nd pernicious
hunter. He had been discreet enough not to question people too closely
where Mazarine's wife was concerned, but there was, however, one gossip
whom Burlingame questioned with some freedom. This was Patsy Kernaghan.

Before the Young Doctor arrived at his office this particular morning,
Patsy, who had followed him from the Court-house, was put under a light
and skillful cross-examination. He had been of service to Burlingame
more than once; and he was regarded as a useful man to do odd jobs for
his office, as for other offices in Askatoon.

"Aw, him--that murderin' moloch at Tralee!" exclaimed Patsy when the
button was pressed. "That Methodys' fella with the face of a pirate!
If there wasn't a better Protistan' than him in the world, the Meeting
Houses'd be used for kindlin'-wood. Joel, they call him--a dacint
prophet's name misused!

"I h'ard him praying once, as I stood outside the Meetin' House windys.
To hear that holy hyena lift up his voice to the skies! Shure, I've
never been the same man since, for the voice of him says wan thing, and
the look of him another. Sez I to meself, Mr. Burlingame, y'r anner, the
minute I first saw him, sez I, 'Askatoon's no safe place for me.' Whin
wan like that gits a footin' in a place, the locks can't be too manny to
shut ye in whin ye want to sleep at night. That fella's got no pedigree,
and if it wouldn't hurt some dacent woman, maybe, I'd say he was
misbegotten. But still, I'll tell ye: out there at Tralee there's what'd
have saved Sodom and Gomorrah-aye, that'd have saved Jerusalem, and
there wouldn't ha' been a single moan from Jeremiah. Out at Tralee
there's as beautiful a little lady as you'd want to see. Just a girl
she is, not more than nineteen or twenty years of age. She's got a face
that'd make ye want to lift the chorals an' the antiphones to her every
marnin'. She's got the figure of one that was never to grow up, an'
there she is the wedded wife of that crocodile great-grandfather.

"Aw, I know all about it, Mr. Burlingame, y'r anner. How do I know?
Didn't Michael Turley tell me before he died what sort o' man his cousin
was? Didn't he tell me Joel Mazarine married first whin he was eighteen
years of age; an' his daughter was married whin she was seventeen; an'
her son was married whin he was eighteen--an' Joel's a great-grandfather
now. An' see him out there with her that looks as if the kindergarten
was the place for her."

"Do you go to Tralee of