WHEN GOD LAUGHS, AND OTHER STORIES

By Jack London

1911 Mills and Boon edition

Contents:

 When God Laughs The Apostate A Wicked Woman Just Meat Created He Them The Chinago Make Westing Semper Idem A Nose For The King The "Francis Spaight" A Curious Fragment A Piece Of Steak

WHEN GOD LAUGHS (with compliments to Harry Cowell)

 "The gods, the gods are stronger; time Falls down before them, all men's knees Bow, all men's prayers and sorrows climb Like incense toward them; yea, for these Are gods, Felise. "

Carquinez had relaxed finally. He stole a glance at the rattlingwindows, looked upward at the beamed roof, and listened for a momentto the savage roar of the south-easter as it caught the bungalow inits bellowing jaws. Then he held his glass between him and the fire andlaughed for joy through the golden wine. 

"It is beautiful, " he said. "It is sweetly sweet. It is a woman's wine, and it was made for gray-robed saints to drink. "

"We grow it on our own warm hills, " I said, with pardonable Californiapride. "You rode up yesterday through the vines from which it was made. "

It was worth while to get Carquinez to loosen up. Nor was he ever reallyhimself until he felt the mellow warmth of the vine singing in hisblood. He was an artist, it is true, always an artist; but somehow, sober, the high pitch and lilt went out of his thought-processes and hewas prone to be as deadly dull as a British Sunday--not dull as othermen are dull, but dull when measured by the sprightly wight that MonteCarquinez was when he was really himself. 

From all this it must not be inferred that Carquinez, who is my dearfriend and dearer comrade, was a sot. Far from it. He rarely erred. AsI have said, he was an artist. He knew when he had enough, and enough, with him, was equilibrium--the equilibrium that is yours and mine whenwe are sober. 

His was a wise and instinctive temperateness that savoured of the Greek. Yet he was far from Greek. "I am Aztec, I am Inca, I am Spaniard, " Ihave heard him say. And in truth he looked it, a compound of strangeand ancient races, what with his swarthy skin and the asymmetry andprimitiveness of his features. His eyes, under massively arched brows, were wide apart and black with the blackness that is barbaric, whilebefore them was perpetually falling down a great black mop of hairthrough which he gazed like a roguish satyr from a thicket. Heinvariably wore a soft flannel shirt under his velvet-corduroy jacket, and his necktie was red. This latter stood for the red flag (he had oncelived with the socialists of Paris), and it symbolized the blood andbrotherhood of man. Also, he had never been known to wear anything onhis head save a leather-banded sombrero. It was even rumoured thathe had been born with this particular piece of headgear. And in myexperience it was provocative of nothing short of sheer delight to seethat Mexican sombrero hailing a cab in Piccadilly or storm-tossed in thecrush for the New York Elevated. 

As I have said, Carquinez was made quick by wine--"as the clay was madequick when God breathed the breath of life into it, " was his way ofsaying it. I confess that he was blasphemously intimate with God; and Imust add that there was no blasphemy in him. He was at all times honest, and, because he was compounded of paradoxes, greatly misunderstood bythose who did not know him. He could be as elementally raw at times as ascreaming savage; and at other times as delicate as a maid, as subtle asa Spaniard. And--well, was he not Aztec? Inca? Spaniard?

And now I must ask pardon for the space I have given him. (He is myfriend, and I love him. ) The house was shaking to the storm, as he drewcloser to the fire and laughed at it through his wine. He looked at me, and by the added lustre of his eye, and by the alertness of it, I knewthat at last he was pitched in his proper key. 

"And so you think you've won out against the gods?" he demanded. 

"Why the gods?"

"Whose will but theirs has put satiety upon man?" he cried. 

"And whence the will in me to escape satiety?" I asked triumphantly. 

"Again the gods, " he laughed. "It is their game we play. They deal andshuffle all the cards. .. And take the stakes. Think not that you haveescaped by fleeing from the mad cities. You with your vine-clad hills, your sunsets and your sunrises, your homely fare and simple round ofliving!

"I've watched you ever since I came. You have not won. You havesurrendered. You have made terms with the enemy. You have madeconfession that you are tired. You have flown the white flag of fatigue. You have nailed up a notice to the effect that life is ebbing down inyou. You have run away from life. You have played a trick, shabby trick. You have balked at the game. You refuse to play. You have thrown yourcards under the table and run away to hide, here amongst your hills. "

He tossed his straight hair back from his flashing eyes, and scarcelyinterrupted to roll a long, brown, Mexican cigarette. 

"But the gods know. It is an old trick. All the generations of man havetried it. .. And lost. The gods know how to deal with such as you. Topursue is to possess, and to possess is to be sated. And so you, in yourwisdom, have refused any longer to pursue. You have elected surcease. Very well. You will become sated with surcease. You say you have escapedsatiety! You have merely bartered it for senility. And senility isanother name for satiety. It is satiety's masquerade. Bah!"

"But look at me!" I cried. 

Carquinez was ever a demon for haling ones soul out and making rags andtatters of it. 

He looked me witheringly up and down. 

"You see no signs, " I challenged. 

"Decay is insidious, " he retorted. "You are rotten ripe. "

I laughed and forgave him for his very deviltry. But he refused to beforgiven. 

"Do I not know?" he asked. "The gods always win. I have watched men playfor years what seemed a winning game. In the end they lost. "

"Don't you ever make mistakes?" I asked. 

He blew many meditative rings of smoke before replying. 

"Yes, I was nearly fooled, once. Let me tell you. There was MarvinFiske. You remember him? And his Dantesque face and poet's soul, singinghis chant of the flesh, the very priest of Love? And there was EthelBaird, whom also you must remember. "

"A warm saint, " I said. 

"That is she! Holy as Love, and sweeter! Just a woman, made for love;and yet--how shall I say?--drenched through with holiness as your ownair here is with the perfume of flowers. Well, they married. They playeda hand with the gods--"

"And they won, they gloriously won!" I broke in. 

Carquinez looked at me pityingly, and his voice was like a funeral bell. 

"They lost. They supremely, colossally lost. "

"But the world believes otherwise, " I ventured coldly. 

"The world conjectures. The world sees only the face of things. But Iknow. Has it ever entered your mind to wonder why she took the veil, buried herself in that dolorous convent of the living dead?"

"Because she loved him so, and when he died. .. "

Speech was frozen on my lips by Carquinez's sneer. 

"A pat answer, " he said, "machine-made like a piece of cotton-drill. Theworld's judgment! And much the world knows about it. Like you, she fledfrom life. She was beaten. She flung out the white flag of fatigue. Andno beleaguered city ever flew that flag in such bitterness and tears. 

"Now I shall tell you the whole tale, and you must believe me, for Iknow. They had pondered the problem of satiety. They loved Love. Theyknew to the uttermost farthing the value of Love. They loved him sowell that they were fain to keep him always, warm and a-thrill in theirhearts. They welcomed his coming; they feared to have him depart. 

"Love was desire, they held, a delicious pain. He was ever seekingeasement, and when he found that for which he sought, he died. Lovedenied was Love alive; Love granted was Love deceased. Do you follow me?They saw it was not the way of life to be hungry for what it has. To eatand still be hungry--man has never accomplished that feat. The problemof satiety. That is it. To have and to keep the sharp famine-edge ofappetite at the groaning board. This was their problem, for they lovedLove. Often did they discuss it, with all Love's sweet ardours brimmingin their eyes; his ruddy blood spraying their cheeks; his voice playingin and out with their voices, now hiding as a tremolo in their throats, and again shading a tone with that ineffable tenderness which he alonecan utter. 

"How do I know all this? I saw--much. More I learned from her diary. This I found in it, from Fiona Macleod: 'For, truly, that wanderingvoice, that twilight-whisper, that breath so dewy-sweet, thatflame-winged lute-player whom none sees but for a moment, in arainbow-shimmer of joy, or a sudden lightning-flare of passion, thisexquisite mystery we call Amor, comes, to some rapt visionaries atleast, not with a song upon the lips that all may hear, or with blitheviol of public music, but as one wrought by ecstasy, dumbly eloquentwith desire. '

"How to keep the flame-winged lute-player with his dumb eloquence ofdesire? To feast him was to lose him. Their love for each other was agreat love. Their granaries were overflowing with plenitude; yet theywanted to keep the sharp famine-edge of their love undulled. 

"Nor were they lean little fledglings theorizing on the threshold ofLove. They were robust and realized souls. They had loved before, with others, in the days before they met; and in those days they hadthrottled Love with caresses, and killed him with kisses, and buried himin the pit of satiety. 

"They were not cold wraiths, this man and woman. They were warm human. They had no Saxon soberness in their blood. The colour of it wassunset-red. They glowed with it. Temperamentally theirs was the Frenchjoy in the flesh. They were idealists, but their idealism was Gallic. It was not tempered by the chill and sombre fluid that for the Englishserves as blood. There was no stoicism about them. They were Americans, descended out of the English, and yet the refraining and self-denying ofthe English spirit-groping were not theirs. 

"They were all this that I have said, and they were made for joy, onlythey achieved a concept. A curse on concepts! They played with logic, and this was their logic. --But first let me tell you of a talk we hadone night. It was of Gautier's Madeline de Maupin. You remember themaid? She kissed once, and once only, and kisses she would have nomore. Not that she found kisses were not sweet, but that she feared withrepetition they would cloy. Satiety again! She tried to play withoutstakes against the gods. Now this is contrary to a rule of the game thegods themselves have made. Only the rules are not posted over the table. Mortals must play in order to learn the rules. 

"Well, to the logic. The man and the woman argued thus: Why kiss onceonly? If to kiss once were wise, was it not wiser to kiss not at all?Thus could they keep Love alive. Fasting, he would knock forever attheir hearts. 

"Perhaps it was out of their heredity that they achieved this unholyconcept. The breed will out and sometimes most fantastically. Thusin them did cursed Albion array herself a scheming wanton, a bold, cold-calculating, and artful hussy. After all, I do not know. But thisI know: it was out of their inordinate desire for joy that they forewentjoy. 

"As he said (I read it long afterward in one of his letters to her):'To hold you in my arms, close, and yet not close. To yearn for you, andnever to have you, and so always to have you. ' And she: 'For you to bealways just beyond my reach. To be ever attaining you, and yet neverattaining you, and for this to last forever, always fresh and new, andalways with the first flush upon us. 

"That is not the way they said it. On my lips their love-philosophy ismangled. And who am I to delve into their soul-stuff? I am a frog, onthe dank edge of a great darkness, gazing goggle-eyed at the mystery andwonder of their flaming souls. 

"And they were right, as far as they went. Everything is good. .. As longas it is unpossessed. Satiety and possession are Death's horses; theyrun in span. 

 "'And time could only tutor us to eke Our rapture's warmth with custom's afterglow. '

"They got that from a sonnet of Alfred Austin's. It was called 'Love'sWisdom. ' It was the one kiss of Madeline de Maupin. How did it run?

 "'Kiss we and part; no further can we go; And better death than we from high to low Should dwindle, or decline from strong to weak. '

"But they were wiser. They would not kiss and part. They would notkiss at all, and thus they planned to stay at Love's topmost peak. Theymarried. You were in England at the time. And never was there such amarriage. They kept their secret to themselves. I did not know, then. Their rapture's warmth did not cool. Their love burned with increasingbrightness. Never was there anything like it. The time passed, themonths, the years, and ever the flame-winged lute-player grew moreresplendent. 

"Everybody marvelled. They became the wonderful lovers, and they weregreatly envied. Sometimes women pitied her because she was childless; itis the form the envy of such creatures takes. 

"And I did not know their secret. I pondered and I marvelled. As first Ihad expected, subconsciously I imagine, the passing of their love. ThenI became aware that it was Time that passed and Love that remained. ThenI became curious. What was their secret? What were the magic fetterswith which they bound Love to them? How did they hold the graceless elf?What elixir of eternal love had they drunk together as had Tristram andIseult of old time? And whose hand had brewed the fairy drink?

"As I say, I was curious, and I watched them. They were love-mad. Theylived in an unending revel of Love. They made a pomp and ceremonial ofit. They saturated themselves in the art and poetry of Love. No, theywere not neurotics. They were sane and healthy, and they were artists. But they had accomplished the impossible. They had achieved deathlessdesire. 

"And I? I saw much of them and their everlasting miracle of Love. Ipuzzled and wondered, and then one day--"

Carquinez broke off abruptly and asked, "Have you ever read, 'Love'sWaiting Time'?"

I shook my head. 

"Page wrote it--Curtis Hidden Page, I think. Well, it was that bit ofverse that gave me the clue. One day, in the window-seat near the bigpiano--you remember how she could play? She used to laugh, sometimes, and doubt whether it was for them I came, or for the music. She calledme a 'music-sot' once, a 'sound-debauchee. ' What a voice he had! Whenhe sang I believed in immortality, my regard for the gods grew almostpatronizing and I devised ways and means whereby I surely could outwitthem and their tricks. 

"It was a spectacle for God, that man and woman, years married, andsinging love-songs with a freshness virginal as new-born Love himself, with a ripeness and wealth of ardour that young lovers can never know. Young lovers were pale and anaemic beside that long-married pair. Tosee them, all fire and flame and tenderness, at a trembling distance, lavishing caresses of eye and voice with every action, through everysilence--their love driving them toward each other, and they withholdinglike fluttering moths, each to the other a candle-flame, and revolvingeach about the other in the mad gyrations of an amazing orbit-flight!It seemed, in obedience to some great law of physics, more potent thangravitation and more subtle, that they must corporeally melt eachinto each there before my very eyes. Small wonder they were called thewonderful lovers. 

"I have wandered. Now to the clue. One day in the window-seat I founda book of verse. It opened of itself, betraying long habit, to 'Love'sWaiting Time. ' The page was thumbed and limp with overhandling, andthere I read:--

 "'So sweet it is to stand but just apart, To know each other better, and to keep The soft, delicious sense of two that touch. .. 

 O love, not yet!. .. Sweet, let us keep our love Wrapped round with sacred mystery awhile, Waiting the secret of the coming years, That come not yet, not yet. .. Sometime. .. Not yet. .. 

 Oh, yet a little while our love may grow! When it has blossomed it will haply die. Feed it with lipless kisses, let it sleep, Bedded in dead denial yet some while. .. Oh, yet a little while, a little while. '

"I folded the book on my thumb and sat there silent and without movingfor a long time. I was stunned by the clearness of vision the versehad imparted to me. It was illumination. It was like a bolt of God'slightning in the Pit. They would keep Love, the fickle sprite, theforerunner of young life--young life that is imperative to be born!

"I conned the lines over in my mind--'Not yet, sometime'--'O Love, notyet'--'Feed it with lipless kisses, let it sleep. ' And I laughedaloud, ha, ha! I saw with white vision their blameless souls. They werechildren. They did not understand. They played with Nature's fire andbedded with a naked sword. They laughed at the gods. They would stopthe cosmic sap. They had invented a system, and brought it to thegaming-table of life, and expected to win out. 'Beware!' I cried. 'Thegods are behind the table. They make new rules for every system that isdevised. You have no chance to win. '

"But I did not so cry to them. I waited. They would learn that theirsystem was worthless and throw it away. They would be content withwhatever happiness the gods gave them and not strive to wrest more away. 

"I watched. I said nothing. The months continued to come and go, andstill the famine-edge of their love grew the sharper. Never did theydull it with a permitted love-clasp. They ground and whetted it onself-denial, and sharper and sharper it grew. This went on until even Idoubted. Did the gods sleep? I wondered. Or were they dead? I laughedto myself. The man and the woman had made a miracle. They had outwittedGod. They had shamed the flesh, and blackened the face of the good EarthMother. They had played with her fire and not been burned. They wereimmune. They were themselves gods, knowing good from evil and tastingnot. 'Was this the way gods came to be?' I asked myself. 'I am a frog, 'I said. 'But for my mud-lidded eyes I should have been blinded by thebrightness of this wonder I have witnessed. I have puffed myself up withmy wisdom and passed judgment upon gods. '

"Yet even in this, my latest wisdom, I was wrong. They were not gods. They were man and woman--soft clay that sighed and thrilled, shotthrough with desire, thumbed with strange weaknesses which the gods havenot. "

Carquinez broke from his narrative to roll another cigarette and tolaugh harshly. It was not a pretty laugh; it was like the mockery of adevil, and it rose over and rode the roar of the storm that came muffledto our ears from the crashing outside world. 

"I am a frog, " he said apologetically. "How were they to understand?They were artists, not biologists. They knew the clay of the studio, butthey did not know the clay of which they themselves were made. But thisI will say--they played high. Never was there such a game before, and Idoubt me if there will ever be such a game again. 

"Never was lovers' ecstasy like theirs. They had not killed Love withkisses. They had quickened him with denial. And by denial they drove himon till he was all aburst with desire. And the flame-winged lute-playerfanned them with his warm wings till they were all but swooning. It wasthe very delirium of Love, and it continued undiminished and increasingthrough the weeks and months. 

"They longed and yearned, with all the fond pangs and sweet deliciousagonies, with an intensity never felt by lovers before nor since. 

"And then one day the drowsy gods ceased nodding. They aroused andlooked at the man and woman who had made a mock of them. And the man andwoman looked into each other's eyes one morning and knew that somethingwas gone. It was the flame-winged one. He had fled, silently, in thenight, from their anchorites' board. 

"They looked into each other's eyes and knew that they did not care. Desire was dead. Do you understand? Desire was dead. And they had neverkissed. Not once had they kissed. Love was gone. They would never yearnand burn again. For them there was nothing left--no more tremblings andflutterings and delicious anguishes, no more throbbing and pulsing, andsighing and song. Desire was dead. It had died in the night, on a couchcold and unattended; nor had they witnessed its passing. They learned itfor the first time in each other's eyes. 

"The gods may not be kind, but they are often merciful. They had twirledthe little ivory ball and swept the stakes from the table. All thatremained was the man and woman gazing into each other's cold eyes. And then he died. That was the mercy. Within the week Marvin Fiske wasdead--you remember the accident. And in her diary, written at this time, I long afterward read Mitchell Kennerly's:--

 "'There was not a single hour We might have kissed and did not kiss. '"

"Oh, the irony of it!" I cried out. 

And Carquinez, in the firelight a veritable Mephistopheles in velvetjacket, fixed me with his black eyes. 

"And they won, you said? The world's judgment! I have told you, and Iknow. They won as you are winning, here in your hills. "

"But you, " I demanded hotly; "you with your orgies of sound and sense, with your mad cities and madder frolics--bethink you that you win?"

He shook his head slowly. "Because you with your sober bucolic regime, lose, is no reason that I should win. We never win. Sometimes we thinkwe win. That is a little pleasantry of the gods. "

THE APOSTATE

 "Now I wake me up to work; I pray the Lord I may not shirk. If I should die before the night, I pray the Lord my work's all right. Amen. "

"If you don't git up, Johnny, I won't give you a bite to eat!"

The threat had no effect on the boy. He clung stubbornly to sleep, fighting for its oblivion as the dreamer fights for his dream. The boy'shands loosely clenched themselves, and he made feeble, spasmodic blowsat the air. These blows were intended for his mother, but she betrayedpractised familiarity in avoiding them as she shook him roughly by theshoulder. 

"Lemme 'lone!"

It was a cry that began, muffled, in the deeps of sleep, that swiftlyrushed upward, like a wail, into passionate belligerence, and that diedaway and sank down into an inarticulate whine. It was a bestial cry, asof a soul in torment, filled with infinite protest and pain. 

But she did not mind. She was a sad-eyed, tired-faced woman, and she hadgrown used to this task, which she repeated every day of her life. Shegot a grip on the bedclothes and tried to strip them down; but the boy, ceasing his punching, clung to them desperately. In a huddle, at thefoot of the bed, he still remained covered. Then she tried dragging thebedding to the floor. The boy opposed her. She braced herself. Herswas the superior weight, and the boy and bedding gave, the formerinstinctively following the latter in order to shelter against the chillof the room that bit into his body. 

As he toppled on the edge of the bed it seemed that he must fallhead-first to the floor. But consciousness fluttered up in him. Herighted himself and for a moment perilously balanced. Then he struck thefloor on his feet. On the instant his mother seized him by the shouldersand shook him. Again his fists struck out, this time with more force anddirectness. At the same time his eyes opened. She released him. He wasawake. 

"All right, " he mumbled. 

She caught up the lamp and hurried out, leaving him in darkness. 

"You'll be docked, " she warned back to him. 

He did not mind the darkness. When he had got into his clothes, he wentout into the kitchen. His tread was very heavy for so thin and light aboy. His legs dragged with their own weight, which seemed unreasonablebecause they were such skinny legs. He drew a broken-bottomed chair tothe table. 

"Johnny, " his mother called sharply. 

He arose as sharply from the chair, and, without a word, went to thesink. It was a greasy, filthy sink. A smell came up from the outlet. Hetook no notice of it. That a sink should smell was to him part of thenatural order, just as it was a part of the natural order that the soapshould be grimy with dish-water and hard to lather. Nor did he try veryhard to make it lather. Several splashes of the cold water from therunning faucet completed the function. He did not wash his teeth. Forthat matter he had never seen a toothbrush, nor did he know that thereexisted beings in the world who were guilty of so great a foolishness astooth washing. 

"You might wash yourself wunst a day without bein' told, " his mothercomplained. 

She was holding a broken lid on the pot as she poured two cups ofcoffee. He made no remark, for this was a standing quarrel between them, and the one thing upon which his mother was hard as adamant. "Wunst" aday it was compulsory that he should wash his face. He dried himself ona greasy towel, damp and dirty and ragged, that left his face coveredwith shreds of lint. 

"I wish we didn't live so far away, " she said, as he sat down. "I tryto do the best I can. You know that. But a dollar on the rent is such asavin', an' we've more room here. You know that. "

He scarcely followed her. He had heard it all before, many times. Therange of her thought was limited, and she was ever harking back to thehardship worked upon them by living so far from the mills. 

"A dollar means more grub, " he remarked sententiously. "I'd sooner dothe walkin' an' git the grub. "

He ate hurriedly, half chewing the bread and washing the unmasticatedchunks down with coffee. The hot and muddy liquid went by the name ofcoffee. Johnny thought it was coffee--and excellent coffee. That was oneof the few of life's illusions that remained to him. He had never drunkreal coffee in his life. 

In addition to the bread, there was a small piece of cold pork. Hismother refilled his cup with coffee. As he was finishing the bread, hebegan to watch if more was forthcoming. She intercepted his questioningglance. 

"Now, don't be hoggish, Johnny, " was her comment. "You've had yourshare. Your brothers an' sisters are smaller'n you. "

He did not answer the rebuke. He was not much of a talker. Also, heceased his hungry glancing for more. He was uncomplaining, with apatience that was as terrible as the school in which it had beenlearned. He finished his coffee, wiped his mouth on the back of hishand, and started to rise. 

"Wait a second, " she said hastily. "I guess the loaf kin stand youanother slice--a thin un. "

There was legerdemain in her actions. With all the seeming of cuttinga slice from the loaf for him, she put loaf and slice back in the breadbox and conveyed to him one of her own two slices. She believed she haddeceived him, but he had noted her sleight-of-hand. Nevertheless, hetook the bread shamelessly. He had a philosophy that his mother, becauseof her chronic sickliness, was not much of an eater anyway. 

She saw that he was chewing the bread dry, and reached over and emptiedher coffee cup into his. 

"Don't set good somehow on my stomach this morning, " she explained. 

A distant whistle, prolonged and shrieking, brought both of them totheir feet. She glanced at the tin alarm-clock on the shelf. The handsstood at half-past five. The rest of the factory world was just arousingfrom sleep. She drew a shawl about her shoulders, and on her head put adingy hat, shapeless and ancient. 

"We've got to run, " she said, turning the wick of the lamp and blowingdown the chimney. 

They groped their way out and down the stairs. It was clear and cold, and Johnny shivered at the first contact with the outside air. The starshad not yet begun to pale in the sky, and the city lay in blackness. Both Johnny and his mother shuffled their feet as they walked. There wasno ambition in the leg muscles to swing the feet clear of the ground. 

After fifteen silent minutes, his mother turned off to the right. 

"Don't be late, " was her final warning from out of the dark that wasswallowing her up. 

He made no response, steadily keeping on his way. In the factoryquarter, doors were opening everywhere, and he was soon one of amultitude that pressed onward through the dark. As he entered thefactory gate the whistle blew again. He glanced at the east. Across aragged sky-line of housetops a pale light was beginning to creep. Thismuch he saw of the day as he turned his back upon it and joined his workgang. 

He took his place in one of many long rows of machines. Before him, above a bin filled with small bobbins, were large bobbins revolvingrapidly. Upon these he wound the jute-twine of the small bobbins. Thework was simple. All that was required was celerity. The small bobbinswere emptied so rapidly, and there were so many large bobbins that didthe emptying, that there were no idle moments. 

He worked mechanically. When a small bobbin ran out, he used his lefthand for a brake, stopping the large bobbin and at the same time, withthumb and forefinger, catching the flying end of twine. Also, at thesame time, with his right hand, he caught up the loose twine-end ofa small bobbin. These various acts with both hands were performedsimultaneously and swiftly. Then there would come a flash of his handsas he looped the weaver's knot and released the bobbin. There wasnothing difficult about weaver's knots. He once boasted he could tiethem in his sleep. And for that matter, he sometimes did, toilingcenturies long in a single night at tying an endless succession ofweaver's knots. 

Some of the boys shirked, wasting time and machinery by not replacingthe small bobbins when they ran out. And there was an overseer toprevent this. He caught Johnny's neighbour at the trick, and boxed hisears. 

"Look at Johnny there--why ain't you like him?" the overseer wrathfullydemanded. 

Johnny's bobbins were running full blast, but he did not thrill at theindirect praise. There had been a time. .. But that was long ago, verylong ago. His apathetic face was expressionless as he listened tohimself being held up as a shining example. He was the perfect worker. He knew that. He had been told so, often. It was a commonplace, andbesides it didn't seem to mean anything to him any more. From theperfect worker he had evolved into the perfect machine. When his workwent wrong, it was with him as with the machine, due to faulty material. It would have been as possible for a perfect nail-die to cut imperfectnails as for him to make a mistake. 

And small wonder. There had never been a time when he had not been inintimate relationship with machines. Machinery had almost been bred intohim, and at any rate he had been brought up on it. Twelve years before, there had been a small flutter of excitement in the loom room of thisvery mill. Johnny's mother had fainted. They stretched her out on thefloor in the midst of the shrieking machines. A couple of elderly womenwere called from their looms. The foreman assisted. And in a few minutesthere was one more soul in the loom room than had entered by the doors. It was Johnny, born with the pounding, crashing roar of the looms in hisears, drawing with his first breath the warm, moist air that was thickwith flying lint. He had coughed that first day in order to rid hislungs of the lint; and for the same reason he had coughed ever since. 

The boy alongside of Johnny whimpered and sniffed. The boy's face wasconvulsed with hatred for the overseer who kept a threatening eye onhim from a distance; but every bobbin was running full. The boy yelledterrible oaths into the whirling bobbins before him; but the sound didnot carry half a dozen feet, the roaring of the room holding it in andcontaining it like a wall. 

Of all this Johnny took no notice. He had a way of accepting things. Besides, things grow monotonous by repetition, and this particularhappening he had witnessed many times. It seemed to him as useless tooppose the overseer as to defy the will of a machine. Machines were madeto go in certain ways and to perform certain tasks. It was the same withthe overseer. 

But at eleven o'clock there was excitement in the room. In an apparentlyoccult way the excitement instantly permeated everywhere. The one-leggedboy who worked on the other side of Johnny bobbed swiftly across thefloor to a bin truck that stood empty. Into this he dived out ofsight, crutch and all. The superintendent of the mill was coming along, accompanied by a young man. He was well dressed and wore a starchedshirt--a gentleman, in Johnny's classification of men, and also, "theInspector. "

He looked sharply at the boys as he passed along. Sometimes he stoppedand asked questions. When he did so, he was compelled to shout at thetop of his lungs, at which moments his face was ludicrously contortedwith the strain of making himself heard. His quick eye noted the emptymachine alongside of Johnny's, but he said nothing. Johnny also caughthis eye, and he stopped abruptly. He caught Johnny by the arm to drawhim back a step from the machine; but with an exclamation of surprise hereleased the arm. 

"Pretty skinny, " the superintendent laughed anxiously. 

"Pipe stems, " was the answer. "Look at those legs. The boy's got therickets--incipient, but he's got them. If epilepsy doesn't get him inthe end, it will be because tuberculosis gets him first. "

Johnny listened, but did not understand. Furthermore he was notinterested in future ills. There was an immediate and more serious illthat threatened him in the form of the inspector. 

"Now, my boy, I want you to tell me the truth, " the inspector said, orshouted, bending close to the boy's ear to make him hear. "How old areyou?"

"Fourteen, " Johnny lied, and he lied with the full force of his lungs. So loudly did he lie that it started him off in a dry, hacking coughthat lifted the lint which had been settling in his lungs all morning. 

"Looks sixteen at least, " said the superintendent. 

"Or sixty, " snapped the inspector. 

"He's always looked that way. "

"How long?" asked the inspector, quickly. 

"For years. Never gets a bit older. "

"Or younger, I dare say. I suppose he's worked here all those years?"

"Off and on--but that was before the new law was passed, " thesuperintendent hastened to add. 

"Machine idle?" the inspector asked, pointing at the unoccupied machinebeside Johnny's, in which the part-filled bobbins were flying like mad. 

"Looks that way. " The superintendent motioned the overseer to him andshouted in his ear and pointed at the machine. "Machine's idle, " hereported back to the inspector. 

They passed on, and Johnny returned to his work, relieved in that theill had been averted. But the one-legged boy was not so fortunate. Thesharp-eyed inspector haled him out at arms length from the bin truck. His lips were quivering, and his face had all the expression of one uponwhom was fallen profound and irremediable disaster. The overseer lookedastounded, as though for the first time he had laid eyes on the boy, while the superintendent's face expressed shock and displeasure. 

