surlily.

In a few moments he had the six thousand dollars in good government
notes in two inner pockets of his shirt. It made him feel very warm
and comfortable. His face almost relaxed into a smile when he bade
Burlingame good-day.

Burlingame had said nothing about the letter from the late Michael
Turley's kinsman in Montreal and the question of the legacy. This was
deliberate on his part. He wanted an excuse to visit Tralee and see its
mistress with his own eyes. He had attempted to pluck many flowers in
his day, and had not been unsuccessful. Out at Tralee was evidently a
rare orchid carefully shielded by the gardener.

As Mazarine left the lawyer's office, he met in the doorway that member
of the McMahon family for whom Burlingame had secured a verdict of
acquittal a couple of hours before. As was his custom, Mazarine gave
the other a sharp, scrutinizing look, but he saw no one he knew; and he
passed on. The furtive smile which had betrayed his content at pocketing
the six thousand dollars still lingered at the corners of his mouth.

Though he did not know the legally innocent McMahon whom he had just
passed, McMahon was not so ignorant. There was no one in all the
countryside whom the McMahons did not know. It was their habit--or
something else--to be familiar with the history of everybody
thereabouts, although they lived secluded lives at Arrowhead Ranch,
which adjoined that belonging to Orlando Guise.

When Tom McMahon saw Mazarine leave Burlingame's office, his furtive eye
lighted. Then it was true, what he had heard from the hired girl at Slow
Down Ranch: that old Mazarine was to receive six thousand dollars in
cash from Orlando Guise by the hands of Burlingame! Only that very
morning, at the moment of his own release from jail, his brother Bill
McMahon had told him of the conversation overheard between Orlando and
his mother, by Milly Gorst, the hired girl.

He turned and watched Mazarine go down the street and enter a barber's
shop. If Mazarine was going to have his hair cut, he would be in the
barber's shop for some time. With intense reflection in his eyes,
McMahon entered Burlingame's office. He had come to settle up accounts
for a clever piece of court-room work on the part of Burlingame. It was
very well worth paying for liberally.

When he entered the office, Burlingame was not there. A clerk, however,
informed him that Burlingame would be free within a few moments--and
would he take a chair?