McMurdo had obtained a temporary job as bookkeeper; for he
was a well-educated man. This kept him out most of the day, and
he had not found occasion yet to report himself to the head of the
lodge of the Eminent Order of Freemen. He was reminded of his
omission, however, by a visit one evening from Mike Scanlan,
the fellow member whom he had met in the train. Scanlan, the
small, sharp-faced, nervous, black-eyed man, seemed glad to see
him once more. After a glass or two of whisky he broached the
object of his visit.
  "Say, McMurdo," said he, "I remembered your address, so l
made bold to call. I'm surprised that you've not reported to the
Bodymaster. Why haven't you seen Boss McGinty yet?"
  "Well, I had to find a job. I have been busy."
  "You must find time for him if you have none for anything
else. Good Lord, man! you're a fool not to have been down to
the Union House and registered your name the first morning after
you came here! If you run against him -- well, you mustn't, that's
all!"
  McMurdo showed mild surprise. "I've been a member of the
lodge for over two years, Scanlan, but I never heard that duties
were so pressing as all that."
  "Maybe not in Chicago."
  "Well, it's the same society here."
  "Is it?"
  Scanlan looked at him long and fixedly. There was something
sinister in his eyes.
  "Isn't it?"
  "You'll tell me that in a month's time. I hear you had a talk
with the patrolmen after I left the train."
  "How did you know that?"
  "Oh, it got about -- things do get about for good and for bad in
this district."
  "Well, yes. I told the hounds what I thought of them."
  "By the Lord, you'll be a man after McGinty's heart!"
  "What, does he hate the police too?"
  Scanlan burst out laughing. "You go and see him, my lad,"
said he as he took his leave. "It's not the police but you that
he'll hate if you don't! Now, take a friend's advice and go at
once!"

  It chanced that on the same evening McMurdo had another
more pressing interview which urged him in the same direction.
It may have been that his attentions to Ettie had been more
evident than before, or that they had gradually obtruded them-
selves into the slow mind of his good German host; but, what-
ever the cause, the boarding-house keeper beckoned the young
man into hls private room and started on the subject without any
circumlocution .
  "It seems to me, mister," said he, "that you are gettin' set on
my Ettie. Ain't that so, or am I wrong?"
  "Yes, that is so," the young man answered.
  "Vell, I vant to tell you right now that it ain't no manner of
use. There's someone slipped in afore you."
  "She told me so."
  "Vell, you can lay that she told you truth. But did she tell you
who it vas?"
  "No, I asked her; but she wouldn't tell."
  "I dare say not, the leetle baggage! Perhaps she did not vish
to frighten you avay."
  "Frighten!" McMurdo was on fire in a moment.
  "Ah, yes, my friend! You need not be ashamed to be fright-
ened of him. It is Teddy Baldwin."
  "And who the devil is he?"
  "He is a boss of Scowrers."
  "Scowrers! I've heard of them before. It's Scowrers here and
Scowrers there, and always in a whisper! What are you all afraid
of? Who are the Scowrers?"
  The boarding-house keeper instinctively sank his voice, as
everyone did who talked about that terrible society. "The
Scowrers," said he, "are the Eminent Order of Freemen!"
  The young man stared. "Why, I am a member of that order
myself."
  "You! I vould never have had you in my house if I had known
it -- not if you vere to pay me a hundred dollar a veek."
  "What's wrong with the order? It's for charity and good
fellowship. The rules say so."
  "Maybe in some places. Not here!"
  "What is it here?"
  "It's a murder society, that's vat it is."
  McMurdo laughed incredulously. "How can you prove that?"
he asked.
  "Prove it! Are there not fifty murders to prove it? Vat about
Milman and Van Shorst, and the Nicholson family, and old Mr.
Hyam, and little Billy James, and the others? Prove it! Is there a
man or a voman in this valley vat does not know it?"
  "See here!" said McMurdo earnestly. "I want you to take
back what you've said, or else make it good. One or the other
you must do before I quit this room. Put yourself in my place.
Here am I, a stranger in the town. I belong to a society that I
know only as an innocent one. You'll find it through the length
and breadth of the States, but always as an innocent one. Now
when I am counting upon joining it here, you tell me that it is the
same as a murder society called the Scowrers. I guess you owe
me either an apology or else an explanation, Mr. Shafter."
