Pauline Privilege               304
+
+ XXXIII. Love is Blind                       312
+
+  XXXIV. A Harpy at the Feast                320
+
+   XXXV. Sonia Consults Livingstone          327
+
+  XXXVI. Arthur's Appeal                     335
+
+ XXXVII. The End of Mischief                 344
+
+XXXVIII. A Tale Well Told                    351
+
+  XXXIX. Three Scenes                        360
+
+
+
+
+DISAPPEARANCE.
+
+
+
+
+THE ART OF DISAPPEARING.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE HOLY OILS.
+
+
+Horace Endicott once believed that life began for him the day he married
+Sonia Westfield. The ten months spent with the young wife were of a hue
+so roseate as to render discussion of the point foolish. His youth had
+been a happy one, of the roystering, innocent kind: noisy with yachting,
+baseball, and a moderate quantity of college beer, but clean, as if his
+mother had supervised it; yet he had never really lived in his
+twenty-five years, until the blessed experience of a long honeymoon and
+a little housekeeping with Sonia had woven into his life the light of
+sun and moon and stars together. However, as he admitted long
+afterwards, his mistake was as terrible as convincing. Life began for
+him that day he sat in the railway carriage across the aisle from
+distinguished Monsignor O'Donnell, prelate of the Pope's household,
+doctor in theology, and vicar-general of the New York diocese. The train
+being on its way to Boston, and the journey dull, Horace whiled away a
+slow hour watching the Monsignor, and wondering what motives govern the
+activity of the priests of Rome. The priest was a handsome man of fifty,
+dark-haired, of an ascetic pallor, but undoubtedly practical, as his
+quick and business-like movements testified. His dark eyes were of fine
+color and expression, and his manners showed the gentleman.
+
+"Some years ago," thought Horace, "I would have studied his person for
+indications of hoofs and horns--so strangely was I brought up. He is
+just a poor fellow like myself--it is as great a mistake to make these
+men demi-gods as to make them demi-devils--and he denies himself a wife
+as a Prohibitionist denies himself a drink. He goes through his
+mummeries as honestly as a parson through his sermons or a dervish
+through his dances--it's all one, and we must allow for it in the
+make-up of human nature. One man has his parson, another his priest, a
+third his dervish--and I have Sonia."
+
+This satisfactory conclusion he dwelt upon lovingly, unconscious that
+the Monsignor was now observing him in turn.
+
+"A fine boy," the priest thought, "with _man_ written all over him.
+Honest face, virtuous expression, daring too, loving-hearted, lovable,
+clever, I'm sure, and his life has been too easy to develop any marked
+character. Too young to have been in the war, but you may be sure he
+wanted to go, and his mother had to exercise her authority to keep him
+at home. He has been enjoying me for an hour.... I'm as pleasant as a
+puzzle to him ... he preferred to read me rather than Dickens, and I
+gather from his expression that he has solved me. By this time I am
+rated in his mind as an impostor. Oh, the children of the Mayflower, how
+hard for them to see anything in life except through the portholes of
+that ship."
+
+With a sigh the priest returned to his book, and the two gentlemen,
+having had their fill of speculation, forgot each other directly and
+forever. At this point the accident occurred. The slow train ran into a
+train ahead, which should have been farther on at that moment. All the
+passengers rose up suddenly, without any ceremony, quite speechless, and
+flew up the car like sparrows. Then the car turned on its left side, and
+Horace rolled into the outstretched arms and elevated legs of Monsignor
+O'Donnell. He was kicked and embraced at the same moment, receiving
+these attentions in speechless awe, as he could not recall who was to
+blame for the introduction and the attitude. For a moment he reasoned
+that they had become the object of most outrageous ridicule from the
+other passengers; for these latter had suddenly set up a shouting and
+screeching very scandalous. Horace wondered if the priest would help him
+to resent this storm of insult, and he raised himself off the
+Monsignor's face, and removed the rest of his person from the
+Monsignor's body, in order the more politely to invite him to the
+battle. Then he discovered the state of things in general. The
+overthrown car was at a stand-still. That no one was hurt seemed happily
+clear from the vigorous yells of everybody, and the fine scramble
+through the car-windows. The priest got up leisurely and felt himself.
+Next he seized his satchel eagerly.
+
+"Now it was more than an accident that I brought the holy oils along,"
+said he to Horace. "I was vexed to find them where they shouldn't be,
+yet see how soon I find use for them. Someone must be badly hurt in this
+disaster, and of course it'll be one of my own."
+
+"I hope," said the other politely, "that I did you no harm in falling on
+you. I could not very well help it."
+
+"Fortune was kinder to you than if the train rolled over the other way.
+Don't mention it, my son. I'll forgive you, if you will find me the way
+out, and learn if any have been injured."
+
+The window was too small for a man of the Monsignor's girth, but through
+the rear door the two crawled out comfortably, Monsignor dragging the
+satchel and murmuring cheerfully: "How lucky! the holy oils!" It was
+just sundown, and the wrecked train lay in a meadow, with a pretty
+stream running by, whose placid ripplings mocked the tumult of the
+mortals examining their injuries in the field. Yet no one had been
+seriously injured. Bruises and cuts were plentiful, some fainted from
+shock, but each was able to do for himself, not so much as a bone having
+been broken. For a few minutes the Monsignor rejoiced that he would have
+no use for what he called the holy oils. Then a trainman came running,
+white and broken-tongued, crying out: "There was a priest on the
+train--who has seen him?" It turned out that the fireman had been caught
+in the wrecked locomotive, and crushed to death.
+
+"And it's a priest he's cryin' for, sir," groaned the trainman, as he
+came up to the Monsignor. The dying man lay in the shade of some trees
+beside the stream, and a lovely woman had his head in her lap, and wept
+silently while the poor boy gasped every now and then "mother" and "the
+priest." She wiped the death-dew from his face, from which the soot had
+been washed with water from the stream, and moistened his lips with a
+cordial. He was a youth, of the kind that should not die too early, so
+vigorous was his young body, so manly and true his dear face; but it was
+only a matter of ten minutes stay beside the little stream for Tim
+Hurley. The group about him made way for Monsignor, who sank on his
+knees beside him, and held up the boy's face to the fading light.
+
+"The priest is here, Tim," he said gently, and Endicott saw the receding
+life rush back with joy into the agonized features. With something like
+a laugh he raised his inert hands, and seized the hands of the priest,
+which he covered with kisses.
+
+"I shall die happy, thanks be to God," he said weakly; "and, father,
+don't forget to tell my mother. It's her last consolation, poor dear."
+
+"And I have the holy oils, Tim," said Monsignor softly.
+
+Another rush of light to the darkening face!
+
+"Tell her that, too, father dear," said Tim.
+
+"With my own lips," answered Monsignor.
+
+The bystanders moved away a little distance, and the lady resigned her
+place, while Tim made his last confession. Endicott stood and wondered
+at the sight; the priest holding the boy's head with his left arm, close
+to his bosom and Tim grasping lovingly the hand of his friend, while he
+whispered in little gasps his sins and his repentance; briefly, for time
+was pressing. Then Monsignor called Horace and bade him support the
+lad's head; and also the lovely lady and gave her directions "for his
+mother's sake." She was woman and mother both, no doubt, by the way she
+served another woman's son in his fatal distress. The men brought her
+water from the stream. With her own hands she bared his feet, bathed and
+wiped them, washed his hands, and cried tenderly all the time. Horace
+shuddered as he dried the boy's sweating forehead, and felt the chill of
+that death which had never yet come near him. He saw now what the priest
+meant by the holy oils. Out of his satchel Monsignor took a golden
+cylinder, unscrewed the top, dipped his thumb in what appeared to be an
+oily substance, and applied it to Tim's eyes, to his ears, his nose, his
+mouth, the palms of his hands, and the soles of his feet, distinctly
+repeating certain Latin invocations as he worked. Then he read for some
+time from a little book, and finished by wiping his fingers in cotton
+and returning all to the satchel again. There was a look of supreme
+satisfaction on his face.
+
+"You are all right now, Tim," he said cheerfully.
+
+"All right, father," repeated the lad faintly, "and don't forget to tell
+mother everything, and say I died happy, praising God, and that she
+won't be long after me. And let Harry Cutler"--the engineer came forward
+and knelt by his side--"tell her everything. She knew how he liked me
+and a word from him was more----"
+
+His voice faded away.
+
+"I'll tell her," murmured the engineer brokenly, and slipped away in
+unbearable distress. The priest looked closer into Tim's face.
+
+"He's going fast," he said, "and I'll ask you all to kneel and say amen
+to the last prayers for the boy."
+
+The crowd knelt by the stream in profound silence, and the voice of the
+priest rose like splendid music, touching, sad, yet to Horace
+unutterably pathetic and grand.
+
+"Go forth, O Christian soul," the Monsignor read, "in the name of God
+the Father Almighty, who created thee; in the name of Jesus Christ, Son
+of the living God, who suffered for thee; in the name of the Holy Ghost,
+who was poured forth upon thee; in the name of the Angels and
+Archangels; in the name of the Thrones and Dominations; in the name of
+the Principalities and Powers; in the name of the Cherubim and Seraphim;
+in the name of the Patriarchs and Prophets; in the name of the holy
+Apostles and Evangelists; in the name of the holy Martyrs and
+Confessors; in the name of the holy Monks and Hermits; in the name of
+the holy Virgins and of all the Saints of God; may thy place be this day
+in peace, and thy abode in holy Sion. Through Jesus Christ our Lord.
+Amen."
+
+Then came a pause and the heavy sigh of the dying one shook all hearts.
+Endicott did not dare to look down at the mournful face of the fireman,
+for a terror of death had come upon him, that he should be holding the
+head of one condemned to the last penalty of nature; at the same moment
+he could not help thinking that a king might not have been more nobly
+sent forth on his journey to judgment than humble Tim Hurley. Monsignor
+took another look at the lad's face, then closed his book, and took off
+the purple ribbon which had hung about his neck.
+
+"It's over. The man's dead," he announced to the silent crowd. There was
+a general stir, and a movement to get a closer look at the quiet body
+lying on the grass. Endicott laid the head down and rose to his feet.
+The woman who had ministered to the dying so sweetly tied up his chin
+and covered his face, murmuring with tears, "His poor mother."
+
+"Ah, there is the heart to be pitied," sighed the Monsignor. "This heart
+aches no more, but the mother's will ache and not die for many a year
+perhaps."
+
+Endicott heard his voice break, and looking saw that the tears were
+falling from his eyes, he wiping them away in the same matter-of-fact
+fashion which had marked his ministrations to the unfortunate fireman.
+
+"Death is terrible only to those who love," he added, and the words sent
+a pang into the heart of Horace. It had never occurred to him that death
+was love's most dreaded enemy,--that Sonia might die while love was
+young.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE NIGHT AT THE TAVERN.
+
+
+The travelers of the wrecked train spent the night at the nearest
+village, whither all went on foot before darkness came on. Monsignor
+took possession of Horace, also of the affections of the tavern-keeper,
+and of the best things which belonged to that yokel and his hostelry. It
+was prosperity in the midst of disaster that he and Endicott should have
+a room on the first floor, and find themselves comfortable in ten
+minutes after their arrival. By the time they had enjoyed a refreshing
+meal, and discussed the accident to the roots, Horace Endicott felt that
+his soul was at ease with the Monsignor, who at no time had displayed
+any other feeling than might arise from a long acquaintance with the
+young man. One would have pronounced the two men, as they settled down
+into the comfort of their room, two collegians who had traveled much
+together.
+
+"It was an excellent thing that I brought the holy oils along,"
+Monsignor said, as if Endicott had no other interest in life than this
+particular form of excellence. To a polite inquiry he explained the
+history, nature, and use of the mysterious oils.
+
+"I can understand how a ceremony of that kind would soothe the last
+hours of Tim Hurley," said the pagan Endicott, "but I am curious, if you
+will pardon me, to know if the holy oils would have a similar effect on
+Monsignor O'Donnell."
+
+"The same old supposition," chuckled the priest, "that there is one law
+for the crowd, the mob, the diggers, and another for the illuminati.
+Now, let me tell you, Mr. Endicott, that with all his faith Tim Hurley
+could not have welcomed priest and oils more than I shall when I need
+them. The anguish of death is very bitter, which you are too young to
+know, and it is a blessed thing to have a sovereign ready for that
+anguish in the Sacrament of Extreme Unction. The Holy Oils are the thing
+which Macbeth desired when he demanded so bitterly of the physician.
+
+    Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
+      Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow?
+
+That is my conviction. So if you are near when I am going to judgment,
+come in and see how emphatically I shall demand the holy oils, even
+before a priest be willing to bring them."
+
+"It seems strange," Horace commented, "very strange. I cannot get at
+your point of view at all."
+
+Then he went on to ask questions rapidly, and Monsignor had to explain
+the meaning of his title, a hundred things connected with his
+priesthood, and to answer many objections to his explanations; until the
+night had worn on to bedtime, and the crowd of guests began to depart
+from the verandahs. It was all so interesting to Horace. In the priest
+and his conversation he had caught a glimpse of a new world both strange
+and fascinating. Curious too was the profound indifference of men like
+himself--college men--to its existence. It did not seem possible that
+the Roman idea could grow into proportions under the bilious eyes of the
+omniscient Saxon, and not a soul be aware of its growth! However,
+Monsignor was a pleasant man, a true college lad, an interesting talker,
+with music in his voice, and a sincere eye. He was not a
+controversialist, but a critic, and he did not seem to mind when Horace
+went off into a dream of Sonia, and asked questions far from the
+subject.
+
+Long afterwards Endicott recalled a peculiarity of this night, which
+escaped his notice at the time: his sensitiveness to every detail of
+their surroundings, to the colors of the room, to the shades of meaning
+in the words of the Monsignor, to his tricks of speech and tone, quite
+unusual in Horace's habit. Sonia complained that he never could tell her
+anything clear or significant of places he had seen. The room which had
+been secured from the landlord was the parlor of the tavern; long and
+low, colonial in the very smell of the tapestry carpet, with doors and
+mantel that made one think of John Adams and General Washington. The
+walls had a certain terror in them, a kind of suspense, as when a jury
+sits petrified while their foreman announces a verdict of death. A long
+line of portraits in oil produced this impression. The faces of ancient
+neighbors, of the Adams, the Endicotts, the Bradburys, severe Puritans,
+for whom the name of priest meant a momentary stoppage of the heart,
+looked coldly and precisely straight out from their frames on the
+Monsignor. Horace fancied that they exchanged glances. What fun it would
+have been to see the entire party move out from their frames, and put
+the wearer of the Roman purple to shameful flight.
+
+"I'll bet they don't let you sleep to-night," he said to the priest, who
+laughed at the conceit.
+
+A cricket came out on the window-sill, chirped at Horace's elbow, and
+fled at the sound of near voices. Through the thick foliage of the
+chestnut trees outside he could see stars at times that made him think
+of Sonia's eyes. The wind shook the branches gently, and made little
+moans and whispers in the corners, as if the ghosts of the portraits
+were discussing the sacrilege of the Monsignor's presence. Horace
+thought at the time his nerves were strung tight by the incidents of the
+day, and his interest deeply stirred by the conversation of the priest;
+since hitherto he had always thought of wind as a thing that blew
+disagreeably except at sea, noisy insects as public nuisances to be
+caught and slain, and family portraits the last praiseworthy attempt of
+ancestors to disturb the sleep of their remote heirs. When he had
+somewhat tired of asking his companion questions, it occurred to him
+that the Monsignor had asked none in return, and might waive his right
+to this privilege of good-fellowship. He mentioned the matter.
+
+"Thank you," said Monsignor, "but I know all about you. See now if I
+give you a good account of your life and descent."
+
+He was promenading the room before the picture-jury frowning on him. He
+looked at them a moment solemnly.
+
+"Indeed I know what I would have to expect from you," he said to the
+portraits, "if you were to sit upon my case to-night. Your descendant
+here is more merciful."
+
+They laughed together.
+
+"Well," to Horace, "you asked me many questions, because you know
+nothing about me or mine, although we have been on the soil this half
+century. The statesmen of your blood disdain me. This scorn is in the
+air of New England, and is part of your marrow. Here is an example of
+it. Once on a vacation I spent a few weeks in the house of a Puritan
+lady, who learned of my faith and blood only a week before my leaving.
+She had been very kind, and when I bade her good-by I assured her that I
+would remember her in my prayers. 'You needn't mind,' she replied, 'my
+own prayers are much better than any you can say.' This temper explains
+why you have to ask questions about me, and I have none to ask
+concerning you."
+
+Horace had to admit the contention.
+
+"Life began for you near the river that turned the wheel of the old
+sawmill. Ah, that river! It was the beginning of history, of time, of
+life! It came from the beyond and it went over the rim of the wonderful
+horizon, singing and laughing like a child. How often you dreamed of
+following it to its end, where you were certain a glory, felt only in
+your dreams, filled the land. The fishes only could do that, for they
+had no feet to be tired by walking. Your first mystery was that wheel
+which the water turned: a monstrous thing, a giant, ugly and deadly,
+whose first movement sent you off in terror. How could it be that the
+gentle, smiling, yielding water, which took any shape from a baby hand,
+had power to speed that giant! The time came when you bathed in the
+stream, mastered it, in spite of the terror which it gave you one day
+when it swallowed the life of a comrade. Do you remember this?"
+
+Monsignor held up his hand with two fingers stretched out beyond the
+others, and gave a gentle war-whoop. Horace laughed.
+
+"I suppose every boy in the country invited his chums to a swim that
+way," he said.
+
+"Just so. The sign language was universal. The old school on the village
+green succeeded the river and the mill in your history. Miss Primby
+taught it, dear old soul, gentler than a mother even, and you laughed at
+her curls, and her funny ways, which hid from child's eyes a noble
+heart. It was she who bound up your black eye after the battle with
+Bouncer, the bully, whose face and reputation you wrecked in the same
+hour for his oppression of the most helpless boy in school. That feat
+made you the leader of the secret society which met at awful hours in
+the deserted shanty just below the sawmill. What a creep went up and
+down your spine as in the chill of the evening the boys came stealing
+out of the undergrowth one by one, and greeted their chief with the
+password, known by every parent in town. The stars looked down upon you
+as they must have looked upon all the great conspirators of time since
+the world began. You felt that the life of the government hung by a
+thread, when such desperate characters took the risk of conspiring
+against it. What a day was July the Fourth--what wretches were the
+British--what a hero was General Washington! What land was like this
+country of the West? Its form on the globe was a promontory while all
+others lay very low on the plane."
+
+"In that spirit you went to Harvard and ran full against some great
+questions of life. The war was on, and your father was at the front.
+Only your age, your father's orders, and your mother's need held you
+back from the fight. You were your mother's son. It is written all over
+you,--and me. And your father loved you doubly that you were his son and
+owned her nature. He fell in battle, and she was slain by a crueller
+foe, the grief that, seizing us, will not let us live even for those we
+love. God rest the faithful dead, give peace to their souls, and
+complete their love and their labors! My father and mother are living
+yet--the sweetest of blessings at my time of life. You grieved as youth
+grieves, but life had its compensations. You are a married man, and you
+love as your parents loved, with the fire and tenderness of both. Happy
+man! Fortunate woman!"
+
+He stopped before the nearest portrait, and stared at it.
+
+"Well, what do you think of my acquaintance with your history?" he
+asked.
+
+"Very clever, Monsignor," answered Horace impressed. "It is like
+necromancy, though I see how the trick is done."
+
+"Precisely. It is my own story. It is the story of thousands of boys
+whom your set will not regard as American boys, unless when they are
+looking for fighting material. Everything and anything that could carry
+a gun in the recent war was American with a vengeance. The Boston
+Coriolanus kissed such an one and swore that he must have come over in
+the Mayflower. But enough--I am not holding a brief for anybody. The
+description I have just given you of your life and mine is also----"
+
+"One moment--pardon me," said Horace, "how did you know I was married?"
+
+"And happy?" said Monsignor. "Well, that was easy. When we were talking
+to-night at tea about the hanging of Howard Tims, what disgust in your
+tone when you cried out, there should be no pity for the wretch that
+kills his wife."
+
+"And there should not."
+
+"Of course. But I knew Tims. I met him for an hour, and I did not feel
+like hanging him."
+
+"You are a celibate."
+
+"Therefore unprejudiced. But he was condemned by a jury of unmarried
+men. A clever fellow he is, and yet he made some curious blunders in his
+attempt to escape the other night. I would like to have helped him. I
+have a theory of disappearing from the sight of men, which would help
+the desperate much. This Tims was a lad of your own appearance,
+disposition, history even. I had a feeling that he ought not to die.
+What a pity we are too wise to yield always to our feelings."
+
+"But about your theory, Monsignor?" said Horace. "A theory of
+disappearing?"
+
+"A few nights ago some friends of mine were discussing the possible
+methods by which such a man as Tims might make his escape sure. You know
+that the influences at his command were great, and tremendous efforts
+were made to spare his family the disgrace of the gallows. The officers
+of the law were quite determined that he should not escape. If he had
+escaped, the pursuit would have been relentless and able. He would have
+been caught. And as I maintained, simply because he would never think of
+using his slight acquaintance with me. You smile at that. So did my
+friends. I have been reading up the escapes of famous criminals--it is
+quite a literature. I learned therein one thing: that they were all
+caught again because they could not give up connection with their past:
+with the people, the scenes, the habits to which they had been
+accustomed. So they left a little path from their hiding-place to the
+past, and the clever detectives always found it. Thinking over this
+matter I discovered that there is an art of disappearing, a real art,
+which many have used to advantage. The principle by which this art may
+be formulated is simple: the person disappearing must cut himself off
+from his past as completely as if he had been secretly drowned in
+mid-ocean."
+
+"They all seem to do that," said Horace, "and yet they are caught as
+easily as rats with traps and cheese."
+
+"I see you think this art means running away to Brazil in a wig and blue
+spectacles, as they do in a play. Let me show some of the consequences a
+poor devil takes upon himself who follows the art like an artist. He
+must escape, not only from his pursuers--that's easy--but from his
+friends--not so easy--and chiefly from himself--there's the rub. He who
+flies from the relentless pursuit of the law must practically die. He
+must change his country, never meet friend or relative again, get a new
+language, a new trade, a new place in society; in fact a new past,
+peopled with parents and relatives, a new habit of body and life, a new
+appearance; the color of hair, eyes, skin must be changed; and he must
+eat and drink, walk, sleep, think, and speak differently. He must become
+another man almost as if he had changed his nature for another's."
+
+"I understand," said Horace, interested; "but the theory is impossible.
+No one could do that even if they desired."
+
+"Tims would have desired it and accomplished it had I thought of
+suggesting it to him. Here is what would have happened. He escapes from
+the prison, which is easy enough, and comes straight to me. We never met
+but once. Therefore not a man in the world would have thought of looking
+for him at my house. A week later he is transferred to the house of Judy
+Trainor, who has been expecting a sick son from California, a boy who
+disappeared ten years previous and is probably dead. I arrange her
+expectation, and the neighbors are invited to rejoice with her over the
+finding of her son. He spends a month or two in the house recovering
+from his illness, and when he appears in public he knows as much about
+the past of Tommy Trainor as Tommy ever knew. He is welcomed by his old
+friends. They recognize him from his resemblance to his father, old
+Micky Trainor. He slips into his position comfortably, and in five years
+the whole neighborhood would go to court and swear Tims into a lunatic
+asylum if he ever tried to resume his own personality."
+
+The two men set up a shout at this sound conclusion.
+
+"After all, there are consequences as dark as the gallows," said Horace.
+
+"For instance," said the priest with a wave of his hand, "sleeping under
+the eyes of these painted ghosts."
+
+"Poor Tim Hurley," said Horace, "little he thought he'd be a ghost
+to-night."
+
+"He's not to be regretted," replied the other, "except for the heart
+that suffers by his absence. He is with God. Death is the one moment of
+our career when we throw ourselves absolutely into the arms of God."
+
+The two were getting ready to slip between the sheets of the pompous
+colonial bed, when Horace began to laugh softly to himself. He kept up
+the chuckling until they were lying side by side in the darkened room.
+
+"I am sure, I have a share in that chuckle," said Monsignor.
+
+"Shades of my ancestors," murmured Horace, "forgive this insult to your
+pious memory--that I should occupy one bed with an idolatrous priest."
+
+"They have got over all that. In eternity there is no bigotry. But what
+a pity that two fine boys like us should be kept apart by that awful
+spirit which prompts men to hate one another for the love of God, and to
+lie like slaves for the pure love of truth."
+
+"I am cured," said Horace, placing his hand on the Monsignor's arm. "I
+shall never again overlook the human in a man. Let me thank you,
+Monsignor, for this opening of my eyes. I shall never forget it. This
+night has been Arabian in its enchantment. I don't like the idea of
+to-morrow."
+
+"No more do I. Life is tiresome in a way. For me it is an everlasting
+job of beating the air with truth, because others beat it with lies. We
+can't help but rejoice when the time comes to breathe the eternal airs,
+where nothing but truth can live."
+
+Horace sighed, and fell asleep thinking of Sonia rather than the
+delights of eternity. The priest slept as soundly. No protest against
+this charming and manly companionship stirred the silence of the room.
+The ghosts of the portraits did not disturb the bold cricket of the
+window-sill. He chirped proudly, pausing now and then to catch the
+breathing of the sleepers, and to interpret their unconscious movings.
+The trained and spiritual ear might have caught the faint sighs and
+velvet footsteps of long-departed souls, or interpreted them out of the
+sighing and whispering of the leaves outside the window, and the tread
+of nervous mice in the fireplace. The dawn came and lighted up the faces
+of the men, faces rising out of the heavy dark like a revelation of
+another world; the veil of melancholy, which Sleep borrows from its
+brother Death, resting on the head which Sonia loved, and deepening the
+shadows on the serious countenance of the priest. They lay there like
+brothers of the same womb, and one might fancy the great mother Eve
+stealing in between the two lights of dawn and day to kiss and bless her
+just-united children.
+
+When they were parting after breakfast, Monsignor said gayly.
+
+"If at any time you wish to disappear, command me."
+
+"Thanks, but I would rather you had to do the act, that I might see you
+carry out your theory. Where do you go now?"
+
+"To tell Tim Hurley's mother he's dead, and thus break her heart," he
+replied sadly, "and then to mend it by telling her how like a saint he
+died."
+
+"Add to that," said Horace, with a sudden rush of tears, which for his
+life he could not explain, "the comfort of a sure support from me for
+the rest of her life."
+
+They clasped hands with feeling, and their eyes expressed the same
+thought and resolution to meet again.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE ABYSSES OF PAIN.
+
+
+Horace Endicott, though not a youth of deep sentiment, had capacities in
+that direction. Life so far had been chiefly of the surface for him.
+Happiness had hidden the deep and dangerous meanings of things. He was a
+child yet in his unconcern for the future, and the child, alone of
+mortals, enjoys a foretaste of immortality, in his belief that happiness
+is everlasting. The shadow of death clouding the pinched face of Tim
+Hurley was his first glimpse of the real. He had not seen his father and
+mother die. The thought that followed, Sonia's beloved face lying under
+that shadow, had terrified him. It was the uplifting of the veil of
+illusion that enwraps childhood. The thought stayed his foot that night
+as he turned into the avenue leading up to his own house, and he paused
+to consider this new dread.
+
+The old colonial house greeted his eyes, solemn and sweet in the
+moonlight, with a few lights of human comfort in its windows. He had
+never thought so before, but now it came straight to his heart that this
+was his home, his old friend, steadfast and unchanging, which had
+welcomed him into the world, and had never changed its look to him,
+never closed its doors against him; all that remained of the dear, but
+almost forgotten past; the beautiful stage from which all the ancient
+actors had made irrevocable exit. What beauty had graced it for a
+century back! What honors its children had brought to it from councils
+of state and of war! What true human worth had sanctified it! Last and
+the least of the splendid throng, he felt his own unworthiness sadly;
+but he was young yet, only a boy, and he said to himself that Sonia had
+crowned the glory of the old house with her beauty, her innocence, her
+devoted love. In making her its mistress he had not wronged its former
+rulers, nor broken the traditions of beauty. He stood a long time
+looking at the old place, wondering at the charm which it had so
+suddenly flung upon him. Then he shook off the new and weird feeling and
+flew to embrace his Sonia of the starry eyes.
+
+Alas, poor boy! He stood for a moment on the threshold. He could hear
+the faint voices of servants, the shutting of distant doors, and a
+hundred sweet sounds within; and around him lay the calmness of the
+night, with a drowsy moon overhead lolling on lazy clouds. Nothing
+warned him that he stood on the threshold of pain. No instinct hinted at
+the horror within. The house that sheltered his holy mother and received
+her last breath, that covered for a few hours the body of his heroic
+father, the house of so many honorable memories, had become the
+habitation of sinners, whose shame was to be everlasting. He stole in on
+tiptoe, with love stirring his young pulses. For thirty minutes there
+was no break in the silence. Then he came out as he entered, on tiptoe,
+and no one knew that he had seen with his own eyes into the deeps of
+hell. For thirty minutes, that seemed to have the power of as many
+centuries, he had looked on sin, shame, disgrace, with what seemed to be
+the eyes of God; so did the horror shock eye and heart, yet leave him
+sight and life to look again and again.
+
+In that time he tasted with his own lips the bitterness which makes the
+most wretched death sweeter by comparison than bread and honey to the
+hungry. At the end of it, when he stole away a madman, he felt within
+his own soul the cracking and upheaving of some immensity, and saw or
+felt the opening of abysses from which rose fearful exhalations of
+crime, shapes of corruption, things without shape that provoked to rage,
+pain and madness. He was not without cunning, since he closed the doors
+softly, stole away in the shadows of the house and the avenue, and
+escaped to a distant wood unseen. From his withered face all feeling
+except horror had faded. Once deep in the wood, he fell under the trees
+like an epileptic, turned on his face, and dug the earth with hands and
+feet and face in convulsions of pain.
+
+The frightened wood-life, sleeping or waking, fled from the great
+creature in its agony. In the darkness he seemed some monster, which in
+dreadful silence, writhed and fought down a slow road to death. He was
+hardly conscious of his own behavior, poor innocent, crushed by the sins
+of others. He lived, and every moment was a dying. He gasped as with the
+last breath, yet each breath came back with new torture. He shivered to
+the root of nature, like one struck fatally, and the convulsion revived
+life and thought and horror. After long hours a dreadful sleep bound his
+senses, and he lay still, face downward, arms outstretched, breathing
+like a child, a pitiful sight. Death must indeed be a binding thing,
+that father and mother did not leave the grave to soothe and strengthen
+their wretched son. He lay there on his face till dawn. The crowing of
+the cock, which once warned Peter of his shame, waked him. He turned
+over, stared at the branches above, sat up puzzled, and showed his face
+to the dim light. His arms gathered in his knees, and he made an effort
+to recollect himself. But no one would have mistaken that sorrowful,
+questioning face; it was Adam looking toward the lost Eden with his arms
+about the dead body of his son. A desolate and unconscious face,
+wretched and vacant as a lone shore strewn with wreckage.
+
+He struggled to his feet after a time, wondering at his weakness. The
+effort roused and steadied him, his mind cleared as he walked to the
+edge of the wood and stared at the old house, which now in the mist of
+morning had the fixed, still, reproachful look of the dead. As if a
+spirit had leaped upon him, memory brought back his personality and his
+grief together. Men told afterwards, early laborers in the fields, of a
+cry from the Endicott woods, so strange and woful that their hearts beat
+fast and their frightened ears strained for its repetition. Sonia heard
+it in her adulterous dreams. It was not repeated. The very horror of it
+terrified the man who uttered it. He stood by a tree trembling, for a
+double terror fell upon him, terror of her no less than of himself. He
+staggered through the woods, and sought far-away places in the hills,
+where none might see him. When the sun drifted in through dark boughs he
+cursed it, the emblem of joy. The singing of the birds sounded to his
+ears like the shriek of madmen. When he could think and reason somewhat,
+he called up the vision of Sonia to wonder over it. The childlike eyes,
+the beautiful, lovable face, the modest glance, the innocent
+blushes--had nature such masks for her vilest offspring? The mere animal
+senses should have recognized at the first this deadly thing, as animals
+recognize their foes; and he had lived with the viper, believing her the
+peer of his spotless mother. She was his wife! Even at that moment the
+passionate love of yesterday stirred in his veins and moved him to
+deeper horror.
+
+He doubted that he was Horace Endicott. Every one knew that boy to be
+the sanest of young men, husband to the loveliest of women, a happy,
+careless, wealthy fellow, almost beside himself with the joy of life.
+The madman who ran about the desolate wilds uttering strange and
+terrible things, who was wrapped within and without in torments of
+flame, who refrained from crime and death only because vengeance would
+thus be cheaply satisfied, could hardly be the boy of yesterday. Was sin
+such a magician that in a day it could evolve out of merry Horace and
+innocent Sonia two such wretches? The wretch Sonia had proved her
+capacity for evil; the wretch Horace felt his capabilities for crime and
+rejoiced in them. He must live to punish. A sudden fear came upon him
+that his grief and rage might bring death or madness, and leave him
+incapable of vengeance. _They_ would wish nothing better. No, he must
+live, and think rationally, and not give way. But the mind worked on in
+spite of the will. It sat like Penelope over the loom, weaving terrible
+fancies in blood and flame! the days that had been, the days that were
+passing; the scenes of love and marriage; the old house and its latest
+sinners; and the days that were to come, crimson-dyed, shameful; the
+dreadful loom worked as if by enchantment, scene following scene, the
+web endless, and the woven stuff flying into the sky like smoke from a
+flying engine, darkening all the blue.
+
+The days and nights passed while he wandered about in the open air.
+Hunger assailed him, distances wearied him, he did not sleep; but these
+hardships rather cooled the inward fire, and did not harm him. One day
+he came to a pool, clear as a spring to its sandy bottom, embowered in
+trees, except on one side where the sun shone. He took off his clothes
+and plunged in. The waters closed over him sweet and cool as the embrace
+of death. The loom ceased its working a while, and the thought rose
+up, is vengeance worth the trouble? He sank to the sandy bed, and oh, it
+was restful! A grip on a root held him there, and a song of his boyhood
+soothed his ears until it died away in heavenly music, far off,
+enticing, welcoming him to happier shores. He had found all at once
+forgetfulness and happiness, and he would remain. Then his grip
+loosened, and he came to the surface, swimming mechanically about,
+debating with himself another descent into the enchanted region beneath.
+
+Some happy change had touched him. He felt the velvety waters grasp his
+body and rejoiced in it; the little waves which he sent to the reedy
+bank made him smile with their huddling and back-rushing and laughing;
+he held up his arm as he swam to see the sun flash through the drops of
+water from his hand. What a sweet bed of death! No hard-eyed nurses and
+physicians with their array of bottles, no hypocrites snuffling sympathy
+while dreaming of fat legacies, no pious mummeries, only the innocent
+things direct from the hand of God, unstained by human sin and training,
+trees and bushes and flowers, the tender living things about, the
+voiceless and passionless music of lonely nature, the hearty sun, and
+the maternal embrace of the sweet waters. It was dying as the wild
+animals die, without ceremony; as the flowers die, a gentle weakening of
+the stem, a rush of perfume to the soft earth, and the caressing winds
+to do the rest. Yes, down to the bottom again! Who would have looked for
+so pleasant a door to death in that lonely and lovely pool!
+
+He slipped his foot under the root so that it would hold him if he
+struggled, put his arms under his head like one about to sleep, and
+yielded his senses to that far-off, divine music, enticing,
+welcoming.... It ceased, but not until he had forgotten all his sorrows
+and was speeding toward death. Sorrow rescued sorrow, and gave him back
+to the torturers. The old woman who passed by the pond that morning
+gathering flowers, and smiling as if she felt the delight of a
+child--the smile of a child on the mask of grief-worn age--saw his
+clothes and then his body floating upward helpless from the bottom. She
+seized his arm, and pulled him up on the low bank. He gasped a little
+and was able to thank her.
+
+"If I hadn't come along just then," she said placidly, as she covered
+him decently with his coat, "you'd have been drownded. Took a cramp, I
+reckon?"
+
+"All I remember is taking a swim and sinking, mother. I am very much
+obliged to you, and can get along very well, I think."
+
+"If you want any help, just say so," she answered. "When you get dressed
+my house is a mile up the road, and the road is a mile from here. I can
+give you a cup of tea or warm milk, and welcome."
+
+"I'll go after a while," said he, "and then I'll be able to thank you
+still better for a very great service, mother."
+
+She smiled at the affectionate title, and went her way. He became weak
+all at once, and for a while could not dress. The long bath had soothed
+his mind, and now distressed nature could make her wants known. Hunger,
+soreness of body, drowsiness, attacked him together. He found it
+pleasant to lie there and look at the sun, and feel too happy to curse
+it as before. The loom had done working, Penelope was asleep. The door
+seemed forever shut on the woman known as Sonia, who had tormented him
+long ago. The dead should trouble no one living. He was utterly weary,
+sore in every spot, crushed by torment as poor Tim Hurley had been
+broken by his engine. This recollection, and his lying beside the pool
+as Tim lay beside the running river, recalled the Monsignor and the holy
+oils. As he fell asleep the fancy struck him that his need at that
+moment was the holy oils; some balm for sick eyes and ears, for tired
+hands and soiled feet, like his mother's kisses long ago, that would
+soothe the aching, and steal from the limbs into the heart afterwards; a
+heavenly dew that would aid sleep in restoring the stiffened sinews and
+distracted nerves. The old woman came back to him later, and found him
+in his sleep of exhaustion. Like a mother, she pillowed his head,
+covered him with his clothes, and her own shawl, and made sure that his
+rest would be safe and comfortable. She studied the noble young head,
+and smoothed it tenderly. The pitiful face, a terrible face for those
+who could read, so bitterly had grief written age on the curved dimpled
+surface of youth, stirred some convulsion in her, for she threw up her
+arms in despair as she walked away homeward, and wild sobs choked her
+for minutes.
+
+He sat on the kitchen porch of her poor home that afternoon, quite free
+from pain. A wonderful relief had come to him. He seemed lifted into an
+upper region of peace like one just returned from infernal levels. The
+golden air tasted like old wine. The scenes about him were marvelous to
+his eyes. His own personality redeemed from recent horror became a
+delightful thing.
+
+"It is terrible to suffer," he said to Martha Willis. "In the last five
+days I have suffered."
+
+"As all men must suffer," said the woman resignedly.
+
+"Then you have suffered too? How did you ever get over it, mother?"
+
+She did not tell him, after a look at his face, that some sorrows are
+indelible.
+
+"We have to get over everything, son. And it is lucky we can do it,
+without running into an insane asylum."
+
+"Were your troubles very great, mother?"
+
+"Lots of people about say I deserved them, so they couldn't be very
+great," she answered, and he laughed at her queer way of putting it,
+then checked himself.
+
+"Sorrow is sorrow to him who suffers," he said, "no matter what people
+say about it. And I would not wish a beast to endure what I did. I would
+help the poor devil who suffered, no matter how much he deserved his
+pain."
+
+"Only those who suffered feel that way. I am alone now, but this house
+was crowded thirty years ago. There was Lucy, and John, and Oliver, and
+Henry, and my husband, and we were very happy."
+
+"And they are all gone?"
+
+"I shall never see them again here. Lucy died when I needed her most,
+and Henry, such a fine boy, followed her before he was twenty. They are
+safe in the churchyard, and that makes me happy, for they are mine
+still, they will always be mine. John was like his father, and both were
+drunkards. They beat me in turn, and I was glad when they took to
+tramping. They're tramping yet, as I hear, but I haven't seen them in
+years. And Oliver, the cleverest boy in the school, and very headstrong,
+he went to Boston, and from there he went to jail for cheating a bank,
+and in jail he died. It was best for him and for me. I took him back to
+lie beside his brother and sister, though some said it was a shame. But
+what can a mother do? Her children are hers no matter if they turn out
+wrong."
+
+"And you lived through it all, mother?" said the listener with his face
+working.
+
+"Once I thought different, but now I know it was for the best," she
+answered calmly, and chiefly for his benefit. "I had my days and years
+even, when I thought some other woman had taken Martha Willis' place, a
+poor miserable creature, more like the dead than the live. But I often
+thought, since my own self came back, how lucky it was Lucy had her
+mother to close her eyes, and the same for poor Henry. And Oliver, he
+was pretty miserable dying in jail, but I never forgot what he said to
+me. 'Mother,' he said, 'it's like dying at home to have you with me
+here.' He was very proud, and it cut him that the cleverest of the
+family should die in jail. And he said, 'you'll put me beside the
+others, and take care of the grave, and not be ashamed of me, mother.'
+It was the money he left me, that kept this house and me ever since. Now
+just think of the way he'd have died if I had not been about to see to
+him. And I suppose the two tramps'll come marching in some day to die,
+or to be buried, and they'll be lucky to find me living. But anyway I've
+arranged it with the minister to see to them, and give them a place with
+their own, if I'm not here to look after them."
+
+"And you lived through it all!" repeated Horace in wonder.
+
+Her story gave him hope. He must put off thinking until grief had
+loosened its grip on his nerves, and the old self had come uppermost. He
+was determined that the old self should return, as Martha had proved it
+could return. He enjoyed its presence at that very moment, though with a
+dread of its impending departure. The old woman readily accepted him as
+a boarder for a few days or longer, and treated him like a son. He slept
+that night in a bed, the bed of Oliver and Henry,--their portraits
+hanging over the bureau--and slept as deeply as a wearied child. A
+blessed sleep was followed by a bitter waking. Something gripped him the
+moment he rose and looked out at the summer sun; a cruel hand seized his
+breast, and weighted it with vague pain. Deep sighs shook him, and the
+loom of Penelope began its dreadful weaving of bloody visions, while
+the restful pool in the woods tempted him to its cool rest. For a moment
+he gave way to the thought that all had ended for him on earth. Then he
+braced himself for his fight, went down to chat cheerfully with Martha,
+and ate her tasty breakfast with relish. He saw that his manner pleased
+the simple heart, the strong, heroic mother, the guardian of so many
+graves.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE ROAD TO NOTHINGNESS.
+
+
+"Whatever trouble you're a-sufferin' from," said Martha, as he was
+going, "I can tell you one sure thing about it. Time changes it so's you
+wouldn't think it was the same trouble a year afterwards. Now, if you
+wait, and have patience, and don't do anything one way or another for a
+month, you'll be real glad you waited. Once I would have been glad to
+die the minute after sorrow came. Now I'm glad I didn't die, for I've
+learned to see things different somehow."
+
+His heart was being gnawed at that moment by horrible pain, but he
+caught the force of her words and took his resolve against the seduction
+of the pool, that lay now in his vision, as beautiful as a window of
+heaven.
+
+"I've come to the same thought," he answered. "I'll not do anything for
+a month anyway, unless it's something very wise and good. But I'm going
+now to think the matter over by myself, and I know that you have done me
+great service in helping me to look at my sorrows rightly."
+
+She smiled her thanks and watched him as he struck out for the hills two
+miles away. Often had her dear sons left the door for the same walk, and
+she had watched them with such love and pride. Oh, life, life!
+
+By the pool which tempted him so strongly Horace sat down to study the
+problem of his future.
+
+"You are one solution of it," he thought, as he smiled on its beautiful
+waters. "All others failing to please, you are here, sure, definite,
+soft as a bed, tender as Martha, lovely as a dream. There will be no
+vulgar outcry when you untie the knot of woe. And because I am sure of
+you, and have such confidence in you, I can sit here and defy your
+present charm."
+
+He felt indeed that he was strong again in spite of pain. As one in
+darkness, longing for the light, might see afar the faint glint of the
+dawn, he had caught a glimpse of hope in the peace which came to him in
+Martha's cottage. It could come again. In its light he knew that he
+could look upon the past with calmness, and feel no terror even at the
+name of Sonia. He would encourage its return. It was necessary for him
+to fix the present status of the woman whom he had once called his wife.
+He could reason from that point logically. She had never been his wife
+except by the forms of law. Her treason had begun with his love, and her
+uncleanness was part of her nature; so much had he learned on that
+fearful night which revealed her to him. His wealth and his name were
+the prizes which made her traitor to lover and husband. What folly is
+there in man, or what enchantment in beauty, or what madness in love,
+that he could have taken to his arms the thing that hated him and hated
+goodness? Should not love, the best of God's gifts, be wisdom too? Or do
+men ever really love the object of passion?
+
+Oh, he had loved her! Not a doubt but that he loved her still! Sonia,
+Sonia! The pool wrinkled at the sound of her name, as he shrieked it in
+anguish across the water. There was nothing in the world so beautiful as
+she. Her figure rose before him more entrancing than this fairy lake
+with its ever-changing loveliness. Its shadows under the trees were in
+her eyes, its luster under the sun was the luster of her body! Oh, there
+was nothing of beauty in it, perfume, grace, color, its singing and
+murmuring on the shore, that this perfect sinner had not in her body!
+
+He steadied himself with the thought of old Martha. A dread caught him
+that the image of this foul beauty would haunt him thus forever, and be
+able at any time to drive joy out of him and madness into him. Some part
+of him clung to her, and wove a thousand fancies about her beauty. When
+the pain of his desolation gripped him the result was invariable: she
+rose out of the mist of pain, not like a fury, or the harpy she was, but
+beautiful as the morning, far above him, with glorious eyes fixed on the
+heavens. He thought it rather the vision of his lost happiness than of
+her. If she were present then, he would have held her under the water
+with his hands squeezing her throat, and so doubly killed her. But what
+a terror if this vision were to become permanent, and he should never
+know ease or the joy of living again! And for a thing so worthless and
+so foul!
+
+He steadied himself again with the thought of old Martha, and fixed his
+mind on the first fact, the starting-point of his reasoning. She had
+never been his wife. Her own lips had uttered that sentence. The law had
+bound them, and the law protected her now. But she enjoyed a stronger
+guard even: his name. It menaced him in each solution of the problem of
+his future life. He could do little without smirching that honored name.
+He might take his own life. But that would be to punish the innocent and
+to reward the guilty. His wealth would become the gilding of adultery,
+and her joy would become perfect in his death. Imagine him asleep in the
+grave, while she laughed over his ashes, crying to herself: always a
+fool. He might kill her, or him, or both; a short punishment for a long
+treason, and then the trail of viperous blood over the name of Endicott
+forever; not blood but slime; not a tragedy, but the killing of rats in
+a cellar; and perhaps a place for himself in a padded cell, legally mad.
+
+He might desert her, go away without explanation, and never see her
+again. That would be putting the burden of shame on his own shoulders,
+in exile and a branded man for her sake. She would still have his name,
+his income, her lover, her place in society, her right to explain his
+absence at her pleasure. He could ruin her ruined life by exposing her.
+Then would come the divorce court, the publicity, the leer of the mob,
+the pointed fingers of scorn. Impossible! Why could he not leave the
+matter untouched and keep up appearances before the world? Least
+endurable of any scheme. He knew that he could never meet her again
+without killing her, unless this problem was settled. When he had
+determined on what he should do, he might get courage to look on her
+face once more.
+
+He wore the day out in vain thought, varying the dulness by stamping
+about the pond, by swimming across it, by studying its pleasant
+features. There was magic in it. When he stripped off his clothes and
+flung them on the bank part of his grief went with them. When he plunged
+into the lovable water, not only did grief leave him, but Horace
+Endicott returned; that Horace who once swam a boy in such lakes, and
+went hilarious with the wild joy of living. He dashed about the pool in
+a gay frenzy, revelling in the sensation that tragedy had no part in his
+life, that sorrow and shame had not yet once come nigh him. The shore
+and the donning of his garments were like clouds pouring themselves out
+on the sunlit earth. He could hardly bear it, and hung about listlessly
+before he could persuade himself to dress.
+
+"Surely you are my one friend," he said to the quiet water. "Is it that
+you feel certain of giving me my last sleep, my last kiss as you steal
+the breath from me? None would do it gentlier. You give me release from
+pain, you alone. And you promise everlasting release. I will remember
+you if it comes to that."
+
+The pool looked up to him out of deep evening shadows cast upon it by
+the woods. There was something human in the variety of its expression.
+As if a chained soul, silenced forever as to speech, condemned to a
+garment of water, struggled to reach a human heart by infinite shades of
+beauty, and endless variations of sound. The thought woke his pity, and
+he looked down at the water as one looks into the face of a suffering
+friend. Here were two castaways, cut off from the highway of life,
+imprisoned in circumstances as firmly as if behind prison grills. For
+him there was hope, for the pool nothing. At this moment its calm face
+pictured profound sadness. The black shadow of the woods lay deep on the
+west bank, but its remotest edge showed a brilliant green, where the sun
+lingered on the top fringes of the foliage. Along the east bank, among
+the reeds, the sun showed crimson, and all the tender colors of the
+water plants faded in a glare of blood. This savage brilliance would
+soon give way to the gray mist of twilight, and then to the darkness of
+night. Even this poor dumb beauty reflected in its helplessly beautiful
+way the tragedies of mankind.
+
+As before with the evening came peace and release from pain. Again he
+sat on Martha's porch after supper, and thought nothing so beautiful as
+life; and as he listened to further details of her life-story, imparted
+with the wise intention of binding him to life more securely, he felt
+that all was not yet lost for him. In his little room while the night
+was still young, he opened an old volume at the play of Hamlet and
+read the story through. Surely he had never read this play before? He
+recalled vaguely that it had been studied in college, that some great
+actor had played it for him, that he had believed it a wonderful thing;
+memories now less real than dreams. For in reading it this night he
+entered into the very soul of Hamlet, lived his tortures over again,
+wept and raved in dumb show with the wretched prince, and flung himself
+and his book to the floor in grief at the pitiful ending. He was the
+Hamlet; youth with a problem of the horrible; called to solve that which
+shook the brains of statesmen; dying in utter failure with that most
+pathetic dread of a wounded name.
+
+    Oh, good Horatio, what a wounded name.
+    Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me.
+    If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,
+    Absent thee from felicity awhile,
+    And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,
+    To tell my story.
+
+For a little he had thought there could not be in the world such
+suffering as his; how clear now that his peculiar sorrow was strange to
+no hour of unfortunate time; an old story, innocence and virtue--God
+knew he had no pride in his own virtue--preyed upon by cunning vice. He
+read Hamlet again. Oh, what depth of anguish! What a portrayal of grief
+and madness! Horace shook with the sobs that nearly choked him. Like the
+sleek murderer and his plump queen, the two creatures hatefulest to him
+lived their meanly prosperous lives on his bounty. What conscience
+flamed so dimly in the Danish prince that he could hesitate before his
+opportunity? Long ago, had Horace been in his place, the guilty pair
+would have paid in blood for their lust and ambition. Hamlet would not
+kill himself because the Almighty had "fixed his canon 'gainst
+self-slaughter;" or because in the sleep of death might rise strange
+dreams; he would not kill his uncle because he caught him praying; and
+he was content with preaching to his mother. Conscience! God! The two
+words had not reached his heart or mind once since that awful night. No
+scruples of the Lord Hamlet obscured his view or delayed his action.
+
+He had been brought up to a vague respect of religious things. He had
+even wondered where his father and mother might now inhabit, as one
+might wonder of the sea-drowned where their bodies might be floating;
+but no nearer than this had heaven come to him. He had never felt any
+special influence of religion in his life. In what circumstances had
+Hamlet been brought up, that religious feeling should have so serious an
+effect upon him? Doubtless the prince had been a Catholic like his
+recent acquaintance the Monsignor. Ah, he had forgotten that interesting
+man, who had told him much worth remembrance. In particular his last
+words ... what were those last words? The effort to remember gave him
+mixed dreams of Hamlet and the Monsignor that night.
+
+In the morning he went off to the pool with the book of Hamlet and the
+echo of those important but forgotten words. The lonely water seemed to
+welcome him when he emerged from the path through the woods; the
+underbrush rustled, living things scurried away into bush and wave, the
+weeds on the far bank set up a rustling, and little waves leaped on the
+shore. He smiled as if getting a friend's morning salute, and began to
+talk aloud.
+
+"I have brought you another unfortunate," he said, "and I am going to
+read his thoughts to you."
+
+He opened the book and very tenderly, as if reciting a funeral service,
+murmured the words of the soliloquy on suicide. How solemnly sounded in
+that solitude the fateful phrase "but that the dread of something after
+death!" That was indeed the rub! After death there can be anything; and
+were it little and slender as a spider's web, it might be too much for
+the sleep that is supposed to know no waking and no dreams. After all,
+he thought, how much are men alike; for the quandary of Hamlet is mine;
+I know not what to do. He laid aside the book and gave himself to idle
+watching of the pool. A bird dipped his wing into it midway, and set a
+circle of wavelets tripping to the shore. One by one they died among the
+sedges, and there was no trace of them more.
+
+"That is the thing for which I am looking," he said; "disappearance
+without consequences ... just to fade away as if into water or air ...
+to separate on the spot into original elements ... to be no more what I
+am, either to myself or others ... then no inquest, no search, no
+funeral, no tears ... nothing. And after such a death, perhaps,
+something might renew the personality in conditions so far from these,
+so different, that _now_ and _then_ would never come into contact."
+
+He sighed. What a disappearance that would be. And at that moment the
+words of the Monsignor came back to him:
+
+"_If at any time you wish to disappear, command me._"
+
+A thrill leaped through his dead veins, as of one rising from the dead,
+but he lay motionless observing the pool. Before him passed the details
+of that night at the tavern; the portraits, the chirping cricket, the
+vines at the window, the strange theory of the priest about
+disappearing. He reviewed that theory as a judge might review a case, so
+he thought; but in fact his mind was swinging at headlong speed over the
+possibilities, and his pulses were bounding. It was possible, even in
+this world, to disappear more thoroughly behind the veil of life than
+under the veil of death. If one only had the will!
+
+He rose brimming with exultant joy. An intoxication seized him that
+lifted him at once over all his sorrow, and placed him almost in that
+very spot wherein he stood ten days ago; gay, debonair, light of heart
+as a boy, untouched by grief or the dread of grief. It was a divine
+madness. He threw off his clothes, admired his shapely body for a moment
+as he poised on the bank, and flung himself in headlong with a shout. He
+felt as he slipped through the water but he did not utter the thought,
+that if this intoxication did not last he would never leave the pool. It
+endured and increased. He swam about like a demented fish. On that far
+shore where the reeds grew he paddled through the mud and thrust his
+head among the sedges kissing them with laughter. In another place he
+reached up to the high bank and pulled out a bunch of ferns which he
+carried about with him. He roamed about the sandy bottom in one corner,
+and thrust his nose and his hands into it, laying his cheek on the
+smooth surface. He swallowed mouthfuls of the cool water, and felt that
+he tasted joy for the first time. He tired his body with divings,
+racings, leapings, and shouting.
+
+When he leaped ashore and flung himself in the shade of the wood, the
+intoxication had increased. So, not for nothing had he met the priest.
+That encounter, the delay in the journey, the stay in the village, the
+peculiar character of the man, his odd theory, were like elements of an
+antidote, compounded to meet that venom which the vicious had injected
+into his life. Wonderful! He looked at the open book beside him, and
+then rose to his knees, with the water dripping from his limbs. In a
+loud voice he made a profession of faith.
+
+"I believe in God forever."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE DOOR IS CLOSED.
+
+
+Even Martha was startled by the change in him. She had hoped and prayed
+for it, but had not looked for it so soon, and did not expect blithe
+spirits after such despair. In deep joy he poured out his soul to her
+all the evening, but never mentioned deeds or names in his tragedy.
+Martha hardly thought of them. She knew from the first that this man's
+soul had been nearly wrecked by some shocking deviltry, and that the
+best medicine for him was complete forgetfulness. Horace felt as a
+life-prisoner, suddenly set free from the loathsomest dungeon in
+Turkestan, might feel on greeting again the day and life's sweet
+activities. The first thought which surged in upon him was the glory of
+that life which had been his up to the moment when sorrow engulfed him.
+
+"My God," he cried to Martha, "is it possible that men can hold such a
+treasure, and prize it as lightly as I did once."
+
+He had thought almost nothing of it, had been glad to get rid of each
+period as it passed, and of many persons and scenes connected with
+childhood, youth, and manhood. Now they looked to him, these despised
+years, persons, and scenes, like jewels set in fine gold, priceless
+jewels of human love fixed forever in the adamant of God's memory. They
+were his no more. Happily God would not forget them, but would treasure
+them, and reward time and place and human love according to their
+deserving. He was full of scorn for himself, who could take and enjoy so
+much of happiness with no thought of its value, and no other
+acknowledgment than the formal and hasty word of thanks, as each soul
+laid its offering of love and service at his feet.
+
+"You're no worse than the rest of us," said Martha, "I didn't know, and
+very few of my friends ever seemed to know, what good things they had
+till they lost 'em. It may be that God would not have us put too high a
+price on 'em at first, fearin' we'd get selfish about 'em. Then when
+they're gone, it turns our thoughts more to heaven, which is the only
+place where we have any chance to get 'em back."
+
+When he had got over his self-scorn, the abyss of pain and horror out of
+which God had lifted him--this was his belief--showed itself mighty and
+terrible to his normal vision. Never would he have believed that a man
+could fall so far and so awfully, had he not been in those dark depths
+and mounted to the sun again. He had read of such pits as exaggerations.
+He had seen sorrow and always thought its expression too fantastic for
+reality. Looking down now into the noisome tunnel of his own tragedy, he
+could only wonder that its wretched walls and exit did not carry the red
+current of blood mingled with its own foul streaks. Nothing that he had
+done in his grief expressed more than a syllable of the pain he had
+endured. The only full voice to such grief would have been the wrecking
+of the world. Strange that he could now look calmly into this abyss,
+without the temptation to go mad. But its very ghastliness turned his
+thought into another channel. The woman who had led him into the pit,
+what of her? Free from the tyranny of her beauty, he saw her with all
+her loveliness, merely the witch of the abyss, the flower and fruit of
+that loathsome depth, in whose bosom filthy things took their natural
+shape of horror, and put on beauty only to entrap the innocent of the
+upper world. Yes, he was entirely freed from her. Her name sounded to
+his ears like a name from hell, but it brought no paleness to his
+cheeks, no shock to his nerves, no stirring of his pulses. The loom of
+Penelope was broken, and forever, he hoped.
+
+"I am free," he said to Martha the next morning, after he had tested
+himself in various ways. "The one devil that remained with me is gone,
+and I feel sure she will never trouble me again."
+
+"It is good to be free," said Martha, "if the thing is evil. I am free
+from all that worried me most. I am free from the old fear of death. But
+sometimes I get sad thinking how little we need those we thought we
+could not do without."
+
+"How true that sounds, mother. There is a pity in it. We are not
+necessary to one another, though we think so. Every one we love dies, we
+lose all things as time goes on, and when we come to old age nothing
+remains of the past; but just the same we enjoy what we have, and forget
+what we had. There is one thing necessary, and that is true life."
+
+"And where can we get that?" said Martha.
+
+"Only from God, I think," he replied.
+
+She smiled her satisfaction with his thought, and he went off to the
+pool for the last time, singing in his heart with joy. He would have
+raised his voice too, but, feeling himself in the presence of a
+stupendous thing, he refrained out of reverence. If suffering Hamlet had
+only encountered the idea of disappearing, his whole life would have
+been set right in a twinkling of the eye. The Dane had an inkling of the
+solution of his problem when in anguish he cried out,
+
+    Oh, that this too, too solid flesh would melt,
+      Thaw and resolve itself into a dew!
+
+But he had not followed his thought to its natural consequence, seeing
+only death at the end of reasoning. Horace saw disappearance, and he had
+now to consider the idea of complete disappearance with all its effects
+upon him and others. What would be the effect upon himself? He would
+vanish into thin air as far as others were concerned. Whatever of his
+past the present held would turn into ashes. There would be no further
+connection with it. An impassable void would be created across which
+neither he nor those he loved could go. He went over in his mind what he
+had to give up, and trembled before his chum and his father's sister,
+two souls that loved him. Death would not be more terrible. For him, no;
+but for them? Death would leave them his last word, look, sigh, his
+ashes, his resting-place; disappearance would rob them of all knowledge,
+and clothe his exit with everlasting sadness. There was no help for it.
+Many souls more loving suffered a similar anguish, and survived it. It
+astonished and even appalled him, if anything could now appal him, that
+only two out of the group of his close friends and near acquaintances
+seemed near enough in affection and intimacy to mourn his loss. Not
+one of twenty others would lose a dinner or a fraction of appetite
+because he had vanished so pitifully. How rarer than diamonds is that
+jewel of friendship!
+
+He had thought once that a hundred friends would have wept bitter tears
+over his sorrow; of the number there were left only two!
+
+It was easy for him to leave the old life, now become so hateful; but
+there was terror in putting on the new, to which he must ally himself as
+if born into it, like a tree uprooted from its native soil and planted
+far from its congenial elements in the secret, dark, sympathetic places
+of the earth. He must cut himself off more thoroughly than by death. The
+disappearance must be eternal, unless death removed Sonia Westfield
+before circumstances made return practically impossible; his experience
+of life showed that disagreeable people rarely die while the microbe of
+disagreeableness thrives in them.
+
+What would be the effect of his disappearance on Sonia and her lover?
+The question brought a smile to his wan face. She had married his name
+and his money, and would lose both advantages. He would take his
+property into exile to the last penny. His name without his income would
+be a burden to her. His disappearance would cast upon her a reproach,
+unspoken, unseen, a mere mist enwrapping her fatally, but not to be
+dispelled. Her mouth would be shut tight; no chance for innuendoes, lest
+hint might add suspicion to mystery. She would be forced to observe the
+proprieties to the letter, and the law would not grant her a divorce for
+years. In time she would learn that her only income was the modest
+revenue from her own small estate; that he had taken all with him into
+darkness; and still she would not dare to tell the damaging fact to her
+friends. She would be forced to keep up appearances, to spend money in a
+vain search for him, or his wealth; suspecting much yet knowing nothing,
+miserably certain that he was living somewhere in luxury, and enjoying
+his vengeance.
+
+He no longer thought of vengeance. He did not desire it. The mills of
+the gods grind out vengeance enough to glut any appetite. By the mere
+exercise of his right to disappear he gave the gods many lashes with
+which to arm the furies against her. He was satisfied with being
+beyond her reach forever. Now that he knew just what to do, now that
+with his plan had come release from depression, now that he was himself
+again almost, he felt that he could meet Sonia Westfield and act the
+part of a busy husband without being tempted to strangle her. In her
+very presence he would put in motion the machinery which would strip her
+of luxury and himself of his present place in the world.
+
+The process took about two months. The first step was a visit to
+Monsignor O'Donnell, a single visit, and the first result was a single
+letter, promptly committed to the flames. Then he went home with a story
+of illness, of a business enterprise which had won his fancy, of
+necessary visits to the far west; which were all true, but not in the
+sense in which Sonia took these details. They not only explained his
+absence, but also excused the oddity of his present behavior. He hardly
+knew how he behaved with her. He did not act, nor lose self-confidence.
+He had no desire to harm her. He was simply indifferent, as if from
+sickness. As the circumstances fell in with her inclinations, though she
+could not help noticing his new habits and peculiarities, she made no
+protest and very little comment. He saw her rarely, and in time carried
+himself with a sardonic good humor as surprising to him as inexplicable
+to her. She seemed as far from him as if she had suddenly turned Eskimo.
+Once or twice a sense of loathing invaded him, a flame of hatred blazed
+up, soon suppressed. He was complete master of himself, and his reward
+was that he could be her judge, with the indifference of a dignitary of
+the law. The disposal of his property was accomplished with perfect
+secrecy, his wife consenting on the plea of a better investment.
+
+So the two months came to an end in peace, and he stood at last before
+that door which he himself had opened into the new future. Once closed
+no other hand but his could open it. A time might come when even to his
+hand the hinge would not respond. Two persons knew his secret in part,
+the Monsignor and a woman; but they knew nothing more than that he did
+not belong to them from the beginning, and more than that they would
+never know, if he carried out his plan of disappearance perfectly.
+Whatever the result, he felt now that the crisis of his life had come.
+
+At the last moment, however, doubts worried him about thus cutting
+himself off from his past so utterly, and adopting another personality.
+Some deep-lying repugnance stirred him against the double process. Would
+it not be better to live under his own name in remote countries, and
+thus be ready, if fate allowed, to return home at the proper time?
+Perhaps. In that case he must be prepared for her pursuit, her letters,
+her chicanery, which he could not bear. Her safety and his own, if the
+stain of blood was to be kept off the name of Endicott, demanded the
+absolute cessation of all relationship between them. Yet that did not
+contain the whole reason. Lurking somewhere in those dark depths of the
+soul, where the lead never penetrates, he found the thought of
+vengeance. After all he did wish to punish her and to see her
+punishment. He had thought to leave all to the gods, but feared the gods
+would not do all their duty. If they needed spurring, he would be near
+to provide new whips and fresher scorpions. He shook off hesitation when
+the last day of his old life came, and made his farewells with decision.
+A letter to his aunt and to his friend, bidding each find no wonder and
+no worry about him in the events of the next month, and lose no time in
+searching for him; a quiet talk with old Martha on her little verandah;
+a visit to the pool on a soft August night; and an evening spent alone
+in his father's house; these were his leave-takings.
+
+They would never find a place in his life again, and he would never dare
+to return to them; since the return of the criminal over the path by
+which he escaped into secrecy gave him into the hands of his pursuers.
+The old house had become the property of strangers. The offset to this
+grief was the fact that Sonia would never dishonor it again with her
+presence. Just now dabbling in her sins down by the summer sea, she was
+probably reading the letter which he had sent her about business in
+Wisconsin. Later a second letter would bear her the sentence of a living
+death. The upright judge had made her the executioner. What a long
+tragedy that would be! He thought of it as he wandered about the lovely
+rooms of his old home; what long days of doubt before certainty would
+come; what horror when bit by bit the scheme of his vengeance unfolded:
+what vain, bitter, furious struggling to find and devour him; and then
+the miserable ending when time had proved his disappearance absolute and
+perfect!
+
+At midnight, after a pilgrimage to every loved spot in the household
+shrine, he slipped away unseen and struck out on foot over the fields
+for a distant railway station. For two months he lived here and there in
+California, while his beard grew and his thoughts devoured him. Then one
+evening he stepped somewhat feebly from the train in New York, crawled
+into a cab, and drove to No. 127 Mulberry Street. The cabman helped him
+up the steps and handed him in the door to a brisk old woman, who must
+have been an actress in her day; for she gave a screech at the sight of
+him, and threw her arms about him crying out, so that the cabman heard,
+"Artie, alanna, back from the dead, back from the dead, acushla
+machree." Then the door closed, and Arthur Dillon was alone with his
+mother; Arthur Dillon who had run away to California ten years before,
+and died there, it was supposed; but he had not died, for behold him
+returned to his mother miraculously. She knew him in spite of the
+changes, in spite of thin face, wild eyes, and strong beard. The
+mother-love is not to be deceived by the disguise of time. So Anne
+Dillon hugged her Arthur with a fervor that surprised him, and wept
+copious tears; thinking more of the boy that might have come back to her
+than of this stranger. He lay in his lonely, unknown grave, and the
+caresses meant for him had been bought by another.
+
+
+
+
+RESURRECTION.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+ANOTHER MAN'S SHOES.
+
+
+As he laid aside his outer garments, Horace felt the joy of the
+exhausted sailor, entering port after a dangerous voyage. He was in
+another man's shoes; would they fit him? He accepted the new house and
+the new mother with scarcely a comment. Mrs. Anne Dillon knew him only
+as a respectable young man of wealth, whom misfortune had driven into
+hiding. His name and his history she might never learn. So Monsignor had
+arranged it. In return for a mother's care and name she was to receive a
+handsome income. A slim and well-fashioned woman, dignified, severe of
+feature, her light hair and fair complexion took away ten from her fifty
+years; a brisk manner and a low voice matched her sharp blue eyes and
+calm face; her speech had a slight brogue; fate had ordained that an
+Endicott should be Irish in his new environment. As she flew about
+getting ready a little supper, he dozed in the rocker, thinking of that
+dear mother who had illumined his youth like a vision, beautiful,
+refined, ever delightful; then of old Martha, rough, plain, and sad, but
+with the spirit and wit of the true mother, to cherish the sorrowful. In
+love for the child these mothers were all alike. He felt at home, and
+admired the quickness and skill with which Anne Dillon took up her new
+office. He noted everything, even his own shifting emotions. This was
+one phase of the melancholy change in him: the man he had cast off
+rarely saw more than pleased him, but the new Arthur Dillon had an alert
+eye for trifles.
+
+"Son dear," said his mother, when they sat down to tea, "we'll have the
+evenin' to ourselves, because I didn't tell a soul what time you were
+comin', though of course they all knew it, for I couldn't keep back such
+good news; that after all of us thinkin' you dead, you should turn out
+to be alive an' well, thank God. So we can spend the evenin' decidin'
+jist what to do an' say to-morrow. The first thing in the mornin' Louis
+Everard will be over to see you. Since he heard of your comin', he's
+been jist wild, for he was your favorite; you taught him to swim, an' to
+play ball, an' to skate, an' carried him around with you, though he's
+six years younger than you. He's goin' to be a priest in time with the
+blessin' o' God. Then his mother an' sister, perhaps Sister Mary
+Magdalen, too; an' your uncle Dan Dillon, on your father's side, he's
+the only relative you have. My folks are all dead. He's a senator, an' a
+leader in Tammany Hall, an' he'll be proud of you. You were very fond of
+him, because he was a prize-fighter in his day, though I never thought
+much of that, an' was glad when he left the business for politics."
+
+"And how am I to know all these people, mother?"
+
+"You've come home sick," she said placidly, "an' you'll stay in bed for
+the next week, or a month if you like. As each one comes I'll let you
+know jist who they are. You needn't talk any more than you like, an' any
+mistakes will be excused, you've been away so long, an' come home so
+sick."
+
+They smiled frankly at each other, and after tea she showed him his
+room, a plain chamber with sacred pictures on the walls and a photograph
+of Arthur Dillon over the bureau.
+
+"Jist as you left it ten years ago," she said with a sob. "An' your
+picture as you looked a month before you went away."
+
+The portrait showed a good-looking and pugnacious boy of sixteen,
+dark-haired and large-eyed like himself; but the likeness between the
+new and the old Arthur was not striking; yet any one who wished or
+thought to find a resemblance might have succeeded. As to disposition,
+Horace Endicott would not have deserted his mother under any temptation.
+
+"What sort of a boy was--was I at that age, mother?"
+
+"The best in the world," she answered mildly but promptly, feeling the
+doubt in the question. "An' no one was able to understan' why you ran
+away as you did. I wonder now my heart didn't break over it. The
+neighbors jist adored you: the best dancer an' singer, the gayest boy in
+the parish, an' the Monsignor thought there was no other like you."
+
+"I have forgotten how to sing an' dance, mother. I think these
+accomplishments can be easily learned again. Does the Monsignor still
+hold his interest in me?"
+
+"More than ever, I think, but he's a quiet man that says little when he
+means a good deal."
+
+At nine o'clock an old woman came in with an evening paper, and gave a
+cry of joy at sight of him. Having been instructed between the opening
+of the outer door and the woman's appearance, Arthur took the old lady
+in his arms and kissed her. She was the servant of the house, more
+companion than servant, wrinkled like an autumn leaf that has felt the
+heat, but blithe and active.
+
+"So you knew me, Judy, in spite of the whiskers and the long absence?"
+
+"Knew you, is it?" cried Judy, laughing, and crying, and talking at
+once, in a way quite wonderful to one who had never witnessed this feat.
+"An' why shouldn't I know you? Didn't I hould ye in me own two arrums
+the night you were born? An' was there a day afther that I didn't have
+something to do wid ye? Oh, ye little spalpeen, to give us all the
+fright ye did, runnin' away to Californy. Now if ye had run away to
+Ireland, there'd be some sinse in it. Musha thin, but it was fond o'
+goold ye wor, an' ye hardly sixteen. I hope ye brought a pile of it back
+wid ye."
+
+She rattled on in her joy until weariness took them all at the same
+moment, and they withdrew to bed. He was awakened in the morning by a
+cautious whispering in the room outside his door.
+
+"Pon me sowl," Judy was saying angrily, "ye take it like anny ould
+Yankee. Ye're as dull as if 'twas his body on'y, an' not body an' sowl
+together, that kem home to ye. Jist like ould Mrs. Wilcox the night her
+son died, sittin' in her room, an' crowshayin' away, whin a dacint woman
+'ud be howlin' wid sorra like a banshee."
+
+"To tell the truth," Anne replied, "I can't quite forgive him for the
+way he left me, an' it's so long since I saw him, Judy, an' he's so thin
+an' miserable lookin', that I feel as if he was only a fairy child."
+
+"Mother, you're talking too loud to your neighbors," he cried out then
+in a cheery and familiar voice, for he saw at once the necessity of
+removing the very natural constraint indicated by his mother's words;
+and there was a sudden cry from the women, Judy flying to the kitchen
+while Anne came to his door.
+
+"It's true the walls have ears," she said with a kindly smile. "But you
+and I, son, will have to make many's the explanation of that kind before
+you are well settled in your old home."
+
+He arose for breakfast with the satisfaction of having enjoyed a perfect
+sleep, and with a delightful interest in what the day had in store for
+him. Judy bantered and petted him. His mother carried him over difficult
+allusions in her speech. The sun looked in on him pleasantly, he took a
+sniff of air from a brickish garden, saw the brown walls of the
+cathedral not far away, and then went back to bed. A sudden and
+overpowering weakness came upon him which made the bed agreeable. Here
+he was to receive such friends as would call upon him that day. Anne
+Dillon looked somewhat anxious over the ordeal, and his own interest
+grew sharper each moment, until the street-door at last opened with
+decision, and his mother whispered quickly:
+
+"Louis Everard! Make much of him."
+
+She went out to check the brisk and excited student who wished to enter
+with a shout, warning him that the returned wanderer was a sick man.
+There was silence for a moment, and then the young fellow appeared in
+the doorway.
+
+"Will you have a fit if I come any nearer?" he said roguishly.
+
+In the soft, clear light from the window Arthur saw a slim, manly
+figure, a lovable face lighted by keen blue eyes, a white and frank
+forehead crowned by light hair, and an expression of face that won him
+on the instant. This was his chum, whom he had loved, and trained, and
+tyrannized over long ago. For the first time since his sorrow he felt
+the inrushing need of love's sympathy, and with tear-dimmed eyes he
+mutely held out his arms. Louis flew into the proffered embrace, and
+kissed him twice with the ardor of a boy. The affectionate touch of his
+lips quite unmanned Arthur, who was silent while the young fellow sat on
+the side of the bed with one arm about him, and began to ply him with
+questions.
+
+"Tell me first of all," he said, "how you had the heart to do it, to run
+away from so many that loved the ground you walked on. I cried my eyes
+out night after night ... and your poor mother ... and indeed all of us
+... how could you do it? What had we done?"
+
+"Drop it," said Arthur. "At that time I could have done anything. It was
+pure thoughtlessness, regretted many a time since. I did it, and there's
+the end of it, except that I am suffering now and must suffer more for
+the folly."
+
+"One thing, remember," said Louis, "you must let them all see that your
+heart is in the right place. I'm not going to tell you all that was said
+about you. But you must let every one see that you are as good as when
+you left us."
+
+"That would be too little, dear heart. Any man that has been through my
+experiences and did not show himself ten times better than ever he was
+before, ought to stay in the desert."
+
+"That sounds like you," said Louis, gently pulling his beard.
+
+"Tell me, partner," said Arthur lightly, "would you recognize me with
+whiskers?"
+
+"Never. There is nothing about you that reminds me of that boy who ran
+away. Just think, it's ten years, and how we all change in ten years.
+But say, what adventures you must have had! I've got to hear the whole
+story, mind, from the first chapter to the last. You are to come over to
+the house two nights in a week, to the old room, you remember, and
+unfold the secrets of ten years. Haven't you had a lot of them?"
+
+"A car-load, and of every kind. In the mines and forests, on the desert,
+lost in the mountains, hunting and fishing and prospecting; not to
+mention love adventures of the tenderest sort. I feel pleasant to think
+of telling you my latest adventures in the old room, where I used to
+curl you up with fright----"
+
+"Over stories of witches and fairies," cried Louis, "when I would crawl
+up your back as we lay in bed, and shiver while I begged you to go on.
+And the room is just the same, for all the new things have the old
+pattern. I felt you would come back some day with a bag of real stories
+to be told in the same dear old place."
+
+"Real enough surely," said Arthur with a deep sigh, "and I hope they may
+not tire you in the telling. Mother ... tells me that you are going to
+be a priest. Is that true?"
+
+"As far as I can see now, yes. But one is never certain."
+
+"Then I hope you will be one of the Monsignor's stamp. That man is
+surely a man of God."
+
+"Not a doubt of it," said Louis, taking his hat to go.
+
+"One thing," said Arthur as he took his hand and detained him. He was
+hungry for loving intimacy with this fine lad, and stammered in his
+words. "We are to be the same ... brothers ... that we were long ago!"
+
+"That's for you to say, old man," replied Louis, who was pleased and
+even flattered, and petted Arthur's hands. "I always had to do as you
+said, and was glad to be your slave. I have been the faithful one all
+these years. It is your turn now."
+
+After that Arthur cared little who came to see him. He was no longer
+alone. This youth loved him with the love of fidelity and gratitude, to
+which he had no claim except by adoption from Mrs. Anne Dillon; but it
+warmed his heart and cheered his spirit so much that he did not discuss
+with himself the propriety of owning and enjoying it. He looked with
+delight on Louis' mother when she came later in the day, and welcomed
+him as a mother would a dear son. A nun accompanied her, whose costume
+gave him great surprise and some irritation. She was a frank-faced but
+homely woman, who wore her religious habit with distinction. Arthur felt
+as if he were in a chapel while she sat by him and studied his face. His
+mother did the talking for him, compared his features with the portrait
+on the wall, and recalled the mischievous pranks of his wild boyhood,
+indirectly giving him much information as to his former relationships
+with the visitors. Mrs. Everard had been fond of him, and Sister Mary
+Magdalen had prepared him for his first communion. This fact the nun
+emphasized by whispering to him as she was about to leave:
+
+"I hope you have not neglected your religious duties?"
+
+"Monsignor will tell you," he said with an amused smile. He found no
+great difficulty in dealing with the visitors that came and went during
+the first week. Thanks to his mother's tactful management no hitches
+occurred more serious than the real Arthur Dillon might have encountered
+after a long absence. The sick man learned very speedily how high his
+uncle stood in the city, for the last polite inquiry of each visitor was
+whether the Senator had called to welcome his nephew. In the narrow
+world of the Endicotts the average mind had not strength enough to
+conceive of a personality which embraced in itself a prize-fighter and a
+state senator. The terms were contradictory. True, Nero had been actor
+and gladiator, and the inference was just that an American might achieve
+equal distinction; but the Endicott mind refused to consider such an
+inference. Arthur Dillon no longer found anything absurd or impossible.
+The surprises of his new position charmed him. Three months earlier and
+the wildest libeller could not have accused him of an uncle lower in
+rank than a governor of the state. Sonorous names, senator and
+gladiator, brimful of the ferocity and dignity of old Rome! near as they
+had been in the days of Caesar, one would have thought the march of
+civilization might have widened the interval. Here was a rogue's march
+indeed! Judy gave the Senator a remarkable character.
+
+"The Senator, is it?" said she when asked for an opinion. "Divil a finer
+man from here to himself! There isn't a sowl in the city that doesn't
+bless his name. He's a great man bekase he was born so. He began life
+with his two fishts, thumpin' other boys wid the gloves, as they call
+'em. Thin he wint to the war, an' began fightin' wid powdher an' guns,
+so they med him a colonel. Thin he kem home an' wint fightin' the boss
+o' the town, so they med him a senator. It was all fightin' wid him, an'
+they say he's at it yet, though he luks so pleasant all the time, he
+must find it healthy. I don't suppose thim he's fightin' wid finds it as
+agreeable. Somewan must git the batin', ye know. There's jist the differ
+betune men. I've been usin' me fists all me life, beltin' the washboord,
+an' I'm nowhere yet. An' Tommy Kilbride the baker, he's been poundin' at
+the dough for thirty years, an' he's no better off than I am. But me
+noble Dan Dillon that began wid punchin' the heads of his neighbors, see
+where he is to-day. But he's worthy of it, an' I'd be the last to
+begrudge him his luck."
+
+In the Endicott circle the appearance of a senator as great as Sumner
+had not been an event to flutter the heart, though the honor was
+unquestioned; but never in his life had the young man felt a keener
+interest than in the visit of his new uncle. He came at last, a
+splendid figure, too ample in outline and too rich in color for the
+simple room. The first impression he made was that of the man. The
+powerful and subtle essence of the man breathed from him. His face and
+figure had that boldness of line and depth of color which rightly belong
+to the well-bred peasant. He was well dressed, and handsome, with eyes
+as soft and bright as a Spaniard's. Arthur was overcome with delight. In
+Louis he had found sympathy and love, and in the Senator he felt sure
+that he would find ideal strength and ideal manhood, things for the weak
+to lean upon. The young patrician seized his uncle's hand and pressed it
+hard between his own. At this affectionate greeting the Senator's voice
+failed him, and he had difficulty in keeping back his tears.
