“Yes; just after dinner on the night of the fight. You see, he was certain he wasn’t coming back. Anyhow, this is what he says:
“My Dear Norah,—
“If I am alive after to-night you will not get this letter: it is only to come to you if I shall have ‘gone West.’ And please don’t worry if I do go West. You see, between you all you have managed almost to make me forget that I am just an apology for a man. I did not think it could be done, but you have done it. Still, now and then I remember, and I know that there will be long years after you have all gone back to that beloved Australia of yours when there will be nothing to keep me from realizing that I am crippled and a hunchback. To-night I have the one chance of my life of living up to the traditions of O’Neills who were fighting men; so if, by good luck, I manage to wing a German or two, and then get in the way of an odd bullet myself, you mustn’t grudge my finishing so much more pleasantly than I had ever hoped to do.
“If I do fall, I am leaving you that place of mine in Surrey. I have hardly any one belonging to me, and they have all more money than is good for them. The family estates are entailed, but this is mine to do as I please with. I know you don’t need it, but it will be a home for you and your father while Jim and Wally are fighting, if you care for it. And perhaps you will make some use of it that will interest you. I liked the place, as well as I could like any place outside Ireland; and if I can look back—and I am very sure that I shall be able to look back—I shall like to see you all there—you people who brought the sun and light and laughter of Australia into the grey shadows of my life—who never seemed to see that I was different from other men.
“Well, good-bye—and God keep you happy, little mate.
“Your friend,
“John O’Neill.”
Jim folded the letter and put it back in his pocket, and there was a long silence. Each boy was seeing again a strip of Irish beach where a brave man had died proudly.
“Different!” Wall said, at last, with a catch in his voice. “He wasn’t different—at least, only in being a jolly sight better than most fellows.”