"I know him, " the inspector said. "He's twelve years old. I've had himdischarged from three factories inside the year. This makes the fourth. "

He turned to the one-legged boy. "You promised me, word and honour, thatyou'd go to school. "

The one-legged boy burst into tears. "Please, Mr. Inspector, two babiesdied on us, and we're awful poor. "

"What makes you cough that way?" the inspector demanded, as thoughcharging him with crime. 

And as in denial of guilt, the one-legged boy replied: "It ain'tnothin'. I jes' caught a cold last week, Mr. Inspector, that's all. "

In the end the one-legged boy went out of the room with the inspector, the latter accompanied by the anxious and protesting superintendent. After that monotony settled down again. The long morning and the longerafternoon wore away and the whistle blew for quitting time. Darkness hadalready fallen when Johnny passed out through the factory gate. In theinterval the sun had made a golden ladder of the sky, flooded the worldwith its gracious warmth, and dropped down and disappeared in the westbehind a ragged sky-line of housetops. 

Supper was the family meal of the day--the one meal at which Johnnyencountered his younger brothers and sisters. It partook of thenature of an encounter, to him, for he was very old, while they weredistressingly young. He had no patience with their excessive and amazingjuvenility. He did not understand it. His own childhood was too farbehind him. He was like an old and irritable man, annoyed by theturbulence of their young spirits that was to him arrant silliness. Heglowered silently over his food, finding compensation in the thoughtthat they would soon have to go to work. That would take the edge offof them and make them sedate and dignified--like him. Thus it was, afterthe fashion of the human, that Johnny made of himself a yardstick withwhich to measure the universe. 

During the meal, his mother explained in various ways and with infiniterepetition that she was trying to do the best she could; so that it waswith relief, the scant meal ended, that Johnny shoved back his chairand arose. He debated for a moment between bed and the front door, and finally went out the latter. He did not go far. He sat down on thestoop, his knees drawn up and his narrow shoulders drooping forward, hiselbows on his knees and the palms of his hands supporting his chin. 

As he sat there, he did no thinking. He was just resting. So far as hismind was concerned, it was asleep. His brothers and sisters came out, and with other children played noisily about him. An electric globe atthe corner lighted their frolics. He was peevish and irritable, thatthey knew; but the spirit of adventure lured them into teasing him. Theyjoined hands before him, and, keeping time with their bodies, chanted inhis face weird and uncomplimentary doggerel. At first he snarled cursesat them--curses he had learned from the lips of various foremen. Findingthis futile, and remembering his dignity, he relapsed into doggedsilence. 

His brother Will, next to him in age, having just passed his tenthbirthday, was the ringleader. Johnny did not possess particularly kindlyfeelings toward him. His life had early been embittered by continualgiving over and giving way to Will. He had a definite feeling thatWill was greatly in his debt and was ungrateful about it. In his ownplaytime, far back in the dim past, he had been robbed of a large partof that playtime by being compelled to take care of Will. Will was ababy then, and then, as now, their mother had spent her days in themills. To Johnny had fallen the part of little father and little motheras well. 

Will seemed to show the benefit of the giving over and the giving way. He was well-built, fairly rugged, as tall as his elder brother and evenheavier. It was as though the life-blood of the one had been divertedinto the other's veins. And in spirits it was the same. Johnny wasjaded, worn out, without resilience, while his younger brother seemedbursting and spilling over with exuberance. 

The mocking chant rose louder and louder. Will leaned closer as hedanced, thrusting out his tongue. Johnny's left arm shot out and caughtthe other around the neck. At the same time he rapped his bony fist tothe other's nose. It was a pathetically bony fist, but that it wassharp to hurt was evidenced by the squeal of pain it produced. The otherchildren were uttering frightened cries, while Johnny's sister, Jennie, had dashed into the house. 

He thrust Will from him, kicked him savagely on the shins, then reachedfor him and slammed him face downward in the dirt. Nor did he releasehim till the face had been rubbed into the dirt several times. Then themother arrived, an anaemic whirlwind of solicitude and maternal wrath. 

"Why can't he leave me alone?" was Johnny's reply to her upbraiding. "Can't he see I'm tired?"

"I'm as big as you, " Will raged in her arms, his face a mass of tears, dirt, and blood. "I'm as big as you now, an' I'm goin' to git bigger. Then I'll lick you--see if I don't. "

"You ought to be to work, seein' how big you are, " Johnny snarled. "That's what's the matter with you. You ought to be to work. An' it's upto your ma to put you to work. "

"But he's too young, " she protested. "He's only a little boy. "

"I was younger'n him when I started to work. "

Johnny's mouth was open, further to express the sense of unfairness thathe felt, but the mouth closed with a snap. He turned gloomily on hisheel and stalked into the house and to bed. The door of his roomwas open to let in warmth from the kitchen. As he undressed in thesemi-darkness he could hear his mother talking with a neighbour womanwho had dropped in. His mother was crying, and her speech was punctuatedwith spiritless sniffles. 

"I can't make out what's gittin' into Johnny, " he could hear her say. "He didn't used to be this way. He was a patient little angel. 

"An' he is a good boy, " she hastened to defend. "He's worked faithful, an' he did go to work too young. But it wasn't my fault. I do the best Ican, I'm sure. "

Prolonged sniffling from the kitchen, and Johnny murmured to himself ashis eyelids closed down, "You betcher life I've worked faithful. "

The next morning he was torn bodily by his mother from the grip ofsleep. Then came the meagre breakfast, the tramp through the dark, andthe pale glimpse of day across the housetops as he turned his back onit and went in through the factory gate. It was another day, of all thedays, and all the days were alike. 

And yet there had been variety in his life--at the times he changed fromone job to another, or was taken sick. When he was six, he was littlemother and father to Will and the other children still younger. At sevenhe went into the mills--winding bobbins. When he was eight, he got workin another mill. His new job was marvellously easy. All he had to do wasto sit down with a little stick in his hand and guide a stream of cloththat flowed past him. This stream of cloth came out of the maw of amachine, passed over a hot roller, and went on its way elsewhere. But hesat always in one place, beyond the reach of daylight, a gas-jet flaringover him, himself part of the mechanism. 

He was very happy at that job, in spite of the moist heat, for he wasstill young and in possession of dreams and illusions. And wonderfuldreams he dreamed as he watched the steaming cloth streaming endlesslyby. But there was no exercise about the work, no call upon his mind, and he dreamed less and less, while his mind grew torpid and drowsy. Nevertheless, he earned two dollars a week, and two dollars representedthe difference between acute starvation and chronic underfeeding. 

But when he was nine, he lost his job. Measles was the cause of it. After he recovered, he got work in a glass factory. The pay was better, and the work demanded skill. It was piecework, and the more skilfulhe was, the bigger wages he earned. Here was incentive. And under thisincentive he developed into a remarkable worker. 

It was simple work, the tying of glass stoppers into small bottles. Athis waist he carried a bundle of twine. He held the bottles between hisknees so that he might work with both hands. Thus, in a sitting positionand bending over his own knees, his narrow shoulders grew humped and hischest was contracted for ten hours each day. This was not good for thelungs, but he tied three hundred dozen bottles a day. 

The superintendent was very proud of him, and brought visitors to lookat him. In ten hours three hundred dozen bottles passed through hishands. This meant that he had attained machine-like perfection. Allwaste movements were eliminated. Every motion of his thin arms, everymovement of a muscle in the thin fingers, was swift and accurate. Heworked at high tension, and the result was that he grew nervous. Atnight his muscles twitched in his sleep, and in the daytime he couldnot relax and rest. He remained keyed up and his muscles continuedto twitch. Also he grew sallow and his lint-cough grew worse. Thenpneumonia laid hold of the feeble lungs within the contracted chest, andhe lost his job in the glass-works. 

Now he had returned to the jute mills where he had first begun withwinding bobbins. But promotion was waiting for him. He was a goodworker. He would next go on the starcher, and later he would go into theloom room. There was nothing after that except increased efficiency. 

The machinery ran faster than when he had first gone to work, and hismind ran slower. He no longer dreamed at all, though his earlier yearshad been full of dreaming. Once he had been in love. It was when hefirst began guiding the cloth over the hot roller, and it was with thedaughter of the superintendent. She was much older than he, a youngwoman, and he had seen her at a distance only a paltry half-dozen times. But that made no difference. On the surface of the cloth stream thatpoured past him, he pictured radiant futures wherein he performedprodigies of toil, invented miraculous machines, won to the mastershipof the mills, and in the end took her in his arms and kissed her soberlyon the brow. 

But that was all in the long ago, before he had grown too old and tiredto love. Also, she had married and gone away, and his mind had gone tosleep. Yet it had been a wonderful experience, and he used often tolook back upon it as other men and women look back upon the time theybelieved in fairies. He had never believed in fairies nor Santa Claus;but he had believed implicitly in the smiling future his imagination hadwrought into the steaming cloth stream. 

He had become a man very early in life. At seven, when he drew his firstwages, began his adolescence. A certain feeling of independence creptup in him, and the relationship between him and his mother changed. Somehow, as an earner and breadwinner, doing his own work in the world, he was more like an equal with her. Manhood, full-blown manhood, hadcome when he was eleven, at which time he had gone to work on the nightshift for six months. No child works on the night shift and remains achild. 

There had been several great events in his life. One of these had beenwhen his mother bought some California prunes. Two others had been thetwo times when she cooked custard. Those had been events. He rememberedthem kindly. And at that time his mother had told him of a blissful dishshe would sometime make--"floating island, " she had called it, "betterthan custard. " For years he had looked forward to the day when he wouldsit down to the table with floating island before him, until at last hehad relegated the idea of it to the limbo of unattainable ideals. 

Once he found a silver quarter lying on the sidewalk. That, also, wasa great event in his life, withal a tragic one. He knew his duty on theinstant the silver flashed on his eyes, before even he had picked it up. At home, as usual, there was not enough to eat, and home he should havetaken it as he did his wages every Saturday night. Right conduct in thiscase was obvious; but he never had any spending of his money, and he wassuffering from candy hunger. He was ravenous for the sweets that only onred-letter days he had ever tasted in his life. 

He did not attempt to deceive himself. He knew it was sin, anddeliberately he sinned when he went on a fifteen-cent candy debauch. Ten cents he saved for a future orgy; but not being accustomed to thecarrying of money, he lost the ten cents. This occurred at the time whenhe was suffering all the torments of conscience, and it was to him anact of divine retribution. He had a frightened sense of the closenessof an awful and wrathful God. God had seen, and God had been swift topunish, denying him even the full wages of sin. 

In memory he always looked back upon that as the one great criminal deedof his life, and at the recollection his conscience always awoke andgave him another twinge. It was the one skeleton in his closet. Also, being so made, and circumstanced, he looked back upon the deed withregret. He was dissatisfied with the manner in which he had spentthe quarter. He could have invested it better, and, out of his laterknowledge of the quickness of God, he would have beaten God out byspending the whole quarter at one fell swoop. In retrospect he spent thequarter a thousand times, and each time to better advantage. 

There was one other memory of the past, dim and faded, but stamped intohis soul everlasting by the savage feet of his father. It was more likea nightmare than a remembered vision of a concrete thing--more like therace-memory of man that makes him fall in his sleep and that goes backto his arboreal ancestry. 

This particular memory never came to Johnny in broad daylight whenhe was wide awake. It came at night, in bed, at the moment that hisconsciousness was sinking down and losing itself in sleep. It alwaysaroused him to frightened wakefulness, and for the moment, in the firstsickening start, it seemed to him that he lay crosswise on the foot ofthe bed. In the bed were the vague forms of his father and mother. Henever saw what his father looked like. He had but one impression of hisfather, and that was that he had savage and pitiless feet. 

His earlier memories lingered with him, but he had no late memories. All days were alike. Yesterday or last year were the same as a thousandyears--or a minute. Nothing ever happened. There were no events to markthe march of time. Time did not march. It stood always still. It wasonly the whirling machines that moved, and they moved nowhere--in spiteof the fact that they moved faster. 

When he was fourteen, he went to work on the starcher. It was a colossalevent. Something had at last happened that could be remembered beyonda night's sleep or a week's pay-day. It marked an era. It was a machineOlympiad, a thing to date from. "When I went to work on the starcher, "or, "after, " or "before I went to work on the starcher, " were sentencesoften on his lips. 

He celebrated his sixteenth birthday by going into the loom room andtaking a loom. Here was an incentive again, for it was piece-work. Andhe excelled, because the clay of him had been moulded by the millsinto the perfect machine. At the end of three months he was running twolooms, and, later, three and four. 

At the end of his second year at the looms he was turning out more yardsthan any other weaver, and more than twice as much as some of the lessskilful ones. And at home things began to prosper as he approached thefull stature of his earning power. Not, however, that his increasedearnings were in excess of need. The children were growing up. They atemore. And they were going to school, and school-books cost money. Andsomehow, the faster he worked, the faster climbed the prices of things. Even the rent went up, though the house had fallen from bad to worsedisrepair. 

He had grown taller; but with his increased height he seemed leanerthan ever. Also, he was more nervous. With the nervousness increased hispeevishness and irritability. The children had learned by many bitterlessons to fight shy of him. His mother respected him for his earningpower, but somehow her respect was tinctured with fear. 

There was no joyousness in life for him. The procession of the days henever saw. The nights he slept away in twitching unconsciousness. The rest of the time he worked, and his consciousness was machineconsciousness. Outside this his mind was a blank. He had no ideals, and but one illusion; namely, that he drank excellent coffee. He was awork-beast. He had no mental life whatever; yet deep down in the cryptsof his mind, unknown to him, were being weighed and sifted every hour ofhis toil, every movement of his hands, every twitch of his muscles, andpreparations were making for a future course of action that would amazehim and all his little world. 

It was in the late spring that he came home from work one night aware ofunusual tiredness. There was a keen expectancy in the air as he sat downto the table, but he did not notice. He went through the meal in moodysilence, mechanically eating what was before him. The children um'dand ah'd and made smacking noises with their mouths. But he was deaf tothem. 

"D'ye know what you're eatin'?" his mother demanded at last, desperately. 

He looked vacantly at the dish before him, and vacantly at her. 

"Floatin' island, " she announced triumphantly. 

"Oh, " he said. 

"Floating island!" the children chorussed loudly. 

"Oh, " he said. And after two or three mouthfuls, he added, "I guess Iain't hungry to-night. "

He dropped the spoon, shoved back his chair, and arose wearily from thetable. 

"An' I guess I'll go to bed. "

His feet dragged more heavily than usual as he crossed the kitchenfloor. Undressing was a Titan's task, a monstrous futility, and he weptweakly as he crawled into bed, one shoe still on. He was aware of arising, swelling something inside his head that made his brain thick andfuzzy. His lean fingers felt as big as his wrist, while in the ends ofthem was a remoteness of sensation vague and fuzzy like his brain. The small of his back ached intolerably. All his bones ached. He achedeverywhere. And in his head began the shrieking, pounding, crashing, roaring of a million looms. All space was filled with flying shuttles. They darted in and out, intricately, amongst the stars. He worked athousand looms himself, and ever they speeded up, faster and faster, andhis brain unwound, faster and faster, and became the thread that fed thethousand flying shuttles. 

He did not go to work next morning. He was too busy weaving colossallyon the thousand looms that ran inside his head. His mother went to work, but first she sent for the doctor. It was a severe attack of la grippe, he said. Jennie served as nurse and carried out his instructions. 

It was a very severe attack, and it was a week before Johnny dressed andtottered feebly across the floor. Another week, the doctor said, and hewould be fit to return to work. The foreman of the loom room visited himon Sunday afternoon, the first day of his convalescence. The best weaverin the room, the foreman told his mother. His job would be held for him. He could come back to work a week from Monday. 

"Why don't you thank 'im, Johnny?" his mother asked anxiously. 

"He's ben that sick he ain't himself yet, " she explained apologeticallyto the visitor. 

Johnny sat hunched up and gazing steadfastly at the floor. He sat in thesame position long after the foreman had gone. It was warm outdoors, and he sat on the stoop in the afternoon. Sometimes his lips moved. Heseemed lost in endless calculations. 

Next morning, after the day grew warm, he took his seat on the stoop. Hehad pencil and paper this time with which to continue his calculations, and he calculated painfully and amazingly. 

"What comes after millions?" he asked at noon, when Will came home fromschool. "An' how d'ye work 'em?"

That afternoon finished his task. Each day, but without paper andpencil, he returned to the stoop. He was greatly absorbed in the onetree that grew across the street. He studied it for hours at a time, andwas unusually interested when the wind swayed its branches and flutteredits leaves. Throughout the week he seemed lost in a great communionwith himself. On Sunday, sitting on the stoop, he laughed aloud, severaltimes, to the perturbation of his mother, who had not heard him laughfor years. 

Next morning, in the early darkness, she came to his bed to rouse him. He had had his fill of sleep all the week, and awoke easily. He made nostruggle, nor did he attempt to hold on to the bedding when she strippedit from him. He lay quietly, and spoke quietly. 

"It ain't no use, ma. "

"You'll be late, " she said, under the impression that he was stillstupid with sleep. 

"I'm awake, ma, an' I tell you it ain't no use. You might as well lemmealone. I ain't goin' to git up. "

"But you'll lose your job!" she cried. 

"I ain't goin' to git up, " he repeated in a strange, passionless voice. 

She did not go to work herself that morning. This was sicknessbeyond any sickness she had ever known. Fever and delirium she couldunderstand; but this was insanity. She pulled the bedding up over himand sent Jennie for the doctor. 

When that person arrived, Johnny was sleeping gently, and gently heawoke and allowed his pulse to be taken. 

"Nothing the matter with him, " the doctor reported. "Badly debilitated, that's all. Not much meat on his bones. "

"He's always been that way, " his mother volunteered. 

"Now go 'way, ma, an' let me finish my snooze. "

Johnny spoke sweetly and placidly, and sweetly and placidly he rolledover on his side and went to sleep. 

At ten o'clock he awoke and dressed himself. He walked out into thekitchen, where he found his mother with a frightened expression on herface. 

"I'm goin' away, ma, " he announced, "an' I jes' want to say good-bye. "

She threw her apron over her head and sat down suddenly and wept. Hewaited patiently. 

"I might a-known it, " she was sobbing. 

"Where?" she finally asked, removing the apron from her head and gazingup at him with a stricken face in which there was little curiosity. 

"I don't know--anywhere. "

As he spoke, the tree across the street appeared with dazzlingbrightness on his inner vision. It seemed to lurk just under hiseyelids, and he could see it whenever he wished. 

"An' your job?" she quavered. 

"I ain't never goin' to work again. "

"My God, Johnny!" she wailed, "don't say that!"

What he had said was blasphemy to her. As a mother who hears her childdeny God, was Johnny's mother shocked by his words. 

"What's got into you, anyway?" she demanded, with a lame attempt atimperativeness. 

"Figures, " he answered. "Jes' figures. I've ben doin' a lot of figurin'this week, an' it's most surprisin'. "

"I don't see what that's got to do with it, " she sniffled. 

Johnny smiled patiently, and his mother was aware of a distinct shock atthe persistent absence of his peevishness and irritability. 

"I'll show you, " he said. "I'm plum' tired out. What makes me tired?Moves. I've ben movin' ever since I was born. I'm tired of movin', an' Iain't goin' to move any more. Remember when I worked in the glass-house?I used to do three hundred dozen a day. Now I reckon I made about tendifferent moves to each bottle. That's thirty-six thousan' moves a day. Ten days, three hundred an' sixty thousan' moves. One month, one millionan' eighty thousan' moves. Chuck out the eighty thousan'"--he spoke withthe complacent beneficence of a philanthropist--"chuck out the eightythousan', that leaves a million moves a month--twelve million moves ayear. 

"At the looms I'm movin' twic'st as much. That makes twenty-five millionmoves a year, an' it seems to me I've ben a movin' that way 'most amillion years. 

"Now this week I ain't moved at all. I ain't made one move in hours an'hours. I tell you it was swell, jes' settin' there, hours an' hours, an' doin' nothin'. I ain't never ben happy before. I never had any time. I've ben movin' all the time. That ain't no way to be happy. An' I ain'tgoing to do it any more. I'm jes' goin' to set, an' set, an' rest, an'rest, and then rest some more. "

"But what's goin' to come of Will an' the children?" she askeddespairingly. 

"That's it, 'Will an' the children, '" he repeated. 

But there was no bitterness in his voice. He had long known his mother'sambition for the younger boy, but the thought of it no longer rankled. Nothing mattered any more. Not even that. 

"I know, ma, what you've ben plannin' for Will--keepin' him in school tomake a book-keeper out of him. But it ain't no use, I've quit. He's gotto go to work. "

"An' after I have brung you up the way I have, " she wept, starting tocover her head with the apron and changing her mind. 

"You never brung me up, " he answered with sad kindliness. "I brungmyself up, ma, an' I brung up Will. He's bigger'n me, an' heavier, an'taller. When I was a kid, I reckon I didn't git enough to eat. When hecome along an' was a kid, I was workin' an' earnin' grub for him too. But that's done with. Will can go to work, same as me, or he can go tohell, I don't care which. I'm tired. I'm goin' now. Ain't you goin' tosay goodbye?"

She made no reply. The apron had gone over her head again, and she wascrying. He paused a moment in the doorway. 

"I'm sure I done the best I knew how, " she was sobbing. 

He passed out of the house and down the street. A wan delight cameinto his face at the sight of the lone tree. "Jes' ain't goin' to donothin', " he said to himself, half aloud, in a crooning tone. He glancedwistfully up at the sky, but the bright sun dazzled and blinded him. 

It was a long walk he took, and he did not walk fast. It took him pastthe jute-mill. The muffled roar of the loom room came to his ears, andhe smiled. It was a gentle, placid smile. He hated no one, not even thepounding, shrieking machines. There was no bitterness in him, nothingbut an inordinate hunger for rest. 

The houses and factories thinned out and the open spaces increased ashe approached the country. At last the city was behind him, and he waswalking down a leafy lane beside the railroad track. He did not walklike a man. He did not look like a man. He was a travesty of the human. It was a twisted and stunted and nameless piece of life that shambledlike a sickly ape, arms loose-hanging, stoop-shouldered, narrow-chested, grotesque and terrible. 

He passed by a small railroad station and lay down in the grass under atree. All afternoon he lay there. Sometimes he dozed, with muscles thattwitched in his sleep. When awake, he lay without movement, watching thebirds or looking up at the sky through the branches of the tree abovehim. Once or twice he laughed aloud, but without relevance to anythinghe had seen or felt. 

After twilight had gone, in the first darkness of the night, a freighttrain rumbled into the station. When the engine was switching cars on tothe side-track, Johnny crept along the side of the train. He pulled openthe side-door of an empty box-car and awkwardly and laboriously climbedin. He closed the door. The engine whistled. Johnny was lying down, andin the darkness he smiled. 

A WICKED WOMAN

It was because she had broken with Billy that Loretta had come visitingto Santa Clara. Billy could not understand. His sister had reported thathe had walked the floor and cried all night. Loretta had not slept allnight either, while she had wept most of the night. Daisy knew this, because it was in her arms that the weeping had been done. And Daisy'shusband, Captain Kitt, knew, too. The tears of Loretta, and thecomforting by Daisy, had lost him some sleep. 

Now Captain Kitt did not like to lose sleep. Neither did he want Lorettato marry Billy--nor anybody else. It was Captain Kitt's belief thatDaisy needed the help of her younger sister in the household. But hedid not say this aloud. Instead, he always insisted that Loretta was tooyoung to think of marriage. So it was Captain Kitt's idea that Lorettashould be packed off on a visit to Mrs. Hemingway. There wouldn't be anyBilly there. 

Before Loretta had been at Santa Clara a week, she was convinced thatCaptain Kitt's idea was a good one. In the first place, though Billywouldn't believe it, she did not want to marry Billy. And in the secondplace, though Captain Kitt wouldn't believe it, she did not want toleave Daisy. By the time Loretta had been at Santa Clara two weeks, shewas absolutely certain that she did not want to marry Billy. But she wasnot so sure about not wanting to leave Daisy. Not that she loved Daisyless, but that she--had doubts. 

The day of Loretta's arrival, a nebulous plan began shaping itself inMrs. Hemingway's brain. The second day she remarked to Jack Hemingway, her husband, that Loretta was so innocent a young thing that were it notfor her sweet guilelessness she would be positively stupid. In proofof which, Mrs. Hemingway told her husband several things that made himchuckle. By the third day Mrs. Hemingway's plan had taken recognizableform. Then it was that she composed a letter. On the envelope she wrote:"Mr. Edward Bashford, Athenian Club, San Francisco. "

"Dear Ned, " the letter began. She had once been violently loved by himfor three weeks in her pre-marital days. But she had covenanted herselfto Jack Hemingway, who had prior claims, and her heart as well; and NedBashford had philosophically not broken his heart over it. He merelyadded the experience to a large fund of similarly collected data out ofwhich he manufactured philosophy. Artistically and temperamentally hewas a Greek--a tired Greek. He was fond of quoting from Nietzsche, intoken that he, too, had passed through the long sickness that followsupon the ardent search for truth; that he too had emerged, tooexperienced, too shrewd, too profound, ever again to be afflicted by themadness of youths in their love of truth. "'To worship appearance, '" heoften quoted; "'to believe in forms, in tones, in words, in the wholeOlympus of appearance!'" This particular excerpt he always concludedwith, "'Those Greeks were superficial--OUT OF PROFUNDITY!'"

He was a fairly young Greek, jaded and worn. Women were faithless andunveracious, he held--at such times that he had relapses and descendedto pessimism from his wonted high philosophical calm. He did not believein the truth of women; but, faithful to his German master, he didnot strip from them the airy gauzes that veiled their untruth. He wascontent to accept them as appearances and to make the best of it. He wassuperficial--OUT OF PROFUNDITY. 

"Jack says to be sure to say to you, 'good swimming, '" Mrs. Hemingwaywrote in her letter; "and also 'to bring your fishing duds along. '" Mrs. Hemingway wrote other things in the letter. She told him that at lastshe was prepared to exhibit to him an absolutely true, unsullied, andinnocent woman. "A more guileless, immaculate bud of womanhood neverblushed on the planet, " was one of the several ways in which she phrasedthe inducement. And to her husband she said triumphantly, "If I don'tmarry Ned off this time--" leaving unstated the terrible alternativethat she lacked either vocabulary to express or imagination to conceive. 

Contrary to all her forebodings, Loretta found that she was not unhappyat Santa Clara. Truly, Billy wrote to her every day, but his letterswere less distressing than his presence. Also, the ordeal of being awayfrom Daisy was not so severe as she had expected. For the first time inher life she was not lost in eclipse in the blaze of Daisy's brilliantand mature personality. Under such favourable circumstances Lorettacame rapidly to the front, while Mrs. Hemingway modestly and shamelesslyretreated into the background. 

Loretta began to discover that she was not a pale orb shining byreflection. Quite unconsciously she became a small centre of things. When she was at the piano, there was some one to turn the pages forher and to express preferences for certain songs. When she dropped herhandkerchief, there was some one to pick it up. And there was some oneto accompany her in ramblings and flower gatherings. Also, she learnedto cast flies in still pools and below savage riffles, and how not toentangle silk lines and gut-leaders with the shrubbery. 

Jack Hemingway did not care to teach beginners, and fished much byhimself, or not at all, thus giving Ned Bashford ample time in whichto consider Loretta as an appearance. As such, she was all that hisphilosophy demanded. Her blue eyes had the direct gaze of a boy, andout of his profundity he delighted in them and forbore to shudder at theduplicity his philosophy bade him to believe lurked in their depths. Shehad the grace of a slender flower, the fragility of colour and line offine china, in all of which he pleasured greatly, without thought of theLife Force palpitating beneath and in spite of Bernard Shaw--in whom hebelieved. 

Loretta burgeoned. She swiftly developed personality. She discovereda will of her own and wishes of her own that were not everlastinglyentwined with the will and the wishes of Daisy. She was petted by JackHemingway, spoiled by Alice Hemingway, and devotedly attended by NedBashford. They encouraged her whims and laughed at her follies, whileshe developed the pretty little tyrannies that are latent in all prettyand delicate women. Her environment acted as a soporific upon herancient desire always to live with Daisy. This desire no longer proddedher as in the days of her companionship with Billy. The more she saw ofBilly, the more certain she had been that she could not live awayfrom Daisy. The more she saw of Ned Bashford, the more she forgot herpressing need of Daisy. 

Ned Bashford likewise did some forgetting. He confused superficialitywith profundity, and entangled appearance with reality until heaccounted them one. Loretta was different from other women. There was nomasquerade about her. She was real. He said as much to Mrs. Hemingway, and more, who agreed with him and at the same time caught her husband'seyelid drooping down for the moment in an unmistakable wink. 

It was at this time that Loretta received a letter from Billy that wassomewhat different from his others. In the main, like all his letters, it was pathological. It was a long recital of symptoms and sufferings, his nervousness, his sleeplessness, and the state of his heart. Thenfollowed reproaches, such as he had never made before. They were sharpenough to make her weep, and true enough to put tragedy into her face. This tragedy she carried down to the breakfast table. It made Jack andMrs. Hemingway speculative, and it worried Ned. They glanced to him forexplanation, but he shook his head. 

"I'll find out to-night, " Mrs. Hemingway said to her husband. 

But Ned caught Loretta in the afternoon in the big living-room. Shetried to turn away. He caught her hands, and she faced him with wetlashes and trembling lips. He looked at her, silently and kindly. Thelashes grew wetter. 

"There, there, don't cry, little one, " he said soothingly. 

He put his arm protectingly around her shoulder. And to his shoulder, like a tired child, she turned her face. He thrilled in ways unusual fora Greek who has recovered from the long sickness. 

"Oh, Ned, " she sobbed on his shoulder, "if you only knew how wicked Iam!"

He smiled indulgently, and breathed in a great breath freighted with thefragrance of her hair. He thought of his world-experience of women, anddrew another long breath. There seemed to emanate from her the perfectsweetness of a child--"the aura of a white soul, " was the way he phrasedit to himself. 

Then he noticed that her sobs were increasing. 

"What's the matter, little one?" he asked pettingly and almostpaternally. "Has Jack been bullying you? Or has your dearly belovedsister failed to write?"

