THE RAGGED EDGE

The Ragged Edge
A Tale of Ward Life & Politics

By
John T. M^c_. Intyre

First Novel

Series

New York
McClure, Phillips & Co.
Mcmii

Copyright, 1902, by
McCLURE, PHILLIPS & CO
Published, September, 1902, R

To
Wayne, Andy, George & Lew

THE RAGGED EDGE

Chapter I

“Arrah, me jewel, sure, Larry’s the boy!”

Old Song.

WEARY horses dragged ponderous trucks homeward; the drivers drooped upon their high seats and thought of cans of beer; a red sun threw shafts of light along the cross-town streets and between the rows of black warehouses.

The porters had all gone for the night from Mason & Sons, and young Mason stood upon the office step, about to lock the door, when Kerrigan jumped from a passing car and hailed him.

“I just happened to notice you as I was going by,” Kerrigan said; “and that reminded me that I wanted to speak to you.”

“Come in and sit down,” said Mason, leading the way into the office.

“I drew up a will the other day in which you were named as executor,” said Kerrigan, mounting a stool at the bookkeeper’s desk.

Mason looked at him questioningly.

“It’s old Miss Cassidy who kept house for your father, years ago. She said that she had not spoken to you about the matter, but that she felt sure that you would consent to act.”

“She’s a queer old soul,” smiled Mason.

“No queerer than the will she had me make for her. Quite a tidy sum of money, too.”

“She was very saving; and then father thought well of her and advised her about small investments which were successful. But what induced her to make a will? Is she ill?”

“She says she is getting old, and thought that the matter should be settled. By the way, Mason, there are rumours going about the City Hall that must interest a reformer like you,” and Kerrigan smiled at his friend. “The Motor Traction Company is endeavouring to secure possession of Center and Line streets.”

“Do they contemplate purchasing the rights of the new company?”

“Not while there’s a chance to steal them; and from what I’ve heard during the last few days that has been their object since the time the injunction was granted against the rival concern.”

The young attorney planted his back against the desk and braced himself with his elbows. “Let me give you a sketch of the thing,” said he. “The City Railway Company was duly chartered, secured the franchise from councils for these two streets and spent thousands of good dollars in putting down road-bed, rails and all that sort of thing. At this stage the Motor Company suddenly discovered that Center and Line streets were arteries that would tap the thickly populated sections, and that the new company would reduce their earnings.

“Under cover of a protest from citizens living along the line of the new road, an injunction was gotten out staying all work; the matter was carried into the courts, where it has been hanging fire ever since.”

“But,” put in Mason, “a decision was rendered in favour of the City Company less than a week ago.”

“I know that; and in that decision the new move of the Motor people had its birth. The long delay, the cost of fighting the case and all that, pretty well drained the resources of the City people, who were none too rich to begin with. And a time limit was put upon the building of the line at the time the franchise was granted. The time specified will shortly expire and the road is but half built. The Motor Company intends to put unlimited money into the next local election in order to elect a majority in both branches of councils favourable to revoking the franchise on the ground of failure to live up to their contract.”

“Why, this is infamous!” exclaimed Mason. “How could the road be built in the time specified when the courts prevented their working upon it?”

Kerrigan shrugged his shoulders. “The Motor Company want that franchise and it is not at all particular about how it is gotten.”

The two young men rose and made their way to the sidewalk.

“I understand,” said Mason, as he sprang the catch of the office door, “when the new company was organized that the stock was mostly taken up in small lots by small store-keepers and people with accounts in saving banks.”

“That’s true,” answered Kerrigan; “and that’s what makes the company easy game.”

A heavy team swung up to the curb and a square-jawed young fellow climbed down from his seat. A battered, drink-sodden man tremulously clutched him by the arm and began mumbling incoherently. The teamster slipped him a nickel and gave him a helpful shove down the street; then he approached and said to Mason:

“There’s a lot o’ stuff up at Shed B for youse people. Shannon wants t’ know when ye want it hauled.”

“Ah, yes,” replied Mason. “We received the notice late this afternoon. Tell Shannon to have it here the first thing in the morning.”

“Good enough!” The driver was about to turn away when Kerrigan exclaimed:

“Hello, Larry! What’s doing?”

“Hello, Johnnie,” greeted the other. “I didn’t know youse.”

“Who’s your friend?” questioned Kerrigan, nodding toward the receding form of the tramp.

“Oh, just a guy what braced me for a nickel so’s he could hang up his hat on the inside of a wall. He said it’s been so long since he covered his stilts wit’ a sheet that he forgets what it feels like.”

“What did you say?”

“I told him that I was workin’ this side o’ the street meself. Say, it’s a big t’ing when a guy kin dig down in his pants an’ produce a roll that would stop a window; but the minute I run up against a bundle o’ rags me vest buttons is in danger. Say, Johnnie, was youse ever strapped?”

Kerrigan confessed that he had been.

“I guess every geezer along the line has done the stunt at some stage o’ the game. Why, I’ve been so tight on the hooks that I couldn’t tell the difference between a coon blowin’ a cake walk an’ a gutter band handin’ out the ‘Dead March in Saul’; an’ if Queen Anne cottages was sellin’ for a quarter a bunch I couldn’t buy in a cellar window. I tell youse what it is, Kerrigan, when a guy’s room rent’s six weeks on the wrong side o’ the ledger an’ his meal ticket wont stan’ for another hole in it, it’s time for him to start somethin’ doin’, an’ try an’ git his eyes on a graft what’s got ‘In God we trust’ chalked on its back. Ain’t that right?”

