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so plain right in front of me, just as though you were there yourself, askin' me to

remember an' be decent. God! Barbara--why wasn't I born for the likes of you,

and not just a measly, ornery mucker like I am. Oh, hell! what is that that Bridge

sings of Knibbs's:

There ain't no sweet Penelope somewhere that's longing much for me, But I can

smell the blundering sea, and hear the rigging hum; And I can hear the

whispering lips that fly before the out-bound ships, And I can hear the breakers

on the sand a-calling "Come!"

Billy took off his hat and scratched his head.

"Funny," he thought, "how a girl and poetry can get a tough nut like me. I wonder

what the guys that used to hang out in back of Kelly's 'ud say if they seen what

was goin' on in my bean just now. They'd call me Lizzy, eh? Well, they wouldn't

call me Lizzy more'n once. I may be gettin' soft in the head, but I'm all to the good

with my dukes."

Speed is not conducive to sentimental thoughts and so Billy had unconsciously

permitted his pony to drop into a lazy walk. There was no need for haste anyhow.

No one knew yet that the bank had been robbed, or at least so Billy argued. He

might, however, have thought differently upon the subject of haste could he have

had a glimpse of the horseman in his rear--two miles behind him, now, but

rapidly closing up the distance at a keen gallop, while he strained his eyes across

the moonlit flat ahead in eager search for his quarry.

So absorbed was Billy Byrne in his reflections that his ears were deaf to the

pounding of the hoofs of the pursuer's horse upon the soft dust of the dry road

until Bridge was little more than a hundred yards from him. For the last half-mile

Bridge had had the figure of the fugitive in full view and his mind had been

playing rapidly with seductive visions of the one-thousand dollars reward--one-

thousand dollars Mex, perhaps, but still quite enough to excite pleasant

thoughts. At the first glimpse of the horseman ahead Bridge had reined his

mount down to a trot that the noise of his approach might thereby be lessened.

He had drawn his revolver from its holster, and was upon the point of putting

spurs to his horse for a sudden dash upon the fugitive when the man ahead,

finally attracted by the noise of the other's approach, turned in his saddle and

saw him.

Neither recognized the other, and at Bridge's command of, "Hands up!" Billy,

lightning-like in his quickness, drew and fired. The bullet raked Bridge's hat from

his head but left him unscathed.

232

The Mucker