The Law-Breakers and Other Stories

ack of a better term, a passive reformer. That is, he read religiously the New York Nation, was totally opposed to the spoils

ld talk knowingly, too, by the card, of the degeneracy of the public men of the nation, and had at his finger-ends inside information as to the manner in which President This or Congressman That had sacrificed the ideals of a vigorous manhood to the brass idol known as a second term. In fact, th

s way sadly, making all the money he could at his private calling, and keeping his hands clean from the slime of the political slough. He was a censor and a gentleman; a well-set-up, agreeable, quick-witted fellow, who

page to the last, for he had met her constantly at dances and dinners ever since she "came out" seven years before, and he was well aware that her physical charms were supplemented by a sympathetic, lively, and independent spirit. One mark of her independence-the least satisfactory to him-was that she had refused him a week before; or, more accurately speaking, the matter had b

, an admiring crowd of his constituents escorted him from prison with a brass band and tendered him a banquet. Yesterday he was chosen an alderman by the ballots of the people of this city. A self-convicted falsifier and cheat! A man who snaps his fingers in the face of the

enuating circumstances?" Miss Wellington appeared duly shocked; yet, being a woman of an alert and cheery disposit

tituents-have no sympathy with the civil-service examination for public office, and so they think it was rather smart of him than otherwise to get the better of t

angerous, and a little specious, too. And can

ng young man with no vices, as I heard one of his admirers declare. By the time I ret

day-her twenty-fifth-she had felt herself committed, was a sort of indefinable suspicion as to the real integrity of his standards. He was an excellent talker, of course; his ideals of public life and private ethics, as expressed in drawing-rooms, or during pleasant dialogues when they were alone together, were exemplary. But every now and then, while he discoursed picturesquely of the evils of the age and the obligations of citizenship, it would occur t

ween truth and falsehood. Indeed, she was half-inclined to call him back to tell him that she had changed her mind and was ready to take him for better or for worse. But she let him go, saying to herself that she could live without him perfectly well for the next sixty days, and that the voyage would do him good

in a while it would occur to her that it would be very pleasant if he should drop in for a cup of tea, and she would wonder what he was doing. Did she, perchance, at the same time exert herself with an

titution, had worked her fingers to the bone to maintain a tenement-roof over the heads of their two little boys and to send them neat and properly nourished to school. This labor of love had been too much for her strength, and finally she had

ouse, on the morning after the funeral, in order to explain the situation to their teacher and evince her personal interest. Miss Burke was a pretty girl two or three years younger than herself. She looked capable and attractive; a little coquettish, too, for her smile was arch, and her po

e sequel of which was that Mary Wellington accepted the invitation to remain and observe how the youthful mind was inoculated with the rudiments of knowledge by the honeyed processes of the modern school sys

im Daly'

in to repeat it, which he did with the sly unction of one proud of his secret. Mary laughed to herself. Some

Jim Dal

oss of the

as just been el

, ma

Joe!" she said in the stage whi

Easter," the guileless prattler conti

swer which rose to Mary's lips, partly prompted, dou

he session broke in upon the conversation, and not only diverted him, but relegated the whole subject to the background for the time being. Nevertheless, the thought of it continued in Mary's mind as she sat listening to the ex

ey had together. Miss Burke expressed so lively an interest in this that it was agreed before they parted that the schoolmistress should pay Mary

sympathetic, despite Mary's secret prejudice; and it happened presently that Miss Burke, whose countenan

about something, Miss Welli

ing, surprising as it was to be co

sing color, "who wishes me to marry him. Perhaps you have heard of him

all ab

h a sweeping answer. "You know what he did, t

else, and passed a civil-se

t it was Jim's desire to help a friend which led him to do it. But he had to serve his time in jail, didn't he?" She looked a

ity was disconcerting. "Do yo

I do." She jerked out her answers in quick

se of

een in jail." Miss Burke set in place the loose hairs of h

u feel that you cannot trust him?" inquired Mary, who, being a log

," said the girl, by way

honorable a

hey call them frills, something to get round if you can. That's how t

voicing George Colfax's sentiments as well as her own. The responsibility of the burden imposed on her was trying, and she disl

he man who could be false in one thing might

words, and suddenly covere

it's the possibility that he might do something worse after we were married-when it was too late-which frightens me.

its own sensitiveness; but she spoke beseechingly, as though t

man Mr. Daly is in oth

other; he is always helping people, and has more friends than any one in the

r that he does care for you, my

e them up, if I insist; but my doing so might prevent his being

stands convicted of falsehood." Sh

er mentor paused to let the

to me. But you know h

quick intelligence refused to be thus cajoled. "But wh

y of the challenge, and recognized that she

seem to me inadequate. That is, if a man gave those reasons to me-I believe I could never tru

hed to know." She looked at the floor for an ins

I loved him enough for that, I

she had failed to observe the logical inconsistency which the coun

that-if I were you-I should have to feel absolutely sure that I loved him; and even then-" She p

suspect that the sphinx-like utterance might contain both the kern