"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.