+
+"If your father were only here now, God rest his soul this day," he
+said. "How he loved you. Often an' often he said to me that his
+happiness would be complete if he lived to see you a man. He died, but I
+live to see it, an' to welcome you back to your own. The Dillons are
+dying out. You're the only one of our family with the family name.
+What's the use o' tellin' you how glad we are that Californy didn't
+swallow you up forever."
+
+Arthur thanked him fervently, and complimented him on his political
+honors. The Senator beamed with the delight of a man who finds the value
+of honors in the joy which they give his friends.
+
+"Yes, I've mounted, Artie, an' I came by everything I have honest.
+You'll not be ashamed of me, boy, when you see where I stand outside.
+But there's one thing about politics very hard, the enemy don't spare
+you. If you were to believe all that's said of me by opponents I'm
+afraid you wouldn't shake hands with me in public."
+
+"I suppose they bring up the prize-fighting," said Arthur. "You ought to
+have told them that no one need be ashamed to do what many a Roman
+emperor did."
+
+"Ah," cried the Senator, "there's where a man feels the loss of an
+education. I never knew the emperors did any ring business. What a
+sockdologer it would have been to compare myself with the Roman
+emperors."
+
+"Then you've done with fighting, uncle?"
+
+There was regret in his tone, for he felt the situation would have been
+improved if the Senator were still before the public as a gladiator.
+
+"I see you ain't lost none o' your old time deviltry, Artie," he replied
+good-naturedly. "I gave that up long ago, an' lots o' things with it.
+But givin' up has nothin' to do with politics, an' regular all my sins
+are retailed in the papers. But one thing they can never say: that I was
+a liar or a thief. An' they can't say that I ever broke my word, or
+broke faith with the people that elected me, or did anything that was
+not becoming in a senator. I respect that position an' the honor for all
+they're worth."
+
+"And they can never say," added Arthur, "that you were afraid of any man
+on earth, or that you ever hurt the helpless, or ever deserted a friend
+or a soul that was in need."
+
+The Senator flushed at the unexpected praise and the sincerity of the
+tone. He was anxious to justify himself even before this sinner, because
+his dead brother and his sister-in-law had been too severe on his former
+occupations to recognize the virtues which Arthur complimented.
+
+"Whatever I have been," said the Senator, pressing the hand which still
+held his, "I was never less than a square man."
+
+"That's easy to believe, uncle, and I'll willingly punch the head of the
+first man that denies it."
+
+"Same old spirit," said the delighted Senator. "Why, you little rogue,
+d'ye remember when you used to go round gettin' all the pictures o' me
+in me fightin' days, an' makin' your dear mother mad by threatenin' to
+go into the ring yourself? Why; you had your own fightin' gear, gloves
+an' clubs an' all that, an' you trained young Everard in the business,
+till his old ... his father put a head ... put a stop to it."
+
+"Fine boy, that Louis, but I never thought he'd turn to the Church."
+
+"He never had any thin' else in him," said the Senator earnestly. "It
+was born in him as fightin' an' general wildness was born in you an' me.
+Look into his face an' you'll see it. Fine? The boy hasn't his like in
+the city or the land. I'll back him for any sum--I'll stand to it that
+he'll be archbishop some day."
+
+"Which I'll never be," said Arthur with a grin.
+
+"Every man in his place, Artie. I've brought you yours, if you want to
+take it. How would politics in New York suit you?"
+
+"I'm ripe for anything with fun in it."
+
+"Then you won't find fault, Artie, if I ask how things stood with
+you--you see it's this way, Artie----"
+
+"Now, hold on, old man," said Arthur. "If you are going to get
+embarrassed in trying to do something for me, then I withdraw. Speak
+right out what you have to say, and leave me to make any reply that
+suits me."
+
+"Then, if you'll pardon me, did you leave things in Californy straight
+an' square, so that nothin' could be said about you in the papers as to
+your record?"
+
+"Straight as a die, uncle."
+
+"An' would you take the position of secretary to the chief an' so get
+acquainted with everything an' everybody?"
+
+"On the spot, and thank you, if you can wait till I am able to move
+about decently."
+
+"Then it's done, an' I'm the proudest man in the state to see another
+Dillon enterin'----"
+
+"The ring," said Arthur.
+
+"No, the arena of politics," corrected the Senator. "An' I can tell from
+your talk that you have education an' sand. In time we'll make you mayor
+of the town."
+
+When he was going after a most affectionate conversation with his nephew
+the Senator made a polite suggestion to Mrs. Dillon.
+
+"His friends an' my friends an' the friends of his father, an' the rank
+an' file generally want to see an' to hear this young man, just as the
+matter stands. Still more will they wish to give him the right hand of
+fellowship when they learn that he is about to enter on a political
+career. Now, why not save time and trouble by just giving a reception
+some day about the end of the month, invite the whole ga--the whole
+multitude, do the thing handsome, an' wind it up forever?"
+
+The Senator had an evident dread of his sister-in-law, and spoke to her
+with senatorial dignity. She meekly accepted his suggestion, and humbly
+attended him to the door. His good sense had cleared the situation.
+Preparation for a reception would set a current going in the quiet
+house, and relieve the awkwardness of the new relationships; and it
+would save time in the business of renewing old acquaintance. They took
+up the work eagerly. The old house had to be refitted for the occasion,
+his mother had to replenish a scanty wardrobe, and he had to dress
+himself in the fashion proper to Arthur Dillon. Anne's taste was good,
+inclined to rich but simple coloring, and he helped her in the selection
+of materials, insisting on expenditures which awed and delighted her.
+Judy Haskell came in for her share of raiment, and carried out some
+dread designs on her own person with conviction. It was pure pleasure to
+help these simple souls who loved him.
+
+After a three weeks' stay in the house he went about the city at his
+ease, and busied himself with the study and practise of his new
+personality. In secret, even from Louis who spent much of his leisure
+with him, he began to acquire the well-known accomplishments of the real
+Arthur Dillon, who had sung and danced his way into the hearts of his
+friends, who had been a wit for a boy, bubbling over with good spirits,
+an athlete, a manager of amateur minstrels, a precocious gallant among
+the girls, a fighter ever ready to defend the weak, a tireless leader in
+any enterprise, and of a bright mind, but indifferent to study. The part
+was difficult for him to play, since his nature was staidness itself
+beside the spontaneity and variety of Arthur Dillon: but his spirits
+rose in the effort, some feeling within responded to the dash and daring
+of this lost boy, so much loved and so deeply mourned.
+
+Louis helped him in preparing his wardrobe, very unlike anything an
+Endicott had ever worn. Lacking the elegance and correctness of earlier
+days, and of a different character, it was in itself a disguise. He wore
+his hair long and thick in the Byronic fashion, and a curly beard
+shadowed his lower face. Standing at the glass on the afternoon of the
+reception he felt confident that Horace Endicott had fairly disappeared
+beneath the new man Dillon. His figure had filled out slightly, and had
+lost its mournful stoop; his face was no longer wolfish in its leanness,
+and his color had returned, though melancholy eyes marked by deep
+circles still betrayed the sick heart. Yet the figure in the glass
+looked as unlike Horace Endicott as Louis Everard. He compared it with
+the accurate portrait sent out by his pursuers through the press. Only
+the day before had the story of his mysterious disappearance been made
+public. For months they had sought him quietly but vainly. It was a
+sign of their despair that the journals should have his story, his
+portrait, and a reward for his discovery.
+
+No man sees his face as others see it, but the difference between the
+printed portrait and the reflection of Arthur Dillon in the mirror was
+so startling that he felt humbled and pained, and had to remind himself
+that this was the unlikeness he so desired. The plump and muscular
+figure of Horace Endicott, dressed perfectly, posed affectively,
+expressed the self-confidence of the aristocrat. His smooth face was
+insolent with happiness and prosperity, with that spirit called the
+pride of life. But for what he knew of this man, he could have laughed
+at his self-sufficiency. The mirror gave back a shrunken, sickly figure,
+somewhat concealed by new garments, and the eyes betrayed a poor soul,
+cracked and seamed by grief and wrong; no longer Horace Endicott, broken
+by sickness of mind and heart, and disguised by circumstance, but
+another man entirely. What a mill is sorrow, thus to grind up an
+Endicott and from the dust remold a Dillon! The young aristocrat, plump,
+insolent, shallow, and self-poised, looked commonplace in his pride
+beside this broken man, who had walked through the abyss of hell, and
+nevertheless saved his soul.
+
+He discovered as he gazed alternately on portrait and mirror that a
+singular feeling had taken hold of him. Horace Endicott all at once
+seemed remote, like a close friend swallowed and obliterated years ago
+by the sea; while within himself, whoever he might be, some one seemed
+struggling for release, or expression, or dominion. He interpreted it
+promptly. Outwardly, he was living the life of Arthur Dillon, and
+inwardly that Arthur was making war on Horace Endicott, taking
+possession as an enemy seizes a stubborn land, reaching out for those
+remote citadels wherein the essence of personality resides. He did not
+object. He was rather pleased, though he shivered with a not unwelcome
+dread.
+
+The reception turned out a marvelous affair for him who had always been
+bored by such ceremonies. His mother, resplendent in a silk dress of
+changeable hue, seemed to walk on air. Mrs. Everard and her daughter
+Mona assisted Anne in receiving the guests. The elder women he knew were
+Irish peasants, who in childhood had run barefoot to school on a
+breakfast of oatmeal porridge, and had since done their own washing and
+baking for a time. Only a practised eye could have distinguished them
+from their sisters born in the purple. Mona was a beauty, who earned her
+own living as a teacher, and had the little virtues of the profession
+well marked; truly a daughter of the gods, tall for a woman, with a
+mocking face all sparkle and bloom, small eyes that flashed like gems, a
+sharp tongue, and a head of silken hair, now known as the Titian red,
+but at that time despised by all except artists and herself. She was a
+witch, an enchantress, who thought no man as good as her brother, and
+showed other men only the regard which irritates them. And Arthur loved
+her and her mother because they belonged to Louis.
+
+"I don't know how you'll like the arrangements," Louis said to him, when
+all things were ready. "This is not a society affair. It's an affair of
+the clan. The Dillons and their friends have a right to attend. So you
+must be prepared for hodcarriers as well as aristocrats."
+
+At three o'clock the house and the garden were thrown open to the stream
+of guests. Arthur gazed in wonder. First came old men and women of all
+conditions, laborers, servants, small shopkeepers, who had known his
+father and been neighbors and clients for years. Dressed in their best,
+and joyful over his return to life and home and friends, they wrung his
+hands, wept over him, and blessed him until their warm delight and
+sincerity nearly overcame him, who had never known the deep love of the
+humble for the head of the clan. The Senator was their benefactor, their
+bulwark and their glory; but Arthur was the heir, the hope of the
+promising future. They went through the ceremony of felicitation and
+congratulation, chatted for a while, and then took their leave as calmly
+and properly as the dames and gallants of a court; and one and all bowed
+to the earth with moist and delighted eyes before the Everards.
+
+"How like a queen she looks," they said of the mother.
+
+"The blessin' o' God on him," they said of Louis, "for priest is written
+all over him, an' how could he help it wid such a mother."
+
+"She's fit for a king," they said of Mona. "Wirra, an' to think she'd
+look at a plain man like Doyle Grahame."
+
+But of Anne Dillon and her son they said nothing, so much were they
+overcome by surprise at the splendor of the mother and the son, and the
+beauty of the old house made over new. After dark the Senator arrived,
+which was the signal for a change in the character of the guests.
+
+"You'll get the aristocracy now, the high Irish," said Louis.
+
+Arthur recognized it by its airs, its superciliousness, and several
+other bad qualities. It was a budding aristocracy at the ugliest moment
+of its development; city officials and their families, lawyers,
+merchants, physicians, journalists, clever and green and bibulous, who
+ran in with a grin and ran out with a witticism, out of respect for the
+chief, and who were abashed and surprised at the superior insolence of
+the returned Dillon. Reminded of the story that he had returned a
+wealthy man, many of them lingered. With these visitors however came the
+pillars of Irish society, solid men and dignified women, whom the
+Senator introduced as they passed. There were three emphatic moments
+which impressed Arthur Dillon. A hush fell upon the chattering crowd one
+instant, and people made way for Monsignor O'Donnell, who looked very
+gorgeous to Arthur in his purple-trimmed soutane, and purple cloak
+falling over his broad shoulders. The politicians bent low, the flippant
+grew serious, the faithful few became reverent. A successful leader was
+passing, and they struggled to touch his garments. Arthur's heart
+swelled at the silent tribute, for he loved this man.
+
+"His little finger," said the Senator in a whisper, "is worth more to
+them than my whole body."
+
+A second time this wave of feeling invaded the crowd, when a
+strong-faced, quiet-mannered man entered the room, and paid his respects
+to the Dillons. Again the lane was made, and hearts fluttered and many
+hands were outstretched in greeting to the political leader, Hon. John
+Sullivan, the head of Tammany, the passing idol of the hour, to whom
+Arthur was soon to be private secretary. He would have left at once but
+that the Senator whispered something in his ear; and presently the two
+went into the hall to receive the third personage of the evening, and
+came back with him, deeply impressed by the honor of his presence. He
+was a short, stocky man, of a military bearing, with a face so strongly
+marked as to indicate a certain ferocity of temperament; his deep and
+sparkling eyes had eyebrows aslant after the fashion of Mephisto; the
+expression a little cynical, all determination, but at that moment
+good-natured. The assembly fell into an ecstasy at the sight and the
+touch of their hero, for no one failed to recognize the dashing General
+Sheridan. They needed only a slight excuse to fall at his feet and adore
+him.
+
+Arthur was impressed indeed, but his mother had fallen into a state of
+heavenly trance over the greatness which had honored their festival. She
+recovered only when the celebrities had departed and the stream of
+guests had come to an end. Then came a dance in the garden for the young
+people, and the school-friends of Arthur Dillon made demands upon him
+for the entertainment of which his boyhood had given such promise; so he
+sang his songs with nerve and success, and danced strange dances with
+graceful foot, until the common voice declared that he had changed only
+in appearance, which was natural, and had kept the promise of his
+boyhood for gayety of spirits, sweet singing, and fine dancing.
+
+"I feel more than ever to-night," said Louis at parting, "that all of
+you has come home."
+
+Reviewing the events of the day in his own room after midnight, he felt
+like an actor whose first appearance has been a success. None of the
+guests seemed to have any doubt of his personality, or to feel any
+surprise at his appearance. For them Arthur Dillon had come home again
+after an adventurous life, and changes were accepted as the natural
+result of growth. They took him to their heart without question. He was
+loved. What Horace Endicott could not command with all his wealth, the
+love of his own kin, a poor, broken adventurer, Arthur Dillon, enjoyed
+in plenty. Well, thank God for the good fortune which followed so
+unexpectedly his exit from the past. He had a secure place in tender
+hearts for the first time since father and mother died. What is life
+without love and loving? What are love and loving without God? He could
+say again, as on the shore of the little pool, I believe in God
+forever.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE DILLON CLAN.
+
+
+After the reception Arthur Dillon fell easily into the good graces of
+the clan, and found his place quite naturally; but like the suspicious
+intruder his ears and eyes remained wide open to catch the general
+sentiment about himself, and the varying opinions as to his manners and
+character. He began to perceive by degrees the magnitude of the task
+which he had imposed upon himself; the act of disappearing was but a
+trifle compared with the relationships crowding upon him in his new
+environment. He would be forced to maintain them all with some likeness
+to the method which would have come naturally to the real Dillon. The
+clan made it easy for him. Since allowance had to be conceded to his
+sickly condition, they formed no decisive opinions about him, accepting
+pleasantly, until health and humor would urge him to speak of his own
+accord, Anne's cloudy story of his adventures, of luck in the mines, and
+of excuses for his long silence. All observed the new element in his
+disposition; the boy who had been too heedless and headlong to notice
+anything but what pleased him, now saw everything; and kept at the same
+time a careful reserve about his past and present experiences, which
+impressed his friends and filled Judy Haskell with dread.
+
+"Tommy Higgins," she said, to Anne in an interval of housework, "kem
+home from Texas pritty much the same, with a face an him as long as yer
+arm, an' his mouth shut up like an old door. Even himself cudn't open
+it. He spint money free, an' av coorse that talked for him. But wan day,
+whin his mother was thryin' an a velvet sack he bought for her, an'
+fightin' him bekase there was no fur collar to id, in walked his wife
+an' three childher to him an' her, an' shtayed wid her ever afther.
+Begob, she never said another word about fur collars, an' she never got
+another velvet sack till she died. Tommy had money, enough to kape them
+all decent, bud not enough for velvet and silk an' joolry. From that
+minnit he got back his tongue, an' he talked himself almost to death
+about what he didn't do, an' what he did do in Californy. So they med
+him a tax-collecthor an' a shtump-speaker right away, an' that saved his
+neighbors from dyin' o' fatague lishtenin' to his lies. Take care, Anne
+Dillon, that this b'y o' yours hastn't a wife somewhere."
+
+Anne was in the precise attitude of old Mrs. Higgins when her son's wife
+arrived, fitting a winter cloak to her trim figure. At the sudden
+suggestion she sat down overcome.
+
+"Oh, God forgive you, Judy," said she, "even to mention such a thing. I
+forbid you ever to speak of it again. I don't care what woman came in
+the door, I'd turn her out like a thramp. He's mine, I've been widout
+him ten years, and I'm going to hold him now against every schemin'
+woman in the world."
+
+"Faith," said Judy, "I don't want to see another woman in the house anny
+more than yerself. I'm on'y warnin' yez. It 'ud jist break my heart to
+lose the grandher he's afther puttin' on yez."
+
+The two women looked about them with mournful admiration. The house,
+perfect in its furnishings, delighted the womanly taste. In Anne's
+wardrobe hung such a collection of millinery, dresses, ornaments, that
+the mere thought of losing it saddened their hearts. And the loss of
+that future which Anne Dillon had seen in her own day-dreams ... she
+turned savagely on Judy.
+
+"You were born wid an evil eye, Judy Haskell," cried she, "to see things
+no wan but you would ever think of. Never mention them again."
+
+"Lemme tell ye thin that there's others who have somethin' to say
+besides meself. If they're in a wondher over Artie, they're in a greater
+wondher over Artie's mother, buyin' silks, an' satins, an' jools like an
+acthress, an' dhressin' as gay as a greenhorn jist over from Ireland."
+
+"They're jealous, an' I'm goin' to make them more so," said Anne with a
+gleeful laugh, as she flung away care and turned to the mirror. For the
+first time since her youth she had become a scandal to her friends.
+
+Judy kept Arthur well informed of the general feeling and the common
+opinion, and he took pains not only to soothe his mother's fright but
+also to explain the little matters which irritated her friends. Mrs.
+Everard did not regard the change in Anne with complacency.
+
+"Arthur is changed for the better, but his mother for the worse," she
+said to Judy, certain that the old lady would retail it to her mistress.
+"A woman of fifty, that always dressed in dark colors, sensibly, to take
+all at once to red, and yellow, and blue, and to order bonnets like the
+Empress Eugenie's ... well, one can't call her crazy, but she's on the
+way."
+
+"She has the money," sighed Mona, who had none.
+
+"Sure she always had that kind of taste," said Judy in defence, "an'
+whin her eyes was blue an' her hair yalla, I dunno but high colors wint
+well enough. Her father always dhressed her well. Anyhow she's goin' to
+make up for all the years she had to dhress like an undertaker.
+Yistherday it was a gran' opery-cloak, as soon as Artie tould her he had
+taken four opery sates for the season."
+
+The ladies gasped, and Mona clapped her hands at the prospect of
+unlimited opera, for Anne had always been kind to her in such matters.
+
+"But all that's nawthin'," Judy went on demurely, "to what's comin' next
+week. It's a secret o' coorse, an' I wudn't have yez mintion it for the
+world, though yez'll hear it soon enough. Micksheen has a new cage all
+silver an' goold, an' Artie says he has a piddygree, which manes that
+they kep' thrack of him as far back as Adam an' Eve, as they do for
+lords an' ladies; though how anny of 'em can get beyant Noah an' the ark
+bates me. Now they're puttin' Micksheen in condition, which manes all
+sorts of nonsense, an' plenty o' throuble for the poor cat, that does be
+bawlin' all over the house night an' day wid the dhread of it, an'
+lukkin' up at me pitiful to save him from what's comin'. Artie has
+enthered his name at the polis headquarthers somewhere, that he's a
+prize cat, an' he's to be sint in the cage to the cat show to win a
+prize over fifty thousand other cats wid piddygrees. They wanted me to
+attind on Micksheen, but I sed no, an' so they've hired a darky in a
+uniform to luk after him. An' wanst a day Anne is goin' to march up to
+the show in a different dhress, an' luk in at Micksheen."
+
+At this point Judy's demureness gave way and she laughed till the tears
+came. The others could not but join.
+
+"Well, that's the top of the hill," said Mrs. Everard. "Surely Arthur
+ought to know enough to stop that tomfoolery. If he doesn't I will, I
+declare."
+
+Arthur however gave the affair a very different complexion when she
+mentioned it.
+
+"Micksheen is a blooded cat," said he, "for Vandervelt presented it to
+the Senator, who gave it to mother. And I suggested the cat-show for two
+reasons: mother's life has not been any too bright, and I had a big
+share in darkening it; so I'm going to crowd as much fun into it as she
+is willing to stand. Then I want to see how Micksheen stands in the
+community. His looks are finer than his pedigree, which is very good.
+And I want every one to know that there's nothing too good in New York
+for mother, and that she's going to have a share in all the fun that's
+going."
+
+"That's just like you, and I wish you luck," said Mary Everard.
+
+Not only did he go about explaining, and mollifying public sentiment
+himself, he also secured the services of Sister Mary Magdalen for the
+same useful end. The nun was a puzzle to him. Encased in her religious
+habit like a knight in armor, her face framed in the white gamp and
+black veil, her hands hidden in her long sleeves, she seemed to him a
+fine automaton, with a sweet voice and some surprising movements; for he
+could not measure her, nor form any impression of her, nor see a line of
+her natural disposition. Her human side appeared very clearly in her
+influence with the clan, her sincere and affectionate interest in
+himself, and her appetite for news in detail. Had she not made him live
+over again the late reception by her questions as to what was done, what
+everybody said, and what the ladies wore? Unwearied in aiding the needy,
+she brought him people of all sorts and conditions, in whom he took not
+the slightest interest, and besought his charity for them. He gave it in
+exchange for her good will, making her clearly understand that the
+change in his mother's habits must not lead to anything like annoyance
+from her old friends and neighbors.
+
+"Oh, dear, no," she exclaimed, "for annoyance would only remove you from
+our midst, and deprive us of a great benefactor, for I am sure you will
+prove to be that. May I introduce to you my friend, Miss Edith
+Conyngham?"
+
+He bowed to the apparition which came forward, seized his hands, held
+them and patted them affectionately, despite his efforts to release
+them.
+
+"We all seem to have known you since childhood," was her apology.
+
+The small, dark woman, pale as a dying nun, irritated him. Blue glasses
+concealed her eyes, and an ugly costume concealed her figure; she came
+out of an obscure corner behind the nun, and fell back into it
+noiselessly, but her voice and manner had the smoothness of velvet. He
+looked at her hands patting his own, and found them very soft, white,
+untouched by age, and a curious contrast to her gray hair. Interest
+touching him faintly he responded to her warmth, and looked closely into
+the blue glasses with a smile. Immediately the little woman sank back
+into her corner. Long after he settled the doubt which assailed him at
+that moment, if there were not significance in her look and words and
+manner. Sister Magdalen bored him ten minutes with her history. He must
+surely take an interest in her ... great friend of his father's ... and
+indeed of his friends ... her whole life devoted to religion and the
+poor ... the recklessness of others had driven her from a convent where
+she had been highly esteemed ... she had to be vindicated ... her case
+was well on the way to trial ... nothing should be left undone to make
+it a triumph. Rather dryly he promised his aid, wondering if he had
+really caught the true meaning of the little woman's behavior. He gave
+up suspicion when Judy provided Miss Conyngham with a character.
+
+"This is the way of it," said Judy, "an' it's aisy to undhershtan' ...
+thin agin I dinno as it's so aisy ... but annyway she was a sisther in a
+convent out west, an' widout lave or license they put her out, bekase
+she wudn't do what the head wan ordhered her to do. So now she's in New
+York, an' Sisther Mary Mag Dillon is lukkin afther her, an' says she
+must be righted if the Pope himself has to do it. We all have pity an
+her, knowin' her people as we did. A smarter girl never opened a book in
+Ameriky. An' I'm her godmother."
+
+"Then we must do something for her," said the master kindly in
+compliment to Judy. After his mother and Judy none appealed to him like
+the women of the Everard home. The motherly grace of Mary and the
+youthful charm of beautiful Mona attracted him naturally; from them he
+picked up stray features of Arthur Dillon's character; but that which
+drew him to them utterly was his love for Louis. Never had any boy, he
+believed, so profoundly the love of mother and sister. The sun rose and
+set with him for the Everards, and beautiful eyes deepened in beauty and
+flashed with joy when they rested on him. Arthur found no difficulty in
+learning from them the simple story of the lad's childhood and youth.
+
+"How did it happen," he inquired of Mary, "that he took up the idea of
+being a priest? It was not in his mind ten years back?"
+
+"He was the priest from his birth," she answered proudly. "Just seven
+months old he was when a first cousin of mine paid us a visit. He was a
+young man, ordained about a week, ... we had waited and prayed for that
+sight ten years ... he sang the Mass for us and blessed us all. It was
+beautiful to see, the boy we had known all his life, to come among us a
+priest, and to say Mass in front of Father O'Donnell--I never can call
+him Monsignor--with the sweetest voice you ever heard. Well, the first
+thing he did when he came to my house and Louis was a fat, hearty baby
+in the cradle, was to take him in his arms, look into his face a little
+while, and then kiss him. And I'll never forget the words he said."
+
+Her dark eyes were moist, but a smile lighted up her calm face.
+
+"Mary," he said to me, "this boy should be the first priest of the next
+generation. I'll bless him to that end, and do you offer him to God. And
+I did. He was the roughest child of all mine, and showed very little of
+the spirit of piety as he grew up. But he was always the best boy to his
+own. He had the heart for us all, and never took his play till he was
+sure the house was well served. Nothing was said to him about being a
+priest. That was left to God. One winter he began to keep a little
+diary, and I saw in it that he was going often to Mass on week days, and
+often to confession. He was working then with his father in the office,
+since he did not care much for school. Then the next thing I knew he
+came to me one night and put his arms about me to say that he wished to
+be a priest, to go to college, and that this very cousin who had blessed
+him in the cradle had urged him to make known the wish that was in him,
+for it seems he discovered what we only hoped for. And so he has been
+coming and going ever since, a blessing to the house, and sure I don't
+know how I shall get along without him when he goes to the seminary next
+year."
+
+"Nor I," said Arthur with a start. "How can you ever think of giving him
+up?"
+
+"That's the first thing we have to learn," she replied with a smile at
+his passion. "The children all leave the house in time one way or
+another. It's only a question of giving him to God's service or to the
+service of another woman. I could never be jealous of God."
+
+He laughed at this suggestion of jealousy in a mother. Of course she
+must hate the woman who robs her of her son, and secures a greater love
+than a mother ever knew. The ways of nature, or God, are indeed hard to
+the flesh. He thought of this as he sat in the attic room with his
+light-hearted chum. He envied him the love and reverence of these good
+women, envied him that he had been offered to God in his infancy; and in
+his envy felt a satisfaction that very soon these affectionate souls
+would soon have to give Louis up to Another. To him this small room was
+like a shrine, sacred, undefiled, the enclosure of a young creature
+specially called to the service of man, perfumed by innocence, cared for
+by angels, let down from heaven into a house on Cherry Street. Louis had
+no such fancies, but flung aside his books, shoved his chum into a
+chair, placed his feet on a stool, put a cigar in his mouth and lighted
+it for him, pulled his whiskers, and ordered the latest instalment of
+Dillon's Dark Doings in Dugout. Then the legends of life in California
+began. Sometimes, after supper, a knock was heard at the door, and there
+entered two little sisters, who must hear a bear-story from Arthur, and
+kiss the big brother good-night; two delicate flowers on the rough stem
+of life, that filled Horace Endicott with bitterness and joy when he
+gathered them into his embrace; the bitterness of hate, the joy of
+escape from paternity. What softness, what beauty, what fragrance in the
+cherubs! _Trumps_, their big brother called them, but the world knew
+them as Marguerite and Constance, and they shared the human repugnance
+to an early bed.
+
+"You ought to be glad to go to bed," Arthur said, "when you go to sleep
+so fast, and dream beautiful dreams about angels."
+
+"But I don't dream of angels," said Marguerite sadly. "Night before last
+I dreamed a big black man came out of a cellar, and took baby away,"
+casting a look of love at Constance in her brother's arms.
+
+"And I dreamed," said Constance, with a queer little pucker of her
+mouth, "that she was all on fire, in her dress, and----"
+
+This was the limit of her language, for the thought of her sister on
+fire overwhelmed the words at her command.
+
+"And baby woke up," the elder continued--for she was a second mother to
+Constance, and pieced out all her deficiencies and did penance for her
+sins--"and she said to mother, 'throw water on Marguerite to put her
+out.'"
+
+"What sad dreams," Arthur said. "Tell Father O'Donnell about them."
+
+"She has other things to tell him," Louis said with a grin. "I have no
+doubt you could help her, Artie. She must go to confession sometime, and
+she has no sins to tell. The other day when I was setting out for
+confession she asked me not to tell all my sins to the priest, but to
+hold back a few and give them to her for her confession. Now you have
+enough to spare for that honest use, I think."
+
+"Oh, please, dear cousin Artie," said the child, thrilling his heart
+with the touch of her tender lips on his cheek.
+
+"There's no doubt I have enough," he cried with a secret groan. "When
+you are ready to go, Marguerite, I will give you all you want."
+
+The history of Arthur's stay in California was drawn entirely from his
+travels on the Pacific slope, tedious to the narrator, but interesting
+because of the lad's interest, and because of the picture which the rapt
+listener made. His study-desk near by, strewn with papers and books, the
+white bed and bookcase farther off, pictures and mottoes of his own
+selection on the white walls, a little altar in the depths of the
+dormer-window; and the lord of the little domain in the foreground,
+hands on knees, lips parted, cheeks flushed, eyes fixed and dreamy,
+seeing the rich colors and varied action as soon as words conveyed the
+story to the ear; a perfect picture of the listening boy, to whom
+experience like a wandering minstrel sings the glory of the future in
+the happenings of the past.
+
+Arthur invariably closed his story with a fit of sighing. That happy
+past made his present fate heavy indeed. Horace Endicott rose strong in
+him then and protested bitterly against Arthur Dillon as a usurper; but
+sure there never was a gentler usurper, for he surrendered so willingly
+and promptly that Endicott fled again into his voluntary obscurity.
+Louis comforted those heavy moments with soft word and gentle touch,
+pulling his beard lovingly, smoothing his hair, lighting for him a fresh
+cigar, asking no questions, and, when the dark humor deepened,
+exorcising the evil spirit with a sprinkling of holy water. Prayers were
+said together--an overpowering moment for the man who rarely prayed to
+see this faith and its devotion in the boy--and then to bed, where Louis
+invariably woke to the incidents of the day and retailed them for an
+hour to his amused ear; and with the last word fell into instant and
+balmy sleep. Oh, this wonder of unconscious boyhood! Had this
+sad-hearted man ever known that blissful state? He lay there listening
+to the soft and regular breathing of the child, who knew so little of
+life and evil. At last he fell asleep moaning. It was Louis who woke
+with a sense of fright, felt that his bedfellow was gone, and heard his
+voice at the other side of the room, an agonized voice that chilled him.
+
+"To go back would be to kill her ... but I must go back ... and then the
+trail of blood over all...."
+
+Louis leaped out of bed, and lit the night-candle. Arthur stood beside
+the altar in the dormer-window, motionless, with pallid face and open
+eyes that saw nothing.
+
+"Why should such a wretch live and I be suffering?--she suffers too ...
+but not enough ... the child ... oh, that was the worst ... the child
+... my child...."
+
+The low voice gave out the words distinctly and without passion, as of
+one repeating what was told to him. Rid of fear Louis slapped him on the
+shoulder and shook him, laughing into his astonished face when sense
+came back to him.
+
+"It's like a scene, or a skene from Macbeth," he said. "Say, Artie, you
+had better make open confession of your sins. Why should you want to
+kill her, and put the trail of blood over it all?"
+
+"I said that, did I?" He thought a moment, then put his arms about
+Louis. They were sitting on the side of the bed.
+
+"You must know it sometime, Louis. It is only for your ear now. I had a
+wife ... she was worthless ... she lives ... that is all."
+
+"And your child? you spoke of a child?"
+
+Arthur shook with a chill and wiped the sweat from his forehead.
+
+"No," he groaned, "no ... thank God for that ... I had no child."
+
+After a little they went back to bed, and Louis made light of everything
+with stories of his own sleep-walking until he fell asleep again. The
+candle was left burning. Misfortune rose and sat looking at the boy
+curiously. With the luck of the average man, he might have been father
+to a boy like this, a girl like Mona with beautiful hair and a golden
+heart, soft sweet babies like the Trumps. He leaned over and studied the
+sleeping face, so sweetly mournful, so like death, yet more spiritual,
+for the soul was there still. In this face the senses had lost their
+daylight influence, had withdrawn into the shadows; and now the light of
+innocence, the light of a beautiful soul, the light that never was on
+land or sea, shone out of the still features. A feeling which had never
+touched his nature before took fierce possession of him, and shook him
+as a tiger shakes his prey. He had to writhe in silence, to beat his
+head with his hands, to stifle words of rage and hate and despair. At
+last exhausted he resigned himself, he took the boy's hand in his,
+remembering that this innocent heart loved him, and fell into a
+dreamless sleep.
+
+The charm and the pain of mystery hung about the new life, attracting
+him, yet baffling him at every step. He could not fathom or grasp the
+people with whom he lived intimately, they seemed beyond him, and yet he
+dared ask no questions, dared not go even to Monsignor for explanations.
+With the prelate his relations had to take that character which suited
+their individual standing. When etiquette allowed him to visit the
+rector, Monsignor provided him with the philosophy of the environment,
+explained the difficulties, and soothed him with the sympathy of a
+generous heart acquainted with his calamities.
+
+"It would have been better to have launched you elsewhere," he said,
+"but I knew no other place well enough to get the right people. And then
+I have the hope that the necessity for this episode will not continue."
+
+"Death only will end it, Monsignor. Death for one or the other. It
+should come soon, for the charm of this life is overpowering me. I shall
+never wish to go back if the charm holds me. My uncle, the Senator, is
+about to place me in politics."
+
+"I knew he would launch you on that stormy sea," Monsignor answered
+reflectively, "but you are not bound to accept the enterprise."
+
+"It will give me distraction, and I need distraction from this
+intolerable pain," tapping his breast with a gesture of anguish.
+
+"It will surely counter-irritate. It has entranced men like the Senator,
+and your chief; even men like Birmingham. They have the ambition which
+runs with great ability. It's a pity that the great prizes are beyond
+them."
+
+"Why beyond them?"
+
+"High office is closed to Catholics in this country."
+
+"Here I run up against the mysterious again," he complained.
+
+"Go down into your memory," Monsignor said after a little reflection,
+"and recall the first feeling which obscurely stirred your heart when
+the ideas of _Irish_ and _Catholic_ were presented to you. See if it was
+not distrust, dislike, irritation, or even hate; something different
+from the feeling aroused by such ideas as _Turk_ and _atheist_."
+
+"Dislike, irritation, perhaps contempt, with a hint of amusement,"
+Arthur replied thoughtfully.
+
+"How came that feeling there touching people of whom you knew next to
+nothing?"
+
+"Another mystery."
+
+"Let me tell you. Hatred and contempt of the Irish Catholic has been the
+mark of English history for four centuries, and the same feelings have
+become a part of English character. It is in the English blood, and
+therefore it is in yours. It keeps such men as Sullivan and Birmingham
+out of high office, and now it will act against you, strangely enough."
+
+"I understand. Queer things, rum things in this world. I am such a
+mystery to myself, however, that I ought not be surprised at outside
+mysteries."
+
+"I often regret that I helped you to your present enterprise," said the
+priest, "on that very account. Life is harsh enough without adding to
+its harshness."
+
+"Never regret that you saved a poor fellow's life, reason, fortune,
+family name from shame and blood," Arthur answered hotly. "I told you
+the consequences that were coming--you averted them--there's no use to
+talk of gratitude--and through you I came to believe in God again, as my
+mother taught me. No regret, for God's sake."
+
+His voice broke for a moment, and he walked to the window. Outside he
+saw the gray-white walls which would some day be the grand cathedral.
+The space about it looked like the studio of a giant artist; piles of
+marble scattered here and there gave the half-formed temple the air of a
+frowsy, ill-dressed child; and the mass rising to the sky resembled a
+cloud that might suddenly melt into the ether. He had seen the great
+temples of the world, yet found in this humbler, but still magnificent
+structure an element of wonder. From the old world, ancient, rich in
+tradition, one expected all things; centaurs might spring from its soil
+unnoticed. That the prosaic rocks of Manhattan should heave for this
+sublimity stirred the sense of admiring wonder.
+
+"This is your child?" said Arthur abruptly.
+
+"I saw the foundation laid when I was a youth, great boulders of
+half-hewn rock, imbedded in cement, to endure with the ages, able to
+support whatever man may pile upon them. This building is part of my
+life--you may call it my child--for it seems to have sprung from me,
+although a greater planned it."
+
+"What a people to attempt this miracle," said Arthur.
+
+"Now you have said it," cried the priest proudly. "The poor people to
+whom you now belong, moved by the spirit which raised the great shrines
+of Europe, are building out of their poverty and their faith the first
+really great temple on this continent. The country waited for them. This
+temple will express more than a desire to have protection from bad
+weather, and to cover the preacher's pulpit. Here you will have in stone
+faith, hope, love, sacrifice. What blessings it will pour out upon the
+city, and upon the people who built it. For them it will be a great
+glory many centuries perhaps."
+
+"I shall have my share in the work," Arthur said with feeling. "I feel
+that I am here to stay, and I shall be a stranger to no work in which my
+friends are engaged. I'll not let the mysteries trouble me. I begin to
+see what you are, and a little of what you mean. Command me, for no
+other in this world to-day has any right to command me--none with a
+right like yours, father and friend."
+
+"Thanks and amen, Arthur. Having no claim upon you we shall be all the
+more grateful. But in good time. For the present look to yourself,
+closely, mind; and draw upon me, upon Louis, upon your mother, they have
+the warmest hearts, for sympathy and consolation."
+
+Not long before and Arthur Dillon would have received with the polite
+indifference of proud and prosperous youth this generous offer of
+sympathy and love; but now it shook him to the center, for he had
+learned, at what a fearful price! how precious, how necessary, how rare
+is the jewel of human love.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+THE WEARIN' O' THE GREEN.
+
+
+By degrees the effervescence of little Ireland, in which strange land
+his fortune had been cast, began to steal into his blood. Mirth ruled
+the East side, working in each soul according to his limitations. It was
+a wink, a smile, a drink, a passing gossoon, a sly girl, a light trick,
+among the unspoken things; or a biting epigram, the phrase felicitous, a
+story gilt with humor, a witticism swift and fatal as lightning; in
+addition varied activity, a dance informal, a ceremonious ball, a party,
+a wake, a political meeting, the visit of the district leader; and with
+all, as Judy expressed it, "lashins an' lavins, an' divil a thought of
+to-morrow." Indeed this gay clan kept Yesterday so deeply and tenderly
+in mind that To-day's house had no room for the uncertain morrow. He
+abandoned himself to the spirit of the place. The demon of reckless fun
+caught him by the heels and sharpened his tongue, so that his wit and
+his dancing became tonics for eyes and ears dusty with commonplace. His
+mother and his chum had to admonish him, and it was very sweet to get
+this sign of their love for him. Reproof from our beloved is sweeter
+than praise from an enemy.
+
+They all watched over him as if he were heir to a throne. The Senator,
+busy with his approaching entrance into local politics, had already
+introduced him to the leaders, who formed a rather mixed circle of
+intelligence and power. He had met its kind before on the frontier,
+where the common denominator in politics was manhood, not blue blood,
+previous good character, wealth, nor the stamp of Harvard. A member held
+his place by virtue of courage, popularity, and ability. Arthur made no
+inquiries, but took everything as it came. All was novelty, all
+surprise, and to his decorous and orderly disposition, all ferment. The
+clan seemed to him to be rushing onward like a torrent night and day,
+from the dance to the ward-meeting, from business to church, interested
+and yet careless. The Senator informed him with pride that his debut
+would take place at the banquet on St. Patrick's Day, when he should
+make a speech.
+
+"Do you think you can do it, me boy?" said the Senator. "If you think
+you can, why you can."
+
+"I know I can," said the reckless Dillon, who had never made a speech in
+his life.
+
+"An' lemme give you a subject," said Judy. They were all together in the
+sitting-room, where the Senator had surprised them in a game of cards.
+
+"Give a bastin' to Mare Livingstone," said Judy seriously. "I read in
+the _Sun_ how he won't inspect the parade on St. Patrick's Day, nor let
+the green flag fly on the city hall. There must be an Orange dhrop in
+his blood, for no dacint Yankee 'ud have anny hathred for the blessed
+green. Sure two years ago Mare Jones dressed himself up in a lovely
+green uniform, like an Irish prince, an' lukked at the parade from a
+platform. It brought the tears to me eyes, he lukked so lovely. They
+ought to have kep' him Mare for the rest of his life. An' for Mare
+Livingstone, may never a blade o' grass or a green leaf grow on his
+grave."
+
+The Senator beamed with secret pleasure, while the others began to talk
+together with a bitterness beyond Arthur's comprehension.
+
+"He ought to have kept his feelings to himself," said quiet Anne. "If he
+didn't like the green, there was no need of insultin' us."
+
+"And that wasn't the worst," Louis hotly added. "He gave a talk to the
+papers the next day, and told how many Irish paupers were in the
+poorhouse, and said how there must be an end to favoring the Irish."
+
+"I saw that too," said Judy, "an' I sez to meself, sez I, he's wan o'
+the snakes St. Pathrick dhruv out of Ireland."
+
+"No need for surprise," Mona remarked, studying her cards, "for the man
+has only one thought: to keep the Irish in the gutter. Do you suppose I
+would have been a teacher to-day if he could have kept me out of it,
+with all his pretended friendship for papa."
+
+"If you baste the Mayor like this now, there won't be much left for me
+to do at the banquet," said Arthur with a laugh for their fierceness.
+
+"Ay, there it is," said Judy. "Yez young Americans have no love for the
+green, except for the fun yez get out of it; barrin' dacint Louis here,
+who read the history of Ireland whin he was tin years old, an' niver got
+over it. Oh, yez may laugh away! Ye are all for the red, white, an'
+blue, till the Mare belts yez wid the red, white, an' blue, for he says
+he does everythin' in honor o' thim colors, though I don't see how it
+honors thim to insult the green. He may be a Livingshtone in name, but
+he's a dead wan for me."
+
+The Senator grew more cheerful as this talk grew warmer, and then,
+seeing Arthur's wonderment, he made an explanation.
+
+"Livingstone is a good fellow, but he's not a politician, Artie. He
+thinks he can ru--manage the affairs of this vil--metropolis without the
+Irish and especially without the Catholics. Oh, he's death on them,
+except as boot-blacks, cooks, and ditch-diggers. He'd let them
+ru--manage all the saloons. He's as mad--as indignant as a hornet that
+he could not boo--get rid of them entirely during his term of office,
+and he had to speak out his feelings or bu--die. And he has put his foot
+in it artistically. He has challenged the Irish and their friends, and
+he goes out of office forever next fall. No party wants a man that lets
+go of his mouth at critical moments. It might be a neat thing for you to
+touch him up in your speech at the banquet."
+
+The Senator spoke with unctuousness and delight, and Arthur saw that the
+politicians rejoiced at the loquacity and bad temper of the Honorable
+Quincy Livingstone, whom the Endicotts included among their distant
+relatives.
+
+"I'll take your subject, Judy," said he.
+
+"Then rade up the histhory of Ireland," replied the old lady flattered.
+
+Close observation of the present proved more interesting and amusing
+than the study of the past. Quincy Livingstone's strictures on the
+exiles of Erin stirred them to the depths, and his refusal to float the
+green flag from the city hall brought a blossoming of green ribbon on
+St. Patrick's Day which only Spring could surpass in her decorations of
+the hills. The merchants blessed the sour spirit which had provoked
+this display to the benefit of their treasuries. The hard streets seemed
+to be sprouting as the crowds moved about, and even the steps and
+corridors of the mayor's office glistened with the proscribed color. The
+cathedral on Mott Street was the center of attraction, and a regiment
+which had done duty in the late war the center of interest. Arthur
+wondered at the enthusiasm of the crowd as the veterans carrying their
+torn battle-flags marched down the street and under the arched entrance
+of the church to take their places for the solemn Mass. All eyes grew
+moist, and sobs burst forth at sight of them.
+
+"If they were only marching for Ireland!" one man cried hoarsely.
+
+"They'll do it yet," said another more hopeful.
+
+Within the cathedral a multitude sat in order, reverently quiet, but
+charged with emotion. With burning eyes they watched the soldiers in
+front and the priests in the sanctuary, and some beat their breasts in
+pain, or writhed with sudden stress of feeling. Arthur felt thrilled by
+the power of an emotion but vaguely understood. These exiles were living
+over in this moment the scenes which had attended their expulsion from
+home and country, as he often repeated the horrid scenes of his own
+tragedy. Under the reverence and decorum due to the temple hearts were
+bursting with passion and grief. In a little while resignation would
+bring them relief and peace.
+
+It was like enchantment for Arthur Dillon. He knew the vested priest for
+his faithful friend; but on the altar, in his mystic robes, uplifted,
+holding the reverent gaze of these thousands, in an atmosphere clouded
+by incense and vocal with pathetic harmonies, the priest seemed as far
+away as heaven; he knew in his strength and his weakness the boy beside
+him, but this enwrapped attitude, this eloquent, still, unconscious
+face, which spoke of thoughts and feelings familiar only to the eye of
+God, seemed to lift Louis into another sphere; he knew the people
+kneeling about, the headlong, improvident, roystering crowd, but knew
+them not in this outpouring of deeper emotions than spring from the
+daily chase for bread and pleasure.
+
+A single incident fixed this scene in his mind and heart forever. Just
+in front of him sat a young woman with her father, whom she covertly
+watched with some anxiety. He was a man of big frame and wasted body,
+too nervous to remain quiet a moment, and deeply moved by the pageant,
+for he twisted his hands and beat his breast as if in anguish. Once she
+touched his arm caressingly. And the face which he turned towards her
+was stained with the unwiped tears; but when he stood up at the close of
+the Mass to see the regiment march down the grand aisle, his pale face
+showed so bitter an agony that Arthur recalled with horror his own
+sufferings. The young woman clung to her father until the last soldier
+had passed, and the man had sunk into his seat with a half-uttered
+groan. No one noticed them, and Arthur as he left with the ladies saw
+her patting the father's hand and whispering to him softly.
+
+Outside the cathedral a joyous uproar attended the beginning of that
+parade which the Mayor had declined to review. As his party was to enjoy
+it at some point of Fifth Avenue he did not tarry to witness the
+surprising scenes about the church, but with Louis took a car uptown.
+Everywhere they heard hearty denunciations of the Mayor. At one street,
+their car being detained by the passing of a single division of the
+parade, the passengers crowded about the front door and the driver, and
+an anxious traveler asked the cause of the delay, and the probable
+length of it. The driver looked at him curiously.
+
+"About five minutes," he said. "Don't you know who's paradin' to-day?"
+
+"No."
+
+"See the green plumes an' ribbons?"
+
+"I do," vacantly.
+
+"Know what day o' the month it is?"
+
+"March seventeenth, of course."
+
+"Live near New York?"
+
+"About twenty miles out."
+
+"Gee whiz!" exclaimed the driver with a gasp. "I've bin a-drivin' o'
+this car for twenty years, an' I never met anythin' quite so innercent.
+Well, it's St. Patrick's Day, an' them's the wild Irish."
+
+The traveler seemed but little enlightened. An emphatic man in black,
+with a mouth so wide that its opening suggested the wonderful, seized
+the hand of the innocent and shook it cordially.
+
+"I'm glad to meet one uncontaminated American citizen in this city," he
+said. "I hope there are millions like you in the land."
+
+The uncontaminated looked puzzled, and might have spoken but for a
+violent interruption. A man had entered the car with an orange ribbon in
+his buttonhole.
+
+"You'll have to take that off," said the conductor in alarm, pointing to
+the ribbon, "or leave the car."
+
+"I won't do either," said the man.
+
+"And I stand by you in that refusal," said the emphatic gentleman. "It's
+an outrage that we must submit to the domination of foreigners."
+
+"It's the order of the company," said the conductor. "First thing we
+know a wild Irishman comes along, he goes for that orange ribbon,
+there's a fight, the women are frightened, and perhaps the car is
+smashed."
+
+"An' besides," said the deliberate driver as he tied up his reins and
+took off his gloves, "it's a darn sight easier an' cheaper for us to put
+you off than to keep an Irishman from tryin' to murder you."
+
+The uncontaminated citizen and two ladies fled to the street, while the
+driver and the conductor stood over the offending passenger.
+
+"Goin' to take off the ribbon?" asked the conductor.
+
+"You will be guilty of a cowardly surrender of principle if you do,"
+said the emphatic gentleman.
+
+"May I suggest," said Arthur blandly, "that you wear it in his stead?"
+
+"I am not interested either way," returned the emphatic one, with a snap
+of the terrible jaws, "but maintain that for the sake of principle----"
+
+A long speech was cut off at that moment by a war-cry from a simple lad
+who had just entered the car, spied the ribbon, and launched himself
+like a catapult upon the Orange champion. A lively scramble followed,
+but the scene speedily resolved itself into its proper elements. The
+procession had passed, the car moved on its way, and the passengers
+through the rear door saw the simple lad grinding the ribbon in the dust
+with triumphant heel, while its late wearer flew toward the horizon
+pursued by an imaginary mob. Louis sat down and glared at the emphatic
+man.
+
+"Who is he?" said Arthur with interest, drawing his breath with joy over
+the delights of this day.
+
+"He's a child-stealer," said Louis with distinctness. "He kidnaps
+Catholic children and finds them Protestant homes where their faith is
+stolen from them. He's the most hated man in the city."
+
+The man accepted this scornful description of himself in silence. Except
+for the emphasis which nature had given to his features, he was a
+presentable person. Flying side-whiskers made his mouth appear
+grotesquely wide, and the play of strong feelings had produced vicious
+wrinkles on his spare face. He appeared to be a man of energy, vivacity
+and vulgarity, reminding one of a dinner of pork and cabbage. He was
+soon forgotten in the excitement of a delightful day, whose glories came
+to a brilliant end in that banquet which introduced the nephew of
+Senator Dillon into political life.
+
+Standing before the guests, he found himself no longer that silent and
+disdainful Horace Endicott, who on such an occasion would have cooly
+stuttered and stammered through fifty sentences of dull congratulation
+and platitude. Feeling aroused him, illumined him, on the instant,
+almost without wish of his own, at the contrast between two pictures
+which traced themselves on his imagination as he rose in his place: the
+wrecked man who had fled from Sonia Westfield, what would he have been
+to-night but for the friendly hands outstretched to save him? Behold him
+in honor, in health, in hope, sure of love and some kind of happiness,
+standing before the people who had rescued him. The thousand impressions
+of the past six months sparkled into life; the sublime, pathetic, and
+amusing scenes of that day rose up like stars in his fancy; and against
+his lips, like water against a dam, rushed vigorous sentences from the
+great deeps opened in his soul by grief and change, and then leaped over
+in a beautiful, glittering flood. He wondered vaguely at his vehemence
+and fluency, at the silence in the hall, that these great people should
+listen to him at all. They heard him with astonishment, the leaders with
+interest, the Senator with tears; and Monsignor looked once towards the
+gallery where Anne Dillon sat literally frozen with terror and pride.
+
+The long and sincere applause which followed the speech warned him that
+he had impressed a rather callous crowd of notables, and an exaltation
+seized him. The guests lost no time in congratulating him, and every
+tongue wagged in his favor.
+
+"You have the gift of eloquence," said Sullivan.
+
+"It will be a pleasure to hear you again," said Vandervelt, the literary
+and social light of the Tammany circle.
+
+"You have cleared your own road," Birmingham the financier remarked, and
+he stayed long to praise the young orator.
+
+"There's nothin' too good for you after to-night," cried the Senator
+brokenly. "I simply can't--cannot talk about it."
+
+"Your uncle," said Doyle Grahame, the young journalist who was bent on
+marrying Mona Everard, "as usual closes the delicate sparring of his
+peers with a knockdown blow; there's nothing too good for you."
+
+"It's embarrassing."
+
+"I wish I had your embarrassment. Shall I translate the praises of these
+great men for you? Sullivan meant, I must have the use of your
+eloquence; the lion Vandervelt, when you speak in my favor; Birmingham,
+please stump for me when I run for office; and the Senator, I will make
+you governor. You may use your uncle; the others hope to use you."
+
+"I am willing to be of service," said Arthur severely.
+
+"A good-nature thrown away, unless you are asked to serve. They have all
+congratulated you on your speech. Let me congratulate you on your uncle.
+They marvel at your eloquence; I, at your luck. Give me such an uncle
+rather than the gift of poesy. Do not neglect oratory, but cultivate thy
+uncle, boy."
+
+Arthur laughed, Monsignor came up then, and heaped him with praise.
+
+"Were you blessed with fluency in--your earlier years?" he said.
+
+"Therein lies the surprise, and the joke. I never had an accomplishment
+except for making an uproar in a crowd. It seems ridiculous to show
+signs of the orator now, without desire, ambition, study, or
+preparation."
+
+"Your California experiences," said the priest casually, "may have
+something to do with it. But let me warn you," and he looked about to
+make sure no one heard, "that early distinction in your case may attract
+the attention you wish to escape."
+
+"I feel that it will help me," Arthur answered. "Who that knew Horace
+Endicott would look for him in a popular Tammany orator? The mantle of
+an Irish Cicero would disguise even a Livingstone."
+
+The surprise and pleasure of the leaders were cold beside the wild
+delight of the Dillon clan when the news went around that Arthur had
+overshadowed the great speakers of the banquet. His speech was read in
+every gathering, its sarcastic description of the offensive Livingstone
+filled the Celts with joy, and threw Anne and Judy into an ecstasy.
+
+"Faith, Mare Livingstone'll see green on St. Patrick's Day for the rest
+of his life," said Judy. "It' ud be a proper punishment if the bread he
+ate, an' everythin' he touched on that day, shud turn greener than ould
+Ireland, the land he insulted."
+
+"There's curse enough on him," Anne replied sharply, ever careful to
+take Arthur's side, as she thought, "and I won't have you spoiling
+Arthur's luck be cursing any wan. I'm too glad to have an orator in the
+family. I can now put my orator against Mary Everard's priest, and be as
+proud as she is."
+
+"The pride was born in ye," said Judy. "You won't have to earn it.
+Indade, ye'll have a new flirt to yer tail, an' a new toss to yer head,
+every day from now to his next speech."
+
+"Why shouldn't I? I'm his mother," with emphasis.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+THE VILLA AT CONEY ISLAND.
+
+
+The awkwardness of his relations with Anne Dillon wore away speedily,
+until he began to think as well as speak of her as his mother; for she
+proved with time to be a humorous and delightful mother. Her love for
+rich colors and gay scenes, her ability to play gracefully the awkward
+part which he had chosen for her, her affectionate and discreet reserve,
+her delicate tact and fine wit, and her half-humorous determination to
+invade society, showed her as a woman of parts. He indulged her fancies,
+in particular her dream of entering the charmed circle of New York
+society. How this success should be won, and what was the circle, he did
+not know, nor care. The pleasure for him lay in her bliss as she
+exhausted one pleasure after another, and ever sought for higher things:
+Micksheen at the cat show attended by the liveried mulatto; the opera
+and the dog show, with bonnets and costumes to match the occasion; then
+her own carriage, used so discreetly as not to lose the respect of the
+parish; and finally the renting of the third pew from the front in the
+middle aisle of the cathedral, a step forward in the social world. How
+he had enjoyed these events in her upward progress! As a closing event
+for the first year of his new life, he suggested a villa by the sea for
+the summer, with Mona and Louis as guests for the season, with as many
+others as pleased her convenience. The light which broke over her face
+at this suggestion came not from within, but direct from heaven!
+
+She sent him modestly to a country of the Philistines known as Coney
+Island, where he found the common herd enjoying a dish called chowder
+amid much spontaneity and dirt, and mingling their uproarious bathing
+with foaming beer; a picture framed in white sand and sounding sea, more
+than pleasant to the jaded taste of an Endicott. The roar of the surf
+drowned the mean uproar of discordant man. The details of life there
+were too cheap to be looked at closely; but at a distance the surface
+had sufficient color and movement. He found an exception to this
+judgment. La Belle Colette danced with artistic power, though in
+surroundings unsuited to her skill. He called it genius. In an open
+pavilion, whose roughness the white sand and the white-green surf helped
+to condone, on a tawdry stage, she appeared, a slight, pale, winsome
+beauty, clad in green and white gauze, looking like a sprite of the
+near-by sea. The witchery of her dancing showed rare art, which was lost
+altogether on the simple crowd. She danced carelessly, as if mocking the
+rustics, and made her exit without applause.
+
+"Where did you get your artiste, August?" he said to a waiter.
+
+"You saw how well she dances, hey? Poor Colette! The best creature in
+the world ... opens more wine than five, and gives too much away. But
+for the drink she might dance at the opera."
+
+Arthur went often to see her dance, with pity for the talent thrown
+away, and brought his mother under protest from that cautious lady, who
+would have nothing to do with so common a place. The villa stood in
+respectable, even aristocratic, quiet at the far end of the island, and
+Anne regarded it almost with reverence, moving about as if in a temple.
+He found, however, that she had made it a stage for a continuous drama,
+in which she played the leading part, and the Dillon clan with all its
+ramifications played minor characters and the audience. Her motives and
+her methods he could not fathom and did not try; the house filled
+rapidly, that was enough; the round of dinners, suppers, receptions,
+dances, and whatnots had the regularity of the tides. Everybody came
+down from Judy's remotest cousin up to His Grace the archbishop. Even
+Edith Conyngham, apparently too timid to leave the shadow of Sister
+Magdalen, stole into a back room with Judy, and haunted the beach for a
+few days. For Judy's sake he turned aside to entertain her, and with the
+perversity which seems to follow certain actions he told her the
+pathetic incident of the dancer. Why he should have chosen this poor nun
+to hear this tale, embellished as if to torture her, he could never make
+out. Often in after years, when events had given the story
+significance, he sought for his own motives in vain. It might have been
+the gray hair, the rusty dress, the depressed manner, so painful a
+contrast to the sea-green sprite, all youth, and grace, and beauty,
+which provoked him.
+
+"I shall pray for the poor thing," said rusty Edith, fingering her
+beads, and then she made to grasp his hand, which he thrust into his
+pockets.
+
+"Not a second time," he told Louis. "I'd rather get the claw of a boiled
+lobster."
+
+The young men did not like Miss Conyngham, but Louis pitied her sad
+state.
+
+The leading characters on Anne's stage, at least the persons whom she
+permitted occasionally to fill its center, were the anxious lovers Mona
+and Doyle Grahame. He was a poet to his finger-tips, dark-haired, ruddy,
+manly, with clear wit, and the tenderest and bravest of dark eyes; and
+she, red-tressed, lovely, candid, simple, loved him with her whole heart
+while submitting to the decree of a sour father who forbade the banns.
+Friends like Anne gave them the opportunity to woo, and the Dillon clan
+stood as one to blind the father as to what was going on. The sight of
+this beauty and faith and love feeding on mutual confidence beside the
+sunlit surf and the moonlight waters gave Arthur profound sadness,
+steeped his heart in bitterness. Such scenes had been the prelude to his
+tragedy. Despair looked out of his eyes and frightened Louis.
+
+"Why should you mind it so, after a year?" the lad pleaded.
+
+"Time was when I minded nothing. I thought love and friendship, goodness
+and happiness, grew on every bush, and that
+
+    When we were far from the lips that we loved,
+    We had but to make love to the lips that were near.
+
+I am wiser now."
+
+"Away with that look," Louis protested. "You have love in plenty with
+us, and you must not let yourself go like that. It's frightful."
+
+"It's gone," Arthur answered rousing himself. "The feeling will never go
+farther than a look. She was not worth it--but the sight of these two--I
+suppose Adam must have grieved looking back at paradise."
+
+"They have their troubles also," Louis said to distract his mind.
+"Father is unkind and harsh with Irish patriots, and because Grahame
+went through the mill, conspiracy, arrest, jail, prison, escape, and all
+the rest of it, he won't hear of marriage for Mona with him. Of course
+he'll have to come down in time. Grahame is the best fellow, and clever
+too."
+
+One day seemed much the same as another to Arthur, but his mother's
+calendar had the dates marked in various colors, according to the rank
+of her visitors. The visit of the archbishop shone in figures of gold,
+but the day and hour which saw Lord Constantine cross her threshold and
+sit at her table stood out on the calendar in letters of flame. The
+Ledwiths who brought him were of little account, except as the friends
+of His Lordship. Anne informed the household the day before of the honor
+which heaven was sending them, and gave minute instructions as to the
+etiquette to be observed; and if Arthur wished to laugh the blissful
+light in her face forbade. The rules of etiquette did not include the
+Ledwiths, who could put up with ordinary politeness and be grateful.
+
+"I can see from the expression of Mona," Arthur observed to the other
+gentlemen, "that the etiquette of to-morrow puts us out of her sight.
+And who is Lord Constantine? I ought to know, so I did not dare ask."
+
+"A young English noble, son and heir of a Marquis," said Grahame with
+mock solemnity, "who is devoted to the cause of bringing London and
+Washington closer together in brotherly love and financial, that is
+rogues' sympathy--no, roguish sympathy--that's better. He would like an
+alliance between England and us. Therefore he cultivates the Irish. And
+he'd marry Honora Ledwith to-morrow if she'd have him. That's part of
+the scheme."
+
+"And who are the Ledwiths?" said Arthur incautiously, but no one noticed
+the slip at the moment.
+
+"People with ideas, strange weird ideas," Louis made answer. "Oh,
+perfectly sane, of course, but so devoted to each other, and the cause
+of Ireland, that they can get along with none, and few can get along
+with them. That's why Pop thinks so much of 'em. They are forever
+running about the world, deep in conspiracies for freedom, and so on,
+but they never get anywhere to stay. Outside of that they're the
+loveliest souls the sun ever shone on, and I adore Honora."
+
+"And if Mona takes to His Lordship," said Grahame, "I'll worship Miss
+Ledwith."
+
+"Very confusing," Arthur muttered. "English noble,--alliance between two
+countries--cultivates Irish--wants to marry Irish girl--conspirators and
+all that--why, there's no head or tail to the thing."
+
+"Well, you keep your eye on Honora Ledwith and me, and you'll get the
+key. She's the sun of the system. And, by the way, don't you remember
+old Ledwith, the red-hot lecturer on the woes of Ireland? Didn't you
+play on her doorstep in Madison street, and treat her to Washington
+pie?"
+
+When the party arrived next day Arthur saw a handsome, vigorous, blond
+young man, hearty in his manner, and hesitating in his speech, whom he
+forgot directly in his surprise over the Ledwiths; for he recognized in
+them the father and daughter whom he had observed in so passionate a
+scene in the cathedral on St. Patrick's Day. He had their history by
+heart, the father being a journalist and the daughter a singer; they had
+traveled half the world; and while every one loved them none favored
+their roseate schemes for the freedom of Ireland. Perhaps this had made
+them peculiar. At the first glance one would have detected oddity as
+well as distinction in them. Tall, lean, vivacious, Owen Ledwith moved
+about restlessly, talked much, and with considerable temper. The
+daughter sat placid and watchful, quite used to playing audience to his
+entertainments; though her eyes never seemed to look at him, Arthur saw
+that she missed none of his movements, never failed to catch his words
+and to smile her approval. The whiteness of her face was like cream, and
+her dark blue eyes were pencilled by lashes so black that at the first
+glance they seemed of a lighter shade. Impressed to a degree by what at
+that instant could not be put into words, he named her in his own mind
+the White Lady. No trace of disdain spoiled her lofty manner, yet he
+thought she looked at people as if they were minor instruments in her
+own scheme. She made herself at home like one accustomed to quick
+changes of scene. A woman of that sort travels round the globe with a
+satchel, and dresses for the play with a ribbon and a comb, never
+finding the horizon too large for personal comfort. Clearly she was
+beloved in the Dillon circle, for they made much of her; but of course
+that day not even the master of the house was a good second to Lord
+Constantine. Anne moved about like herself in a dream. She was heavenly,
+and Arthur enjoyed it, offering incense to His Lordship, and provoking
+him into very English utterances. The young man's fault was that he rode
+his hobby too hard.
+
+"It's a shame, doncheknow," he cried as soon as he could decently get at
+his favorite theme, "that the English-speaking peoples should be so
+hopelessly divided just now----"
+
+"Hold on, Lord Conny," interrupted Grahame, "you're talking Greek to
+Dillon. Arthur, m'lud has a theory that the English-speaking peoples
+should do something together, doncheknow, and the devil of it is to get
+'em together, doncheknow."
+
+They all laughed save Anne, who looked awful at this scandalous mimicry
+of a personage, until His Lordship laughed too.
+
+"You are only a journalist," said he gayly, "and talk like your journal.
+As I was saying, we are divided at home, and here it is much worse. The
+Irish here hate us worse than their brethren at home hate us,
+doncheknow--thank you, Miss Ledwith, I really will not use that word
+again--and all the races settled with you seem to dislike one another
+extremely. In Canada it's no better, and sometimes I would despair
+altogether, only a beginning must be made sometime; and I am really
+doing very well among the Irish."
+
+He looked towards Honora who smiled and turned again to Arthur with
+those gracious eyes.
+
+"I knew you would not forget it," she said. "The Washington pie in
+itself would keep it in your mind. How I loved that pie, and every one
+who gave me some. Your coming home must have been very wonderful to your
+dear mother."
+
+"More wonderful than I could make you understand," murmured Arthur. "Do
+you know the old house is still in Madison street, where we played and
+ate the pie?"
+
+Louis put his head between them slyly and whispered:
+
+"I can run over to the baker's if you wish and get a chunk of that
+identical pie, if you're so in love with it, and we'll have the whole
+scene over again."
+
+No persuasion could induce the party to remain over night at the villa,
+because of important engagements in the city touching the alliance and
+the freedom of Erin; and the same tremendous interests would take them
+far away the next morning to be absent for months; but the winter would
+find them in the city and, when they would be fairly settled, Arthur was
+bid to come and dine with them often. On the last boat the White Lady
+sailed away with her lord and father, and Anne watched the boat out of
+sight, sighing like one who has been ravished to the third heaven, and
+finds it a distressing job to get a grip on earth again.
+
+Arthur noticed that his mother dressed particularly well for the visits
+of the politicians, and entertained them sumptuously. Was she planning
+for his career? Delicious thought! But no, the web was weaving for the
+Senator. When the last knot was tied, she threw it over his head in
+perfect style. He complimented her on her latest costume. She swung
+about the room with mock airs and graces to display it more perfectly,
+and the men applauded. Good fortune had brought her back a likeness of
+her former beauty, angles and wrinkles had vanished, there was luster in
+her hair, and her melting eyes shone clear blue, a trifle faded. In her
+old age the coquette of twenty years back was returning with a charm
+which caught brother and son.
+
+"I shall wear one like it at your inauguration, Senator," said she
+brightly.
+
+"For President? Thank you. But the dress reminds me, Anne," the Senator
+added with feeling, "of what you were twenty years ago: the sweetest and
+prettiest girl in the city."
+
+"Oh, you always have the golden word," said she, "and thank you. But
+you'll not be elected president, only mayor of our own city."
+
+"It might come--in time," the Senator thought.
+
+"And now is the time," cried she so emphatically that he jumped.
+"Vandervelt told me that no man could be elected unless you said the
+word. Why shouldn't you say it for yourself? He told me in the same
+breath he'd like to see you in the place afore any friend he had,
+because you were a man o' your word, and no wan could lose be your
+election."
+
+"Did he say all that?"
+
+"Every word, and twice as much," she declared with eagerness. "Now think
+it over with all your clever brains, Senator dear, and lift up the
+Dillon name to the first place in the city. Oh, I'd give me life to see
+that glory."
+
+"And to win it," Arthur added under his breath.
+
+The Senator was impressed, and Arthur had a feeling akin to awe. Who can
+follow the way of the world? The thread of destiny for the great city up
+the bay lay between the fingers of this sweet, ambitious house-mother,
+and of the popular gladiator. Even though she should lead the Senator by
+the nose to humiliation, the scene was wonderfully picturesque, and her
+thought daring. He did not know enough history to be aware that this
+same scene had happened several hundred times in past centuries; but he
+went out to take another look at the house which sheltered a woman of
+pluck and genius. The secret of the villa was known. Anne had used it to
+help in the selection of the next Mayor. He laughed from the depths of
+his being as he walked along the shore.
+
+The Everard children returned home early in September to enjoy the
+preparations for the entrance of Louis into the seminary. The time had
+arrived for him to take up the special studies of the priesthood, and
+this meant his separation from the home circle forever. He would come
+and go for years perhaps, but alas! only as a visitor. The soul of
+Arthur was knit with the lad's as Jonathan with David. He had never
+known a youth so gracious and so strange, whose heart was like a
+sanctuary where
+
+    Fair gleams the snowy altar-cloth,
+      The silver vessels sparkle clean,
+    The shrill bell rings, the censer swings,
+      And solemn chants resound between.
+
+It was with him as with Sir Galahad.
+
+    But all my heart is drawn above.
+      My knees are bowed in crypt and shrine
+    I never felt the kiss of love,
+      Nor maiden's hand in mine.
+
+Parting with him was a calamity.
+
+"How can you let him go?" he said to Mary Everard, busy with the
+preparations.
+
+"I am a happy woman that God calls my boy to His service," she answered
+cheerfully. "The children go anyway ... it's nature. I left father and
+mother for my own home. How good it is to think he is going to the
+sanctuary. I know that he is going forever ... he is mine no more ... he
+will come back often, but he is mine no more. I am heart-broken ... I am
+keeping a gay face while he is here, for the child must not be worried
+with our grief ... time enough for that when he is gone ... and he is so
+happy. My heart is leaving me to go with him. Twenty years since he was
+born, and in all that time not a moment's pain on his account ... all
+his life has been ours ... as if he were the father of the family. What
+shall I be for the rest of my life, listening for his step and his
+voice, and never a sight or sound of him for months at a time. God give
+me strength to bear it. If I live to see him on the altar, I shall thank
+God and die...."
+
+Twenty years she had served him, yet here came the inevitable end, as if
+such love had never been.
+
+"Oh, you people of faith! I believe you never suffer, nor know what
+suffering is!"
+
+"Not your kind of suffering, surely, or we would die. Our hope is always
+with us, and fortunately does not depend on our moods for its power."
+
+Mona teased him into good humor. That was a great moment when in
+presence of the family the lad put on the dress of the seminary,
+Arthur's gift. Feeling like a prince who clothes his favorite knight in
+his new armor, Arthur helped him to don the black cassock, tied the
+ribbons of the surplice, and fixed the three-cornered cap properly on
+the brown, curly head. A pallor spread over the mother's face. Mona
+talked much to keep back her tears, and the father declared it a shame
+to make a priest of so fine a fellow, since there were too many priests
+in the world for its good. The boy walked about as proud as a young
+soldier dressed for his first parade. The Trumps, enraptured at the
+sight, clapped their hands with joy.
+
+"Why, he's a priest," cried Constance, with a twist of her pretty mouth.
+"Louis is a priest."
+
+"No, Baby," corrected Marguerite, the little mother, "but he is going to
+be one sometime."
+
+The wonderful garments enchanted them, they feared to touch him, and
+protested when he swung them high and kissed them on the return flight.
+The boy's departure for the seminary stirred the region of Cherry Hill.
+The old neighbors came and went in a steady procession for two days to
+take their leave of him, to bless his parents, and to wish them the joy
+of seeing him one day at the altar as a priest of God. They bowed to him
+with that reverence which belonged to Monsignor, only more familiar and
+loquacious, and each brought his gift of respect or affection. Even the
+Senator and the Boss appeared to say a parting word.
+
+"I wish you luck, Louis," the Senator said in his resonant voice, and
+with the speaker's chair before his eyes, "and I know you'll get it,
+because you have deserved it, sir. I've seen you grow up, and I've
+always been proud to know you, and I want to know you as long as I live.
+If ever you should need a hand like mine in the ga ... I mean, if ever
+my assistance is of any use to you, you know where to call."
+
+"You have a hard road to travel," the genial Sullivan said at the close
+of his visit, "but your training has prepared you for it, and we all
+hope you will walk it honorably to the end. Remember we all take an
+interest in you, and what happens to you for good or ill will be felt in
+this parish."
+
+Then the moment of parting came, and Arthur thought less of his own
+grief than of the revelation it contained for him. Was this the feeling
+which prompted the tears of his mother, and the tender, speechless
+embrace of his dear father in the far-off days when he set out for
+school? Was this the grief which made the parting moment terrible? Then
+he had thought it nothing that for months of the year they should be
+without his beloved presence! He shivered at the last embraces of Mary
+and Mona, at the tears of the children; he saw behind the father's mask
+of calmness; he wondered no more at himself as he stood looking after
+the train which bore the boy away. The city seemed as vacant all at once
+as if turned into a desert. The room in the attic, with its bed, its
+desk, and its altar, suddenly became a terrible place, like a body from
+which the soul has fled. Every feature of it gave him pain, and he
+hurried back with Mona to the frivolity of Anne in her villa by the
+sea.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+THE HUMORS OF ELECTION.
+
+
+When the villa closed the Senator was hopelessly enmeshed in the golden
+net which had been so skilfully and genially woven by Anne during the
+summer. He believed himself to be the coming man, all his natural
+shrewdness and rich experience going for naught before the witchery of
+his sister's imagination. In her mind the climax of the drama was a
+Dillon at the top of the heap in the City Hall. Alas, the very first
+orders of the chief to his secretary swept away the fine-spun dreams of
+the Dillons, as the broom brushes into obscure dirt the wondrous cobweb.
+The Hon. John Sullivan spoke in short sentences, used each man according
+to that man's nature, stood above and ahead of his cleverest
+lieutenants, had few prejudices, and these noble, and was truly a hero
+on the battle-ground of social forces, where no artillery roars, no
+uniforms glare, and no trumpets sound for the poets. The time having
+come for action he gave Arthur his orders on the supposition that he
+understood the political situation, which he did in some degree, but not
+seriously. The Endicotts looked upon elections as the concern of the
+rabble, and this Endicott thought it perhaps an occasion for uproarious
+fun. His orders partly sobered him.
+
+"Go to your uncle," said Sullivan, "and tell him he's not in the race. I
+don't know where he got that bee in his bonnet. Then arrange with
+Everard to call on Livingstone. Do what you can to straighten the Mayor
+out. He ought to be the candidate."
+
+This dealing with men inspired him. Hitherto he had been playing with
+children in the garden of life; now he stood with the fighters in the
+terrible arena. And his first task was to extinguish the roseate dreams
+of Anne and her gladiator, to destroy that exquisite fabric woven of
+moonlit seas, enchanting dinners, and Parisian millinery. Never! Let
+the chief commit that sacrilege! He would not say the word whose
+utterance might wound the hearts that loved him. The Senator and Anne
+should have a clear field. High time for the very respectable citizens
+of the metropolis to secure a novelty for mayor, to get a taste of Roman
+liberty, when a distinguished member of the arena could wear the purple
+if he had the mind.
+
+Birmingham forced him to change his attitude. The man of money was both
+good-hearted and large-minded, and had departed from the ways of
+commerce to seek distinction in politics. Stolid, without enthusiasm or
+dash, he could be stubbornly great in defence of principle. Success and
+a few millions had not changed his early theories of life. Pride in his
+race, delight in his religion, devotion to his party, increased in him
+as he rose to honor and fame. Arthur Dillon felt still more the
+seriousness of the position when this man came to ask his aid in
+securing the nomination.
+
+"There never was a time in the history of the city," said Birmingham,
+"when a Catholic had such a chance to become mayor as now. Protestants
+would not have him, if he were a saint. But prejudice has abated, and
+confidence in us has increased since the war. Sullivan can have the
+position if he wants it. So can many others. All of them can afford to
+wait, while I cannot. I am not a politician, only a candidate. At any
+moment, by the merest accident, I may become one of the impossibles. I
+am anxious, therefore, to secure the nomination this year. I would like
+to get your influence. Where the balance is often turned by the weight
+of a hair one cannot be too alert."
+
+"Do you think I have influence?" said Arthur humbly.
+
+"You are the secretary," Birmingham answered, surprised.
+
+"I shall have to use it in behalf of my uncle then."
+
+"And if your uncle should not run?"
+
+"I should be happy to give you my support."
+
+Birmingham looked as blank as one before whom a door opens unexpectedly.
+
+"You understand," continued Arthur, "that I have been absent too long to
+grasp the situation clearly. I think my uncle aspires...."
+
+"A very worthy man," murmured Birmingham.
+
+"You seem to think he has not much of a chance...."
+
+"I know something of Sullivan's mind," Birmingham ventured, "and you
+know it still better. The exploits of the Senator in his youth--really
+it would be well for him not to expose himself to public ridicule...."
+
+"I had not thought of that," said Arthur, when the other paused
+delicately. "You are quite right. He should not expose himself. As no
+other has done me the honor to ask my help, I am free to help you."
+
+"You are more than kind. This nomination means election, and election
+means the opening of a fine career for me. Beyond lie the governorship,
+the senate, and perhaps higher things. To us these high offices have
+been closed as firmly as if they were in Sweden. I want the honor of
+breaking down the barriers."
+
+"It is time. I hope you will get the honor," said Arthur gravely. He
+felt sadly about the Senator, and the shining ambition of his mother.
+How could he shatter their dreams? Yet in very pity the task had to be
+done, and when next he heard them vaporing on the glory of the future,
+he said casually:
+
+"I know what your enemies will say if you come into contrast with
+Livingstone."
+
+"I've heard it often enough," answered the Senator gayly. "If I'd
+listened to them I'd be still in the ring."
+
+Then a suspicion overcame him, and he cried out bitterly:
+
+"Do you say the same, Artie?"
+
+"Rot. There isn't another like you in the whole world, uncle. If my vote
+could do it you'd go into the White House to-morrow. If you're in
+earnest in this business of the nomination, then I'm with you to the
+last ditch. Now when you become mayor of the first city in the
+land"--Oh, the smile which flashed on the faces of Anne and the Senator
+at this phrase!--"you become also the target of every journal in the
+country, of every comic paper, of every cartoonist. All your little
+faults, your blunders, past and present, are magnified. They sing of you
+in the music-halls. Oh, there would be no end to it! Ridicule is worse
+than abuse. It would hurt your friends more than you. You could not
+escape it, and no one could answer it. Is the prize worth the pain?"
+
+Then he looked out of the window to escape seeing the pain in his
+mother's face, and the bitterness in the Senator's. He did not
+illustrate his contention with examples, for with these the Senator and
+his friends were familiar. A light arose on the poor man's horizon.
+Looking timidly at Anne, after a moment's pause, he said:
+
+"I never thought of all that. You've put me on the right track, Artie. I
+thank you."
+
+"What can I do," he whispered to Anne, "since it's plain he wants me to
+give in--no, to avoid the comic papers?"
+
+"Whatever he wishes must be done," she replied with a gesture of
+despair.
+
+"The boy is a wonder," thought the Senator. "He has us all under that
+little California thumb."
+
+"I was a fool to think of the nomination," he said aloud as Arthur
+turned from the window. "Of course there'd be no end to the ridicule.
+Didn't the chap on Harper's, when I was elected for the Senate, rig me
+out as a gladiator, without a stitch on me, actually, Artie, not a
+stitch--most indecent thing--and show old Cicero in the same picture
+looking at me like John Everard, with a sneer, and singing to himself: a
+senator! No, I couldn't stand it. I give up. I've got as high as my kind
+can go. But there's one thing, if I can't be mayor myself, I can say
+who's goin' to be."
+
+"Then make it Birmingham, uncle," Arthur suggested. "I would like to see
+him in that place next to you."
+
+"And Birmingham it is, unless"--he looked at Anne limp with
+disappointment--"unless I take it into my head to name you for the
+place."
+
+She gave a little cry of joy and sat up straight.
+
+"Now God bless you for that word, Senator. It'll be a Dillon anyway."
+
+"In that case I make Birmingham second choice," Arthur said seriously,
+accepting the hint as a happy ending to a rather painful scene.