“A man entirely without money,” said Mason, “is certainly an object for sympathy.”

Larry gestured his contempt.

“I’d like to deal in that,” said he. “If I could sell it at two bits a crate I’d make money till youse couldn’t rest. The lobsters what runs the beanery’s got sympathy to give away; but youse couldn’t coax a beef stew out o’ the kitchen if ye had a smile like Maude Adams. And the gent that runs the hock shop keeps it in stock too, but the same guy wouldn’t lend youse a half a plunk on a pair o’ bags wit’ a hole in ’em if ye was spittin’ blood.

“Sympathy,” continued the square-jawed young man, “is the cheapest graft that ever looked over the hill; it’s got every other con game skinned to death and a guy in a tight pull takes chances o’ breakin’ his neck over it every time he opens his mouth. But, say, on the level, when a man’s single, an’ on’y got one end to watch he kin pipe up a breeze if he ain’t dead leary on action; but when he’s got a full hand o’ kids like me friend Chip Nolan, an’ has to keep leather on their tootseys an’ their first teeth busy three times a day, he’s got to keep his t’ink-tank stirrin’ to beat the band, or he’ll look like a last year’s poster on a broken-down fence.”

He climbed up to his high seat and gathered up the reins.

“Don’t t’ink from this song an’ dance,” said he, “that I’ve ever stood in line wit’ a yellow ticket an’ a tin can. But, say, as Chip Nolan ’ed say: ‘Yer on the turf, mate, but youse ain’t under it yet.’ See? Git ’ep, Pete!”

Chapter II

“Ding, dong, ding-el, ding-el, dong,

Listen to the echo in the dell,

Hurry, little children, Sunday morn,

There goes the old Church bell.”

Harrigan.

IT was Sunday morning. The iron heart of the bell that hung in the tower of St. Michael’s beat against its brazen ribs, and the clangour went rioting over the housetops. Streams of people, dressed in their Sunday best, picked their way across the railroad toward the sound; heavy faces peered through bedroom windows and sleep-dry lips murmured curses at the noise; a shifting engine panted heavily as it dragged a milk train over the rails, and spat cinders into the face of day.

In the kitchen of a squat, shabby building fronting on the railroad, a lean, yellow-faced old woman sat beside the range, nursing her knees and drawing at a black clay pipe. Another, almost her counterpart, was sweeping the floor with the worn stump of a broom.

“God be good till uz, Ellen!” suddenly exclaimed the first. “What are yez about?”

“What talk have ye, Bridget?”

“Sure ye wur as near as a hair till swapin’ the bit av dust out av the dure!”

“Divil a fear av me. Is it swape the luck from the house I’d be doin’?”

Ellen scraped up the sweepings. “There do be bad luck enough about the place,” she continued, as she slid the dust into the fire and watched it burn, the flame lighting up her old, faded face, her dirty white cap, her bony, large-veined hands. “Malachi tells me that the biz’ness do be poorly.”

“Little wonder,” declared Bridget, knocking the ashes from her pipe and laying it carefully on the top of a tin at the back of the stove. “I know’d what ’ud come av havin’ the son av a Know-nothin’ glosterin’ about the place! Sure the curse av God is on the loike!”

“True for yez,” assented her sister. “Owld Larkin wur the spit av the owld felly himself; he wur a Derry man an’ as black a Presbyterian as iver cried ‘To h—l wid the Pope!’”

Ellen took up the hot pipe and charged it from the tin, shaking her head ominously.

“Ah, the Orange thafe!” piped the other. “Well do I raymember him, years ago, at the riots at the Nanny-Goat Market, that stood beyant there where the railroad is. Sure it wur him that put the divil in their heads till burn down St. Michael’s; an’ wid me own two eyes I see him shoutin’ an’ laffin’ as the cross tumbled intill the street!”

Ellen made a hurried sign of the cross and muttered some words in Gaelic.

“An’ they say,” whispered she, awed, “that he barked loike a dog iver after!”

“Sorra the lie’s in it, avic. Owld Mrs. Flannagan, that lived nixt dure till him, towld me, wid her own two lips, that it wur so. Bud he always said it wur asthma he wur after havin’.”

“Oh, the robber! It wur himself that cud twist t’ings till serve his turn. More like it wur the divil in him, cryin’ till be let out.”

“An’ d’yez raymember at the toime av the riots, Ellen, whin he stood be the fince, overight our back yard, wid Foley’s musket, waitin’ for any av uz till pop out our heads?”

Ellen, through some mischance, had swallowed some of the rank pipe smoke, and she gasped and strangled, with waving hands and protruding eyes.

“Well do I, asthore,” she panted between her fits of coughing. “Oh, the Crom’ell!”

“Bridget,” cried a voice from the storeroom in front, “have ye not me bit av breakfast ready? It’s late for Mass I’ll be iv yez don’t stir yezself, woman.”