  "I can but tell you vat the whole vorld knows, mister. The
bosses of the one are the bosses of the other. If you offend the
one, it is the other vat vill strike you. We have proved it too
often."
  "That's just gossip -- I want proof!" said McMurdo.
  "If you live here long you vill get your proof. But I forget that
you are yourself one of them. You vill soon be as bad as the rest.
But you vill find other lodgings, mister. I cannot have you here.
Is it not bad enough that one of these people come courting my
Ettie, and that I dare not turn him down, but that I should have
another for my boarder? Yes, indeed, you shall not sleep here
after to-night!"

  McMurdo found himself under sentence of banishment both
from his comfortable quarters and from the girl whom he loved.
He found her alone in the sitting-room that same evening, and he
poured his troubles into her ear.
  "Sure, your father is after giving me notice," he said. "It's
little I would care if it was just my room, but indeed, Ettie,
though it's only a week that I've known you, you are the very
breath of life to me, and I can't live without you!"
  "Oh, hush, Mr. McMurdo, don't speak so!" said the girl. "I
have told you, have I not, that you are too late? There is another,
and if I have not promised to marry him at once, at least I can
promise no one else."
  "Suppose I had been first, Ettie, would I have had a chance?"
  The girl sank her face into her hands. "I wish to heaven that
you had been first!" she sobbed.
  McMurdo was down on his knees before her in an instant.
"For God's sake, Ettie, let it stand at that!" he cried. "Will you
ruin your life and my own for the sake of this promise? Follow
your heart, acushla! 'Tis a safer guide than any promise before
you knew what it was that you were saying."
  He had seized Ettie's white hand between his own strong
brown ones.
  "Say that you will be mine, and we will face it out together!"
  "Not here?"
  "Yes, here."
  "No, no, Jack!" His arms were round her now. "It could not
be here. Could you take me away?"
  A struggle passed for a moment over McMurdo's face; but it
ended by setting like granite. "No, here," he said. "I'll hold
you against the world, Ettie, right here where we are!"
  "Why should we not leave together?"
  "No, Ettie, I can't leave here."
  "But why?"
  "I'd never hold my head up again if I felt that I had been
driven out. Besides, what is there to be afraid of? Are we not
free folks in a free country? If you love me, and I you, who will
dare to come between?"
  "You don't know, Jack. You've been here too short a time.
You don't know this Baldwin. You don't know McGinty and his
Scowrers."
  "No, I don't know them, and I don't fear them, and I don't
believe in them!" said McMurdo. "I've lived among rough
men, my darling, and instead of fearing them it has always
ended that they have feared me -- always, Ettie. It's mad on the
face of it! If these men, as your father says, have done crime
after crime in the valley, and if everyone knows them by name,
how comes it that none are brought to justice? You answer me
that, Ettie!"
  "Because no witness dares to appear against them. He would
not live a month if he did. Also because they have always their
own men to swear that the accused one was far from the scene of
the crime. But surely, Jack, you must have read all this. I had
understood that every paper in the United States was writing
about it."
  "Well, I have read something, it is true; but I had thought it
was a story. Maybe these men have some reason in what they
do. Maybe they are wronged and have no other way to help
themselves."
  "Oh, Jack, don't let me hear you speak so! That is how he
speaks -- the other one!"
  "Baldwin -- he speaks like that, does he?"
  "And that is why I loathe him so. Oh, Jack, now I can tell
you the truth. I loathe him with all my heart; but I fear him also.
I fear him for myself; but above all I fear him for father. I know
that some great sorrow would come upon us if I dared to say
what I really felt. That is why I have put him off with half-
promises. It was in real truth our only hope. But if you would fly
with me, Jack, we could take father with us and live forever far
from the power of these wicked men."
  Again there was the struggle upon McMurdo's face, and again
it set like granite. "No harm shall come to you, Ettie -- nor to
your father either. As to wicked men, I expect you may find that
I am as bad as the worst of them before we're through."
  "No, no, Jack! I would trust you anywhere."
  McMurdo laughed bitterly. "Good Lord! how little you know
of me! Your innocent soul, my darling, could not even guess
what is passing in mine. But, hullo, who's the visitor?"