+
+The second part of the Chief's order proved more entertaining. To visit
+the Mayor and sound him on the question of his own renomination appeared
+to Arthur amusing rather than important; because of his own rawness for
+such a mission, and also because of their relationship. Livingstone was
+his kinsman. Of course John Everard gave the embassy character, but his
+reputation reflected on its usefulness. Nature had not yet provided a
+key to the character of Louis' father. Arthur endured him because Louis
+loved him, quoted him admiringly, and seemed to understand him most of
+the time; but he could not understand an Irishman who maintained, as a
+principle of history, the inferiority of his race to the English, traced
+its miseries to its silly pride, opposed all schemes of progress until
+his principle was accepted, and placed the salvation of his people in
+that moment when they should have admitted the inferiority imposed by
+nature, and laid aside their wretched conceit. This perverse nature had
+a sociable, even humorous side, and in a sardonic way loved its own.
+
+"I have often wondered," Arthur said, when they were discussing the
+details of the mission to Livingstone, "how your tough fiber ever
+generated beings so tender and beautiful as Mona, and Louis, and the
+Trumps. And now I'm wondering why Sullivan associates you and me in this
+business. Is it his plan to sink the Mayor deeper in his own mud?"
+
+"Whatever his plan I'd like to know what he means in sending with me to
+the noblest official in the city and the land, for that matter, the
+notorious orator of a cheap banquet."
+
+"I think it means that Quincy must apologize to the Irish, or nominate
+himself," said Arthur slowly.
+
+A lively emotion touched him when he first entered the room where the
+Mayor sat stately and gracious. In him the Endicott features were
+emphatic and beautiful. Tall, ruddy, perfectly dressed, with white hair
+and moustache shining like silver, and dark blue eyes full of fire, the
+aristocrat breathed from him like a perfume. His greeting both for
+Everard and Dillon had a graciousness tinged with contempt; a contempt
+never yet perceived by Everard, but perceived and promptly answered on
+Arthur's part with equal scorn.
+
+"Mr. Dillon comes from Sullivan," said Everard, "to ask you, as a
+condition of renomination, that you take back your remarks on the Irish
+last winter. You did them good. They are so soaked in flattery, the
+flattery of budding orators, that your talk wakes them to the truth."
+
+"I take nothing back," said the Mayor in a calm, sweet voice to which
+feeling gave an edge.
+
+"Then you do not desire the nomination of Tammany Hall?" Arthur said
+with a placid drawl, which usually exasperated Everard and other people.
+
+"But I do," the Mayor answered quickly, comprehending on the instant the
+quality of this antagonist, feeling his own insolence in the tone. "I
+merely decline the conditions."
+
+"Then you must nominate yourself, for the Irish won't vote for you,"
+cried Everard.
+
+"The leaders would like to give you the nomination, Mr. Livingstone. You
+may have it, if you can find the means to placate offended voters for
+your behavior and your utterances on St. Patrick's Day."
+
+"Go down on your knees at once, Mayor," sneered Everard.
+
+"I hope Your Honor does not pay too much attention to the opinions of
+this gentleman," said Arthur with a gesture for his companion. "He's a
+Crusoe in politics. There's no one else on his island. You have a
+history, sir, which is often told in the Irish colony here. I have heard
+it often since my return home----"
+
+"This is the gentleman who spoke of your policy at the Donnybrook
+banquet," Everard interrupted.
+
+Livingstone made a sign for silence, and took a closer look at Arthur.
+
+"The Irish do not like you, they have no faith in you as a fair man,
+they say that you are always planning against them, that you are
+responsible for the deviltries practised upon them through gospel
+missions, soup kitchens, kidnapping industries, and political intrigues.
+Whether these things be true, it seems to me that a candidate ought to
+go far out of his way to destroy such fancies."
+
+"A very good word, fancies! Are you going to make your famous speech
+over again?" said Everard with the ready sneer.
+
+"Can you deny that what I have spoken is the truth?"
+
+"It is not necessary that he should," Livingstone answered quietly. "I
+am not interested in what some people say of me. Tell Mr. Sullivan I am
+ready to accept the nomination, but that I never retract, never desert
+a position."
+
+This young man nettled and irritated the Mayor. His insolence, the
+insolence of his own class, was so subtly and politely expressed, that
+no fault could be found; and, though his inexperience was evident, he
+handled a ready blade and made no secret of his disdain. Arthur did not
+know to what point of the compass the short conversation had carried
+them, but he took a boy's foolish delight in teasing the irritated men.
+
+"It all comes to this: you must nominate yourself," said Everard.
+
+"And divide the party?"
+
+"I am not sure it would divide the party," Livingstone condescended to
+say, for he was amused at the simple horror of Dillon. "It might unite
+it under different circumstances."
+
+"That's the remark of a statesman. And it would rid us, Arthur Dillon,
+of Sullivan and his kind, who should be running a gin-mill in Hester
+street."
+
+"If he didn't have a finer experience in politics, and a bigger brain
+for managing men than any three in the city," retorted Arthur icily. "He
+is too wise to bring the prejudices of race and creed into city
+politics. If Your Honor runs on an independent ticket, the Irish will
+vote against you to a man. One would think that far-seeing men,
+interested in the city and careful of the future, would hesitate to make
+dangerous rivalries of this sort. Is there not enough bigotry now?"
+
+"Not that I know," said the Mayor with a pretence of indifference. "We
+are all eager to keep the races in good humor, but at the same time to
+prevent the ascendancy of a particular race, except the native. It is
+the Irish to-day. It will be the Germans to-morrow. Once checked
+thoroughly, there will be no trouble in the future."
+
+The interview ended with these words. By that time Arthur had gone
+beyond his political depth, and was glad to make his adieu to the great
+man. He retained one honest conclusion from the interview.
+
+"Birmingham can thank this pig-headed gentleman," said he to Everard,
+"for making him mayor of New York."
+
+John snorted his contempt of the statement and its abettors. The report
+of Arthur disquieted the Chief and his counselors, who assembled to hear
+and discuss it.
+
+"It's regrettable," was Sullivan's opinion. "Livingstone makes a fine
+figure in a campaign. He has an attractive name. His independence is
+popular, and does no harm. He hasn't the interests of the party at heart
+though. The question now is, can we persuade the Irish to overlook his
+peculiarities about the green and St. Patrick's Day?"
+
+"A more pertinent question," Vandervelt said after a respectful silence,
+"would be as to the next available man. I favor Birmingham."
+
+"And I," echoed the Senator.
+
+Arthur listened to the amicable discussion that followed with thoughts
+not for the candidate, but for the three men who thus determined the
+history of the city for the next two years. The triumvirs! Cloudy scenes
+of half-forgotten history rose before him, strange names uttered
+themselves. Mark Antony and young Octavius and weak Lepidus! He felt
+suddenly the seriousness of life, and wonder at the ways of men; for he
+had never stood so near the little gods that harness society to their
+policies, never till now had he seen with his own eyes how the world is
+steered. The upshot of endless talk and trickery was the nomination of
+Birmingham, and the placing of an independent ticket in the field with
+the Mayor at its head.
+
+"Now for the fun," said Grahame. "It's going to be a big fight. If you
+want to see the working out of principles keep close to me while the
+fight is on, and I'll explain things."
+
+The explanation was intricate and long. What did not matter he forgot,
+but the picturesque things, which touched his own life afterwards very
+closely, he kept in mind. Trotting about with the journalist they
+encountered one day a cleric of distinguished appearance.
+
+"Take a good look at him. He's the man that steers Livingstone."
+
+"I thought it was John Everard."
+
+"John doesn't even steer himself," said Grahame savagely. "But take a
+view of the bishop."
+
+Arthur saw a face whose fine features were shaded by melancholy, tinged
+with jaundice, gloomy in expression; the mouth drooped at the corners,
+and the eyes were heavy; one could hardly picture that face lighted by
+humor or fancy.
+
+"We refuse to discuss certain things in political circles here," Grahame
+continued. "One of them is the muddle made of politics every little
+while by dragging in religion. The bishop, Bishop Bradford is his name,
+never loses a chance to make a mud pie. The independent ticket is his
+pie this year. He secured Livingstone to bake it, for he's no baker
+himself. He believes in God, but still more does he believe that the
+Catholics of this city should be kept in the backyard of society. If
+they eat his pie, their only ambition will be to live in an American
+backyard. No word of this ever finds its way into the journals, but it
+is the secret element in New York politics."
+
+"I thought everything got into the newspapers," Arthur complained.
+"Blamed if I can get hold of the thing."
+
+"You're right, everything goes into the sewers, but not in a formal way.
+What's the reason for the independent ticket? Printed: revolt against a
+domineering boss. Private: to shake the Irish in politics. Do you see?
+Now, here is a campaign going on. It began last week. It ends in
+November. But the other campaign has neither beginning nor end. I'll
+give you object-lessons. There's where the fun comes in."
+
+The first object-lesson brought Arthur to the gospel-hall managed by a
+gentleman whom he had not seen or thought of since the pleasant
+celebration of St. Patrick's day. Rev. Mr. McMeeter, evangelist of the
+expansive countenance, was warming up his gathering of sinners that
+night with a twofold theme: hell for sinners, and the same, embroidered
+intensely, for Rome.
+
+"He handles it as Laocoon did the serpents," whispered Grahame.
+
+In a very clerical costume, on a small platform, the earnest man
+writhed, twisted, and sweated, with every muscle in strain, his face
+working in convulsions, his lungs beating heaven with sound. He outdid
+the Trojan hero in the leaps across the platform, the sinuous gestures,
+the rendings of the enemy; until that moment when he drew the bars of
+hell for the unrepentant, and flung Rome into the abyss. This effective
+performance, inartistic and almost grotesque, never fell to the level of
+the ridiculous, for native power was strong in the man. The peroration
+raised Livingstone to the skies, chained Sullivan in the lowest depths
+of the Inferno, and introduced as a terrible example a brand just
+rescued from the burning.
+
+"Study her, observe her," said Grahame. "These brands have had curious
+burnings."
+
+She spoke with ease, a little woman in widow's weeds, coquettishly
+displaying silken brown hair under the ruching of a demure bonnet.
+Taking her own account--"Which some reporter wrote for her no doubt,"
+Grahame commented--she had been a sinner, a slave of Rome, a castaway
+bound hand and foot to degrading superstition, until rescued by the
+noblest of men and led by spirit into the great work of rescuing others
+from the grinding slavery of the Church of Rome. Very tenderly she
+appealed to the audience to help her. The prayers of the saints were
+about to be answered. God had raised up a leader who would strike the
+shackles off the limbs of the children. The leader, of course, was Mayor
+Livingstone.
+
+"You see how the spirit works," said Grahame.
+
+Then came an interruption. The Brand introduced a girl of twelve as an
+illustration of her work of rescue among the dreadful hirelings of Rome.
+A feeble and ragged woman in the audience rose and cried out that the
+child was her lost Ellen. The little girl made a leap from the platform
+but was caught dexterously by the Brand and flung behind the scenes. A
+stout woman shook her fist in the Brand's face and called her out of her
+name; and also gave the evangelist a slap in the stomach which taught
+him a new kind of convulsion. His aids fell upon the stout woman, the
+tough men of the audience fell upon the aids, the mother of Ellen began
+shrieking, and some respectable people ran to the door to call the
+police. A single policeman entered cooly, and laid about him with his
+stick so as to hit the evangelists with frequency. For a few minutes all
+things turned to dust, confusion, and bad language. The policeman
+restored order, dismissed Ellen with her mother, calmed the stout woman,
+and cautioned the host. The Brand had watched the scene calmly and
+probably enjoyed it. When Arthur left with Grahame Mr. McMeeter had just
+begun an address which described the policeman as a satellite, a
+janizary, and a pretorian of Rome.
+
+"They're doing a very neat job for Livingstone," said Grahame. "Maybe
+there are fifty such places about the town. Little Ellen was lucky to
+see her mother again. Most of these stolen children are shipped off to
+the west, and turned into very good Protestants, while their mothers
+grieve to death."
+
+"Livingstone ought to be above such work."
+
+"He is. He has nothing in common with a kidnapper like McMeeter. He just
+accepts what is thrown at him. McMeeter throws his support at him. Only
+high-class methods attract a man like Livingstone. Sister Claire, the
+Escaped Nun, is one of his methods. We'll go and see her too. She
+lectures at Chickering Hall to-night ... comes on about half after
+nine--tells all about her escape from a prison in a convent ... how she
+was enslaved ... How sin thrives in convents ... and appeals for help
+for other nuns not yet escaped ... with reference to the coming election
+and the great deliverer, Livingstone ... makes a pile of money."
+
+"You seem envious," Arthur hinted.
+
+"Who wouldn't? I can't make a superfluous cent being virtuous, and
+Sister Claire clears thousands by lying about her neighbors."
+
+They took a seat among the reporters, in front of a decorous, severe,
+even godly audience, who awaited the coming of the Escaped Nun with
+religious interest. Amid a profound stillness, she came upon the stage
+from a rear door, ushered in by an impressive clergyman; and walked
+forward, a startling figure, to the speaker's place, where she stood
+with the dignity and modesty of her profession, and a self-possession
+all her own.
+
+"Stunning," Grahame whispered. "Costume incorrect, but dramatic."
+
+Her dress and veil were of pale yellow, some woolen stuff, the coif and
+gamp were of white linen, and a red cross marked the entire front of her
+dress, the arms of the cross resting on her bosom. Arthur stared. Her
+face of a sickly pallor had deep circles under the eyes, but seemed
+plump enough for her years. For a moment she stood quietly, with
+drooping head and uplifted eyes, her hands clasped, a picture of beauty.
+After a gasp and a pause the audience broke into warm applause long
+continued. In a sweet and sonorous voice she made her speech, and told
+her story. It sounded like the _Lady of the Lake_ at times. Grahame
+yawned--he had heard it so often. Arthur gathered that she had somewhere
+suffered the tortures of the Inquisition, that innocent girls were
+enjoying the same experience in the convents of the country, that they
+were deserted both of God and man, and that she alone had taken up their
+cause. She was a devoted Catholic, and could never change her faith; if
+she appealed to her audience, it was only to interest them in behalf of
+her suffering sisters.
+
+"That's the artistic touch," Grahame whispered again. "But it won't pay.
+Her revelations must get more salaciousness after election."
+
+Arthur hardly heard him. Where had he seen and heard this woman before?
+Though he could not recall a feature of her face, form, dress, manner,
+yet he had the puzzling sense of having met her long ago, that her
+personality was not unfamiliar. Still her features baffled the sense. He
+studied her in vain. When her lecture ended, with drooping head and
+clasped hands, she modestly withdrew amid fervid acclamations.
+
+Strange and bewildering were the currents of intrigue that made up a
+campaign in the great city; not to mention the hidden forces whose
+current no human could discern. Arthur went about exercising his talent
+for oratory in behalf of Birmingham, and found consolation in the
+sincere applause of humble men, and of boys subdued by the charm of his
+manner. He learned that the true orator expresses not only his own
+convictions and emotions, but also the unspoken thoughts, the mute
+feelings, the cloudy convictions of the simple multitude. He is their
+interpreter to themselves. The thought gave him reverence for that power
+which had lain long dormant in him until sorrow waked its noble
+harmonies. The ferment in the city astonished him. The very boys fought
+in the vacant lots, and reveled in the strategy of crooked streets and
+blind alleys. Kindly women, suddenly reminded that the Irish were a race
+of slaves, banged their doors, and flirted their skirts in scorn.
+Workmen lost their job here and there, mates fought at the workbench,
+the bully found his excuse to beat the weak, all in the name of
+Livingstone. The small business men, whose profits came from both sides,
+did severe penance for their sins of sanded sugar and deficient weight.
+The police found their nerves overstrained.
+
+To him the entire drama of the campaign had the interest of an
+impossible romance. It was a struggle between a poor people, cast out by
+one nation, fighting for a footing on new soil, and a successful few,
+who had forgotten the sufferings, the similar struggle of their fathers.
+He rejoiced when Birmingham won. He had not a single regret for the
+defeat of Livingstone, though it hurt him that a bad cause should have
+found its leader in his kinsman.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+AN ENDICOTT HEIR.
+
+
+Meanwhile what of the world and the woman he had left behind? A year had
+passed, his new personality had begun to fit, and no word or sign direct
+from the Endicott circle had reached him. Time seemed to have created a
+profound silence between him and them. Indirectly, however, through the
+journals, he caught fleeting glimpses of that rage which had filled
+Sonia with hatred and despair. A description of his person appeared as
+an advertisement, with a reward of five thousand dollars for information
+that would lead to the discovery of his whereabouts, or to a certainty
+of his death. At another time the journals which printed both reward and
+notice, had a carefully worded plea from his Aunt Lois for letter or
+visit to soothe the anxieties of her last days. He shook over this
+reminder of her faithful love until he analyzed the circumstances which
+had probably led to this burst of publicity. Early in July a letter had
+informed Sonia of his visit to Wisconsin; two months later a second
+letter described, in one word, her character, and in six her sentence:
+adulteress, you shall never see me again. A week's work by her lawyers
+would have laid bare the fact that the Endicott estate had vanished, and
+that her own small income was her sole possession.
+
+A careful study of his motives would have revealed in part his plans,
+and a detective had probably spent a month in a vain pursuit. The
+detective's report must have startled even the lawyers. All clues led to
+nothing. Sonia had no money to throw away, nor would she dare to appeal
+too strongly to Aunt Lois and Horace Endicott's friends, who might learn
+too much, if she were too candid. The two who loved him were not yet
+really worried by his disappearance, since they had his significant
+letter. In time their confidence would give place to anxiety, and
+heaven and earth would be moved to uncover his hiding-place. This
+loving notice was a trap set by Sonia. On the road which led from
+Mulberry Street to Cambridge, from the home of Anne Dillon to the home
+of Lois Endicott, Sonia's detective lay in wait for the returning steps
+of the lost husband, and Sonia's eyes devoured the shadows, her ears
+drank in every sound. He laughed, he grew warm with the feeling of
+triumph. She would watch and listen in vain. The judgment-seat of God
+was the appointment he had made for her.
+
+He began now to wonder at the completeness of his own disappearance. His
+former self seemed utterly beyond the reach of men. The detectives had
+not only failed to find him, they had not even fallen upon his track by
+accident. How singular that an Irish colony in the metropolis should be
+so far in fact and sympathy from the aristocracy. Sonia and her
+detectives would have thought of Greenland and the Eskimos, Ashanti,
+Alaska, the court of China, as possible refuges, but never of Cherry
+Street and the children of Erin, who were farther off from the Endicotts
+and the Livingstones than the head-hunters of Borneo. Had her detectives
+by any chance met him on the road, prepared for any disguise, how dumb
+and deaf and sightless would they become when his position as the nephew
+of Senator Dillon, the secretary of Sullivan, the orator of Tammany
+Hall, and the pride of Cherry Hill, shone upon them.
+
+This triumph he would have enjoyed the more could he have seen the
+effect which the gradual change in his personality had produced on
+Monsignor O'Donnell, for whom the Endicott episode proved the most
+curious experience of his career. Its interest was discounted by the
+responsibility imposed upon him. His only comfort lay in the thought
+that at any moment he could wash his hands of the affair, before
+annoying or dangerous consequences began to threaten. He suffered from
+constant misgivings. The drama of a change in personality went on daily
+under his eyes, and almost frightened him by its climaxes, which were
+more distinct to him than to Endicott. First, the pale, worn, savage,
+and blood-haunted boy who came to him in his first agony; then the
+melancholy, bearded, yet serene invalid who lay in Anne Dillon's house
+and was welcomed as her son; next, the young citizen of the Irish
+colony, known as a wealthy and lucky Californian, bidding for honors as
+the nephew of Senator Dillon; and last the surprising orator, the idol
+of the Irish people, their devoted friend, who spared neither labor nor
+money in serving them.
+
+The awesome things in this process were the fading away of the Endicott
+and the growing distinctness of the Dillon. At first the old personality
+lay concealed under the new as under a mask; but something like
+absorption by degrees obliterated the outlines of Endicott and developed
+the Dillon. Daily he noticed the new features which sprang into sight
+between sunrise and sunrise. It was not only the fashion of dress, of
+body, and of speech, which mimics may adopt; but also a change of
+countenance, a turn of mind which remained permanent, change of gesture,
+a deeper color of skin, greater decision in movement; in fact, so many
+and so minute mutations that he could not recall one-tenth the number.
+Endicott for instance had possessed an eloquent, lustrous, round eye,
+with an expression delightfully indolent; in Dillon the roundness and
+indolence gave way to a malicious wrinkle at the outside corners, which
+gave his glance a touch of bitterness. Endicott had been gracefully slow
+in his movement; Dillon was nervous and alert. A fascination of terror
+held Monsignor as Arthur Dillon grew like his namesake more and more.
+Out of what depths had this new personality been conjured up? What would
+be the end of it? He said to himself that a single incident, the death
+of Sonia, would be enough to destroy on the instant this Dillon and
+resurrect the Endicott. Still he was not sure, and the longer this
+terrible process continued the less likely a change back to the normal.
+
+Morbid introspection had become a part of the young man's pain. The
+study of the changes in himself proved more pleasant than painful. His
+mind swung between bitter depression, and warm, natural joy. His moments
+of deepest joy were coincident with an interesting condition of mind. On
+certain days he completely forgot the Endicott and became the Dillon
+almost perfectly. Then he no longer acted a part, but was absorbed in
+it. Most of the time he was Endicott playing the role of Dillon, without
+effort and with much pleasure, indeed, but still an actor. When memory
+and grief fled from him together, as on St. Patrick's Day, his new
+personality dominated each instant of consciousness, and banished
+thought of the old. Then a new spirit rose in him; not merely a feeling
+of relief from pain, but a positive influence which led him to do
+surprising and audacious things, like the speech at the banquet. It was
+a divine forgetfulness, which he prayed might be continuous. He loved to
+think that some years of his life would see the new personality in full
+possession of him, while the old would be but a feeble memory, a mere
+dream of an impossible past. Wonderful, if the little things of the day,
+small but innumerable, should wipe out in the end an entire youth that
+took twenty years in building. What is the past after all but a vague
+horizon made emphatic by the peaks of memory? What is the future but a
+bare plain with no emphasis at all? Man lives only in the present, like
+the God whose spirit breathes in him.
+
+Sonia was bent on his not forgetting, however. His heart died within him
+when he read in the journals the prominent announcement of the birth of
+a son to the lost Horace Endicott, whose woful fate still troubled the
+short memory of editors. A son! He crushed the paper in his anguish and
+fell again into the old depression. Oh, how thoroughly had God punished
+the hidden crimes of this lost woman! A child would have saved her, and
+in her hatred of him she had ... he always refused to utter to himself
+the thought which here rose before his mind. His head bent in agony.
+This child was not his, perhaps not even hers. She had invented it as a
+trap for him. Were it really his little one, his flesh and blood, how
+eagerly he would have thrown off his present life and flown to its
+rescue from such a mother!
+
+Sonia did not hope for such a result. It was her fraudulent mortgage on
+the future and its possibilities. The child would be heir to his
+property; would have the sympathy and inherit the possessions of his
+Aunt Lois; would lull the suspicions concerning its mother, and
+conciliate the gossips; and might win him back from hiding, if only to
+expose the fraud and take shame from the Endicotts. What a clever and
+daring criminal was this woman! With a cleverness always at fault
+because of her rare unscrupulousness. Even wickedness has its delicacy,
+its modesty, its propriety, which a criminal respects in proportion to
+his genius for crime. Sonia offended all in her daring, and lost at
+every turn. This trap would catch her own feet. A child! A son! He
+shuddered at the thought, and thanked God that he had escaped a new
+dishonor. His blood would never mingle with the puddle in Sonia's veins.
+
+He would not permit her to work this iniquity, and to check her he must
+risk final success in his plan of disappearance by violating the first
+principle of the art: that there be no further connection with the past.
+The detectives were watching the path by which he would return, counting
+perhaps upon his rage over this fraudulent heir. He must give them their
+opportunity, if he would destroy Sonia's schemes against Aunt Lois, but
+felt sure that they would be unprepared to seize it, even if they
+dreamed it at hand. He had a plan which might accomplish his object
+without endangering his position; and one night he slipped away from the
+city on a train for Boston, got off at a lonely station, and plunged
+into the darkness without a word for a sleepy station-master.
+
+At dawn after two hours' walk he passed the pond which had once seemed
+to him the door of escape. Poor old friend! Its gray face lay under the
+morning sky like the face of a dead saint, luminous in its outlines, as
+if the glory of heaven shone through; still, oh, so still, and deep as
+if it mirrored immensity. Little complaining murmurs, like the
+whimperings of a sleepy child, rose up from the reeds, sweeter than any
+songs. He paused an instant to compare the _then_ and _now_, but fled
+with a groan as the old sorrow, the old madness, suddenly seized him
+with the powerful grip of that horrid time. In fact, every step of the
+way to Martha's house was torture. He saw that for him there were other
+dangers than Sonia and her detectives, in leaving the refuge which God
+had provided for him. Oh, never could he be too grateful for the
+blessing, never could he love enough the holy man who had suggested it,
+never could he repay the dear souls whose love had made it beautiful.
+They rose up before him as he hurried down the road, the lovable,
+humorous, rollicking, faulty clan; and he would not have exchanged them
+for the glories of a court, for the joys of Arcady.
+
+The sun and he found Martha busy with household duties. She did not know
+him and he said not a word to enlighten her; he was a messenger from a
+friend who asked of her a service, the carrying of a letter to a
+certain woman in Boston; and no one should see her deliver the letter,
+or learn her name, or know her coming and going; for her friend, in
+hiding, and pursued, must not be discovered. Then she knew that he came
+from Horace, and shed tears that he lived well and happy, but could not
+believe, when he had made himself known, that this was the same man of a
+year before. They spent a happy day together in perfecting the details
+of her visit to Aunt Lois, which had to be accomplished with great care
+and secrecy. There was to be no correspondence between them. In two
+weeks he would come again to hear a report of her success or failure. If
+she were not at home, he would come two weeks later. She could tell Aunt
+Lois whatever the old lady desired to hear about him, and assure her
+that nothing would induce him ever to return to his former life. The
+letter said as much. When night came they went off over the hills
+together to the nearest railway station, where he left her to find her
+way to the city, while he went on to a different station and took a late
+train to New York. By these methods he felt hopeful that his violation
+of the rules of disappearing would have no evil results for him, beyond
+that momentary return of the old anguish which had frightened him more
+than Sonia's detectives.
+
+In four weeks old Martha returned from her mission, and told this story
+as they sat in the pleasant kitchen near a cheery fire.
+
+"I rented a room in the neighborhood of your Aunt Lois' house, and
+settled myself to wait for the most natural opportunity to meet her. It
+was long in coming, for she had been sick; but when she got better I saw
+her going out to ride, and a little later she took to walking in the
+park with her maid. There she often sat, and chatted with passing
+children, or with old women like herself, poor old things trying to get
+life from the air. The maid is a spy. She noted every soul about, and
+had an extra glance for me when your aunt spoke to me, after I had
+waited three weeks for a word. I told her my story, as I told it to you.
+She was interested, and I must go to her house to take lunch with her. I
+refused. I was not used to such invitations, but I would call on her at
+other times. And the maid listened the more. She was never out of
+hearing, nor out of sight, until Aunt Lois would get into a rage, and
+bid her take a walk. It was then I handed her the letter under my shawl.
+The maid's eyes could not see through the shawl. I told her what you bid
+me: that you would never return again, no more than if you were dead,
+that she must burn the letter so that none would know a letter had been
+received and burned, and that she would understand many things when she
+had read it; most particular that she was surrounded by spies, and that
+she must go right on as if nothing had happened, and deceive as she had
+been deceived.
+
+"I met her only twice after that. I told her my plan to deceive the
+maid. I was a shrewd beggar studying to get money out of her, with a
+story about going to my son in Washington. She bid the maid secretly
+find out if I was worthy, and I saw the maid in private, and begged her
+to report of me favorably, and she might have half the money, and then I
+would go away. And the maid was deceived, for she brought me fifty
+dollars from your aunt, and kept thirty. She would not give even the
+twenty until I had promised to go away without complaint. So I went
+away, and stayed with a friend in Worcester. Since I came home I have
+not seen or heard of any stranger in this neighborhood. So that it is
+likely I have not been suspected or followed. And the letter was burned.
+And at the first fair chance your Aunt will go to Europe, taking with
+her her two dearest relatives. She called them Sonia Endicott and her
+child Horace, and she would keep them with her while she lived. At the
+last she sent you her love, though she could not understand some of the
+things you were doing, but that was your own business. And she never
+shed a tear, but kept smiling, and her smile was terrible."
+
+He could believe that. Sonia might as well have lived in the glare of
+Vesuvius as in the enlightened smile of Aunt Lois. The schemer was now
+in her own toils, and only at the death of the brave old woman would she
+know her failure. Oh, how sweet and great is even human justice!
+
+"If I do not see you again, Martha," said Arthur as he kissed the dear
+old mother farewell, "remember that I am happy, and that you made me
+so."
+
+
+
+
+THE GREEN AGAINST THE RED.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+THE HATE OF HANNIBAL.
+
+
+Owen Ledwith had a theory concerning the invasion of Ireland, which he
+began to expound that winter. Since few know much more about the
+military art than the firing of a shotgun, he won the scorn of all
+except his daughter and Arthur Dillon. In order to demonstrate his
+theory Ledwith was willing to desert journalism, to fit out a small
+ship, and to sail into an Irish harbor from New York and back, without
+asking leave from any government; if only the money were supplied by the
+patriots to buy the ship and pay the sailors. His theory held that a
+fleet of many ships might sail unquestioned from the unused harbors of
+the American coast, and land one hundred thousand armed men in Ireland,
+where a blow might be struck such as never had been yet in the good
+cause. Military critics denied the possibility of such an invasion. He
+would have liked to perform the feat with a single ship, to convince
+them.
+
+"I have a suspicion," he said one night to his daughter, "that this
+young Dillon would give me five thousand dollars for the asking. He is a
+Fenian now."
+
+"Is it possible?" Honora cried in astonishment.
+
+"Well, I don't see any reason for wonder, Nora. He has been listening to
+me for three months, vaporing over the wrongs of Ireland; he's of Celtic
+blood; he has been an adventurer in California; he has the money, it
+would seem. Why, the wonder would be if he did not do what all the young
+fellows are doing."
+
+"I have not quite made up my mind about him yet, father," the young
+woman said thoughtfully.
+
+"He's all man," said the father.
+
+"True, but a man who is playing a part."
+
+He laid down his pipe in his surprise, but she smiled assuringly.
+
+"Well, it's fine acting, if you call it so, my love. In a little over a
+year he has made himself the pride of Cherry Hill. Your great
+friend,"--this with a sniff--"Monsignor O'Donnell, is his sponsor. He
+speaks like the orator born and with sincerity, though he knows little
+of politics. But he has ideas. Then did you ever meet a merrier lad?
+Such a singer and dancer, such a favorite among boys and girls! He seems
+to be as lovable as his uncle the Senator, and the proof of it is that
+all confide in him. However, I have faith in your instincts, Nora. What
+do they say?"
+
+"He looks at us all like a spectator sitting in front of a stage. Of
+course I have heard the people talk about him. He is a popular idol,
+except to his mother who seems to be afraid of him. He has moods of
+sadness, gloom, and Miss Conyngham told me she would wager he left a
+wife in California. While all like him, each one has a curious thing to
+tell about him. They all say it is the sickness which he had on coming
+home, and that the queer things are leaving him. The impression he gives
+me is that of one acting a part. I must say it is fading every day, but
+it hinders me from feeling quite satisfied about him."
+
+"Well, one thing is in his favor: he listens to me," said Ledwith. "He
+is one of the few men to whom I am not a crazy dreamer, crazy with love
+of Erin and hate of her shameless foe."
+
+"And I love him for that, father," she said tenderly. "There is no
+acting in his regard and esteem for you, nothing insincere in his liking
+for us, even if we cannot quite understand it. For we _are_ queer,
+Daddy," putting her arms about him. "Much love for our old home and much
+thinking how to help it, and more despair and worry, have shut us off
+from the normal life, until we have forgotten the qualities which make
+people liked. Poor Daddy!"
+
+"Better that than doing nothing," he said sadly. "To struggle and fight
+once in a while mean living; to sit still would be to die."
+
+Arthur was ushered in just then by the servant, and took his place
+comfortably before the fire. One could see the regard which they felt
+for him; on the part of Ledwith it was almost affection. Deeply and
+sincerely he returned their kindly feeling.
+
+He had a host of reasons for his regard. Their position seemed as
+strange to the humdrum world as his own. They were looked on as queer
+people, who lived outside the ruts for the sake of an enslaved nation.
+The idea of losing three meals a day and a fixed home for a hopeless
+cause tickled the humor of the practical. Their devotion to an idea
+hardly surpassed their devotion to each other. He mourned for her
+isolation, she mourned over his failures to free his native land.
+
+"I have almost given the cause up," he said once to Arthur, "because I
+feel my helplessness. I cannot agree with the leaders nor they with me.
+But if I gave up she would worry herself to death over my loss of hope.
+I keep on, half on her account, half in the hope of striking the real
+thing at the end."
+
+"It seems to be also the breath of her life," said Arthur.
+
+"No, it is not," the father replied. "Have you not heard her talk of
+your friend, Louis Everard? How she dwells on his calling, and the
+happiness of it! My poor child, her whole heart yearns for the cloister.
+She loves all such things. I have urged her to follow her inclinations,
+though I know it would be the stroke of death for me, but she will not
+leave me until I die."
+
+"You must not take us too seriously," she had once said, "in this matter
+of Irish liberties. My father is hopelessly out of the current, for his
+health is only fair, and he has quarreled with his leaders. I have given
+up hope of achieving anything. But if he gives up he dies. So, I
+encourage him and keep marching on, in spite of the bitterest
+disappointments. Perhaps something may come of it in the end."
+
+"Not a doubt of it," said Arthur, uttering a great thought. "Every tear,
+every thought, every heart-throb, every drop of sweat and blood,
+expended for human liberty, must be gathered up by God and laid away in
+the treasury of heaven. The despots of time shall pay the interest of
+that fund here or there."
+
+A woman whose ideals embraced the freedom of an oppressed people,
+devotion to her father, and love for the things of God, would naturally
+have a strong title to the respect of Arthur Dillon; and she was,
+besides, a beautiful woman, who spoke great things in a voice so
+sweetly responsive to her emotions that father and friend listened as to
+music. The Ledwiths had a comfortable income, when they set to work,
+earned by his clever pen and her exquisite voice. The young man missed
+none of her public appearances, though he kept the fact to himself. She
+was on those occasions the White Lady in earnest. Her art had warmth
+indeed, but the coldness and aloofness of exalted purity put her beyond
+the zone of desire; a snowy peak, distinct to the eye, but inaccessible.
+When they were done with greetings Arthur brought up a specific subject.
+
+"It has gone about that I have become a Fenian," he said, "and I have
+been called on to explain to many what chance the movement has of
+succeeding. There was nothing in the initiation which gave me that
+information."
+
+"You can say: none," Ledwith answered bitterly. "And if you quote me as
+your authority there will be many new members in the brotherhood."
+
+"Then why keep up the movement, if nothing is to come of it?"
+
+"The fighting must go on," Ledwith replied, "from generation to
+generation in spite of failure. The Fenian movement will fail like all
+its predecessors. The only reason for its continuance is that its
+successor may succeed. Step by step! Few nations are as lucky as this to
+win in the first fight. Our country is the unluckiest of all. Her battle
+has been on seven hundred years."
+
+"But I think there must be more consolation in the fight than your words
+imply;" Arthur declared. "There must be a chance, a hope of winning."
+
+"The hope has never died but the chance does not yet exist, and there is
+no chance for the Fenians," Ledwith answered with emphasis. "The
+consolation lies for most of us in keeping up the fight. It is a joy to
+let our enemy, England, know, and to make her feel, that we hate her
+still, and that our hate keeps pace with her advancing greatness. It is
+pleasant to prove to her, even by an abortive rising, that all her
+crimes, rogueries, and diplomacies against us have been vain to quench
+our hate. We have been scattered over the world, but our hate has been
+intensified. It is joy to see her foam at the mouth like a wild beast,
+then whine to the world over the ingratitude of the Irish; to hear the
+representatives of her tax-payers howl in Parliament at the expense of
+putting down regular rebellions; to see the landlords flying out of the
+country they have ravaged, and the Orangemen white with the fear of
+slaughter. Then these movements are an education. The children are
+trained to a knowledge of the position, to hatred of the English power,
+and their generation takes up the fight where the preceding left it."
+
+"Hate is a terrible thing," said the young man. "Is England so hateful
+then?"
+
+Honora urged him by looks to change the subject, for her father knew no
+bounds in speaking of his country's enemy, but he would not lift his
+eyes to her face. He wished to hear Owen Ledwith express his feelings
+with full vent on the dearest question to his heart. The man warmed up
+as he spoke, fire in his eyes, his cheeks, his words, and gestures.
+
+"She is a fiend from hell," he replied, hissing the words quietly. Deep
+emotion brought exterior calm to Ledwith. "But that is only a feeling of
+mine. Let us deal with the facts. Like the fabled vampire England hangs
+upon the throat of Ireland, battening on her blood. Populous England,
+vanishing Ireland! What is the meaning of it? One people remains at home
+by the millions, the other flies to other lands by the millions. Because
+the hell-witch is good to her own. For them the trade of the world, the
+opening of mines, the building of factories, the use of every natural
+power, the coddling of every artificial power. They go abroad only to
+conquer and tax the foreigner for the benefit of those at home. Their
+harbors are filled with ships, and their treasury with the gold of the
+world. For our people, there is only permission to work the soil, for
+the benefit of absentee landlords, or encouragement to depart to
+America. No mines, no factories, no commerce, no harbors, no ships, in a
+word no future. So the Irish do not stay at home. The laws of England
+accomplished this destruction of trade, of art, of education, oh, say it
+at once, of life. Damnable laws, fashioned by the horrid greed of a rich
+people, that could not bear to see a poor people grow comfortable. They
+called over to their departments of trade, of war, of art, to court,
+camp, and studio, our geniuses, gave them fame, and dubbed them
+Englishmen; the castaways, the Irish in America and elsewhere are known
+as 'the mere Irish.'"
+
+"It is very bitter," said Arthur, seeing the unshed tears in Honora's
+eyes.
+
+"I wonder how we bear it," Ledwith continued. "We have not the American
+spirit, you may be sure. I can fancy the colonists of a hundred years
+back meeting an Irish situation; the men who faced the Indian risings,
+and, worse, the subduing of the wilderness. For them it would have been
+equal rights and privileges and chances, or the bottom of the sea for
+one of the countries. But we are poetic and religious, and murderous
+only when a Cromwell or a Castlereagh opens hell for us. However, the
+past is nothing; it is the present which galls us. The gilding of the
+gold and the painting of the lily are symbols of our present sufferings.
+After stripping and roasting us at home, this England, this hell-witch
+sends abroad into all countries her lies and slanders about us. Her
+spies, her professors, her gospellers, her agents, her sympathizers
+everywhere, can tell you by the yard of our natural inferiority to the
+Chinese. Was it not an American bishop who protested in behalf of the
+Chinese of San Francisco that they were more desirable immigrants than
+the sodden Irish? God! this clean, patient, laborious race, whose
+chastity is notorious, whose Christianity has withstood the desertion of
+Christ----"
+
+Honora gave a half scream at the blasphemy, but at once controlled
+herself.
+
+"I take that back, child--it was only madness," Ledwith said. "You see,
+Dillon, how scarred my soul is with this sorrow. But the bishop and the
+Chinese! Not a word against that unfortunate people, whose miseries are
+greater even than ours, and spring from the same sources. At least
+_they_ are not lied about, and a bishop, forsooth! can compare them,
+pagans in thought and act and habit though they be, with the most moral
+and religious people in the world, to his own shame. It is the English
+lie working. The Irish are inferior, and of a low, groveling, filthy
+nature; they are buried both in ignorance and superstition; their
+ignorance can be seen in their hatred of British rule, and their refusal
+to accept the British religion; wherever they go in the wide world, they
+reduce the average of decency and intelligence and virtue; for twenty
+years these lies have been sung in the ears of the nations, until only
+the enemies of England have a welcome for us. Behold our position in
+this country. Just tolerated. No place open to us except that of
+cleaning the sewers. Every soul of us compelled to fight, as Birmingham
+did the other day, for a career, and to fight against men like
+Livingstone, who should be our friends. And in the hearts of the common
+people a hatred for us, a disgust, even a horror, not inspired by the
+leprous Chinese. We have earned all this hatred and scorn and opposition
+from England, because in fighting with her we have observed the laws of
+humanity, when we should have wiped her people off the face of the earth
+as Saul smote Agag and his corrupt people, as Cromwell treated us. Do
+you wonder that I hate this England far more than I hate sin, or the
+devil, or any monstrous creature which feeds upon man."
+
+"I do not wonder," said Arthur. "With you there is always an increasing
+hatred of England?"
+
+"Until death," cried Ledwith, leaping from his seat, as if the fire of
+hate tortured him, and striding about the room. "To fight every minute
+against this monster, to fight in every fashion, to irritate her, to
+destroy a grain of her influence, in a single mind, in a little
+community, to expose her pretense, her sham virtues, her splendid
+hypocrisy, these are the breath of my life. That hate will never perish
+until----"
+
+He paused as if in painful thought, and passed his hand over his
+forehead.
+
+"Until the wrongs of centuries have been avenged," said Arthur. Ledwith
+sat down with a scornful laugh.
+
+"That's a sentence from the orations of our patriotic orators," he
+sneered. "What have we to do with the past? It is dead. The oppressed
+and injured are dead. God has settled their cause long ago. It would be
+a pretty and consoling sight to look at the present difference between
+the English Dives and the Irish Lazarus! The vengeance of God is a
+terrible thing. No! my hate is of the present. It will not die until we
+have shaken the hold of this vampire, until we have humiliated and
+disgraced it, and finally destroyed it. I don't speak of retaliation.
+The sufferings of the innocent and oppressed are not atoned for by the
+sufferings of other innocents and other oppressed. The people are
+blameless. The leaders, the accursed aristocracy of blood, of place, of
+money, these make the corporate vampire, which battens upon the weak and
+ignorant poor; only in England they give them a trifle more, flatter
+them with skill, while the Irish are kicked out like beggars."
+
+He looked at Dillon with haggard eyes. Honora sat like a statue, as if
+waiting for the storm to pass.
+
+"I have not sworn an oath like Hannibal," he said, "because God cannot
+be called as a witness to hate. But the great foe of Rome never observed
+his oath more faithfully than I shall that compact which I have made
+with myself and the powers of my nature: to turn all my strength and
+time and capacity into the channel of hate against England. Oh, how poor
+are words and looks and acts to express that fire which rages in the
+weakest and saddest of men."
+
+He sank back with a gesture of weariness, and found Honora's hand
+resting on his tenderly.
+
+"The other fire you have not mentioned, Daddy," she said wistfully, "the
+fire of a love which has done more for Erin than the fire of hate. For
+love is more than hate, Daddy."
+
+"Ay, indeed," he admitted. "Much as I hate England, what is it to my
+love for her victim? Love is more than hate. One destroys, the other
+builds."
+
+Ledwith, quite exhausted by emotion, became silent. The maid entered
+with a letter, which Honora opened, read silently, and handed to her
+father without comment. His face flushed with pleasure.
+
+"Doyle Grahame writes me," he explained to Arthur, "that a friend, who
+wishes to remain unknown, has contributed five thousand dollars to
+testing my theory of an invasion of Ireland. That makes the expedition a
+certainty--for May."
+
+"Then let me volunteer the first for this enterprise," said Arthur
+blithely.
+
+"And me the second," cried Honora with enthusiasm.
+
+"Accepted both," said Ledwith, with a proud smile, new life stealing
+into his veins.
+
+Not for a moment did he suspect the identity of his benefactor, until
+Monsignor, worried over the risk for Arthur came to protest some days
+later. The priest had no faith in the military enterprise of the
+Fenians, and, if he smiled at Arthur's interest in conspiracy, saw no
+good reasons why he should waste his money and expose his life and
+liberty in a feeble and useless undertaking. His protest both to Arthur
+and others was vigorous.
+
+"If you have had anything to do with making young Dillon a Fenian," he
+said, "and bringing him into this scheme of invasion, Owen, I would like
+you to undo the business, and persuade him to stay at home."
+
+"Which I shall not do, you may be sure, Monsignor," replied the patriot
+politely. "I want such men. The enemy we fight sacrifices the flower of
+English youth to maintain its despotism; why should we shrink from
+sacrifice?"
+
+"I do not speak of sacrifice," said Monsignor. "One man is the same as
+another. But there are grave reasons which demand the presence of this
+young man in America, and graver reasons why he should not spend his
+money incautiously."
+
+"Well, he has not spent any money yet, so far as I know," Ledwith said.
+
+The priest hesitated a moment, while the other looked at him curiously.
+
+"You are not aware, then, that he has provided the money for your
+enterprise?" Honora uttered a cry, and Ledwith sprang from his chair in
+delighted surprise.
+
+"Do you tell me that?" he shouted. "Honora, Honora, we have found the
+right man at last! Oh, I felt a hundred times that this young fellow was
+destined to work immense good for me and mine. God bless him forever and
+ever."
+
+"Amen," said Honora, rejoicing in her father's joy.
+
+"You know my opinion on these matters, Owen," said Monsignor.
+
+"Ay, indeed, and of all the priests for that matter. Had we no religion
+the question of Irish freedom would have been settled long ago. Better
+for us had we been pagans or savages. Religion teaches us only how to
+suffer and be slaves."
+
+"And what has patriotism done for you?" Monsignor replied without
+irritation.
+
+"Little enough, to be sure."
+
+"Now, since I have told you how necessary it is that Dillon should
+remain in America, and that his money should not be expended----"
+
+"Monsignor," Ledwith broke in impatiently, "let me say at once you are
+asking what you shall not get. I swear to you that if the faith which
+you preach depended on getting this young fellow to take back his money
+and to desert this enterprise, that faith would die. I want men, and I
+shall take the widow's only son, the father of the family, the last hope
+of a broken heart. I want money, and I shall take the crust from the
+mouth of the starving, the pennies from the poor-box, the last cent of
+the poor, the vessels of the altar, anything and everything, for my
+cause. How many times has our struggle gone down in blood and shame
+because we let our foolish hearts, with their humanity, their faith,
+their sense of honor, their ridiculous pride, rule us. I want this man
+and his money. I did not seek them, and I shall not play tricks to keep
+them. But now that they are mine, no man shall take them from me."
+
+Honora made peace between them, for these were stubborn men, unwilling
+to make compromises. Monsignor could give only general reasons. Ledwith
+thought God had answered his prayers at last. They parted with equal
+determination.
+
+What a welcome Arthur Dillon received from the Ledwiths on his next
+visit! The two innocents had been explaining their ideas for years, and
+traveling the earth to put them into action; and in all that time had
+not met a single soul with confidence enough to invest a dollar in them.
+They had spent their spare ducats in attempting what required a bank to
+maintain. They had endured the ridicule of the hard-hearted and the
+silent pity of the friends who believed them foolish dreamers. And
+behold a man of money appears to endow their enterprise, and to show his
+faith in it by shipping as a common member of the expedition. Was there
+ever such luck? They thanked him brokenly, and looked at him with eyes
+so full of tenderness and admiration and confidence, that Arthur swore
+to himself he would hereafter go about the earth, hunting up just such
+tender creatures, and providing the money to make their beautiful,
+heroic, and foolish dreams come true. He began to feel the truth of a
+philosopher's saying: the dreams of the innocent are the last reasoning
+of sages.
+
+"And to this joy is added another," said Ledwith, when he could speak
+steadily. "General Sheridan has promised to lead a Fenian army the
+moment the Irish government can show it in the field."
+
+"What does that mean?" said Arthur.
+
+"What does it mean that an Irish army on Irish soil should have for its
+leader a brilliant general like Sheridan?" cried Ledwith. A new emotion
+overpowered him. His eyes filled with tears. "It means victory for a
+forlorn cause. Napoleon himself never led more devoted troops than will
+follow that hero to battle. Washington never received such love and
+veneration as he will from the poor Irish, sick with longing for a true
+leader. Oh, God grant the day may come, and that we may see it, when
+that man will lead us to victory."
+
+His eyes flashed fire. He saw that far-off future, the war with its
+glories, the final triumph, the crowning of Sheridan with everlasting
+fame. And then without warning he suddenly fell over into a chair.
+Arthur lifted up his head in a fright, and saw a pallid face and
+lusterless eyes. Honora bathed his temples, with the coolness and
+patience of habit.
+
+"It is nothing, nothing," he said feebly after a moment. "Only the
+foolishness of it all ... I can forget like a boy ... the thing will
+never come to pass ... never, never, never! There stands the hero,
+splendid with success, rich in experience, eager, willing, a demigod
+whom the Irish could worship ... his word would destroy faction, wipe
+out treason, weed out fools, hold the clans in solid union ... if we
+could give him an army, back him with a government, provide him with
+money! We shall never have the army ... nothing. Treason breeding
+faction, faction inviting treason ... there's our story. O, God, ruling
+in heaven, but not on earth, why do you torture us so? To give us such a
+man, and leave us without the opportunity or the means of using him!"
+
+He burst into violent, silent weeping. Dillon felt the stab of that
+hopeless grief, which for the moment revived his own, although he could
+not quite understand it. Ledwith dashed away the tears after a little
+and spoke calmly.
+
+"You see how I can yield to dreams like a foolish child. I felt for a
+little as if the thing had come to pass, and gave in to the fascination.
+This is the awaking. All the joy and sorrow of my life have come mostly
+from dreams."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+ANNE DILLON'S FELICITY.
+
+
+Monsignor was not discouraged by his failure to detach Arthur from the
+romantic expedition to the Irish coast. With a view to save him from an
+adventure so hurtful to his welfare, he went to see Anne Dillon. Her
+home, no longer on Mulberry Street, but on the confines of Washington
+Square, in a modest enough dwelling, enjoyed that exclusiveness which is
+like the atmosphere of a great painting. One feels by instinct that the
+master hand has been here. Although aware that good fortune had wrought
+a marked change in Anne, Monsignor was utterly taken aback by a
+transformation as remarkable in its way as the metamorphosis of Horace
+Endicott.
+
+Judy Haskell admitted him, and with a reverence showed him into the
+parlor; the same Judy Haskell as of yore, ornamented with a lace cap, a
+collar, deep cuffs, and an apron; through which her homeliness shone as
+defiantly as the face of a rough mountain through the fog. She had been
+instructed in the delicate art of receiving visitors with whom her
+intimacy had formerly been marked; but for Monsignor she made an
+exception, and the glint in her eye, the smile just born in the corner
+of her emphatic mouth, warned him that she knew of the astonishment
+which his good breeding concealed.
+
+"We're mountin' the laddher o' glory," she said, after the usual
+questions. "Luk at me in me ould age, dhressed out like a Frinch
+sportin' maid. If there was a baby in the house ye'd see me, Father
+Phil, galivantin' behind a baby-carriage up an' down the Square. Faith,
+she does it well, the climbin', if we don't get dizzy whin we're halfway
+up, an' come to earth afore all the neighbors, flatter nor pancakes."
+
+"Tut, tut," said Monsignor, "are you not as good as the best, with the
+blood of the Montgomerys and the Haskells in your veins? Are you to
+make strange with all this magnificence, as if you were Indians seeing
+it for the first time?"
+
+"That's what I've been sayin' to meself since it began," she replied.
+
+"Since what began?"
+
+"Why, the changin' from Mulberry Sthreet Irish to Washington Square
+Yankees," Judy said with a shade of asperity. "It began wid the dog-show
+an' the opera. Oh, but I thought I'd die wid laughin', whin I had to
+shtan' at the doors o' wan place or the other, waitin' on Micksheen, or
+listenin' to the craziest music that ever was played or sung. After that
+kem politics, an' nothin' wud do her but she'd bate ould Livingstone for
+Mare all by herself. Thin it was Vandervelt for imbassador to England,
+an' she gev the Senator an' the Boss no pace till they tuk it up. An'
+now it's the Countess o' Skibbereen mornin', noon, an' night. I'm sick
+o' that ould woman. But she owns the soul of Anne Dillon."
+
+"Well, her son can afford it," said Monsignor affably. "Why shouldn't
+she enjoy herself in her own way?"
+
+"Thrue for you, Father Phil; I ought to call you Morrisania, but the
+ould names are always the shweetest. He has the money, and he knows how
+to spind it, an' if he didn't she'd show him. Oh, but he's the fine b'y!
+Did ye ever see annywan grow more an' more like his father, pace to his
+ashes. Whin he first kem it wasn't so plain, but now it seems to me he's
+the very spit o' Pat Dillon. The turn of his head is very like him."
+
+At this point in a chat, which interested Monsignor deeply, a soft voice
+floated down from the upper distance, calling, "Judy! Judy!" in a
+delicate and perfect French accent.
+
+"D'ye hear that, Father Phil?" whispered Judy with a grin. "It's nothin'
+now but Frinch an' a Frinch masther. Wait till yez hear me at it."
+
+She hastened to the hall and cried out, "Oui, oui, Madame," with a
+murmured aside to the priest, "It's all I know."
+
+"Venez en haut, Judy," said the voice.
+
+"Oui, oui, Madame," answered Judy. "That manes come up, Father Phil,"
+and Judy walked off upright, with folded arms, swinging her garments,
+actions belied by the broad grin on her face, and the sarcastic motion
+of her lips, which kept forming the French words with great scorn.
+
+A few minutes afterward Anne glided into the room. The Montgomery girls
+had all been famous for their beauty in the earlier history of Cherry
+Hill, and Anne had been the belle of her time. He remembered her thirty
+years back, on the day of her marriage, when he served as altar-boy at
+her wedding; and recalled a sweet-faced girl, with light brown silken
+hair, languorous blue eyes, rose-pink skin, the loveliest mouth, the
+most provoking chin. Time and sorrow had dealt harshly with her, and
+changed her, as the fairies might, into a thin-faced, gray-haired,
+severe woman, whose dim eyes were hidden by glasses. She had retained
+only her grace and dignity of manner. He recalled all this, and drew his
+breath; for before him stood Anne Montgomery, as she had stood before
+him at the altar; allowing that thirty years had artistically removed
+the youthful brilliance of youth, but left all else untouched. The brown
+hair waved above her forehead, from her plump face most of the wrinkles
+had disappeared, her eyes gleamed with the old time radiance, spectacles
+had been banished, a subdued color tinted her smiling face.
+
+"Your son is not the only one to astound me," said Monsignor. "Anne, you
+have brought back your youth again. What a magician is prosperity."
+
+"It's the light-heartedness, Monsignor. To have as much money as one can
+use wisely and well, to be done with scrimpin' forever, gives wan a new
+heart, or a new soul. I feel as I felt the day I was married."
+
+She might have added some information as to the share which modiste and
+beautifier might claim in her rejuvenation, but Monsignor, very strict
+and happily ignorant of the details of the toilet, as an ecclesiastic
+should be, was lost in admiration of her. It took him ten minutes to
+come to the object of his visit.
+
+"He has long been ahead of you," she said, referring to Arthur. "I asked
+him for leave to visit Ireland, and he gave it on two conditions: that I
+would take Louis and Mona wid me, and refuse to interfere with this
+Fenian business, no matter who asked me. I was so pleased that I
+promised, and of course I can't go back on me word."
+
+"This is a very clever young man," said Monsignor, admiring Anne's skill
+in extinguishing her beautiful brogue, which, however, broke out sweetly
+at times.
+
+"Did you ever see the like of him?" she exclaimed. "I'm afraid of him.
+He begins to look like himself and like his father ... glory be to God
+... just from looking at the pictures of the two and thinkin' about
+them. He's good and generous, but I have never got over being afeared of
+him. It was only when he went back on his uncle ... on Senator Dillon
+... that I plucked up courage to face him. I had the Senator all ready
+to take the place which Mr. Birmingham has to-day, when Arthur called
+him off."
+
+"He never could have been elected, Anne."
+
+"I never could see why. The people that said that didn't think Mr.
+Vandervelt could be made ambassador to England, at least this time. But
+he kem so near it that Quincy Livingstone complimented me on my interest
+for Mr. Vandervelt. And just the same, Dan Dillon would have won had he
+run for the office. It was with him a case of not wantin' to be de
+trop."
+
+"Your French is tres propos, Anne," said Monsignor with a laugh.
+
+"If you want to hear an opinion of it," said the clever woman, laughing,
+too, "go and hear the complaints of Mary and Sister Magdalen. Mais je
+suis capable de parler Francais tout de meme."
+
+"And are you still afraid of Arthur? Wouldn't you venture on a little
+protest against his exposing himself to needless danger?"
+
+"I can do that, certainement, but no more. I love him, he's so fine a
+boy, and I wish I could make free wid him; but he terrifies me when I
+think of everything and look at him. More than wanst have I seen Arthur
+Dillon looking out at me from his eyes; and sometimes I feel that Pat is
+in the room with me when he is around. As I said, I got courage to face
+him, and he was grieved that I had to. For he went right into the
+contest over Vandervelt, and worked beautifully for the Countess of
+Skibbereen. I'm to dine with her at the Vandervelts' next week, the
+farewell dinner."
+
+Her tones had a velvet tenderness in uttering this last sentence. She
+had touched one of the peaks of her ambition.
+
+"I shall meet you there," said Monsignor, taking a pinch of snuff.
+"Anne, you're a wonderful woman. How have all these wonders come about?"
+
+"It would take a head like your own to tell," she answered, with a
+meaning look at her handsome afternoon costume. "But I know some of the
+points of the game. I met Mr. Vandervelt at a reception, and told him he
+should not miss his chance to be ambassador, even if Livingstone lost
+the election and wanted to go to England himself. Then he whispered to
+me the loveliest whisper. Says he, 'Mrs. Dillon, they think it will be a
+good way to get rid of Mr. Livingstone if he's defeated,' says he; 'but
+if he wins I'll never get the high place, says he, 'for Tammany will be
+of no account for years.'"
+
+Anne smiled to herself with simple delight over that whispered
+confidence of a Vandervelt, and Monsignor sat admiring this dawning
+cleverness. He noticed for the first time that her taste in dress was
+striking and perfect, as far as he could judge.
+
+"'Then' says I, 'Mr. Vandervelt,' says I, 'there's only wan thing to be
+done, wan thing to be done,' says I. 'Arthur and the Senator and Doyle
+Grahame and Monsignor must tell Mr. Sullivan along wid Mr. Birmingham
+that you should go to England this year. 'Oh,' said he, 'if you can get
+such influence to work, nothing will stop me but the ill-will of the
+President.' 'And even there,' said I, 'it will be paving the way for the
+next time, if you make a good showing this time.' 'You see very far and
+well,' said he. That settled it. I've been dinin' and lunching with the
+Vandervelts ever since. You know yourself, Monsignor, how I started
+every notable man in town to tell Mr. Sullivan that Vandervelt must go
+to England. We failed, but it was the President did it; but he gave Mr.
+Vandervelt his choice of any other first-class mission. Then next, along
+came the old Countess of Skibbereen, and she was on the hands of the
+Vandervelts with her scheme of getting knitting-machines for the poor
+people of Galway. She wasn't getting on a bit, for she was old and queer
+in her ways, and the Vandervelts were worried over it. Then I said: 'why
+not get up a concert, and have Honora sing and let Tammany take up one
+end and society the other, and send home the Countess with ten thousand
+dollars?' My dear, they jumped at it, and the Countess jumped at me.
+Will you ever forget it, Monsignor dear, the night that Honora sang as
+the Genius of Erin? If that girl could only get over her craziness for
+Ireland and her father--but that's not what I was talking about. Well,
+the Countess has her ten thousand dollars, and says I'm the best-dressed
+woman in New York. So, that's the way I come to dine with the
+Vandervelts at the farewell dinner to the Countess, and when it comes
+off New York will be ringing with the name of Mrs. Montgomery Dillon."
+
+"Is that the present name?" said Monsignor. "Anne, if you go to Ireland
+you'll return with a title. Your son should be proud of you."
+
+"I'll give him better reason before I'm done, Monsignor."
+
+The prelate rose to go, then hesitated a moment.
+
+"Do you think there is anything?--do you think there could be anything
+with regard to Honora Ledwith?"
+
+She stopped him with a gesture.
+
+"I have watched all that. Not a thing could happen. Her thoughts are in
+heaven, poor child, and his are busy with some woman that bothered him
+long ago, and may have a claim on him. No wan told me, but my seein' and
+hearing are sharp as ever."
+
+"Good-by, Mrs. Montgomery Dillon," he said, bowing at the door.
+
+"Au plaisir, Monseigneur," she replied with a curtsey, and Judy opened
+the outer door, face and mien like an Egyptian statue of the twelfth
+dynasty.
+
+Anne Dillon watched him go with a sigh of deep contentment. How often
+she had dreamed of men as distinguished leaving her presence and her
+house in this fashion; and the dream had come true. All her life she had
+dreamed of the elegance and importance, which had come to her through
+her strange son, partly through her own ambition and ability. She now
+believed that if one only dreams hard enough fortune will bring dreams
+true. As the life which is past fades, for all its reality, into the
+mist-substance of dreams, why should not the reverse action occur? Had
+she been without the rich-colored visions which illuminated her idle
+hours, opportunity might have found her a spiritless creature, content
+to take a salary from her son and to lay it by for the miserable days of
+old age. Out upon such tameness! She had found life in her dreams, and
+the two highest expressions of that life were Mrs. Montgomery Dillon
+and the Dowager Countess of Skibbereen.
+
+As a pagan priestess might have arrayed herself for appearance in the
+sanctuary, she clothed herself in purple and gold on the evening of the
+farewell dinner.
+
+Arthur escorted his mother and Honora to the Vandervelt residence.
+
+As the trio made their bows, the aspirant for diplomatic honors rejoiced
+that his gratitude for real favors reflected itself in objects so
+distinguished. He was a grateful man, this Vandervelt, and broad-minded,
+willing to gild the steps by which he mounted, and to honor the humblest
+who honored him: an aristocrat in the American sense of the term,
+believing that those who wished should be encouraged to climb as high as
+natural capacity and opportunity permitted. The party sat down slightly
+bored, they had gone through it so often; but for Anne Dillon each
+moment and each circumstance shone with celestial beauty. She floated in
+the ether. The mellow lights, the glitter of silver and glass, the
+perfume of flowers, the soft voices, all sights and sounds, made up a
+harmony which lifted her body from the ground as on wings, more like a
+dream than her richest dreams. For conversation, some one started Lord
+Constantine on his hobby, and said Arthur was a Fenian, bent on
+destroying the hobby forever. In the discussion the Countess appealed to
+Anne.
+
+"We are a fighting race," said she, with admirable caution picking her
+steps through a long paragraph. "There's--there are times when no one
+can hold us. This is such a time. A few months back the Fenian trouble
+could have been settled in one week. Now it will take a year."
+
+"But how?" said Vandervelt. "If you had the making of the scheme, I'm
+sure it would be a success."
+
+"In this way," she answered, bowing and smiling to his sincere
+compliment, "by making all the Irish Fenians, that is, those in Ireland,
+policemen."
+
+The gentlemen laughed with one accord.
+
+"Mr. Sullivan manages his troublesome people that way," she observed
+triumphantly.
+
+"You are a student of the leader," said Vandervelt.
+
+"Everybody should study him, if they want to win," said Anne.
+
+"And that's wisdom," cried Lord Constantine.
+
+The conversation turned on opera, and the hostess wondered why Honora
+did not study for the operatic stage. Then they all urged her to think
+of the scheme.
+
+"I hope," said Anne gently, "that she will never try to spoil her voice
+with opera. The great singers give me the chills, and the creeps, and
+the shivers, the most terrible feeling, which I never had since the day
+Monsignor preached his first sermon, and broke down."
+
+"Oh, you dear creature," cried the Countess, "what a long memory you
+have."
+
+Monsignor had to explain his first sermon. So it went on throughout the
+dinner. The haze of perfect happiness gathered about Anne, and her
+speech became inspired. A crown of glory descended upon her head when
+the Dowager, hearing of her summer visit to Ireland with Mona and Louis
+in her care, exacted a solemn promise from her that the party should
+spend one month with her at Castle Moyna, her dower home.
+
+"That lovely boy and girl," said the Countess, "will find the place
+pleasant, and will make it pleasant for me; where usually I can induce
+not even my son's children to come, they find it so dull."
+
+It did not matter much to Anne what happened thereafter. The farewells,
+the compliments, the joy of walking down to the coach on the arm of
+Vandervelt, were as dust to this invitation of the Dowager Countess of
+Skibbereen. The glory of the dinner faded away. She looked down on the
+Vandervelts from the heights of Castle Moyna. She lost all at once her
+fear of her son. From that moment the earth became as a rose-colored
+flame. She almost ignored the adulation of Cherry Hill, and the
+astonished reverence of her friends over her success. Her success was
+told in awesome whispers in the church as she walked to the third pew of
+the middle aisle. A series of legends grew about it, over which the
+experienced gossips disputed in vain; her own description of the dinner
+was carried to the four quarters of the world by Sister Magdalen, Miss
+Conyngham, Senator Dillon, and Judy; the skeptical and envious pretended
+to doubt even the paragraph in the journals. At last they were struck
+dumb with the rest when it was announced that on Saturday last Mrs.
+Montgomery Dillon, Miss Mona Everard, and Mr. Louis Everard had sailed
+on the City of London for a tour of Europe, the first month of which
+would be spent at Castle Moyna, Ireland, as guests of the Dowager
+Countess of Skibbereen!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+ABOARD THE "ARROW."
+
+
+One month later sailed another ship. In the depth of night the _Arrow_
+slipped her anchor, and stole away from the suspicious eyes of harbor
+officials into the Atlantic; a stout vessel, sailed with discretion, her
+trick being to avoid no encounters on the high seas and to seek none.
+Love and hope steered her course. Her bowsprit pointed, like the lance
+of a knight, at the power of England. Her north star was the freedom of
+a nation. War had nothing to do with her, however, though her mission
+was warlike: to prove that one hundred similar vessels might sail from
+various parts to the Irish coast, and land an army and its supplies
+without serious interference from the enemy. The crew was a select body
+of men, whose souls ever sought the danger of hopeless missions, as
+others seek a holiday. In spite of fine weather and bracing seas, the
+cloud of a lonely fate hung over the ship. Arthur alone was
+enthusiastic. Ledwith, feverish over slight success, because it roused
+the dormant appetite for complete success, and Honora, fed upon
+disappointment, feared that this expedition would prove ashen bread as
+usual; but the improvement in her father's health kept her cheerful.
+Doyle Grahame, always in high spirits, devoted his leisure to writing
+the book which was to bring him fame and much money. He described its
+motive and aim to his companions.
+
+"It calls a halt," he said "on the senseless haste of Christians to take
+up such pagans as Matthew Arnold, and raises a warning cry against
+surrender to the pagan spirit which is abroad."
+
+"And do you think that the critics will read it and be overcome?" asked
+Arthur.
+
+"It will convince the critics, not that they are pagans, but that I am.
+They will review it, therefore, just to annoy me."
+
+"You reason just like a critic, from anywhere to nowhere."
+
+"The book will make a stir, nevertheless," and Doyle showed his
+confidence.
+
+"It's to be a loud protest, and will tangle the supple legs of Henry
+Ward Beecher and other semi-pagans like a lasso."
+
+"How about the legs of the publishers?"
+
+"That's their lookout. I have nothing against them, and I hope at the
+close of the sale they will have nothing against me."
+
+"When, where, with what title, binding and so forth?"
+
+"Speak not overmuch to thy dentist," said Grahame slyly. "Already he
+knoweth too many of thy mouth's secrets."
+
+The young men kept the little company alive with their pranks and their
+badinage. Grahame discovered in the Captain a rare personality, who had
+seen the globe in its entirety, particularly the underside, as a
+detective and secret service agent for various governments. He was a
+tall, slender man, rather like a New England deacon than a daring
+adventurer, with a refined face, a handsome beard, and a speaking,
+languid gray eye. He spent the first week in strict devotion to his
+duties, and in close observation of his passengers. In the second week
+Grahame had him telling stories after dinner for the sole purpose of
+diverting the sad and anxious thoughts of Honora, although Arthur hardly
+gave her time to think by the multiplied services which he rendered her.
+There came an afternoon of storm, followed by a nasty night, which kept
+all the passengers in the cabin; and after tea there, a demand was made
+upon Captain Richard Curran for the best and longest story in his
+repertory. The men lit pipes and cigars, and Honora brought her
+crotcheting. The rolling and tossing of the ship, the beating of the
+rain, and the roar of the wind, gave them a sense of comfort. The ship,
+in her element, proudly and smoothly rode the rough waves, showing her
+strength like a racer.
+
+"Let us have a choice, Captain," said Grahame, as the officer settled
+himself in his chair. "You detectives always set forth your successes.
+Give us now a story of complete failure, something that remains a
+mystery till now."
+
+"Mystery is the word," said Honora. "This is a night of mystery. But a
+story without an end to it----"
+
+"Like the history of Ireland," said Ledwith dryly.
+
+"Is the very one to keep us thinking and talking for a month," said
+Grahame. "Captain, if you will oblige us, a story of failure and of
+mystery."
+
+"Such a one is fresh in my mind, for I fled from my ill-success to take
+charge of this expedition," said the Captain, whose voice was singularly
+pleasant. "The detective grows stale sometimes, as singers and musicians
+do, makes a failure of his simplest work, and has to go off and sharpen
+his wits at another trade. I am in that condition. For twenty months I
+sought the track of a man, who disappeared as if the air absorbed him
+where he last breathed. I did not find him. The search gave me a touch
+of monomania. For two months I have not been able to rest upon meeting a
+new face until satisfied its owner was not--let us say, Tom Jones."
+
+"Are you satisfied, then," said Arthur, "that we are all right?"
+
+"He was not an Irishman, but a Puritan," replied the Captain, "and would
+not be found in a place like this. I admit I studied your faces an hour
+or so, and asked about you among the men, but under protest. I have
+given up the pursuit of Tom Jones, and I wish he would give up the
+pursuit of me. I had to quiet my mind with some inquiries."
+
+"Was there any money awaiting Tom? If so, I might be induced to be
+discovered," Grahame said anxiously.
+
+"You are all hopeless, Mr. Grahame. I have known you and Mr. Ledwith
+long enough, and Mr. Dillon has his place secure in New York----"
+
+"With a weak spot in my history," said Arthur. "I was off in California,
+playing bad boy for ten years."
+
+The Captain waved his hand as admitting Dillon's right to his
+personality.
+
+"In October nearly two years ago the case of Tom Jones was placed in my
+care with orders to report at once to Mrs. Tom. The problem of finding a
+lost man is in itself very simple, if he is simply lost or in hiding.
+You follow his track from the place where he was last seen to his new
+abode. But around this simple fact of disappearance are often grouped
+the interests of many persons, which make a tangle worse than a poor
+fisherman's line. A proper detective will make no start in his search
+until the line is as straight and taut as if a black bass were sporting
+at the other end of it."
+
+All the men exchanged delighted glances at this simile.
+
+"I could spin this story for three hours straight talking of the
+characters who tangled me at the start. But I did not budge until I had
+unraveled them every one. Mrs. Jones declared there was no reason for
+the disappearance of Tom; his aunt Quincy said her flightiness had
+driven him to it; and Cousin Jack, Mrs. Tom's adviser, thought it just a
+freak after much dissipation, for Tom had been acting queerly for months
+before he did the vanishing act. The three were talking either from
+spleen or the wish to hide the truth. When there was no trace of Tom
+after a month of ordinary searching much of the truth came out, and I
+discovered the rest. Plain speech with Mrs. Tom brought her to the
+half-truth. She was told that her husband would never be found if the
+detective had to work in the dark. She was a clever woman, and very much
+worried, for reasons, over her husband's disappearance. It was something
+to have her declare that he had suspected her fidelity, but chiefly out
+of spleen, because she had discovered his infidelity. A little sifting
+of many statements, which took a long time, for I was on the case nearly
+two years, as I said, revealed Mrs. Tom as a remarkable woman. In
+viciousness she must have been something of a monster, though she was
+beautiful enough to have posed for an angel. Her corruption was of the
+marrow. She breathed crime and bred it. But her blade was too keen. She
+wounded herself too often. Grit and ferocity were her strong points. We
+meet such women occasionally. When she learned that I knew as much about
+her as need be, she threw off hypocrisy, and made me an offer of ten
+thousand dollars to find her husband."
+
+"I felt sure then of the money. Disappearance, for a living man, if
+clever people are looking for him, is impossible nowadays. I can admit
+the case of a man being secretly killed or self-buried, say, for
+instance, his wandering into a swamp and there perishing: these cases of
+disappearance are common. But if he is alive he can be found."
+
+"Why are you so sure of that?" said Arthur.
+
+"Because no man can escape from his past, which is more a part of him
+than his heart or his liver," said Curran. "That past is the pathway
+which leads to him. If you have it, it's only a matter of time when you
+will have him."
+
+"Yet you failed to find Tom Jones."
+
+"For the time, yes," said the Captain with an eloquent smile. "Then, I
+had an antagonist of the noblest quality. Tom Jones was a bud of the
+Mayflower stock. All his set agreed that he was an exceptional man: a
+clean, honest, upright chap, the son of a soldier and a peerless mother,
+apparently an every-day lad, but really as fine a piece of manhood as
+the world turns out. Anyhow, I came to that conclusion about him when I
+had studied him through the documents. What luck threw him between the
+foul jaws of his wife I can't say. She was a----"
+
+The detective coughed before uttering the word, and looked at the men as
+he changed the form of his sentence.
+
+"She was a cruel creature. He adored her, and she hated him, and when he
+was gone slandered him with a laugh, and defiled his honest name."
+
+"Oh," cried Honora with a gasp of pain, "can there be such women now? I
+have read of them in history, but I always felt they were far off----"
+
+"I hope they are not many," said the Captain politely, "but in my
+profession I have met them. Here was a case where the best of men was
+the victim of an Agrippina."
+
+"Poor, dear lad," sighed she, "and of course he fled from her in
+horror."
+
+"He was a wonder, Miss Ledwith. Think what he did. Such a man is more
+than a match for such a woman. He discovered her unfaithfulness months
+before he disappeared. Then he sold all his property, turning all he
+owned into money, and transferred it beyond any reach but his own,
+leaving his wife just what she brought him--an income from her parents
+of fifteen hundred a year: a mere drop to a woman whom he had dowered
+with a share in one hundred thousand. Though I could not follow the
+tracks of his feet, I saw the traces of his thoughts as he executed his
+scheme of vengeance. He discovered her villainy, he would have no
+scandal, he was disgusted with life, so he dropped out of it with the
+prize for which she had married him, and left her like a famished wolf
+in the desert. It would have satisfied him to have seen her rage and
+dismay, but he was not one of the kind that enjoys torture."
+
+"I watched Mrs. Tom for months, and felt she was the nearest thing to a
+demon I had ever met. Well, I worked hard to find Tom. We tried many
+tricks to lure him from his hiding-place, if it were near by, and we
+followed many a false trail into foreign lands. The result was dreadful
+to me. We found nothing. When a child was born to him, and the fact
+advertised, and still he did not appear, or give the faintest sign, I
+surrendered. It would be tedious to describe for you how I followed the
+sales of his property, how I examined his last traces, how I pursued all
+clues, how I wore myself out with study. At the last I gave out
+altogether and cut the whole business. I was beginning to have Tom on
+the brain. He came to live on my nerves, and to haunt my dreams, and to
+raise ghosts for me. He is gone two years, and Mrs. Tom is in Europe
+with her baby and Tom's aunt Quincy. When I get over my present trouble,
+and get back a clear brain, I shall take up the search. I shall find him
+yet. I'd like to show some of the documents, but the matter is still
+confidential, and I must keep quiet, though I don't suppose you know any
+of the parties. When I find him I shall finish the story for you."
+
+"You will never find him," said Honora with emphasis. "That fearful
+woman shattered his very soul. I know the sort of a man he was. He will
+never go back. If he can bear to live, it will be because in his
+obscurity God gave him new faith and hope in human nature, and in the
+woman's part of it."
+
+"I shall find him," said the detective.
+
+"You won't," said Grahame. "I'll wager he has been so close to you all
+this time, that you cannot recognize him. That man is living within your
+horizon, if he's living at all. Probably he has aided you in your
+search. You wouldn't be the first detective fooled in that game."
+
+The Captain made no reply, but went off to see how his ship was bearing
+the storm. The little company fell silent, perhaps depressed by the
+sounds of tempest without and the thought of the poor soul whose
+departure from life had been so strange. Arthur sat thinking of many
+things. He remembered the teaching that to God the past, present, and
+future are as one living present. Here was an illustration: the old past
+and the new present side by side to-night in the person of this
+detective. What a giant hand was that which could touch him, and fail to
+seize only because the fingers did not know their natural prey. No doubt
+that the past is more a part of a man than his heart, for here was every
+nerve of his body tingling to turn traitor to his will. Horace Endicott,
+so long stilled that he thought him dead, rose from his sleep at the
+bidding of the detective, and fought to betray Arthur Dillon. The blush,
+the trembling of the hands, the tension of the muscles, the misty eye,
+the pallor of the cheek, the tremulous lip, the writhing tongue, seemed
+to put themselves at the service of Endicott, and to fight for the
+chance to betray the secret to Curran. He sat motionless, fighting,
+fighting; until after a little he felt a delightful consciousness of the
+strength of Dillon, as of a rampart which the Endicott could not
+overclimb. Then his spirits rose, and he listened without dread to the
+story. How pitiful! What a fate for that splendid boy, the son of a
+brave soldier and a peerless mother! A human being allied with a beast!
+Oh, tender heart of Honora that sighed for him so pitifully! Oh, true
+spirit that recognized how impossible for Horace Endicott ever to
+return! Down, out of sight forever, husband of Agrippina! The furies lie
+in wait for thee, wretched husband of their daughter! Have shame enough
+to keep in thy grave until thou goest to meet Sonia at the judgment
+seat!
+
+Captain Curran was not at all flattered by the deep interest which
+Arthur took for the next two days in the case of Tom Jones; but the
+young man nettled him by his emphatic assertions that the detective had
+adopted a wrong theory as to the mysterious disappearance. They went
+over the question of motives and of methods. The shrewd objections of
+Dillon gave him favor in Curran's eyes. Before long the secret documents
+in the Captain's possession were laid before him under obligations of
+secrecy. He saw various photographs of Endicott, and wondered at the
+blindness of man; for here side by side were the man sought and his
+portrait, yet the detective could not see the truth. Was it possible
+that the exterior man had changed so thoroughly to match the inner
+personality which had grown up in him? He was conscious of such a
+change. The mirror which reflected Arthur Dillon displayed a figure in
+no way related to the portrait.
+
+"It seems to me," said Arthur, after a study of the photograph, "that I
+would be able to reach that man, no matter what his disguise."
+
+"Disguises are mere veils," said Curran, "which the trained eye of the
+detective can pierce easily. But the great difficulty lies in a natural
+disguise, in the case where the man's appearance changes without
+artificial aids. Here are two photographs which will illustrate my
+meaning. Look at this."
+
+Arthur saw a young and well-dressed fellow who might have been a student
+of good birth and training.
+
+"Now look at this," said the Captain, "and discover that they picture
+one and the same individual, with a difference in age of two years."
+
+The second portrait was a vigorous, rudely-dressed, bearded adventurer,
+as much like the first as Dillon was like Grahame. Knowing that the
+portraits stood for the same youth, Arthur could trace a resemblance in
+the separate features, but in the ensemble there was no likeness.
+
+"The young fellow went from college to Africa," said Curran, "where he
+explored the wilderness for two years. This photograph was taken on his
+return from an expedition. His father and mother, his relatives and
+friends, saw that picture without recognizing him. When told who it was,
+they were wholly astonished, and after a second study still failed to
+recognize their friend. What are you going to do in a case of that kind?
+You or Grahame or Ledwith might be Tom Jones, and how could I pierce
+such perfect and natural disguises."
+
+"Let me see," said Arthur, as he stood with Endicott's photograph in his
+hand and studied the detective, "if I can see this young man in you."
+
+Having compared the features of the portrait and of the detective, he
+had to admit the absence of a likeness. Handing the photograph to the
+Captain he said,
+
+"You do the same for me."
+
+"There is more likelihood in your case," said Curran, "for your age is
+nearer that of Tom Jones, and youth has resemblances of color and
+feature."
+
+He studied the photograph and compared it with the grave face before
+him.
+
+"I have done this before," said Curran, "with the same result. You are
+ten years older than Tom Jones, and you are as clearly Arthur Dillon as
+he was Tom Jones."
+
+The young man and the Captain sighed together.
+
+"Oh, I brought in others, clever and experienced," said Curran, "to try
+what a fresh mind could do to help me, but in vain."
+
+"There must have been something hard about Tom Jones," said Arthur,
+"when he was able to stay away and make no sign after his child was
+born."
+
+The Captain burst into a mocking laugh, which escaped him before he
+could repress the inclination.
+
+"He may never have heard of it, and if he did his wife's reputation----"
+
+"I see," said Arthur Dillon smiling, convinced that Captain Curran knew
+more of Sonia Westfield than he cared to tell. At the detective's
+request the matter was dropped as one that did him harm; but he
+complimented Arthur on the shrewdness of his suggestions, which indeed
+had given him new views without changing his former opinions.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+THE INVASION OF IRELAND.
