McGraw-Hill

“ Come with me and be a Pagan, my friend, and when you have finished the job I'll guarantee to plant you up on the slope of Kearsarge, where your soul, as it mounts to the God of a Square Deal, can look down on the valley that you have prepared for a happy people, and say: 'That is mine. I helped create it, and I did it for love. I finished what the Almighty commenced, and the job was worth while.' Will you play the game with me, T. Morgan Carey, and get some joy out of life?”
The land-grabber—the parasite who had lived only to destroy—looked up at Bob McGraw. ”

“ Never before had Bob McGraw unburdened his heart of its innermost secrets, its hopes, its fears, its aspirations; for a moment now he almost quivered at the thought that Donna would look upon him as a dreamer, an idealist—perhaps a fool—he, a penniless desert wanderer assuming to hold in his sunburnt palm the destinies of the under dogs of civilization—the cripples too weak and hopeless to be anything more than wretched camp-followers in the Army of Labor. ”

“ I said. “It might be a chance, but the odds are it would prove a fake. Go home, and go to bed, and make up your mind that if you can find something for McGraw, he'll do better by you than lead you off on a wild-goose chase.” ”

“ He has had bitter disappointments, but they have never beaten him down. Had Stephen McGraw left his money and not his name to the university, the doctor's task would have been easier, for it is not the way of men to beautify another's monument. Once, I remember, a Western capitalist was persuaded to make a great gift to McGraw. He made it with conditions, and for a while our hopes blazed high and with exceeding fury. The collegiate Gothic quadrangles were within our reach, as near to us as the grapes to Tantalus. A half-million dollars was promised us if we raised a like sum within a year. ”

“ A Mexican with a knife was solely responsible. Yet, worse than all of these disappointments is the fact that his name was not Gerald Van Alstyne. No, indeed. The Leading Man owned to the plain, homely, unromantic patronymic of Bob McGraw. The only thing romantic and—er—literary about Bob McGraw was his Roman-nosed mustang, Friar Tuck—so called because he had been foaled and raised on a wooded range near Sherwood in Mendocino county. ”

“ The man with courage enough to turn outlaw and rob a stage had courage enough to kill his man, and Bob McGraw would have fought it out in the open, He would never have taken to the shelter of a sand-dune and fired from ambush. Bob McGraw, having brains, would have killed the messenger and gone back for his hat! He was too cunning a frontiersman to leave a trail like that behind him and it was no part of his nature to do a half-way job. Still, the man who had robbed that stage had had no hobbles on his courage. ”

“ Weel, I waited a wee, then I crawled oot masel,
And the big stuff wis gorin' and roarin' around,
And I seemed tae be under the oxter o' hell,
And Creation wis crackin' tae bits by the sound.
And I says in ma mind: "Gang ye back, ye auld fule!"
When I thrilled tae a note that wis saucy and sma';
And there in a crater, collected and cool,
Wi' his wee penny whistle wis Sandy McGraw.
Ay, there he wis playin' as gleg as could be,
And listenin' hard wis a spectacled Boche;
Then Sandy turned roon' and he noddit tae me,
And he says: "Dinna blab on me, Sergeant McTosh. ”

“ Our attempts to market books in foreign languages from New York, or from one of our foreign agencies, have not been encouraging. Accordingly, the first question, when we are endeavoring to arrange for a translation, is for us to find a publisher in the country selected who will undertake the work of securing a translator and publishing the book. When a translator offers his services, we find it necessary to ask him first to interest a publisher in his own country in the venture. ”

“ Suppose we stand here—it's a convenient distance apart—and wait with our arms folded for the next time the white horse paws the rocks, because when I kill you, McGurk, I want you to die knowing that another man was faster on the draw and straighter with his bullets than you are. D'you see?"
He could not have spoken with a more formal politeness if he had been asking the other to pass first through the door of a dining-room. The wonder of McGurk grew and the sweat on his forehead seemed to be spreading a chill through his entire body. He said: "I see. You trust all to the cross, eh, Pierre? ”

