Howbeit, this easy mutual intercourse was one day interrupted by what

seemed a trifling incident. The piano, which Mr. Barstow had promised,

duly made its appearance in the schoolhouse, to the delight of the

scholars and the gentle satisfaction of Mrs. Martin, who, in addition to

the rudimentary musical instruction of the younger girls, occasionally

played upon it herself in a prim, refined, and conscientious fashion.

To this, when she was alone after school hours, she sometimes added a

faint, colorless voice of limited range and gentlewomanly expression. It

was on one of these occasions that Twing, becoming an accidental auditor

of this chaste, sad piping, was not only permitted to remain to hear the

end of a love song of strictly guarded passion in the subjunctive

mood, but at the close was invited to try his hand--a quick, if not a

cultivated one--at the instrument. He did so. Like her, he added his

voice. Like hers, it was a love song. But there the similitude ended.

Negro in dialect, illiterate in construction, idiotic in passion, and

presumably addressed to the “Rose of Alabama,” in the very extravagance

of its childish infatuation it might have been a mockery of the

schoolmistress's song but for one tremendous fact! In unrestrained

feeling, pathetic yearning, and exquisite tenderness of expression, it

was unmistakably and appallingly personal and sincere. It was true the

lips spoken of were “lubly,” the eyes alluded to were like “lightenin'

bugs,” but from the voice and gestures of the singer Mrs. Martin

confusedly felt that they were intended for HERS, and even the refrain

that “she dressed so neat and looked so sweet” was glaringly allusive

to her own modish mourning. Alternately flushing and paling, with a

hysteric smile hovering round her small reserved mouth, the unfortunate

gentlewoman was fain to turn to the window to keep her countenance until

it was concluded. She did not ask him to repeat it, nor did she again

subject herself to this palpable serenade, but a few days afterwards, as

she was idly striking the keys in the interval of a music lesson, one

of her little pupils broke out, “Why, Mrs. Martin, if yo ain't a pickin'

out that pow'ful pretty tune that Mr. Twing sings!”

Nevertheless, when Twing, a week or two later, suggested that he might

sing the same song as a solo at a certain performance to be given by the

school children in aid of a local charity, she drily intimated that it

was hardly of a character to suit the entertainment. “But,” she added,

more gently, “you recite so well; why not give a recitation?”

He looked at her with questioning and troubled eyes,--the one expression

he seemed to have lately acquired. “But that would be IN PUBLIC!

There'll be a lot of people there,” he said doubtfully.

A little amused at this first apparent sign of a want of confidence in

himself, she said, with a reassuring smile, “So much the better,--you do

it really too well to have it thrown away entirely on children.”

“Do YOU wish it?” he said suddenly.

Somewhat confused, but more irritated by his abruptness, she replied,

“Why not?” But when the day came, and before a crowded audience, in

which there was a fair sprinkling of strangers, she regretted her rash

suggestion. For when the pupils had gone through certain calisthenic

exercises--admirably taught and arranged by him--and “spoken their

pieces,” he arose, and, fixing his eyes on her, began Othello's defense

before the Duke and Council. Here, as on the previous occasion, she felt

herself personally alluded to in his account of his wooing.

Desdemona, for some occult reason, vicariously appeared for her in the

unwarrantable picture of his passion, and to this was added the absurd

consciousness which she could not put aside that the audience, following

with enthusiasm his really strong declamation, was also following his

suggestion and adopting it. Yet she was also conscious, and, as she

thought, as inconsistently, of being pleased and even proud of his

success. At the conclusion the applause was general, and a voice added

with husky admiration and familiarity:--

“Brayvo, Johnny Walker!”

Twing's face became suddenly white as a Pierrot mask. There was a dead

silence, in which the voice continued, “Give us 'Sugar in the Gourd,'

Johnny.”

A few hisses, and cries of “Hush!” “Put him out!” followed. Mrs. Martin

raised her eyes quickly to where her assistant had stood bowing his

thanks a moment before. He was gone!

More concerned than she cared to confess, vaguely fearful that she was

in some way connected with his abrupt withdrawal, and perhaps a little

remorseful that she had allowed her personal feelings to interfere with

her frank recognition of his triumph, she turned back to the schoolroom,

after the little performers and their audience had departed, in the hope

that he might return. It was getting late, the nearly level rays of the

sun were lying on the empty benches at the lower end of the room, but

the desk where she sat with its lid raised was in deep shadow.

Suddenly she heard his voice in a rear hall, but it was accompanied by

another's,--the same voice which had interrupted the applause. Before

she could either withdraw, or make herself known, the two men had

entered the room, and were passing slowly through it. She understood at

once that Twing had slipped out into a janitor's room in the rear,

where he had evidently forced an interview and explanation from his

interrupter, and now had been waiting for the audience to disperse

before emerging by the front door. They had evidently overlooked her in

the shadow.

“But,” said the stranger, as if following an aggrieved line of apology,

“if Barstow knew who you were, and what you'd done, and still thought

you good enough to rastle round here and square up them Pike County

fellers and them kids--what in thunder do you care if the others DO find

you out, as long as Barstow sticks to you?”

“I've told you why, Dick,” returned Twing gloomily.

“Oh, the schoolma'am!”

“Yes, she's a saint, an angel. More than that--she's a lady, Dick,

to the tip of her fingers, who knows nothing of the world outside a

parson's study. She took me on trust--without a word--when the trustees

hung back and stared. She's never asked me about myself, and now when

she knows who and what I have been--she'll loathe me!”

“But look here, Jim,” said the stranger anxiously. “I'll say it's all a

lie. I'll come here and apologize to you afore HER, and say I took you

for somebody else. I'll”--

“It's too late,” said Twing moodily.

“And what'll you do?”

“Leave here.”

They had reached the door together. To Mrs. Martin's terror, as the

stranger passed out, Twing, instead of following him as she expected,

said “Good-night,” and gloomily re-entered the schoolroom. Here he

paused a moment, and then throwing himself on one of the benches,

dropped his head upon a desk with his face buried in his hands--like a

very schoolboy.

What passed through Mrs. Martin's mind I know not. For a moment she sat

erect and rigid at her desk. Then she slipped quietly down, and, softly

as one of the last shadows cast by the dying sun, glided across the

floor to where he sat.

“Mrs. Martin,” he said, starting to his feet.

“I have heard all,” she said faintly. “I couldn't help it. I was here

when you came in. But I want to tell you that I am content to know you

only as you seem to be,--as I have always found you here,--strong and

loyal to a duty laid upon you by those who had a full knowledge of all

you had been.”

“Did you? Do you know what I have been?”

Mrs. Martin looked frightened, trembled a moment, and, recovering

herself with an effort, said gently, “I know nothing of your past.”

“Nothing?” he repeated, with a mirthless attempt at laughter, and a

quick breath. “Not that I've been a--a--mountebank, a variety actor--a

clown, you know, for the amusement of the lowest, at twenty-five cents a

ticket. That I'm 'Johnny Walker,' the song and dance man--the all-round

man--selected by Mr. Barstow to teach these boors a lesson as to what

they wanted!”

She looked at him a moment--timidly, yet thoughtfully. “Then you are an

actor--a person who simulates what he does not feel?”

“Yes.”

“And all the time you have been here you have been acting the

schoolmaster--playing a part--for--for Mr. Barstow?”

“Yes.”

“Always?”

“Yes.”

The color came softly to her face again, and her voice was very low.

“And when you sang to me that day, and when you looked at me--as

you did--an hour or two ago--while you were entertaining--you

were--only--acting?”

Mr. Twing's answer was not known, but it must have been a full and

complete one, for it was quite dark when he left the schoolroom--NOT for

the last time--with its mistress on his arm.

IN A PIONEER RESTAURANT.

CHAPTER I.

There was probably no earthly reason why the “Poco Mas o Menos” Club

of San Francisco should have ever existed, or why its five harmless,

indistinctive members should not have met and dined together as ordinary

individuals. Still less was there any justification for the gratuitous

opinion which obtained, that it was bold, bad, and brilliant. Looking

back upon it over a quarter of a century and half a globe, I confess I

cannot recall a single witticism, audacity, or humorous characteristic

that belonged to it. Yet there was no doubt that we were thought to be

extremely critical and satirical, and I am inclined to think we

honestly believed it. To take our seats on Wednesdays and Saturdays at

a specially reserved table at the restaurant we patronized, to be

conscious of being observed by the other guests, and of our waiter

confidentially imparting our fame to strangers behind the shaken-out

folds of a napkin, and of knowing that the faintest indication of

merriment from our table thrilled the other guests with anticipatory

smiles, was, I am firmly convinced, all that we ever did to justify our

reputations. Nor, strictly speaking, were we remarkable as individuals;

an assistant editor, a lawyer, a young army quartermaster, a bank clerk

and a mining secretary--we could not separately challenge any special

social or literary distinction. Yet I am satisfied that the very name

of our Club--a common Spanish colloquialism, literally meaning “a little

more or less,” and adopted in Californian slang to express an unknown

quantity--was supposed to be replete with deep and convulsing humor.

