The Best Man. MacGrath Harold

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СКАЧАТЬ perfectly logical. The matter will never be tried in court. Money will do all this."

      "My dear little woman, you reason like Pythagoras; but," Carrington added gravely, "when I undertook to untangle this affair, I realized its huge proportions. For every redoubt your father has, I have an assault, for every wall a catapult, for every gate a petard. But, as I said before, you have only to say the word, and for the present nobody will be any the wiser."

      "If I permitted you to do this, I should destroy my faith in both of us. It would erect a barrier which would be insurmountable. That is not the way out."

      "I have weighed all these things," discouragedly.

      He took the document from his pocket and caught it in a way that indicated how easily it might be ripped into halves, the halves into quarters, the quarters into infinitesimal squares of meaningless letters.

      "Once more, shall I, Kate?"

      "No, John. That would only make our difficulties greater. But I do ask this one favor; put your evidence into the hands of a strange attorney, have nothing to do with the prosecution; for my sake."

      "I must have the night to think it over. Most of my attacks are not herein written; I dared keep them only in my head."

      "I am very unhappy," said the girl.

      He took her hand and kissed it reverently. He longed to console her, but no words he had in mind seemed adequate.

      "Fore!" came lazily over the knoll. They were no longer alone. So together they wandered slowly back to the club-house. Tea was being served, and Carrington drank his abstractedly. From time to time he joined the conversation, but without any heart. Some of the busier ladies whispered that it looked this time as though Kate had given the young man his congé.

      On the way home Norah, with her humorous comment on the weekly budget of gossip, saved the situation from any possible contretemps. Mrs. Cavenaugh was easy-going, but for all that she possessed remarkably observant eyes; and her eldest daughter was glad that they were occupied elsewhere.

      Kate was very unhappy; her father was not honest, and the man she loved had come into the knowledge of the fact. Ah, how quickly shadow can darken sunshine!

      "What did you make it in to-day, Mr. Carrington?" asked Norah.

      "Make what?" he counter-questioned absently.

      "The course, Mr. Goose! What did you think I meant?"

      "Oh," lamely, "I made a bad play at the beginning, and gave it up."

      By this time they had arrived at the gates, and everybody was thankful; Mrs. Cavenaugh, because her nose smarted with sunburn; Norah, because the gown she was to wear at the dance that night was new; Kate, because she wanted to be alone; and Carrington, because he wanted to learn whether the Angel threw Jacob or Jacob threw the Angel. The driver and the horses were glad to arrive because they were hungry.

      It took the young lawyer some time to dress for dinner that night. His usually direct mind vacillated between right and wrong, wrong and right; and he floated from one to the other like an unattached cork. He made a dozen annoying blunders in dressing. And when finally the pier-glass reflected an irreproachable and finished picture, he searched his cast-off vest for his growing monster and transferred it to the pocket of his coat. Monster! Here was no story-monster, like the creature of a Frankenstein; it was genuine, and was like to turn upon him at any moment and rend him. He shrugged and proceeded down the stairs. There are soliloquies that sometimes leave an unpleasant taste behind. So he pinned his faith to the banner of the late genial and hopeful Micawber: something might turn up for the benefit of all concerned.

      The hall and living-room at the Cavenaugh manor were one and the same. There were bookcases ranging along the walls, window-seats, a reading-table and an ancient chimney-seat. As Carrington turned the first landing he stopped.

      "Father, I think it positively dreadful the way you treat poor grandpa." This was Norah.

      There was a crackle of a newspaper.

      "Never mind, Norah, darling; your grandpa is used to it. It doesn't matter at all."

      It was the sight of the last speaker that brought Carrington to a stand. Norah's grandpa was no less a person than the shabbily dressed old man he had seen at the station that afternoon. What kind of family skeleton in the closet was he that they kept him en camera? He coughed and went on.

      Norah was plucky, whole-hearted, frank and encouraging.

      "Mr. Carrington," she said immediately, "this is my grandpa."

      Carrington did not hesitate a moment, but smiled and thrust out his hand, which the other grasped with a questioning air of diffidence.

      "Glad to meet you, sir," said Carrington.

      Cavenaugh fils glanced over the top of his paper, scowled, and resumed his reading. Kate hadn't come down yet, so she missed this scene. When she did appear, there was no visible sign of any previous agitation. She and Norah were thoroughbreds.

      "Why, grandpa!" she cried, extending her hand.

      The old man bowed over it and kissed it, and his action was lacking neither in grace nor gallantry.

      "I happened to be down this way on business," said the old man with a covert glance at his son, "and thought I'd drop in."

      "Dinner is served," said the splendid butler, as he slid back the doors to the dining-room.

      The old man looked about him questioningly, and Norah slipped her arm through his. "You'll have to take me in, grandpa," she laughed.

      The old man's eyes shone for a moment, and he patted her hand.

      "I'm as proud as a king, Norah."

      Now, Carrington could read between the lines. It was manifestly plain that grandpa was not welcome to Cavenaugh. But why? Mrs. Cavenaugh scarcely tolerated him. While the girls seldom if ever spoke of him, it was evident that both held him in their affections. There were many strange things going on in the Cavenaugh manor; and Carrington entered the dining-room in a subdued state of mind.

      By degrees Norah succeeded in drawing the pariah out of himself. Carrington was soon listening to an amazing range of adventures. The old man had seen Cuba in the filibusters' time, he had fought the Canadian constabulary as a Fenian, he had been a sailor, and had touched the shores of many strange lands. Grandpa Cavenaugh was anything but illiterate. Quite often there was a flash of wit, a well-turned phrase, a quotation. He had, besides, a comprehensive grasp of the politics of all countries.

      Carrington saw at once that his half-formed opinion was a house of cards. There was no reason in the world why they should be ashamed of him, shunt him off into the side-track of obscurity, and begrudge him a plate at the table. Carrington realized that he was very close to some peculiar mystery, and that the old man's bitterest enemy was his son.

      Throughout the meal the millionaire preserved a repelling silence. From time to time, when there was laughter, he scowled. Once or twice Mrs. Cavenaugh essayed to pass an observation across the table to him, but a curt nod was all she received for her pains. Presently Cavenaugh dropped his knife on his plate, and the pariah retreated meekly into his shell. In fact, he looked frightened, as if the thought had come to him that he had made an irreparable blunder in warming under his grandchildren's smiles.

      "Carrington," said Midas, balling СКАЧАТЬ