Crowley

“ By this time Crowley's eyes had grown accustomed to the light, and he looked at the other man with a natural curiosity which deepened, as he gazed, to a discreet studiousness.
“Oh, pshaw! I'm glad enough to have you! I 'bach' it here alone, through the winter. My name's Allin—John Allin.”
When Crowley, holding aloof from giving his name, explained that his home was in New York, Allin paused in the act of helping him off with his fur lined overcoat, and looked at him enviously, an even keener interest in his quick eyes. ”

“ Crowley's mind flashed back over the three intervening years, those idly withering, denuding implacably alienating years when life and all it held seemed to have fallen into a sour stagnation, from which even she herself had emerged so insufficient, so flaccid, so bitterly unsatisfying. ”

“ Crowley had had a hard time of it ever since he came on the beat. The vicinity was German and he was Irish, and race hatred pursued him daily with sneers, and jibes, and insults, now and then with stones and clods. The children took their cue from the gang at Nussbaum's; the gang made his life miserable. Yet Crowley was a kindly Irishman, with many a jest and joke, and a pleasant word for every one. Almost anybody he arrested could get Crowley to let him go by begging hard enough. On the warm evenings Koerner would sit on the stoop, and Crowley, coming by, would stop for a dish of gossip. ”

“ Be it known that many great placer fortunes have been won by those who stepped in the warm tracks of the discoverers, while rarely does the goddess smile on the tardy; in consequence, no frenzy approaches that of the gold stampede.
Passing Sully's place, they found him and his partner ready and waiting, their packs on the saw-buck. Crowley glared at his enemy in silence while the other sneered wickedly back, and Big Knute laughed in his yellow beard. ”

“ Crowley had been a student at Magdalen College at Oxford, and obtained a fellowship. At the close of the reign of Henry the Eighth, Crowley appears to have sojourned in “the great city;” and in that of Edward the Sixth, we must not be surprised to discover the Fellow of Magdalen established as a printer and bookseller, and moreover combining the elevated characters of poet and preacher. How it happened that a man of letters, and not undistinguished by his genius, adopted a mechanical profession, we may account for from the exigencies of the time. ”

“ Straight up the fifty-mile stream to its source, over the great backbone and into the unmapped country their course led. If they hurried they would have first choice of the good claims close about the discovery; if they lagged Sully and his ox-eyed partner would overtake them, and beyond that it was unpleasant to conjecture.
"We'll hit water pretty soon!" Crowley's voice broke hours of silence, for they were sparing of language. They neither whistled nor sang nor spoke, for Man is a potential body from which his store of energy wastes through tiny unheeded ways. ”

“ In the Crowley language he was "a fine figure of a man," broad and well padded by nature across the shoulders and ample of chest. Crowley liked the ruddy, jovial face, the fine, fierce iron-gray mustache at which his honor was wont to pull while his little blue eyes twinkled down upon a voter's baby.
They started delicately. Lady Hamilton and her owner. His big hands in their orange driving gloves grasped the reins lightly. On the River Way Daniel had purposed to give the horse her head, but the twisting road did not look promising for speeding. ”

“ Crowley was educated in the principles of total abstinence from intoxicating liquors and fanatical hatred of the English connection, and is said to have adorned his circle. He was implicated in the Fenian conspiracy almost from the beginning, and was present at the attempt to break into the coastguard station at Knockadoon made in March 1867. The attack being repulsed, Crowley retired with a small party to the Kilclooney wood, where on the 31st he was shot in a skirmish with the constabulary. ”

“ Crowley crossed the room to the humble little bookshelves. Reaching over a paper-strewn packing-case which obviously served as a writing-desk, he drew back the faded calico curtain which seemed, he thought, so jealously to guard this lonely wilderness-student's library. With languid interest his eye ran down the meager line of books, a row of college texts, Plutarch's Lives, Spenser's Faerie Queene, a tattered Shakespeare, Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, Baldwin's Handbook of Psychology, a dog-eared Keats——
And there Crowley's knowledge of the shelf and its printed contents suddenly ceased. ”