Malachi O’Hara stood in his shop among his stock in trade. About him were heaped the rakings of low auction rooms and pawnbrokers’ sales; stacks of half-worn clothing lay upon the counter; the shelves were loaded with crockery, oil lamps, plaster of paris images, table cutlery, clocks, fly-specked pictures and a heterogeneous mass of battered, greasy and utterly useless articles for which it would be impossible to find names. In the window hung a banjo with two broken strings; a family Bible, its pages held open by a set of steel “knuckle dusters” lay just below, and it was garnished on all sides with old-fashioned silver watches, seal rings, black jacks and so on down the list of articles that clutter such establishments.

O’Hara, a pot-bellied man, bald, broad-faced and with hard little eyes, walked back to the kitchen.

“We wur talkin’ av owld Jimmie Larkin,” said Bridget putting the crockery upon the table. “Look till the sup av coffee, Ellen,” she whispered, hurriedly, “d’ye not see that it’s b’ilin’ over!”

O’Hara glowered at them, angrily.

“An’ it’s only startin’ yez are!” he cried. “D’ye si’ here like a pair av owld cacklin’ hens, an’ the bell just rung for Mass!”

The bell had just ceased and people were still hurrying on; the red sun peeped at them from behind the church tower; the hands of the big clock reproachfully pointed out the fact that they were late. Bridget glanced through the side window.

“There goes Clancy’s wife in her new silk,” said she. “It’s proud enough she’s gettin’ till be, since her husband opened the grocery.”

“May the divil fly away wid Clancy’s wife an’ her silks as well! Faix an’ there do be other things that Clancy could do wid his money!” O’Hara was in a stormy mood.

“Sit down till yez bit av breakfast,” soothed Ellen. “Clancy do be doin’ well an’ will pay the money he borried av ye, Malachi. It’s drink yez coffee black yez’ll have till,” she added, “for young McGonagle have not come wid the milk yet.”

He sat down with a crabbed laugh.

“McGonagle is it!” exclaimed he. “Faith an’ there’s another wan. The toime is drawin’ on, so it is, but divil the dollar richer is he. It’s wait for me bit av money he’ll be wantin’ me till, but scure till the day will I. I’ll sell him out, the spalpeen! He do not trate me wid rayspect.”

A rattling of wheels ceased at the door, and it shook under a thundering hand.

“Spake av the divil!” remarked Ellen. She took a pitcher from the table and opened the door. “A pint,” she said.

The youth with the milk-pail dexterously dipped out the required quantity.

“Heard the news?” inquired he.

“We’ve heerd nothin’,” returned Ellen, “barrin’ that Hogan as he passed on his bate this mornin’, towld uz that his b’y Tom wur near kilt las’ noight at yez bla’gard club.”

“Ah, Hogan’s daffy! I meant did ye hear about old man Murphy a-dyin’?”

“What!” exclaimed O’Hara, his mouth full, “is owld Larry cold, thin?”

“Not yet; but he’ll die before the day’s over.” And with this the milkman threw himself and can into the wagon at the curb, and rolled down the street. Ellen closed the door and put the pitcher upon the table.

“So he’ll be goin’ at las’,” said she.

“Small wonder,” put in the sister; “sure he’s been poorly this long time.”

“The owld man made a tidy bit av money in his day,” said the brother, admiringly. “Bud,” with a sigh, “it’s lavin’ it all he’ll be.”

“An’ tell me, Malachi,” said Bridget, “d’yez think the gran’son’ll git any av it?”

O’Hara spilled some of the milk into his coffee.

“Divil a cint,” answered he, positively. “Sure, the owld man have niver noticed him since the day he wur born. An’ small blame till him,” rapping upon the table with his spoon, “for what call had his son till take up wid a Jewess?”

“But,” reasoned Ellen, “now that he do be dyin’ he might call him in an’—”

“Sorra the fear av that! Faix an’ whin Mike lay dead at O’Connor’s, the undertaker, he wint naythur nixt nor near him. Some say Kelly wur the cause av that, but owld Larry had timper enough av his own, God knows.”

“An’ do ye t’ink he’ll lave the property till the Church?”

“Ayther that or till Mary Carroll. Kelly t’inks there do be a chance for his boy, Martin; but Martin’s a hard drinker an’ the owld man niver liked a bone in his body.”

The gong over the store door rattled sharply. A plump little woman with a rosy, chubby face had entered; she wore a bright scarlet shawl shot with green and saffron, and upon her head was perched a tiny black bonnet with blue strings.

“Good mornin’ all,” greeted this lady with a sweeping flourish of a big brass-clasped prayer book. “An’ Bridget, acushla, have ye heard about poor owld Larry Murphy?”

“God luk down on uz, I have,” answered Bridget, wagging her head from side to side. “Ah bud death’s a sad t’ing, Mrs. McGonagle.”

“True for ye, asthore, true for ye!” And Mrs. McGonagle wagged her head also. “But,” she continued, “what will become av the houses in the alley, an’ the power av money they say he have in bank?”

“We wur this minit spakin’ av that same,” said Ellen; “an’ Malachi t’inks the gran’son’ll git sorra the cint av it.”

“God be good till uz, Malachi! An’ d’ye t’ink so?”

Mrs. McGonagle caught her breath and stared at O’Hara in horror. “Till t’ink,” she added, in an awed tone, “av him holdin’ the grudge an’ him a-dyin’.”

O’Hara had finished his breakfast and was putting on his coat.

“I can see nothin’ ilce for it,” remarked he, sagely.