  The door had opened suddenly, and a young fellow came
swaggering in with the air of one who is the master. He was a
handsome, dashing young man of about the same age and build as
McMurdo himself. Under his broad-brimmed black felt hat,
which he had not troubled to remove, a handsome face with
fierce, domineering eyes and a curved hawk-bill of a nose looked
savagely at the pair who sat by the stove.
  Ettie had jumped to her feet full of confusion and alarm. "I'm
glad to see you, Mr. Baldwin," said she. "You're earlier than I
had thought. Come and sit down."
  Baldwin stood with his hands on his hips looking at McMurdo.
"Who is this?" he asked curtly.
  "It's a friend of mine, Mr. Baldwin, a new boarder here. Mr.
McMurdo, may I introduce you to Mr. Baldwin?''
  The young men nodded in surly fashion to each other.
  "Maybe Miss Ettie has told you how it is with us?" said
Baldwin.
  "I didn't understand that there was any relation between
you."
  "Didn't you? Well, you can understand it now. You can take
it from me that this young lady is mine, and you'll find it a very
fine evening for a walk."
  "Thank you, I am in no humour for a walk."
  "Aren't you?" The man's savage eyes were blazing with
anger. "Maybe you are in a humour for a fight, Mr. Boarder!"
  "That I am!" cried McMurdo, springing to his feet. "You
never said a more welcome word."
  "For God's sake, Jack! Oh, for God's sake!" cried poor
distracted Ettie. "Oh, Jack, Jack, he will hurt youl"
  "Oh, it's Jack, is it?" said Baldwin with an oath. "You've
come to that already, have you?"
  "Oh, Ted, be reasonable -- be kind! For my sake, Ted, if ever
you loved me, be big-hearted and forgiving!"
  "I think, Ettie, that if you were to leave us alone we could get
this thing settled," said McMurdo quietly. "Or maybe, Mr.
Baldwin, you will take a turn down the street with me. It's a fine
evening, and there's some open ground beyond the next block."
  "I'll get even with you without needing to dirty my hands,"
said his enemy. "You'll wish you had never set foot in this
house before I am through with you!"
  "No time like the present," cried McMurdo.
  "I'll choose my own time, mister. You can leave the time to
me. See here!" He suddenly rolled up his sleeve and showed
upon his forearm a peculiar sign which appeared to have been
branded there. It was a circle with a triangle within it. "D'you
know what that means?"
  "I neither know nor care!"
  "Well, you will know, I'll promise you that. You won't be
much older, either. Perhaps Miss Ettie can tell you something
about it. As to you, Ettie, you'll come back to me on your
knees -- d'ye hear, girl? -- on your knees -- and then I'll tell you
what your punishment may be. You've sowed -- and by the Lord,
I'll see that you reap!" He glanced at them both in fury. Then he
turned upon his heel, and an instant later the outer door had
banged behind him.
  For a few moments McMurdo and the girl stood in silence.
Then she threw her arms around him.
  "Oh, Jack, how brave you were! But it is no use, you must
fly! To-night -- Jack -- to-night! It's your only hope. He will have
your life. I read it in his horrible eyes. What chance have you
against a dozen of them, with Boss McGinty and all the power of
the lodge behind them?"
  McMurdo disengaged her hands, kissed her, and gently pushed
her back into a chair. "There, acushla, there! Don't be disturbed
or fear for me. I'm a Freeman myself. I'm after telling your
father about it. Maybe I am no better than the others; so don't
make a saint of me. Perhaps you hate me too, now that I've told
you as much?"
  "Hate you, Jack? While life lasts I could never do that! I've
heard that there is no harm in being a Freeman anywhere but
here; so why should I think the worse of you for that? But if you
are a Freeman, Jack, why should you not go down and make a
friend of Boss McGinty? Oh, hurry, Jack, hurry! Get your word
in first, or the hounds will be on your trail."
  "I was thinking the same thing," said McMurdo. "I'll go
right now and fix it. You can tell your father that I'll sleep here
to-night and find some other quarters in the morning."
