BOOKS BY 
 RUTH McENERY STUART 
 
 A GOLDEN WEDDING. Illustrated. .Post 8vo $1.50 
 
 CARLOTTA S INTENDED. Illustrated. .Post 8vo 1.50 
 
 Forget-me-not Edition. Illustrated. ...... 1.25 
 
 STORY OF BABETTE. Illustrated. .. .Post 8vo 1.50 
 
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 SOLOMON CROW S CHRISTMAS POCKETS. Ill d. 
 
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 IN SIMPKINSVILLE. Illustrated .... Post 8vo 1.25 
 
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 HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, N. Y. 
 
 Copyright, 1894, by HARPER & BROTHERS. 
 Copyright, 1891, by J. B. LIPPINCOTT Co. 
 
 All rights reserved. 
 Published October, 1909. 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 THE MERCANTILE HOUSE OF DI CARLO . . . Frontispiece 
 "SHE LOOKED NOT UNLIKE THE STATUES OF 
 
 THE VIRGIN MOTHER AND CHILD" . . . Facing p. 26 
 
 "AND THE THREE FOLLOWED THE CHILDREN 
 
 HOME" " 60 
 
 405465 
 
1 / 
 
 (bazlotta 6 Intended 
 
(Satlottad Contended 
 
 A SHORT, swarthy, gray - haired old man who 
 swung his little legs on both sides of the barrel 
 upon which he sat; who smoked a stumpy old 
 pipe; whose one heavy eyebrow ran clear across 
 his forehead; who wore tiny gold ear-rings and 
 seldom cut his hair, who spoke in monosyllables- 
 such was Carlo Di Carlo, "the Dago." 
 
 A tall, fat, blooming brown creature, loud- 
 talking and voluble, full of fun and temper, luxu 
 riant to coarseness; whose bust measure and age 
 were both somewhere in the early forties; who 
 seemed fashioned for laughter and unlimited ma 
 ternity; who sat every evening on the front door 
 step of the shop opposite her husband this was 
 the Signora Di Carlo. 
 
 A dainty bit of a girl, radiant as petite; dark as 
 her father, symmetrical as her mother of twenty 
 years before, whose slim figure was just throwing 
 out hints of future perfections; whose long black 
 hair was as straight as an Indian s, but fine as the 
 down upon the head of the babe who lay crowing 
 upon the mother s lap; who was reticent like her 
 
father, but whose mother s fire flashed from her 
 eye on occasion; a girl to love, to hate, to do and 
 dare behold the sweet daughter, Carlotta Di 
 Carlo ! The discerning eye beheld in her promise 
 of romance, possibilities of tragedy, and he who 
 looked upon her once paused to look again. 
 
 A row of little black-eyed dagoes of various 
 ages and sexes, of various degrees of beauty, but 
 all handsome; a healthy, picturesque, noisy lot, 
 quarrelsome without pugnacity these were the 
 little Di Carlos. 
 
 A small square front room, with a low shed 
 around its two sides over the banquette, an oyster- 
 counter along its partition -wall; a fruit -stand 
 spread beneath its sheds opening on two streets; 
 a red lantern hung out at the corner for a sign 
 see the mercantile house of Di Carlo. 
 
 Within a front corner of the shop in winter, 
 and out on the banquette in summer, his chair 
 placed so as to command a view of the fruit- 
 shelves on both sides, sat a one-legged cobbler, 
 surrounded by his professional litter of old shoes, 
 strings, and scraps of leather. 
 
 Fourteen years before Pat Rooney took this 
 chair, engaging to pay for the rent and privileges 
 of the same by doing the family cobbling a fail- 
 enough arrangement with a circle of three when 
 Carlotta was wearing her first shoes, but, to quote 
 from Pat, " There s been niver a time since but 
 the madam s been aither afther raisin the rint on 
 me or threatenin to do that same, an sure I d 
 
ve deserrted long since if she d iver sint me a no 
 tification be an ugly messenger ; but whin she 
 shteps out, erself bloominer n iver, wud anither 
 wan o thim black-eyed beauties forninst her buz- 
 zom, I do put by a fresh batch o little scraps for 
 patches an trate mesilf to a dozen on the half- 
 shell, on the strength o the new-customer to the 
 thrade." 
 
 The Di Carlos doubtless knew a good bargain 
 when they had it, and so Pat had been encour 
 aged to remain by perquisites in the way of oys 
 ters and fruit. 
 
 This, however, was a scant offset to an increase 
 from one to nine healthy shoe-wearing boys and 
 girls. 
 
 If Pat had begun to think seriously of the matter 
 some years ago, the christening of a new-comer 
 when Pat had hobbled all the way up the aisle at St. 
 Alphonse s one morning and recorded a sponsor s 
 vows for a diminutive little beauty by the name 
 of Patrick Rooney Di Carlo held him firm to his 
 chair for some time, and then well, the signora 
 counted on this, and became reckless, and there 
 were twins, and in a year another. There s no 
 telling what discontent might have begun to fer 
 ment in Pat s breast had it not been that Carlotta 
 began to grow so startlingly beautiful, and young 
 men and old men and boys began hanging about 
 the shop when there was nothing to buy, or buy 
 ing things they evidently did not want, and all 
 the time looking at Carlotta. 
 
Pat had petted the child, called her his " swate- 
 heart," trotted her on his one knee and sung her 
 to sleep to " Lanigan s Ball," from the time he 
 came to the Di Carlo shop. 
 
 Only within the last year, however, since the 
 halo of radiant womanhood had been hovering 
 about her, had a tender solicitude for the girl en 
 tered his heart; and, although the signora, fort 
 unately, did not suspect it, no added duty would 
 have driven him from his post now. 
 
 And yet the Di Carlos had not been entirely 
 unreasonable. Later concessions had been made. 
 A room, the entire garret over the shop, had been 
 placed at Pat s disposal, and here he had finally 
 moved his few belongings a cot, a chair or two, 
 a huge green box which held his surplus clothing 
 in a fraction of its space (such a wooden bin as 
 the poor Irish emigrant usually dignifies by the 
 name of trunk, and which one need not be Eng 
 lish to call a box), a gaudy picture of the Virgin 
 Mother with her heart aflame, a much- framed 
 photograph of Carlotta in her first-communion 
 dress, a rosary and a crucifix, and hanging across 
 the rafters the moth-eaten remains of a bright 
 uniform and a broken torch-lamp. For before his 
 accident Pat had been an Irishman, a Fenian, an 
 American ward-politician, and a festive leader in 
 torch-light processions, pat-riot-ism, and the like. 
 
 Nobody ever knew just how or by whom the 
 shot was fired that made him a cripple and a cob 
 bler (and, he always added, " a Dutchman and a 
 
dago, to boot" laughing alone at his final pun). 
 But it was a fearful row. Three men were shot, 
 and all came near dying but didn t die, and, as 
 all the wounded carried weapons more or less 
 spent, they considered discretion the better part 
 of valor, and instigated no investigations. 
 
 All this was before the days of telephones and 
 hospital ambulances, and Pat was carried into 
 the shop of a German shoemaker, next door to 
 the saloon where the shooting was done. He 
 would probably have been sent to the Charity 
 Hospital next day, however, excepting that his 
 host, Hans Schmidt, had happened to be in the 
 saloon at the time of the disturbance, and, his 
 recollection of the matter being somewhat hazy, 
 he had feared possible implications, and insisted on 
 nursing the wounded man through his trouble. 
 
 The neatness of this arrangement lay in the 
 fact that as soon as the convalescent was able to 
 hold up his head, here was a trade for him, right 
 under his eyes and hands. The ward-politician 
 became an artisan, and, as he characteristically 
 expressed it, " his first tool was his last." 
 
 " An ye niver seen an Irishman a-mindin shoes 
 afore ?" he was wont to say on occasion. "Mebbe 
 not ; an yet divil a wan ud turrn is back on a 
 cobbler! Tis thrue enough, in the ould counthry, 
 tis the prastes that do be savin our sowls for us, 
 an I m worrkin at the same thrade, savin soles 
 to feed me body. But the edge of the joke is, 
 twas losin me fut that set me to shoemakin ." 
 
Thus by light and witty speech did he cover what 
 he firmly believed to be a broken spirit. 
 
 A tedious convalescence, with enforced ab 
 stemiousness, had given him ample time for re 
 flection, and by the time he had been nourished 
 back to strength on apple-pie, cinnamon cake, 
 nudels, and smierkcise, and found himself practi 
 cally apprenticed to a shoemaker, he felt that he 
 was no longer, even at heart, "one of the boys." 
 
 As soon as his period of invalidism was safely 
 over, however, when his cautious and worthy host 
 was assured that his life was no longer in jeopardy, 
 things were rearranged on a business basis, and 
 the terms were not satisfactory to the prentice, 
 who, with a true Celtic alacrity, had mastered the 
 trade to a degree that surprised himself. 
 
 Before the occupation of the corner shop by 
 the Di Carlos, a cobbler had carried on a busi 
 ness here, by which he and a small barefoot fami 
 ly had managed to live ; and when Pat discovered 
 the change of tenants, the bright idea of slipping 
 into this trade occurred to him hence the 
 proposition, conveyed by an interpreter, to oc 
 cupy a cobbler s chair in the new fruit-shop. 
 
 The arrangement had much to recommend it. 
 On wash-days, when the father and the boys were 
 out peddling over-ripe stock, Pat often represent 
 ed the entire business, calling " Shop !" on occa 
 sion, or even effecting a trade when there were 
 no complications. 
 
 "Picayune o lemons, is it?" he would say, for 
 
9 
 
 instance, to the small-boy customer. " Fetch yei 
 silver heer,till I feel the heft av ut. That s solid 
 rings like the bells o heaven ! Drop it beyant on the 
 counter so. Now, pick two big lemons or three 
 little wans. That s a man ; takes three middlin 
 sizes. He s got a business fist on im 11 be a Van- 
 derbilt yet nades a shoe-string for lagniappe" 
 And to himself, as the embryonic Vanderbilt de 
 parted, he would continue after this fashion : 
 
 " Faith, an be the time I do worrk up me Dutch 
 thrade wud a dago s business, an throw in a Creole 
 lagniappe, I do have to run me hand forninst me 
 flabby pockut-book to know mesilf for a Paddy." 
 And his soliloquy held as much truth as humor ; 
 for, notwithstanding the fact that he soon com 
 manded a neat little custom, Pat s heart and hand 
 were those of a true son of the Emerald Isle. 
 
 From the day she first put up her pretty red lips 
 for the shaggy old fellow to kiss, his whole heart 
 and purse had belonged to the baby Carlotta. 
 As his mind had begun to run on shoe-leather, his 
 first spare dollar had gone for a pair of little red 
 shoes for her when she was barely able to toddle. 
 
 This was the beginning ; and then there were 
 other things trinkets, a pair of gold ear-rings set 
 with turquoises (and he had locked himself in the 
 coal-house and stopped his ears while they were 
 put into her little ears), and then, later, a thimble, 
 then a prayer-book and mother-of-pearl rosary ; 
 and so it went. 
 
 As he petted the little thing and the other 
 
1(1 
 
 babies as they came, he accused himself of an old 
 man s fondness ; though when this story begins 
 he was in fact but forty years old. 
 
 " Little Lottie " came to stand in his life in 
 place of all he had lost, and he took comfort in 
 her, calling himself "an ould grandmother" while 
 he buttoned her tiny gowns or washed her pretty 
 little hands and face for her. 
 
 "Say, Carlo," said the signora, one day this 
 was when Carlotta was about six years old " wad 
 you say eef we geev-a C lotta to Meester Pad fo 
 wife wan day, eh ?" 
 
 Indade, me respicted mother-in-law," Pat re 
 plied, laughing, "sure ye re too late shpakin I 
 Lottie an me s engaged six months, come Moddy 
 Graw." 
 
 And so it gradually came about that he called 
 the pretty dark-eyed child " me swateheart," " me 
 intinded," " me future," and the like, while she 
 would always leave her father or mother to go to 
 " Woona " (her best baby effort at his name in 
 the early days when he was "Mr. Rooney " in the 
 Di Carlo household). 
 
 Within the last year, however, while as unfail 
 ingly attentive and gentle, he called her only 
 Lottie, and any allusion to the old jests was wit 
 tily turned aside. 
 
 In the evenings, after dark, Pat generally 
 formed one of the family circle on the banquette 
 about the doors, flavoring the conversation with 
 his unfailing humor and mirth. 
 
! I 
 
 Usually at about eight o clock the little father 
 would jump down from his barrel, and, rubbing 
 the leg that had "gone to sleep," hop around 
 limping while he closed in the fruit-shelves, took 
 down the lantern, and prepared to lock up the 
 shop. 
 
 At his first movement Pat hobbled in, carrying 
 his chair with him, the signora following, and 
 bending over her sleeping bundle with a maternal 
 " Sh-h-h !" as she passed in. 
 
 Finally, just before entering himself, the father 
 called, " Toney ! Pasquale ! Joe ! Anita ! Neek !" 
 and a crowd came rushing noisily in from the con 
 gregation of children half-way down the block, 
 one or two of whom, generally pursued them to 
 the door for a "last tag" and "good -night," 
 while a voice or two from the foremost Di Carlos 
 answered from within, " Sleep tight." 
 
 As they flocked in, passing the little old father 
 standing in the doorway, he looked proudly upon 
 them and grunted his approval. They were a 
 royal lot, and they were his. 
 
 The scene reminds one of a familiar barn-yard 
 group a little game rooster, a fine Brahma hen, 
 and their brood of handsome chicks. The dimin 
 utive but pompous father struts around with a 
 most important proprietary air, and, flattering 
 himself, forgets to look at the mother. So it was 
 with little Di Carlo. Men and roosters are so 
 thoughtless. 
 
 It was true, Caiiotta was a beauty, and every 
 
12 
 
 one said she was the image of her father ; and so 
 she was his image inspired. And the mother was 
 the inspiration. 
 
 If the little husband reminded one of a rooster, 
 a rooster who never crowed, it was not so much 
 because the wife persisted in doing the family 
 crowing, as well as cackling, as that it pleased 
 him to sit by and smoke while she assumed his 
 prerogative. One always felt that the crow was 
 in him, and that he had full confidence in the vol 
 ume of it. Such is the value of reserve. 
 
 In deference to Pat, the language of the even 
 ing circle was usually English. But though he 
 had never attempted the Italian speech or pro 
 fessed a comprehension of it, fourteen years of 
 such familiarity with it as the shop afforded had 
 opened the doors of his understanding, and noth 
 ing less than a subtlety of meaning as far beyond 
 the Di Carlos as himself would have eluded him 
 now. 
 
 A sort of delicacy, however, forbade his reveal 
 ing this to those who sometimes chose to speak in 
 his presence without inviting his participation. 
 
 Among the occasional frequenters of the shop 
 had been for some time an old man, Pietro Socola 
 by name, for whom Pat had always felt an in 
 stinctive dislike. 
 
 During the past few months Socola had be 
 come a frequent guest, and while he sat on a box 
 at the father s side in the evenings and spoke in 
 a low tone in Italian, he was observed to cast 
 
18 
 
 frequent covert glances toward the daughter, 
 Carlotta. 
 
 Now, Socola was rich, according to the Di Carlo 
 standard, and a widower, and so Pat was not super- 
 suspicious in interpreting these glances as ominous 
 of meaning to Carlotta. 
 
 The suspicion quickened his hearing, but the 
 most assiduous eavesdropping had as yet dis 
 closed nothing to confirm his fears. Gossip about 
 the men on the luggers or at the Picayune Tier, 
 discussions as to the rise or fall in prices of fruit 
 or oysters, interspersed with long tobacco-flavored 
 silences, seemed to constitute all their social in 
 tercourse ; and yet why did the ugly old fellow 
 keep looking at Carlotta? 
 
 Socola was of the one essentially homely Italian 
 type. His blue-gray eyes and reddish hair were 
 bereft of any leaning towards beauty by a heavy 
 swarthy skin, while the entire absence of upper 
 front teeth gave a touch of grotesqueness to his 
 ugly visage. Short-necked and square of build, 
 he had nevertheless a stoop, producing an effect 
 as if his face arose from his chest. The edges of 
 his grizzly -red mustache were further colored 
 from the tobacco which he perpetually chewed, 
 and his hairy little hands bore about their blunt 
 finger-tips similar suggestions of the weed. 
 
 Socola was plain, as well as distinctly deficient 
 in the subtle charm which we call personal mag 
 netism. 
 
 His wife had been dead but three months when 
 
14 
 
 he first came on Sunday afternoon to the Di 
 Carlos . For three successive Sundays he re 
 turned thus, and then he began dropping in in 
 the late evenings, until now almost any night he 
 could be seen propped up on his box at Di Carlo s 
 side, and whether Carlotta sat on the door-step 
 working on her "sampler" or promenaded the 
 banquette with one of the twins astride her hip, 
 old Pietro s eyes followed her. 
 
 This, which Pat had been observing for some 
 weeks, culminated one day in a tangible occasion 
 for alarm. 
 
 He was sitting inside the shop, putting a finish 
 ing-stitch to a patch, when he saw Socola pass the 
 door to join the circle about the steps without. 
 
 A moment later Carlotta hastily entered the 
 shop, her face black as a storm-cloud. 
 
 " Come heer, Lottie," he called, quickly ; and, 
 as she approached him, " Whut ails ye ?" 
 
 He had never seen her so angry. It was a mo 
 ment before she spoke. 
 
 " Shpake out, Lottie, me girrl, an tell me who 
 done ye onythink." 
 
 "I don t like oP Pietro Socola," she said, finally, 
 her eyes flashing. 
 