“Young Larry is a study, sober, hard workin’ boy!” exclaimed Mrs. McGonagle, “an’ its a sin an’ a shame for him till be treated so. He have lodged in me third story for a long time, now, an’ I have the first time till see him wid a sup av drink in him; an’ I’d say that iv it wur me last breath, so I wud!”

The gong rattled; the door slammed; and a girl, flushed and breathless, darted through the store and into the kitchen.

“Aunt Ellen,” cried she, “give me the candles we had from last Candlemas Day; an’ I want the ivory crucifix, too, for they’ve sent for Father Dawson.”

Ellen began a hurried rummaging for the articles named; the girl caught sight of Mrs. McGonagle and grasped her by the arm.

“Oh,” she exclaimed, “is it you, Mrs. McGonagle? I’m glad you’re here; I was just a-goin’ to run around to your house.”

“For why?”

“Here!” cried Ellen pushing a parcel into the girl’s hand. “Here’s what yez want; away wid ye, now, an’ don’t be stan’in’.”

“You’ll hurry home, won’t you, Mrs. McGonagle,” the girl was now at the door, her hand on the latch, “an’ tell Larry Murphy his gran’father wants to see him before he dies.”

And with that the side door closed behind her and she went by the window like a flash.

“Be the powers av Moll Kelly!” exclaimed O’Hara, his broad face blank with wonder, “but that bates the Owld Nick.”

He stood staring at his sisters, who had their withered hands in the air in gestures of amazement. Mrs. McGonagle’s face shone with glee and she cackled rapturously.

“I must hurry home,” said she, “an’ waken Larry.”

“Is he still in bed?” cried Ellen.

“Do he not go till Mass?” cried Bridget.

“Why, not very often,” admitted Mrs. McGonagle, reluctantly. “He an’ Jimmie Larkin slapes till a’most dinner toime ivery Sunday. But Larry’s a daysint b’y for all that. Good day till yez.” And with that the good little woman bolted into the street and went sailing toward McGarragles’ Alley, her bright shawl fluttering in the breeze.

The two old crones clawed mystic signs in the air over the spot where their visitor had lately stood and began muttering in Gaelic. O’Hara was brushing his Sunday high hat with the sleeve of his coat and paused as he caught the words.

“What humbuggin’ are yez at now?” demanded he.

“Would yez be after lettin’ the curse stay in the house?” cried Bridget.

“Sure, she hav the evil eye!” asserted Ellen.

O’Hara regarded them fixedly for a moment; then with a snort he put on his hat, took his black-thorn stick from behind the door, and started off for church.

Chapter III

“My grandfather, he, at the age of eighty-three,

One day in May was taken ill and died,

And after he was dead, the will, of course, was read,

By a lawyer, as we all stood by his side.”

Popular Song.

LARRY MURPHY awoke and sat up in bed; the sun was streaming in through the one small window of Mrs. McGonagle’s third story room, and the peal of the bell sounded solemnly in his ears. Through the window could be seen the church tower, pointing like a gigantic finger heavenward; the hands of the clock were slowly lifting as though to screen its face from the glare of the sun. Larry stretched himself lazily.

“Solemn High Mass,” yawned he.

A second young man lay upon a cot opposite, propped up with a pillow and reading a pink sporting paper. He glanced up.

“That’s the one,” remarked he, “that the property holders come together at, ain’t it? Ye kin see every plug hat in the parish on Second Street at half past ten on Sunday morning; but I’ll bet five cases to one that the collection ain’t no heavier than it is at the one what the dump-cart drivers goes to.”

Young Murphy grinned. “Ye’d better not say too much about that when yer on the street,” advised he. “Some o’ the Turks around here’s dead sore on youse since youse led the march at the ‘Sons o’ Derry’s Ball,’ an’ they’ll cop youse a sly one when yer not next.”

“Don’t lose any sleep over that,” said the other. “Somebody’ll get hurt if they run up against me, and that’s no dream. I don’t have to ask no gang o’ Mocaraws if I kin go to a ball; ain’t that right?”

Murphy nodded the subject aside.

“Anything new?” he inquired, looking at the paper which his friend had thrown upon the bare floor.

“Nothin’ much, ’cept that Jack Slattery got the life lammed out o’ him in his twenty round job with McCook’s ‘Pidgeon.’ There’s a good t’ing gone wrong! I know the time when Slattery went right down the line and give ’em all a go; but drink got the best o’ him, and now he’s willin’ to take dimes for a hard job agin a big man, where he used to stan’ pat for dollars to put out a dub.”

“Rum’s a tough game to go up against,” commented Larry. “Say,” after a pause, “how’s yer trip South comin’ up?”

“Big. Me manager’s got me go’s at New Orleans, Galveston an’ half a dozen other burgs; an’ if I holds up me end, he’ll stack me against the champion fer as many plunks as youse kin hold in yer hat. That’ll be a great graft; eh, Larry? I’ll be a main squeeze meself then, and sportin’ guys’ll come out from under their hats as soon as they gits their eyes on me!” And Jimmie Larkin twisted himself around on his elbow and waved one thick, hairy arm delightedly.

“But, talkin’ about fight,” resumed he, “puts me in mind o’ the mix up at the club last night. Mart Kelly didn’t do a t’ing but open up Hogan wit’ a jack.”

Murphy sneered. “Kelly’s gittin’ to be a reg’lar slugger,” said he. “What was the matter?”