  The bar of McGinty's saloon was crowded as usual, for it was
the favourite loafing place of all the rougher elements of the
town. The man was popular; for he had a rough, jovial disposi-
tion which formed a mask, covering a great deal which lay
behind it. But apart from this popularity, the fear in which he
was held throughout the township, and indeed down the whole
thirty miles of the valley and past the mountains on each side of
it, was enough in itself to fill his bar; for none could afford to
neglect his good will.
  Besides those secret powers which it was universally believed
that he exercised in so pitiless a fashion, he was a high public
official, a municipal councillor, and a commissioner of roads,
elected to the office through the votes of the ruffians who in turn
expected to receive favours at his hands. Assessments and taxes
were enormous; the public works were notoriously neglected, the
accounts were slurred over by bribed auditors, and the decent
citizen was terrorized into paying public blackmail, and holding
his tongue lest some worse thing befall him.
  Thus it was that, year by year, Boss McGinty's diamond pins
became more obtrusive, his gold chains more weighty across a
more gorgeous vest, and his saloon stretched farther and farther,
until it threatened to absorb one whole side of the Market
Square.
  McMurdo pushed open the swinging door of the saloon and
made his way amid the crowd of men within, through an atmo-
sphere blurred with tobacco smoke and heavy with the smell of
spirits. The place was brilliantly lighted, and the huge, heavily
gilt mirrors upon every wall reflected and multiplied the garish
illumination. There were several bartenders in their shirt sleeves,
hard at work mixing drinks for the loungers who fringed the
broad, brass-trimmed counter.
  At the far end, with his body resting upon the bar and a cigar
stuck at an acute angle from the corner of his mouth, stood a tall,
strong, heavily built man who could be none other than the
famous McGinty himself. He was a black-maned giant, bearded
to the cheek-bones, and with a shock of raven hair which fell to
his collar. His complexion was as swarthy as that of an Italian,
and his eyes were of a strange dead black, which, combined with
a slight squint, gave them a particularly sinister appearance.
  All else in the man -- his noble proportions, his fine features,
and his frank bearing -- fitted in with that jovial, man-to-man
manner which he affected. Here. one would say, is a bluff,
honest fellow, whose heart would be sound however rude his
outspoken words might seem. It was only when those dead, dark
eyes, deep and remorseless, were turned upon a man that he
shrank within himself, feeling that he was face to face with an
infinite possibility of latent evil, with a strength and courage and
cunning behind it which made it a thousand times more deadly.
   Having had a good look at his man, McMurdo elbowed his
way forward with his usual careless audacity, and pushed him-
self through the little group of courtiers who were fawning upon
the powerful boss, laughing uproariously at the smallest of his
jokes. The young stranger's bold gray eyes looked back fear-
lessly through their glasses at the deadly black ones which turned
sharply upon him.
  "Well, young man, I can't call your face to mind."
  "I'm new here, Mr. McGinty."
  "You are not so new that you can't give a gentleman his
proper title."
  "He's Councillor McGinty, young man," said a voice from
the group.
  "I'm sorry, Councillor. I'm strange to the ways of the place.
But I was advised to see you."
  "Well, you see me. This is all there is. What d'you think of
me?"
  "Well, it's early days. If your heart is as big as your body, and
your soul as fine as your face, then I'd ask for nothing better,"
said McMurdo.
  "By Gar! you've got an Irish tongue in your head anyhow,"
cried the saloon-keeper, not quite certain whether to humour this
audacious visitor or to stand upon his dignity.
  "So you are good enough to pass my appearance?"
  "Sure," said McMurdo.
  "And you were told to see me?"
  "I was."
  "And who told you?"
  "Brother Scanlan of Lodge 341, Vermissa. I drink your health
Councillor, and to our better acquaintance." He raised a glass
with which he had been served to his lips and elevated his little
finger as he drank it.
  McGinty, who had been watching him narrowly, raised his
thick black eyebrows. "Oh, it's like that, is it?" said he. "I'll
have to look a bit closer into this, Mister --"
  "McMurdo."
  "A bit closer, Mr. McMurdo; for we don't take folk on trust
in these parts, nor believe all we're told neither. Come in here
for a moment, behind the bar."
