Page:MacGrath--The luck of the Irish.djvu/50



FTER a few blocks he let down his stride to an amble and began his favorite pastime—building castles. And always there was a garden, a wife, and a couple of kids. For why should he build castles but for these? He looked up at the spangled canopy of the night. He saw two little brown shoes step lightly from star to star, one-two-three, and they were gone. His school-teacher; there was the girl for you; no nonsense about her, always on the job. Where did she go on her vacations? And what had really restrained him from going up into the street just once for a peek at her? Perhaps it was the fear that his fatal beauty would have blasted her where she stood. Oh, well; perhaps the Lord had made the majority of human beings homely so that some real work could be done. Handsome-Is was always crawling under the job, watching the clock, and beating it five minutes before closing hour.

His thought veered suddenly into another channel. The picture of the young woman in flight returned.

Poor, silly little butterflies, didn't they have any sense? Wasn't there anybody to look after them and warn them of the pitfalls? Or were