on when the other laid a hand upon his
knee.

"Oi don't have to wor-rk f'r no man, an' Oi'll not wor-rk f'r
Moncrossen. But Oi'd cross hell on thin ice in July to folly a McKim
wanst more, an' if to do ut Oi must cook f'r Appleton's camp, thin so
ut is. Git ye some shleep now whilst Oi loaf down to Burrage's."

CHAPTER XXII

CREED SEES A GHOST

When Bill awoke, yellow lamplight flooded the room and Daddy Dunnigan
was busy about the stove, from the direction of which came a cheerful
sizzling and the appetizing odor of frying meat and strong coffee.

For several minutes he lay in a delicious drowse, idly watching the old
man as he hobbled deftly from stove to cupboard, and from cupboard to
table.

So this was the man, he mused, of whom his mother had so often spoken
when, as a little boy, he had listened with bated breath to her tales
of the fighting McKims.

He remembered how her soft eyes would glow, and her lips curve with
pride as she recounted the deeds of her warrior kin.

But, most of all, she loved to tell of Captain Fronte, the big,
fighting, devil-may-care brother who was her childish idol; and of one,
James Dunnigan, the corporal, who had followed Captain Fronte through
all the wars, and to whose coolness and courage her soldier brother
owed his life on more than one occasion, and whose devotion and loyalty
to the name of McKim was a byword throughout the regiment, and in
Kerry.

"And now," thought Bill, "that I have found him, I will never lose
sight of him. He needs someone to look after him in his old age."

Over the little flat-topped stove the leathern old world-rover muttered
and chuckled to himself as he prodded a fork into the browning
pork-chops, shooting now and then an affectionate glance toward the
bunk.

"Saints be praised!" he muttered. "Oi'd av know'd um in hiven or hell,
or Hong-Kong. Captain Fronte's own silf, he is, as loike as two peas.
An' the age av Captain Fronte befure he was kilt, phwin he was th'
besht officer in all th' British ar-rmy--or an-ny ar-rmy.

"Him that c'd lay down th' naygers in windrows all day, an' dhrink, an'
play car-rds, an' make love all noight--an' at 'em agin in th' marnin'!
An' now Oi've found um Oi'll shtay by um till wan av us burries th'
other. For whilst a McKim roams th' earth James Dunnigan's place is to
folly um.

"An', Lord be praised, he's a foightin' man--but a McKim that don't
dhrink! Wurrah! Maybe he wasn't failin' roight, or t