The Struggle of the Outliers Page: 199
[16], 107-208, [44] p., [3] leaves of plates : ill., some col. ; 24 cm.View a full description of this prose (fiction).
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THE STRUGGLE OF THE
OUTLIERS.
BY O. HENRY.A G:IN, to-day, at a certain street on the ragged
. boundaries of the city, Lawrence Holcombe
stopped the trolley car and got off. Holcombe
was a handsome, prosperous business man of forty; a
man of high social standing and connections. His
comfortable suburban residence was some five miles
furth er out on the car line from the street where so
often of late he had dropped off the outgoing car.
The conductor winked at a regular passenger, and
nodded his head archly in the direction of Holcombe's
hurrying figure.
"Getting to be a regular thing," commented the
conductor.
Holcombe picked his way gingerly down a roughly
graded side street infested with ragged urchins and
impeded by abandoned tinware. He stopped at a
small cottage fenced in with a patch of stony ground
with a few stunted shade-trees growing about it. A
stout, middle-aged woman was washing clothes in a
tub at one side of the door. She looked around, and
smiled a smile of fat recognition.
"Good avening, Mr. IIolcombe, is it herself ag'in?
Ye'll find Katie, inside, sir."
" Did you speak to her for me ?" asked Ilolcombe,
in a low voice ; "did you try to help me gain her con-
sent as you promised to do ?"
"Sure, and I did that. But, sir, ye know gyurls
will be gyurl . The more ve coax 'em the wilfuller
they gets. 'Tis yer own pleadin' that'll get her if
anything will. An' I hopes ye may, for I tells her
she'll never get a betther offer than yours, sir. 'Tis a
good girl she is, and a tidy hand for anything from
the kitchen to the parlor, and she's never a fault
except, maybe, a bit too much likin' for dances and
ruffles and rilbbons, but that's natural to her age and
good looks if I do say it meself, bein' her mither, AMr.
Holcombe. Ye can spake ag'in to Katie, sir, and
maybe this time ye'll have luck unless Danny Conlan,
the wild gossoon, has been at it ag'in overpersuadin'
her against ye."
Holcombe turned slightly pale, and his lips closed
tightly for a moment.
"I've heard of this fellow Conlan before. Why
does he interfere? Why does lie stand in the way?
Is there anything between him and Katie? Does
Katie care for him ?"
Mrs. Flynn gave a sigh, like a vuff of a locomotive,
and a flap upon the washboard with a sodden garment
that sent IIolcombe, well splashed, six feet away.
"Ask me no questions about what's in a gyurl's
heart and I'll tell ye no lies. Her own mither can't
tell any more than herself, Mr. Holcombe."
Holcombe stepped inside the cottage. Katie Flynn,
with rolled-up sleeves, was ironing
C a a dress of flounced muslin. Criti-
cism of Holcombe's deviation from
his own sphere to this star of
lower orbit must have waned at
the sight of the girl. Her beauty
was of the most solvent and con-
vincing sort. Dusky Irish eyes,
one great braid of jetty, shininghair, a crimson mouth, dimpling and shaping itself to
every mood of its owner, a figure strong and graceful,
seemingly full of imperishable life and action-Katie
Flynn was one to be sought after and striven for.
Holcombe went and stood by her side as she ironed,
and watched the lithe play of muscles rolling beneath
the satiny skin of her rounded forearms.
"Katie," he said, his voice concealing a certain
anxiety beneath a wooing tenderness, "I have come
for my answer. It isn't necessary to repeat what we
have talked over so often, but you know how anxious
I am to have you. You know my circumstances and
position, and that you will have every comfort and
every privilege that you could ask for. Say, 'Yes,'
Katie, and I'll be the luckiest man in this town to-day."
Kate set her iron down with a metallic click, and
leaned her elbows upon the ironing board. Her great
blue-black eyes went, in their Irish way, from spark-
ling fun to thoughtful melancholy.
"Oh, Mr. IIolcombe, I don't know what to say. I
know you'd be kind to me, and give me the best home
I could ever expect. I'd like to say ' yes '-indeed I
would. I'd about decided to tell you so, but there's
Danny he objects so."
Danny again ! Holcombe strode up and down the
room impatiently frowning.
" Who is this fellow Conlan, Katie'?" he asked.
"Every time I nearly get your consent he comes be-
tween us. Does he want you to live always in this
cottage for the convenience of his nightiness? -Why
do you listen to him ?"
'' He wants me," said Katie, in the voice of a small,
spoiled child.
" Well, I want you too," said Holcombe, master-
fully. "If I could see this wonderful AMr. Conlan, of
the persuasive tongue, I'd argue the matter with him."
"He's been the champion middleweight fighter of
this town," said Katie, a bit mischievously.
"0h, has he! Well, that doesn't frighten me,
Katie. In fact, I am not sure but what I'd tackle him
a few rounds myself, with you for the prize; although
I'm somewhat rusty with the gloves."
"Whlist ! there Ihe comes now," exclaimed Katie,
her eyes widening a little with apprehension.
Holcombe looked out the door and saw a young man
coming up from the gate. IIe walked with an easy
swagger. HIis face was smooth and truculent, but not
bad. He wore a cap pulled down to one eye. He
walked inside the house and stopped at the door of
the room in which stood his rival and the hone of con-
tention.
"You're after my girl again, are you?" he grum-
bled, huskily and ominously. "I don't like it, do you
see? I've told her so, and I tell
you so. She stays here. For ten
cents I'd knock your block off. Do
you see ?"
"Now Mr. Conlan," began Hol-
combe, striving to avoid the argu-
mentum ar homincem, "listen to
reason. It is only fair to let Katie
choose for herself. Is it quite the- ___ I__ a~~~~_~_ _~___~ _~~~ -~
I I lsdaeB c ~ 881
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Henry, O., 1862-1910. The Struggle of the Outliers, prose (fiction), August 1902; New York. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth139427/m1/3/: accessed April 30, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Austin History Center, Austin Public Library.