My impression is that our extravagant reputation, and, indeed, our

continued existence as a Club, was due solely to the proprietor of the

restaurant and two of his waiters, and that we were actually “run”

by them. When the suggestion of our meeting regularly there was first

broached to the proprietor--a German of slow but deep emotions--he

received it with a “So” of such impressive satisfaction that it might

have been the beginning of our vainglory. From that moment he became at

once our patron and our devoted slave. To linger near our table once or

twice during dinner with an air of respectful vacuity,--as of one who

knew himself too well to be guilty of the presumption of attempting

to understand our brilliancy,--to wear a certain parental pride and

unconsciousness in our fame, and yet to never go further in seeming to

comprehend it than to obligingly translate the name of the Club as “a

leedle more and nod quide so much”--was to him sufficient happiness.

That he ever experienced any business profit from the custom of the

Club, or its advertisement, may be greatly doubted; on the contrary,

that a few plain customers, nettled at our self-satisfaction, might

have resented his favoritism seemed more probable. Equally vague,

disinterested, and loyal was the attachment of the two waiters,--one

an Italian, faintly reminiscent of better days and possibly superior

extraction; the other a rough but kindly Western man, who might have

taken this menial position from temporary stress of circumstances, yet

who continued in it from sheer dominance of habit and some feebleness of

will. They both vied with each other to please us. It may have been they

considered their attendance upon a reputed intellectual company less

degrading than ministering to the purely animal and silent wants of

the average customers. It may have been that they were attracted by

our general youthfulness. Indeed, I am inclined to think that they

themselves were much more distinctive and interesting than any members

of the Club, and it is to introduce THEM that I venture to recall so

much of its history.

A few months after our advent at the restaurant, one evening, Joe

Tallant, the mining secretary, one of our liveliest members, was

observed to be awkward and distrait during dinner, forgetting even to

offer the usual gratuity to the Italian waiter who handed him his hat,

although he stared at him with an imbecile smile. As we chanced to leave

the restaurant together, I was rallying him upon his abstraction, when

to my surprise he said gravely: “Look here, one of two things has got to

happen: either we must change our restaurant or I'm going to resign.”

“Why?”

“Well, to make matters clear, I'm obliged to tell you something that

in our business we usually keep a secret. About three weeks ago I had

a notice to transfer twenty feet of Gold Hill to a fellow named

'Tournelli.' Well, Tournelli happened to call for it himself, and who

the devil do you suppose Tournelli was? Why our Italian waiter. I was

regularly startled, and so was he. But business is business; so I passed

him over the stock and said nothing--nor did he--neither there nor here.

Day before yesterday he had thirty feet more transferred to him, and

sold out.”

“Well?” I said impatiently.

“Well,” repeated Tallant indignantly. “Gold Hill's worth six hundred

dollars a foot. That's eighteen thousand dollars cash. And a man who's

good enough for that much money is too good to wait upon me. Fancy a man

who could pay my whole year's salary with five feet of stock slinging

hash to ME. Fancy YOU tipping him with a quarter!”

“But if HE don't mind it--and prefers to continue a waiter--why should

YOU care? And WE'RE not supposed to know.”

“That's just it,” groaned Tallant. “That's just where the sell comes in.

Think how he must chuckle over us! No, sir! There's nothing aristocratic

about me; but, by thunder, if I can't eat my dinner, and feel I am as

good as the man who waits on me, I'll resign from the Club.”

After endeavoring to point out to him the folly of such a proceeding, I

finally suggested that we should take the other members of our Club into

our confidence, and abide by their decision; to which he agreed. But, to

his chagrin, the others, far from participating in his delicacy, seemed

to enjoy Tournelli's unexpected wealth with a vicarious satisfaction

and increase of dignity as if we were personally responsible for

it. Although it had been unanimously agreed that we should make no

allusions, jocose or serious, to him, nor betray any knowledge of it

before him, I am afraid our attitude at the next dinner was singularly

artificial. A nervous expectancy when he approached us, and a certain

restraint during his presence, a disposition to check any discussion

of shares or “strikes” in mining lest he should think it personal, an

avoidance of unnecessary or trifling “orders,” and a singular patience

in awaiting their execution when given; a vague hovering between

sympathetic respect and the other extreme of indifferent bluntness in

our requests, tended, I think, to make that meal far from exhilarating.

Indeed, the unusual depression affected the unfortunate cause of it,

who added to our confusion by increased solicitude of service and--as if

fearful of some fault, or having incurred our disfavor--by a deprecatory

and exaggerated humility that in our sensitive state seemed like the

keenest irony. At last, evidently interpreting our constraint before him

into a desire to be alone, he retired to the door of a distant pantry,

whence he surveyed us with dark and sorrowful Southern eyes. Tallant,

who in this general embarrassment had been imperfectly served, and had

eaten nothing, here felt his grievance reach its climax, and in a sudden

outbreak of recklessness he roared out, “Hi, waiter--you, Tournelli. He

may,” he added, turning darkly to us, “buy up enough stock to control

the board and dismiss ME; but, by thunder, if it costs me my place, I'm

going to have some more chicken!”

It was probably this sensitiveness that kept us from questioning him,

even indirectly, and perhaps led us into the wildest surmises. He was

acting secretly for a brotherhood or society of waiters; he was a silent

partner of his German employer; he was a disguised Italian stockbroker,

gaining “points” from the unguarded conversation of “operating”

customers; he was a political refugee with capital; he was a fugitive

Sicilian bandit, investing his ill-gotten gains in California; he was

a dissipated young nobleman, following some amorous intrigue across the

ocean, and acting as his own Figaro or Leporello. I think a majority of

us favored the latter hypothesis, possibly because we were young, and

his appearance gave it color. His thin black mustaches and dark eyes,

we felt, were Tuscan and aristocratic; at least, they were like the

baritone who played those parts, and HE ought to know. Yet nothing could

be more exemplary and fastidious than his conduct towards the few lady

frequenters of the “Poodle Dog” restaurant, who, I regret to say, were

not puritanically reserved or conventual in manner.

But an unexpected circumstance presently changed and divided our

interest. It was alleged by Clay, the assistant editor, that entering

the restaurant one evening he saw the back and tails of a coat that

seemed familiar to him half-filling a doorway leading to the restaurant

kitchen. It was unmistakably the figure of one of our Club members,--the

young lawyer,--Jack Manners. But what was he doing there? While the

Editor was still gazing after him, he suddenly disappeared, as if some

one had warned him that he was observed. As he did not reappear, when

Tournelli entered from the kitchen a few moments later, the Editor

called him and asked for his fellow-member. To his surprise the Italian

answered, with every appearance of truthfulness, that he had not seen

Mr. Manners at all! The Editor was staggered; but as he chanced, some

hours later, to meet Manners, he playfully rallied him on his mysterious

conference with the Italian. Manners replied briefly that he had had no

interview whatever with Tournelli, and changed the subject quickly. The

mystery--as we persisted in believing it--was heightened when another

member deposed that he had seen “Tom,” the Western waiter, coming from

Manners's office. As Manners had volunteered no information of this, we

felt that we could not without indelicacy ask him if Tom was a client,

or a messenger from Tournelli. The only result was that our Club dinner

was even more constrained than before. Not only was “Tom” now invested

with a dark importance, but it was evident that the harmony of the Club

was destroyed by these singular secret relations of two of its members

with their employes.

It chanced that one morning, arriving from a delayed journey, I dropped

into the restaurant. It was that slack hour between the lingering

breakfast and coming luncheon when the tables are partly stripped and

unknown doors, opened for ventilation, reveal the distant kitchen, and a

mingled flavor of cold coffee-grounds and lukewarm soups hangs heavy

on the air. To this cheerlessness was added a gusty rain without, that

filmed the panes of the windows and doors, and veiled from the passer-by

the usual tempting display of snowy cloths and china.

As I seemed to be the only customer at that hour, I selected a table by

the window for distraction. Tom had taken my order; the other waiters,

including Tournelli, were absent, with the exception of a solitary

German, who, in the interlude of perfunctory trifling with the casters,

gazed at me with that abstracted irresponsibility which one waiter

assumes towards another's customer. Even the proprietor had deserted his

desk at the counter. It seemed to be a favorable opportunity to get some

information from Tom.

But he anticipated me. When he had dealt a certain number of dishes

around me, as if they were cards and he was telling my fortune, he

leaned over the table and said, with interrogating confidence:--

“I reckon you call that Mr. Manners of yours a good lawyer?”

We were very loyal to each other in the Club, and I replied with

youthful enthusiasm that he was considered one of the most promising at

the bar. And, remembering Tournelli, I added confidently that whoever

engaged him to look after their property interests had secured a

treasure.

“But is he good in criminal cases--before a police court, for instance?”

continued Tom.

I believed--I don't know on what grounds--that Manners was good in

insurance and admiralty law, and that he looked upon criminal practice

as low; but I answered briskly--though a trifle startled--that as a

criminal lawyer he was perfect.

