But at last their good luck deserted them. One night while working at the still, John carelessly knocked over an oil-lamp, and in a moment the old dry woodwork of the attic was in flames. Before morning the grand old house, with its great collection of priceless furniture, was a smouldering ruin, nothing but the bare blackened walls standing, and so it is likely to remain for all time. The Evanses, having made a considerable sum of money by now, said good-bye to Blake, and returned to their native land. XI. THE MAYOR’S CONSCIENCE. In the spring of 1920 Blake suddenly received orders to proceed to a town in the south of Ireland on special duty, and on applying for leave was granted a fortnight, which he determined to spend in Dublin. In due course his relief arrived, and after handing over he found himself free from all responsibility for the first time for many months. At this period the Government and the Irish railwaymen were enacting a comic opera worthy of Gilbert and Sullivan at their best, the Government paying the railway companies a huge subsidy, the greater part of which found its way into the railwaymen’s pockets in the form of enormous wages, while the men refused to carry any armed forces of the Crown; and the public, who, of course, indirectly paid the subsidy, looked on helplessly. In order to get a passenger train Blake had to motor thirty-two miles to a station in the next county, where, as yet, no armed forces had tried to travel. While waiting here a green country boy asked him some trivial question, and with little difficulty Blake led him on to tell his whole history. In spite of a Sinn Fein edict to the contrary, many young men, who could find no work in Ireland, or who wished to avoid service in the I.R.A., were at this time contriving to emigrate to the States by crossing to England and sailing from Southampton. In order to defeat this, Sinn Fein agents were in the habit of frequenting the termini in Dublin for the purpose of getting in touch with these would-be emigrants and forcing them to return home. This youth, who came from the Ballyrick district, and had never been in a train in his life, told Blake that a brother in the States had sent him his passage, and that he was due to sail from Southampton in a few days’ time, but had to go to the American Consul in Dublin in order that his passport might be viséd, and asked Blake where the consul’s office was. Blake warned him not to tell any one he met on his journey that he was going to America, or he would surely fall into the hands of the Sinn Fein police, and thought no more about the matter.