+
+
+One lovely morning the good ship sailed into the harbor of Foreskillen,
+an obscure fishing port on the lonely coast of Donegal. The _Arrow_ had
+been in sight of land all the day before. A hush had fallen on the
+spirits of the adventurers. The two innocents, Honora and her father,
+had sat on deck with eyes fixed on the land of their love, scarcely able
+to speak, and unwilling to eat, in spite of Arthur's coaxing. Half the
+night they sat there, mostly silent, talking reverently, every one
+touched and afraid to disturb them; after a short sleep they were on
+deck again to see the ship enter the harbor in the gray dawn. The sun
+was still behind the brown hills. Arthur saw a silver bay, a mournful
+shore with a few houses huddled miserably in the distance, and bare
+hills without verdure or life. It was an indifferent part of the earth
+to him; but revealed in the hearts of Owen Ledwith and his daughter, no
+jewel of the mines could have shone more resplendent. He did not
+understand the love called patriotism, any more than the love of a
+parent for his child. These affections have to be experienced to be
+known. He loved his country and was ready to die for it; but to have
+bled for it, to have writhed under tortures for it, to have groaned in
+unison with its mortal anguish, to have passed through the fire of death
+and yet lived for it, these were not his glories.
+
+In the cool, sad morning the father and daughter stood glorified in his
+eyes, for if they loved each other much, they loved this strange land
+more. The white lady, whiter now than lilies, stood with her arm about
+her father, her eyes shining; and he, poor man, trembled in an ague of
+love and pity and despair and triumph, with a rapt, grief-stricken face,
+his shoulders heaving to the repressed sob, as if nature would there
+make an end of him under this torrent of delight and pain. Arthur
+writhed in secret humiliation. To love like this was of the gods, and he
+had never loved anything so but Agrippina. As the ship glided to her
+anchorage the crew stood about the deck in absolute silence, every man's
+heart in his face, the watch at its post, the others leaning on the
+bulwarks. Like statues they gazed on the shore. It seemed a phantom
+ship, blown from ghostly shores by the strength of hatred against the
+enemy, and love for the land of Eire; for no hope shone in their eyes,
+or in the eyes of Ledwith and his daughter, only triumph at their own
+light success. What a pity, thought Dillon, that at this hour of time
+men should have reason to look so at the power of England. He knew there
+were millions of them scattered over the earth, studying in just hate to
+shake the English grip on stolen lands, to pay back the robberies of
+years in English blood.
+
+The ship came to anchor amid profound silence, save for the orders of
+the Captain and the movements of the men. Ledwith was speaking to
+himself more than to Honora, a lament in the Irish fashion over the
+loved and lost, in a way to break the heart. The tears rolled down
+Honora's cheek, for the agony was beginning.
+
+"Land of love ... land of despair ... without a friend except among thy
+own children ... here am I back again with just a grain of hope ... I
+love thee, I love thee, I love thee! Let them neglect thee ... die every
+moment under the knife ... live in rags ... in scorn ... and hatred too
+... they have spared thee nothing ... I love thee ... I am faithful ...
+God strike me that day when I forget thee! Here is the first gift I have
+ever given thee besides my heart and my daughter ... a ship ... no
+freight but hope ... no guns alas! for thy torturers ... they are still
+free to tear thee, these wolves, and to lie about thee to the whole
+world ... blood and lies are their feast ... and how sweet are thy
+shores ... after all ... because thou art everlasting! Thy children are
+gone, but they shall come back ... the dead are dead, but the living are
+in many lands, and they will return ... perhaps soon ... I am the
+messenger ... helpless as ever, but I bring thee news ... good news ...
+my beautiful Ireland! Poorer than ever I return ... I shall never see
+thee free----"
+
+He was working himself into a fever of grief when Honora spoke to him.
+
+"You are forgetting, father, that this is the moment to thank Mr. Dillon
+in the name of our country----"
+
+"I forget everything when I am here," said Ledwith, breaking into
+cheerful smiles, and seizing Arthur's hand. "I would be ashamed to say
+'thank you,' Arthur, for what you have done. Let this dear land herself
+welcome you to her shores. Never a foot stepped on them worthier of
+respect and love than you."
+
+They went ashore in silence, having determined on their course the night
+previous. They must learn first what had happened since their departure
+from New York, where there had been rumors of a rising, which Ledwith
+distrusted. It was too soon for the Fenians to rise; but as the movement
+had gotten partly beyond the control of the leaders, anything might have
+happened. If the country was still undisturbed, they might enjoy a ride
+through wild Donegal; if otherwise, it was safer, having accomplished
+the purpose of the trip, to sail back to the West. The miserable village
+at the head of the bay showed a few dwellers when they landed on the
+beach, but little could be learned from them, save directions to a
+distant cotter who owned an ass and a cart, and always kept information
+and mountain dew for travelers and the gentry. The young men visited the
+cotter, and returned with the cart and the news. The rising was said to
+have begun, but farther east and south, and the cotter had seen soldiers
+and police and squads of men hurrying over the country; but so remote
+was the storm that the whole party agreed a ride over the bare hills
+threatened no danger.
+
+They mounted the cart in high spirits, now that emotion had subsided.
+All matters had been arranged with Captain Curran, who was not to expect
+them earlier than the next day at evening, and had his instructions for
+all contingencies. They set out for a village to the north, expressly to
+avoid encounters possible southward. The morning was glorious. Arthur
+wondered at the miles of uninhabited land stretching away on either side
+of the road, at the lack of population in a territory so small. He had
+heard of these things before, but the sight of them proved stranger than
+the hearing. Perhaps they had gone five miles on the road to Cruarig,
+when Grahame, driving, pulled up the donkey with suddenness, and cried
+out in horror. Eight men had suddenly come in sight on the road, armed
+with muskets, and as suddenly fled up the nearest timbered hill and
+disappeared.
+
+"I'll wager something," said Grahame, "that these men are being pursued
+by the police, or--which would be worse for us--by soldiers. There is
+nothing to do but retreat in good order, and send out a scout to make
+sure of the ground. We ought to have done that the very first thing."
+
+No one gainsaid him, but Arthur thought that they might go on a bit
+further cautiously, and if nothing suspicious occurred reach the town.
+Dubiously Grahame whipped up the donkey, and drove with eyes alert past
+the wooded hill, which on its north side dropped into a little glen
+watered by the sweetest singing brook. They paused to look at the brook
+and the glen. The road stretched away above and below like a ribbon. A
+body of soldiers suddenly brightened the north end of the ribbon two
+miles off.
+
+"Now by all the evil gods," said Grahame, "but we have dropped into the
+very midst of the insurrection."
+
+He was about to turn the donkey, when Honora cried out in alarm and
+pointed back over the road which they had just traveled. Another scarlet
+troop was moving upon them from that direction. Without a word Grahame
+turned the cart into the glen, and drove as far as the limits would
+permit within the shade. They alighted.
+
+"This is our only chance," he said. "The eight men with muskets are
+rebels whom the troops have cornered. There may be a large force in the
+vicinity, ready to give the soldiers of Her Majesty a stiff battle. The
+soldiers will be looking for rebels and not for harmless tourists, and
+we may escape comfortably by keeping quiet until the two divisions
+marching towards each other have met and had an explanation. If we are
+discovered, I shall do the talking, and explain our embarrassment at
+meeting so many armed men first, and then so many soldiers. We are in
+for it, I know."
+
+No one seemed to mind particularly. Honora stole an anxious glance at
+her father, while she pulled a little bunch of shamrock and handed it to
+Arthur. He felt like saying it would yet be stained by his blood in
+defense of her country, but knew at the same moment how foolish and
+weak the words would sound in her ears. He offered himself as a scout to
+examine the top of the hill, and discover if the rebels were there, and
+was permitted to go under cautions from Grahame, to return within
+fifteen minutes. He returned promptly full of enthusiasm. The eight men
+were holding the top of the hill, almost over their heads, and would
+have it out with the two hundred soldiers from the town. They had
+expected a body of one hundred insurgents at this point, but the party
+had not turned up. Eager to have a brush with the enemy, they intended
+to hold the hill as long as possible, and then scatter in different
+directions, sure that pursuit could not catch them.
+
+"The thing for them to do is to save us," said Grahame. "Let them move
+on to another hill northward, and while they fight the soldiers we may
+be able to slip back to the ship."
+
+The suggestion came too late. The troops were in full sight. Their
+scouts had met in front of the glen, evidently acting upon information
+received earlier, and seemed disappointed at finding no trace of a body
+of insurgents large enough to match their own battalion. The boys on the
+top of the hill put an end to speculations as to the next move by firing
+a volley into them. A great scattering followed, and the bid for a fight
+was cheerfully answered by the officer in command of the troops. Having
+joined his companies, examined the position and made sure that its
+defenders were few and badly armed, he ordered a charge. In five minutes
+the troops were in possession of the hilltop, and the insurgents had
+fled; but on the hillside lay a score of men wounded and dead. The
+rebels were good marksmen, and fleet-footed. The scouts beat the bushes
+and scoured the wood in vain. The report to the commanding officer was
+the wounding of two men, who were just then dying in a little glen close
+by, and the discovery of a party of tourists in the glen, who had
+evidently turned aside to escape the trouble, and were now ministering
+to the dying rebels.
+
+Captain Sydenham went up to investigate. Before he arrived the little
+drama of death had passed, and the two insurgents lay side by side at
+the margin of the brook like brothers asleep. When the insurgents fled
+from their position, the two wounded ones dropped into the glen in the
+hope of escaping notice for the time; but they were far spent when they
+fell headlong among the party in hiding below. Grahame and Ledwith
+picked them up and laid them near the brook, Honora pillowed their heads
+with coats, Arthur brought water to bathe their hands and faces, grimy
+with dust of travel and sweat of death; for an examination of the wounds
+showed Ledwith that they were speedily mortal. He dipped his
+handkerchief in the flowing blood of each, and placed it reverently in
+his breast. There was nothing to do but bathe the faces and moisten the
+lips of the dying and unconscious men. They were young, one rugged and
+hard, the other delicate in shape and color; the same grace of youth
+belonged to both, and showed all the more beautifully at this moment
+through the heavy veil of death.
+
+Arthur gazed at them with eager curiosity, and at the red blood bubbling
+from their wounds. For their country they were dying, as his father had
+died, on the field of battle. This blood, of which he had so often read,
+was the price which man pays for liberty, which redeems the slave;
+richer than molten gold, than sun and stars, priceless. Oh, sweet and
+glorious, unutterably sweet to die like this for men!
+
+"Do you recognize him?" said Ledwith to Grahame, pointing to the elder
+of the two. Grahame bent forward, startled that he should know either
+unfortunate.
+
+"It is young Devin, the poet," cried Ledwith with a burst of tears.
+Honora moaned, and Grahame threw up his hands in despair.
+
+"We must give the best to our mother," said Ledwith, "but I would prefer
+blood so rich to be scattered over a larger soil."
+
+He took the poet's hand in his own, and stroked it gently; Honora wiped
+the face of the other; Grahame on his knees said the prayers he
+remembered for sinners and passing souls; secretly Arthur put in his
+pocket a rag stained with death-sweat and life-blood. Almost in silence,
+without painful struggle, the boys died. Devin opened his eyes one
+moment on the clear blue sky and made an effort to sing. He chanted a
+single phrase, which summed up his life and its ideals: "Mother, always
+the best for Ireland." Then his eyes closed and his heart stopped. The
+little party remained silent, until Honora, looking at the still faces,
+so young and tender, thought of the mothers sitting in her place, and
+began to weep aloud. At this moment Captain Sydenham marched up the glen
+with clinking spur. He stopped at a distance and took off his hat with
+the courtesy of a gentleman and the sympathy of a soldier. Grahame went
+forward to meet him, and made his explanations.
+
+"It is perfectly clear," said the Captain, "that you are tourists and
+free from all suspicion. However, it will be necessary for you to
+accompany me to the town and make your declarations to the magistrate as
+well. As you were going there anyhow it will be no hardship, and I shall
+be glad to make matters as pleasant as possible for the young lady."
+
+Grahame thanked him, and introduced him to the party. He bowed very low
+over the hand which Honora gave him.
+
+"A rather unfortunate scene for you to witness," he said.
+
+Yet she had borne it like one accustomed to scenes of horror. Her
+training in Ledwith's school bred calmness, and above all silence, amid
+anxiety, disappointment and calamity.
+
+"I was glad to be here," she replied, the tears still coursing down her
+face, "to take their mother's place."
+
+"Two beautiful boys," said the Captain, looking into the dead faces.
+"Killing men is a bad business anywhere, but when we have to kill our
+own, and such as these, it is so much worse."
+
+Ledwith flashed the officer a look of gratitude.
+
+"I shall have the bodies carried to the town along with our own dead,
+and let the authorities take care of them. And now if you will have the
+goodness to take your places, I shall do myself the pleasure of riding
+with you as far as the magistrate's."
+
+Honora knelt and kissed the pale cheeks of the dead boys, and then
+accepted Captain Sydenham's arm in the march out of the glen. The men
+followed sadly. Ledwith looked wild for a while. The tears pressed
+against Arthur's eyes. What honor gilded these dead heroes!
+
+The procession moved along the road splendidly, the soldiers in front
+and the cart in the rear, while a detail still farther off carried the
+wounded and dead. Captain Sydenham devoted himself to Honora, which gave
+Grahame the chance to talk matters over with Ledwith on the other side
+of the car.
+
+"Did you ever dream in all your rainbow dreams," said Grahame, "of
+marching thus into Cruarig with escort of Her Majesty? It's damfunny.
+But the question now is, what are we to do with the magistrate? Any sort
+of an inquiry will prove that we are more than suspicious characters. If
+they run across the ship we shall go to jail. If they discover you and
+me, death or Botany Bay will be our destination."
+
+"It is simply a case of luck," Ledwith replied. "Scheming won't save us.
+If Lord Constantine were in London now----"
+
+"Great God!" cried Grahame in a whisper, "there's the luck. Say no more.
+I'll work that fine name as it was never worked before."
+
+He called out to Captain Sydenham to come around to his side of the car
+for a moment.
+
+"I am afraid," he said, "that we have fallen upon evil conditions, and
+that, before we get through with the magistrates, delays will be many
+and vexatious. I feel that we shall need some of our English friends of
+last winter in New York. Do you know Lord Constantine?"
+
+"Are you friends of Lord Leverett?" cried the Captain. "Well, then, that
+settles it. A telegram from him will smooth the magistrate to the
+silkiness of oil. But I do not apprehend any annoyance. I shall be happy
+to explain the circumstances, and you can get away to Dublin, or any
+port where you hope to meet your ship."
+
+The Captain went back to Honora, and talked Lord Constantine until they
+arrived in the town and proceeded to the home of the magistrate.
+Unfortunately there was little cordiality between Captain Sydenham and
+Folsom, the civil ruler of the district; and because the gallant Captain
+made little of the episode therefore Folsom must make much of it.
+
+"I can easily believe in the circumstances which threw tourists into so
+unpleasant a situation," said Folsom, "but at the same time I am
+compelled to observe all the formalities. Of course the young lady is
+free. Messrs. Dillon and Grahame may settle themselves comfortably in
+the town, on their word not to depart without permission. Mr. Ledwith
+has a name which my memory connects with treasonable doings and sayings.
+He must remain for a few hours at least in the jail."
+
+"This is not at all pleasant," said Captain Sydenham pugnaciously. "I
+could have let these friends of my friends go without troubling you
+about them. I wished to make it easier for them to travel to Dublin by
+bringing them before you, and here is my reward."
+
+"I wish you had, Captain," said the magistrate. "But now you've done it,
+neither is free to do more than follow the routine. We have enough real
+work without annoying honest travelers. However, it's only a matter of a
+few hours."
+
+"Then you had better telegraph to Lord Constantine," said Sydenham to
+Grahame.
+
+Folsom started at the name and looked at the party with a puzzled frown.
+Grahame wrote on a sheet of paper the legend: "A telegram from you to
+the authorities here will get Honora and her party out of much trouble."
+
+"Is it as warm as that?" said the Captain with a smile, as he read the
+lines and handed the paper to Folsom with a broad grin.
+
+"I'm in for it now," groaned Folsom to himself as he read. "Wish I'd let
+the Captain alone and tended to strict business."
+
+While the wires were humming between Dublin and Cruarig, Captain
+Sydenham spent his spare time in atoning for his blunders against the
+comfort of the party. Ledwith having been put in jail most honorably,
+the Captain led the others to the inn and located them sumptuously. He
+arranged for lunch, at which he was to join them, and then left them to
+their ease while he transacted his own affairs.
+
+"One of the men you read about," said Grahame, as the three looked at
+one another dolorously. "Sorry I didn't confide in him from the start.
+Now it's a dead certainty that your father stays in jail, Honora, and I
+may be with him."
+
+"I really can't see any reason for such despair," said Arthur.
+
+"Of course not," replied Grahame. "But even Lord Constantine could not
+save Owen Ledwith from prison in times like these, if the authorities
+learn his identity."
+
+"What is to be done?" inquired Honora.
+
+"You will stay with your father of course?" Honora nodded.
+
+"I'm going to make a run for it at the first opportunity," said Grahame.
+"I can be of no use here, and we must get back the ship safe and sound.
+Arthur, if they hold Ledwith you will have the honor of working for his
+freedom. Owen is an American citizen. He ought to have all the rights
+and privileges of a British subject in his trial, if it comes to that.
+He won't get them unless the American minister to the court of St. James
+insists upon it. Said minister, being a doughhead, will not insist. He
+will even help to punish him. It will be your business to go up to
+London and make Livingstone do his duty if you have to choke him black
+in the face. If the American minister interferes in this case Lord
+Constantine will be a power. If the said minister hangs back, or says,
+hang the idiot, my Lord will not amount to a hill of beans."
+
+"If it comes to a trial," said Arthur, "won't Ledwith get the same
+chance as any other lawbreaker?"
+
+Honora and Grahame looked at each other as much as to say: "Poor
+innocent!"
+
+"When there's a rising on, my dear boy, there is no trial for Irishmen.
+Arrest means condemnation, and all that follows is only form. Go ahead
+now and do your best."
+
+Before lunch the telegrams had done their best and worst. The party was
+free to go as they came with the exception of Ledwith. They had a merry
+lunch, enlivened by a telegram from Lord Constantine, and by Folsom's
+discomfiture. Then Grahame drove away to the ship, Arthur set out for
+Dublin, and Honora was left alone with her dread and her sorrows, which
+Captain Sydenham swore would be the shortest of her life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+CASTLE MOYNA.
+
+
+The Dillon party took possession of Castle Moyna, its mistress, and
+Captain Sydenham, who had a fondness for Americans. Mona Everard owned
+any human being who looked at her the second time, as the oriole catches
+the eye with its color and then the heart with its song; and Louis had
+the same magnetism in a lesser degree. Life at the castle was not of the
+liveliest, but with the Captain's aid it became as rapid as the
+neighboring gentry could have desired. Anne cared little, so that her
+children had their triumph. Wrapped in her dreams of amethyst, the
+exquisiteness of this new world kept her in ecstasy. Its smallest
+details seemed priceless. She performed each function as if it were the
+last of her life. While rebuffs were not lacking, she parried them
+easily, and even the refusal of the parish priest to accept her aid in
+his bazaar did not diminish the delight of her happy situation. She knew
+the meaning of his refusal: she, an upstart, having got within the gates
+of Castle Moyna by some servility, when her proper place was a _shebeen_
+in Cruarig, offered him charity from a low motive. She felt a rebuke
+from a priest as a courtier a blow from his king; but keeping her
+temper, she made many excuses for him in her own mind, without losing
+the firm will to teach him better manners in her own reverent way. The
+Countess heard of it, and made a sharp complaint to Captain Sydenham.
+The old dowager had a short temper, and a deep gratitude for Anne's
+remarkable services in New York. Nor did she care to see her guests
+slighted.
+
+"Father Roslyn has treated her shabbily. She suggested a booth at his
+bazaar, offered to fit it up herself and to bring the gentry to buy. She
+was snubbed: 'neither your money nor your company.' You must set that
+right, Sydenham," said she.
+
+"He shall weep tears of brine for it," answered the Captain cheerfully.
+
+"Tell him," said the Dowager, "the whole story, if your priest can
+appreciate it, which I doubt. A Cavan peasant, who can teach the fine
+ladies of Dublin how to dress and how to behave; whose people are half
+the brains of New York; the prize-fighter turned senator, the Boss of
+Tammany, the son with a gold mine. Above all, don't forget to tell how
+she may name the next ambassador to England."
+
+They laughed in sheer delight at her accomplishments and her triumphs.
+
+"Gad, but she's the finest woman," the Captain declared. "At first I
+thought it was acting, deuced fine acting. But it's only her nature
+finding expression. What d'ye think she's planning now? An audience with
+the Pope, begad, special, to present an American flag and a thousand
+pounds. And she laid out Lady Cruikshank yesterday, stone cold. Said her
+ladyship: 'Quite a compliment to Ireland, Mrs. Dillon, that you kept the
+Cavan brogue so well.' Said Mrs. Dillon: 'It was all I ever got from
+Ireland, and a brogue in New York is always a recommendation to mercy
+from the court; then abroad it marks one off from the common English and
+their common Irish imitators.' Did she know of Lady Cruikshank's effort
+to file off the Dublin brogue?"
+
+"Likely. She seems to know the right thing at the right minute."
+
+Evidently Anne's footing among the nobility was fairly secure in spite
+of difficulties. There were difficulties below stairs also, and Judy
+Haskell had the task of solving them, which she did with a success quite
+equal to Anne's. She made no delay in seizing the position of arbiter in
+the servants' hall, not only of questions touching the Dillons, and
+their present relations with the Irish nobility, but also on such vital
+topics as the rising, the Fenians, the comparative rank of the Irish at
+home and those in America, and the standing of the domestics in Castle
+Moyna from the point of experience and travel. Inwardly Judy had a
+profound respect for domestics in the service of a countess, and looked
+to find them as far above herself as a countess is above the rest of the
+world. She would have behaved humbly among the servants of Castle Moyna,
+had not their airs betrayed them for an inferior grade.
+
+"These Americans," said the butler with his nose in the air.
+
+"As if ye knew anythin' about Americans," said Judy promptly. "Have ye
+ever thraveled beyant Donegal, me good little man?"
+
+"It wasn't necessary, me good woman."
+
+"Faith, it's yerself 'ud be blowin' about it if ye had. An' d'ye think
+people that thraveled five thousan' miles to spind a few dollars on yer
+miserable country wud luk at the likes o' ye? Keep yer criticisms on
+these Americans in yer own buzzum. It's not becomin' that an ould
+gossoon shud make remarks on Mrs. Dillon, the finest lady in New York,
+an' the best dhressed at this minnit in all Ireland. Whin ye've
+thraveled as much as I have ye can have me permission to talk on what ye
+have seen."
+
+"The impidence o' some people," said the cook with a loud and scornful
+laugh.
+
+"If ye laughed that way in New York," said Judy, "ye'd be sint to the
+Island for breaking the public peace. A laugh like that manes no
+increase o' wages."
+
+"The Irish in New York are allowed to live there I belave," said a pert
+housemaid with a simper.
+
+"Oh, yes, ma'am, an' they are also allowed to sind home the rint o'
+their houses to kape the poor Irish from starvin', an' to help the lords
+an' ladies of yer fine castles to kape the likes o' yees in a job."
+
+"'Twas always a wondher to me," said the cook to the housemaid, as if no
+other was present, "how these American bigbugs wid their inilligant ways
+ever got as far as the front door o' the Countess."
+
+"I can tell ye how Mrs. Dillon got in so far that her fut is on the neck
+of all o' yez this minnit," said Judy. "If she crooked her finger at ye
+this hour, ye'd take yer pack on yer back an' fut it over to yer
+father's shanty, wid no more chance for another place than if ye wor in
+Timbuctoo. The Countess o' Skibbereen kem over to New York to hould a
+concert, an' to raise money for the cooks an' housemaids an' butlers
+that were out of places in Donegal. Well, she cudn't get a singer, nor
+she couldn't get a hall, nor she cudn't sell a ticket, till Mrs. Dillon
+gathered around her the Boss of Tammany Hall, an' Senator Dillon, an'
+Mayor Birmingham, an' Mayor Livingstone, an' says to thim, 'let the
+Countess o' Skibbereen have a concert an' let Tammany Hall buy every
+ticket she has for sale, an' do yeez turn out the town to make the
+concert a success.' An' thin she got the greatest singer in the world,
+Honora Ledwith, that ye cudn't buy to sing in Ireland for all the little
+money there's in it, to do the singin', an' so the Countess med enough
+money to buy shirts for the whole of Ireland. But not a door wud have
+opened to her if Mrs. Dillon hadn't opened them all be wan word. That's
+why Castle Moyna is open to her to the back door. For me I wondher she
+shtays in the poor little place, whin the palace o' the American
+ambassador in London expects her."
+
+The audience, awed at Judy's assurance, was urged by pride to laugh
+haughtily at this last statement.
+
+"An' why wudn't his palace be open to her," Judy continued with equal
+scorn. "He's afraid of her. She kem widin an ace o' spoilin' his chances
+o' goin' to London an' bowin' to the Queen. An, bedad, he's not sure of
+his futtin' while she's in it, for she has her mind on the place for Mr.
+Vandervelt, the finest man in New York wid a family that goes back to
+the first Dutchman that ever was, a little fellow that sat fishin' in
+the say the day St. Pathrick sailed for Ireland. Now Mr. Livingstone sez
+to Mrs. Dillon whin he was leavin' for London, 'Come over,' sez he, 'an'
+shtay at me palace as long as I'm in it.' She's goin' there whin she
+laves here, but I don't see why she shtays in this miserable place, whin
+she cud be among her aquils, runnin' in an out to visit the Queen like
+wan o' thimselves."
+
+By degrees, as Judy's influence invaded the audience, alarm spread among
+them for their own interests. They had not been over polite to the
+Americans, since it was not their habit to treat any but the nobility
+with more than surface respect. New York most of them hoped to visit and
+dwell within some day. What if they had offended the most influential of
+the great ladies of the western city! Judy saw their fear and guessed
+its motive.
+
+"Me last word to the whole o' yez is, get down an yer knees to Mrs.
+Dillon afore she l'aves, if she'll let yez. I hear that some o' ye think
+of immigratin' to New York. Are yez fit for that great city? What are
+yer wages here? Mebbe a pound a month. In our city the girls get four
+pounds for doin' next to nothin'. An' to see the dhress an' the shtyle
+o' thim fine girls! Why, yez cudn't tell them from their own
+misthresses. What wud yez be doin' in New York, wid yer clothes thrun on
+yez be a pitchfork, an' lukkin' as if they were made in the ark? But if
+ye wor as smart as the lady that waits on the Queen, not wan fut will ye
+set in New York if Mrs. Dillon says no. Yez may go to Hartford or
+Newark, or some other little place, an' yez'll be mighty lucky if ye're
+not sint sthraight on to quarantine wid the smallpox patients an' the
+Turks."
+
+The cook gave a gasp, and Judy saw that she had won the day. One more
+struggle, however, remained before her triumph was complete. The
+housekeeper and the butler formed an alliance against her, and refused
+to be awed by the stories of Mrs. Dillon's power and greatness; but as
+became their station their opposition was not expressed in mere
+language. They did not condescend to bandy words with inferiors. The
+butler fought his battle with Judy by simply tilting his nose toward the
+sky on meeting her. Judy thereupon tilted her nose in the same fashion,
+so that the servants' hall was convulsed at the sight, and the butler
+had to surrender or lose his dignity. The housekeeper carried on the
+battle by an attempt to stare Judy out of countenance with a formidable
+eye; and the greatest staring-match on the part of rival servants in
+Castle Moyna took place between the representative of the Skibbereens
+and the maid of New York. The former may have thought her eye as good as
+that of the basilisk, but found the eye of Miss Haskell much harder.
+
+The housekeeper one day met Judy descending the back stairs. She fixed
+her eyes upon her with the clear design of transfixing and paralyzing
+this brazen American. Judy folded her arms and turned her glance upon
+her foe. The nearest onlookers held their breaths. Overcome by the calm
+majesty of Judy's iron glance, which pressed against her face like a
+spear, the housekeeper smiled scornfully and began to ascend the stairs
+with scornful air. Judy stood on the last step and turned her neck round
+and her eyes upward until she resembled the Gorgon. She had the
+advantage of the housekeeper, who in mounting the stairs had to watch
+her steps; but in any event the latter was foredoomed to defeat. The
+eyes that had not blinked before Anne Dillon, or the Senator, or Mayor
+Livingstone, or John Everard, or the Countess of Skibbereen, or the
+great Sullivan, and had modestly held their own under the charming
+glance of the Monsignor, were not to be dazzled by the fiercest glance
+of a mere Donegal housekeeper. The contempt in Judy's eyes proved too
+much for the poor creature, and at the top of the stairs, with a
+hysterical shriek, she burst into tears and fled humbled.
+
+"I knew you'd do it," said Jerry the third butler. "It's not in thim
+wake craythurs to take the luk from you, Miss Haskell."
+
+"Ye're the wan dacint boy in the place," said Judy, remembering many
+attentions from the shrewd lad. "An' as soon as iver ye come to New
+York, an' shtay long enough to become an American, I'll get ye a place
+on the polls."
+
+From that day the position of the Dillon party became something
+celestial as far as the servants were concerned, while Judy, as arbiter
+in the servants' hall, settled all questions of history, science,
+politics, dress, and gossip, by judgments from which there was no
+present appeal. All these details floated to the ears of Captain
+Sydenham, who was a favorite with Judy and shared her confidence; and
+the Captain saw to it that the gossip of Castle Moyna also floated into
+the parish residence daily. Some of it was so alarming that Father
+Roslyn questioned his friend Captain Sydenham, who dropped in for a
+quiet smoke now and then.
+
+"Who are these people, these Americans, do you know, Captain? I mean
+those just now stopping with the Countess of Skibbereen?"
+
+"That reminds me," replied the Captain. "Didn't you tell me Father
+William was going to America this winter on a collecting tour? Well, if
+you get him the interest of Mrs. Dillon his tour is assured of success
+before he begins it."
+
+A horrible fear smote the heart of the priest, nor did he see the
+peculiar smile on the Captain's face. Had he made the dreadful mistake
+of losing a grand opportunity for his brother, soon to undertake a
+laborious mission?
+
+"Why do you think so?" he inquired.
+
+"You would have to be in New York to understand it," replied the
+Captain. "But the Countess of Skibbereen is not a patch in this county
+compared to what Mrs. Dillon is in New York!"
+
+"Oh, dear me! Do you tell me!"
+
+"Her people are all in politics, and in the church, and in business. Her
+son is a--well, he owns a gold mine, I think, and he is in politics,
+too. In fact, it seems pretty clear that if you want anything in New
+York Mrs. Dillon is the woman to get it, as the Countess found it. And
+if you are not wanted in New York by Mrs. Dillon, then you must go west
+as far as Chicago."
+
+"Oh, how unfortunate! I am afraid, Captain, that I have made a blunder.
+Mrs. Dillon came to me--most kindly of course--and made an offer to take
+care of a booth at the bazaar, and I refused her. You know my feeling
+against giving these Americans any foothold amongst us----"
+
+"Don't tell that to Father William, or he will never forgive you," said
+the Captain. "But Mrs. Dillon is forgiving as well as generous. Do the
+handsome thing by her. Go up to the castle and explain matters, and she
+will forget your----"
+
+"Oh, call it foolishness at once," said the priest. "I'm afraid I'm too
+late, but for the sake of charity I'll do what you say."
+
+A velvety welcome Anne gave him. Before all others she loved the priest,
+and but that she had to teach Father Roslyn a lesson he would have seen
+her falling at his feet for his blessing. In some fashion he made
+explanation and apology.
+
+"Father dear, don't mention it. Really, it is my place to make
+explanations and not yours. I was hurt, of course, that you refused the
+little I can give you, but I knew other places would be the richer by
+it, and charity is good everywhere."
+
+"A very just thought, madam. It would give us all great pleasure if you
+could renew your suggestion to take a booth at the bazaar. We are all
+very fond of Americans here--that is, when we understand them----"
+
+"Only that I'm going up to London, father dear, I'd be only too happy.
+It was not the booth I was thinking of, you see, but the bringing of all
+the nobility to spend a few pounds with you."
+
+"Oh, my dear, you could never have done it," cried he in astonishment;
+"they are all Protestants, and very dark."
+
+"We do it in America, and why not here? I used to get more money from
+Protestant friends than from me own. When I told them of my scheme here
+they all promised to come for the enjoyment of it. Now, I'm so sorry I
+have to go to London. I must present my letters to the ambassador before
+he leaves town, and then we are in a hurry to get to Rome before the end
+of August. Cardinal Simeoni has promised us already a private audience
+with the Pope. Now, father dear, if there is anything I can do for you
+in Rome--of course the booth must go up at the bazaar just the same,
+only the nobility will not be there--but at Rome, now, if you wanted
+anything."
+
+"My dear Mrs. Dillon you overwhelm me. There is nothing I want for
+myself, but my brother, Father William----"
+
+"Oh, to be sure, your brother," cried Anne, when the priest paused in
+confusion; "let him call on us in Rome, and I will take him to the
+private audience."
+
+"Oh, thank you, thank you, my dear madam, but my brother is not going to
+Rome. It is to America I refer. His bishop has selected him from among
+many eminent priests of the diocese to make a collecting tour in America
+this winter. And I feel sure that if a lady of your rank took an
+interest in him, it would save him much labor, and, what I fear is
+unavoidable, hardship."
+
+Anne rose up delighted and came toward Father Roslyn with a smile. She
+placed her hand lightly on his shoulder.
+
+"Father dear, whisper."
+
+He bent forward. There was not a soul within hearing distance, but Anne
+loved a dramatic effect.
+
+"He need never leave New York. I'll see that Father William has the
+_entree_ into the diocese, and I'll take care of him until he leaves for
+home."
+
+She tapped him on the shoulder with her jeweled finger, and gave him a
+most expressive look of assurance.
+
+"Oh, how you overwhelm me," cried Father Roslyn. "I thank you a hundred
+times, but I won't accept so kind an offer unless you promise me that
+you will preside at a booth in the bazaar."
+
+Of course she promised, much as the delay might embarrass the American
+minister in London, and the Cardinal who awaited with impatience her
+arrival in Rome.
+
+The bazaar became a splendid legend in the parish of Cruarig; how its
+glory was of heaven; how Mrs. Dillon seemed to hover over it like an
+angel or a queen; how Father Roslyn could hardly keep out of her booth
+long enough to praise the others; how the nobility flocked about it
+every night of three, and ate wonderful dishes at fancy prices, and were
+dressed like princes; and how Judy Haskell ruled the establishment with
+a rod of iron from two to ten each day, devoting her leisure to the
+explanation and description of the booths once presided over by her
+mistress in the great city over seas. All these incidents and others as
+great passed out of mind before the happenings which shadowed the last
+days at Castle Moyna with anxiety and dread.
+
+The Dowager gave a fete in honor of her guests one afternoon, and all
+the county came. As a rule the gentry sneered at the American guests of
+the Countess, and found half their enjoyment at a garden fete in making
+fun of the hostess and her friends in a harmless way. There might not
+have been so much ridicule on this occasion for two reasons: the
+children were liked, and their guardian was dreaded. Anne had met and
+vanquished her critics in the lists of wit and polite insolence. Then a
+few other Americans, discovered by Captain Sydenham, were present, and
+bore half the brunt of public attention. The Dillons met their
+countrymen for a moment and forgot them, even forgot the beautiful woman
+whose appearance held the eyes of the guests a long time. Captain
+Sydenham was interesting them in a pathetic story of battle and death
+which had just happened only a few miles away. When the two boys were
+dead beside the stream in the glen, and the tourists had met their fate
+before the magistrate in Cruarig, he closed the story by saying,
+
+"And now down in the hotel is the loveliest Irish girl you ever saw,
+waiting with the most patient grief for the help which will release her
+father from jail. Am I not right, Mrs. Endicott?"
+
+The beautiful American looked up with a smile.
+
+"Yes, indeed," she replied in a clear, rich voice. "It is long since I
+met a woman that impressed me more than this lonely creature. The
+Captain was kind enough to take me to see her, that I might comfort her
+a little. But she seemed to need little comfort. Very self-possessed you
+know. Used to that sort of thing."
+
+"The others got scot free, no thanks to old Folsom," said the Captain,
+"and one went off to their yacht and the other intended to start for
+Dublin to interest the secretary. The Countess should interest herself
+in her. Egad, don't you know, it's worth the trouble to take an interest
+in such a girl as Honora Ledwith."
+
+"Honora Ledwith," said the Dowager at a little distance. "What do you
+know of my lovely Honora?"
+
+Already in the course of the story a suspicion had been shaping itself
+in Anne's mind. The ship must have arrived, it was time to hear from
+Arthur and his party; the story warned her that a similar fate might
+have overtaken her friends. Then she braced herself for the shock which
+came with Honora's name; and at the same moment, as in a dream, she saw
+Arthur swinging up the lawn towards her group; whereupon she gave a
+faint shriek, and rose up with a face so pale that all stretched out
+hands to her assistance; but Arthur was before them, as she tottered to
+him, and caught her in his arms. After a moment of silence, Mona and
+Louis ran to his side, Captain Sydenham said some words, and then the
+little group marched off the lawn to the house, leaving the Captain to
+explain matters, and to wonder at the stupidity which had made him
+overlook the similarity in names.
+
+"Why, don't you know," said he to Mrs. Endicott, "her son was one of the
+party of tourists that Folsom sent to jail, and I never once connected
+the names. Absurd and stupid on my part."
+
+"Charming young man," said the lady, as she excused herself and went
+off. Up in one of the rooms of Castle Moyna, when the excitement was
+over and the explanations briefly made, Mona at the window described to
+Arthur the people of distinction, as they made their adieus to their
+hostess and expressed sympathy with the sudden and very proper
+indisposition of Mrs. Dillon. He could not help thinking how small the
+world is, what a puzzle is the human heart, how weird is the life of
+man.
+
+"There she is now," cried Mona, pointing to Mrs. Endicott and an old
+lady, who were bidding adieu to the Countess of Skibbereen. "A perfectly
+lovely face, a striking figure--oh, why should Captain Sydenham say our
+Honora was the loveliest girl he ever saw?--and he saw them together you
+know----"
+
+"Saw whom together?" said Arthur.
+
+"Why, Mrs. Endicott called on Honora at the hotel, you know."
+
+"Oh!"
+
+He leaned out of the window and took a long look at her with scarcely an
+extra beat of the heart, except for the triumph of having met her face
+to face and remained unknown. His longest look was for Aunt Lois, who
+loved him, and was now helping to avenge him. Strange, strange, strange!
+
+"Well?" cried Mona eagerly.
+
+"The old lady is a very sweet-looking woman," he answered. "On the whole
+I think Captain Sydenham was right."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE AMBASSADOR.
+
+
+After the happy reunion at Castle Moyna there followed a council of war.
+Captain Sydenham treasonably presided, and Honora sat enthroned amid the
+silent homage of her friends, who had but one thought, to lift the
+sorrow from her heart, and banish the pallor of anxiety from her lovely
+face. Her violet eyes burned with fever. The Captain drew his breath
+when he looked at her.
+
+"And she sings as she looks," whispered the Countess noting his gasp.
+
+"It's a bad time to do anything for Mr. Ledwith," the Captain said to
+the little assembly. "The Fenian movement has turned out a complete
+failure here in Ireland, and abroad too. As its stronghold was the
+United States, you can see that the power of the American Minister will
+be much diminished. It is very important to approach him in the right
+way, and count every inch of the road that leads to him. We must not
+make any mistakes, ye know, if only for Miss Ledwith's sake."
+
+His reward was a melting glance from the wonderful eyes.
+
+"I know the Minister well, and I feel sure he will help for the asking,"
+said Anne.
+
+"Glad you're so hopeful, mother, but some of us are not," Arthur
+interjected.
+
+"Then if you fail with His Excellency, Artie," she replied composedly,
+"I shall go to see him myself."
+
+Captain and Dowager exchanged glances of admiration.
+
+"Now, there are peculiarities in our trials here, trials of rebels I
+mean ... I haven't time to explain them ..." Arthur grinned ... "but
+they make imperative a certain way of acting, d'ye see? If I were in Mr.
+Dillon's place I should try to get one of two things from the American
+Minister: either that the Minister notify Her Majesty's government that
+he will have his representative at the trial of Ledwith; or, if the
+trial is begun ... they are very summary at times ... that the same
+gentleman inform the government that he will insist on all the forms
+being observed."
+
+"What effect would these notifications have?" Arthur asked.
+
+"Gad, most wonderful," replied the Captain. "If the Minister got in his
+warning before the trial began, there wouldn't be any trial; and if
+later, the trial would end in acquittal."
+
+Every one looked impressed, so much so that the Captain had to explain.
+
+"I don't know how to explain it to strangers--we all know it here,
+doncheknow--but in these cases the different governments always have
+some kind of an understanding. Ledwith is an American citizen, for
+example; he is arrested as an insurgent, no one is interested in him,
+the government is in a hurry, a few witnesses heard him talk against the
+government, and off he goes to jail. It's a troublesome time, d'ye see?
+But suppose the other case. A powerful friend interests the American
+Minister. That official notifies the proper officials that he is going
+to watch the trial. This means that the Minister is satisfied of the
+man's innocence. Government isn't going to waste time so, when there are
+hundreds to be tried and deported. So he goes free. Same thing if the
+Minister comes in while the trial is going on, and threatens to review
+all the testimony, the procedure, the character of the witnesses. He
+simply knocks the bottom out of the case, and the prisoner goes free."
+
+"I see your points," said Arthur, smiling. "I appreciate them. Just the
+same, we must have every one working on the case, and if I should fail
+the others must be ready to play their parts."
+
+"Command us all," said the Captain with spirit. "You have Lord
+Constantine in London. He's a host. But remember we are in the midst of
+the trouble, and home influence won't be a snap of my finger compared
+with the word of the Minister."
+
+"Then the Minister's our man," said Anne with decision. "If Arthur fails
+with him, then every soul of us must move on London like an Irish army,
+and win or die. So, my dear Honora, take the puckers out of your face,
+and keep your heart light. I know a way to make Quincy Livingstone dance
+to any music I play."
+
+The smiles came back to Honora's face, hearts grew lighter, and Arthur
+started for London, with little confidence in the good-will of
+Livingstone, but more in his own ability to force the gentleman to do
+his duty. He ran up against a dead wall in his mission, however, for the
+question of interference on behalf of American citizens in English jails
+had been settled months before in a conference between Livingstone and
+the Premier, although feeling was cold and almost hostile between the
+two governments. Lord Constantine described the position with the
+accuracy of a theorist in despair.
+
+"There's just a chance of doing something for Ledwith," he said
+dolorously.
+
+"By your looks a pretty poor one, I think," Arthur commented.
+
+"Oh, it's got to be done, doncheknow," he said irritably. "But that
+da--that fool, Livingstone, is spoiling the stew with his rot. And I've
+been watching this pot boil for five years at least."
+
+"What's wrong with our representative?" affecting innocence.
+
+"What's right with him would be the proper question," growled his
+lordship.
+
+"In Ledwith's case the wrong is that he's gone and given assurances to
+the government. He will not interfere with their disposition of Fenian
+prisoners, when these prisoners are American citizen. In other words, he
+has given the government a free hand. He will not be inclined to show
+Ledwith any favor."
+
+"A free hand," repeated Arthur, fishing for information. "And what is a
+free hand?"
+
+"Well, he could hamper the government very much when it is trying an
+American citizen for crimes committed on British soil. Such a prisoner
+must get all the privileges of a native. He must be tried fairly, as he
+would be at home, say."
+
+"Well, surely that strong instinct of fair play, that sense of justice
+so peculiarly British, of which we have all heard in the school-books,
+would----"
+
+"Drop it," said Lord Constantine fiercely. "In war there's nothing but
+the brute left. The Fenians--may the plague take them ... will be hung,
+shipped to Botany Bay, and left to rot in the home prisons, without
+respect to law, privilege, decency. Rebels must be wiped out,
+doncheknow. I don't mind that. They've done me enough harm ... put back
+the alliance ten years at least ... and left me howling in the
+wilderness. Livingstone will let every Fenian of American citizenship be
+tried like his British mates ... that is, they will get no trial at all,
+except inform. They will not benefit by their American ties."
+
+"Why should he neglect them like that?"
+
+"He has theories, of course. I heard him spout them at some beastly
+reception somewhere. Too many Irish in America--too strong--too
+popish--must be kept down--alliance between England and the United
+States to keep them down----"
+
+"I remember he was one of your alliance men," provokingly.
+
+"Alas, yes," mourned his lordship. "The Fenians threatened to make
+mince-meat of it, but they're done up and knocked down. Now, this
+Livingstone proposes a new form of mincing, worse than the Fenians a
+thousand times, begad."
+
+"Begad," murmured Arthur. "Surely you're getting excited."
+
+"The alliance is now to be argued on the plea of defense against popish
+aggressions, Arthur. This is the unkind cut. Before, we had to reunite
+the Irish and the English. Now, we must soothe the prejudices of bigots
+besides. Oh, but you should see the programme of His Excellency for the
+alliance in his mind. You'll feel it when you get back home. A regular
+programme, doncheknow. The first number has the boards now: general
+indignation of the hired press at the criminal recklessness of the Irish
+in rebelling against our benign rule. When that chorus is ended, there
+comes a solo by an escaped nun. Did you ever hear of Sister Claire
+Thingamy----"
+
+"Saw her--know her--at a distance. What is she to sing?"
+
+"A book--confessions and all that thing--revelations of the horrors of
+papist life. It's to be printed by thousands and scattered over the
+world. After that Fritters, our home historian at Oxford, is to travel
+in your county and lecture to the cream of society on the beauty of
+British rule over the Irish. He is to affect the classes. The nun and
+the press are to affect the masses. Between them what becomes of the
+alliance? Am I not patient? My pan demanded harmonious and brotherly
+feelings among all parties. Isn't that what an alliance must depend on?
+But Livingstone takes the other tack. To bring about his scheme we shall
+all be at each other's throats. Talk of the Kilkenny cats and Donnybrook
+fair, begad!"
+
+"I don't wonder you feel so badly," Arthur said, laughing. "But see
+here: we're not afraid of Livingstone. We've knocked him out before, and
+we can do it again. It will be interesting to go back home, and help to
+undo that programme. If you can manage him here, rely on Grahame and me
+and a few others in New York, to take the starch out of him at home.
+What's all this to do with Ledwith?"
+
+"Nothing," said his lordship with an apology. "But my own trouble seems
+bigger than his. We'll get him out, of course. Go and see Livingstone,
+and talk to him on the uppish plan. Demand the rights and privileges of
+the British subject for our man. You won't get any satisfaction, but a
+stiff talk will pave the way for my share in the scheme. You take the
+American ground, and I come in on the British ground. We ought to make
+him ashamed between us, doncheknow."
+
+Arthur had doubts of that, but no doubt at all that Lord Constantine
+owned the finest heart that ever beat in a man. He felt very cheerful at
+the thought of shaking up the Minister. Half hopeful of success, curious
+to test the strings which move an American Minister at the court of St.
+James, anxious about Honora and Owen, he presented himself at
+Livingstone's residence by appointment, and received a gracious welcome.
+Unknown to themselves, the two men had an attraction for each other.
+Fate opposed them strangely. This hour Arthur Dillon stood forth as the
+knight of a despised and desperate race, in a bloody turmoil at home,
+fighting for a little space on American soil, hopeful but spent with the
+labor of upholding its ideals; and Livingstone represented a triumphant
+faction in both countries, which, having long made life bitter and
+bloody for the Irish, still kept before them the choice of final
+destruction or the acceptance of the Puritan gods. To Arthur the
+struggle so far seemed but a clever game whose excitement kept sorrow
+from eating out his heart. He saw the irony rather than the tragedy of
+the contest. It tickled him immensely just now that Puritan faced
+Puritan; the new striking at the old for decency's sake; a Protestant
+fighting a Protestant in behalf of the religious ideals of Papists. He
+had an advantage over his kinsman beyond the latter's ken; since to him
+the humor of the situation seemed more vital than the tragedy, a mistake
+quite easy to youth. Arthur stated Ledwith's case beautifully, and asked
+him to notify the British officials that the American Minister would
+send his representative to watch the trial.
+
+"Impossible," said Livingstone. "I am content with the ordinary course
+for all these cases."
+
+"We are not," replied Arthur as decisively, "and we call upon our
+government to protect its citizens against the packed juries and other
+injustices of these Irish trials."
+
+"And what good would my interference do?" said Livingstone. Arthur
+grinned.
+
+"Your Excellency, such a notification would open the doors of the jail
+to Ledwith to-morrow. There would be no trial."
+
+"My instructions from the President are precise in this matter. We are
+satisfied that American citizens will get as fair a trial as Englishmen
+themselves. There will be no interference until I am satisfied that
+things are not going properly."
+
+"Can you tell me, then, how I am to satisfy you in Ledwith's case?" said
+the young man good-naturedly.
+
+"I don't think you or any one else can, Mr. Dillon. I know Ledwith, a
+conspirator from his youth. He is found in Ireland in a time of
+insurrection. That's quite enough."
+
+"You forget that I have given you my word he was not concerned with the
+insurrection, and did not know it was so imminent; that he went to
+Ireland with his daughter on a business matter."
+
+"All which can be shown at the trial, and will secure his acquittal."
+
+"Neither I nor his daughter will ever be called as witnesses. Instead, a
+pack of ready informers will swear to anything necessary to hurry him
+off to life imprisonment."
+
+"That is your opinion."
+
+"Do you know who sent me here, your Excellency, with the request for
+your aid?"
+
+Livingstone stared his interrogation.
+
+"An English officer with whom you are acquainted, friendly to Ledwith
+for some one else's sake. In plain words, he gave me to understand that
+there is no hope for Ledwith unless you interfere. If he goes to trial,
+he hangs or goes to Botany Bay."
+
+"You are pessimistic," mocked Livingstone. "It is the fault of the Irish
+that they have no faith in any government, because they cannot establish
+one of their own."
+
+"Outside of New York," corrected Arthur, with delightful malice.
+
+"Amendment accepted."
+
+"Would you be able to interfere in behalf of my friend while the trial
+was on, say, just before the summing up, when the informers had sworn to
+one thing, and the witnesses for the defense to another, if they are not
+shut out altogether?"
+
+"Impossible. I might as well interfere now."
+
+"Then on the score of sentiment. Ledwith is failing into age. Even a
+brief term in prison may kill him."
+
+"He took the risk in returning to Ireland at this time. I would be
+willing to aid him on that score, but it would open the door to a
+thousand others, and we are unwilling to embarrass the English
+government at a trying moment."
+
+"Were they so considerate when our moments were trying and they could
+embarrass us?"
+
+"That is an Irish argument."
+
+"What they said of your Excellency in New York was true, I am inclined
+to believe: that you accepted the English mission to be of use to the
+English in the present insurrection."
+
+"Well," said the Minister, laughing in spite of himself at the audacity
+of Arthur, "you will admit that I have a right to pay back the Irish for
+my defeat at the polls."
+
+"You are our representative and defender," replied Arthur gravely, "and
+yet you leave us no alternative but to appeal to the English
+themselves."
+
+Livingstone began to look bored, because irritation scorched him and had
+to be concealed. Arthur rose.
+
+"We are to understand, then, the friends of Ledwith, that you will do
+nothing beyond what is absolutely required by the law, and after all
+formalities are complied with?" he said.
+
+"Precisely."
+
+"We shall have to depend on his English friends, then. It will look
+queer to see Englishmen take up your duty where you deserted it."
+
+The Minister waved his hand to signify that he had enough of that topic,
+but the provoking quality of Arthur's smile, for he did not seem
+chagrined, reminded him of a question.
+
+"Who are the people interested in Ledwith, may I ask?"
+
+"All your old friends of New York," said Arthur, "Birmingham, Sullivan,
+and so on."
+
+"Of course. And the English friends who are to take up my duties where I
+desert them?"
+
+"You must know some of them," and Arthur grinned again, so that the
+Minister slightly winced. "Captain Sydenham, commanding in Donegal----"
+
+"I met him in New York one winter--younger brother to Lord Groton."
+
+"The Dowager Countess of Skibbereen."
+
+"Very fine woman. Ledwith is in luck."
+
+"And Lord Constantine of Essex."
+
+"I see you know the value of a climax, Mr. Dillon. Well, good-night. I
+hope the friends of Mr. Ledwith will be able to do everything for him."
+
+It irritated him that Arthur carried off the honors of the occasion, for
+the young man's smiling face betrayed his belief that the mention of
+these noble names, and the fact that their owners were working for
+Ledwith, would sorely trouble the pillow of Livingstone that night. The
+contrast between the generosity of kindly Englishmen and his own
+harshness was too violent. He foresaw that to any determined attempt on
+the part of Ledwith's English friends he must surrender as gracefully as
+might be; and the problem was to make that surrender harmless. He had
+solved it by the time Anne Dillon reached London, and had composed that
+music sure to make the Minister dance whether he would or no. In taking
+charge of the case Anne briefly expressed her opinion of her son's
+methods.
+
+"You did the best you could, Arthur," she said sweetly.
+
+He could not but laugh and admire. Her instincts for the game were far
+surer than his own, and her methods infallible. She made the road easy
+for Livingstone, but he had to walk it briskly. How could the poor man
+help himself? She hurled at him an army of nobles, headed by the
+Countess and Lord Constantine; she brought him letters from his friends
+at home; there was a dinner at the hotel, the Dowager being the hostess;
+and he was almost awed by the second generation of Anne's audacious
+race: Mona, red-lipped, jewel-eyed, sweeter than wild honey; Louis,
+whose lovely nature and high purpose shone in his face; and Arthur,
+sad-eyed, impudent, cynical, who seemed ready to shake dice with the
+devil, and had no fear of mortals because he had no respect for them.
+These outcasts of a few years back were able now to seize the threads of
+intrigue, and shake up two governments with a single pull! He mourned
+while he described what he had done for them. There would be no trial
+for Ledwith. He would be released at once and sent home at government
+expense. It was a great favor, a very great favor. Even Arthur thanked
+him, though he had difficulty in suppressing the grin which stole to his
+face whenever he looked at his kinsman. The Minister saw the grin
+peeping from his eyes, but forgave him.
+
+Arthur had the joy of bringing the good news down to Donegal. Anne bade
+him farewell with a sly smile of triumph. Admirable woman! she floated
+above them all in the celestial airs. But she was gracious to her son.
+The poor boy had been so long in California that he did not know how to
+go about things. She urged him to join them in Rome for the visit to the
+Pope, and sent her love to Honora and a bit of advice to Owen. When
+Arthur arrived in Cruarig, whither a telegram had preceded him, he was
+surprised to find Honora Ledwith in no way relieved of anxiety.
+
+"You have nothing to do but pack your trunk and get away," he said.
+"There is to be no trial, you know. Your father will go straight to the
+steamer, and the government will pay his expenses. It ought to pay more
+for the outrage."
+
+She thanked him, but did not seem to be comforted. She made no comment,
+and he went off to get an explanation from Captain Sydenham.
+
+"I meant to have written you about it," said the Captain, "but hoped
+that it would have come out all right without writing. Ledwith
+maintains, and I think he's quite right, that he must be permitted to go
+free without conditions, or be tried as a Fenian conspirator. The case
+is simple: an American citizen traveling in Ireland is arrested on a
+charge of complicity in the present rebellion; the government must prove
+its case in a public trial, or, unable to do that, must release him as
+an innocent man; but it does neither, for it leads him from jail to the
+steamer as a suspect, ordering him out of the country. Ledwith demands
+either a trial or the freedom of an innocent man. He will not help the
+government out of the hole in which accident, his Excellency the
+Minister, and your admirable mother have placed it. Of course it's hard
+on that adorable Miss Ledwith, and it may kill Ledwith himself, if not
+the two of them. Did you ever in your life see such a daughter and such
+a father?"
+
+"Well, all we can do is to make the trial as warm as possible for the
+government," said Arthur. "Counsel, witnesses, publicity, telegrams to
+the Minister, cablegrams to our Secretary of State, and all the rest of
+it."
+
+"Of no use," said the Captain moodily. "You have no idea of an Irish
+court and an Irish judge in times of revolt. I didn't till I came here.
+If Ledwith stands trial, nothing can save him from some kind of a
+sentence."
+
+"Then for his daughter's sake I must persuade him to get away."
+
+"Hope you can. All's fair in war, you know, but Ledwith is the worst
+kind of patriot, a visionary one, exalted, as the French say."
+
+Ledwith thanked Arthur warmly when he called upon him in jail, and made
+his explanation as the Captain had outlined it.
+
+"Don't think me a fool," he said. "I'm eager to get away. I have no
+relish for English prison life. But I am not going to promote
+Livingstone's trickery. I am an American citizen. I have had no part,
+direct or indirect, in this futile insurrection. I can prove it in a
+fair trial. It must be either trial or honorable release to do as any
+American citizen would do under the circumstances. If I go to prison I
+shall rely on my friends to expose Livingstone, and to warm up the
+officials at home who connive with him."
+
+Nor would he be moved from this position, and the trial came off with a
+speed more than creditable when justice deals with pirates, but
+otherwise scandalous.
+
+It ended in a morning, in spite of counsel, quibbles, and other
+ornamental obstacles, with a sentence of twenty years at hard labor in
+an English prison. To this prison Ledwith went the next day at noon.
+There had not been much time for work, but Arthur had played his part to
+his own satisfaction; the Irish and American journals buzzed with the
+items which he provided, and the denunciations of the American Minister
+were vivid, biting, and widespread; yet how puerile it all seemed before
+the brief, half contemptuous sentence of the hired judge, who thus
+roughly shoved another irritating patriot out of the way. The farewell
+to Ledwith was not without hope. Arthur had declared his purpose to go
+straight to New York and set every influence to work that could reach
+the President. Honora was to live near the prison, support herself by
+her singing, and use her great friends to secure a mitigation of his
+sentence, and access to him at intervals.
+
+"I am going in joy," he said to her and Arthur. "Death is the lightest
+suffering of the true patriot. Nora and I long ago offered our lives for
+Ireland. Perhaps they are the only useful things we could offer, for we
+haven't done much. Poor old country! I wish our record of service had
+some brighter spots in it."
+
+"At the expense of my modesty," said Arthur, "can't I mention myself as
+one of the brighter spots? But for you I would never have raised a
+finger for my mother's land. Now, I am enlisted, not only in the cause
+of Erin, but pledged to do what I can for any race that withers like
+yours under the rule of the slave-master. And that means my money, my
+time and thought and labor, and my life."
+
+"It is the right spirit," said Ledwith, trembling. "I knew it was in
+you. Not only for Ireland, but for the enslaved and outraged everywhere.
+God be thanked, if we poor creatures have stirred this spirit in you,
+lighted the flame--it's enough."
+
+"I have sworn it," cried Arthur, betrayed by his secret rage into
+eloquence. "I did not dream the world was so full of injustice. I could
+not understand the divine sorrow which tore your hearts for the wronged
+everywhere. I saw you suffer. I saw later what caused your suffering,
+and I felt ashamed that I had been so long idle and blind. Now I have
+sworn to myself that my life and my wealth shall be at the service of
+the enslaved forever."
+
+They went their different ways, the father to prison, Honora to the
+prison village, and Arthur with all speed to New York, burning with
+hatred of Livingstone. The great man had simply tricked them, had
+studied the matter over with his English friends, and had found a way to
+satisfy the friends of Ledwith and the government at the same time.
+Well, it was a long lane that had no turning, and Arthur swore that he
+would find the turning which would undo Quincy Livingstone.
+
+
+
+
+AN ESCAPED NUN.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+JUDY VISITS THE POPE.
+
+
+He used the leisure of the voyage to review recent events, and to
+measure his own progress. For the first time since his calamity he had
+lost sight of himself in this poetic enterprise of Ledwith's, successful
+beyond all expectation. In this life of intrigue against the injustice
+of power, this endless struggle to shake the grip of the master on the
+slave, he found an intoxication. Though many plans had come to nothing,
+and the prison had swallowed a thousand victims, the game was worth the
+danger and the failure. In the Fenian uprising the proud rulers had lost
+sleep and comfort, and the world had raised its languid eyes for a
+moment to study events in Ireland. Even the slave can stir the selfish
+to interest by a determined blow at his masters. In his former existence
+very far had been from him this glorious career, though honors lay in
+wait for an Endicott who took to statecraft. Shallow Horace, sprung from
+statesman, had found public life a bore. This feeling had saved him
+perhaps from the fate of Livingstone, who in his snail-shell could see
+no other America than a monstrous reproduction of Plymouth colony.
+
+He had learned at last that his dear country was made for the human
+race. God had guided the little ones of the nations, wretched but hardy,
+to the land, the only land on earth, where dreams so often come true.
+Like the waves they surged upon the American shore. With ax and shovel
+and plow, with sweat of labor and pain, they fought the wilderness and
+bought a foothold in the new commonwealth. What great luck that his exit
+from the old life should prove to be his entrance into the very heart of
+a simple multitude flying from the greed and stupidity of the decadent
+aristocracy of Europe! What fitness that he, child of a race which had
+triumphantly fought injustice, poverty, Indian, and wilderness, should
+now be leader for a people who had fled from injustice at home only to
+begin a new struggle with plotters like Livingstone, foolish
+representative of the caste-system of the old world.
+
+Sonia Westfield, by strange fatality, was aboard with her child and Aunt
+Lois. Her presence, when first they came face to face, startled him; not
+the event, but the littleness of the great earth; that his hatred and
+her crime could not keep them farther apart. The Endicott in him rose up
+for a moment at the sight of her, and to his horror even sighed for her:
+this Endicott, who for a twelvemonth had been so submerged under the new
+personality that Dillon had hardly thought of him. He sighed for her!
+Her beauty still pinched him, and the memory of the first enchantment
+had not faded from the mind of the poor ghost. It mouthed in anger at
+the master who had destroyed it, who mocked at it now bitterly: you are
+the husband of Sonia Westfield, and the father of her fraudulent child;
+go to them as you desire. But the phantom fled humiliated, while Dillon
+remained horror-shaken by that passing fancy of the Endicott to take up
+the dream of youth again. Could he by any fatality descend to this
+shame? Her presence did not arouse his anger or his dread, hardly his
+curiosity. He kept out of her way as much as possible, yet more than
+once they met; but only at the last did the vague inquiry in her face
+indicate that memory had impressions of him.
+
+Often he studied her from afar, when she sat deep in thought with her
+lovely eyes ... how he had loved them ... melting, damnable, false eyes
+fixed on the sea. He wondered how she bore her misery, of which not a
+sign showed on the velvet face. Did she rage at the depths of that sea
+which in an instant had engulfed her fool-husband and his fortune? The
+same sea now mocked her, laughed at her rage, bearing on its bosom the
+mystery which she struggled to steal from time. No one could punish this
+creature like herself. She bore her executioner about with her, Aunt
+Lois, evidently returning home to die. That death would complete the
+ruin of Sonia, and over the grave she would learn once for all how well
+her iniquity had been known, how the lost husband had risen from his
+darkness to accuse her, how little her latest crime would avail her.
+What a dull fool Horace Endicott had been over a woman suspected of her
+own world! Her beauty would have kept him a fool forever, had she been
+less beastly in her pleasures. And this Endicott, down in the depths,
+sighed for her still!
+
+But Arthur Dillon saw her in another light, as an unclean beast from
+sin's wilderness, in the light that shone from Honora Ledwith. Messalina
+cowered under the halo of Beatrice! When that light shone full upon her,
+Sonia looked to his eye like a painted Phryne surprised by the daylight.
+Her corruption showed through her beauty. Honora! Incomparable woman!
+dear lady of whiteness! pure heart that shut out earthly love, while God
+was to be served, or men suffered, or her country bled, or her father
+lived! The thought of her purified him. He had not truly known his dear
+mother till now; when he knew her in Honora, in old Martha, in charming
+Mona, in Mary Everard, in clever Anne Dillon. These women would bless
+his life hereafter. They refreshed him in mind and heart. It began to
+dawn upon him that his place in life was fixed, that he would never go
+back even though he might do so with honor, his shame remaining unknown.
+It was mere justice that the wretched past should be in a grave, doomed
+never to see the light of resurrection.
+
+His mother and her party shared the journey with him. The delay of
+Ledwith's trial had enabled them to make the short tour on the
+Continent, and catch his steamer. Anne was utterly vexed with him that
+Ledwith had not escaped the prison. Her plain irritation gave Judy deep
+content.
+
+"She needs something to pull her down," was her comment to Arthur, "or
+she'll fly off the earth with the lightness of her head. My, my, but the
+airs of her since she laid out the ambassador, an' talked to the Pope!
+She can hardly spake at all now wid the grandher! Whin Father Phil ... I
+never can call him Mounsinnyory ... an', be the way, for years wasn't I
+callin' him Morrisania be mistake, an' the dear man never corrected me
+wanst ... but I learned the difference over in Rome ... where was I?...
+whin Father Phil kem back from Rome he gev us a grand lecther on what he
+saw, an' he talked for two hours like an angel. But Anne Dillon can on'y
+shut her eyes, an' dhrop her head whin ye ask her a single question
+about it. Faith, I dinno if she'll ever get over it. Isn't that quare
+now?"
+
+"Very," Arthur answered, "but give her time. So you saw the Pope?"
+
+"Faith, I did, an' it surprised me a gra'dale to find out that he was a
+dago, God forgi' me for sayin' as much. I was tould be wan o' the
+Mounsinnyory that he was pure Italian. 'No,' sez I, 'the Pope may be
+Rooshin or German, though I don't belave he's aither, but he's not
+Italian. If he wor, he'd have the blessed sinse to hide it, for fear the
+Irish 'ud lave the Church whin they found it out.'"
+
+"What blood do you think there's in him?" said Arthur.
+
+"He looked so lovely sittin' there whin we wint in that me sivin sinses
+left me, an' I cudn't rightly mek up me mind afterwards. Thin I was so
+taken up wid Mrs. Dillon," and Judy laughed softly, "that I was
+bothered. But I know the Pope's not a dago, anny more than he's a
+naygur. I put him down in me own mind as a Roman, no more an' no less."
+
+"That's a safe guess," said Arthur; "and you still have the choice of
+his being a Sicilian, a Venetian, or a Neapolitan."
+
+"Unless," said the old lady cautiously, "he comes of the same stock as
+Our Lord Himself."
+
+"Which would make him a Jew," Arthur smoothly remarked.
+
+"God forgive ye, Artie! G'long wid ye! If Our Lord was a Jew he was the
+first an' last an' on'y wan of his kind."
+
+"And that's true too. And how did you come to see the Pope so easy, and
+it in the summer time?"
+
+The expressive grin covered Judy's face as with comic sunshine.
+
+"I dunno," she answered. "If Anne Dillon made up her mind to be Impress
+of France, I dunno annythin' nor anny wan that cud hould her back; an'
+perhaps the on'y thing that kep' her from tryin' to be Impress was that
+the Frinch had an Impress already. I know they had, because I heard her
+ladyship lamentin', whin we wor in Paris, that she didn't get a letther
+of introduction to the Impress from Lady Skibbereen. She had anny number
+of letthers to the Pope. I suppose that's how we all got in, for I wint
+too, an' the three of us looked like sisters of mercy, dhressed in black
+wid veils on our heads. Whin we dhruv up to the palace, her ladyship gev
+a screech. 'Mother of heaven,' says she, 'but I forgot me permit, an'
+we can't get in to see his Holiness.' We sarched all her pockets, but
+found on'y the square bit o' paper, a milliner's bill, that she tuk for
+the permit be mistake. 'Well, this'll have to do,' says she. Says I,
+'Wud ye insult the Pope be shakin' a milliner's bill in his face as ye
+go in the dure?' She never answered me, but walked in an' presented her
+bill to a Mounsinnyory----"
+
+"What's that?" Arthur asked. "I was never in Rome."
+
+"Somethin' like the man that takes the tickets at the theayter, ou'y
+he's a priest, an' looks like a bishop, but he cuts more capers than ten
+bishops in wan. He never opened the paper--faith, if he had, there'd be
+the fine surprise--so we wint in. I knew the Pope the minnit I set eyes
+on him, the heavenly man. Oh, but I'd like to be as sure o' savin' me
+soul as that darlin' saint. His eyes looked as if they saw heaven every
+night an' mornin'. We dhropped on our knees, while the talkin' was goin'
+on, an' if I wasn't so frikened at bein' near heaven itself, I'd a died
+listenin' to her ladyship tellin' the Pope in French--in French, d'ye
+mind?--how much she thought of him an' how much she was goin' to spind
+on him while she was in Rome. 'God forgive ye, Anne Dillon,' says I to
+meself, 'but ye might betther spind yer money an' never let an.' She med
+quite free wid him, an' he talked back like a father, an' blessed us
+twinty times. I dinno how I wint in or how I kem out. I was like a top,
+spinnin' an' spinnin'. Things went round all the way home, so that I
+didn't dar say a word for fear herself might think I had been drinkin'.
+So that's how we saw the Pope. Ye can see now the terrible determination
+of Anne Dillon, though she was the weeniest wan o' the family."
+
+In the early morning the steamer entered the lower bay, picking up Doyle
+Grahame from a tug which had wandered about for hours, not in search of
+news, but on the scent for beautiful Mona. He routed out the Dillon
+party in short order.
+
+"What's up?" Arthur asked sleepily. "Are you here as a reporter----"
+
+"As a lover," Grahame corrected, with heaving chest and flashing eyes.
+"The crowd that will gather to receive you on the dock may have many
+dignitaries, but I am the only lover. That's why I am here. If I stayed
+with the crowd, Everard, who hates me almost, would have taken pains to
+shut me out from even a plain how-de-do with my goddess."
+
+"I see. It's rather early for a goddess, but no doubt she will oblige.
+You mentioned a crowd on the dock to receive us. What crowd?"
+
+"Your mother," said Doyle, "is a wonderful woman. I have often
+speculated on the absence of a like ability in her son."
+
+"Nature is kind. Wait till I'm as old as she is," said the son.
+
+"The crowd awaits her to do her honor. The common travelers _will land_
+this morning, glad to set foot on solid ground again. Mrs. Montgomery
+Dillon and her party are the only personages that _will arrive from
+Europe_. The crowd gathers to meet, not the passengers who merely land,
+but the personages who arrive from Europe."
+
+"Nice distinction. And who is the crowd?"
+
+"Monsignor O'Donnell----"
+
+"A very old and dear friend----"
+
+"Who hopes to build his cathedral with her help. The Senator----"
+
+"Representing the Dillon clan."
+
+"Who did not dare absent himself, and hopes for more inspiration like
+that which took him out of the ring and made him a great man.
+Vandervelt."
+
+"Well, he, of course, is purely disinterested."
+
+"Didn't she inform him of her triumph over Livingstone in London? And
+isn't he to be the next ambassador, and more power to him?"
+
+"And John Everard of course."
+
+"To greet his daughter, and to prevent your humble servant from kissing
+the same," and he sighed with pleasure and triumph. "Where is she? Shall
+I have long to wait? Is she changed?"
+
+"Ask her brother," with a nod for the upper berth where Louis slept
+serenely.
+
+"And of course you have news?"
+
+"Loads of it. I have arranged for a breakfast and a talk after the
+arrival is finished. There'll be more to eat than the steak."
+
+The steamer swung to the pier some hours later, and Arthur walked
+ashore to the music of a band which played decorously the popular
+strains for a popular hero returning crowned with glory. His mother
+arrived as became the late guest of the Irish nobility. Grahame handed
+Mona into her father's arms with an exasperating gesture, and then
+plunged into his note-book, as if he did not care. The surprised
+passengers wondered what hidden greatness had traveled with them across
+the sea. On the deck Sonia watched the scene with dull interest, for
+some one had murmured something about a notorious Fenian getting back
+home to his kind. Arthur saw her get into a cab with her party a few
+minutes later and drive away. A sadness fell upon him, the bitterness
+which follows the fading of our human dreams before the strong light of
+day.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+LA BELLE COLETTE.
+
+
+After the situation had been discussed over the breakfast for ten
+minutes Arthur understood the mournful expression of the Senator, whose
+gaiety lapsed at intervals when bitterness got the better of him.
+
+"The boys--the whole town is raving about you, Artie," said he with
+pride, "over the way you managed that affair of Ledwith's. There'll be
+nothing too good for you this year, if you work all the points of the
+game--if you follow good advice, I mean. You've got Livingstone in a
+corner. When this cruel war is over, and it is over for the
+Fenians--they've had enough, God knows--it ought to be commencing for
+the Honorable Quincy Livingstone."
+
+"You make too much of it, Senator," Grahame responded. "We know what's
+back of these attacks on you and others. It's this way, Arthur: the
+Senator and I have been working hard for the American citizens in
+English jails, Fenians of course, and the Livingstone crowd have hit
+back at us hard. The Senator, as the biggest man in sight, got hit
+hardest."
+
+"What they say of me is true, though. That's what hurts."
+
+"Except that they leave out the man whom every one admires for his good
+sense, generous heart, and great success," Arthur said to console him.
+
+"Of course one doesn't like to have the sins of his youth advertised for
+two civilizations," Grahame continued. "One must consider the source of
+this abuse however. They are clever men who write against us, but to
+know them is not to admire them. Bitterkin of the _Post_ has his brain,
+stomach, and heart stowed away in a single sack under his liver, which
+is very torpid, and his stomach is always sour. His blood is three parts
+water from the Boyne, his food is English, his clothes are a very bad
+fit, and his whiskers are so hard they dull the scissors. He loves
+America when he can forget that Irish and other foreign vermin inhabit
+it, otherwise he detests it. He loves England until he remembers that he
+can't live in it. The other fellow, Smallish, writes beautiful English,
+and lives on the old clothes of the nobility. Now who would mourn over
+the diatribes of such cats?"
+
+The Senator had to laugh at the description despite his sadness.
+
+"This is only one symptom of the trouble that's brewing. There's no use
+in hiding the fact that things are looking bad. Since the Fenian scheme
+went to pieces, the rats have left their holes. The Irish are
+demoralized everywhere, fighting themselves as usual after a collapse,
+and their enemies are quoting them against one another. Here in New York
+the hired bravos of the press are in the pay of the Livingstone crowd,
+or of the British secret service. What can you expect?"
+
+"How long will it last? What is doing against it?" said Arthur.
+
+"Ask me easier questions. Anyway, I'm only consoling the Senator for the
+hard knocks he's getting for the sake of old Ireland. Cheer up,
+Senator."
+
+"Even when Fritters made his bow," said the mournful Senator, "they made
+game of me," and the tears rose to his eyes. Arthur felt a secret rage
+at this grief.
+
+"You heard of Fritters?" and Arthur nodded. "He arrived, and the
+Columbia College crowd started him off with a grand banquet. He's an
+Oxford historian with a new recipe for cooking history. The Columbia
+professor who stood sponsor for him at the banquet told the world that
+Fritters would show how English government worked among the Irish, and
+how impossible is the Anglo-Saxon idea among peoples in whom barbarism
+does not die with the appearance and advance of civilization. He touched
+up the elegant parades and genial shindys of St. Patrick's Day as
+'inexplicable dumb shows and noise,'--see Hamlet's address to the
+players--and hoped the banks of our glorious Hudson would never witness
+the bloody rows peculiar to the banks of the immortal Boyne. Then he
+dragged in the Senator."
+
+"What's his little game?" Arthur asked.
+
+"Scientific ridicule ... the press plays to the galleries, and Fritters
+to the boxes ... it's a part of the general scheme ... I tell you
+there's going to be fun galore this winter ... and the man in London is
+at the root of the deviltry."
+
+"What's to be done?"
+
+"If we only knew," the Senator groaned. "If we could only get them under
+our fists, in a fair and square tussle!"
+
+"I think the hinge of the Livingstone plan is Sister Claire, the escaped
+nun," Grahame said thoughtfully. "She's the star of the combination,
+appeals to the true blue church-member with descriptions of the horrors
+of convents. Her book is out, and you'll find a copy waiting for you at
+home. Dime novels are prayer-books beside it. French novels are virtuous
+compared with it. It is raising an awful row. On the strength of it
+McMeeter has begun an enterprise for the relief of imprisoned nuns--to
+rescue them--house them for a time, and see them safely married. Sister
+Claire is to be matron of the house of escaped nuns. No one doubts her
+experience. Now isn't that McMeeter all over? But see the book, the
+_Confessions of an Escaped Nun_."
+
+"You think she's the hinge of the great scheme?"
+
+"She has the public eye and ear," said Grahame, thinking out his own
+theory as he talked. "Her book is the book of the hour ... reviewed by
+the press ... the theme of pulpits ... the text of speeches galore ...
+common workmen thump one another over it at the bench. Now all the
+others, Bradford, Fritters, the Columbia professors, Bitterkin and his
+followers, seem to play second to her book. They keep away from her
+society, yet her strongest backing is from them. You know what I mean.
+It has occurred to me that if we got her history ... it must be pretty
+savory ... and printed it ... traced her connection with the Livingstone
+crowd ... it would be quite a black eye for the Honorable Quincy."
+
+"By George, but you've struck it," cried Arthur waking up to the
+situation. "If she's the hinge, she's the party to strike at. Tell me,
+what became of Curran?"
+
+"Lucky thought," shouted Grahame. "He's in town yet. The very man for
+us."
+
+"I'm going to have it out with Livingstone," said Arthur, with a clear
+vision of an English prison and the patient woman who watched its walls
+from a window in the town. "In fact, I _must_ have it out with
+Livingstone. He's good game, and I'd like to bring him back from England
+in a bag. Perhaps Sister Claire may be able to provide the bag."
+
+"Hands on it," said Grahame, and they touched palms over the table,
+while the Senator broke into smiles. He had unlimited faith in his
+nephew.
+
+"Lord Conny gave me an outline of Livingstone's program before I left.
+He's worried over the effect it's going to have on his alliance scheme,
+and he cursed the Minister sincerely. He'll help us. Let's begin with
+Sister Claire in the hope of bagging the whole crowd. Let Curran hunt up
+her history. Above all let him get evidence that Livingstone provides
+the money for her enterprise."
+
+Having come to a conclusion on this important matter, they dropped into
+more personal topics.
+
+"Strangely enough," said Grahame cheerfully, "my own destiny is mixed up
+with this whole business. The bulwark of Livingstone in one quarter is
+John Everard. I am wooing, in the hope of winning, my future
+father-in-law."
+
+"He's very dead," the Senator thought.
+
+"The art of wooing a father-in-law!--what an art!" murmured Grahame.
+"The mother-in-law is easy. She wishes her daughter married. Papa
+doesn't. At least in this case, with a girl like Mona."
+
+"Has Everard anything against you?"
+
+"A whole litany of crimes."
+
+"What's wrong with Everard?"
+
+"He was born the night of the first big wind, and he has had it in for
+the whole world ever since. He's perverse. Nothing but another big wind
+will turn him round."
+
+Seeing Arthur puzzled over these allusions, Grahame explained.
+
+"Think of such a man having children like the twins, little lumps of
+sweetness ... like Louis ... heavens! if I live to be the father of such
+a boy, life will be complete ... like my Mona ... oh!"
+
+He stalked about the room throwing himself into poses of ecstasy and
+adoration before an imaginary goddess to the delight of the Senator.
+
+"I've been there myself," Arthur commented unmoved. "To the question:
+how do you hope to woo and win Everard?"
+
+"First, by my book. It's the story of just such a fool as he: a chap who
+wears the American flag in bed and waves it at his meals, as a nightgown
+and a napkin; then, he is a religious man of the kind that finds no
+religion to his liking, and would start one of his own if he thought it
+would pay; finally, he is a purist in politics, believes in blue glass,
+drinks ten glasses of filtered water a day, which makes him as blue as
+the glass, wears paper collars, and won't let his son be a monk because
+there are too many in the world. Now, Everard will laugh himself weak
+over this character. He's so perverse that he will never see himself in
+the mirror which I have provided."
+
+"Rather risky, I should think."
+
+"But that's not all," Grahame went on, "since you are kind enough to
+listen. I'm going to wave the American flag, eat it, sing it, for the
+next year, myself. Attend: the descendants of the Pilgrim Fathers are
+going to sit on what is left of Plymouth Rock next spring, and make
+speeches and read poems, and eat banquets. I am to be invited to sing,
+to read the poem. Vandervelt is to see to that. Think of it, a wild
+Irishman, an exile, a conspirator against the British Crown, a subject
+of the Pope, reading or singing the praises of the pilgrims, the grim
+pilgrims. Turn in your grave, Cotton Mather, as my melodious verses
+harrow your ears."
+
+"Will that impress John Everard?"
+
+"Or give him a fatal fit. The book and the poem ought to do the
+business. He can't resist. 'Never was Everard in this humor wooed, never
+was Everard in this humor won.' Oh, that Shakespeare had known an
+Everard, and embalmed him like a fly in the everlasting amber of his
+verse. But should these things fail, I have another matter. While
+Everard rips up Church and priest and doctrine at his pleasure, he has
+one devotion which none may take liberties with. He swears by the nuns.