“He could advise a man, who had a row hanging on, how to steer clear of

being up for murder--eh?”

I trusted, with a desperate attempt at jocosity, that neither he nor

Tournelli had been doing anything to require Manners's services in that

way.

“It would be too late, THEN,” said Tom, coolly, “and ANYBODY could tell

a man what he ought to have done, or how to make the best of what he

had done; but the smart thing in a lawyer would be to give a chap points

BEFOREHAND, and sorter tell him how far he could go, and yet keep

inside the law. How he might goad a fellow to draw on him, and then plug

him--eh?”

I looked up quickly. There was nothing in his ordinary, good-humored,

but not very strong face to suggest that he himself was the subject of

this hypothetical case. If he were speaking for Tournelli, the Italian

certainly was not to be congratulated on his ambassador's prudence; and,

above all, Manners was to be warned of the interpretation which might be

put upon his counsels, and disseminated thus publicly. As I was thinking

what to say, he moved away, but suddenly returned again.

“What made you think Tournelli had been up to anything?” he asked

sharply.

“Nothing,” I answered; “I only thought you and he, being friends”--

“You mean we're both waiters in the same restaurant. Well, I don't know

him any better than I know that chap over there,” pointing to the other

waiter. “He's a Greaser or an Italian, and, I reckon, goes with his

kind.”

Why had we not thought of this before? Nothing would be more natural

than that the rich and imperious Tournelli should be exclusive, and have

no confidences with his enforced associates. And it was evident that Tom

had noticed it and was jealous.

“I suppose he's rather a swell, isn't he?” I suggested tentatively.

A faint smile passed over Tom's face. It was partly cynical and partly

suggestive of that amused toleration of our youthful credulity which

seemed to be a part of that discomposing patronage that everybody

extended to the Club. As he said nothing, I continued encouragingly:--

“Because a man's a waiter, it doesn't follow that he's always been one,

or always will be.”

“No,” said Tom, abstractedly; “but it's about as good as anything else

to lie low and wait on.” But here two customers entered, and he

turned to them, leaving me in doubt whether to accept this as a verbal

pleasantry or an admission. Only one thing seemed plain: I had certainly

gained no information, and only added a darker mystery to his conference

with Manners, which I determined I should ask Manners to explain.

I finished my meal in solitude. The rain was still beating drearily

against the windows with an occasional accession of impulse that seemed

like human impatience. Vague figures under dripping umbrellas, that

hid their faces as if in premeditated disguise, hurried from the main

thoroughfare. A woman in a hooded waterproof like a domino, a Mexican

in a black serape, might have been stage conspirators hastening to a

rendezvous. The cavernous chill and odor which I had before noted as

coming from some sarcophagus of larder or oven, where “funeral baked

meats” might have been kept in stock, began to oppress me. The hollow

and fictitious domesticity of this common board had never before seemed

so hopelessly displayed. And Tom, the waiter, his napkin twisted in

his hand and his face turned with a sudden dark abstraction towards the

window, appeared to be really “lying low,” and waiting for something

outside his avocation.

CHAPTER II.

The fact that Tom did not happen to be on duty at the next Club dinner

gave me an opportunity to repeat his mysterious remark to Manners, and

to jokingly warn that rising young lawyer against the indiscretion of

vague counsel. Manners, however, only shrugged his shoulders. “I don't

know what he meant,” he said carelessly; “but since he chooses to talk

of his own affairs publicly, I don't mind saying that they are neither

very weighty nor very dangerous. It's only the old story: the usual

matrimonial infidelities that are mixed up with the Californian

emigration. He leaves the regular wife behind,--fairly or unfairly, I

can't say. She gets tired waiting, after the usual style, and elopes

with somebody else. The Western Penelope isn't built for waiting. But

she seems to have converted some of his property into cash when she

skipped from St. Louis, and that's where his chief concern comes in.

That's what he wanted to see me for; that's why he inveigled me into

that infernal pantry of his one day to show me a plan of his property,

as if that was any good.”

He paused disgustedly. We all felt, I think, that Tom was some kind of

an impostor, claiming the sympathies of the Club on false pretenses.

Nevertheless, the Quartermaster said, “Then you didn't do anything for

him--give him any advice, eh?”

“No; for the property's as much hers as his, and he hasn't got a

divorce; and, as it's doubtful whether he didn't desert her first, he

can't get one. He was surprised,” he added, with a grim smile, “when I

told him that he was obliged to support her, and was even liable for

her debts. But people who are always talking of invoking the law know

nothing about it.” We were surprised too, although Manners was always

convincing us, in some cheerful but discomposing way, that we were all

daily and hourly, in our simplest acts, making ourself responsible

for all sorts of liabilities and actions, and even generally preparing

ourselves for arrest and imprisonment. The Quartermaster continued

lazily:--

“Then you didn't give him any points about shooting?”

“No; he doesn't even know the man she went off with. It was eighteen

months ago, and I don't believe he'd even know her again if he met

her. But, if he isn't much of a client, we shall miss him to-night as

a waiter, for the place is getting full, and there are not enough to

serve.”

The restaurant was, indeed, unusually crowded that evening; the more so

that, the private rooms above being early occupied, some dinner parties

and exclusive couples had been obliged to content themselves with the

public dining saloon. A small table nearest us, usually left vacant to

insure a certain seclusion to the Club, was arranged, with a deprecatory

apology from the proprietor, for one of those couples, a man and

woman. The man was a well-known speculator,--cool, yet reckless and

pleasure-loving; the woman, good-looking, picturesquely attractive,

self-conscious, and self-possessed. Our propinquity was evidently

neither novel nor discomposing. As she settled her skirts in her place,

her bright, dark eyes swept our table with a frank, almost childish,

familiarity. The younger members of the Club quite unconsciously pulled

up their collars and settled their neckties; the elders as unconsciously

raised their voices slightly, and somewhat arranged their sentences.

Alas! the simplicity and unaffectedness of the Club were again invaded.

Suddenly there was a crash, the breaking of glass, and an exclamation.

Tournelli, no doubt disorganized by the unusual hurry, on his way to our

table had dropped his tray, impartially distributed a plate of

asparagus over an adjoining table, and, flushed and nervous, yet with

an affectation of studied calmness, was pouring the sauce into the young

Quartermaster's plate, in spite of his languid protests. At any other

time we would have laughed, but there was something in the exaggerated

agitation of the Italian that checked our mirth. Why should he be so

upset by a trifling accident? He could afford to pay for the breakage;

he would laugh at dismissal. Was it the sensitiveness of a refined

nature, or--he was young and good-looking--was he disconcerted by the

fact that our handsome neighbor had witnessed his awkwardness? But she

was not laughing, and, as far as I could see, was intently regarding the

bill of fare.

“Waiter!” called her companion, hailing Tournelli. “Here!” The Italian,

with a face now distinctly white, leaned over the table, adjusting the

glasses, but did not reply.

“Waiter!” repeated the stranger, sharply. Tournelli's face twitched,

then became set as a mask; but he did not move. The stranger leaned

forward and pulled his apron from behind. Tournelli started with

flashing eyes, and turned swiftly round. But the Quartermaster's hand

had closed on his wrist.

“That's my knife, Tournelli.”

The knife dropped from the Italian's fingers.

“Better see WHAT he wants. It may not be THAT,” said the young officer,

coolly but kindly.

Tournelli turned impatiently towards the stranger. We alone had

witnessed this incident, and were watching him breathlessly. Yet what

bade fair a moment ago to be a tragedy, seemed now to halt grotesquely.

For Tournelli, throwing open his linen jacket with a melodramatic

gesture, tapped his breast, and with flashing eyes and suppressed

accents said, “Sare; you wantah me? Look--I am herre!”

The speculator leaned back in his chair in good-humored astonishment.

The lady's black eyes, without looking at Tournelli, glanced backward

round the room, and slipped along our table, with half-defiant

unconcern; and then she uttered a short hysterical laugh.

“Ah! ze lady--madame--ze signora--eh--she wantah me?” continued

Tournelli, leaning on the table with compressed fingers, and glaring at

her. “Perhaps SHE wantah Tournelli--eh?”

“Well, you might bring some with the soup,” blandly replied her escort,

who seemed to enjoy the Italian's excitement as a national eccentricity;

“but hurry up and set the table, will you?”

Then followed, on the authority of the Editor, who understood Italian, a

singular scene. Secure, apparently, in his belief that his language was

generally uncomprehended, Tournelli brought a decanter, and, setting

it on the table, said, “Traitress!” in an intense whisper. This

was followed by the cruets, which he put down with the exclamation,

“Perjured fiend!” Two glasses, placed on either side of her, carried the

word “Apostate!” to her ear; and three knives and forks, rattling

more than was necessary, and laid crosswise before her plate, were

accompanied with “Tremble, wanton!” Then, as he pulled the tablecloth

straight, and ostentatiously concealed a wine-stain with a clean napkin,

scarcely whiter than his lips, he articulated under his breath: “Let

him beware! he goes not hence alive! I will slice his craven

heart--thus--and thou shalt see it.” He turned quickly to a side table

and brought back a spoon. “And THIS is why I have not found you;”

another spoon, “For THIS you have disappeared;” a purely perfunctory

polishing of her fork, “For HIM, bah!” an equally unnecessary wiping

of her glass, “Blood of God!”--more wiping--“It will end! Yes”--general

wiping and a final flourish over the whole table with a napkin--“I go,

but at the door I shall await you both.”

