mandarin in an official position at Pekin. He had travelled much on the mainland as well as in Formosa, and was well acquainted with official procedure both in peace and in war. Scarcely had Sergeant Gorman begun his explanations when his "Ho! . . Ho! ... An-ni ho!.. Put-tsi ho!" (Good! good! That's good! Very good!) showed that he fully understood what was expected of him.

...

M

IX

A QUIET LIFE

EANWHILE McLeod and Sinclair were studying the sergeant. He was a man of perhaps forty-five years, but could pass for much younger. Five feet eight or nine inches in height, he was broad-shouldered and sturdily built. No matter where he might be or how dressed, there could be no mistaking that he had been a soldier. Long military training spoke in every movement.

His thick hair was a red-brown, with the emphasis on the red. So was his heavy, fierce-looking moustache. So were his bristling eyebrows. So were his eyes. His face, save where it was ordinarily covered by the band of his sun-helmet, was pretty nearly the same shade.

He talked rapidly; very rapidly; so rapidly that his words often stumbled over one another in their eagerness to get out, until he actually stuttered. When he tried, he spoke English with just enough Irish accent to make it sweet on his tongue. But when he didn't try, and that was most of the time, the brogue was rich and thick. Nearly always he had the peculiarly Irish trick of repeating the last words of a closing

sentence.

"How long has Gorman been here?" asked Sinclair in a low tone.

"Only a couple of months," replied McLeod. "Came over with us from Amoy."

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How does it come that a sergeant with his record of service should end up by being consulate constable in an out-of-the-way corner like Tamsui?" Search me! I can't tell you."

66

"Probably the old story of a man who has served his Queen and country well and then been dropped, to live or die wherever he may chance to fall."

"Yes, and none of the blockheads who have commanded him have sense enough to know how much good service they could get out of a man like that, if they would only give him a chance to rise. Instead they turn him adrift like a worn-out horse."

"Perhaps he has a history behind him. It seems to me that most men out here, except you and I, Mac, have histories. Here he comes. Perhaps he

will talk."

The sergeant crossed the little deck, stood at attention, and saluted:

"I have the honour to report, sir, that I have given the Chinese, A Hoa, the instructions you commanded and that he seems to understand them very well, sir."

"Very good, sergeant. There is nothing further to be done until we reach Twatutia. Be seated." Thank you, sir."

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"By the way, sergeant, I notice by the passport that your name is John Gorman.”

"It is, sir."

"I used to know a Sergeant John Gorman on the police force in Kingston, Canada. They say that, when the college boys were out on a frolic and raising cain, he could do more to keep them within bounds with a smile and a bit of blarney than all the rest of the force could do with their batons."

"Och, but he'll be

from Sleeahtballymackcur

raghalicky, in County Cork. All the people there are Gormans, an' most of thim are John Gormans. An' as for the shmile, all the Gormans have it. They get it whin they're childer, sayin' the name of their native place. An' whin they grow up, no matther where they go, the shmile wan't come off-the divil a bit will it come off."

"You're right there, sergeant," said McLeod. "You have the smile, sure enough. But it never shows to best advantage until you say the name of the place where you were born. What's this it is, again?” "Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky."

66

66

Exactly! That's a name to make any one smile." Och, Misther McLeod, but you shud have seen it on me whin I furst left the ould place. Me face was all shmile. But on the Afghan border wan day, an ould black-face of a Pathan-may the divil fly away wid him!-tuk a pot shot at me from betune two rocks. He got me through the two cheeks of me, an' siv'ral of me teeth. After the wounds healed up I never had me natural shmile ag'in,-wud you bel'ave me, I niver was able to shmile natural ag'in."

"Did you get back at him at all?" inquired McLeod.

"That's jist what was hurtin' me. For while I was spittin' out me teeth, an' in no condishun to take aim, the onderhanded, tricherous Afghan was dodgin' away through the rocks. But me next in file in the Munsters, he was a Scotchman from Aberdeen, got a squint of him as he bint double, goin' round the corner of a pricipice, an' be the blissin' of Hiven, took a chip off the stern works of him,-a mortial good shot, for the target he hit was the only part in sight."

"But how did you know that he was hit?" asked McLeod. "Did you take him prisoner?"

"Divil a bit! A wounded Pathan can crawl loike a wounded snake. But eighteen months afterwards I was up in the hills, wan of an escort of the p'ace envoys. The very first day wan of the native policemen pointed out an ould black-face among the chiefs an' tould me that was the man that put the bullet through me two cheeks. An' be the powers, that ould haythen cud no more sit down than I cud shmile. The shot of me next in file had spoiled the joint in the middle of him. It was the furst rale comfort that had come to me since the day I was shot. I began to laugh whin I saw him shtandin' up shtiff as a ramrod whin the others sat; or lyin' on his back, shtraight as a yardshtick whin the rest were reclinin’-loike on the divans. The more I thought of it, the more I laughed, an' the shmile of the Gormans began to come back to me little by little. But I'll niver have the shmile ag’in that I had in Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky-sure as I'm livin', I'll niver shmile ag'in as I used to whin I left Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky."

"How did you come to leave Sleeahtballymackwhat-a-ghalicky?" inquired Sinclair.

"Shure, docther, an' it wasn't me own doin'. To the best of me ricolliction it was the doin' of Providence, wid a bit of help from the priests, an' me father, an' the government, an' the recruitin' sergeant thrown in."

"How did they all come to the help of Providence?" asked the doctor.

"Faix, but you're of an inquirin' turn of moind, docther; beggin' your pardon for makin' so bould as to tell you that same."