+He is foaming at the mouth over the injury and insult offered them by
+the _Confessions_ of Sister Claire. We expose this clever woman. Picture
+me, then, the despised suitor, after having pleased him by my book, and
+astounded him with my poem, and mesmerized him with the exposure of
+Claire, standing before him with silent lips but eyes speaking: I want
+your daughter. Can even this perverse man deny me? Don't you think I
+have a chance?"
+
+"Not with Everard," said the Senator solemnly. "He's simply coke."
+
+"You should write a book, Doyle, on the art of wooing a father-in-law,
+and explain what you have left out here: how to get away with the dog."
+
+"Before marriage," said the ready wit, "the girl looks after the dog;
+after marriage the dog can be trained to bite the father-in-law."
+
+Arthur found the _Confessions of an Escaped Nun_ interesting reading
+from many points of view, and spent the next three days analyzing the
+book of the hour. His sympathy for convent life equaled his
+understanding of it. He had come to understand and like Sister Mary
+Magdalene, in spite of a prejudice against her costume; but the motive
+and spirit of the life she led were as yet beyond him. Nevertheless, he
+could see how earnestly the _Confessions_ lied about what it pretended
+to expose. The smell of the indecent and venal informer exhaled from the
+pages. The vital feature, however, lay in the revelation of Sister
+Claire's character, between the lines. Beneath the vulgarity and
+obscenity, poorly veiled in a mock-modest verbiage, pulsated a burning
+sensuality reaching the horror of mania. A well-set trap would have easy
+work in catching the feet of a woman related to the nymphs. Small wonder
+that the Livingstone party kept her afar off from their perfumed and
+reputable society while she did her nasty work. The book must have been
+oil to that conflagration raging among the Irish. The abuse of the
+press, the criticism of their friends, the reproaches of their own, the
+hostility of the government, the rage and grief at the failure of their
+hopes, the plans to annoy and cripple them, scorched indeed their
+sensitive natures; but the book of the Escaped Nun, defiling their holy
+ones so shamelessly, ate like acid into their hearts. Louis came in,
+when he had completed his analysis of the volume, and begun to think up
+a plan of action. The lad fingered the book gingerly, and said timidly:
+
+"I'm going to see ... I have an appointment with this terrible woman
+for to-morrow afternoon. In fact, I saw her this morning. I went to her
+office with Sister Mary Magdalen."
+
+"Of course the good Sister has a scheme to convert the poor thing!"
+Arthur said lightly, concealing his delight and surprise under a
+pretense of indifference.
+
+"Well, yes," and the lad laughed and blushed. "And she may succeed too.
+The greater the sin the deeper the repentance. The unfortunate
+woman----"
+
+"Who is making a fortune on her book by the way----"
+
+"----received us very kindly. Sister Magdalen had been corresponding with
+her. She wept in admitting that her fall seemed beyond hope. She felt so
+tangled in her own sins that she knew no way to get out of them. Really,
+she _was_ so sincere. When we were leaving she begged me to call again,
+and as I have to return to the seminary Monday I named to-morrow
+afternoon."
+
+"You may then have the honor of converting her."
+
+"It would be an honor," Louis replied stoutly.
+
+"Try it," said Arthur after thinking the matter over. "I know what force
+_your_ arguments will have with her. And if you don't object I'll stay
+... by the way, where is her office?"
+
+"In a quiet business building on Bleecker Street, near Broadway."
+
+"If you don't mind I'll stay outside in the hall, and rush in to act as
+altar-boy, when she agrees to 'vert."
+
+"I'm going for all your ridicule, Arthur."
+
+"No objection, but keep a cool head, and bear in mind that I am in the
+hall outside."
+
+He suspected the motive of Sister Claire, both in making this
+appointment, and in playing at conversion with Sister Magdalen. Perhaps
+it might prove the right sort of trap for her cunning feet. He doubted
+the propriety of exposing Louis to the fangs of the beast, and for a
+moment he thought to warn him of the danger. But he had no right to
+interfere in Sister Magdalen's affair, and if a beginning had to be made
+this adventure could be used effectively. He forgot the affair within
+the hour, in the business of hunting up Curran.
+
+He had a double reason for seeking the detective. Besides the task of
+ferreting out the record of Sister Claire, he wished to get news of the
+Endicotts. Aunt Lois had slipped out of life two days after her return
+from Europe. The one heart that loved him truly beat for him no more. By
+this time her vengeance must have fallen, and Sonia, learning the full
+extent of her punishment, must now be writhing under a second
+humiliation and disappointment. He did not care to see her anguish, but
+he did care to hear of the new effort that would undoubtedly be made to
+find the lost husband. Curran would know. He met him that afternoon on
+the street near his own house.
+
+"Yes, I'm back in the old business," he said proudly; "the trip home so
+freshened me that I feel like myself again. Besides, I have my own home,
+here it is, and my wife lives with me. Perhaps you have heard of her, La
+Belle Colette."
+
+"And seen her too ... a beautiful and artistic dancer."
+
+"You must come in now and meet her. She is a trifle wild, you know, and
+once she took to drink; but she's a fine girl, a real good fellow, and
+worth twenty like me. Come right in, and we'll talk business later."
+
+La Belle Colette! The dancer at a cheap seaside resort! The wild
+creature who drank and did things! This shrewd, hard fellow, who faced
+death as others faced a wind, was deeply in love and happy in her
+companionship. What standard of womanhood and wifehood remained to such
+men? However, his wonder ceased when he had bowed to La Belle Colette in
+her own parlor, heard her sweet voice, and looked into the most
+entrancing eyes ever owned by a woman, soft, fiery, tender, glad, candid
+eyes. He recalled the dancer, leaping like a flame about the stage. In
+the plainer home garments he recognized the grace, quickness, and gaiety
+of the artist. Her charm won him at once, the spell which her rare kind
+have ever been able to cast about the hearts of men. He understood why
+the flinty detective should be in love with his wife at times, but not
+why he should continue in that state. She served them with wine and
+cigars, rolled a cigarette for herself, chatted with the ease and
+chumminess of a good fellow, and treated Arthur with tenderness.
+
+"Richard has told me so much of you," she explained.
+
+"I have so admired your exquisite art," he replied, "that we are already
+friends."
+
+"Que vous etes bien gentil," she murmured, and her tone would have
+caressed the wrinkles out of the heart of old age.
+
+"Yes, I'm back at the old game," said Curran, when they got away from
+pleasantry. "I'm chasing after Tom Jones. It's more desperate than ever.
+His old aunt died some days back, and left Tom's wife a dollar, and
+Tom's son another dollar."
+
+"I can fancy her," said Colette with a laugh, "repeating to herself that
+magic phrase, two dollars, for hours and hours. Hereafter she will get
+weak at sight of the figure two, and things that go in twos, like
+married people, she will hate."
+
+"How easy to see that you are French, Colette," said Arthur, as a
+compliment. She threw him a kiss from her pretty fingers, and gave a
+sidelong look at Curran.
+
+"There's a devil in her," Arthur thought.
+
+"The will was very correct and very sound," resumed the detective. "No
+hope in a contest if they thought of such a thing among the West ... the
+Jones'. The heirs took pity on her, and gave her a lump for consolation.
+She took it and cursed them for their kindness. Her rage was something
+to see. She is going to use that lump, somewhere about twenty-five
+thousand, I think, to find her accursed Tom. How do I know? That's part
+of the prize for me if I catch up with Tom Jones within three years. And
+I draw a salary and expenses all the time. You should have seen Mrs. Tom
+the day I went to see her. Colette," with a smile for his wife, "your
+worst trouble with a manager was a summer breeze to it. You're a
+white-winged angel in your tempers compared with Mrs. Tom Jones. Her
+language concerning the aunt and the vanished nephew was wonderful. I
+tried to remember it, and I couldn't."
+
+"I can see her, I can feel with her," cried La Belle Colette, jumping to
+her feet, and rushing through a pantomime of fiendish rage, which made
+the men laugh to exhaustion. As she sat down she said with emphasis,
+"She must find him, and through you. I shall help, and so will our
+friend Dillon. It's an outrage for any man to leave a woman in such a
+scrape ... for a mere trifle."
+
+"She has her consolations," said the detective; "but the devil in her is
+not good-natured like the devil in you, Colette. She wants to get hold
+of Tom and cut him in little bits for what he has made her suffer."
+
+"Did you get out any plans?" said Arthur.
+
+"One. Look for him between here and Boston. That's my wife's idea. Tom
+Jones was not clever, but she says ... Say it yourself, my dear."
+
+"Rage and disappointment, or any other strong feeling," said the woman
+sharply, with strong puffs at her cigarette, "turns a fool into a wise
+man for a minute. It would be just like this fool to have a brilliant
+interval while he dreamed of murdering his clever wife. Then he hit upon
+a scheme to cheat the detectives. It's easy, if you know how stupid they
+are, except Dick. Tom Jones is here, on his own soil. He was not going
+to run away with a million and try to spend it in the desert of Sahara.
+He's here, or in Boston, enjoying the sight of his wife stewing in
+poverty. It would be just like the sneak to do her that turn."
+
+She looked wickedly at Arthur. What a face! Thin, broad, yet finely
+proportioned, with short, flaxen locks framing it, delicate eyebrows
+marking the brow and emphasizing the beautiful eyes. A woman to be
+feared, an evil spirit in some of her moods.
+
+"You tried the same plan," Arthur began----
+
+"But he had no partner to sharpen his wits," she interrupted. Arthur
+bowed.
+
+"That makes all the difference in the world," he said sincerely. "Let me
+hope that you will give your husband some hints in a case which I am
+going to give him."
+
+He described the career of Sister Claire briefly, and expressed the wish
+to learn as much as possible of her earlier history. The Currans
+laughed.
+
+"I had that job before," said the detective. "If the Jones case were
+only half a hundred times harder I might be happy. Her past is unknown
+except that she has been put out of many convents. I never looked up her
+birthplace or her relatives. Her name is Kate Kerrigan along with ten
+other names. She drinks a little, and just now holds a fine stake in New
+York ... There's the whole of it."
+
+"Not much to build upon, if one wished to worry Claire, or other
+people."
+
+"Depend upon it," Colette broke in, "that Kate Kerrigan has a pretty
+history behind her. I'll bet she was an actress once. I've seen her
+stage poses ... then her name, catchy ... and the way she rolls her eyes
+and looks at that congregation of elders, and deacons and female saints,
+when she sets them shivering over the nastiness that's coming."
+
+Curran glanced at her with a look of inquiry. She sat on the window-sill
+like a bird, watching the street without, half listening to the men
+within. Arthur made a close study of the weird creature, sure that a
+strain of madness ran in her blood. Her looks and acts had the grace of
+a wild nature, which purrs, and kills, and purrs again. Quiet and dreamy
+this hour, in her dances she seemed half mad with vitality.
+
+"Tell him what you learned about her," said Curran, and then to Arthur,
+"She can do a little work herself, and likes it."
+
+"To hunt a poor soul down, never!" she cried. "But when a mean thing is
+hiding what every one has a right to know, I like to tear the truth out
+of her ... like your case of Tom Jones. Sister Claire is downright mean.
+Maybe she can't help it. But I know the nuns, and they're God's own
+children. She knows it too, but, just for the sake of money, she's lying
+night and day against them, and against her own conscience. There's a
+devil in her. I could do a thing like that for deviltry, and I could
+pull a load of money out of her backers, not for the money, but for
+deviltry too, to skin a miser like McMeeter, and a dandy like Bradford.
+And she's just skinning them, to the last cent."
+
+She took a fit of laughing, then, over the embarrassment of Sister
+Claire's chief supporters.
+
+"Here's what I know about her," she went on. "The museum fakirs are
+worshiping her as a wonderful success. They seem to feel by instinct
+that she's one of themselves, but a genius. They have a lot of fairy
+stories about her, but here's the truth: Bishop Bradford and Erastus
+McMeeter are her backers. The Bishop plays high society for her, and the
+bawler looks after the mob. She gets fifty per cent. of everything, and
+they take all the risks. Her book, I know you read it, chock-full of
+lies, thrilling lies, for the brothers and the sisters who can't read
+French novels in public--well, she owns the whole thing and gets all
+the receipts except a beggar's ten per cent., thrown to the publishers
+... and they're the crack publishers of the town, the Hoppertons ... but
+all the same they dassent let their names go on the title-page ... they
+had that much shame ... so old Johnson, whom nobody knows, is printer
+and publisher. The book is selling like peanuts. There's more than one
+way of selling your soul to the devil."
+
+After this surprising remark, uttered without a smile, she looked out of
+the window sadly, while Curran chuckled with delight.
+
+"It takes the woman to measure the woman," he said. Arthur was delighted
+at this information.
+
+"I wish you would learn some more about her, Mrs. Curran."
+
+She mimicked the formal name in dumb show.
+
+"Well, La Belle Colette, then," he said laughing. She came over to him
+and sat on the arm of his chair, her beautiful eyes fixed on his with an
+expression well understood by both the men.
+
+"You are going to hunt that dreadful creature down," said she. "I won't
+help you. What do you know about her motives? She may have good reason
+for playing the part ... she may have suffered?"
+
+"One must protect his own," replied Arthur grimly.
+
+"What are we all but wolves that eat one another?--lambs by day, wolves
+in the night. We all play our part----"
+
+"All the world's a stage, of course----"
+
+"Even you are playing a part," with sudden violence. "I have studied
+you, young man, since you came in. Lemme read your palm, and tell you."
+
+She held his hand long, then tossed it aside with petulance, parted his
+hair and peered into his face, passed her hands lightly over his head
+for the prominences, dashed unexpected tears from her eyes, and then
+said with decision:
+
+"There are two of you in there," tapping his chest. "I can't tell why,
+but I can read, or feel one man, and outside I see another."
+
+"Your instinct is correct," said Arthur seriously. "I have long been
+aware of the same fact, peculiar and painful. But for a long time the
+outside man has had the advantage. Now with regard to this Sister
+Claire, not to change the subject too suddenly----"
+
+Colette deserted his chair, and went to her husband. She had lost
+interest in the matter and would not open her lips again. The men
+discussed the search for Endicott, and the inquiry into the history of
+Sister Claire, while the dancer grew drowsy after the fashion of a
+child, her eyes became misty, her red lips pouted, her voice drawled
+faint and complaining music in whispers, and Curran looked often and
+long at her while he talked. Arthur went away debating with himself. His
+mind had developed the habit of reminiscence. Colette reminded him of a
+face, which he had seen ... no, not a face but a voice ... or was it a
+manner?... or was it her look, which seemed intimate, as of earlier
+acquaintance?... what was it? It eluded him however. He felt happy and
+satisfied, now that he had set Curran on the track of the unclean
+beast.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+THE ESCAPED NUN.
+
+
+Sister Claire sat in her office the next afternoon awaiting Louis as the
+gorged spider awaits the fly, with desire indeed, but without anxiety.
+Her office consisted of three rooms, opening into one another within,
+each connected by doors with the hall without. A solemn youth kept guard
+in the antechamber, a bilious lad whose feverish imagination enshrined
+Sister Claire and McMeeter on the same altar, and fed its fires on the
+promises of the worthy pair some day to send him on a mission as
+glorious as their own. The furnishings had the severe simplicity of the
+convent. The brilliant costume of the woman riveted the eye by the very
+dulness of her surroundings. At close view her beauty seemed more
+spiritual than in her public appearances. The heavy eyebrows were a
+blemish indeed, but like a beauty-spot emphasized the melting eyes and
+the peachy skin.
+
+The creamy habit of the nun and the white coif about her head left only
+her oval face and her lovely hands visible; but what a revelation were
+these of loveliness and grace! One glance at her tender face and the
+little hands would have scattered to the winds the slanders of Colette.
+Success had thrilled but not coarsened the escaped nun. As Grahame had
+surmised, she was now the hinge of Livingstone's scheme. The success of
+her book and the popularity of her lectures, together with her discreet
+behavior, had given her immense influence with her supporters and with
+the leaders. Their money poured into her lap. She did not need it while
+her book sold and her lectures were crowded.
+
+The office saw come and go the most distinguished visitors. Even the
+English historian did not begin to compare with her in glory, and so far
+his lectures had not been well attended. Thinking of many things with
+deep pride, she remembered that adversity had divided the leisure of
+her table with prosperity. Hence, she could not help wondering how long
+this fine success would last. Her peculiar fate demanded an end to it
+sometime. As if in answer to her question, the solemn youth in the
+antechamber knocked at her door, and announced with decorum Mr. Richard
+Curran.
+
+"I have made the inquiries you wanted," Curran said, as he took a chair
+at her bidding. "Young Everard is a special pet of Dillon. This boy is
+the apple of his eye. And Everard, the father, is an ardent supporter of
+Livingstone. I think you had better drop this affair, if you would
+escape a tangle--a nasty tangle."
+
+"If the boy is willing, where's the tangle, Mr. Curran?" she answered
+placidly.
+
+"Well, you know more about the thing than I can tell you," he said, as
+if worried. "You know them all. But I can't help warning you against
+this Dillon. If you lay your hand on anything of his, I'm of opinion
+that this country will not be big enough for you and him at the same
+time."
+
+"I shall get him also, and that'll put an end to his enmity. He's a fine
+fellow. He's on my track, but you'll see how enchantment will put him
+off it. Now, don't grumble. I'll be as tender and sweet with the boy as
+a siren. You will come in only when I feel that the spell doesn't work.
+Rely on me to do the prudent thing."
+
+That he did not rely on her his expression showed clearly.
+
+"You have made a great hit in this city, Sister Claire," he began----
+
+"And you think I am about to ruin my chances of a fortune?" she
+interrupted. "Well, I am willing to take the risk, and you have nothing
+to say about it. You know your part. Go into the next room, and wait for
+your cue. I'll bet any sum that you'll never get the cue. If you do, be
+sure to make a quick entrance."
+
+He looked long at her and sighed, but made no pretense to move. She
+rose, and pointed to the third room of the suite. Sheepishly, moodily,
+in silent protest, he obeyed the gesture and went out humbly. Before
+that look the brave detective surrendered like a slave to his chains.
+The door had hardly closed behind him, when the office-boy solemnly
+announced Louis, and at a sign from Sister Claire ushered in the friend
+of Arthur Dillon. She received him with downcast eyes, standing at a
+little distance. With a whispered welcome and a drooping head, she
+pointed to a seat. Louis sat down nervous and overawed, wishing that he
+had never undertaken this impossible and depressing task. Who was he to
+be dealing with such a character as this dubious and disreputable woman?
+
+"I feared you would not come," she began in a very low tone. "I feared
+you would misunderstand ... what can one like you understand of sin and
+misery?... but thank Heaven for your courage ... I may yet owe to you my
+salvation!"
+
+"I was afraid," said the lad frankly, gladdened by her cunning words. "I
+don't know of what ... but I suppose it was distrust of myself. If I can
+be of any service to you how glad I shall be!"
+
+"Oh, you can, you can," she murmured, turning her beautiful eyes on him.
+Her voice failed her, and she had to struggle with her sobs.
+
+"What do you think I can do for you?" he asked, to relieve the suspense.
+
+"I shall tell you that later," she replied, and almost burst out
+laughing. "It will be simple and easy for you, but no one else can
+satisfy me. We are alone. I must tell you my story, that you may be the
+better able to understand the service which I shall ask of you. It is a
+short story, but terrible ... especially to one like you ... promise me
+that you will not shrink, that you will not despise me----"
+
+"I have no right to despise you," said Louis, catching his breath.
+
+She bowed her head to hide a smile, and appeared to be irresolute for a
+moment. Then with sudden, and even violent, resolve, she drew a chair to
+his side, and began the history of her wretched career. Her position was
+such, that to see her face he had to turn his head; but her delicate
+hands rested on the arm of his chair, clasped now, and again twisted
+with anguish, and then stretched out with upward palms appealing for
+pity, or drooping in despair. She could see his profile, and watch the
+growing uneasiness, the shame of innocence brought face to face with
+dirt unspeakable, the mortal terror of a pure boy in the presence of
+Phryne. With this sport Sister Claire had been long familiar.
+
+Her caressing voice and deep sorrow stripped the tale of half its
+vileness. At times her voice fell to a breath. Then she bent towards him
+humbly, and a perfume swept over him like a breeze from the tropics. The
+tale turned him to stone. Sister Claire undoubtedly drew upon her
+imagination and her reading for the facts, since it rarely falls to the
+lot of one woman to sound all the depths of depravity. Louis had little
+nonsense in his character. At first his horror urged him to fly from the
+place, but whenever the tale aroused this feeling in him, the cunning
+creature broke forth into a strain of penitence so sweet and touching
+that he had not the heart to desert her. At the last she fell upon her
+knees and buried her face in his lap, crying out:
+
+"If you do not hate me now ... after all this ... then take pity on me."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Arthur sauntered into the hall outside the office of Sister Claire about
+half-past four. He had forgotten the momentous interview which bid so
+fair to end in the conversion of the escaped nun; also his declaration
+to be within hailing distance in case of necessity. In a lucky moment,
+however, the thought of Sister Mary Magdalen and her rainbow enterprise,
+so foolish, so incredible, came to his mind, and sent him in haste to
+the rescue of his friend. Had Louis kept his engagement and received the
+vows and the confession of the audacious tool of Livingstone? No sound
+came from the office. It would hardly do for him to make inquiry.
+
+He observed that Sister Claire's office formed a suite of three rooms.
+The door of the first looked like the main entrance. It had the
+appearance of use, and within he heard the cough of the solemn
+office-boy. A faint murmur came from the second room. This must be the
+private sanctum of the spider; this murmur might be the spider's
+enchantment over the fly. What should the third room be? The trap? He
+turned the knob and entered swiftly and silently, much to the
+detective's surprise and his own.
+
+"I had no idea that door was unlocked," said Curran helplessly.
+
+"Nor I. Who's within? My friend, young Everard?"
+
+"Don't know. She shoved me in here to wait until some visitor departed.
+Then we are to consider a proposition I made her," said the calm
+detective.
+
+"So you have made a beginning? That's good. Don't stir. Perhaps it is as
+well that you are here. Let me discover who is in here with the good
+sister."
+
+"I can go to the first room, the front office, and inquire," said
+Curran.
+
+"Never mind."
+
+He could hear no words, only the low tones of the woman speaking; until
+of a sudden the strong, manly voice of Louis, but subdued by emotion,
+husky and uncertain, rose in answer to her passionate outburst.
+
+"He's inside ... my young man ... hopes to convert her," Arthur
+whispered to Curran, and they laughed together in silence. "Now I have
+my own suspicion as to her motive in luring the boy here. If he goes as
+he came, why I'm wrong perhaps. If there's a rumpus, I may have her
+little feet in the right sort of a trap, and so save you labor, and the
+rest of us money. If anything happens, Curran, leave the situation to
+me. I'm anxious for a close acquaintance with Sister Claire."
+
+Curran sat as comfortably, to the eye, as if in his own house
+entertaining his friend Dillon. The latter occasionally made the very
+natural reflection that this brave and skilful man lay in the trap of
+just such a creature as Sister Claire. Suddenly there came a burst of
+sound from the next room, exclamations, the hurrying of feet, the crash
+of a chair, and the trying of the doors. A frenzied hand shook the knob
+of the door at which Arthur was looking with a satisfied smile.
+
+"Locked in?" he said to Curran, who nodded in a dazed way.
+
+Then some kind of a struggle began on the other side of that door.
+Arthur stood there like a cat ready to pounce on the foolish mouse, and
+the detective glared at him like a surly dog eager to rend him, but
+afraid. They could hear smothered calls for help in a woman's voice.
+
+"If she knew how near the cat is," Arthur remarked patiently.
+
+At last the key clicked in the lock, the door half opened, and as Arthur
+pushed it inwards Sister Claire flung herself away from it, and gasped
+feebly for help. She was hanging like a tiger to Louis, who in a gentle
+way tried to shake her hands and arms from his neck. The young fellow's
+face bore the frightful look of a terrified child struggling for life
+against hopeless odds--mingled despair and pain. Arthur remained quietly
+in the entrance, and the detective glared over his shoulder warningly at
+Claire. At sight of the man who stood there, she would have shrieked in
+her horror and fright, but that sound died away in her throat. She
+loosened her grip, and stood staring a moment, then swiftly and
+meaningly began to arrange her disordered clothing. Louis made a dash
+for the door, seeing only a way of escape and not recognizing his
+friend. Arthur shook him.
+
+"Ah, you will go converting before your time," he said gayly.
+
+"Oh, Arthur, thank God----" the lad stammered.
+
+"Seize him," Claire began to shriek, very cautiously however. "Hold him,
+gentlemen. Get the police. He is an emissary of the papists----"
+
+"Let me go," Louis cried in anguish.
+
+"Steady all round," Arthur answered with a laugh. "Sister Claire, if you
+want the police raise your voice. One harlot more on the Island will not
+matter. Louis, get your nerve, man. Did I not tell you I would be in the
+hall? Go home, and leave me to deal with this perfect lady. Look after
+him," he flung at Curran, and closed the door on them, quite happy at
+the result of Sister Magdalen's scheme of conversion.
+
+He did not see the gesture from Curran which warned Sister Claire to
+make terms in a hurry with this dangerous young man. The fury stood at
+the far end of the office, burning with rage and uncertainty. Having
+fallen into her own trap, she knew not what to do. The situation had
+found its master. Arthur Dillon evidently took great pleasure in this
+climax of her making. He looked at her for a moment as one might at a
+wild animal of a new species. The room had been darkened so that one
+could not see distinctly. He knew that trick too. Her beauty improved
+upon acquaintance. For the second time her face reminded him that they
+had met before, and he considered the point for an instant. What did it
+matter just then? She had fallen into his hands, and must be disposed
+of. Pointing to a chair he sat down affably, his manner making his
+thought quite plain. She remained standing.
+
+"You may be very tired before our little talk is concluded----"
+
+"Am I to receive your insults as well as your agent's?" she interrupted.
+
+"Now, now, Sister Claire, this will never do. You have been acting" ...
+he looked at his watch ... "since four o'clock. The play is over. We are
+in real life again. Talk sense. Since Everard failed to convert you, and
+you to convert Everard, try the arts of Cleopatra on me. Or, let me
+convince you that you have made a blunder----"
+
+"I do not wish to listen you," she snapped. "I will not be insulted a
+second time."
+
+"Who could insult the author of the _Confessions_? You are beyond
+insult, Claire. I have read your book with the deepest interest. I have
+read you between every line, which cannot be said of most of your
+readers. I am not going to waste any words on you. I am going to give
+you an alternative, which will do duty until I find rope enough to hang
+you as high as Jack Sheppard. You know what you are, and so do I. The
+friends of this young man who fell so nicely into your claws will be
+anxious to keep his adventure with you very quiet."
+
+A light leaped into her eyes. She had feared that outside, in the hall,
+this man might have his hirelings ready to do her mischief, that some
+dreadful plot had come to a head which meant her ruin. Light began to
+dawn upon her. He laughed at her thoughts.
+
+"One does not care to make public an adventure with such a woman as
+you," said he affably. "A young man like that too. It would be fatal for
+him. Therefore, you are to say nothing about it. You are not eager to
+talk about your failure ... Cleopatra blushes for your failure ... but a
+heedless tongue and a bitter feeling often get the better of sense. If
+you remain silent, so shall I."
+
+"Very generous," she answered calmly, coming back to her natural
+coolness and audacity. "As you have all to lose, and I have all to gain
+by a description of the trap set for me by your unclean emissary, your
+proposition won't go. I shall place the matter before my friends, and
+before the public, when I find it agreeable."
+
+"When!" he mocked. "You know by this time that you are playing a losing
+game, Claire. If you don't know it, then you are not smart enough for
+the game. Apart from that, remember one thing: when you speak I shall
+whisper the truth to the excitable people whom your dirty book is
+harrying now."
+
+"I am not afraid of whispers, quite used to them in fact," she drawled,
+as if mimicking him.
+
+"I see you are not smart enough for the game," and the remark startled
+her. "You can see no possible results from that whisper. Did you ever
+hear of Jezebel and her fate? Oh, you recall how the dogs worried her
+bones, do you? So far your evil work has been confined to glittering
+generalities. To-day you took a new tack. Now you must answer to me. Let
+it once become known that you tried to defile the innocent, to work harm
+to one of mine, and you may suffer the fate of the unclean things to
+which you belong by nature. The mob kills without delicacy. It will tear
+you as the dogs tore the painted Jezebel."
+
+"You are threatening me," she stammered with a show of pride.
+
+"No. That would be a waste of time. I am warning you. You have still the
+form of a woman, therefore I give you a chance. You are at the end of
+your rope. Stretch it further, and it may become the noose to hang you.
+You have defiled with your touch one whom I love. He kept his innocence,
+so I let it pass. But a rat like you must be destroyed. Very soon too.
+We are not going to stand your abominations, even if men like
+Livingstone and Bradford encourage you. I am giving you a chance. What
+do you say? Have I your promise to be silent?"
+
+"You have," she replied brokenly.
+
+He looked at her surprised. The mask of her brazen audacity remained,
+but some feeling had overpowered her, and she began to weep like any
+woman in silent humiliation. He left her without a word, knowing enough
+of her sex to respect this inexplicable grief, and to wait for a more
+favorable time to improve his acquaintance. "Sonia's mate," he said to
+himself as he reached the street. The phrase never left him from that
+day, and became a prophecy of woe afterwards. He writhed as he saw how
+nearly the honor and happiness of Louis had fallen into the hands of
+this wretch. Protected by the great, she could fling her dirt upon the
+clean, and go unpunished. Sonia's mate! He had punished one creature of
+her kind, and with God's help he would yet lash the backs of Sister
+Claire and her supporters.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+AN ANXIOUS NIGHT.
+
+
+Curran caught up with him as he turned into Broadway. He had waited to
+learn if Arthur had any instructions, as he was now to return to Sister
+Claire's office and explain as he might the astounding appearance of
+Dillon at a critical moment.
+
+"She's a ripe one," Arthur said, smiling at thought of her collapse, but
+the next moment he frowned. "She's a devil, Curran, a handsome devil,
+and we must deal with her accordingly--stamp her out like a snake. Did
+you notice her?"
+
+"No doubt she's a bad one," Curran answered thickly, but Arthur's bitter
+words gave him a shiver, and he seemed to choke in his utterance.
+
+"Make any explanation you like, Curran. She will accuse you of letting
+me in perhaps. It looks like a trap, doesn't it? By the way, what became
+of the boy?"
+
+"He seemed pretty well broken up," the detective answered, "and sent me
+off as soon as he learned that I had him in charge. I told him that you
+had the whole business nicely in hand, and not to worry. He muttered
+something about going home. Anyway, he would have no more of me, and he
+went off quite steady, but looking rather queer, I thought."
+
+Arthur, with sudden anxiety, recalled that pitiful, hopeless look of the
+terrified child in Louis' face. Perhaps he had been too dazed to
+understand how completely Arthur had rescued him in the nick of time. To
+the lad's inexperience this cheap attempt of Claire to overcome his
+innocence by a modified badger game might have the aspect of a tragedy.
+Moreover, he remained ignorant of the farce into which it had been
+turned.
+
+"I am sorry you left him," he said, thoughtfully weighing the
+circumstances. "This creature threatened him, of course, with
+publicity, an attack on her honor by a papist emissary. He doesn't know
+how little she would dare such adventure now. He may run away in his
+fright, thinking that his shame may be printed in the papers, and that
+the police may be watching for him. Public disgrace means ruin for him,
+for, as you know, he is studying to be a priest."
+
+"I didn't know," Curran answered stupidly, a greenish pallor spreading
+over his face. "That kind of work won't bring her much luck."
+
+"It occurs to me now that he was too frightened to understand what my
+appearance meant, and what your words meant," Arthur resumed. "He may
+feel an added shame that we know about it. I must find him. Do you go at
+once to Sister Claire and settle your business with her. Then ride over
+to the Everards, and tell the lad, if he be there, that I wish to see
+him at once. If he has not yet got back, leave word with his mother ...
+keep a straight face while you talk with her ... to send him over to me
+as soon as he gets home. And tell her that if I meet him before he does
+get home, that I shall keep him with me all night. Do you see the point?
+If he has gone off in his fright, we have sixteen hours to find him. No
+one must know of his trouble, in that house at least, until he is safe.
+Do you think we can get on his trail right away, Curran?"
+
+"We must," Curran said harshly, "we must. Has he any money?"
+
+"Not enough to carry him far."
+
+"Then ten hours' search ought to capture him."
+
+"Report then to me at my residence within an hour. I have hopes that
+this search will not be needed, that you will find him at home. But be
+quicker than ever you were in your life, Curran. I'd go over to Cherry
+Street myself, but my inquiries would frighten the Everards. There must
+be no scandal."
+
+Strange that he had not foreseen this possibility. For him the escapade
+with the escaped nun would have been a joke, and he had not thought how
+differently Louis must have regarded it. If the lad had really fled, and
+his friends must learn of it, Sister Claire's share in the matter would
+have to remain a profound secret. With all their great love for this
+boy, his clan would rather have seen him borne to the grave than living
+under the shadow of scandal in connection with this vicious woman. Her
+perfidy would add disgrace to grief, and deepen their woe beyond time's
+power to heal.
+
+For with this people the prejudice against impurity was so nobly
+unreasonable that mere suspicion became equal to crime. This feeling
+intensified itself in regard to the priesthood. The innocence of Louis
+would not save him from lifelong reproach should his recent adventure
+finds its way into the sneering journals. Within the hour Curran, more
+anxious than Arthur himself, brought word that the lad had not yet
+reached home. His people were not worried, and promised to send him with
+speed to Arthur.
+
+"Begin your search then," said Arthur, "and report here every hour. I
+have an idea he may have gone to see an aunt of his, and I'll go there
+to find out. What is your plan?"
+
+"He has no money, and he'll want to go as far as he can, and where he
+won't be easily got at. He'll ship on an Indiaman. I'll set a few men to
+look after the outgoing ships as a beginning."
+
+"Secrecy above all things, understand," was the last admonition.
+
+Darkness had come on, and the clocks struck the hour of seven as Arthur
+set out for a visit to Sister Mary Magdalen. Possibly Louis had sought
+her to tell the story of failure and shame, the sad result of her
+foolish enterprise; and she had kept him to console him, to put him in
+shape before his return home, so that none might mark the traces of his
+frightful emotion. Alas, the good nun had not seen him since their visit
+to Claire's office in Bleecker Street the day before. He concealed from
+her the situation.
+
+"How in the name of Heaven," said he, "did you conceive this scheme of
+converting this woman?"
+
+"She has a soul to be saved, and it's quite saveable," answered the nun
+tartly. "The more hopeless from man's view, the more likely from God's.
+I have a taste for hopeless enterprises."
+
+"I wish you had left Louis out of this one," Arthur thought. "But to
+deal with a wretch like her, so notorious, so fallen," he said aloud,
+"you must have risked too much. Suppose, after you had entered her
+office, she had sent for a reporter to see you there, to see you leaving
+after kissing her, to hear a pretty story of an embassy from the
+archbishop to coax her back to religion; and the next morning a long
+account of this attempt on her resolution should appear in the papers?
+What would your superiors say?"
+
+"That could happen," she admitted with a shiver, "but I had her word
+that my visit was to be kept a secret."
+
+"Her word!" and he raised his hands.
+
+"Oh, I assure you the affair was arranged beforehand to the smallest
+detail," she declared. "Of course no one can trust a woman like that
+absolutely. But, as you see, in this case everything went off smoothly."
+
+"I see indeed," said Arthur too worried to smile.
+
+"I arranged the meeting through Miss Conyngham," the nun continued, "a
+very clever person for such work. I knew the danger of the enterprise,
+but the woman has a soul, and I thought if some one had the courage to
+take her by the hand and lead her out of her wicked life, she might do
+penance, and even become a saint. She received Miss Conyngham quite
+nicely indeed; and also my message that a helping hand was ready for her
+at any moment. She was afraid too of a trap; but at the last she begged
+to see me, and I went, with the consent of my superior."
+
+"And how did you come to mix Louis up in the thing?"
+
+"He happened to drop in as I was going, and I took him along. He was
+very much edified, we all were."
+
+"And he has been more edified since," observed Arthur, but the good nun
+missed the sarcasm.
+
+"She made open confession before the three of us," warming up at the
+memory of that scene. "With tears in her eyes she described her fall,
+her present remorse, her despair of the future, and her hope in us. Most
+remarkable scene I ever witnessed. I arranged for her to call at this
+convent whenever she could to plan for her return. She may be here any
+time. Oh, yes, I forgot. The most touching moment of all came at the
+last. When we were leaving she took Louis' hand, pressed it to her
+heart, kissed it with respect, and cried out: 'You happy soul, oh, keep
+the grace of God in your heart, hold to your high vocation through any
+torment: to lose it, to destroy it, as I destroyed mine, is to open wide
+the soul to devils.' Wasn't that beautiful now? Then she asked him in
+the name of God to call on her the next day, and he promised. He may be
+here to-night to tell me about it."
+
+"You say three. Was Edith Conyngham the third?"
+
+"Oh, no, only a sister of our community."
+
+He burst out laughing at the thought of the fox acting so cleverly
+before the three geese. Claire must have laughed herself into a fit when
+they had gone. He had now to put the Sister on her guard at the expense
+of her self-esteem. He tried to do so gently and considerately, fearing
+hysterics.
+
+"You put the boy in the grasp of the devil, I fear," he said. "Convert
+Sister Claire! You would better have turned your prayers on Satan! She
+got him alone this afternoon in her office, as you permitted, and made
+him a proposition, which she had in her mind from the minute she first
+saw him. I arrived in time to give her a shock, and to rescue him. Now
+we are looking for him to tell him he need not fear Sister Claire's
+threats to publish how he made an attack upon her virtue."
+
+"I do not quite understand," gasped Sister Magdalen stupefied. What
+Arthur thought considerate others might have named differently.
+Exasperation at the downright folly of the scheme, and its threatened
+results, may have actuated him. His explanation satisfied the nun, and
+her fine nerve resisted hysterics and tears.
+
+"It is horrible," she said at the last word. "But we acted honestly, and
+God will not desert us. You will find Louis before morning, and I shall
+spend the night in prayer until you have found him ... for him and you
+... and for that poor wretch, that dreadful woman, more to be pitied
+than any one."
+
+His confidence did not encourage him. Hour by hour the messengers of
+Curran appeared with the one hopeless phrase: no news. He walked about
+the park until midnight, and then posted himself in the basement with
+cigar and journal to while away the long hours. Sinister thoughts
+troubled him, and painful fancies. He could see the poor lad hiding in
+the slums, or at the mercy of wretches as vile as Claire; wandering
+about the city, perhaps, in anguish over his ruined life, horrified at
+what his friends must read in the morning papers, planning helplessly to
+escape from a danger which did not exist, except in his own mind. Oh,
+no doubt Curran would find him! Why, he _must_ find him!
+
+Across the sea in London, Minister Livingstone slept, full fed with the
+flatteries of a day, dreaming of the pleasures and honors sure to come
+with the morning. Down in the prison town lived Honora, with her eyes
+dulled from watching the jail and her heart sore with longing. For Owen
+the prison, for Louis the pavement, for Honora and himself the sleepless
+hours of the aching heart; but for the responsible Minister and his
+responsible tool sweet sleep, gilded comfort, overwhelming honors. Such
+things could be only because men of his sort were craven idiots. What a
+wretched twist in all things human! Why not, if nothing else could be
+done, go and set fire to Claire's office, the bishop's house, and the
+Livingstone mansion?
+
+However, joy came at the end of the night, for the messenger brought
+word that the lad had been found, sound as a bell, having just shipped
+as a common sailor on an Indiaman. Since Curran could not persuade him
+to leave his ship, the detective had remained on the vessel to await
+Arthur's arrival. A cab took him down to the wharf, and a man led him
+along the dock to the gang-plank, thence across the deck to a space near
+the forecastle, where Curran sat with Louis in the starlight.
+
+"Then it's all true ... what he has been telling me?" Louis cried as he
+leaped to his feet and took the hearty grasp of his friend.
+
+"As true as gospel," said Arthur, using Judy's phrase. "Let's get out of
+this without delay. We can talk about it at home. Curran, do you settle
+with the captain."
+
+They hurried away to the cab in silence. Before entering Arthur wrung
+the hand of the detective warmly.
+
+"It would take more than I own to pay you for this night's work, Curran.
+I want you to know how I feel about it, and when the time comes ask your
+own reward."
+
+"What you have just said is half of it," the man answered in a strange
+tone. "When the time comes I shall not be bashful."
+
+"It would have been the greatest blunder of your life," Arthur said, as
+they drove homeward, "if you had succeeded in getting away. It cannot be
+denied, Louis, that from five o'clock this afternoon till now you made a
+fool of yourself. Don't reply. Don't worry about it. Just think of this
+gold-plate fact: no one knows anything about it. You are supposed to be
+sleeping sweetly at my house. I settled Claire beautifully. And Sister
+Magdalen, too. By the way, I must send her word by the cabby ... better
+let her do penance on her knees till sunrise ... she's praying for you
+... but the suspense might kill her ... no, I'll send word. As I was
+saying, everything is as it was at four o'clock this afternoon."
+
+He chattered for the lad's benefit, noting that at times Louis shivered
+as with ague, and that his hands were cold. He has tasted calamity,
+Arthur thought with resignation, and life will never be quite the same
+thing again. In the comfortable room the marks of suffering became
+painfully evident. Even joy failed to rouse his old self. Pale, wrinkled
+like age, shrunken, almost lean, he presented a woful spectacle. Arthur
+mixed a warm punch for him, and spread a substantial lunch.
+
+"The sauce for this feast," said he, "is not appetite, but this fact:
+that your troubles are over. Now eat."
+
+Louis made a pretense of eating, and later, under the influence of the
+punch, found a little appetite. By degrees his mind became clearer as
+his body rested, the wrinkles began to disappear, his body seemed to
+fill out while the comfort of the situation invaded him. Arthur, puffing
+his cigar and describing his interview with Claire, looked so stanch and
+solid, so sure of himself, so at ease with his neighbors, that one could
+scarcely fail to catch his happy complaint.
+
+"She has begun her descent into hell," he said placidly, "but since you
+are with us still, I shall give her plenty of time to make it. What I am
+surprised at is that you did not understand what my entrance meant. She
+understood it. She thought Curran was due as her witness of the assault.
+What surprises me still more is that you so completely forgot my advice:
+no matter what the trouble and the shame, come straight to me. Here was
+a grand chance to try it."
+
+"I never thought of this kind of trouble," said Louis dully. "Anyway, I
+got such a fright that I understood nothing rightly up to midnight. The
+terrible feeling of public disgrace eat into me. I saw and heard people
+crying over me as at a funeral, you know that hopeless crying. The road
+ahead looked to be full of black clouds. I wanted to die. Then I wanted
+to get away. When I found a ship they took me for a half-drunk sailor,
+and hustled me into the forecastle in lively shape. When Curran found me
+and hauled me out of the bunk, I had been asleep enjoying the awfullest
+dreams. I took him for a trickster, who wanted to get me ashore and jail
+me. I feel better. I think I can sleep now."
+
+"Experience maybe has given you a better grip on the meaning of that
+wise advice which I repeat now: no matter what the trouble, come to me."
+
+"I shall come," said the lad with a show of spirit that delighted
+Arthur. "Even if you should see me hanged the next day."
+
+"That's a fine sentiment to sleep on, so we'll go to bed. However,
+remind yourself that a little good sense when you resume business ... by
+the way, it's morning ... no super-sensitiveness, no grieving, for you
+were straight all through ... go right on as if nothing had happened ...
+and in fact nothing has happened yet ... I can see that you understand."
+
+They went to bed, and slept comfortably until noon. After breakfast
+Louis looked passably well, yet miserable enough to make explanations
+necessary for his alarmed parents. Arthur undertook the disagreeable
+office, which seemed to him delightful by comparison with that other
+story of a runaway son _en route_ in fancied disgrace for India. All's
+well that ends well. Mary Everard wept with grief, joy, and gratitude,
+and took her jewel to her arms without complaint or question. The
+crotchety father was disposed to have it out with either the knaves or
+the fools in the game, did not Arthur reduce him to quiet by his little
+indictment.
+
+"There is only one to quarrel with about this sad affair, John Everard,"
+said he smoothly, "and that only one is your friend and well wisher,
+Quincy Livingstone. I want you to remember that, when we set out to take
+his scalp. It's a judgment on you that you are the first to suffer
+directly by this man's plotting. You needn't talk back. The boy is going
+to be ill, and you'll need all your epithets for your chief and yourself
+before you see comfort again."
+
+Recalling his son's appearance the father remained silent. Arthur's
+prevision came true. The physician ordered Louis to bed for an
+indefinite time, having found him suffering from shock, and threatened
+with some form of fever. The danger did not daunt his mother. Whatever
+of suffering yet remained, her boy would endure it in the shelter of her
+arms.
+
+"If he died this night," she said to Arthur, "I would still thank God
+that sent him back to die among his own; and after God, you, son dear,
+who have been more than a brother to him."
+
+Thus the items in his account with kinsman Livingstone kept mounting
+daily.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+THE END OF A MELODRAMA.
+
+
+Louis kept his bed for some weeks, and suffered a slow convalescence.
+Private grief must give way to public necessity. In this case the
+private grief developed a public necessity. Arthur took pains to tell
+his story to the leaders. It gave point to the general onslaught now
+being made on the Irish by the hired journals, the escaped nun, and, as
+some named him, the escaped historian. A plan was formulated to deal
+with all three. Grahame entered the lists against Bitterkin and
+Smallish, Vandervelt denounced the _Confessions_ and its author at a
+banquet _vis-a-vis_ with Bradford, and Monsignor pursued the escaped
+historian by lecturing in the same cities, and often on the same
+platform. Arthur held to Sister Claire as his specialty, as the hinge of
+the Livingstone scheme, a very rotten hinge on which to depend.
+Nevertheless, she kept her footing for months after her interview with
+him.
+
+Curran had laid bare her life and exposed her present methods nicely;
+but neither afforded a grip which might shake her, except inasmuch as it
+gave him an unexpected clue to the Claire labyrinth. Her history showed
+that she had often played two parts in the same drama. Without doubt a
+similar trick served her now, not only to indulge her riotous passions,
+but to glean advantages from her enemies and useful criticism from her
+friends. He cast about among his casual acquaintance for characters that
+Claire might play. Edith Conyngham? Not impossible! The Brand who held
+forth at the gospel hall? Here was a find indeed! Comparing the
+impressions left upon him by these women, as a result he gave Curran the
+commission to watch and study the daily living of Edith Conyngham. Even
+this man's nerve shook at a stroke so luckily apt.
+
+"I don't know much about the ways of escaped nuns," said Arthur, "but I
+am going to study them. I'll wager you find Claire behind the rusty
+garments of this obscure, muddy, slimy little woman. They have the same
+appetite anyway."
+
+This choice bit of news, carried at once to the escaped nun, sounded in
+Sister Claire's ear like the crack of doom, and she stared at Curran,
+standing humbly in her office, with distorted face.
+
+"Is this the result of your clever story-telling, Dick Curran?" she
+gasped.
+
+"It's the result of your affair with young Everard," he replied sadly.
+"That was a mistake altogether. It waked up Arthur Dillon."
+
+"The mistake was to wake that man," she said sourly. "I fear him.
+There's something hiding in him, something terrible, that looks out of
+his eyes like a ghost in hell. The dogs ... Jezebel ... that was his
+threat ... ugh!"
+
+"He has waked up the whole crowd against you and frightened your
+friends. If ever he tells the Clan-na-Gael about young Everard, your
+life won't be worth a pin."
+
+"With you to defend me?" ironically.
+
+"I could only die with you ... against that crowd."
+
+"And you would," she said with conviction, tears in her eyes. "My one
+friend."
+
+His cheeks flushed and his eyes sparkled at the fervent praise of his
+fidelity.
+
+"Well, it's all up with me," changing to a mood of gaiety. "The Escaped
+Nun must escape once more. They will all turn their coldest shoulders to
+me, absolutely frightened by this Irish crowd, to which we belong after
+all, Dick. I'm not sorry they can stand up for themselves, are you? So,
+there's nothing to do but take up the play, and begin work on it in dead
+earnest."
+
+"It's a bad time," Curran ventured, as she took a manuscript from a
+desk. "But you know how to manage such things, you are so clever," he
+hastened to add, catching a fiery glance from her eye. "Only you must go
+with caution."
+
+"It's a fine play," she said, turning the pages of the manuscript.
+"Dick, you are little short of a genius. If I had not liked the real
+play so well, playing to the big world this role of escaped nun, I
+would have taken it up long ago. The little stage of the theater is
+nothing to the grand stage of the world, where a whole nation applauds;
+and men like the Bishop take it for the real thing, this impersonation
+of mine. But since I am shut out ... and my curse on this Arthur Dillon
+... no, no, I take that back ... he's a fine fellow, working according
+to his nature ... since he will shut me out I must take to the imitation
+stage. Ah, but the part is fine! First act: the convent garden, the
+novice reading her love in the flowers, the hateful old mother superior
+choking her to get her lover's note from her, the reading of the note,
+and the dragging of the novice to her prison cell, down in the depths of
+the earth. How that will draw the tears from the old maids of Methodism
+all over the country!"
+
+She burst into hearty laughter.
+
+"Second act: the dungeon, the tortures, old superior again, and the
+hateful hag who is in love with the hero and would like to wreak her
+jealousy on me, poor thing, all tears and determination. I loathe the
+two women. I denounce the creed which invents such tortures. I lie down
+to die in the dungeon while the music moans and the deacons and their
+families in the audience groan. Don't you think, Dicky dear, I can do
+the dying act to perfection?"
+
+"On the stage perfectly."
+
+"You're a wretch," she shrieked with sudden rage. "You hint at the night
+I took a colic and howled for the priest, when you know it was only the
+whisky and the delirium. How dare you!"
+
+"It slipped on me," he said humbly.
+
+"The third act is simply beautiful: chapel of the convent, a fat priest
+at the altar, all the nuns gathered about to hear the charges against
+me, I am brought in bound, pale, starved, but determined; the trial, the
+sentence, the curse ... oh, that scene is sublime, I can see Booth in it
+... pity we can't have him ... then the inrush of my lover, the terror,
+the shrieks, the confusion, as I am carried off the stage with the
+curtain going down. At last the serene fourth act: another garden, the
+villains all punished, my lover's arms about me, and we two reading the
+flowers as the curtain descends. Well," with a sigh of pleasure, "if
+that doesn't take among the Methodists and the general public out West
+and down South, what will?"
+
+"I can see the fire with which you will act it," said Curran eagerly.
+"You are a born actress. Who but you could play so many parts at once?"
+
+"And yet," she answered dreamily, giving an expressive kick with
+unconscious grace, "this is what I like best. If it could be introduced
+into the last act ... but of course the audiences wouldn't tolerate it,
+dancing. Well," waking up suddenly to business, "are you all ready for
+the _grand coup_--press, manager, all details?"
+
+"Ready long ago."
+
+"Here then is the program, Dicky dear. To-morrow I seek the seclusion of
+the convent at Park Square--isn't _seclusion_ good? To-night letters go
+out to all my friends, warning them of my utter loneliness, and dread of
+impending abduction. In two or three days you get a notice in the papers
+about these letters, and secure interviews with the Bishop if possible,
+with McMeeter anyway ... oh, he'll begin to howl as soon as he gets his
+letter. Whenever you think the public interest, or excitement, is at its
+height, then you bring your little ladder to the convent, and wait
+outside for a racket which will wake the neighborhood. In the midst of
+it, as the people are gathering, up with the ladder, and down with me in
+your triumphant arms. Pity we can't have a calcium light for that scene.
+If there should be any failure ... of course there can't be ... then a
+note of warning will reach me, with any instructions you may wish to
+give me ... to the old address of course."
+
+Both laughed heartily at this allusion.
+
+"It has been great fun," she said, "fooling them all right and left.
+That Dillon is suspicious though ... fine fellow ... I like him. Dicky,
+... you're not jealous. What a wonder you are, dear old faithful Dicky,
+my playwright, manager, lover, detective, everything to me. Well, run
+along to your work. We strike for fortune this time--for fortune and for
+fame. You will not see me again until you carry me down the ladder from
+the convent window. What a lark! And there's money in it for you and
+me."
+
+He dared not discourage her, being too completely her slave, like wax in
+her hands; and he believed, too, that her scheme of advertising the
+drama of _The Escaped Nun_ would lead to splendid and profitable
+notoriety. A real escape, from a city convent, before the very eyes of
+respectable citizens, would ring through the country like an alarm, and
+set the entire Protestant community in motion. While he feared, he was
+also dazzled by the brilliancy of the scheme.
+
+It began very well. The journals one morning announced the disappearance
+of Sister Claire, and described the alarm of her friends at her failure
+to return. Thereupon McMeeter raised his wonderful voice over the letter
+sent him on the eve of her flight, and printed the pathetic epistle
+along with his denunciation of the cowardice which had given her over to
+her enemies. Later Bishop Bradford, expressing his sympathy in a speech
+to the Dorcas' Society, referred to the walling up of escaped nuns
+during the dark ages. A little tide of paragraphs flowed from the
+papers, plaintively murmuring the one sad strain: the dear sister could
+not be far distant; she might be in the city, deep in a convent dungeon;
+she had belonged to the community of the Good Shepherd, whose convent
+stood in Morris Street, large enough, sufficiently barred with iron to
+suggest dungeons; the escaped one had often expressed her dread of
+abduction; the convents ought to be examined suddenly and secretly; and
+so on without end.
+
+"What is the meaning of it?" said Monsignor. "I thought you had
+extinguished her, Arthur."
+
+"Another scheme of course. I was too merciful with her, I imagine. All
+this noise seems to have one aim: to direct attention to these convents.
+Now if she were hidden in any of them, and a committee should visit that
+convent and find her forcibly detained, as she would call it; or if she
+could sound a fire alarm and make a spectacular escape at two in the
+morning, before the whole world, what could be said about it?"
+
+"Isn't it rather late in history for such things?" said Monsignor.
+
+"A good trick is as good to-day as a thousand years ago. I can picture
+you explaining to the American citizen, amid the howls of McMeeter and
+the purring speeches of the Bishop, how Sister Claire came to be in the
+convent from which her friends rescued her."
+
+"It would be awkward enough I admit. You think, then, that she ... but
+what could be her motive?"
+
+"Notoriety, and the sympathy of the people. I would like to trip her up
+in this scheme, and hurl her once for all into the hell which she seems
+anxious to prepare for other people. You Catholics are altogether too
+easy with the Claires and the McMeeters. Hence the tears of the
+Everards."
+
+"We are so used to it," said the priest in apology. "It would be
+foolish, however, not to heed your warning. Go to the convents of the
+city from me, and put them on their guard. Let them dismiss all
+strangers and keep out newcomers until the danger appears to be over."
+
+The most careful search failed to reveal a trace of Sister Claire's
+hiding-place among the various communities, who were thrown into a fever
+of dread by the warning. The journals kept up their crescendo of inquiry
+and information. One must look for that snake, Arthur thought, not with
+the eyes, but through inspiration. She hid neither in the clouds nor in
+Arizona, but in the grass at their feet. Seeking for inspiration, he
+went over the ground a second time with Sister Magdalen, who had lost
+flesh over the shame of her dealings with Claire, the Everard troubles,
+and the dread of what was still to come. She burned to atone for her
+holy indiscretions. The Park Square convent, however, held no strangers.
+In the home attached to it were many poor women, but all of them known.
+Edith Conyngham the obscure, the mute, the humble, was just then
+occupying a room in the place, making a retreat of ten days in charge of
+Sister Magdalen. At this fact Arthur was seized by his inspiration.
+
+"She must give up her retreat and leave the place," he said quietly,
+though his pulse was bounding. "Make no objection. It's only a case of
+being too careful. Leave the whole matter to me. Say nothing to her
+about it. To-night the good creature will have slipped away without
+noise, and she can finish her retreat later. It's absurd, but better be
+absurd than sorry."
+
+And Sister Magdalen, thinking of the long penance she must undergo for
+her folly, made only a polite objection. He wrote out a note at once in
+a disguised hand, giving it no signature:
+
+    "The game is up. You cannot get out of the convent too quick or too
+    soon. At ten o'clock a cab will be at the southwest corner of Park
+    Square. Take it and drive to the office. Before ten I shall be with
+    you. Don't delay an instant. State prison is in sight. Dillon is on
+    your track."
+
+"At eight o'clock this evening where will Miss Conyngham be, Sister?"
+
+"In her room," said the nun, unhappy over the treatment intended for her
+client, "preparing her meditation for the morning. She has a great love
+for meditation on the profound mysteries of religion."
+
+"Glad to know it," he said dryly. "Well, slip this note under her door,
+make no noise, let no one see you, give her no hint of your presence.
+Then go to bed and pray for us poor sinners out in the wicked world."
+
+One must do a crazy thing now and then, under cover of the proprieties,
+if only to test one's sanity. Edith and Claire, as he had suggested to
+Curran, might be the same person. What if Claire appeared tall, portly,
+resonant, youthful, abounding in life, while Edith seemed mute, old,
+thin, feeble? The art of the actor can work miracles in personal
+appearance. A dual life provided perfect security in carrying out
+Claire's plans, and it matched the daring of the Escaped Nun to live as
+Edith in the very hearts of the people she sought to destroy. Good sense
+opposed his theory of course, but he made out a satisfactory argument
+for himself. How often had Sister Claire puzzled him by her resemblance
+to some one whom he could not force out of the shadows of memory! Even
+now, with the key of the mystery in his hands, he could see no likeness
+between them. Yet no doubt remained in his mind that a dual life would
+explain and expose Sister Claire.
+
+That night he sat on the seat of a cab in proper costume, at the
+southwest corner of Park Square. The convent, diagonally opposite, was
+dark and silent at nine o'clock; and far in the rear, facing the side
+street, stood the home of the indigent, whose door would open for the
+exit of a clever actress at ten o'clock, or, well closed, reproach him
+for his stupidity. The great front of the convent, dominating the
+Square, would have been a fine stage for the scene contemplated by
+Sister Claire, and he laughed at the spectacle of the escaped one
+leaping from a window into her lover's arms, or sliding down a rope amid
+the cheers of the mob and the shrieks of the disgraced poor souls
+within. Then he gritted his teeth at the thought of Louis, and Mary his
+mother, and Mona his sister. His breath came short. Claire was a woman,
+but some women are not dishonored by the fate of Jezebel.
+
+Shortly after ten o'clock a small, well-wrapped figure turned the remote
+corner of the Home, came out to the Square, saw the cab, and coming
+forward with confidence opened the door and stepped in. As Arthur drove
+off the blood surged to his head and his heart in a way that made his
+ears sing. It seemed impossible that the absurd should turn out wisdom
+at the first jump. As he drove along he wondered over the capacities of
+art. No two individuals could have been more unlike in essentials than
+Edith Conyngham and Sister Claire. Now it would appear that high-heeled
+shoes, padded clothes, heavy eyebrows, paint, a loud and confident
+voice, a bold manner, and her beautiful costume had made Sister Claire;
+while shoes without heels, rusty clothes, a gray wig, a weak voice, and
+timid manner, had given form to Edith Conyngham.
+
+A soul is betrayed by its sins. The common feature of the two characters
+was the sensuality which, neither in the nun nor in her double, would be
+repressed or disguised. Looking back, Arthur could see some points of
+resemblance which might have betrayed the wretch to a clever detective.
+Well, he would settle all accounts with her presently, and he debated
+only one point, the flinging of her to the dogs. In twenty minutes they
+reached the office of the Escaped Nun. He opened the door of the cab and
+she stepped out nervously, but walked with decision into the building,
+for which she had the keys.
+
+"Anything more, mum?" he said respectfully.
+
+"Come right in, and light up for me," she said ungraciously, in a
+towering rage. He found his way to the gas jets and flooded the office
+with the light from four. She pulled down the curtains, and flung aside
+her rusty shawl. At the same moment he flung an arm about her, and with
+his free hand tore the gray wig from her head, and shook free the mass
+of yellow hair which lay beneath it. Then he flung her limp into the
+nearest chair, and stood gazing at her, frozen with amaze. She cowered,
+pale with the sudden fright of the attack. It was not Sister Claire who
+stood revealed, but the charming and lovely La Belle Colette. The next
+instant he laughed like a hysterical woman.
+
+"By heavens, but that _was_ an inspiration!" he exclaimed. "Don't be
+frightened, beautiful Colette. I was prepared for a tragedy, but this
+discovery reveals a farce."
+
+Her terror gave way to stupefaction when she recognized him.
+
+"So it's three instead of two," he went on. "The lovely dancer is also
+the Escaped Nun and the late Edith Conyngham. And Curran knew it of
+course, who was our detective. That's bad. But Judy Haskell claims you
+as a goddaughter. You are Curran's wife. You are Sister Magdalen's poor
+friend. You are Katharine Kerrigan. You are Sister Claire. You are
+Messalina. La Belle Colette, you are the very devil."
+
+She recovered from her fright at his laugh, in which some amusement
+tinkled, and also something terrible. They were in a lonely place, he
+had made the situation, and she felt miserably helpless.
+
+"You need not blame Curran," she said decisively. "He knew the game, but
+he has no control over me. I want to go home, and I want to know right
+away your terms. It's all up with me. I confess. But let me know what
+you are going to do with me."
+
+"Take you home to your husband," said Arthur. "Come."
+
+They drove to the little apartment where Curran lay peacefully sleeping,
+and where he received his erratic wife with stupor. The three sat down
+in the parlor to discuss the situation, which was serious enough, though
+Arthur now professed to take it lightly. Colette stared at him like a
+fascinated bird and answered his questions humbly.
+
+"It's all very simple," said she. "I am truly Edith Conyngham, and Judy
+Haskell is my godmother, and I was in a convent out West. I was expelled
+for a love caper, and came back to my friends much older in appearance
+than I had need to be. The Escaped-Nun-racket was a money-maker. What I
+really am, you see. I am the dancer, La Belle Colette. All the rest is
+disguise."
+
+Curran asked no questions and accepted the situation composedly.
+
+"She is in your hands," he said.
+
+"I place her in yours for the present," Arthur replied, glowering as he
+thought of Louis. "Detectives will shadow you both until I come to a
+decision what to do with you. Any move to escape and you will be nipped.
+Then the law takes its course. As for you, La Belle Colette, say your
+prayers. I am still tempted to send you after Jezebel."
+
+"You are a terrible man," she whimpered, as he walked out and left them
+to their sins.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+THE FIRST BLOW.
+
+
+Mayor Birmingham and Grahame, summoned by messengers, met him in the
+forever-deserted offices of Sister Claire. He made ready for them by
+turning on all the lights, setting forth a cheerful bottle and some soda
+from Claire's hidden ice-box, and lighting a cigar. Delight ran through
+his blood like fire. At last he had his man on the hip, and the vision
+of that toss which he meant to give him made his body tingle from the
+roots of his hair to the points of his toes. However, the case was not
+for him to deal with alone. Birmingham, the man of weight, prudence,
+fairness, the true leader, really owned the situation. Grahame,
+experienced journalist, had the right to manage the publicity department
+of this delicious scandal. His own task would be to hold Claire in the
+traces, and drive her round the track, show the world her paces, past
+the judge's stand. Ah, to see the face of the Minister as he read the
+story of exposure--her exposure and his own shame!
+
+The two men stared at his comfortable attitude in that strange inn, and
+fairly gasped at the climax of his story.
+
+"The devil's in you. No one but you would have thought out such a
+scheme," said Grahame, recalling the audacity, the cleverness, the
+surprises of his friend's career from the California episode to the
+invasion of Ireland. "Great heavens! but you have the knack of seizing
+the hinge of things."
+
+"I think we have Livingstone and his enterprise in the proper sort of
+hole," Arthur answered. "The question is how to use our advantage?"
+
+The young men turned to Birmingham with deference.
+
+"The most thorough way," said the Mayor, after complimenting Arthur on
+his astonishing success, "would be to hale Claire before the courts for
+fraud, and subpoena all our distinguished enemies. That course has
+some disagreeable consequences, however."
+
+"I think we had better keep out of court," Arthur said quickly.
+
+His companions looked surprised at his hesitation. He did not understand
+it himself. For Edith Conyngham he felt only disgust, and for Sister
+Claire an amused contempt; but sparkling Colette, so clever, bright, and
+amiable, so charmingly conscienceless, so gracefully wicked, inspired
+him with pity almost. He could not crush the pretty reptile, or thrust
+her into prison.
+
+"Of course I want publicity," he hastened to add, "the very widest, to
+reach as far as London, and strike the Minister. How can that be got,
+and keep away from the courts?"
+
+"An investigating committee is what you are thinking of," said the
+Mayor. "I can call such a body together at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, our
+most distinguished citizens. They could receive the confession of this
+woman, and report to the public on her character."
+
+"That's the plan," Arthur interrupted with joy. "That _must_ be carried
+out. I'll see that Claire appears before that committee and confesses
+her frauds. But mark this: on that committee you should have the agents
+of Livingstone: Bradford, Bitterkin ... I owe him one for his meanness
+to the Senator ... Smallish in particular, and McMeeter for the fun of
+the thing."
+
+"Wild horses wouldn't drag them to it," Grahame thought.
+
+"I have something better than wild horses, the proofs of their
+conspiracy, of their league with this woman," and Arthur pointed to the
+locked drawers of the office. "How will our minister to England like to
+have his name connected with this scandal openly. Now, if these people
+refuse to serve, by heavens, I'll take the whole case to court, and give
+it an exposure as wide as the earth. If they're agreeable, I'll keep
+away from the courts, and the rougher part of the scandal."
+
+"There's your weapon," said the Mayor, "the alternative of committee or
+court. I'll see to that part of the business. Do you get the escaped nun
+ready for her confession, and I'll guarantee the committee, let us say
+inside of ten days. Your part, Grahame, will be to write up a story for
+the morning papers, covering dramatically the details of this very
+remarkable episode."
+
+They sat long discussing the various features of the scheme.
+
+Next morning Curran and Arthur sat down to talk over the terms of
+surrender in the detective's house. Colette still kept her bed,
+distracted with grief, and wild with apprehension over the sensational
+articles in the morning papers. Curran saw little hope for himself and
+his wife in the stern face of Dillon.
+
+"At the start I would like to hear your explanation," Arthur began
+coldly. "You were in my employ and in hers."
+
+"In hers only to hinder what evil I could, and to protect her from
+herself," the detective answered steadily and frankly. "I make no
+excuse, because there isn't any to make. But if I didn't live up to my
+contract with you, I can say honestly that I never betrayed your
+interest. You can guess the helplessness of a man in my fix. I have no
+influence over Colette. She played her game against my wish and prayer.
+Most particular did I warn her against annoying you and yours. I was
+going to break up her designs on young Everard, when you did it
+yourself. I hope you----"
+
+In his nervous apprehension for Colette's fate the strong-willed man
+broke down. He remained silent, struggling for his vanishing
+self-control.
+
+"I understand, and I excuse you. The position was nasty. I have always
+trusted you without knowing why exactly," and he reflected a moment on
+that interesting fact. "You did me unforgettable service in saving Louis
+Everard."
+
+"How glad I am you remember that service," Curran gasped, like one who
+grasping at a straw finds it a plank. "I foresaw this moment when I said
+to you that night, 'I shall not be bashful about reminding you of it and
+asking a reward at the right time.' I ask it now. For the boy's sake be
+merciful with her. Don't hand her over to the courts. Deal with her
+yourself, and I'll help you."
+
+For the boy's sake, for that service so aptly rendered, for the joy it
+brought and the grief it averted, he could forget justice and crown
+Colette with diamonds! Curran trembled with eagerness and suspense. He
+loved her,--this wretch, witch, fiend of a woman!
+
+"The question is, can I deal with her myself? She is intractable."
+
+"You ought to know by this time that she will do anything for you ...
+and still more when she has to choose between your wish and jail."
+
+"I shall require a good deal of her, not for my own sake, but to undo
+the evil work----"
+
+"How I have tried to keep her out of that evil work," Curran cried
+fiercely. "We are bad enough as it is without playing traitors to our
+own, and throwing mud on holy things. There can be no luck in it, and
+she knows it. When one gets as low as she has, it's time for the
+funeral. Hell is more respectable."
+
+Arthur did not understand this feeling in Curran. The man's degradation
+seemed so complete to him that not even sacrilege could intensify it;
+yet clearly the hardened sinner saw some depths below his own which
+excited his horror and loathing.
+
+"If you think I can deal with her, I shall not invoke the aid of the
+law."
+
+The detective thanked him in a breaking voice. He had enjoyed a very bad
+night speculating on the probable course of events. Colette came in
+shortly, and greeted Arthur as brazenly as usual, but with extreme
+sadness, which became her well; so sweet, so delicate, so fragile, that
+he felt pleased to have forgiven her so early in the struggle. He had
+persecuted her, treated her with violence, and printed her history for
+the scornful pleasure of the world; he had come to offer her the
+alternative of public shame or public trial and jail; yet she had a
+patient smile for him, a dignified submission that touched him. After
+all, he thought with emotion, she is of the same nature with myself; a
+poor castaway from conventional life playing one part or another by
+caprice, for gain or sport or notoriety; only the devil has entered into
+her, while I have been lucky enough to cast my lot with the exorcists of
+the race. He almost regretted his duty.
+
+"I have taken possession of your office and papers, Colette," said he
+with the dignity of the master. "I dismissed the office-boy with his
+wages, and notified the owner that you would need the rooms no more
+after the end of the month."
+
+"Thanks," she murmured with downcast eyes.
+
+"I am ready now to lay before you the conditions----"
+
+"Are you going to send me to jail?"
+
+"I leave that to you," he answered softly. "You must withdraw your book
+from circulation. You must get an injunction from the courts to restrain
+the publishers, if they won't stop printing at your request, and you
+must bring suit against them for your share of the profits. I want them
+to be exposed. My lawyer is at your service for such work."
+
+"This for the beginning?" she said in despair.
+
+"You must write for me a confession next, describing your career, and
+the parts which you played in this city; also naming your accomplices,
+your supporters, and what money they put up for your enterprise."
+
+"You will find all that in my papers."
+
+"Is Mr. Livingstone's name among your papers?"
+
+"He was the ringleader. Of course."
+
+"Finally you must appear before a committee of gentlemen at the Fifth
+Avenue Hotel, and show how you disguised yourself for the three parts of
+Edith Conyngham, Sister Claire, and the Brand of the gospel-hall."
+
+She burst out crying then, looking from one man to the other with the
+tears streaming down her lovely face. Curran squirmed in anguish. Arthur
+studied her with interest. Who could tell when she was not acting?
+
+"Ah, you wretch! I am bad. Sometimes I can't bear myself. But you are
+worse, utterly without heart. You think I don't feel my position."
+
+Her sobbing touched him by its pathos and its cleverness.
+
+"You are beyond feeling, but you _must_ talk about feeling," was his
+hard reply. "Probably I shall make you feel before the end of this
+adventure."
+
+"As if you hadn't done it already," she fairly bawled like a hurt child.
+"For months I have not left the house without seeing everywhere the dogs
+that tore Jezebel."
+
+"You might also have seen that poor child whom you nearly drove to
+death," he retorted, "and the mother whose heart you might have broken."
+
+"Poor child!" she sneered, and burst out laughing while the tears still
+lingered on her cheek. "He was a milksop, not a man. I thought he was a
+man, or I never would have offered him pleasure. And you want me to make
+a show of myself before...."
+
+"Your old friends and well-wishers, McMeeter, Bradford and Co."
+
+"Never, never, never," she screamed, and fell to weeping again. "I'll
+die first."
+
+"You won't be asked to die, madam. You'll go to jail the minute I leave
+this house, and stand trial on fifty different charges. I'll keep you in
+jail for the rest of your life. If by any trick you escape me, I'll
+deliver you to the dogs."
+
+"Can he do this?" she said scornfully to Curran, who nodded.
+
+"And if I agree to it, what do I get?" turning again to Dillon.
+
+"You can live in peace as La Belle Colette the dancer, practise your
+profession, and enjoy the embraces of your devoted husband. I let you
+off lightly. Your private life, your stage name, will be kept from the
+public, and, by consequence, from the dogs."
+
+She shivered at the phrase. Shame was not in her, but fear could grip
+her heart vigorously. Her nerve did not exclude cowardice. This man she
+had always feared, perceiving in him not only a strength beyond the
+common, but a mysterious power not to be analyzed and named. Her flimsy
+rage would break hopelessly on this rock. Still before surrendering, her
+crooked nature forced her to the petty arts in which she excelled. Very
+clearly in this acting appeared the various strokes of character
+peculiar to Edith, Claire, and the Brand. She wheedled and whined one
+moment in the husky tones of Sister Magdalen's late favorite; when
+dignity was required she became the escaped nun; and in her rage she
+would burst into the melodramatic frenzy dear to the McMeeter audiences;
+but Colette, the heedless, irresponsible, half-mad butterfly, dominated
+these various parts, and to this charming personality she returned.
+Through his own sad experience this spectacle interested him. He subdued
+her finally by a precise description of consequences.
+
+"You have done the Catholics of this city harm that will last a long
+time, Colette," said he. "That vile book of yours ... you ought to be
+hung for it. It will live to do its miserable work when you are in hell
+howling. I really don't know why I should be merciful to you. Did you
+ever show mercy to any one? The court would do this for you and for us:
+the facts, figures, and personages of your career would be dragged into
+the light of day ... what a background that would be ... not a bad
+company either ... not a fact would escape ... you would be painted as
+you are. I'll not tell you what you are, but I know that you would die
+of your own colors ... you would go to jail, and rot there ... every
+time you came out I'd have a new charge on which to send you back. Your
+infamy would be printed by columns in the papers ... and the dogs would
+be put on your trail ... ah, there's the rub ... if the law let you go
+free, what a meal you'd make for the people who think you ought to be
+torn limb from limb, and who would do it with joy. I really do not
+understand why I offer you an alternative. Perhaps it's for the sake of
+this man who loves you ... for the great service he did me."
+
+He paused to decide this point, while she gazed like a fascinated bird.
+
+"What I want is this really," he went on. "I want to let the city see
+just what tools Livingstone, your employer, is willing to do his dirty
+work with. I want this committee to assemble with pomp and circumstance
+... those are the right words ... and to see you, in your very cleverest
+way, act the parts through which you fooled the wise. I want them to
+hear you say in that sweetest of voices, how you lied to them to get
+their dollars ... how you lied about us, your own people, threw mud on
+us, as Curran says, to get their dollars ... how your life, and your
+book, and your lectures, are all lies ... invented and printed because
+the crowd that devoured them were eager to believe us the horrible
+creatures you described. When you have done that, you can go free. No
+one will know your husband, or your name, or your profession. I don't
+see why you hesitate. I don't know why I should offer you this chance.
+When Birmingham hears your story he will not approve of my action. But
+if you agree to follow my directions to the letter I'll promise that the
+law will not seize you."
+
+What could she do but accept his terms, protesting that death was
+preferable? The risk of losing her just as the committee would be ready
+to meet, for her fickleness verged on insanity, he had to accept. He
+trusted in his own watchfulness, and in the fidelity of Curran to keep
+her in humor. Even now she forgot her disasters in the memory of her
+success as an impersonator, and entertained the men with scenes from her
+masquerade as Edith, Claire, and the Brand. From such a creature, so
+illy balanced, one might expect anything.
+
+However, by judicious coddling and terrorizing, her courage and spirit
+were kept alive to the very moment when she stood before Birmingham and
+his committee, heard her confession of imposture read, signed it with
+perfect sang-froid, and illustrated for the scandalized members her
+method of impersonation. So had Arthur worked upon her conceit that she
+took a real pride in displaying her costumes, and in explaining how
+skilfully she had led three lives in that city. Grim, bitter, sickened
+with disappointment, yet masked in smiles, part of the committee watched
+her performance to the end. They felt the completeness of Arthur's
+triumph. With the little airs and graces peculiar to a stage artiste,
+Edith put on the dusty costume of Edith Conyngham, and limped feebly
+across the floor; then the decorous garments of the Brand, and whispered
+tenderly in McMeeter's ear; last, the brilliant habit of the escaped
+nun, the curious eyebrows, the pallid face; curtseying at the close of
+the performance with her bold eyes on her audience, as if beseeching the
+merited applause. In the dead silence afterwards, Arthur mercifully led
+her away.
+
+The journals naturally gave the affair large attention, and the net
+results were surprisingly fine. The house of cards so lovingly built up
+by Livingstone and his friends tumbled in a morning never to rise again.
+All the little plans failed like kites snipped of their tails. Fritters
+went home, because the public lost interest in his lectures. The book of
+the escaped nun fell flat and disappeared from the market. McMeeter gave
+up his scheme of rescuing the inmates of convents and housing them until
+married. The hired press ignored the Paddies and their island for a
+whole year. Best of all, suddenly, on the plea of dying among his
+friends, Ledwith was set free, mainly through the representations of
+Lord Constantine in London and Arthur in Washington. These rebuffs told
+upon the Minister severely. He knew from whose strong hand they came,
+and that the same hand would not soon tire of striking.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+ANNE MAKES HISTORY.
+
+
+In the months that followed Anne Dillon lived as near to perfect
+felicity as earthly conditions permit. A countess and a lord breathed
+under her roof, ate at her table, and talked prose and poetry with her
+as freely as Judy Haskell. The Countess of Skibbereen and Lord
+Constantine had accompanied the Ledwiths to America, after Owen's
+liberation from jail, and fallen victims to the wiles of this clever
+woman. Arthur might look after the insignificant Ledwiths. Anne would
+have none of them. She belonged henceforth to the nobility. His lordship
+was bent on utilizing his popularity with the Irish to further the cause
+of the Anglo-American Alliance. As the friend who had stood by the
+Fenian prisoners, not only against embittered England, but against
+indifferent Livingstone, he was welcomed; and if he wanted an alliance,
+or an heiress, or the freedom of the city, or anything which the Irish
+could buy for him, he had only to ask in order to receive. Anne sweetly
+took the responsibility off his shoulders, after he had outlined his
+plans.
+
+"Leave it all to me," said she. "You shall win the support of all these
+people without turning your hand over."
+
+"You may be sure she'll do it much better than you will," was the
+opinion of the Countess, and the young man was of the same mind.
+
+She relied chiefly on Doyle Grahame for one part of her program, but
+that effervescent youth had fallen into a state of discouragement which
+threatened to leave him quite useless. He shook his head to her demand
+for a column in next morning's _Herald_.
+
+"Same old story ... the Countess and you ... lovely costumes ... visits
+... it won't go. The editors are wondering why there's so much of you."
+
+"Hasn't it all been good?"
+
+"Of course, or it would not have been printed. But there must come an
+end sometime. What's your aim anyway?"
+
+"I want a share in making history," she said slyly.
+
+"Take a share in making mine," he answered morosely, and thereupon she
+landed him.
+
+"Oh, run away with Mona, if you're thinking of marrying."
+
+"Thinking of it! Talking of it! That's as near as I can get to it," he
+groaned. "John Everard is going to drive a desperate bargain with me. I
+wrote a book, I helped to expose Edith Conyngham, I drove Fritters out
+of the country with my ridicule, I shocked Bradford, and silenced
+McMeeter; and I have failed to move that wretch. All I got out of my
+labors was permission to sit beside Mona in her own house with her
+father present."
+
+"You humor the man too much," Anne said with a laugh. "I can twist John
+Everard about my finger, only----"
+
+"There it is," cried Grahame. "Behold it in its naked simplicity! Only!
+Well, if anything short of the divine can get around, over, under,
+through, or by his sweet, little 'only,' he's fit to be the next king of
+Ireland. What have I not done to do away with it? Once I thought, I
+hoped, that the invitation to read the poem on the landing of the
+Pilgrim Fathers, coming as a climax to multitudinous services, would
+surely have fetched him. Now, with the invitation in my pocket, I'm
+afraid to mention it. What if he should scorn it?"
+
+"He won't if I say the word. Give me the column to-morrow, and any time
+I want it for a month or two, and I'll guarantee that John Everard will
+do the right thing by you."
+
+"You can have the column. What do you want it for?"
+
+"The alliance, of course. I'm in the business of making history, as I
+told you. Don't open your mouth quite so wide, please. There's to be a
+meeting of the wise in this house, after a dinner, to express favorable
+opinions about the alliance. Then in a month or two a distinguished
+peer, member of the British Cabinet, is coming over to sound the great
+men on the question.... What are you whistling for?"
+
+"You've got a fine thing, Mrs. Dillon," said he. "By Jove, but I'll help
+you spread this for all it's worth."
+
+"Understand," she said, tapping the table with emphasis, "the alliance
+must go through as far as we can make it go. Now, do your best. When you
+go over to see John Everard next, go with a mind to kill him if he
+doesn't take your offer to marry his daughter. I'll see to it that the
+poem on the Pilgrims does the trick for you."
+
+"I'd have killed him long ago, if I thought it worth the trouble," he
+said.