She did not answer, and he felt that he really must kiss her hair, thathe could not be responsible if the situation continued much longer. 

"Tell me, " he said gently, "and we'll see what I can do. "

"I can't. You will despise me. --Oh, Ned, I am so ashamed!"

He laughed incredulously, and lightly touched her hair with his lips--solightly that she did not know. 

"Dear little one, let us forget all about it, whatever it is. I want totell you how I love--"

She uttered a sharp cry that was all delight, and then moaned--

"Too late!"

"Too late?" he echoed in surprise. 

"Oh, why did I? Why did I?" she was moaning. 

He was aware of a swift chill at his heart. 

"What?" he asked. 

"Oh, I. .. He. .. Billy. 

"I am such a wicked woman, Ned. I know you will never speak to meagain. "

"This--er--this Billy, " he began haltingly. "He is your brother?"

"No. .. He. .. I didn't know. I was so young. I could not help it. Oh, Ishall go mad! I shall go mad!"

It was then that Loretta felt his shoulder and the encircling arm becomelimp. He drew away from her gently, and gently he deposited her in abig chair, where she buried her face and sobbed afresh. He twisted hismoustache fiercely, then drew up another chair and sat down. 

"I--I do not understand, " he said. 

"I am so unhappy, " she wailed. 

"Why unhappy?"

"Because. .. He. .. He wants me to marry him. "

His face cleared on the instant, and he placed a hand soothingly onhers. 

"That should not make any girl unhappy, " he remarked sagely. "Becauseyou don't love him is no reason--of course, you don't love him?"

Loretta shook her head and shoulders in a vigorous negative. 

"What?"

Bashford wanted to make sure. 

"No, " she asserted explosively. "I don't love Billy! I don't want tolove Billy!"

"Because you don't love him, " Bashford resumed with confidence, "is noreason that you should be unhappy just because he has proposed to you. "

She sobbed again, and from the midst of her sobs she cried--

"That's the trouble. I wish I did love him. Oh, I wish I were dead!"

"Now, my dear child, you are worrying yourself over trifles. " His otherhand crossed over after its mate and rested on hers. "Women do it everyday. Because you have changed your mind or did not know your mind, because you have--to use an unnecessarily harsh word--jilted a man--"

"Jilted!" She had raised her head and was looking at him withtear-dimmed eyes. "Oh, Ned, if that were all!"

"All?" he asked in a hollow voice, while his hands slowly retreated fromhers. He was about to speak further, then remained silent. 

"But I don't want to marry him, " Loretta broke forth protestingly. 

"Then I shouldn't, " he counselled. 

"But I ought to marry him. "

"OUGHT to marry him?"

She nodded. 

"That is a strong word. "

"I know it is, " she acquiesced, while she strove to control hertrembling lips. Then she spoke more calmly. "I am a wicked woman, aterribly wicked woman. No one knows how wicked I am--except Billy. "

There was a pause. Ned Bashford's face was grave, and he looked queerlyat Loretta. 

"He--Billy knows?" he asked finally. 

A reluctant nod and flaming cheeks was the reply. 

He debated with himself for a while, seeming, like a diver, to bepreparing himself for the plunge. 

"Tell me about it. " He spoke very firmly. "You must tell me all of it. "

"And will you--ever--forgive me?" she asked in a faint, small voice. 

He hesitated, drew a long breath, and made the plunge. 

"Yes, " he said desperately. "I'll forgive you. Go ahead. "

"There was no one to tell me, " she began. "We were with each other somuch. I did not know anything of the world--then. "

She paused to meditate. Bashford was biting his lip impatiently. 

"If I had only known--"

She paused again. 

"Yes, go on, " he urged. 

"We were together almost every evening. "

"Billy?" he demanded, with a savageness that startled her. 

"Yes, of course, Billy. We were with each other so much. .. If I had onlyknown. .. There was no one to tell me. .. I was so young--"

Her lips parted as though to speak further, and she regarded himanxiously. 

"The scoundrel!"

With the explosion Ned Bashford was on his feet, no longer a tiredGreek, but a violently angry young man. 

"Billy is not a scoundrel; he is a good man, " Loretta defended, with afirmness that surprised Bashford. 

"I suppose you'll be telling me next that it was all your fault, " hesaid sarcastically. 

She nodded. 

"What?" he shouted. 

"It was all my fault, " she said steadily. "I should never have let him. I was to blame. "

Bashford ceased from his pacing up and down, and when he spoke, hisvoice was resigned. 

"All right, " he said. "I don't blame you in the least, Loretta. And youhave been very honest. But Billy is right, and you are wrong. You mustget married. "

"To Billy?" she asked, in a dim, far-away voice. 

"Yes, to Billy. I'll see to it. Where does he live? I'll make him. "

"But I don't want to marry Billy!" she cried out in alarm. "Oh, Ned, youwon't do that?"

"I shall, " he answered sternly. "You must. And Billy must. Do youunderstand?"

Loretta buried her face in the cushioned chair back, and broke into apassionate storm of sobs. 

All that Bashford could make out at first, as he listened, was: "But Idon't want to leave Daisy! I don't want to leave Daisy!"

He paced grimly back and forth, then stopped curiously to listen. 

"How was I to know?--Boo--hoo, " Loretta was crying. "He didn't tell me. Nobody else ever kissed me. I never dreamed a kiss could be soterrible. .. Until, boo-hoo. .. Until he wrote to me. I only got theletter this morning. "

His face brightened. It seemed as though light was dawning on him. 

"Is that what you're crying about?"

"N--no. "

His heart sank. 

"Then what are you crying about?" he asked in a hopeless voice. 

"Because you said I had to marry Billy. And I don't want to marry Billy. I don't want to leave Daisy. I don't know what I want. I wish I weredead. "

He nerved himself for another effort. 

"Now look here, Loretta, be sensible. What is this about kisses. Youhaven't told me everything?"

"I--I don't want to tell you everything. "

She looked at him beseechingly in the silence that fell. 

"Must I?" she quavered finally. 

"You must, " he said imperatively. "You must tell me everything. "

"Well, then. .. Must I?"

"You must. "

"He. .. I. .. We. .. " she began flounderingly. Then blurted out, "I lethim, and he kissed me. "

"Go on, " Bashford commanded desperately. 

"That's all, " she answered. 

"All?" There was a vast incredulity in his voice. 

"All?" In her voice was an interrogation no less vast. 

"I mean--er--nothing worse?" He was overwhelmingly aware of his ownawkwardness. 

"Worse?" She was frankly puzzled. "As though there could be! Billysaid--"

"When did he say it?" Bashford demanded abruptly. 

"In his letter I got this morning. Billy said that my. .. Our. .. Ourkisses were terrible if we didn't get married. "

Bashford's head was swimming. 

"What else did Billy say?" he asked. 

"He said that when a woman allowed a man to kiss her, she always marriedhim--that it was terrible if she didn't. It was the custom, he said;and I say it is a bad, wicked custom, and I don't like it. I know I'mterrible, " she added defiantly, "but I can't help it. "

Bashford absent-mindedly brought out a cigarette. 

"Do you mind if I smoke?" he asked, as he struck a match. 

Then he came to himself. 

"I beg your pardon, " he cried, flinging away match and cigarette. "Idon't want to smoke. I didn't mean that at all. What I mean is--"

He bent over Loretta, caught her hands in his, then sat on the arm ofthe chair and softly put one arm around her. 

"Loretta, I am a fool. I mean it. And I mean something more. I want youto be my wife. "

He waited anxiously in the pause that followed. 

"You might answer me, " he urged. 

"I will. .. If--"

"Yes, go on. If what?"

"If I don't have to marry Billy. "

"You can't marry both of us, " he almost shouted. 

"And it isn't the custom. .. What. .. What Billy said?"

"No, it isn't the custom. Now, Loretta, will you marry me?"

"Don't be angry with me, " she pouted demurely. 

He gathered her into his arms and kissed her. 

"I wish it were the custom, " she said in a faint voice, from themidst of the embrace, "because then I'd have to marry you, Ned dear. .. Wouldn't I?"

JUST MEAT

He strolled to the corner and glanced up and down the intersectingstreet, but saw nothing save the oases of light shed by the street lampsat the successive crossings. Then he strolled back the way he had come. He was a shadow of a man, sliding noiselessly and without undue movementthrough the semi-darkness. Also he was very alert, like a wild animal inthe jungle, keenly perceptive and receptive. The movement of another inthe darkness about him would need to have been more shadowy than he tohave escaped him. 

In addition to the running advertisement of the state of affairs carriedto him by his senses, he had a subtler perception, a FEEL, of theatmosphere around him. He knew that the house in front of which hepaused for a moment, contained children. Yet by no willed effort ofperception did he have this knowledge. For that matter, he was not evenaware that he knew, so occult was the impression. Yet, did a momentarise in which action, in relation to that house, were imperative, hewould have acted on the assumption that it contained children. He wasnot aware of all that he knew about the neighbourhood. 

In the same way, he knew not how, he knew that no danger threatened inthe footfalls that came up the cross street. Before he saw the walker, he knew him for a belated pedestrian hurrying home. The walker cameinto view at the crossing and disappeared on up the street. The man thatwatched, noted a light that flared up in the window of a house on thecorner, and as it died down he knew it for an expiring match. This wasconscious identification of familiar phenomena, and through his mindflitted the thought, "Wanted to know what time. " In another house oneroom was lighted. The light burned dimly and steadily, and he had thefeel that it was a sick-room. 

He was especially interested in a house across the street in the middleof the block. To this house he paid most attention. No matter whatway he looked, nor what way he walked, his looks and his steps alwaysreturned to it. Except for an open window above the porch, there wasnothing unusual about the house. Nothing came in nor out. Nothinghappened. There were no lighted windows, nor had lights appeared anddisappeared in any of the windows. Yet it was the central point of hisconsideration. He rallied to it each time after a divination of thestate of the neighbourhood. 

Despite his feel of things, he was not confident. He was supremelyconscious of the precariousness of his situation. Though unperturbed bythe footfalls of the chance pedestrian, he was as keyed up and sensitiveand ready to be startled as any timorous deer. He was aware ofthe possibility of other intelligences prowling about in thedarkness--intelligences similar to his own in movement, perception, anddivination. 

Far down the street he caught a glimpse of something that moved. And heknew it was no late home-goer, but menace and danger. He whistled twiceto the house across the street, then faded away shadow-like to thecorner and around the corner. Here he paused and looked about himcarefully. Reassured, he peered back around the corner and studied theobject that moved and that was coming nearer. He had divined aright. Itwas a policeman. 

The man went down the cross street to the next corner, from the shelterof which he watched the corner he had just left. He saw the policemanpass by, going straight on up the street. He paralleled the policeman'scourse, and from the next corner again watched him go by; then hereturned the way he had come. He whistled once to the house across thestreet, and after a time whistled once again. There was reassurancein the whistle, just as there had been warning in the previous doublewhistle. 

He saw a dark bulk outline itself on the roof of the porch and slowlydescend a pillar. Then it came down the steps, passed through the smalliron gate, and went down the sidewalk, taking on the form of a man. Hethat watched kept on his own side of the street and moved on abreastto the corner, where he crossed over and joined the other. He was quitesmall alongside the man he accosted. 

"How'd you make out, Matt?" he asked. 

The other grunted indistinctly, and walked on in silence a few steps. 

"I reckon I landed the goods, " he said. 

Jim chuckled in the darkness, and waited for further information. Theblocks passed by under their feet, and he grew impatient. 

"Well, how about them goods?" he asked. "What kind of a haul did youmake, anyway?"

"I was too busy to figger it out, but it's fat. I can tell you thatmuch, Jim, it's fat. I don't dast to think how fat it is. Wait till weget to the room. "

Jim looked at him keenly under the street lamp of the next crossing, and saw that his face was a trifle grim and that he carried his left armpeculiarly. 

"What's the matter with your arm?" he demanded. 

"The little cuss bit me. Hope I don't get hydrophoby. Folks getshydrophoby from manbite sometimes, don't they?"

"Gave you fight, eh?" Jim asked encouragingly. 

The other grunted. 

"You're harder'n hell to get information from, " Jim burst out irritably. "Tell us about it. You ain't goin' to lose money just a-tellin' a guy. "

"I guess I choked him some, " came the answer. Then, by way ofexplanation, "He woke up on me. "

"You did it neat. I never heard a sound. "

"Jim, " the other said with seriousness, "it's a hangin' matter. I fixed 'm. I had to. He woke up on me. You an' me's got to do somelayin' low for a spell. "

Jim gave a low whistle of comprehension. 

"Did you hear me whistle?" he asked suddenly. 

"Sure. I was all done. I was just comin' out. "

"It was a bull. But he wasn't on a little bit. Went right by an' kepta-paddin' the hoof out a sight. Then I come back an' gave you thewhistle. What made you take so long after that?"

"I was waitin' to make sure, " Matt explained. "I was mighty glad whenI heard you whistle again. It's hard work waitin'. I just sat there an'thought an' thought. .. Oh, all kinds' of things. It's remarkable whata fellow'll think about. And then there was a darn cat that kept movin'around the house all' botherin' me with its noises. "

"An' it's fat!" Jim exclaimed irrelevantly and with joy. 

"I'm sure tellin' you, Jim, it's fat. I'm plum' anxious for another lookat 'em. "

Unconsciously the two men quickened their pace. Yet they did not relaxfrom their caution. Twice they changed their course in order to avoidpolicemen, and they made very sure that they were not observed when theydived into the dark hallway of a cheap rooming house down town. 

Not until they had gained their own room on the top floor, did theyscratch a match. While Jim lighted a lamp, Matt locked the door andthrew the bolts into place. As he turned, he noticed that his partnerwas waiting expectantly. Matt smiled to himself at the other'seagerness. 

"Them search-lights is all right, " he said, drawing forth a small pocketelectric lamp and examining it. "But we got to get a new battery. It'srunnin' pretty weak. I thought once or twice it'd leave me in the dark. Funny arrangements in that house. I near got lost. His room was on theleft, an' that fooled me some. "

"I told you it was on the left, " Jim interrupted. 

"You told me it was on the right, " Matt went on. "I guess I know whatyou told me, an' there's the map you drew. "

Fumbling in his vest pocket, he drew out a folded slip of paper. As heunfolded it, Jim bent over and looked. 

"I did make a mistake, " he confessed. 

"You sure did. It got me guessin' some for a while. "

"But it don't matter now, " Jim cried. "Let's see what you got. "

"It does matter, " Matt retorted. "It matters a lot. .. To me. I've gotto run all the risk. I put my head in the trap while you stay on thestreet. You got to get on to yourself an' be more careful. All right, I'll show you. "

He dipped loosely into his trousers pocket and brought out a handful ofsmall diamonds. He spilled them out in a blazing stream on the greasytable. Jim let out a great oath. 

"That's nothing, " Matt said with triumphant complacence. "I ain't begunyet. "

From one pocket after another he continued bringing forth the spoil. There were many diamonds wrapped in chamois skin that were larger thanthose in the first handful. From one pocket he brought out a handful ofvery small cut gems. 

"Sun dust, " he remarked, as he spilled them on the table in a space bythemselves. 

Jim examined them. 

"Just the same, they retail for a couple of dollars each, " he said. "Isthat all?"

"Ain't it enough?" the other demanded in an aggrieved tone. 

"Sure it is, " Jim answered with unqualified approval. "Better'n Iexpected. I wouldn't take a cent less than ten thousan' for the bunch. "

"Ten thousan', " Matt sneered. "They're worth twic't that, an' I don'tknow anything about joolery, either. Look at that big boy!"

He picked it out from the sparkling heap and held it near to the lampwith the air of an expert, weighing and judging. 

"Worth a thousan' all by its lonely, " was Jim's quicker judgment. 

"A thousan' your grandmother, " was Matt's scornful rejoinder. "Youcouldn't buy it for three. "

"Wake me up! I'm dreamin'!" The sparkle of the gems was in Jim's eyes, and he began sorting out the larger diamonds and examining them. "We'rerich men, Matt--we'll be regular swells. "

"It'll take years to get rid of 'em, " was Matt's more practical thought. 

"But think how we'll live! Nothin' to do but spend the money an' go ongettin' rid of em. "

Matt's eyes were beginning to sparkle, though sombrely, as hisphlegmatic nature woke up. 

"I told you I didn't dast think how fat it was, " he murmured in a lowvoice. 

"What a killin'! What a killin'!" was the other's more ecstaticutterance. 

"I almost forgot, " Matt said, thrusting his hand into his inside coatpocket. 

A string of large pearls emerged from wrappings of tissue paper andchamois skin. Jim scarcely glanced at them. 

"They're worth money, " he said, and returned to the diamonds. 

A silence fell on the two men. Jim played with the gems, running themthrough his fingers, sorting them into piles, and spreading them outflat and wide. He was a slender, weazened man, nervous, irritable, high-strung, and anaemic--a typical child of the gutter, withunbeautiful twisted features, small-eyed, with face and mouthperpetually and feverishly hungry, brutish in a cat-like way, stamped tothe core with degeneracy. 

Matt did not finger the diamonds. He sat with chin on hands and elbowson table, blinking heavily at the blazing array. He was in every way acontrast to the other. No city had bred him. He was heavy-muscled andhairy, gorilla-like in strength and aspect. For him there was no unseenworld. His eyes were full and wide apart, and there seemed in thema certain bold brotherliness. They inspired confidence. But a closerinspection would have shown that his eyes were just a trifle too full, just a shade too wide apart. He exceeded, spilled over the limits ofnormality, and his features told lies about the man beneath. 

"The bunch is worth fifty thousan', " Jim remarked suddenly. 

"A hundred thousan', " Matt said. 

The silence returned and endured a long time, to be broken again by Jim. 

"What in hell was he doin' with 'em all at the house?--that's whatI want to know. I'd a-thought he'd kept 'em in the safe down at thestore. "

Matt had just been considering the vision of the throttled man as he hadlast looked upon him in the dim light of the electric lantern; but hedid not start at the mention of him. 

"There's no tellin', " he answered. "He might a-ben gettin' ready tochuck his pardner. He might a-pulled out in the mornin' for partsunknown, if we hadn't happened along. I guess there's just as manythieves among honest men as there is among thieves. You read about suchthings in the papers, Jim. Pardners is always knifin' each other. "

A queer, nervous look came into the other's eyes. Matt did not betraythat he noted it, though he said--

"What was you thinkin' about, Jim?"

Jim was a trifle awkward for the moment. 

"Nothin', " he answered. "Only I was thinkin' just how funny it was--allthem jools at his house. What made you ask?"

"Nothin'. I was just wonderin', that was all. "

The silence settled down, broken by an occasional low and nervous giggleon the part of Jim. He was overcome by the spread of gems. It was notthat he felt their beauty. He was unaware that they were beautiful inthemselves. But in them his swift imagination visioned the joys of lifethey would buy, and all the desires and appetites of his diseased mindand sickly flesh were tickled by the promise they extended. He buildedwondrous, orgy-haunted castles out of their brilliant fires, and wasappalled at what he builded. Then it was that he giggled. It was alltoo impossible to be real. And yet there they blazed on the table beforehim, fanning the flame of the lust of him, and he giggled again. 

"I guess we might as well count 'em, " Matt said suddenly, tearinghimself away from his own visions. "You watch me an' see thatit's square, because you an' me has got to be on the square, Jim. Understand?"

Jim did not like this, and betrayed it in his eyes, while Matt did notlike what he saw in his partner's eyes. 

"Understand?" Matt repeated, almost menacingly. 

"Ain't we always ben square?" the other replied, on the defensivebecause of the treachery already whispering in him. 

"It don't cost nothin', bein' square in hard times, " Matt retorted. "It's bein' square in prosperity that counts. When we ain't got nothin', we can't help bein' square. We're prosperous now, an' we've got to bebusiness men--honest business men. Understand?"

"That's the talk for me, " Jim approved, but deep down in the meagre soulof him, --and in spite of him, --wanton and lawless thoughts were stirringlike chained beasts. 

Matt stepped to the food shelf behind the two-burner kerosene cookingstove. He emptied the tea from a paper bag, and from a second bagemptied some red peppers. Returning to the table with the bags, he putinto them the two sizes of small diamonds. Then he counted the largegems and wrapped them in their tissue paper and chamois skin. 

"Hundred an' forty-seven good-sized ones, " was his inventory; "twentyreal big ones; two big boys and one whopper; an' a couple of fistfuls ofteeny ones an' dust. "

He looked at Jim. 

"Correct, " was the response. 

He wrote the count out on a slip of memorandum paper, and made a copy ofit, giving one slip to his partner and retaining the other. 

"Just for reference, " he said. 

Again he had recourse to the food shelf, where he emptied the sugar froma large paper bag. Into this he thrust the diamonds, large and small, wrapped it up in a bandanna handkerchief, and stowed it away under hispillow. Then he sat down on the edge of the bed and took off his shoes. 

"An' you think they're worth a hundred thousan'?" Jim asked, pausing andlooking up from the unlacing of his shoe. 

"Sure, " was the answer. "I seen a dance-house girl down in Arizona once, with some big sparklers on her. They wasn't real. She said if they wasshe wouldn't be dancin'. Said they'd be worth all of fifty thousan', an'she didn't have a dozen of 'em all told. "

"Who'd work for a livin'?" Jim triumphantly demanded. "Pick an' shovelwork!" he sneered. "Work like a dog all my life, an' save all my wages, an' I wouldn't have half as much as we got tonight. "

"Dish washin's about your measure, an' you couldn't get more'n twenty amonth an' board. Your figgers is 'way off, but your point is well taken. Let them that likes it, work. I rode range for thirty a month when I wasyoung an' foolish. Well, I'm older, an' I ain't ridin' range. "

He got into bed on one side. Jim put out the light and followed him inon the other side. 

"How's your arm feel?" Jim queried amiably. 

Such concern was unusual, and Matt noted it, and replied--

"I guess there's no danger of hydrophoby. What made you ask?"

Jim felt in himself a guilty stir, and under his breath he cursed theother's way of asking disagreeable questions; but aloud he answered--

"Nothin', only you seemed scared of it at first. What are you goin' todo with your share, Matt?"

"Buy a cattle ranch in Arizona an' set down an' pay other men to riderange for me. There's some several I'd like to see askin' a job from me, damn them! An' now you shut your face, Jim. It'll be some time before Ibuy that ranch. Just now I'm goin' to sleep. "

But Jim lay long awake, nervous and twitching, rolling about restlesslyand rolling himself wide awake every time he dozed. The diamonds stillblazed under his eyelids, and the fire of them hurt. Matt, in spite ofhis heavy nature, slept lightly, like a wild animal alert in its sleep;and Jim noticed, every time he moved, that his partner's body movedsufficiently to show that it had received the impression and that it wastrembling on the verge of awakening. For that matter, Jim did notknow whether or not, frequently, the other was awake. Once, quietly, betokening complete consciousness, Matt said to him: "Aw, go to sleep, Jim. Don't worry about them jools. They'll keep. " And Jim had thoughtthat at that particular moment Matt had been surely asleep. 

In the late morning Matt was awake with Jim's first movement, andthereafter he awoke and dozed with him until midday, when they got uptogether and began dressing. 

"I'm goin' out to get a paper an' some bread, " Matt said. "You boil thecoffee. "

As Jim listened, unconsciously his gaze left Matt's face and rovedto the pillow, beneath which was the bundle wrapped in the bandannahandkerchief. On the instant Matt's face became like a wild beast's. 

"Look here, Jim, " he snarled. "You've got to play square. If you do medirt, I'll fix you. Understand? I'd eat you, Jim. You know that. I'dbite right into your throat an' eat you like that much beefsteak. "

His sunburned skin was black with the surge of blood in it, and histobacco-stained teeth were exposed by the snarling lips. Jim shiveredand involuntarily cowered. There was death in the man he looked at. Onlythe night before that black-faced man had killed another with his hands, and it had not hurt his sleep. And in his own heart Jim was aware ofa sneaking guilt, of a train of thought that merited all that wasthreatened. 

Matt passed out, leaving him still shivering. Then a hatred twisted hisown face, and he softly hurled savage curses at the door. He rememberedthe jewels, and hastened to the bed, feeling under the pillow for thebandanna bundle. He crushed it with his fingers to make certain thatit still contained the diamonds. Assured that Matt had not carried themaway, he looked toward the kerosene stove with a guilty start. Then hehurriedly lighted it, filled the coffee-pot at the sink, and put it overthe flame. 

The coffee was boiling when Matt returned, and while the latter cut thebread and put a slice of butter on the table, Jim poured out the coffee. It was not until he sat down and had taken a few sips of the coffee, that Matt pulled out the morning paper from his pocket. 

"We was way off, " he said. "I told you I didn't dast figger out how fatit was. Look at that. "

He pointed to the head-lines on the first page. 

"SWIFT NEMESIS ON BUJANNOFF'S TRACK, " they read. "MURDERED IN HIS SLEEPAFTER ROBBING HIS PARTNER. "

"There you have it!" Matt cried. "He robbed his partner--robbed him likea dirty thief. "

"Half a million of jewels missin', " Jim read aloud. He put the paperdown and stared at Matt. 

"That's what I told you, " the latter said. "What in hell do we knowabout jools? Half a million!--an' the best I could figger it was ahundred thousan'. Go on an' read the rest of it. "

They read on silently, their heads side by side, the untouched coffeegrowing cold; and ever and anon one or the other burst forth with somesalient printed fact. 

"I'd like to seen Metzner's face when he opened the safe at the storethis mornin', " Jim gloated. 

"He hit the high places right away for Bujannoff's house, " Mattexplained. "Go on an' read. "

"Was to have sailed last night at ten on the Sajoda for the SouthSeas--steamship delayed by extra freight--"

"That's why we caught 'm in bed, " Matt interrupted. "It was justluck--like pickin' a fifty-to-one winner. "

"Sajoda sailed at six this mornin'--"

"He didn't catch her, " Matt said. "I saw his alarm-clock was set atfive. That'd given 'm plenty of time. .. Only I come along an' put thekibosh on his time. Go on. "

"Adolph Metzner in despair--the famous Haythorne pearlnecklace--magnificently assorted pearls--valued by experts at from fiftyto seventy thousan' dollars. "

Jim broke off to swear vilely and solemnly, concluding with, "Those damnoyster-eggs worth all that money!"

He licked his lips and added, "They was beauties an' no mistake. "

"Big Brazilian gem, " he read on. "Eighty thousan' dollars--many valuablegems of the first water--several thousan' small diamonds well worthforty thousan'. "

"What you don't know about jools is worth knowin', " Matt smiledgood-humouredly. 

"Theory of the sleuths, " Jim read. "Thieves must have known--cleverlykept watch on Bujannoff's actions--must have learned his plan andtrailed him to his house with the fruits of his robbery--"

"Clever--hell!" Matt broke out. "That's the way reputations is made. .. In the noospapers. How'd we know he was robbin' his pardner?"

"Anyway, we've got the goods, " Jim grinned. "Let's look at 'em again. "

He assured himself that the door was locked and bolted, while Mattbrought out the bundle in the bandanna and opened it on the table. 

"Ain't they beauties, though!" Jim exclaimed at sight of the pearls; andfor a time he had eyes only for them. "Accordin' to the experts, worthfrom fifty to seventy thousan' dollars. "

"An' women like them things, " Matt commented. "An' they'll do everythingto get 'em--sell themselves, commit murder, anything. "

"Just like you an' me. "

"Not on your life, " Matt retorted. "I'll commit murder for 'em, but notfor their own sakes, but for sake of what they'll get me. That's thedifference. Women want the jools for themselves, an' I want the joolsfor the women an' such things they'll get me. "

"Lucky that men an' women don't want the same things, " Jim remarked. 

"That's what makes commerce, " Matt agreed; "people wantin' differentthings. "

In the middle of the afternoon Jim went out to buy food. While he wasgone, Matt cleared the table of the jewels, wrapping them up as beforeand putting them under the pillow. Then he lighted the kerosene stoveand started to boil water for coffee. A few minutes later, Jim returned. 

"Most surprising, " he remarked. "Streets, an' stores, an' people justlike they always was. Nothin' changed. An' me walking along through itall a millionaire. Nobody looked at me an' guessed it. "

Matt grunted unsympathetically. He had little comprehension of thelighter whims and fancies of his partner's imagination. 

"Did you get a porterhouse?" he demanded. 

"Sure, an' an inch thick. It's a peach. Look at it. "

He unwrapped the steak and held it up for the other's inspection. Thenhe made the coffee and set the table, while Matt fried the steak. 

"Don't put on too much of them red peppers, " Jim warned. "I ain't usedto your Mexican cookin'. You always season too hot. "

Matt grunted a laugh and went on with his cooking. Jim poured out thecoffee, but first, into the nicked china cup, he emptied a powder he hadcarried in his vest pocket wrapped in a rice-paper. He had turned hisback for the moment on his partner, but he did not dare to glance aroundat him. Matt placed a newspaper on the table, and on the newspaperset the hot frying-pan. He cut the steak in half, and served Jim andhimself. 

"Eat her while she's hot, " he counselled, and with knife and fork setthe example. 

"She's a dandy, " was Jim's judgment, after his first mouthful. "ButI tell you one thing straight. I'm never goin' to visit you on thatArizona ranch, so you needn't ask me. "

"What's the matter now?" Matt asked. 

"Hell's the matter, " was the answer. "The Mexican cookin' on yourranch'd be too much for me. If I've got hell a-comin' in the next life, I'm not goin' to torment my insides in this one. Damned peppers!"

He smiled, expelled his breath forcibly to cool his burning mouth, dranksome coffee, and went on eating the steak. 

"What do you think about the next life anyway, Matt?" he asked a littlelater, while secretly he wondered why the other had not yet touched hiscoffee. 

"Ain't no next life, " Matt answered, pausing from the steak to takehis first sip of coffee. "Nor heaven nor hell, nor nothin'. You get allthat's comin' right here in this life. "

"An' afterward?" Jim queried out of his morbid curiosity, for he knewthat he looked upon a man that was soon to die. "An' afterward?" herepeated. 

"Did you ever see a man two weeks dead?" the other asked. 

Jim shook his head. 

