FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92  
93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   >>   >|  
ntain the shock of a new experience. He had fought and lost all his battles--bitter struggles to think of even now, after the lapse of years, and the little he had to tell of himself was an intricate mingling of truth and falsehood, grotesque exaggeration, purposeless mendacity. He and Mahaffy had met exactly one month before, on the deck of the steamer from which they had been put ashore at the river landing two miles from Pleasantville. Mahaffy's historic era had begun just there. Apparently he had no past of which he could be brought to speak. He admitted having been born in Boston some sixty years before, and was a printer by trade; further than this, he had not revealed himself, drunk or sober. At the judge's elbow Mr. Mahaffy changed his position with nervous suddenness. Then he folded his long arms. "You asked if there was any news, Price; while we were waiting for the boat a raft tied up to the bank; the fellow aboard of it had a man he'd fished up out of the river, a man who'd been pretty well cut to pieces." "Who was he?" asked the judge. "Nobody knew, and he wasn't conscious. I shouldn't be surprised if he never opens his lips again. When the doctor had looked to his cuts, the fellow on the raft cast off and went on down the Elk." It occurred to the judge that he himself had news to impart. He must account for the boy's presence. "While you've been taking your whiff of life down at the steamboat landing, Mahaffy, I've been experiencing a most extraordinary coincidence." The judge paused. By a sullen glare in his deep-sunk eyes Mr. Mahaffy seemed to bid him go on. "Back east--" the judge jerked his thumb with an indefinite gesture "back east at my ancestral home--" Mahaffy snorted harshly. "You don't believe I had an ancestral home?--well, I had! It was of brick, sir, with eight Corinthian columns across the front, having a spacious paneled hall sixty feet long. I had the distinguished honor to entertain General Andrew Jackson there." "Did you get those dimensions out of the jug?" inquiry Mahaffy, with a frightful bark that was intended for a sarcastic laugh. "Sir, it is not in your province to judge me by my present degraded associates. Near the house I have described--my father's and his father's before him, and mine now--but for the unparalleled misfortunes which have pursued me--lived a family by the name of Hazard. And when I went to the war of '12--" "What were you in that bloody ti
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92  
93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Mahaffy
 

ancestral

 

fellow

 

father

 

landing

 
sullen
 
Hazard
 

degraded

 
present
 

bloody


paused

 

associates

 
extraordinary
 

presence

 
unparalleled
 

account

 
pursued
 
misfortunes
 

impart

 

taking


experiencing

 

coincidence

 

steamboat

 

province

 

occurred

 

paneled

 

frightful

 

spacious

 

columns

 

distinguished


inquiry

 
dimensions
 

Jackson

 

entertain

 

General

 
Andrew
 

Corinthian

 
indefinite
 

gesture

 
jerked

sarcastic
 

family

 
harshly
 
intended
 

snorted

 

ashore

 
Pleasantville
 

steamer

 
historic
 

brought