She had not spoken yet, nor even lifted her eyes. When she did

so, however, she raised them level with his, showed all her white

teeth--they were small and cruel-looking--and said smilingly in his own

dialect:--

“Thief!”

Tournelli halted, rigid.

“You're talking his lingo, eh?” said her escort good-humoredly.

“Yes.”

“Well--tell him to bustle around and be a little livelier with the

dinner, won't you? This is only skirmishing.”

“You hear,” she continued to Tournelli in a perfectly even voice; “or

shall it be a policeman, and a charge of stealing?”

“Stealing!” gasped Tournelli. “YOU say stealing!”

“Yes--ten thousand dollars. You are well disguised here, my little

fellow; it is a good business--yours. Keep it while you can.”

I think he would have sprung upon her there and then, but that the

Quartermaster, who was nearest him, and had been intently watching his

face, made a scarcely perceptible movement as if ready to anticipate

him. He caught the officer's eye; caught, I think, in ours the

revelation that he had been understood, drew back with a sidelong,

sinuous movement, and disappeared in the passage to the kitchen.

I believe we all breathed more freely, although the situation was still

full enough of impending possibilities to prevent peaceful enjoyment

of our dinner. As the Editor finished his hurried translation, it was

suggested that we ought to warn the unsuspecting escort of Tournelli's

threats. But it was pointed out that this would be betraying the woman,

and that Jo Hays (her companion) was fully able to take care of himself.

“Besides,” said the Editor, aggrievedly, “you fellows only think of

YOURSELVES, and you don't understand the first principles of journalism.

Do you suppose I'm going to do anything to spoil a half-column of leaded

brevier copy--from an eye-witness, too? No; it's a square enough fight

as it stands. We must look out for the woman, and not let Tournelli get

an unfair drop on Hays. That is, if the whole thing isn't a bluff.”

But the Italian did not return. Whether he had incontinently fled, or

was nursing his wrath in the kitchen, or already fulfilling his threat

of waiting on the pavement outside the restaurant, we could not guess.

Another waiter appeared with the dinners they had ordered. A momentary

thrill of excitement passed over us at the possibility that Tournelli

had poisoned their soup; but it presently lapsed, as we saw the couple

partaking of it comfortably, and chatting with apparent unconcern. Was

the scene we had just witnessed only a piece of Southern exaggeration?

Was the woman a creature devoid of nerves or feeling of any kind; or was

she simply a consummate actress? Yet she was clearly not acting, for

in the intervals of conversation, and even while talking, her dark eyes

wandered carelessly around the room, with the easy self-confidence of

a pretty woman. We were beginning to talk of something else, when the

Editor said suddenly, in a suppressed voice:

“Hullo! What's the matter now?”

The woman had risen, and was hurriedly throwing her cloak over her

shoulders. But it was HER face that was now ashen and agitated, and we

could see that her hands were trembling. Her escort was assisting her,

but was evidently as astonished as ourselves. “Perhaps,” he suggested

hopefully, “if you wait a minute it will pass off.”

“No, no,” she gasped, still hurriedly wrestling with her cloak. “Don't

you see I'm suffocating here--I want air. You can follow!” She began

to move off, her face turned fixedly in the direction of the door. We

instinctively looked there--perhaps for Tournelli. There was no one.

Nevertheless, the Editor and Quartermaster had half-risen from their

seats.

“Helloo!” said Manners suddenly. “There's Tom just come in. Call him!”

Tom, evidently recalled from his brief furlough by the proprietor on

account of the press of custom, had just made his appearance from the

kitchen.

“Tom, where's Tournelli?” asked the Lawyer hurriedly, but following the

retreating woman with his eyes.

“Skipped, they say. Somebody insulted him,” said Tom curtly.

“You didn't see him hanging round outside, eh? Swearing vengeance?”

asked the Editor.

“No,” said Tom scornfully.

The woman had reached the door, and darted out of it as her escort

paused a moment at the counter to throw down a coin. Yet in that moment

she had hurried before him through the passage into the street. I

turned breathlessly to the window. For an instant her face, white as a

phantom's, appeared pressed rigidly against the heavy plate-glass, her

eyes staring with a horrible fascination back into the room--I even

imagined at us. Perhaps, as it was evident that Tournelli was not with

her, she fancied he was still here; perhaps she had mistaken Tom for

him! However, her escort quickly rejoined her; their shadows passed the

window together--they were gone.

Then a pistol-shot broke the quiet of the street.

The Editor and Quartermaster rose and ran to the door. Manners rose

also, but lingered long enough to whisper to me, “Don't lose sight of

Tom,” and followed them. But to my momentary surprise no one else

moved. I had forgotten, in the previous excitement, that in those days

a pistol-shot was not unusual enough to attract attention. A few raised

their heads at the sound of running feet on the pavement, and the

flitting of black shadows past the windows. Tom had not stirred, but,

napkin in hand, and eyes fixed on vacancy, was standing, as I had seen

him once before, in an attitude of listless expectation.

In a few minutes Manners returned. I thought he glanced oddly at Tom,

who was still lingering in attendance, and I even fancied he talked to

us ostentatiously for his benefit. “Yes, it was a row of Tournelli's. He

was waiting at the corner; had rushed at Hays with a knife, but had been

met with a derringer-shot through his hat. The lady, who, it seems, was

only a chance steamer acquaintance of Hays', thought the attack must

have been meant for HER, as she had recognized in the Italian a man who

had stolen from her divorced husband in the States, two years ago, and

was a fugitive from justice. At least that was the explanation given by

Hays, for the woman had fainted and been driven off to her hotel by

the Quartermaster, and Tournelli had escaped. But the Editor was on his

track. You didn't notice that lady, Tom, did you?”

Tom came out of an abstracted study, and said: “No, she had her back to

me all the time.”

Manners regarded him steadily for a moment without speaking, but in a

way that I could not help thinking was much more embarrassing to the

bystanders than to him. When we rose to leave, as he placed his usual

gratuity into Tom's hand, he said carelessly, “You might drop into my

office to-morrow if you have anything to tell ME.”

“I haven't,” said Tom quietly.

“Then I may have something to tell YOU.”

Tom nodded, and turned away to his duties. The Mining Secretary and

myself could scarcely wait to reach the street before we turned eagerly

on Manners.

“Well?”

“Well; the woman you saw was Tom's runaway wife, and Tournelli the man

she ran away with.”

“And Tom knew it?”

“Can't say.”

“And you mean to say that all this while Tom never suspected HIM, and

even did not recognize HER just now?”

Manners lifted his hat and passed his fingers through his hair

meditatively. “Ask me something easier, gentlemen.”

A TREASURE OF THE GALLEON.

Her father's house was nearly a mile from the sea, but the breath of

it was always strong at the windows and doors in the early morning, and

when there were heavy “southwesters” blowing in the winter, the wind

brought the sharp sting of sand to her cheek, and the rain an odd taste

of salt to her lips. On this particular December afternoon, however, as

she stood in the doorway, it seemed to be singularly calm; the southwest

trades blew but faintly, and scarcely broke the crests of the long

Pacific swell that lazily rose and fell on the beach, which only

a slanting copse of scrub-oak and willow hid from the cottage.

Nevertheless, she knew this league-long strip of shining sand much

better, it is to be feared, than the scanty flower-garden, arid and

stunted by its contiguity. It had been her playground when she first

came there, a motherless girl of twelve, and she had helped her father

gather its scattered driftwood--as the fortunes of the Millers were not

above accepting these occasional offerings of their lordly neighbor.

“I wouldn't go far to-day, Jenny,” said her father, as the girl stepped

from the threshold. “I don't trust the weather at this season; and

besides you had better be looking over your wardrobe for the Christmas

Eve party at Sol. Catlin's.”

“Why, father, you don't intend to go to that man's?” said the girl,

looking up with a troubled face.

“Lawyer Miller,” as he was called by his few neighbors, looked slightly

embarrassed. “Why not?” he asked in a faintly irritated tone.

“Why not? Why, father, you know how vulgar and conceited he is,--how

everybody here truckles to him!”

“Very likely; he's a very superior man of his kind,--a kind they

understand here, too,--a great trapper, hunter, and pioneer.”

“But I don't believe in his trapping, hunting, and pioneering,” said

the girl, petulantly. “I believe it's all as hollow and boisterous as

himself. It's no more real, or what one thinks it should be, than he

is. And he dares to patronize you--you, father, an educated man and a

gentleman!”

“Say rather an unsuccessful lawyer who was fool enough to believe that

buying a ranch could make him a farmer,” returned her father, but half

jestingly. “I only wish I was as good at my trade as he is.”

