When the Governor entered the reception room he came in unexpectedly, as Father Maurice was leaning forward with one of Mike's red hands clasped in his two white ones. Mike was wiping his eyes with his coat sleeve.

The Governor paused in the doorway and coughed. His visitors started in surprise, and then arose.

It was Father Maurice who stated their errand, his seamed face turned upward to the serious eyes of the Governor; and as he proceeded, choosing his quaint Frenchified English carefully, the Governor's face became grave. He motioned them to their chairs.

He was a gray haired man, and his face was the face of a nobleman. Clear, gray eyes were set deep under his brows, and his mouth was a straight line of uncompromising honesty. He sat with one knee thrown over the other. With one hand he fingered a pen on the desk at his side; the other he ran again and again through the hair that stood in masses on his head. His face was long, and the cheekbones protruded. His nose was power, and his chin was resistance.

He listened silently until Father

Maurice had ended. Then he laid the pen carefully by the inkstand, unfolded his gaunt limbs, and arose.

“No,” he said slowly. “I cannot interfere.”

“But his wife? His mother?” asked the priest.

“He should have considered them before,” said the Governor sadly. “If you prepare a petition, I will consider it, but I cannot offer you any hope. They all come to me with the same plea—the wife and the mother—but they do not take the wife and the mother into account when the blow is struck. It is late to think of them when the prison door is closed. You will pardon me, father, but I am very tired to-night.”

He extended his hand, in token that the interview was at an end, and Mike arose from his chair in the shadow. He stood awkwardly turning his hat while the Governor shook the priest's hand, and then shuffled forward to be dismissed.

“Good night, sir,” said the Governor. “I did not hear your name—”

“Murphy,” said the priest quickly—“Michael Murphy. He is the father of the boy.”

The Governor looked the old man over carefully, and the old man's eyes fell under his keen glances.

“Mike Murphy?” asked the Governor slowly. “Are you the Mike Murphy who used to go to old No. 3 school in Harmontown, forty—no, nearly fifty—years ago? There was a Mike Murphy sat on my bench. Are you the boy they called Red Head?”

The old man tried to answer. His lips formed the words, but his voice did not come. He nodded his head.

“Be seated, gentlemen,” said the Governor, and Father Maurice sat down hopefully. Mike Murphy dropped into a chair with deeper dejection.

“Well, well!” The Governor nodded his head slowly, his gray eyes searching the ruddy face before him. “So you are the Mike Murphy who used to drub me?”

He smiled grimly. His eyes strayed from the old man's face, and their glance was lost in the air above his head. He smiled again, as he sat with the fingers of his left hand pressing the thin skin into a roll above his cheek bone, for he recalled an incident of his boyhood.

The Governor had once been an arrant little coward. His mother lived in the big white house two blocks above the schoolhouse, on the opposite side of the street. Red Head Mike lived across the alley in a shanty. The Governor's mother bought milk of Mrs. Murphy, and Red Head brought it every evening.

Red Head was a wonderful boy. He was the first to go barefoot in the spring, picking his way with painful carefulness over the clods in the street. He was the only boy who chewed tobacco. The others chewed licorice or purple thistle tops, but Red Head had the real thing. He even smoked a real pipe without dire consequences, and laughed at the other boys' mild substitutes of corn silk and “lady cigars”; and the way he swore was a liberal education. All the boys swore more or less, especially when they were behind the barn smoking com silk, but they knew it was not natural It was a puny imitation, but the Red Head article sounded right.

But it was when it came to fighting that Red Head had proved his right to the worship of the world. He could lick any two boys in the school. The Governor, who was plain Willie Gary then, could not fight at all. His early youth was one great fear of being whipped. The smallest boys in the school were accustomed to practice on him until they gained sufficient dexterity or courage to attack one another. He had a hundred opprobrious nicknames, which he accepted meekly. “Cry-baby” was the favorite. When he was attacked he hid his face in his arm and bawled, leaning his arm against any convenient fence or tree, while his tormentor drubbed his back at pleasure. He was happy when he could sneak home unmolested. The chiefest of his tormentors was Red Head, but there was no partiality. All the boys drubbed him.

One day Mrs. Gary made him a pair of breeches. They were good, stout breeches of dove colored corduroy, and his mother was proud of them. So was Willie. As he walked to school he felt that every one saw and admired them He felt as conspicuous as when, in a dream, he went to school in his night dress, but he felt more comfortable.

He took his seat in the school room proudly, and when he was called to the blackboard to do a sum he walked with a strut. He felt that even the big boys—the wonderful youths who had money to jingle in their pockets—observed him, and he blushed as he imagined the eyes of the little women on the girls' side of the room following him.

As he crossed the floor, the legs of his breeches rubbed against each other, giving forth the crisp corduroy sound of “Whist—whist—whist.” It could be heard in the farthest corner. All the scholars looked up from their slates or books. He caught Bessie Clayton's eye upon him, and his cheek flamed. She had blue eyes and yellow curls, and snubbed him daily.

Even the teacher glanced at his new breeches. Willie paused in his sum and looked at them with satisfaction himself. Then he walked back to his bench, and the corduroy spoke again—“Whist—whist—whist.” It was as musical as the clumping of a new pair of red topped boots.

As he slid into his place on his bench, Red Head turned his face and made a mouth.

“Don't you think you're smart, Whistle Breeches?” he whispered.

“Whist—whist,” said the breeches in reply, as Willie moved, and every eye in the school seemed to gaze on him, not enviously as before, but sneeringly. Who'd want whistle breeches?

When the recess bell rang, Willie walked to the playground with short steps, but still the corduroy whistled. Two boys behind him laughed, and Willie burned with shame. They must be laughing at his new breeches. Bessie Clayton passed him, and he stood motionless, crowded against the wall, until she was out of hearing.

He paused in the doorway timidly. Red Head was standing just outside, one shoulder turned toward Freckles Redmond. It was the signal for a fight, and the small boys were crowded about them.

“Aw, you're one yourself,” Red Head was saying, “an' you dassan't say it agin. I dare you to say it,” he cried, but he caught sight of Willie. “Huh!” he shouted. “Look here, fellers! Here's Whistle Breeches. Let's spit on 'em!”

The boys crowded into the entry and spat on them. Red Head pulled Willie's hair twice, drawing his head forward as he would pull a bell rope.

“Don't he think he's smart?” “Wouldn't have 'em!” “Whistle Breeches! Whistle Breeches!” they shouted in derision, and Willie whimpered and edged into a corner.

“Don't you do that,” he said in a choking voice. “I'll tell teacher, I will!”

Red Head stuck his freckled face close and shoved him with a warlike shoulder. His fists were doubled, and he jabbed Willie with his elbow.

“Aw, you tell him, then, why don't you, Whistle Breeches?” he inquired. “Jist you tell him, an' I'll punch your face off.”

He drew his arm back and feinted, Willie crooked his elbow to hide his face.

“Aw, come on, fellers,” said Red Head with deep disgust. “What's the use of foolin' with him? He ain't nothin' but a cry-baby in whistle breeches. He ain't no fun.”