 " ISTorr me nayther," he answered, shaking his 
 head. "But tell me whut e done ye." 
 
 "He mashed my chin." 
 
 " Squazed yer chin, did e ? An may the divil 
 snatch is mother from heaven !" 
 
 " Yas, an try to kiss me. I hate im !" 
 
" Thried to kiss ye, did e ? Bad lack to is 
 lonesome mouth ! An who seen urn ?" 
 
 "My paw an my maw was a-talkin . I don 
 know ef my maw seen im or not. She laughed. 
 I hate im !" 
 
 " See heer, Lottie." He was much excited, but 
 spoke low, lest he should be overheard. " There s 
 throuble a-brewin for ye, me beauty. Don t ye 
 say northin to nobody, but ef that low-down, 
 dirrty, blue-eyed nagur av a dago lays the heft 
 av is finger-tip on ye again, ye go for um : d ye 
 heer?" 
 
 She was silent, and he continued: "Wull ye 
 do what I tell ye, Lottie ?" 
 
 " Yas." 
 
 " Well, take me advice an kape out av arrm s 
 len th av im whin ye can; but whin ye can t, 
 an he so much as blows is breath on a hair o yer 
 head, ye come down on im wud a regular thun- 
 derin polthogue like this!" 
 
 He placed his closed fist against his own temple. 
 
 "See heer, colleen," he resumed, with some hes 
 itancy, " I c d lather im for ye a couple o hefts 
 o me peg d land im pantin in the gutther but 
 twould do ye no good." 
 
 " F e turn is sassy ol eyes on me again, I m 
 goin slap is face good," she said, as she turned to 
 serve a customer. 
 
 A suppressed sigh escaped the cobbler, and his 
 fingers moved nervously as he finished his patch. 
 
 His worst fears were materializing. Socola, 
 
16 
 
 the rich, the honored guest, was coming for Car- 
 lotta. 
 
 His cobbling finished for the day, he rose to go 
 to his room. He had not the heart to join the 
 circle about the doors to-night. He hesitated a 
 moment, and glanced without. 
 
 The signora had crossed from her seat on the 
 step, and drawn a stool opposite the men her hus 
 band and Socola. 
 
 The guest was speaking very earnestly in a low 
 voice in Italian, and his audience listened with ev 
 ident deference. 
 
 Pat heard distinctly Carlotta s name. Who can 
 blame him for lingering, just a moment, to be 
 doubly sure he was not mistaken ? 
 
 But no, he heard it again, and then something 
 about money "a thousand dollars" and the 
 mother and father of the girl smiled, and, while 
 they exchanged glances, nodded assent. 
 
 For the first time since he had been a teetotaler 
 Pat staggered as he walked to the staircase, and 
 when he reached his attic room he sank into his 
 chair, trembling as if an ague possessed him. 
 
 He was bewildered as much at his own sensa 
 tions as at that which had produced them. What 
 did it mean ? It was bad enough, but why were cold 
 chills running all over him? Why did he think 
 of the night he heard of his mother s death ? Why 
 was he sobbing before he could control himself ? 
 
 Oh, Patrick Rooney, is it possible that you are 
 in love ? 
 
It was even so; and the sudden revelation of the 
 truth to himself seerned to seize and shake him to 
 the foundations of his being. 
 
 The exquisite agony of the first discovery soon 
 spent itself in emotion, but all night long he sat 
 as one dazed, lost in wonder, bewildered. 
 
 II 
 
 When at last the day broke, when the explain 
 ing sun s rays lifted the veil that the moonlight 
 imposes, and instead of shadows Pat began to see 
 things clearly, he cast his eyes about him, as if to 
 reassure himself and get his bearings. Every 
 thing in his meagre apartment seemed to hold 
 some association with the child, Carlotta. Hang 
 ing upon the wall were the little worn red shoes, 
 his first gift to her, bearing yet the impress of her 
 baby feet. Within the lid of his big trunk, open 
 before him, swung the tiny brass hook he had 
 placed there so that she might safely fasten her 
 self within, and, hiding here until the storm was 
 over, she had escaped many a whipping from her 
 mother. A row of auger-holes along the back, 
 ruining the trunk, had further fitted it for her 
 safe retreat. And she had never told. She had 
 always been a rare child. 
 
 Every picture summoned by the associations 
 was charmingly pretty, and when finally he cast 
 his eyes down upon himself upon his toil-stained 
 
18 
 
 garments, his rough hands, his one untidy shoe 
 he felt as if he were blushing at a sense of his utter 
 unfitness for her. 
 
 Seizing his mirror, a triangular fragment, he 
 closely scrutinized his unshaven face and unkempt 
 hair, and as he laid the glass down he turned his 
 vision inward and backward upon the years of his 
 life at the Di Carlos and before. He thought of 
 Carlotta when first he saw her, and of the years 
 since. She had sweetened and cheered his life 
 ever since he had known her. 
 
 She and this sacred love that had come to him 
 were holy things, but what should he do with 
 them he, a poor, miserable, penniless, clumsy 
 old cripple ? It was a terrible, terrible folly, this 
 love ; and yet, despite the hopelessness of it, de 
 spite the vivid ludicrous view of it which his Irish 
 perception afforded, he felt transported by it into 
 a state of painful ecstasy. What should he do 
 with himself where go ? 
 
 For one thing, he must bathe and shave and cast 
 off these ugly, dusty garments. The sacred thing 
 that had come to him required this much of him. 
 
 It was late in the morning before his toilet was 
 complete. His ordinary hurried ablutions "for 
 dacency s sake" were performed with reference 
 to the world. To-day his own consciousness de 
 manded that he should be clean. Even his old 
 wooden leg received its first baptism, the rite be 
 ing applied with soft soap and a scrubbing-brush. 
 The hard old oak, polished from long use, shone 
 
19 
 
 like the Di Carlo biscuit-board and it must be 
 understood that the signora was of the clean sort, 
 unfortunately in the minority among her class. 
 
 Pat had just readjusted his peg with new leath 
 er straps, when two little black eyes appeared 
 above the stairway. 
 
 "Mr. Pat, dey got a colored lady down-stairs 
 what want her shoes mend." It was the boy Pas- 
 quale, and he was all the way up now. 
 
 " Tell er I m not worrkin to-day, Pasquale, me 
 b y. I m very sick." 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Pat, you scared me awful ! I thought 
 you was a man up here." 
 
 " An did ye r a ly ? Sure an ye made a terri 
 ble mishtake, for there s northin up heer but 
 three-quarrters av an ould divil av a fool." 
 
 " Oh, you look awful white, Mr. Pat ! You 
 sick f o true ? Mus I call my maw ? Is dey got 
 anybody dead, Mr. Pat ?" 
 
 Pat s only previous rigorous toilets had been 
 made to attend an occasional funeral of some for 
 mer comrade. 
 
 " Plaze God, there s a fraction of a loafer dead, 
 sonny, an I m dthressed for the buryin . Call no 
 body, but go now, don t be delayin , and tell the lady 
 below I m tuck suddintly ill an I m not worrkin ." 
 
 It was with manifest reluctance that the little 
 fellow at last withdrew his eyes from the gentle 
 man in the attic to deliver his message. 
 
 In a moment the signora s voice was heard at 
 the foot of the stairs : 
 
20 
 
 " Oh, Mcester Pad ! Pasquale say god-a some- 
 theen the niatther weeth-a you. F you feel-a sig, 
 mus-a shore call-a sorne#0(&/." 
 
 "Much obliged, ma am, but sure I m takin a 
 day off, jist, an I m in nade o northin but a 
 broom, if ye ll lind me the loan av one." 
 
 Pat was not an artist, and his hands were 
 clumsy, yet the result of a single effort in the di 
 rection of respectability wrought a transformation 
 in his apartment. After he had swept, dusted, 
 and rearranged his shabby belongings, he took 
 from his box a little old-fashioned daguerreotype 
 of his mother and gazed upon it in silence for 
 some minutes. When finally he spoke, his voice 
 was tremulous and tender : 
 
 " Indade an yer b y s in great throuble, mam 
 my dear. Ye always said I was the biggest fool 
 o the dozen, an sure I want to take back me 
 sassy conthradiction." 
 
 He drew his sleeve clumsily over it, wiping a 
 tear from the face of the picture, and, hobbling 
 across the room, placed it open upon the shelf that 
 served for a mantel. 
 
 He did not go down- stairs that day. Though 
 cleansed and clothed, he was not assured of being in 
 his right mind. He dreaded to meet Carlotta, lest 
 she should detect the insanity that possessed him, 
 and despise him as he despised himself for it. Of 
 course this nonsense would die out in time, and he 
 would always be just the same old " Woona" to her 
 as of yore, and when the time and the right man 
 
should come he would do his best to have her suit 
 ably married. It was absurd that right here at the 
 outset he should be having trouble with himself. 
 
 For three days he felt constrained to put off 
 " till to - morrow " his going down - stairs. While 
 he could not treat with this exquisite, delicate 
 thing without purifications of himself and sur 
 roundings, it was yet only a something to be sure 
 ly overcome. A few days banishment and fast 
 ing would restore him to himself. The fasting, 
 it is true, he practised only because he could not 
 eat, and the banishment on a similar principle, yet 
 he counted on this discipline, with time and reso 
 lution, to quell a passion which could bring him 
 only ignominy, and to the girl, should she suspect 
 it, but embarrassment and estrangement from her 
 best friend. But she should never know it. 
 
 In a few weeks, at furthest, Socola would press 
 his suit; for was there not every reason to expect 
 haste? He was old (old men are always in a 
 hurry), a widower (who ever knew a widower to 
 dally with a proposal ?), and he came from Sicily, 
 from Palermo, that warm clime of impatient love 
 and ardent adorer? . 
 
 In a few weeks Oarlotta might have need of a 
 friend. Socola was rich. The Di Carlos one 
 weakness, in Pat s eyes, was love of money. The 
 signora had laughed when the old man tried to 
 kiss Carlotta. It was a bad omen. She would 
 favor his suit. 
 
 It was on the morning of the fourth day that lit- 
 
22 
 
 tie Pasquale reappeared at the head of the stairs, 
 bearing this time in his hands a half-worn shoe. 
 
 "Back wud ye, now!" exclaimed Pat, anticipat 
 ing the application. "Sure an I m on the re 
 tired lisht for a couple o days. Fetch me no 
 more ordhers." 
 
 "Who s a-talkin bout orders?" drawled the 
 pert boy. "Give a fellow time to talk, won t 
 you ? My maw sez, she sez C lotta s feet s on de 
 groun , and somebody haf to sew er shoe." 
 
 The old shoe, torn and muddy, which the boy 
 laid in Pat s hand, bearing the unmistakable im 
 press of the physical vigor and undiscriminat- 
 ing step of a growing girl, was neither small nor 
 shapely, but Pat s hand trembled visibly as he 
 touched it, and he felt so queer that he was fright 
 ened. He seemed to see Carlotta standing in the 
 flesh before him. 
 
 " An my maw sez, she sez if you ll sew it righd 
 away, cause C lotta ain t got no more shoes, an " 
 
 " All right. Tell er she ll have a new shoe 
 built around the patch I ll putt on it, an off wud 
 ye, now." 
 
 As the boy disappeared, Pat turned the shoe 
 about in his hands slowly, and, perceiving the 
 trembling of his fingers, exclaimed : 
 
 " The divil s grandmother! Sure an I wouldn t 
 know mesilf from a shakin Quaker or a quakin 
 Shaker, I m that rattled ! But I ll kiss the fut 
 av er, onyhow!" And he laid the old shoe against 
 his lips with a caressing movement. 
 
23 
 
 It needed many stitches, and Pat was still at 
 work upon it an hour later when he heard the sig- 
 nora trudging up the stairs. 
 
 "Hello, Meester Pad; m-a come talk weeth-a 
 you," she began, while still invisible. " God-a so 
 much-a troub , haf to spik weeth-a you." And as 
 she finally reached the landing she exclaimed, 
 looking about her, " Name o God! Well, I swea ! 
 Pasquale ees-a tell me you was-a pud on-a plenny 
 style up here." Crossing, she dropped into a seat 
 at Pat s side, putting the baby which she carried 
 upon the floor before her. 
 
 "Fo God sague! Never was-a seen you so 
 fine-a biffo . Belief you goin a ged-a marry, Mees 
 ter Pad." 
 
 "Arrah, thin, I may s well confess; Carlotta an 
 me s plannin to shtep over to S int Alphonse s 
 some fine morrnin , an" run across to Algiers for 
 a weddin -tower an back again be the Frinch 
 Marrket f r a bridal breakfasht. Sure an we re 
 only tarryin for me mother-in-law s perrmission." 
 
 This bravado helped him immensely. He had 
 said the same thing substantially a hundred times 
 before, but not for a long time. Instead of laugh 
 ing as of yore, however, the signora grew serious. 
 
 "Dthaz-a just-a fo wad I m-a goin -a talk 
 weeth-a you, Meester Pad. Of-a coze I know you 
 god-a nobody an-a northeen, you haf to mague a 
 lill-a fun some time, but know sometheen ? Young 
 gal ligue-a C lotta ees-a god-a no senz. C lotta 
 b lief thad. She thing you ees-a lov weeth-a her." 
 
24 
 
 " An who sez she does ?" 
 
 " I am-a sho , sho she b lief thad." 
 
 "An who sez she does?" he repeated, with 
 keen vehemence. 
 
 "Nobody, only erselve ees-a say it." 
 
 " An who did she say ut to ? She niver said 
 it, ma am !" 
 
 "My God, you thing me I m a liar? C lotta 
 sez to me, sez I don -a lov-a no man bud-a just-a 
 Woona. Wad you call-a thad ?" 
 
 " Begorra, an I suppose she loves her father 
 betther yet. Who the divil shud she like betther 
 nor me she that s afther cutt n er eye-teeth on 
 me thumb-nail ?" 
 
 " Of-a coze ; dthaz-a thrue ; bud-a you don 
 un erstan , Meester Pad. God-a so much-a troub 
 weeth-a thad chiF. Now ees-a raise er so big, an 
 she sassy me to my face. God knows, I weesh me 
 I was-a dead ! God-a so much-a troub . Fo two 
 days, can d do northeen weeth-a C lotta. God-a fine 
 chanz, C lotta, an she don care northeen boud." 
 
 "A fine chance, has she? An whut is it?" 
 His heart stood still. 
 
 " Pietro Socola ees-a wan reech-a man, Meester 
 Pad. Wan -a marry weeth-a C lotta /" 
 
 " The divil s pitchfork ! An whut does whut 
 does she say ?" 
 
 " Say she won -a marry weeth-a heem. Can d 
 do northeen weeth-a C lotta. Her pa ees-a w ip 
 er, me, I ees-a w ip er, an the mo we ees-a beat 
 er the mo she ees-a sassy me to my face." 
 
25 
 
 Pat was speechless with surging emotion, and 
 the mother continued : 
 
 " Pietro Socola ees-a prormis me an Carlo a 
 t ousan dollah, an -a tague eem een-a pardners, 
 f e can-a ged C lotta. Oh, ees-a crazy fo C lot- 
 ta lov er so hard." 
 
 " An did e shpake love to er ?" 
 
 " One time ees-a try speak weeth-a C lotta, an 
 C lotta ees-a slap is face." 
 
 "An whut did he say?" 
 
 "He ees-a just laugh. Lov-a C lotta so hard 
 e don care. Want er all-a same. Theng God 
 fo thad. Tell you, Meester Pad, plenny troub 
 een theze-a worP. Come-a talk weeth you boud 
 C lotta. M goin-a call er talk weeth-a you. You 
 rauz-a please talk-a senz weeth er. Tell er she 
 haf to marry Socola. C lotta do anytheen-a fo 
 you." 
 
 Pat was diplomat enough to see the worse than 
 futility of opposition. He let her call Carlotta. 
 
 Paler than he had ever seen her, her pallor ex 
 aggerating a dark bruise upon her cheek, but with 
 her head erect, she appeared before them. 
 
 " Whut ails yer face, Lottie ?" said the man, 
 gently, as, drawing a stool to his side, he mo 
 tioned to her to be seated. 
 
 She remained standing, however, and the moth 
 er answered : 
 
 " When somebody slap-a company in-a face, 
 muz-a show er how it feel to have-a face slap. * 
 " An who done ut ?" 
 
26 
 
 " Me myselve done it. Slap er face good fo 
 her ! Muz-a teach-a my chil some manners. Lill- 
 a mo would-a pud C lotta s eye oud. Hit er good 
 weeth a tin cup. Take plenny pains, yas, teach-a 
 C lotta manners an-a raise er nice." 
 
 The tension of the situation here was happily 
 relieved by the signer Di Carlo, who called loud 
 ly in Italian for his wife to come and light up the 
 shop. She would have hesitated, but an impera 
 tive " Nbn posso sestare! Spicciatevir warned 
 her that her lord was impatient. 
 
 She rose hastily, slipping her feet deftly from 
 under the child who had crept up against her and 
 fallen asleep, and, bidding Carlotta " min -a the 
 baby," hurriedly descended the stairs. 
 
 The child, disturbed, began to fret. Seating 
 herself, Carlotta raised the little one upon her 
 lap, where in a moment it slept again. 
 
 She sat opposite Pat, in the seat her mother 
 had vacated. Sitting thus, with the beautiful 
 babe in her arms, in the tender twilight which 
 was further sensitized by the subtle insinuation 
 of light from a new moon which hung just with 
 out, she looked not unlike the statues in the 
 churches of the Virgin Mother and Child. 
 
 Even Pat saw it, and felt like crossing himself 
 as he looked upon her. 
 
 He had never seen her look like this before. 
 The habitual spirit of joyous childishness had 
 passed out of her face, which seemed clothed 
 with modesty and sadness. 
 
