McGillicuddy

“ But it's the only life!”
Illustration: It was not in McGillicuddy's soul to suffer any girl to famish in his presence. He told the train-boy to pass the basket down the aisle and bring the bill to him. When the boy reappeared, the basket had been emptied. McGillicuddy was so pleased with the generous spirit in which the Ideals had availed themselves of his hospitality that he gave the boy a five-dollar bill and told him to keep the change. Where McGillicuddy sat became the center of the car. Anyone seeing the Ideals fluttering about him might have thought him an old friend and comrade. ”

“ McGillicuddy gained the further bank under the impetus of a patter of shot, and crouched behind a log. The guard was already down in the stream, flashing an electric lamp and demanding that a certain person profanely described come out of hiding and surrender.
McGillicuddy had no thought of surrendering. On the contrary, he left the brook and struck out boldly for the open. The booming of the gun was likely to reunite the scattered foe, and McGillicuddy ran as he had never run before. ”

“ The sympathies of the soldiers were entirely with the After-Clap, who loved soldiers, knowing them to be his true friends, and was never happier than with his big, kind, blue-coated playmates, the troopers, with their rattling sabres and clanking spurs.
Sergeant McGillicuddy, being himself under Mrs. McGillicuddy's iron rule, did not approve of Kettle's breach of discipline and hatched a scheme to catch him. With a countenance as inscrutable as the Sphinx, he stepped to the telephone booth, shut the door carefully, and held a short conversation over the wire with Mrs. McGillicuddy. ”

“ The aura flung over the top of a hill by the lights of an approaching car brought him to attention. He dismissed instantly the thought that the discarded lover might be in pursuit, for that young gentleman could hardly have found a machine and picked up the trail so quickly.
The oncoming car came to a standstill, and four men jumped out and planted themselves across the road. Two of them carried objects which, to McGillicuddy's surprised vision, looked very much like shotguns. ”

“ Past the veranda filed the twenty priceless sheep, and on to the paddock.
"I suppose they'll carry off all the prizes at the fair, won't they?" asked the Mistress civilly, as McGillicuddy plodded past her at the tail of the procession.
"Aiblins, aye," grunted McGillicuddy, with the exquisite courtesy of a member of his race and class who feels he is being patronized. "Aiblins, aye. Aiblins, na'. Aiblins—ugh-uh."
Having thus safeguarded his statement against assault from any side at all, the Scot moved on. Lad strolled down toward the paddock to superintend the task of locking up the sheep. ”

“ Again McGillicuddy glowered dourly at Lad. The collie returned the look with interest; a well-bred dog being as skilled in reading human faces as is any professional dead beat. Lad saw the dislike in McGillicuddy's heavy-thatched eyes; cordially he yearned to prove his own distaste for the shepherd, but the Mistress' command had immuned this sour stranger. ”

“ And young Jack McGillicuddy, under an assumed name that became "Owen Carey" finally, worked as an errand boy, as a shoe clerk, in a printer's office, in a press-room—in Toledo, in Chicago, in Boston—tramping, beating his way on freight-trains, working at anything temporary, even begging when he had—to an absurd, sensitive, eccentric young victim of his own intenseness, whose one consistent impression of mankind was its good-natured inhumanity.
That was why the whine of an animal affected him more than a human appeal. He had a fellow-feeling for the animal. ”

“ McGillicuddy marched proudly out at the head of 75 broad-shouldered, well-thewed young Indianians, fit and fine as any south of the Ohio.
The guides, holding their muskets butts up, indicated where the line was to form, the trim little Adjutant, glorious as the day in a new uniform and full breasted as a pouter-pigeon, was strutting over toward the band, and the towering red-headed Colonel, martial from his waving plume to his jangling spurs, stood before his tent in massive dignity, waiting for the color company to come up and receive the precious regimental standard. ”

“ Florette continued. “But you got to get that out o' your system. A girl like her, who aint naturally fitted for a professional career, and cries when she gets a call-down, had better get married and play the girl with the hoe in her own little garden. Lord! If Forbes talked to me the way he does to Irene, I'd sure retire to private life!”
McGillicuddy hated Forbes for his lack of consideration for Irene. He had observed Forbes at the lunch-counter and had formed the lowest opinion of him. McGillicuddy felt deeply that a man with so many young lives in his keeping should be a gentleman. ”

