Barbran

Immediately upon hearing of my fell design MacLachan, the tailor, paid a visit of protest to my bench.

"Is it true fact that I hear, Dominie?"

"What do you hear, MacLachan?"

"That ye're to make one of yer silly histories about Barbran?"

"Perfectly true," said I, passing over the uncomplimentary adjective.

"'Tis a feckless waste of time."

"Very likely."

"'Twill encourage the pair, when a man of yer age and influence in Our Square should be dissuadin' them."

"Perhaps they need a friendly word."

MacLachan frowned. "Ye're determined?"

"Oh, quite!"

"Then I'll give ye a title for yer romance."

"That's very kind of you. Give it."

"The Story of Two Young Fools. By an Old One," said MacLachan witheringly, and turned to depart.

"Mac!"

"What?"

"Wait a moment."

I held him with my glittering eye. Also, in case that should be inadequate, with the crook of my cane firmly fixed upon his ankle.

"I'll waste na time from the tailorin'," began the Scot disdainfully, but paused as I pointed a loaded finger at his head. "Well?" he said, showing a guilty inclination to flinch.

"Mac, was I an original accomplice in this affair?"

"Will ye purtend to deny--"

"Did I scheme and plot with Cyrus the Gaunt and young Stacey?"

MacLachan mumbled something about undue influence.

"Did I get arrested?"

MacLachan grunted.

"In a cellar?"

MacLachan snorted.

"With my nose painted green?"

MacLachan groaned. "There was others," he pleaded.

"A man of your age and influence in Our Square," I interrupted sternly, "should have been dissuading them."

"Arr ye designin' to put all that in yer sil--in yer interestin' account?"

"Every detail."

MacLachan dislodged my crook from his leg, gave me such a look as mid-Victorian painters strove for in pictures of the Dying Stag, and retired to his Home of Fashion.

* * * * *

That men of the sobriety and standing of Cyrus the Gaunt, MacLachan, Leon Coventry, the Little Red Doctor, and Boggs (I do not count young Phil Stacey, for he was insane at the time, and has been so, with modifications and glorifications, ever since) should paint their noses green and frequent dubious cellars, calls for explanation. The explanation is Barbran.

Barbran came to us from the immeasurable distances; to wit, Washington Square.

Let me confess at once that we are a bit supercilious in our attitude