27 
 
 She had not spoken since she entered the gar 
 ret. She had not even looked at Pat. 
 
 Though silent also for a time, he was first to 
 speak : 
 
 " Well, mavourneen, me poor child o sorrow, 
 the throuble s come quicker nor I thought for. 
 Betune the two av us, ye ve got a black eye, for 
 yer mother only paid ye for takin me advice. 
 Forgive me me share o the blame while I talk 
 to ye plain, Lottie." 
 
 Raising his eyes, he muttered to himself, " The 
 Lord o light give me courage this night !" Then 
 he turned to her : 
 
 "An* ye must answer me plain, Lottie. Ye 
 must shpake to-night plainer nor ye iver shpoke 
 since yer firrst confession. Answer me questions 
 like the Holy Virgin, whose image ye are, an 
 swered the angel o the Lord, kapin northin hid. 
 Wull ye do ut, Lottie ?" 
 
 She turned and looked at him. 
 
 " Wull ye answer me questions an kape north- 
 in back, mavourneen ?" 
 
 She gave assent by an inclination of her head, 
 keeping her eyes upon his face. 
 
 " R ye goin to marry Peter Socola, Lottie ?" 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " No ? An why not? D ye know he has riches 
 an* jew ls an 11 make a fine lady av ye? I m 
 kapin northin back from ye, an ye must answer 
 me thrue. D ye know all that, Lottie ?" 
 
 "Yas." 
 
28 
 
 " An ye don t want im, nohow ?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 "Not if e was tarred wud melted gold an 
 feathered wud diamonds till Vd shine like a gov 
 ernment light-house ! Ye don t want im noway, 
 sick norr well, alive norr dead, raw norr cooked, 
 mummied norr shtuffed, divilled norr on the half- 
 shell ! If I m not mishtaken, I know yer sinti- 
 mints on the Chinese question, an that s about 
 the size av ut ! Ye don t want Peter, not if he 
 does come wud the golden keys o the kingdom o 
 this airth ! Ain t that so ?" 
 
 "Yas." 
 
 "Yiswhut?" 
 
 "I don t want." 
 
 " That s it ; ye don t want an shtfrft have the 
 antiquated ould pill coated for a sugar-plum! Ye 
 sha n t have um, an nayther shall he have you. 
 That much is settled, an the hows an the whins 
 an the wheres come aftherr. An now for the 
 next question : Is there onybody else ye like ? 
 that ye d like to marry, I mane ?" 
 
 She looked straight into his eyes and answered 
 not a word. 
 
 How his heart thumped ! 
 
 " Shpake, Lottie. Out wud ut ! Is there ony 
 body else ye like betther nor all the worrld ?" 
 
 But still she, looking into his eyes, answered 
 not. 
 
 He flinched visibly as he put the next question: 
 
 " Is it Joe Limongi, Lottie ?" 
 
His heart was dancing a highland fling now. 
 
 With an almost imperceptible, but steady move 
 ment, she shook her head. 
 
 It was not Limongi Limongi who sold canta^ 
 loupes for her father and liked to talk to Carlotta. 
 Maybe it was 
 
 " Is it Antonino ? Shpake out an answer me 
 thrue. Is it Toney ?" 
 
 Another head-shake. 
 
 " Norr yer cousin Nicolo ? Sure I niver seen 
 im shpakin wud ye." 
 
 The Madonna head shook again. 
 
 " Arrah, musha, an sure an it can t be Pat 
 Murphy, the bit av a grocery-b y at Keenan s be- 
 yant a freckled, red-headed, blue-eyed Paddy, 
 wud a brogue on im as thick as a mush poultice. 
 Sure ye wudn t care for the likes av a blazin divil 
 av an Irishman, wud ye ?" 
 
 He waited, but she answered nothing nor moved 
 her head. 
 
 He was frightened. His voice was lower when 
 he spoke again : 
 
 "In the name o God, Lottie, answer me, me 
 child. Ye re not demanin yerself wud love for 
 Pat Murphy, are ye ?" 
 
 No, it was not Pat Murphy. The head shook 
 now with solemn decision. 
 
 " Thin who, in the name o the Poydras Marr- 
 ket ? I don t know no more a-comin round heer. 
 Sure it can t be the cross-eyed baker s man wud a 
 crooked " 
 
30 
 
 It was not the baker s boy, nor yet the young 
 American who lived at the corner. 
 
 Pat could think of no other. 
 
 " An* f o the love o Heaven, is it onybody, 
 Lottie ?" 
 
 She did not answer. It was surely some one. 
 
 " An does he love ye, me child ? An are ye 
 engaged to um ?" 
 
 "I don t know." This slowly, after a pause. 
 
 " Don t know if ye re engaged ? Is it afther 
 makin a fool av me ye are, Lottie ?" 
 
 He was wounded. The girl saw it, and was 
 suddenly roused. 
 
 " You don t like me no more !" she exclaimed, 
 her eyes flashing. " Since two years you never 
 call me no more * intend never say you want 
 me never, never say nothing ! I don t care, me. 
 If you want, I ll marry ol Pietro Socola. Any 
 how, he loves me speak with me kind, an talk 
 with my maw an my paw f o me. An you you 
 say nothing ! Anybody can come, say love- words 
 an get me you don t care ! It s all right. Me, 
 I don t care neither, only fo what you took me 
 when I was little an know no better, an speak 
 love-words with me say I am for you fool me 
 like that an now, now when I am mo bigger an 
 know better, now when I know to love, you turn 
 your back! like to see me marry some strange 
 man ! My God, if I thought some bad man do 
 like that to my liT sister here, me, I d throw er 
 right now out the window ! Better so than like 
 
31 
 
 me me to love always one, to think only fo one, 
 since I am like this baby, an you pet me, make 
 like you love me, buy me every pretty thing an 
 then when I am mo older, say I am fo you call 
 me always your * intend before my maw an* my 
 paw art everybody call me so an never in all my 
 life speak no cross word with me an now, when 
 I am only for you, an you know it, you hate me /" 
 
 " Whist ! Sh-h-h !" Pat fairly hissed, raising his 
 arm wildly. " Hush, mavourneen ! Ye re shpakin 
 blasphemy. Hush-h-h! Fo the love o God say 
 no more !" 
 
 For a moment he was silent. Then, raising 
 hands and face heavenward, he said, reverently : 
 
 " Holy Mary, Mother av God, an all the saints 
 an angels, pass out in a full-dthress parade this 
 day, an wutness this mericle in the little shanty 
 on S int Andthrew Street !" 
 
 A sob stopped his throat for a moment, but pres 
 ently, in a voice pitifully weak and low, he said : 
 
 "An did ye think yer ould Woona turned 
 ag in ye, me purrty he that was kissin the sole 
 av yer dirrty shoe this minute ! Sure I love ye 
 betther nor I love me mother that s in heaven, an 
 God knows I m not takin er down a peg from er 
 high station in me recollection whin I do be sayin 
 ut all honor to er name, though she s left me a 
 couple o shpankin s shorrt in me ginteel educa 
 tion ! Sure twas the love in me heart that sint 
 me on a retrate from ye, colleen bawn. For two 
 yeers yer name thrimbled on me lips, an yet I 
 
32 
 
 f eered to own the truth, an since I knowed ut for 
 a fact sure I was afeered to show me face, lest the 
 whole story d lake out through the pores o me 
 skin if I kept me lips shut, an ye d hate me for a 
 dizzy ould fool. An now I fale I fale my God, 
 I do fale like a pig in a puddle, when somebody 
 frown im a bookay sure he ate it up ! Fo the 
 love o God, gi me the baby to howld, Lottie, 
 afore I do take ye for a bookay!" 
 
 Reaching forward, he actually took the sleep 
 ing child from her arms. 
 
 " Sure I ll howld er for ballast, to kape me from 
 risin into the air, till I do talk wud ye sinsible! 
 I m that delerious I m like a dthrunken man wud 
 the William o Thrimities ! An did ye think I 
 loved ye since ye were like this to fool ye ? Oh, 
 but I must talk wud ye like a major to-night, Lot 
 tie." He hesitated, and when he spoke again his 
 voice was touchingly tender : 
 
 " Ye re but a child, darlint. I niver thrifled wud 
 ye in me life, an I won t thrifle wud ye now. Sure 
 an if I tuck all ye re sayin to me to-night, an 
 held ye to ut, all I d nade ud be a pitchfork an a 
 tail for me rigimintals ; but I m not lookin fo 
 that line o promotion ! If I was half or a quarr- 
 ter fit for ye, I d thry to qualify the remainder, 
 but wud three-quarrters o unfitness an the ither 
 quarrter bey ant redimption in a jar o alcohol, sure 
 I d be a dog to thry for ye." 
 
 " You don t want" 
 
 Her eyes flashed again. 
 
33 
 
 " Sh-h-h ! My God, I do want, I tell ye, an 
 from this night for ard, till he comes that ye like 
 betther nor me, ye re mine promised an pledged 
 over the head o this slapin image o yerself when 
 firrst ye thricked me ould heart! I m bound to 
 ye, remimber, Lottie mavourneen, be me own will, 
 to love ye, to help ye, to fight for ye to die for 
 ye, the day me grave II be a safe bridge over yer 
 throubles! But ye must be free yet, me purrty 
 little innocent free till ye ve listened to love at 
 its best. The old man Socola can t give ye a 
 sample o the genuine arrticle, through his emp 
 ty gums. Sure it s stale an warrmed over in a 
 cracked oven an all out o shape afore ye do get 
 it from him. Let purrty young lips tell the story 
 an purrty young eyes thry to hide ut from ye in 
 vain. Let one sing ut in rhyme an anither clinch 
 is fists an swear ut to ye, an then come an tell 
 yer ould Woona all about ut. Ye see, ye can t 
 fully undtherstand till ye ve had the best lessons 
 in the language, no more nor I c d polly fronsay 
 wud a Frinchman. Take yer own time, me dar- 
 lint, an remimber, whativer comes, Pm yer in- 
 tinded! (I ll say ut, if me ears grow six inches 
 to the minute, to designate ass-ification !) Wull 
 ye thrust me now, an do what I say, an kape 
 northin from me ?" 
 
 " Yas ; but I don t want no French lessons." 
 " Aha, but sure I insist upon ut !" he replied, 
 laughing heartily at the unconscious humor of her 
 naive reply. 
 
34 
 
 " Sure an I ve waked the baby wud me thrum- 
 pet s voice. Take er, darlint, an go, afore yer 
 mother calls ye, an if she asks ye, tell er I urrged 
 ye to marry ould gum-drops, but ye ll die firrst. 
 If I do show me hand I b lave she d put me out ; 
 an I think ye may nade me manoeuvrin more norr 
 a skirrmish. Ye just come down like a thousand 
 o brick on him an the whole lot, an say ye 
 won t an? nobody can make ye! An I ll see 
 ye through ut. Good -night, an God bless ye. 
 Sh-h-h-h!" 
 
 This last was to the baby, who fretted again in 
 the transfer to Carlotta s arms. Placing one of 
 her hands over the other about the shoulders of 
 the sleeping child, Pat laid his lips against them 
 reverently. 
 
 " God bless ye an God bless ye," he said, and 
 again as she went down the stairs, " God bless 
 ye," and he hobbled back to the open window, 
 sank upon a chair, and in a moment was sobbing 
 and sobbing. 
 
 He felt so old, so dilapidated, so lonely and for 
 lorn, so rough and uncouth, so far removed from 
 his ideal of the man who should dare aspire to the 
 love of Carlotta Carlotta, whose exquisite youth 
 and vestal beauty stood her in stead of all the 
 graces and refinements of life; and yet he was so 
 madly in love, so deliriously jubilant over her loy 
 alty, which, no matter what should come, was now 
 wholly his, that he wept from a full surrender of 
 himself to his conflicting emotions. 
 
85 
 
 He had sat here an hour, perhaps, when the 
 sound of excited talking below drew him to the 
 head of the stairs. It was the mother s voice. 
 " Ogly !" sne was screaming. " Ogly ! Fo God 
 sague, Carlo, list n ad C lotta ! Sayce Signor Pie- 
 tro Socola ees-a wan ogly ol man ! Ogly ees-a 
 northeen ! Ogly ees-a good fo wan man, pritty 
 ees-a for a woma . F a man ees-a pritty, ees-a no 
 coun . Z god-a too strong eye fo pritty, haf to 
 look all-a day een-a glass. Talk aboud-a ogly ! 
 My God, loog ad yo pa ! You thing me I ees-a 
 marry heem f o pritty ?" 
 
 The voice passed out into the other room. This 
 was only an argument by the way. Pat turned, 
 and, going to his shelf, lit his candle, and, raising 
 his glass, moved it from one angle to another, 
 studying his own face: 
 
 "An I do wondher, fo the love o God, does 
 the little darlint think me purrty ? Faith an 
 mebbe I am, but me style is peculiar a rustic 
 landscape forninst a turrkey-egg background, a 
 mammoth cave, a natural bridge surrounded by a 
 dinse perrarie on fire,wud chips o snow in among 
 the blazes throuble on the borrders, but refuge 
 in the middle ! An mebbe that s what the poor 
 child sees in ut !" 
 
 The interpretation was touching in its mingling 
 of humor and modesty. The face, while perhaps 
 a stranger to recognized elements of beauty, was 
 yet more than attractive to the observer who cared 
 to read its meanings. Generosity, tender-hearted- 
 
86 
 
 ness, intelligence, wit can the face on which these 
 are written be called ugly ? 
 
 The little blue eyes twinkled anew as he dropped 
 the glass and, fastening a last thread in Carlotta s 
 shoe, hurried down -stairs. There was no longer 
 occasion for retreat, as there was nothing to hide, 
 naught to reveal. 
 
 A general murmur of welcome from the family 
 greeted him when he appeared in the shop. Even 
 Socola, who had just come in, grunted a pleasant 
 inquiry as to his health. 
 
 " Sure an I m convalescent, Misther Socola," he 
 said, his eyes dancing as he turned to the old man 
 with a friendliness entirely new to him. "An 
 how s yersilf this day o the wake ?" 
 
 " Oh, me, I am-a all-a-way kip well. Feel-a mo 
 young efera day." 
 
 " Droth an they re all alike," said Pat to him 
 self, as he passed out. "There s northin like a 
 wife s grave for makin over ould min. Sure if 
 I d had the foresight to marry lame Biddy O Shea 
 afore ould Brindle hooked er into purrgatory, I d 
 be as much too young as I am too ould for love. 
 It takes an ould codger like Socola to shtand sich 
 a h avin set-back an land out av the cradle." 
 
 Instead of joining the group at the door this 
 evening, Pat preferred to walk abroad, to get the 
 fresh open air and to find a quiet retreat to think 
 over things. 
 
 Hailing a passing car at Jackson street, he rode 
 out to its terminus at the river, and, passing be- 
 
37 
 
 yond the ferry - landing into a shadowy corner 
 behind high piles of freight, he sat down. 
 
 In the new retrospect, Socola and his little affair 
 dwindled into utter insignificance as a trivial in 
 cident by the way. 
 
 He sat here until past midnight, absorbed in 
 his own thoughts, which, no matter which way he 
 turned, seemed punctuated with interrogation- 
 points. "Would Carlotta always love him? 
 Was it fair to her to hope for this ? Was it hu 
 man not to hope ? What should he do now ?" 
 
 The last question was that which remained with 
 him. " What should he do ?" 
 
 He knew that these revived energies and ambi 
 tions that filled him to his finger - tips were not 
 transitory thrills unless the whole were a dream ; 
 and, even so, he would dream out an honorable so 
 lution. 
 
 If he were really a man worthy a true girl s 
 passing fancy even to put it safely and not the 
 " ould granny " as which he had posed to himself 
 for all these years, surely there must be standing- 
 room for him somewhere in the world ; not in the 
 rollicking, frolicking world he had left, perhaps, 
 where two feet on which to stand often fail to 
 keep its inhabitants erect, but in the industrial 
 world of workers on the edge of which he had 
 dozed so long. 
 
 During the week following, while he worked at 
 his bench in the Di Carlo shop, he was so en 
 grossed with his own schemes that, but dimly 
 
38 
 
 conscious of his surroundings, he saw the old 
 suitor, Socola, come and go, and the young men 
 congregate about the shop and disperse, with but 
 a passing smile. It was only the diverting by 
 play in his own drama and Carlotta s the 
 drama for whose leading part he must equip 
 himself. 
 
 Strange to say, the signora had never interro 
 gated him in regard to his interview with Car- 
 lotta, presumably in behalf of Socola. The girl s 
 sustained attitude of resistance was evidence 
 enough of its result. So far as Pat observed, the 
 affair was drifting without special incident. 
 
 The little father Di Carlo still opened his best 
 old wine for Pietro on Sundays, and the signora 
 made up in attention for whatever was lacking in 
 Carlotta. 
 
 So a week passed, during which Pat had had 
 scarcely a private word with the girl. 
 
 " Pst ! Come heer, Lottie," he called, as she 
 was passing through the shop on Saturday after 
 noon. 
 
 " Sit down an putt up yer fut till I take yer 
 measure." 
 
 She obeyed, coloring as she did so, for she 
 knew the request was only a ruse. Did he not 
 have hanging behind his door a row of lasts made 
 for her feet at every stage of growth from her in 
 fancy till now ? 
 