  There was a small room there, lined with barrels. McGinty
carefully closed the door, and then seated himself on one of
them, biting thoughtfully on his cigar and surveying his compan-
ion with those disquieting eyes. For a couple of minutes he sat in
complete silence. McMurdo bore the inspection cheerfully, one
hand in his coat pocket, the other twisting his brown mous-
tache. Suddenly McGinty stooped and produced a wicked-looking
revolver.
  "See here, my joker," said he, "if I thought you were
playing any game on us, it would be short work for you."
  "This is a strange welcome," McMurdo answered with some
dignity, "for the Bodymaster of a lodge of Freemen to give to a
stranger brother."
  "Ay, but it's just that same that you have to prove," said
McGinty, "and God help you if you fail! Where were you
made?"
  "Lodge 29, Chicago."
  "When?"
  "June 24, 1872."
  "What Bodymaster?"
  "James H. Scott."
  "Who is your district ruler?"
  "Bartholomew Wilson."
  "Hum! You seem glib enough in your tests. What are you
doing here?"
  "Working, the same as you -- but a poorer job."
  "You have your back answer quick enough."
  "Yes, I was always quick of speech."
  "Are you quick of action?"
  "I have had that name among those that knew me best."
  "Well, we may try you sooner than you think. Have you
heard anything of the lodge in these parts?"
  "I've heard that it takes a man to be a brother."
  "True for you, Mr. McMurdo. Why did you leave Chicago?"
  "I'm damned if I tell you that!"
  McGinty opened his eyes. He was not used to being answered
in such fashion, and it amused him. "Why won't you tell me?"
  "Because no brother may tell another a lie."
  "Then the truth is too bad to tell?"
  "You can put it that way if you like."
  "See here, mister, you can't expect me, as Bodymaster, to
pass into the lodge a man for whose past he can't answer."
  McMurdo looked puzzled. Then he took a worn newspaper
cutting from an inner pocket.
  "You wouldn't squeal on a fellow?" said he.
  "I'll wipe my hand across your face if you say such words to
me!" cried McGinty hotly.
  "You are right, Councillor," said McMurdo meekly. "I should
apologize. I spoke without thought. Well, I know that I am safe
in your hands. Look at that clipping."
  McGinty glanced his eyes over the account of the shooting of
one Jonas Pinto, in the Lake Saloon, Market Street, Chicago, in
the New Year week of 1874.
  "Your work?" he asked, as he handed back the paper.
  McMurdo nodded.
  "Why did you shoot him?"
  "I was helping Uncle Sam to make dollars. Maybe mine were
not as good gold as his. but they looked as well and were cheaper
to make. This man Pinto helped me to shove the queer --"
  "To do what?"
  "Well, it means to pass the dollars out into circulation. Then
he said he would split. Maybe he did split. I didn't wait to see. I
just killed him and lighted out for the coal country."
  "Why the coal country?"
  " 'Cause I'd read in the papers that they weren't too particular
in those parts."
  McGinty laughed. "You were first a coiner and then a mur-
derer, and you came to these parts because you thought you'd be
welcome."
  "That's about the size of it," McMurdo answered.
  "Well, I guess you'll go far. Say, can you make those dollars
yet?"
  McMurdo took half a dozen from his pocket. "Those never
passed the Philadelphia mint," said he.
  "You don't say!" McGinty held them to the light in his
enormous hand, which was hairy as a gorilla's. "I can see no
difference. Gar! you'll be a mighty useful brother, I'm thinking!
We can do with a bad man or two among us, Friend McMurdo:
for there are times when we have to take our own part. We'd
soon be against the wall if we didn't shove back at those that
were pushing us."
  "Well, I guess I'll do my share of shoving with the rest of the
boys."
  "You seem to have a good nerve. You didn't squirm when I
shoved this gun at you."
  "It was not me that was in danger."
  "Who then?"
  "It was you, Councillor." McMurdo drew a cocked pistol
from the side pocket of his peajacket. "I was covering you all
the time. I guess my shot would have been as quick as yours."
  "By Gar!" McGinty flushed an angry red and then burst into
a roar of laughter. "Say, we've had no such holy terror come to
hand this many a year. I reckon the lodge will learn to be proud
of you.... Well, what the hell do you want? And can't I speak
alone with a gentleman for five minutes but you must butt in on
us?"
