The Farmington times., 1917-03-16
The Path Master
Continued from page y

or I'll shoot your lamps out!"
"Hes been a-drinkin' again." whis-
pered the game-warden. "Fur Gods
said give him that bottle, somebody"
But as the bottle was pushed across
the counter, McCloud swung his rifle
butt and knocked the bottle into slivers,
Drinks for the crowd!" he said, with
an ugly laugh. "Get down and lap
it up off the floor, you fox cubs!"
Then, pushing the fly-screen door
open with one elbow, he sauntered out
into the moonlight, careless who might
follow him, although now that he had
insulted and defied the entire town there
were men behind who would have
done him a mischief if they had dared
believe him off his guard.
He walked moodily on in the moon
light, disdaining to either listen or
glance behind him. There was stoop
to his shoulders now, loose carriage
which sometimes marks a man whose
last shred of self-respect has gone,
leaving him nothing but the naked
virtues and vices with which he was
born. McCloud's vices were many,
though some of them lay dormant;
his virtues, if they were virtues, could
be counted in a breath--a natural
courage and generous heart, paralyzed
and inactive under load of despair
and deep resentment against everybody
and everything. He hated the for
tunate and the unfortunate alike; he
despised his neighbors, he desplsed
himself. His inertia had given place
to fierce restlessness; he felt q sudden
and curious desire for physical struggle
with q strong antagonist-llke young
Byram.
All at once the misery of his poverty
arose up before him. 1t was not un-
endurable simply because he was OBJ
hged to endure it.
The thought of his hopeless poverty
stupefied him at first, then rage fol-
lowed. Poverty was an antagonist,
like young Byram-a powerful one.
How he hated it'll How he hated Byraml
Why? And, as he walked there, shuffling
up the dust in the moonlight, he
thought, for the first time in his life,
that if poverty were only a breathing
creature he would strangle it with his
naked hands. But logic carried him
no further; he began to brood again,
remembering Tansey's insults and the
white anger of young Byram, and the
threats from the dim group around the
stove. If they molested him they
WOulu remember IL. I1e WOuIu u6lJneE
pay taxes nor work for them.
Then he thought of the path-master,
reddening as he remembered Tansey's
accusation. He shrugged his shoulders
and Strengthened up, dismissing her
from his mind, but she returned, only
to be again dismissed with an effort.
When for the third time the memory
of the little path-master returned, he
glanced up as though he could see
her in the flesh standing in the road
before his house. She soas therein
the flesh.
The moonlight silvered her hair,
and her face was the face of a spirit;
it quickened the sluggish blood in his
veins to see her SO in the moonlight.
She said: "I thought that if you
knew / should be obliged to pay your
road-tax if you do not, you would
pay. Would you7"
A shadow glided across the moon
light; it was the collie dog, and it came
and looked up into McCloud's shadowy
eyes.
"Yes--I would" he said; "but I
cannot"
His heart began to beat faster; q
tide of wholesome blood stirred and
flowed through his veins. 1t was the