 " Now," said he, " while I do thrick the inquis 
 itive wud me tape-line, Lottie, I want to talk wud 
 
39 
 
 ye. Don t say northin to nobody norr let on ye 
 know ut, but I m goin off for a thrip for a wake 
 or so. I ll say I m goin for me health, but sure 
 it s wealth I m afther. (Faith an if I do lie 
 about the firrst letter o the worrd, I do spind the 
 remainder in repintance.) I m lookin out for a 
 betther job norr the exterrnal tratement av corrns 
 an bunions poulticin over wan man s worrk in 
 the corrner av anither man s shop." 
 
 " I m glad," she said, and the rosy color in her 
 face turned to scarlet. 
 
 " I knowed ye d be glad, mavourneen." 
 
 "Where you goin ?" She spoke quickly. 
 
 " I m goin up the Jackson railroad to visit me 
 frind the Dutchman, jist. They tell me he has a 
 boomin thrade at Chattawa in the shoe business, 
 an he s only a yeer there, an sure an begorra 
 where Hans Schmidt 11 go I m safe to vinture, 
 for he an is ould frau are but two solid lumps 
 o prudence." 
 
 " When you goin ?" 
 
 " I m off airly o Monda morrnin , plaze God, 
 an look for me back whin ye do heer me peg on 
 the banquette. I m goin a - scrimmagin an a- 
 skirrmishin till I find what I want a barefutted 
 town a-wailin for a wan-legged shoemaker ; an " 
 lowering his voice " Lottie mavourneen, be a 
 good girrl till Woona comes back, d ye heer ? An 
 let no one bully ye into listenin to the ould man s 
 complaint. Remimber, nobody can make ye, if ye 
 won t. If they helt ye up afore the praste, sure 
 
40 
 
 ye cud shtiffen out into a dead faint an they d be 
 compelled to carry ye out, Miss Di Carlo an 
 don t ye forget that." 
 
 "I m not fraid. My maw an my paw knows 
 me. They won t try nothin like that on me." 
 
 "Ye re solid on that, colleen. An now I ll 
 1 ave me adthress on a shlip o paper, an in case 
 ye do nade a friend, sind me a line. Art now" 
 in a louder tone, raising his tape-line " nine 
 inches an a quarrter across the inshtep the same 
 from heel to toe." And lower again, " I seen the 
 madam a-peepin twice-t ; mebbe ye betther run 
 off now me purrty little intinded." 
 
 The last, in a whisper, just reached her ear, 
 spreading o fresh blush over her face as she 
 arose. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Pat s business tour extended itself from one to 
 two weeks. The idea of establishing himself in 
 some suburban town was not new to him, but 
 it had never before seemed quite worth while. 
 His really worthy but conservative friends, the 
 Schmidts, though evidently quietly prosperous, 
 were non-committal, and would give no advice. 
 His impressions were favorable, however, and he 
 returned to New Orleans buoyant with promising 
 schemes. 
 
 It was after dark when he reached the city, and 
 
-11 
 
 as he approached the Di Carlo s a row of carriage- 
 lights before the door startled him so that he felt 
 in danger of falling. Something unusual was 
 happening. If any one had died he would have 
 heard : besides, who ever heard of a night funeral, 
 except under extraordinary circumstances? Could 
 it be a wedding f He had had a strange forebod 
 ing of ill. Why had he left Carlotta ? 
 
 Reaching the house, he hesitated without, in 
 the shadow of an open shutter. He must have a 
 moment to still the mad beating of his heart. 
 
 The window was up, and through the Venetian 
 blinds the scene which greeted him was of the 
 utmost confusion. 
 
 Socola, attired in his dress suit and white kid 
 gloves, bloodless as yellow wax and blue of lip, 
 was excitedly walking up and down the room. 
 About him, standing in squads or sitting in groups, 
 whispering, was a gathering of people, among 
 whom Pat recognized some of the Di Carlo kin 
 dred, while others were strangers. All were in 
 tensely excited. 
 
 Just as Socola reached a point near the window, 
 a young woman crossing from the other side of 
 the room stopped him. 
 
 Pat recognized her immediately as a cousin of 
 Carlotta, and, by a coincidence, one who bore her 
 full name. 
 
 "I m-a shore I woun -a grief myself boud-a 
 Carlotta, signer," she said, as she excitedly fanned 
 her dark fat face with a light-blue feather fan. 
 
And so Carlotta was dead! Pat leaned against 
 the house for support. 
 
 But wait. The old man was answering in 
 Italian : 
 
 " Grief ! I grieve not for her. She may go to 
 the devil. I care not for her, but for myself ! It 
 is the disgrace! I have come here to marry her, 
 and if I wait all night I will have her ! Money 
 is nothing to me. I can pay the police order 
 the detective force out scour the city." 
 
 The girl shrugged her shoulders. " Oh, well, 
 z-god-a just-a so good fish in the riv z-a come 
 oud." 
 
 "But I am not to be mocked!" The old man 
 was hoarse with passion. There was a majesty 
 in his wrath which might even have won respect 
 from Carlotta could she have seen him. 
 
 "She shall not mock me!" he continued. "Every 
 laborer down at the Picayune Tier every man on 
 the luggers all my business comrades everybody 
 knows the name of Carlotta Di Carlo, and that I 
 come to marry her to-night. I have her mother s 
 promise. She must be found !" 
 
 "Carlotta Di Carlo ees-a no gread-a name," 
 she replied, still in English, toying with her fan. 
 " Z-a my name just-a the same ligue-a my cous n. 
 Neva ees-a bring me sudge-a so gread-a good- 
 luck." Just here the door opened at Pat s side, 
 and a man stepped out. Fearing discovery, he 
 immediately entered the house, where a chorus of 
 exclamations greeted him : 
 
43 
 
 " Carlotta ees-a run away !" 
 
 "Z-a jump oud-a window !" 
 
 " run off!" 
 
 " Cand fine-a no place." 
 
 In the back room the mother was noisily be 
 moaning her misfortune, sometimes in Italian and 
 then in English. 
 
 " Come in, fo God sague, Meester Pad !" she 
 cried, when she saw him. " Come-a see wad-a 
 troub we god-a theeze day. Come, loog !" Draw 
 ing him into the back room, she pointed to the 
 bed, upon which was spread an array of finery. 
 
 " Loog loog here 1 All-a fine silg dress, silg 
 pock-a-hankcher silg stockin silg hat keed-a 
 glove keed-a shoe gol watch-a chain gol ring 
 loog ! Everytheen-a so fine Signor Socola ees-a 
 bring Carlotta fo marry weeth-a heein to-nighd 
 an C lotta ees-a run away ! Sez to me, * Mus-a 
 lock-a door fo wash-a myselve just a ligue 
 thad an ees-a climb oud-a window an gone! 
 Oh, my God, me Pm-a crezzy !" 
 
 " An had she given her consint, ma am ?" Pat 
 managed to ask, at last. He had only listen 
 ed yet. 
 
 " Consen ! Geev - a consen ! No ! Geev - a 
 northeen ! C lotta ees-a god on y six-a-teen year. 
 Wad-a chil ligue that knowce aboud-a man? 
 Don know northeen boud-a consen !" 
 
 "That s whut I say, ma am!" It was all he 
 could do to hold himself, but he remembered her 
 he loved, and in her interest was silent. 
 
44 
 
 His only fear, and this was slight, was that they 
 should find her. 
 
 A half -hour passed slowly. At any unusual 
 sound in the front room every one looked anx 
 iously towards the door, as in a church when the 
 bridal party is due. 
 
 Presently a distinct and sudden movement and 
 a renewed hum of voices indicated that something 
 had happened. 
 
 It was true. Something was happening. 
 
 The old man Socola, leading by the hand the 
 other Carlotta, the cousin, entered the room and 
 approached the bed. With a dignified inclination 
 of his head to the company, and pointing to the 
 display of gifts, he said (he spoke always in 
 Italian) : 
 
 " I present to Carlotta Di Carlo those presents 
 which are marked in the name of Carlotta Di 
 Carlo, and when she is dressed as my bride we 
 will drive to the church. The announcement in 
 to-morrow s papers shall prove that Pietro Socola 
 has not been disappointed." 
 
 Hesitating here, and gathering emphasis by a 
 lowered voice, as he glanced with menacing brow 
 about him, he continued : 
 
 " What happens here to-night is in the bosom 
 of Mafia society !" They could have heard a 
 pin drop now. "Mafia s children can keep her 
 secrets." He paused again and looked from one 
 to another. " But if there is a Judas here if 
 one word passes that door the knives of a hundred 
 
45 
 
 of Mafia s sons are ready to avenge it ! And I am 
 Pietro Jesns Adolpho Socola who speaks !" 
 
 Pat was the first to break the death-like silence 
 which followed. 
 
 "An accept me warrmest congratulations, 
 Misther Socola," he said, stepping forward and 
 grasping the old man s white-gloved hand. 
 
 Others followed closely. Congratulations were 
 now in order, the new bride-elect receiving her 
 accidental honors with ill-concealed pride. 
 
 A fresh wedding-stir arose, but beneath it all 
 was a suppressed moan, like the irresistible under 
 tow of a playful sea. The missing girl, the lost 
 wealth, the mystery, the humiliation, Mafia s 
 authoritative command of secrecy, with its death- 
 penaltyall these, as elements of possible tragedy, 
 were felt, even by the satellites of the new bride, 
 and showed themselves in the subdued air and 
 blanched faces of the family of the supplanted. 
 
 Pat was the happiest person present, excepting 
 perhaps the fat little creature who in the next 
 room was holding her breath and panting while 
 one squeezed, another fanned her, and a third 
 burst off hooks and eyes in the determined effort 
 to prove that the bridal gown designed for Car- 
 lotta Di Carlo had not proved a misfit. 
 
 It was a relief to all when finally the wedding- 
 party started off. 
 
 Those who came in the back carriages rode 
 now in front, the family of Carlo Di Carlo bring 
 ing up the rear as relations of the bride " like 
 
46 
 
 the asses which always follow on the tail of the 
 Rex procession on Mardi Gras," Pat heard the 
 little father say in Italian to the signora, adding, 
 as he and his sons got into the last carriage, " You 
 have made us a pretty pack of fools !" 
 
 There was that in the husband s tone that made 
 the wife keep silent, but when they had gone she 
 turned to Pat and burst into violent weeping. 
 
 For once a woman s tears were powerless to 
 move him. Turning abruptly, he left her with 
 out a word, and mounted the stairs to his own 
 room. 
 
 In a moment, however, he heard her following. 
 She was not to be so easily eluded. She must 
 have an audience. Her habit of finding relief by 
 pouring her complaint into Pat s ears was too 
 firmly fixed to be given up at this crisis, when her 
 ignominious failure seemed more than she could 
 bear. Her cup had been spared no possible dreg 
 of bitterness, even to the summoning of the hated 
 family of her brother-in-law Di Carlo to witness 
 and reap a triumph in her defeat. This was the 
 refinement of cruelty ; and then, as a finishing- 
 touch, came Mafia s command. They dare never 
 explain. Those stuck-up Toney Di Carlos might 
 give the world any story they chose but the true 
 one the one they would love to keep. 
 
 When she appeared before him, panting from 
 her hasty ascent, Pat thought she resembled noth 
 ing so much as a hyena at bay. 
 
 " Haf to lis n ad me, Meester Pad," she began, 
 
47 
 
 dropping into a chair. " God Almighty ees-a 
 turn is back on me to-nighd pud-a me down 
 ligue wan dog biffore all-a doze nasty Toney Di 
 Carlos !" 
 
 "God Almighty done ut, d ye say? Ye re 
 pay in yersilf a purrty round complimint for a 
 wake-day, Misthress Di Carlo ! I d kape that for 
 a Sunday, till we cud buy ye a tin halo an putt 
 on our Sunday clothes an say our beads to yer 
 Holiness." 
 
 His wrath oiled his tongue. Of course she did 
 not understand. 
 
 " Z-a no time f o play, Meester Pad. Fo God 
 sague, you god-a no heart? See wan-a poor 
 woma in-a so gread-a troub !" 
 
 " I have, ma ain, a palpitator in the vicinity 
 o me left lung, but it s engaged at prisent in be 
 half o the slip av a child that s turrned out av er 
 father s house on a darrk night to escape worrse 
 nor a livin death at the hand av er mother. 
 Tis a black night, ma am, an where is the child ?" 
 " My God !" her whisper was heavy with pas 
 sion, "you tague-a side weeth-a C lotta? Me, I 
 don care where ees ! Hofe-a the dev s got er !" 
 " An I ll warrant ye, ma am, he has an orrgan- 
 ized detective forrce out in searrch o the likes 
 av her to-night, ye may be sure o that ! An 
 plinty illuminated transums above hell s sky- 
 parrlors 11 open their thrap-doors to welcome er 
 in, wud music borrowed from heaven to entrap 
 an angel !" His voice trembled with wrath. "Sure 
 
48 
 
 they ll give er er pick av bridal dresses, an a 
 sate at a faste where the bread she ll ate 11 be as 
 honest as that ye offered er raised from, the same 
 leaven an at the same price !" 
 
 " Wad you talk, Meester Pad ? Brida dress 
 an -a same price ! Thing yo head ees-a gone 
 wrong ! Z no mo rich-a man s wan -a C lotta. 
 Wad-a you say ?" 
 
 "I say the divil has a shtandin ordther out for 
 brides, ma am, an the city strates av a darrk night 
 are his harvest-field, an whin an angel is thrapped 
 unbeknowinst to his bed, he does mock heaven 
 wild fresh fireworrks an ring the bells o hell for 
 a holiday ! Tis tin o clock, mother Di Carlo, an 
 rainin cats an dogs this minute. Ye have a 
 child, a fair bit av a daughter, out hidin from ye. 
 She knows no people. Tis the firrst time nine 
 o clock iver missed er from her little thrundle- 
 bed. Can ye tell me in whose back alley I ll find 
 er skulkin , like an odd cat, an bring er home to 
 the mother that s grievin after er ?" 
 
 His passion calmed the woman. She looked 
 dazed, but answered him nothing. 
 
 " If yer Divinity 11 parrdon me shirrt-slaves 
 till I do putt on me rain-coat, I ll shtep out 
 mesilf an see if bechance her ould granny can 
 thrace er." 
 
 Crossing the room, he proceeded to raise the 
 lid of his trunk, but it resisted. It was fastened 
 on the inside ! 
 
 For a second only voice and wit failed him. 
 
49 
 
 "Ye ll excuse me manners, ma am, fer lavin* 
 me saloon-pan Id 1 whin I ve company, but I ve 
 a call to enlist on the opposition to the divil s 
 forrce," he said, and, with a bow, " Wull ye walk 
 firrst, Misthress Di Carlo ?" 
 
 Sniffling, but silent, the woman arose and pre 
 ceded him down the stairs. 
 
 Following, he hurried into the street, but re 
 turned in a moment. 
 
 " Betther go back for me rubber boot an me 
 bumberel," said he. " Sure the strates are flowin 
 wud wather." And hastily he reascended the 
 stairs. 
 
 " Whst !" he called, tapping gently upon the 
 trunk, and " sh-h-h !" as the girl s head pushed 
 up the lid. 
 
 "Glory be to God Almighty!" he whispered, as 
 he carefully aided her to rise from her cramped 
 position, though she remained sitting in the 
 trunk. 
 
 " An did me ould box harber ye again, me little 
 wan ? An why didn t ye write me the letther ?" 
 
 " I never knowed I haf to get married till to 
 night. My maw sez to me I mus marry Socola, 
 on coun o my po lill brothers an sisters an " 
 
 "Sh-h! Spake aisy, mavourneen." 
 
 " Then I seen my only chance was to run away. 
 It was dark outside. I was afraid. So then I 
 thought about the trunk, an I climbed up over 
 the back shed " 
 
 " Niver mind now, darlint. I musht go ; the 
 
50 
 
 madam 11 be af ther missin me. But you stay heer. 
 Make yersilf at home to-night in me ould din. I ll 
 shlape below in the shop, an tell thim I m on the 
 watch for ye, which 11 be God s truth. Ye re not 
 to make yer appeerance till she s wapin an wailin 
 for a sight av ye. Shtrike no light, an off wud 
 yer shoes. I ll manoeuvre below - stairs, an ye 
 kape silence above." 
 
 " You think the old man 11 come back for me to 
 morrow again ?" she asked, anxiously. 
 
 " Heavens above ! An didn t ye know he s mar 
 ried to yer cousin Carlotta?" 
 
 The tension had been so great that, at this sud 
 den relief, the girl, trembling, bent her head upon 
 her arm over the edge of the trunk, and fell to 
 sobbing hysterically. 
 
 Pat was frightened lest she should be overheard, 
 for he dreaded the mother s unspent rage. He 
 laid his hand tenderly upon her head. 
 
 " Sh-h ! The throuble s over now, darlint, an* 
 Woona s heer to thrash onybody but yer mother, 
 an it s she that mustn t heer ye !" 
 
 A sound of loud talking below reassured him, 
 however. The father and brothers had returned 
 from the wedding. 
 
 Carlotta heard it, and the distraction soon quiet 
 ed her. With Pat s aid she presently arose, and 
 together they cautiously approached the opening. 
 
 In the tumult the father s voice prevailed. He 
 spoke in Italian : 
 
 "What am I, that my wife lies to me? You 
 
51 
 
 said the child consented. You lied, lied! I told 
 you you should not compel her. You are paid. 
 I am glad. But I want my daughter. Where is 
 the child ? What can I do ? Where I go to seek 
 her I spread an ugly tale Carlotta, the pretty 
 daughter of Di Carlo, is not in her father s house 
 at night. A sweet story, that ! Oh, my wife is a 
 fine schemer got a rich husband for Toney s 
 ugly girl with the pimply face. Ha ! she is 
 kind, yes I am glad, but, only, I want my lit 
 tle girl." 
 
