THE GOOD SAMARITANS
She looked sharply at him through her bright blue eyes.
"Are ye saaking to make me belave ye are from Ireland?"
"Sartinly--Mike Murphy, from the town of Tipperary, County of Tipperary,
at your sarvice," and he bowed again.
"Arrah, poor Ireland, how many wrongs are heaped upon ye! I was sure from
yer accint that ye were a Dutchman or Frinch."
"May I ask yer name, me leddy?"
"Mrs. Maggie McCaffry, and me husband is Tam that is working for Mr.
Burns at Beartown."
Mike clasped his hands and with a glowing expression stepped forward.
"I knowed it! I knowed it!" he exclaimed, as if overrunning with joy.
"Knowed phwat?"
"That ye were my mither's fourth cousin that lift Tipperary fur Noo York
six years ago, but by some mistake landed in Dublin jail--bad cess to
them as made the same mistake!"
"It's bad enough fur ye to be born in the same counthry wid mesilf, but I
war-r-n ye to make no claim to relationship. There's some things a
respictable leddy can't stand."
"Did ye not almost break me heart by thinking I was a Dutchman?" asked
Mike reprovingly.
"I'll make the same roight by axing the pardon of ivery Dutchman I maats
for the rist of me born days. 'Twas har-r-d on the poor haythen."
"Aunt Maggie, I'll give ye all me wealth if ye'll consint to let me dry
mesilf in front of yer fire."
"Arrah, now, what are ye saying? Five cints is no object to me----"
Just then, in spite of an effort to prevent it, Mike's teeth chattered.
Now that he had ceased walking he quickly became chilled. The woman
noticed it and her warm sympathy instantly welled up.
"'Tis a shame that I kipt ye talking nonsense wid me while ye was
shivering. Do ye walk straight into the house and war-r-m yersilf till I
come, which will be in a jiffy whin I have the rest of me clothes hung
out. And if ye're hungry ye shall have food."
"I thank ye, aunty, but I am not in need of that."
Two small wooden steps were in front of the only door on that side of the
neat little cottage. He pressed his thumb on the latch, pushed open the
door and the next instant faced one of the greatest surprises of his
life.
The lower floor consisted of two rooms, a kitchen and a general living
room. The fire in the former would have been enough for the interior, but
for the fact that a visitor had preceded Mike, and because of his
presence a roaring fire was burning on the hearth. In front of this sat a
young man leaning back in a rocking chair, with a bandaged leg resting on
a pillow laid upon a second chair in front of him. He was smoking a
cigarette, and despite the fact that something ailed him, looked quite
comfortable.
As the door opened, his eyes met those of Mike Murphy, who halted with
one foot over the threshold, started and exclaimed:
"Can I belave what me eyes tell me! Is it _yersilf_?"
The young man sitting before him, smoking and nursing his injured limb,
was Orestes Noxon, whom Mike chased away from the Beartown post office
the night before, and who received a part of the charge from the shotgun
of Gerald Buxton.
The face of the injured youth flushed and he laughed nervously, but with
amazing coolness answered:
"I guess you don't need spectacles. You've got the best of me; I'm down
and you're up."
"There's an old account to be squared atween us, but that can rist till
ye become yersilf. Be the same token, are ye much hurt?"
Mike's Irish sympathy immediately went out to the fellow, who certainly
was at his mercy.
"I can't say I am. But your clothing is wet. I heard a part of your talk
with Mrs. McCaffry--God bless her splendid soul!--so suppose you come
closer where you will be in front of the fire and can dry yourself, and
we'll get on better."
It was good advice and Mike acted upon it. Standing with his back to the
blaze, he looked down in the face of the criminal whose self-possession
he could not help admiring.
"You remember our little foot race from the back of the Beartown post
office?" said Noxon, as if referring to an incident in which he felt no
particular interest.
"I do, but I niver won a prize at running and ye give me the slip."
"Only to get in front of that beefeater with a shotgun. Why didn't you
fire when you were chasing and threatening me?"
"I couldn't have touched off that busted gun any more than I could have
fired a broom handle."
"I made the mistake of thinking the other fellow would be equally
forbearing and kept on running, till all at once, bang! he let drive. I
caught a good part of the charge in that leg below the knee. It didn't
hurt much at first, and after managing to get hold of his gun I made him
dance for me. It would have killed you to see him," and at the
recollection the young man laughed hard.
"His boy Jim obsarved it all and told us and we laughed," said Mike, with
a grin. "The sight must have been very insthructive."