“Oh, he was a-shootin’ off his mouth like he always does. He said his old man was the best councilman the ward ever had; Hogan was about half drunk, and he said he was a stiff, and had trun down the party. Then they clinched and Kelly started to hammer him.”

All was now quiet in the street except for the rattle of an occasional wagon, and the faint wheeze of a broken accordion being played down the alley. A barb of yellow sunlight shot through the window and fell upon a bright lithograph of the Virgin which was tacked upon the wall near Larry’s bed. He had bought this years before and he had always kept it because he thought it looked like his dead mother. Across the room was a large photograph of Larkin in ring costume, as he had appeared just previous to his desperate battle with the champion of the sixth ward; and under this again was pasted a policy slip with three numbers underscored, commemorative of the day that same gentleman had struck the “Hard Luck Row,” at Levitsky’s policy shop, and gotten his name down upon the books of the tenth police district as a “drunk and disorderly.”

“I wonder,” said Larry, his eyes dwelling soberly upon the Jewish face of the Virgin, “how the old one is?”

“I saw Rosie O’Hara stan’in’ in the door last night,” returned Jimmie, “an’ she said that he was as good as gone.”

“I’m sorry,” said Larry. Then catching the look which Larkin threw him, he added: “He never done nothin’ to me, sure; but when I was a kid an’ me father was a-livin’, he told me never to knock.”

The plaster ceiling was seamed with cracks, discolored by the soaking through of rain. Larkin, lying on his back, thoughtfully followed the longest of these with his eye; and when he had reached its termination, he said:

“If youse was in with yer gran’dad just now, Larry, ye’d come in for some o’ the gilt.”

Murphy turned about with a jerk that threatened to end the cot’s unity.

“I don’t want his coin; I wouldn’t make a play for it if I was flat on me uppers! I said that I was sorry for the old man, not that I would scoop his money after he was planted!”

“Keep yer shirt on,” said Larkin; “I was on’y sayin’, ye know.”

Mrs. McGonagle’s son, Goose, was seated upon an empty cracker box in front of Clancy’s grocery; his wagon was drawn up at the curb, and a small Italian was shining his russet leather shoes. His mother came up, panting and wheezing from her haste.

“Run intill the house!” she exclaimed breathlessly.

“All right; I’m gittin’ me leathers shined,” said her son.

“Faith yez shine kin wait, an’ somethin’ ilce can’t.” Mrs. McGonagle dropped upon a salt-fish barrel, regardless, in her excitement, of what effect the brine would have upon her church-going skirt. “Run” she continued, “an’ tell Larry Murphy that his poor owld gran’father’s at death’s door an’ wants till spake till him.”

Goose stared at her incredulously.

“G’way,” said he.

“Don’t sit there starin’ at me, all as wan as a County Down peat cutter, but go at wanst! Divil another step cud I stir iv the gates av Heaven wur stan’in’ open till me!”

Within a minute after hearing the above tidings McGonagle came charging up the crooked steps leading to their lodger’s room, like a drove of mavericks.

“Git into yer rags, Murphy,” cried he, “yer wanted.”

“Is it about Kelly an’ Hogan?” asked Larry. “I ain’t no witness. I didn’t see the scrap.”

“No, it’s yer gran’father; he’s a cashin’ in, an’ wants to see youse. Me mother jist told me.”

Larry was out on the floor like a shot, pulling on his clothes and talking incoherently.

“I kin hear the song they’ll sing,” said he. “They’ll pull me into rags; ain’t that right, Larkin? Where’s me collar buttons?”

“Look in yer other shirt,” Jimmie was also up, and dressing rapidly. Murphy found the missing articles and resumed:

“They’ll say I wus on’y waitin’ fer a chance to get next to the gilt.” The thought seemed to anger him and he glared at his friends. “But it ain’t so,” he cried, “so help me God, it ain’t! I don’t want the coin; I’ve got a job, ain’t I? And I’ve went up against it this far, alone, an’ I kin go the rest o’ the distance, too.” He turned to the others, an appeal in his voice. “Did I ever make a play? Speak out, did I?”

“Sure not,” said McGonagle.

“Yer raw there, Murphy,” said Larkin. “If youse hadn’t been afeared o’ what people’d say the old man’d shook yer hand long ago.”

Larry drew in the slack of his suspenders and closed the catch with a snap. He looked at Larkin in surprise; this was a thought that had never struck him.

“D’ye t’ink so?” was all he said.

“I cert’ny do. I often seen youse brush elbows with him on the street, and him turn and look after ye. He’d a-spoke to ye if youse had give him on’y half a chance, see?”

“Didn’t he have a chance when I was a kid? Didn’t he have a chance when me father died and the neighbours in the alley had to take up a collection to bury him? Did he do anyt’ing for me then? Not on yer life, he didn’t! He let ’em put me in a Home.”

“But, say, that wuz a dead long time ago, ain’t that right? If youse put a stick o’ wood in the stove it’ll burn hard at first, won’t it—but it’ll burn out at last, eh? The old one was leary on yer father then; but, say, take it from me, the blaze went down long ago, and it’s bin a kid game ever since; neither one o’ youse’d speak first.”

Larry buttoned up his square-cut sack coat and looked at his tie in the little glass near the stairway.

“That might be all right,” said he; “but look at the time he—” here he stopped short and then added: “I don’t want to knock. I promised that I wouldn’t and it’s too late to begin now.”