 In the midst of this, but not heeding it, the 
 woman was contesting her position in broken Eng 
 lish an appeal for sympathy to the English- 
 speaking boys, her sons. 
 
 "Fo who ees I lie?" she screamed, between 
 sobs. " Wad ees-a money fo me ? Rich or po 
 ees-a all-a same to me. God-a rock-a cradle fo 
 you- dthaz all ! F I lie, z fo you, an fo C lotta 
 selve. An now everybody ees - a blame me ! 
 Weesh, me, I was dead. You ees-a curse me, 
 Meester Pad ees-a sassy me to my face, an all on 
 coun o C lotta !" 
 
 " Shp !" hissed the old man. " No more ! Show 
 me my child, and we speak never of this again. 
 I am not blameless. I consented, but not to force 
 her. You were tempted, and she saved you. It 
 is well. We have not sold our first babe to feed 
 the last. But I want her here. I want my little 
 girl." 
 
 " I m goin , Woona," said Carlotta, starting sud- 
 
52 
 
 denly. She would have descended the stairs, but 
 Pat held her arm. 
 
 " Not from heer, darlint. Ye ve kept the thrunk 
 secret for a dozen years " 
 
 She understood, and, agile as a cat, had dashed 
 by him in the other direction, and was out the win 
 dow on the roof before he realized her intention. 
 She would return as she had come. 
 
 Pat hobbled after her to the window. She had 
 just reached the corner of the low shed (where 
 an overhanging fig -tree afforded safe and pri 
 vate transit to the ground), when she suddenly 
 returned and laid her hand on the Irishman s 
 arm. 
 
 "Don t be mad. You are good. I like you, 
 Woona, but I never knowed " 
 
 She began to cry. 
 
 " I never knowed my paw liked me before ; haf 
 to go to him." 
 
 Pat was choked with emotion, and before he 
 could answer her the slim shadow of the girl had 
 flitted down, and was merged into the broad shad 
 ow of the tree. 
 
 Though the rain was over, the night was dark. 
 
 Pat s heart was thumping so when he returned 
 to his vantage-ground at the head of the stairs 
 that he had to sit down. 
 
 Soon he heard a timid knock at the street door 
 Carlotta was a cute one then a rush of boys 
 heavy feet, a clank of iron as the hook was raised, 
 and now, through the open door, loud crying, like 
 
53 
 
 the heart-sobs of a little child. So Carlotta met 
 her father. 
 
 By ducking his head very low, Pat saw, for a 
 second only, the little reticent old man with out 
 stretched arms going to meet her ; and he, sitting 
 alone on the top step, blubbered like a school-boy, 
 but no one heard him. 
 
 Pat could scarcely realize that he had been home 
 hardly three hours when, a few minutes later, he 
 looked at his watch to find it but eleven o clock. 
 
 So far as he could discover, the affair was never 
 alluded to in the household afterwards ; but for a 
 long time between himself and the signora a dis 
 tinct coldness was felt which made him uncom 
 fortable. 
 
 His anger towards her had soon melted, but he 
 wanted it forgotten. She was no worse than many 
 rich mothers. Her methods were only a little 
 more crude. 
 
 He had easily forgiven her, since she had failed. 
 Though she had had no conception of the force of 
 his words, she realized that he had blamed and 
 silenced her had " sassied her to her face " and 
 it was hard to forget it. And then, too, her re 
 lations were somewhat embarrassed with all who 
 knew of the affair. 
 
 "I wonder," said he one evening a few weeks 
 later, as he sat near her at the door "I wonder 
 wud the madam wear a pair o shoes o my makin ? 
 I ll guarantee I cud make ye a bully pair 11 do ye 
 
54 
 
 through the next christening an ye ll be dthrag- 
 gin em slip-shod till the wan afther that ag in." 
 
 " Oh, you ees-a so bad, Meester Pad !" she ex 
 claimed, with a hearty laugh delightfully like the 
 familiar ring of old times. " How much-a price 
 you goin -a charge me ?" 
 
 " Charrge ye ! Well, I ll be dog-goned if ye re 
 hot complimintary ! I ll charrge ye enough, sure, 
 whin ye do bring me yer ordher for a pair, but 
 whin I do make ye a presint I ll ask ye a returrn 
 o what I do putt into the job a free confession 
 o frindly feelin , jist. Whut do ye say, ma am?" 
 
 Laughing, she stuck out her heavy foot. " Z big 
 nough speak fo heemselve !" 
 
 And so the old relations were restored. 
 
 Pat had been especially desirous of this recon 
 ciliation because of his contemplated change of 
 residence, which of course the signora did not sus 
 pect. 
 
 Exactly what arrangement would result from 
 his reconnoitring tour he did not yet know, but 
 the matter was unexpectedly decided one day by 
 the receipt of a formal business proposal of part 
 nership with his German friend, Hans Schmidt. 
 
 The old fellow was growing decrepit, and wished 
 to rest. The offer was framed with characteristic 
 caution, and its terms were hard, but in his pres 
 ent mood Pat was all the better pleased, and so 
 the matter was settled. 
 
 He would still call the Di Carlo garret "home," 
 and would come on Sunday mornings and stay 
 
55 
 
 until Monday. Chattawa was but a few hours 
 run from the city. 
 
 All the signora s sentiments towards him were 
 sensitized and perfumed with the generous odor 
 of fresh shoe - leather when Pat told her of his 
 plans, and she said so many touching things about 
 breaking up the family, and the like, that he add 
 ed forgetfulness to his forgiveness of her sin, and 
 they almost wept upon each other s bosoms when 
 he went away. 
 
 IV 
 
 Time dragged rather heavily at the Di Carlos 
 after Pat s departure. There was no one now al 
 ways ready to give a humorous turn to common 
 place things to raise a playful breeze over the 
 dull monotony of every-day life. Whether the 
 baby bumped her head or a customer quarrelled 
 over his bill, the occurrence, served up with Pat s 
 piquant wit, had always become a delightful 
 joke. 
 
 It is possible that not even Carlotta missed him 
 more than did the signora. And the little family 
 toes missed him! Dainty pink buttons that had 
 not been allowed to see the light came all the way 
 out, as if to inquire for the absent Pat, and grew 
 familiar with the floor and the banquette, like other 
 little dago children s toes. And yet the signora 
 vowed that she had done nothing but pay out 
 
56 
 
 money for shoe-patching ever since Mr. Pat went 
 away. 
 
 In the evenings the young men and boys still 
 came and laughed and talked with Caiiotta. 
 
 At first there had been with occasional expres 
 sions of surprise, inquisitive glances, at Socola s 
 marriage to the other, but the mother s flat and 
 surprised denial of her Carlotta s ever having been 
 thought of in so absurd a connection soon silenced 
 all concern about the matter. 
 
 Pat came usually on Saturday night or Sunday, 
 and was always an honored guest. " The mad 
 am" never tired of rehearsing to him the events 
 of the week or exhibiting the baby s last tooth or 
 promising gums, nor did she ever fail to hold out 
 for his inspection "the mos -a easy-walkin pai 
 shoe ees-a ever was-a wear." 
 
 And so weeks lapped over weeks until months 
 had passed and folded likewise one upon the other. 
 
 Carlotta was still to her fond old lover a dainty 
 little saint within a high niche, and when he said 
 his " Hail Mary " at night, as he had tried to do 
 ever since he had confessed himself in love, he 
 kept seeing her picture sitting in the garret win 
 dow in the moonlight, and wondering how far his 
 piety was at fault. Even irreligious men say 
 prayers when they are honestly and purely in 
 love. Pat was only unreligious. 
 
 He still told himself, as he told her, that she 
 was free, and must listen untrammelled to any 
 story of love that should please her; and yet, 
 
57 
 
 when he laid by small sums of money, he thought, 
 " How purrty it ll shtuff out er little pockut- 
 book !" or, "I wondher wull she lave ut in a dhry- 
 goods shop or hide ut in an ould shtockun ! but, 
 savin or shpindin , sure she ll be handlin er own, 
 God bless her." 
 
 He expected to find young men sitting around 
 the shop in the evenings when he came home, and 
 the sound of an accordion or flute or tambourine 
 or familiar laughter reaching him, as he approached 
 the house, served but to identify the crowd. 
 
 It was only when the accordion became his in 
 variable greeting, when, even descending upon 
 the family in the middle of the week, he found it 
 still there, that he began to consider that Carlotta 
 had never told him about this young musician, 
 except to give his name in answer to a question. 
 
 It seemed absurd to think seriously of so trivial 
 a matter ; and yet, when a long time passed and 
 the accordion, long-winded or short of breath ac 
 cording to the player s mood, sent its voice out 
 panting or trilling to meet him, he began to hate 
 the sound of it, and to wish that Carlotta would 
 sometimes talk upon the subject. 
 
 She had told him how young Alessandro Socon- 
 neti, who won a prize in the lottery, had wanted 
 her, and how Joe Zucca, the peanut-vender, had 
 vainly insisted on her love, and even of her cousin 
 Angelo, who had tried to coax her to forget his 
 kinship. Why had she forgotten to mention this 
 strange boy who played the accordion ? 
 
58 
 
 Pat seldom saw her alone now excepting when 
 occasionally on Sunday afternoons he would take 
 her with the children for a ride up to the park, as 
 had been his habit for years. While the little 
 ones played under the oaks or braided clover 
 wreaths near, he would sit at her feet on the 
 gnarled roots of the old trees and tell her about 
 his life at "the Dutchman s," and sometimes, 
 though not often, he would speak of how he had 
 missed her out of his daily life. 
 
 He avoided this as much as possible, however. 
 It was so hard to be a little tender when in his 
 Irish heart was smouldering a fire that at the 
 lightest breath would flare into a flame. 
 
 He had promised himself and her to wait until 
 she should pass her eighteenth year before allow 
 ing her to bind herself by solemn promise. 
 
 She knew that he loved her that he was work 
 ing early and late, living with people who were in 
 touch with him only in their determination to 
 make money and that it was all for her. 
 
 Sometimes, growing weary of his silence, she 
 would invite a declaration by some naive question 
 put in monosyllables, as when she said, one Sun 
 day, as they rose to start home : 
 
 " You like me yet, Woona ?" 
 
 "Like ye yet ! Arrah, musha, an whut ? re ye 
 sayin , darlint ? Like ye ? Sure I love ye, from 
 the crown av yer purrty little black head to the 
 sole av yer two feet, an all the way back, wud a 
 lap over ! An why d ye ask me that ?" 
 
59 
 
 But instead of answering him, she only colored 
 like a rose, and said : 
 
 "I m glad." 
 
 And Pat, lifting the children into the car, felt 
 like kicking his wooden leg to the winds and fly 
 ing ; but he only said, as he sat beside her : 
 
 " Begad, an I m glad ye re glad, mavourneen. 
 Sure sorrow 11 dim my day whin ye re sorry." 
 And as he raised his eyes he saw, sitting opposite, 
 a young man who smiled and tipped his hat to 
 Carlotta and under his arm he carried an accor 
 dion. 
 
 As he looked upon him, Pat felt a shiver pass 
 over him, for he thought he had never seen a 
 youth so beautiful as he. 
 
 " That s Giuseppe Rubino," said Carlotta, look 
 ing into his eyes with the directness of a child. 
 
 " Is it, indade ? Sure I tuck im for a vision of 
 S int Joseph or wan av the angels. An isn t he a 
 beauty ?" 
 
 " He sings pritty," replied the girl, as she might 
 have said, "It is growing cold," or, " The river is 
 rising." 
 
 Pat regarded her with covert scrutiny for a 
 moment. Could it be possible that she did not 
 see that this tall brown boy, with his soft red lips 
 and white teeth, his lofty movement and languid 
 grace, was a creature of rare and poetic beauty ? 
 
 Had she too not seen the red deepen beneath 
 the olive of his cheek when his eye met hers? 
 Had she not learned in all the summer evenings 
 
what Pat had caught in a twinkling that the 
 youth loved her with all the fresh ardor of a nat 
 ure fashioned for romance ? 
 
 It seemed not; for she remarked, in the same 
 even tone : 
 
 " He comes ev ry evenin pass the time away. 
 He plays nice." 
 
 If she had been saying she hated the boy, it 
 would not have kept Pat s heart from thumping 
 against his waiscoat while his eyes rested on the 
 beautiful youth who was helping the girl he loved 
 to "pass the time away" during his absence. 
 
 " An whut does he do for a livin ? Sure 
 there s little money in the machine he carries, 
 wud all its puffin an blowun . " 
 
 " He s pore. He works fo ol Socola. He hates 
 him, too. He s savin up. Bimeby he s goin to 
 start for isself." 
 
 " An who told ye all that, Lottie ?" 
 
 "Hetol me." 
 
 " An where did ye meet um ?" 
 
 " He come to fetch my paw a note from ol So 
 cola. He say he seen me first in his sleep one 
 night. He talks funny. I don pay no tention." 
 
 It was time to stop the car; but before Pat 
 could do so the young man had pulled the strap 
 and was going out. 
 
 " Please to make you quainted wid Mister Ru- 
 bino, Mister Rooney," said Carlotta, as Giuseppe, 
 smiling, joined them, and the three, Carlotta in 
 the middle, followed the children home. 
 
AND THE THREE FOLLOWED THE CHILDREN HOME 
 
If Pat appeared at a disadvantage, no one was 
 half so conscious of it as himself as he hobbled 
 beside the youthful pair on his wooden peg. 
 
 Ever since he had loved the girl, he had been 
 keenly sensitive in regard to his lameness. In 
 deed, he had even once gone so far as to try to 
 repair it by wearing an artificial leg, but, as Car- 
 lotta had shrunk away from it as something un 
 canny, declaring that it "made her think about 
 dead people," he had discarded it after a single 
 experiment. 
 
 It seemed but natural that Pat should sit with 
 "the old folks" while Carlotta and the youth 
 joined the young group at the other door to-night ; 
 it was quite natural that Giuseppe should presently 
 be playing the accordion for the crowd the same 
 thing had happened before, many a time; and yet 
 to-night Pat felt it all as he had never done be 
 fore. 
 
 "A fine-lookin chap is this young man Ru- 
 bino," he said, presently, to the signora. 
 
 She shrugged her shoulders. 
 
 " And who is e ?" he pursued. 
 
 " Carlo sayce ees - a wan good steady young 
 man; bud me, I know northeen boud who ees-a 
 keep-a comp ny weeth-a C lotta." And the shoul 
 ders shrugged again, a movement so distinctly 
 reminiscent of the previous affair that Pat thought 
 it discreet to change the subject. 
 
 As the evening wore on, he grew restless. 
 
 " Well, I b lave I ll thry a promenade for me 
 
62 
 
 complexion," said he, rising finally. " Sure me 
 right fut is itchin for a walk." And, with this 
 characteristic allusion to the missing member, he 
 started down the street. He had not gone far, 
 however, when he came upon a crowd of young 
 men, Italians most of them, sitting upon the steps 
 outside the closed doors of a shop a common 
 Sunday-evening congregation and, as a familiar 
 voice accosted him, he had soon seated himself 
 with them. 
 
 Several of the habitues of the Di Carlo shop 
 were present, and were bantering one another in 
 Italian about Carlotta. Pat was not supposed to 
 understand. 
 
 All went smoothly for a time, until young Tra- 
 monetti, an ugly, heavily-set fellow who had been 
 the target of several sallies on the score of his 
 well-known unsuccessful suitj suddenly turned in 
 anger. 
 
 " I could marry her to - morrow if I had 
 money !" he exclaimed, with a sneer. 
 
 " Psh-h-h ! You d have to get a new face on 
 you first !" came a quick retort. 
 
 " I think my face is just as pretty as old Pietro 
 Socola s ; and she tried hard enough to get him, 
 all the same !" 
 
 " You better say he tried for her, yes," was the 
 reply. 
 
 Pat, although talking quietly aside, caught and 
 understood every word. 
 
 " Tried nothing !" continued Tramonetti. - " He 
 
63 
 
 never wanted her. Married her rich cousin, yes ! 
 But Carlotta tried pretty hard to get him. My 
 self saw her every minute pass before him in the 
 shop and make sheep s-eyes !" 
 
 Pat could stand no more. 
 
 "An I say ye re a liur!" he exclaimed, rising 
 and facing the speaker. 
 
 The effect of his words was magical. A still 
 ness fell upon the assembly. After an interval, an 
 old man, Tramonetti s uncle, broke the silence. 
 
 " Wath-a you knowce bouth ?" he asked, turn 
 ing languidly to the Irishman with that apathetic 
 manner beneath which anything may lurk. 
 
 " Sure an I do jist happen accidintally to know 
 that that young man is a liur !" 
 
 The object of his accusation quietly lit a ciga 
 rette. 
 
 " How ees-a you knowce ? Socola selve ees-a 
 tell evera-body neva ees-a lov -a tall. Wath-a you 
 knowce ?" 
 
 And now another spoke a cousin of Tramo- 
 netti. 
 
 " Socola ees-a tell all-a mans on Picayune Tier 
 she ees-a try for eem all-a same." 
 
 Grunts of assent in several directions testified 
 that the story was familiar. 
 
 "An he s another liur, an I d tell ut to is 
 gums, the toothless ould macaroni-sucker ! Sure 
 an I ve had me two eers pricked for this same lie 
 this twelvemonth, an , bedad, I ve laid low an kep 
 shtill for ut! An did e say she thried to catch 
 
64 
 
 im the contimptible little river shrimp he that 
 had is two eyes set out like yung telescopes af- 
 ther er!" 
 
 " Fo God sague, don -a mague-a no troub ! 
 Blief Socola ees-a just talk fo play !" suggested 
 another. 
 