“But you never liked him,--you always used to ignore him; you've

changed, father”--She stopped suddenly, for her recollection of her

father's quiet superiority and easy independence when he first came

there was in such marked contrast to his late careless and weak

concession to the rude life around them, that she felt a pang of vague

degradation, which she feared her voice might betray.

“Very well! Do as you like,” he replied, with affected carelessness;

“only I thought, as we cannot afford to go elsewhere this Christmas, it

might be well for us to take what we could find here.”

“Take what we could find here!” It was so unlike him--he who had always

been so strong in preserving their little domestic refinements in their

rude surroundings, that their poverty had never seemed mean, nor their

seclusion ignoble. She turned away to conceal her indignant color. She

could share the household work with a squaw and Chinaman, she could

fetch wood and water. Catlin had patronizingly seen her doing it, but to

dance to his vulgar piping--never!

She was not long in reaching the sands that now lay before her,

warm, sweet-scented from short beach grass, stretching to a dim rocky

promontory, and absolutely untrod by any foot but her own. It was this

virginity of seclusion that had been charming to her girlhood; fenced

in between the impenetrable hedge of scrub-oaks on the one side, and the

lifting green walls of breakers tipped with chevaux de frise of white

foam on the other, she had known a perfect security for her sports

and fancies that had captivated her town-bred instincts and native

fastidiousness. A few white-winged sea-birds, as proud, reserved, and

maiden-like as herself, had been her only companions. And it was now

the custodian of her secret,--a secret as innocent and childlike as her

previous youthful fancies,--but still a secret known only to herself.

One day she had come upon the rotting ribs of a wreck on the beach. Its

distance from the tide line, its position, and its deep imbedding of

sand, showed that it was of ancient origin. An omnivorous reader of all

that pertained to the history of California, Jenny had in fancy often

sailed the seas in one of those mysterious treasure-ships that had

skirted the coast in bygone days, and she at once settled in her mind

that her discovery was none other than a castaway Philippine galleon.

Partly from her reserve, and partly from a suddenly conceived plan,

she determined to keep its existence unknown to her father, as careful

inquiry on her part had found it was equally unknown to the neighbors.

For this shy, imaginative young girl of eighteen had convinced herself

that it might still contain a part of its old treasure. She would dig

for it herself, without telling anybody. If she failed, no one would

know it; if she were successful, she would surprise her father and

perhaps retrieve their fortune by less vulgar means than their present

toil. Thanks to the secluded locality and the fact that she was known

to spend her leisure moments in wandering there, she could work without

suspicion. Secretly conveying a shovel and a few tools to the spot the

next day, she set about her prodigious task. As the upper works were

gone, and the galleon not large, in three weeks, working an hour or two

each day, she had made a deep excavation in the stern. She had found

many curious things,--the flotsam and jetsam of previous storms,--but as

yet, it is perhaps needless to say, not the treasure.

To-day she was filled with the vague hope of making her discovery before

Christmas Day. To have been able to take her father something on that

day--if only a few old coins--the fruit of her own unsuspected labor and

intuition--not the result of vulgar barter or menial wage--would have

been complete happiness. It was perhaps a somewhat visionary expectation

for an educated girl of eighteen, but I am writing of a young

Californian girl, who had lived in the fierce glamour of

treasure-hunting, and in whose sensitive individuality some of its

subtle poison had been instilled. Howbeit, to-day she found nothing.

She was sadly hiding her pick and shovel, as was her custom, when she

discovered the fresh track of an alien foot in the sand. Robinson Crusoe

was not more astounded at the savage footprint than Jenny Miller at this

damning proof of the invasion of her sacred territory. The footprints

came from and returned to the copse of shrubs. Some one might have seen

her at work!

But a singular change in the weather, overlooked in her excitement, here

forced itself upon her. A light film over sea and sky, lifted only by

fitful gusts of wind, seemed to have suddenly thickened until it became

an opaque vault, narrowing in circumference as the wind increased. The

promontory behind her disappeared, as if swallowed up, the distance

before her seemed to contract; the ocean at her side, the color of

dull pewter, vanished in a sheet of slanting rain, and by the time she

reached the house, half running, half carried along by the quartering

force of the wind, a full gale was blowing.

It blew all the evening, reaching a climax and fury at past midnight

that was remembered for many years along that coast. In the midst of it

they heard the booming of cannon, and then the voices of neighbors in

the road. “There was,” said the voices, “a big steamer ashore just afore

the house.” They dressed quickly and ran out.

Hugging the edge of the copse to breathe and evade the fury of the wind,

they struggled to the sands. At first, looking out to sea, the girl saw

nothing but foam. But, following the direction of a neighbor's arm, for

in that wild tumult man alone seemed speechless, she saw directly before

her, so close upon her that she could have thrown a pebble on board, the

high bows of a ship. Indeed, its very nearness gave her the feeling that

it was already saved, and its occasional heavy roll to leeward, drunken,

helpless, ludicrous, but never awful, brought a hysteric laugh to her

lips. But when a livid blue light, lit in the swinging top, showed a

number of black objects clinging to bulwarks and rigging, and the sea,

with languid, heavy cruelty, pushing rather than beating them away, one

by one, she knew that Death was there.

The neighbors, her father with the others, had been running hopelessly

to and fro, or cowering in groups against the copse, when suddenly they

uttered a cry--their first--of joyful welcome. And with that shout,

the man she most despised and hated, Sol. Catlin, mounted on a “calico”

mustang, as outrageous and bizarre as himself, dashed among them.

In another moment, what had been fear, bewilderment, and hesitation

was changed to courage, confidence, and action. The men pressed eagerly

around him, and as eagerly dispersed under his quick command. Galloping

at his heels was a team with the whale-boat, brought from the river,

miles away. He was here, there, and everywhere; catching the line thrown

by the rocket from the ship, marshaling the men to haul it in, answering

the hail from those on board above the tempest, pervading everything

and everybody with the fury of the storm; loud, imperious, domineering,

self-asserting, all-sufficient, and successful! And when the boat was

launched, the last mighty impulse came from his shoulder. He rode at the

helm into the first hanging wall of foam, erect and triumphant! Dazzled,

bewildered, crying and laughing, she hated him more than ever.

The boat made three trips, bringing off, with the aid of the hawser,

all but the sailors she had seen perish before her own eyes. The

passengers,--they were few,--the captain and officers, found refuge in

her father's house, and were loud in their praises of Sol. Catlin. But

in that grateful chorus a single gloomy voice arose, the voice of a

wealthy and troubled passenger. “I will give,” he said, “five thousand

dollars to the man who brings me a box of securities I left in my

stateroom.” Every eye turned instinctively to Sol.; he answered only

those of Jenny's. “Say ten thousand, and if the dod-blasted hulk holds

together two hours longer I'll do it, d--n me! You hear me! My name's

Sol. Catlin, and when I say a thing, by G-d, I do it.” Jenny's disgust

here reached its climax. The hero of a night of undoubted energy and

courage had blotted it out in a single moment of native vanity and

vulgar avarice.

He was gone; not only two hours, but daylight had come and they

were eagerly seeking him, when he returned among them, dripping

and--empty-handed. He had reached the ship, he said, with another; found

the box, and trusted himself alone with it to the sea. But in the surf

he had to abandon it to save himself. It had perhaps drifted ashore, and

might be found; for himself, he abandoned his claim to the reward. Had

he looked abashed or mortified, Jenny felt that she might have relented,

but the braggart was as all-satisfied, as confident and boastful as

ever. Nevertheless, as his eye seemed to seek hers, she was constrained,

in mere politeness, to add her own to her father's condolences. “I

suppose,” she hesitated, in passing him, “that this is a mere nothing

to you after all that you did last night that was really great and

unselfish.”

“Were you never disappointed, Miss?” he said, with exasperating

abruptness.

A quick consciousness of her own thankless labor on the galleon, and

a terrible idea that he might have some suspicion of, and perhaps the

least suggestion that she might have been disappointed in him, brought a

faint color to her cheek. But she replied with dignity:--

“I really couldn't say. But certainly,” she added, with a new-found

pertness, “you don't look it.”

“Nor do you, Miss,” was his idiotic answer.

A few hours later, alarmed at what she had heard of the inroads of the

sea, which had risen higher than ever known to the oldest settler, and

perhaps mindful of yesterday's footprints, she sought her old secluded

haunt. The wreck was still there, but the sea had reached it. The

excavation between its gaunt ribs was filled with drift and the seaweed

carried there by the surges and entrapped in its meshes. And there, too,

caught as in a net, lay the wooden box of securities Sol. Catlin had

abandoned to the sea.

This is the story as it was told to me. The singularity of coincidences

has challenged some speculation. Jenny insisted at the time upon sharing

the full reward with Catlin, but local critics have pointed out that

from subsequent events this proved nothing. For she had married him!

OUT OF A PIONEER'S TRUNK.