Chapter IV

“When yer flat on yer back, wit’ a doctor as referee an a train’d nurse holdin’ the towel, why it’s up t’ youse, Cull, it’s up t’ youse!”

Chip Nolan’s Remarks.

A RED-FACED, bare-armed woman opened a door in Murphy’s court and threw a pan of garbage into the gutter. Her next door neighbour was walking up and down the narrow strip of sidewalk, hushing the cry of a weazened baby.

“Is Jamsie not well, Mrs. Burns?” inquired the red-faced woman.

“Sorry the bit, Mrs. Nolan; he’s as cross as two sticks. It’s walk up an’ down the floor wid him I’ve been doin’ all the God’s blessed night. Scure till the wink av slape I’ve had since I opened me two eyes at half after foive yisterday mornin’.”

“Poor sowl! Yez shud git him a rubber ring till cut his teeth on; it’s an illigant t’ing for childer’, I’m towld.”

Contractor McGlory’s stables and cart sheds stood on the opposite side of the court. A young man sat on a feed-box in the doorway polishing a set of light harness; a group of dirty children were playing under an up-tilted cart, and a brace of starving curs fought savagely up the alley over a mouldy bone. Mrs. Nolan called to the young man:

“An’ sure, is it out drivin’ yez’ed be goin’ so arly on Sunday mornin’, Jerry?”

“On’y a little spin,” said the youth. “I want to try out a new skate what the old gent bought at the bazar.” He rubbed away in industrious silence for a moment and then, nodding toward a clean-looking brick house at the end of the court, inquired:

“Did youse see Johnnie Kerrigan go in?”

“Is it young Kerrigan go intill Murphy’s!” Mrs. Nolan seemed dumbfounded.

“Not the saloon-keeper’s son that do be at the ’torneyin’!” cried Mrs. Burns.

“That’s the guy,” said Jerry. “He went in a couple o’ minutes ago.”

Mrs. Nolan looked at her neighbour, and the latter lady returned the look with interest.

“I declare till God!” said the former, “Iv that don’t bate all I iver heerd since the day I wur born. Sure an’ his father an’ owld Larry have been bitter at wan another for years.”

“It’s forgivin’ his enemies he’ll be doin’ now that the breath do be lavin’ him,” said Mrs. Burns. “Divil the fear av him forgivin’ me the bit av rint I owes him, though,” she added bitterly.

“There’s worse than old Murphy,” said Jerry. “Kelly’s got his net out after the court, an’ if he lands it, it won’t be long before youse find it out, either.”

But Mrs. Burns could only think of the crusty old harpy who went from door to door down the court on the first day of the month, the skinny old claw that reached out so graspingly for the rent, the leathery old face frowning blackly upon delay, of the bitter tongue that spat venom into the faces of all not ready to pay. And for the life of her, the good woman could think of none worse than old Larry Murphy to deal with.

“Faix an’ he’d take the bit av bread out av the children’s mouths,” declared she.

A flock of grimy sparrows suddenly lit upon the roof of the stable, chattering, fluttering and fighting madly; one of the quarrelling dogs had been defeated and licked his wounds and howled dolefully; a drunken man, passing the end of the court, pitched into the gutter and lay there.

“Mother av Heaven!” exclaimed Mrs. Nolan with a suddenness that caused her neighbour to jump. She was pointing toward the house spoken of as Murphy’s. “Look there!”

Young Larry Murphy was standing upon the white stone step; he had just pulled the door bell softly; and catching the astonished stare of the two women, he swore at them under his breath.

“They’re next already,” he muttered. “They’ll chew me up, an’ spit me out, an’ laugh about it! Why don’t the fagots stay in the house!”

The door opened and he went in, leaving them staring at the house over which death was hovering.

Clean and fresh-looking the house stood among its squalid surroundings of dirty stables, frowsy, ill-smelling drains and pestilential manure pits. Its stone steps were spotless, the brass bell knob was as bright as burnished gold, the pretty curtains at the windows like snow. And this was the home of the landlord of the court—the clean, bright, comfortable home he had dreamed of years before, when he stepped from the emigrant ship to begin life in a new land.

He was dying now, and the money for which he had slaved and demeaned himself—the money which he had hoarded and loved—was about to pass from him. Once more he was going to begin in a new land, and a land where hard craft was as nothing beside clean hands. Not that old Larry had ever exacted more than his due; but he had stood flat-footed for that, in spite of prayers and tears; and the reckoning was now at hand.

The door had been opened for young Larry by a stout, heavy-browed man, dressed in decent black; and as he stood aside for the youth to pass him in the narrow entry, he showed his discoloured teeth in a sneer.

“So ye have hurried here at wanst, eh?” said he. “Divil the foot have yez iver put in the house afore, Larry?”

“It’s manners to wait till yer asked,” returned Larry gruffly.

The stout man closed the door. The house was soundless, and there was a heavy smell of sickness; the door of the sitting room stood partly open, and Larry caught the rustle of skirts.

“I knowed yez’ed come,” continued the man who had admitted him. “Ah, but it’s the sharp wan yez are, Larry.”

The youth turned and grasped the door knob. “I knowed how it’d be,” snarled he, looking savagely over his shoulder at the stout man. “I’ll lick youse for this, Kelly!”