“ McGoorty."
"What's the matter?" asked Kirby, coming up with another bucket of water. "Time's about ready to be called."
"We're sunk!" bawled McVey. "This ain't McGoorty! This is a derned hill-billy which murdered McGoorty and stole his clothes."
"We're rooint!" exclaimed Richards, aghast. "Everybody's bet their dough without even seein' our man, they was that full of trust and civic pride. We can't call it off now. Tomahawk is rooint! What'll we do?" ”

“ He glanced back at the portrait. “But not one as sweet as you!” he added loyally. Then he, too, dropped into the ever-moving stream and was lost to the angry manager's sight.
It is a long call from Kirkhumphries to London, and most of the way Sandy McGrab had walked on “nothing a mile.” He had not tasted food for forty-eight hours, and this was his first night in the great metropolis. The many lights danced before his eyes; at times the pavement showed an inclination to rise up and hit him on the head. The hundreds of changing faces added to his confusion. ”

“ He was kind. Harley P. Hennage was right. Bob McGraw was a Desert Rat. But a Desert Rat lives close to the great heart of Mother Nature, and his own heart is clean.
The dawn-light came filtering across the desert and lit up the room where she sat. She turned to the bed and saw that Bob McGraw was watching her again, and on his face was that little, cheerful, mocking, inscrutable smile.
Again Donna found herself powerless to resist the appeal in the man's eyes. ”

“ There were three clothiers in Kirk Humphries, but the firm of McGrab & Son had done more in the line of gulling the credulous upstart English than the other two put together, and consequently was the most noted for its strict integrity. Not that the McGrabs were dishonest. Far from it. But they were Scotch, and their customers were English—and further explanation is superfluous.
Sandy McGrab was selling a warranted heather mixture to Sir John Hodge. Sir John Hodge—of Hodge's Patent Baby Food fame—had bought Glen Every, the McPhersons' estate on the other side of the loch, and wore kilts. ”

“ There's your little old bag with your applications still untouched, although I will admit that I was mean enough to help you file some of those instruments of abandonment from your dummy entrymen. I must hurry along now. Thank you so much—”
The janitor entered. In his hand he held Mr. McGraw's suspenders.
“You might need these” he interrupted, “more particular if you're goin' to do any runnin', an' I'll bet you are.”
“Thank you” murmured Mr. McGraw. “You're very thoughtful,” and quite calmly he proceeded to remove his coat and vest and replace the suspenders. ”

“ Come up into Owens valley three years from now and I'll prove it to you. Good-day.”
“One moment, McGraw. Don't go for a minute or two. I—I'd like to believe that what you say is true, but the trouble is—you see, McGraw, I have never encountered your point of view heretofore. Tell me, McGraw—don't lie to me—do you feel the slightest desire to see me suffer, or is this—er—brotherly-love talk of yours plain buncombe?”
Bob McGraw advanced toward the man he had beaten. He held out his hand. “I try to be a man” he said—“to be too big to hate and put myself on a level with a brute. ”

“ The Reverend John Andrews slipped into his host's vacant chair, and leaned forward eagerly.
“Sandy McGrab,” he said, in a hurried undertone, “are ye here as a wolf in sheep's clothing?”
“I dinna ken what ye mean,” McGrab retorted sullenly.
“Ye ken weel eno'. These puir, honest folk—do they ken what ye are—a play actor—a mon on thebroad road that leadeth——”
“They'll ken in guid time,” McGrab interrupted.
“A mon who is to marry a play actress——”
“It's no true—I mean——” He broke off, aghast at the horrible significance of his own words. “I mean I'm no engaged to any woman——” he stammered. ”

“ I'll no move on——”
“My poor young man——” the curate interrupted, and then stopped short. Even in broad daylight, the travel-stained kilt must have been quite unrecognizable, but whether Stuart or McPherson or Macduff, it was still indubitably a kilt. Sandy McGrab's knees were stained with the damp soil, and the glory of silver buckles was no more. John Andrews drew his breath quickly. “Man,” he said almost with passion, “you're not real?” ”

“ But I tell you this McGraw man's a Desert Rat. The desert's got him. Generally it don't get 'em so young, but once in a while it does, An' of all the Desert Rats that ever sucked a niggerhead cactus, the feller that goes huntin' lost mines is the worst. They never get over it.”
Donna permitted herself a very small smile.
“Sometimes they do” she reminded him.
“I wouldn't be surprised. But not until they've found what they're lookin' for. However, we'll wait an' see if Bob McGraw—like that name, Miss Donna?” ”