“ McGillicuddy assented; "but after you've been shot at a few times, you really don't mind it. It's like any other habit."
AFTER Watson left, McGillicuddy went through his act half a dozen times, laying stress on the dance to limber up. His shoulders and back were slightly uncomfortable from the adhesive plaster where Foster dressed his wounds, but otherwise he had never felt better.
To conserve his strength as much as possible, he had Ijima drive him to the country club in a touring car he kept as part of his establishment. ”

“ The Ideals worked hard; he was impressed by their zeal and industry; but the harder they worked, the sadder book and music became. McGillicuddy was a practical man, and he watched the piece proceed with the melancholy knowledge that the Ideals would never get beyond Kernville.
He returned to the hotel to await the coming of Irene and Florette, for whom he ordered the best supper the Dixon House offered. Members of the company, hurrying back from the theater, execrated the faithless Forbes and discussed in bitter terms their unpaid salaries and the future that hung darkly before them. ”

“ I've played cards too often with Shorty not to keep my eye on him whenever he is around. I saw through that gun-lock trick."
"The trouble with you fellows," responded Capt. McGillicuddy, "is that you are constantly hunting around for some reason rather than the real one for Co. Q being always ahead of you. It isn't my fault that Co. Q is the best company in the regiment. It simply comes natural to the men that make up the company. You gentlemen divide up the rest among you, and then come down to the sutler's and we'll talk the matter over. ”

“ He folded the trousers neatly, hung them over a chair and lighted a cigar. Jimmie was baffled. For McGillicuddy never drank; he had seen him lay a small, well-kept fat hand rejectingly upon his glass when the butler offered wine at dinner. Nor did it seem possible that the shrewd, substantial dry-goods merchant had suddenly lost his senses.
“Forget it, Jimmie; forget all about it, and by this time to-morrow it will all be over! It will have to be,” he added, crossing to his dressing-table and inspecting a timetable, “for I leave on the four-ten ferry.” ”

“ McGillicuddy called out warningly:
"Shorty! Shorty!"'
Si looked in amazement at this new development of his partner's genius. The officers and men on the other side of the branch seemed to have forgotten for the moment the annoyance of the balked team in enjoyment of Shorty's outburst.
"Why under heaven they put such murrain cattle as you in the army I can't tell," he continued with another savage kick in the mule's side. "You only take up room from your betters. You don't fight, you only strut like a turkey-cock, and eat and he-haw. ”

“ He was a happier man than he had been in the old days, and he accepted the presence of the Ideals as a mitigating circumstance of the journey to Kernville. The lively conversation about him at once caused his eyes to roam unseeingly over his newspaper. A diffident man, McGillicuddy, he had grown immensely curious of late as to the employments and habits of fragments of the human race that were wholly alien to wholesale dry goods. ”

“ McGillicuddy looked up, recognized the waving of the Deacon's bandanna, and hastened thither. Fortunately he knew the Provost officers; there were explanations all around, and profuse apologies, and just as the fifes and drums struck up the "Rogue's March" behind the luckless storekeeper, who had to step off in front of a line of leveled bayonets, the Deacon walked away arm-in-arm with the Captain.
"I'm not goin' to let go o' you till I'm safe back in our own place," he said. "My gracious! think of havin' my head shaved and marched off the way that feller's bein'." ”

“ McGillicuddy, stepping down to the center, so that his whisper could be heard by all. "It's always so when men fire downhill. Then, you all want to be careful and fire low, so as to hit as many as possible, and rattle them in their future firing. The more of them we can hit the less of us will be hit afterward. Forward—Guide right!"
It seemed as if the crashing of their marching feet was so loud that the rebels on the hill could not fail to hear it, and they held their breaths in painful expectancy of the volley. ”