It was a slightly cynical, but fairly good-humored crowd that had

gathered before a warehouse on Long Wharf in San Francisco one afternoon

in the summer of '51. Although the occasion was an auction, the bidders'

chances more than usually hazardous, and the season and locality famous

for reckless speculation, there was scarcely any excitement among the

bystanders, and a lazy, half-humorous curiosity seemed to have taken the

place of any zeal for gain.

It was an auction of unclaimed trunks and boxes--the personal luggage of

early emigrants--which had been left on storage in hulk or warehouse at

San Francisco, while the owner was seeking his fortune in the mines. The

difficulty and expense of transport, often obliging the gold-seeker

to make part of his journey on foot, restricted him to the smallest

impedimenta, and that of a kind not often found in the luggage of

ordinary civilization. As a consequence, during the emigration of

'49, he was apt on landing to avail himself of the invitation usually

displayed on some of the doors of the rude hostelries on the shore:

“Rest for the Weary and Storage for Trunks.” In a majority of cases

he never returned to claim his stored property. Enforced absence,

protracted equally by good or evil fortune, accumulated the high storage

charges until they usually far exceeded the actual value of the goods;

sickness, further emigration, or death also reduced the number of

possible claimants, and that more wonderful human frailty--absolute

forgetfulness of deposited possessions--combined together to leave

the bulk of the property in the custodian's hands. Under an understood

agreement they were always sold at public auction after a given time.

Although the contents of some of the trunks were exposed, it was found

more in keeping with the public sentiment to sell the trunks LOCKED and

UNOPENED. The element of curiosity was kept up from time to time by the

incautious disclosures of the lucky or unlucky purchaser, and general

bidding thus encouraged--except when the speculator, with the true

gambling instinct, gave no indication in his face of what was drawn in

this lottery. Generally, however, some suggestion in the exterior of

the trunk, a label or initials; some conjectural knowledge of its former

owner, or the idea that he might be secretly present in the hope of

getting his property back for less than the accumulated dues, kept up

the bidding and interest.

A modest-looking, well-worn portmanteau had been just put up at a

small opening bid, when Harry Flint joined the crowd. The young man had

arrived a week before at San Francisco friendless and penniless, and had

been forced to part with his own effects to procure necessary food

and lodging while looking for an employment. In the irony of fate that

morning the proprietors of a dry-goods store, struck with his good looks

and manners, had offered him a situation, if he could make himself

more presentable to their fair clients. Harry Flint was gazing half

abstractedly, half hopelessly, at the portmanteau without noticing the

auctioneer's persuasive challenge. In his abstraction he was not aware

that the auctioneer's assistant was also looking at him curiously, and

that possibly his dejected and half-clad appearance had excited the

attention of one of the cynical bystanders, who was exchanging a few

words with the assistant. He was, however, recalled to himself a moment

later when the portmanteau was knocked down at fifteen dollars, and

considerably startled when the assistant placed it at his feet with a

grim smile. “That's your property, Fowler, and I reckon you look as if

you wanted it back bad.”

“But--there's some mistake,” stammered Flint. “I didn't bid.”

“No, but Tom Flynn did for you. You see, I spotted you from the first,

and told Flynn I reckoned you were one of those chaps who came back from

the mines dead broke. And he up and bought your things for you--like a

square man. That's Flynn's style, if he is a gambler.”

“But,” persisted Flint, “this never was my property. My name isn't

Fowler, and I never left anything here.”

The assistant looked at him with a grim, half-credulous, half-scornful

smile. “Have it your own way,” he said, “but I oughter tell ye, old

man, that I'm the warehouse clerk, and I remember YOU. I'm here for that

purpose. But as that thar valise is bought and paid for by somebody else

and given to you, it's nothing more to me. Take it or leave it.”

The ridiculousness of quarreling over the mere form of his good fortune

here struck Flint, and, as his abrupt benefactor had as abruptly

disappeared, he hurried off with his prize. Reaching his cheap

lodging-house, he examined its contents. As he had surmised, it

contained a full suit of clothing of the better sort, and suitable to

his urban needs. There were a few articles of jewelry, which he put

religiously aside. There were some letters, which seemed to be of a

purely business character. There were a few daguerreotypes of pretty

faces, one of which was singularly fascinating to him. But there

was another, of a young man, which startled him with its marvelous

resemblance to HIMSELF! In a flash of intelligence he understood it all

now. It was the likeness of the former owner of the trunk, for whom

the assistant had actually mistaken him! He glanced hurriedly at the

envelopes of the letters. They were addressed to Shelby Fowler, the name

by which the assistant had just called him. The mystery was plain now.

And for the present he could fairly accept his good luck, and trust to

later fortune to justify himself.

Transformed in his new garb, he left his lodgings to present himself

once more to his possible employer. His way led past one of the large

gambling saloons. It was yet too early to find the dry-goods trader

disengaged; perhaps the consciousness of more decent, civilized garb

emboldened him to mingle more freely with strangers, and he entered the

saloon. He was scarcely abreast of one of the faro tables when a man

suddenly leaped up with an oath and discharged a revolver full in his

face. The shot missed. Before his unknown assailant could fire again

the astonished Flint had closed with him, and instinctively clutched

the weapon. A brief but violent struggle ensued. Flint felt his strength

failing him, when suddenly a look of astonishment came into the furious

eyes of his adversary, and the man's grasp mechanically relaxed. The

half-freed pistol, thrown upwards by this movement, was accidentally

discharged point blank into his temples, and he fell dead. No one in the

crowd had stirred or interfered.

“You've done for Australian Pete this time, Mr. Fowler,” said a voice

at his elbow. He turned gaspingly and recognized his strange benefactor,

Flynn. “I call you all to witness, gentlemen,” continued the gambler,

turning dictatorially to the crowd, “that this man was FIRST attacked

and was UNARMED.” He lifted Flint's limp and empty hands and then

pointed to the dead man, who was still grasping the weapon. “Come!” He

caught the half-paralyzed arm of Flint and dragged him into the street.

“But,” stammered the horrified Flint, as he was borne along, “what does

it all mean? What made that man attack me?”

“I reckon it was a case of shooting on sight, Mr. Fowler; but he missed

it by not waiting to see if you were armed. It wasn't the square thing,

and you're all right with the crowd now, whatever he might have had

agin' you.”

“But,” protested the unhappy Flint, “I never laid eyes on the man

before, and my name isn't Fowler.”

Flynn halted, and dragged him in a door way. “Who the devil are you?” he

asked roughly.

Briefly, passionately, almost hysterically, Flint told him his scant

story. An odd expression came over the gambler's face.

“Look here,” he said abruptly, “I have passed my word to the crowd

yonder that you are a dead-broke miner called Fowler. I allowed that you

might have had some row with that Sydney duck, Australian Pete, in the

mines. That satisfied them. If I go back now, and say it's a lie, that

your name ain't Fowler, and you never knew who Pete was, they'll jest

pass you over to the police to deal with you, and wash their hands of it

altogether. You may prove to the police who you are, and how that d---

clerk mistook you, but it will give you trouble. And who is there here

who knows who you really are?”

“No one,” said Flint, with sudden hopelessness.

“And you say you're an orphan, and ain't got any relations livin' that

you're beholden to?”

“No one.”

“Then, take my advice, and BE Fowler, and stick to it! Be Fowler until

Fowler turns up, and thanks you for it; for you've saved Fowler's life,

as Pete would never have funked and lost his grit over Fowler as he did

with you; and you've a right to his name.”

He stopped, and the same odd, superstitious look came into his dark

eyes.

“Don't you see what all that means? Well, I'll tell you. You're in the

biggest streak of luck a man ever had. You've got the cards in your own

hand! They spell 'Fowler'! Play Fowler first, last, and all the time.

Good-night, and good luck, MR. FOWLER.”

The next morning's journal contained an account of the justifiable

killing of the notorious desperado and ex-convict, Australian Pete, by

a courageous young miner by the name of Fowler. “An act of firmness

and daring,” said the “Pioneer,” “which will go far to counteract the

terrorism produced by those lawless ruffians.”

In his new suit of clothes, and with this paper in his hand, Flint

sought the dry-goods proprietor--the latter was satisfied and convinced.

That morning Harry Flint began his career as salesman and as “Shelby

Fowler.”

From that day Shelby Fowler's career was one of uninterrupted

prosperity. Within the year he became a partner. The same miraculous

fortune followed other ventures later. He was mill owner, mine owner,

bank director--a millionaire! He was popular, the reputation of his

brief achievement over the desperado kept him secure from the attack of

envy and rivalry. He never was confronted by the real Fowler. There was

no danger of exposure by others--the one custodian of his secret, Tom

Flynn, died in Nevada the year following. He had quite forgotten his

youthful past, and even the more recent lucky portmanteau; remembered

nothing, perhaps, but the pretty face of the daguerreotype that had

fascinated him. There seemed to be no reason why he should not live and

die as Shelby Fowler.

His business a year later took him to Europe. He was entering a train

at one of the great railway stations of London, when the porter, who

had just deposited his portmanteau in a compartment, reappeared at the

window followed by a young lady in mourning.