"It was, to that old codger, who won't get over his lesson for a month.
Well, as the gun wasn't of any use to me I threw it away and started to
find my friends and the boat we came on. By and by my leg began to hurt,
I suppose from walking so much and a tumble I got by catching my foot in
the root of a tree. I sat down to rest awhile and when I got up it hurt
so badly that I thought it was all up with me. You know it was night, and
somehow I had gone astray in the infernal pine woods. The wound was
bleeding, and I sat down again intending to wait till morning. By and by
I heard a dog bark so near that I climbed to my feet again and made by
way to this house. McCaffry and his wife were asleep and it took a good
deal of banging and shouting for me to wake them. But when they found out
what was the matter they took me in, and my own father and mother could
not have been kinder."
"What did they do fur yer fut?"
"The good woman not only washed the wound, but, by the light of the lamp
which her husband held, picked out every one of the shot that had been
buried there and were making the trouble. Then she bathed the hurt again
and wrapped it about with the clean linen, as you see for yourself. All
that remains is for me to keep quiet for a few days and nature will do
the rest."
"Wouldn't it be well if I got a docther fur ye?"
Noxon looked up in the face of the Irish youth, who tried to keep a grave
countenance.
"I think not," replied the sufferer.
There was a world of significance in the words, and both understood.
Strange that these two who had never met before except as the bitterest
of enemies should talk now as comrades. Mike kept pinching his clothing
and turning every side to the blaze, thus drying the garments quite
rapidly. He was so interested in the story of Noxon that he grew
careless.
"I think I see smoke coming from behind you," finally said the sitter.
Mike reached back to investigate and with a gasp snatched back his
fingers.
"I'm afire! Is there a well outside that I can dive into the same?"
"Turn around; I can help you," said Noxon, laughing, dropping his foot
and sitting forward.
Together they quenched the twist of blaze which if left alone would have
played the mischief with Mike's garments.
"I'm thinking this is a little different, Mr. Noxon, from last night."
"It is, and I hope it will always stay that way."
Mike was astonished and looked questioningly at the fellow.
"Phwat might ye be maaning?" he asked, lowering his voice.
Noxon tried to speak, but his voice broke. He snatched out his
handkerchief from the side pocket of his coat and pressed it to his eyes.
Then his breast heaved and he broke into sobbing.
The heart of Mike melted at the sight. He had never dreamed of anything
like this. Enmity and resentment gave way to an anguish of sympathy for
the fellow. He longed to say something comforting, but could not think of
a word, and remained mute. Very soon the youth regained his self-control.
Dropping his handkerchief in his lap, and with eyes streaming, he
exclaimed from the very depths of his despair:
"Oh, why didn't that man aim better and kill me! I'm not fit to live! I'm
the worst villain unhanged! I am lost--damned, and a curse to those who
love me!"
Mike pulled himself together sufficiently to reply:
"I don't think ye're quite all them things. Cheer up! cheer up, old
fellow!"
Noxon did not speak, but slowly swayed his head from side to side, like
one from whom all hope had departed. Mike drew a chair beside him, and as
tenderly as a mother lifted the white hand from where it lay on the
handkerchief, and held it in his own warm grasp.
"Noxy, me bye, Mike Murphy is yer frind through thick and thin--don't ye
forget _that_--and I'm going to see ye through this if I have to break a
thrace in trying."
"_You!_" repeated the despairing one, looking up in Mike's honest blue
eyes. "No one can save a wretch like me. I'm not worth saving!"
"Ye forget there's One to whom the same is aisy, me bye. Ye feel down in
the mouth jest now, as Jonah did respicting the whale, but bimeby this
fog will clear away and the sun will shine forth again. I've been in some
purty bad scrapes mesilf and He niver desarted me. Why, it ain't two
hours, since He raiched out His hand, grabbed me by the neck and saved me
from drowning. I tell ye, Noxy, that He won't fail ye."
"But you never did what I have done."
The Irish youth bent his head as if recalling his past life.
"I can't say that I did, but I'm the meanest scamp that iver
lived--barring yersilf," he added, with the old twinkle in his eyes.
"Come, now, be a man and we'll have ye out of this scrape as quick as I
jumped awhile ago whin I awoke to the fact that me trousers was afire."
Noxon actually smiled at the recollection.
"You call yourself a scamp. Why, you are an angel compared with me--so is
everybody! Kit Woodford and Graff Miller are a thousand times better than
I."