“ he refused tea, but Mrs. Crowley poured out a cup and handed it to him.
'You need not drink it, but I insist on your holding it in your hand. I hate people who habitually deny themselves things, and I can't allow you to mortify the flesh in my house.'
Alec smiled gravely. ”

“ He got up from his chair, and from behind the faded little calico curtain brought out the picture in the bronze frame. He placed it with careful and deliberate fingers on the table, where the lamplight fell full and strong on the pleading, unsatisfied eyes, and on the passionate young lips that seemed so eager for life.
“This is the woman,” he said slowly, as he leaned forward on his arms and looked at her through the drifting smoke.
“This is the woman,” echoed Crowley vacantly, and he, in turn, from the other at her. ”

“ Ef they do, an' worst comes to worst, we'll give 'em a battle!"
It took some time for Crowley to convince Ross that this was the proper course to pursue; but eventually Ross determined to stick it out, and he and Crowley came back to the others, and Crowley gave the orders.
"A couple of yo' men block up the tunnel so 't a snake can't get through either way. Ross, let's yo' an' me hobble this here young Jim Corbett so 't he'll stay with us a spell." Turning to Whitey, he said, "Yo' are goin' t' be a guest o' the ranch fer a time, Jim. ”

“ He paused, musingly, unashamed of his boyish eloquence, glowing with an ardor that filled Crowley with an ominous and fretful uneasiness. Every tendency of the older man's life had been toward reticence ”

“ At one of these doors the phaeton presently drew up, and dropping the reins on the pony's back, Aunt Lucy alighted with a bound between the wheels, and began with Ordway's help, to remove the paper parcels from the seat. When their arms were full, she pushed open the gate, and led him up the short walk to the door where an old man, wearing a knitted shawl, sat in an invalid's chair beyond the threshold. At the sound of their footsteps Crowley turned on them a cheerful wrinkled face which was brightened by a pair of twinkling black eyes that gave him an innocent and merry look. ”

“ But Whitey returned their black looks with interest; his fighting-blood was up,—he had no regard for consequences; and had he been loose, he would have charged all of them. One thing only was the salvation of Whitey. Crowley caught sight of several of the men nursing their various bruises—the welt above Ross' eye was assuming ludicrous proportions—and Crowley laughed!
"No danger, hey?" snarled Ross. "He couldn't git loose, er nuthin'! Oh, no! He's jes' as harmless as a ton o' dynamite!"
"No more chanct o' him gittin' loose 'n the' is o' the lamp explodin'!" ”

“ Crowley, whom he liked because she was American, rich, and a widow.
'I'm grateful, too,' she murmured, as she bade him farewell. 'A clergyman always helps one so much to bear other people's misfortunes.'
Canon Spratte smiled and made a mental note of the remark, which he thought would do very well from his own lips.
'Where is Lucy?' asked Mrs. Crowley, when he had gone.
Lady Kelsey threw up her hands with the feeling, half of amazement, half of annoyance, which a very emotional person has always for one who is self-restrained.
'She's sitting in her room, reading. She's been reading all day. ”

“ Houston put in, "he's working for that Rome scholarship—but he'll never get it any more than I shall the Athens...."
"They used to play hand ball—the gods did——" [Pg 21] Crowley explained professorily. "And in a court, too. I suppose your tennis is merely a survival of that old Greek game."
The three sat at the edge of the court while Crowley discoursed learnedly upon the pastimes of the ancient Greeks. The deep throated bells in the Library Tower rang out the hour of eight across the maples and the amateur lecturer rose lazily.
"Do you want to go down town, Jack?" he asked indifferently. ”

“ After all, someone must look after his children, and if I don't hoard my money a little, George and Lucy will be penniless.
Mrs. Crowley.
Oh, you were quite right to refuse.
Lady Kelsey.
I thought it would only go in senseless extravagances as all the rest has gone, and when he said it was a matter of life and death, I couldn't believe it. He'd said that so often.
Carbery.
It's shocking to think a man of his position and abilities should have come to such a pass.
Mrs. Crowley.
Dear Mr. Carbery, don't draw the very obvious moral. We're all quite wretched enough as it is. ”

