"
"And you've no kick coming. Dreams dreams, always dreams, but you've had
your hour, too.' He took another look at the lights of the
fleet--another to the lights of the city below him--'Good night, Lima,'
he whispered, and dropped off the wall."
The pump-man had begun his story this evening while sitting with back to
the rail and feet stretched out on the deck before him. He finished
while lying on his back, hands clasped under the back of his head, and
wide eyes on the sky.
The passenger leaned on the rail, studied the stem of the ship, and
listened to the surge of back wash against the ship's bow as she drove
on. Abeam, the young moon drooped.
Kieran said nothing more. The passenger nothing for a long time. Then it
was:
"And they were married?"
"I don't know--Cogan didn't wait to see--but of course."
"Of course," echoed the passenger, and in silence resumed his study of
the ship's bow cutting through the little seas.
The passenger turned inboard. "But Cogan--where is he?"
"There was no Cogan."
"No Cogan."
"No, no Cogan."
"And no bull-fight, and no Valera, and no Torellas, nor Juan, and it
never happened?"
"Why, of course it happened, and just as I've told it. But not to
anybody named Cogan. There was no Cogan, or rather"--Kieran rolled over
on his side and rested his head on his elbow--"I'm Cogan."
"Oh-h-h.
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