He had put up that barrier to signify that the road was closed; very well, they'd see. Dirt under their feet, huh? All right. How he hated them all, with their horses and carriages and dances and dinners and clubs! Bah! He took a flask from his pocket and drank. Then he cursed the laggard Italians, and mourned that a year and a half must pass before he could sell their votes again. Bolles contracted for Italian labor and controlled something more than eight hundred votes. McQuade sublet various small contracts to him, and in return used the Italians during elections. That jump, harmless enough in itself, was to prove a bad inspiration on Warrington's part. But it is always these seemingly inconsequent things that bear the heaviest reckoning. Half a mile onward they drew down to a walk, flushed and breathless. "Perhaps we oughtn't to have done that," she said doubtfully, working the numbness from her fingers. "No thoroughfare" had hitherto been religiously respected by her; this was her first transgression, and she wasn't entirely satisfied with herself. "Pshaw! There's no harm done. There was no earthly reason why we should have turned back to the fork and added two miles to our ride. Don't let anything like that worry you; we went by too fast to be recognized. Look! here's a big clover patch. I never pass clover without wanting to get down and hunt for four-leaves. Shall we?" She was out of the saddle before the query had left his lips. "I believe it would be a good idea to arm ourselves against bad luck," she replied, gently moving aside the clover heads with her crop. "You believe in four-leaf clover, then?" She nodded. "I do. I also am very careful," he added, "to catch the money-patches on my coffee." She laughed. After all, there was something old-fashioned about this man. "And I never think of plucking a five-leaf. That's bad luck." "The worst kind of bad luck. I remember, when I was a kid, I never played hooky without first hunting up my four-leaved amulet. If I got a licking when I returned home, why, I consoled myself with the thought, that it might have been ten times worse but for the four-leaf." They moved about, looking here and there, while the horses buried their noses in the wet grass and threatened never to return to the road again. After a diligent search Patty found a beautiful four-leaf clover. She exhibited it in triumph. "You've better luck than I," said Warrington. "We shall have to go on without my finding one." "You may have this one," she replied; "and I hope it will bring you all sorts of good luck." He took out his card-case and made room for the little amulet. "It is impossible not to be fortunate now," he said, with a gravity that was not assumed. She looked at him dubiously. No, there was no laughter in his eyes; he was perfectly serious.