+
+He felt that the crisis had come for him and Mona. That charming girl,
+in spite of his entreaties, of his threats to go exploring Africa,
+remained as rigidly faithful to her ideas of duty as her father to his
+obstinacy. She would not marry without his consent. With all his
+confidence in Anne's cleverness, how could he expect her to do the
+impossible? To change the unchangeable? John Everard showed no sign of
+the influence which had brought Livingstone to his knees, when Grahame
+and Mona stood before him, and the lover placed in her father's hands
+the document of honor.
+
+"Really, this is wonderful," said Everard, impressed to the point of
+violence. "You are to compose and to read the poem on the Pilgrim
+Fathers?"
+
+"That's the prize," said Grahame severely. He might be squaring off at
+this man the next moment, and could not carry his honors lightly. "And
+now that it has come I want my reward. We must be married two weeks
+before I read that poem, and the whole world must see and admire the
+source of my inspiration."
+
+He drew his beloved into his arms and kissed her pale cheek.
+
+"Very well. That will be appropriate," the father said placidly,
+clearing his throat to read the invitation aloud. He read pompously,
+quite indifferent to the emotion of his children, proud that they were
+to be prominent figures in a splendid gathering. They, beatified, pale,
+unstrung by this calm acceptance of what he had opposed bitterly two
+years, sat down foolishly, and listened to the pompous utterance of
+pompous phrases in praise of dead heroes and a living poet. Thought and
+speech failed together. If only some desperado would break in upon him
+and try to kill him! if the house would take fire, or a riot begin in
+the street! The old man finished his reading, congratulated the poet,
+blessed the pair in the old-fashioned style, informed his wife of the
+date of the wedding, and marched off to bed. After pulling at that door
+for years it was maddening to have the very frame-work come out as if
+cemented with butter. What an outrage to come prepared for heroic
+action, and to find the enemy turned friend! Oh, admirable enchantress
+was this Anne Dillon!
+
+The enchantress, having brought Grahame into line and finally into good
+humor, took up the more difficult task of muzzling her stubborn son. To
+win him to the good cause, she had no hope; sufficient, if he could be
+won to silence while diplomacy shaped the course of destiny.
+
+"Better let me be on that point," Arthur said when she made her attack.
+"I'm hostile only when disturbed. Lord Conny owns us for the present. I
+won't say a word to shake his title. Neither will I lift my eyebrows to
+help this enterprise."
+
+"If you only will keep quiet," she suggested.
+
+"Well, I'm trying to. I'm set against alliance with England, until we
+have knocked the devil out of her, begging your pardon for my frankness.
+I must speak plainly now so that we may not fall out afterwards. But
+I'll be quiet. I'll not say a word to influence a soul. I'll do just as
+Ledwith does."
+
+He laughed at the light which suddenly shone in her face.
+
+"That's a fair promise," she said smoothly, and fled before he could add
+conditions.
+
+Her aim and her methods alike remained hidden from him. He knew only
+that she was leading them all by the nose to some brilliant climax of
+her own devising. He was willing to be led. The climax turned out to be
+a dinner. Anne had long ago discovered the secret influence of a fine
+dinner on the politics of the world. The halo of a saint pales before
+the golden nimbus which well-fed guests see radiating from their hostess
+after dinner. A good man may possess a few robust virtues, but the
+dinner-giver has them all. Therefore, the manager of the alliance
+gathered about her table one memorable evening the leaders whose good
+opinion and hearty support Lord Constantine valued in his task of
+winning the Irish to neutrality or favor for his enterprise. Arthur
+recognized the climax only when Lord Constantine, after the champagne
+had sparkled in the glasses, began to explain his dream to Sullivan.
+
+"What do you think of it?" said he.
+
+"It sounds as harmless as a popgun, and looks like a vision. I don't see
+any details in your scheme," said the blunt leader graciously.
+
+"We can leave the details to the framers of the alliance," said His
+Lordship, uneasy at Arthur's laugh. "What we want first is a large,
+generous feeling in its favor, to encourage the leaders."
+
+"Well, in general," said the Boss, "it is a good thing for all countries
+to live in harmony. When they speak the same language, it's still
+better. I have no feeling one way or the other. I left Ireland young,
+and would hardly have remembered I'm Irish but for Livingstone. What do
+you think of it, Senator?"
+
+"An alliance with England!" cried he with contempt. "Fancy me walking
+down to a district meeting with such an auctioneer's tag hanging on my
+back. Why, I'd be sold out on the spot. Those people haven't forgot how
+they were thrown down and thrown out of Ireland. No, sir. Leave us out
+of an alliance."
+
+"That's the popular feeling, I think," Sullivan said to His Lordship.
+
+"I can understand the Senator's feelings," the Englishman replied
+softly. "But if, before the alliance came to pass, the Irish question
+should be well settled, how would that affect your attitude, Senator?"
+
+"My attitude," replied the Senator, posing as he reflected that a
+budding statesman made the inquiry, "would be entirely in your favor."
+
+"Thank you. What more could I ask?" Lord Constantine replied with a
+fierce look at Arthur. "I say myself, until the Irish get their rights,
+no alliance."
+
+"Then we are with you cordially. We want to do all we can for a man who
+has been so fair to our people," the Boss remarked with the flush of
+good wine in his cheek. "Champagne sentiments," murmured Arthur.
+
+Monsignor, prompted by Anne, came to the rescue of the young nobleman.
+
+"There would be a row, if the matter came up for discussion just now,"
+he said. "Ten years hence may see a change. There's one thing in favor
+of Irish ... well, call it neutrality. Speaking as a churchman,
+Catholics have a happier lot in English-speaking lands than in other
+countries. They have the natural opportunity to develop, they are not
+hampered in speech and action as in Italy and France."
+
+"How good of you to say so," murmured His Lordship.
+
+"Then again," continued Monsignor, with a sly glance at Arthur, "it
+seems to me inevitable that the English-speaking peoples must come into
+closer communion, not merely for their own good, or for selfish aims,
+but to spread among less fortunate nations their fine political
+principles. There's the force, the strength, of the whole scheme. Put
+poor Ireland on her feet, and I vote for an alliance."
+
+"Truly, a Daniel come to judgment," murmured Arthur.
+
+"It's a fine view to take of it," the Boss thought.
+
+"Are you afraid to ask Ledwith for an opinion?" Arthur suggested.
+
+"What's he got to do with it?" Everard snapped, unsoftened by the mellow
+atmosphere of the feast.
+
+"It is no longer a practical question with me," Owen said cheerfully. "I
+have always said that if the common people of the British Isles got an
+understanding of each other, and a better liking for each other, the end
+of oppression would come very soon. They are kept apart by the
+artificial hindrances raised by the aristocracy of birth and money. The
+common people easily fraternize, if they are permitted. See them in this
+country, living, working, intermarrying, side by side."
+
+"How will that sound among the brethren?" said Arthur disappointed.
+
+His mother flashed him a look of triumph, and Lord Constantine looked
+foolishly happy.
+
+"As the utterance of a maniac, of course. Have they ever regarded me as
+sane?" he answered easily.
+
+"And what becomes of your dream?" Arthur persisted.
+
+"I have myself become a dream," he answered sadly. "I am passing into
+the land of dreams, of shadows. My dream was Ireland; a principle that
+would bring forth its own flower, fruit, and seed; not a department of
+an empire. Who knows what is best in this world of change? Some day men
+may realize the poet's dream:
+
+    "The parliament of man, the federation of the world."
+
+Arthur surrendered with bad grace. He had expected from Ledwith the
+last, grand, fiery denunciation which would have swept the room as a
+broadside sweeps a deck, and hurled the schemes of his mother and Lord
+Constantine into the sea. Sad, sad, to see how champagne can undo such a
+patriot! For that matter the golden wine had undone the entire party.
+Judy declared to her dying day that the alliance was toasted amid cheers
+before the close of the banquet; that Lord Constantine in his delight
+kissed Anne as she left the room; with many other circumstances too
+improbable to find a place in a veracious history. It is a fact,
+however, that the great scheme which still agitates the peoples
+interested, had its success depended on the guests of Anne Dillon, would
+have been adopted that night. The dinner was a real triumph.
+
+Unfortunately, dinners do not make treaties; and, as Arthur declared,
+one dinner is good enough until a better is eaten. When the member of
+the British Cabinet came to sit at Anne's table, if one might say so,
+the tables were turned. Birmingham instead of Monsignor played the lead;
+the man whose practical temperament, financial and political influence,
+could soothe and propitiate his own people and interest the moneyed men
+in the alliance. It was admitted no scheme of this kind could progress
+without his aid. He had been reserved for the Cabinet Minister.
+
+No one thought much about the dinner except the hostess, who felt, as
+she looked down the beautiful table, that her glory had reached its
+brilliant meridian. A cabinet minister, a lord, a countess, a leading
+Knickerbocker, the head of Tammany, and a few others who did not matter;
+what a long distance from the famous cat-show and Mulberry Street!
+Arthur also looked up the table with satisfaction. If his part in the
+play had not been dumb show (by his mother's orders), he would have
+quoted the famous grind of the mills of the gods. The two races, so
+unequally matched at home, here faced each other on equal ground.
+Birmingham knew what he had to do.
+
+"I am sure," he said to the cabinet minister, "that in a matter so
+serious you want absolute sincerity?"
+
+"Absolute, and thank you," replied the great man.
+
+"Then let me begin with myself. Personally I would not lift my littlest
+finger to help this scheme. I might not go out of my way to hinder it,
+but I am that far Irish in feeling, not to aid England so finely. For a
+nation that will soon be without a friend in the world, an alliance with
+us would be of immense benefit. No man of Irish blood, knowing what his
+race has endured and still endures from the English, can keep his
+self-respect and back the scheme."
+
+Arthur was sorry for his lordship, who sat utterly astounded and cast
+down wofully at this expression of feeling from such a man.
+
+"The main question can be answered in this way," Birmingham continued.
+"Were I willing to take part in this business, my influence with the
+Irish and their descendants, whatever it may be, would not be able to
+bring a corporal's guard into line in its behalf."
+
+Lord Constantine opened his mouth, Everard snorted his contempt, but the
+great man signaled silence. Birmingham paid no attention.
+
+"In this country the Irish have learned much more than saving money and
+acquiring power; they have learned the unredeemed blackness of the
+injustice done them at home, just as I learned it. What would Grahame
+here, Sullivan, Senator Dillon, or myself have been at this moment had
+we remained in Ireland? Therefore the Irish in this country are more
+bitter against the English government than their brethren at home. I am
+certain that no man can rally even a minority of the Irish to the
+support of the alliance. I am sure I could not. I am certain the formal
+proposal of the scheme would rouse them to fiery opposition."
+
+"Remember," Arthur whispered to Everard, raging to speak, "that the
+Cabinet Minister doesn't care to hear anyone but Birmingham."
+
+"I'm sorry for you, Conny," he whispered to his lordship, "but it's the
+truth."
+
+"Never enjoyed anything so much," said Grahame _sotto voce_, his eyes on
+Everard.
+
+"However, let us leave the Irish out of the question," the speaker went
+on. "Or, better, let us suppose them favorable, and myself able to win
+them over. What chance has the alliance of success? None."
+
+"Fudge!" cried Everard, unabashed by the beautiful English stare of the
+C. M.
+
+"The measure is one-sided commercially. This country has nothing to gain
+from a scheme, which would be a mine to England; therefore the moneyed
+men will not touch it, will not listen to it. Their time is too
+valuable. What remains? An appeal to the people on the score of
+humanity, brotherhood, progress, what you please? My opinion is that the
+dead weight there could not be moved. The late war and the English share
+in it are too fresh in the public mind. The outlook to me is utterly
+against your scheme."
+
+"It might be objected to your view that feeling is too strong an element
+of it," said the Cabinet Minister.
+
+"Feeling has only to do with my share in the scheme," Birmingham
+replied. "As an Irishman I would not further it, yet I might be glad to
+see it succeed. My opinion is concerned with the actual conditions as I
+see them."
+
+With this remark the formal discussion ended. Mortified at this outcome
+of his plans, Lord Constantine could not be consoled.
+
+"As long as Livingstone is on your side, Conny," said Arthur, "you are
+foredoomed."
+
+"I am not so sure," His Lordship answered with some bitterness. "The
+Chief Justice of the United States is a good friend to have."
+
+A thrill shot through Dillon at this emphasis to a rumor hitherto too
+light for printing. The present incumbent of the high office mentioned
+by Lord Constantine lay dying. Livingstone coveted few places, and this
+would be one. In so exalted a station he would be "enskied and sainted."
+Even his proud soul would not disdain to step from the throne-room of
+Windsor to the dais of the Supreme Court of his country. And to strike
+him in the very moment of his triumph, to snatch away the prize, to
+close his career like a broken sentence with a dash and a mark of
+interrogation, to bring him home like any dead game in a bag: here would
+be magnificent justice!
+
+"Have I found thee, O mine enemy?" Arthur cried in his delight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+
+THE CATHEDRAL.
+
+
+Ledwith was dying in profound depression, like most brave souls, whose
+success has been partial, or whose failure has been absolute. This
+mournful ending to a brave, unselfish life seemed to Arthur pitiful and
+monstrous. A mere breathing-machine like himself had enjoyed a
+stimulating vengeance for the failure of one part of his life. Oh, how
+sweet had been that vengeance! The draught had not yet reached the
+bottom of the cup! His cause for the moment a ruin, dragged down with
+Fenianism; his great enemy stronger, more glorious, and more pitiless
+than when he had first raised his hand against her injustice; now the
+night had closed in upon Ledwith, not merely the bitter night of
+sickness and death and failure, but that more savage night of
+despondency, which steeps all human sorrow in the black, polluted
+atmosphere of hell. For such a sufferer the heart of Arthur Dillon
+opened as wide as the gates of heaven. Oh, had he not known what it is
+to suffer so, without consolation!
+
+He was like a son to Owen Ledwith.
+
+Every plan born in the poetic and fertile brain of the patriot he took
+oath to carry out; he vowed his whole life to the cause of Ireland; and
+he consoled Owen for apparent failure by showing him that he had not
+altogether failed, since a man, young, earnest, determined, and wealthy
+should take up the great work just where he dropped it. Could any worker
+ask more of life? A hero should go to his eternity with lofty joy,
+leaving his noble example to the mean world, a reproach to the
+despicable among rulers, a star in the night to the warriors of justice.
+
+In Honora her father did not find the greatest comfort. His soul was of
+the earth and human liberty was his day-star; her soul rose above that
+great human good to the freedom of heaven. Her heart ached for him,
+that he should be going out of life with only human consolation. The
+father stood in awe of an affection, which at the same time humbled and
+exalted him; she had never loved man or woman like him; he was next to
+God in that virginal heart, for with all her love of country, the father
+had the stronger hold on her. Too spiritual for him, her sublime faith
+did not cheer him. Yet when they looked straight into each other's eyes
+with the consciousness of what was coming, mutual anguish terribly
+probed their love. He had no worry for her.
+
+"She has the best of friends," he said to Arthur, "she is capable, and
+trained to take care of herself handsomely; but these things will not be
+of any use. She will go to the convent."
+
+"Not if Lord Constantine can hinder it," Arthur said bluntly.
+
+"I would like to see her in so exalted and happy a sphere as Lord
+Constantine could give her. But I am convinced that the man is not born
+who can win the love of this child of mine. Sir Galahad might, but not
+the stuff of which you and I are made."
+
+"I believe you," said Arthur.
+
+Honora herself told him of her future plans, as they sat with the sick
+man after a trying evening, when for some hours the end seemed near. The
+hour invited confidences, and like brother and sister at the sick-bed of
+a beloved parent they exchanged them. When she had finished telling him
+how she had tried to do her duty to her father, and to her country, and
+how she had laid aside her idea of the convent for their sake, but would
+now take up her whole duty to God by entering a sisterhood, he said
+casually:
+
+"It seems to me these three duties work together; and when you were
+busiest with your father and your country, then were you most faithful
+to God."
+
+"Very true," she replied, looking up with surprise. "Obedience is better
+than sacrifice."
+
+"Take care that you are not deceiving yourself, Honora. Which would
+cause more pain, to give up your art and your cause, or to give up the
+convent?"
+
+"To give up the convent," she replied promptly.
+
+"That looks to me like selfishness," he said gently. "There are many
+nuns in the convents working for the wretched and helping the poor and
+praying for the oppressed, while only a few women are devoted directly
+to the cause of freedom. It strikes me that you descend when you retire
+from a field of larger scope to one which narrows your circle and
+diminishes your opportunities. I am not criticizing the nun's life, but
+simply your personal scheme."
+
+"And you think I descend?" she murmured with a little gasp of pain.
+"Why, how can that be?"
+
+"You are giving up the work, the necessary work, which few women are
+doing, to take up a work in which many women are engaged," he answered,
+uncertain of his argument, but quite sure of his intention. "You lose
+great opportunities to gain small ones, purely personal. That's the way
+it looks to me."
+
+With wonderful cunning he unfolded his arguments in the next few weeks.
+He appealed to her love for her father, her wish to see his work
+continued; he described his own helplessness, very vaguely though, in
+carrying out schemes with which he was unacquainted, and to which he was
+vowed; he mourned over the helpless peoples of the world, for whom a new
+community was needed to fight, as the Knights of St. John fought for
+Christendom; and he painted with delicate satire that love of ease which
+leads heroes to desert the greater work for the lesser on the plea of
+the higher life. Selfishly she sought rest, relief for the taxing
+labors, anxieties, and journeys of fifteen years, and not the will of
+God, as she imagined. Was he conscious of his own motives? Did he
+discover therein any selfishness? Who can say?
+
+He discoursed at the same time to Owen, and in the same fashion. Ledwith
+felt that his dreams were patch work beside the rainbow visions of this
+California miner, who had the mines which make the wildest dreams come
+true sometimes. The wealthy enthusiast might fall, however, into the
+hands of the professional patriot, who would bleed him to death in
+behalf of paper schemes. To whom could he confide him? Honora! It had
+always been Honora with him, who could do nothing without her. He did
+not wish to hamper her in the last moment, as he had hampered her since
+she had first planned her own life.
+
+It was even a pleasant thought for him, to think of his faithful child
+living her beautiful, quiet, convent life, after the fatigues and
+pilgrimages of years, devoted to his memory, mingling his name with her
+prayers, innocent of any other love than for him and her Creator. Yes,
+she must be free as the air after he died. However, the sick are not
+masters of their emotions. A great dread and a great anguish filled him.
+Would it be his fate to lose Arthur to Ireland by consideration for
+others? But he loved her so! How could he bind her in bonds at the very
+moment of their bitter separation? He would not do it! He would not do
+it! He fought down his own longing until he woke up in a sweat of terror
+one night, and called to her loudly, fearing that he would die before he
+exacted from her the last promise. He must sacrifice all for his
+country, even the freedom of his child.
+
+"Honora," he cried, "was I ever faithless to Erin? Did I ever hesitate
+when it was a question of money, or life, or danger, or suffering for
+her sake?"
+
+"Never, father dear," she said, soothing him like a child.
+
+"I have sinned now, then. For your sake I have sinned. I wished to leave
+you free when I am gone, although I saw you were still necessary to
+Eire. Promise me, my child, that you will delay a little after I am
+gone, before entering the convent; that you will make sure beforehand
+that Erin has no great need of you ... just a month or a year ... any
+delay----"
+
+"As long as you please, father," she said quietly. "Make it five years
+if you will----"
+
+"No, no," he interrupted with anguish in his throat. "I shall never
+demand again from you the sacrifices of the past. What may seem just to
+you will be enough. I die almost happy in leaving Arthur Dillon to carry
+on with his talent and his money the schemes of which I only dreamed.
+But I fear the money patriots will get hold of him and cheat him of his
+enthusiasm and his money together. If you were by to let him know what
+was best to be done--that is all I ask of you----"
+
+"A year at least then, father dear! What is time to you and me that we
+should be stingy of the only thing we ever really possessed."
+
+"And now I lose even that," with a long sigh.
+
+Thus gently and naturally Arthur gained his point.
+
+Monsignor came often, and then oftener when Owen's strength began to
+fail rapidly. The two friends in Irish politics had little agreement,
+but in the gloom of approaching death they remembered only their
+friendship. The priest worked vainly to put Owen into a proper frame of
+mind before his departure for judgment. He had made his peace with the
+Church, and received the last rites like a believer, but with the
+coldness of him who receives necessities from one who has wronged him.
+He was dying, not like a Christian, but like the pagan patriot who has
+failed: only the shades awaited him when he fled from the darkness of
+earthly shame. They sat together one March afternoon facing the window
+and the declining sun. To the right another window gave them a good view
+of the beautiful cathedral, whose twin spires, many turrets, and noble
+walls shone blue and golden in the brilliant light.
+
+"I love to look at it from this elevation," said Monsignor, who had just
+been discoursing on the work of his life. "In two years, just think, the
+most beautiful temple in the western continent will be dedicated."
+
+"The money that has gone into it would have struck a great blow for
+Erin," said Ledwith with a bitter sigh.
+
+"So much of it as escaped the yawning pockets of the numberless
+patriots," retorted Monsignor dispassionately. "The money would not have
+been lost in so good a cause, but its present use has done more for your
+people than a score of the blows which you aim at England."
+
+"Claim everything in sight while you are at it," said Owen. "In God's
+name what connection has your gorgeous cathedral with any one's
+freedom?"
+
+"Father dear, you are exciting yourself," Honora broke in, but neither
+heeded her.
+
+"Christ brought us true freedom," said Monsignor, "and the Church alone
+teaches, practises, and maintains it."
+
+"A fine example is provided by Ireland, where to a dead certainty
+freedom was lost because the Church had too unnatural a hold upon the
+people."
+
+"What was lost on account of the faith will be given back again with
+compound interest. Political and military movements have done much for
+Ireland in fifty years; but the only real triumphs, universal,
+brilliant, enduring, significant, leading surely up to greater things,
+have been won by the Irish faith, of which that cathedral, shining so
+gloriously in the sun this afternoon, is both a result and a symbol."
+
+"I believe you will die with that conviction," Ledwith said in wonder.
+
+"I wish you could die with the same, Owen," replied Monsignor tenderly.
+
+They fell silent for a little under the stress of sudden feeling.
+
+"How do men reason themselves into such absurdities?" Owen asked
+himself.
+
+"You ought to know. You have done it often enough," said the priest
+tartly.
+
+Then both laughed together, as they always did when the argument became
+personal.
+
+"Do you know what Livingstone and Bradford and the people whom they
+represent think of that temple?" said Monsignor impressively.
+
+"Oh, their opinions!" Owen snorted.
+
+"They are significant," replied the priest. "These two leaders would
+give the price of the building to have kept down or destroyed the spirit
+which undertook and carried out the scheme. They have said to themselves
+many times in the last twenty years, while that temple rose slowly but
+gloriously into being, what sort of a race is this, so despised and
+ill-treated, so poor and ignorant, that in a brief time on our shores
+can build the finest temple to God which this country has yet seen? What
+will the people, to whom we have described this race as sunk in
+papistical stupidity, debased, unenterprising, think, when they gaze on
+this absolute proof of our mendacity?"
+
+Ledwith, in silence, took a second look at the shining walls and towers.
+
+"Owen, your generous but short-sighted crowd have fought England briefly
+and unsuccessfully a few times on the soil of Ireland ... but the
+children of the faith have fought her with church, and school, and
+catechism around the globe. Their banner, around which they fought, was
+not the banner of the Fenians but the banner of Christ. What did you do
+for the scattered children of the household? Nothing, but collect their
+moneys. While the great Church followed them everywhere with her
+priests, centered them about the temple, and made them the bulwark of
+the faith, the advance-guard, in many lands. Here in America, and in all
+the colonies of England, in Scotland, even in England itself, wherever
+the Irish settled, the faith took root and flourished; the faith which
+means death to the English heresy, and to English power as far as it
+rests upon the heresy."
+
+"The faith kept the people together, scattered all over the world. It
+organized them, it trained them, it kept them true to the Christ
+preached by St. Patrick; it built the fortress of the temple, and the
+rampart of the school; it kept them a people apart, it kept them
+civilized, saved them from inevitable apostasy, and founded a force from
+which you collect your revenues for battle with your enemies; a force
+which fights England all over the earth night and day, in legislatures,
+in literature and journalism, in social and commercial life ... why,
+man, you are a fragment, a mere fragment, you and your warriors, of that
+great fight which has the world for an audience and the English earths
+for its stage."
+
+"When did you evolve this new fallacy?" said Ledwith hoarsely.
+
+"You have all been affected with the spirit of the anti-Catholic
+revolution in Europe, whose cry is that the Church is the enemy of
+liberty; yours, that it has been no friend to Irish liberty. Take
+another look at that cathedral. When you are dead, and many others that
+will live longer, that church will deliver its message to the people who
+pass: 'I am the child of the Catholic faith and the Irish; the broad
+shoulders of America waited for a simple, poor, cast-out people, to dig
+me from the earth and shape me into a thing of beauty, a glory of the
+new continent; I myself am not new; I am of that race which in Europe
+speaks in divine language to you pigmies of the giants that lived in
+ancient days; I am a new bond between the old continent and the new,
+between the old order and the new; I speak for the faith of the past; I
+voice the faith of the hour; the hands that raised me are not unskilled
+and untrained; from what I am judge, ye people, of what stuff my
+builders are made.' And around the world, in all the capitals, in the
+great cities, of the English-speaking peoples, temples of lesser worth
+and beauty, are speaking in the same strain."
+
+Honora anxiously watched her father. A new light shone upon him, a new
+emotion disturbed him; perhaps that old hardness within was giving way.
+Ledwith had the poetic temperament, and the philosopher's power of
+generalization. A hint could open a grand horizon before him, and the
+cathedral in its solemn beauty was the hint. Of course, he could see it
+all, blind as he had been before. The Irish revolution worked fitfully,
+and exploded in a night, its achievement measured by the period of a
+month; but this temple and its thousand sisters lived on doing their
+good work in silence, fighting for the truth without noise or
+conspiracy.
+
+"And this is the glory of the Irish," Monsignor continued, "this is the
+fact which fills me with pride, American as I am, in the race whose
+blood I own; they have preserved the faith for the great
+English-speaking world. Already the new principle peculiar to that faith
+has begun its work in literature, in art, in education, in social life.
+Heresy allowed the Christ to be banished from all the departments of
+human activity, except the home and the temple. Christ is not in the
+schools of the children, nor in the books we read, nor in the pictures
+and sculptures of our studios, nor in our architecture, even of the
+churches, nor in our journalism, any more than in the market-place and
+in the government. These things are purely pagan, or worthless
+composites. It looks as if the historian of these times, a century or
+two hence, will have hard work to fitly describe the Gesta Hibernicorum,
+when this principle of Christianity will have conquered the American
+world as it conquered ancient Europe. I tell you, Owen," and he strode
+to the window with hands outstretched to the great building, "in spite
+of all the shame and suffering endured for His sake, God has been very
+good to your people, He is heaping them with honors. As wide as is the
+power of England, it is no wider than the influence of the Irish faith.
+Stubborn heresy is doomed to fall before the truth which alone can set
+men free and keep them so."
+
+Ledwith had begun to tremble, but he said never a word.
+
+"I am prouder to have had a share in the building of that temple,"
+Monsignor continued, "than to have won a campaign against the English.
+This is a victory, not of one race over another, but of the faith over
+heresy, truth over untruth. It will be the Christ-like glory of Ireland
+to give back to England one day the faith which a corrupt king
+destroyed, for which we have suffered crucifixion. No soul ever loses by
+climbing the cross with Christ."
+
+Ledwith gave a sudden cry, and raised his hands to heaven, but grew
+quiet at once.
+
+The priest watched contentedly the spires of his cathedral.
+
+"You have touched heart and reason together," Honora whispered.
+
+Ledwith remained a long time silent, struggling with a new spirit. At
+last he turned the wide, frank eyes on his friend and victor.
+
+"I am conquered, Monsignor."
+
+"Not wholly yet, Owen."
+
+"I have been a fool, a foolish fool,--not to have seen and understood."
+
+"And your folly is not yet dead. You are dying in sadness and despair
+almost, when you should go to eternity in triumph."
+
+"I go in triumph! Alas! if I could only be blotted out with my last
+breath, and leave neither grave nor memory, it would be happiness. Why
+do you say, 'triumph'?"
+
+"Because you have been true to your country with the fidelity of a
+saint. That's enough. Besides you leave behind you the son born of your
+fidelity to carry on your work----"
+
+"God bless that noble son," Owen cried.
+
+"And a daughter whose prayers will mount from the nun's cell, to bless
+your cause. If you could but go from her resigned!"
+
+"How I wish that I might. I ought to be happy, just for leaving two such
+heirs, two noble hostages to Ireland. I see my error. Christ is the
+King, and no man can better His plans for men. I surrender to Him."
+
+"But your submission is only in part. You are not wholly conquered."
+
+"Twice have you said that," Owen complained, raising his heavy eyes in
+reproach.
+
+"Love of country is not the greatest love."
+
+"No, love of the race, of humanity, is more."
+
+"And the love of God is more than either. With all their beauty, what do
+these abstract loves bring us? The country we love can give us a grave
+and a stone. Humanity crucifies its redeemers. Wolsey summed up the
+matter: 'Had I but served my God with half the zeal with which I served
+my king, He would not in mine age, have left me naked to mine enemies.'"
+
+He paused to let his words sink into Ledwith's mind.
+
+"Owen, you are leaving the world oppressed by the hate of a lifetime,
+the hate ingrained in your nature, the fatal gift of persecutor and
+persecuted from the past."
+
+"And I shall never give that up," Owen declared, sitting up and fixing
+his hardest look on the priest. "I shall never forget Erin's wrongs, nor
+Albion's crimes. I shall carry that just and honorable hate beyond the
+grave. Oh, you priests!"
+
+"I said you were not conquered. You may hate injustice, but not the
+unjust. You will find no hate in heaven, only justice. The persecutors
+and their victims have long been dead, and judged. The welcome of the
+wretched into heaven, the home of justice and love, wiped out all memory
+of suffering here, as it will for us all. The justice measured out to
+their tyrants even you would be satisfied with. Can your hate add
+anything to the joy of the blessed, or the woe of the lost?"
+
+"Nothing," murmured Owen from the pillow, as his eyes looked afar,
+wondering at that justice so soon to be measured out to him. "You are
+again right. Oh, but we are feeble ... but we are foolish ... to think
+it. What is our hate any more than our justice ... both impotent and
+ridiculous."
+
+There followed a long pause, then, for Monsignor had finished his
+argument, and only waited to control his own emotion before saying
+good-by.
+
+"I die content," said Ledwith with a long restful sigh, coming back to
+earth, after a deep look into divine power and human littleness. "Bring
+me to-morrow, and often, the Lord of Justice. I never knew till now that
+in desiring Justice so ardently, it was He I desired. Monsignor, I die
+content, without hate, and without despair."
+
+If ever a human creature had a foretaste of heaven it was Honora during
+the few weeks that followed this happy day. The bitterness in the soul
+of Owen vanished like a dream, and with it went regret, and vain
+longing, and the madness which at odd moments sprang from these
+emotions. His martyrdom, so long and ferocious, would end in the glory
+of a beautiful sunset, the light of heaven in his heart, shining in his
+face. He lay forever beyond the fire of time and injustice.
+
+Every morning Honora prepared the little altar in the sick-room, and
+Monsignor brought the Blessed Sacrament. Arthur answered the prayers and
+gazed with awe upon the glorified face of the father, with something
+like anger upon the exalted face of the daughter; for the two were gone
+suddenly beyond him. Every day certain books provided by Monsignor were
+read to the dying man by the daughter or the son; describing the
+migration of the Irish all over the English-speaking world, their growth
+to consequence and power. Owen had to hear the figures of this growth,
+see and touch the journals printed by the scattered race, and to hear
+the editorials which spoke their success, their assurance, their
+convictions, their pride.
+
+Then he laughed so sweetly, so naturally, chuckled so mirthfully that
+Honora had to weep and thank God for this holy mirthfulness, which
+sounded like the spontaneous, careless, healthy mirth of a boy.
+Monsignor came evenings to explain, interpret, put flesh and life into
+the reading of the day with his vivid and pointed comment. Ledwith
+walked in wonderland. "The hand of God is surely there," was his one
+saying. The last day of his pilgrimage he had a long private talk with
+Arthur. They had indeed become father and son, and their mutual
+tenderness was deep.
+
+Honora knew from the expression of the two men that a new element had
+entered into her father's happiness.
+
+"I free you from your promise, my child," said Ledwith, "my most
+faithful, most tender child. It is the glory of men that the race is
+never without such children as you. You are free from any bond. It is my
+wish that you accept your release."
+
+She accepted smiling, to save him from the stress of emotion. Then he
+wished to see the cathedral in the light of the afternoon sun, and
+Arthur opened the door of the sick-room. The dying man could see from
+his pillow the golden spires, and the shining roof, that spoke to him so
+wonderfully of the triumph of his race in a new land, the triumph which
+had been built up in the night, unseen, uncared for, unnoticed.
+
+"God alone has the future," he said.
+
+Once he looked at Honora, once more, with burning eyes, that never could
+look enough on that loved child. With his eyes on the great temple,
+smiling, he died. They thought he had fallen asleep in his weakness.
+Honora took his head in her arms, and Arthur Dillon stood beside her and
+wept.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+
+THE FALL OF LIVINGSTONE.
+
+
+The ending of Quincy Livingstone's career in England promised to be like
+the setting of the sun: his glory fading on the hills of Albion only to
+burn with greater splendor in his native land: Chief Justice of the
+Supreme Court! He needed the elevation. True, his career at court had
+been delightful, from the English point of view even brilliant; the
+nobility had made much of him, if not as much as he had made of the
+nobility; the members of the government had seriously praised him, far
+as they stood from Lord Constantine's theory of American friendship.
+However pleasant these things looked to the Minister, of what account
+could they be to a mere citizen returning to private life in New York?
+Could they make up for the failures of the past year at home, the utter
+destruction of his pet schemes for the restraint of the Irish in the
+land of the Puritans?
+
+What disasters! The alliance thrust out of consideration by the strong
+hand of Birmingham; the learned Fritters chased from the platform by
+cold audiences, and then from the country by relentless ridicule; Sister
+Claire reduced to the rank of a tolerated criminal, a ticket-of-leave
+girl; and the whole movement discredited! Fortunately these calamities
+remained unknown in London.
+
+The new honors, however, would hide the failure and the shame. His
+elevation was certain. The President had made known his intention, and
+had asked Minister Livingstone to be ready within a short time to sail
+for home for final consultation. His departure from the court of St.
+James would be glorious, and his welcome home significant; afterwards
+his place would be amongst the stars. He owned the honorable pride that
+loves power and place, when these are worthy, but does not seek them.
+From the beginning the Livingstones had no need to run after office. It
+always sought them, receiving as rich a lustre as it gave in the
+recognition of their worth. His heart grew warm that fortune had singled
+him out for the loftiest place in his country's gift. To die
+chief-justice atoned for life's shortcomings. Life itself was at once
+steeped in the color and perfume of the rose.
+
+Felicitations poured in from the great. The simplicities of life
+suddenly put on a new charm, the commonplaces a new emphasis. My Lord
+Tomnoddy's 'how-de-do' was uttered with feeling, men took a second look
+at him, the friends of a season felt a warmth about their language, if
+not about the heart, in telling of his coming dignity. The government
+people shook off their natural drowsiness to measure the facts, to
+understand that emotion should have a share in uttering the words of
+farewell. "Oh, my _dear_, DEAR Livingstone!" cried the Premier as he
+pressed his hand vigorously at their first meeting after the news had
+been given out. Society sang after the same fashion. Who could resist
+the delight of these things?
+
+His family and friends exulted. Lovable and deep-hearted with them,
+harsh as he might be with opponents, their gladness gave him joy. The
+news spread among the inner circles with due reserve, since no one
+forgot the distance between the cup and the lip; but to intimates the
+appointment was said to be a certainty, and confirmation by the Senate
+as sure as anything mortal. Of course the Irish would raise a clamor,
+but no arm among them had length or strength enough to snatch away the
+prize. Not in many years had Livingstone dipped so deeply into the
+waters of joy as in the weeks that followed the advice from the
+President.
+
+Arthur Dillon knew that mere opposition would not affect Livingstone's
+chances. His position was too strong to be stormed, he learned upon
+inquiry in Washington. The political world was quiet to drowsiness, and
+the President so determined in his choice that candidates would not come
+forward to embarrass his nominee. The public accepted the rumor of the
+appointment with indifference, which remained undisturbed when a second
+rumor told of Irish opposition. But for Arthur's determination the
+selection of a chief-justice would have been as dull as the naming of a
+consul to Algiers.
+
+"We can make a good fight," was Grahame's conclusion, "but the field
+belongs to Livingstone."
+
+"Chance is always kind to the unfit," said Arthur, "because the Irish
+are good-natured."
+
+"I don't see the connection."
+
+"I should have said, because mankind is so. In this case Quincy gets the
+prize, because the Irish think he will get it."
+
+"You speak like the oracle," said Grahame.
+
+"Well, the fight must be made, a stiff one, to the last cartridge. But
+it won't be enough, mere opposition. There must be another candidate. We
+can take Quincy in front; the candidate can take him in the rear. It
+must not be seen, only said, that the President surrendered to Irish
+pressure. There's the plan: well-managed opposition, and another
+candidate. We can see to the first, who will be the other?"
+
+They were discussing that point without fruit when Anne knocked at the
+door of the study, and entered in some anxiety.
+
+"Is it true, what I heard whispered," said she, "that they will soon be
+looking for a minister to England, that Livingstone is coming back?"
+
+"True, mother dear," and he rose to seat her comfortably. "But if you
+can find us a chief-justice the good man will not need to come back. He
+can remain to help keep patriots in English prisons."
+
+"Why I want to make sure, you know, is that Vandervelt should get the
+English mission this time without fail. I wouldn't have him miss it for
+the whole world."
+
+"There's your man," said Grahame.
+
+"Better than the English mission, mother," Arthur said quickly, "would
+be the chief-justiceship for so good a man as Vandervelt. If you can get
+him to tell his friends he wants to be chief-justice, I can swear that
+he will get one place or the other. I know which one he would prefer.
+No, not the mission. That's for a few years, forgotten honors. The
+other's for life, lasting honor. Oh, how Vandervelt must sigh for that
+noble dais, the only throne in the Republic, the throne of American
+justice. Think, how Livingstone would defile it! The hater and
+persecutor of a wronged and hounded race, who begrudges us all but the
+honors of slavery, how could he understand and administer justice, even
+among his own?"
+
+"What are you raving about, Artie?" she complained. "I'll get Vandervelt
+to do anything if it's the right thing for him to do; only explain to me
+what you want done."
+
+He explained so clearly that she was filled with delight. With a
+quickness which astonished him, she picked up the threads of the
+intrigue; some had their beginning five years back, and she had not
+forgotten. Suddenly the root of the affair bared itself to her: this son
+of hers was doing battle for his own. She had forgotten Livingstone long
+ago, and therefore had forgiven him. Arthur had remembered. Her fine
+spirit stirred dubious Grahame.
+
+"Lave Vandervelt to me," she said, for her brogue came back and gently
+tripped her at times, "and do you young men look after Livingstone. I
+have no hard feelings against him, but, God forgive me, when I think of
+Louis Everard, and all that Mary suffered, and Honora, and the shame put
+upon us by Sister Claire, something like hate burns me. Anyway we're not
+worth bein' tramped upon, if we let the like of him get so high, when we
+can hinder it."
+
+"Hurrah for the Irish!" cried Grahame, and the two cheered her as she
+left the room to prepare for her share of the labor.
+
+The weight of the work lay in the swift and easy formation of an
+opposition whose strength and temper would be concealed except from the
+President, and whose action would be impressive, consistent, and
+dramatic. The press was to know only what it wished to know, without
+provocation. The main effort should convince the President of the
+unfitness of one candidate and the fitness of the other. There were to
+be no public meetings or loud denunciations. What cared the officials
+for mere cries of rage? Arthur found his task delightful, and he worked
+like a smith at the forge, heating, hammering, and shaping his engine of
+war. When ready for action, his mother had won Vandervelt, convinced him
+that his bid for the greater office would inevitably land him in either
+place. He had faith in her, and she had prophesied his future glory!
+
+Languidly the journals gave out in due time the advent of another
+candidate for the chief-justiceship, and also cloudy reports of Irish
+opposition to Livingstone. No one was interested but John Everard, still
+faithful to the Livingstone interest in spite of the gibes of Dillon and
+Grahame. The scheme worked so effectively that Arthur did not care to
+have any interruptions from this source. The leaders talked to the
+President singly, in the order of their importance, against his nominee,
+on the score of party peace. What need to disturb the Irish by naming a
+man who had always irritated and even insulted them? The representation
+in the House would surely suffer by his action, because in this way only
+could the offended people retaliate. They detested Livingstone.
+
+Day after day this testimony fairly rained upon the President,
+unanimous, consistent, and increasing in dignity with time, each
+protester seeming more important than he who just went out the door.
+Inquiries among the indifferent proved that the Irish would give much to
+see Livingstone lose the honors. And always in the foreground of the
+picture of protest stood the popular and dignified Vandervelt surrounded
+by admiring friends!
+
+Everard had the knack of ferreting out obscure movements. When this
+intrigue was laid bare he found Arthur Dillon at his throat on the
+morning he had chosen for a visit to the President. To promise the
+executive support from a strong Irish group in the appointment of
+Livingstone would have been fatal to the opposition. Hence the look
+which Arthur bestowed on Everard was as ugly as his determination to put
+the marplot in a retreat for the insane, if no other plan kept him at
+home.
+
+"I want to defeat Livingstone," said Arthur, "and I think I have him
+defeated. You had better stay at home. You are hurting a good cause."
+
+"I am going to destroy that good cause," John boasted gayly. "You
+thought you had the field to yourself. And you had, only that I
+discovered your game."
+
+"It's a thing to be proud of," Arthur replied sadly, "this steady
+support of the man who would have ruined your boy. Keep quiet. You've
+got to have the truth rammed down your throat, since you will take it in
+no other way. This Livingstone has been plotting against your race for
+twenty years. It may not matter to a disposition as crooked as yours,
+that he opened the eyes of English government people to the meaning of
+Irish advance in America, that he is responsible for Fritters, for the
+alliance, for McMeeter, for the escaped nun, for her vile _Confessions_,
+for the kidnapping societies here. You are cantankerous enough to forget
+that he used his position in London to do us harm, and you won't see
+that he will do as much with the justiceship. Let these things pass. If
+you were a good Catholic one might excuse your devotion to Livingstone
+on the score that you were eager to return good for evil. But you're a
+half-cooked Catholic, John. Let that pass too. Have you no manhood left
+in you? Are you short on self-respect? This man brought out and backed
+the woman who sought to ruin your son, to break your wife's heart, to
+destroy your own happiness. With his permission she slandered the poor
+nuns with tongue and pen, a vile woman hired to defile the innocent. And
+for this man you throw dirt on your own, for this man you are going to
+fight your own that he may get honors which he will shame. Isn't it fair
+to think that you are going mad, Everard?"
+
+"Don't attempt," said the other in a fury, "to work off your oratory on
+me. I am going to Washington to expose your intrigues against a
+gentleman. What! am I to tremble at your frown----?"
+
+"Rot, man! Who asked you to tremble? I saved your boy from Livingstone,
+and I shall save you from yourself, even if I have to put you in an
+asylum for the harmless insane. Don't you believe that Livingstone is
+the patron of Sister Claire? that he is indirectly responsible for that
+scandal?"
+
+"I never did, and I never shall," with vehemence. "You are one of those
+that can prove anything----"
+
+"If you were sure of his responsibility, would you go to Washington?"
+
+"Haven't I the evidence of my own senses? Were not all Livingstone's
+friends on the committee which exposed Sister Claire?"
+
+"Because we insisted on that or a public trial, and they came with sour
+stomachs," said Arthur, glad that he had begun to discuss the point.
+"Would you go to Washington if you were sure he backed the woman?"
+
+"Enough, young man. I'm off for the train. Here, Mary, my satchel----"
+
+Two strong bands were laid on his shoulders, he was pushed back into his
+chair, and the face which glowered on him after this astonishing
+violence for the moment stilled his rage and astonishment.
+
+"Would you go to Washington if you were sure Livingstone backed Sister
+Claire?" came the relentless question.
+
+"No, I wouldn't," he answered vacantly.
+
+"Do you wish to be made sure of it?"
+
+He began to turn purple and to bluster.
+
+"Not a word," said his master, "not a cry. Just answer that question. Do
+you wish to be made sure of this man's atrocious guilt and your own
+folly?"
+
+"I want to know what is the meaning of this," Everard sputtered, "this
+violence? In my own house, in broad day, like a burglar."
+
+"Answer the question."
+
+Alarm began to steal over Everard, who was by no means a brave man. Had
+Arthur Dillon, always a strange fellow, gone mad? Or was this scene a
+hint of murder? The desperate societies to which Dillon was said to
+belong often indulged in violence. It had never occurred to him before
+that these secret forces must be fighting Livingstone through Dillon.
+They would never permit him to use his influence at Washington in the
+Minister's behalf. Dreadful! He must dissemble.
+
+"If you can make me sure, I am willing," he said meekly.
+
+"Read that, then," and Arthur placed his winning card, as he thought, in
+his hands; the private confession of Sister Claire as to the persons who
+had assisted her in her outrageous schemes; and the chief, of course,
+was Livingstone. Everard read it with contempt.
+
+"Legally you know what her testimony is worth," said he.
+
+"You accepted her testimony as to her own frauds, and so did the whole
+committee."
+
+"We had to accept the evidence of our own senses."
+
+Obstinate to the last was Everard.
+
+"You will not be convinced," said Arthur rudely, "but you can be
+muzzled. I say again: keep away from Washington, and keep your hands off
+my enterprise. You have some idea of what happens to men like you for
+interfering. If I meet you in Washington, or find any trace of your
+meddling in the matter, here is what I shall do; this whole scandal of
+the escaped nun shall be reopened, this confession shall be printed, and
+the story of Louis' adventure, from that notable afternoon at four
+o'clock until his return, word for word, with portraits of his
+interesting family, of Sister Claire, all the details, will be given to
+the journals. Do you understand? Meanwhile, study this problem in
+psychology: how long will John Everard be able to endure life after I
+tell the Irish how he helped to enthrone their bitterest enemy?"
+
+He did not wait for an answer, but left the baffled man to wrestle with
+the situation, which must have worsted him, for his hand did not appear
+in the game at Washington. Very smoothly the plans of Arthur worked to
+their climax. The friends of Vandervelt pressed his cause as urgently
+and politely as might be, and with increasing energy as the
+embarrassment of the President grew. The inherent weakness of
+Vandervelt's case appeared to the tireless Dillon more appalling in the
+last moments than at the beginning: the situation had no logical
+outcome. It was merely a question whether the President would risk a
+passing unpopularity.
+
+He felt the absence of Birmingham keenly, the one man who could say to
+the executive with authority, this appointment would be a blunder.
+Birmingham being somewhere on the continent, out of reach of appeals for
+help, his place was honorably filled by the General of the Army, with an
+influence, however, purely sentimental. Arthur accompanied him for the
+last interview with the President. Only two days intervened before the
+invitation would be sent to Livingstone to return home. The great man
+listened with sympathy to the head of the army making his protest, but
+would promise nothing; he had fixed an hour however for the settlement
+of the irritating problem; if they would call the next morning at ten,
+he would give them his unalterable decision.
+
+Feeling that the decision must be against his hopes, Arthur passed a
+miserable night prowling with Grahame about the hotel. Had he omitted
+any point in the fight? Was there any straw afloat which could be of
+service? Doyle used his gift of poetry to picture for him the return of
+Livingstone, and his induction into office; the serenity of mind, the
+sense of virtue and patriotism rewarded, his cold contempt of the
+defeated opposition and their candidate, the matchless dignity, which
+would exalt Livingstone to the skies as the Chief-Justice. Their only
+consolation was the fight itself, which had shaken for a moment the
+edifice of the Minister's fame.
+
+The details went to London from friends close to the President, and
+enabled Livingstone to measure the full strength of a young man's
+hatred. The young man should be attended to after the struggle. There
+was no reason to lose confidence. While the factions were still
+worrying, the cablegram came with the request that he sail on Saturday
+for home, the equivalent of appointment. When reading it at the Savage
+Club, whither a special messenger had followed him, the heavy mustache
+and very round spectacles of Birmingham rose up suddenly before him, and
+they exchanged greetings with the heartiness of exiles from the same
+land. The Minister remembered that his former rival had no share in the
+attempt to deprive him of his coming honors, and Birmingham recalled the
+rumor picked up that day in the city.
+
+"I suppose there's no truth in it," he said.
+
+The Minister handed him the cablegram.
+
+"Within ten days," making a mental calculation, "I should be on my way
+back to London, with the confirmation of the Senate practically
+secured."
+
+"When it comes I shall be pleased to offer my congratulations,"
+Birmingham replied, and the remark slightly irritated Livingstone.
+
+Could he have seen what happened during the next few hours his sleep
+would have lost its sweetness. Birmingham went straight to the telegraph
+office, and sent a cipher despatch to his man of business, ordering him
+to see the President that night in Washington, and to declare in his
+name, with all the earnestness demanded by the situation, that the
+appointment of Livingstone would mean political death to him and immense
+embarrassment to his party for years. As it would be three in the
+morning before a reply would reach London, Birmingham went to bed with a
+good conscience. Thus, while the two young men babbled all night in the
+hotel, and thought with dread of the fatal hour next morning, wire, and
+train, and business man flew into the capital and out of it, carrying
+one man's word in and another man's glory out, fleet, silent,
+unrecognized, unhonored, and unknown.
+
+At breakfast Birmingham read the reply from his business man with
+profound satisfaction. At breakfast the Minister read a second cablegram
+with a sudden recollection of Birmingham's ominous words the night
+before. He knew that he would need no congratulations, for the prize had
+been snatched away forever. The cablegram informed him that he should
+not sail on Saturday, and that explanations would follow. For a moment
+his proud heart failed him. Bitterness flowed in on him, so that the
+food in his mouth became tasteless. What did he care that his enemies
+had triumphed? Or, that he had been overthrown? The loss of the vision
+which had crowned his life, and made a hard struggle for what he thought
+the fit and right less sordid, even beautiful; that was a calamity.
+
+He had indulged it in spite of mental protests against the dangerous
+folly. The swift imagination, prompted by all that was Livingstone in
+him, had gone over the many glories of the expected dignity; the
+departure from beautiful and flattering England, the distinction of the
+return to his beloved native land, the splendid interval before the
+glorious day, the crowning honors amid the applause of his own, and the
+long sweet afternoon of life, when each day would bring its own
+distinction! He had had his glimpse of Paradise. Oh, never, never would
+life be the same for him! He began to study the reasons for his
+ill-success....
+
+At ten o'clock that day the President informed the General of the Army
+in Mr. Dillon's presence that he had sent the name of Hon. Van
+Rensselaer Vandervelt to the Senate for the position of Chief-Justice!
+
+
+
+
+THE TEST OF DISAPPEARANCE.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+
+A PROBLEM OF DISAPPEARANCE.
+
+
+After patient study of the disappearance of Horace Endicott, for five
+years, Richard Curran decided to give up the problem. All clues had come
+to nothing. Not the faintest trace of the missing man had been found.
+His experience knew nothing like it. The money earned in the pursuit
+would never repay him for the loss of self-confidence and of nerve, due
+to study and to ill success. But for his wife he would have withdrawn
+long ago from the search.
+
+"Since you have failed," she said, "take up my theory. You will find
+that man in Arthur Dillon."
+
+"That's the strongest reason for giving up," he replied. "Once before I
+felt my mind going from insane eagerness to solve the problem. It would
+not do to have us both in the asylum at once."
+
+"I made more money in following my instincts, Dick, than you have made
+in chasing your theories. Instinct warned me years ago that Arthur
+Dillon is another than what he pretends. It warns me now that he is
+Horace Endicott. At least before you give up for good, have a shy at my
+theory."
+
+"Instinct! Theory! It is pure hatred. And the hate of a woman can make
+her take an ass for Apollo."
+
+"No doubt I hate him. Oh, how I hate that man ... and young Everard...."
+
+"Or any man that escapes you," he filled in with sly malice.
+
+"Be careful, Dick," she screamed at him, and he apologized. "That hate
+is more to me than my child. It will grow big enough to kill him yet.
+But apart from hate, Arthur Dillon is not the man he seems. I could
+swear he is Horace Endicott. Remember all I have told you about his
+return. He came back from California about the time Endicott
+disappeared. I was playing Edith Conyngham then with great success,
+though not to crowded houses."
+
+She laughed heartily at the recollection.
+
+"I remarked to myself even then that Anne Dillon ... she's the choice
+hypocrite ... did not seem easy in showing the letter which told of his
+coming back, how sorry he was for his conduct, how happy he would make
+her with the fortune he had earned."
+
+"All pure inference," said Curran. "Twenty men arrived home in New York
+about the same time with fortunes from the mines, and some without
+fortunes from the war."
+
+"Then how do you account for this, smart one? Never a word of his life
+in California from that day to this. Mind that. No one knows, or seems
+to know, just where he had been, just how he got his money ... you
+understand ... all the little bits o' things that are told, and guessed,
+and leak out in a year. I asked fifty people, I suppose, and all they
+knew was: California. You'd think Judy Haskell knew, and she told me
+everything. What had she to tell? that no one dared to ask him about
+such matters."
+
+"Dillon is a very close man."
+
+"Endicott had to be among that long-tongued Irish crowd. I watched him.
+He was stupid at first ... stuck to the house ... no one saw him for
+weeks ... except the few. He listened and watched ... I saw him ... his
+eyes and his ears ought to be as big as a donkey's from it ... and he
+said nothing. They made excuses for a thing that everyone saw and talked
+about. He was ill. I say he wanted to make no mistakes; he was learning
+his part; there was nothing of the Irish in him, only the sharp Yankee.
+It made me wonder for weeks what was wrong. He looked as much like the
+boy that ran away as you do. And then I had no suspicions, mind you. I
+believed Anne Dillon's boy had come back with a fortune, and I was
+thinking how I could get a good slice of it."
+
+"And you didn't get a cent," Curran remarked.
+
+"He hated me from the beginning. It takes one that is playing a part to
+catch another in the same business. After a while he began to bloom. He
+got more Irish than the Irish. There's no Yankee living, no Englishman,
+can play the Irishman. He can give a good imitation maybe, d'ye hear?
+That's what Dillon gave. He did everything that young Dillon used to do
+before he left home ... a scamp he was too. He danced jigs, flattered
+the girls, chummed with the ditch-diggers and barkeepers ... and he
+hated them all, women and men. The Yankees hate the Irish as easy as
+they breathe. I tell you he had forgotten nothing that he used to do as
+a boy. And the fools that looked on said, oh, it's easy to see he was
+sick, for now that he is well we can all recognize our old dare-devil,
+Arthur."
+
+"He's dare-devil clear enough," commented her husband.
+
+"First point you've scored," she said with contempt. "Horace Endicott
+was a milksop: to run away when he should have killed the two idiots.
+Dillon is a devil, as I ought to know. But the funniest thing was his
+dealings with his mother. She was afraid of him ... as much as I am ...
+she is till this minute. Haven't I seen her look at him, when she dared
+to say a sharp thing? And she's a good actress, mind you. It took her
+years to act as a mother can act with a son."
+
+"Quite natural, I think. He went away a boy, came back a rich man, and
+was able to boss things, having the cash."
+
+"You think! You! I've seen ten years of your thinking! Well, I thought
+too. I saw a chance for cash, where I smelled a mystery. Do you know
+that he isn't a Catholic? Do you know that he's strange to all Catholic
+ways? that he doesn't know how to hear Mass, to kneel when he enters a
+pew, to bless himself when he takes the holy water at the door? Do you
+know that he never goes to communion? And therefore he never goes to
+confession. Didn't I watch for years, so that I might find out what was
+wrong with him, and make some money?"
+
+"All that's very plausible," said her husband. "Only, there are many
+Catholics in this town, and in particular the Californians, that forgot
+as much as he forgot about their religion, and more."
+
+"But he is not a Catholic," she persisted. "There's an understanding
+between him and Monsignor O'Donnell. They exchange looks when they meet.
+He visits the priest when he feels like it, but in public they keep
+apart. Oh, all round, that Arthur Dillon is the strangest fellow; but
+he plays his part so well that fools like you, Dick, are tricked."
+
+"You put a case well, Dearie. But it doesn't convince me. However," for
+he knew her whim must be obeyed, "I don't mind trying again to find
+Horace Endicott in this Arthur Dillon."
+
+"And of course," with a sneer, "you'll begin with the certainty that
+there's nothing in the theory. What can the cleverest man discover, when
+he's sure beforehand that there's nothing to discover?"
+
+"My word, Colette, if I take up the matter, I'll convince you that
+you're wrong, or myself that you're right. And I'll begin right here
+this minute. I believe with you that we have found Endicott at last.
+Then the first question I ask myself is: who helped Horace Endicott to
+become Arthur Dillon?"
+
+"Monsignor O'Donnell of course," she answered.
+
+"Then Endicott must have known the priest before he disappeared: known
+him so as to trust him, and to get a great favor from him? Now, Sonia
+didn't know that fact."
+
+"That fool of a woman knows nothing, never did, never will," she
+snapped.
+
+"Well, for the sake of peace let us say he was helped by Monsignor, and
+knew the priest a little before he went away. Monsignor helped him to
+find his present hiding-place; quite naturally he knew Mrs. Dillon, how
+her son had gone and never been heard of: and he knew it would be a
+great thing for her to have a son with an income like Endicott's. The
+next question is: how many people know at this moment who Dillon really
+is?"
+
+"Just two, sir. He's a fox ... they're three foxes ... Monsignor, Anne
+Dillon, and Arthur himself. I know, for I watched 'em all, his uncle,
+his friends, his old chums ... the fellows he played with before he ran
+away ... and no one knows but the two that had to know ... sly Anne and
+smooth Monsignor. They made the money that I wasn't smart enough to get
+hold of."
+
+"Then the next question is: is it worth while to make inquiries among
+the Irish, his friends and neighbors, the people that knew the real
+Dillon?"
+
+"You won't find out any more than I've told you, but you may prove how
+little reason they have for accepting him as the boy that ran away."
+
+"After that it would be necessary to search California."
+
+"Poor Dick," she interrupted with compassion, smoothing his beard. "You
+are really losing your old cleverness. Search California! Can't you see
+yet the wonderful 'cuteness of this man, Endicott? He settled all that
+before he wrote the letter to Anne Dillon, saying that her son was
+coming home. He found out the career of Arthur Dillon in California. If
+he found that runaway he sent him off to Australia with a lump of money,
+to keep out of sight for twenty years. Did the scamp need much
+persuading? I reckon not. He had been doing it for nothing ten years.
+Or, perhaps the boy was dead: then he had only to make the proper
+connections with his history up to the time of his death. Or he may have
+disappeared forever, and that made the matter all the simpler for
+Endicott. Oh, you're not clever, Dick," and she kissed him to sweeten
+the bitterness of the opinion.
+
+"I'm not convinced," he said cheerfully. "Then tell me what to do."
+
+"I don't know myself. Endicott took his money with him. Where does
+Arthur Dillon keep his money? How did it get there? Where was it kept
+before that? How is he spending it just now? Does he talk in his sleep?
+Are there any mementoes of his past in his private boxes? Could he be
+surprised into admissions of his real character by some trick, such as
+bringing him face to face on a sudden with Sonia? Wouldn't that be worth
+seeing? Just like the end of a drama. You know the marks on Endicott's
+body, birthmarks and the like ... are they on Dillon's body? The boy
+that ran away must have had some marks.... Judy Haskell would know ...
+are they on Endicott's body?"
+
+"You've got the map of the business in that pretty head perfect," said
+Curran in mock admiration. "But don't you see, my pet, that if this man
+is as clever as you would have him he has already seen to these things?
+He has removed the birthmarks and peculiarities of Horace, and adopted
+those of Arthur? You'll find it a tangled business the deeper you dive
+into it."
+
+"Well, it's your business to dive deeper than the tangle," she answered
+crossly. "If I had your practice----"
+
+"You would leave me miles behind, of course. Here's the way I would
+reason about this thing: Horace Endicott is now known as Arthur Dillon;
+he has left no track by which Endicott can be traced to his present
+locality; but there must be a very poor connection between the Dillon at
+home and the real Dillon in California, in Australia, or in his grave;
+if we can trace the real Arthur Dillon then we take away the foundations
+of his counterfeit. Do you see? I say a trip to California and a clean
+examination there, after we have done our best here to pick flaws in the
+position of the gentleman who has been so cruel to my pet. He must get
+his punishment for that, I swear."
+
+"Ah, there's the rub," she whimpered in her childish way. "I hate him,
+and I love him. He's the finest fellow in the world. He has the strength
+of ten. See how he fought the battles of the Irish against his own. One
+minute I could tear him like a wolf, and now I could let him tear me to
+pieces. You are fond of him too, Dick."
+
+"I would follow him to the end of the world, through fire and flood and
+fighting," said the detective with feeling. "He loves Ireland, he loves
+and pities our poor people, he is spending his money for them. But I
+could kill him just the same for his cruelty to you. He's a hard man,
+Colette."
+
+"Now I know what you are trying to do," she said sharply. "You think you
+can frighten me by telling me what I know already. Well, you can't."
+
+"No, no," he protested, "I was thinking of another thing. We'll come to
+the danger part later. There is one test of this man that ought to be
+tried before all others. When I have sounded the people about Arthur
+Dillon, and am ready for California, Sonia Endicott should be brought
+here to have a good look at him in secret first; and then, perhaps, in
+the open, if you thought well of it."
+
+"Why shouldn't I think well of it? But will it do any good, and mayn't
+it do harm? Sonia has no brains. If you can't see any resemblance
+between Arthur and the pictures of Horace Endicott, what can Sonia see?"
+
+"The eyes of hate, and the eyes of love," said he sagely.
+
+"Then I'd be afraid to bring them together," she admitted whispering
+again, and cowering into his arms. "If he suspects I am hunting him
+down, he will have no pity."
+
+"No doubt of it," he said thoughtfully. "I have always felt the devil in
+him. Endicott was a fat, gay, lazy sport, that never so much as rode
+after the hounds. Now Arthur Dillon has had his training in the mines.
+That explains his dare-devil nature."
+
+"And Horace Endicott was betrayed by the woman he loved," she cried with
+sudden fierceness. "That turns a man sour quicker than all the
+mining-camps in the world. That made him lean and terrible like a wolf.
+That sharpened his teeth, and gave him a taste for woman's blood. That's
+why he hates me."
+
+"You're wrong again, my pet. He has a liking for you, but you spoil it
+by laying hands on his own. You saw his looks when he was hunting for
+young Everard."
+
+"Oh, how he frightens me," and she began to walk the room in a rage.
+"How I would like to throw off this fear and face him and fight him, as
+I face you. I'll do it if the terror kills me. I shall not be terrified
+by any man. You shall hunt him down, Dick Curran. Begin at once. When
+you are ready send for Sonia. I'll bring them together myself, and take
+the responsibility. What can he do but kill me?"
+
+Sadness came over the detective as she returned to her seat on his knee.
+
+"He is not the kind, little girl," said he, "that lays hands on a woman
+or a man outside of fair, free, open fight before the whole world."
+
+"What do you mean?" knowing very well what he meant.
+
+"If he found you on his trail," with cunning deliberation, so that every
+word beat heart and brain like a hammer, "and if he is really Horace
+Endicott, he would only have to give your character and your
+address----"
+
+"To the dogs," she shrieked in a sudden access of horror.
+
+Then she lay very still in his arms, and the man laughed quietly to
+himself, sure that he had subdued her and driven her crazy scheme into
+limbo. The wild creature had one dread and by reason of it one master.
+Never had she been so amenable to discipline as under Dillon's remote
+and affable authority. Curran had no fear of consequences in studying
+the secret years of Arthur Dillon's existence. The study might reveal
+things which a young man preferred to leave in the shadows, but would
+not deliver up to Sonia her lost Horace; and even if Arthur came to know
+what they were doing, he could smile at Edith's vagaries.
+
+"What shall we do?" he ventured to say at last.
+
+"Find Horace Endicott in Arthur Dillon," was the unexpected answer,
+energetic, but sighed rather than spoken. "I fear him, I love him, I
+hate him, and I'm going to destroy him before he destroys me. Begin
+to-night."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+A FIRST TEST.
+
+
+Curran could not study the Endicott problem. His mind had lost edge in
+the vain process, getting as confused over details as the experimenter
+in perpetual motion after an hundred failures. In favor of Edith he said
+to himself that her instincts had always been remarkable, always
+helpful; and her theory compared well with the twenty upon which he had
+worked years to no purpose. Since he could not think the matter out, he
+went straight on in the fashion which fancy had suggested. Taking it for
+granted that Dillon and Endicott were the same man, he must establish
+the connection; that is, discover the moment when Horace Endicott passed
+from his own into the character of Arthur Dillon.
+
+Two persons would know the fact: Anne Dillon and her son. Four others
+might have knowledge of it; Judy, the Senator, Louis, and Monsignor. A
+fifth might be added, if the real Arthur Dillon were still living in
+obscurity, held there by the price paid him for following his own whim.
+Others would hardly be in the secret. The theory was charming in itself,
+and only a woman like Edith, whose fancy had always been sportive, would
+have dreamed it. The detective recalled Arthur's interest in his pursuit
+of Endicott; then the little scenes on board the _Arrow_; and grew dizzy
+to think of the man pursued comparing his own photograph with his
+present likeness, under the eyes of the detective who had grown stale in
+the chase of him.
+
+He knew of incidents quite as remarkable, which had a decent explanation
+afterwards, however. He went about among the common people of Cherry
+Hill, who had known Arthur Dillon from his baptism, had petted him every
+week until he disappeared, and now adored him in his success. He renewed
+acquaintance with them, and heaped them with favors. Loitering about in
+their idling places, he threw out the questions; hints, surmises, which
+might bring to the surface their faith in Arthur Dillon. He reported the
+result to Edith.
+
+"Not one of them" said he, "but would go to court and swear a bushel of
+oaths that Arthur Dillon is the boy who ran away. They have their
+reasons too; how he dances, and sings, and plays the fiddle, and teases
+the girls, just as he did when a mere strip of a lad; how the devil was
+always in him for doing the thing that no one looked for; how he had no
+fear of even the priest, or of the wildest horse; and sought out
+terrible things to do and to dare, just as now he shakes up your late
+backers, bishops, ministers, ambassadors, editors, or plots against
+England; all as if he earned a living that way."
+
+She sneered at this bias, and bade him search deeper.
+
+It was necessary to approach the Senator on the matter. He secured from
+him a promise that their talk would remain a secret, not only because
+the matter touched one very dear to the Senator, but also because
+publicity might ruin the detective himself. If the Senator did not care
+to give his word, there would be no talk, but his relative might also be
+exposed to danger. The Senator was always gracious with Curran.
+
+"Do you know anything about Arthur's history in California?" and his
+lazy eyes noted every change in the ruddy, handsome face.
+
+"Never asked him but one question about it. He answered that straight,
+and never spoke since about it. Nothing wrong, I hope?" the Senator
+answered with alarm.
+
+"Lots, I guess, but I don't know for sure. Here are the circumstances.
+Think them out for yourself. A crowd of sharp speculators in California
+mines bought a mine from Arthur Dillon when he was settling up his
+accounts to come home to his mother. As trouble arose lately about that
+mine, they had to hunt up Arthur Dillon. They send their agent to New
+York, he comes to Arthur, and has a talk with him. Then he goes back to
+his speculators, and declares to them that this Arthur Dillon is not the
+man who sold the mine. So the company, full of suspicion, offers me the
+job of looking up the character of Arthur, and what he had been doing
+these ten years. They say straight out that the real Arthur Dillon has
+been put out of the way, and that the man who is holding the name and
+the stakes here in New York is a fraud."
+
+This bit of fiction relieved the Senator's mind.
+
+"A regular cock-and-bull story," said he with indignation. "What's their
+game? Did you tell them what we think of Artie? Would his own mother
+mistake him? Or even his uncle? If they're looking for hurt, tell them
+they're on the right road."
+
+"No, no," said Curran, "these are straight men. But if doubt is cast on
+a business transaction, they intend to clear it away. It would be just
+like them to bring suit to establish the identity of Arthur with the
+Arthur Dillon who sold them the mine. Now, Senator, could you go into
+court and swear positively that the young man who came back from
+California five years ago is the nephew who ran away from home at the
+age of fifteen?"
+
+"Swear it till I turned blue; why, it's foolish, simply foolish. And
+every man, woman, and child in the district would do the same. Why don't
+you go and talk with Artie about it?"
+
+"Because the company doesn't wish to make a fuss until they have some
+ground to walk on," replied Curran easily. "When I tell them how sure
+the relatives and friends of Arthur are about his identity, they may
+drop the affair. But now, Senator, just discussing the thing as friends,
+you know, if you were asked in court why you were so sure Arthur is your
+nephew, what could you tell the court?"
+
+"If the court asked me how I knew my mother was my mother----"
+
+"That's well enough, I know. But in this case Arthur was absent ten
+years, in which time you never saw him, heard of him, or from him."
+
+"Good point," said the Senator musingly. "When Artie came home from
+California, he was sick, and I went to see him. He was in bed. Say, I'll
+never forget it, Curran. I saw Pat sick once at the same age ... Pat was
+his father, d'ye see?... and here was Pat lying before me in the bed. I
+tell you it shook me. I never thought he'd grow so much like his father,
+though he has the family features. Know him to be Pat's son? Why, if he
+told me himself he was any one else, I wouldn't believe him."
+
+Evidently the Senator knew nothing of Horace Endicott and recognised
+Arthur Dillon as his brother's son. The detective was not surprised;
+neither was Edith at the daily report.
+
+"There isn't another like him on earth," she said with the pride of a
+discoverer. "Keep on until you find his tracks, here or in California."
+
+Curran had an interesting chat with Judy Haskell on a similar theme, but
+with a different excuse from that which roused the Senator. The old lady
+knew the detective only as Arthur's friend. He approached her
+mysteriously, with a story of a gold mine awaiting Arthur in California,
+as soon as he could prove to the courts that he was really Arthur
+Dillon. Judy began to laugh. "Prove that he's Arthur Dillon! Faith, an'
+long I'd wait for a gold mine if I had to prove I was Judy Haskell. How
+can any one prove themselves to be themselves, Misther Curran? Are the
+courts goin' crazy?"
+
+The detective explained what evidence a court would accept as proof of
+personality.
+
+"Well, Arthur can give that aisy enough," said she.
+
+"But he won't touch the thing at all, Mrs. Haskell. He was absent ten
+years, and maybe he doesn't want that period ripped up in a court. It
+might appear that he had a wife, you know, or some other disagreeable
+thing might leak out. When the lawyers get one on the witness stand,
+they make hares of him."
+
+"Sure enough," said Judy thoughtfully. Had she not suggested this very
+suspicion to Anne? The young are wild, and even Arthur could have
+slipped from grace in that interval of his life. Curran hoped that
+Arthur could prove his identity without exposing the secrets of the
+past.
+
+"For example," said he smoothly, with an eye for Judy's expression,
+"could you go to court to-morrow and swear that Arthur is the same lad
+that ran away from his mother fifteen years ago?"
+
+"I cud swear as manny oaths on that point as there are hairs in yer
+head," said Judy.
+
+"And what would you say, Mrs. Haskell, if the judge said to you: Now,
+madam, it's very easy for you to say you know the young man to be the
+same person as the runaway boy; but how do you know it? what makes you
+think you know it?"
+
+"I'd say he was purty sassy, indade. Of coorse I'd say that to meself,
+for ye can't talk to a judge as aisy an' free as to a lawyer. Well, I'd
+say manny pleasant things. Arthur was gone tin years, but I knew him an'
+he knew me the minute we set eyes on aich other. Then, agin, I knew him
+out of his father. He doesn't favor the mother at all, for she's light
+an' he's dark. There's a dale o' the Dillon in him. Then, agin, how
+manny things he tould me of the times we had together, an' he even asked
+me if Teresa Flynn, his sweetheart afore he wint off, was livin' still.
+Oh, as thrue as ye're sittin' there! Poor thing, she was married. An' he
+remembered how fond he was o' rice puddin' ice cold. An' he knew Louis
+Everard the minute he shtud forninst him in the door. But what's the use
+o' talkin'? I cud tell ye for hours all the things he said an' did to
+show he was Arthur Dillon."
+
+"Has he any marks on his body that would help to identify him, if he
+undertook to get the gold mine that belongs to him?"
+
+"Artie had only wan mark on him as a boy ... he was the most spotless
+child I ever saw ... an' that was a mole on his right shoulder. He tuk
+it wid him to California, an' he brought it back, for I saw it meself in
+the same spot while he was sick, an' I called his attintion to it, an'
+he was much surprised, for he had never thought of it wanst."
+
+"It's my opinion," said Curran solemnly, "that he can prove his identity
+without exposing his life in the west. I hope to persuade him to it.
+Maybe the photographs of himself and his father would help. Have you any
+copies of them?"
+
+"There's jist two. I wudn't dare to take thim out of his room, but if ye
+care to walk up-stairs, Mr. Curran, an' luk at thim there, ye're
+welcome. He an' his mother are away the night to a gran' ball."
+
+They entered Arthur's apartments together, and Judy showed the pictures
+of Arthur Dillon as a boy of fourteen, and of his youthful father; old
+daguerreotypes, but faithful and clear as a likeness. Judy rattled on
+for an hour, but the detective had achieved his object. She had no share
+in the secret.
+
+Arthur Dillon was his father's son, for her. He studied the pictures,
+and carefully examined the rooms, his admiration provoking Judy into a
+display of their beauties. With the skill and satisfaction of an artist
+in man-hunting, he observed how thoroughly the character of the young
+man displayed itself in the trifles of decoration and furnishing.
+
+The wooden crucifix with the pathetic figure in bronze on the wall over
+the desk, the holy water stoup at the door, carved figures of the Holy
+Family, a charming group, on the desk, exquisite etchings of the Christ
+and the Madonna after the masters, a _prie-dieu_ in the inner room with
+a group of works of devotion: and Edith had declared him no Catholic.
+Here was the refutation.
+
+"He is a pious man," Curran said.
+
+"And no wan sees it but God and himself. So much the betther, I say,"
+Judy remarked. "Only thim that had sorra knows how to pray, an' he prays
+like wan that had his fill of it."
+
+The tears came into the man's eyes at the indications of Arthur's love
+for poor Erin. Hardness was the mark of Curran, and sin had been his
+lifelong delight; but for his country he had kept a tenderness and
+devotion that softened and elevated his nature at times. Of little use
+and less honor to his native land, he felt humbled in this room, whose
+books, pictures, and ornaments revealed thought and study in behalf of a
+harried and wretched people, yet the student was not a native of
+Ireland. It seemed profane to set foot here, to spy upon its holy
+privacy. He felt glad that its details gave the lie so emphatically to
+Edith's instincts.
+
+The astonishing thing was the absence of Californian relics and
+mementoes. Some photographs and water colors, whose names Curran
+mentally copied for future use, pictured popular scenes on the Pacific
+slope; but they could be bought at any art store. Surely his life in the
+mines, with all the luck that had come to him, must have held some great
+bitterness, that he never spoke of it casually, and banished all
+remembrances.
+
+That would come up later, but Curran had made up his mind that no secret
+of Arthur's life should ever see the light because he found it. Not even
+vengeful Edith, and she had the right to hate her enemy, should wring
+from him any disagreeable facts in the lad's career. So deeply the
+detective respected him!
+
+In the place of honor, at the foot of his bed, where his eyes rested on
+them earliest and latest, hung a group of portraits in oil, in the same
+frame, of Louis the beloved, from his babyhood to the present time: on
+the side wall hung a painting of Anne in her first glory as mistress of
+the new home in Washington Square; opposite, Monsignor smiled down in
+purple splendor; two miniatures contained the grave, sweet, motherly
+face of Mary Everard and the auburn hair and lovely face of Mona.
+
+"There are the people he loves," said Curran with emotion.
+
+"Ay, indade," Judy said tenderly, "an' did ever a wild boy like him love
+his own more? Night an' day his wan thought is of them. The sun rises
+an' sets for him behind that picther there," pointing to Louis'
+portraits. "If annythin' had happened to that lovely child last Spring
+he'd a-choked the life out o' wan woman wid his own two hands. He's aisy
+enough, God knows, but I'd rather jump into the say than face him when
+the anger is in him."
+
+"He's a terrible man," said Curran, repeating Edith's phrase.
+
+He examined some manuscript in Arthur's handwriting. How different from
+the careless scrawl of Horace Endicott this clear, bold, dashing script,
+which ran full speed across the page, yet turned with ease and leisurely
+from the margin. What a pity Edith could not see with her own eyes these
+silent witnesses to the truth. Beyond the study was a music-room, where
+hung his violin over some scattered music. Horace Endicott hated the
+practising of the art, much as he loved the opera. It was all very
+sweet, just what the detective would have looked for, beautiful to see.
+He could have lingered in the rooms and speculated on that secret and
+manly life, whose currents were so feebly but shiningly indicated in
+little things. It occurred to him that copies of the daguerreotypes,
+Arthur at fourteen and his father at twenty-five, would be of service in
+the search through California. He spoke of it to Judy.
+
+"Sure that was done years ago," said Judy cautiously. "Anne Dillon
+wouldn't have it known for the world, ye see, but I know that she sint a
+thousand o' thim to the polis in California; an' that's the way she kem
+across the lad. Whin he found his mother shtill mournin' him, he wrote
+to her that he had made his pile an' was comin' home. Anne has the pride
+in her, an' she wants all the world to believe he kem home of himself,
+d'ye see? Now kape that a secret, mind."
+
+"And do you never let on what I've been telling you," said Curran
+gravely. "It may come to nothing, and it may come to much, but we must
+be silent."
+
+She had given her word, and Judy's word was like the laws of the Medes
+and Persians. Curran rejoiced at the incident of the daguerreotypes,
+which anticipated his proposed search in California. Vainly however did
+he describe the result of his inquiry for Edith. She would have none of
+his inferences. He must try to entrap Anne Dillon and the priest, and
+afterwards he might scrape the surface of California.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX.
+
+THE NERVE OF ANNE.
+
+
+Curran laid emphasis in his account to his wife on the details of
+Arthur's rooms, and on the photographs which had helped to discover the
+lost boy in California. Edith laughed at him.
+
+"Horace Endicott invented that scheme of the photographs," said she.
+"The dear clever boy! If he had been the detective, not a stupid like
+you! I saw Arthur Dillon in church many times in four years, and I tell
+you he is not a Catholic born, no matter what you saw in his rooms. He's
+playing the part of Arthur Dillon to the last letter. Don't look at me
+that way, Dick or I'll scratch your face. You want to say that I am
+crazy over this theory, and that I have an explanation ready for all
+your objections."
+
+"I have nothing to say, I am just working on your lines, dearie," he
+replied humbly.
+
+"Just now your game is busy with an affair of the heart. He won't be too
+watchful, unless, as I think, he's on our tracks all the time. You ought
+to get at his papers."
+
+"A love affair! Our tracks!" Curran repeated in confusion.
+
+"Do you think you can catch a man like Arthur napping?" she sneered. "Is
+there a moment in the last four years that he has been asleep? See to it
+that you are not reported to him every night. But if he is in love with
+Honora Ledwith, there's a chance that he won't see or care to see what
+you are doing. She's a lovely girl. A hint of another woman would settle
+his chances of winning her. I can give her that. I'd like to. A woman of
+her stamp has no business marrying."
+
+She mused a few minutes over her own statements, while Curran stared. He
+began to feel that the threads of this game were not all in his hands.
+
+"You must now go to the priest and Anne Dillon," she resumed, "and say
+to them plump ... take the priest first ... say to them plump before
+they can hold their faces in shape: do you know Horace Endicott? Then
+watch the faces, and get what you can out of them."
+
+"That means you will have Arthur down on you next day."
+
+"Sure," catching her breath. "But it is now near the end of the season.
+When he comes to have it out with me, he will find himself face to face
+with Sonia. If it's to be a fight, he'll find a tiger. Then we can run
+away to California, if Sonia says so."
+
+"You are going to bring Sonia down, then?"
+
+"You suggested it. Lemme tell you what you're going to find out to-day.
+You're going to find out that Monsignor knew Horace Endicott. After that
+I think it would be all right to bring down Sonia."
+
+Little use to argue with her, or with any woman for that matter, once an
+idea lodged so deep in her brain. He went to see Monsignor, with the
+intention of being candid with him: in fact there was no other way of
+dealing with the priest. In his experience Curran had found no class so
+difficult to deal with as the clergy. They were used to keeping other
+people's secrets as well as their own. He did not reveal his plan to
+Edith, because he feared her criticism, and could not honestly follow
+her methods. He had not, with all his skill and cunning, her genius for
+ferreting.
+
+Monsignor, acquainted with him, received him coldly. Edith's
+instructions were, ask the question plump, watch his face, and then run
+to Anne Dillon before she can be warned by the Monsignor's messenger.
+Looking into the calm, well-drilled countenance of the priest, Curran
+found it impossible to surprise him so uncourteously. Anyway the
+detective felt sure that there would be no surprise, except at the mere
+question.