 " Thin Pm playin when I tell ye that he thried 
 wud all the iloquent perrsuasion av his money 
 bags to buy er! offered the ould man a thousand 
 dollars down for er, an pitched imself in at the 
 end o the thrade, like a punkin-colored chrorno 
 for lagniappe ; but the girrl sure I do raise me 
 hat whin I do sphake er name " every hat fol 
 lowed as he lifted his own " but the girrl wudn t 
 look ut um ! An the night he married er pug- 
 nosed cousin, sure he kem in the kerridge wud all 
 is crowd for erself, an she shkipped out the win 
 dow an hid. So whin he cudn t get corrn e took 
 shucks, as mony o ye 11 do -afther im ! Now, putt 
 that in yer pipe an shmoke ut !" 
 
 He turned now again to Tramonetti. 
 
 "An this yung gas-chandelier heer, who sez e 
 seen er wink at im, is a dirrty black " 
 
 " Ah-h-h-h! Ged oud! M just a mague a lill-a 
 fun!" drawled the boy. 
 
 " An ye take ut back, wul ye ?" 
 
 The men were all laughing now at the new ver 
 sion of the Socola marriage. 
 
 " So the ol man got fooled, eh ?" said one. 
 
 " But I say, d ye take ut back ?" persisted Pat. 
 
 " Ain t I sayce was-a play n ? Fo God sague, 
 
65 
 
 how much-a mo 1 you wan ?" And he rose 
 to go. 
 
 The storm was past, and by twos and threes 
 the men dispersed, laughing and talking as they 
 went. 
 
 As Pat moved away, an old man who had sat 
 apart in the shadow stood up, and the light from 
 the gas at the corner fell upon a visage sinister, 
 one-eyed, and lowering. 
 
 Pat instantly recognized it as the face of a man 
 who had been present at the Di Carlos on the 
 night of the Socola wedding. Indeed, it was he 
 who had been sent to Pat as interpreter, on this 
 occasion, of the Mafia anathema. Pat thought of 
 this, but he did not care. 
 
 As he turned his back, another man arose out 
 of the shadow at the other end of the shed. He 
 too had been a guest at the wedding. 
 
 The two Sicilians, who were presently left alone, 
 regarded each other in silence for a moment, when 
 the last to rise made the sign of the Mafia. The 
 answering motion was given, and the two, still 
 silent, sat down together again in the shadow. 
 
 They were bound by oath to report this disclos 
 ure to Socola, and they knew what the inevitable 
 result would be: the Irishman s words would 
 prove his death-sentence. 
 
 Under the vow of perfect obedience, either or 
 both of them might become the executors of an 
 old man s personal vengeance. 
 
 It was an ugly business, and neither of the men 
 
66 
 
 welcomed it. Both knew Pat s cordial relations 
 with many of their countrymen, among whom, in 
 deed, he had not a single enemy. Even the old 
 man Socola liked him. But they understood too 
 well the imperious pride of the vindictive old Si 
 cilian to hope that a personal friendship, or even 
 a tie of blood, would protect any man who dared 
 betray his dignity. Certainly the casual feeling 
 of negative good-will which he felt towards Pat 
 would melt like snow beneath the hot breath of 
 his wrath when he should learn that the Irishman 
 had given his secret to the common herd of his 
 countrymen. The indomitable pride which had 
 led him to marry an ugly, unattractive woman the 
 first time he met her, rather than brook the odium 
 of a disclosure of his rejection, would not spare 
 him who, although forewarned, had dared di 
 vulge it. 
 
 It was some moments before either of the men 
 spoke, and then one said, in Italian : 
 
 Well" 
 
 " Well " was the answer. And, after a pause: 
 
 " I wish I had gone home to-night." 
 
 " And me too. I wish I had stayed at the cof 
 fee-house." 
 
 " He s a good friend to all the Carlo Di Carlos, 
 that old Irishman." 
 
 " Yes, I know. Last year, when all the babies 
 took the small-pox and the shop was shut up, 
 he signed for the rent ; and he paid every cent 
 since three months rent." 
 
67 
 
 " Yes, and old Di Carlo says Carlotta s school 
 ing never cost him a dollar. This cripple pai,d 
 it all." 
 
 " And when the old man was stung with a taran 
 tula hidden in a bunch of bananas, while every 
 body cried and ran every way, they say the shoe 
 maker threw his hat on the spider and sat on it 
 quick, while he took little Di Carlo across his 
 knee like a baby and sucked the poison from the 
 back of his neck. Di Carlo was carrying the 
 bananas on his shoulder when the little devil 
 stung him." 
 
 " Yes, I heard that. And all the people laughed 
 while they cried, because when he was sucking 
 the poison he said, Let me kiss you for your 
 mother. " 
 
 They were silent again for a time. 
 
 " If Tramonetti had only kept his big mouth 
 shut" 
 
 " Yes, I wish he had choked before he spoke 
 to-night. He made all the trouble." 
 
 Another silence. 
 
 Well" 
 
 Well" 
 
 " It s a bad world, this. One minute we play 
 an organ at the corner for any beggar to dance, 
 the next minute maybe we get orders to file our 
 stilettos and put on a black mask." 
 
 " Me, I am tired. I wish I was out of it." 
 
 " And me too. Tell the truth, I ve never been 
 the same since that job you and I did at the old 
 
Basin. I see, a thousand times a day, that young 
 man s face the way it looked in the moonlight. 
 Sometimes I am playing my organ laughing, and 
 he comes and stands before me with his neck so. 
 And, I swear before God, I believe the monkey 
 sees him. Many times when he is dancing he 
 looks up and runs and crawls behind me, crying, 
 and I look around, and I see the young man with 
 his neck cut. I kiss the cross, but it s true. 
 Four times last week Jocko did that, and I trem 
 bled so I missed the time in my music. You 
 don t believe it s true ?" 
 
 " Yes, I believe you. I ve seen them again, 
 too. But now they are too many. They don t 
 frighten me. I laugh in their faces, and they 
 dance and run one through another, like clouds 
 of smoke. I am an old man, and I have struck 
 many a blow, but not one for hate, thank God 
 only obedience." 
 
 "Nor me neither. Only twice I have been on 
 duty. Once my partner did the work, and the 
 other time you know. And now, my God ! if 
 I have to listen all my life to that Irishman s 
 wooden leg, * tap, tap, tap, 1 in my ears, I ll go 
 crazy ; I ll drown myself." 
 
 The other man laughed. 
 
 " Oh, don t hurt yourself. Maybe old Socola 11 
 put somebody else on this job. And the next 
 time that young fellow we finished at the Basin 
 comes fooling around you, showing you the cut 
 in his neck, you send him to me. I believe I gave 
 
him his send-off, anyway. Twas good enough 
 for him. His tongue was too long." 
 
 " No, no ! They know whom to follow and 
 I know. I am left-handed, and the hole in his 
 neck was here; and sometimes my left hand 
 burns like hell. You can laugh," he continued, 
 rising, " but it is no fun to me. But I am not a 
 teething baby. Easy or hard, I am good for my 
 duty." 
 
 " Well," said the other, " dimani" (to-morrow). 
 
 " Dimani" was the answer. 
 
 And so they parted. 
 
 As the younger man walked away, the older 
 sighed. 
 
 " Poor boy !" (he spoke still in Italian), " I was 
 like him too, once. The first drop of blood on 
 a man s hand burns like a coal of fire, and a ghost 
 stands beside it always, blowing upon it to keep 
 it burning. The only relief is more blood. When 
 once he is bathed in blood he burns the same all 
 over, and he knows himself for a devil, and the 
 air of hell feels good to him. All around him 
 are ghosts blowing upon him, and he likes their 
 breath and laughs because he is solid fire and 
 they are like a roaring wind around him. If they 
 would go and leave him to cool he would go all 
 to gray ashes and fall to pieces. He would go 
 crazy and kill himself. Anyhow, I am sorry for 
 this business." 
 
 He rose, and, as he started home, curiosity led 
 him somewhat out of his way to pass the Di 
 
70 
 
 Carlo shop. He walked on the other side of the 
 street. He looked over. 
 
 Pat stood among the children on the banquette, 
 throwing a little one into the air and catching 
 her, while the others stood waiting and begging: 
 
 " Take me, Mr. Pat!" 
 
 " Teresa had four turns." 
 
 " Little Pat always gets the most." 
 
 It was a pretty picture. 
 
 " Well, I m sorry," the man repeated to himself 
 as he passed on. " In the name of God, why can t 
 men keep their tongues? But, anyhow, I am 
 sorry." 
 
 The picture of the amiable man in the bosom 
 of the family of his countryman playing with his 
 children, unconscious of impending evil, remained 
 with the Sicilian as he walked home. Indeed, 
 Pat s offence seemed to him more than half a 
 virtue ; for was it not provoked by his stanch 
 championship of the young Italian girl, Carlotta? 
 
 If only Socola would be made to see it in this 
 light ! 
 
 Before reporting the case, even, this man of 
 the sinister face, who had never before troubled 
 himself with a personal concern for his victims, 
 summoned his best English and wrote a word of 
 warning to the Irishman. 
 
 It ran about like this : 
 
 " MR. ROONEY AT CARLO Di CARLO, This warn 
 you to run for your life. Leaf New Orleans rite 
 
71 
 
 way. It is not in power off man to safe you neith 
 er God if you remane before the eye of Mafia. 
 
 " One man s spite it is whitch marc you to die. 
 If you remaine a nife go throught your heart. It 
 is true. I swear before God." 
 
 When he passed through the shop early Mon 
 day morning on his way home, Pat found this 
 note with another slipped in beneath the edge of 
 the front door. 
 
 The other was shorter, but, as if to add weight 
 and solemnity to its almost affectionate warning, 
 across the top of the sheet were written the words 
 "Jesus, Mary, Joseph." 
 
 Both notes were unsigned. Pat read them hast 
 ily, and, chuckling, as he slipped them into his 
 pocket, started out. 
 
 He had proceeded but a few steps, however, 
 when he suddenly hesitated, took off his hat, 
 scratched his head for a moment, and, turning, 
 went back into the house. 
 
 Five minutes reflection had sufficed to decide 
 him as to what he should do. 
 
 It was two hours later when Pat started out 
 again, and this time he went directly down to the 
 fruit-shop of Pietro Socola, where a most unex 
 pected and festive scene greeted him. 
 
72 
 
 The little old man, surrounded by a dozen or 
 more of his countrymen (and others were coming 
 and going), was opening bottles of wine and drink 
 ing freely. 
 
 As Pat entered, Socola bowed delightedly, and, 
 filling a glass, presented it to him. 
 
 Everybody was laughing and drinking, and the 
 host, although it was yet scarce ten o clock in the 
 morning, showed the effect of many glasses in his 
 flushed face and hilarious spirits. 
 
 Not understanding in the least, but unable to 
 resist so social a spirit, Pat, at the signal, raised 
 the glass to his lips. It was only when some one 
 pronounced the name " Pietro Socola Junio " that 
 the situation flashed upon his comprehension. 
 
 Unto the house of Socola a son had been born. 
 
 The last time Pat had met the old man, a year 
 before, the night of his wedding, he had grasped 
 his hand in congratulation, and he did so again now. 
 
 "Accept me congratulations, Misther Socola," 
 he exclaimed; and, with a twinkle in his eye, rais 
 ing his glass again, "Ileer s luck to the junior 
 partner in the future firrm av Socola an Son. 
 May he niver cross is father an niver boss is 
 mother, an be a shinin example to all is yunger 
 brothers an sisters !" 
 
 Hearty laughter greeted this toast, and the old 
 man insisted on refilling the glasses all round, 
 saying, in Italian, to the men as he did so, " He 
 has come a great distance to wish me joy. Keep 
 his glass full." 
 
73 
 
 Socola was not a heavy drinker, and his voice 
 was already growing unsteady. 
 
 While they stood here, the one-eyed man whom 
 Pat had recognized in the shadow the night be 
 fore joined the group. He winced visibly, Pat 
 thought, on perceiving him in this crowd, and 
 while he and Socola touched glasses, Pat with 
 drew, and, joining some of the men whom he 
 knew, walked out upon the levee. 
 
 When he returned, an hour later, he glanced 
 into Socola s shop. The hitherto childless old 
 man, translated by his tardy honors into a state 
 of gleeful irresponsibility, had by this time got 
 ten right royally drunk, and now some friends 
 were trying to induce him to go home. 
 
 Pat laughed to himself as he saw him stagger 
 up to the carriage door. "Arrah, musha!" he 
 exclaimed, "sure an it s a holy thing to be a 
 father ! Faith an he waddles like a puddle- 
 dthrake on a hatchin day ! I hope the young 
 duck 11 be big enough to crowd murdher out av 
 the ould dthrake s heart, if ut s in ut." 
 
 The truth was, Pat had gone down to Socola to 
 propose that they confess themselves mutually 
 aggrieved, and proceed to settle the matter at 
 once by a square hand-to-hand fist-fight. 
 
 He had withheld the facts about the wedding 
 until Socola had first lied about it. He was will 
 ing to fight for the truth. If Socola wanted to 
 fight for the lie, let him come and " have it out " 
 then and there ; or if the old man preferred to 
 
74 
 
 I 
 
 have a subordinate member of the Mafia to rep 
 resent him in the affair, let him send any one of 
 them to him. 
 
 It was only as a vague intangibility that Pat 
 objected to deal with the Mafia. 
 
 He was sure that as soon as Socola should see 
 that all he demanded was a " fair showing " they 
 could come to a satisfactory understanding: so 
 little did he comprehend the nature of the man 
 with whom he had to deal, or the character of the 
 organization which threatened him. 
 
 As he surmised, Socola had not yet even heard 
 of his offence. The two men who went to make 
 their reports were, like himself, treated to wine, 
 and saw their host carried home hors de combat. 
 
 As Pat hesitated at Socola s door, the one-eyed 
 man was coming out, and they met, face to face. 
 
 Pat touched his hat. The Sicilian responded by 
 a like salutation, and would have passed on, but 
 Pat detained him: 
 
 " Shtop a bit, Misther ; sure, I don t know 
 
 yer name, but whilst no one s by I d like to thank 
 ye for the bit of a love-letther ye sint me last 
 night." 
 
 The man shrugged his shoulders. " Loaf-a-let- 
 ther ?" he asked, with inimitable blandness. " Me, 
 I no write-a northeen." 
 
 "Mebbe ye don t call it a love-letther itself. 
 Now I do think again, I belave it s not a heart 
 wud a dart run through ut for a bookay at the 
 top o the sheet, but a couple o shin-bones for- 
 
75 
 
 ninst a graveyard photograph wud a company 
 shmile on im. But sure what s left out av the 
 crest is indicated in the text. Ye ve hinted purty 
 clear at the piercin o me palpitator at the end o 
 the po m." 
 
 Fumbling in his pocket, he now brought out the 
 two letters. 
 
 "Pity ye cudn t get ould Socola to set for a 
 Cupid aimin wud his bow an arrer at me hearrt. 
 Ye see, Irish litherature is different ag in from 
 Jtalian. Sure an if a bunch o Paddies wint into 
 the tinder correspondence like this, like as not 
 they d have me in a picture, peg an all, shlapin 
 in the heart av a rose, like they do be in Hoyt s 
 Gerrman Cologne advertizemints, an mebbe a 
 bumble-bee wud ould Socola s face on im threat- 
 enin the unconscious shlaper wud wan av his reg 
 ular breech-loaders ! Ye see, it d be a bit cheer 
 ful, but aqually to the point. Sure there s no life 
 nor joy in a bare shin-bone, lest ye d have it 
 raised like a fearless sprig o shillelah." 
 
 By this time he had opened both letters. 
 
 "Now," he continued, " droth an I don t know 
 which o these two shtate dokimints ye sint me, 
 or whether ye re wan o thim scriptural chaps that 
 kapes yer right hand in ignorance o the thricks 
 o the left, an yer two hands unbeknowinst to 
 wan anither have sint me a frindly warrnin ; 
 but r a ly and truly I m very much obliged 
 to ye." 
 
 Pat had given him no chance to reply, but now 
 
he saw that the Italian s attitude was one of pro 
 test. 
 
 "Know northeeh bouth," he was saying, 
 gently. 
 
 " Whut! D ye mane to say ye niver sint me 
 nayther wan o dthese letthers ?" 
 
 "Know northeen bouth," he repeated, with an 
 apathy of manner that was almost convincing. 
 
 Pat scratched his head. 
 
 "Mary Ann s mother-in-law!" he exclaimed, 
 and, after a pause : 
 
 " Thin who in the name o Donnybrook Fair 
 done ut ? Ye re the only mon who cud write ut. 
 Sure none o thim chaps last night knowed north- 
 in about the throuble at Socola s marriage till I 
 towld ut, an faith ye re the only mon there that 
 knowed I shpoke the truth." 
 
 The old man shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Me, I no know f ees-a thrue." 
 
 This was too much. 
 
 " Don t know if ut s thrue ! The divil ye don t! 
 An didn t ye come the night o the marriage an 
 explain to me, worrd for worrd, the way Socola 
 put the Mafia currse on him that d tell ?" 
 
 The Sicilian smiled. "Me, I know northeen 
 bouth-a Signor Socola northeen bouth-a Mafia 
 northeen bouth-a northeen!" 
 
 "An ye weren t at the Di Carlos this night 
 twelvemonth past ?" 
 
 " Scuza me, my frien , f you please. M in-a 
 gread-a hoary. Me, m-a allawa fo business." 
 
77 
 
 He hesitated here, and, looking round cautious 
 ly, lowered his voice as he took Pat s hand. 
 