“ He glanced up quickly. “It's the same with you, Mr. McGrab. You have your enemies, like the rest of us. The public adores you, but there are men who'd be glad to tear you headlong from your high place. ”

“ But men could not forget that in all his work there rode behind Red Pierre six dauntless warriors of the mountain-desert, while McGurk had been always a single hand against the world, a veritable lone wolf. ”

“ Sandy McGrab went into his ancestral dwelling and slammed the door.
II.
THE LAIRD ENTERTAINS.
“Well, I shall make one more attempt at a reconciliation,” said Sir John pompously and stretched out an unbooted foot in the direction of his valet. “The man's a fool, of course, going about with his nose in the air because his grandfather was a smarter sheep stealer than the others; but it's my duty as landowner to do the neighborly, and I shall ask him up to meet Donna Eleonora next week. The car at ten-thirty sharp, James.” ”

“ Sandy McGrab pulled himself together.
“I'm not,” he said. “I'm a Highlander.”
She laughed.
“A Highland actor!” she said gayly. “Isn't that a possible combination?”
“Play actors are the children of the devil,” he declared, and the spirit of the late McGrab shone in his scornful eyes. ”

“ Sandy McGrab entered his flat as an elegant gentleman of fashion. He had tipped his taxi driver with an Anglo-Saxon liberality, and bidden him good night with scarcely the suggestion of a Highland accent. Half an hour later he was seated before his fire in the shabbiest of shabby kilts, talking broad Scotch to a bewildered, but sympathetic English retainer.
“Ye ken, it's guid to be a reel mon again,” said McGrab, rubbing his bare knees with genial contentment. “It's just wonderful what the kilts can do for one. ”

“ Nothing moved save the sunlight, flying like a beaten army to a last fastness on the distant hilltops. Not a stag—not so much as a rabbit—showed itself. Sandy McGrab sniffed the air luxuriously. There was a keenness in it that told of long, hard nights to come and the scent of the moldering leaves that shone red gold against the somber background of faded gorse and heather. A long way off something dead white glittered amidst the crimson clouds—the first finger streak of winter. A mighty sigh of relief heaved up Sandy McGrab's big shoulders. ”

“ Bob McGraw walked to the main entrance of the State House and back again to the door of the land office. Still nobody came. He was approaching the main entrance to the State House a second time when he heard an automobile chugging through the capitol grounds and pause outside the main entrance. Half a minute later a man appeared at the head of the corridor and approached rapidly. As he came nearer Bob saw that he was about fifty years old. He wore a carefully trimmed imperial and a gold pince-nez and seemed to exude a general air of pomposity and power. ”

“ The McPhersons still occupied a fragment of their ancestral dominions, lived on bread and cheese and a majestic sense of superiority, and hated the interloper with an amazing, entirely racial pertinacity. The fact that it was Hodge's English money that provided the bread and cheese and gave sustenance to the superiority, softened them not at all. Sandy McGrab, who with the rest of Kirk Humphries took cautious sides with the ousted clan, was explaining the exact merits of the unshrinkable tweeds to Sir John's patronizing innocence. ”

“ We will go through the doors together—me first to take his fire, and you behind to shoot him down."
"I guess no man can be as brave as a woman, Jack. No; I have to see McGurk alone. He faced my father alone and shot him down. I'll face McGurk alone and live long enough to put my mark on him."
"But you don't know him. He can't be hurt. Do you think my father and—and Dick Wilbur would fear any man who could be hurt? No, but McGurk has been in a hundred fights and never been touched. There's a charm over him, don't you see?"
"I'll break the charm, that's all."
"You're only a boy, Pierre." ”

“ I knew old Tom McGraw well. He died only last winter, in the secluded quiet of a little house he’d bought in the Bronx. A queer old fellow, very secretive, but in his last years, when the friendship was established and old age had limbered the rigidity of temperament and training, he grew more expansive. What he told me, as first-hand witness, and what he had sensed as one who knew Blatch’s character and history, furnished the main facts of the story. ”