"Eight forty-five, eh?" he exclaimed. "Whew! it is late." He set his watch and then began winding it. "That case is loose, I must get it fixed," he pursued. He glanced again at the girl's timepiece, then whimsically shook his own. "Not much like yours, is it?" he said, with a sorry smile. "Poor little turnip! But it'll be buried with me, Maisie, I'll never have another. I don't want another. You see,—she gave it to me."
He sank into a chair, his face in the shadow. "I can see it now," he pursued in a low voice, "just as if it was yesterday. How tickled I was! and so was she, to see me so. There were just us two, and now—I'm alone. Oh! it's years ago, but it's one of those things that'll hurt every time I remember it—now she's gone—will hurt till I go, too! Of course it didn't cost her much, poor little woman. It couldn't; she didn't have it. How she managed to save the few poor dollars for it, God knows; I can't figure it. But she did, and one day when I got in from selling my papers, she met me and gave it to me. And I was only a kid, Maisie, and I up and bellered like a calf, with my arms around her,—and she cried, too; and it wasn't very long,—" his voice broke for a moment,—"it wasn't very long after that,—it was dark and cold I remember, and snowflakes in the air,—and I was crying and trying to pull away from them while they were leading me away—from—her grave."
It was very still. The girl averted her eyes; they were full of tears. O'Byrn sat in the shadow, his head bent. In a moment he resumed.
"I've knocked around from pillar to post since then, Maisie, from one end of the land to the other. I've lived high and low, from glad rags to just plain rags. I could always get a job—and I could always lose it. Oh, yes, I might as well be frank," with a bitter laugh. "It's whisky—a heritage. Not all the time—fits that I can't help—every now and then—like bad dreams, only worse—they're real! It's at those times that the old feeling grips me, too,—to keep movin'. Why, I usually wake up where everything's strange—and I have to ask 'em where I am. I've been on the road to something worth while so often—and always kicked it over. And it cropped out in me so young! You'd be surprised—"
"Oh, don't!" she cried. He stared at her mutely. "What makes you say such horrible things about yourself?" she pursued passionately, a quiver in her voice. "Do you want me to believe—"
"The truth," he interrupted, gently. "Only the truth. Of course, I haven't known you long, but it seems like all my life. I'd feel like a yellow dog, somehow, if I shouldn't tell you. But then, we won't say anything more about it. I'm not to blame, exactly; it was a present. We'll go back, there isn't much to tell. It's always been the newspaper business with me. Odds and ends at first, then they found I could write, and I've been at it ever since. I wasn't much on education, but I've picked up quite a lot, and I've seen the country. Oh, I've had my dreams. Maybe I could do something sometime—if—" He broke off abruptly.
She sprang up, coming quickly to him. Her little hand sought his arm. "Micky," she breathed softly, with shining eyes, "do it! You can; it's in you; if you will only leave off—and you can—you must! Think of her, Micky,—she cried over you—perhaps she's crying yet! Make her smile, instead! Oh, what makes me talk to you like this, only knowing you a few weeks? What right—"
He caught her hand as she moved slowly away and drew her back. "What right?" he echoed warmly. "The best in the world! It does me good! You're a true friend, you are, and you can see what a mess I've made of my life and how I could do better if I would—or could, for you don't know what I have to fight against, Maisie." He drew a chair for her close to his own. "But then, I'm young yet," he pursued, with a rather sorry smile. "Time yet, perhaps, for dreams. Dreams!" he repeated, with a queer, half-shamed look, "how the fellows at the office would laugh to hear me say that! They'd say I'd gone bug-house."
"Dreams?" she repeated softly, a divine smile in her wistful eyes, "why, Micky, we're all dreamers. Between here and the store—the store and here, day after day, don't you suppose they help me; the dreams? Doesn't it help your work—your old humdrum work, whatever it is, without any beginning or ending—doesn't it help to mix a little dreaming with it? Of course, it doesn't really help me—I'm a poor, silly little thing—but it can help you, Micky—it can help you!"
"'Poor, silly little thing!'" he repeated after her, his eyes moistening. "Don't, Maisie, it makes me feel like a fool! Why, I'm not fit to speak to you, girl! The life I've lived—Oh, the road is where I belong, after all! And the dreams—why, they're just dreams, that's all. I'd only have to try to realize them to prove it—and I'm afraid. Yes, when I haven't been drunk, I've been afraid."