“ McGillicuddy. "All the news is that Bragg is down there in Shelbyville in force, and with blood in his eye. Somebody is going to be terribly whipped before the end of the week, and I'm pretty sure it won't be the Army of the Cumberland."
"Well, let's have it over and done with," said Si. "It's got to be fought out some time, and the sooner the better. I wish the whole thing could be fought to a finish to-morrow. Then I'd know at once whether I'm to live through this war."
"I don't think you'll be kept long in suspense," replied Capt. McGillicuddy. "Shelbyville is only 25 miles away. ”

“ Sergeant Gully here says the drill sergeant is a honey, but he's awful mistaken. I've known Briggs ever since we was rookies together, and he's a cruel man, and has caused the death of several rookies by his murderin' ways."
Just then the three came face to face with Sergeant McGillicuddy. In those days McGillicuddy's honest face was gloomy and he had not much spirit for jokes, but he laughed when Sergeant Halligan explained to him that Sergeant Gully had enlisted Kettle and had passed him both mentally and physically, and that he was then on his way to take his first lesson in riding. ”

“ ROGER G. McGILLICUDDY had never traveled with an opera company before. Indeed, he did not immediately realize that the young ladies and gentlemen, thirty in number, who had sleepily jostled him on the Fostoria platform were members of a profession adorned by Geraldine Farrar and Enrico Caruso. He was more concerned with the fact that No. 18 did not carry a parlor-car, though the common carrier to which he had confidingly intrusted his person had, through its officers and agents, promised him that luxury. ”

“ By the time the rebels were all up, Co. Q had arrived on the scene. As the prisoners were being disarmed and put under guard, Si called out to Capt. McGillicuddy:
"Captain, one o' these men is my partickler meat. I want to 'tend to him."
"All right. Corporal," responded the Captain, "attend to him, but don't be too rough on him. Remember that he is an unarmed prisoner."
Si and Shorty got down off their horses, and approached Bushrod, who turned white as death, trembled violently, and began to beg.
"Gentlemen, don't kill me," he whined. "I'm a poor man, an' have a fambly to support. ”

“ He's never seen you before, and don't know one o' you from Adam's off-ox. He has his own ideas as to who he wants in the company, and what he says goes. It may be that the color o' your hair'll decide him, mebbe the look in your eyes, mebbe the shape o' your noses. 'Tention! Right dress! Front! Saloot!"
Capt. McGillicuddy came down at the head of the company officers of the regiment, and took a comprehensive survey of the squad.
"Fine-looking lot of youngsters," he remarked. "They'll make good soldiers."
"Every one o' them true-blue, all wool and a yard wide. Captain," said Si. ”

“ After Governor Tener had accepted the presidency of the League of Base Ball Clubs, the Pen and Pencil Club gave him a dinner. At this dinner I met “Connie Mack,” the man who has been heard of everywhere because under his management the Athletic Club won the championships through a series of years. His real name is Cornelius McGillicuddy. He made a speech about what he had done and hoped to do which was apt and pleasing. He is a dark-eyed and fleshless man, about five feet ten inches in height, and through the drawn lines of his rather hard face a smile of good nature continually makes its way. ”

“ O, but I'll soak 'em for that yet."
"Trouble is," said Si, laughing, "the boys've bin layin' around doin' nothin' too long. They're fuller o' devilment than a dog is of fleas."
"But I haint told you half," continued the Orderly-Sergeant. "Them smarties were quick to find out that Alf Russell and Jim Humphreys leaned strongly toward religion, and they filled 'em with the idea that Cap McGillicuddy was a very devout man, and held family devotions every evening in his tent, in which his company joined." ”

“ Everyone looked eagerly toward the Colonel's tent, and saw him come out buckling on his sword, while his Orderly sped away for his horse. Apparently, all the officers had been in consultation with him, for they were hurrying away to their several companies.
"Fall in, Co. Q," shouted the Orderly-Sergeant. "Fall in promptly."
Everybody made a rush for his gun and equipments.
"Hurry up. Orderly," said Capt. McGillicuddy, coming up with his sword and belt in hand. "Let the boys take what rations they can lay their hands on, but not stop to cook any. We've got to go on the jump." ”