“Beg pardon, sir, but I handed you the wrong portmanteau. That belongs

to this young lady. This is yours.”

Flint glanced at the portmanteau on the seat before him. It certainly

was not his, although it bore the initials “S. F.” He was mechanically

handing it back to the porter, when his eyes fell on the young lady's

face. For an instant he stood petrified. It was the face of the

daguerreotype. “I beg pardon,” he stammered, “but are these your

initials?” She hesitated, perhaps it was the abruptness of the question,

but he saw she looked confused.

“No. A friend's.”

She disappeared into another carriage, but from that moment Harry Flint

knew that he had no other aim in life but to follow this clue and the

beautiful girl who had dropped it. He bribed the guard at the next

station, and discovered that she was going to York. On their arrival,

he was ready on the platform to respectfully assist her. A few words

disclosed the fact that she was a fellow-countrywoman, although residing

in England, and at present on her way to join some friends at Harrogate.

Her name was West. At the mention of his, he again fancied she looked

disturbed.

They met again and again; the informality of his introduction was

overlooked by her friends, as his assumed name was already respectably

and responsibly known beyond California. He thought no more of his

future. He was in love. He even dared to think it might be returned; but

he felt he had no right to seek that knowledge until he had told her his

real name and how he came to assume another's. He did so alone--scarcely

a month after their first meeting. To his alarm, she burst into a flood

of tears, and showed an agitation that seemed far beyond any apparent

cause. When she had partly recovered, she said, in a low, frightened

voice:--

“You are bearing MY BROTHER'S name. But it was a name that the unhappy

boy had so shamefully disgraced in Australia that he abandoned it, and,

as he lay upon his death-bed, the last act of his wasted life was

to write an imploring letter begging me to change mine too. For the

infamous companion of his crime who had first tempted, then betrayed

him, had possession of all his papers and letters, many of them from ME,

and was threatening to bring them to our Virginia home and expose him

to our neighbors. Maddened by desperation, the miserable boy twice

attempted the life of the scoundrel, and might have added that blood

guiltiness to his other sins had he lived. I DID change my name to my

mother's maiden one, left the country, and have lived here to escape the

revelations of that desperado, should he fulfill his threat.”

In a flash of recollection Flint remembered the startled look that had

come into his assailant's eye after they had clinched. It was the same

man who had too late realized that his antagonist was not Fowler. “Thank

God! you are forever safe from any exposure from that man,” he said,

gravely, “and the name of Fowler has never been known in San Francisco

save in all respect and honor. It is for you to take back--fearlessly

and alone!”

She did--but not alone, for she shared it with her husband.

THE GHOSTS OF STUKELEY CASTLE.

There should have been snow on the ground to make the picture seasonable

and complete, but the Western Barbarian had lived long enough in England

to know that, except in the pages of a holiday supplement, this was

rarely the accompaniment of a Christmas landscape, and he cheerfully

accepted, on the 24th of December, the background of a low, brooding

sky, on which the delicate tracery of leafless sprays and blacker

chevaux de frise of pine was faintly etched, as a consistent setting

to the turrets and peacefully stacked chimneys of Stukeley Castle. Yet,

even in this disastrous eclipse of color and distance, the harmonious

outlines of the long, gray, irregular pile seemed to him as wonderful

as ever. It still dominated the whole landscape, and, as he had often

fancied, carried this subjection even to the human beings who had

created it, lived in it, but which it seemed to have in some dull,

senile way dozed over and forgotten. He vividly recalled the previous

sunshine of an autumnal house party within its walls, where some

descendants of its old castellans, encountered in long galleries or at

the very door of their bedrooms, looked as alien to the house as the

Barbarian himself.

For the rest it may be found described in the local guide-books, with a

view of its “South Front,” “West Front,” and “Great Quadrangle.” It

was alleged to be based on an encampment of the Romans--that highly

apocryphal race who seemed to have spent their time in getting up

picnics on tessellated pavements, where, after hilariously emptying

their pockets of their loose coin and throwing round their dishes, they

instantly built a road to escape by, leaving no other record of their

existence. Stow and Dugdale had recorded the date when a Norman favorite

obtained the royal license to “embattle it;” it had done duty on

Christmas cards with the questionable snow already referred to laid

on thickly in crystal; it had been lovingly portrayed by a fair

countrywoman--the vivacious correspondent of the “East Machias

Sentinel”--in a combination of the most delightful feminine disregard

of facts with the highest feminine respect for titles. It was rich in a

real and spiritual estate of tapestries, paintings, armor, legends, and

ghosts. Everything the poet could wish for, and indeed some things that

decent prose might have possibly wished out of it, were there.

Yet, from the day that it had been forcibly seized by a Parliamentary

General, until more recently, when it had passed by the no less

desperate conveyance of marriage into the hands of a Friendly Nobleman

known to the Western Barbarian, it had been supposed to suggest

something or other more remarkable than itself. “Few spectators,” said

the guide-book, “even the most unimpassioned, can stand in the courtyard

and gaze upon those historic walls without feeling a thrill of awe,”

etc. The Western Barbarian had stood there, gazed, and felt no thrill.

“The privileged guest,” said the grave historian, “passing in review the

lineaments of the illustrious owners of Stukeley, as he slowly paces the

sombre gallery, must be conscious of emotions of no ordinary character,”

etc., etc. The Barbarian had been conscious of no such emotions. And

it was for this reason, and believing he MIGHT experience them if left

there in solitude, with no distracting or extraneous humanity around

him, it had been agreed between him and the Friendly Nobleman, who had

fine Barbarian instincts, that as he--the Friendly Nobleman--and his

family were to spend their holidays abroad, the Barbarian should be

allowed, on the eve and day of Christmas, to stay at Stukeley alone.

“But,” added his host, “you'll find it beastly lonely, and although I've

told the housekeeper to look after you--you'd better go over to dine at

Audley Friars, where there's a big party, and they know you, and it will

be a deuced deal more amusing. And--er--I say--you know--you're really

NOT looking out for ghosts, and that sort of thing, are you? You know

you fellows don't believe in them--over there.” And the Barbarian,

assuring him that this was a part of his deficient emotions, it was

settled then and there that he should come. And that was why, on the

24th of December, the Barbarian found himself gazing hopefully on the

landscape with his portmanteau at his feet, as he drove up the avenue.

The ravens did NOT croak ominously from the battlements as he entered.

And the housekeeper, although neither “stately” nor “tall,” nor full

of reminiscences of “his late lordship, the present Earl's father,” was

very sensible and practical. The Barbarian could, of course, have his

choice of rooms--but--she had thought--remembering his tastes the last

time, that the long blue room? Exactly! The long, low-arched room,

with the faded blue tapestry, looking upon the gallery--capital! He

had always liked that room. From purely negative evidence he had every

reason to believe that it was the one formidable-looking room in England

that Queen Elizabeth had not slept in.

When the footman had laid out his clothes, and his step grew fainter

along the passage, until it was suddenly swallowed up with the

closing of a red baize door in the turret staircase, like a trap in an

oubliette, the whole building seemed to sink back into repose. Quiet it

certainly was, but not more so, he remembered, than when the chambers on

either side were filled with guests, and floating voices in the corridor

were lost in those all-absorbing walls. So far, certainly, this was no

new experience. It was past four. He waited for the shadows to gather.

Light thickened beyond his windows; gradually the outflanking wall and

part of a projecting terrace crumbled away in the darkness, as if Night

were slowly reducing the castle. The figures on the tapestry in his room

stood out faintly. The gallery, seen through his open door, barred

with black spaces between the mullioned windows, presently became

obliterated, as if invaded by a dull smoke from without. But nothing

moved, nothing glimmered. Really this might become in time very stupid.

He was startled, however, while dressing, to see from his windows that

the great banqueting hall was illuminated, but on coming down was amused

to find his dinner served on a small table in its oaken solitude lit

by the large electric chandelier--for Stukeley Castle under its present

lord had all the modern improvements--shining on the tattered banners

and glancing mail above him. It was evidently the housekeeper's reading

of some written suggestion of her noble master. The Barbarian, in a

flash of instinct, imagined the passage:--

“Humor him as a harmless lunatic; the plate is quite safe.”

Declining the further offer of an illumination of the picture gallery,

grand drawing-room, ball-room, and chapel, a few hours later he found

himself wandering in the corridor with a single candle and a growing

conviction of the hopelessness of his experiment. The castle had as yet

yielded to him nothing that he had not seen before in the distraction of

company and the garishness of day. It was becoming a trifle monotonous.

Yet fine--exceedingly; and now that a change of wind had lifted the

fog, and the full moon shone on the lower half of the pictures of the

gallery, starting into the most artificial simulation of life a number

of Van Dyke legs, farthingales, and fingers that would have deceived

nobody, it seemed gracious, gentle, and innocent beyond expression.