+
+"I would like to ask you a question, Monsignor," said Curran smoothly,
+"which I have no right to ask perhaps. I am looking for a man who
+disappeared some time ago, and the parties interested hope that you can
+give some information. You can tell me if the question is at all
+impertinent, and I will go. Do you know Horace Endicott?"
+
+There was no change in the priest's expression or manner, no starting,
+no betrayal of feeling. Keeping his eyes on the detective's face, he
+repeated the name as one utters a half-forgotten thing.
+
+"Why has that name a familiar sound?" he asked himself.
+
+"You may have read it frequently in the papers at the time Horace
+Endicott disappeared," Curran suggested.
+
+"Possibly, but I do not read the journals so carefully," Monsignor
+answered musingly. "Endicott, Endicott ... I have it ... and it brings
+to my mind the incident of the only railroad wreck in which I have ever
+had the misfortune to be ... only this time it was good fortune for one
+poor man."
+
+Very deliberately he told the story of the collision and of his slight
+acquaintance with the young fellow whose name, as well as he could
+remember, was Endicott. The detective handed him a photograph of the
+young man.
+
+"How clearly this picture calls up the whole scene," said Monsignor much
+pleased. "This is the very boy. Have you a copy of this? Do send me
+one."
+
+"You can keep that," said Curran, delighted at his progress, astonished
+that Edith's prophecy should have come true. Naturally the next question
+would be, have you seen the young man since that time? and Curran would
+have asked it had not the priest broken in with a request for the story
+of his disappearance. It was told.
+
+"Of course I shall be delighted to give what information I possess,"
+said Monsignor. "There was no secret about him then ... many others saw
+him ... of course this must have been some time before he disappeared.
+But let me ask a question before we go any further. How did you suspect
+my acquaintance with a man whom I met so casually? The incident had
+almost faded from my mind. In fact I have never mentioned it to a soul."
+
+"It was a mere guess on the part of those interested in finding him."
+
+"Still the guess must have been prompted by some theory of the search."
+
+"I am almost ashamed to tell it," Curran said uneasily. "The truth is
+that my employers suspect that Horace Endicott has been hiding for years
+under the character of Arthur Dillon."
+
+Monsignor looked amazed for a moment and then laughed.
+
+"Interesting for Mr. Dillon and his friends, particularly if this
+Endicott is wanted for any crime...."
+
+"Oh, no, no," cried the detective. "It is his wife who is seeking him, a
+perfectly respectable man, you know ... it's a long story. We have
+chased many a man supposed to be Endicott, and Mr. Dillon is the latest.
+I don't accept the theory myself. I know Dillon is Dillon, but a
+detective must sift the theories of his employers. In fact my work up to
+this moment proves very clearly that of all our wrong chases this is the
+worst."
+
+"It looks absurd at first sight. I remember the time poor Mrs. Dillon
+sent out her photographs, scattered a few hundred of them among the
+police and the miners of California, in the hope of finding her lost
+son. That was done with my advice. She had her first response, a letter
+from her son, about the very time that I met young Endicott. For the
+life of me I cannot understand why anyone should suppose Arthur
+Dillon...."
+
+He picked up the photograph of Endicott again.
+
+"The two men look as much alike as I look like you. I'm glad you
+mentioned the connection which Dillon has with the matter. You will
+kindly leave me out of it until you have made inquiries of Mr. Dillon
+himself. It would not do, you understand, for a priest in my position to
+give out any details in a matter which may yet give trouble. I fear that
+in telling you of my meeting with Endicott I have already overstepped
+the limits of prudence. However, that was my fault, as you warned me.
+Thanks for the photograph, a very nice souvenir of a tragedy. Poor young
+fellow! Better had he perished in the smash-up than to go out of life in
+so dreary a way."
+
+"If I might venture another----"
+
+"Pardon, not another word. In any official and public way I am always
+ready to tell what the law requires, or charity demands."
+
+"You would be willing then to declare that Arthur Dillon----"
+
+"Is Mrs. Dillon's son? Certainly ... at any time, under proper
+conditions. Good morning. Don't mention it," and Curran was outside the
+door before his thoughts took good shape; so lost in wonder over the
+discovery of Monsignor's acquaintance with Endicott, that he forgot to
+visit Anne Dillon. Instead he hurried home with the news to Edith, and
+blushed with shame when she asked if he had called on Anne. She forgave
+his stupidity in her delight, and put him through his catechism on all
+that had been said and seen in the interview with Monsignor.
+
+"You are a poor stick," was her comment, and for the first time in years
+he approved of her opinion. "The priest steered you about and out with
+his little finger, and the corner of his eye. He did not give you a
+chance to ask if he had ever seen Horace Endicott since. Monsignor will
+not lie for any man. He simply refuses to answer on the ground that his
+position will not permit it. You will never see the priest again on this
+matter. Arthur Dillon will bid you stand off. Well, you see what my
+instinct is now! Are you more willing to believe in it when it says:
+Arthur Dillon is Horace Endicott?"
+
+"Not a bit, sweetheart."
+
+"I won't fight with you, since you are doing as I order. Go to Anne
+Dillon now. Mind, she's already prepared by this time for your visit.
+You may run against Arthur instead of her. While you are gone I shall
+write to Sonia that we have at last found a clue, and ask her to come on
+at once. Dillon may not give us a week to make our escape after he
+learns what we have been doing. We must be quick. Go, my dear old
+stupid, and bear in mind that Anne Dillon is the cunningest cat you've
+had to do with yet."
+
+She gave an imitation of the lady that was funny to a degree, and sent
+the detective off laughing, but not at all convinced that there was any
+significance in his recent discovery. He felt mortified to learn again
+for the hundredth time how a prejudice takes the edge off intellect.
+Though certain Edith's theory was wrong, why should he act like a donkey
+in disproving it? On the contrary his finest skill was required, and
+methods as safe as if Dillon were sure to turn out Endicott. He
+sharpened his blade for the coming duel with Anne, whom Monsignor had
+warned, without doubt. However, Anne had received no warning and she met
+Curran with her usual reserve. He was smoothly brutal.
+
+"I would like to know if you are acquainted with Mr. Horace Endicott?"
+said he.
+
+Anne's face remained as blank as the wall, and her manner tranquil. She
+had never heard the name before, for in the transactions between
+herself and her son only the name of Arthur Dillon had been mentioned,
+while of his previous life she knew not a single detail. Curran not
+disappointed, hastened, after a pause, to explain his own rudeness.
+
+"I never heard the name," said Anne coldly. "Nor do I see by what right
+you come here and ask questions."
+
+"Pardon my abruptness," said the detective. "I am searching for a young
+man who disappeared some years ago, and his friends are still hunting
+for him, still anxious, so that they follow the most absurd clues. I am
+forced to ask this question of all sorts of people, only to get the
+answer which you have given. I trust you will pardon me for my
+presumption for the sake of people who are suffering."
+
+His speech warned her that she had heard her son's name for the first
+time, that she stood on the verge of exposure; and her heart failed her,
+she felt that her voice would break if she ventured to speak, her knees
+give way if she resented this man's manner by leaving the room. Yet the
+weakness was only for a moment, and when it passed a wild curiosity to
+hear something of that past which had been a sealed book to her, to know
+the real personality of Arthur Dillon, burned her like a flame, and
+steadied her nerves. For two years she had been resenting his secrecy,
+not understanding his reasons. He was guarding against the very
+situation of this moment.
+
+"Horace Endicott," she repeated with interest. "There is no one of that
+name in my little circle, and I have never heard the name before. Who
+was he? And how did he come to be lost?"
+
+And she rose to indicate that his reply must be brief.
+
+Curran told with eloquence of the disappearance and the long search, and
+gave a history of Endicott's life in nice detail, pleased with the
+unaffected interest of this severe but elegant woman. As he spoke his
+eye took in every mark of feeling, every gesture, every expression. Her
+self-command, if she knew Horace Endicott, remained perfect; if she knew
+him not, her manner seemed natural.
+
+"God pity his poor people," was her fervent comment as she took her seat
+again. "I was angry with you at first, sir," looking at his card, "and
+of a mind to send you away for what looked like impertinence. But it's I
+would be only too glad to give you help if I could. I never even heard
+the young man's name. And it puzzles me, why you should come to me."
+
+"For this reason, Mrs. Dillon," he said with sincere disgust. "The
+people who are hunting for Horace Endicott think that Arthur Dillon is
+the man; or to put it in another way, that you were deceived when you
+welcomed back your son from California. Horace Endicott and not Arthur
+Dillon returned."
+
+"My God!" cried she, and sat staring at him; then rose up and began to
+move towards the door backwards, keeping an eye upon him. Her thought
+showed clear to the detective: she had been entertaining a lunatic. He
+laughed.
+
+"Don't go," he said. "I know what you imagine, but I'm no lunatic. I
+don't believe that your son is an impostor. He is a friend of mine, and
+I know that he is Arthur Dillon. But a man in my business must do as he
+is ordered by his employers. I am a detective."
+
+For a minute she hesitated with hand outstretched to the bell-rope. Her
+mind acted with speed; she had nothing to fear, the man was friendly,
+his purpose had failed, whatever it was, the more he talked the more she
+would learn, and it might be in her power to avert danger by policy. She
+went back to her seat, having left it only to act her part. Taking the
+hint provided by Curran, she pretended belief in his insanity, and
+passed to indignation at this attempt upon her happiness, her
+motherhood. This rage became real, when she reflected that the Aladdin
+palace of her life was really threatened by Curran's employers. To her
+the prosperity and luxury of the past five years had always been
+dream-like in its fabric, woven of the mists of morning, a fairy
+enchantment, which might vanish in an hour and leave poor Cinderella
+sitting on a pumpkin by the roadside, the sport of enemies, the burden
+of friends. How near she had been to this public humiliation! What
+wretches, these people who employed the detective!
+
+"My dear boy was absent ten years," she said, "and I suffered agony all
+that time. What hearts must some people have to wish to put me through
+another time like that! Couldn't any wan see that I accepted him as my
+son? that all the neighbors accepted him? What could a man want to
+deceive a poor mother so? I had nothing to give him but the love of a
+mother, and men care little for that, wild boys care nothing for it. He
+brought me a fortune, and has made my life beautiful ever since he came
+back. I had nothing to give him. Who is at the bottom of this thing?"
+
+The detective explained the existence and motives of a deserted,
+poverty-stricken wife and child.
+
+"I knew a woman would be at the bottom of it," she exclaimed viciously,
+feeling against Sonia a hatred which she knew to be unjust. "Well, isn't
+she able to recognize her own husband? If I could tell my son after ten
+years, when he had grown to be a man, can't she tell her own husband
+after a few years? Could it be that my boy played Horace Endicott in
+Boston and married that woman, and then came back to me?"
+
+"Oh, my dear Mrs. Dillon," cried the detective in alarm, "do not excite
+yourself over so trifling a thing. Your son is your son no matter what
+our theories may be. This Endicott was born and brought up in the
+vicinity of Boston, and came from a very old family. Your suspicion is
+baseless. Forget the whole matter I beg of you."
+
+"Have you a picture of the young man?"
+
+He handed her the inevitable photograph reluctantly, quite sure that she
+would have hysterics before he left, so sincere was her excitement. Anne
+studied the portrait with keen interest, it may be imagined, astonished
+to find it so different from Arthur Dillon. Had she blundered as well as
+the detective? Between this portrait and any of the recent photographs
+of Arthur there seemed no apparent resemblance in any feature. She had
+been exciting herself for nothing.
+
+"Wonderful are the ways of men," was her comment. "How any one ..." her
+brogue had left her ... "could take Arthur Dillon for this man, even
+supposing he was disguised now, is strange and shameful. What is to be
+the end of it?"
+
+"Just this, dear madam," said Curran, delighted at her returning
+calmness. "I shall tell them what you have said, what every one says,
+and they'll drop the inquiry as they have dropped about one hundred
+others. If they are persistent, I shall add that you are ready to go
+into any court in the land and swear positively that you know your own
+son."
+
+"Into twenty courts," she replied with fervor, and the tears, real tears
+came into her eyes; then, at sight of Aladdin's palace as firm as ever
+on its frail foundations, the tears rolled down her cheeks.
+
+"Precisely. And now if you would be kind enough to keep this matter from
+the ears of Mr. Dillon ... he's a great friend of mine ... I admire him
+... I was with him in the little expedition to Ireland, you know ... and
+it was to save him pain that I came to you first ... if it could be kept
+quiet----"
+
+"I want it kept quiet," she said with decision, "but at the same time
+Arthur must know of these cruel suspicions. Oh, how my heart beats when
+I think of it! Without him ten years, and then to have strangers plan to
+take him from me altogether ... forever ... forever ... oh!"
+
+Curran perspired freely at the prospect of violent hysterics. No man
+could deal more rudely with the weak and helpless with right on his
+side, or if his plans demanded it. Before a situation like this he felt
+lost and foolish.
+
+"Certainly he must know in time. I shall tell him myself, as soon as I
+make my report of the failure of this clue to my employers. I would take
+it as a very great favor if you would permit me to tell him. It must
+come very bitter to a mother to tell her son that he is suspected of not
+being her son. Let me spare you that anguish."
+
+Anne played with him delightfully, knowing that she had him at her
+mercy, not forgetting however that the sport was with tigers. Persuaded
+to wait a few days while Curran made his report, in return he promised
+to inform her of the finding of poor Endicott at the proper moment. The
+detective bowed himself out, the lady smiled. A fair day's work! She had
+learned the name and the history of the young man known as Arthur Dillon
+in a most delightful way. The doubt attached to this conclusion did not
+disturb her. Wonderful, that Arthur Dillon should look so little like
+the portrait of Horace Endicott! More wonderful still that she, knowing
+Arthur was not her son, had come to think of him, to feel towards him,
+and to act accordingly, as her son! Her rage over this attempt upon the
+truth and the fact of their relationship grew to proportions.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX.
+
+UNDER THE EYES OF HATE.
+
+
+Edith's inference from the interviews with the Monsignor and Anne did
+justice to her acuteness. The priest alone knew the true personality of
+Arthur. From Anne all but the fact of his disappearance had been kept,
+probably to guard against just such attempts as Curran's. The detective
+reminded her that her theory stood only because of her method of
+selection from his investigations. Nine facts opposed and one favored
+her contention: therefore nine were shelved, leaving one to support the
+edifice of her instincts or her suspicions. She stuck out her tongue at
+him.
+
+"It shows how you are failing when nine out of ten facts, gathered in a
+whole day's work, are worthless. Isn't that one fact, that the priest
+knew Horace Endicott, worth all your foolish reasonings? Who discovered
+it? Now, will you coax Sonia Endicott down here to have a look at this
+Arthur Dillon? Before we start for California?"
+
+He admitted humbly that the lady would not accept his invitation,
+without stern evidence of a valuable clue. The detectives had given her
+many a useless journey.
+
+"She'll be at the Everett House to-morrow early in the morning," said
+Edith proudly. "Want to know why, stupid? I sent her a message that her
+game had been treed at last ... by me."
+
+He waved his hands in despair.
+
+"Then you'll do the talking, Madam Mischief."
+
+"And you'll never say a word, even when asked. What! would I let you
+mesmerize her at the start by telling her how little you think of my
+idea and my plans? She would think as little of them as you do, when you
+got through. No! I shall tell her, I shall plan for her, I shall lead
+her to the point of feeling where that long experience with Horace
+Endicott will become of some use in piercing the disguise of Arthur
+Dillon. You would convince her she was not to see Horace Endicott, and
+of course she would see only Arthur Dillon. I'll convince her she is to
+see her runaway husband, and then if she doesn't I'll confess defeat."
+
+"There's a good deal in your method," he admitted in a hopeless way.
+
+"We are in for it now," she went on, scorning the compliment. "By this
+time Arthur Dillon knows, if he did not before, that I am up to
+mischief. He may fall on us any minute. He will not suffer this
+interference: not because he cares two cents one way or the other, but
+because he will not have us frightening his relatives and friends,
+telling every one that he is two. Keep out of his way so that he shall
+have to come here, and to send word first that he is coming. I'll
+arrange a scene for him with his Sonia. It may be sublime, and again it
+may be a fizzle. One way or the other, if Sonia says so, we'll fly to
+the west out of his way. The dear, dear boy!"
+
+"He'll _dear_ you after that scene!"
+
+"Now, do you make what attempts you may to find out where he keeps his
+money, he must have piles of it, and search his papers, his safe...."
+
+"He has nothing of the kind ... everything about him is as open as the
+day ... it's an impertinence to bother him so ... well, he can manage
+you, I think ... no need for me to interfere or get irritated."
+
+Then she had a tantrum, which galled the soul of Curran, except that it
+ended as usual in her soft whimpering, her childish murmuring, her sweet
+complaint against the world, and her falling asleep in his arms. Thus
+was he regularly conquered and led captive.
+
+They went next day at noon to visit Sonia Endicott at the Everett House,
+where she had established herself with her little boy and his nurse. Her
+reception of the Currans, while supercilious in expression, was really
+sincere. They represented her hope in that long search of five years,
+which only a vigorous hate had kept going. Marked with the
+characteristics of the cat, velvety to eye and touch, insolent and
+elusive in her glance, undisciplined, she could act a part for a time.
+To Horace Endicott she had played the role of a child of light, an elf,
+a goddess, for which nature had dressed her with golden hair, melting
+eyes of celestial blue, and exquisite form.
+
+The years had brought out the animal in her. She found it more and more
+difficult to repress the spite, rage, hatred, against Horace and fate,
+which consumed her within, and violated the external beauty with unholy
+touches, wrinkles, grimaces, tricks of sneering, distortions of rage.
+Her dreams of hatred had only one scene: a tiger in her own form rending
+the body of the man who had discovered and punished her with a power
+like omnipotence; rending him but not killing him, leaving his heart to
+beat and his face unmarked, that he might feel his agony and show it.
+
+"If _you_ had sent me the telegram," she remarked to Curran, "I would
+not have come. But this dear Colette, she is to be my good angel and
+lead me to success, aren't you, little devil? Ever since she took up the
+matter I have had my beautiful dreams once more, oh, such thrilling
+dreams! Like the novels of Eugene Sue, just splendid. Well, why don't
+you speak?"
+
+He pointed to Edith with a gesture of submission. She was hugging the
+little boy before the nurse took him away, teasing him into baby talk,
+kissing him decorously but lavishly, as if she could not get enough of
+him.
+
+"He's not to speak until asked," she cried.
+
+"And then only say what she thinks," he added.
+
+"La! are you fighting over it already? That's not a good sign."
+
+With a final embrace which brought a howl from young Horace, Edith gave
+the boy to the nurse and began her story of finding Horace Endicott in
+the son of Anne Dillon. She acted the story, admirably keeping back the
+points which would have grated on Sonia's instincts, or rather
+expectations. The lady, impressed, evidently felt a lack of something
+when Curran refused his interest and his concurrence to the description.
+
+"What do you wish me to do?" said she.
+
+"To see this Dillon and to study him, as one would a problem. The man's
+been playing this part, living it indeed, nearly five years. Can any one
+expect that the first glance will pierce his disguise? He must be
+watched and studied for days, and if that fetches nothing, then you must
+meet him suddenly, and say to him tenderly, 'at last, Horace!' If that
+fetches nothing, then we must go to California, and work until we get
+the evidence which will force him to acknowledge himself and give up his
+money. But by that time, if we can make sure it is he, and if we can get
+his money, then I would recommend one thing! Kill him!"
+
+Sonia's eyes sparkled at the thought of that sweet murder.
+
+"And wait another five years for all this," was her cynical remark.
+
+"If the question is not settled this Fall, then let it go forever," said
+Edith with energy.
+
+"The scheme is well enough," Sonia said lazily. "Is this Arthur Dillon
+handsome, a dashing blade?"
+
+"Better," murmured Edith with a smack of her lips, "a virtuous sport,
+who despises the sex in a way, and can master woman by a look. He is my
+master. And I hate him! It will be worth your time to see him and meet
+him."
+
+"And now you," to Curran.
+
+Sonia did not know, nor care why Edith hated Dillon.
+
+"I protest, Sonia. He will put a spell on you, and spoil our chances.
+Let him talk later when we have succeeded or failed."
+
+"Nonsense, you fool. I must hear both sides, but I declare now that I
+submit myself to you wholly. What do you say, Curran?"
+
+"Just this, madam: if this man Arthur Dillon is really your husband,
+then he's too clever to be caught by any power in this world. Any way
+you choose to take it, you will end as this search has always ended."
+
+"Why do you think him so clever? My Horace was anything but clever ...
+at least we thought so ... until now."
+
+"Until he has foiled every attempt to find him," said Curran. "Colette
+has her own ideas, but she has kept back all the details that make or
+unmake a case. She is so sure of her instincts! No doubt they are good."
+
+"But not everything, hey?" said the lady tenderly. "Ah, a woman's
+instincts lead her too far sometimes...." they all laughed. "Well, give
+me the details Colette left out. No winking at each other. I won't raise
+a hand in this matter until I have heard both sides."
+
+"This Arthur Dillon is Irish, and lives among the Irish in the
+old-fashioned Irish way, half in the slums, and half in the swell
+places...."
+
+"_Mon Dieu_, what is this I hear! The Irish! My Horace live among the
+Irish! That's not the man. He could live anywhere, among the Chinese,
+the Indians, the niggers, but with that low class of people, never!" and
+she threw up her hands in despair. "Did I come from Boston to pursue a
+low Irishman!"
+
+"You see," cried Edith. "Already he has cast his spell on you. He
+doesn't believe I have found your man, and he won't let you believe it.
+Can't you see that this Horace went to the very place where you were
+sure he would not go?"
+
+"You cannot tell him now from an Irishman," continued the detective. "He
+has an Irish mother, he is a member of Tammany Hall, he is a politician
+who depends on Irish voters, he joined the Irish revolutionists and went
+over the sea to fight England, and he's in love with an Irish girl."
+
+"Shocking! Horace never had any taste or any sense, but I know he
+detested the Irish around Boston. I can't believe it of him. But, as
+Colette says truly, he would hide himself in the very place where we
+least think of looking for him."
+
+"Theories have come to nothing," screamed Edith, until the lady placed
+her hands on her ears. "Skill and training and coolness and all that rot
+have come to nothing. Because I hate Arthur Dillon I have discovered
+Horace Endicott. Now I want to see your eyes looking at this man, eyes
+with hate in them, and with murder in them. They will discover more than
+all the stupid detectives in the country. See what hate did for Horace
+Endicott. He hated you, and instead of murdering you he learned to
+torture you. He hated you, and it made him clever. Oh, hate is a great
+teacher! This fool of mine loves Arthur Dillon, because he is a patriot
+and hates England. Hate breeds cleverness, it breeds love, it opens the
+mind, it will dig out Horace Endicott and his fortune, and enrich us
+all."
+
+"La, but you are strenuous," said the lady placidly, but impressed. She
+was a shallow creature in the main, and Curran compared his little wife,
+eloquent, glowing with feeling, dainty as a flame, to the slower-witted
+beauty, with plain admiration in his gaze. She deserves to succeed, he
+thought. Sonia came to a conclusion, languidly.
+
+"We must try the eyes of hate," was her decision.
+
+The pursuit of Arthur proved very interesting. The detective knew his
+habits of labor and amusement, his public haunts and loitering-places.
+Sonia saw him first at the opera, modestly occupying a front seat in the
+balcony.
+
+"Horace would never do that when he could get a box," and she leveled
+her glass at him.
+
+Edith mentally dubbed her a fool. However, her study of the face and
+figure and behavior of the man showed care and intelligence. Edith's
+preparation had helped her. She saw a lean, nervous young man, whose
+flowing black hair and full beard were streaked with gray. His dark
+face, hollow in the cheeks and not too well-colored with the glow of
+health, seemed to get light and vivacity from his melancholy eyes.
+Seriousness was the characteristic expression. Once he laughed, in the
+whole evening. Once he looked straight into her face, with so fixed, so
+intense an expression, so near a gaze, so intimate and penetrating, that
+she gave a low cry.
+
+"You have recognized him?" Edith whispered mad with joy.
+
+"No, indeed," she answered sadly, "That is not Horace Endicott. Not a
+feature that I recall, certainly no resemblance. I was startled because
+I saw just now in his look, ... he looked towards me into the glass ...
+an expression that seemed familiar ... as if I had seen it before, and
+it had hurt me then as it hurts me now."
+
+"There's a beginning," said Edith with triumph. "Next time for a nearer
+look."
+
+"Oh, he could never have changed so," Sonia cried with bitterness of
+heart.
+
+Curran secured tickets for a ball to be held by a political association
+in the Cherry Hill district, and placed the ladies in a quiet corner of
+the gallery of the hall. Arthur Dillon, as a leading spirit in the
+society, delighted to mingle with the homely, sincere, warm-hearted, and
+simple people for whom this occasion was a high festival; and nowhere
+did his sorrow rest so lightly on his soul, nowhere did he feel so
+keenly the delight of life, or give freer expression to it. Edith kept
+Sonia at the highest pitch of excitement and interest.
+
+"Remember," she said now, "that he probably knows you are in town, that
+you are here watching him; but not once will he look this way, nor do a
+thing other than if you were miles away. My God, to be an actor like
+that!"
+
+The actor played his part to perfection and to the utter disappointment
+of the women. The serious face shone now with smiles and color, with the
+flash of wit and the play of humor. Horace Endicott had been a merry
+fellow, but a Quaker compared with the butterfly swiftness and gaiety of
+this young man, who led the grand march, flirted with the damsels and
+chatted with the dames, danced as often as possible, joked with the men,
+found partners for the unlucky, and touched the heart of every
+rollicking moment. The old ladies danced jigs with him, proud to their
+marrow of the honor, and he allowed himself ... Sonia gasped at the
+sight ... to execute a wild Irish _pas seul_ amid the thunderous
+applause of the hearty and adoring company.
+
+"That man Horace Endicott!" she exclaimed with contempt. "Bah! But it's
+interesting, of course."
+
+"What a compliment! what acting! oh, incomparable man!" said Edith,
+enraged at his success before such an audience. Her husband smiled
+behind his hand.
+
+"You have a fine imagination, Colette, but I would not give a penny for
+your instinct," said Sonia.
+
+"My instinct will win just the same, but I fear we shall have to go to
+California. This man is too clever for commonplace people."
+
+"Arthur Dillon is a fine orator," said Curran mischievously, "and
+to-morrow night you shall hear him at his best on the sorrows of
+Ireland."
+
+Sonia laughed heartily and mockingly. Were not these same sorrows, from
+their constancy and from repetition, become the joke of the world?
+Curran could have struck her evil face for the laugh.
+
+"Was your husband a speaker?" he asked.
+
+"Horace would not demean himself to talk in public, and he couldn't make
+a speech to save his life. But to talk on the sorrows of Ireland ... oh,
+it's too absurd."
+
+"And why not Ireland's sorrows as well as those of America, or any other
+country?" he replied savagely.
+
+"Oh, I quite forgot that you were Irish ... a thousand pardons," she
+said with sneering civility. "Of course, I shall be glad to hear his
+description of the sorrows. An orator! It's very interesting."
+
+The occasion for the display of Arthur's powers was one of the numerous
+meetings for which the talking Irish are famous all over the world, and
+in which their clever speakers have received fine training. Even Sonia,
+impressed by the enthusiasm of the gathering, and its esteem for Dillon,
+could not withhold her admiration. Alas, it was not her Horace who
+poured out a volume of musical tone, vigorous English, elegant rhetoric,
+with the expression, the abandonment, the picturesqueness of a great
+actor. She shuddered at his descriptions, her heart melted and her eyes
+moistened at his pathos, she became filled with wonder. It was not
+Horace! Her husband might have developed powers of eloquence, but would
+have to be remade to talk in that fashion of any land. This Dillon had
+terrible passion, and her Horace was only a a handsome fool. She could
+have loved Dillon.
+
+"So you will have to arrange the little scene where I shall stand before
+him without warning, and murmur tenderly, 'at last, Horace!' And it must
+be done without delay," was her command to Edith.
+
+"It can be done perhaps to-morrow night," Edith said in a secret rage,
+wondering what Arthur Dillon could have seen in Sonia. "But bear in mind
+why I am doing this scene, with the prospects of a furious time
+afterwards with Dillon. I want you to see him asleep, just for ten
+minutes, in the light of a strong lamp. In sleep there is no disguise.
+When he is dressed for a part and playing it, the sharpest eyes, even
+the eyes of hate, may not be able to escape the glamour of the disguise.
+The actor asleep is more like himself. You shall look into his face, and
+turn it from side to side with your own hands. If you do not catch some
+feeling from that, strike a resemblance, I shall feel like giving up."
+
+"La, but you are an audacious creature," said Sonia, and the triviality
+of the remark sent Edith into wild laughter. She would like to have
+bitten the beauty.
+
+The detective consented to Edith's plans, in his anxiety to bring the
+farce to an end before the element of danger grew. Up to this point they
+might appeal to Arthur for mercy. Later the dogs would be upon them. As
+yet no sign of irritation on Arthur's part had appeared. The day after
+the oration on the sorrows of Erin he sent a note to Curran announcing
+his intention to call the same evening. Edith, amazed at her own courage
+in playing with the fire which in an instant could destroy her, against
+the warning of her husband, was bent on carrying out the scene.
+
+Dearly she loved the dramatic off the stage, spending thought and time
+in its arrangement. How delicious the thought of this man and his wife
+meeting under circumstances so wondrous after five years of separation.
+Though death reached her the next moment she would see it. The weakness
+of the plot lay in Sonia's skepticism and Arthur's knowledge that a trap
+was preparing. He would brush her machinery aside like a cobweb, but
+that did not affect the chance of his recognition by Sonia.
+
+Dillon had never lost his interest in the dancer and her husband. They
+attracted him. In their lives ran the same strain of madness, the
+madness of the furies, as in his own. Their lovable qualities were not
+few. Occasionally he dropped in to tease Edith over her lack of
+conscience, or her failures, and to discuss the cause of freedom with
+the smooth and flinty Curran. Wild humans have the charm of their
+wilderness. One must not forget their teeth and their claws. This night
+the two men sat alone. Curran filled the glasses and passed the cigars.
+Arthur made no comment on the absence of Edith. He might have been aware
+that the curtains within three feet of his chair, hiding the room
+beyond, concealed the two women, whose eyes, peering through small
+glasses fixed in the curtains, studied his face. He might even have
+guessed that his easy chair had been so placed as to let the light fall
+upon him while Curran sat in the dim light beyond. The young man gave no
+sign, spoke freely with Curran on the business of the night, and acted
+as usual.
+
+"Of course it must be stopped at once," he said. "Very much flattered of
+course that I should be taken for Horace Endicott ... you gave away Tom
+Jones' name at last ... but these things, so trifling to you, jar the
+nerves of women. Then it would never do for me, with my little career in
+California unexplained, to have stories of a double identity ... is that
+what you call it?... running around. Of course I know it's that devil
+Edith, presuming always on good nature ... that's _her_ nature ... but
+if you don't stop it, why I must."
+
+"You'll have to do it, I think," the detective replied maliciously. "I
+can do only what she orders. I had to satisfy her by running to the
+priest, and your mother, and the Senator----"
+
+"What! even my poor uncle! Oh, Curran!"
+
+"The whole town, for that matter, Mr. Dillon. It was done in such a way,
+of course, that none of them suspected anything wrong, and we talked
+under promise of secrecy. I saw that the thing had to be done to satisfy
+her and to bring you down on us. Now you're down and the trouble's over
+as far as I am concerned."
+
+"And Tom Jones was Horace Endicott," Arthur mused, "I knew it of course
+all along, but I respected your confidence. I had known Endicott."
+
+"You knew Horace Endicott?" said Curran, horrified by a sudden vision of
+his own stupidity.
+
+"And his lady, a lovely, a superb creature, but just a shade too sharp
+for her husband, don't you know. He was a fool in love, wasn't he?
+judging from your story of him. Has she become reconciled to her small
+income, I wonder? She was not that kind, but when one has to, that's the
+end of it. _And there are consolations._ How the past month has tired
+me. I could go to sleep right in the chair, only I want to settle this
+matter to-night, and I must say a kind word to the little devil----"
+
+His voice faded away, and he slept, quite overpowered by the drug placed
+in his wine. After perfect silence for a minute, Curran beckoned to the
+women, who came noiseless into the room, and bent over the sleeping
+face. In his contempt for them, the detective neither spoke nor left his
+seat. Harpies brooding over the dead! Even he knew that!
+
+Arthur's face lay in profile, its lines all visible, owing to the strong
+light, through the disguise of the beard. The melancholy which marks the
+face of any sleeper, a foreshadow of the eternal sleep, had become on
+this sleeper's countenance a profound sadness. From his seat Curran
+could see the pitiful droop of the mouth, the hollowness of the eyes,
+the shadows under the cheek-bones; marks of a sadness too deep for
+tears. Sonia took his face in her soft hands and turned the right
+profile to the light. She looked at the full face, smoothed his hair as
+if trying to recall an ancient memory.
+
+"The eyes of hate," murmured Edith between tears and rage. She pitied
+while she hated him, understanding the sorrow that could mark a man's
+face so deeply, admiring the courage which could wear the mask so well.
+Sonia was deeply moved in spite of disappointment. At one moment she
+caught a fleeting glimpse of her Horace, but too elusive to hold and
+analyze. Something pinched her feelings and the great tears fell from
+her soft eyes. Emotion merely pinched her. Only in hate could she writhe
+and foam and exhaust nature. She studied his hands, observed the
+fingers, with the despairing conviction that this was not the man; too
+lean and too coarse and too hard; and her rage began to burn against
+destiny. Oh, to have Horace as helpless under her hands! How she could
+rend him!
+
+"Do you see any likeness?" whispered Edith.
+
+"None," was the despairing answer.
+
+"Be careful," hissed Curran. "In this sleep words are heard and
+remembered sometimes."
+
+Edith swore the great oaths which relieved her anger. But what use to
+curse, to look and curse again? At the last moment Curran signalled them
+away, and began talking about his surprise that Arthur should have known
+the lost man.
+
+"Because you might have given me a clue," Arthur heard him saying as he
+came back from what he thought had been a minute's doze, "and saved me a
+year's search, not to mention the money I could have made."
+
+"I'll tell you about it some other time," said Arthur with a yawn, as he
+lit a fresh cigar. "Ask madam to step in here, will you. I must warn her
+in a wholesome way."
+
+"I think she is entertaining a friend," Curran said, hinting plainly at
+a surprise.
+
+"Let her bring the friend along," was the careless answer.
+
+The two women entered presently, and Edith made the introduction. The
+husband and wife stood face to face at last. Her voice failed in her
+throat from nervousness, so sure was she that the Endicotts had met
+again! They had the center of the stage, and the interest of the
+audience, but acted not one whit like the people in a play.
+
+"Delighted," said Arthur in his usual drawling way on these occasions.
+"I have had the pleasure of meeting Mrs. Endicott before."
+
+"Indeed," cried the lady. "I regret that my memory...."
+
+"At Castle Moyna, a little fete, mother fainted because she saw me
+running across the lawn ... of course you remember...."
+
+"Why, certainly ... we all felt so sorry for the young singer ... her
+father...."
+
+"He was in jail and died since, poor man. Then I saw you coming across
+on the steamer with a dear, sweet, old lady...."
+
+"My husband's aunt," Sonia gasped at the thought of Aunt Lois.
+
+"Oh, but he's letter-perfect," murmured Edith in admiration.
+
+"And you might remember me," said the heartless fellow, "but of course
+on a wedding-tour no one can expect the parties to remember anything, as
+the guide for a whole week to your party in California."
+
+"Of course there was a guide," she admitted, very pleasant to meet him
+again, and so on to the empty end. Edith, stunned by her defeat, sat
+crushed, for this man no more minded the presence of his wife than did
+Curran. It was true. Arthur had often thought that a meeting like this
+in the far-off years would rock his nature as an earthquake rocks the
+solid plain. Though not surprised at her appearance, for Edith's schemes
+had all been foreseen, he felt surprise at his own indifference. So
+utterly had she gone out of his thought, that her sudden appearance,
+lovely and seductive as of old, gave him no twinge of hate, fear,
+repugnance, disgust, horror, shame, or pain.
+
+He took no credit to himself for a self-control, which he had not been
+called upon by any stress of feeling to exercise. He was only Arthur
+Dillon, encountering a lady with a past; a fact in itself more or less
+amusing. Once she might have been a danger to be kept out like a pest,
+or barricaded in quarantine. That time had gone by. His indifference for
+the moment appalled him, since it showed the hopeless depth of
+Endicott's grave. After chatting honestly ten minutes, he went away
+light of heart, without venturing to warn Edith. Another day, he told
+her, and be good meanwhile.
+
+Curran became thoughtful, and the women irritable after he had gone.
+Edith felt that her instincts had no longer a value in the market. In
+this wretched Endicott affair striking disappointment met the most
+brilliant endeavors. Sonia made ready to return to her hotel. Dolorously
+the Currans paid her the last courtesies, waiting for the word which
+would end the famous search for her Horace.
+
+"I have been thinking the matter over," she said sweetly, "and I have
+thought out a plan, not in your line of course, which I shall see to at
+once. I think it worth while to look through California for points in
+the life of this interesting young man, Mr. Dillon."
+
+When the door closed on her, Edith began to shriek in hysterical
+laughter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI.
+
+THE HEART OF HONORA.
+
+
+While Edith urged the search for Endicott, the little world to be
+horrified by her success enjoyed itself north and south as the season
+suggested, and the laws of fashion permitted. At the beginning of June,
+Anne settled herself comfortably for the summer in a roomy farmhouse,
+overlooking Lake Champlain and that particular island of Valcour, which
+once witnessed the plucky sea-fight and defeat of dare-devil Arnold.
+Only Honora accompanied her, but at the close of the month Louis, the
+deacon, and Mrs. Doyle Grahame joined them; and after that the whole
+world came at odd times, with quiet to-day and riot to-morrow. Honora,
+the center of interest, the storm-center, as we call it in these days,
+turned every eye in her direction with speculative interest. Would she
+retire to the convent, or find her vocation in the world? She had more
+than fulfilled her father's wish that she remain in secular life for a
+year. Almost two years had passed. He could not reproach her from his
+grave.
+
+One divine morning she came upon the natural stage which had been the
+scene of a heart-drama more bitter to her than any sorrow. Walking alone
+in the solemn woods along the lake shore, the path suddenly ended on a
+rocky terrace, unshaded by trees, and directly over the water. Raspberry
+bushes made an enclosure there, in the center of which the stumps of two
+trees held a rough plank to make a seat. A stony beach curved inward
+from this point, the dark woods rose behind, and the soft waters made
+music in the hollows of the rock beneath her feet. Delightful with the
+perfume of the forest, the placid shores of Valcour, sun, and flower,
+and bird filling eye and ear with beauty, the sight of the spot chilled
+her heart. Here Lord Constantine had offered her his love and his life
+the year before. To her it had been a frightful scene, this strong,
+handsome, clever man, born to the highest things of mind, heart, talent
+and rank, kneeling before her, pleading with pallid face for her love,
+... and all the rest of it! She would have sunk down with shame but for
+his kindness in accepting the situation, and carrying her through it.
+
+Why his proposal shocked her his lordship could not see at first. He
+understood before his mournful interview and ended. Honora was of that
+class, to whom marriage does not present itself as a personal concern.
+She had the true feminine interest in the marriage of her friends, and
+had vaguely dreamed of her own march to the altar, an adoring lover, a
+happy home and household cares. Happy in the love of a charming mother
+and a high-hearted father, she had devoted her youthful days to them and
+to music. They stood between her and importunate lovers, whose
+intentions she had never divined.
+
+With the years came trouble, the death of the mother, the earning of her
+living by her art, the care of her father, and the work for her native
+land. Lovers could not pursue this busy woman, occupied with father and
+native land, and daily necessity. The eternal round of travel,
+conspiracy, scheming, planning, spending, with its invariable ending of
+disappointment and weariness of heart, brought forth a longing for the
+peace of rest, routine, satisfied aspirations; and from a dream the
+convent became a passion, longed for as the oasis by the traveler in the
+sands.
+
+Simple and sincere as light, the hollow pretence of the world disgusted
+her. Her temperament was of that unhappy fiber which sees the end almost
+as speedily as the beginning; change and death and satiety treading on
+the heels of the noblest enterprise. For her there seemed no happiness
+but in the possession of the everlasting, the unchangeable, the divinely
+beautiful. Out of these feelings and her pious habits rose the longing
+for the convent, for what seemed to be permanent, fixed, proportioned,
+without dust and dirt and ragged edges, and wholly devoted to God.
+
+After a little Lord Constantine understood her astonishment, her
+humiliation, her fright. He had a wretched satisfaction in knowing that
+no other man would snatch this prize; but oh, how bitter to give her up
+even to God! The one woman in all time for him, more could be said in
+her praise still; her like was not outside heaven. How much this
+splendid lake, with sapphire sky and green shores, lacked of true beauty
+until she stepped like light into view; then, as for the first time, one
+saw the green woods glisten, the waters sparkle anew, the sky deepen in
+richness! One had to know her heart, her nature, so nobly dowered, to
+see this lighting up of nature's finest work at her coming. She was
+beautiful, white as milk, with eyes like jewels, framed in lashes of
+silken black, so dark, so dark!
+
+Honora wept at the sight of his face as he went away. She had seen that
+despair in her father's face. And she wept to-day as she sat on the
+rough bench. Had she been to blame? Why had she delayed her entrance
+into the convent a year beyond the time? Arthur had declared his work
+could not get on without her for at least an extra half year. She was
+lingering still? Had present comfort shaken her resolution?
+
+A cry roused her from her mournful thoughts, and she looked up to see
+Mona rounding the point at the other end of the stony beach, laboring at
+the heavy oars. Honora smiled and waved her handkerchief. Here was one
+woman for whom life had no problems, only solid contentment, and
+perennial interest; and who thought her husband the finest thing in the
+world. She beached her boat and found her way up to the top of the rock.
+To look at her no one would dream, Honora certainly did not, that she
+had any other purpose than breathing the air.
+
+Mrs. Doyle Grahame enjoyed the conviction that marriage settles all
+difficulties, if one goes about it rightly. She had gone about it
+rightly, with marvellous results. That charming bear her father had put
+his neck in her yoke, and now traveled about in her interest as mild as
+a clam. All men gasped at the sight of his meekness. When John Everard
+Grahame arrived on this planet, his grandfather fell on his knees before
+him and his parents, and never afterwards departed from that attitude.
+Doyle Grahame laid it to his art of winning a father-in-law. Mona found
+the explanation simply in the marriage, which to her, from the making of
+the trousseau to the christening of the boy, had been wonderful enough
+to have changed the face of the earth. The delicate face, a trifle
+fuller, had increased in dignity. Her hair flamed more glorious than
+ever. As a young matron she patronized Honora now an old maid.
+
+"You've been crying," said she, with a glance around, "and I don't
+wonder. This is the place where you broke a good man's heart. It will
+remain bewitched until you accept some other man in the same spot. How
+did we know, Miss Cleverly? Do you think Conny was as secret as you? And
+didn't I witness the whole scene from the point yonder? I couldn't hear
+the words, but there wasn't any need of it. Heavens, the expression of
+you two!"
+
+"Mona, do you mean to tell me that every one knew it?"
+
+"Every soul, my dear ostrich with your head in the sand. The hope is
+that you will not repeat the refusal when the next lover comes along.
+And if you can arrange to have the scene come off here, as you arranged
+for the last one ... I have always maintained that the lady with a
+convent vocation is by nature the foxiest of all women. I don't know
+why, but she shows it."
+
+The usual fashion of teasing Honora attributed to her qualities opposed
+to a religious vocation.
+
+"Well, I have made up my mind to fly at once to the convent," she said,
+"with my foxiness and other evil qualities. If it was my fault that one
+man proposed to me----"
+
+"It was your fault, of course. Why do you throw doubt upon it?"
+
+"It will not be my fault that the second man proposes. So, this place
+may remain accursed forever. Oh, my poor Lord Constantine! After all his
+kindness to father and me, to be forced to inflict such suffering on
+him! Why do men care for us poor creatures so much, Mona?"
+
+"Because we care so much for them ..." Honora laughed ... "and because
+we are necessary to their happiness. You should go round the stations on
+your knees once a day for the rest of your life, for having rejected
+Lord Conny. It wasn't mere ingratitude ... that was bad enough; but to
+throw over a career so splendid, to desert Ireland so outrageously,"
+this was mere pretence ... "to lose all importance in life for the sake
+of a dream, for the sake of a convent."
+
+"You have a prejudice against convents, Mona."
+
+"No, dear, I believe in convents for those who are made that way. I
+have noticed, perhaps you have too, that many people who should go to a
+convent will not, and many people at present in the cloisters ought to
+have stayed where nature put them first."
+
+"It's pleasant on a day like this for you to feel that you are just
+where nature intended you to be, isn't it? How did you leave the baby?"
+
+Mona leaped into a rhapsody on the wonderful child, who was just then
+filling the time of Anne, and at the same time filling the air with
+howlings, but returned speedily to her purpose.
+
+"Did you say you had fixed the day, Honora?"
+
+"In September, any day before the end of the month."
+
+"You were never made for the convent," with seriousness. "Too fond of
+the running about in life, and your training is all against it."
+
+"My training!" said Honora.
+
+"All your days you were devoted to one man, weren't you? And to the
+cause of a nation, weren't you? And to the applause of the crowd,
+weren't you? Now, my dear, when you find it necessary to make a change
+in your habits, the changes should be in line with those habits.
+Otherwise you may get a jolt that you won't forget. In a convent, there
+will be no man, no Ireland, and no crowd, will there? What you should
+have done was to marry Lord Conny, and to keep right on doing what you
+had done before, only with more success. Now when the next man comes
+along, do not let the grand opportunity go."
+
+"I'll risk the jolt," Honora replied. "But this next man about whom you
+have been hinting since you came up here? Is this the man?"
+
+She pointed to the path leading into the woods. Louis came towards them
+in a hurry, having promised them a trip to the rocks of Valcour. The
+young deacon was in fighting trim after a month on the farm, the pallor
+of hard study and confinement had fled, and the merry prospect ahead
+made his life an enchantment. Only his own could see the slight but
+ineffaceable mark of his experience with Sister Claire.
+
+"Take care," whispered Mona. "He is not the man, but the man's agent."
+
+Louis bounced into the raspberry enclosure and flung himself at their
+feet.
+
+"Tell me," said Honora mischievously. "Is there any man in love with me,
+and planning to steal away my convent from me? Tell me true, Louis."
+
+The deacon sat up and cast an indignant look on his sister.
+
+"Shake not thy gory locks at me," she began cooly....
+
+"There it is," he burst out. "Do you know, Honora, I think marriage
+turns certain kinds of people, the redheads in particular, quite daft.
+This one is never done talking about her husband, her baby, her
+experience, her theory, her friends who are about to marry, or who want
+to marry, or who can't marry. She can't see two persons together without
+patching up a union for them...."
+
+"Everybody should get married," said Mona serenely, "except priests and
+nuns. Mona is not a nun, therefore she should get married."
+
+"The reasoning is all right," replied the deacon, "but it doesn't apply
+here. Don't you worry, Honora. There's no man about here that will worry
+you, and even if there was, hold fast to that which is given thee...."
+
+"Don't quote Scripture, Reverend Sir," cried Mona angrily.
+
+"The besotted world is not worth the pother this foolish young married
+woman makes over it."
+
+The foolish young woman received a warning from her brother when Mona
+went into the woods to gather an armful of wild blossoms for the boat.
+
+"Don't you know," said he with the positiveness of a young theologian,
+"that Arthur will probably never marry? Has he looked at a girl in that
+way since he came back from California? He's giddy enough, I know, but
+one that studies him can see he has no intention of marrying. Now why do
+you trouble this poor girl, after her scene with the Englishman, with
+hints of Arthur? I tell you he will never marry."
+
+"You may know more about him than I do," his sister placidly answered,
+"but I have seen him looking at Honora for the last five years, and
+working for her, and thinking about her. His look changed recently.
+Perhaps you know why. There's something in the air. I can feel it. You
+can't. None of you celibates can. And you can't see beyond your books in
+matters of love and marriage. That's quite right. We can manage such
+things better. And if Arthur makes up his mind to win her, I'm bound
+she shall have him."
+
+"We can manage! I'm bound!" he mimicked. "Well, remember that I warned
+you. It isn't so much that your fingers may be burned ... that's what
+you need, you married minx. You may do harm to those two. They seem to
+be at peace. Let 'em alone."
+
+"What was the baby doing when you left the house?" said she for answer.
+
+"Tearing the nurse's hair out in handfuls," said the proud uncle, as he
+plunged into a list of the doings of the wonderful child, who fitted
+into any conversation as neatly as a preposition.
+
+Mona, grew sad at heart. Her brother evidently knew of some obstacle to
+this union, something in Arthur's past life which made his marriage with
+any woman impossible. She recalled his silence about the California
+episode, his indifference to women, his lack of enthusiasm as to
+marriage.
+
+They rowed away over the lake, with the boat half buried in wild bushes,
+sprinkled with dandelion flowers and the tender blossoms of the apple
+trees. Honora was happy, at peace. She put the scene with Lord
+Constantine away from her, and forgot the light words of Mona.
+
+Whoever the suitor might be, Arthur did not appear to her as a lover. So
+careful had he been in his behavior, that Louis would have as much place
+in her thought as Arthur, who had never discouraged her hope of the
+convent, except by pleading for Ireland. The delay in keeping her own
+resolution had been pleasant. Now that the date was fixed, the grateful
+enclosure of the cloister seemed to shut her in from all this dust and
+clamor of men, from the noisome sights and sounds of world-living, from
+the endless coming and going and running about, concerning trifles, from
+the injustice and meanness and hopeless crimes of men.
+
+In the shade of the altar, in the restful gloom of Calvary, she could
+look up with untired eyes to the calm glow of the celestial life,
+unchanging, orderly, beautiful with its satisfied aspiration, and rich
+in perfect love and holy companionship. Such a longing came over her to
+walk into this perfect peace that moment! Mona well knew this mood, and
+Louis in triumph signalled his sister to look. Her eyes, turned to the
+rocky shore of Valcour, saw far beyond. On her perfect face lay a
+shadow, the shadow of her longing, and from her lips came now and then
+the perfume of a sigh.
+
+In silence these two watched her, Louis recognizing the borderland of
+holy ecstasy, Mona hopeful that the vision was only a mirage. The boat
+floated close to the perpendicular rocks and reflected itself in the
+deep waters; far away the farmhouse lay against the green woods; to the
+north rose the highest point of the bluff, dark with pines; farther on
+was the sweep of the curved shore, and still farther the red walls of
+the town. Never boat carried freight so beautiful as this which bore
+along the island the young mother, the young deacon, and deep-hearted
+Honora, who was blessing God.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII.
+
+THE PAULINE PRIVILEGE.
+
+
+For a week at the end of July Arthur had been in the city closing up the
+Curran episode. On his return every one felt that change of marked and
+mysterious kind had touched him. His face shone with joy. The brooding
+shadow, acquired in his exile, had disappeared. Light played about his
+face, emanated from it, as from moonlit water, a phosphorescence of the
+daylight. His mother studied him with anxiety, without which she had not
+been since the surprising visit of Curran. The old shadow seemed to have
+fled forever.
+
+One night on the lake, as Louis and he floated lazily towards the
+island, he told the story. After enjoying a moonlight swim at the foot
+of the bluff, they were preparing to row over to Valcour when Honora's
+glorious voice rang out from the farmhouse on the hill above, singing to
+Mona's accompaniment. The two sat in delight. A full moon stood in the
+sky, and radiance silvered the bosom of the lake, the mystic shores, the
+far-off horizon. This singer was the voice of the night, whose mystic
+beauty and voiceless feeling surged into the woman's song like waters
+escaping through a ravine. Dillon was utterly oppressed by happiness.
+When the song had ceased, he stretched out his arms towards her.
+
+"Dearest and best of women! By God's grace I shall soon call you mine!"
+
+Louis took up the oars and pulled with energy in the direction of
+Valcour. "Is that the meaning of the look on your face since your
+return?" said he.
+
+"That's the meaning. I saw you all watching me in surprise. My mother
+told me of it in her anxiety. If my face matched my feelings the moon
+there would look sickly besides its brightness. I have been in jail for
+five years, and to-day I am free."
+
+"And how about that other woman ...?"
+
+"Dead as far as I am concerned, the poor wretch! Yesterday I could curse
+her. I pity her to-day. She has gone her way and I go mine. Monsignor
+has declared me free. Isn't that enough?"
+
+"That's enough," cried Louis, dropping the oars in his excitement. "But
+is it enough to give you Honora? I'm so glad you think of her that way.
+Mona told her only yesterday that some lover was pursuing her, not
+mentioning your name. I assured her on the contrary that the road to the
+convent would have no obstacles. And I rebuked Mona for her
+interference."
+
+"You were right, and she was right," said Arthur sadly. "I never dared
+to show her my love, because I was not free. But now I shall declare it.
+What did she think of Mona's remarks?"
+
+"She took them lightly. I am afraid that your freedom comes at a poor
+time, Arthur; that you may be too late. I have had many talks with her.
+Her heart is set on the convent, she has fixed the date for September,
+and she does not seem to have love in her mind at all."
+
+"Love begets love. How could she think of love when I never gave any
+sign, except what sharp-eyed Mona saw. You can conceal nothing from a
+woman. Wait until I have wooed her ... but apart from all that you must
+hear how I came to be free ... oh, my God, I can hardly believe it even
+now after three days ... I have been so happy that the old anguish which
+tore my soul years ago seemed easier to bear than this exquisite pain. I
+must get used to it. Listen now to the story of my escape, and row
+gently while you listen so as to miss not a word."
+
+Arthur did not tell his chum more than half of the tale, chiefly because
+Louis was never to know the story of Horace Endicott. He had gone to New
+York at the invitation of Livingstone. This surprising incident began a
+series of surprises. The Currans had returned from California, and made
+their report to Sonia; and to Livingstone of all men the wife of Horace
+Endicott had gone for advice in so delicate an affair as forcing Arthur
+Dillon to prove and defend his identity. After two or three interviews
+with Livingstone Arthur carried his report to Monsignor.
+
+"All this looks to me," said the priest, "as if the time for a return
+to your own proper personality had come. You know how I have feared the
+consequences of this scheme. The more I look into it, the more terrible
+it seems."
+
+"And why should I give up now of all times? when I am a success?" cried
+the young fellow. "Do I fear Livingstone and the lawyers? Curran and his
+wife have done their best, and failed. Will the lawyers do any better?"
+
+"It is not that," said the priest. "But you will always be annoyed in
+this way. The sharks and blackmailers will get after you later...."
+
+"No, no, no, Monsignor. This effort of the Currans and Mrs. Endicott
+will be the last. I won't permit it. There will be no result from
+Livingstone's interference. He can go as far as interviews with me, but
+not one step beyond. And I can guarantee that no one will ever take up
+the case after him."
+
+"You are not reasonable," urged the priest. "The very fact that these
+people suspect you to be Horace Endicott is enough; it proves that you
+have been discovered."
+
+"I am only the twentieth whom they pursued for Horace," he laughed.
+"Curran knows I am not Endicott. He has proved to the satisfaction of
+Livingstone that I am Arthur Dillon. But the two women are pertinacious,
+and urge the men on. Since these are well paid for their trouble, why
+should they not keep on?"
+
+"They are not the only pertinacious ones," the priest replied.
+
+"You may claim a little of the virtue yourself," Arthur slyly remarked.
+"You have urged me to betray myself into the hands of enemies once a
+month for the last five years."
+
+"In this case would it not be better to get an advantage by declaring
+yourself, before Livingstone can bring suit against you?"
+
+"There will be no suit," he answered positively. "I hold the winning
+cards in this game. There is no advantage in my returning to a life
+which for me holds nothing but horror. Do you not see, Monsignor, that
+the same reasons which sent me out of it hold good to keep me out of
+it?"
+
+"Very true," said Monsignor reluctantly, as he viewed the situation.
+
+"And new reasons, not to be controverted, have sprung up around Arthur
+Dillon. For Horace Endicott there is nothing in that old life but public
+disgrace. Do you know that I hate that fat fool, that wretched cuckold
+who had not sense enough to discover what the uninterested knew about
+that woman? I would not wear his name, nor go back to his circle, if the
+man and woman were dead, and the secret buried forever."
+
+"He was young and innocent," said the priest with a pitiful glance at
+Arthur.
+
+"And selfish and sensual too. I despise him. He would never have been
+more than an empty-headed pleasure-seeker. With that wife he could have
+become anything you please. The best thing he did was his flight into
+everlasting obscurity, and that he owed to the simple, upright,
+strong-hearted woman who nourished him in his despair. Monsignor," and
+he laid his firm hand on the knee of the priest and looked at him with
+terrible eyes, "I would choose death rather than go back to what I was.
+I shall never go back. I get hot with shame when I think of the part an
+Endicott played as Sonia Westfield's fool."
+
+"And the reason not to be controverted?"
+
+"In what a position my departure would leave my mother. Have you thought
+of that? After all her kindness, her real affection, as if I had been
+her own son. She thinks now that I am her son, and I feel that she is my
+mother. And what would induce me to expose her to the public gaze as the
+chief victim, or the chief plotter in a fraud? If it had to be done, I
+would wait in any event until my mother was dead. But beyond all these
+minor reasons is one that overshadows everything. I am Arthur Dillon.
+That other man is not only dead, he is as unreal to me as the hero of
+any book I read in my boyhood. It was hard to give up the old
+personality; to give up what I am now would be impossible. I am what I
+seem. I feel, think, speak, dream Arthur Dillon. The roots would bleed
+if I were to transplant myself. I found my career among your people, and
+the meaning of life. There is no other career for me. These are the
+people I love. I will never raise between them and me so odious a
+barrier as the story of my disappearance would be. They could never
+take to Horace Endicott. Oh, I have given the matter a moment's thought,
+Monsignor. The more I dwell on it, the worse it seems."
+
+He considered the point for a moment, and then whispered with joyous
+triumph, "I have succeeded beyond my own expectations. I have
+disappeared even from myself. An enemy cannot find me, not even my own
+confession would reveal me. The people who love me would swear to a man
+that I am Arthur Dillon, and that only insanity could explain my own
+confession. At the very least they would raise such a doubt in the mind
+of a judge that he would insist on clean proofs from both sides. But
+there's the clear fact. I have escaped from myself, disappeared from the
+sight of Arthur Dillon. Before long I can safely testify to a dream I
+had of having once been a wretch named Horace Endicott. But I have a
+doubt even now that I was such a man."
+
+"My God, but it's weird," said Monsignor with emotion, as he rose to
+walk the room. "I have the same notion myself at times."
+
+"It's a matter to be left undisturbed, or some one will go crazy over
+it," Arthur said seriously.
+
+"And you are happy, really happy? The sight of this woman did not revive
+in you any regret...."
+
+"I am happy, Monsignor, beyond belief," with a contented sigh. "It would
+be too much to expect perfect happiness. Yet that is within my reach. If
+I were only free to marry Honora Ledwith."
+
+"I heard of that too," said the priest meditatively. "Has she any regard
+for you?"
+
+"As a brother. How could I have asked any other love? And I am rich in
+that. Since there is no divorce for Catholics, I could not let her see
+the love which burned in me. I had no hope."
+
+"And she goes into the convent, I believe. You must not stand in God's
+way."
+
+"I have not, though I delayed her going because I could not bear to part
+from her. Willingly I have resigned her to God, because I know that in
+His goodness, had I been free, He would have given her to me."
+
+Monsignor paused as if struck by the thought and looked at him for a
+moment.
+
+"It is the right spirit," was his brief comment.
+
+He loved this strange, incomprehensible man, who had stood for five
+years between his adopted people and their enemies in many a fight, who
+had sought battle in their behalf and heaped them with favors. His eyes
+saw the depth of that resignation which gave to God the one jewel that
+would have atoned for the horrid sufferings of the past. If he were
+free! He thought of old Lear moaning over dead Cordelia.
+
+                          She lives! If it be so,
+    It is a chance which does redeem all sorrows
+    That ever I have felt.
+
+"It is the right spirit," he repeated as he considered the matter. "One
+must not stand in the way of a soul, or in the way of God. Yet were you
+free, where would be the advantage? She is for the convent, and has
+never thought of you in the way of love."
+
+"Love begets love, father dear. I could light the flame in her heart,
+for I am dear to her as a brother, as her father's son."
+
+"Then her dream of the convent, which she has cherished so many years,
+cannot be more than a dream, if she resigned it for you."
+
+"I cannot argue with you," he said hopelessly, "and it's a sad subject.
+There is only the will of God to be done."
+
+"And if you were free," went on Monsignor smiling, "and tried and failed
+to light love in her heart, you would suffer still more."
+
+"A little more or less would not matter. I would be happy still to give
+her to God."
+
+"I see, I see," shaking his sage head. "To God! As long as it is not to
+another and luckier fellow, the resignation is perfect."
+
+Arthur broke into a laugh, and the priest said casually:
+
+"I think that by the law of the Church you are a free man."
+
+Arthur leaped to his feet with a face like death.
+
+"In the name of God!" he cried.
+
+Monsignor pushed him back into his chair.
+
+"That's my opinion. Just listen, will you. Then take your case to a
+doctor of the law. There is a kind of divorce in the Church known as the
+Pauline Privilege. Let me state the items, and do you examine if you can
+claim the privilege. Horatius, an infidel, that is, unbaptized, deserts
+his wife legally and properly, because of her crimes; later he becomes a
+Catholic; meeting a noble Catholic lady, Honoria, he desires to marry
+her; question, is he free to contract this marriage? The answer of the
+doctors of the law is in the affirmative, with the following conditions:
+that the first wife be an infidel, that is, unbaptized; that to live
+with her is impossible; that she has been notified of his intention to
+break the marriage. The two latter conditions are fulfilled in your case
+the moment the first wife secures the divorce which enables her to marry
+her paramour. Horatius is then free to marry Honoria, or any other
+Catholic lady, but not a heretic or a pagan. This is called the Pauline
+Privilege because it is described in the Epistle of St. Paul to the
+Corinthians. My opinion is that you are free."
+
+The man, unable to speak, or move, felt his hope grow strong and violent
+out of the priest's words.
+
+"Mind, it's only my opinion," said Monsignor, to moderate his
+transports.
+
+"You must go to Dr. Bender, the theologian, to get a purely legal
+decision. I fear that I am only adding to your misery. What if he should
+decide against you? What if she should decide against you?"
+
+"Neither will happen," with painful effort. Sudden joy overcame him with
+that anguish of the past, and this was overwhelming, wonderful.
+
+"The essence of love is sacrifice," said Monsignor, talking to give him
+time for composure. "Not your good only, but the happiness of her you
+love must control your heart and will; and above all there must be
+submission to God. When He calls, the child must leave the parent, the
+lover his mistress, all ties must be broken."
+
+"I felt from the beginning that this would come to pass," said Arthur
+weakly. "Oh, I made my sacrifice long ago. The facts were all against
+me, of course. Easy to make the sacrifice which had to be made. I can
+make another sacrifice, but isn't it now her turn? Oh, Monsignor, all my
+joy seems to come through you! From that first moment years ago, when we
+met, I can date----"
+
+"All your sorrow," the priest interrupted.
+
+"And all my joy. Well, one cannot speak of these great things, only act.
+I'm going to the theologian. Before I sleep to-night he must settle that
+case. I know from your eyes it will be in my favor. I can bear
+disappointment. I can bear anything now. I am free from that creature,
+she is without a claim on me in any way, law, fact, religion, sympathy.
+Oh, my God!"
+
+Monsignor could not hinder the tears that poured from his eyes silently.
+He clasped Arthur's hand and saw him go as he wept. In his varied life
+he had never seen so intimately any heart, none so strange and woful in
+its sorrow and its history, none so pathetic. The man lived entirely on
+the plane of tragedy, in the ecstasy of pain; a mystery, a problem, a
+wonder, yet only an average, natural, simple man, that had fought
+destiny with strange weapons.
+
+This story Arthur whispered to Louis, floating between the moonlit
+shores of Champlain. He lay in the stern watching the rhythmic rise of
+the oar-blades, and the flashing of the water-drops falling back like
+diamonds into the wave. Happiness lay beside him steering the boat, a
+seraph worked the oars, the land ahead must be paradise. His was a
+lover's story, clear, yet broken with phrases of love; for was he not
+speaking to the heart, half his own, that beat with his in unison? The
+tears flowed down the deacon's cheek, tears of dread and of sympathy.
+What if Honora refused this gift laid so reverently at her feet? He
+spoke his dread.
+
+"One must take the chance," said the lover calmly. "She is free too. I
+would not have her bound. The very air up here will conspire with me to
+win her. She must learn at once that I want her for my wife. Then let
+the leaven work."
+
+The boat came back to the landing. The ladies sat on the veranda
+chatting quietly, watching the moon which rose higher and higher, and
+threw Valcour into shadow so deep, that it looked like a great serpent
+asleep on a crystal rock, nailed by a golden spike through its head to
+the crystal rock beneath. The lighthouse lamp burning steadily at the
+south point, and its long reflection in the still waters, was the golden
+nail. A puffing tug passed by with its procession of lumber boats,
+fanciful with colored lights, resounding with the roaring songs of the
+boatmen; and the waves recorded their protest against it in long groans
+on the shore. Arthur drank in the scene without misgiving, bathed in
+love as in moonlight. This moon would see the consummation of his joy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII.
+
+LOVE IS BLIND.
+
+
+Next morning after breakfast the house began to echo with the singing of
+the inmates. Mona sang to the baby in an upper room, the Deacon thrummed
+the piano and hummed to himself in the raucous voice peculiar to most
+churchmen. Judy in the kitchen meditatively crooned to her maids an
+ancient lamentation, and out on the lawn, Arthur sang to his mother an
+amorous ditty in compliment to her youthful appearance. Honora, the
+song-bird, silent, heard with amusement this sudden lifting up of
+voices, each unconscious of the other. Arthur's bawling dominated.
+
+"Has the house gone mad?" she inquired from the hallway stairs, so
+clearly that the singers paused to hear. "What is the meaning of all
+this uproar of song. Judy in the kitchen, Mona in the nursery, Louis in
+the parlor, Arthur on the lawn?"
+
+The criminals began to laugh at the coincidence.
+
+"I always sing to baby," Mona screamed in justification.
+
+"I wasn't singing, I never sing," Louis yelled from the parlor.
+
+"Mother drove me to it," Arthur howled through the door.
+
+"I think the singin' was betther nor the shoutin'," Judy observed
+leaning out of the window to display her quizzical smile.
+
+A new spirit illumined the old farmhouse. Love had entered it, and hope
+had followed close on his heels; hope that Honora would never get to her
+beloved convent. They loved her so and him that with all their faith,
+their love and respect for the convent life, gladly would they have seen
+her turn away from the holy doors into Arthur's reverential arms. With
+the exception of Anne. So surely had she become his mother that the
+thought of giving him up to any woman angered her. She looked coldly on
+Honora for having inspired him with a foolish passion.
+
+"Come down, celestial goddess," said Arthur gayly, "and join the Deacon
+and me in a walk over the bluff, through the perfumed woods, down the
+loud-resounding shore. Put on rubbers, for the dew has no respect for
+the feet of such divinity."
+
+They went off together in high spirits, and Mona came down to the
+veranda with the baby in her arms to look after them. Anne grieved at
+the sight of their intimacy.
+
+"I have half a mind," she said, "to hurry Honora off to her convent, or
+to bring Sister Magdalen and the Mother Superior up here to strengthen
+her. If that boy has his way, he'll marry her before Christmas. He has
+the look of it in his eye."
+
+"And why shouldn't he?" Mona asked. "If she will have him, then she has
+no business with the convent, and it will be a good opportunity for her
+to test her vocation."
+
+"And what luck will there be in it for him?" said the mother bitterly.
+"How would you feel if some hussy cheated Louis out of his priesthood,
+with blue eyes and golden hair and impudence? If Arthur wants to marry
+after waiting so long, let him set eyes on women that ask for marriage.
+He'll never have luck tempting a poor girl from the convent."
+
+"Little ye think o' the luck," said Judy, who had come out to have her
+morning word with the mistress. "Weren't ye goin' into a convent yerself
+whin Pat Dillon kem along, an' wid a wink tuk ye to church undher his
+arm. An' is there a woman in the whole world that's had greater luck
+than yerself?"
+
+"Oh, I know you are all working for the same thing, all against me,"
+Anne said pettishly.
+
+"Faith we are, and may the angels guide him and her to each other. Can't
+a blind man see they wor made to be man an' wife? An' I say it, knowin'
+that the convent is the best place in the world for anny girl. I wish
+every girl that was born wint there. If they knew what is lyin' in wait
+for thim whin they take up wid a man, there wouldn't be convents enough
+to hould all that wud be runnin' to thim. But ye know as well as I do
+that the girls are not med for the convent, except the blessed few...."
+
+Anne fled from the stream of Judy's eloquence, and the old lady looked
+expressively at Mona.
+
+"She's afraid she's goin' to lose her Artie. Oh, these Irish mothers!
+they'd kape a boy till his hairs were gray, an' mek him belave it too,
+if they cud. I never saw but wan mother crazy to marry her son. That was
+Biddy Brady, that wint to school wid yer mother, an' poor Micksheen was
+a born ijit, wid a lip hangin' like a sign, so's ye cud hang an auction
+notice on it. Sure, the poor boy wudn't lave his mother for Vanus
+herself, an' the mother batin' him out o' the house every day, an' he
+bawlin' for fear the women wud get hould of him."
+
+Honora had observed the happy change in Arthur, her knight of service,
+who had stood between her and danger, and had fought her battles with
+chivalry; asking no reward, hinting at none, because she had already
+given him all, a sister's love. What tenderness, what adoration, what
+service had he lavished on her, unmarred by act, or word, or hint! God
+would surely reward him for his consideration. Walking through the
+scented woods she found it easy to tell them of the date fixed for her
+entrance into the convent. Grand trees were marshalled along the path,
+supporting a roof of gold and green, where the sun fell strong on the
+heavy foliage.
+
+"September," said Arthur making a calculation. "Why not wait until
+October and then shed your colors with the trees. I can see her," he
+went on humorously, "decorously arranging the black dress so that it
+will hang well, and not make her a fright altogether before the other
+women; and getting a right tilt to the black bonnet and enough lace in
+it to set off her complexion."
+
+"Six months later," said the Deacon taking up the strain, "she will do
+better than that. Discarding the plain robes of the postulant, she will
+get herself into the robes of a bride...."
+
+"Oh, sooner than that," said Arthur with a meaning which escaped her.
+
+"No, six months is the period," she corrected seriously.
+
+"In wedding finery she will prance before her delighted friends for a
+few minutes, and then march out to shed white silk and fleecy tulle. A
+vengeful nun, whose hair has long been worn away, will then clip with
+one snip of the scissors her brown locks from her head...."
+
+"Horror!" cried Arthur.
+
+"Sure, straight across the neck, you know, like the women's-rights
+people. Then the murder of the hair has to be concealed, so they put on
+a nightcap, and hide that with a veil, and then bring her into the
+bishop to tell him it's all right, and that she's satisfied."
+
+"And what do they make of the hair?" said Arthur.
+
+"That's one of the things yet to be revealed."
+
+"And after that she is set at chasing the rule, or being chased by the
+rule for two years. She studies striking examples of observing the rule,
+and of the contrary. She has a shy at observing it herself, and the
+contrary. The rule is it when she observes it; she's it when she
+doesn't. At this point the mother superior comes into the game."
+
+"Where do the frowsy children come in?"
+
+"At meals usually. Honora cuts the bread and her fingers, butters it,
+and passes it round; the frowsy butter themselves, and Honora; this is
+an act of mortification, which is intensified when the mistress of
+novices discovers the butter on her habit."
+
+"Finally the last stage is worse than the first, I suppose. Having
+acquired the habit she gets into it so deeply...."
+
+"She sheds it once more, Arthur. Then she's tied to the frowsy children
+forever, and is known as Sister Mary of the Cold Shoulder to the world."
+
+"This is a case of rescue," said Arthur with determination, "I move we
+rescue her this minute. Help, help!"
+
+The woods echoed with his mocking cries. Honora had not spoken, the
+smile had died away, and she was plainly offended. Louis observant
+passed a hint to Arthur, who made the apology.
+
+"We shall be there," he said humbly, "with our hearts bleeding because
+we must surrender you. And who are we that you need care? It is poor
+Ireland that will mourn for the child that bathed and bound her wounds,
+that watched by her in the dark night, and kept the lamp of hope and
+comfort burning, that stirred hearts to pity and service, that woke up
+Lord Constantine and me, and strangers and enemies like us, to render
+service; the child whose face and voice and word and song made the
+meanest listen to a story of injustice; all shut out, concealed, put
+away where the mother may never see or hear her more."
+
+His voice broke, his eyes filled with tears at the vividness of the
+vision called up in the heart of the woods; and he walked ahead to
+conceal his emotion. Honora stopped dead and looked inquiringly at the
+Deacon, who switched the flowers with downcast eyes.
+
+"What is the meaning of it, Louis?"
+
+He knew not how to make answer, thinking that Arthur should be the first
+to tell his story.
+
+"Do you think that we can let you go easily?" he said. "If we tease you
+as we did just now it is to hide what we really suffer. His feeling got
+the better of him, I think."
+
+The explanation sounded harmless. For an instant a horrid fear that
+these woods must witness another scene like Lord Constantine's chilled
+her heart. She comforted Arthur like a sister.
+
+"Do not feel my going too deeply. Change must come. Let us be glad it is
+not death, or a journey into distant lands with no return. I shall be
+among you still, and meanwhile God will surely comfort you."
+
+"Oh, if we could walk straight on like this," Arthur answered, "through
+the blessed, free, scented forest, just as we are, forever! And walking
+on for years, content with one another, you, Louis, and I, come out at
+last, as we shall soon come out here on the lake, on the shore of
+eternity, just as life's sun sets, and the moon of the immortal life
+rises; and then without change, or the anguish of separation and dying,
+if we could pass over the waters, and enter the land of eternity, taking
+our place with God and His children, our friends, that have been there
+so long!"
+
+"Is not that just what we are to do, not after your fashion, but after
+the will of God, Arthur? Louis at the altar, I in the convent before the
+altar, and you in the field of battle fighting for us both. Aaron,
+Miriam, Moses, here are the three in the woods of Champlain, as once in
+the desert of Arabia," and she smiled at the young men.
+
+Louis returned the smile, and Arthur gave her a look of adoration, so
+tender, so bold, that she trembled. The next moment, when the broad
+space through which they were walking ended in a berry-patch, he plunged
+among the bushes with eagerness, to gather for her black raspberries in
+his drinking-cup. Her attempt to discuss her departure amiably had
+failed.
+
+"I am tired already," said she to Louis helplessly. "I shall go back to
+the house, and leave you to go on together."
+
+"Don't blame him," the Deacon pleaded, perceiving how useless was
+concealment. "If you knew how that man has suffered in his life, and how
+you opened heaven to him ..." she made a gesture of pain ... "remember
+all his goodness and be gentle with him. He must speak before you go. He
+will take anything from you, and you alone can teach him patience and
+submission."
+
+"How long...." she began. He divined what she would have asked.
+
+"Mona has known it more than a year, but no one else, for he gave no
+sign. I know it only a short time. After all it is not to be wondered
+at. He has been near you, working with you for years. His life has been
+lonely somehow, and you seemed to fill it. Do not be hasty with him. Let
+him come to his avowal and his refusal in his own way. It is all you can
+do for him. Knowing you so well he probably knows what he has to
+receive."
+
+Arthur came back with his berries and poured them out on a leaf for her
+to eat. Seated for a little on a rock, while he lay on the ground at her
+feet, she ate to please him; but her soul in terror saw only the white
+face of Lord Constantine, and thought only of the pain in store for this
+most faithful friend. Oh, to have it out with him that moment! Yet it
+seemed too cruel. But how go on for a month in dread of what was to
+come?
+
+She loved him in her own beautiful way. Her tears fell that night as she
+sat in her room by the window watching the high moon, deep crimson,
+rising through the mist over the far-off islands. How bitter to leave
+her beloved even for God, when the leaving brought woe to them! So long
+she had waited for the hour of freedom, and always a tangle at the
+supreme moment! How could she be happy and he suffering without the
+convent gates? This pity was to be the last temptation, her greatest
+trial. Its great strength did not disarm her. If twenty broke their
+hearts on that day, she would not give up her loved design. Let God
+comfort them, since she could not. But the vision of a peaceful
+entrance into the convent faded. She would have to enter, as she had
+passed through life, carrying the burden of another's woe, in tears.
+
+She could see that he never lost heart. The days passed delightfully,
+and somehow his adoration pleased her. Having known him in many lights,
+there was novelty in seeing him illumined by candid love. How could he
+keep so high a courage with the end so dark and so near? Honora had no
+experience of love, romantic love, and she had always smiled at its
+expression in the novels of the time. If Arthur only knew the task he
+had set for himself! She loved him truly, but marriage repelled her
+almost, except in others.
+
+Therefore, having endured the uncertainty of the position a week, she
+had it out with Arthur. Sitting on the rocks of an ancient quarry, high
+above the surface of the lake, they watched the waters rough and white
+from the strong south wind. The household had adjourned that day for
+lunch to this wild spot, and the members were scattered about, leaving
+them, as they always did now, by common consent alone.
+
+"Perhaps," she said calmly, "this would be a good time to talk to you,
+Arthur, as sister to brother ... can't we talk as brother and sister?"
+
+For a change came over his face that sickened her. The next moment he
+was ready for the struggle.
+
+"I fear not, Honora," said he humbly. "I fear we can never do that
+again."
+
+"Then you are to stand in my way too?" with bitterness.
+
+"No, but I am not going to stand in my own way," he replied boldly.
+"Have I ever stood in your way, Honora?"
+
+"You have always helped me. Do not fail me at the last, I beg of you."
+
+"I shall never fail you, nor stand in your way. You are free now as your
+father wished you to be. You shall go to the convent on the date which
+you have named. Neither Ireland, nor anything but your heart shall
+hinder you. You have seen my heart for a week as you never saw it
+before. Do not let what you saw disturb or detain you. I told your
+father of it the last day of his life, and he was glad. He said it was
+like ... he was satisfied. Both he and I were of one mind that you
+should be free. And you are."
+
+Ideas and words fled from her. The situation of her own making she knew
+not how to manage. What could be more sensible than his speech?
+
+"Very well, thank you," she said helplessly.
+
+He had perfect control of himself, but his attitude expressed his
+uneasiness, his face only just concealed his pain. All his life in
+moments like this, Arthur Dillon would suffer from his earliest sorrow.
+
+"I hope you will all let me go with resignation," she began again.
+
+"I give you to God freely," was his astonishing answer, "but I may tell
+you it is my hope He will give you back to me. I have nothing, and He is
+the Lord of all. He has permitted my heart to be turned to ashes, and
+yet gave it life again through you. I have confidence in Him. To you I
+am nothing; in the future I shall be only a memory to be prayed for. If
+we had not God to lift us up, and repay us for our suffering, to what
+would we come? I could not make my heart clear to you, show you its
+depths of feeling, frightful depths, I think sometimes, and secure your
+pity. God alone, the master of hearts, can do that. I have been generous
+to the last farthing. He will not be outdone by me."
+
+"Oh, my God!" she murmured, looking at him in wonder, for his words
+sounded insanely to her ear.
+
+"I love you, Honora," he went on, with a flush on his cheek, and so
+humble that he kept his eyes on the ground. "Go, in spite of that, if
+God demands it. If you can, knowing that I shall be alone, how much
+alone no one may know, go nevertheless. Only bear it in mind, that I
+shall wait for you outside the convent gate. If you cannot remain
+thinking of me, I shall be ready for you. If not here, then hereafter,
+as God wills. But you are free, and I love you. Before you go, God's
+beloved," and he looked at her then with eyes so beautiful that her
+heart went out to him, "you must let me tell you what I have been. You
+will pray for me better, when you have learned how far a man can sink
+into hell, and yet by God's grace reach heaven again."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV.
+
+A HARPY AT THE FEAST.
+
+
+Honora now saw that suffering was not to be avoided. Experience had
+taught her how to economize with it. In the wood one day she watched for
+minutes two robins hopping about in harmony, feeding, singing now and
+then low notes of content from a bough, and always together. A third
+robin made appearance on the scene, and their content vanished.
+Irritated and uneasy, even angered, they dashed at the intruder, who
+stood his ground, confident of his strength. For a long time he fought
+them, leaving only at his own pleasure. Longer still the pair remained
+unquiet, distressed by the struggle rather than wearied, complaining to
+each other tenderly.
+
+Behold a picture of her own mind, its order upset by the entrance of a
+new idea. That life of the mind, which is our true life, had to change
+its point of view in order to meet and cope with the newcomer. Arthur's
+love had the fiber of tragedy. She felt rather than knew its nature. For
+years it had been growing in his strong heart, disciplined by steady
+buffeting, by her indifference, by his own hard circumstances; no
+passion of an hour like Romeo's; more like her father's love for Erin.