"Well, I have. He was like this beefsteak you an' me is eatin'. It wasonce steer cavortin' over the landscape. But now it's just meat. That's all, just meat. An' that's what you an' me an' all people cometo--meat. "

Matt gulped down the whole cup of coffee, and refilled the cup. 

"Are you scared to die?" he asked. 

Jim shook his head. "What's the use? I don't die anyway. I pass on an'live again--"

"To go stealin', an' lyin' an' snivellin' through another life, an' goon that way forever an' ever an' ever?" Matt sneered. 

"Maybe I'll improve, " Jim suggested hopefully. "Maybe stealin' won't benecessary in the life to come. "

He ceased abruptly, and stared straight before him, a frightenedexpression on his face. 

"What's the matter!" Matt demanded. 

"Nothin'. I was just wonderin'"--Jim returned to himself with aneffort--"about this dyin', that was all. "

But he could not shake off the fright that had startled him. It wasas if an unseen thing of gloom had passed him by, casting upon himthe intangible shadow of its presence. He was aware of a feeling offoreboding. Something ominous was about to happen. Calamity hovered inthe air. He gazed fixedly across the table at the other man. He couldnot understand. Was it that he had blundered and poisoned himself? No, Matt had the nicked cup, and he had certainly put the poison in thenicked cup. 

It was all his own imagination, was his next thought. It had played himtricks before. Fool! Of course it was. Of course something was about tohappen, but it was about to happen to Matt. Had not Matt drunk the wholecup of coffee?

Jim brightened up and finished his steak, sopping bread in the gravywhen the meat was gone. 

"When I was a kid--" he began, but broke off abruptly. 

Again the unseen thing of gloom had fluttered, and his being was vibrantwith premonition of impending misfortune. He felt a disruptive influenceat work in the flesh of him, and in all his muscles there was a seemingthat they were about to begin to twitch. He sat back suddenly, and assuddenly leaned forward with his elbows on the table. A tremor randimly through the muscles of his body. It was like the first rustlingof leaves before the oncoming of wind. He clenched his teeth. It cameagain, a spasmodic tensing of his muscles. He knew panic at the revoltwithin his being. His muscles no longer recognized his mastery overthem. Again they spasmodically tensed, despite the will of him, forhe had willed that they should not tense. This was revolution withinhimself, this was anarchy; and the terror of impotence rushed up in himas his flesh gripped and seemed to seize him in a clutch, chills runningup and down his back and sweat starting on his brow. He glanced aboutthe room, and all the details of it smote him with a strange sense offamiliarity. It was as though he had just returned from a long journey. He looked across the table at his partner. Matt was watching him andsmiling. An expression of horror spread over Jim's face. 

"My God, Matt!" he screamed. "You ain't doped me?"

Matt smiled and continued to watch him. In the paroxysm that followed, Jim did not become unconscious. His muscles tensed and twitched andknotted, hurting him and crushing him in their savage grip. And in themidst of it all, it came to him that Matt was acting queerly. He wastravelling the same road. The smile had gone from his face, and therewas on it an intent expression, as if he were listening to some innertale of himself and trying to divine the message. Matt got up and walkedacross the room and back again, then sat down. 

"You did this, Jim, " he said quietly. 

"But I didn't think you'd try to fix ME, " Jim answered reproachfully. 

"Oh, I fixed you all right, " Matt said, with teeth close together andshivering body. "What did you give me?"

"Strychnine. "

"Same as I gave you, " Matt volunteered. "It's a hell of a mess, ain'tit?"

"You're lyin', Matt, " Jim pleaded. "You ain't doped me, have you?"

"I sure did, Jim; an' I didn't overdose you, neither. I cooked it in asneat as you please in your half the porterhouse. --Hold on! Where're yougoin'?"

Jim had made a dash for the door, and was throwing back the bolts. Mattsprang in between and shoved him away. 

"Drug store, " Jim panted. "Drug store. "

"No you don't. You'll stay right here. There ain't goin' to be anyrunnin' out an' makin' a poison play on the street--not with all themjools reposin' under the pillow. Savve? Even if you didn't die, you'dbe in the hands of the police with a whole lot of explanations comin'. Emetics is the stuff for poison. I'm just as bad bit as you, an' I'mgoin' to take a emetic. That's all they'd give you at a drug store, anyway. "

He thrust Jim back into the middle of the room and shot the bolts intoplace. As he went across the floor to the food shelf, he passed one handover his brow and flung off the beaded sweat. It spattered audibly onthe floor. Jim watched agonizedly as Matt got the mustard-can and a cupand ran for the sink. He stirred a cupful of mustard and water and drankit down. Jim had followed him and was reaching with trembling hands forthe empty cup. Again Matt shoved him away. As he mixed a second cupful, he demanded--

"D'you think one cup'll do for me? You can wait till I'm done. "

Jim started to totter toward the door, but Matt checked him. 

"If you monkey with that door, I'll twist your neck. Savve? You can takeyours when I'm done. An' if it saves you, I'll twist your neck, anyway. You ain't got no chance, nohow. I told you many times what you'd get ifyou did me dirt. "

"But you did me dirt, too, " Jim articulated with an effort. 

Matt was drinking the second cupful, and did not answer. The sweat hadgot into Jim's eyes, and he could scarcely see his way to the table, where he got a cup for himself. But Matt was mixing a third cupful, and, as before, thrust him away. 

"I told you to wait till I was done, " Matt growled. "Get outa my way. "

And Jim supported his twitching body by holding on to the sink, thewhile he yearned toward the yellowish concoction that stood for life. Itwas by sheer will that he stood and clung to the sink. His flesh stroveto double him up and bring him to the floor. Matt drank the thirdcupful, and with difficulty managed to get to a chair and sit down. Hisfirst paroxysm was passing. The spasms that afflicted him were dyingaway. This good effect he ascribed to the mustard and water. He wassafe, at any rate. He wiped the sweat from his face, and, in theinterval of calm, found room for curiosity. He looked at his partner. 

A spasm had shaken the mustard can out of Jim's hands, and the contentswere spilled upon the floor. He stooped to scoop some of the mustardinto the cup, and the succeeding spasm doubled him upon the floor. Mattsmiled. 

"Stay with it, " he encouraged. "It's the stuff all right. It's fixed meup. "

Jim heard him and turned toward him a stricken face, twisted withsuffering and pleading. Spasm now followed spasm till he was inconvulsions, rolling on the floor and yellowing his face and hair in themustard. 

Matt laughed hoarsely at the sight, but the laugh broke midway. A tremorhad run through his body. A new paroxysm was beginning. He arose andstaggered across to the sink, where, with probing forefinger, he vainlystrove to assist the action of the emetic. In the end, he clung tothe sink as Jim had clung, filled with the horror of going down to thefloor. 

The other's paroxysm had passed, and he sat up, weak and fainting, tooweak to rise, his forehead dripping, his lips flecked with a foam madeyellow by the mustard in which he had rolled. He rubbed his eyes withhis knuckles, and groans that were like whines came from his throat. 

"What are you snifflin' about?" Matt demanded out of his agony. "All yougot to do is die. An' when you die you're dead. "

"I. .. Ain't. .. Snifflin'. .. It's. .. The. .. Mustard. .. Stingin'. .. My. .. Eyes, " Jim panted with desperate slowness. 

It was his last successful attempt at speech. Thereafter he babbledincoherently, pawing the air with shaking arms till a fresh convulsionstretched him on the floor. 

Matt struggled back to the chair, and, doubled up on it, with his armsclasped about his knees, he fought with his disintegrating flesh. Hecame out of the convulsion cool and weak. He looked to see how it wentwith the other, and saw him lying motionless. 

He tried to soliloquize, to be facetious, to have his last grim laugh atlife, but his lips made only incoherent sounds. The thought came tohim that the emetic had failed, and that nothing remained but the drugstore. He looked toward the door and drew himself to his feet. There hesaved himself from falling by clutching the chair. Another paroxysm hadbegun. And in the midst of the paroxysm, with his body and all the partsof it flying apart and writhing and twisting back again into knots, heclung to the chair and shoved it before him across the floor. The lastshreds of his will were leaving him when he gained the door. He turnedthe key and shot back one bolt. He fumbled for the second bolt, butfailed. Then he leaned his weight against the door and slid down gentlyto the floor. 

CREATED HE THEM

She met him at the door. 

"I did not think you would be so early. "

"It is half past eight. " He looked at his watch. "The train leaves at9. 12. "

He was very businesslike, until he saw her lips tremble as she abruptlyturned and led the way. 

"It'll be all right, little woman, " he said soothingly. "DoctorBodineau's the man. He'll pull him through, you'll see. "

They entered the living-room. His glance quested apprehensively about, then turned to her. 

"Where's Al?"

She did not answer, but with a sudden impulse came close to him andstood motionless. She was a slender, dark-eyed woman, in whose facewas stamped the strain and stress of living. But the fine lines and thehaunted look in the eyes were not the handiwork of mere worry. He knewwhose handiwork it was as he looked upon it, and she knew when sheconsulted her mirror. 

"It's no use, Mary, " he said. He put his hand on her shoulder. "We'vetried everything. It's a wretched business, I know, but what else can wedo? You've failed. Doctor Bodineau's all that's left. "

"If I had another chance. .. " she began falteringly. 

"We've threshed that all out, " he answered harshly. "You've got to buckup, now. You know what conclusion we arrived at. You know you haven'tthe ghost of a hope in another chance. "

She shook her head. "I know it. But it is terrible, the thought of hisgoing away to fight it out alone. "

"He won't be alone. There's Doctor Bodineau. And besides, it's abeautiful place. "

She remained silent. 

"It is the only thing, " he said. 

"It is the only thing, " she repeated mechanically. 

He looked at his watch. "Where's Al?"

"I'll send him. "

When the door had closed behind her, he walked over to the window andlooked out, drumming absently with his knuckles on the pane. 

"Hello. "

He turned and responded to the greeting of the man who had just entered. There was a perceptible drag to the man's feet as he walked acrosstoward the window and paused irresolutely halfway. 

"I've changed my mind, George, " he announced hurriedly and nervously. "I'm not going. "

He plucked at his sleeve, shuffled with his feet, dropped his eyes, andwith a strong effort raised them again to confront the other. 

George regarded him silently, his nostrils distending and his leanfingers unconsciously crooking like an eagle's talons about to clutch. 

In line and feature, there was much of resemblance between the two men;and yet, in the strongest resemblances there was a radical difference. Theirs were the same black eyes, but those of the man at the window weresharp and straight looking, while those of the man in the middle of theroom were cloudy and furtive. He could not face the other's gaze, andcontinually and vainly struggled with himself to do so. The high cheekbones with the hollows beneath were the same, yet the texture of thehollows seemed different. The thin-lipped mouths were from the samemould, but George's lips were firm and muscular, while Al's were softand loose--the lips of an ascetic turned voluptuary. There was also asag at the corners. His flesh hinted of grossness, especially so in theeagle-like aquiline nose that must once have been like the other's, butthat had lost the austerity the other's still retained. 

Al fought for steadiness in the middle of the floor. The silencebothered him. He had a feeling that he was about to begin swaying backand forth. He moistened his lips with his tongue. 

"I'm going to stay, " he said desperately. 

He dropped his eyes and plucked again at his sleeve. 

"And you are only twenty-six years old, " George said at last. "You poor, feeble old man. "

"Don't be so sure of that, " Al retorted, with a flash of belligerence. 

"Do you remember when we swam that mile and a half across the channel?"

"Well, and what of it?" A sullen expression was creeping across Al'sface. 

"And do you remember when we boxed in the barn after school?"

"I could take all you gave me. "

"All I gave you!" George's voice rose momentarily to a higher pitch. "You licked me four afternoons out of five. You were twice as strong asI--three times as strong. And now I'd be afraid to land on you with asofa cushion; you'd crumple up like a last year's leaf. You'd die, youpoor, miserable old man. "

"You needn't abuse me just because I've changed my mind, " the otherprotested, the hint of a whine in his voice. 

His wife entered, and he looked appealingly to her; but the man at thewindow strode suddenly up to him and burst out--

"You don't know your own mind for two successive minutes! You haven'tany mind, you spineless, crawling worm!"

"You can't make me angry. " Al smiled with cunning, and glancedtriumphantly at his wife. "You can't make me angry, " he repeated, asthough the idea were thoroughly gratifying to him. "I know your game. It's my stomach, I tell you. I can't help it. Before God, I can't! Isn'tit my stomach, Mary?"

She glanced at George and spoke composedly, though she hid a tremblinghand in a fold of her skirt. 

"Isn't it time?" she asked softly. 

Her husband turned upon her savagely. "I'm not going to go!" he cried. "That's just what I've been telling. .. Him. And I tell you again, all ofyou, I'm not going. You can't bully me. "

"Why, Al, dear, you said--" she began. 

"Never mind what I said!" he broke out. "I've said something else rightnow, and you've heard it, and that settles it. "

He walked across the room and threw himself with emphasis into a Morrischair. But the other man was swiftly upon him. The talon-like fingersgripped his shoulders, jerked him to his feet, and held him there. 

"You've reached the limit, Al, and I want you to understand it. I'vetried to treat you like. .. Like my brother, but hereafter I shall treatyou like the thing that you are. Do you understand?"

The anger in his voice was cold. The blaze in his eyes was cold. It wasvastly more effective than any outburst, and Al cringed under it andunder the clutching hand that was bruising his shoulder muscles. 

"It is only because of me that you have this house, that you have thefood you eat. Your position? Any other man would have been shown thedoor a year ago--two years ago. I have held you in it. Your salary hasbeen charity. It has been paid out of my pocket. Mary. .. Her dresses. .. That gown she has on is made over; she wears the discarded dresses ofher sisters, of my wife. Charity--do you understand? Your children--theyare wearing the discarded clothes of my children, of the children of myneighbours who think the clothes went to some orphan asylum. And it isan orphan asylum. .. Or it soon will be. "

He emphasized each point with an unconscious tightening of his gripon the shoulder. Al was squirming with the pain of it. The sweat wasstarting out on his forehead. 

"Now listen well to me, " his brother went on. "In three minutes you willtell me that you are going with me. If you don't, Mary and the childrenwill be taken away from you--to-day. You needn't ever come to theoffice. This house will be closed to you. And in six months I shallhave the pleasure of burying you. You have three minutes to make up yourmind. "

Al made a strangling movement, and reached up with weak fingers to theclutching hand. 

"My heart. .. Let me go. .. You'll be the death of me, " he gasped. 

The hand thrust him down forcibly into the Morris chair and releasedhim. 

The clock on the mantle ticked loudly. George glanced at it, andat Mary. She was leaning against the table, unable to conceal hertrembling. He became unpleasantly aware of the feeling of his brother'sfingers on his hand. Quite unconsciously he wiped the back of the handupon his coat. The clock ticked on in the silence. It seemed to Georgethat the room reverberated with his voice. He could hear himself stillspeaking. 

"I'll go, " came from the Morris chair. 

It was a weak and shaken voice, and it was a weak and shaken man thatpulled himself out of the Morris chair. He started toward the door. 

"Where are you going?" George demanded. 

"Suit case, " came the response. "Mary'll send the trunk later. I'll beback in a minute. "

The door closed after him. A moment later, struck with sudden suspicion, George was opening the door. He glanced in. His brother stood at asideboard, in one hand a decanter, in the other hand, bottom up and tohis lips, a whisky glass. 

Across the glass Al saw that he was observed. It threw him into a panic. Hastily he tried to refill the glass and get it to his lips; but glassand decanter were sent smashing to the floor. He snarled. It was likethe sound of a wild beast. But the grip on his shoulder subdued andfrightened him. He was being propelled toward the door. 

"The suit case, " he gasped. "It's there in that room. Let me get it. "

"Where's the key?" his brother asked, when he had brought it. 

"It isn't locked. "

The next moment the suit case was spread open, and George's hand wassearching the contents. From one side it brought out a bottle of whisky, from the other side a flask. He snapped the case to. 

"Come on, " he said. "If we miss one car, we miss that train. "

He went out into the hallway, leaving Al with his wife. It was like afuneral, George thought, as he waited. 

His brother's overcoat caught on the knob of the front door and delayedits closing long enough for Mary's first sob to come to their ears. George's lips were very thin and compressed as he went down the steps. In one hand he carried the suit case. With the other hand he held hisbrother's arm. 

As they neared the corner, he heard the electric car a block away, and urged his brother on. Al was breathing hard. His feet dragged andshuffled, and he held back. 

"A hell of a brother YOU are, " he panted. 

For reply, he received a vicious jerk on his arm. It reminded him of hischildhood when he was hurried along by some angry grown-up. And like achild, he had to be helped up the car step. He sank down on an outsideseat, panting, sweating, overcome by the exertion. He followed George'seyes as the latter looked him up and down. 

"A hell of a brother YOU are, " was George's comment when he had finishedthe inspection. 

Moisture welled into Al's eyes. 

"It's my stomach, " he said with self-pity. 

"I don't wonder, " was the retort. "Burnt out like the crater of avolcano. Fervent heat isn't a circumstance. "

Thereafter they did not speak. When they arrived at the transfer point, George came to himself with a start. He smiled. With fixed gaze thatdid not see the houses that streamed across his field of vision, he hadhimself been sunk deep in self-pity. He helped his brother from the car, and looked up the intersecting street. The car they were to take was notin sight. 

Al's eyes chanced upon the corner grocery and saloon across the way. At once he became restless. His hands passed beyond his control, and heyearned hungrily across the street to the door that swung open even ashe looked and let in a happy pilgrim. And in that instant he saw thewhite-jacketed bartender against an array of glittering glass. Quiteunconsciously he started to cross the street. 

"Hold on. " George's hand was on his arm. 

"I want some whisky, " he answered. 

"You've already had some. "

"That was hours ago. Go on, George, let me have some. It's the lastday. Don't shut off on me until we get there--God knows it will be soonenough. "

George glanced desperately up the street. The car was in sight. 

"There isn't time for a drink, " he said. 

"I don't want a drink. I want a bottle. " Al's voice became wheedling. "Go on, George. It's the last, the very last. "

"No. " The denial was as final as George's thin lips could make it. 

Al glanced at the approaching car. He sat down suddenly on thecurbstone. 

"What's the matter?" his brother asked, with momentary alarm. 

"Nothing. I want some whisky. It's my stomach. "

"Come on now, get up. "

George reached for him, but was anticipated, for his brother sprawledflat on the pavement, oblivious to the dirt and to the curious glancesof the passers-by. The car was clanging its gong at the crossing, ablock away. 

"You'll miss it, " Al grinned from the pavement. "And it will be yourfault. "

George's fists clenched tightly. 

"For two cents I'd give you a thrashing. "

"And miss the car, " was the triumphant comment from the pavement. 

George looked at the car. It was halfway down the block. He looked athis watch. He debated a second longer. 

"All right, " he said. "I'll get it. But you get on that car. If you missit, I'll break the bottle over your head. "

He dashed across the street and into the saloon. The car came in andstopped. There were no passengers to get off. Al dragged himself up thesteps and sat down. He smiled as the conductor rang the bell and the carstarted. The swinging door of the saloon burst open. Clutching inhis hand the suit case and a pint bottle of whisky, George started inpursuit. The conductor, his hand on the bell cord, waited to see if itwould be necessary to stop. It was not. George swung lightly aboard, satdown beside his brother, and passed him the bottle. 

"You might have got a quart, " Al said reproachfully. 

He extracted the cork with a pocket corkscrew, and elevated the bottle. 

"I'm sick. .. My stomach, " he explained in apologetic tones to thepassenger who sat next to him. 

In the train they sat in the smoking-car. George felt that it wasimperative. Also, having successfully caught the train, his heartsoftened. He felt more kindly toward his brother, and accused himself ofunnecessary harshness. He strove to atone by talking about their mother, and sisters, and the little affairs and interests of the family. But Alwas morose, and devoted himself to the bottle. As the time passed, hismouth hung looser and looser, while the rings under his eyes seemed topuff out and all his facial muscles to relax. 

"It's my stomach, " he said, once, when he finished the bottle anddropped it under the seat; but the swift hardening of his brother's facedid not encourage further explanations. 

The conveyance that met them at the station had all the dignity andluxuriousness of a private carriage. George's eyes were keen for the earmarks of the institution to which they were going, but his apprehensionswere allayed from moment to moment. As they entered the wide gatewayand rolled on through the spacious grounds, he felt sure that theinstitutional side of the place would not jar upon his brother. It wasmore like a summer hotel, or, better yet, a country club. And as theyswept on through the spring sunshine, the songs of birds in his ears, and in his nostrils the breath of flowers, George sighed for a weekof rest in such a place, and before his eyes loomed the arid vista ofsummer in town and at the office. There was not room in his income forhis brother and himself. 

"Let us take a walk in the grounds, " he suggested, after they had metDoctor Bodineau and inspected the quarters assigned to Al. "The carriageleaves for the station in half an hour, and we'll just have time. "

"It's beautiful, " he remarked a moment later. Under his feet wasthe velvet grass, the trees arched overhead, and he stood in mottledsunshine. "I wish I could stay for a month. "

"I'll trade places with you, " Al said quickly. 

George laughed it off, but he felt a sinking of the heart. 

"Look at that oak!" he cried. "And that woodpecker! Isn't he a beauty!"

"I don't like it here, " he heard his brother mutter. 

George's lips tightened in preparation for the struggle, but he said--

"I'm going to send Mary and the children off to the mountains. She needsit, and so do they. And when you're in shape, I'll send you right on tojoin them. Then you can take your summer vacation before you come backto the office. "

"I'm not going to stay in this damned hole, for all you talk about it, "Al announced abruptly. 

"Yes you are, and you're going to get your health and strength backagain, so that the look of you will put the colour in Mary's cheekswhere it used to be. "

"I'm going back with you. " Al's voice was firm. "I'm going to take thesame train back. It's about time for that carriage, I guess. "

"I haven't told you all my plans, " George tried to go on, but Al cut himoff. 

"You might as well quit that. I don't want any of your soapy talking. You treat me like a child. I'm not a child. My mind's made up, and I'llshow you how long it can stay made up. You needn't talk to me. I don'tcare a rap for what you're going to say. "

A baleful light was in his eyes, and to his brother he seemed for allthe world like a cornered rat, desperate and ready to fight. As Georgelooked at him he remembered back to their childhood, and it came to himthat at last was aroused in Al the same old stubborn strain that hadenabled him, as a child, to stand against all force and persuasion. 

George abandoned hope. He had lost. This creature was not human. Thelast fine instinct of the human had fled. It was a brute, sluggishand stolid, impossible to move--just the raw stuff of life, combative, rebellious, and indomitable. And as he contemplated his brother he feltin himself the rising up of a similar brute. He became suddenly awarethat his fingers were tensing and crooking like a thug's, and he knewthe desire to kill. And his reason, turned traitor at last, counselledthat he should kill, that it was the only thing left for him to do. 

He was aroused by a servant calling to him through the trees that thecarriage was waiting. He answered. Then, looking straight before him, hediscovered his brother. He had forgotten it was his brother. It had beenonly a thing the moment before. He began to talk, and as he talked theway became clear to him. His reason had not turned traitor. The brute inhim had merely orientated his reason. 

"You are no earthly good, Al, " he said. "You know that. You've madeMary's life a hell. You are a curse to your children. And you have notmade life exactly a paradise for the rest of us. "

"There's no use your talking, " Al interjected. "I'm not going to stayhere. "

"That's what I'm coming to, " George continued. "You don't have to stayhere. " (Al's face brightened, and he involuntarily made a movement, asthough about to start toward the carriage. ) "On the other hand, it isnot necessary that you should return with me. There is another way. "

George's hand went to his hip pocket and appeared with a revolver. Itlay along his palm, the butt toward Al, and toward Al he extended it. Atthe same time, with his head, he indicated the near-by thicket. 

"You can't bluff me, " Al snarled. 

"It is not a bluff, Al. Look at me. I mean it. And if you don't do itfor yourself, I shall have to do it for you. "

They faced each other, the proffered revolver still extended. Al debatedfor a moment, then his eyes blazed. With a quick movement he seized therevolver. 

"My God! I'll do it, " he said. "I'll show you what I've got in me. "

George felt suddenly sick. He turned away. He did not see his brotherenter the thicket, but he heard the passage of his body through theleaves and branches. 

"Good-bye, Al, " he called. 

"Good-bye, " came from the thicket. 

George felt the sweat upon his forehead. He began mopping his face withhis handkerchief. He heard, as from a remote distance, the voice ofthe servant again calling to him that the carriage was waiting. Thewoodpecker dropped down through the mottled sunshine and lighted on thetrunk of a tree a dozen feet away. George felt that it was all a dream, and yet through it all he felt supreme justification. It was the rightthing to do. It was the only thing. 

His whole body gave a spasmodic start, as though the revolver had beenfired. It was the voice of Al, close at his back. 

"Here's your gun, " Al said. "I'll stay. "

The servant appeared among the trees, approaching rapidly and callinganxiously. George put the weapon in his pocket and caught both hisbrother's hands in his own. 

"God bless you, old man, " he murmured; "and"--with a final squeeze ofthe hands--"good luck!"

"I'm coming, " he called to the servant, and turned and ran through thetrees toward the carriage. 

THE CHINAGO

 "The coral waxes, the palm grows, but man departs. " --Tahitian proverb. 

Ah Cho did not understand French. He sat in the crowded court room, veryweary and bored, listening to the unceasing, explosive French that nowone official and now another uttered. It was just so much gabble to AhCho, and he marvelled at the stupidity of the Frenchmen who took so longto find out the murderer of Chung Ga, and who did not find him at all. The five hundred coolies on the plantation knew that Ah San had done thekilling, and here was Ah San not even arrested. It was true that allthe coolies had agreed secretly not to testify against one another; butthen, it was so simple, the Frenchmen should have been able to discoverthat Ah San was the man. They were very stupid, these Frenchmen. 

Ah Cho had done nothing of which to be afraid. He had had no hand inthe killing. It was true he had been present at it, and Schemmer, theoverseer on the plantation, had rushed into the barracks immediatelyafterward and caught him there, along with four or five others; but whatof that? Chung Ga had been stabbed only twice. It stood to reason thatfive or six men could not inflict two stab wounds. At the most, if a manhad struck but once, only two men could have done it. 

So it was that Ah Cho reasoned, when he, along with his four companions, had lied and blocked and obfuscated in their statements to the courtconcerning what had taken place. They had heard the sounds of thekilling, and, like Schemmer, they had run to the spot. They had gotthere before Schemmer--that was all. True, Schemmer had testified that, attracted by the sound of quarrelling as he chanced to pass by, he hadstood for at least five minutes outside; that then, when he entered, hefound the prisoners already inside; and that they had not entered justbefore, because he had been standing by the one door to the barracks. But what of that? Ah Cho and his four fellow-prisoners had testifiedthat Schemmer was mistaken. In the end they would be let go. They wereall confident of that. Five men could not have their heads cut off fortwo stab wounds. Besides, no foreign devil had seen the killing. Butthese Frenchmen were so stupid. In China, as Ah Cho well knew, themagistrate would order all of them to the torture and learn the truth. The truth was very easy to learn under torture. But these Frenchmen didnot torture--bigger fools they! Therefore they would never find out whokilled Chung Ga. 

But Ah Cho did not understand everything. The English Company that ownedthe plantation had imported into Tahiti, at great expense, the fivehundred coolies. The stockholders were clamouring for dividends, andthe Company had not yet paid any; wherefore the Company did not want itscostly contract labourers to start the practice of killing one another. Also, there were the French, eager and willing to impose upon theChinagos the virtues and excellences of French law. There was nothinglike setting an example once in a while; and, besides, of what use wasNew Caledonia except to send men to live out their days in misery andpain in payment of the penalty for being frail and human?

Ah Cho did not understand all this. He sat in the court room and waitedfor the baffled judgment that would set him and his comrades free to goback to the plantation and work out the terms of their contracts. Thisjudgment would soon be rendered. Proceedings were drawing to a close. Hecould see that. There was no more testifying, no more gabble of tongues. The French devils were tired, too, and evidently waiting for thejudgment. And as he waited he remembered back in his life to the timewhen he had signed the contract and set sail in the ship for Tahiti. Times had been hard in his sea-coast village, and when he indenturedhimself to labour for five years in the South Seas at fifty centsMexican a day, he had thought himself fortunate. There were men in hisvillage who toiled a whole year for ten dollars Mexican, and there werewomen who made nets all the year round for five dollars, while in thehouses of shopkeepers there were maidservants who received four dollarsfor a year of service. And here he was to receive fifty cents a day; forone day, only one day, he was to receive that princely sum! What if thework were hard? At the end of the five years he would return home--thatwas in the contract--and he would never have to work again. He wouldbe a rich man for life, with a house of his own, a wife, and childrengrowing up to venerate him. Yes, and back of the house he would have asmall garden, a place of meditation and repose, with goldfish in a tinylakelet, and wind bells tinkling in the several trees, and there wouldbe a high wall all around so that his meditation and repose should beundisturbed. 

Well, he had worked out three of those five years. He was already awealthy man (in his own country) through his earnings, and only twoyears more intervened between the cotton plantation on Tahiti and themeditation and repose that awaited him. But just now he was losing moneybecause of the unfortunate accident of being present at the killing ofChung Ga. He had lain three weeks in prison, and for each day of thosethree weeks he had lost fifty cents. But now judgment would soon begiven, and he would go back to work. 

Ah Cho was twenty-two years old. He was happy and good-natured, and itwas easy for him to smile. While his body was slim in the Asiatic way, his face was rotund. It was round, like the moon, and it irradiated agentle complacence and a sweet kindliness of spirit that was unusualamong his countrymen. Nor did his looks belie him. He never causedtrouble, never took part in wrangling. He did not gamble. His soul wasnot harsh enough for the soul that must belong to a gambler. He wascontent with little things and simple pleasures. The hush and quiet inthe cool of the day after the blazing toil in the cotton field wasto him an infinite satisfaction. He could sit for hours gazing at asolitary flower and philosophizing about the mysteries and riddlesof being. A blue heron on a tiny crescent of sandy beach, a silverysplatter of flying fish, or a sunset of pearl and rose across thelagoon, could entrance him to all forgetfulness of the procession ofwearisome days and of the heavy lash of Schemmer. 

