oured
into view through the brush fringe at the north edge of the marsh and
halted, but only for an instant.

"Who is your friend at the time when you need a friend?----Harrigan,
that's me!"

The maudlin menace of that chorus rocketed from ridge to ridge. Then,
a tight-ranked mass of humanity, they had formed and were sweeping
forward again, stepping out to the beat of the ragtime which was their
marching hymn. And still the man who stood apart from the rest gave no
sign that he was aware of their approach. Once he did straighten; when
separate faces began to be distinguishable in that reeling mob he
turned and gazed, emptily, toward the group a few yards
away--Wickersham putty-skinned before this storm which he had brewed;
Allison himself pale; and the girl whose eyes were staring back at him
with no clear understanding in their depths. He made no move toward
action, not even when the singing pack surged up and spread out before
him, until a jostling crescent, straggling at the points, half
encircled him and swallowed up as well the little knot behind which had
come bristling to its feet. Their onslaught had seemed an irresistible
thing, bent upon instant violence; and yet little by little their
syncopated defiance died away until they, too, were staring uncertainly
at that worn and mud-stained figure which seemed to hang its head. His
very inertia robbed them of their impetus.

"Harrigan, that's me!" they faltered now, and there came a lull in the
valley at Thirty-Mile, broken only by heavy breathing and the crunch of
logs jamming beneath the bridge, and the ugly swirl of backed-up water.
It held quiet while Steve looked up, mildly, and scanned the ring in
front of him and nodded in recognition to a sullen few; then oaths
broke that silence, and a command for room to pass. An upheaval
disrupted the crescent's centre. Steve saw Big Louie's face high above
the heads of his shorter companions; he watched him plow heavily
forward. Shayne he glimpsed, automatically, and Fallon, faithful
henchmen. And then Harrigan stood forth.

Long arms dangling, palms back, almost to his knees, that red-headed
one minced forward on the balls of his feet. Harrigan was redeeming a
promise many weeks overdue. It was spring, and Harrigan had come back!

"I'm here," he spoke to that bowed head, "if you are afther carin' to
welcome me!"

"I've been expecting you, Harrigan."

Again that startling mildness.

There is littl