“ You see the difference, too, Captain Crowley, between setting a watch forward in front of a man to whom it can suggest nothing criminal, and setting it an hour ahead in front of the man who, after he had murdered Bronson—not at two, but a little after one—stooped to the body and set the watch at least an hour fast, then rushed in to talk coolly with you, in order to establish an incontestable alibi for the time he had so fixed for the murder! ”

“ Crowley learned that Swiss had come from a country a great many miles farther away from America than Ireland was, he rose greatly in her estimation and she made no objection to his occupying a warm corner of the kitchen.
About noon, when the storm was at its very worst, Mandy, who was looking out of the kitchen window, espied something black in the road about halfway between Deacon Mason's and the Pettengill house. She called Mrs. Crowley to the window and asked her what she thought it was.
"That's aisy," said Mrs. Crowley, "It's a man coming down the road." ”

“ Crowley turned, picked out his weapons from the pile and then turned to Jordan. "Ef you value the lives o' them hombreys you got lined up there," he said, "I'd advise you to tie up thet boy, too. He's liable to be too rough with 'em."
Then he turned and strode out of the room; and in a few moments the men heard the hoof-beats of his horse as he galloped away.
Bill offered no explanation of his leniency and none was asked; but such was the confidence in Jordan's squareness, that it is improbable that any one felt that an injustice had been done. ”

“ He was to observe every movement, catch every word, if possible, mark every detail of Miss Kennard’s operations.
[146] Crowley did not show the letter to Miss Elsham, nor did he speak of it. He would mortally offend her by revealing his double-crossing tactics; as a woman she would be more offended by being relegated to the background in favor of the newcomer.
Crowley found his espionage an easy job at first. All he had to report to Mern for three or four days was that “Patsy Jones” did her work in the hotel and remained in her room till after dark—and then went out and strolled aimlessly. ”

“ Crowley.
But men ought to be extravagant. That's what they're there for.
Dick.
Women always took his side because he had an irresistible charm of manner.
Mrs. Crowley.
I think George has, too, a little.
Dick.
I hope for Lucy's sake he will turn out a different man from his father. I wish he weren't so like him in appearance. At last Fred Allerton had squandered every penny, and he married Lady Kelsey's sister, one of the three rich daughters of a Liverpool merchant. But he ran through her money, too, gambling, racing, and so forth, and she died of a broken heart—adoring him still. ”

“ As far as the observance of the conventional virtues were concerned, Richard Ordway, he supposed, was, and had been all his life, a good man, yet something in his austere excellence froze instantly all the gentler impulses in his nephew's heart. It was impossible after this to mention again the subject of Crowley, so going back to his work, he applied himself to his copying until Richard put down his papers and left the office. ”

“ Mrs. Crowley.
But, my dear friend, if a woman really makes up her mind to marry a man, nothing on earth can save him.
Dick.
Don't say that, you terrify me.
Mrs. Crowley.
You need not be in the least alarmed, because I shall refuse you.
Dick.
Thanks, awfully. But all the same I don't think I'll risk a proposal.
Mrs. Crowley.
My dear Mr. Lomas, your only safety is in immediate flight.
Dick.
Why?
Mrs. Crowley.
It must be obvious to the meanest intelligence that you've been on the verge of proposing to me for the last month.
Dick.
Oh, I assure you, you're quite mistaken.
Mrs. Crowley. ”

“ Crowley’s bantering tone ceased abruptly. “Look here, Ordway, practice is at three-thirty. I told you when I let you come back that you were to stick. You’re not keeping your part of the agreement. Unless you were detained by the faculty, in which case you should have notified me, you have no excuse whatsoever. I don’t want any fellows here who can’t be on time. Life’s too short to worry about them. ”

“ While Lucy wandered by the seashore, occupied with painful memories, her old friend Dick, too lazy to walk with her, sat in the drawing-room of Court Leys, talking to his hostess.
Mrs. Crowley was an American woman, who had married an Englishman, and on being left a widow, had continued to live in England. She was a person who thoroughly enjoyed life ”