Page:Harper's New Monthly Magazine - v109.djvu/49

Rh That's what brought me up here into the mountains—me that was born, as ye might say, on the stair-steps of a tenement-house, an' fetched up the same."

Absorbed in the interest of his own affairs, the Irishman did not notice what revelations he had made. Whether or not this knowledge was new to his host the uncertain light of the dying fire upon that grave, impassive face did not disclose.

"An' now," Kerry went on, "I've been thinkin' about Katy a heap in the last few days. I'm goin' home to her to-morry—home to Philadelphy—goin' with empty hands. An' I'm a-goin' to say to her, 'Katy, would ye rather take me jest as I am, out of a job'—fer that's what I'll be when I go back,—'would ye rather take me so an' wait fer the little farm?' I guess she'll do it; I guess she'll take me. I've got that love fer her that makes me think she'll take me. Did ye ever love a woman like that?"—turning suddenly to the silent figure on the other side of the fire. "Did ye ever love one so that ye felt like ye could jest trust her, same as you could trust yourself? It's a—it—well, it's a mighty comfortable thing."

The mountaineer stretched out his injured hand, and examined it for so long a time without speaking that it seemed as though he would not answer at all. The wound was healing admirably now; he had made shift to shoot, with Kerry's shoulder for a rest, and their larder was stocked with game once more. When he at last raised his head and looked across the fire, his black eyes were such wells of misery as made the other catch his breath.

Upon the silence fell his big, serious voice, as solemn and sonorous as a church-bell: "You ast me did I ever love an' trust a woman like that. I did—an' she failed me. I ain't gwine to call you fool fer sich; you're a town feller, Dan, with