The St. Louis Republic. [volume] (St. Louis, Mo.) 1888-1919, 1903-01-04

themselves from their horses and made for
his serious gray eyes. Bring him up here.
Michael"
Michael abandoned his efforts to kick the
gray horses forelegs into a becoming posi-
ton and led him up to me.
1 regarded him from under my umbrella
with a quite unreasonable disfavor.
He had the dreadful beauty of a horse in
a toy shop. as chubby, as wooden and as
conscientiously dappled, but it was unrca-
sonable to urge this as an objection.
Yielding to circumstance, / threw my leg
over the brute.
After pacing gravely round the quadrant
gle that formed the yard, / decided that
as he had neither fallen down nor kicked
me off it was worth paying f5 for him. if
only to get in out of the rain.
Mr.. Knox accompanied me INTO the house
and had a drink.
He was a fair. spare young man. who
looked like q. stable boy among gentlemen
and a gentleman among stable boys.
He belonged to a clan that c-opped up
in every grade Of society in the county.
from Sir Valentine Knox of Castle Knox
down TO the Auctioneer Knox. who bore
the attractive title of Larry the Liar.
~ Ia as L toui0 JUS, ANtN~NN 'i''"'
thy OF that Xix occupied a shifting posi-
ton about midway in the tribe.
I had met him at a dinner at Sir Vaian-
tines; I had heard of him at an Illicit
auction. held by Larry the Liar, Of brandy
stolen from a wreck.
They were 'Black Protestants," all Of
them. in virtue of their descent from a
sodly soldier of Cromwell. and all were
prepared at any moment of the day or night
TO sell Il horse.
You'll be apt to find this place a bit
lonesome after the hotel remarked Mr..
FURRY. sympathetically. as he placed his
foot in Its steaming boot on the hoo.
ITS a fine, sound house, anyway, and lots
of rooms in 1t. though, indeed. to tell you
the truth, 1 never was through the whole
of them since the time my great-uncie,
Denis Mccarthy, died here.
The dear knows 1 had enough of it that
time"
He paused and lit a cigarette.
Those top floors, now" he resumed, Il
wouldn't make too free with them. There's
some of them would jump under you like
a spring bed. Many's the night l was in and
out Of those attics, following my poor uncle
when he had a bad turn on him-the hor-
rors, y know-there were nights he never
stopped walking through the house. Good
Lord! will / ever forget the morning he
said he saw the devil coming up the ave-
nue.! Look at the two horns on him. says
ne. and he out with his gun and shot him.
and, begad, it was his own ~donkey.
The autumn evening, gray with rain, was
darkening in the tall windows, and the
was beginning to make bullying
PUSHES among the shrubs In the area; a
shower Of 500. ratified down the chimney
and fell on the hearthrug.
More rain coming" said Mr.. Knox, rising
composedly.
You'll have to put a goose down these
chimneys some day soon: it's the only way
in the world to clean them. Well, I'm for
the road.
You'll come out on the gray next week,
1 hope; the hounds'll be meeting here"
He threw his cigarette into the fire and
a hand to me.
"Good-by, Major: you'll see plenty of me
and my hounds before you're done. There's
u power of foxes in the plantations here"
This was scarcely r~eassuring for a man
who hoped to shoot woodcock. 1 limited as
much.
oh, is 1t the cock?' said Mr.. FURRY.
"B'leeve me. the best shoots ever / had
here the hounds were in it the day before"
When Mr.. Knox had gone. 1 began to
picture myself going across country roar
ing, while Philippe put the goose down the
chimney.
When l sat down to write to her l did
not feel equal to being humorous about it.
l dilated ponderously on my cold, my hard
work and my loneliness, and eventually
went to bed at 10 o'clock full of cold shivers
and hot whisky-and-water.
After a couple of hours of feverish dog
ing, I began to understand what had driven
Mccarthy to p~erambulate the
house by night.
/ should have said my couch was stuffed
with old boots.
i have seldom spent a more wretched
The rain drummed with soft fingers on my
panes; the house was full of noises.
/ seemed to see Great-Uncle Mccarthy
the passages with Furry at his
heels; several times | thought / heard him.
Whisperings seemed borne on the wind
my keyhole; boards creaked in the
room overhead, and once l could have
sworn that a hand passed, cropping. over
the panels of my door.
The morning broke stormily. and / woke
to find Mrs. Cadogan's understudy. a
grimy nephew. of about IS. standing by my
with a black bottle in his hand
There's no bath in the house, SIR" was
his reply to my command: but me ant
said. would We like a taggeen?'
This alternative proved to be a glass of
whisky.
1 declined it.
1 look back TO that first week of house
at Shreelane as to d comedy ex-
badly staged and striped with lurid
nelodrama.
Duly shro, ded in macintosh. 1 set forth
for the Petty Sessions Courtssof my wide
daily, in the inevitable atmosphere