Schemmer, Karl Schemmer, was a brute, a brutish brute. But he earnedhis salary. He got the last particle of strength out of the five hundredslaves; for slaves they were until their term of years was up. Schemmerworked hard to extract the strength from those five hundred sweatingbodies and to transmute it into bales of fluffy cotton ready for export. His dominant, iron-clad, primeval brutishness was what enabled him toeffect the transmutation. Also, he was assisted by a thick leather belt, three inches wide and a yard in length, with which he always rode andwhich, on occasion, could come down on the naked back of a stoopingcoolie with a report like a pistol-shot. These reports were frequentwhen Schemmer rode down the furrowed field. 

Once, at the beginning of the first year of contract labour, he hadkilled a coolie with a single blow of his fist. He had not exactlycrushed the man's head like an egg-shell, but the blow had beensufficient to addle what was inside, and, after being sick for a week, the man had died. But the Chinese had not complained to the Frenchdevils that ruled over Tahiti. It was their own look out. Schemmer wastheir problem. They must avoid his wrath as they avoided the venomof the centipedes that lurked in the grass or crept into the sleepingquarters on rainy nights. The Chinagos--such they were called bythe indolent, brown-skinned island folk--saw to it that they did notdisplease Schemmer too greatly. This was equivalent to rendering up tohim a full measure of efficient toil. That blow of Schemmer's fist hadbeen worth thousands of dollars to the Company, and no trouble ever cameof it to Schemmer. 

The French, with no instinct for colonization, futile in their childishplaygame of developing the resources of the island, were only too gladto see the English Company succeed. What matter of Schemmer and hisredoubtable fist? The Chinago that died? Well, he was only a Chinago. Besides, he died of sunstroke, as the doctor's certificate attested. True, in all the history of Tahiti no one had ever died of sunstroke. But it was that, precisely that, which made the death of this Chinagounique. The doctor said as much in his report. He was very candid. Dividends must be paid, or else one more failure would be added to thelong history of failure in Tahiti. 

There was no understanding these white devils. Ah Cho pondered theirinscrutableness as he sat in the court room waiting the judgment. Therewas no telling what went on at the back of their minds. He had seen afew of the white devils. They were all alike--the officers and sailorson the ship, the French officials, the several white men on theplantation, including Schemmer. Their minds all moved in mysterious waysthere was no getting at. They grew angry without apparent cause, andtheir anger was always dangerous. They were like wild beasts at suchtimes. They worried about little things, and on occasion could out-toileven a Chinago. They were not temperate as Chinagos were temperate; theywere gluttons, eating prodigiously and drinking more prodigiously. AChinago never knew when an act would please them or arouse a storm ofwrath. A Chinago could never tell. What pleased one time, the very nexttime might provoke an outburst of anger. There was a curtain behind theeyes of the white devils that screened the backs of their minds from theChinago's gaze. And then, on top of it all, was that terrible efficiencyof the white devils, that ability to do things, to make things go, towork results, to bend to their wills all creeping, crawling things, and the powers of the very elements themselves. Yes, the white men werestrange and wonderful, and they were devils. Look at Schemmer. 

Ah Cho wondered why the judgment was so long in forming. Not a man ontrial had laid hand on Chung Ga. Ah San alone had killed him. Ah Sanhad done it, bending Chung Ga's head back with one hand by a grip of hisqueue, and with the other hand, from behind, reaching over and drivingthe knife into his body. Twice had he driven it in. There in the courtroom, with closed eyes, Ah Cho saw the killing acted over again--thesquabble, the vile words bandied back and forth, the filth and insultflung upon venerable ancestors, the curses laid upon unbegottengenerations, the leap of Ah San, the grip on the queue of Chung Ga, theknife that sank twice into his flesh, the bursting open of the door, theirruption of Schemmer, the dash for the door, the escape of Ah San, theflying belt of Schemmer that drove the rest into the corner, and thefiring of the revolver as a signal that brought help to Schemmer. AhCho shivered as he lived it over. One blow of the belt had bruised hischeek, taking off some of the skin. Schemmer had pointed to the bruiseswhen, on the witness-stand, he had identified Ah Cho. It was only justnow that the marks had become no longer visible. That had been a blow. Half an inch nearer the centre and it would have taken out his eye. ThenAh Cho forgot the whole happening in a vision he caught of the gardenof meditation and repose that would be his when he returned to his ownland. 

He sat with impassive face, while the magistrate rendered the judgment. Likewise were the faces of his four companions impassive. And theyremained impassive when the interpreter explained that the five of themhad been found guilty of the murder of Chung Ga, and that Ah Chowshould have his head cut off, Ah Cho serve twenty years in prison in NewCaledonia, Wong Li twelve years, and Ah Tong ten years. There was no usein getting excited about it. Even Ah Chow remained expressionless asa mummy, though it was his head that was to be cut off. The magistrateadded a few words, and the interpreter explained that Ah Chow's facehaving been most severely bruised by Schemmer's strap had made hisidentification so positive that, since one man must die, he might aswell be that man. Also, the fact that Ah Cho's face likewise had beenseverely bruised, conclusively proving his presence at the murder andhis undoubted participation, had merited him the twenty years of penalservitude. And down to the ten years of Ah Tong, the proportioned reasonfor each sentence was explained. Let the Chinagos take the lesson toheart, the Court said finally, for they must learn that the law would befulfilled in Tahiti though the heavens fell. 

The five Chinagos were taken back to jail. They were not shockednor grieved. The sentences being unexpected was quite what they wereaccustomed to in their dealings with the white devils. From them aChinago rarely expected more than the unexpected. The heavy punishmentfor a crime they had not committed was no stranger than the countlessstrange things that white devils did. In the weeks that followed, Ah Chooften contemplated Ah Chow with mild curiosity. His head was to be cutoff by the guillotine that was being erected on the plantation. For himthere would be no declining years, no gardens of tranquillity. Ah Chophilosophized and speculated about life and death. As for himself, hewas not perturbed. Twenty years were merely twenty years. By that muchwas his garden removed from him--that was all. He was young, and thepatience of Asia was in his bones. He could wait those twenty years, andby that time the heats of his blood would be assuaged and he would bebetter fitted for that garden of calm delight. He thought of a name forit; he would call it The Garden of the Morning Calm. He was made happyall day by the thought, and he was inspired to devise a moral maxim onthe virtue of patience, which maxim proved a great comfort, especiallyto Wong Li and Ah Tong. Ah Chow, however, did not care for the maxim. His head was to be separated from his body in so short a time that hehad no need for patience to wait for that event. He smoked well, atewell, slept well, and did not worry about the slow passage of time. 

Cruchot was a gendarme. He had seen twenty years of service in thecolonies, from Nigeria and Senegal to the South Seas, and thosetwenty years had not perceptibly brightened his dull mind. He was asslow-witted and stupid as in his peasant days in the south of France. Heknew discipline and fear of authority, and from God down to the sergeantof gendarmes the only difference to him was the measure of slavishobedience which he rendered. In point of fact, the sergeant bulkedbigger in his mind than God, except on Sundays when God's mouthpieceshad their say. God was usually very remote, while the sergeant wasordinarily very close at hand. 

Cruchot it was who received the order from the Chief Justice to thejailer commanding that functionary to deliver over to Cruchot the personof Ah Chow. Now, it happened that the Chief Justice had given a dinnerthe night before to the captain and officers of the French man-of-war. His hand was shaking when he wrote out the order, and his eyes wereaching so dreadfully that he did not read over the order. It was only aChinago's life he was signing away, anyway. So he did not notice that hehad omitted the final letter in Ah Chow's name. The order read "Ah Cho, "and, when Cruchot presented the order, the jailer turned over to him theperson of Ah Cho. Cruchot took that person beside him on the seat of awagon, behind two mules, and drove away. 

Ah Cho was glad to be out in the sunshine. He sat beside the gendarmeand beamed. He beamed more ardently than ever when he noted the mulesheaded south toward Atimaono. Undoubtedly Schemmer had sent for him tobe brought back. Schemmer wanted him to work. Very well, he would workwell. Schemmer would never have cause to complain. It was a hot day. There had been a stoppage of the trades. The mules sweated, Cruchotsweated, and Ah Cho sweated. But it was Ah Cho that bore the heat withthe least concern. He had toiled three years under that sun on theplantation. He beamed and beamed with such genial good nature that evenCruchot's heavy mind was stirred to wonderment. 

"You are very funny, " he said at last. 

Ah Cho nodded and beamed more ardently. Unlike the magistrate, Cruchotspoke to him in the Kanaka tongue, and this, like all Chinagos and allforeign devils, Ah Cho understood. 

"You laugh too much, " Cruchot chided. "One's heart should be full oftears on a day like this. "

"I am glad to get out of the jail. "

"Is that all?" The gendarme shrugged his shoulders. 

"Is it not enough?" was the retort. 

"Then you are not glad to have your head cut off?"

Ah Cho looked at him in abrupt perplexity, and said--

"Why, I am going back to Atimaono to work on the plantation forSchemmer. Are you not taking me to Atimaono?"

Cruchot stroked his long moustaches reflectively. "Well, well, " he saidfinally, with a flick of the whip at the off mule, "so you don't know?"

"Know what?" Ah Cho was beginning to feel a vague alarm. "Won't Schemmerlet me work for him any more?"

"Not after to-day. " Cruchot laughed heartily. It was a good joke. "Yousee, you won't be able to work after to-day. A man with his head offcan't work, eh?" He poked the Chinago in the ribs, and chuckled. 

Ah Cho maintained silence while the mules trotted a hot mile. Then hespoke: "Is Schemmer going to cut off my head?"

Cruchot grinned as he nodded. 

"It is a mistake, " said Ah Cho, gravely. "I am not the Chinago thatis to have his head cut off. I am Ah Cho. The honourable judge hasdetermined that I am to stop twenty years in New Caledonia. "

The gendarme laughed. It was a good joke, this funny Chinago trying tocheat the guillotine. The mules trotted through a coconut grove and forhalf a mile beside the sparkling sea before Ah Cho spoke again. 

"I tell you I am not Ah Chow. The honourable judge did not say that myhead was to go off. "

"Don't be afraid, " said Cruchot, with the philanthropic intention ofmaking it easier for his prisoner. "It is not difficult to die thatway. " He snapped his fingers. "It is quick--like that. It is not likehanging on the end of a rope and kicking and making faces for fiveminutes. It is like killing a chicken with a hatchet. You cut its headoff, that is all. And it is the same with a man. Pouf!--it is over. Itdoesn't hurt. You don't even think it hurts. You don't think. Your headis gone, so you cannot think. It is very good. That is the way I want todie--quick, ah, quick. You are lucky to die that way. You might get theleprosy and fall to pieces slowly, a finger at a time, and now and againa thumb, also the toes. I knew a man who was burned by hot water. Ittook him two days to die. You could hear him yelling a kilometre away. But you? Ah! so easy! Chck!--the knife cuts your neck like that. It isfinished. The knife may even tickle. Who can say? Nobody who died thatway ever came back to say. "

He considered this last an excruciating joke, and permitted himselfto be convulsed with laughter for half a minute. Part of his mirth wasassumed, but he considered it his humane duty to cheer up the Chinago. 

"But I tell you I am Ah Cho, " the other persisted. "I don't want my headcut off. "

Cruchot scowled. The Chinago was carrying the foolishness too far. 

"I am not Ah Chow--" Ah Cho began. 

"That will do, " the gendarme interrupted. He puffed up his cheeks andstrove to appear fierce. 

"I tell you I am not--" Ah Cho began again. 

"Shut up!" bawled Cruchot. 

After that they rode along in silence. It was twenty miles from Papeeteto Atimaono, and over half the distance was covered by the time theChinago again ventured into speech. 

"I saw you in the court room, when the honourable judge sought after ourguilt, " he began. "Very good. And do you remember that Ah Chow, whosehead is to be cut off--do you remember that he--Ah Chow--was a tall man?Look at me. "

He stood up suddenly, and Cruchot saw that he was a short man. And justas suddenly Cruchot caught a glimpse of a memory picture of Ah Chow, andin that picture Ah Chow was tall. To the gendarme all Chinagos lookedalike. One face was like another. But between tallness and shortness hecould differentiate, and he knew that he had the wrong man beside him onthe seat. He pulled up the mules abruptly, so that the pole shot aheadof them, elevating their collars. 

"You see, it was a mistake, " said Ah Cho, smiling pleasantly. 

But Cruchot was thinking. Already he regretted that he had stopped thewagon. He was unaware of the error of the Chief Justice, and he hadno way of working it out; but he did know that he had been given thisChinago to take to Atimaono and that it was his duty to take him toAtimaono. What if he was the wrong man and they cut his head off? Itwas only a Chinago when all was said, and what was a Chinago, anyway?Besides, it might not be a mistake. He did not know what went on in theminds of his superiors. They knew their business best. Who was he todo their thinking for them? Once, in the long ago, he had attempted tothink for them, and the sergeant had said: "Cruchot, you are a fool? Thequicker you know that, the better you will get on. You are not to think;you are to obey and leave thinking to your betters. " He smarted underthe recollection. Also, if he turned back to Papeete, he would delay theexecution at Atimaono, and if he were wrong in turning back, he wouldget a reprimand from the sergeant who was waiting for the prisoner. And, furthermore, he would get a reprimand at Papeete as well. 

He touched the mules with the whip and drove on. He looked at his watch. He would be half an hour late as it was, and the sergeant was bound tobe angry. He put the mules into a faster trot. The more Ah Cho persistedin explaining the mistake, the more stubborn Cruchot became. Theknowledge that he had the wrong man did not make his temper better. Theknowledge that it was through no mistake of his confirmed him in thebelief that the wrong he was doing was the right. And, rather than incurthe displeasure of the sergeant, he would willingly have assisted adozen wrong Chinagos to their doom. 

As for Ah Cho, after the gendarme had struck him over the head with thebutt of the whip and commanded him in a loud voice to shut up, thereremained nothing for him to do but to shut up. The long ride continuedin silence. Ah Cho pondered the strange ways of the foreign devils. There was no explaining them. What they were doing with him was of apiece with everything they did. First they found guilty five innocentmen, and next they cut off the head of the man that even they, in theirbenighted ignorance, had deemed meritorious of no more than twentyyears' imprisonment. And there was nothing he could do. He could onlysit idly and take what these lords of life measured out to him. Once, hegot in a panic, and the sweat upon his body turned cold; but he foughthis way out of it. He endeavoured to resign himself to his fate byremembering and repeating certain passages from the "Yin Chih Wen" ("TheTract of the Quiet Way"); but, instead, he kept seeing his dream-gardenof meditation and repose. This bothered him, until he abandoned himselfto the dream and sat in his garden listening to the tinkling of thewindbells in the several trees. And lo! sitting thus, in the dream, he was able to remember and repeat the passages from "The Tract of theQuiet Way. "

So the time passed nicely until Atimaono was reached and the mulestrotted up to the foot of the scaffold, in the shade of which stood theimpatient sergeant. Ah Cho was hurried up the ladder of the scaffold. Beneath him on one side he saw assembled all the coolies of theplantation. Schemmer had decided that the event would be a goodobject-lesson, and so he called in the coolies from the fields andcompelled them to be present. As they caught sight of Ah Cho theygabbled among themselves in low voices. They saw the mistake; but theykept it to themselves. The inexplicable white devils had doubtlesslychanged their minds. Instead of taking the life of one innocent man, they were taking the life of another innocent man. Ah Chow or AhCho--what did it matter which? They could never understand the whitedogs any more than could the white dogs understand them. Ah Cho wasgoing to have his head cut off, but they, when their two remaining yearsof servitude were up, were going back to China. 

Schemmer had made the guillotine himself. He was a handy man, and thoughhe had never seen a guillotine, the French officials had explained theprinciple to him. It was on his suggestion that they had ordered theexecution to take place at Atimaono instead of at Papeete. The sceneof the crime, Schemmer had argued, was the best possible place for thepunishment, and, in addition, it would have a salutary influenceupon the half-thousand Chinagos on the plantation. Schemmer had alsovolunteered to act as executioner, and in that capacity he was now onthe scaffold, experimenting with the instrument he had made. A bananatree, of the size and consistency of a man's neck, lay under theguillotine. Ah Cho watched with fascinated eyes. The German, turning asmall crank, hoisted the blade to the top of the little derrick he hadrigged. A jerk on a stout piece of cord loosed the blade and it droppedwith a flash, neatly severing the banana trunk. 

"How does it work?" The sergeant, coming out on top the scaffold, hadasked the question. 

"Beautifully, " was Schemmer's exultant answer. "Let me show you. "

Again he turned the crank that hoisted the blade, jerked the cord, andsent the blade crashing down on the soft tree. But this time it went nomore than two-thirds of the way through. 

The sergeant scowled. "That will not serve, " he said. 

Schemmer wiped the sweat from his forehead. "What it needs is moreweight, " he announced. Walking up to the edge of the scaffold, he calledhis orders to the blacksmith for a twenty-five-pound piece of iron. Ashe stooped over to attach the iron to the broad top of the blade, Ah Choglanced at the sergeant and saw his opportunity. 

"The honourable judge said that Ah Chow was to have his head cut off, "he began. 

The sergeant nodded impatiently. He was thinking of the fifteen-mileride before him that afternoon, to the windward side of the island, andof Berthe, the pretty half-caste daughter of Lafiere, the pearl-trader, who was waiting for him at the end of it. 

"Well, I am not Ah Chow. I am Ah Cho. The honourable jailer has made amistake. Ah Chow is a tall man, and you see I am short. "

The sergeant looked at him hastily and saw the mistake. "Schemmer!" hecalled, imperatively. "Come here. "

The German grunted, but remained bent over his task till the chunkof iron was lashed to his satisfaction. "Is your Chinago ready?" hedemanded. 

"Look at him, " was the answer. "Is he the Chinago?"

Schemmer was surprised. He swore tersely for a few seconds, and lookedregretfully across at the thing he had made with his own hands andwhich he was eager to see work. "Look here, " he said finally, "we can'tpostpone this affair. I've lost three hours' work already out of thosefive hundred Chinagos. I can't afford to lose it all over again for theright man. Let's put the performance through just the same. It is only aChinago. "

The sergeant remembered the long ride before him, and the pearl-trader'sdaughter, and debated with himself. 

"They will blame it on Cruchot--if it is discovered, " the German urged. "But there's little chance of its being discovered. Ah Chow won't giveit away, at any rate. "

"The blame won't lie with Cruchot, anyway, " the sergeant said. "It musthave been the jailer's mistake. "

"Then let's go on with it. They can't blame us. Who can tell one Chinagofrom another? We can say that we merely carried out instructions withthe Chinago that was turned over to us. Besides, I really can't take allthose coolies a second time away from their labour. "

They spoke in French, and Ah Cho, who did not understand a word of it, nevertheless knew that they were determining his destiny. He knew, also, that the decision rested with the sergeant, and he hung upon thatofficial's lips. 

"All right, " announced the sergeant. "Go ahead with it. He is only aChinago. "

"I'm going to try it once more, just to make sure. " Schemmer moved thebanana trunk forward under the knife, which he had hoisted to the top ofthe derrick. 

Ah Cho tried to remember maxims from "The Tract of the Quiet Way. " "Livein concord, " came to him; but it was not applicable. He was not going tolive. He was about to die. No, that would not do. "Forgive malice"--yes, but there was no malice to forgive. Schemmer and the rest were doingthis thing without malice. It was to them merely a piece of work thathad to be done, just as clearing the jungle, ditching the water, andplanting cotton were pieces of work that had to be done. Schemmer jerkedthe cord, and Ah Cho forgot "The Tract of the Quiet Way. " The knife shotdown with a thud, making a clean slice of the tree. 

"Beautiful!" exclaimed the sergeant, pausing in the act of lighting acigarette. "Beautiful, my friend. "

Schemmer was pleased at the praise. 

"Come on, Ah Chow, " he said, in the Tahitian tongue. 

"But I am not Ah Chow--" Ah Cho began. 

"Shut up!" was the answer. "If you open your mouth again, I'll breakyour head. "

The overseer threatened him with a clenched fist, and he remainedsilent. What was the good of protesting? Those foreign devils always hadtheir way. He allowed himself to be lashed to the vertical board thatwas the size of his body. Schemmer drew the buckles tight--so tight thatthe straps cut into his flesh and hurt. But he did not complain. Thehurt would not last long. He felt the board tilting over in the airtoward the horizontal, and closed his eyes. And in that moment he caughta last glimpse of his garden of meditation and repose. It seemed to himthat he sat in the garden. A cool wind was blowing, and the bells inthe several trees were tinkling softly. Also, birds were making sleepynoises, and from beyond the high wall came the subdued sound of villagelife. 

Then he was aware that the board had come to rest, and from muscularpressures and tensions he knew that he was lying on his back. He openedhis eyes. Straight above him he saw the suspended knife blazing in thesunshine. He saw the weight which had been added, and noted that oneof Schemmer's knots had slipped. Then he heard the sergeant's voice insharp command. Ah Cho closed his eyes hastily. He did not want to seethat knife descend. But he felt it--for one great fleeting instant. Andin that instant he remembered Cruchot and what Cruchot had said. ButCruchot was wrong. The knife did not tickle. That much he knew before heceased to know. 

MAKE WESTING

 Whatever you do, make westing! make westing! --Sailing directions for Cape Horn. 

For seven weeks the Mary Rogers had been between 50 degrees south in theAtlantic and 50 degrees south in the Pacific, which meant that for sevenweeks she had been struggling to round Cape Horn. For seven weeksshe had been either in dirt, or close to dirt, save once, and then, following upon six days of excessive dirt, which she had ridden outunder the shelter of the redoubtable Terra del Fuego coast, she hadalmost gone ashore during a heavy swell in the dead calm that hadsuddenly fallen. For seven weeks she had wrestled with the Cape Horngraybeards, and in return been buffeted and smashed by them. She was awooden ship, and her ceaseless straining had opened her seams, so thattwice a day the watch took its turn at the pumps. 

The Mary Rogers was strained, the crew was strained, and big Dan Cullen, master, was likewise strained. Perhaps he was strained most of all, forupon him rested the responsibility of that titanic struggle. He sleptmost of the time in his clothes, though he rarely slept. He haunted thedeck at night, a great, burly, robust ghost, black with the sunburnof thirty years of sea and hairy as an orang-outang. He, in turn, washaunted by one thought of action, a sailing direction for the Horn:Whatever you do, make westing! make westing! It was an obsession. Hethought of nothing else, except, at times, to blaspheme God for sendingsuch bitter weather. 

Make westing! He hugged the Horn, and a dozen times lay hove to with theiron Cape bearing east-by-north, or north-north-east, a score of milesaway. And each time the eternal west wind smote him back and he madeeasting. He fought gale after gale, south to 64 degrees, inside theantarctic drift-ice, and pledged his immortal soul to the Powers ofDarkness for a bit of westing, for a slant to take him around. And hemade easting. In despair, he had tried to make the passage through theStraits of Le Maire. Halfway through, the wind hauled to the north'ardof north-west, the glass dropped to 28. 88, and he turned and ran beforea gale of cyclonic fury, missing, by a hair's-breadth, piling up theMary Rogers on the black-toothed rocks. Twice he had made west to theDiego Ramirez Rocks, one of the times saved between two snow-squalls bysighting the gravestones of ships a quarter of a mile dead ahead. 

Blow! Captain Dan Cullen instanced all his thirty years at sea to provethat never had it blown so before. The Mary Rogers was hove to at thetime he gave the evidence, and, to clinch it, inside half an hour theMary Rogers was hove down to the hatches. Her new maintopsail and brandnew spencer were blown away like tissue paper; and five sails, furledand fast under double gaskets, were blown loose and stripped from theyards. And before morning the Mary Rogers was hove down twice again, andholes were knocked in her bulwarks to ease her decks from the weight ofocean that pressed her down. 

On an average of once a week Captain Dan Cullen caught glimpses of thesun. Once, for ten minutes, the sun shone at midday, and ten minutesafterward a new gale was piping up, both watches were shortening sail, and all was buried in the obscurity of a driving snow-squall. Fora fortnight, once, Captain Dan Cullen was without a meridian or achronometer sight. Rarely did he know his position within half of adegree, except when in sight of land; for sun and stars remained hiddenbehind the sky, and it was so gloomy that even at the best the horizonswere poor for accurate observations. A gray gloom shrouded the world. The clouds were gray; the great driving seas were leaden gray; thesmoking crests were a gray churning; even the occasional albatrosseswere gray, while the snow-flurries were not white, but gray, under thesombre pall of the heavens. 

Life on board the Mary Rogers was gray--gray and gloomy. The facesof the sailors were blue-gray; they were afflicted with sea-cuts andsea-boils, and suffered exquisitely. They were shadows of men. For sevenweeks, in the forecastle or on deck, they had not known what it was tobe dry. They had forgotten what it was to sleep out a watch, and allwatches it was, "All hands on deck!" They caught snatches of agonizedsleep, and they slept in their oilskins ready for the everlasting call. So weak and worn were they that it took both watches to do the work ofone. That was why both watches were on deck so much of the time. And noshadow of a man could shirk duty. Nothing less than a broken leg couldenable a man to knock off work; and there were two such, who had beenmauled and pulped by the seas that broke aboard. 

One other man who was the shadow of a man was George Dorety. He was theonly passenger on board, a friend of the firm, and he had elected tomake the voyage for his health. But seven weeks of Cape Horn had notbettered his health. He gasped and panted in his bunk through the long, heaving nights; and when on deck he was so bundled up for warmth that heresembled a peripatetic old-clothes shop. At midday, eating at the cabintable in a gloom so deep that the swinging sea-lamps burned always, helooked as blue-gray as the sickest, saddest man for'ard. Nor did gazingacross the table at Captain Dan Cullen have any cheering effect uponhim. Captain Cullen chewed and scowled and kept silent. The scowlswere for God, and with every chew he reiterated the sole thought of hisexistence, which was make westing. He was a big, hairy brute, and thesight of him was not stimulating to the other's appetite. He lookedupon George Dorety as a Jonah, and told him so, once each meal, savagelytransferring the scowl from God to the passenger and back again. 

Nor did the mate prove a first aid to a languid appetite. JoshuaHiggins by name, a seaman by profession and pull, but a pot-wolloperby capacity, he was a loose-jointed, sniffling creature, heartless andselfish and cowardly, without a soul, in fear of his life of Dan Cullen, and a bully over the sailors, who knew that behind the mate was CaptainCullen, the law-giver and compeller, the driver and the destroyer, theincarnation of a dozen bucko mates. In that wild weather at the southernend of the earth, Joshua Higgins ceased washing. His grimy face usuallyrobbed George Dorety of what little appetite he managed to accumulate. Ordinarily this lavatorial dereliction would have caught CaptainCullen's eye and vocabulary, but in the present his mind was filled withmaking westing, to the exclusion of all other things not contributorythereto. Whether the mate's face was clean or dirty had no bearingupon westing. Later on, when 50 degrees south in the Pacific had beenreached, Joshua Higgins would wash his face very abruptly. In themeantime, at the cabin table, where gray twilight alternated withlamplight while the lamps were being filled, George Dorety sat betweenthe two men, one a tiger and the other a hyena, and wondered why God hadmade them. The second mate, Matthew Turner, was a true sailor and a man, but George Dorety did not have the solace of his company, for he ate byhimself, solitary, when they had finished. 

On Saturday morning, July 24, George Dorety awoke to a feeling of lifeand headlong movement. On deck he found the Mary Rogers running offbefore a howling south-easter. Nothing was set but the lower topsailsand the foresail. It was all she could stand, yet she was makingfourteen knots, as Mr. Turner shouted in Dorety's ear when he came ondeck. And it was all westing. She was going around the Horn at last. .. If the wind held. Mr. Turner looked happy. The end of the struggle wasin sight. But Captain Cullen did not look happy. He scowled at Doretyin passing. Captain Cullen did not want God to know that he was pleasedwith that wind. He had a conception of a malicious God, and believedin his secret soul that if God knew it was a desirable wind, God wouldpromptly efface it and send a snorter from the west. So he walked softlybefore God, smothering his joy down under scowls and muttered curses, and, so, fooling God, for God was the only thing in the universe ofwhich Dan Cullen was afraid. 

All Saturday and Saturday night the Mary Rogers raced her westing. Persistently she logged her fourteen knots, so that by Sunday morningshe had covered three hundred and fifty miles. If the wind held, shewould make around. If it failed, and the snorter came from anywherebetween south-west and north, back the Mary Rogers would be hurled andbe no better off than she had been seven weeks before. And on Sundaymorning the wind was failing. The big sea was going down and runningsmooth. Both watches were on deck setting sail after sail as fast as theship could stand it. And now Captain Cullen went around brazenly beforeGod, smoking a big cigar, smiling jubilantly, as if the failing winddelighted him, while down underneath he was raging against God fortaking the life out of the blessed wind. Make westing! So he would, ifGod would only leave him alone. Secretly, he pledged himself anew tothe Powers of Darkness, if they would let him make westing. He pledgedhimself so easily because he did not believe in the Powers of Darkness. He really believed only in God, though he did not know it. And in hisinverted theology God was really the Prince of Darkness. Captain Cullenwas a devil-worshipper, but he called the devil by another name, thatwas all. 

At midday, after calling eight bells, Captain Cullen ordered the royalson. The men went aloft faster than they had gone in weeks. Not alonewere they nimble because of the westing, but a benignant sun was shiningdown and limbering their stiff bodies. George Dorety stood aft, nearCaptain Cullen, less bundled in clothes than usual, soaking in thegrateful warmth as he watched the scene. Swiftly and abruptly theincident occurred. There was a cry from the foreroyal-yard of "Manoverboard!" Somebody threw a life-buoy over the side, and at the sameinstant the second mate's voice came aft, ringing and peremptory--

"Hard down your helm!"

The man at the wheel never moved a spoke. He knew better, for CaptainDan Cullen was standing alongside of him. He wanted to move a spoke, tomove all the spokes, to grind the wheel down, hard down, for his comradedrowning in the sea. He glanced at Captain Dan Cullen, and Captain DanCullen gave no sign. 

"Down! Hard down!" the second mate roared, as he sprang aft. 

But he ceased springing and commanding, and stood still, when he sawDan Cullen by the wheel. And big Dan Cullen puffed at his cigar and saidnothing. Astern, and going astern fast, could be seen the sailor. He hadcaught the life-buoy and was clinging to it. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved. The men aloft clung to the royal yards and watched with terror-strickenfaces. And the Mary Rogers raced on, making her westing. A long, silentminute passed. 

"Who was it?" Captain Cullen demanded. 

"Mops, sir, " eagerly answered the sailor at the wheel. 

Mops topped a wave astern and disappeared temporarily in the trough. It was a large wave, but it was no graybeard. A small boat could liveeasily in such a sea, and in such a sea the Mary Rogers could easilycome to. But she could not come to and make westing at the same time. 

For the first time in all his years, George Dorety was seeing a realdrama of life and death--a sordid little drama in which the scalesbalanced an unknown sailor named Mops against a few miles of longitude. At first he had watched the man astern, but now he watched big DanCullen, hairy and black, vested with power of life and death, smoking acigar. 

Captain Dan Cullen smoked another long, silent minute. Then he removedthe cigar from his mouth. He glanced aloft at the spars of the MaryRogers, and overside at the sea. 

"Sheet home the royals!" he cried. 

Fifteen minutes later they sat at table, in the cabin, with food servedbefore them. On one side of George Dorety sat Dan Cullen, the tiger, onthe other side, Joshua Higgins, the hyena. Nobody spoke. On deck the menwere sheeting home the skysails. George Dorety could hear their cries, while a persistent vision haunted him of a man called Mops, alive andwell, clinging to a life-buoy miles astern in that lonely ocean. Heglanced at Captain Cullen, and experienced a feeling of nausea, for theman was eating his food with relish, almost bolting it. 

"Captain Cullen, " Dorety said, "you are in command of this ship, and itis not proper for me to comment now upon what you do. But I wish to sayone thing. There is a hereafter, and yours will be a hot one. "

Captain Cullen did not even scowl. In his voice was regret as he said--

"It was blowing a living gale. It was impossible to save the man. "

"He fell from the royal-yard, " Dorety cried hotly. "You were settingthe royals at the time. Fifteen minutes afterward you were setting theskysails. "

"It was a living gale, wasn't it, Mr. Higgin?" Captain Cullen said, turning to the mate. 

"If you'd brought her to, it'd have taken the sticks out of her, " wasthe mate's answer. "You did the proper thing, Captain Cullen. The manhadn't a ghost of a show. "

George Dorety made no answer, and to the meal's end no one spoke. Afterthat, Dorety had his meals served in his state-room. Captain Cullenscowled at him no longer, though no speech was exchanged between them, while the Mary Rogers sped north toward warmer latitudes. At the end ofthe week, Dan Cullen cornered Dorety on deck. 

"What are you going to do when we get to 'Frisco?" he demanded bluntly. 

"I am going to swear out a warrant for your arrest, " Dorety answeredquietly. "I am going to charge you with murder, and I am going to seeyou hanged for it. "

"You're almighty sure of yourself, " Captain Cullen sneered, turning onhis heel. 

A second week passed, and one morning found George Dorety standing inthe coach-house companionway at the for'ard end of the long poop, taking his first gaze around the deck. The Mary Rogers was reachingfull-and-by, in a stiff breeze. Every sail was set and drawing, including the staysails. Captain Cullen strolled for'ard along the poop. He strolled carelessly, glancing at the passenger out of the cornerof his eye. Dorety was looking the other way, standing with head andshoulders outside the companionway, and only the back of his head was tobe seen. Captain Cullen, with swift eye, embraced the mainstaysail-blockand the head and estimated the distance. He glanced about him. Nobodywas looking. Aft, Joshua Higgins, pacing up and down, had just turnedhis back and was going the other way. Captain Cullen bent over suddenlyand cast the staysail-sheet off from its pin. The heavy block hurtledthrough the air, smashing Dorety's head like an egg-shell and hurtlingon and back and forth as the staysail whipped and slatted in the wind. Joshua Higgins turned around to see what had carried away, and met thefull blast of the vilest portion of Captain Cullen's profanity. 

"I made the sheet fast myself, " whimpered the mate in the first lull, "with an extra turn to make sure. I remember it distinctly. "

"Made fast?" the Captain snarled back, for the benefit of the watch asit struggled to capture the flying sail before it tore to ribbons. "Youcouldn't make your grandmother fast, you useless hell's scullion. Ifyou made that sheet fast with an extra turn, why in hell didn't it stayfast? That's what I want to know. Why in hell didn't it stay fast?"

The mate whined inarticulately. 

"Oh, shut up!" was the final word of Captain Cullen. 

Half an hour later he was as surprised as any when the body of GeorgeDorety was found inside the companionway on the floor. In the afternoon, alone in his room, he doctored up the log. 

"Ordinary seaman, Karl Brun, " he wrote, "lost overboard fromforeroyal-yard in a gale of wind. Was running at the time, and for thesafety of the ship did not dare come up to the wind. Nor could a boathave lived in the sea that was running. "

On another page, he wrote

"Had often warned Mr. Dorety about the danger he ran because of hiscarelessness on deck. I told him, once, that some day he would get hishead knocked off by a block. A carelessly fastened mainstaysail sheetwas the cause of the accident, which was deeply to be regretted becauseMr. Dorety was a favourite with all of us. "

Captain Dan Cullen read over his literary effort with admiration, blotted the page, and closed the log. He lighted a cigar and staredbefore him. He felt the Mary Rogers lift, and heel, and surge along, and knew that she was making nine knots. A smile of satisfaction slowlydawned on his black and hairy face. Well, anyway, he had made hiswesting and fooled God. 

SEMPER IDEM

Doctor Bicknell was in a remarkably gracious mood. Through a minoraccident, a slight bit of carelessness, that was all, a man who mighthave pulled through had died the preceding night. Though it had beenonly a sailorman, one of the innumerable unwashed, the steward of thereceiving hospital had been on the anxious seat all the morning. It wasnot that the man had died that gave him discomfort, he knew the Doctortoo well for that, but his distress lay in the fact that the operationhad been done so well. One of the most delicate in surgery, it had beenas successful as it was clever and audacious. All had then depended uponthe treatment, the nurses, the steward. And the man had died. Nothingmuch, a bit of carelessness, yet enough to bring the professional wrathof Doctor Bicknell about his ears and to perturb the working of thestaff and nurses for twenty-four hours to come. 

But, as already stated, the Doctor was in a remarkably gracious mood. When informed by the steward, in fear and trembling, of the man'sunexpected take-off, his lips did not so much as form one syllable ofcensure; nay, they were so pursed that snatches of rag-time floatedsoftly from them, to be broken only by a pleasant query after the healthof the other's eldest-born. The steward, deeming it impossible that hecould have caught the gist of the case, repeated it. 

"Yes, yes, " Doctor Bicknell said impatiently; "I understand. But howabout Semper Idem? Is he ready to leave?"

"Yes. They're helping him dress now, " the steward answered, passing onto the round of his duties, content that peace still reigned within theiodine-saturated walls. 

It was Semper Idem's recovery which had so fully compensated DoctorBicknell for the loss of the sailorman. Lives were to him as nothing, the unpleasant but inevitable incidents of the profession, but cases, ah, cases were everything. People who knew him were prone to brand him abutcher, but his colleagues were at one in the belief that a bolderand yet a more capable man never stood over the table. He was not animaginative man. He did not possess, and hence had no tolerance for, emotion. His nature was accurate, precise, scientific. Men were to himno more than pawns, without individuality or personal value. But ascases it was different. The more broken a man was, the more precarioushis grip on life, the greater his significance in the eyes of DoctorBicknell. He would as readily forsake a poet laureate suffering from acommon accident for a nameless, mangled vagrant who defied every law oflife by refusing to die, as would a child forsake a Punch and Judy for acircus. 

So it had been in the case of Semper Idem. The mystery of the man hadnot appealed to him, nor had his silence and the veiled romance whichthe yellow reporters had so sensationally and so fruitlessly exploitedin divers Sunday editions. But Semper Idem's throat had been cut. Thatwas the point. That was where his interest had centred. Cut from ear toear, and not one surgeon in a thousand to give a snap of the fingersfor his chance of recovery. But, thanks to the swift municipal ambulanceservice and to Doctor Bicknell, he had been dragged back into the worldhe had sought to leave. The Doctor's co-workers had shaken their headswhen the case was brought in. Impossible, they said. Throat, windpipe, jugular, all but actually severed, and the loss of blood frightful. Asit was such a foregone conclusion, Doctor Bicknell had employed methodsand done things which made them, even in their professional capacities, shudder. And lo! the man had recovered. 

So, on this morning that Semper Idem was to leave the hospital, haleand hearty, Doctor Bicknell's geniality was in nowise disturbed by thesteward's report, and he proceeded cheerfully to bring order out of thechaos of a child's body which had been ground and crunched beneath thewheels of an electric car. 

As many will remember, the case of Semper Idem aroused a vast dealof unseemly yet highly natural curiosity. He had been found in a slumlodging, with throat cut as aforementioned, and blood dripping down uponthe inmates of the room below and disturbing their festivities. He hadevidently done the deed standing, with head bowed forward that he mightgaze his last upon a photograph which stood on the table propped againsta candlestick. It was this attitude which had made it possible forDoctor Bicknell to save him. So terrific had been the sweep of the razorthat had he had his head thrown back, as he should have done to haveaccomplished the act properly, with his neck stretched and the elasticvascular walls distended, he would have of a certainty well-nighdecapitated himself. 

At the hospital, during all the time he travelled the repugnant roadback to life, not a word had left his lips. Nor could anything belearned of him by the sleuths detailed by the chief of police. Nobodyknew him, nor had ever seen or heard of him before. He was strictly, uniquely, of the present. His clothes and surroundings were those of thelowest labourer, his hands the hands of a gentleman. But not a shredof writing was discovered, nothing, save in one particular, which wouldserve to indicate his past or his position in life. 

And that one particular was the photograph. If it were at all alikeness, the woman who gazed frankly out upon the onlooker from thecard-mount must have been a striking creature indeed. It was an amateurproduction, for the detectives were baffled in that no professionalphotographer's signature or studio was appended. Across a corner of themount, in delicate feminine tracery, was written: "Semper idem; semperfidelis. " And she looked it. As many recollect, it was a face one couldnever forget. Clever half-tones, remarkably like, were published in allthe leading papers at the time; but such procedure gave rise to nothingbut the uncontrollable public curiosity and interminable copy to thespace-writers. 

For want of a better name, the rescued suicide was known to the hospitalattendants, and to the world, as Semper Idem. And Semper Idem heremained. Reporters, detectives, and nurses gave him up in despair. Not one word could he be persuaded to utter; yet the flitting consciouslight of his eyes showed that his ears heard and his brain grasped everyquestion put to him. 

But this mystery and romance played no part in Doctor Bicknell'sinterest when he paused in the office to have a parting word with hispatient. He, the Doctor, had performed a prodigy in the matter of thisman, done what was virtually unprecedented in the annals of surgery. Hedid not care who or what the man was, and it was highly improbablethat he should ever see him again; but, like the artist gazing upon afinished creation, he wished to look for the last time upon the work ofhis hand and brain. 

Semper Idem still remained mute. He seemed anxious to be gone. Not aword could the Doctor extract from him, and little the Doctor cared. He examined the throat of the convalescent carefully, idling over thehideous scar with the lingering, half-caressing fondness of a parent. It was not a particularly pleasing sight. An angry line circled thethroat--for all the world as though the man had just escaped thehangman's noose--and, disappearing below the ear on either side, had theappearance of completing the fiery periphery at the nape of the neck. 

Maintaining his dogged silence, yielding to the other's examination inmuch the manner of a leashed lion, Semper Idem betrayed only his desireto drop from out of the public eye. 

"Well, I'll not keep you, " Doctor Bicknell finally said, laying a handon the man's shoulder and stealing a last glance at his own handiwork. "But let me give you a bit of advice. Next time you try it on, holdyour chin up, so. Don't snuggle it down and butcher yourself like a cow. Neatness and despatch, you know. Neatness and despatch. "

Semper Idem's eyes flashed in token that he heard, and a moment laterthe hospital door swung to on his heel. 

It was a busy day for Doctor Bicknell, and the afternoon was well alongwhen he lighted a cigar preparatory to leaving the table upon which itseemed the sufferers almost clamoured to be laid. But the last one, anold rag-picker with a broken shoulder-blade, had been disposed of, andthe first fragrant smoke wreaths had begun to curl about his head, whenthe gong of a hurrying ambulance came through the open window fromthe street, followed by the inevitable entry of the stretcher with itsghastly freight. 

"Lay it on the table, " the Doctor directed, turning for a moment toplace his cigar in safety. "What is it?"

"Suicide--throat cut, " responded one of the stretcher bearers. "Down onMorgan Alley. Little hope, I think, sir. He's 'most gone. "

"Eh? Well, I'll give him a look, anyway. " He leaned over the man at themoment when the quick made its last faint flutter and succumbed. 

"It's Semper Idem come back again, " the steward said. 

"Ay, " replied Doctor Bicknell, "and gone again. No bungling this time. Properly done, upon my life, sir, properly done. Took my advice to theletter. I'm not required here. Take it along to the morgue. "

Doctor Bicknell secured his cigar and relighted it. "That, " he saidbetween the puffs, looking at the steward, "that evens up for the oneyou lost last night. We're quits now. "

A NOSE FOR THE KING

In the morning calm of Korea, when its peace and tranquillity trulymerited its ancient name, "Cho-sen, " there lived a politician by name YiChin Ho. He was a man of parts, and--who shall say?--perhaps in no wiseworse than politicians the world over. But, unlike his brethren in otherlands, Yi Chin Ho was in jail. Not that he had inadvertently diverted tohimself public moneys, but that he had inadvertently diverted too much. Excess is to be deplored in all things, even in grafting, and Yi ChinHo's excess had brought him to most deplorable straits. 

Ten thousand strings of cash he owed the Government, and he layin prison under sentence of death. There was one advantage to thesituation--he had plenty of time in which to think. And he thought well. Then called he the jailer to him. 

"Most worthy man, you see before you one most wretched, " he began. "Yetall will be well with me if you will but let me go free for one shorthour this night. And all will be well with you, for I shall see toyour advancement through the years, and you shall come at length to thedirectorship of all the prisons of Cho-sen. "

"How now?" demanded the jailer. "What foolishness is this? One shorthour, and you but waiting for your head to be chopped off! And I, withan aged and much-to-be-respected mother, not to say anything of a wifeand several children of tender years! Out upon you for the scoundrelthat you are!"

"From the Sacred City to the ends of all the Eight Coasts there is noplace for me to hide, " Yi Chin Ho made reply. "I am a man of wisdom, butof what worth my wisdom here in prison? Were I free, well I know I couldseek out and obtain the money wherewith to repay the Government. I knowof a nose that will save me from all my difficulties. "

"A nose!" cried the jailer. 

"A nose, " said Yi Chin Ho. "A remarkable nose, if I may say so, a mostremarkable nose. "

The jailer threw up his hands despairingly. "Ah, what a wag you are, what a wag, " he laughed. "To think that that very admirable wit of yoursmust go the way of the chopping-block!"

And so saying, he turned and went away. But in the end, being a man softof head and heart, when the night was well along he permitted Yi Chin Hoto go. 

Straight he went to the Governor, catching him alone and arousing himfrom his sleep. 

"Yi Chin Ho, or I'm no Governor!" cried the Governor. "What do you herewho should be in prison waiting on the chopping-block?"

"I pray Your Excellency to listen to me, " said Yi Chin Ho, squatting onhis hams by the bedside and lighting his pipe from the fire-box. "A deadman is without value. It is true, I am as a dead man, without value tothe Government, to Your Excellency, or to myself. But if, so to say, Your Excellency were to give me my freedom--"

"Impossible!" cried the Governor. "Beside, you are condemned to death. "

"Your Excellency well knows that if I can repay the ten thousand stringsof cash, the Government will pardon me, " Yi Chin Ho went on. "So, as Isay, if Your Excellency were to give me my freedom for a few days, beinga man of understanding, I should then repay the Government and be inposition to be of service to Your Excellency. I should be in position tobe of very great service to Your Excellency. "

"Have you a plan whereby you hope to obtain this money?" asked theGovernor. 

"I have, " said Yi Chin Ho. 

"Then come with it to me to-morrow night; I would now sleep, " said theGovernor, taking up his snore where it had been interrupted. 

On the following night, having again obtained leave of absence from thejailer, Yi Chin Ho presented himself at the Governor's bedside. 

"Is it you, Yi Chin Ho?" asked the Governor. "And have you the plan?"

"It is I, Your Excellency, " answered Yi Chin Ho, "and the plan is here. "

"Speak, " commanded the Governor. 

"The plan is here, " repeated Yi Chin Ho, "here in my hand. "

The Governor sat up and opened his eyes. Yi Chin Ho proffered in hishand a sheet of paper. The Governor held it to the light. 

"Nothing but a nose, " said he. 

"A bit pinched, so, and so, Your Excellency, " said Yi Chin Ho. 

"Yes, a bit pinched here and there, as you say, " said the Governor. 

"Withal it is an exceeding corpulent nose, thus, and so, all in oneplace, at the end, " proceeded Yi Chin Ho. "Your Excellency would seekfar and wide and many a day for that nose and find it not!"

"An unusual nose, " admitted the Governor. 

"There is a wart upon it, " said Yi Chin Ho. 

"A most unusual nose, " said the Governor. "Never have I seen the like. But what do you with this nose, Yi Chin Ho?"

"I seek it whereby to repay the money to the Government, " said Yi ChinHo. "I seek it to be of service to Your Excellency, and I seek it tosave my own worthless head. Further, I seek Your Excellency's seal uponthis picture of the nose. "

And the Governor laughed and affixed the seal of State, and Yi Chin Hodeparted. For a month and a day he travelled the King's Road which leadsto the shore of the Eastern Sea; and there, one night, at the gate ofthe largest mansion of a wealthy city he knocked loudly for admittance. 

"None other than the master of the house will I see, " said he fiercelyto the frightened servants. "I travel upon the King's business. "

Straightway was he led to an inner room, where the master of the housewas roused from his sleep and brought blinking before him. 

"You are Pak Chung Chang, head man of this city, " said Yi Chin Ho intones that were all-accusing. "I am upon the King's business. "

Pak Chung Chang trembled. Well he knew the King's business was ever aterrible business. His knees smote together, and he near fell to thefloor. 

"The hour is late, " he quavered. "Were it not well to--"

"The King's business never waits!" thundered Yi Chin Ho. "Come apartwith me, and swiftly. I have an affair of moment to discuss with you. 

"It is the King's affair, " he added with even greater fierceness; sothat Pak Chung Chang's silver pipe dropped from his nerveless fingersand clattered on the floor. 

"Know then, " said Yi Chin Ho, when they had gone apart, "that the Kingis troubled with an affliction, a very terrible affliction. In that hefailed to cure, the Court physician has had nothing else than his headchopped off. From all the Eight Provinces have the physicians come towait upon the King. Wise consultation have they held, and they havedecided that for a remedy for the King's affliction nothing else isrequired than a nose, a certain kind of nose, a very peculiar certainkind of nose. 

"Then by none other was I summoned than His Excellency the PrimeMinister himself. He put a paper into my hand. Upon this paper wasthe very peculiar kind of nose drawn by the physicians of the EightProvinces, with the seal of State upon it. 

"'Go, ' said His Excellency the Prime Minister. 'Seek out this nose, forthe King's affliction is sore. And wheresoever you find this nose uponthe face of a man, strike it off forthright and bring it in all haste tothe Court, for the King must be cured. Go, and come not back until yoursearch is rewarded. '

"And so I departed upon my quest, " said Yi Chin Ho. "I have soughtout the remotest corners of the kingdom; I have travelled the EightHighways, searched the Eight Provinces, and sailed the seas of the EightCoasts. And here I am. "

With a great flourish he drew a paper from his girdle, unrolled it withmany snappings and cracklings, and thrust it before the face of PakChung Chang. Upon the paper was the picture of the nose. 

Pak Chung Chang stared upon it with bulging eyes. 

"Never have I beheld such a nose, " he began. 

"There is a wart upon it, " said Yi Chin Ho. 

"Never have I beheld--" Pak Chung Chang began again. 

"Bring your father before me, " Yi Chin Ho interrupted sternly. 

"My ancient and very-much-to-be-respected ancestor sleeps, " said PakChung Chang. 

"Why dissemble?" demanded Yi Chin Ho. "You know it is your father'snose. Bring him before me that I may strike it off and be gone. Hurry, lest I make bad report of you. "

"Mercy!" cried Pak Chung Chang, falling on his knees. "It is impossible!It is impossible! You cannot strike off my father's nose. He cannotgo down without his nose to the grave. He will become a laughter and abyword, and all my days and nights will be filled with woe. O reflect!Report that you have seen no such nose in your travels. You, too, have afather. "

Pak Chung Chang clasped Yi Chin Ho's knees and fell to weeping on hissandals. 

"My heart softens strangely at your tears, " said Yi Chin Ho. "I, too, know filial piety and regard. But--" He hesitated, then added, as thoughthinking aloud, "It is as much as my head is worth. "

"How much is your head worth?" asked Pak Chung Chang in a thin, smallvoice. 

"A not remarkable head, " said Yi Chin Ho. "An absurdly unremarkablehead; but, such is my great foolishness, I value it at nothing less thanone hundred thousand strings of cash. "

"So be it, " said Pak Chung Chang, rising to his feet. 

"I shall need horses to carry the treasure, " said Yi Chin Ho, "and mento guard it well as I journey through the mountains. There are robbersabroad in the land. "

"There are robbers abroad in the land, " said Pak Chung Chang, sadly. "But it shall be as you wish, so long as my ancient andvery-much-to-be-respected ancestor's nose abide in its appointed place. "

"Say nothing to any man of this occurrence, " said Yi Chin Ho, "else willother and more loyal servants than I be sent to strike off your father'snose. "

And so Yi Chin Ho departed on his way through the mountains, blitheof heart and gay of song as he listened to the jingling bells of histreasure-laden ponies. 

There is little more to tell. Yi Chin Ho prospered through the years. Byhis efforts the jailer attained at length to the directorship of all theprisons of Cho-sen; the Governor ultimately betook himself to the SacredCity to be Prime Minister to the King, while Yi Chin Ho became theKing's boon companion and sat at table with him to the end of a round, fat life. But Pak Chung Chang fell into a melancholy, and ever after heshook his head sadly, with tears in his eyes, whenever he regarded theexpensive nose of his ancient and very-much-to-be-respected ancestor. 

THE "FRANCIS SPAIGHT"

(A TRUE TALE RETOLD)

The Francis Spaight was running before it solely under a mizzentopsail, when the thing happened. It was not due to carelessness so much asto the lack of discipline of the crew and to the fact that they wereindifferent seamen at best. The man at the wheel in particular, aLimerick man, had had no experience with salt water beyond that ofrafting timber on the Shannon between the Quebec vessels and the shore. He was afraid of the huge seas that rose out of the murk astern andbore down upon him, and he was more given to cowering away from theirthreatened impact than he was to meeting their blows with the wheel andchecking the ship's rush to broach to. 

It was three in the morning when his unseamanlike conduct precipitatedthe catastrophe. At sight of a sea far larger than its fellows, hecrouched down, releasing his hands from the spokes. The Francis Spaightsheered as her stern lifted on the sea, receiving the full fling of thecap on her quarter. The next instant she was in the trough, her lee-railburied till the ocean was level with her hatch-coamings, sea after seabreaking over her weather rail and sweeping what remained exposed of thedeck with icy deluges. 

The men were out of hand, helpless and hopeless, stupid in theirbewilderment and fear, and resolute only in that they would not obeyorders. Some wailed, others clung silently in the weather shrouds, andstill others muttered prayers or shrieked vile imprecations; and neithercaptain nor mate could get them to bear a hand at the pumps or atsetting patches of sails to bring the vessel up to the wind and sea. Inside the hour the ship was over on her beam ends, the lubberly cowardsclimbing up her side and hanging on in the rigging. When she went over, the mate was caught and drowned in the after-cabin, as were two sailorswho had sought refuge in the forecastle. 

The mate had been the ablest man on board, and the captain was nowscarcely less helpless than his men. Beyond cursing them for theirworthlessness, he did nothing; and it remained for a man named Mahoney, a Belfast man, and a boy, O'Brien, of Limerick, to cut away the fore andmain masts. This they did at great risk on the perpendicular wall of thewreck, sending the mizzentopmast overside along in the general crash. The Francis Spaight righted, and it was well that she was lumberladen, else she would have sunk, for she was already water-logged. The mainmast, still fast by the shrouds, beat like a thunderoussledge-hammer against the ship's side, every stroke bringing groans fromthe men. 

Day dawned on the savage ocean, and in the cold gray light all thatcould be seen of the Francis Spaight emerging from the sea were thepoop, the shattered mizzenmast, and a ragged line of bulwarks. It wasmidwinter in the North Atlantic, and the wretched men were half-deadfrom cold. But there was no place where they could find rest. Every seabreached clean over the wreck, washing away the salt incrustations fromtheir bodies and depositing fresh incrustations. The cabin under thepoop was awash to the knees, but here at least was shelter from thechill wind, and here the survivors congregated, standing upright, holding on by the cabin furnishings, and leaning against one another forsupport. 

In vain Mahoney strove to get the men to take turns in watching aloftfrom the mizzenmast for any chance vessel. The icy gale was too much forthem, and they preferred the shelter of the cabin. O'Brien, the boy, whowas only fifteen, took turns with Mahoney on the freezing perch. It wasthe boy, at three in the afternoon, who called down that he had sighteda sail. This did bring them from the cabin, and they crowded the pooprail and weather mizzen shrouds as they watched the strange ship. Butits course did not lie near, and when it disappeared below the skyline, they returned shivering to the cabin, not one offering to relieve thewatch at the mast head. 

By the end of the second day, Mahoney and O'Brien gave up their attempt, and thereafter the vessel drifted in the gale uncared for and without alookout. There were thirteen alive, and for seventy-two hours they stoodknee-deep in the sloshing water on the cabin floor, half-frozen, withoutfood, and with but three bottles of wine shared among them. All food andfresh water were below, and there was no getting at such supplies inthe water-logged condition of the wreck. As the days went by, no foodwhatever passed their lips. Fresh water, in small quantities, they wereable to obtain by holding a cover of a tureen under the saddle of themizzenmast. But the rain fell infrequently, and they were hard put. Whenit rained, they also soaked their handkerchiefs, squeezing them out intotheir mouths or into their shoes. As the wind and sea went down, theywere even able to mop the exposed portions of the deck that were freefrom brine and so add to their water supply. But food they had none, andno way of getting it, though sea-birds flew repeatedly overhead. 

In the calm weather that followed the gale, after having remained ontheir feet for ninety-six hours, they were able to find dry planks inthe cabin on which to lie. But the long hours of standing in the saltwater had caused sores to form on their legs. These sores were extremelypainful. The slightest contact or scrape caused severe anguish, and intheir weak condition and crowded situation they were continually hurtingone another in this manner. Not a man could move about without beingfollowed by volleys of abuse, curses, and groans. So great was theirmisery that the strong oppressed the weak, shoving them aside fromthe dry planks to shift for themselves in the cold and wet. The boy, O'Brien, was specially maltreated. Though there were three otherboys, it was O'Brien who came in for most of the abuse. There was noexplaining it, except on the ground that his was a stronger and moredominant spirit than those of the other boys, and that he stood up morefor his rights, resenting the petty injustices that were meted out toall the boys by the men. Whenever O'Brien came near the men in searchof a dry place to sleep, or merely moved about, he was kicked and cuffedaway. In return, he cursed them for their selfish brutishness, and blowsand kicks and curses were rained upon him. Miserable as were all ofthem, he was thus made far more miserable; and it was only the flame oflife, unusually strong in him, that enabled him to endure. 

As the days went by and they grew weaker, their peevishness andill-temper increased, which, in turn, increased the ill-treatment andsufferings of O'Brien. By the sixteenth day all hands were far gone withhunger, and they stood together in small groups, talking in undertonesand occasionally glancing at O'Brien. It was at high noon that theconference came to a head. The captain was the spokesman. All werecollected on the poop. 

"Men, " the captain began, "we have been a long time without food--twoweeks and two days it is, though it seems more like two years and twomonths. We can't hang out much longer. It is beyond human nature to goon hanging out with nothing in our stomachs. There is a serious questionto consider: whether it is better for all to die, or for one to die. Weare standing with our feet in our graves. If one of us dies, the restmay live until a ship is sighted. What say you?"

Michael Behane, the man who had been at the wheel when the FrancisSpaight broached to, called out that it was well. The others joined inthe cry. 

"Let it be one of the b'ys!" cried Sullivan, a Tarbert man, glancing atthe same time significantly at O'Brien. 

"It is my opinion, " the captain went on, "that it will be a good deedfor one of us to die for the rest. "

"A good deed! A good deed!" the men interjected. 

"And it is my opinion that 'tis best for one of the boys to die. Theyhave no families to support, nor would they be considered so great aloss to their friends as those who have wives and children. "

"'Tis right. " "Very right. " "Very fit it should be done, " the menmuttered one to another. 

But the four boys cried out against the injustice of it. 

"Our lives is just as dear to us as the rest iv yez, " O'Brien protested. "An' our famblies, too. As for wives an' childer, who is there savin'meself to care for me old mother that's a widow, as you know well, Michael Behane, that comes from Limerick? 'Tis not fair. Let the lots bedrawn between all of us, men and b'ys. "

Mahoney was the only man who spoke in favour of the boys, declaring thatit was the fair thing for all to share alike. Sullivan and the captaininsisted on the drawing of lots being confined to the boys. Therewere high words, in the midst of which Sullivan turned upon O'Brien, snarling--

"'Twould be a good deed to put you out of the way. You deserve it. 'Twould be the right way to serve you, an' serve you we will. "

He started toward O'Brien, with intent to lay hands on him and proceedat once with the killing, while several others likewise shuffled towardhim and reached for him. He stumbled backwards to escape them, at thesame time crying that he would submit to the drawing of the lots amongthe boys. 

The captain prepared four sticks of different lengths and handed them toSullivan. 

"You're thinkin' the drawin'll not be fair, " the latter sneered toO'Brien. "So it's yerself'll do the drawin'. "

To this O'Brien agreed. A handkerchief was tied over his eyes, blindfolding him, and he knelt down on the deck with his back toSullivan. 

"Whoever you name for the shortest stick'll die, " the captain said. 

Sullivan held up one of the sticks. The rest were concealed in his handso that no one could see whether it was the short stick or not. 

"An' whose stick will it be?" Sullivan demanded. 

"For little Johnny Sheehan, " O'Brien answered. 

Sullivan laid the stick aside. Those who looked could not tell if itwere the fatal one. Sullivan held up another stick. 

"Whose will it be?"

"For George Burns, " was the reply. 

The stick was laid with the first one, and a third held up. 

"An' whose is this wan?"

"For myself, " said O'Brien. 

With a quick movement, Sullivan threw the four sticks together. No onehad seen. 

"'Tis for yourself ye've drawn it, " Sullivan announced. 

"A good deed, " several of the men muttered. 

O'Brien was very quiet. He arose to his feet, took the bandage off, andlooked around. 

"Where is ut?" he demanded. "The short stick? The wan for me?"

The captain pointed to the four sticks lying on the deck. 

"How do you know the stick was mine?" O'Brien questioned. "Did you seeut, Johnny Sheehan?"

Johnny Sheehan, who was the youngest of the boys, did not answer. 

"Did you see ut?" O'Brien next asked Mahoney. 

"No, I didn't see ut. "

The men were muttering and growling. 

"'Twas a fair drawin', " Sullivan said. "Ye had yer chanct an' ye lost, that's all iv ut. "

"A fair drawin', " the captain added. "Didn't I behold it myself? Thestick was yours, O'Brien, an' ye may as well get ready. Where's thecook? Gorman, come here. Fetch the tureen cover, some of ye. Gorman, doyour duty like a man. "

"But how'll I do it, " the cook demanded. He was a weak-eyed, weak-chinned, indecisive man. 

"'Tis a damned murder!" O'Brien cried out. 

"I'll have none of ut, " Mahoney announced. "Not a bite shall pass melips. "

"Then 'tis yer share for better men than yerself, " Sullivan sneered. "Goon with yer duty, cook. "

"'Tis not me duty, the killin' of b'ys, " Gorman protested irresolutely. 

"If yez don't make mate for us, we'll be makin' mate of yerself, " Behanethreatened. "Somebody must die, an' as well you as another. "

Johnny Sheehan began to cry. O'Brien listened anxiously. His face waspale. His lips trembled, and at times his whole body shook. 

"I signed on as cook, " Gorman enounced. "An' cook I wud if galley therewas. But I'll not lay me hand to murder. 'Tis not in the articles. I'mthe cook--"

"An' cook ye'll be for wan minute more only, " Sullivan said grimly, atthe same moment gripping the cook's head from behind and bending it backtill the windpipe and jugular were stretched taut. "Where's yer knife, Mike? Pass it along. "

At the touch of the steel, Gorman whimpered. 

"I'll do ut, if yez'll hold the b'y. "

The pitiable condition of the cook seemed in some fashion to nerve upO'Brien. 

"It's all right, Gorman, " he said. "Go on with ut. 'Tis meself knows yernot wantin' to do ut. It's all right, sir"--this to the captain, whohad laid a hand heavily on his arm. "Ye won't have to hold me, sir. I'llstand still. "

"Stop yer blitherin', an' go an' get the tureen cover, " Behane commandedJohnny Sheehan, at the same time dealing him a heavy cuff alongside thehead. 

The boy, who was scarcely more than a child, fetched the cover. Hecrawled and tottered along the deck, so weak was he from hunger. Thetears still ran down his cheeks. Behane took the cover from him, at thesame time administering another cuff. 

O'Brien took off his coat and bared his right arm. His under lip stilltrembled, but he held a tight grip on himself. The captain's penknifewas opened and passed to Gorman. 

"Mahoney, tell me mother what happened to me, if ever ye get back, "O'Brien requested. 

Mahoney nodded. 

"'Tis black murder, black an' damned, " he said. "The b'y's flesh'll donone iv yez anny good. Mark me words. Ye'll not profit by it, none ivyez. "

"Get ready, " the captain ordered. "You, Sullivan, hold the cover--that'sit--close up. Spill nothing. It's precious stuff. "

Gorman made an effort. The knife was dull. He was weak. Besides, hishand was shaking so violently that he nearly dropped the knife. Thethree boys were crouched apart, in a huddle, crying and sobbing. Withthe exception of Mahoney, the men were gathered about the victim, craning their necks to see. 

"Be a man, Gorman, " the captain cautioned. 

The wretched cook was seized with a spasm of resolution, sawing backand forth with the blade on O'Brien's wrist. The veins were severed. Sullivan held the tureen cover close underneath. The cut veins gapedwide, but no ruddy flood gushed forth. There was no blood at all. Theveins were dry and empty. No one spoke. The grim and silent figuresswayed in unison with each heave of the ship. Every eye was turnedfixedly upon that inconceivable and monstrous thing, the dry veins of acreature that was alive. 

"'Tis a warnin', " Mahoney cried. "Lave the b'y alone. Mark me words. Hisdeath'll do none iv yez anny good. "

"Try at the elbow--the left elbow, 'tis nearer the heart, " the captainsaid finally, in a dim and husky voice that was unlike his own. 

"Give me the knife, " O'Brien said roughly, taking it out of the cook'shand. "I can't be lookin' at ye puttin' me to hurt. "

Quite coolly he cut the vein at the left elbow, but, like the cook, hefailed to bring blood. 

"This is all iv no use, " Sullivan said. "'Tis better to put him out ivhis misery by bleedin' him at the throat. "

The strain had been too much for the lad. 

"Don't be doin' ut, " he cried. "There'll be no blood in me throat. Giveme a little time. 'Tis cold an' weak I am. Be lettin' me lay down an'slape a bit. Then I'll be warm an' the blood'll flow. "

"'Tis no use, " Sullivan objected. "As if ye cud be slapin' at a timelike this. Ye'll not slape, and ye'll not warm up. Look at ye now. You've an ague. "

"I was sick at Limerick wan night, " O'Brien hurried on, "an' the dochtorcudn't bleed me. But after slapin' a few hours an' gettin' warm inbed the blood came freely. It's God's truth I'm tellin' yez. Don't bemurderin' me!"

"His veins are open now, " the captain said. "'Tis no use leavin' him inhis pain. Do it now an' be done with it. "

They started to reach for O'Brien, but he backed away. 

"I'll be the death iv yez!" he screamed. "Take yer hands off iv me, Sullivan! I'll come back! I'll haunt yez! Wakin' or slapin', I'll hauntyez till you die!"

"'Tis disgraceful!" yelled Behane. "If the short stick'd ben mine, I'da-let me mates cut the head off iv me an' died happy. "

Sullivan leaped in and caught the unhappy lad by the hair. The rest ofthe men followed, O'Brien kicked and struggled, snarling and snapping atthe hands that clutched him from every side. Little Johnny Sheehan brokeout into wild screaming, but the men took no notice of him. O'Brien wasbent backward to the deck, the tureen cover under his neck. Gorman wasshoved forward. Some one had thrust a large sheath-knife into his hand. 

"Do yer duty! Do yer duty!" the men cried. 

The cook bent over, but he caught the boy's eyes and faltered. 

"If ye don't, I'll kill ye with me own hands, " Behane shouted. 

From every side a torrent of abuse and threats poured in upon the cook. Still he hung back. 

"Maybe there'll be more blood in his veins than O'Brien's, " Sullivansuggested significantly. 

Behane caught Gorman by the hair and twisted his head back, whileSullivan attempted to take possession of the sheath-knife. But Gormanclung to it desperately. 

"Lave go, an' I'll do ut!" he screamed frantically. "Don't be cuttin' methroat! I'll do the deed! I'll do the deed!"

"See that you do it, then, " the captain threatened him. 

Gorman allowed himself to be shoved forward. He looked at the boy, closed his eyes, and muttered a prayer. Then, without opening his eyes, he did the deed that had been appointed him. O'Brien emitted a shriekthat sank swiftly to a gurgling sob. The men held him till his strugglesceased, when he was laid upon the deck. They were eager and impatient, and with oaths and threats they urged Gorman to hurry with thepreparation of the meal. 

"Lave ut, you bloody butchers, " Mahoney said quietly. "Lave ut, I tellyez. Ye'll not be needin' anny iv ut now. 'Tis as I said: ye'll notbe profitin' by the lad's blood. Empty ut overside, Behane. Empty utoverside. "

Behane, still holding the tureen cover in both his hands, glanced towindward. He walked to the rail and threw the cover and contents intothe sea. A full-rigged ship was bearing down upon them a short mileaway. So occupied had they been with the deed just committed, thatnone had had eyes for a lookout. All hands watched her coming on--thebrightly coppered forefoot parting the water like a golden knife, theheadsails flapping lazily and emptily at each downward surge, and thetowering canvas tiers dipping and curtsying with each stately swing ofthe sea. No man spoke. 

As she hove to, a cable length away, the captain of the Francis Spaightbestirred himself and ordered a tarpaulin to be thrown over O'Brien'scorpse. A boat was lowered from the stranger's side and began to pulltoward them. John Gorman laughed. He laughed softly at first, but heaccompanied each stroke of the oars with spasmodically increasing glee. It was this maniacal laughter that greeted the rescue boat as it hauledalongside and the first officer clambered on board. 

A CURIOUS FRAGMENT

 [The capitalist, or industrial oligarch, Roger Vanderwater, mentioned in the narrative, has been identified as the ninth in the line of the Vanderwaters that controlled for hundreds of years the cotton factories of the South. This Roger Vanderwater flourished in the last decades of the twenty- sixth century after Christ, which was the fifth century of the terrible industrial oligarchy that was reared upon the ruins of the early Republic. 

 From internal evidences we are convinced that the narrative which follows was not reduced to writing till the twenty- ninth century. Not only was it unlawful to write or print such matter during that period, but the working-class was so illiterate that only in rare instances were its members able to read and write. This was the dark reign of the overman, in whose speech the great mass of the people were characterized as the "herd animals. " All literacy was frowned upon and stamped out. From the statute-books of the times may be instanced that black law that made it a capital offence for any man, no matter of what class, to teach even the alphabet to a member of the working-class. Such stringent limitation of education to the ruling class was necessary if that class was to continue to rule. 

 One result of the foregoing was the development of the professional story-tellers. These story-tellers were paid by the oligarchy, and the tales they told were legendary, mythical, romantic, and harmless. But the spirit of freedom never quite died out, and agitators, under the guise of story-tellers, preached revolt to the slave class. That the following tale was banned by the oligarchs we have proof from the records of the criminal police court of Ashbury, wherein, on January 27, 2734, one John Tourney, found guilty of telling the tale in a boozing-ken of labourers, was sentenced to five years' penal servitude in the borax mines of the Arizona Desert. --EDITOR'S NOTE. ]

Listen, my brothers, and I will tell you a tale of an arm. It was thearm of Tom Dixon, and Tom Dixon was a weaver of the first class in afactory of that hell-hound and master, Roger Vanderwater. This factorywas called "Hell's Bottom". .. By the slaves who toiled in it, and Iguess they ought to know; and it was situated in Kingsbury, at the otherend of the town from Vanderwater's summer palace. You do not know whereKingsbury is? There are many things, my brothers, that you do not know, and it is sad. It is because you do not know that you are slaves. When Ihave told you this tale, I should like to form a class among you for thelearning of written and printed speech. Our masters read and write andpossess many books, and it is because of that that they are our masters, and live in palaces, and do not work. When the toilers learn to readand write--all of them--they will grow strong; then they will use theirstrength to break their bonds, and there will be no more masters and nomore slaves. 

Kingsbury, my brothers, is in the old State of Alabama. For threehundred years the Vanderwaters have owned Kingsbury and its slave pensand factories, and slave pens and factories in many other places andStates. You have heard of the Vanderwaters--who has not?--but let metell you things you do not know about them. The first Vanderwater wasa slave, even as you and I. Have you got that? He was a slave, and thatwas over three hundred years ago. His father was a machinist in theslave pen of Alexander Burrell, and his mother was a washerwoman in thesame slave pen. There is no doubt about this. I am telling you truth. Itis history. It is printed, every word of it, in the history books of ourmasters, which you cannot read because your masters will not permit youto learn to read. You can understand why they will not permit you tolearn to read, when there are such things in the books. They know, andthey are very wise. If you did read such things, you might be wantingin respect to your masters, which would be a dangerous thing. .. To yourmasters. But I know, for I can read, and I am telling you what I haveread with my own eyes in the history books of our masters. 

The first Vanderwater's name was not Vanderwater; it was Vange--BillVange, the son of Yergis Vange, the machinist, and Laura Carnly, thewasherwoman. Young Bill Vange was strong. He might have remained withthe slaves and led them to freedom; instead, however, he served themasters and was well rewarded. He began his service, when yet a smallchild, as a spy in his home slave pen. He is known to have informed onhis own father for seditious utterance. This is fact. I have read itwith my own eyes in the records. He was too good a slave for the slavepen. Alexander Burrell took him out, while yet a child, and he wastaught to read and write. He was taught many things, and he was enteredin the secret service of the Government. Of course, he no longer worethe slave dress, except for disguise at such times when he sought topenetrate the secrets and plots of the slaves. It was he, when buteighteen years of age, who brought that great hero and comrade, RalphJacobus, to trial and execution in the electric chair. Of course, youhave all heard the sacred name of Ralph Jacobus, but it is news to youthat he was brought to his death by the first Vanderwater, whosename was Vange. I know. I have read it in the books. There are manyinteresting things like that in the books. 

And after Ralph Jacobus died his shameful death, Bill Vange's name beganthe many changes it was to undergo. He was known as "Sly Vange" far andwide. He rose high in the secret service, and he was rewarded in grandways, but still he was not a member of the master class. The men werewilling that he should become so; it was the women of the master classwho refused to have Sly Vange one of them. Sly Vange gave good serviceto the masters. He had been a slave himself, and he knew the ways of theslaves. There was no fooling him. In those days the slaves were braverthan now, and they were always trying for their freedom. And Sly Vangewas everywhere, in all their schemes and plans, bringing their schemesand plans to naught and their leaders to the electric chair. It was in2255 that his name was next changed for him. It was in that year thatthe Great Mutiny took place. In that region west of the Rocky Mountains, seventeen millions of slaves strove bravely to overthrow their masters. Who knows, if Sly Vange had not lived, but that they would havesucceeded? But Sly Vange was very much alive. The masters gave himsupreme command of the situation. In eight months of fighting, onemillion and three hundred and fifty thousand slaves were killed. Vange, Bill Vange, Sly Vange, killed them, and he broke the Great Mutiny. Andhe was greatly rewarded, and so red were his hands with the blood ofthe slaves that thereafter he was called "Bloody Vange. " You see, mybrothers, what interesting things are to be found in the books when onecan read them. And, take my word for it, there are many other things, even more interesting, in the books. And if you will but study with me, in a year's time you can read those books for yourselves--ay, in sixmonths some of you will be able to read those books for yourselves. 

Bloody Vange lived to a ripe old age, and always, to the last, was hereceived in the councils of the masters; but never was he made a masterhimself. He had first opened his eyes, you see, in a slave pen. But oh, he was well rewarded! He had a dozen palaces in which to live. He, whowas no master, owned thousands of slaves. He had a great pleasure yachtupon the sea that was a floating palace, and he owned a whole island inthe sea where toiled ten thousand slaves on his coffee plantations. Butin his old age he was lonely, for he lived apart, hated by his brothers, the slaves, and looked down upon by those he had served and who refusedto be his brothers. The masters looked down upon him because he hadbeen born a slave. Enormously wealthy he died; but he died horribly, tormented by his conscience, regretting all he had done and the redstain on his name. 

But with his children it was different. They had not been born in theslave pen, and by the special ruling of the Chief Oligarch of that time, John Morrison, they were elevated to the master class. And it was thenthat the name of Vange disappears from the page of history. It becomesVanderwater, and Jason Vange, the son of Bloody Vange, becomes JasonVanderwater, the founder of the Vanderwater line. But that wasthree hundred years ago, and the Vanderwaters of to-day forget theirbeginnings and imagine that somehow the clay of their bodies isdifferent stuff from the clay in your body and mine and in the bodiesof all slaves. And I ask you, Why should a slave become the master ofanother slave? And why should the son of a slave become the master ofmany slaves? I leave these questions for you to answer for yourselves, but do not forget that in the beginning the Vanderwaters were slaves. 

And now, my brothers, I come back to the beginning of my tale to tellyou of Tom Dixon's arm. Roger Vanderwater's factory in Kingsbury wasrightly named "Hell's Bottom, " but the men who toiled in it were men, asyou shall see. Women toiled there, too, and children, little children. All that toiled there had the regular slave rights under the law, butonly under the law, for they were deprived of many of their rights bythe two overseers of Hell's Bottom, Joseph Clancy and Adolph Munster. 

It is a long story, but I shall not tell all of it to you. I shall tellonly about the arm. It happened that, according to the law, a portion ofthe starvation wage of the slaves was held back each month and putinto a fund. This fund was for the purpose of helping such unfortunatefellow-workmen as happened to be injured by accidents or to be overtakenby sickness. As you know with yourselves, these funds are controlledby the overseers. It is the law, and so it was that the fund at Hell'sBottom was controlled by the two overseers of accursed memory. 

Now, Clancy and Munster took this fund for their own use. When accidentshappened to the workmen, their fellows, as was the custom, made grantsfrom the fund; but the overseers refused to pay over the grants. Whatcould the slaves do? They had their rights under the law, but theyhad no access to the law. Those that complained to the overseers werepunished. You know yourselves what form such punishment takes--the finesfor faulty work that is not faulty; the overcharging of accounts in theCompany's store; the vile treatment of one's women and children; and theallotment to bad machines whereon, work as one will, he starves. 

Once, the slaves of Hell's Bottom protested to Vanderwater. It was thetime of the year when he spent several months in Kingsbury. One of theslaves could write; it chanced that his mother could write, and she hadsecretly taught him as her mother had secretly taught her. So this slavewrote a round robin, wherein was contained their grievances, and all theslaves signed by mark. And, with proper stamps upon the envelope, theround robin was mailed to Roger Vanderwater. And Roger Vanderwater didnothing, save to turn the round robin over to the two overseers. Clancyand Munster were angered. They turned the guards loose at night on theslave pen. The guards were armed with pick handles. It is said that nextday only half of the slaves were able to work in Hell's Bottom. Theywere well beaten. The slave who could write was so badly beaten that helived only three months. But before he died, he wrote once more, to whatpurpose you shall hear. 

Four or five weeks afterward, Tom Dixon, a slave, had his arm torn offby a belt in Hell's Bottom. His fellow-workmen, as usual, made a grantto him from the fund, and Clancy and Munster, as usual, refused to payit over from the fund. The slave who could write, and who even then wasdying, wrote anew a recital of their grievances. And this document wasthrust into the hand of the arm that had been torn from Tom Dixon'sbody. 

Now it chanced that Roger Vanderwater was lying ill in his palace at theother end of Kingsbury--not the dire illness that strikes down you andme, brothers; just a bit of biliousness, mayhap, or no more than a badheadache because he had eaten too heartily or drunk too deeply. But itwas enough for him, being tender and soft from careful rearing. Suchmen, packed in cotton wool all their lives, are exceeding tender andsoft. Believe me, brothers, Roger Vanderwater felt as badly with hisaching head, or THOUGHT he felt as badly, as Tom Dixon really felt withhis arm torn out by the roots. 

It happened that Roger Vanderwater was fond of scientific farming, andthat on his farm, three miles outside of Kingsbury, he had managed togrow a new kind of strawberry. He was very proud of that new strawberryof his, and he would have been out to see and pick the first ripe ones, had it not been for his illness. Because of his illness he had orderedthe old farm slave to bring in personally the first box of the berries. All this was learned from the gossip of a palace scullion, who slepteach night in the slave pen. The overseer of the plantation should havebrought in the berries, but he was on his back with a broken leg fromtrying to break a colt. The scullion brought the word in the night, andit was known that next day the berries would come in. And the men in theslave pen of Hell's Bottom, being men and not cowards, held a council. 

The slave who could write, and who was sick and dying from thepick-handle beating, said he would carry Tom Dixon's arm; also, he saidhe must die anyway, and that it mattered nothing if he died a littlesooner. So five slaves stole from the slave pen that night after theguards had made their last rounds. One of the slaves was the man whocould write. They lay in the brush by the roadside until late in themorning, when the old farm slave came driving to town with the preciousfruit for the master. What of the farm slave being old and rheumatic, and of the slave who could write being stiff and injured from hisbeating, they moved their bodies about when they walked, very much inthe same fashion. The slave who could write put on the other's clothes, pulled the broad-brimmed hat over his eyes, climbed upon the seat of thewagon, and drove on to town. The old farm slave was kept tied all dayin the bushes until evening, when the others loosed him and went back tothe slave pen to take their punishment for having broken bounds. 

In the meantime, Roger Vanderwater lay waiting for the berries in hiswonderful bedroom--such wonders and such comforts were there that theywould have blinded the eyes of you and me who have never seen suchthings. The slave who could write said afterward that it was likea glimpse of Paradise! And why not? The labour and the lives of tenthousand slaves had gone to the making of that bedchamber, while theythemselves slept in vile lairs like wild beasts. The slave who couldwrite brought in the berries on a silver tray or platter--you see, RogerVanderwater wanted to speak with him in person about the berries. 

The slave who could write tottered his dying body across the wonderfulroom and knelt by the couch of Vanderwater, holding out before him thetray. Large green leaves covered the top of the tray, and these thebody-servant alongside whisked away so that Vanderwater could see. And Roger Vanderwater, propped upon his elbow, saw. He saw the fresh, wonderful fruit lying there like precious jewels, and in the midst of itthe arm of Tom Dixon as it had been torn from his body, well washed, of course, my brothers, and very white against the blood-red fruit. Andalso he saw, clutched in the stiff, dead fingers, the petition of hisslaves who toiled in Hell's Bottom. 

"Take and read, " said the slave who could write. And even as the mastertook the petition, the body-servant, who till then had been motionlesswith surprise, struck with his fist the kneeling slave upon the mouth. The slave was dying anyway, and was very weak, and did not mind. He madeno sound, and, having fallen over on his side, he lay there quietly, bleeding from the blow on the mouth. The physician, who had run for thepalace guards, came back with them, and the slave was dragged uprightupon his feet. But as they dragged him up, his hand clutched Tom Dixon'sarm from where it had fallen on the floor. 

"He shall be flung alive to the hounds!" the body-servant was crying ingreat wrath. "He shall be flung alive to the hounds!"

But Roger Vanderwater, forgetting his headache, still leaning on hiselbow, commanded silence, and went on reading the petition. And whilehe read, there was silence, all standing upright, the wrathfulbody-servant, the physician, the palace guards, and in their midst theslave, bleeding at the mouth and still holding Tom Dixon's arm. And whenRoger Vanderwater had done, he turned upon the slave, saying--

"If in this paper there be one lie, you shall be sorry that you wereever born. "

And the slave said, "I have been sorry all my life that I was born. "

Roger Vanderwater looked at him closely, and the slave said--

"You have done your worst to me. I am dying now. In a week I shall bedead, so it does not matter if you kill me now. "

"What do you with that?" the master asked, pointing to the arm; and theslave made answer--

"I take it back to the pen to give it burial. Tom Dixon was my friend. We worked beside each other at our looms. "

There is little more to my tale, brothers. The slave and the arm weresent back in a cart to the pen. Nor were any of the slaves punished forwhat they had done. Indeed, Roger Vanderwater made investigation andpunished the two overseers, Joseph Clancy and Adolph Munster. Theirfreeholds were taken from them. They were branded, each upon theforehead, their right hands were cut off, and they were turned looseupon the highway to wander and beg until they died. And the fund wasmanaged rightfully thereafter for a time--for a time only, my brothers;for after Roger Vanderwater came his son, Albert, who was a cruel masterand half mad. 

Brothers, that slave who carried the arm into the presence of the masterwas my father. He was a brave man. And even as his mother secretlytaught him to read, so did he teach me. Because he died shortly afterfrom the pick-handle beating, Roger Vanderwater took me out of the slavepen and tried to make various better things out of me. I mighthave become an overseer in Hell's Bottom, but I chose to become astory-teller, wandering over the land and getting close to my brothers, the slaves, everywhere. And I tell you stories like this, secretly, knowing that you will not betray me; for if you did, you know as well asI that my tongue will be torn out and that I shall tell stories no more. And my message is, brothers, that there is a good time coming, when allwill be well in the world and there will be neither masters nor slaves. But first you must prepare for that good time by learning to read. Thereis power in the printed word. And here am I to teach you to read, and aswell there are others to see that you get the books when I am gonealong upon my way--the history books wherein you will learn about yourmasters, and learn to become strong even as they. 

[EDITOR'S NOTE. --From "Historical Fragments and Sketches, " firstpublished in fifty volumes in 4427, and now, after two hundred years, because of its accuracy and value, edited and republished by theNational Committee on Historical Research. ]

A PIECE OF STEAK

With the last morsel of bread Tom King wiped his plate clean of the lastparticle of flour gravy and chewed the resulting mouthful in a slow andmeditative way. When he arose from the table, he was oppressed by thefeeling that he was distinctly hungry. Yet he alone had eaten. The twochildren in the other room had been sent early to bed in order that insleep they might forget they had gone supperless. His wife had touchednothing, and had sat silently and watched him with solicitous eyes. Shewas a thin, worn woman of the working-class, though signs of an earlierprettiness were not wanting in her face. The flour for the gravy she hadborrowed from the neighbour across the hall The last two ha'pennies hadgone to buy the bread. 

He sat down by the window on a rickety chair that protested under hisweight, and quite mechanically he put his pipe in his mouth and dippedinto the side pocket of his coat. The absence of any tobacco made himaware of his action, and, with a scowl for his forgetfulness, he put thepipe away. His movements were slow, almost hulking, as though he wereburdened by the heavy weight of his muscles. He was a solid-bodied, stolid-looking man, and his appearance did not suffer from beingoverprepossessing. His rough clothes were old and slouchy. The uppers ofhis shoes were too weak to carry the heavy re-soling that was itselfof no recent date. And his cotton shirt, a cheap, two shilling affair, showed a frayed collar and ineradicable paint stains. 

But it was Tom King's face that advertised him unmistakably for what hewas. It was the face of a typical prize-fighter; of one who had put inlong years of service in the squared ring and, by that means, developedand emphasized all the marks of the fighting beast. It was distinctly alowering countenance, and, that no feature of it might escape notice, itwas clean-shaven. The lips were shapeless and constituted a mouth harshto excess, that was like a gash in his face. The jaw was aggressive, brutal, heavy. The eyes, slow of movement and heavy-lidded, were almostexpressionless under the shaggy, indrawn brows. Sheer animal that hewas, the eyes were the most animal-like feature about him. They weresleepy, lion-like--the eyes of a fighting animal. The forehead slantedquickly back to the hair, which, clipped close, showed every bump of avillainous-looking head. A nose twice broken and moulded variouslyby countless blows, and a cauliflower ear, permanently swollen anddistorted to twice its size, completed his adornment, while the beard, fresh-shaven as it was, sprouted in the skin and gave the face ablue-black stain. 

Altogether, it was the face of a man to be afraid of in a dark alley orlonely place. And yet Tom King was not a criminal, nor had he ever doneanything criminal. Outside of brawls, common to his walk in life, he hadharmed no one. Nor had he ever been known to pick a quarrel. He was aprofessional, and all the fighting brutishness of him was reservedfor his professional appearances. Outside the ring he was slow-going, easy-natured, and, in his younger days, when money was flush, tooopen-handed for his own good. He bore no grudges and had few enemies. Fighting was a business with him. In the ring he struck to hurt, struckto maim, struck to destroy; but there was no animus in it. It wasa plain business proposition. Audiences assembled and paid for thespectacle of men knocking each other out. The winner took the big end ofthe purse. When Tom King faced the Woolloomoolloo Gouger, twenty yearsbefore, he knew that the Gouger's jaw was only four months healed afterhaving been broken in a Newcastle bout. And he had played for that jawand broken it again in the ninth round, not because he bore the Gougerany ill-will, but because that was the surest way to put the Gougerout and win the big end of the purse. Nor had the Gouger borne him anyill-will for it. It was the game, and both knew the game and played it. 

Tom King had never been a talker, and he sat by the window, moroselysilent, staring at his hands. The veins stood out on the backs of thehands, large and swollen; and the knuckles, smashed and battered andmalformed, testified to the use to which they had been put. He had neverheard that a man's life was the life of his arteries, but well he knewthe meaning of those big upstanding veins. His heart had pumped too muchblood through them at top pressure. They no longer did the work. Hehad stretched the elasticity out of them, and with their distension hadpassed his endurance. He tired easily now. No longer could he do a fasttwenty rounds, hammer and tongs, fight, fight, fight, from gong to gong, with fierce rally on top of fierce rally, beaten to the ropes andin turn beating his opponent to the ropes, and rallying fiercest andfastest of all in that last, twentieth round, with the house on itsfeet and yelling, himself rushing, striking, ducking, raining showersof blows upon showers of blows and receiving showers of blows in return, and all the time the heart faithfully pumping the surging blood throughthe adequate veins. The veins, swollen at the time, had alwaysshrunk down again, though each time, imperceptibly at first, notquite--remaining just a trifle larger than before. He stared at them andat his battered knuckles, and, for the moment, caught a vision of theyouthful excellence of those hands before the first knuckle had beensmashed on the head of Benny Jones, otherwise known as the Welsh Terror. 

The impression of his hunger came back on him. 

