Regan, with a sort of inward satisfaction and some complacency, tugged at his scraggly brown mustache, and summed it up pretty well. "Did I not say," said Regan, "that the only decent thing old John would ever do would be to die? H'm? Well, then, I was right, wasn't I? Look at young Reddy! Straight as a string--and taking care of the old lady now. No; I ain't getting my shirts starched the way Mrs. MacQuigan used to starch them--but no matter. Mrs. MacQuigan isn't taking in washing any more, God bless her! I guess Reddy got it handed to him pretty straight on the carpet that night. I'll have him pulling a throttle one of these days--what?" Bradley? Yes; this is Martin Bradley's story--not Reddy MacQuigan's. But Reddy had his part in it--had running orders to make one more of those strange meeting points fixed by the Great Despatcher that we were speaking about a minute ago. It was three months to the day from old John MacQuigan's death that Bradley, in from a run, found a letter waiting for him up at Mrs. MacQuigan's--and went down under it like a felled ox! Not the big thing to do? Well, perhaps not--all that he cared for in life, everything that he lived for, everything that had kept him straight since his trouble years ago, snatched from him without a moment's warning--that was all. Another man might not have lost his grip--or he might. Bradley lost his--for a little while--but they call him to-day a game man on the Hill Division. White-faced, not quite understanding himself, in a queer sort of groping way, Bradley, in his flood of bitter misery, told Mrs. MacQuigan, who had watched him open the letter--told her that his little housekeeper, as he had come to call the kiddie, was dead. Not even a chance to see her--an accident--the letter from the lawyers who did his business, transmitting the news received from the school authorities who knew only the lawyers as the principals--a letter, trying to break the news in a softer way than a telegram would have done, since Bradley was too far away to get back East in time, anyhow. And Mrs. MacQuigan put her arms around him, and, understanding as only her mother's heart could understand, tried to comfort him, while the tears rained down the sweet old face. But Bradley's eyes were dry. With his elbows on the table, holding his chin in his hands, his face like stone, he stared at the letter he had spread out on the red checkered cloth--stared for a long time at that, and at the little photograph he had taken from his pocket. "Martin, boy," pleaded Mrs. MacQuigan, and her hand brushed back the hair from his forehead, "Martin, boy, don't take it like that." And then Bradley turned and looked at her--not a word--only a bitter laugh--and picked up his letter and the picture and went out.