she was at her work, Jennie being at school, Cully had loved the little
cripple with the devotion of a dog to its master. Lawless, rough, often
cruel, and sometimes vindictive as Cully was to others, a word from
Patsy humbled and softened him.

And Patsy loved Cully. His big, broad chest, stout, straight legs,
strong arms and hands, were his admiration and constant pride. Cully was
his champion and his ideal. The waif's recklessness and audacity were to
him only evidences of so much brains and energy.

This love between the lads grew stronger after Tom had sent to Dublin
for her old father, that she might have "a man about the house." Then
a new blessing came, not only into the lives of both the lads, but into
the whole household as well. Mullins, in his later years, had been a
dependent about Trinity College, and constant association with books and
students had given him a taste for knowledge denied his daughter. Tom
had left home when a girl. In the long winter nights during the slack
season, after the stalls were bedded and the horses were fed and watered
and locked up for the night, the old man would draw up his chair to
the big kerosene lamp on the table, and tell the boys stories--they
listening with wide-open eyes, Cully interrupting the narrative every
now and then by such asides as "No flies on them fellers, wuz ther',
Patsy? They wuz daisies, they wuz. Go on, Pop; it's better'n a circus;"
while Patsy would cheer aloud at the downfall of the vanquished, with
their "three thousand lance-bearers put to death by the sword," waving
his crutch over his head in his enthusiasm.

Jennie would come in too, and sit by her mother; and after Nilsson's
encounter with Quigg--an incident which greatly advanced him in Tom's
estimation--Cully would be sent to bring him in from his room over the
stable and give him a chair with the others, that he might learn
the language easier. At these times it was delightful to watch the
expression of pride and happiness that would come over Tom's face as she
listened to her father's talk.

"But ye have a great head, Gran'pop," she would say. "Cully, ye
blatherin' idiot, why don't ye brace up an' git some knowledge in yer
head? Sure, Gran'pop, Father McCluskey ain't in it wid ye a minute. Ye
could down the whole gang of 'em." And the old man would smile faintly
and say he had heard the young gentlemen at the college recite the
stories so many times he could never forget them.

In this