He jerked open the door and was about to depart when a woman’s voice called:

“Mr. Murphy!” A girl had come into the entry from the sitting room; she was tall and slim; a bright spot burned in each cheek and she coughed slightly as the draft from the open door struck her. She held out her hand.

“I’m glad that you’ve come,” said she. “Your grandfather has been asking for you again. Were you going away?”

“Yes,” said Larry. He closed the door and took the proffered hand, ashamed of the anger which Kelly had awakened. She looked into his face with quiet, candid eyes.

“That was wrong,” she said. “He is very low; will you come up?”

He silently followed her up stairs. Kelly entered the sitting room and stood by the window; his heavy brows were bent and his lips were muttering. The people were streaming back from the church, across the railroad; the sooty shifting engine was still making up its train, panting and whistling like some asthmatic animal; a priestly-looking young man paused at the door of the house and looked up at the number.

“Father Dawson,” muttered Kelly hurrying to open the door. “He tuk his toime comin’, faith.”

The sick man, parchment-faced and wasted by disease, lay upon his bed; his lips were moving, and his gaunt hands clutched the ivory crucifix. The wax candles burned upon a table; beside them stood a glass bowl of water blessed at Easter time; a bisque image of the Virgin stood upon a shelf, and Rosie O’Hara knelt before it, her head bent, her eyes fixed upon the floor. Young Kerrigan sat beside the bed, reading a newly written paper; the sun slanted in between the partly closed blinds and lay like a bar of gold upon the floor.

“You have stated your wishes very clearly, Mr. Murphy,” said the attorney, “and I see nothing that should be changed.”

The old man opened his eyes and tried to sit up. “Mary!” said he. “Where’s Mary?”

“Here, Uncle Larry.” The girl knelt beside him and smoothed his pillow. “You must lie still,” said she, gently.

“Ye will be a witness till me mark,” said he, faintly, “an’ so must Rosie. Is she here?”

“Yes Uncle, she’s here.”

“The sight do be lavin’ me. An’ the b’y? Did he say he’d come, Mary?”

“He’s here, Uncle Larry.” She took the young man’s hand and placed it within that of his grandfather: and once more the old man strove to lift himself, peering at the other with dim eyes.

“An’ this is Mike’s son?” he muttered.

“Yes, sir.” Larry would have liked to have said “Grandfather,” but somehow it stuck in his throat. He looked upon the old man with awed, wondering eyes; it was the first person he had ever seen upon the threshold of death; and the drawn face, wet with the death damp, sent a chill through him.

“I didn’t do right by yez father, Larry,” said the sick man, “I t’ought a curse lay upon him for marryin’ yez mother!”

Larry stepped back from the bedside, and Mary Carroll’s quiet eyes alone kept back the angry words that leaped to his lips in his mother’s defence. His mother—that oriental-eyed mother—bring a curse upon anyone! The words still sounded in his ears as he looked down at the shrunken form, pity contending with anger in his heart.

His mother had died a Christian; she had deserted, in fear and trembling, the faith of her fathers; she had knelt before the altar raised to the Nazarene Carpenter, and strove with all the power of her tortured soul to believe that He was the same God who had spoken to the Law-Giver of her tribe upon the heights of Sinai. And she had done all this through love for his father, the father whom this hard old man had disowned.

“I wud niver knowed better iv it hadn’t a-been for Mary; she made me see it; it wur her that towld me av the black wrong I done yez, both. I’ll make up for it, Larry, I’ll make it up, never fear!” The old man paused for a moment, his face twitching. “D’ye t’ink it’s too late?” he added eagerly.

“It’s never too late.” And thinking to soothe the fears that gripped at the darkening brain, Larry added. “It wasn’t much, ye know.”

“But it wur, lad, it wur. Ye don’t know the gredge I wanst held in me heart agin yez both. Didn’t I walk the flure, when he lay dead beyant there at O’Connor’s, half mad wid the thinkin’? I t’ought till give him a daysint berryin’ an’ bring yezself home here; but the divil got the better av me, lad, so he did! Yez don’t know the black bitterness I’ve held against yez; yez don’t know!”

The agitation seemed to exhaust him; he sank back, a thin streak of blood showing on his purple lips.

“Don’t excite yourself, Uncle Larry,” said Mary. “That is all past and gone now; Larry has forgiven you, and his father has, too.”

A smile of hope flickered over the face of the sick man, and the girl kissed the withered cheek. The youth with the screed leaned forward.

“Hadn’t he better attend to this,” whispered he; “he may die at any moment, now. This meeting, or rather the prospect of it, was all that kept him up.”

The old man caught the words.

“Is that young Kerrigan?” breathed he; “yez are r’ght, Johnnie; soign me name, lad, an’ I’ll make me mark.”

The name was attached to the paper, the mark was made and the two girls witnessed it. Kerrigan folded the paper and put it into his pocket; the old man lay back upon his pillow and seemed scarce to breathe; his chest was sunken, his eyes stared vacantly. A dog yelped dolefully below in the court; from the railroad came the hiss of escaping steam and the grind of wheels. Kelly opened the door softly, and said:

“Father Dawson’s comin’ up.” He returned into the passage and looked over the stair rail. “This way, Father,” said he.

The pure-faced young priest came into the room. Mary’s lips trembled and her voice broke slightly as she greeted him.

“Bear up,” said he gently; “death is the common lot; and then he is very old.” He bent over the bed; the bar of light had shifted and old Larry’s hair shone like silver under its warm touch. “He should have the last rites of the Church,” said the priest. Then turning to Kelly and Larry he added: “I will ask you to leave the room for a few moments, please. You may stay,” to Kerrigan, who had moved toward the door with the others. “I may need you.”

The two men stood in the passage for a time in silence; Rosie could be heard sobbing heavily, and the priest’s voice murmured holy words. At length Kelly spoke:

“What wur Kerrigan called in for?” asked he.

“I didn’t know he was called in,” answered Larry.

Kelly regarded him for a moment, disbelief written upon his face. Then he resumed, anxiously:

“Did the owld man put his mark till anything?”

“Yes!”

“Ah!” and Kelly bent his heavy brows. “Wur there anything mention av Martin an’ meself?”

“I didn’t hear nobody mentioned.”

“Humph!” Kelly bit the nail of his thumb viciously and spat over the stair rail. Then, after a pause, longer than the first, he said: “How is the toide?”

“I don’t know.”

“Tim Burns says it’s on the stan’,” said Kelly. “An’ whin it goes down, he’ll go out wid it.”

They waited in silence after this; Rosie’s sobs had ceased, the clergyman was reciting the litany for the dying, and the others were giving the responses. And then their voices were hushed; there was a stir in the room; the door opened and Mary came out.

“Mr. Murphy,” said she, “will you hurry over to O’Connor’s and tell him to come, at once?”

Chapter V

“He’d strop up his razor, graceful an’ nice,

An’ then from your face he’d carve off a slice.

Your life from the gallows! Ye couldn’t be vexed,

When Tecumsha O’Riley’s calling out ‘next.’”

Comic Song.

SCHWARTZ’S barber shop stood almost within the shadow of the church tower. The gas light streamed through his plate window and across the sidewalk; a row of customers lined up along the wall, waiting their turn in the chair; the fat proprietor stropped a razor and conversed with a short man who stood at the stove rubbing a freshly reaped chin. A large aired man, with a dyed moustache, was pulling a pair of kid gloves over hands too large for them. He wore a light overcoat, a silk hat, a flower in his buttonhole and seemed to sweat importance. This was Squire Moran, thrice elected to the minor judiciary and a power in the ward.

“Ach!” exclaimed Schwartz, “dot vas too pad, Misder Purns.”

“It’s gittin’ a bit wurried I am,” said the little man; “for what kin a body be doin’ wit’out a bit av wurk.”

“Sure I t’ought, Squire,” said Clancy, the grocer, who lay back in the barber’s chair, tucked about with towels, “that yez wur goin’ till give Tim a job in the water daypartment.”

“There’s many a slip, Clancy,” quoth his honour, struggling with the gloves. “I’m not the only duck in the pond, ye know; and it’s Tim’s own fault that he ain’t in the department long ago.”

“How’s that?” queried the grocer.

“McQuirk’s against him,” answered Moran.

Mr. Burns looked downhearted; the others nodded sagaciously as though the reason given was all sufficient.

“I almost got down on my knees to him,” went on the magistrate, “but he said no; so what can I do?”

“What’s he sore on Tim for?” asked Goose McGonagle who, in a bright scarlet tie, sat near the wash-stand.

“I wouldn’t vote for O’Connor,” Burns hastened to say. “Sure Gartenheim did me a favour wanst; an’ wud yez have me go back on a friend?”

A murmur went around the room.

“But O’Connor was the reg’lar nominee,” argued Moran, “an’ if it hadn’t been for the push that turned in for Gartenheim, O’Connor ’ud be holdin’ down the office instead of Kelly. McQuirk’s dead leary on split tickets—unless he gives the order—an’ he told ye at the time that he’d remember ye for it.”

“He had little till do,” mumbled Clancy.

Moran laughed. “What the boss don’t know about practical politics ain’t worth knowin’,” said he. “An’ it’s the little things what holds the party in line. So stick to McQuirk an’ McQuirk’ll stick to you.” He had succeeded with his gloves by this time and was about to depart. “If I can do anything for you, Tim,” he added, “I’ll do it. But when Mac says no, why he generally means it. Good night, everybody.”

“Niver talk till me av politicians,” said Clancy; “be dad they’re all tarred wid wan stick. An’ divil a better are they across the say; sure, I wur radin’ in the Irish World that Redmond do be at his tricks wanst more.”

“D’yez say so,” exclaimed Burns; “ah, but the owld dart is in a bad way betune thim all.”

“Redmond do be after firin’ off some illigant spaches,” put in Malachi O’Hara, from behind a newspaper, “an’ he’s an able lad, so he is. Didn’t he take up for Parnell whin—”

“Parnell!” Clancy snorted his disgust so violently as to endanger his safety from the barber’s razor. “Don’t talk till me av that felly.”

“Yez wur a Parnell man yezself wanst, Clancy,” said Burns, with an elaborate wink at the others. “Sure, I see the chromo av him that came with the Freeman’s Journal nailed up on yez wall overight the kitchen dure.”

“An’ divil a long it stayed out av the stove after he wur found out,” said the grocer stoutly.

“Filled up, Schwartz?” cried Jerry McGlory, poking his head in at the doorway.

“Gome in, Mr. McGlory; dere’s nod many aheat of you.”