+
+Former ideas began to shift position, and to struggle against the
+intruder vainly. Some fought in his favor. The vision of convent peace
+grew dim. She must take it with tears, and his sorrow would cloud its
+beauty. Marriage, always so remote from her life, came near, and tried
+to prove the lightness of its yoke with Arthur as the mate. The passion
+of her father's life awoke. Dear Erin cried out to her for the help
+which such a union would bring.
+
+Her fixed resolve to depart for her convent in September kept the
+process from tangle. Sweet indeed was the thought of how nobly he loved
+her. She was free. God alone was the arbiter. None would hinder her
+going, if her heart did not bid her stay for his sake. Her father had
+needed her. She would never have forgiven herself had she left him to
+carry his sorrow alone. Perhaps this poor soul needed her more. With
+delight one moment and shame the next, she saw herself drifting towards
+him. Nevertheless she did not waver, nor change the date of her
+departure.
+
+Arthur continued to adore at her shrine as he had done for years, and
+she studied him with the one thought: how will he bear new sorrow? No
+man bore the mark of sorrow more terribly when he let himself go, and at
+times his mask fell off in spite of resolve. As a lover Honora, with all
+her distaste for marriage, found him more lovable than ever, and had to
+admit that companionship with her hero would not be irritating. The
+conspiracy in his favor flourished within and without the citadel.
+Knowing that he adored her, she liked the adoration. To any goddess the
+smell of the incense is sweet, the sight of the flowers, the humid eyes,
+the leaping heart delightful. Yet she put it one side when the day over,
+and she knelt in her room for prayer. Like a dream the meanings of the
+day faded, and the vision of her convent cell, its long desired peace
+and rest, returned with fresher coloring. The men and women of her
+little world, the passions and interests of the daylight, so faded, that
+they seemed to belong to another age.
+
+While this comedy went on the farmhouse and its happy life were keenly
+and bitterly watched by the wretched wife of Curran. It was her luck,
+like Sonia's, to spoil her own feast in defiling her enemy's banquet.
+Having been routed at all points and all but sent to Jezebel's fate by
+Arthur Dillon, she had stolen into this paradise to do what mischief she
+could. Thus it happened, at the moment most favorable for Arthur's
+hopes, when Honora inclined towards him out of sisterly love and pity,
+that the two women met in a favorite haunt of Honora's, in the woods
+near the lake shore.
+
+To reach it one took a wild path through the woods, over the bluff, and
+along the foot of the hill, coming out on a small plateau some fifteen
+feet above the lake. Behind rose a rocky wall, covered with slender
+pines and cedars; noble trees shaded the plateau, leaving a clearing
+towards the lake; so that one looked out as from a frame of foliage on
+the blue waters, the islet of St. Michel, and the wooded cape known as
+Cumberland Head.
+
+As Honora entered this lovely place, Edith sat on a stone near the edge
+of the precipice, enjoying the view. She faced the newcomer with
+unfailing impertinence, and coolly studied the woman whom Arthur Dillon
+loved. Sickness of heart filled her with rage. The evil beauty of Sonia
+and herself showed purely animal beside the pale spiritual luster that
+shone from this noble, sad-hearted maid. Honora bowed distantly and
+passed on. Edith began to glow with delight of torturing her presently,
+and would not speak lest her pleasure be hurried. The instinct of the
+wild beast, to worry the living game, overpowered her. What business had
+Honora with so much luck? The love of Arthur, fame as a singer, beauty,
+and a passion for the perfect life? God had endowed herself with three
+of these gifts. Having dragged them through the mud, she hated the woman
+who had used them with honor. What delight that in a moment she could
+torture her with death's anguish!
+
+"I came here in the hope of meeting you, madam," she began suddenly, "if
+you are Miss Ledwith. I come to warn you."
+
+"I do not need warnings from strangers," Honora replied easily, studying
+the other for an instant with indifferent eyes, "and if you wished me to
+see on proper matters you should have called at the house."
+
+"For a scene with the man who ran away from his wife before he deceived
+me, and then made love to you? I could hardly do that," said she as
+demure and soft as a purring cat.
+
+Honora's calm look plainly spoke her thought: the creature was mad.
+
+"I am not mad. Miss Ledwith, and your looks will not prevent me warning
+you. Arthur Dillon is not the man he pretends----"
+
+"Please go away," Honora interrupted.
+
+"He is not the son of Anne Dillon----"
+
+"Then I shall go," said Honora, but Edith barred the only way out of the
+place, her eyes blazing with the insane pleasure of torturing the
+innocent. Honora turned her back on her and walked down to the edge of
+the cliff, where she remained until the end.
+
+"I know Arthur Dillon better than you know him," Edith went on, "and I
+know you better than you think. Once I had the honor of your
+acquaintance. That doesn't matter. Neither does it matter just who
+Arthur Dillon is. He's a fraud from cover to cover. His deserted wife is
+living, poor as well as neglected. The wretched woman has sought him
+long----"
+
+"Why don't you put her on the track?" Honora asked, relieved that the
+lunatic wished only to talk.
+
+"He makes love to you now as he has done for years, and he hopes to
+marry you soon. I can tell that by his behavior. I warn you that he is
+not free to marry. His wife lives. If you marry him I shall put her on
+his track, and give you a honeymoon of scandal. It was enough for him to
+have wrecked my life and broken my heart. I shall not permit him to
+repeat that work on any other unfortunate."
+
+"Is that all?"
+
+Edith, wholly astonished at the feeble impression made by her story, saw
+that her usual form had been lacking. Her scorn for Honora suggested
+that acting would be wasted on her; that the mere news of the living
+wife would be sufficient to plunge her into anguish. But here was no
+delight of pallid face and trembling limbs. Her tale would have gone
+just as well with the trees.
+
+"I have risked my life to tell you this," said she throwing in the note
+of pathos. "If Arthur Dillon, or whoever he is, hears of it, he will
+kill me."
+
+"Don't worry then," and Honora turned about with benign face and manner,
+quite suited to the need of a crazy patient escaped from her keepers, "I
+shall never tell him. But please go, for some one is coming. It may be
+he."
+
+Edith turned about swiftly and saw a form approaching through the trees.
+She had her choice of two paths a little beyond, and fled by the upper
+one. Her fear of Arthur had become mortal. As it was she rushed into the
+arms of Louis, who had seen the fleeing form, and thought to play a joke
+upon Mona or Honora. He dropped the stranger and made apologies for his
+rudeness. She curtsied mockingly, and murmured:
+
+"Possibly we have met before."
+
+The blood rose hot to his face as he recognized her, and her face paled
+as he seized her by the wrist with scant courtesy.
+
+"I scarcely hoped for the honor of meeting you again, Sister Claire. Of
+course you are here only for mischief, and Arthur Dillon must see you
+and settle with you. I'll trouble you to come with me."
+
+"You have not improved," she snarled. "You would attack my honor again."
+
+Then she screamed for help once, not the second time, which might have
+brought Arthur to the scene; but Honora came running to her assistance.
+
+"Ah, this was your prey, wolf?" said Louis coolly. "Honora, has she been
+lying to you, this fox, Sister Claire, Edith Conyngham, with a string of
+other names not to be remembered? Didn't you know her?"
+
+Honora recoiled. Edith stood in shame, with the mortified expression of
+the wild beast, the intelligent fox, trapped by an inferior boy.
+
+"Oh, let her go, Louis," she pleaded.
+
+"Not till she has seen Arthur. The mischief she can do is beyond
+counting. Arthur knows how to deal with her."
+
+"I insist," said Honora. "Come away, Louis, please, come away."
+
+He flung away her wrist with contempt, and pointed out her path. In a
+short time she had disappeared.
+
+"And what had she to tell you, may I ask?" said the Deacon. "Like the
+banshee her appearance brings misfortune to us."
+
+"You have always been my confidant, Louis," she answered after some
+thought. "Do you know anything about the earlier years of Arthur
+Dillon?"
+
+"Much. Was that her theme?"
+
+"That he was married and his wife still lives."
+
+"He will tell you about that business himself no doubt. I know nothing
+clear or certain ... some hasty expressions of feeling ... part of a
+dream ... the declaration that all was well now ... and so on. But I
+shall tell him. Don't object, I must. The woman is persistent and
+diabolical in her attempts to injure us. He must know at least that she
+is in the vicinity. He will guess what she's after without any further
+hint. But you mustn't credit her, Honora. As you know...."
+
+"Oh, I know," she answered with a smile. "The wretched creature is not
+to be believed under any circumstances. Poor soul!"
+
+Nevertheless she felt the truth of Edith's story. It mattered little
+whether Arthur was Anne Dillon's son, he would always be the faithful,
+strong friend, and benefactor. That he had a wife living, the living
+witness of the weakness of his career in the mines, shocked her for the
+moment. The fact carried comfort too. Doubt fled, and the weighing of
+inclinations, the process kept up by her mind apart from her will,
+ceased of a sudden. The great pity for Arthur, which had welled up in
+her heart like a new spring, dried up at its source. For the first time
+she felt the sin in him, the absence of the ideal. He had tripped and
+fallen like all his kind in the wild days of youth; and according to his
+nature had been repeating with her the drama enacted with his first
+love. She respected his first love. She respected the method of nature,
+but did not feel forced to admire it.
+
+Her distaste for the intimacy of marriage returned with tenfold
+strength. One might have become submissive and companionable with a
+virgin nature; to marry another woman's lover seemed ridiculous. This
+storm cleared the air beautifully. Her own point of view became plainer,
+and she saw how far inclination had hurried her. For some hours she had
+been near to falling in love with Arthur, had been willing to yield to
+tender persuasion. The woman guilty of such weakness did not seem at
+this moment to have been Honora Ledwith; only a poor soul, like a little
+ship in a big wind, borne away by the tempest of emotion.
+
+She had no blame for Arthur. His life was his own concern. Part of it
+had brought her much happiness. Edith's scandalous story did not shake
+her confidence in him. Undoubtedly he was free to marry, or he would not
+have approached her. His freedom from a terrible bond must have been
+recent, since his manner towards herself had changed only that summer,
+within the month in fact. The reserve of years had been prompted by hard
+conditions. In honor he could not woo. Ah, in him ran the fibre of the
+hero, no matter what might have been his mistakes! He had resisted every
+natural temptation to show his love. Once more they were brother and
+sister, children of the dear father whose last moments they had
+consoled. Who would regret the sorrow which led to such a revealing of
+hearts?
+
+The vision of her convent rose again to her pleased eye, fresh and
+beautiful as of old, and dearer because of the passing darkness which
+had concealed it for a time; the light from the chapel windows falling
+upon the dark robes in the choir, the voices of the reader, chanter, and
+singer, and the solemn music of the organ; the procession filing
+silently from one duty to another, the quiet cell when the day was over,
+and the gracious intimacy with God night and day. Could her belief and
+her delight in that holy life have been dim for an instant? Ah, weakness
+of the heart! The mountain is none the less firm because clouds obscure
+its lofty form. She had been wrapped in the clouds of feeling, but never
+once had her determination failed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV.
+
+SONIA CONSULTS LIVINGSTONE.
+
+
+Edith's visit, so futile, so unlike her, had been prompted by the
+hatefulness of her nature. The expedition to California had failed, her
+effort to prove her instincts true had come to nothing, and Arthur
+Dillon had at last put his foot down and extinguished her and Sonia
+together. Free to snarl and spit if they chose, the two cats could never
+plot seriously against him more. Curran triumphed in the end. Tracking
+Arthur Dillon through California had all the features of a chase through
+the clouds after a bird. The scene changed with every step, and the
+ground just gone over faded like a dream.
+
+They found Dillons, a few named Arthur, some coincidences, several
+mysteries, and nothing beyond. The police still had the photographs sent
+out by Anne Dillon, and a record that the man sought for had been found
+and returned to his mother. The town where the search ended had only a
+ruined tavern and one inhabitant, who vaguely remembered the close of
+the incident. Edith surrendered the search in a violent temper, and all
+but scratched out the eyes of her devoted slave. To Sonia the detective
+put the net result very sensibly.
+
+"Arthur Dillon did not live in California under his own name," said he,
+"and things have so changed there in five years that his tracks have
+been wiped out as if by rain. All that has been done so far proves this
+man to be just what he appears. We never had a worse case, and never
+took up a more foolish pursuit. We have proved just one sure thing: that
+if this man be Horace, then he can't be found. He is too clever to be
+caught, until he is willing to reveal himself. If you pursue him to the
+point which might result in his capture, there'll be murder or worse
+waiting for you at that point. It might be better for you two not to
+find him."
+
+This suggestion, clever and terrifying, Sonia could not understand as
+clearly as Curran. She thought the soft nature of Horace quite
+manageable, and if murder were to be done her knife should do it. Oh, to
+seize his throat with her beautiful hands, to press and squeeze and dig
+until the blood gorged his face, and to see him die by inches, gasping!
+He had lied like a coward! Nothing easier to destroy than such a wretch!
+
+"Don't give up, Sonia," was Edith's comment on the wise words of Curran.
+"Get a good lawyer, and by some trick drag Dillon and his mother and the
+priest to court, put them on oath as to who the man is; they won't
+perjure themselves, I'll wager."
+
+"That is my thought," said Sonia tenderly nursing the idea. "There seems
+to be nothing more to do. I have thought the matter over very carefully.
+We are at the end. If this fails I mean to abandon the matter. But for
+his money I would have let him go as far as he wanted, and I would let
+this man pass too but for the hope of getting at his money. It is the
+only way to punish Horace, as he punished me. I feel like you, that the
+mystery is with this Arthur Dillon. Since I saw you last, he has filled
+my dreams, and always in the dreams he has been so like Horace that I
+now see more of a likeness in Arthur Dillon. I have a relative in the
+city, a very successful lawyer, Quincy Livingstone. I shall consult him.
+Perhaps it would be well for you to accompany me, Edith. You explain
+this case so well."
+
+"No, she'll keep out of it, by your leave," the detective answered for
+her. "Dillon has had patience with this woman, but he will resent
+interference so annoying."
+
+Edith made a face at him.
+
+"As if I could be bossed by either you or Arthur. Sonia, you have the
+right stuff in you, clear grit. This trick will land your man."
+
+"You'll find an alligator who will eat the legs off you both before you
+can run away," said Curran.
+
+"Do you know what I think, Dick Curran?" she snapped at him. "That you
+have been playing the traitor to us, telling Arthur Dillon all we've
+been doing. Oh, if I could prove that, you wretch!"
+
+"You have a high opinion of his softness, if you think he would throw
+away money to learn what any schoolboy might learn by himself. How much
+did you, with all your cleverness, get out of him in the last five
+years?"
+
+He laughed joyfully at her wicked face.
+
+"Let me tell you this," he added. "You have been teasing that boy as a
+monkey might a lion. Now you will set on him the man that he likes least
+in this world, Livingstone. What a pretty mouthful you will be when he
+makes up his mind that you've done enough."
+
+Nevertheless the two women called on Livingstone. The great man, no
+longer great, no longer in the eye of the world, out of politics because
+the charmed circle had closed, and no more named for high places because
+his record had made him impossible, had returned to the practice of law.
+Eminent by his ability, his achievement, and his blood, but only a
+private citizen, the shadow of his failure lay heavy on his life and
+showed clearly in his handsome face. That noble position which he had
+missed, so dear to heart and imagination, haunted his moments of leisure
+and mocked his dreams. He had borne the disappointment bravely, had
+lightly called it the luck of politics. Now that the past lay in clear
+perspective, he recognized his own madness.
+
+He had fought with destiny like a fool, had stood in the path of a
+people to whom God had given the chance which the rulers of the earth
+denied them; and this people, through a youth carrying the sling of
+David, had ruined him. He had no feeling against Birmingham, nor against
+Arthur Dillon. The torrent, not the men, had destroyed him. Yet he had
+learned nothing. With a fair chance he would have built another dam the
+next morning. He was out of the race forever. In the English mission he
+had touched the highest mark of his success. He mourned in quiet. Life
+had still enough for him, but oh! the keenness of his regret.
+
+Sonia's story he had heard before, at the beginning of the search, as a
+member of the Endicott family. The details had never reached him. The
+cause of Horace Endicott's flight he had forgotten. Edith in her present
+costume remained unknown, nor did she enlighten him. Her thought as she
+studied him was of Dillon's luck in his enterprises. Behold three of his
+victims. Sonia repeated for the lawyer the story of her husband's
+disappearance, and of the efforts to find him.
+
+"At last I think that I have found him," was her conclusion, "in the
+person of a man known in this city as Arthur Dillon."
+
+Livingstone started slightly. However, there must be many Arthur
+Dillons, the Irish being so numerous, and tasteless in the matter of
+names. When she described her particular Arthur his astonishment became
+boundless at the absurdity of the supposition.
+
+"You have fair evidence I suppose that he is Horace Endicott, madam?"
+
+"I am sorry to tell you that I have none, because the statement makes
+one feel so foolish. On the contrary the search of a clever detective
+... he's really clever, isn't he, Edith?... shows that Dillon is just
+what he appears to be, the son of Mrs. Anne Dillon. The whole town
+believes he is her son. The people who knew him since he was born
+declare him to be the very image of his father. Still, I think that he
+is Horace Endicott. Why I think so, ... Edith, my dear, it is your turn
+now. Do explain to the lawyer."
+
+Livingstone wondered as the dancer spoke where that beautiful voice and
+fluent English had become familiar. Sister Claire had passed from his
+mind with all the minor episodes of his political intrigues. He could
+not find her place in his memory. Her story won him against his
+judgment. The case, well put, found strength in the contention that the
+last move had not been made, since the three most important characters
+in the play had not been put to the question.
+
+His mind ran over the chief incidents in that remarkable fight which
+Arthur Dillon had waged in behalf of his people: the interview before
+the election of Birmingham, ... the intrigues in London, the dexterous
+maneuvers which had wrecked the campaign against the Irish, had silenced
+McMeeter, stunned the Bishop, banished Fritters, ruined Sister Claire,
+tumbled him from his lofty position, and cut off his shining future. How
+frightful the thought that this wide ruin might have been wrought by an
+Endicott, one of his own blood!
+
+"A woman's instincts are admirable," he said, politely and gravely, "and
+they have led you admirably in this case. But in face of three facts,
+the failure of the detective, the declaration of Mr. Dillon, and your
+failure to recognize your husband after five years, it would be absurd
+to persist in the belief that this young man is your husband. Moreover
+there are intrinsic difficulties, which would tell even if you had made
+out a good case for the theory. No Endicott would take up intimate
+connection with the Irish. He would not know enough about them, he could
+not endure them; his essence would make the scheme, even if it were
+presented to him by others, impossible. One has only to think of two or
+three main difficulties to feel and see the utter absurdity of the whole
+thing."
+
+"No doubt," replied Sonia sweetly. "Yet I am determined not to miss this
+last opportunity to find my husband. If it fails I shall get my divorce,
+and ... bother with the matter no more."
+
+Edith smiled faintly at the suggestive pause, and murmured the intended
+phrase, "marry Quincy Lenox."
+
+"Very well," said the lawyer. "You have only to begin divorce
+proceedings here, issue a summons for the real Horace Endicott, and
+serve the papers on Mr. Arthur Dillon. You must be prepared for many
+events however. The whole business will be ventilated in the journals.
+The disappearance will come up again, and be described in the light of
+this new sensation. Mr. Dillon is eminent among his people, and well
+known in this city. It will be a year's wonder to have him sued in a
+divorce case, to have it made known that he is supposed to be Horace
+Endicott."
+
+"That is unavoidable," Edith prompted, seeing a sudden shrinking on the
+part of Sonia. "Do not forget, sir, that all Mrs. Endicott wants is the
+sworn declaration of Arthur Dillon that he is not Horace Endicott, of
+his mother that he is her son, of Father O'Donnell that he knows nothing
+of Horace Endicott since his disappearance."
+
+"You would not like the case to come to trial?" said the lawyer to
+Sonia.
+
+"I must get my divorce," she answered coolly, "whether this is the right
+man or no."
+
+"Let me tell you what may happen after the summons, or notice, is served
+on Mr. Dillon," said the lawyer. "The serving can be done so quietly
+that for some time no others but those concerned need know about it. I
+shall assume that Mr. Dillon is not Horace Endicott. In that case he can
+ignore the summons, which is not for him, but for another man. He need
+never appear. If you insisted on his appearance, you would have to offer
+some evidence that he is really Horace Endicott. This you cannot do. He
+could make affidavit that he is not the man. By that time the matter
+would be public property, and he could strike back at you for the
+scandal, the annoyance, and the damage done to his good name."
+
+"What I want is to have his declaration under oath that he is not
+Horace. If he is Horace he will never swear to anything but the truth."
+
+For the first time Sonia showed emotion, tears dropped from her lovely
+eyes, and the lawyer wondered what folly had lost to her husband so
+sweet a creature. Evidently she admired one of Horace's good qualities.
+
+"You can get the declaration in that way. To please you, he might at my
+request make affidavit without publicity and scenes at court."
+
+"I would prefer the court," said Sonia firmly.
+
+"She's afeared the lawyer suspects her virtue," Edith said to herself.
+
+"Let me now assume that Arthur Dillon is really Horace Endicott,"
+continued Livingstone. "He must be a consummate actor to play his part
+so well and so long. He can play the part in this matter also, by
+ignoring the summons, and declaring simply that he is not the man. In
+that case he leaves himself open to punishment, for if he should
+thereafter be proved to be Horace Endicott, the court could punish him
+for contempt. Or, he can answer the summons by his lawyer, denying the
+fact, and stating his readiness to swear that he is not any other than
+Arthur Dillon. You would then have to prove that he is Horace Endicott,
+which you cannot do."
+
+"All I want is the declaration under oath," Sonia repeated.
+
+"And you are ready for any ill consequences, the resentment and suit of
+Mr. Dillon, for instance? Understand, my dear lady, that suit for
+divorce is not a trifling matter for Mr. Dillon, if he is not Endicott."
+
+"Particularly as he is about to marry a very handsome woman," Edith
+interjected, heedless of the withering glance from Sonia.
+
+"Ah, indeed!"
+
+"Then I think some way ought to be planned to get Anne Dillon and the
+priest into court," Edith suggested. "Under oath they might give us some
+hint of the way to find Horace Endicott. The priest knows something
+about him."
+
+"I shall be satisfied if Arthur Dillon swears that he is not Horace,"
+Sonia said, "and then I shall get my divorce and wash my hands of the
+tiresome case. It has cost me too much money and worry."
+
+"Was there any reason alleged for the remarkable disappearance of the
+young man? I knew his father and mother very well, and admired them. I
+saw the boy in his schooldays, never afterwards. You have a child, I
+understand."
+
+Edith lowered her eyes and looked out of the window on the busy street.
+
+"It is for my child's sake that I have kept up the search," Sonia
+answered with maternal tenderness. "Insanity is supposed to be the
+cause. Horace acted strangely for three months before his disappearance,
+he grew quite thin, and was absent most of the time. As it was summer,
+which I spent at the shore with friends, I hardly noticed his condition.
+It was only when he had gone, without warning, taking considerable money
+with him, that I recalled his queer behavior. Since then not a scrap of
+information, not a trace, nor a hint of him, has ever come back to me.
+The detectives did their best until this moment. All has failed."
+
+"Very sad," Livingstone said, touched by the hopeless tone. "Well, as
+you wish it then, I shall bring suit for divorce and alimony against
+Horace Endicott, and have the papers served on Arthur Dillon. He can
+ignore them or make his reply. In either case he must be brought to make
+affidavit that he is not the man you look for."
+
+"And the others? The priest and Mrs. Dillon?" asked Edith.
+
+"They are of no consequence," was Sonia's opinion.
+
+After settling unimportant details the two women departed. Livingstone
+found the problem which they had brought to his notice fascinating. He
+had always marked Arthur Dillon among his associates, as an able and
+peculiar young man, he had been attracted by him, and had listened to
+his speeches with more consideration than most young men deserved. His
+amazing success in dealing with a Livingstone, his audacity and nerve
+in attacking the policy which he brought to nothing, were more wonderful
+to the lawyer than to the friends of Dillon, who had not seen the task
+in its entirety.
+
+And this peculiar fellow was thought to be an Endicott, of his own
+family, of the English blood, more Irish than the Irish, bitterer
+towards him than the priests had been. The very impossibility of the
+thing made it charming. What course of thought, what set of
+circumstances, could turn the Puritan mind in the Celtic direction? Was
+there such genius in man to convert one personality into another so
+neatly that the process remained undiscoverable, not to be detected by
+the closest observation? He shook off the fascination. These two women
+believed it, but he knew that no Endicott could ever be converted.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+
+ARTHUR'S APPEAL.
+
+
+Suit was promptly begun by Livingstone on behalf of Sonia for a divorce
+from Horace Endicott. Before the papers had been fully made out, even
+before the officer had been instructed to serve them on Arthur Dillon,
+the lawyer received an evening visit from the defendant himself. As a
+suspicious act he welcomed it; but a single glance at the frank face and
+easy manner, when one knew the young man's ability, disarmed suspicion.
+The lawyer studied closely, for the first time with interest, the man
+who might yet prove to be his kinsman. He saw a form inclined to
+leanness, a face that might have been handsome but for the sunken
+cheeks, dark and expressive eyes whose natural beauty faded in the dark
+circles around them, a fine head with dead black hair, and a handsome
+beard, streaked with gray. His dress, gentleman-like but of a strange
+fashion, the lawyer did not recognize as the bachelor costume of Cherry
+Hill prepared by his own tailor. Nothing of the Endicott in face or
+manner, nothing tragical, the expression decorous and formal, perhaps a
+trifle quizzical, as this was their first meeting since the interview in
+London.
+
+"I have called to enter a protest," Arthur began primly, "against the
+serving of the papers in the coming Endicott divorce case on your humble
+servant."
+
+"As the papers are to be served only on Horace Endicott, I fail to see
+how you have any right or reason to protest," was the suave answer.
+
+"I know all about the matter, sir, for very good reasons. For some
+months the movements of the two women concerned in this affair have been
+watched in my interest. Not long after they left you a few days ago, the
+result of their visit was made known to me. To anticipate the
+disagreeable consequences of serving the papers on me, I have not
+waited. I appeal to you not only as the lawyer of Mrs. Endicott, but
+also as one much to blame for the new persecution which is about to fall
+upon me."
+
+"I recognize the touch," said Livingstone, unable to resist a smile.
+"Mr. Dillon must be audacious or nothing."
+
+"I am quite serious," Arthur replied. "You know part of the story, what
+Mrs. Endicott chose to tell you, but I can enlighten you still more. I
+appeal to you, as the lady's lawyer, to hinder her from doing mischief;
+and again I appeal to you as one to blame in part for the threatened
+annoyances. But for the lady who accompanied Mrs. Endicott, I would not
+be suspected of relationship with your honored family. But for the
+discipline which I helped to procure for that lady, she would have left
+me in peace. But for your encouragement of the lady, I would not have
+been forced to subject a woman to discipline. You may remember the
+effective Sister Claire?"
+
+So true was the surprise that Livingstone blushed with sudden violence.
+
+"That woman was the so-called escaped nun?" he exclaimed.
+
+"Now Mrs. Curran, wife of the detective employed by Mrs. Endicott for
+five years to discover her lost husband. She satisfies her noblest
+aspirations by dancing in the theaters, ... and a very fine dancer she
+is. Her leisure is devoted to plotting vengeance on me. She pretends to
+believe that I am Horace Endicott; perhaps she does believe it. Anyway
+she knows that persecution will result, and she has persuaded Mrs.
+Endicott to inaugurate it. I do not know if you were her selection to
+manage the case."
+
+This time Livingstone did not blush, being prepared for any turn of mood
+and speech from this singular young man.
+
+"As the matter was described to me," he said, "only a sentimental reason
+included you in the divorce proceedings. I can understand Mrs. Curran's
+feelings, and to what they would urge a woman of that character. Still,
+her statements here were very plausible."
+
+"Undoubtedly. She made her career up to this moment on the plausible.
+Let me tell you, if it is not too tedious, how she has pursued this
+theory in the face of all good sense."
+
+The lawyer bowed his permission.
+
+"I am of opinion that the creature is half mad, or subject to fits of
+insanity. Her husband had talked much of the Endicott case, which was
+not good for a woman of her peculiarities. By inspiration, insane
+suggestion, she assumed that I was the man sought for, and built up the
+theory as you have heard. First, she persuaded her good-natured husband,
+with whom I am acquainted, to investigate among my acquaintances for the
+merest suspicion, doubt, of my real personality. A long and minute
+inquiry, the details of which are in writing in my possession, was made
+by the detective with one result: that no one doubted me to be what I
+was born."
+
+Livingstone cast a look at him to see the expression which backed that
+natural and happy phrase. Arthur Dillon might have borne it.
+
+"She kept at her husband, however, until he had tried to surprise my
+relatives, my friends, my nurse, and my mother, ... yes, even my
+confessor, into admissions favorable to her mad dream. My rooms, my
+papers, my habits, my secrets were turned inside out; Mrs. Endicott was
+brought on from Boston to study me in my daily life; for days I was
+watched by the three. In the detective's house I was drugged into a
+profound sleep, and for ten minutes the two women examined my sleeping
+face for signs of Horace Endicott. When all these things failed, Sister
+Claire dragged her unwilling husband to California, where I had spent
+ten years of my life, and tried hard to find another Arthur Dillon, or
+to disconnect me with myself. She proved to her own satisfaction that
+these things could not be done. But there is a devil of perversity in
+her. She is like a boa constrictor ... I think that's the snake which
+cannot let go its prey once it has seized it. She can't let go. In
+desperation she is risking her own safety and happiness to make public
+her belief that I am Horace Endicott. In spite of the overwhelming
+proofs against the theory, and in favor of me, she is bent on bringing
+the case into court."
+
+"Risking her own safety and happiness?" Livingstone repeated.
+
+"If the wild geese among the Irish could locate Sister Claire, who is
+supposed to have fled the town long ago, her life would be taken. If
+this suit continues she will have to leave the city forever. Knowing
+this the devil in her urges her to her own ruin."
+
+"You have kept close track of her," said Livingstone.
+
+"You left me no choice," was the reply, "having sprung the creature on
+us, and then thrown her off when you found out her character. If she had
+only turned on her abettors and wracked them I wouldn't have cared."
+
+"You protest then against the serving of these papers on you. Would it
+not be better to settle forever the last doubts in so peculiar a
+matter?"
+
+"What have I to do with the doubts of an escaped nun, and of Mrs.
+Endicott? Must I go to court and stand the odium of a shameful
+imputation to settle the doubts of a lunatic criminal and a woman whose
+husband fled from her with his entire fortune?"
+
+"It is regrettable," the lawyer admitted with surprise. "As Mrs.
+Endicott is perhaps the most deeply interested, I fear that the case
+must go on."
+
+"I have come to show you that it will not be to the interest of the two
+women that it should go on. In fact I feel quite certain that you will
+not serve those papers on me after I have laid a few facts before you."
+
+"I shall be glad to examine them in the interest of my client."
+
+"Having utterly failed to prove me other than I am," Arthur said easily,
+while the lawyer watched with increasing interest the expressive face,
+"these women have accepted your suggestion to put me under oath as to my
+own personality. I would not take affidavit," and his contempt was
+evident. "I am not going to permit any public or official attempt to
+cast doubt on my good name. You can understand the feeling. My mother
+and my friends are not accustomed to the atmosphere of courts, nor of
+scandal. It would mean severe suffering for them to be dragged into so
+sensational a trial. The consequences one cannot measure beforehand. The
+unpleasantness lives after all the parties are dead. Since I can prevent
+it I am going to do it. As far as I am concerned Mrs. Endicott must be
+content with a simple denial, or a simple affirmation rather, that I am
+Arthur Dillon, and therefore not her husband. It is more than she
+deserves, because there is not a shred of evidence to warrant her making
+a single move against me. She has not been able to find in me a feature
+resembling her husband."
+
+"Then, you are prepared to convince Mrs. Endicott that she has more to
+lose than to gain by bringing you into her divorce suit?"
+
+"Precisely. Here is the point for her to consider: if the papers in this
+suit are served upon me, then there will be no letting-up afterward. Her
+affairs, the affairs of this woman Curran, the lives of both to the last
+detail, will be served up to the court and the public. You know how that
+can be done. I would rather not have it done, but I proffer Mrs.
+Endicott the alternative."
+
+"I do not know how strong an argument that would be with Mrs. Endicott,"
+said Livingstone with interest.
+
+"She is too shallow a woman to perceive its strength, unless you, as her
+lawyer and kinsman, make it plain to her," was the guileless answer.
+"Mrs. Curran knows nothing of court procedure, but she is clever enough
+to foresee consequences, and her history before her New York fiasco
+includes bits of romance from the lives of important people."
+
+Livingstone resisted the inclination to laugh, and then to get angry.
+
+"You think then, that if Mrs. Endicott could be made to see the
+possibilities of a desperate trial, the possible exposures of her sins
+and the sins of others, that she would not risk it?"
+
+"She has family pride," said Arthur seriously, "and would not care to
+expose her own to scorn. I presume you know something about the Endicott
+disappearance?"
+
+"Nothing more than the fact, and the failure to find the young man?"
+
+"His wife employed the detective Curran to make the search for Endicott,
+and Curran is a Fenian, as interested as myself in such matters. He was
+with me in the little enterprise which ended so fatally for Ledwith and
+... others." Livingstone was too sore on this subject to smile at the
+pause and the word. "Curran told me the details after he had left the
+pursuit of Endicott. They are known now to Mrs. Endicott's family in
+part. It is understood that she will marry her cousin Quincy Lenox when
+she gets a divorce. He was devoted to her before her marriage and is
+faithful still, I am told."
+
+Not a sign of feeling in the utterance of these significant words!
+
+"It is not affection, then, which prompts the actions of my client? She
+wishes to make sure of the existence or non-existence of her husband
+before entering upon this other marriage?"
+
+"Of course I can tell you only what the detective and one other told
+us," Arthur said. "When Horace Endicott disappeared, it is said, he took
+with him his entire fortune, something over a million, leaving not one
+cent to his wife. He had converted his property into cash secretly. Her
+anxiety to find him is very properly to get her lawful share in that
+property, that is, alimony with her divorce?"
+
+"I see," said Livingstone, and he began to understand the lines and
+shadows on this young man's face. "A peculiar, and I suppose thorough,
+revenge."
+
+"If the papers are served on me, you understand, then in one fashion or
+another Mrs. Endicott shall be brought to court, and Quincy Lenox too,
+with the detective and his wife, and a few others. It is almost too much
+that you have been made acquainted with the doubts of these people. I
+bear with it, but I shall not endure one degree more of publicity. Once
+it is known that I am thought to be Horace Endicott, then the whole
+world must know quite as thoroughly that I am Arthur Dillon; and also
+who these people are that so foolishly pursue me. It cannot but appear
+to the average crowd that this new form of persecution is no more than
+an outgrowth of the old."
+
+Then they glared at each other mildly, for the passions of yesterday
+were still warm. Livingstone's mood had changed, however. He felt
+speculatively certain that Horace Endicott sat before him, and he knew
+Sonia to be a guilty woman. As his mind flew over the humiliating events
+which connected him with Dillon, consolation soothed his wounded heart
+that he had been overthrown perhaps by one of his own, rather than by
+the Irish. The unknown element in the contest had given victory to the
+lucky side. He recalled his sense of this young fellow's superiority to
+his environment. He tried to fathom Arthur's motive in this visit, but
+failed. As a matter of fact Arthur was merely testing the thoroughness
+of his own disappearance. His visit to Livingstone the real Dillon would
+have made. It would lead the lawyer to believe that Sonia, in giving up
+her design, had been moved by his advice and not by a quiet, secret
+conversation with her husband. Livingstone quickly made up his mind that
+the divorce suit would have to be won by default, but he wished to learn
+more of this daring and interesting kinsman.
+
+"The decision must remain with Mrs. Endicott," he said after a pause. "I
+shall tell her, before your name is mixed up with the matter, just what
+she must expect. If she has anything to fear from a public trial you are
+undoubtedly the man to bring it out."
+
+"Thank you."
+
+"I might even use persuasion ..."
+
+"It would be a service to the Endicott family," Arthur said earnestly,
+"for I can swear to you that the truth will come out, the scandal which
+Horace Endicott fled to avoid and conceal forever."
+
+"Did you know Endicott?"
+
+"Very well indeed. I was his guide in California every time he made a
+trip to that country."
+
+"I might persuade Mrs. Endicott," said the lawyer with deeper interest,
+"for the sake of the family name, to surrender her foolish theory. It is
+quite clear to any one with unbiased judgment that you are not Horace
+Endicott, even if you are not Arthur Dillon. I knew the young man
+slightly, and his family very well. I can see myself playing the part
+which you have presented to us for the past five years, quite as
+naturally as Horace Endicott would have played it. It was not in
+Horace's nature, nor in the Endicott nature to turn Irish so
+completely."
+
+Arthur felt all the bitterness and the interest which this shot implied.
+
+"I had the pleasure of knowing Endicott well, much better than you,
+sir," he returned warmly, "and while I know he was something of a
+good-natured butterfly, I can say something for his fairness and
+courage. If he had known what I know of the Irish, of their treatment by
+their enemies at home and here, of English hypocrisy and American
+meanness, of their banishment from the land God gave them and your
+attempt to drive them out of New York or to keep them in the gutter, he
+would have taken up their cause as honestly as I have done."
+
+"You are always the orator, Mr. Endi ... Dillon."
+
+"I have feeling, which is rare in the world," said Arthur smiling. "Do
+you know what this passion for justice has done for me, Mr. Livingstone?
+It has brought out in me the eloquence which you have praised, and
+inspired the energy, the deviltry, the trickery, the courage, that were
+used so finely at your expense.
+
+"I was like Endicott, a wild irresponsible creature, thinking only of my
+own pleasure. Out of my love for one country which is not mine, out of a
+study of the wrongs heaped upon the Irish by a civilized people, I have
+secured the key to the conditions of the time. I have learned to despise
+and pity the littleness of your party, to recognize the shams of the
+time everywhere, the utter hypocrisy of those in power.
+
+"I have pledged myself to make war on them as I made war on you; on the
+power that, mouthing liberty, holds Ireland in slavery; on the powers
+that, mouthing order and peace, hold down Poland, maintain Turkey, rob
+and starve India, loot the helpless wherever they may. I was a harmless
+hypocrite and mostly a fool once. Time and hardship and other things,
+chiefly Irish and English, have given me a fresh start in the life of
+thought. You hardly understand this, being thoroughly English in your
+make-up.
+
+"You love good Protestants, pagans who hate the Pope, all who bow to
+England, and that part of America which is English. You can blow about
+their rights and liberties, and denounce their persecutors, if these
+happen to be French or Dutch or Russian. For a Pole or an Irishman you
+have no sympathy, and you would deny him any place on the earth but a
+grave. Liberty is not for him unless he becomes a good English
+Protestant at the same time. In other words liberty may be the proper
+sauce for the English goose but not for the Irish gander."
+
+"I suppose it appears that way to you," said Livingstone, who had
+listened closely, not merely to the sentiments, but to the words, the
+tone, the idiom. Could Horace Endicott have ever descended to this view
+of his world, this rawness of thought, sentiment, and expression? So
+peculiarly Irish, anti-English, rich with the flavor of the Fourth Ward,
+and nevertheless most interesting.
+
+"I shall not argue the point," he continued. "I judge from your
+earnestness that you have a well-marked ambition in life, and that you
+will follow it."
+
+"My present ambition is to see our grand cathedral completed and
+dedicated as soon as possible, as the loudest word we can speak to you
+about our future. But I fear I am detaining you. If during the next few
+days the papers in the divorce case are not served on me, I may feel
+certain that Mrs. Endicott has given up the idea of including me in the
+suit?"
+
+"I shall advise her to leave you in peace for the sake of the Endicott
+name," said Livingstone politely.
+
+Arthur thanked him and departed, while the lawyer spent an hour enjoying
+his impressions and vainly trying to disentangle the Endicott from the
+Dillon in this extraordinary man.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII.
+
+THE END OF MISCHIEF.
+
+
+Arthur set out for the Curran household, where he was awaited with
+anxiety. Quite cheerful over his command of the situation, and inclined
+to laugh at the mixed feelings of Livingstone, he felt only reverence
+and awe before the human mind as seen in the light of his own
+experience. His particular mind had once been Horace Endicott's, but now
+represented the more intense and emotional personality of Arthur Dillon.
+He was neither Horace, nor the boy who had disappeared; but a new being
+fashioned after the ideal Arthur Dillon, as Horace Endicott had
+conceived him. What he had been seemed no more a part of his past, but a
+memory attached to another man. All his actions proved it.
+
+The test of his disappearance delighted him. He had gone through its
+various scenes with little emotion, with less than Edith had displayed;
+far less than Arthur Dillon would have felt and shown. Who can measure
+the mind? Itself the measure of man's knowledge, the judge in the court
+of human destiny, how feeble its power over itself! A few years back
+this mind directed Horace Endicott; to-day it cheerfully served the
+conscience of Arthur Dillon!
+
+Edith and her husband awaited their executioner. The detective suffered
+for her rather than himself. From Dillon he had nothing to fear, and for
+his sake, also for the strange regard he had always kept for Curran's
+wife, Arthur had been kind when harshness would have done more good. Now
+the end had come for her and Sonia. As the unexpected usually came from
+this young man, they had reason to feel apprehension. He took his seat
+comfortably in the familiar chair, and lit his cigar while chaffing her.
+
+"They who love the danger shall perish in it," he said for a beginning.
+"You court it, Colette, and not very wisely."
+
+"How, not wisely?" she asked with a pretence of boldness.
+
+"You count on the good will of the people whom you annoy and wrong, and
+yet you have never any good will to give them in return. You have hated
+me and pursued me on the strength of my good will for you. It seems
+never to have occurred to you to do me a good turn for the many I have
+done for you. You are a bud of incarnate evil, Colette."
+
+How she hated him when he talked in that fashion!
+
+"Well, it's all settled. I have had the last talk with Livingstone, and
+spoiled your last trick against the comfort of Arthur Dillon. There will
+be no dragging to court of the Dillon clan. Mr. Livingstone believes
+with me that the publicity would be too severe for Mrs. Endicott and her
+family, not to mention the minor revelations connected with yourself. So
+there's the end of your precious tomfoolery, Colette."
+
+She burst into vehement tears.
+
+"But you weep too soon," he protested. "I have saved you as usual from
+yourself, but only to inflict my own punishment. Don't weep those
+crocodile diamonds until you have heard your own sentence. Of course you
+know that I have followed every step you took in this matter. You are
+clever enough to have guessed that. You discovered all that was to be
+discovered, of course. But you are too keen. If this trial had come to
+pass you would have been on the witness stand, and the dogs would have
+caught the scent then never to lose it. You would have ruined your
+husband as well as yourself."
+
+"Why do you let him talk to me so?" she screamed at Curran.
+
+"Because it is for your good," Arthur answered. "But here's briefness.
+You must leave New York at once, and forever. Get as far from it as you
+can, and stay there while I am alive. And for consolation in your exile
+take your child with you, your little boy, whom Mrs. Endicott parades as
+her little son, the heir of her beloved Horace."
+
+A frightful stillness fell in the room with this terrific declaration.
+But for pity he could have laughed at the paralysis which seized both
+the detective and his wife. Edith sat like a statue, white-faced,
+pouting at him, her hands clasped in her lap.
+
+"Well, are you surprised? You, the clever one? If I am Horace Endicott,
+as you pretend to believe, do I not know the difference between my own
+child and another's? I am Arthur Dillon only, and yet I know how you
+conspired with Mrs. Endicott to provide her with an heir for the
+Endicott money. You did this in spite of your husband, who has never
+been able to control you, not even when you chose to commit so grave a
+crime. Now, it is absolutely necessary for the child's sake that you
+save him from Mrs. Endicott's neglect, when he is of no further use to
+her. She loves children, as you know."
+
+"Who are you, anyway?" Curran burst out hoarsely after a while.
+
+"Not half as good a detective as you are, but I happen in this matter to
+be on the inside," Arthur answered cheerfully. "I knew Horace Endicott
+much better than his wife or his friends. The poor fellow is dead and
+gone, and yet he left enough information behind him to trouble the
+clever people. Are you satisfied, Colette, that this time everything
+must be done as I have ordered?"
+
+"You have proved yourself Horace Endicott," she gasped in her rage,
+burning with hate, mortification, shame, fifty tigerish feelings that
+could not find expression.
+
+"Fie, fie, Colette! You have proved that I am Arthur Dillon. Why go back
+on your own work? If you had known Horace Endicott as I did, you would
+not compare the meek and civilized Dillon with the howling demon into
+which his wife turned him. That fellow would not have sat in your
+presence ten minutes knowing that you had palmed off your child as his,
+without taking your throat in his hands for a death squeeze. His wife
+would not have escaped death from the madman had he ever encountered
+her. Here are your orders now; it is late and I must not keep you from
+your beauty sleep; take the child as soon as the Endicott woman sends
+him to you, and leave New York one hundred miles behind you. If you are
+found in this city any time after the month of September, you take all
+the risks. I shall not stand between you and justice again. You are the
+most ungrateful sinner that I have ever dealt with. Now go and weep for
+yourself. Don't waste any tears on Mrs. Endicott."
+
+Sobbing like an angry and humiliated child, Edith rushed out of the
+room. Curran felt excessively foolish. Though partly in league with
+Arthur, the present situation went beyond him.
+
+"Be hanged if I don't feel like demanding an explanation," he said
+awkwardly.
+
+"You don't need it," said Arthur as he proceeded to make it. "Can't you
+see that Horace Endicott is acting through me, and has been from the
+first, to secure the things I have secured. He is dead as I told you.
+How he got away, kept himself hid, and all that, you are as good an
+authority as I. While he was alive you could have found him as easily as
+I could, but he was beyond search always, though I guess not beyond
+betrayal. Well, let me congratulate you on getting your little family
+together again. Don't worry over what has happened to-night. Drop the
+Endicott case. You can see there's no luck in it for any one."
+
+Certainly there had been no luck in it for the Currans. Arthur went to
+his club in the best humor, shaking with laughter over the complete
+crushing of Edith, with whom he felt himself quite even in the contest
+that had endured so long. Next morning it would be Sonia's turn. Ah,
+what a despicable thing is man's love, how unstable and profitless! No
+wonder Honora valued it so lightly. How Horace Endicott had raved over
+this whited sepulcher five years ago, believed in her, sworn by her
+virtue and truth! And to-day he regarded her without feeling, neither
+love nor hate, perfect indifference only marking his mental attitude in
+her regard. Somehow one liked to feel that love is unchangeable, as with
+the mother, the father; as with God also, for whom sin does not change
+relationship with the sinner.
+
+When he stood before her the next day in the hotel parlor, she reminded
+him in her exquisite beauty of a play seen from the back of the stage;
+the illusion so successful with the audience is there an exposed sham,
+without coherence, and without beauty. Her eyes had a scared look. She
+had to say to herself, if this is Horace then my time has come, if it is
+Arthur Dillon I have nothing to worry about, before her hate came to her
+aid and gave her courage. She murmured the usual formula of unexpected
+pleasure. He bowed, finding no pleasure in this part of his revenge.
+Arthur Dillon could not have been more considerate of Messalina.
+
+"It is certainly a privilege and an honor," said he, "to be suspected of
+so charming a relationship with Mrs. Endicott. Nevertheless I have
+persuaded your lawyer, Mr. Livingstone, that it would be unprofitable
+and imprudent to bring me into the suit for divorce. He will so advise
+you I think to-day."
+
+She smiled at the compliment and felt reassured.
+
+"There were some things which I could not tell the lawyer," he went on,
+"and so I made bold to call on you personally. It is disagreeable, what
+I must tell you. My only apology is that you yourself have made this
+visit necessary by bringing my name into the case."
+
+Her smile died away, and her face hardened. She prepared herself for
+trouble.
+
+"I told your lawyer that if the papers were served on me, and a public
+and official doubt thrown on my right to the name of Arthur Dillon, I
+would not let the business drop until the Endicott-Curran-Dillon mystery
+had been thoroughly ventilated in the courts. He agreed with me that
+this would expose the Endicott name to scandal."
+
+"We have been perhaps too careful from the beginning about the Endicott
+name," she said severely. "Which is the reason why no advance has been
+made in the search for my dear husband."
+
+"That may be true, Mrs. Endicott. You must not forget, however, that you
+will be a witness, and Mrs. Curran, and her husband, and Mr. Quincy
+Lenox, and others besides. How do you think these people would stand
+questioning as to who your little boy, called Horace Endicott, really
+is?"
+
+She sat prepared for a dangerous surprise, but not for this horror; and
+the life left her on the spot, for the poor weed was as soft and
+cowardly as any other product of the swamp. He rang for restoratives and
+sent for her maid. In ten minutes, somewhat restored, she faced the
+ordeal, if only to learn what this terrible man knew.
+
+"Who are you?" she asked feebly, the same question asked by Curran in
+his surprise.
+
+"A friend of Horace Endicott," he answered quietly.
+
+"And what do you know of us?"
+
+"All that Horace knew."
+
+She could not summon courage to put a third question. He came to her
+aid.
+
+"Perhaps you are not sure about what Horace knew? Shall I tell you? I
+did not tell your lawyer. I only hinted that the truth would be brought
+out if my name was dragged into the case against my protest. Shall I
+tell you what Horace knew?"
+
+With closed eyes she made a sign of acquiescence.
+
+"He knew of your relations with Quincy Lenox. He saw you together on a
+certain night, when he arrived home after a few days' absence. He also
+heard your conversation. In this you admitted that out of hatred for
+your husband you had destroyed his heir before the child was born. He
+knew your plan of retrieving that blunder by adopting the child of Edith
+Curran, and palming him off as your own. He knew of your plan to secure
+the good will of his Aunt Lois for the impostor, and found the means to
+inform his aunt of the fraud. All that he knew will be brought out at
+any trial in which my name shall be included. Your lawyer will tell you
+that it cannot be avoided. Therefore, when your lawyer advises you to
+get a divorce from your former husband without including me as that
+husband, yon had better accept that advice."
+
+She opened her eyes and stared at him with insane fright. Who but Horace
+Endicott could know her crimes? All but the crime which he had named her
+blunder. Could this passionless stranger, this Irish politician, looking
+at her as indifferently as the judge on the bench, be Horace? No, surely
+no! Because that fool, dolt though he was, would never have seen this
+wretched confession of her crimes, and not slain her the next minute.
+Into this ambuscade had she been led by the crazy wife of Curran, whose
+sound advice she herself had thrown aside to follow the instincts of
+Edith. Recovering her nerve quickly, she began her retreat as well as
+one might after so disastrous a field.
+
+"It was a mistake to have disturbed you, Mr. Dillon," she said. "You may
+rest assured that no further attempt will be made on your good name.
+Since you pretend to such intimacy with my unfortunate husband I would
+like to ask you...."
+
+"That was the extent of my intimacy, Mrs. Endicott, and I would never
+have revealed it except to defend myself," he interrupted suavely. "Of
+course the revelation brings consequences. You must arrange to have your
+little Horace die properly in some remote country, surround his funeral
+with all the legal formalities, and so on. That will be easy. Meanwhile
+you can return the boy to his mother, who is ready to receive him. Then
+your suit for divorce must continue, and you will win it by default,
+that is, by the failure of Horace Endicott to defend his side. When
+these things are done, it would be well for your future happiness to lay
+aside further meddling with the mystery of your husband's
+disappearance."
+
+"I have learned a lesson," she said more composedly. "I shall do as you
+command, because I feel sure it is a command. I have some curiosity
+however about the life which Horace led after he disappeared. Since you
+must have known him a little, would it be asking too much from you...."
+
+She lost her courage at sight of his expression. Her voice faded. Oh,
+shallow as any frog-pond, indecently shallow, to ask such a question of
+the judge who had just ordered her to execution. His contempt silenced
+her. With a formal apology for having caused her so much pain, he bowed
+and withdrew. Some emotion had stirred him during the interview, but he
+had kept himself well under control. Later he found it was horror, ever
+to have been linked with a monster; and dread too that in a sudden
+access of passion he might have done her to death. It seemed natural and
+righteous to strike and destroy the reptile.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII.
+
+A TALE WELL TOLD.
+
+
+Of these strange and stirring events no one knew but Arthur himself; nor
+of the swift consequences, the divorce of Sonia from her lost husband,
+her marriage to Quincy Lenox, the death and burial of her little boy in
+England, and the establishment of La Belle Colette and her son Horace in
+Chicago, where the temptation to annoy her enemies disappeared, and the
+risk to herself was practically removed forever. Thus faded the old life
+out of Arthur's view, its sin-stained personages frightened off the
+scene by his well-used knowledge of their crimes. Whatever doubt they
+held about his real character, self-interest accepted him as Arthur
+Dillon.
+
+He was free. Honora saw the delight of that freedom in his loving and
+candid expression. He repressed his feelings no more, no longer bound.
+
+He was gayer than ever before, with the gaiety of his nature, not of the
+part which he had played. Honora knew how deeply she loved him, from her
+very dread of inflicting on him that pain which was bound to come. The
+convent would be her rich possession; but he who had given her and her
+father all that man could give, he would have only bitter remembrance.
+How bitter that could be experience with her father informed her. The
+mystery of his life attracted her. If not Arthur Dillon, who was he?
+What tragedy had driven him from one life into another? Did it explain
+that suffering so clearly marked on his face? To which she must add, as
+part of the return to be made for all his goodness!
+
+Her pity for him grew, and prompted deeper tenderness; and how could she
+know, who had been without experience, that pity is often akin to love?
+
+The heavenly days flew by like swift swallows. September came with its
+splendid warnings of change. The trees were suddenly bordered in gold
+yellow and dotted with fire-red. The nights began to be haunted by cool
+winds. Louis packed his trunk early in the month. His long vacations had
+ended, ordination was at hand, and his life-work would begin in the
+month of October.
+
+The household went down to the city for the grand ceremony. Mona and her
+baby remained in the city then, while the others returned to the lake
+for a final week, Anne with perfect content, Honora in calmness of
+spirit, but also in dread for Arthur's sake. He seemed to have no
+misgivings. Her determination continued, and the situation therefore
+remained as clear as the cold September mornings. Yet some tie bound
+them, elusive, beyond description, but so much in evidence that every
+incident of the waiting time seemed to strengthen it. Delay did not
+abate her resolution, but it favored his hope.
+
+"Were you disturbed by the revelations of Mrs. Curran?" he said as they
+sat, for the last time indeed, on the terrace so fatal to Lord
+Constantine. Anne read the morning newspaper in the shadow of the grove
+behind them, with Judy to comment on the news. The day, perfect,
+comfortable, without the perfume of August, sparkled with the snap of
+September.
+
+"My curiosity was disturbed," she admitted frankly, and her heart beat,
+for the terrible hour had come. "I felt that your life had some sadness
+and mystery in it, but it was a surprise to hear that you were not Anne
+Dillon's long-lost son."
+
+"That was pure guess-work on Colette's part, you know. She's a born
+devil, if there are such things among us humans. I'll tell you about her
+some time. Then the fact of my wife's existence did not disturb you at
+all?"
+
+"On the contrary, it soothed me, I think," she said with a blush.
+
+"I know why. Well, it will take my story to explain hers. She told the
+truth in part, poor Colette. Once I had a wife, before I became Anne
+Dillon's son. Will it be too painful for you to hear the story? It is
+mournful. To no one have I ever told it complete; in fact I could not,
+only to you. How I have burned to tell it from beginning to end to the
+true heart. I could not shock Louis, the dear innocent, and it was
+necessary to keep most of it from my mother, for legal reasons.
+Monsignor has heard the greater part, but not all. And I have been like
+the Ancient Mariner.
+
+    Since then at an uncertain hour
+    That agony returns;
+    And till my ghastly tale is told,
+    The heart within me burns.
+
+    *       *       *       *       *
+
+    That moment that his face I see
+    I know the man that must hear me;
+    To him my tale I teach."
+
+"I am the man," said she, "with a woman's curiosity. How can I help but
+listen?"
+
+    He holds him with his glittering eye--
+    The wedding-guest stood still,
+    And listens like a three years' child:
+    The mariner hath his will.
+
+    The wedding-guest sat on a stone,
+    He cannot choose but hear;
+    And thus spake on that ancient man,
+    That bright-eyed mariner.
+
+"Do you remember how we read and re-read it on the _Arrow_ years ago?
+Somehow it has rung in my ears ever since, Honora. My life had a horror
+like it. Had it not passed I could not speak of it even to you. Long ago
+I was an innocent fool whom men knew in the neighborhood of Cambridge as
+Horace Endicott. I was an orphan, without guides, or real friends. I
+felt no need of them, for was I not rich, and happily married? Good
+nature and luck had carried me along lazily like that pine-stick
+floating down there. What a banging it would get on this rocky shore if
+a good south wind sprang up. For a long time I escaped the winds. When
+they came.... I'll tell you who I was and what she was. Do you remember
+on the _Arrow_ Captain Curran's story of Tom Jones?"
+
+He looked up at her interested face, and saw the violet eyes widen with
+sudden horror.
+
+"I remember," she cried with astonishment and pain. "You, Arthur, you
+the victim of that shameful story?"
+
+"Do you remember what you said then, Honora, when Curran declared he
+would one day find Tom Jones?"
+
+She knew by the softness of his speech that her saying had penetrated
+the lad's heart, and had been treasured till this day, would be
+treasured forever.
+
+"And you were sitting there, in the cabin, not ten feet off, listening
+to him and me?" she said with a gasp of pleasure.
+
+"'You will never find him, Captain Curran ... that fearful woman
+shattered his very soul ... I know the sort of man he was ... he will
+never go back ... if he can bear to live, it will be because in his
+obscurity God gave him new faith and hope in human nature, and in the
+woman's part of it.' Those are your words, Honora."
+
+She blushed with pleasure and murmured: "I hope they came true!"
+
+"They were true at that moment," he said reflectively. "Oh, indeed God
+guided me, placed me in the hands of Monsignor, of my mother, of such
+people as Judy and the Senator and Louis, and of you all."
+
+"Oh, my God, what suffering!" she exclaimed suddenly as her tears began
+to fall. "Louis told me, I saw it in your face as every one did, but now
+I know. And we never gave you the pity you needed!"
+
+"Then you must give it to me now," said he with boldness. "But don't
+waste any pity on Endicott. He is dead, and I look at him across these
+five years as at a stranger. Suffer? The poor devil went mad with
+suffering. He raved for days in the wilderness, after he discovered his
+shame, dreaming dreams of murder for the guilty, of suicide for
+himself----"
+
+She clasped her hands in anguish and turned toward him as if to protect
+him.
+
+"It was a good woman who saved him, and she was an old mother who had
+tasted death. Some day I shall show you the pool where this old woman
+found him, after he had overcome the temptation to die. She took him to
+her home and her heart, nourished him, gave him courage, sent him on a
+new mission of life. What a life! He had a scheme of vengeance, and to
+execute it he had to return to the old scenes, where he was more
+alone----
+
+    Alone, alone, all, all alone,
+    Alone on a wide, wide sea!
+    And never a saint took pity on
+    My soul in agony.
+
+    *       *       *       *       *
+
+    O wedding-guest! this soul hath been
+    Alone on a wide, wide sea;
+    So lonely 'twas that God Himself
+    Scarce seemed there to be."
+
+The wonder to Honora, as he described himself, was the indifference of
+his tone. It had no more than the sympathy one might show toward a
+stranger whose suffering had been succeeded by great joy.
+
+"Oh, God grant," he broke in with vehemence, "that no soul suffers as
+did this Endicott, poor wretch, during the time of his vengeance.
+Honora, I would not inflict on that terrible woman the suffering of that
+man for a year after his discovery of her sin. I doubted long the mercy
+of God. Rather I knew nothing about His mercy. I had no religion, no
+understanding of it, except in a vague, unpractical way. You know now
+that I am of the Puritan race ... Livingstone is of my family ... the
+race which dislikes the Irish and the Catholic as the English dislike
+them ... the race that persecuted yours! But you cannot say that I have
+not atoned for them as nearly as one man can?"
+
+Trembling with emotion, she simply raised her hands in a gesture that
+said a thousand things too beautiful for words.
+
+"My vengeance on the guilty was to disappear. I took with me all my
+property, and I left Messalina with her own small dower to enjoy her
+freedom in poverty. She sought for me, hired that detective and others
+to hound me to my hiding-place, and so far has failed to make sure of
+me. But to have you understand the story clearly, I shall stick to the
+order of events. I had known Monsignor a few days before calamity
+overtook me, and to him I turned for aid. It was he who found a mother
+for me, a place among 'the mere Irish,' a career which has turned out
+very well. You know how Anne Dillon lost her son. What no one knows is
+this: three months before she was asked to take part in the scheme of
+disappearance she sent a thousand photographs of her dead husband and
+her lost son to the police of California, and offered a reward for his
+discovery living or dead. Monsignor helped her to that. I acknowledged
+that advertisement from one of the most obscure and ephemeral of the
+mining-camps, and came home as her son."
+
+"And the real Arthur Dillon? He was never found?"
+
+"Oh, yes, he answered it too, indirectly. While I was loitering
+riotously about, awaiting the proper moment to make myself known, I
+heard that one Arthur Dillon was dying in another mining-camp some
+thirty miles to the north of us. He claimed to be the real thing, but he
+was dying of consumption, and was too feeble, and of too little
+consequence, to be taken notice of. I looked after him till he died, and
+made sure of his identity. He was Anne Dillon's son and he lies in the
+family lot in Calvary beside his father. No one knows this but his
+mother, Monsignor, and ourselves. Colette stumbled on the fact in her
+search of California, but the fates have been against that clever
+woman."
+
+He laughed heartily at the complete overthrow of the escaped nun. Honora
+looked at him in astonishment. Arthur Dillon laughed, quite forgetful of
+the tragedy of Horace Endicott.
+
+"Since my return you know what I have been, Honora. I can appeal to you
+as did Augustus to his friends on his dying-bed: have I not played well
+the part?"
+
+"I am lost in wonder," she said.
+
+"Then give me your applause as I depart," he answered sadly, and her
+eyes fell before his eloquent glance. "In those early days rage and
+hate, and the maddest desire for justice, sustained me. That woman had
+only one wish in life: to find, rob, and murder the man who had befooled
+her worse than she had tricked him. I made war on that man. I hated
+Horace Endicott as a weak fool. He had fallen lowest of all his honest,
+able, stern race. I beat him first into hiding, then into slavery, and
+at last into annihilation. I studied to annihilate him, and I did it by
+raising Arthur Dillon in his place. I am now Arthur Dillon. I think,
+feel, act, speak, dream like that Arthur Dillon which I first imagined.
+When you knew me first, Honora, I was playing a part. I am no longer
+acting. I am the man whom the world knows as Arthur Dillon."
+
+"I can see that, and it seems more wonderful than any dream of romance.
+You a Puritan are more Irish than the Irish, more Catholic than the
+Catholics, more Dillon than the Dillons. Oh, how can this be?"
+
+"Don't let it worry you," he said grimly. "Just accept the fact and me.
+I never lived until Horace Endicott disappeared. He was a child of
+fortune and a lover of ease and pleasure. His greatest pain had been a
+toothache. His view of life had been a boy's. When I stepped on this
+great stage I found myself for the first time in the very current of
+life. Suffering ate my heart out, and I plunged into that current to
+deaden the agony. I found myself by accident a leader of a poor people
+who had fled from injustice at home to suffer a mean persecution here. I
+was thrown in with the great men of the hour, and found a splendid
+opponent in a member of the Endicott family, Livingstone. I saw the very
+heart of great things, and the look enchanted me.
+
+"You know how I worked for my friends, for your father, for the people,
+for every one and everything that needed help. For the first time I saw
+into the heart of a true friend. Monsignor helped me, carried me
+through, stood by me, directed me. For the first time I saw into the
+heart of innocence and sanctity, deep down, the heart of that blessed
+boy, Louis. For the first time I looked into the heart of a patriot, and
+learned of the love which can endure, not merely failure, but absolute
+and final disappointment, and still be faithful. I became an orator, an
+adventurer, an enthusiast. The Endicott who could not speak ten words
+before a crowd, the empty-headed stroller who classed patriots with
+pickles, became what you know me to be. I learned what love is, the love
+of one's own; of mother, and friend, and clan. Let me not boast, but I
+learned to know God and perhaps to love Him, at least since I am
+resigned to His will. But I am talking too much, since it is for the
+last time."
+
+"You have not ended," said she beseechingly.
+
+"It would take a lifetime," and he looked to see if she would give him
+that time, but her eyes watched the lake. "The latest events in my
+history took place this summer, and you had a little share in them. By
+guess-work Colette arrived at the belief that I am Horace Endicott, and
+she set her detective-husband to discover the link between Endicott and
+Dillon. I helped him, because I was curious to see how Arthur Dillon
+would stand the test of direct pursuit. They could discover nothing. As
+fast as a trace of me showed it vanished into thin air. There was
+nothing to do but invent a suit which would bring my mother, Monsignor,
+and myself into court, and have us declare under oath who is Arthur
+Dillon. I blocked that game perfectly. Messalina has her divorce from
+Horace Endicott, and is married to her lover. There will be no further
+search for the man who disappeared. And I am free, Monsignor declares.
+No ties bind me to that shameful past. I have had my vengeance without
+publicity or shame to anyone. I have punished as I had the right to
+punish. I have a noble place in life, which no one can take from me."
+
+"And did you meet her since you left her ... that woman?" Honora said in
+a low voice half ashamed of the question.
+
+"At Castle Moyna ..." he began and stopped dead at a sudden
+recollection.
+
+"I met her," cried Honora with a stifled scream, "I met her."
+
+"I met her again on the steamer returning," he said after a pause. "She
+did not recognize me, nor has she ever. We met for the last time in
+July. At that meeting Arthur Dillon pronounced sentence on her in the
+name of Horace Endicott. She will never wish to see me or her lost
+husband again."
+
+"Oh, how you must have suffered, Arthur, how you must have suffered!"
+
+She had grown pale alarmingly, but he did not perceive it. The critical
+moment had come for him, and he was praying silently against the
+expected blow. Her resolution had left her, and the road had vanished in
+the obscurity of night. She no longer saw her way clear. Her nerves had
+been shaken by this wonderful story, and the surges of feeling that rose
+before it like waves before the wind.
+
+"And I must suffer still," he went on half to himself. "I was sure that
+God would give me that which I most desired, because I had given Him all
+that belonged to me. I kept back nothing except as Monsignor ordered.
+Through you, Honora, my faith in woman came back, as you said it would
+when you answered the detective in my behalf. When Monsignor told me I
+was free, that I could speak to you as an honorable man, I took it as a
+sign from heaven that the greatest of God's gifts was for me. I love you
+so, Honora, that your wish is my only happiness. Since you must go, if
+it is the will of God, do not mind my suffering, which is also His
+will...."
+
+He arose from his place and his knees were shaking.
+
+"There is consolation for us all somewhere. Mine is not to be here. The
+road to heaven is sometimes long. Not here, Honora?"
+
+The hope in him was not yet dead. She rose too and put her arms about
+him, drawing his head to her bosom with sudden and overpowering
+affection.
+
+"Here and hereafter," she whispered, as they sat down on the bench
+again.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Judy," said Anne in the shade of the trees, "is Arthur hugging Honora,
+or...."
+
+"Glory be," whispered Judy with tears streaming down her face, "it's
+Honora that's hugging Arthur ... no, it's both o' them at wanst, thanks
+be to God."
+
+And the two old ladies stole away home through the happy woods.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX.
+
+THREE SCENES.
+
+
+Anne might have been the bitterest critic of Honora for her descent from
+the higher to the lesser life, but she loved the girl too well even to
+look displeasure. Having come to believe that Arthur would be hers alone
+forever, she regarded Honora's decision as a mistake. The whole world
+rejoiced at the union of these ideal creatures, even Sister Magdalen,
+from whom Arthur had snatched a prize. Honora was her own severest
+critic. How she had let herself go in pity for a sufferer to whom her
+people, her faith, her father, her friends, and herself owed much, she
+knew not. His explanation was simple: God gave you to me.
+
+The process of surrender really began at Louis' ordination. Arthur
+watched his boy, the center of the august ceremony, with wet eyes. This
+innocent heart, with its solemn aspirations, its spiritual beauty, had
+always been for him a wonder and a delight; and it seemed fitting that a
+life so mysteriously beautiful should end its novitiate and begin its
+career with a ceremony so touching. The September sun streamed through
+the venerable windows of the cathedral, the music soared among the
+arches, the altar glowed with lights and flowers; the venerable
+archbishop and his priests and attendants filled the sanctuary, an
+adoring crowd breathed with reverence in the nave; but the center of the
+scene, its heart of beauty, was the pale, sanctified son of Mary
+Everard.
+
+For him were all these glories! Happy, happy, youth! Blessed mother!
+There were no two like them in the whole world, he said in his emotion.
+Her glorified face often shone on him in the pauses of the ceremony. Her
+look repeated the words she had uttered the night before: "Under God my
+happiness is owing to you, Arthur Dillon: like the happiness of so many
+others; and that I am not to-day dead of sorrow and grief is also owing
+to you; now may God grant you the dearest wish of your heart, as He has
+granted mine this day through you; for there is nothing too good for a
+man with a heart and a hand like yours."
+
+How his heart had like to burst under that blessing! He thought of
+Honora, not yet his own.
+
+The entire Irishry was present, with their friends of every race. In
+deference to his faithful adherent, the great Livingstone sat in the
+very front pew, seriously attentive to the rite, and studious of its
+significance. Around him were grouped the well-beloved of Arthur Dillon,
+the souls knit to his with the strength of heaven; the Senator,
+high-colored, richly-dressed, resplendent, sincere; the Boss, dark and
+taciturn, keen, full of emotion, sighing from the depths of his rich
+nature over the meaning of life, as it leaped into the light of this
+scene; Birmingham, impressive and dignified, rejoicing at the splendor
+so powerful with the world that reckons everything by the outward show;
+and all the friends of the new life, to whom this ceremony was dear as
+the breath of their bodies. For this people the sanctuary signified the
+highest honor, the noblest service, the loftiest glory. Beside it the
+honors of the secular life, no matter how esteemed, looked like dead
+flowers.
+
+At times his emotion seemed to slip from the rein, threatening to unman
+him. This child, whose innocent hands were anointed with the Holy Oil,
+who was bound and led away, who read the mass with the bishop and
+received the Sacred Elements with him, upon whom the prelate breathed
+solemn powers, who lay prostrate on the floor, whose head was blessed by
+the hands of the assembled priests: this child God had given him to
+replace the innocent so cruelly destroyed long ago!
+
+Honora's eyes hardly left Arthur's transfigured face, which held her,
+charmed her, frightened her by its ever-changing expression. Light and
+shadow flew across it as over the depths of the sea. The mask off, the
+habit of repression laid aside, his severe features responded to the
+inner emotions. She saw his great eyes fill with tears, his breast heave
+at times. As yet she had not heard his story. The power of that story
+came less from the tale than the recollection of scenes like this, which
+she unthinking had witnessed in the years of their companionship. What
+made this strange man so unlike all other men?
+
+At the close of the ordination the blessing from the new priest began.
+Flushed, dewy-eyed, calm, and white, Louis stood at the railing to lay
+his anointed hands on each in turn; first the mother, and the father.
+Then came a little pause, while Mona made way for him dearest to all
+hearts that day, Arthur. He held back until he saw that his delay
+retarded the ceremony, when he accepted the honor. He felt the blessed
+hands on his head, and a thrill leaped through him as the palms, odorous
+of the balmy chrism, touched his lips.
+
+Mona held up her baby with the secret prayer that he too would be found
+worthy of the sanctuary; then followed her husband and her sisters.
+Honora did not see as she knelt how Arthur's heart leaped into his eyes,
+and shot a burning glance at Louis to remind him of a request uttered
+long ago: when you bless Honora, bless her for me! Thus all conspired
+against her. Was it wonderful that she left the cathedral drawn to her
+hero as never before?
+
+The next day Arthur told her with pride and tenderness, as they drove to
+the church where Father Louis was to sing his first Mass, that every
+vestment of the young priest came from him. Sister Magdalen had made the
+entire set, with her own hands embroidered them, and he had borne the
+expense. Honora found her heart melting under these beautiful details of
+an affection, without limit. The depth of this man's heart seemed
+incredible, deeper than her father's, as if more savage sorrow had dug
+depths in what was deep enough by nature. Long afterward she recognized
+how deeply the ordination had affected her. It roused the feeling that
+such a heart should not be lightly rejected.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Desolation seized her, as the vision of the convent vanished like some
+lovely vale which one leaves forever. Very simply he banished the
+desolation.
+
+"I have been computing," he said, as they sat on the veranda after
+breakfast, "what you might have been worth to the Church as a nun ...
+hear me, hear me ... wait for the end of the story ... it is charming.
+You are now about twenty-seven, I won't venture any nearer your age. I
+don't know my mother's age."
+
+"And no man will ever know it," said Anne. "Men have no discretion about
+ages."
+
+"Let me suppose," Arthur continued, "that fifty years of service would
+be the limit of your active life. You would then be seventy-seven, and
+there is no woman alive as old as that. The oldest is under sixty."
+
+"Unless the newspapers want to say that she's a hundred," said Anne
+slyly.
+
+"For the sake of notoriety she is willing to have the truth told about
+her age."
+
+"As a school-teacher, a music-teacher, or a nurse, let me say that your
+services might be valued at one thousand a year for the fifty years,
+Honora. Do you think that a fair average?"
+
+"Very fair," said she indifferently.
+
+"Well, I am going to give that sum to the convent for having deprived
+them of your pleasant company," said he. "Hear me, hear me, ... I'm not
+done yet. I must be generous, and I know your conscience will be tender
+a long time, if something is not done to toughen it. I want to be
+married in the new cathedral, which another year will see dedicated. But
+a good round sum would advance the date. We owe much to Monsignor. In
+your name and mine I am going to give him enough to put the great church
+in the way to be dedicated by November."
+
+He knew the suffering which burned her heart that morning, himself past
+master in the art of sorrow. That she had come down from the heights to
+the common level would be her grief forever; thus to console her would
+be his everlasting joy.
+
+"What do you think of it? Isn't it a fair release?"
+
+"Only I am not worth it," she said. "But so much the better, if every
+one gains more than I lose by my ... infatuation."
+
+"Are you as much in love as that?" said Anne with malice.
+
+They were married with becoming splendor in January. A quiet ceremony
+suggested by Honora had been promptly overruled by Anne Dillon, who saw
+in this wedding a social opportunity beyond any of her previous
+triumphs. Mrs. Dillon was not your mere aristocrat, who keeps exclusive
+her ceremonious march through life. At that early date she had perceived
+the usefulness to the aristocracy of the press, of general popularity,
+and of mixed assemblies; things freely and openly sought for by society
+to-day. Therefore the great cathedral of the western continent never
+witnessed a more splendid ceremony than the wedding of Honora and
+Arthur; and no event in the career of Anne Dillon bore stronger
+testimony to her genius.
+
+The Chief Justice of the nation headed the _elite_, among whom shone
+like a constellation the Countess of Skibbereen; the Senator brought in
+the whole political circle of the city and the state; Grahame marshaled
+the journalists and the conspirators against the peace of England; the
+profession of music came forward to honor the bride; the common people
+of Cherry Hill went to cheer their hero; Monsignor drew to the sanctuary
+the clerics of rank to honor the benefactor of the cathedral; and high
+above all, enthroned in beauty, the Cardinal of that year presided as
+the dispenser of the Sacrament.
+
+As at the ordination of Louis the admirable Livingstone sat among the
+attendant princes. For the third time within a few months had he been
+witness to the splendors of Rome now budding on the American landscape.
+He did not know what share this Arthur Dillon had in the life of Louis
+and in the building of the beautiful temple. But he knew the strength of
+his leadership among his people; and he felt curious to see with his own
+eyes, to feel with his own heart, the charm, the enchantment, which had
+worked a spell so fatal on the richly endowed Endicott nature.
+
+For enchantment there must have been. The treachery and unworthiness of
+Sonia, detestable beyond thought, could not alone work so strange and
+weird a transformation. Half cynic always, and still more cynical since
+his late misfortunes, he could not withhold his approbation from the
+cleverness which grouped about this young man and his bride the great
+ones of the hour. The scene wholly depressed him. Not the grandeur, nor
+the presence of the powers of society, but the sight of this Endicott,
+of the mould of heroes, of the blood of the English Puritan, acting as
+sponsor of a new order of things in his beloved country, the order
+which he had hoped, still hoped, to destroy. His heart bled as he
+watched him.
+
+The lovely mother, the high-hearted father, lay in their grave. Here
+stood their beloved, a prince among men, bowing before the idols of
+Rome, receiving for himself and his bride the blessing of the archpriest
+of Romanism, a cardinal in his ferocious scarlet. All his courage and
+skill would be forever at the service of the new order. Who was to
+blame? Was it not the rotten reed which he had leaned upon, the woman
+Sonia, rather than these? True it is, true it always will be, that a
+man's enemies are they of his own household.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A grand content filled the heart of Arthur. The bitterness of his fight
+had passed. So long had he struggled that fighting had become a part of
+his dreams, as necessary as daily bread. He had not laid aside his armor
+even for his marriage. Yet there had been an armistice, quite
+unperceived, from the day of the cathedral's dedication. He had lonely
+possession of the battle-field. His enemies had fled. All was well with
+his people. They had reached and passed the frontier, as it were, on
+that day when the great temple opened its sanctuary to God and its
+portals to the nation.
+
+The building he regarded as a witness to the daring of Monsignor; for
+Honora's sake he had given to it a third of his fortune; the day of the
+dedication crowned Monsignor's triumph. When he had seen the spectacle,
+he learned how little men have to do with the great things of history.
+God alone makes history; man is the tide which rushes in and out at His
+command, at the great hours set by Him, and knows only the fact, not the
+reason. In the building that day gathered a multitude representing every
+form of human activity and success. They stood for the triumph of a
+whole race, which, starved out of its native seat, had clung desperately
+to the land of Columbia in spite of persecution.
+
+Soldiers sat in the assembly, witnesses for the dead of the southern
+battle-fields, for all who had given life and love, who had sacrificed
+their dearest, to the new land in its hour of calamity. Men rich in the
+honors of commerce, of the professions, of the schools, artists,
+journalists, leaders, bore witness to the native power of a people, who
+had been written down in the books of the hour as idle, inferior,
+incapable by their very nature. In the sanctuary sat priests and
+prelate, a brilliant gathering, surrounding the delicate-featured
+Cardinal, in gleaming red, high on his beautiful throne.
+
+From the organ rolled the wonderful harmonies born of faith and genius;
+from the pulpit came in sonorous English the interpretation of the scene
+as a gifted mind perceived it; about the altar the ancient ritual
+enacted the holy drama, whose sublime enchantment holds every age.
+Around rose the towering arches, the steady columns, the broad walls,
+lighted from the storied windows, of the first really great temple of
+the western continent!
+
+Whose hands raised it? Arthur discovered in the answer the charm which
+had worked upon dying Ledwith, turned his failure into triumph, and his
+sadness into joy. What a witness, an eternal witness, to the energy and
+faith of a poor, simple, despised people, would be this temple! Looking
+upon its majestic beauty, who could doubt their powers, though the books
+printed English slanders in letters of gold? Out of these great doors
+would march ideas to strengthen and refresh the poor; ideas once
+rejected, once thought destructible by the air of the American
+wilderness. A conspiracy of centuries had been unable to destroy them.
+Into these great portals for long years would a whole people march for
+their own sanctification and glory!
+
+Thereafter the temple became for him a symbol, as for the faithful
+priest; the symbol of his own life as that of his people.
+
+He saw it in the early dawn, whiter than the mist which broke against
+it, a great angel whose beautiful feet the longing earth had imprisoned!
+red with the flush of morning, rosy with the tints of sunrise, as if
+heaven were smiling upon it from open gates! clear, majestic, commanding
+in the broad day, like a leader of the people, drawing all eyes to
+itself, provoking the question, the denial, the prayer from every
+passer, as tributes to its power! in the sunset, as dying Ledwith had
+seen it, flushed with the fever of life, but paling like the day,
+tender, beseeching, appealing to the flying crowd for a last turning to
+God before the day be done forever! in the twilight, calm, restful,
+submissive to the darkness, which had no power over it, because of the
+Presence within! terrible when night falls and sin goes forth in purple
+and fine linen, a giant which had heaved the earth and raised itself
+from the dead stone to rebuke and threaten the erring children of God!
+
+He described all this for Honora, and, strangely enough, for
+Livingstone, who never recovered from the spell cast over him by this
+strange man. The old gentleman loved his race with the fervor of an
+ancient clansman. For this lost sheep of the house of Endicott he
+developed in time an interest which Arthur foresaw would lead agreeably
+one day to a review of the art of disappearing. He was willing to
+satisfy his curiosity. Meanwhile, airing his ideas on the providential
+mission of the country, and of its missionary races, and combatting his
+exclusiveness, they became excellent friends. Livingstone fell deeply in
+love with Honora, as it was the fashion in regard to that charming
+woman. For Arthur the circle of life had its beginning in her, and with
+her would have its end.
+
+
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Art of Disappearing, by John Talbot Smith
+
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