  The bartender stood abashed. "I'm sorry, Councillor, but it's
Ted Baldwin. He says he must see you this very minute."
  The message was unnecessary; for the set. cruel face of the
man himself was looking over the servant's shoulder. He pushed
the bartender out and closed the door on him.
  "So," said he with a furious glance at McMurdo, "you got
here first, did you? I've a word to say to you, Councillor, about
this man."
  "Then say it here and now before my face," cried McMurdo.
  "I'll say it at my own time, in my own way."
  "Tut! Tut!" said McGinty, getting off his barrel. "This will
never do. We have a new brother here, Baldwin, and it's not for
us to greet him in such fashion. Hold out your hand, man, and
make it up!"
  "Never!" cried Baldwin in a fury.
  "I've offered to fight him if he thinks I have wronged him,"
said McMurdo. "I'll fight him with fists, or, if that won't satisfy
him, I'll fight him any other way he chooses. Now, I'll leave it
to you, Councillor, to judge between us as a Bodymaster should."
  "What is it, then?"
  "A young lady. She's free to choose for herself."
  "Is she?" cried Baldwin.
  "As between two brothers of the lodge I should say that she
was," said the Boss.
  "Oh, that's your ruling, is it?"
  "Yes, it is, Ted Baldwin," said McGinty, with a wicked
stare. "Is it you that would dispute it?"
  "You would throw over one that has stood by you this five
years in favour of a man that you never saw before in your life?
You're not Bodymaster for life, Jack McGinty, and by God!
when next it comes to a vote --"
  The Councillor sprang at him like a tiger. His hand closed
round the other's neck, and he hurled him back across one of the
barrels. In his mad fury he would have squeezed the life out of
him if McMurdo had not interfered.
  "Easy, Councillor! For heaven's sake, go easy!" he cried, as
he dragged him back.
  McGinty released his hold, and Baldwin, cowed and shaken
gasping for breath, and shivering in every limb, as one who has
looked over the very edge of death, sat up on the barrel over
which he had been hurled.
  "You've been asking for it this many a day, Ted Baldwin -- 
now you've got it!" cried McGinty, his huge chest rising and
falling. "Maybe you think if I was voted down from Bodymaster
you would find yourself in my shoes. It's for the lodge to say
that. But so long as I am the chief I'll have no man lift his voice
agalnst me or my rulings."
  "I have nothing against you," mumbled Baldwin, feeling his
throat.
  "Well, then," cried the other, relapsing in a moment into a
bluff joviality, "we are all good friends again and there's an end
of the matter."
  He took a bottle of champagne down from the shelf and
twisted out the cork.
  "See now," he continued, as he filled three high glasses
"Let us drink the quarrelling toast of the lodge. After that, as
you know, there can be no bad blood between us. Now, then
the left hand on the apple of my throat. I say to you, Ted
Baldwin, what is the offense, sir?"
  "The clouds are heavy," answered Baldwin
  "But they will forever brighten."
  "And this I swear!"
  The men drank their glasses, and the same ceremony was
performed between Baldwin and McMurdo
  "There!" cried McGinty, rubbing his hands. "That's the end
of the black blood. You come under lodge discipline if it goes
further, and that's a heavy hand in these parts, as Brother
Baldwin knows -- and as you will damn soon find out, Brother
McMurdo, if you ask for trouble!"
  "Faith, I'd be slow to do that," said McMurdo. He held out
his hand to Baldwin. "I'm quick to quarrel and quick to forgive.
It's my hot Irish blood, they tell me. But it's over for me, and I
bear no grudge."
  Baldwin had to take the proffered hand, for the baleful eye of
the terrible Boss was upon him. But his sullen face showed how
little the words of the other had moved him.
  McGinty clapped them both on the shoulders. "Tut! These
girls! These girls!" he cried. "To think that the same petticoats
should come between two of my boys! It's the devil's own luck!
Well, it's the colleen inside of them that must settle the question
for it's outside the jurisdiction of a Bodymaster -- and the Lord
be praised for that! We have enough on us, without the women
as well. You'll have to be affiliated to Lodge 341, Brother
McMurdo. We have our own ways and methods, different from
Chicago. Saturday night is our meeting, and if you come then,
we'll make you free forever of the Vermissa Valley.