Wandering down the gallery, conscious of being more like a ghost than

any of the painted figures, and that they might reasonably object to

him, he wished he could meet the original of one of those pictured

gallants and secretly compare his fingers with the copy. He remembered

an embroidered pair of gloves in a cabinet and a suit of armor on the

wall that, in measurement, did not seem to bear out the delicacy of the

one nor the majesty of the other. It occurred to him also to satisfy a

yearning he had once felt to try on a certain breastplate and steel cap

that hung over an oaken settle. It will be perceived that he was getting

a good deal bored. For thus caparisoned he listlessly, and, as will

be seen, imprudently, allowed himself to sink back into a very modern

chair, and give way to a dreamy cogitation.

What possible interest could the dead have in anything that was here?

Admitting that they had any, and that it was not the LIVING, whom the

Barbarian had always found most inclined to haunt the past, would not

a ghost of any decided convictions object to such a collection as his

descendant had gathered in this gallery? Yonder idiot in silk and steel

had blunderingly and cruelly persecuted his kinsman in leather and steel

only a few panels distant. Would they care to meet here? And if their

human weaknesses had died with them, what would bring them here at all?

And if not THEM--who then? He stopped short. The door at the lower end

of the gallery had opened! Not stealthily, not noiselessly, but in an

ordinary fashion, and a number of figures, dressed in the habiliments of

a bygone age, came trooping in. They did not glide in nor float in, but

trampled in awkwardly, clumsily, and unfamiliarly, gaping about them as

they walked. At the head was apparently a steward in a kind of livery,

who stopped once or twice and seemed to be pointing out and explaining

certain objects in the room. A flash of indignant intelligence filled

the brain of the Barbarian! It seemed absurd!--impossible!--but it

was true! It was a holiday excursion party of ghosts, being shown over

Stukeley Castle by a ghostly Cicerone! And as his measured, monotonous

voice rose on the Christmas morning air, it could be heard that he was

actually showing off, not the antiquities of the Castle, but the MODERN

IMPROVEMENTS!

“This 'ere, gossips,”--the Barbarian instantly detected the fallacy of

all the so-called mediaeval jargon he had read,--“is the Helectric

Bell, which does away with our hold, hordinary 'orn blowin', and the

hattendant waitin' in the 'all for the usual 'Without there, who waits?'

which all of us was accustomed to in mortal flesh. You hobserve this

button. I press it so, and it instantly rings a bell in the kitchen

'all, and shows in fair letters the name of this 'ere gallery--as we

will see later. Will hany good dame or gaffer press the button? Will

YOU, mistress?” said the Cicerone to a giggling, kerchief-coifed lass.

“Oi soy, Maudlin!--look out--will yer!--It's the soime old gag as them

bloomin' knobs you ketched hold of when yer was 'ere las' Whitsuntide,”

called out the mediaeval 'Arry of the party.

“It is NOT the Galvanic-Magnetic machine in 'is lordship's library,”

said the Cicerone, severely, “which is a mere toy for infants, and

hold-fashioned. And we have 'ere a much later invention. I open this

little door, I turn this 'andle--called a switch--and, has you perceive,

the gallery is hinstantly hilluminated.”

There was a hoarse cry of astonishment from the assemblage. The

Barbarian felt an awful thrill as this searching, insufferable light

of the nineteenth century streamed suddenly upon the up-turned,

vacant-eyed, and dull faces of those sightseers of the past. But there

was no responsive gleam in their eyes.

“It be the sun,” gasped an old woman in a gray cloak.

“Toime to rouse out, Myryan, and make the foire,” said the mediaeval

'Arry. The custodian smiled with superior toleration.

“But what do 'ee want o' my old lanthorne,” asked a yellow-jerkined

stable boy, pointing to an old-fashioned horned lantern, tempus Edward

III., “with this brave loight?”

“You know,” said the custodian, with condescending familiarity, “these

mortals worship what they call 'curios' and the 'antique,' and 'is

lordship gave a matter of fifty pounds for that same lanthern. That's

what the modern folk come 'ere to see--like as ye.”

“Oi've an old three-legged stool in Whitechapel oi'll let his lordship

'ave cheap--for five quid,” suggested the humorist.

“The 'prentice wight knows not that he speaks truly. For 'ere is a

braver jest than 'is. Good folks, wilt please ye to examine yon coffer?”

pointing to an oaken chest.

“'Tis but poor stuff, marry,” said Maudlin.

“'Tis a coffer--the same being made in Wardour Street last year--'is

lordship gave one hundred pounds for it. Look at these would-be

worm-holes,--but they were made with an AUGER. Marry, WE know what

worm-holes are!”

A ghastly grin spread over the faces of the spectral assembly as they

gathered around the chest with silent laughter.

“Wilt walk 'ere and see the phonograph in the libry, made by Hedison,

an Hamerican, which bottles up the voice and preserves it fresh for a

hundred years? 'Tis a rare new fancy.”

“Rot,” said 'Arry. Then turning to the giggling Maudlin, he whispered:

“Saw it las' toime. 'Is lordship got a piece o' moy moind that oi

reeled off into it about this 'ere swindle. Fawney that old bloke there

charging a tanner apiece to us for chaffin' a bit of a barrel.”

“Have you no last new braveries to show us of the gallants and their

mistresses, as you were wont?” said Maudlin to the Cicerone. “'Twas

a rare show last time--the modish silk gowns and farthingales in the

closets.”

“But there be no company this Christmas,” said the custodian, “and 'is

lordship does not entertain, unless it be the new fool 'is lordship sent

down 'ere to-day, who has been mopin' and moonin' in the corridors, as

is ever the way of these wittol creatures when they are not heeded. He

was 'ere in a rare motley of his own choosing, with which he thinks to

raise a laugh, a moment ago. Ye see him not--not 'avin' the gift that

belongs by right to my dread office. 'Tis a weird privilege I have--and

may not be imparted to others--save”--

“Save what, good man steward? Prithee, speak?” said Marian earnestly.

“'Tis ever a shillin' extra.”

There was no response. A few of the more bashful ghosts thrust their

hands in their pockets and looked awkwardly another way. The Barbarian

felt a momentary relief followed by a slight pang of mortified vanity.

He was a little afraid of them. The price was an extortion, certainly,

but surely he was worth the extra shilling!

“He has brought but little braveries of attire into the Castle,”

continued the Cicerone, “but I 'ave something 'ere which was found on

the top of his portmanteau. I wot ye know not the use of this.” To the

Barbarian's intense indignation, the Cicerone produced, from under his,

his (the Barbarian's) own opera hat. “Marry, what should be this? Read

me this riddle! To it--and unyoke!”

A dozen vacant guesses were made as the showman held it aloft. Then

with a conjuror's gesture he suddenly placed his thumbs within the rim,

released the spring and extended the hat. The assembly laughed again

silently as before.

“'Tis a hat,” said the Cicerone, with a superior air.

“Nay,” said Maudlin, “give it here.” She took it curiously, examined

it, and then with a sudden coquettish movement lifted it towards her own

coifed head, as if to try it on. The Cicerone suddenly sprang forward

with a despairing gesture to prevent her. And here the Barbarian was

conscious of a more startling revelation. How and why he could not tell,

but he KNEW that the putting on of that article of his own dress would

affect the young girl as the assumption of the steel cap and corselet

had evidently affected him, and that he would instantly become as

visible to her as she and her companions had been to him. He attempted

to rise, but was too late; she had evaded the Cicerone by ducking, and,

facing in the direction of the Barbarian, clapped the hat on her head.

He saw the swift light of consciousness, of astonishment, of sudden fear

spring into her eyes! She shrieked, he started, struggled, and awoke!

But what was this! He was alone in the moonlit gallery, certainly; the

ghastly figures in their outlandish garb were gone; he was awake and

in his senses, but, in this first flash of real consciousness, he could

have sworn that something remained! Something terror-stricken, and

retreating even then before him,--something of the world, modern,--and,

even as he gazed, vanishing through the gallery door with the material

flash and rustle of silk.

He walked quietly to the door. It was open. Ah! No doubt he had

forgotten to shut it fast; a current of air or a sudden draught had

opened it. That noise had awakened him. More than that, remembering the

lightning flash of dream consciousness, it had been the CAUSE of his

dream. Yet, for a few moments he listened attentively.

What might have been the dull reverberation of a closing door in the

direction of the housekeeper's room, on the lower story, was all he

heard. He smiled, for even that, natural as it might be, was less

distinct and real than his absurd vision.

Nevertheless the next afternoon he concluded to walk over to Audley

Friars for his Christmas dinner. Its hospitable master greeted him

cordially.

“But do you know, my dear fellow,” he said, when they were alone for

a moment, “if you hadn't come by yourself I'd have sent over there for

you. The fact is that A--- wrote to us that you were down at Stukeley

alone, ghost-hunting or something of that sort, and I'm afraid it leaked

out among the young people of our party. Two of our girls--I shan't tell

you which--stole over there last night to give you a start of some kind.

They didn't see you at all, but, by Jove, it seems they got the biggest

kind of a fright THEMSELVES, for they declare that something dreadful in

armor, you know, was sitting in the gallery. Awfully good joke, wasn't

it? Of course YOU didn't see anything,--did you?”

“No,” said the Barbarian, discreetly.