 " Tell-a you thrue," he said, with a nearer ap 
 proach to animation than he had yet shown 
 " tell-a you thrue, f I was-a ged a ledther ligue 
 thad, me, I would-a theng God I haf time run quig 
 hide-a myselve. Well goo -by ! Hofe-a you good 
 lug." And he turned away. 
 
 A sudden light came into the Irishman s face. 
 
 " Howld on a bit!" he exclaimed. " Howld on 
 
 a bit ! I ve a purrty thick shkull on me, but 
 
 I do begin to see the dthrift f yer iloquence. 
 Plaze to presint me complimints to the gintleman 
 that sint me the letthers, if ye do chance to run 
 aground av im on the boulevards, an tell im III 
 not run, nor hide nayther /" 
 
 Gathering emphasis here by a moment s si 
 lence, he leaned forward and looked the Sicilian 
 squarely in the eye. 
 
 " There s a bit av a song we do sing in the ould 
 counthry. Perchance ye ve niver heerd ut, but 
 I m that interested in the cultivation av yer mind 
 I ll tell ut out to ye partly: 
 
 " S int Patthrick was a gintleman, 
 
 And kem av dacent people ; 
 He built a church in Dublin town 
 
 An on ut put a shteeple. 
 His father was a Gallagher, 
 
 His mother was a Brady, 
 His aunt was an O Shaughnessy, 
 
 His uncle was O Grady. 
 
78 
 
 So success attind S int Patthrick s fist, 
 
 For he was a saint so clever 
 Oh, he gave t/te shnakes and toads a twist 
 
 That bothered thim forever. 
 
 " Ye see, that s a beautiful po m, Misther Mis- 
 ther Know-northin , wud solud Irish sintimints, 
 an the whole moral law jellied down into shtand- 
 in -shape in the chorus." 
 
 He moved backwards a step here, and touched 
 his own breast as he continued: 
 
 "The umble perrson ye do see before ye is a 
 fractional descindant along th bein a namesake 
 o the gintleman, S int Patthrick himself, an , up 
 to the prisent moment, sure success has always at- 
 tinded his fist ! We re av a pedigree that has no 
 use for toads norr shnakes, norr onything toadyin 
 norr shnakin beyant givin thim a twist 
 that ll bother thim forever. Sure I kem down 
 this morrnin with the onerable intintion o 
 latherin/ the bit av a varmint, Socola, wud 
 me fist, but the wave o prosperity or pos 
 terity, whichever ye like lifted him beyant 
 me entirely. But Fll be down again, plaze 
 God, in a couple o days, wud S int Patthrick s 
 weapon !" 
 
 He held up his clenched fist. " And now," he 
 added, extending his hand, "I do wish ye good- 
 day!" 
 
 The Sicilian stood and looked after him a mo 
 ment in bewilderment, and then he said some 
 thing, presumably in Anglo - Italian ; at least, it 
 
79 
 
 sounded like " Damfoo , " a word not found in 
 English print. 
 
 By a strange coincidence, Pat said the same 
 word as he turned the corner. He had picked up 
 a good deal of the colloquial patois of these peo 
 ple. 
 
 When Socola returned to his shop on the next 
 day, a little withered grotesque impersonation of 
 bilious pomposity, his inner consciousness never 
 theless corresponded to his own best ideal of a 
 noble, dignified, and tender father. 
 
 Indeed, he felt father to all the world, except 
 ing, of course, the dear woman to whom he was 
 husband ; and this exception was as distinct and 
 as tender and sensitive as only this particularly 
 potent occasion could make it. 
 
 He had hitherto known nothing so exquisitely 
 refined as the almost reverential tenderness with 
 which his intensely masculine heart went out to 
 the sallow little mother and the tiny yellow man- 
 child who lay upon her breast to-day. The com 
 bination was something to live for, to fight for, to 
 die for almost. 
 
 And Pat s offence was against this embodiment 
 of sacredness this woman this infant. 
 
 The accidental wife the incidental babe ! How 
 the thought would cheapen the sacred possessions 
 in the vulgar mind ! To Socola himself, when it 
 all dimly recurred to him, it seemed almost a dream 
 which he no longer more than half believed. If 
 he were choosing again, he could choose no other 
 
80 
 
 woman of all the world ; and surely he would have 
 no other babe than this ! 
 
 When the two men, the one with the blind eye 
 and the other, came together in the shop on this 
 second day and gave to Socola, separately, as op 
 portunity offered, the sign of the Mafia, it was a 
 signal to withdraw hastily with them into his pri 
 vate office. 
 
 A subordinate gives the summons to his chief 
 only when a communication of importance is pend 
 ing. 
 
 When he returned to the shop, an hour later, the 
 old man was still blue about the lips, and his hands 
 trembled as he swore promiscuous oaths indis 
 criminately at the employes of the shop for im 
 aginary offences. 
 
 The two men had gone silently together out of 
 the side door with their heads down. 
 
 Although Pat was restless in view of an im 
 pending row and eager to have it over, gaug 
 ing the probable duration of an Italian s spree 
 by the Hibernian standard, he did not think it 
 worth while to return to the city for several 
 days. 
 
 The gentleman from Palermo had in the mean 
 time had much time for sober reflection. He had, 
 of course, heard of Pat s projected visit, and was 
 ready for him with an extended hand. 
 
 Indeed, no crafty diplomat ever confounded an 
 adversary with a more gracious and smiling suav 
 ity than that with which he greeted and disarmed 
 
his ingenuous guest when, on the Thursday fol 
 lowing, Pat re-entered his shop. 
 
 Socola s English vocabulary, at best a matter of 
 a few hundred words, seemed to-day to have 
 shrunken until it was less only than his compre 
 hension. 
 
 He failed utterly to understand that there could 
 be anything disagreeable in his visitor s mission. 
 
 The interview, a ludicrous pantomimic affair 
 throughout, ended by a mutual hand-shaking con 
 fession of friendly feeling, and Pat went away en 
 tirely satisfied that either a mistake had been 
 made, the Sicilian had forgotten his oath, or the 
 coming of the babe had indeed crowded murder 
 out of the father s heart. 
 
 He had personally no longer a quarrel with the 
 old man. He had refuted the lie, and was simply 
 willing to stand by the refutation. 
 
 If he had glanced backwards as he left the shop 
 and seen the menacing scowl that followed his re 
 ceding figure, he would perhaps have understood. 
 
 From Socola s presence he went up "home," to 
 the Di Carlos . Here, to his dismay, two more 
 notes of solemn warning awaited him. 
 
 Both were unsealed. Indeed, they were written 
 on unfolded scraps of paper, and were found 
 slipped in beneath the door, just as the first had 
 been. 
 
 When the signora had called Pat into an inner 
 room, she closed the door arid turned gray with 
 pallor as she handed them to him. 
 
82 
 
 Her fear of the law, of death, of purgatory, of 
 hell, was vague and as nothing to her terror of 
 the vengeance of the Mafia. None of her family 
 were members of the dread organization, but she 
 remembered only too vividly how the husband of 
 her first-cousin had years ago received just such 
 a warning as this, and one day he had gone as 
 usual to his work and had never come home 
 again. 
 
 Ever since she had had the letters in her pos 
 session she had felt as if the angel of death were 
 hovering over the house. 
 
 As she stood at Pat s side and saw him read the 
 words of warning she began to cry. 
 
 "Fo God sague, Meester Pad, wad you ees-a 
 been do ?" she moaned. 
 
 Pat laughed. 
 
 "Well, ma am," said he, "at the present mo 
 ment I m jist afther a second visit to yer yung 
 frind, Socola. We re that thick ye d think we 
 were twins or thriplets mebbe, an I was two an 
 he only wan the way he does bow an schrape 
 right an left to me." 
 
 " Socola !" 
 
 If Pat had said he had just returned from a 
 visit to his Satanic majesty, she would not have 
 been much more startled. " Socola ! You ees-a 
 been see Socola ! Fo God sague, how you ees-a 
 fin J im?" 
 
 " Find im ! Faith an he s as well as cud be ex 
 pected afther havin a fine b y a-Sunda night. Ye 
 
83 
 
 see, it does be very dangerous whin a firrst b y is 
 borrn to an ould man. It does fly to his head an 
 set im ravin crazy. I b lave the docthers do call 
 it puerile f aver. Did ye niver heer av ut ?" 
 
 The woman was too much concerned even to 
 realize that he was jesting. 
 
 " Wad e sayce to you ?" she asked, eagerly. 
 
 "Sure an he sez he wants to name the yung- 
 sther af ther me ; but I m that proud I won t allow 
 ut. Ye see, the shtyle av beauty in the Rooney 
 family has been preserrved through thick an thin 
 wud great pains, an I d niver consint to take a 
 risk on Socola s f atures, wud no promise av relafe 
 from her loyal accidency the madam. Ye see, a 
 proud man must protect his name as well as his 
 fame." 
 
 This bantering, really only a ruse to gain time 
 to reflect a little on the situation, was becoming 
 very trying to the signora. Pat became suddenly 
 conscious that there were genuine tears in her 
 eyes. 
 
 " Niver mind, now, niver mind," he said, with 
 real feeling. " Don t fret yersilf because a couple 
 o cranks do sind me a valentine. Faith, there s 
 northin in ut, but mebbe a thrick o the shoe 
 thrade to dthrive me out o the competition." 
 
 He then briefly reviewed his two visits to the 
 old Sicilian, omitting the occasion of his going, 
 and laying special stress on all the pleasant feat 
 ures of their meetings. 
 
 But she was not to be so easily appeased. She 
 
84 
 
 lowered her voice almost to a whisper when she 
 spoke again : 
 
 " Tell-a you thrue, Meester Pad, me an Carlo 
 ees-a been hear sornetheen." 
 
 "Heerd something, did ye? An what was ut?" 
 
 " Plenny young mans ees-a tell me an Carlo 
 you ees-a say sometheen boud-a C lotta an Signer 
 Socola. All-a peoples ees-a talkin boud." 
 
 " They are, are they ? An whut if I did ? An 
 whut did ye say ?" 
 
 "Me ? Of-a coze I sayce ees-a no true : Socola 
 ees-a neva was-a lova-a C lotta." 
 
 " Ye did, did ye ? An whut did er father say?" 
 
 "Carlo sayce you ees-a just a mague-a lill fun ; 
 2 no true" 
 
 Pat scratched his head. " An betune the two 
 av yez ye ve made me out a bloomin liur, now 
 haven t yez?" 
 
 " F I mague you oud a lie, I mague you just-a 
 pardner fo myselve. Fo God sague, lis n ad me, 
 Meester Pad. Z no time fo talk boud lie. Z-a 
 time fo business. You muz-a go just-a so quig as 
 you can-a go an tell all-a doze young mans you 
 was-a just-a play n ." 
 
 Even the strong friendship evinced by her in 
 tense anxiety failed to palliate the affront of her 
 proposition in Pat s eyes. He looked at her, bit 
 his lip, and, without a word, turned on his heel 
 and left her. 
 
 As he passed out the door the sound of a sob 
 reached his ear. He was back in a moment. 
 
85 
 
 " Fo the love o shad, ma am, don t dorttfret. 
 Niver mind, now, I tell ye. If ye cry anither dthrop 
 I ll howl out a high tenor mesilf to match ye. Sure 
 it 11 be all right now, I ll promise ye. I ll shtep 
 out by-an -by till I do find the crowd, an I ll make 
 a bit av a spache that 11 silence thim, an they ll 
 niver lay a hand on me. I ll promise ye that. 
 Come on out, now." 
 
 " Tell m ees-a no true, Meester Pad. Say you 
 was just-a mague fun. An anyhow, I b lief ees-a 
 bedder you go way." 
 
 She sobbed again. 
 
 " Well, I declare, ma am, I m that ashamed av 
 ye ! Ye re f rettin yersilf about northin an 
 Socola an me like two peas, a green wan an a 
 dthry wan, in wan pod. Come on out, now. Sure 
 the crowd around the shteps are all half ashlape, 
 an they ll have no fun till ye do come an wake 
 thim up wud a good laugh. Come, now. The 
 royal consorrt an all yer majesty s loyal subjects 
 11 not dare open parliamint till the queen does 
 arrive." 
 
 With a comical bobbing courtesy he made way 
 for her to pass out. Sniffling and wiping her eyes, 
 she escaped to her own room for a moment, but it 
 was not long before she joined the circle on the 
 banquette. 
 
 It was a sultry summer afternoon, and the scene 
 about the doors was drowsy enough indeed. The 
 little father Di Carlo nodded on his barrel. The 
 baby, a mosquito-netting stretched over her face, 
 
lay sleeping in her willow cradle at his side. Sev 
 eral men lounged on the benches, talking lazily in 
 Italian, and fighting the flies with their red cotton 
 kerchiefs. 
 
 Within the shop the boy Pasquale stood lan 
 guidly opening oysters for a black girl, who, lean 
 ing with half her tall length spread over the 
 counter, indolently chewed a cud of gum as she 
 waited with bovine patience while her bucket was 
 slowly filling. 
 
 Half-way down the block a chattering group of 
 neighborhood children, among whom was a gen 
 erous sprinkling of Di Carlos, were playing in the 
 doubtful shade of a tallow -tree. Some sat with 
 their laps piled high with china blossoms, which 
 they strung on threads into fragrant purple neck 
 laces. A pair of girls played "jack-stones" on 
 the fronts of their dress -skirts lapped one over 
 the other on the ground, while others, arm in arm, 
 promenaded up and down, shading themselves, 
 after the fashion of Paul and Virginia, with tall 
 green banana leaves, purloined from over a neigh 
 boring fence. 
 
 Somewhat apart from the other children, and 
 nearer the shop, two taller girls sat crocheting 
 cotton lace, while their toddling charges slept at 
 their sides. 
 
 Pat, whose seat commanded a view of them, was 
 not long in discovering that the smaller of these 
 two was Carlotta, and, while he passed idly from 
 one subject to another, challenging conversation at 
 
87 
 
 random with his drowsy company, he delighted to 
 watch her as the oblique rays of the sun revealed 
 her each moment more clearly to him. 
 
 "Five times thim two childer have dropped 
 their nadles to measure their lace, or fringe, or 
 whativer ye call it," he said, presently, laughing. 
 "Sure I m goin to watch thim now, an the sev 
 enth time they do measure ut I ll up an be off. 
 I ve a call to make a spache to some o me con 
 stituents, an I must hunt thim up. I do fale as 
 lazy as the fly on the banana here at me elbow. 
 See him walk like a bug from wan black ind to 
 take a sup at the ither, too lazy to raise his wings 
 an fly. There they go again, the childer, God 
 bless thim ! measurin again ! Six times in forrty 
 minutes. Sure they ve harrdly time to put a tuck 
 in ut betune the two measures." 
 
 The signora laughed heartily. "Lis n ad -a 
 Meester Pad ! Pood a tug in -a lace ! I swea 
 you would-a mague a dead dog laugh." 
 
 Her laughter did Pat good. " Sure a tuck or a 
 him are all wan to a tailor in leather," he replied, 
 unconsciously coming into the domain of Carlyle s 
 thought. 
 
 " But tell me, ma am," he continued, " how do 
 ye ladies him fringes, ony way ? I cudn t f orr the 
 life av me him a fringe, nor scallop it nayther." 
 
 She screamed with laughter now. " My God ! 
 Hem a fringe ! Nobody can-a hem a fringe." 
 
 " Is that so ? An d ye fringe the hims ? I m 
 not jokin . Faith I niver so much as fringed a 
 
88 
 
 scallop in me life, let alone a him. Tell me, now, 
 <T yez dthraw threads, orr dthrop stitches, or puck 
 er it on the bias ? Och, there now ! I must go ! 
 the two girrls beyant are measurin their scallops 
 again. Well, so long, ma am ! I ll be back in the 
 autumn, plaze God, whin the Paves begin to 
 fall. " 
 
 She was laughing so that she could not speak 
 when Pat rose to go. 
 
 " Since ye do insist upon ut," he added, as he 
 turned away, "I b lave I ll change me summer 
 plans an come back be supper-time. Put an ex- 
 thra sup av coffee in the dthripper, plaze, an 
 dthrop the name av Rooney promiscuously in the 
 pots." 
 
 " All -a righd! Muz-a be shore, shore come to 
 supper. Prormus you sometheen good." 
 
 This was a thing Pat rarely did; and she was 
 delighted. Even had she not known that he 
 would come in laden with paper bags full of good 
 things to add to the supper-table, she would have 
 been just as glad to set his plate in between little 
 Pat s and Carlotta s. 
 
 Pat had no trouble in finding the " constitu 
 ents " whom he wanted to meet. He knew that 
 at this hour certain Italians would be sure to con 
 gregate at their favorite rendezvous, a coffee 
 house near the levee. He was glad to find Tra- 
 monetti, and others who were present on the form 
 er occasion, already there. 
 
 It took but a few moments to repeat his former 
 
account of the Socola wedding, which he colored 
 with new drolleries in the narration, and to add 
 and this was the object of his visit the item 
 carelessly omitted before viz., Socola s threat 
 that the Mafia would avenge a betrayal of the 
 affair. 
 
 This, he carefully explained, was the reason his 
 good friends the Di Carlos had felt constrained 
 to deny it. They were afraid of the Mafia. They 
 couldn t understand how he and Socola under 
 stood each other perfectly now, and, after all, it 
 was a small matter whether Socola had been jilted 
 or not : who cared ? It was a thing of the past. 
 For himself, he only mentioned it again to prove 
 that he hadn t lied before. The whole business 
 was, he finally declared, "a timpest in a tay-pot," 
 and the sooner forgotten the better. He ended 
 by begging them not to "worry the madam" 
 by saying anything more about it at the Di 
 Carlos . 
 
