"Who do you want to see?" inquired the man with the spade.
Before Barnes could reply, a hearty voice accosted him from behind. He
whirled and saw O'Dowd approaching, not twenty yards away. The
Irishman's face was aglow with pleasure.
"I knew I couldn't be mistaken in the shape of you," he cried,
advancing with outstretched hand. "You've got the breadth of a dock-
hand in your shoulders, and the trimness of a prize-fighter in your
waist."
They shook hands. "I fear I am trespassing," said Barnes. His glance
went over his shoulder as he spoke. The man with the spade had been
swallowed up by the earth! He could not have vanished more quickly in
any other way. Off among the trees there were intermittent flashes of
blue and white.
"I am quite sure you are," said O'Dowd promptly, but without a trace
of unfriendliness in his manner. "Bedad, loving him as I do, I can't
help saying that Curtis is a bally old crank. Mind ye, I'd say it to
his face,--I often do, for the matter of that. Of course," he went on
seriously, "he is a sick man, poor devil. I have the unholy courage to
call him a chronic crank every once in awhile, and the best thing I
can say for his health is that he grins when I say it to him.
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