"Blimey, but couldn't I go a piece of steak!" he muttered aloud, clenching his huge fists and spitting out a smothered oath. 

"I tried both Burke's an' Sawley's, " his wife said half apologetically. 

"An' they wouldn't?" he demanded. 

"Not a ha'penny. Burke said--" She faltered. 

"G'wan! Wot'd he say?"

"As how 'e was thinkin' Sandel ud do ye to-night, an' as how yer scorewas comfortable big as it was. "

Tom King grunted, but did not reply. He was busy thinking of the bullterrier he had kept in his younger days to which he had fed steakswithout end. Burke would have given him credit for a thousandsteaks--then. But times had changed. Tom King was getting old; and oldmen, fighting before second-rate clubs, couldn't expect to run bills ofany size with the tradesmen. 

He had got up in the morning with a longing for a piece of steak, andthe longing had not abated. He had not had a fair training for thisfight. It was a drought year in Australia, times were hard, and eventhe most irregular work was difficult to find. He had had no sparringpartner, and his food had not been of the best nor always sufficient. He had done a few days' navvy work when he could get it, and he had runaround the Domain in the early mornings to get his legs in shape. Butit was hard, training without a partner and with a wife and two kiddiesthat must be fed. Credit with the tradesmen had undergone very slightexpansion when he was matched with Sandel. The secretary of the GayetyClub had advanced him three pounds--the loser's end of the purse--andbeyond that had refused to go. Now and again he had managed to borrow afew shillings from old pals, who would have lent more only that it was adrought year and they were hard put themselves. No--and there was nouse in disguising the fact--his training had not been satisfactory. He should have had better food and no worries. Besides, when a man isforty, it is harder to get into condition than when he is twenty. 

"What time is it, Lizzie?" he asked. 

His wife went across the hall to inquire, and came back. 

"Quarter before eight. "

"They'll be startin' the first bout in a few minutes, " he said. "Only atry-out. Then there's a four-round spar 'tween Dealer Wells an' Gridley, an' a ten-round go 'tween Starlight an' some sailor bloke. I don't comeon for over an hour. "

At the end of another silent ten minutes, he rose to his feet. 

"Truth is, Lizzie, I ain't had proper trainin'. "

He reached for his hat and started for the door. He did not offer tokiss her--he never did on going out--but on this night she dared to kisshim, throwing her arms around him and compelling him to bend down to herface. She looked quite small against the massive bulk of the man. 

"Good luck, Tom, " she said. "You gotter do 'im. "

"Ay, I gotter do 'im, " he repeated. "That's all there is to it. I jus'gotter do 'im. "

He laughed with an attempt at heartiness, while she pressed more closelyagainst him. Across her shoulders he looked around the bare room. It wasall he had in the world, with the rent overdue, and her and the kiddies. And he was leaving it to go out into the night to get meat for his mateand cubs--not like a modern working-man going to his machine grind, butin the old, primitive, royal, animal way, by fighting for it. 

"I gotter do 'im, " he repeated, this time a hint of desperation in hisvoice. "If it's a win, it's thirty quid--an' I can pay all that's owin', with a lump o' money left over. If it's a lose, I get naught--not evena penny for me to ride home on the tram. The secretary's give all that'scomin' from a loser's end. Good-bye, old woman. I'll come straight homeif it's a win. "

"An' I'll be waitin' up, " she called to him along the hall. 

It was full two miles to the Gayety, and as he walked along heremembered how in his palmy days--he had once been the heavyweightchampion of New South Wales--he would have ridden in a cab to the fight, and how, most likely, some heavy backer would have paid for the cab andridden with him. There were Tommy Burns and that Yankee nigger, JackJohnson--they rode about in motor-cars. And he walked! And, as any manknew, a hard two miles was not the best preliminary to a fight. He wasan old un, and the world did not wag well with old uns. He was good fornothing now except navvy work, and his broken nose and swollen ear wereagainst him even in that. He found himself wishing that he had learneda trade. It would have been better in the long run. But no one hadtold him, and he knew, deep down in his heart, that he would not havelistened if they had. It had been so easy. Big money--sharp, gloriousfights--periods of rest and loafing in between--a following of eagerflatterers, the slaps on the back, the shakes of the hand, the toffsglad to buy him a drink for the privilege of five minutes' talk--andthe glory of it, the yelling houses, the whirlwind finish, the referee's"King wins!" and his name in the sporting columns next day. 

Those had been times! But he realized now, in his slow, ruminating way, that it was the old uns he had been putting away. He was Youth, rising;and they were Age, sinking. No wonder it had been easy--they with theirswollen veins and battered knuckles and weary in the bones of them fromthe long battles they had already fought. He remembered the time he putout old Stowsher Bill, at Rush-Cutters Bay, in the eighteenth round, and how old Bill had cried afterward in the dressing-room like a baby. Perhaps old Bill's rent had been overdue. Perhaps he'd had at home amissus an' a couple of kiddies. And perhaps Bill, that very day of thefight, had had a hungering for a piece of steak. Bill had fought gameand taken incredible punishment. He could see now, after he had gonethrough the mill himself, that Stowsher Bill had fought for a biggerstake, that night twenty years ago, than had young Tom King, who hadfought for glory and easy money. No wonder Stowsher Bill had criedafterward in the dressing-room. 

Well, a man had only so many fights in him, to begin with. It was theiron law of the game. One man might have a hundred hard fights in him, another man only twenty; each, according to the make of him and thequality of his fibre, had a definite number, and, when he had foughtthem, he was done. Yes, he had had more fights in him than most ofthem, and he had had far more than his share of the hard, gruellingfights--the kind that worked the heart and lungs to bursting, that tookthe elastic out of the arteries and made hard knots of muscle out ofYouth's sleek suppleness, that wore out nerve and stamina and made brainand bones weary from excess of effort and endurance overwrought. Yes, he had done better than all of them. There were none of his old fightingpartners left. He was the last of the old guard. He had seen them allfinished, and he had had a hand in finishing some of them. 

They had tried him out against the old uns, and one after another he hadput them away--laughing when, like old Stowsher Bill, they cried inthe dressing-room. And now he was an old un, and they tried out theyoungsters on him. There was that bloke, Sandel. He had come over fromNew Zealand with a record behind him. But nobody in Australia knewanything about him, so they put him up against old Tom King. If Sandelmade a showing, he would be given better men to fight, with biggerpurses to win; so it was to be depended upon that he would put up afierce battle. He had everything to win by it--money and glory andcareer; and Tom King was the grizzled old chopping-block that guardedthe highway to fame and fortune. And he had nothing to win except thirtyquid, to pay to the landlord and the tradesmen. And, as Tom King thusruminated, there came to his stolid vision the form of Youth, gloriousYouth, rising exultant and invincible, supple of muscle and silken ofskin, with heart and lungs that had never been tired and torn andthat laughed at limitation of effort. Yes, Youth was the Nemesis. Itdestroyed the old uns and recked not that, in so doing, it destroyeditself. It enlarged its arteries and smashed its knuckles, and was inturn destroyed by Youth. For Youth was ever youthful. It was only Agethat grew old. 

At Castlereagh Street he turned to the left, and three blocks along cameto the Gayety. A crowd of young larrikins hanging outside the door maderespectful way for him, and he heard one say to another: "That's 'im!That's Tom King!"

Inside, on the way to his dressing-room, he encountered the secretary, akeen-eyed, shrewd-faced young man, who shook his hand. 

"How are you feelin', Tom?" he asked. 

"Fit as a fiddle, " King answered, though he knew that he lied, andthat if he had a quid, he would give it right there for a good piece ofsteak. 

When he emerged from the dressing-room, his seconds behind him, and camedown the aisle to the squared ring in the centre of the hall, a burstof greeting and applause went up from the waiting crowd. He acknowledgedsalutations right and left, though few of the faces did he know. Mostof them were the faces of kiddies unborn when he was winning his firstlaurels in the squared ring. He leaped lightly to the raised platformand ducked through the ropes to his corner, where he sat down on afolding stool. Jack Ball, the referee, came over and shook his hand. Ball was a broken-down pugilist who for over ten years had not enteredthe ring as a principal. King was glad that he had him for referee. Theywere both old uns. If he should rough it with Sandel a bit beyond therules, he knew Ball could be depended upon to pass it by. 

Aspiring young heavyweights, one after another, were climbing into thering and being presented to the audience by the referee. Also, he issuedtheir challenges for them. 

"Young Pronto, " Bill announced, "from North Sydney, challenges thewinner for fifty pounds side bet. "

The audience applauded, and applauded again as Sandel himself sprangthrough the ropes and sat down in his corner. Tom King looked acrossthe ring at him curiously, for in a few minutes they would be lockedtogether in merciless combat, each trying with all the force of himto knock the other into unconsciousness. But little could he see, forSandel, like himself, had trousers and sweater on over his ring costume. His face was strongly handsome, crowned with a curly mop of yellow hair, while his thick, muscular neck hinted at bodily magnificence. 

Young Pronto went to one corner and then the other, shaking hands withthe principals and dropping down out of the ring. The challengeswent on. Ever Youth climbed through the ropes--Youth unknown, butinsatiable--crying out to mankind that with strength and skill it wouldmatch issues with the winner. A few years before, in his own heydayof invincibleness, Tom King would have been amused and bored by thesepreliminaries. But now he sat fascinated, unable to shake the visionof Youth from his eyes. Always were these youngsters rising up in theboxing game, springing through the ropes and shouting their defiance;and always were the old uns going down before them. They climbed tosuccess over the bodies of the old uns. And ever they came, more andmore youngsters--Youth unquenchable and irresistible--and ever they putthe old uns away, themselves becoming old uns and travelling the samedownward path, while behind them, ever pressing on them, was Youtheternal--the new babies, grown lusty and dragging their elders down, with behind them more babies to the end of time--Youth that must haveits will and that will never die. 

King glanced over to the press box and nodded to Morgan, of theSportsman, and Corbett, of the Referee. Then he held out his hands, while Sid Sullivan and Charley Bates, his seconds, slipped on his glovesand laced them tight, closely watched by one of Sandel's seconds, whofirst examined critically the tapes on King's knuckles. A second of hisown was in Sandel's corner, performing a like office. Sandel's trouserswere pulled off, and, as he stood up, his sweater was skinned off overhis head. And Tom King, looking, saw Youth incarnate, deep-chested, heavy-thewed, with muscles that slipped and slid like live things underthe white satin skin. The whole body was a-crawl with life, and Tom Kingknew that it was a life that had never oozed its freshness out throughthe aching pores during the long fights wherein Youth paid its toll anddeparted not quite so young as when it entered. 

The two men advanced to meet each other, and, as the gong sounded andthe seconds clattered out of the ring with the folding stools, theyshook hands and instantly took their fighting attitudes. And instantly, like a mechanism of steel and springs balanced on a hair trigger, Sandelwas in and out and in again, landing a left to the eyes, a right to theribs, ducking a counter, dancing lightly away and dancing menacinglyback again. He was swift and clever. It was a dazzling exhibition. Thehouse yelled its approbation. But King was not dazzled. He had foughttoo many fights and too many youngsters. He knew the blows for what theywere--too quick and too deft to be dangerous. Evidently Sandel was goingto rush things from the start. It was to be expected. It was the wayof Youth, expending its splendour and excellence in wild insurgence andfurious onslaught, overwhelming opposition with its own unlimited gloryof strength and desire. 

Sandel was in and out, here, there, and everywhere, light-footed andeager-hearted, a living wonder of white flesh and stinging muscle thatwove itself into a dazzling fabric of attack, slipping and leaping likea flying shuttle from action to action through a thousand actions, allof them centred upon the destruction of Tom King, who stood between himand fortune. And Tom King patiently endured. He knew his business, andhe knew Youth now that Youth was no longer his. There was nothing to dotill the other lost some of his steam, was his thought, and he grinnedto himself as he deliberately ducked so as to receive a heavy blow onthe top of his head. It was a wicked thing to do, yet eminently fairaccording to the rules of the boxing game. A man was supposed to takecare of his own knuckles, and, if he insisted on hitting an opponent onthe top of the head, he did so at his own peril. King could have duckedlower and let the blow whiz harmlessly past, but he remembered his ownearly fights and how he smashed his first knuckle on the head of theWelsh Terror. He was but playing the game. That duck had accounted forone of Sandel's knuckles. Not that Sandel would mind it now. He would goon, superbly regardless, hitting as hard as ever throughout the fight. But later on, when the long ring battles had begun to tell, he wouldregret that knuckle and look back and remember how he smashed it on TomKing's head. 

The first round was all Sandel's, and he had the house yelling with therapidity of his whirlwind rushes. He overwhelmed King with avalanches ofpunches, and King did nothing. He never struck once, contentinghimself with covering up, blocking and ducking and clinching to avoidpunishment. He occasionally feinted, shook his head when the weight ofa punch landed, and moved stolidly about, never leaping or springing orwasting an ounce of strength. Sandel must foam the froth of Youth awaybefore discreet Age could dare to retaliate. All King's movements wereslow and methodical, and his heavy-lidded, slow-moving eyes gave him theappearance of being half asleep or dazed. Yet they were eyes that saweverything, that had been trained to see everything through all histwenty years and odd in the ring. They were eyes that did not blinkor waver before an impending blow, but that coolly saw and measureddistance. 

Seated in his corner for the minute's rest at the end of the round, helay back with outstretched legs, his arms resting on the right angle ofthe ropes, his chest and abdomen heaving frankly and deeply as he gulpeddown the air driven by the towels of his seconds. He listened withclosed eyes to the voices of the house, "Why don't yeh fight, Tom?" manywere crying. "Yeh ain't afraid of 'im, are yeh?"

"Muscle-bound, " he heard a man on a front seat comment. "He can't movequicker. Two to one on Sandel, in quids. "

The gong struck and the two men advanced from their corners. Sandel cameforward fully three-quarters of the distance, eager to begin again; butKing was content to advance the shorter distance. It was in line withhis policy of economy. He had not been well trained, and he had not hadenough to eat, and every step counted. Besides, he had already walkedtwo miles to the ringside. It was a repetition of the first round, withSandel attacking like a whirlwind and with the audience indignantlydemanding why King did not fight. Beyond feinting and several slowlydelivered and ineffectual blows he did nothing save block and stalland clinch. Sandel wanted to make the pace fast, while King, out of hiswisdom, refused to accommodate him. He grinned with a certain wistfulpathos in his ring-battered countenance, and went on cherishing hisstrength with the jealousy of which only Age is capable. Sandel wasYouth, and he threw his strength away with the munificent abandon ofYouth. To King belonged the ring generalship, the wisdom bred of long, aching fights. He watched with cool eyes and head, moving slowlyand waiting for Sandel's froth to foam away. To the majority of theonlookers it seemed as though King was hopelessly outclassed, and theyvoiced their opinion in offers of three to one on Sandel. But there werewise ones, a few, who knew King of old time, and who covered what theyconsidered easy money. 

The third round began as usual, one-sided, with Sandel doing all theleading, and delivering all the punishment. A half-minute had passedwhen Sandel, over-confident, left an opening. King's eyes and right armflashed in the same instant. It was his first real blow--a hook, withthe twisted arch of the arm to make it rigid, and with all the weightof the half-pivoted body behind it. It was like a sleepy-seeming lionsuddenly thrusting out a lightning paw. Sandel, caught on the side ofthe jaw, was felled like a bullock. The audience gasped and murmuredawe-stricken applause. The man was not muscle-bound, after all, and hecould drive a blow like a trip-hammer. 

Sandel was shaken. He rolled over and attempted to rise, but the sharpyells from his seconds to take the count restrained him. He knelt onone knee, ready to rise, and waited, while the referee stood over him, counting the seconds loudly in his ear. At the ninth he rose in fightingattitude, and Tom King, facing him, knew regret that the blow hadnot been an inch nearer the point of the jaw. That would have been aknock-out, and he could have carried the thirty quid home to the missusand the kiddies. 

The round continued to the end of its three minutes, Sandel for thefirst time respectful of his opponent and King slow of movement andsleepy-eyed as ever. As the round neared its close, King, warned of thefact by sight of the seconds crouching outside ready for the spring inthrough the ropes, worked the fight around to his own corner. And whenthe gong struck, he sat down immediately on the waiting stool, whileSandel had to walk all the way across the diagonal of the square to hisown corner. It was a little thing, but it was the sum of little thingsthat counted. Sandel was compelled to walk that many more steps, to giveup that much energy, and to lose a part of the precious minute of rest. At the beginning of every round King loafed slowly out from his corner, forcing his opponent to advance the greater distance. The end of everyround found the fight manoeuvred by King into his own corner so that hecould immediately sit down. 

Two more rounds went by, in which King was parsimonious of effort andSandel prodigal. The latter's attempt to force a fast pace made Kinguncomfortable, for a fair percentage of the multitudinous blows showeredupon him went home. Yet King persisted in his dogged slowness, despitethe crying of the young hot-heads for him to go in and fight. Again, in the sixth round, Sandel was careless, again Tom King's fearful rightflashed out to the jaw, and again Sandel took the nine seconds count. 

By the seventh round Sandel's pink of condition was gone, and he settleddown to what he knew was to be the hardest fight in his experience. TomKing was an old un, but a better old un than he had ever encountered--anold un who never lost his head, who was remarkably able at defence, whose blows had the impact of a knotted club, and who had a knockout ineither hand. Nevertheless, Tom King dared not hit often. He neverforgot his battered knuckles, and knew that every hit must count if theknuckles were to last out the fight. As he sat in his corner, glancingacross at his opponent, the thought came to him that the sum ofhis wisdom and Sandel's youth would constitute a world's championheavyweight. But that was the trouble. Sandel would never become a worldchampion. He lacked the wisdom, and the only way for him to get it wasto buy it with Youth; and when wisdom was his, Youth would have beenspent in buying it. 

King took every advantage he knew. He never missed an opportunity toclinch, and in effecting most of the clinches his shoulder drove stifflyinto the other's ribs. In the philosophy of the ring a shoulder was asgood as a punch so far as damage was concerned, and a great deal betterso far as concerned expenditure of effort. Also, in the clinchesKing rested his weight on his opponent, and was loath to let go. Thiscompelled the interference of the referee, who tore them apart, alwaysassisted by Sandel, who had not yet learned to rest. He could notrefrain from using those glorious flying arms and writhing muscles ofhis, and when the other rushed into a clinch, striking shoulder againstribs, and with head resting under Sandel's left arm, Sandel almostinvariably swung his right behind his own back and into the projectingface. It was a clever stroke, much admired by the audience, but it wasnot dangerous, and was, therefore, just that much wasted strength. ButSandel was tireless and unaware of limitations, and King grinned anddoggedly endured. 

Sandel developed a fierce right to the body, which made it appear thatKing was taking an enormous amount of punishment, and it was only theold ringsters who appreciated the deft touch of King's left glove to theother's biceps just before the impact of the blow. It was true, the blowlanded each time; but each time it was robbed of its power by that touchon the biceps. In the ninth round, three times inside a minute, King'sright hooked its twisted arch to the jaw; and three times Sandel's body, heavy as it was, was levelled to the mat. Each time he took the nineseconds allowed him and rose to his feet, shaken and jarred, but stillstrong. He had lost much of his speed, and he wasted less effort. He wasfighting grimly; but he continued to draw upon his chief asset, whichwas Youth. King's chief asset was experience. As his vitality had dimmedand his vigour abated, he had replaced them with cunning, with wisdomborn of the long fights and with a careful shepherding of strength. Notalone had he learned never to make a superfluous movement, but he hadlearned how to seduce an opponent into throwing his strength away. Againand again, by feint of foot and hand and body he continued to inveigleSandel into leaping back, ducking, or countering. King rested, but henever permitted Sandel to rest. It was the strategy of Age. 

Early in the tenth round King began stopping the other's rushes withstraight lefts to the face, and Sandel, grown wary, responded by drawingthe left, then by ducking it and delivering his right in a swinging hookto the side of the head. It was too high up to be vitally effective; butwhen first it landed, King knew the old, familiar descent of the blackveil of unconsciousness across his mind. For the instant, or for theslighest fraction of an instant, rather, he ceased. In the one moment hesaw his opponent ducking out of his field of vision and the backgroundof white, watching faces; in the next moment he again saw his opponentand the background of faces. It was as if he had slept for a time andjust opened his eyes again, and yet the interval of unconsciousness wasso microscopically short that there had been no time for him to fall. The audience saw him totter and his knees give, and then saw him recoverand tuck his chin deeper into the shelter of his left shoulder. 

Several times Sandel repeated the blow, keeping King partially dazed, and then the latter worked out his defence, which was also a counter. Feinting with his left he took a half-step backward, at the same timeupper cutting with the whole strength of his right. So accurately wasit timed that it landed squarely on Sandel's face in the full, downwardsweep of the duck, and Sandel lifted in the air and curled backward, striking the mat on his head and shoulders. Twice King achieved this, then turned loose and hammered his opponent to the ropes. He gave Sandelno chance to rest or to set himself, but smashed blow in upon blow tillthe house rose to its feet and the air was filled with an unbroken roarof applause. But Sandel's strength and endurance were superb, and hecontinued to stay on his feet. A knock-out seemed certain, and a captainof police, appalled at the dreadful punishment, arose by the ringsideto stop the fight. The gong struck for the end of the round and Sandelstaggered to his corner, protesting to the captain that he was soundand strong. To prove it, he threw two back-air-springs, and the policecaptain gave in. 

Tom King, leaning back in his corner and breathing hard, wasdisappointed. If the fight had been stopped, the referee, perforce, would have rendered him the decision and the purse would have been his. Unlike Sandel, he was not fighting for glory or career, but for thirtyquid. And now Sandel would recuperate in the minute of rest. 

Youth will be served--this saying flashed into King's mind, and heremembered the first time he had heard it, the night when he had putaway Stowsher Bill. The toff who had bought him a drink after the fightand patted him on the shoulder had used those words. Youth will beserved! The toff was right. And on that night in the long ago he hadbeen Youth. To-night Youth sat in the opposite corner. As for himself, he had been fighting for half an hour now, and he was an old man. Hadhe fought like Sandel, he would not have lasted fifteen minutes. But thepoint was that he did not recuperate. Those upstanding arteries andthat sorely tried heart would not enable him to gather strength in theintervals between the rounds. And he had not had sufficient strength inhim to begin with. His legs were heavy under him and beginning to cramp. He should not have walked those two miles to the fight. And there wasthe steak which he had got up longing for that morning. A great andterrible hatred rose up in him for the butchers who had refused himcredit. It was hard for an old man to go into a fight without enoughto eat. And a piece of steak was such a little thing, a few pennies atbest; yet it meant thirty quid to him. 

With the gong that opened the eleventh round, Sandel rushed, making ashow of freshness which he did not really possess. King knew it for whatit was--a bluff as old as the game itself. He clinched to save himself, then, going free, allowed Sandel to get set. This was what King desired. He feinted with his left, drew the answering duck and swinging upwardhook, then made the half-step backward, delivered the upper cut full tothe face and crumpled Sandel over to the mat. After that he neverlet him rest, receiving punishment himself, but inflicting far more, smashing Sandel to the ropes, hooking and driving all manner ofblows into him, tearing away from his clinches or punching him out ofattempted clinches, and ever when Sandel would have fallen, catching himwith one uplifting hand and with the other immediately smashing him intothe ropes where he could not fall. 

The house by this time had gone mad, and it was his house, nearly everyvoice yelling: "Go it, Tom!" "Get 'im! Get 'im!" "You've got 'im, Tom!You've got 'im!" It was to be a whirlwind finish, and that was what aringside audience paid to see. 

And Tom King, who for half an hour had conserved his strength, nowexpended it prodigally in the one great effort he knew he had in him. Itwas his one chance--now or not at all. His strength was waning fast, andhis hope was that before the last of it ebbed out of him he would havebeaten his opponent down for the count. And as he continued to strikeand force, coolly estimating the weight of his blows and the quality ofthe damage wrought, he realized how hard a man Sandel was to knock out. Stamina and endurance were his to an extreme degree, and they were thevirgin stamina and endurance of Youth. Sandel was certainly a comingman. He had it in him. Only out of such rugged fibre were successfulfighters fashioned. 

Sandel was reeling and staggering, but Tom King's legs were crampingand his knuckles going back on him. Yet he steeled himself to strike thefierce blows, every one of which brought anguish to his tortured hands. Though now he was receiving practically no punishment, he was weakeningas rapidly as the other. His blows went home, but there was no longerthe weight behind them, and each blow was the result of a severe effortof will. His legs were like lead, and they dragged visibly underhim; while Sandel's backers, cheered by this symptom, began callingencouragement to their man. 

King was spurred to a burst of effort. He delivered two blows insuccession--a left, a trifle too high, to the solar plexus, and a rightcross to the jaw. They were not heavy blows, yet so weak and dazed wasSandel that he went down and lay quivering. The referee stood over him, shouting the count of the fatal seconds in his ear. If before the tenthsecond was called, he did not rise, the fight was lost. The house stoodin hushed silence. King rested on trembling legs. A mortal dizziness wasupon him, and before his eyes the sea of faces sagged and swayed, whileto his ears, as from a remote distance, came the count of the referee. Yet he looked upon the fight as his. It was impossible that a man sopunished could rise. 

Only Youth could rise, and Sandel rose. At the fourth second he rolledover on his face and groped blindly for the ropes. By the seventh secondhe had dragged himself to his knee, where he rested, his head rollinggroggily on his shoulders. As the referee cried "Nine!" Sandel stoodupright, in proper stalling position, his left arm wrapped about hisface, his right wrapped about his stomach. Thus were his vital pointsguarded, while he lurched forward toward King in the hope of effecting aclinch and gaining more time. 

At the instant Sandel arose, King was at him, but the two blows hedelivered were muffled on the stalled arms. The next moment Sandel wasin the clinch and holding on desperately while the referee strove todrag the two men apart. King helped to force himself free. He knew therapidity with which Youth recovered, and he knew that Sandel was his ifhe could prevent that recovery. One stiff punch would do it. Sandelwas his, indubitably his. He had out-generalled him, out-fought him, out-pointed him. Sandel reeled out of the clinch, balanced on the hairline between defeat or survival. One good blow would topple him overand down and out. And Tom King, in a flash of bitterness, rememberedthe piece of steak and wished that he had it then behind that necessarypunch he must deliver. He nerved himself for the blow, but it wasnot heavy enough nor swift enough. Sandel swayed, but did not fall, staggering back to the ropes and holding on. King staggered after him, and, with a pang like that of dissolution, delivered another blow. But his body had deserted him. All that was left of him was a fightingintelligence that was dimmed and clouded from exhaustion. The blow thatwas aimed for the jaw struck no higher than the shoulder. He had willedthe blow higher, but the tired muscles had not been able to obey. And, from the impact of the blow, Tom King himself reeled back and nearlyfell. Once again he strove. This time his punch missed altogether, and, from absolute weakness, he fell against Sandel and clinched, holding onto him to save himself from sinking to the floor. 

King did not attempt to free himself. He had shot his bolt. He wasgone. And Youth had been served. Even in the clinch he could feel Sandelgrowing stronger against him. When the referee thrust them apart, there, before his eyes, he saw Youth recuperate. From instant to instant Sandelgrew stronger. His punches, weak and futile at first, became stiff andaccurate. Tom King's bleared eyes saw the gloved fist driving at hisjaw, and he willed to guard it by interposing his arm. He saw thedanger, willed the act; but the arm was too heavy. It seemed burdenedwith a hundredweight of lead. It would not lift itself, and he strove tolift it with his soul. Then the gloved fist landed home. He experienceda sharp snap that was like an electric spark, and, simultaneously, theveil of blackness enveloped him. 

When he opened his eyes again he was in his corner, and he heard theyelling of the audience like the roar of the surf at Bondi Beach. A wetsponge was being pressed against the base of his brain, and Sid Sullivanwas blowing cold water in a refreshing spray over his face and chest. His gloves had already been removed, and Sandel, bending over him, wasshaking his hand. He bore no ill-will toward the man who had put himout and he returned the grip with a heartiness that made his batteredknuckles protest. Then Sandel stepped to the centre of the ring andthe audience hushed its pandemonium to hear him accept young Pronto'schallenge and offer to increase the side bet to one hundred pounds. Kinglooked on apathetically while his seconds mopped the streaming waterfrom him, dried his face, and prepared him to leave the ring. He felthungry. It was not the ordinary, gnawing kind, but a great faintness, a palpitation at the pit of the stomach that communicated itself to allhis body. He remembered back into the fight to the moment when he hadSandel swaying and tottering on the hair-line balance of defeat. Ah, that piece of steak would have done it! He had lacked just that forthe decisive blow, and he had lost. It was all because of the piece ofsteak. 

His seconds were half-supporting him as they helped him through theropes. He tore free from them, ducked through the ropes unaided, andleaped heavily to the floor, following on their heels as they forced apassage for him down the crowded centre aisle. Leaving the dressing-roomfor the street, in the entrance to the hall, some young fellow spoke tohim. 

"W'y didn't yuh go in an' get 'im when yuh 'ad 'im?" the young fellowasked. 

"Aw, go to hell!" said Tom King, and passed down the steps to thesidewalk. 

The doors of the public-house at the corner were swinging wide, andhe saw the lights and the smiling barmaids, heard the many voicesdiscussing the fight and the prosperous chink of money on the bar. Somebody called to him to have a drink. He hesitated perceptibly, thenrefused and went on his way. 

He had not a copper in his pocket, and the two-mile walk home seemedvery long. He was certainly getting old. Crossing the Domain, he satdown suddenly on a bench, unnerved by the thought of the missus sittingup for him, waiting to learn the outcome of the fight. That was harderthan any knockout, and it seemed almost impossible to face. 

He felt weak and sore, and the pain of his smashed knuckles warned himthat, even if he could find a job at navvy work, it would be a weekbefore he could grip a pick handle or a shovel. The hunger palpitationat the pit of the stomach was sickening. His wretchedness overwhelmedhim, and into his eyes came an unwonted moisture. He covered his facewith his hands, and, as he cried, he remembered Stowsher Bill and howhe had served him that night in the long ago. Poor old Stowsher Bill!He could understand now why Bill had cried in the dressing-room.