 " Sure the madam s been wapin an wailin for 
 feer I ll be kilt entirely. She thinks I m out this 
 minute tellin ye all I was jokin an thryin to 
 back out av the whole shtatemint. Sure I d back 
 out in a minute if I knowed a back-shtep ; but 
 when I tuck dancin - lessons in Paris whin I was 
 a yungshter, I niver learrned the craw-fish move 
 ment, an faith it s too late in life now to dthrag 
 me wooden peg into a new figure. There s but 
 three-quarrters av me left, onyhow, but it s three- 
 quarrters av a man s shape, praise God, an I ll 
 
90 
 
 not disgrace the fraction, for the likeness it does 
 bear me mother, God rest her." 
 
 The crowd were rather still and subdued for 
 some time after Pat left them. 
 
 " I m sorry I ever opened my lips about Socola s 
 business," said one, finally, in Italian; "but, any 
 how, I told where I heard it." 
 
 " I never said anything to anybody," said an 
 other, u and I m glad. I don t want any of his 
 flock of vampires following me in the dark." 
 
 " But I d hate to be in that Irishman s shoes !" 
 
 " In his one shoe, you mean. And me too. So 
 would I." 
 
 VI 
 
 For several months after this things seemed to 
 drift along as usual. 
 
 Pat s prosperity, already assured though plod 
 ding, had been unexpectedly accelerated by the 
 sudden death of his partner, whose widow had 
 preferred a settlement in cash to the possible risk 
 of an investment subject to the vicissitudes of 
 trade. This left Pat in sole possession of a prom 
 ising little business, and he was doing well. 
 
 He still went " home " nearly every Sunday ; 
 and, as Carlotta had of late been especially kind 
 to him, he began to feel that the materialization of 
 his hopes was not far distant. 
 
 The youth Rubino still hung about the shop 
 
!M 
 
 with his accordion, and once Pat had found him 
 and Carlotta out walking together when he came 
 on Sunday afternoon. He said to himself that it 
 was all right for her to be happy in her own 
 youthful way, and he tried to feel glad. Indeed, 
 if he were not wholly so at the time, her hearty 
 greeting when she came home in a little while 
 made him forget it all. 
 
 So the winter passed a second since the Socola 
 affair. In a month Carlotta would pass her eigh- 
 teenth birthday. Things were coming very close. 
 
 Pat feared no opposition from the Di Carlo 
 parents. Indeed, the signora, in her relation of 
 unconscious mother-in-law elect, was a joy to his 
 Irish heart. She had evidently no suspicion of 
 the truth, and, in face of Pat s blossoming out 
 into a successful gentleman, had been unable to 
 refrain from throwing out occasional hints recall 
 ing his early fancy for Carlotta. And Pat, the 
 while laughing in his sleeve, kept her in continual 
 suspense by hinting at other possible alliances, 
 as when he said : 
 
 "Sure an I wush ye cud see the widdy 
 Schmidt, how purrty an yimg she is since the 
 ould man s gone. Troth an ye may heer any day 
 av an elopemint in high life. Sure I tould er we 
 betther wait till the Berrmuda is firrmly rooted 
 on the ould gintleman s grave God rist im ! 
 an wu d ye bel ave? she does northin but 
 shprinkle it wud a watherin -pot since." 
 
 *< Oh-h-h, z-a shame f o you, Meester Pad, talk 
 
92 
 
 like thad ! Can get plenny pritty young-a woma 1 
 yed." 
 
 " I ve not fully made up me mind yet, ma am, 
 sure, till I do see wull she turrn back all the cap 
 ital she dthrew out av the thrade an promise me 
 a day off once a wake from cinnamon-cake till I 
 do fale me pulse an starrt fresh." 
 
 It was no wonder the signora missed Pat out of 
 her daily life. He made so much fun. Was it 
 strange she wanted to secure him ? 
 
 It was at last Carlotta s birthday. Pat had 
 come to town rather earlier than usual, intend 
 ing to take her alone for the first time out 
 for a ride. They would go up to the Carrollton 
 Garden and sit on one of the little benches to 
 gether under a tree ; and when they came home 
 they would tell " the madam " and ask her bless 
 ing. 
 
 He knew just the funny things he would say as 
 he would present the little bald spot on his head 
 for her maternal blessing. And then they would 
 have to tell or rather to ask the father. He 
 scratched his head a little nervously at this thought, 
 and wished the ordeal were over ; yet he would 
 get through somehow, and "carry it off" with 
 whatever inspiration the moment should bring. 
 
 He was dressed in his very best, and would have 
 given much to wear his artificial leg for the occa 
 sion. He would have liked to appear as a whole 
 man walking at her side to-night. 
 
 It was just merging into twilight when he ap- 
 
93 
 
 preached the shop, and the family sat, as usual, 
 about the doors. 
 
 " An 1 where s Lottie ?" he asked, as he joined 
 the circle. 
 
 He had never called for her in this way before, 
 but he was too near the edge of things to-night 
 to think or to care. 
 
 " C lotta ees-a just now gone oud-a walk weeth 
 Giuseppe Rubino. Sid down, Meester Pad." And 
 the signora lifted her foot from the rung of a 
 stool and pushed it towards him. 
 
 He sat down, but he was uneasy. 
 
 After a little while, during which, the signora 
 afterwards said, he had never been more lively or 
 witty, he rose and left them. 
 
 For the last three Saturday evenings Carlotta 
 had been out with Giuseppe when he came, but he 
 had tried not to think seriously of it. But to 
 night ! Had she not remembered ? Did she not 
 realize that to-day meant much to him and to 
 her ? He would pass the hour until he should be 
 sure to find her at home in his favorite retreat on 
 the river-bank, alone. There would be no demand 
 upon him here, and he could get himself together 
 again ; for he was keenly hurt. 
 
 As he left the Di Carlos , he could not see that 
 two men Sicilians they were who stood to 
 gether in the shadow of the wall across the way, 
 moved slowly after him until he stopped the car, 
 when, quickening their paces, they also jumped 
 aboard, one seating himself within, while the 
 
94 
 
 other passed out to the platform with the driver. 
 Neither could he know when he crossed the wharf 
 that these two men watched and by separate routes 
 followed him at a distance as he disappeared 
 among the shadows between the. piles of freight 
 along the pier. 
 
 The river was high, and when he reached his 
 accustomed seat the floating wharf which was 
 chained to the heavy timbers attracted him. He 
 had never been down here, but a pair of hanging 
 steps invited the folly of his descent to-night, and 
 he had soon hobbled down and seated himself on 
 the inner edge of the raft, and thus within the 
 shadow of the pier above. It pleased his mood to 
 get thus near the turbulent, restless waters for a 
 while. 
 
 To sit in a little black shadow while he waited 
 for Carlotta to come home with Giuseppe suited 
 him to-night ; while the booming, swelling, resist 
 less river which lifted him upon its bosom and 
 seemed threatening to submerge everything was 
 typical of his love. 
 
 His thoughts had hardly begun to cool and 
 shape themselves when, first vaguely, as at a dis 
 tance, and now nearer, clearer, came the sound of 
 an accordion. 
 
 On summer evenings, almost anywhere along 
 the river-bank one may expect to find a sprink 
 ling of accordion-players usually German kitch 
 en-courtships out for an airing and there should 
 have been nothing very startling in the sound ; 
 
95 
 
 yet its first note made the Irishman s heart stand 
 still. He knew the most distant reach of Giu 
 seppe s accordion. It had come out to meet him 
 too often in the evenings for him to mistake it now. 
 It was coming very near, and soon he began to 
 hear voices Carlotta s and the youth s. They 
 were sitting down on the wharf just above his 
 head. Broken snatches of tunes proved that 
 Giuseppe was toying thoughtlessly with his in 
 strument, and while he played he was earnestly 
 talking. Soon the music stopped altogether, the 
 voice fell lower, more serious, more indistinct. It 
 seemed to Pat that the boy talked for an age; but 
 he could distinguish nothing. 
 
 But presently Carlotta spoke, clearly : 
 
 " No, no, Giuseppe. Hush ! I can t lis n at 
 you !" 
 
 Then again Giuseppe muttered in a tone indis 
 tinct as to words, but full of pleading. 
 
 And now Carlotta again : 
 
 "Hush, I say, Giuseppe ! I mus rit lis n at you! 
 I wish I was dead ! I hate you ! I hate myself ! 
 I hate your music ! I hate everything ! Before 
 you came, I was satisfied. Everything was prom 
 ise good,, an I never knowed no better. Now, 
 when I put my finger in my ears, I hear you sing 
 I hear that music. Oh, I hate it all ! To-night 
 I ought to be home, and I am here with you al 
 ways with you." 
 
 He spoke more clearly now in Italian : " But 
 why do you speak so, Carlotta? It is not true 
 
96 
 
 that you hate me. You love me I know it, I 
 feel it. Since first I saw you, I knew we were for 
 each other." 
 
 " But no, Giuseppe. Hush, I say ! I can t be 
 for you. Since two years I am promised. My 
 word is passed." 
 
 "And who is it that holds a child by her word 
 when she loves him not?" 
 
 " Oh, hush, Giuseppe ! He don t hold me. I 
 hold myself. He is the best man in all the world. 
 He loves me more than even my maw. Since I 
 was so big he loved me and I loved him good ; 
 but since you came I am not the same. I am not 
 fit. I run away with you, and then when I see 
 him I am sorry, and speak kind with him, but all 
 the time I see you. He trusts me, Giuseppe, same 
 like I trust the blessed Mother he even put my 
 name by her name once and you have all broken 
 me hearted, Giuseppe, an made me turn away 
 from him. I wish I was dead ! and you ! and 
 him !" 
 
 There were tears in her voice. 
 
 " But listen, Carlotta. You don t understand. 
 Nothing is true but love. Everything else conies 
 after promises, mistakes, all everything ! Love 
 is from God Almighty. He never sends love like 
 mine but he sends the answer too. For two 
 months I have read my answer in your eyes, and 
 was satisfied ; but it was sweet to wait, to sing, to 
 play, to laugh all around it, making believe I was 
 not sure. But I am sure. You are mine!" 
 
97 
 
 " Oh, but no, no, no, Guiseppe ! I am not for 
 you. If I was that mean, God would never bless 
 me nor you. It would be a curse. You cannot 
 understand." 
 
 " Who is this coward who holds you ?" 
 " But hush ! He is no coward, Giuseppe. Me, 
 I am a coward but not him. It was me what 
 made him speak love. You talk about God ! For 
 what does God let us make mistakes ! How can 
 we be sure? I was crazy for him, and in my 
 heart I felt sure sure it was love, and I told him, 
 Giuseppe. I made him to love me. And now 
 if only you go away, Giuseppe ! If you love me 
 true, go, and let me have peace and not trouble. 
 Go far, and let me forget the sound of your mu 
 sic let me forget your eyes let me not see your 
 shape in the air which way I turn. Then it will 
 all pass away, and I will be like before. I love 
 him good, Giuseppe. I am not a liar. Only now 
 I am like in a dream, and in my dream I see 
 only you. Now I see, I know, what you meant, 
 Giuseppe, when you said in your sleep I stood 
 before you. But soon I will wake. I will see 
 his kind eyes, and it will pass. He will never 
 know." 
 
 " And who is this man for whom you put me 
 away ?" 
 
 " It is time enough, Giuseppe ; but better if 
 you never know him. Go far away." 
 
 " I go not away without you, Carlotta. Every 
 day I will come till I get you. I will walk by your 
 
98 
 
 side before this man, and when he looks at us he 
 will see he is a fool." 
 
 " I walk with you no more, Giuseppe. To-night 
 finishes. Come, let us go. I heard a noise, and 
 just now over there a shadow moved. I am afraid. 
 Come." 
 
 As they rose to go, the accordion, which Giu 
 seppe grasped hastily in rising, opening by its 
 own weight, sent out an attenuated discordant 
 wail. And to Pat, sitting alone in the shadow be 
 neath, it sounded like a weird Banshee s shriek 
 coming from far over the seas. 
 
 The tender tremor in Carlotta s voice when first 
 she spoke Giuseppe s name had struck his heart 
 like a death-knell, and the words which followed 
 were but as clods falling upon a coffin. The girl s 
 loyalty through it all seemed to mock him like a 
 hymn at a grave. It was as the silver sheen upon 
 the silken fabric of a shroud the smile upon the 
 face of death. 
 
 For a long time after they had gone the heavy 
 timbers about him were not more still than he. 
 
 Once he thought he heard soft steps above him. 
 If he had risen, he might have seen two dark fig 
 ures peering stealthily about as if looking for 
 some one. They might have been assassins in 
 ambush. 
 
 But Pat did not even glance upward. 
 
 Can any one, by simply imagining, be sure he 
 half understands how this man felt ? or must he 
 have passed through the shades of a like sorrow 
 
99 
 
 to know its black, bleak depths and the hopeless 
 ness of it ? 
 
 His first movement was to cast his eyes about 
 him upon the water. It was all around him so 
 near go inviting. It seemed almost to call him. 
 It would have been so easy, from where he sat, 
 just to lean over and over, like Maupassant s little 
 blue-and-red soldier, as if he were trying to drink. 
 There would be only a few bubbles fit emblems 
 of his life and its story and so it would end. 
 
 Had he not promised her his grave whenever it 
 would be a safe bridge over her troubles ? The 
 time had come. Or had it come? Would the 
 plunge be for her sake or his own? Was he, 
 after all, a coward he who had never run from 
 a foe in his life who had even fought and van 
 quished his potheen with a flask in his pocket? 
 
 Distinct rapid footsteps above startled him, and 
 he raised his eyes. As he did so, a bundle fell at 
 his side into the water, and the steps retreated. 
 
 He seemed to see a struggle as the dark object 
 twisted for a second within the rings of the eddy 
 that swallowed it down; but he could not be sure. 
 In a moment, however, he heard, quite near, the 
 thin, wiry cry of a young kitten. He looked about 
 him and above, but could see nothing of it, though 
 the sound came again and again. Finally, how 
 ever, a desperate wail located the sufferer. 
 
 On the outside of the heavy timbers, caught 
 in its fall by a protruding splinter or spike, the 
 wretched little creature hung suspended, its own 
 
100 
 
 weight and struggles imprisoning it more securely 
 each moment within the notch. 
 
 The struggling contents of the whirling bundle 
 were explained. This little unfortunate had slipped 
 out of the open bag in its fall, to perish high and 
 dry in the night wind, or to be scorched by the 
 sun should it survive the night. 
 
 Pat regarded the writhing little form a moment 
 only. 
 
 "Sure we re in the same boat, kitty, you an 
 me," he said, aloud ; " we re wan too many in a 
 crowded worrld. But, plaze God, I ll give ye the 
 same chance I ll take meself in the name o Him 
 that shaped the two av us." 
 
 With this, seizing the fragment of a broken oar, 
 he swung himself outside the timbers. 
 
 At the sound of his voice two black shadows 
 rushed noiselessly across the wharf, and, quickly 
 reaching the edge, peered over. 
 
 What they saw was only a whining young kit 
 ten crawling feebly along the raft. 
 
 The upward reach with the oar which liberated 
 the little beast and sent him back to life had 
 thrown his deliverer accidentally backward. The 
 grip of his one leg about the post had served only 
 to let him down, down, gently, noiselessly, into the 
 eddying current, which sucked him under the raft 
 without even a twirl or a twist. There was not 
 so much as a gurgle of the waters as he sank. 
 
 The black figures waited a long time, lying on 
 their faces and listening, and two stilettos were 
 
101* 
 
 drawn and ready. When the voice should speak 
 again, they would do their work quickly; for the 
 emissaries of the Mafia are wont to use despatch. 
 
 It was past midnight, and the moon was rising, 
 when at last, despairing and mystified, they sep 
 arated reluctantly, and by different routes went 
 to report another failure to old Pietro Socola, 
 their chief. 
 
 The Di Carlos wondered with great anxiety 
 why Pat did not come home, and all during the 
 night the signora started at every sound, fancy 
 ing she heard his wooden peg ascending the 
 stairs. 
 
 It was on the second day afterwards when a boy 
 in the shop read from the daily paper that the 
 body of a one-legged man had been washed up 
 against a coal-barge floating in the river near 
 Canal Street. 
 
 The father Di Carlo went immediately to in 
 vestigate the matter, and when he came home an 
 hour later, and the family gathered about him, 
 anxious to hear the news, he only shook his head 
 sadly, and, taking from his handkerchief an old 
 red baby shoe, he said, "It was in his inside 
 pocket." 
 
 Customers who came in at the time, and people 
 passing by, thought from their distress that a 
 member of the family was dead. 
 
 Carlotta, trembling and white as marble, went 
 away alone. 
 
 An investigation of Pat s affairs and effects dis- 
 
102 
 
 closed a will, made some years before, bequeath 
 ing to Carlotta all his worldly goods. 
 
 A large proportion of this which proved quite 
 a neat competence she expended, despite her 
 mother s frugal protest that it could do him no 
 good, in a handsome marble shaft to his memory. 
 In its unique inscription, which was of her own 
 dictation, she sought to make some sort of repa 
 ration for the sin of which she accused herself. 
 
 The monument still stands in the corner of St. 
 Patrick s Cemetery, and reads: 
 
 IN MEMORY 
 OF 
 
 Patrick Hooneji, 
 
 INTEND OF CARLOTTA Dl CARLO, 
 AGE, 42 YEARS. 
 
 And on any All - Saints Day, Carlotta and Giu 
 seppe, with their flock of beautiful children, may 
 be seen to stop there for a while, leaving a bou 
 quet of plush -topped coxcombs and a cross of 
 white chrysanthemums. 
 
 THE END 
 

 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
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 expiration of loan period. 
 
GENERAL LIBRARY -U.C. BERKELEY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY