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| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-14 19:53:47 -0700 |
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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-14 19:53:47 -0700 |
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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/30448-0.txt b/30448-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d794380 --- /dev/null +++ b/30448-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4902 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30448 *** + + THE + + LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + A NOVEL + + BY + + GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + [Illustration: Publishers symbol] + + + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY + The Riverside Press, Cambridge + 1903 + + + Copyright, 1902 + BY THE ESS ESS PUBLISHING CO. + + + Copyright, 1903 + BY GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + + + _Published March, 1903_ + + + + + TO + + M. R. B. + + IN MEMORY OF THE RESCUE OF A MAN AT SEA + + + + + CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I. THE FLY ON THE WHEEL 1 + + II. THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET 21 + + III. A FACE IN THE CROWD 40 + + IV. AS BETWEEN FRIENDS 60 + + V. A BRAND FROM THE BURNING 80 + + VI. MCGRATH LAUGHS 98 + + VII. THE MIRAGE OF POWER 117 + + VIII. THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS 137 + + IX. THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW 156 + + X. A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 177 + + XI. YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE 196 + + XII. DIOGENES 215 + + XIII. THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE 234 + + XIV. THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA 252 + + + + +THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + + +I + +THE FLY ON THE WHEEL + + +The offices of the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor adjoined. Each +had its ante-room, in which a private secretary wrote eternally at a +roll-top desk, an excessively plain-featured stenographer rattled the +keys of his typewriter, and a smug-faced page yawned over a newspaper, +or scanned the cards of visitors with the air of an official censor. At +intervals, an electric bell whirred once, twice, or three times; and, +according to the signal, one of the trio disappeared into the presence +of the august personage within. + +A door connected the office of the chief executive with that of his +lieutenant, but this was rarely opened by either, and then only after a +formal tap and permission to enter had been given. It was a matter of +general knowledge that the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor were not +in sympathy; but few, even among the intimates of either, were aware how +deep, and wide, and hopelessly impassable was the gulf which lay between +them. This was due not alone to disparity in age, though twenty-eight +years separated the white-haired Governor from his handsome subordinate, +who had been nominated to this, his first public office, on his +thirtieth birthday; nor was it wholly a difference between the +experience of the one and the inexperience of the other. The point of +view of the veteran is, naturally, not that of the novice, particularly +in politics. That the enthusiasms of Lieutenant-Governor Barclay should +have been the disillusions of Governor Abbott, and his pitfalls his +senior's stepping-stones,--this was to be expected. The root of their +dissimilarity lay deeper. It was nothing less than mutual distrust which +kept the connecting door closed day after day, and clogged the channel +of coöperation with the sharp-pointed boulders of antagonism. + +The convention which nominated the successful ticket of the preceding +year had been a veritable chaos of contending factions. The labor +delegates, encouraged by the unexpected strength of their +representation, were not content with such nominal plums as had fallen +to their share in former conventions. Led by Michael McGrath, an +agitator whose native Irish eloquence, made keener and more persuasive +by practice in bar-room forensics, brought him naturally to the fore, +they threatened, at one stage of the proceedings, to carry all before +them. The more conservative faction, its strength sapped by the +formation, in its very ranks, of a reform party determined upon the fall +of the "machine," was forced to yield ground. The reformers themselves, +young men for the most part, distinguished by great ideals but small +ability, were too few to impose their individual will upon their +opponents, yet sufficiently numerous to make their support necessary to +the success of either party. The usual smooth course of the convention, +upset by this unlooked-for resistance from two quarters, staggered +helplessly, and was on the point of coming to a deadlock. It was Michael +McGrath's shrewd perception of the situation which solved the problem. +In a brief, impassioned speech he laid the claims of his faction before +the delegates, winding up with a stirring picture of the coöperation of +labor and reform, now possible, which held the convention in spellbound +silence for ten seconds after he had closed, and then set the hall +ringing to cheers and vigorously plied hands and feet. For an instant he +paused, with his arms folded, and his keen blue eyes sliding over the +faces before him, and then played his trump card. At his signal, a +banner, hastily prepared, was borne, slowly revolving, down the central +aisle, and on this were boldly lettered the words which at the same +moment McGrath was thundering from the platform:-- + + LABOR AND REFORM! + + FOR GOVERNOR, + ELIJAH ABBOTT. + + FOR LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR, + JOHN HAMILTON BARCLAY. + +McGrath had no need to look toward the labor faction for support. He +knew what the name of Elijah Abbott meant in that quarter. His shifting +glance was fixed upon the seats of the reform delegates, and a little +smile twitched at the corners of his mouth, as he saw them rise with a +cheer. Barclay was the chief spirit of their movement. They had not +expected this recognition. But if, in the enthusiasm of unlooked-for +victory, they did not perceive how little, in reality, was their gain, +McGrath was far from being unaware how great was his own. Before the +cheering of the now allied forces of labor and reform had fairly died +away, he had moved that nominations were in order, and, ten minutes +later, while the partisans of the "machine" were still endeavoring to +collect their wits, the main business of the convention was an +accomplished fact, and Abbott and Barclay were declared the regular +Democratic nominees for Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of the state. +In six weeks followed their election by a small plurality, and on the +first of January the two men moved into their adjoining rooms, in the +inexcusably unlovely state capitol, on the main hill of Kenton City, +wherein they were, thenceforward, separated, one from the other, by two +inches of Georgia pine and a practically infinite diversity of principle +and prejudice. + +From the first their relationship had been no better than an armed +truce. Both were courteous men, the one because such was his policy, the +other because he was to this manner born. There was no need for them to +discuss their individual creeds. They tacitly accepted the fact that +there was not a parallel between the two. From the moment when his +election was assured by the returns, Abbott was candidly the man of the +Labor--nay, more--of the Socialist party. McGrath and his associates +manipulated him as readily as a marionette. The promises and pledges of +the campaign were ruthlessly jettisoned. If Governor Abbott did not +stand for anarchy, it was only because, for the moment, anarchy was not +the demand of his party. Withal, he was dignified and self-possessed, +robed in an agreeable suavity which became him at functions and +ceremonials, and assured his popularity with those--and they were, as +always, in the majority--who did not look below the surface. + +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay had not been ten days in office before he +realized the futility of resistance to the established order, as +represented in his superior. He had accepted his nomination, and +welcomed his election, with an almost Quixotic elation in the +opportunity thus opened to him. He would accomplish--oh, there was no +telling what Lieutenant-Governor Barclay would _not_ accomplish! + +He was standing at his office window now, staring out disconsolately +over the sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin +patches of snow, which had contrived to withstand the recent thaw, and +he was telling himself, for the thousandth time, the dispiriting fact +that, as a force for good or evil in the destiny of his state, he was no +more significant than his stenographer's Remington or his secretary's +roll-top desk. With all his ideals, with all those pledges which are +infinitely more vital when made in private to one's conscience than when +made in public to one's party, he found himself merely a cog in the +state machinery--a cog, too, that, seemingly, might be skipped at any or +every time, without in the least degree disturbing the progress of +routine. On the few occasions, in the early days of their official +relation, when he had ventured to set his will in opposition to that of +the Governor, there had not been manifest in the latter's attitude even +that spirit of resistance which spurs men to more active and resolute +endeavor. Governor Abbott had smiled pleasantly upon him, and then +quietly shifted the conversation into other channels, with an air of +selecting a topic more suited to his companion's comprehension. +Finally, on one occasion, when Barclay had voiced his opinion with an +energy which savored of rebuke, the Governor had gone further, and had +asked calmly--"And what were you proposing to do about it?" After that +Barclay had relinquished the unequal struggle, and resigned himself to +the unavoidable conclusion of his impotency. + +It is a situation which tries men's souls, this of utter helplessness in +the face of plain duty. He could have no hope of making his position +clear to the constituency to which he was responsible. Debarred on the +one side from taking an active part in the administration of state +affairs, and bitterly arraigned on the other on the grounds of +inefficiency, laxity, and indifference to duty, the second month of +office found John Barclay in a fair way to be ground to powder between +the millstones of impuissance and hostile criticism. The men of his +party who had, both in private conviction and public statement, based +their hopes of political reform upon the frankly avowed platform of his +principles, now passed him coldly, with a bare nod, sometimes with none +whatever; the labor element jeered joyously at his attitude; the +"machine" pointed to him as proof of the fallacy of the reform creed. It +is easy to expect great performances from great promises, easier still +to outline the duties and condemn the delinquencies of another, and not +even Barclay's knowledge of his own good faith was sufficient +compensation for the sneers of press and public which fell to his share. +As he surveyed the dispiriting prospect from his office window, on that +late February afternoon, he was near to resigning his position, and with +it all further pretension to political prominence. + +In the opinion of those competent to judge, the state of Alleghenia was +going to the dogs. A press distinguished alike for the amplitude of its +headlines and the pitiable paucity of its principles; a legislature of +which practically every member had, not only a price, but such a price +as the advertisements describe as being "within the reach of all;" a +Governor who avowedly stood ready to sanction the most extreme +pretensions of the notoriously corrupt party which had secured him his +election,--here, surely, were good and sufficient reasons for the +generously bestowed disapproval of Alleghenia's sister states. In all +the _personnel_ of her government there was but one man sincerely +devoted to her advancement on the lines of integrity and +non-partisanship. And that man was Lieutenant-Governor Barclay, whose +influence on the trend of affairs was approximately that of the +proverbial fly on the hub of the revolving wheel. + +The Lieutenant-Governor had turned back to his desk, and was arranging +his papers, preparatory to departing for the day, when his ears were +greeted by the unusual and unwelcome sound of a rap upon the +communicating door. Instinctively he braced himself for an unpleasant +encounter before replying. It was his experience that the Governor's +room was like to Nazareth of old, in that no good might be expected to +issue therefrom. Nevertheless, as Governor Abbott entered, in response +to Barclay's "Come!" it was difficult to believe that he was aught but +what he appeared to be,--a courteous, conspicuously well-dressed and +white-haired gentleman, of sixty or thereabouts, smooth-shaven save for +chop side-whiskers of iron gray, with a habit of rubbing his hands, and +an inclination from the hips forward which suggested a floor-walker. In +brief, the Governor of Alleghenia seemed the type of a man who turns +sideways and slips through narrow places, rather than run the risk of +barking his elbows by a face-front advance. In reality he was somewhat +less pliable than a steel rail. + +"You are going?" he asked, seeing how Barclay was employed. + +"I was thinking of it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor. "Of course, if +there is anything"-- + +Governor Abbott seated himself on the edge of the desk, holding a lapel +of his coat in each hand, and surveyed his subordinate from under his +drooping eyelids, with his head cocked on one side. + +"I believe you know Peter Rathbawne," he said. + +"I do. I am engaged to his elder daughter." + +"Ah! That is what I thought." + +The Governor looked contemplatively at the ceiling, closing his right +eye, and nibbling behind his pursed lips. + +"Peter Rathbawne," he said, "is the second most obstinate man in Kenton +City, if not in Alleghenia. I'm afraid he thinks he is the _most_ +obstinate. If so, he does me an injustice. His mills are the largest in +the state. I am told that when they are running full strength they +employ over four thousand hands." + +"Something like that number, I believe," put in Barclay, as the Governor +seemed to expect a reply. + +"Ah! It is a pity for such an industry as that to be tied up on account +of one man's obstinacy." + +"I had not heard"--began Barclay; but Governor Abbott continued +steadily, disregarding the interruption. + +"Yesterday morning Mr. Rathbawne discharged fifteen employees on the +ground of incompetency. It is hard to see exactly what Mr. Rathbawne +means by 'incompetency.' These men were not newcomers. Some of them had +been in the mills for as much as eighteen months. It seems as if he +might have discovered the alleged incompetency long ago. It is more or +less arbitrary, one might say, this discharging men by wholesale, as it +were." + +"I suppose," commented Barclay, "that a man may do as he will with his +own." + +"Ah!" said the Governor, lifting his hands from his lapels with a little +gesture of deprecation, but immediately replacing them. "But _can_ he? A +man in Peter Rathbawne's position has a responsibility to fulfill toward +the community. He cannot beggar men for a caprice--because his horse has +gone lame, or his breakfast has not agreed with him. He must show +reasons--give an accounting. He must be fair." + +"Oh, when it comes to fairness," laughed the other, "I assure you, +Governor Abbott, you won't find Mr. Rathbawne's equal this side of the +Pacific. He's famous for square dealing." + +"He _has_ been," corrected the Governor. "In the present instance he +seems to have fallen below standard. He has declined to reconsider his +decision in the case of the discharged men. What's worse, he has flatly +refused to see the committee appointed by the Union." + +"I'm not surprised at that," said Barclay slowly, fingering a +paper-cutter on the desk before him. "Mr. Rathbawne is peculiar in one +respect; he supports and considers the Union in every other. But he has +always insisted upon his right to discharge the hands at will, and +without giving reasons. Incompetency is only a word which is used to +cover more serious causes." + +"Well, he's wrong," said the Governor, with a heat unusual to him. +"He's dead wrong, Mr. Barclay, and he will find it out before he's a day +older." + +"Do you mean"-- + +"I mean that if the men in question are not taken back before to-morrow +noon, every man, woman, and child in the employ of the Rathbawne Mills +will be out on strike. The question is, what is Peter Rathbawne prepared +to do?" + +The silence that followed was broken only by the tap, tap, tap of the +Lieutenant-Governor's paper-cutter on the silver-mounted blotter. +Presently he looked up and met the Governor's eye. + +"If you want _my_ opinion, sir," he answered, "it is that Mr. Rathbawne +would fight such a point to a standstill. He's sole owner of the mills, +and he's a rich man. He has always treated his employees as if they were +his own children. If they turn on him now for something which, from +their experience of his character, they must know was fair and +justifiable"-- + +"But _was_ it?" interrupted the Governor. + +"I don't know the facts, sir, but I know Peter Rathbawne," said Barclay, +throwing back his head, "and I can say, with clear conviction, that it +_must_ have been. If, as you suggest, the hands go out, I think he would +close down the mills for a year, and go abroad. He's a man who doesn't +argue; he simply acts. I fancy there wouldn't be much opposition left by +the time he wanted to reopen." + +"Provided always that there were anything left to reopen," suggested the +Governor softly. + +"The state troops have more than once proved their ability to assure the +sanctity of property," answered his subordinate, with a touch of the old +pride with which he had assumed office. + +"Hum!" said Governor Abbott. "But calling out the militia is a serious +matter, Mr. Barclay, to say nothing of the expense entailed. Considering +that the difficulty would be due entirely to the obstinacy of one +man--er--one might not feel justified"-- + +He hesitated briefly under the Lieutenant-Governor's keen glance, and +then swerved from this line of suggestion. + +"What I wanted to say was this: You are a friend of Mr. +Rathbawne's,--something more than a friend, indeed. No doubt he has a +respect for your opinion, as you have for his. Now, if in the course of +a quiet chat--it will have to be to-night--you should point out the +situation that threatens him, the distress that a strike will cause, the +probable destruction of his property, perhaps he might consent to +reinstate the discharged men to-morrow morning." + +"It would be a surrender of principle, to which he would never consent," +said Barclay firmly. "Of that I am sure. Moreover, sir, I should be +speaking against my convictions were I to advise him to adopt such a +course." + +The Governor's lip wrinkled slightly. + +"The Union is prepared to do the right thing by the man who settles this +question," he said. + +"I hope you don't mean that!" exclaimed Barclay. "You are the first man +to make such a suggestion to me. Pardon me, Governor Abbott, but I +cannot but think the executive chamber of the capitol of Alleghenia a +singular place for it to be mentioned." + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"You misunderstand me," he said. "One would suppose I had offered you a +purse! I mean simply that the popularity of the man who averts this +strike will be an assured fact. He would be the idol of the working +people, and hardly less esteemed by the element of capital. Moreover, he +would be doing a humane and merciful thing. You are the only man who is +in a position to approach Rathbawne, and, if you will excuse the +suggestion, I think you can hardly afford to throw away the chance. As +it is, you--er--you are not what might be called popular, Mr. Barclay." + +This time the silence was broken by a single sharp little +click--the latch of the connecting door slipping into place. The +Lieutenant-Governor sank slowly into his revolving chair, tipped back, +swung round a half circle, and stared out disconsolately over the +sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin patches of +snow. + + + + +II + +THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET + + +Young Nisbet leaned forward in his chair. + +"And I've been thinking," he added, "that perhaps--that perhaps"-- + +"That perhaps what?" asked the junior Miss Rathbawne, leaning forward in +hers. + +"If I don't have tea _instantly_," said her mother, with profound +conviction, as she came ponderously through the portières, tugging at +her gloves, "I shall expire! How de do, Mr. Nisbet. _Do_ sit up +straight, Dorothy, my dear." + +She sank heavily into a low chair, which brought her within the radius +of lamp-light at the tea-table, and was thus revealed as a lady of +generous proportions, with a conspicuous absence of features, and no +observable lap. In speaking, she displayed a marked partiality for undue +emphasis. Sublimely unconscious of the depression induced by her +advent, she continued to talk, as she pulled off her gloves, which were +a size too small, and came away with reluctance, leaving imprints of the +stitching on her pudgy pink hands. + +Young Nisbet surveyed her with a kind of mute despair. He was a very +average young American, very conventionally in love, and the trifling +remnant of self-assertiveness which had triumphed over the crescent +humility natural to his condition inevitably evaporated into thin air at +the approach of Mrs. Rathbawne; and always, as he was doing now, he +turned in his toes excessively when she was present, hitched at his +right trouser-leg, where the crease passed over his knee, and looked +first at her, and then at the floor, and then at her again, with the +purposeless regularity of a mechanical toy. + +There was a tremendous and highly significant rattling of cups, saucers, +and silver spoons, as Dorothy Rathbawne prepared her mother's tea. All +things considered, one found something very admirable about Dorothy at +such a time as this. It was not complete submission, still less was it +open revolt, but savored of both, and was incomparable as an attitude +toward Mrs. Rathbawne. On some occasions it was almost as impossible to +get on with Mrs. Rathbawne as it would have been, on others, to get on +without her. The which, nowadays, is more or less true of all parents. +And children. + +"Natalie and your Aunt Helen got out at the florist's," went on the good +lady, "but I came straight on, and sent the carriage back for them. I +felt that I _couldn't_ exist an _instant_ longer without my tea. I'm +sure I don't see how Natalie _stands_ it. She was out all morning in the +brougham, too. You had best make enough for three cups, Dorothy--and +_do_ sit up straight, my dear!--and order Thomas to bring in some more +tartines. They are _sure_ to be hungry, and they are apt to come in at +_any_ moment." + +"That is a family failing," said Dorothy venomously, from behind the +kettle. + +"Well, I'm _sure_, my dear," said Mrs. Rathbawne innocently, as she +straightened her rings, and picked an imaginary speck out of one of her +round, flat nails, "there is no disgrace at all in a healthy appetite. +I'm thankful we all have it--though as for your Aunt Helen, _hers_ is +about like that of a fly." + +"Flies have very good appetites--judging from all I've seen, that is," +said Dorothy, "so I don't think she is to be commiserated on that +account." + +"That was only a figure of speech, my dear," replied Mrs. Rathbawne, +with engaging placidity. "Mercy! but I'm glad to get home. We've had a +positively _exhausting_ day with Natalie's shopping, and the _worst_ of +it is to think what a _lot_ more there is to do. A wedding certainly +_is_ an undertaking, Mr. Nisbet." + +"Is it?" answered young Nisbet, perceptibly startled at being thus +abruptly included in the conversation. + +"Decidedly!" asseverated Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"Of course, in the case of an _ordinary_ man"-- + +"Two lumps, mother?" + +"_Always_ two lumps, Dorothy, my dear. Surely you must know that, by +this time! As I was _saying_, Mr. Nisbet, the fact that my elder +daughter is to marry Mr. Barclay"-- + +Dorothy's eyebrows went up resignedly as she bent with affected +solicitude over the alcohol lamp, than which none ever burned more +blamelessly. There was no stopping Mrs. Rathbawne now! + +"One has to keep his position in mind," she was saying. "It isn't like +the _usual_ marriage, which interests only the families and friends of +the persons concerned, you know. It isn't even as if only Kenton City +were looking on. _All_ Alleghenia will be on the _qui vive_, Mr. Nisbet, +_all_ the state of Alleghenia. I shouldn't wonder if _some_ notice were +taken of the event, even at Washington. Marrying a statesman, you +see,--a Lieutenant-Governor! Oh, it's _quite_ different--_quite_! _Do_ +sit up straight, Dorothy, my dear!" + +She continued to prattle of the momentous marriage impending, until her +complacent chatter was interrupted by the entrance of her half-sister, +Mrs. Wynyard, and the elder Miss Rathbawne. + +The two newcomers were both beautiful, in widely dissimilar ways. Helen +Wynyard, Mrs. Rathbawne's junior by nearly a score of years, retained at +thirty the transparent brilliancy of complexion which, at eighteen, had +made her the most admired _débutante_ of her season in San Francisco. +Her marriage with Ellery Wynyard had caused a great to-do among the +gossips, and, later, had defrauded them pitilessly of their +self-promised "I told you so's," by reason of the death of the handsome +young rake, before the rose-color of the honeymoon had begun to fade. +Beauty, wit, and infallible tact she inherited from her mother, shrewd +business ability and a keen insight into men and things from her father, +and wealth and a certain attractive audacity of speech from her +husband; and five years of widowhood only served to develop and +emphasize the promise of her first season. There were numerous feet +which aspired to be shod with Ellery Wynyard's discarded shoes, but no +one pair, said the world, so much as an inch in advance of the rest. + +Mrs. Wynyard was spending the winter with her half-sister, and the +Rathbawnes, whom the circumstance of widely distant residence had always +kept from coming into close touch with her, were equally at a loss when +they wondered how they had formerly contrived to exist without her, and +in what manner they should resign themselves to giving her up. She was a +woman who came amazingly near to being indispensable. + +For the moment, Natalie Rathbawne, in reality the beauty which Dorothy +by a fraction fell short of being, suffered by comparison with her +sister. She was desperately tired--that was in her smile. But there was +something else: a singular preoccupation which was nearly akin to +listlessness. That was in the droop of her eyelids, in the eloquently +inattentive gesture with which she touched a bowl of Gloire de Dijon +roses as she passed, and in her conventionally courteous acknowledgment +of young Nisbet's greeting. And, too, as she seated herself beside her +sister on the divan, there was perceptible purpose in her avoidance of +the lamp-light, her withdrawal into the dark, deep corner. To the +conversation which followed she contributed only such brief remarks as +were made necessary by those occasionally addressed to her. + +The two women brought with them a delicious, indefinite atmosphere of +out-of-doors: that commingled smell of cold flowers, and cold flesh, and +cold fur, which is to a drawing-room in winter what a whiff of salt air +is in summer to a sun-baked hillside; and this proved almost too much +for the self-possession, already tottering, of young Nisbet. He had +always been accustomed to have the things he desired, had young Nisbet, +but these, until now, had been either creature comforts, readily +obtainable when one's father is a multi-millionaire, or athletic honors, +equally easy of attainment when one measures forty-two around the chest, +and can do one's quarter in something under fifty. Again, the Nisbets +lived on a ranch, and when one does not know people in New York one +spends the Sundays in New Haven, so that neither the terms nor the +vacations incidental to his four years at Yale had equipped him, in the +sense in which they equipped his fellows, for dealing with society. + +Now that he was in Kenton City, representing his father's interests, +young Nisbet was painfully self-conscious of multitudinous shortcomings, +totally unsuspected hitherto. His speech was apparently hopelessly +incrusted with slang, his legs were too long, his ears protruded +abominably, his hair was desperately unruly, his freckles and his +capacity for blushing were inexhaustible. He was as much at ease in such +surroundings as these in which he now found himself as a trout in a +sandpile. The great room, with its costly furnishings, the tea-table +crowded with silver and fragile porcelain, the kettle purring +contentedly above the iridescent flame of the alcohol lamp,--above all, +the subtle, indefinable suggestion of femininity which unknowably +pervaded his surroundings,--all these enthralled young Nisbet beyond +expression, and awed him immeasurably, into the bargain. He was, as +usual, very clear in his own mind as to what he wanted, and that was the +younger Miss Rathbawne, but, for the first time in his experience, the +means at his command did not seem to be sufficient unto the end. For the +younger Miss Rathbawne was, very evidently, not the sort of triumph +which is achieved by recourse to an imposingly ample bank-account, nor +yet by two months' loyalty to the exigencies of the training-table. And +this was February, and he had known her since July, and, altogether, it +was highly discouraging. Unwittingly, young Nisbet heaved a sigh so +profound and so pitiable that Mrs. Wynyard immediately proffered her +sympathy. + +"Poor, dear Mr. Nisbet! I never heard a more pathetic sigh. Whatever is +the matter?" + +"He's sleepy," put in Dorothy. "He always is, after talking with me for +a whole hour." + +"I was just thinking," protested young Nisbet helplessly. + +"Oh!" exclaimed Dorothy, "that's it, is it? Then pray don't discourage +him, Aunt Helen. He's really getting into some very good habits, of +late." + +"Why, _Dorothy_!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, digging her chin reproachfully +into her black velvet collar, "how _can_ you say such things? Mr. Nisbet +will think you have had _no_ bringing up at all. And _do_ sit up +straight, my dear!" + +"And if you don't stop nagging, O most conscientious of parents," +retorted Dorothy, with her nose in the air, "Mr. Nisbet will think you +bring people up by throwing them down!" + +"And slang! _Dorothy!_" + +"I always think," said Mrs. Wynyard, "that Dorothy should have had a +fairy godmother, to promise that every time she uttered a word of slang +a pearl should pop out of her mouth. We should have all been wearing +triple strings down to our knees within a week after she learned to +talk." + +"That settles it!" exclaimed Dorothy. "If you are going to side with the +enemy, Aunt Helen, there is nothing left for me to do but to beat a +retreat. Come on, Mr. Nisbet, there is rest for the weary in the +conservatory--that is, unless you want another cup of tea?" + +In the conservatory the air was heavy with the moist, sweet smell of +earth and moss, and faintly vibrant with the tiny plash of water, +dripping from a pile of rocks into the circular central pool, wherein +fat gold-fish went idly to and fro, nuzzling floating specks upon the +surface. Through the polished green of the surrounding palms and +rubber-plants stared gardenias and camelias; below, between maidenhair +and sword-ferns, winked the little waxen blossoms of fuchsias and +begonias: at intervals poinsettia flared audaciously among its more +quietly dressed neighbors; and, in the far corners the golden spheres +were swelling to fairly respectable proportions on the branches of dwarf +orange-trees. + +Dorothy installed herself on a bench, and young Nisbet perched upon the +rim of the pool, and stared at vacancy. + +"It's corking, in here," he said, after a moment. + +"Isn't it, though?" agreed Dorothy, with a nod of approval. "It's my +favorite part of the house. You can't imagine how many hours I spend +here, sewing, or reading, or fiddling with the fish and all those funny +little plants under the palms." + +"You bet!" said young Nisbet, with enthusiasm, if not much relevancy. +"I've just got a picture of that, you know. Besides, we've spent a good +many of those hours together in here, these past few months." + +"Oh, not a tenth of them!" exclaimed Dorothy, "and then only the very +shortest." + +"Oh!" said young Nisbet gloomily. His fertile imagination was +immediately peopled with the forms and faces of those who had shared the +other hours, a score of eligible and attractive young men, his moral, +mental, and physical superiors in every conceivable particular, +faultlessly arrayed, scintillating with wit, and surpassingly skilled in +the way to win a woman. The conservatory was full of them. He saw them +in every imaginable posture: feeding the gold-fish, watering the +begonias, looking up into Dorothy's eyes as they sat at her feet, +looking down at her slender fingers, as she pinned gardenias to their +lapels. And these had been granted the long hours, he only the short. +Inwardly, young Nisbet groaned; aloud, as was his wont, he said the +wrong thing. + +"They seemed long enough to me." + +"_Well!_" said Dorothy. + +"Oh, hang it all! I didn't mean that. What an oaf I am!" + +"Never mind," said Dorothy consolingly. "I know you well enough to +understand you, by this time." She smoothed her skirt reflectively. +"Let me see," she added, "what were we talking about when we were +swamped by the family?" + +"I think," answered young Nisbet, with one of his illogical blushes, +"that I had just asked you what sort of a man you thought you would like +to marry. I remember I was on the point of saying that I thought perhaps +you had ideas like--er--like your mother's." + +Dorothy raised her eyebrows. + +"Like the Mater's?" + +"About a man being big and prominent, and all that, you know," +floundered young Nisbet. "She always makes such a point of Barclay's +being Lieutenant-Governor--I thought you might be for the same kind of +thing." + +Dorothy looked him over, with a whimsical smile, as he was speaking. +There was a deep bronze light in his close-cropped, ruddy hair, and his +skin was very smooth and clean. His eyes were appealing, with that +unspeakable eloquence of simple honesty which is almost pathetic. Under +his blue cloth coat, the great muscles of his shoulders and chest stood +out magnificently, rippling the fabric as he stirred, as if eager to +throw off their trammels, and be given free play. About him there was a +distinct suggestion of sane living and regular exercise. For all his +freckles, and his nose that was too little, and his mouth that was too +large, "the ugliest of the Nisbet boys"--he had often been called +that!--was very emphatically good to look upon. + +"A big man?" answered Dorothy. "Yes, I think I should like to marry a +big man. I want him very clean, too--_very_ clean!--morally, as well as +otherwise. And honest as the day is long. And not _too_ bright! I don't +want to be continually trying to live up to his brain, and continually +failing. It is fatal to one's self-respect, that sort of thing. Then, he +must be heels over head in love with me--for keeps! And then--oh, he +must be a _man_, a man through and through, who wouldn't think anything +he didn't dare to say, nor say anything he didn't dare to do! That's +what I want, and if I can get it, all the prominence in the world may +go hang!" + +"That's just about John Barclay, though," said young Nisbet, "with the +prominence thrown in." + +"Well, I'm not saying I wouldn't have married John Barclay, if I'd had +the chance. He comes pretty close to being all I would ask for, in the +way of a man. But, unfortunately, there's only one John Barclay, and, +like the rest of the world, he looked directly over poor little Me's +shoulders, and saw only Natalie. Good gracious! Who could blame him? +She's the loveliest little thing in the world! But, at all events, she +nabbed him, so all that is left for me to do is to grin and bear the +disappointment as best I may. He's very much of a man, John Barclay is!" + +"Yes," assented young Nisbet, somewhat mournfully. "I can see that would +be the kind of a chap that the dames would stand for everlastingly." + +"But, as I said before," continued Dorothy, "it's not because he's +Lieutenant-Governor, whatever the Mater may think about it, that I +admire him. It's just because he's so big, and earnest, and loyal, +and--and"-- + +"White," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, _isn't_ he? That's it--white!" + +"I can understand a man like that getting spliced," observed young +Nisbet very earnestly. "He has so much to offer a girl. But as for the +rest of us"-- + +"Oh, as to that," broke in Dorothy airily, "John Barclay isn't the only +man in the world, by any manner of means! Besides, Natalie having +already bagged him, it is plain I shall have to look elsewhere." + +There was a long pause, broken only by the plash of the water, which +seemed, as the seconds slipped by, to grow amazingly loud. Then young +Nisbet raised his eyes, and looked at her, blushing deplorably. + +"I wish"--he said, "I wish"-- + +"Dorothy! _Do_ excuse me, Mr. Nisbet, but _really_--dinner at seven, you +know, and this child _must_ be thinking about dressing. She takes +_ages_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne folded her fat hands, and stood waiting, at the +conservatory door. Young Nisbet rose. + +"Of course!" he said. "I'm always so stupid about these things. Good-by, +Miss Rathbawne. I'm off to New York to-morrow on some confounded +business, so I probably won't see you for a week or so. Good-by." + +"_Would_ you mind going out by the hall, Mr. Nisbet?" suggested Mrs. +Rathbawne. "Mr. Barclay is in the drawing-room with my elder daughter, +and he is so _greatly_ occupied with affairs of state that they have +_very_ little time together. I _hate_ to have them interrupted. One can +do _so_ much harm sometimes, you know, by thoughtlessly interrupting +people who are in love with each other. Thank you _so_ much; good-by. +_Do_ try to stand a little straighter, Dorothy, my dear." + + + + +III + +A FACE IN THE CROWD + + +At the sound of the Lieutenant-Governor's voice at the front door, Mrs. +Rathbawne had beaten a hasty retreat, dragging her immensely edified +half-sister in her wake, so that when he stepped through the curtained +doorway Barclay found Natalie alone. + +"I'm so glad you could come early," she said, from the corner of the +divan. "Now we can have a talk before dinner. I seem to see so little of +you. I suppose that's the penalty attached to being engaged to the +second biggest man in the state. I'm sometimes jealous, Johnny boy, of +Alleghenia's place in your affections." + +"You're the only person in the world who has no need to be," laughed +Barclay. "What is the news?" + +"Probably," said Natalie, "the only interesting items are that you are +cold and a little cross, and that you want a big chair and a cup of tea +and some hot toast." + +"Your summary of the situation is so exhaustive," said Barclay, "that +there seems to be nothing left for me to say, except that you are the +most beautiful girl in the world, and that I think I must stand still a +moment and just look at you, before I accept any of the luxuries you +suggest." + +"I can't imagine how you know that I'm so beautiful. You can't possibly +see me in this dark corner. But I see I've made one mistake! You are +distinctly _not_ cross." + +"Why should I be?" asked the Lieutenant-Governor, standing before the +table, with his long legs far apart, and rocking from his toes to his +heels and back again. "When a man has been walking for half an hour +through a gnawing February air, and suddenly, out of all proportion to +his deserts, comes full upon a rose in bloom, is that a reason for being +cross?" + +She was very small, and deliciously delicate, was Natalie Rathbawne, +like a little Dresden image, with an arbutus-pink complexion, brown +hair, and deep-blue eyes, now clouded thoughtfully, but oftener alight +with humor, or dilating and clearing under the impetus of conversation. +A doll-like daintiness of tiny pleats and ruffles, fresh bows, and fine +stitching pervaded everything she wore, and if her voice inspired the +hackneyed comparison of running water, it was of water running under +moss, the sound whereof is as different from that of an open brook as is +music from discord. To John Barclay's thinking the barely believable +fact that this little miracle of beauty--this pocket-Venus, as he was +wont to call her--actually belonged to him remained one of the insoluble +mysteries of life. He could not, in the thraldom of his present Elysium, +be expected to remember, even if he had ever fully realized, that he +himself was tall, broad-shouldered, clean-cut, and clean-lived, with the +unmistakable stamp of the American gentleman on his linen and his +simple, well-fitting clothes, and the evidences of a sane, regular +existence in his steady hands and his clear eyes and his firm mouth,--a +man of whom any woman might be, and of whom this particular woman was, +extravagantly proud. For the first tribute which a lover lays at the +feet of his lady is, in ordinary, the stamped-upon and abused summary of +his personal attributes, which, in his own mind, he has taken remarkable +pains to render as despicable as possible, and which, in hers, her +imagination contrives not only to rehabilitate, but to imbue with a +preposterously exaggerated splendor. + +"I wonder," added the Lieutenant-Governor presently, "whether when +gentlemen are invited to tea they are supposed to kiss the hostess on +entering." + +"If you are in any doubt about it," observed Natalie, with an air of +superb indifference, "I advise you to write for advice to the etiquette +editor of the 'Kenton City Record.' She is probably sixty-two years old, +looks like an English walnut, has never had a proposal in her life, and +so knows all about"-- + +What the lady in question was supposed to know all about was for +sufficient reasons never made clear. There are occasions, despite the +manuals of polite behavior, when interruption cannot with any approach +to justice be regarded as rudeness. + +Barclay heaved a long sigh of satisfaction as he took his tea and two +thin slices of toast and settled himself in his chair. + +"Do you think it possible," he asked, "for a man to be asleep for six +weeks, dreaming that he is in another garden of Eden, with an Eve in a +French frock, who has no partiality for apples"-- + +"I _adore_ apples!" said the girl. + +"And then wake up," he continued, disregarding the interruption, "and +find that the dream was only a dream, after all,--that he's only a poor +dog of a politician, that the garden is only a dingy office, and the +flower-beds full of briers and pitfalls?" + +"You've been eating pie for lunch again," said Natalie severely, "and it +always makes you morbid. No; I don't think it possible at all. If I did, +I should hang on to your coattails like fury and keep you in dreamland, +whether you wanted to wake up or not." + +"It's all too good to be true! How _dare_ you be so beautiful?" + +"John"-- + +"It's gospel truth!" + +Barclay paused for a moment, and then went on more seriously. + +"You're tired, littlest and most lovely in the world, and troubled about +something." + +Natalie laughed shortly, with evident effort. + +"Why do you say that?" she asked. + +"Why not? Don't you suppose I know? Do you think you could say a hundred +words without my perceiving that? It almost seems to me that the +knowledge that you were unhappy would make its way to me, no matter what +distance separated us, and that I should come to you at top-speed to set +things right. I've hardly seen your face, and yet I know your dear, deep +eyes are troubled; I had barely heard your voice before I felt its +weariness." + +Natalie bent forward until her face came under the light. + +"Yes, I'm tired," she said; "or, rather, I was tired when I first came +in. I'm better now, since I've had my tea. But you're right, Johnny +boy,--there's something more. I'm troubled, desperately troubled and +heartsick. I've been trying to make myself believe that it's all +imagination, that I have no reason for feeling as I do; but I'm afraid I +can't manage it. John, I thought I saw Spencer Cavendish to-day." + +"Spencer Cavendish? Are you sure? I had almost forgotten his +existence!--Of course, it's not impossible; but I imagined he had taken +root in some South Sea island long ago. That's what he was always +expecting to do, you remember. How I have hated that man!" + +"You were good friends once." + +"Yes, and should be yet, if I had not been the most suspicious mortal +that ever breathed, and he the most hot-blooded. There was a reason, you +know,--a little reason, but the most important in the world! I was +jealous, Natalie, insanely jealous. I could forgive him everything now." + +"That hurts me, John. I'm so happy, boy dear, that I want everybody else +to be happy as well. Oh, why is it that a girl must always have that one +thought on her mind, which is so hard, so hard?--I mean the thought of +the good men, the true, brave, loyal men, whom she has cared for, who +have been her best friends perhaps, and yet whom she has been forced to +hurt bitterly because they asked her for something she was not able to +give. A man has so much easier a road! His happiness, when it comes to +him, isn't clouded by the thought of those to whom it means the loss of +their last remnant of hope. They are there, the disappointed ones, but +he doesn't know, he doesn't know! He hasn't on his conscience the memory +of hearts cruelly wounded,--wounded even to death. He doesn't in memory +see the eagerness in a good friend's eyes die to disillusion, to +hopelessness, to bitter, bitter sorrow. He doesn't have to remember how +the life died suddenly out of a voice that had been tender and eloquent. +He doesn't sicken with the thought that his hand has given a blow so +merciless, so unmerited, and yet so inevitable. Worst of all, for the +girl, is the after-discovery that her decision has made a difference--a +hideous, irreparable difference,--that the man can never be the same +again,--that she has wrecked a life with a word! Oh, there ought to be +some way! The man ought not to ask unless he is sure of the reply! It's +too much responsibility to force upon the girl! + +"So with Spencer Cavendish," she went on after a moment. "In spite of +all--in spite of all, John!--I can't forget that he loved me. I think a +woman never forgets that." + +"Until the man marries another woman!" + +"Ah," said Natalie, with a faint smile, "then least of all, John! And +besides, Spencer never married. He knew I loved you, long before you +did! I felt that it was due to him that he should know; he was my +oldest and best friend then, and so I told him! And then he went out of +my life--out of his own--into darkness. I can't forget it! I can't +forget that I broke up your friendship"-- + +"Dearest!" + +"I did, John! It wasn't my fault, perhaps, nor any one's, for that +matter, but I did, just the same. Besides, it wasn't only the question +of your friendship. What hurt me most was the wilful wreck of his life. +And yet, how could I have known what was going to happen? What could I +do when it did happen? He was beyond my reach. He didn't even answer the +letter I wrote, asking him to come and see me. I thought, if he cared +for me, I could save him. But it was just as he had said,--he must have +everything, or he would have nothing at all. And so he went wrong--oh, +so terribly, terribly wrong!--he who might have been anything, if it +hadn't been for me. I can never forget it--never! I can never forget the +pity of it, the tragedy of its awful publicity, the newspapers, the +scandal, people's sneers, his mother dying of a broken heart--_and I did +it_! Think of it! Think of a man like Spencer Cavendish in the police +courts, not once, but a dozen times. Think of what Justice Meyer called +him at last, and what was printed in the papers,--'a common drunk!' Oh, +John!" + +"Natalie, Natalie!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "Why should you +think of such things, brood over them, above all, blame them on +yourself? How could it possibly have been your fault? how could you +possibly have helped it? He was a reckless, hot-headed chap--brilliant, +of course, but a slave to his impulses and his nerves. If Lochinvars +could act with impunity nowadays, he'd have ridden up to your door on a +black horse, killed Thomas, and carried you off across his pommel. As it +was, he let himself go, and disgraced himself. I tried to talk to him, +just as you did, but he wouldn't have it--called me 'an insolent cub' +and--er--worse. I had to give it up. It was all very distressing, I +admit, but then, dear, it was all so long ago. He hasn't been in Kenton +City for two years and more, and I've no doubt he pulled himself +together long since, and is leading a straight life somewhere. He had +lots in him, with all his recklessness. A chap like that, with no family +hanging about his neck, and with his brains, and only his own living to +make, could forge ahead almost anywhere." + +"But John, I'm _sure_ I saw him to-day, and suppose I should tell you +that he was--begging?" + +Barclay almost smiled at her earnest, troubled face, as he replaced his +cup on the table. + +"Begging?" he answered. "I'm afraid I couldn't bring myself to believe +you, violet-eyes. Even granting that he has fallen as low as that, which +I should think one of the most unlikely things in the world, it would +hardly be in Kenton City, would it?--a place where his face is known to +a thousand people. Tell me about it. What makes you think you saw him?" + +"I was shopping this morning," said Natalie, "all alone; and as I came +out of Kendrick's and was just about to get into the brougham, I saw +that some one was holding the door open for me. I looked up carelessly, +as one naturally would under the circumstances, and, John--I know it was +he! At first I thought so, and then I didn't, because he was so changed, +so thin and pale, and because he had a beard. So, before I thought what +I was doing, I stepped into the brougham, and put my hand on the door to +close it. Then I looked up again, and saw his face, peering in at me +through the glass, and that time there couldn't be any mistake. It +_was_! I was going to speak, but he was gone in a flash. I saw him +disappearing in the crowd before the shop--_slinking_, John!--with that +dreadfully pathetic air which all beggars have, his shoulders all +hunched up, and his head bent, and his hands in his pockets. He was +cold, John, I could see that, and, no doubt, hungry! And there I was, in +that dreadful little brougham, with my hateful furs, as warm as toast, +and I didn't even speak to him. I could have died of shame!" + +She buried her face in her hands, bending low over the tea-table. +Barclay was leaning forward in his chair, his lips set. + +"It's impossible," he murmured, "impossible!" + +The girl looked up suddenly, a white spot in the centre of each cheek, +where the pressure of her thumbs had left its mark in the tender, pink +flesh. + +"Improbable--yes!" she said, "but not impossible. Oh, I wish I could +believe otherwise, but I'm sure, I'm sure! Oh, John! You are so big, so +strong, so powerful now! Think of it--Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia! +You can do anything. And if he _is_ here in Kenton City, homeless, cold, +starving, you must find and help him--for me, Johnny boy, for me!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor had risen, and was pacing up and down the room, +with his brows knit, and his strong, white hands chafing slowly against +each other, palm to palm. It seemed impossible, indeed! Spencer +Cavendish, the last of one of Alleghenia's proudest families; Spencer +Cavendish, the brilliant young society pet and sportsman; Spencer +Cavendish, the wit, the _viveur_--a beggar in the street? And yet-- + +The scandal of Cavendish's sudden and reckless plunge into sodden, open +dissipation, two years before, freshly called to Barclay's mind by +Natalie's words, had pointed to almost any finale, however debased, +however sordid. Barclay mentally invoked the face of his former friend, +as he had seen it on the occasion of their last meeting, flushed, +swollen-eyed, insolent, the fine patrician mouth hideously contorted and +maundering insults, filth, banality. + +"And I did it!" the girl was saying. "Don't forget that, John. +Unwittingly, ignorantly, helplessly, if you will, I did it, just the +same. If I could have loved him, I could have saved him. As it was, I +had to send him away, and he has come to--to this! Oh, don't you see? +Don't you understand that something more than chance has crossed my path +with his, just at this moment of my supremest happiness, and of his +utter degradation? My duty is plain. It is to help him, to uplift him, +to make a man of him once more--to undo what I have done! I'm +responsible--and I'm helpless! What can I do? What can any girl do in +such a case? I can't go out into the streets and search for him. I can +only turn to you, Johnny boy, and rely upon your aid." + +"But, Natalie dearest," said the Lieutenant-Governor slowly, "don't you +see that it is impossible, all this? I cannot allow such an affair to +come into your pure, sweet life, bringing with it the knowledge of the +depths to which men may fall, and the shadow of misery and degradation. +I cannot bear that, in even the remotest way, you should blame yourself +for that which it was never in your power to prevent or remedy. A +man--this man--has no business to cast on you the blight of his own +weakness and folly, to establish a relation of cause and effect between +your refusal of him and the subsequent transformation of a gentleman +into a common drunkard." + +"John!" + +"Ah, don't think me bitter, dearest! If the man you saw was actually +Cavendish, I pity him from the bottom of my heart. But it was his hands +which built up the barrier between his life and ours, and it must be his +that tear it down. It is intolerable that in his degradation he should +come into your life again, and have, even in your imagination, the +smallest claim upon you--intolerable! The paths of my love for you and +my duty toward you are identical in this respect. There can be no +alternative--no quibbling. At least until he has redeemed himself, if +redemption is still possible, the thought of him, his presence, his +misdoings, must not and shall not contaminate the atmosphere in which +you live and move." + +Natalie had risen suddenly, her eyes ablaze. + +"Ah, John!" she said. "Am I then a toy, a sugar figure, that I must be +packed in cotton, and shielded from all knowledge of the evil in the +world? Is that what it means to be a woman? Ah, _no_! It is bad enough +to be hemmed in by the wretched conventionalities which prevent my doing +openly what I conceive to be my duty, without adding to the restrictions +that actually exist the imaginary one that I must not even think of the +misery, the wretchedness, the sordid vice which abound just across the +borders of the comfortable little world in which I live. And see, boy +dear!--with all the force of my conviction that things should be +otherwise, yet I am reasonable. I don't ask to see Spencer, or to have +an active hand in his redemption. I realize that the time for that has +passed, and that you are just in saying that he must come to me, not I +to him--and come to me another than the man he is to-day. Anything else +is impossible: that I see and accept. But the hideous fact remains. A +man who loved me once, who offered me all that a man can offer a woman, +is walking the streets of Kenton City, cold, hungry, homeless--a +beggar! What business is it of yours or mine what his past follies and +weaknesses were? His temptations may have been beyond our understanding, +but his present plight is not. He is begging--begging at our very +doors--a man whom we have called by the name of friend! I can't help +him. All I can do, as I said before, is to turn to you, whom I love +better than all the world, and ask you to save him, in my stead. Ah, +boy, boy!--I've given you all I refused to him, taken at your hands all +I put away at his. You can afford to be generous!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor came slowly toward her, and, placing his hands +upon her shoulders, looked her in the eyes. + +"Dearest and Most Beautiful," he said tenderly, "you are right. I +hope--I believe--that you were overwrought, fanciful, that it is not +true. But if it is, if Cavendish is begging in our streets, then, so +surely as I am Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, I will pull him out of +them, and make a man of him, if it takes a month and every police +officer and detective in Kenton City to find him. And that not alone for +your sake, tenderest-hearted, but for mine. I _can_ afford to be +generous, God bless your sweet face, I can indeed!" + +And he bent over reverently, and kissed her hand. + + + + +IV + +AS BETWEEN FRIENDS + + +There were but two guests at the Rathbawnes' dinner-table that night, +the Lieutenant-Governor and Colonel Amos Broadcastle, a veteran of the +Rebellion, brevetted Major for conspicuous gallantry at Lookout +Mountain, and now commanding officer of the Ninth Regiment, N. G. A., +the crack militia organization of Kenton City. Colonel Broadcastle had +seen his sixty-five, but his broad, square shoulders, his rigid +carriage, and his black hair, even now only slightly touched with gray, +clipped twenty years from his appearance. His eye was one that was +famous throughout the Alleghenia Guard,--an eye accustomed to control, +not a single man, or two, or three, but a thousand, moving as one at his +command; an eye enforcing obedience immediate, machine-like, and +unquestioning. + +It had been a momentous day for the Ninth when Amos Broadcastle, +retiring from the staff of a former Governor, had accepted, first a +majority therein, and then, three months later, its colonelcy. He found +ten companies, in no one instance exceeding twenty files front. He found +a field and staff vain, incompetent, and jealous; company officers +deficient alike in their knowledge of tactics and in their conception of +their responsibilities; sergeants, corporals, and lances chosen without +any view to fitness, and ignorant and tyrannical in their positions; and +finally, the rank and file lazy, untidy, and frankly contemptuous of the +school of the soldier. Some one had once said of the Ninth that there +was consolation to be found in the mortifying knowledge that the men +composing it were there with the unique view of escaping jury duty. The +consolation lay in the probability that such infernally bad soldiers +would have made jurors quite as infernally bad. + +But Broadcastle, a born disciplinarian and a trained tactician, was now +in a position to echo, albeit in a different spirit, the arrogance of +Louis: "_Nous avons changé tout cela!_" Ten years had sufficed to change +the indolent and incompetent Ninth of Alleghenia into a regiment +rivaling in prestige the Seventh of New York. The commissioned officers +were thrust upon, rather than achieved by, their companies, but, once +established in their respective positions, proceeded without exception +to justify, by their energy and ability, their selection from the best +element of Kenton City. Among the enlisted men the exponents of the old +spirit of sloth, indifference, and laxity were weeded out as fast as +their terms of service expired, and their places filled from the same +sources whence the company officers were drawn. Colonel Broadcastle was +a diplomat as well as a disciplinarian. By some unknowable system of +suggestion and example it came, little by little, to be regarded in +Kenton City as "the thing" to belong to the Ninth. Before the capital +was aware of the transformation, every company roster read 103, the +field and staff had been reorganized and perfected, and the Ninth +Regiment, N. G. A., was what it remained thereafter: a magnificent +fighting machine, ably drilled, perfectly equipped, a credit to the +state, to the credit of which there stood so little else. The +declaration of war with Spain brought it suddenly into prominence by the +astonishing readiness with which it went into camp twenty hours after +the Adjutant-General of Alleghenia published the President's call for +volunteers; and although it never saw active service, it attracted at +Chickamauga, and later at Tampa, the admiring attention of the regular +army, and was spoken of as the most perfect body among the volunteer +forces. + +The citizens of Kenton City were not accustomed to discovering things in +which they could take pride. The exact contrary was more apt to be the +case. When, therefore, they discovered the rehabilitated Ninth, and its +redeemer in the person of its commanding officer, they had a deal to +say, and said it with unexampled arrogance and satisfaction. +Thenceforward, Alleghenia meant much to Colonel Broadcastle, and +Colonel Broadcastle considerably more than much to Alleghenia. + +Something of all this went through the Lieutenant-Governor's mind during +the progress of the dinner. He sat at Mrs. Rathbawne's right, than which +nothing in the world could have been more cheerless, unless it was +sitting at Mrs. Rathbawne's left. But the good lady's habitual +complacency was plainly in abeyance, her customary volubility replaced +by a fidgety reserve. The dinner, as a social achievement, was a +distinct failure, save in so far as Mrs. Wynyard and Colonel Broadcastle +were concerned. Several months before, Mrs. Wynyard had frankly +announced that she had designs upon the Colonel. Latterly, Barclay had +begun to suspect the Colonel of having designs upon Mrs. Wynyard. Thirty +and sixty-five that looked forty-five--a widow and a widower! More +wonderful things had happened. + +"If I were thirty years younger," Broadcastle was saying even now, as he +did full justice to the celery mayonnaise, "I should say we were made +for each other." + +"Since two single people may be made for each other," laughed Mrs. +Wynyard, "I wonder if two married people can't be unmade for each other. +Perhaps that is just what has happened to us!" + +"I'll think that over," replied the Colonel with mock gravity. "I don't +want to commit myself on so serious a hypothesis, without due +reflection." + +They were the only ones who were thoroughly at ease. Barclay and +Natalie, unstrung by the events of the day, ate little and talked +listlessly. Dorothy, victim to an inward excitement which was half +happiness and half disappointment, chattered feverishly. Rathbawne was +wrapped in his own thoughts, and his wife, innocently unobservant of +emotional manifestations in any and every other, but pathetically +sensitive to the slightest evidence of mental perturbation in this +stern, kind man, between herself and whom existed a devotion dog-like in +its silence and intensity, watched his clouded face with an anxiety +which she made no effort to conceal. The dinner dragged hopelessly, +until she shook herself into a bewildered realization that it was over, +folded her napkin scrupulously, dusted a few crumbs from the black-satin +slope of her obsolete lap, and, followed by her daughters and Mrs. +Wynyard, left the men to their cordials and cigars. + +The latter drew their chairs nearer, as the door closed, made little +clearings in the wilderness of finger-bowls, silver, and discarded +napkins, for the accommodation of their coffee-cups and cordial glasses, +and, lighting the long Invincibles which were Rathbawne's sole +extravagance, inhaled that first matchless whiff of smoke which makes a +whole day of anxiety and vexation seem to have been worth the while. + +It is a moment apart and _sui generis_, this, and is rivaled only by +that of early morning realization that one is awake--and not obliged to +get up. It is apt to pass in silence, for a newly lit cigar is like a +newly married wife: a man is deliberately oblivious to all else. The +moment, too, is one of readjustment, of hasty mental survey of the +chatter that has passed, and of preparation for the essentially +dissimilar talk to come. With men of the mental calibre of the three +here assembled this opportunity is sacred to some of the gravest and +most vital thoughts which they exchange. Peter Rathbawne, in particular, +whenever he reviewed the paramount conversations of his life, seemed to +find their significance indissolubly fused with the fragrance of Havana +cigars and the taste of kümmel or yellow Chartreuse. + +His eyes dwelt thoughtfully upon his companions during the pause which +followed. First, on Broadcastle. He could depend upon him as he could +depend upon no other man on earth. They had fought side by side in many +a tight place in the black days of '62, and in many another, full as +tight, since then, on battlefields commercial and political. It is +doubtful whether so much as a single word of admiration or affection had +ever passed between them. It is equally doubtful whether anything could +have been more entirely superfluous than such a voicing of self-evident +sentiments. + +John Barclay, too! Peter Rathbawne, with what had been natural +shrewdness at the outset now sharpened almost to clairvoyance by his +years of dealing with a multiplicity of men and things, understood the +Lieutenant-Governor absolutely, and admired him with all the force of +his rugged nature. And Rathbawne was not given to admiring people. His +business experience had not fostered the spirit of hero-worship. He had +seen too much for that. But in the two men before him he recognized +qualities so unusual, and in many ways so similar, that he was proud to +count them friends. + +For the moment, however, as he took stock of them, he was measuring them +by a new standard, more rigid, more severe than he had hitherto had +reason to apply. It is one thing to trust a man implicitly, and another +thing entirely to try to tell him so. For silence is most golden in the +specification of friendship, and when employed in the particularizing of +intimate emotion the silver of speech is apt to turn to veriest tinsel. + +Yet the occasion was one which demanded speech. Moreover, and in direct +opposition to his inclinations and the precedents he had established, he +was forced not only to give practical expression to his feeling for +Broadcastle and Barclay, but, what humiliated as well as annoyed him, to +confess himself incapable of dealing with a question which confronted +him. It was the first time within his recollection when he had +mistrusted his own judgment. + +But Peter Rathbawne was not the man to procrastinate, and presently he +began to speak, in a low but curiously intense voice, from which the +others instinctively took their cue. He was a short man, inclined to +stoutness, but with the clear, sharp eye and the underhang of jaw which +tell of right principle and indomitable perseverance. It was a question +whether in calling him the second most obstinate man in Alleghenia, +Governor Abbott had given him the full measure of his due. + +"Gentlemen," he said, with the somewhat stilted formality which was part +of his manner, "I will say to you what I wouldn't say to others,--I'm in +a hole, and I want your advice. I'll be as brief as possible, and I'll +come right to the point. For thirty years I've been building up the +Rathbawne Mills, giving them every hour of my thought, every particle of +my strength, every atom of my ability. I've seen them grow from a little +shanty on the outskirts of Kenton City to a collection of buildings +covering four solid squares, filled with modern machinery, and employing +four thousand, two hundred and odd hands. I've been a business man, I've +been a rigid man, but I've been a fair man, too. No one can say that I +ever clipped wages, even when I had to run the mills at a loss, as I've +had to do more than once. I gave my people an eight-hour day long before +the law of Alleghenia jammed it down the throats of other mill-owners. +I swallowed the Union, though it was a bitter mouthful. There has never +been a just complaint from one of my employees that wasn't attended to +in short order, if it was in my power to do so. There's many an old +fossil on my pay-rolls to-day who isn't worth his salt, but he stays +there, and will continue to stay there, because he did his best when he +could, and it's not his fault that he's dead wood now. I've given in, +over and over again, in one way or another, sometimes against my +convictions, and oftener against my will. But one thing I've stuck to, +and that's my right to discharge a hand when I see fit, without +dictation from the Union or anybody else. In the past, this has been +comparatively easy sailing. One man, now and again, isn't a ripple on +the surface of four thousand employees. Besides, there was always a good +reason. The others saw that, and there was never a finger raised. They +believed in me, through and through, and it has been my pride to know +that they did, and that they had good cause to. But now it's different. +There has been a band of young good-for-nothings in Shop 22, who were +full, chock-a-block, of socialism, and equality, and workingmen's +rights, and God knows what-not! They've talked enough poisonous gas to +the other hands to blow up a state. They distributed pamphlets, and made +speeches, and organized clubs, and fomented discord, till I got sick and +tired of it. There wasn't one square day's work in the whole fifteen of +them put together. So, when I'd stood them as long as I could--which was +at ten o'clock yesterday morning--I discharged them all in a bunch, and +if there'd been a steep place handy, I'd have expected to see them all +run violently down it into the sea--like the other swine, in Scripture. +For if ever there was a band of devils made incarnate, it was that same +fifteen who were sowing anarchy broadcast through the Rathbawne Mills! + +"Now--what? Lo and behold, they are all henchmen and disciples of +Michael McGrath, whom we in Kenton City know to our cost, and regular +and loyal members--save the mark!--of his Union. Well, gentlemen, I've +got that Union about my ears like a nest of hornets, with McGrath at the +head, and unless those fifteen men are reinstated by noon to-morrow, my +four thousand hands will be out on strike, and the Rathbawne Mills will +be tied up as tight as a drum!" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle curtly, as the other paused. + +"That's what I meant to do--but where am I going to come out? If I +thought, for instance, that I was going to have your regiment to back me +up, Broadcastle, or even the Kenton City police, why, well and good! But +_am_ I? No, sir! _No_, sir! Not with Elijah Abbott in the Governor's +chair, I'm not! You know that as well as I. Why, Broadcastle, I'd rather +see McGrath himself at the capitol than that smooth-spoken skunk!" + +He paused to relight his cigar, and then continued. + +"The Rathbawne Mills are like the fruit of my own body to me. I love +them! I love every stone and brick of them, that I've put in place, as +it were, with my own hands. I've often thought that if they should burn +down it would come close to killing me. And yet I could watch them go +with a lighter heart, God knows, than that with which I foresee the +misery that's coming to these people of mine, who are going to starve at +the bidding of a band of black-legs, and that not even because they +think their cause a just one, but simply because they can't help +themselves. It isn't only that ruin's staring me in the face, though +there's that possibility in the situation, too, but that privation, +bitter misery, and despair are lying in wait for them. God!--what an +iniquity! + +"But I _can't_ give in, Broadcastle--I _can't_ give in, John Barclay! It +means the sacrifice of a principle I've held out for, and that I know is +right. What's more, it isn't as if I were yielding one point. It would +only be the beginning. If I give in now, I might as well turn over the +mills to McGrath at once, and let him run them according to his own +blackguardly will. You know how such things go. Give them an inch"-- + +"And they raise a hell!" put in Colonel Broadcastle. + +"Exactly! It's commercial suicide. And yet, if I _don't_ yield, I'm +precipitating disorder, and bloodshed, and the untold suffering of four +thousand souls. What am I to do?" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle, with a sharp nod of his head. + +Rathbawne turned from him to the Lieutenant-Governor, and to the latter, +knowing the man he had been, there was something indescribably +heart-rending in the sudden, irresolute trembling of his half-raised +hands, the slow shake of his head, and the pathos of his raised eyebrows +and drooping lips. + +"John," he said, "I'm an old man, and you're a young one, but I'm a +plain citizen, and you're the Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia. You +know how things stand. Now, I've given you my girl, and after that it's +not much to put myself into your hands as well. I'm getting on. My +strength isn't what it was. I'm not as fit to stand such a struggle as +this is bound to be, as I was thirty years ago. I look strong, but, in +reality, I'm not. My doctor has warned me, more than once. A sudden +shock--you know what these medical chaps say about sudden shocks! I've +laughed at him, of course, and yet--I know there is truth in it. I've +been up against hard propositions, but never one as hard as this. I've +had big responsibilities, but never a responsibility that I felt as I +feel this one. If I hold out, I know what people and the newspapers will +say,--how they'll blackguard me,--but I'm not afraid of that. I'm not +even thinking of it. No, and I'm not thinking of what the strain may +mean to me. Every man's turn is sure to come--why not one way as well as +another? But what I _am_ thinking of is the result upon the lives of +these people whom I've made, as surely as if I were another Creator. And +McGrath's another Beelzebub! There's a fight on between us for the +salvation of a little world of four thousand souls! But I'm not God! I +can't act with the conviction of omniscience. I've been the most +independent of men. I've made my own fortune with my own brains. I've +done as I saw fit, and the results have seemed to indicate that I've +been oftener right than wrong. But now, I'm at a loss. It's not the men +I'm thinking of so much. They ought to be able to make their own way, as +I've made mine. It's the women and children dependent upon them--the +women and children who have no voice in the matter, and yet who are +bound to suffer most by a strike. I've got to think for them. I've +reached a crisis--a cross-ways--and I've got to choose which course to +take--and I can't! All my experience counts for nothing. I've never--you +probably know it--asked for advice before. But now I must have the +unprejudiced, the outside point of view. I've always thought there was a +clear, unmistakable boundary between right and wrong, but now there's +some right in the wrong, and a big sight more of wrong in the right! +I've heard Broadcastle's opinion, and I want yours. If you agree, I'll +go by what you say. As I said before, John, in this matter I'm the +individual--you're the state. I'll go by what you say. What shall I do?" + +Peter Rathbawne's words had wrought tremendously upon the +Lieutenant-Governor. He answered slowly, looking down, and with a +perceptible tremor in his voice. + +"Mr. Rathbawne, you and the Colonel know how high-sounding my title is, +and how little, in reality, it means. There is no need to go into +details. I'm Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, yes!--and as helpless in +the cause of right as a new-born baby! If I could by any means, in any +manner, support the advice I gave you, I would give it willingly." + +"John!" said Peter Rathbawne, "I don't mean that. I've put the case +wrongly. Give me your counsel, not as Lieutenant-Governor, but as my +friend, and the man who loves my daughter!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor raised his eyes from the finger-tips with which, +as the other was speaking, he had been plucking at the cloth. + +"Fight them, Mr. Rathbawne," he said, "and may God help you--because I +can't!" + + + + +V + +A BRAND FROM THE BURNING + + +More heartsick than he cared to confess, even to himself, the +Lieutenant-Governor left the Rathbawnes' earlier than his wont, despite +the fact that his host and Colonel Broadcastle were still engaged in +discussing the impending situation, and that Natalie, with a batch of +new music, was waiting for him at the piano. He pleaded an unusually +busy day and his consequent fatigue as an excuse, and so, at half after +nine, found himself about to light a second cigar, on the steps of the +Rathbawne residence, and shivering a little in the night air, which +stung the inside of his nostrils and set his eyes watering. Raw as the +day had been, it had turned colder now, but the night was superbly +clear. The sky seemed to have drawn nearer to the earth, and the stars +twinkled so sharply and clearly against its deep blue-black that they +resembled in form their conventionally five-pointed counterfeits of +silver paper. A brisk wind whirled a few dried leaves in whispering +eddies across the smooth asphaltum of the driveway, but beyond this and +the peevish sputtering of the arc-light on the opposite corner there was +no sound. It was the kind of night which, with its crystal clearness and +its steely intensity, stirs the normal pulse to keen exhilaration: yet +never had John Barclay felt more hopelessly dispirited, more utterly at +a loss to see the way before him. That anxiety, distress, possibly +actual disaster should be impending over this house where lay his heart, +his happiness, and his hope, was sufficiently disturbing in itself. That +he should not be able, despite his position, to raise a hand to avert +the calamity was worse. But that the battle was to be a battle for the +right, and yet, as it seemed, foredoomed from the start to end in +disaster, since no aid could be expected from the strong arm of the law +to which the partisans of principle turn naturally for support: this +was worst of all. For out of dangerous surroundings he felt himself able +to snatch away the littlest and most lovely woman in the world. She, at +least, should not suffer. And out of this nightmare of powerless +prominence, of impotent position, he himself could retire into private +life, and be no less a man than he had been before. But from the +reproach of corruption which had fallen upon her, and the impending slur +of anarchy, who was to rescue Alleghenia? The Lieutenant-Governor set +his lips and drove his nails into his palms, as he stood in the shadow +of the Rathbawnes' doorway, looking up at the sky of the February night. +He was not a religious man--as the term goes--but in that moment he said +a better prayer for the welfare of his state than had ever lain upon the +lips of any priest in Kenton City! + +He was about to strike his match when an instinct rather than an actual +perception of movement arrested his hand. Bradbury Avenue, upon which +stood the Rathbawne house, was situated in one of the quieter residence +districts which prided itself on the turfed spaces between its +dwellings, pretentious enough for the most part, and the double rows of +trees which lined its thoroughfares. It was one of these trees which, at +the moment, attracted Barclay's attention. It lay in a direct line +between himself and the arc-light on the corner, and its trunk, in some +miraculous manner, had abruptly developed an elbow, and then an arm. The +Lieutenant-Governor was still staring at this phenomenon when it was as +abruptly explained by the sudden emergence from shadow of a man, who had +apparently been standing on the side of the tree nearest to the house. +He was crossing the avenue obliquely when something about his bearing +caused the Lieutenant-Governor to lean forward and follow him intently +with his eyes. It was all there, as Natalie had said--the lifted +shoulders, the bent head, the unmistakable, pathetic air of the beggar. +Then, as he neared the light, he gave a short upward strain to his neck +and chin, the impatient movement of a man whose collar annoys him. The +trick was too familiar to have been forgotten. The next moment Barclay's +heels were pounding on the asphaltum behind him, and then Barclay's hand +fell upon his shoulder and whirled him round. + +In the oddly intense radiance of the arc-light above, which cut sharply +across the surface of forehead, cheek, and chin, and left heavy shadows +like those in a roughly blocked-out carving, under brow, nose, and lower +lip, the two men faced each other briefly, in silence. Then the +Lieutenant-Governor voiced the other's name, hardly above a whisper. + +"Spencer Cavendish!" + +And the other, echoing the tone, if not the words, replied:-- + +"Bar-clay!" + +A square away, the lights of a hansom winked into the avenue, and the +hoof-beats of the horse clonked on the pavement, unaccompanied by any +sound from the smoothly trundling, rubber-tired wheels. Barclay stepped +to the kerb, and hailed the driver with his stick. The cab drew in, +stopped, and threw the divisions of its apron wide, like two black hands +extended in cordial welcome. + +The Lieutenant-Governor turned to his companion. + +"Get in," he said. "I want to have a talk with you." + +The drive of a mile and more from Bradbury Avenue to Barclay's quarters +in the new bachelor apartment-house "Rockingham" was accomplished +without the exchange of a word. Once, he felt his companion shiver, and +dragging a rug from under them, he spread it across their knees. That +was the only movement on the part of either. They sat, side by side, +looking straight before them over the horse's bobbing crupper, until the +hansom pulled up sharply before the broad and brilliantly illuminated +entrance of the "Rockingham." As they passed in, Cavendish had a passing +impression of tiled floors, columns of green marble, and attendants in +tightly fitting green uniforms with brass buttons. Then an elevator +whirled them up to the eighth floor, deposited them in a square hallway, +and vanished again, with the little page in charge wrinkling his nose +and biting the thumb of his cotton glove. + +"Wot's the Loot'nt-Guvnor up to now, Sawed-Off?" inquired the doorkeeper +genially, as the elevator returned to the ground floor. + +"Ide'no!" replied the little page with equal affability. "Goin' in fer +pol'tics, I guest. Jeest! Wot a slob it wuz--wot?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor unlocked the door of his apartment, touched an +electric button which flooded the little hall and the drawing-room +beyond with light, and, entering the latter, went directly to a closet +in the wall. Unlocking this, he took out a jar of biscuits and a +decanter, and setting them upon the table, turned once more to his +companion. + +"Put away a couple of those biscuits and a glass of sherry," he said, +"and then we'll talk." + +"I'm past biscuits," said the other, almost sullenly. + +"I'll see to that," replied Barclay. "They are only by way of a +starter." + +He passed into the hall as he spoke, and presently Cavendish heard the +click of a telephone receiver slipping from its crotch, and Barclay's +voice speaking, to some one below, of a steak, vegetables, salad, and +coffee. He stepped to the table, devoured two or three of the biscuits +ravenously, poured himself a glass of sherry, sipped, and then swallowed +it, and flung himself down upon a wide divan. + +"Have you a cigarette?" he asked, as Barclay reëntered. "I haven't +smoked in three days. That's worse than mere hunger, you know." + +"I believe you!" + +Barclay pushed a silver box across the table, and seating himself +opposite, touched a match to the cigar which he had been about to light +at the Rathbawnes' door, and which he still held between his lips. + +"Help yourself," he added. "Your supper will be up presently. Meanwhile, +shall I fire away, or will you?" + +Cavendish let the first smoke from his cigarette curl slowly up his +cheek before replying. In the full light now first resting upon it, his +face showed as that of a man approximately Barclay's age, but pinched by +want, and deeply lined by dissipation. His under lids were puffy and +discolored, and a dozen heavy creases ran, fan-like, from the corners of +his eyes. Hair already turning white and an unkempt mustache and beard +completed the picture. His clothes were faded and frayed, no linen was +visible, and his boots were cracked and soggy. There was nothing about +him to suggest the former estate of gentleman save his hands, which, +while thin and tremulous, were clean and well-kept, in singular contrast +to the slovenliness of his attire. + +"Age before respectability," he said in reply to Barclay's question, +with a shrug. "I'll go first. It will save your asking questions. We +parted in anger, Barclay." + +"Let that pass," put in the Lieutenant-Governor, briefly. "Two years +wipe out all scores as petty as was the cause of our quarrel." + +"Well, then," continued Cavendish more easily, "when I left Kenton City, +it was with the best intention in the world of making a fresh start in +some place where my story wasn't known. I went to New York. I had a +little money, but only a very little, and not the most remote idea of +how difficult it is for a man to make his way in a place where he is +unknown, particularly if he has no credentials and is too proud to ask +for any from his old associates. Moreover, I'd been drinking hard for +six months and there was no such thing as clipping it short all at once. +I had an idea of tapering off, and perhaps, if I had found a job, I +might have done so. As it was I climbed up one step and fell down two, +and that went on indefinitely. It wasn't as if I'd had a distinct aim or +anything in my life which made it seem worth living. I didn't half care. +I'd set my heart on something which I couldn't get, and--well, never +mind that. It is all as long ago as the Flood! I got work now and again, +tried reporting, and teaching, and copying. But each time it was a grade +lower, and I stuck to nothing but the whiskey--except when I had a +little more money than usual, and then it was absinthe." + +He touched his eyes, and then raised his hand to the level of his chin, +with the fingers held wide apart and rigid, and watched it tremble for +an instant in silence. + +"I haven't seen a mirror in weeks," he went on, "but I know the signs +are all there. That's the story. I could string it out for an hour, but +it would all be in the same key. I've simply been going down, down, +down. I'm what the old judge called me--do you remember it came out in +the 'Record?'--I'm a common drunk, Barclay. And I don't care! I've been +on the point of putting an end to it many a time--but I always held out +for another drink! Now, even my pride's gone. It stuck to me longer than +anything else, but it's taken itself off at last. I've been feeling +lately that I'm pretty near the end, and I wanted to see Kenton City +again before it came. That's the reason I walked all the way from +Pittsburg, and I've been begging on the streets since I got in. I +thought nobody would recognize me." + +"But _I_ did," said Barclay. + +"Yes, and--and"-- + +"Yes, and _she_ did! She saw you this morning, but before she took in +fully that it was you, you were gone in the crowd. She was half +heart-broken over it, and made me promise to look you up. I was going to +do so, when I tumbled against you by chance to-night. You were watching +the house?" + +"Yes, for the last time. I saw she had recognized me and that Kenton +City was no place for me. So I was off again to-night. Is she"-- + +"She is well, and, I am glad to say, happy. We are to be married in the +autumn." + +A smile hovered for an instant on Cavendish's lips. + +"God bless her!" he said slowly. "I'm glad of it. But don't let's talk +of that. She's as far above me as the stars!" + +"And as far above me, too, for that matter!" answered Barclay. "Here's +your supper. While you're eating, I'll take my turn at the talk." + +A bell-boy arranged the tray on the table, removed the covers, and in a +moment the two men were again alone. With a deep sigh of satisfaction +Cavendish drew a chair to the table and set to work on the steaming +dishes before him. + +"Jupiter!" he said, with the first mouthful poised on his fork, "you +don't know what this means, Barclay, and you can thank God you don't. I +won't attempt to thank you. Go on, and tell me about yourself." + +"I've no intention of doing that just at present," replied the +Lieutenant-Governor, settling himself more comfortably in his chair. "I +want to talk about you. Don't be afraid. I'm not going to preach! But I +_am_ going to say that while I understand a good deal of what you've +said, the last part is pure rot! You're a bit of a wreck, of course, but +it isn't your pride or your self-respect or whatever you choose to call +it, that's gone. It's only your nerve. Now you've had your experience, +and you're back where you belong, and you've friends who like you, and +who can help you, and who will. I'm in a position to do so myself, and I +don't expect you to make any bones about accepting my assistance, and +whatever money you need for the moment. It will be a loan, of course, to +be repaid when you're on your feet again. We'll have you there in no +time. When you've made way with the grub, you can bunk down on that +divan for the night, and in the morning I'll tog you out in one of my +outfits, and you can set about getting back on _terra firma_. You'll +have to shake the drink, that goes without saying." + +Cavendish straightened himself suddenly, laid down his knife and fork, +and laughed shortly. + +"It sounds well," he said bitterly, "but you don't understand, Barclay. +It's too late! I don't care, and if I did, I couldn't shake the drink to +save my immortal soul. I'm steady enough for the time being, because I'm +hungry and because I'm being fed. But I've tried the other game too +often. I know what it means. I wouldn't promise you to quit, because I +don't want to lie to you, and that's all it would be. When the craving +comes back, I'll go down before it like a row of tenpins. No, Barclay, +it won't do." + +"Nonsense, man! Do you want to tell me you're as weak as that?" + +"Every bit!" said Cavendish, attacking the steak again. + +"Well, I don't believe it, that's all. In the morning you'll be a +different man. I'll give you a bromide when you're ready for bed. You're +shaky, as it is, but that's all a matter of nerves. Now we'll drop the +subject, and talk of other things." + +It was midnight when they separated. Barclay brought out sheets and +blankets for the divan, produced pajamas for his guest, put the bath at +his disposal, and mixed a strong dose of bromide for him to take upon +retiring. + +Half an hour later, when he reëntered the drawing-room to see whether +Cavendish was in need of anything further, he found him standing by the +table in his pajamas, trembling, wide-eyed, and very pale. + +"What is it?" he asked. "Are you ill?" + +"No," answered Cavendish, striving in vain to control the trembling of +his lips, "only damnably nervous. Could you--could you give me a drop of +brandy, Barclay?" + +"Certainly not!" said the Lieutenant-Governor. "Pull yourself together, +man! There's your bromide. Take that. It's better than a thousand +brandies." + +Cavendish turned, lifted the glass, spilling a little as he did so, and +swallowed the sedative at a gulp. Then he stretched himself upon the +divan and drew the covers close up about his chin. Presently, from the +bedroom, Barclay heard him breathing deeply and regularly, and turning +on his side, fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep. + +He awoke with a start, as the dawn was showing gray through the chinks +of his window curtains, with a vague, uneasy sense of something wrong, +and lay listening, every nerve strained taut. From the adjoining room +came the sound of Cavendish's breathing, but now it was more raucous, +more like groan following groan. The Lieutenant-Governor strove in vain +to put off the foreboding which lay heavy upon him, until, finally, +unable to resist the impulse, he rose, slid his feet into his slippers, +and going noiselessly into the drawing-room, stepped to the windows and +put the curtains softly aside. What first met his eye as he turned was +the door of his little wine-closet in the wall. It was standing wide +open, and about the lock the wood was hacked and hewed away in great +splinters. On a chair near by lay a rough knife with the blade open and +a sliver of wood yet sticking to the point. Then he looked toward the +divan. Cavendish was lying face down upon it, outside the blankets, +with his head lolling sharply over the edge. His left arm was extended +full length toward the ground, where his fingers just touched a bottle +of French absinthe, overturned upon its side, and uncorked, with the +thick, gummy liquid spread from its mouth in a circular pool on the +waxed floor. + + + + +VI + +McGRATH LAUGHS + + +The clock on the huge central tower of the Capitol marked nine, as the +Lieutenant-Governor passed rapidly through the lofty entrance hall +toward the corridor leading to his office and that of Governor Abbott. +Already his promptness was proverbial, and there were those in the +great, grim building who looked forward to the moment of his arrival, +each morning, with a kind of eagerness. These were the simpler folk of +the official world with which circumstance housed him for eight hours +daily,--bootblacks, elevator-boys, porters, doormen. For to the big, +clean, wholesome personality which appeals irresistibly to these humbler +people, Barclay added an astonishing memory for faces, and for the names +and circumstances connected with them. It was a gift which counted as an +unspeakably important factor in the establishment and maintenance of +unusually cordial relations with all those with whom he came in contact. +No one brought within the radius of his personal magnetism long resisted +it. It was only those who judged him from a distance, as did the press +and the rank and file of his party, or those who deliberately +misinterpreted him, as did his political enemies, who permitted +themselves anything short of enthusiasm for John Barclay. And this +faculty for attracting admiration and commanding respect, this +infallible kindness and this inherent dignity, were never made manifest +to so great advantage as in his attitude toward his inferiors. These +adored him. He accumulated, bit by bit, a remarkable store of intimate +information relating to them, and employed it in his intercourse with +them, with a tact and a frank sincerity of interest which never failed +of their effect. The response thus elicited was strongest of the minor +pleasures in his life. He was aware--none better--of the shrewdness +native to those who have no claim upon one's recognition, their +appreciation of notice that is unfeignedly interested, their +sensitiveness to open indifference, their resentment of the simulated +consideration which is mere impertinence; and he was conscious of a +little inward thrill of satisfaction at the difference of attitude in +the employees at the Capitol as toward Governor Abbott and himself. +Where the former's suavity elicited only formal respect, manifestly +obligatory, his own whole-heartedness lined his way with smiles and +kindly greetings. His official existence, beset with annoyance, +mortification, and disappointment, was, as he often reflected, made +tolerable only by this friendliness which he, almost unconsciously, +inspired. Dogs, children, and his subordinates--the three most +intuitively critical classes of beings--were all his friends. The +pathway to and from the daily routine, which he was coming to regard as +moral martyrdom, was a pathway illumined with sunlight and strewn with +flowers! + +As the Lieutenant-Governor passed through his ante-room, with a wink at +the boy, a nod to the stenographer, and a word of greeting to his +private secretary, and entered his office, he was surprised to find the +communicating door open, and to hear the sound of a vaguely familiar +voice in the Governor's room beyond. In an effort to place the speaker, +he hesitated briefly before advancing to a point which would bring him +within range of the Governor's eye. Almost immediately, the memory of +the convention rushed over him, and he recognized the voice as that of +Michael McGrath. + +"And it won't be a strike like other strikes," he was saying, "not so +long as I'm running it, that is. It's going to mean business from the +word go! There's been too much shilly-shallying in the strikes I've +known anything about, too much talk, and too much wasting of Union +funds. You know what I mean. It isn't enough to tie up a mill, and then +hang around on street-corners for two months, waiting for the other side +to give in. The only place to hit a man like Rathbawne is in his pocket, +and by that I don't mean simply cutting off his income, but chopping +into his capital as well. He's got to understand"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor walked over to his desk, laid his hat and stick +on a chair, and, before removing his overcoat, began turning over the +pile of letters which awaited his attention. As he did so, Governor +Abbott's voice broke in suavely upon the other's. + +"I deprecate any resort to violence," he said. "You must proceed with +discretion if you expect the state to maintain an attitude of +neutrality. Otherwise, the police or the militia"-- + +"Oh, to hell with the police and the militia!" broke in McGrath +impatiently. "What's the use"-- + +"There is the Lieutenant-Governor now," interrupted the other. "Perhaps +he has some news for us. Mr. Barclay, will you kindly step in here for a +moment?" + +McGrath was standing on the opposite side of the Governor's table as +Barclay entered the room. He acknowledged the latter's curt nod with an +ironical bow, slipped his hands into the pockets of his checked +trousers, and stood waiting, with his square head thrust forward, for +what was to follow. + +"Mr. McGrath has called," continued the Governor, "to explain the +attitude of the Union in the impending strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +I've been telling him of our conversation of yesterday afternoon, and +that, as you were to see Mr. Rathbawne last night, you would probably +have something to tell us in regard to his position. Were you able to +persuade him to a more reasonable view of the situation?" + +"I have nothing to add, sir, to what I said yesterday," replied Barclay. +"I told you then that I had no intention of endeavoring to influence Mr. +Rathbawne's judgment." + +"He spoke to you about it?" + +"Yes." + +"And asked your advice?" + +"He did." + +"And you replied?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor flushed. + +"I beg to suggest, sir," he answered, "that this is hardly the time for +me to commit myself as to that. I conceive it to be a matter of official +privacy. Mr. McGrath"-- + +"You have my authority to speak, Mr. Barclay," said the Governor. +"Indeed, I desire it. Since one side knows your views, there is no +reason why the other should not be informed as well. Mr. McGrath is the +president of the Union. It is best that he should know the attitude of +the state authorities in this controversy." + +"I am not in a position to question your wishes, sir. You should know +best." + +"One cannot pretend to be infallible, Mr. Barclay," answered the +Governor, rubbing his hands. "One can only do what seems to be right and +proper under the circumstances. By our conversation of yesterday, I in a +measure put the negotiations with Mr. Rathbawne into your hands." + +"It is a task I did not seek, sir. Pardon me if I say that it is also +one which I should hardly have accepted, had I been aware that in +speaking as you did you were actually asking me to assume it. Mr. +Rathbawne is my friend, and, moreover, my personal convictions"-- + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"There can be no question of friendship or of personal conviction, Mr. +Barclay, in the case of a duty imposed upon a state official. I realize +that what you--or I, for that matter--must do in the performance of our +obligations, is oftentimes disagreeable, oftentimes at variance with our +wishes. But that is unavoidable." + +Barclay moved uneasily. The intrusion of this pedantry, so conspicuously +insincere, with its implied rebuke, chafed him unspeakably, in view of +the presence of McGrath. The Governor had adopted the tone, half +authoritative, half reproachful, of a teacher reproving a refractory +child. + +"My time, as you must know, is inadequate to the demands made upon it. I +am forced, on occasions, to turn more or less important matters over to +others. To whom more naturally than to you, Mr. Barclay?" + +"May I suggest, sir, that there can be no profit in prolonging this +discussion? I appreciate the position perfectly, and I am quite prepared +to state what I know of Mr. Rathbawne's attitude toward the demands of +the Union." + +"Ah," said the Governor, "that is as it should be, and as satisfactory +as possible. Let me remind you, Mr. Barclay, that it was not I, but +yourself, who introduced this digression." + +He turned to the president of the Union. + +"You will understand from what I have said, Mr. McGrath," he added, +"both to the Lieutenant-Governor and to you, that in the matter of the +proposed strike, he is, to all intents and purposes, acting in my stead. +He was in a position to approach Mr. Rathbawne, and I was not. Now, Mr. +Barclay, if you please"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor straightened himself instinctively, as, for the +first time, he addressed himself to the agitator. + +"Mr. McGrath," he said, "my confidence in Mr. Rathbawne's fairness and +integrity would have led me to approve any course which he might have +seen fit to take. As you have already heard me say, I had absolutely no +intention of endeavoring to influence his judgment. Greatly to my +surprise, Mr. Rathbawne himself consulted me in the matter, without any +suggestion on my part, and asked for my advice." + +"That's fortunate," put in McGrath, "very fortunate. You've been able to +sidetrack a lot of trouble." + +Barclay's eyes hardened at the hypocrisy of the sneer. + +"I have pleasure in informing you," he continued, "that, in reply, I +advised him to fight the Union in the present dispute to the utmost of +his means and ability. I should have counseled him further to hold out +until he had spent his last cent and shed his last drop of blood, except +that, knowing him as I do, I conceived such a recommendation to be +wholly superfluous. Mr. Rathbawne has his character and his record +behind him. There is about as much chance of his yielding you an inch of +ground as if he were standing with his back against the Capitol!" + +McGrath shrugged his shoulders. + +"It's a damned funny way you have of not influencing people's judgment," +he said. + +"I mis-stated my attitude in saying that," retorted the +Lieutenant-Governor coolly. "I should have said, what, after all, is +self-evident, that I had no intention of trying to influence Mr. +Rathbawne in favor of the Union, at least so long as it is acting under +your dictation. Its present character is well known--almost as well +known as yours, in fact--and I believe its position in this matter to be +entirely untenable, unjustifiable, and iniquitous. I may add that if it +is, indeed, Governor Abbott's resolve that I am to deal, in his stead, +with the question of your proposed strike, you may confidently rely upon +having to put the entire state force of Alleghenia out of business +before you can even so much as begin to bully Peter Rathbawne into +submission!" + +"If that's your opinion of the Union," said McGrath sullenly, "it might +be interesting to hear your opinion of me." + +"You are perfectly welcome to it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor +easily. "I consider you an unmitigated blackguard!" + +Governor Abbott tipped back his chair and looked at McGrath. + +"That's pretty plain talk," he said. "You see how it is, Mr. McGrath. +You'll have to go ahead on your own responsibility, and you mustn't be +surprised if the State steps in at the first evidence of disorder." + +McGrath rose, flecked some specks of dust from his waistcoat, and walked +toward the door without a word. On the threshold he turned, looked from +the Governor to the Lieutenant-Governor, and back again, and laughed. +Then he went out, closing the door softly behind him. + +At the Rathbawne Mills it was usual for a huge whistle to give one long +blast at noon as a signal for the lunch hour. On that day, however, +following McGrath's instructions, the single blast was replaced by five +short ones in rapid succession, and three minutes later the employees +were pouring through half a dozen gates into the streets surrounding the +mills, in laughing, chattering, excited streams. + +A majority of the men went directly to a hall in the neighborhood where +McGrath had called a mass-meeting for half-past twelve. A minority of +them crowded into the saloons of the vicinity, where they pounded on the +bars, and filled the close, smoke-grayed air with heated discussion. +Several of the discharged hands were in evidence, each surrounded by an +attentive group, and expounding more or less inflammatory views. The +women gathered in gossiping throngs on the sidewalks, laughing, and +pulling each other about by the arms. The boys played ball and leap-frog +in the streets, shouting, and whistling through their fingers. In brief, +the great strike was on, but, for the time being, it was masquerading +in the guise of a public holiday. + +At one o'clock the whistle blew again, and a thousand voices whooped a +derisive accompaniment, but no one of the throng in the streets made a +move toward the mills. Half an hour later, watchmen swung to and bolted +the gates, and, issuing presently from a small side entrance, in +company, were received with cheers, handshakes, and slaps upon the back. +Then the crowd gradually thinned,--many going to the already well-filled +hall where McGrath was delivering an address, and others to their +homes,--and a silence descended upon the neighborhood, broken only by +the voices of the men about the saloon doorways. + +At two, Peter Rathbawne, attended by his private secretary, came out of +the side entrance and walked slowly away in the direction of his home. +He held his head high, and his eyes straight to the front, and paid no +attention to the respectful greetings of those of the strikers who +saluted him, touching their hats. There were many among them whose +hearts sank at this attitude in a man who had made it his boast that he +knew every hand in his mills by sight, and who, in the past, had had a +nod or a friendly word for each and all of them. For the first time a +premonition settled upon them of what this strike, which had been +welcomed principally for novelty's sake, might mean. It was the first +the Rathbawne Mills had ever known. Some of those who saw the face of +Peter Rathbawne that afternoon were already hoping that it might be the +last. + +The Lieutenant-Governor returned to his apartment for lunch. Cavendish +was still sleeping as he had left him, with a stalwart negro porter, +summoned from the Capitol by telephone early that morning, watching in a +chair. Under Barclay's orders, a carpenter had already removed the +splintered door of the wine-closet, and an upholsterer had replaced it +by a slender brass rod from which swung a velvet curtain. With his own +hands the Lieutenant-Governor had taken away the fallen bottle, mopped +up the pool of absinthe, and put the room to rights. Now he dismissed +the negro, took from his pocket a little box of strychnine tablets, +obtained from his physician on his way from the Capitol, and, after a +brief survey of his surroundings to see that all was in order, went over +to the divan and shook the sleeping man by the shoulders. + +"Come, lazy-bones!" he said, with a laugh. "You've slept over twelve +hours. That will do--even for a nervous wreck." + +Cavendish opened his swollen eyes slowly, looked at him, and then closed +them again with a murmured "Oh, God!" which was like a groan. + +To this the Lieutenant-Governor paid no heed. Passing into the bathroom, +he turned on the cold water in the tub, poured a half glass of vichy +from a syphon, and then returned, carrying the tumbler in his hand. +Cavendish had raised himself on one elbow, and was looking stupidly +about the room. + +"Here you are," said Barclay cheerfully. "Stow this pill, and here's +vichy to wash it down. Your bath's running. By the time you've had it, +there'll be some clothes ready for you." + +Cavendish gulped down the tablet, and sat upright. + +"Last night"--he faltered. + +For the first time in his life, the Lieutenant-Governor called him by +his first name. + +"Last night, Spencer," he said, looking him fairly in the eye, "belongs +to the past, and is taboo. I won't hear a word about it. This is to-day. +Get up, and we'll set about putting wrong right. You're a man again. +Don't forget that. And I'm your friend. Don't forget that, either." + +His hand rested for an instant on the other's shoulder with a firm +pressure, and then he passed into his bedroom and shut the door. + +They had lunch together in the dining-room of the "Rockingham," and then +went up again to Barclay's rooms. At the door, Cavendish came to a halt. + +"I can't stand this," he said. + +"You'll have to," replied the Lieutenant-Governor, "so shut up!" + +"You've made a change," said Cavendish obstinately, pointing to the +curtained cupboard. + +Barclay's eyes did not follow the gesture. + +"So have you!" he answered. "Now, look here. There are twenty dollars in +the waistcoat of that suit, and a letter to Payson of the 'Kenton City +Sentinel.' Go down and see him this afternoon, and I think he'll give +you a job at reporting, which will fix you up for the present. In +another pocket you'll find a box, with three tablets like the one you +had before lunch. Take one of them every two hours. In still another +pocket there's a key to these rooms. I'm going to be busy till about ten +o'clock, so you'll have to shift for yourself. Make yourself at home, +and if you're awake I'll see you when I come in." + +Taking him suddenly by the shoulders, he twisted him about, facing the +chimney piece, on which stood a photograph of Natalie Rathbawne, smiling +out of a silver frame. + +"I'll leave you to talk it out with her," he added simply. + +In the hall, as he passed out, he caught a reflection of Cavendish in a +mirror. His hands were resting on the mantel-edge, and he was leaning +forward with his haggard face close to the photograph. Barclay looked at +his watch. + +"Two o'clock," he said to himself, "and all's well!" + + + + +VII + +THE MIRAGE OF POWER + + +Barclay was conscious of a feeling of exhilaration such as he had not +known for many weeks, as he swung into Bradbury Avenue late that +afternoon on his way to the Rathbawne residence. The duties of the day +had been inordinately petty and vexatious, but he had dispatched them +one and all with something approaching enthusiasm,--a touch of the old +Quixotic energy with which he had taken office. The morning conversation +in Governor Abbott's room had braced and toned him. He forgot its +inauspicious opening, and even his distress at the attempt to force him +into the position of mediator between Peter Rathbawne and the Union, in +the solid satisfaction of having been able to speak his mind to McGrath, +and call that worthy a blackguard to his face. He was a man who +despised a quarrel, but, for its own sake, loved a square, hard fight. + +Back, however, of this somewhat inadequate excuse for cheerfulness lay +the Governor's assurance that in the matter of the strike his lieutenant +was to have free rein. It was the first time since the beginning of +their official association that Elijah Abbott had placed an actual +responsibility in Barclay's hands. A corner-stone laying, a banquet here +and there, the opening of a trolley line, or a library, or a +sewer,--these were the major calls upon the Lieutenant-Governor's time. +The main current of routine was a hopeless monotony of official +correspondence, investigations, statistics, reading and reporting on the +interminable and flatulent maunderings of the Legislature,--duties +heart-breaking in their desperate tedium and maddening inutility. + +But at last here was responsibility, actual and deeply significant, +calling for the exercise of tact, courage, and immutable firmness. The +particular task was not one which he would have coveted, and yet he +welcomed it. Anything,--anything to assuage in him that sense of +ineptitude, of being ignored, a titled nonentity! + +With this vast lightening of spirit came, not only gratitude, but a +sense of lenity toward Governor Abbott. He encouraged himself to believe +that the note between them had been one of misunderstanding merely. It +might not be too late, after all! Gradually, he began to form a mental +picture of a growing sympathy and affiliation between them, large with +possibilities of improvement for Alleghenia. As he turned into the +Rathbawnes' gateway, he could have laughed aloud for very lightness of +heart. His optimism was not even impaired by running, in the hall, full +against Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"_Good_ gracious! Lieutenant-Governor, is that you?" + +Repeated and earnest endeavor on Barclay's part had never dissuaded her +from this form of address. + +"What _is_ the use of _having_ such a title, if one can't _call_ you by +it?" she would say, when he remonstrated. "Do _you_ suppose that, if +Natalie were engaged to a _prince_, I should be going around, calling +him Tom, Dick, or Harry, instead of 'Your Royal _Highness_'? You ought +to be _proud_ of your title. _I_ am!" + +"But, Mrs. Rathbawne"-- + +"Now, _please_ not, Lieutenant-Governor, _please_ not! I like it best +that way." + +The north wind was attentive and amenable to the voice of persuasion, in +comparison with Josephine Rathbawne. + +"Of _course_ you know the _strike_ is on!" she continued now, without +waiting for an assurance from Barclay that he was indeed none other than +himself. "Isn't it _awful_? I expect to hear the roar of the mob at +_any_ moment! Come into the drawing-room. Natalie _was_ there, only +_half_ an hour ago." + +And she swept through the doorway, Barclay following. + +"Natalie," she began, "here's the Lieu--why, _Dorothy_! I took you for +Natalie. And--er--oh! Why, Mr.--er--how de do? I didn't see you at +first. Oh, _do_ turn on the switch, my dear. The place is as black as +pitch." + +The electric light, flooding the room, revealed young Nisbet, one vast, +consuming blush, and Dorothy, with a dangerous light in her eyes, and +her lips tightly compressed. It was plain that Mrs. Rathbawne had fallen +foul of Dan Cupid's machinery once more! + +"Why, Mr. _Nisbet_! I thought you were in New York." + +"I had a telegram this morning, calling the date off," said young Nisbet +in pitiable confusion; "that is, I didn't have to go, you know. So I +just fell in here to explain. I thought some of you might spot me on the +street, and after I'd said"-- + +He began to flounder hopelessly, and cast a glance of mute appeal at +Dorothy. That facile young lady marched directly into the breach. + +"If you and John are looking for Natalie," she said, "you'll find her in +the library with Dad. How do you do, John?" + +"Pretty well, I thank you, Flibbertigibbet. It is really your husband +whom I came to see, Mrs. Rathbawne. I've a little business with him, so, +for the moment, I'll have to give Natalie the cold shoulder." + +"Oh!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, lifting her fat hands. "Of _course_, +Lieutenant-Governor! I understand _perfectly_. Business before pleasure, +_always_. Go right in, won't you, and send Natalie here to me. _I'll_ +stay here. Aren't we going to have tea, Dorothy? Oh, _do_ try to sit up +straight, my dear!" + +Natalie and her father were bending low over a great portfolio, their +heads close together in the yellow glow of the table-lamp, which was the +only light in the room. Rathbawne looked up with a grim smile, as the +Lieutenant-Governor entered. + +"Pottering over my autographs, again, you see," he remarked. "I've been +neglecting them shamefully, of late--eh, Natalie? Didn't have the time. +It looks just now as if I wouldn't have to complain again of lack of +leisure for quite a while!" + +"It was that I dropped in to see you about," said Barclay, striving, +with only partial success, to keep the exultation out of his voice. "You +may not be in for so much leisure as you imagine, Mr. Rathbawne. You may +not get much of a holiday, after all." + +Without for an instant losing the Lieutenant-Governor's eye, Rathbawne +reached out and touched his daughter on the arm. + +"Oh, Dad!" she said reproachfully. + +"There's no need for her to go, sir," added Barclay, "unless you wish +it. I bring only good news." + +Acquiescing, Rathbawne drew Natalie close to him, passing one arm across +her shoulders, so that his gnarled hand rested firmly on the delicate +fabric of her sleeve. Between these two there had always lain a +sympathy, an affection, a mutuality of comprehension, more like the +relation of husband and wife than that of child and parent. + +"Nothing but good news?" answered Rathbawne. "Go on. What is it?" + +"News not so much of actual happenings as of potentialities," said the +Lieutenant-Governor. "Last night I had to say to you that in the cause +of right I was as powerless to aid you as a baby. To-night, I have come +to tell you that I am in a position to see justice done, and that I +will." + +In detail, his voice ringing with enthusiasm and confidence, he +described the interview of that morning, his statement of Rathbawne's +position, his passage at arms with McGrath, finally, the Governor's +announcement that the strike was to be supervised by his lieutenant in +his stead. + +"I had almost lost hope," he concluded. "I thought my opportunity would +never come, and here it is, after all--the chance to act! And, somehow, +I feel that it is only the beginning--that, as he gets to understand me +better"-- + +Rathbawne suddenly left his daughter's side, and in three steps was +directly before the Lieutenant-Governor. As he interrupted him, his +fingers closed upon the lapels of the other's coat, and he punctuated +his words with little tugs at these, his knuckles coming together with +tiny muffled thuds. He spoke with a gravity that was vibrant with +suppressed anger and slow with sincere regret. + +"My boy," he said, "it's not a gracious thing to do to spoil an +enthusiasm like yours, but don't deceive yourself. Elijah Abbott as a +trickster is alone in his class. You were never more powerless to act +for the right than you are at this moment." + +"But I have his assurance"-- + +"Oh, _his_ assurance! It isn't worth the ash off your cigar. What, give +you a chance to interfere with the will of the Union which made him, and +owns him, body and soul? Never in God's world! Listen to me. I spent an +hour in his office this very afternoon, discussing the strike--_and he +never so much as mentioned your name_!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor winced as if the words had been the touch of a +lancet. Then he closed his eyes. + +"And I was in the next room," he said, almost as if to +himself,--"planning--my--control--of the situation! Good God!" + +"I went directly to him," continued Rathbawne, "because I knew that it +would be purely and simply a waste of time to parley with the lesser +officials who are either helpless or frankly his tools. I knew, too, +that no satisfactory result would come of appealing to him, but I wanted +to give him the chance. All I asked of him was an assurance that the +mills would have proper police protection, and that, if necessary, the +militia would be called out in support of order. The outcome was exactly +what I expected. Governor Abbott rubbed his hands, and smiled, and said: +'All in good time, Mr. Rathbawne, all in good time. When the conditions +seem to warrant it, we can discuss these measures.' That means that they +are free to blow the mills to kingdom come, before a finger will be +raised by the authorities to prevent them. And what's more, they'll do +it! Do you think I don't know McGrath?" + +As he had intended it should, this speech had given the other a chance +to recover himself. The Lieutenant-Governor's habitual poise was +already restored, and his voice, as he answered, was quite steady, but +eloquent of his desperate discouragement and weariness. + +"I hope it's not as bad as all that, Mr. Rathbawne. It's not necessary +to tell you, that for me there can never again be such a thing as +trusting the word of Governor Abbott; but, at the same time, I can +hardly bring myself to believe that he would openly countenance the +practical existence of anarchy in the capital city of Alleghenia." + +"Well, I can, then!" declared Rathbawne. "I can believe anything of him! +Mark my words, John, he's as sleek a scoundrel as you'll find outside of +the State's Prison. He cares less for Alleghenia and her capital city +than you do for one of the hairs on his rascally head. I tell you, the +Union has bought him, body and soul, and unless a miracle comes down +from heaven, I'm a beaten man!" + +Barclay bit his lips without replying. In his heart of hearts, he knew +that Peter Rathbawne's words were true. + +"He'll be impeached, sooner or later," continued the old man, "if +there's a speck of decency left in the Legislature--which I doubt. But +long before that, John, long before that, I'll be down and out. I would +to God you were Governor of Alleghenia, my boy. You're the only ray of +hope I can see for her." + +The Lieutenant-Governor fell back a step, and covered his face with his +hands. For a full minute there was absolute silence. Rathbawne had +returned to the table, and, with his fore-arms across the back of a +chair, and one foot on the lower cross-bar, was staring vacantly at his +autographs, his hands moulding and remoulding each other into an +infinity of forms. Natalie was at the window, her face in the crevice +between the curtains. The same impulse had prompted both father and +daughter. There are some things which it is better not to watch. + +They turned at the sound of his voice, to find him with his head flung +back, his hands clenched at his sides, his right foot planted firmly in +advance of his left, his whole bearing one of passionate earnestness. +And, though he was seemingly addressing Rathbawne, there was that in his +voice and in his words which was meant for every ear in the state! + +"Governor of Alleghenia!" he said, "I would to God I were! Sometimes I +almost--yes, sometimes I wholly despair. I love this state, Mr. +Rathbawne, as I love nothing else on earth--not even my girl there, not +even Natalie. You two are the only ones in the world who can understand +what it means when I say that. It has always been so, ever since I was +big enough to know what Alleghenia meant, and more than ever since I +have come to understand her shame, and her vital peril, and her dire +need. I've never tried to explain the feeling; I've never found any one +who seemed to share it with me. I hear other men talk of national +patriotism, and the flag, and all that, and I understand it, and honor +them for it. But--while it may be only a fancy of mine--for me Kenton +City comes even before Washington, and even before these United States +of America the sovereign state of Alleghenia! I would have her courts +incorruptibility itself, her government the perfect commingling of +equity and mercy; her press the vehicle of verity, intelligence, and +watchfulness; her public servants the faithful exponents of loyalty and +diligence; her people, one and all, whatever is best in our +interpretation of the word American--and then, something +more!--Alleghenians!--citizens, not only of the Republic, but of the +state which I would have shine brightest in the field of stars, and be +quoted, from Maine to California, and from Florida to Washington, as the +synonym for law and order, truth, integrity, and justice. You know how +far the dream is from the reality. We are held up to ridicule and +contempt as law-breakers, time-servers, and bribe-takers--and we deserve +it! I can't see help on any hand. I don't believe our people, as a +class, are actually vicious and corrupt--only callous and indifferent, +accustomed so long to the spectacle of political chicanery and depravity +that they have lost their ability to appreciate its significance. But, +so far as results are concerned, it all amounts to the same thing. Once, +I hoped I should be able to do something. But now--I'm a nonentity, Mr. +Rathbawne, as you know, and not only that, but a man who has taken a +false step, from which he can never recover. I'm dead, politically +speaking--as dead as Benjamin Butler!" + +He paused, drawing a deep breath. + +"We were speaking of your interview," he added, more evenly. "What was +the result?" + +"Nothing, beyond what I've told you," answered Rathbawne, shaking his +head. "All I can do is to keep my mouth shut, await developments, and +trust in a Providence which it takes a good bit of obstinacy to believe +hasn't deserted the state of Alleghenia for good and all. It isn't for +my own sake alone, John, that I pray the Union will give in before my +people begin to think of violence. You remember '94 in Chicago? Well, +we don't want anything like that in Kenton City. It would be the last +straw! Alleghenia has a big enough burden of disgrace to carry, as it +is." + +A servant entered, even as he was speaking, to summon him to the +telephone, and with an exclamation of impatience he left the room. +Immediately, Natalie stepped from her post at the window, and came +toward Barclay with outstretched hands. + +"Oh, Johnny boy," she said, "I'm _so_ sorry. How you've been hurt, dear, +and disappointed, and cruelly wronged!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's hands clenched again at the sound of sorrow in +her voice, and he strove in vain to control the tremor of his lip. +Tenderly he put his arms about her. + +"I'm sorry, too, little girl--sorry you were here to see me make a fool +of myself and then squeal when I got hurt as I deserved. I shouldn't +have done that. But I was so proud--so grateful--I thought I was going +to be able"-- + +"_Johnny--Johnny!_" + +They held to each other rigidly for an instant, her face against his +sleeve, in an agony which no tears came to soothe. + +"There!" said Barclay presently. "I'm better already. It does one good +to blow off steam, now and again." + +His tone lightened perceptibly. + +"And look here," he added, "what's most important, after all, is that I +have news for you, and ought to be delivering it." + +As yet, they did not dare to meet each other's eyes, but Natalie took +the cue. + +"You can spare yourself the trouble, my lord," she retorted, sweeping +him a curtsy. "I can guess what it is, without your aid. You've found +him!" + +"How did you know?" + +"I didn't. But you will remember that I asked you to find him. The +inference is as plain as a pikestaff." + +"Arrogance! But you're right. I have. He has been at my rooms since last +night. He was frightfully shaky, and utterly despondent, but he's taking +something to settle his nerves, and I've no doubt a week or so of good +food and straight living will bring him around into something like his +old form." + +"Boy dear! And you're taking care of him?" + +"Oh, just directing the cure, that's all! I'll tell you more when I can +report definite progress. Do you suppose there is a single secluded +corner in all this mansion which has not already been preëmpted by +Dorothy and Nisbet?" + +He slipped his arm about her again, and together they went out, across +the wide hall, toward the drawing-room. Rathbawne was standing at the +telephone under the stairway, but, as they approached him, he replaced +the receiver, and stepped forth under the light of the chandelier. They +both halted, shocked into speechlessness by the look on his face. The +past ten minutes seemed to have added a decade to his age. His cheeks +were white and drawn, and with his hands he groped before him, as if he +had been stricken blind. As he came close to them, he lifted his head, +and peered first at his daughter, and then at Barclay, seeming barely to +recognize them. + +"Dad! What _is_ it?" said the girl, in a voice just above a whisper. + +Rathbawne raised his hand, and pushed back the hair from his forehead. + +"A message--from Payson--of the 'Sentinel,'" he mumbled. "It seems +there's a fire--a fire on Charles Street--near the mills--one of my +buildings--a shop--a shop. Some one in the crowd--threw a +torch in at the window--there is a great crowd--a throng of +strikers--watching--cheering the flames--hissing the firemen. They've +begun early--and this is only the beginning! My people--my people"---- + +He stumbled forward, and would have fallen, but that his daughter caught +him. To his dying day Barclay remembered how, as he sprang to aid her, +her hands gleamed, white and slender, against the black of Peter +Rathbawne's coat. + +The hush that followed was broken presently by the sound of the old +man's choking sobs, and the low, soothing tones of Natalie, murmuring +against his ear. From the drawing-room came indeterminate scraps of Mrs. +Wynyard's gay chatter, as she regaled Mrs. Rathbawne with the gossip +gleaned in a round of calls. She herself was partly visible, drawing off +her gloves before the fire. From the music-room beyond issued the chords +of Dorothy's none-too-sure accompaniment, and young Nisbet's superb, +full tenor:-- + + "'Ah, love, could you and I with fate conspire + To grasp the sorry scheme of things entire'"-- + +But, in the Lieutenant-Governor's imagination, another sound mingled +with and dominated these,--the voice of Michael McGrath, as he had heard +it that morning, through the open door of Governor Abbott's room:-- + +"It won't be a strike like other strikes, not so long as I'm running it, +that is. It's going to mean business from the word go!" + + + + +VIII + +THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS + + +One spotted peach will contaminate an entire basket, one drop of ink +cloud a full glass of clear water. It was so in the case of the strikers +at the Rathbawne Mills. Their unwonted idleness, the long succession of +empty hours, already, among the more improvident, the preliminary +pressure of privation's teeth,--all these made them easy prey for the +sophistries of men like McGrath and his associates. At first they simply +laughed at the arraignments of Peter Rathbawne as a plutocrat, a +slave-master, and an oppressor of the poor, knowing better in their +hearts. But the memory of past kindness is too apt to be the most +fleeting of human impressions. On the one side the gates of the +Rathbawne Mills remained obstinately closed, and, though Rathbawne +himself manifested no intention of resorting to the intolerable +importation of "scab" labor, he persisted in his refusal to treat with +the Union so long as the discharge of the fifteen men remained a subject +proposed for debate. On the other hand, the denunciations of McGrath and +the other Union orators were constant, unavoidable, and sufficiently +plausible to produce an impression, and linger in the mind. And, +meanwhile, to and fro among the strikers, stalked, arm in arm, the +spectres of idleness and starvation, the one smirking openly, the other, +as yet, half-veiled. Altogether it was fertile ground. + +After the burning of Mr. Rathbawne's shop, on the first night of the +strike, ensued a week of comparative quiet. The outrage had been +flagrant, the source, if not the very author, of it was known, and the +police did--nothing. For three days the press of Kenton City blazed with +indignation, excepting only the "Record," which openly favored the +strikers, and then all the papers alike suddenly ceased to refer to the +incident at all. For, while McGrath was not in favor of wasting the +funds of the Union, he was as well aware as the next man that a dollar, +as well as a stitch, in time, saves nine. + +Herein lay the cardinal peril of Alleghenia. As John Barclay had said, +it was not that her people, as a class, were corrupt or criminal, but +merely that they viewed with easy tolerance evidences of laxity and +lawlessness which would have set the citizens of another state by the +ears, and filled the newspaper columns and the public forums with +indignation and protest. In this respect, the papers of Kenton City were +the most flagrant offenders. Even the most reputable, the "Sentinel," +could be silenced at practically any moment by those cognizant of the +method, and in a position to command the price, of manipulation. As a +whited sepulchre it was a conspicuous success, being irreproachably +scholarly, dignified, and didactic in tone, and wholly destitute of +principle. + +Michael McGrath, demagogue though he was, knew his public as the +physician knows the pulse he feels. It was a feature of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills that no attempt was made to justify the cause of the +strikers in the eye of the disinterested public of Kenton City. McGrath +himself was fully alive to the slenderness of his pretext, and alive, as +well, to the strength of Peter Rathbawne's case, if it should come to a +discussion of the rights and wrongs involved, wherein his business +probity and his justice to, and consideration for, his employees, would +furnish arguments well-nigh unanswerable. He contented himself, +therefore, with standing upon a simple declaration of the will of the +Union, which was, in effect, his own; and, strong in his reliance, if +not upon the support, at least upon the non-interference of the state +authorities, devoted his attention to holding the press in check, by +methods long since found effectual, and confidently left the public to +think and act as it saw fit. + +There could have been no more contemptuous comment upon the moral and +intellectual status of the community than this insolent assumption of +its indifference to the commonest principles of justice, but for a time +his confidence had the appearance of being amply justified. The strike +went its way, characterized by an infinity of petty outrages and a +constant and consistent vilification of Peter Rathbawne, while--with the +exception of that first and promptly quashed protest on the part of the +press--no voice was raised in opposition. + +Reduced to its lowest terms, the struggle was one between Rathbawne and +McGrath, and that, not as representatives the one of a great industrial, +the other of a great socialistic organization, but as individuals. The +source of the stream which had thus reached its rapids, and was plunging +on toward its annihilating cataract, lay far back in the early days of +Rathbawne's commercial career. McGrath was a man who practiced neither +the vice of forgetfulness nor the virtue of forgiveness. As plain as the +event of a yesterday lay upon his memory his contemptuous dismissal from +Rathbawne's employ, charged in particular with a petty peculation, and +in general with the indisputable fact of being a bad influence in the +mills. His case had been in many ways identical with that of the men +whose cause he was now, for reasons of his own, espousing. + +But Peter Rathbawne, then less shrewd in estimating men than now, had +reckoned without due credit to the vindictiveness and pertinacity of the +man before him. McGrath--brutally handsome in those days, idle, +insolent, and independent--later had developed qualities of which at the +time there was little evidence. He had smiled and shrugged his +shoulders--a habit which had grown upon him--as Rathbawne gave his +verdict, and had instinctively resisted the temptation to threaten +revenge. For that inspiration he had been devoutly grateful ever since. +It had enabled him to work in silence and unseen, like a mole, toward +the goal at which he aimed. He was a poker player, was Michael McGrath, +of the class which pulls victory out of defeat by the aid of its own +personality and a low pair. The calm indifference with which he had +received his dismissal from the employ of Peter Rathbawne seemed to him, +on reflection, to have been the unconscious forerunner of the elaborate +_nonchalance_ with which he now viewed the unexpected filling of a +broken straight. It was certain that the other player had not guessed +the strength of his cards. + +He had never forgiven, never forgotten. It had taken a quarter-century +of unremitting effort, of indomitable perseverance, of calculated +ingenuity, to secure to him the position which he now felt to be +assured--that of being able to cope with the man who had been his +adversary, and so overwhelmingly his superior. The fight was on at +last,--a fight in which the odds were not only equal, but, if anything, +in favor of the former mill-hand, thus become one of the most powerful +men in Alleghenia; a fight to be fought to the bitter finish, with an +almost certain triumph as his reward. + +Added to these motives was another,--newer, it is true, but none the +less potent,--his hatred for the Lieutenant-Governor. He had been able +to laugh within a half-minute after the words "unmitigated blackguard" +had smitten his ears; but they had rankled for all that. It was not so +much the insult, as the knowledge that it was justified. He was +remarkably candid with himself, was Michael McGrath. + +Hence the unparalleled venom of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +McGrath's dual sense of wounded vanity prescribed a course of surpassing +vindictiveness. His personal resentment, reinforced by consummate +appreciation of the adversaries with whom he had to deal, dictated a +safe road to revenge, which enabled him to fling wide the floodgates of +his long-stored animosity, secure in his knowledge of having the upper +hand. Disorder, calumny, outrage, even open anarchy--he could venture +upon them unafraid. A corrupt Governor, whom he had created, stood +behind him, smiling tolerantly. An indifferent community would let him +have his will. Only he must proceed by degrees, and be ready at any +moment to take one backward step for the sake of being able presently +thereafter to take two in advance. + +Here precisely lay the weak point in his plan of campaign. With the +fatuity incidental on occasions to even the shrewdest minds, he had not +counted upon independence in the host which he believed slave to him, in +thought and word and deed. He rated himself the dictator, the prompter +without whose suggestion no one of all the players in this gigantic +tragedy could speak his line. As a matter of fact, like all leaders of +his class, he could drive his followers forward at will, while totally +unable to hold them back. He was wholly master so long as he used the +spur. The peril lay in the fancied efficacy of the curb. In short, he +was discovering already that he had unwittingly created a monster beside +which Frankenstein's was the veriest doll. + +Thus, shortly, the strain began to tell upon the four thousand +unemployed sets of nerves around the Rathbawne Mills. Meetings became +more frequent and more turbulent; drinking and disorder were observably +on the increase; and at the end of another four weeks one of the gates +of the mills was beaten down, and several hundred men and boys paraded +around shop after shop, breaking windows and singing ribald songs. It +was not a very serious demonstration in itself. Its ominous feature lay +in the fact that the police made no attempt to check it. There was +something else about it, to the thinking of McGrath. It was not so much +that events were moving too fast, but that they were moving without +intelligent control. + +Two nights later, another building belonging to Peter Rathbawne, and +situated only a half-block from the mills, was burned in the same manner +as the first, watched by an enormous crowd of strikers, who applauded +each fresh burst of flame, as if the fire had been a circus or a play. +Still there was no move on the part of the police. + +Then it was that the business men of Kenton City sat up in their office +chairs and began to think. This was an eventuality entirely outside the +calculations of McGrath. But the pachydermatous inertia of the citizens +of Alleghenia had yet its vulnerable spot, where the weapon might enter. +Vaguely these men had known that the state was rotten, but the fact had +never been brought to their attention in a manner so poignantly +suggestive before. Unwittingly McGrath had aroused the suspicion that it +was not the purse of Peter Rathbawne alone which was in danger. If it +was possible for disorder to go to such extremes in the very streets of +Kenton City without fear of interference or rebuke, then no man's +property was safe. That thought was the Achilles' heel of the community. +So it was that a Citizens' Committee, composed of presidents of two +insurance companies, directors from five banks, representatives from the +Chamber of Commerce and the Board of Trade, and, finally, Colonel Amos +Broadcastle, was appointed to wait upon the Mayor. That gentleman, as +was entirely to be expected, referred them to the Governor, and to the +Governor they went. + +Barclay was present at the interview. For his own reasons Governor +Abbott had kept his immediate subordinate well to the fore in all +matters pertaining to the strike since the latter's rebuke to +McGrath,--in all matters, that is to say, not involving the exercise of +actual authority. Of that, indeed, the Lieutenant-Governor had had no +hope after the conversation in Peter Rathbawne's library. He met the +representatives of the press, conducted the correspondence with +mill-owners and other negatively interested parties, and at the +Governor's request made what was palpably a farcical inspection of the +entire state militia--to judge of their readiness for strike service!--a +task which consumed a fortnight in constant travel, and visits to +armories all alike in insufficient equipment and utter slovenliness. The +Ninth Regiment alone remained, and this command was to parade for +inspection by the Governor himself that very evening. The coincidence +flashed through Barclay's mind as the Citizens' Committee entered, with +Broadcastle, in his capacity as spokesman, at its head. + +The dignity and air of command habitual to the Colonel of the Ninth were +doubly apparent as he advanced toward the Governor's table. Both Barclay +and Abbott rose to receive him, but the latter reseated himself, as soon +as Broadcastle had introduced his fellow-members of the Committee. He +listened to what followed with an air of thoughtfulness, tinged with a +faint and exasperating suggestion of amusement. At a neighboring table, +his official stenographer took down every word which fell. + +Colonel Broadcastle was not accustomed to mince matters, when the +occasion demanded brevity and conciseness. Now, he stepped to within a +few feet of the Governor's table, and stood rigidly confronting him, +with his hands clasped before him on the head of his stick, in the +position of parade-rest. + +"Governor Abbott," he said, in his curt, dry voice, "these gentlemen and +myself form a Committee appointed by a meeting of the business men of +Kenton City, to protest against the state of affairs now existing in +connection with the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. It is only generous +to presume that other matters have diverted your attention from an +appreciation of these conditions. The situation is without parallel in +the annals of Alleghenia. Disorder is rampant, and destruction of +property is freely indulged in by the strikers without any apparent fear +of molestation. Despite the fact that there is a large police-force, it +makes no effort to check these operations. The sole reply of Chief +Pendle to the protests of those interested in the promotion of law and +order has been that he will not suffer any outside interference in the +control of his department--the which, in view of his responsibility to +the public, can only be regarded as sheer and intolerable insolence! An +appeal to Mayor Goadby has elicited the response that the whole matter +lies in the Governor's hands." + +The Colonel paused. The Governor, leaning back in his chair, and +fingering a pencil, smiled slightly and nodded his head. + +"I suppose that is so," he said. "Continue, continue, Colonel +Broadcastle." + +"It is the sense of the law-abiding element of Kenton City," went on the +Colonel, flushing at the condescension of his tone, "that the limit of +endurance has been reached. If, willfully or otherwise, the police do +not act, my regiment is prepared to act as substitute. I have already +placed it at the service of the Adjutant-General. His reply, like the +Mayor's, was to refer me to you for orders. I am here to receive them, +sir." + +"Your offer is appreciated," said the Governor suavely. "We of Kenton +City have reason to be proud of the Ninth, Colonel Broadcastle. I +congratulate myself upon my privilege of reviewing it, to-night. And we +have reason to be proud, as well, of the intelligence which has made +such an organization possible. Your disinterested devotion"-- + +Broadcastle flung up his chin. + +"I am not here to receive compliments, sir!" he said abruptly. + +"Nor I to bestow them," answered the Governor, unruffled. "As +commander-in-chief of the state forces, I believe it is not outside my +province to render deserved commendation to a subordinate." + +"Oh, do not let us juggle with words, Governor Abbott! It is precisely +as commander-in-chief of the state forces that the time has come for you +to act; it is precisely as your subordinate that I am here to receive +your orders. Assume the responsibility which confronts you, issue the +commands proper to the emergency, and you will have no more tireless +executor of them than I. My regiment can be on duty at the Rathbawne +Mills inside of six hours"-- + +"But, my good Colonel Broadcastle," broke in the Governor, "the state +has no need of your regiment for the moment! Calling upon the militia is +no light matter, sir. You talk about my ordering out the Ninth as you +would advise me to ring for a messenger-boy!" + +"The welfare of the municipality, if not that of the commonwealth," +replied Colonel Broadcastle firmly, "demands that an immediate stop be +put to this lawlessness. We are dealing with extremities, sir!" + +The Governor swung forward, and placed his elbows on the table. + +"You will permit me to be the best judge of what the welfare of the +commonwealth may be," he retorted. "Whatever lawlessness exists--and I +think you have grossly exaggerated its extent, Colonel Broadcastle--is +due to the selfish obstinacy of one man. In my opinion, Mr. Rathbawne is +entirely in the wrong. He had fair warning, which he did not choose to +heed. If his property suffers at the hands of the strikers, he has only +himself to blame." + +"It is not a question of Mr. Rathbawne, or of any other individual," +said Broadcastle, "but of the integrity of the state of Alleghenia!" + +"The integrity of the state of Alleghenia," answered the Governor dryly, +"has been intrusted, by the vote of her citizens, to me, as chief +executive." + +"An action," exclaimed the Colonel, "which I venture to predict they +will shortly have reason most bitterly to regret!" + +Governor Abbott rose abruptly to his feet. + +"This interview is at an end, Colonel Broadcastle," he said, bringing +his fist down upon the table with a thud. "I take exception to your +remarks, from first to last. I consider myself fully competent to deal +with the situation, and you may depend, sir, I shall do so at my own +time, and in my own way. If Mr. Peter Rathbawne supposes that he can +defy reason and justice at will, and that the state authorities are +prepared to support him, he is grossly and fatally mistaken. Gentlemen, +I have the honor to bid you good-day!" + +For a quarter-minute, the two men stood facing each other, without +speaking. It was observable that the eyes of neither flinched. Then-- + +"It is my earnest hope, Elijah Abbott," said the Colonel slowly, "to see +you impeached by a righteously indignant community, and committed for a +term of years to the State's Prison at Mowberly, for rank malfeasance +in office!" + +The Governor shrugged his shoulders. + +"Your record and your position protect you, Colonel Broadcastle," he +said, with something of his usual suavity. "Will you have the goodness +to retire?" + +As the Citizens' Committee left the room the Lieutenant-Governor turned +on his heel, passed into his office, and closed the door. + +For a long time he sat motionless at his desk, with his temples in his +hands, staring at a frame upon the opposite wall, which contained the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia. These were a hand holding even balances, +upon a circular shield, supported by the nude figures of two young men, +representing Art and Labor. Above, upon a scroll, were the words, +"_Justitia. Lex. Integritas._" + +It was not only bad heraldry, but indifferently appropriate symbolism. + + + + +IX + +THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW + + +The huge armory of the Ninth, transformed, by the same system which had +metamorphosed the _personnel_ of the regiment itself, from a gaunt, +barn-like structure, ill-fitted to its purpose in all but size, to the +most cheerful, as well as the most completely equipped, of Alleghenian +arsenals, was blazing with light and echoing to the sound of many +voices. A steady stream of people poured in at the heavy doors, now +standing wide, but significant, with their great timbers, elaborate +locks and bolts, and precautionary peep-holes, of the possibility of an +attitude less hospitable. Threading their way at a rapid pace through +the more sluggish main current of the crowd, the members of the +regiment, in an infinite variety of civilian attire,--from tweeds and +knickerbockers to top-hats and evening-dress,--sought their respective +company-rooms, vanished therein, and, presently, reappeared in uniform. +It was as if behind those ten doors which lined the upper corridor there +were as many moulds, identical in form, whereinto this perplexing +diversity of raw material was plunged on entering, to be drawn forth +again in a constant reduplication of militiamen. + +As the hour for the review drew near, the proportion of these to the +throng with which they mingled, perceptibly increasing, seemed, little +by little, to leaven the whole lump. The dress-uniform of the Ninth was +everywhere, the black shakos and epaulettes, white pompons, cross-belts +and gloves, and multiplicity of brass buttons, lending the immense +assemblage a singular spirit and vivacity. + +On the floor of the drill-room the people spread in all directions, +fan-like, from the main doorway, the multitudinous footfalls mounting +murmurously into the spaces of the lofty roof, where forty arc-lights +hung, dizzily suspended, pallid in the thin haze of dust swung upwards +from the hurrying feet of the thousands below. + +"Precisely like an army of ants--and every one of them with an uncle or +two, and a round dozen of nephews and nieces!" said Mrs. Wynyard. + +She and the Rathbawne girls were looking down upon the drill-floor +from the balcony of the Colonel's room. Broadcastle and the +Lieutenant-Governor were deep in conversation inside, having seized the +delay in the arrival of Governor Abbott as an opportunity for a few +words in private. + +"How funny they are, scuttling along, all of them!" said Dorothy. "And +how immensely pleased the favored ones are, who have a soldier to show +them the way. I see a distinct difference in their walk from that of the +others, don't you, Natalie? They seem to be saying '_We_ were +_invited_--and by this splendiferous creature at our side!' See how they +strut! And look at the soldierless ones, how timidly they go--just as if +they had found their tickets in the street, or had crept in through the +basement windows. 'Please, kind Mr. Soldier-man, let us stay and see the +show. We'll be _awf'ly_ good!'" + +"How preposterous you are, Dorothy!" answered Mrs. Wynyard. "Look! The +people are taking to the sides of the room already, and the companies +are forming. What astonishing method and precision there is to it all! +Do you suppose each man has a little circle marked on the floor, to show +just where he is to stand?" + +"I haven't the most remote doubt of it," said Natalie, with a +smile,--"and his name neatly lettered inside it with gilt paint!" + +The long, enclosed racks at the ends of the drill-room were open now, +and the electric light winked upon the barrels of the Springfields, as +busy, white-gloved hands plied the polishing cloths along them. The +enormous drill-floor, cleared as if by magic from the disorderly +weed-growth which had encumbered it, began to make manifest its proper +crop--long lines of gray and white, like sprouting sage, at first but a +dot here and there, to indicate the direction, then a scattering, then +distinct clumps, finally a thick, serried row. In the distance, a bugle +sounded, followed by a long ruffle of drums, and Colonel Broadcastle +stepped quickly to the window of the balcony. + +"There's the Governor," he said. "Will you come in? I'll send my orderly +to show you to your seats." + +At the same moment, the door from the corridor opened, and the orderly +entered, his hand at his shako. + +"Sir, the Governor has arrived." + +Then, as the trio on the balcony stepped in through the window, he +turned suddenly and superlatively scarlet. As has been said, young +Nisbet was accustomed to getting what he wanted. In this instance what +he had wanted happened to be that the Adjutant should choose him from +the guard detail as Colonel's orderly. To be thus chosen was to be +admittedly the most immaculate of thirty men, all more immaculate than a +thousand immaculate others. The thing was not easy of achievement, but +Dorothy Rathbawne was to be present at the review, and so--there was no +second way about it--it simply had to be done. Young Nisbet's way of +doing it was an absolutely new uniform and gold-plated buttons and +accoutrements. Extravagance? Vanity? Perhaps! But at the present moment, +he was wearing one cross-belt where his thousand and odd comrades were +wearing two. There was no answer to such an argument as that. + +Colonel Broadcastle had reserved seats for the party on the temporary +reviewing stand, and, five minutes after they had taken their places, +the bugles sang again, a curt order--"'shun! 'shun!"--ran in varying +intonations from company to company, and the slack gray ranks before +them stiffened into absolute rigidity. Then from the broad hallway +beyond came a tremendous burst of sound, and, to the strains of the +famous old march of the Ninth, the regimental band swung into view, +followed by Governor Abbott and Colonel Broadcastle and the former's +staff. + +To the Lieutenant-Governor, but newly returned from his wearisome round +of the state armories, much of what followed was so stale as to be no +more than a constantly increasing strain upon nerves already overtaxed. +He deliberately allowed his attention to wander, until he felt rather +than actually perceived the steady tramp-tramp of the men, swinging, +fours right, into column, the occasional "hep! hep!" of an officious +file-closer, the endless succession of fours winking past him, like the +palings of a gray fence seen from the window of a train, the intervals +narrowed by short-step, widening again at the "Forward--_march_!" the +blare of the band, lessening as it approached the further end of the +building, then suddenly bursting into its former volume at the +right-about. He endured it all listlessly. It was tediously familiar, +stamped upon his brain by repetition after repetition. + +Moreover, he was completely fagged, and unutterably oppressed by his +burden of discouragement. The old wounds, in part healed by his recent +absence from the immediate vicinity of his constant discomfiture, had +been re-opened and set bleeding afresh by Governor Abbott's treatment of +the Citizens' Committee. Whatever lingering hope had remained in his +mind of peace with honor for the troubled capital of Alleghenia, seemed +to have been effectually dispelled by that interview. The most enduring +charity, the most fatuous credulity, the blindest partisanship--even +these could not have preserved a last spark of confidence in Elijah +Abbott. Still less was Barclay's indeterminate hope of the ultimate +triumph of right able to stand against such crushing evidence of its +instability. It was no longer a question of suspicions, of precedents, +of deductions from the significance of a host of former misdoings. Out +of his own mouth was the Governor convicted. "At my own time, and in my +own way," he had said. It was a phrase, nothing more, and could be +boiled down until its whole purport was contained in one word--Never! + +"Fours _left_--_March_! Compan_ee_--_halt_!" + +The entire regiment, as one man, swung from column of fours into +battalion front, halted, and then--cr-r-rick! boooo-m-m-m!--came to +order arms. The sides of the room were lined with a solid rampart of +white and gray and gold. Barclay was aware of the First Sergeants, +scurrying from their positions to report, of their voices, and those of +the Majors and the Adjutant, and, finally the Colonel:-- + +"Take your post, sir!" + +But his thoughts were anywhere and everywhere else. What a farce it all +was, this life which he was leading, this mental and moral martyrdom to +an impossible hope, this eternal and heart-sickening ordeal of hope +deferred, this waiting, waiting, waiting, for something which never +would and never could happen! Rotten, rotten to the core, this state for +which he would have given his heart's blood, and not only rotten, but +not caring a whit for her rottenness--glorying rather, in her own +degradation. The chief executive had flung back into their very faces +the appeal to his conscience of the most influential men in Kenton +City; the police, even now seated about their station stoves, were +sniggling at the predicament of the public which paid them for its +protection against precisely the kind of thing which they openly +tolerated and encouraged; yes, and even the militia, the guarantee of +law and order, Broadcastle's own command, were decked out in tinsel and +pipeclay, strutting to music in a palpable bid for applause and +admiration. And yonder--the tide of anarchy was slowly but surely rising +about the Rathbawne Mills, presaging riot, bloodshed, God alone knew +what!--but one thing, inevitably,--the absolute downfall of dignity and +rout of decency in Alleghenia! + +Suddenly, his old intrepid spirit of resolution reasserted itself, but +doubtfully, like the flame of a lamp flaring once out of dimness before +it dies forever. Was it for this that he had devoted the best thought of +his youth and his earlier manhood to plans for the betterment of his +state? Should he now, at this, the hour of her supremest political and +moral peril, desert her as irredeemable, and join the ranks of those who +sneered at her, and pointed mocking fingers at her shame and nakedness? + +"Your loquacity faintly suggests that of a mummy," said Natalie, at his +side. + +"I was alone with my thoughts," answered the Lieutenant-Governor, +turning to her with an attempt at a smile, "and pretty black ones they +were, at that!" + +"Alleghenia again?" + +"Alleghenia again--and always. This business is becoming an obsession +with me. I haven't had a chance to tell you, and I can't very well +explain now. I'll have to leave it till I see you to-morrow. But +something happened to-day which drove another nail--and one of the +last!--into the coffin of my faith. There's not a gleam of hope +anywhere." + +"Don't you see hope in all this?" asked Natalie, with a little, +indicative gesture toward the scene before them. "Somehow, it is +impressing me tremendously to-night--more than ever before. I seem to +understand better what it means, what it stands for." + +"It's a stale enough story with me," said Barclay. "Remember, I've been +doing just about nothing but watch this kind of thing for the past two +weeks. After all, what does it amount to but a thousand possibilities +parading like peacocks?" + +"How unlike you, that speech! It amounts to a vast deal more than that, +Johnny boy,--oh, infinitely more! I don't speak of the other regiments +you have seen. This is different. Well, what _does_ it amount to? Who +and what are these thousand peacocks of yours? Aren't they the very +flower of Kenton City, the youngest and best blood in our veins, +gathered by one good man's will into an organization of sterling +loyalty, with one great aim in view, and that the support and protection +and preservation of all that is best in Alleghenia? The very fact that +such a body of men exists among us is in the nature of a guarantee, it +seems to me, that we shall come out all right in the end. Have you +noticed their faces?--many of them so absurdly boyish, all of them so +honest, and manly, and--and--_American_, John! They are the +personifications of your ideal of that afternoon in the +library--Americans, and something more--Alleghenians! And, to prove it, +they are freely giving a portion of their time and their strength, in +order that there may be at least one thing in Kenton City which is +without fear and without reproach. I wonder--I wonder, John, whether it +isn't the old story, after all: whether you haven't been wandering all +over the world, like the prince in the fairy-book, looking for the magic +talisman that is to save the state you love, while, all the time, it has +been lying at your very door? Oh, this means something--I'm too stupid +to interpret it as you could--but I know it's there, and that it would +help you and encourage you. Let me try. Look there! A single purpose +animates them all--the maintenance of the standard which Colonel +Broadcastle set for them, and the record they have made for themselves." + +Colonel Broadcastle's voice was sweeping the armory, as he put the +regiment through the manual of arms. + +"One has only to hear one of them--Mr. Nisbet, for example--say 'the +Ninth' to find the hope of which you are in search. These men say it as +others say 'God' or 'my mother'--as you yourself, Johnny boy, say +'Alleghenia.'" + +"Charge--_bay'n'ts_!" + +With a single click, a thousand rifles fell into position, a thousand +left feet smote the floor in unison, and the light rippled and twinkled +along a solid line of flashing steel. + +"There! A single voice,--a single, mighty response! Don't you see the +wonderful suggestiveness of it? Don't you feel the presence of the +enormous reserve force which lies behind all this? Oh, believe me, John, +this is a weapon too mighty to lie unused, and too intelligent to be +misused, if the worst come to the worst. After all, as no one knows +better than yourself, it's not your own advancement you're looking for, +it's that of the state. Well, there may be other agencies, perhaps +entirely independent of you or of your influence, but none the less +invaluable. For example, you are close upon despair--and yet, before +your fears come true, the forces of wrong will have to fight their way, +step by step, through this rampart of American manhood!" + +Barclay touched her hand lightly, as she ceased speaking. In the midst +of the thousands about them, they were alone as they had never been +before. + +"Thank you," he said simply. "Thank you, littlest and wisest in the +world!" + +The regiment was in motion again, skirting the room in column of fours, +preparatory to the march-past: but now the Lieutenant-Governor surveyed +it from a new, and a dual point-of-view,--as a thousand individuals, +that is, each a potential factor for immeasurable good in the coming +rehabilitation of the state; and, then, as a vast fighting-machine +perfect in every detail, resistless and awe-inspiring in its very +integrity. He noted the faces as they passed--stern, intelligent faces, +young, for the most part, and curiously refined, intent upon correct +performance of the present duty, and touched, almost without exception, +with an enthusiasm born of the martial music and the rhythmic tramp of +advancing feet. He saw the quick, reciprocal glance of the pivot and +flank men, as the fours, in perfect alignment, swept round into +company-front; the long, easy compression and give of the compact lines, +acquiring correct adjustment; the rigid tenure of chests and shoulders; +the firm fling of slender gray legs, as regularly intervaled as the +teeth of a giant comb. Company by company, the regiment fell into the +cadence of full-step. Midway, the standards of the Republic and +Alleghenia rippled side by side. And so, with blare of brass and sharp +staccato of snare-drums, with sheen of rifles and accoutrements, with +flash of slender swords, raised in salute,--above all and always, with +that magnificent unanimity, that mighty pulse of the thunderous +advance, the Ninth swept past its Governor and its Colonel in review. + +And then, in an instant, as it seemed, the vast square was formed again, +a sharp command rang out, the rifles snapped to a present-arms, the +standards dipped, and the strains of the "Star-Spangled Banner" mounted +triumphantly to the great girders of the lofty roof. The multitude of +spectators rose at the sound, and the Lieutenant-Governor rose with +them, his heart aglow with new inspiration, new hope, and new resolve. +The band was almost speaking the words of the anthem on the dust-grayed +air:-- + + "Oh! say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave + O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?" + +To the accompaniment of a myriad clapping hands, the Lieutenant-Governor +resumed his seat, shaken by a novel, tremendous emotion. Yes! a thousand +times yes! The star-spangled banner, symbol of loftiest ideals and +purest purposes, mute memorial and reminder of devotion incalculable and +sacrifice without bound, guarantee of liberty and brotherhood, mercy, +equality, and justice--yet waved! And, part and indissoluble portion of +its inspiring memories and illustrious destinies, the star of Alleghenia +yet blazed upon its azure field! He had been living in a world of +unrealities, in a valley of shadow, grayed by portents of failure and +despair. His eyes had been narrowed to see the pitfalls which lined his +path, to the stumbling-blocks, the briers, the indescribable sordidness +of his personal position and his immediate surroundings. Now, he looked +up and horizonward. The thunder-clouds of official depravity and +duplicity which darkened the way of his endeavor--were they able, after +all, to blot out the memory of the clear, high sky above? + +As this thought came to him, it was almost as if, in actuality, a +brooding heaven had been rent asunder, revealing the steel-blue of the +infinite ether permeated with the supreme radiance of noon; and at the +incursion of this illuminating element the host of his discouragements +dwindled and disappeared, like noisome little prowlers of the night, +scuttling to cover at the abrupt break of a tropical day. For a moment, +he strove to realize whence the light had come, and in what consisted +this sovereign ally, hitherto uncalculated, of his optimism. As he +tracked his thought, it led him undeviatingly back to its direct +inspiration, the words of Natalie Rathbawne. + +"Before your fears come true"--she had said. + +Before his fears came true--well, what? The revelation leaped at him +full and fair now, and every nerve sang like a taut wire in answer to +its touch. Before his fears came true, this wretched little world of +petty chicanery and official corruption which surrounded and sickened +him would be wiped out of existence. Abbott--McGrath--their machinations +and their misdeeds--their lies and their ambitions--their power and +their pride,--they were newts that fouled a pool, gnats in the sunshine, +cinders on the snow. Towering above them, ready, at an instant's +notice, to crush them out of being, was the rock of ages, the righteous +spirit of Alleghenia, integral and indestructible, illumined by the +ancient, undimmed, and eternal sense of rectitude inherent in the +American people! + +Not by his agency, perhaps--perhaps not even in his day,--nevertheless +and infallibly, the right was bound to conquer in the end. The clear +eyes and the firm mouths of the men of the Ninth spoke it, their rifles, +their broad shoulders, and their precision confirmed and guaranteed it, +and back of these stood the great, taciturn figure of the People, a +smile upon its calm and silent lips. When those lips should speak, as +speak they would, their words would be the annihilation of Elijah Abbott +and of all his kind! + +Meanwhile--the bitterness--the disappointments--the humiliations--ah, in +a moment, how they had grown shrunken, and wizened, and old! For out of +the radiance of revelation, as Christ of old spoke to His disciples, so +now the spirit of Alleghenia spoke to her Lieutenant-Governor. + +"_What is that to thee? Follow thou Me!_" + +Like a woman, the spirit of her cried unto him, and, like a man, the +spirit of John Barclay answered. + + + + +X + +A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER + + +Much to Barclay's satisfaction, Cavendish had obtained his appointment +as a city reporter on the staff of the "Sentinel." Even the first week +of the new life thus entered upon had produced a vast change in his +manner and appearance. Though the Lieutenant-Governor had seen him but +once, when he came to repay the loan made him--in itself, of all signs +of restoration to a normal attitude, the most significant--he found that +his complexion had cleared and softened, and his eye perceptibly +brightened. He was clean-shaven once more, and his dress, while of +strict simplicity, was yet suggestive of the old days when he had been +called the most fastidious man in Kenton City. He held himself +straighter, too, with his shoulders thrown back and his head up; and +Barclay had noted, with quiet gratification, that there was not a +tremor about the hands which unfolded and smoothed the bills he had come +to return. One evidence alone remained of the desperate ordeal through +which he had passed. His voice, formerly firm and vibrant with a spirit +that was half gayety, half arrogance, was now indescribably modulated, +and touched with a melancholy which was not that of servility, still +less of shame. Rather, it was an unspeakably appealing regret, a +monotonous listlessness, a suggestion of hopeless surrender to something +tragic and inevitable. Barclay was puzzled by it. It seemed illogical, +and evaded him, like a melody with a dimly familiar _motif_ which he was +unable to place or even fully recall. It haunted him singularly, when +Cavendish had left, and afterwards, in his leisure moments, came back to +him, striving, as he fancied, to make itself understood. Intimately +candid as their recent relation had been, here was something +unexplained, which he could not come at, and which was yet eloquent of +vitality, of the need of comprehension. + +Since that time, three weeks before, the two men had not met. For this +there were several reasons. Barclay knew from a brief note that +Cavendish had taken a small room in a boarding-house, not far from the +"Rockingham," and that the pressure of his work for the "Sentinel" set +him afoot so early, and sent him home at night so brain and body weary, +that he had neither the strength nor the inclination for other things. +Added to this, had been the Lieutenant-Governor's absorption in his own +duties, and, in particular, his absence from Kenton City, on his round +of inspection of the state militia. But, just before the dinner hour, on +the evening following that of the review, Cavendish called, as Barclay +was in the act of dressing. + +"I had a suspicion I'd catch you just about this time," he said, +dragging a chair to the door of the bedroom, where he could watch the +Lieutenant-Governor struggling with a refractory white tie. "I'm getting +on famously, and I wanted you to know it." + +"That's right!" said Barclay, scowling into the mirror. "But then, I +knew you would. Your pessimism didn't produce much effect on me. I've +heard men talk like that before. And, of course, when a chap gets into +the condition you were in, back there, there's no such thing as making +him believe he can ever pull out. You talked like an ass, that first +night, Spencer." + +"And acted like a blackguard! I suppose you will allow me to refer to +that now?" + +"Now less than ever, my good sir. As I've told you already, all that +belongs to the past. You're yourself again. What's the use of dwelling +on a time gone by, when you were in reality somebody else--or, rather, +nobody at all? When are you going to call at the Rathbawnes'? The old +man is pretty ill, I'm afraid, but I think the rest would like to see +you again. They were speaking of you only the other day--that is, one of +them was!" + +"Not till this strike trouble is over, at all events; they have all they +can attend to at present, without being bothered by reformed drunkards. +And perhaps I sha'n't call at all. I haven't decided yet what would be +best." + +Then, before Barclay had time to speak, he added:-- + +"By the way, I'm to take up the strike to-morrow, for the 'Sentinel.'" + +"Are you?" exclaimed the Lieutenant-Governor, in a tone of the liveliest +interest. "That's good news. It must be about the most important +assignment they could give you, just now. Well, I wonder if you are +destined to be the only conscientious reporter in Kenton City, or +whether you will simply be like all the rest. Are you going to have the +courage of your convictions--which I think I can surmise, though you +haven't as yet confided them to me--or are you going to wear the +slave-chains of your fellows, and distort, and misrepresent, and truckle +and kow-tow to the policy of the most venal press in America?" + +"_On fait ce qu'on peut_," said Cavendish, with a shrug. "Orders are +orders, John. If the orders of the editor don't go, the orders on the +cashier don't come. That's about all there is to it. It would be rather +futile to attempt the Don Quixote act, if only for the reason that one +would never get into print. One can't do more than follow instructions. +The reporter's best policy is his paper's best honesty." + +"Honesty?" repeated the Lieutenant-Governor. "Where does the honesty +come in? Of course I understand your position. In a way, it is identical +with mine--subservience to a principle that you despise, acquiescence in +methods that you know to be utterly false and wrong! How sick I am of it +all! It's the old experience, all over again, which I used to have as a +child with the Tom Smith paper crackers. You are fascinated by the +tinsel, and the colored paper, and the gaudy label. You think that when +you've dissected one, and pulled it all to pieces, you'll find a bugle +and a gold crown inside--because that's what it says on the box. But, +the first thing you know, you'll find yourself blowing on a tin whistle +and wearing a fool's cap of green paper! Lord! how the press of Kenton +City needs a _man_--a man with the courage and the power to show up the +scoundrels who are responsible for all this--McGrath and his associates, +I mean. I'm sick and tired of reporters whose rascality is self-evident, +of editors who are bought and sold like chattels, of a state of affairs, +in general, so infamous as to surpass expression! You have my sympathy, +Spencer--the sympathy of a fellow-victim. To be a reporter on a +newspaper which dictates dishonesty; to be the lieutenant of a Governor +who enjoins duplicity--it's all just about one and the same thing!" + +"It's curious," commented Cavendish, "that it wasn't until about a week +after--after that night, that I knew you were Lieutenant-Governor. Then, +your name happened to be mentioned in the office, and somebody asked me +if I knew you." + +"Whereupon," said Barclay, conquering the tie at last, and turning from +the mirror, "you had the inexpressible privilege of saying that you knew +me intimately." + +"Whereupon," repeated Cavendish, in that so singular tone which had lain +heavy upon the other's memory, "I had the inexpressible privilege of +saying that I used to know you, but that we had quarreled, and were +now--strangers." + +"Why?" demanded the Lieutenant-Governor, wheeling abruptly upon him. +"What possessed you to say such a silly thing as that?" + +Cavendish leaned forward in his chair, with his elbows on his knees, and +his forehead against his interlaced fingers, staring at the floor. + +"I'm glad, in a way, to have you ask that question," he said slowly. "We +are wary of mock heroics, or even real heroics, men like you and me. And +yet there are things which must be explained, things not easy to +explain, because they come so close at times to melodrama. I've always +had a horror of emotional situations; and, from what I know of you, I'm +sure you have, as well. I'd avoid this explanation, if I could--indeed, +I've deliberately avoided it, thus far. Yet if I were a Romanist in the +presence of my priest, I think I should feel more at liberty to evade +confession than I do now. For both our sakes, I'll try to be as brief, +as simple, as lucid, as I can. And I'll trust you to understand, as well +as may be. Don't think there's any pose, any aim at effect, in what I'm +going to say. You've asked me a question, and I'm going to answer it, +that's all! I don't think, in my present frame of mind, I could bear to +have you entertain the suspicion that the answer was affected or lacking +in candor. _Allons!_ Already I'm growing too verbose!" + +He looked up with a wan smile. + +"Let's get down to facts. You ask me why I told my questioner that we no +longer knew each other. Well, then, let's have at it! It was because, +John Barclay, there is likely--no, there is sure--to come a time when +you won't care to acknowledge me as your friend. Oh, wait!" he added, as +the Lieutenant-Governor held up his hand in protest. "Hear me out. You +say I talked like an ass, that first night. Perhaps. But the fact +remains that I've been a drunkard--and that I'm bound to be one again! +I've been fighting against temptation for several weeks. It hasn't been +very strong, for some reason, and so I've managed to ground it so far. +But you remember the chap with whom old Hercules wrestled? Every time he +touched earth his strength was multiplied. Well, that's the way with +drink. I can throw the temptation for a while, but every time I do so it +rises, stronger many-fold. Sooner or later, I'm forced to give in. I +know it, as I know I'm sitting here. I'm doing my best now, because, in +the future, when the wrong that for a time you've righted goes wrong +again, I want you to remember that I made the effort--for you--and for +her--for the Fairy Princess. The end is as plain as day! It was born in +me, this. I think I've never told you that my father died of it, but +that's the truth. And the next time I drop, it will be for good and all. +I shall never make another effort to conquer the inevitable. If I can't +do it now, with the hope of redemption thus made plain, with a new +start, and a fresh chance, and--thanks to you, John--the past wiped off +the slate and a new sum set to solve, with the incentive of your +friendship and confidence, and the interest, so undeserved, of the Fairy +Princess, into the bargain,--if I can't do it now, I say, why surely I +can never do it. John, you can't know what I've been through. You, +who've never had the temptation, can't conceive of what it means. It's a +living actuality, this lust for drink. When your nerves go wrong, even +at the end of a day, or a week, or a year, during which you've kept +straight, when you're tired, discouraged, and, above all, _alone_!--then +it comes at you like a live thing,--speaks--grips your arm--drags you +wherever it wills! I've laughed at it, scoffed at it, in its absence, +tried to make myself believe it a fragment of an otherwise forgotten +dream, many and many and many a time. _But it always came back!_ Oh, +John Barclay, you others will never understand! A man has to have been +through it, in order to know, and that not once, but, as I have, a +hundred times." + +"I can well believe it to be a tremendous temptation," said the +Lieutenant-Governor gravely. + +"Temptation? It's more than that! A temptation gives you _some_ chance, +doesn't it? You may yield to it, but, at least, you've had your +fighting-chance. Well, in that sense, this is no temptation, though I've +been using the word myself to describe it. Why, John, it's madness, +sheer insanity. You probably remember that I never used to touch alcohol +at all. I promised my poor mother to let it alone until I reached my +majority. Of course, I didn't realize about the dear old man; he died +when I was too young for that. But her one great fear, and naturally, +was that the curse had descended to me--just as it had! Well, I stuck to +my promise till I was twenty-one, and kept along in the same way for +some time afterwards, just because there didn't seem to be any +particularly good reason for taking up something which I had managed to +get along very well without, all my life. Then came that time, you +know--three years ago--and out of mere recklessness, bravado, God knows +what, I began to drink. John, I was a doomed man from the first swallow! +That demon had been hiding inside me, without sound or movement or other +hint of his presence, for twenty-eight years--just waiting his chance! +You know the rest. The fight has been going on ever since, and the thing +has beaten every time. I've resisted. I've struggled. I've even prayed. +It's all useless." + +He pointed significantly to the curtain which hung where the door of the +wine-closet had been. + +"As I did that night," he continued, "I shall do again, and still again, +until the end. It's insanity, nothing more or less. It lurks at the back +of my brain--always--always--and then, suddenly, when I am least +expecting it, it comes forward with a rush, and I might as well try to +check the north wind or the incoming tide. I feel it tingling in my +fingers, scorching my throat, tearing at my reason. I swear I won't give +in, and, in the very act of so swearing, I get up and go out to meet it. +I could break down iron doors to get at the drink when it calls to me. +And, though I seem to be going straight enough now, the moment is coming +when it _will_ call and when I shall obey! Then you won't want to think +you've ever known me, John Barclay, still less to remember that the name +of the Fairy Princess has passed between us. And, in the midst of my +damnation, it will be a drop of cold water on my tongue to know that +I've left you a loophole through which to escape the acknowledgment of +these last few weeks. So far, no one but the 'Rockingham' people, and +Payson, and--and the Fairy Princess--know that we've been together +recently. The 'Rockingham' people don't even know my name. Payson won't +speak. And _she_ certainly won't. So far, so good. Further, I've come to +say good-by. Hereafter, we mustn't see each other"-- + +"Stop--stop!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "What is all this rot +you're talking? Chuck it, will you? Look here! If you go back on +me--which is bad--and on your Fairy Princess--which is worse--and on +yourself--which is the worst of all"-- + +"Yes, yes," answered Cavendish, "that's all true. But I'm not talking +about _if_ I go back, I'm talking about _when_ I go back! As I said when +I began, there's no use trying to explain this thing to a man who +doesn't understand it, and no man _can_ understand it except through his +own experience. In this respect, if in no other, you and I talk +different languages, belong on different planets. Could I expect you to +comprehend with me that first give of self-control which lets the demon +loose, and the meaning of the sight or smell of drink at that exact +moment when the will is weakest--the first glass, hastily swallowed, as +a brute, long thirsty, gulps down the water it has craved--the second +and third, taken more slowly--and then, that slackening of every nerve, +that jettisoning of all the moral cargo, that sudden love and +appreciation of the sensuous side of life? Don't you see? It's another +world, that, which you simply can't understand, unless you travel to it +by the road by which I have come--which God forbid!" + +"In all this," said Barclay, "I can see no reason why our present +friendship should not continue, and should not be known." + +"Simply this," answered Cavendish: "I'm--nothing! You're the +Lieutenant-Governor,--who is spoken of, if you care to know it, in the +office of the 'Sentinel' as the only honest official in the state of +Alleghenia. You mustn't tie up to me, nor I to you. I've told you what +my end is going to be. You don't believe it, perhaps, but it's none the +less true. And yours--do you know that the law-abiding element looks up +to you as a kind of Messiah? Do you know that you are the dawn of honor +and integrity which lies behind the present black cloud of lawlessness? +I tell you, John, the promise of your future is such as might nerve a +beaten Napoleon to renewed endeavor. In your hands lies the salvation of +the state." + +"I wish I could think so," said the Lieutenant-Governor. "God knows I'd +willingly cut one of them off, if I thought its loss could benefit the +commonwealth. But, as I've had occasion to say to others, in the present +emergency I'm as helpless as a babe unborn. You see how things are +going--one might as well appeal, so far as any hope of success is +concerned, to McGrath himself as to Governor Abbott. There's no getting +around it, Spencer. It's a declaration of anarchy pure and simple, and +with the official seal of Alleghenia at the bottom of the document. +Iniquitous wrong is being done, not only to Mr. Rathbawne in refusing +him the protection of the law to which he is entitled, but to the cause +of the strikers themselves, if they can justly be said to have a cause. +Nothing ever was or ever will be gained for the benefit of the many by +the violence of the few. It can only end in one way: by the +interposition of the federal troops. You know what happened at Chicago. +It will be the same thing here; and before it is over we shall see +people shot down like rats in the streets of Kenton City." + +"I hope it won't come to that," said Cavendish; "but even so, all's well +that ends well. Provided that order is finally restored"-- + +"But what credit is it," broke in Barclay, "to the state of Alleghenia +to have her law-breakers suppressed by the national government? Don't +you see that it would be only a final proof that she is too incompetent +or too indifferent to do it herself? From the point of view of the +state's good name, I doubt which is worst, her present attitude or the +interference of federal force." + +"Will it come to the latter in any event?" + +"Undoubtedly. They've already tried to prevent the delivery of Mr. +Rathbawne's mail, both at the mills and at his house. You know what +that means, don't you? One carrier interfered with in the performance of +his duty is sufficient excuse for mobilizing a brigade." + +"But the Governor"-- + +Barclay came forward, laid his hand on Cavendish's shoulder, and looked +down at him, slowly nodding his head. + +"The Governor of Alleghenia is a dyed-in-the-wool scoundrel, my good +sir," he said. "It is his manifest duty to enforce the law rigidly and +at once, and if the police of Kenton City cannot or will not assist him, +to summon the militia to his aid. In that way only can the honor of +Alleghenia be saved. And that is what Elijah Abbott will never do. There +is anarchy open and flagrant in the streets of Kenton City--there is +anarchy silent and sneering in the Governor's chair. God save the +state!" + + + + +XI + +YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE + + +"I have promised to marry Colonel Broadcastle," announced Mrs. Wynyard +when the silence had lasted twenty minutes. + +Dorothy flung round from the window against which she had been +mercilessly pressing her pretty nose. + +"Why, Aunt Helen!" she exclaimed. "You really are the most startlingly +abrupt person I ever knew. Are you in earnest? What under the sun +possessed you to do that?" + +"I think it must have been Colonel Broadcastle," answered Mrs. Wynyard, +with an air of reflection. "It was last night when he was showing us +over the armory, after the review. He not only asked me, but appeared to +have quite set his heart upon my giving him an affirmative answer. And +he had been so extremely civil, Dorothy, about our seats and all that, +that I thought it would seem rather ungracious to refuse the first favor +he had ever asked of me. So I said yes." + +"Aunt Helen, Aunt Helen! One of these fine days you will be the death of +me. Did any one _ever_ hear of such a reason for accepting a man?" + +"I couldn't think of a better one for refusing him," said Mrs. Wynyard +serenely. "So there you are!" + +"Talk about logic!" said Dorothy. She came across the room, and seated +herself beside her aunt. "I never heard anything so exciting in my +life!" she added. "Do you really mean it? Are you really going to marry +him?" + +"That is the arrangement, as I understand it," replied Mrs. Wynyard. "Of +course, I haven't his promise in writing, but I think I can trust him. I +once looked him up in your father's business guide, and he had three A's +after his name. I'm sure I don't know what they can stand for, if it's +not Acquaintance, Appeal, and Acceptance. I don't really see what else +I could have done. It seems to have all been arranged without consulting +me at all. One can't very well set one's self up in opposition to a +business guide, you know." + +"But he's old enough to be your father, Aunt Helen!" + +"That's precisely the reason why there wouldn't have been any sense in +my promising to be a sister to him. You see, I was quite helpless in the +matter from start to finish." + +"And it was only last night that you called me preposterous!" laughed +Dorothy. "Really, Aunt Helen, people who live in glass houses shouldn't +throw stones. I think you are the most absurd creature in the world. Do +you love him?" + +"I can even go so far as to say that I think I do," said Mrs. Wynyard, +without a break in her gravity. "I have all the symptoms,--palpitation +of the heart, a morbid craving for Shelley and chocolate caramels, a +tendency to wake up singing, and a failing for flattening my nose +against the window-pane for twenty minutes at a stretch without saying a +word to my poor old aunt, on the mere chance that he may be coming down +the avenue." + +The blush which Dorothy paid as tribute to this subtle innuendo came +near to rivaling one of young Nisbet's celebrated performances in the +same line. + +"You're making fun of me," she said reproachfully. + +"I, my dear?--not the least in the world. It's all as true as the gospel +according to St. Valentine. I've told you first because we're not only +aunt and niece, but the very best friends possible besides, and I knew +you would like to hear the news before any one else. Colonel Broadcastle +is by all odds the finest man I know,--I won't even except John Barclay, +much as I admire him. He has paid me a very great honor. I respect him +tremendously; I trust him absolutely. These alone are good reasons; but +there's a better one,--so much better that nothing else really has any +bearing on the subject. Can you guess?" + +"Yes," said Dorothy softly, "you just love him. Isn't that it?" + +"Exactly. It's a curious thing, this love. There may be every reason why +one should marry a man, his own wish included, and yet one doesn't. +There may be no reason at all, so far as outsiders can see, and yet one +does! I've known a woman to throw over one suitor who had everything in +his favor--money, character, position--and accept another who had none +of these advantages--because she liked the way he parted his hair! +That's the way it goes. It's the most illogical thing in the world, if +we except the stock market and other women's gowns. And then, when it's +all arranged, his friends wonder what she could have seen in him, and +her friends what he could have seen in her! But I'm wandering from the +subject. Seriously, Dorothy dear, I love him very sincerely, and I have +been more happy than I can say ever since I found out that it wasn't +going to be one of those one-sided love-affairs which assure the incomes +of the poets and the lawyers. And now,--confidence for confidence, +Dorothy!" + +"Aunt Helen! I don't know what you mean." + +"Oh, Dorothy! 'I don't know what you mean' is one of those phrases like +'Not at home' and 'Yours very sincerely,' which are white lies on the +face of them. I don't want to force your confidence. We all have what +our friends recognize as our private affairs, with the accent--worse +luck!--on the _pry_! But this is very different. I'm very fond of you, +as you know, and my interest is far from being vulgar curiosity. Of a +woman's five cardinal failings--inquisitiveness, extravagance, vanity, +vacillation, and loquacity--I'm guiltless of all except the last and +most innocent. But don't we all need to talk at times? Don't we all long +for a trustworthy _confidante_? Aren't our little secrets often like +precious liquors?--if we don't make use of them, share them with our +friends, they either ferment and sour, or else lose all their sweetness +and significance by slow evaporation." + +"You would draw confidence from a stone," said Dorothy, with a little +smile, "but what have I to tell you?" + +"How should I know? Perhaps nothing--as yet; perhaps everything. Take +your time about it, dear. I'm not trying to get you to commit yourself. +I only want you to know that I'm ready to share your secret when it's +ready to be shared, and to help and counsel you in any way I can. I know +the main great fact already. Because, you see, Dorothy, one may conceal +an infinite amount, even from one's nearest and dearest, when they don't +understand--and they are so _apt_ not to understand, one's nearest and +dearest! And the financier may hide his schemes from his partners, or +the general his plan of campaign from his fellow-officers, or the +politician his ambitions from his most ardent supporters--but I doubt, +my dear, if a woman in love was ever able to hide very much from +another woman in the same lamentable condition! + +"If it were not," she added, taking Dorothy's hand in hers, "for the +great happiness which has come into my life, do you think that I should +have been able to divine that other great happiness which seems to be +hovering over yours? I am the physician afflicted with the disease which +it becomes his duty to study and to cure. Only, it's not a disease, +Dorothy, but a great, a beautiful revelation. I should have compared +myself, instead, to the prophet who is enabled to interpret the dreams +of others because they are identical with his own. There's my little +speech. And when you are prepared to answer it, you'll find me ready." + +As she was speaking the last words, the butler flung back the curtains +at the doorway of the drawing-room. + +"Mr. Nisbet," he announced imperturbably. + +Dorothy looked at her aunt, and then, with her frank laugh:-- + +"If there _is_ an answer," she said, "that's it!" + +As young Nisbet entered, Mrs. Wynyard was the first to greet him. + +"So," she observed, looking him over approvingly, "you've beaten your +swords into walking-sticks, and your spears into top-hats, as my friend +Isaiah so aptly observes! That's very commendable, but I almost think I +like you better in your war-paint. Do you know, a Colonel's orderly is +the spickest-and-spanest object upon which I've ever laid, or hope to +lay, my eyes?" + +"He just naturally has to be," said young Nisbet, with a grin. Somehow, +he was always more at his ease with Mrs. Wynyard than with other women. +"You see," he added, "if it wasn't that way, he wouldn't be it." + +Which was as near as he had ever come to making an epigram. + +"Well, I shall leave you to the tender mercies of Dorothy," said Mrs. +Wynyard. "I've promised to take a walk with your--what is it you call +him--instead of commanding officer, you know?" + +"K. O.," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, that's it. How deplorably you militiamen spell! Well, at all +events, I'm going to walk with your K. O., and it's time I was getting +ready. Good-by." + +"Good-by, Mrs. Wynyard." + +"Day-day!" said Dorothy, from the divan. + +"She's a crack-a-jack!" exclaimed young Nisbet, after she had gone. + +"Mercy!" said Dorothy. "I never knew you to be so enthusiastic over any +one before. If you have any intention of falling in love with Aunt +Helen, I feel it to be my duty, as a friend and well-wisher, to warn you +in advance that there isn't the most remote show in the world for you." + +"Oh, it's not that!" protested young Nisbet with that stupendous +earnestness which made people want to hug him. "Why, Mrs. Wynyard would +have me talked to a standstill in two or seven minutes! Imagine me +trying to make love to a dame like that! She'd lose me so quick you +couldn't see me for the dust. Besides"-- + +"Besides what?" asked Dorothy with an elaborate air of unconcern, as he +hesitated. + +Young Nisbet was quite crimson now, and twitched at the creases in his +trousers where they passed over his knees, and turned in his toes +excessively. + +"There's somebody else in the running!" he blurted out desperately. + +There! It was out--a part of it, at least--not at all, to be sure, in +anything even remotely resembling one of the thousand manners he had +proposed to himself as effective, during long hours of wakefulness, when +there was nothing in the world but his crowding thoughts and the ticking +of his clock--but still, out! The ice was broken. It was impossible that +she should not understand. The rest would be easier. + +Alas for young Nisbet! He was, as he himself acknowledged, not "up on +women!" + +"Somebody else?" repeated Dorothy. "How ever did you find that out? She +only told _me_ about it twenty minutes ago." + +Alas, alas, for young Nisbet! He had thought his feet upon the beach at +last, whereas they had but touched a sand-bar in passing over. The +under-tow of embarrassment was worse than ever now, and threatened to +drag him down. + +"Oh, I don't mean Mrs. Wynyard. I wasn't talking of her--that is, I was, +at first--but afterwards--anyhow, I'm not talking of her now! When I say +there's somebody else, I mean--I mean"-- + +"I am going out for a moment, Dorothy--just over to the _doctor's_. +_How_ de do, Mr. Nisbet? _Wretched_ weather, _isn't_ it? Natalie's with +your father, my dear, and _I'll_ be back _almost_ immediately. +Er--_ahem_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne went through a kind of rudimentary calisthenic exercise, +which consisted of squaring her shoulders and drawing in her chin. It +was accompanied by a meaning glance at her daughter, and was designed as +an inconspicuous substitute for the frank injunction to "sit up +straight, my dear," upon which Dorothy had finally placed a ban. + +"And _won't_ you feed the gold-fish, my dear?" she added. "I've been _so_ +occupied, and the poor things haven't had a _crumb_ for three days. I've +just told Thomas to take a plate of bread in at _once_. I'm sure Mr. +_Nisbet_ won't mind: get him to _help_ you. Er--_ahem_! And I'll be back +in about fifteen minutes, or so." + +For a time there was silence in the big, warm conservatory. Young Nisbet +had taken the dish from Dorothy's hands, and, after seating himself on +the low marble parapet surrounding the pool, devoted his energies to +feeding the gold-fish. He was thinking that it was all to be done over +again, and that it was harder than ever, if such a thing were possible, +to do. What was there about those few words which seemed to choke him? +For the moment, he took refuge in a commonplace question. + +"Is it one of your duties to feed these persons?" + +Dorothy laughed shortly, like a little chord of music. + +"No--it's the Mater's peculiar privilege," she answered. "She adores the +stupid little beasts. Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. Nisbet. She +feeds them regularly herself,--or did, until Dad began to require so +much of her time. But lately, the house has been so upset, and she has +been doing such a lot of going out, and coming in"-- + +"Yes," put in young Nisbet dryly, "I've noticed the coming in part." + +"So Natalie has been doing it for her," went on Dorothy, more rapidly. +"I suppose Natalie herself hasn't had the time, these last three days. +They _are_ hungry, aren't they? _Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. +Nisbet!_ Don't you see the poor things have only button-holes for +mouths?" + +There was another long pause, before either spoke again. + +"What defeats me about your mother," said young Nisbet slowly, "is the +way she manages to come in just at the wrong moment. At interruption, +she's the most star performer I've ever run up against. You don't mind +my saying that, do you? I'm not throwing any asparagus. I wouldn't be +disrespectful about her for the world. But really, for chopping into a +conversation, she's a dazzler!" + +"She _is_ a little inopportune at times," admitted Dorothy. + +"Inopportune? Yes,--she's all of that. When she marches in, I feel +exactly as if the boat had gybed, and the boom come over and knocked me +into thirty fathoms of water. Lord!" + +"Why, how ridiculous!" said Dorothy. "There's nothing about the Mater to +be afraid of. She's the dearest, most innocent old thing in the world! +She just blunders along like that, and nobody is less aware of her +mistakes than she is. And, after all, why shouldn't she interrupt us, so +long as we're not saying anything in particular? And if we _were_ +saying--anything in particular, we could always pick up the +conversation where we dropped it." + +"That's just what I find it so hard to do!" confessed young Nisbet. "I'm +a stupid sort of lout, you know, Miss Rathbawne. I've never had half a +chance to practice talking to dames, and where other lads fuss like +experts, I just can't make good. I foozle every stroke. I'm an +ass--that's all!" + +"You're nothing of the sort!" said Dorothy indignantly. "You're an +extremely attractive young man!" + +"As good as the average in some ways, perhaps. But--how can I explain +what I mean?--there always comes a day when a chap wants to be more, +wants to be the best ever, in every way! That's the proposition I'm up +against now. I seem to be just a bundle of misfits, and--and--oh, +shucks! my line of talk is all crooked, and I can't tell you what the +trouble is, but"-- + +"Your liver's out of kilter," interpolated Dorothy. + +"No, sir!" protested young Nisbet. "Nothing is ever out of kilter +inside me! If I'm nothing else, I'm blue-ribbon boy on the health +question. No, it's something I want, and that I'm pretty sure I can't +get." + +"I know perfectly well what it is," said Dorothy, "and you haven't even +asked for it!" + +Young Nisbet looked up suddenly. + +"Do you mean?"--he stammered, "do you mean?"-- + +Outside, the front door slammed, and Mrs. Rathbawne's voice became +audible, inquiring Dorothy's whereabouts of the butler. The girl +laughed. + +"There's the Mater back again," she said. "Oh, Mr. _Nisbet_!" + +For young Nisbet had dropped dish and bread-crumbs into the pool with a +great splash, electrifying the gold-fish into unheard-of activity, and +had risen, at the same moment, to his feet. He stood before her, his +honest face blazing, his hands outstretched. + +"I love you!" he said. "Will you marry me?" + +And whether or not he received an audible reply to this question he +never knew,--only she was in his arms, and gold-fish might feast or +starve, for all he cared about them. The wide doors of perfect bliss +swung open before him, and young Nisbet passed within. + +He was gazing ruefully into the water, as Mrs. Rathbawne entered. For +the first time in his experience, her presence did not embarrass him. + +"I've dropped a dish into your pool, Mrs. Rathbawne," he said, "and +scared the gold-fish into blue conniption fits. Look how they are +scurrying around. I hope I haven't done them any harm." + +"Oh, no," answered Mrs. Rathbawne placidly. "They are getting _so_ fat +that I should _think_ a little exercise, _now_ and again, would be +_good_ for them. We _might_ drop a dish into the pool every week or so, +Dorothy, just to stir them up." + +"It might go for a while," said young Nisbet, "but any old football +player like myself, Mrs. Rathbawne, will tell you that you can't work +the same trick more than just a certain number of times." + +"Interruption, for example!" added Dorothy, and laughed across at him, +deliciously, with her eyes. + + + + +XII + +DIOGENES + + +It was during the tenth week of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills that +the "Kenton City Record" made its long-remembered attack upon +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay. The arraignment was one unparalleled for +venom, even in the columns of that most notoriously scurrilous journal +in the state, and, withal, there was about it a devilish ingenuity, a +distortion of facts so slight as to defy refutation, and so plausible as +to carry conviction. It was the last blow in the long series of +discouragements which Barclay had suffered since his inauguration, and +for the moment he was completely unmanned. He was at no loss, however, +to trace the source from which the ingeniously perverted facts had been +obtained. Not even McGrath, with his intimate knowledge of all that went +forward at the capitol, could have supplied information so detailed. +The hand of Elijah Abbott was traceable in every line of the attack. +Their conversation, on the afternoon when he had first spoken to Barclay +of the impending strike, was reproduced almost word for word, as well as +that on the occasion when McGrath had been present, and therefrom the +"Record" went on to deduce that not even Peter Rathbawne, with all his +obstinacy, all his blindness to the welfare of his employees, was +responsible for their present destitution in the same sense as was the +Lieutenant-Governor, who might have avoided the strike by a conciliatory +word, and who, instead, had advised Mr. Rathbawne to fight the +working-people until the last cent of their money should be exhausted +and the last drop of their blood should be shed. + +"Incompetency," said the article in part, "is what we long since learned +to expect from John Hamilton Barclay. Gross neglect of public duty, +flagrant callousness to responsibility, contemptuous indifference to the +interests of the citizens whose votes placed him where he is,--all +these have been part and parcel of his attitude since the unfortunate +moment of his election. But even in him we had not looked for the +incredible spectacle of a public official deliberately precipitating the +incalculable distress which has followed in the wake of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills. Overburdened with the cares of office, in a single +instance the Governor of Alleghenia turned over a question of vital +significance to the lieutenant from whom he had every reason to expect +compliance and support. Even so, he was careful to point out a line of +action by which the impending calamity might readily have been avoided. +And what was the result? Not only in total disregard of plain duty, but +in direct disobedience of the orders of his superior, the +Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia threw his influence into the scale to +outweigh law and order, and brought about the deplorable destitution now +facing the families of four thousand martyrs to principle. When men are +driven to desperation, when women turn to shame in order to maintain +life, when children are heard crying in our streets for bread, to whom +shall we point as the author of it all? To Peter Rathbawne, a poor, +doddering old man, barely responsible now, if rumor is to be believed, +for what he does? No! To John Hamilton Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of +Alleghenia!" + +This, and much more in the same strain, while passed over as sensational +bombast by the better element, did not fail of its effect upon the +strikers. A mass-meeting, held that morning, denounced Barclay in a set +of resolutions, as a traitor to his office and as the avowed enemy of +labor, and demanded his impeachment on the ground of neglect of duty. +During the day, half a score of threatening letters came to his office. +But what hurt him most, though he almost smiled at his own +sensitiveness, was that the doormen and porters at the Capitol greeted +his morning nod with a stare, and even the little office-boy, bending +low over his table in the ante-room, did not look up for the customary +wink. For his mother was a trimmer at the Rathbawne Mills. + +Once in his office, the Lieutenant-Governor found it impossible to +concentrate his mind upon the work before him. Sentence after sentence, +the words of his arraignment marched through his mind, as he sat with +his elbows on the desk and his chin in his doubled fists. A single +reading seemed to have stamped them indelibly and forever upon his +memory. Baffled by conflicting reflections he began, for the first time, +to doubt whether his had been the course of conscience, or merely that +of pride and perversity. Was not the "Record" right, perhaps, after all? +If it was true that the strike was driving men to crime and women to the +streets--and if it was not, as yet, true, it soon must be--who, indeed, +was to blame if not he himself, who had said "Fight them!" when he might +have kept peace by a word? + +Suddenly, the Lieutenant-Governor rose, and, crossing the room to where +the arms of Alleghenia hung upon the wall, took down the frame, laid +it, face up, upon the table, and, bending down, studied it intently. The +beautifully executed nude figures of Art and Labor stared steadfastly +back at him, their muscular hands grasping the circular shield, strength +and endurance in every line of their necks, shoulders, and thighs, +purity and purpose in their blue eyes and square-cut jaws. He was as +motionless as they for full five minutes. Presently his finger moved +slowly across the frame, and he said, quite softly: + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas._" + +Then he looked up, straight before him, out of the open window, where an +encircling wistaria was dotted with minute sprouts of green, and up at +the clear, wide sky. + +"I'm right!" he said aloud. "I'm right!" + + * * * * * + +At five that afternoon, Spencer Cavendish set out upon the most +unpleasant assignment which had ever fallen to his lot. When Payson had +told him that he was to procure an interview with Peter Rathbawne for +the "Sentinel," with a special eye to the mill-owner's failing health, +as reported in the morning's "Record," he had shrunk back instinctively +from a task so distasteful, and was on the point of refusing. But two +considerations checked this impulse. If the thing were to be done at +all, he thought, surely it had better be the work of one friendly to the +Rathbawnes and with their interests at heart than that of a bungling +outsider, with it in his power to hurt them beyond expression. The +argument was plausible, but behind its logic, at the back of Cavendish's +brain, there lay another reason, without which the first had been +insufficient to persuade him. He wanted to see Natalie again--to meet +her under the shield of some compatible excuse, so that he should not +seem to have sought her of his own will. He was thirsty for a word from +her, thirsty with the pitiable thirst of the shipwrecked sailor who +knows a swallow of salt water will but increase his torture, and who +craves it, none the less. Long since, he had forfeited his right to her +friendship--no sophistry could blind him to that. Moreover the ocean of +degradation not only lay behind him; it lay in front as well. It was as +he had told Barclay. He stood upon an island, not the mainland, of +redemption, and another plunge was inevitable. + +What he expected to gain by a word with Natalie Rathbawne, Cavendish +himself could hardly have told. At most, he was conscious of a faint +hope that in some turn or twist of the conversation he might have a +chance of thanking her, of telling her that he rejoiced in her +happiness, and of bidding her good-by. For paramount in his mind lay the +thought of his approaching downfall, inevitable, utter, and final. He +did not attempt to deceive himself. He knew what was coming. It had come +before. + +When Cavendish had sent in his card, a servant showed him through the +library into the conservatory, where Peter Rathbawne was seated in a +deep rattan chair watching his daughter, who stood at his side tossing +bread-crumbs to the gold-fish in the circular central pool. They both +turned at the sound of his footsteps, and Natalie held out her hand. + +"So you've come at last!" she said. "I should think it was quite time. +Dad, you remember Mr. Cavendish, don't you?" + +"Yes," answered her father. "Oh, yes!" + +Rathbawne's voice was without life, his face almost wholly void of +expression. Though he glanced at Cavendish, it was with the blank stare +of a delirious person whose attention is unconsciously caught by an +unusual noise rather than with any evidence of direct interest, and he +took no further part in the conversation, nor even seemed to realize +that his companions were speaking. When he had answered his daughter's +question and looked at Cavendish, he leaned back in his chair, and +wearily closed his eyes. + +"He is very much changed since you saw him," said the girl in a lower +tone, turning again to the pool, "and it's all come about in the past +six weeks. The strike has had a most curious, a most pathetic effect +upon him. Even the doctor is at a loss to account for it. I think that +I am, perhaps, the only one who really understands. He has always been +so proud of his mills and of his people, so loyal to them, so like a +father to them, one and all, that to have them turn against him like +this, and, what is worse, get to drinking and rioting, has almost broken +his heart. The doctor says only one thing can save him, and that is to +see the mills going again and the people happy and prosperous, as they +were before. And who knows when that will be? For, feeble and broken as +he is, he will never give in to the Union. Of that I'm sure." + +"I'm very sorry," said Cavendish softly. One look at Rathbawne had been +enough to show him that the interview for which he had been sent was an +impossibility. One look at Natalie sufficed to banish from his mind +every thought save that of her pitiful pallor and the pathetic quiver of +her lips. + +"I had no idea it was as bad as this," he continued. "Can't anything be +done? You are far from being in good shape yourself, Miss Rathbawne." + +"Tired and dispirited, that's all," she answered, trying to smile. "And +I fear nothing can be done as long as our fate lies in Governor Abbott's +hands. There's no use in harping on that, though. You know as well as I +what we have to expect from him. Did you see the attack on Mr. Barclay +this morning?" + +"An infamous libel!" exclaimed Cavendish hotly. + +Miss Rathbawne crumbled the bread between her fingers, and resumed her +feeding of the gold-fish. + +"You must know that I am the last person in the world to need that +assurance," she said slowly. "It is only another thread in all the +hideous tissue of injustice and iniquity which has been wrapped about us +like a pall. What a shame, is it not, that such a man as he should be +powerless to do the work I think God intended for him? And what a shame +that Alleghenia, needing his clear head and his strong arm and his +loyal heart as she does in this hour of emergency, should only be +sneering at him as a coward and a cad!" + +"I cannot believe," answered Cavendish, "that the venom of the 'Record' +is to be taken as the sentiment of the state. There must be many--there +must be a majority of Alleghenians who know, as we know, that no better +man breathes than John Barclay." + +"Thank you," said the girl. + +In the open spaces of water between the lily-pads the fat indolent +gold-fish mouthed at the crumbs, stirring the silence with little +sucking sounds, and sending tiny ripples widening on all sides. One +alone, dingy yellow in color, moped apart from his fellows, and took no +interest in the banquet. + +"That one's a cynic," said Miss Rathbawne presently. "My subtlest +cajoleries never win him from that attitude of sneering contempt. The +others get all the tid-bits, and he doesn't seem to care. He isn't even +ornamental--he's in a class by himself. I call him Diogenes, and I'm +thinking of buying him a tub all for himself, where he can sulk in +solitary grandeur to his heart's content." + +"Perhaps not altogether in a class by himself," said Cavendish. "There +are others, you know, who make no use of their opportunities, and who +can never hope to be anything but ugly and useless, while their fellows +are getting all the good things of life, and enjoying them, and giving +pleasure of one kind or another into the bargain." + +Something in his tone caused Natalie to look at him suddenly. + +"I'm not enough of a pessimist," she answered firmly, "to believe that +true in anything beyond appearances. We are all apt, no matter how +conceited we may be, to underestimate at times the extent of our own +usefulness--or, rather, we are unconscious of the direction in which it +is most productive. If what you say is so, then all that is lacking is +the opportunity, and that is sure to come. We may squander many +opportunities, and, hardly less probably, actually turn to account in a +way we do not perceive many which we seem to ourselves to squander. In +any event, others will come. A woman once said to me that the good in +her was not cultivated nor exercised with a view to _individual +immortality_. That seemed to me to mean so much that I've built up quite +a little creed on it. It's the principle, isn't it, upon which the whole +scheme of the world hinges? A million leaves fall and decay to enrich +the soil wherefrom two million more may spring. An infinity of little +shell-fish die, and the ages grind their shells to powder to make the +sands and the chalk cliffs. Countless raindrops sacrifice their identity +to maintain that of one great river. And why should it not be so with +us? If only we can contribute in the smallest degree to the uplifting of +our kind, to the advancement of the race, to the maintenance of what we +know to be right, what possible difference can it make whether, in the +effort to be of such service, we live or succumb? We were put here, it +seems to me, very much as separate notes are put into one great harmony. +Each note is struck at the proper time, serves its purpose, and goes +into nothingness. Each plays its part, however small. We can't all be +included in the wonderful final chords. Our place may seem trivial to +us, and yet in some sense we may be sure we are all contributors to the +unity and perfection of the whole. That ought to be enough. No one note +achieves individual immortality, but each does something to assure the +immortality of the composition of which it forms a part. If we don't +believe that, if we are not content to have it so, how is it possible to +believe in any divine purpose, any scheme of justice at all? Look at the +indescribable waste of life on all sides of us. If only in the case of +humanity, people are dying by hundreds every minute, unheeded, +unlamented, unrecorded. Human life is such a little thing!--as little as +the life of the leaf or the raindrop. And yet in the death of these last +we are able to perceive the working of a vast system which must be the +outcome of a direct purpose, and whereby the best interest of each +species is furthered. And so, the human race. Why should it be less +than lesser things? One man dies in order that two may live. A +confederacy--as in the case of our own Rebellion--perishes in order that +a nation may endure. Everywhere, in short, the individual sacrifices his +individual existence in order that it may contribute to and fertilize +the growth of his species. So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly +content to have it so. I should ask nothing better, when my own time +comes, than the assurance that, in one way or another, my death had a +significance,--that it was for a person or a principle, and not merely a +natural phenomenon. I may not be able to believe that; but there is one +belief possible to all of us,--I mean that, if not in death, then +assuredly in life, we have been of service to our race and time. We are +often told that the indispensable thing does not exist. I think the same +may be said of the useless one. I don't believe even the humblest of +God's creatures goes out of life without having been at one time or +another an influence for good. I even have hopes of Diogenes. Some day +there will be a scrap of refuse or an ugly little bug which mars the +symmetry of the pool, and Diogenes will eat it,--and perhaps die of +indigestion as a martyr to principle!" + +The silence which followed her words was broken by a hoarse sob from Mr. +Rathbawne, and, turning, they saw that his head had fallen back against +the chair, with his eyes, wide and staring, fixed upon the glass roof, +and his breath coming in short, thick gasps from between his parted +lips. In an instant Natalie was on her knees by his side, with her arms +about him. + +"Don't be frightened," she said, looking up at Cavendish with a brave +little smile. "It's his heart. He has had these attacks frequently of +late. Will you get me the whiskey decanter and a glass? You'll find them +in the dining-room--on the sideboard--to the left." + +Decanter in hand, Cavendish stood watching her, as she tenderly poured a +little of the raw spirit between her father's lips. The effect was +almost instantaneous. Rathbawne choked, swallowed the restorative, and +presently raised his head and looked at her, patting her hand +tremulously with his own. They were so absorbed in each other that +neither noted a sudden, strange transformation in Cavendish's +expression. From the wide-mouthed decanter in his hand, the faint acrid +odor of Peter Rathbawne's fine old Scotch whiskey crept upward, stung +his nostrils, and, of a sudden, set him all a-quiver, like a startled +animal. The smell was almost that of pure alcohol, and set his mouth +watering, and drove his breath out in a little shuddering gasp that was +like a revulsion from some sickening medicine, just swallowed. But he +knew it, none the less, for something which belonged to and was part of +him. For weeks he had avoided it. Now it assailed him like that foe of +Hercules, of whom he had spoken to Barclay, whose strength was +multiplied a hundred-fold for every time his opponent trod him under +foot. + +As he told the Lieutenant-Governor, at the moment when least he +expected it, the demon touched his arm. For a minute he fought +desperately against the suggestion, with his eyes closed, and his teeth +cutting into his inner lip. He clung madly to the thought of the +presence in which he was, conscious that the girl's words had +uplifted him immeasurably, given him a clearer insight into the +essential significance of life than he had ever known. It was +useless--useless--useless! There was nothing left in the world but the +smell of the liquor that he loathed and that he loved! + +"If you were to leave us alone"-- + +At the suggestion, Cavendish bowed and went slowly back toward the +dining-room. Once out of sight of the others, he paused, glanced back +over his shoulder, and then, abruptly, supporting himself with one hand +against the side-post of the doorway, raised the decanter in the other +to his lips, and drank. + + + + +XIII + +THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE + + +The day had been deliciously warm and still, one of those eloquent +heralds of spring that are touched with a peculiar beauty rivaling her +own. As Cavendish came out of the Rathbawne residence, Bradbury Avenue +was splashed with huge blotches of dazzling yellow, where the light of +the westwardly sun poured between the houses and was spilled upon the +smooth pavement. The man choked slightly at the after-taste of the raw +whiskey he had just swallowed, but almost immediately he smiled. + +"I knew it would come," he said to himself as he turned out into the +avenue, "and here it is. I'm not surprised. I'm glad, God help me--I'm +_glad_!" + +His mouth was watering, and he felt, as it were, every inch of the +stimulant's progress through his veins, warming him with its familiar +glow. When he had left the conservatory, he had been trembling +pitifully. Now he was calm, and as steady as if his nerves had been +cords of steel. Responsibility, resolution, remorse--they had fallen +from him like so many discarded garments. He was sharply alive to the +pleasure of the moment, keenly appreciative of the sunlight, the soft +air, the laughter of the children romping in the streets. Of a singular +languor which had been wont to come over him toward the close of each +busy day of the past six weeks there was now no hint. He walked rapidly, +with his shoulders thrown back, and his chin well elevated, but his +course was not in the direction of his home, nor yet in that of the +"Sentinel" office. Instinctively, he had turned toward that part of the +city where were the large restaurants, the playhouses, and the more +pretentious saloons. + +At a corner, he wheeled abruptly into one of these last, and, seating +himself at a small table, called for an absinthe. The place was already +lighted, and each glass in the pyramids behind the bar twinkled with a +tiny brilliant reflection of the nearest incandescent globes. The air +was faintly redolent of lemon and the mingled odors of many liquors. To +Cavendish it was all very familiar, and all very pleasant. Again he told +himself that he was glad, glad that the restraint he had been exercising +was at an end. He was free, he thought, free to accomplish his own +inevitable damnation. He had no patience for the tedious operation of +dripping the water into his absinthe over a lump of sugar, but ordered +gum, and stirring the two rapidly together, filled the glass to the brim +from a little pitcher at his side. Then he drank, slowly but steadily, +barely touching the glass to the table between his sips. + +Presently, he was conscious of a slight numbness at his wrists, a barely +perceptible tingling in his knees and knuckles. His heart was +fluttering, and his temples pulsed pleasurably. He glanced toward the +glittering pyramids of glasses, and for a fraction of time they seemed +to shift in unison a foot to the right, returning immediately to their +original position with a jerk. Then he rose, and went toward the door, +catching sight of his face in a mirror as he passed. It was very pale, +and he crinkled his nose at it derisively, and then smiled at the +whimsical oddity of his reflected expression. On the threshold he +paused, looking toward the west, blazing with the red and saffron of the +departed sun. + +"Oof!" he said, with a downward tug at his waistcoat. "It comes quickly. +That's what it is to be out of practice." + +He dined alone in a corner of an unfrequented restaurant, eating little, +but drinking steadily, absinthe at first, then whiskey, four +half-goblets of it, barely diluted with water. Then he found himself +once more in the streets, now brilliantly lighted, going on and on +without purpose, save when the blazing colored glass of a saloon swerved +him from his path. He knew that he was walking steadily, avoiding +obstacles as if by instinct, stepping from and on to kerbs without any +actual perception of them. Faces swam past him, staring. Men, +particularly those at the bars he leaned against, were talking loudly, +but, as it seemed to him, brilliantly. He often smiled involuntarily, +and sometimes spoke to one of them, drank with him, and presently was +alone again, walking on and on. Occasionally a white-faced clock bulged +at him out of the night; and then he noticed that time was galloping. It +was close upon one when he found himself in a quarter which his recent +employment had made familiar--the neighborhood of the Rathbawne Mills. + +Here, suddenly, his mind emerged from a mist, and every detail of his +surroundings stood out sharp and clear-cut. The street was +insufficiently illuminated, but the light of a full moon cut across the +buildings on one side, half way between roof and sidewalk. Cavendish +perceived, with a kind of dull surprise, that the pavements were +thronged, and that almost every window framed a figure or two. A hoarse +murmur pulsed in the air, and his quickened ear was greeted on every +side by foul jests and grumbled oaths, broken now and again by drunken +imprecations, scuffles, or the shrill invective of women invisible in +the throng. Once a girl touched his arm, and he found her face close to +his, thin, haggard, and imploring. He shook her off, and turned +unsteadily into the doorway of a saloon; stumbling, as he did so, over a +little boy crying on the step. + +Inside, the air was reeking with rank smoke and the fumes of stale beer. +The floor was strewn with sawdust, streaked and circled by shuffling +feet; the mirror backing the bar was covered with soiled gauze dotted +with tawdry roses, and an indescribable dinginess seemed to have laid +its sordid fingers on all the fittings. + +The room was crowded, nevertheless--crowded not only with the men +themselves, but, to the stifling point, with their voices and their +gestures and the spirit of their unrest and discontent. Cavendish, +leaning against the end of the bar, looked wearily down the line of +flushed faces and backward at the disputing groups which rocked and +swayed, as the men argued and swore, grasping the lapels of each others' +coats, and spilling the liquor from their glasses as they gesticulated. +He was wholly sober now. It was the stage of dissipation which +experience had taught him to dread the most--the emergence from dulled +sensibility into a nervous tension upon which stimulant had no apparent +effect. He was trembling again, too, and his face, as he saw it in the +mirror through the clouding gauze, was as that of a stranger, a stranger +of whom he was afraid. He swallowed the whiskey he had ordered, and, +supporting himself by the bar, swung back and gave his attention to what +the men about him were saying. It did not need his sharpened perception +to appreciate the fact that he was in the thick of the worst element of +the Rathbawne strikers, or that the situation was a crisis. What little +restraint had characterized the earlier stages of the strike was now, +most evidently, at an end. Starvation was no longer a mere possibility, +or violence a mere threat. The men raved like wild creatures against +Rathbawne and John Barclay, recounting maudlinly the destitution of +their families, and, anon, flaming forth into cries for vengeance. How +long the babel lasted Cavendish could not have said. Long since, the +doors had been closed, and the lights half lowered, in mock deference to +a supposedly vigilant police, when suddenly a hush fell upon the +assemblage. A side door had opened, and Michael McGrath stood in the +midst of his followers, with his arms folded and a thin smile upon his +lips. There was not a whisper as he began to speak. The men leaned +toward him breathlessly, their mouths open, their eyes starting glassily +out of their sodden faces. + +"And how long is _this_ going to go on?" demanded their leader, with a +sneer. "Talk--talk--talk! That's always the way, and nothing done, after +all. Well, there's been about enough of it, and that's flat. You've +been living on the Union, and I suppose you think you can go on living +on it till hell freezes over. Now listen to me. When the strike began we +had plenty of funds, and more came to us from the Central Federation. +The funds are gone, d' you hear, and the Federation is asking what we +mean to do. There is six hundred and odd dollars in the treasury. No +need to tell you how far that much will go, is there? Not one day! And +with all your talk, you've everything your own way, if only you knew +it--a police that doesn't dare lift a finger against you, and a Governor +that won't budge an inch till I give the word! Well, to-morrow I give +the word, understand me? To-morrow I throw you over, and you can get out +of this the best way you can. I'm sick of your talk. I'm sick of your +doing nothing. Your daughters are on the streets, your wives and your +children are starving, and _you_--by God! _you_ are boozing in a bar +till daylight, and _talking_! So that's enough. To-morrow, the strike's +at an end. To-morrow, the Governor comes down on you like ten thousand +of brick! And I'm the man that gives the word! Unless"-- + +He paused and cast a keen glance at the faces which surrounded him. His +last words had been greeted by a low growl. + +"Unless," he continued, "you know your business, and make a move that's +worth the name." + +The hush of attention seemed to deepen into the leaden silence of +expectancy. + +"There are two men who must be put out of the way," said McGrath slowly, +"and that before another midnight. I don't care how it's done, but done +it must be, for the sake of example. It's easy enough to manage it, as +things are. There'll be a howl, but we have the authorities fixed. And +those two men must go!" + +In the tense silence which followed, a man's voice whispered two words +hoarsely:-- + +"Mr. Rathbawne!" + +"Ay, _Mr._ Rathbawne!" echoed McGrath, flashing into that passionate +manner of his which carried all before it. "_Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +starving you! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's making your sons drunkards! _Mr._ +Rathbawne, who's debauching your daughters! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +killing your wives by inches! _Mr._ Rathbawne, and _Mr._ John Hamilton +Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia!" + +For a moment it seemed as if he would be swept off his feet by a torrent +of enthusiasm. The men crowded about him, slapping him upon the +shoulders, shouting their approval, reaching for his hand. One +brandished a revolver under his nose, with a shrill cry of "This'll do +it, Mac! This'll do it, by God!" The rest had turned to each other, +embracing frantically, and repeating his words in a kind of frenzy. + +Presently McGrath raised his hand, and, as silence was restored at the +signal, turned to the bar-tender with his thin smile. + +"Set 'em up, Dick," he said composedly. "It's on me, this time, and +we'll drink to better days." + +In the confusion Cavendish made his way to the side-door, and passing +through it into the street, hesitated, dazzled by a brilliant light. It +was broad day. + + * * * * * + +As the Lieutenant-Governor entered his ante-room that morning his eyes +contracted suddenly, and he stopped, with his hand upon the knob of the +door. There could be no mistaking the look in the face of the man who +sat facing him, gripping desperately at the arms of his chair. Cavendish +was as white as chalk, with the hunted look of despair which lay so +vividly on Barclay's remembrance of the night when they had met on +Bradbury Avenue. He rose as the Lieutenant-Governor appeared and drew +himself up with an effort at steadiness, conscious that the others +present were observing him narrowly. But Barclay's hesitation was as +brief as it had been involuntary. With a bare glance at his +subordinates, he came forward cordially to take Cavendish's hand, and +then, opening the door of his private office, motioned him to enter +first. + +"Glad to see you," he said steadily, as their hands met. + +Once inside, the manner of both men changed as abruptly as it had been +assumed. The Lieutenant-Governor went slowly toward his desk, with his +head bent, and Cavendish, throwing himself into the nearest chair, and, +with no attempt at concealment, drew a flask from his pocket and drank a +long draught. He looked up to find that the Lieutenant-Governor had +wheeled at the desk, and was standing with his eyes fixed upon him. + +"Wait a minute," said Cavendish, as Barclay seemed about to speak. "We +won't discuss this, for the moment, if you please." + +He held up the flask with a shrug. + +"In fact we needn't discuss it at all," he continued. "I've simply gone +to hell, that's all there is about it. I knew I would. I told you so +long ago. I didn't come here to make excuses--or to receive rebukes, +John Barclay. I've a means here of settling the problem which can give +cards and spades to all your projects of reform." And he tapped his +pocket, where the cloth bulged slightly, with a smile. The +Lieutenant-Governor made no attempt to interrupt him. + +"What I did come to say," went on Cavendish, more steadily, "is that +your life and Mr. Rathbawne's are in danger. You're to be put out of the +way, both of you, before twelve to-night. McGrath's determined on it, +and there's no lack of men to carry out his orders. The strikers are +desperate. I overheard their talk, while--well, while I was getting +drunk! _What's that?_" + +He stopped, with his hand to his ear. Some one was tapping at the +communicating door. + +"Put up that flask!" said Barclay under his breath, adding aloud, as +Cavendish obeyed: + +"Come in!" + +The door swung open softly, and Governor Abbott, smiling and rubbing his +hands, appeared upon the threshold. + +"I beg your pardon, Mr. Barclay," he said. "I did not know you were +engaged. We have the pleasure of another visit from the Citizens' +Committee, and, by a singularly opportune coincidence, Mr. McGrath has +called at the same time. Can you spare us a few moments of your time?" + +With a bow, and a glance at Cavendish, Barclay followed his superior +silently from the room. + +In the Governor's office he found a dozen men, all standing. McGrath, +with his back to the others, was examining with an elaborate air of +interest a map of Alleghenia which hung upon the wall. Colonel +Broadcastle and his fellow-members of the Citizens' Committee, stood +close to, and facing, the Governor's desk. The air was electric with +suggestion of a crisis about to come. + +When the Governor began to speak, it was in his habitually suave voice, +yet he was visibly nervous. + +"Colonel Broadcastle has been good enough to observe," he said, "that if +I do not call out the militia within three hours, to protect the +interests of Mr. Peter Rathbawne, his committee will appeal for aid to +the federal government. Now--er--now, in my place, and in such a +situation, Mr. Barclay--er--what would you do?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's nerve, strained beyond endurance by the events +of the past twenty-four hours, snapped like a dry twig at the +contemptuous hypocrisy of the other's tone. + +"_Do!_" he thundered--"_do?_ Why, as God is my witness, Elijah Abbott, +if I were in your place I would do what any honest man would do! I would +do what my oath demanded of me! I would clap that man McGrath into jail +for iniquitous inciting to riot, and place Colonel Broadcastle, at the +head of his regiment, in charge of the city to restore order and the +reign of law, and to redeem Alleghenia from the disgrace that is +overwhelming her. _Do?_ Before God, the Republic, and the state, +Governor Abbott, I would do my duty as a man!" + +"_Then do it!_" + +The words, spoken from the threshold of Barclay's office, rent the +silence like a thunderclap, and before those present had time to turn, +there came the sound of a pistol-shot, and Governor Abbott, wheeling +slowly on his heels, crashed headforemost through the plate-glass window +behind him, and lay, limp and motionless, across the sill. + +"Then do it, by God, _Governor Barclay_!" repeated Cavendish, and flung +his revolver into the centre of the room. + +The apartment was already filled with those attracted from the corridors +and adjacent offices by the sound of the shot. Several seized Cavendish, +who stood without movement, smiling. Barclay, Colonel Broadcastle, and +the other members of the committee lifted the Governor's body from the +position in which it had fallen, and laid it upon a couch. After a brief +examination, the Colonel looked up into Barclay's eyes. + +"He's dead, sir," he said. "The assassin was right. You are Governor of +Alleghenia." + +For an instant, Barclay returned his glance with one of earnest inquiry. + +"Even in the face of this tragedy," added Colonel Broadcastle in a low +voice, "I trust you will not forget the exigencies of the situation. It +is for you to act, sir." + +Barclay suddenly raised himself to his full height, and faced the silent +gathering. + +"Gentlemen," he said firmly, "the Governor is dead. For the moment, at +least, I act in his stead. Kenton City is under martial law. Those who +have the assassin in charge will see that he is immediately turned over +to the chief of police. Mr. McGrath, you will consider yourself under +arrest. Colonel Broadcastle, you will immediately assemble your regiment +at its armory, issue three days' rations, and twenty rounds of ball +cartridge, and hold yourself and your command in readiness for riot +duty, subject to my orders." + +Then he faced Cavendish. + +"There's a message I'd like to have delivered, to the Fairy Princess," +said the latter, still smiling. "It is that Diogenes has eaten the ugly +little bug." + + + + +XIV + +THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA + + +As Barclay had foreseen, the adoption of stringent measures was all that +was needed to break the back-bone of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +The presence of the Ninth Regiment, under command of that noted +disciplinarian, Colonel Broadcastle, and terribly in earnest, as was +evinced by the ball cartridges gleaming in their belts, was sufficient +to discourage any further attempts at disorder; the sudden shift of base +of the newspapers which had formerly supported the rioters, and now, +taking their cue from the policy of the new Governor, counseled +immediate surrender; above all, the trial, conviction, and sentence of +their moving spirit, McGrath, to a term of years for inciting to +riot--all were irresistible factors in the Union's capitulation. Two +weeks after the death of Governor Abbott, the Rathbawne Mills were +running once more, and Peter Rathbawne himself, though whiter of hair +and but a shadow of his old self, was, nevertheless, on the high road to +recovery. + +The trial and conviction of Spencer Cavendish were accomplished with +unexampled celerity. He would admit of no defense, although the lawyer +appointed for him by the court was strenuous for a plea of insanity, +based upon the singular remark which he had made upon the announcement +of Elijah Abbott's death, and which was construed by those who heard it +as ample proof of irresponsibility. Called upon in court to give his +defense, Cavendish stated in a loud, clear voice that he was strictly +accountable for his act, that he was in full possession of his senses at +the time, and that he had killed the Governor in the firm conviction +that he was a menace to the safety of the community, and that the +latter's sole salvation lay in his removal, and the succession of the +Lieutenant-Governor to the position of chief executive. + +"I desire," he concluded, with the same odd smile that he had worn at +the moment of the Governor's death, "nothing but the full penalty of the +law." + +The next day Spencer Cavendish was sentenced to be executed on the +thirtieth of the following month at the State's Prison at Mowberly. + +Then followed the most remarkable manifestation of popular sentiment +ever known in Alleghenia. As Barclay had once said of them, the citizens +of his long degraded state were less vicious than callous, and their +callousness was effectively cured by the dramatic event which had +removed a corrupt official from the head of the state government, and +put in his place a man whose first acts were proofs positive of +strength, integrity, and singleness of purpose. The revulsion of feeling +was overwhelming. Even the press which had sneered at and cried down +John Barclay was forced to the other extreme. Relieved from the burden +of lawlessness which had lain on Kenton City for close upon three +months, the citizens went over in a body to the support of their new +Governor. He was cheered on his every appearance in public as +assiduously as he had been ignored before, and, responding with the +whole force of his sensitive nature to this longed-for and unexpected +popularity, he devoted himself more and more earnestly, day by day, to +the welfare of the state which was his idol. + +But following in the wake of this revulsion of feeling in favor of +Barclay came one, hardly less complete, in favor of Spencer Cavendish. +While strictly speaking there could be no condoning his act, it was none +the less evident to even the most rigid adherents of law that by it he +had conferred an indisputable benefit upon the state of Alleghenia, and +his open statement of his reasons at the time of his trial militated for +rather than against him. So it was that a public petition was framed and +circulated, asking, at the hands of Governor Barclay, the commutation of +the death sentence to one of life imprisonment. Little by little the +list of signatures grew, until, a week before the date fixed for +Cavendish's execution, they were numbered by tens of thousands. Then the +petition, rolled into a cylinder, was presented to the Governor by a +committee, and left for his consideration. + +To Barclay the intervening time had passed with almost incredible +rapidity. His days, filled as they were to overflowing with numberless +and complex duties, were yet the pleasantest he had ever known. At last, +he was what he had dreamed of being--an active factor, the most active +of all factors, in the advancement of his state. Redeemed, as if by a +miracle, from the disgrace which had laid her low, Alleghenia arose, in +his eyes, like a phoenix, throwing off the ashes of her reproach, and +blazing, with new wings of burnished beauty, in the sunlight of hope and +peace. + +Barclay had retained his old office, not caring to make use of a room so +permeated with associations of recent tragedy as was that which had +formerly been Governor Abbott's. Now, with the windows open and the +soft May air stirring the papers on his desk, he sat, looking vacantly +across the room, with the huge petition spread out before him. His +attention, long absorbed by the problem in hand, was diverted by a tap +on the ante-room door, and, in answer to his call, Natalie Rathbawne +stood before him, smiling out of the exquisite daintiness of a fresh +spring frock. + +"You've forgotten!" she said immediately, at sight of his knit brows. + +"Forgotten what?" inquired the Governor inadvisedly. + +The girl's little foot stamped almost noiselessly upon the thick carpet. + +"Upon my word!" she exclaimed, "if there's one thing worse than being +engaged to the Lieutenant-Governor, it's being engaged to the Governor +himself! Forgotten, of course, that we are to lunch together, and look +at wall-papers afterwards! Do you know, John Barclay, I don't believe +you mean to marry me, after all? We'll be just approaching the altar, +when"-- + +She was interrupted in characteristic fashion, and disengaged herself, +with a great air of indignation, from Barclay's arms. + +"If you want to take lunch in the company of a rag carpet," she said +severely, "that's the very best way to go about it. Get your hat." + +There was a little pause as Barclay filed some papers in his private +safe, and then one startled word from the girl. + +"_John!_" + +Wheeling abruptly, he saw her standing at the desk, with her hand on the +petition, and her eyes, wide and wonderstruck, searching his face. + +"Dearest!" he said impulsively, "I wish you hadn't." + +But Natalie only laughed joyfully. + +"But I'm glad, Johnny boy," she answered, "glad--glad--glad! What a +wonderful thing it is to be Governor, boy dear! I don't think I ever +really understood before. Think of it! To have the power of life and +death--to be able to right the wrongs of justice with a single stroke of +the pen. Oh, John! Sign it now--before we go. I shall be so much +happier." + +The Governor made no reply. He stood, with his head bent, smoothing his +hat with the fingers of his right hand. Gradually the expression of +eager expectation on her face changed to one of anxiety. + +"John," she said in a half whisper, "you _are_ going to sign it, aren't +you, boy dear?" + +"I'm not sure," faltered the Governor. "I'm not quite sure, dearest. It +is the hardest problem I've ever had given me to solve. I can understand +now the meaning of something your father said to me just before the +strike,--that, for the first time in his life, he didn't know what to +do, because right seemed to be hopelessly entangled with wrong, and +wrong with right. When a man does evil in order that good may come, one +tries to find an excuse for him, tries to palliate his offense in any +reasonable way. That is human instinct. That is what accounts for the +petition there, with the signatures of many of the most conscientious +men in Alleghenia attached. They have managed to find the excuse, or +they think they have, which, so far as their personal convictions are +concerned, amounts to about the same thing. And I've been saying to +myself that when public opinion points out a course as justifiable it +can hardly be possible for a single individual to say that it is not. +And yet the wrong is there, isn't it? No matter how confused a question +may seem to us, there must absolutely, when we come to think of it, be +some one great elemental principle upon which it not only can, but must, +be decided--some boundary line between justice and injustice which we +may be too blind to see, but which exists, and calls for observance, +none the less. Right is right, wrong is wrong. No confusion between the +two can possibly exist except in appearance. Strive to elude truth as we +will, it remains eternal truth, and cannot be evaded in the end. And +where it seems to be beyond us, all we can do is to strive to find the +silken thread which will surely lead us out of the labyrinth into the +searching light of day. It is that clue which I have been groping for. +What is it? How am I to know it when I see it? What am I to do? At first +I thought the case was clear--what he said, you know--about Diogenes--it +seemed so odd--every one thought so--it might be construed as--as +insanity"-- + +"Oh, _no_, John! Why, _we_ know what that meant! No--no! The best part +of it all was his sanity, his wonderful courage, his braving of almost +certain death for what he believed--and knew, John--_knew_ to be right +and best. Think what he did for Alleghenia, Johnny boy. He has been +almost as great an instrument in her salvation as you. Think what he has +done for all of us--for you, in giving you this opportunity--for me--for +Dad! John, how _can_ you hesitate?" + +The Governor shook his head. + +"Dearest," he said, "you're on the wrong track, just as I have been, a +dozen times since the petition came. Don't you suppose I've thought of +all that? Its significance, not only to me, but, as you say, to the +state, is so tremendous that, at the first glance, it seems to be an +unanswerable argument. But--don't you see?--no sophistry, no +contemplation of the results achieved, can ever make it justifiable for +a man to arrogate to himself the power of taking human life, which is +the prerogative of God and the law alone. The peculiar circumstances of +Cavendish's crime plead eloquently, almost irresistibly, for his pardon. +He has saved the state--yes! But the case is one in a million, and it is +not an individual case alone which hangs upon my decision,--it is the +establishment of a precedent, the maintenance of a principle." + +"But, John," broke in Natalie eagerly, "what you've just said--isn't +that the clue for which you have been groping? He saved the state! I've +heard you talk of Alleghenia too often, of what you hoped for her, and +what you despaired of ever bringing to pass, not to know what those four +words must mean to you. Think of it! _He saved the state!_ Without any +possibility of selfish object he did this extraordinary thing--made it +possible for Alleghenia to win back the honor and respect she had so +nearly lost forever! He killed the man who had no thought of her purity +and dignity, who used the power the people had given him for the +furtherance of his own selfish and wicked ends, who made her justice a +mockery, who played with her law as if"-- + +"Stop!" exclaimed the Governor. "Stop--I must think. Wait a moment. I +must think--I must think!" + +After a minute he began to speak again, this time in a lower tone, a +tone which suggested self-communion rather than direct address to the +girl before him. + +"Yes, that's it. Wait now,--let me be sure! He killed the man who had no +thought of Alleghenia's purity, who used his power to serve his own +ends, who made her justice"--he was speaking very slowly, dwelling on +each word as it left his lips--"her _justice_ a mockery, who played with +her law--her law--her _Law_"-- + +He paused once more, his brows knit, his firm hand slowly stroking his +chin. Then, of a sudden, he drew a deep breath, flung back his +shoulders, and looked at her. His eyes were blazing, his voice touched +with a new meaning, an eloquence deep, firm, conclusive. + +"Natalie," he said, "come here." + +"You've struck the keynote," he added, when they stood face to face, a +foot or two apart. "It isn't what you thought, or what you meant, but it +is the keynote, just the same. The Law!" + +He wheeled slowly, and stepped forward, until he was directly before the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia which hung upon his wall. + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas!_" he said. "Many a time, when the way +seemed darkest, I've read those words over to myself, and found hope in +them. Events changed, crises came and went, portents loomed thick, +despair seemed omnipotent, failure and disgrace inevitable--but the +motto of Alleghenia remained the same. Steadfast, purposeful, and +commanding, it has endured through the trivial changes of political +significance which have been as impotent to sully the actuality of her +fair fame as are sun-spots to dim the radiance of the sun. It is only +natural, perhaps, that the discouragements which were but transient +should have seemed to me to be vital, damning, irremediable. Just as the +Israelites of old turned from the promises of God to worship Baal, so +have I turned from the assurance given me by these arms of Alleghenia, +to prostrate myself before false idols of doubt and despair. I should +have remembered how they called me, in the first instance, from a life +of idleness and ease, to fight my way through the desert of difficulty, +toward the promised land of honor. I should have remembered how in my +darkest hours they went before me as a pillar of fire, how in the famine +of my soul these words were the manna of encouragement, how in my thirst +they struck clear water from the rock of adverse circumstance. But the +Israelites came back to their true God at last; so I, little girl, to my +true ideal. The Law!--you said the word--the Law is the clue, the +keynote, the boundary between right and wrong!" + +She was at his side, and he slipped one arm around her, and held her +close to him as with his finger he traced again the motto of Alleghenia. + +"Do you know what this means?" he asked. "_Justitia_,--to be just to all +men, without fear or favor, lenient to our enemies, rigid and +unyielding, if need be, to our friends; putting aside personal +considerations, striving so far as in us lies to be impartial, merciful +in the face of prejudice, relentless in that of conviction--fair! +_Lex_,--to abide by the law, in spirit only if our inmost conviction +warrants that course, but in letter absolutely where there is the +smallest hint of doubt; secure in the knowledge that, however fallible +it be, it is the best that man has yet been able to do in imitation of +the immutable decrees of God. _Integritas_,--to be true to the oaths we +have sworn, faithful to the promises we have made, loyal to the office +intrusted to us by the people, to whom and for whom we are responsible. +Dearest, I am no mere man. Were I that, were I to consult my will alone, +and it lay, as now it lies, in my power to accomplish, Spencer Cavendish +should go free to-day. I know what he has done; I appreciate his +sacrifice; I see that by a single act he has accomplished what the rest +of us were powerless to cure; I admire his courage; I condone his crime; +I could forget all his weaknesses for the sake of this one great +evidence of his strength. And yet--listen to me, dearest!--in what he +strove to do he has failed utterly, if in removing a corrupt official +who made a mockery of Alleghenia's law he has not replaced him by one +who with all the force of his conscience and all the power of his +influence will see that law administered. And whatever we may say of his +crime, whatever its causes, whatever its wonderful results, it was and +is a crime. 'Thou shalt not kill!' God has said it; Alleghenia by the +voice of her law has ratified it. And not even the fact that Cavendish +has made possible all my fondest and worthiest hopes, the fact that he +has rescued from suffering all I hold most dear"-- + +Barclay suddenly covered his face with his free hand, as he had covered +it on that afternoon in Peter Rathbawne's library, weeks before; then he +looked up again, his lips trembling. + +"Dearest," he said, "I am Governor of Alleghenia, and as such owe an +allegiance, an obedience, which personal prejudice cannot impugn. On +the day when you spoke to me of meeting Cavendish you pointed out the +course of a gentleman and a friend. On the night of the Ninth's +review you taught me the creed of an American and an Alleghenian. +To-day--unconsciously perhaps, but none the less surely--you have made +clear the duty of a public servant. God bless you, my life, my heart, my +conscience! May I be worthy of you and of the commonwealth I serve. +Where I doubted before, now I am sure. It is hard--God only knows how +hard--but listen to Alleghenia's bidding! _Justitia_, _Lex_, +_Integritas_,--equity, the code, and good faith, in the sight of God and +man, heaven and earth, the American people and the commonwealth of +Alleghenia. God save the state!" + +"John," whispered the girl brokenly,--"John, you're right. God save the +state!" + +Slowly, tenderly, the Governor of Alleghenia led her back to the table, +and taking up a pen, with a firm hand wrote five words, heavily +underscored, at the head of the Cavendish petition. And these were:-- + + "_Disapproved._ + _John Hamilton Barclay_, + _Governor._" + +Then, turning to the girl who loved him, he took her in his arms. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30448 *** diff --git a/30448-8.txt b/30448-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ed579eb --- /dev/null +++ b/30448-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5296 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Lieutenant-Governor + +Author: Guy Wetmore Carryl + +Release Date: November 10, 2009 [EBook #30448] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + THE + + LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + A NOVEL + + BY + + GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + [Illustration: Publishers symbol] + + + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY + The Riverside Press, Cambridge + 1903 + + + Copyright, 1902 + BY THE ESS ESS PUBLISHING CO. + + + Copyright, 1903 + BY GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + + + _Published March, 1903_ + + + + + TO + + M. R. B. + + IN MEMORY OF THE RESCUE OF A MAN AT SEA + + + + + CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I. THE FLY ON THE WHEEL 1 + + II. THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET 21 + + III. A FACE IN THE CROWD 40 + + IV. AS BETWEEN FRIENDS 60 + + V. A BRAND FROM THE BURNING 80 + + VI. MCGRATH LAUGHS 98 + + VII. THE MIRAGE OF POWER 117 + + VIII. THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS 137 + + IX. THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW 156 + + X. A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 177 + + XI. YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE 196 + + XII. DIOGENES 215 + + XIII. THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE 234 + + XIV. THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA 252 + + + + +THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + + +I + +THE FLY ON THE WHEEL + + +The offices of the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor adjoined. Each +had its ante-room, in which a private secretary wrote eternally at a +roll-top desk, an excessively plain-featured stenographer rattled the +keys of his typewriter, and a smug-faced page yawned over a newspaper, +or scanned the cards of visitors with the air of an official censor. At +intervals, an electric bell whirred once, twice, or three times; and, +according to the signal, one of the trio disappeared into the presence +of the august personage within. + +A door connected the office of the chief executive with that of his +lieutenant, but this was rarely opened by either, and then only after a +formal tap and permission to enter had been given. It was a matter of +general knowledge that the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor were not +in sympathy; but few, even among the intimates of either, were aware how +deep, and wide, and hopelessly impassable was the gulf which lay between +them. This was due not alone to disparity in age, though twenty-eight +years separated the white-haired Governor from his handsome subordinate, +who had been nominated to this, his first public office, on his +thirtieth birthday; nor was it wholly a difference between the +experience of the one and the inexperience of the other. The point of +view of the veteran is, naturally, not that of the novice, particularly +in politics. That the enthusiasms of Lieutenant-Governor Barclay should +have been the disillusions of Governor Abbott, and his pitfalls his +senior's stepping-stones,--this was to be expected. The root of their +dissimilarity lay deeper. It was nothing less than mutual distrust which +kept the connecting door closed day after day, and clogged the channel +of coöperation with the sharp-pointed boulders of antagonism. + +The convention which nominated the successful ticket of the preceding +year had been a veritable chaos of contending factions. The labor +delegates, encouraged by the unexpected strength of their +representation, were not content with such nominal plums as had fallen +to their share in former conventions. Led by Michael McGrath, an +agitator whose native Irish eloquence, made keener and more persuasive +by practice in bar-room forensics, brought him naturally to the fore, +they threatened, at one stage of the proceedings, to carry all before +them. The more conservative faction, its strength sapped by the +formation, in its very ranks, of a reform party determined upon the fall +of the "machine," was forced to yield ground. The reformers themselves, +young men for the most part, distinguished by great ideals but small +ability, were too few to impose their individual will upon their +opponents, yet sufficiently numerous to make their support necessary to +the success of either party. The usual smooth course of the convention, +upset by this unlooked-for resistance from two quarters, staggered +helplessly, and was on the point of coming to a deadlock. It was Michael +McGrath's shrewd perception of the situation which solved the problem. +In a brief, impassioned speech he laid the claims of his faction before +the delegates, winding up with a stirring picture of the coöperation of +labor and reform, now possible, which held the convention in spellbound +silence for ten seconds after he had closed, and then set the hall +ringing to cheers and vigorously plied hands and feet. For an instant he +paused, with his arms folded, and his keen blue eyes sliding over the +faces before him, and then played his trump card. At his signal, a +banner, hastily prepared, was borne, slowly revolving, down the central +aisle, and on this were boldly lettered the words which at the same +moment McGrath was thundering from the platform:-- + + LABOR AND REFORM! + + FOR GOVERNOR, + ELIJAH ABBOTT. + + FOR LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR, + JOHN HAMILTON BARCLAY. + +McGrath had no need to look toward the labor faction for support. He +knew what the name of Elijah Abbott meant in that quarter. His shifting +glance was fixed upon the seats of the reform delegates, and a little +smile twitched at the corners of his mouth, as he saw them rise with a +cheer. Barclay was the chief spirit of their movement. They had not +expected this recognition. But if, in the enthusiasm of unlooked-for +victory, they did not perceive how little, in reality, was their gain, +McGrath was far from being unaware how great was his own. Before the +cheering of the now allied forces of labor and reform had fairly died +away, he had moved that nominations were in order, and, ten minutes +later, while the partisans of the "machine" were still endeavoring to +collect their wits, the main business of the convention was an +accomplished fact, and Abbott and Barclay were declared the regular +Democratic nominees for Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of the state. +In six weeks followed their election by a small plurality, and on the +first of January the two men moved into their adjoining rooms, in the +inexcusably unlovely state capitol, on the main hill of Kenton City, +wherein they were, thenceforward, separated, one from the other, by two +inches of Georgia pine and a practically infinite diversity of principle +and prejudice. + +From the first their relationship had been no better than an armed +truce. Both were courteous men, the one because such was his policy, the +other because he was to this manner born. There was no need for them to +discuss their individual creeds. They tacitly accepted the fact that +there was not a parallel between the two. From the moment when his +election was assured by the returns, Abbott was candidly the man of the +Labor--nay, more--of the Socialist party. McGrath and his associates +manipulated him as readily as a marionette. The promises and pledges of +the campaign were ruthlessly jettisoned. If Governor Abbott did not +stand for anarchy, it was only because, for the moment, anarchy was not +the demand of his party. Withal, he was dignified and self-possessed, +robed in an agreeable suavity which became him at functions and +ceremonials, and assured his popularity with those--and they were, as +always, in the majority--who did not look below the surface. + +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay had not been ten days in office before he +realized the futility of resistance to the established order, as +represented in his superior. He had accepted his nomination, and +welcomed his election, with an almost Quixotic elation in the +opportunity thus opened to him. He would accomplish--oh, there was no +telling what Lieutenant-Governor Barclay would _not_ accomplish! + +He was standing at his office window now, staring out disconsolately +over the sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin +patches of snow, which had contrived to withstand the recent thaw, and +he was telling himself, for the thousandth time, the dispiriting fact +that, as a force for good or evil in the destiny of his state, he was no +more significant than his stenographer's Remington or his secretary's +roll-top desk. With all his ideals, with all those pledges which are +infinitely more vital when made in private to one's conscience than when +made in public to one's party, he found himself merely a cog in the +state machinery--a cog, too, that, seemingly, might be skipped at any or +every time, without in the least degree disturbing the progress of +routine. On the few occasions, in the early days of their official +relation, when he had ventured to set his will in opposition to that of +the Governor, there had not been manifest in the latter's attitude even +that spirit of resistance which spurs men to more active and resolute +endeavor. Governor Abbott had smiled pleasantly upon him, and then +quietly shifted the conversation into other channels, with an air of +selecting a topic more suited to his companion's comprehension. +Finally, on one occasion, when Barclay had voiced his opinion with an +energy which savored of rebuke, the Governor had gone further, and had +asked calmly--"And what were you proposing to do about it?" After that +Barclay had relinquished the unequal struggle, and resigned himself to +the unavoidable conclusion of his impotency. + +It is a situation which tries men's souls, this of utter helplessness in +the face of plain duty. He could have no hope of making his position +clear to the constituency to which he was responsible. Debarred on the +one side from taking an active part in the administration of state +affairs, and bitterly arraigned on the other on the grounds of +inefficiency, laxity, and indifference to duty, the second month of +office found John Barclay in a fair way to be ground to powder between +the millstones of impuissance and hostile criticism. The men of his +party who had, both in private conviction and public statement, based +their hopes of political reform upon the frankly avowed platform of his +principles, now passed him coldly, with a bare nod, sometimes with none +whatever; the labor element jeered joyously at his attitude; the +"machine" pointed to him as proof of the fallacy of the reform creed. It +is easy to expect great performances from great promises, easier still +to outline the duties and condemn the delinquencies of another, and not +even Barclay's knowledge of his own good faith was sufficient +compensation for the sneers of press and public which fell to his share. +As he surveyed the dispiriting prospect from his office window, on that +late February afternoon, he was near to resigning his position, and with +it all further pretension to political prominence. + +In the opinion of those competent to judge, the state of Alleghenia was +going to the dogs. A press distinguished alike for the amplitude of its +headlines and the pitiable paucity of its principles; a legislature of +which practically every member had, not only a price, but such a price +as the advertisements describe as being "within the reach of all;" a +Governor who avowedly stood ready to sanction the most extreme +pretensions of the notoriously corrupt party which had secured him his +election,--here, surely, were good and sufficient reasons for the +generously bestowed disapproval of Alleghenia's sister states. In all +the _personnel_ of her government there was but one man sincerely +devoted to her advancement on the lines of integrity and +non-partisanship. And that man was Lieutenant-Governor Barclay, whose +influence on the trend of affairs was approximately that of the +proverbial fly on the hub of the revolving wheel. + +The Lieutenant-Governor had turned back to his desk, and was arranging +his papers, preparatory to departing for the day, when his ears were +greeted by the unusual and unwelcome sound of a rap upon the +communicating door. Instinctively he braced himself for an unpleasant +encounter before replying. It was his experience that the Governor's +room was like to Nazareth of old, in that no good might be expected to +issue therefrom. Nevertheless, as Governor Abbott entered, in response +to Barclay's "Come!" it was difficult to believe that he was aught but +what he appeared to be,--a courteous, conspicuously well-dressed and +white-haired gentleman, of sixty or thereabouts, smooth-shaven save for +chop side-whiskers of iron gray, with a habit of rubbing his hands, and +an inclination from the hips forward which suggested a floor-walker. In +brief, the Governor of Alleghenia seemed the type of a man who turns +sideways and slips through narrow places, rather than run the risk of +barking his elbows by a face-front advance. In reality he was somewhat +less pliable than a steel rail. + +"You are going?" he asked, seeing how Barclay was employed. + +"I was thinking of it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor. "Of course, if +there is anything"-- + +Governor Abbott seated himself on the edge of the desk, holding a lapel +of his coat in each hand, and surveyed his subordinate from under his +drooping eyelids, with his head cocked on one side. + +"I believe you know Peter Rathbawne," he said. + +"I do. I am engaged to his elder daughter." + +"Ah! That is what I thought." + +The Governor looked contemplatively at the ceiling, closing his right +eye, and nibbling behind his pursed lips. + +"Peter Rathbawne," he said, "is the second most obstinate man in Kenton +City, if not in Alleghenia. I'm afraid he thinks he is the _most_ +obstinate. If so, he does me an injustice. His mills are the largest in +the state. I am told that when they are running full strength they +employ over four thousand hands." + +"Something like that number, I believe," put in Barclay, as the Governor +seemed to expect a reply. + +"Ah! It is a pity for such an industry as that to be tied up on account +of one man's obstinacy." + +"I had not heard"--began Barclay; but Governor Abbott continued +steadily, disregarding the interruption. + +"Yesterday morning Mr. Rathbawne discharged fifteen employees on the +ground of incompetency. It is hard to see exactly what Mr. Rathbawne +means by 'incompetency.' These men were not newcomers. Some of them had +been in the mills for as much as eighteen months. It seems as if he +might have discovered the alleged incompetency long ago. It is more or +less arbitrary, one might say, this discharging men by wholesale, as it +were." + +"I suppose," commented Barclay, "that a man may do as he will with his +own." + +"Ah!" said the Governor, lifting his hands from his lapels with a little +gesture of deprecation, but immediately replacing them. "But _can_ he? A +man in Peter Rathbawne's position has a responsibility to fulfill toward +the community. He cannot beggar men for a caprice--because his horse has +gone lame, or his breakfast has not agreed with him. He must show +reasons--give an accounting. He must be fair." + +"Oh, when it comes to fairness," laughed the other, "I assure you, +Governor Abbott, you won't find Mr. Rathbawne's equal this side of the +Pacific. He's famous for square dealing." + +"He _has_ been," corrected the Governor. "In the present instance he +seems to have fallen below standard. He has declined to reconsider his +decision in the case of the discharged men. What's worse, he has flatly +refused to see the committee appointed by the Union." + +"I'm not surprised at that," said Barclay slowly, fingering a +paper-cutter on the desk before him. "Mr. Rathbawne is peculiar in one +respect; he supports and considers the Union in every other. But he has +always insisted upon his right to discharge the hands at will, and +without giving reasons. Incompetency is only a word which is used to +cover more serious causes." + +"Well, he's wrong," said the Governor, with a heat unusual to him. +"He's dead wrong, Mr. Barclay, and he will find it out before he's a day +older." + +"Do you mean"-- + +"I mean that if the men in question are not taken back before to-morrow +noon, every man, woman, and child in the employ of the Rathbawne Mills +will be out on strike. The question is, what is Peter Rathbawne prepared +to do?" + +The silence that followed was broken only by the tap, tap, tap of the +Lieutenant-Governor's paper-cutter on the silver-mounted blotter. +Presently he looked up and met the Governor's eye. + +"If you want _my_ opinion, sir," he answered, "it is that Mr. Rathbawne +would fight such a point to a standstill. He's sole owner of the mills, +and he's a rich man. He has always treated his employees as if they were +his own children. If they turn on him now for something which, from +their experience of his character, they must know was fair and +justifiable"-- + +"But _was_ it?" interrupted the Governor. + +"I don't know the facts, sir, but I know Peter Rathbawne," said Barclay, +throwing back his head, "and I can say, with clear conviction, that it +_must_ have been. If, as you suggest, the hands go out, I think he would +close down the mills for a year, and go abroad. He's a man who doesn't +argue; he simply acts. I fancy there wouldn't be much opposition left by +the time he wanted to reopen." + +"Provided always that there were anything left to reopen," suggested the +Governor softly. + +"The state troops have more than once proved their ability to assure the +sanctity of property," answered his subordinate, with a touch of the old +pride with which he had assumed office. + +"Hum!" said Governor Abbott. "But calling out the militia is a serious +matter, Mr. Barclay, to say nothing of the expense entailed. Considering +that the difficulty would be due entirely to the obstinacy of one +man--er--one might not feel justified"-- + +He hesitated briefly under the Lieutenant-Governor's keen glance, and +then swerved from this line of suggestion. + +"What I wanted to say was this: You are a friend of Mr. +Rathbawne's,--something more than a friend, indeed. No doubt he has a +respect for your opinion, as you have for his. Now, if in the course of +a quiet chat--it will have to be to-night--you should point out the +situation that threatens him, the distress that a strike will cause, the +probable destruction of his property, perhaps he might consent to +reinstate the discharged men to-morrow morning." + +"It would be a surrender of principle, to which he would never consent," +said Barclay firmly. "Of that I am sure. Moreover, sir, I should be +speaking against my convictions were I to advise him to adopt such a +course." + +The Governor's lip wrinkled slightly. + +"The Union is prepared to do the right thing by the man who settles this +question," he said. + +"I hope you don't mean that!" exclaimed Barclay. "You are the first man +to make such a suggestion to me. Pardon me, Governor Abbott, but I +cannot but think the executive chamber of the capitol of Alleghenia a +singular place for it to be mentioned." + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"You misunderstand me," he said. "One would suppose I had offered you a +purse! I mean simply that the popularity of the man who averts this +strike will be an assured fact. He would be the idol of the working +people, and hardly less esteemed by the element of capital. Moreover, he +would be doing a humane and merciful thing. You are the only man who is +in a position to approach Rathbawne, and, if you will excuse the +suggestion, I think you can hardly afford to throw away the chance. As +it is, you--er--you are not what might be called popular, Mr. Barclay." + +This time the silence was broken by a single sharp little +click--the latch of the connecting door slipping into place. The +Lieutenant-Governor sank slowly into his revolving chair, tipped back, +swung round a half circle, and stared out disconsolately over the +sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin patches of +snow. + + + + +II + +THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET + + +Young Nisbet leaned forward in his chair. + +"And I've been thinking," he added, "that perhaps--that perhaps"-- + +"That perhaps what?" asked the junior Miss Rathbawne, leaning forward in +hers. + +"If I don't have tea _instantly_," said her mother, with profound +conviction, as she came ponderously through the portières, tugging at +her gloves, "I shall expire! How de do, Mr. Nisbet. _Do_ sit up +straight, Dorothy, my dear." + +She sank heavily into a low chair, which brought her within the radius +of lamp-light at the tea-table, and was thus revealed as a lady of +generous proportions, with a conspicuous absence of features, and no +observable lap. In speaking, she displayed a marked partiality for undue +emphasis. Sublimely unconscious of the depression induced by her +advent, she continued to talk, as she pulled off her gloves, which were +a size too small, and came away with reluctance, leaving imprints of the +stitching on her pudgy pink hands. + +Young Nisbet surveyed her with a kind of mute despair. He was a very +average young American, very conventionally in love, and the trifling +remnant of self-assertiveness which had triumphed over the crescent +humility natural to his condition inevitably evaporated into thin air at +the approach of Mrs. Rathbawne; and always, as he was doing now, he +turned in his toes excessively when she was present, hitched at his +right trouser-leg, where the crease passed over his knee, and looked +first at her, and then at the floor, and then at her again, with the +purposeless regularity of a mechanical toy. + +There was a tremendous and highly significant rattling of cups, saucers, +and silver spoons, as Dorothy Rathbawne prepared her mother's tea. All +things considered, one found something very admirable about Dorothy at +such a time as this. It was not complete submission, still less was it +open revolt, but savored of both, and was incomparable as an attitude +toward Mrs. Rathbawne. On some occasions it was almost as impossible to +get on with Mrs. Rathbawne as it would have been, on others, to get on +without her. The which, nowadays, is more or less true of all parents. +And children. + +"Natalie and your Aunt Helen got out at the florist's," went on the good +lady, "but I came straight on, and sent the carriage back for them. I +felt that I _couldn't_ exist an _instant_ longer without my tea. I'm +sure I don't see how Natalie _stands_ it. She was out all morning in the +brougham, too. You had best make enough for three cups, Dorothy--and +_do_ sit up straight, my dear!--and order Thomas to bring in some more +tartines. They are _sure_ to be hungry, and they are apt to come in at +_any_ moment." + +"That is a family failing," said Dorothy venomously, from behind the +kettle. + +"Well, I'm _sure_, my dear," said Mrs. Rathbawne innocently, as she +straightened her rings, and picked an imaginary speck out of one of her +round, flat nails, "there is no disgrace at all in a healthy appetite. +I'm thankful we all have it--though as for your Aunt Helen, _hers_ is +about like that of a fly." + +"Flies have very good appetites--judging from all I've seen, that is," +said Dorothy, "so I don't think she is to be commiserated on that +account." + +"That was only a figure of speech, my dear," replied Mrs. Rathbawne, +with engaging placidity. "Mercy! but I'm glad to get home. We've had a +positively _exhausting_ day with Natalie's shopping, and the _worst_ of +it is to think what a _lot_ more there is to do. A wedding certainly +_is_ an undertaking, Mr. Nisbet." + +"Is it?" answered young Nisbet, perceptibly startled at being thus +abruptly included in the conversation. + +"Decidedly!" asseverated Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"Of course, in the case of an _ordinary_ man"-- + +"Two lumps, mother?" + +"_Always_ two lumps, Dorothy, my dear. Surely you must know that, by +this time! As I was _saying_, Mr. Nisbet, the fact that my elder +daughter is to marry Mr. Barclay"-- + +Dorothy's eyebrows went up resignedly as she bent with affected +solicitude over the alcohol lamp, than which none ever burned more +blamelessly. There was no stopping Mrs. Rathbawne now! + +"One has to keep his position in mind," she was saying. "It isn't like +the _usual_ marriage, which interests only the families and friends of +the persons concerned, you know. It isn't even as if only Kenton City +were looking on. _All_ Alleghenia will be on the _qui vive_, Mr. Nisbet, +_all_ the state of Alleghenia. I shouldn't wonder if _some_ notice were +taken of the event, even at Washington. Marrying a statesman, you +see,--a Lieutenant-Governor! Oh, it's _quite_ different--_quite_! _Do_ +sit up straight, Dorothy, my dear!" + +She continued to prattle of the momentous marriage impending, until her +complacent chatter was interrupted by the entrance of her half-sister, +Mrs. Wynyard, and the elder Miss Rathbawne. + +The two newcomers were both beautiful, in widely dissimilar ways. Helen +Wynyard, Mrs. Rathbawne's junior by nearly a score of years, retained at +thirty the transparent brilliancy of complexion which, at eighteen, had +made her the most admired _débutante_ of her season in San Francisco. +Her marriage with Ellery Wynyard had caused a great to-do among the +gossips, and, later, had defrauded them pitilessly of their +self-promised "I told you so's," by reason of the death of the handsome +young rake, before the rose-color of the honeymoon had begun to fade. +Beauty, wit, and infallible tact she inherited from her mother, shrewd +business ability and a keen insight into men and things from her father, +and wealth and a certain attractive audacity of speech from her +husband; and five years of widowhood only served to develop and +emphasize the promise of her first season. There were numerous feet +which aspired to be shod with Ellery Wynyard's discarded shoes, but no +one pair, said the world, so much as an inch in advance of the rest. + +Mrs. Wynyard was spending the winter with her half-sister, and the +Rathbawnes, whom the circumstance of widely distant residence had always +kept from coming into close touch with her, were equally at a loss when +they wondered how they had formerly contrived to exist without her, and +in what manner they should resign themselves to giving her up. She was a +woman who came amazingly near to being indispensable. + +For the moment, Natalie Rathbawne, in reality the beauty which Dorothy +by a fraction fell short of being, suffered by comparison with her +sister. She was desperately tired--that was in her smile. But there was +something else: a singular preoccupation which was nearly akin to +listlessness. That was in the droop of her eyelids, in the eloquently +inattentive gesture with which she touched a bowl of Gloire de Dijon +roses as she passed, and in her conventionally courteous acknowledgment +of young Nisbet's greeting. And, too, as she seated herself beside her +sister on the divan, there was perceptible purpose in her avoidance of +the lamp-light, her withdrawal into the dark, deep corner. To the +conversation which followed she contributed only such brief remarks as +were made necessary by those occasionally addressed to her. + +The two women brought with them a delicious, indefinite atmosphere of +out-of-doors: that commingled smell of cold flowers, and cold flesh, and +cold fur, which is to a drawing-room in winter what a whiff of salt air +is in summer to a sun-baked hillside; and this proved almost too much +for the self-possession, already tottering, of young Nisbet. He had +always been accustomed to have the things he desired, had young Nisbet, +but these, until now, had been either creature comforts, readily +obtainable when one's father is a multi-millionaire, or athletic honors, +equally easy of attainment when one measures forty-two around the chest, +and can do one's quarter in something under fifty. Again, the Nisbets +lived on a ranch, and when one does not know people in New York one +spends the Sundays in New Haven, so that neither the terms nor the +vacations incidental to his four years at Yale had equipped him, in the +sense in which they equipped his fellows, for dealing with society. + +Now that he was in Kenton City, representing his father's interests, +young Nisbet was painfully self-conscious of multitudinous shortcomings, +totally unsuspected hitherto. His speech was apparently hopelessly +incrusted with slang, his legs were too long, his ears protruded +abominably, his hair was desperately unruly, his freckles and his +capacity for blushing were inexhaustible. He was as much at ease in such +surroundings as these in which he now found himself as a trout in a +sandpile. The great room, with its costly furnishings, the tea-table +crowded with silver and fragile porcelain, the kettle purring +contentedly above the iridescent flame of the alcohol lamp,--above all, +the subtle, indefinable suggestion of femininity which unknowably +pervaded his surroundings,--all these enthralled young Nisbet beyond +expression, and awed him immeasurably, into the bargain. He was, as +usual, very clear in his own mind as to what he wanted, and that was the +younger Miss Rathbawne, but, for the first time in his experience, the +means at his command did not seem to be sufficient unto the end. For the +younger Miss Rathbawne was, very evidently, not the sort of triumph +which is achieved by recourse to an imposingly ample bank-account, nor +yet by two months' loyalty to the exigencies of the training-table. And +this was February, and he had known her since July, and, altogether, it +was highly discouraging. Unwittingly, young Nisbet heaved a sigh so +profound and so pitiable that Mrs. Wynyard immediately proffered her +sympathy. + +"Poor, dear Mr. Nisbet! I never heard a more pathetic sigh. Whatever is +the matter?" + +"He's sleepy," put in Dorothy. "He always is, after talking with me for +a whole hour." + +"I was just thinking," protested young Nisbet helplessly. + +"Oh!" exclaimed Dorothy, "that's it, is it? Then pray don't discourage +him, Aunt Helen. He's really getting into some very good habits, of +late." + +"Why, _Dorothy_!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, digging her chin reproachfully +into her black velvet collar, "how _can_ you say such things? Mr. Nisbet +will think you have had _no_ bringing up at all. And _do_ sit up +straight, my dear!" + +"And if you don't stop nagging, O most conscientious of parents," +retorted Dorothy, with her nose in the air, "Mr. Nisbet will think you +bring people up by throwing them down!" + +"And slang! _Dorothy!_" + +"I always think," said Mrs. Wynyard, "that Dorothy should have had a +fairy godmother, to promise that every time she uttered a word of slang +a pearl should pop out of her mouth. We should have all been wearing +triple strings down to our knees within a week after she learned to +talk." + +"That settles it!" exclaimed Dorothy. "If you are going to side with the +enemy, Aunt Helen, there is nothing left for me to do but to beat a +retreat. Come on, Mr. Nisbet, there is rest for the weary in the +conservatory--that is, unless you want another cup of tea?" + +In the conservatory the air was heavy with the moist, sweet smell of +earth and moss, and faintly vibrant with the tiny plash of water, +dripping from a pile of rocks into the circular central pool, wherein +fat gold-fish went idly to and fro, nuzzling floating specks upon the +surface. Through the polished green of the surrounding palms and +rubber-plants stared gardenias and camelias; below, between maidenhair +and sword-ferns, winked the little waxen blossoms of fuchsias and +begonias: at intervals poinsettia flared audaciously among its more +quietly dressed neighbors; and, in the far corners the golden spheres +were swelling to fairly respectable proportions on the branches of dwarf +orange-trees. + +Dorothy installed herself on a bench, and young Nisbet perched upon the +rim of the pool, and stared at vacancy. + +"It's corking, in here," he said, after a moment. + +"Isn't it, though?" agreed Dorothy, with a nod of approval. "It's my +favorite part of the house. You can't imagine how many hours I spend +here, sewing, or reading, or fiddling with the fish and all those funny +little plants under the palms." + +"You bet!" said young Nisbet, with enthusiasm, if not much relevancy. +"I've just got a picture of that, you know. Besides, we've spent a good +many of those hours together in here, these past few months." + +"Oh, not a tenth of them!" exclaimed Dorothy, "and then only the very +shortest." + +"Oh!" said young Nisbet gloomily. His fertile imagination was +immediately peopled with the forms and faces of those who had shared the +other hours, a score of eligible and attractive young men, his moral, +mental, and physical superiors in every conceivable particular, +faultlessly arrayed, scintillating with wit, and surpassingly skilled in +the way to win a woman. The conservatory was full of them. He saw them +in every imaginable posture: feeding the gold-fish, watering the +begonias, looking up into Dorothy's eyes as they sat at her feet, +looking down at her slender fingers, as she pinned gardenias to their +lapels. And these had been granted the long hours, he only the short. +Inwardly, young Nisbet groaned; aloud, as was his wont, he said the +wrong thing. + +"They seemed long enough to me." + +"_Well!_" said Dorothy. + +"Oh, hang it all! I didn't mean that. What an oaf I am!" + +"Never mind," said Dorothy consolingly. "I know you well enough to +understand you, by this time." She smoothed her skirt reflectively. +"Let me see," she added, "what were we talking about when we were +swamped by the family?" + +"I think," answered young Nisbet, with one of his illogical blushes, +"that I had just asked you what sort of a man you thought you would like +to marry. I remember I was on the point of saying that I thought perhaps +you had ideas like--er--like your mother's." + +Dorothy raised her eyebrows. + +"Like the Mater's?" + +"About a man being big and prominent, and all that, you know," +floundered young Nisbet. "She always makes such a point of Barclay's +being Lieutenant-Governor--I thought you might be for the same kind of +thing." + +Dorothy looked him over, with a whimsical smile, as he was speaking. +There was a deep bronze light in his close-cropped, ruddy hair, and his +skin was very smooth and clean. His eyes were appealing, with that +unspeakable eloquence of simple honesty which is almost pathetic. Under +his blue cloth coat, the great muscles of his shoulders and chest stood +out magnificently, rippling the fabric as he stirred, as if eager to +throw off their trammels, and be given free play. About him there was a +distinct suggestion of sane living and regular exercise. For all his +freckles, and his nose that was too little, and his mouth that was too +large, "the ugliest of the Nisbet boys"--he had often been called +that!--was very emphatically good to look upon. + +"A big man?" answered Dorothy. "Yes, I think I should like to marry a +big man. I want him very clean, too--_very_ clean!--morally, as well as +otherwise. And honest as the day is long. And not _too_ bright! I don't +want to be continually trying to live up to his brain, and continually +failing. It is fatal to one's self-respect, that sort of thing. Then, he +must be heels over head in love with me--for keeps! And then--oh, he +must be a _man_, a man through and through, who wouldn't think anything +he didn't dare to say, nor say anything he didn't dare to do! That's +what I want, and if I can get it, all the prominence in the world may +go hang!" + +"That's just about John Barclay, though," said young Nisbet, "with the +prominence thrown in." + +"Well, I'm not saying I wouldn't have married John Barclay, if I'd had +the chance. He comes pretty close to being all I would ask for, in the +way of a man. But, unfortunately, there's only one John Barclay, and, +like the rest of the world, he looked directly over poor little Me's +shoulders, and saw only Natalie. Good gracious! Who could blame him? +She's the loveliest little thing in the world! But, at all events, she +nabbed him, so all that is left for me to do is to grin and bear the +disappointment as best I may. He's very much of a man, John Barclay is!" + +"Yes," assented young Nisbet, somewhat mournfully. "I can see that would +be the kind of a chap that the dames would stand for everlastingly." + +"But, as I said before," continued Dorothy, "it's not because he's +Lieutenant-Governor, whatever the Mater may think about it, that I +admire him. It's just because he's so big, and earnest, and loyal, +and--and"-- + +"White," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, _isn't_ he? That's it--white!" + +"I can understand a man like that getting spliced," observed young +Nisbet very earnestly. "He has so much to offer a girl. But as for the +rest of us"-- + +"Oh, as to that," broke in Dorothy airily, "John Barclay isn't the only +man in the world, by any manner of means! Besides, Natalie having +already bagged him, it is plain I shall have to look elsewhere." + +There was a long pause, broken only by the plash of the water, which +seemed, as the seconds slipped by, to grow amazingly loud. Then young +Nisbet raised his eyes, and looked at her, blushing deplorably. + +"I wish"--he said, "I wish"-- + +"Dorothy! _Do_ excuse me, Mr. Nisbet, but _really_--dinner at seven, you +know, and this child _must_ be thinking about dressing. She takes +_ages_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne folded her fat hands, and stood waiting, at the +conservatory door. Young Nisbet rose. + +"Of course!" he said. "I'm always so stupid about these things. Good-by, +Miss Rathbawne. I'm off to New York to-morrow on some confounded +business, so I probably won't see you for a week or so. Good-by." + +"_Would_ you mind going out by the hall, Mr. Nisbet?" suggested Mrs. +Rathbawne. "Mr. Barclay is in the drawing-room with my elder daughter, +and he is so _greatly_ occupied with affairs of state that they have +_very_ little time together. I _hate_ to have them interrupted. One can +do _so_ much harm sometimes, you know, by thoughtlessly interrupting +people who are in love with each other. Thank you _so_ much; good-by. +_Do_ try to stand a little straighter, Dorothy, my dear." + + + + +III + +A FACE IN THE CROWD + + +At the sound of the Lieutenant-Governor's voice at the front door, Mrs. +Rathbawne had beaten a hasty retreat, dragging her immensely edified +half-sister in her wake, so that when he stepped through the curtained +doorway Barclay found Natalie alone. + +"I'm so glad you could come early," she said, from the corner of the +divan. "Now we can have a talk before dinner. I seem to see so little of +you. I suppose that's the penalty attached to being engaged to the +second biggest man in the state. I'm sometimes jealous, Johnny boy, of +Alleghenia's place in your affections." + +"You're the only person in the world who has no need to be," laughed +Barclay. "What is the news?" + +"Probably," said Natalie, "the only interesting items are that you are +cold and a little cross, and that you want a big chair and a cup of tea +and some hot toast." + +"Your summary of the situation is so exhaustive," said Barclay, "that +there seems to be nothing left for me to say, except that you are the +most beautiful girl in the world, and that I think I must stand still a +moment and just look at you, before I accept any of the luxuries you +suggest." + +"I can't imagine how you know that I'm so beautiful. You can't possibly +see me in this dark corner. But I see I've made one mistake! You are +distinctly _not_ cross." + +"Why should I be?" asked the Lieutenant-Governor, standing before the +table, with his long legs far apart, and rocking from his toes to his +heels and back again. "When a man has been walking for half an hour +through a gnawing February air, and suddenly, out of all proportion to +his deserts, comes full upon a rose in bloom, is that a reason for being +cross?" + +She was very small, and deliciously delicate, was Natalie Rathbawne, +like a little Dresden image, with an arbutus-pink complexion, brown +hair, and deep-blue eyes, now clouded thoughtfully, but oftener alight +with humor, or dilating and clearing under the impetus of conversation. +A doll-like daintiness of tiny pleats and ruffles, fresh bows, and fine +stitching pervaded everything she wore, and if her voice inspired the +hackneyed comparison of running water, it was of water running under +moss, the sound whereof is as different from that of an open brook as is +music from discord. To John Barclay's thinking the barely believable +fact that this little miracle of beauty--this pocket-Venus, as he was +wont to call her--actually belonged to him remained one of the insoluble +mysteries of life. He could not, in the thraldom of his present Elysium, +be expected to remember, even if he had ever fully realized, that he +himself was tall, broad-shouldered, clean-cut, and clean-lived, with the +unmistakable stamp of the American gentleman on his linen and his +simple, well-fitting clothes, and the evidences of a sane, regular +existence in his steady hands and his clear eyes and his firm mouth,--a +man of whom any woman might be, and of whom this particular woman was, +extravagantly proud. For the first tribute which a lover lays at the +feet of his lady is, in ordinary, the stamped-upon and abused summary of +his personal attributes, which, in his own mind, he has taken remarkable +pains to render as despicable as possible, and which, in hers, her +imagination contrives not only to rehabilitate, but to imbue with a +preposterously exaggerated splendor. + +"I wonder," added the Lieutenant-Governor presently, "whether when +gentlemen are invited to tea they are supposed to kiss the hostess on +entering." + +"If you are in any doubt about it," observed Natalie, with an air of +superb indifference, "I advise you to write for advice to the etiquette +editor of the 'Kenton City Record.' She is probably sixty-two years old, +looks like an English walnut, has never had a proposal in her life, and +so knows all about"-- + +What the lady in question was supposed to know all about was for +sufficient reasons never made clear. There are occasions, despite the +manuals of polite behavior, when interruption cannot with any approach +to justice be regarded as rudeness. + +Barclay heaved a long sigh of satisfaction as he took his tea and two +thin slices of toast and settled himself in his chair. + +"Do you think it possible," he asked, "for a man to be asleep for six +weeks, dreaming that he is in another garden of Eden, with an Eve in a +French frock, who has no partiality for apples"-- + +"I _adore_ apples!" said the girl. + +"And then wake up," he continued, disregarding the interruption, "and +find that the dream was only a dream, after all,--that he's only a poor +dog of a politician, that the garden is only a dingy office, and the +flower-beds full of briers and pitfalls?" + +"You've been eating pie for lunch again," said Natalie severely, "and it +always makes you morbid. No; I don't think it possible at all. If I did, +I should hang on to your coattails like fury and keep you in dreamland, +whether you wanted to wake up or not." + +"It's all too good to be true! How _dare_ you be so beautiful?" + +"John"-- + +"It's gospel truth!" + +Barclay paused for a moment, and then went on more seriously. + +"You're tired, littlest and most lovely in the world, and troubled about +something." + +Natalie laughed shortly, with evident effort. + +"Why do you say that?" she asked. + +"Why not? Don't you suppose I know? Do you think you could say a hundred +words without my perceiving that? It almost seems to me that the +knowledge that you were unhappy would make its way to me, no matter what +distance separated us, and that I should come to you at top-speed to set +things right. I've hardly seen your face, and yet I know your dear, deep +eyes are troubled; I had barely heard your voice before I felt its +weariness." + +Natalie bent forward until her face came under the light. + +"Yes, I'm tired," she said; "or, rather, I was tired when I first came +in. I'm better now, since I've had my tea. But you're right, Johnny +boy,--there's something more. I'm troubled, desperately troubled and +heartsick. I've been trying to make myself believe that it's all +imagination, that I have no reason for feeling as I do; but I'm afraid I +can't manage it. John, I thought I saw Spencer Cavendish to-day." + +"Spencer Cavendish? Are you sure? I had almost forgotten his +existence!--Of course, it's not impossible; but I imagined he had taken +root in some South Sea island long ago. That's what he was always +expecting to do, you remember. How I have hated that man!" + +"You were good friends once." + +"Yes, and should be yet, if I had not been the most suspicious mortal +that ever breathed, and he the most hot-blooded. There was a reason, you +know,--a little reason, but the most important in the world! I was +jealous, Natalie, insanely jealous. I could forgive him everything now." + +"That hurts me, John. I'm so happy, boy dear, that I want everybody else +to be happy as well. Oh, why is it that a girl must always have that one +thought on her mind, which is so hard, so hard?--I mean the thought of +the good men, the true, brave, loyal men, whom she has cared for, who +have been her best friends perhaps, and yet whom she has been forced to +hurt bitterly because they asked her for something she was not able to +give. A man has so much easier a road! His happiness, when it comes to +him, isn't clouded by the thought of those to whom it means the loss of +their last remnant of hope. They are there, the disappointed ones, but +he doesn't know, he doesn't know! He hasn't on his conscience the memory +of hearts cruelly wounded,--wounded even to death. He doesn't in memory +see the eagerness in a good friend's eyes die to disillusion, to +hopelessness, to bitter, bitter sorrow. He doesn't have to remember how +the life died suddenly out of a voice that had been tender and eloquent. +He doesn't sicken with the thought that his hand has given a blow so +merciless, so unmerited, and yet so inevitable. Worst of all, for the +girl, is the after-discovery that her decision has made a difference--a +hideous, irreparable difference,--that the man can never be the same +again,--that she has wrecked a life with a word! Oh, there ought to be +some way! The man ought not to ask unless he is sure of the reply! It's +too much responsibility to force upon the girl! + +"So with Spencer Cavendish," she went on after a moment. "In spite of +all--in spite of all, John!--I can't forget that he loved me. I think a +woman never forgets that." + +"Until the man marries another woman!" + +"Ah," said Natalie, with a faint smile, "then least of all, John! And +besides, Spencer never married. He knew I loved you, long before you +did! I felt that it was due to him that he should know; he was my +oldest and best friend then, and so I told him! And then he went out of +my life--out of his own--into darkness. I can't forget it! I can't +forget that I broke up your friendship"-- + +"Dearest!" + +"I did, John! It wasn't my fault, perhaps, nor any one's, for that +matter, but I did, just the same. Besides, it wasn't only the question +of your friendship. What hurt me most was the wilful wreck of his life. +And yet, how could I have known what was going to happen? What could I +do when it did happen? He was beyond my reach. He didn't even answer the +letter I wrote, asking him to come and see me. I thought, if he cared +for me, I could save him. But it was just as he had said,--he must have +everything, or he would have nothing at all. And so he went wrong--oh, +so terribly, terribly wrong!--he who might have been anything, if it +hadn't been for me. I can never forget it--never! I can never forget the +pity of it, the tragedy of its awful publicity, the newspapers, the +scandal, people's sneers, his mother dying of a broken heart--_and I did +it_! Think of it! Think of a man like Spencer Cavendish in the police +courts, not once, but a dozen times. Think of what Justice Meyer called +him at last, and what was printed in the papers,--'a common drunk!' Oh, +John!" + +"Natalie, Natalie!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "Why should you +think of such things, brood over them, above all, blame them on +yourself? How could it possibly have been your fault? how could you +possibly have helped it? He was a reckless, hot-headed chap--brilliant, +of course, but a slave to his impulses and his nerves. If Lochinvars +could act with impunity nowadays, he'd have ridden up to your door on a +black horse, killed Thomas, and carried you off across his pommel. As it +was, he let himself go, and disgraced himself. I tried to talk to him, +just as you did, but he wouldn't have it--called me 'an insolent cub' +and--er--worse. I had to give it up. It was all very distressing, I +admit, but then, dear, it was all so long ago. He hasn't been in Kenton +City for two years and more, and I've no doubt he pulled himself +together long since, and is leading a straight life somewhere. He had +lots in him, with all his recklessness. A chap like that, with no family +hanging about his neck, and with his brains, and only his own living to +make, could forge ahead almost anywhere." + +"But John, I'm _sure_ I saw him to-day, and suppose I should tell you +that he was--begging?" + +Barclay almost smiled at her earnest, troubled face, as he replaced his +cup on the table. + +"Begging?" he answered. "I'm afraid I couldn't bring myself to believe +you, violet-eyes. Even granting that he has fallen as low as that, which +I should think one of the most unlikely things in the world, it would +hardly be in Kenton City, would it?--a place where his face is known to +a thousand people. Tell me about it. What makes you think you saw him?" + +"I was shopping this morning," said Natalie, "all alone; and as I came +out of Kendrick's and was just about to get into the brougham, I saw +that some one was holding the door open for me. I looked up carelessly, +as one naturally would under the circumstances, and, John--I know it was +he! At first I thought so, and then I didn't, because he was so changed, +so thin and pale, and because he had a beard. So, before I thought what +I was doing, I stepped into the brougham, and put my hand on the door to +close it. Then I looked up again, and saw his face, peering in at me +through the glass, and that time there couldn't be any mistake. It +_was_! I was going to speak, but he was gone in a flash. I saw him +disappearing in the crowd before the shop--_slinking_, John!--with that +dreadfully pathetic air which all beggars have, his shoulders all +hunched up, and his head bent, and his hands in his pockets. He was +cold, John, I could see that, and, no doubt, hungry! And there I was, in +that dreadful little brougham, with my hateful furs, as warm as toast, +and I didn't even speak to him. I could have died of shame!" + +She buried her face in her hands, bending low over the tea-table. +Barclay was leaning forward in his chair, his lips set. + +"It's impossible," he murmured, "impossible!" + +The girl looked up suddenly, a white spot in the centre of each cheek, +where the pressure of her thumbs had left its mark in the tender, pink +flesh. + +"Improbable--yes!" she said, "but not impossible. Oh, I wish I could +believe otherwise, but I'm sure, I'm sure! Oh, John! You are so big, so +strong, so powerful now! Think of it--Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia! +You can do anything. And if he _is_ here in Kenton City, homeless, cold, +starving, you must find and help him--for me, Johnny boy, for me!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor had risen, and was pacing up and down the room, +with his brows knit, and his strong, white hands chafing slowly against +each other, palm to palm. It seemed impossible, indeed! Spencer +Cavendish, the last of one of Alleghenia's proudest families; Spencer +Cavendish, the brilliant young society pet and sportsman; Spencer +Cavendish, the wit, the _viveur_--a beggar in the street? And yet-- + +The scandal of Cavendish's sudden and reckless plunge into sodden, open +dissipation, two years before, freshly called to Barclay's mind by +Natalie's words, had pointed to almost any finale, however debased, +however sordid. Barclay mentally invoked the face of his former friend, +as he had seen it on the occasion of their last meeting, flushed, +swollen-eyed, insolent, the fine patrician mouth hideously contorted and +maundering insults, filth, banality. + +"And I did it!" the girl was saying. "Don't forget that, John. +Unwittingly, ignorantly, helplessly, if you will, I did it, just the +same. If I could have loved him, I could have saved him. As it was, I +had to send him away, and he has come to--to this! Oh, don't you see? +Don't you understand that something more than chance has crossed my path +with his, just at this moment of my supremest happiness, and of his +utter degradation? My duty is plain. It is to help him, to uplift him, +to make a man of him once more--to undo what I have done! I'm +responsible--and I'm helpless! What can I do? What can any girl do in +such a case? I can't go out into the streets and search for him. I can +only turn to you, Johnny boy, and rely upon your aid." + +"But, Natalie dearest," said the Lieutenant-Governor slowly, "don't you +see that it is impossible, all this? I cannot allow such an affair to +come into your pure, sweet life, bringing with it the knowledge of the +depths to which men may fall, and the shadow of misery and degradation. +I cannot bear that, in even the remotest way, you should blame yourself +for that which it was never in your power to prevent or remedy. A +man--this man--has no business to cast on you the blight of his own +weakness and folly, to establish a relation of cause and effect between +your refusal of him and the subsequent transformation of a gentleman +into a common drunkard." + +"John!" + +"Ah, don't think me bitter, dearest! If the man you saw was actually +Cavendish, I pity him from the bottom of my heart. But it was his hands +which built up the barrier between his life and ours, and it must be his +that tear it down. It is intolerable that in his degradation he should +come into your life again, and have, even in your imagination, the +smallest claim upon you--intolerable! The paths of my love for you and +my duty toward you are identical in this respect. There can be no +alternative--no quibbling. At least until he has redeemed himself, if +redemption is still possible, the thought of him, his presence, his +misdoings, must not and shall not contaminate the atmosphere in which +you live and move." + +Natalie had risen suddenly, her eyes ablaze. + +"Ah, John!" she said. "Am I then a toy, a sugar figure, that I must be +packed in cotton, and shielded from all knowledge of the evil in the +world? Is that what it means to be a woman? Ah, _no_! It is bad enough +to be hemmed in by the wretched conventionalities which prevent my doing +openly what I conceive to be my duty, without adding to the restrictions +that actually exist the imaginary one that I must not even think of the +misery, the wretchedness, the sordid vice which abound just across the +borders of the comfortable little world in which I live. And see, boy +dear!--with all the force of my conviction that things should be +otherwise, yet I am reasonable. I don't ask to see Spencer, or to have +an active hand in his redemption. I realize that the time for that has +passed, and that you are just in saying that he must come to me, not I +to him--and come to me another than the man he is to-day. Anything else +is impossible: that I see and accept. But the hideous fact remains. A +man who loved me once, who offered me all that a man can offer a woman, +is walking the streets of Kenton City, cold, hungry, homeless--a +beggar! What business is it of yours or mine what his past follies and +weaknesses were? His temptations may have been beyond our understanding, +but his present plight is not. He is begging--begging at our very +doors--a man whom we have called by the name of friend! I can't help +him. All I can do, as I said before, is to turn to you, whom I love +better than all the world, and ask you to save him, in my stead. Ah, +boy, boy!--I've given you all I refused to him, taken at your hands all +I put away at his. You can afford to be generous!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor came slowly toward her, and, placing his hands +upon her shoulders, looked her in the eyes. + +"Dearest and Most Beautiful," he said tenderly, "you are right. I +hope--I believe--that you were overwrought, fanciful, that it is not +true. But if it is, if Cavendish is begging in our streets, then, so +surely as I am Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, I will pull him out of +them, and make a man of him, if it takes a month and every police +officer and detective in Kenton City to find him. And that not alone for +your sake, tenderest-hearted, but for mine. I _can_ afford to be +generous, God bless your sweet face, I can indeed!" + +And he bent over reverently, and kissed her hand. + + + + +IV + +AS BETWEEN FRIENDS + + +There were but two guests at the Rathbawnes' dinner-table that night, +the Lieutenant-Governor and Colonel Amos Broadcastle, a veteran of the +Rebellion, brevetted Major for conspicuous gallantry at Lookout +Mountain, and now commanding officer of the Ninth Regiment, N. G. A., +the crack militia organization of Kenton City. Colonel Broadcastle had +seen his sixty-five, but his broad, square shoulders, his rigid +carriage, and his black hair, even now only slightly touched with gray, +clipped twenty years from his appearance. His eye was one that was +famous throughout the Alleghenia Guard,--an eye accustomed to control, +not a single man, or two, or three, but a thousand, moving as one at his +command; an eye enforcing obedience immediate, machine-like, and +unquestioning. + +It had been a momentous day for the Ninth when Amos Broadcastle, +retiring from the staff of a former Governor, had accepted, first a +majority therein, and then, three months later, its colonelcy. He found +ten companies, in no one instance exceeding twenty files front. He found +a field and staff vain, incompetent, and jealous; company officers +deficient alike in their knowledge of tactics and in their conception of +their responsibilities; sergeants, corporals, and lances chosen without +any view to fitness, and ignorant and tyrannical in their positions; and +finally, the rank and file lazy, untidy, and frankly contemptuous of the +school of the soldier. Some one had once said of the Ninth that there +was consolation to be found in the mortifying knowledge that the men +composing it were there with the unique view of escaping jury duty. The +consolation lay in the probability that such infernally bad soldiers +would have made jurors quite as infernally bad. + +But Broadcastle, a born disciplinarian and a trained tactician, was now +in a position to echo, albeit in a different spirit, the arrogance of +Louis: "_Nous avons changé tout cela!_" Ten years had sufficed to change +the indolent and incompetent Ninth of Alleghenia into a regiment +rivaling in prestige the Seventh of New York. The commissioned officers +were thrust upon, rather than achieved by, their companies, but, once +established in their respective positions, proceeded without exception +to justify, by their energy and ability, their selection from the best +element of Kenton City. Among the enlisted men the exponents of the old +spirit of sloth, indifference, and laxity were weeded out as fast as +their terms of service expired, and their places filled from the same +sources whence the company officers were drawn. Colonel Broadcastle was +a diplomat as well as a disciplinarian. By some unknowable system of +suggestion and example it came, little by little, to be regarded in +Kenton City as "the thing" to belong to the Ninth. Before the capital +was aware of the transformation, every company roster read 103, the +field and staff had been reorganized and perfected, and the Ninth +Regiment, N. G. A., was what it remained thereafter: a magnificent +fighting machine, ably drilled, perfectly equipped, a credit to the +state, to the credit of which there stood so little else. The +declaration of war with Spain brought it suddenly into prominence by the +astonishing readiness with which it went into camp twenty hours after +the Adjutant-General of Alleghenia published the President's call for +volunteers; and although it never saw active service, it attracted at +Chickamauga, and later at Tampa, the admiring attention of the regular +army, and was spoken of as the most perfect body among the volunteer +forces. + +The citizens of Kenton City were not accustomed to discovering things in +which they could take pride. The exact contrary was more apt to be the +case. When, therefore, they discovered the rehabilitated Ninth, and its +redeemer in the person of its commanding officer, they had a deal to +say, and said it with unexampled arrogance and satisfaction. +Thenceforward, Alleghenia meant much to Colonel Broadcastle, and +Colonel Broadcastle considerably more than much to Alleghenia. + +Something of all this went through the Lieutenant-Governor's mind during +the progress of the dinner. He sat at Mrs. Rathbawne's right, than which +nothing in the world could have been more cheerless, unless it was +sitting at Mrs. Rathbawne's left. But the good lady's habitual +complacency was plainly in abeyance, her customary volubility replaced +by a fidgety reserve. The dinner, as a social achievement, was a +distinct failure, save in so far as Mrs. Wynyard and Colonel Broadcastle +were concerned. Several months before, Mrs. Wynyard had frankly +announced that she had designs upon the Colonel. Latterly, Barclay had +begun to suspect the Colonel of having designs upon Mrs. Wynyard. Thirty +and sixty-five that looked forty-five--a widow and a widower! More +wonderful things had happened. + +"If I were thirty years younger," Broadcastle was saying even now, as he +did full justice to the celery mayonnaise, "I should say we were made +for each other." + +"Since two single people may be made for each other," laughed Mrs. +Wynyard, "I wonder if two married people can't be unmade for each other. +Perhaps that is just what has happened to us!" + +"I'll think that over," replied the Colonel with mock gravity. "I don't +want to commit myself on so serious a hypothesis, without due +reflection." + +They were the only ones who were thoroughly at ease. Barclay and +Natalie, unstrung by the events of the day, ate little and talked +listlessly. Dorothy, victim to an inward excitement which was half +happiness and half disappointment, chattered feverishly. Rathbawne was +wrapped in his own thoughts, and his wife, innocently unobservant of +emotional manifestations in any and every other, but pathetically +sensitive to the slightest evidence of mental perturbation in this +stern, kind man, between herself and whom existed a devotion dog-like in +its silence and intensity, watched his clouded face with an anxiety +which she made no effort to conceal. The dinner dragged hopelessly, +until she shook herself into a bewildered realization that it was over, +folded her napkin scrupulously, dusted a few crumbs from the black-satin +slope of her obsolete lap, and, followed by her daughters and Mrs. +Wynyard, left the men to their cordials and cigars. + +The latter drew their chairs nearer, as the door closed, made little +clearings in the wilderness of finger-bowls, silver, and discarded +napkins, for the accommodation of their coffee-cups and cordial glasses, +and, lighting the long Invincibles which were Rathbawne's sole +extravagance, inhaled that first matchless whiff of smoke which makes a +whole day of anxiety and vexation seem to have been worth the while. + +It is a moment apart and _sui generis_, this, and is rivaled only by +that of early morning realization that one is awake--and not obliged to +get up. It is apt to pass in silence, for a newly lit cigar is like a +newly married wife: a man is deliberately oblivious to all else. The +moment, too, is one of readjustment, of hasty mental survey of the +chatter that has passed, and of preparation for the essentially +dissimilar talk to come. With men of the mental calibre of the three +here assembled this opportunity is sacred to some of the gravest and +most vital thoughts which they exchange. Peter Rathbawne, in particular, +whenever he reviewed the paramount conversations of his life, seemed to +find their significance indissolubly fused with the fragrance of Havana +cigars and the taste of kümmel or yellow Chartreuse. + +His eyes dwelt thoughtfully upon his companions during the pause which +followed. First, on Broadcastle. He could depend upon him as he could +depend upon no other man on earth. They had fought side by side in many +a tight place in the black days of '62, and in many another, full as +tight, since then, on battlefields commercial and political. It is +doubtful whether so much as a single word of admiration or affection had +ever passed between them. It is equally doubtful whether anything could +have been more entirely superfluous than such a voicing of self-evident +sentiments. + +John Barclay, too! Peter Rathbawne, with what had been natural +shrewdness at the outset now sharpened almost to clairvoyance by his +years of dealing with a multiplicity of men and things, understood the +Lieutenant-Governor absolutely, and admired him with all the force of +his rugged nature. And Rathbawne was not given to admiring people. His +business experience had not fostered the spirit of hero-worship. He had +seen too much for that. But in the two men before him he recognized +qualities so unusual, and in many ways so similar, that he was proud to +count them friends. + +For the moment, however, as he took stock of them, he was measuring them +by a new standard, more rigid, more severe than he had hitherto had +reason to apply. It is one thing to trust a man implicitly, and another +thing entirely to try to tell him so. For silence is most golden in the +specification of friendship, and when employed in the particularizing of +intimate emotion the silver of speech is apt to turn to veriest tinsel. + +Yet the occasion was one which demanded speech. Moreover, and in direct +opposition to his inclinations and the precedents he had established, he +was forced not only to give practical expression to his feeling for +Broadcastle and Barclay, but, what humiliated as well as annoyed him, to +confess himself incapable of dealing with a question which confronted +him. It was the first time within his recollection when he had +mistrusted his own judgment. + +But Peter Rathbawne was not the man to procrastinate, and presently he +began to speak, in a low but curiously intense voice, from which the +others instinctively took their cue. He was a short man, inclined to +stoutness, but with the clear, sharp eye and the underhang of jaw which +tell of right principle and indomitable perseverance. It was a question +whether in calling him the second most obstinate man in Alleghenia, +Governor Abbott had given him the full measure of his due. + +"Gentlemen," he said, with the somewhat stilted formality which was part +of his manner, "I will say to you what I wouldn't say to others,--I'm in +a hole, and I want your advice. I'll be as brief as possible, and I'll +come right to the point. For thirty years I've been building up the +Rathbawne Mills, giving them every hour of my thought, every particle of +my strength, every atom of my ability. I've seen them grow from a little +shanty on the outskirts of Kenton City to a collection of buildings +covering four solid squares, filled with modern machinery, and employing +four thousand, two hundred and odd hands. I've been a business man, I've +been a rigid man, but I've been a fair man, too. No one can say that I +ever clipped wages, even when I had to run the mills at a loss, as I've +had to do more than once. I gave my people an eight-hour day long before +the law of Alleghenia jammed it down the throats of other mill-owners. +I swallowed the Union, though it was a bitter mouthful. There has never +been a just complaint from one of my employees that wasn't attended to +in short order, if it was in my power to do so. There's many an old +fossil on my pay-rolls to-day who isn't worth his salt, but he stays +there, and will continue to stay there, because he did his best when he +could, and it's not his fault that he's dead wood now. I've given in, +over and over again, in one way or another, sometimes against my +convictions, and oftener against my will. But one thing I've stuck to, +and that's my right to discharge a hand when I see fit, without +dictation from the Union or anybody else. In the past, this has been +comparatively easy sailing. One man, now and again, isn't a ripple on +the surface of four thousand employees. Besides, there was always a good +reason. The others saw that, and there was never a finger raised. They +believed in me, through and through, and it has been my pride to know +that they did, and that they had good cause to. But now it's different. +There has been a band of young good-for-nothings in Shop 22, who were +full, chock-a-block, of socialism, and equality, and workingmen's +rights, and God knows what-not! They've talked enough poisonous gas to +the other hands to blow up a state. They distributed pamphlets, and made +speeches, and organized clubs, and fomented discord, till I got sick and +tired of it. There wasn't one square day's work in the whole fifteen of +them put together. So, when I'd stood them as long as I could--which was +at ten o'clock yesterday morning--I discharged them all in a bunch, and +if there'd been a steep place handy, I'd have expected to see them all +run violently down it into the sea--like the other swine, in Scripture. +For if ever there was a band of devils made incarnate, it was that same +fifteen who were sowing anarchy broadcast through the Rathbawne Mills! + +"Now--what? Lo and behold, they are all henchmen and disciples of +Michael McGrath, whom we in Kenton City know to our cost, and regular +and loyal members--save the mark!--of his Union. Well, gentlemen, I've +got that Union about my ears like a nest of hornets, with McGrath at the +head, and unless those fifteen men are reinstated by noon to-morrow, my +four thousand hands will be out on strike, and the Rathbawne Mills will +be tied up as tight as a drum!" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle curtly, as the other paused. + +"That's what I meant to do--but where am I going to come out? If I +thought, for instance, that I was going to have your regiment to back me +up, Broadcastle, or even the Kenton City police, why, well and good! But +_am_ I? No, sir! _No_, sir! Not with Elijah Abbott in the Governor's +chair, I'm not! You know that as well as I. Why, Broadcastle, I'd rather +see McGrath himself at the capitol than that smooth-spoken skunk!" + +He paused to relight his cigar, and then continued. + +"The Rathbawne Mills are like the fruit of my own body to me. I love +them! I love every stone and brick of them, that I've put in place, as +it were, with my own hands. I've often thought that if they should burn +down it would come close to killing me. And yet I could watch them go +with a lighter heart, God knows, than that with which I foresee the +misery that's coming to these people of mine, who are going to starve at +the bidding of a band of black-legs, and that not even because they +think their cause a just one, but simply because they can't help +themselves. It isn't only that ruin's staring me in the face, though +there's that possibility in the situation, too, but that privation, +bitter misery, and despair are lying in wait for them. God!--what an +iniquity! + +"But I _can't_ give in, Broadcastle--I _can't_ give in, John Barclay! It +means the sacrifice of a principle I've held out for, and that I know is +right. What's more, it isn't as if I were yielding one point. It would +only be the beginning. If I give in now, I might as well turn over the +mills to McGrath at once, and let him run them according to his own +blackguardly will. You know how such things go. Give them an inch"-- + +"And they raise a hell!" put in Colonel Broadcastle. + +"Exactly! It's commercial suicide. And yet, if I _don't_ yield, I'm +precipitating disorder, and bloodshed, and the untold suffering of four +thousand souls. What am I to do?" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle, with a sharp nod of his head. + +Rathbawne turned from him to the Lieutenant-Governor, and to the latter, +knowing the man he had been, there was something indescribably +heart-rending in the sudden, irresolute trembling of his half-raised +hands, the slow shake of his head, and the pathos of his raised eyebrows +and drooping lips. + +"John," he said, "I'm an old man, and you're a young one, but I'm a +plain citizen, and you're the Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia. You +know how things stand. Now, I've given you my girl, and after that it's +not much to put myself into your hands as well. I'm getting on. My +strength isn't what it was. I'm not as fit to stand such a struggle as +this is bound to be, as I was thirty years ago. I look strong, but, in +reality, I'm not. My doctor has warned me, more than once. A sudden +shock--you know what these medical chaps say about sudden shocks! I've +laughed at him, of course, and yet--I know there is truth in it. I've +been up against hard propositions, but never one as hard as this. I've +had big responsibilities, but never a responsibility that I felt as I +feel this one. If I hold out, I know what people and the newspapers will +say,--how they'll blackguard me,--but I'm not afraid of that. I'm not +even thinking of it. No, and I'm not thinking of what the strain may +mean to me. Every man's turn is sure to come--why not one way as well as +another? But what I _am_ thinking of is the result upon the lives of +these people whom I've made, as surely as if I were another Creator. And +McGrath's another Beelzebub! There's a fight on between us for the +salvation of a little world of four thousand souls! But I'm not God! I +can't act with the conviction of omniscience. I've been the most +independent of men. I've made my own fortune with my own brains. I've +done as I saw fit, and the results have seemed to indicate that I've +been oftener right than wrong. But now, I'm at a loss. It's not the men +I'm thinking of so much. They ought to be able to make their own way, as +I've made mine. It's the women and children dependent upon them--the +women and children who have no voice in the matter, and yet who are +bound to suffer most by a strike. I've got to think for them. I've +reached a crisis--a cross-ways--and I've got to choose which course to +take--and I can't! All my experience counts for nothing. I've never--you +probably know it--asked for advice before. But now I must have the +unprejudiced, the outside point of view. I've always thought there was a +clear, unmistakable boundary between right and wrong, but now there's +some right in the wrong, and a big sight more of wrong in the right! +I've heard Broadcastle's opinion, and I want yours. If you agree, I'll +go by what you say. As I said before, John, in this matter I'm the +individual--you're the state. I'll go by what you say. What shall I do?" + +Peter Rathbawne's words had wrought tremendously upon the +Lieutenant-Governor. He answered slowly, looking down, and with a +perceptible tremor in his voice. + +"Mr. Rathbawne, you and the Colonel know how high-sounding my title is, +and how little, in reality, it means. There is no need to go into +details. I'm Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, yes!--and as helpless in +the cause of right as a new-born baby! If I could by any means, in any +manner, support the advice I gave you, I would give it willingly." + +"John!" said Peter Rathbawne, "I don't mean that. I've put the case +wrongly. Give me your counsel, not as Lieutenant-Governor, but as my +friend, and the man who loves my daughter!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor raised his eyes from the finger-tips with which, +as the other was speaking, he had been plucking at the cloth. + +"Fight them, Mr. Rathbawne," he said, "and may God help you--because I +can't!" + + + + +V + +A BRAND FROM THE BURNING + + +More heartsick than he cared to confess, even to himself, the +Lieutenant-Governor left the Rathbawnes' earlier than his wont, despite +the fact that his host and Colonel Broadcastle were still engaged in +discussing the impending situation, and that Natalie, with a batch of +new music, was waiting for him at the piano. He pleaded an unusually +busy day and his consequent fatigue as an excuse, and so, at half after +nine, found himself about to light a second cigar, on the steps of the +Rathbawne residence, and shivering a little in the night air, which +stung the inside of his nostrils and set his eyes watering. Raw as the +day had been, it had turned colder now, but the night was superbly +clear. The sky seemed to have drawn nearer to the earth, and the stars +twinkled so sharply and clearly against its deep blue-black that they +resembled in form their conventionally five-pointed counterfeits of +silver paper. A brisk wind whirled a few dried leaves in whispering +eddies across the smooth asphaltum of the driveway, but beyond this and +the peevish sputtering of the arc-light on the opposite corner there was +no sound. It was the kind of night which, with its crystal clearness and +its steely intensity, stirs the normal pulse to keen exhilaration: yet +never had John Barclay felt more hopelessly dispirited, more utterly at +a loss to see the way before him. That anxiety, distress, possibly +actual disaster should be impending over this house where lay his heart, +his happiness, and his hope, was sufficiently disturbing in itself. That +he should not be able, despite his position, to raise a hand to avert +the calamity was worse. But that the battle was to be a battle for the +right, and yet, as it seemed, foredoomed from the start to end in +disaster, since no aid could be expected from the strong arm of the law +to which the partisans of principle turn naturally for support: this +was worst of all. For out of dangerous surroundings he felt himself able +to snatch away the littlest and most lovely woman in the world. She, at +least, should not suffer. And out of this nightmare of powerless +prominence, of impotent position, he himself could retire into private +life, and be no less a man than he had been before. But from the +reproach of corruption which had fallen upon her, and the impending slur +of anarchy, who was to rescue Alleghenia? The Lieutenant-Governor set +his lips and drove his nails into his palms, as he stood in the shadow +of the Rathbawnes' doorway, looking up at the sky of the February night. +He was not a religious man--as the term goes--but in that moment he said +a better prayer for the welfare of his state than had ever lain upon the +lips of any priest in Kenton City! + +He was about to strike his match when an instinct rather than an actual +perception of movement arrested his hand. Bradbury Avenue, upon which +stood the Rathbawne house, was situated in one of the quieter residence +districts which prided itself on the turfed spaces between its +dwellings, pretentious enough for the most part, and the double rows of +trees which lined its thoroughfares. It was one of these trees which, at +the moment, attracted Barclay's attention. It lay in a direct line +between himself and the arc-light on the corner, and its trunk, in some +miraculous manner, had abruptly developed an elbow, and then an arm. The +Lieutenant-Governor was still staring at this phenomenon when it was as +abruptly explained by the sudden emergence from shadow of a man, who had +apparently been standing on the side of the tree nearest to the house. +He was crossing the avenue obliquely when something about his bearing +caused the Lieutenant-Governor to lean forward and follow him intently +with his eyes. It was all there, as Natalie had said--the lifted +shoulders, the bent head, the unmistakable, pathetic air of the beggar. +Then, as he neared the light, he gave a short upward strain to his neck +and chin, the impatient movement of a man whose collar annoys him. The +trick was too familiar to have been forgotten. The next moment Barclay's +heels were pounding on the asphaltum behind him, and then Barclay's hand +fell upon his shoulder and whirled him round. + +In the oddly intense radiance of the arc-light above, which cut sharply +across the surface of forehead, cheek, and chin, and left heavy shadows +like those in a roughly blocked-out carving, under brow, nose, and lower +lip, the two men faced each other briefly, in silence. Then the +Lieutenant-Governor voiced the other's name, hardly above a whisper. + +"Spencer Cavendish!" + +And the other, echoing the tone, if not the words, replied:-- + +"Bar-clay!" + +A square away, the lights of a hansom winked into the avenue, and the +hoof-beats of the horse clonked on the pavement, unaccompanied by any +sound from the smoothly trundling, rubber-tired wheels. Barclay stepped +to the kerb, and hailed the driver with his stick. The cab drew in, +stopped, and threw the divisions of its apron wide, like two black hands +extended in cordial welcome. + +The Lieutenant-Governor turned to his companion. + +"Get in," he said. "I want to have a talk with you." + +The drive of a mile and more from Bradbury Avenue to Barclay's quarters +in the new bachelor apartment-house "Rockingham" was accomplished +without the exchange of a word. Once, he felt his companion shiver, and +dragging a rug from under them, he spread it across their knees. That +was the only movement on the part of either. They sat, side by side, +looking straight before them over the horse's bobbing crupper, until the +hansom pulled up sharply before the broad and brilliantly illuminated +entrance of the "Rockingham." As they passed in, Cavendish had a passing +impression of tiled floors, columns of green marble, and attendants in +tightly fitting green uniforms with brass buttons. Then an elevator +whirled them up to the eighth floor, deposited them in a square hallway, +and vanished again, with the little page in charge wrinkling his nose +and biting the thumb of his cotton glove. + +"Wot's the Loot'nt-Guvnor up to now, Sawed-Off?" inquired the doorkeeper +genially, as the elevator returned to the ground floor. + +"Ide'no!" replied the little page with equal affability. "Goin' in fer +pol'tics, I guest. Jeest! Wot a slob it wuz--wot?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor unlocked the door of his apartment, touched an +electric button which flooded the little hall and the drawing-room +beyond with light, and, entering the latter, went directly to a closet +in the wall. Unlocking this, he took out a jar of biscuits and a +decanter, and setting them upon the table, turned once more to his +companion. + +"Put away a couple of those biscuits and a glass of sherry," he said, +"and then we'll talk." + +"I'm past biscuits," said the other, almost sullenly. + +"I'll see to that," replied Barclay. "They are only by way of a +starter." + +He passed into the hall as he spoke, and presently Cavendish heard the +click of a telephone receiver slipping from its crotch, and Barclay's +voice speaking, to some one below, of a steak, vegetables, salad, and +coffee. He stepped to the table, devoured two or three of the biscuits +ravenously, poured himself a glass of sherry, sipped, and then swallowed +it, and flung himself down upon a wide divan. + +"Have you a cigarette?" he asked, as Barclay reëntered. "I haven't +smoked in three days. That's worse than mere hunger, you know." + +"I believe you!" + +Barclay pushed a silver box across the table, and seating himself +opposite, touched a match to the cigar which he had been about to light +at the Rathbawnes' door, and which he still held between his lips. + +"Help yourself," he added. "Your supper will be up presently. Meanwhile, +shall I fire away, or will you?" + +Cavendish let the first smoke from his cigarette curl slowly up his +cheek before replying. In the full light now first resting upon it, his +face showed as that of a man approximately Barclay's age, but pinched by +want, and deeply lined by dissipation. His under lids were puffy and +discolored, and a dozen heavy creases ran, fan-like, from the corners of +his eyes. Hair already turning white and an unkempt mustache and beard +completed the picture. His clothes were faded and frayed, no linen was +visible, and his boots were cracked and soggy. There was nothing about +him to suggest the former estate of gentleman save his hands, which, +while thin and tremulous, were clean and well-kept, in singular contrast +to the slovenliness of his attire. + +"Age before respectability," he said in reply to Barclay's question, +with a shrug. "I'll go first. It will save your asking questions. We +parted in anger, Barclay." + +"Let that pass," put in the Lieutenant-Governor, briefly. "Two years +wipe out all scores as petty as was the cause of our quarrel." + +"Well, then," continued Cavendish more easily, "when I left Kenton City, +it was with the best intention in the world of making a fresh start in +some place where my story wasn't known. I went to New York. I had a +little money, but only a very little, and not the most remote idea of +how difficult it is for a man to make his way in a place where he is +unknown, particularly if he has no credentials and is too proud to ask +for any from his old associates. Moreover, I'd been drinking hard for +six months and there was no such thing as clipping it short all at once. +I had an idea of tapering off, and perhaps, if I had found a job, I +might have done so. As it was I climbed up one step and fell down two, +and that went on indefinitely. It wasn't as if I'd had a distinct aim or +anything in my life which made it seem worth living. I didn't half care. +I'd set my heart on something which I couldn't get, and--well, never +mind that. It is all as long ago as the Flood! I got work now and again, +tried reporting, and teaching, and copying. But each time it was a grade +lower, and I stuck to nothing but the whiskey--except when I had a +little more money than usual, and then it was absinthe." + +He touched his eyes, and then raised his hand to the level of his chin, +with the fingers held wide apart and rigid, and watched it tremble for +an instant in silence. + +"I haven't seen a mirror in weeks," he went on, "but I know the signs +are all there. That's the story. I could string it out for an hour, but +it would all be in the same key. I've simply been going down, down, +down. I'm what the old judge called me--do you remember it came out in +the 'Record?'--I'm a common drunk, Barclay. And I don't care! I've been +on the point of putting an end to it many a time--but I always held out +for another drink! Now, even my pride's gone. It stuck to me longer than +anything else, but it's taken itself off at last. I've been feeling +lately that I'm pretty near the end, and I wanted to see Kenton City +again before it came. That's the reason I walked all the way from +Pittsburg, and I've been begging on the streets since I got in. I +thought nobody would recognize me." + +"But _I_ did," said Barclay. + +"Yes, and--and"-- + +"Yes, and _she_ did! She saw you this morning, but before she took in +fully that it was you, you were gone in the crowd. She was half +heart-broken over it, and made me promise to look you up. I was going to +do so, when I tumbled against you by chance to-night. You were watching +the house?" + +"Yes, for the last time. I saw she had recognized me and that Kenton +City was no place for me. So I was off again to-night. Is she"-- + +"She is well, and, I am glad to say, happy. We are to be married in the +autumn." + +A smile hovered for an instant on Cavendish's lips. + +"God bless her!" he said slowly. "I'm glad of it. But don't let's talk +of that. She's as far above me as the stars!" + +"And as far above me, too, for that matter!" answered Barclay. "Here's +your supper. While you're eating, I'll take my turn at the talk." + +A bell-boy arranged the tray on the table, removed the covers, and in a +moment the two men were again alone. With a deep sigh of satisfaction +Cavendish drew a chair to the table and set to work on the steaming +dishes before him. + +"Jupiter!" he said, with the first mouthful poised on his fork, "you +don't know what this means, Barclay, and you can thank God you don't. I +won't attempt to thank you. Go on, and tell me about yourself." + +"I've no intention of doing that just at present," replied the +Lieutenant-Governor, settling himself more comfortably in his chair. "I +want to talk about you. Don't be afraid. I'm not going to preach! But I +_am_ going to say that while I understand a good deal of what you've +said, the last part is pure rot! You're a bit of a wreck, of course, but +it isn't your pride or your self-respect or whatever you choose to call +it, that's gone. It's only your nerve. Now you've had your experience, +and you're back where you belong, and you've friends who like you, and +who can help you, and who will. I'm in a position to do so myself, and I +don't expect you to make any bones about accepting my assistance, and +whatever money you need for the moment. It will be a loan, of course, to +be repaid when you're on your feet again. We'll have you there in no +time. When you've made way with the grub, you can bunk down on that +divan for the night, and in the morning I'll tog you out in one of my +outfits, and you can set about getting back on _terra firma_. You'll +have to shake the drink, that goes without saying." + +Cavendish straightened himself suddenly, laid down his knife and fork, +and laughed shortly. + +"It sounds well," he said bitterly, "but you don't understand, Barclay. +It's too late! I don't care, and if I did, I couldn't shake the drink to +save my immortal soul. I'm steady enough for the time being, because I'm +hungry and because I'm being fed. But I've tried the other game too +often. I know what it means. I wouldn't promise you to quit, because I +don't want to lie to you, and that's all it would be. When the craving +comes back, I'll go down before it like a row of tenpins. No, Barclay, +it won't do." + +"Nonsense, man! Do you want to tell me you're as weak as that?" + +"Every bit!" said Cavendish, attacking the steak again. + +"Well, I don't believe it, that's all. In the morning you'll be a +different man. I'll give you a bromide when you're ready for bed. You're +shaky, as it is, but that's all a matter of nerves. Now we'll drop the +subject, and talk of other things." + +It was midnight when they separated. Barclay brought out sheets and +blankets for the divan, produced pajamas for his guest, put the bath at +his disposal, and mixed a strong dose of bromide for him to take upon +retiring. + +Half an hour later, when he reëntered the drawing-room to see whether +Cavendish was in need of anything further, he found him standing by the +table in his pajamas, trembling, wide-eyed, and very pale. + +"What is it?" he asked. "Are you ill?" + +"No," answered Cavendish, striving in vain to control the trembling of +his lips, "only damnably nervous. Could you--could you give me a drop of +brandy, Barclay?" + +"Certainly not!" said the Lieutenant-Governor. "Pull yourself together, +man! There's your bromide. Take that. It's better than a thousand +brandies." + +Cavendish turned, lifted the glass, spilling a little as he did so, and +swallowed the sedative at a gulp. Then he stretched himself upon the +divan and drew the covers close up about his chin. Presently, from the +bedroom, Barclay heard him breathing deeply and regularly, and turning +on his side, fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep. + +He awoke with a start, as the dawn was showing gray through the chinks +of his window curtains, with a vague, uneasy sense of something wrong, +and lay listening, every nerve strained taut. From the adjoining room +came the sound of Cavendish's breathing, but now it was more raucous, +more like groan following groan. The Lieutenant-Governor strove in vain +to put off the foreboding which lay heavy upon him, until, finally, +unable to resist the impulse, he rose, slid his feet into his slippers, +and going noiselessly into the drawing-room, stepped to the windows and +put the curtains softly aside. What first met his eye as he turned was +the door of his little wine-closet in the wall. It was standing wide +open, and about the lock the wood was hacked and hewed away in great +splinters. On a chair near by lay a rough knife with the blade open and +a sliver of wood yet sticking to the point. Then he looked toward the +divan. Cavendish was lying face down upon it, outside the blankets, +with his head lolling sharply over the edge. His left arm was extended +full length toward the ground, where his fingers just touched a bottle +of French absinthe, overturned upon its side, and uncorked, with the +thick, gummy liquid spread from its mouth in a circular pool on the +waxed floor. + + + + +VI + +McGRATH LAUGHS + + +The clock on the huge central tower of the Capitol marked nine, as the +Lieutenant-Governor passed rapidly through the lofty entrance hall +toward the corridor leading to his office and that of Governor Abbott. +Already his promptness was proverbial, and there were those in the +great, grim building who looked forward to the moment of his arrival, +each morning, with a kind of eagerness. These were the simpler folk of +the official world with which circumstance housed him for eight hours +daily,--bootblacks, elevator-boys, porters, doormen. For to the big, +clean, wholesome personality which appeals irresistibly to these humbler +people, Barclay added an astonishing memory for faces, and for the names +and circumstances connected with them. It was a gift which counted as an +unspeakably important factor in the establishment and maintenance of +unusually cordial relations with all those with whom he came in contact. +No one brought within the radius of his personal magnetism long resisted +it. It was only those who judged him from a distance, as did the press +and the rank and file of his party, or those who deliberately +misinterpreted him, as did his political enemies, who permitted +themselves anything short of enthusiasm for John Barclay. And this +faculty for attracting admiration and commanding respect, this +infallible kindness and this inherent dignity, were never made manifest +to so great advantage as in his attitude toward his inferiors. These +adored him. He accumulated, bit by bit, a remarkable store of intimate +information relating to them, and employed it in his intercourse with +them, with a tact and a frank sincerity of interest which never failed +of their effect. The response thus elicited was strongest of the minor +pleasures in his life. He was aware--none better--of the shrewdness +native to those who have no claim upon one's recognition, their +appreciation of notice that is unfeignedly interested, their +sensitiveness to open indifference, their resentment of the simulated +consideration which is mere impertinence; and he was conscious of a +little inward thrill of satisfaction at the difference of attitude in +the employees at the Capitol as toward Governor Abbott and himself. +Where the former's suavity elicited only formal respect, manifestly +obligatory, his own whole-heartedness lined his way with smiles and +kindly greetings. His official existence, beset with annoyance, +mortification, and disappointment, was, as he often reflected, made +tolerable only by this friendliness which he, almost unconsciously, +inspired. Dogs, children, and his subordinates--the three most +intuitively critical classes of beings--were all his friends. The +pathway to and from the daily routine, which he was coming to regard as +moral martyrdom, was a pathway illumined with sunlight and strewn with +flowers! + +As the Lieutenant-Governor passed through his ante-room, with a wink at +the boy, a nod to the stenographer, and a word of greeting to his +private secretary, and entered his office, he was surprised to find the +communicating door open, and to hear the sound of a vaguely familiar +voice in the Governor's room beyond. In an effort to place the speaker, +he hesitated briefly before advancing to a point which would bring him +within range of the Governor's eye. Almost immediately, the memory of +the convention rushed over him, and he recognized the voice as that of +Michael McGrath. + +"And it won't be a strike like other strikes," he was saying, "not so +long as I'm running it, that is. It's going to mean business from the +word go! There's been too much shilly-shallying in the strikes I've +known anything about, too much talk, and too much wasting of Union +funds. You know what I mean. It isn't enough to tie up a mill, and then +hang around on street-corners for two months, waiting for the other side +to give in. The only place to hit a man like Rathbawne is in his pocket, +and by that I don't mean simply cutting off his income, but chopping +into his capital as well. He's got to understand"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor walked over to his desk, laid his hat and stick +on a chair, and, before removing his overcoat, began turning over the +pile of letters which awaited his attention. As he did so, Governor +Abbott's voice broke in suavely upon the other's. + +"I deprecate any resort to violence," he said. "You must proceed with +discretion if you expect the state to maintain an attitude of +neutrality. Otherwise, the police or the militia"-- + +"Oh, to hell with the police and the militia!" broke in McGrath +impatiently. "What's the use"-- + +"There is the Lieutenant-Governor now," interrupted the other. "Perhaps +he has some news for us. Mr. Barclay, will you kindly step in here for a +moment?" + +McGrath was standing on the opposite side of the Governor's table as +Barclay entered the room. He acknowledged the latter's curt nod with an +ironical bow, slipped his hands into the pockets of his checked +trousers, and stood waiting, with his square head thrust forward, for +what was to follow. + +"Mr. McGrath has called," continued the Governor, "to explain the +attitude of the Union in the impending strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +I've been telling him of our conversation of yesterday afternoon, and +that, as you were to see Mr. Rathbawne last night, you would probably +have something to tell us in regard to his position. Were you able to +persuade him to a more reasonable view of the situation?" + +"I have nothing to add, sir, to what I said yesterday," replied Barclay. +"I told you then that I had no intention of endeavoring to influence Mr. +Rathbawne's judgment." + +"He spoke to you about it?" + +"Yes." + +"And asked your advice?" + +"He did." + +"And you replied?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor flushed. + +"I beg to suggest, sir," he answered, "that this is hardly the time for +me to commit myself as to that. I conceive it to be a matter of official +privacy. Mr. McGrath"-- + +"You have my authority to speak, Mr. Barclay," said the Governor. +"Indeed, I desire it. Since one side knows your views, there is no +reason why the other should not be informed as well. Mr. McGrath is the +president of the Union. It is best that he should know the attitude of +the state authorities in this controversy." + +"I am not in a position to question your wishes, sir. You should know +best." + +"One cannot pretend to be infallible, Mr. Barclay," answered the +Governor, rubbing his hands. "One can only do what seems to be right and +proper under the circumstances. By our conversation of yesterday, I in a +measure put the negotiations with Mr. Rathbawne into your hands." + +"It is a task I did not seek, sir. Pardon me if I say that it is also +one which I should hardly have accepted, had I been aware that in +speaking as you did you were actually asking me to assume it. Mr. +Rathbawne is my friend, and, moreover, my personal convictions"-- + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"There can be no question of friendship or of personal conviction, Mr. +Barclay, in the case of a duty imposed upon a state official. I realize +that what you--or I, for that matter--must do in the performance of our +obligations, is oftentimes disagreeable, oftentimes at variance with our +wishes. But that is unavoidable." + +Barclay moved uneasily. The intrusion of this pedantry, so conspicuously +insincere, with its implied rebuke, chafed him unspeakably, in view of +the presence of McGrath. The Governor had adopted the tone, half +authoritative, half reproachful, of a teacher reproving a refractory +child. + +"My time, as you must know, is inadequate to the demands made upon it. I +am forced, on occasions, to turn more or less important matters over to +others. To whom more naturally than to you, Mr. Barclay?" + +"May I suggest, sir, that there can be no profit in prolonging this +discussion? I appreciate the position perfectly, and I am quite prepared +to state what I know of Mr. Rathbawne's attitude toward the demands of +the Union." + +"Ah," said the Governor, "that is as it should be, and as satisfactory +as possible. Let me remind you, Mr. Barclay, that it was not I, but +yourself, who introduced this digression." + +He turned to the president of the Union. + +"You will understand from what I have said, Mr. McGrath," he added, +"both to the Lieutenant-Governor and to you, that in the matter of the +proposed strike, he is, to all intents and purposes, acting in my stead. +He was in a position to approach Mr. Rathbawne, and I was not. Now, Mr. +Barclay, if you please"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor straightened himself instinctively, as, for the +first time, he addressed himself to the agitator. + +"Mr. McGrath," he said, "my confidence in Mr. Rathbawne's fairness and +integrity would have led me to approve any course which he might have +seen fit to take. As you have already heard me say, I had absolutely no +intention of endeavoring to influence his judgment. Greatly to my +surprise, Mr. Rathbawne himself consulted me in the matter, without any +suggestion on my part, and asked for my advice." + +"That's fortunate," put in McGrath, "very fortunate. You've been able to +sidetrack a lot of trouble." + +Barclay's eyes hardened at the hypocrisy of the sneer. + +"I have pleasure in informing you," he continued, "that, in reply, I +advised him to fight the Union in the present dispute to the utmost of +his means and ability. I should have counseled him further to hold out +until he had spent his last cent and shed his last drop of blood, except +that, knowing him as I do, I conceived such a recommendation to be +wholly superfluous. Mr. Rathbawne has his character and his record +behind him. There is about as much chance of his yielding you an inch of +ground as if he were standing with his back against the Capitol!" + +McGrath shrugged his shoulders. + +"It's a damned funny way you have of not influencing people's judgment," +he said. + +"I mis-stated my attitude in saying that," retorted the +Lieutenant-Governor coolly. "I should have said, what, after all, is +self-evident, that I had no intention of trying to influence Mr. +Rathbawne in favor of the Union, at least so long as it is acting under +your dictation. Its present character is well known--almost as well +known as yours, in fact--and I believe its position in this matter to be +entirely untenable, unjustifiable, and iniquitous. I may add that if it +is, indeed, Governor Abbott's resolve that I am to deal, in his stead, +with the question of your proposed strike, you may confidently rely upon +having to put the entire state force of Alleghenia out of business +before you can even so much as begin to bully Peter Rathbawne into +submission!" + +"If that's your opinion of the Union," said McGrath sullenly, "it might +be interesting to hear your opinion of me." + +"You are perfectly welcome to it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor +easily. "I consider you an unmitigated blackguard!" + +Governor Abbott tipped back his chair and looked at McGrath. + +"That's pretty plain talk," he said. "You see how it is, Mr. McGrath. +You'll have to go ahead on your own responsibility, and you mustn't be +surprised if the State steps in at the first evidence of disorder." + +McGrath rose, flecked some specks of dust from his waistcoat, and walked +toward the door without a word. On the threshold he turned, looked from +the Governor to the Lieutenant-Governor, and back again, and laughed. +Then he went out, closing the door softly behind him. + +At the Rathbawne Mills it was usual for a huge whistle to give one long +blast at noon as a signal for the lunch hour. On that day, however, +following McGrath's instructions, the single blast was replaced by five +short ones in rapid succession, and three minutes later the employees +were pouring through half a dozen gates into the streets surrounding the +mills, in laughing, chattering, excited streams. + +A majority of the men went directly to a hall in the neighborhood where +McGrath had called a mass-meeting for half-past twelve. A minority of +them crowded into the saloons of the vicinity, where they pounded on the +bars, and filled the close, smoke-grayed air with heated discussion. +Several of the discharged hands were in evidence, each surrounded by an +attentive group, and expounding more or less inflammatory views. The +women gathered in gossiping throngs on the sidewalks, laughing, and +pulling each other about by the arms. The boys played ball and leap-frog +in the streets, shouting, and whistling through their fingers. In brief, +the great strike was on, but, for the time being, it was masquerading +in the guise of a public holiday. + +At one o'clock the whistle blew again, and a thousand voices whooped a +derisive accompaniment, but no one of the throng in the streets made a +move toward the mills. Half an hour later, watchmen swung to and bolted +the gates, and, issuing presently from a small side entrance, in +company, were received with cheers, handshakes, and slaps upon the back. +Then the crowd gradually thinned,--many going to the already well-filled +hall where McGrath was delivering an address, and others to their +homes,--and a silence descended upon the neighborhood, broken only by +the voices of the men about the saloon doorways. + +At two, Peter Rathbawne, attended by his private secretary, came out of +the side entrance and walked slowly away in the direction of his home. +He held his head high, and his eyes straight to the front, and paid no +attention to the respectful greetings of those of the strikers who +saluted him, touching their hats. There were many among them whose +hearts sank at this attitude in a man who had made it his boast that he +knew every hand in his mills by sight, and who, in the past, had had a +nod or a friendly word for each and all of them. For the first time a +premonition settled upon them of what this strike, which had been +welcomed principally for novelty's sake, might mean. It was the first +the Rathbawne Mills had ever known. Some of those who saw the face of +Peter Rathbawne that afternoon were already hoping that it might be the +last. + +The Lieutenant-Governor returned to his apartment for lunch. Cavendish +was still sleeping as he had left him, with a stalwart negro porter, +summoned from the Capitol by telephone early that morning, watching in a +chair. Under Barclay's orders, a carpenter had already removed the +splintered door of the wine-closet, and an upholsterer had replaced it +by a slender brass rod from which swung a velvet curtain. With his own +hands the Lieutenant-Governor had taken away the fallen bottle, mopped +up the pool of absinthe, and put the room to rights. Now he dismissed +the negro, took from his pocket a little box of strychnine tablets, +obtained from his physician on his way from the Capitol, and, after a +brief survey of his surroundings to see that all was in order, went over +to the divan and shook the sleeping man by the shoulders. + +"Come, lazy-bones!" he said, with a laugh. "You've slept over twelve +hours. That will do--even for a nervous wreck." + +Cavendish opened his swollen eyes slowly, looked at him, and then closed +them again with a murmured "Oh, God!" which was like a groan. + +To this the Lieutenant-Governor paid no heed. Passing into the bathroom, +he turned on the cold water in the tub, poured a half glass of vichy +from a syphon, and then returned, carrying the tumbler in his hand. +Cavendish had raised himself on one elbow, and was looking stupidly +about the room. + +"Here you are," said Barclay cheerfully. "Stow this pill, and here's +vichy to wash it down. Your bath's running. By the time you've had it, +there'll be some clothes ready for you." + +Cavendish gulped down the tablet, and sat upright. + +"Last night"--he faltered. + +For the first time in his life, the Lieutenant-Governor called him by +his first name. + +"Last night, Spencer," he said, looking him fairly in the eye, "belongs +to the past, and is taboo. I won't hear a word about it. This is to-day. +Get up, and we'll set about putting wrong right. You're a man again. +Don't forget that. And I'm your friend. Don't forget that, either." + +His hand rested for an instant on the other's shoulder with a firm +pressure, and then he passed into his bedroom and shut the door. + +They had lunch together in the dining-room of the "Rockingham," and then +went up again to Barclay's rooms. At the door, Cavendish came to a halt. + +"I can't stand this," he said. + +"You'll have to," replied the Lieutenant-Governor, "so shut up!" + +"You've made a change," said Cavendish obstinately, pointing to the +curtained cupboard. + +Barclay's eyes did not follow the gesture. + +"So have you!" he answered. "Now, look here. There are twenty dollars in +the waistcoat of that suit, and a letter to Payson of the 'Kenton City +Sentinel.' Go down and see him this afternoon, and I think he'll give +you a job at reporting, which will fix you up for the present. In +another pocket you'll find a box, with three tablets like the one you +had before lunch. Take one of them every two hours. In still another +pocket there's a key to these rooms. I'm going to be busy till about ten +o'clock, so you'll have to shift for yourself. Make yourself at home, +and if you're awake I'll see you when I come in." + +Taking him suddenly by the shoulders, he twisted him about, facing the +chimney piece, on which stood a photograph of Natalie Rathbawne, smiling +out of a silver frame. + +"I'll leave you to talk it out with her," he added simply. + +In the hall, as he passed out, he caught a reflection of Cavendish in a +mirror. His hands were resting on the mantel-edge, and he was leaning +forward with his haggard face close to the photograph. Barclay looked at +his watch. + +"Two o'clock," he said to himself, "and all's well!" + + + + +VII + +THE MIRAGE OF POWER + + +Barclay was conscious of a feeling of exhilaration such as he had not +known for many weeks, as he swung into Bradbury Avenue late that +afternoon on his way to the Rathbawne residence. The duties of the day +had been inordinately petty and vexatious, but he had dispatched them +one and all with something approaching enthusiasm,--a touch of the old +Quixotic energy with which he had taken office. The morning conversation +in Governor Abbott's room had braced and toned him. He forgot its +inauspicious opening, and even his distress at the attempt to force him +into the position of mediator between Peter Rathbawne and the Union, in +the solid satisfaction of having been able to speak his mind to McGrath, +and call that worthy a blackguard to his face. He was a man who +despised a quarrel, but, for its own sake, loved a square, hard fight. + +Back, however, of this somewhat inadequate excuse for cheerfulness lay +the Governor's assurance that in the matter of the strike his lieutenant +was to have free rein. It was the first time since the beginning of +their official association that Elijah Abbott had placed an actual +responsibility in Barclay's hands. A corner-stone laying, a banquet here +and there, the opening of a trolley line, or a library, or a +sewer,--these were the major calls upon the Lieutenant-Governor's time. +The main current of routine was a hopeless monotony of official +correspondence, investigations, statistics, reading and reporting on the +interminable and flatulent maunderings of the Legislature,--duties +heart-breaking in their desperate tedium and maddening inutility. + +But at last here was responsibility, actual and deeply significant, +calling for the exercise of tact, courage, and immutable firmness. The +particular task was not one which he would have coveted, and yet he +welcomed it. Anything,--anything to assuage in him that sense of +ineptitude, of being ignored, a titled nonentity! + +With this vast lightening of spirit came, not only gratitude, but a +sense of lenity toward Governor Abbott. He encouraged himself to believe +that the note between them had been one of misunderstanding merely. It +might not be too late, after all! Gradually, he began to form a mental +picture of a growing sympathy and affiliation between them, large with +possibilities of improvement for Alleghenia. As he turned into the +Rathbawnes' gateway, he could have laughed aloud for very lightness of +heart. His optimism was not even impaired by running, in the hall, full +against Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"_Good_ gracious! Lieutenant-Governor, is that you?" + +Repeated and earnest endeavor on Barclay's part had never dissuaded her +from this form of address. + +"What _is_ the use of _having_ such a title, if one can't _call_ you by +it?" she would say, when he remonstrated. "Do _you_ suppose that, if +Natalie were engaged to a _prince_, I should be going around, calling +him Tom, Dick, or Harry, instead of 'Your Royal _Highness_'? You ought +to be _proud_ of your title. _I_ am!" + +"But, Mrs. Rathbawne"-- + +"Now, _please_ not, Lieutenant-Governor, _please_ not! I like it best +that way." + +The north wind was attentive and amenable to the voice of persuasion, in +comparison with Josephine Rathbawne. + +"Of _course_ you know the _strike_ is on!" she continued now, without +waiting for an assurance from Barclay that he was indeed none other than +himself. "Isn't it _awful_? I expect to hear the roar of the mob at +_any_ moment! Come into the drawing-room. Natalie _was_ there, only +_half_ an hour ago." + +And she swept through the doorway, Barclay following. + +"Natalie," she began, "here's the Lieu--why, _Dorothy_! I took you for +Natalie. And--er--oh! Why, Mr.--er--how de do? I didn't see you at +first. Oh, _do_ turn on the switch, my dear. The place is as black as +pitch." + +The electric light, flooding the room, revealed young Nisbet, one vast, +consuming blush, and Dorothy, with a dangerous light in her eyes, and +her lips tightly compressed. It was plain that Mrs. Rathbawne had fallen +foul of Dan Cupid's machinery once more! + +"Why, Mr. _Nisbet_! I thought you were in New York." + +"I had a telegram this morning, calling the date off," said young Nisbet +in pitiable confusion; "that is, I didn't have to go, you know. So I +just fell in here to explain. I thought some of you might spot me on the +street, and after I'd said"-- + +He began to flounder hopelessly, and cast a glance of mute appeal at +Dorothy. That facile young lady marched directly into the breach. + +"If you and John are looking for Natalie," she said, "you'll find her in +the library with Dad. How do you do, John?" + +"Pretty well, I thank you, Flibbertigibbet. It is really your husband +whom I came to see, Mrs. Rathbawne. I've a little business with him, so, +for the moment, I'll have to give Natalie the cold shoulder." + +"Oh!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, lifting her fat hands. "Of _course_, +Lieutenant-Governor! I understand _perfectly_. Business before pleasure, +_always_. Go right in, won't you, and send Natalie here to me. _I'll_ +stay here. Aren't we going to have tea, Dorothy? Oh, _do_ try to sit up +straight, my dear!" + +Natalie and her father were bending low over a great portfolio, their +heads close together in the yellow glow of the table-lamp, which was the +only light in the room. Rathbawne looked up with a grim smile, as the +Lieutenant-Governor entered. + +"Pottering over my autographs, again, you see," he remarked. "I've been +neglecting them shamefully, of late--eh, Natalie? Didn't have the time. +It looks just now as if I wouldn't have to complain again of lack of +leisure for quite a while!" + +"It was that I dropped in to see you about," said Barclay, striving, +with only partial success, to keep the exultation out of his voice. "You +may not be in for so much leisure as you imagine, Mr. Rathbawne. You may +not get much of a holiday, after all." + +Without for an instant losing the Lieutenant-Governor's eye, Rathbawne +reached out and touched his daughter on the arm. + +"Oh, Dad!" she said reproachfully. + +"There's no need for her to go, sir," added Barclay, "unless you wish +it. I bring only good news." + +Acquiescing, Rathbawne drew Natalie close to him, passing one arm across +her shoulders, so that his gnarled hand rested firmly on the delicate +fabric of her sleeve. Between these two there had always lain a +sympathy, an affection, a mutuality of comprehension, more like the +relation of husband and wife than that of child and parent. + +"Nothing but good news?" answered Rathbawne. "Go on. What is it?" + +"News not so much of actual happenings as of potentialities," said the +Lieutenant-Governor. "Last night I had to say to you that in the cause +of right I was as powerless to aid you as a baby. To-night, I have come +to tell you that I am in a position to see justice done, and that I +will." + +In detail, his voice ringing with enthusiasm and confidence, he +described the interview of that morning, his statement of Rathbawne's +position, his passage at arms with McGrath, finally, the Governor's +announcement that the strike was to be supervised by his lieutenant in +his stead. + +"I had almost lost hope," he concluded. "I thought my opportunity would +never come, and here it is, after all--the chance to act! And, somehow, +I feel that it is only the beginning--that, as he gets to understand me +better"-- + +Rathbawne suddenly left his daughter's side, and in three steps was +directly before the Lieutenant-Governor. As he interrupted him, his +fingers closed upon the lapels of the other's coat, and he punctuated +his words with little tugs at these, his knuckles coming together with +tiny muffled thuds. He spoke with a gravity that was vibrant with +suppressed anger and slow with sincere regret. + +"My boy," he said, "it's not a gracious thing to do to spoil an +enthusiasm like yours, but don't deceive yourself. Elijah Abbott as a +trickster is alone in his class. You were never more powerless to act +for the right than you are at this moment." + +"But I have his assurance"-- + +"Oh, _his_ assurance! It isn't worth the ash off your cigar. What, give +you a chance to interfere with the will of the Union which made him, and +owns him, body and soul? Never in God's world! Listen to me. I spent an +hour in his office this very afternoon, discussing the strike--_and he +never so much as mentioned your name_!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor winced as if the words had been the touch of a +lancet. Then he closed his eyes. + +"And I was in the next room," he said, almost as if to +himself,--"planning--my--control--of the situation! Good God!" + +"I went directly to him," continued Rathbawne, "because I knew that it +would be purely and simply a waste of time to parley with the lesser +officials who are either helpless or frankly his tools. I knew, too, +that no satisfactory result would come of appealing to him, but I wanted +to give him the chance. All I asked of him was an assurance that the +mills would have proper police protection, and that, if necessary, the +militia would be called out in support of order. The outcome was exactly +what I expected. Governor Abbott rubbed his hands, and smiled, and said: +'All in good time, Mr. Rathbawne, all in good time. When the conditions +seem to warrant it, we can discuss these measures.' That means that they +are free to blow the mills to kingdom come, before a finger will be +raised by the authorities to prevent them. And what's more, they'll do +it! Do you think I don't know McGrath?" + +As he had intended it should, this speech had given the other a chance +to recover himself. The Lieutenant-Governor's habitual poise was +already restored, and his voice, as he answered, was quite steady, but +eloquent of his desperate discouragement and weariness. + +"I hope it's not as bad as all that, Mr. Rathbawne. It's not necessary +to tell you, that for me there can never again be such a thing as +trusting the word of Governor Abbott; but, at the same time, I can +hardly bring myself to believe that he would openly countenance the +practical existence of anarchy in the capital city of Alleghenia." + +"Well, I can, then!" declared Rathbawne. "I can believe anything of him! +Mark my words, John, he's as sleek a scoundrel as you'll find outside of +the State's Prison. He cares less for Alleghenia and her capital city +than you do for one of the hairs on his rascally head. I tell you, the +Union has bought him, body and soul, and unless a miracle comes down +from heaven, I'm a beaten man!" + +Barclay bit his lips without replying. In his heart of hearts, he knew +that Peter Rathbawne's words were true. + +"He'll be impeached, sooner or later," continued the old man, "if +there's a speck of decency left in the Legislature--which I doubt. But +long before that, John, long before that, I'll be down and out. I would +to God you were Governor of Alleghenia, my boy. You're the only ray of +hope I can see for her." + +The Lieutenant-Governor fell back a step, and covered his face with his +hands. For a full minute there was absolute silence. Rathbawne had +returned to the table, and, with his fore-arms across the back of a +chair, and one foot on the lower cross-bar, was staring vacantly at his +autographs, his hands moulding and remoulding each other into an +infinity of forms. Natalie was at the window, her face in the crevice +between the curtains. The same impulse had prompted both father and +daughter. There are some things which it is better not to watch. + +They turned at the sound of his voice, to find him with his head flung +back, his hands clenched at his sides, his right foot planted firmly in +advance of his left, his whole bearing one of passionate earnestness. +And, though he was seemingly addressing Rathbawne, there was that in his +voice and in his words which was meant for every ear in the state! + +"Governor of Alleghenia!" he said, "I would to God I were! Sometimes I +almost--yes, sometimes I wholly despair. I love this state, Mr. +Rathbawne, as I love nothing else on earth--not even my girl there, not +even Natalie. You two are the only ones in the world who can understand +what it means when I say that. It has always been so, ever since I was +big enough to know what Alleghenia meant, and more than ever since I +have come to understand her shame, and her vital peril, and her dire +need. I've never tried to explain the feeling; I've never found any one +who seemed to share it with me. I hear other men talk of national +patriotism, and the flag, and all that, and I understand it, and honor +them for it. But--while it may be only a fancy of mine--for me Kenton +City comes even before Washington, and even before these United States +of America the sovereign state of Alleghenia! I would have her courts +incorruptibility itself, her government the perfect commingling of +equity and mercy; her press the vehicle of verity, intelligence, and +watchfulness; her public servants the faithful exponents of loyalty and +diligence; her people, one and all, whatever is best in our +interpretation of the word American--and then, something +more!--Alleghenians!--citizens, not only of the Republic, but of the +state which I would have shine brightest in the field of stars, and be +quoted, from Maine to California, and from Florida to Washington, as the +synonym for law and order, truth, integrity, and justice. You know how +far the dream is from the reality. We are held up to ridicule and +contempt as law-breakers, time-servers, and bribe-takers--and we deserve +it! I can't see help on any hand. I don't believe our people, as a +class, are actually vicious and corrupt--only callous and indifferent, +accustomed so long to the spectacle of political chicanery and depravity +that they have lost their ability to appreciate its significance. But, +so far as results are concerned, it all amounts to the same thing. Once, +I hoped I should be able to do something. But now--I'm a nonentity, Mr. +Rathbawne, as you know, and not only that, but a man who has taken a +false step, from which he can never recover. I'm dead, politically +speaking--as dead as Benjamin Butler!" + +He paused, drawing a deep breath. + +"We were speaking of your interview," he added, more evenly. "What was +the result?" + +"Nothing, beyond what I've told you," answered Rathbawne, shaking his +head. "All I can do is to keep my mouth shut, await developments, and +trust in a Providence which it takes a good bit of obstinacy to believe +hasn't deserted the state of Alleghenia for good and all. It isn't for +my own sake alone, John, that I pray the Union will give in before my +people begin to think of violence. You remember '94 in Chicago? Well, +we don't want anything like that in Kenton City. It would be the last +straw! Alleghenia has a big enough burden of disgrace to carry, as it +is." + +A servant entered, even as he was speaking, to summon him to the +telephone, and with an exclamation of impatience he left the room. +Immediately, Natalie stepped from her post at the window, and came +toward Barclay with outstretched hands. + +"Oh, Johnny boy," she said, "I'm _so_ sorry. How you've been hurt, dear, +and disappointed, and cruelly wronged!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's hands clenched again at the sound of sorrow in +her voice, and he strove in vain to control the tremor of his lip. +Tenderly he put his arms about her. + +"I'm sorry, too, little girl--sorry you were here to see me make a fool +of myself and then squeal when I got hurt as I deserved. I shouldn't +have done that. But I was so proud--so grateful--I thought I was going +to be able"-- + +"_Johnny--Johnny!_" + +They held to each other rigidly for an instant, her face against his +sleeve, in an agony which no tears came to soothe. + +"There!" said Barclay presently. "I'm better already. It does one good +to blow off steam, now and again." + +His tone lightened perceptibly. + +"And look here," he added, "what's most important, after all, is that I +have news for you, and ought to be delivering it." + +As yet, they did not dare to meet each other's eyes, but Natalie took +the cue. + +"You can spare yourself the trouble, my lord," she retorted, sweeping +him a curtsy. "I can guess what it is, without your aid. You've found +him!" + +"How did you know?" + +"I didn't. But you will remember that I asked you to find him. The +inference is as plain as a pikestaff." + +"Arrogance! But you're right. I have. He has been at my rooms since last +night. He was frightfully shaky, and utterly despondent, but he's taking +something to settle his nerves, and I've no doubt a week or so of good +food and straight living will bring him around into something like his +old form." + +"Boy dear! And you're taking care of him?" + +"Oh, just directing the cure, that's all! I'll tell you more when I can +report definite progress. Do you suppose there is a single secluded +corner in all this mansion which has not already been preëmpted by +Dorothy and Nisbet?" + +He slipped his arm about her again, and together they went out, across +the wide hall, toward the drawing-room. Rathbawne was standing at the +telephone under the stairway, but, as they approached him, he replaced +the receiver, and stepped forth under the light of the chandelier. They +both halted, shocked into speechlessness by the look on his face. The +past ten minutes seemed to have added a decade to his age. His cheeks +were white and drawn, and with his hands he groped before him, as if he +had been stricken blind. As he came close to them, he lifted his head, +and peered first at his daughter, and then at Barclay, seeming barely to +recognize them. + +"Dad! What _is_ it?" said the girl, in a voice just above a whisper. + +Rathbawne raised his hand, and pushed back the hair from his forehead. + +"A message--from Payson--of the 'Sentinel,'" he mumbled. "It seems +there's a fire--a fire on Charles Street--near the mills--one of my +buildings--a shop--a shop. Some one in the crowd--threw a +torch in at the window--there is a great crowd--a throng of +strikers--watching--cheering the flames--hissing the firemen. They've +begun early--and this is only the beginning! My people--my people"---- + +He stumbled forward, and would have fallen, but that his daughter caught +him. To his dying day Barclay remembered how, as he sprang to aid her, +her hands gleamed, white and slender, against the black of Peter +Rathbawne's coat. + +The hush that followed was broken presently by the sound of the old +man's choking sobs, and the low, soothing tones of Natalie, murmuring +against his ear. From the drawing-room came indeterminate scraps of Mrs. +Wynyard's gay chatter, as she regaled Mrs. Rathbawne with the gossip +gleaned in a round of calls. She herself was partly visible, drawing off +her gloves before the fire. From the music-room beyond issued the chords +of Dorothy's none-too-sure accompaniment, and young Nisbet's superb, +full tenor:-- + + "'Ah, love, could you and I with fate conspire + To grasp the sorry scheme of things entire'"-- + +But, in the Lieutenant-Governor's imagination, another sound mingled +with and dominated these,--the voice of Michael McGrath, as he had heard +it that morning, through the open door of Governor Abbott's room:-- + +"It won't be a strike like other strikes, not so long as I'm running it, +that is. It's going to mean business from the word go!" + + + + +VIII + +THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS + + +One spotted peach will contaminate an entire basket, one drop of ink +cloud a full glass of clear water. It was so in the case of the strikers +at the Rathbawne Mills. Their unwonted idleness, the long succession of +empty hours, already, among the more improvident, the preliminary +pressure of privation's teeth,--all these made them easy prey for the +sophistries of men like McGrath and his associates. At first they simply +laughed at the arraignments of Peter Rathbawne as a plutocrat, a +slave-master, and an oppressor of the poor, knowing better in their +hearts. But the memory of past kindness is too apt to be the most +fleeting of human impressions. On the one side the gates of the +Rathbawne Mills remained obstinately closed, and, though Rathbawne +himself manifested no intention of resorting to the intolerable +importation of "scab" labor, he persisted in his refusal to treat with +the Union so long as the discharge of the fifteen men remained a subject +proposed for debate. On the other hand, the denunciations of McGrath and +the other Union orators were constant, unavoidable, and sufficiently +plausible to produce an impression, and linger in the mind. And, +meanwhile, to and fro among the strikers, stalked, arm in arm, the +spectres of idleness and starvation, the one smirking openly, the other, +as yet, half-veiled. Altogether it was fertile ground. + +After the burning of Mr. Rathbawne's shop, on the first night of the +strike, ensued a week of comparative quiet. The outrage had been +flagrant, the source, if not the very author, of it was known, and the +police did--nothing. For three days the press of Kenton City blazed with +indignation, excepting only the "Record," which openly favored the +strikers, and then all the papers alike suddenly ceased to refer to the +incident at all. For, while McGrath was not in favor of wasting the +funds of the Union, he was as well aware as the next man that a dollar, +as well as a stitch, in time, saves nine. + +Herein lay the cardinal peril of Alleghenia. As John Barclay had said, +it was not that her people, as a class, were corrupt or criminal, but +merely that they viewed with easy tolerance evidences of laxity and +lawlessness which would have set the citizens of another state by the +ears, and filled the newspaper columns and the public forums with +indignation and protest. In this respect, the papers of Kenton City were +the most flagrant offenders. Even the most reputable, the "Sentinel," +could be silenced at practically any moment by those cognizant of the +method, and in a position to command the price, of manipulation. As a +whited sepulchre it was a conspicuous success, being irreproachably +scholarly, dignified, and didactic in tone, and wholly destitute of +principle. + +Michael McGrath, demagogue though he was, knew his public as the +physician knows the pulse he feels. It was a feature of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills that no attempt was made to justify the cause of the +strikers in the eye of the disinterested public of Kenton City. McGrath +himself was fully alive to the slenderness of his pretext, and alive, as +well, to the strength of Peter Rathbawne's case, if it should come to a +discussion of the rights and wrongs involved, wherein his business +probity and his justice to, and consideration for, his employees, would +furnish arguments well-nigh unanswerable. He contented himself, +therefore, with standing upon a simple declaration of the will of the +Union, which was, in effect, his own; and, strong in his reliance, if +not upon the support, at least upon the non-interference of the state +authorities, devoted his attention to holding the press in check, by +methods long since found effectual, and confidently left the public to +think and act as it saw fit. + +There could have been no more contemptuous comment upon the moral and +intellectual status of the community than this insolent assumption of +its indifference to the commonest principles of justice, but for a time +his confidence had the appearance of being amply justified. The strike +went its way, characterized by an infinity of petty outrages and a +constant and consistent vilification of Peter Rathbawne, while--with the +exception of that first and promptly quashed protest on the part of the +press--no voice was raised in opposition. + +Reduced to its lowest terms, the struggle was one between Rathbawne and +McGrath, and that, not as representatives the one of a great industrial, +the other of a great socialistic organization, but as individuals. The +source of the stream which had thus reached its rapids, and was plunging +on toward its annihilating cataract, lay far back in the early days of +Rathbawne's commercial career. McGrath was a man who practiced neither +the vice of forgetfulness nor the virtue of forgiveness. As plain as the +event of a yesterday lay upon his memory his contemptuous dismissal from +Rathbawne's employ, charged in particular with a petty peculation, and +in general with the indisputable fact of being a bad influence in the +mills. His case had been in many ways identical with that of the men +whose cause he was now, for reasons of his own, espousing. + +But Peter Rathbawne, then less shrewd in estimating men than now, had +reckoned without due credit to the vindictiveness and pertinacity of the +man before him. McGrath--brutally handsome in those days, idle, +insolent, and independent--later had developed qualities of which at the +time there was little evidence. He had smiled and shrugged his +shoulders--a habit which had grown upon him--as Rathbawne gave his +verdict, and had instinctively resisted the temptation to threaten +revenge. For that inspiration he had been devoutly grateful ever since. +It had enabled him to work in silence and unseen, like a mole, toward +the goal at which he aimed. He was a poker player, was Michael McGrath, +of the class which pulls victory out of defeat by the aid of its own +personality and a low pair. The calm indifference with which he had +received his dismissal from the employ of Peter Rathbawne seemed to him, +on reflection, to have been the unconscious forerunner of the elaborate +_nonchalance_ with which he now viewed the unexpected filling of a +broken straight. It was certain that the other player had not guessed +the strength of his cards. + +He had never forgiven, never forgotten. It had taken a quarter-century +of unremitting effort, of indomitable perseverance, of calculated +ingenuity, to secure to him the position which he now felt to be +assured--that of being able to cope with the man who had been his +adversary, and so overwhelmingly his superior. The fight was on at +last,--a fight in which the odds were not only equal, but, if anything, +in favor of the former mill-hand, thus become one of the most powerful +men in Alleghenia; a fight to be fought to the bitter finish, with an +almost certain triumph as his reward. + +Added to these motives was another,--newer, it is true, but none the +less potent,--his hatred for the Lieutenant-Governor. He had been able +to laugh within a half-minute after the words "unmitigated blackguard" +had smitten his ears; but they had rankled for all that. It was not so +much the insult, as the knowledge that it was justified. He was +remarkably candid with himself, was Michael McGrath. + +Hence the unparalleled venom of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +McGrath's dual sense of wounded vanity prescribed a course of surpassing +vindictiveness. His personal resentment, reinforced by consummate +appreciation of the adversaries with whom he had to deal, dictated a +safe road to revenge, which enabled him to fling wide the floodgates of +his long-stored animosity, secure in his knowledge of having the upper +hand. Disorder, calumny, outrage, even open anarchy--he could venture +upon them unafraid. A corrupt Governor, whom he had created, stood +behind him, smiling tolerantly. An indifferent community would let him +have his will. Only he must proceed by degrees, and be ready at any +moment to take one backward step for the sake of being able presently +thereafter to take two in advance. + +Here precisely lay the weak point in his plan of campaign. With the +fatuity incidental on occasions to even the shrewdest minds, he had not +counted upon independence in the host which he believed slave to him, in +thought and word and deed. He rated himself the dictator, the prompter +without whose suggestion no one of all the players in this gigantic +tragedy could speak his line. As a matter of fact, like all leaders of +his class, he could drive his followers forward at will, while totally +unable to hold them back. He was wholly master so long as he used the +spur. The peril lay in the fancied efficacy of the curb. In short, he +was discovering already that he had unwittingly created a monster beside +which Frankenstein's was the veriest doll. + +Thus, shortly, the strain began to tell upon the four thousand +unemployed sets of nerves around the Rathbawne Mills. Meetings became +more frequent and more turbulent; drinking and disorder were observably +on the increase; and at the end of another four weeks one of the gates +of the mills was beaten down, and several hundred men and boys paraded +around shop after shop, breaking windows and singing ribald songs. It +was not a very serious demonstration in itself. Its ominous feature lay +in the fact that the police made no attempt to check it. There was +something else about it, to the thinking of McGrath. It was not so much +that events were moving too fast, but that they were moving without +intelligent control. + +Two nights later, another building belonging to Peter Rathbawne, and +situated only a half-block from the mills, was burned in the same manner +as the first, watched by an enormous crowd of strikers, who applauded +each fresh burst of flame, as if the fire had been a circus or a play. +Still there was no move on the part of the police. + +Then it was that the business men of Kenton City sat up in their office +chairs and began to think. This was an eventuality entirely outside the +calculations of McGrath. But the pachydermatous inertia of the citizens +of Alleghenia had yet its vulnerable spot, where the weapon might enter. +Vaguely these men had known that the state was rotten, but the fact had +never been brought to their attention in a manner so poignantly +suggestive before. Unwittingly McGrath had aroused the suspicion that it +was not the purse of Peter Rathbawne alone which was in danger. If it +was possible for disorder to go to such extremes in the very streets of +Kenton City without fear of interference or rebuke, then no man's +property was safe. That thought was the Achilles' heel of the community. +So it was that a Citizens' Committee, composed of presidents of two +insurance companies, directors from five banks, representatives from the +Chamber of Commerce and the Board of Trade, and, finally, Colonel Amos +Broadcastle, was appointed to wait upon the Mayor. That gentleman, as +was entirely to be expected, referred them to the Governor, and to the +Governor they went. + +Barclay was present at the interview. For his own reasons Governor +Abbott had kept his immediate subordinate well to the fore in all +matters pertaining to the strike since the latter's rebuke to +McGrath,--in all matters, that is to say, not involving the exercise of +actual authority. Of that, indeed, the Lieutenant-Governor had had no +hope after the conversation in Peter Rathbawne's library. He met the +representatives of the press, conducted the correspondence with +mill-owners and other negatively interested parties, and at the +Governor's request made what was palpably a farcical inspection of the +entire state militia--to judge of their readiness for strike service!--a +task which consumed a fortnight in constant travel, and visits to +armories all alike in insufficient equipment and utter slovenliness. The +Ninth Regiment alone remained, and this command was to parade for +inspection by the Governor himself that very evening. The coincidence +flashed through Barclay's mind as the Citizens' Committee entered, with +Broadcastle, in his capacity as spokesman, at its head. + +The dignity and air of command habitual to the Colonel of the Ninth were +doubly apparent as he advanced toward the Governor's table. Both Barclay +and Abbott rose to receive him, but the latter reseated himself, as soon +as Broadcastle had introduced his fellow-members of the Committee. He +listened to what followed with an air of thoughtfulness, tinged with a +faint and exasperating suggestion of amusement. At a neighboring table, +his official stenographer took down every word which fell. + +Colonel Broadcastle was not accustomed to mince matters, when the +occasion demanded brevity and conciseness. Now, he stepped to within a +few feet of the Governor's table, and stood rigidly confronting him, +with his hands clasped before him on the head of his stick, in the +position of parade-rest. + +"Governor Abbott," he said, in his curt, dry voice, "these gentlemen and +myself form a Committee appointed by a meeting of the business men of +Kenton City, to protest against the state of affairs now existing in +connection with the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. It is only generous +to presume that other matters have diverted your attention from an +appreciation of these conditions. The situation is without parallel in +the annals of Alleghenia. Disorder is rampant, and destruction of +property is freely indulged in by the strikers without any apparent fear +of molestation. Despite the fact that there is a large police-force, it +makes no effort to check these operations. The sole reply of Chief +Pendle to the protests of those interested in the promotion of law and +order has been that he will not suffer any outside interference in the +control of his department--the which, in view of his responsibility to +the public, can only be regarded as sheer and intolerable insolence! An +appeal to Mayor Goadby has elicited the response that the whole matter +lies in the Governor's hands." + +The Colonel paused. The Governor, leaning back in his chair, and +fingering a pencil, smiled slightly and nodded his head. + +"I suppose that is so," he said. "Continue, continue, Colonel +Broadcastle." + +"It is the sense of the law-abiding element of Kenton City," went on the +Colonel, flushing at the condescension of his tone, "that the limit of +endurance has been reached. If, willfully or otherwise, the police do +not act, my regiment is prepared to act as substitute. I have already +placed it at the service of the Adjutant-General. His reply, like the +Mayor's, was to refer me to you for orders. I am here to receive them, +sir." + +"Your offer is appreciated," said the Governor suavely. "We of Kenton +City have reason to be proud of the Ninth, Colonel Broadcastle. I +congratulate myself upon my privilege of reviewing it, to-night. And we +have reason to be proud, as well, of the intelligence which has made +such an organization possible. Your disinterested devotion"-- + +Broadcastle flung up his chin. + +"I am not here to receive compliments, sir!" he said abruptly. + +"Nor I to bestow them," answered the Governor, unruffled. "As +commander-in-chief of the state forces, I believe it is not outside my +province to render deserved commendation to a subordinate." + +"Oh, do not let us juggle with words, Governor Abbott! It is precisely +as commander-in-chief of the state forces that the time has come for you +to act; it is precisely as your subordinate that I am here to receive +your orders. Assume the responsibility which confronts you, issue the +commands proper to the emergency, and you will have no more tireless +executor of them than I. My regiment can be on duty at the Rathbawne +Mills inside of six hours"-- + +"But, my good Colonel Broadcastle," broke in the Governor, "the state +has no need of your regiment for the moment! Calling upon the militia is +no light matter, sir. You talk about my ordering out the Ninth as you +would advise me to ring for a messenger-boy!" + +"The welfare of the municipality, if not that of the commonwealth," +replied Colonel Broadcastle firmly, "demands that an immediate stop be +put to this lawlessness. We are dealing with extremities, sir!" + +The Governor swung forward, and placed his elbows on the table. + +"You will permit me to be the best judge of what the welfare of the +commonwealth may be," he retorted. "Whatever lawlessness exists--and I +think you have grossly exaggerated its extent, Colonel Broadcastle--is +due to the selfish obstinacy of one man. In my opinion, Mr. Rathbawne is +entirely in the wrong. He had fair warning, which he did not choose to +heed. If his property suffers at the hands of the strikers, he has only +himself to blame." + +"It is not a question of Mr. Rathbawne, or of any other individual," +said Broadcastle, "but of the integrity of the state of Alleghenia!" + +"The integrity of the state of Alleghenia," answered the Governor dryly, +"has been intrusted, by the vote of her citizens, to me, as chief +executive." + +"An action," exclaimed the Colonel, "which I venture to predict they +will shortly have reason most bitterly to regret!" + +Governor Abbott rose abruptly to his feet. + +"This interview is at an end, Colonel Broadcastle," he said, bringing +his fist down upon the table with a thud. "I take exception to your +remarks, from first to last. I consider myself fully competent to deal +with the situation, and you may depend, sir, I shall do so at my own +time, and in my own way. If Mr. Peter Rathbawne supposes that he can +defy reason and justice at will, and that the state authorities are +prepared to support him, he is grossly and fatally mistaken. Gentlemen, +I have the honor to bid you good-day!" + +For a quarter-minute, the two men stood facing each other, without +speaking. It was observable that the eyes of neither flinched. Then-- + +"It is my earnest hope, Elijah Abbott," said the Colonel slowly, "to see +you impeached by a righteously indignant community, and committed for a +term of years to the State's Prison at Mowberly, for rank malfeasance +in office!" + +The Governor shrugged his shoulders. + +"Your record and your position protect you, Colonel Broadcastle," he +said, with something of his usual suavity. "Will you have the goodness +to retire?" + +As the Citizens' Committee left the room the Lieutenant-Governor turned +on his heel, passed into his office, and closed the door. + +For a long time he sat motionless at his desk, with his temples in his +hands, staring at a frame upon the opposite wall, which contained the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia. These were a hand holding even balances, +upon a circular shield, supported by the nude figures of two young men, +representing Art and Labor. Above, upon a scroll, were the words, +"_Justitia. Lex. Integritas._" + +It was not only bad heraldry, but indifferently appropriate symbolism. + + + + +IX + +THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW + + +The huge armory of the Ninth, transformed, by the same system which had +metamorphosed the _personnel_ of the regiment itself, from a gaunt, +barn-like structure, ill-fitted to its purpose in all but size, to the +most cheerful, as well as the most completely equipped, of Alleghenian +arsenals, was blazing with light and echoing to the sound of many +voices. A steady stream of people poured in at the heavy doors, now +standing wide, but significant, with their great timbers, elaborate +locks and bolts, and precautionary peep-holes, of the possibility of an +attitude less hospitable. Threading their way at a rapid pace through +the more sluggish main current of the crowd, the members of the +regiment, in an infinite variety of civilian attire,--from tweeds and +knickerbockers to top-hats and evening-dress,--sought their respective +company-rooms, vanished therein, and, presently, reappeared in uniform. +It was as if behind those ten doors which lined the upper corridor there +were as many moulds, identical in form, whereinto this perplexing +diversity of raw material was plunged on entering, to be drawn forth +again in a constant reduplication of militiamen. + +As the hour for the review drew near, the proportion of these to the +throng with which they mingled, perceptibly increasing, seemed, little +by little, to leaven the whole lump. The dress-uniform of the Ninth was +everywhere, the black shakos and epaulettes, white pompons, cross-belts +and gloves, and multiplicity of brass buttons, lending the immense +assemblage a singular spirit and vivacity. + +On the floor of the drill-room the people spread in all directions, +fan-like, from the main doorway, the multitudinous footfalls mounting +murmurously into the spaces of the lofty roof, where forty arc-lights +hung, dizzily suspended, pallid in the thin haze of dust swung upwards +from the hurrying feet of the thousands below. + +"Precisely like an army of ants--and every one of them with an uncle or +two, and a round dozen of nephews and nieces!" said Mrs. Wynyard. + +She and the Rathbawne girls were looking down upon the drill-floor +from the balcony of the Colonel's room. Broadcastle and the +Lieutenant-Governor were deep in conversation inside, having seized the +delay in the arrival of Governor Abbott as an opportunity for a few +words in private. + +"How funny they are, scuttling along, all of them!" said Dorothy. "And +how immensely pleased the favored ones are, who have a soldier to show +them the way. I see a distinct difference in their walk from that of the +others, don't you, Natalie? They seem to be saying '_We_ were +_invited_--and by this splendiferous creature at our side!' See how they +strut! And look at the soldierless ones, how timidly they go--just as if +they had found their tickets in the street, or had crept in through the +basement windows. 'Please, kind Mr. Soldier-man, let us stay and see the +show. We'll be _awf'ly_ good!'" + +"How preposterous you are, Dorothy!" answered Mrs. Wynyard. "Look! The +people are taking to the sides of the room already, and the companies +are forming. What astonishing method and precision there is to it all! +Do you suppose each man has a little circle marked on the floor, to show +just where he is to stand?" + +"I haven't the most remote doubt of it," said Natalie, with a +smile,--"and his name neatly lettered inside it with gilt paint!" + +The long, enclosed racks at the ends of the drill-room were open now, +and the electric light winked upon the barrels of the Springfields, as +busy, white-gloved hands plied the polishing cloths along them. The +enormous drill-floor, cleared as if by magic from the disorderly +weed-growth which had encumbered it, began to make manifest its proper +crop--long lines of gray and white, like sprouting sage, at first but a +dot here and there, to indicate the direction, then a scattering, then +distinct clumps, finally a thick, serried row. In the distance, a bugle +sounded, followed by a long ruffle of drums, and Colonel Broadcastle +stepped quickly to the window of the balcony. + +"There's the Governor," he said. "Will you come in? I'll send my orderly +to show you to your seats." + +At the same moment, the door from the corridor opened, and the orderly +entered, his hand at his shako. + +"Sir, the Governor has arrived." + +Then, as the trio on the balcony stepped in through the window, he +turned suddenly and superlatively scarlet. As has been said, young +Nisbet was accustomed to getting what he wanted. In this instance what +he had wanted happened to be that the Adjutant should choose him from +the guard detail as Colonel's orderly. To be thus chosen was to be +admittedly the most immaculate of thirty men, all more immaculate than a +thousand immaculate others. The thing was not easy of achievement, but +Dorothy Rathbawne was to be present at the review, and so--there was no +second way about it--it simply had to be done. Young Nisbet's way of +doing it was an absolutely new uniform and gold-plated buttons and +accoutrements. Extravagance? Vanity? Perhaps! But at the present moment, +he was wearing one cross-belt where his thousand and odd comrades were +wearing two. There was no answer to such an argument as that. + +Colonel Broadcastle had reserved seats for the party on the temporary +reviewing stand, and, five minutes after they had taken their places, +the bugles sang again, a curt order--"'shun! 'shun!"--ran in varying +intonations from company to company, and the slack gray ranks before +them stiffened into absolute rigidity. Then from the broad hallway +beyond came a tremendous burst of sound, and, to the strains of the +famous old march of the Ninth, the regimental band swung into view, +followed by Governor Abbott and Colonel Broadcastle and the former's +staff. + +To the Lieutenant-Governor, but newly returned from his wearisome round +of the state armories, much of what followed was so stale as to be no +more than a constantly increasing strain upon nerves already overtaxed. +He deliberately allowed his attention to wander, until he felt rather +than actually perceived the steady tramp-tramp of the men, swinging, +fours right, into column, the occasional "hep! hep!" of an officious +file-closer, the endless succession of fours winking past him, like the +palings of a gray fence seen from the window of a train, the intervals +narrowed by short-step, widening again at the "Forward--_march_!" the +blare of the band, lessening as it approached the further end of the +building, then suddenly bursting into its former volume at the +right-about. He endured it all listlessly. It was tediously familiar, +stamped upon his brain by repetition after repetition. + +Moreover, he was completely fagged, and unutterably oppressed by his +burden of discouragement. The old wounds, in part healed by his recent +absence from the immediate vicinity of his constant discomfiture, had +been re-opened and set bleeding afresh by Governor Abbott's treatment of +the Citizens' Committee. Whatever lingering hope had remained in his +mind of peace with honor for the troubled capital of Alleghenia, seemed +to have been effectually dispelled by that interview. The most enduring +charity, the most fatuous credulity, the blindest partisanship--even +these could not have preserved a last spark of confidence in Elijah +Abbott. Still less was Barclay's indeterminate hope of the ultimate +triumph of right able to stand against such crushing evidence of its +instability. It was no longer a question of suspicions, of precedents, +of deductions from the significance of a host of former misdoings. Out +of his own mouth was the Governor convicted. "At my own time, and in my +own way," he had said. It was a phrase, nothing more, and could be +boiled down until its whole purport was contained in one word--Never! + +"Fours _left_--_March_! Compan_ee_--_halt_!" + +The entire regiment, as one man, swung from column of fours into +battalion front, halted, and then--cr-r-rick! boooo-m-m-m!--came to +order arms. The sides of the room were lined with a solid rampart of +white and gray and gold. Barclay was aware of the First Sergeants, +scurrying from their positions to report, of their voices, and those of +the Majors and the Adjutant, and, finally the Colonel:-- + +"Take your post, sir!" + +But his thoughts were anywhere and everywhere else. What a farce it all +was, this life which he was leading, this mental and moral martyrdom to +an impossible hope, this eternal and heart-sickening ordeal of hope +deferred, this waiting, waiting, waiting, for something which never +would and never could happen! Rotten, rotten to the core, this state for +which he would have given his heart's blood, and not only rotten, but +not caring a whit for her rottenness--glorying rather, in her own +degradation. The chief executive had flung back into their very faces +the appeal to his conscience of the most influential men in Kenton +City; the police, even now seated about their station stoves, were +sniggling at the predicament of the public which paid them for its +protection against precisely the kind of thing which they openly +tolerated and encouraged; yes, and even the militia, the guarantee of +law and order, Broadcastle's own command, were decked out in tinsel and +pipeclay, strutting to music in a palpable bid for applause and +admiration. And yonder--the tide of anarchy was slowly but surely rising +about the Rathbawne Mills, presaging riot, bloodshed, God alone knew +what!--but one thing, inevitably,--the absolute downfall of dignity and +rout of decency in Alleghenia! + +Suddenly, his old intrepid spirit of resolution reasserted itself, but +doubtfully, like the flame of a lamp flaring once out of dimness before +it dies forever. Was it for this that he had devoted the best thought of +his youth and his earlier manhood to plans for the betterment of his +state? Should he now, at this, the hour of her supremest political and +moral peril, desert her as irredeemable, and join the ranks of those who +sneered at her, and pointed mocking fingers at her shame and nakedness? + +"Your loquacity faintly suggests that of a mummy," said Natalie, at his +side. + +"I was alone with my thoughts," answered the Lieutenant-Governor, +turning to her with an attempt at a smile, "and pretty black ones they +were, at that!" + +"Alleghenia again?" + +"Alleghenia again--and always. This business is becoming an obsession +with me. I haven't had a chance to tell you, and I can't very well +explain now. I'll have to leave it till I see you to-morrow. But +something happened to-day which drove another nail--and one of the +last!--into the coffin of my faith. There's not a gleam of hope +anywhere." + +"Don't you see hope in all this?" asked Natalie, with a little, +indicative gesture toward the scene before them. "Somehow, it is +impressing me tremendously to-night--more than ever before. I seem to +understand better what it means, what it stands for." + +"It's a stale enough story with me," said Barclay. "Remember, I've been +doing just about nothing but watch this kind of thing for the past two +weeks. After all, what does it amount to but a thousand possibilities +parading like peacocks?" + +"How unlike you, that speech! It amounts to a vast deal more than that, +Johnny boy,--oh, infinitely more! I don't speak of the other regiments +you have seen. This is different. Well, what _does_ it amount to? Who +and what are these thousand peacocks of yours? Aren't they the very +flower of Kenton City, the youngest and best blood in our veins, +gathered by one good man's will into an organization of sterling +loyalty, with one great aim in view, and that the support and protection +and preservation of all that is best in Alleghenia? The very fact that +such a body of men exists among us is in the nature of a guarantee, it +seems to me, that we shall come out all right in the end. Have you +noticed their faces?--many of them so absurdly boyish, all of them so +honest, and manly, and--and--_American_, John! They are the +personifications of your ideal of that afternoon in the +library--Americans, and something more--Alleghenians! And, to prove it, +they are freely giving a portion of their time and their strength, in +order that there may be at least one thing in Kenton City which is +without fear and without reproach. I wonder--I wonder, John, whether it +isn't the old story, after all: whether you haven't been wandering all +over the world, like the prince in the fairy-book, looking for the magic +talisman that is to save the state you love, while, all the time, it has +been lying at your very door? Oh, this means something--I'm too stupid +to interpret it as you could--but I know it's there, and that it would +help you and encourage you. Let me try. Look there! A single purpose +animates them all--the maintenance of the standard which Colonel +Broadcastle set for them, and the record they have made for themselves." + +Colonel Broadcastle's voice was sweeping the armory, as he put the +regiment through the manual of arms. + +"One has only to hear one of them--Mr. Nisbet, for example--say 'the +Ninth' to find the hope of which you are in search. These men say it as +others say 'God' or 'my mother'--as you yourself, Johnny boy, say +'Alleghenia.'" + +"Charge--_bay'n'ts_!" + +With a single click, a thousand rifles fell into position, a thousand +left feet smote the floor in unison, and the light rippled and twinkled +along a solid line of flashing steel. + +"There! A single voice,--a single, mighty response! Don't you see the +wonderful suggestiveness of it? Don't you feel the presence of the +enormous reserve force which lies behind all this? Oh, believe me, John, +this is a weapon too mighty to lie unused, and too intelligent to be +misused, if the worst come to the worst. After all, as no one knows +better than yourself, it's not your own advancement you're looking for, +it's that of the state. Well, there may be other agencies, perhaps +entirely independent of you or of your influence, but none the less +invaluable. For example, you are close upon despair--and yet, before +your fears come true, the forces of wrong will have to fight their way, +step by step, through this rampart of American manhood!" + +Barclay touched her hand lightly, as she ceased speaking. In the midst +of the thousands about them, they were alone as they had never been +before. + +"Thank you," he said simply. "Thank you, littlest and wisest in the +world!" + +The regiment was in motion again, skirting the room in column of fours, +preparatory to the march-past: but now the Lieutenant-Governor surveyed +it from a new, and a dual point-of-view,--as a thousand individuals, +that is, each a potential factor for immeasurable good in the coming +rehabilitation of the state; and, then, as a vast fighting-machine +perfect in every detail, resistless and awe-inspiring in its very +integrity. He noted the faces as they passed--stern, intelligent faces, +young, for the most part, and curiously refined, intent upon correct +performance of the present duty, and touched, almost without exception, +with an enthusiasm born of the martial music and the rhythmic tramp of +advancing feet. He saw the quick, reciprocal glance of the pivot and +flank men, as the fours, in perfect alignment, swept round into +company-front; the long, easy compression and give of the compact lines, +acquiring correct adjustment; the rigid tenure of chests and shoulders; +the firm fling of slender gray legs, as regularly intervaled as the +teeth of a giant comb. Company by company, the regiment fell into the +cadence of full-step. Midway, the standards of the Republic and +Alleghenia rippled side by side. And so, with blare of brass and sharp +staccato of snare-drums, with sheen of rifles and accoutrements, with +flash of slender swords, raised in salute,--above all and always, with +that magnificent unanimity, that mighty pulse of the thunderous +advance, the Ninth swept past its Governor and its Colonel in review. + +And then, in an instant, as it seemed, the vast square was formed again, +a sharp command rang out, the rifles snapped to a present-arms, the +standards dipped, and the strains of the "Star-Spangled Banner" mounted +triumphantly to the great girders of the lofty roof. The multitude of +spectators rose at the sound, and the Lieutenant-Governor rose with +them, his heart aglow with new inspiration, new hope, and new resolve. +The band was almost speaking the words of the anthem on the dust-grayed +air:-- + + "Oh! say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave + O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?" + +To the accompaniment of a myriad clapping hands, the Lieutenant-Governor +resumed his seat, shaken by a novel, tremendous emotion. Yes! a thousand +times yes! The star-spangled banner, symbol of loftiest ideals and +purest purposes, mute memorial and reminder of devotion incalculable and +sacrifice without bound, guarantee of liberty and brotherhood, mercy, +equality, and justice--yet waved! And, part and indissoluble portion of +its inspiring memories and illustrious destinies, the star of Alleghenia +yet blazed upon its azure field! He had been living in a world of +unrealities, in a valley of shadow, grayed by portents of failure and +despair. His eyes had been narrowed to see the pitfalls which lined his +path, to the stumbling-blocks, the briers, the indescribable sordidness +of his personal position and his immediate surroundings. Now, he looked +up and horizonward. The thunder-clouds of official depravity and +duplicity which darkened the way of his endeavor--were they able, after +all, to blot out the memory of the clear, high sky above? + +As this thought came to him, it was almost as if, in actuality, a +brooding heaven had been rent asunder, revealing the steel-blue of the +infinite ether permeated with the supreme radiance of noon; and at the +incursion of this illuminating element the host of his discouragements +dwindled and disappeared, like noisome little prowlers of the night, +scuttling to cover at the abrupt break of a tropical day. For a moment, +he strove to realize whence the light had come, and in what consisted +this sovereign ally, hitherto uncalculated, of his optimism. As he +tracked his thought, it led him undeviatingly back to its direct +inspiration, the words of Natalie Rathbawne. + +"Before your fears come true"--she had said. + +Before his fears came true--well, what? The revelation leaped at him +full and fair now, and every nerve sang like a taut wire in answer to +its touch. Before his fears came true, this wretched little world of +petty chicanery and official corruption which surrounded and sickened +him would be wiped out of existence. Abbott--McGrath--their machinations +and their misdeeds--their lies and their ambitions--their power and +their pride,--they were newts that fouled a pool, gnats in the sunshine, +cinders on the snow. Towering above them, ready, at an instant's +notice, to crush them out of being, was the rock of ages, the righteous +spirit of Alleghenia, integral and indestructible, illumined by the +ancient, undimmed, and eternal sense of rectitude inherent in the +American people! + +Not by his agency, perhaps--perhaps not even in his day,--nevertheless +and infallibly, the right was bound to conquer in the end. The clear +eyes and the firm mouths of the men of the Ninth spoke it, their rifles, +their broad shoulders, and their precision confirmed and guaranteed it, +and back of these stood the great, taciturn figure of the People, a +smile upon its calm and silent lips. When those lips should speak, as +speak they would, their words would be the annihilation of Elijah Abbott +and of all his kind! + +Meanwhile--the bitterness--the disappointments--the humiliations--ah, in +a moment, how they had grown shrunken, and wizened, and old! For out of +the radiance of revelation, as Christ of old spoke to His disciples, so +now the spirit of Alleghenia spoke to her Lieutenant-Governor. + +"_What is that to thee? Follow thou Me!_" + +Like a woman, the spirit of her cried unto him, and, like a man, the +spirit of John Barclay answered. + + + + +X + +A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER + + +Much to Barclay's satisfaction, Cavendish had obtained his appointment +as a city reporter on the staff of the "Sentinel." Even the first week +of the new life thus entered upon had produced a vast change in his +manner and appearance. Though the Lieutenant-Governor had seen him but +once, when he came to repay the loan made him--in itself, of all signs +of restoration to a normal attitude, the most significant--he found that +his complexion had cleared and softened, and his eye perceptibly +brightened. He was clean-shaven once more, and his dress, while of +strict simplicity, was yet suggestive of the old days when he had been +called the most fastidious man in Kenton City. He held himself +straighter, too, with his shoulders thrown back and his head up; and +Barclay had noted, with quiet gratification, that there was not a +tremor about the hands which unfolded and smoothed the bills he had come +to return. One evidence alone remained of the desperate ordeal through +which he had passed. His voice, formerly firm and vibrant with a spirit +that was half gayety, half arrogance, was now indescribably modulated, +and touched with a melancholy which was not that of servility, still +less of shame. Rather, it was an unspeakably appealing regret, a +monotonous listlessness, a suggestion of hopeless surrender to something +tragic and inevitable. Barclay was puzzled by it. It seemed illogical, +and evaded him, like a melody with a dimly familiar _motif_ which he was +unable to place or even fully recall. It haunted him singularly, when +Cavendish had left, and afterwards, in his leisure moments, came back to +him, striving, as he fancied, to make itself understood. Intimately +candid as their recent relation had been, here was something +unexplained, which he could not come at, and which was yet eloquent of +vitality, of the need of comprehension. + +Since that time, three weeks before, the two men had not met. For this +there were several reasons. Barclay knew from a brief note that +Cavendish had taken a small room in a boarding-house, not far from the +"Rockingham," and that the pressure of his work for the "Sentinel" set +him afoot so early, and sent him home at night so brain and body weary, +that he had neither the strength nor the inclination for other things. +Added to this, had been the Lieutenant-Governor's absorption in his own +duties, and, in particular, his absence from Kenton City, on his round +of inspection of the state militia. But, just before the dinner hour, on +the evening following that of the review, Cavendish called, as Barclay +was in the act of dressing. + +"I had a suspicion I'd catch you just about this time," he said, +dragging a chair to the door of the bedroom, where he could watch the +Lieutenant-Governor struggling with a refractory white tie. "I'm getting +on famously, and I wanted you to know it." + +"That's right!" said Barclay, scowling into the mirror. "But then, I +knew you would. Your pessimism didn't produce much effect on me. I've +heard men talk like that before. And, of course, when a chap gets into +the condition you were in, back there, there's no such thing as making +him believe he can ever pull out. You talked like an ass, that first +night, Spencer." + +"And acted like a blackguard! I suppose you will allow me to refer to +that now?" + +"Now less than ever, my good sir. As I've told you already, all that +belongs to the past. You're yourself again. What's the use of dwelling +on a time gone by, when you were in reality somebody else--or, rather, +nobody at all? When are you going to call at the Rathbawnes'? The old +man is pretty ill, I'm afraid, but I think the rest would like to see +you again. They were speaking of you only the other day--that is, one of +them was!" + +"Not till this strike trouble is over, at all events; they have all they +can attend to at present, without being bothered by reformed drunkards. +And perhaps I sha'n't call at all. I haven't decided yet what would be +best." + +Then, before Barclay had time to speak, he added:-- + +"By the way, I'm to take up the strike to-morrow, for the 'Sentinel.'" + +"Are you?" exclaimed the Lieutenant-Governor, in a tone of the liveliest +interest. "That's good news. It must be about the most important +assignment they could give you, just now. Well, I wonder if you are +destined to be the only conscientious reporter in Kenton City, or +whether you will simply be like all the rest. Are you going to have the +courage of your convictions--which I think I can surmise, though you +haven't as yet confided them to me--or are you going to wear the +slave-chains of your fellows, and distort, and misrepresent, and truckle +and kow-tow to the policy of the most venal press in America?" + +"_On fait ce qu'on peut_," said Cavendish, with a shrug. "Orders are +orders, John. If the orders of the editor don't go, the orders on the +cashier don't come. That's about all there is to it. It would be rather +futile to attempt the Don Quixote act, if only for the reason that one +would never get into print. One can't do more than follow instructions. +The reporter's best policy is his paper's best honesty." + +"Honesty?" repeated the Lieutenant-Governor. "Where does the honesty +come in? Of course I understand your position. In a way, it is identical +with mine--subservience to a principle that you despise, acquiescence in +methods that you know to be utterly false and wrong! How sick I am of it +all! It's the old experience, all over again, which I used to have as a +child with the Tom Smith paper crackers. You are fascinated by the +tinsel, and the colored paper, and the gaudy label. You think that when +you've dissected one, and pulled it all to pieces, you'll find a bugle +and a gold crown inside--because that's what it says on the box. But, +the first thing you know, you'll find yourself blowing on a tin whistle +and wearing a fool's cap of green paper! Lord! how the press of Kenton +City needs a _man_--a man with the courage and the power to show up the +scoundrels who are responsible for all this--McGrath and his associates, +I mean. I'm sick and tired of reporters whose rascality is self-evident, +of editors who are bought and sold like chattels, of a state of affairs, +in general, so infamous as to surpass expression! You have my sympathy, +Spencer--the sympathy of a fellow-victim. To be a reporter on a +newspaper which dictates dishonesty; to be the lieutenant of a Governor +who enjoins duplicity--it's all just about one and the same thing!" + +"It's curious," commented Cavendish, "that it wasn't until about a week +after--after that night, that I knew you were Lieutenant-Governor. Then, +your name happened to be mentioned in the office, and somebody asked me +if I knew you." + +"Whereupon," said Barclay, conquering the tie at last, and turning from +the mirror, "you had the inexpressible privilege of saying that you knew +me intimately." + +"Whereupon," repeated Cavendish, in that so singular tone which had lain +heavy upon the other's memory, "I had the inexpressible privilege of +saying that I used to know you, but that we had quarreled, and were +now--strangers." + +"Why?" demanded the Lieutenant-Governor, wheeling abruptly upon him. +"What possessed you to say such a silly thing as that?" + +Cavendish leaned forward in his chair, with his elbows on his knees, and +his forehead against his interlaced fingers, staring at the floor. + +"I'm glad, in a way, to have you ask that question," he said slowly. "We +are wary of mock heroics, or even real heroics, men like you and me. And +yet there are things which must be explained, things not easy to +explain, because they come so close at times to melodrama. I've always +had a horror of emotional situations; and, from what I know of you, I'm +sure you have, as well. I'd avoid this explanation, if I could--indeed, +I've deliberately avoided it, thus far. Yet if I were a Romanist in the +presence of my priest, I think I should feel more at liberty to evade +confession than I do now. For both our sakes, I'll try to be as brief, +as simple, as lucid, as I can. And I'll trust you to understand, as well +as may be. Don't think there's any pose, any aim at effect, in what I'm +going to say. You've asked me a question, and I'm going to answer it, +that's all! I don't think, in my present frame of mind, I could bear to +have you entertain the suspicion that the answer was affected or lacking +in candor. _Allons!_ Already I'm growing too verbose!" + +He looked up with a wan smile. + +"Let's get down to facts. You ask me why I told my questioner that we no +longer knew each other. Well, then, let's have at it! It was because, +John Barclay, there is likely--no, there is sure--to come a time when +you won't care to acknowledge me as your friend. Oh, wait!" he added, as +the Lieutenant-Governor held up his hand in protest. "Hear me out. You +say I talked like an ass, that first night. Perhaps. But the fact +remains that I've been a drunkard--and that I'm bound to be one again! +I've been fighting against temptation for several weeks. It hasn't been +very strong, for some reason, and so I've managed to ground it so far. +But you remember the chap with whom old Hercules wrestled? Every time he +touched earth his strength was multiplied. Well, that's the way with +drink. I can throw the temptation for a while, but every time I do so it +rises, stronger many-fold. Sooner or later, I'm forced to give in. I +know it, as I know I'm sitting here. I'm doing my best now, because, in +the future, when the wrong that for a time you've righted goes wrong +again, I want you to remember that I made the effort--for you--and for +her--for the Fairy Princess. The end is as plain as day! It was born in +me, this. I think I've never told you that my father died of it, but +that's the truth. And the next time I drop, it will be for good and all. +I shall never make another effort to conquer the inevitable. If I can't +do it now, with the hope of redemption thus made plain, with a new +start, and a fresh chance, and--thanks to you, John--the past wiped off +the slate and a new sum set to solve, with the incentive of your +friendship and confidence, and the interest, so undeserved, of the Fairy +Princess, into the bargain,--if I can't do it now, I say, why surely I +can never do it. John, you can't know what I've been through. You, +who've never had the temptation, can't conceive of what it means. It's a +living actuality, this lust for drink. When your nerves go wrong, even +at the end of a day, or a week, or a year, during which you've kept +straight, when you're tired, discouraged, and, above all, _alone_!--then +it comes at you like a live thing,--speaks--grips your arm--drags you +wherever it wills! I've laughed at it, scoffed at it, in its absence, +tried to make myself believe it a fragment of an otherwise forgotten +dream, many and many and many a time. _But it always came back!_ Oh, +John Barclay, you others will never understand! A man has to have been +through it, in order to know, and that not once, but, as I have, a +hundred times." + +"I can well believe it to be a tremendous temptation," said the +Lieutenant-Governor gravely. + +"Temptation? It's more than that! A temptation gives you _some_ chance, +doesn't it? You may yield to it, but, at least, you've had your +fighting-chance. Well, in that sense, this is no temptation, though I've +been using the word myself to describe it. Why, John, it's madness, +sheer insanity. You probably remember that I never used to touch alcohol +at all. I promised my poor mother to let it alone until I reached my +majority. Of course, I didn't realize about the dear old man; he died +when I was too young for that. But her one great fear, and naturally, +was that the curse had descended to me--just as it had! Well, I stuck to +my promise till I was twenty-one, and kept along in the same way for +some time afterwards, just because there didn't seem to be any +particularly good reason for taking up something which I had managed to +get along very well without, all my life. Then came that time, you +know--three years ago--and out of mere recklessness, bravado, God knows +what, I began to drink. John, I was a doomed man from the first swallow! +That demon had been hiding inside me, without sound or movement or other +hint of his presence, for twenty-eight years--just waiting his chance! +You know the rest. The fight has been going on ever since, and the thing +has beaten every time. I've resisted. I've struggled. I've even prayed. +It's all useless." + +He pointed significantly to the curtain which hung where the door of the +wine-closet had been. + +"As I did that night," he continued, "I shall do again, and still again, +until the end. It's insanity, nothing more or less. It lurks at the back +of my brain--always--always--and then, suddenly, when I am least +expecting it, it comes forward with a rush, and I might as well try to +check the north wind or the incoming tide. I feel it tingling in my +fingers, scorching my throat, tearing at my reason. I swear I won't give +in, and, in the very act of so swearing, I get up and go out to meet it. +I could break down iron doors to get at the drink when it calls to me. +And, though I seem to be going straight enough now, the moment is coming +when it _will_ call and when I shall obey! Then you won't want to think +you've ever known me, John Barclay, still less to remember that the name +of the Fairy Princess has passed between us. And, in the midst of my +damnation, it will be a drop of cold water on my tongue to know that +I've left you a loophole through which to escape the acknowledgment of +these last few weeks. So far, no one but the 'Rockingham' people, and +Payson, and--and the Fairy Princess--know that we've been together +recently. The 'Rockingham' people don't even know my name. Payson won't +speak. And _she_ certainly won't. So far, so good. Further, I've come to +say good-by. Hereafter, we mustn't see each other"-- + +"Stop--stop!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "What is all this rot +you're talking? Chuck it, will you? Look here! If you go back on +me--which is bad--and on your Fairy Princess--which is worse--and on +yourself--which is the worst of all"-- + +"Yes, yes," answered Cavendish, "that's all true. But I'm not talking +about _if_ I go back, I'm talking about _when_ I go back! As I said when +I began, there's no use trying to explain this thing to a man who +doesn't understand it, and no man _can_ understand it except through his +own experience. In this respect, if in no other, you and I talk +different languages, belong on different planets. Could I expect you to +comprehend with me that first give of self-control which lets the demon +loose, and the meaning of the sight or smell of drink at that exact +moment when the will is weakest--the first glass, hastily swallowed, as +a brute, long thirsty, gulps down the water it has craved--the second +and third, taken more slowly--and then, that slackening of every nerve, +that jettisoning of all the moral cargo, that sudden love and +appreciation of the sensuous side of life? Don't you see? It's another +world, that, which you simply can't understand, unless you travel to it +by the road by which I have come--which God forbid!" + +"In all this," said Barclay, "I can see no reason why our present +friendship should not continue, and should not be known." + +"Simply this," answered Cavendish: "I'm--nothing! You're the +Lieutenant-Governor,--who is spoken of, if you care to know it, in the +office of the 'Sentinel' as the only honest official in the state of +Alleghenia. You mustn't tie up to me, nor I to you. I've told you what +my end is going to be. You don't believe it, perhaps, but it's none the +less true. And yours--do you know that the law-abiding element looks up +to you as a kind of Messiah? Do you know that you are the dawn of honor +and integrity which lies behind the present black cloud of lawlessness? +I tell you, John, the promise of your future is such as might nerve a +beaten Napoleon to renewed endeavor. In your hands lies the salvation of +the state." + +"I wish I could think so," said the Lieutenant-Governor. "God knows I'd +willingly cut one of them off, if I thought its loss could benefit the +commonwealth. But, as I've had occasion to say to others, in the present +emergency I'm as helpless as a babe unborn. You see how things are +going--one might as well appeal, so far as any hope of success is +concerned, to McGrath himself as to Governor Abbott. There's no getting +around it, Spencer. It's a declaration of anarchy pure and simple, and +with the official seal of Alleghenia at the bottom of the document. +Iniquitous wrong is being done, not only to Mr. Rathbawne in refusing +him the protection of the law to which he is entitled, but to the cause +of the strikers themselves, if they can justly be said to have a cause. +Nothing ever was or ever will be gained for the benefit of the many by +the violence of the few. It can only end in one way: by the +interposition of the federal troops. You know what happened at Chicago. +It will be the same thing here; and before it is over we shall see +people shot down like rats in the streets of Kenton City." + +"I hope it won't come to that," said Cavendish; "but even so, all's well +that ends well. Provided that order is finally restored"-- + +"But what credit is it," broke in Barclay, "to the state of Alleghenia +to have her law-breakers suppressed by the national government? Don't +you see that it would be only a final proof that she is too incompetent +or too indifferent to do it herself? From the point of view of the +state's good name, I doubt which is worst, her present attitude or the +interference of federal force." + +"Will it come to the latter in any event?" + +"Undoubtedly. They've already tried to prevent the delivery of Mr. +Rathbawne's mail, both at the mills and at his house. You know what +that means, don't you? One carrier interfered with in the performance of +his duty is sufficient excuse for mobilizing a brigade." + +"But the Governor"-- + +Barclay came forward, laid his hand on Cavendish's shoulder, and looked +down at him, slowly nodding his head. + +"The Governor of Alleghenia is a dyed-in-the-wool scoundrel, my good +sir," he said. "It is his manifest duty to enforce the law rigidly and +at once, and if the police of Kenton City cannot or will not assist him, +to summon the militia to his aid. In that way only can the honor of +Alleghenia be saved. And that is what Elijah Abbott will never do. There +is anarchy open and flagrant in the streets of Kenton City--there is +anarchy silent and sneering in the Governor's chair. God save the +state!" + + + + +XI + +YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE + + +"I have promised to marry Colonel Broadcastle," announced Mrs. Wynyard +when the silence had lasted twenty minutes. + +Dorothy flung round from the window against which she had been +mercilessly pressing her pretty nose. + +"Why, Aunt Helen!" she exclaimed. "You really are the most startlingly +abrupt person I ever knew. Are you in earnest? What under the sun +possessed you to do that?" + +"I think it must have been Colonel Broadcastle," answered Mrs. Wynyard, +with an air of reflection. "It was last night when he was showing us +over the armory, after the review. He not only asked me, but appeared to +have quite set his heart upon my giving him an affirmative answer. And +he had been so extremely civil, Dorothy, about our seats and all that, +that I thought it would seem rather ungracious to refuse the first favor +he had ever asked of me. So I said yes." + +"Aunt Helen, Aunt Helen! One of these fine days you will be the death of +me. Did any one _ever_ hear of such a reason for accepting a man?" + +"I couldn't think of a better one for refusing him," said Mrs. Wynyard +serenely. "So there you are!" + +"Talk about logic!" said Dorothy. She came across the room, and seated +herself beside her aunt. "I never heard anything so exciting in my +life!" she added. "Do you really mean it? Are you really going to marry +him?" + +"That is the arrangement, as I understand it," replied Mrs. Wynyard. "Of +course, I haven't his promise in writing, but I think I can trust him. I +once looked him up in your father's business guide, and he had three A's +after his name. I'm sure I don't know what they can stand for, if it's +not Acquaintance, Appeal, and Acceptance. I don't really see what else +I could have done. It seems to have all been arranged without consulting +me at all. One can't very well set one's self up in opposition to a +business guide, you know." + +"But he's old enough to be your father, Aunt Helen!" + +"That's precisely the reason why there wouldn't have been any sense in +my promising to be a sister to him. You see, I was quite helpless in the +matter from start to finish." + +"And it was only last night that you called me preposterous!" laughed +Dorothy. "Really, Aunt Helen, people who live in glass houses shouldn't +throw stones. I think you are the most absurd creature in the world. Do +you love him?" + +"I can even go so far as to say that I think I do," said Mrs. Wynyard, +without a break in her gravity. "I have all the symptoms,--palpitation +of the heart, a morbid craving for Shelley and chocolate caramels, a +tendency to wake up singing, and a failing for flattening my nose +against the window-pane for twenty minutes at a stretch without saying a +word to my poor old aunt, on the mere chance that he may be coming down +the avenue." + +The blush which Dorothy paid as tribute to this subtle innuendo came +near to rivaling one of young Nisbet's celebrated performances in the +same line. + +"You're making fun of me," she said reproachfully. + +"I, my dear?--not the least in the world. It's all as true as the gospel +according to St. Valentine. I've told you first because we're not only +aunt and niece, but the very best friends possible besides, and I knew +you would like to hear the news before any one else. Colonel Broadcastle +is by all odds the finest man I know,--I won't even except John Barclay, +much as I admire him. He has paid me a very great honor. I respect him +tremendously; I trust him absolutely. These alone are good reasons; but +there's a better one,--so much better that nothing else really has any +bearing on the subject. Can you guess?" + +"Yes," said Dorothy softly, "you just love him. Isn't that it?" + +"Exactly. It's a curious thing, this love. There may be every reason why +one should marry a man, his own wish included, and yet one doesn't. +There may be no reason at all, so far as outsiders can see, and yet one +does! I've known a woman to throw over one suitor who had everything in +his favor--money, character, position--and accept another who had none +of these advantages--because she liked the way he parted his hair! +That's the way it goes. It's the most illogical thing in the world, if +we except the stock market and other women's gowns. And then, when it's +all arranged, his friends wonder what she could have seen in him, and +her friends what he could have seen in her! But I'm wandering from the +subject. Seriously, Dorothy dear, I love him very sincerely, and I have +been more happy than I can say ever since I found out that it wasn't +going to be one of those one-sided love-affairs which assure the incomes +of the poets and the lawyers. And now,--confidence for confidence, +Dorothy!" + +"Aunt Helen! I don't know what you mean." + +"Oh, Dorothy! 'I don't know what you mean' is one of those phrases like +'Not at home' and 'Yours very sincerely,' which are white lies on the +face of them. I don't want to force your confidence. We all have what +our friends recognize as our private affairs, with the accent--worse +luck!--on the _pry_! But this is very different. I'm very fond of you, +as you know, and my interest is far from being vulgar curiosity. Of a +woman's five cardinal failings--inquisitiveness, extravagance, vanity, +vacillation, and loquacity--I'm guiltless of all except the last and +most innocent. But don't we all need to talk at times? Don't we all long +for a trustworthy _confidante_? Aren't our little secrets often like +precious liquors?--if we don't make use of them, share them with our +friends, they either ferment and sour, or else lose all their sweetness +and significance by slow evaporation." + +"You would draw confidence from a stone," said Dorothy, with a little +smile, "but what have I to tell you?" + +"How should I know? Perhaps nothing--as yet; perhaps everything. Take +your time about it, dear. I'm not trying to get you to commit yourself. +I only want you to know that I'm ready to share your secret when it's +ready to be shared, and to help and counsel you in any way I can. I know +the main great fact already. Because, you see, Dorothy, one may conceal +an infinite amount, even from one's nearest and dearest, when they don't +understand--and they are so _apt_ not to understand, one's nearest and +dearest! And the financier may hide his schemes from his partners, or +the general his plan of campaign from his fellow-officers, or the +politician his ambitions from his most ardent supporters--but I doubt, +my dear, if a woman in love was ever able to hide very much from +another woman in the same lamentable condition! + +"If it were not," she added, taking Dorothy's hand in hers, "for the +great happiness which has come into my life, do you think that I should +have been able to divine that other great happiness which seems to be +hovering over yours? I am the physician afflicted with the disease which +it becomes his duty to study and to cure. Only, it's not a disease, +Dorothy, but a great, a beautiful revelation. I should have compared +myself, instead, to the prophet who is enabled to interpret the dreams +of others because they are identical with his own. There's my little +speech. And when you are prepared to answer it, you'll find me ready." + +As she was speaking the last words, the butler flung back the curtains +at the doorway of the drawing-room. + +"Mr. Nisbet," he announced imperturbably. + +Dorothy looked at her aunt, and then, with her frank laugh:-- + +"If there _is_ an answer," she said, "that's it!" + +As young Nisbet entered, Mrs. Wynyard was the first to greet him. + +"So," she observed, looking him over approvingly, "you've beaten your +swords into walking-sticks, and your spears into top-hats, as my friend +Isaiah so aptly observes! That's very commendable, but I almost think I +like you better in your war-paint. Do you know, a Colonel's orderly is +the spickest-and-spanest object upon which I've ever laid, or hope to +lay, my eyes?" + +"He just naturally has to be," said young Nisbet, with a grin. Somehow, +he was always more at his ease with Mrs. Wynyard than with other women. +"You see," he added, "if it wasn't that way, he wouldn't be it." + +Which was as near as he had ever come to making an epigram. + +"Well, I shall leave you to the tender mercies of Dorothy," said Mrs. +Wynyard. "I've promised to take a walk with your--what is it you call +him--instead of commanding officer, you know?" + +"K. O.," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, that's it. How deplorably you militiamen spell! Well, at all +events, I'm going to walk with your K. O., and it's time I was getting +ready. Good-by." + +"Good-by, Mrs. Wynyard." + +"Day-day!" said Dorothy, from the divan. + +"She's a crack-a-jack!" exclaimed young Nisbet, after she had gone. + +"Mercy!" said Dorothy. "I never knew you to be so enthusiastic over any +one before. If you have any intention of falling in love with Aunt +Helen, I feel it to be my duty, as a friend and well-wisher, to warn you +in advance that there isn't the most remote show in the world for you." + +"Oh, it's not that!" protested young Nisbet with that stupendous +earnestness which made people want to hug him. "Why, Mrs. Wynyard would +have me talked to a standstill in two or seven minutes! Imagine me +trying to make love to a dame like that! She'd lose me so quick you +couldn't see me for the dust. Besides"-- + +"Besides what?" asked Dorothy with an elaborate air of unconcern, as he +hesitated. + +Young Nisbet was quite crimson now, and twitched at the creases in his +trousers where they passed over his knees, and turned in his toes +excessively. + +"There's somebody else in the running!" he blurted out desperately. + +There! It was out--a part of it, at least--not at all, to be sure, in +anything even remotely resembling one of the thousand manners he had +proposed to himself as effective, during long hours of wakefulness, when +there was nothing in the world but his crowding thoughts and the ticking +of his clock--but still, out! The ice was broken. It was impossible that +she should not understand. The rest would be easier. + +Alas for young Nisbet! He was, as he himself acknowledged, not "up on +women!" + +"Somebody else?" repeated Dorothy. "How ever did you find that out? She +only told _me_ about it twenty minutes ago." + +Alas, alas, for young Nisbet! He had thought his feet upon the beach at +last, whereas they had but touched a sand-bar in passing over. The +under-tow of embarrassment was worse than ever now, and threatened to +drag him down. + +"Oh, I don't mean Mrs. Wynyard. I wasn't talking of her--that is, I was, +at first--but afterwards--anyhow, I'm not talking of her now! When I say +there's somebody else, I mean--I mean"-- + +"I am going out for a moment, Dorothy--just over to the _doctor's_. +_How_ de do, Mr. Nisbet? _Wretched_ weather, _isn't_ it? Natalie's with +your father, my dear, and _I'll_ be back _almost_ immediately. +Er--_ahem_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne went through a kind of rudimentary calisthenic exercise, +which consisted of squaring her shoulders and drawing in her chin. It +was accompanied by a meaning glance at her daughter, and was designed as +an inconspicuous substitute for the frank injunction to "sit up +straight, my dear," upon which Dorothy had finally placed a ban. + +"And _won't_ you feed the gold-fish, my dear?" she added. "I've been _so_ +occupied, and the poor things haven't had a _crumb_ for three days. I've +just told Thomas to take a plate of bread in at _once_. I'm sure Mr. +_Nisbet_ won't mind: get him to _help_ you. Er--_ahem_! And I'll be back +in about fifteen minutes, or so." + +For a time there was silence in the big, warm conservatory. Young Nisbet +had taken the dish from Dorothy's hands, and, after seating himself on +the low marble parapet surrounding the pool, devoted his energies to +feeding the gold-fish. He was thinking that it was all to be done over +again, and that it was harder than ever, if such a thing were possible, +to do. What was there about those few words which seemed to choke him? +For the moment, he took refuge in a commonplace question. + +"Is it one of your duties to feed these persons?" + +Dorothy laughed shortly, like a little chord of music. + +"No--it's the Mater's peculiar privilege," she answered. "She adores the +stupid little beasts. Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. Nisbet. She +feeds them regularly herself,--or did, until Dad began to require so +much of her time. But lately, the house has been so upset, and she has +been doing such a lot of going out, and coming in"-- + +"Yes," put in young Nisbet dryly, "I've noticed the coming in part." + +"So Natalie has been doing it for her," went on Dorothy, more rapidly. +"I suppose Natalie herself hasn't had the time, these last three days. +They _are_ hungry, aren't they? _Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. +Nisbet!_ Don't you see the poor things have only button-holes for +mouths?" + +There was another long pause, before either spoke again. + +"What defeats me about your mother," said young Nisbet slowly, "is the +way she manages to come in just at the wrong moment. At interruption, +she's the most star performer I've ever run up against. You don't mind +my saying that, do you? I'm not throwing any asparagus. I wouldn't be +disrespectful about her for the world. But really, for chopping into a +conversation, she's a dazzler!" + +"She _is_ a little inopportune at times," admitted Dorothy. + +"Inopportune? Yes,--she's all of that. When she marches in, I feel +exactly as if the boat had gybed, and the boom come over and knocked me +into thirty fathoms of water. Lord!" + +"Why, how ridiculous!" said Dorothy. "There's nothing about the Mater to +be afraid of. She's the dearest, most innocent old thing in the world! +She just blunders along like that, and nobody is less aware of her +mistakes than she is. And, after all, why shouldn't she interrupt us, so +long as we're not saying anything in particular? And if we _were_ +saying--anything in particular, we could always pick up the +conversation where we dropped it." + +"That's just what I find it so hard to do!" confessed young Nisbet. "I'm +a stupid sort of lout, you know, Miss Rathbawne. I've never had half a +chance to practice talking to dames, and where other lads fuss like +experts, I just can't make good. I foozle every stroke. I'm an +ass--that's all!" + +"You're nothing of the sort!" said Dorothy indignantly. "You're an +extremely attractive young man!" + +"As good as the average in some ways, perhaps. But--how can I explain +what I mean?--there always comes a day when a chap wants to be more, +wants to be the best ever, in every way! That's the proposition I'm up +against now. I seem to be just a bundle of misfits, and--and--oh, +shucks! my line of talk is all crooked, and I can't tell you what the +trouble is, but"-- + +"Your liver's out of kilter," interpolated Dorothy. + +"No, sir!" protested young Nisbet. "Nothing is ever out of kilter +inside me! If I'm nothing else, I'm blue-ribbon boy on the health +question. No, it's something I want, and that I'm pretty sure I can't +get." + +"I know perfectly well what it is," said Dorothy, "and you haven't even +asked for it!" + +Young Nisbet looked up suddenly. + +"Do you mean?"--he stammered, "do you mean?"-- + +Outside, the front door slammed, and Mrs. Rathbawne's voice became +audible, inquiring Dorothy's whereabouts of the butler. The girl +laughed. + +"There's the Mater back again," she said. "Oh, Mr. _Nisbet_!" + +For young Nisbet had dropped dish and bread-crumbs into the pool with a +great splash, electrifying the gold-fish into unheard-of activity, and +had risen, at the same moment, to his feet. He stood before her, his +honest face blazing, his hands outstretched. + +"I love you!" he said. "Will you marry me?" + +And whether or not he received an audible reply to this question he +never knew,--only she was in his arms, and gold-fish might feast or +starve, for all he cared about them. The wide doors of perfect bliss +swung open before him, and young Nisbet passed within. + +He was gazing ruefully into the water, as Mrs. Rathbawne entered. For +the first time in his experience, her presence did not embarrass him. + +"I've dropped a dish into your pool, Mrs. Rathbawne," he said, "and +scared the gold-fish into blue conniption fits. Look how they are +scurrying around. I hope I haven't done them any harm." + +"Oh, no," answered Mrs. Rathbawne placidly. "They are getting _so_ fat +that I should _think_ a little exercise, _now_ and again, would be +_good_ for them. We _might_ drop a dish into the pool every week or so, +Dorothy, just to stir them up." + +"It might go for a while," said young Nisbet, "but any old football +player like myself, Mrs. Rathbawne, will tell you that you can't work +the same trick more than just a certain number of times." + +"Interruption, for example!" added Dorothy, and laughed across at him, +deliciously, with her eyes. + + + + +XII + +DIOGENES + + +It was during the tenth week of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills that +the "Kenton City Record" made its long-remembered attack upon +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay. The arraignment was one unparalleled for +venom, even in the columns of that most notoriously scurrilous journal +in the state, and, withal, there was about it a devilish ingenuity, a +distortion of facts so slight as to defy refutation, and so plausible as +to carry conviction. It was the last blow in the long series of +discouragements which Barclay had suffered since his inauguration, and +for the moment he was completely unmanned. He was at no loss, however, +to trace the source from which the ingeniously perverted facts had been +obtained. Not even McGrath, with his intimate knowledge of all that went +forward at the capitol, could have supplied information so detailed. +The hand of Elijah Abbott was traceable in every line of the attack. +Their conversation, on the afternoon when he had first spoken to Barclay +of the impending strike, was reproduced almost word for word, as well as +that on the occasion when McGrath had been present, and therefrom the +"Record" went on to deduce that not even Peter Rathbawne, with all his +obstinacy, all his blindness to the welfare of his employees, was +responsible for their present destitution in the same sense as was the +Lieutenant-Governor, who might have avoided the strike by a conciliatory +word, and who, instead, had advised Mr. Rathbawne to fight the +working-people until the last cent of their money should be exhausted +and the last drop of their blood should be shed. + +"Incompetency," said the article in part, "is what we long since learned +to expect from John Hamilton Barclay. Gross neglect of public duty, +flagrant callousness to responsibility, contemptuous indifference to the +interests of the citizens whose votes placed him where he is,--all +these have been part and parcel of his attitude since the unfortunate +moment of his election. But even in him we had not looked for the +incredible spectacle of a public official deliberately precipitating the +incalculable distress which has followed in the wake of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills. Overburdened with the cares of office, in a single +instance the Governor of Alleghenia turned over a question of vital +significance to the lieutenant from whom he had every reason to expect +compliance and support. Even so, he was careful to point out a line of +action by which the impending calamity might readily have been avoided. +And what was the result? Not only in total disregard of plain duty, but +in direct disobedience of the orders of his superior, the +Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia threw his influence into the scale to +outweigh law and order, and brought about the deplorable destitution now +facing the families of four thousand martyrs to principle. When men are +driven to desperation, when women turn to shame in order to maintain +life, when children are heard crying in our streets for bread, to whom +shall we point as the author of it all? To Peter Rathbawne, a poor, +doddering old man, barely responsible now, if rumor is to be believed, +for what he does? No! To John Hamilton Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of +Alleghenia!" + +This, and much more in the same strain, while passed over as sensational +bombast by the better element, did not fail of its effect upon the +strikers. A mass-meeting, held that morning, denounced Barclay in a set +of resolutions, as a traitor to his office and as the avowed enemy of +labor, and demanded his impeachment on the ground of neglect of duty. +During the day, half a score of threatening letters came to his office. +But what hurt him most, though he almost smiled at his own +sensitiveness, was that the doormen and porters at the Capitol greeted +his morning nod with a stare, and even the little office-boy, bending +low over his table in the ante-room, did not look up for the customary +wink. For his mother was a trimmer at the Rathbawne Mills. + +Once in his office, the Lieutenant-Governor found it impossible to +concentrate his mind upon the work before him. Sentence after sentence, +the words of his arraignment marched through his mind, as he sat with +his elbows on the desk and his chin in his doubled fists. A single +reading seemed to have stamped them indelibly and forever upon his +memory. Baffled by conflicting reflections he began, for the first time, +to doubt whether his had been the course of conscience, or merely that +of pride and perversity. Was not the "Record" right, perhaps, after all? +If it was true that the strike was driving men to crime and women to the +streets--and if it was not, as yet, true, it soon must be--who, indeed, +was to blame if not he himself, who had said "Fight them!" when he might +have kept peace by a word? + +Suddenly, the Lieutenant-Governor rose, and, crossing the room to where +the arms of Alleghenia hung upon the wall, took down the frame, laid +it, face up, upon the table, and, bending down, studied it intently. The +beautifully executed nude figures of Art and Labor stared steadfastly +back at him, their muscular hands grasping the circular shield, strength +and endurance in every line of their necks, shoulders, and thighs, +purity and purpose in their blue eyes and square-cut jaws. He was as +motionless as they for full five minutes. Presently his finger moved +slowly across the frame, and he said, quite softly: + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas._" + +Then he looked up, straight before him, out of the open window, where an +encircling wistaria was dotted with minute sprouts of green, and up at +the clear, wide sky. + +"I'm right!" he said aloud. "I'm right!" + + * * * * * + +At five that afternoon, Spencer Cavendish set out upon the most +unpleasant assignment which had ever fallen to his lot. When Payson had +told him that he was to procure an interview with Peter Rathbawne for +the "Sentinel," with a special eye to the mill-owner's failing health, +as reported in the morning's "Record," he had shrunk back instinctively +from a task so distasteful, and was on the point of refusing. But two +considerations checked this impulse. If the thing were to be done at +all, he thought, surely it had better be the work of one friendly to the +Rathbawnes and with their interests at heart than that of a bungling +outsider, with it in his power to hurt them beyond expression. The +argument was plausible, but behind its logic, at the back of Cavendish's +brain, there lay another reason, without which the first had been +insufficient to persuade him. He wanted to see Natalie again--to meet +her under the shield of some compatible excuse, so that he should not +seem to have sought her of his own will. He was thirsty for a word from +her, thirsty with the pitiable thirst of the shipwrecked sailor who +knows a swallow of salt water will but increase his torture, and who +craves it, none the less. Long since, he had forfeited his right to her +friendship--no sophistry could blind him to that. Moreover the ocean of +degradation not only lay behind him; it lay in front as well. It was as +he had told Barclay. He stood upon an island, not the mainland, of +redemption, and another plunge was inevitable. + +What he expected to gain by a word with Natalie Rathbawne, Cavendish +himself could hardly have told. At most, he was conscious of a faint +hope that in some turn or twist of the conversation he might have a +chance of thanking her, of telling her that he rejoiced in her +happiness, and of bidding her good-by. For paramount in his mind lay the +thought of his approaching downfall, inevitable, utter, and final. He +did not attempt to deceive himself. He knew what was coming. It had come +before. + +When Cavendish had sent in his card, a servant showed him through the +library into the conservatory, where Peter Rathbawne was seated in a +deep rattan chair watching his daughter, who stood at his side tossing +bread-crumbs to the gold-fish in the circular central pool. They both +turned at the sound of his footsteps, and Natalie held out her hand. + +"So you've come at last!" she said. "I should think it was quite time. +Dad, you remember Mr. Cavendish, don't you?" + +"Yes," answered her father. "Oh, yes!" + +Rathbawne's voice was without life, his face almost wholly void of +expression. Though he glanced at Cavendish, it was with the blank stare +of a delirious person whose attention is unconsciously caught by an +unusual noise rather than with any evidence of direct interest, and he +took no further part in the conversation, nor even seemed to realize +that his companions were speaking. When he had answered his daughter's +question and looked at Cavendish, he leaned back in his chair, and +wearily closed his eyes. + +"He is very much changed since you saw him," said the girl in a lower +tone, turning again to the pool, "and it's all come about in the past +six weeks. The strike has had a most curious, a most pathetic effect +upon him. Even the doctor is at a loss to account for it. I think that +I am, perhaps, the only one who really understands. He has always been +so proud of his mills and of his people, so loyal to them, so like a +father to them, one and all, that to have them turn against him like +this, and, what is worse, get to drinking and rioting, has almost broken +his heart. The doctor says only one thing can save him, and that is to +see the mills going again and the people happy and prosperous, as they +were before. And who knows when that will be? For, feeble and broken as +he is, he will never give in to the Union. Of that I'm sure." + +"I'm very sorry," said Cavendish softly. One look at Rathbawne had been +enough to show him that the interview for which he had been sent was an +impossibility. One look at Natalie sufficed to banish from his mind +every thought save that of her pitiful pallor and the pathetic quiver of +her lips. + +"I had no idea it was as bad as this," he continued. "Can't anything be +done? You are far from being in good shape yourself, Miss Rathbawne." + +"Tired and dispirited, that's all," she answered, trying to smile. "And +I fear nothing can be done as long as our fate lies in Governor Abbott's +hands. There's no use in harping on that, though. You know as well as I +what we have to expect from him. Did you see the attack on Mr. Barclay +this morning?" + +"An infamous libel!" exclaimed Cavendish hotly. + +Miss Rathbawne crumbled the bread between her fingers, and resumed her +feeding of the gold-fish. + +"You must know that I am the last person in the world to need that +assurance," she said slowly. "It is only another thread in all the +hideous tissue of injustice and iniquity which has been wrapped about us +like a pall. What a shame, is it not, that such a man as he should be +powerless to do the work I think God intended for him? And what a shame +that Alleghenia, needing his clear head and his strong arm and his +loyal heart as she does in this hour of emergency, should only be +sneering at him as a coward and a cad!" + +"I cannot believe," answered Cavendish, "that the venom of the 'Record' +is to be taken as the sentiment of the state. There must be many--there +must be a majority of Alleghenians who know, as we know, that no better +man breathes than John Barclay." + +"Thank you," said the girl. + +In the open spaces of water between the lily-pads the fat indolent +gold-fish mouthed at the crumbs, stirring the silence with little +sucking sounds, and sending tiny ripples widening on all sides. One +alone, dingy yellow in color, moped apart from his fellows, and took no +interest in the banquet. + +"That one's a cynic," said Miss Rathbawne presently. "My subtlest +cajoleries never win him from that attitude of sneering contempt. The +others get all the tid-bits, and he doesn't seem to care. He isn't even +ornamental--he's in a class by himself. I call him Diogenes, and I'm +thinking of buying him a tub all for himself, where he can sulk in +solitary grandeur to his heart's content." + +"Perhaps not altogether in a class by himself," said Cavendish. "There +are others, you know, who make no use of their opportunities, and who +can never hope to be anything but ugly and useless, while their fellows +are getting all the good things of life, and enjoying them, and giving +pleasure of one kind or another into the bargain." + +Something in his tone caused Natalie to look at him suddenly. + +"I'm not enough of a pessimist," she answered firmly, "to believe that +true in anything beyond appearances. We are all apt, no matter how +conceited we may be, to underestimate at times the extent of our own +usefulness--or, rather, we are unconscious of the direction in which it +is most productive. If what you say is so, then all that is lacking is +the opportunity, and that is sure to come. We may squander many +opportunities, and, hardly less probably, actually turn to account in a +way we do not perceive many which we seem to ourselves to squander. In +any event, others will come. A woman once said to me that the good in +her was not cultivated nor exercised with a view to _individual +immortality_. That seemed to me to mean so much that I've built up quite +a little creed on it. It's the principle, isn't it, upon which the whole +scheme of the world hinges? A million leaves fall and decay to enrich +the soil wherefrom two million more may spring. An infinity of little +shell-fish die, and the ages grind their shells to powder to make the +sands and the chalk cliffs. Countless raindrops sacrifice their identity +to maintain that of one great river. And why should it not be so with +us? If only we can contribute in the smallest degree to the uplifting of +our kind, to the advancement of the race, to the maintenance of what we +know to be right, what possible difference can it make whether, in the +effort to be of such service, we live or succumb? We were put here, it +seems to me, very much as separate notes are put into one great harmony. +Each note is struck at the proper time, serves its purpose, and goes +into nothingness. Each plays its part, however small. We can't all be +included in the wonderful final chords. Our place may seem trivial to +us, and yet in some sense we may be sure we are all contributors to the +unity and perfection of the whole. That ought to be enough. No one note +achieves individual immortality, but each does something to assure the +immortality of the composition of which it forms a part. If we don't +believe that, if we are not content to have it so, how is it possible to +believe in any divine purpose, any scheme of justice at all? Look at the +indescribable waste of life on all sides of us. If only in the case of +humanity, people are dying by hundreds every minute, unheeded, +unlamented, unrecorded. Human life is such a little thing!--as little as +the life of the leaf or the raindrop. And yet in the death of these last +we are able to perceive the working of a vast system which must be the +outcome of a direct purpose, and whereby the best interest of each +species is furthered. And so, the human race. Why should it be less +than lesser things? One man dies in order that two may live. A +confederacy--as in the case of our own Rebellion--perishes in order that +a nation may endure. Everywhere, in short, the individual sacrifices his +individual existence in order that it may contribute to and fertilize +the growth of his species. So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly +content to have it so. I should ask nothing better, when my own time +comes, than the assurance that, in one way or another, my death had a +significance,--that it was for a person or a principle, and not merely a +natural phenomenon. I may not be able to believe that; but there is one +belief possible to all of us,--I mean that, if not in death, then +assuredly in life, we have been of service to our race and time. We are +often told that the indispensable thing does not exist. I think the same +may be said of the useless one. I don't believe even the humblest of +God's creatures goes out of life without having been at one time or +another an influence for good. I even have hopes of Diogenes. Some day +there will be a scrap of refuse or an ugly little bug which mars the +symmetry of the pool, and Diogenes will eat it,--and perhaps die of +indigestion as a martyr to principle!" + +The silence which followed her words was broken by a hoarse sob from Mr. +Rathbawne, and, turning, they saw that his head had fallen back against +the chair, with his eyes, wide and staring, fixed upon the glass roof, +and his breath coming in short, thick gasps from between his parted +lips. In an instant Natalie was on her knees by his side, with her arms +about him. + +"Don't be frightened," she said, looking up at Cavendish with a brave +little smile. "It's his heart. He has had these attacks frequently of +late. Will you get me the whiskey decanter and a glass? You'll find them +in the dining-room--on the sideboard--to the left." + +Decanter in hand, Cavendish stood watching her, as she tenderly poured a +little of the raw spirit between her father's lips. The effect was +almost instantaneous. Rathbawne choked, swallowed the restorative, and +presently raised his head and looked at her, patting her hand +tremulously with his own. They were so absorbed in each other that +neither noted a sudden, strange transformation in Cavendish's +expression. From the wide-mouthed decanter in his hand, the faint acrid +odor of Peter Rathbawne's fine old Scotch whiskey crept upward, stung +his nostrils, and, of a sudden, set him all a-quiver, like a startled +animal. The smell was almost that of pure alcohol, and set his mouth +watering, and drove his breath out in a little shuddering gasp that was +like a revulsion from some sickening medicine, just swallowed. But he +knew it, none the less, for something which belonged to and was part of +him. For weeks he had avoided it. Now it assailed him like that foe of +Hercules, of whom he had spoken to Barclay, whose strength was +multiplied a hundred-fold for every time his opponent trod him under +foot. + +As he told the Lieutenant-Governor, at the moment when least he +expected it, the demon touched his arm. For a minute he fought +desperately against the suggestion, with his eyes closed, and his teeth +cutting into his inner lip. He clung madly to the thought of the +presence in which he was, conscious that the girl's words had +uplifted him immeasurably, given him a clearer insight into the +essential significance of life than he had ever known. It was +useless--useless--useless! There was nothing left in the world but the +smell of the liquor that he loathed and that he loved! + +"If you were to leave us alone"-- + +At the suggestion, Cavendish bowed and went slowly back toward the +dining-room. Once out of sight of the others, he paused, glanced back +over his shoulder, and then, abruptly, supporting himself with one hand +against the side-post of the doorway, raised the decanter in the other +to his lips, and drank. + + + + +XIII + +THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE + + +The day had been deliciously warm and still, one of those eloquent +heralds of spring that are touched with a peculiar beauty rivaling her +own. As Cavendish came out of the Rathbawne residence, Bradbury Avenue +was splashed with huge blotches of dazzling yellow, where the light of +the westwardly sun poured between the houses and was spilled upon the +smooth pavement. The man choked slightly at the after-taste of the raw +whiskey he had just swallowed, but almost immediately he smiled. + +"I knew it would come," he said to himself as he turned out into the +avenue, "and here it is. I'm not surprised. I'm glad, God help me--I'm +_glad_!" + +His mouth was watering, and he felt, as it were, every inch of the +stimulant's progress through his veins, warming him with its familiar +glow. When he had left the conservatory, he had been trembling +pitifully. Now he was calm, and as steady as if his nerves had been +cords of steel. Responsibility, resolution, remorse--they had fallen +from him like so many discarded garments. He was sharply alive to the +pleasure of the moment, keenly appreciative of the sunlight, the soft +air, the laughter of the children romping in the streets. Of a singular +languor which had been wont to come over him toward the close of each +busy day of the past six weeks there was now no hint. He walked rapidly, +with his shoulders thrown back, and his chin well elevated, but his +course was not in the direction of his home, nor yet in that of the +"Sentinel" office. Instinctively, he had turned toward that part of the +city where were the large restaurants, the playhouses, and the more +pretentious saloons. + +At a corner, he wheeled abruptly into one of these last, and, seating +himself at a small table, called for an absinthe. The place was already +lighted, and each glass in the pyramids behind the bar twinkled with a +tiny brilliant reflection of the nearest incandescent globes. The air +was faintly redolent of lemon and the mingled odors of many liquors. To +Cavendish it was all very familiar, and all very pleasant. Again he told +himself that he was glad, glad that the restraint he had been exercising +was at an end. He was free, he thought, free to accomplish his own +inevitable damnation. He had no patience for the tedious operation of +dripping the water into his absinthe over a lump of sugar, but ordered +gum, and stirring the two rapidly together, filled the glass to the brim +from a little pitcher at his side. Then he drank, slowly but steadily, +barely touching the glass to the table between his sips. + +Presently, he was conscious of a slight numbness at his wrists, a barely +perceptible tingling in his knees and knuckles. His heart was +fluttering, and his temples pulsed pleasurably. He glanced toward the +glittering pyramids of glasses, and for a fraction of time they seemed +to shift in unison a foot to the right, returning immediately to their +original position with a jerk. Then he rose, and went toward the door, +catching sight of his face in a mirror as he passed. It was very pale, +and he crinkled his nose at it derisively, and then smiled at the +whimsical oddity of his reflected expression. On the threshold he +paused, looking toward the west, blazing with the red and saffron of the +departed sun. + +"Oof!" he said, with a downward tug at his waistcoat. "It comes quickly. +That's what it is to be out of practice." + +He dined alone in a corner of an unfrequented restaurant, eating little, +but drinking steadily, absinthe at first, then whiskey, four +half-goblets of it, barely diluted with water. Then he found himself +once more in the streets, now brilliantly lighted, going on and on +without purpose, save when the blazing colored glass of a saloon swerved +him from his path. He knew that he was walking steadily, avoiding +obstacles as if by instinct, stepping from and on to kerbs without any +actual perception of them. Faces swam past him, staring. Men, +particularly those at the bars he leaned against, were talking loudly, +but, as it seemed to him, brilliantly. He often smiled involuntarily, +and sometimes spoke to one of them, drank with him, and presently was +alone again, walking on and on. Occasionally a white-faced clock bulged +at him out of the night; and then he noticed that time was galloping. It +was close upon one when he found himself in a quarter which his recent +employment had made familiar--the neighborhood of the Rathbawne Mills. + +Here, suddenly, his mind emerged from a mist, and every detail of his +surroundings stood out sharp and clear-cut. The street was +insufficiently illuminated, but the light of a full moon cut across the +buildings on one side, half way between roof and sidewalk. Cavendish +perceived, with a kind of dull surprise, that the pavements were +thronged, and that almost every window framed a figure or two. A hoarse +murmur pulsed in the air, and his quickened ear was greeted on every +side by foul jests and grumbled oaths, broken now and again by drunken +imprecations, scuffles, or the shrill invective of women invisible in +the throng. Once a girl touched his arm, and he found her face close to +his, thin, haggard, and imploring. He shook her off, and turned +unsteadily into the doorway of a saloon; stumbling, as he did so, over a +little boy crying on the step. + +Inside, the air was reeking with rank smoke and the fumes of stale beer. +The floor was strewn with sawdust, streaked and circled by shuffling +feet; the mirror backing the bar was covered with soiled gauze dotted +with tawdry roses, and an indescribable dinginess seemed to have laid +its sordid fingers on all the fittings. + +The room was crowded, nevertheless--crowded not only with the men +themselves, but, to the stifling point, with their voices and their +gestures and the spirit of their unrest and discontent. Cavendish, +leaning against the end of the bar, looked wearily down the line of +flushed faces and backward at the disputing groups which rocked and +swayed, as the men argued and swore, grasping the lapels of each others' +coats, and spilling the liquor from their glasses as they gesticulated. +He was wholly sober now. It was the stage of dissipation which +experience had taught him to dread the most--the emergence from dulled +sensibility into a nervous tension upon which stimulant had no apparent +effect. He was trembling again, too, and his face, as he saw it in the +mirror through the clouding gauze, was as that of a stranger, a stranger +of whom he was afraid. He swallowed the whiskey he had ordered, and, +supporting himself by the bar, swung back and gave his attention to what +the men about him were saying. It did not need his sharpened perception +to appreciate the fact that he was in the thick of the worst element of +the Rathbawne strikers, or that the situation was a crisis. What little +restraint had characterized the earlier stages of the strike was now, +most evidently, at an end. Starvation was no longer a mere possibility, +or violence a mere threat. The men raved like wild creatures against +Rathbawne and John Barclay, recounting maudlinly the destitution of +their families, and, anon, flaming forth into cries for vengeance. How +long the babel lasted Cavendish could not have said. Long since, the +doors had been closed, and the lights half lowered, in mock deference to +a supposedly vigilant police, when suddenly a hush fell upon the +assemblage. A side door had opened, and Michael McGrath stood in the +midst of his followers, with his arms folded and a thin smile upon his +lips. There was not a whisper as he began to speak. The men leaned +toward him breathlessly, their mouths open, their eyes starting glassily +out of their sodden faces. + +"And how long is _this_ going to go on?" demanded their leader, with a +sneer. "Talk--talk--talk! That's always the way, and nothing done, after +all. Well, there's been about enough of it, and that's flat. You've +been living on the Union, and I suppose you think you can go on living +on it till hell freezes over. Now listen to me. When the strike began we +had plenty of funds, and more came to us from the Central Federation. +The funds are gone, d' you hear, and the Federation is asking what we +mean to do. There is six hundred and odd dollars in the treasury. No +need to tell you how far that much will go, is there? Not one day! And +with all your talk, you've everything your own way, if only you knew +it--a police that doesn't dare lift a finger against you, and a Governor +that won't budge an inch till I give the word! Well, to-morrow I give +the word, understand me? To-morrow I throw you over, and you can get out +of this the best way you can. I'm sick of your talk. I'm sick of your +doing nothing. Your daughters are on the streets, your wives and your +children are starving, and _you_--by God! _you_ are boozing in a bar +till daylight, and _talking_! So that's enough. To-morrow, the strike's +at an end. To-morrow, the Governor comes down on you like ten thousand +of brick! And I'm the man that gives the word! Unless"-- + +He paused and cast a keen glance at the faces which surrounded him. His +last words had been greeted by a low growl. + +"Unless," he continued, "you know your business, and make a move that's +worth the name." + +The hush of attention seemed to deepen into the leaden silence of +expectancy. + +"There are two men who must be put out of the way," said McGrath slowly, +"and that before another midnight. I don't care how it's done, but done +it must be, for the sake of example. It's easy enough to manage it, as +things are. There'll be a howl, but we have the authorities fixed. And +those two men must go!" + +In the tense silence which followed, a man's voice whispered two words +hoarsely:-- + +"Mr. Rathbawne!" + +"Ay, _Mr._ Rathbawne!" echoed McGrath, flashing into that passionate +manner of his which carried all before it. "_Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +starving you! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's making your sons drunkards! _Mr._ +Rathbawne, who's debauching your daughters! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +killing your wives by inches! _Mr._ Rathbawne, and _Mr._ John Hamilton +Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia!" + +For a moment it seemed as if he would be swept off his feet by a torrent +of enthusiasm. The men crowded about him, slapping him upon the +shoulders, shouting their approval, reaching for his hand. One +brandished a revolver under his nose, with a shrill cry of "This'll do +it, Mac! This'll do it, by God!" The rest had turned to each other, +embracing frantically, and repeating his words in a kind of frenzy. + +Presently McGrath raised his hand, and, as silence was restored at the +signal, turned to the bar-tender with his thin smile. + +"Set 'em up, Dick," he said composedly. "It's on me, this time, and +we'll drink to better days." + +In the confusion Cavendish made his way to the side-door, and passing +through it into the street, hesitated, dazzled by a brilliant light. It +was broad day. + + * * * * * + +As the Lieutenant-Governor entered his ante-room that morning his eyes +contracted suddenly, and he stopped, with his hand upon the knob of the +door. There could be no mistaking the look in the face of the man who +sat facing him, gripping desperately at the arms of his chair. Cavendish +was as white as chalk, with the hunted look of despair which lay so +vividly on Barclay's remembrance of the night when they had met on +Bradbury Avenue. He rose as the Lieutenant-Governor appeared and drew +himself up with an effort at steadiness, conscious that the others +present were observing him narrowly. But Barclay's hesitation was as +brief as it had been involuntary. With a bare glance at his +subordinates, he came forward cordially to take Cavendish's hand, and +then, opening the door of his private office, motioned him to enter +first. + +"Glad to see you," he said steadily, as their hands met. + +Once inside, the manner of both men changed as abruptly as it had been +assumed. The Lieutenant-Governor went slowly toward his desk, with his +head bent, and Cavendish, throwing himself into the nearest chair, and, +with no attempt at concealment, drew a flask from his pocket and drank a +long draught. He looked up to find that the Lieutenant-Governor had +wheeled at the desk, and was standing with his eyes fixed upon him. + +"Wait a minute," said Cavendish, as Barclay seemed about to speak. "We +won't discuss this, for the moment, if you please." + +He held up the flask with a shrug. + +"In fact we needn't discuss it at all," he continued. "I've simply gone +to hell, that's all there is about it. I knew I would. I told you so +long ago. I didn't come here to make excuses--or to receive rebukes, +John Barclay. I've a means here of settling the problem which can give +cards and spades to all your projects of reform." And he tapped his +pocket, where the cloth bulged slightly, with a smile. The +Lieutenant-Governor made no attempt to interrupt him. + +"What I did come to say," went on Cavendish, more steadily, "is that +your life and Mr. Rathbawne's are in danger. You're to be put out of the +way, both of you, before twelve to-night. McGrath's determined on it, +and there's no lack of men to carry out his orders. The strikers are +desperate. I overheard their talk, while--well, while I was getting +drunk! _What's that?_" + +He stopped, with his hand to his ear. Some one was tapping at the +communicating door. + +"Put up that flask!" said Barclay under his breath, adding aloud, as +Cavendish obeyed: + +"Come in!" + +The door swung open softly, and Governor Abbott, smiling and rubbing his +hands, appeared upon the threshold. + +"I beg your pardon, Mr. Barclay," he said. "I did not know you were +engaged. We have the pleasure of another visit from the Citizens' +Committee, and, by a singularly opportune coincidence, Mr. McGrath has +called at the same time. Can you spare us a few moments of your time?" + +With a bow, and a glance at Cavendish, Barclay followed his superior +silently from the room. + +In the Governor's office he found a dozen men, all standing. McGrath, +with his back to the others, was examining with an elaborate air of +interest a map of Alleghenia which hung upon the wall. Colonel +Broadcastle and his fellow-members of the Citizens' Committee, stood +close to, and facing, the Governor's desk. The air was electric with +suggestion of a crisis about to come. + +When the Governor began to speak, it was in his habitually suave voice, +yet he was visibly nervous. + +"Colonel Broadcastle has been good enough to observe," he said, "that if +I do not call out the militia within three hours, to protect the +interests of Mr. Peter Rathbawne, his committee will appeal for aid to +the federal government. Now--er--now, in my place, and in such a +situation, Mr. Barclay--er--what would you do?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's nerve, strained beyond endurance by the events +of the past twenty-four hours, snapped like a dry twig at the +contemptuous hypocrisy of the other's tone. + +"_Do!_" he thundered--"_do?_ Why, as God is my witness, Elijah Abbott, +if I were in your place I would do what any honest man would do! I would +do what my oath demanded of me! I would clap that man McGrath into jail +for iniquitous inciting to riot, and place Colonel Broadcastle, at the +head of his regiment, in charge of the city to restore order and the +reign of law, and to redeem Alleghenia from the disgrace that is +overwhelming her. _Do?_ Before God, the Republic, and the state, +Governor Abbott, I would do my duty as a man!" + +"_Then do it!_" + +The words, spoken from the threshold of Barclay's office, rent the +silence like a thunderclap, and before those present had time to turn, +there came the sound of a pistol-shot, and Governor Abbott, wheeling +slowly on his heels, crashed headforemost through the plate-glass window +behind him, and lay, limp and motionless, across the sill. + +"Then do it, by God, _Governor Barclay_!" repeated Cavendish, and flung +his revolver into the centre of the room. + +The apartment was already filled with those attracted from the corridors +and adjacent offices by the sound of the shot. Several seized Cavendish, +who stood without movement, smiling. Barclay, Colonel Broadcastle, and +the other members of the committee lifted the Governor's body from the +position in which it had fallen, and laid it upon a couch. After a brief +examination, the Colonel looked up into Barclay's eyes. + +"He's dead, sir," he said. "The assassin was right. You are Governor of +Alleghenia." + +For an instant, Barclay returned his glance with one of earnest inquiry. + +"Even in the face of this tragedy," added Colonel Broadcastle in a low +voice, "I trust you will not forget the exigencies of the situation. It +is for you to act, sir." + +Barclay suddenly raised himself to his full height, and faced the silent +gathering. + +"Gentlemen," he said firmly, "the Governor is dead. For the moment, at +least, I act in his stead. Kenton City is under martial law. Those who +have the assassin in charge will see that he is immediately turned over +to the chief of police. Mr. McGrath, you will consider yourself under +arrest. Colonel Broadcastle, you will immediately assemble your regiment +at its armory, issue three days' rations, and twenty rounds of ball +cartridge, and hold yourself and your command in readiness for riot +duty, subject to my orders." + +Then he faced Cavendish. + +"There's a message I'd like to have delivered, to the Fairy Princess," +said the latter, still smiling. "It is that Diogenes has eaten the ugly +little bug." + + + + +XIV + +THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA + + +As Barclay had foreseen, the adoption of stringent measures was all that +was needed to break the back-bone of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +The presence of the Ninth Regiment, under command of that noted +disciplinarian, Colonel Broadcastle, and terribly in earnest, as was +evinced by the ball cartridges gleaming in their belts, was sufficient +to discourage any further attempts at disorder; the sudden shift of base +of the newspapers which had formerly supported the rioters, and now, +taking their cue from the policy of the new Governor, counseled +immediate surrender; above all, the trial, conviction, and sentence of +their moving spirit, McGrath, to a term of years for inciting to +riot--all were irresistible factors in the Union's capitulation. Two +weeks after the death of Governor Abbott, the Rathbawne Mills were +running once more, and Peter Rathbawne himself, though whiter of hair +and but a shadow of his old self, was, nevertheless, on the high road to +recovery. + +The trial and conviction of Spencer Cavendish were accomplished with +unexampled celerity. He would admit of no defense, although the lawyer +appointed for him by the court was strenuous for a plea of insanity, +based upon the singular remark which he had made upon the announcement +of Elijah Abbott's death, and which was construed by those who heard it +as ample proof of irresponsibility. Called upon in court to give his +defense, Cavendish stated in a loud, clear voice that he was strictly +accountable for his act, that he was in full possession of his senses at +the time, and that he had killed the Governor in the firm conviction +that he was a menace to the safety of the community, and that the +latter's sole salvation lay in his removal, and the succession of the +Lieutenant-Governor to the position of chief executive. + +"I desire," he concluded, with the same odd smile that he had worn at +the moment of the Governor's death, "nothing but the full penalty of the +law." + +The next day Spencer Cavendish was sentenced to be executed on the +thirtieth of the following month at the State's Prison at Mowberly. + +Then followed the most remarkable manifestation of popular sentiment +ever known in Alleghenia. As Barclay had once said of them, the citizens +of his long degraded state were less vicious than callous, and their +callousness was effectively cured by the dramatic event which had +removed a corrupt official from the head of the state government, and +put in his place a man whose first acts were proofs positive of +strength, integrity, and singleness of purpose. The revulsion of feeling +was overwhelming. Even the press which had sneered at and cried down +John Barclay was forced to the other extreme. Relieved from the burden +of lawlessness which had lain on Kenton City for close upon three +months, the citizens went over in a body to the support of their new +Governor. He was cheered on his every appearance in public as +assiduously as he had been ignored before, and, responding with the +whole force of his sensitive nature to this longed-for and unexpected +popularity, he devoted himself more and more earnestly, day by day, to +the welfare of the state which was his idol. + +But following in the wake of this revulsion of feeling in favor of +Barclay came one, hardly less complete, in favor of Spencer Cavendish. +While strictly speaking there could be no condoning his act, it was none +the less evident to even the most rigid adherents of law that by it he +had conferred an indisputable benefit upon the state of Alleghenia, and +his open statement of his reasons at the time of his trial militated for +rather than against him. So it was that a public petition was framed and +circulated, asking, at the hands of Governor Barclay, the commutation of +the death sentence to one of life imprisonment. Little by little the +list of signatures grew, until, a week before the date fixed for +Cavendish's execution, they were numbered by tens of thousands. Then the +petition, rolled into a cylinder, was presented to the Governor by a +committee, and left for his consideration. + +To Barclay the intervening time had passed with almost incredible +rapidity. His days, filled as they were to overflowing with numberless +and complex duties, were yet the pleasantest he had ever known. At last, +he was what he had dreamed of being--an active factor, the most active +of all factors, in the advancement of his state. Redeemed, as if by a +miracle, from the disgrace which had laid her low, Alleghenia arose, in +his eyes, like a phoenix, throwing off the ashes of her reproach, and +blazing, with new wings of burnished beauty, in the sunlight of hope and +peace. + +Barclay had retained his old office, not caring to make use of a room so +permeated with associations of recent tragedy as was that which had +formerly been Governor Abbott's. Now, with the windows open and the +soft May air stirring the papers on his desk, he sat, looking vacantly +across the room, with the huge petition spread out before him. His +attention, long absorbed by the problem in hand, was diverted by a tap +on the ante-room door, and, in answer to his call, Natalie Rathbawne +stood before him, smiling out of the exquisite daintiness of a fresh +spring frock. + +"You've forgotten!" she said immediately, at sight of his knit brows. + +"Forgotten what?" inquired the Governor inadvisedly. + +The girl's little foot stamped almost noiselessly upon the thick carpet. + +"Upon my word!" she exclaimed, "if there's one thing worse than being +engaged to the Lieutenant-Governor, it's being engaged to the Governor +himself! Forgotten, of course, that we are to lunch together, and look +at wall-papers afterwards! Do you know, John Barclay, I don't believe +you mean to marry me, after all? We'll be just approaching the altar, +when"-- + +She was interrupted in characteristic fashion, and disengaged herself, +with a great air of indignation, from Barclay's arms. + +"If you want to take lunch in the company of a rag carpet," she said +severely, "that's the very best way to go about it. Get your hat." + +There was a little pause as Barclay filed some papers in his private +safe, and then one startled word from the girl. + +"_John!_" + +Wheeling abruptly, he saw her standing at the desk, with her hand on the +petition, and her eyes, wide and wonderstruck, searching his face. + +"Dearest!" he said impulsively, "I wish you hadn't." + +But Natalie only laughed joyfully. + +"But I'm glad, Johnny boy," she answered, "glad--glad--glad! What a +wonderful thing it is to be Governor, boy dear! I don't think I ever +really understood before. Think of it! To have the power of life and +death--to be able to right the wrongs of justice with a single stroke of +the pen. Oh, John! Sign it now--before we go. I shall be so much +happier." + +The Governor made no reply. He stood, with his head bent, smoothing his +hat with the fingers of his right hand. Gradually the expression of +eager expectation on her face changed to one of anxiety. + +"John," she said in a half whisper, "you _are_ going to sign it, aren't +you, boy dear?" + +"I'm not sure," faltered the Governor. "I'm not quite sure, dearest. It +is the hardest problem I've ever had given me to solve. I can understand +now the meaning of something your father said to me just before the +strike,--that, for the first time in his life, he didn't know what to +do, because right seemed to be hopelessly entangled with wrong, and +wrong with right. When a man does evil in order that good may come, one +tries to find an excuse for him, tries to palliate his offense in any +reasonable way. That is human instinct. That is what accounts for the +petition there, with the signatures of many of the most conscientious +men in Alleghenia attached. They have managed to find the excuse, or +they think they have, which, so far as their personal convictions are +concerned, amounts to about the same thing. And I've been saying to +myself that when public opinion points out a course as justifiable it +can hardly be possible for a single individual to say that it is not. +And yet the wrong is there, isn't it? No matter how confused a question +may seem to us, there must absolutely, when we come to think of it, be +some one great elemental principle upon which it not only can, but must, +be decided--some boundary line between justice and injustice which we +may be too blind to see, but which exists, and calls for observance, +none the less. Right is right, wrong is wrong. No confusion between the +two can possibly exist except in appearance. Strive to elude truth as we +will, it remains eternal truth, and cannot be evaded in the end. And +where it seems to be beyond us, all we can do is to strive to find the +silken thread which will surely lead us out of the labyrinth into the +searching light of day. It is that clue which I have been groping for. +What is it? How am I to know it when I see it? What am I to do? At first +I thought the case was clear--what he said, you know--about Diogenes--it +seemed so odd--every one thought so--it might be construed as--as +insanity"-- + +"Oh, _no_, John! Why, _we_ know what that meant! No--no! The best part +of it all was his sanity, his wonderful courage, his braving of almost +certain death for what he believed--and knew, John--_knew_ to be right +and best. Think what he did for Alleghenia, Johnny boy. He has been +almost as great an instrument in her salvation as you. Think what he has +done for all of us--for you, in giving you this opportunity--for me--for +Dad! John, how _can_ you hesitate?" + +The Governor shook his head. + +"Dearest," he said, "you're on the wrong track, just as I have been, a +dozen times since the petition came. Don't you suppose I've thought of +all that? Its significance, not only to me, but, as you say, to the +state, is so tremendous that, at the first glance, it seems to be an +unanswerable argument. But--don't you see?--no sophistry, no +contemplation of the results achieved, can ever make it justifiable for +a man to arrogate to himself the power of taking human life, which is +the prerogative of God and the law alone. The peculiar circumstances of +Cavendish's crime plead eloquently, almost irresistibly, for his pardon. +He has saved the state--yes! But the case is one in a million, and it is +not an individual case alone which hangs upon my decision,--it is the +establishment of a precedent, the maintenance of a principle." + +"But, John," broke in Natalie eagerly, "what you've just said--isn't +that the clue for which you have been groping? He saved the state! I've +heard you talk of Alleghenia too often, of what you hoped for her, and +what you despaired of ever bringing to pass, not to know what those four +words must mean to you. Think of it! _He saved the state!_ Without any +possibility of selfish object he did this extraordinary thing--made it +possible for Alleghenia to win back the honor and respect she had so +nearly lost forever! He killed the man who had no thought of her purity +and dignity, who used the power the people had given him for the +furtherance of his own selfish and wicked ends, who made her justice a +mockery, who played with her law as if"-- + +"Stop!" exclaimed the Governor. "Stop--I must think. Wait a moment. I +must think--I must think!" + +After a minute he began to speak again, this time in a lower tone, a +tone which suggested self-communion rather than direct address to the +girl before him. + +"Yes, that's it. Wait now,--let me be sure! He killed the man who had no +thought of Alleghenia's purity, who used his power to serve his own +ends, who made her justice"--he was speaking very slowly, dwelling on +each word as it left his lips--"her _justice_ a mockery, who played with +her law--her law--her _Law_"-- + +He paused once more, his brows knit, his firm hand slowly stroking his +chin. Then, of a sudden, he drew a deep breath, flung back his +shoulders, and looked at her. His eyes were blazing, his voice touched +with a new meaning, an eloquence deep, firm, conclusive. + +"Natalie," he said, "come here." + +"You've struck the keynote," he added, when they stood face to face, a +foot or two apart. "It isn't what you thought, or what you meant, but it +is the keynote, just the same. The Law!" + +He wheeled slowly, and stepped forward, until he was directly before the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia which hung upon his wall. + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas!_" he said. "Many a time, when the way +seemed darkest, I've read those words over to myself, and found hope in +them. Events changed, crises came and went, portents loomed thick, +despair seemed omnipotent, failure and disgrace inevitable--but the +motto of Alleghenia remained the same. Steadfast, purposeful, and +commanding, it has endured through the trivial changes of political +significance which have been as impotent to sully the actuality of her +fair fame as are sun-spots to dim the radiance of the sun. It is only +natural, perhaps, that the discouragements which were but transient +should have seemed to me to be vital, damning, irremediable. Just as the +Israelites of old turned from the promises of God to worship Baal, so +have I turned from the assurance given me by these arms of Alleghenia, +to prostrate myself before false idols of doubt and despair. I should +have remembered how they called me, in the first instance, from a life +of idleness and ease, to fight my way through the desert of difficulty, +toward the promised land of honor. I should have remembered how in my +darkest hours they went before me as a pillar of fire, how in the famine +of my soul these words were the manna of encouragement, how in my thirst +they struck clear water from the rock of adverse circumstance. But the +Israelites came back to their true God at last; so I, little girl, to my +true ideal. The Law!--you said the word--the Law is the clue, the +keynote, the boundary between right and wrong!" + +She was at his side, and he slipped one arm around her, and held her +close to him as with his finger he traced again the motto of Alleghenia. + +"Do you know what this means?" he asked. "_Justitia_,--to be just to all +men, without fear or favor, lenient to our enemies, rigid and +unyielding, if need be, to our friends; putting aside personal +considerations, striving so far as in us lies to be impartial, merciful +in the face of prejudice, relentless in that of conviction--fair! +_Lex_,--to abide by the law, in spirit only if our inmost conviction +warrants that course, but in letter absolutely where there is the +smallest hint of doubt; secure in the knowledge that, however fallible +it be, it is the best that man has yet been able to do in imitation of +the immutable decrees of God. _Integritas_,--to be true to the oaths we +have sworn, faithful to the promises we have made, loyal to the office +intrusted to us by the people, to whom and for whom we are responsible. +Dearest, I am no mere man. Were I that, were I to consult my will alone, +and it lay, as now it lies, in my power to accomplish, Spencer Cavendish +should go free to-day. I know what he has done; I appreciate his +sacrifice; I see that by a single act he has accomplished what the rest +of us were powerless to cure; I admire his courage; I condone his crime; +I could forget all his weaknesses for the sake of this one great +evidence of his strength. And yet--listen to me, dearest!--in what he +strove to do he has failed utterly, if in removing a corrupt official +who made a mockery of Alleghenia's law he has not replaced him by one +who with all the force of his conscience and all the power of his +influence will see that law administered. And whatever we may say of his +crime, whatever its causes, whatever its wonderful results, it was and +is a crime. 'Thou shalt not kill!' God has said it; Alleghenia by the +voice of her law has ratified it. And not even the fact that Cavendish +has made possible all my fondest and worthiest hopes, the fact that he +has rescued from suffering all I hold most dear"-- + +Barclay suddenly covered his face with his free hand, as he had covered +it on that afternoon in Peter Rathbawne's library, weeks before; then he +looked up again, his lips trembling. + +"Dearest," he said, "I am Governor of Alleghenia, and as such owe an +allegiance, an obedience, which personal prejudice cannot impugn. On +the day when you spoke to me of meeting Cavendish you pointed out the +course of a gentleman and a friend. On the night of the Ninth's +review you taught me the creed of an American and an Alleghenian. +To-day--unconsciously perhaps, but none the less surely--you have made +clear the duty of a public servant. God bless you, my life, my heart, my +conscience! May I be worthy of you and of the commonwealth I serve. +Where I doubted before, now I am sure. It is hard--God only knows how +hard--but listen to Alleghenia's bidding! _Justitia_, _Lex_, +_Integritas_,--equity, the code, and good faith, in the sight of God and +man, heaven and earth, the American people and the commonwealth of +Alleghenia. God save the state!" + +"John," whispered the girl brokenly,--"John, you're right. God save the +state!" + +Slowly, tenderly, the Governor of Alleghenia led her back to the table, +and taking up a pen, with a firm hand wrote five words, heavily +underscored, at the head of the Cavendish petition. And these were:-- + + "_Disapproved._ + _John Hamilton Barclay_, + _Governor._" + +Then, turning to the girl who loved him, he took her in his arms. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + +***** This file should be named 30448-8.txt or 30448-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/4/4/30448/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/30448-8.zip b/30448-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2872c6d --- /dev/null +++ b/30448-8.zip diff --git a/30448-h.zip b/30448-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..00ed611 --- /dev/null +++ b/30448-h.zip diff --git a/30448-h/30448-h.htm b/30448-h/30448-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0ef9095 --- /dev/null +++ b/30448-h/30448-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,4975 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" +"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8" /> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +p { + margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; +} + +table { + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; +} + +.pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; +} /* page numbers */ + +.left {text-align: left;} + +.center {text-align: center;} + +.right {text-align: right;} + +.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + +/* Images */ +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; +} + +/* Poetry */ +.poem { + margin-left:10%; + margin-right:10%; + text-align: left; +} + +.poem br {display: none;} + +.poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + +.poem span.i0 { + display: block; + margin-left: 0em; + padding-left: 3em; + text-indent: -3em; +} + </style> + </head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30448 ***</div> + +<h1>THE + +LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR</h1> + +<h4><span class="smcap">A Novel</span></h4> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>GUY WETMORE CARRYL<br /><br /></h2> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 78px;"> +<img src="images/001.png" width="78" height="100" alt="" title="Publishers symbol" /> +<br /><br /></div> + +<h5>BOSTON AND NEW YORK</h5> +<h4>HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY</h4> +<h5>The Riverside Press, Cambridge</h5> +<h5>1903<br /><br /><br /><br /></h5> + + +<h5>Copyright, 1902</h5> +<h4><span class="smcap">By THE ESS ESS PUBLISHING CO.</span></h4> + +<h5>Copyright, 1903</h5> +<h4><span class="smcap">By GUY WETMORE CARRYL</span></h4> + +<h5>ALL RIGHTS RESERVED</h5> + +<h4><i>Published March, 1903</i><br /><br /></h4> + + +<h5>TO</h5> + +<h3>M. R. B.</h3> + +<h5>IN MEMORY OF THE RESCUE OF A MAN AT SEA<br /><br /><br /><br /></h5> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + + +<div class="center"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="Contents"> +<tr><td align="right">CHAPTER</td><td align="left"></td><td align="right">PAGE</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">I.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Fly on the Wheel</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">II.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Odds against Young Nisbet</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_21">21</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">III.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">A Face in the Crowd</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_40">40</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">IV.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">As Between Friends</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_60">60</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">V.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">A Brand from the Burning</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_80">80</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">VI.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">McGrath laughs</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_98">98</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">VII.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Mirage of Power</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_117">117</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">VIII.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Governor unmasks</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_137">137</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">IX.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Ninth passes in Review</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_156">156</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">X.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">A Question and an Answer</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_177">177</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">XI.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Young Nisbet finds his Tongue</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_196">196</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">XII.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Diogenes</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_215">215</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">XIII.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Instrument of Fate</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_234">234</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">XIV.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Voice of Alleghenia</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_252">252</a></td></tr> +</table></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> + +<h1>THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR</h1> + + +<h2>I</h2> + +<h3>THE FLY ON THE WHEEL</h3> + + +<p>The offices of the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor adjoined. Each +had its ante-room, in which a private secretary wrote eternally at a +roll-top desk, an excessively plain-featured stenographer rattled the +keys of his typewriter, and a smug-faced page yawned over a newspaper, +or scanned the cards of visitors with the air of an official censor. At +intervals, an electric bell whirred once, twice, or three times; and, +according to the signal, one of the trio disappeared into the presence +of the august personage within.</p> + +<p>A door connected the office of the chief executive with that of his +lieutenant, but this was rarely opened by either, and then only<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> after a +formal tap and permission to enter had been given. It was a matter of +general knowledge that the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor were not +in sympathy; but few, even among the intimates of either, were aware how +deep, and wide, and hopelessly impassable was the gulf which lay between +them. This was due not alone to disparity in age, though twenty-eight +years separated the white-haired Governor from his handsome subordinate, +who had been nominated to this, his first public office, on his +thirtieth birthday; nor was it wholly a difference between the +experience of the one and the inexperience of the other. The point of +view of the veteran is, naturally, not that of the novice, particularly +in politics. That the enthusiasms of Lieutenant-Governor Barclay should +have been the disillusions of Governor Abbott, and his pitfalls his +senior's stepping-stones,—this was to be expected. The root of their +dissimilarity lay deeper. It was nothing less than mutual distrust which +kept the connecting door closed day after day, and clogged the channel +of coöper<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span>ation with the sharp-pointed boulders of antagonism.</p> + +<p>The convention which nominated the successful ticket of the preceding +year had been a veritable chaos of contending factions. The labor +delegates, encouraged by the unexpected strength of their +representation, were not content with such nominal plums as had fallen +to their share in former conventions. Led by Michael McGrath, an +agitator whose native Irish eloquence, made keener and more persuasive +by practice in bar-room forensics, brought him naturally to the fore, +they threatened, at one stage of the proceedings, to carry all before +them. The more conservative faction, its strength sapped by the +formation, in its very ranks, of a reform party determined upon the fall +of the "machine," was forced to yield ground. The reformers themselves, +young men for the most part, distinguished by great ideals but small +ability, were too few to impose their individual will upon their +opponents, yet sufficiently numerous to make their support necessary to +the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> success of either party. The usual smooth course of the convention, +upset by this unlooked-for resistance from two quarters, staggered +helplessly, and was on the point of coming to a deadlock. It was Michael +McGrath's shrewd perception of the situation which solved the problem. +In a brief, impassioned speech he laid the claims of his faction before +the delegates, winding up with a stirring picture of the coöperation of +labor and reform, now possible, which held the convention in spellbound +silence for ten seconds after he had closed, and then set the hall +ringing to cheers and vigorously plied hands and feet. For an instant he +paused, with his arms folded, and his keen blue eyes sliding over the +faces before him, and then played his trump card. At his signal, a +banner, hastily prepared, was borne, slowly revolving, down the central +aisle, and on this were boldly lettered the words which at the same +moment McGrath was thundering from the platform:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span>—</p> + + +<p class="center"> +LABOR AND REFORM!<br /> +<br /> +<span class="smcap">For Governor,</span><br /> +ELIJAH ABBOTT.<br /> +<br /> +<span class="smcap">For Lieutenant-governor,</span><br /> +JOHN HAMILTON BARCLAY.<br /> +</p> + +<p>McGrath had no need to look toward the labor faction for support. He +knew what the name of Elijah Abbott meant in that quarter. His shifting +glance was fixed upon the seats of the reform delegates, and a little +smile twitched at the corners of his mouth, as he saw them rise with a +cheer. Barclay was the chief spirit of their movement. They had not +expected this recognition. But if, in the enthusiasm of unlooked-for +victory, they did not perceive how little, in reality, was their gain, +McGrath was far from being unaware how great was his own. Before the +cheering of the now allied forces of labor and reform had fairly died +away, he had moved that nominations were in order, and, ten minutes +later, while the partisans of the "machine" were still endeavoring to +collect their wits, the main business of the convention was an<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> +accomplished fact, and Abbott and Barclay were declared the regular +Democratic nominees for Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of the state. +In six weeks followed their election by a small plurality, and on the +first of January the two men moved into their adjoining rooms, in the +inexcusably unlovely state capitol, on the main hill of Kenton City, +wherein they were, thenceforward, separated, one from the other, by two +inches of Georgia pine and a practically infinite diversity of principle +and prejudice.</p> + +<p>From the first their relationship had been no better than an armed +truce. Both were courteous men, the one because such was his policy, the +other because he was to this manner born. There was no need for them to +discuss their individual creeds. They tacitly accepted the fact that +there was not a parallel between the two. From the moment when his +election was assured by the returns, Abbott was candidly the man of the +Labor—nay, more—of the Socialist party. McGrath and his associates +manipulated him as readily<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> as a marionette. The promises and pledges of +the campaign were ruthlessly jettisoned. If Governor Abbott did not +stand for anarchy, it was only because, for the moment, anarchy was not +the demand of his party. Withal, he was dignified and self-possessed, +robed in an agreeable suavity which became him at functions and +ceremonials, and assured his popularity with those—and they were, as +always, in the majority—who did not look below the surface.</p> + +<p>Lieutenant-Governor Barclay had not been ten days in office before he +realized the futility of resistance to the established order, as +represented in his superior. He had accepted his nomination, and +welcomed his election, with an almost Quixotic elation in the +opportunity thus opened to him. He would accomplish—oh, there was no +telling what Lieutenant-Governor Barclay would <i>not</i> accomplish!</p> + +<p>He was standing at his office window now, staring out disconsolately +over the sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> +patches of snow, which had contrived to withstand the recent thaw, and +he was telling himself, for the thousandth time, the dispiriting fact +that, as a force for good or evil in the destiny of his state, he was no +more significant than his stenographer's Remington or his secretary's +roll-top desk. With all his ideals, with all those pledges which are +infinitely more vital when made in private to one's conscience than when +made in public to one's party, he found himself merely a cog in the +state machinery—a cog, too, that, seemingly, might be skipped at any or +every time, without in the least degree disturbing the progress of +routine. On the few occasions, in the early days of their official +relation, when he had ventured to set his will in opposition to that of +the Governor, there had not been manifest in the latter's attitude even +that spirit of resistance which spurs men to more active and resolute +endeavor. Governor Abbott had smiled pleasantly upon him, and then +quietly shifted the conversation into other channels, with an air of +selecting a topic more suited to his companion's comprehension.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> +Finally, on one occasion, when Barclay had voiced his opinion with an +energy which savored of rebuke, the Governor had gone further, and had +asked calmly—"And what were you proposing to do about it?" After that +Barclay had relinquished the unequal struggle, and resigned himself to +the unavoidable conclusion of his impotency.</p> + +<p>It is a situation which tries men's souls, this of utter helplessness in +the face of plain duty. He could have no hope of making his position +clear to the constituency to which he was responsible. Debarred on the +one side from taking an active part in the administration of state +affairs, and bitterly arraigned on the other on the grounds of +inefficiency, laxity, and indifference to duty, the second month of +office found John Barclay in a fair way to be ground to powder between +the millstones of impuissance and hostile criticism. The men of his +party who had, both in private conviction and public statement, based +their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> hopes of political reform upon the frankly avowed platform of his +principles, now passed him coldly, with a bare nod, sometimes with none +whatever; the labor element jeered joyously at his attitude; the +"machine" pointed to him as proof of the fallacy of the reform creed. It +is easy to expect great performances from great promises, easier still +to outline the duties and condemn the delinquencies of another, and not +even Barclay's knowledge of his own good faith was sufficient +compensation for the sneers of press and public which fell to his share. +As he surveyed the dispiriting prospect from his office window, on that +late February afternoon, he was near to resigning his position, and with +it all further pretension to political prominence.</p> + +<p>In the opinion of those competent to judge, the state of Alleghenia was +going to the dogs. A press distinguished alike for the amplitude of its +headlines and the pitiable paucity of its principles; a legislature of +which practically every member had, not only a price, but such a price +as the advertisements describe as being "within the reach of all;" a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> +Governor who avowedly stood ready to sanction the most extreme +pretensions of the notoriously corrupt party which had secured him his +election,—here, surely, were good and sufficient reasons for the +generously bestowed disapproval of Alleghenia's sister states. In all +the <i>personnel</i> of her government there was but one man sincerely +devoted to her advancement on the lines of integrity and +non-partisanship. And that man was Lieutenant-Governor Barclay, whose +influence on the trend of affairs was approximately that of the +proverbial fly on the hub of the revolving wheel.</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor had turned back to his desk, and was arranging +his papers, preparatory to departing for the day, when his ears were +greeted by the unusual and unwelcome sound of a rap upon the +communicating door. Instinctively he braced himself for an unpleasant +encounter before replying. It was his experience that the Governor's +room was like to Nazareth of old, in that no good might<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> be expected to +issue therefrom. Nevertheless, as Governor Abbott entered, in response +to Barclay's "Come!" it was difficult to believe that he was aught but +what he appeared to be,—a courteous, conspicuously well-dressed and +white-haired gentleman, of sixty or thereabouts, smooth-shaven save for +chop side-whiskers of iron gray, with a habit of rubbing his hands, and +an inclination from the hips forward which suggested a floor-walker. In +brief, the Governor of Alleghenia seemed the type of a man who turns +sideways and slips through narrow places, rather than run the risk of +barking his elbows by a face-front advance. In reality he was somewhat +less pliable than a steel rail.</p> + +<p>"You are going?" he asked, seeing how Barclay was employed.</p> + +<p>"I was thinking of it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor. "Of course, if +there is anything"—</p> + +<p>Governor Abbott seated himself on the edge of the desk, holding a lapel +of his coat in each hand, and surveyed his subordinate<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> from under his +drooping eyelids, with his head cocked on one side.</p> + +<p>"I believe you know Peter Rathbawne," he said.</p> + +<p>"I do. I am engaged to his elder daughter."</p> + +<p>"Ah! That is what I thought."</p> + +<p>The Governor looked contemplatively at the ceiling, closing his right +eye, and nibbling behind his pursed lips.</p> + +<p>"Peter Rathbawne," he said, "is the second most obstinate man in Kenton +City, if not in Alleghenia. I'm afraid he thinks he is the <i>most</i> +obstinate. If so, he does me an injustice. His mills are the largest in +the state. I am told that when they are running full strength they +employ over four thousand hands."</p> + +<p>"Something like that number, I believe," put in Barclay, as the Governor +seemed to expect a reply.</p> + +<p>"Ah! It is a pity for such an industry as that to be tied up on account +of one man's obstinacy."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I had not heard"—began Barclay; but Governor Abbott continued +steadily, disregarding the interruption.</p> + +<p>"Yesterday morning Mr. Rathbawne discharged fifteen employees on the +ground of incompetency. It is hard to see exactly what Mr. Rathbawne +means by 'incompetency.' These men were not newcomers. Some of them had +been in the mills for as much as eighteen months. It seems as if he +might have discovered the alleged incompetency long ago. It is more or +less arbitrary, one might say, this discharging men by wholesale, as it +were."</p> + +<p>"I suppose," commented Barclay, "that a man may do as he will with his +own."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said the Governor, lifting his hands from his lapels with a little +gesture of deprecation, but immediately replacing them. "But <i>can</i> he? A +man in Peter Rathbawne's position has a responsibility to fulfill toward +the community. He cannot beggar men for a caprice—because his horse has +gone lame, or his breakfast has not agreed with him.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> He must show +reasons—give an accounting. He must be fair."</p> + +<p>"Oh, when it comes to fairness," laughed the other, "I assure you, +Governor Abbott, you won't find Mr. Rathbawne's equal this side of the +Pacific. He's famous for square dealing."</p> + +<p>"He <i>has</i> been," corrected the Governor. "In the present instance he +seems to have fallen below standard. He has declined to reconsider his +decision in the case of the discharged men. What's worse, he has flatly +refused to see the committee appointed by the Union."</p> + +<p>"I'm not surprised at that," said Barclay slowly, fingering a +paper-cutter on the desk before him. "Mr. Rathbawne is peculiar in one +respect; he supports and considers the Union in every other. But he has +always insisted upon his right to discharge the hands at will, and +without giving reasons. Incompetency is only a word which is used to +cover more serious causes."</p> + +<p>"Well, he's wrong," said the Governor,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> with a heat unusual to him. +"He's dead wrong, Mr. Barclay, and he will find it out before he's a day +older."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean"—</p> + +<p>"I mean that if the men in question are not taken back before to-morrow +noon, every man, woman, and child in the employ of the Rathbawne Mills +will be out on strike. The question is, what is Peter Rathbawne prepared +to do?"</p> + +<p>The silence that followed was broken only by the tap, tap, tap of the +Lieutenant-Governor's paper-cutter on the silver-mounted blotter. +Presently he looked up and met the Governor's eye.</p> + +<p>"If you want <i>my</i> opinion, sir," he answered, "it is that Mr. Rathbawne +would fight such a point to a standstill. He's sole owner of the mills, +and he's a rich man. He has always treated his employees as if they were +his own children. If they turn on him now for something which, from +their experience of his character, they must know was fair and +justifiable"—<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></p> + +<p>"But <i>was</i> it?" interrupted the Governor.</p> + +<p>"I don't know the facts, sir, but I know Peter Rathbawne," said Barclay, +throwing back his head, "and I can say, with clear conviction, that it +<i>must</i> have been. If, as you suggest, the hands go out, I think he would +close down the mills for a year, and go abroad. He's a man who doesn't +argue; he simply acts. I fancy there wouldn't be much opposition left by +the time he wanted to reopen."</p> + +<p>"Provided always that there were anything left to reopen," suggested the +Governor softly.</p> + +<p>"The state troops have more than once proved their ability to assure the +sanctity of property," answered his subordinate, with a touch of the old +pride with which he had assumed office.</p> + +<p>"Hum!" said Governor Abbott. "But calling out the militia is a serious +matter, Mr. Barclay, to say nothing of the expense entailed. Considering +that the difficulty would be due entirely to the obstinacy of one +man—er—one might not feel justified"—<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span></p> + +<p>He hesitated briefly under the Lieutenant-Governor's keen glance, and +then swerved from this line of suggestion.</p> + +<p>"What I wanted to say was this: You are a friend of Mr. +Rathbawne's,—something more than a friend, indeed. No doubt he has a +respect for your opinion, as you have for his. Now, if in the course of +a quiet chat—it will have to be to-night—you should point out the +situation that threatens him, the distress that a strike will cause, the +probable destruction of his property, perhaps he might consent to +reinstate the discharged men to-morrow morning."</p> + +<p>"It would be a surrender of principle, to which he would never consent," +said Barclay firmly. "Of that I am sure. Moreover, sir, I should be +speaking against my convictions were I to advise him to adopt such a +course."</p> + +<p>The Governor's lip wrinkled slightly.</p> + +<p>"The Union is prepared to do the right thing by the man who settles this +question," he said.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I hope you don't mean that!" exclaimed Barclay. "You are the first man +to make such a suggestion to me. Pardon me, Governor Abbott, but I +cannot but think the executive chamber of the capitol of Alleghenia a +singular place for it to be mentioned."</p> + +<p>The Governor held up his hand.</p> + +<p>"You misunderstand me," he said. "One would suppose I had offered you a +purse! I mean simply that the popularity of the man who averts this +strike will be an assured fact. He would be the idol of the working +people, and hardly less esteemed by the element of capital. Moreover, he +would be doing a humane and merciful thing. You are the only man who is +in a position to approach Rathbawne, and, if you will excuse the +suggestion, I think you can hardly afford to throw away the chance. As +it is, you—er—you are not what might be called popular, Mr. Barclay."</p> + +<p>This time the silence was broken by a single sharp little +click—the latch of the connecting door slipping into place. The +Lieutenant<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>-Governor sank slowly into his revolving chair, tipped back, +swung round a half circle, and stared out disconsolately over the +sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin patches of +snow.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p> +<h2>II</h2> + +<h3>THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET</h3> + + +<p>Young Nisbet leaned forward in his chair.</p> + +<p>"And I've been thinking," he added, "that perhaps—that perhaps"—</p> + +<p>"That perhaps what?" asked the junior Miss Rathbawne, leaning forward in +hers.</p> + +<p>"If I don't have tea <i>instantly</i>," said her mother, with profound +conviction, as she came ponderously through the portières, tugging at +her gloves, "I shall expire! How de do, Mr. Nisbet. <i>Do</i> sit up +straight, Dorothy, my dear."</p> + +<p>She sank heavily into a low chair, which brought her within the radius +of lamp-light at the tea-table, and was thus revealed as a lady of +generous proportions, with a conspicuous absence of features, and no +observable lap. In speaking, she displayed a marked partiality for undue +emphasis. Sublimely unconscious of the depression induced by her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> +advent, she continued to talk, as she pulled off her gloves, which were +a size too small, and came away with reluctance, leaving imprints of the +stitching on her pudgy pink hands.</p> + +<p>Young Nisbet surveyed her with a kind of mute despair. He was a very +average young American, very conventionally in love, and the trifling +remnant of self-assertiveness which had triumphed over the crescent +humility natural to his condition inevitably evaporated into thin air at +the approach of Mrs. Rathbawne; and always, as he was doing now, he +turned in his toes excessively when she was present, hitched at his +right trouser-leg, where the crease passed over his knee, and looked +first at her, and then at the floor, and then at her again, with the +purposeless regularity of a mechanical toy.</p> + +<p>There was a tremendous and highly significant rattling of cups, saucers, +and silver spoons, as Dorothy Rathbawne prepared her mother's tea. All +things considered, one<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> found something very admirable about Dorothy at +such a time as this. It was not complete submission, still less was it +open revolt, but savored of both, and was incomparable as an attitude +toward Mrs. Rathbawne. On some occasions it was almost as impossible to +get on with Mrs. Rathbawne as it would have been, on others, to get on +without her. The which, nowadays, is more or less true of all parents. +And children.</p> + +<p>"Natalie and your Aunt Helen got out at the florist's," went on the good +lady, "but I came straight on, and sent the carriage back for them. I +felt that I <i>couldn't</i> exist an <i>instant</i> longer without my tea. I'm +sure I don't see how Natalie <i>stands</i> it. She was out all morning in the +brougham, too. You had best make enough for three cups, Dorothy—and +<i>do</i> sit up straight, my dear!—and order Thomas to bring in some more +tartines. They are <i>sure</i> to be hungry, and they are apt to come in at +<i>any</i> moment."</p> + +<p>"That is a family failing," said Dorothy venomously, from behind the +kettle.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Well, I'm <i>sure</i>, my dear," said Mrs. Rathbawne innocently, as she +straightened her rings, and picked an imaginary speck out of one of her +round, flat nails, "there is no disgrace at all in a healthy appetite. +I'm thankful we all have it—though as for your Aunt Helen, <i>hers</i> is +about like that of a fly."</p> + +<p>"Flies have very good appetites—judging from all I've seen, that is," +said Dorothy, "so I don't think she is to be commiserated on that +account."</p> + +<p>"That was only a figure of speech, my dear," replied Mrs. Rathbawne, +with engaging placidity. "Mercy! but I'm glad to get home. We've had a +positively <i>exhausting</i> day with Natalie's shopping, and the <i>worst</i> of +it is to think what a <i>lot</i> more there is to do. A wedding certainly +<i>is</i> an undertaking, Mr. Nisbet."</p> + +<p>"Is it?" answered young Nisbet, perceptibly startled at being thus +abruptly included in the conversation.</p> + +<p>"Decidedly!" asseverated Mrs. Rathbawne.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Of course, in the case of an <i>ordinary</i> man"—</p> + +<p>"Two lumps, mother?"</p> + +<p>"<i>Always</i> two lumps, Dorothy, my dear. Surely you must know that, by +this time! As I was <i>saying</i>, Mr. Nisbet, the fact that my elder +daughter is to marry Mr. Barclay"—</p> + +<p>Dorothy's eyebrows went up resignedly as she bent with affected +solicitude over the alcohol lamp, than which none ever burned more +blamelessly. There was no stopping Mrs. Rathbawne now!</p> + +<p>"One has to keep his position in mind," she was saying. "It isn't like +the <i>usual</i> marriage, which interests only the families and friends of +the persons concerned, you know. It isn't even as if only Kenton City +were looking on. <i>All</i> Alleghenia will be on the <i>qui vive</i>, Mr. Nisbet, +<i>all</i> the state of Alleghenia. I shouldn't wonder if <i>some</i> notice were +taken of the event, even at Washington. Marrying a statesman, you +see,—a Lieutenant-Governor! Oh, it's <i>quite</i> differ<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span>ent—<i>quite</i>! <i>Do</i> +sit up straight, Dorothy, my dear!"</p> + +<p>She continued to prattle of the momentous marriage impending, until her +complacent chatter was interrupted by the entrance of her half-sister, +Mrs. Wynyard, and the elder Miss Rathbawne.</p> + +<p>The two newcomers were both beautiful, in widely dissimilar ways. Helen +Wynyard, Mrs. Rathbawne's junior by nearly a score of years, retained at +thirty the transparent brilliancy of complexion which, at eighteen, had +made her the most admired <i>débutante</i> of her season in San Francisco. +Her marriage with Ellery Wynyard had caused a great to-do among the +gossips, and, later, had defrauded them pitilessly of their +self-promised "I told you so's," by reason of the death of the handsome +young rake, before the rose-color of the honeymoon had begun to fade. +Beauty, wit, and infallible tact she inherited from her mother, shrewd +business ability and a keen insight into men and things from her father, +and wealth and a certain attractive audacity<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> of speech from her +husband; and five years of widowhood only served to develop and +emphasize the promise of her first season. There were numerous feet +which aspired to be shod with Ellery Wynyard's discarded shoes, but no +one pair, said the world, so much as an inch in advance of the rest.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Wynyard was spending the winter with her half-sister, and the +Rathbawnes, whom the circumstance of widely distant residence had always +kept from coming into close touch with her, were equally at a loss when +they wondered how they had formerly contrived to exist without her, and +in what manner they should resign themselves to giving her up. She was a +woman who came amazingly near to being indispensable.</p> + +<p>For the moment, Natalie Rathbawne, in reality the beauty which Dorothy +by a fraction fell short of being, suffered by comparison with her +sister. She was desperately tired—that was in her smile. But there was +something else: a singular preoccupation which was nearly akin to +listlessness. That<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> was in the droop of her eyelids, in the eloquently +inattentive gesture with which she touched a bowl of Gloire de Dijon +roses as she passed, and in her conventionally courteous acknowledgment +of young Nisbet's greeting. And, too, as she seated herself beside her +sister on the divan, there was perceptible purpose in her avoidance of +the lamp-light, her withdrawal into the dark, deep corner. To the +conversation which followed she contributed only such brief remarks as +were made necessary by those occasionally addressed to her.</p> + +<p>The two women brought with them a delicious, indefinite atmosphere of +out-of-doors: that commingled smell of cold flowers, and cold flesh, and +cold fur, which is to a drawing-room in winter what a whiff of salt air +is in summer to a sun-baked hillside; and this proved almost too much +for the self-possession, already tottering, of young Nisbet. He had +always been accustomed to have the things he desired, had young Nisbet, +but these, until now, had been either creature<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> comforts, readily +obtainable when one's father is a multi-millionaire, or athletic honors, +equally easy of attainment when one measures forty-two around the chest, +and can do one's quarter in something under fifty. Again, the Nisbets +lived on a ranch, and when one does not know people in New York one +spends the Sundays in New Haven, so that neither the terms nor the +vacations incidental to his four years at Yale had equipped him, in the +sense in which they equipped his fellows, for dealing with society.</p> + +<p>Now that he was in Kenton City, representing his father's interests, +young Nisbet was painfully self-conscious of multitudinous shortcomings, +totally unsuspected hitherto. His speech was apparently hopelessly +incrusted with slang, his legs were too long, his ears protruded +abominably, his hair was desperately unruly, his freckles and his +capacity for blushing were inexhaustible. He was as much at ease in such +surroundings as these in which he now found himself as a trout in a +sandpile. The great room, with its costly furnish<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>ings, the tea-table +crowded with silver and fragile porcelain, the kettle purring +contentedly above the iridescent flame of the alcohol lamp,—above all, +the subtle, indefinable suggestion of femininity which unknowably +pervaded his surroundings,—all these enthralled young Nisbet beyond +expression, and awed him immeasurably, into the bargain. He was, as +usual, very clear in his own mind as to what he wanted, and that was the +younger Miss Rathbawne, but, for the first time in his experience, the +means at his command did not seem to be sufficient unto the end. For the +younger Miss Rathbawne was, very evidently, not the sort of triumph +which is achieved by recourse to an imposingly ample bank-account, nor +yet by two months' loyalty to the exigencies of the training-table. And +this was February, and he had known her since July, and, altogether, it +was highly discouraging. Unwittingly, young Nisbet heaved a sigh so +profound and so pitiable that Mrs. Wynyard immediately proffered her +sympathy.</p> + +<p>"Poor, dear Mr. Nisbet! I never heard a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> more pathetic sigh. Whatever is +the matter?"</p> + +<p>"He's sleepy," put in Dorothy. "He always is, after talking with me for +a whole hour."</p> + +<p>"I was just thinking," protested young Nisbet helplessly.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" exclaimed Dorothy, "that's it, is it? Then pray don't discourage +him, Aunt Helen. He's really getting into some very good habits, of +late."</p> + +<p>"Why, <i>Dorothy</i>!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, digging her chin reproachfully +into her black velvet collar, "how <i>can</i> you say such things? Mr. Nisbet +will think you have had <i>no</i> bringing up at all. And <i>do</i> sit up +straight, my dear!"</p> + +<p>"And if you don't stop nagging, O most conscientious of parents," +retorted Dorothy, with her nose in the air, "Mr. Nisbet will think you +bring people up by throwing them down!"</p> + +<p>"And slang! <i>Dorothy!</i>"</p> + +<p>"I always think," said Mrs. Wynyard,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> "that Dorothy should have had a +fairy godmother, to promise that every time she uttered a word of slang +a pearl should pop out of her mouth. We should have all been wearing +triple strings down to our knees within a week after she learned to +talk."</p> + +<p>"That settles it!" exclaimed Dorothy. "If you are going to side with the +enemy, Aunt Helen, there is nothing left for me to do but to beat a +retreat. Come on, Mr. Nisbet, there is rest for the weary in the +conservatory—that is, unless you want another cup of tea?"</p> + +<p>In the conservatory the air was heavy with the moist, sweet smell of +earth and moss, and faintly vibrant with the tiny plash of water, +dripping from a pile of rocks into the circular central pool, wherein +fat gold-fish went idly to and fro, nuzzling floating specks upon the +surface. Through the polished green of the surrounding palms and +rubber-plants stared gardenias and camelias; below, between maidenhair +and sword-ferns, winked the little waxen blossoms of fuchsias and +begonias: at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> intervals poinsettia flared audaciously among its more +quietly dressed neighbors; and, in the far corners the golden spheres +were swelling to fairly respectable proportions on the branches of dwarf +orange-trees.</p> + +<p>Dorothy installed herself on a bench, and young Nisbet perched upon the +rim of the pool, and stared at vacancy.</p> + +<p>"It's corking, in here," he said, after a moment.</p> + +<p>"Isn't it, though?" agreed Dorothy, with a nod of approval. "It's my +favorite part of the house. You can't imagine how many hours I spend +here, sewing, or reading, or fiddling with the fish and all those funny +little plants under the palms."</p> + +<p>"You bet!" said young Nisbet, with enthusiasm, if not much relevancy. +"I've just got a picture of that, you know. Besides, we've spent a good +many of those hours together in here, these past few months."</p> + +<p>"Oh, not a tenth of them!" exclaimed Dorothy, "and then only the very +shortest."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said young Nisbet gloomily. His<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> fertile imagination was +immediately peopled with the forms and faces of those who had shared the +other hours, a score of eligible and attractive young men, his moral, +mental, and physical superiors in every conceivable particular, +faultlessly arrayed, scintillating with wit, and surpassingly skilled in +the way to win a woman. The conservatory was full of them. He saw them +in every imaginable posture: feeding the gold-fish, watering the +begonias, looking up into Dorothy's eyes as they sat at her feet, +looking down at her slender fingers, as she pinned gardenias to their +lapels. And these had been granted the long hours, he only the short. +Inwardly, young Nisbet groaned; aloud, as was his wont, he said the +wrong thing.</p> + +<p>"They seemed long enough to me."</p> + +<p>"<i>Well!</i>" said Dorothy.</p> + +<p>"Oh, hang it all! I didn't mean that. What an oaf I am!"</p> + +<p>"Never mind," said Dorothy consolingly. "I know you well enough to +understand you, by this time." She smoothed her skirt re<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>flectively. +"Let me see," she added, "what were we talking about when we were +swamped by the family?"</p> + +<p>"I think," answered young Nisbet, with one of his illogical blushes, +"that I had just asked you what sort of a man you thought you would like +to marry. I remember I was on the point of saying that I thought perhaps +you had ideas like—er—like your mother's."</p> + +<p>Dorothy raised her eyebrows.</p> + +<p>"Like the Mater's?"</p> + +<p>"About a man being big and prominent, and all that, you know," +floundered young Nisbet. "She always makes such a point of Barclay's +being Lieutenant-Governor—I thought you might be for the same kind of +thing."</p> + +<p>Dorothy looked him over, with a whimsical smile, as he was speaking. +There was a deep bronze light in his close-cropped, ruddy hair, and his +skin was very smooth and clean. His eyes were appealing, with that +unspeakable eloquence of simple honesty which is almost pathetic. Under +his blue cloth coat, the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> great muscles of his shoulders and chest stood +out magnificently, rippling the fabric as he stirred, as if eager to +throw off their trammels, and be given free play. About him there was a +distinct suggestion of sane living and regular exercise. For all his +freckles, and his nose that was too little, and his mouth that was too +large, "the ugliest of the Nisbet boys"—he had often been called +that!—was very emphatically good to look upon.</p> + +<p>"A big man?" answered Dorothy. "Yes, I think I should like to marry a +big man. I want him very clean, too—<i>very</i> clean!—morally, as well as +otherwise. And honest as the day is long. And not <i>too</i> bright! I don't +want to be continually trying to live up to his brain, and continually +failing. It is fatal to one's self-respect, that sort of thing. Then, he +must be heels over head in love with me—for keeps! And then—oh, he +must be a <i>man</i>, a man through and through, who wouldn't think anything +he didn't dare to say, nor say anything he didn't dare to do! That's +what I want, and if I can get<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> it, all the prominence in the world may +go hang!"</p> + +<p>"That's just about John Barclay, though," said young Nisbet, "with the +prominence thrown in."</p> + +<p>"Well, I'm not saying I wouldn't have married John Barclay, if I'd had +the chance. He comes pretty close to being all I would ask for, in the +way of a man. But, unfortunately, there's only one John Barclay, and, +like the rest of the world, he looked directly over poor little Me's +shoulders, and saw only Natalie. Good gracious! Who could blame him? +She's the loveliest little thing in the world! But, at all events, she +nabbed him, so all that is left for me to do is to grin and bear the +disappointment as best I may. He's very much of a man, John Barclay is!"</p> + +<p>"Yes," assented young Nisbet, somewhat mournfully. "I can see that would +be the kind of a chap that the dames would stand for everlastingly."</p> + +<p>"But, as I said before," continued Dorothy, "it's not because he's +Lieutenant-Governor,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> whatever the Mater may think about it, that I +admire him. It's just because he's so big, and earnest, and loyal, +and—and"—</p> + +<p>"White," said young Nisbet.</p> + +<p>"Yes, <i>isn't</i> he? That's it—white!"</p> + +<p>"I can understand a man like that getting spliced," observed young +Nisbet very earnestly. "He has so much to offer a girl. But as for the +rest of us"—</p> + +<p>"Oh, as to that," broke in Dorothy airily, "John Barclay isn't the only +man in the world, by any manner of means! Besides, Natalie having +already bagged him, it is plain I shall have to look elsewhere."</p> + +<p>There was a long pause, broken only by the plash of the water, which +seemed, as the seconds slipped by, to grow amazingly loud. Then young +Nisbet raised his eyes, and looked at her, blushing deplorably.</p> + +<p>"I wish"—he said, "I wish"—</p> + +<p>"Dorothy! <i>Do</i> excuse me, Mr. Nisbet, but <i>really</i>—dinner at seven, you +know, and this child <i>must</i> be thinking about dressing. She takes +<i>ages</i>!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p> + +<p>Mrs. Rathbawne folded her fat hands, and stood waiting, at the +conservatory door. Young Nisbet rose.</p> + +<p>"Of course!" he said. "I'm always so stupid about these things. Good-by, +Miss Rathbawne. I'm off to New York to-morrow on some confounded +business, so I probably won't see you for a week or so. Good-by."</p> + +<p>"<i>Would</i> you mind going out by the hall, Mr. Nisbet?" suggested Mrs. +Rathbawne. "Mr. Barclay is in the drawing-room with my elder daughter, +and he is so <i>greatly</i> occupied with affairs of state that they have +<i>very</i> little time together. I <i>hate</i> to have them interrupted. One can +do <i>so</i> much harm sometimes, you know, by thoughtlessly interrupting +people who are in love with each other. Thank you <i>so</i> much; good-by. +<i>Do</i> try to stand a little straighter, Dorothy, my dear."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<h3>A FACE IN THE CROWD</h3> + + +<p>At the sound of the Lieutenant-Governor's voice at the front door, Mrs. +Rathbawne had beaten a hasty retreat, dragging her immensely edified +half-sister in her wake, so that when he stepped through the curtained +doorway Barclay found Natalie alone.</p> + +<p>"I'm so glad you could come early," she said, from the corner of the +divan. "Now we can have a talk before dinner. I seem to see so little of +you. I suppose that's the penalty attached to being engaged to the +second biggest man in the state. I'm sometimes jealous, Johnny boy, of +Alleghenia's place in your affections."</p> + +<p>"You're the only person in the world who has no need to be," laughed +Barclay. "What is the news?"</p> + +<p>"Probably," said Natalie, "the only inter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>esting items are that you are +cold and a little cross, and that you want a big chair and a cup of tea +and some hot toast."</p> + +<p>"Your summary of the situation is so exhaustive," said Barclay, "that +there seems to be nothing left for me to say, except that you are the +most beautiful girl in the world, and that I think I must stand still a +moment and just look at you, before I accept any of the luxuries you +suggest."</p> + +<p>"I can't imagine how you know that I'm so beautiful. You can't possibly +see me in this dark corner. But I see I've made one mistake! You are +distinctly <i>not</i> cross."</p> + +<p>"Why should I be?" asked the Lieutenant-Governor, standing before the +table, with his long legs far apart, and rocking from his toes to his +heels and back again. "When a man has been walking for half an hour +through a gnawing February air, and suddenly, out of all proportion to +his deserts, comes full upon a rose in bloom, is that a reason for being +cross?"</p> + +<p>She was very small, and deliciously delicate,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> was Natalie Rathbawne, +like a little Dresden image, with an arbutus-pink complexion, brown +hair, and deep-blue eyes, now clouded thoughtfully, but oftener alight +with humor, or dilating and clearing under the impetus of conversation. +A doll-like daintiness of tiny pleats and ruffles, fresh bows, and fine +stitching pervaded everything she wore, and if her voice inspired the +hackneyed comparison of running water, it was of water running under +moss, the sound whereof is as different from that of an open brook as is +music from discord. To John Barclay's thinking the barely believable +fact that this little miracle of beauty—this pocket-Venus, as he was +wont to call her—actually belonged to him remained one of the insoluble +mysteries of life. He could not, in the thraldom of his present Elysium, +be expected to remember, even if he had ever fully realized, that he +himself was tall, broad-shouldered, clean-cut, and clean-lived, with the +unmistakable stamp of the American gentleman on his linen and his +simple, well-fitting clothes, and the evidences of a sane, regular +existence<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> in his steady hands and his clear eyes and his firm mouth,—a +man of whom any woman might be, and of whom this particular woman was, +extravagantly proud. For the first tribute which a lover lays at the +feet of his lady is, in ordinary, the stamped-upon and abused summary of +his personal attributes, which, in his own mind, he has taken remarkable +pains to render as despicable as possible, and which, in hers, her +imagination contrives not only to rehabilitate, but to imbue with a +preposterously exaggerated splendor.</p> + +<p>"I wonder," added the Lieutenant-Governor presently, "whether when +gentlemen are invited to tea they are supposed to kiss the hostess on +entering."</p> + +<p>"If you are in any doubt about it," observed Natalie, with an air of +superb indifference, "I advise you to write for advice to the etiquette +editor of the 'Kenton City Record.' She is probably sixty-two years old, +looks like an English walnut, has never had a proposal in her life, and +so knows all about"—</p> + +<p>What the lady in question was supposed to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> know all about was for +sufficient reasons never made clear. There are occasions, despite the +manuals of polite behavior, when interruption cannot with any approach +to justice be regarded as rudeness.</p> + +<p>Barclay heaved a long sigh of satisfaction as he took his tea and two +thin slices of toast and settled himself in his chair.</p> + +<p>"Do you think it possible," he asked, "for a man to be asleep for six +weeks, dreaming that he is in another garden of Eden, with an Eve in a +French frock, who has no partiality for apples"—</p> + +<p>"I <i>adore</i> apples!" said the girl.</p> + +<p>"And then wake up," he continued, disregarding the interruption, "and +find that the dream was only a dream, after all,—that he's only a poor +dog of a politician, that the garden is only a dingy office, and the +flower-beds full of briers and pitfalls?"</p> + +<p>"You've been eating pie for lunch again," said Natalie severely, "and it +always makes you morbid. No; I don't think it possible at all. If I did, +I should hang on to your coat<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span>tails like fury and keep you in dreamland, +whether you wanted to wake up or not."</p> + +<p>"It's all too good to be true! How <i>dare</i> you be so beautiful?"</p> + +<p>"John"—</p> + +<p>"It's gospel truth!"</p> + +<p>Barclay paused for a moment, and then went on more seriously.</p> + +<p>"You're tired, littlest and most lovely in the world, and troubled about +something."</p> + +<p>Natalie laughed shortly, with evident effort.</p> + +<p>"Why do you say that?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"Why not? Don't you suppose I know? Do you think you could say a hundred +words without my perceiving that? It almost seems to me that the +knowledge that you were unhappy would make its way to me, no matter what +distance separated us, and that I should come to you at top-speed to set +things right. I've hardly seen your face, and yet I know your dear, deep +eyes are troubled; I had barely heard your voice before I felt its +weariness."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span></p> + +<p>Natalie bent forward until her face came under the light.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I'm tired," she said; "or, rather, I was tired when I first came +in. I'm better now, since I've had my tea. But you're right, Johnny +boy,—there's something more. I'm troubled, desperately troubled and +heartsick. I've been trying to make myself believe that it's all +imagination, that I have no reason for feeling as I do; but I'm afraid I +can't manage it. John, I thought I saw Spencer Cavendish to-day."</p> + +<p>"Spencer Cavendish? Are you sure? I had almost forgotten his +existence!—Of course, it's not impossible; but I imagined he had taken +root in some South Sea island long ago. That's what he was always +expecting to do, you remember. How I have hated that man!"</p> + +<p>"You were good friends once."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and should be yet, if I had not been the most suspicious mortal +that ever breathed, and he the most hot-blooded. There was a reason, you +know,—a little reason, but the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> most important in the world! I was +jealous, Natalie, insanely jealous. I could forgive him everything now."</p> + +<p>"That hurts me, John. I'm so happy, boy dear, that I want everybody else +to be happy as well. Oh, why is it that a girl must always have that one +thought on her mind, which is so hard, so hard?—I mean the thought of +the good men, the true, brave, loyal men, whom she has cared for, who +have been her best friends perhaps, and yet whom she has been forced to +hurt bitterly because they asked her for something she was not able to +give. A man has so much easier a road! His happiness, when it comes to +him, isn't clouded by the thought of those to whom it means the loss of +their last remnant of hope. They are there, the disappointed ones, but +he doesn't know, he doesn't know! He hasn't on his conscience the memory +of hearts cruelly wounded,—wounded even to death. He doesn't in memory +see the eagerness in a good friend's eyes die to disillusion, to +hopelessness, to bitter, bitter sorrow. He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> doesn't have to remember how +the life died suddenly out of a voice that had been tender and eloquent. +He doesn't sicken with the thought that his hand has given a blow so +merciless, so unmerited, and yet so inevitable. Worst of all, for the +girl, is the after-discovery that her decision has made a difference—a +hideous, irreparable difference,—that the man can never be the same +again,—that she has wrecked a life with a word! Oh, there ought to be +some way! The man ought not to ask unless he is sure of the reply! It's +too much responsibility to force upon the girl!</p> + +<p>"So with Spencer Cavendish," she went on after a moment. "In spite of +all—in spite of all, John!—I can't forget that he loved me. I think a +woman never forgets that."</p> + +<p>"Until the man marries another woman!"</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Natalie, with a faint smile, "then least of all, John! And +besides, Spencer never married. He knew I loved you, long before you +did! I felt that it was due to him that he should know; he was my +oldest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> and best friend then, and so I told him! And then he went out of +my life—out of his own—into darkness. I can't forget it! I can't +forget that I broke up your friendship"—</p> + +<p>"Dearest!"</p> + +<p>"I did, John! It wasn't my fault, perhaps, nor any one's, for that +matter, but I did, just the same. Besides, it wasn't only the question +of your friendship. What hurt me most was the wilful wreck of his life. +And yet, how could I have known what was going to happen? What could I +do when it did happen? He was beyond my reach. He didn't even answer the +letter I wrote, asking him to come and see me. I thought, if he cared +for me, I could save him. But it was just as he had said,—he must have +everything, or he would have nothing at all. And so he went wrong—oh, +so terribly, terribly wrong!—he who might have been anything, if it +hadn't been for me. I can never forget it—never! I can never forget the +pity of it, the tragedy of its awful publicity,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> the newspapers, the +scandal, people's sneers, his mother dying of a broken heart—<i>and I did +it</i>! Think of it! Think of a man like Spencer Cavendish in the police +courts, not once, but a dozen times. Think of what Justice Meyer called +him at last, and what was printed in the papers,—'a common drunk!' Oh, +John!"</p> + +<p>"Natalie, Natalie!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "Why should you +think of such things, brood over them, above all, blame them on +yourself? How could it possibly have been your fault? how could you +possibly have helped it? He was a reckless, hot-headed chap—brilliant, +of course, but a slave to his impulses and his nerves. If Lochinvars +could act with impunity nowadays, he'd have ridden up to your door on a +black horse, killed Thomas, and carried you off across his pommel. As it +was, he let himself go, and disgraced himself. I tried to talk to him, +just as you did, but he wouldn't have it—called me 'an insolent cub' +and—er—worse. I had to give it up. It was all<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> very distressing, I +admit, but then, dear, it was all so long ago. He hasn't been in Kenton +City for two years and more, and I've no doubt he pulled himself +together long since, and is leading a straight life somewhere. He had +lots in him, with all his recklessness. A chap like that, with no family +hanging about his neck, and with his brains, and only his own living to +make, could forge ahead almost anywhere."</p> + +<p>"But John, I'm <i>sure</i> I saw him to-day, and suppose I should tell you +that he was—begging?"</p> + +<p>Barclay almost smiled at her earnest, troubled face, as he replaced his +cup on the table.</p> + +<p>"Begging?" he answered. "I'm afraid I couldn't bring myself to believe +you, violet-eyes. Even granting that he has fallen as low as that, which +I should think one of the most unlikely things in the world, it would +hardly be in Kenton City, would it?—a place where his face is known to +a thousand people. Tell me about it. What makes you think you saw him?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I was shopping this morning," said Natalie, "all alone; and as I came +out of Kendrick's and was just about to get into the brougham, I saw +that someone was holding the door open for me. I looked up carelessly, +as one naturally would under the circumstances, and, John—I know it was +he! At first I thought so, and then I didn't, because he was so changed, +so thin and pale, and because he had a beard. So, before I thought what +I was doing, I stepped into the brougham, and put my hand on the door to +close it. Then I looked up again, and saw his face, peering in at me +through the glass, and that time there couldn't be any mistake. It +<i>was</i>! I was going to speak, but he was gone in a flash. I saw him +disappearing in the crowd before the shop—<i>slinking</i>, John!—with that +dreadfully pathetic air which all beggars have, his shoulders all +hunched up, and his head bent, and his hands in his pockets. He was +cold, John, I could see that, and, no doubt, hungry! And there I was, in +that dreadful little brougham, with my<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> hateful furs, as warm as toast, +and I didn't even speak to him. I could have died of shame!"</p> + +<p>She buried her face in her hands, bending low over the tea-table. +Barclay was leaning forward in his chair, his lips set.</p> + +<p>"It's impossible," he murmured, "impossible!"</p> + +<p>The girl looked up suddenly, a white spot in the centre of each cheek, +where the pressure of her thumbs had left its mark in the tender, pink +flesh.</p> + +<p>"Improbable—yes!" she said, "but not impossible. Oh, I wish I could +believe otherwise, but I'm sure, I'm sure! Oh, John! You are so big, so +strong, so powerful now! Think of it—Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia! +You can do anything. And if he <i>is</i> here in Kenton City, homeless, cold, +starving, you must find and help him—for me, Johnny boy, for me!"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor had risen, and was pacing up and down the room, +with his brows knit, and his strong, white hands chaf<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>ing slowly against +each other, palm to palm. It seemed impossible, indeed! Spencer +Cavendish, the last of one of Alleghenia's proudest families; Spencer +Cavendish, the brilliant young society pet and sportsman; Spencer +Cavendish, the wit, the <i>viveur</i>—a beggar in the street? And yet—</p> + +<p>The scandal of Cavendish's sudden and reckless plunge into sodden, open +dissipation, two years before, freshly called to Barclay's mind by +Natalie's words, had pointed to almost any finale, however debased, +however sordid. Barclay mentally invoked the face of his former friend, +as he had seen it on the occasion of their last meeting, flushed, +swollen-eyed, insolent, the fine patrician mouth hideously contorted and +maundering insults, filth, banality.</p> + +<p>"And I did it!" the girl was saying. "Don't forget that, John. +Unwittingly, ignorantly, helplessly, if you will, I did it, just the +same. If I could have loved him, I could have saved him. As it was, I +had to send him away, and he has come to—to this!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> Oh, don't you see? +Don't you understand that something more than chance has crossed my path +with his, just at this moment of my supremest happiness, and of his +utter degradation? My duty is plain. It is to help him, to uplift him, +to make a man of him once more—to undo what I have done! I'm +responsible—and I'm helpless! What can I do? What can any girl do in +such a case? I can't go out into the streets and search for him. I can +only turn to you, Johnny boy, and rely upon your aid."</p> + +<p>"But, Natalie dearest," said the Lieutenant-Governor slowly, "don't you +see that it is impossible, all this? I cannot allow such an affair to +come into your pure, sweet life, bringing with it the knowledge of the +depths to which men may fall, and the shadow of misery and degradation. +I cannot bear that, in even the remotest way, you should blame yourself +for that which it was never in your power to prevent or remedy. A +man—this man—has no business to cast on you the blight of his own +weakness and folly, to es<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>tablish a relation of cause and effect between +your refusal of him and the subsequent transformation of a gentleman +into a common drunkard."</p> + +<p>"John!"</p> + +<p>"Ah, don't think me bitter, dearest! If the man you saw was actually +Cavendish, I pity him from the bottom of my heart. But it was his hands +which built up the barrier between his life and ours, and it must be his +that tear it down. It is intolerable that in his degradation he should +come into your life again, and have, even in your imagination, the +smallest claim upon you—intolerable! The paths of my love for you and +my duty toward you are identical in this respect. There can be no +alternative—no quibbling. At least until he has redeemed himself, if +redemption is still possible, the thought of him, his presence, his +misdoings, must not and shall not contaminate the atmosphere in which +you live and move."</p> + +<p>Natalie had risen suddenly, her eyes ablaze.</p> + +<p>"Ah, John!" she said. "Am I then a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> toy, a sugar figure, that I must be +packed in cotton, and shielded from all knowledge of the evil in the +world? Is that what it means to be a woman? Ah, <i>no</i>! It is bad enough +to be hemmed in by the wretched conventionalities which prevent my doing +openly what I conceive to be my duty, without adding to the restrictions +that actually exist the imaginary one that I must not even think of the +misery, the wretchedness, the sordid vice which abound just across the +borders of the comfortable little world in which I live. And see, boy +dear!—with all the force of my conviction that things should be +otherwise, yet I am reasonable. I don't ask to see Spencer, or to have +an active hand in his redemption. I realize that the time for that has +passed, and that you are just in saying that he must come to me, not I +to him—and come to me another than the man he is to-day. Anything else +is impossible: that I see and accept. But the hideous fact remains. A +man who loved me once, who offered me all that a man can offer a woman, +is walking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> the streets of Kenton City, cold, hungry, homeless—a +beggar! What business is it of yours or mine what his past follies and +weaknesses were? His temptations may have been beyond our understanding, +but his present plight is not. He is begging—begging at our very +doors—a man whom we have called by the name of friend! I can't help +him. All I can do, as I said before, is to turn to you, whom I love +better than all the world, and ask you to save him, in my stead. Ah, +boy, boy!—I've given you all I refused to him, taken at your hands all +I put away at his. You can afford to be generous!"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor came slowly toward her, and, placing his hands +upon her shoulders, looked her in the eyes.</p> + +<p>"Dearest and Most Beautiful," he said tenderly, "you are right. I +hope—I believe—that you were overwrought, fanciful, that it is not +true. But if it is, if Cavendish is begging in our streets, then, so +surely as I am Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, I will pull him out of +them, and make a man of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> him, if it takes a month and every police +officer and detective in Kenton City to find him. And that not alone for +your sake, tenderest-hearted, but for mine. I <i>can</i> afford to be +generous, God bless your sweet face, I can indeed!"</p> + +<p>And he bent over reverently, and kissed her hand.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<h3>AS BETWEEN FRIENDS</h3> + + +<p>There were but two guests at the Rathbawnes' dinner-table that night, +the Lieutenant-Governor and Colonel Amos Broadcastle, a veteran of the +Rebellion, brevetted Major for conspicuous gallantry at Lookout +Mountain, and now commanding officer of the Ninth Regiment, N. G. A., +the crack militia organization of Kenton City. Colonel Broadcastle had +seen his sixty-five, but his broad, square shoulders, his rigid +carriage, and his black hair, even now only slightly touched with gray, +clipped twenty years from his appearance. His eye was one that was +famous throughout the Alleghenia Guard,—an eye accustomed to control, +not a single man, or two, or three, but a thousand, moving as one at his +command; an eye enforcing obedience immediate, machine-like, and +unquestioning.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span></p> + +<p>It had been a momentous day for the Ninth when Amos Broadcastle, +retiring from the staff of a former Governor, had accepted, first a +majority therein, and then, three months later, its colonelcy. He found +ten companies, in no one instance exceeding twenty files front. He found +a field and staff vain, incompetent, and jealous; company officers +deficient alike in their knowledge of tactics and in their conception of +their responsibilities; sergeants, corporals, and lances chosen without +any view to fitness, and ignorant and tyrannical in their positions; and +finally, the rank and file lazy, untidy, and frankly contemptuous of the +school of the soldier. Some one had once said of the Ninth that there +was consolation to be found in the mortifying knowledge that the men +composing it were there with the unique view of escaping jury duty. The +consolation lay in the probability that such infernally bad soldiers +would have made jurors quite as infernally bad.</p> + +<p>But Broadcastle, a born disciplinarian and a trained tactician, was now +in a position to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> echo, albeit in a different spirit, the arrogance of +Louis: "<i>Nous avons changé tout cela!</i>" Ten years had sufficed to change +the indolent and incompetent Ninth of Alleghenia into a regiment +rivaling in prestige the Seventh of New York. The commissioned officers +were thrust upon, rather than achieved by, their companies, but, once +established in their respective positions, proceeded without exception +to justify, by their energy and ability, their selection from the best +element of Kenton City. Among the enlisted men the exponents of the old +spirit of sloth, indifference, and laxity were weeded out as fast as +their terms of service expired, and their places filled from the same +sources whence the company officers were drawn. Colonel Broadcastle was +a diplomat as well as a disciplinarian. By some unknowable system of +suggestion and example it came, little by little, to be regarded in +Kenton City as "the thing" to belong to the Ninth. Before the capital +was aware of the transformation, every company roster read 103, the +field and staff had been reorgan<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span>ized and perfected, and the Ninth +Regiment, N. G. A., was what it remained thereafter: a magnificent +fighting machine, ably drilled, perfectly equipped, a credit to the +state, to the credit of which there stood so little else. The +declaration of war with Spain brought it suddenly into prominence by the +astonishing readiness with which it went into camp twenty hours after +the Adjutant-General of Alleghenia published the President's call for +volunteers; and although it never saw active service, it attracted at +Chickamauga, and later at Tampa, the admiring attention of the regular +army, and was spoken of as the most perfect body among the volunteer +forces.</p> + +<p>The citizens of Kenton City were not accustomed to discovering things in +which they could take pride. The exact contrary was more apt to be the +case. When, therefore, they discovered the rehabilitated Ninth, and its +redeemer in the person of its commanding officer, they had a deal to +say, and said it with unexampled arrogance and satisfaction. +Thenceforward, Alleghenia meant much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> to Colonel Broadcastle, and +Colonel Broadcastle considerably more than much to Alleghenia.</p> + +<p>Something of all this went through the Lieutenant-Governor's mind during +the progress of the dinner. He sat at Mrs. Rathbawne's right, than which +nothing in the world could have been more cheerless, unless it was +sitting at Mrs. Rathbawne's left. But the good lady's habitual +complacency was plainly in abeyance, her customary volubility replaced +by a fidgety reserve. The dinner, as a social achievement, was a +distinct failure, save in so far as Mrs. Wynyard and Colonel Broadcastle +were concerned. Several months before, Mrs. Wynyard had frankly +announced that she had designs upon the Colonel. Latterly, Barclay had +begun to suspect the Colonel of having designs upon Mrs. Wynyard. Thirty +and sixty-five that looked forty-five—a widow and a widower! More +wonderful things had happened.</p> + +<p>"If I were thirty years younger," Broadcastle was saying even now, as he +did full<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> justice to the celery mayonnaise, "I should say we were made +for each other."</p> + +<p>"Since two single people may be made for each other," laughed Mrs. +Wynyard, "I wonder if two married people can't be unmade for each other. +Perhaps that is just what has happened to us!"</p> + +<p>"I'll think that over," replied the Colonel with mock gravity. "I don't +want to commit myself on so serious a hypothesis, without due +reflection."</p> + +<p>They were the only ones who were thoroughly at ease. Barclay and +Natalie, unstrung by the events of the day, ate little and talked +listlessly. Dorothy, victim to an inward excitement which was half +happiness and half disappointment, chattered feverishly. Rathbawne was +wrapped in his own thoughts, and his wife, innocently unobservant of +emotional manifestations in any and every other, but pathetically +sensitive to the slightest evidence of mental perturbation in this +stern, kind man, between herself and whom existed a devotion dog-like in +its silence and intensity, watched<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> his clouded face with an anxiety +which she made no effort to conceal. The dinner dragged hopelessly, +until she shook herself into a bewildered realization that it was over, +folded her napkin scrupulously, dusted a few crumbs from the black-satin +slope of her obsolete lap, and, followed by her daughters and Mrs. +Wynyard, left the men to their cordials and cigars.</p> + +<p>The latter drew their chairs nearer, as the door closed, made little +clearings in the wilderness of finger-bowls, silver, and discarded +napkins, for the accommodation of their coffee-cups and cordial glasses, +and, lighting the long Invincibles which were Rathbawne's sole +extravagance, inhaled that first matchless whiff of smoke which makes a +whole day of anxiety and vexation seem to have been worth the while.</p> + +<p>It is a moment apart and <i>sui generis</i>, this, and is rivaled only by +that of early morning realization that one is awake—and not obliged to +get up. It is apt to pass in silence, for a newly lit cigar is like a +newly married<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> wife: a man is deliberately oblivious to all else. The +moment, too, is one of readjustment, of hasty mental survey of the +chatter that has passed, and of preparation for the essentially +dissimilar talk to come. With men of the mental calibre of the three +here assembled this opportunity is sacred to some of the gravest and +most vital thoughts which they exchange. Peter Rathbawne, in particular, +whenever he reviewed the paramount conversations of his life, seemed to +find their significance indissolubly fused with the fragrance of Havana +cigars and the taste of kümmel or yellow Chartreuse.</p> + +<p>His eyes dwelt thoughtfully upon his companions during the pause which +followed. First, on Broadcastle. He could depend upon him as he could +depend upon no other man on earth. They had fought side by side in many +a tight place in the black days of '62, and in many another, full as +tight, since then, on battlefields commercial and political. It is +doubtful whether so much as a single word of admiration or affection had +ever passed be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>tween them. It is equally doubtful whether anything could +have been more entirely superfluous than such a voicing of self-evident +sentiments.</p> + +<p>John Barclay, too! Peter Rathbawne, with what had been natural +shrewdness at the outset now sharpened almost to clairvoyance by his +years of dealing with a multiplicity of men and things, understood the +Lieutenant-Governor absolutely, and admired him with all the force of +his rugged nature. And Rathbawne was not given to admiring people. His +business experience had not fostered the spirit of hero-worship. He had +seen too much for that. But in the two men before him he recognized +qualities so unusual, and in many ways so similar, that he was proud to +count them friends.</p> + +<p>For the moment, however, as he took stock of them, he was measuring them +by a new standard, more rigid, more severe than he had hitherto had +reason to apply. It is one thing to trust a man implicitly, and another +thing entirely to try to tell him so. For silence is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> most golden in the +specification of friendship, and when employed in the particularizing of +intimate emotion the silver of speech is apt to turn to veriest tinsel.</p> + +<p>Yet the occasion was one which demanded speech. Moreover, and in direct +opposition to his inclinations and the precedents he had established, he +was forced not only to give practical expression to his feeling for +Broadcastle and Barclay, but, what humiliated as well as annoyed him, to +confess himself incapable of dealing with a question which confronted +him. It was the first time within his recollection when he had +mistrusted his own judgment.</p> + +<p>But Peter Rathbawne was not the man to procrastinate, and presently he +began to speak, in a low but curiously intense voice, from which the +others instinctively took their cue. He was a short man, inclined to +stoutness, but with the clear, sharp eye and the underhang of jaw which +tell of right principle and indomitable perseverance. It was a question +whether in calling him the second<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> most obstinate man in Alleghenia, +Governor Abbott had given him the full measure of his due.</p> + +<p>"Gentlemen," he said, with the somewhat stilted formality which was part +of his manner, "I will say to you what I wouldn't say to others,—I'm in +a hole, and I want your advice. I'll be as brief as possible, and I'll +come right to the point. For thirty years I've been building up the +Rathbawne Mills, giving them every hour of my thought, every particle of +my strength, every atom of my ability. I've seen them grow from a little +shanty on the outskirts of Kenton City to a collection of buildings +covering four solid squares, filled with modern machinery, and employing +four thousand, two hundred and odd hands. I've been a business man, I've +been a rigid man, but I've been a fair man, too. No one can say that I +ever clipped wages, even when I had to run the mills at a loss, as I've +had to do more than once. I gave my people an eight-hour day long before +the law of Alleghenia jammed it down the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> throats of other mill-owners. +I swallowed the Union, though it was a bitter mouthful. There has never +been a just complaint from one of my employees that wasn't attended to +in short order, if it was in my power to do so. There's many an old +fossil on my pay-rolls to-day who isn't worth his salt, but he stays +there, and will continue to stay there, because he did his best when he +could, and it's not his fault that he's dead wood now. I've given in, +over and over again, in one way or another, sometimes against my +convictions, and oftener against my will. But one thing I've stuck to, +and that's my right to discharge a hand when I see fit, without +dictation from the Union or anybody else. In the past, this has been +comparatively easy sailing. One man, now and again, isn't a ripple on +the surface of four thousand employees. Besides, there was always a good +reason. The others saw that, and there was never a finger raised. They +believed in me, through and through, and it has been my pride to know +that they did, and that they had good cause<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> to. But now it's different. +There has been a band of young good-for-nothings in Shop 22, who were +full, chock-a-block, of socialism, and equality, and workingmen's +rights, and God knows what-not! They've talked enough poisonous gas to +the other hands to blow up a state. They distributed pamphlets, and made +speeches, and organized clubs, and fomented discord, till I got sick and +tired of it. There wasn't one square day's work in the whole fifteen of +them put together. So, when I'd stood them as long as I could—which was +at ten o'clock yesterday morning—I discharged them all in a bunch, and +if there'd been a steep place handy, I'd have expected to see them all +run violently down it into the sea—like the other swine, in Scripture. +For if ever there was a band of devils made incarnate, it was that same +fifteen who were sowing anarchy broadcast through the Rathbawne Mills!</p> + +<p>"Now—what? Lo and behold, they are all henchmen and disciples of +Michael McGrath, whom we in Kenton City know to our cost,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> and regular +and loyal members—save the mark!—of his Union. Well, gentlemen, I've +got that Union about my ears like a nest of hornets, with McGrath at the +head, and unless those fifteen men are reinstated by noon to-morrow, my +four thousand hands will be out on strike, and the Rathbawne Mills will +be tied up as tight as a drum!"</p> + +<p>"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle curtly, as the other paused.</p> + +<p>"That's what I meant to do—but where am I going to come out? If I +thought, for instance, that I was going to have your regiment to back me +up, Broadcastle, or even the Kenton City police, why, well and good! But +<i>am</i> I? No, sir! <i>No</i>, sir! Not with Elijah Abbott in the Governor's +chair, I'm not! You know that as well as I. Why, Broadcastle, I'd rather +see McGrath himself at the capitol than that smooth-spoken skunk!"</p> + +<p>He paused to relight his cigar, and then continued.</p> + +<p>"The Rathbawne Mills are like the fruit<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> of my own body to me. I love +them! I love every stone and brick of them, that I've put in place, as +it were, with my own hands. I've often thought that if they should burn +down it would come close to killing me. And yet I could watch them go +with a lighter heart, God knows, than that with which I foresee the +misery that's coming to these people of mine, who are going to starve at +the bidding of a band of black-legs, and that not even because they +think their cause a just one, but simply because they can't help +themselves. It isn't only that ruin's staring me in the face, though +there's that possibility in the situation, too, but that privation, +bitter misery, and despair are lying in wait for them. God!—what an +iniquity!</p> + +<p>"But I <i>can't</i> give in, Broadcastle—I <i>can't</i> give in, John Barclay! It +means the sacrifice of a principle I've held out for, and that I know is +right. What's more, it isn't as if I were yielding one point. It would +only be the beginning. If I give in now, I might as well turn over the +mills to McGrath at once,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> and let him run them according to his own +blackguardly will. You know how such things go. Give them an inch"—</p> + +<p>"And they raise a hell!" put in Colonel Broadcastle.</p> + +<p>"Exactly! It's commercial suicide. And yet, if I <i>don't</i> yield, I'm +precipitating disorder, and bloodshed, and the untold suffering of four +thousand souls. What am I to do?"</p> + +<p>"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle, with a sharp nod of his head.</p> + +<p>Rathbawne turned from him to the Lieutenant-Governor, and to the latter, +knowing the man he had been, there was something indescribably +heart-rending in the sudden, irresolute trembling of his half-raised +hands, the slow shake of his head, and the pathos of his raised eyebrows +and drooping lips.</p> + +<p>"John," he said, "I'm an old man, and you're a young one, but I'm a +plain citizen, and you're the Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia. You +know how things stand. Now, I've given you my girl, and after that it's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> +not much to put myself into your hands as well. I'm getting on. My +strength isn't what it was. I'm not as fit to stand such a struggle as +this is bound to be, as I was thirty years ago. I look strong, but, in +reality, I'm not. My doctor has warned me, more than once. A sudden +shock—you know what these medical chaps say about sudden shocks! I've +laughed at him, of course, and yet—I know there is truth in it. I've +been up against hard propositions, but never one as hard as this. I've +had big responsibilities, but never a responsibility that I felt as I +feel this one. If I hold out, I know what people and the newspapers will +say,—how they'll blackguard me,—but I'm not afraid of that. I'm not +even thinking of it. No, and I'm not thinking of what the strain may +mean to me. Every man's turn is sure to come—why not one way as well as +another? But what I <i>am</i> thinking of is the result upon the lives of +these people whom I've made, as surely as if I were another Creator. And +McGrath's another Beelzebub!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> There's a fight on between us for the +salvation of a little world of four thousand souls! But I'm not God! I +can't act with the conviction of omniscience. I've been the most +independent of men. I've made my own fortune with my own brains. I've +done as I saw fit, and the results have seemed to indicate that I've +been oftener right than wrong. But now, I'm at a loss. It's not the men +I'm thinking of so much. They ought to be able to make their own way, as +I've made mine. It's the women and children dependent upon them—the +women and children who have no voice in the matter, and yet who are +bound to suffer most by a strike. I've got to think for them. I've +reached a crisis—a cross-ways—and I've got to choose which course to +take—and I can't! All my experience counts for nothing. I've never—you +probably know it—asked for advice before. But now I must have the +unprejudiced, the outside point of view. I've always thought there was a +clear, unmistakable boundary between right and wrong, but now there's +some right<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> in the wrong, and a big sight more of wrong in the right! +I've heard Broadcastle's opinion, and I want yours. If you agree, I'll +go by what you say. As I said before, John, in this matter I'm the +individual—you're the state. I'll go by what you say. What shall I do?"</p> + +<p>Peter Rathbawne's words had wrought tremendously upon the +Lieutenant-Governor. He answered slowly, looking down, and with a +perceptible tremor in his voice.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Rathbawne, you and the Colonel know how high-sounding my title is, +and how little, in reality, it means. There is no need to go into +details. I'm Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, yes!—and as helpless in +the cause of right as a new-born baby! If I could by any means, in any +manner, support the advice I gave you, I would give it willingly."</p> + +<p>"John!" said Peter Rathbawne, "I don't mean that. I've put the case +wrongly. Give me your counsel, not as Lieutenant-Governor, but as my +friend, and the man who loves my daughter!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor raised his eyes from the finger-tips with which, +as the other was speaking, he had been plucking at the cloth.</p> + +<p>"Fight them, Mr. Rathbawne," he said, "and may God help you—because I +can't!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<h3>A BRAND FROM THE BURNING</h3> + + +<p>More heartsick than he cared to confess, even to himself, the +Lieutenant-Governor left the Rathbawnes' earlier than his wont, despite +the fact that his host and Colonel Broadcastle were still engaged in +discussing the impending situation, and that Natalie, with a batch of +new music, was waiting for him at the piano. He pleaded an unusually +busy day and his consequent fatigue as an excuse, and so, at half after +nine, found himself about to light a second cigar, on the steps of the +Rathbawne residence, and shivering a little in the night air, which +stung the inside of his nostrils and set his eyes watering. Raw as the +day had been, it had turned colder now, but the night was superbly +clear. The sky seemed to have drawn nearer to the earth, and the stars +twinkled so sharply and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> clearly against its deep blue-black that they +resembled in form their conventionally five-pointed counterfeits of +silver paper. A brisk wind whirled a few dried leaves in whispering +eddies across the smooth asphaltum of the driveway, but beyond this and +the peevish sputtering of the arc-light on the opposite corner there was +no sound. It was the kind of night which, with its crystal clearness and +its steely intensity, stirs the normal pulse to keen exhilaration: yet +never had John Barclay felt more hopelessly dispirited, more utterly at +a loss to see the way before him. That anxiety, distress, possibly +actual disaster should be impending over this house where lay his heart, +his happiness, and his hope, was sufficiently disturbing in itself. That +he should not be able, despite his position, to raise a hand to avert +the calamity was worse. But that the battle was to be a battle for the +right, and yet, as it seemed, foredoomed from the start to end in +disaster, since no aid could be expected from the strong arm of the law +to which the partisans of principle<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> turn naturally for support: this +was worst of all. For out of dangerous surroundings he felt himself able +to snatch away the littlest and most lovely woman in the world. She, at +least, should not suffer. And out of this nightmare of powerless +prominence, of impotent position, he himself could retire into private +life, and be no less a man than he had been before. But from the +reproach of corruption which had fallen upon her, and the impending slur +of anarchy, who was to rescue Alleghenia? The Lieutenant-Governor set +his lips and drove his nails into his palms, as he stood in the shadow +of the Rathbawnes' doorway, looking up at the sky of the February night. +He was not a religious man—as the term goes—but in that moment he said +a better prayer for the welfare of his state than had ever lain upon the +lips of any priest in Kenton City!</p> + +<p>He was about to strike his match when an instinct rather than an actual +perception of movement arrested his hand. Bradbury Avenue, upon which +stood the Rathbawne house,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> was situated in one of the quieter residence +districts which prided itself on the turfed spaces between its +dwellings, pretentious enough for the most part, and the double rows of +trees which lined its thoroughfares. It was one of these trees which, at +the moment, attracted Barclay's attention. It lay in a direct line +between himself and the arc-light on the corner, and its trunk, in some +miraculous manner, had abruptly developed an elbow, and then an arm. The +Lieutenant-Governor was still staring at this phenomenon when it was as +abruptly explained by the sudden emergence from shadow of a man, who had +apparently been standing on the side of the tree nearest to the house. +He was crossing the avenue obliquely when something about his bearing +caused the Lieutenant-Governor to lean forward and follow him intently +with his eyes. It was all there, as Natalie had said—the lifted +shoulders, the bent head, the unmistakable, pathetic air of the beggar. +Then, as he neared the light, he gave a short upward strain to his neck +and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> chin, the impatient movement of a man whose collar annoys him. The +trick was too familiar to have been forgotten. The next moment Barclay's +heels were pounding on the asphaltum behind him, and then Barclay's hand +fell upon his shoulder and whirled him round.</p> + +<p>In the oddly intense radiance of the arc-light above, which cut sharply +across the surface of forehead, cheek, and chin, and left heavy shadows +like those in a roughly blocked-out carving, under brow, nose, and lower +lip, the two men faced each other briefly, in silence. Then the +Lieutenant-Governor voiced the other's name, hardly above a whisper.</p> + +<p>"Spencer Cavendish!"</p> + +<p>And the other, echoing the tone, if not the words, replied:—</p> + +<p>"Bar-clay!"</p> + +<p>A square away, the lights of a hansom winked into the avenue, and the +hoof-beats of the horse clonked on the pavement, unaccompanied by any +sound from the smoothly trundling, rubber-tired wheels. Barclay stepped +to the kerb, and hailed the driver<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> with his stick. The cab drew in, +stopped, and threw the divisions of its apron wide, like two black hands +extended in cordial welcome.</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor turned to his companion.</p> + +<p>"Get in," he said. "I want to have a talk with you."</p> + +<p>The drive of a mile and more from Bradbury Avenue to Barclay's quarters +in the new bachelor apartment-house "Rockingham" was accomplished +without the exchange of a word. Once, he felt his companion shiver, and +dragging a rug from under them, he spread it across their knees. That +was the only movement on the part of either. They sat, side by side, +looking straight before them over the horse's bobbing crupper, until the +hansom pulled up sharply before the broad and brilliantly illuminated +entrance of the "Rockingham." As they passed in, Cavendish had a passing +impression of tiled floors, columns of green marble, and attendants in +tightly fitting green uniforms with brass but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>tons. Then an elevator +whirled them up to the eighth floor, deposited them in a square hallway, +and vanished again, with the little page in charge wrinkling his nose +and biting the thumb of his cotton glove.</p> + +<p>"Wot's the Loot'nt-Guvnor up to now, Sawed-Off?" inquired the doorkeeper +genially, as the elevator returned to the ground floor.</p> + +<p>"Ide'no!" replied the little page with equal affability. "Goin' in fer +pol'tics, I guest. Jeest! Wot a slob it wuz—wot?"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor unlocked the door of his apartment, touched an +electric button which flooded the little hall and the drawing-room +beyond with light, and, entering the latter, went directly to a closet +in the wall. Unlocking this, he took out a jar of biscuits and a +decanter, and setting them upon the table, turned once more to his +companion.</p> + +<p>"Put away a couple of those biscuits and a glass of sherry," he said, +"and then we'll talk."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I'm past biscuits," said the other, almost sullenly.</p> + +<p>"I'll see to that," replied Barclay. "They are only by way of a +starter."</p> + +<p>He passed into the hall as he spoke, and presently Cavendish heard the +click of a telephone receiver slipping from its crotch, and Barclay's +voice speaking, to some one below, of a steak, vegetables, salad, and +coffee. He stepped to the table, devoured two or three of the biscuits +ravenously, poured himself a glass of sherry, sipped, and then swallowed +it, and flung himself down upon a wide divan.</p> + +<p>"Have you a cigarette?" he asked, as Barclay reëntered. "I haven't +smoked in three days. That's worse than mere hunger, you know."</p> + +<p>"I believe you!"</p> + +<p>Barclay pushed a silver box across the table, and seating himself +opposite, touched a match to the cigar which he had been about to light +at the Rathbawnes' door, and which he still held between his lips.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Help yourself," he added. "Your supper will be up presently. Meanwhile, +shall I fire away, or will you?"</p> + +<p>Cavendish let the first smoke from his cigarette curl slowly up his +cheek before replying. In the full light now first resting upon it, his +face showed as that of a man approximately Barclay's age, but pinched by +want, and deeply lined by dissipation. His under lids were puffy and +discolored, and a dozen heavy creases ran, fan-like, from the corners of +his eyes. Hair already turning white and an unkempt mustache and beard +completed the picture. His clothes were faded and frayed, no linen was +visible, and his boots were cracked and soggy. There was nothing about +him to suggest the former estate of gentleman save his hands, which, +while thin and tremulous, were clean and well-kept, in singular contrast +to the slovenliness of his attire.</p> + +<p>"Age before respectability," he said in reply to Barclay's question, +with a shrug. "I'll go first. It will save your asking questions. We +parted in anger, Barclay."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Let that pass," put in the Lieutenant-Governor, briefly. "Two years +wipe out all scores as petty as was the cause of our quarrel."</p> + +<p>"Well, then," continued Cavendish more easily, "when I left Kenton City, +it was with the best intention in the world of making a fresh start in +some place where my story wasn't known. I went to New York. I had a +little money, but only a very little, and not the most remote idea of +how difficult it is for a man to make his way in a place where he is +unknown, particularly if he has no credentials and is too proud to ask +for any from his old associates. Moreover, I'd been drinking hard for +six months and there was no such thing as clipping it short all at once. +I had an idea of tapering off, and perhaps, if I had found a job, I +might have done so. As it was I climbed up one step and fell down two, +and that went on indefinitely. It wasn't as if I'd had a distinct aim or +anything in my life which made it seem worth living. I didn't half care. +I'd set my heart on some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span>thing which I couldn't get, and—well, never +mind that. It is all as long ago as the Flood! I got work now and again, +tried reporting, and teaching, and copying. But each time it was a grade +lower, and I stuck to nothing but the whiskey—except when I had a +little more money than usual, and then it was absinthe."</p> + +<p>He touched his eyes, and then raised his hand to the level of his chin, +with the fingers held wide apart and rigid, and watched it tremble for +an instant in silence.</p> + +<p>"I haven't seen a mirror in weeks," he went on, "but I know the signs +are all there. That's the story. I could string it out for an hour, but +it would all be in the same key. I've simply been going down, down, +down. I'm what the old judge called me—do you remember it came out in +the 'Record?'—I'm a common drunk, Barclay. And I don't care! I've been +on the point of putting an end to it many a time—but I always held out +for another drink! Now, even my pride's gone. It stuck to me longer than +anything else, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> it's taken itself off at last. I've been feeling +lately that I'm pretty near the end, and I wanted to see Kenton City +again before it came. That's the reason I walked all the way from +Pittsburg, and I've been begging on the streets since I got in. I +thought nobody would recognize me."</p> + +<p>"But <i>I</i> did," said Barclay.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and—and"—</p> + +<p>"Yes, and <i>she</i> did! She saw you this morning, but before she took in +fully that it was you, you were gone in the crowd. She was half +heart-broken over it, and made me promise to look you up. I was going to +do so, when I tumbled against you by chance to-night. You were watching +the house?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, for the last time. I saw she had recognized me and that Kenton +City was no place for me. So I was off again to-night. Is she"—</p> + +<p>"She is well, and, I am glad to say, happy. We are to be married in the +autumn."</p> + +<p>A smile hovered for an instant on Cavendish's lips.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></p> + +<p>"God bless her!" he said slowly. "I'm glad of it. But don't let's talk +of that. She's as far above me as the stars!"</p> + +<p>"And as far above me, too, for that matter!" answered Barclay. "Here's +your supper. While you're eating, I'll take my turn at the talk."</p> + +<p>A bell-boy arranged the tray on the table, removed the covers, and in a +moment the two men were again alone. With a deep sigh of satisfaction +Cavendish drew a chair to the table and set to work on the steaming +dishes before him.</p> + +<p>"Jupiter!" he said, with the first mouthful poised on his fork, "you +don't know what this means, Barclay, and you can thank God you don't. I +won't attempt to thank you. Go on, and tell me about yourself."</p> + +<p>"I've no intention of doing that just at present," replied the +Lieutenant-Governor, settling himself more comfortably in his chair. "I +want to talk about you. Don't be afraid. I'm not going to preach! But I +<i>am</i> going to say that while I understand a good deal of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> what you've +said, the last part is pure rot! You're a bit of a wreck, of course, but +it isn't your pride or your self-respect or whatever you choose to call +it, that's gone. It's only your nerve. Now you've had your experience, +and you're back where you belong, and you've friends who like you, and +who can help you, and who will. I'm in a position to do so myself, and I +don't expect you to make any bones about accepting my assistance, and +whatever money you need for the moment. It will be a loan, of course, to +be repaid when you're on your feet again. We'll have you there in no +time. When you've made way with the grub, you can bunk down on that +divan for the night, and in the morning I'll tog you out in one of my +outfits, and you can set about getting back on <i>terra firma</i>. You'll +have to shake the drink, that goes without saying."</p> + +<p>Cavendish straightened himself suddenly, laid down his knife and fork, +and laughed shortly.</p> + +<p>"It sounds well," he said bitterly, "but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> you don't understand, Barclay. +It's too late! I don't care, and if I did, I couldn't shake the drink to +save my immortal soul. I'm steady enough for the time being, because I'm +hungry and because I'm being fed. But I've tried the other game too +often. I know what it means. I wouldn't promise you to quit, because I +don't want to lie to you, and that's all it would be. When the craving +comes back, I'll go down before it like a row of tenpins. No, Barclay, +it won't do."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, man! Do you want to tell me you're as weak as that?"</p> + +<p>"Every bit!" said Cavendish, attacking the steak again.</p> + +<p>"Well, I don't believe it, that's all. In the morning you'll be a +different man. I'll give you a bromide when you're ready for bed. You're +shaky, as it is, but that's all a matter of nerves. Now we'll drop the +subject, and talk of other things."</p> + +<p>It was midnight when they separated. Barclay brought out sheets and +blankets for the divan, produced pajamas for his guest,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> put the bath at +his disposal, and mixed a strong dose of bromide for him to take upon +retiring.</p> + +<p>Half an hour later, when he reëntered the drawing-room to see whether +Cavendish was in need of anything further, he found him standing by the +table in his pajamas, trembling, wide-eyed, and very pale.</p> + +<p>"What is it?" he asked. "Are you ill?"</p> + +<p>"No," answered Cavendish, striving in vain to control the trembling of +his lips, "only damnably nervous. Could you—could you give me a drop of +brandy, Barclay?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly not!" said the Lieutenant-Governor. "Pull yourself together, +man! There's your bromide. Take that. It's better than a thousand +brandies."</p> + +<p>Cavendish turned, lifted the glass, spilling a little as he did so, and +swallowed the sedative at a gulp. Then he stretched himself upon the +divan and drew the covers close up about his chin. Presently, from the +bedroom, Barclay heard him breathing deeply and regu<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span>larly, and turning +on his side, fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep.</p> + +<p>He awoke with a start, as the dawn was showing gray through the chinks +of his window curtains, with a vague, uneasy sense of something wrong, +and lay listening, every nerve strained taut. From the adjoining room +came the sound of Cavendish's breathing, but now it was more raucous, +more like groan following groan. The Lieutenant-Governor strove in vain +to put off the foreboding which lay heavy upon him, until, finally, +unable to resist the impulse, he rose, slid his feet into his slippers, +and going noiselessly into the drawing-room, stepped to the windows and +put the curtains softly aside. What first met his eye as he turned was +the door of his little wine-closet in the wall. It was standing wide +open, and about the lock the wood was hacked and hewed away in great +splinters. On a chair near by lay a rough knife with the blade open and +a sliver of wood yet sticking to the point. Then he looked toward the +divan. Cavendish was ly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>ing face down upon it, outside the blankets, +with his head lolling sharply over the edge. His left arm was extended +full length toward the ground, where his fingers just touched a bottle +of French absinthe, overturned upon its side, and uncorked, with the +thick, gummy liquid spread from its mouth in a circular pool on the +waxed floor.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<h3>McGRATH LAUGHS</h3> + + +<p>The clock on the huge central tower of the Capitol marked nine, as the +Lieutenant-Governor passed rapidly through the lofty entrance hall +toward the corridor leading to his office and that of Governor Abbott. +Already his promptness was proverbial, and there were those in the +great, grim building who looked forward to the moment of his arrival, +each morning, with a kind of eagerness. These were the simpler folk of +the official world with which circumstance housed him for eight hours +daily,—bootblacks, elevator-boys, porters, doormen. For to the big, +clean, wholesome personality which appeals irresistibly to these humbler +people, Barclay added an astonishing memory for faces, and for the names +and circumstances connected with them. It was a gift which counted as an +unspeakably<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> important factor in the establishment and maintenance of +unusually cordial relations with all those with whom he came in contact. +No one brought within the radius of his personal magnetism long resisted +it. It was only those who judged him from a distance, as did the press +and the rank and file of his party, or those who deliberately +misinterpreted him, as did his political enemies, who permitted +themselves anything short of enthusiasm for John Barclay. And this +faculty for attracting admiration and commanding respect, this +infallible kindness and this inherent dignity, were never made manifest +to so great advantage as in his attitude toward his inferiors. These +adored him. He accumulated, bit by bit, a remarkable store of intimate +information relating to them, and employed it in his intercourse with +them, with a tact and a frank sincerity of interest which never failed +of their effect. The response thus elicited was strongest of the minor +pleasures in his life. He was aware—none better—of the shrewdness +native to those who have no claim upon<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> one's recognition, their +appreciation of notice that is unfeignedly interested, their +sensitiveness to open indifference, their resentment of the simulated +consideration which is mere impertinence; and he was conscious of a +little inward thrill of satisfaction at the difference of attitude in +the employees at the Capitol as toward Governor Abbott and himself. +Where the former's suavity elicited only formal respect, manifestly +obligatory, his own whole-heartedness lined his way with smiles and +kindly greetings. His official existence, beset with annoyance, +mortification, and disappointment, was, as he often reflected, made +tolerable only by this friendliness which he, almost unconsciously, +inspired. Dogs, children, and his subordinates—the three most +intuitively critical classes of beings—were all his friends. The +pathway to and from the daily routine, which he was coming to regard as +moral martyrdom, was a pathway illumined with sunlight and strewn with +flowers!</p> + +<p>As the Lieutenant-Governor passed through his ante-room, with a wink at +the boy, a nod<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> to the stenographer, and a word of greeting to his +private secretary, and entered his office, he was surprised to find the +communicating door open, and to hear the sound of a vaguely familiar +voice in the Governor's room beyond. In an effort to place the speaker, +he hesitated briefly before advancing to a point which would bring him +within range of the Governor's eye. Almost immediately, the memory of +the convention rushed over him, and he recognized the voice as that of +Michael McGrath.</p> + +<p>"And it won't be a strike like other strikes," he was saying, "not so +long as I'm running it, that is. It's going to mean business from the +word go! There's been too much shilly-shallying in the strikes I've +known anything about, too much talk, and too much wasting of Union +funds. You know what I mean. It isn't enough to tie up a mill, and then +hang around on street-corners for two months, waiting for the other side +to give in. The only place to hit a man like Rathbawne is in his pocket, +and by that I don't mean<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> simply cutting off his income, but chopping +into his capital as well. He's got to understand"—</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor walked over to his desk, laid his hat and stick +on a chair, and, before removing his overcoat, began turning over the +pile of letters which awaited his attention. As he did so, Governor +Abbott's voice broke in suavely upon the other's.</p> + +<p>"I deprecate any resort to violence," he said. "You must proceed with +discretion if you expect the state to maintain an attitude of +neutrality. Otherwise, the police or the militia"—</p> + +<p>"Oh, to hell with the police and the militia!" broke in McGrath +impatiently. "What's the use"—</p> + +<p>"There is the Lieutenant-Governor now," interrupted the other. "Perhaps +he has some news for us. Mr. Barclay, will you kindly step in here for a +moment?"</p> + +<p>McGrath was standing on the opposite side of the Governor's table as +Barclay entered the room. He acknowledged the latter's curt nod<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> with an +ironical bow, slipped his hands into the pockets of his checked +trousers, and stood waiting, with his square head thrust forward, for +what was to follow.</p> + +<p>"Mr. McGrath has called," continued the Governor, "to explain the +attitude of the Union in the impending strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +I've been telling him of our conversation of yesterday afternoon, and +that, as you were to see Mr. Rathbawne last night, you would probably +have something to tell us in regard to his position. Were you able to +persuade him to a more reasonable view of the situation?"</p> + +<p>"I have nothing to add, sir, to what I said yesterday," replied Barclay. +"I told you then that I had no intention of endeavoring to influence Mr. +Rathbawne's judgment."</p> + +<p>"He spoke to you about it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"And asked your advice?"</p> + +<p>"He did."</p> + +<p>"And you replied?"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor flushed.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I beg to suggest, sir," he answered, "that this is hardly the time for +me to commit myself as to that. I conceive it to be a matter of official +privacy. Mr. McGrath"—</p> + +<p>"You have my authority to speak, Mr. Barclay," said the Governor. +"Indeed, I desire it. Since one side knows your views, there is no +reason why the other should not be informed as well. Mr. McGrath is the +president of the Union. It is best that he should know the attitude of +the state authorities in this controversy."</p> + +<p>"I am not in a position to question your wishes, sir. You should know +best."</p> + +<p>"One cannot pretend to be infallible, Mr. Barclay," answered the +Governor, rubbing his hands. "One can only do what seems to be right and +proper under the circumstances. By our conversation of yesterday, I in a +measure put the negotiations with Mr. Rathbawne into your hands."</p> + +<p>"It is a task I did not seek, sir. Pardon me if I say that it is also +one which I should<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> hardly have accepted, had I been aware that in +speaking as you did you were actually asking me to assume it. Mr. +Rathbawne is my friend, and, moreover, my personal convictions"—</p> + +<p>The Governor held up his hand.</p> + +<p>"There can be no question of friendship or of personal conviction, Mr. +Barclay, in the case of a duty imposed upon a state official. I realize +that what you—or I, for that matter—must do in the performance of our +obligations, is oftentimes disagreeable, oftentimes at variance with our +wishes. But that is unavoidable."</p> + +<p>Barclay moved uneasily. The intrusion of this pedantry, so conspicuously +insincere, with its implied rebuke, chafed him unspeakably, in view of +the presence of McGrath. The Governor had adopted the tone, half +authoritative, half reproachful, of a teacher reproving a refractory +child.</p> + +<p>"My time, as you must know, is inadequate to the demands made upon it. I +am forced,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> on occasions, to turn more or less important matters over to +others. To whom more naturally than to you, Mr. Barclay?"</p> + +<p>"May I suggest, sir, that there can be no profit in prolonging this +discussion? I appreciate the position perfectly, and I am quite prepared +to state what I know of Mr. Rathbawne's attitude toward the demands of +the Union."</p> + +<p>"Ah," said the Governor, "that is as it should be, and as satisfactory +as possible. Let me remind you, Mr. Barclay, that it was not I, but +yourself, who introduced this digression."</p> + +<p>He turned to the president of the Union.</p> + +<p>"You will understand from what I have said, Mr. McGrath," he added, +"both to the Lieutenant-Governor and to you, that in the matter of the +proposed strike, he is, to all intents and purposes, acting in my stead. +He was in a position to approach Mr. Rathbawne, and I was not. Now, Mr. +Barclay, if you please"—</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor straightened him<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span>self instinctively, as, for the +first time, he addressed himself to the agitator.</p> + +<p>"Mr. McGrath," he said, "my confidence in Mr. Rathbawne's fairness and +integrity would have led me to approve any course which he might have +seen fit to take. As you have already heard me say, I had absolutely no +intention of endeavoring to influence his judgment. Greatly to my +surprise, Mr. Rathbawne himself consulted me in the matter, without any +suggestion on my part, and asked for my advice."</p> + +<p>"That's fortunate," put in McGrath, "very fortunate. You've been able to +sidetrack a lot of trouble."</p> + +<p>Barclay's eyes hardened at the hypocrisy of the sneer.</p> + +<p>"I have pleasure in informing you," he continued, "that, in reply, I +advised him to fight the Union in the present dispute to the utmost of +his means and ability. I should have counseled him further to hold out +until he had spent his last cent and shed his last drop of blood, except +that, knowing him as I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> do, I conceived such a recommendation to be +wholly superfluous. Mr. Rathbawne has his character and his record +behind him. There is about as much chance of his yielding you an inch of +ground as if he were standing with his back against the Capitol!"</p> + +<p>McGrath shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p>"It's a damned funny way you have of not influencing people's judgment," +he said.</p> + +<p>"I mis-stated my attitude in saying that," retorted the +Lieutenant-Governor coolly. "I should have said, what, after all, is +self-evident, that I had no intention of trying to influence Mr. +Rathbawne in favor of the Union, at least so long as it is acting under +your dictation. Its present character is well known—almost as well +known as yours, in fact—and I believe its position in this matter to be +entirely untenable, unjustifiable, and iniquitous. I may add that if it +is, indeed, Governor Abbott's resolve that I am to deal, in his stead, +with the question of your proposed strike, you may confidently rely upon +having to put the entire state force of Alleghenia out of busi<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span>ness +before you can even so much as begin to bully Peter Rathbawne into +submission!"</p> + +<p>"If that's your opinion of the Union," said McGrath sullenly, "it might +be interesting to hear your opinion of me."</p> + +<p>"You are perfectly welcome to it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor +easily. "I consider you an unmitigated blackguard!"</p> + +<p>Governor Abbott tipped back his chair and looked at McGrath.</p> + +<p>"That's pretty plain talk," he said. "You see how it is, Mr. McGrath. +You'll have to go ahead on your own responsibility, and you mustn't be +surprised if the State steps in at the first evidence of disorder."</p> + +<p>McGrath rose, flecked some specks of dust from his waistcoat, and walked +toward the door without a word. On the threshold he turned, looked from +the Governor to the Lieutenant-Governor, and back again, and laughed. +Then he went out, closing the door softly behind him.</p> + +<p>At the Rathbawne Mills it was usual for a huge whistle to give one long +blast at noon as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> a signal for the lunch hour. On that day, however, +following McGrath's instructions, the single blast was replaced by five +short ones in rapid succession, and three minutes later the employees +were pouring through half a dozen gates into the streets surrounding the +mills, in laughing, chattering, excited streams.</p> + +<p>A majority of the men went directly to a hall in the neighborhood where +McGrath had called a mass-meeting for half-past twelve. A minority of +them crowded into the saloons of the vicinity, where they pounded on the +bars, and filled the close, smoke-grayed air with heated discussion. +Several of the discharged hands were in evidence, each surrounded by an +attentive group, and expounding more or less inflammatory views. The +women gathered in gossiping throngs on the sidewalks, laughing, and +pulling each other about by the arms. The boys played ball and leap-frog +in the streets, shouting, and whistling through their fingers. In brief, +the great strike was on, but, for the time being, it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> was masquerading +in the guise of a public holiday.</p> + +<p>At one o'clock the whistle blew again, and a thousand voices whooped a +derisive accompaniment, but no one of the throng in the streets made a +move toward the mills. Half an hour later, watchmen swung to and bolted +the gates, and, issuing presently from a small side entrance, in +company, were received with cheers, handshakes, and slaps upon the back. +Then the crowd gradually thinned,—many going to the already well-filled +hall where McGrath was delivering an address, and others to their +homes,—and a silence descended upon the neighborhood, broken only by +the voices of the men about the saloon doorways.</p> + +<p>At two, Peter Rathbawne, attended by his private secretary, came out of +the side entrance and walked slowly away in the direction of his home. +He held his head high, and his eyes straight to the front, and paid no +attention to the respectful greetings of those of the strikers who +saluted him, touching their hats. There were many among them whose +hearts<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> sank at this attitude in a man who had made it his boast that he +knew every hand in his mills by sight, and who, in the past, had had a +nod or a friendly word for each and all of them. For the first time a +premonition settled upon them of what this strike, which had been +welcomed principally for novelty's sake, might mean. It was the first +the Rathbawne Mills had ever known. Some of those who saw the face of +Peter Rathbawne that afternoon were already hoping that it might be the +last.</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor returned to his apartment for lunch. Cavendish +was still sleeping as he had left him, with a stalwart negro porter, +summoned from the Capitol by telephone early that morning, watching in a +chair. Under Barclay's orders, a carpenter had already removed the +splintered door of the wine-closet, and an upholsterer had replaced it +by a slender brass rod from which swung a velvet curtain. With his own +hands the Lieutenant-Governor had taken away the fallen bottle, mopped +up the pool of absinthe, and put the room to rights. Now he dis<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span>missed +the negro, took from his pocket a little box of strychnine tablets, +obtained from his physician on his way from the Capitol, and, after a +brief survey of his surroundings to see that all was in order, went over +to the divan and shook the sleeping man by the shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Come, lazy-bones!" he said, with a laugh. "You've slept over twelve +hours. That will do—even for a nervous wreck."</p> + +<p>Cavendish opened his swollen eyes slowly, looked at him, and then closed +them again with a murmured "Oh, God!" which was like a groan.</p> + +<p>To this the Lieutenant-Governor paid no heed. Passing into the bathroom, +he turned on the cold water in the tub, poured a half glass of vichy +from a syphon, and then returned, carrying the tumbler in his hand. +Cavendish had raised himself on one elbow, and was looking stupidly +about the room.</p> + +<p>"Here you are," said Barclay cheerfully. "Stow this pill, and here's +vichy to wash it down. Your bath's running. By the time<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> you've had it, +there'll be some clothes ready for you."</p> + +<p>Cavendish gulped down the tablet, and sat upright.</p> + +<p>"Last night"—he faltered.</p> + +<p>For the first time in his life, the Lieutenant-Governor called him by +his first name.</p> + +<p>"Last night, Spencer," he said, looking him fairly in the eye, "belongs +to the past, and is taboo. I won't hear a word about it. This is to-day. +Get up, and we'll set about putting wrong right. You're a man again. +Don't forget that. And I'm your friend. Don't forget that, either."</p> + +<p>His hand rested for an instant on the other's shoulder with a firm +pressure, and then he passed into his bedroom and shut the door.</p> + +<p>They had lunch together in the dining-room of the "Rockingham," and then +went up again to Barclay's rooms. At the door, Cavendish came to a halt.</p> + +<p>"I can't stand this," he said.</p> + +<p>"You'll have to," replied the Lieutenant-Governor, "so shut up!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You've made a change," said Cavendish obstinately, pointing to the +curtained cupboard.</p> + +<p>Barclay's eyes did not follow the gesture.</p> + +<p>"So have you!" he answered. "Now, look here. There are twenty dollars in +the waistcoat of that suit, and a letter to Payson of the 'Kenton City +Sentinel.' Go down and see him this afternoon, and I think he'll give +you a job at reporting, which will fix you up for the present. In +another pocket you'll find a box, with three tablets like the one you +had before lunch. Take one of them every two hours. In still another +pocket there's a key to these rooms. I'm going to be busy till about ten +o'clock, so you'll have to shift for yourself. Make yourself at home, +and if you're awake I'll see you when I come in."</p> + +<p>Taking him suddenly by the shoulders, he twisted him about, facing the +chimney piece, on which stood a photograph of Natalie Rathbawne, smiling +out of a silver frame.</p> + +<p>"I'll leave you to talk it out with her," he added simply.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the hall, as he passed out, he caught a reflection of Cavendish in a +mirror. His hands were resting on the mantel-edge, and he was leaning +forward with his haggard face close to the photograph. Barclay looked at +his watch.</p> + +<p>"Two o'clock," he said to himself, "and all's well!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<h3>THE MIRAGE OF POWER</h3> + + +<p>Barclay was conscious of a feeling of exhilaration such as he had not +known for many weeks, as he swung into Bradbury Avenue late that +afternoon on his way to the Rathbawne residence. The duties of the day +had been inordinately petty and vexatious, but he had dispatched them +one and all with something approaching enthusiasm,—a touch of the old +Quixotic energy with which he had taken office. The morning conversation +in Governor Abbott's room had braced and toned him. He forgot its +inauspicious opening, and even his distress at the attempt to force him +into the position of mediator between Peter Rathbawne and the Union, in +the solid satisfaction of having been able to speak his mind to McGrath, +and call that worthy a blackguard to his face. He was a man who +de<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>spised a quarrel, but, for its own sake, loved a square, hard fight.</p> + +<p>Back, however, of this somewhat inadequate excuse for cheerfulness lay +the Governor's assurance that in the matter of the strike his lieutenant +was to have free rein. It was the first time since the beginning of +their official association that Elijah Abbott had placed an actual +responsibility in Barclay's hands. A corner-stone laying, a banquet here +and there, the opening of a trolley line, or a library, or a +sewer,—these were the major calls upon the Lieutenant-Governor's time. +The main current of routine was a hopeless monotony of official +correspondence, investigations, statistics, reading and reporting on the +interminable and flatulent maunderings of the Legislature,—duties +heart-breaking in their desperate tedium and maddening inutility.</p> + +<p>But at last here was responsibility, actual and deeply significant, +calling for the exercise of tact, courage, and immutable firmness. The +particular task was not one which he would have coveted, and yet he +welcomed it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> Anything,—anything to assuage in him that sense of +ineptitude, of being ignored, a titled nonentity!</p> + +<p>With this vast lightening of spirit came, not only gratitude, but a +sense of lenity toward Governor Abbott. He encouraged himself to believe +that the note between them had been one of misunderstanding merely. It +might not be too late, after all! Gradually, he began to form a mental +picture of a growing sympathy and affiliation between them, large with +possibilities of improvement for Alleghenia. As he turned into the +Rathbawnes' gateway, he could have laughed aloud for very lightness of +heart. His optimism was not even impaired by running, in the hall, full +against Mrs. Rathbawne.</p> + +<p>"<i>Good</i> gracious! Lieutenant-Governor, is that you?"</p> + +<p>Repeated and earnest endeavor on Barclay's part had never dissuaded her +from this form of address.</p> + +<p>"What <i>is</i> the use of <i>having</i> such a title, if one can't <i>call</i> you by +it?" she would say,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> when he remonstrated. "Do <i>you</i> suppose that, if +Natalie were engaged to a <i>prince</i>, I should be going around, calling +him Tom, Dick, or Harry, instead of 'Your Royal <i>Highness</i>'? You ought +to be <i>proud</i> of your title. <i>I</i> am!"</p> + +<p>"But, Mrs. Rathbawne"—</p> + +<p>"Now, <i>please</i> not, Lieutenant-Governor, <i>please</i> not! I like it best +that way."</p> + +<p>The north wind was attentive and amenable to the voice of persuasion, in +comparison with Josephine Rathbawne.</p> + +<p>"Of <i>course</i> you know the <i>strike</i> is on!" she continued now, without +waiting for an assurance from Barclay that he was indeed none other than +himself. "Isn't it <i>awful</i>? I expect to hear the roar of the mob at +<i>any</i> moment! Come into the drawing-room. Natalie <i>was</i> there, only +<i>half</i> an hour ago."</p> + +<p>And she swept through the doorway, Barclay following.</p> + +<p>"Natalie," she began, "here's the Lieu—why, <i>Dorothy</i>! I took you for +Natalie. And—er—oh! Why, Mr.—er—how de do?<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> I didn't see you at +first. Oh, <i>do</i> turn on the switch, my dear. The place is as black as +pitch."</p> + +<p>The electric light, flooding the room, revealed young Nisbet, one vast, +consuming blush, and Dorothy, with a dangerous light in her eyes, and +her lips tightly compressed. It was plain that Mrs. Rathbawne had fallen +foul of Dan Cupid's machinery once more!</p> + +<p>"Why, Mr. <i>Nisbet</i>! I thought you were in New York."</p> + +<p>"I had a telegram this morning, calling the date off," said young Nisbet +in pitiable confusion; "that is, I didn't have to go, you know. So I +just fell in here to explain. I thought some of you might spot me on the +street, and after I'd said"—</p> + +<p>He began to flounder hopelessly, and cast a glance of mute appeal at +Dorothy. That facile young lady marched directly into the breach.</p> + +<p>"If you and John are looking for Natalie," she said, "you'll find her in +the library with Dad. How do you do, John?"</p> + +<p>"Pretty well, I thank you, Flibbertigibbet.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> It is really your husband +whom I came to see, Mrs. Rathbawne. I've a little business with him, so, +for the moment, I'll have to give Natalie the cold shoulder."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, lifting her fat hands. "Of <i>course</i>, +Lieutenant-Governor! I understand <i>perfectly</i>. Business before pleasure, +<i>always</i>. Go right in, won't you, and send Natalie here to me. <i>I'll</i> +stay here. Aren't we going to have tea, Dorothy? Oh, <i>do</i> try to sit up +straight, my dear!"</p> + +<p>Natalie and her father were bending low over a great portfolio, their +heads close together in the yellow glow of the table-lamp, which was the +only light in the room. Rathbawne looked up with a grim smile, as the +Lieutenant-Governor entered.</p> + +<p>"Pottering over my autographs, again, you see," he remarked. "I've been +neglecting them shamefully, of late—eh, Natalie? Didn't have the time. +It looks just now as if I wouldn't have to complain again of lack of +leisure for quite a while!"</p> + +<p>"It was that I dropped in to see you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> about," said Barclay, striving, +with only partial success, to keep the exultation out of his voice. "You +may not be in for so much leisure as you imagine, Mr. Rathbawne. You may +not get much of a holiday, after all."</p> + +<p>Without for an instant losing the Lieutenant-Governor's eye, Rathbawne +reached out and touched his daughter on the arm.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Dad!" she said reproachfully.</p> + +<p>"There's no need for her to go, sir," added Barclay, "unless you wish +it. I bring only good news."</p> + +<p>Acquiescing, Rathbawne drew Natalie close to him, passing one arm across +her shoulders, so that his gnarled hand rested firmly on the delicate +fabric of her sleeve. Between these two there had always lain a +sympathy, an affection, a mutuality of comprehension, more like the +relation of husband and wife than that of child and parent.</p> + +<p>"Nothing but good news?" answered Rathbawne. "Go on. What is it?"</p> + +<p>"News not so much of actual happenings as of potentialities," said the +Lieutenant-Gov<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span>ernor. "Last night I had to say to you that in the cause +of right I was as powerless to aid you as a baby. To-night, I have come +to tell you that I am in a position to see justice done, and that I +will."</p> + +<p>In detail, his voice ringing with enthusiasm and confidence, he +described the interview of that morning, his statement of Rathbawne's +position, his passage at arms with McGrath, finally, the Governor's +announcement that the strike was to be supervised by his lieutenant in +his stead.</p> + +<p>"I had almost lost hope," he concluded. "I thought my opportunity would +never come, and here it is, after all—the chance to act! And, somehow, +I feel that it is only the beginning—that, as he gets to understand me +better"—</p> + +<p>Rathbawne suddenly left his daughter's side, and in three steps was +directly before the Lieutenant-Governor. As he interrupted him, his +fingers closed upon the lapels of the other's coat, and he punctuated +his words with little tugs at these, his knuckles coming<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> together with +tiny muffled thuds. He spoke with a gravity that was vibrant with +suppressed anger and slow with sincere regret.</p> + +<p>"My boy," he said, "it's not a gracious thing to do to spoil an +enthusiasm like yours, but don't deceive yourself. Elijah Abbott as a +trickster is alone in his class. You were never more powerless to act +for the right than you are at this moment."</p> + +<p>"But I have his assurance"—</p> + +<p>"Oh, <i>his</i> assurance! It isn't worth the ash off your cigar. What, give +you a chance to interfere with the will of the Union which made him, and +owns him, body and soul? Never in God's world! Listen to me. I spent an +hour in his office this very afternoon, discussing the strike—<i>and he +never so much as mentioned your name</i>!"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor winced as if the words had been the touch of a +lancet. Then he closed his eyes.</p> + +<p>"And I was in the next room," he said, almost as if to +himself,—"planning—my—control—of the situation! Good God!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I went directly to him," continued Rathbawne, "because I knew that it +would be purely and simply a waste of time to parley with the lesser +officials who are either helpless or frankly his tools. I knew, too, +that no satisfactory result would come of appealing to him, but I wanted +to give him the chance. All I asked of him was an assurance that the +mills would have proper police protection, and that, if necessary, the +militia would be called out in support of order. The outcome was exactly +what I expected. Governor Abbott rubbed his hands, and smiled, and said: +'All in good time, Mr. Rathbawne, all in good time. When the conditions +seem to warrant it, we can discuss these measures.' That means that they +are free to blow the mills to kingdom come, before a finger will be +raised by the authorities to prevent them. And what's more, they'll do +it! Do you think I don't know McGrath?"</p> + +<p>As he had intended it should, this speech had given the other a chance +to recover himself. The Lieutenant-Governor's habitual<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> poise was +already restored, and his voice, as he answered, was quite steady, but +eloquent of his desperate discouragement and weariness.</p> + +<p>"I hope it's not as bad as all that, Mr. Rathbawne. It's not necessary +to tell you, that for me there can never again be such a thing as +trusting the word of Governor Abbott; but, at the same time, I can +hardly bring myself to believe that he would openly countenance the +practical existence of anarchy in the capital city of Alleghenia."</p> + +<p>"Well, I can, then!" declared Rathbawne. "I can believe anything of him! +Mark my words, John, he's as sleek a scoundrel as you'll find outside of +the State's Prison. He cares less for Alleghenia and her capital city +than you do for one of the hairs on his rascally head. I tell you, the +Union has bought him, body and soul, and unless a miracle comes down +from heaven, I'm a beaten man!"</p> + +<p>Barclay bit his lips without replying. In his heart of hearts, he knew +that Peter Rathbawne's words were true.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span></p> + +<p>"He'll be impeached, sooner or later," continued the old man, "if +there's a speck of decency left in the Legislature—which I doubt. But +long before that, John, long before that, I'll be down and out. I would +to God you were Governor of Alleghenia, my boy. You're the only ray of +hope I can see for her."</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor fell back a step, and covered his face with his +hands. For a full minute there was absolute silence. Rathbawne had +returned to the table, and, with his fore-arms across the back of a +chair, and one foot on the lower cross-bar, was staring vacantly at his +autographs, his hands moulding and remoulding each other into an +infinity of forms. Natalie was at the window, her face in the crevice +between the curtains. The same impulse had prompted both father and +daughter. There are some things which it is better not to watch.</p> + +<p>They turned at the sound of his voice, to find him with his head flung +back, his hands clenched at his sides, his right foot planted<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> firmly in +advance of his left, his whole bearing one of passionate earnestness. +And, though he was seemingly addressing Rathbawne, there was that in his +voice and in his words which was meant for every ear in the state!</p> + +<p>"Governor of Alleghenia!" he said, "I would to God I were! Sometimes I +almost—yes, sometimes I wholly despair. I love this state, Mr. +Rathbawne, as I love nothing else on earth—not even my girl there, not +even Natalie. You two are the only ones in the world who can understand +what it means when I say that. It has always been so, ever since I was +big enough to know what Alleghenia meant, and more than ever since I +have come to understand her shame, and her vital peril, and her dire +need. I've never tried to explain the feeling; I've never found any one +who seemed to share it with me. I hear other men talk of national +patriotism, and the flag, and all that, and I understand it, and honor +them for it. But—while it may be only a fancy of mine—for me Kenton +City comes even before Washington, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> even before these United States +of America the sovereign state of Alleghenia! I would have her courts +incorruptibility itself, her government the perfect commingling of +equity and mercy; her press the vehicle of verity, intelligence, and +watchfulness; her public servants the faithful exponents of loyalty and +diligence; her people, one and all, whatever is best in our +interpretation of the word American—and then, something +more!—Alleghenians!—citizens, not only of the Republic, but of the +state which I would have shine brightest in the field of stars, and be +quoted, from Maine to California, and from Florida to Washington, as the +synonym for law and order, truth, integrity, and justice. You know how +far the dream is from the reality. We are held up to ridicule and +contempt as law-breakers, time-servers, and bribe-takers—and we deserve +it! I can't see help on any hand. I don't believe our people, as a +class, are actually vicious and corrupt—only callous and indifferent, +accustomed so long to the spectacle of political chicanery and depravity +that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> they have lost their ability to appreciate its significance. But, +so far as results are concerned, it all amounts to the same thing. Once, +I hoped I should be able to do something. But now—I'm a nonentity, Mr. +Rathbawne, as you know, and not only that, but a man who has taken a +false step, from which he can never recover. I'm dead, politically +speaking—as dead as Benjamin Butler!"</p> + +<p>He paused, drawing a deep breath.</p> + +<p>"We were speaking of your interview," he added, more evenly. "What was +the result?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing, beyond what I've told you," answered Rathbawne, shaking his +head. "All I can do is to keep my mouth shut, await developments, and +trust in a Providence which it takes a good bit of obstinacy to believe +hasn't deserted the state of Alleghenia for good and all. It isn't for +my own sake alone, John, that I pray the Union will give in before my +people begin to think of violence. You remember '94 in Chicago? Well, +we<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> don't want anything like that in Kenton City. It would be the last +straw! Alleghenia has a big enough burden of disgrace to carry, as it +is."</p> + +<p>A servant entered, even as he was speaking, to summon him to the +telephone, and with an exclamation of impatience he left the room. +Immediately, Natalie stepped from her post at the window, and came +toward Barclay with outstretched hands.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Johnny boy," she said, "I'm <i>so</i> sorry. How you've been hurt, dear, +and disappointed, and cruelly wronged!"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor's hands clenched again at the sound of sorrow in +her voice, and he strove in vain to control the tremor of his lip. +Tenderly he put his arms about her.</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry, too, little girl—sorry you were here to see me make a fool +of myself and then squeal when I got hurt as I deserved. I shouldn't +have done that. But I was so proud—so grateful—I thought I was going +to be able"—</p> + +<p>"<i>Johnny—Johnny!</i>"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span></p> + +<p>They held to each other rigidly for an instant, her face against his +sleeve, in an agony which no tears came to soothe.</p> + +<p>"There!" said Barclay presently. "I'm better already. It does one good +to blow off steam, now and again."</p> + +<p>His tone lightened perceptibly.</p> + +<p>"And look here," he added, "what's most important, after all, is that I +have news for you, and ought to be delivering it."</p> + +<p>As yet, they did not dare to meet each other's eyes, but Natalie took +the cue.</p> + +<p>"You can spare yourself the trouble, my lord," she retorted, sweeping +him a curtsy. "I can guess what it is, without your aid. You've found +him!"</p> + +<p>"How did you know?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't. But you will remember that I asked you to find him. The +inference is as plain as a pikestaff."</p> + +<p>"Arrogance! But you're right. I have. He has been at my rooms since last +night. He was frightfully shaky, and utterly despondent, but he's taking +something to settle his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> nerves, and I've no doubt a week or so of good +food and straight living will bring him around into something like his +old form."</p> + +<p>"Boy dear! And you're taking care of him?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, just directing the cure, that's all! I'll tell you more when I can +report definite progress. Do you suppose there is a single secluded +corner in all this mansion which has not already been preëmpted by +Dorothy and Nisbet?"</p> + +<p>He slipped his arm about her again, and together they went out, across +the wide hall, toward the drawing-room. Rathbawne was standing at the +telephone under the stairway, but, as they approached him, he replaced +the receiver, and stepped forth under the light of the chandelier. They +both halted, shocked into speechlessness by the look on his face. The +past ten minutes seemed to have added a decade to his age. His cheeks +were white and drawn, and with his hands he groped before him, as if he +had been stricken blind. As he came close to them, he lifted his head,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> +and peered first at his daughter, and then at Barclay, seeming barely to +recognize them.</p> + +<p>"Dad! What <i>is</i> it?" said the girl, in a voice just above a whisper.</p> + +<p>Rathbawne raised his hand, and pushed back the hair from his forehead.</p> + +<p>"A message—from Payson—of the 'Sentinel,'" he mumbled. "It seems +there's a fire—a fire on Charles Street—near the mills—one of my +buildings—a shop—a shop. Some one in the crowd—threw a +torch in at the window—there is a great crowd—a throng of +strikers—watching—cheering the flames—hissing the firemen. They've +begun early—and this is only the beginning! My people—my people"——</p> + +<p>He stumbled forward, and would have fallen, but that his daughter caught +him. To his dying day Barclay remembered how, as he sprang to aid her, +her hands gleamed, white and slender, against the black of Peter +Rathbawne's coat.</p> + +<p>The hush that followed was broken presently by the sound of the old +man's choking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> sobs, and the low, soothing tones of Natalie, murmuring +against his ear. From the drawing-room came indeterminate scraps of Mrs. +Wynyard's gay chatter, as she regaled Mrs. Rathbawne with the gossip +gleaned in a round of calls. She herself was partly visible, drawing off +her gloves before the fire. From the music-room beyond issued the chords +of Dorothy's none-too-sure accompaniment, and young Nisbet's superb, +full tenor:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"'Ah, love, could you and I with fate conspire<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To grasp the sorry scheme of things entire'"—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>But, in the Lieutenant-Governor's imagination, another sound mingled +with and dominated these,—the voice of Michael McGrath, as he had heard +it that morning, through the open door of Governor Abbott's room:—</p> + +<p>"It won't be a strike like other strikes, not so long as I'm running it, +that is. It's going to mean business from the word go!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<h3>THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS</h3> + + +<p>One spotted peach will contaminate an entire basket, one drop of ink +cloud a full glass of clear water. It was so in the case of the strikers +at the Rathbawne Mills. Their unwonted idleness, the long succession of +empty hours, already, among the more improvident, the preliminary +pressure of privation's teeth,—all these made them easy prey for the +sophistries of men like McGrath and his associates. At first they simply +laughed at the arraignments of Peter Rathbawne as a plutocrat, a +slave-master, and an oppressor of the poor, knowing better in their +hearts. But the memory of past kindness is too apt to be the most +fleeting of human impressions. On the one side the gates of the +Rathbawne Mills remained obstinately closed, and, though Rathbawne +himself manifested no intention<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> of resorting to the intolerable +importation of "scab" labor, he persisted in his refusal to treat with +the Union so long as the discharge of the fifteen men remained a subject +proposed for debate. On the other hand, the denunciations of McGrath and +the other Union orators were constant, unavoidable, and sufficiently +plausible to produce an impression, and linger in the mind. And, +meanwhile, to and fro among the strikers, stalked, arm in arm, the +spectres of idleness and starvation, the one smirking openly, the other, +as yet, half-veiled. Altogether it was fertile ground.</p> + +<p>After the burning of Mr. Rathbawne's shop, on the first night of the +strike, ensued a week of comparative quiet. The outrage had been +flagrant, the source, if not the very author, of it was known, and the +police did—nothing. For three days the press of Kenton City blazed with +indignation, excepting only the "Record," which openly favored the +strikers, and then all the papers alike suddenly ceased to refer to the +incident at all. For,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> while McGrath was not in favor of wasting the +funds of the Union, he was as well aware as the next man that a dollar, +as well as a stitch, in time, saves nine.</p> + +<p>Herein lay the cardinal peril of Alleghenia. As John Barclay had said, +it was not that her people, as a class, were corrupt or criminal, but +merely that they viewed with easy tolerance evidences of laxity and +lawlessness which would have set the citizens of another state by the +ears, and filled the newspaper columns and the public forums with +indignation and protest. In this respect, the papers of Kenton City were +the most flagrant offenders. Even the most reputable, the "Sentinel," +could be silenced at practically any moment by those cognizant of the +method, and in a position to command the price, of manipulation. As a +whited sepulchre it was a conspicuous success, being irreproachably +scholarly, dignified, and didactic in tone, and wholly destitute of +principle.</p> + +<p>Michael McGrath, demagogue though he was, knew his public as the +physician knows<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> the pulse he feels. It was a feature of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills that no attempt was made to justify the cause of the +strikers in the eye of the disinterested public of Kenton City. McGrath +himself was fully alive to the slenderness of his pretext, and alive, as +well, to the strength of Peter Rathbawne's case, if it should come to a +discussion of the rights and wrongs involved, wherein his business +probity and his justice to, and consideration for, his employees, would +furnish arguments well-nigh unanswerable. He contented himself, +therefore, with standing upon a simple declaration of the will of the +Union, which was, in effect, his own; and, strong in his reliance, if +not upon the support, at least upon the non-interference of the state +authorities, devoted his attention to holding the press in check, by +methods long since found effectual, and confidently left the public to +think and act as it saw fit.</p> + +<p>There could have been no more contemptuous comment upon the moral and +intellectual status of the community than this insolent<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> assumption of +its indifference to the commonest principles of justice, but for a time +his confidence had the appearance of being amply justified. The strike +went its way, characterized by an infinity of petty outrages and a +constant and consistent vilification of Peter Rathbawne, while—with the +exception of that first and promptly quashed protest on the part of the +press—no voice was raised in opposition.</p> + +<p>Reduced to its lowest terms, the struggle was one between Rathbawne and +McGrath, and that, not as representatives the one of a great industrial, +the other of a great socialistic organization, but as individuals. The +source of the stream which had thus reached its rapids, and was plunging +on toward its annihilating cataract, lay far back in the early days of +Rathbawne's commercial career. McGrath was a man who practiced neither +the vice of forgetfulness nor the virtue of forgiveness. As plain as the +event of a yesterday lay upon his memory his contemptuous dismissal from +Rathbawne's employ, charged in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> particular with a petty peculation, and +in general with the indisputable fact of being a bad influence in the +mills. His case had been in many ways identical with that of the men +whose cause he was now, for reasons of his own, espousing.</p> + +<p>But Peter Rathbawne, then less shrewd in estimating men than now, had +reckoned without due credit to the vindictiveness and pertinacity of the +man before him. McGrath—brutally handsome in those days, idle, +insolent, and independent—later had developed qualities of which at the +time there was little evidence. He had smiled and shrugged his +shoulders—a habit which had grown upon him—as Rathbawne gave his +verdict, and had instinctively resisted the temptation to threaten +revenge. For that inspiration he had been devoutly grateful ever since. +It had enabled him to work in silence and unseen, like a mole, toward +the goal at which he aimed. He was a poker player, was Michael McGrath, +of the class which pulls victory out of defeat by the aid of its own +personality and a low pair.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> The calm indifference with which he had +received his dismissal from the employ of Peter Rathbawne seemed to him, +on reflection, to have been the unconscious forerunner of the elaborate +<i>nonchalance</i> with which he now viewed the unexpected filling of a +broken straight. It was certain that the other player had not guessed +the strength of his cards.</p> + +<p>He had never forgiven, never forgotten. It had taken a quarter-century +of unremitting effort, of indomitable perseverance, of calculated +ingenuity, to secure to him the position which he now felt to be +assured—that of being able to cope with the man who had been his +adversary, and so overwhelmingly his superior. The fight was on at +last,—a fight in which the odds were not only equal, but, if anything, +in favor of the former mill-hand, thus become one of the most powerful +men in Alleghenia; a fight to be fought to the bitter finish, with an +almost certain triumph as his reward.</p> + +<p>Added to these motives was another,—newer, it is true, but none the +less potent,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span>—his hatred for the Lieutenant-Governor. He had been able +to laugh within a half-minute after the words "unmitigated blackguard" +had smitten his ears; but they had rankled for all that. It was not so +much the insult, as the knowledge that it was justified. He was +remarkably candid with himself, was Michael McGrath.</p> + +<p>Hence the unparalleled venom of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +McGrath's dual sense of wounded vanity prescribed a course of surpassing +vindictiveness. His personal resentment, reinforced by consummate +appreciation of the adversaries with whom he had to deal, dictated a +safe road to revenge, which enabled him to fling wide the floodgates of +his long-stored animosity, secure in his knowledge of having the upper +hand. Disorder, calumny, outrage, even open anarchy—he could venture +upon them unafraid. A corrupt Governor, whom he had created, stood +behind him, smiling tolerantly. An indifferent community would let him +have his will. Only he must proceed by degrees, and be ready at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> any +moment to take one backward step for the sake of being able presently +thereafter to take two in advance.</p> + +<p>Here precisely lay the weak point in his plan of campaign. With the +fatuity incidental on occasions to even the shrewdest minds, he had not +counted upon independence in the host which he believed slave to him, in +thought and word and deed. He rated himself the dictator, the prompter +without whose suggestion no one of all the players in this gigantic +tragedy could speak his line. As a matter of fact, like all leaders of +his class, he could drive his followers forward at will, while totally +unable to hold them back. He was wholly master so long as he used the +spur. The peril lay in the fancied efficacy of the curb. In short, he +was discovering already that he had unwittingly created a monster beside +which Frankenstein's was the veriest doll.</p> + +<p>Thus, shortly, the strain began to tell upon the four thousand +unemployed sets of nerves around the Rathbawne Mills. Meetings became +more frequent and more turbulent; drinking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> and disorder were observably +on the increase; and at the end of another four weeks one of the gates +of the mills was beaten down, and several hundred men and boys paraded +around shop after shop, breaking windows and singing ribald songs. It +was not a very serious demonstration in itself. Its ominous feature lay +in the fact that the police made no attempt to check it. There was +something else about it, to the thinking of McGrath. It was not so much +that events were moving too fast, but that they were moving without +intelligent control.</p> + +<p>Two nights later, another building belonging to Peter Rathbawne, and +situated only a half-block from the mills, was burned in the same manner +as the first, watched by an enormous crowd of strikers, who applauded +each fresh burst of flame, as if the fire had been a circus or a play. +Still there was no move on the part of the police.</p> + +<p>Then it was that the business men of Kenton City sat up in their office +chairs and began to think. This was an eventuality entirely outside the +calculations of McGrath.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> But the pachydermatous inertia of the citizens +of Alleghenia had yet its vulnerable spot, where the weapon might enter. +Vaguely these men had known that the state was rotten, but the fact had +never been brought to their attention in a manner so poignantly +suggestive before. Unwittingly McGrath had aroused the suspicion that it +was not the purse of Peter Rathbawne alone which was in danger. If it +was possible for disorder to go to such extremes in the very streets of +Kenton City without fear of interference or rebuke, then no man's +property was safe. That thought was the Achilles' heel of the community. +So it was that a Citizens' Committee, composed of presidents of two +insurance companies, directors from five banks, representatives from the +Chamber of Commerce and the Board of Trade, and, finally, Colonel Amos +Broadcastle, was appointed to wait upon the Mayor. That gentleman, as +was entirely to be expected, referred them to the Governor, and to the +Governor they went.</p> + +<p>Barclay was present at the interview. For<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> his own reasons Governor +Abbott had kept his immediate subordinate well to the fore in all +matters pertaining to the strike since the latter's rebuke to +McGrath,—in all matters, that is to say, not involving the exercise of +actual authority. Of that, indeed, the Lieutenant-Governor had had no +hope after the conversation in Peter Rathbawne's library. He met the +representatives of the press, conducted the correspondence with +mill-owners and other negatively interested parties, and at the +Governor's request made what was palpably a farcical inspection of the +entire state militia—to judge of their readiness for strike service!—a +task which consumed a fortnight in constant travel, and visits to +armories all alike in insufficient equipment and utter slovenliness. The +Ninth Regiment alone remained, and this command was to parade for +inspection by the Governor himself that very evening. The coincidence +flashed through Barclay's mind as the Citizens' Committee entered, with +Broadcastle, in his capacity as spokesman, at its head.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span></p> + +<p>The dignity and air of command habitual to the Colonel of the Ninth were +doubly apparent as he advanced toward the Governor's table. Both Barclay +and Abbott rose to receive him, but the latter reseated himself, as soon +as Broadcastle had introduced his fellow-members of the Committee. He +listened to what followed with an air of thoughtfulness, tinged with a +faint and exasperating suggestion of amusement. At a neighboring table, +his official stenographer took down every word which fell.</p> + +<p>Colonel Broadcastle was not accustomed to mince matters, when the +occasion demanded brevity and conciseness. Now, he stepped to within a +few feet of the Governor's table, and stood rigidly confronting him, +with his hands clasped before him on the head of his stick, in the +position of parade-rest.</p> + +<p>"Governor Abbott," he said, in his curt, dry voice, "these gentlemen and +myself form a Committee appointed by a meeting of the business men of +Kenton City, to protest against the state of affairs now existing in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> +connection with the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. It is only generous +to presume that other matters have diverted your attention from an +appreciation of these conditions. The situation is without parallel in +the annals of Alleghenia. Disorder is rampant, and destruction of +property is freely indulged in by the strikers without any apparent fear +of molestation. Despite the fact that there is a large police-force, it +makes no effort to check these operations. The sole reply of Chief +Pendle to the protests of those interested in the promotion of law and +order has been that he will not suffer any outside interference in the +control of his department—the which, in view of his responsibility to +the public, can only be regarded as sheer and intolerable insolence! An +appeal to Mayor Goadby has elicited the response that the whole matter +lies in the Governor's hands."</p> + +<p>The Colonel paused. The Governor, leaning back in his chair, and +fingering a pencil, smiled slightly and nodded his head.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I suppose that is so," he said. "Continue, continue, Colonel +Broadcastle."</p> + +<p>"It is the sense of the law-abiding element of Kenton City," went on the +Colonel, flushing at the condescension of his tone, "that the limit of +endurance has been reached. If, willfully or otherwise, the police do +not act, my regiment is prepared to act as substitute. I have already +placed it at the service of the Adjutant-General. His reply, like the +Mayor's, was to refer me to you for orders. I am here to receive them, +sir."</p> + +<p>"Your offer is appreciated," said the Governor suavely. "We of Kenton +City have reason to be proud of the Ninth, Colonel Broadcastle. I +congratulate myself upon my privilege of reviewing it, to-night. And we +have reason to be proud, as well, of the intelligence which has made +such an organization possible. Your disinterested devotion"—</p> + +<p>Broadcastle flung up his chin.</p> + +<p>"I am not here to receive compliments, sir!" he said abruptly.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Nor I to bestow them," answered the Governor, unruffled. "As +commander-in-chief of the state forces, I believe it is not outside my +province to render deserved commendation to a subordinate."</p> + +<p>"Oh, do not let us juggle with words, Governor Abbott! It is precisely +as commander-in-chief of the state forces that the time has come for you +to act; it is precisely as your subordinate that I am here to receive +your orders. Assume the responsibility which confronts you, issue the +commands proper to the emergency, and you will have no more tireless +executor of them than I. My regiment can be on duty at the Rathbawne +Mills inside of six hours"—</p> + +<p>"But, my good Colonel Broadcastle," broke in the Governor, "the state +has no need of your regiment for the moment! Calling upon the militia is +no light matter, sir. You talk about my ordering out the Ninth as you +would advise me to ring for a messenger-boy!"</p> + +<p>"The welfare of the municipality, if not that of the commonwealth," +replied Colonel<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> Broadcastle firmly, "demands that an immediate stop be +put to this lawlessness. We are dealing with extremities, sir!"</p> + +<p>The Governor swung forward, and placed his elbows on the table.</p> + +<p>"You will permit me to be the best judge of what the welfare of the +commonwealth may be," he retorted. "Whatever lawlessness exists—and I +think you have grossly exaggerated its extent, Colonel Broadcastle—is +due to the selfish obstinacy of one man. In my opinion, Mr. Rathbawne is +entirely in the wrong. He had fair warning, which he did not choose to +heed. If his property suffers at the hands of the strikers, he has only +himself to blame."</p> + +<p>"It is not a question of Mr. Rathbawne, or of any other individual," +said Broadcastle, "but of the integrity of the state of Alleghenia!"</p> + +<p>"The integrity of the state of Alleghenia," answered the Governor dryly, +"has been intrusted, by the vote of her citizens, to me, as chief +executive."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span></p> + +<p>"An action," exclaimed the Colonel, "which I venture to predict they +will shortly have reason most bitterly to regret!"</p> + +<p>Governor Abbott rose abruptly to his feet.</p> + +<p>"This interview is at an end, Colonel Broadcastle," he said, bringing +his fist down upon the table with a thud. "I take exception to your +remarks, from first to last. I consider myself fully competent to deal +with the situation, and you may depend, sir, I shall do so at my own +time, and in my own way. If Mr. Peter Rathbawne supposes that he can +defy reason and justice at will, and that the state authorities are +prepared to support him, he is grossly and fatally mistaken. Gentlemen, +I have the honor to bid you good-day!"</p> + +<p>For a quarter-minute, the two men stood facing each other, without +speaking. It was observable that the eyes of neither flinched. Then—</p> + +<p>"It is my earnest hope, Elijah Abbott," said the Colonel slowly, "to see +you impeached by a righteously indignant community, and committed for a +term of years to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> State's Prison at Mowberly, for rank malfeasance +in office!"</p> + +<p>The Governor shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Your record and your position protect you, Colonel Broadcastle," he +said, with something of his usual suavity. "Will you have the goodness +to retire?"</p> + +<p>As the Citizens' Committee left the room the Lieutenant-Governor turned +on his heel, passed into his office, and closed the door.</p> + +<p>For a long time he sat motionless at his desk, with his temples in his +hands, staring at a frame upon the opposite wall, which contained the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia. These were a hand holding even balances, +upon a circular shield, supported by the nude figures of two young men, +representing Art and Labor. Above, upon a scroll, were the words, +"<i>Justitia. Lex. Integritas.</i>"</p> + +<p>It was not only bad heraldry, but indifferently appropriate symbolism.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2> + +<h3>THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW</h3> + + +<p>The huge armory of the Ninth, transformed, by the same system which had +metamorphosed the <i>personnel</i> of the regiment itself, from a gaunt, +barn-like structure, ill-fitted to its purpose in all but size, to the +most cheerful, as well as the most completely equipped, of Alleghenian +arsenals, was blazing with light and echoing to the sound of many +voices. A steady stream of people poured in at the heavy doors, now +standing wide, but significant, with their great timbers, elaborate +locks and bolts, and precautionary peep-holes, of the possibility of an +attitude less hospitable. Threading their way at a rapid pace through +the more sluggish main current of the crowd, the members of the +regiment, in an infinite variety of civilian attire,—from tweeds and +knickerbockers to top-hats and evening-dress,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>—sought their respective +company-rooms, vanished therein, and, presently, reappeared in uniform. +It was as if behind those ten doors which lined the upper corridor there +were as many moulds, identical in form, whereinto this perplexing +diversity of raw material was plunged on entering, to be drawn forth +again in a constant reduplication of militiamen.</p> + +<p>As the hour for the review drew near, the proportion of these to the +throng with which they mingled, perceptibly increasing, seemed, little +by little, to leaven the whole lump. The dress-uniform of the Ninth was +everywhere, the black shakos and epaulettes, white pompons, cross-belts +and gloves, and multiplicity of brass buttons, lending the immense +assemblage a singular spirit and vivacity.</p> + +<p>On the floor of the drill-room the people spread in all directions, +fan-like, from the main doorway, the multitudinous footfalls mounting +murmurously into the spaces of the lofty roof, where forty arc-lights +hung, dizzily suspended, pallid in the thin haze of dust<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> swung upwards +from the hurrying feet of the thousands below.</p> + +<p>"Precisely like an army of ants—and every one of them with an uncle or +two, and a round dozen of nephews and nieces!" said Mrs. Wynyard.</p> + +<p>She and the Rathbawne girls were looking down upon the drill-floor +from the balcony of the Colonel's room. Broadcastle and the +Lieutenant-Governor were deep in conversation inside, having seized the +delay in the arrival of Governor Abbott as an opportunity for a few +words in private.</p> + +<p>"How funny they are, scuttling along, all of them!" said Dorothy. "And +how immensely pleased the favored ones are, who have a soldier to show +them the way. I see a distinct difference in their walk from that of the +others, don't you, Natalie? They seem to be saying '<i>We</i> were +<i>invited</i>—and by this splendiferous creature at our side!' See how they +strut! And look at the soldierless ones, how timidly they go—just as if +they had found their tickets in the street, or had crept<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> in through the +basement windows. 'Please, kind Mr. Soldier-man, let us stay and see the +show. We'll be <i>awf'ly</i> good!'"</p> + +<p>"How preposterous you are, Dorothy!" answered Mrs. Wynyard. "Look! The +people are taking to the sides of the room already, and the companies +are forming. What astonishing method and precision there is to it all! +Do you suppose each man has a little circle marked on the floor, to show +just where he is to stand?"</p> + +<p>"I haven't the most remote doubt of it," said Natalie, with a +smile,—"and his name neatly lettered inside it with gilt paint!"</p> + +<p>The long, enclosed racks at the ends of the drill-room were open now, +and the electric light winked upon the barrels of the Springfields, as +busy, white-gloved hands plied the polishing cloths along them. The +enormous drill-floor, cleared as if by magic from the disorderly +weed-growth which had encumbered it, began to make manifest its proper +crop—long lines of gray and white, like sprouting sage, at first but a +dot here and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> there, to indicate the direction, then a scattering, then +distinct clumps, finally a thick, serried row. In the distance, a bugle +sounded, followed by a long ruffle of drums, and Colonel Broadcastle +stepped quickly to the window of the balcony.</p> + +<p>"There's the Governor," he said. "Will you come in? I'll send my orderly +to show you to your seats."</p> + +<p>At the same moment, the door from the corridor opened, and the orderly +entered, his hand at his shako.</p> + +<p>"Sir, the Governor has arrived."</p> + +<p>Then, as the trio on the balcony stepped in through the window, he +turned suddenly and superlatively scarlet. As has been said, young +Nisbet was accustomed to getting what he wanted. In this instance what +he had wanted happened to be that the Adjutant should choose him from +the guard detail as Colonel's orderly. To be thus chosen was to be +admittedly the most immaculate of thirty men, all more immaculate than a +thousand immaculate others. The thing was not easy of achievement, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> +Dorothy Rathbawne was to be present at the review, and so—there was no +second way about it—it simply had to be done. Young Nisbet's way of +doing it was an absolutely new uniform and gold-plated buttons and +accoutrements. Extravagance? Vanity? Perhaps! But at the present moment, +he was wearing one cross-belt where his thousand and odd comrades were +wearing two. There was no answer to such an argument as that.</p> + +<p>Colonel Broadcastle had reserved seats for the party on the temporary +reviewing stand, and, five minutes after they had taken their places, +the bugles sang again, a curt order—"'shun! 'shun!"—ran in varying +intonations from company to company, and the slack gray ranks before +them stiffened into absolute rigidity. Then from the broad hallway +beyond came a tremendous burst of sound, and, to the strains of the +famous old march of the Ninth, the regimental band swung into view, +followed by Governor Abbott and Colonel Broadcastle and the former's +staff.</p> + +<p>To the Lieutenant-Governor, but newly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> returned from his wearisome round +of the state armories, much of what followed was so stale as to be no +more than a constantly increasing strain upon nerves already overtaxed. +He deliberately allowed his attention to wander, until he felt rather +than actually perceived the steady tramp-tramp of the men, swinging, +fours right, into column, the occasional "hep! hep!" of an officious +file-closer, the endless succession of fours winking past him, like the +palings of a gray fence seen from the window of a train, the intervals +narrowed by short-step, widening again at the "Forward—<i>march</i>!" the +blare of the band, lessening as it approached the further end of the +building, then suddenly bursting into its former volume at the +right-about. He endured it all listlessly. It was tediously familiar, +stamped upon his brain by repetition after repetition.</p> + +<p>Moreover, he was completely fagged, and unutterably oppressed by his +burden of discouragement. The old wounds, in part healed by his recent +absence from the immediate<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> vicinity of his constant discomfiture, had +been re-opened and set bleeding afresh by Governor Abbott's treatment of +the Citizens' Committee. Whatever lingering hope had remained in his +mind of peace with honor for the troubled capital of Alleghenia, seemed +to have been effectually dispelled by that interview. The most enduring +charity, the most fatuous credulity, the blindest partisanship—even +these could not have preserved a last spark of confidence in Elijah +Abbott. Still less was Barclay's indeterminate hope of the ultimate +triumph of right able to stand against such crushing evidence of its +instability. It was no longer a question of suspicions, of precedents, +of deductions from the significance of a host of former misdoings. Out +of his own mouth was the Governor convicted. "At my own time, and in my +own way," he had said. It was a phrase, nothing more, and could be +boiled down until its whole purport was contained in one word—Never!</p> + +<p>"Fours <i>left—March</i>! Compan<i>ee—halt</i>!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span></p> + +<p>The entire regiment, as one man, swung from column of fours into +battalion front, halted, and then—cr-r-rick! boooo-m-m-m!—came to +order arms. The sides of the room were lined with a solid rampart of +white and gray and gold. Barclay was aware of the First Sergeants, +scurrying from their positions to report, of their voices, and those of +the Majors and the Adjutant, and, finally the Colonel:—</p> + +<p>"Take your post, sir!"</p> + +<p>But his thoughts were anywhere and everywhere else. What a farce it all +was, this life which he was leading, this mental and moral martyrdom to +an impossible hope, this eternal and heart-sickening ordeal of hope +deferred, this waiting, waiting, waiting, for something which never +would and never could happen! Rotten, rotten to the core, this state for +which he would have given his heart's blood, and not only rotten, but +not caring a whit for her rottenness—glorying rather, in her own +degradation. The chief executive had flung back into their very faces +the appeal to his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> conscience of the most influential men in Kenton +City; the police, even now seated about their station stoves, were +sniggling at the predicament of the public which paid them for its +protection against precisely the kind of thing which they openly +tolerated and encouraged; yes, and even the militia, the guarantee of +law and order, Broadcastle's own command, were decked out in tinsel and +pipeclay, strutting to music in a palpable bid for applause and +admiration. And yonder—the tide of anarchy was slowly but surely rising +about the Rathbawne Mills, presaging riot, bloodshed, God alone knew +what!—but one thing, inevitably,—the absolute downfall of dignity and +rout of decency in Alleghenia!</p> + +<p>Suddenly, his old intrepid spirit of resolution reasserted itself, but +doubtfully, like the flame of a lamp flaring once out of dimness before +it dies forever. Was it for this that he had devoted the best thought of +his youth and his earlier manhood to plans for the betterment of his +state? Should he now, at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> this, the hour of her supremest political and +moral peril, desert her as irredeemable, and join the ranks of those who +sneered at her, and pointed mocking fingers at her shame and nakedness?</p> + +<p>"Your loquacity faintly suggests that of a mummy," said Natalie, at his +side.</p> + +<p>"I was alone with my thoughts," answered the Lieutenant-Governor, +turning to her with an attempt at a smile, "and pretty black ones they +were, at that!"</p> + +<p>"Alleghenia again?"</p> + +<p>"Alleghenia again—and always. This business is becoming an obsession +with me. I haven't had a chance to tell you, and I can't very well +explain now. I'll have to leave it till I see you to-morrow. But +something happened to-day which drove another nail—and one of the +last!—into the coffin of my faith. There's not a gleam of hope +anywhere."</p> + +<p>"Don't you see hope in all this?" asked Natalie, with a little, +indicative gesture toward the scene before them. "Somehow,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> it is +impressing me tremendously to-night—more than ever before. I seem to +understand better what it means, what it stands for."</p> + +<p>"It's a stale enough story with me," said Barclay. "Remember, I've been +doing just about nothing but watch this kind of thing for the past two +weeks. After all, what does it amount to but a thousand possibilities +parading like peacocks?"</p> + +<p>"How unlike you, that speech! It amounts to a vast deal more than that, +Johnny boy,—oh, infinitely more! I don't speak of the other regiments +you have seen. This is different. Well, what <i>does</i> it amount to? Who +and what are these thousand peacocks of yours? Aren't they the very +flower of Kenton City, the youngest and best blood in our veins, +gathered by one good man's will into an organization of sterling +loyalty, with one great aim in view, and that the support and protection +and preservation of all that is best in Alleghenia? The very fact that +such a body of men exists among us is in the na<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span>ture of a guarantee, it +seems to me, that we shall come out all right in the end. Have you +noticed their faces?—many of them so absurdly boyish, all of them so +honest, and manly, and—and—<i>American</i>, John! They are the +personifications of your ideal of that afternoon in the +library—Americans, and something more—Alleghenians! And, to prove it, +they are freely giving a portion of their time and their strength, in +order that there may be at least one thing in Kenton City which is +without fear and without reproach. I wonder—I wonder, John, whether it +isn't the old story, after all: whether you haven't been wandering all +over the world, like the prince in the fairy-book, looking for the magic +talisman that is to save the state you love, while, all the time, it has +been lying at your very door? Oh, this means something—I'm too stupid +to interpret it as you could—but I know it's there, and that it would +help you and encourage you. Let me try. Look there! A single purpose +animates them all—the maintenance of the standard<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> which Colonel +Broadcastle set for them, and the record they have made for themselves."</p> + +<p>Colonel Broadcastle's voice was sweeping the armory, as he put the +regiment through the manual of arms.</p> + +<p>"One has only to hear one of them—Mr. Nisbet, for example—say 'the +Ninth' to find the hope of which you are in search. These men say it as +others say 'God' or 'my mother'—as you yourself, Johnny boy, say +'Alleghenia.'"</p> + +<p>"Charge—<i>bay'n'ts</i>!"</p> + +<p>With a single click, a thousand rifles fell into position, a thousand +left feet smote the floor in unison, and the light rippled and twinkled +along a solid line of flashing steel.</p> + +<p>"There! A single voice,—a single, mighty response! Don't you see the +wonderful suggestiveness of it? Don't you feel the presence of the +enormous reserve force which lies behind all this? Oh, believe me, John, +this is a weapon too mighty to lie unused, and too intelligent to be +misused, if the worst come to the worst. After all, as no one<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> knows +better than yourself, it's not your own advancement you're looking for, +it's that of the state. Well, there may be other agencies, perhaps +entirely independent of you or of your influence, but none the less +invaluable. For example, you are close upon despair—and yet, before +your fears come true, the forces of wrong will have to fight their way, +step by step, through this rampart of American manhood!"</p> + +<p>Barclay touched her hand lightly, as she ceased speaking. In the midst +of the thousands about them, they were alone as they had never been +before.</p> + +<p>"Thank you," he said simply. "Thank you, littlest and wisest in the +world!"</p> + +<p>The regiment was in motion again, skirting the room in column of fours, +preparatory to the march-past: but now the Lieutenant-Governor surveyed +it from a new, and a dual point-of-view,—as a thousand individuals, +that is, each a potential factor for immeasurable good in the coming +rehabilitation of the state; and, then, as a vast fighting-machine<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> +perfect in every detail, resistless and awe-inspiring in its very +integrity. He noted the faces as they passed—stern, intelligent faces, +young, for the most part, and curiously refined, intent upon correct +performance of the present duty, and touched, almost without exception, +with an enthusiasm born of the martial music and the rhythmic tramp of +advancing feet. He saw the quick, reciprocal glance of the pivot and +flank men, as the fours, in perfect alignment, swept round into +company-front; the long, easy compression and give of the compact lines, +acquiring correct adjustment; the rigid tenure of chests and shoulders; +the firm fling of slender gray legs, as regularly intervaled as the +teeth of a giant comb. Company by company, the regiment fell into the +cadence of full-step. Midway, the standards of the Republic and +Alleghenia rippled side by side. And so, with blare of brass and sharp +staccato of snare-drums, with sheen of rifles and accoutrements, with +flash of slender swords, raised in salute,—above all and always, with +that magnificent<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> unanimity, that mighty pulse of the thunderous +advance, the Ninth swept past its Governor and its Colonel in review.</p> + +<p>And then, in an instant, as it seemed, the vast square was formed again, +a sharp command rang out, the rifles snapped to a present-arms, the +standards dipped, and the strains of the "Star-Spangled Banner" mounted +triumphantly to the great girders of the lofty roof. The multitude of +spectators rose at the sound, and the Lieutenant-Governor rose with +them, his heart aglow with new inspiration, new hope, and new resolve. +The band was almost speaking the words of the anthem on the dust-grayed +air:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Oh! say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>To the accompaniment of a myriad clapping hands, the Lieutenant-Governor +resumed his seat, shaken by a novel, tremendous emotion. Yes! a thousand +times yes! The star-spangled banner, symbol of loftiest ideals and +purest purposes, mute memorial and reminder of devotion incalculable and +sacrifice without<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> bound, guarantee of liberty and brotherhood, mercy, +equality, and justice—yet waved! And, part and indissoluble portion of +its inspiring memories and illustrious destinies, the star of Alleghenia +yet blazed upon its azure field! He had been living in a world of +unrealities, in a valley of shadow, grayed by portents of failure and +despair. His eyes had been narrowed to see the pitfalls which lined his +path, to the stumbling-blocks, the briers, the indescribable sordidness +of his personal position and his immediate surroundings. Now, he looked +up and horizonward. The thunder-clouds of official depravity and +duplicity which darkened the way of his endeavor—were they able, after +all, to blot out the memory of the clear, high sky above?</p> + +<p>As this thought came to him, it was almost as if, in actuality, a +brooding heaven had been rent asunder, revealing the steel-blue of the +infinite ether permeated with the supreme radiance of noon; and at the +incursion of this illuminating element the host of his discouragements +dwindled and disappeared, like<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> noisome little prowlers of the night, +scuttling to cover at the abrupt break of a tropical day. For a moment, +he strove to realize whence the light had come, and in what consisted +this sovereign ally, hitherto uncalculated, of his optimism. As he +tracked his thought, it led him undeviatingly back to its direct +inspiration, the words of Natalie Rathbawne.</p> + +<p>"Before your fears come true"—she had said.</p> + +<p>Before his fears came true—well, what? The revelation leaped at him +full and fair now, and every nerve sang like a taut wire in answer to +its touch. Before his fears came true, this wretched little world of +petty chicanery and official corruption which surrounded and sickened +him would be wiped out of existence. Abbott—McGrath—their machinations +and their misdeeds—their lies and their ambitions—their power and +their pride,—they were newts that fouled a pool, gnats in the sunshine, +cinders on the snow. Towering above them, ready, at an instant's +notice,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> to crush them out of being, was the rock of ages, the righteous +spirit of Alleghenia, integral and indestructible, illumined by the +ancient, undimmed, and eternal sense of rectitude inherent in the +American people!</p> + +<p>Not by his agency, perhaps—perhaps not even in his day,—nevertheless +and infallibly, the right was bound to conquer in the end. The clear +eyes and the firm mouths of the men of the Ninth spoke it, their rifles, +their broad shoulders, and their precision confirmed and guaranteed it, +and back of these stood the great, taciturn figure of the People, a +smile upon its calm and silent lips. When those lips should speak, as +speak they would, their words would be the annihilation of Elijah Abbott +and of all his kind!</p> + +<p>Meanwhile—the bitterness—the disappointments—the humiliations—ah, in +a moment, how they had grown shrunken, and wizened, and old! For out of +the radiance of revelation, as Christ of old spoke to His disciples, so +now the spirit of Alleghenia spoke to her Lieutenant-Governor.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span></p> + +<p>"<i>What is that to thee? Follow thou Me!</i>"</p> + +<p>Like a woman, the spirit of her cried unto him, and, like a man, the +spirit of John Barclay answered.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2> + +<h3>A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER</h3> + + +<p>Much to Barclay's satisfaction, Cavendish had obtained his appointment +as a city reporter on the staff of the "Sentinel." Even the first week +of the new life thus entered upon had produced a vast change in his +manner and appearance. Though the Lieutenant-Governor had seen him but +once, when he came to repay the loan made him—in itself, of all signs +of restoration to a normal attitude, the most significant—he found that +his complexion had cleared and softened, and his eye perceptibly +brightened. He was clean-shaven once more, and his dress, while of +strict simplicity, was yet suggestive of the old days when he had been +called the most fastidious man in Kenton City. He held himself +straighter, too, with his shoulders thrown back and his head up; and +Barclay had noted, with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> quiet gratification, that there was not a +tremor about the hands which unfolded and smoothed the bills he had come +to return. One evidence alone remained of the desperate ordeal through +which he had passed. His voice, formerly firm and vibrant with a spirit +that was half gayety, half arrogance, was now indescribably modulated, +and touched with a melancholy which was not that of servility, still +less of shame. Rather, it was an unspeakably appealing regret, a +monotonous listlessness, a suggestion of hopeless surrender to something +tragic and inevitable. Barclay was puzzled by it. It seemed illogical, +and evaded him, like a melody with a dimly familiar <i>motif</i> which he was +unable to place or even fully recall. It haunted him singularly, when +Cavendish had left, and afterwards, in his leisure moments, came back to +him, striving, as he fancied, to make itself understood. Intimately +candid as their recent relation had been, here was something +unexplained, which he could not come at, and which was yet eloquent of +vitality, of the need of comprehension.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p> + +<p>Since that time, three weeks before, the two men had not met. For this +there were several reasons. Barclay knew from a brief note that +Cavendish had taken a small room in a boarding-house, not far from the +"Rockingham," and that the pressure of his work for the "Sentinel" set +him afoot so early, and sent him home at night so brain and body weary, +that he had neither the strength nor the inclination for other things. +Added to this, had been the Lieutenant-Governor's absorption in his own +duties, and, in particular, his absence from Kenton City, on his round +of inspection of the state militia. But, just before the dinner hour, on +the evening following that of the review, Cavendish called, as Barclay +was in the act of dressing.</p> + +<p>"I had a suspicion I'd catch you just about this time," he said, +dragging a chair to the door of the bedroom, where he could watch the +Lieutenant-Governor struggling with a refractory white tie. "I'm getting +on famously, and I wanted you to know it."</p> + +<p>"That's right!" said Barclay, scowling<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> into the mirror. "But then, I +knew you would. Your pessimism didn't produce much effect on me. I've +heard men talk like that before. And, of course, when a chap gets into +the condition you were in, back there, there's no such thing as making +him believe he can ever pull out. You talked like an ass, that first +night, Spencer."</p> + +<p>"And acted like a blackguard! I suppose you will allow me to refer to +that now?"</p> + +<p>"Now less than ever, my good sir. As I've told you already, all that +belongs to the past. You're yourself again. What's the use of dwelling +on a time gone by, when you were in reality somebody else—or, rather, +nobody at all? When are you going to call at the Rathbawnes'? The old +man is pretty ill, I'm afraid, but I think the rest would like to see +you again. They were speaking of you only the other day—that is, one of +them was!"</p> + +<p>"Not till this strike trouble is over, at all events; they have all they +can attend to at present, without being bothered by reformed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> drunkards. +And perhaps I sha'n't call at all. I haven't decided yet what would be +best."</p> + +<p>Then, before Barclay had time to speak, he added:—</p> + +<p>"By the way, I'm to take up the strike to-morrow, for the 'Sentinel.'"</p> + +<p>"Are you?" exclaimed the Lieutenant-Governor, in a tone of the liveliest +interest. "That's good news. It must be about the most important +assignment they could give you, just now. Well, I wonder if you are +destined to be the only conscientious reporter in Kenton City, or +whether you will simply be like all the rest. Are you going to have the +courage of your convictions—which I think I can surmise, though you +haven't as yet confided them to me—or are you going to wear the +slave-chains of your fellows, and distort, and misrepresent, and truckle +and kow-tow to the policy of the most venal press in America?"</p> + +<p>"<i>On fait ce qu'on peut</i>," said Cavendish, with a shrug. "Orders are +orders, John. If the orders of the editor don't go, the orders<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> on the +cashier don't come. That's about all there is to it. It would be rather +futile to attempt the Don Quixote act, if only for the reason that one +would never get into print. One can't do more than follow instructions. +The reporter's best policy is his paper's best honesty."</p> + +<p>"Honesty?" repeated the Lieutenant-Governor. "Where does the honesty +come in? Of course I understand your position. In a way, it is identical +with mine—subservience to a principle that you despise, acquiescence in +methods that you know to be utterly false and wrong! How sick I am of it +all! It's the old experience, all over again, which I used to have as a +child with the Tom Smith paper crackers. You are fascinated by the +tinsel, and the colored paper, and the gaudy label. You think that when +you've dissected one, and pulled it all to pieces, you'll find a bugle +and a gold crown inside—because that's what it says on the box. But, +the first thing you know, you'll find yourself blowing on a tin whistle +and wearing a fool's cap of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> green paper! Lord! how the press of Kenton +City needs a <i>man</i>—a man with the courage and the power to show up the +scoundrels who are responsible for all this—McGrath and his associates, +I mean. I'm sick and tired of reporters whose rascality is self-evident, +of editors who are bought and sold like chattels, of a state of affairs, +in general, so infamous as to surpass expression! You have my sympathy, +Spencer—the sympathy of a fellow-victim. To be a reporter on a +newspaper which dictates dishonesty; to be the lieutenant of a Governor +who enjoins duplicity—it's all just about one and the same thing!"</p> + +<p>"It's curious," commented Cavendish, "that it wasn't until about a week +after—after that night, that I knew you were Lieutenant-Governor. Then, +your name happened to be mentioned in the office, and somebody asked me +if I knew you."</p> + +<p>"Whereupon," said Barclay, conquering the tie at last, and turning from +the mirror, "you had the inexpressible privilege of saying that you knew +me intimately."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Whereupon," repeated Cavendish, in that so singular tone which had lain +heavy upon the other's memory, "I had the inexpressible privilege of +saying that I used to know you, but that we had quarreled, and were +now—strangers."</p> + +<p>"Why?" demanded the Lieutenant-Governor, wheeling abruptly upon him. +"What possessed you to say such a silly thing as that?"</p> + +<p>Cavendish leaned forward in his chair, with his elbows on his knees, and +his forehead against his interlaced fingers, staring at the floor.</p> + +<p>"I'm glad, in a way, to have you ask that question," he said slowly. "We +are wary of mock heroics, or even real heroics, men like you and me. And +yet there are things which must be explained, things not easy to +explain, because they come so close at times to melodrama. I've always +had a horror of emotional situations; and, from what I know of you, I'm +sure you have, as well. I'd avoid this explanation, if I could—indeed,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> +I've deliberately avoided it, thus far. Yet if I were a Romanist in the +presence of my priest, I think I should feel more at liberty to evade +confession than I do now. For both our sakes, I'll try to be as brief, +as simple, as lucid, as I can. And I'll trust you to understand, as well +as may be. Don't think there's any pose, any aim at effect, in what I'm +going to say. You've asked me a question, and I'm going to answer it, +that's all! I don't think, in my present frame of mind, I could bear to +have you entertain the suspicion that the answer was affected or lacking +in candor. <i>Allons!</i> Already I'm growing too verbose!"</p> + +<p>He looked up with a wan smile.</p> + +<p>"Let's get down to facts. You ask me why I told my questioner that we no +longer knew each other. Well, then, let's have at it! It was because, +John Barclay, there is likely—no, there is sure—to come a time when +you won't care to acknowledge me as your friend. Oh, wait!" he added, as +the Lieutenant-Governor held up his hand in protest.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> "Hear me out. You +say I talked like an ass, that first night. Perhaps. But the fact +remains that I've been a drunkard—and that I'm bound to be one again! +I've been fighting against temptation for several weeks. It hasn't been +very strong, for some reason, and so I've managed to ground it so far. +But you remember the chap with whom old Hercules wrestled? Every time he +touched earth his strength was multiplied. Well, that's the way with +drink. I can throw the temptation for a while, but every time I do so it +rises, stronger many-fold. Sooner or later, I'm forced to give in. I +know it, as I know I'm sitting here. I'm doing my best now, because, in +the future, when the wrong that for a time you've righted goes wrong +again, I want you to remember that I made the effort—for you—and for +her—for the Fairy Princess. The end is as plain as day! It was born in +me, this. I think I've never told you that my father died of it, but +that's the truth. And the next time I drop, it will be for good and all. +I shall never make<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> another effort to conquer the inevitable. If I can't +do it now, with the hope of redemption thus made plain, with a new +start, and a fresh chance, and—thanks to you, John—the past wiped off +the slate and a new sum set to solve, with the incentive of your +friendship and confidence, and the interest, so undeserved, of the Fairy +Princess, into the bargain,—if I can't do it now, I say, why surely I +can never do it. John, you can't know what I've been through. You, +who've never had the temptation, can't conceive of what it means. It's a +living actuality, this lust for drink. When your nerves go wrong, even +at the end of a day, or a week, or a year, during which you've kept +straight, when you're tired, discouraged, and, above all, <i>alone</i>!—then +it comes at you like a live thing,—speaks—grips your arm—drags you +wherever it wills! I've laughed at it, scoffed at it, in its absence, +tried to make myself believe it a fragment of an otherwise forgotten +dream, many and many and many a time. <i>But it always came back!</i> Oh, +John<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> Barclay, you others will never understand! A man has to have been +through it, in order to know, and that not once, but, as I have, a +hundred times."</p> + +<p>"I can well believe it to be a tremendous temptation," said the +Lieutenant-Governor gravely.</p> + +<p>"Temptation? It's more than that! A temptation gives you <i>some</i> chance, +doesn't it? You may yield to it, but, at least, you've had your +fighting-chance. Well, in that sense, this is no temptation, though I've +been using the word myself to describe it. Why, John, it's madness, +sheer insanity. You probably remember that I never used to touch alcohol +at all. I promised my poor mother to let it alone until I reached my +majority. Of course, I didn't realize about the dear old man; he died +when I was too young for that. But her one great fear, and naturally, +was that the curse had descended to me—just as it had! Well, I stuck to +my promise till I was twenty-one, and kept along in the same way for +some time afterwards, just because there<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> didn't seem to be any +particularly good reason for taking up something which I had managed to +get along very well without, all my life. Then came that time, you +know—three years ago—and out of mere recklessness, bravado, God knows +what, I began to drink. John, I was a doomed man from the first swallow! +That demon had been hiding inside me, without sound or movement or other +hint of his presence, for twenty-eight years—just waiting his chance! +You know the rest. The fight has been going on ever since, and the thing +has beaten every time. I've resisted. I've struggled. I've even prayed. +It's all useless."</p> + +<p>He pointed significantly to the curtain which hung where the door of the +wine-closet had been.</p> + +<p>"As I did that night," he continued, "I shall do again, and still again, +until the end. It's insanity, nothing more or less. It lurks at the back +of my brain—always—always—and then, suddenly, when I am least +expecting it, it comes forward with a rush, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> I might as well try to +check the north wind or the incoming tide. I feel it tingling in my +fingers, scorching my throat, tearing at my reason. I swear I won't give +in, and, in the very act of so swearing, I get up and go out to meet it. +I could break down iron doors to get at the drink when it calls to me. +And, though I seem to be going straight enough now, the moment is coming +when it <i>will</i> call and when I shall obey! Then you won't want to think +you've ever known me, John Barclay, still less to remember that the name +of the Fairy Princess has passed between us. And, in the midst of my +damnation, it will be a drop of cold water on my tongue to know that +I've left you a loophole through which to escape the acknowledgment of +these last few weeks. So far, no one but the 'Rockingham' people, and +Payson, and—and the Fairy Princess—know that we've been together +recently. The 'Rockingham' people don't even know my name. Payson won't +speak. And <i>she</i> certainly won't. So far, so good. Further, I've come to +say<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> good-by. Hereafter, we mustn't see each other"—</p> + +<p>"Stop—stop!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "What is all this rot +you're talking? Chuck it, will you? Look here! If you go back on +me—which is bad—and on your Fairy Princess—which is worse—and on +yourself—which is the worst of all"—</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes," answered Cavendish, "that's all true. But I'm not talking +about <i>if</i> I go back, I'm talking about <i>when</i> I go back! As I said when +I began, there's no use trying to explain this thing to a man who +doesn't understand it, and no man <i>can</i> understand it except through his +own experience. In this respect, if in no other, you and I talk +different languages, belong on different planets. Could I expect you to +comprehend with me that first give of self-control which lets the demon +loose, and the meaning of the sight or smell of drink at that exact +moment when the will is weakest—the first glass, hastily swallowed, as +a brute, long thirsty,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> gulps down the water it has craved—the second +and third, taken more slowly—and then, that slackening of every nerve, +that jettisoning of all the moral cargo, that sudden love and +appreciation of the sensuous side of life? Don't you see? It's another +world, that, which you simply can't understand, unless you travel to it +by the road by which I have come—which God forbid!"</p> + +<p>"In all this," said Barclay, "I can see no reason why our present +friendship should not continue, and should not be known."</p> + +<p>"Simply this," answered Cavendish: "I'm—nothing! You're the +Lieutenant-Governor,—who is spoken of, if you care to know it, in the +office of the 'Sentinel' as the only honest official in the state of +Alleghenia. You mustn't tie up to me, nor I to you. I've told you what +my end is going to be. You don't believe it, perhaps, but it's none the +less true. And yours—do you know that the law-abiding element looks up +to you as a kind of Messiah? Do you know that you are the dawn of honor +and integrity which lies behind<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> the present black cloud of lawlessness? +I tell you, John, the promise of your future is such as might nerve a +beaten Napoleon to renewed endeavor. In your hands lies the salvation of +the state."</p> + +<p>"I wish I could think so," said the Lieutenant-Governor. "God knows I'd +willingly cut one of them off, if I thought its loss could benefit the +commonwealth. But, as I've had occasion to say to others, in the present +emergency I'm as helpless as a babe unborn. You see how things are +going—one might as well appeal, so far as any hope of success is +concerned, to McGrath himself as to Governor Abbott. There's no getting +around it, Spencer. It's a declaration of anarchy pure and simple, and +with the official seal of Alleghenia at the bottom of the document. +Iniquitous wrong is being done, not only to Mr. Rathbawne in refusing +him the protection of the law to which he is entitled, but to the cause +of the strikers themselves, if they can justly be said to have a cause. +Nothing ever was or ever will be gained for the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> benefit of the many by +the violence of the few. It can only end in one way: by the +interposition of the federal troops. You know what happened at Chicago. +It will be the same thing here; and before it is over we shall see +people shot down like rats in the streets of Kenton City."</p> + +<p>"I hope it won't come to that," said Cavendish; "but even so, all's well +that ends well. Provided that order is finally restored"—</p> + +<p>"But what credit is it," broke in Barclay, "to the state of Alleghenia +to have her law-breakers suppressed by the national government? Don't +you see that it would be only a final proof that she is too incompetent +or too indifferent to do it herself? From the point of view of the +state's good name, I doubt which is worst, her present attitude or the +interference of federal force."</p> + +<p>"Will it come to the latter in any event?"</p> + +<p>"Undoubtedly. They've already tried to prevent the delivery of Mr. +Rathbawne's mail, both at the mills and at his house. You<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> know what +that means, don't you? One carrier interfered with in the performance of +his duty is sufficient excuse for mobilizing a brigade."</p> + +<p>"But the Governor"—</p> + +<p>Barclay came forward, laid his hand on Cavendish's shoulder, and looked +down at him, slowly nodding his head.</p> + +<p>"The Governor of Alleghenia is a dyed-in-the-wool scoundrel, my good +sir," he said. "It is his manifest duty to enforce the law rigidly and +at once, and if the police of Kenton City cannot or will not assist him, +to summon the militia to his aid. In that way only can the honor of +Alleghenia be saved. And that is what Elijah Abbott will never do. There +is anarchy open and flagrant in the streets of Kenton City—there is +anarchy silent and sneering in the Governor's chair. God save the +state!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2> + +<h3>YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE</h3> + + +<p>"I have promised to marry Colonel Broadcastle," announced Mrs. Wynyard +when the silence had lasted twenty minutes.</p> + +<p>Dorothy flung round from the window against which she had been +mercilessly pressing her pretty nose.</p> + +<p>"Why, Aunt Helen!" she exclaimed. "You really are the most startlingly +abrupt person I ever knew. Are you in earnest? What under the sun +possessed you to do that?"</p> + +<p>"I think it must have been Colonel Broadcastle," answered Mrs. Wynyard, +with an air of reflection. "It was last night when he was showing us +over the armory, after the review. He not only asked me, but appeared to +have quite set his heart upon my giving him an affirmative answer. And +he had been so ex<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span>tremely civil, Dorothy, about our seats and all that, +that I thought it would seem rather ungracious to refuse the first favor +he had ever asked of me. So I said yes."</p> + +<p>"Aunt Helen, Aunt Helen! One of these fine days you will be the death of +me. Did any one <i>ever</i> hear of such a reason for accepting a man?"</p> + +<p>"I couldn't think of a better one for refusing him," said Mrs. Wynyard +serenely. "So there you are!"</p> + +<p>"Talk about logic!" said Dorothy. She came across the room, and seated +herself beside her aunt. "I never heard anything so exciting in my +life!" she added. "Do you really mean it? Are you really going to marry +him?"</p> + +<p>"That is the arrangement, as I understand it," replied Mrs. Wynyard. "Of +course, I haven't his promise in writing, but I think I can trust him. I +once looked him up in your father's business guide, and he had three A's +after his name. I'm sure I don't know what they can stand for, if it's +not Acquaintance,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> Appeal, and Acceptance. I don't really see what else +I could have done. It seems to have all been arranged without consulting +me at all. One can't very well set one's self up in opposition to a +business guide, you know."</p> + +<p>"But he's old enough to be your father, Aunt Helen!"</p> + +<p>"That's precisely the reason why there wouldn't have been any sense in +my promising to be a sister to him. You see, I was quite helpless in the +matter from start to finish."</p> + +<p>"And it was only last night that you called me preposterous!" laughed +Dorothy. "Really, Aunt Helen, people who live in glass houses shouldn't +throw stones. I think you are the most absurd creature in the world. Do +you love him?"</p> + +<p>"I can even go so far as to say that I think I do," said Mrs. Wynyard, +without a break in her gravity. "I have all the symptoms,—palpitation +of the heart, a morbid craving for Shelley and chocolate caramels, a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> +tendency to wake up singing, and a failing for flattening my nose +against the window-pane for twenty minutes at a stretch without saying a +word to my poor old aunt, on the mere chance that he may be coming down +the avenue."</p> + +<p>The blush which Dorothy paid as tribute to this subtle innuendo came +near to rivaling one of young Nisbet's celebrated performances in the +same line.</p> + +<p>"You're making fun of me," she said reproachfully.</p> + +<p>"I, my dear?—not the least in the world. It's all as true as the gospel +according to St. Valentine. I've told you first because we're not only +aunt and niece, but the very best friends possible besides, and I knew +you would like to hear the news before any one else. Colonel Broadcastle +is by all odds the finest man I know,—I won't even except John Barclay, +much as I admire him. He has paid me a very great honor. I respect him +tremendously; I trust him absolutely. These alone are good reasons; but +there's a better<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> one,—so much better that nothing else really has any +bearing on the subject. Can you guess?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Dorothy softly, "you just love him. Isn't that it?"</p> + +<p>"Exactly. It's a curious thing, this love. There may be every reason why +one should marry a man, his own wish included, and yet one doesn't. +There may be no reason at all, so far as outsiders can see, and yet one +does! I've known a woman to throw over one suitor who had everything in +his favor—money, character, position—and accept another who had none +of these advantages—because she liked the way he parted his hair! +That's the way it goes. It's the most illogical thing in the world, if +we except the stock market and other women's gowns. And then, when it's +all arranged, his friends wonder what she could have seen in him, and +her friends what he could have seen in her! But I'm wandering from the +subject. Seriously, Dorothy dear, I love him very sincerely, and I have +been more happy than I can say ever since I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> found out that it wasn't +going to be one of those one-sided love-affairs which assure the incomes +of the poets and the lawyers. And now,—confidence for confidence, +Dorothy!"</p> + +<p>"Aunt Helen! I don't know what you mean."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Dorothy! 'I don't know what you mean' is one of those phrases like +'Not at home' and 'Yours very sincerely,' which are white lies on the +face of them. I don't want to force your confidence. We all have what +our friends recognize as our private affairs, with the accent—worse +luck!—on the <i>pry</i>! But this is very different. I'm very fond of you, +as you know, and my interest is far from being vulgar curiosity. Of a +woman's five cardinal failings—inquisitiveness, extravagance, vanity, +vacillation, and loquacity—I'm guiltless of all except the last and +most innocent. But don't we all need to talk at times? Don't we all long +for a trustworthy <i>confidante</i>? Aren't our little secrets often like +precious liquors?—if we don't make use of them, share them with our +friends, they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> either ferment and sour, or else lose all their sweetness +and significance by slow evaporation."</p> + +<p>"You would draw confidence from a stone," said Dorothy, with a little +smile, "but what have I to tell you?"</p> + +<p>"How should I know? Perhaps nothing—as yet; perhaps everything. Take +your time about it, dear. I'm not trying to get you to commit yourself. +I only want you to know that I'm ready to share your secret when it's +ready to be shared, and to help and counsel you in any way I can. I know +the main great fact already. Because, you see, Dorothy, one may conceal +an infinite amount, even from one's nearest and dearest, when they don't +understand—and they are so <i>apt</i> not to understand, one's nearest and +dearest! And the financier may hide his schemes from his partners, or +the general his plan of campaign from his fellow-officers, or the +politician his ambitions from his most ardent supporters—but I doubt, +my dear, if a woman in love was ever able to hide very<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> much from +another woman in the same lamentable condition!</p> + +<p>"If it were not," she added, taking Dorothy's hand in hers, "for the +great happiness which has come into my life, do you think that I should +have been able to divine that other great happiness which seems to be +hovering over yours? I am the physician afflicted with the disease which +it becomes his duty to study and to cure. Only, it's not a disease, +Dorothy, but a great, a beautiful revelation. I should have compared +myself, instead, to the prophet who is enabled to interpret the dreams +of others because they are identical with his own. There's my little +speech. And when you are prepared to answer it, you'll find me ready."</p> + +<p>As she was speaking the last words, the butler flung back the curtains +at the doorway of the drawing-room.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Nisbet," he announced imperturbably.</p> + +<p>Dorothy looked at her aunt, and then, with her frank laugh:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"If there <i>is</i> an answer," she said, "that's it!"</p> + +<p>As young Nisbet entered, Mrs. Wynyard was the first to greet him.</p> + +<p>"So," she observed, looking him over approvingly, "you've beaten your +swords into walking-sticks, and your spears into top-hats, as my friend +Isaiah so aptly observes! That's very commendable, but I almost think I +like you better in your war-paint. Do you know, a Colonel's orderly is +the spickest-and-spanest object upon which I've ever laid, or hope to +lay, my eyes?"</p> + +<p>"He just naturally has to be," said young Nisbet, with a grin. Somehow, +he was always more at his ease with Mrs. Wynyard than with other women. +"You see," he added, "if it wasn't that way, he wouldn't be it."</p> + +<p>Which was as near as he had ever come to making an epigram.</p> + +<p>"Well, I shall leave you to the tender mercies of Dorothy," said Mrs. +Wynyard. "I've promised to take a walk with your—what is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> it you call +him—instead of commanding officer, you know?"</p> + +<p>"K. O.," said young Nisbet.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's it. How deplorably you militiamen spell! Well, at all +events, I'm going to walk with your K. O., and it's time I was getting +ready. Good-by."</p> + +<p>"Good-by, Mrs. Wynyard."</p> + +<p>"Day-day!" said Dorothy, from the divan.</p> + +<p>"She's a crack-a-jack!" exclaimed young Nisbet, after she had gone.</p> + +<p>"Mercy!" said Dorothy. "I never knew you to be so enthusiastic over any +one before. If you have any intention of falling in love with Aunt +Helen, I feel it to be my duty, as a friend and well-wisher, to warn you +in advance that there isn't the most remote show in the world for you."</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's not that!" protested young Nisbet with that stupendous +earnestness which made people want to hug him. "Why, Mrs. Wynyard would +have me talked to a standstill in two or seven minutes! Imagine me +trying to make love to a dame like that! She'd<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> lose me so quick you +couldn't see me for the dust. Besides"—</p> + +<p>"Besides what?" asked Dorothy with an elaborate air of unconcern, as he +hesitated.</p> + +<p>Young Nisbet was quite crimson now, and twitched at the creases in his +trousers where they passed over his knees, and turned in his toes +excessively.</p> + +<p>"There's somebody else in the running!" he blurted out desperately.</p> + +<p>There! It was out—a part of it, at least—not at all, to be sure, in +anything even remotely resembling one of the thousand manners he had +proposed to himself as effective, during long hours of wakefulness, when +there was nothing in the world but his crowding thoughts and the ticking +of his clock—but still, out! The ice was broken. It was impossible that +she should not understand. The rest would be easier.</p> + +<p>Alas for young Nisbet! He was, as he himself acknowledged, not "up on +women!"</p> + +<p>"Somebody else?" repeated Dorothy.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> "How ever did you find that out? She +only told <i>me</i> about it twenty minutes ago."</p> + +<p>Alas, alas, for young Nisbet! He had thought his feet upon the beach at +last, whereas they had but touched a sand-bar in passing over. The +under-tow of embarrassment was worse than ever now, and threatened to +drag him down.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't mean Mrs. Wynyard. I wasn't talking of her—that is, I was, +at first—but afterwards—anyhow, I'm not talking of her now! When I say +there's somebody else, I mean—I mean"—</p> + +<p>"I am going out for a moment, Dorothy—just over to the <i>doctor's</i>. +<i>How</i> de do, Mr. Nisbet? <i>Wretched</i> weather, <i>isn't</i> it? Natalie's with +your father, my dear, and <i>I'll</i> be back <i>almost</i> immediately. +Er—<i>ahem</i>!"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Rathbawne went through a kind of rudimentary calisthenic exercise, +which consisted of squaring her shoulders and drawing in her chin. It +was accompanied by a meaning glance at her daughter, and was designed as +an inconspicuous substitute for the frank<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> injunction to "sit up +straight, my dear," upon which Dorothy had finally placed a ban.</p> + +<p>"And <i>won't</i> you feed the gold-fish, my dear?" she added. "I've been <i>so</i> +occupied, and the poor things haven't had a <i>crumb</i> for three days. I've +just told Thomas to take a plate of bread in at <i>once</i>. I'm sure Mr. +<i>Nisbet</i> won't mind: get him to <i>help</i> you. Er—<i>ahem</i>! And I'll be back +in about fifteen minutes, or so."</p> + +<p>For a time there was silence in the big, warm conservatory. Young Nisbet +had taken the dish from Dorothy's hands, and, after seating himself on +the low marble parapet surrounding the pool, devoted his energies to +feeding the gold-fish. He was thinking that it was all to be done over +again, and that it was harder than ever, if such a thing were possible, +to do. What was there about those few words which seemed to choke him? +For the moment, he took refuge in a commonplace question.</p> + +<p>"Is it one of your duties to feed these persons?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span></p> + +<p>Dorothy laughed shortly, like a little chord of music.</p> + +<p>"No—it's the Mater's peculiar privilege," she answered. "She adores the +stupid little beasts. Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. Nisbet. She +feeds them regularly herself,—or did, until Dad began to require so +much of her time. But lately, the house has been so upset, and she has +been doing such a lot of going out, and coming in"—</p> + +<p>"Yes," put in young Nisbet dryly, "I've noticed the coming in part."</p> + +<p>"So Natalie has been doing it for her," went on Dorothy, more rapidly. +"I suppose Natalie herself hasn't had the time, these last three days. +They <i>are</i> hungry, aren't they? <i>Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. +Nisbet!</i> Don't you see the poor things have only button-holes for +mouths?"</p> + +<p>There was another long pause, before either spoke again.</p> + +<p>"What defeats me about your mother," said young Nisbet slowly, "is the +way she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> manages to come in just at the wrong moment. At interruption, +she's the most star performer I've ever run up against. You don't mind +my saying that, do you? I'm not throwing any asparagus. I wouldn't be +disrespectful about her for the world. But really, for chopping into a +conversation, she's a dazzler!"</p> + +<p>"She <i>is</i> a little inopportune at times," admitted Dorothy.</p> + +<p>"Inopportune? Yes,—she's all of that. When she marches in, I feel +exactly as if the boat had gybed, and the boom come over and knocked me +into thirty fathoms of water. Lord!"</p> + +<p>"Why, how ridiculous!" said Dorothy. "There's nothing about the Mater to +be afraid of. She's the dearest, most innocent old thing in the world! +She just blunders along like that, and nobody is less aware of her +mistakes than she is. And, after all, why shouldn't she interrupt us, so +long as we're not saying anything in particular? And if we <i>were</i> +saying—anything in particular, we<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> could always pick up the +conversation where we dropped it."</p> + +<p>"That's just what I find it so hard to do!" confessed young Nisbet. "I'm +a stupid sort of lout, you know, Miss Rathbawne. I've never had half a +chance to practice talking to dames, and where other lads fuss like +experts, I just can't make good. I foozle every stroke. I'm an +ass—that's all!"</p> + +<p>"You're nothing of the sort!" said Dorothy indignantly. "You're an +extremely attractive young man!"</p> + +<p>"As good as the average in some ways, perhaps. But—how can I explain +what I mean?—there always comes a day when a chap wants to be more, +wants to be the best ever, in every way! That's the proposition I'm up +against now. I seem to be just a bundle of misfits, and—and—oh, +shucks! my line of talk is all crooked, and I can't tell you what the +trouble is, but"—</p> + +<p>"Your liver's out of kilter," interpolated Dorothy.</p> + +<p>"No, sir!" protested young Nisbet. "No<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>thing is ever out of kilter +inside me! If I'm nothing else, I'm blue-ribbon boy on the health +question. No, it's something I want, and that I'm pretty sure I can't +get."</p> + +<p>"I know perfectly well what it is," said Dorothy, "and you haven't even +asked for it!"</p> + +<p>Young Nisbet looked up suddenly.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean?"—he stammered, "do you mean?"—</p> + +<p>Outside, the front door slammed, and Mrs. Rathbawne's voice became +audible, inquiring Dorothy's whereabouts of the butler. The girl +laughed.</p> + +<p>"There's the Mater back again," she said. "Oh, Mr. <i>Nisbet</i>!"</p> + +<p>For young Nisbet had dropped dish and bread-crumbs into the pool with a +great splash, electrifying the gold-fish into unheard-of activity, and +had risen, at the same moment, to his feet. He stood before her, his +honest face blazing, his hands outstretched.</p> + +<p>"I love you!" he said. "Will you marry me?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span></p> + +<p>And whether or not he received an audible reply to this question he +never knew,—only she was in his arms, and gold-fish might feast or +starve, for all he cared about them. The wide doors of perfect bliss +swung open before him, and young Nisbet passed within.</p> + +<p>He was gazing ruefully into the water, as Mrs. Rathbawne entered. For +the first time in his experience, her presence did not embarrass him.</p> + +<p>"I've dropped a dish into your pool, Mrs. Rathbawne," he said, "and +scared the gold-fish into blue conniption fits. Look how they are +scurrying around. I hope I haven't done them any harm."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no," answered Mrs. Rathbawne placidly. "They are getting <i>so</i> fat +that I should <i>think</i> a little exercise, <i>now</i> and again, would be +<i>good</i> for them. We <i>might</i> drop a dish into the pool every week or so, +Dorothy, just to stir them up."</p> + +<p>"It might go for a while," said young Nisbet, "but any old football +player like myself, Mrs. Rathbawne, will tell you that you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> can't work +the same trick more than just a certain number of times."</p> + +<p>"Interruption, for example!" added Dorothy, and laughed across at him, +deliciously, with her eyes.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2> + +<h3>DIOGENES</h3> + + +<p>It was during the tenth week of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills that +the "Kenton City Record" made its long-remembered attack upon +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay. The arraignment was one unparalleled for +venom, even in the columns of that most notoriously scurrilous journal +in the state, and, withal, there was about it a devilish ingenuity, a +distortion of facts so slight as to defy refutation, and so plausible as +to carry conviction. It was the last blow in the long series of +discouragements which Barclay had suffered since his inauguration, and +for the moment he was completely unmanned. He was at no loss, however, +to trace the source from which the ingeniously perverted facts had been +obtained. Not even McGrath, with his intimate knowledge of all that went +forward at the capitol,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> could have supplied information so detailed. +The hand of Elijah Abbott was traceable in every line of the attack. +Their conversation, on the afternoon when he had first spoken to Barclay +of the impending strike, was reproduced almost word for word, as well as +that on the occasion when McGrath had been present, and therefrom the +"Record" went on to deduce that not even Peter Rathbawne, with all his +obstinacy, all his blindness to the welfare of his employees, was +responsible for their present destitution in the same sense as was the +Lieutenant-Governor, who might have avoided the strike by a conciliatory +word, and who, instead, had advised Mr. Rathbawne to fight the +working-people until the last cent of their money should be exhausted +and the last drop of their blood should be shed.</p> + +<p>"Incompetency," said the article in part, "is what we long since learned +to expect from John Hamilton Barclay. Gross neglect of public duty, +flagrant callousness to responsibility, contemptuous indifference to the +interests of the citizens whose votes placed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> him where he is,—all +these have been part and parcel of his attitude since the unfortunate +moment of his election. But even in him we had not looked for the +incredible spectacle of a public official deliberately precipitating the +incalculable distress which has followed in the wake of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills. Overburdened with the cares of office, in a single +instance the Governor of Alleghenia turned over a question of vital +significance to the lieutenant from whom he had every reason to expect +compliance and support. Even so, he was careful to point out a line of +action by which the impending calamity might readily have been avoided. +And what was the result? Not only in total disregard of plain duty, but +in direct disobedience of the orders of his superior, the +Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia threw his influence into the scale to +outweigh law and order, and brought about the deplorable destitution now +facing the families of four thousand martyrs to principle. When men are +driven to desperation, when women turn to shame in order<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> to maintain +life, when children are heard crying in our streets for bread, to whom +shall we point as the author of it all? To Peter Rathbawne, a poor, +doddering old man, barely responsible now, if rumor is to be believed, +for what he does? No! To John Hamilton Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of +Alleghenia!"</p> + +<p>This, and much more in the same strain, while passed over as sensational +bombast by the better element, did not fail of its effect upon the +strikers. A mass-meeting, held that morning, denounced Barclay in a set +of resolutions, as a traitor to his office and as the avowed enemy of +labor, and demanded his impeachment on the ground of neglect of duty. +During the day, half a score of threatening letters came to his office. +But what hurt him most, though he almost smiled at his own +sensitiveness, was that the doormen and porters at the Capitol greeted +his morning nod with a stare, and even the little office-boy, bending +low over his table in the ante-room, did not look up for the customary +wink.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> For his mother was a trimmer at the Rathbawne Mills.</p> + +<p>Once in his office, the Lieutenant-Governor found it impossible to +concentrate his mind upon the work before him. Sentence after sentence, +the words of his arraignment marched through his mind, as he sat with +his elbows on the desk and his chin in his doubled fists. A single +reading seemed to have stamped them indelibly and forever upon his +memory. Baffled by conflicting reflections he began, for the first time, +to doubt whether his had been the course of conscience, or merely that +of pride and perversity. Was not the "Record" right, perhaps, after all? +If it was true that the strike was driving men to crime and women to the +streets—and if it was not, as yet, true, it soon must be—who, indeed, +was to blame if not he himself, who had said "Fight them!" when he might +have kept peace by a word?</p> + +<p>Suddenly, the Lieutenant-Governor rose, and, crossing the room to where +the arms of Alleghenia hung upon the wall, took down<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> the frame, laid +it, face up, upon the table, and, bending down, studied it intently. The +beautifully executed nude figures of Art and Labor stared steadfastly +back at him, their muscular hands grasping the circular shield, strength +and endurance in every line of their necks, shoulders, and thighs, +purity and purpose in their blue eyes and square-cut jaws. He was as +motionless as they for full five minutes. Presently his finger moved +slowly across the frame, and he said, quite softly:</p> + +<p>"<i>Justitia—Lex—Integritas.</i>"</p> + +<p>Then he looked up, straight before him, out of the open window, where an +encircling wistaria was dotted with minute sprouts of green, and up at +the clear, wide sky.</p> + +<p>"I'm right!" he said aloud. "I'm right!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>At five that afternoon, Spencer Cavendish set out upon the most +unpleasant assignment which had ever fallen to his lot. When Payson had +told him that he was to procure an interview with Peter Rathbawne for +the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> "Sentinel," with a special eye to the mill-owner's failing health, +as reported in the morning's "Record," he had shrunk back instinctively +from a task so distasteful, and was on the point of refusing. But two +considerations checked this impulse. If the thing were to be done at +all, he thought, surely it had better be the work of one friendly to the +Rathbawnes and with their interests at heart than that of a bungling +outsider, with it in his power to hurt them beyond expression. The +argument was plausible, but behind its logic, at the back of Cavendish's +brain, there lay another reason, without which the first had been +insufficient to persuade him. He wanted to see Natalie again—to meet +her under the shield of some compatible excuse, so that he should not +seem to have sought her of his own will. He was thirsty for a word from +her, thirsty with the pitiable thirst of the shipwrecked sailor who +knows a swallow of salt water will but increase his torture, and who +craves it, none the less. Long since, he had forfeited his right to her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> +friendship—no sophistry could blind him to that. Moreover the ocean of +degradation not only lay behind him; it lay in front as well. It was as +he had told Barclay. He stood upon an island, not the mainland, of +redemption, and another plunge was inevitable.</p> + +<p>What he expected to gain by a word with Natalie Rathbawne, Cavendish +himself could hardly have told. At most, he was conscious of a faint +hope that in some turn or twist of the conversation he might have a +chance of thanking her, of telling her that he rejoiced in her +happiness, and of bidding her good-by. For paramount in his mind lay the +thought of his approaching downfall, inevitable, utter, and final. He +did not attempt to deceive himself. He knew what was coming. It had come +before.</p> + +<p>When Cavendish had sent in his card, a servant showed him through the +library into the conservatory, where Peter Rathbawne was seated in a +deep rattan chair watching his daughter, who stood at his side tossing +bread<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span>-crumbs to the gold-fish in the circular central pool. They both +turned at the sound of his footsteps, and Natalie held out her hand.</p> + +<p>"So you've come at last!" she said. "I should think it was quite time. +Dad, you remember Mr. Cavendish, don't you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," answered her father. "Oh, yes!"</p> + +<p>Rathbawne's voice was without life, his face almost wholly void of +expression. Though he glanced at Cavendish, it was with the blank stare +of a delirious person whose attention is unconsciously caught by an +unusual noise rather than with any evidence of direct interest, and he +took no further part in the conversation, nor even seemed to realize +that his companions were speaking. When he had answered his daughter's +question and looked at Cavendish, he leaned back in his chair, and +wearily closed his eyes.</p> + +<p>"He is very much changed since you saw him," said the girl in a lower +tone, turning again to the pool, "and it's all come about in the past +six weeks. The strike has had a most curious, a most pathetic effect +upon him.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> Even the doctor is at a loss to account for it. I think that +I am, perhaps, the only one who really understands. He has always been +so proud of his mills and of his people, so loyal to them, so like a +father to them, one and all, that to have them turn against him like +this, and, what is worse, get to drinking and rioting, has almost broken +his heart. The doctor says only one thing can save him, and that is to +see the mills going again and the people happy and prosperous, as they +were before. And who knows when that will be? For, feeble and broken as +he is, he will never give in to the Union. Of that I'm sure."</p> + +<p>"I'm very sorry," said Cavendish softly. One look at Rathbawne had been +enough to show him that the interview for which he had been sent was an +impossibility. One look at Natalie sufficed to banish from his mind +every thought save that of her pitiful pallor and the pathetic quiver of +her lips.</p> + +<p>"I had no idea it was as bad as this," he continued. "Can't anything be +done? You<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> are far from being in good shape yourself, Miss Rathbawne."</p> + +<p>"Tired and dispirited, that's all," she answered, trying to smile. "And +I fear nothing can be done as long as our fate lies in Governor Abbott's +hands. There's no use in harping on that, though. You know as well as I +what we have to expect from him. Did you see the attack on Mr. Barclay +this morning?"</p> + +<p>"An infamous libel!" exclaimed Cavendish hotly.</p> + +<p>Miss Rathbawne crumbled the bread between her fingers, and resumed her +feeding of the gold-fish.</p> + +<p>"You must know that I am the last person in the world to need that +assurance," she said slowly. "It is only another thread in all the +hideous tissue of injustice and iniquity which has been wrapped about us +like a pall. What a shame, is it not, that such a man as he should be +powerless to do the work I think God intended for him? And what a shame +that Alleghenia, needing his clear head and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> his strong arm and his +loyal heart as she does in this hour of emergency, should only be +sneering at him as a coward and a cad!"</p> + +<p>"I cannot believe," answered Cavendish, "that the venom of the 'Record' +is to be taken as the sentiment of the state. There must be many—there +must be a majority of Alleghenians who know, as we know, that no better +man breathes than John Barclay."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said the girl.</p> + +<p>In the open spaces of water between the lily-pads the fat indolent +gold-fish mouthed at the crumbs, stirring the silence with little +sucking sounds, and sending tiny ripples widening on all sides. One +alone, dingy yellow in color, moped apart from his fellows, and took no +interest in the banquet.</p> + +<p>"That one's a cynic," said Miss Rathbawne presently. "My subtlest +cajoleries never win him from that attitude of sneering contempt. The +others get all the tid-bits, and he doesn't seem to care. He isn't even +ornamental—he's in a class by himself. I call him Diogenes, and I'm +thinking of buying him a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> tub all for himself, where he can sulk in +solitary grandeur to his heart's content."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps not altogether in a class by himself," said Cavendish. "There +are others, you know, who make no use of their opportunities, and who +can never hope to be anything but ugly and useless, while their fellows +are getting all the good things of life, and enjoying them, and giving +pleasure of one kind or another into the bargain."</p> + +<p>Something in his tone caused Natalie to look at him suddenly.</p> + +<p>"I'm not enough of a pessimist," she answered firmly, "to believe that +true in anything beyond appearances. We are all apt, no matter how +conceited we may be, to underestimate at times the extent of our own +usefulness—or, rather, we are unconscious of the direction in which it +is most productive. If what you say is so, then all that is lacking is +the opportunity, and that is sure to come. We may squander many +opportunities, and, hardly less probably, actually turn to account in a +way we do not perceive many which we<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> seem to ourselves to squander. In +any event, others will come. A woman once said to me that the good in +her was not cultivated nor exercised with a view to <i>individual +immortality</i>. That seemed to me to mean so much that I've built up quite +a little creed on it. It's the principle, isn't it, upon which the whole +scheme of the world hinges? A million leaves fall and decay to enrich +the soil wherefrom two million more may spring. An infinity of little +shell-fish die, and the ages grind their shells to powder to make the +sands and the chalk cliffs. Countless raindrops sacrifice their identity +to maintain that of one great river. And why should it not be so with +us? If only we can contribute in the smallest degree to the uplifting of +our kind, to the advancement of the race, to the maintenance of what we +know to be right, what possible difference can it make whether, in the +effort to be of such service, we live or succumb? We were put here, it +seems to me, very much as separate notes are put into one great harmony. +Each note is struck at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> the proper time, serves its purpose, and goes +into nothingness. Each plays its part, however small. We can't all be +included in the wonderful final chords. Our place may seem trivial to +us, and yet in some sense we may be sure we are all contributors to the +unity and perfection of the whole. That ought to be enough. No one note +achieves individual immortality, but each does something to assure the +immortality of the composition of which it forms a part. If we don't +believe that, if we are not content to have it so, how is it possible to +believe in any divine purpose, any scheme of justice at all? Look at the +indescribable waste of life on all sides of us. If only in the case of +humanity, people are dying by hundreds every minute, unheeded, +unlamented, unrecorded. Human life is such a little thing!—as little as +the life of the leaf or the raindrop. And yet in the death of these last +we are able to perceive the working of a vast system which must be the +outcome of a direct purpose, and whereby the best interest of each +species is furthered. And so,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> the human race. Why should it be less +than lesser things? One man dies in order that two may live. A +confederacy—as in the case of our own Rebellion—perishes in order that +a nation may endure. Everywhere, in short, the individual sacrifices his +individual existence in order that it may contribute to and fertilize +the growth of his species. So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly +content to have it so. I should ask nothing better, when my own time +comes, than the assurance that, in one way or another, my death had a +significance,—that it was for a person or a principle, and not merely a +natural phenomenon. I may not be able to believe that; but there is one +belief possible to all of us,—I mean that, if not in death, then +assuredly in life, we have been of service to our race and time. We are +often told that the indispensable thing does not exist. I think the same +may be said of the useless one. I don't believe even the humblest of +God's creatures goes out of life without having been at one time or +another an influence for good. I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> even have hopes of Diogenes. Some day +there will be a scrap of refuse or an ugly little bug which mars the +symmetry of the pool, and Diogenes will eat it,—and perhaps die of +indigestion as a martyr to principle!"</p> + +<p>The silence which followed her words was broken by a hoarse sob from Mr. +Rathbawne, and, turning, they saw that his head had fallen back against +the chair, with his eyes, wide and staring, fixed upon the glass roof, +and his breath coming in short, thick gasps from between his parted +lips. In an instant Natalie was on her knees by his side, with her arms +about him.</p> + +<p>"Don't be frightened," she said, looking up at Cavendish with a brave +little smile. "It's his heart. He has had these attacks frequently of +late. Will you get me the whiskey decanter and a glass? You'll find them +in the dining-room—on the sideboard—to the left."</p> + +<p>Decanter in hand, Cavendish stood watching her, as she tenderly poured a +little of the raw spirit between her father's lips. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> effect was +almost instantaneous. Rathbawne choked, swallowed the restorative, and +presently raised his head and looked at her, patting her hand +tremulously with his own. They were so absorbed in each other that +neither noted a sudden, strange transformation in Cavendish's +expression. From the wide-mouthed decanter in his hand, the faint acrid +odor of Peter Rathbawne's fine old Scotch whiskey crept upward, stung +his nostrils, and, of a sudden, set him all a-quiver, like a startled +animal. The smell was almost that of pure alcohol, and set his mouth +watering, and drove his breath out in a little shuddering gasp that was +like a revulsion from some sickening medicine, just swallowed. But he +knew it, none the less, for something which belonged to and was part of +him. For weeks he had avoided it. Now it assailed him like that foe of +Hercules, of whom he had spoken to Barclay, whose strength was +multiplied a hundred-fold for every time his opponent trod him under +foot.</p> + +<p>As he told the Lieutenant-Governor, at the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> moment when least he +expected it, the demon touched his arm. For a minute he fought +desperately against the suggestion, with his eyes closed, and his teeth +cutting into his inner lip. He clung madly to the thought of the +presence in which he was, conscious that the girl's words had +uplifted him immeasurably, given him a clearer insight into the +essential significance of life than he had ever known. It was +useless—useless—useless! There was nothing left in the world but the +smell of the liquor that he loathed and that he loved!</p> + +<p>"If you were to leave us alone"—</p> + +<p>At the suggestion, Cavendish bowed and went slowly back toward the +dining-room. Once out of sight of the others, he paused, glanced back +over his shoulder, and then, abruptly, supporting himself with one hand +against the side-post of the doorway, raised the decanter in the other +to his lips, and drank.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XIII" id="XIII"></a>XIII</h2> + +<h3>THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE</h3> + + +<p>The day had been deliciously warm and still, one of those eloquent +heralds of spring that are touched with a peculiar beauty rivaling her +own. As Cavendish came out of the Rathbawne residence, Bradbury Avenue +was splashed with huge blotches of dazzling yellow, where the light of +the westwardly sun poured between the houses and was spilled upon the +smooth pavement. The man choked slightly at the after-taste of the raw +whiskey he had just swallowed, but almost immediately he smiled.</p> + +<p>"I knew it would come," he said to himself as he turned out into the +avenue, "and here it is. I'm not surprised. I'm glad, God help me—I'm +<i>glad</i>!"</p> + +<p>His mouth was watering, and he felt, as it were, every inch of the +stimulant's progress<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> through his veins, warming him with its familiar +glow. When he had left the conservatory, he had been trembling +pitifully. Now he was calm, and as steady as if his nerves had been +cords of steel. Responsibility, resolution, remorse—they had fallen +from him like so many discarded garments. He was sharply alive to the +pleasure of the moment, keenly appreciative of the sunlight, the soft +air, the laughter of the children romping in the streets. Of a singular +languor which had been wont to come over him toward the close of each +busy day of the past six weeks there was now no hint. He walked rapidly, +with his shoulders thrown back, and his chin well elevated, but his +course was not in the direction of his home, nor yet in that of the +"Sentinel" office. Instinctively, he had turned toward that part of the +city where were the large restaurants, the playhouses, and the more +pretentious saloons.</p> + +<p>At a corner, he wheeled abruptly into one of these last, and, seating +himself at a small table, called for an absinthe. The place was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> already +lighted, and each glass in the pyramids behind the bar twinkled with a +tiny brilliant reflection of the nearest incandescent globes. The air +was faintly redolent of lemon and the mingled odors of many liquors. To +Cavendish it was all very familiar, and all very pleasant. Again he told +himself that he was glad, glad that the restraint he had been exercising +was at an end. He was free, he thought, free to accomplish his own +inevitable damnation. He had no patience for the tedious operation of +dripping the water into his absinthe over a lump of sugar, but ordered +gum, and stirring the two rapidly together, filled the glass to the brim +from a little pitcher at his side. Then he drank, slowly but steadily, +barely touching the glass to the table between his sips.</p> + +<p>Presently, he was conscious of a slight numbness at his wrists, a barely +perceptible tingling in his knees and knuckles. His heart was +fluttering, and his temples pulsed pleasurably. He glanced toward the +glittering pyramids of glasses, and for a fraction of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> time they seemed +to shift in unison a foot to the right, returning immediately to their +original position with a jerk. Then he rose, and went toward the door, +catching sight of his face in a mirror as he passed. It was very pale, +and he crinkled his nose at it derisively, and then smiled at the +whimsical oddity of his reflected expression. On the threshold he +paused, looking toward the west, blazing with the red and saffron of the +departed sun.</p> + +<p>"Oof!" he said, with a downward tug at his waistcoat. "It comes quickly. +That's what it is to be out of practice."</p> + +<p>He dined alone in a corner of an unfrequented restaurant, eating little, +but drinking steadily, absinthe at first, then whiskey, four +half-goblets of it, barely diluted with water. Then he found himself +once more in the streets, now brilliantly lighted, going on and on +without purpose, save when the blazing colored glass of a saloon swerved +him from his path. He knew that he was walking steadily, avoiding +obstacles as if by instinct,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> stepping from and on to kerbs without any +actual perception of them. Faces swam past him, staring. Men, +particularly those at the bars he leaned against, were talking loudly, +but, as it seemed to him, brilliantly. He often smiled involuntarily, +and sometimes spoke to one of them, drank with him, and presently was +alone again, walking on and on. Occasionally a white-faced clock bulged +at him out of the night; and then he noticed that time was galloping. It +was close upon one when he found himself in a quarter which his recent +employment had made familiar—the neighborhood of the Rathbawne Mills.</p> + +<p>Here, suddenly, his mind emerged from a mist, and every detail of his +surroundings stood out sharp and clear-cut. The street was +insufficiently illuminated, but the light of a full moon cut across the +buildings on one side, half way between roof and sidewalk. Cavendish +perceived, with a kind of dull surprise, that the pavements were +thronged, and that almost every window framed a figure or<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> two. A hoarse +murmur pulsed in the air, and his quickened ear was greeted on every +side by foul jests and grumbled oaths, broken now and again by drunken +imprecations, scuffles, or the shrill invective of women invisible in +the throng. Once a girl touched his arm, and he found her face close to +his, thin, haggard, and imploring. He shook her off, and turned +unsteadily into the doorway of a saloon; stumbling, as he did so, over a +little boy crying on the step.</p> + +<p>Inside, the air was reeking with rank smoke and the fumes of stale beer. +The floor was strewn with sawdust, streaked and circled by shuffling +feet; the mirror backing the bar was covered with soiled gauze dotted +with tawdry roses, and an indescribable dinginess seemed to have laid +its sordid fingers on all the fittings.</p> + +<p>The room was crowded, nevertheless—crowded not only with the men +themselves, but, to the stifling point, with their voices and their +gestures and the spirit of their unrest and discontent. Cavendish, +leaning<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> against the end of the bar, looked wearily down the line of +flushed faces and backward at the disputing groups which rocked and +swayed, as the men argued and swore, grasping the lapels of each others' +coats, and spilling the liquor from their glasses as they gesticulated. +He was wholly sober now. It was the stage of dissipation which +experience had taught him to dread the most—the emergence from dulled +sensibility into a nervous tension upon which stimulant had no apparent +effect. He was trembling again, too, and his face, as he saw it in the +mirror through the clouding gauze, was as that of a stranger, a stranger +of whom he was afraid. He swallowed the whiskey he had ordered, and, +supporting himself by the bar, swung back and gave his attention to what +the men about him were saying. It did not need his sharpened perception +to appreciate the fact that he was in the thick of the worst element of +the Rathbawne strikers, or that the situation was a crisis. What little +restraint had characterized the earlier stages of the strike was now,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> +most evidently, at an end. Starvation was no longer a mere possibility, +or violence a mere threat. The men raved like wild creatures against +Rathbawne and John Barclay, recounting maudlinly the destitution of +their families, and, anon, flaming forth into cries for vengeance. How +long the babel lasted Cavendish could not have said. Long since, the +doors had been closed, and the lights half lowered, in mock deference to +a supposedly vigilant police, when suddenly a hush fell upon the +assemblage. A side door had opened, and Michael McGrath stood in the +midst of his followers, with his arms folded and a thin smile upon his +lips. There was not a whisper as he began to speak. The men leaned +toward him breathlessly, their mouths open, their eyes starting glassily +out of their sodden faces.</p> + +<p>"And how long is <i>this</i> going to go on?" demanded their leader, with a +sneer. "Talk—talk—talk! That's always the way, and nothing done, after +all. Well, there's been about enough of it, and that's flat. You've<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> +been living on the Union, and I suppose you think you can go on living +on it till hell freezes over. Now listen to me. When the strike began we +had plenty of funds, and more came to us from the Central Federation. +The funds are gone, d' you hear, and the Federation is asking what we +mean to do. There is six hundred and odd dollars in the treasury. No +need to tell you how far that much will go, is there? Not one day! And +with all your talk, you've everything your own way, if only you knew +it—a police that doesn't dare lift a finger against you, and a Governor +that won't budge an inch till I give the word! Well, to-morrow I give +the word, understand me? To-morrow I throw you over, and you can get out +of this the best way you can. I'm sick of your talk. I'm sick of your +doing nothing. Your daughters are on the streets, your wives and your +children are starving, and <i>you</i>—by God! <i>you</i> are boozing in a bar +till daylight, and <i>talking</i>! So that's enough. To-morrow, the strike's +at an end. To-morrow, the Gov<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span>ernor comes down on you like ten thousand +of brick! And I'm the man that gives the word! Unless"—</p> + +<p>He paused and cast a keen glance at the faces which surrounded him. His +last words had been greeted by a low growl.</p> + +<p>"Unless," he continued, "you know your business, and make a move that's +worth the name."</p> + +<p>The hush of attention seemed to deepen into the leaden silence of +expectancy.</p> + +<p>"There are two men who must be put out of the way," said McGrath slowly, +"and that before another midnight. I don't care how it's done, but done +it must be, for the sake of example. It's easy enough to manage it, as +things are. There'll be a howl, but we have the authorities fixed. And +those two men must go!"</p> + +<p>In the tense silence which followed, a man's voice whispered two words +hoarsely:—</p> + +<p>"Mr. Rathbawne!"</p> + +<p>"Ay, <i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne!" echoed McGrath, flashing into that passionate +manner of his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> which carried all before it. "<i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne, who's +starving you! <i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne, who's making your sons drunkards! <i>Mr.</i> +Rathbawne, who's debauching your daughters! <i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne, who's +killing your wives by inches! <i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne, and <i>Mr.</i> John Hamilton +Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia!"</p> + +<p>For a moment it seemed as if he would be swept off his feet by a torrent +of enthusiasm. The men crowded about him, slapping him upon the +shoulders, shouting their approval, reaching for his hand. One +brandished a revolver under his nose, with a shrill cry of "This'll do +it, Mac! This'll do it, by God!" The rest had turned to each other, +embracing frantically, and repeating his words in a kind of frenzy.</p> + +<p>Presently McGrath raised his hand, and, as silence was restored at the +signal, turned to the bar-tender with his thin smile.</p> + +<p>"Set 'em up, Dick," he said composedly. "It's on me, this time, and +we'll drink to better days."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the confusion Cavendish made his way to the side-door, and passing +through it into the street, hesitated, dazzled by a brilliant light. It +was broad day.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>As the Lieutenant-Governor entered his ante-room that morning his eyes +contracted suddenly, and he stopped, with his hand upon the knob of the +door. There could be no mistaking the look in the face of the man who +sat facing him, gripping desperately at the arms of his chair. Cavendish +was as white as chalk, with the hunted look of despair which lay so +vividly on Barclay's remembrance of the night when they had met on +Bradbury Avenue. He rose as the Lieutenant-Governor appeared and drew +himself up with an effort at steadiness, conscious that the others +present were observing him narrowly. But Barclay's hesitation was as +brief as it had been involuntary. With a bare glance at his +subordinates, he came forward cordially to take Cavendish's hand, and +then,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> opening the door of his private office, motioned him to enter +first.</p> + +<p>"Glad to see you," he said steadily, as their hands met.</p> + +<p>Once inside, the manner of both men changed as abruptly as it had been +assumed. The Lieutenant-Governor went slowly toward his desk, with his +head bent, and Cavendish, throwing himself into the nearest chair, and, +with no attempt at concealment, drew a flask from his pocket and drank a +long draught. He looked up to find that the Lieutenant-Governor had +wheeled at the desk, and was standing with his eyes fixed upon him.</p> + +<p>"Wait a minute," said Cavendish, as Barclay seemed about to speak. "We +won't discuss this, for the moment, if you please."</p> + +<p>He held up the flask with a shrug.</p> + +<p>"In fact we needn't discuss it at all," he continued. "I've simply gone +to hell, that's all there is about it. I knew I would. I told you so +long ago. I didn't come here to make excuses—or to receive rebukes, +John Barclay. I've a means here of settling the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> problem which can give +cards and spades to all your projects of reform." And he tapped his +pocket, where the cloth bulged slightly, with a smile. The +Lieutenant-Governor made no attempt to interrupt him.</p> + +<p>"What I did come to say," went on Cavendish, more steadily, "is that +your life and Mr. Rathbawne's are in danger. You're to be put out of the +way, both of you, before twelve to-night. McGrath's determined on it, +and there's no lack of men to carry out his orders. The strikers are +desperate. I overheard their talk, while—well, while I was getting +drunk! <i>What's that?</i>"</p> + +<p>He stopped, with his hand to his ear. Some one was tapping at the +communicating door.</p> + +<p>"Put up that flask!" said Barclay under his breath, adding aloud, as +Cavendish obeyed:</p> + +<p>"Come in!"</p> + +<p>The door swung open softly, and Governor Abbott, smiling and rubbing his +hands, appeared upon the threshold.</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon, Mr. Barclay," he said. "I did not know you were +engaged. We<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> have the pleasure of another visit from the Citizens' +Committee, and, by a singularly opportune coincidence, Mr. McGrath has +called at the same time. Can you spare us a few moments of your time?"</p> + +<p>With a bow, and a glance at Cavendish, Barclay followed his superior +silently from the room.</p> + +<p>In the Governor's office he found a dozen men, all standing. McGrath, +with his back to the others, was examining with an elaborate air of +interest a map of Alleghenia which hung upon the wall. Colonel +Broadcastle and his fellow-members of the Citizens' Committee, stood +close to, and facing, the Governor's desk. The air was electric with +suggestion of a crisis about to come.</p> + +<p>When the Governor began to speak, it was in his habitually suave voice, +yet he was visibly nervous.</p> + +<p>"Colonel Broadcastle has been good enough to observe," he said, "that if +I do not call out the militia within three hours, to protect the +interests of Mr. Peter Rathbawne, his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> committee will appeal for aid to +the federal government. Now—er—now, in my place, and in such a +situation, Mr. Barclay—er—what would you do?"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor's nerve, strained beyond endurance by the events +of the past twenty-four hours, snapped like a dry twig at the +contemptuous hypocrisy of the other's tone.</p> + +<p>"<i>Do!</i>" he thundered—"<i>do?</i> Why, as God is my witness, Elijah Abbott, +if I were in your place I would do what any honest man would do! I would +do what my oath demanded of me! I would clap that man McGrath into jail +for iniquitous inciting to riot, and place Colonel Broadcastle, at the +head of his regiment, in charge of the city to restore order and the +reign of law, and to redeem Alleghenia from the disgrace that is +overwhelming her. <i>Do?</i> Before God, the Republic, and the state, +Governor Abbott, I would do my duty as a man!"</p> + +<p>"<i>Then do it!</i>"</p> + +<p>The words, spoken from the threshold of Barclay's office, rent the +silence like a thunder<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span>clap, and before those present had time to turn, +there came the sound of a pistol-shot, and Governor Abbott, wheeling +slowly on his heels, crashed headforemost through the plate-glass window +behind him, and lay, limp and motionless, across the sill.</p> + +<p>"Then do it, by God, <i>Governor Barclay</i>!" repeated Cavendish, and flung +his revolver into the centre of the room.</p> + +<p>The apartment was already filled with those attracted from the corridors +and adjacent offices by the sound of the shot. Several seized Cavendish, +who stood without movement, smiling. Barclay, Colonel Broadcastle, and +the other members of the committee lifted the Governor's body from the +position in which it had fallen, and laid it upon a couch. After a brief +examination, the Colonel looked up into Barclay's eyes.</p> + +<p>"He's dead, sir," he said. "The assassin was right. You are Governor of +Alleghenia."</p> + +<p>For an instant, Barclay returned his glance with one of earnest inquiry.</p> + +<p>"Even in the face of this tragedy," added<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> Colonel Broadcastle in a low +voice, "I trust you will not forget the exigencies of the situation. It +is for you to act, sir."</p> + +<p>Barclay suddenly raised himself to his full height, and faced the silent +gathering.</p> + +<p>"Gentlemen," he said firmly, "the Governor is dead. For the moment, at +least, I act in his stead. Kenton City is under martial law. Those who +have the assassin in charge will see that he is immediately turned over +to the chief of police. Mr. McGrath, you will consider yourself under +arrest. Colonel Broadcastle, you will immediately assemble your regiment +at its armory, issue three days' rations, and twenty rounds of ball +cartridge, and hold yourself and your command in readiness for riot +duty, subject to my orders."</p> + +<p>Then he faced Cavendish.</p> + +<p>"There's a message I'd like to have delivered, to the Fairy Princess," +said the latter, still smiling. "It is that Diogenes has eaten the ugly +little bug."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XIV" id="XIV"></a>XIV</h2> + +<h3>THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA</h3> + + +<p>As Barclay had foreseen, the adoption of stringent measures was all that +was needed to break the back-bone of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +The presence of the Ninth Regiment, under command of that noted +disciplinarian, Colonel Broadcastle, and terribly in earnest, as was +evinced by the ball cartridges gleaming in their belts, was sufficient +to discourage any further attempts at disorder; the sudden shift of base +of the newspapers which had formerly supported the rioters, and now, +taking their cue from the policy of the new Governor, counseled +immediate surrender; above all, the trial, conviction, and sentence of +their moving spirit, McGrath, to a term of years for inciting to +riot—all were irresistible factors in the Union's capitulation. Two +weeks after the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> death of Governor Abbott, the Rathbawne Mills were +running once more, and Peter Rathbawne himself, though whiter of hair +and but a shadow of his old self, was, nevertheless, on the high road to +recovery.</p> + +<p>The trial and conviction of Spencer Cavendish were accomplished with +unexampled celerity. He would admit of no defense, although the lawyer +appointed for him by the court was strenuous for a plea of insanity, +based upon the singular remark which he had made upon the announcement +of Elijah Abbott's death, and which was construed by those who heard it +as ample proof of irresponsibility. Called upon in court to give his +defense, Cavendish stated in a loud, clear voice that he was strictly +accountable for his act, that he was in full possession of his senses at +the time, and that he had killed the Governor in the firm conviction +that he was a menace to the safety of the community, and that the +latter's sole salvation lay in his removal, and the succession of the +Lieutenant-Governor to the position of chief executive.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I desire," he concluded, with the same odd smile that he had worn at +the moment of the Governor's death, "nothing but the full penalty of the +law."</p> + +<p>The next day Spencer Cavendish was sentenced to be executed on the +thirtieth of the following month at the State's Prison at Mowberly.</p> + +<p>Then followed the most remarkable manifestation of popular sentiment +ever known in Alleghenia. As Barclay had once said of them, the citizens +of his long degraded state were less vicious than callous, and their +callousness was effectively cured by the dramatic event which had +removed a corrupt official from the head of the state government, and +put in his place a man whose first acts were proofs positive of +strength, integrity, and singleness of purpose. The revulsion of feeling +was overwhelming. Even the press which had sneered at and cried down +John Barclay was forced to the other extreme. Relieved from the burden +of lawlessness which had lain on Kenton City for close upon three +months,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> the citizens went over in a body to the support of their new +Governor. He was cheered on his every appearance in public as +assiduously as he had been ignored before, and, responding with the +whole force of his sensitive nature to this longed-for and unexpected +popularity, he devoted himself more and more earnestly, day by day, to +the welfare of the state which was his idol.</p> + +<p>But following in the wake of this revulsion of feeling in favor of +Barclay came one, hardly less complete, in favor of Spencer Cavendish. +While strictly speaking there could be no condoning his act, it was none +the less evident to even the most rigid adherents of law that by it he +had conferred an indisputable benefit upon the state of Alleghenia, and +his open statement of his reasons at the time of his trial militated for +rather than against him. So it was that a public petition was framed and +circulated, asking, at the hands of Governor Barclay, the commutation of +the death sentence to one of life imprisonment. Little by little the +list of signatures grew,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> until, a week before the date fixed for +Cavendish's execution, they were numbered by tens of thousands. Then the +petition, rolled into a cylinder, was presented to the Governor by a +committee, and left for his consideration.</p> + +<p>To Barclay the intervening time had passed with almost incredible +rapidity. His days, filled as they were to overflowing with numberless +and complex duties, were yet the pleasantest he had ever known. At last, +he was what he had dreamed of being—an active factor, the most active +of all factors, in the advancement of his state. Redeemed, as if by a +miracle, from the disgrace which had laid her low, Alleghenia arose, in +his eyes, like a phœnix, throwing off the ashes of her reproach, and +blazing, with new wings of burnished beauty, in the sunlight of hope and +peace.</p> + +<p>Barclay had retained his old office, not caring to make use of a room so +permeated with associations of recent tragedy as was that which had +formerly been Governor Abbott's. Now, with the windows open and the +soft<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> May air stirring the papers on his desk, he sat, looking vacantly +across the room, with the huge petition spread out before him. His +attention, long absorbed by the problem in hand, was diverted by a tap +on the ante-room door, and, in answer to his call, Natalie Rathbawne +stood before him, smiling out of the exquisite daintiness of a fresh +spring frock.</p> + +<p>"You've forgotten!" she said immediately, at sight of his knit brows.</p> + +<p>"Forgotten what?" inquired the Governor inadvisedly.</p> + +<p>The girl's little foot stamped almost noiselessly upon the thick carpet.</p> + +<p>"Upon my word!" she exclaimed, "if there's one thing worse than being +engaged to the Lieutenant-Governor, it's being engaged to the Governor +himself! Forgotten, of course, that we are to lunch together, and look +at wall-papers afterwards! Do you know, John Barclay, I don't believe +you mean to marry me, after all? We'll be just approaching the altar, +when"—</p> + +<p>She was interrupted in characteristic fash<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span>ion, and disengaged herself, +with a great air of indignation, from Barclay's arms.</p> + +<p>"If you want to take lunch in the company of a rag carpet," she said +severely, "that's the very best way to go about it. Get your hat."</p> + +<p>There was a little pause as Barclay filed some papers in his private +safe, and then one startled word from the girl.</p> + +<p>"<i>John!</i>"</p> + +<p>Wheeling abruptly, he saw her standing at the desk, with her hand on the +petition, and her eyes, wide and wonderstruck, searching his face.</p> + +<p>"Dearest!" he said impulsively, "I wish you hadn't."</p> + +<p>But Natalie only laughed joyfully.</p> + +<p>"But I'm glad, Johnny boy," she answered, "glad—glad—glad! What a +wonderful thing it is to be Governor, boy dear! I don't think I ever +really understood before. Think of it! To have the power of life and +death—to be able to right the wrongs of justice with a single stroke of +the pen. Oh, John!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> Sign it now—before we go. I shall be so much +happier."</p> + +<p>The Governor made no reply. He stood, with his head bent, smoothing his +hat with the fingers of his right hand. Gradually the expression of +eager expectation on her face changed to one of anxiety.</p> + +<p>"John," she said in a half whisper, "you <i>are</i> going to sign it, aren't +you, boy dear?"</p> + +<p>"I'm not sure," faltered the Governor. "I'm not quite sure, dearest. It +is the hardest problem I've ever had given me to solve. I can understand +now the meaning of something your father said to me just before the +strike,—that, for the first time in his life, he didn't know what to +do, because right seemed to be hopelessly entangled with wrong, and +wrong with right. When a man does evil in order that good may come, one +tries to find an excuse for him, tries to palliate his offense in any +reasonable way. That is human instinct. That is what accounts for the +petition there, with the signatures of many of the most conscientious +men in Alleghenia at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span>tached. They have managed to find the excuse, or +they think they have, which, so far as their personal convictions are +concerned, amounts to about the same thing. And I've been saying to +myself that when public opinion points out a course as justifiable it +can hardly be possible for a single individual to say that it is not. +And yet the wrong is there, isn't it? No matter how confused a question +may seem to us, there must absolutely, when we come to think of it, be +some one great elemental principle upon which it not only can, but must, +be decided—some boundary line between justice and injustice which we +may be too blind to see, but which exists, and calls for observance, +none the less. Right is right, wrong is wrong. No confusion between the +two can possibly exist except in appearance. Strive to elude truth as we +will, it remains eternal truth, and cannot be evaded in the end. And +where it seems to be beyond us, all we can do is to strive to find the +silken thread which will surely lead us out of the labyrinth into the +searching<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> light of day. It is that clue which I have been groping for. +What is it? How am I to know it when I see it? What am I to do? At first +I thought the case was clear—what he said, you know—about Diogenes—it +seemed so odd—every one thought so—it might be construed as—as +insanity"—</p> + +<p>"Oh, <i>no</i>, John! Why, <i>we</i> know what that meant! No—no! The best part +of it all was his sanity, his wonderful courage, his braving of almost +certain death for what he believed—and knew, John—<i>knew</i> to be right +and best. Think what he did for Alleghenia, Johnny boy. He has been +almost as great an instrument in her salvation as you. Think what he has +done for all of us—for you, in giving you this opportunity—for me—for +Dad! John, how <i>can</i> you hesitate?"</p> + +<p>The Governor shook his head.</p> + +<p>"Dearest," he said, "you're on the wrong track, just as I have been, a +dozen times since the petition came. Don't you suppose I've thought of +all that? Its significance, not only to me, but, as you say, to the +state, is so<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> tremendous that, at the first glance, it seems to be an +unanswerable argument. But—don't you see?—no sophistry, no +contemplation of the results achieved, can ever make it justifiable for +a man to arrogate to himself the power of taking human life, which is +the prerogative of God and the law alone. The peculiar circumstances of +Cavendish's crime plead eloquently, almost irresistibly, for his pardon. +He has saved the state—yes! But the case is one in a million, and it is +not an individual case alone which hangs upon my decision,—it is the +establishment of a precedent, the maintenance of a principle."</p> + +<p>"But, John," broke in Natalie eagerly, "what you've just said—isn't +that the clue for which you have been groping? He saved the state! I've +heard you talk of Alleghenia too often, of what you hoped for her, and +what you despaired of ever bringing to pass, not to know what those four +words must mean to you. Think of it! <i>He saved the state!</i> Without any +possibility of selfish object he did this extraordinary thing—made it +possi<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span>ble for Alleghenia to win back the honor and respect she had so +nearly lost forever! He killed the man who had no thought of her purity +and dignity, who used the power the people had given him for the +furtherance of his own selfish and wicked ends, who made her justice a +mockery, who played with her law as if"—</p> + +<p>"Stop!" exclaimed the Governor. "Stop—I must think. Wait a moment. I +must think—I must think!"</p> + +<p>After a minute he began to speak again, this time in a lower tone, a +tone which suggested self-communion rather than direct address to the +girl before him.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's it. Wait now,—let me be sure! He killed the man who had no +thought of Alleghenia's purity, who used his power to serve his own +ends, who made her justice"—he was speaking very slowly, dwelling on +each word as it left his lips—"her <i>justice</i> a mockery, who played with +her law—her law—her <i>Law</i>"—</p> + +<p>He paused once more, his brows knit, his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> firm hand slowly stroking his +chin. Then, of a sudden, he drew a deep breath, flung back his +shoulders, and looked at her. His eyes were blazing, his voice touched +with a new meaning, an eloquence deep, firm, conclusive.</p> + +<p>"Natalie," he said, "come here."</p> + +<p>"You've struck the keynote," he added, when they stood face to face, a +foot or two apart. "It isn't what you thought, or what you meant, but it +is the keynote, just the same. The Law!"</p> + +<p>He wheeled slowly, and stepped forward, until he was directly before the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia which hung upon his wall.</p> + +<p>"<i>Justitia—Lex—Integritas!</i>" he said. "Many a time, when the way +seemed darkest, I've read those words over to myself, and found hope in +them. Events changed, crises came and went, portents loomed thick, +despair seemed omnipotent, failure and disgrace inevitable—but the +motto of Alleghenia remained the same. Steadfast, purposeful, and +commanding, it has endured through the triv<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span>ial changes of political +significance which have been as impotent to sully the actuality of her +fair fame as are sun-spots to dim the radiance of the sun. It is only +natural, perhaps, that the discouragements which were but transient +should have seemed to me to be vital, damning, irremediable. Just as the +Israelites of old turned from the promises of God to worship Baal, so +have I turned from the assurance given me by these arms of Alleghenia, +to prostrate myself before false idols of doubt and despair. I should +have remembered how they called me, in the first instance, from a life +of idleness and ease, to fight my way through the desert of difficulty, +toward the promised land of honor. I should have remembered how in my +darkest hours they went before me as a pillar of fire, how in the famine +of my soul these words were the manna of encouragement, how in my thirst +they struck clear water from the rock of adverse circumstance. But the +Israelites came back to their true God at last; so I, little girl, to my +true ideal. The Law!—you said the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> word—the Law is the clue, the +keynote, the boundary between right and wrong!"</p> + +<p>She was at his side, and he slipped one arm around her, and held her +close to him as with his finger he traced again the motto of Alleghenia.</p> + +<p>"Do you know what this means?" he asked. "<i>Justitia</i>,—to be just to all +men, without fear or favor, lenient to our enemies, rigid and +unyielding, if need be, to our friends; putting aside personal +considerations, striving so far as in us lies to be impartial, merciful +in the face of prejudice, relentless in that of conviction—fair! +<i>Lex</i>,—to abide by the law, in spirit only if our inmost conviction +warrants that course, but in letter absolutely where there is the +smallest hint of doubt; secure in the knowledge that, however fallible +it be, it is the best that man has yet been able to do in imitation of +the immutable decrees of God. <i>Integritas</i>,—to be true to the oaths we +have sworn, faithful to the promises we have made, loyal to the office +intrusted to us by the people, to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> whom and for whom we are responsible. +Dearest, I am no mere man. Were I that, were I to consult my will alone, +and it lay, as now it lies, in my power to accomplish, Spencer Cavendish +should go free to-day. I know what he has done; I appreciate his +sacrifice; I see that by a single act he has accomplished what the rest +of us were powerless to cure; I admire his courage; I condone his crime; +I could forget all his weaknesses for the sake of this one great +evidence of his strength. And yet—listen to me, dearest!—in what he +strove to do he has failed utterly, if in removing a corrupt official +who made a mockery of Alleghenia's law he has not replaced him by one +who with all the force of his conscience and all the power of his +influence will see that law administered. And whatever we may say of his +crime, whatever its causes, whatever its wonderful results, it was and +is a crime. 'Thou shalt not kill!' God has said it; Alleghenia by the +voice of her law has ratified it. And not even the fact that Cavendish +has made possible all my<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> fondest and worthiest hopes, the fact that he +has rescued from suffering all I hold most dear"—</p> + +<p>Barclay suddenly covered his face with his free hand, as he had covered +it on that afternoon in Peter Rathbawne's library, weeks before; then he +looked up again, his lips trembling.</p> + +<p>"Dearest," he said, "I am Governor of Alleghenia, and as such owe an +allegiance, an obedience, which personal prejudice cannot impugn. On +the day when you spoke to me of meeting Cavendish you pointed out the +course of a gentleman and a friend. On the night of the Ninth's +review you taught me the creed of an American and an Alleghenian. +To-day—unconsciously perhaps, but none the less surely—you have made +clear the duty of a public servant. God bless you, my life, my heart, my +conscience! May I be worthy of you and of the commonwealth I serve. +Where I doubted before, now I am sure. It is hard—God only knows how +hard—but listen to Alleghenia's bidding! <i>Justitia</i>,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> <i>Lex</i>, +<i>Integritas</i>,—equity, the code, and good faith, in the sight of God and +man, heaven and earth, the American people and the commonwealth of +Alleghenia. God save the state!"</p> + +<p>"John," whispered the girl brokenly,—"John, you're right. God save the +state!"</p> + +<p>Slowly, tenderly, the Governor of Alleghenia led her back to the table, +and taking up a pen, with a firm hand wrote five words, heavily +underscored, at the head of the Cavendish petition. And these were:—</p> + +<p class="left"> +"<u><i>Disapproved.</i><br /></u></p> +<p class="center"><u><i>John Hamilton Barclay</i></u>,<br /></p> +<p class="right"><u><i>Governor.</i>"</u></p><br /> +<br /> + +<p>Then, turning to the girl who loved him, he took her in his arms.<br /><br /><br /></p> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30448 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/30448-h/images/001.png b/30448-h/images/001.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..c74dd97 --- /dev/null +++ b/30448-h/images/001.png diff --git a/30448.txt b/30448.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7b390f3 --- /dev/null +++ b/30448.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5296 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Lieutenant-Governor + +Author: Guy Wetmore Carryl + +Release Date: November 10, 2009 [EBook #30448] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + THE + + LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + A NOVEL + + BY + + GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + [Illustration: Publishers symbol] + + + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY + The Riverside Press, Cambridge + 1903 + + + Copyright, 1902 + BY THE ESS ESS PUBLISHING CO. + + + Copyright, 1903 + BY GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + + + _Published March, 1903_ + + + + + TO + + M. R. B. + + IN MEMORY OF THE RESCUE OF A MAN AT SEA + + + + + CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I. THE FLY ON THE WHEEL 1 + + II. THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET 21 + + III. A FACE IN THE CROWD 40 + + IV. AS BETWEEN FRIENDS 60 + + V. A BRAND FROM THE BURNING 80 + + VI. MCGRATH LAUGHS 98 + + VII. THE MIRAGE OF POWER 117 + + VIII. THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS 137 + + IX. THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW 156 + + X. A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 177 + + XI. YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE 196 + + XII. DIOGENES 215 + + XIII. THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE 234 + + XIV. THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA 252 + + + + +THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + + +I + +THE FLY ON THE WHEEL + + +The offices of the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor adjoined. Each +had its ante-room, in which a private secretary wrote eternally at a +roll-top desk, an excessively plain-featured stenographer rattled the +keys of his typewriter, and a smug-faced page yawned over a newspaper, +or scanned the cards of visitors with the air of an official censor. At +intervals, an electric bell whirred once, twice, or three times; and, +according to the signal, one of the trio disappeared into the presence +of the august personage within. + +A door connected the office of the chief executive with that of his +lieutenant, but this was rarely opened by either, and then only after a +formal tap and permission to enter had been given. It was a matter of +general knowledge that the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor were not +in sympathy; but few, even among the intimates of either, were aware how +deep, and wide, and hopelessly impassable was the gulf which lay between +them. This was due not alone to disparity in age, though twenty-eight +years separated the white-haired Governor from his handsome subordinate, +who had been nominated to this, his first public office, on his +thirtieth birthday; nor was it wholly a difference between the +experience of the one and the inexperience of the other. The point of +view of the veteran is, naturally, not that of the novice, particularly +in politics. That the enthusiasms of Lieutenant-Governor Barclay should +have been the disillusions of Governor Abbott, and his pitfalls his +senior's stepping-stones,--this was to be expected. The root of their +dissimilarity lay deeper. It was nothing less than mutual distrust which +kept the connecting door closed day after day, and clogged the channel +of cooperation with the sharp-pointed boulders of antagonism. + +The convention which nominated the successful ticket of the preceding +year had been a veritable chaos of contending factions. The labor +delegates, encouraged by the unexpected strength of their +representation, were not content with such nominal plums as had fallen +to their share in former conventions. Led by Michael McGrath, an +agitator whose native Irish eloquence, made keener and more persuasive +by practice in bar-room forensics, brought him naturally to the fore, +they threatened, at one stage of the proceedings, to carry all before +them. The more conservative faction, its strength sapped by the +formation, in its very ranks, of a reform party determined upon the fall +of the "machine," was forced to yield ground. The reformers themselves, +young men for the most part, distinguished by great ideals but small +ability, were too few to impose their individual will upon their +opponents, yet sufficiently numerous to make their support necessary to +the success of either party. The usual smooth course of the convention, +upset by this unlooked-for resistance from two quarters, staggered +helplessly, and was on the point of coming to a deadlock. It was Michael +McGrath's shrewd perception of the situation which solved the problem. +In a brief, impassioned speech he laid the claims of his faction before +the delegates, winding up with a stirring picture of the cooperation of +labor and reform, now possible, which held the convention in spellbound +silence for ten seconds after he had closed, and then set the hall +ringing to cheers and vigorously plied hands and feet. For an instant he +paused, with his arms folded, and his keen blue eyes sliding over the +faces before him, and then played his trump card. At his signal, a +banner, hastily prepared, was borne, slowly revolving, down the central +aisle, and on this were boldly lettered the words which at the same +moment McGrath was thundering from the platform:-- + + LABOR AND REFORM! + + FOR GOVERNOR, + ELIJAH ABBOTT. + + FOR LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR, + JOHN HAMILTON BARCLAY. + +McGrath had no need to look toward the labor faction for support. He +knew what the name of Elijah Abbott meant in that quarter. His shifting +glance was fixed upon the seats of the reform delegates, and a little +smile twitched at the corners of his mouth, as he saw them rise with a +cheer. Barclay was the chief spirit of their movement. They had not +expected this recognition. But if, in the enthusiasm of unlooked-for +victory, they did not perceive how little, in reality, was their gain, +McGrath was far from being unaware how great was his own. Before the +cheering of the now allied forces of labor and reform had fairly died +away, he had moved that nominations were in order, and, ten minutes +later, while the partisans of the "machine" were still endeavoring to +collect their wits, the main business of the convention was an +accomplished fact, and Abbott and Barclay were declared the regular +Democratic nominees for Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of the state. +In six weeks followed their election by a small plurality, and on the +first of January the two men moved into their adjoining rooms, in the +inexcusably unlovely state capitol, on the main hill of Kenton City, +wherein they were, thenceforward, separated, one from the other, by two +inches of Georgia pine and a practically infinite diversity of principle +and prejudice. + +From the first their relationship had been no better than an armed +truce. Both were courteous men, the one because such was his policy, the +other because he was to this manner born. There was no need for them to +discuss their individual creeds. They tacitly accepted the fact that +there was not a parallel between the two. From the moment when his +election was assured by the returns, Abbott was candidly the man of the +Labor--nay, more--of the Socialist party. McGrath and his associates +manipulated him as readily as a marionette. The promises and pledges of +the campaign were ruthlessly jettisoned. If Governor Abbott did not +stand for anarchy, it was only because, for the moment, anarchy was not +the demand of his party. Withal, he was dignified and self-possessed, +robed in an agreeable suavity which became him at functions and +ceremonials, and assured his popularity with those--and they were, as +always, in the majority--who did not look below the surface. + +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay had not been ten days in office before he +realized the futility of resistance to the established order, as +represented in his superior. He had accepted his nomination, and +welcomed his election, with an almost Quixotic elation in the +opportunity thus opened to him. He would accomplish--oh, there was no +telling what Lieutenant-Governor Barclay would _not_ accomplish! + +He was standing at his office window now, staring out disconsolately +over the sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin +patches of snow, which had contrived to withstand the recent thaw, and +he was telling himself, for the thousandth time, the dispiriting fact +that, as a force for good or evil in the destiny of his state, he was no +more significant than his stenographer's Remington or his secretary's +roll-top desk. With all his ideals, with all those pledges which are +infinitely more vital when made in private to one's conscience than when +made in public to one's party, he found himself merely a cog in the +state machinery--a cog, too, that, seemingly, might be skipped at any or +every time, without in the least degree disturbing the progress of +routine. On the few occasions, in the early days of their official +relation, when he had ventured to set his will in opposition to that of +the Governor, there had not been manifest in the latter's attitude even +that spirit of resistance which spurs men to more active and resolute +endeavor. Governor Abbott had smiled pleasantly upon him, and then +quietly shifted the conversation into other channels, with an air of +selecting a topic more suited to his companion's comprehension. +Finally, on one occasion, when Barclay had voiced his opinion with an +energy which savored of rebuke, the Governor had gone further, and had +asked calmly--"And what were you proposing to do about it?" After that +Barclay had relinquished the unequal struggle, and resigned himself to +the unavoidable conclusion of his impotency. + +It is a situation which tries men's souls, this of utter helplessness in +the face of plain duty. He could have no hope of making his position +clear to the constituency to which he was responsible. Debarred on the +one side from taking an active part in the administration of state +affairs, and bitterly arraigned on the other on the grounds of +inefficiency, laxity, and indifference to duty, the second month of +office found John Barclay in a fair way to be ground to powder between +the millstones of impuissance and hostile criticism. The men of his +party who had, both in private conviction and public statement, based +their hopes of political reform upon the frankly avowed platform of his +principles, now passed him coldly, with a bare nod, sometimes with none +whatever; the labor element jeered joyously at his attitude; the +"machine" pointed to him as proof of the fallacy of the reform creed. It +is easy to expect great performances from great promises, easier still +to outline the duties and condemn the delinquencies of another, and not +even Barclay's knowledge of his own good faith was sufficient +compensation for the sneers of press and public which fell to his share. +As he surveyed the dispiriting prospect from his office window, on that +late February afternoon, he was near to resigning his position, and with +it all further pretension to political prominence. + +In the opinion of those competent to judge, the state of Alleghenia was +going to the dogs. A press distinguished alike for the amplitude of its +headlines and the pitiable paucity of its principles; a legislature of +which practically every member had, not only a price, but such a price +as the advertisements describe as being "within the reach of all;" a +Governor who avowedly stood ready to sanction the most extreme +pretensions of the notoriously corrupt party which had secured him his +election,--here, surely, were good and sufficient reasons for the +generously bestowed disapproval of Alleghenia's sister states. In all +the _personnel_ of her government there was but one man sincerely +devoted to her advancement on the lines of integrity and +non-partisanship. And that man was Lieutenant-Governor Barclay, whose +influence on the trend of affairs was approximately that of the +proverbial fly on the hub of the revolving wheel. + +The Lieutenant-Governor had turned back to his desk, and was arranging +his papers, preparatory to departing for the day, when his ears were +greeted by the unusual and unwelcome sound of a rap upon the +communicating door. Instinctively he braced himself for an unpleasant +encounter before replying. It was his experience that the Governor's +room was like to Nazareth of old, in that no good might be expected to +issue therefrom. Nevertheless, as Governor Abbott entered, in response +to Barclay's "Come!" it was difficult to believe that he was aught but +what he appeared to be,--a courteous, conspicuously well-dressed and +white-haired gentleman, of sixty or thereabouts, smooth-shaven save for +chop side-whiskers of iron gray, with a habit of rubbing his hands, and +an inclination from the hips forward which suggested a floor-walker. In +brief, the Governor of Alleghenia seemed the type of a man who turns +sideways and slips through narrow places, rather than run the risk of +barking his elbows by a face-front advance. In reality he was somewhat +less pliable than a steel rail. + +"You are going?" he asked, seeing how Barclay was employed. + +"I was thinking of it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor. "Of course, if +there is anything"-- + +Governor Abbott seated himself on the edge of the desk, holding a lapel +of his coat in each hand, and surveyed his subordinate from under his +drooping eyelids, with his head cocked on one side. + +"I believe you know Peter Rathbawne," he said. + +"I do. I am engaged to his elder daughter." + +"Ah! That is what I thought." + +The Governor looked contemplatively at the ceiling, closing his right +eye, and nibbling behind his pursed lips. + +"Peter Rathbawne," he said, "is the second most obstinate man in Kenton +City, if not in Alleghenia. I'm afraid he thinks he is the _most_ +obstinate. If so, he does me an injustice. His mills are the largest in +the state. I am told that when they are running full strength they +employ over four thousand hands." + +"Something like that number, I believe," put in Barclay, as the Governor +seemed to expect a reply. + +"Ah! It is a pity for such an industry as that to be tied up on account +of one man's obstinacy." + +"I had not heard"--began Barclay; but Governor Abbott continued +steadily, disregarding the interruption. + +"Yesterday morning Mr. Rathbawne discharged fifteen employees on the +ground of incompetency. It is hard to see exactly what Mr. Rathbawne +means by 'incompetency.' These men were not newcomers. Some of them had +been in the mills for as much as eighteen months. It seems as if he +might have discovered the alleged incompetency long ago. It is more or +less arbitrary, one might say, this discharging men by wholesale, as it +were." + +"I suppose," commented Barclay, "that a man may do as he will with his +own." + +"Ah!" said the Governor, lifting his hands from his lapels with a little +gesture of deprecation, but immediately replacing them. "But _can_ he? A +man in Peter Rathbawne's position has a responsibility to fulfill toward +the community. He cannot beggar men for a caprice--because his horse has +gone lame, or his breakfast has not agreed with him. He must show +reasons--give an accounting. He must be fair." + +"Oh, when it comes to fairness," laughed the other, "I assure you, +Governor Abbott, you won't find Mr. Rathbawne's equal this side of the +Pacific. He's famous for square dealing." + +"He _has_ been," corrected the Governor. "In the present instance he +seems to have fallen below standard. He has declined to reconsider his +decision in the case of the discharged men. What's worse, he has flatly +refused to see the committee appointed by the Union." + +"I'm not surprised at that," said Barclay slowly, fingering a +paper-cutter on the desk before him. "Mr. Rathbawne is peculiar in one +respect; he supports and considers the Union in every other. But he has +always insisted upon his right to discharge the hands at will, and +without giving reasons. Incompetency is only a word which is used to +cover more serious causes." + +"Well, he's wrong," said the Governor, with a heat unusual to him. +"He's dead wrong, Mr. Barclay, and he will find it out before he's a day +older." + +"Do you mean"-- + +"I mean that if the men in question are not taken back before to-morrow +noon, every man, woman, and child in the employ of the Rathbawne Mills +will be out on strike. The question is, what is Peter Rathbawne prepared +to do?" + +The silence that followed was broken only by the tap, tap, tap of the +Lieutenant-Governor's paper-cutter on the silver-mounted blotter. +Presently he looked up and met the Governor's eye. + +"If you want _my_ opinion, sir," he answered, "it is that Mr. Rathbawne +would fight such a point to a standstill. He's sole owner of the mills, +and he's a rich man. He has always treated his employees as if they were +his own children. If they turn on him now for something which, from +their experience of his character, they must know was fair and +justifiable"-- + +"But _was_ it?" interrupted the Governor. + +"I don't know the facts, sir, but I know Peter Rathbawne," said Barclay, +throwing back his head, "and I can say, with clear conviction, that it +_must_ have been. If, as you suggest, the hands go out, I think he would +close down the mills for a year, and go abroad. He's a man who doesn't +argue; he simply acts. I fancy there wouldn't be much opposition left by +the time he wanted to reopen." + +"Provided always that there were anything left to reopen," suggested the +Governor softly. + +"The state troops have more than once proved their ability to assure the +sanctity of property," answered his subordinate, with a touch of the old +pride with which he had assumed office. + +"Hum!" said Governor Abbott. "But calling out the militia is a serious +matter, Mr. Barclay, to say nothing of the expense entailed. Considering +that the difficulty would be due entirely to the obstinacy of one +man--er--one might not feel justified"-- + +He hesitated briefly under the Lieutenant-Governor's keen glance, and +then swerved from this line of suggestion. + +"What I wanted to say was this: You are a friend of Mr. +Rathbawne's,--something more than a friend, indeed. No doubt he has a +respect for your opinion, as you have for his. Now, if in the course of +a quiet chat--it will have to be to-night--you should point out the +situation that threatens him, the distress that a strike will cause, the +probable destruction of his property, perhaps he might consent to +reinstate the discharged men to-morrow morning." + +"It would be a surrender of principle, to which he would never consent," +said Barclay firmly. "Of that I am sure. Moreover, sir, I should be +speaking against my convictions were I to advise him to adopt such a +course." + +The Governor's lip wrinkled slightly. + +"The Union is prepared to do the right thing by the man who settles this +question," he said. + +"I hope you don't mean that!" exclaimed Barclay. "You are the first man +to make such a suggestion to me. Pardon me, Governor Abbott, but I +cannot but think the executive chamber of the capitol of Alleghenia a +singular place for it to be mentioned." + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"You misunderstand me," he said. "One would suppose I had offered you a +purse! I mean simply that the popularity of the man who averts this +strike will be an assured fact. He would be the idol of the working +people, and hardly less esteemed by the element of capital. Moreover, he +would be doing a humane and merciful thing. You are the only man who is +in a position to approach Rathbawne, and, if you will excuse the +suggestion, I think you can hardly afford to throw away the chance. As +it is, you--er--you are not what might be called popular, Mr. Barclay." + +This time the silence was broken by a single sharp little +click--the latch of the connecting door slipping into place. The +Lieutenant-Governor sank slowly into his revolving chair, tipped back, +swung round a half circle, and stared out disconsolately over the +sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin patches of +snow. + + + + +II + +THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET + + +Young Nisbet leaned forward in his chair. + +"And I've been thinking," he added, "that perhaps--that perhaps"-- + +"That perhaps what?" asked the junior Miss Rathbawne, leaning forward in +hers. + +"If I don't have tea _instantly_," said her mother, with profound +conviction, as she came ponderously through the portieres, tugging at +her gloves, "I shall expire! How de do, Mr. Nisbet. _Do_ sit up +straight, Dorothy, my dear." + +She sank heavily into a low chair, which brought her within the radius +of lamp-light at the tea-table, and was thus revealed as a lady of +generous proportions, with a conspicuous absence of features, and no +observable lap. In speaking, she displayed a marked partiality for undue +emphasis. Sublimely unconscious of the depression induced by her +advent, she continued to talk, as she pulled off her gloves, which were +a size too small, and came away with reluctance, leaving imprints of the +stitching on her pudgy pink hands. + +Young Nisbet surveyed her with a kind of mute despair. He was a very +average young American, very conventionally in love, and the trifling +remnant of self-assertiveness which had triumphed over the crescent +humility natural to his condition inevitably evaporated into thin air at +the approach of Mrs. Rathbawne; and always, as he was doing now, he +turned in his toes excessively when she was present, hitched at his +right trouser-leg, where the crease passed over his knee, and looked +first at her, and then at the floor, and then at her again, with the +purposeless regularity of a mechanical toy. + +There was a tremendous and highly significant rattling of cups, saucers, +and silver spoons, as Dorothy Rathbawne prepared her mother's tea. All +things considered, one found something very admirable about Dorothy at +such a time as this. It was not complete submission, still less was it +open revolt, but savored of both, and was incomparable as an attitude +toward Mrs. Rathbawne. On some occasions it was almost as impossible to +get on with Mrs. Rathbawne as it would have been, on others, to get on +without her. The which, nowadays, is more or less true of all parents. +And children. + +"Natalie and your Aunt Helen got out at the florist's," went on the good +lady, "but I came straight on, and sent the carriage back for them. I +felt that I _couldn't_ exist an _instant_ longer without my tea. I'm +sure I don't see how Natalie _stands_ it. She was out all morning in the +brougham, too. You had best make enough for three cups, Dorothy--and +_do_ sit up straight, my dear!--and order Thomas to bring in some more +tartines. They are _sure_ to be hungry, and they are apt to come in at +_any_ moment." + +"That is a family failing," said Dorothy venomously, from behind the +kettle. + +"Well, I'm _sure_, my dear," said Mrs. Rathbawne innocently, as she +straightened her rings, and picked an imaginary speck out of one of her +round, flat nails, "there is no disgrace at all in a healthy appetite. +I'm thankful we all have it--though as for your Aunt Helen, _hers_ is +about like that of a fly." + +"Flies have very good appetites--judging from all I've seen, that is," +said Dorothy, "so I don't think she is to be commiserated on that +account." + +"That was only a figure of speech, my dear," replied Mrs. Rathbawne, +with engaging placidity. "Mercy! but I'm glad to get home. We've had a +positively _exhausting_ day with Natalie's shopping, and the _worst_ of +it is to think what a _lot_ more there is to do. A wedding certainly +_is_ an undertaking, Mr. Nisbet." + +"Is it?" answered young Nisbet, perceptibly startled at being thus +abruptly included in the conversation. + +"Decidedly!" asseverated Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"Of course, in the case of an _ordinary_ man"-- + +"Two lumps, mother?" + +"_Always_ two lumps, Dorothy, my dear. Surely you must know that, by +this time! As I was _saying_, Mr. Nisbet, the fact that my elder +daughter is to marry Mr. Barclay"-- + +Dorothy's eyebrows went up resignedly as she bent with affected +solicitude over the alcohol lamp, than which none ever burned more +blamelessly. There was no stopping Mrs. Rathbawne now! + +"One has to keep his position in mind," she was saying. "It isn't like +the _usual_ marriage, which interests only the families and friends of +the persons concerned, you know. It isn't even as if only Kenton City +were looking on. _All_ Alleghenia will be on the _qui vive_, Mr. Nisbet, +_all_ the state of Alleghenia. I shouldn't wonder if _some_ notice were +taken of the event, even at Washington. Marrying a statesman, you +see,--a Lieutenant-Governor! Oh, it's _quite_ different--_quite_! _Do_ +sit up straight, Dorothy, my dear!" + +She continued to prattle of the momentous marriage impending, until her +complacent chatter was interrupted by the entrance of her half-sister, +Mrs. Wynyard, and the elder Miss Rathbawne. + +The two newcomers were both beautiful, in widely dissimilar ways. Helen +Wynyard, Mrs. Rathbawne's junior by nearly a score of years, retained at +thirty the transparent brilliancy of complexion which, at eighteen, had +made her the most admired _debutante_ of her season in San Francisco. +Her marriage with Ellery Wynyard had caused a great to-do among the +gossips, and, later, had defrauded them pitilessly of their +self-promised "I told you so's," by reason of the death of the handsome +young rake, before the rose-color of the honeymoon had begun to fade. +Beauty, wit, and infallible tact she inherited from her mother, shrewd +business ability and a keen insight into men and things from her father, +and wealth and a certain attractive audacity of speech from her +husband; and five years of widowhood only served to develop and +emphasize the promise of her first season. There were numerous feet +which aspired to be shod with Ellery Wynyard's discarded shoes, but no +one pair, said the world, so much as an inch in advance of the rest. + +Mrs. Wynyard was spending the winter with her half-sister, and the +Rathbawnes, whom the circumstance of widely distant residence had always +kept from coming into close touch with her, were equally at a loss when +they wondered how they had formerly contrived to exist without her, and +in what manner they should resign themselves to giving her up. She was a +woman who came amazingly near to being indispensable. + +For the moment, Natalie Rathbawne, in reality the beauty which Dorothy +by a fraction fell short of being, suffered by comparison with her +sister. She was desperately tired--that was in her smile. But there was +something else: a singular preoccupation which was nearly akin to +listlessness. That was in the droop of her eyelids, in the eloquently +inattentive gesture with which she touched a bowl of Gloire de Dijon +roses as she passed, and in her conventionally courteous acknowledgment +of young Nisbet's greeting. And, too, as she seated herself beside her +sister on the divan, there was perceptible purpose in her avoidance of +the lamp-light, her withdrawal into the dark, deep corner. To the +conversation which followed she contributed only such brief remarks as +were made necessary by those occasionally addressed to her. + +The two women brought with them a delicious, indefinite atmosphere of +out-of-doors: that commingled smell of cold flowers, and cold flesh, and +cold fur, which is to a drawing-room in winter what a whiff of salt air +is in summer to a sun-baked hillside; and this proved almost too much +for the self-possession, already tottering, of young Nisbet. He had +always been accustomed to have the things he desired, had young Nisbet, +but these, until now, had been either creature comforts, readily +obtainable when one's father is a multi-millionaire, or athletic honors, +equally easy of attainment when one measures forty-two around the chest, +and can do one's quarter in something under fifty. Again, the Nisbets +lived on a ranch, and when one does not know people in New York one +spends the Sundays in New Haven, so that neither the terms nor the +vacations incidental to his four years at Yale had equipped him, in the +sense in which they equipped his fellows, for dealing with society. + +Now that he was in Kenton City, representing his father's interests, +young Nisbet was painfully self-conscious of multitudinous shortcomings, +totally unsuspected hitherto. His speech was apparently hopelessly +incrusted with slang, his legs were too long, his ears protruded +abominably, his hair was desperately unruly, his freckles and his +capacity for blushing were inexhaustible. He was as much at ease in such +surroundings as these in which he now found himself as a trout in a +sandpile. The great room, with its costly furnishings, the tea-table +crowded with silver and fragile porcelain, the kettle purring +contentedly above the iridescent flame of the alcohol lamp,--above all, +the subtle, indefinable suggestion of femininity which unknowably +pervaded his surroundings,--all these enthralled young Nisbet beyond +expression, and awed him immeasurably, into the bargain. He was, as +usual, very clear in his own mind as to what he wanted, and that was the +younger Miss Rathbawne, but, for the first time in his experience, the +means at his command did not seem to be sufficient unto the end. For the +younger Miss Rathbawne was, very evidently, not the sort of triumph +which is achieved by recourse to an imposingly ample bank-account, nor +yet by two months' loyalty to the exigencies of the training-table. And +this was February, and he had known her since July, and, altogether, it +was highly discouraging. Unwittingly, young Nisbet heaved a sigh so +profound and so pitiable that Mrs. Wynyard immediately proffered her +sympathy. + +"Poor, dear Mr. Nisbet! I never heard a more pathetic sigh. Whatever is +the matter?" + +"He's sleepy," put in Dorothy. "He always is, after talking with me for +a whole hour." + +"I was just thinking," protested young Nisbet helplessly. + +"Oh!" exclaimed Dorothy, "that's it, is it? Then pray don't discourage +him, Aunt Helen. He's really getting into some very good habits, of +late." + +"Why, _Dorothy_!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, digging her chin reproachfully +into her black velvet collar, "how _can_ you say such things? Mr. Nisbet +will think you have had _no_ bringing up at all. And _do_ sit up +straight, my dear!" + +"And if you don't stop nagging, O most conscientious of parents," +retorted Dorothy, with her nose in the air, "Mr. Nisbet will think you +bring people up by throwing them down!" + +"And slang! _Dorothy!_" + +"I always think," said Mrs. Wynyard, "that Dorothy should have had a +fairy godmother, to promise that every time she uttered a word of slang +a pearl should pop out of her mouth. We should have all been wearing +triple strings down to our knees within a week after she learned to +talk." + +"That settles it!" exclaimed Dorothy. "If you are going to side with the +enemy, Aunt Helen, there is nothing left for me to do but to beat a +retreat. Come on, Mr. Nisbet, there is rest for the weary in the +conservatory--that is, unless you want another cup of tea?" + +In the conservatory the air was heavy with the moist, sweet smell of +earth and moss, and faintly vibrant with the tiny plash of water, +dripping from a pile of rocks into the circular central pool, wherein +fat gold-fish went idly to and fro, nuzzling floating specks upon the +surface. Through the polished green of the surrounding palms and +rubber-plants stared gardenias and camelias; below, between maidenhair +and sword-ferns, winked the little waxen blossoms of fuchsias and +begonias: at intervals poinsettia flared audaciously among its more +quietly dressed neighbors; and, in the far corners the golden spheres +were swelling to fairly respectable proportions on the branches of dwarf +orange-trees. + +Dorothy installed herself on a bench, and young Nisbet perched upon the +rim of the pool, and stared at vacancy. + +"It's corking, in here," he said, after a moment. + +"Isn't it, though?" agreed Dorothy, with a nod of approval. "It's my +favorite part of the house. You can't imagine how many hours I spend +here, sewing, or reading, or fiddling with the fish and all those funny +little plants under the palms." + +"You bet!" said young Nisbet, with enthusiasm, if not much relevancy. +"I've just got a picture of that, you know. Besides, we've spent a good +many of those hours together in here, these past few months." + +"Oh, not a tenth of them!" exclaimed Dorothy, "and then only the very +shortest." + +"Oh!" said young Nisbet gloomily. His fertile imagination was +immediately peopled with the forms and faces of those who had shared the +other hours, a score of eligible and attractive young men, his moral, +mental, and physical superiors in every conceivable particular, +faultlessly arrayed, scintillating with wit, and surpassingly skilled in +the way to win a woman. The conservatory was full of them. He saw them +in every imaginable posture: feeding the gold-fish, watering the +begonias, looking up into Dorothy's eyes as they sat at her feet, +looking down at her slender fingers, as she pinned gardenias to their +lapels. And these had been granted the long hours, he only the short. +Inwardly, young Nisbet groaned; aloud, as was his wont, he said the +wrong thing. + +"They seemed long enough to me." + +"_Well!_" said Dorothy. + +"Oh, hang it all! I didn't mean that. What an oaf I am!" + +"Never mind," said Dorothy consolingly. "I know you well enough to +understand you, by this time." She smoothed her skirt reflectively. +"Let me see," she added, "what were we talking about when we were +swamped by the family?" + +"I think," answered young Nisbet, with one of his illogical blushes, +"that I had just asked you what sort of a man you thought you would like +to marry. I remember I was on the point of saying that I thought perhaps +you had ideas like--er--like your mother's." + +Dorothy raised her eyebrows. + +"Like the Mater's?" + +"About a man being big and prominent, and all that, you know," +floundered young Nisbet. "She always makes such a point of Barclay's +being Lieutenant-Governor--I thought you might be for the same kind of +thing." + +Dorothy looked him over, with a whimsical smile, as he was speaking. +There was a deep bronze light in his close-cropped, ruddy hair, and his +skin was very smooth and clean. His eyes were appealing, with that +unspeakable eloquence of simple honesty which is almost pathetic. Under +his blue cloth coat, the great muscles of his shoulders and chest stood +out magnificently, rippling the fabric as he stirred, as if eager to +throw off their trammels, and be given free play. About him there was a +distinct suggestion of sane living and regular exercise. For all his +freckles, and his nose that was too little, and his mouth that was too +large, "the ugliest of the Nisbet boys"--he had often been called +that!--was very emphatically good to look upon. + +"A big man?" answered Dorothy. "Yes, I think I should like to marry a +big man. I want him very clean, too--_very_ clean!--morally, as well as +otherwise. And honest as the day is long. And not _too_ bright! I don't +want to be continually trying to live up to his brain, and continually +failing. It is fatal to one's self-respect, that sort of thing. Then, he +must be heels over head in love with me--for keeps! And then--oh, he +must be a _man_, a man through and through, who wouldn't think anything +he didn't dare to say, nor say anything he didn't dare to do! That's +what I want, and if I can get it, all the prominence in the world may +go hang!" + +"That's just about John Barclay, though," said young Nisbet, "with the +prominence thrown in." + +"Well, I'm not saying I wouldn't have married John Barclay, if I'd had +the chance. He comes pretty close to being all I would ask for, in the +way of a man. But, unfortunately, there's only one John Barclay, and, +like the rest of the world, he looked directly over poor little Me's +shoulders, and saw only Natalie. Good gracious! Who could blame him? +She's the loveliest little thing in the world! But, at all events, she +nabbed him, so all that is left for me to do is to grin and bear the +disappointment as best I may. He's very much of a man, John Barclay is!" + +"Yes," assented young Nisbet, somewhat mournfully. "I can see that would +be the kind of a chap that the dames would stand for everlastingly." + +"But, as I said before," continued Dorothy, "it's not because he's +Lieutenant-Governor, whatever the Mater may think about it, that I +admire him. It's just because he's so big, and earnest, and loyal, +and--and"-- + +"White," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, _isn't_ he? That's it--white!" + +"I can understand a man like that getting spliced," observed young +Nisbet very earnestly. "He has so much to offer a girl. But as for the +rest of us"-- + +"Oh, as to that," broke in Dorothy airily, "John Barclay isn't the only +man in the world, by any manner of means! Besides, Natalie having +already bagged him, it is plain I shall have to look elsewhere." + +There was a long pause, broken only by the plash of the water, which +seemed, as the seconds slipped by, to grow amazingly loud. Then young +Nisbet raised his eyes, and looked at her, blushing deplorably. + +"I wish"--he said, "I wish"-- + +"Dorothy! _Do_ excuse me, Mr. Nisbet, but _really_--dinner at seven, you +know, and this child _must_ be thinking about dressing. She takes +_ages_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne folded her fat hands, and stood waiting, at the +conservatory door. Young Nisbet rose. + +"Of course!" he said. "I'm always so stupid about these things. Good-by, +Miss Rathbawne. I'm off to New York to-morrow on some confounded +business, so I probably won't see you for a week or so. Good-by." + +"_Would_ you mind going out by the hall, Mr. Nisbet?" suggested Mrs. +Rathbawne. "Mr. Barclay is in the drawing-room with my elder daughter, +and he is so _greatly_ occupied with affairs of state that they have +_very_ little time together. I _hate_ to have them interrupted. One can +do _so_ much harm sometimes, you know, by thoughtlessly interrupting +people who are in love with each other. Thank you _so_ much; good-by. +_Do_ try to stand a little straighter, Dorothy, my dear." + + + + +III + +A FACE IN THE CROWD + + +At the sound of the Lieutenant-Governor's voice at the front door, Mrs. +Rathbawne had beaten a hasty retreat, dragging her immensely edified +half-sister in her wake, so that when he stepped through the curtained +doorway Barclay found Natalie alone. + +"I'm so glad you could come early," she said, from the corner of the +divan. "Now we can have a talk before dinner. I seem to see so little of +you. I suppose that's the penalty attached to being engaged to the +second biggest man in the state. I'm sometimes jealous, Johnny boy, of +Alleghenia's place in your affections." + +"You're the only person in the world who has no need to be," laughed +Barclay. "What is the news?" + +"Probably," said Natalie, "the only interesting items are that you are +cold and a little cross, and that you want a big chair and a cup of tea +and some hot toast." + +"Your summary of the situation is so exhaustive," said Barclay, "that +there seems to be nothing left for me to say, except that you are the +most beautiful girl in the world, and that I think I must stand still a +moment and just look at you, before I accept any of the luxuries you +suggest." + +"I can't imagine how you know that I'm so beautiful. You can't possibly +see me in this dark corner. But I see I've made one mistake! You are +distinctly _not_ cross." + +"Why should I be?" asked the Lieutenant-Governor, standing before the +table, with his long legs far apart, and rocking from his toes to his +heels and back again. "When a man has been walking for half an hour +through a gnawing February air, and suddenly, out of all proportion to +his deserts, comes full upon a rose in bloom, is that a reason for being +cross?" + +She was very small, and deliciously delicate, was Natalie Rathbawne, +like a little Dresden image, with an arbutus-pink complexion, brown +hair, and deep-blue eyes, now clouded thoughtfully, but oftener alight +with humor, or dilating and clearing under the impetus of conversation. +A doll-like daintiness of tiny pleats and ruffles, fresh bows, and fine +stitching pervaded everything she wore, and if her voice inspired the +hackneyed comparison of running water, it was of water running under +moss, the sound whereof is as different from that of an open brook as is +music from discord. To John Barclay's thinking the barely believable +fact that this little miracle of beauty--this pocket-Venus, as he was +wont to call her--actually belonged to him remained one of the insoluble +mysteries of life. He could not, in the thraldom of his present Elysium, +be expected to remember, even if he had ever fully realized, that he +himself was tall, broad-shouldered, clean-cut, and clean-lived, with the +unmistakable stamp of the American gentleman on his linen and his +simple, well-fitting clothes, and the evidences of a sane, regular +existence in his steady hands and his clear eyes and his firm mouth,--a +man of whom any woman might be, and of whom this particular woman was, +extravagantly proud. For the first tribute which a lover lays at the +feet of his lady is, in ordinary, the stamped-upon and abused summary of +his personal attributes, which, in his own mind, he has taken remarkable +pains to render as despicable as possible, and which, in hers, her +imagination contrives not only to rehabilitate, but to imbue with a +preposterously exaggerated splendor. + +"I wonder," added the Lieutenant-Governor presently, "whether when +gentlemen are invited to tea they are supposed to kiss the hostess on +entering." + +"If you are in any doubt about it," observed Natalie, with an air of +superb indifference, "I advise you to write for advice to the etiquette +editor of the 'Kenton City Record.' She is probably sixty-two years old, +looks like an English walnut, has never had a proposal in her life, and +so knows all about"-- + +What the lady in question was supposed to know all about was for +sufficient reasons never made clear. There are occasions, despite the +manuals of polite behavior, when interruption cannot with any approach +to justice be regarded as rudeness. + +Barclay heaved a long sigh of satisfaction as he took his tea and two +thin slices of toast and settled himself in his chair. + +"Do you think it possible," he asked, "for a man to be asleep for six +weeks, dreaming that he is in another garden of Eden, with an Eve in a +French frock, who has no partiality for apples"-- + +"I _adore_ apples!" said the girl. + +"And then wake up," he continued, disregarding the interruption, "and +find that the dream was only a dream, after all,--that he's only a poor +dog of a politician, that the garden is only a dingy office, and the +flower-beds full of briers and pitfalls?" + +"You've been eating pie for lunch again," said Natalie severely, "and it +always makes you morbid. No; I don't think it possible at all. If I did, +I should hang on to your coattails like fury and keep you in dreamland, +whether you wanted to wake up or not." + +"It's all too good to be true! How _dare_ you be so beautiful?" + +"John"-- + +"It's gospel truth!" + +Barclay paused for a moment, and then went on more seriously. + +"You're tired, littlest and most lovely in the world, and troubled about +something." + +Natalie laughed shortly, with evident effort. + +"Why do you say that?" she asked. + +"Why not? Don't you suppose I know? Do you think you could say a hundred +words without my perceiving that? It almost seems to me that the +knowledge that you were unhappy would make its way to me, no matter what +distance separated us, and that I should come to you at top-speed to set +things right. I've hardly seen your face, and yet I know your dear, deep +eyes are troubled; I had barely heard your voice before I felt its +weariness." + +Natalie bent forward until her face came under the light. + +"Yes, I'm tired," she said; "or, rather, I was tired when I first came +in. I'm better now, since I've had my tea. But you're right, Johnny +boy,--there's something more. I'm troubled, desperately troubled and +heartsick. I've been trying to make myself believe that it's all +imagination, that I have no reason for feeling as I do; but I'm afraid I +can't manage it. John, I thought I saw Spencer Cavendish to-day." + +"Spencer Cavendish? Are you sure? I had almost forgotten his +existence!--Of course, it's not impossible; but I imagined he had taken +root in some South Sea island long ago. That's what he was always +expecting to do, you remember. How I have hated that man!" + +"You were good friends once." + +"Yes, and should be yet, if I had not been the most suspicious mortal +that ever breathed, and he the most hot-blooded. There was a reason, you +know,--a little reason, but the most important in the world! I was +jealous, Natalie, insanely jealous. I could forgive him everything now." + +"That hurts me, John. I'm so happy, boy dear, that I want everybody else +to be happy as well. Oh, why is it that a girl must always have that one +thought on her mind, which is so hard, so hard?--I mean the thought of +the good men, the true, brave, loyal men, whom she has cared for, who +have been her best friends perhaps, and yet whom she has been forced to +hurt bitterly because they asked her for something she was not able to +give. A man has so much easier a road! His happiness, when it comes to +him, isn't clouded by the thought of those to whom it means the loss of +their last remnant of hope. They are there, the disappointed ones, but +he doesn't know, he doesn't know! He hasn't on his conscience the memory +of hearts cruelly wounded,--wounded even to death. He doesn't in memory +see the eagerness in a good friend's eyes die to disillusion, to +hopelessness, to bitter, bitter sorrow. He doesn't have to remember how +the life died suddenly out of a voice that had been tender and eloquent. +He doesn't sicken with the thought that his hand has given a blow so +merciless, so unmerited, and yet so inevitable. Worst of all, for the +girl, is the after-discovery that her decision has made a difference--a +hideous, irreparable difference,--that the man can never be the same +again,--that she has wrecked a life with a word! Oh, there ought to be +some way! The man ought not to ask unless he is sure of the reply! It's +too much responsibility to force upon the girl! + +"So with Spencer Cavendish," she went on after a moment. "In spite of +all--in spite of all, John!--I can't forget that he loved me. I think a +woman never forgets that." + +"Until the man marries another woman!" + +"Ah," said Natalie, with a faint smile, "then least of all, John! And +besides, Spencer never married. He knew I loved you, long before you +did! I felt that it was due to him that he should know; he was my +oldest and best friend then, and so I told him! And then he went out of +my life--out of his own--into darkness. I can't forget it! I can't +forget that I broke up your friendship"-- + +"Dearest!" + +"I did, John! It wasn't my fault, perhaps, nor any one's, for that +matter, but I did, just the same. Besides, it wasn't only the question +of your friendship. What hurt me most was the wilful wreck of his life. +And yet, how could I have known what was going to happen? What could I +do when it did happen? He was beyond my reach. He didn't even answer the +letter I wrote, asking him to come and see me. I thought, if he cared +for me, I could save him. But it was just as he had said,--he must have +everything, or he would have nothing at all. And so he went wrong--oh, +so terribly, terribly wrong!--he who might have been anything, if it +hadn't been for me. I can never forget it--never! I can never forget the +pity of it, the tragedy of its awful publicity, the newspapers, the +scandal, people's sneers, his mother dying of a broken heart--_and I did +it_! Think of it! Think of a man like Spencer Cavendish in the police +courts, not once, but a dozen times. Think of what Justice Meyer called +him at last, and what was printed in the papers,--'a common drunk!' Oh, +John!" + +"Natalie, Natalie!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "Why should you +think of such things, brood over them, above all, blame them on +yourself? How could it possibly have been your fault? how could you +possibly have helped it? He was a reckless, hot-headed chap--brilliant, +of course, but a slave to his impulses and his nerves. If Lochinvars +could act with impunity nowadays, he'd have ridden up to your door on a +black horse, killed Thomas, and carried you off across his pommel. As it +was, he let himself go, and disgraced himself. I tried to talk to him, +just as you did, but he wouldn't have it--called me 'an insolent cub' +and--er--worse. I had to give it up. It was all very distressing, I +admit, but then, dear, it was all so long ago. He hasn't been in Kenton +City for two years and more, and I've no doubt he pulled himself +together long since, and is leading a straight life somewhere. He had +lots in him, with all his recklessness. A chap like that, with no family +hanging about his neck, and with his brains, and only his own living to +make, could forge ahead almost anywhere." + +"But John, I'm _sure_ I saw him to-day, and suppose I should tell you +that he was--begging?" + +Barclay almost smiled at her earnest, troubled face, as he replaced his +cup on the table. + +"Begging?" he answered. "I'm afraid I couldn't bring myself to believe +you, violet-eyes. Even granting that he has fallen as low as that, which +I should think one of the most unlikely things in the world, it would +hardly be in Kenton City, would it?--a place where his face is known to +a thousand people. Tell me about it. What makes you think you saw him?" + +"I was shopping this morning," said Natalie, "all alone; and as I came +out of Kendrick's and was just about to get into the brougham, I saw +that some one was holding the door open for me. I looked up carelessly, +as one naturally would under the circumstances, and, John--I know it was +he! At first I thought so, and then I didn't, because he was so changed, +so thin and pale, and because he had a beard. So, before I thought what +I was doing, I stepped into the brougham, and put my hand on the door to +close it. Then I looked up again, and saw his face, peering in at me +through the glass, and that time there couldn't be any mistake. It +_was_! I was going to speak, but he was gone in a flash. I saw him +disappearing in the crowd before the shop--_slinking_, John!--with that +dreadfully pathetic air which all beggars have, his shoulders all +hunched up, and his head bent, and his hands in his pockets. He was +cold, John, I could see that, and, no doubt, hungry! And there I was, in +that dreadful little brougham, with my hateful furs, as warm as toast, +and I didn't even speak to him. I could have died of shame!" + +She buried her face in her hands, bending low over the tea-table. +Barclay was leaning forward in his chair, his lips set. + +"It's impossible," he murmured, "impossible!" + +The girl looked up suddenly, a white spot in the centre of each cheek, +where the pressure of her thumbs had left its mark in the tender, pink +flesh. + +"Improbable--yes!" she said, "but not impossible. Oh, I wish I could +believe otherwise, but I'm sure, I'm sure! Oh, John! You are so big, so +strong, so powerful now! Think of it--Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia! +You can do anything. And if he _is_ here in Kenton City, homeless, cold, +starving, you must find and help him--for me, Johnny boy, for me!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor had risen, and was pacing up and down the room, +with his brows knit, and his strong, white hands chafing slowly against +each other, palm to palm. It seemed impossible, indeed! Spencer +Cavendish, the last of one of Alleghenia's proudest families; Spencer +Cavendish, the brilliant young society pet and sportsman; Spencer +Cavendish, the wit, the _viveur_--a beggar in the street? And yet-- + +The scandal of Cavendish's sudden and reckless plunge into sodden, open +dissipation, two years before, freshly called to Barclay's mind by +Natalie's words, had pointed to almost any finale, however debased, +however sordid. Barclay mentally invoked the face of his former friend, +as he had seen it on the occasion of their last meeting, flushed, +swollen-eyed, insolent, the fine patrician mouth hideously contorted and +maundering insults, filth, banality. + +"And I did it!" the girl was saying. "Don't forget that, John. +Unwittingly, ignorantly, helplessly, if you will, I did it, just the +same. If I could have loved him, I could have saved him. As it was, I +had to send him away, and he has come to--to this! Oh, don't you see? +Don't you understand that something more than chance has crossed my path +with his, just at this moment of my supremest happiness, and of his +utter degradation? My duty is plain. It is to help him, to uplift him, +to make a man of him once more--to undo what I have done! I'm +responsible--and I'm helpless! What can I do? What can any girl do in +such a case? I can't go out into the streets and search for him. I can +only turn to you, Johnny boy, and rely upon your aid." + +"But, Natalie dearest," said the Lieutenant-Governor slowly, "don't you +see that it is impossible, all this? I cannot allow such an affair to +come into your pure, sweet life, bringing with it the knowledge of the +depths to which men may fall, and the shadow of misery and degradation. +I cannot bear that, in even the remotest way, you should blame yourself +for that which it was never in your power to prevent or remedy. A +man--this man--has no business to cast on you the blight of his own +weakness and folly, to establish a relation of cause and effect between +your refusal of him and the subsequent transformation of a gentleman +into a common drunkard." + +"John!" + +"Ah, don't think me bitter, dearest! If the man you saw was actually +Cavendish, I pity him from the bottom of my heart. But it was his hands +which built up the barrier between his life and ours, and it must be his +that tear it down. It is intolerable that in his degradation he should +come into your life again, and have, even in your imagination, the +smallest claim upon you--intolerable! The paths of my love for you and +my duty toward you are identical in this respect. There can be no +alternative--no quibbling. At least until he has redeemed himself, if +redemption is still possible, the thought of him, his presence, his +misdoings, must not and shall not contaminate the atmosphere in which +you live and move." + +Natalie had risen suddenly, her eyes ablaze. + +"Ah, John!" she said. "Am I then a toy, a sugar figure, that I must be +packed in cotton, and shielded from all knowledge of the evil in the +world? Is that what it means to be a woman? Ah, _no_! It is bad enough +to be hemmed in by the wretched conventionalities which prevent my doing +openly what I conceive to be my duty, without adding to the restrictions +that actually exist the imaginary one that I must not even think of the +misery, the wretchedness, the sordid vice which abound just across the +borders of the comfortable little world in which I live. And see, boy +dear!--with all the force of my conviction that things should be +otherwise, yet I am reasonable. I don't ask to see Spencer, or to have +an active hand in his redemption. I realize that the time for that has +passed, and that you are just in saying that he must come to me, not I +to him--and come to me another than the man he is to-day. Anything else +is impossible: that I see and accept. But the hideous fact remains. A +man who loved me once, who offered me all that a man can offer a woman, +is walking the streets of Kenton City, cold, hungry, homeless--a +beggar! What business is it of yours or mine what his past follies and +weaknesses were? His temptations may have been beyond our understanding, +but his present plight is not. He is begging--begging at our very +doors--a man whom we have called by the name of friend! I can't help +him. All I can do, as I said before, is to turn to you, whom I love +better than all the world, and ask you to save him, in my stead. Ah, +boy, boy!--I've given you all I refused to him, taken at your hands all +I put away at his. You can afford to be generous!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor came slowly toward her, and, placing his hands +upon her shoulders, looked her in the eyes. + +"Dearest and Most Beautiful," he said tenderly, "you are right. I +hope--I believe--that you were overwrought, fanciful, that it is not +true. But if it is, if Cavendish is begging in our streets, then, so +surely as I am Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, I will pull him out of +them, and make a man of him, if it takes a month and every police +officer and detective in Kenton City to find him. And that not alone for +your sake, tenderest-hearted, but for mine. I _can_ afford to be +generous, God bless your sweet face, I can indeed!" + +And he bent over reverently, and kissed her hand. + + + + +IV + +AS BETWEEN FRIENDS + + +There were but two guests at the Rathbawnes' dinner-table that night, +the Lieutenant-Governor and Colonel Amos Broadcastle, a veteran of the +Rebellion, brevetted Major for conspicuous gallantry at Lookout +Mountain, and now commanding officer of the Ninth Regiment, N. G. A., +the crack militia organization of Kenton City. Colonel Broadcastle had +seen his sixty-five, but his broad, square shoulders, his rigid +carriage, and his black hair, even now only slightly touched with gray, +clipped twenty years from his appearance. His eye was one that was +famous throughout the Alleghenia Guard,--an eye accustomed to control, +not a single man, or two, or three, but a thousand, moving as one at his +command; an eye enforcing obedience immediate, machine-like, and +unquestioning. + +It had been a momentous day for the Ninth when Amos Broadcastle, +retiring from the staff of a former Governor, had accepted, first a +majority therein, and then, three months later, its colonelcy. He found +ten companies, in no one instance exceeding twenty files front. He found +a field and staff vain, incompetent, and jealous; company officers +deficient alike in their knowledge of tactics and in their conception of +their responsibilities; sergeants, corporals, and lances chosen without +any view to fitness, and ignorant and tyrannical in their positions; and +finally, the rank and file lazy, untidy, and frankly contemptuous of the +school of the soldier. Some one had once said of the Ninth that there +was consolation to be found in the mortifying knowledge that the men +composing it were there with the unique view of escaping jury duty. The +consolation lay in the probability that such infernally bad soldiers +would have made jurors quite as infernally bad. + +But Broadcastle, a born disciplinarian and a trained tactician, was now +in a position to echo, albeit in a different spirit, the arrogance of +Louis: "_Nous avons change tout cela!_" Ten years had sufficed to change +the indolent and incompetent Ninth of Alleghenia into a regiment +rivaling in prestige the Seventh of New York. The commissioned officers +were thrust upon, rather than achieved by, their companies, but, once +established in their respective positions, proceeded without exception +to justify, by their energy and ability, their selection from the best +element of Kenton City. Among the enlisted men the exponents of the old +spirit of sloth, indifference, and laxity were weeded out as fast as +their terms of service expired, and their places filled from the same +sources whence the company officers were drawn. Colonel Broadcastle was +a diplomat as well as a disciplinarian. By some unknowable system of +suggestion and example it came, little by little, to be regarded in +Kenton City as "the thing" to belong to the Ninth. Before the capital +was aware of the transformation, every company roster read 103, the +field and staff had been reorganized and perfected, and the Ninth +Regiment, N. G. A., was what it remained thereafter: a magnificent +fighting machine, ably drilled, perfectly equipped, a credit to the +state, to the credit of which there stood so little else. The +declaration of war with Spain brought it suddenly into prominence by the +astonishing readiness with which it went into camp twenty hours after +the Adjutant-General of Alleghenia published the President's call for +volunteers; and although it never saw active service, it attracted at +Chickamauga, and later at Tampa, the admiring attention of the regular +army, and was spoken of as the most perfect body among the volunteer +forces. + +The citizens of Kenton City were not accustomed to discovering things in +which they could take pride. The exact contrary was more apt to be the +case. When, therefore, they discovered the rehabilitated Ninth, and its +redeemer in the person of its commanding officer, they had a deal to +say, and said it with unexampled arrogance and satisfaction. +Thenceforward, Alleghenia meant much to Colonel Broadcastle, and +Colonel Broadcastle considerably more than much to Alleghenia. + +Something of all this went through the Lieutenant-Governor's mind during +the progress of the dinner. He sat at Mrs. Rathbawne's right, than which +nothing in the world could have been more cheerless, unless it was +sitting at Mrs. Rathbawne's left. But the good lady's habitual +complacency was plainly in abeyance, her customary volubility replaced +by a fidgety reserve. The dinner, as a social achievement, was a +distinct failure, save in so far as Mrs. Wynyard and Colonel Broadcastle +were concerned. Several months before, Mrs. Wynyard had frankly +announced that she had designs upon the Colonel. Latterly, Barclay had +begun to suspect the Colonel of having designs upon Mrs. Wynyard. Thirty +and sixty-five that looked forty-five--a widow and a widower! More +wonderful things had happened. + +"If I were thirty years younger," Broadcastle was saying even now, as he +did full justice to the celery mayonnaise, "I should say we were made +for each other." + +"Since two single people may be made for each other," laughed Mrs. +Wynyard, "I wonder if two married people can't be unmade for each other. +Perhaps that is just what has happened to us!" + +"I'll think that over," replied the Colonel with mock gravity. "I don't +want to commit myself on so serious a hypothesis, without due +reflection." + +They were the only ones who were thoroughly at ease. Barclay and +Natalie, unstrung by the events of the day, ate little and talked +listlessly. Dorothy, victim to an inward excitement which was half +happiness and half disappointment, chattered feverishly. Rathbawne was +wrapped in his own thoughts, and his wife, innocently unobservant of +emotional manifestations in any and every other, but pathetically +sensitive to the slightest evidence of mental perturbation in this +stern, kind man, between herself and whom existed a devotion dog-like in +its silence and intensity, watched his clouded face with an anxiety +which she made no effort to conceal. The dinner dragged hopelessly, +until she shook herself into a bewildered realization that it was over, +folded her napkin scrupulously, dusted a few crumbs from the black-satin +slope of her obsolete lap, and, followed by her daughters and Mrs. +Wynyard, left the men to their cordials and cigars. + +The latter drew their chairs nearer, as the door closed, made little +clearings in the wilderness of finger-bowls, silver, and discarded +napkins, for the accommodation of their coffee-cups and cordial glasses, +and, lighting the long Invincibles which were Rathbawne's sole +extravagance, inhaled that first matchless whiff of smoke which makes a +whole day of anxiety and vexation seem to have been worth the while. + +It is a moment apart and _sui generis_, this, and is rivaled only by +that of early morning realization that one is awake--and not obliged to +get up. It is apt to pass in silence, for a newly lit cigar is like a +newly married wife: a man is deliberately oblivious to all else. The +moment, too, is one of readjustment, of hasty mental survey of the +chatter that has passed, and of preparation for the essentially +dissimilar talk to come. With men of the mental calibre of the three +here assembled this opportunity is sacred to some of the gravest and +most vital thoughts which they exchange. Peter Rathbawne, in particular, +whenever he reviewed the paramount conversations of his life, seemed to +find their significance indissolubly fused with the fragrance of Havana +cigars and the taste of kuemmel or yellow Chartreuse. + +His eyes dwelt thoughtfully upon his companions during the pause which +followed. First, on Broadcastle. He could depend upon him as he could +depend upon no other man on earth. They had fought side by side in many +a tight place in the black days of '62, and in many another, full as +tight, since then, on battlefields commercial and political. It is +doubtful whether so much as a single word of admiration or affection had +ever passed between them. It is equally doubtful whether anything could +have been more entirely superfluous than such a voicing of self-evident +sentiments. + +John Barclay, too! Peter Rathbawne, with what had been natural +shrewdness at the outset now sharpened almost to clairvoyance by his +years of dealing with a multiplicity of men and things, understood the +Lieutenant-Governor absolutely, and admired him with all the force of +his rugged nature. And Rathbawne was not given to admiring people. His +business experience had not fostered the spirit of hero-worship. He had +seen too much for that. But in the two men before him he recognized +qualities so unusual, and in many ways so similar, that he was proud to +count them friends. + +For the moment, however, as he took stock of them, he was measuring them +by a new standard, more rigid, more severe than he had hitherto had +reason to apply. It is one thing to trust a man implicitly, and another +thing entirely to try to tell him so. For silence is most golden in the +specification of friendship, and when employed in the particularizing of +intimate emotion the silver of speech is apt to turn to veriest tinsel. + +Yet the occasion was one which demanded speech. Moreover, and in direct +opposition to his inclinations and the precedents he had established, he +was forced not only to give practical expression to his feeling for +Broadcastle and Barclay, but, what humiliated as well as annoyed him, to +confess himself incapable of dealing with a question which confronted +him. It was the first time within his recollection when he had +mistrusted his own judgment. + +But Peter Rathbawne was not the man to procrastinate, and presently he +began to speak, in a low but curiously intense voice, from which the +others instinctively took their cue. He was a short man, inclined to +stoutness, but with the clear, sharp eye and the underhang of jaw which +tell of right principle and indomitable perseverance. It was a question +whether in calling him the second most obstinate man in Alleghenia, +Governor Abbott had given him the full measure of his due. + +"Gentlemen," he said, with the somewhat stilted formality which was part +of his manner, "I will say to you what I wouldn't say to others,--I'm in +a hole, and I want your advice. I'll be as brief as possible, and I'll +come right to the point. For thirty years I've been building up the +Rathbawne Mills, giving them every hour of my thought, every particle of +my strength, every atom of my ability. I've seen them grow from a little +shanty on the outskirts of Kenton City to a collection of buildings +covering four solid squares, filled with modern machinery, and employing +four thousand, two hundred and odd hands. I've been a business man, I've +been a rigid man, but I've been a fair man, too. No one can say that I +ever clipped wages, even when I had to run the mills at a loss, as I've +had to do more than once. I gave my people an eight-hour day long before +the law of Alleghenia jammed it down the throats of other mill-owners. +I swallowed the Union, though it was a bitter mouthful. There has never +been a just complaint from one of my employees that wasn't attended to +in short order, if it was in my power to do so. There's many an old +fossil on my pay-rolls to-day who isn't worth his salt, but he stays +there, and will continue to stay there, because he did his best when he +could, and it's not his fault that he's dead wood now. I've given in, +over and over again, in one way or another, sometimes against my +convictions, and oftener against my will. But one thing I've stuck to, +and that's my right to discharge a hand when I see fit, without +dictation from the Union or anybody else. In the past, this has been +comparatively easy sailing. One man, now and again, isn't a ripple on +the surface of four thousand employees. Besides, there was always a good +reason. The others saw that, and there was never a finger raised. They +believed in me, through and through, and it has been my pride to know +that they did, and that they had good cause to. But now it's different. +There has been a band of young good-for-nothings in Shop 22, who were +full, chock-a-block, of socialism, and equality, and workingmen's +rights, and God knows what-not! They've talked enough poisonous gas to +the other hands to blow up a state. They distributed pamphlets, and made +speeches, and organized clubs, and fomented discord, till I got sick and +tired of it. There wasn't one square day's work in the whole fifteen of +them put together. So, when I'd stood them as long as I could--which was +at ten o'clock yesterday morning--I discharged them all in a bunch, and +if there'd been a steep place handy, I'd have expected to see them all +run violently down it into the sea--like the other swine, in Scripture. +For if ever there was a band of devils made incarnate, it was that same +fifteen who were sowing anarchy broadcast through the Rathbawne Mills! + +"Now--what? Lo and behold, they are all henchmen and disciples of +Michael McGrath, whom we in Kenton City know to our cost, and regular +and loyal members--save the mark!--of his Union. Well, gentlemen, I've +got that Union about my ears like a nest of hornets, with McGrath at the +head, and unless those fifteen men are reinstated by noon to-morrow, my +four thousand hands will be out on strike, and the Rathbawne Mills will +be tied up as tight as a drum!" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle curtly, as the other paused. + +"That's what I meant to do--but where am I going to come out? If I +thought, for instance, that I was going to have your regiment to back me +up, Broadcastle, or even the Kenton City police, why, well and good! But +_am_ I? No, sir! _No_, sir! Not with Elijah Abbott in the Governor's +chair, I'm not! You know that as well as I. Why, Broadcastle, I'd rather +see McGrath himself at the capitol than that smooth-spoken skunk!" + +He paused to relight his cigar, and then continued. + +"The Rathbawne Mills are like the fruit of my own body to me. I love +them! I love every stone and brick of them, that I've put in place, as +it were, with my own hands. I've often thought that if they should burn +down it would come close to killing me. And yet I could watch them go +with a lighter heart, God knows, than that with which I foresee the +misery that's coming to these people of mine, who are going to starve at +the bidding of a band of black-legs, and that not even because they +think their cause a just one, but simply because they can't help +themselves. It isn't only that ruin's staring me in the face, though +there's that possibility in the situation, too, but that privation, +bitter misery, and despair are lying in wait for them. God!--what an +iniquity! + +"But I _can't_ give in, Broadcastle--I _can't_ give in, John Barclay! It +means the sacrifice of a principle I've held out for, and that I know is +right. What's more, it isn't as if I were yielding one point. It would +only be the beginning. If I give in now, I might as well turn over the +mills to McGrath at once, and let him run them according to his own +blackguardly will. You know how such things go. Give them an inch"-- + +"And they raise a hell!" put in Colonel Broadcastle. + +"Exactly! It's commercial suicide. And yet, if I _don't_ yield, I'm +precipitating disorder, and bloodshed, and the untold suffering of four +thousand souls. What am I to do?" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle, with a sharp nod of his head. + +Rathbawne turned from him to the Lieutenant-Governor, and to the latter, +knowing the man he had been, there was something indescribably +heart-rending in the sudden, irresolute trembling of his half-raised +hands, the slow shake of his head, and the pathos of his raised eyebrows +and drooping lips. + +"John," he said, "I'm an old man, and you're a young one, but I'm a +plain citizen, and you're the Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia. You +know how things stand. Now, I've given you my girl, and after that it's +not much to put myself into your hands as well. I'm getting on. My +strength isn't what it was. I'm not as fit to stand such a struggle as +this is bound to be, as I was thirty years ago. I look strong, but, in +reality, I'm not. My doctor has warned me, more than once. A sudden +shock--you know what these medical chaps say about sudden shocks! I've +laughed at him, of course, and yet--I know there is truth in it. I've +been up against hard propositions, but never one as hard as this. I've +had big responsibilities, but never a responsibility that I felt as I +feel this one. If I hold out, I know what people and the newspapers will +say,--how they'll blackguard me,--but I'm not afraid of that. I'm not +even thinking of it. No, and I'm not thinking of what the strain may +mean to me. Every man's turn is sure to come--why not one way as well as +another? But what I _am_ thinking of is the result upon the lives of +these people whom I've made, as surely as if I were another Creator. And +McGrath's another Beelzebub! There's a fight on between us for the +salvation of a little world of four thousand souls! But I'm not God! I +can't act with the conviction of omniscience. I've been the most +independent of men. I've made my own fortune with my own brains. I've +done as I saw fit, and the results have seemed to indicate that I've +been oftener right than wrong. But now, I'm at a loss. It's not the men +I'm thinking of so much. They ought to be able to make their own way, as +I've made mine. It's the women and children dependent upon them--the +women and children who have no voice in the matter, and yet who are +bound to suffer most by a strike. I've got to think for them. I've +reached a crisis--a cross-ways--and I've got to choose which course to +take--and I can't! All my experience counts for nothing. I've never--you +probably know it--asked for advice before. But now I must have the +unprejudiced, the outside point of view. I've always thought there was a +clear, unmistakable boundary between right and wrong, but now there's +some right in the wrong, and a big sight more of wrong in the right! +I've heard Broadcastle's opinion, and I want yours. If you agree, I'll +go by what you say. As I said before, John, in this matter I'm the +individual--you're the state. I'll go by what you say. What shall I do?" + +Peter Rathbawne's words had wrought tremendously upon the +Lieutenant-Governor. He answered slowly, looking down, and with a +perceptible tremor in his voice. + +"Mr. Rathbawne, you and the Colonel know how high-sounding my title is, +and how little, in reality, it means. There is no need to go into +details. I'm Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, yes!--and as helpless in +the cause of right as a new-born baby! If I could by any means, in any +manner, support the advice I gave you, I would give it willingly." + +"John!" said Peter Rathbawne, "I don't mean that. I've put the case +wrongly. Give me your counsel, not as Lieutenant-Governor, but as my +friend, and the man who loves my daughter!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor raised his eyes from the finger-tips with which, +as the other was speaking, he had been plucking at the cloth. + +"Fight them, Mr. Rathbawne," he said, "and may God help you--because I +can't!" + + + + +V + +A BRAND FROM THE BURNING + + +More heartsick than he cared to confess, even to himself, the +Lieutenant-Governor left the Rathbawnes' earlier than his wont, despite +the fact that his host and Colonel Broadcastle were still engaged in +discussing the impending situation, and that Natalie, with a batch of +new music, was waiting for him at the piano. He pleaded an unusually +busy day and his consequent fatigue as an excuse, and so, at half after +nine, found himself about to light a second cigar, on the steps of the +Rathbawne residence, and shivering a little in the night air, which +stung the inside of his nostrils and set his eyes watering. Raw as the +day had been, it had turned colder now, but the night was superbly +clear. The sky seemed to have drawn nearer to the earth, and the stars +twinkled so sharply and clearly against its deep blue-black that they +resembled in form their conventionally five-pointed counterfeits of +silver paper. A brisk wind whirled a few dried leaves in whispering +eddies across the smooth asphaltum of the driveway, but beyond this and +the peevish sputtering of the arc-light on the opposite corner there was +no sound. It was the kind of night which, with its crystal clearness and +its steely intensity, stirs the normal pulse to keen exhilaration: yet +never had John Barclay felt more hopelessly dispirited, more utterly at +a loss to see the way before him. That anxiety, distress, possibly +actual disaster should be impending over this house where lay his heart, +his happiness, and his hope, was sufficiently disturbing in itself. That +he should not be able, despite his position, to raise a hand to avert +the calamity was worse. But that the battle was to be a battle for the +right, and yet, as it seemed, foredoomed from the start to end in +disaster, since no aid could be expected from the strong arm of the law +to which the partisans of principle turn naturally for support: this +was worst of all. For out of dangerous surroundings he felt himself able +to snatch away the littlest and most lovely woman in the world. She, at +least, should not suffer. And out of this nightmare of powerless +prominence, of impotent position, he himself could retire into private +life, and be no less a man than he had been before. But from the +reproach of corruption which had fallen upon her, and the impending slur +of anarchy, who was to rescue Alleghenia? The Lieutenant-Governor set +his lips and drove his nails into his palms, as he stood in the shadow +of the Rathbawnes' doorway, looking up at the sky of the February night. +He was not a religious man--as the term goes--but in that moment he said +a better prayer for the welfare of his state than had ever lain upon the +lips of any priest in Kenton City! + +He was about to strike his match when an instinct rather than an actual +perception of movement arrested his hand. Bradbury Avenue, upon which +stood the Rathbawne house, was situated in one of the quieter residence +districts which prided itself on the turfed spaces between its +dwellings, pretentious enough for the most part, and the double rows of +trees which lined its thoroughfares. It was one of these trees which, at +the moment, attracted Barclay's attention. It lay in a direct line +between himself and the arc-light on the corner, and its trunk, in some +miraculous manner, had abruptly developed an elbow, and then an arm. The +Lieutenant-Governor was still staring at this phenomenon when it was as +abruptly explained by the sudden emergence from shadow of a man, who had +apparently been standing on the side of the tree nearest to the house. +He was crossing the avenue obliquely when something about his bearing +caused the Lieutenant-Governor to lean forward and follow him intently +with his eyes. It was all there, as Natalie had said--the lifted +shoulders, the bent head, the unmistakable, pathetic air of the beggar. +Then, as he neared the light, he gave a short upward strain to his neck +and chin, the impatient movement of a man whose collar annoys him. The +trick was too familiar to have been forgotten. The next moment Barclay's +heels were pounding on the asphaltum behind him, and then Barclay's hand +fell upon his shoulder and whirled him round. + +In the oddly intense radiance of the arc-light above, which cut sharply +across the surface of forehead, cheek, and chin, and left heavy shadows +like those in a roughly blocked-out carving, under brow, nose, and lower +lip, the two men faced each other briefly, in silence. Then the +Lieutenant-Governor voiced the other's name, hardly above a whisper. + +"Spencer Cavendish!" + +And the other, echoing the tone, if not the words, replied:-- + +"Bar-clay!" + +A square away, the lights of a hansom winked into the avenue, and the +hoof-beats of the horse clonked on the pavement, unaccompanied by any +sound from the smoothly trundling, rubber-tired wheels. Barclay stepped +to the kerb, and hailed the driver with his stick. The cab drew in, +stopped, and threw the divisions of its apron wide, like two black hands +extended in cordial welcome. + +The Lieutenant-Governor turned to his companion. + +"Get in," he said. "I want to have a talk with you." + +The drive of a mile and more from Bradbury Avenue to Barclay's quarters +in the new bachelor apartment-house "Rockingham" was accomplished +without the exchange of a word. Once, he felt his companion shiver, and +dragging a rug from under them, he spread it across their knees. That +was the only movement on the part of either. They sat, side by side, +looking straight before them over the horse's bobbing crupper, until the +hansom pulled up sharply before the broad and brilliantly illuminated +entrance of the "Rockingham." As they passed in, Cavendish had a passing +impression of tiled floors, columns of green marble, and attendants in +tightly fitting green uniforms with brass buttons. Then an elevator +whirled them up to the eighth floor, deposited them in a square hallway, +and vanished again, with the little page in charge wrinkling his nose +and biting the thumb of his cotton glove. + +"Wot's the Loot'nt-Guvnor up to now, Sawed-Off?" inquired the doorkeeper +genially, as the elevator returned to the ground floor. + +"Ide'no!" replied the little page with equal affability. "Goin' in fer +pol'tics, I guest. Jeest! Wot a slob it wuz--wot?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor unlocked the door of his apartment, touched an +electric button which flooded the little hall and the drawing-room +beyond with light, and, entering the latter, went directly to a closet +in the wall. Unlocking this, he took out a jar of biscuits and a +decanter, and setting them upon the table, turned once more to his +companion. + +"Put away a couple of those biscuits and a glass of sherry," he said, +"and then we'll talk." + +"I'm past biscuits," said the other, almost sullenly. + +"I'll see to that," replied Barclay. "They are only by way of a +starter." + +He passed into the hall as he spoke, and presently Cavendish heard the +click of a telephone receiver slipping from its crotch, and Barclay's +voice speaking, to some one below, of a steak, vegetables, salad, and +coffee. He stepped to the table, devoured two or three of the biscuits +ravenously, poured himself a glass of sherry, sipped, and then swallowed +it, and flung himself down upon a wide divan. + +"Have you a cigarette?" he asked, as Barclay reentered. "I haven't +smoked in three days. That's worse than mere hunger, you know." + +"I believe you!" + +Barclay pushed a silver box across the table, and seating himself +opposite, touched a match to the cigar which he had been about to light +at the Rathbawnes' door, and which he still held between his lips. + +"Help yourself," he added. "Your supper will be up presently. Meanwhile, +shall I fire away, or will you?" + +Cavendish let the first smoke from his cigarette curl slowly up his +cheek before replying. In the full light now first resting upon it, his +face showed as that of a man approximately Barclay's age, but pinched by +want, and deeply lined by dissipation. His under lids were puffy and +discolored, and a dozen heavy creases ran, fan-like, from the corners of +his eyes. Hair already turning white and an unkempt mustache and beard +completed the picture. His clothes were faded and frayed, no linen was +visible, and his boots were cracked and soggy. There was nothing about +him to suggest the former estate of gentleman save his hands, which, +while thin and tremulous, were clean and well-kept, in singular contrast +to the slovenliness of his attire. + +"Age before respectability," he said in reply to Barclay's question, +with a shrug. "I'll go first. It will save your asking questions. We +parted in anger, Barclay." + +"Let that pass," put in the Lieutenant-Governor, briefly. "Two years +wipe out all scores as petty as was the cause of our quarrel." + +"Well, then," continued Cavendish more easily, "when I left Kenton City, +it was with the best intention in the world of making a fresh start in +some place where my story wasn't known. I went to New York. I had a +little money, but only a very little, and not the most remote idea of +how difficult it is for a man to make his way in a place where he is +unknown, particularly if he has no credentials and is too proud to ask +for any from his old associates. Moreover, I'd been drinking hard for +six months and there was no such thing as clipping it short all at once. +I had an idea of tapering off, and perhaps, if I had found a job, I +might have done so. As it was I climbed up one step and fell down two, +and that went on indefinitely. It wasn't as if I'd had a distinct aim or +anything in my life which made it seem worth living. I didn't half care. +I'd set my heart on something which I couldn't get, and--well, never +mind that. It is all as long ago as the Flood! I got work now and again, +tried reporting, and teaching, and copying. But each time it was a grade +lower, and I stuck to nothing but the whiskey--except when I had a +little more money than usual, and then it was absinthe." + +He touched his eyes, and then raised his hand to the level of his chin, +with the fingers held wide apart and rigid, and watched it tremble for +an instant in silence. + +"I haven't seen a mirror in weeks," he went on, "but I know the signs +are all there. That's the story. I could string it out for an hour, but +it would all be in the same key. I've simply been going down, down, +down. I'm what the old judge called me--do you remember it came out in +the 'Record?'--I'm a common drunk, Barclay. And I don't care! I've been +on the point of putting an end to it many a time--but I always held out +for another drink! Now, even my pride's gone. It stuck to me longer than +anything else, but it's taken itself off at last. I've been feeling +lately that I'm pretty near the end, and I wanted to see Kenton City +again before it came. That's the reason I walked all the way from +Pittsburg, and I've been begging on the streets since I got in. I +thought nobody would recognize me." + +"But _I_ did," said Barclay. + +"Yes, and--and"-- + +"Yes, and _she_ did! She saw you this morning, but before she took in +fully that it was you, you were gone in the crowd. She was half +heart-broken over it, and made me promise to look you up. I was going to +do so, when I tumbled against you by chance to-night. You were watching +the house?" + +"Yes, for the last time. I saw she had recognized me and that Kenton +City was no place for me. So I was off again to-night. Is she"-- + +"She is well, and, I am glad to say, happy. We are to be married in the +autumn." + +A smile hovered for an instant on Cavendish's lips. + +"God bless her!" he said slowly. "I'm glad of it. But don't let's talk +of that. She's as far above me as the stars!" + +"And as far above me, too, for that matter!" answered Barclay. "Here's +your supper. While you're eating, I'll take my turn at the talk." + +A bell-boy arranged the tray on the table, removed the covers, and in a +moment the two men were again alone. With a deep sigh of satisfaction +Cavendish drew a chair to the table and set to work on the steaming +dishes before him. + +"Jupiter!" he said, with the first mouthful poised on his fork, "you +don't know what this means, Barclay, and you can thank God you don't. I +won't attempt to thank you. Go on, and tell me about yourself." + +"I've no intention of doing that just at present," replied the +Lieutenant-Governor, settling himself more comfortably in his chair. "I +want to talk about you. Don't be afraid. I'm not going to preach! But I +_am_ going to say that while I understand a good deal of what you've +said, the last part is pure rot! You're a bit of a wreck, of course, but +it isn't your pride or your self-respect or whatever you choose to call +it, that's gone. It's only your nerve. Now you've had your experience, +and you're back where you belong, and you've friends who like you, and +who can help you, and who will. I'm in a position to do so myself, and I +don't expect you to make any bones about accepting my assistance, and +whatever money you need for the moment. It will be a loan, of course, to +be repaid when you're on your feet again. We'll have you there in no +time. When you've made way with the grub, you can bunk down on that +divan for the night, and in the morning I'll tog you out in one of my +outfits, and you can set about getting back on _terra firma_. You'll +have to shake the drink, that goes without saying." + +Cavendish straightened himself suddenly, laid down his knife and fork, +and laughed shortly. + +"It sounds well," he said bitterly, "but you don't understand, Barclay. +It's too late! I don't care, and if I did, I couldn't shake the drink to +save my immortal soul. I'm steady enough for the time being, because I'm +hungry and because I'm being fed. But I've tried the other game too +often. I know what it means. I wouldn't promise you to quit, because I +don't want to lie to you, and that's all it would be. When the craving +comes back, I'll go down before it like a row of tenpins. No, Barclay, +it won't do." + +"Nonsense, man! Do you want to tell me you're as weak as that?" + +"Every bit!" said Cavendish, attacking the steak again. + +"Well, I don't believe it, that's all. In the morning you'll be a +different man. I'll give you a bromide when you're ready for bed. You're +shaky, as it is, but that's all a matter of nerves. Now we'll drop the +subject, and talk of other things." + +It was midnight when they separated. Barclay brought out sheets and +blankets for the divan, produced pajamas for his guest, put the bath at +his disposal, and mixed a strong dose of bromide for him to take upon +retiring. + +Half an hour later, when he reentered the drawing-room to see whether +Cavendish was in need of anything further, he found him standing by the +table in his pajamas, trembling, wide-eyed, and very pale. + +"What is it?" he asked. "Are you ill?" + +"No," answered Cavendish, striving in vain to control the trembling of +his lips, "only damnably nervous. Could you--could you give me a drop of +brandy, Barclay?" + +"Certainly not!" said the Lieutenant-Governor. "Pull yourself together, +man! There's your bromide. Take that. It's better than a thousand +brandies." + +Cavendish turned, lifted the glass, spilling a little as he did so, and +swallowed the sedative at a gulp. Then he stretched himself upon the +divan and drew the covers close up about his chin. Presently, from the +bedroom, Barclay heard him breathing deeply and regularly, and turning +on his side, fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep. + +He awoke with a start, as the dawn was showing gray through the chinks +of his window curtains, with a vague, uneasy sense of something wrong, +and lay listening, every nerve strained taut. From the adjoining room +came the sound of Cavendish's breathing, but now it was more raucous, +more like groan following groan. The Lieutenant-Governor strove in vain +to put off the foreboding which lay heavy upon him, until, finally, +unable to resist the impulse, he rose, slid his feet into his slippers, +and going noiselessly into the drawing-room, stepped to the windows and +put the curtains softly aside. What first met his eye as he turned was +the door of his little wine-closet in the wall. It was standing wide +open, and about the lock the wood was hacked and hewed away in great +splinters. On a chair near by lay a rough knife with the blade open and +a sliver of wood yet sticking to the point. Then he looked toward the +divan. Cavendish was lying face down upon it, outside the blankets, +with his head lolling sharply over the edge. His left arm was extended +full length toward the ground, where his fingers just touched a bottle +of French absinthe, overturned upon its side, and uncorked, with the +thick, gummy liquid spread from its mouth in a circular pool on the +waxed floor. + + + + +VI + +McGRATH LAUGHS + + +The clock on the huge central tower of the Capitol marked nine, as the +Lieutenant-Governor passed rapidly through the lofty entrance hall +toward the corridor leading to his office and that of Governor Abbott. +Already his promptness was proverbial, and there were those in the +great, grim building who looked forward to the moment of his arrival, +each morning, with a kind of eagerness. These were the simpler folk of +the official world with which circumstance housed him for eight hours +daily,--bootblacks, elevator-boys, porters, doormen. For to the big, +clean, wholesome personality which appeals irresistibly to these humbler +people, Barclay added an astonishing memory for faces, and for the names +and circumstances connected with them. It was a gift which counted as an +unspeakably important factor in the establishment and maintenance of +unusually cordial relations with all those with whom he came in contact. +No one brought within the radius of his personal magnetism long resisted +it. It was only those who judged him from a distance, as did the press +and the rank and file of his party, or those who deliberately +misinterpreted him, as did his political enemies, who permitted +themselves anything short of enthusiasm for John Barclay. And this +faculty for attracting admiration and commanding respect, this +infallible kindness and this inherent dignity, were never made manifest +to so great advantage as in his attitude toward his inferiors. These +adored him. He accumulated, bit by bit, a remarkable store of intimate +information relating to them, and employed it in his intercourse with +them, with a tact and a frank sincerity of interest which never failed +of their effect. The response thus elicited was strongest of the minor +pleasures in his life. He was aware--none better--of the shrewdness +native to those who have no claim upon one's recognition, their +appreciation of notice that is unfeignedly interested, their +sensitiveness to open indifference, their resentment of the simulated +consideration which is mere impertinence; and he was conscious of a +little inward thrill of satisfaction at the difference of attitude in +the employees at the Capitol as toward Governor Abbott and himself. +Where the former's suavity elicited only formal respect, manifestly +obligatory, his own whole-heartedness lined his way with smiles and +kindly greetings. His official existence, beset with annoyance, +mortification, and disappointment, was, as he often reflected, made +tolerable only by this friendliness which he, almost unconsciously, +inspired. Dogs, children, and his subordinates--the three most +intuitively critical classes of beings--were all his friends. The +pathway to and from the daily routine, which he was coming to regard as +moral martyrdom, was a pathway illumined with sunlight and strewn with +flowers! + +As the Lieutenant-Governor passed through his ante-room, with a wink at +the boy, a nod to the stenographer, and a word of greeting to his +private secretary, and entered his office, he was surprised to find the +communicating door open, and to hear the sound of a vaguely familiar +voice in the Governor's room beyond. In an effort to place the speaker, +he hesitated briefly before advancing to a point which would bring him +within range of the Governor's eye. Almost immediately, the memory of +the convention rushed over him, and he recognized the voice as that of +Michael McGrath. + +"And it won't be a strike like other strikes," he was saying, "not so +long as I'm running it, that is. It's going to mean business from the +word go! There's been too much shilly-shallying in the strikes I've +known anything about, too much talk, and too much wasting of Union +funds. You know what I mean. It isn't enough to tie up a mill, and then +hang around on street-corners for two months, waiting for the other side +to give in. The only place to hit a man like Rathbawne is in his pocket, +and by that I don't mean simply cutting off his income, but chopping +into his capital as well. He's got to understand"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor walked over to his desk, laid his hat and stick +on a chair, and, before removing his overcoat, began turning over the +pile of letters which awaited his attention. As he did so, Governor +Abbott's voice broke in suavely upon the other's. + +"I deprecate any resort to violence," he said. "You must proceed with +discretion if you expect the state to maintain an attitude of +neutrality. Otherwise, the police or the militia"-- + +"Oh, to hell with the police and the militia!" broke in McGrath +impatiently. "What's the use"-- + +"There is the Lieutenant-Governor now," interrupted the other. "Perhaps +he has some news for us. Mr. Barclay, will you kindly step in here for a +moment?" + +McGrath was standing on the opposite side of the Governor's table as +Barclay entered the room. He acknowledged the latter's curt nod with an +ironical bow, slipped his hands into the pockets of his checked +trousers, and stood waiting, with his square head thrust forward, for +what was to follow. + +"Mr. McGrath has called," continued the Governor, "to explain the +attitude of the Union in the impending strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +I've been telling him of our conversation of yesterday afternoon, and +that, as you were to see Mr. Rathbawne last night, you would probably +have something to tell us in regard to his position. Were you able to +persuade him to a more reasonable view of the situation?" + +"I have nothing to add, sir, to what I said yesterday," replied Barclay. +"I told you then that I had no intention of endeavoring to influence Mr. +Rathbawne's judgment." + +"He spoke to you about it?" + +"Yes." + +"And asked your advice?" + +"He did." + +"And you replied?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor flushed. + +"I beg to suggest, sir," he answered, "that this is hardly the time for +me to commit myself as to that. I conceive it to be a matter of official +privacy. Mr. McGrath"-- + +"You have my authority to speak, Mr. Barclay," said the Governor. +"Indeed, I desire it. Since one side knows your views, there is no +reason why the other should not be informed as well. Mr. McGrath is the +president of the Union. It is best that he should know the attitude of +the state authorities in this controversy." + +"I am not in a position to question your wishes, sir. You should know +best." + +"One cannot pretend to be infallible, Mr. Barclay," answered the +Governor, rubbing his hands. "One can only do what seems to be right and +proper under the circumstances. By our conversation of yesterday, I in a +measure put the negotiations with Mr. Rathbawne into your hands." + +"It is a task I did not seek, sir. Pardon me if I say that it is also +one which I should hardly have accepted, had I been aware that in +speaking as you did you were actually asking me to assume it. Mr. +Rathbawne is my friend, and, moreover, my personal convictions"-- + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"There can be no question of friendship or of personal conviction, Mr. +Barclay, in the case of a duty imposed upon a state official. I realize +that what you--or I, for that matter--must do in the performance of our +obligations, is oftentimes disagreeable, oftentimes at variance with our +wishes. But that is unavoidable." + +Barclay moved uneasily. The intrusion of this pedantry, so conspicuously +insincere, with its implied rebuke, chafed him unspeakably, in view of +the presence of McGrath. The Governor had adopted the tone, half +authoritative, half reproachful, of a teacher reproving a refractory +child. + +"My time, as you must know, is inadequate to the demands made upon it. I +am forced, on occasions, to turn more or less important matters over to +others. To whom more naturally than to you, Mr. Barclay?" + +"May I suggest, sir, that there can be no profit in prolonging this +discussion? I appreciate the position perfectly, and I am quite prepared +to state what I know of Mr. Rathbawne's attitude toward the demands of +the Union." + +"Ah," said the Governor, "that is as it should be, and as satisfactory +as possible. Let me remind you, Mr. Barclay, that it was not I, but +yourself, who introduced this digression." + +He turned to the president of the Union. + +"You will understand from what I have said, Mr. McGrath," he added, +"both to the Lieutenant-Governor and to you, that in the matter of the +proposed strike, he is, to all intents and purposes, acting in my stead. +He was in a position to approach Mr. Rathbawne, and I was not. Now, Mr. +Barclay, if you please"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor straightened himself instinctively, as, for the +first time, he addressed himself to the agitator. + +"Mr. McGrath," he said, "my confidence in Mr. Rathbawne's fairness and +integrity would have led me to approve any course which he might have +seen fit to take. As you have already heard me say, I had absolutely no +intention of endeavoring to influence his judgment. Greatly to my +surprise, Mr. Rathbawne himself consulted me in the matter, without any +suggestion on my part, and asked for my advice." + +"That's fortunate," put in McGrath, "very fortunate. You've been able to +sidetrack a lot of trouble." + +Barclay's eyes hardened at the hypocrisy of the sneer. + +"I have pleasure in informing you," he continued, "that, in reply, I +advised him to fight the Union in the present dispute to the utmost of +his means and ability. I should have counseled him further to hold out +until he had spent his last cent and shed his last drop of blood, except +that, knowing him as I do, I conceived such a recommendation to be +wholly superfluous. Mr. Rathbawne has his character and his record +behind him. There is about as much chance of his yielding you an inch of +ground as if he were standing with his back against the Capitol!" + +McGrath shrugged his shoulders. + +"It's a damned funny way you have of not influencing people's judgment," +he said. + +"I mis-stated my attitude in saying that," retorted the +Lieutenant-Governor coolly. "I should have said, what, after all, is +self-evident, that I had no intention of trying to influence Mr. +Rathbawne in favor of the Union, at least so long as it is acting under +your dictation. Its present character is well known--almost as well +known as yours, in fact--and I believe its position in this matter to be +entirely untenable, unjustifiable, and iniquitous. I may add that if it +is, indeed, Governor Abbott's resolve that I am to deal, in his stead, +with the question of your proposed strike, you may confidently rely upon +having to put the entire state force of Alleghenia out of business +before you can even so much as begin to bully Peter Rathbawne into +submission!" + +"If that's your opinion of the Union," said McGrath sullenly, "it might +be interesting to hear your opinion of me." + +"You are perfectly welcome to it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor +easily. "I consider you an unmitigated blackguard!" + +Governor Abbott tipped back his chair and looked at McGrath. + +"That's pretty plain talk," he said. "You see how it is, Mr. McGrath. +You'll have to go ahead on your own responsibility, and you mustn't be +surprised if the State steps in at the first evidence of disorder." + +McGrath rose, flecked some specks of dust from his waistcoat, and walked +toward the door without a word. On the threshold he turned, looked from +the Governor to the Lieutenant-Governor, and back again, and laughed. +Then he went out, closing the door softly behind him. + +At the Rathbawne Mills it was usual for a huge whistle to give one long +blast at noon as a signal for the lunch hour. On that day, however, +following McGrath's instructions, the single blast was replaced by five +short ones in rapid succession, and three minutes later the employees +were pouring through half a dozen gates into the streets surrounding the +mills, in laughing, chattering, excited streams. + +A majority of the men went directly to a hall in the neighborhood where +McGrath had called a mass-meeting for half-past twelve. A minority of +them crowded into the saloons of the vicinity, where they pounded on the +bars, and filled the close, smoke-grayed air with heated discussion. +Several of the discharged hands were in evidence, each surrounded by an +attentive group, and expounding more or less inflammatory views. The +women gathered in gossiping throngs on the sidewalks, laughing, and +pulling each other about by the arms. The boys played ball and leap-frog +in the streets, shouting, and whistling through their fingers. In brief, +the great strike was on, but, for the time being, it was masquerading +in the guise of a public holiday. + +At one o'clock the whistle blew again, and a thousand voices whooped a +derisive accompaniment, but no one of the throng in the streets made a +move toward the mills. Half an hour later, watchmen swung to and bolted +the gates, and, issuing presently from a small side entrance, in +company, were received with cheers, handshakes, and slaps upon the back. +Then the crowd gradually thinned,--many going to the already well-filled +hall where McGrath was delivering an address, and others to their +homes,--and a silence descended upon the neighborhood, broken only by +the voices of the men about the saloon doorways. + +At two, Peter Rathbawne, attended by his private secretary, came out of +the side entrance and walked slowly away in the direction of his home. +He held his head high, and his eyes straight to the front, and paid no +attention to the respectful greetings of those of the strikers who +saluted him, touching their hats. There were many among them whose +hearts sank at this attitude in a man who had made it his boast that he +knew every hand in his mills by sight, and who, in the past, had had a +nod or a friendly word for each and all of them. For the first time a +premonition settled upon them of what this strike, which had been +welcomed principally for novelty's sake, might mean. It was the first +the Rathbawne Mills had ever known. Some of those who saw the face of +Peter Rathbawne that afternoon were already hoping that it might be the +last. + +The Lieutenant-Governor returned to his apartment for lunch. Cavendish +was still sleeping as he had left him, with a stalwart negro porter, +summoned from the Capitol by telephone early that morning, watching in a +chair. Under Barclay's orders, a carpenter had already removed the +splintered door of the wine-closet, and an upholsterer had replaced it +by a slender brass rod from which swung a velvet curtain. With his own +hands the Lieutenant-Governor had taken away the fallen bottle, mopped +up the pool of absinthe, and put the room to rights. Now he dismissed +the negro, took from his pocket a little box of strychnine tablets, +obtained from his physician on his way from the Capitol, and, after a +brief survey of his surroundings to see that all was in order, went over +to the divan and shook the sleeping man by the shoulders. + +"Come, lazy-bones!" he said, with a laugh. "You've slept over twelve +hours. That will do--even for a nervous wreck." + +Cavendish opened his swollen eyes slowly, looked at him, and then closed +them again with a murmured "Oh, God!" which was like a groan. + +To this the Lieutenant-Governor paid no heed. Passing into the bathroom, +he turned on the cold water in the tub, poured a half glass of vichy +from a syphon, and then returned, carrying the tumbler in his hand. +Cavendish had raised himself on one elbow, and was looking stupidly +about the room. + +"Here you are," said Barclay cheerfully. "Stow this pill, and here's +vichy to wash it down. Your bath's running. By the time you've had it, +there'll be some clothes ready for you." + +Cavendish gulped down the tablet, and sat upright. + +"Last night"--he faltered. + +For the first time in his life, the Lieutenant-Governor called him by +his first name. + +"Last night, Spencer," he said, looking him fairly in the eye, "belongs +to the past, and is taboo. I won't hear a word about it. This is to-day. +Get up, and we'll set about putting wrong right. You're a man again. +Don't forget that. And I'm your friend. Don't forget that, either." + +His hand rested for an instant on the other's shoulder with a firm +pressure, and then he passed into his bedroom and shut the door. + +They had lunch together in the dining-room of the "Rockingham," and then +went up again to Barclay's rooms. At the door, Cavendish came to a halt. + +"I can't stand this," he said. + +"You'll have to," replied the Lieutenant-Governor, "so shut up!" + +"You've made a change," said Cavendish obstinately, pointing to the +curtained cupboard. + +Barclay's eyes did not follow the gesture. + +"So have you!" he answered. "Now, look here. There are twenty dollars in +the waistcoat of that suit, and a letter to Payson of the 'Kenton City +Sentinel.' Go down and see him this afternoon, and I think he'll give +you a job at reporting, which will fix you up for the present. In +another pocket you'll find a box, with three tablets like the one you +had before lunch. Take one of them every two hours. In still another +pocket there's a key to these rooms. I'm going to be busy till about ten +o'clock, so you'll have to shift for yourself. Make yourself at home, +and if you're awake I'll see you when I come in." + +Taking him suddenly by the shoulders, he twisted him about, facing the +chimney piece, on which stood a photograph of Natalie Rathbawne, smiling +out of a silver frame. + +"I'll leave you to talk it out with her," he added simply. + +In the hall, as he passed out, he caught a reflection of Cavendish in a +mirror. His hands were resting on the mantel-edge, and he was leaning +forward with his haggard face close to the photograph. Barclay looked at +his watch. + +"Two o'clock," he said to himself, "and all's well!" + + + + +VII + +THE MIRAGE OF POWER + + +Barclay was conscious of a feeling of exhilaration such as he had not +known for many weeks, as he swung into Bradbury Avenue late that +afternoon on his way to the Rathbawne residence. The duties of the day +had been inordinately petty and vexatious, but he had dispatched them +one and all with something approaching enthusiasm,--a touch of the old +Quixotic energy with which he had taken office. The morning conversation +in Governor Abbott's room had braced and toned him. He forgot its +inauspicious opening, and even his distress at the attempt to force him +into the position of mediator between Peter Rathbawne and the Union, in +the solid satisfaction of having been able to speak his mind to McGrath, +and call that worthy a blackguard to his face. He was a man who +despised a quarrel, but, for its own sake, loved a square, hard fight. + +Back, however, of this somewhat inadequate excuse for cheerfulness lay +the Governor's assurance that in the matter of the strike his lieutenant +was to have free rein. It was the first time since the beginning of +their official association that Elijah Abbott had placed an actual +responsibility in Barclay's hands. A corner-stone laying, a banquet here +and there, the opening of a trolley line, or a library, or a +sewer,--these were the major calls upon the Lieutenant-Governor's time. +The main current of routine was a hopeless monotony of official +correspondence, investigations, statistics, reading and reporting on the +interminable and flatulent maunderings of the Legislature,--duties +heart-breaking in their desperate tedium and maddening inutility. + +But at last here was responsibility, actual and deeply significant, +calling for the exercise of tact, courage, and immutable firmness. The +particular task was not one which he would have coveted, and yet he +welcomed it. Anything,--anything to assuage in him that sense of +ineptitude, of being ignored, a titled nonentity! + +With this vast lightening of spirit came, not only gratitude, but a +sense of lenity toward Governor Abbott. He encouraged himself to believe +that the note between them had been one of misunderstanding merely. It +might not be too late, after all! Gradually, he began to form a mental +picture of a growing sympathy and affiliation between them, large with +possibilities of improvement for Alleghenia. As he turned into the +Rathbawnes' gateway, he could have laughed aloud for very lightness of +heart. His optimism was not even impaired by running, in the hall, full +against Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"_Good_ gracious! Lieutenant-Governor, is that you?" + +Repeated and earnest endeavor on Barclay's part had never dissuaded her +from this form of address. + +"What _is_ the use of _having_ such a title, if one can't _call_ you by +it?" she would say, when he remonstrated. "Do _you_ suppose that, if +Natalie were engaged to a _prince_, I should be going around, calling +him Tom, Dick, or Harry, instead of 'Your Royal _Highness_'? You ought +to be _proud_ of your title. _I_ am!" + +"But, Mrs. Rathbawne"-- + +"Now, _please_ not, Lieutenant-Governor, _please_ not! I like it best +that way." + +The north wind was attentive and amenable to the voice of persuasion, in +comparison with Josephine Rathbawne. + +"Of _course_ you know the _strike_ is on!" she continued now, without +waiting for an assurance from Barclay that he was indeed none other than +himself. "Isn't it _awful_? I expect to hear the roar of the mob at +_any_ moment! Come into the drawing-room. Natalie _was_ there, only +_half_ an hour ago." + +And she swept through the doorway, Barclay following. + +"Natalie," she began, "here's the Lieu--why, _Dorothy_! I took you for +Natalie. And--er--oh! Why, Mr.--er--how de do? I didn't see you at +first. Oh, _do_ turn on the switch, my dear. The place is as black as +pitch." + +The electric light, flooding the room, revealed young Nisbet, one vast, +consuming blush, and Dorothy, with a dangerous light in her eyes, and +her lips tightly compressed. It was plain that Mrs. Rathbawne had fallen +foul of Dan Cupid's machinery once more! + +"Why, Mr. _Nisbet_! I thought you were in New York." + +"I had a telegram this morning, calling the date off," said young Nisbet +in pitiable confusion; "that is, I didn't have to go, you know. So I +just fell in here to explain. I thought some of you might spot me on the +street, and after I'd said"-- + +He began to flounder hopelessly, and cast a glance of mute appeal at +Dorothy. That facile young lady marched directly into the breach. + +"If you and John are looking for Natalie," she said, "you'll find her in +the library with Dad. How do you do, John?" + +"Pretty well, I thank you, Flibbertigibbet. It is really your husband +whom I came to see, Mrs. Rathbawne. I've a little business with him, so, +for the moment, I'll have to give Natalie the cold shoulder." + +"Oh!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, lifting her fat hands. "Of _course_, +Lieutenant-Governor! I understand _perfectly_. Business before pleasure, +_always_. Go right in, won't you, and send Natalie here to me. _I'll_ +stay here. Aren't we going to have tea, Dorothy? Oh, _do_ try to sit up +straight, my dear!" + +Natalie and her father were bending low over a great portfolio, their +heads close together in the yellow glow of the table-lamp, which was the +only light in the room. Rathbawne looked up with a grim smile, as the +Lieutenant-Governor entered. + +"Pottering over my autographs, again, you see," he remarked. "I've been +neglecting them shamefully, of late--eh, Natalie? Didn't have the time. +It looks just now as if I wouldn't have to complain again of lack of +leisure for quite a while!" + +"It was that I dropped in to see you about," said Barclay, striving, +with only partial success, to keep the exultation out of his voice. "You +may not be in for so much leisure as you imagine, Mr. Rathbawne. You may +not get much of a holiday, after all." + +Without for an instant losing the Lieutenant-Governor's eye, Rathbawne +reached out and touched his daughter on the arm. + +"Oh, Dad!" she said reproachfully. + +"There's no need for her to go, sir," added Barclay, "unless you wish +it. I bring only good news." + +Acquiescing, Rathbawne drew Natalie close to him, passing one arm across +her shoulders, so that his gnarled hand rested firmly on the delicate +fabric of her sleeve. Between these two there had always lain a +sympathy, an affection, a mutuality of comprehension, more like the +relation of husband and wife than that of child and parent. + +"Nothing but good news?" answered Rathbawne. "Go on. What is it?" + +"News not so much of actual happenings as of potentialities," said the +Lieutenant-Governor. "Last night I had to say to you that in the cause +of right I was as powerless to aid you as a baby. To-night, I have come +to tell you that I am in a position to see justice done, and that I +will." + +In detail, his voice ringing with enthusiasm and confidence, he +described the interview of that morning, his statement of Rathbawne's +position, his passage at arms with McGrath, finally, the Governor's +announcement that the strike was to be supervised by his lieutenant in +his stead. + +"I had almost lost hope," he concluded. "I thought my opportunity would +never come, and here it is, after all--the chance to act! And, somehow, +I feel that it is only the beginning--that, as he gets to understand me +better"-- + +Rathbawne suddenly left his daughter's side, and in three steps was +directly before the Lieutenant-Governor. As he interrupted him, his +fingers closed upon the lapels of the other's coat, and he punctuated +his words with little tugs at these, his knuckles coming together with +tiny muffled thuds. He spoke with a gravity that was vibrant with +suppressed anger and slow with sincere regret. + +"My boy," he said, "it's not a gracious thing to do to spoil an +enthusiasm like yours, but don't deceive yourself. Elijah Abbott as a +trickster is alone in his class. You were never more powerless to act +for the right than you are at this moment." + +"But I have his assurance"-- + +"Oh, _his_ assurance! It isn't worth the ash off your cigar. What, give +you a chance to interfere with the will of the Union which made him, and +owns him, body and soul? Never in God's world! Listen to me. I spent an +hour in his office this very afternoon, discussing the strike--_and he +never so much as mentioned your name_!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor winced as if the words had been the touch of a +lancet. Then he closed his eyes. + +"And I was in the next room," he said, almost as if to +himself,--"planning--my--control--of the situation! Good God!" + +"I went directly to him," continued Rathbawne, "because I knew that it +would be purely and simply a waste of time to parley with the lesser +officials who are either helpless or frankly his tools. I knew, too, +that no satisfactory result would come of appealing to him, but I wanted +to give him the chance. All I asked of him was an assurance that the +mills would have proper police protection, and that, if necessary, the +militia would be called out in support of order. The outcome was exactly +what I expected. Governor Abbott rubbed his hands, and smiled, and said: +'All in good time, Mr. Rathbawne, all in good time. When the conditions +seem to warrant it, we can discuss these measures.' That means that they +are free to blow the mills to kingdom come, before a finger will be +raised by the authorities to prevent them. And what's more, they'll do +it! Do you think I don't know McGrath?" + +As he had intended it should, this speech had given the other a chance +to recover himself. The Lieutenant-Governor's habitual poise was +already restored, and his voice, as he answered, was quite steady, but +eloquent of his desperate discouragement and weariness. + +"I hope it's not as bad as all that, Mr. Rathbawne. It's not necessary +to tell you, that for me there can never again be such a thing as +trusting the word of Governor Abbott; but, at the same time, I can +hardly bring myself to believe that he would openly countenance the +practical existence of anarchy in the capital city of Alleghenia." + +"Well, I can, then!" declared Rathbawne. "I can believe anything of him! +Mark my words, John, he's as sleek a scoundrel as you'll find outside of +the State's Prison. He cares less for Alleghenia and her capital city +than you do for one of the hairs on his rascally head. I tell you, the +Union has bought him, body and soul, and unless a miracle comes down +from heaven, I'm a beaten man!" + +Barclay bit his lips without replying. In his heart of hearts, he knew +that Peter Rathbawne's words were true. + +"He'll be impeached, sooner or later," continued the old man, "if +there's a speck of decency left in the Legislature--which I doubt. But +long before that, John, long before that, I'll be down and out. I would +to God you were Governor of Alleghenia, my boy. You're the only ray of +hope I can see for her." + +The Lieutenant-Governor fell back a step, and covered his face with his +hands. For a full minute there was absolute silence. Rathbawne had +returned to the table, and, with his fore-arms across the back of a +chair, and one foot on the lower cross-bar, was staring vacantly at his +autographs, his hands moulding and remoulding each other into an +infinity of forms. Natalie was at the window, her face in the crevice +between the curtains. The same impulse had prompted both father and +daughter. There are some things which it is better not to watch. + +They turned at the sound of his voice, to find him with his head flung +back, his hands clenched at his sides, his right foot planted firmly in +advance of his left, his whole bearing one of passionate earnestness. +And, though he was seemingly addressing Rathbawne, there was that in his +voice and in his words which was meant for every ear in the state! + +"Governor of Alleghenia!" he said, "I would to God I were! Sometimes I +almost--yes, sometimes I wholly despair. I love this state, Mr. +Rathbawne, as I love nothing else on earth--not even my girl there, not +even Natalie. You two are the only ones in the world who can understand +what it means when I say that. It has always been so, ever since I was +big enough to know what Alleghenia meant, and more than ever since I +have come to understand her shame, and her vital peril, and her dire +need. I've never tried to explain the feeling; I've never found any one +who seemed to share it with me. I hear other men talk of national +patriotism, and the flag, and all that, and I understand it, and honor +them for it. But--while it may be only a fancy of mine--for me Kenton +City comes even before Washington, and even before these United States +of America the sovereign state of Alleghenia! I would have her courts +incorruptibility itself, her government the perfect commingling of +equity and mercy; her press the vehicle of verity, intelligence, and +watchfulness; her public servants the faithful exponents of loyalty and +diligence; her people, one and all, whatever is best in our +interpretation of the word American--and then, something +more!--Alleghenians!--citizens, not only of the Republic, but of the +state which I would have shine brightest in the field of stars, and be +quoted, from Maine to California, and from Florida to Washington, as the +synonym for law and order, truth, integrity, and justice. You know how +far the dream is from the reality. We are held up to ridicule and +contempt as law-breakers, time-servers, and bribe-takers--and we deserve +it! I can't see help on any hand. I don't believe our people, as a +class, are actually vicious and corrupt--only callous and indifferent, +accustomed so long to the spectacle of political chicanery and depravity +that they have lost their ability to appreciate its significance. But, +so far as results are concerned, it all amounts to the same thing. Once, +I hoped I should be able to do something. But now--I'm a nonentity, Mr. +Rathbawne, as you know, and not only that, but a man who has taken a +false step, from which he can never recover. I'm dead, politically +speaking--as dead as Benjamin Butler!" + +He paused, drawing a deep breath. + +"We were speaking of your interview," he added, more evenly. "What was +the result?" + +"Nothing, beyond what I've told you," answered Rathbawne, shaking his +head. "All I can do is to keep my mouth shut, await developments, and +trust in a Providence which it takes a good bit of obstinacy to believe +hasn't deserted the state of Alleghenia for good and all. It isn't for +my own sake alone, John, that I pray the Union will give in before my +people begin to think of violence. You remember '94 in Chicago? Well, +we don't want anything like that in Kenton City. It would be the last +straw! Alleghenia has a big enough burden of disgrace to carry, as it +is." + +A servant entered, even as he was speaking, to summon him to the +telephone, and with an exclamation of impatience he left the room. +Immediately, Natalie stepped from her post at the window, and came +toward Barclay with outstretched hands. + +"Oh, Johnny boy," she said, "I'm _so_ sorry. How you've been hurt, dear, +and disappointed, and cruelly wronged!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's hands clenched again at the sound of sorrow in +her voice, and he strove in vain to control the tremor of his lip. +Tenderly he put his arms about her. + +"I'm sorry, too, little girl--sorry you were here to see me make a fool +of myself and then squeal when I got hurt as I deserved. I shouldn't +have done that. But I was so proud--so grateful--I thought I was going +to be able"-- + +"_Johnny--Johnny!_" + +They held to each other rigidly for an instant, her face against his +sleeve, in an agony which no tears came to soothe. + +"There!" said Barclay presently. "I'm better already. It does one good +to blow off steam, now and again." + +His tone lightened perceptibly. + +"And look here," he added, "what's most important, after all, is that I +have news for you, and ought to be delivering it." + +As yet, they did not dare to meet each other's eyes, but Natalie took +the cue. + +"You can spare yourself the trouble, my lord," she retorted, sweeping +him a curtsy. "I can guess what it is, without your aid. You've found +him!" + +"How did you know?" + +"I didn't. But you will remember that I asked you to find him. The +inference is as plain as a pikestaff." + +"Arrogance! But you're right. I have. He has been at my rooms since last +night. He was frightfully shaky, and utterly despondent, but he's taking +something to settle his nerves, and I've no doubt a week or so of good +food and straight living will bring him around into something like his +old form." + +"Boy dear! And you're taking care of him?" + +"Oh, just directing the cure, that's all! I'll tell you more when I can +report definite progress. Do you suppose there is a single secluded +corner in all this mansion which has not already been preempted by +Dorothy and Nisbet?" + +He slipped his arm about her again, and together they went out, across +the wide hall, toward the drawing-room. Rathbawne was standing at the +telephone under the stairway, but, as they approached him, he replaced +the receiver, and stepped forth under the light of the chandelier. They +both halted, shocked into speechlessness by the look on his face. The +past ten minutes seemed to have added a decade to his age. His cheeks +were white and drawn, and with his hands he groped before him, as if he +had been stricken blind. As he came close to them, he lifted his head, +and peered first at his daughter, and then at Barclay, seeming barely to +recognize them. + +"Dad! What _is_ it?" said the girl, in a voice just above a whisper. + +Rathbawne raised his hand, and pushed back the hair from his forehead. + +"A message--from Payson--of the 'Sentinel,'" he mumbled. "It seems +there's a fire--a fire on Charles Street--near the mills--one of my +buildings--a shop--a shop. Some one in the crowd--threw a +torch in at the window--there is a great crowd--a throng of +strikers--watching--cheering the flames--hissing the firemen. They've +begun early--and this is only the beginning! My people--my people"---- + +He stumbled forward, and would have fallen, but that his daughter caught +him. To his dying day Barclay remembered how, as he sprang to aid her, +her hands gleamed, white and slender, against the black of Peter +Rathbawne's coat. + +The hush that followed was broken presently by the sound of the old +man's choking sobs, and the low, soothing tones of Natalie, murmuring +against his ear. From the drawing-room came indeterminate scraps of Mrs. +Wynyard's gay chatter, as she regaled Mrs. Rathbawne with the gossip +gleaned in a round of calls. She herself was partly visible, drawing off +her gloves before the fire. From the music-room beyond issued the chords +of Dorothy's none-too-sure accompaniment, and young Nisbet's superb, +full tenor:-- + + "'Ah, love, could you and I with fate conspire + To grasp the sorry scheme of things entire'"-- + +But, in the Lieutenant-Governor's imagination, another sound mingled +with and dominated these,--the voice of Michael McGrath, as he had heard +it that morning, through the open door of Governor Abbott's room:-- + +"It won't be a strike like other strikes, not so long as I'm running it, +that is. It's going to mean business from the word go!" + + + + +VIII + +THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS + + +One spotted peach will contaminate an entire basket, one drop of ink +cloud a full glass of clear water. It was so in the case of the strikers +at the Rathbawne Mills. Their unwonted idleness, the long succession of +empty hours, already, among the more improvident, the preliminary +pressure of privation's teeth,--all these made them easy prey for the +sophistries of men like McGrath and his associates. At first they simply +laughed at the arraignments of Peter Rathbawne as a plutocrat, a +slave-master, and an oppressor of the poor, knowing better in their +hearts. But the memory of past kindness is too apt to be the most +fleeting of human impressions. On the one side the gates of the +Rathbawne Mills remained obstinately closed, and, though Rathbawne +himself manifested no intention of resorting to the intolerable +importation of "scab" labor, he persisted in his refusal to treat with +the Union so long as the discharge of the fifteen men remained a subject +proposed for debate. On the other hand, the denunciations of McGrath and +the other Union orators were constant, unavoidable, and sufficiently +plausible to produce an impression, and linger in the mind. And, +meanwhile, to and fro among the strikers, stalked, arm in arm, the +spectres of idleness and starvation, the one smirking openly, the other, +as yet, half-veiled. Altogether it was fertile ground. + +After the burning of Mr. Rathbawne's shop, on the first night of the +strike, ensued a week of comparative quiet. The outrage had been +flagrant, the source, if not the very author, of it was known, and the +police did--nothing. For three days the press of Kenton City blazed with +indignation, excepting only the "Record," which openly favored the +strikers, and then all the papers alike suddenly ceased to refer to the +incident at all. For, while McGrath was not in favor of wasting the +funds of the Union, he was as well aware as the next man that a dollar, +as well as a stitch, in time, saves nine. + +Herein lay the cardinal peril of Alleghenia. As John Barclay had said, +it was not that her people, as a class, were corrupt or criminal, but +merely that they viewed with easy tolerance evidences of laxity and +lawlessness which would have set the citizens of another state by the +ears, and filled the newspaper columns and the public forums with +indignation and protest. In this respect, the papers of Kenton City were +the most flagrant offenders. Even the most reputable, the "Sentinel," +could be silenced at practically any moment by those cognizant of the +method, and in a position to command the price, of manipulation. As a +whited sepulchre it was a conspicuous success, being irreproachably +scholarly, dignified, and didactic in tone, and wholly destitute of +principle. + +Michael McGrath, demagogue though he was, knew his public as the +physician knows the pulse he feels. It was a feature of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills that no attempt was made to justify the cause of the +strikers in the eye of the disinterested public of Kenton City. McGrath +himself was fully alive to the slenderness of his pretext, and alive, as +well, to the strength of Peter Rathbawne's case, if it should come to a +discussion of the rights and wrongs involved, wherein his business +probity and his justice to, and consideration for, his employees, would +furnish arguments well-nigh unanswerable. He contented himself, +therefore, with standing upon a simple declaration of the will of the +Union, which was, in effect, his own; and, strong in his reliance, if +not upon the support, at least upon the non-interference of the state +authorities, devoted his attention to holding the press in check, by +methods long since found effectual, and confidently left the public to +think and act as it saw fit. + +There could have been no more contemptuous comment upon the moral and +intellectual status of the community than this insolent assumption of +its indifference to the commonest principles of justice, but for a time +his confidence had the appearance of being amply justified. The strike +went its way, characterized by an infinity of petty outrages and a +constant and consistent vilification of Peter Rathbawne, while--with the +exception of that first and promptly quashed protest on the part of the +press--no voice was raised in opposition. + +Reduced to its lowest terms, the struggle was one between Rathbawne and +McGrath, and that, not as representatives the one of a great industrial, +the other of a great socialistic organization, but as individuals. The +source of the stream which had thus reached its rapids, and was plunging +on toward its annihilating cataract, lay far back in the early days of +Rathbawne's commercial career. McGrath was a man who practiced neither +the vice of forgetfulness nor the virtue of forgiveness. As plain as the +event of a yesterday lay upon his memory his contemptuous dismissal from +Rathbawne's employ, charged in particular with a petty peculation, and +in general with the indisputable fact of being a bad influence in the +mills. His case had been in many ways identical with that of the men +whose cause he was now, for reasons of his own, espousing. + +But Peter Rathbawne, then less shrewd in estimating men than now, had +reckoned without due credit to the vindictiveness and pertinacity of the +man before him. McGrath--brutally handsome in those days, idle, +insolent, and independent--later had developed qualities of which at the +time there was little evidence. He had smiled and shrugged his +shoulders--a habit which had grown upon him--as Rathbawne gave his +verdict, and had instinctively resisted the temptation to threaten +revenge. For that inspiration he had been devoutly grateful ever since. +It had enabled him to work in silence and unseen, like a mole, toward +the goal at which he aimed. He was a poker player, was Michael McGrath, +of the class which pulls victory out of defeat by the aid of its own +personality and a low pair. The calm indifference with which he had +received his dismissal from the employ of Peter Rathbawne seemed to him, +on reflection, to have been the unconscious forerunner of the elaborate +_nonchalance_ with which he now viewed the unexpected filling of a +broken straight. It was certain that the other player had not guessed +the strength of his cards. + +He had never forgiven, never forgotten. It had taken a quarter-century +of unremitting effort, of indomitable perseverance, of calculated +ingenuity, to secure to him the position which he now felt to be +assured--that of being able to cope with the man who had been his +adversary, and so overwhelmingly his superior. The fight was on at +last,--a fight in which the odds were not only equal, but, if anything, +in favor of the former mill-hand, thus become one of the most powerful +men in Alleghenia; a fight to be fought to the bitter finish, with an +almost certain triumph as his reward. + +Added to these motives was another,--newer, it is true, but none the +less potent,--his hatred for the Lieutenant-Governor. He had been able +to laugh within a half-minute after the words "unmitigated blackguard" +had smitten his ears; but they had rankled for all that. It was not so +much the insult, as the knowledge that it was justified. He was +remarkably candid with himself, was Michael McGrath. + +Hence the unparalleled venom of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +McGrath's dual sense of wounded vanity prescribed a course of surpassing +vindictiveness. His personal resentment, reinforced by consummate +appreciation of the adversaries with whom he had to deal, dictated a +safe road to revenge, which enabled him to fling wide the floodgates of +his long-stored animosity, secure in his knowledge of having the upper +hand. Disorder, calumny, outrage, even open anarchy--he could venture +upon them unafraid. A corrupt Governor, whom he had created, stood +behind him, smiling tolerantly. An indifferent community would let him +have his will. Only he must proceed by degrees, and be ready at any +moment to take one backward step for the sake of being able presently +thereafter to take two in advance. + +Here precisely lay the weak point in his plan of campaign. With the +fatuity incidental on occasions to even the shrewdest minds, he had not +counted upon independence in the host which he believed slave to him, in +thought and word and deed. He rated himself the dictator, the prompter +without whose suggestion no one of all the players in this gigantic +tragedy could speak his line. As a matter of fact, like all leaders of +his class, he could drive his followers forward at will, while totally +unable to hold them back. He was wholly master so long as he used the +spur. The peril lay in the fancied efficacy of the curb. In short, he +was discovering already that he had unwittingly created a monster beside +which Frankenstein's was the veriest doll. + +Thus, shortly, the strain began to tell upon the four thousand +unemployed sets of nerves around the Rathbawne Mills. Meetings became +more frequent and more turbulent; drinking and disorder were observably +on the increase; and at the end of another four weeks one of the gates +of the mills was beaten down, and several hundred men and boys paraded +around shop after shop, breaking windows and singing ribald songs. It +was not a very serious demonstration in itself. Its ominous feature lay +in the fact that the police made no attempt to check it. There was +something else about it, to the thinking of McGrath. It was not so much +that events were moving too fast, but that they were moving without +intelligent control. + +Two nights later, another building belonging to Peter Rathbawne, and +situated only a half-block from the mills, was burned in the same manner +as the first, watched by an enormous crowd of strikers, who applauded +each fresh burst of flame, as if the fire had been a circus or a play. +Still there was no move on the part of the police. + +Then it was that the business men of Kenton City sat up in their office +chairs and began to think. This was an eventuality entirely outside the +calculations of McGrath. But the pachydermatous inertia of the citizens +of Alleghenia had yet its vulnerable spot, where the weapon might enter. +Vaguely these men had known that the state was rotten, but the fact had +never been brought to their attention in a manner so poignantly +suggestive before. Unwittingly McGrath had aroused the suspicion that it +was not the purse of Peter Rathbawne alone which was in danger. If it +was possible for disorder to go to such extremes in the very streets of +Kenton City without fear of interference or rebuke, then no man's +property was safe. That thought was the Achilles' heel of the community. +So it was that a Citizens' Committee, composed of presidents of two +insurance companies, directors from five banks, representatives from the +Chamber of Commerce and the Board of Trade, and, finally, Colonel Amos +Broadcastle, was appointed to wait upon the Mayor. That gentleman, as +was entirely to be expected, referred them to the Governor, and to the +Governor they went. + +Barclay was present at the interview. For his own reasons Governor +Abbott had kept his immediate subordinate well to the fore in all +matters pertaining to the strike since the latter's rebuke to +McGrath,--in all matters, that is to say, not involving the exercise of +actual authority. Of that, indeed, the Lieutenant-Governor had had no +hope after the conversation in Peter Rathbawne's library. He met the +representatives of the press, conducted the correspondence with +mill-owners and other negatively interested parties, and at the +Governor's request made what was palpably a farcical inspection of the +entire state militia--to judge of their readiness for strike service!--a +task which consumed a fortnight in constant travel, and visits to +armories all alike in insufficient equipment and utter slovenliness. The +Ninth Regiment alone remained, and this command was to parade for +inspection by the Governor himself that very evening. The coincidence +flashed through Barclay's mind as the Citizens' Committee entered, with +Broadcastle, in his capacity as spokesman, at its head. + +The dignity and air of command habitual to the Colonel of the Ninth were +doubly apparent as he advanced toward the Governor's table. Both Barclay +and Abbott rose to receive him, but the latter reseated himself, as soon +as Broadcastle had introduced his fellow-members of the Committee. He +listened to what followed with an air of thoughtfulness, tinged with a +faint and exasperating suggestion of amusement. At a neighboring table, +his official stenographer took down every word which fell. + +Colonel Broadcastle was not accustomed to mince matters, when the +occasion demanded brevity and conciseness. Now, he stepped to within a +few feet of the Governor's table, and stood rigidly confronting him, +with his hands clasped before him on the head of his stick, in the +position of parade-rest. + +"Governor Abbott," he said, in his curt, dry voice, "these gentlemen and +myself form a Committee appointed by a meeting of the business men of +Kenton City, to protest against the state of affairs now existing in +connection with the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. It is only generous +to presume that other matters have diverted your attention from an +appreciation of these conditions. The situation is without parallel in +the annals of Alleghenia. Disorder is rampant, and destruction of +property is freely indulged in by the strikers without any apparent fear +of molestation. Despite the fact that there is a large police-force, it +makes no effort to check these operations. The sole reply of Chief +Pendle to the protests of those interested in the promotion of law and +order has been that he will not suffer any outside interference in the +control of his department--the which, in view of his responsibility to +the public, can only be regarded as sheer and intolerable insolence! An +appeal to Mayor Goadby has elicited the response that the whole matter +lies in the Governor's hands." + +The Colonel paused. The Governor, leaning back in his chair, and +fingering a pencil, smiled slightly and nodded his head. + +"I suppose that is so," he said. "Continue, continue, Colonel +Broadcastle." + +"It is the sense of the law-abiding element of Kenton City," went on the +Colonel, flushing at the condescension of his tone, "that the limit of +endurance has been reached. If, willfully or otherwise, the police do +not act, my regiment is prepared to act as substitute. I have already +placed it at the service of the Adjutant-General. His reply, like the +Mayor's, was to refer me to you for orders. I am here to receive them, +sir." + +"Your offer is appreciated," said the Governor suavely. "We of Kenton +City have reason to be proud of the Ninth, Colonel Broadcastle. I +congratulate myself upon my privilege of reviewing it, to-night. And we +have reason to be proud, as well, of the intelligence which has made +such an organization possible. Your disinterested devotion"-- + +Broadcastle flung up his chin. + +"I am not here to receive compliments, sir!" he said abruptly. + +"Nor I to bestow them," answered the Governor, unruffled. "As +commander-in-chief of the state forces, I believe it is not outside my +province to render deserved commendation to a subordinate." + +"Oh, do not let us juggle with words, Governor Abbott! It is precisely +as commander-in-chief of the state forces that the time has come for you +to act; it is precisely as your subordinate that I am here to receive +your orders. Assume the responsibility which confronts you, issue the +commands proper to the emergency, and you will have no more tireless +executor of them than I. My regiment can be on duty at the Rathbawne +Mills inside of six hours"-- + +"But, my good Colonel Broadcastle," broke in the Governor, "the state +has no need of your regiment for the moment! Calling upon the militia is +no light matter, sir. You talk about my ordering out the Ninth as you +would advise me to ring for a messenger-boy!" + +"The welfare of the municipality, if not that of the commonwealth," +replied Colonel Broadcastle firmly, "demands that an immediate stop be +put to this lawlessness. We are dealing with extremities, sir!" + +The Governor swung forward, and placed his elbows on the table. + +"You will permit me to be the best judge of what the welfare of the +commonwealth may be," he retorted. "Whatever lawlessness exists--and I +think you have grossly exaggerated its extent, Colonel Broadcastle--is +due to the selfish obstinacy of one man. In my opinion, Mr. Rathbawne is +entirely in the wrong. He had fair warning, which he did not choose to +heed. If his property suffers at the hands of the strikers, he has only +himself to blame." + +"It is not a question of Mr. Rathbawne, or of any other individual," +said Broadcastle, "but of the integrity of the state of Alleghenia!" + +"The integrity of the state of Alleghenia," answered the Governor dryly, +"has been intrusted, by the vote of her citizens, to me, as chief +executive." + +"An action," exclaimed the Colonel, "which I venture to predict they +will shortly have reason most bitterly to regret!" + +Governor Abbott rose abruptly to his feet. + +"This interview is at an end, Colonel Broadcastle," he said, bringing +his fist down upon the table with a thud. "I take exception to your +remarks, from first to last. I consider myself fully competent to deal +with the situation, and you may depend, sir, I shall do so at my own +time, and in my own way. If Mr. Peter Rathbawne supposes that he can +defy reason and justice at will, and that the state authorities are +prepared to support him, he is grossly and fatally mistaken. Gentlemen, +I have the honor to bid you good-day!" + +For a quarter-minute, the two men stood facing each other, without +speaking. It was observable that the eyes of neither flinched. Then-- + +"It is my earnest hope, Elijah Abbott," said the Colonel slowly, "to see +you impeached by a righteously indignant community, and committed for a +term of years to the State's Prison at Mowberly, for rank malfeasance +in office!" + +The Governor shrugged his shoulders. + +"Your record and your position protect you, Colonel Broadcastle," he +said, with something of his usual suavity. "Will you have the goodness +to retire?" + +As the Citizens' Committee left the room the Lieutenant-Governor turned +on his heel, passed into his office, and closed the door. + +For a long time he sat motionless at his desk, with his temples in his +hands, staring at a frame upon the opposite wall, which contained the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia. These were a hand holding even balances, +upon a circular shield, supported by the nude figures of two young men, +representing Art and Labor. Above, upon a scroll, were the words, +"_Justitia. Lex. Integritas._" + +It was not only bad heraldry, but indifferently appropriate symbolism. + + + + +IX + +THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW + + +The huge armory of the Ninth, transformed, by the same system which had +metamorphosed the _personnel_ of the regiment itself, from a gaunt, +barn-like structure, ill-fitted to its purpose in all but size, to the +most cheerful, as well as the most completely equipped, of Alleghenian +arsenals, was blazing with light and echoing to the sound of many +voices. A steady stream of people poured in at the heavy doors, now +standing wide, but significant, with their great timbers, elaborate +locks and bolts, and precautionary peep-holes, of the possibility of an +attitude less hospitable. Threading their way at a rapid pace through +the more sluggish main current of the crowd, the members of the +regiment, in an infinite variety of civilian attire,--from tweeds and +knickerbockers to top-hats and evening-dress,--sought their respective +company-rooms, vanished therein, and, presently, reappeared in uniform. +It was as if behind those ten doors which lined the upper corridor there +were as many moulds, identical in form, whereinto this perplexing +diversity of raw material was plunged on entering, to be drawn forth +again in a constant reduplication of militiamen. + +As the hour for the review drew near, the proportion of these to the +throng with which they mingled, perceptibly increasing, seemed, little +by little, to leaven the whole lump. The dress-uniform of the Ninth was +everywhere, the black shakos and epaulettes, white pompons, cross-belts +and gloves, and multiplicity of brass buttons, lending the immense +assemblage a singular spirit and vivacity. + +On the floor of the drill-room the people spread in all directions, +fan-like, from the main doorway, the multitudinous footfalls mounting +murmurously into the spaces of the lofty roof, where forty arc-lights +hung, dizzily suspended, pallid in the thin haze of dust swung upwards +from the hurrying feet of the thousands below. + +"Precisely like an army of ants--and every one of them with an uncle or +two, and a round dozen of nephews and nieces!" said Mrs. Wynyard. + +She and the Rathbawne girls were looking down upon the drill-floor +from the balcony of the Colonel's room. Broadcastle and the +Lieutenant-Governor were deep in conversation inside, having seized the +delay in the arrival of Governor Abbott as an opportunity for a few +words in private. + +"How funny they are, scuttling along, all of them!" said Dorothy. "And +how immensely pleased the favored ones are, who have a soldier to show +them the way. I see a distinct difference in their walk from that of the +others, don't you, Natalie? They seem to be saying '_We_ were +_invited_--and by this splendiferous creature at our side!' See how they +strut! And look at the soldierless ones, how timidly they go--just as if +they had found their tickets in the street, or had crept in through the +basement windows. 'Please, kind Mr. Soldier-man, let us stay and see the +show. We'll be _awf'ly_ good!'" + +"How preposterous you are, Dorothy!" answered Mrs. Wynyard. "Look! The +people are taking to the sides of the room already, and the companies +are forming. What astonishing method and precision there is to it all! +Do you suppose each man has a little circle marked on the floor, to show +just where he is to stand?" + +"I haven't the most remote doubt of it," said Natalie, with a +smile,--"and his name neatly lettered inside it with gilt paint!" + +The long, enclosed racks at the ends of the drill-room were open now, +and the electric light winked upon the barrels of the Springfields, as +busy, white-gloved hands plied the polishing cloths along them. The +enormous drill-floor, cleared as if by magic from the disorderly +weed-growth which had encumbered it, began to make manifest its proper +crop--long lines of gray and white, like sprouting sage, at first but a +dot here and there, to indicate the direction, then a scattering, then +distinct clumps, finally a thick, serried row. In the distance, a bugle +sounded, followed by a long ruffle of drums, and Colonel Broadcastle +stepped quickly to the window of the balcony. + +"There's the Governor," he said. "Will you come in? I'll send my orderly +to show you to your seats." + +At the same moment, the door from the corridor opened, and the orderly +entered, his hand at his shako. + +"Sir, the Governor has arrived." + +Then, as the trio on the balcony stepped in through the window, he +turned suddenly and superlatively scarlet. As has been said, young +Nisbet was accustomed to getting what he wanted. In this instance what +he had wanted happened to be that the Adjutant should choose him from +the guard detail as Colonel's orderly. To be thus chosen was to be +admittedly the most immaculate of thirty men, all more immaculate than a +thousand immaculate others. The thing was not easy of achievement, but +Dorothy Rathbawne was to be present at the review, and so--there was no +second way about it--it simply had to be done. Young Nisbet's way of +doing it was an absolutely new uniform and gold-plated buttons and +accoutrements. Extravagance? Vanity? Perhaps! But at the present moment, +he was wearing one cross-belt where his thousand and odd comrades were +wearing two. There was no answer to such an argument as that. + +Colonel Broadcastle had reserved seats for the party on the temporary +reviewing stand, and, five minutes after they had taken their places, +the bugles sang again, a curt order--"'shun! 'shun!"--ran in varying +intonations from company to company, and the slack gray ranks before +them stiffened into absolute rigidity. Then from the broad hallway +beyond came a tremendous burst of sound, and, to the strains of the +famous old march of the Ninth, the regimental band swung into view, +followed by Governor Abbott and Colonel Broadcastle and the former's +staff. + +To the Lieutenant-Governor, but newly returned from his wearisome round +of the state armories, much of what followed was so stale as to be no +more than a constantly increasing strain upon nerves already overtaxed. +He deliberately allowed his attention to wander, until he felt rather +than actually perceived the steady tramp-tramp of the men, swinging, +fours right, into column, the occasional "hep! hep!" of an officious +file-closer, the endless succession of fours winking past him, like the +palings of a gray fence seen from the window of a train, the intervals +narrowed by short-step, widening again at the "Forward--_march_!" the +blare of the band, lessening as it approached the further end of the +building, then suddenly bursting into its former volume at the +right-about. He endured it all listlessly. It was tediously familiar, +stamped upon his brain by repetition after repetition. + +Moreover, he was completely fagged, and unutterably oppressed by his +burden of discouragement. The old wounds, in part healed by his recent +absence from the immediate vicinity of his constant discomfiture, had +been re-opened and set bleeding afresh by Governor Abbott's treatment of +the Citizens' Committee. Whatever lingering hope had remained in his +mind of peace with honor for the troubled capital of Alleghenia, seemed +to have been effectually dispelled by that interview. The most enduring +charity, the most fatuous credulity, the blindest partisanship--even +these could not have preserved a last spark of confidence in Elijah +Abbott. Still less was Barclay's indeterminate hope of the ultimate +triumph of right able to stand against such crushing evidence of its +instability. It was no longer a question of suspicions, of precedents, +of deductions from the significance of a host of former misdoings. Out +of his own mouth was the Governor convicted. "At my own time, and in my +own way," he had said. It was a phrase, nothing more, and could be +boiled down until its whole purport was contained in one word--Never! + +"Fours _left_--_March_! Compan_ee_--_halt_!" + +The entire regiment, as one man, swung from column of fours into +battalion front, halted, and then--cr-r-rick! boooo-m-m-m!--came to +order arms. The sides of the room were lined with a solid rampart of +white and gray and gold. Barclay was aware of the First Sergeants, +scurrying from their positions to report, of their voices, and those of +the Majors and the Adjutant, and, finally the Colonel:-- + +"Take your post, sir!" + +But his thoughts were anywhere and everywhere else. What a farce it all +was, this life which he was leading, this mental and moral martyrdom to +an impossible hope, this eternal and heart-sickening ordeal of hope +deferred, this waiting, waiting, waiting, for something which never +would and never could happen! Rotten, rotten to the core, this state for +which he would have given his heart's blood, and not only rotten, but +not caring a whit for her rottenness--glorying rather, in her own +degradation. The chief executive had flung back into their very faces +the appeal to his conscience of the most influential men in Kenton +City; the police, even now seated about their station stoves, were +sniggling at the predicament of the public which paid them for its +protection against precisely the kind of thing which they openly +tolerated and encouraged; yes, and even the militia, the guarantee of +law and order, Broadcastle's own command, were decked out in tinsel and +pipeclay, strutting to music in a palpable bid for applause and +admiration. And yonder--the tide of anarchy was slowly but surely rising +about the Rathbawne Mills, presaging riot, bloodshed, God alone knew +what!--but one thing, inevitably,--the absolute downfall of dignity and +rout of decency in Alleghenia! + +Suddenly, his old intrepid spirit of resolution reasserted itself, but +doubtfully, like the flame of a lamp flaring once out of dimness before +it dies forever. Was it for this that he had devoted the best thought of +his youth and his earlier manhood to plans for the betterment of his +state? Should he now, at this, the hour of her supremest political and +moral peril, desert her as irredeemable, and join the ranks of those who +sneered at her, and pointed mocking fingers at her shame and nakedness? + +"Your loquacity faintly suggests that of a mummy," said Natalie, at his +side. + +"I was alone with my thoughts," answered the Lieutenant-Governor, +turning to her with an attempt at a smile, "and pretty black ones they +were, at that!" + +"Alleghenia again?" + +"Alleghenia again--and always. This business is becoming an obsession +with me. I haven't had a chance to tell you, and I can't very well +explain now. I'll have to leave it till I see you to-morrow. But +something happened to-day which drove another nail--and one of the +last!--into the coffin of my faith. There's not a gleam of hope +anywhere." + +"Don't you see hope in all this?" asked Natalie, with a little, +indicative gesture toward the scene before them. "Somehow, it is +impressing me tremendously to-night--more than ever before. I seem to +understand better what it means, what it stands for." + +"It's a stale enough story with me," said Barclay. "Remember, I've been +doing just about nothing but watch this kind of thing for the past two +weeks. After all, what does it amount to but a thousand possibilities +parading like peacocks?" + +"How unlike you, that speech! It amounts to a vast deal more than that, +Johnny boy,--oh, infinitely more! I don't speak of the other regiments +you have seen. This is different. Well, what _does_ it amount to? Who +and what are these thousand peacocks of yours? Aren't they the very +flower of Kenton City, the youngest and best blood in our veins, +gathered by one good man's will into an organization of sterling +loyalty, with one great aim in view, and that the support and protection +and preservation of all that is best in Alleghenia? The very fact that +such a body of men exists among us is in the nature of a guarantee, it +seems to me, that we shall come out all right in the end. Have you +noticed their faces?--many of them so absurdly boyish, all of them so +honest, and manly, and--and--_American_, John! They are the +personifications of your ideal of that afternoon in the +library--Americans, and something more--Alleghenians! And, to prove it, +they are freely giving a portion of their time and their strength, in +order that there may be at least one thing in Kenton City which is +without fear and without reproach. I wonder--I wonder, John, whether it +isn't the old story, after all: whether you haven't been wandering all +over the world, like the prince in the fairy-book, looking for the magic +talisman that is to save the state you love, while, all the time, it has +been lying at your very door? Oh, this means something--I'm too stupid +to interpret it as you could--but I know it's there, and that it would +help you and encourage you. Let me try. Look there! A single purpose +animates them all--the maintenance of the standard which Colonel +Broadcastle set for them, and the record they have made for themselves." + +Colonel Broadcastle's voice was sweeping the armory, as he put the +regiment through the manual of arms. + +"One has only to hear one of them--Mr. Nisbet, for example--say 'the +Ninth' to find the hope of which you are in search. These men say it as +others say 'God' or 'my mother'--as you yourself, Johnny boy, say +'Alleghenia.'" + +"Charge--_bay'n'ts_!" + +With a single click, a thousand rifles fell into position, a thousand +left feet smote the floor in unison, and the light rippled and twinkled +along a solid line of flashing steel. + +"There! A single voice,--a single, mighty response! Don't you see the +wonderful suggestiveness of it? Don't you feel the presence of the +enormous reserve force which lies behind all this? Oh, believe me, John, +this is a weapon too mighty to lie unused, and too intelligent to be +misused, if the worst come to the worst. After all, as no one knows +better than yourself, it's not your own advancement you're looking for, +it's that of the state. Well, there may be other agencies, perhaps +entirely independent of you or of your influence, but none the less +invaluable. For example, you are close upon despair--and yet, before +your fears come true, the forces of wrong will have to fight their way, +step by step, through this rampart of American manhood!" + +Barclay touched her hand lightly, as she ceased speaking. In the midst +of the thousands about them, they were alone as they had never been +before. + +"Thank you," he said simply. "Thank you, littlest and wisest in the +world!" + +The regiment was in motion again, skirting the room in column of fours, +preparatory to the march-past: but now the Lieutenant-Governor surveyed +it from a new, and a dual point-of-view,--as a thousand individuals, +that is, each a potential factor for immeasurable good in the coming +rehabilitation of the state; and, then, as a vast fighting-machine +perfect in every detail, resistless and awe-inspiring in its very +integrity. He noted the faces as they passed--stern, intelligent faces, +young, for the most part, and curiously refined, intent upon correct +performance of the present duty, and touched, almost without exception, +with an enthusiasm born of the martial music and the rhythmic tramp of +advancing feet. He saw the quick, reciprocal glance of the pivot and +flank men, as the fours, in perfect alignment, swept round into +company-front; the long, easy compression and give of the compact lines, +acquiring correct adjustment; the rigid tenure of chests and shoulders; +the firm fling of slender gray legs, as regularly intervaled as the +teeth of a giant comb. Company by company, the regiment fell into the +cadence of full-step. Midway, the standards of the Republic and +Alleghenia rippled side by side. And so, with blare of brass and sharp +staccato of snare-drums, with sheen of rifles and accoutrements, with +flash of slender swords, raised in salute,--above all and always, with +that magnificent unanimity, that mighty pulse of the thunderous +advance, the Ninth swept past its Governor and its Colonel in review. + +And then, in an instant, as it seemed, the vast square was formed again, +a sharp command rang out, the rifles snapped to a present-arms, the +standards dipped, and the strains of the "Star-Spangled Banner" mounted +triumphantly to the great girders of the lofty roof. The multitude of +spectators rose at the sound, and the Lieutenant-Governor rose with +them, his heart aglow with new inspiration, new hope, and new resolve. +The band was almost speaking the words of the anthem on the dust-grayed +air:-- + + "Oh! say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave + O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?" + +To the accompaniment of a myriad clapping hands, the Lieutenant-Governor +resumed his seat, shaken by a novel, tremendous emotion. Yes! a thousand +times yes! The star-spangled banner, symbol of loftiest ideals and +purest purposes, mute memorial and reminder of devotion incalculable and +sacrifice without bound, guarantee of liberty and brotherhood, mercy, +equality, and justice--yet waved! And, part and indissoluble portion of +its inspiring memories and illustrious destinies, the star of Alleghenia +yet blazed upon its azure field! He had been living in a world of +unrealities, in a valley of shadow, grayed by portents of failure and +despair. His eyes had been narrowed to see the pitfalls which lined his +path, to the stumbling-blocks, the briers, the indescribable sordidness +of his personal position and his immediate surroundings. Now, he looked +up and horizonward. The thunder-clouds of official depravity and +duplicity which darkened the way of his endeavor--were they able, after +all, to blot out the memory of the clear, high sky above? + +As this thought came to him, it was almost as if, in actuality, a +brooding heaven had been rent asunder, revealing the steel-blue of the +infinite ether permeated with the supreme radiance of noon; and at the +incursion of this illuminating element the host of his discouragements +dwindled and disappeared, like noisome little prowlers of the night, +scuttling to cover at the abrupt break of a tropical day. For a moment, +he strove to realize whence the light had come, and in what consisted +this sovereign ally, hitherto uncalculated, of his optimism. As he +tracked his thought, it led him undeviatingly back to its direct +inspiration, the words of Natalie Rathbawne. + +"Before your fears come true"--she had said. + +Before his fears came true--well, what? The revelation leaped at him +full and fair now, and every nerve sang like a taut wire in answer to +its touch. Before his fears came true, this wretched little world of +petty chicanery and official corruption which surrounded and sickened +him would be wiped out of existence. Abbott--McGrath--their machinations +and their misdeeds--their lies and their ambitions--their power and +their pride,--they were newts that fouled a pool, gnats in the sunshine, +cinders on the snow. Towering above them, ready, at an instant's +notice, to crush them out of being, was the rock of ages, the righteous +spirit of Alleghenia, integral and indestructible, illumined by the +ancient, undimmed, and eternal sense of rectitude inherent in the +American people! + +Not by his agency, perhaps--perhaps not even in his day,--nevertheless +and infallibly, the right was bound to conquer in the end. The clear +eyes and the firm mouths of the men of the Ninth spoke it, their rifles, +their broad shoulders, and their precision confirmed and guaranteed it, +and back of these stood the great, taciturn figure of the People, a +smile upon its calm and silent lips. When those lips should speak, as +speak they would, their words would be the annihilation of Elijah Abbott +and of all his kind! + +Meanwhile--the bitterness--the disappointments--the humiliations--ah, in +a moment, how they had grown shrunken, and wizened, and old! For out of +the radiance of revelation, as Christ of old spoke to His disciples, so +now the spirit of Alleghenia spoke to her Lieutenant-Governor. + +"_What is that to thee? Follow thou Me!_" + +Like a woman, the spirit of her cried unto him, and, like a man, the +spirit of John Barclay answered. + + + + +X + +A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER + + +Much to Barclay's satisfaction, Cavendish had obtained his appointment +as a city reporter on the staff of the "Sentinel." Even the first week +of the new life thus entered upon had produced a vast change in his +manner and appearance. Though the Lieutenant-Governor had seen him but +once, when he came to repay the loan made him--in itself, of all signs +of restoration to a normal attitude, the most significant--he found that +his complexion had cleared and softened, and his eye perceptibly +brightened. He was clean-shaven once more, and his dress, while of +strict simplicity, was yet suggestive of the old days when he had been +called the most fastidious man in Kenton City. He held himself +straighter, too, with his shoulders thrown back and his head up; and +Barclay had noted, with quiet gratification, that there was not a +tremor about the hands which unfolded and smoothed the bills he had come +to return. One evidence alone remained of the desperate ordeal through +which he had passed. His voice, formerly firm and vibrant with a spirit +that was half gayety, half arrogance, was now indescribably modulated, +and touched with a melancholy which was not that of servility, still +less of shame. Rather, it was an unspeakably appealing regret, a +monotonous listlessness, a suggestion of hopeless surrender to something +tragic and inevitable. Barclay was puzzled by it. It seemed illogical, +and evaded him, like a melody with a dimly familiar _motif_ which he was +unable to place or even fully recall. It haunted him singularly, when +Cavendish had left, and afterwards, in his leisure moments, came back to +him, striving, as he fancied, to make itself understood. Intimately +candid as their recent relation had been, here was something +unexplained, which he could not come at, and which was yet eloquent of +vitality, of the need of comprehension. + +Since that time, three weeks before, the two men had not met. For this +there were several reasons. Barclay knew from a brief note that +Cavendish had taken a small room in a boarding-house, not far from the +"Rockingham," and that the pressure of his work for the "Sentinel" set +him afoot so early, and sent him home at night so brain and body weary, +that he had neither the strength nor the inclination for other things. +Added to this, had been the Lieutenant-Governor's absorption in his own +duties, and, in particular, his absence from Kenton City, on his round +of inspection of the state militia. But, just before the dinner hour, on +the evening following that of the review, Cavendish called, as Barclay +was in the act of dressing. + +"I had a suspicion I'd catch you just about this time," he said, +dragging a chair to the door of the bedroom, where he could watch the +Lieutenant-Governor struggling with a refractory white tie. "I'm getting +on famously, and I wanted you to know it." + +"That's right!" said Barclay, scowling into the mirror. "But then, I +knew you would. Your pessimism didn't produce much effect on me. I've +heard men talk like that before. And, of course, when a chap gets into +the condition you were in, back there, there's no such thing as making +him believe he can ever pull out. You talked like an ass, that first +night, Spencer." + +"And acted like a blackguard! I suppose you will allow me to refer to +that now?" + +"Now less than ever, my good sir. As I've told you already, all that +belongs to the past. You're yourself again. What's the use of dwelling +on a time gone by, when you were in reality somebody else--or, rather, +nobody at all? When are you going to call at the Rathbawnes'? The old +man is pretty ill, I'm afraid, but I think the rest would like to see +you again. They were speaking of you only the other day--that is, one of +them was!" + +"Not till this strike trouble is over, at all events; they have all they +can attend to at present, without being bothered by reformed drunkards. +And perhaps I sha'n't call at all. I haven't decided yet what would be +best." + +Then, before Barclay had time to speak, he added:-- + +"By the way, I'm to take up the strike to-morrow, for the 'Sentinel.'" + +"Are you?" exclaimed the Lieutenant-Governor, in a tone of the liveliest +interest. "That's good news. It must be about the most important +assignment they could give you, just now. Well, I wonder if you are +destined to be the only conscientious reporter in Kenton City, or +whether you will simply be like all the rest. Are you going to have the +courage of your convictions--which I think I can surmise, though you +haven't as yet confided them to me--or are you going to wear the +slave-chains of your fellows, and distort, and misrepresent, and truckle +and kow-tow to the policy of the most venal press in America?" + +"_On fait ce qu'on peut_," said Cavendish, with a shrug. "Orders are +orders, John. If the orders of the editor don't go, the orders on the +cashier don't come. That's about all there is to it. It would be rather +futile to attempt the Don Quixote act, if only for the reason that one +would never get into print. One can't do more than follow instructions. +The reporter's best policy is his paper's best honesty." + +"Honesty?" repeated the Lieutenant-Governor. "Where does the honesty +come in? Of course I understand your position. In a way, it is identical +with mine--subservience to a principle that you despise, acquiescence in +methods that you know to be utterly false and wrong! How sick I am of it +all! It's the old experience, all over again, which I used to have as a +child with the Tom Smith paper crackers. You are fascinated by the +tinsel, and the colored paper, and the gaudy label. You think that when +you've dissected one, and pulled it all to pieces, you'll find a bugle +and a gold crown inside--because that's what it says on the box. But, +the first thing you know, you'll find yourself blowing on a tin whistle +and wearing a fool's cap of green paper! Lord! how the press of Kenton +City needs a _man_--a man with the courage and the power to show up the +scoundrels who are responsible for all this--McGrath and his associates, +I mean. I'm sick and tired of reporters whose rascality is self-evident, +of editors who are bought and sold like chattels, of a state of affairs, +in general, so infamous as to surpass expression! You have my sympathy, +Spencer--the sympathy of a fellow-victim. To be a reporter on a +newspaper which dictates dishonesty; to be the lieutenant of a Governor +who enjoins duplicity--it's all just about one and the same thing!" + +"It's curious," commented Cavendish, "that it wasn't until about a week +after--after that night, that I knew you were Lieutenant-Governor. Then, +your name happened to be mentioned in the office, and somebody asked me +if I knew you." + +"Whereupon," said Barclay, conquering the tie at last, and turning from +the mirror, "you had the inexpressible privilege of saying that you knew +me intimately." + +"Whereupon," repeated Cavendish, in that so singular tone which had lain +heavy upon the other's memory, "I had the inexpressible privilege of +saying that I used to know you, but that we had quarreled, and were +now--strangers." + +"Why?" demanded the Lieutenant-Governor, wheeling abruptly upon him. +"What possessed you to say such a silly thing as that?" + +Cavendish leaned forward in his chair, with his elbows on his knees, and +his forehead against his interlaced fingers, staring at the floor. + +"I'm glad, in a way, to have you ask that question," he said slowly. "We +are wary of mock heroics, or even real heroics, men like you and me. And +yet there are things which must be explained, things not easy to +explain, because they come so close at times to melodrama. I've always +had a horror of emotional situations; and, from what I know of you, I'm +sure you have, as well. I'd avoid this explanation, if I could--indeed, +I've deliberately avoided it, thus far. Yet if I were a Romanist in the +presence of my priest, I think I should feel more at liberty to evade +confession than I do now. For both our sakes, I'll try to be as brief, +as simple, as lucid, as I can. And I'll trust you to understand, as well +as may be. Don't think there's any pose, any aim at effect, in what I'm +going to say. You've asked me a question, and I'm going to answer it, +that's all! I don't think, in my present frame of mind, I could bear to +have you entertain the suspicion that the answer was affected or lacking +in candor. _Allons!_ Already I'm growing too verbose!" + +He looked up with a wan smile. + +"Let's get down to facts. You ask me why I told my questioner that we no +longer knew each other. Well, then, let's have at it! It was because, +John Barclay, there is likely--no, there is sure--to come a time when +you won't care to acknowledge me as your friend. Oh, wait!" he added, as +the Lieutenant-Governor held up his hand in protest. "Hear me out. You +say I talked like an ass, that first night. Perhaps. But the fact +remains that I've been a drunkard--and that I'm bound to be one again! +I've been fighting against temptation for several weeks. It hasn't been +very strong, for some reason, and so I've managed to ground it so far. +But you remember the chap with whom old Hercules wrestled? Every time he +touched earth his strength was multiplied. Well, that's the way with +drink. I can throw the temptation for a while, but every time I do so it +rises, stronger many-fold. Sooner or later, I'm forced to give in. I +know it, as I know I'm sitting here. I'm doing my best now, because, in +the future, when the wrong that for a time you've righted goes wrong +again, I want you to remember that I made the effort--for you--and for +her--for the Fairy Princess. The end is as plain as day! It was born in +me, this. I think I've never told you that my father died of it, but +that's the truth. And the next time I drop, it will be for good and all. +I shall never make another effort to conquer the inevitable. If I can't +do it now, with the hope of redemption thus made plain, with a new +start, and a fresh chance, and--thanks to you, John--the past wiped off +the slate and a new sum set to solve, with the incentive of your +friendship and confidence, and the interest, so undeserved, of the Fairy +Princess, into the bargain,--if I can't do it now, I say, why surely I +can never do it. John, you can't know what I've been through. You, +who've never had the temptation, can't conceive of what it means. It's a +living actuality, this lust for drink. When your nerves go wrong, even +at the end of a day, or a week, or a year, during which you've kept +straight, when you're tired, discouraged, and, above all, _alone_!--then +it comes at you like a live thing,--speaks--grips your arm--drags you +wherever it wills! I've laughed at it, scoffed at it, in its absence, +tried to make myself believe it a fragment of an otherwise forgotten +dream, many and many and many a time. _But it always came back!_ Oh, +John Barclay, you others will never understand! A man has to have been +through it, in order to know, and that not once, but, as I have, a +hundred times." + +"I can well believe it to be a tremendous temptation," said the +Lieutenant-Governor gravely. + +"Temptation? It's more than that! A temptation gives you _some_ chance, +doesn't it? You may yield to it, but, at least, you've had your +fighting-chance. Well, in that sense, this is no temptation, though I've +been using the word myself to describe it. Why, John, it's madness, +sheer insanity. You probably remember that I never used to touch alcohol +at all. I promised my poor mother to let it alone until I reached my +majority. Of course, I didn't realize about the dear old man; he died +when I was too young for that. But her one great fear, and naturally, +was that the curse had descended to me--just as it had! Well, I stuck to +my promise till I was twenty-one, and kept along in the same way for +some time afterwards, just because there didn't seem to be any +particularly good reason for taking up something which I had managed to +get along very well without, all my life. Then came that time, you +know--three years ago--and out of mere recklessness, bravado, God knows +what, I began to drink. John, I was a doomed man from the first swallow! +That demon had been hiding inside me, without sound or movement or other +hint of his presence, for twenty-eight years--just waiting his chance! +You know the rest. The fight has been going on ever since, and the thing +has beaten every time. I've resisted. I've struggled. I've even prayed. +It's all useless." + +He pointed significantly to the curtain which hung where the door of the +wine-closet had been. + +"As I did that night," he continued, "I shall do again, and still again, +until the end. It's insanity, nothing more or less. It lurks at the back +of my brain--always--always--and then, suddenly, when I am least +expecting it, it comes forward with a rush, and I might as well try to +check the north wind or the incoming tide. I feel it tingling in my +fingers, scorching my throat, tearing at my reason. I swear I won't give +in, and, in the very act of so swearing, I get up and go out to meet it. +I could break down iron doors to get at the drink when it calls to me. +And, though I seem to be going straight enough now, the moment is coming +when it _will_ call and when I shall obey! Then you won't want to think +you've ever known me, John Barclay, still less to remember that the name +of the Fairy Princess has passed between us. And, in the midst of my +damnation, it will be a drop of cold water on my tongue to know that +I've left you a loophole through which to escape the acknowledgment of +these last few weeks. So far, no one but the 'Rockingham' people, and +Payson, and--and the Fairy Princess--know that we've been together +recently. The 'Rockingham' people don't even know my name. Payson won't +speak. And _she_ certainly won't. So far, so good. Further, I've come to +say good-by. Hereafter, we mustn't see each other"-- + +"Stop--stop!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "What is all this rot +you're talking? Chuck it, will you? Look here! If you go back on +me--which is bad--and on your Fairy Princess--which is worse--and on +yourself--which is the worst of all"-- + +"Yes, yes," answered Cavendish, "that's all true. But I'm not talking +about _if_ I go back, I'm talking about _when_ I go back! As I said when +I began, there's no use trying to explain this thing to a man who +doesn't understand it, and no man _can_ understand it except through his +own experience. In this respect, if in no other, you and I talk +different languages, belong on different planets. Could I expect you to +comprehend with me that first give of self-control which lets the demon +loose, and the meaning of the sight or smell of drink at that exact +moment when the will is weakest--the first glass, hastily swallowed, as +a brute, long thirsty, gulps down the water it has craved--the second +and third, taken more slowly--and then, that slackening of every nerve, +that jettisoning of all the moral cargo, that sudden love and +appreciation of the sensuous side of life? Don't you see? It's another +world, that, which you simply can't understand, unless you travel to it +by the road by which I have come--which God forbid!" + +"In all this," said Barclay, "I can see no reason why our present +friendship should not continue, and should not be known." + +"Simply this," answered Cavendish: "I'm--nothing! You're the +Lieutenant-Governor,--who is spoken of, if you care to know it, in the +office of the 'Sentinel' as the only honest official in the state of +Alleghenia. You mustn't tie up to me, nor I to you. I've told you what +my end is going to be. You don't believe it, perhaps, but it's none the +less true. And yours--do you know that the law-abiding element looks up +to you as a kind of Messiah? Do you know that you are the dawn of honor +and integrity which lies behind the present black cloud of lawlessness? +I tell you, John, the promise of your future is such as might nerve a +beaten Napoleon to renewed endeavor. In your hands lies the salvation of +the state." + +"I wish I could think so," said the Lieutenant-Governor. "God knows I'd +willingly cut one of them off, if I thought its loss could benefit the +commonwealth. But, as I've had occasion to say to others, in the present +emergency I'm as helpless as a babe unborn. You see how things are +going--one might as well appeal, so far as any hope of success is +concerned, to McGrath himself as to Governor Abbott. There's no getting +around it, Spencer. It's a declaration of anarchy pure and simple, and +with the official seal of Alleghenia at the bottom of the document. +Iniquitous wrong is being done, not only to Mr. Rathbawne in refusing +him the protection of the law to which he is entitled, but to the cause +of the strikers themselves, if they can justly be said to have a cause. +Nothing ever was or ever will be gained for the benefit of the many by +the violence of the few. It can only end in one way: by the +interposition of the federal troops. You know what happened at Chicago. +It will be the same thing here; and before it is over we shall see +people shot down like rats in the streets of Kenton City." + +"I hope it won't come to that," said Cavendish; "but even so, all's well +that ends well. Provided that order is finally restored"-- + +"But what credit is it," broke in Barclay, "to the state of Alleghenia +to have her law-breakers suppressed by the national government? Don't +you see that it would be only a final proof that she is too incompetent +or too indifferent to do it herself? From the point of view of the +state's good name, I doubt which is worst, her present attitude or the +interference of federal force." + +"Will it come to the latter in any event?" + +"Undoubtedly. They've already tried to prevent the delivery of Mr. +Rathbawne's mail, both at the mills and at his house. You know what +that means, don't you? One carrier interfered with in the performance of +his duty is sufficient excuse for mobilizing a brigade." + +"But the Governor"-- + +Barclay came forward, laid his hand on Cavendish's shoulder, and looked +down at him, slowly nodding his head. + +"The Governor of Alleghenia is a dyed-in-the-wool scoundrel, my good +sir," he said. "It is his manifest duty to enforce the law rigidly and +at once, and if the police of Kenton City cannot or will not assist him, +to summon the militia to his aid. In that way only can the honor of +Alleghenia be saved. And that is what Elijah Abbott will never do. There +is anarchy open and flagrant in the streets of Kenton City--there is +anarchy silent and sneering in the Governor's chair. God save the +state!" + + + + +XI + +YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE + + +"I have promised to marry Colonel Broadcastle," announced Mrs. Wynyard +when the silence had lasted twenty minutes. + +Dorothy flung round from the window against which she had been +mercilessly pressing her pretty nose. + +"Why, Aunt Helen!" she exclaimed. "You really are the most startlingly +abrupt person I ever knew. Are you in earnest? What under the sun +possessed you to do that?" + +"I think it must have been Colonel Broadcastle," answered Mrs. Wynyard, +with an air of reflection. "It was last night when he was showing us +over the armory, after the review. He not only asked me, but appeared to +have quite set his heart upon my giving him an affirmative answer. And +he had been so extremely civil, Dorothy, about our seats and all that, +that I thought it would seem rather ungracious to refuse the first favor +he had ever asked of me. So I said yes." + +"Aunt Helen, Aunt Helen! One of these fine days you will be the death of +me. Did any one _ever_ hear of such a reason for accepting a man?" + +"I couldn't think of a better one for refusing him," said Mrs. Wynyard +serenely. "So there you are!" + +"Talk about logic!" said Dorothy. She came across the room, and seated +herself beside her aunt. "I never heard anything so exciting in my +life!" she added. "Do you really mean it? Are you really going to marry +him?" + +"That is the arrangement, as I understand it," replied Mrs. Wynyard. "Of +course, I haven't his promise in writing, but I think I can trust him. I +once looked him up in your father's business guide, and he had three A's +after his name. I'm sure I don't know what they can stand for, if it's +not Acquaintance, Appeal, and Acceptance. I don't really see what else +I could have done. It seems to have all been arranged without consulting +me at all. One can't very well set one's self up in opposition to a +business guide, you know." + +"But he's old enough to be your father, Aunt Helen!" + +"That's precisely the reason why there wouldn't have been any sense in +my promising to be a sister to him. You see, I was quite helpless in the +matter from start to finish." + +"And it was only last night that you called me preposterous!" laughed +Dorothy. "Really, Aunt Helen, people who live in glass houses shouldn't +throw stones. I think you are the most absurd creature in the world. Do +you love him?" + +"I can even go so far as to say that I think I do," said Mrs. Wynyard, +without a break in her gravity. "I have all the symptoms,--palpitation +of the heart, a morbid craving for Shelley and chocolate caramels, a +tendency to wake up singing, and a failing for flattening my nose +against the window-pane for twenty minutes at a stretch without saying a +word to my poor old aunt, on the mere chance that he may be coming down +the avenue." + +The blush which Dorothy paid as tribute to this subtle innuendo came +near to rivaling one of young Nisbet's celebrated performances in the +same line. + +"You're making fun of me," she said reproachfully. + +"I, my dear?--not the least in the world. It's all as true as the gospel +according to St. Valentine. I've told you first because we're not only +aunt and niece, but the very best friends possible besides, and I knew +you would like to hear the news before any one else. Colonel Broadcastle +is by all odds the finest man I know,--I won't even except John Barclay, +much as I admire him. He has paid me a very great honor. I respect him +tremendously; I trust him absolutely. These alone are good reasons; but +there's a better one,--so much better that nothing else really has any +bearing on the subject. Can you guess?" + +"Yes," said Dorothy softly, "you just love him. Isn't that it?" + +"Exactly. It's a curious thing, this love. There may be every reason why +one should marry a man, his own wish included, and yet one doesn't. +There may be no reason at all, so far as outsiders can see, and yet one +does! I've known a woman to throw over one suitor who had everything in +his favor--money, character, position--and accept another who had none +of these advantages--because she liked the way he parted his hair! +That's the way it goes. It's the most illogical thing in the world, if +we except the stock market and other women's gowns. And then, when it's +all arranged, his friends wonder what she could have seen in him, and +her friends what he could have seen in her! But I'm wandering from the +subject. Seriously, Dorothy dear, I love him very sincerely, and I have +been more happy than I can say ever since I found out that it wasn't +going to be one of those one-sided love-affairs which assure the incomes +of the poets and the lawyers. And now,--confidence for confidence, +Dorothy!" + +"Aunt Helen! I don't know what you mean." + +"Oh, Dorothy! 'I don't know what you mean' is one of those phrases like +'Not at home' and 'Yours very sincerely,' which are white lies on the +face of them. I don't want to force your confidence. We all have what +our friends recognize as our private affairs, with the accent--worse +luck!--on the _pry_! But this is very different. I'm very fond of you, +as you know, and my interest is far from being vulgar curiosity. Of a +woman's five cardinal failings--inquisitiveness, extravagance, vanity, +vacillation, and loquacity--I'm guiltless of all except the last and +most innocent. But don't we all need to talk at times? Don't we all long +for a trustworthy _confidante_? Aren't our little secrets often like +precious liquors?--if we don't make use of them, share them with our +friends, they either ferment and sour, or else lose all their sweetness +and significance by slow evaporation." + +"You would draw confidence from a stone," said Dorothy, with a little +smile, "but what have I to tell you?" + +"How should I know? Perhaps nothing--as yet; perhaps everything. Take +your time about it, dear. I'm not trying to get you to commit yourself. +I only want you to know that I'm ready to share your secret when it's +ready to be shared, and to help and counsel you in any way I can. I know +the main great fact already. Because, you see, Dorothy, one may conceal +an infinite amount, even from one's nearest and dearest, when they don't +understand--and they are so _apt_ not to understand, one's nearest and +dearest! And the financier may hide his schemes from his partners, or +the general his plan of campaign from his fellow-officers, or the +politician his ambitions from his most ardent supporters--but I doubt, +my dear, if a woman in love was ever able to hide very much from +another woman in the same lamentable condition! + +"If it were not," she added, taking Dorothy's hand in hers, "for the +great happiness which has come into my life, do you think that I should +have been able to divine that other great happiness which seems to be +hovering over yours? I am the physician afflicted with the disease which +it becomes his duty to study and to cure. Only, it's not a disease, +Dorothy, but a great, a beautiful revelation. I should have compared +myself, instead, to the prophet who is enabled to interpret the dreams +of others because they are identical with his own. There's my little +speech. And when you are prepared to answer it, you'll find me ready." + +As she was speaking the last words, the butler flung back the curtains +at the doorway of the drawing-room. + +"Mr. Nisbet," he announced imperturbably. + +Dorothy looked at her aunt, and then, with her frank laugh:-- + +"If there _is_ an answer," she said, "that's it!" + +As young Nisbet entered, Mrs. Wynyard was the first to greet him. + +"So," she observed, looking him over approvingly, "you've beaten your +swords into walking-sticks, and your spears into top-hats, as my friend +Isaiah so aptly observes! That's very commendable, but I almost think I +like you better in your war-paint. Do you know, a Colonel's orderly is +the spickest-and-spanest object upon which I've ever laid, or hope to +lay, my eyes?" + +"He just naturally has to be," said young Nisbet, with a grin. Somehow, +he was always more at his ease with Mrs. Wynyard than with other women. +"You see," he added, "if it wasn't that way, he wouldn't be it." + +Which was as near as he had ever come to making an epigram. + +"Well, I shall leave you to the tender mercies of Dorothy," said Mrs. +Wynyard. "I've promised to take a walk with your--what is it you call +him--instead of commanding officer, you know?" + +"K. O.," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, that's it. How deplorably you militiamen spell! Well, at all +events, I'm going to walk with your K. O., and it's time I was getting +ready. Good-by." + +"Good-by, Mrs. Wynyard." + +"Day-day!" said Dorothy, from the divan. + +"She's a crack-a-jack!" exclaimed young Nisbet, after she had gone. + +"Mercy!" said Dorothy. "I never knew you to be so enthusiastic over any +one before. If you have any intention of falling in love with Aunt +Helen, I feel it to be my duty, as a friend and well-wisher, to warn you +in advance that there isn't the most remote show in the world for you." + +"Oh, it's not that!" protested young Nisbet with that stupendous +earnestness which made people want to hug him. "Why, Mrs. Wynyard would +have me talked to a standstill in two or seven minutes! Imagine me +trying to make love to a dame like that! She'd lose me so quick you +couldn't see me for the dust. Besides"-- + +"Besides what?" asked Dorothy with an elaborate air of unconcern, as he +hesitated. + +Young Nisbet was quite crimson now, and twitched at the creases in his +trousers where they passed over his knees, and turned in his toes +excessively. + +"There's somebody else in the running!" he blurted out desperately. + +There! It was out--a part of it, at least--not at all, to be sure, in +anything even remotely resembling one of the thousand manners he had +proposed to himself as effective, during long hours of wakefulness, when +there was nothing in the world but his crowding thoughts and the ticking +of his clock--but still, out! The ice was broken. It was impossible that +she should not understand. The rest would be easier. + +Alas for young Nisbet! He was, as he himself acknowledged, not "up on +women!" + +"Somebody else?" repeated Dorothy. "How ever did you find that out? She +only told _me_ about it twenty minutes ago." + +Alas, alas, for young Nisbet! He had thought his feet upon the beach at +last, whereas they had but touched a sand-bar in passing over. The +under-tow of embarrassment was worse than ever now, and threatened to +drag him down. + +"Oh, I don't mean Mrs. Wynyard. I wasn't talking of her--that is, I was, +at first--but afterwards--anyhow, I'm not talking of her now! When I say +there's somebody else, I mean--I mean"-- + +"I am going out for a moment, Dorothy--just over to the _doctor's_. +_How_ de do, Mr. Nisbet? _Wretched_ weather, _isn't_ it? Natalie's with +your father, my dear, and _I'll_ be back _almost_ immediately. +Er--_ahem_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne went through a kind of rudimentary calisthenic exercise, +which consisted of squaring her shoulders and drawing in her chin. It +was accompanied by a meaning glance at her daughter, and was designed as +an inconspicuous substitute for the frank injunction to "sit up +straight, my dear," upon which Dorothy had finally placed a ban. + +"And _won't_ you feed the gold-fish, my dear?" she added. "I've been _so_ +occupied, and the poor things haven't had a _crumb_ for three days. I've +just told Thomas to take a plate of bread in at _once_. I'm sure Mr. +_Nisbet_ won't mind: get him to _help_ you. Er--_ahem_! And I'll be back +in about fifteen minutes, or so." + +For a time there was silence in the big, warm conservatory. Young Nisbet +had taken the dish from Dorothy's hands, and, after seating himself on +the low marble parapet surrounding the pool, devoted his energies to +feeding the gold-fish. He was thinking that it was all to be done over +again, and that it was harder than ever, if such a thing were possible, +to do. What was there about those few words which seemed to choke him? +For the moment, he took refuge in a commonplace question. + +"Is it one of your duties to feed these persons?" + +Dorothy laughed shortly, like a little chord of music. + +"No--it's the Mater's peculiar privilege," she answered. "She adores the +stupid little beasts. Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. Nisbet. She +feeds them regularly herself,--or did, until Dad began to require so +much of her time. But lately, the house has been so upset, and she has +been doing such a lot of going out, and coming in"-- + +"Yes," put in young Nisbet dryly, "I've noticed the coming in part." + +"So Natalie has been doing it for her," went on Dorothy, more rapidly. +"I suppose Natalie herself hasn't had the time, these last three days. +They _are_ hungry, aren't they? _Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. +Nisbet!_ Don't you see the poor things have only button-holes for +mouths?" + +There was another long pause, before either spoke again. + +"What defeats me about your mother," said young Nisbet slowly, "is the +way she manages to come in just at the wrong moment. At interruption, +she's the most star performer I've ever run up against. You don't mind +my saying that, do you? I'm not throwing any asparagus. I wouldn't be +disrespectful about her for the world. But really, for chopping into a +conversation, she's a dazzler!" + +"She _is_ a little inopportune at times," admitted Dorothy. + +"Inopportune? Yes,--she's all of that. When she marches in, I feel +exactly as if the boat had gybed, and the boom come over and knocked me +into thirty fathoms of water. Lord!" + +"Why, how ridiculous!" said Dorothy. "There's nothing about the Mater to +be afraid of. She's the dearest, most innocent old thing in the world! +She just blunders along like that, and nobody is less aware of her +mistakes than she is. And, after all, why shouldn't she interrupt us, so +long as we're not saying anything in particular? And if we _were_ +saying--anything in particular, we could always pick up the +conversation where we dropped it." + +"That's just what I find it so hard to do!" confessed young Nisbet. "I'm +a stupid sort of lout, you know, Miss Rathbawne. I've never had half a +chance to practice talking to dames, and where other lads fuss like +experts, I just can't make good. I foozle every stroke. I'm an +ass--that's all!" + +"You're nothing of the sort!" said Dorothy indignantly. "You're an +extremely attractive young man!" + +"As good as the average in some ways, perhaps. But--how can I explain +what I mean?--there always comes a day when a chap wants to be more, +wants to be the best ever, in every way! That's the proposition I'm up +against now. I seem to be just a bundle of misfits, and--and--oh, +shucks! my line of talk is all crooked, and I can't tell you what the +trouble is, but"-- + +"Your liver's out of kilter," interpolated Dorothy. + +"No, sir!" protested young Nisbet. "Nothing is ever out of kilter +inside me! If I'm nothing else, I'm blue-ribbon boy on the health +question. No, it's something I want, and that I'm pretty sure I can't +get." + +"I know perfectly well what it is," said Dorothy, "and you haven't even +asked for it!" + +Young Nisbet looked up suddenly. + +"Do you mean?"--he stammered, "do you mean?"-- + +Outside, the front door slammed, and Mrs. Rathbawne's voice became +audible, inquiring Dorothy's whereabouts of the butler. The girl +laughed. + +"There's the Mater back again," she said. "Oh, Mr. _Nisbet_!" + +For young Nisbet had dropped dish and bread-crumbs into the pool with a +great splash, electrifying the gold-fish into unheard-of activity, and +had risen, at the same moment, to his feet. He stood before her, his +honest face blazing, his hands outstretched. + +"I love you!" he said. "Will you marry me?" + +And whether or not he received an audible reply to this question he +never knew,--only she was in his arms, and gold-fish might feast or +starve, for all he cared about them. The wide doors of perfect bliss +swung open before him, and young Nisbet passed within. + +He was gazing ruefully into the water, as Mrs. Rathbawne entered. For +the first time in his experience, her presence did not embarrass him. + +"I've dropped a dish into your pool, Mrs. Rathbawne," he said, "and +scared the gold-fish into blue conniption fits. Look how they are +scurrying around. I hope I haven't done them any harm." + +"Oh, no," answered Mrs. Rathbawne placidly. "They are getting _so_ fat +that I should _think_ a little exercise, _now_ and again, would be +_good_ for them. We _might_ drop a dish into the pool every week or so, +Dorothy, just to stir them up." + +"It might go for a while," said young Nisbet, "but any old football +player like myself, Mrs. Rathbawne, will tell you that you can't work +the same trick more than just a certain number of times." + +"Interruption, for example!" added Dorothy, and laughed across at him, +deliciously, with her eyes. + + + + +XII + +DIOGENES + + +It was during the tenth week of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills that +the "Kenton City Record" made its long-remembered attack upon +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay. The arraignment was one unparalleled for +venom, even in the columns of that most notoriously scurrilous journal +in the state, and, withal, there was about it a devilish ingenuity, a +distortion of facts so slight as to defy refutation, and so plausible as +to carry conviction. It was the last blow in the long series of +discouragements which Barclay had suffered since his inauguration, and +for the moment he was completely unmanned. He was at no loss, however, +to trace the source from which the ingeniously perverted facts had been +obtained. Not even McGrath, with his intimate knowledge of all that went +forward at the capitol, could have supplied information so detailed. +The hand of Elijah Abbott was traceable in every line of the attack. +Their conversation, on the afternoon when he had first spoken to Barclay +of the impending strike, was reproduced almost word for word, as well as +that on the occasion when McGrath had been present, and therefrom the +"Record" went on to deduce that not even Peter Rathbawne, with all his +obstinacy, all his blindness to the welfare of his employees, was +responsible for their present destitution in the same sense as was the +Lieutenant-Governor, who might have avoided the strike by a conciliatory +word, and who, instead, had advised Mr. Rathbawne to fight the +working-people until the last cent of their money should be exhausted +and the last drop of their blood should be shed. + +"Incompetency," said the article in part, "is what we long since learned +to expect from John Hamilton Barclay. Gross neglect of public duty, +flagrant callousness to responsibility, contemptuous indifference to the +interests of the citizens whose votes placed him where he is,--all +these have been part and parcel of his attitude since the unfortunate +moment of his election. But even in him we had not looked for the +incredible spectacle of a public official deliberately precipitating the +incalculable distress which has followed in the wake of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills. Overburdened with the cares of office, in a single +instance the Governor of Alleghenia turned over a question of vital +significance to the lieutenant from whom he had every reason to expect +compliance and support. Even so, he was careful to point out a line of +action by which the impending calamity might readily have been avoided. +And what was the result? Not only in total disregard of plain duty, but +in direct disobedience of the orders of his superior, the +Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia threw his influence into the scale to +outweigh law and order, and brought about the deplorable destitution now +facing the families of four thousand martyrs to principle. When men are +driven to desperation, when women turn to shame in order to maintain +life, when children are heard crying in our streets for bread, to whom +shall we point as the author of it all? To Peter Rathbawne, a poor, +doddering old man, barely responsible now, if rumor is to be believed, +for what he does? No! To John Hamilton Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of +Alleghenia!" + +This, and much more in the same strain, while passed over as sensational +bombast by the better element, did not fail of its effect upon the +strikers. A mass-meeting, held that morning, denounced Barclay in a set +of resolutions, as a traitor to his office and as the avowed enemy of +labor, and demanded his impeachment on the ground of neglect of duty. +During the day, half a score of threatening letters came to his office. +But what hurt him most, though he almost smiled at his own +sensitiveness, was that the doormen and porters at the Capitol greeted +his morning nod with a stare, and even the little office-boy, bending +low over his table in the ante-room, did not look up for the customary +wink. For his mother was a trimmer at the Rathbawne Mills. + +Once in his office, the Lieutenant-Governor found it impossible to +concentrate his mind upon the work before him. Sentence after sentence, +the words of his arraignment marched through his mind, as he sat with +his elbows on the desk and his chin in his doubled fists. A single +reading seemed to have stamped them indelibly and forever upon his +memory. Baffled by conflicting reflections he began, for the first time, +to doubt whether his had been the course of conscience, or merely that +of pride and perversity. Was not the "Record" right, perhaps, after all? +If it was true that the strike was driving men to crime and women to the +streets--and if it was not, as yet, true, it soon must be--who, indeed, +was to blame if not he himself, who had said "Fight them!" when he might +have kept peace by a word? + +Suddenly, the Lieutenant-Governor rose, and, crossing the room to where +the arms of Alleghenia hung upon the wall, took down the frame, laid +it, face up, upon the table, and, bending down, studied it intently. The +beautifully executed nude figures of Art and Labor stared steadfastly +back at him, their muscular hands grasping the circular shield, strength +and endurance in every line of their necks, shoulders, and thighs, +purity and purpose in their blue eyes and square-cut jaws. He was as +motionless as they for full five minutes. Presently his finger moved +slowly across the frame, and he said, quite softly: + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas._" + +Then he looked up, straight before him, out of the open window, where an +encircling wistaria was dotted with minute sprouts of green, and up at +the clear, wide sky. + +"I'm right!" he said aloud. "I'm right!" + + * * * * * + +At five that afternoon, Spencer Cavendish set out upon the most +unpleasant assignment which had ever fallen to his lot. When Payson had +told him that he was to procure an interview with Peter Rathbawne for +the "Sentinel," with a special eye to the mill-owner's failing health, +as reported in the morning's "Record," he had shrunk back instinctively +from a task so distasteful, and was on the point of refusing. But two +considerations checked this impulse. If the thing were to be done at +all, he thought, surely it had better be the work of one friendly to the +Rathbawnes and with their interests at heart than that of a bungling +outsider, with it in his power to hurt them beyond expression. The +argument was plausible, but behind its logic, at the back of Cavendish's +brain, there lay another reason, without which the first had been +insufficient to persuade him. He wanted to see Natalie again--to meet +her under the shield of some compatible excuse, so that he should not +seem to have sought her of his own will. He was thirsty for a word from +her, thirsty with the pitiable thirst of the shipwrecked sailor who +knows a swallow of salt water will but increase his torture, and who +craves it, none the less. Long since, he had forfeited his right to her +friendship--no sophistry could blind him to that. Moreover the ocean of +degradation not only lay behind him; it lay in front as well. It was as +he had told Barclay. He stood upon an island, not the mainland, of +redemption, and another plunge was inevitable. + +What he expected to gain by a word with Natalie Rathbawne, Cavendish +himself could hardly have told. At most, he was conscious of a faint +hope that in some turn or twist of the conversation he might have a +chance of thanking her, of telling her that he rejoiced in her +happiness, and of bidding her good-by. For paramount in his mind lay the +thought of his approaching downfall, inevitable, utter, and final. He +did not attempt to deceive himself. He knew what was coming. It had come +before. + +When Cavendish had sent in his card, a servant showed him through the +library into the conservatory, where Peter Rathbawne was seated in a +deep rattan chair watching his daughter, who stood at his side tossing +bread-crumbs to the gold-fish in the circular central pool. They both +turned at the sound of his footsteps, and Natalie held out her hand. + +"So you've come at last!" she said. "I should think it was quite time. +Dad, you remember Mr. Cavendish, don't you?" + +"Yes," answered her father. "Oh, yes!" + +Rathbawne's voice was without life, his face almost wholly void of +expression. Though he glanced at Cavendish, it was with the blank stare +of a delirious person whose attention is unconsciously caught by an +unusual noise rather than with any evidence of direct interest, and he +took no further part in the conversation, nor even seemed to realize +that his companions were speaking. When he had answered his daughter's +question and looked at Cavendish, he leaned back in his chair, and +wearily closed his eyes. + +"He is very much changed since you saw him," said the girl in a lower +tone, turning again to the pool, "and it's all come about in the past +six weeks. The strike has had a most curious, a most pathetic effect +upon him. Even the doctor is at a loss to account for it. I think that +I am, perhaps, the only one who really understands. He has always been +so proud of his mills and of his people, so loyal to them, so like a +father to them, one and all, that to have them turn against him like +this, and, what is worse, get to drinking and rioting, has almost broken +his heart. The doctor says only one thing can save him, and that is to +see the mills going again and the people happy and prosperous, as they +were before. And who knows when that will be? For, feeble and broken as +he is, he will never give in to the Union. Of that I'm sure." + +"I'm very sorry," said Cavendish softly. One look at Rathbawne had been +enough to show him that the interview for which he had been sent was an +impossibility. One look at Natalie sufficed to banish from his mind +every thought save that of her pitiful pallor and the pathetic quiver of +her lips. + +"I had no idea it was as bad as this," he continued. "Can't anything be +done? You are far from being in good shape yourself, Miss Rathbawne." + +"Tired and dispirited, that's all," she answered, trying to smile. "And +I fear nothing can be done as long as our fate lies in Governor Abbott's +hands. There's no use in harping on that, though. You know as well as I +what we have to expect from him. Did you see the attack on Mr. Barclay +this morning?" + +"An infamous libel!" exclaimed Cavendish hotly. + +Miss Rathbawne crumbled the bread between her fingers, and resumed her +feeding of the gold-fish. + +"You must know that I am the last person in the world to need that +assurance," she said slowly. "It is only another thread in all the +hideous tissue of injustice and iniquity which has been wrapped about us +like a pall. What a shame, is it not, that such a man as he should be +powerless to do the work I think God intended for him? And what a shame +that Alleghenia, needing his clear head and his strong arm and his +loyal heart as she does in this hour of emergency, should only be +sneering at him as a coward and a cad!" + +"I cannot believe," answered Cavendish, "that the venom of the 'Record' +is to be taken as the sentiment of the state. There must be many--there +must be a majority of Alleghenians who know, as we know, that no better +man breathes than John Barclay." + +"Thank you," said the girl. + +In the open spaces of water between the lily-pads the fat indolent +gold-fish mouthed at the crumbs, stirring the silence with little +sucking sounds, and sending tiny ripples widening on all sides. One +alone, dingy yellow in color, moped apart from his fellows, and took no +interest in the banquet. + +"That one's a cynic," said Miss Rathbawne presently. "My subtlest +cajoleries never win him from that attitude of sneering contempt. The +others get all the tid-bits, and he doesn't seem to care. He isn't even +ornamental--he's in a class by himself. I call him Diogenes, and I'm +thinking of buying him a tub all for himself, where he can sulk in +solitary grandeur to his heart's content." + +"Perhaps not altogether in a class by himself," said Cavendish. "There +are others, you know, who make no use of their opportunities, and who +can never hope to be anything but ugly and useless, while their fellows +are getting all the good things of life, and enjoying them, and giving +pleasure of one kind or another into the bargain." + +Something in his tone caused Natalie to look at him suddenly. + +"I'm not enough of a pessimist," she answered firmly, "to believe that +true in anything beyond appearances. We are all apt, no matter how +conceited we may be, to underestimate at times the extent of our own +usefulness--or, rather, we are unconscious of the direction in which it +is most productive. If what you say is so, then all that is lacking is +the opportunity, and that is sure to come. We may squander many +opportunities, and, hardly less probably, actually turn to account in a +way we do not perceive many which we seem to ourselves to squander. In +any event, others will come. A woman once said to me that the good in +her was not cultivated nor exercised with a view to _individual +immortality_. That seemed to me to mean so much that I've built up quite +a little creed on it. It's the principle, isn't it, upon which the whole +scheme of the world hinges? A million leaves fall and decay to enrich +the soil wherefrom two million more may spring. An infinity of little +shell-fish die, and the ages grind their shells to powder to make the +sands and the chalk cliffs. Countless raindrops sacrifice their identity +to maintain that of one great river. And why should it not be so with +us? If only we can contribute in the smallest degree to the uplifting of +our kind, to the advancement of the race, to the maintenance of what we +know to be right, what possible difference can it make whether, in the +effort to be of such service, we live or succumb? We were put here, it +seems to me, very much as separate notes are put into one great harmony. +Each note is struck at the proper time, serves its purpose, and goes +into nothingness. Each plays its part, however small. We can't all be +included in the wonderful final chords. Our place may seem trivial to +us, and yet in some sense we may be sure we are all contributors to the +unity and perfection of the whole. That ought to be enough. No one note +achieves individual immortality, but each does something to assure the +immortality of the composition of which it forms a part. If we don't +believe that, if we are not content to have it so, how is it possible to +believe in any divine purpose, any scheme of justice at all? Look at the +indescribable waste of life on all sides of us. If only in the case of +humanity, people are dying by hundreds every minute, unheeded, +unlamented, unrecorded. Human life is such a little thing!--as little as +the life of the leaf or the raindrop. And yet in the death of these last +we are able to perceive the working of a vast system which must be the +outcome of a direct purpose, and whereby the best interest of each +species is furthered. And so, the human race. Why should it be less +than lesser things? One man dies in order that two may live. A +confederacy--as in the case of our own Rebellion--perishes in order that +a nation may endure. Everywhere, in short, the individual sacrifices his +individual existence in order that it may contribute to and fertilize +the growth of his species. So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly +content to have it so. I should ask nothing better, when my own time +comes, than the assurance that, in one way or another, my death had a +significance,--that it was for a person or a principle, and not merely a +natural phenomenon. I may not be able to believe that; but there is one +belief possible to all of us,--I mean that, if not in death, then +assuredly in life, we have been of service to our race and time. We are +often told that the indispensable thing does not exist. I think the same +may be said of the useless one. I don't believe even the humblest of +God's creatures goes out of life without having been at one time or +another an influence for good. I even have hopes of Diogenes. Some day +there will be a scrap of refuse or an ugly little bug which mars the +symmetry of the pool, and Diogenes will eat it,--and perhaps die of +indigestion as a martyr to principle!" + +The silence which followed her words was broken by a hoarse sob from Mr. +Rathbawne, and, turning, they saw that his head had fallen back against +the chair, with his eyes, wide and staring, fixed upon the glass roof, +and his breath coming in short, thick gasps from between his parted +lips. In an instant Natalie was on her knees by his side, with her arms +about him. + +"Don't be frightened," she said, looking up at Cavendish with a brave +little smile. "It's his heart. He has had these attacks frequently of +late. Will you get me the whiskey decanter and a glass? You'll find them +in the dining-room--on the sideboard--to the left." + +Decanter in hand, Cavendish stood watching her, as she tenderly poured a +little of the raw spirit between her father's lips. The effect was +almost instantaneous. Rathbawne choked, swallowed the restorative, and +presently raised his head and looked at her, patting her hand +tremulously with his own. They were so absorbed in each other that +neither noted a sudden, strange transformation in Cavendish's +expression. From the wide-mouthed decanter in his hand, the faint acrid +odor of Peter Rathbawne's fine old Scotch whiskey crept upward, stung +his nostrils, and, of a sudden, set him all a-quiver, like a startled +animal. The smell was almost that of pure alcohol, and set his mouth +watering, and drove his breath out in a little shuddering gasp that was +like a revulsion from some sickening medicine, just swallowed. But he +knew it, none the less, for something which belonged to and was part of +him. For weeks he had avoided it. Now it assailed him like that foe of +Hercules, of whom he had spoken to Barclay, whose strength was +multiplied a hundred-fold for every time his opponent trod him under +foot. + +As he told the Lieutenant-Governor, at the moment when least he +expected it, the demon touched his arm. For a minute he fought +desperately against the suggestion, with his eyes closed, and his teeth +cutting into his inner lip. He clung madly to the thought of the +presence in which he was, conscious that the girl's words had +uplifted him immeasurably, given him a clearer insight into the +essential significance of life than he had ever known. It was +useless--useless--useless! There was nothing left in the world but the +smell of the liquor that he loathed and that he loved! + +"If you were to leave us alone"-- + +At the suggestion, Cavendish bowed and went slowly back toward the +dining-room. Once out of sight of the others, he paused, glanced back +over his shoulder, and then, abruptly, supporting himself with one hand +against the side-post of the doorway, raised the decanter in the other +to his lips, and drank. + + + + +XIII + +THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE + + +The day had been deliciously warm and still, one of those eloquent +heralds of spring that are touched with a peculiar beauty rivaling her +own. As Cavendish came out of the Rathbawne residence, Bradbury Avenue +was splashed with huge blotches of dazzling yellow, where the light of +the westwardly sun poured between the houses and was spilled upon the +smooth pavement. The man choked slightly at the after-taste of the raw +whiskey he had just swallowed, but almost immediately he smiled. + +"I knew it would come," he said to himself as he turned out into the +avenue, "and here it is. I'm not surprised. I'm glad, God help me--I'm +_glad_!" + +His mouth was watering, and he felt, as it were, every inch of the +stimulant's progress through his veins, warming him with its familiar +glow. When he had left the conservatory, he had been trembling +pitifully. Now he was calm, and as steady as if his nerves had been +cords of steel. Responsibility, resolution, remorse--they had fallen +from him like so many discarded garments. He was sharply alive to the +pleasure of the moment, keenly appreciative of the sunlight, the soft +air, the laughter of the children romping in the streets. Of a singular +languor which had been wont to come over him toward the close of each +busy day of the past six weeks there was now no hint. He walked rapidly, +with his shoulders thrown back, and his chin well elevated, but his +course was not in the direction of his home, nor yet in that of the +"Sentinel" office. Instinctively, he had turned toward that part of the +city where were the large restaurants, the playhouses, and the more +pretentious saloons. + +At a corner, he wheeled abruptly into one of these last, and, seating +himself at a small table, called for an absinthe. The place was already +lighted, and each glass in the pyramids behind the bar twinkled with a +tiny brilliant reflection of the nearest incandescent globes. The air +was faintly redolent of lemon and the mingled odors of many liquors. To +Cavendish it was all very familiar, and all very pleasant. Again he told +himself that he was glad, glad that the restraint he had been exercising +was at an end. He was free, he thought, free to accomplish his own +inevitable damnation. He had no patience for the tedious operation of +dripping the water into his absinthe over a lump of sugar, but ordered +gum, and stirring the two rapidly together, filled the glass to the brim +from a little pitcher at his side. Then he drank, slowly but steadily, +barely touching the glass to the table between his sips. + +Presently, he was conscious of a slight numbness at his wrists, a barely +perceptible tingling in his knees and knuckles. His heart was +fluttering, and his temples pulsed pleasurably. He glanced toward the +glittering pyramids of glasses, and for a fraction of time they seemed +to shift in unison a foot to the right, returning immediately to their +original position with a jerk. Then he rose, and went toward the door, +catching sight of his face in a mirror as he passed. It was very pale, +and he crinkled his nose at it derisively, and then smiled at the +whimsical oddity of his reflected expression. On the threshold he +paused, looking toward the west, blazing with the red and saffron of the +departed sun. + +"Oof!" he said, with a downward tug at his waistcoat. "It comes quickly. +That's what it is to be out of practice." + +He dined alone in a corner of an unfrequented restaurant, eating little, +but drinking steadily, absinthe at first, then whiskey, four +half-goblets of it, barely diluted with water. Then he found himself +once more in the streets, now brilliantly lighted, going on and on +without purpose, save when the blazing colored glass of a saloon swerved +him from his path. He knew that he was walking steadily, avoiding +obstacles as if by instinct, stepping from and on to kerbs without any +actual perception of them. Faces swam past him, staring. Men, +particularly those at the bars he leaned against, were talking loudly, +but, as it seemed to him, brilliantly. He often smiled involuntarily, +and sometimes spoke to one of them, drank with him, and presently was +alone again, walking on and on. Occasionally a white-faced clock bulged +at him out of the night; and then he noticed that time was galloping. It +was close upon one when he found himself in a quarter which his recent +employment had made familiar--the neighborhood of the Rathbawne Mills. + +Here, suddenly, his mind emerged from a mist, and every detail of his +surroundings stood out sharp and clear-cut. The street was +insufficiently illuminated, but the light of a full moon cut across the +buildings on one side, half way between roof and sidewalk. Cavendish +perceived, with a kind of dull surprise, that the pavements were +thronged, and that almost every window framed a figure or two. A hoarse +murmur pulsed in the air, and his quickened ear was greeted on every +side by foul jests and grumbled oaths, broken now and again by drunken +imprecations, scuffles, or the shrill invective of women invisible in +the throng. Once a girl touched his arm, and he found her face close to +his, thin, haggard, and imploring. He shook her off, and turned +unsteadily into the doorway of a saloon; stumbling, as he did so, over a +little boy crying on the step. + +Inside, the air was reeking with rank smoke and the fumes of stale beer. +The floor was strewn with sawdust, streaked and circled by shuffling +feet; the mirror backing the bar was covered with soiled gauze dotted +with tawdry roses, and an indescribable dinginess seemed to have laid +its sordid fingers on all the fittings. + +The room was crowded, nevertheless--crowded not only with the men +themselves, but, to the stifling point, with their voices and their +gestures and the spirit of their unrest and discontent. Cavendish, +leaning against the end of the bar, looked wearily down the line of +flushed faces and backward at the disputing groups which rocked and +swayed, as the men argued and swore, grasping the lapels of each others' +coats, and spilling the liquor from their glasses as they gesticulated. +He was wholly sober now. It was the stage of dissipation which +experience had taught him to dread the most--the emergence from dulled +sensibility into a nervous tension upon which stimulant had no apparent +effect. He was trembling again, too, and his face, as he saw it in the +mirror through the clouding gauze, was as that of a stranger, a stranger +of whom he was afraid. He swallowed the whiskey he had ordered, and, +supporting himself by the bar, swung back and gave his attention to what +the men about him were saying. It did not need his sharpened perception +to appreciate the fact that he was in the thick of the worst element of +the Rathbawne strikers, or that the situation was a crisis. What little +restraint had characterized the earlier stages of the strike was now, +most evidently, at an end. Starvation was no longer a mere possibility, +or violence a mere threat. The men raved like wild creatures against +Rathbawne and John Barclay, recounting maudlinly the destitution of +their families, and, anon, flaming forth into cries for vengeance. How +long the babel lasted Cavendish could not have said. Long since, the +doors had been closed, and the lights half lowered, in mock deference to +a supposedly vigilant police, when suddenly a hush fell upon the +assemblage. A side door had opened, and Michael McGrath stood in the +midst of his followers, with his arms folded and a thin smile upon his +lips. There was not a whisper as he began to speak. The men leaned +toward him breathlessly, their mouths open, their eyes starting glassily +out of their sodden faces. + +"And how long is _this_ going to go on?" demanded their leader, with a +sneer. "Talk--talk--talk! That's always the way, and nothing done, after +all. Well, there's been about enough of it, and that's flat. You've +been living on the Union, and I suppose you think you can go on living +on it till hell freezes over. Now listen to me. When the strike began we +had plenty of funds, and more came to us from the Central Federation. +The funds are gone, d' you hear, and the Federation is asking what we +mean to do. There is six hundred and odd dollars in the treasury. No +need to tell you how far that much will go, is there? Not one day! And +with all your talk, you've everything your own way, if only you knew +it--a police that doesn't dare lift a finger against you, and a Governor +that won't budge an inch till I give the word! Well, to-morrow I give +the word, understand me? To-morrow I throw you over, and you can get out +of this the best way you can. I'm sick of your talk. I'm sick of your +doing nothing. Your daughters are on the streets, your wives and your +children are starving, and _you_--by God! _you_ are boozing in a bar +till daylight, and _talking_! So that's enough. To-morrow, the strike's +at an end. To-morrow, the Governor comes down on you like ten thousand +of brick! And I'm the man that gives the word! Unless"-- + +He paused and cast a keen glance at the faces which surrounded him. His +last words had been greeted by a low growl. + +"Unless," he continued, "you know your business, and make a move that's +worth the name." + +The hush of attention seemed to deepen into the leaden silence of +expectancy. + +"There are two men who must be put out of the way," said McGrath slowly, +"and that before another midnight. I don't care how it's done, but done +it must be, for the sake of example. It's easy enough to manage it, as +things are. There'll be a howl, but we have the authorities fixed. And +those two men must go!" + +In the tense silence which followed, a man's voice whispered two words +hoarsely:-- + +"Mr. Rathbawne!" + +"Ay, _Mr._ Rathbawne!" echoed McGrath, flashing into that passionate +manner of his which carried all before it. "_Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +starving you! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's making your sons drunkards! _Mr._ +Rathbawne, who's debauching your daughters! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +killing your wives by inches! _Mr._ Rathbawne, and _Mr._ John Hamilton +Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia!" + +For a moment it seemed as if he would be swept off his feet by a torrent +of enthusiasm. The men crowded about him, slapping him upon the +shoulders, shouting their approval, reaching for his hand. One +brandished a revolver under his nose, with a shrill cry of "This'll do +it, Mac! This'll do it, by God!" The rest had turned to each other, +embracing frantically, and repeating his words in a kind of frenzy. + +Presently McGrath raised his hand, and, as silence was restored at the +signal, turned to the bar-tender with his thin smile. + +"Set 'em up, Dick," he said composedly. "It's on me, this time, and +we'll drink to better days." + +In the confusion Cavendish made his way to the side-door, and passing +through it into the street, hesitated, dazzled by a brilliant light. It +was broad day. + + * * * * * + +As the Lieutenant-Governor entered his ante-room that morning his eyes +contracted suddenly, and he stopped, with his hand upon the knob of the +door. There could be no mistaking the look in the face of the man who +sat facing him, gripping desperately at the arms of his chair. Cavendish +was as white as chalk, with the hunted look of despair which lay so +vividly on Barclay's remembrance of the night when they had met on +Bradbury Avenue. He rose as the Lieutenant-Governor appeared and drew +himself up with an effort at steadiness, conscious that the others +present were observing him narrowly. But Barclay's hesitation was as +brief as it had been involuntary. With a bare glance at his +subordinates, he came forward cordially to take Cavendish's hand, and +then, opening the door of his private office, motioned him to enter +first. + +"Glad to see you," he said steadily, as their hands met. + +Once inside, the manner of both men changed as abruptly as it had been +assumed. The Lieutenant-Governor went slowly toward his desk, with his +head bent, and Cavendish, throwing himself into the nearest chair, and, +with no attempt at concealment, drew a flask from his pocket and drank a +long draught. He looked up to find that the Lieutenant-Governor had +wheeled at the desk, and was standing with his eyes fixed upon him. + +"Wait a minute," said Cavendish, as Barclay seemed about to speak. "We +won't discuss this, for the moment, if you please." + +He held up the flask with a shrug. + +"In fact we needn't discuss it at all," he continued. "I've simply gone +to hell, that's all there is about it. I knew I would. I told you so +long ago. I didn't come here to make excuses--or to receive rebukes, +John Barclay. I've a means here of settling the problem which can give +cards and spades to all your projects of reform." And he tapped his +pocket, where the cloth bulged slightly, with a smile. The +Lieutenant-Governor made no attempt to interrupt him. + +"What I did come to say," went on Cavendish, more steadily, "is that +your life and Mr. Rathbawne's are in danger. You're to be put out of the +way, both of you, before twelve to-night. McGrath's determined on it, +and there's no lack of men to carry out his orders. The strikers are +desperate. I overheard their talk, while--well, while I was getting +drunk! _What's that?_" + +He stopped, with his hand to his ear. Some one was tapping at the +communicating door. + +"Put up that flask!" said Barclay under his breath, adding aloud, as +Cavendish obeyed: + +"Come in!" + +The door swung open softly, and Governor Abbott, smiling and rubbing his +hands, appeared upon the threshold. + +"I beg your pardon, Mr. Barclay," he said. "I did not know you were +engaged. We have the pleasure of another visit from the Citizens' +Committee, and, by a singularly opportune coincidence, Mr. McGrath has +called at the same time. Can you spare us a few moments of your time?" + +With a bow, and a glance at Cavendish, Barclay followed his superior +silently from the room. + +In the Governor's office he found a dozen men, all standing. McGrath, +with his back to the others, was examining with an elaborate air of +interest a map of Alleghenia which hung upon the wall. Colonel +Broadcastle and his fellow-members of the Citizens' Committee, stood +close to, and facing, the Governor's desk. The air was electric with +suggestion of a crisis about to come. + +When the Governor began to speak, it was in his habitually suave voice, +yet he was visibly nervous. + +"Colonel Broadcastle has been good enough to observe," he said, "that if +I do not call out the militia within three hours, to protect the +interests of Mr. Peter Rathbawne, his committee will appeal for aid to +the federal government. Now--er--now, in my place, and in such a +situation, Mr. Barclay--er--what would you do?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's nerve, strained beyond endurance by the events +of the past twenty-four hours, snapped like a dry twig at the +contemptuous hypocrisy of the other's tone. + +"_Do!_" he thundered--"_do?_ Why, as God is my witness, Elijah Abbott, +if I were in your place I would do what any honest man would do! I would +do what my oath demanded of me! I would clap that man McGrath into jail +for iniquitous inciting to riot, and place Colonel Broadcastle, at the +head of his regiment, in charge of the city to restore order and the +reign of law, and to redeem Alleghenia from the disgrace that is +overwhelming her. _Do?_ Before God, the Republic, and the state, +Governor Abbott, I would do my duty as a man!" + +"_Then do it!_" + +The words, spoken from the threshold of Barclay's office, rent the +silence like a thunderclap, and before those present had time to turn, +there came the sound of a pistol-shot, and Governor Abbott, wheeling +slowly on his heels, crashed headforemost through the plate-glass window +behind him, and lay, limp and motionless, across the sill. + +"Then do it, by God, _Governor Barclay_!" repeated Cavendish, and flung +his revolver into the centre of the room. + +The apartment was already filled with those attracted from the corridors +and adjacent offices by the sound of the shot. Several seized Cavendish, +who stood without movement, smiling. Barclay, Colonel Broadcastle, and +the other members of the committee lifted the Governor's body from the +position in which it had fallen, and laid it upon a couch. After a brief +examination, the Colonel looked up into Barclay's eyes. + +"He's dead, sir," he said. "The assassin was right. You are Governor of +Alleghenia." + +For an instant, Barclay returned his glance with one of earnest inquiry. + +"Even in the face of this tragedy," added Colonel Broadcastle in a low +voice, "I trust you will not forget the exigencies of the situation. It +is for you to act, sir." + +Barclay suddenly raised himself to his full height, and faced the silent +gathering. + +"Gentlemen," he said firmly, "the Governor is dead. For the moment, at +least, I act in his stead. Kenton City is under martial law. Those who +have the assassin in charge will see that he is immediately turned over +to the chief of police. Mr. McGrath, you will consider yourself under +arrest. Colonel Broadcastle, you will immediately assemble your regiment +at its armory, issue three days' rations, and twenty rounds of ball +cartridge, and hold yourself and your command in readiness for riot +duty, subject to my orders." + +Then he faced Cavendish. + +"There's a message I'd like to have delivered, to the Fairy Princess," +said the latter, still smiling. "It is that Diogenes has eaten the ugly +little bug." + + + + +XIV + +THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA + + +As Barclay had foreseen, the adoption of stringent measures was all that +was needed to break the back-bone of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +The presence of the Ninth Regiment, under command of that noted +disciplinarian, Colonel Broadcastle, and terribly in earnest, as was +evinced by the ball cartridges gleaming in their belts, was sufficient +to discourage any further attempts at disorder; the sudden shift of base +of the newspapers which had formerly supported the rioters, and now, +taking their cue from the policy of the new Governor, counseled +immediate surrender; above all, the trial, conviction, and sentence of +their moving spirit, McGrath, to a term of years for inciting to +riot--all were irresistible factors in the Union's capitulation. Two +weeks after the death of Governor Abbott, the Rathbawne Mills were +running once more, and Peter Rathbawne himself, though whiter of hair +and but a shadow of his old self, was, nevertheless, on the high road to +recovery. + +The trial and conviction of Spencer Cavendish were accomplished with +unexampled celerity. He would admit of no defense, although the lawyer +appointed for him by the court was strenuous for a plea of insanity, +based upon the singular remark which he had made upon the announcement +of Elijah Abbott's death, and which was construed by those who heard it +as ample proof of irresponsibility. Called upon in court to give his +defense, Cavendish stated in a loud, clear voice that he was strictly +accountable for his act, that he was in full possession of his senses at +the time, and that he had killed the Governor in the firm conviction +that he was a menace to the safety of the community, and that the +latter's sole salvation lay in his removal, and the succession of the +Lieutenant-Governor to the position of chief executive. + +"I desire," he concluded, with the same odd smile that he had worn at +the moment of the Governor's death, "nothing but the full penalty of the +law." + +The next day Spencer Cavendish was sentenced to be executed on the +thirtieth of the following month at the State's Prison at Mowberly. + +Then followed the most remarkable manifestation of popular sentiment +ever known in Alleghenia. As Barclay had once said of them, the citizens +of his long degraded state were less vicious than callous, and their +callousness was effectively cured by the dramatic event which had +removed a corrupt official from the head of the state government, and +put in his place a man whose first acts were proofs positive of +strength, integrity, and singleness of purpose. The revulsion of feeling +was overwhelming. Even the press which had sneered at and cried down +John Barclay was forced to the other extreme. Relieved from the burden +of lawlessness which had lain on Kenton City for close upon three +months, the citizens went over in a body to the support of their new +Governor. He was cheered on his every appearance in public as +assiduously as he had been ignored before, and, responding with the +whole force of his sensitive nature to this longed-for and unexpected +popularity, he devoted himself more and more earnestly, day by day, to +the welfare of the state which was his idol. + +But following in the wake of this revulsion of feeling in favor of +Barclay came one, hardly less complete, in favor of Spencer Cavendish. +While strictly speaking there could be no condoning his act, it was none +the less evident to even the most rigid adherents of law that by it he +had conferred an indisputable benefit upon the state of Alleghenia, and +his open statement of his reasons at the time of his trial militated for +rather than against him. So it was that a public petition was framed and +circulated, asking, at the hands of Governor Barclay, the commutation of +the death sentence to one of life imprisonment. Little by little the +list of signatures grew, until, a week before the date fixed for +Cavendish's execution, they were numbered by tens of thousands. Then the +petition, rolled into a cylinder, was presented to the Governor by a +committee, and left for his consideration. + +To Barclay the intervening time had passed with almost incredible +rapidity. His days, filled as they were to overflowing with numberless +and complex duties, were yet the pleasantest he had ever known. At last, +he was what he had dreamed of being--an active factor, the most active +of all factors, in the advancement of his state. Redeemed, as if by a +miracle, from the disgrace which had laid her low, Alleghenia arose, in +his eyes, like a phoenix, throwing off the ashes of her reproach, and +blazing, with new wings of burnished beauty, in the sunlight of hope and +peace. + +Barclay had retained his old office, not caring to make use of a room so +permeated with associations of recent tragedy as was that which had +formerly been Governor Abbott's. Now, with the windows open and the +soft May air stirring the papers on his desk, he sat, looking vacantly +across the room, with the huge petition spread out before him. His +attention, long absorbed by the problem in hand, was diverted by a tap +on the ante-room door, and, in answer to his call, Natalie Rathbawne +stood before him, smiling out of the exquisite daintiness of a fresh +spring frock. + +"You've forgotten!" she said immediately, at sight of his knit brows. + +"Forgotten what?" inquired the Governor inadvisedly. + +The girl's little foot stamped almost noiselessly upon the thick carpet. + +"Upon my word!" she exclaimed, "if there's one thing worse than being +engaged to the Lieutenant-Governor, it's being engaged to the Governor +himself! Forgotten, of course, that we are to lunch together, and look +at wall-papers afterwards! Do you know, John Barclay, I don't believe +you mean to marry me, after all? We'll be just approaching the altar, +when"-- + +She was interrupted in characteristic fashion, and disengaged herself, +with a great air of indignation, from Barclay's arms. + +"If you want to take lunch in the company of a rag carpet," she said +severely, "that's the very best way to go about it. Get your hat." + +There was a little pause as Barclay filed some papers in his private +safe, and then one startled word from the girl. + +"_John!_" + +Wheeling abruptly, he saw her standing at the desk, with her hand on the +petition, and her eyes, wide and wonderstruck, searching his face. + +"Dearest!" he said impulsively, "I wish you hadn't." + +But Natalie only laughed joyfully. + +"But I'm glad, Johnny boy," she answered, "glad--glad--glad! What a +wonderful thing it is to be Governor, boy dear! I don't think I ever +really understood before. Think of it! To have the power of life and +death--to be able to right the wrongs of justice with a single stroke of +the pen. Oh, John! Sign it now--before we go. I shall be so much +happier." + +The Governor made no reply. He stood, with his head bent, smoothing his +hat with the fingers of his right hand. Gradually the expression of +eager expectation on her face changed to one of anxiety. + +"John," she said in a half whisper, "you _are_ going to sign it, aren't +you, boy dear?" + +"I'm not sure," faltered the Governor. "I'm not quite sure, dearest. It +is the hardest problem I've ever had given me to solve. I can understand +now the meaning of something your father said to me just before the +strike,--that, for the first time in his life, he didn't know what to +do, because right seemed to be hopelessly entangled with wrong, and +wrong with right. When a man does evil in order that good may come, one +tries to find an excuse for him, tries to palliate his offense in any +reasonable way. That is human instinct. That is what accounts for the +petition there, with the signatures of many of the most conscientious +men in Alleghenia attached. They have managed to find the excuse, or +they think they have, which, so far as their personal convictions are +concerned, amounts to about the same thing. And I've been saying to +myself that when public opinion points out a course as justifiable it +can hardly be possible for a single individual to say that it is not. +And yet the wrong is there, isn't it? No matter how confused a question +may seem to us, there must absolutely, when we come to think of it, be +some one great elemental principle upon which it not only can, but must, +be decided--some boundary line between justice and injustice which we +may be too blind to see, but which exists, and calls for observance, +none the less. Right is right, wrong is wrong. No confusion between the +two can possibly exist except in appearance. Strive to elude truth as we +will, it remains eternal truth, and cannot be evaded in the end. And +where it seems to be beyond us, all we can do is to strive to find the +silken thread which will surely lead us out of the labyrinth into the +searching light of day. It is that clue which I have been groping for. +What is it? How am I to know it when I see it? What am I to do? At first +I thought the case was clear--what he said, you know--about Diogenes--it +seemed so odd--every one thought so--it might be construed as--as +insanity"-- + +"Oh, _no_, John! Why, _we_ know what that meant! No--no! The best part +of it all was his sanity, his wonderful courage, his braving of almost +certain death for what he believed--and knew, John--_knew_ to be right +and best. Think what he did for Alleghenia, Johnny boy. He has been +almost as great an instrument in her salvation as you. Think what he has +done for all of us--for you, in giving you this opportunity--for me--for +Dad! John, how _can_ you hesitate?" + +The Governor shook his head. + +"Dearest," he said, "you're on the wrong track, just as I have been, a +dozen times since the petition came. Don't you suppose I've thought of +all that? Its significance, not only to me, but, as you say, to the +state, is so tremendous that, at the first glance, it seems to be an +unanswerable argument. But--don't you see?--no sophistry, no +contemplation of the results achieved, can ever make it justifiable for +a man to arrogate to himself the power of taking human life, which is +the prerogative of God and the law alone. The peculiar circumstances of +Cavendish's crime plead eloquently, almost irresistibly, for his pardon. +He has saved the state--yes! But the case is one in a million, and it is +not an individual case alone which hangs upon my decision,--it is the +establishment of a precedent, the maintenance of a principle." + +"But, John," broke in Natalie eagerly, "what you've just said--isn't +that the clue for which you have been groping? He saved the state! I've +heard you talk of Alleghenia too often, of what you hoped for her, and +what you despaired of ever bringing to pass, not to know what those four +words must mean to you. Think of it! _He saved the state!_ Without any +possibility of selfish object he did this extraordinary thing--made it +possible for Alleghenia to win back the honor and respect she had so +nearly lost forever! He killed the man who had no thought of her purity +and dignity, who used the power the people had given him for the +furtherance of his own selfish and wicked ends, who made her justice a +mockery, who played with her law as if"-- + +"Stop!" exclaimed the Governor. "Stop--I must think. Wait a moment. I +must think--I must think!" + +After a minute he began to speak again, this time in a lower tone, a +tone which suggested self-communion rather than direct address to the +girl before him. + +"Yes, that's it. Wait now,--let me be sure! He killed the man who had no +thought of Alleghenia's purity, who used his power to serve his own +ends, who made her justice"--he was speaking very slowly, dwelling on +each word as it left his lips--"her _justice_ a mockery, who played with +her law--her law--her _Law_"-- + +He paused once more, his brows knit, his firm hand slowly stroking his +chin. Then, of a sudden, he drew a deep breath, flung back his +shoulders, and looked at her. His eyes were blazing, his voice touched +with a new meaning, an eloquence deep, firm, conclusive. + +"Natalie," he said, "come here." + +"You've struck the keynote," he added, when they stood face to face, a +foot or two apart. "It isn't what you thought, or what you meant, but it +is the keynote, just the same. The Law!" + +He wheeled slowly, and stepped forward, until he was directly before the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia which hung upon his wall. + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas!_" he said. "Many a time, when the way +seemed darkest, I've read those words over to myself, and found hope in +them. Events changed, crises came and went, portents loomed thick, +despair seemed omnipotent, failure and disgrace inevitable--but the +motto of Alleghenia remained the same. Steadfast, purposeful, and +commanding, it has endured through the trivial changes of political +significance which have been as impotent to sully the actuality of her +fair fame as are sun-spots to dim the radiance of the sun. It is only +natural, perhaps, that the discouragements which were but transient +should have seemed to me to be vital, damning, irremediable. Just as the +Israelites of old turned from the promises of God to worship Baal, so +have I turned from the assurance given me by these arms of Alleghenia, +to prostrate myself before false idols of doubt and despair. I should +have remembered how they called me, in the first instance, from a life +of idleness and ease, to fight my way through the desert of difficulty, +toward the promised land of honor. I should have remembered how in my +darkest hours they went before me as a pillar of fire, how in the famine +of my soul these words were the manna of encouragement, how in my thirst +they struck clear water from the rock of adverse circumstance. But the +Israelites came back to their true God at last; so I, little girl, to my +true ideal. The Law!--you said the word--the Law is the clue, the +keynote, the boundary between right and wrong!" + +She was at his side, and he slipped one arm around her, and held her +close to him as with his finger he traced again the motto of Alleghenia. + +"Do you know what this means?" he asked. "_Justitia_,--to be just to all +men, without fear or favor, lenient to our enemies, rigid and +unyielding, if need be, to our friends; putting aside personal +considerations, striving so far as in us lies to be impartial, merciful +in the face of prejudice, relentless in that of conviction--fair! +_Lex_,--to abide by the law, in spirit only if our inmost conviction +warrants that course, but in letter absolutely where there is the +smallest hint of doubt; secure in the knowledge that, however fallible +it be, it is the best that man has yet been able to do in imitation of +the immutable decrees of God. _Integritas_,--to be true to the oaths we +have sworn, faithful to the promises we have made, loyal to the office +intrusted to us by the people, to whom and for whom we are responsible. +Dearest, I am no mere man. Were I that, were I to consult my will alone, +and it lay, as now it lies, in my power to accomplish, Spencer Cavendish +should go free to-day. I know what he has done; I appreciate his +sacrifice; I see that by a single act he has accomplished what the rest +of us were powerless to cure; I admire his courage; I condone his crime; +I could forget all his weaknesses for the sake of this one great +evidence of his strength. And yet--listen to me, dearest!--in what he +strove to do he has failed utterly, if in removing a corrupt official +who made a mockery of Alleghenia's law he has not replaced him by one +who with all the force of his conscience and all the power of his +influence will see that law administered. And whatever we may say of his +crime, whatever its causes, whatever its wonderful results, it was and +is a crime. 'Thou shalt not kill!' God has said it; Alleghenia by the +voice of her law has ratified it. And not even the fact that Cavendish +has made possible all my fondest and worthiest hopes, the fact that he +has rescued from suffering all I hold most dear"-- + +Barclay suddenly covered his face with his free hand, as he had covered +it on that afternoon in Peter Rathbawne's library, weeks before; then he +looked up again, his lips trembling. + +"Dearest," he said, "I am Governor of Alleghenia, and as such owe an +allegiance, an obedience, which personal prejudice cannot impugn. On +the day when you spoke to me of meeting Cavendish you pointed out the +course of a gentleman and a friend. On the night of the Ninth's +review you taught me the creed of an American and an Alleghenian. +To-day--unconsciously perhaps, but none the less surely--you have made +clear the duty of a public servant. God bless you, my life, my heart, my +conscience! May I be worthy of you and of the commonwealth I serve. +Where I doubted before, now I am sure. It is hard--God only knows how +hard--but listen to Alleghenia's bidding! _Justitia_, _Lex_, +_Integritas_,--equity, the code, and good faith, in the sight of God and +man, heaven and earth, the American people and the commonwealth of +Alleghenia. God save the state!" + +"John," whispered the girl brokenly,--"John, you're right. God save the +state!" + +Slowly, tenderly, the Governor of Alleghenia led her back to the table, +and taking up a pen, with a firm hand wrote five words, heavily +underscored, at the head of the Cavendish petition. And these were:-- + + "_Disapproved._ + _John Hamilton Barclay_, + _Governor._" + +Then, turning to the girl who loved him, he took her in his arms. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + +***** This file should be named 30448.txt or 30448.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/4/4/30448/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..01264d6 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #30448 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30448) diff --git a/old/30448-8.txt b/old/30448-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ed579eb --- /dev/null +++ b/old/30448-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5296 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Lieutenant-Governor + +Author: Guy Wetmore Carryl + +Release Date: November 10, 2009 [EBook #30448] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + THE + + LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + A NOVEL + + BY + + GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + [Illustration: Publishers symbol] + + + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY + The Riverside Press, Cambridge + 1903 + + + Copyright, 1902 + BY THE ESS ESS PUBLISHING CO. + + + Copyright, 1903 + BY GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + + + _Published March, 1903_ + + + + + TO + + M. R. B. + + IN MEMORY OF THE RESCUE OF A MAN AT SEA + + + + + CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I. THE FLY ON THE WHEEL 1 + + II. THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET 21 + + III. A FACE IN THE CROWD 40 + + IV. AS BETWEEN FRIENDS 60 + + V. A BRAND FROM THE BURNING 80 + + VI. MCGRATH LAUGHS 98 + + VII. THE MIRAGE OF POWER 117 + + VIII. THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS 137 + + IX. THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW 156 + + X. A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 177 + + XI. YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE 196 + + XII. DIOGENES 215 + + XIII. THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE 234 + + XIV. THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA 252 + + + + +THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + + +I + +THE FLY ON THE WHEEL + + +The offices of the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor adjoined. Each +had its ante-room, in which a private secretary wrote eternally at a +roll-top desk, an excessively plain-featured stenographer rattled the +keys of his typewriter, and a smug-faced page yawned over a newspaper, +or scanned the cards of visitors with the air of an official censor. At +intervals, an electric bell whirred once, twice, or three times; and, +according to the signal, one of the trio disappeared into the presence +of the august personage within. + +A door connected the office of the chief executive with that of his +lieutenant, but this was rarely opened by either, and then only after a +formal tap and permission to enter had been given. It was a matter of +general knowledge that the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor were not +in sympathy; but few, even among the intimates of either, were aware how +deep, and wide, and hopelessly impassable was the gulf which lay between +them. This was due not alone to disparity in age, though twenty-eight +years separated the white-haired Governor from his handsome subordinate, +who had been nominated to this, his first public office, on his +thirtieth birthday; nor was it wholly a difference between the +experience of the one and the inexperience of the other. The point of +view of the veteran is, naturally, not that of the novice, particularly +in politics. That the enthusiasms of Lieutenant-Governor Barclay should +have been the disillusions of Governor Abbott, and his pitfalls his +senior's stepping-stones,--this was to be expected. The root of their +dissimilarity lay deeper. It was nothing less than mutual distrust which +kept the connecting door closed day after day, and clogged the channel +of coöperation with the sharp-pointed boulders of antagonism. + +The convention which nominated the successful ticket of the preceding +year had been a veritable chaos of contending factions. The labor +delegates, encouraged by the unexpected strength of their +representation, were not content with such nominal plums as had fallen +to their share in former conventions. Led by Michael McGrath, an +agitator whose native Irish eloquence, made keener and more persuasive +by practice in bar-room forensics, brought him naturally to the fore, +they threatened, at one stage of the proceedings, to carry all before +them. The more conservative faction, its strength sapped by the +formation, in its very ranks, of a reform party determined upon the fall +of the "machine," was forced to yield ground. The reformers themselves, +young men for the most part, distinguished by great ideals but small +ability, were too few to impose their individual will upon their +opponents, yet sufficiently numerous to make their support necessary to +the success of either party. The usual smooth course of the convention, +upset by this unlooked-for resistance from two quarters, staggered +helplessly, and was on the point of coming to a deadlock. It was Michael +McGrath's shrewd perception of the situation which solved the problem. +In a brief, impassioned speech he laid the claims of his faction before +the delegates, winding up with a stirring picture of the coöperation of +labor and reform, now possible, which held the convention in spellbound +silence for ten seconds after he had closed, and then set the hall +ringing to cheers and vigorously plied hands and feet. For an instant he +paused, with his arms folded, and his keen blue eyes sliding over the +faces before him, and then played his trump card. At his signal, a +banner, hastily prepared, was borne, slowly revolving, down the central +aisle, and on this were boldly lettered the words which at the same +moment McGrath was thundering from the platform:-- + + LABOR AND REFORM! + + FOR GOVERNOR, + ELIJAH ABBOTT. + + FOR LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR, + JOHN HAMILTON BARCLAY. + +McGrath had no need to look toward the labor faction for support. He +knew what the name of Elijah Abbott meant in that quarter. His shifting +glance was fixed upon the seats of the reform delegates, and a little +smile twitched at the corners of his mouth, as he saw them rise with a +cheer. Barclay was the chief spirit of their movement. They had not +expected this recognition. But if, in the enthusiasm of unlooked-for +victory, they did not perceive how little, in reality, was their gain, +McGrath was far from being unaware how great was his own. Before the +cheering of the now allied forces of labor and reform had fairly died +away, he had moved that nominations were in order, and, ten minutes +later, while the partisans of the "machine" were still endeavoring to +collect their wits, the main business of the convention was an +accomplished fact, and Abbott and Barclay were declared the regular +Democratic nominees for Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of the state. +In six weeks followed their election by a small plurality, and on the +first of January the two men moved into their adjoining rooms, in the +inexcusably unlovely state capitol, on the main hill of Kenton City, +wherein they were, thenceforward, separated, one from the other, by two +inches of Georgia pine and a practically infinite diversity of principle +and prejudice. + +From the first their relationship had been no better than an armed +truce. Both were courteous men, the one because such was his policy, the +other because he was to this manner born. There was no need for them to +discuss their individual creeds. They tacitly accepted the fact that +there was not a parallel between the two. From the moment when his +election was assured by the returns, Abbott was candidly the man of the +Labor--nay, more--of the Socialist party. McGrath and his associates +manipulated him as readily as a marionette. The promises and pledges of +the campaign were ruthlessly jettisoned. If Governor Abbott did not +stand for anarchy, it was only because, for the moment, anarchy was not +the demand of his party. Withal, he was dignified and self-possessed, +robed in an agreeable suavity which became him at functions and +ceremonials, and assured his popularity with those--and they were, as +always, in the majority--who did not look below the surface. + +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay had not been ten days in office before he +realized the futility of resistance to the established order, as +represented in his superior. He had accepted his nomination, and +welcomed his election, with an almost Quixotic elation in the +opportunity thus opened to him. He would accomplish--oh, there was no +telling what Lieutenant-Governor Barclay would _not_ accomplish! + +He was standing at his office window now, staring out disconsolately +over the sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin +patches of snow, which had contrived to withstand the recent thaw, and +he was telling himself, for the thousandth time, the dispiriting fact +that, as a force for good or evil in the destiny of his state, he was no +more significant than his stenographer's Remington or his secretary's +roll-top desk. With all his ideals, with all those pledges which are +infinitely more vital when made in private to one's conscience than when +made in public to one's party, he found himself merely a cog in the +state machinery--a cog, too, that, seemingly, might be skipped at any or +every time, without in the least degree disturbing the progress of +routine. On the few occasions, in the early days of their official +relation, when he had ventured to set his will in opposition to that of +the Governor, there had not been manifest in the latter's attitude even +that spirit of resistance which spurs men to more active and resolute +endeavor. Governor Abbott had smiled pleasantly upon him, and then +quietly shifted the conversation into other channels, with an air of +selecting a topic more suited to his companion's comprehension. +Finally, on one occasion, when Barclay had voiced his opinion with an +energy which savored of rebuke, the Governor had gone further, and had +asked calmly--"And what were you proposing to do about it?" After that +Barclay had relinquished the unequal struggle, and resigned himself to +the unavoidable conclusion of his impotency. + +It is a situation which tries men's souls, this of utter helplessness in +the face of plain duty. He could have no hope of making his position +clear to the constituency to which he was responsible. Debarred on the +one side from taking an active part in the administration of state +affairs, and bitterly arraigned on the other on the grounds of +inefficiency, laxity, and indifference to duty, the second month of +office found John Barclay in a fair way to be ground to powder between +the millstones of impuissance and hostile criticism. The men of his +party who had, both in private conviction and public statement, based +their hopes of political reform upon the frankly avowed platform of his +principles, now passed him coldly, with a bare nod, sometimes with none +whatever; the labor element jeered joyously at his attitude; the +"machine" pointed to him as proof of the fallacy of the reform creed. It +is easy to expect great performances from great promises, easier still +to outline the duties and condemn the delinquencies of another, and not +even Barclay's knowledge of his own good faith was sufficient +compensation for the sneers of press and public which fell to his share. +As he surveyed the dispiriting prospect from his office window, on that +late February afternoon, he was near to resigning his position, and with +it all further pretension to political prominence. + +In the opinion of those competent to judge, the state of Alleghenia was +going to the dogs. A press distinguished alike for the amplitude of its +headlines and the pitiable paucity of its principles; a legislature of +which practically every member had, not only a price, but such a price +as the advertisements describe as being "within the reach of all;" a +Governor who avowedly stood ready to sanction the most extreme +pretensions of the notoriously corrupt party which had secured him his +election,--here, surely, were good and sufficient reasons for the +generously bestowed disapproval of Alleghenia's sister states. In all +the _personnel_ of her government there was but one man sincerely +devoted to her advancement on the lines of integrity and +non-partisanship. And that man was Lieutenant-Governor Barclay, whose +influence on the trend of affairs was approximately that of the +proverbial fly on the hub of the revolving wheel. + +The Lieutenant-Governor had turned back to his desk, and was arranging +his papers, preparatory to departing for the day, when his ears were +greeted by the unusual and unwelcome sound of a rap upon the +communicating door. Instinctively he braced himself for an unpleasant +encounter before replying. It was his experience that the Governor's +room was like to Nazareth of old, in that no good might be expected to +issue therefrom. Nevertheless, as Governor Abbott entered, in response +to Barclay's "Come!" it was difficult to believe that he was aught but +what he appeared to be,--a courteous, conspicuously well-dressed and +white-haired gentleman, of sixty or thereabouts, smooth-shaven save for +chop side-whiskers of iron gray, with a habit of rubbing his hands, and +an inclination from the hips forward which suggested a floor-walker. In +brief, the Governor of Alleghenia seemed the type of a man who turns +sideways and slips through narrow places, rather than run the risk of +barking his elbows by a face-front advance. In reality he was somewhat +less pliable than a steel rail. + +"You are going?" he asked, seeing how Barclay was employed. + +"I was thinking of it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor. "Of course, if +there is anything"-- + +Governor Abbott seated himself on the edge of the desk, holding a lapel +of his coat in each hand, and surveyed his subordinate from under his +drooping eyelids, with his head cocked on one side. + +"I believe you know Peter Rathbawne," he said. + +"I do. I am engaged to his elder daughter." + +"Ah! That is what I thought." + +The Governor looked contemplatively at the ceiling, closing his right +eye, and nibbling behind his pursed lips. + +"Peter Rathbawne," he said, "is the second most obstinate man in Kenton +City, if not in Alleghenia. I'm afraid he thinks he is the _most_ +obstinate. If so, he does me an injustice. His mills are the largest in +the state. I am told that when they are running full strength they +employ over four thousand hands." + +"Something like that number, I believe," put in Barclay, as the Governor +seemed to expect a reply. + +"Ah! It is a pity for such an industry as that to be tied up on account +of one man's obstinacy." + +"I had not heard"--began Barclay; but Governor Abbott continued +steadily, disregarding the interruption. + +"Yesterday morning Mr. Rathbawne discharged fifteen employees on the +ground of incompetency. It is hard to see exactly what Mr. Rathbawne +means by 'incompetency.' These men were not newcomers. Some of them had +been in the mills for as much as eighteen months. It seems as if he +might have discovered the alleged incompetency long ago. It is more or +less arbitrary, one might say, this discharging men by wholesale, as it +were." + +"I suppose," commented Barclay, "that a man may do as he will with his +own." + +"Ah!" said the Governor, lifting his hands from his lapels with a little +gesture of deprecation, but immediately replacing them. "But _can_ he? A +man in Peter Rathbawne's position has a responsibility to fulfill toward +the community. He cannot beggar men for a caprice--because his horse has +gone lame, or his breakfast has not agreed with him. He must show +reasons--give an accounting. He must be fair." + +"Oh, when it comes to fairness," laughed the other, "I assure you, +Governor Abbott, you won't find Mr. Rathbawne's equal this side of the +Pacific. He's famous for square dealing." + +"He _has_ been," corrected the Governor. "In the present instance he +seems to have fallen below standard. He has declined to reconsider his +decision in the case of the discharged men. What's worse, he has flatly +refused to see the committee appointed by the Union." + +"I'm not surprised at that," said Barclay slowly, fingering a +paper-cutter on the desk before him. "Mr. Rathbawne is peculiar in one +respect; he supports and considers the Union in every other. But he has +always insisted upon his right to discharge the hands at will, and +without giving reasons. Incompetency is only a word which is used to +cover more serious causes." + +"Well, he's wrong," said the Governor, with a heat unusual to him. +"He's dead wrong, Mr. Barclay, and he will find it out before he's a day +older." + +"Do you mean"-- + +"I mean that if the men in question are not taken back before to-morrow +noon, every man, woman, and child in the employ of the Rathbawne Mills +will be out on strike. The question is, what is Peter Rathbawne prepared +to do?" + +The silence that followed was broken only by the tap, tap, tap of the +Lieutenant-Governor's paper-cutter on the silver-mounted blotter. +Presently he looked up and met the Governor's eye. + +"If you want _my_ opinion, sir," he answered, "it is that Mr. Rathbawne +would fight such a point to a standstill. He's sole owner of the mills, +and he's a rich man. He has always treated his employees as if they were +his own children. If they turn on him now for something which, from +their experience of his character, they must know was fair and +justifiable"-- + +"But _was_ it?" interrupted the Governor. + +"I don't know the facts, sir, but I know Peter Rathbawne," said Barclay, +throwing back his head, "and I can say, with clear conviction, that it +_must_ have been. If, as you suggest, the hands go out, I think he would +close down the mills for a year, and go abroad. He's a man who doesn't +argue; he simply acts. I fancy there wouldn't be much opposition left by +the time he wanted to reopen." + +"Provided always that there were anything left to reopen," suggested the +Governor softly. + +"The state troops have more than once proved their ability to assure the +sanctity of property," answered his subordinate, with a touch of the old +pride with which he had assumed office. + +"Hum!" said Governor Abbott. "But calling out the militia is a serious +matter, Mr. Barclay, to say nothing of the expense entailed. Considering +that the difficulty would be due entirely to the obstinacy of one +man--er--one might not feel justified"-- + +He hesitated briefly under the Lieutenant-Governor's keen glance, and +then swerved from this line of suggestion. + +"What I wanted to say was this: You are a friend of Mr. +Rathbawne's,--something more than a friend, indeed. No doubt he has a +respect for your opinion, as you have for his. Now, if in the course of +a quiet chat--it will have to be to-night--you should point out the +situation that threatens him, the distress that a strike will cause, the +probable destruction of his property, perhaps he might consent to +reinstate the discharged men to-morrow morning." + +"It would be a surrender of principle, to which he would never consent," +said Barclay firmly. "Of that I am sure. Moreover, sir, I should be +speaking against my convictions were I to advise him to adopt such a +course." + +The Governor's lip wrinkled slightly. + +"The Union is prepared to do the right thing by the man who settles this +question," he said. + +"I hope you don't mean that!" exclaimed Barclay. "You are the first man +to make such a suggestion to me. Pardon me, Governor Abbott, but I +cannot but think the executive chamber of the capitol of Alleghenia a +singular place for it to be mentioned." + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"You misunderstand me," he said. "One would suppose I had offered you a +purse! I mean simply that the popularity of the man who averts this +strike will be an assured fact. He would be the idol of the working +people, and hardly less esteemed by the element of capital. Moreover, he +would be doing a humane and merciful thing. You are the only man who is +in a position to approach Rathbawne, and, if you will excuse the +suggestion, I think you can hardly afford to throw away the chance. As +it is, you--er--you are not what might be called popular, Mr. Barclay." + +This time the silence was broken by a single sharp little +click--the latch of the connecting door slipping into place. The +Lieutenant-Governor sank slowly into his revolving chair, tipped back, +swung round a half circle, and stared out disconsolately over the +sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin patches of +snow. + + + + +II + +THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET + + +Young Nisbet leaned forward in his chair. + +"And I've been thinking," he added, "that perhaps--that perhaps"-- + +"That perhaps what?" asked the junior Miss Rathbawne, leaning forward in +hers. + +"If I don't have tea _instantly_," said her mother, with profound +conviction, as she came ponderously through the portières, tugging at +her gloves, "I shall expire! How de do, Mr. Nisbet. _Do_ sit up +straight, Dorothy, my dear." + +She sank heavily into a low chair, which brought her within the radius +of lamp-light at the tea-table, and was thus revealed as a lady of +generous proportions, with a conspicuous absence of features, and no +observable lap. In speaking, she displayed a marked partiality for undue +emphasis. Sublimely unconscious of the depression induced by her +advent, she continued to talk, as she pulled off her gloves, which were +a size too small, and came away with reluctance, leaving imprints of the +stitching on her pudgy pink hands. + +Young Nisbet surveyed her with a kind of mute despair. He was a very +average young American, very conventionally in love, and the trifling +remnant of self-assertiveness which had triumphed over the crescent +humility natural to his condition inevitably evaporated into thin air at +the approach of Mrs. Rathbawne; and always, as he was doing now, he +turned in his toes excessively when she was present, hitched at his +right trouser-leg, where the crease passed over his knee, and looked +first at her, and then at the floor, and then at her again, with the +purposeless regularity of a mechanical toy. + +There was a tremendous and highly significant rattling of cups, saucers, +and silver spoons, as Dorothy Rathbawne prepared her mother's tea. All +things considered, one found something very admirable about Dorothy at +such a time as this. It was not complete submission, still less was it +open revolt, but savored of both, and was incomparable as an attitude +toward Mrs. Rathbawne. On some occasions it was almost as impossible to +get on with Mrs. Rathbawne as it would have been, on others, to get on +without her. The which, nowadays, is more or less true of all parents. +And children. + +"Natalie and your Aunt Helen got out at the florist's," went on the good +lady, "but I came straight on, and sent the carriage back for them. I +felt that I _couldn't_ exist an _instant_ longer without my tea. I'm +sure I don't see how Natalie _stands_ it. She was out all morning in the +brougham, too. You had best make enough for three cups, Dorothy--and +_do_ sit up straight, my dear!--and order Thomas to bring in some more +tartines. They are _sure_ to be hungry, and they are apt to come in at +_any_ moment." + +"That is a family failing," said Dorothy venomously, from behind the +kettle. + +"Well, I'm _sure_, my dear," said Mrs. Rathbawne innocently, as she +straightened her rings, and picked an imaginary speck out of one of her +round, flat nails, "there is no disgrace at all in a healthy appetite. +I'm thankful we all have it--though as for your Aunt Helen, _hers_ is +about like that of a fly." + +"Flies have very good appetites--judging from all I've seen, that is," +said Dorothy, "so I don't think she is to be commiserated on that +account." + +"That was only a figure of speech, my dear," replied Mrs. Rathbawne, +with engaging placidity. "Mercy! but I'm glad to get home. We've had a +positively _exhausting_ day with Natalie's shopping, and the _worst_ of +it is to think what a _lot_ more there is to do. A wedding certainly +_is_ an undertaking, Mr. Nisbet." + +"Is it?" answered young Nisbet, perceptibly startled at being thus +abruptly included in the conversation. + +"Decidedly!" asseverated Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"Of course, in the case of an _ordinary_ man"-- + +"Two lumps, mother?" + +"_Always_ two lumps, Dorothy, my dear. Surely you must know that, by +this time! As I was _saying_, Mr. Nisbet, the fact that my elder +daughter is to marry Mr. Barclay"-- + +Dorothy's eyebrows went up resignedly as she bent with affected +solicitude over the alcohol lamp, than which none ever burned more +blamelessly. There was no stopping Mrs. Rathbawne now! + +"One has to keep his position in mind," she was saying. "It isn't like +the _usual_ marriage, which interests only the families and friends of +the persons concerned, you know. It isn't even as if only Kenton City +were looking on. _All_ Alleghenia will be on the _qui vive_, Mr. Nisbet, +_all_ the state of Alleghenia. I shouldn't wonder if _some_ notice were +taken of the event, even at Washington. Marrying a statesman, you +see,--a Lieutenant-Governor! Oh, it's _quite_ different--_quite_! _Do_ +sit up straight, Dorothy, my dear!" + +She continued to prattle of the momentous marriage impending, until her +complacent chatter was interrupted by the entrance of her half-sister, +Mrs. Wynyard, and the elder Miss Rathbawne. + +The two newcomers were both beautiful, in widely dissimilar ways. Helen +Wynyard, Mrs. Rathbawne's junior by nearly a score of years, retained at +thirty the transparent brilliancy of complexion which, at eighteen, had +made her the most admired _débutante_ of her season in San Francisco. +Her marriage with Ellery Wynyard had caused a great to-do among the +gossips, and, later, had defrauded them pitilessly of their +self-promised "I told you so's," by reason of the death of the handsome +young rake, before the rose-color of the honeymoon had begun to fade. +Beauty, wit, and infallible tact she inherited from her mother, shrewd +business ability and a keen insight into men and things from her father, +and wealth and a certain attractive audacity of speech from her +husband; and five years of widowhood only served to develop and +emphasize the promise of her first season. There were numerous feet +which aspired to be shod with Ellery Wynyard's discarded shoes, but no +one pair, said the world, so much as an inch in advance of the rest. + +Mrs. Wynyard was spending the winter with her half-sister, and the +Rathbawnes, whom the circumstance of widely distant residence had always +kept from coming into close touch with her, were equally at a loss when +they wondered how they had formerly contrived to exist without her, and +in what manner they should resign themselves to giving her up. She was a +woman who came amazingly near to being indispensable. + +For the moment, Natalie Rathbawne, in reality the beauty which Dorothy +by a fraction fell short of being, suffered by comparison with her +sister. She was desperately tired--that was in her smile. But there was +something else: a singular preoccupation which was nearly akin to +listlessness. That was in the droop of her eyelids, in the eloquently +inattentive gesture with which she touched a bowl of Gloire de Dijon +roses as she passed, and in her conventionally courteous acknowledgment +of young Nisbet's greeting. And, too, as she seated herself beside her +sister on the divan, there was perceptible purpose in her avoidance of +the lamp-light, her withdrawal into the dark, deep corner. To the +conversation which followed she contributed only such brief remarks as +were made necessary by those occasionally addressed to her. + +The two women brought with them a delicious, indefinite atmosphere of +out-of-doors: that commingled smell of cold flowers, and cold flesh, and +cold fur, which is to a drawing-room in winter what a whiff of salt air +is in summer to a sun-baked hillside; and this proved almost too much +for the self-possession, already tottering, of young Nisbet. He had +always been accustomed to have the things he desired, had young Nisbet, +but these, until now, had been either creature comforts, readily +obtainable when one's father is a multi-millionaire, or athletic honors, +equally easy of attainment when one measures forty-two around the chest, +and can do one's quarter in something under fifty. Again, the Nisbets +lived on a ranch, and when one does not know people in New York one +spends the Sundays in New Haven, so that neither the terms nor the +vacations incidental to his four years at Yale had equipped him, in the +sense in which they equipped his fellows, for dealing with society. + +Now that he was in Kenton City, representing his father's interests, +young Nisbet was painfully self-conscious of multitudinous shortcomings, +totally unsuspected hitherto. His speech was apparently hopelessly +incrusted with slang, his legs were too long, his ears protruded +abominably, his hair was desperately unruly, his freckles and his +capacity for blushing were inexhaustible. He was as much at ease in such +surroundings as these in which he now found himself as a trout in a +sandpile. The great room, with its costly furnishings, the tea-table +crowded with silver and fragile porcelain, the kettle purring +contentedly above the iridescent flame of the alcohol lamp,--above all, +the subtle, indefinable suggestion of femininity which unknowably +pervaded his surroundings,--all these enthralled young Nisbet beyond +expression, and awed him immeasurably, into the bargain. He was, as +usual, very clear in his own mind as to what he wanted, and that was the +younger Miss Rathbawne, but, for the first time in his experience, the +means at his command did not seem to be sufficient unto the end. For the +younger Miss Rathbawne was, very evidently, not the sort of triumph +which is achieved by recourse to an imposingly ample bank-account, nor +yet by two months' loyalty to the exigencies of the training-table. And +this was February, and he had known her since July, and, altogether, it +was highly discouraging. Unwittingly, young Nisbet heaved a sigh so +profound and so pitiable that Mrs. Wynyard immediately proffered her +sympathy. + +"Poor, dear Mr. Nisbet! I never heard a more pathetic sigh. Whatever is +the matter?" + +"He's sleepy," put in Dorothy. "He always is, after talking with me for +a whole hour." + +"I was just thinking," protested young Nisbet helplessly. + +"Oh!" exclaimed Dorothy, "that's it, is it? Then pray don't discourage +him, Aunt Helen. He's really getting into some very good habits, of +late." + +"Why, _Dorothy_!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, digging her chin reproachfully +into her black velvet collar, "how _can_ you say such things? Mr. Nisbet +will think you have had _no_ bringing up at all. And _do_ sit up +straight, my dear!" + +"And if you don't stop nagging, O most conscientious of parents," +retorted Dorothy, with her nose in the air, "Mr. Nisbet will think you +bring people up by throwing them down!" + +"And slang! _Dorothy!_" + +"I always think," said Mrs. Wynyard, "that Dorothy should have had a +fairy godmother, to promise that every time she uttered a word of slang +a pearl should pop out of her mouth. We should have all been wearing +triple strings down to our knees within a week after she learned to +talk." + +"That settles it!" exclaimed Dorothy. "If you are going to side with the +enemy, Aunt Helen, there is nothing left for me to do but to beat a +retreat. Come on, Mr. Nisbet, there is rest for the weary in the +conservatory--that is, unless you want another cup of tea?" + +In the conservatory the air was heavy with the moist, sweet smell of +earth and moss, and faintly vibrant with the tiny plash of water, +dripping from a pile of rocks into the circular central pool, wherein +fat gold-fish went idly to and fro, nuzzling floating specks upon the +surface. Through the polished green of the surrounding palms and +rubber-plants stared gardenias and camelias; below, between maidenhair +and sword-ferns, winked the little waxen blossoms of fuchsias and +begonias: at intervals poinsettia flared audaciously among its more +quietly dressed neighbors; and, in the far corners the golden spheres +were swelling to fairly respectable proportions on the branches of dwarf +orange-trees. + +Dorothy installed herself on a bench, and young Nisbet perched upon the +rim of the pool, and stared at vacancy. + +"It's corking, in here," he said, after a moment. + +"Isn't it, though?" agreed Dorothy, with a nod of approval. "It's my +favorite part of the house. You can't imagine how many hours I spend +here, sewing, or reading, or fiddling with the fish and all those funny +little plants under the palms." + +"You bet!" said young Nisbet, with enthusiasm, if not much relevancy. +"I've just got a picture of that, you know. Besides, we've spent a good +many of those hours together in here, these past few months." + +"Oh, not a tenth of them!" exclaimed Dorothy, "and then only the very +shortest." + +"Oh!" said young Nisbet gloomily. His fertile imagination was +immediately peopled with the forms and faces of those who had shared the +other hours, a score of eligible and attractive young men, his moral, +mental, and physical superiors in every conceivable particular, +faultlessly arrayed, scintillating with wit, and surpassingly skilled in +the way to win a woman. The conservatory was full of them. He saw them +in every imaginable posture: feeding the gold-fish, watering the +begonias, looking up into Dorothy's eyes as they sat at her feet, +looking down at her slender fingers, as she pinned gardenias to their +lapels. And these had been granted the long hours, he only the short. +Inwardly, young Nisbet groaned; aloud, as was his wont, he said the +wrong thing. + +"They seemed long enough to me." + +"_Well!_" said Dorothy. + +"Oh, hang it all! I didn't mean that. What an oaf I am!" + +"Never mind," said Dorothy consolingly. "I know you well enough to +understand you, by this time." She smoothed her skirt reflectively. +"Let me see," she added, "what were we talking about when we were +swamped by the family?" + +"I think," answered young Nisbet, with one of his illogical blushes, +"that I had just asked you what sort of a man you thought you would like +to marry. I remember I was on the point of saying that I thought perhaps +you had ideas like--er--like your mother's." + +Dorothy raised her eyebrows. + +"Like the Mater's?" + +"About a man being big and prominent, and all that, you know," +floundered young Nisbet. "She always makes such a point of Barclay's +being Lieutenant-Governor--I thought you might be for the same kind of +thing." + +Dorothy looked him over, with a whimsical smile, as he was speaking. +There was a deep bronze light in his close-cropped, ruddy hair, and his +skin was very smooth and clean. His eyes were appealing, with that +unspeakable eloquence of simple honesty which is almost pathetic. Under +his blue cloth coat, the great muscles of his shoulders and chest stood +out magnificently, rippling the fabric as he stirred, as if eager to +throw off their trammels, and be given free play. About him there was a +distinct suggestion of sane living and regular exercise. For all his +freckles, and his nose that was too little, and his mouth that was too +large, "the ugliest of the Nisbet boys"--he had often been called +that!--was very emphatically good to look upon. + +"A big man?" answered Dorothy. "Yes, I think I should like to marry a +big man. I want him very clean, too--_very_ clean!--morally, as well as +otherwise. And honest as the day is long. And not _too_ bright! I don't +want to be continually trying to live up to his brain, and continually +failing. It is fatal to one's self-respect, that sort of thing. Then, he +must be heels over head in love with me--for keeps! And then--oh, he +must be a _man_, a man through and through, who wouldn't think anything +he didn't dare to say, nor say anything he didn't dare to do! That's +what I want, and if I can get it, all the prominence in the world may +go hang!" + +"That's just about John Barclay, though," said young Nisbet, "with the +prominence thrown in." + +"Well, I'm not saying I wouldn't have married John Barclay, if I'd had +the chance. He comes pretty close to being all I would ask for, in the +way of a man. But, unfortunately, there's only one John Barclay, and, +like the rest of the world, he looked directly over poor little Me's +shoulders, and saw only Natalie. Good gracious! Who could blame him? +She's the loveliest little thing in the world! But, at all events, she +nabbed him, so all that is left for me to do is to grin and bear the +disappointment as best I may. He's very much of a man, John Barclay is!" + +"Yes," assented young Nisbet, somewhat mournfully. "I can see that would +be the kind of a chap that the dames would stand for everlastingly." + +"But, as I said before," continued Dorothy, "it's not because he's +Lieutenant-Governor, whatever the Mater may think about it, that I +admire him. It's just because he's so big, and earnest, and loyal, +and--and"-- + +"White," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, _isn't_ he? That's it--white!" + +"I can understand a man like that getting spliced," observed young +Nisbet very earnestly. "He has so much to offer a girl. But as for the +rest of us"-- + +"Oh, as to that," broke in Dorothy airily, "John Barclay isn't the only +man in the world, by any manner of means! Besides, Natalie having +already bagged him, it is plain I shall have to look elsewhere." + +There was a long pause, broken only by the plash of the water, which +seemed, as the seconds slipped by, to grow amazingly loud. Then young +Nisbet raised his eyes, and looked at her, blushing deplorably. + +"I wish"--he said, "I wish"-- + +"Dorothy! _Do_ excuse me, Mr. Nisbet, but _really_--dinner at seven, you +know, and this child _must_ be thinking about dressing. She takes +_ages_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne folded her fat hands, and stood waiting, at the +conservatory door. Young Nisbet rose. + +"Of course!" he said. "I'm always so stupid about these things. Good-by, +Miss Rathbawne. I'm off to New York to-morrow on some confounded +business, so I probably won't see you for a week or so. Good-by." + +"_Would_ you mind going out by the hall, Mr. Nisbet?" suggested Mrs. +Rathbawne. "Mr. Barclay is in the drawing-room with my elder daughter, +and he is so _greatly_ occupied with affairs of state that they have +_very_ little time together. I _hate_ to have them interrupted. One can +do _so_ much harm sometimes, you know, by thoughtlessly interrupting +people who are in love with each other. Thank you _so_ much; good-by. +_Do_ try to stand a little straighter, Dorothy, my dear." + + + + +III + +A FACE IN THE CROWD + + +At the sound of the Lieutenant-Governor's voice at the front door, Mrs. +Rathbawne had beaten a hasty retreat, dragging her immensely edified +half-sister in her wake, so that when he stepped through the curtained +doorway Barclay found Natalie alone. + +"I'm so glad you could come early," she said, from the corner of the +divan. "Now we can have a talk before dinner. I seem to see so little of +you. I suppose that's the penalty attached to being engaged to the +second biggest man in the state. I'm sometimes jealous, Johnny boy, of +Alleghenia's place in your affections." + +"You're the only person in the world who has no need to be," laughed +Barclay. "What is the news?" + +"Probably," said Natalie, "the only interesting items are that you are +cold and a little cross, and that you want a big chair and a cup of tea +and some hot toast." + +"Your summary of the situation is so exhaustive," said Barclay, "that +there seems to be nothing left for me to say, except that you are the +most beautiful girl in the world, and that I think I must stand still a +moment and just look at you, before I accept any of the luxuries you +suggest." + +"I can't imagine how you know that I'm so beautiful. You can't possibly +see me in this dark corner. But I see I've made one mistake! You are +distinctly _not_ cross." + +"Why should I be?" asked the Lieutenant-Governor, standing before the +table, with his long legs far apart, and rocking from his toes to his +heels and back again. "When a man has been walking for half an hour +through a gnawing February air, and suddenly, out of all proportion to +his deserts, comes full upon a rose in bloom, is that a reason for being +cross?" + +She was very small, and deliciously delicate, was Natalie Rathbawne, +like a little Dresden image, with an arbutus-pink complexion, brown +hair, and deep-blue eyes, now clouded thoughtfully, but oftener alight +with humor, or dilating and clearing under the impetus of conversation. +A doll-like daintiness of tiny pleats and ruffles, fresh bows, and fine +stitching pervaded everything she wore, and if her voice inspired the +hackneyed comparison of running water, it was of water running under +moss, the sound whereof is as different from that of an open brook as is +music from discord. To John Barclay's thinking the barely believable +fact that this little miracle of beauty--this pocket-Venus, as he was +wont to call her--actually belonged to him remained one of the insoluble +mysteries of life. He could not, in the thraldom of his present Elysium, +be expected to remember, even if he had ever fully realized, that he +himself was tall, broad-shouldered, clean-cut, and clean-lived, with the +unmistakable stamp of the American gentleman on his linen and his +simple, well-fitting clothes, and the evidences of a sane, regular +existence in his steady hands and his clear eyes and his firm mouth,--a +man of whom any woman might be, and of whom this particular woman was, +extravagantly proud. For the first tribute which a lover lays at the +feet of his lady is, in ordinary, the stamped-upon and abused summary of +his personal attributes, which, in his own mind, he has taken remarkable +pains to render as despicable as possible, and which, in hers, her +imagination contrives not only to rehabilitate, but to imbue with a +preposterously exaggerated splendor. + +"I wonder," added the Lieutenant-Governor presently, "whether when +gentlemen are invited to tea they are supposed to kiss the hostess on +entering." + +"If you are in any doubt about it," observed Natalie, with an air of +superb indifference, "I advise you to write for advice to the etiquette +editor of the 'Kenton City Record.' She is probably sixty-two years old, +looks like an English walnut, has never had a proposal in her life, and +so knows all about"-- + +What the lady in question was supposed to know all about was for +sufficient reasons never made clear. There are occasions, despite the +manuals of polite behavior, when interruption cannot with any approach +to justice be regarded as rudeness. + +Barclay heaved a long sigh of satisfaction as he took his tea and two +thin slices of toast and settled himself in his chair. + +"Do you think it possible," he asked, "for a man to be asleep for six +weeks, dreaming that he is in another garden of Eden, with an Eve in a +French frock, who has no partiality for apples"-- + +"I _adore_ apples!" said the girl. + +"And then wake up," he continued, disregarding the interruption, "and +find that the dream was only a dream, after all,--that he's only a poor +dog of a politician, that the garden is only a dingy office, and the +flower-beds full of briers and pitfalls?" + +"You've been eating pie for lunch again," said Natalie severely, "and it +always makes you morbid. No; I don't think it possible at all. If I did, +I should hang on to your coattails like fury and keep you in dreamland, +whether you wanted to wake up or not." + +"It's all too good to be true! How _dare_ you be so beautiful?" + +"John"-- + +"It's gospel truth!" + +Barclay paused for a moment, and then went on more seriously. + +"You're tired, littlest and most lovely in the world, and troubled about +something." + +Natalie laughed shortly, with evident effort. + +"Why do you say that?" she asked. + +"Why not? Don't you suppose I know? Do you think you could say a hundred +words without my perceiving that? It almost seems to me that the +knowledge that you were unhappy would make its way to me, no matter what +distance separated us, and that I should come to you at top-speed to set +things right. I've hardly seen your face, and yet I know your dear, deep +eyes are troubled; I had barely heard your voice before I felt its +weariness." + +Natalie bent forward until her face came under the light. + +"Yes, I'm tired," she said; "or, rather, I was tired when I first came +in. I'm better now, since I've had my tea. But you're right, Johnny +boy,--there's something more. I'm troubled, desperately troubled and +heartsick. I've been trying to make myself believe that it's all +imagination, that I have no reason for feeling as I do; but I'm afraid I +can't manage it. John, I thought I saw Spencer Cavendish to-day." + +"Spencer Cavendish? Are you sure? I had almost forgotten his +existence!--Of course, it's not impossible; but I imagined he had taken +root in some South Sea island long ago. That's what he was always +expecting to do, you remember. How I have hated that man!" + +"You were good friends once." + +"Yes, and should be yet, if I had not been the most suspicious mortal +that ever breathed, and he the most hot-blooded. There was a reason, you +know,--a little reason, but the most important in the world! I was +jealous, Natalie, insanely jealous. I could forgive him everything now." + +"That hurts me, John. I'm so happy, boy dear, that I want everybody else +to be happy as well. Oh, why is it that a girl must always have that one +thought on her mind, which is so hard, so hard?--I mean the thought of +the good men, the true, brave, loyal men, whom she has cared for, who +have been her best friends perhaps, and yet whom she has been forced to +hurt bitterly because they asked her for something she was not able to +give. A man has so much easier a road! His happiness, when it comes to +him, isn't clouded by the thought of those to whom it means the loss of +their last remnant of hope. They are there, the disappointed ones, but +he doesn't know, he doesn't know! He hasn't on his conscience the memory +of hearts cruelly wounded,--wounded even to death. He doesn't in memory +see the eagerness in a good friend's eyes die to disillusion, to +hopelessness, to bitter, bitter sorrow. He doesn't have to remember how +the life died suddenly out of a voice that had been tender and eloquent. +He doesn't sicken with the thought that his hand has given a blow so +merciless, so unmerited, and yet so inevitable. Worst of all, for the +girl, is the after-discovery that her decision has made a difference--a +hideous, irreparable difference,--that the man can never be the same +again,--that she has wrecked a life with a word! Oh, there ought to be +some way! The man ought not to ask unless he is sure of the reply! It's +too much responsibility to force upon the girl! + +"So with Spencer Cavendish," she went on after a moment. "In spite of +all--in spite of all, John!--I can't forget that he loved me. I think a +woman never forgets that." + +"Until the man marries another woman!" + +"Ah," said Natalie, with a faint smile, "then least of all, John! And +besides, Spencer never married. He knew I loved you, long before you +did! I felt that it was due to him that he should know; he was my +oldest and best friend then, and so I told him! And then he went out of +my life--out of his own--into darkness. I can't forget it! I can't +forget that I broke up your friendship"-- + +"Dearest!" + +"I did, John! It wasn't my fault, perhaps, nor any one's, for that +matter, but I did, just the same. Besides, it wasn't only the question +of your friendship. What hurt me most was the wilful wreck of his life. +And yet, how could I have known what was going to happen? What could I +do when it did happen? He was beyond my reach. He didn't even answer the +letter I wrote, asking him to come and see me. I thought, if he cared +for me, I could save him. But it was just as he had said,--he must have +everything, or he would have nothing at all. And so he went wrong--oh, +so terribly, terribly wrong!--he who might have been anything, if it +hadn't been for me. I can never forget it--never! I can never forget the +pity of it, the tragedy of its awful publicity, the newspapers, the +scandal, people's sneers, his mother dying of a broken heart--_and I did +it_! Think of it! Think of a man like Spencer Cavendish in the police +courts, not once, but a dozen times. Think of what Justice Meyer called +him at last, and what was printed in the papers,--'a common drunk!' Oh, +John!" + +"Natalie, Natalie!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "Why should you +think of such things, brood over them, above all, blame them on +yourself? How could it possibly have been your fault? how could you +possibly have helped it? He was a reckless, hot-headed chap--brilliant, +of course, but a slave to his impulses and his nerves. If Lochinvars +could act with impunity nowadays, he'd have ridden up to your door on a +black horse, killed Thomas, and carried you off across his pommel. As it +was, he let himself go, and disgraced himself. I tried to talk to him, +just as you did, but he wouldn't have it--called me 'an insolent cub' +and--er--worse. I had to give it up. It was all very distressing, I +admit, but then, dear, it was all so long ago. He hasn't been in Kenton +City for two years and more, and I've no doubt he pulled himself +together long since, and is leading a straight life somewhere. He had +lots in him, with all his recklessness. A chap like that, with no family +hanging about his neck, and with his brains, and only his own living to +make, could forge ahead almost anywhere." + +"But John, I'm _sure_ I saw him to-day, and suppose I should tell you +that he was--begging?" + +Barclay almost smiled at her earnest, troubled face, as he replaced his +cup on the table. + +"Begging?" he answered. "I'm afraid I couldn't bring myself to believe +you, violet-eyes. Even granting that he has fallen as low as that, which +I should think one of the most unlikely things in the world, it would +hardly be in Kenton City, would it?--a place where his face is known to +a thousand people. Tell me about it. What makes you think you saw him?" + +"I was shopping this morning," said Natalie, "all alone; and as I came +out of Kendrick's and was just about to get into the brougham, I saw +that some one was holding the door open for me. I looked up carelessly, +as one naturally would under the circumstances, and, John--I know it was +he! At first I thought so, and then I didn't, because he was so changed, +so thin and pale, and because he had a beard. So, before I thought what +I was doing, I stepped into the brougham, and put my hand on the door to +close it. Then I looked up again, and saw his face, peering in at me +through the glass, and that time there couldn't be any mistake. It +_was_! I was going to speak, but he was gone in a flash. I saw him +disappearing in the crowd before the shop--_slinking_, John!--with that +dreadfully pathetic air which all beggars have, his shoulders all +hunched up, and his head bent, and his hands in his pockets. He was +cold, John, I could see that, and, no doubt, hungry! And there I was, in +that dreadful little brougham, with my hateful furs, as warm as toast, +and I didn't even speak to him. I could have died of shame!" + +She buried her face in her hands, bending low over the tea-table. +Barclay was leaning forward in his chair, his lips set. + +"It's impossible," he murmured, "impossible!" + +The girl looked up suddenly, a white spot in the centre of each cheek, +where the pressure of her thumbs had left its mark in the tender, pink +flesh. + +"Improbable--yes!" she said, "but not impossible. Oh, I wish I could +believe otherwise, but I'm sure, I'm sure! Oh, John! You are so big, so +strong, so powerful now! Think of it--Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia! +You can do anything. And if he _is_ here in Kenton City, homeless, cold, +starving, you must find and help him--for me, Johnny boy, for me!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor had risen, and was pacing up and down the room, +with his brows knit, and his strong, white hands chafing slowly against +each other, palm to palm. It seemed impossible, indeed! Spencer +Cavendish, the last of one of Alleghenia's proudest families; Spencer +Cavendish, the brilliant young society pet and sportsman; Spencer +Cavendish, the wit, the _viveur_--a beggar in the street? And yet-- + +The scandal of Cavendish's sudden and reckless plunge into sodden, open +dissipation, two years before, freshly called to Barclay's mind by +Natalie's words, had pointed to almost any finale, however debased, +however sordid. Barclay mentally invoked the face of his former friend, +as he had seen it on the occasion of their last meeting, flushed, +swollen-eyed, insolent, the fine patrician mouth hideously contorted and +maundering insults, filth, banality. + +"And I did it!" the girl was saying. "Don't forget that, John. +Unwittingly, ignorantly, helplessly, if you will, I did it, just the +same. If I could have loved him, I could have saved him. As it was, I +had to send him away, and he has come to--to this! Oh, don't you see? +Don't you understand that something more than chance has crossed my path +with his, just at this moment of my supremest happiness, and of his +utter degradation? My duty is plain. It is to help him, to uplift him, +to make a man of him once more--to undo what I have done! I'm +responsible--and I'm helpless! What can I do? What can any girl do in +such a case? I can't go out into the streets and search for him. I can +only turn to you, Johnny boy, and rely upon your aid." + +"But, Natalie dearest," said the Lieutenant-Governor slowly, "don't you +see that it is impossible, all this? I cannot allow such an affair to +come into your pure, sweet life, bringing with it the knowledge of the +depths to which men may fall, and the shadow of misery and degradation. +I cannot bear that, in even the remotest way, you should blame yourself +for that which it was never in your power to prevent or remedy. A +man--this man--has no business to cast on you the blight of his own +weakness and folly, to establish a relation of cause and effect between +your refusal of him and the subsequent transformation of a gentleman +into a common drunkard." + +"John!" + +"Ah, don't think me bitter, dearest! If the man you saw was actually +Cavendish, I pity him from the bottom of my heart. But it was his hands +which built up the barrier between his life and ours, and it must be his +that tear it down. It is intolerable that in his degradation he should +come into your life again, and have, even in your imagination, the +smallest claim upon you--intolerable! The paths of my love for you and +my duty toward you are identical in this respect. There can be no +alternative--no quibbling. At least until he has redeemed himself, if +redemption is still possible, the thought of him, his presence, his +misdoings, must not and shall not contaminate the atmosphere in which +you live and move." + +Natalie had risen suddenly, her eyes ablaze. + +"Ah, John!" she said. "Am I then a toy, a sugar figure, that I must be +packed in cotton, and shielded from all knowledge of the evil in the +world? Is that what it means to be a woman? Ah, _no_! It is bad enough +to be hemmed in by the wretched conventionalities which prevent my doing +openly what I conceive to be my duty, without adding to the restrictions +that actually exist the imaginary one that I must not even think of the +misery, the wretchedness, the sordid vice which abound just across the +borders of the comfortable little world in which I live. And see, boy +dear!--with all the force of my conviction that things should be +otherwise, yet I am reasonable. I don't ask to see Spencer, or to have +an active hand in his redemption. I realize that the time for that has +passed, and that you are just in saying that he must come to me, not I +to him--and come to me another than the man he is to-day. Anything else +is impossible: that I see and accept. But the hideous fact remains. A +man who loved me once, who offered me all that a man can offer a woman, +is walking the streets of Kenton City, cold, hungry, homeless--a +beggar! What business is it of yours or mine what his past follies and +weaknesses were? His temptations may have been beyond our understanding, +but his present plight is not. He is begging--begging at our very +doors--a man whom we have called by the name of friend! I can't help +him. All I can do, as I said before, is to turn to you, whom I love +better than all the world, and ask you to save him, in my stead. Ah, +boy, boy!--I've given you all I refused to him, taken at your hands all +I put away at his. You can afford to be generous!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor came slowly toward her, and, placing his hands +upon her shoulders, looked her in the eyes. + +"Dearest and Most Beautiful," he said tenderly, "you are right. I +hope--I believe--that you were overwrought, fanciful, that it is not +true. But if it is, if Cavendish is begging in our streets, then, so +surely as I am Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, I will pull him out of +them, and make a man of him, if it takes a month and every police +officer and detective in Kenton City to find him. And that not alone for +your sake, tenderest-hearted, but for mine. I _can_ afford to be +generous, God bless your sweet face, I can indeed!" + +And he bent over reverently, and kissed her hand. + + + + +IV + +AS BETWEEN FRIENDS + + +There were but two guests at the Rathbawnes' dinner-table that night, +the Lieutenant-Governor and Colonel Amos Broadcastle, a veteran of the +Rebellion, brevetted Major for conspicuous gallantry at Lookout +Mountain, and now commanding officer of the Ninth Regiment, N. G. A., +the crack militia organization of Kenton City. Colonel Broadcastle had +seen his sixty-five, but his broad, square shoulders, his rigid +carriage, and his black hair, even now only slightly touched with gray, +clipped twenty years from his appearance. His eye was one that was +famous throughout the Alleghenia Guard,--an eye accustomed to control, +not a single man, or two, or three, but a thousand, moving as one at his +command; an eye enforcing obedience immediate, machine-like, and +unquestioning. + +It had been a momentous day for the Ninth when Amos Broadcastle, +retiring from the staff of a former Governor, had accepted, first a +majority therein, and then, three months later, its colonelcy. He found +ten companies, in no one instance exceeding twenty files front. He found +a field and staff vain, incompetent, and jealous; company officers +deficient alike in their knowledge of tactics and in their conception of +their responsibilities; sergeants, corporals, and lances chosen without +any view to fitness, and ignorant and tyrannical in their positions; and +finally, the rank and file lazy, untidy, and frankly contemptuous of the +school of the soldier. Some one had once said of the Ninth that there +was consolation to be found in the mortifying knowledge that the men +composing it were there with the unique view of escaping jury duty. The +consolation lay in the probability that such infernally bad soldiers +would have made jurors quite as infernally bad. + +But Broadcastle, a born disciplinarian and a trained tactician, was now +in a position to echo, albeit in a different spirit, the arrogance of +Louis: "_Nous avons changé tout cela!_" Ten years had sufficed to change +the indolent and incompetent Ninth of Alleghenia into a regiment +rivaling in prestige the Seventh of New York. The commissioned officers +were thrust upon, rather than achieved by, their companies, but, once +established in their respective positions, proceeded without exception +to justify, by their energy and ability, their selection from the best +element of Kenton City. Among the enlisted men the exponents of the old +spirit of sloth, indifference, and laxity were weeded out as fast as +their terms of service expired, and their places filled from the same +sources whence the company officers were drawn. Colonel Broadcastle was +a diplomat as well as a disciplinarian. By some unknowable system of +suggestion and example it came, little by little, to be regarded in +Kenton City as "the thing" to belong to the Ninth. Before the capital +was aware of the transformation, every company roster read 103, the +field and staff had been reorganized and perfected, and the Ninth +Regiment, N. G. A., was what it remained thereafter: a magnificent +fighting machine, ably drilled, perfectly equipped, a credit to the +state, to the credit of which there stood so little else. The +declaration of war with Spain brought it suddenly into prominence by the +astonishing readiness with which it went into camp twenty hours after +the Adjutant-General of Alleghenia published the President's call for +volunteers; and although it never saw active service, it attracted at +Chickamauga, and later at Tampa, the admiring attention of the regular +army, and was spoken of as the most perfect body among the volunteer +forces. + +The citizens of Kenton City were not accustomed to discovering things in +which they could take pride. The exact contrary was more apt to be the +case. When, therefore, they discovered the rehabilitated Ninth, and its +redeemer in the person of its commanding officer, they had a deal to +say, and said it with unexampled arrogance and satisfaction. +Thenceforward, Alleghenia meant much to Colonel Broadcastle, and +Colonel Broadcastle considerably more than much to Alleghenia. + +Something of all this went through the Lieutenant-Governor's mind during +the progress of the dinner. He sat at Mrs. Rathbawne's right, than which +nothing in the world could have been more cheerless, unless it was +sitting at Mrs. Rathbawne's left. But the good lady's habitual +complacency was plainly in abeyance, her customary volubility replaced +by a fidgety reserve. The dinner, as a social achievement, was a +distinct failure, save in so far as Mrs. Wynyard and Colonel Broadcastle +were concerned. Several months before, Mrs. Wynyard had frankly +announced that she had designs upon the Colonel. Latterly, Barclay had +begun to suspect the Colonel of having designs upon Mrs. Wynyard. Thirty +and sixty-five that looked forty-five--a widow and a widower! More +wonderful things had happened. + +"If I were thirty years younger," Broadcastle was saying even now, as he +did full justice to the celery mayonnaise, "I should say we were made +for each other." + +"Since two single people may be made for each other," laughed Mrs. +Wynyard, "I wonder if two married people can't be unmade for each other. +Perhaps that is just what has happened to us!" + +"I'll think that over," replied the Colonel with mock gravity. "I don't +want to commit myself on so serious a hypothesis, without due +reflection." + +They were the only ones who were thoroughly at ease. Barclay and +Natalie, unstrung by the events of the day, ate little and talked +listlessly. Dorothy, victim to an inward excitement which was half +happiness and half disappointment, chattered feverishly. Rathbawne was +wrapped in his own thoughts, and his wife, innocently unobservant of +emotional manifestations in any and every other, but pathetically +sensitive to the slightest evidence of mental perturbation in this +stern, kind man, between herself and whom existed a devotion dog-like in +its silence and intensity, watched his clouded face with an anxiety +which she made no effort to conceal. The dinner dragged hopelessly, +until she shook herself into a bewildered realization that it was over, +folded her napkin scrupulously, dusted a few crumbs from the black-satin +slope of her obsolete lap, and, followed by her daughters and Mrs. +Wynyard, left the men to their cordials and cigars. + +The latter drew their chairs nearer, as the door closed, made little +clearings in the wilderness of finger-bowls, silver, and discarded +napkins, for the accommodation of their coffee-cups and cordial glasses, +and, lighting the long Invincibles which were Rathbawne's sole +extravagance, inhaled that first matchless whiff of smoke which makes a +whole day of anxiety and vexation seem to have been worth the while. + +It is a moment apart and _sui generis_, this, and is rivaled only by +that of early morning realization that one is awake--and not obliged to +get up. It is apt to pass in silence, for a newly lit cigar is like a +newly married wife: a man is deliberately oblivious to all else. The +moment, too, is one of readjustment, of hasty mental survey of the +chatter that has passed, and of preparation for the essentially +dissimilar talk to come. With men of the mental calibre of the three +here assembled this opportunity is sacred to some of the gravest and +most vital thoughts which they exchange. Peter Rathbawne, in particular, +whenever he reviewed the paramount conversations of his life, seemed to +find their significance indissolubly fused with the fragrance of Havana +cigars and the taste of kümmel or yellow Chartreuse. + +His eyes dwelt thoughtfully upon his companions during the pause which +followed. First, on Broadcastle. He could depend upon him as he could +depend upon no other man on earth. They had fought side by side in many +a tight place in the black days of '62, and in many another, full as +tight, since then, on battlefields commercial and political. It is +doubtful whether so much as a single word of admiration or affection had +ever passed between them. It is equally doubtful whether anything could +have been more entirely superfluous than such a voicing of self-evident +sentiments. + +John Barclay, too! Peter Rathbawne, with what had been natural +shrewdness at the outset now sharpened almost to clairvoyance by his +years of dealing with a multiplicity of men and things, understood the +Lieutenant-Governor absolutely, and admired him with all the force of +his rugged nature. And Rathbawne was not given to admiring people. His +business experience had not fostered the spirit of hero-worship. He had +seen too much for that. But in the two men before him he recognized +qualities so unusual, and in many ways so similar, that he was proud to +count them friends. + +For the moment, however, as he took stock of them, he was measuring them +by a new standard, more rigid, more severe than he had hitherto had +reason to apply. It is one thing to trust a man implicitly, and another +thing entirely to try to tell him so. For silence is most golden in the +specification of friendship, and when employed in the particularizing of +intimate emotion the silver of speech is apt to turn to veriest tinsel. + +Yet the occasion was one which demanded speech. Moreover, and in direct +opposition to his inclinations and the precedents he had established, he +was forced not only to give practical expression to his feeling for +Broadcastle and Barclay, but, what humiliated as well as annoyed him, to +confess himself incapable of dealing with a question which confronted +him. It was the first time within his recollection when he had +mistrusted his own judgment. + +But Peter Rathbawne was not the man to procrastinate, and presently he +began to speak, in a low but curiously intense voice, from which the +others instinctively took their cue. He was a short man, inclined to +stoutness, but with the clear, sharp eye and the underhang of jaw which +tell of right principle and indomitable perseverance. It was a question +whether in calling him the second most obstinate man in Alleghenia, +Governor Abbott had given him the full measure of his due. + +"Gentlemen," he said, with the somewhat stilted formality which was part +of his manner, "I will say to you what I wouldn't say to others,--I'm in +a hole, and I want your advice. I'll be as brief as possible, and I'll +come right to the point. For thirty years I've been building up the +Rathbawne Mills, giving them every hour of my thought, every particle of +my strength, every atom of my ability. I've seen them grow from a little +shanty on the outskirts of Kenton City to a collection of buildings +covering four solid squares, filled with modern machinery, and employing +four thousand, two hundred and odd hands. I've been a business man, I've +been a rigid man, but I've been a fair man, too. No one can say that I +ever clipped wages, even when I had to run the mills at a loss, as I've +had to do more than once. I gave my people an eight-hour day long before +the law of Alleghenia jammed it down the throats of other mill-owners. +I swallowed the Union, though it was a bitter mouthful. There has never +been a just complaint from one of my employees that wasn't attended to +in short order, if it was in my power to do so. There's many an old +fossil on my pay-rolls to-day who isn't worth his salt, but he stays +there, and will continue to stay there, because he did his best when he +could, and it's not his fault that he's dead wood now. I've given in, +over and over again, in one way or another, sometimes against my +convictions, and oftener against my will. But one thing I've stuck to, +and that's my right to discharge a hand when I see fit, without +dictation from the Union or anybody else. In the past, this has been +comparatively easy sailing. One man, now and again, isn't a ripple on +the surface of four thousand employees. Besides, there was always a good +reason. The others saw that, and there was never a finger raised. They +believed in me, through and through, and it has been my pride to know +that they did, and that they had good cause to. But now it's different. +There has been a band of young good-for-nothings in Shop 22, who were +full, chock-a-block, of socialism, and equality, and workingmen's +rights, and God knows what-not! They've talked enough poisonous gas to +the other hands to blow up a state. They distributed pamphlets, and made +speeches, and organized clubs, and fomented discord, till I got sick and +tired of it. There wasn't one square day's work in the whole fifteen of +them put together. So, when I'd stood them as long as I could--which was +at ten o'clock yesterday morning--I discharged them all in a bunch, and +if there'd been a steep place handy, I'd have expected to see them all +run violently down it into the sea--like the other swine, in Scripture. +For if ever there was a band of devils made incarnate, it was that same +fifteen who were sowing anarchy broadcast through the Rathbawne Mills! + +"Now--what? Lo and behold, they are all henchmen and disciples of +Michael McGrath, whom we in Kenton City know to our cost, and regular +and loyal members--save the mark!--of his Union. Well, gentlemen, I've +got that Union about my ears like a nest of hornets, with McGrath at the +head, and unless those fifteen men are reinstated by noon to-morrow, my +four thousand hands will be out on strike, and the Rathbawne Mills will +be tied up as tight as a drum!" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle curtly, as the other paused. + +"That's what I meant to do--but where am I going to come out? If I +thought, for instance, that I was going to have your regiment to back me +up, Broadcastle, or even the Kenton City police, why, well and good! But +_am_ I? No, sir! _No_, sir! Not with Elijah Abbott in the Governor's +chair, I'm not! You know that as well as I. Why, Broadcastle, I'd rather +see McGrath himself at the capitol than that smooth-spoken skunk!" + +He paused to relight his cigar, and then continued. + +"The Rathbawne Mills are like the fruit of my own body to me. I love +them! I love every stone and brick of them, that I've put in place, as +it were, with my own hands. I've often thought that if they should burn +down it would come close to killing me. And yet I could watch them go +with a lighter heart, God knows, than that with which I foresee the +misery that's coming to these people of mine, who are going to starve at +the bidding of a band of black-legs, and that not even because they +think their cause a just one, but simply because they can't help +themselves. It isn't only that ruin's staring me in the face, though +there's that possibility in the situation, too, but that privation, +bitter misery, and despair are lying in wait for them. God!--what an +iniquity! + +"But I _can't_ give in, Broadcastle--I _can't_ give in, John Barclay! It +means the sacrifice of a principle I've held out for, and that I know is +right. What's more, it isn't as if I were yielding one point. It would +only be the beginning. If I give in now, I might as well turn over the +mills to McGrath at once, and let him run them according to his own +blackguardly will. You know how such things go. Give them an inch"-- + +"And they raise a hell!" put in Colonel Broadcastle. + +"Exactly! It's commercial suicide. And yet, if I _don't_ yield, I'm +precipitating disorder, and bloodshed, and the untold suffering of four +thousand souls. What am I to do?" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle, with a sharp nod of his head. + +Rathbawne turned from him to the Lieutenant-Governor, and to the latter, +knowing the man he had been, there was something indescribably +heart-rending in the sudden, irresolute trembling of his half-raised +hands, the slow shake of his head, and the pathos of his raised eyebrows +and drooping lips. + +"John," he said, "I'm an old man, and you're a young one, but I'm a +plain citizen, and you're the Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia. You +know how things stand. Now, I've given you my girl, and after that it's +not much to put myself into your hands as well. I'm getting on. My +strength isn't what it was. I'm not as fit to stand such a struggle as +this is bound to be, as I was thirty years ago. I look strong, but, in +reality, I'm not. My doctor has warned me, more than once. A sudden +shock--you know what these medical chaps say about sudden shocks! I've +laughed at him, of course, and yet--I know there is truth in it. I've +been up against hard propositions, but never one as hard as this. I've +had big responsibilities, but never a responsibility that I felt as I +feel this one. If I hold out, I know what people and the newspapers will +say,--how they'll blackguard me,--but I'm not afraid of that. I'm not +even thinking of it. No, and I'm not thinking of what the strain may +mean to me. Every man's turn is sure to come--why not one way as well as +another? But what I _am_ thinking of is the result upon the lives of +these people whom I've made, as surely as if I were another Creator. And +McGrath's another Beelzebub! There's a fight on between us for the +salvation of a little world of four thousand souls! But I'm not God! I +can't act with the conviction of omniscience. I've been the most +independent of men. I've made my own fortune with my own brains. I've +done as I saw fit, and the results have seemed to indicate that I've +been oftener right than wrong. But now, I'm at a loss. It's not the men +I'm thinking of so much. They ought to be able to make their own way, as +I've made mine. It's the women and children dependent upon them--the +women and children who have no voice in the matter, and yet who are +bound to suffer most by a strike. I've got to think for them. I've +reached a crisis--a cross-ways--and I've got to choose which course to +take--and I can't! All my experience counts for nothing. I've never--you +probably know it--asked for advice before. But now I must have the +unprejudiced, the outside point of view. I've always thought there was a +clear, unmistakable boundary between right and wrong, but now there's +some right in the wrong, and a big sight more of wrong in the right! +I've heard Broadcastle's opinion, and I want yours. If you agree, I'll +go by what you say. As I said before, John, in this matter I'm the +individual--you're the state. I'll go by what you say. What shall I do?" + +Peter Rathbawne's words had wrought tremendously upon the +Lieutenant-Governor. He answered slowly, looking down, and with a +perceptible tremor in his voice. + +"Mr. Rathbawne, you and the Colonel know how high-sounding my title is, +and how little, in reality, it means. There is no need to go into +details. I'm Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, yes!--and as helpless in +the cause of right as a new-born baby! If I could by any means, in any +manner, support the advice I gave you, I would give it willingly." + +"John!" said Peter Rathbawne, "I don't mean that. I've put the case +wrongly. Give me your counsel, not as Lieutenant-Governor, but as my +friend, and the man who loves my daughter!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor raised his eyes from the finger-tips with which, +as the other was speaking, he had been plucking at the cloth. + +"Fight them, Mr. Rathbawne," he said, "and may God help you--because I +can't!" + + + + +V + +A BRAND FROM THE BURNING + + +More heartsick than he cared to confess, even to himself, the +Lieutenant-Governor left the Rathbawnes' earlier than his wont, despite +the fact that his host and Colonel Broadcastle were still engaged in +discussing the impending situation, and that Natalie, with a batch of +new music, was waiting for him at the piano. He pleaded an unusually +busy day and his consequent fatigue as an excuse, and so, at half after +nine, found himself about to light a second cigar, on the steps of the +Rathbawne residence, and shivering a little in the night air, which +stung the inside of his nostrils and set his eyes watering. Raw as the +day had been, it had turned colder now, but the night was superbly +clear. The sky seemed to have drawn nearer to the earth, and the stars +twinkled so sharply and clearly against its deep blue-black that they +resembled in form their conventionally five-pointed counterfeits of +silver paper. A brisk wind whirled a few dried leaves in whispering +eddies across the smooth asphaltum of the driveway, but beyond this and +the peevish sputtering of the arc-light on the opposite corner there was +no sound. It was the kind of night which, with its crystal clearness and +its steely intensity, stirs the normal pulse to keen exhilaration: yet +never had John Barclay felt more hopelessly dispirited, more utterly at +a loss to see the way before him. That anxiety, distress, possibly +actual disaster should be impending over this house where lay his heart, +his happiness, and his hope, was sufficiently disturbing in itself. That +he should not be able, despite his position, to raise a hand to avert +the calamity was worse. But that the battle was to be a battle for the +right, and yet, as it seemed, foredoomed from the start to end in +disaster, since no aid could be expected from the strong arm of the law +to which the partisans of principle turn naturally for support: this +was worst of all. For out of dangerous surroundings he felt himself able +to snatch away the littlest and most lovely woman in the world. She, at +least, should not suffer. And out of this nightmare of powerless +prominence, of impotent position, he himself could retire into private +life, and be no less a man than he had been before. But from the +reproach of corruption which had fallen upon her, and the impending slur +of anarchy, who was to rescue Alleghenia? The Lieutenant-Governor set +his lips and drove his nails into his palms, as he stood in the shadow +of the Rathbawnes' doorway, looking up at the sky of the February night. +He was not a religious man--as the term goes--but in that moment he said +a better prayer for the welfare of his state than had ever lain upon the +lips of any priest in Kenton City! + +He was about to strike his match when an instinct rather than an actual +perception of movement arrested his hand. Bradbury Avenue, upon which +stood the Rathbawne house, was situated in one of the quieter residence +districts which prided itself on the turfed spaces between its +dwellings, pretentious enough for the most part, and the double rows of +trees which lined its thoroughfares. It was one of these trees which, at +the moment, attracted Barclay's attention. It lay in a direct line +between himself and the arc-light on the corner, and its trunk, in some +miraculous manner, had abruptly developed an elbow, and then an arm. The +Lieutenant-Governor was still staring at this phenomenon when it was as +abruptly explained by the sudden emergence from shadow of a man, who had +apparently been standing on the side of the tree nearest to the house. +He was crossing the avenue obliquely when something about his bearing +caused the Lieutenant-Governor to lean forward and follow him intently +with his eyes. It was all there, as Natalie had said--the lifted +shoulders, the bent head, the unmistakable, pathetic air of the beggar. +Then, as he neared the light, he gave a short upward strain to his neck +and chin, the impatient movement of a man whose collar annoys him. The +trick was too familiar to have been forgotten. The next moment Barclay's +heels were pounding on the asphaltum behind him, and then Barclay's hand +fell upon his shoulder and whirled him round. + +In the oddly intense radiance of the arc-light above, which cut sharply +across the surface of forehead, cheek, and chin, and left heavy shadows +like those in a roughly blocked-out carving, under brow, nose, and lower +lip, the two men faced each other briefly, in silence. Then the +Lieutenant-Governor voiced the other's name, hardly above a whisper. + +"Spencer Cavendish!" + +And the other, echoing the tone, if not the words, replied:-- + +"Bar-clay!" + +A square away, the lights of a hansom winked into the avenue, and the +hoof-beats of the horse clonked on the pavement, unaccompanied by any +sound from the smoothly trundling, rubber-tired wheels. Barclay stepped +to the kerb, and hailed the driver with his stick. The cab drew in, +stopped, and threw the divisions of its apron wide, like two black hands +extended in cordial welcome. + +The Lieutenant-Governor turned to his companion. + +"Get in," he said. "I want to have a talk with you." + +The drive of a mile and more from Bradbury Avenue to Barclay's quarters +in the new bachelor apartment-house "Rockingham" was accomplished +without the exchange of a word. Once, he felt his companion shiver, and +dragging a rug from under them, he spread it across their knees. That +was the only movement on the part of either. They sat, side by side, +looking straight before them over the horse's bobbing crupper, until the +hansom pulled up sharply before the broad and brilliantly illuminated +entrance of the "Rockingham." As they passed in, Cavendish had a passing +impression of tiled floors, columns of green marble, and attendants in +tightly fitting green uniforms with brass buttons. Then an elevator +whirled them up to the eighth floor, deposited them in a square hallway, +and vanished again, with the little page in charge wrinkling his nose +and biting the thumb of his cotton glove. + +"Wot's the Loot'nt-Guvnor up to now, Sawed-Off?" inquired the doorkeeper +genially, as the elevator returned to the ground floor. + +"Ide'no!" replied the little page with equal affability. "Goin' in fer +pol'tics, I guest. Jeest! Wot a slob it wuz--wot?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor unlocked the door of his apartment, touched an +electric button which flooded the little hall and the drawing-room +beyond with light, and, entering the latter, went directly to a closet +in the wall. Unlocking this, he took out a jar of biscuits and a +decanter, and setting them upon the table, turned once more to his +companion. + +"Put away a couple of those biscuits and a glass of sherry," he said, +"and then we'll talk." + +"I'm past biscuits," said the other, almost sullenly. + +"I'll see to that," replied Barclay. "They are only by way of a +starter." + +He passed into the hall as he spoke, and presently Cavendish heard the +click of a telephone receiver slipping from its crotch, and Barclay's +voice speaking, to some one below, of a steak, vegetables, salad, and +coffee. He stepped to the table, devoured two or three of the biscuits +ravenously, poured himself a glass of sherry, sipped, and then swallowed +it, and flung himself down upon a wide divan. + +"Have you a cigarette?" he asked, as Barclay reëntered. "I haven't +smoked in three days. That's worse than mere hunger, you know." + +"I believe you!" + +Barclay pushed a silver box across the table, and seating himself +opposite, touched a match to the cigar which he had been about to light +at the Rathbawnes' door, and which he still held between his lips. + +"Help yourself," he added. "Your supper will be up presently. Meanwhile, +shall I fire away, or will you?" + +Cavendish let the first smoke from his cigarette curl slowly up his +cheek before replying. In the full light now first resting upon it, his +face showed as that of a man approximately Barclay's age, but pinched by +want, and deeply lined by dissipation. His under lids were puffy and +discolored, and a dozen heavy creases ran, fan-like, from the corners of +his eyes. Hair already turning white and an unkempt mustache and beard +completed the picture. His clothes were faded and frayed, no linen was +visible, and his boots were cracked and soggy. There was nothing about +him to suggest the former estate of gentleman save his hands, which, +while thin and tremulous, were clean and well-kept, in singular contrast +to the slovenliness of his attire. + +"Age before respectability," he said in reply to Barclay's question, +with a shrug. "I'll go first. It will save your asking questions. We +parted in anger, Barclay." + +"Let that pass," put in the Lieutenant-Governor, briefly. "Two years +wipe out all scores as petty as was the cause of our quarrel." + +"Well, then," continued Cavendish more easily, "when I left Kenton City, +it was with the best intention in the world of making a fresh start in +some place where my story wasn't known. I went to New York. I had a +little money, but only a very little, and not the most remote idea of +how difficult it is for a man to make his way in a place where he is +unknown, particularly if he has no credentials and is too proud to ask +for any from his old associates. Moreover, I'd been drinking hard for +six months and there was no such thing as clipping it short all at once. +I had an idea of tapering off, and perhaps, if I had found a job, I +might have done so. As it was I climbed up one step and fell down two, +and that went on indefinitely. It wasn't as if I'd had a distinct aim or +anything in my life which made it seem worth living. I didn't half care. +I'd set my heart on something which I couldn't get, and--well, never +mind that. It is all as long ago as the Flood! I got work now and again, +tried reporting, and teaching, and copying. But each time it was a grade +lower, and I stuck to nothing but the whiskey--except when I had a +little more money than usual, and then it was absinthe." + +He touched his eyes, and then raised his hand to the level of his chin, +with the fingers held wide apart and rigid, and watched it tremble for +an instant in silence. + +"I haven't seen a mirror in weeks," he went on, "but I know the signs +are all there. That's the story. I could string it out for an hour, but +it would all be in the same key. I've simply been going down, down, +down. I'm what the old judge called me--do you remember it came out in +the 'Record?'--I'm a common drunk, Barclay. And I don't care! I've been +on the point of putting an end to it many a time--but I always held out +for another drink! Now, even my pride's gone. It stuck to me longer than +anything else, but it's taken itself off at last. I've been feeling +lately that I'm pretty near the end, and I wanted to see Kenton City +again before it came. That's the reason I walked all the way from +Pittsburg, and I've been begging on the streets since I got in. I +thought nobody would recognize me." + +"But _I_ did," said Barclay. + +"Yes, and--and"-- + +"Yes, and _she_ did! She saw you this morning, but before she took in +fully that it was you, you were gone in the crowd. She was half +heart-broken over it, and made me promise to look you up. I was going to +do so, when I tumbled against you by chance to-night. You were watching +the house?" + +"Yes, for the last time. I saw she had recognized me and that Kenton +City was no place for me. So I was off again to-night. Is she"-- + +"She is well, and, I am glad to say, happy. We are to be married in the +autumn." + +A smile hovered for an instant on Cavendish's lips. + +"God bless her!" he said slowly. "I'm glad of it. But don't let's talk +of that. She's as far above me as the stars!" + +"And as far above me, too, for that matter!" answered Barclay. "Here's +your supper. While you're eating, I'll take my turn at the talk." + +A bell-boy arranged the tray on the table, removed the covers, and in a +moment the two men were again alone. With a deep sigh of satisfaction +Cavendish drew a chair to the table and set to work on the steaming +dishes before him. + +"Jupiter!" he said, with the first mouthful poised on his fork, "you +don't know what this means, Barclay, and you can thank God you don't. I +won't attempt to thank you. Go on, and tell me about yourself." + +"I've no intention of doing that just at present," replied the +Lieutenant-Governor, settling himself more comfortably in his chair. "I +want to talk about you. Don't be afraid. I'm not going to preach! But I +_am_ going to say that while I understand a good deal of what you've +said, the last part is pure rot! You're a bit of a wreck, of course, but +it isn't your pride or your self-respect or whatever you choose to call +it, that's gone. It's only your nerve. Now you've had your experience, +and you're back where you belong, and you've friends who like you, and +who can help you, and who will. I'm in a position to do so myself, and I +don't expect you to make any bones about accepting my assistance, and +whatever money you need for the moment. It will be a loan, of course, to +be repaid when you're on your feet again. We'll have you there in no +time. When you've made way with the grub, you can bunk down on that +divan for the night, and in the morning I'll tog you out in one of my +outfits, and you can set about getting back on _terra firma_. You'll +have to shake the drink, that goes without saying." + +Cavendish straightened himself suddenly, laid down his knife and fork, +and laughed shortly. + +"It sounds well," he said bitterly, "but you don't understand, Barclay. +It's too late! I don't care, and if I did, I couldn't shake the drink to +save my immortal soul. I'm steady enough for the time being, because I'm +hungry and because I'm being fed. But I've tried the other game too +often. I know what it means. I wouldn't promise you to quit, because I +don't want to lie to you, and that's all it would be. When the craving +comes back, I'll go down before it like a row of tenpins. No, Barclay, +it won't do." + +"Nonsense, man! Do you want to tell me you're as weak as that?" + +"Every bit!" said Cavendish, attacking the steak again. + +"Well, I don't believe it, that's all. In the morning you'll be a +different man. I'll give you a bromide when you're ready for bed. You're +shaky, as it is, but that's all a matter of nerves. Now we'll drop the +subject, and talk of other things." + +It was midnight when they separated. Barclay brought out sheets and +blankets for the divan, produced pajamas for his guest, put the bath at +his disposal, and mixed a strong dose of bromide for him to take upon +retiring. + +Half an hour later, when he reëntered the drawing-room to see whether +Cavendish was in need of anything further, he found him standing by the +table in his pajamas, trembling, wide-eyed, and very pale. + +"What is it?" he asked. "Are you ill?" + +"No," answered Cavendish, striving in vain to control the trembling of +his lips, "only damnably nervous. Could you--could you give me a drop of +brandy, Barclay?" + +"Certainly not!" said the Lieutenant-Governor. "Pull yourself together, +man! There's your bromide. Take that. It's better than a thousand +brandies." + +Cavendish turned, lifted the glass, spilling a little as he did so, and +swallowed the sedative at a gulp. Then he stretched himself upon the +divan and drew the covers close up about his chin. Presently, from the +bedroom, Barclay heard him breathing deeply and regularly, and turning +on his side, fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep. + +He awoke with a start, as the dawn was showing gray through the chinks +of his window curtains, with a vague, uneasy sense of something wrong, +and lay listening, every nerve strained taut. From the adjoining room +came the sound of Cavendish's breathing, but now it was more raucous, +more like groan following groan. The Lieutenant-Governor strove in vain +to put off the foreboding which lay heavy upon him, until, finally, +unable to resist the impulse, he rose, slid his feet into his slippers, +and going noiselessly into the drawing-room, stepped to the windows and +put the curtains softly aside. What first met his eye as he turned was +the door of his little wine-closet in the wall. It was standing wide +open, and about the lock the wood was hacked and hewed away in great +splinters. On a chair near by lay a rough knife with the blade open and +a sliver of wood yet sticking to the point. Then he looked toward the +divan. Cavendish was lying face down upon it, outside the blankets, +with his head lolling sharply over the edge. His left arm was extended +full length toward the ground, where his fingers just touched a bottle +of French absinthe, overturned upon its side, and uncorked, with the +thick, gummy liquid spread from its mouth in a circular pool on the +waxed floor. + + + + +VI + +McGRATH LAUGHS + + +The clock on the huge central tower of the Capitol marked nine, as the +Lieutenant-Governor passed rapidly through the lofty entrance hall +toward the corridor leading to his office and that of Governor Abbott. +Already his promptness was proverbial, and there were those in the +great, grim building who looked forward to the moment of his arrival, +each morning, with a kind of eagerness. These were the simpler folk of +the official world with which circumstance housed him for eight hours +daily,--bootblacks, elevator-boys, porters, doormen. For to the big, +clean, wholesome personality which appeals irresistibly to these humbler +people, Barclay added an astonishing memory for faces, and for the names +and circumstances connected with them. It was a gift which counted as an +unspeakably important factor in the establishment and maintenance of +unusually cordial relations with all those with whom he came in contact. +No one brought within the radius of his personal magnetism long resisted +it. It was only those who judged him from a distance, as did the press +and the rank and file of his party, or those who deliberately +misinterpreted him, as did his political enemies, who permitted +themselves anything short of enthusiasm for John Barclay. And this +faculty for attracting admiration and commanding respect, this +infallible kindness and this inherent dignity, were never made manifest +to so great advantage as in his attitude toward his inferiors. These +adored him. He accumulated, bit by bit, a remarkable store of intimate +information relating to them, and employed it in his intercourse with +them, with a tact and a frank sincerity of interest which never failed +of their effect. The response thus elicited was strongest of the minor +pleasures in his life. He was aware--none better--of the shrewdness +native to those who have no claim upon one's recognition, their +appreciation of notice that is unfeignedly interested, their +sensitiveness to open indifference, their resentment of the simulated +consideration which is mere impertinence; and he was conscious of a +little inward thrill of satisfaction at the difference of attitude in +the employees at the Capitol as toward Governor Abbott and himself. +Where the former's suavity elicited only formal respect, manifestly +obligatory, his own whole-heartedness lined his way with smiles and +kindly greetings. His official existence, beset with annoyance, +mortification, and disappointment, was, as he often reflected, made +tolerable only by this friendliness which he, almost unconsciously, +inspired. Dogs, children, and his subordinates--the three most +intuitively critical classes of beings--were all his friends. The +pathway to and from the daily routine, which he was coming to regard as +moral martyrdom, was a pathway illumined with sunlight and strewn with +flowers! + +As the Lieutenant-Governor passed through his ante-room, with a wink at +the boy, a nod to the stenographer, and a word of greeting to his +private secretary, and entered his office, he was surprised to find the +communicating door open, and to hear the sound of a vaguely familiar +voice in the Governor's room beyond. In an effort to place the speaker, +he hesitated briefly before advancing to a point which would bring him +within range of the Governor's eye. Almost immediately, the memory of +the convention rushed over him, and he recognized the voice as that of +Michael McGrath. + +"And it won't be a strike like other strikes," he was saying, "not so +long as I'm running it, that is. It's going to mean business from the +word go! There's been too much shilly-shallying in the strikes I've +known anything about, too much talk, and too much wasting of Union +funds. You know what I mean. It isn't enough to tie up a mill, and then +hang around on street-corners for two months, waiting for the other side +to give in. The only place to hit a man like Rathbawne is in his pocket, +and by that I don't mean simply cutting off his income, but chopping +into his capital as well. He's got to understand"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor walked over to his desk, laid his hat and stick +on a chair, and, before removing his overcoat, began turning over the +pile of letters which awaited his attention. As he did so, Governor +Abbott's voice broke in suavely upon the other's. + +"I deprecate any resort to violence," he said. "You must proceed with +discretion if you expect the state to maintain an attitude of +neutrality. Otherwise, the police or the militia"-- + +"Oh, to hell with the police and the militia!" broke in McGrath +impatiently. "What's the use"-- + +"There is the Lieutenant-Governor now," interrupted the other. "Perhaps +he has some news for us. Mr. Barclay, will you kindly step in here for a +moment?" + +McGrath was standing on the opposite side of the Governor's table as +Barclay entered the room. He acknowledged the latter's curt nod with an +ironical bow, slipped his hands into the pockets of his checked +trousers, and stood waiting, with his square head thrust forward, for +what was to follow. + +"Mr. McGrath has called," continued the Governor, "to explain the +attitude of the Union in the impending strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +I've been telling him of our conversation of yesterday afternoon, and +that, as you were to see Mr. Rathbawne last night, you would probably +have something to tell us in regard to his position. Were you able to +persuade him to a more reasonable view of the situation?" + +"I have nothing to add, sir, to what I said yesterday," replied Barclay. +"I told you then that I had no intention of endeavoring to influence Mr. +Rathbawne's judgment." + +"He spoke to you about it?" + +"Yes." + +"And asked your advice?" + +"He did." + +"And you replied?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor flushed. + +"I beg to suggest, sir," he answered, "that this is hardly the time for +me to commit myself as to that. I conceive it to be a matter of official +privacy. Mr. McGrath"-- + +"You have my authority to speak, Mr. Barclay," said the Governor. +"Indeed, I desire it. Since one side knows your views, there is no +reason why the other should not be informed as well. Mr. McGrath is the +president of the Union. It is best that he should know the attitude of +the state authorities in this controversy." + +"I am not in a position to question your wishes, sir. You should know +best." + +"One cannot pretend to be infallible, Mr. Barclay," answered the +Governor, rubbing his hands. "One can only do what seems to be right and +proper under the circumstances. By our conversation of yesterday, I in a +measure put the negotiations with Mr. Rathbawne into your hands." + +"It is a task I did not seek, sir. Pardon me if I say that it is also +one which I should hardly have accepted, had I been aware that in +speaking as you did you were actually asking me to assume it. Mr. +Rathbawne is my friend, and, moreover, my personal convictions"-- + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"There can be no question of friendship or of personal conviction, Mr. +Barclay, in the case of a duty imposed upon a state official. I realize +that what you--or I, for that matter--must do in the performance of our +obligations, is oftentimes disagreeable, oftentimes at variance with our +wishes. But that is unavoidable." + +Barclay moved uneasily. The intrusion of this pedantry, so conspicuously +insincere, with its implied rebuke, chafed him unspeakably, in view of +the presence of McGrath. The Governor had adopted the tone, half +authoritative, half reproachful, of a teacher reproving a refractory +child. + +"My time, as you must know, is inadequate to the demands made upon it. I +am forced, on occasions, to turn more or less important matters over to +others. To whom more naturally than to you, Mr. Barclay?" + +"May I suggest, sir, that there can be no profit in prolonging this +discussion? I appreciate the position perfectly, and I am quite prepared +to state what I know of Mr. Rathbawne's attitude toward the demands of +the Union." + +"Ah," said the Governor, "that is as it should be, and as satisfactory +as possible. Let me remind you, Mr. Barclay, that it was not I, but +yourself, who introduced this digression." + +He turned to the president of the Union. + +"You will understand from what I have said, Mr. McGrath," he added, +"both to the Lieutenant-Governor and to you, that in the matter of the +proposed strike, he is, to all intents and purposes, acting in my stead. +He was in a position to approach Mr. Rathbawne, and I was not. Now, Mr. +Barclay, if you please"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor straightened himself instinctively, as, for the +first time, he addressed himself to the agitator. + +"Mr. McGrath," he said, "my confidence in Mr. Rathbawne's fairness and +integrity would have led me to approve any course which he might have +seen fit to take. As you have already heard me say, I had absolutely no +intention of endeavoring to influence his judgment. Greatly to my +surprise, Mr. Rathbawne himself consulted me in the matter, without any +suggestion on my part, and asked for my advice." + +"That's fortunate," put in McGrath, "very fortunate. You've been able to +sidetrack a lot of trouble." + +Barclay's eyes hardened at the hypocrisy of the sneer. + +"I have pleasure in informing you," he continued, "that, in reply, I +advised him to fight the Union in the present dispute to the utmost of +his means and ability. I should have counseled him further to hold out +until he had spent his last cent and shed his last drop of blood, except +that, knowing him as I do, I conceived such a recommendation to be +wholly superfluous. Mr. Rathbawne has his character and his record +behind him. There is about as much chance of his yielding you an inch of +ground as if he were standing with his back against the Capitol!" + +McGrath shrugged his shoulders. + +"It's a damned funny way you have of not influencing people's judgment," +he said. + +"I mis-stated my attitude in saying that," retorted the +Lieutenant-Governor coolly. "I should have said, what, after all, is +self-evident, that I had no intention of trying to influence Mr. +Rathbawne in favor of the Union, at least so long as it is acting under +your dictation. Its present character is well known--almost as well +known as yours, in fact--and I believe its position in this matter to be +entirely untenable, unjustifiable, and iniquitous. I may add that if it +is, indeed, Governor Abbott's resolve that I am to deal, in his stead, +with the question of your proposed strike, you may confidently rely upon +having to put the entire state force of Alleghenia out of business +before you can even so much as begin to bully Peter Rathbawne into +submission!" + +"If that's your opinion of the Union," said McGrath sullenly, "it might +be interesting to hear your opinion of me." + +"You are perfectly welcome to it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor +easily. "I consider you an unmitigated blackguard!" + +Governor Abbott tipped back his chair and looked at McGrath. + +"That's pretty plain talk," he said. "You see how it is, Mr. McGrath. +You'll have to go ahead on your own responsibility, and you mustn't be +surprised if the State steps in at the first evidence of disorder." + +McGrath rose, flecked some specks of dust from his waistcoat, and walked +toward the door without a word. On the threshold he turned, looked from +the Governor to the Lieutenant-Governor, and back again, and laughed. +Then he went out, closing the door softly behind him. + +At the Rathbawne Mills it was usual for a huge whistle to give one long +blast at noon as a signal for the lunch hour. On that day, however, +following McGrath's instructions, the single blast was replaced by five +short ones in rapid succession, and three minutes later the employees +were pouring through half a dozen gates into the streets surrounding the +mills, in laughing, chattering, excited streams. + +A majority of the men went directly to a hall in the neighborhood where +McGrath had called a mass-meeting for half-past twelve. A minority of +them crowded into the saloons of the vicinity, where they pounded on the +bars, and filled the close, smoke-grayed air with heated discussion. +Several of the discharged hands were in evidence, each surrounded by an +attentive group, and expounding more or less inflammatory views. The +women gathered in gossiping throngs on the sidewalks, laughing, and +pulling each other about by the arms. The boys played ball and leap-frog +in the streets, shouting, and whistling through their fingers. In brief, +the great strike was on, but, for the time being, it was masquerading +in the guise of a public holiday. + +At one o'clock the whistle blew again, and a thousand voices whooped a +derisive accompaniment, but no one of the throng in the streets made a +move toward the mills. Half an hour later, watchmen swung to and bolted +the gates, and, issuing presently from a small side entrance, in +company, were received with cheers, handshakes, and slaps upon the back. +Then the crowd gradually thinned,--many going to the already well-filled +hall where McGrath was delivering an address, and others to their +homes,--and a silence descended upon the neighborhood, broken only by +the voices of the men about the saloon doorways. + +At two, Peter Rathbawne, attended by his private secretary, came out of +the side entrance and walked slowly away in the direction of his home. +He held his head high, and his eyes straight to the front, and paid no +attention to the respectful greetings of those of the strikers who +saluted him, touching their hats. There were many among them whose +hearts sank at this attitude in a man who had made it his boast that he +knew every hand in his mills by sight, and who, in the past, had had a +nod or a friendly word for each and all of them. For the first time a +premonition settled upon them of what this strike, which had been +welcomed principally for novelty's sake, might mean. It was the first +the Rathbawne Mills had ever known. Some of those who saw the face of +Peter Rathbawne that afternoon were already hoping that it might be the +last. + +The Lieutenant-Governor returned to his apartment for lunch. Cavendish +was still sleeping as he had left him, with a stalwart negro porter, +summoned from the Capitol by telephone early that morning, watching in a +chair. Under Barclay's orders, a carpenter had already removed the +splintered door of the wine-closet, and an upholsterer had replaced it +by a slender brass rod from which swung a velvet curtain. With his own +hands the Lieutenant-Governor had taken away the fallen bottle, mopped +up the pool of absinthe, and put the room to rights. Now he dismissed +the negro, took from his pocket a little box of strychnine tablets, +obtained from his physician on his way from the Capitol, and, after a +brief survey of his surroundings to see that all was in order, went over +to the divan and shook the sleeping man by the shoulders. + +"Come, lazy-bones!" he said, with a laugh. "You've slept over twelve +hours. That will do--even for a nervous wreck." + +Cavendish opened his swollen eyes slowly, looked at him, and then closed +them again with a murmured "Oh, God!" which was like a groan. + +To this the Lieutenant-Governor paid no heed. Passing into the bathroom, +he turned on the cold water in the tub, poured a half glass of vichy +from a syphon, and then returned, carrying the tumbler in his hand. +Cavendish had raised himself on one elbow, and was looking stupidly +about the room. + +"Here you are," said Barclay cheerfully. "Stow this pill, and here's +vichy to wash it down. Your bath's running. By the time you've had it, +there'll be some clothes ready for you." + +Cavendish gulped down the tablet, and sat upright. + +"Last night"--he faltered. + +For the first time in his life, the Lieutenant-Governor called him by +his first name. + +"Last night, Spencer," he said, looking him fairly in the eye, "belongs +to the past, and is taboo. I won't hear a word about it. This is to-day. +Get up, and we'll set about putting wrong right. You're a man again. +Don't forget that. And I'm your friend. Don't forget that, either." + +His hand rested for an instant on the other's shoulder with a firm +pressure, and then he passed into his bedroom and shut the door. + +They had lunch together in the dining-room of the "Rockingham," and then +went up again to Barclay's rooms. At the door, Cavendish came to a halt. + +"I can't stand this," he said. + +"You'll have to," replied the Lieutenant-Governor, "so shut up!" + +"You've made a change," said Cavendish obstinately, pointing to the +curtained cupboard. + +Barclay's eyes did not follow the gesture. + +"So have you!" he answered. "Now, look here. There are twenty dollars in +the waistcoat of that suit, and a letter to Payson of the 'Kenton City +Sentinel.' Go down and see him this afternoon, and I think he'll give +you a job at reporting, which will fix you up for the present. In +another pocket you'll find a box, with three tablets like the one you +had before lunch. Take one of them every two hours. In still another +pocket there's a key to these rooms. I'm going to be busy till about ten +o'clock, so you'll have to shift for yourself. Make yourself at home, +and if you're awake I'll see you when I come in." + +Taking him suddenly by the shoulders, he twisted him about, facing the +chimney piece, on which stood a photograph of Natalie Rathbawne, smiling +out of a silver frame. + +"I'll leave you to talk it out with her," he added simply. + +In the hall, as he passed out, he caught a reflection of Cavendish in a +mirror. His hands were resting on the mantel-edge, and he was leaning +forward with his haggard face close to the photograph. Barclay looked at +his watch. + +"Two o'clock," he said to himself, "and all's well!" + + + + +VII + +THE MIRAGE OF POWER + + +Barclay was conscious of a feeling of exhilaration such as he had not +known for many weeks, as he swung into Bradbury Avenue late that +afternoon on his way to the Rathbawne residence. The duties of the day +had been inordinately petty and vexatious, but he had dispatched them +one and all with something approaching enthusiasm,--a touch of the old +Quixotic energy with which he had taken office. The morning conversation +in Governor Abbott's room had braced and toned him. He forgot its +inauspicious opening, and even his distress at the attempt to force him +into the position of mediator between Peter Rathbawne and the Union, in +the solid satisfaction of having been able to speak his mind to McGrath, +and call that worthy a blackguard to his face. He was a man who +despised a quarrel, but, for its own sake, loved a square, hard fight. + +Back, however, of this somewhat inadequate excuse for cheerfulness lay +the Governor's assurance that in the matter of the strike his lieutenant +was to have free rein. It was the first time since the beginning of +their official association that Elijah Abbott had placed an actual +responsibility in Barclay's hands. A corner-stone laying, a banquet here +and there, the opening of a trolley line, or a library, or a +sewer,--these were the major calls upon the Lieutenant-Governor's time. +The main current of routine was a hopeless monotony of official +correspondence, investigations, statistics, reading and reporting on the +interminable and flatulent maunderings of the Legislature,--duties +heart-breaking in their desperate tedium and maddening inutility. + +But at last here was responsibility, actual and deeply significant, +calling for the exercise of tact, courage, and immutable firmness. The +particular task was not one which he would have coveted, and yet he +welcomed it. Anything,--anything to assuage in him that sense of +ineptitude, of being ignored, a titled nonentity! + +With this vast lightening of spirit came, not only gratitude, but a +sense of lenity toward Governor Abbott. He encouraged himself to believe +that the note between them had been one of misunderstanding merely. It +might not be too late, after all! Gradually, he began to form a mental +picture of a growing sympathy and affiliation between them, large with +possibilities of improvement for Alleghenia. As he turned into the +Rathbawnes' gateway, he could have laughed aloud for very lightness of +heart. His optimism was not even impaired by running, in the hall, full +against Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"_Good_ gracious! Lieutenant-Governor, is that you?" + +Repeated and earnest endeavor on Barclay's part had never dissuaded her +from this form of address. + +"What _is_ the use of _having_ such a title, if one can't _call_ you by +it?" she would say, when he remonstrated. "Do _you_ suppose that, if +Natalie were engaged to a _prince_, I should be going around, calling +him Tom, Dick, or Harry, instead of 'Your Royal _Highness_'? You ought +to be _proud_ of your title. _I_ am!" + +"But, Mrs. Rathbawne"-- + +"Now, _please_ not, Lieutenant-Governor, _please_ not! I like it best +that way." + +The north wind was attentive and amenable to the voice of persuasion, in +comparison with Josephine Rathbawne. + +"Of _course_ you know the _strike_ is on!" she continued now, without +waiting for an assurance from Barclay that he was indeed none other than +himself. "Isn't it _awful_? I expect to hear the roar of the mob at +_any_ moment! Come into the drawing-room. Natalie _was_ there, only +_half_ an hour ago." + +And she swept through the doorway, Barclay following. + +"Natalie," she began, "here's the Lieu--why, _Dorothy_! I took you for +Natalie. And--er--oh! Why, Mr.--er--how de do? I didn't see you at +first. Oh, _do_ turn on the switch, my dear. The place is as black as +pitch." + +The electric light, flooding the room, revealed young Nisbet, one vast, +consuming blush, and Dorothy, with a dangerous light in her eyes, and +her lips tightly compressed. It was plain that Mrs. Rathbawne had fallen +foul of Dan Cupid's machinery once more! + +"Why, Mr. _Nisbet_! I thought you were in New York." + +"I had a telegram this morning, calling the date off," said young Nisbet +in pitiable confusion; "that is, I didn't have to go, you know. So I +just fell in here to explain. I thought some of you might spot me on the +street, and after I'd said"-- + +He began to flounder hopelessly, and cast a glance of mute appeal at +Dorothy. That facile young lady marched directly into the breach. + +"If you and John are looking for Natalie," she said, "you'll find her in +the library with Dad. How do you do, John?" + +"Pretty well, I thank you, Flibbertigibbet. It is really your husband +whom I came to see, Mrs. Rathbawne. I've a little business with him, so, +for the moment, I'll have to give Natalie the cold shoulder." + +"Oh!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, lifting her fat hands. "Of _course_, +Lieutenant-Governor! I understand _perfectly_. Business before pleasure, +_always_. Go right in, won't you, and send Natalie here to me. _I'll_ +stay here. Aren't we going to have tea, Dorothy? Oh, _do_ try to sit up +straight, my dear!" + +Natalie and her father were bending low over a great portfolio, their +heads close together in the yellow glow of the table-lamp, which was the +only light in the room. Rathbawne looked up with a grim smile, as the +Lieutenant-Governor entered. + +"Pottering over my autographs, again, you see," he remarked. "I've been +neglecting them shamefully, of late--eh, Natalie? Didn't have the time. +It looks just now as if I wouldn't have to complain again of lack of +leisure for quite a while!" + +"It was that I dropped in to see you about," said Barclay, striving, +with only partial success, to keep the exultation out of his voice. "You +may not be in for so much leisure as you imagine, Mr. Rathbawne. You may +not get much of a holiday, after all." + +Without for an instant losing the Lieutenant-Governor's eye, Rathbawne +reached out and touched his daughter on the arm. + +"Oh, Dad!" she said reproachfully. + +"There's no need for her to go, sir," added Barclay, "unless you wish +it. I bring only good news." + +Acquiescing, Rathbawne drew Natalie close to him, passing one arm across +her shoulders, so that his gnarled hand rested firmly on the delicate +fabric of her sleeve. Between these two there had always lain a +sympathy, an affection, a mutuality of comprehension, more like the +relation of husband and wife than that of child and parent. + +"Nothing but good news?" answered Rathbawne. "Go on. What is it?" + +"News not so much of actual happenings as of potentialities," said the +Lieutenant-Governor. "Last night I had to say to you that in the cause +of right I was as powerless to aid you as a baby. To-night, I have come +to tell you that I am in a position to see justice done, and that I +will." + +In detail, his voice ringing with enthusiasm and confidence, he +described the interview of that morning, his statement of Rathbawne's +position, his passage at arms with McGrath, finally, the Governor's +announcement that the strike was to be supervised by his lieutenant in +his stead. + +"I had almost lost hope," he concluded. "I thought my opportunity would +never come, and here it is, after all--the chance to act! And, somehow, +I feel that it is only the beginning--that, as he gets to understand me +better"-- + +Rathbawne suddenly left his daughter's side, and in three steps was +directly before the Lieutenant-Governor. As he interrupted him, his +fingers closed upon the lapels of the other's coat, and he punctuated +his words with little tugs at these, his knuckles coming together with +tiny muffled thuds. He spoke with a gravity that was vibrant with +suppressed anger and slow with sincere regret. + +"My boy," he said, "it's not a gracious thing to do to spoil an +enthusiasm like yours, but don't deceive yourself. Elijah Abbott as a +trickster is alone in his class. You were never more powerless to act +for the right than you are at this moment." + +"But I have his assurance"-- + +"Oh, _his_ assurance! It isn't worth the ash off your cigar. What, give +you a chance to interfere with the will of the Union which made him, and +owns him, body and soul? Never in God's world! Listen to me. I spent an +hour in his office this very afternoon, discussing the strike--_and he +never so much as mentioned your name_!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor winced as if the words had been the touch of a +lancet. Then he closed his eyes. + +"And I was in the next room," he said, almost as if to +himself,--"planning--my--control--of the situation! Good God!" + +"I went directly to him," continued Rathbawne, "because I knew that it +would be purely and simply a waste of time to parley with the lesser +officials who are either helpless or frankly his tools. I knew, too, +that no satisfactory result would come of appealing to him, but I wanted +to give him the chance. All I asked of him was an assurance that the +mills would have proper police protection, and that, if necessary, the +militia would be called out in support of order. The outcome was exactly +what I expected. Governor Abbott rubbed his hands, and smiled, and said: +'All in good time, Mr. Rathbawne, all in good time. When the conditions +seem to warrant it, we can discuss these measures.' That means that they +are free to blow the mills to kingdom come, before a finger will be +raised by the authorities to prevent them. And what's more, they'll do +it! Do you think I don't know McGrath?" + +As he had intended it should, this speech had given the other a chance +to recover himself. The Lieutenant-Governor's habitual poise was +already restored, and his voice, as he answered, was quite steady, but +eloquent of his desperate discouragement and weariness. + +"I hope it's not as bad as all that, Mr. Rathbawne. It's not necessary +to tell you, that for me there can never again be such a thing as +trusting the word of Governor Abbott; but, at the same time, I can +hardly bring myself to believe that he would openly countenance the +practical existence of anarchy in the capital city of Alleghenia." + +"Well, I can, then!" declared Rathbawne. "I can believe anything of him! +Mark my words, John, he's as sleek a scoundrel as you'll find outside of +the State's Prison. He cares less for Alleghenia and her capital city +than you do for one of the hairs on his rascally head. I tell you, the +Union has bought him, body and soul, and unless a miracle comes down +from heaven, I'm a beaten man!" + +Barclay bit his lips without replying. In his heart of hearts, he knew +that Peter Rathbawne's words were true. + +"He'll be impeached, sooner or later," continued the old man, "if +there's a speck of decency left in the Legislature--which I doubt. But +long before that, John, long before that, I'll be down and out. I would +to God you were Governor of Alleghenia, my boy. You're the only ray of +hope I can see for her." + +The Lieutenant-Governor fell back a step, and covered his face with his +hands. For a full minute there was absolute silence. Rathbawne had +returned to the table, and, with his fore-arms across the back of a +chair, and one foot on the lower cross-bar, was staring vacantly at his +autographs, his hands moulding and remoulding each other into an +infinity of forms. Natalie was at the window, her face in the crevice +between the curtains. The same impulse had prompted both father and +daughter. There are some things which it is better not to watch. + +They turned at the sound of his voice, to find him with his head flung +back, his hands clenched at his sides, his right foot planted firmly in +advance of his left, his whole bearing one of passionate earnestness. +And, though he was seemingly addressing Rathbawne, there was that in his +voice and in his words which was meant for every ear in the state! + +"Governor of Alleghenia!" he said, "I would to God I were! Sometimes I +almost--yes, sometimes I wholly despair. I love this state, Mr. +Rathbawne, as I love nothing else on earth--not even my girl there, not +even Natalie. You two are the only ones in the world who can understand +what it means when I say that. It has always been so, ever since I was +big enough to know what Alleghenia meant, and more than ever since I +have come to understand her shame, and her vital peril, and her dire +need. I've never tried to explain the feeling; I've never found any one +who seemed to share it with me. I hear other men talk of national +patriotism, and the flag, and all that, and I understand it, and honor +them for it. But--while it may be only a fancy of mine--for me Kenton +City comes even before Washington, and even before these United States +of America the sovereign state of Alleghenia! I would have her courts +incorruptibility itself, her government the perfect commingling of +equity and mercy; her press the vehicle of verity, intelligence, and +watchfulness; her public servants the faithful exponents of loyalty and +diligence; her people, one and all, whatever is best in our +interpretation of the word American--and then, something +more!--Alleghenians!--citizens, not only of the Republic, but of the +state which I would have shine brightest in the field of stars, and be +quoted, from Maine to California, and from Florida to Washington, as the +synonym for law and order, truth, integrity, and justice. You know how +far the dream is from the reality. We are held up to ridicule and +contempt as law-breakers, time-servers, and bribe-takers--and we deserve +it! I can't see help on any hand. I don't believe our people, as a +class, are actually vicious and corrupt--only callous and indifferent, +accustomed so long to the spectacle of political chicanery and depravity +that they have lost their ability to appreciate its significance. But, +so far as results are concerned, it all amounts to the same thing. Once, +I hoped I should be able to do something. But now--I'm a nonentity, Mr. +Rathbawne, as you know, and not only that, but a man who has taken a +false step, from which he can never recover. I'm dead, politically +speaking--as dead as Benjamin Butler!" + +He paused, drawing a deep breath. + +"We were speaking of your interview," he added, more evenly. "What was +the result?" + +"Nothing, beyond what I've told you," answered Rathbawne, shaking his +head. "All I can do is to keep my mouth shut, await developments, and +trust in a Providence which it takes a good bit of obstinacy to believe +hasn't deserted the state of Alleghenia for good and all. It isn't for +my own sake alone, John, that I pray the Union will give in before my +people begin to think of violence. You remember '94 in Chicago? Well, +we don't want anything like that in Kenton City. It would be the last +straw! Alleghenia has a big enough burden of disgrace to carry, as it +is." + +A servant entered, even as he was speaking, to summon him to the +telephone, and with an exclamation of impatience he left the room. +Immediately, Natalie stepped from her post at the window, and came +toward Barclay with outstretched hands. + +"Oh, Johnny boy," she said, "I'm _so_ sorry. How you've been hurt, dear, +and disappointed, and cruelly wronged!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's hands clenched again at the sound of sorrow in +her voice, and he strove in vain to control the tremor of his lip. +Tenderly he put his arms about her. + +"I'm sorry, too, little girl--sorry you were here to see me make a fool +of myself and then squeal when I got hurt as I deserved. I shouldn't +have done that. But I was so proud--so grateful--I thought I was going +to be able"-- + +"_Johnny--Johnny!_" + +They held to each other rigidly for an instant, her face against his +sleeve, in an agony which no tears came to soothe. + +"There!" said Barclay presently. "I'm better already. It does one good +to blow off steam, now and again." + +His tone lightened perceptibly. + +"And look here," he added, "what's most important, after all, is that I +have news for you, and ought to be delivering it." + +As yet, they did not dare to meet each other's eyes, but Natalie took +the cue. + +"You can spare yourself the trouble, my lord," she retorted, sweeping +him a curtsy. "I can guess what it is, without your aid. You've found +him!" + +"How did you know?" + +"I didn't. But you will remember that I asked you to find him. The +inference is as plain as a pikestaff." + +"Arrogance! But you're right. I have. He has been at my rooms since last +night. He was frightfully shaky, and utterly despondent, but he's taking +something to settle his nerves, and I've no doubt a week or so of good +food and straight living will bring him around into something like his +old form." + +"Boy dear! And you're taking care of him?" + +"Oh, just directing the cure, that's all! I'll tell you more when I can +report definite progress. Do you suppose there is a single secluded +corner in all this mansion which has not already been preëmpted by +Dorothy and Nisbet?" + +He slipped his arm about her again, and together they went out, across +the wide hall, toward the drawing-room. Rathbawne was standing at the +telephone under the stairway, but, as they approached him, he replaced +the receiver, and stepped forth under the light of the chandelier. They +both halted, shocked into speechlessness by the look on his face. The +past ten minutes seemed to have added a decade to his age. His cheeks +were white and drawn, and with his hands he groped before him, as if he +had been stricken blind. As he came close to them, he lifted his head, +and peered first at his daughter, and then at Barclay, seeming barely to +recognize them. + +"Dad! What _is_ it?" said the girl, in a voice just above a whisper. + +Rathbawne raised his hand, and pushed back the hair from his forehead. + +"A message--from Payson--of the 'Sentinel,'" he mumbled. "It seems +there's a fire--a fire on Charles Street--near the mills--one of my +buildings--a shop--a shop. Some one in the crowd--threw a +torch in at the window--there is a great crowd--a throng of +strikers--watching--cheering the flames--hissing the firemen. They've +begun early--and this is only the beginning! My people--my people"---- + +He stumbled forward, and would have fallen, but that his daughter caught +him. To his dying day Barclay remembered how, as he sprang to aid her, +her hands gleamed, white and slender, against the black of Peter +Rathbawne's coat. + +The hush that followed was broken presently by the sound of the old +man's choking sobs, and the low, soothing tones of Natalie, murmuring +against his ear. From the drawing-room came indeterminate scraps of Mrs. +Wynyard's gay chatter, as she regaled Mrs. Rathbawne with the gossip +gleaned in a round of calls. She herself was partly visible, drawing off +her gloves before the fire. From the music-room beyond issued the chords +of Dorothy's none-too-sure accompaniment, and young Nisbet's superb, +full tenor:-- + + "'Ah, love, could you and I with fate conspire + To grasp the sorry scheme of things entire'"-- + +But, in the Lieutenant-Governor's imagination, another sound mingled +with and dominated these,--the voice of Michael McGrath, as he had heard +it that morning, through the open door of Governor Abbott's room:-- + +"It won't be a strike like other strikes, not so long as I'm running it, +that is. It's going to mean business from the word go!" + + + + +VIII + +THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS + + +One spotted peach will contaminate an entire basket, one drop of ink +cloud a full glass of clear water. It was so in the case of the strikers +at the Rathbawne Mills. Their unwonted idleness, the long succession of +empty hours, already, among the more improvident, the preliminary +pressure of privation's teeth,--all these made them easy prey for the +sophistries of men like McGrath and his associates. At first they simply +laughed at the arraignments of Peter Rathbawne as a plutocrat, a +slave-master, and an oppressor of the poor, knowing better in their +hearts. But the memory of past kindness is too apt to be the most +fleeting of human impressions. On the one side the gates of the +Rathbawne Mills remained obstinately closed, and, though Rathbawne +himself manifested no intention of resorting to the intolerable +importation of "scab" labor, he persisted in his refusal to treat with +the Union so long as the discharge of the fifteen men remained a subject +proposed for debate. On the other hand, the denunciations of McGrath and +the other Union orators were constant, unavoidable, and sufficiently +plausible to produce an impression, and linger in the mind. And, +meanwhile, to and fro among the strikers, stalked, arm in arm, the +spectres of idleness and starvation, the one smirking openly, the other, +as yet, half-veiled. Altogether it was fertile ground. + +After the burning of Mr. Rathbawne's shop, on the first night of the +strike, ensued a week of comparative quiet. The outrage had been +flagrant, the source, if not the very author, of it was known, and the +police did--nothing. For three days the press of Kenton City blazed with +indignation, excepting only the "Record," which openly favored the +strikers, and then all the papers alike suddenly ceased to refer to the +incident at all. For, while McGrath was not in favor of wasting the +funds of the Union, he was as well aware as the next man that a dollar, +as well as a stitch, in time, saves nine. + +Herein lay the cardinal peril of Alleghenia. As John Barclay had said, +it was not that her people, as a class, were corrupt or criminal, but +merely that they viewed with easy tolerance evidences of laxity and +lawlessness which would have set the citizens of another state by the +ears, and filled the newspaper columns and the public forums with +indignation and protest. In this respect, the papers of Kenton City were +the most flagrant offenders. Even the most reputable, the "Sentinel," +could be silenced at practically any moment by those cognizant of the +method, and in a position to command the price, of manipulation. As a +whited sepulchre it was a conspicuous success, being irreproachably +scholarly, dignified, and didactic in tone, and wholly destitute of +principle. + +Michael McGrath, demagogue though he was, knew his public as the +physician knows the pulse he feels. It was a feature of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills that no attempt was made to justify the cause of the +strikers in the eye of the disinterested public of Kenton City. McGrath +himself was fully alive to the slenderness of his pretext, and alive, as +well, to the strength of Peter Rathbawne's case, if it should come to a +discussion of the rights and wrongs involved, wherein his business +probity and his justice to, and consideration for, his employees, would +furnish arguments well-nigh unanswerable. He contented himself, +therefore, with standing upon a simple declaration of the will of the +Union, which was, in effect, his own; and, strong in his reliance, if +not upon the support, at least upon the non-interference of the state +authorities, devoted his attention to holding the press in check, by +methods long since found effectual, and confidently left the public to +think and act as it saw fit. + +There could have been no more contemptuous comment upon the moral and +intellectual status of the community than this insolent assumption of +its indifference to the commonest principles of justice, but for a time +his confidence had the appearance of being amply justified. The strike +went its way, characterized by an infinity of petty outrages and a +constant and consistent vilification of Peter Rathbawne, while--with the +exception of that first and promptly quashed protest on the part of the +press--no voice was raised in opposition. + +Reduced to its lowest terms, the struggle was one between Rathbawne and +McGrath, and that, not as representatives the one of a great industrial, +the other of a great socialistic organization, but as individuals. The +source of the stream which had thus reached its rapids, and was plunging +on toward its annihilating cataract, lay far back in the early days of +Rathbawne's commercial career. McGrath was a man who practiced neither +the vice of forgetfulness nor the virtue of forgiveness. As plain as the +event of a yesterday lay upon his memory his contemptuous dismissal from +Rathbawne's employ, charged in particular with a petty peculation, and +in general with the indisputable fact of being a bad influence in the +mills. His case had been in many ways identical with that of the men +whose cause he was now, for reasons of his own, espousing. + +But Peter Rathbawne, then less shrewd in estimating men than now, had +reckoned without due credit to the vindictiveness and pertinacity of the +man before him. McGrath--brutally handsome in those days, idle, +insolent, and independent--later had developed qualities of which at the +time there was little evidence. He had smiled and shrugged his +shoulders--a habit which had grown upon him--as Rathbawne gave his +verdict, and had instinctively resisted the temptation to threaten +revenge. For that inspiration he had been devoutly grateful ever since. +It had enabled him to work in silence and unseen, like a mole, toward +the goal at which he aimed. He was a poker player, was Michael McGrath, +of the class which pulls victory out of defeat by the aid of its own +personality and a low pair. The calm indifference with which he had +received his dismissal from the employ of Peter Rathbawne seemed to him, +on reflection, to have been the unconscious forerunner of the elaborate +_nonchalance_ with which he now viewed the unexpected filling of a +broken straight. It was certain that the other player had not guessed +the strength of his cards. + +He had never forgiven, never forgotten. It had taken a quarter-century +of unremitting effort, of indomitable perseverance, of calculated +ingenuity, to secure to him the position which he now felt to be +assured--that of being able to cope with the man who had been his +adversary, and so overwhelmingly his superior. The fight was on at +last,--a fight in which the odds were not only equal, but, if anything, +in favor of the former mill-hand, thus become one of the most powerful +men in Alleghenia; a fight to be fought to the bitter finish, with an +almost certain triumph as his reward. + +Added to these motives was another,--newer, it is true, but none the +less potent,--his hatred for the Lieutenant-Governor. He had been able +to laugh within a half-minute after the words "unmitigated blackguard" +had smitten his ears; but they had rankled for all that. It was not so +much the insult, as the knowledge that it was justified. He was +remarkably candid with himself, was Michael McGrath. + +Hence the unparalleled venom of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +McGrath's dual sense of wounded vanity prescribed a course of surpassing +vindictiveness. His personal resentment, reinforced by consummate +appreciation of the adversaries with whom he had to deal, dictated a +safe road to revenge, which enabled him to fling wide the floodgates of +his long-stored animosity, secure in his knowledge of having the upper +hand. Disorder, calumny, outrage, even open anarchy--he could venture +upon them unafraid. A corrupt Governor, whom he had created, stood +behind him, smiling tolerantly. An indifferent community would let him +have his will. Only he must proceed by degrees, and be ready at any +moment to take one backward step for the sake of being able presently +thereafter to take two in advance. + +Here precisely lay the weak point in his plan of campaign. With the +fatuity incidental on occasions to even the shrewdest minds, he had not +counted upon independence in the host which he believed slave to him, in +thought and word and deed. He rated himself the dictator, the prompter +without whose suggestion no one of all the players in this gigantic +tragedy could speak his line. As a matter of fact, like all leaders of +his class, he could drive his followers forward at will, while totally +unable to hold them back. He was wholly master so long as he used the +spur. The peril lay in the fancied efficacy of the curb. In short, he +was discovering already that he had unwittingly created a monster beside +which Frankenstein's was the veriest doll. + +Thus, shortly, the strain began to tell upon the four thousand +unemployed sets of nerves around the Rathbawne Mills. Meetings became +more frequent and more turbulent; drinking and disorder were observably +on the increase; and at the end of another four weeks one of the gates +of the mills was beaten down, and several hundred men and boys paraded +around shop after shop, breaking windows and singing ribald songs. It +was not a very serious demonstration in itself. Its ominous feature lay +in the fact that the police made no attempt to check it. There was +something else about it, to the thinking of McGrath. It was not so much +that events were moving too fast, but that they were moving without +intelligent control. + +Two nights later, another building belonging to Peter Rathbawne, and +situated only a half-block from the mills, was burned in the same manner +as the first, watched by an enormous crowd of strikers, who applauded +each fresh burst of flame, as if the fire had been a circus or a play. +Still there was no move on the part of the police. + +Then it was that the business men of Kenton City sat up in their office +chairs and began to think. This was an eventuality entirely outside the +calculations of McGrath. But the pachydermatous inertia of the citizens +of Alleghenia had yet its vulnerable spot, where the weapon might enter. +Vaguely these men had known that the state was rotten, but the fact had +never been brought to their attention in a manner so poignantly +suggestive before. Unwittingly McGrath had aroused the suspicion that it +was not the purse of Peter Rathbawne alone which was in danger. If it +was possible for disorder to go to such extremes in the very streets of +Kenton City without fear of interference or rebuke, then no man's +property was safe. That thought was the Achilles' heel of the community. +So it was that a Citizens' Committee, composed of presidents of two +insurance companies, directors from five banks, representatives from the +Chamber of Commerce and the Board of Trade, and, finally, Colonel Amos +Broadcastle, was appointed to wait upon the Mayor. That gentleman, as +was entirely to be expected, referred them to the Governor, and to the +Governor they went. + +Barclay was present at the interview. For his own reasons Governor +Abbott had kept his immediate subordinate well to the fore in all +matters pertaining to the strike since the latter's rebuke to +McGrath,--in all matters, that is to say, not involving the exercise of +actual authority. Of that, indeed, the Lieutenant-Governor had had no +hope after the conversation in Peter Rathbawne's library. He met the +representatives of the press, conducted the correspondence with +mill-owners and other negatively interested parties, and at the +Governor's request made what was palpably a farcical inspection of the +entire state militia--to judge of their readiness for strike service!--a +task which consumed a fortnight in constant travel, and visits to +armories all alike in insufficient equipment and utter slovenliness. The +Ninth Regiment alone remained, and this command was to parade for +inspection by the Governor himself that very evening. The coincidence +flashed through Barclay's mind as the Citizens' Committee entered, with +Broadcastle, in his capacity as spokesman, at its head. + +The dignity and air of command habitual to the Colonel of the Ninth were +doubly apparent as he advanced toward the Governor's table. Both Barclay +and Abbott rose to receive him, but the latter reseated himself, as soon +as Broadcastle had introduced his fellow-members of the Committee. He +listened to what followed with an air of thoughtfulness, tinged with a +faint and exasperating suggestion of amusement. At a neighboring table, +his official stenographer took down every word which fell. + +Colonel Broadcastle was not accustomed to mince matters, when the +occasion demanded brevity and conciseness. Now, he stepped to within a +few feet of the Governor's table, and stood rigidly confronting him, +with his hands clasped before him on the head of his stick, in the +position of parade-rest. + +"Governor Abbott," he said, in his curt, dry voice, "these gentlemen and +myself form a Committee appointed by a meeting of the business men of +Kenton City, to protest against the state of affairs now existing in +connection with the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. It is only generous +to presume that other matters have diverted your attention from an +appreciation of these conditions. The situation is without parallel in +the annals of Alleghenia. Disorder is rampant, and destruction of +property is freely indulged in by the strikers without any apparent fear +of molestation. Despite the fact that there is a large police-force, it +makes no effort to check these operations. The sole reply of Chief +Pendle to the protests of those interested in the promotion of law and +order has been that he will not suffer any outside interference in the +control of his department--the which, in view of his responsibility to +the public, can only be regarded as sheer and intolerable insolence! An +appeal to Mayor Goadby has elicited the response that the whole matter +lies in the Governor's hands." + +The Colonel paused. The Governor, leaning back in his chair, and +fingering a pencil, smiled slightly and nodded his head. + +"I suppose that is so," he said. "Continue, continue, Colonel +Broadcastle." + +"It is the sense of the law-abiding element of Kenton City," went on the +Colonel, flushing at the condescension of his tone, "that the limit of +endurance has been reached. If, willfully or otherwise, the police do +not act, my regiment is prepared to act as substitute. I have already +placed it at the service of the Adjutant-General. His reply, like the +Mayor's, was to refer me to you for orders. I am here to receive them, +sir." + +"Your offer is appreciated," said the Governor suavely. "We of Kenton +City have reason to be proud of the Ninth, Colonel Broadcastle. I +congratulate myself upon my privilege of reviewing it, to-night. And we +have reason to be proud, as well, of the intelligence which has made +such an organization possible. Your disinterested devotion"-- + +Broadcastle flung up his chin. + +"I am not here to receive compliments, sir!" he said abruptly. + +"Nor I to bestow them," answered the Governor, unruffled. "As +commander-in-chief of the state forces, I believe it is not outside my +province to render deserved commendation to a subordinate." + +"Oh, do not let us juggle with words, Governor Abbott! It is precisely +as commander-in-chief of the state forces that the time has come for you +to act; it is precisely as your subordinate that I am here to receive +your orders. Assume the responsibility which confronts you, issue the +commands proper to the emergency, and you will have no more tireless +executor of them than I. My regiment can be on duty at the Rathbawne +Mills inside of six hours"-- + +"But, my good Colonel Broadcastle," broke in the Governor, "the state +has no need of your regiment for the moment! Calling upon the militia is +no light matter, sir. You talk about my ordering out the Ninth as you +would advise me to ring for a messenger-boy!" + +"The welfare of the municipality, if not that of the commonwealth," +replied Colonel Broadcastle firmly, "demands that an immediate stop be +put to this lawlessness. We are dealing with extremities, sir!" + +The Governor swung forward, and placed his elbows on the table. + +"You will permit me to be the best judge of what the welfare of the +commonwealth may be," he retorted. "Whatever lawlessness exists--and I +think you have grossly exaggerated its extent, Colonel Broadcastle--is +due to the selfish obstinacy of one man. In my opinion, Mr. Rathbawne is +entirely in the wrong. He had fair warning, which he did not choose to +heed. If his property suffers at the hands of the strikers, he has only +himself to blame." + +"It is not a question of Mr. Rathbawne, or of any other individual," +said Broadcastle, "but of the integrity of the state of Alleghenia!" + +"The integrity of the state of Alleghenia," answered the Governor dryly, +"has been intrusted, by the vote of her citizens, to me, as chief +executive." + +"An action," exclaimed the Colonel, "which I venture to predict they +will shortly have reason most bitterly to regret!" + +Governor Abbott rose abruptly to his feet. + +"This interview is at an end, Colonel Broadcastle," he said, bringing +his fist down upon the table with a thud. "I take exception to your +remarks, from first to last. I consider myself fully competent to deal +with the situation, and you may depend, sir, I shall do so at my own +time, and in my own way. If Mr. Peter Rathbawne supposes that he can +defy reason and justice at will, and that the state authorities are +prepared to support him, he is grossly and fatally mistaken. Gentlemen, +I have the honor to bid you good-day!" + +For a quarter-minute, the two men stood facing each other, without +speaking. It was observable that the eyes of neither flinched. Then-- + +"It is my earnest hope, Elijah Abbott," said the Colonel slowly, "to see +you impeached by a righteously indignant community, and committed for a +term of years to the State's Prison at Mowberly, for rank malfeasance +in office!" + +The Governor shrugged his shoulders. + +"Your record and your position protect you, Colonel Broadcastle," he +said, with something of his usual suavity. "Will you have the goodness +to retire?" + +As the Citizens' Committee left the room the Lieutenant-Governor turned +on his heel, passed into his office, and closed the door. + +For a long time he sat motionless at his desk, with his temples in his +hands, staring at a frame upon the opposite wall, which contained the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia. These were a hand holding even balances, +upon a circular shield, supported by the nude figures of two young men, +representing Art and Labor. Above, upon a scroll, were the words, +"_Justitia. Lex. Integritas._" + +It was not only bad heraldry, but indifferently appropriate symbolism. + + + + +IX + +THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW + + +The huge armory of the Ninth, transformed, by the same system which had +metamorphosed the _personnel_ of the regiment itself, from a gaunt, +barn-like structure, ill-fitted to its purpose in all but size, to the +most cheerful, as well as the most completely equipped, of Alleghenian +arsenals, was blazing with light and echoing to the sound of many +voices. A steady stream of people poured in at the heavy doors, now +standing wide, but significant, with their great timbers, elaborate +locks and bolts, and precautionary peep-holes, of the possibility of an +attitude less hospitable. Threading their way at a rapid pace through +the more sluggish main current of the crowd, the members of the +regiment, in an infinite variety of civilian attire,--from tweeds and +knickerbockers to top-hats and evening-dress,--sought their respective +company-rooms, vanished therein, and, presently, reappeared in uniform. +It was as if behind those ten doors which lined the upper corridor there +were as many moulds, identical in form, whereinto this perplexing +diversity of raw material was plunged on entering, to be drawn forth +again in a constant reduplication of militiamen. + +As the hour for the review drew near, the proportion of these to the +throng with which they mingled, perceptibly increasing, seemed, little +by little, to leaven the whole lump. The dress-uniform of the Ninth was +everywhere, the black shakos and epaulettes, white pompons, cross-belts +and gloves, and multiplicity of brass buttons, lending the immense +assemblage a singular spirit and vivacity. + +On the floor of the drill-room the people spread in all directions, +fan-like, from the main doorway, the multitudinous footfalls mounting +murmurously into the spaces of the lofty roof, where forty arc-lights +hung, dizzily suspended, pallid in the thin haze of dust swung upwards +from the hurrying feet of the thousands below. + +"Precisely like an army of ants--and every one of them with an uncle or +two, and a round dozen of nephews and nieces!" said Mrs. Wynyard. + +She and the Rathbawne girls were looking down upon the drill-floor +from the balcony of the Colonel's room. Broadcastle and the +Lieutenant-Governor were deep in conversation inside, having seized the +delay in the arrival of Governor Abbott as an opportunity for a few +words in private. + +"How funny they are, scuttling along, all of them!" said Dorothy. "And +how immensely pleased the favored ones are, who have a soldier to show +them the way. I see a distinct difference in their walk from that of the +others, don't you, Natalie? They seem to be saying '_We_ were +_invited_--and by this splendiferous creature at our side!' See how they +strut! And look at the soldierless ones, how timidly they go--just as if +they had found their tickets in the street, or had crept in through the +basement windows. 'Please, kind Mr. Soldier-man, let us stay and see the +show. We'll be _awf'ly_ good!'" + +"How preposterous you are, Dorothy!" answered Mrs. Wynyard. "Look! The +people are taking to the sides of the room already, and the companies +are forming. What astonishing method and precision there is to it all! +Do you suppose each man has a little circle marked on the floor, to show +just where he is to stand?" + +"I haven't the most remote doubt of it," said Natalie, with a +smile,--"and his name neatly lettered inside it with gilt paint!" + +The long, enclosed racks at the ends of the drill-room were open now, +and the electric light winked upon the barrels of the Springfields, as +busy, white-gloved hands plied the polishing cloths along them. The +enormous drill-floor, cleared as if by magic from the disorderly +weed-growth which had encumbered it, began to make manifest its proper +crop--long lines of gray and white, like sprouting sage, at first but a +dot here and there, to indicate the direction, then a scattering, then +distinct clumps, finally a thick, serried row. In the distance, a bugle +sounded, followed by a long ruffle of drums, and Colonel Broadcastle +stepped quickly to the window of the balcony. + +"There's the Governor," he said. "Will you come in? I'll send my orderly +to show you to your seats." + +At the same moment, the door from the corridor opened, and the orderly +entered, his hand at his shako. + +"Sir, the Governor has arrived." + +Then, as the trio on the balcony stepped in through the window, he +turned suddenly and superlatively scarlet. As has been said, young +Nisbet was accustomed to getting what he wanted. In this instance what +he had wanted happened to be that the Adjutant should choose him from +the guard detail as Colonel's orderly. To be thus chosen was to be +admittedly the most immaculate of thirty men, all more immaculate than a +thousand immaculate others. The thing was not easy of achievement, but +Dorothy Rathbawne was to be present at the review, and so--there was no +second way about it--it simply had to be done. Young Nisbet's way of +doing it was an absolutely new uniform and gold-plated buttons and +accoutrements. Extravagance? Vanity? Perhaps! But at the present moment, +he was wearing one cross-belt where his thousand and odd comrades were +wearing two. There was no answer to such an argument as that. + +Colonel Broadcastle had reserved seats for the party on the temporary +reviewing stand, and, five minutes after they had taken their places, +the bugles sang again, a curt order--"'shun! 'shun!"--ran in varying +intonations from company to company, and the slack gray ranks before +them stiffened into absolute rigidity. Then from the broad hallway +beyond came a tremendous burst of sound, and, to the strains of the +famous old march of the Ninth, the regimental band swung into view, +followed by Governor Abbott and Colonel Broadcastle and the former's +staff. + +To the Lieutenant-Governor, but newly returned from his wearisome round +of the state armories, much of what followed was so stale as to be no +more than a constantly increasing strain upon nerves already overtaxed. +He deliberately allowed his attention to wander, until he felt rather +than actually perceived the steady tramp-tramp of the men, swinging, +fours right, into column, the occasional "hep! hep!" of an officious +file-closer, the endless succession of fours winking past him, like the +palings of a gray fence seen from the window of a train, the intervals +narrowed by short-step, widening again at the "Forward--_march_!" the +blare of the band, lessening as it approached the further end of the +building, then suddenly bursting into its former volume at the +right-about. He endured it all listlessly. It was tediously familiar, +stamped upon his brain by repetition after repetition. + +Moreover, he was completely fagged, and unutterably oppressed by his +burden of discouragement. The old wounds, in part healed by his recent +absence from the immediate vicinity of his constant discomfiture, had +been re-opened and set bleeding afresh by Governor Abbott's treatment of +the Citizens' Committee. Whatever lingering hope had remained in his +mind of peace with honor for the troubled capital of Alleghenia, seemed +to have been effectually dispelled by that interview. The most enduring +charity, the most fatuous credulity, the blindest partisanship--even +these could not have preserved a last spark of confidence in Elijah +Abbott. Still less was Barclay's indeterminate hope of the ultimate +triumph of right able to stand against such crushing evidence of its +instability. It was no longer a question of suspicions, of precedents, +of deductions from the significance of a host of former misdoings. Out +of his own mouth was the Governor convicted. "At my own time, and in my +own way," he had said. It was a phrase, nothing more, and could be +boiled down until its whole purport was contained in one word--Never! + +"Fours _left_--_March_! Compan_ee_--_halt_!" + +The entire regiment, as one man, swung from column of fours into +battalion front, halted, and then--cr-r-rick! boooo-m-m-m!--came to +order arms. The sides of the room were lined with a solid rampart of +white and gray and gold. Barclay was aware of the First Sergeants, +scurrying from their positions to report, of their voices, and those of +the Majors and the Adjutant, and, finally the Colonel:-- + +"Take your post, sir!" + +But his thoughts were anywhere and everywhere else. What a farce it all +was, this life which he was leading, this mental and moral martyrdom to +an impossible hope, this eternal and heart-sickening ordeal of hope +deferred, this waiting, waiting, waiting, for something which never +would and never could happen! Rotten, rotten to the core, this state for +which he would have given his heart's blood, and not only rotten, but +not caring a whit for her rottenness--glorying rather, in her own +degradation. The chief executive had flung back into their very faces +the appeal to his conscience of the most influential men in Kenton +City; the police, even now seated about their station stoves, were +sniggling at the predicament of the public which paid them for its +protection against precisely the kind of thing which they openly +tolerated and encouraged; yes, and even the militia, the guarantee of +law and order, Broadcastle's own command, were decked out in tinsel and +pipeclay, strutting to music in a palpable bid for applause and +admiration. And yonder--the tide of anarchy was slowly but surely rising +about the Rathbawne Mills, presaging riot, bloodshed, God alone knew +what!--but one thing, inevitably,--the absolute downfall of dignity and +rout of decency in Alleghenia! + +Suddenly, his old intrepid spirit of resolution reasserted itself, but +doubtfully, like the flame of a lamp flaring once out of dimness before +it dies forever. Was it for this that he had devoted the best thought of +his youth and his earlier manhood to plans for the betterment of his +state? Should he now, at this, the hour of her supremest political and +moral peril, desert her as irredeemable, and join the ranks of those who +sneered at her, and pointed mocking fingers at her shame and nakedness? + +"Your loquacity faintly suggests that of a mummy," said Natalie, at his +side. + +"I was alone with my thoughts," answered the Lieutenant-Governor, +turning to her with an attempt at a smile, "and pretty black ones they +were, at that!" + +"Alleghenia again?" + +"Alleghenia again--and always. This business is becoming an obsession +with me. I haven't had a chance to tell you, and I can't very well +explain now. I'll have to leave it till I see you to-morrow. But +something happened to-day which drove another nail--and one of the +last!--into the coffin of my faith. There's not a gleam of hope +anywhere." + +"Don't you see hope in all this?" asked Natalie, with a little, +indicative gesture toward the scene before them. "Somehow, it is +impressing me tremendously to-night--more than ever before. I seem to +understand better what it means, what it stands for." + +"It's a stale enough story with me," said Barclay. "Remember, I've been +doing just about nothing but watch this kind of thing for the past two +weeks. After all, what does it amount to but a thousand possibilities +parading like peacocks?" + +"How unlike you, that speech! It amounts to a vast deal more than that, +Johnny boy,--oh, infinitely more! I don't speak of the other regiments +you have seen. This is different. Well, what _does_ it amount to? Who +and what are these thousand peacocks of yours? Aren't they the very +flower of Kenton City, the youngest and best blood in our veins, +gathered by one good man's will into an organization of sterling +loyalty, with one great aim in view, and that the support and protection +and preservation of all that is best in Alleghenia? The very fact that +such a body of men exists among us is in the nature of a guarantee, it +seems to me, that we shall come out all right in the end. Have you +noticed their faces?--many of them so absurdly boyish, all of them so +honest, and manly, and--and--_American_, John! They are the +personifications of your ideal of that afternoon in the +library--Americans, and something more--Alleghenians! And, to prove it, +they are freely giving a portion of their time and their strength, in +order that there may be at least one thing in Kenton City which is +without fear and without reproach. I wonder--I wonder, John, whether it +isn't the old story, after all: whether you haven't been wandering all +over the world, like the prince in the fairy-book, looking for the magic +talisman that is to save the state you love, while, all the time, it has +been lying at your very door? Oh, this means something--I'm too stupid +to interpret it as you could--but I know it's there, and that it would +help you and encourage you. Let me try. Look there! A single purpose +animates them all--the maintenance of the standard which Colonel +Broadcastle set for them, and the record they have made for themselves." + +Colonel Broadcastle's voice was sweeping the armory, as he put the +regiment through the manual of arms. + +"One has only to hear one of them--Mr. Nisbet, for example--say 'the +Ninth' to find the hope of which you are in search. These men say it as +others say 'God' or 'my mother'--as you yourself, Johnny boy, say +'Alleghenia.'" + +"Charge--_bay'n'ts_!" + +With a single click, a thousand rifles fell into position, a thousand +left feet smote the floor in unison, and the light rippled and twinkled +along a solid line of flashing steel. + +"There! A single voice,--a single, mighty response! Don't you see the +wonderful suggestiveness of it? Don't you feel the presence of the +enormous reserve force which lies behind all this? Oh, believe me, John, +this is a weapon too mighty to lie unused, and too intelligent to be +misused, if the worst come to the worst. After all, as no one knows +better than yourself, it's not your own advancement you're looking for, +it's that of the state. Well, there may be other agencies, perhaps +entirely independent of you or of your influence, but none the less +invaluable. For example, you are close upon despair--and yet, before +your fears come true, the forces of wrong will have to fight their way, +step by step, through this rampart of American manhood!" + +Barclay touched her hand lightly, as she ceased speaking. In the midst +of the thousands about them, they were alone as they had never been +before. + +"Thank you," he said simply. "Thank you, littlest and wisest in the +world!" + +The regiment was in motion again, skirting the room in column of fours, +preparatory to the march-past: but now the Lieutenant-Governor surveyed +it from a new, and a dual point-of-view,--as a thousand individuals, +that is, each a potential factor for immeasurable good in the coming +rehabilitation of the state; and, then, as a vast fighting-machine +perfect in every detail, resistless and awe-inspiring in its very +integrity. He noted the faces as they passed--stern, intelligent faces, +young, for the most part, and curiously refined, intent upon correct +performance of the present duty, and touched, almost without exception, +with an enthusiasm born of the martial music and the rhythmic tramp of +advancing feet. He saw the quick, reciprocal glance of the pivot and +flank men, as the fours, in perfect alignment, swept round into +company-front; the long, easy compression and give of the compact lines, +acquiring correct adjustment; the rigid tenure of chests and shoulders; +the firm fling of slender gray legs, as regularly intervaled as the +teeth of a giant comb. Company by company, the regiment fell into the +cadence of full-step. Midway, the standards of the Republic and +Alleghenia rippled side by side. And so, with blare of brass and sharp +staccato of snare-drums, with sheen of rifles and accoutrements, with +flash of slender swords, raised in salute,--above all and always, with +that magnificent unanimity, that mighty pulse of the thunderous +advance, the Ninth swept past its Governor and its Colonel in review. + +And then, in an instant, as it seemed, the vast square was formed again, +a sharp command rang out, the rifles snapped to a present-arms, the +standards dipped, and the strains of the "Star-Spangled Banner" mounted +triumphantly to the great girders of the lofty roof. The multitude of +spectators rose at the sound, and the Lieutenant-Governor rose with +them, his heart aglow with new inspiration, new hope, and new resolve. +The band was almost speaking the words of the anthem on the dust-grayed +air:-- + + "Oh! say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave + O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?" + +To the accompaniment of a myriad clapping hands, the Lieutenant-Governor +resumed his seat, shaken by a novel, tremendous emotion. Yes! a thousand +times yes! The star-spangled banner, symbol of loftiest ideals and +purest purposes, mute memorial and reminder of devotion incalculable and +sacrifice without bound, guarantee of liberty and brotherhood, mercy, +equality, and justice--yet waved! And, part and indissoluble portion of +its inspiring memories and illustrious destinies, the star of Alleghenia +yet blazed upon its azure field! He had been living in a world of +unrealities, in a valley of shadow, grayed by portents of failure and +despair. His eyes had been narrowed to see the pitfalls which lined his +path, to the stumbling-blocks, the briers, the indescribable sordidness +of his personal position and his immediate surroundings. Now, he looked +up and horizonward. The thunder-clouds of official depravity and +duplicity which darkened the way of his endeavor--were they able, after +all, to blot out the memory of the clear, high sky above? + +As this thought came to him, it was almost as if, in actuality, a +brooding heaven had been rent asunder, revealing the steel-blue of the +infinite ether permeated with the supreme radiance of noon; and at the +incursion of this illuminating element the host of his discouragements +dwindled and disappeared, like noisome little prowlers of the night, +scuttling to cover at the abrupt break of a tropical day. For a moment, +he strove to realize whence the light had come, and in what consisted +this sovereign ally, hitherto uncalculated, of his optimism. As he +tracked his thought, it led him undeviatingly back to its direct +inspiration, the words of Natalie Rathbawne. + +"Before your fears come true"--she had said. + +Before his fears came true--well, what? The revelation leaped at him +full and fair now, and every nerve sang like a taut wire in answer to +its touch. Before his fears came true, this wretched little world of +petty chicanery and official corruption which surrounded and sickened +him would be wiped out of existence. Abbott--McGrath--their machinations +and their misdeeds--their lies and their ambitions--their power and +their pride,--they were newts that fouled a pool, gnats in the sunshine, +cinders on the snow. Towering above them, ready, at an instant's +notice, to crush them out of being, was the rock of ages, the righteous +spirit of Alleghenia, integral and indestructible, illumined by the +ancient, undimmed, and eternal sense of rectitude inherent in the +American people! + +Not by his agency, perhaps--perhaps not even in his day,--nevertheless +and infallibly, the right was bound to conquer in the end. The clear +eyes and the firm mouths of the men of the Ninth spoke it, their rifles, +their broad shoulders, and their precision confirmed and guaranteed it, +and back of these stood the great, taciturn figure of the People, a +smile upon its calm and silent lips. When those lips should speak, as +speak they would, their words would be the annihilation of Elijah Abbott +and of all his kind! + +Meanwhile--the bitterness--the disappointments--the humiliations--ah, in +a moment, how they had grown shrunken, and wizened, and old! For out of +the radiance of revelation, as Christ of old spoke to His disciples, so +now the spirit of Alleghenia spoke to her Lieutenant-Governor. + +"_What is that to thee? Follow thou Me!_" + +Like a woman, the spirit of her cried unto him, and, like a man, the +spirit of John Barclay answered. + + + + +X + +A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER + + +Much to Barclay's satisfaction, Cavendish had obtained his appointment +as a city reporter on the staff of the "Sentinel." Even the first week +of the new life thus entered upon had produced a vast change in his +manner and appearance. Though the Lieutenant-Governor had seen him but +once, when he came to repay the loan made him--in itself, of all signs +of restoration to a normal attitude, the most significant--he found that +his complexion had cleared and softened, and his eye perceptibly +brightened. He was clean-shaven once more, and his dress, while of +strict simplicity, was yet suggestive of the old days when he had been +called the most fastidious man in Kenton City. He held himself +straighter, too, with his shoulders thrown back and his head up; and +Barclay had noted, with quiet gratification, that there was not a +tremor about the hands which unfolded and smoothed the bills he had come +to return. One evidence alone remained of the desperate ordeal through +which he had passed. His voice, formerly firm and vibrant with a spirit +that was half gayety, half arrogance, was now indescribably modulated, +and touched with a melancholy which was not that of servility, still +less of shame. Rather, it was an unspeakably appealing regret, a +monotonous listlessness, a suggestion of hopeless surrender to something +tragic and inevitable. Barclay was puzzled by it. It seemed illogical, +and evaded him, like a melody with a dimly familiar _motif_ which he was +unable to place or even fully recall. It haunted him singularly, when +Cavendish had left, and afterwards, in his leisure moments, came back to +him, striving, as he fancied, to make itself understood. Intimately +candid as their recent relation had been, here was something +unexplained, which he could not come at, and which was yet eloquent of +vitality, of the need of comprehension. + +Since that time, three weeks before, the two men had not met. For this +there were several reasons. Barclay knew from a brief note that +Cavendish had taken a small room in a boarding-house, not far from the +"Rockingham," and that the pressure of his work for the "Sentinel" set +him afoot so early, and sent him home at night so brain and body weary, +that he had neither the strength nor the inclination for other things. +Added to this, had been the Lieutenant-Governor's absorption in his own +duties, and, in particular, his absence from Kenton City, on his round +of inspection of the state militia. But, just before the dinner hour, on +the evening following that of the review, Cavendish called, as Barclay +was in the act of dressing. + +"I had a suspicion I'd catch you just about this time," he said, +dragging a chair to the door of the bedroom, where he could watch the +Lieutenant-Governor struggling with a refractory white tie. "I'm getting +on famously, and I wanted you to know it." + +"That's right!" said Barclay, scowling into the mirror. "But then, I +knew you would. Your pessimism didn't produce much effect on me. I've +heard men talk like that before. And, of course, when a chap gets into +the condition you were in, back there, there's no such thing as making +him believe he can ever pull out. You talked like an ass, that first +night, Spencer." + +"And acted like a blackguard! I suppose you will allow me to refer to +that now?" + +"Now less than ever, my good sir. As I've told you already, all that +belongs to the past. You're yourself again. What's the use of dwelling +on a time gone by, when you were in reality somebody else--or, rather, +nobody at all? When are you going to call at the Rathbawnes'? The old +man is pretty ill, I'm afraid, but I think the rest would like to see +you again. They were speaking of you only the other day--that is, one of +them was!" + +"Not till this strike trouble is over, at all events; they have all they +can attend to at present, without being bothered by reformed drunkards. +And perhaps I sha'n't call at all. I haven't decided yet what would be +best." + +Then, before Barclay had time to speak, he added:-- + +"By the way, I'm to take up the strike to-morrow, for the 'Sentinel.'" + +"Are you?" exclaimed the Lieutenant-Governor, in a tone of the liveliest +interest. "That's good news. It must be about the most important +assignment they could give you, just now. Well, I wonder if you are +destined to be the only conscientious reporter in Kenton City, or +whether you will simply be like all the rest. Are you going to have the +courage of your convictions--which I think I can surmise, though you +haven't as yet confided them to me--or are you going to wear the +slave-chains of your fellows, and distort, and misrepresent, and truckle +and kow-tow to the policy of the most venal press in America?" + +"_On fait ce qu'on peut_," said Cavendish, with a shrug. "Orders are +orders, John. If the orders of the editor don't go, the orders on the +cashier don't come. That's about all there is to it. It would be rather +futile to attempt the Don Quixote act, if only for the reason that one +would never get into print. One can't do more than follow instructions. +The reporter's best policy is his paper's best honesty." + +"Honesty?" repeated the Lieutenant-Governor. "Where does the honesty +come in? Of course I understand your position. In a way, it is identical +with mine--subservience to a principle that you despise, acquiescence in +methods that you know to be utterly false and wrong! How sick I am of it +all! It's the old experience, all over again, which I used to have as a +child with the Tom Smith paper crackers. You are fascinated by the +tinsel, and the colored paper, and the gaudy label. You think that when +you've dissected one, and pulled it all to pieces, you'll find a bugle +and a gold crown inside--because that's what it says on the box. But, +the first thing you know, you'll find yourself blowing on a tin whistle +and wearing a fool's cap of green paper! Lord! how the press of Kenton +City needs a _man_--a man with the courage and the power to show up the +scoundrels who are responsible for all this--McGrath and his associates, +I mean. I'm sick and tired of reporters whose rascality is self-evident, +of editors who are bought and sold like chattels, of a state of affairs, +in general, so infamous as to surpass expression! You have my sympathy, +Spencer--the sympathy of a fellow-victim. To be a reporter on a +newspaper which dictates dishonesty; to be the lieutenant of a Governor +who enjoins duplicity--it's all just about one and the same thing!" + +"It's curious," commented Cavendish, "that it wasn't until about a week +after--after that night, that I knew you were Lieutenant-Governor. Then, +your name happened to be mentioned in the office, and somebody asked me +if I knew you." + +"Whereupon," said Barclay, conquering the tie at last, and turning from +the mirror, "you had the inexpressible privilege of saying that you knew +me intimately." + +"Whereupon," repeated Cavendish, in that so singular tone which had lain +heavy upon the other's memory, "I had the inexpressible privilege of +saying that I used to know you, but that we had quarreled, and were +now--strangers." + +"Why?" demanded the Lieutenant-Governor, wheeling abruptly upon him. +"What possessed you to say such a silly thing as that?" + +Cavendish leaned forward in his chair, with his elbows on his knees, and +his forehead against his interlaced fingers, staring at the floor. + +"I'm glad, in a way, to have you ask that question," he said slowly. "We +are wary of mock heroics, or even real heroics, men like you and me. And +yet there are things which must be explained, things not easy to +explain, because they come so close at times to melodrama. I've always +had a horror of emotional situations; and, from what I know of you, I'm +sure you have, as well. I'd avoid this explanation, if I could--indeed, +I've deliberately avoided it, thus far. Yet if I were a Romanist in the +presence of my priest, I think I should feel more at liberty to evade +confession than I do now. For both our sakes, I'll try to be as brief, +as simple, as lucid, as I can. And I'll trust you to understand, as well +as may be. Don't think there's any pose, any aim at effect, in what I'm +going to say. You've asked me a question, and I'm going to answer it, +that's all! I don't think, in my present frame of mind, I could bear to +have you entertain the suspicion that the answer was affected or lacking +in candor. _Allons!_ Already I'm growing too verbose!" + +He looked up with a wan smile. + +"Let's get down to facts. You ask me why I told my questioner that we no +longer knew each other. Well, then, let's have at it! It was because, +John Barclay, there is likely--no, there is sure--to come a time when +you won't care to acknowledge me as your friend. Oh, wait!" he added, as +the Lieutenant-Governor held up his hand in protest. "Hear me out. You +say I talked like an ass, that first night. Perhaps. But the fact +remains that I've been a drunkard--and that I'm bound to be one again! +I've been fighting against temptation for several weeks. It hasn't been +very strong, for some reason, and so I've managed to ground it so far. +But you remember the chap with whom old Hercules wrestled? Every time he +touched earth his strength was multiplied. Well, that's the way with +drink. I can throw the temptation for a while, but every time I do so it +rises, stronger many-fold. Sooner or later, I'm forced to give in. I +know it, as I know I'm sitting here. I'm doing my best now, because, in +the future, when the wrong that for a time you've righted goes wrong +again, I want you to remember that I made the effort--for you--and for +her--for the Fairy Princess. The end is as plain as day! It was born in +me, this. I think I've never told you that my father died of it, but +that's the truth. And the next time I drop, it will be for good and all. +I shall never make another effort to conquer the inevitable. If I can't +do it now, with the hope of redemption thus made plain, with a new +start, and a fresh chance, and--thanks to you, John--the past wiped off +the slate and a new sum set to solve, with the incentive of your +friendship and confidence, and the interest, so undeserved, of the Fairy +Princess, into the bargain,--if I can't do it now, I say, why surely I +can never do it. John, you can't know what I've been through. You, +who've never had the temptation, can't conceive of what it means. It's a +living actuality, this lust for drink. When your nerves go wrong, even +at the end of a day, or a week, or a year, during which you've kept +straight, when you're tired, discouraged, and, above all, _alone_!--then +it comes at you like a live thing,--speaks--grips your arm--drags you +wherever it wills! I've laughed at it, scoffed at it, in its absence, +tried to make myself believe it a fragment of an otherwise forgotten +dream, many and many and many a time. _But it always came back!_ Oh, +John Barclay, you others will never understand! A man has to have been +through it, in order to know, and that not once, but, as I have, a +hundred times." + +"I can well believe it to be a tremendous temptation," said the +Lieutenant-Governor gravely. + +"Temptation? It's more than that! A temptation gives you _some_ chance, +doesn't it? You may yield to it, but, at least, you've had your +fighting-chance. Well, in that sense, this is no temptation, though I've +been using the word myself to describe it. Why, John, it's madness, +sheer insanity. You probably remember that I never used to touch alcohol +at all. I promised my poor mother to let it alone until I reached my +majority. Of course, I didn't realize about the dear old man; he died +when I was too young for that. But her one great fear, and naturally, +was that the curse had descended to me--just as it had! Well, I stuck to +my promise till I was twenty-one, and kept along in the same way for +some time afterwards, just because there didn't seem to be any +particularly good reason for taking up something which I had managed to +get along very well without, all my life. Then came that time, you +know--three years ago--and out of mere recklessness, bravado, God knows +what, I began to drink. John, I was a doomed man from the first swallow! +That demon had been hiding inside me, without sound or movement or other +hint of his presence, for twenty-eight years--just waiting his chance! +You know the rest. The fight has been going on ever since, and the thing +has beaten every time. I've resisted. I've struggled. I've even prayed. +It's all useless." + +He pointed significantly to the curtain which hung where the door of the +wine-closet had been. + +"As I did that night," he continued, "I shall do again, and still again, +until the end. It's insanity, nothing more or less. It lurks at the back +of my brain--always--always--and then, suddenly, when I am least +expecting it, it comes forward with a rush, and I might as well try to +check the north wind or the incoming tide. I feel it tingling in my +fingers, scorching my throat, tearing at my reason. I swear I won't give +in, and, in the very act of so swearing, I get up and go out to meet it. +I could break down iron doors to get at the drink when it calls to me. +And, though I seem to be going straight enough now, the moment is coming +when it _will_ call and when I shall obey! Then you won't want to think +you've ever known me, John Barclay, still less to remember that the name +of the Fairy Princess has passed between us. And, in the midst of my +damnation, it will be a drop of cold water on my tongue to know that +I've left you a loophole through which to escape the acknowledgment of +these last few weeks. So far, no one but the 'Rockingham' people, and +Payson, and--and the Fairy Princess--know that we've been together +recently. The 'Rockingham' people don't even know my name. Payson won't +speak. And _she_ certainly won't. So far, so good. Further, I've come to +say good-by. Hereafter, we mustn't see each other"-- + +"Stop--stop!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "What is all this rot +you're talking? Chuck it, will you? Look here! If you go back on +me--which is bad--and on your Fairy Princess--which is worse--and on +yourself--which is the worst of all"-- + +"Yes, yes," answered Cavendish, "that's all true. But I'm not talking +about _if_ I go back, I'm talking about _when_ I go back! As I said when +I began, there's no use trying to explain this thing to a man who +doesn't understand it, and no man _can_ understand it except through his +own experience. In this respect, if in no other, you and I talk +different languages, belong on different planets. Could I expect you to +comprehend with me that first give of self-control which lets the demon +loose, and the meaning of the sight or smell of drink at that exact +moment when the will is weakest--the first glass, hastily swallowed, as +a brute, long thirsty, gulps down the water it has craved--the second +and third, taken more slowly--and then, that slackening of every nerve, +that jettisoning of all the moral cargo, that sudden love and +appreciation of the sensuous side of life? Don't you see? It's another +world, that, which you simply can't understand, unless you travel to it +by the road by which I have come--which God forbid!" + +"In all this," said Barclay, "I can see no reason why our present +friendship should not continue, and should not be known." + +"Simply this," answered Cavendish: "I'm--nothing! You're the +Lieutenant-Governor,--who is spoken of, if you care to know it, in the +office of the 'Sentinel' as the only honest official in the state of +Alleghenia. You mustn't tie up to me, nor I to you. I've told you what +my end is going to be. You don't believe it, perhaps, but it's none the +less true. And yours--do you know that the law-abiding element looks up +to you as a kind of Messiah? Do you know that you are the dawn of honor +and integrity which lies behind the present black cloud of lawlessness? +I tell you, John, the promise of your future is such as might nerve a +beaten Napoleon to renewed endeavor. In your hands lies the salvation of +the state." + +"I wish I could think so," said the Lieutenant-Governor. "God knows I'd +willingly cut one of them off, if I thought its loss could benefit the +commonwealth. But, as I've had occasion to say to others, in the present +emergency I'm as helpless as a babe unborn. You see how things are +going--one might as well appeal, so far as any hope of success is +concerned, to McGrath himself as to Governor Abbott. There's no getting +around it, Spencer. It's a declaration of anarchy pure and simple, and +with the official seal of Alleghenia at the bottom of the document. +Iniquitous wrong is being done, not only to Mr. Rathbawne in refusing +him the protection of the law to which he is entitled, but to the cause +of the strikers themselves, if they can justly be said to have a cause. +Nothing ever was or ever will be gained for the benefit of the many by +the violence of the few. It can only end in one way: by the +interposition of the federal troops. You know what happened at Chicago. +It will be the same thing here; and before it is over we shall see +people shot down like rats in the streets of Kenton City." + +"I hope it won't come to that," said Cavendish; "but even so, all's well +that ends well. Provided that order is finally restored"-- + +"But what credit is it," broke in Barclay, "to the state of Alleghenia +to have her law-breakers suppressed by the national government? Don't +you see that it would be only a final proof that she is too incompetent +or too indifferent to do it herself? From the point of view of the +state's good name, I doubt which is worst, her present attitude or the +interference of federal force." + +"Will it come to the latter in any event?" + +"Undoubtedly. They've already tried to prevent the delivery of Mr. +Rathbawne's mail, both at the mills and at his house. You know what +that means, don't you? One carrier interfered with in the performance of +his duty is sufficient excuse for mobilizing a brigade." + +"But the Governor"-- + +Barclay came forward, laid his hand on Cavendish's shoulder, and looked +down at him, slowly nodding his head. + +"The Governor of Alleghenia is a dyed-in-the-wool scoundrel, my good +sir," he said. "It is his manifest duty to enforce the law rigidly and +at once, and if the police of Kenton City cannot or will not assist him, +to summon the militia to his aid. In that way only can the honor of +Alleghenia be saved. And that is what Elijah Abbott will never do. There +is anarchy open and flagrant in the streets of Kenton City--there is +anarchy silent and sneering in the Governor's chair. God save the +state!" + + + + +XI + +YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE + + +"I have promised to marry Colonel Broadcastle," announced Mrs. Wynyard +when the silence had lasted twenty minutes. + +Dorothy flung round from the window against which she had been +mercilessly pressing her pretty nose. + +"Why, Aunt Helen!" she exclaimed. "You really are the most startlingly +abrupt person I ever knew. Are you in earnest? What under the sun +possessed you to do that?" + +"I think it must have been Colonel Broadcastle," answered Mrs. Wynyard, +with an air of reflection. "It was last night when he was showing us +over the armory, after the review. He not only asked me, but appeared to +have quite set his heart upon my giving him an affirmative answer. And +he had been so extremely civil, Dorothy, about our seats and all that, +that I thought it would seem rather ungracious to refuse the first favor +he had ever asked of me. So I said yes." + +"Aunt Helen, Aunt Helen! One of these fine days you will be the death of +me. Did any one _ever_ hear of such a reason for accepting a man?" + +"I couldn't think of a better one for refusing him," said Mrs. Wynyard +serenely. "So there you are!" + +"Talk about logic!" said Dorothy. She came across the room, and seated +herself beside her aunt. "I never heard anything so exciting in my +life!" she added. "Do you really mean it? Are you really going to marry +him?" + +"That is the arrangement, as I understand it," replied Mrs. Wynyard. "Of +course, I haven't his promise in writing, but I think I can trust him. I +once looked him up in your father's business guide, and he had three A's +after his name. I'm sure I don't know what they can stand for, if it's +not Acquaintance, Appeal, and Acceptance. I don't really see what else +I could have done. It seems to have all been arranged without consulting +me at all. One can't very well set one's self up in opposition to a +business guide, you know." + +"But he's old enough to be your father, Aunt Helen!" + +"That's precisely the reason why there wouldn't have been any sense in +my promising to be a sister to him. You see, I was quite helpless in the +matter from start to finish." + +"And it was only last night that you called me preposterous!" laughed +Dorothy. "Really, Aunt Helen, people who live in glass houses shouldn't +throw stones. I think you are the most absurd creature in the world. Do +you love him?" + +"I can even go so far as to say that I think I do," said Mrs. Wynyard, +without a break in her gravity. "I have all the symptoms,--palpitation +of the heart, a morbid craving for Shelley and chocolate caramels, a +tendency to wake up singing, and a failing for flattening my nose +against the window-pane for twenty minutes at a stretch without saying a +word to my poor old aunt, on the mere chance that he may be coming down +the avenue." + +The blush which Dorothy paid as tribute to this subtle innuendo came +near to rivaling one of young Nisbet's celebrated performances in the +same line. + +"You're making fun of me," she said reproachfully. + +"I, my dear?--not the least in the world. It's all as true as the gospel +according to St. Valentine. I've told you first because we're not only +aunt and niece, but the very best friends possible besides, and I knew +you would like to hear the news before any one else. Colonel Broadcastle +is by all odds the finest man I know,--I won't even except John Barclay, +much as I admire him. He has paid me a very great honor. I respect him +tremendously; I trust him absolutely. These alone are good reasons; but +there's a better one,--so much better that nothing else really has any +bearing on the subject. Can you guess?" + +"Yes," said Dorothy softly, "you just love him. Isn't that it?" + +"Exactly. It's a curious thing, this love. There may be every reason why +one should marry a man, his own wish included, and yet one doesn't. +There may be no reason at all, so far as outsiders can see, and yet one +does! I've known a woman to throw over one suitor who had everything in +his favor--money, character, position--and accept another who had none +of these advantages--because she liked the way he parted his hair! +That's the way it goes. It's the most illogical thing in the world, if +we except the stock market and other women's gowns. And then, when it's +all arranged, his friends wonder what she could have seen in him, and +her friends what he could have seen in her! But I'm wandering from the +subject. Seriously, Dorothy dear, I love him very sincerely, and I have +been more happy than I can say ever since I found out that it wasn't +going to be one of those one-sided love-affairs which assure the incomes +of the poets and the lawyers. And now,--confidence for confidence, +Dorothy!" + +"Aunt Helen! I don't know what you mean." + +"Oh, Dorothy! 'I don't know what you mean' is one of those phrases like +'Not at home' and 'Yours very sincerely,' which are white lies on the +face of them. I don't want to force your confidence. We all have what +our friends recognize as our private affairs, with the accent--worse +luck!--on the _pry_! But this is very different. I'm very fond of you, +as you know, and my interest is far from being vulgar curiosity. Of a +woman's five cardinal failings--inquisitiveness, extravagance, vanity, +vacillation, and loquacity--I'm guiltless of all except the last and +most innocent. But don't we all need to talk at times? Don't we all long +for a trustworthy _confidante_? Aren't our little secrets often like +precious liquors?--if we don't make use of them, share them with our +friends, they either ferment and sour, or else lose all their sweetness +and significance by slow evaporation." + +"You would draw confidence from a stone," said Dorothy, with a little +smile, "but what have I to tell you?" + +"How should I know? Perhaps nothing--as yet; perhaps everything. Take +your time about it, dear. I'm not trying to get you to commit yourself. +I only want you to know that I'm ready to share your secret when it's +ready to be shared, and to help and counsel you in any way I can. I know +the main great fact already. Because, you see, Dorothy, one may conceal +an infinite amount, even from one's nearest and dearest, when they don't +understand--and they are so _apt_ not to understand, one's nearest and +dearest! And the financier may hide his schemes from his partners, or +the general his plan of campaign from his fellow-officers, or the +politician his ambitions from his most ardent supporters--but I doubt, +my dear, if a woman in love was ever able to hide very much from +another woman in the same lamentable condition! + +"If it were not," she added, taking Dorothy's hand in hers, "for the +great happiness which has come into my life, do you think that I should +have been able to divine that other great happiness which seems to be +hovering over yours? I am the physician afflicted with the disease which +it becomes his duty to study and to cure. Only, it's not a disease, +Dorothy, but a great, a beautiful revelation. I should have compared +myself, instead, to the prophet who is enabled to interpret the dreams +of others because they are identical with his own. There's my little +speech. And when you are prepared to answer it, you'll find me ready." + +As she was speaking the last words, the butler flung back the curtains +at the doorway of the drawing-room. + +"Mr. Nisbet," he announced imperturbably. + +Dorothy looked at her aunt, and then, with her frank laugh:-- + +"If there _is_ an answer," she said, "that's it!" + +As young Nisbet entered, Mrs. Wynyard was the first to greet him. + +"So," she observed, looking him over approvingly, "you've beaten your +swords into walking-sticks, and your spears into top-hats, as my friend +Isaiah so aptly observes! That's very commendable, but I almost think I +like you better in your war-paint. Do you know, a Colonel's orderly is +the spickest-and-spanest object upon which I've ever laid, or hope to +lay, my eyes?" + +"He just naturally has to be," said young Nisbet, with a grin. Somehow, +he was always more at his ease with Mrs. Wynyard than with other women. +"You see," he added, "if it wasn't that way, he wouldn't be it." + +Which was as near as he had ever come to making an epigram. + +"Well, I shall leave you to the tender mercies of Dorothy," said Mrs. +Wynyard. "I've promised to take a walk with your--what is it you call +him--instead of commanding officer, you know?" + +"K. O.," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, that's it. How deplorably you militiamen spell! Well, at all +events, I'm going to walk with your K. O., and it's time I was getting +ready. Good-by." + +"Good-by, Mrs. Wynyard." + +"Day-day!" said Dorothy, from the divan. + +"She's a crack-a-jack!" exclaimed young Nisbet, after she had gone. + +"Mercy!" said Dorothy. "I never knew you to be so enthusiastic over any +one before. If you have any intention of falling in love with Aunt +Helen, I feel it to be my duty, as a friend and well-wisher, to warn you +in advance that there isn't the most remote show in the world for you." + +"Oh, it's not that!" protested young Nisbet with that stupendous +earnestness which made people want to hug him. "Why, Mrs. Wynyard would +have me talked to a standstill in two or seven minutes! Imagine me +trying to make love to a dame like that! She'd lose me so quick you +couldn't see me for the dust. Besides"-- + +"Besides what?" asked Dorothy with an elaborate air of unconcern, as he +hesitated. + +Young Nisbet was quite crimson now, and twitched at the creases in his +trousers where they passed over his knees, and turned in his toes +excessively. + +"There's somebody else in the running!" he blurted out desperately. + +There! It was out--a part of it, at least--not at all, to be sure, in +anything even remotely resembling one of the thousand manners he had +proposed to himself as effective, during long hours of wakefulness, when +there was nothing in the world but his crowding thoughts and the ticking +of his clock--but still, out! The ice was broken. It was impossible that +she should not understand. The rest would be easier. + +Alas for young Nisbet! He was, as he himself acknowledged, not "up on +women!" + +"Somebody else?" repeated Dorothy. "How ever did you find that out? She +only told _me_ about it twenty minutes ago." + +Alas, alas, for young Nisbet! He had thought his feet upon the beach at +last, whereas they had but touched a sand-bar in passing over. The +under-tow of embarrassment was worse than ever now, and threatened to +drag him down. + +"Oh, I don't mean Mrs. Wynyard. I wasn't talking of her--that is, I was, +at first--but afterwards--anyhow, I'm not talking of her now! When I say +there's somebody else, I mean--I mean"-- + +"I am going out for a moment, Dorothy--just over to the _doctor's_. +_How_ de do, Mr. Nisbet? _Wretched_ weather, _isn't_ it? Natalie's with +your father, my dear, and _I'll_ be back _almost_ immediately. +Er--_ahem_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne went through a kind of rudimentary calisthenic exercise, +which consisted of squaring her shoulders and drawing in her chin. It +was accompanied by a meaning glance at her daughter, and was designed as +an inconspicuous substitute for the frank injunction to "sit up +straight, my dear," upon which Dorothy had finally placed a ban. + +"And _won't_ you feed the gold-fish, my dear?" she added. "I've been _so_ +occupied, and the poor things haven't had a _crumb_ for three days. I've +just told Thomas to take a plate of bread in at _once_. I'm sure Mr. +_Nisbet_ won't mind: get him to _help_ you. Er--_ahem_! And I'll be back +in about fifteen minutes, or so." + +For a time there was silence in the big, warm conservatory. Young Nisbet +had taken the dish from Dorothy's hands, and, after seating himself on +the low marble parapet surrounding the pool, devoted his energies to +feeding the gold-fish. He was thinking that it was all to be done over +again, and that it was harder than ever, if such a thing were possible, +to do. What was there about those few words which seemed to choke him? +For the moment, he took refuge in a commonplace question. + +"Is it one of your duties to feed these persons?" + +Dorothy laughed shortly, like a little chord of music. + +"No--it's the Mater's peculiar privilege," she answered. "She adores the +stupid little beasts. Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. Nisbet. She +feeds them regularly herself,--or did, until Dad began to require so +much of her time. But lately, the house has been so upset, and she has +been doing such a lot of going out, and coming in"-- + +"Yes," put in young Nisbet dryly, "I've noticed the coming in part." + +"So Natalie has been doing it for her," went on Dorothy, more rapidly. +"I suppose Natalie herself hasn't had the time, these last three days. +They _are_ hungry, aren't they? _Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. +Nisbet!_ Don't you see the poor things have only button-holes for +mouths?" + +There was another long pause, before either spoke again. + +"What defeats me about your mother," said young Nisbet slowly, "is the +way she manages to come in just at the wrong moment. At interruption, +she's the most star performer I've ever run up against. You don't mind +my saying that, do you? I'm not throwing any asparagus. I wouldn't be +disrespectful about her for the world. But really, for chopping into a +conversation, she's a dazzler!" + +"She _is_ a little inopportune at times," admitted Dorothy. + +"Inopportune? Yes,--she's all of that. When she marches in, I feel +exactly as if the boat had gybed, and the boom come over and knocked me +into thirty fathoms of water. Lord!" + +"Why, how ridiculous!" said Dorothy. "There's nothing about the Mater to +be afraid of. She's the dearest, most innocent old thing in the world! +She just blunders along like that, and nobody is less aware of her +mistakes than she is. And, after all, why shouldn't she interrupt us, so +long as we're not saying anything in particular? And if we _were_ +saying--anything in particular, we could always pick up the +conversation where we dropped it." + +"That's just what I find it so hard to do!" confessed young Nisbet. "I'm +a stupid sort of lout, you know, Miss Rathbawne. I've never had half a +chance to practice talking to dames, and where other lads fuss like +experts, I just can't make good. I foozle every stroke. I'm an +ass--that's all!" + +"You're nothing of the sort!" said Dorothy indignantly. "You're an +extremely attractive young man!" + +"As good as the average in some ways, perhaps. But--how can I explain +what I mean?--there always comes a day when a chap wants to be more, +wants to be the best ever, in every way! That's the proposition I'm up +against now. I seem to be just a bundle of misfits, and--and--oh, +shucks! my line of talk is all crooked, and I can't tell you what the +trouble is, but"-- + +"Your liver's out of kilter," interpolated Dorothy. + +"No, sir!" protested young Nisbet. "Nothing is ever out of kilter +inside me! If I'm nothing else, I'm blue-ribbon boy on the health +question. No, it's something I want, and that I'm pretty sure I can't +get." + +"I know perfectly well what it is," said Dorothy, "and you haven't even +asked for it!" + +Young Nisbet looked up suddenly. + +"Do you mean?"--he stammered, "do you mean?"-- + +Outside, the front door slammed, and Mrs. Rathbawne's voice became +audible, inquiring Dorothy's whereabouts of the butler. The girl +laughed. + +"There's the Mater back again," she said. "Oh, Mr. _Nisbet_!" + +For young Nisbet had dropped dish and bread-crumbs into the pool with a +great splash, electrifying the gold-fish into unheard-of activity, and +had risen, at the same moment, to his feet. He stood before her, his +honest face blazing, his hands outstretched. + +"I love you!" he said. "Will you marry me?" + +And whether or not he received an audible reply to this question he +never knew,--only she was in his arms, and gold-fish might feast or +starve, for all he cared about them. The wide doors of perfect bliss +swung open before him, and young Nisbet passed within. + +He was gazing ruefully into the water, as Mrs. Rathbawne entered. For +the first time in his experience, her presence did not embarrass him. + +"I've dropped a dish into your pool, Mrs. Rathbawne," he said, "and +scared the gold-fish into blue conniption fits. Look how they are +scurrying around. I hope I haven't done them any harm." + +"Oh, no," answered Mrs. Rathbawne placidly. "They are getting _so_ fat +that I should _think_ a little exercise, _now_ and again, would be +_good_ for them. We _might_ drop a dish into the pool every week or so, +Dorothy, just to stir them up." + +"It might go for a while," said young Nisbet, "but any old football +player like myself, Mrs. Rathbawne, will tell you that you can't work +the same trick more than just a certain number of times." + +"Interruption, for example!" added Dorothy, and laughed across at him, +deliciously, with her eyes. + + + + +XII + +DIOGENES + + +It was during the tenth week of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills that +the "Kenton City Record" made its long-remembered attack upon +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay. The arraignment was one unparalleled for +venom, even in the columns of that most notoriously scurrilous journal +in the state, and, withal, there was about it a devilish ingenuity, a +distortion of facts so slight as to defy refutation, and so plausible as +to carry conviction. It was the last blow in the long series of +discouragements which Barclay had suffered since his inauguration, and +for the moment he was completely unmanned. He was at no loss, however, +to trace the source from which the ingeniously perverted facts had been +obtained. Not even McGrath, with his intimate knowledge of all that went +forward at the capitol, could have supplied information so detailed. +The hand of Elijah Abbott was traceable in every line of the attack. +Their conversation, on the afternoon when he had first spoken to Barclay +of the impending strike, was reproduced almost word for word, as well as +that on the occasion when McGrath had been present, and therefrom the +"Record" went on to deduce that not even Peter Rathbawne, with all his +obstinacy, all his blindness to the welfare of his employees, was +responsible for their present destitution in the same sense as was the +Lieutenant-Governor, who might have avoided the strike by a conciliatory +word, and who, instead, had advised Mr. Rathbawne to fight the +working-people until the last cent of their money should be exhausted +and the last drop of their blood should be shed. + +"Incompetency," said the article in part, "is what we long since learned +to expect from John Hamilton Barclay. Gross neglect of public duty, +flagrant callousness to responsibility, contemptuous indifference to the +interests of the citizens whose votes placed him where he is,--all +these have been part and parcel of his attitude since the unfortunate +moment of his election. But even in him we had not looked for the +incredible spectacle of a public official deliberately precipitating the +incalculable distress which has followed in the wake of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills. Overburdened with the cares of office, in a single +instance the Governor of Alleghenia turned over a question of vital +significance to the lieutenant from whom he had every reason to expect +compliance and support. Even so, he was careful to point out a line of +action by which the impending calamity might readily have been avoided. +And what was the result? Not only in total disregard of plain duty, but +in direct disobedience of the orders of his superior, the +Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia threw his influence into the scale to +outweigh law and order, and brought about the deplorable destitution now +facing the families of four thousand martyrs to principle. When men are +driven to desperation, when women turn to shame in order to maintain +life, when children are heard crying in our streets for bread, to whom +shall we point as the author of it all? To Peter Rathbawne, a poor, +doddering old man, barely responsible now, if rumor is to be believed, +for what he does? No! To John Hamilton Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of +Alleghenia!" + +This, and much more in the same strain, while passed over as sensational +bombast by the better element, did not fail of its effect upon the +strikers. A mass-meeting, held that morning, denounced Barclay in a set +of resolutions, as a traitor to his office and as the avowed enemy of +labor, and demanded his impeachment on the ground of neglect of duty. +During the day, half a score of threatening letters came to his office. +But what hurt him most, though he almost smiled at his own +sensitiveness, was that the doormen and porters at the Capitol greeted +his morning nod with a stare, and even the little office-boy, bending +low over his table in the ante-room, did not look up for the customary +wink. For his mother was a trimmer at the Rathbawne Mills. + +Once in his office, the Lieutenant-Governor found it impossible to +concentrate his mind upon the work before him. Sentence after sentence, +the words of his arraignment marched through his mind, as he sat with +his elbows on the desk and his chin in his doubled fists. A single +reading seemed to have stamped them indelibly and forever upon his +memory. Baffled by conflicting reflections he began, for the first time, +to doubt whether his had been the course of conscience, or merely that +of pride and perversity. Was not the "Record" right, perhaps, after all? +If it was true that the strike was driving men to crime and women to the +streets--and if it was not, as yet, true, it soon must be--who, indeed, +was to blame if not he himself, who had said "Fight them!" when he might +have kept peace by a word? + +Suddenly, the Lieutenant-Governor rose, and, crossing the room to where +the arms of Alleghenia hung upon the wall, took down the frame, laid +it, face up, upon the table, and, bending down, studied it intently. The +beautifully executed nude figures of Art and Labor stared steadfastly +back at him, their muscular hands grasping the circular shield, strength +and endurance in every line of their necks, shoulders, and thighs, +purity and purpose in their blue eyes and square-cut jaws. He was as +motionless as they for full five minutes. Presently his finger moved +slowly across the frame, and he said, quite softly: + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas._" + +Then he looked up, straight before him, out of the open window, where an +encircling wistaria was dotted with minute sprouts of green, and up at +the clear, wide sky. + +"I'm right!" he said aloud. "I'm right!" + + * * * * * + +At five that afternoon, Spencer Cavendish set out upon the most +unpleasant assignment which had ever fallen to his lot. When Payson had +told him that he was to procure an interview with Peter Rathbawne for +the "Sentinel," with a special eye to the mill-owner's failing health, +as reported in the morning's "Record," he had shrunk back instinctively +from a task so distasteful, and was on the point of refusing. But two +considerations checked this impulse. If the thing were to be done at +all, he thought, surely it had better be the work of one friendly to the +Rathbawnes and with their interests at heart than that of a bungling +outsider, with it in his power to hurt them beyond expression. The +argument was plausible, but behind its logic, at the back of Cavendish's +brain, there lay another reason, without which the first had been +insufficient to persuade him. He wanted to see Natalie again--to meet +her under the shield of some compatible excuse, so that he should not +seem to have sought her of his own will. He was thirsty for a word from +her, thirsty with the pitiable thirst of the shipwrecked sailor who +knows a swallow of salt water will but increase his torture, and who +craves it, none the less. Long since, he had forfeited his right to her +friendship--no sophistry could blind him to that. Moreover the ocean of +degradation not only lay behind him; it lay in front as well. It was as +he had told Barclay. He stood upon an island, not the mainland, of +redemption, and another plunge was inevitable. + +What he expected to gain by a word with Natalie Rathbawne, Cavendish +himself could hardly have told. At most, he was conscious of a faint +hope that in some turn or twist of the conversation he might have a +chance of thanking her, of telling her that he rejoiced in her +happiness, and of bidding her good-by. For paramount in his mind lay the +thought of his approaching downfall, inevitable, utter, and final. He +did not attempt to deceive himself. He knew what was coming. It had come +before. + +When Cavendish had sent in his card, a servant showed him through the +library into the conservatory, where Peter Rathbawne was seated in a +deep rattan chair watching his daughter, who stood at his side tossing +bread-crumbs to the gold-fish in the circular central pool. They both +turned at the sound of his footsteps, and Natalie held out her hand. + +"So you've come at last!" she said. "I should think it was quite time. +Dad, you remember Mr. Cavendish, don't you?" + +"Yes," answered her father. "Oh, yes!" + +Rathbawne's voice was without life, his face almost wholly void of +expression. Though he glanced at Cavendish, it was with the blank stare +of a delirious person whose attention is unconsciously caught by an +unusual noise rather than with any evidence of direct interest, and he +took no further part in the conversation, nor even seemed to realize +that his companions were speaking. When he had answered his daughter's +question and looked at Cavendish, he leaned back in his chair, and +wearily closed his eyes. + +"He is very much changed since you saw him," said the girl in a lower +tone, turning again to the pool, "and it's all come about in the past +six weeks. The strike has had a most curious, a most pathetic effect +upon him. Even the doctor is at a loss to account for it. I think that +I am, perhaps, the only one who really understands. He has always been +so proud of his mills and of his people, so loyal to them, so like a +father to them, one and all, that to have them turn against him like +this, and, what is worse, get to drinking and rioting, has almost broken +his heart. The doctor says only one thing can save him, and that is to +see the mills going again and the people happy and prosperous, as they +were before. And who knows when that will be? For, feeble and broken as +he is, he will never give in to the Union. Of that I'm sure." + +"I'm very sorry," said Cavendish softly. One look at Rathbawne had been +enough to show him that the interview for which he had been sent was an +impossibility. One look at Natalie sufficed to banish from his mind +every thought save that of her pitiful pallor and the pathetic quiver of +her lips. + +"I had no idea it was as bad as this," he continued. "Can't anything be +done? You are far from being in good shape yourself, Miss Rathbawne." + +"Tired and dispirited, that's all," she answered, trying to smile. "And +I fear nothing can be done as long as our fate lies in Governor Abbott's +hands. There's no use in harping on that, though. You know as well as I +what we have to expect from him. Did you see the attack on Mr. Barclay +this morning?" + +"An infamous libel!" exclaimed Cavendish hotly. + +Miss Rathbawne crumbled the bread between her fingers, and resumed her +feeding of the gold-fish. + +"You must know that I am the last person in the world to need that +assurance," she said slowly. "It is only another thread in all the +hideous tissue of injustice and iniquity which has been wrapped about us +like a pall. What a shame, is it not, that such a man as he should be +powerless to do the work I think God intended for him? And what a shame +that Alleghenia, needing his clear head and his strong arm and his +loyal heart as she does in this hour of emergency, should only be +sneering at him as a coward and a cad!" + +"I cannot believe," answered Cavendish, "that the venom of the 'Record' +is to be taken as the sentiment of the state. There must be many--there +must be a majority of Alleghenians who know, as we know, that no better +man breathes than John Barclay." + +"Thank you," said the girl. + +In the open spaces of water between the lily-pads the fat indolent +gold-fish mouthed at the crumbs, stirring the silence with little +sucking sounds, and sending tiny ripples widening on all sides. One +alone, dingy yellow in color, moped apart from his fellows, and took no +interest in the banquet. + +"That one's a cynic," said Miss Rathbawne presently. "My subtlest +cajoleries never win him from that attitude of sneering contempt. The +others get all the tid-bits, and he doesn't seem to care. He isn't even +ornamental--he's in a class by himself. I call him Diogenes, and I'm +thinking of buying him a tub all for himself, where he can sulk in +solitary grandeur to his heart's content." + +"Perhaps not altogether in a class by himself," said Cavendish. "There +are others, you know, who make no use of their opportunities, and who +can never hope to be anything but ugly and useless, while their fellows +are getting all the good things of life, and enjoying them, and giving +pleasure of one kind or another into the bargain." + +Something in his tone caused Natalie to look at him suddenly. + +"I'm not enough of a pessimist," she answered firmly, "to believe that +true in anything beyond appearances. We are all apt, no matter how +conceited we may be, to underestimate at times the extent of our own +usefulness--or, rather, we are unconscious of the direction in which it +is most productive. If what you say is so, then all that is lacking is +the opportunity, and that is sure to come. We may squander many +opportunities, and, hardly less probably, actually turn to account in a +way we do not perceive many which we seem to ourselves to squander. In +any event, others will come. A woman once said to me that the good in +her was not cultivated nor exercised with a view to _individual +immortality_. That seemed to me to mean so much that I've built up quite +a little creed on it. It's the principle, isn't it, upon which the whole +scheme of the world hinges? A million leaves fall and decay to enrich +the soil wherefrom two million more may spring. An infinity of little +shell-fish die, and the ages grind their shells to powder to make the +sands and the chalk cliffs. Countless raindrops sacrifice their identity +to maintain that of one great river. And why should it not be so with +us? If only we can contribute in the smallest degree to the uplifting of +our kind, to the advancement of the race, to the maintenance of what we +know to be right, what possible difference can it make whether, in the +effort to be of such service, we live or succumb? We were put here, it +seems to me, very much as separate notes are put into one great harmony. +Each note is struck at the proper time, serves its purpose, and goes +into nothingness. Each plays its part, however small. We can't all be +included in the wonderful final chords. Our place may seem trivial to +us, and yet in some sense we may be sure we are all contributors to the +unity and perfection of the whole. That ought to be enough. No one note +achieves individual immortality, but each does something to assure the +immortality of the composition of which it forms a part. If we don't +believe that, if we are not content to have it so, how is it possible to +believe in any divine purpose, any scheme of justice at all? Look at the +indescribable waste of life on all sides of us. If only in the case of +humanity, people are dying by hundreds every minute, unheeded, +unlamented, unrecorded. Human life is such a little thing!--as little as +the life of the leaf or the raindrop. And yet in the death of these last +we are able to perceive the working of a vast system which must be the +outcome of a direct purpose, and whereby the best interest of each +species is furthered. And so, the human race. Why should it be less +than lesser things? One man dies in order that two may live. A +confederacy--as in the case of our own Rebellion--perishes in order that +a nation may endure. Everywhere, in short, the individual sacrifices his +individual existence in order that it may contribute to and fertilize +the growth of his species. So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly +content to have it so. I should ask nothing better, when my own time +comes, than the assurance that, in one way or another, my death had a +significance,--that it was for a person or a principle, and not merely a +natural phenomenon. I may not be able to believe that; but there is one +belief possible to all of us,--I mean that, if not in death, then +assuredly in life, we have been of service to our race and time. We are +often told that the indispensable thing does not exist. I think the same +may be said of the useless one. I don't believe even the humblest of +God's creatures goes out of life without having been at one time or +another an influence for good. I even have hopes of Diogenes. Some day +there will be a scrap of refuse or an ugly little bug which mars the +symmetry of the pool, and Diogenes will eat it,--and perhaps die of +indigestion as a martyr to principle!" + +The silence which followed her words was broken by a hoarse sob from Mr. +Rathbawne, and, turning, they saw that his head had fallen back against +the chair, with his eyes, wide and staring, fixed upon the glass roof, +and his breath coming in short, thick gasps from between his parted +lips. In an instant Natalie was on her knees by his side, with her arms +about him. + +"Don't be frightened," she said, looking up at Cavendish with a brave +little smile. "It's his heart. He has had these attacks frequently of +late. Will you get me the whiskey decanter and a glass? You'll find them +in the dining-room--on the sideboard--to the left." + +Decanter in hand, Cavendish stood watching her, as she tenderly poured a +little of the raw spirit between her father's lips. The effect was +almost instantaneous. Rathbawne choked, swallowed the restorative, and +presently raised his head and looked at her, patting her hand +tremulously with his own. They were so absorbed in each other that +neither noted a sudden, strange transformation in Cavendish's +expression. From the wide-mouthed decanter in his hand, the faint acrid +odor of Peter Rathbawne's fine old Scotch whiskey crept upward, stung +his nostrils, and, of a sudden, set him all a-quiver, like a startled +animal. The smell was almost that of pure alcohol, and set his mouth +watering, and drove his breath out in a little shuddering gasp that was +like a revulsion from some sickening medicine, just swallowed. But he +knew it, none the less, for something which belonged to and was part of +him. For weeks he had avoided it. Now it assailed him like that foe of +Hercules, of whom he had spoken to Barclay, whose strength was +multiplied a hundred-fold for every time his opponent trod him under +foot. + +As he told the Lieutenant-Governor, at the moment when least he +expected it, the demon touched his arm. For a minute he fought +desperately against the suggestion, with his eyes closed, and his teeth +cutting into his inner lip. He clung madly to the thought of the +presence in which he was, conscious that the girl's words had +uplifted him immeasurably, given him a clearer insight into the +essential significance of life than he had ever known. It was +useless--useless--useless! There was nothing left in the world but the +smell of the liquor that he loathed and that he loved! + +"If you were to leave us alone"-- + +At the suggestion, Cavendish bowed and went slowly back toward the +dining-room. Once out of sight of the others, he paused, glanced back +over his shoulder, and then, abruptly, supporting himself with one hand +against the side-post of the doorway, raised the decanter in the other +to his lips, and drank. + + + + +XIII + +THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE + + +The day had been deliciously warm and still, one of those eloquent +heralds of spring that are touched with a peculiar beauty rivaling her +own. As Cavendish came out of the Rathbawne residence, Bradbury Avenue +was splashed with huge blotches of dazzling yellow, where the light of +the westwardly sun poured between the houses and was spilled upon the +smooth pavement. The man choked slightly at the after-taste of the raw +whiskey he had just swallowed, but almost immediately he smiled. + +"I knew it would come," he said to himself as he turned out into the +avenue, "and here it is. I'm not surprised. I'm glad, God help me--I'm +_glad_!" + +His mouth was watering, and he felt, as it were, every inch of the +stimulant's progress through his veins, warming him with its familiar +glow. When he had left the conservatory, he had been trembling +pitifully. Now he was calm, and as steady as if his nerves had been +cords of steel. Responsibility, resolution, remorse--they had fallen +from him like so many discarded garments. He was sharply alive to the +pleasure of the moment, keenly appreciative of the sunlight, the soft +air, the laughter of the children romping in the streets. Of a singular +languor which had been wont to come over him toward the close of each +busy day of the past six weeks there was now no hint. He walked rapidly, +with his shoulders thrown back, and his chin well elevated, but his +course was not in the direction of his home, nor yet in that of the +"Sentinel" office. Instinctively, he had turned toward that part of the +city where were the large restaurants, the playhouses, and the more +pretentious saloons. + +At a corner, he wheeled abruptly into one of these last, and, seating +himself at a small table, called for an absinthe. The place was already +lighted, and each glass in the pyramids behind the bar twinkled with a +tiny brilliant reflection of the nearest incandescent globes. The air +was faintly redolent of lemon and the mingled odors of many liquors. To +Cavendish it was all very familiar, and all very pleasant. Again he told +himself that he was glad, glad that the restraint he had been exercising +was at an end. He was free, he thought, free to accomplish his own +inevitable damnation. He had no patience for the tedious operation of +dripping the water into his absinthe over a lump of sugar, but ordered +gum, and stirring the two rapidly together, filled the glass to the brim +from a little pitcher at his side. Then he drank, slowly but steadily, +barely touching the glass to the table between his sips. + +Presently, he was conscious of a slight numbness at his wrists, a barely +perceptible tingling in his knees and knuckles. His heart was +fluttering, and his temples pulsed pleasurably. He glanced toward the +glittering pyramids of glasses, and for a fraction of time they seemed +to shift in unison a foot to the right, returning immediately to their +original position with a jerk. Then he rose, and went toward the door, +catching sight of his face in a mirror as he passed. It was very pale, +and he crinkled his nose at it derisively, and then smiled at the +whimsical oddity of his reflected expression. On the threshold he +paused, looking toward the west, blazing with the red and saffron of the +departed sun. + +"Oof!" he said, with a downward tug at his waistcoat. "It comes quickly. +That's what it is to be out of practice." + +He dined alone in a corner of an unfrequented restaurant, eating little, +but drinking steadily, absinthe at first, then whiskey, four +half-goblets of it, barely diluted with water. Then he found himself +once more in the streets, now brilliantly lighted, going on and on +without purpose, save when the blazing colored glass of a saloon swerved +him from his path. He knew that he was walking steadily, avoiding +obstacles as if by instinct, stepping from and on to kerbs without any +actual perception of them. Faces swam past him, staring. Men, +particularly those at the bars he leaned against, were talking loudly, +but, as it seemed to him, brilliantly. He often smiled involuntarily, +and sometimes spoke to one of them, drank with him, and presently was +alone again, walking on and on. Occasionally a white-faced clock bulged +at him out of the night; and then he noticed that time was galloping. It +was close upon one when he found himself in a quarter which his recent +employment had made familiar--the neighborhood of the Rathbawne Mills. + +Here, suddenly, his mind emerged from a mist, and every detail of his +surroundings stood out sharp and clear-cut. The street was +insufficiently illuminated, but the light of a full moon cut across the +buildings on one side, half way between roof and sidewalk. Cavendish +perceived, with a kind of dull surprise, that the pavements were +thronged, and that almost every window framed a figure or two. A hoarse +murmur pulsed in the air, and his quickened ear was greeted on every +side by foul jests and grumbled oaths, broken now and again by drunken +imprecations, scuffles, or the shrill invective of women invisible in +the throng. Once a girl touched his arm, and he found her face close to +his, thin, haggard, and imploring. He shook her off, and turned +unsteadily into the doorway of a saloon; stumbling, as he did so, over a +little boy crying on the step. + +Inside, the air was reeking with rank smoke and the fumes of stale beer. +The floor was strewn with sawdust, streaked and circled by shuffling +feet; the mirror backing the bar was covered with soiled gauze dotted +with tawdry roses, and an indescribable dinginess seemed to have laid +its sordid fingers on all the fittings. + +The room was crowded, nevertheless--crowded not only with the men +themselves, but, to the stifling point, with their voices and their +gestures and the spirit of their unrest and discontent. Cavendish, +leaning against the end of the bar, looked wearily down the line of +flushed faces and backward at the disputing groups which rocked and +swayed, as the men argued and swore, grasping the lapels of each others' +coats, and spilling the liquor from their glasses as they gesticulated. +He was wholly sober now. It was the stage of dissipation which +experience had taught him to dread the most--the emergence from dulled +sensibility into a nervous tension upon which stimulant had no apparent +effect. He was trembling again, too, and his face, as he saw it in the +mirror through the clouding gauze, was as that of a stranger, a stranger +of whom he was afraid. He swallowed the whiskey he had ordered, and, +supporting himself by the bar, swung back and gave his attention to what +the men about him were saying. It did not need his sharpened perception +to appreciate the fact that he was in the thick of the worst element of +the Rathbawne strikers, or that the situation was a crisis. What little +restraint had characterized the earlier stages of the strike was now, +most evidently, at an end. Starvation was no longer a mere possibility, +or violence a mere threat. The men raved like wild creatures against +Rathbawne and John Barclay, recounting maudlinly the destitution of +their families, and, anon, flaming forth into cries for vengeance. How +long the babel lasted Cavendish could not have said. Long since, the +doors had been closed, and the lights half lowered, in mock deference to +a supposedly vigilant police, when suddenly a hush fell upon the +assemblage. A side door had opened, and Michael McGrath stood in the +midst of his followers, with his arms folded and a thin smile upon his +lips. There was not a whisper as he began to speak. The men leaned +toward him breathlessly, their mouths open, their eyes starting glassily +out of their sodden faces. + +"And how long is _this_ going to go on?" demanded their leader, with a +sneer. "Talk--talk--talk! That's always the way, and nothing done, after +all. Well, there's been about enough of it, and that's flat. You've +been living on the Union, and I suppose you think you can go on living +on it till hell freezes over. Now listen to me. When the strike began we +had plenty of funds, and more came to us from the Central Federation. +The funds are gone, d' you hear, and the Federation is asking what we +mean to do. There is six hundred and odd dollars in the treasury. No +need to tell you how far that much will go, is there? Not one day! And +with all your talk, you've everything your own way, if only you knew +it--a police that doesn't dare lift a finger against you, and a Governor +that won't budge an inch till I give the word! Well, to-morrow I give +the word, understand me? To-morrow I throw you over, and you can get out +of this the best way you can. I'm sick of your talk. I'm sick of your +doing nothing. Your daughters are on the streets, your wives and your +children are starving, and _you_--by God! _you_ are boozing in a bar +till daylight, and _talking_! So that's enough. To-morrow, the strike's +at an end. To-morrow, the Governor comes down on you like ten thousand +of brick! And I'm the man that gives the word! Unless"-- + +He paused and cast a keen glance at the faces which surrounded him. His +last words had been greeted by a low growl. + +"Unless," he continued, "you know your business, and make a move that's +worth the name." + +The hush of attention seemed to deepen into the leaden silence of +expectancy. + +"There are two men who must be put out of the way," said McGrath slowly, +"and that before another midnight. I don't care how it's done, but done +it must be, for the sake of example. It's easy enough to manage it, as +things are. There'll be a howl, but we have the authorities fixed. And +those two men must go!" + +In the tense silence which followed, a man's voice whispered two words +hoarsely:-- + +"Mr. Rathbawne!" + +"Ay, _Mr._ Rathbawne!" echoed McGrath, flashing into that passionate +manner of his which carried all before it. "_Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +starving you! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's making your sons drunkards! _Mr._ +Rathbawne, who's debauching your daughters! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +killing your wives by inches! _Mr._ Rathbawne, and _Mr._ John Hamilton +Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia!" + +For a moment it seemed as if he would be swept off his feet by a torrent +of enthusiasm. The men crowded about him, slapping him upon the +shoulders, shouting their approval, reaching for his hand. One +brandished a revolver under his nose, with a shrill cry of "This'll do +it, Mac! This'll do it, by God!" The rest had turned to each other, +embracing frantically, and repeating his words in a kind of frenzy. + +Presently McGrath raised his hand, and, as silence was restored at the +signal, turned to the bar-tender with his thin smile. + +"Set 'em up, Dick," he said composedly. "It's on me, this time, and +we'll drink to better days." + +In the confusion Cavendish made his way to the side-door, and passing +through it into the street, hesitated, dazzled by a brilliant light. It +was broad day. + + * * * * * + +As the Lieutenant-Governor entered his ante-room that morning his eyes +contracted suddenly, and he stopped, with his hand upon the knob of the +door. There could be no mistaking the look in the face of the man who +sat facing him, gripping desperately at the arms of his chair. Cavendish +was as white as chalk, with the hunted look of despair which lay so +vividly on Barclay's remembrance of the night when they had met on +Bradbury Avenue. He rose as the Lieutenant-Governor appeared and drew +himself up with an effort at steadiness, conscious that the others +present were observing him narrowly. But Barclay's hesitation was as +brief as it had been involuntary. With a bare glance at his +subordinates, he came forward cordially to take Cavendish's hand, and +then, opening the door of his private office, motioned him to enter +first. + +"Glad to see you," he said steadily, as their hands met. + +Once inside, the manner of both men changed as abruptly as it had been +assumed. The Lieutenant-Governor went slowly toward his desk, with his +head bent, and Cavendish, throwing himself into the nearest chair, and, +with no attempt at concealment, drew a flask from his pocket and drank a +long draught. He looked up to find that the Lieutenant-Governor had +wheeled at the desk, and was standing with his eyes fixed upon him. + +"Wait a minute," said Cavendish, as Barclay seemed about to speak. "We +won't discuss this, for the moment, if you please." + +He held up the flask with a shrug. + +"In fact we needn't discuss it at all," he continued. "I've simply gone +to hell, that's all there is about it. I knew I would. I told you so +long ago. I didn't come here to make excuses--or to receive rebukes, +John Barclay. I've a means here of settling the problem which can give +cards and spades to all your projects of reform." And he tapped his +pocket, where the cloth bulged slightly, with a smile. The +Lieutenant-Governor made no attempt to interrupt him. + +"What I did come to say," went on Cavendish, more steadily, "is that +your life and Mr. Rathbawne's are in danger. You're to be put out of the +way, both of you, before twelve to-night. McGrath's determined on it, +and there's no lack of men to carry out his orders. The strikers are +desperate. I overheard their talk, while--well, while I was getting +drunk! _What's that?_" + +He stopped, with his hand to his ear. Some one was tapping at the +communicating door. + +"Put up that flask!" said Barclay under his breath, adding aloud, as +Cavendish obeyed: + +"Come in!" + +The door swung open softly, and Governor Abbott, smiling and rubbing his +hands, appeared upon the threshold. + +"I beg your pardon, Mr. Barclay," he said. "I did not know you were +engaged. We have the pleasure of another visit from the Citizens' +Committee, and, by a singularly opportune coincidence, Mr. McGrath has +called at the same time. Can you spare us a few moments of your time?" + +With a bow, and a glance at Cavendish, Barclay followed his superior +silently from the room. + +In the Governor's office he found a dozen men, all standing. McGrath, +with his back to the others, was examining with an elaborate air of +interest a map of Alleghenia which hung upon the wall. Colonel +Broadcastle and his fellow-members of the Citizens' Committee, stood +close to, and facing, the Governor's desk. The air was electric with +suggestion of a crisis about to come. + +When the Governor began to speak, it was in his habitually suave voice, +yet he was visibly nervous. + +"Colonel Broadcastle has been good enough to observe," he said, "that if +I do not call out the militia within three hours, to protect the +interests of Mr. Peter Rathbawne, his committee will appeal for aid to +the federal government. Now--er--now, in my place, and in such a +situation, Mr. Barclay--er--what would you do?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's nerve, strained beyond endurance by the events +of the past twenty-four hours, snapped like a dry twig at the +contemptuous hypocrisy of the other's tone. + +"_Do!_" he thundered--"_do?_ Why, as God is my witness, Elijah Abbott, +if I were in your place I would do what any honest man would do! I would +do what my oath demanded of me! I would clap that man McGrath into jail +for iniquitous inciting to riot, and place Colonel Broadcastle, at the +head of his regiment, in charge of the city to restore order and the +reign of law, and to redeem Alleghenia from the disgrace that is +overwhelming her. _Do?_ Before God, the Republic, and the state, +Governor Abbott, I would do my duty as a man!" + +"_Then do it!_" + +The words, spoken from the threshold of Barclay's office, rent the +silence like a thunderclap, and before those present had time to turn, +there came the sound of a pistol-shot, and Governor Abbott, wheeling +slowly on his heels, crashed headforemost through the plate-glass window +behind him, and lay, limp and motionless, across the sill. + +"Then do it, by God, _Governor Barclay_!" repeated Cavendish, and flung +his revolver into the centre of the room. + +The apartment was already filled with those attracted from the corridors +and adjacent offices by the sound of the shot. Several seized Cavendish, +who stood without movement, smiling. Barclay, Colonel Broadcastle, and +the other members of the committee lifted the Governor's body from the +position in which it had fallen, and laid it upon a couch. After a brief +examination, the Colonel looked up into Barclay's eyes. + +"He's dead, sir," he said. "The assassin was right. You are Governor of +Alleghenia." + +For an instant, Barclay returned his glance with one of earnest inquiry. + +"Even in the face of this tragedy," added Colonel Broadcastle in a low +voice, "I trust you will not forget the exigencies of the situation. It +is for you to act, sir." + +Barclay suddenly raised himself to his full height, and faced the silent +gathering. + +"Gentlemen," he said firmly, "the Governor is dead. For the moment, at +least, I act in his stead. Kenton City is under martial law. Those who +have the assassin in charge will see that he is immediately turned over +to the chief of police. Mr. McGrath, you will consider yourself under +arrest. Colonel Broadcastle, you will immediately assemble your regiment +at its armory, issue three days' rations, and twenty rounds of ball +cartridge, and hold yourself and your command in readiness for riot +duty, subject to my orders." + +Then he faced Cavendish. + +"There's a message I'd like to have delivered, to the Fairy Princess," +said the latter, still smiling. "It is that Diogenes has eaten the ugly +little bug." + + + + +XIV + +THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA + + +As Barclay had foreseen, the adoption of stringent measures was all that +was needed to break the back-bone of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +The presence of the Ninth Regiment, under command of that noted +disciplinarian, Colonel Broadcastle, and terribly in earnest, as was +evinced by the ball cartridges gleaming in their belts, was sufficient +to discourage any further attempts at disorder; the sudden shift of base +of the newspapers which had formerly supported the rioters, and now, +taking their cue from the policy of the new Governor, counseled +immediate surrender; above all, the trial, conviction, and sentence of +their moving spirit, McGrath, to a term of years for inciting to +riot--all were irresistible factors in the Union's capitulation. Two +weeks after the death of Governor Abbott, the Rathbawne Mills were +running once more, and Peter Rathbawne himself, though whiter of hair +and but a shadow of his old self, was, nevertheless, on the high road to +recovery. + +The trial and conviction of Spencer Cavendish were accomplished with +unexampled celerity. He would admit of no defense, although the lawyer +appointed for him by the court was strenuous for a plea of insanity, +based upon the singular remark which he had made upon the announcement +of Elijah Abbott's death, and which was construed by those who heard it +as ample proof of irresponsibility. Called upon in court to give his +defense, Cavendish stated in a loud, clear voice that he was strictly +accountable for his act, that he was in full possession of his senses at +the time, and that he had killed the Governor in the firm conviction +that he was a menace to the safety of the community, and that the +latter's sole salvation lay in his removal, and the succession of the +Lieutenant-Governor to the position of chief executive. + +"I desire," he concluded, with the same odd smile that he had worn at +the moment of the Governor's death, "nothing but the full penalty of the +law." + +The next day Spencer Cavendish was sentenced to be executed on the +thirtieth of the following month at the State's Prison at Mowberly. + +Then followed the most remarkable manifestation of popular sentiment +ever known in Alleghenia. As Barclay had once said of them, the citizens +of his long degraded state were less vicious than callous, and their +callousness was effectively cured by the dramatic event which had +removed a corrupt official from the head of the state government, and +put in his place a man whose first acts were proofs positive of +strength, integrity, and singleness of purpose. The revulsion of feeling +was overwhelming. Even the press which had sneered at and cried down +John Barclay was forced to the other extreme. Relieved from the burden +of lawlessness which had lain on Kenton City for close upon three +months, the citizens went over in a body to the support of their new +Governor. He was cheered on his every appearance in public as +assiduously as he had been ignored before, and, responding with the +whole force of his sensitive nature to this longed-for and unexpected +popularity, he devoted himself more and more earnestly, day by day, to +the welfare of the state which was his idol. + +But following in the wake of this revulsion of feeling in favor of +Barclay came one, hardly less complete, in favor of Spencer Cavendish. +While strictly speaking there could be no condoning his act, it was none +the less evident to even the most rigid adherents of law that by it he +had conferred an indisputable benefit upon the state of Alleghenia, and +his open statement of his reasons at the time of his trial militated for +rather than against him. So it was that a public petition was framed and +circulated, asking, at the hands of Governor Barclay, the commutation of +the death sentence to one of life imprisonment. Little by little the +list of signatures grew, until, a week before the date fixed for +Cavendish's execution, they were numbered by tens of thousands. Then the +petition, rolled into a cylinder, was presented to the Governor by a +committee, and left for his consideration. + +To Barclay the intervening time had passed with almost incredible +rapidity. His days, filled as they were to overflowing with numberless +and complex duties, were yet the pleasantest he had ever known. At last, +he was what he had dreamed of being--an active factor, the most active +of all factors, in the advancement of his state. Redeemed, as if by a +miracle, from the disgrace which had laid her low, Alleghenia arose, in +his eyes, like a phoenix, throwing off the ashes of her reproach, and +blazing, with new wings of burnished beauty, in the sunlight of hope and +peace. + +Barclay had retained his old office, not caring to make use of a room so +permeated with associations of recent tragedy as was that which had +formerly been Governor Abbott's. Now, with the windows open and the +soft May air stirring the papers on his desk, he sat, looking vacantly +across the room, with the huge petition spread out before him. His +attention, long absorbed by the problem in hand, was diverted by a tap +on the ante-room door, and, in answer to his call, Natalie Rathbawne +stood before him, smiling out of the exquisite daintiness of a fresh +spring frock. + +"You've forgotten!" she said immediately, at sight of his knit brows. + +"Forgotten what?" inquired the Governor inadvisedly. + +The girl's little foot stamped almost noiselessly upon the thick carpet. + +"Upon my word!" she exclaimed, "if there's one thing worse than being +engaged to the Lieutenant-Governor, it's being engaged to the Governor +himself! Forgotten, of course, that we are to lunch together, and look +at wall-papers afterwards! Do you know, John Barclay, I don't believe +you mean to marry me, after all? We'll be just approaching the altar, +when"-- + +She was interrupted in characteristic fashion, and disengaged herself, +with a great air of indignation, from Barclay's arms. + +"If you want to take lunch in the company of a rag carpet," she said +severely, "that's the very best way to go about it. Get your hat." + +There was a little pause as Barclay filed some papers in his private +safe, and then one startled word from the girl. + +"_John!_" + +Wheeling abruptly, he saw her standing at the desk, with her hand on the +petition, and her eyes, wide and wonderstruck, searching his face. + +"Dearest!" he said impulsively, "I wish you hadn't." + +But Natalie only laughed joyfully. + +"But I'm glad, Johnny boy," she answered, "glad--glad--glad! What a +wonderful thing it is to be Governor, boy dear! I don't think I ever +really understood before. Think of it! To have the power of life and +death--to be able to right the wrongs of justice with a single stroke of +the pen. Oh, John! Sign it now--before we go. I shall be so much +happier." + +The Governor made no reply. He stood, with his head bent, smoothing his +hat with the fingers of his right hand. Gradually the expression of +eager expectation on her face changed to one of anxiety. + +"John," she said in a half whisper, "you _are_ going to sign it, aren't +you, boy dear?" + +"I'm not sure," faltered the Governor. "I'm not quite sure, dearest. It +is the hardest problem I've ever had given me to solve. I can understand +now the meaning of something your father said to me just before the +strike,--that, for the first time in his life, he didn't know what to +do, because right seemed to be hopelessly entangled with wrong, and +wrong with right. When a man does evil in order that good may come, one +tries to find an excuse for him, tries to palliate his offense in any +reasonable way. That is human instinct. That is what accounts for the +petition there, with the signatures of many of the most conscientious +men in Alleghenia attached. They have managed to find the excuse, or +they think they have, which, so far as their personal convictions are +concerned, amounts to about the same thing. And I've been saying to +myself that when public opinion points out a course as justifiable it +can hardly be possible for a single individual to say that it is not. +And yet the wrong is there, isn't it? No matter how confused a question +may seem to us, there must absolutely, when we come to think of it, be +some one great elemental principle upon which it not only can, but must, +be decided--some boundary line between justice and injustice which we +may be too blind to see, but which exists, and calls for observance, +none the less. Right is right, wrong is wrong. No confusion between the +two can possibly exist except in appearance. Strive to elude truth as we +will, it remains eternal truth, and cannot be evaded in the end. And +where it seems to be beyond us, all we can do is to strive to find the +silken thread which will surely lead us out of the labyrinth into the +searching light of day. It is that clue which I have been groping for. +What is it? How am I to know it when I see it? What am I to do? At first +I thought the case was clear--what he said, you know--about Diogenes--it +seemed so odd--every one thought so--it might be construed as--as +insanity"-- + +"Oh, _no_, John! Why, _we_ know what that meant! No--no! The best part +of it all was his sanity, his wonderful courage, his braving of almost +certain death for what he believed--and knew, John--_knew_ to be right +and best. Think what he did for Alleghenia, Johnny boy. He has been +almost as great an instrument in her salvation as you. Think what he has +done for all of us--for you, in giving you this opportunity--for me--for +Dad! John, how _can_ you hesitate?" + +The Governor shook his head. + +"Dearest," he said, "you're on the wrong track, just as I have been, a +dozen times since the petition came. Don't you suppose I've thought of +all that? Its significance, not only to me, but, as you say, to the +state, is so tremendous that, at the first glance, it seems to be an +unanswerable argument. But--don't you see?--no sophistry, no +contemplation of the results achieved, can ever make it justifiable for +a man to arrogate to himself the power of taking human life, which is +the prerogative of God and the law alone. The peculiar circumstances of +Cavendish's crime plead eloquently, almost irresistibly, for his pardon. +He has saved the state--yes! But the case is one in a million, and it is +not an individual case alone which hangs upon my decision,--it is the +establishment of a precedent, the maintenance of a principle." + +"But, John," broke in Natalie eagerly, "what you've just said--isn't +that the clue for which you have been groping? He saved the state! I've +heard you talk of Alleghenia too often, of what you hoped for her, and +what you despaired of ever bringing to pass, not to know what those four +words must mean to you. Think of it! _He saved the state!_ Without any +possibility of selfish object he did this extraordinary thing--made it +possible for Alleghenia to win back the honor and respect she had so +nearly lost forever! He killed the man who had no thought of her purity +and dignity, who used the power the people had given him for the +furtherance of his own selfish and wicked ends, who made her justice a +mockery, who played with her law as if"-- + +"Stop!" exclaimed the Governor. "Stop--I must think. Wait a moment. I +must think--I must think!" + +After a minute he began to speak again, this time in a lower tone, a +tone which suggested self-communion rather than direct address to the +girl before him. + +"Yes, that's it. Wait now,--let me be sure! He killed the man who had no +thought of Alleghenia's purity, who used his power to serve his own +ends, who made her justice"--he was speaking very slowly, dwelling on +each word as it left his lips--"her _justice_ a mockery, who played with +her law--her law--her _Law_"-- + +He paused once more, his brows knit, his firm hand slowly stroking his +chin. Then, of a sudden, he drew a deep breath, flung back his +shoulders, and looked at her. His eyes were blazing, his voice touched +with a new meaning, an eloquence deep, firm, conclusive. + +"Natalie," he said, "come here." + +"You've struck the keynote," he added, when they stood face to face, a +foot or two apart. "It isn't what you thought, or what you meant, but it +is the keynote, just the same. The Law!" + +He wheeled slowly, and stepped forward, until he was directly before the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia which hung upon his wall. + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas!_" he said. "Many a time, when the way +seemed darkest, I've read those words over to myself, and found hope in +them. Events changed, crises came and went, portents loomed thick, +despair seemed omnipotent, failure and disgrace inevitable--but the +motto of Alleghenia remained the same. Steadfast, purposeful, and +commanding, it has endured through the trivial changes of political +significance which have been as impotent to sully the actuality of her +fair fame as are sun-spots to dim the radiance of the sun. It is only +natural, perhaps, that the discouragements which were but transient +should have seemed to me to be vital, damning, irremediable. Just as the +Israelites of old turned from the promises of God to worship Baal, so +have I turned from the assurance given me by these arms of Alleghenia, +to prostrate myself before false idols of doubt and despair. I should +have remembered how they called me, in the first instance, from a life +of idleness and ease, to fight my way through the desert of difficulty, +toward the promised land of honor. I should have remembered how in my +darkest hours they went before me as a pillar of fire, how in the famine +of my soul these words were the manna of encouragement, how in my thirst +they struck clear water from the rock of adverse circumstance. But the +Israelites came back to their true God at last; so I, little girl, to my +true ideal. The Law!--you said the word--the Law is the clue, the +keynote, the boundary between right and wrong!" + +She was at his side, and he slipped one arm around her, and held her +close to him as with his finger he traced again the motto of Alleghenia. + +"Do you know what this means?" he asked. "_Justitia_,--to be just to all +men, without fear or favor, lenient to our enemies, rigid and +unyielding, if need be, to our friends; putting aside personal +considerations, striving so far as in us lies to be impartial, merciful +in the face of prejudice, relentless in that of conviction--fair! +_Lex_,--to abide by the law, in spirit only if our inmost conviction +warrants that course, but in letter absolutely where there is the +smallest hint of doubt; secure in the knowledge that, however fallible +it be, it is the best that man has yet been able to do in imitation of +the immutable decrees of God. _Integritas_,--to be true to the oaths we +have sworn, faithful to the promises we have made, loyal to the office +intrusted to us by the people, to whom and for whom we are responsible. +Dearest, I am no mere man. Were I that, were I to consult my will alone, +and it lay, as now it lies, in my power to accomplish, Spencer Cavendish +should go free to-day. I know what he has done; I appreciate his +sacrifice; I see that by a single act he has accomplished what the rest +of us were powerless to cure; I admire his courage; I condone his crime; +I could forget all his weaknesses for the sake of this one great +evidence of his strength. And yet--listen to me, dearest!--in what he +strove to do he has failed utterly, if in removing a corrupt official +who made a mockery of Alleghenia's law he has not replaced him by one +who with all the force of his conscience and all the power of his +influence will see that law administered. And whatever we may say of his +crime, whatever its causes, whatever its wonderful results, it was and +is a crime. 'Thou shalt not kill!' God has said it; Alleghenia by the +voice of her law has ratified it. And not even the fact that Cavendish +has made possible all my fondest and worthiest hopes, the fact that he +has rescued from suffering all I hold most dear"-- + +Barclay suddenly covered his face with his free hand, as he had covered +it on that afternoon in Peter Rathbawne's library, weeks before; then he +looked up again, his lips trembling. + +"Dearest," he said, "I am Governor of Alleghenia, and as such owe an +allegiance, an obedience, which personal prejudice cannot impugn. On +the day when you spoke to me of meeting Cavendish you pointed out the +course of a gentleman and a friend. On the night of the Ninth's +review you taught me the creed of an American and an Alleghenian. +To-day--unconsciously perhaps, but none the less surely--you have made +clear the duty of a public servant. God bless you, my life, my heart, my +conscience! May I be worthy of you and of the commonwealth I serve. +Where I doubted before, now I am sure. It is hard--God only knows how +hard--but listen to Alleghenia's bidding! _Justitia_, _Lex_, +_Integritas_,--equity, the code, and good faith, in the sight of God and +man, heaven and earth, the American people and the commonwealth of +Alleghenia. God save the state!" + +"John," whispered the girl brokenly,--"John, you're right. God save the +state!" + +Slowly, tenderly, the Governor of Alleghenia led her back to the table, +and taking up a pen, with a firm hand wrote five words, heavily +underscored, at the head of the Cavendish petition. And these were:-- + + "_Disapproved._ + _John Hamilton Barclay_, + _Governor._" + +Then, turning to the girl who loved him, he took her in his arms. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + +***** This file should be named 30448-8.txt or 30448-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/4/4/30448/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Lieutenant-Governor + +Author: Guy Wetmore Carryl + +Release Date: November 10, 2009 [EBook #30448] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<h1>THE + +LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR</h1> + +<h4><span class="smcap">A Novel</span></h4> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>GUY WETMORE CARRYL<br /><br /></h2> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 78px;"> +<img src="images/001.png" width="78" height="100" alt="" title="Publishers symbol" /> +<br /><br /></div> + +<h5>BOSTON AND NEW YORK</h5> +<h4>HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY</h4> +<h5>The Riverside Press, Cambridge</h5> +<h5>1903<br /><br /><br /><br /></h5> + + +<h5>Copyright, 1902</h5> +<h4><span class="smcap">By THE ESS ESS PUBLISHING CO.</span></h4> + +<h5>Copyright, 1903</h5> +<h4><span class="smcap">By GUY WETMORE CARRYL</span></h4> + +<h5>ALL RIGHTS RESERVED</h5> + +<h4><i>Published March, 1903</i><br /><br /></h4> + + +<h5>TO</h5> + +<h3>M. R. B.</h3> + +<h5>IN MEMORY OF THE RESCUE OF A MAN AT SEA<br /><br /><br /><br /></h5> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + + +<div class="center"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="Contents"> +<tr><td align="right">CHAPTER</td><td align="left"></td><td align="right">PAGE</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">I.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Fly on the Wheel</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">II.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Odds against Young Nisbet</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_21">21</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">III.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">A Face in the Crowd</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_40">40</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">IV.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">As Between Friends</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_60">60</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">V.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">A Brand from the Burning</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_80">80</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">VI.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">McGrath laughs</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_98">98</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">VII.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Mirage of Power</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_117">117</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">VIII.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Governor unmasks</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_137">137</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">IX.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Ninth passes in Review</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_156">156</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">X.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">A Question and an Answer</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_177">177</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">XI.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Young Nisbet finds his Tongue</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_196">196</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">XII.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Diogenes</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_215">215</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">XIII.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Instrument of Fate</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_234">234</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right">XIV.</td><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Voice of Alleghenia</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_252">252</a></td></tr> +</table></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> + +<h1>THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR</h1> + + +<h2>I</h2> + +<h3>THE FLY ON THE WHEEL</h3> + + +<p>The offices of the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor adjoined. Each +had its ante-room, in which a private secretary wrote eternally at a +roll-top desk, an excessively plain-featured stenographer rattled the +keys of his typewriter, and a smug-faced page yawned over a newspaper, +or scanned the cards of visitors with the air of an official censor. At +intervals, an electric bell whirred once, twice, or three times; and, +according to the signal, one of the trio disappeared into the presence +of the august personage within.</p> + +<p>A door connected the office of the chief executive with that of his +lieutenant, but this was rarely opened by either, and then only<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> after a +formal tap and permission to enter had been given. It was a matter of +general knowledge that the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor were not +in sympathy; but few, even among the intimates of either, were aware how +deep, and wide, and hopelessly impassable was the gulf which lay between +them. This was due not alone to disparity in age, though twenty-eight +years separated the white-haired Governor from his handsome subordinate, +who had been nominated to this, his first public office, on his +thirtieth birthday; nor was it wholly a difference between the +experience of the one and the inexperience of the other. The point of +view of the veteran is, naturally, not that of the novice, particularly +in politics. That the enthusiasms of Lieutenant-Governor Barclay should +have been the disillusions of Governor Abbott, and his pitfalls his +senior's stepping-stones,—this was to be expected. The root of their +dissimilarity lay deeper. It was nothing less than mutual distrust which +kept the connecting door closed day after day, and clogged the channel +of coöper<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span>ation with the sharp-pointed boulders of antagonism.</p> + +<p>The convention which nominated the successful ticket of the preceding +year had been a veritable chaos of contending factions. The labor +delegates, encouraged by the unexpected strength of their +representation, were not content with such nominal plums as had fallen +to their share in former conventions. Led by Michael McGrath, an +agitator whose native Irish eloquence, made keener and more persuasive +by practice in bar-room forensics, brought him naturally to the fore, +they threatened, at one stage of the proceedings, to carry all before +them. The more conservative faction, its strength sapped by the +formation, in its very ranks, of a reform party determined upon the fall +of the "machine," was forced to yield ground. The reformers themselves, +young men for the most part, distinguished by great ideals but small +ability, were too few to impose their individual will upon their +opponents, yet sufficiently numerous to make their support necessary to +the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> success of either party. The usual smooth course of the convention, +upset by this unlooked-for resistance from two quarters, staggered +helplessly, and was on the point of coming to a deadlock. It was Michael +McGrath's shrewd perception of the situation which solved the problem. +In a brief, impassioned speech he laid the claims of his faction before +the delegates, winding up with a stirring picture of the coöperation of +labor and reform, now possible, which held the convention in spellbound +silence for ten seconds after he had closed, and then set the hall +ringing to cheers and vigorously plied hands and feet. For an instant he +paused, with his arms folded, and his keen blue eyes sliding over the +faces before him, and then played his trump card. At his signal, a +banner, hastily prepared, was borne, slowly revolving, down the central +aisle, and on this were boldly lettered the words which at the same +moment McGrath was thundering from the platform:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span>—</p> + + +<p class="center"> +LABOR AND REFORM!<br /> +<br /> +<span class="smcap">For Governor,</span><br /> +ELIJAH ABBOTT.<br /> +<br /> +<span class="smcap">For Lieutenant-governor,</span><br /> +JOHN HAMILTON BARCLAY.<br /> +</p> + +<p>McGrath had no need to look toward the labor faction for support. He +knew what the name of Elijah Abbott meant in that quarter. His shifting +glance was fixed upon the seats of the reform delegates, and a little +smile twitched at the corners of his mouth, as he saw them rise with a +cheer. Barclay was the chief spirit of their movement. They had not +expected this recognition. But if, in the enthusiasm of unlooked-for +victory, they did not perceive how little, in reality, was their gain, +McGrath was far from being unaware how great was his own. Before the +cheering of the now allied forces of labor and reform had fairly died +away, he had moved that nominations were in order, and, ten minutes +later, while the partisans of the "machine" were still endeavoring to +collect their wits, the main business of the convention was an<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> +accomplished fact, and Abbott and Barclay were declared the regular +Democratic nominees for Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of the state. +In six weeks followed their election by a small plurality, and on the +first of January the two men moved into their adjoining rooms, in the +inexcusably unlovely state capitol, on the main hill of Kenton City, +wherein they were, thenceforward, separated, one from the other, by two +inches of Georgia pine and a practically infinite diversity of principle +and prejudice.</p> + +<p>From the first their relationship had been no better than an armed +truce. Both were courteous men, the one because such was his policy, the +other because he was to this manner born. There was no need for them to +discuss their individual creeds. They tacitly accepted the fact that +there was not a parallel between the two. From the moment when his +election was assured by the returns, Abbott was candidly the man of the +Labor—nay, more—of the Socialist party. McGrath and his associates +manipulated him as readily<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> as a marionette. The promises and pledges of +the campaign were ruthlessly jettisoned. If Governor Abbott did not +stand for anarchy, it was only because, for the moment, anarchy was not +the demand of his party. Withal, he was dignified and self-possessed, +robed in an agreeable suavity which became him at functions and +ceremonials, and assured his popularity with those—and they were, as +always, in the majority—who did not look below the surface.</p> + +<p>Lieutenant-Governor Barclay had not been ten days in office before he +realized the futility of resistance to the established order, as +represented in his superior. He had accepted his nomination, and +welcomed his election, with an almost Quixotic elation in the +opportunity thus opened to him. He would accomplish—oh, there was no +telling what Lieutenant-Governor Barclay would <i>not</i> accomplish!</p> + +<p>He was standing at his office window now, staring out disconsolately +over the sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> +patches of snow, which had contrived to withstand the recent thaw, and +he was telling himself, for the thousandth time, the dispiriting fact +that, as a force for good or evil in the destiny of his state, he was no +more significant than his stenographer's Remington or his secretary's +roll-top desk. With all his ideals, with all those pledges which are +infinitely more vital when made in private to one's conscience than when +made in public to one's party, he found himself merely a cog in the +state machinery—a cog, too, that, seemingly, might be skipped at any or +every time, without in the least degree disturbing the progress of +routine. On the few occasions, in the early days of their official +relation, when he had ventured to set his will in opposition to that of +the Governor, there had not been manifest in the latter's attitude even +that spirit of resistance which spurs men to more active and resolute +endeavor. Governor Abbott had smiled pleasantly upon him, and then +quietly shifted the conversation into other channels, with an air of +selecting a topic more suited to his companion's comprehension.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> +Finally, on one occasion, when Barclay had voiced his opinion with an +energy which savored of rebuke, the Governor had gone further, and had +asked calmly—"And what were you proposing to do about it?" After that +Barclay had relinquished the unequal struggle, and resigned himself to +the unavoidable conclusion of his impotency.</p> + +<p>It is a situation which tries men's souls, this of utter helplessness in +the face of plain duty. He could have no hope of making his position +clear to the constituency to which he was responsible. Debarred on the +one side from taking an active part in the administration of state +affairs, and bitterly arraigned on the other on the grounds of +inefficiency, laxity, and indifference to duty, the second month of +office found John Barclay in a fair way to be ground to powder between +the millstones of impuissance and hostile criticism. The men of his +party who had, both in private conviction and public statement, based +their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> hopes of political reform upon the frankly avowed platform of his +principles, now passed him coldly, with a bare nod, sometimes with none +whatever; the labor element jeered joyously at his attitude; the +"machine" pointed to him as proof of the fallacy of the reform creed. It +is easy to expect great performances from great promises, easier still +to outline the duties and condemn the delinquencies of another, and not +even Barclay's knowledge of his own good faith was sufficient +compensation for the sneers of press and public which fell to his share. +As he surveyed the dispiriting prospect from his office window, on that +late February afternoon, he was near to resigning his position, and with +it all further pretension to political prominence.</p> + +<p>In the opinion of those competent to judge, the state of Alleghenia was +going to the dogs. A press distinguished alike for the amplitude of its +headlines and the pitiable paucity of its principles; a legislature of +which practically every member had, not only a price, but such a price +as the advertisements describe as being "within the reach of all;" a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> +Governor who avowedly stood ready to sanction the most extreme +pretensions of the notoriously corrupt party which had secured him his +election,—here, surely, were good and sufficient reasons for the +generously bestowed disapproval of Alleghenia's sister states. In all +the <i>personnel</i> of her government there was but one man sincerely +devoted to her advancement on the lines of integrity and +non-partisanship. And that man was Lieutenant-Governor Barclay, whose +influence on the trend of affairs was approximately that of the +proverbial fly on the hub of the revolving wheel.</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor had turned back to his desk, and was arranging +his papers, preparatory to departing for the day, when his ears were +greeted by the unusual and unwelcome sound of a rap upon the +communicating door. Instinctively he braced himself for an unpleasant +encounter before replying. It was his experience that the Governor's +room was like to Nazareth of old, in that no good might<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> be expected to +issue therefrom. Nevertheless, as Governor Abbott entered, in response +to Barclay's "Come!" it was difficult to believe that he was aught but +what he appeared to be,—a courteous, conspicuously well-dressed and +white-haired gentleman, of sixty or thereabouts, smooth-shaven save for +chop side-whiskers of iron gray, with a habit of rubbing his hands, and +an inclination from the hips forward which suggested a floor-walker. In +brief, the Governor of Alleghenia seemed the type of a man who turns +sideways and slips through narrow places, rather than run the risk of +barking his elbows by a face-front advance. In reality he was somewhat +less pliable than a steel rail.</p> + +<p>"You are going?" he asked, seeing how Barclay was employed.</p> + +<p>"I was thinking of it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor. "Of course, if +there is anything"—</p> + +<p>Governor Abbott seated himself on the edge of the desk, holding a lapel +of his coat in each hand, and surveyed his subordinate<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> from under his +drooping eyelids, with his head cocked on one side.</p> + +<p>"I believe you know Peter Rathbawne," he said.</p> + +<p>"I do. I am engaged to his elder daughter."</p> + +<p>"Ah! That is what I thought."</p> + +<p>The Governor looked contemplatively at the ceiling, closing his right +eye, and nibbling behind his pursed lips.</p> + +<p>"Peter Rathbawne," he said, "is the second most obstinate man in Kenton +City, if not in Alleghenia. I'm afraid he thinks he is the <i>most</i> +obstinate. If so, he does me an injustice. His mills are the largest in +the state. I am told that when they are running full strength they +employ over four thousand hands."</p> + +<p>"Something like that number, I believe," put in Barclay, as the Governor +seemed to expect a reply.</p> + +<p>"Ah! It is a pity for such an industry as that to be tied up on account +of one man's obstinacy."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I had not heard"—began Barclay; but Governor Abbott continued +steadily, disregarding the interruption.</p> + +<p>"Yesterday morning Mr. Rathbawne discharged fifteen employees on the +ground of incompetency. It is hard to see exactly what Mr. Rathbawne +means by 'incompetency.' These men were not newcomers. Some of them had +been in the mills for as much as eighteen months. It seems as if he +might have discovered the alleged incompetency long ago. It is more or +less arbitrary, one might say, this discharging men by wholesale, as it +were."</p> + +<p>"I suppose," commented Barclay, "that a man may do as he will with his +own."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said the Governor, lifting his hands from his lapels with a little +gesture of deprecation, but immediately replacing them. "But <i>can</i> he? A +man in Peter Rathbawne's position has a responsibility to fulfill toward +the community. He cannot beggar men for a caprice—because his horse has +gone lame, or his breakfast has not agreed with him.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> He must show +reasons—give an accounting. He must be fair."</p> + +<p>"Oh, when it comes to fairness," laughed the other, "I assure you, +Governor Abbott, you won't find Mr. Rathbawne's equal this side of the +Pacific. He's famous for square dealing."</p> + +<p>"He <i>has</i> been," corrected the Governor. "In the present instance he +seems to have fallen below standard. He has declined to reconsider his +decision in the case of the discharged men. What's worse, he has flatly +refused to see the committee appointed by the Union."</p> + +<p>"I'm not surprised at that," said Barclay slowly, fingering a +paper-cutter on the desk before him. "Mr. Rathbawne is peculiar in one +respect; he supports and considers the Union in every other. But he has +always insisted upon his right to discharge the hands at will, and +without giving reasons. Incompetency is only a word which is used to +cover more serious causes."</p> + +<p>"Well, he's wrong," said the Governor,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> with a heat unusual to him. +"He's dead wrong, Mr. Barclay, and he will find it out before he's a day +older."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean"—</p> + +<p>"I mean that if the men in question are not taken back before to-morrow +noon, every man, woman, and child in the employ of the Rathbawne Mills +will be out on strike. The question is, what is Peter Rathbawne prepared +to do?"</p> + +<p>The silence that followed was broken only by the tap, tap, tap of the +Lieutenant-Governor's paper-cutter on the silver-mounted blotter. +Presently he looked up and met the Governor's eye.</p> + +<p>"If you want <i>my</i> opinion, sir," he answered, "it is that Mr. Rathbawne +would fight such a point to a standstill. He's sole owner of the mills, +and he's a rich man. He has always treated his employees as if they were +his own children. If they turn on him now for something which, from +their experience of his character, they must know was fair and +justifiable"—<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></p> + +<p>"But <i>was</i> it?" interrupted the Governor.</p> + +<p>"I don't know the facts, sir, but I know Peter Rathbawne," said Barclay, +throwing back his head, "and I can say, with clear conviction, that it +<i>must</i> have been. If, as you suggest, the hands go out, I think he would +close down the mills for a year, and go abroad. He's a man who doesn't +argue; he simply acts. I fancy there wouldn't be much opposition left by +the time he wanted to reopen."</p> + +<p>"Provided always that there were anything left to reopen," suggested the +Governor softly.</p> + +<p>"The state troops have more than once proved their ability to assure the +sanctity of property," answered his subordinate, with a touch of the old +pride with which he had assumed office.</p> + +<p>"Hum!" said Governor Abbott. "But calling out the militia is a serious +matter, Mr. Barclay, to say nothing of the expense entailed. Considering +that the difficulty would be due entirely to the obstinacy of one +man—er—one might not feel justified"—<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span></p> + +<p>He hesitated briefly under the Lieutenant-Governor's keen glance, and +then swerved from this line of suggestion.</p> + +<p>"What I wanted to say was this: You are a friend of Mr. +Rathbawne's,—something more than a friend, indeed. No doubt he has a +respect for your opinion, as you have for his. Now, if in the course of +a quiet chat—it will have to be to-night—you should point out the +situation that threatens him, the distress that a strike will cause, the +probable destruction of his property, perhaps he might consent to +reinstate the discharged men to-morrow morning."</p> + +<p>"It would be a surrender of principle, to which he would never consent," +said Barclay firmly. "Of that I am sure. Moreover, sir, I should be +speaking against my convictions were I to advise him to adopt such a +course."</p> + +<p>The Governor's lip wrinkled slightly.</p> + +<p>"The Union is prepared to do the right thing by the man who settles this +question," he said.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I hope you don't mean that!" exclaimed Barclay. "You are the first man +to make such a suggestion to me. Pardon me, Governor Abbott, but I +cannot but think the executive chamber of the capitol of Alleghenia a +singular place for it to be mentioned."</p> + +<p>The Governor held up his hand.</p> + +<p>"You misunderstand me," he said. "One would suppose I had offered you a +purse! I mean simply that the popularity of the man who averts this +strike will be an assured fact. He would be the idol of the working +people, and hardly less esteemed by the element of capital. Moreover, he +would be doing a humane and merciful thing. You are the only man who is +in a position to approach Rathbawne, and, if you will excuse the +suggestion, I think you can hardly afford to throw away the chance. As +it is, you—er—you are not what might be called popular, Mr. Barclay."</p> + +<p>This time the silence was broken by a single sharp little +click—the latch of the connecting door slipping into place. The +Lieutenant<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>-Governor sank slowly into his revolving chair, tipped back, +swung round a half circle, and stared out disconsolately over the +sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin patches of +snow.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p> +<h2>II</h2> + +<h3>THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET</h3> + + +<p>Young Nisbet leaned forward in his chair.</p> + +<p>"And I've been thinking," he added, "that perhaps—that perhaps"—</p> + +<p>"That perhaps what?" asked the junior Miss Rathbawne, leaning forward in +hers.</p> + +<p>"If I don't have tea <i>instantly</i>," said her mother, with profound +conviction, as she came ponderously through the portières, tugging at +her gloves, "I shall expire! How de do, Mr. Nisbet. <i>Do</i> sit up +straight, Dorothy, my dear."</p> + +<p>She sank heavily into a low chair, which brought her within the radius +of lamp-light at the tea-table, and was thus revealed as a lady of +generous proportions, with a conspicuous absence of features, and no +observable lap. In speaking, she displayed a marked partiality for undue +emphasis. Sublimely unconscious of the depression induced by her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> +advent, she continued to talk, as she pulled off her gloves, which were +a size too small, and came away with reluctance, leaving imprints of the +stitching on her pudgy pink hands.</p> + +<p>Young Nisbet surveyed her with a kind of mute despair. He was a very +average young American, very conventionally in love, and the trifling +remnant of self-assertiveness which had triumphed over the crescent +humility natural to his condition inevitably evaporated into thin air at +the approach of Mrs. Rathbawne; and always, as he was doing now, he +turned in his toes excessively when she was present, hitched at his +right trouser-leg, where the crease passed over his knee, and looked +first at her, and then at the floor, and then at her again, with the +purposeless regularity of a mechanical toy.</p> + +<p>There was a tremendous and highly significant rattling of cups, saucers, +and silver spoons, as Dorothy Rathbawne prepared her mother's tea. All +things considered, one<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> found something very admirable about Dorothy at +such a time as this. It was not complete submission, still less was it +open revolt, but savored of both, and was incomparable as an attitude +toward Mrs. Rathbawne. On some occasions it was almost as impossible to +get on with Mrs. Rathbawne as it would have been, on others, to get on +without her. The which, nowadays, is more or less true of all parents. +And children.</p> + +<p>"Natalie and your Aunt Helen got out at the florist's," went on the good +lady, "but I came straight on, and sent the carriage back for them. I +felt that I <i>couldn't</i> exist an <i>instant</i> longer without my tea. I'm +sure I don't see how Natalie <i>stands</i> it. She was out all morning in the +brougham, too. You had best make enough for three cups, Dorothy—and +<i>do</i> sit up straight, my dear!—and order Thomas to bring in some more +tartines. They are <i>sure</i> to be hungry, and they are apt to come in at +<i>any</i> moment."</p> + +<p>"That is a family failing," said Dorothy venomously, from behind the +kettle.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Well, I'm <i>sure</i>, my dear," said Mrs. Rathbawne innocently, as she +straightened her rings, and picked an imaginary speck out of one of her +round, flat nails, "there is no disgrace at all in a healthy appetite. +I'm thankful we all have it—though as for your Aunt Helen, <i>hers</i> is +about like that of a fly."</p> + +<p>"Flies have very good appetites—judging from all I've seen, that is," +said Dorothy, "so I don't think she is to be commiserated on that +account."</p> + +<p>"That was only a figure of speech, my dear," replied Mrs. Rathbawne, +with engaging placidity. "Mercy! but I'm glad to get home. We've had a +positively <i>exhausting</i> day with Natalie's shopping, and the <i>worst</i> of +it is to think what a <i>lot</i> more there is to do. A wedding certainly +<i>is</i> an undertaking, Mr. Nisbet."</p> + +<p>"Is it?" answered young Nisbet, perceptibly startled at being thus +abruptly included in the conversation.</p> + +<p>"Decidedly!" asseverated Mrs. Rathbawne.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Of course, in the case of an <i>ordinary</i> man"—</p> + +<p>"Two lumps, mother?"</p> + +<p>"<i>Always</i> two lumps, Dorothy, my dear. Surely you must know that, by +this time! As I was <i>saying</i>, Mr. Nisbet, the fact that my elder +daughter is to marry Mr. Barclay"—</p> + +<p>Dorothy's eyebrows went up resignedly as she bent with affected +solicitude over the alcohol lamp, than which none ever burned more +blamelessly. There was no stopping Mrs. Rathbawne now!</p> + +<p>"One has to keep his position in mind," she was saying. "It isn't like +the <i>usual</i> marriage, which interests only the families and friends of +the persons concerned, you know. It isn't even as if only Kenton City +were looking on. <i>All</i> Alleghenia will be on the <i>qui vive</i>, Mr. Nisbet, +<i>all</i> the state of Alleghenia. I shouldn't wonder if <i>some</i> notice were +taken of the event, even at Washington. Marrying a statesman, you +see,—a Lieutenant-Governor! Oh, it's <i>quite</i> differ<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span>ent—<i>quite</i>! <i>Do</i> +sit up straight, Dorothy, my dear!"</p> + +<p>She continued to prattle of the momentous marriage impending, until her +complacent chatter was interrupted by the entrance of her half-sister, +Mrs. Wynyard, and the elder Miss Rathbawne.</p> + +<p>The two newcomers were both beautiful, in widely dissimilar ways. Helen +Wynyard, Mrs. Rathbawne's junior by nearly a score of years, retained at +thirty the transparent brilliancy of complexion which, at eighteen, had +made her the most admired <i>débutante</i> of her season in San Francisco. +Her marriage with Ellery Wynyard had caused a great to-do among the +gossips, and, later, had defrauded them pitilessly of their +self-promised "I told you so's," by reason of the death of the handsome +young rake, before the rose-color of the honeymoon had begun to fade. +Beauty, wit, and infallible tact she inherited from her mother, shrewd +business ability and a keen insight into men and things from her father, +and wealth and a certain attractive audacity<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> of speech from her +husband; and five years of widowhood only served to develop and +emphasize the promise of her first season. There were numerous feet +which aspired to be shod with Ellery Wynyard's discarded shoes, but no +one pair, said the world, so much as an inch in advance of the rest.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Wynyard was spending the winter with her half-sister, and the +Rathbawnes, whom the circumstance of widely distant residence had always +kept from coming into close touch with her, were equally at a loss when +they wondered how they had formerly contrived to exist without her, and +in what manner they should resign themselves to giving her up. She was a +woman who came amazingly near to being indispensable.</p> + +<p>For the moment, Natalie Rathbawne, in reality the beauty which Dorothy +by a fraction fell short of being, suffered by comparison with her +sister. She was desperately tired—that was in her smile. But there was +something else: a singular preoccupation which was nearly akin to +listlessness. That<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> was in the droop of her eyelids, in the eloquently +inattentive gesture with which she touched a bowl of Gloire de Dijon +roses as she passed, and in her conventionally courteous acknowledgment +of young Nisbet's greeting. And, too, as she seated herself beside her +sister on the divan, there was perceptible purpose in her avoidance of +the lamp-light, her withdrawal into the dark, deep corner. To the +conversation which followed she contributed only such brief remarks as +were made necessary by those occasionally addressed to her.</p> + +<p>The two women brought with them a delicious, indefinite atmosphere of +out-of-doors: that commingled smell of cold flowers, and cold flesh, and +cold fur, which is to a drawing-room in winter what a whiff of salt air +is in summer to a sun-baked hillside; and this proved almost too much +for the self-possession, already tottering, of young Nisbet. He had +always been accustomed to have the things he desired, had young Nisbet, +but these, until now, had been either creature<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> comforts, readily +obtainable when one's father is a multi-millionaire, or athletic honors, +equally easy of attainment when one measures forty-two around the chest, +and can do one's quarter in something under fifty. Again, the Nisbets +lived on a ranch, and when one does not know people in New York one +spends the Sundays in New Haven, so that neither the terms nor the +vacations incidental to his four years at Yale had equipped him, in the +sense in which they equipped his fellows, for dealing with society.</p> + +<p>Now that he was in Kenton City, representing his father's interests, +young Nisbet was painfully self-conscious of multitudinous shortcomings, +totally unsuspected hitherto. His speech was apparently hopelessly +incrusted with slang, his legs were too long, his ears protruded +abominably, his hair was desperately unruly, his freckles and his +capacity for blushing were inexhaustible. He was as much at ease in such +surroundings as these in which he now found himself as a trout in a +sandpile. The great room, with its costly furnish<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>ings, the tea-table +crowded with silver and fragile porcelain, the kettle purring +contentedly above the iridescent flame of the alcohol lamp,—above all, +the subtle, indefinable suggestion of femininity which unknowably +pervaded his surroundings,—all these enthralled young Nisbet beyond +expression, and awed him immeasurably, into the bargain. He was, as +usual, very clear in his own mind as to what he wanted, and that was the +younger Miss Rathbawne, but, for the first time in his experience, the +means at his command did not seem to be sufficient unto the end. For the +younger Miss Rathbawne was, very evidently, not the sort of triumph +which is achieved by recourse to an imposingly ample bank-account, nor +yet by two months' loyalty to the exigencies of the training-table. And +this was February, and he had known her since July, and, altogether, it +was highly discouraging. Unwittingly, young Nisbet heaved a sigh so +profound and so pitiable that Mrs. Wynyard immediately proffered her +sympathy.</p> + +<p>"Poor, dear Mr. Nisbet! I never heard a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> more pathetic sigh. Whatever is +the matter?"</p> + +<p>"He's sleepy," put in Dorothy. "He always is, after talking with me for +a whole hour."</p> + +<p>"I was just thinking," protested young Nisbet helplessly.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" exclaimed Dorothy, "that's it, is it? Then pray don't discourage +him, Aunt Helen. He's really getting into some very good habits, of +late."</p> + +<p>"Why, <i>Dorothy</i>!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, digging her chin reproachfully +into her black velvet collar, "how <i>can</i> you say such things? Mr. Nisbet +will think you have had <i>no</i> bringing up at all. And <i>do</i> sit up +straight, my dear!"</p> + +<p>"And if you don't stop nagging, O most conscientious of parents," +retorted Dorothy, with her nose in the air, "Mr. Nisbet will think you +bring people up by throwing them down!"</p> + +<p>"And slang! <i>Dorothy!</i>"</p> + +<p>"I always think," said Mrs. Wynyard,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> "that Dorothy should have had a +fairy godmother, to promise that every time she uttered a word of slang +a pearl should pop out of her mouth. We should have all been wearing +triple strings down to our knees within a week after she learned to +talk."</p> + +<p>"That settles it!" exclaimed Dorothy. "If you are going to side with the +enemy, Aunt Helen, there is nothing left for me to do but to beat a +retreat. Come on, Mr. Nisbet, there is rest for the weary in the +conservatory—that is, unless you want another cup of tea?"</p> + +<p>In the conservatory the air was heavy with the moist, sweet smell of +earth and moss, and faintly vibrant with the tiny plash of water, +dripping from a pile of rocks into the circular central pool, wherein +fat gold-fish went idly to and fro, nuzzling floating specks upon the +surface. Through the polished green of the surrounding palms and +rubber-plants stared gardenias and camelias; below, between maidenhair +and sword-ferns, winked the little waxen blossoms of fuchsias and +begonias: at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> intervals poinsettia flared audaciously among its more +quietly dressed neighbors; and, in the far corners the golden spheres +were swelling to fairly respectable proportions on the branches of dwarf +orange-trees.</p> + +<p>Dorothy installed herself on a bench, and young Nisbet perched upon the +rim of the pool, and stared at vacancy.</p> + +<p>"It's corking, in here," he said, after a moment.</p> + +<p>"Isn't it, though?" agreed Dorothy, with a nod of approval. "It's my +favorite part of the house. You can't imagine how many hours I spend +here, sewing, or reading, or fiddling with the fish and all those funny +little plants under the palms."</p> + +<p>"You bet!" said young Nisbet, with enthusiasm, if not much relevancy. +"I've just got a picture of that, you know. Besides, we've spent a good +many of those hours together in here, these past few months."</p> + +<p>"Oh, not a tenth of them!" exclaimed Dorothy, "and then only the very +shortest."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said young Nisbet gloomily. His<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> fertile imagination was +immediately peopled with the forms and faces of those who had shared the +other hours, a score of eligible and attractive young men, his moral, +mental, and physical superiors in every conceivable particular, +faultlessly arrayed, scintillating with wit, and surpassingly skilled in +the way to win a woman. The conservatory was full of them. He saw them +in every imaginable posture: feeding the gold-fish, watering the +begonias, looking up into Dorothy's eyes as they sat at her feet, +looking down at her slender fingers, as she pinned gardenias to their +lapels. And these had been granted the long hours, he only the short. +Inwardly, young Nisbet groaned; aloud, as was his wont, he said the +wrong thing.</p> + +<p>"They seemed long enough to me."</p> + +<p>"<i>Well!</i>" said Dorothy.</p> + +<p>"Oh, hang it all! I didn't mean that. What an oaf I am!"</p> + +<p>"Never mind," said Dorothy consolingly. "I know you well enough to +understand you, by this time." She smoothed her skirt re<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>flectively. +"Let me see," she added, "what were we talking about when we were +swamped by the family?"</p> + +<p>"I think," answered young Nisbet, with one of his illogical blushes, +"that I had just asked you what sort of a man you thought you would like +to marry. I remember I was on the point of saying that I thought perhaps +you had ideas like—er—like your mother's."</p> + +<p>Dorothy raised her eyebrows.</p> + +<p>"Like the Mater's?"</p> + +<p>"About a man being big and prominent, and all that, you know," +floundered young Nisbet. "She always makes such a point of Barclay's +being Lieutenant-Governor—I thought you might be for the same kind of +thing."</p> + +<p>Dorothy looked him over, with a whimsical smile, as he was speaking. +There was a deep bronze light in his close-cropped, ruddy hair, and his +skin was very smooth and clean. His eyes were appealing, with that +unspeakable eloquence of simple honesty which is almost pathetic. Under +his blue cloth coat, the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> great muscles of his shoulders and chest stood +out magnificently, rippling the fabric as he stirred, as if eager to +throw off their trammels, and be given free play. About him there was a +distinct suggestion of sane living and regular exercise. For all his +freckles, and his nose that was too little, and his mouth that was too +large, "the ugliest of the Nisbet boys"—he had often been called +that!—was very emphatically good to look upon.</p> + +<p>"A big man?" answered Dorothy. "Yes, I think I should like to marry a +big man. I want him very clean, too—<i>very</i> clean!—morally, as well as +otherwise. And honest as the day is long. And not <i>too</i> bright! I don't +want to be continually trying to live up to his brain, and continually +failing. It is fatal to one's self-respect, that sort of thing. Then, he +must be heels over head in love with me—for keeps! And then—oh, he +must be a <i>man</i>, a man through and through, who wouldn't think anything +he didn't dare to say, nor say anything he didn't dare to do! That's +what I want, and if I can get<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> it, all the prominence in the world may +go hang!"</p> + +<p>"That's just about John Barclay, though," said young Nisbet, "with the +prominence thrown in."</p> + +<p>"Well, I'm not saying I wouldn't have married John Barclay, if I'd had +the chance. He comes pretty close to being all I would ask for, in the +way of a man. But, unfortunately, there's only one John Barclay, and, +like the rest of the world, he looked directly over poor little Me's +shoulders, and saw only Natalie. Good gracious! Who could blame him? +She's the loveliest little thing in the world! But, at all events, she +nabbed him, so all that is left for me to do is to grin and bear the +disappointment as best I may. He's very much of a man, John Barclay is!"</p> + +<p>"Yes," assented young Nisbet, somewhat mournfully. "I can see that would +be the kind of a chap that the dames would stand for everlastingly."</p> + +<p>"But, as I said before," continued Dorothy, "it's not because he's +Lieutenant-Governor,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> whatever the Mater may think about it, that I +admire him. It's just because he's so big, and earnest, and loyal, +and—and"—</p> + +<p>"White," said young Nisbet.</p> + +<p>"Yes, <i>isn't</i> he? That's it—white!"</p> + +<p>"I can understand a man like that getting spliced," observed young +Nisbet very earnestly. "He has so much to offer a girl. But as for the +rest of us"—</p> + +<p>"Oh, as to that," broke in Dorothy airily, "John Barclay isn't the only +man in the world, by any manner of means! Besides, Natalie having +already bagged him, it is plain I shall have to look elsewhere."</p> + +<p>There was a long pause, broken only by the plash of the water, which +seemed, as the seconds slipped by, to grow amazingly loud. Then young +Nisbet raised his eyes, and looked at her, blushing deplorably.</p> + +<p>"I wish"—he said, "I wish"—</p> + +<p>"Dorothy! <i>Do</i> excuse me, Mr. Nisbet, but <i>really</i>—dinner at seven, you +know, and this child <i>must</i> be thinking about dressing. She takes +<i>ages</i>!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p> + +<p>Mrs. Rathbawne folded her fat hands, and stood waiting, at the +conservatory door. Young Nisbet rose.</p> + +<p>"Of course!" he said. "I'm always so stupid about these things. Good-by, +Miss Rathbawne. I'm off to New York to-morrow on some confounded +business, so I probably won't see you for a week or so. Good-by."</p> + +<p>"<i>Would</i> you mind going out by the hall, Mr. Nisbet?" suggested Mrs. +Rathbawne. "Mr. Barclay is in the drawing-room with my elder daughter, +and he is so <i>greatly</i> occupied with affairs of state that they have +<i>very</i> little time together. I <i>hate</i> to have them interrupted. One can +do <i>so</i> much harm sometimes, you know, by thoughtlessly interrupting +people who are in love with each other. Thank you <i>so</i> much; good-by. +<i>Do</i> try to stand a little straighter, Dorothy, my dear."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<h3>A FACE IN THE CROWD</h3> + + +<p>At the sound of the Lieutenant-Governor's voice at the front door, Mrs. +Rathbawne had beaten a hasty retreat, dragging her immensely edified +half-sister in her wake, so that when he stepped through the curtained +doorway Barclay found Natalie alone.</p> + +<p>"I'm so glad you could come early," she said, from the corner of the +divan. "Now we can have a talk before dinner. I seem to see so little of +you. I suppose that's the penalty attached to being engaged to the +second biggest man in the state. I'm sometimes jealous, Johnny boy, of +Alleghenia's place in your affections."</p> + +<p>"You're the only person in the world who has no need to be," laughed +Barclay. "What is the news?"</p> + +<p>"Probably," said Natalie, "the only inter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>esting items are that you are +cold and a little cross, and that you want a big chair and a cup of tea +and some hot toast."</p> + +<p>"Your summary of the situation is so exhaustive," said Barclay, "that +there seems to be nothing left for me to say, except that you are the +most beautiful girl in the world, and that I think I must stand still a +moment and just look at you, before I accept any of the luxuries you +suggest."</p> + +<p>"I can't imagine how you know that I'm so beautiful. You can't possibly +see me in this dark corner. But I see I've made one mistake! You are +distinctly <i>not</i> cross."</p> + +<p>"Why should I be?" asked the Lieutenant-Governor, standing before the +table, with his long legs far apart, and rocking from his toes to his +heels and back again. "When a man has been walking for half an hour +through a gnawing February air, and suddenly, out of all proportion to +his deserts, comes full upon a rose in bloom, is that a reason for being +cross?"</p> + +<p>She was very small, and deliciously delicate,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> was Natalie Rathbawne, +like a little Dresden image, with an arbutus-pink complexion, brown +hair, and deep-blue eyes, now clouded thoughtfully, but oftener alight +with humor, or dilating and clearing under the impetus of conversation. +A doll-like daintiness of tiny pleats and ruffles, fresh bows, and fine +stitching pervaded everything she wore, and if her voice inspired the +hackneyed comparison of running water, it was of water running under +moss, the sound whereof is as different from that of an open brook as is +music from discord. To John Barclay's thinking the barely believable +fact that this little miracle of beauty—this pocket-Venus, as he was +wont to call her—actually belonged to him remained one of the insoluble +mysteries of life. He could not, in the thraldom of his present Elysium, +be expected to remember, even if he had ever fully realized, that he +himself was tall, broad-shouldered, clean-cut, and clean-lived, with the +unmistakable stamp of the American gentleman on his linen and his +simple, well-fitting clothes, and the evidences of a sane, regular +existence<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> in his steady hands and his clear eyes and his firm mouth,—a +man of whom any woman might be, and of whom this particular woman was, +extravagantly proud. For the first tribute which a lover lays at the +feet of his lady is, in ordinary, the stamped-upon and abused summary of +his personal attributes, which, in his own mind, he has taken remarkable +pains to render as despicable as possible, and which, in hers, her +imagination contrives not only to rehabilitate, but to imbue with a +preposterously exaggerated splendor.</p> + +<p>"I wonder," added the Lieutenant-Governor presently, "whether when +gentlemen are invited to tea they are supposed to kiss the hostess on +entering."</p> + +<p>"If you are in any doubt about it," observed Natalie, with an air of +superb indifference, "I advise you to write for advice to the etiquette +editor of the 'Kenton City Record.' She is probably sixty-two years old, +looks like an English walnut, has never had a proposal in her life, and +so knows all about"—</p> + +<p>What the lady in question was supposed to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> know all about was for +sufficient reasons never made clear. There are occasions, despite the +manuals of polite behavior, when interruption cannot with any approach +to justice be regarded as rudeness.</p> + +<p>Barclay heaved a long sigh of satisfaction as he took his tea and two +thin slices of toast and settled himself in his chair.</p> + +<p>"Do you think it possible," he asked, "for a man to be asleep for six +weeks, dreaming that he is in another garden of Eden, with an Eve in a +French frock, who has no partiality for apples"—</p> + +<p>"I <i>adore</i> apples!" said the girl.</p> + +<p>"And then wake up," he continued, disregarding the interruption, "and +find that the dream was only a dream, after all,—that he's only a poor +dog of a politician, that the garden is only a dingy office, and the +flower-beds full of briers and pitfalls?"</p> + +<p>"You've been eating pie for lunch again," said Natalie severely, "and it +always makes you morbid. No; I don't think it possible at all. If I did, +I should hang on to your coat<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span>tails like fury and keep you in dreamland, +whether you wanted to wake up or not."</p> + +<p>"It's all too good to be true! How <i>dare</i> you be so beautiful?"</p> + +<p>"John"—</p> + +<p>"It's gospel truth!"</p> + +<p>Barclay paused for a moment, and then went on more seriously.</p> + +<p>"You're tired, littlest and most lovely in the world, and troubled about +something."</p> + +<p>Natalie laughed shortly, with evident effort.</p> + +<p>"Why do you say that?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"Why not? Don't you suppose I know? Do you think you could say a hundred +words without my perceiving that? It almost seems to me that the +knowledge that you were unhappy would make its way to me, no matter what +distance separated us, and that I should come to you at top-speed to set +things right. I've hardly seen your face, and yet I know your dear, deep +eyes are troubled; I had barely heard your voice before I felt its +weariness."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span></p> + +<p>Natalie bent forward until her face came under the light.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I'm tired," she said; "or, rather, I was tired when I first came +in. I'm better now, since I've had my tea. But you're right, Johnny +boy,—there's something more. I'm troubled, desperately troubled and +heartsick. I've been trying to make myself believe that it's all +imagination, that I have no reason for feeling as I do; but I'm afraid I +can't manage it. John, I thought I saw Spencer Cavendish to-day."</p> + +<p>"Spencer Cavendish? Are you sure? I had almost forgotten his +existence!—Of course, it's not impossible; but I imagined he had taken +root in some South Sea island long ago. That's what he was always +expecting to do, you remember. How I have hated that man!"</p> + +<p>"You were good friends once."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and should be yet, if I had not been the most suspicious mortal +that ever breathed, and he the most hot-blooded. There was a reason, you +know,—a little reason, but the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> most important in the world! I was +jealous, Natalie, insanely jealous. I could forgive him everything now."</p> + +<p>"That hurts me, John. I'm so happy, boy dear, that I want everybody else +to be happy as well. Oh, why is it that a girl must always have that one +thought on her mind, which is so hard, so hard?—I mean the thought of +the good men, the true, brave, loyal men, whom she has cared for, who +have been her best friends perhaps, and yet whom she has been forced to +hurt bitterly because they asked her for something she was not able to +give. A man has so much easier a road! His happiness, when it comes to +him, isn't clouded by the thought of those to whom it means the loss of +their last remnant of hope. They are there, the disappointed ones, but +he doesn't know, he doesn't know! He hasn't on his conscience the memory +of hearts cruelly wounded,—wounded even to death. He doesn't in memory +see the eagerness in a good friend's eyes die to disillusion, to +hopelessness, to bitter, bitter sorrow. He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> doesn't have to remember how +the life died suddenly out of a voice that had been tender and eloquent. +He doesn't sicken with the thought that his hand has given a blow so +merciless, so unmerited, and yet so inevitable. Worst of all, for the +girl, is the after-discovery that her decision has made a difference—a +hideous, irreparable difference,—that the man can never be the same +again,—that she has wrecked a life with a word! Oh, there ought to be +some way! The man ought not to ask unless he is sure of the reply! It's +too much responsibility to force upon the girl!</p> + +<p>"So with Spencer Cavendish," she went on after a moment. "In spite of +all—in spite of all, John!—I can't forget that he loved me. I think a +woman never forgets that."</p> + +<p>"Until the man marries another woman!"</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Natalie, with a faint smile, "then least of all, John! And +besides, Spencer never married. He knew I loved you, long before you +did! I felt that it was due to him that he should know; he was my +oldest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> and best friend then, and so I told him! And then he went out of +my life—out of his own—into darkness. I can't forget it! I can't +forget that I broke up your friendship"—</p> + +<p>"Dearest!"</p> + +<p>"I did, John! It wasn't my fault, perhaps, nor any one's, for that +matter, but I did, just the same. Besides, it wasn't only the question +of your friendship. What hurt me most was the wilful wreck of his life. +And yet, how could I have known what was going to happen? What could I +do when it did happen? He was beyond my reach. He didn't even answer the +letter I wrote, asking him to come and see me. I thought, if he cared +for me, I could save him. But it was just as he had said,—he must have +everything, or he would have nothing at all. And so he went wrong—oh, +so terribly, terribly wrong!—he who might have been anything, if it +hadn't been for me. I can never forget it—never! I can never forget the +pity of it, the tragedy of its awful publicity,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> the newspapers, the +scandal, people's sneers, his mother dying of a broken heart—<i>and I did +it</i>! Think of it! Think of a man like Spencer Cavendish in the police +courts, not once, but a dozen times. Think of what Justice Meyer called +him at last, and what was printed in the papers,—'a common drunk!' Oh, +John!"</p> + +<p>"Natalie, Natalie!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "Why should you +think of such things, brood over them, above all, blame them on +yourself? How could it possibly have been your fault? how could you +possibly have helped it? He was a reckless, hot-headed chap—brilliant, +of course, but a slave to his impulses and his nerves. If Lochinvars +could act with impunity nowadays, he'd have ridden up to your door on a +black horse, killed Thomas, and carried you off across his pommel. As it +was, he let himself go, and disgraced himself. I tried to talk to him, +just as you did, but he wouldn't have it—called me 'an insolent cub' +and—er—worse. I had to give it up. It was all<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> very distressing, I +admit, but then, dear, it was all so long ago. He hasn't been in Kenton +City for two years and more, and I've no doubt he pulled himself +together long since, and is leading a straight life somewhere. He had +lots in him, with all his recklessness. A chap like that, with no family +hanging about his neck, and with his brains, and only his own living to +make, could forge ahead almost anywhere."</p> + +<p>"But John, I'm <i>sure</i> I saw him to-day, and suppose I should tell you +that he was—begging?"</p> + +<p>Barclay almost smiled at her earnest, troubled face, as he replaced his +cup on the table.</p> + +<p>"Begging?" he answered. "I'm afraid I couldn't bring myself to believe +you, violet-eyes. Even granting that he has fallen as low as that, which +I should think one of the most unlikely things in the world, it would +hardly be in Kenton City, would it?—a place where his face is known to +a thousand people. Tell me about it. What makes you think you saw him?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I was shopping this morning," said Natalie, "all alone; and as I came +out of Kendrick's and was just about to get into the brougham, I saw +that someone was holding the door open for me. I looked up carelessly, +as one naturally would under the circumstances, and, John—I know it was +he! At first I thought so, and then I didn't, because he was so changed, +so thin and pale, and because he had a beard. So, before I thought what +I was doing, I stepped into the brougham, and put my hand on the door to +close it. Then I looked up again, and saw his face, peering in at me +through the glass, and that time there couldn't be any mistake. It +<i>was</i>! I was going to speak, but he was gone in a flash. I saw him +disappearing in the crowd before the shop—<i>slinking</i>, John!—with that +dreadfully pathetic air which all beggars have, his shoulders all +hunched up, and his head bent, and his hands in his pockets. He was +cold, John, I could see that, and, no doubt, hungry! And there I was, in +that dreadful little brougham, with my<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> hateful furs, as warm as toast, +and I didn't even speak to him. I could have died of shame!"</p> + +<p>She buried her face in her hands, bending low over the tea-table. +Barclay was leaning forward in his chair, his lips set.</p> + +<p>"It's impossible," he murmured, "impossible!"</p> + +<p>The girl looked up suddenly, a white spot in the centre of each cheek, +where the pressure of her thumbs had left its mark in the tender, pink +flesh.</p> + +<p>"Improbable—yes!" she said, "but not impossible. Oh, I wish I could +believe otherwise, but I'm sure, I'm sure! Oh, John! You are so big, so +strong, so powerful now! Think of it—Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia! +You can do anything. And if he <i>is</i> here in Kenton City, homeless, cold, +starving, you must find and help him—for me, Johnny boy, for me!"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor had risen, and was pacing up and down the room, +with his brows knit, and his strong, white hands chaf<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>ing slowly against +each other, palm to palm. It seemed impossible, indeed! Spencer +Cavendish, the last of one of Alleghenia's proudest families; Spencer +Cavendish, the brilliant young society pet and sportsman; Spencer +Cavendish, the wit, the <i>viveur</i>—a beggar in the street? And yet—</p> + +<p>The scandal of Cavendish's sudden and reckless plunge into sodden, open +dissipation, two years before, freshly called to Barclay's mind by +Natalie's words, had pointed to almost any finale, however debased, +however sordid. Barclay mentally invoked the face of his former friend, +as he had seen it on the occasion of their last meeting, flushed, +swollen-eyed, insolent, the fine patrician mouth hideously contorted and +maundering insults, filth, banality.</p> + +<p>"And I did it!" the girl was saying. "Don't forget that, John. +Unwittingly, ignorantly, helplessly, if you will, I did it, just the +same. If I could have loved him, I could have saved him. As it was, I +had to send him away, and he has come to—to this!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> Oh, don't you see? +Don't you understand that something more than chance has crossed my path +with his, just at this moment of my supremest happiness, and of his +utter degradation? My duty is plain. It is to help him, to uplift him, +to make a man of him once more—to undo what I have done! I'm +responsible—and I'm helpless! What can I do? What can any girl do in +such a case? I can't go out into the streets and search for him. I can +only turn to you, Johnny boy, and rely upon your aid."</p> + +<p>"But, Natalie dearest," said the Lieutenant-Governor slowly, "don't you +see that it is impossible, all this? I cannot allow such an affair to +come into your pure, sweet life, bringing with it the knowledge of the +depths to which men may fall, and the shadow of misery and degradation. +I cannot bear that, in even the remotest way, you should blame yourself +for that which it was never in your power to prevent or remedy. A +man—this man—has no business to cast on you the blight of his own +weakness and folly, to es<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>tablish a relation of cause and effect between +your refusal of him and the subsequent transformation of a gentleman +into a common drunkard."</p> + +<p>"John!"</p> + +<p>"Ah, don't think me bitter, dearest! If the man you saw was actually +Cavendish, I pity him from the bottom of my heart. But it was his hands +which built up the barrier between his life and ours, and it must be his +that tear it down. It is intolerable that in his degradation he should +come into your life again, and have, even in your imagination, the +smallest claim upon you—intolerable! The paths of my love for you and +my duty toward you are identical in this respect. There can be no +alternative—no quibbling. At least until he has redeemed himself, if +redemption is still possible, the thought of him, his presence, his +misdoings, must not and shall not contaminate the atmosphere in which +you live and move."</p> + +<p>Natalie had risen suddenly, her eyes ablaze.</p> + +<p>"Ah, John!" she said. "Am I then a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> toy, a sugar figure, that I must be +packed in cotton, and shielded from all knowledge of the evil in the +world? Is that what it means to be a woman? Ah, <i>no</i>! It is bad enough +to be hemmed in by the wretched conventionalities which prevent my doing +openly what I conceive to be my duty, without adding to the restrictions +that actually exist the imaginary one that I must not even think of the +misery, the wretchedness, the sordid vice which abound just across the +borders of the comfortable little world in which I live. And see, boy +dear!—with all the force of my conviction that things should be +otherwise, yet I am reasonable. I don't ask to see Spencer, or to have +an active hand in his redemption. I realize that the time for that has +passed, and that you are just in saying that he must come to me, not I +to him—and come to me another than the man he is to-day. Anything else +is impossible: that I see and accept. But the hideous fact remains. A +man who loved me once, who offered me all that a man can offer a woman, +is walking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> the streets of Kenton City, cold, hungry, homeless—a +beggar! What business is it of yours or mine what his past follies and +weaknesses were? His temptations may have been beyond our understanding, +but his present plight is not. He is begging—begging at our very +doors—a man whom we have called by the name of friend! I can't help +him. All I can do, as I said before, is to turn to you, whom I love +better than all the world, and ask you to save him, in my stead. Ah, +boy, boy!—I've given you all I refused to him, taken at your hands all +I put away at his. You can afford to be generous!"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor came slowly toward her, and, placing his hands +upon her shoulders, looked her in the eyes.</p> + +<p>"Dearest and Most Beautiful," he said tenderly, "you are right. I +hope—I believe—that you were overwrought, fanciful, that it is not +true. But if it is, if Cavendish is begging in our streets, then, so +surely as I am Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, I will pull him out of +them, and make a man of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> him, if it takes a month and every police +officer and detective in Kenton City to find him. And that not alone for +your sake, tenderest-hearted, but for mine. I <i>can</i> afford to be +generous, God bless your sweet face, I can indeed!"</p> + +<p>And he bent over reverently, and kissed her hand.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<h3>AS BETWEEN FRIENDS</h3> + + +<p>There were but two guests at the Rathbawnes' dinner-table that night, +the Lieutenant-Governor and Colonel Amos Broadcastle, a veteran of the +Rebellion, brevetted Major for conspicuous gallantry at Lookout +Mountain, and now commanding officer of the Ninth Regiment, N. G. A., +the crack militia organization of Kenton City. Colonel Broadcastle had +seen his sixty-five, but his broad, square shoulders, his rigid +carriage, and his black hair, even now only slightly touched with gray, +clipped twenty years from his appearance. His eye was one that was +famous throughout the Alleghenia Guard,—an eye accustomed to control, +not a single man, or two, or three, but a thousand, moving as one at his +command; an eye enforcing obedience immediate, machine-like, and +unquestioning.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span></p> + +<p>It had been a momentous day for the Ninth when Amos Broadcastle, +retiring from the staff of a former Governor, had accepted, first a +majority therein, and then, three months later, its colonelcy. He found +ten companies, in no one instance exceeding twenty files front. He found +a field and staff vain, incompetent, and jealous; company officers +deficient alike in their knowledge of tactics and in their conception of +their responsibilities; sergeants, corporals, and lances chosen without +any view to fitness, and ignorant and tyrannical in their positions; and +finally, the rank and file lazy, untidy, and frankly contemptuous of the +school of the soldier. Some one had once said of the Ninth that there +was consolation to be found in the mortifying knowledge that the men +composing it were there with the unique view of escaping jury duty. The +consolation lay in the probability that such infernally bad soldiers +would have made jurors quite as infernally bad.</p> + +<p>But Broadcastle, a born disciplinarian and a trained tactician, was now +in a position to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> echo, albeit in a different spirit, the arrogance of +Louis: "<i>Nous avons changé tout cela!</i>" Ten years had sufficed to change +the indolent and incompetent Ninth of Alleghenia into a regiment +rivaling in prestige the Seventh of New York. The commissioned officers +were thrust upon, rather than achieved by, their companies, but, once +established in their respective positions, proceeded without exception +to justify, by their energy and ability, their selection from the best +element of Kenton City. Among the enlisted men the exponents of the old +spirit of sloth, indifference, and laxity were weeded out as fast as +their terms of service expired, and their places filled from the same +sources whence the company officers were drawn. Colonel Broadcastle was +a diplomat as well as a disciplinarian. By some unknowable system of +suggestion and example it came, little by little, to be regarded in +Kenton City as "the thing" to belong to the Ninth. Before the capital +was aware of the transformation, every company roster read 103, the +field and staff had been reorgan<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span>ized and perfected, and the Ninth +Regiment, N. G. A., was what it remained thereafter: a magnificent +fighting machine, ably drilled, perfectly equipped, a credit to the +state, to the credit of which there stood so little else. The +declaration of war with Spain brought it suddenly into prominence by the +astonishing readiness with which it went into camp twenty hours after +the Adjutant-General of Alleghenia published the President's call for +volunteers; and although it never saw active service, it attracted at +Chickamauga, and later at Tampa, the admiring attention of the regular +army, and was spoken of as the most perfect body among the volunteer +forces.</p> + +<p>The citizens of Kenton City were not accustomed to discovering things in +which they could take pride. The exact contrary was more apt to be the +case. When, therefore, they discovered the rehabilitated Ninth, and its +redeemer in the person of its commanding officer, they had a deal to +say, and said it with unexampled arrogance and satisfaction. +Thenceforward, Alleghenia meant much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> to Colonel Broadcastle, and +Colonel Broadcastle considerably more than much to Alleghenia.</p> + +<p>Something of all this went through the Lieutenant-Governor's mind during +the progress of the dinner. He sat at Mrs. Rathbawne's right, than which +nothing in the world could have been more cheerless, unless it was +sitting at Mrs. Rathbawne's left. But the good lady's habitual +complacency was plainly in abeyance, her customary volubility replaced +by a fidgety reserve. The dinner, as a social achievement, was a +distinct failure, save in so far as Mrs. Wynyard and Colonel Broadcastle +were concerned. Several months before, Mrs. Wynyard had frankly +announced that she had designs upon the Colonel. Latterly, Barclay had +begun to suspect the Colonel of having designs upon Mrs. Wynyard. Thirty +and sixty-five that looked forty-five—a widow and a widower! More +wonderful things had happened.</p> + +<p>"If I were thirty years younger," Broadcastle was saying even now, as he +did full<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> justice to the celery mayonnaise, "I should say we were made +for each other."</p> + +<p>"Since two single people may be made for each other," laughed Mrs. +Wynyard, "I wonder if two married people can't be unmade for each other. +Perhaps that is just what has happened to us!"</p> + +<p>"I'll think that over," replied the Colonel with mock gravity. "I don't +want to commit myself on so serious a hypothesis, without due +reflection."</p> + +<p>They were the only ones who were thoroughly at ease. Barclay and +Natalie, unstrung by the events of the day, ate little and talked +listlessly. Dorothy, victim to an inward excitement which was half +happiness and half disappointment, chattered feverishly. Rathbawne was +wrapped in his own thoughts, and his wife, innocently unobservant of +emotional manifestations in any and every other, but pathetically +sensitive to the slightest evidence of mental perturbation in this +stern, kind man, between herself and whom existed a devotion dog-like in +its silence and intensity, watched<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> his clouded face with an anxiety +which she made no effort to conceal. The dinner dragged hopelessly, +until she shook herself into a bewildered realization that it was over, +folded her napkin scrupulously, dusted a few crumbs from the black-satin +slope of her obsolete lap, and, followed by her daughters and Mrs. +Wynyard, left the men to their cordials and cigars.</p> + +<p>The latter drew their chairs nearer, as the door closed, made little +clearings in the wilderness of finger-bowls, silver, and discarded +napkins, for the accommodation of their coffee-cups and cordial glasses, +and, lighting the long Invincibles which were Rathbawne's sole +extravagance, inhaled that first matchless whiff of smoke which makes a +whole day of anxiety and vexation seem to have been worth the while.</p> + +<p>It is a moment apart and <i>sui generis</i>, this, and is rivaled only by +that of early morning realization that one is awake—and not obliged to +get up. It is apt to pass in silence, for a newly lit cigar is like a +newly married<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> wife: a man is deliberately oblivious to all else. The +moment, too, is one of readjustment, of hasty mental survey of the +chatter that has passed, and of preparation for the essentially +dissimilar talk to come. With men of the mental calibre of the three +here assembled this opportunity is sacred to some of the gravest and +most vital thoughts which they exchange. Peter Rathbawne, in particular, +whenever he reviewed the paramount conversations of his life, seemed to +find their significance indissolubly fused with the fragrance of Havana +cigars and the taste of kümmel or yellow Chartreuse.</p> + +<p>His eyes dwelt thoughtfully upon his companions during the pause which +followed. First, on Broadcastle. He could depend upon him as he could +depend upon no other man on earth. They had fought side by side in many +a tight place in the black days of '62, and in many another, full as +tight, since then, on battlefields commercial and political. It is +doubtful whether so much as a single word of admiration or affection had +ever passed be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>tween them. It is equally doubtful whether anything could +have been more entirely superfluous than such a voicing of self-evident +sentiments.</p> + +<p>John Barclay, too! Peter Rathbawne, with what had been natural +shrewdness at the outset now sharpened almost to clairvoyance by his +years of dealing with a multiplicity of men and things, understood the +Lieutenant-Governor absolutely, and admired him with all the force of +his rugged nature. And Rathbawne was not given to admiring people. His +business experience had not fostered the spirit of hero-worship. He had +seen too much for that. But in the two men before him he recognized +qualities so unusual, and in many ways so similar, that he was proud to +count them friends.</p> + +<p>For the moment, however, as he took stock of them, he was measuring them +by a new standard, more rigid, more severe than he had hitherto had +reason to apply. It is one thing to trust a man implicitly, and another +thing entirely to try to tell him so. For silence is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> most golden in the +specification of friendship, and when employed in the particularizing of +intimate emotion the silver of speech is apt to turn to veriest tinsel.</p> + +<p>Yet the occasion was one which demanded speech. Moreover, and in direct +opposition to his inclinations and the precedents he had established, he +was forced not only to give practical expression to his feeling for +Broadcastle and Barclay, but, what humiliated as well as annoyed him, to +confess himself incapable of dealing with a question which confronted +him. It was the first time within his recollection when he had +mistrusted his own judgment.</p> + +<p>But Peter Rathbawne was not the man to procrastinate, and presently he +began to speak, in a low but curiously intense voice, from which the +others instinctively took their cue. He was a short man, inclined to +stoutness, but with the clear, sharp eye and the underhang of jaw which +tell of right principle and indomitable perseverance. It was a question +whether in calling him the second<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> most obstinate man in Alleghenia, +Governor Abbott had given him the full measure of his due.</p> + +<p>"Gentlemen," he said, with the somewhat stilted formality which was part +of his manner, "I will say to you what I wouldn't say to others,—I'm in +a hole, and I want your advice. I'll be as brief as possible, and I'll +come right to the point. For thirty years I've been building up the +Rathbawne Mills, giving them every hour of my thought, every particle of +my strength, every atom of my ability. I've seen them grow from a little +shanty on the outskirts of Kenton City to a collection of buildings +covering four solid squares, filled with modern machinery, and employing +four thousand, two hundred and odd hands. I've been a business man, I've +been a rigid man, but I've been a fair man, too. No one can say that I +ever clipped wages, even when I had to run the mills at a loss, as I've +had to do more than once. I gave my people an eight-hour day long before +the law of Alleghenia jammed it down the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> throats of other mill-owners. +I swallowed the Union, though it was a bitter mouthful. There has never +been a just complaint from one of my employees that wasn't attended to +in short order, if it was in my power to do so. There's many an old +fossil on my pay-rolls to-day who isn't worth his salt, but he stays +there, and will continue to stay there, because he did his best when he +could, and it's not his fault that he's dead wood now. I've given in, +over and over again, in one way or another, sometimes against my +convictions, and oftener against my will. But one thing I've stuck to, +and that's my right to discharge a hand when I see fit, without +dictation from the Union or anybody else. In the past, this has been +comparatively easy sailing. One man, now and again, isn't a ripple on +the surface of four thousand employees. Besides, there was always a good +reason. The others saw that, and there was never a finger raised. They +believed in me, through and through, and it has been my pride to know +that they did, and that they had good cause<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> to. But now it's different. +There has been a band of young good-for-nothings in Shop 22, who were +full, chock-a-block, of socialism, and equality, and workingmen's +rights, and God knows what-not! They've talked enough poisonous gas to +the other hands to blow up a state. They distributed pamphlets, and made +speeches, and organized clubs, and fomented discord, till I got sick and +tired of it. There wasn't one square day's work in the whole fifteen of +them put together. So, when I'd stood them as long as I could—which was +at ten o'clock yesterday morning—I discharged them all in a bunch, and +if there'd been a steep place handy, I'd have expected to see them all +run violently down it into the sea—like the other swine, in Scripture. +For if ever there was a band of devils made incarnate, it was that same +fifteen who were sowing anarchy broadcast through the Rathbawne Mills!</p> + +<p>"Now—what? Lo and behold, they are all henchmen and disciples of +Michael McGrath, whom we in Kenton City know to our cost,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> and regular +and loyal members—save the mark!—of his Union. Well, gentlemen, I've +got that Union about my ears like a nest of hornets, with McGrath at the +head, and unless those fifteen men are reinstated by noon to-morrow, my +four thousand hands will be out on strike, and the Rathbawne Mills will +be tied up as tight as a drum!"</p> + +<p>"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle curtly, as the other paused.</p> + +<p>"That's what I meant to do—but where am I going to come out? If I +thought, for instance, that I was going to have your regiment to back me +up, Broadcastle, or even the Kenton City police, why, well and good! But +<i>am</i> I? No, sir! <i>No</i>, sir! Not with Elijah Abbott in the Governor's +chair, I'm not! You know that as well as I. Why, Broadcastle, I'd rather +see McGrath himself at the capitol than that smooth-spoken skunk!"</p> + +<p>He paused to relight his cigar, and then continued.</p> + +<p>"The Rathbawne Mills are like the fruit<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> of my own body to me. I love +them! I love every stone and brick of them, that I've put in place, as +it were, with my own hands. I've often thought that if they should burn +down it would come close to killing me. And yet I could watch them go +with a lighter heart, God knows, than that with which I foresee the +misery that's coming to these people of mine, who are going to starve at +the bidding of a band of black-legs, and that not even because they +think their cause a just one, but simply because they can't help +themselves. It isn't only that ruin's staring me in the face, though +there's that possibility in the situation, too, but that privation, +bitter misery, and despair are lying in wait for them. God!—what an +iniquity!</p> + +<p>"But I <i>can't</i> give in, Broadcastle—I <i>can't</i> give in, John Barclay! It +means the sacrifice of a principle I've held out for, and that I know is +right. What's more, it isn't as if I were yielding one point. It would +only be the beginning. If I give in now, I might as well turn over the +mills to McGrath at once,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> and let him run them according to his own +blackguardly will. You know how such things go. Give them an inch"—</p> + +<p>"And they raise a hell!" put in Colonel Broadcastle.</p> + +<p>"Exactly! It's commercial suicide. And yet, if I <i>don't</i> yield, I'm +precipitating disorder, and bloodshed, and the untold suffering of four +thousand souls. What am I to do?"</p> + +<p>"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle, with a sharp nod of his head.</p> + +<p>Rathbawne turned from him to the Lieutenant-Governor, and to the latter, +knowing the man he had been, there was something indescribably +heart-rending in the sudden, irresolute trembling of his half-raised +hands, the slow shake of his head, and the pathos of his raised eyebrows +and drooping lips.</p> + +<p>"John," he said, "I'm an old man, and you're a young one, but I'm a +plain citizen, and you're the Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia. You +know how things stand. Now, I've given you my girl, and after that it's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> +not much to put myself into your hands as well. I'm getting on. My +strength isn't what it was. I'm not as fit to stand such a struggle as +this is bound to be, as I was thirty years ago. I look strong, but, in +reality, I'm not. My doctor has warned me, more than once. A sudden +shock—you know what these medical chaps say about sudden shocks! I've +laughed at him, of course, and yet—I know there is truth in it. I've +been up against hard propositions, but never one as hard as this. I've +had big responsibilities, but never a responsibility that I felt as I +feel this one. If I hold out, I know what people and the newspapers will +say,—how they'll blackguard me,—but I'm not afraid of that. I'm not +even thinking of it. No, and I'm not thinking of what the strain may +mean to me. Every man's turn is sure to come—why not one way as well as +another? But what I <i>am</i> thinking of is the result upon the lives of +these people whom I've made, as surely as if I were another Creator. And +McGrath's another Beelzebub!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> There's a fight on between us for the +salvation of a little world of four thousand souls! But I'm not God! I +can't act with the conviction of omniscience. I've been the most +independent of men. I've made my own fortune with my own brains. I've +done as I saw fit, and the results have seemed to indicate that I've +been oftener right than wrong. But now, I'm at a loss. It's not the men +I'm thinking of so much. They ought to be able to make their own way, as +I've made mine. It's the women and children dependent upon them—the +women and children who have no voice in the matter, and yet who are +bound to suffer most by a strike. I've got to think for them. I've +reached a crisis—a cross-ways—and I've got to choose which course to +take—and I can't! All my experience counts for nothing. I've never—you +probably know it—asked for advice before. But now I must have the +unprejudiced, the outside point of view. I've always thought there was a +clear, unmistakable boundary between right and wrong, but now there's +some right<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> in the wrong, and a big sight more of wrong in the right! +I've heard Broadcastle's opinion, and I want yours. If you agree, I'll +go by what you say. As I said before, John, in this matter I'm the +individual—you're the state. I'll go by what you say. What shall I do?"</p> + +<p>Peter Rathbawne's words had wrought tremendously upon the +Lieutenant-Governor. He answered slowly, looking down, and with a +perceptible tremor in his voice.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Rathbawne, you and the Colonel know how high-sounding my title is, +and how little, in reality, it means. There is no need to go into +details. I'm Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, yes!—and as helpless in +the cause of right as a new-born baby! If I could by any means, in any +manner, support the advice I gave you, I would give it willingly."</p> + +<p>"John!" said Peter Rathbawne, "I don't mean that. I've put the case +wrongly. Give me your counsel, not as Lieutenant-Governor, but as my +friend, and the man who loves my daughter!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor raised his eyes from the finger-tips with which, +as the other was speaking, he had been plucking at the cloth.</p> + +<p>"Fight them, Mr. Rathbawne," he said, "and may God help you—because I +can't!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<h3>A BRAND FROM THE BURNING</h3> + + +<p>More heartsick than he cared to confess, even to himself, the +Lieutenant-Governor left the Rathbawnes' earlier than his wont, despite +the fact that his host and Colonel Broadcastle were still engaged in +discussing the impending situation, and that Natalie, with a batch of +new music, was waiting for him at the piano. He pleaded an unusually +busy day and his consequent fatigue as an excuse, and so, at half after +nine, found himself about to light a second cigar, on the steps of the +Rathbawne residence, and shivering a little in the night air, which +stung the inside of his nostrils and set his eyes watering. Raw as the +day had been, it had turned colder now, but the night was superbly +clear. The sky seemed to have drawn nearer to the earth, and the stars +twinkled so sharply and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> clearly against its deep blue-black that they +resembled in form their conventionally five-pointed counterfeits of +silver paper. A brisk wind whirled a few dried leaves in whispering +eddies across the smooth asphaltum of the driveway, but beyond this and +the peevish sputtering of the arc-light on the opposite corner there was +no sound. It was the kind of night which, with its crystal clearness and +its steely intensity, stirs the normal pulse to keen exhilaration: yet +never had John Barclay felt more hopelessly dispirited, more utterly at +a loss to see the way before him. That anxiety, distress, possibly +actual disaster should be impending over this house where lay his heart, +his happiness, and his hope, was sufficiently disturbing in itself. That +he should not be able, despite his position, to raise a hand to avert +the calamity was worse. But that the battle was to be a battle for the +right, and yet, as it seemed, foredoomed from the start to end in +disaster, since no aid could be expected from the strong arm of the law +to which the partisans of principle<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> turn naturally for support: this +was worst of all. For out of dangerous surroundings he felt himself able +to snatch away the littlest and most lovely woman in the world. She, at +least, should not suffer. And out of this nightmare of powerless +prominence, of impotent position, he himself could retire into private +life, and be no less a man than he had been before. But from the +reproach of corruption which had fallen upon her, and the impending slur +of anarchy, who was to rescue Alleghenia? The Lieutenant-Governor set +his lips and drove his nails into his palms, as he stood in the shadow +of the Rathbawnes' doorway, looking up at the sky of the February night. +He was not a religious man—as the term goes—but in that moment he said +a better prayer for the welfare of his state than had ever lain upon the +lips of any priest in Kenton City!</p> + +<p>He was about to strike his match when an instinct rather than an actual +perception of movement arrested his hand. Bradbury Avenue, upon which +stood the Rathbawne house,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> was situated in one of the quieter residence +districts which prided itself on the turfed spaces between its +dwellings, pretentious enough for the most part, and the double rows of +trees which lined its thoroughfares. It was one of these trees which, at +the moment, attracted Barclay's attention. It lay in a direct line +between himself and the arc-light on the corner, and its trunk, in some +miraculous manner, had abruptly developed an elbow, and then an arm. The +Lieutenant-Governor was still staring at this phenomenon when it was as +abruptly explained by the sudden emergence from shadow of a man, who had +apparently been standing on the side of the tree nearest to the house. +He was crossing the avenue obliquely when something about his bearing +caused the Lieutenant-Governor to lean forward and follow him intently +with his eyes. It was all there, as Natalie had said—the lifted +shoulders, the bent head, the unmistakable, pathetic air of the beggar. +Then, as he neared the light, he gave a short upward strain to his neck +and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> chin, the impatient movement of a man whose collar annoys him. The +trick was too familiar to have been forgotten. The next moment Barclay's +heels were pounding on the asphaltum behind him, and then Barclay's hand +fell upon his shoulder and whirled him round.</p> + +<p>In the oddly intense radiance of the arc-light above, which cut sharply +across the surface of forehead, cheek, and chin, and left heavy shadows +like those in a roughly blocked-out carving, under brow, nose, and lower +lip, the two men faced each other briefly, in silence. Then the +Lieutenant-Governor voiced the other's name, hardly above a whisper.</p> + +<p>"Spencer Cavendish!"</p> + +<p>And the other, echoing the tone, if not the words, replied:—</p> + +<p>"Bar-clay!"</p> + +<p>A square away, the lights of a hansom winked into the avenue, and the +hoof-beats of the horse clonked on the pavement, unaccompanied by any +sound from the smoothly trundling, rubber-tired wheels. Barclay stepped +to the kerb, and hailed the driver<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> with his stick. The cab drew in, +stopped, and threw the divisions of its apron wide, like two black hands +extended in cordial welcome.</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor turned to his companion.</p> + +<p>"Get in," he said. "I want to have a talk with you."</p> + +<p>The drive of a mile and more from Bradbury Avenue to Barclay's quarters +in the new bachelor apartment-house "Rockingham" was accomplished +without the exchange of a word. Once, he felt his companion shiver, and +dragging a rug from under them, he spread it across their knees. That +was the only movement on the part of either. They sat, side by side, +looking straight before them over the horse's bobbing crupper, until the +hansom pulled up sharply before the broad and brilliantly illuminated +entrance of the "Rockingham." As they passed in, Cavendish had a passing +impression of tiled floors, columns of green marble, and attendants in +tightly fitting green uniforms with brass but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>tons. Then an elevator +whirled them up to the eighth floor, deposited them in a square hallway, +and vanished again, with the little page in charge wrinkling his nose +and biting the thumb of his cotton glove.</p> + +<p>"Wot's the Loot'nt-Guvnor up to now, Sawed-Off?" inquired the doorkeeper +genially, as the elevator returned to the ground floor.</p> + +<p>"Ide'no!" replied the little page with equal affability. "Goin' in fer +pol'tics, I guest. Jeest! Wot a slob it wuz—wot?"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor unlocked the door of his apartment, touched an +electric button which flooded the little hall and the drawing-room +beyond with light, and, entering the latter, went directly to a closet +in the wall. Unlocking this, he took out a jar of biscuits and a +decanter, and setting them upon the table, turned once more to his +companion.</p> + +<p>"Put away a couple of those biscuits and a glass of sherry," he said, +"and then we'll talk."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I'm past biscuits," said the other, almost sullenly.</p> + +<p>"I'll see to that," replied Barclay. "They are only by way of a +starter."</p> + +<p>He passed into the hall as he spoke, and presently Cavendish heard the +click of a telephone receiver slipping from its crotch, and Barclay's +voice speaking, to some one below, of a steak, vegetables, salad, and +coffee. He stepped to the table, devoured two or three of the biscuits +ravenously, poured himself a glass of sherry, sipped, and then swallowed +it, and flung himself down upon a wide divan.</p> + +<p>"Have you a cigarette?" he asked, as Barclay reëntered. "I haven't +smoked in three days. That's worse than mere hunger, you know."</p> + +<p>"I believe you!"</p> + +<p>Barclay pushed a silver box across the table, and seating himself +opposite, touched a match to the cigar which he had been about to light +at the Rathbawnes' door, and which he still held between his lips.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Help yourself," he added. "Your supper will be up presently. Meanwhile, +shall I fire away, or will you?"</p> + +<p>Cavendish let the first smoke from his cigarette curl slowly up his +cheek before replying. In the full light now first resting upon it, his +face showed as that of a man approximately Barclay's age, but pinched by +want, and deeply lined by dissipation. His under lids were puffy and +discolored, and a dozen heavy creases ran, fan-like, from the corners of +his eyes. Hair already turning white and an unkempt mustache and beard +completed the picture. His clothes were faded and frayed, no linen was +visible, and his boots were cracked and soggy. There was nothing about +him to suggest the former estate of gentleman save his hands, which, +while thin and tremulous, were clean and well-kept, in singular contrast +to the slovenliness of his attire.</p> + +<p>"Age before respectability," he said in reply to Barclay's question, +with a shrug. "I'll go first. It will save your asking questions. We +parted in anger, Barclay."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Let that pass," put in the Lieutenant-Governor, briefly. "Two years +wipe out all scores as petty as was the cause of our quarrel."</p> + +<p>"Well, then," continued Cavendish more easily, "when I left Kenton City, +it was with the best intention in the world of making a fresh start in +some place where my story wasn't known. I went to New York. I had a +little money, but only a very little, and not the most remote idea of +how difficult it is for a man to make his way in a place where he is +unknown, particularly if he has no credentials and is too proud to ask +for any from his old associates. Moreover, I'd been drinking hard for +six months and there was no such thing as clipping it short all at once. +I had an idea of tapering off, and perhaps, if I had found a job, I +might have done so. As it was I climbed up one step and fell down two, +and that went on indefinitely. It wasn't as if I'd had a distinct aim or +anything in my life which made it seem worth living. I didn't half care. +I'd set my heart on some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span>thing which I couldn't get, and—well, never +mind that. It is all as long ago as the Flood! I got work now and again, +tried reporting, and teaching, and copying. But each time it was a grade +lower, and I stuck to nothing but the whiskey—except when I had a +little more money than usual, and then it was absinthe."</p> + +<p>He touched his eyes, and then raised his hand to the level of his chin, +with the fingers held wide apart and rigid, and watched it tremble for +an instant in silence.</p> + +<p>"I haven't seen a mirror in weeks," he went on, "but I know the signs +are all there. That's the story. I could string it out for an hour, but +it would all be in the same key. I've simply been going down, down, +down. I'm what the old judge called me—do you remember it came out in +the 'Record?'—I'm a common drunk, Barclay. And I don't care! I've been +on the point of putting an end to it many a time—but I always held out +for another drink! Now, even my pride's gone. It stuck to me longer than +anything else, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> it's taken itself off at last. I've been feeling +lately that I'm pretty near the end, and I wanted to see Kenton City +again before it came. That's the reason I walked all the way from +Pittsburg, and I've been begging on the streets since I got in. I +thought nobody would recognize me."</p> + +<p>"But <i>I</i> did," said Barclay.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and—and"—</p> + +<p>"Yes, and <i>she</i> did! She saw you this morning, but before she took in +fully that it was you, you were gone in the crowd. She was half +heart-broken over it, and made me promise to look you up. I was going to +do so, when I tumbled against you by chance to-night. You were watching +the house?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, for the last time. I saw she had recognized me and that Kenton +City was no place for me. So I was off again to-night. Is she"—</p> + +<p>"She is well, and, I am glad to say, happy. We are to be married in the +autumn."</p> + +<p>A smile hovered for an instant on Cavendish's lips.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></p> + +<p>"God bless her!" he said slowly. "I'm glad of it. But don't let's talk +of that. She's as far above me as the stars!"</p> + +<p>"And as far above me, too, for that matter!" answered Barclay. "Here's +your supper. While you're eating, I'll take my turn at the talk."</p> + +<p>A bell-boy arranged the tray on the table, removed the covers, and in a +moment the two men were again alone. With a deep sigh of satisfaction +Cavendish drew a chair to the table and set to work on the steaming +dishes before him.</p> + +<p>"Jupiter!" he said, with the first mouthful poised on his fork, "you +don't know what this means, Barclay, and you can thank God you don't. I +won't attempt to thank you. Go on, and tell me about yourself."</p> + +<p>"I've no intention of doing that just at present," replied the +Lieutenant-Governor, settling himself more comfortably in his chair. "I +want to talk about you. Don't be afraid. I'm not going to preach! But I +<i>am</i> going to say that while I understand a good deal of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> what you've +said, the last part is pure rot! You're a bit of a wreck, of course, but +it isn't your pride or your self-respect or whatever you choose to call +it, that's gone. It's only your nerve. Now you've had your experience, +and you're back where you belong, and you've friends who like you, and +who can help you, and who will. I'm in a position to do so myself, and I +don't expect you to make any bones about accepting my assistance, and +whatever money you need for the moment. It will be a loan, of course, to +be repaid when you're on your feet again. We'll have you there in no +time. When you've made way with the grub, you can bunk down on that +divan for the night, and in the morning I'll tog you out in one of my +outfits, and you can set about getting back on <i>terra firma</i>. You'll +have to shake the drink, that goes without saying."</p> + +<p>Cavendish straightened himself suddenly, laid down his knife and fork, +and laughed shortly.</p> + +<p>"It sounds well," he said bitterly, "but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> you don't understand, Barclay. +It's too late! I don't care, and if I did, I couldn't shake the drink to +save my immortal soul. I'm steady enough for the time being, because I'm +hungry and because I'm being fed. But I've tried the other game too +often. I know what it means. I wouldn't promise you to quit, because I +don't want to lie to you, and that's all it would be. When the craving +comes back, I'll go down before it like a row of tenpins. No, Barclay, +it won't do."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, man! Do you want to tell me you're as weak as that?"</p> + +<p>"Every bit!" said Cavendish, attacking the steak again.</p> + +<p>"Well, I don't believe it, that's all. In the morning you'll be a +different man. I'll give you a bromide when you're ready for bed. You're +shaky, as it is, but that's all a matter of nerves. Now we'll drop the +subject, and talk of other things."</p> + +<p>It was midnight when they separated. Barclay brought out sheets and +blankets for the divan, produced pajamas for his guest,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> put the bath at +his disposal, and mixed a strong dose of bromide for him to take upon +retiring.</p> + +<p>Half an hour later, when he reëntered the drawing-room to see whether +Cavendish was in need of anything further, he found him standing by the +table in his pajamas, trembling, wide-eyed, and very pale.</p> + +<p>"What is it?" he asked. "Are you ill?"</p> + +<p>"No," answered Cavendish, striving in vain to control the trembling of +his lips, "only damnably nervous. Could you—could you give me a drop of +brandy, Barclay?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly not!" said the Lieutenant-Governor. "Pull yourself together, +man! There's your bromide. Take that. It's better than a thousand +brandies."</p> + +<p>Cavendish turned, lifted the glass, spilling a little as he did so, and +swallowed the sedative at a gulp. Then he stretched himself upon the +divan and drew the covers close up about his chin. Presently, from the +bedroom, Barclay heard him breathing deeply and regu<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span>larly, and turning +on his side, fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep.</p> + +<p>He awoke with a start, as the dawn was showing gray through the chinks +of his window curtains, with a vague, uneasy sense of something wrong, +and lay listening, every nerve strained taut. From the adjoining room +came the sound of Cavendish's breathing, but now it was more raucous, +more like groan following groan. The Lieutenant-Governor strove in vain +to put off the foreboding which lay heavy upon him, until, finally, +unable to resist the impulse, he rose, slid his feet into his slippers, +and going noiselessly into the drawing-room, stepped to the windows and +put the curtains softly aside. What first met his eye as he turned was +the door of his little wine-closet in the wall. It was standing wide +open, and about the lock the wood was hacked and hewed away in great +splinters. On a chair near by lay a rough knife with the blade open and +a sliver of wood yet sticking to the point. Then he looked toward the +divan. Cavendish was ly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>ing face down upon it, outside the blankets, +with his head lolling sharply over the edge. His left arm was extended +full length toward the ground, where his fingers just touched a bottle +of French absinthe, overturned upon its side, and uncorked, with the +thick, gummy liquid spread from its mouth in a circular pool on the +waxed floor.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<h3>McGRATH LAUGHS</h3> + + +<p>The clock on the huge central tower of the Capitol marked nine, as the +Lieutenant-Governor passed rapidly through the lofty entrance hall +toward the corridor leading to his office and that of Governor Abbott. +Already his promptness was proverbial, and there were those in the +great, grim building who looked forward to the moment of his arrival, +each morning, with a kind of eagerness. These were the simpler folk of +the official world with which circumstance housed him for eight hours +daily,—bootblacks, elevator-boys, porters, doormen. For to the big, +clean, wholesome personality which appeals irresistibly to these humbler +people, Barclay added an astonishing memory for faces, and for the names +and circumstances connected with them. It was a gift which counted as an +unspeakably<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> important factor in the establishment and maintenance of +unusually cordial relations with all those with whom he came in contact. +No one brought within the radius of his personal magnetism long resisted +it. It was only those who judged him from a distance, as did the press +and the rank and file of his party, or those who deliberately +misinterpreted him, as did his political enemies, who permitted +themselves anything short of enthusiasm for John Barclay. And this +faculty for attracting admiration and commanding respect, this +infallible kindness and this inherent dignity, were never made manifest +to so great advantage as in his attitude toward his inferiors. These +adored him. He accumulated, bit by bit, a remarkable store of intimate +information relating to them, and employed it in his intercourse with +them, with a tact and a frank sincerity of interest which never failed +of their effect. The response thus elicited was strongest of the minor +pleasures in his life. He was aware—none better—of the shrewdness +native to those who have no claim upon<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> one's recognition, their +appreciation of notice that is unfeignedly interested, their +sensitiveness to open indifference, their resentment of the simulated +consideration which is mere impertinence; and he was conscious of a +little inward thrill of satisfaction at the difference of attitude in +the employees at the Capitol as toward Governor Abbott and himself. +Where the former's suavity elicited only formal respect, manifestly +obligatory, his own whole-heartedness lined his way with smiles and +kindly greetings. His official existence, beset with annoyance, +mortification, and disappointment, was, as he often reflected, made +tolerable only by this friendliness which he, almost unconsciously, +inspired. Dogs, children, and his subordinates—the three most +intuitively critical classes of beings—were all his friends. The +pathway to and from the daily routine, which he was coming to regard as +moral martyrdom, was a pathway illumined with sunlight and strewn with +flowers!</p> + +<p>As the Lieutenant-Governor passed through his ante-room, with a wink at +the boy, a nod<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> to the stenographer, and a word of greeting to his +private secretary, and entered his office, he was surprised to find the +communicating door open, and to hear the sound of a vaguely familiar +voice in the Governor's room beyond. In an effort to place the speaker, +he hesitated briefly before advancing to a point which would bring him +within range of the Governor's eye. Almost immediately, the memory of +the convention rushed over him, and he recognized the voice as that of +Michael McGrath.</p> + +<p>"And it won't be a strike like other strikes," he was saying, "not so +long as I'm running it, that is. It's going to mean business from the +word go! There's been too much shilly-shallying in the strikes I've +known anything about, too much talk, and too much wasting of Union +funds. You know what I mean. It isn't enough to tie up a mill, and then +hang around on street-corners for two months, waiting for the other side +to give in. The only place to hit a man like Rathbawne is in his pocket, +and by that I don't mean<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> simply cutting off his income, but chopping +into his capital as well. He's got to understand"—</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor walked over to his desk, laid his hat and stick +on a chair, and, before removing his overcoat, began turning over the +pile of letters which awaited his attention. As he did so, Governor +Abbott's voice broke in suavely upon the other's.</p> + +<p>"I deprecate any resort to violence," he said. "You must proceed with +discretion if you expect the state to maintain an attitude of +neutrality. Otherwise, the police or the militia"—</p> + +<p>"Oh, to hell with the police and the militia!" broke in McGrath +impatiently. "What's the use"—</p> + +<p>"There is the Lieutenant-Governor now," interrupted the other. "Perhaps +he has some news for us. Mr. Barclay, will you kindly step in here for a +moment?"</p> + +<p>McGrath was standing on the opposite side of the Governor's table as +Barclay entered the room. He acknowledged the latter's curt nod<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> with an +ironical bow, slipped his hands into the pockets of his checked +trousers, and stood waiting, with his square head thrust forward, for +what was to follow.</p> + +<p>"Mr. McGrath has called," continued the Governor, "to explain the +attitude of the Union in the impending strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +I've been telling him of our conversation of yesterday afternoon, and +that, as you were to see Mr. Rathbawne last night, you would probably +have something to tell us in regard to his position. Were you able to +persuade him to a more reasonable view of the situation?"</p> + +<p>"I have nothing to add, sir, to what I said yesterday," replied Barclay. +"I told you then that I had no intention of endeavoring to influence Mr. +Rathbawne's judgment."</p> + +<p>"He spoke to you about it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"And asked your advice?"</p> + +<p>"He did."</p> + +<p>"And you replied?"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor flushed.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I beg to suggest, sir," he answered, "that this is hardly the time for +me to commit myself as to that. I conceive it to be a matter of official +privacy. Mr. McGrath"—</p> + +<p>"You have my authority to speak, Mr. Barclay," said the Governor. +"Indeed, I desire it. Since one side knows your views, there is no +reason why the other should not be informed as well. Mr. McGrath is the +president of the Union. It is best that he should know the attitude of +the state authorities in this controversy."</p> + +<p>"I am not in a position to question your wishes, sir. You should know +best."</p> + +<p>"One cannot pretend to be infallible, Mr. Barclay," answered the +Governor, rubbing his hands. "One can only do what seems to be right and +proper under the circumstances. By our conversation of yesterday, I in a +measure put the negotiations with Mr. Rathbawne into your hands."</p> + +<p>"It is a task I did not seek, sir. Pardon me if I say that it is also +one which I should<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> hardly have accepted, had I been aware that in +speaking as you did you were actually asking me to assume it. Mr. +Rathbawne is my friend, and, moreover, my personal convictions"—</p> + +<p>The Governor held up his hand.</p> + +<p>"There can be no question of friendship or of personal conviction, Mr. +Barclay, in the case of a duty imposed upon a state official. I realize +that what you—or I, for that matter—must do in the performance of our +obligations, is oftentimes disagreeable, oftentimes at variance with our +wishes. But that is unavoidable."</p> + +<p>Barclay moved uneasily. The intrusion of this pedantry, so conspicuously +insincere, with its implied rebuke, chafed him unspeakably, in view of +the presence of McGrath. The Governor had adopted the tone, half +authoritative, half reproachful, of a teacher reproving a refractory +child.</p> + +<p>"My time, as you must know, is inadequate to the demands made upon it. I +am forced,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> on occasions, to turn more or less important matters over to +others. To whom more naturally than to you, Mr. Barclay?"</p> + +<p>"May I suggest, sir, that there can be no profit in prolonging this +discussion? I appreciate the position perfectly, and I am quite prepared +to state what I know of Mr. Rathbawne's attitude toward the demands of +the Union."</p> + +<p>"Ah," said the Governor, "that is as it should be, and as satisfactory +as possible. Let me remind you, Mr. Barclay, that it was not I, but +yourself, who introduced this digression."</p> + +<p>He turned to the president of the Union.</p> + +<p>"You will understand from what I have said, Mr. McGrath," he added, +"both to the Lieutenant-Governor and to you, that in the matter of the +proposed strike, he is, to all intents and purposes, acting in my stead. +He was in a position to approach Mr. Rathbawne, and I was not. Now, Mr. +Barclay, if you please"—</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor straightened him<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span>self instinctively, as, for the +first time, he addressed himself to the agitator.</p> + +<p>"Mr. McGrath," he said, "my confidence in Mr. Rathbawne's fairness and +integrity would have led me to approve any course which he might have +seen fit to take. As you have already heard me say, I had absolutely no +intention of endeavoring to influence his judgment. Greatly to my +surprise, Mr. Rathbawne himself consulted me in the matter, without any +suggestion on my part, and asked for my advice."</p> + +<p>"That's fortunate," put in McGrath, "very fortunate. You've been able to +sidetrack a lot of trouble."</p> + +<p>Barclay's eyes hardened at the hypocrisy of the sneer.</p> + +<p>"I have pleasure in informing you," he continued, "that, in reply, I +advised him to fight the Union in the present dispute to the utmost of +his means and ability. I should have counseled him further to hold out +until he had spent his last cent and shed his last drop of blood, except +that, knowing him as I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> do, I conceived such a recommendation to be +wholly superfluous. Mr. Rathbawne has his character and his record +behind him. There is about as much chance of his yielding you an inch of +ground as if he were standing with his back against the Capitol!"</p> + +<p>McGrath shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p>"It's a damned funny way you have of not influencing people's judgment," +he said.</p> + +<p>"I mis-stated my attitude in saying that," retorted the +Lieutenant-Governor coolly. "I should have said, what, after all, is +self-evident, that I had no intention of trying to influence Mr. +Rathbawne in favor of the Union, at least so long as it is acting under +your dictation. Its present character is well known—almost as well +known as yours, in fact—and I believe its position in this matter to be +entirely untenable, unjustifiable, and iniquitous. I may add that if it +is, indeed, Governor Abbott's resolve that I am to deal, in his stead, +with the question of your proposed strike, you may confidently rely upon +having to put the entire state force of Alleghenia out of busi<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span>ness +before you can even so much as begin to bully Peter Rathbawne into +submission!"</p> + +<p>"If that's your opinion of the Union," said McGrath sullenly, "it might +be interesting to hear your opinion of me."</p> + +<p>"You are perfectly welcome to it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor +easily. "I consider you an unmitigated blackguard!"</p> + +<p>Governor Abbott tipped back his chair and looked at McGrath.</p> + +<p>"That's pretty plain talk," he said. "You see how it is, Mr. McGrath. +You'll have to go ahead on your own responsibility, and you mustn't be +surprised if the State steps in at the first evidence of disorder."</p> + +<p>McGrath rose, flecked some specks of dust from his waistcoat, and walked +toward the door without a word. On the threshold he turned, looked from +the Governor to the Lieutenant-Governor, and back again, and laughed. +Then he went out, closing the door softly behind him.</p> + +<p>At the Rathbawne Mills it was usual for a huge whistle to give one long +blast at noon as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> a signal for the lunch hour. On that day, however, +following McGrath's instructions, the single blast was replaced by five +short ones in rapid succession, and three minutes later the employees +were pouring through half a dozen gates into the streets surrounding the +mills, in laughing, chattering, excited streams.</p> + +<p>A majority of the men went directly to a hall in the neighborhood where +McGrath had called a mass-meeting for half-past twelve. A minority of +them crowded into the saloons of the vicinity, where they pounded on the +bars, and filled the close, smoke-grayed air with heated discussion. +Several of the discharged hands were in evidence, each surrounded by an +attentive group, and expounding more or less inflammatory views. The +women gathered in gossiping throngs on the sidewalks, laughing, and +pulling each other about by the arms. The boys played ball and leap-frog +in the streets, shouting, and whistling through their fingers. In brief, +the great strike was on, but, for the time being, it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> was masquerading +in the guise of a public holiday.</p> + +<p>At one o'clock the whistle blew again, and a thousand voices whooped a +derisive accompaniment, but no one of the throng in the streets made a +move toward the mills. Half an hour later, watchmen swung to and bolted +the gates, and, issuing presently from a small side entrance, in +company, were received with cheers, handshakes, and slaps upon the back. +Then the crowd gradually thinned,—many going to the already well-filled +hall where McGrath was delivering an address, and others to their +homes,—and a silence descended upon the neighborhood, broken only by +the voices of the men about the saloon doorways.</p> + +<p>At two, Peter Rathbawne, attended by his private secretary, came out of +the side entrance and walked slowly away in the direction of his home. +He held his head high, and his eyes straight to the front, and paid no +attention to the respectful greetings of those of the strikers who +saluted him, touching their hats. There were many among them whose +hearts<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> sank at this attitude in a man who had made it his boast that he +knew every hand in his mills by sight, and who, in the past, had had a +nod or a friendly word for each and all of them. For the first time a +premonition settled upon them of what this strike, which had been +welcomed principally for novelty's sake, might mean. It was the first +the Rathbawne Mills had ever known. Some of those who saw the face of +Peter Rathbawne that afternoon were already hoping that it might be the +last.</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor returned to his apartment for lunch. Cavendish +was still sleeping as he had left him, with a stalwart negro porter, +summoned from the Capitol by telephone early that morning, watching in a +chair. Under Barclay's orders, a carpenter had already removed the +splintered door of the wine-closet, and an upholsterer had replaced it +by a slender brass rod from which swung a velvet curtain. With his own +hands the Lieutenant-Governor had taken away the fallen bottle, mopped +up the pool of absinthe, and put the room to rights. Now he dis<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span>missed +the negro, took from his pocket a little box of strychnine tablets, +obtained from his physician on his way from the Capitol, and, after a +brief survey of his surroundings to see that all was in order, went over +to the divan and shook the sleeping man by the shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Come, lazy-bones!" he said, with a laugh. "You've slept over twelve +hours. That will do—even for a nervous wreck."</p> + +<p>Cavendish opened his swollen eyes slowly, looked at him, and then closed +them again with a murmured "Oh, God!" which was like a groan.</p> + +<p>To this the Lieutenant-Governor paid no heed. Passing into the bathroom, +he turned on the cold water in the tub, poured a half glass of vichy +from a syphon, and then returned, carrying the tumbler in his hand. +Cavendish had raised himself on one elbow, and was looking stupidly +about the room.</p> + +<p>"Here you are," said Barclay cheerfully. "Stow this pill, and here's +vichy to wash it down. Your bath's running. By the time<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> you've had it, +there'll be some clothes ready for you."</p> + +<p>Cavendish gulped down the tablet, and sat upright.</p> + +<p>"Last night"—he faltered.</p> + +<p>For the first time in his life, the Lieutenant-Governor called him by +his first name.</p> + +<p>"Last night, Spencer," he said, looking him fairly in the eye, "belongs +to the past, and is taboo. I won't hear a word about it. This is to-day. +Get up, and we'll set about putting wrong right. You're a man again. +Don't forget that. And I'm your friend. Don't forget that, either."</p> + +<p>His hand rested for an instant on the other's shoulder with a firm +pressure, and then he passed into his bedroom and shut the door.</p> + +<p>They had lunch together in the dining-room of the "Rockingham," and then +went up again to Barclay's rooms. At the door, Cavendish came to a halt.</p> + +<p>"I can't stand this," he said.</p> + +<p>"You'll have to," replied the Lieutenant-Governor, "so shut up!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You've made a change," said Cavendish obstinately, pointing to the +curtained cupboard.</p> + +<p>Barclay's eyes did not follow the gesture.</p> + +<p>"So have you!" he answered. "Now, look here. There are twenty dollars in +the waistcoat of that suit, and a letter to Payson of the 'Kenton City +Sentinel.' Go down and see him this afternoon, and I think he'll give +you a job at reporting, which will fix you up for the present. In +another pocket you'll find a box, with three tablets like the one you +had before lunch. Take one of them every two hours. In still another +pocket there's a key to these rooms. I'm going to be busy till about ten +o'clock, so you'll have to shift for yourself. Make yourself at home, +and if you're awake I'll see you when I come in."</p> + +<p>Taking him suddenly by the shoulders, he twisted him about, facing the +chimney piece, on which stood a photograph of Natalie Rathbawne, smiling +out of a silver frame.</p> + +<p>"I'll leave you to talk it out with her," he added simply.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the hall, as he passed out, he caught a reflection of Cavendish in a +mirror. His hands were resting on the mantel-edge, and he was leaning +forward with his haggard face close to the photograph. Barclay looked at +his watch.</p> + +<p>"Two o'clock," he said to himself, "and all's well!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<h3>THE MIRAGE OF POWER</h3> + + +<p>Barclay was conscious of a feeling of exhilaration such as he had not +known for many weeks, as he swung into Bradbury Avenue late that +afternoon on his way to the Rathbawne residence. The duties of the day +had been inordinately petty and vexatious, but he had dispatched them +one and all with something approaching enthusiasm,—a touch of the old +Quixotic energy with which he had taken office. The morning conversation +in Governor Abbott's room had braced and toned him. He forgot its +inauspicious opening, and even his distress at the attempt to force him +into the position of mediator between Peter Rathbawne and the Union, in +the solid satisfaction of having been able to speak his mind to McGrath, +and call that worthy a blackguard to his face. He was a man who +de<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>spised a quarrel, but, for its own sake, loved a square, hard fight.</p> + +<p>Back, however, of this somewhat inadequate excuse for cheerfulness lay +the Governor's assurance that in the matter of the strike his lieutenant +was to have free rein. It was the first time since the beginning of +their official association that Elijah Abbott had placed an actual +responsibility in Barclay's hands. A corner-stone laying, a banquet here +and there, the opening of a trolley line, or a library, or a +sewer,—these were the major calls upon the Lieutenant-Governor's time. +The main current of routine was a hopeless monotony of official +correspondence, investigations, statistics, reading and reporting on the +interminable and flatulent maunderings of the Legislature,—duties +heart-breaking in their desperate tedium and maddening inutility.</p> + +<p>But at last here was responsibility, actual and deeply significant, +calling for the exercise of tact, courage, and immutable firmness. The +particular task was not one which he would have coveted, and yet he +welcomed it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> Anything,—anything to assuage in him that sense of +ineptitude, of being ignored, a titled nonentity!</p> + +<p>With this vast lightening of spirit came, not only gratitude, but a +sense of lenity toward Governor Abbott. He encouraged himself to believe +that the note between them had been one of misunderstanding merely. It +might not be too late, after all! Gradually, he began to form a mental +picture of a growing sympathy and affiliation between them, large with +possibilities of improvement for Alleghenia. As he turned into the +Rathbawnes' gateway, he could have laughed aloud for very lightness of +heart. His optimism was not even impaired by running, in the hall, full +against Mrs. Rathbawne.</p> + +<p>"<i>Good</i> gracious! Lieutenant-Governor, is that you?"</p> + +<p>Repeated and earnest endeavor on Barclay's part had never dissuaded her +from this form of address.</p> + +<p>"What <i>is</i> the use of <i>having</i> such a title, if one can't <i>call</i> you by +it?" she would say,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> when he remonstrated. "Do <i>you</i> suppose that, if +Natalie were engaged to a <i>prince</i>, I should be going around, calling +him Tom, Dick, or Harry, instead of 'Your Royal <i>Highness</i>'? You ought +to be <i>proud</i> of your title. <i>I</i> am!"</p> + +<p>"But, Mrs. Rathbawne"—</p> + +<p>"Now, <i>please</i> not, Lieutenant-Governor, <i>please</i> not! I like it best +that way."</p> + +<p>The north wind was attentive and amenable to the voice of persuasion, in +comparison with Josephine Rathbawne.</p> + +<p>"Of <i>course</i> you know the <i>strike</i> is on!" she continued now, without +waiting for an assurance from Barclay that he was indeed none other than +himself. "Isn't it <i>awful</i>? I expect to hear the roar of the mob at +<i>any</i> moment! Come into the drawing-room. Natalie <i>was</i> there, only +<i>half</i> an hour ago."</p> + +<p>And she swept through the doorway, Barclay following.</p> + +<p>"Natalie," she began, "here's the Lieu—why, <i>Dorothy</i>! I took you for +Natalie. And—er—oh! Why, Mr.—er—how de do?<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> I didn't see you at +first. Oh, <i>do</i> turn on the switch, my dear. The place is as black as +pitch."</p> + +<p>The electric light, flooding the room, revealed young Nisbet, one vast, +consuming blush, and Dorothy, with a dangerous light in her eyes, and +her lips tightly compressed. It was plain that Mrs. Rathbawne had fallen +foul of Dan Cupid's machinery once more!</p> + +<p>"Why, Mr. <i>Nisbet</i>! I thought you were in New York."</p> + +<p>"I had a telegram this morning, calling the date off," said young Nisbet +in pitiable confusion; "that is, I didn't have to go, you know. So I +just fell in here to explain. I thought some of you might spot me on the +street, and after I'd said"—</p> + +<p>He began to flounder hopelessly, and cast a glance of mute appeal at +Dorothy. That facile young lady marched directly into the breach.</p> + +<p>"If you and John are looking for Natalie," she said, "you'll find her in +the library with Dad. How do you do, John?"</p> + +<p>"Pretty well, I thank you, Flibbertigibbet.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> It is really your husband +whom I came to see, Mrs. Rathbawne. I've a little business with him, so, +for the moment, I'll have to give Natalie the cold shoulder."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, lifting her fat hands. "Of <i>course</i>, +Lieutenant-Governor! I understand <i>perfectly</i>. Business before pleasure, +<i>always</i>. Go right in, won't you, and send Natalie here to me. <i>I'll</i> +stay here. Aren't we going to have tea, Dorothy? Oh, <i>do</i> try to sit up +straight, my dear!"</p> + +<p>Natalie and her father were bending low over a great portfolio, their +heads close together in the yellow glow of the table-lamp, which was the +only light in the room. Rathbawne looked up with a grim smile, as the +Lieutenant-Governor entered.</p> + +<p>"Pottering over my autographs, again, you see," he remarked. "I've been +neglecting them shamefully, of late—eh, Natalie? Didn't have the time. +It looks just now as if I wouldn't have to complain again of lack of +leisure for quite a while!"</p> + +<p>"It was that I dropped in to see you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> about," said Barclay, striving, +with only partial success, to keep the exultation out of his voice. "You +may not be in for so much leisure as you imagine, Mr. Rathbawne. You may +not get much of a holiday, after all."</p> + +<p>Without for an instant losing the Lieutenant-Governor's eye, Rathbawne +reached out and touched his daughter on the arm.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Dad!" she said reproachfully.</p> + +<p>"There's no need for her to go, sir," added Barclay, "unless you wish +it. I bring only good news."</p> + +<p>Acquiescing, Rathbawne drew Natalie close to him, passing one arm across +her shoulders, so that his gnarled hand rested firmly on the delicate +fabric of her sleeve. Between these two there had always lain a +sympathy, an affection, a mutuality of comprehension, more like the +relation of husband and wife than that of child and parent.</p> + +<p>"Nothing but good news?" answered Rathbawne. "Go on. What is it?"</p> + +<p>"News not so much of actual happenings as of potentialities," said the +Lieutenant-Gov<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span>ernor. "Last night I had to say to you that in the cause +of right I was as powerless to aid you as a baby. To-night, I have come +to tell you that I am in a position to see justice done, and that I +will."</p> + +<p>In detail, his voice ringing with enthusiasm and confidence, he +described the interview of that morning, his statement of Rathbawne's +position, his passage at arms with McGrath, finally, the Governor's +announcement that the strike was to be supervised by his lieutenant in +his stead.</p> + +<p>"I had almost lost hope," he concluded. "I thought my opportunity would +never come, and here it is, after all—the chance to act! And, somehow, +I feel that it is only the beginning—that, as he gets to understand me +better"—</p> + +<p>Rathbawne suddenly left his daughter's side, and in three steps was +directly before the Lieutenant-Governor. As he interrupted him, his +fingers closed upon the lapels of the other's coat, and he punctuated +his words with little tugs at these, his knuckles coming<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> together with +tiny muffled thuds. He spoke with a gravity that was vibrant with +suppressed anger and slow with sincere regret.</p> + +<p>"My boy," he said, "it's not a gracious thing to do to spoil an +enthusiasm like yours, but don't deceive yourself. Elijah Abbott as a +trickster is alone in his class. You were never more powerless to act +for the right than you are at this moment."</p> + +<p>"But I have his assurance"—</p> + +<p>"Oh, <i>his</i> assurance! It isn't worth the ash off your cigar. What, give +you a chance to interfere with the will of the Union which made him, and +owns him, body and soul? Never in God's world! Listen to me. I spent an +hour in his office this very afternoon, discussing the strike—<i>and he +never so much as mentioned your name</i>!"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor winced as if the words had been the touch of a +lancet. Then he closed his eyes.</p> + +<p>"And I was in the next room," he said, almost as if to +himself,—"planning—my—control—of the situation! Good God!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I went directly to him," continued Rathbawne, "because I knew that it +would be purely and simply a waste of time to parley with the lesser +officials who are either helpless or frankly his tools. I knew, too, +that no satisfactory result would come of appealing to him, but I wanted +to give him the chance. All I asked of him was an assurance that the +mills would have proper police protection, and that, if necessary, the +militia would be called out in support of order. The outcome was exactly +what I expected. Governor Abbott rubbed his hands, and smiled, and said: +'All in good time, Mr. Rathbawne, all in good time. When the conditions +seem to warrant it, we can discuss these measures.' That means that they +are free to blow the mills to kingdom come, before a finger will be +raised by the authorities to prevent them. And what's more, they'll do +it! Do you think I don't know McGrath?"</p> + +<p>As he had intended it should, this speech had given the other a chance +to recover himself. The Lieutenant-Governor's habitual<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> poise was +already restored, and his voice, as he answered, was quite steady, but +eloquent of his desperate discouragement and weariness.</p> + +<p>"I hope it's not as bad as all that, Mr. Rathbawne. It's not necessary +to tell you, that for me there can never again be such a thing as +trusting the word of Governor Abbott; but, at the same time, I can +hardly bring myself to believe that he would openly countenance the +practical existence of anarchy in the capital city of Alleghenia."</p> + +<p>"Well, I can, then!" declared Rathbawne. "I can believe anything of him! +Mark my words, John, he's as sleek a scoundrel as you'll find outside of +the State's Prison. He cares less for Alleghenia and her capital city +than you do for one of the hairs on his rascally head. I tell you, the +Union has bought him, body and soul, and unless a miracle comes down +from heaven, I'm a beaten man!"</p> + +<p>Barclay bit his lips without replying. In his heart of hearts, he knew +that Peter Rathbawne's words were true.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span></p> + +<p>"He'll be impeached, sooner or later," continued the old man, "if +there's a speck of decency left in the Legislature—which I doubt. But +long before that, John, long before that, I'll be down and out. I would +to God you were Governor of Alleghenia, my boy. You're the only ray of +hope I can see for her."</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor fell back a step, and covered his face with his +hands. For a full minute there was absolute silence. Rathbawne had +returned to the table, and, with his fore-arms across the back of a +chair, and one foot on the lower cross-bar, was staring vacantly at his +autographs, his hands moulding and remoulding each other into an +infinity of forms. Natalie was at the window, her face in the crevice +between the curtains. The same impulse had prompted both father and +daughter. There are some things which it is better not to watch.</p> + +<p>They turned at the sound of his voice, to find him with his head flung +back, his hands clenched at his sides, his right foot planted<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> firmly in +advance of his left, his whole bearing one of passionate earnestness. +And, though he was seemingly addressing Rathbawne, there was that in his +voice and in his words which was meant for every ear in the state!</p> + +<p>"Governor of Alleghenia!" he said, "I would to God I were! Sometimes I +almost—yes, sometimes I wholly despair. I love this state, Mr. +Rathbawne, as I love nothing else on earth—not even my girl there, not +even Natalie. You two are the only ones in the world who can understand +what it means when I say that. It has always been so, ever since I was +big enough to know what Alleghenia meant, and more than ever since I +have come to understand her shame, and her vital peril, and her dire +need. I've never tried to explain the feeling; I've never found any one +who seemed to share it with me. I hear other men talk of national +patriotism, and the flag, and all that, and I understand it, and honor +them for it. But—while it may be only a fancy of mine—for me Kenton +City comes even before Washington, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> even before these United States +of America the sovereign state of Alleghenia! I would have her courts +incorruptibility itself, her government the perfect commingling of +equity and mercy; her press the vehicle of verity, intelligence, and +watchfulness; her public servants the faithful exponents of loyalty and +diligence; her people, one and all, whatever is best in our +interpretation of the word American—and then, something +more!—Alleghenians!—citizens, not only of the Republic, but of the +state which I would have shine brightest in the field of stars, and be +quoted, from Maine to California, and from Florida to Washington, as the +synonym for law and order, truth, integrity, and justice. You know how +far the dream is from the reality. We are held up to ridicule and +contempt as law-breakers, time-servers, and bribe-takers—and we deserve +it! I can't see help on any hand. I don't believe our people, as a +class, are actually vicious and corrupt—only callous and indifferent, +accustomed so long to the spectacle of political chicanery and depravity +that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> they have lost their ability to appreciate its significance. But, +so far as results are concerned, it all amounts to the same thing. Once, +I hoped I should be able to do something. But now—I'm a nonentity, Mr. +Rathbawne, as you know, and not only that, but a man who has taken a +false step, from which he can never recover. I'm dead, politically +speaking—as dead as Benjamin Butler!"</p> + +<p>He paused, drawing a deep breath.</p> + +<p>"We were speaking of your interview," he added, more evenly. "What was +the result?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing, beyond what I've told you," answered Rathbawne, shaking his +head. "All I can do is to keep my mouth shut, await developments, and +trust in a Providence which it takes a good bit of obstinacy to believe +hasn't deserted the state of Alleghenia for good and all. It isn't for +my own sake alone, John, that I pray the Union will give in before my +people begin to think of violence. You remember '94 in Chicago? Well, +we<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> don't want anything like that in Kenton City. It would be the last +straw! Alleghenia has a big enough burden of disgrace to carry, as it +is."</p> + +<p>A servant entered, even as he was speaking, to summon him to the +telephone, and with an exclamation of impatience he left the room. +Immediately, Natalie stepped from her post at the window, and came +toward Barclay with outstretched hands.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Johnny boy," she said, "I'm <i>so</i> sorry. How you've been hurt, dear, +and disappointed, and cruelly wronged!"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor's hands clenched again at the sound of sorrow in +her voice, and he strove in vain to control the tremor of his lip. +Tenderly he put his arms about her.</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry, too, little girl—sorry you were here to see me make a fool +of myself and then squeal when I got hurt as I deserved. I shouldn't +have done that. But I was so proud—so grateful—I thought I was going +to be able"—</p> + +<p>"<i>Johnny—Johnny!</i>"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span></p> + +<p>They held to each other rigidly for an instant, her face against his +sleeve, in an agony which no tears came to soothe.</p> + +<p>"There!" said Barclay presently. "I'm better already. It does one good +to blow off steam, now and again."</p> + +<p>His tone lightened perceptibly.</p> + +<p>"And look here," he added, "what's most important, after all, is that I +have news for you, and ought to be delivering it."</p> + +<p>As yet, they did not dare to meet each other's eyes, but Natalie took +the cue.</p> + +<p>"You can spare yourself the trouble, my lord," she retorted, sweeping +him a curtsy. "I can guess what it is, without your aid. You've found +him!"</p> + +<p>"How did you know?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't. But you will remember that I asked you to find him. The +inference is as plain as a pikestaff."</p> + +<p>"Arrogance! But you're right. I have. He has been at my rooms since last +night. He was frightfully shaky, and utterly despondent, but he's taking +something to settle his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> nerves, and I've no doubt a week or so of good +food and straight living will bring him around into something like his +old form."</p> + +<p>"Boy dear! And you're taking care of him?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, just directing the cure, that's all! I'll tell you more when I can +report definite progress. Do you suppose there is a single secluded +corner in all this mansion which has not already been preëmpted by +Dorothy and Nisbet?"</p> + +<p>He slipped his arm about her again, and together they went out, across +the wide hall, toward the drawing-room. Rathbawne was standing at the +telephone under the stairway, but, as they approached him, he replaced +the receiver, and stepped forth under the light of the chandelier. They +both halted, shocked into speechlessness by the look on his face. The +past ten minutes seemed to have added a decade to his age. His cheeks +were white and drawn, and with his hands he groped before him, as if he +had been stricken blind. As he came close to them, he lifted his head,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> +and peered first at his daughter, and then at Barclay, seeming barely to +recognize them.</p> + +<p>"Dad! What <i>is</i> it?" said the girl, in a voice just above a whisper.</p> + +<p>Rathbawne raised his hand, and pushed back the hair from his forehead.</p> + +<p>"A message—from Payson—of the 'Sentinel,'" he mumbled. "It seems +there's a fire—a fire on Charles Street—near the mills—one of my +buildings—a shop—a shop. Some one in the crowd—threw a +torch in at the window—there is a great crowd—a throng of +strikers—watching—cheering the flames—hissing the firemen. They've +begun early—and this is only the beginning! My people—my people"——</p> + +<p>He stumbled forward, and would have fallen, but that his daughter caught +him. To his dying day Barclay remembered how, as he sprang to aid her, +her hands gleamed, white and slender, against the black of Peter +Rathbawne's coat.</p> + +<p>The hush that followed was broken presently by the sound of the old +man's choking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> sobs, and the low, soothing tones of Natalie, murmuring +against his ear. From the drawing-room came indeterminate scraps of Mrs. +Wynyard's gay chatter, as she regaled Mrs. Rathbawne with the gossip +gleaned in a round of calls. She herself was partly visible, drawing off +her gloves before the fire. From the music-room beyond issued the chords +of Dorothy's none-too-sure accompaniment, and young Nisbet's superb, +full tenor:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"'Ah, love, could you and I with fate conspire<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To grasp the sorry scheme of things entire'"—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>But, in the Lieutenant-Governor's imagination, another sound mingled +with and dominated these,—the voice of Michael McGrath, as he had heard +it that morning, through the open door of Governor Abbott's room:—</p> + +<p>"It won't be a strike like other strikes, not so long as I'm running it, +that is. It's going to mean business from the word go!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<h3>THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS</h3> + + +<p>One spotted peach will contaminate an entire basket, one drop of ink +cloud a full glass of clear water. It was so in the case of the strikers +at the Rathbawne Mills. Their unwonted idleness, the long succession of +empty hours, already, among the more improvident, the preliminary +pressure of privation's teeth,—all these made them easy prey for the +sophistries of men like McGrath and his associates. At first they simply +laughed at the arraignments of Peter Rathbawne as a plutocrat, a +slave-master, and an oppressor of the poor, knowing better in their +hearts. But the memory of past kindness is too apt to be the most +fleeting of human impressions. On the one side the gates of the +Rathbawne Mills remained obstinately closed, and, though Rathbawne +himself manifested no intention<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> of resorting to the intolerable +importation of "scab" labor, he persisted in his refusal to treat with +the Union so long as the discharge of the fifteen men remained a subject +proposed for debate. On the other hand, the denunciations of McGrath and +the other Union orators were constant, unavoidable, and sufficiently +plausible to produce an impression, and linger in the mind. And, +meanwhile, to and fro among the strikers, stalked, arm in arm, the +spectres of idleness and starvation, the one smirking openly, the other, +as yet, half-veiled. Altogether it was fertile ground.</p> + +<p>After the burning of Mr. Rathbawne's shop, on the first night of the +strike, ensued a week of comparative quiet. The outrage had been +flagrant, the source, if not the very author, of it was known, and the +police did—nothing. For three days the press of Kenton City blazed with +indignation, excepting only the "Record," which openly favored the +strikers, and then all the papers alike suddenly ceased to refer to the +incident at all. For,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> while McGrath was not in favor of wasting the +funds of the Union, he was as well aware as the next man that a dollar, +as well as a stitch, in time, saves nine.</p> + +<p>Herein lay the cardinal peril of Alleghenia. As John Barclay had said, +it was not that her people, as a class, were corrupt or criminal, but +merely that they viewed with easy tolerance evidences of laxity and +lawlessness which would have set the citizens of another state by the +ears, and filled the newspaper columns and the public forums with +indignation and protest. In this respect, the papers of Kenton City were +the most flagrant offenders. Even the most reputable, the "Sentinel," +could be silenced at practically any moment by those cognizant of the +method, and in a position to command the price, of manipulation. As a +whited sepulchre it was a conspicuous success, being irreproachably +scholarly, dignified, and didactic in tone, and wholly destitute of +principle.</p> + +<p>Michael McGrath, demagogue though he was, knew his public as the +physician knows<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> the pulse he feels. It was a feature of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills that no attempt was made to justify the cause of the +strikers in the eye of the disinterested public of Kenton City. McGrath +himself was fully alive to the slenderness of his pretext, and alive, as +well, to the strength of Peter Rathbawne's case, if it should come to a +discussion of the rights and wrongs involved, wherein his business +probity and his justice to, and consideration for, his employees, would +furnish arguments well-nigh unanswerable. He contented himself, +therefore, with standing upon a simple declaration of the will of the +Union, which was, in effect, his own; and, strong in his reliance, if +not upon the support, at least upon the non-interference of the state +authorities, devoted his attention to holding the press in check, by +methods long since found effectual, and confidently left the public to +think and act as it saw fit.</p> + +<p>There could have been no more contemptuous comment upon the moral and +intellectual status of the community than this insolent<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> assumption of +its indifference to the commonest principles of justice, but for a time +his confidence had the appearance of being amply justified. The strike +went its way, characterized by an infinity of petty outrages and a +constant and consistent vilification of Peter Rathbawne, while—with the +exception of that first and promptly quashed protest on the part of the +press—no voice was raised in opposition.</p> + +<p>Reduced to its lowest terms, the struggle was one between Rathbawne and +McGrath, and that, not as representatives the one of a great industrial, +the other of a great socialistic organization, but as individuals. The +source of the stream which had thus reached its rapids, and was plunging +on toward its annihilating cataract, lay far back in the early days of +Rathbawne's commercial career. McGrath was a man who practiced neither +the vice of forgetfulness nor the virtue of forgiveness. As plain as the +event of a yesterday lay upon his memory his contemptuous dismissal from +Rathbawne's employ, charged in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> particular with a petty peculation, and +in general with the indisputable fact of being a bad influence in the +mills. His case had been in many ways identical with that of the men +whose cause he was now, for reasons of his own, espousing.</p> + +<p>But Peter Rathbawne, then less shrewd in estimating men than now, had +reckoned without due credit to the vindictiveness and pertinacity of the +man before him. McGrath—brutally handsome in those days, idle, +insolent, and independent—later had developed qualities of which at the +time there was little evidence. He had smiled and shrugged his +shoulders—a habit which had grown upon him—as Rathbawne gave his +verdict, and had instinctively resisted the temptation to threaten +revenge. For that inspiration he had been devoutly grateful ever since. +It had enabled him to work in silence and unseen, like a mole, toward +the goal at which he aimed. He was a poker player, was Michael McGrath, +of the class which pulls victory out of defeat by the aid of its own +personality and a low pair.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> The calm indifference with which he had +received his dismissal from the employ of Peter Rathbawne seemed to him, +on reflection, to have been the unconscious forerunner of the elaborate +<i>nonchalance</i> with which he now viewed the unexpected filling of a +broken straight. It was certain that the other player had not guessed +the strength of his cards.</p> + +<p>He had never forgiven, never forgotten. It had taken a quarter-century +of unremitting effort, of indomitable perseverance, of calculated +ingenuity, to secure to him the position which he now felt to be +assured—that of being able to cope with the man who had been his +adversary, and so overwhelmingly his superior. The fight was on at +last,—a fight in which the odds were not only equal, but, if anything, +in favor of the former mill-hand, thus become one of the most powerful +men in Alleghenia; a fight to be fought to the bitter finish, with an +almost certain triumph as his reward.</p> + +<p>Added to these motives was another,—newer, it is true, but none the +less potent,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span>—his hatred for the Lieutenant-Governor. He had been able +to laugh within a half-minute after the words "unmitigated blackguard" +had smitten his ears; but they had rankled for all that. It was not so +much the insult, as the knowledge that it was justified. He was +remarkably candid with himself, was Michael McGrath.</p> + +<p>Hence the unparalleled venom of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +McGrath's dual sense of wounded vanity prescribed a course of surpassing +vindictiveness. His personal resentment, reinforced by consummate +appreciation of the adversaries with whom he had to deal, dictated a +safe road to revenge, which enabled him to fling wide the floodgates of +his long-stored animosity, secure in his knowledge of having the upper +hand. Disorder, calumny, outrage, even open anarchy—he could venture +upon them unafraid. A corrupt Governor, whom he had created, stood +behind him, smiling tolerantly. An indifferent community would let him +have his will. Only he must proceed by degrees, and be ready at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> any +moment to take one backward step for the sake of being able presently +thereafter to take two in advance.</p> + +<p>Here precisely lay the weak point in his plan of campaign. With the +fatuity incidental on occasions to even the shrewdest minds, he had not +counted upon independence in the host which he believed slave to him, in +thought and word and deed. He rated himself the dictator, the prompter +without whose suggestion no one of all the players in this gigantic +tragedy could speak his line. As a matter of fact, like all leaders of +his class, he could drive his followers forward at will, while totally +unable to hold them back. He was wholly master so long as he used the +spur. The peril lay in the fancied efficacy of the curb. In short, he +was discovering already that he had unwittingly created a monster beside +which Frankenstein's was the veriest doll.</p> + +<p>Thus, shortly, the strain began to tell upon the four thousand +unemployed sets of nerves around the Rathbawne Mills. Meetings became +more frequent and more turbulent; drinking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> and disorder were observably +on the increase; and at the end of another four weeks one of the gates +of the mills was beaten down, and several hundred men and boys paraded +around shop after shop, breaking windows and singing ribald songs. It +was not a very serious demonstration in itself. Its ominous feature lay +in the fact that the police made no attempt to check it. There was +something else about it, to the thinking of McGrath. It was not so much +that events were moving too fast, but that they were moving without +intelligent control.</p> + +<p>Two nights later, another building belonging to Peter Rathbawne, and +situated only a half-block from the mills, was burned in the same manner +as the first, watched by an enormous crowd of strikers, who applauded +each fresh burst of flame, as if the fire had been a circus or a play. +Still there was no move on the part of the police.</p> + +<p>Then it was that the business men of Kenton City sat up in their office +chairs and began to think. This was an eventuality entirely outside the +calculations of McGrath.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> But the pachydermatous inertia of the citizens +of Alleghenia had yet its vulnerable spot, where the weapon might enter. +Vaguely these men had known that the state was rotten, but the fact had +never been brought to their attention in a manner so poignantly +suggestive before. Unwittingly McGrath had aroused the suspicion that it +was not the purse of Peter Rathbawne alone which was in danger. If it +was possible for disorder to go to such extremes in the very streets of +Kenton City without fear of interference or rebuke, then no man's +property was safe. That thought was the Achilles' heel of the community. +So it was that a Citizens' Committee, composed of presidents of two +insurance companies, directors from five banks, representatives from the +Chamber of Commerce and the Board of Trade, and, finally, Colonel Amos +Broadcastle, was appointed to wait upon the Mayor. That gentleman, as +was entirely to be expected, referred them to the Governor, and to the +Governor they went.</p> + +<p>Barclay was present at the interview. For<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> his own reasons Governor +Abbott had kept his immediate subordinate well to the fore in all +matters pertaining to the strike since the latter's rebuke to +McGrath,—in all matters, that is to say, not involving the exercise of +actual authority. Of that, indeed, the Lieutenant-Governor had had no +hope after the conversation in Peter Rathbawne's library. He met the +representatives of the press, conducted the correspondence with +mill-owners and other negatively interested parties, and at the +Governor's request made what was palpably a farcical inspection of the +entire state militia—to judge of their readiness for strike service!—a +task which consumed a fortnight in constant travel, and visits to +armories all alike in insufficient equipment and utter slovenliness. The +Ninth Regiment alone remained, and this command was to parade for +inspection by the Governor himself that very evening. The coincidence +flashed through Barclay's mind as the Citizens' Committee entered, with +Broadcastle, in his capacity as spokesman, at its head.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span></p> + +<p>The dignity and air of command habitual to the Colonel of the Ninth were +doubly apparent as he advanced toward the Governor's table. Both Barclay +and Abbott rose to receive him, but the latter reseated himself, as soon +as Broadcastle had introduced his fellow-members of the Committee. He +listened to what followed with an air of thoughtfulness, tinged with a +faint and exasperating suggestion of amusement. At a neighboring table, +his official stenographer took down every word which fell.</p> + +<p>Colonel Broadcastle was not accustomed to mince matters, when the +occasion demanded brevity and conciseness. Now, he stepped to within a +few feet of the Governor's table, and stood rigidly confronting him, +with his hands clasped before him on the head of his stick, in the +position of parade-rest.</p> + +<p>"Governor Abbott," he said, in his curt, dry voice, "these gentlemen and +myself form a Committee appointed by a meeting of the business men of +Kenton City, to protest against the state of affairs now existing in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> +connection with the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. It is only generous +to presume that other matters have diverted your attention from an +appreciation of these conditions. The situation is without parallel in +the annals of Alleghenia. Disorder is rampant, and destruction of +property is freely indulged in by the strikers without any apparent fear +of molestation. Despite the fact that there is a large police-force, it +makes no effort to check these operations. The sole reply of Chief +Pendle to the protests of those interested in the promotion of law and +order has been that he will not suffer any outside interference in the +control of his department—the which, in view of his responsibility to +the public, can only be regarded as sheer and intolerable insolence! An +appeal to Mayor Goadby has elicited the response that the whole matter +lies in the Governor's hands."</p> + +<p>The Colonel paused. The Governor, leaning back in his chair, and +fingering a pencil, smiled slightly and nodded his head.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I suppose that is so," he said. "Continue, continue, Colonel +Broadcastle."</p> + +<p>"It is the sense of the law-abiding element of Kenton City," went on the +Colonel, flushing at the condescension of his tone, "that the limit of +endurance has been reached. If, willfully or otherwise, the police do +not act, my regiment is prepared to act as substitute. I have already +placed it at the service of the Adjutant-General. His reply, like the +Mayor's, was to refer me to you for orders. I am here to receive them, +sir."</p> + +<p>"Your offer is appreciated," said the Governor suavely. "We of Kenton +City have reason to be proud of the Ninth, Colonel Broadcastle. I +congratulate myself upon my privilege of reviewing it, to-night. And we +have reason to be proud, as well, of the intelligence which has made +such an organization possible. Your disinterested devotion"—</p> + +<p>Broadcastle flung up his chin.</p> + +<p>"I am not here to receive compliments, sir!" he said abruptly.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Nor I to bestow them," answered the Governor, unruffled. "As +commander-in-chief of the state forces, I believe it is not outside my +province to render deserved commendation to a subordinate."</p> + +<p>"Oh, do not let us juggle with words, Governor Abbott! It is precisely +as commander-in-chief of the state forces that the time has come for you +to act; it is precisely as your subordinate that I am here to receive +your orders. Assume the responsibility which confronts you, issue the +commands proper to the emergency, and you will have no more tireless +executor of them than I. My regiment can be on duty at the Rathbawne +Mills inside of six hours"—</p> + +<p>"But, my good Colonel Broadcastle," broke in the Governor, "the state +has no need of your regiment for the moment! Calling upon the militia is +no light matter, sir. You talk about my ordering out the Ninth as you +would advise me to ring for a messenger-boy!"</p> + +<p>"The welfare of the municipality, if not that of the commonwealth," +replied Colonel<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> Broadcastle firmly, "demands that an immediate stop be +put to this lawlessness. We are dealing with extremities, sir!"</p> + +<p>The Governor swung forward, and placed his elbows on the table.</p> + +<p>"You will permit me to be the best judge of what the welfare of the +commonwealth may be," he retorted. "Whatever lawlessness exists—and I +think you have grossly exaggerated its extent, Colonel Broadcastle—is +due to the selfish obstinacy of one man. In my opinion, Mr. Rathbawne is +entirely in the wrong. He had fair warning, which he did not choose to +heed. If his property suffers at the hands of the strikers, he has only +himself to blame."</p> + +<p>"It is not a question of Mr. Rathbawne, or of any other individual," +said Broadcastle, "but of the integrity of the state of Alleghenia!"</p> + +<p>"The integrity of the state of Alleghenia," answered the Governor dryly, +"has been intrusted, by the vote of her citizens, to me, as chief +executive."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span></p> + +<p>"An action," exclaimed the Colonel, "which I venture to predict they +will shortly have reason most bitterly to regret!"</p> + +<p>Governor Abbott rose abruptly to his feet.</p> + +<p>"This interview is at an end, Colonel Broadcastle," he said, bringing +his fist down upon the table with a thud. "I take exception to your +remarks, from first to last. I consider myself fully competent to deal +with the situation, and you may depend, sir, I shall do so at my own +time, and in my own way. If Mr. Peter Rathbawne supposes that he can +defy reason and justice at will, and that the state authorities are +prepared to support him, he is grossly and fatally mistaken. Gentlemen, +I have the honor to bid you good-day!"</p> + +<p>For a quarter-minute, the two men stood facing each other, without +speaking. It was observable that the eyes of neither flinched. Then—</p> + +<p>"It is my earnest hope, Elijah Abbott," said the Colonel slowly, "to see +you impeached by a righteously indignant community, and committed for a +term of years to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> State's Prison at Mowberly, for rank malfeasance +in office!"</p> + +<p>The Governor shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Your record and your position protect you, Colonel Broadcastle," he +said, with something of his usual suavity. "Will you have the goodness +to retire?"</p> + +<p>As the Citizens' Committee left the room the Lieutenant-Governor turned +on his heel, passed into his office, and closed the door.</p> + +<p>For a long time he sat motionless at his desk, with his temples in his +hands, staring at a frame upon the opposite wall, which contained the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia. These were a hand holding even balances, +upon a circular shield, supported by the nude figures of two young men, +representing Art and Labor. Above, upon a scroll, were the words, +"<i>Justitia. Lex. Integritas.</i>"</p> + +<p>It was not only bad heraldry, but indifferently appropriate symbolism.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2> + +<h3>THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW</h3> + + +<p>The huge armory of the Ninth, transformed, by the same system which had +metamorphosed the <i>personnel</i> of the regiment itself, from a gaunt, +barn-like structure, ill-fitted to its purpose in all but size, to the +most cheerful, as well as the most completely equipped, of Alleghenian +arsenals, was blazing with light and echoing to the sound of many +voices. A steady stream of people poured in at the heavy doors, now +standing wide, but significant, with their great timbers, elaborate +locks and bolts, and precautionary peep-holes, of the possibility of an +attitude less hospitable. Threading their way at a rapid pace through +the more sluggish main current of the crowd, the members of the +regiment, in an infinite variety of civilian attire,—from tweeds and +knickerbockers to top-hats and evening-dress,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>—sought their respective +company-rooms, vanished therein, and, presently, reappeared in uniform. +It was as if behind those ten doors which lined the upper corridor there +were as many moulds, identical in form, whereinto this perplexing +diversity of raw material was plunged on entering, to be drawn forth +again in a constant reduplication of militiamen.</p> + +<p>As the hour for the review drew near, the proportion of these to the +throng with which they mingled, perceptibly increasing, seemed, little +by little, to leaven the whole lump. The dress-uniform of the Ninth was +everywhere, the black shakos and epaulettes, white pompons, cross-belts +and gloves, and multiplicity of brass buttons, lending the immense +assemblage a singular spirit and vivacity.</p> + +<p>On the floor of the drill-room the people spread in all directions, +fan-like, from the main doorway, the multitudinous footfalls mounting +murmurously into the spaces of the lofty roof, where forty arc-lights +hung, dizzily suspended, pallid in the thin haze of dust<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> swung upwards +from the hurrying feet of the thousands below.</p> + +<p>"Precisely like an army of ants—and every one of them with an uncle or +two, and a round dozen of nephews and nieces!" said Mrs. Wynyard.</p> + +<p>She and the Rathbawne girls were looking down upon the drill-floor +from the balcony of the Colonel's room. Broadcastle and the +Lieutenant-Governor were deep in conversation inside, having seized the +delay in the arrival of Governor Abbott as an opportunity for a few +words in private.</p> + +<p>"How funny they are, scuttling along, all of them!" said Dorothy. "And +how immensely pleased the favored ones are, who have a soldier to show +them the way. I see a distinct difference in their walk from that of the +others, don't you, Natalie? They seem to be saying '<i>We</i> were +<i>invited</i>—and by this splendiferous creature at our side!' See how they +strut! And look at the soldierless ones, how timidly they go—just as if +they had found their tickets in the street, or had crept<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> in through the +basement windows. 'Please, kind Mr. Soldier-man, let us stay and see the +show. We'll be <i>awf'ly</i> good!'"</p> + +<p>"How preposterous you are, Dorothy!" answered Mrs. Wynyard. "Look! The +people are taking to the sides of the room already, and the companies +are forming. What astonishing method and precision there is to it all! +Do you suppose each man has a little circle marked on the floor, to show +just where he is to stand?"</p> + +<p>"I haven't the most remote doubt of it," said Natalie, with a +smile,—"and his name neatly lettered inside it with gilt paint!"</p> + +<p>The long, enclosed racks at the ends of the drill-room were open now, +and the electric light winked upon the barrels of the Springfields, as +busy, white-gloved hands plied the polishing cloths along them. The +enormous drill-floor, cleared as if by magic from the disorderly +weed-growth which had encumbered it, began to make manifest its proper +crop—long lines of gray and white, like sprouting sage, at first but a +dot here and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> there, to indicate the direction, then a scattering, then +distinct clumps, finally a thick, serried row. In the distance, a bugle +sounded, followed by a long ruffle of drums, and Colonel Broadcastle +stepped quickly to the window of the balcony.</p> + +<p>"There's the Governor," he said. "Will you come in? I'll send my orderly +to show you to your seats."</p> + +<p>At the same moment, the door from the corridor opened, and the orderly +entered, his hand at his shako.</p> + +<p>"Sir, the Governor has arrived."</p> + +<p>Then, as the trio on the balcony stepped in through the window, he +turned suddenly and superlatively scarlet. As has been said, young +Nisbet was accustomed to getting what he wanted. In this instance what +he had wanted happened to be that the Adjutant should choose him from +the guard detail as Colonel's orderly. To be thus chosen was to be +admittedly the most immaculate of thirty men, all more immaculate than a +thousand immaculate others. The thing was not easy of achievement, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> +Dorothy Rathbawne was to be present at the review, and so—there was no +second way about it—it simply had to be done. Young Nisbet's way of +doing it was an absolutely new uniform and gold-plated buttons and +accoutrements. Extravagance? Vanity? Perhaps! But at the present moment, +he was wearing one cross-belt where his thousand and odd comrades were +wearing two. There was no answer to such an argument as that.</p> + +<p>Colonel Broadcastle had reserved seats for the party on the temporary +reviewing stand, and, five minutes after they had taken their places, +the bugles sang again, a curt order—"'shun! 'shun!"—ran in varying +intonations from company to company, and the slack gray ranks before +them stiffened into absolute rigidity. Then from the broad hallway +beyond came a tremendous burst of sound, and, to the strains of the +famous old march of the Ninth, the regimental band swung into view, +followed by Governor Abbott and Colonel Broadcastle and the former's +staff.</p> + +<p>To the Lieutenant-Governor, but newly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> returned from his wearisome round +of the state armories, much of what followed was so stale as to be no +more than a constantly increasing strain upon nerves already overtaxed. +He deliberately allowed his attention to wander, until he felt rather +than actually perceived the steady tramp-tramp of the men, swinging, +fours right, into column, the occasional "hep! hep!" of an officious +file-closer, the endless succession of fours winking past him, like the +palings of a gray fence seen from the window of a train, the intervals +narrowed by short-step, widening again at the "Forward—<i>march</i>!" the +blare of the band, lessening as it approached the further end of the +building, then suddenly bursting into its former volume at the +right-about. He endured it all listlessly. It was tediously familiar, +stamped upon his brain by repetition after repetition.</p> + +<p>Moreover, he was completely fagged, and unutterably oppressed by his +burden of discouragement. The old wounds, in part healed by his recent +absence from the immediate<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> vicinity of his constant discomfiture, had +been re-opened and set bleeding afresh by Governor Abbott's treatment of +the Citizens' Committee. Whatever lingering hope had remained in his +mind of peace with honor for the troubled capital of Alleghenia, seemed +to have been effectually dispelled by that interview. The most enduring +charity, the most fatuous credulity, the blindest partisanship—even +these could not have preserved a last spark of confidence in Elijah +Abbott. Still less was Barclay's indeterminate hope of the ultimate +triumph of right able to stand against such crushing evidence of its +instability. It was no longer a question of suspicions, of precedents, +of deductions from the significance of a host of former misdoings. Out +of his own mouth was the Governor convicted. "At my own time, and in my +own way," he had said. It was a phrase, nothing more, and could be +boiled down until its whole purport was contained in one word—Never!</p> + +<p>"Fours <i>left—March</i>! Compan<i>ee—halt</i>!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span></p> + +<p>The entire regiment, as one man, swung from column of fours into +battalion front, halted, and then—cr-r-rick! boooo-m-m-m!—came to +order arms. The sides of the room were lined with a solid rampart of +white and gray and gold. Barclay was aware of the First Sergeants, +scurrying from their positions to report, of their voices, and those of +the Majors and the Adjutant, and, finally the Colonel:—</p> + +<p>"Take your post, sir!"</p> + +<p>But his thoughts were anywhere and everywhere else. What a farce it all +was, this life which he was leading, this mental and moral martyrdom to +an impossible hope, this eternal and heart-sickening ordeal of hope +deferred, this waiting, waiting, waiting, for something which never +would and never could happen! Rotten, rotten to the core, this state for +which he would have given his heart's blood, and not only rotten, but +not caring a whit for her rottenness—glorying rather, in her own +degradation. The chief executive had flung back into their very faces +the appeal to his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> conscience of the most influential men in Kenton +City; the police, even now seated about their station stoves, were +sniggling at the predicament of the public which paid them for its +protection against precisely the kind of thing which they openly +tolerated and encouraged; yes, and even the militia, the guarantee of +law and order, Broadcastle's own command, were decked out in tinsel and +pipeclay, strutting to music in a palpable bid for applause and +admiration. And yonder—the tide of anarchy was slowly but surely rising +about the Rathbawne Mills, presaging riot, bloodshed, God alone knew +what!—but one thing, inevitably,—the absolute downfall of dignity and +rout of decency in Alleghenia!</p> + +<p>Suddenly, his old intrepid spirit of resolution reasserted itself, but +doubtfully, like the flame of a lamp flaring once out of dimness before +it dies forever. Was it for this that he had devoted the best thought of +his youth and his earlier manhood to plans for the betterment of his +state? Should he now, at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> this, the hour of her supremest political and +moral peril, desert her as irredeemable, and join the ranks of those who +sneered at her, and pointed mocking fingers at her shame and nakedness?</p> + +<p>"Your loquacity faintly suggests that of a mummy," said Natalie, at his +side.</p> + +<p>"I was alone with my thoughts," answered the Lieutenant-Governor, +turning to her with an attempt at a smile, "and pretty black ones they +were, at that!"</p> + +<p>"Alleghenia again?"</p> + +<p>"Alleghenia again—and always. This business is becoming an obsession +with me. I haven't had a chance to tell you, and I can't very well +explain now. I'll have to leave it till I see you to-morrow. But +something happened to-day which drove another nail—and one of the +last!—into the coffin of my faith. There's not a gleam of hope +anywhere."</p> + +<p>"Don't you see hope in all this?" asked Natalie, with a little, +indicative gesture toward the scene before them. "Somehow,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> it is +impressing me tremendously to-night—more than ever before. I seem to +understand better what it means, what it stands for."</p> + +<p>"It's a stale enough story with me," said Barclay. "Remember, I've been +doing just about nothing but watch this kind of thing for the past two +weeks. After all, what does it amount to but a thousand possibilities +parading like peacocks?"</p> + +<p>"How unlike you, that speech! It amounts to a vast deal more than that, +Johnny boy,—oh, infinitely more! I don't speak of the other regiments +you have seen. This is different. Well, what <i>does</i> it amount to? Who +and what are these thousand peacocks of yours? Aren't they the very +flower of Kenton City, the youngest and best blood in our veins, +gathered by one good man's will into an organization of sterling +loyalty, with one great aim in view, and that the support and protection +and preservation of all that is best in Alleghenia? The very fact that +such a body of men exists among us is in the na<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span>ture of a guarantee, it +seems to me, that we shall come out all right in the end. Have you +noticed their faces?—many of them so absurdly boyish, all of them so +honest, and manly, and—and—<i>American</i>, John! They are the +personifications of your ideal of that afternoon in the +library—Americans, and something more—Alleghenians! And, to prove it, +they are freely giving a portion of their time and their strength, in +order that there may be at least one thing in Kenton City which is +without fear and without reproach. I wonder—I wonder, John, whether it +isn't the old story, after all: whether you haven't been wandering all +over the world, like the prince in the fairy-book, looking for the magic +talisman that is to save the state you love, while, all the time, it has +been lying at your very door? Oh, this means something—I'm too stupid +to interpret it as you could—but I know it's there, and that it would +help you and encourage you. Let me try. Look there! A single purpose +animates them all—the maintenance of the standard<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> which Colonel +Broadcastle set for them, and the record they have made for themselves."</p> + +<p>Colonel Broadcastle's voice was sweeping the armory, as he put the +regiment through the manual of arms.</p> + +<p>"One has only to hear one of them—Mr. Nisbet, for example—say 'the +Ninth' to find the hope of which you are in search. These men say it as +others say 'God' or 'my mother'—as you yourself, Johnny boy, say +'Alleghenia.'"</p> + +<p>"Charge—<i>bay'n'ts</i>!"</p> + +<p>With a single click, a thousand rifles fell into position, a thousand +left feet smote the floor in unison, and the light rippled and twinkled +along a solid line of flashing steel.</p> + +<p>"There! A single voice,—a single, mighty response! Don't you see the +wonderful suggestiveness of it? Don't you feel the presence of the +enormous reserve force which lies behind all this? Oh, believe me, John, +this is a weapon too mighty to lie unused, and too intelligent to be +misused, if the worst come to the worst. After all, as no one<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> knows +better than yourself, it's not your own advancement you're looking for, +it's that of the state. Well, there may be other agencies, perhaps +entirely independent of you or of your influence, but none the less +invaluable. For example, you are close upon despair—and yet, before +your fears come true, the forces of wrong will have to fight their way, +step by step, through this rampart of American manhood!"</p> + +<p>Barclay touched her hand lightly, as she ceased speaking. In the midst +of the thousands about them, they were alone as they had never been +before.</p> + +<p>"Thank you," he said simply. "Thank you, littlest and wisest in the +world!"</p> + +<p>The regiment was in motion again, skirting the room in column of fours, +preparatory to the march-past: but now the Lieutenant-Governor surveyed +it from a new, and a dual point-of-view,—as a thousand individuals, +that is, each a potential factor for immeasurable good in the coming +rehabilitation of the state; and, then, as a vast fighting-machine<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> +perfect in every detail, resistless and awe-inspiring in its very +integrity. He noted the faces as they passed—stern, intelligent faces, +young, for the most part, and curiously refined, intent upon correct +performance of the present duty, and touched, almost without exception, +with an enthusiasm born of the martial music and the rhythmic tramp of +advancing feet. He saw the quick, reciprocal glance of the pivot and +flank men, as the fours, in perfect alignment, swept round into +company-front; the long, easy compression and give of the compact lines, +acquiring correct adjustment; the rigid tenure of chests and shoulders; +the firm fling of slender gray legs, as regularly intervaled as the +teeth of a giant comb. Company by company, the regiment fell into the +cadence of full-step. Midway, the standards of the Republic and +Alleghenia rippled side by side. And so, with blare of brass and sharp +staccato of snare-drums, with sheen of rifles and accoutrements, with +flash of slender swords, raised in salute,—above all and always, with +that magnificent<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> unanimity, that mighty pulse of the thunderous +advance, the Ninth swept past its Governor and its Colonel in review.</p> + +<p>And then, in an instant, as it seemed, the vast square was formed again, +a sharp command rang out, the rifles snapped to a present-arms, the +standards dipped, and the strains of the "Star-Spangled Banner" mounted +triumphantly to the great girders of the lofty roof. The multitude of +spectators rose at the sound, and the Lieutenant-Governor rose with +them, his heart aglow with new inspiration, new hope, and new resolve. +The band was almost speaking the words of the anthem on the dust-grayed +air:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Oh! say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>To the accompaniment of a myriad clapping hands, the Lieutenant-Governor +resumed his seat, shaken by a novel, tremendous emotion. Yes! a thousand +times yes! The star-spangled banner, symbol of loftiest ideals and +purest purposes, mute memorial and reminder of devotion incalculable and +sacrifice without<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> bound, guarantee of liberty and brotherhood, mercy, +equality, and justice—yet waved! And, part and indissoluble portion of +its inspiring memories and illustrious destinies, the star of Alleghenia +yet blazed upon its azure field! He had been living in a world of +unrealities, in a valley of shadow, grayed by portents of failure and +despair. His eyes had been narrowed to see the pitfalls which lined his +path, to the stumbling-blocks, the briers, the indescribable sordidness +of his personal position and his immediate surroundings. Now, he looked +up and horizonward. The thunder-clouds of official depravity and +duplicity which darkened the way of his endeavor—were they able, after +all, to blot out the memory of the clear, high sky above?</p> + +<p>As this thought came to him, it was almost as if, in actuality, a +brooding heaven had been rent asunder, revealing the steel-blue of the +infinite ether permeated with the supreme radiance of noon; and at the +incursion of this illuminating element the host of his discouragements +dwindled and disappeared, like<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> noisome little prowlers of the night, +scuttling to cover at the abrupt break of a tropical day. For a moment, +he strove to realize whence the light had come, and in what consisted +this sovereign ally, hitherto uncalculated, of his optimism. As he +tracked his thought, it led him undeviatingly back to its direct +inspiration, the words of Natalie Rathbawne.</p> + +<p>"Before your fears come true"—she had said.</p> + +<p>Before his fears came true—well, what? The revelation leaped at him +full and fair now, and every nerve sang like a taut wire in answer to +its touch. Before his fears came true, this wretched little world of +petty chicanery and official corruption which surrounded and sickened +him would be wiped out of existence. Abbott—McGrath—their machinations +and their misdeeds—their lies and their ambitions—their power and +their pride,—they were newts that fouled a pool, gnats in the sunshine, +cinders on the snow. Towering above them, ready, at an instant's +notice,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> to crush them out of being, was the rock of ages, the righteous +spirit of Alleghenia, integral and indestructible, illumined by the +ancient, undimmed, and eternal sense of rectitude inherent in the +American people!</p> + +<p>Not by his agency, perhaps—perhaps not even in his day,—nevertheless +and infallibly, the right was bound to conquer in the end. The clear +eyes and the firm mouths of the men of the Ninth spoke it, their rifles, +their broad shoulders, and their precision confirmed and guaranteed it, +and back of these stood the great, taciturn figure of the People, a +smile upon its calm and silent lips. When those lips should speak, as +speak they would, their words would be the annihilation of Elijah Abbott +and of all his kind!</p> + +<p>Meanwhile—the bitterness—the disappointments—the humiliations—ah, in +a moment, how they had grown shrunken, and wizened, and old! For out of +the radiance of revelation, as Christ of old spoke to His disciples, so +now the spirit of Alleghenia spoke to her Lieutenant-Governor.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span></p> + +<p>"<i>What is that to thee? Follow thou Me!</i>"</p> + +<p>Like a woman, the spirit of her cried unto him, and, like a man, the +spirit of John Barclay answered.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2> + +<h3>A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER</h3> + + +<p>Much to Barclay's satisfaction, Cavendish had obtained his appointment +as a city reporter on the staff of the "Sentinel." Even the first week +of the new life thus entered upon had produced a vast change in his +manner and appearance. Though the Lieutenant-Governor had seen him but +once, when he came to repay the loan made him—in itself, of all signs +of restoration to a normal attitude, the most significant—he found that +his complexion had cleared and softened, and his eye perceptibly +brightened. He was clean-shaven once more, and his dress, while of +strict simplicity, was yet suggestive of the old days when he had been +called the most fastidious man in Kenton City. He held himself +straighter, too, with his shoulders thrown back and his head up; and +Barclay had noted, with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> quiet gratification, that there was not a +tremor about the hands which unfolded and smoothed the bills he had come +to return. One evidence alone remained of the desperate ordeal through +which he had passed. His voice, formerly firm and vibrant with a spirit +that was half gayety, half arrogance, was now indescribably modulated, +and touched with a melancholy which was not that of servility, still +less of shame. Rather, it was an unspeakably appealing regret, a +monotonous listlessness, a suggestion of hopeless surrender to something +tragic and inevitable. Barclay was puzzled by it. It seemed illogical, +and evaded him, like a melody with a dimly familiar <i>motif</i> which he was +unable to place or even fully recall. It haunted him singularly, when +Cavendish had left, and afterwards, in his leisure moments, came back to +him, striving, as he fancied, to make itself understood. Intimately +candid as their recent relation had been, here was something +unexplained, which he could not come at, and which was yet eloquent of +vitality, of the need of comprehension.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p> + +<p>Since that time, three weeks before, the two men had not met. For this +there were several reasons. Barclay knew from a brief note that +Cavendish had taken a small room in a boarding-house, not far from the +"Rockingham," and that the pressure of his work for the "Sentinel" set +him afoot so early, and sent him home at night so brain and body weary, +that he had neither the strength nor the inclination for other things. +Added to this, had been the Lieutenant-Governor's absorption in his own +duties, and, in particular, his absence from Kenton City, on his round +of inspection of the state militia. But, just before the dinner hour, on +the evening following that of the review, Cavendish called, as Barclay +was in the act of dressing.</p> + +<p>"I had a suspicion I'd catch you just about this time," he said, +dragging a chair to the door of the bedroom, where he could watch the +Lieutenant-Governor struggling with a refractory white tie. "I'm getting +on famously, and I wanted you to know it."</p> + +<p>"That's right!" said Barclay, scowling<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> into the mirror. "But then, I +knew you would. Your pessimism didn't produce much effect on me. I've +heard men talk like that before. And, of course, when a chap gets into +the condition you were in, back there, there's no such thing as making +him believe he can ever pull out. You talked like an ass, that first +night, Spencer."</p> + +<p>"And acted like a blackguard! I suppose you will allow me to refer to +that now?"</p> + +<p>"Now less than ever, my good sir. As I've told you already, all that +belongs to the past. You're yourself again. What's the use of dwelling +on a time gone by, when you were in reality somebody else—or, rather, +nobody at all? When are you going to call at the Rathbawnes'? The old +man is pretty ill, I'm afraid, but I think the rest would like to see +you again. They were speaking of you only the other day—that is, one of +them was!"</p> + +<p>"Not till this strike trouble is over, at all events; they have all they +can attend to at present, without being bothered by reformed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> drunkards. +And perhaps I sha'n't call at all. I haven't decided yet what would be +best."</p> + +<p>Then, before Barclay had time to speak, he added:—</p> + +<p>"By the way, I'm to take up the strike to-morrow, for the 'Sentinel.'"</p> + +<p>"Are you?" exclaimed the Lieutenant-Governor, in a tone of the liveliest +interest. "That's good news. It must be about the most important +assignment they could give you, just now. Well, I wonder if you are +destined to be the only conscientious reporter in Kenton City, or +whether you will simply be like all the rest. Are you going to have the +courage of your convictions—which I think I can surmise, though you +haven't as yet confided them to me—or are you going to wear the +slave-chains of your fellows, and distort, and misrepresent, and truckle +and kow-tow to the policy of the most venal press in America?"</p> + +<p>"<i>On fait ce qu'on peut</i>," said Cavendish, with a shrug. "Orders are +orders, John. If the orders of the editor don't go, the orders<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> on the +cashier don't come. That's about all there is to it. It would be rather +futile to attempt the Don Quixote act, if only for the reason that one +would never get into print. One can't do more than follow instructions. +The reporter's best policy is his paper's best honesty."</p> + +<p>"Honesty?" repeated the Lieutenant-Governor. "Where does the honesty +come in? Of course I understand your position. In a way, it is identical +with mine—subservience to a principle that you despise, acquiescence in +methods that you know to be utterly false and wrong! How sick I am of it +all! It's the old experience, all over again, which I used to have as a +child with the Tom Smith paper crackers. You are fascinated by the +tinsel, and the colored paper, and the gaudy label. You think that when +you've dissected one, and pulled it all to pieces, you'll find a bugle +and a gold crown inside—because that's what it says on the box. But, +the first thing you know, you'll find yourself blowing on a tin whistle +and wearing a fool's cap of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> green paper! Lord! how the press of Kenton +City needs a <i>man</i>—a man with the courage and the power to show up the +scoundrels who are responsible for all this—McGrath and his associates, +I mean. I'm sick and tired of reporters whose rascality is self-evident, +of editors who are bought and sold like chattels, of a state of affairs, +in general, so infamous as to surpass expression! You have my sympathy, +Spencer—the sympathy of a fellow-victim. To be a reporter on a +newspaper which dictates dishonesty; to be the lieutenant of a Governor +who enjoins duplicity—it's all just about one and the same thing!"</p> + +<p>"It's curious," commented Cavendish, "that it wasn't until about a week +after—after that night, that I knew you were Lieutenant-Governor. Then, +your name happened to be mentioned in the office, and somebody asked me +if I knew you."</p> + +<p>"Whereupon," said Barclay, conquering the tie at last, and turning from +the mirror, "you had the inexpressible privilege of saying that you knew +me intimately."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Whereupon," repeated Cavendish, in that so singular tone which had lain +heavy upon the other's memory, "I had the inexpressible privilege of +saying that I used to know you, but that we had quarreled, and were +now—strangers."</p> + +<p>"Why?" demanded the Lieutenant-Governor, wheeling abruptly upon him. +"What possessed you to say such a silly thing as that?"</p> + +<p>Cavendish leaned forward in his chair, with his elbows on his knees, and +his forehead against his interlaced fingers, staring at the floor.</p> + +<p>"I'm glad, in a way, to have you ask that question," he said slowly. "We +are wary of mock heroics, or even real heroics, men like you and me. And +yet there are things which must be explained, things not easy to +explain, because they come so close at times to melodrama. I've always +had a horror of emotional situations; and, from what I know of you, I'm +sure you have, as well. I'd avoid this explanation, if I could—indeed,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> +I've deliberately avoided it, thus far. Yet if I were a Romanist in the +presence of my priest, I think I should feel more at liberty to evade +confession than I do now. For both our sakes, I'll try to be as brief, +as simple, as lucid, as I can. And I'll trust you to understand, as well +as may be. Don't think there's any pose, any aim at effect, in what I'm +going to say. You've asked me a question, and I'm going to answer it, +that's all! I don't think, in my present frame of mind, I could bear to +have you entertain the suspicion that the answer was affected or lacking +in candor. <i>Allons!</i> Already I'm growing too verbose!"</p> + +<p>He looked up with a wan smile.</p> + +<p>"Let's get down to facts. You ask me why I told my questioner that we no +longer knew each other. Well, then, let's have at it! It was because, +John Barclay, there is likely—no, there is sure—to come a time when +you won't care to acknowledge me as your friend. Oh, wait!" he added, as +the Lieutenant-Governor held up his hand in protest.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> "Hear me out. You +say I talked like an ass, that first night. Perhaps. But the fact +remains that I've been a drunkard—and that I'm bound to be one again! +I've been fighting against temptation for several weeks. It hasn't been +very strong, for some reason, and so I've managed to ground it so far. +But you remember the chap with whom old Hercules wrestled? Every time he +touched earth his strength was multiplied. Well, that's the way with +drink. I can throw the temptation for a while, but every time I do so it +rises, stronger many-fold. Sooner or later, I'm forced to give in. I +know it, as I know I'm sitting here. I'm doing my best now, because, in +the future, when the wrong that for a time you've righted goes wrong +again, I want you to remember that I made the effort—for you—and for +her—for the Fairy Princess. The end is as plain as day! It was born in +me, this. I think I've never told you that my father died of it, but +that's the truth. And the next time I drop, it will be for good and all. +I shall never make<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> another effort to conquer the inevitable. If I can't +do it now, with the hope of redemption thus made plain, with a new +start, and a fresh chance, and—thanks to you, John—the past wiped off +the slate and a new sum set to solve, with the incentive of your +friendship and confidence, and the interest, so undeserved, of the Fairy +Princess, into the bargain,—if I can't do it now, I say, why surely I +can never do it. John, you can't know what I've been through. You, +who've never had the temptation, can't conceive of what it means. It's a +living actuality, this lust for drink. When your nerves go wrong, even +at the end of a day, or a week, or a year, during which you've kept +straight, when you're tired, discouraged, and, above all, <i>alone</i>!—then +it comes at you like a live thing,—speaks—grips your arm—drags you +wherever it wills! I've laughed at it, scoffed at it, in its absence, +tried to make myself believe it a fragment of an otherwise forgotten +dream, many and many and many a time. <i>But it always came back!</i> Oh, +John<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> Barclay, you others will never understand! A man has to have been +through it, in order to know, and that not once, but, as I have, a +hundred times."</p> + +<p>"I can well believe it to be a tremendous temptation," said the +Lieutenant-Governor gravely.</p> + +<p>"Temptation? It's more than that! A temptation gives you <i>some</i> chance, +doesn't it? You may yield to it, but, at least, you've had your +fighting-chance. Well, in that sense, this is no temptation, though I've +been using the word myself to describe it. Why, John, it's madness, +sheer insanity. You probably remember that I never used to touch alcohol +at all. I promised my poor mother to let it alone until I reached my +majority. Of course, I didn't realize about the dear old man; he died +when I was too young for that. But her one great fear, and naturally, +was that the curse had descended to me—just as it had! Well, I stuck to +my promise till I was twenty-one, and kept along in the same way for +some time afterwards, just because there<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> didn't seem to be any +particularly good reason for taking up something which I had managed to +get along very well without, all my life. Then came that time, you +know—three years ago—and out of mere recklessness, bravado, God knows +what, I began to drink. John, I was a doomed man from the first swallow! +That demon had been hiding inside me, without sound or movement or other +hint of his presence, for twenty-eight years—just waiting his chance! +You know the rest. The fight has been going on ever since, and the thing +has beaten every time. I've resisted. I've struggled. I've even prayed. +It's all useless."</p> + +<p>He pointed significantly to the curtain which hung where the door of the +wine-closet had been.</p> + +<p>"As I did that night," he continued, "I shall do again, and still again, +until the end. It's insanity, nothing more or less. It lurks at the back +of my brain—always—always—and then, suddenly, when I am least +expecting it, it comes forward with a rush, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> I might as well try to +check the north wind or the incoming tide. I feel it tingling in my +fingers, scorching my throat, tearing at my reason. I swear I won't give +in, and, in the very act of so swearing, I get up and go out to meet it. +I could break down iron doors to get at the drink when it calls to me. +And, though I seem to be going straight enough now, the moment is coming +when it <i>will</i> call and when I shall obey! Then you won't want to think +you've ever known me, John Barclay, still less to remember that the name +of the Fairy Princess has passed between us. And, in the midst of my +damnation, it will be a drop of cold water on my tongue to know that +I've left you a loophole through which to escape the acknowledgment of +these last few weeks. So far, no one but the 'Rockingham' people, and +Payson, and—and the Fairy Princess—know that we've been together +recently. The 'Rockingham' people don't even know my name. Payson won't +speak. And <i>she</i> certainly won't. So far, so good. Further, I've come to +say<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> good-by. Hereafter, we mustn't see each other"—</p> + +<p>"Stop—stop!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "What is all this rot +you're talking? Chuck it, will you? Look here! If you go back on +me—which is bad—and on your Fairy Princess—which is worse—and on +yourself—which is the worst of all"—</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes," answered Cavendish, "that's all true. But I'm not talking +about <i>if</i> I go back, I'm talking about <i>when</i> I go back! As I said when +I began, there's no use trying to explain this thing to a man who +doesn't understand it, and no man <i>can</i> understand it except through his +own experience. In this respect, if in no other, you and I talk +different languages, belong on different planets. Could I expect you to +comprehend with me that first give of self-control which lets the demon +loose, and the meaning of the sight or smell of drink at that exact +moment when the will is weakest—the first glass, hastily swallowed, as +a brute, long thirsty,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> gulps down the water it has craved—the second +and third, taken more slowly—and then, that slackening of every nerve, +that jettisoning of all the moral cargo, that sudden love and +appreciation of the sensuous side of life? Don't you see? It's another +world, that, which you simply can't understand, unless you travel to it +by the road by which I have come—which God forbid!"</p> + +<p>"In all this," said Barclay, "I can see no reason why our present +friendship should not continue, and should not be known."</p> + +<p>"Simply this," answered Cavendish: "I'm—nothing! You're the +Lieutenant-Governor,—who is spoken of, if you care to know it, in the +office of the 'Sentinel' as the only honest official in the state of +Alleghenia. You mustn't tie up to me, nor I to you. I've told you what +my end is going to be. You don't believe it, perhaps, but it's none the +less true. And yours—do you know that the law-abiding element looks up +to you as a kind of Messiah? Do you know that you are the dawn of honor +and integrity which lies behind<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> the present black cloud of lawlessness? +I tell you, John, the promise of your future is such as might nerve a +beaten Napoleon to renewed endeavor. In your hands lies the salvation of +the state."</p> + +<p>"I wish I could think so," said the Lieutenant-Governor. "God knows I'd +willingly cut one of them off, if I thought its loss could benefit the +commonwealth. But, as I've had occasion to say to others, in the present +emergency I'm as helpless as a babe unborn. You see how things are +going—one might as well appeal, so far as any hope of success is +concerned, to McGrath himself as to Governor Abbott. There's no getting +around it, Spencer. It's a declaration of anarchy pure and simple, and +with the official seal of Alleghenia at the bottom of the document. +Iniquitous wrong is being done, not only to Mr. Rathbawne in refusing +him the protection of the law to which he is entitled, but to the cause +of the strikers themselves, if they can justly be said to have a cause. +Nothing ever was or ever will be gained for the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> benefit of the many by +the violence of the few. It can only end in one way: by the +interposition of the federal troops. You know what happened at Chicago. +It will be the same thing here; and before it is over we shall see +people shot down like rats in the streets of Kenton City."</p> + +<p>"I hope it won't come to that," said Cavendish; "but even so, all's well +that ends well. Provided that order is finally restored"—</p> + +<p>"But what credit is it," broke in Barclay, "to the state of Alleghenia +to have her law-breakers suppressed by the national government? Don't +you see that it would be only a final proof that she is too incompetent +or too indifferent to do it herself? From the point of view of the +state's good name, I doubt which is worst, her present attitude or the +interference of federal force."</p> + +<p>"Will it come to the latter in any event?"</p> + +<p>"Undoubtedly. They've already tried to prevent the delivery of Mr. +Rathbawne's mail, both at the mills and at his house. You<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> know what +that means, don't you? One carrier interfered with in the performance of +his duty is sufficient excuse for mobilizing a brigade."</p> + +<p>"But the Governor"—</p> + +<p>Barclay came forward, laid his hand on Cavendish's shoulder, and looked +down at him, slowly nodding his head.</p> + +<p>"The Governor of Alleghenia is a dyed-in-the-wool scoundrel, my good +sir," he said. "It is his manifest duty to enforce the law rigidly and +at once, and if the police of Kenton City cannot or will not assist him, +to summon the militia to his aid. In that way only can the honor of +Alleghenia be saved. And that is what Elijah Abbott will never do. There +is anarchy open and flagrant in the streets of Kenton City—there is +anarchy silent and sneering in the Governor's chair. God save the +state!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2> + +<h3>YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE</h3> + + +<p>"I have promised to marry Colonel Broadcastle," announced Mrs. Wynyard +when the silence had lasted twenty minutes.</p> + +<p>Dorothy flung round from the window against which she had been +mercilessly pressing her pretty nose.</p> + +<p>"Why, Aunt Helen!" she exclaimed. "You really are the most startlingly +abrupt person I ever knew. Are you in earnest? What under the sun +possessed you to do that?"</p> + +<p>"I think it must have been Colonel Broadcastle," answered Mrs. Wynyard, +with an air of reflection. "It was last night when he was showing us +over the armory, after the review. He not only asked me, but appeared to +have quite set his heart upon my giving him an affirmative answer. And +he had been so ex<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span>tremely civil, Dorothy, about our seats and all that, +that I thought it would seem rather ungracious to refuse the first favor +he had ever asked of me. So I said yes."</p> + +<p>"Aunt Helen, Aunt Helen! One of these fine days you will be the death of +me. Did any one <i>ever</i> hear of such a reason for accepting a man?"</p> + +<p>"I couldn't think of a better one for refusing him," said Mrs. Wynyard +serenely. "So there you are!"</p> + +<p>"Talk about logic!" said Dorothy. She came across the room, and seated +herself beside her aunt. "I never heard anything so exciting in my +life!" she added. "Do you really mean it? Are you really going to marry +him?"</p> + +<p>"That is the arrangement, as I understand it," replied Mrs. Wynyard. "Of +course, I haven't his promise in writing, but I think I can trust him. I +once looked him up in your father's business guide, and he had three A's +after his name. I'm sure I don't know what they can stand for, if it's +not Acquaintance,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> Appeal, and Acceptance. I don't really see what else +I could have done. It seems to have all been arranged without consulting +me at all. One can't very well set one's self up in opposition to a +business guide, you know."</p> + +<p>"But he's old enough to be your father, Aunt Helen!"</p> + +<p>"That's precisely the reason why there wouldn't have been any sense in +my promising to be a sister to him. You see, I was quite helpless in the +matter from start to finish."</p> + +<p>"And it was only last night that you called me preposterous!" laughed +Dorothy. "Really, Aunt Helen, people who live in glass houses shouldn't +throw stones. I think you are the most absurd creature in the world. Do +you love him?"</p> + +<p>"I can even go so far as to say that I think I do," said Mrs. Wynyard, +without a break in her gravity. "I have all the symptoms,—palpitation +of the heart, a morbid craving for Shelley and chocolate caramels, a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> +tendency to wake up singing, and a failing for flattening my nose +against the window-pane for twenty minutes at a stretch without saying a +word to my poor old aunt, on the mere chance that he may be coming down +the avenue."</p> + +<p>The blush which Dorothy paid as tribute to this subtle innuendo came +near to rivaling one of young Nisbet's celebrated performances in the +same line.</p> + +<p>"You're making fun of me," she said reproachfully.</p> + +<p>"I, my dear?—not the least in the world. It's all as true as the gospel +according to St. Valentine. I've told you first because we're not only +aunt and niece, but the very best friends possible besides, and I knew +you would like to hear the news before any one else. Colonel Broadcastle +is by all odds the finest man I know,—I won't even except John Barclay, +much as I admire him. He has paid me a very great honor. I respect him +tremendously; I trust him absolutely. These alone are good reasons; but +there's a better<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> one,—so much better that nothing else really has any +bearing on the subject. Can you guess?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Dorothy softly, "you just love him. Isn't that it?"</p> + +<p>"Exactly. It's a curious thing, this love. There may be every reason why +one should marry a man, his own wish included, and yet one doesn't. +There may be no reason at all, so far as outsiders can see, and yet one +does! I've known a woman to throw over one suitor who had everything in +his favor—money, character, position—and accept another who had none +of these advantages—because she liked the way he parted his hair! +That's the way it goes. It's the most illogical thing in the world, if +we except the stock market and other women's gowns. And then, when it's +all arranged, his friends wonder what she could have seen in him, and +her friends what he could have seen in her! But I'm wandering from the +subject. Seriously, Dorothy dear, I love him very sincerely, and I have +been more happy than I can say ever since I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> found out that it wasn't +going to be one of those one-sided love-affairs which assure the incomes +of the poets and the lawyers. And now,—confidence for confidence, +Dorothy!"</p> + +<p>"Aunt Helen! I don't know what you mean."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Dorothy! 'I don't know what you mean' is one of those phrases like +'Not at home' and 'Yours very sincerely,' which are white lies on the +face of them. I don't want to force your confidence. We all have what +our friends recognize as our private affairs, with the accent—worse +luck!—on the <i>pry</i>! But this is very different. I'm very fond of you, +as you know, and my interest is far from being vulgar curiosity. Of a +woman's five cardinal failings—inquisitiveness, extravagance, vanity, +vacillation, and loquacity—I'm guiltless of all except the last and +most innocent. But don't we all need to talk at times? Don't we all long +for a trustworthy <i>confidante</i>? Aren't our little secrets often like +precious liquors?—if we don't make use of them, share them with our +friends, they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> either ferment and sour, or else lose all their sweetness +and significance by slow evaporation."</p> + +<p>"You would draw confidence from a stone," said Dorothy, with a little +smile, "but what have I to tell you?"</p> + +<p>"How should I know? Perhaps nothing—as yet; perhaps everything. Take +your time about it, dear. I'm not trying to get you to commit yourself. +I only want you to know that I'm ready to share your secret when it's +ready to be shared, and to help and counsel you in any way I can. I know +the main great fact already. Because, you see, Dorothy, one may conceal +an infinite amount, even from one's nearest and dearest, when they don't +understand—and they are so <i>apt</i> not to understand, one's nearest and +dearest! And the financier may hide his schemes from his partners, or +the general his plan of campaign from his fellow-officers, or the +politician his ambitions from his most ardent supporters—but I doubt, +my dear, if a woman in love was ever able to hide very<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> much from +another woman in the same lamentable condition!</p> + +<p>"If it were not," she added, taking Dorothy's hand in hers, "for the +great happiness which has come into my life, do you think that I should +have been able to divine that other great happiness which seems to be +hovering over yours? I am the physician afflicted with the disease which +it becomes his duty to study and to cure. Only, it's not a disease, +Dorothy, but a great, a beautiful revelation. I should have compared +myself, instead, to the prophet who is enabled to interpret the dreams +of others because they are identical with his own. There's my little +speech. And when you are prepared to answer it, you'll find me ready."</p> + +<p>As she was speaking the last words, the butler flung back the curtains +at the doorway of the drawing-room.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Nisbet," he announced imperturbably.</p> + +<p>Dorothy looked at her aunt, and then, with her frank laugh:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"If there <i>is</i> an answer," she said, "that's it!"</p> + +<p>As young Nisbet entered, Mrs. Wynyard was the first to greet him.</p> + +<p>"So," she observed, looking him over approvingly, "you've beaten your +swords into walking-sticks, and your spears into top-hats, as my friend +Isaiah so aptly observes! That's very commendable, but I almost think I +like you better in your war-paint. Do you know, a Colonel's orderly is +the spickest-and-spanest object upon which I've ever laid, or hope to +lay, my eyes?"</p> + +<p>"He just naturally has to be," said young Nisbet, with a grin. Somehow, +he was always more at his ease with Mrs. Wynyard than with other women. +"You see," he added, "if it wasn't that way, he wouldn't be it."</p> + +<p>Which was as near as he had ever come to making an epigram.</p> + +<p>"Well, I shall leave you to the tender mercies of Dorothy," said Mrs. +Wynyard. "I've promised to take a walk with your—what is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> it you call +him—instead of commanding officer, you know?"</p> + +<p>"K. O.," said young Nisbet.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's it. How deplorably you militiamen spell! Well, at all +events, I'm going to walk with your K. O., and it's time I was getting +ready. Good-by."</p> + +<p>"Good-by, Mrs. Wynyard."</p> + +<p>"Day-day!" said Dorothy, from the divan.</p> + +<p>"She's a crack-a-jack!" exclaimed young Nisbet, after she had gone.</p> + +<p>"Mercy!" said Dorothy. "I never knew you to be so enthusiastic over any +one before. If you have any intention of falling in love with Aunt +Helen, I feel it to be my duty, as a friend and well-wisher, to warn you +in advance that there isn't the most remote show in the world for you."</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's not that!" protested young Nisbet with that stupendous +earnestness which made people want to hug him. "Why, Mrs. Wynyard would +have me talked to a standstill in two or seven minutes! Imagine me +trying to make love to a dame like that! She'd<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> lose me so quick you +couldn't see me for the dust. Besides"—</p> + +<p>"Besides what?" asked Dorothy with an elaborate air of unconcern, as he +hesitated.</p> + +<p>Young Nisbet was quite crimson now, and twitched at the creases in his +trousers where they passed over his knees, and turned in his toes +excessively.</p> + +<p>"There's somebody else in the running!" he blurted out desperately.</p> + +<p>There! It was out—a part of it, at least—not at all, to be sure, in +anything even remotely resembling one of the thousand manners he had +proposed to himself as effective, during long hours of wakefulness, when +there was nothing in the world but his crowding thoughts and the ticking +of his clock—but still, out! The ice was broken. It was impossible that +she should not understand. The rest would be easier.</p> + +<p>Alas for young Nisbet! He was, as he himself acknowledged, not "up on +women!"</p> + +<p>"Somebody else?" repeated Dorothy.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> "How ever did you find that out? She +only told <i>me</i> about it twenty minutes ago."</p> + +<p>Alas, alas, for young Nisbet! He had thought his feet upon the beach at +last, whereas they had but touched a sand-bar in passing over. The +under-tow of embarrassment was worse than ever now, and threatened to +drag him down.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't mean Mrs. Wynyard. I wasn't talking of her—that is, I was, +at first—but afterwards—anyhow, I'm not talking of her now! When I say +there's somebody else, I mean—I mean"—</p> + +<p>"I am going out for a moment, Dorothy—just over to the <i>doctor's</i>. +<i>How</i> de do, Mr. Nisbet? <i>Wretched</i> weather, <i>isn't</i> it? Natalie's with +your father, my dear, and <i>I'll</i> be back <i>almost</i> immediately. +Er—<i>ahem</i>!"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Rathbawne went through a kind of rudimentary calisthenic exercise, +which consisted of squaring her shoulders and drawing in her chin. It +was accompanied by a meaning glance at her daughter, and was designed as +an inconspicuous substitute for the frank<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> injunction to "sit up +straight, my dear," upon which Dorothy had finally placed a ban.</p> + +<p>"And <i>won't</i> you feed the gold-fish, my dear?" she added. "I've been <i>so</i> +occupied, and the poor things haven't had a <i>crumb</i> for three days. I've +just told Thomas to take a plate of bread in at <i>once</i>. I'm sure Mr. +<i>Nisbet</i> won't mind: get him to <i>help</i> you. Er—<i>ahem</i>! And I'll be back +in about fifteen minutes, or so."</p> + +<p>For a time there was silence in the big, warm conservatory. Young Nisbet +had taken the dish from Dorothy's hands, and, after seating himself on +the low marble parapet surrounding the pool, devoted his energies to +feeding the gold-fish. He was thinking that it was all to be done over +again, and that it was harder than ever, if such a thing were possible, +to do. What was there about those few words which seemed to choke him? +For the moment, he took refuge in a commonplace question.</p> + +<p>"Is it one of your duties to feed these persons?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span></p> + +<p>Dorothy laughed shortly, like a little chord of music.</p> + +<p>"No—it's the Mater's peculiar privilege," she answered. "She adores the +stupid little beasts. Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. Nisbet. She +feeds them regularly herself,—or did, until Dad began to require so +much of her time. But lately, the house has been so upset, and she has +been doing such a lot of going out, and coming in"—</p> + +<p>"Yes," put in young Nisbet dryly, "I've noticed the coming in part."</p> + +<p>"So Natalie has been doing it for her," went on Dorothy, more rapidly. +"I suppose Natalie herself hasn't had the time, these last three days. +They <i>are</i> hungry, aren't they? <i>Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. +Nisbet!</i> Don't you see the poor things have only button-holes for +mouths?"</p> + +<p>There was another long pause, before either spoke again.</p> + +<p>"What defeats me about your mother," said young Nisbet slowly, "is the +way she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> manages to come in just at the wrong moment. At interruption, +she's the most star performer I've ever run up against. You don't mind +my saying that, do you? I'm not throwing any asparagus. I wouldn't be +disrespectful about her for the world. But really, for chopping into a +conversation, she's a dazzler!"</p> + +<p>"She <i>is</i> a little inopportune at times," admitted Dorothy.</p> + +<p>"Inopportune? Yes,—she's all of that. When she marches in, I feel +exactly as if the boat had gybed, and the boom come over and knocked me +into thirty fathoms of water. Lord!"</p> + +<p>"Why, how ridiculous!" said Dorothy. "There's nothing about the Mater to +be afraid of. She's the dearest, most innocent old thing in the world! +She just blunders along like that, and nobody is less aware of her +mistakes than she is. And, after all, why shouldn't she interrupt us, so +long as we're not saying anything in particular? And if we <i>were</i> +saying—anything in particular, we<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> could always pick up the +conversation where we dropped it."</p> + +<p>"That's just what I find it so hard to do!" confessed young Nisbet. "I'm +a stupid sort of lout, you know, Miss Rathbawne. I've never had half a +chance to practice talking to dames, and where other lads fuss like +experts, I just can't make good. I foozle every stroke. I'm an +ass—that's all!"</p> + +<p>"You're nothing of the sort!" said Dorothy indignantly. "You're an +extremely attractive young man!"</p> + +<p>"As good as the average in some ways, perhaps. But—how can I explain +what I mean?—there always comes a day when a chap wants to be more, +wants to be the best ever, in every way! That's the proposition I'm up +against now. I seem to be just a bundle of misfits, and—and—oh, +shucks! my line of talk is all crooked, and I can't tell you what the +trouble is, but"—</p> + +<p>"Your liver's out of kilter," interpolated Dorothy.</p> + +<p>"No, sir!" protested young Nisbet. "No<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>thing is ever out of kilter +inside me! If I'm nothing else, I'm blue-ribbon boy on the health +question. No, it's something I want, and that I'm pretty sure I can't +get."</p> + +<p>"I know perfectly well what it is," said Dorothy, "and you haven't even +asked for it!"</p> + +<p>Young Nisbet looked up suddenly.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean?"—he stammered, "do you mean?"—</p> + +<p>Outside, the front door slammed, and Mrs. Rathbawne's voice became +audible, inquiring Dorothy's whereabouts of the butler. The girl +laughed.</p> + +<p>"There's the Mater back again," she said. "Oh, Mr. <i>Nisbet</i>!"</p> + +<p>For young Nisbet had dropped dish and bread-crumbs into the pool with a +great splash, electrifying the gold-fish into unheard-of activity, and +had risen, at the same moment, to his feet. He stood before her, his +honest face blazing, his hands outstretched.</p> + +<p>"I love you!" he said. "Will you marry me?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span></p> + +<p>And whether or not he received an audible reply to this question he +never knew,—only she was in his arms, and gold-fish might feast or +starve, for all he cared about them. The wide doors of perfect bliss +swung open before him, and young Nisbet passed within.</p> + +<p>He was gazing ruefully into the water, as Mrs. Rathbawne entered. For +the first time in his experience, her presence did not embarrass him.</p> + +<p>"I've dropped a dish into your pool, Mrs. Rathbawne," he said, "and +scared the gold-fish into blue conniption fits. Look how they are +scurrying around. I hope I haven't done them any harm."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no," answered Mrs. Rathbawne placidly. "They are getting <i>so</i> fat +that I should <i>think</i> a little exercise, <i>now</i> and again, would be +<i>good</i> for them. We <i>might</i> drop a dish into the pool every week or so, +Dorothy, just to stir them up."</p> + +<p>"It might go for a while," said young Nisbet, "but any old football +player like myself, Mrs. Rathbawne, will tell you that you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> can't work +the same trick more than just a certain number of times."</p> + +<p>"Interruption, for example!" added Dorothy, and laughed across at him, +deliciously, with her eyes.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2> + +<h3>DIOGENES</h3> + + +<p>It was during the tenth week of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills that +the "Kenton City Record" made its long-remembered attack upon +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay. The arraignment was one unparalleled for +venom, even in the columns of that most notoriously scurrilous journal +in the state, and, withal, there was about it a devilish ingenuity, a +distortion of facts so slight as to defy refutation, and so plausible as +to carry conviction. It was the last blow in the long series of +discouragements which Barclay had suffered since his inauguration, and +for the moment he was completely unmanned. He was at no loss, however, +to trace the source from which the ingeniously perverted facts had been +obtained. Not even McGrath, with his intimate knowledge of all that went +forward at the capitol,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> could have supplied information so detailed. +The hand of Elijah Abbott was traceable in every line of the attack. +Their conversation, on the afternoon when he had first spoken to Barclay +of the impending strike, was reproduced almost word for word, as well as +that on the occasion when McGrath had been present, and therefrom the +"Record" went on to deduce that not even Peter Rathbawne, with all his +obstinacy, all his blindness to the welfare of his employees, was +responsible for their present destitution in the same sense as was the +Lieutenant-Governor, who might have avoided the strike by a conciliatory +word, and who, instead, had advised Mr. Rathbawne to fight the +working-people until the last cent of their money should be exhausted +and the last drop of their blood should be shed.</p> + +<p>"Incompetency," said the article in part, "is what we long since learned +to expect from John Hamilton Barclay. Gross neglect of public duty, +flagrant callousness to responsibility, contemptuous indifference to the +interests of the citizens whose votes placed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> him where he is,—all +these have been part and parcel of his attitude since the unfortunate +moment of his election. But even in him we had not looked for the +incredible spectacle of a public official deliberately precipitating the +incalculable distress which has followed in the wake of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills. Overburdened with the cares of office, in a single +instance the Governor of Alleghenia turned over a question of vital +significance to the lieutenant from whom he had every reason to expect +compliance and support. Even so, he was careful to point out a line of +action by which the impending calamity might readily have been avoided. +And what was the result? Not only in total disregard of plain duty, but +in direct disobedience of the orders of his superior, the +Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia threw his influence into the scale to +outweigh law and order, and brought about the deplorable destitution now +facing the families of four thousand martyrs to principle. When men are +driven to desperation, when women turn to shame in order<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> to maintain +life, when children are heard crying in our streets for bread, to whom +shall we point as the author of it all? To Peter Rathbawne, a poor, +doddering old man, barely responsible now, if rumor is to be believed, +for what he does? No! To John Hamilton Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of +Alleghenia!"</p> + +<p>This, and much more in the same strain, while passed over as sensational +bombast by the better element, did not fail of its effect upon the +strikers. A mass-meeting, held that morning, denounced Barclay in a set +of resolutions, as a traitor to his office and as the avowed enemy of +labor, and demanded his impeachment on the ground of neglect of duty. +During the day, half a score of threatening letters came to his office. +But what hurt him most, though he almost smiled at his own +sensitiveness, was that the doormen and porters at the Capitol greeted +his morning nod with a stare, and even the little office-boy, bending +low over his table in the ante-room, did not look up for the customary +wink.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> For his mother was a trimmer at the Rathbawne Mills.</p> + +<p>Once in his office, the Lieutenant-Governor found it impossible to +concentrate his mind upon the work before him. Sentence after sentence, +the words of his arraignment marched through his mind, as he sat with +his elbows on the desk and his chin in his doubled fists. A single +reading seemed to have stamped them indelibly and forever upon his +memory. Baffled by conflicting reflections he began, for the first time, +to doubt whether his had been the course of conscience, or merely that +of pride and perversity. Was not the "Record" right, perhaps, after all? +If it was true that the strike was driving men to crime and women to the +streets—and if it was not, as yet, true, it soon must be—who, indeed, +was to blame if not he himself, who had said "Fight them!" when he might +have kept peace by a word?</p> + +<p>Suddenly, the Lieutenant-Governor rose, and, crossing the room to where +the arms of Alleghenia hung upon the wall, took down<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> the frame, laid +it, face up, upon the table, and, bending down, studied it intently. The +beautifully executed nude figures of Art and Labor stared steadfastly +back at him, their muscular hands grasping the circular shield, strength +and endurance in every line of their necks, shoulders, and thighs, +purity and purpose in their blue eyes and square-cut jaws. He was as +motionless as they for full five minutes. Presently his finger moved +slowly across the frame, and he said, quite softly:</p> + +<p>"<i>Justitia—Lex—Integritas.</i>"</p> + +<p>Then he looked up, straight before him, out of the open window, where an +encircling wistaria was dotted with minute sprouts of green, and up at +the clear, wide sky.</p> + +<p>"I'm right!" he said aloud. "I'm right!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>At five that afternoon, Spencer Cavendish set out upon the most +unpleasant assignment which had ever fallen to his lot. When Payson had +told him that he was to procure an interview with Peter Rathbawne for +the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> "Sentinel," with a special eye to the mill-owner's failing health, +as reported in the morning's "Record," he had shrunk back instinctively +from a task so distasteful, and was on the point of refusing. But two +considerations checked this impulse. If the thing were to be done at +all, he thought, surely it had better be the work of one friendly to the +Rathbawnes and with their interests at heart than that of a bungling +outsider, with it in his power to hurt them beyond expression. The +argument was plausible, but behind its logic, at the back of Cavendish's +brain, there lay another reason, without which the first had been +insufficient to persuade him. He wanted to see Natalie again—to meet +her under the shield of some compatible excuse, so that he should not +seem to have sought her of his own will. He was thirsty for a word from +her, thirsty with the pitiable thirst of the shipwrecked sailor who +knows a swallow of salt water will but increase his torture, and who +craves it, none the less. Long since, he had forfeited his right to her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> +friendship—no sophistry could blind him to that. Moreover the ocean of +degradation not only lay behind him; it lay in front as well. It was as +he had told Barclay. He stood upon an island, not the mainland, of +redemption, and another plunge was inevitable.</p> + +<p>What he expected to gain by a word with Natalie Rathbawne, Cavendish +himself could hardly have told. At most, he was conscious of a faint +hope that in some turn or twist of the conversation he might have a +chance of thanking her, of telling her that he rejoiced in her +happiness, and of bidding her good-by. For paramount in his mind lay the +thought of his approaching downfall, inevitable, utter, and final. He +did not attempt to deceive himself. He knew what was coming. It had come +before.</p> + +<p>When Cavendish had sent in his card, a servant showed him through the +library into the conservatory, where Peter Rathbawne was seated in a +deep rattan chair watching his daughter, who stood at his side tossing +bread<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span>-crumbs to the gold-fish in the circular central pool. They both +turned at the sound of his footsteps, and Natalie held out her hand.</p> + +<p>"So you've come at last!" she said. "I should think it was quite time. +Dad, you remember Mr. Cavendish, don't you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," answered her father. "Oh, yes!"</p> + +<p>Rathbawne's voice was without life, his face almost wholly void of +expression. Though he glanced at Cavendish, it was with the blank stare +of a delirious person whose attention is unconsciously caught by an +unusual noise rather than with any evidence of direct interest, and he +took no further part in the conversation, nor even seemed to realize +that his companions were speaking. When he had answered his daughter's +question and looked at Cavendish, he leaned back in his chair, and +wearily closed his eyes.</p> + +<p>"He is very much changed since you saw him," said the girl in a lower +tone, turning again to the pool, "and it's all come about in the past +six weeks. The strike has had a most curious, a most pathetic effect +upon him.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> Even the doctor is at a loss to account for it. I think that +I am, perhaps, the only one who really understands. He has always been +so proud of his mills and of his people, so loyal to them, so like a +father to them, one and all, that to have them turn against him like +this, and, what is worse, get to drinking and rioting, has almost broken +his heart. The doctor says only one thing can save him, and that is to +see the mills going again and the people happy and prosperous, as they +were before. And who knows when that will be? For, feeble and broken as +he is, he will never give in to the Union. Of that I'm sure."</p> + +<p>"I'm very sorry," said Cavendish softly. One look at Rathbawne had been +enough to show him that the interview for which he had been sent was an +impossibility. One look at Natalie sufficed to banish from his mind +every thought save that of her pitiful pallor and the pathetic quiver of +her lips.</p> + +<p>"I had no idea it was as bad as this," he continued. "Can't anything be +done? You<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> are far from being in good shape yourself, Miss Rathbawne."</p> + +<p>"Tired and dispirited, that's all," she answered, trying to smile. "And +I fear nothing can be done as long as our fate lies in Governor Abbott's +hands. There's no use in harping on that, though. You know as well as I +what we have to expect from him. Did you see the attack on Mr. Barclay +this morning?"</p> + +<p>"An infamous libel!" exclaimed Cavendish hotly.</p> + +<p>Miss Rathbawne crumbled the bread between her fingers, and resumed her +feeding of the gold-fish.</p> + +<p>"You must know that I am the last person in the world to need that +assurance," she said slowly. "It is only another thread in all the +hideous tissue of injustice and iniquity which has been wrapped about us +like a pall. What a shame, is it not, that such a man as he should be +powerless to do the work I think God intended for him? And what a shame +that Alleghenia, needing his clear head and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> his strong arm and his +loyal heart as she does in this hour of emergency, should only be +sneering at him as a coward and a cad!"</p> + +<p>"I cannot believe," answered Cavendish, "that the venom of the 'Record' +is to be taken as the sentiment of the state. There must be many—there +must be a majority of Alleghenians who know, as we know, that no better +man breathes than John Barclay."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said the girl.</p> + +<p>In the open spaces of water between the lily-pads the fat indolent +gold-fish mouthed at the crumbs, stirring the silence with little +sucking sounds, and sending tiny ripples widening on all sides. One +alone, dingy yellow in color, moped apart from his fellows, and took no +interest in the banquet.</p> + +<p>"That one's a cynic," said Miss Rathbawne presently. "My subtlest +cajoleries never win him from that attitude of sneering contempt. The +others get all the tid-bits, and he doesn't seem to care. He isn't even +ornamental—he's in a class by himself. I call him Diogenes, and I'm +thinking of buying him a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> tub all for himself, where he can sulk in +solitary grandeur to his heart's content."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps not altogether in a class by himself," said Cavendish. "There +are others, you know, who make no use of their opportunities, and who +can never hope to be anything but ugly and useless, while their fellows +are getting all the good things of life, and enjoying them, and giving +pleasure of one kind or another into the bargain."</p> + +<p>Something in his tone caused Natalie to look at him suddenly.</p> + +<p>"I'm not enough of a pessimist," she answered firmly, "to believe that +true in anything beyond appearances. We are all apt, no matter how +conceited we may be, to underestimate at times the extent of our own +usefulness—or, rather, we are unconscious of the direction in which it +is most productive. If what you say is so, then all that is lacking is +the opportunity, and that is sure to come. We may squander many +opportunities, and, hardly less probably, actually turn to account in a +way we do not perceive many which we<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> seem to ourselves to squander. In +any event, others will come. A woman once said to me that the good in +her was not cultivated nor exercised with a view to <i>individual +immortality</i>. That seemed to me to mean so much that I've built up quite +a little creed on it. It's the principle, isn't it, upon which the whole +scheme of the world hinges? A million leaves fall and decay to enrich +the soil wherefrom two million more may spring. An infinity of little +shell-fish die, and the ages grind their shells to powder to make the +sands and the chalk cliffs. Countless raindrops sacrifice their identity +to maintain that of one great river. And why should it not be so with +us? If only we can contribute in the smallest degree to the uplifting of +our kind, to the advancement of the race, to the maintenance of what we +know to be right, what possible difference can it make whether, in the +effort to be of such service, we live or succumb? We were put here, it +seems to me, very much as separate notes are put into one great harmony. +Each note is struck at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> the proper time, serves its purpose, and goes +into nothingness. Each plays its part, however small. We can't all be +included in the wonderful final chords. Our place may seem trivial to +us, and yet in some sense we may be sure we are all contributors to the +unity and perfection of the whole. That ought to be enough. No one note +achieves individual immortality, but each does something to assure the +immortality of the composition of which it forms a part. If we don't +believe that, if we are not content to have it so, how is it possible to +believe in any divine purpose, any scheme of justice at all? Look at the +indescribable waste of life on all sides of us. If only in the case of +humanity, people are dying by hundreds every minute, unheeded, +unlamented, unrecorded. Human life is such a little thing!—as little as +the life of the leaf or the raindrop. And yet in the death of these last +we are able to perceive the working of a vast system which must be the +outcome of a direct purpose, and whereby the best interest of each +species is furthered. And so,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> the human race. Why should it be less +than lesser things? One man dies in order that two may live. A +confederacy—as in the case of our own Rebellion—perishes in order that +a nation may endure. Everywhere, in short, the individual sacrifices his +individual existence in order that it may contribute to and fertilize +the growth of his species. So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly +content to have it so. I should ask nothing better, when my own time +comes, than the assurance that, in one way or another, my death had a +significance,—that it was for a person or a principle, and not merely a +natural phenomenon. I may not be able to believe that; but there is one +belief possible to all of us,—I mean that, if not in death, then +assuredly in life, we have been of service to our race and time. We are +often told that the indispensable thing does not exist. I think the same +may be said of the useless one. I don't believe even the humblest of +God's creatures goes out of life without having been at one time or +another an influence for good. I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> even have hopes of Diogenes. Some day +there will be a scrap of refuse or an ugly little bug which mars the +symmetry of the pool, and Diogenes will eat it,—and perhaps die of +indigestion as a martyr to principle!"</p> + +<p>The silence which followed her words was broken by a hoarse sob from Mr. +Rathbawne, and, turning, they saw that his head had fallen back against +the chair, with his eyes, wide and staring, fixed upon the glass roof, +and his breath coming in short, thick gasps from between his parted +lips. In an instant Natalie was on her knees by his side, with her arms +about him.</p> + +<p>"Don't be frightened," she said, looking up at Cavendish with a brave +little smile. "It's his heart. He has had these attacks frequently of +late. Will you get me the whiskey decanter and a glass? You'll find them +in the dining-room—on the sideboard—to the left."</p> + +<p>Decanter in hand, Cavendish stood watching her, as she tenderly poured a +little of the raw spirit between her father's lips. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> effect was +almost instantaneous. Rathbawne choked, swallowed the restorative, and +presently raised his head and looked at her, patting her hand +tremulously with his own. They were so absorbed in each other that +neither noted a sudden, strange transformation in Cavendish's +expression. From the wide-mouthed decanter in his hand, the faint acrid +odor of Peter Rathbawne's fine old Scotch whiskey crept upward, stung +his nostrils, and, of a sudden, set him all a-quiver, like a startled +animal. The smell was almost that of pure alcohol, and set his mouth +watering, and drove his breath out in a little shuddering gasp that was +like a revulsion from some sickening medicine, just swallowed. But he +knew it, none the less, for something which belonged to and was part of +him. For weeks he had avoided it. Now it assailed him like that foe of +Hercules, of whom he had spoken to Barclay, whose strength was +multiplied a hundred-fold for every time his opponent trod him under +foot.</p> + +<p>As he told the Lieutenant-Governor, at the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> moment when least he +expected it, the demon touched his arm. For a minute he fought +desperately against the suggestion, with his eyes closed, and his teeth +cutting into his inner lip. He clung madly to the thought of the +presence in which he was, conscious that the girl's words had +uplifted him immeasurably, given him a clearer insight into the +essential significance of life than he had ever known. It was +useless—useless—useless! There was nothing left in the world but the +smell of the liquor that he loathed and that he loved!</p> + +<p>"If you were to leave us alone"—</p> + +<p>At the suggestion, Cavendish bowed and went slowly back toward the +dining-room. Once out of sight of the others, he paused, glanced back +over his shoulder, and then, abruptly, supporting himself with one hand +against the side-post of the doorway, raised the decanter in the other +to his lips, and drank.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XIII" id="XIII"></a>XIII</h2> + +<h3>THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE</h3> + + +<p>The day had been deliciously warm and still, one of those eloquent +heralds of spring that are touched with a peculiar beauty rivaling her +own. As Cavendish came out of the Rathbawne residence, Bradbury Avenue +was splashed with huge blotches of dazzling yellow, where the light of +the westwardly sun poured between the houses and was spilled upon the +smooth pavement. The man choked slightly at the after-taste of the raw +whiskey he had just swallowed, but almost immediately he smiled.</p> + +<p>"I knew it would come," he said to himself as he turned out into the +avenue, "and here it is. I'm not surprised. I'm glad, God help me—I'm +<i>glad</i>!"</p> + +<p>His mouth was watering, and he felt, as it were, every inch of the +stimulant's progress<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> through his veins, warming him with its familiar +glow. When he had left the conservatory, he had been trembling +pitifully. Now he was calm, and as steady as if his nerves had been +cords of steel. Responsibility, resolution, remorse—they had fallen +from him like so many discarded garments. He was sharply alive to the +pleasure of the moment, keenly appreciative of the sunlight, the soft +air, the laughter of the children romping in the streets. Of a singular +languor which had been wont to come over him toward the close of each +busy day of the past six weeks there was now no hint. He walked rapidly, +with his shoulders thrown back, and his chin well elevated, but his +course was not in the direction of his home, nor yet in that of the +"Sentinel" office. Instinctively, he had turned toward that part of the +city where were the large restaurants, the playhouses, and the more +pretentious saloons.</p> + +<p>At a corner, he wheeled abruptly into one of these last, and, seating +himself at a small table, called for an absinthe. The place was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> already +lighted, and each glass in the pyramids behind the bar twinkled with a +tiny brilliant reflection of the nearest incandescent globes. The air +was faintly redolent of lemon and the mingled odors of many liquors. To +Cavendish it was all very familiar, and all very pleasant. Again he told +himself that he was glad, glad that the restraint he had been exercising +was at an end. He was free, he thought, free to accomplish his own +inevitable damnation. He had no patience for the tedious operation of +dripping the water into his absinthe over a lump of sugar, but ordered +gum, and stirring the two rapidly together, filled the glass to the brim +from a little pitcher at his side. Then he drank, slowly but steadily, +barely touching the glass to the table between his sips.</p> + +<p>Presently, he was conscious of a slight numbness at his wrists, a barely +perceptible tingling in his knees and knuckles. His heart was +fluttering, and his temples pulsed pleasurably. He glanced toward the +glittering pyramids of glasses, and for a fraction of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> time they seemed +to shift in unison a foot to the right, returning immediately to their +original position with a jerk. Then he rose, and went toward the door, +catching sight of his face in a mirror as he passed. It was very pale, +and he crinkled his nose at it derisively, and then smiled at the +whimsical oddity of his reflected expression. On the threshold he +paused, looking toward the west, blazing with the red and saffron of the +departed sun.</p> + +<p>"Oof!" he said, with a downward tug at his waistcoat. "It comes quickly. +That's what it is to be out of practice."</p> + +<p>He dined alone in a corner of an unfrequented restaurant, eating little, +but drinking steadily, absinthe at first, then whiskey, four +half-goblets of it, barely diluted with water. Then he found himself +once more in the streets, now brilliantly lighted, going on and on +without purpose, save when the blazing colored glass of a saloon swerved +him from his path. He knew that he was walking steadily, avoiding +obstacles as if by instinct,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> stepping from and on to kerbs without any +actual perception of them. Faces swam past him, staring. Men, +particularly those at the bars he leaned against, were talking loudly, +but, as it seemed to him, brilliantly. He often smiled involuntarily, +and sometimes spoke to one of them, drank with him, and presently was +alone again, walking on and on. Occasionally a white-faced clock bulged +at him out of the night; and then he noticed that time was galloping. It +was close upon one when he found himself in a quarter which his recent +employment had made familiar—the neighborhood of the Rathbawne Mills.</p> + +<p>Here, suddenly, his mind emerged from a mist, and every detail of his +surroundings stood out sharp and clear-cut. The street was +insufficiently illuminated, but the light of a full moon cut across the +buildings on one side, half way between roof and sidewalk. Cavendish +perceived, with a kind of dull surprise, that the pavements were +thronged, and that almost every window framed a figure or<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> two. A hoarse +murmur pulsed in the air, and his quickened ear was greeted on every +side by foul jests and grumbled oaths, broken now and again by drunken +imprecations, scuffles, or the shrill invective of women invisible in +the throng. Once a girl touched his arm, and he found her face close to +his, thin, haggard, and imploring. He shook her off, and turned +unsteadily into the doorway of a saloon; stumbling, as he did so, over a +little boy crying on the step.</p> + +<p>Inside, the air was reeking with rank smoke and the fumes of stale beer. +The floor was strewn with sawdust, streaked and circled by shuffling +feet; the mirror backing the bar was covered with soiled gauze dotted +with tawdry roses, and an indescribable dinginess seemed to have laid +its sordid fingers on all the fittings.</p> + +<p>The room was crowded, nevertheless—crowded not only with the men +themselves, but, to the stifling point, with their voices and their +gestures and the spirit of their unrest and discontent. Cavendish, +leaning<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> against the end of the bar, looked wearily down the line of +flushed faces and backward at the disputing groups which rocked and +swayed, as the men argued and swore, grasping the lapels of each others' +coats, and spilling the liquor from their glasses as they gesticulated. +He was wholly sober now. It was the stage of dissipation which +experience had taught him to dread the most—the emergence from dulled +sensibility into a nervous tension upon which stimulant had no apparent +effect. He was trembling again, too, and his face, as he saw it in the +mirror through the clouding gauze, was as that of a stranger, a stranger +of whom he was afraid. He swallowed the whiskey he had ordered, and, +supporting himself by the bar, swung back and gave his attention to what +the men about him were saying. It did not need his sharpened perception +to appreciate the fact that he was in the thick of the worst element of +the Rathbawne strikers, or that the situation was a crisis. What little +restraint had characterized the earlier stages of the strike was now,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> +most evidently, at an end. Starvation was no longer a mere possibility, +or violence a mere threat. The men raved like wild creatures against +Rathbawne and John Barclay, recounting maudlinly the destitution of +their families, and, anon, flaming forth into cries for vengeance. How +long the babel lasted Cavendish could not have said. Long since, the +doors had been closed, and the lights half lowered, in mock deference to +a supposedly vigilant police, when suddenly a hush fell upon the +assemblage. A side door had opened, and Michael McGrath stood in the +midst of his followers, with his arms folded and a thin smile upon his +lips. There was not a whisper as he began to speak. The men leaned +toward him breathlessly, their mouths open, their eyes starting glassily +out of their sodden faces.</p> + +<p>"And how long is <i>this</i> going to go on?" demanded their leader, with a +sneer. "Talk—talk—talk! That's always the way, and nothing done, after +all. Well, there's been about enough of it, and that's flat. You've<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> +been living on the Union, and I suppose you think you can go on living +on it till hell freezes over. Now listen to me. When the strike began we +had plenty of funds, and more came to us from the Central Federation. +The funds are gone, d' you hear, and the Federation is asking what we +mean to do. There is six hundred and odd dollars in the treasury. No +need to tell you how far that much will go, is there? Not one day! And +with all your talk, you've everything your own way, if only you knew +it—a police that doesn't dare lift a finger against you, and a Governor +that won't budge an inch till I give the word! Well, to-morrow I give +the word, understand me? To-morrow I throw you over, and you can get out +of this the best way you can. I'm sick of your talk. I'm sick of your +doing nothing. Your daughters are on the streets, your wives and your +children are starving, and <i>you</i>—by God! <i>you</i> are boozing in a bar +till daylight, and <i>talking</i>! So that's enough. To-morrow, the strike's +at an end. To-morrow, the Gov<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span>ernor comes down on you like ten thousand +of brick! And I'm the man that gives the word! Unless"—</p> + +<p>He paused and cast a keen glance at the faces which surrounded him. His +last words had been greeted by a low growl.</p> + +<p>"Unless," he continued, "you know your business, and make a move that's +worth the name."</p> + +<p>The hush of attention seemed to deepen into the leaden silence of +expectancy.</p> + +<p>"There are two men who must be put out of the way," said McGrath slowly, +"and that before another midnight. I don't care how it's done, but done +it must be, for the sake of example. It's easy enough to manage it, as +things are. There'll be a howl, but we have the authorities fixed. And +those two men must go!"</p> + +<p>In the tense silence which followed, a man's voice whispered two words +hoarsely:—</p> + +<p>"Mr. Rathbawne!"</p> + +<p>"Ay, <i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne!" echoed McGrath, flashing into that passionate +manner of his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> which carried all before it. "<i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne, who's +starving you! <i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne, who's making your sons drunkards! <i>Mr.</i> +Rathbawne, who's debauching your daughters! <i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne, who's +killing your wives by inches! <i>Mr.</i> Rathbawne, and <i>Mr.</i> John Hamilton +Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia!"</p> + +<p>For a moment it seemed as if he would be swept off his feet by a torrent +of enthusiasm. The men crowded about him, slapping him upon the +shoulders, shouting their approval, reaching for his hand. One +brandished a revolver under his nose, with a shrill cry of "This'll do +it, Mac! This'll do it, by God!" The rest had turned to each other, +embracing frantically, and repeating his words in a kind of frenzy.</p> + +<p>Presently McGrath raised his hand, and, as silence was restored at the +signal, turned to the bar-tender with his thin smile.</p> + +<p>"Set 'em up, Dick," he said composedly. "It's on me, this time, and +we'll drink to better days."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the confusion Cavendish made his way to the side-door, and passing +through it into the street, hesitated, dazzled by a brilliant light. It +was broad day.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>As the Lieutenant-Governor entered his ante-room that morning his eyes +contracted suddenly, and he stopped, with his hand upon the knob of the +door. There could be no mistaking the look in the face of the man who +sat facing him, gripping desperately at the arms of his chair. Cavendish +was as white as chalk, with the hunted look of despair which lay so +vividly on Barclay's remembrance of the night when they had met on +Bradbury Avenue. He rose as the Lieutenant-Governor appeared and drew +himself up with an effort at steadiness, conscious that the others +present were observing him narrowly. But Barclay's hesitation was as +brief as it had been involuntary. With a bare glance at his +subordinates, he came forward cordially to take Cavendish's hand, and +then,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> opening the door of his private office, motioned him to enter +first.</p> + +<p>"Glad to see you," he said steadily, as their hands met.</p> + +<p>Once inside, the manner of both men changed as abruptly as it had been +assumed. The Lieutenant-Governor went slowly toward his desk, with his +head bent, and Cavendish, throwing himself into the nearest chair, and, +with no attempt at concealment, drew a flask from his pocket and drank a +long draught. He looked up to find that the Lieutenant-Governor had +wheeled at the desk, and was standing with his eyes fixed upon him.</p> + +<p>"Wait a minute," said Cavendish, as Barclay seemed about to speak. "We +won't discuss this, for the moment, if you please."</p> + +<p>He held up the flask with a shrug.</p> + +<p>"In fact we needn't discuss it at all," he continued. "I've simply gone +to hell, that's all there is about it. I knew I would. I told you so +long ago. I didn't come here to make excuses—or to receive rebukes, +John Barclay. I've a means here of settling the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> problem which can give +cards and spades to all your projects of reform." And he tapped his +pocket, where the cloth bulged slightly, with a smile. The +Lieutenant-Governor made no attempt to interrupt him.</p> + +<p>"What I did come to say," went on Cavendish, more steadily, "is that +your life and Mr. Rathbawne's are in danger. You're to be put out of the +way, both of you, before twelve to-night. McGrath's determined on it, +and there's no lack of men to carry out his orders. The strikers are +desperate. I overheard their talk, while—well, while I was getting +drunk! <i>What's that?</i>"</p> + +<p>He stopped, with his hand to his ear. Some one was tapping at the +communicating door.</p> + +<p>"Put up that flask!" said Barclay under his breath, adding aloud, as +Cavendish obeyed:</p> + +<p>"Come in!"</p> + +<p>The door swung open softly, and Governor Abbott, smiling and rubbing his +hands, appeared upon the threshold.</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon, Mr. Barclay," he said. "I did not know you were +engaged. We<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> have the pleasure of another visit from the Citizens' +Committee, and, by a singularly opportune coincidence, Mr. McGrath has +called at the same time. Can you spare us a few moments of your time?"</p> + +<p>With a bow, and a glance at Cavendish, Barclay followed his superior +silently from the room.</p> + +<p>In the Governor's office he found a dozen men, all standing. McGrath, +with his back to the others, was examining with an elaborate air of +interest a map of Alleghenia which hung upon the wall. Colonel +Broadcastle and his fellow-members of the Citizens' Committee, stood +close to, and facing, the Governor's desk. The air was electric with +suggestion of a crisis about to come.</p> + +<p>When the Governor began to speak, it was in his habitually suave voice, +yet he was visibly nervous.</p> + +<p>"Colonel Broadcastle has been good enough to observe," he said, "that if +I do not call out the militia within three hours, to protect the +interests of Mr. Peter Rathbawne, his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> committee will appeal for aid to +the federal government. Now—er—now, in my place, and in such a +situation, Mr. Barclay—er—what would you do?"</p> + +<p>The Lieutenant-Governor's nerve, strained beyond endurance by the events +of the past twenty-four hours, snapped like a dry twig at the +contemptuous hypocrisy of the other's tone.</p> + +<p>"<i>Do!</i>" he thundered—"<i>do?</i> Why, as God is my witness, Elijah Abbott, +if I were in your place I would do what any honest man would do! I would +do what my oath demanded of me! I would clap that man McGrath into jail +for iniquitous inciting to riot, and place Colonel Broadcastle, at the +head of his regiment, in charge of the city to restore order and the +reign of law, and to redeem Alleghenia from the disgrace that is +overwhelming her. <i>Do?</i> Before God, the Republic, and the state, +Governor Abbott, I would do my duty as a man!"</p> + +<p>"<i>Then do it!</i>"</p> + +<p>The words, spoken from the threshold of Barclay's office, rent the +silence like a thunder<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span>clap, and before those present had time to turn, +there came the sound of a pistol-shot, and Governor Abbott, wheeling +slowly on his heels, crashed headforemost through the plate-glass window +behind him, and lay, limp and motionless, across the sill.</p> + +<p>"Then do it, by God, <i>Governor Barclay</i>!" repeated Cavendish, and flung +his revolver into the centre of the room.</p> + +<p>The apartment was already filled with those attracted from the corridors +and adjacent offices by the sound of the shot. Several seized Cavendish, +who stood without movement, smiling. Barclay, Colonel Broadcastle, and +the other members of the committee lifted the Governor's body from the +position in which it had fallen, and laid it upon a couch. After a brief +examination, the Colonel looked up into Barclay's eyes.</p> + +<p>"He's dead, sir," he said. "The assassin was right. You are Governor of +Alleghenia."</p> + +<p>For an instant, Barclay returned his glance with one of earnest inquiry.</p> + +<p>"Even in the face of this tragedy," added<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> Colonel Broadcastle in a low +voice, "I trust you will not forget the exigencies of the situation. It +is for you to act, sir."</p> + +<p>Barclay suddenly raised himself to his full height, and faced the silent +gathering.</p> + +<p>"Gentlemen," he said firmly, "the Governor is dead. For the moment, at +least, I act in his stead. Kenton City is under martial law. Those who +have the assassin in charge will see that he is immediately turned over +to the chief of police. Mr. McGrath, you will consider yourself under +arrest. Colonel Broadcastle, you will immediately assemble your regiment +at its armory, issue three days' rations, and twenty rounds of ball +cartridge, and hold yourself and your command in readiness for riot +duty, subject to my orders."</p> + +<p>Then he faced Cavendish.</p> + +<p>"There's a message I'd like to have delivered, to the Fairy Princess," +said the latter, still smiling. "It is that Diogenes has eaten the ugly +little bug."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"/><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XIV" id="XIV"></a>XIV</h2> + +<h3>THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA</h3> + + +<p>As Barclay had foreseen, the adoption of stringent measures was all that +was needed to break the back-bone of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +The presence of the Ninth Regiment, under command of that noted +disciplinarian, Colonel Broadcastle, and terribly in earnest, as was +evinced by the ball cartridges gleaming in their belts, was sufficient +to discourage any further attempts at disorder; the sudden shift of base +of the newspapers which had formerly supported the rioters, and now, +taking their cue from the policy of the new Governor, counseled +immediate surrender; above all, the trial, conviction, and sentence of +their moving spirit, McGrath, to a term of years for inciting to +riot—all were irresistible factors in the Union's capitulation. Two +weeks after the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> death of Governor Abbott, the Rathbawne Mills were +running once more, and Peter Rathbawne himself, though whiter of hair +and but a shadow of his old self, was, nevertheless, on the high road to +recovery.</p> + +<p>The trial and conviction of Spencer Cavendish were accomplished with +unexampled celerity. He would admit of no defense, although the lawyer +appointed for him by the court was strenuous for a plea of insanity, +based upon the singular remark which he had made upon the announcement +of Elijah Abbott's death, and which was construed by those who heard it +as ample proof of irresponsibility. Called upon in court to give his +defense, Cavendish stated in a loud, clear voice that he was strictly +accountable for his act, that he was in full possession of his senses at +the time, and that he had killed the Governor in the firm conviction +that he was a menace to the safety of the community, and that the +latter's sole salvation lay in his removal, and the succession of the +Lieutenant-Governor to the position of chief executive.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I desire," he concluded, with the same odd smile that he had worn at +the moment of the Governor's death, "nothing but the full penalty of the +law."</p> + +<p>The next day Spencer Cavendish was sentenced to be executed on the +thirtieth of the following month at the State's Prison at Mowberly.</p> + +<p>Then followed the most remarkable manifestation of popular sentiment +ever known in Alleghenia. As Barclay had once said of them, the citizens +of his long degraded state were less vicious than callous, and their +callousness was effectively cured by the dramatic event which had +removed a corrupt official from the head of the state government, and +put in his place a man whose first acts were proofs positive of +strength, integrity, and singleness of purpose. The revulsion of feeling +was overwhelming. Even the press which had sneered at and cried down +John Barclay was forced to the other extreme. Relieved from the burden +of lawlessness which had lain on Kenton City for close upon three +months,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> the citizens went over in a body to the support of their new +Governor. He was cheered on his every appearance in public as +assiduously as he had been ignored before, and, responding with the +whole force of his sensitive nature to this longed-for and unexpected +popularity, he devoted himself more and more earnestly, day by day, to +the welfare of the state which was his idol.</p> + +<p>But following in the wake of this revulsion of feeling in favor of +Barclay came one, hardly less complete, in favor of Spencer Cavendish. +While strictly speaking there could be no condoning his act, it was none +the less evident to even the most rigid adherents of law that by it he +had conferred an indisputable benefit upon the state of Alleghenia, and +his open statement of his reasons at the time of his trial militated for +rather than against him. So it was that a public petition was framed and +circulated, asking, at the hands of Governor Barclay, the commutation of +the death sentence to one of life imprisonment. Little by little the +list of signatures grew,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> until, a week before the date fixed for +Cavendish's execution, they were numbered by tens of thousands. Then the +petition, rolled into a cylinder, was presented to the Governor by a +committee, and left for his consideration.</p> + +<p>To Barclay the intervening time had passed with almost incredible +rapidity. His days, filled as they were to overflowing with numberless +and complex duties, were yet the pleasantest he had ever known. At last, +he was what he had dreamed of being—an active factor, the most active +of all factors, in the advancement of his state. Redeemed, as if by a +miracle, from the disgrace which had laid her low, Alleghenia arose, in +his eyes, like a phœnix, throwing off the ashes of her reproach, and +blazing, with new wings of burnished beauty, in the sunlight of hope and +peace.</p> + +<p>Barclay had retained his old office, not caring to make use of a room so +permeated with associations of recent tragedy as was that which had +formerly been Governor Abbott's. Now, with the windows open and the +soft<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> May air stirring the papers on his desk, he sat, looking vacantly +across the room, with the huge petition spread out before him. His +attention, long absorbed by the problem in hand, was diverted by a tap +on the ante-room door, and, in answer to his call, Natalie Rathbawne +stood before him, smiling out of the exquisite daintiness of a fresh +spring frock.</p> + +<p>"You've forgotten!" she said immediately, at sight of his knit brows.</p> + +<p>"Forgotten what?" inquired the Governor inadvisedly.</p> + +<p>The girl's little foot stamped almost noiselessly upon the thick carpet.</p> + +<p>"Upon my word!" she exclaimed, "if there's one thing worse than being +engaged to the Lieutenant-Governor, it's being engaged to the Governor +himself! Forgotten, of course, that we are to lunch together, and look +at wall-papers afterwards! Do you know, John Barclay, I don't believe +you mean to marry me, after all? We'll be just approaching the altar, +when"—</p> + +<p>She was interrupted in characteristic fash<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span>ion, and disengaged herself, +with a great air of indignation, from Barclay's arms.</p> + +<p>"If you want to take lunch in the company of a rag carpet," she said +severely, "that's the very best way to go about it. Get your hat."</p> + +<p>There was a little pause as Barclay filed some papers in his private +safe, and then one startled word from the girl.</p> + +<p>"<i>John!</i>"</p> + +<p>Wheeling abruptly, he saw her standing at the desk, with her hand on the +petition, and her eyes, wide and wonderstruck, searching his face.</p> + +<p>"Dearest!" he said impulsively, "I wish you hadn't."</p> + +<p>But Natalie only laughed joyfully.</p> + +<p>"But I'm glad, Johnny boy," she answered, "glad—glad—glad! What a +wonderful thing it is to be Governor, boy dear! I don't think I ever +really understood before. Think of it! To have the power of life and +death—to be able to right the wrongs of justice with a single stroke of +the pen. Oh, John!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> Sign it now—before we go. I shall be so much +happier."</p> + +<p>The Governor made no reply. He stood, with his head bent, smoothing his +hat with the fingers of his right hand. Gradually the expression of +eager expectation on her face changed to one of anxiety.</p> + +<p>"John," she said in a half whisper, "you <i>are</i> going to sign it, aren't +you, boy dear?"</p> + +<p>"I'm not sure," faltered the Governor. "I'm not quite sure, dearest. It +is the hardest problem I've ever had given me to solve. I can understand +now the meaning of something your father said to me just before the +strike,—that, for the first time in his life, he didn't know what to +do, because right seemed to be hopelessly entangled with wrong, and +wrong with right. When a man does evil in order that good may come, one +tries to find an excuse for him, tries to palliate his offense in any +reasonable way. That is human instinct. That is what accounts for the +petition there, with the signatures of many of the most conscientious +men in Alleghenia at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span>tached. They have managed to find the excuse, or +they think they have, which, so far as their personal convictions are +concerned, amounts to about the same thing. And I've been saying to +myself that when public opinion points out a course as justifiable it +can hardly be possible for a single individual to say that it is not. +And yet the wrong is there, isn't it? No matter how confused a question +may seem to us, there must absolutely, when we come to think of it, be +some one great elemental principle upon which it not only can, but must, +be decided—some boundary line between justice and injustice which we +may be too blind to see, but which exists, and calls for observance, +none the less. Right is right, wrong is wrong. No confusion between the +two can possibly exist except in appearance. Strive to elude truth as we +will, it remains eternal truth, and cannot be evaded in the end. And +where it seems to be beyond us, all we can do is to strive to find the +silken thread which will surely lead us out of the labyrinth into the +searching<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> light of day. It is that clue which I have been groping for. +What is it? How am I to know it when I see it? What am I to do? At first +I thought the case was clear—what he said, you know—about Diogenes—it +seemed so odd—every one thought so—it might be construed as—as +insanity"—</p> + +<p>"Oh, <i>no</i>, John! Why, <i>we</i> know what that meant! No—no! The best part +of it all was his sanity, his wonderful courage, his braving of almost +certain death for what he believed—and knew, John—<i>knew</i> to be right +and best. Think what he did for Alleghenia, Johnny boy. He has been +almost as great an instrument in her salvation as you. Think what he has +done for all of us—for you, in giving you this opportunity—for me—for +Dad! John, how <i>can</i> you hesitate?"</p> + +<p>The Governor shook his head.</p> + +<p>"Dearest," he said, "you're on the wrong track, just as I have been, a +dozen times since the petition came. Don't you suppose I've thought of +all that? Its significance, not only to me, but, as you say, to the +state, is so<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> tremendous that, at the first glance, it seems to be an +unanswerable argument. But—don't you see?—no sophistry, no +contemplation of the results achieved, can ever make it justifiable for +a man to arrogate to himself the power of taking human life, which is +the prerogative of God and the law alone. The peculiar circumstances of +Cavendish's crime plead eloquently, almost irresistibly, for his pardon. +He has saved the state—yes! But the case is one in a million, and it is +not an individual case alone which hangs upon my decision,—it is the +establishment of a precedent, the maintenance of a principle."</p> + +<p>"But, John," broke in Natalie eagerly, "what you've just said—isn't +that the clue for which you have been groping? He saved the state! I've +heard you talk of Alleghenia too often, of what you hoped for her, and +what you despaired of ever bringing to pass, not to know what those four +words must mean to you. Think of it! <i>He saved the state!</i> Without any +possibility of selfish object he did this extraordinary thing—made it +possi<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span>ble for Alleghenia to win back the honor and respect she had so +nearly lost forever! He killed the man who had no thought of her purity +and dignity, who used the power the people had given him for the +furtherance of his own selfish and wicked ends, who made her justice a +mockery, who played with her law as if"—</p> + +<p>"Stop!" exclaimed the Governor. "Stop—I must think. Wait a moment. I +must think—I must think!"</p> + +<p>After a minute he began to speak again, this time in a lower tone, a +tone which suggested self-communion rather than direct address to the +girl before him.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's it. Wait now,—let me be sure! He killed the man who had no +thought of Alleghenia's purity, who used his power to serve his own +ends, who made her justice"—he was speaking very slowly, dwelling on +each word as it left his lips—"her <i>justice</i> a mockery, who played with +her law—her law—her <i>Law</i>"—</p> + +<p>He paused once more, his brows knit, his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> firm hand slowly stroking his +chin. Then, of a sudden, he drew a deep breath, flung back his +shoulders, and looked at her. His eyes were blazing, his voice touched +with a new meaning, an eloquence deep, firm, conclusive.</p> + +<p>"Natalie," he said, "come here."</p> + +<p>"You've struck the keynote," he added, when they stood face to face, a +foot or two apart. "It isn't what you thought, or what you meant, but it +is the keynote, just the same. The Law!"</p> + +<p>He wheeled slowly, and stepped forward, until he was directly before the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia which hung upon his wall.</p> + +<p>"<i>Justitia—Lex—Integritas!</i>" he said. "Many a time, when the way +seemed darkest, I've read those words over to myself, and found hope in +them. Events changed, crises came and went, portents loomed thick, +despair seemed omnipotent, failure and disgrace inevitable—but the +motto of Alleghenia remained the same. Steadfast, purposeful, and +commanding, it has endured through the triv<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span>ial changes of political +significance which have been as impotent to sully the actuality of her +fair fame as are sun-spots to dim the radiance of the sun. It is only +natural, perhaps, that the discouragements which were but transient +should have seemed to me to be vital, damning, irremediable. Just as the +Israelites of old turned from the promises of God to worship Baal, so +have I turned from the assurance given me by these arms of Alleghenia, +to prostrate myself before false idols of doubt and despair. I should +have remembered how they called me, in the first instance, from a life +of idleness and ease, to fight my way through the desert of difficulty, +toward the promised land of honor. I should have remembered how in my +darkest hours they went before me as a pillar of fire, how in the famine +of my soul these words were the manna of encouragement, how in my thirst +they struck clear water from the rock of adverse circumstance. But the +Israelites came back to their true God at last; so I, little girl, to my +true ideal. The Law!—you said the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> word—the Law is the clue, the +keynote, the boundary between right and wrong!"</p> + +<p>She was at his side, and he slipped one arm around her, and held her +close to him as with his finger he traced again the motto of Alleghenia.</p> + +<p>"Do you know what this means?" he asked. "<i>Justitia</i>,—to be just to all +men, without fear or favor, lenient to our enemies, rigid and +unyielding, if need be, to our friends; putting aside personal +considerations, striving so far as in us lies to be impartial, merciful +in the face of prejudice, relentless in that of conviction—fair! +<i>Lex</i>,—to abide by the law, in spirit only if our inmost conviction +warrants that course, but in letter absolutely where there is the +smallest hint of doubt; secure in the knowledge that, however fallible +it be, it is the best that man has yet been able to do in imitation of +the immutable decrees of God. <i>Integritas</i>,—to be true to the oaths we +have sworn, faithful to the promises we have made, loyal to the office +intrusted to us by the people, to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> whom and for whom we are responsible. +Dearest, I am no mere man. Were I that, were I to consult my will alone, +and it lay, as now it lies, in my power to accomplish, Spencer Cavendish +should go free to-day. I know what he has done; I appreciate his +sacrifice; I see that by a single act he has accomplished what the rest +of us were powerless to cure; I admire his courage; I condone his crime; +I could forget all his weaknesses for the sake of this one great +evidence of his strength. And yet—listen to me, dearest!—in what he +strove to do he has failed utterly, if in removing a corrupt official +who made a mockery of Alleghenia's law he has not replaced him by one +who with all the force of his conscience and all the power of his +influence will see that law administered. And whatever we may say of his +crime, whatever its causes, whatever its wonderful results, it was and +is a crime. 'Thou shalt not kill!' God has said it; Alleghenia by the +voice of her law has ratified it. And not even the fact that Cavendish +has made possible all my<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> fondest and worthiest hopes, the fact that he +has rescued from suffering all I hold most dear"—</p> + +<p>Barclay suddenly covered his face with his free hand, as he had covered +it on that afternoon in Peter Rathbawne's library, weeks before; then he +looked up again, his lips trembling.</p> + +<p>"Dearest," he said, "I am Governor of Alleghenia, and as such owe an +allegiance, an obedience, which personal prejudice cannot impugn. On +the day when you spoke to me of meeting Cavendish you pointed out the +course of a gentleman and a friend. On the night of the Ninth's +review you taught me the creed of an American and an Alleghenian. +To-day—unconsciously perhaps, but none the less surely—you have made +clear the duty of a public servant. God bless you, my life, my heart, my +conscience! May I be worthy of you and of the commonwealth I serve. +Where I doubted before, now I am sure. It is hard—God only knows how +hard—but listen to Alleghenia's bidding! <i>Justitia</i>,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> <i>Lex</i>, +<i>Integritas</i>,—equity, the code, and good faith, in the sight of God and +man, heaven and earth, the American people and the commonwealth of +Alleghenia. God save the state!"</p> + +<p>"John," whispered the girl brokenly,—"John, you're right. God save the +state!"</p> + +<p>Slowly, tenderly, the Governor of Alleghenia led her back to the table, +and taking up a pen, with a firm hand wrote five words, heavily +underscored, at the head of the Cavendish petition. And these were:—</p> + +<p class="left"> +"<u><i>Disapproved.</i><br /></u></p> +<p class="center"><u><i>John Hamilton Barclay</i></u>,<br /></p> +<p class="right"><u><i>Governor.</i>"</u></p><br /> +<br /> + +<p>Then, turning to the girl who loved him, he took her in his arms.<br /><br /><br /></p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + +***** This file should be named 30448-h.htm or 30448-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/4/4/30448/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Lieutenant-Governor + +Author: Guy Wetmore Carryl + +Release Date: November 10, 2009 [EBook #30448] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + THE + + LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + A NOVEL + + BY + + GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + [Illustration: Publishers symbol] + + + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY + The Riverside Press, Cambridge + 1903 + + + Copyright, 1902 + BY THE ESS ESS PUBLISHING CO. + + + Copyright, 1903 + BY GUY WETMORE CARRYL + + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + + + _Published March, 1903_ + + + + + TO + + M. R. B. + + IN MEMORY OF THE RESCUE OF A MAN AT SEA + + + + + CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I. THE FLY ON THE WHEEL 1 + + II. THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET 21 + + III. A FACE IN THE CROWD 40 + + IV. AS BETWEEN FRIENDS 60 + + V. A BRAND FROM THE BURNING 80 + + VI. MCGRATH LAUGHS 98 + + VII. THE MIRAGE OF POWER 117 + + VIII. THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS 137 + + IX. THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW 156 + + X. A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 177 + + XI. YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE 196 + + XII. DIOGENES 215 + + XIII. THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE 234 + + XIV. THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA 252 + + + + +THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR + + + + +I + +THE FLY ON THE WHEEL + + +The offices of the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor adjoined. Each +had its ante-room, in which a private secretary wrote eternally at a +roll-top desk, an excessively plain-featured stenographer rattled the +keys of his typewriter, and a smug-faced page yawned over a newspaper, +or scanned the cards of visitors with the air of an official censor. At +intervals, an electric bell whirred once, twice, or three times; and, +according to the signal, one of the trio disappeared into the presence +of the august personage within. + +A door connected the office of the chief executive with that of his +lieutenant, but this was rarely opened by either, and then only after a +formal tap and permission to enter had been given. It was a matter of +general knowledge that the Governor and the Lieutenant-Governor were not +in sympathy; but few, even among the intimates of either, were aware how +deep, and wide, and hopelessly impassable was the gulf which lay between +them. This was due not alone to disparity in age, though twenty-eight +years separated the white-haired Governor from his handsome subordinate, +who had been nominated to this, his first public office, on his +thirtieth birthday; nor was it wholly a difference between the +experience of the one and the inexperience of the other. The point of +view of the veteran is, naturally, not that of the novice, particularly +in politics. That the enthusiasms of Lieutenant-Governor Barclay should +have been the disillusions of Governor Abbott, and his pitfalls his +senior's stepping-stones,--this was to be expected. The root of their +dissimilarity lay deeper. It was nothing less than mutual distrust which +kept the connecting door closed day after day, and clogged the channel +of cooperation with the sharp-pointed boulders of antagonism. + +The convention which nominated the successful ticket of the preceding +year had been a veritable chaos of contending factions. The labor +delegates, encouraged by the unexpected strength of their +representation, were not content with such nominal plums as had fallen +to their share in former conventions. Led by Michael McGrath, an +agitator whose native Irish eloquence, made keener and more persuasive +by practice in bar-room forensics, brought him naturally to the fore, +they threatened, at one stage of the proceedings, to carry all before +them. The more conservative faction, its strength sapped by the +formation, in its very ranks, of a reform party determined upon the fall +of the "machine," was forced to yield ground. The reformers themselves, +young men for the most part, distinguished by great ideals but small +ability, were too few to impose their individual will upon their +opponents, yet sufficiently numerous to make their support necessary to +the success of either party. The usual smooth course of the convention, +upset by this unlooked-for resistance from two quarters, staggered +helplessly, and was on the point of coming to a deadlock. It was Michael +McGrath's shrewd perception of the situation which solved the problem. +In a brief, impassioned speech he laid the claims of his faction before +the delegates, winding up with a stirring picture of the cooperation of +labor and reform, now possible, which held the convention in spellbound +silence for ten seconds after he had closed, and then set the hall +ringing to cheers and vigorously plied hands and feet. For an instant he +paused, with his arms folded, and his keen blue eyes sliding over the +faces before him, and then played his trump card. At his signal, a +banner, hastily prepared, was borne, slowly revolving, down the central +aisle, and on this were boldly lettered the words which at the same +moment McGrath was thundering from the platform:-- + + LABOR AND REFORM! + + FOR GOVERNOR, + ELIJAH ABBOTT. + + FOR LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR, + JOHN HAMILTON BARCLAY. + +McGrath had no need to look toward the labor faction for support. He +knew what the name of Elijah Abbott meant in that quarter. His shifting +glance was fixed upon the seats of the reform delegates, and a little +smile twitched at the corners of his mouth, as he saw them rise with a +cheer. Barclay was the chief spirit of their movement. They had not +expected this recognition. But if, in the enthusiasm of unlooked-for +victory, they did not perceive how little, in reality, was their gain, +McGrath was far from being unaware how great was his own. Before the +cheering of the now allied forces of labor and reform had fairly died +away, he had moved that nominations were in order, and, ten minutes +later, while the partisans of the "machine" were still endeavoring to +collect their wits, the main business of the convention was an +accomplished fact, and Abbott and Barclay were declared the regular +Democratic nominees for Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of the state. +In six weeks followed their election by a small plurality, and on the +first of January the two men moved into their adjoining rooms, in the +inexcusably unlovely state capitol, on the main hill of Kenton City, +wherein they were, thenceforward, separated, one from the other, by two +inches of Georgia pine and a practically infinite diversity of principle +and prejudice. + +From the first their relationship had been no better than an armed +truce. Both were courteous men, the one because such was his policy, the +other because he was to this manner born. There was no need for them to +discuss their individual creeds. They tacitly accepted the fact that +there was not a parallel between the two. From the moment when his +election was assured by the returns, Abbott was candidly the man of the +Labor--nay, more--of the Socialist party. McGrath and his associates +manipulated him as readily as a marionette. The promises and pledges of +the campaign were ruthlessly jettisoned. If Governor Abbott did not +stand for anarchy, it was only because, for the moment, anarchy was not +the demand of his party. Withal, he was dignified and self-possessed, +robed in an agreeable suavity which became him at functions and +ceremonials, and assured his popularity with those--and they were, as +always, in the majority--who did not look below the surface. + +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay had not been ten days in office before he +realized the futility of resistance to the established order, as +represented in his superior. He had accepted his nomination, and +welcomed his election, with an almost Quixotic elation in the +opportunity thus opened to him. He would accomplish--oh, there was no +telling what Lieutenant-Governor Barclay would _not_ accomplish! + +He was standing at his office window now, staring out disconsolately +over the sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin +patches of snow, which had contrived to withstand the recent thaw, and +he was telling himself, for the thousandth time, the dispiriting fact +that, as a force for good or evil in the destiny of his state, he was no +more significant than his stenographer's Remington or his secretary's +roll-top desk. With all his ideals, with all those pledges which are +infinitely more vital when made in private to one's conscience than when +made in public to one's party, he found himself merely a cog in the +state machinery--a cog, too, that, seemingly, might be skipped at any or +every time, without in the least degree disturbing the progress of +routine. On the few occasions, in the early days of their official +relation, when he had ventured to set his will in opposition to that of +the Governor, there had not been manifest in the latter's attitude even +that spirit of resistance which spurs men to more active and resolute +endeavor. Governor Abbott had smiled pleasantly upon him, and then +quietly shifted the conversation into other channels, with an air of +selecting a topic more suited to his companion's comprehension. +Finally, on one occasion, when Barclay had voiced his opinion with an +energy which savored of rebuke, the Governor had gone further, and had +asked calmly--"And what were you proposing to do about it?" After that +Barclay had relinquished the unequal struggle, and resigned himself to +the unavoidable conclusion of his impotency. + +It is a situation which tries men's souls, this of utter helplessness in +the face of plain duty. He could have no hope of making his position +clear to the constituency to which he was responsible. Debarred on the +one side from taking an active part in the administration of state +affairs, and bitterly arraigned on the other on the grounds of +inefficiency, laxity, and indifference to duty, the second month of +office found John Barclay in a fair way to be ground to powder between +the millstones of impuissance and hostile criticism. The men of his +party who had, both in private conviction and public statement, based +their hopes of political reform upon the frankly avowed platform of his +principles, now passed him coldly, with a bare nod, sometimes with none +whatever; the labor element jeered joyously at his attitude; the +"machine" pointed to him as proof of the fallacy of the reform creed. It +is easy to expect great performances from great promises, easier still +to outline the duties and condemn the delinquencies of another, and not +even Barclay's knowledge of his own good faith was sufficient +compensation for the sneers of press and public which fell to his share. +As he surveyed the dispiriting prospect from his office window, on that +late February afternoon, he was near to resigning his position, and with +it all further pretension to political prominence. + +In the opinion of those competent to judge, the state of Alleghenia was +going to the dogs. A press distinguished alike for the amplitude of its +headlines and the pitiable paucity of its principles; a legislature of +which practically every member had, not only a price, but such a price +as the advertisements describe as being "within the reach of all;" a +Governor who avowedly stood ready to sanction the most extreme +pretensions of the notoriously corrupt party which had secured him his +election,--here, surely, were good and sufficient reasons for the +generously bestowed disapproval of Alleghenia's sister states. In all +the _personnel_ of her government there was but one man sincerely +devoted to her advancement on the lines of integrity and +non-partisanship. And that man was Lieutenant-Governor Barclay, whose +influence on the trend of affairs was approximately that of the +proverbial fly on the hub of the revolving wheel. + +The Lieutenant-Governor had turned back to his desk, and was arranging +his papers, preparatory to departing for the day, when his ears were +greeted by the unusual and unwelcome sound of a rap upon the +communicating door. Instinctively he braced himself for an unpleasant +encounter before replying. It was his experience that the Governor's +room was like to Nazareth of old, in that no good might be expected to +issue therefrom. Nevertheless, as Governor Abbott entered, in response +to Barclay's "Come!" it was difficult to believe that he was aught but +what he appeared to be,--a courteous, conspicuously well-dressed and +white-haired gentleman, of sixty or thereabouts, smooth-shaven save for +chop side-whiskers of iron gray, with a habit of rubbing his hands, and +an inclination from the hips forward which suggested a floor-walker. In +brief, the Governor of Alleghenia seemed the type of a man who turns +sideways and slips through narrow places, rather than run the risk of +barking his elbows by a face-front advance. In reality he was somewhat +less pliable than a steel rail. + +"You are going?" he asked, seeing how Barclay was employed. + +"I was thinking of it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor. "Of course, if +there is anything"-- + +Governor Abbott seated himself on the edge of the desk, holding a lapel +of his coat in each hand, and surveyed his subordinate from under his +drooping eyelids, with his head cocked on one side. + +"I believe you know Peter Rathbawne," he said. + +"I do. I am engaged to his elder daughter." + +"Ah! That is what I thought." + +The Governor looked contemplatively at the ceiling, closing his right +eye, and nibbling behind his pursed lips. + +"Peter Rathbawne," he said, "is the second most obstinate man in Kenton +City, if not in Alleghenia. I'm afraid he thinks he is the _most_ +obstinate. If so, he does me an injustice. His mills are the largest in +the state. I am told that when they are running full strength they +employ over four thousand hands." + +"Something like that number, I believe," put in Barclay, as the Governor +seemed to expect a reply. + +"Ah! It is a pity for such an industry as that to be tied up on account +of one man's obstinacy." + +"I had not heard"--began Barclay; but Governor Abbott continued +steadily, disregarding the interruption. + +"Yesterday morning Mr. Rathbawne discharged fifteen employees on the +ground of incompetency. It is hard to see exactly what Mr. Rathbawne +means by 'incompetency.' These men were not newcomers. Some of them had +been in the mills for as much as eighteen months. It seems as if he +might have discovered the alleged incompetency long ago. It is more or +less arbitrary, one might say, this discharging men by wholesale, as it +were." + +"I suppose," commented Barclay, "that a man may do as he will with his +own." + +"Ah!" said the Governor, lifting his hands from his lapels with a little +gesture of deprecation, but immediately replacing them. "But _can_ he? A +man in Peter Rathbawne's position has a responsibility to fulfill toward +the community. He cannot beggar men for a caprice--because his horse has +gone lame, or his breakfast has not agreed with him. He must show +reasons--give an accounting. He must be fair." + +"Oh, when it comes to fairness," laughed the other, "I assure you, +Governor Abbott, you won't find Mr. Rathbawne's equal this side of the +Pacific. He's famous for square dealing." + +"He _has_ been," corrected the Governor. "In the present instance he +seems to have fallen below standard. He has declined to reconsider his +decision in the case of the discharged men. What's worse, he has flatly +refused to see the committee appointed by the Union." + +"I'm not surprised at that," said Barclay slowly, fingering a +paper-cutter on the desk before him. "Mr. Rathbawne is peculiar in one +respect; he supports and considers the Union in every other. But he has +always insisted upon his right to discharge the hands at will, and +without giving reasons. Incompetency is only a word which is used to +cover more serious causes." + +"Well, he's wrong," said the Governor, with a heat unusual to him. +"He's dead wrong, Mr. Barclay, and he will find it out before he's a day +older." + +"Do you mean"-- + +"I mean that if the men in question are not taken back before to-morrow +noon, every man, woman, and child in the employ of the Rathbawne Mills +will be out on strike. The question is, what is Peter Rathbawne prepared +to do?" + +The silence that followed was broken only by the tap, tap, tap of the +Lieutenant-Governor's paper-cutter on the silver-mounted blotter. +Presently he looked up and met the Governor's eye. + +"If you want _my_ opinion, sir," he answered, "it is that Mr. Rathbawne +would fight such a point to a standstill. He's sole owner of the mills, +and he's a rich man. He has always treated his employees as if they were +his own children. If they turn on him now for something which, from +their experience of his character, they must know was fair and +justifiable"-- + +"But _was_ it?" interrupted the Governor. + +"I don't know the facts, sir, but I know Peter Rathbawne," said Barclay, +throwing back his head, "and I can say, with clear conviction, that it +_must_ have been. If, as you suggest, the hands go out, I think he would +close down the mills for a year, and go abroad. He's a man who doesn't +argue; he simply acts. I fancy there wouldn't be much opposition left by +the time he wanted to reopen." + +"Provided always that there were anything left to reopen," suggested the +Governor softly. + +"The state troops have more than once proved their ability to assure the +sanctity of property," answered his subordinate, with a touch of the old +pride with which he had assumed office. + +"Hum!" said Governor Abbott. "But calling out the militia is a serious +matter, Mr. Barclay, to say nothing of the expense entailed. Considering +that the difficulty would be due entirely to the obstinacy of one +man--er--one might not feel justified"-- + +He hesitated briefly under the Lieutenant-Governor's keen glance, and +then swerved from this line of suggestion. + +"What I wanted to say was this: You are a friend of Mr. +Rathbawne's,--something more than a friend, indeed. No doubt he has a +respect for your opinion, as you have for his. Now, if in the course of +a quiet chat--it will have to be to-night--you should point out the +situation that threatens him, the distress that a strike will cause, the +probable destruction of his property, perhaps he might consent to +reinstate the discharged men to-morrow morning." + +"It would be a surrender of principle, to which he would never consent," +said Barclay firmly. "Of that I am sure. Moreover, sir, I should be +speaking against my convictions were I to advise him to adopt such a +course." + +The Governor's lip wrinkled slightly. + +"The Union is prepared to do the right thing by the man who settles this +question," he said. + +"I hope you don't mean that!" exclaimed Barclay. "You are the first man +to make such a suggestion to me. Pardon me, Governor Abbott, but I +cannot but think the executive chamber of the capitol of Alleghenia a +singular place for it to be mentioned." + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"You misunderstand me," he said. "One would suppose I had offered you a +purse! I mean simply that the popularity of the man who averts this +strike will be an assured fact. He would be the idol of the working +people, and hardly less esteemed by the element of capital. Moreover, he +would be doing a humane and merciful thing. You are the only man who is +in a position to approach Rathbawne, and, if you will excuse the +suggestion, I think you can hardly afford to throw away the chance. As +it is, you--er--you are not what might be called popular, Mr. Barclay." + +This time the silence was broken by a single sharp little +click--the latch of the connecting door slipping into place. The +Lieutenant-Governor sank slowly into his revolving chair, tipped back, +swung round a half circle, and stared out disconsolately over the +sloping lawns of the capitol grounds, mottled with thin patches of +snow. + + + + +II + +THE ODDS AGAINST YOUNG NISBET + + +Young Nisbet leaned forward in his chair. + +"And I've been thinking," he added, "that perhaps--that perhaps"-- + +"That perhaps what?" asked the junior Miss Rathbawne, leaning forward in +hers. + +"If I don't have tea _instantly_," said her mother, with profound +conviction, as she came ponderously through the portieres, tugging at +her gloves, "I shall expire! How de do, Mr. Nisbet. _Do_ sit up +straight, Dorothy, my dear." + +She sank heavily into a low chair, which brought her within the radius +of lamp-light at the tea-table, and was thus revealed as a lady of +generous proportions, with a conspicuous absence of features, and no +observable lap. In speaking, she displayed a marked partiality for undue +emphasis. Sublimely unconscious of the depression induced by her +advent, she continued to talk, as she pulled off her gloves, which were +a size too small, and came away with reluctance, leaving imprints of the +stitching on her pudgy pink hands. + +Young Nisbet surveyed her with a kind of mute despair. He was a very +average young American, very conventionally in love, and the trifling +remnant of self-assertiveness which had triumphed over the crescent +humility natural to his condition inevitably evaporated into thin air at +the approach of Mrs. Rathbawne; and always, as he was doing now, he +turned in his toes excessively when she was present, hitched at his +right trouser-leg, where the crease passed over his knee, and looked +first at her, and then at the floor, and then at her again, with the +purposeless regularity of a mechanical toy. + +There was a tremendous and highly significant rattling of cups, saucers, +and silver spoons, as Dorothy Rathbawne prepared her mother's tea. All +things considered, one found something very admirable about Dorothy at +such a time as this. It was not complete submission, still less was it +open revolt, but savored of both, and was incomparable as an attitude +toward Mrs. Rathbawne. On some occasions it was almost as impossible to +get on with Mrs. Rathbawne as it would have been, on others, to get on +without her. The which, nowadays, is more or less true of all parents. +And children. + +"Natalie and your Aunt Helen got out at the florist's," went on the good +lady, "but I came straight on, and sent the carriage back for them. I +felt that I _couldn't_ exist an _instant_ longer without my tea. I'm +sure I don't see how Natalie _stands_ it. She was out all morning in the +brougham, too. You had best make enough for three cups, Dorothy--and +_do_ sit up straight, my dear!--and order Thomas to bring in some more +tartines. They are _sure_ to be hungry, and they are apt to come in at +_any_ moment." + +"That is a family failing," said Dorothy venomously, from behind the +kettle. + +"Well, I'm _sure_, my dear," said Mrs. Rathbawne innocently, as she +straightened her rings, and picked an imaginary speck out of one of her +round, flat nails, "there is no disgrace at all in a healthy appetite. +I'm thankful we all have it--though as for your Aunt Helen, _hers_ is +about like that of a fly." + +"Flies have very good appetites--judging from all I've seen, that is," +said Dorothy, "so I don't think she is to be commiserated on that +account." + +"That was only a figure of speech, my dear," replied Mrs. Rathbawne, +with engaging placidity. "Mercy! but I'm glad to get home. We've had a +positively _exhausting_ day with Natalie's shopping, and the _worst_ of +it is to think what a _lot_ more there is to do. A wedding certainly +_is_ an undertaking, Mr. Nisbet." + +"Is it?" answered young Nisbet, perceptibly startled at being thus +abruptly included in the conversation. + +"Decidedly!" asseverated Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"Of course, in the case of an _ordinary_ man"-- + +"Two lumps, mother?" + +"_Always_ two lumps, Dorothy, my dear. Surely you must know that, by +this time! As I was _saying_, Mr. Nisbet, the fact that my elder +daughter is to marry Mr. Barclay"-- + +Dorothy's eyebrows went up resignedly as she bent with affected +solicitude over the alcohol lamp, than which none ever burned more +blamelessly. There was no stopping Mrs. Rathbawne now! + +"One has to keep his position in mind," she was saying. "It isn't like +the _usual_ marriage, which interests only the families and friends of +the persons concerned, you know. It isn't even as if only Kenton City +were looking on. _All_ Alleghenia will be on the _qui vive_, Mr. Nisbet, +_all_ the state of Alleghenia. I shouldn't wonder if _some_ notice were +taken of the event, even at Washington. Marrying a statesman, you +see,--a Lieutenant-Governor! Oh, it's _quite_ different--_quite_! _Do_ +sit up straight, Dorothy, my dear!" + +She continued to prattle of the momentous marriage impending, until her +complacent chatter was interrupted by the entrance of her half-sister, +Mrs. Wynyard, and the elder Miss Rathbawne. + +The two newcomers were both beautiful, in widely dissimilar ways. Helen +Wynyard, Mrs. Rathbawne's junior by nearly a score of years, retained at +thirty the transparent brilliancy of complexion which, at eighteen, had +made her the most admired _debutante_ of her season in San Francisco. +Her marriage with Ellery Wynyard had caused a great to-do among the +gossips, and, later, had defrauded them pitilessly of their +self-promised "I told you so's," by reason of the death of the handsome +young rake, before the rose-color of the honeymoon had begun to fade. +Beauty, wit, and infallible tact she inherited from her mother, shrewd +business ability and a keen insight into men and things from her father, +and wealth and a certain attractive audacity of speech from her +husband; and five years of widowhood only served to develop and +emphasize the promise of her first season. There were numerous feet +which aspired to be shod with Ellery Wynyard's discarded shoes, but no +one pair, said the world, so much as an inch in advance of the rest. + +Mrs. Wynyard was spending the winter with her half-sister, and the +Rathbawnes, whom the circumstance of widely distant residence had always +kept from coming into close touch with her, were equally at a loss when +they wondered how they had formerly contrived to exist without her, and +in what manner they should resign themselves to giving her up. She was a +woman who came amazingly near to being indispensable. + +For the moment, Natalie Rathbawne, in reality the beauty which Dorothy +by a fraction fell short of being, suffered by comparison with her +sister. She was desperately tired--that was in her smile. But there was +something else: a singular preoccupation which was nearly akin to +listlessness. That was in the droop of her eyelids, in the eloquently +inattentive gesture with which she touched a bowl of Gloire de Dijon +roses as she passed, and in her conventionally courteous acknowledgment +of young Nisbet's greeting. And, too, as she seated herself beside her +sister on the divan, there was perceptible purpose in her avoidance of +the lamp-light, her withdrawal into the dark, deep corner. To the +conversation which followed she contributed only such brief remarks as +were made necessary by those occasionally addressed to her. + +The two women brought with them a delicious, indefinite atmosphere of +out-of-doors: that commingled smell of cold flowers, and cold flesh, and +cold fur, which is to a drawing-room in winter what a whiff of salt air +is in summer to a sun-baked hillside; and this proved almost too much +for the self-possession, already tottering, of young Nisbet. He had +always been accustomed to have the things he desired, had young Nisbet, +but these, until now, had been either creature comforts, readily +obtainable when one's father is a multi-millionaire, or athletic honors, +equally easy of attainment when one measures forty-two around the chest, +and can do one's quarter in something under fifty. Again, the Nisbets +lived on a ranch, and when one does not know people in New York one +spends the Sundays in New Haven, so that neither the terms nor the +vacations incidental to his four years at Yale had equipped him, in the +sense in which they equipped his fellows, for dealing with society. + +Now that he was in Kenton City, representing his father's interests, +young Nisbet was painfully self-conscious of multitudinous shortcomings, +totally unsuspected hitherto. His speech was apparently hopelessly +incrusted with slang, his legs were too long, his ears protruded +abominably, his hair was desperately unruly, his freckles and his +capacity for blushing were inexhaustible. He was as much at ease in such +surroundings as these in which he now found himself as a trout in a +sandpile. The great room, with its costly furnishings, the tea-table +crowded with silver and fragile porcelain, the kettle purring +contentedly above the iridescent flame of the alcohol lamp,--above all, +the subtle, indefinable suggestion of femininity which unknowably +pervaded his surroundings,--all these enthralled young Nisbet beyond +expression, and awed him immeasurably, into the bargain. He was, as +usual, very clear in his own mind as to what he wanted, and that was the +younger Miss Rathbawne, but, for the first time in his experience, the +means at his command did not seem to be sufficient unto the end. For the +younger Miss Rathbawne was, very evidently, not the sort of triumph +which is achieved by recourse to an imposingly ample bank-account, nor +yet by two months' loyalty to the exigencies of the training-table. And +this was February, and he had known her since July, and, altogether, it +was highly discouraging. Unwittingly, young Nisbet heaved a sigh so +profound and so pitiable that Mrs. Wynyard immediately proffered her +sympathy. + +"Poor, dear Mr. Nisbet! I never heard a more pathetic sigh. Whatever is +the matter?" + +"He's sleepy," put in Dorothy. "He always is, after talking with me for +a whole hour." + +"I was just thinking," protested young Nisbet helplessly. + +"Oh!" exclaimed Dorothy, "that's it, is it? Then pray don't discourage +him, Aunt Helen. He's really getting into some very good habits, of +late." + +"Why, _Dorothy_!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, digging her chin reproachfully +into her black velvet collar, "how _can_ you say such things? Mr. Nisbet +will think you have had _no_ bringing up at all. And _do_ sit up +straight, my dear!" + +"And if you don't stop nagging, O most conscientious of parents," +retorted Dorothy, with her nose in the air, "Mr. Nisbet will think you +bring people up by throwing them down!" + +"And slang! _Dorothy!_" + +"I always think," said Mrs. Wynyard, "that Dorothy should have had a +fairy godmother, to promise that every time she uttered a word of slang +a pearl should pop out of her mouth. We should have all been wearing +triple strings down to our knees within a week after she learned to +talk." + +"That settles it!" exclaimed Dorothy. "If you are going to side with the +enemy, Aunt Helen, there is nothing left for me to do but to beat a +retreat. Come on, Mr. Nisbet, there is rest for the weary in the +conservatory--that is, unless you want another cup of tea?" + +In the conservatory the air was heavy with the moist, sweet smell of +earth and moss, and faintly vibrant with the tiny plash of water, +dripping from a pile of rocks into the circular central pool, wherein +fat gold-fish went idly to and fro, nuzzling floating specks upon the +surface. Through the polished green of the surrounding palms and +rubber-plants stared gardenias and camelias; below, between maidenhair +and sword-ferns, winked the little waxen blossoms of fuchsias and +begonias: at intervals poinsettia flared audaciously among its more +quietly dressed neighbors; and, in the far corners the golden spheres +were swelling to fairly respectable proportions on the branches of dwarf +orange-trees. + +Dorothy installed herself on a bench, and young Nisbet perched upon the +rim of the pool, and stared at vacancy. + +"It's corking, in here," he said, after a moment. + +"Isn't it, though?" agreed Dorothy, with a nod of approval. "It's my +favorite part of the house. You can't imagine how many hours I spend +here, sewing, or reading, or fiddling with the fish and all those funny +little plants under the palms." + +"You bet!" said young Nisbet, with enthusiasm, if not much relevancy. +"I've just got a picture of that, you know. Besides, we've spent a good +many of those hours together in here, these past few months." + +"Oh, not a tenth of them!" exclaimed Dorothy, "and then only the very +shortest." + +"Oh!" said young Nisbet gloomily. His fertile imagination was +immediately peopled with the forms and faces of those who had shared the +other hours, a score of eligible and attractive young men, his moral, +mental, and physical superiors in every conceivable particular, +faultlessly arrayed, scintillating with wit, and surpassingly skilled in +the way to win a woman. The conservatory was full of them. He saw them +in every imaginable posture: feeding the gold-fish, watering the +begonias, looking up into Dorothy's eyes as they sat at her feet, +looking down at her slender fingers, as she pinned gardenias to their +lapels. And these had been granted the long hours, he only the short. +Inwardly, young Nisbet groaned; aloud, as was his wont, he said the +wrong thing. + +"They seemed long enough to me." + +"_Well!_" said Dorothy. + +"Oh, hang it all! I didn't mean that. What an oaf I am!" + +"Never mind," said Dorothy consolingly. "I know you well enough to +understand you, by this time." She smoothed her skirt reflectively. +"Let me see," she added, "what were we talking about when we were +swamped by the family?" + +"I think," answered young Nisbet, with one of his illogical blushes, +"that I had just asked you what sort of a man you thought you would like +to marry. I remember I was on the point of saying that I thought perhaps +you had ideas like--er--like your mother's." + +Dorothy raised her eyebrows. + +"Like the Mater's?" + +"About a man being big and prominent, and all that, you know," +floundered young Nisbet. "She always makes such a point of Barclay's +being Lieutenant-Governor--I thought you might be for the same kind of +thing." + +Dorothy looked him over, with a whimsical smile, as he was speaking. +There was a deep bronze light in his close-cropped, ruddy hair, and his +skin was very smooth and clean. His eyes were appealing, with that +unspeakable eloquence of simple honesty which is almost pathetic. Under +his blue cloth coat, the great muscles of his shoulders and chest stood +out magnificently, rippling the fabric as he stirred, as if eager to +throw off their trammels, and be given free play. About him there was a +distinct suggestion of sane living and regular exercise. For all his +freckles, and his nose that was too little, and his mouth that was too +large, "the ugliest of the Nisbet boys"--he had often been called +that!--was very emphatically good to look upon. + +"A big man?" answered Dorothy. "Yes, I think I should like to marry a +big man. I want him very clean, too--_very_ clean!--morally, as well as +otherwise. And honest as the day is long. And not _too_ bright! I don't +want to be continually trying to live up to his brain, and continually +failing. It is fatal to one's self-respect, that sort of thing. Then, he +must be heels over head in love with me--for keeps! And then--oh, he +must be a _man_, a man through and through, who wouldn't think anything +he didn't dare to say, nor say anything he didn't dare to do! That's +what I want, and if I can get it, all the prominence in the world may +go hang!" + +"That's just about John Barclay, though," said young Nisbet, "with the +prominence thrown in." + +"Well, I'm not saying I wouldn't have married John Barclay, if I'd had +the chance. He comes pretty close to being all I would ask for, in the +way of a man. But, unfortunately, there's only one John Barclay, and, +like the rest of the world, he looked directly over poor little Me's +shoulders, and saw only Natalie. Good gracious! Who could blame him? +She's the loveliest little thing in the world! But, at all events, she +nabbed him, so all that is left for me to do is to grin and bear the +disappointment as best I may. He's very much of a man, John Barclay is!" + +"Yes," assented young Nisbet, somewhat mournfully. "I can see that would +be the kind of a chap that the dames would stand for everlastingly." + +"But, as I said before," continued Dorothy, "it's not because he's +Lieutenant-Governor, whatever the Mater may think about it, that I +admire him. It's just because he's so big, and earnest, and loyal, +and--and"-- + +"White," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, _isn't_ he? That's it--white!" + +"I can understand a man like that getting spliced," observed young +Nisbet very earnestly. "He has so much to offer a girl. But as for the +rest of us"-- + +"Oh, as to that," broke in Dorothy airily, "John Barclay isn't the only +man in the world, by any manner of means! Besides, Natalie having +already bagged him, it is plain I shall have to look elsewhere." + +There was a long pause, broken only by the plash of the water, which +seemed, as the seconds slipped by, to grow amazingly loud. Then young +Nisbet raised his eyes, and looked at her, blushing deplorably. + +"I wish"--he said, "I wish"-- + +"Dorothy! _Do_ excuse me, Mr. Nisbet, but _really_--dinner at seven, you +know, and this child _must_ be thinking about dressing. She takes +_ages_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne folded her fat hands, and stood waiting, at the +conservatory door. Young Nisbet rose. + +"Of course!" he said. "I'm always so stupid about these things. Good-by, +Miss Rathbawne. I'm off to New York to-morrow on some confounded +business, so I probably won't see you for a week or so. Good-by." + +"_Would_ you mind going out by the hall, Mr. Nisbet?" suggested Mrs. +Rathbawne. "Mr. Barclay is in the drawing-room with my elder daughter, +and he is so _greatly_ occupied with affairs of state that they have +_very_ little time together. I _hate_ to have them interrupted. One can +do _so_ much harm sometimes, you know, by thoughtlessly interrupting +people who are in love with each other. Thank you _so_ much; good-by. +_Do_ try to stand a little straighter, Dorothy, my dear." + + + + +III + +A FACE IN THE CROWD + + +At the sound of the Lieutenant-Governor's voice at the front door, Mrs. +Rathbawne had beaten a hasty retreat, dragging her immensely edified +half-sister in her wake, so that when he stepped through the curtained +doorway Barclay found Natalie alone. + +"I'm so glad you could come early," she said, from the corner of the +divan. "Now we can have a talk before dinner. I seem to see so little of +you. I suppose that's the penalty attached to being engaged to the +second biggest man in the state. I'm sometimes jealous, Johnny boy, of +Alleghenia's place in your affections." + +"You're the only person in the world who has no need to be," laughed +Barclay. "What is the news?" + +"Probably," said Natalie, "the only interesting items are that you are +cold and a little cross, and that you want a big chair and a cup of tea +and some hot toast." + +"Your summary of the situation is so exhaustive," said Barclay, "that +there seems to be nothing left for me to say, except that you are the +most beautiful girl in the world, and that I think I must stand still a +moment and just look at you, before I accept any of the luxuries you +suggest." + +"I can't imagine how you know that I'm so beautiful. You can't possibly +see me in this dark corner. But I see I've made one mistake! You are +distinctly _not_ cross." + +"Why should I be?" asked the Lieutenant-Governor, standing before the +table, with his long legs far apart, and rocking from his toes to his +heels and back again. "When a man has been walking for half an hour +through a gnawing February air, and suddenly, out of all proportion to +his deserts, comes full upon a rose in bloom, is that a reason for being +cross?" + +She was very small, and deliciously delicate, was Natalie Rathbawne, +like a little Dresden image, with an arbutus-pink complexion, brown +hair, and deep-blue eyes, now clouded thoughtfully, but oftener alight +with humor, or dilating and clearing under the impetus of conversation. +A doll-like daintiness of tiny pleats and ruffles, fresh bows, and fine +stitching pervaded everything she wore, and if her voice inspired the +hackneyed comparison of running water, it was of water running under +moss, the sound whereof is as different from that of an open brook as is +music from discord. To John Barclay's thinking the barely believable +fact that this little miracle of beauty--this pocket-Venus, as he was +wont to call her--actually belonged to him remained one of the insoluble +mysteries of life. He could not, in the thraldom of his present Elysium, +be expected to remember, even if he had ever fully realized, that he +himself was tall, broad-shouldered, clean-cut, and clean-lived, with the +unmistakable stamp of the American gentleman on his linen and his +simple, well-fitting clothes, and the evidences of a sane, regular +existence in his steady hands and his clear eyes and his firm mouth,--a +man of whom any woman might be, and of whom this particular woman was, +extravagantly proud. For the first tribute which a lover lays at the +feet of his lady is, in ordinary, the stamped-upon and abused summary of +his personal attributes, which, in his own mind, he has taken remarkable +pains to render as despicable as possible, and which, in hers, her +imagination contrives not only to rehabilitate, but to imbue with a +preposterously exaggerated splendor. + +"I wonder," added the Lieutenant-Governor presently, "whether when +gentlemen are invited to tea they are supposed to kiss the hostess on +entering." + +"If you are in any doubt about it," observed Natalie, with an air of +superb indifference, "I advise you to write for advice to the etiquette +editor of the 'Kenton City Record.' She is probably sixty-two years old, +looks like an English walnut, has never had a proposal in her life, and +so knows all about"-- + +What the lady in question was supposed to know all about was for +sufficient reasons never made clear. There are occasions, despite the +manuals of polite behavior, when interruption cannot with any approach +to justice be regarded as rudeness. + +Barclay heaved a long sigh of satisfaction as he took his tea and two +thin slices of toast and settled himself in his chair. + +"Do you think it possible," he asked, "for a man to be asleep for six +weeks, dreaming that he is in another garden of Eden, with an Eve in a +French frock, who has no partiality for apples"-- + +"I _adore_ apples!" said the girl. + +"And then wake up," he continued, disregarding the interruption, "and +find that the dream was only a dream, after all,--that he's only a poor +dog of a politician, that the garden is only a dingy office, and the +flower-beds full of briers and pitfalls?" + +"You've been eating pie for lunch again," said Natalie severely, "and it +always makes you morbid. No; I don't think it possible at all. If I did, +I should hang on to your coattails like fury and keep you in dreamland, +whether you wanted to wake up or not." + +"It's all too good to be true! How _dare_ you be so beautiful?" + +"John"-- + +"It's gospel truth!" + +Barclay paused for a moment, and then went on more seriously. + +"You're tired, littlest and most lovely in the world, and troubled about +something." + +Natalie laughed shortly, with evident effort. + +"Why do you say that?" she asked. + +"Why not? Don't you suppose I know? Do you think you could say a hundred +words without my perceiving that? It almost seems to me that the +knowledge that you were unhappy would make its way to me, no matter what +distance separated us, and that I should come to you at top-speed to set +things right. I've hardly seen your face, and yet I know your dear, deep +eyes are troubled; I had barely heard your voice before I felt its +weariness." + +Natalie bent forward until her face came under the light. + +"Yes, I'm tired," she said; "or, rather, I was tired when I first came +in. I'm better now, since I've had my tea. But you're right, Johnny +boy,--there's something more. I'm troubled, desperately troubled and +heartsick. I've been trying to make myself believe that it's all +imagination, that I have no reason for feeling as I do; but I'm afraid I +can't manage it. John, I thought I saw Spencer Cavendish to-day." + +"Spencer Cavendish? Are you sure? I had almost forgotten his +existence!--Of course, it's not impossible; but I imagined he had taken +root in some South Sea island long ago. That's what he was always +expecting to do, you remember. How I have hated that man!" + +"You were good friends once." + +"Yes, and should be yet, if I had not been the most suspicious mortal +that ever breathed, and he the most hot-blooded. There was a reason, you +know,--a little reason, but the most important in the world! I was +jealous, Natalie, insanely jealous. I could forgive him everything now." + +"That hurts me, John. I'm so happy, boy dear, that I want everybody else +to be happy as well. Oh, why is it that a girl must always have that one +thought on her mind, which is so hard, so hard?--I mean the thought of +the good men, the true, brave, loyal men, whom she has cared for, who +have been her best friends perhaps, and yet whom she has been forced to +hurt bitterly because they asked her for something she was not able to +give. A man has so much easier a road! His happiness, when it comes to +him, isn't clouded by the thought of those to whom it means the loss of +their last remnant of hope. They are there, the disappointed ones, but +he doesn't know, he doesn't know! He hasn't on his conscience the memory +of hearts cruelly wounded,--wounded even to death. He doesn't in memory +see the eagerness in a good friend's eyes die to disillusion, to +hopelessness, to bitter, bitter sorrow. He doesn't have to remember how +the life died suddenly out of a voice that had been tender and eloquent. +He doesn't sicken with the thought that his hand has given a blow so +merciless, so unmerited, and yet so inevitable. Worst of all, for the +girl, is the after-discovery that her decision has made a difference--a +hideous, irreparable difference,--that the man can never be the same +again,--that she has wrecked a life with a word! Oh, there ought to be +some way! The man ought not to ask unless he is sure of the reply! It's +too much responsibility to force upon the girl! + +"So with Spencer Cavendish," she went on after a moment. "In spite of +all--in spite of all, John!--I can't forget that he loved me. I think a +woman never forgets that." + +"Until the man marries another woman!" + +"Ah," said Natalie, with a faint smile, "then least of all, John! And +besides, Spencer never married. He knew I loved you, long before you +did! I felt that it was due to him that he should know; he was my +oldest and best friend then, and so I told him! And then he went out of +my life--out of his own--into darkness. I can't forget it! I can't +forget that I broke up your friendship"-- + +"Dearest!" + +"I did, John! It wasn't my fault, perhaps, nor any one's, for that +matter, but I did, just the same. Besides, it wasn't only the question +of your friendship. What hurt me most was the wilful wreck of his life. +And yet, how could I have known what was going to happen? What could I +do when it did happen? He was beyond my reach. He didn't even answer the +letter I wrote, asking him to come and see me. I thought, if he cared +for me, I could save him. But it was just as he had said,--he must have +everything, or he would have nothing at all. And so he went wrong--oh, +so terribly, terribly wrong!--he who might have been anything, if it +hadn't been for me. I can never forget it--never! I can never forget the +pity of it, the tragedy of its awful publicity, the newspapers, the +scandal, people's sneers, his mother dying of a broken heart--_and I did +it_! Think of it! Think of a man like Spencer Cavendish in the police +courts, not once, but a dozen times. Think of what Justice Meyer called +him at last, and what was printed in the papers,--'a common drunk!' Oh, +John!" + +"Natalie, Natalie!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "Why should you +think of such things, brood over them, above all, blame them on +yourself? How could it possibly have been your fault? how could you +possibly have helped it? He was a reckless, hot-headed chap--brilliant, +of course, but a slave to his impulses and his nerves. If Lochinvars +could act with impunity nowadays, he'd have ridden up to your door on a +black horse, killed Thomas, and carried you off across his pommel. As it +was, he let himself go, and disgraced himself. I tried to talk to him, +just as you did, but he wouldn't have it--called me 'an insolent cub' +and--er--worse. I had to give it up. It was all very distressing, I +admit, but then, dear, it was all so long ago. He hasn't been in Kenton +City for two years and more, and I've no doubt he pulled himself +together long since, and is leading a straight life somewhere. He had +lots in him, with all his recklessness. A chap like that, with no family +hanging about his neck, and with his brains, and only his own living to +make, could forge ahead almost anywhere." + +"But John, I'm _sure_ I saw him to-day, and suppose I should tell you +that he was--begging?" + +Barclay almost smiled at her earnest, troubled face, as he replaced his +cup on the table. + +"Begging?" he answered. "I'm afraid I couldn't bring myself to believe +you, violet-eyes. Even granting that he has fallen as low as that, which +I should think one of the most unlikely things in the world, it would +hardly be in Kenton City, would it?--a place where his face is known to +a thousand people. Tell me about it. What makes you think you saw him?" + +"I was shopping this morning," said Natalie, "all alone; and as I came +out of Kendrick's and was just about to get into the brougham, I saw +that some one was holding the door open for me. I looked up carelessly, +as one naturally would under the circumstances, and, John--I know it was +he! At first I thought so, and then I didn't, because he was so changed, +so thin and pale, and because he had a beard. So, before I thought what +I was doing, I stepped into the brougham, and put my hand on the door to +close it. Then I looked up again, and saw his face, peering in at me +through the glass, and that time there couldn't be any mistake. It +_was_! I was going to speak, but he was gone in a flash. I saw him +disappearing in the crowd before the shop--_slinking_, John!--with that +dreadfully pathetic air which all beggars have, his shoulders all +hunched up, and his head bent, and his hands in his pockets. He was +cold, John, I could see that, and, no doubt, hungry! And there I was, in +that dreadful little brougham, with my hateful furs, as warm as toast, +and I didn't even speak to him. I could have died of shame!" + +She buried her face in her hands, bending low over the tea-table. +Barclay was leaning forward in his chair, his lips set. + +"It's impossible," he murmured, "impossible!" + +The girl looked up suddenly, a white spot in the centre of each cheek, +where the pressure of her thumbs had left its mark in the tender, pink +flesh. + +"Improbable--yes!" she said, "but not impossible. Oh, I wish I could +believe otherwise, but I'm sure, I'm sure! Oh, John! You are so big, so +strong, so powerful now! Think of it--Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia! +You can do anything. And if he _is_ here in Kenton City, homeless, cold, +starving, you must find and help him--for me, Johnny boy, for me!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor had risen, and was pacing up and down the room, +with his brows knit, and his strong, white hands chafing slowly against +each other, palm to palm. It seemed impossible, indeed! Spencer +Cavendish, the last of one of Alleghenia's proudest families; Spencer +Cavendish, the brilliant young society pet and sportsman; Spencer +Cavendish, the wit, the _viveur_--a beggar in the street? And yet-- + +The scandal of Cavendish's sudden and reckless plunge into sodden, open +dissipation, two years before, freshly called to Barclay's mind by +Natalie's words, had pointed to almost any finale, however debased, +however sordid. Barclay mentally invoked the face of his former friend, +as he had seen it on the occasion of their last meeting, flushed, +swollen-eyed, insolent, the fine patrician mouth hideously contorted and +maundering insults, filth, banality. + +"And I did it!" the girl was saying. "Don't forget that, John. +Unwittingly, ignorantly, helplessly, if you will, I did it, just the +same. If I could have loved him, I could have saved him. As it was, I +had to send him away, and he has come to--to this! Oh, don't you see? +Don't you understand that something more than chance has crossed my path +with his, just at this moment of my supremest happiness, and of his +utter degradation? My duty is plain. It is to help him, to uplift him, +to make a man of him once more--to undo what I have done! I'm +responsible--and I'm helpless! What can I do? What can any girl do in +such a case? I can't go out into the streets and search for him. I can +only turn to you, Johnny boy, and rely upon your aid." + +"But, Natalie dearest," said the Lieutenant-Governor slowly, "don't you +see that it is impossible, all this? I cannot allow such an affair to +come into your pure, sweet life, bringing with it the knowledge of the +depths to which men may fall, and the shadow of misery and degradation. +I cannot bear that, in even the remotest way, you should blame yourself +for that which it was never in your power to prevent or remedy. A +man--this man--has no business to cast on you the blight of his own +weakness and folly, to establish a relation of cause and effect between +your refusal of him and the subsequent transformation of a gentleman +into a common drunkard." + +"John!" + +"Ah, don't think me bitter, dearest! If the man you saw was actually +Cavendish, I pity him from the bottom of my heart. But it was his hands +which built up the barrier between his life and ours, and it must be his +that tear it down. It is intolerable that in his degradation he should +come into your life again, and have, even in your imagination, the +smallest claim upon you--intolerable! The paths of my love for you and +my duty toward you are identical in this respect. There can be no +alternative--no quibbling. At least until he has redeemed himself, if +redemption is still possible, the thought of him, his presence, his +misdoings, must not and shall not contaminate the atmosphere in which +you live and move." + +Natalie had risen suddenly, her eyes ablaze. + +"Ah, John!" she said. "Am I then a toy, a sugar figure, that I must be +packed in cotton, and shielded from all knowledge of the evil in the +world? Is that what it means to be a woman? Ah, _no_! It is bad enough +to be hemmed in by the wretched conventionalities which prevent my doing +openly what I conceive to be my duty, without adding to the restrictions +that actually exist the imaginary one that I must not even think of the +misery, the wretchedness, the sordid vice which abound just across the +borders of the comfortable little world in which I live. And see, boy +dear!--with all the force of my conviction that things should be +otherwise, yet I am reasonable. I don't ask to see Spencer, or to have +an active hand in his redemption. I realize that the time for that has +passed, and that you are just in saying that he must come to me, not I +to him--and come to me another than the man he is to-day. Anything else +is impossible: that I see and accept. But the hideous fact remains. A +man who loved me once, who offered me all that a man can offer a woman, +is walking the streets of Kenton City, cold, hungry, homeless--a +beggar! What business is it of yours or mine what his past follies and +weaknesses were? His temptations may have been beyond our understanding, +but his present plight is not. He is begging--begging at our very +doors--a man whom we have called by the name of friend! I can't help +him. All I can do, as I said before, is to turn to you, whom I love +better than all the world, and ask you to save him, in my stead. Ah, +boy, boy!--I've given you all I refused to him, taken at your hands all +I put away at his. You can afford to be generous!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor came slowly toward her, and, placing his hands +upon her shoulders, looked her in the eyes. + +"Dearest and Most Beautiful," he said tenderly, "you are right. I +hope--I believe--that you were overwrought, fanciful, that it is not +true. But if it is, if Cavendish is begging in our streets, then, so +surely as I am Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, I will pull him out of +them, and make a man of him, if it takes a month and every police +officer and detective in Kenton City to find him. And that not alone for +your sake, tenderest-hearted, but for mine. I _can_ afford to be +generous, God bless your sweet face, I can indeed!" + +And he bent over reverently, and kissed her hand. + + + + +IV + +AS BETWEEN FRIENDS + + +There were but two guests at the Rathbawnes' dinner-table that night, +the Lieutenant-Governor and Colonel Amos Broadcastle, a veteran of the +Rebellion, brevetted Major for conspicuous gallantry at Lookout +Mountain, and now commanding officer of the Ninth Regiment, N. G. A., +the crack militia organization of Kenton City. Colonel Broadcastle had +seen his sixty-five, but his broad, square shoulders, his rigid +carriage, and his black hair, even now only slightly touched with gray, +clipped twenty years from his appearance. His eye was one that was +famous throughout the Alleghenia Guard,--an eye accustomed to control, +not a single man, or two, or three, but a thousand, moving as one at his +command; an eye enforcing obedience immediate, machine-like, and +unquestioning. + +It had been a momentous day for the Ninth when Amos Broadcastle, +retiring from the staff of a former Governor, had accepted, first a +majority therein, and then, three months later, its colonelcy. He found +ten companies, in no one instance exceeding twenty files front. He found +a field and staff vain, incompetent, and jealous; company officers +deficient alike in their knowledge of tactics and in their conception of +their responsibilities; sergeants, corporals, and lances chosen without +any view to fitness, and ignorant and tyrannical in their positions; and +finally, the rank and file lazy, untidy, and frankly contemptuous of the +school of the soldier. Some one had once said of the Ninth that there +was consolation to be found in the mortifying knowledge that the men +composing it were there with the unique view of escaping jury duty. The +consolation lay in the probability that such infernally bad soldiers +would have made jurors quite as infernally bad. + +But Broadcastle, a born disciplinarian and a trained tactician, was now +in a position to echo, albeit in a different spirit, the arrogance of +Louis: "_Nous avons change tout cela!_" Ten years had sufficed to change +the indolent and incompetent Ninth of Alleghenia into a regiment +rivaling in prestige the Seventh of New York. The commissioned officers +were thrust upon, rather than achieved by, their companies, but, once +established in their respective positions, proceeded without exception +to justify, by their energy and ability, their selection from the best +element of Kenton City. Among the enlisted men the exponents of the old +spirit of sloth, indifference, and laxity were weeded out as fast as +their terms of service expired, and their places filled from the same +sources whence the company officers were drawn. Colonel Broadcastle was +a diplomat as well as a disciplinarian. By some unknowable system of +suggestion and example it came, little by little, to be regarded in +Kenton City as "the thing" to belong to the Ninth. Before the capital +was aware of the transformation, every company roster read 103, the +field and staff had been reorganized and perfected, and the Ninth +Regiment, N. G. A., was what it remained thereafter: a magnificent +fighting machine, ably drilled, perfectly equipped, a credit to the +state, to the credit of which there stood so little else. The +declaration of war with Spain brought it suddenly into prominence by the +astonishing readiness with which it went into camp twenty hours after +the Adjutant-General of Alleghenia published the President's call for +volunteers; and although it never saw active service, it attracted at +Chickamauga, and later at Tampa, the admiring attention of the regular +army, and was spoken of as the most perfect body among the volunteer +forces. + +The citizens of Kenton City were not accustomed to discovering things in +which they could take pride. The exact contrary was more apt to be the +case. When, therefore, they discovered the rehabilitated Ninth, and its +redeemer in the person of its commanding officer, they had a deal to +say, and said it with unexampled arrogance and satisfaction. +Thenceforward, Alleghenia meant much to Colonel Broadcastle, and +Colonel Broadcastle considerably more than much to Alleghenia. + +Something of all this went through the Lieutenant-Governor's mind during +the progress of the dinner. He sat at Mrs. Rathbawne's right, than which +nothing in the world could have been more cheerless, unless it was +sitting at Mrs. Rathbawne's left. But the good lady's habitual +complacency was plainly in abeyance, her customary volubility replaced +by a fidgety reserve. The dinner, as a social achievement, was a +distinct failure, save in so far as Mrs. Wynyard and Colonel Broadcastle +were concerned. Several months before, Mrs. Wynyard had frankly +announced that she had designs upon the Colonel. Latterly, Barclay had +begun to suspect the Colonel of having designs upon Mrs. Wynyard. Thirty +and sixty-five that looked forty-five--a widow and a widower! More +wonderful things had happened. + +"If I were thirty years younger," Broadcastle was saying even now, as he +did full justice to the celery mayonnaise, "I should say we were made +for each other." + +"Since two single people may be made for each other," laughed Mrs. +Wynyard, "I wonder if two married people can't be unmade for each other. +Perhaps that is just what has happened to us!" + +"I'll think that over," replied the Colonel with mock gravity. "I don't +want to commit myself on so serious a hypothesis, without due +reflection." + +They were the only ones who were thoroughly at ease. Barclay and +Natalie, unstrung by the events of the day, ate little and talked +listlessly. Dorothy, victim to an inward excitement which was half +happiness and half disappointment, chattered feverishly. Rathbawne was +wrapped in his own thoughts, and his wife, innocently unobservant of +emotional manifestations in any and every other, but pathetically +sensitive to the slightest evidence of mental perturbation in this +stern, kind man, between herself and whom existed a devotion dog-like in +its silence and intensity, watched his clouded face with an anxiety +which she made no effort to conceal. The dinner dragged hopelessly, +until she shook herself into a bewildered realization that it was over, +folded her napkin scrupulously, dusted a few crumbs from the black-satin +slope of her obsolete lap, and, followed by her daughters and Mrs. +Wynyard, left the men to their cordials and cigars. + +The latter drew their chairs nearer, as the door closed, made little +clearings in the wilderness of finger-bowls, silver, and discarded +napkins, for the accommodation of their coffee-cups and cordial glasses, +and, lighting the long Invincibles which were Rathbawne's sole +extravagance, inhaled that first matchless whiff of smoke which makes a +whole day of anxiety and vexation seem to have been worth the while. + +It is a moment apart and _sui generis_, this, and is rivaled only by +that of early morning realization that one is awake--and not obliged to +get up. It is apt to pass in silence, for a newly lit cigar is like a +newly married wife: a man is deliberately oblivious to all else. The +moment, too, is one of readjustment, of hasty mental survey of the +chatter that has passed, and of preparation for the essentially +dissimilar talk to come. With men of the mental calibre of the three +here assembled this opportunity is sacred to some of the gravest and +most vital thoughts which they exchange. Peter Rathbawne, in particular, +whenever he reviewed the paramount conversations of his life, seemed to +find their significance indissolubly fused with the fragrance of Havana +cigars and the taste of kuemmel or yellow Chartreuse. + +His eyes dwelt thoughtfully upon his companions during the pause which +followed. First, on Broadcastle. He could depend upon him as he could +depend upon no other man on earth. They had fought side by side in many +a tight place in the black days of '62, and in many another, full as +tight, since then, on battlefields commercial and political. It is +doubtful whether so much as a single word of admiration or affection had +ever passed between them. It is equally doubtful whether anything could +have been more entirely superfluous than such a voicing of self-evident +sentiments. + +John Barclay, too! Peter Rathbawne, with what had been natural +shrewdness at the outset now sharpened almost to clairvoyance by his +years of dealing with a multiplicity of men and things, understood the +Lieutenant-Governor absolutely, and admired him with all the force of +his rugged nature. And Rathbawne was not given to admiring people. His +business experience had not fostered the spirit of hero-worship. He had +seen too much for that. But in the two men before him he recognized +qualities so unusual, and in many ways so similar, that he was proud to +count them friends. + +For the moment, however, as he took stock of them, he was measuring them +by a new standard, more rigid, more severe than he had hitherto had +reason to apply. It is one thing to trust a man implicitly, and another +thing entirely to try to tell him so. For silence is most golden in the +specification of friendship, and when employed in the particularizing of +intimate emotion the silver of speech is apt to turn to veriest tinsel. + +Yet the occasion was one which demanded speech. Moreover, and in direct +opposition to his inclinations and the precedents he had established, he +was forced not only to give practical expression to his feeling for +Broadcastle and Barclay, but, what humiliated as well as annoyed him, to +confess himself incapable of dealing with a question which confronted +him. It was the first time within his recollection when he had +mistrusted his own judgment. + +But Peter Rathbawne was not the man to procrastinate, and presently he +began to speak, in a low but curiously intense voice, from which the +others instinctively took their cue. He was a short man, inclined to +stoutness, but with the clear, sharp eye and the underhang of jaw which +tell of right principle and indomitable perseverance. It was a question +whether in calling him the second most obstinate man in Alleghenia, +Governor Abbott had given him the full measure of his due. + +"Gentlemen," he said, with the somewhat stilted formality which was part +of his manner, "I will say to you what I wouldn't say to others,--I'm in +a hole, and I want your advice. I'll be as brief as possible, and I'll +come right to the point. For thirty years I've been building up the +Rathbawne Mills, giving them every hour of my thought, every particle of +my strength, every atom of my ability. I've seen them grow from a little +shanty on the outskirts of Kenton City to a collection of buildings +covering four solid squares, filled with modern machinery, and employing +four thousand, two hundred and odd hands. I've been a business man, I've +been a rigid man, but I've been a fair man, too. No one can say that I +ever clipped wages, even when I had to run the mills at a loss, as I've +had to do more than once. I gave my people an eight-hour day long before +the law of Alleghenia jammed it down the throats of other mill-owners. +I swallowed the Union, though it was a bitter mouthful. There has never +been a just complaint from one of my employees that wasn't attended to +in short order, if it was in my power to do so. There's many an old +fossil on my pay-rolls to-day who isn't worth his salt, but he stays +there, and will continue to stay there, because he did his best when he +could, and it's not his fault that he's dead wood now. I've given in, +over and over again, in one way or another, sometimes against my +convictions, and oftener against my will. But one thing I've stuck to, +and that's my right to discharge a hand when I see fit, without +dictation from the Union or anybody else. In the past, this has been +comparatively easy sailing. One man, now and again, isn't a ripple on +the surface of four thousand employees. Besides, there was always a good +reason. The others saw that, and there was never a finger raised. They +believed in me, through and through, and it has been my pride to know +that they did, and that they had good cause to. But now it's different. +There has been a band of young good-for-nothings in Shop 22, who were +full, chock-a-block, of socialism, and equality, and workingmen's +rights, and God knows what-not! They've talked enough poisonous gas to +the other hands to blow up a state. They distributed pamphlets, and made +speeches, and organized clubs, and fomented discord, till I got sick and +tired of it. There wasn't one square day's work in the whole fifteen of +them put together. So, when I'd stood them as long as I could--which was +at ten o'clock yesterday morning--I discharged them all in a bunch, and +if there'd been a steep place handy, I'd have expected to see them all +run violently down it into the sea--like the other swine, in Scripture. +For if ever there was a band of devils made incarnate, it was that same +fifteen who were sowing anarchy broadcast through the Rathbawne Mills! + +"Now--what? Lo and behold, they are all henchmen and disciples of +Michael McGrath, whom we in Kenton City know to our cost, and regular +and loyal members--save the mark!--of his Union. Well, gentlemen, I've +got that Union about my ears like a nest of hornets, with McGrath at the +head, and unless those fifteen men are reinstated by noon to-morrow, my +four thousand hands will be out on strike, and the Rathbawne Mills will +be tied up as tight as a drum!" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle curtly, as the other paused. + +"That's what I meant to do--but where am I going to come out? If I +thought, for instance, that I was going to have your regiment to back me +up, Broadcastle, or even the Kenton City police, why, well and good! But +_am_ I? No, sir! _No_, sir! Not with Elijah Abbott in the Governor's +chair, I'm not! You know that as well as I. Why, Broadcastle, I'd rather +see McGrath himself at the capitol than that smooth-spoken skunk!" + +He paused to relight his cigar, and then continued. + +"The Rathbawne Mills are like the fruit of my own body to me. I love +them! I love every stone and brick of them, that I've put in place, as +it were, with my own hands. I've often thought that if they should burn +down it would come close to killing me. And yet I could watch them go +with a lighter heart, God knows, than that with which I foresee the +misery that's coming to these people of mine, who are going to starve at +the bidding of a band of black-legs, and that not even because they +think their cause a just one, but simply because they can't help +themselves. It isn't only that ruin's staring me in the face, though +there's that possibility in the situation, too, but that privation, +bitter misery, and despair are lying in wait for them. God!--what an +iniquity! + +"But I _can't_ give in, Broadcastle--I _can't_ give in, John Barclay! It +means the sacrifice of a principle I've held out for, and that I know is +right. What's more, it isn't as if I were yielding one point. It would +only be the beginning. If I give in now, I might as well turn over the +mills to McGrath at once, and let him run them according to his own +blackguardly will. You know how such things go. Give them an inch"-- + +"And they raise a hell!" put in Colonel Broadcastle. + +"Exactly! It's commercial suicide. And yet, if I _don't_ yield, I'm +precipitating disorder, and bloodshed, and the untold suffering of four +thousand souls. What am I to do?" + +"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle, with a sharp nod of his head. + +Rathbawne turned from him to the Lieutenant-Governor, and to the latter, +knowing the man he had been, there was something indescribably +heart-rending in the sudden, irresolute trembling of his half-raised +hands, the slow shake of his head, and the pathos of his raised eyebrows +and drooping lips. + +"John," he said, "I'm an old man, and you're a young one, but I'm a +plain citizen, and you're the Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia. You +know how things stand. Now, I've given you my girl, and after that it's +not much to put myself into your hands as well. I'm getting on. My +strength isn't what it was. I'm not as fit to stand such a struggle as +this is bound to be, as I was thirty years ago. I look strong, but, in +reality, I'm not. My doctor has warned me, more than once. A sudden +shock--you know what these medical chaps say about sudden shocks! I've +laughed at him, of course, and yet--I know there is truth in it. I've +been up against hard propositions, but never one as hard as this. I've +had big responsibilities, but never a responsibility that I felt as I +feel this one. If I hold out, I know what people and the newspapers will +say,--how they'll blackguard me,--but I'm not afraid of that. I'm not +even thinking of it. No, and I'm not thinking of what the strain may +mean to me. Every man's turn is sure to come--why not one way as well as +another? But what I _am_ thinking of is the result upon the lives of +these people whom I've made, as surely as if I were another Creator. And +McGrath's another Beelzebub! There's a fight on between us for the +salvation of a little world of four thousand souls! But I'm not God! I +can't act with the conviction of omniscience. I've been the most +independent of men. I've made my own fortune with my own brains. I've +done as I saw fit, and the results have seemed to indicate that I've +been oftener right than wrong. But now, I'm at a loss. It's not the men +I'm thinking of so much. They ought to be able to make their own way, as +I've made mine. It's the women and children dependent upon them--the +women and children who have no voice in the matter, and yet who are +bound to suffer most by a strike. I've got to think for them. I've +reached a crisis--a cross-ways--and I've got to choose which course to +take--and I can't! All my experience counts for nothing. I've never--you +probably know it--asked for advice before. But now I must have the +unprejudiced, the outside point of view. I've always thought there was a +clear, unmistakable boundary between right and wrong, but now there's +some right in the wrong, and a big sight more of wrong in the right! +I've heard Broadcastle's opinion, and I want yours. If you agree, I'll +go by what you say. As I said before, John, in this matter I'm the +individual--you're the state. I'll go by what you say. What shall I do?" + +Peter Rathbawne's words had wrought tremendously upon the +Lieutenant-Governor. He answered slowly, looking down, and with a +perceptible tremor in his voice. + +"Mr. Rathbawne, you and the Colonel know how high-sounding my title is, +and how little, in reality, it means. There is no need to go into +details. I'm Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia, yes!--and as helpless in +the cause of right as a new-born baby! If I could by any means, in any +manner, support the advice I gave you, I would give it willingly." + +"John!" said Peter Rathbawne, "I don't mean that. I've put the case +wrongly. Give me your counsel, not as Lieutenant-Governor, but as my +friend, and the man who loves my daughter!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor raised his eyes from the finger-tips with which, +as the other was speaking, he had been plucking at the cloth. + +"Fight them, Mr. Rathbawne," he said, "and may God help you--because I +can't!" + + + + +V + +A BRAND FROM THE BURNING + + +More heartsick than he cared to confess, even to himself, the +Lieutenant-Governor left the Rathbawnes' earlier than his wont, despite +the fact that his host and Colonel Broadcastle were still engaged in +discussing the impending situation, and that Natalie, with a batch of +new music, was waiting for him at the piano. He pleaded an unusually +busy day and his consequent fatigue as an excuse, and so, at half after +nine, found himself about to light a second cigar, on the steps of the +Rathbawne residence, and shivering a little in the night air, which +stung the inside of his nostrils and set his eyes watering. Raw as the +day had been, it had turned colder now, but the night was superbly +clear. The sky seemed to have drawn nearer to the earth, and the stars +twinkled so sharply and clearly against its deep blue-black that they +resembled in form their conventionally five-pointed counterfeits of +silver paper. A brisk wind whirled a few dried leaves in whispering +eddies across the smooth asphaltum of the driveway, but beyond this and +the peevish sputtering of the arc-light on the opposite corner there was +no sound. It was the kind of night which, with its crystal clearness and +its steely intensity, stirs the normal pulse to keen exhilaration: yet +never had John Barclay felt more hopelessly dispirited, more utterly at +a loss to see the way before him. That anxiety, distress, possibly +actual disaster should be impending over this house where lay his heart, +his happiness, and his hope, was sufficiently disturbing in itself. That +he should not be able, despite his position, to raise a hand to avert +the calamity was worse. But that the battle was to be a battle for the +right, and yet, as it seemed, foredoomed from the start to end in +disaster, since no aid could be expected from the strong arm of the law +to which the partisans of principle turn naturally for support: this +was worst of all. For out of dangerous surroundings he felt himself able +to snatch away the littlest and most lovely woman in the world. She, at +least, should not suffer. And out of this nightmare of powerless +prominence, of impotent position, he himself could retire into private +life, and be no less a man than he had been before. But from the +reproach of corruption which had fallen upon her, and the impending slur +of anarchy, who was to rescue Alleghenia? The Lieutenant-Governor set +his lips and drove his nails into his palms, as he stood in the shadow +of the Rathbawnes' doorway, looking up at the sky of the February night. +He was not a religious man--as the term goes--but in that moment he said +a better prayer for the welfare of his state than had ever lain upon the +lips of any priest in Kenton City! + +He was about to strike his match when an instinct rather than an actual +perception of movement arrested his hand. Bradbury Avenue, upon which +stood the Rathbawne house, was situated in one of the quieter residence +districts which prided itself on the turfed spaces between its +dwellings, pretentious enough for the most part, and the double rows of +trees which lined its thoroughfares. It was one of these trees which, at +the moment, attracted Barclay's attention. It lay in a direct line +between himself and the arc-light on the corner, and its trunk, in some +miraculous manner, had abruptly developed an elbow, and then an arm. The +Lieutenant-Governor was still staring at this phenomenon when it was as +abruptly explained by the sudden emergence from shadow of a man, who had +apparently been standing on the side of the tree nearest to the house. +He was crossing the avenue obliquely when something about his bearing +caused the Lieutenant-Governor to lean forward and follow him intently +with his eyes. It was all there, as Natalie had said--the lifted +shoulders, the bent head, the unmistakable, pathetic air of the beggar. +Then, as he neared the light, he gave a short upward strain to his neck +and chin, the impatient movement of a man whose collar annoys him. The +trick was too familiar to have been forgotten. The next moment Barclay's +heels were pounding on the asphaltum behind him, and then Barclay's hand +fell upon his shoulder and whirled him round. + +In the oddly intense radiance of the arc-light above, which cut sharply +across the surface of forehead, cheek, and chin, and left heavy shadows +like those in a roughly blocked-out carving, under brow, nose, and lower +lip, the two men faced each other briefly, in silence. Then the +Lieutenant-Governor voiced the other's name, hardly above a whisper. + +"Spencer Cavendish!" + +And the other, echoing the tone, if not the words, replied:-- + +"Bar-clay!" + +A square away, the lights of a hansom winked into the avenue, and the +hoof-beats of the horse clonked on the pavement, unaccompanied by any +sound from the smoothly trundling, rubber-tired wheels. Barclay stepped +to the kerb, and hailed the driver with his stick. The cab drew in, +stopped, and threw the divisions of its apron wide, like two black hands +extended in cordial welcome. + +The Lieutenant-Governor turned to his companion. + +"Get in," he said. "I want to have a talk with you." + +The drive of a mile and more from Bradbury Avenue to Barclay's quarters +in the new bachelor apartment-house "Rockingham" was accomplished +without the exchange of a word. Once, he felt his companion shiver, and +dragging a rug from under them, he spread it across their knees. That +was the only movement on the part of either. They sat, side by side, +looking straight before them over the horse's bobbing crupper, until the +hansom pulled up sharply before the broad and brilliantly illuminated +entrance of the "Rockingham." As they passed in, Cavendish had a passing +impression of tiled floors, columns of green marble, and attendants in +tightly fitting green uniforms with brass buttons. Then an elevator +whirled them up to the eighth floor, deposited them in a square hallway, +and vanished again, with the little page in charge wrinkling his nose +and biting the thumb of his cotton glove. + +"Wot's the Loot'nt-Guvnor up to now, Sawed-Off?" inquired the doorkeeper +genially, as the elevator returned to the ground floor. + +"Ide'no!" replied the little page with equal affability. "Goin' in fer +pol'tics, I guest. Jeest! Wot a slob it wuz--wot?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor unlocked the door of his apartment, touched an +electric button which flooded the little hall and the drawing-room +beyond with light, and, entering the latter, went directly to a closet +in the wall. Unlocking this, he took out a jar of biscuits and a +decanter, and setting them upon the table, turned once more to his +companion. + +"Put away a couple of those biscuits and a glass of sherry," he said, +"and then we'll talk." + +"I'm past biscuits," said the other, almost sullenly. + +"I'll see to that," replied Barclay. "They are only by way of a +starter." + +He passed into the hall as he spoke, and presently Cavendish heard the +click of a telephone receiver slipping from its crotch, and Barclay's +voice speaking, to some one below, of a steak, vegetables, salad, and +coffee. He stepped to the table, devoured two or three of the biscuits +ravenously, poured himself a glass of sherry, sipped, and then swallowed +it, and flung himself down upon a wide divan. + +"Have you a cigarette?" he asked, as Barclay reentered. "I haven't +smoked in three days. That's worse than mere hunger, you know." + +"I believe you!" + +Barclay pushed a silver box across the table, and seating himself +opposite, touched a match to the cigar which he had been about to light +at the Rathbawnes' door, and which he still held between his lips. + +"Help yourself," he added. "Your supper will be up presently. Meanwhile, +shall I fire away, or will you?" + +Cavendish let the first smoke from his cigarette curl slowly up his +cheek before replying. In the full light now first resting upon it, his +face showed as that of a man approximately Barclay's age, but pinched by +want, and deeply lined by dissipation. His under lids were puffy and +discolored, and a dozen heavy creases ran, fan-like, from the corners of +his eyes. Hair already turning white and an unkempt mustache and beard +completed the picture. His clothes were faded and frayed, no linen was +visible, and his boots were cracked and soggy. There was nothing about +him to suggest the former estate of gentleman save his hands, which, +while thin and tremulous, were clean and well-kept, in singular contrast +to the slovenliness of his attire. + +"Age before respectability," he said in reply to Barclay's question, +with a shrug. "I'll go first. It will save your asking questions. We +parted in anger, Barclay." + +"Let that pass," put in the Lieutenant-Governor, briefly. "Two years +wipe out all scores as petty as was the cause of our quarrel." + +"Well, then," continued Cavendish more easily, "when I left Kenton City, +it was with the best intention in the world of making a fresh start in +some place where my story wasn't known. I went to New York. I had a +little money, but only a very little, and not the most remote idea of +how difficult it is for a man to make his way in a place where he is +unknown, particularly if he has no credentials and is too proud to ask +for any from his old associates. Moreover, I'd been drinking hard for +six months and there was no such thing as clipping it short all at once. +I had an idea of tapering off, and perhaps, if I had found a job, I +might have done so. As it was I climbed up one step and fell down two, +and that went on indefinitely. It wasn't as if I'd had a distinct aim or +anything in my life which made it seem worth living. I didn't half care. +I'd set my heart on something which I couldn't get, and--well, never +mind that. It is all as long ago as the Flood! I got work now and again, +tried reporting, and teaching, and copying. But each time it was a grade +lower, and I stuck to nothing but the whiskey--except when I had a +little more money than usual, and then it was absinthe." + +He touched his eyes, and then raised his hand to the level of his chin, +with the fingers held wide apart and rigid, and watched it tremble for +an instant in silence. + +"I haven't seen a mirror in weeks," he went on, "but I know the signs +are all there. That's the story. I could string it out for an hour, but +it would all be in the same key. I've simply been going down, down, +down. I'm what the old judge called me--do you remember it came out in +the 'Record?'--I'm a common drunk, Barclay. And I don't care! I've been +on the point of putting an end to it many a time--but I always held out +for another drink! Now, even my pride's gone. It stuck to me longer than +anything else, but it's taken itself off at last. I've been feeling +lately that I'm pretty near the end, and I wanted to see Kenton City +again before it came. That's the reason I walked all the way from +Pittsburg, and I've been begging on the streets since I got in. I +thought nobody would recognize me." + +"But _I_ did," said Barclay. + +"Yes, and--and"-- + +"Yes, and _she_ did! She saw you this morning, but before she took in +fully that it was you, you were gone in the crowd. She was half +heart-broken over it, and made me promise to look you up. I was going to +do so, when I tumbled against you by chance to-night. You were watching +the house?" + +"Yes, for the last time. I saw she had recognized me and that Kenton +City was no place for me. So I was off again to-night. Is she"-- + +"She is well, and, I am glad to say, happy. We are to be married in the +autumn." + +A smile hovered for an instant on Cavendish's lips. + +"God bless her!" he said slowly. "I'm glad of it. But don't let's talk +of that. She's as far above me as the stars!" + +"And as far above me, too, for that matter!" answered Barclay. "Here's +your supper. While you're eating, I'll take my turn at the talk." + +A bell-boy arranged the tray on the table, removed the covers, and in a +moment the two men were again alone. With a deep sigh of satisfaction +Cavendish drew a chair to the table and set to work on the steaming +dishes before him. + +"Jupiter!" he said, with the first mouthful poised on his fork, "you +don't know what this means, Barclay, and you can thank God you don't. I +won't attempt to thank you. Go on, and tell me about yourself." + +"I've no intention of doing that just at present," replied the +Lieutenant-Governor, settling himself more comfortably in his chair. "I +want to talk about you. Don't be afraid. I'm not going to preach! But I +_am_ going to say that while I understand a good deal of what you've +said, the last part is pure rot! You're a bit of a wreck, of course, but +it isn't your pride or your self-respect or whatever you choose to call +it, that's gone. It's only your nerve. Now you've had your experience, +and you're back where you belong, and you've friends who like you, and +who can help you, and who will. I'm in a position to do so myself, and I +don't expect you to make any bones about accepting my assistance, and +whatever money you need for the moment. It will be a loan, of course, to +be repaid when you're on your feet again. We'll have you there in no +time. When you've made way with the grub, you can bunk down on that +divan for the night, and in the morning I'll tog you out in one of my +outfits, and you can set about getting back on _terra firma_. You'll +have to shake the drink, that goes without saying." + +Cavendish straightened himself suddenly, laid down his knife and fork, +and laughed shortly. + +"It sounds well," he said bitterly, "but you don't understand, Barclay. +It's too late! I don't care, and if I did, I couldn't shake the drink to +save my immortal soul. I'm steady enough for the time being, because I'm +hungry and because I'm being fed. But I've tried the other game too +often. I know what it means. I wouldn't promise you to quit, because I +don't want to lie to you, and that's all it would be. When the craving +comes back, I'll go down before it like a row of tenpins. No, Barclay, +it won't do." + +"Nonsense, man! Do you want to tell me you're as weak as that?" + +"Every bit!" said Cavendish, attacking the steak again. + +"Well, I don't believe it, that's all. In the morning you'll be a +different man. I'll give you a bromide when you're ready for bed. You're +shaky, as it is, but that's all a matter of nerves. Now we'll drop the +subject, and talk of other things." + +It was midnight when they separated. Barclay brought out sheets and +blankets for the divan, produced pajamas for his guest, put the bath at +his disposal, and mixed a strong dose of bromide for him to take upon +retiring. + +Half an hour later, when he reentered the drawing-room to see whether +Cavendish was in need of anything further, he found him standing by the +table in his pajamas, trembling, wide-eyed, and very pale. + +"What is it?" he asked. "Are you ill?" + +"No," answered Cavendish, striving in vain to control the trembling of +his lips, "only damnably nervous. Could you--could you give me a drop of +brandy, Barclay?" + +"Certainly not!" said the Lieutenant-Governor. "Pull yourself together, +man! There's your bromide. Take that. It's better than a thousand +brandies." + +Cavendish turned, lifted the glass, spilling a little as he did so, and +swallowed the sedative at a gulp. Then he stretched himself upon the +divan and drew the covers close up about his chin. Presently, from the +bedroom, Barclay heard him breathing deeply and regularly, and turning +on his side, fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep. + +He awoke with a start, as the dawn was showing gray through the chinks +of his window curtains, with a vague, uneasy sense of something wrong, +and lay listening, every nerve strained taut. From the adjoining room +came the sound of Cavendish's breathing, but now it was more raucous, +more like groan following groan. The Lieutenant-Governor strove in vain +to put off the foreboding which lay heavy upon him, until, finally, +unable to resist the impulse, he rose, slid his feet into his slippers, +and going noiselessly into the drawing-room, stepped to the windows and +put the curtains softly aside. What first met his eye as he turned was +the door of his little wine-closet in the wall. It was standing wide +open, and about the lock the wood was hacked and hewed away in great +splinters. On a chair near by lay a rough knife with the blade open and +a sliver of wood yet sticking to the point. Then he looked toward the +divan. Cavendish was lying face down upon it, outside the blankets, +with his head lolling sharply over the edge. His left arm was extended +full length toward the ground, where his fingers just touched a bottle +of French absinthe, overturned upon its side, and uncorked, with the +thick, gummy liquid spread from its mouth in a circular pool on the +waxed floor. + + + + +VI + +McGRATH LAUGHS + + +The clock on the huge central tower of the Capitol marked nine, as the +Lieutenant-Governor passed rapidly through the lofty entrance hall +toward the corridor leading to his office and that of Governor Abbott. +Already his promptness was proverbial, and there were those in the +great, grim building who looked forward to the moment of his arrival, +each morning, with a kind of eagerness. These were the simpler folk of +the official world with which circumstance housed him for eight hours +daily,--bootblacks, elevator-boys, porters, doormen. For to the big, +clean, wholesome personality which appeals irresistibly to these humbler +people, Barclay added an astonishing memory for faces, and for the names +and circumstances connected with them. It was a gift which counted as an +unspeakably important factor in the establishment and maintenance of +unusually cordial relations with all those with whom he came in contact. +No one brought within the radius of his personal magnetism long resisted +it. It was only those who judged him from a distance, as did the press +and the rank and file of his party, or those who deliberately +misinterpreted him, as did his political enemies, who permitted +themselves anything short of enthusiasm for John Barclay. And this +faculty for attracting admiration and commanding respect, this +infallible kindness and this inherent dignity, were never made manifest +to so great advantage as in his attitude toward his inferiors. These +adored him. He accumulated, bit by bit, a remarkable store of intimate +information relating to them, and employed it in his intercourse with +them, with a tact and a frank sincerity of interest which never failed +of their effect. The response thus elicited was strongest of the minor +pleasures in his life. He was aware--none better--of the shrewdness +native to those who have no claim upon one's recognition, their +appreciation of notice that is unfeignedly interested, their +sensitiveness to open indifference, their resentment of the simulated +consideration which is mere impertinence; and he was conscious of a +little inward thrill of satisfaction at the difference of attitude in +the employees at the Capitol as toward Governor Abbott and himself. +Where the former's suavity elicited only formal respect, manifestly +obligatory, his own whole-heartedness lined his way with smiles and +kindly greetings. His official existence, beset with annoyance, +mortification, and disappointment, was, as he often reflected, made +tolerable only by this friendliness which he, almost unconsciously, +inspired. Dogs, children, and his subordinates--the three most +intuitively critical classes of beings--were all his friends. The +pathway to and from the daily routine, which he was coming to regard as +moral martyrdom, was a pathway illumined with sunlight and strewn with +flowers! + +As the Lieutenant-Governor passed through his ante-room, with a wink at +the boy, a nod to the stenographer, and a word of greeting to his +private secretary, and entered his office, he was surprised to find the +communicating door open, and to hear the sound of a vaguely familiar +voice in the Governor's room beyond. In an effort to place the speaker, +he hesitated briefly before advancing to a point which would bring him +within range of the Governor's eye. Almost immediately, the memory of +the convention rushed over him, and he recognized the voice as that of +Michael McGrath. + +"And it won't be a strike like other strikes," he was saying, "not so +long as I'm running it, that is. It's going to mean business from the +word go! There's been too much shilly-shallying in the strikes I've +known anything about, too much talk, and too much wasting of Union +funds. You know what I mean. It isn't enough to tie up a mill, and then +hang around on street-corners for two months, waiting for the other side +to give in. The only place to hit a man like Rathbawne is in his pocket, +and by that I don't mean simply cutting off his income, but chopping +into his capital as well. He's got to understand"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor walked over to his desk, laid his hat and stick +on a chair, and, before removing his overcoat, began turning over the +pile of letters which awaited his attention. As he did so, Governor +Abbott's voice broke in suavely upon the other's. + +"I deprecate any resort to violence," he said. "You must proceed with +discretion if you expect the state to maintain an attitude of +neutrality. Otherwise, the police or the militia"-- + +"Oh, to hell with the police and the militia!" broke in McGrath +impatiently. "What's the use"-- + +"There is the Lieutenant-Governor now," interrupted the other. "Perhaps +he has some news for us. Mr. Barclay, will you kindly step in here for a +moment?" + +McGrath was standing on the opposite side of the Governor's table as +Barclay entered the room. He acknowledged the latter's curt nod with an +ironical bow, slipped his hands into the pockets of his checked +trousers, and stood waiting, with his square head thrust forward, for +what was to follow. + +"Mr. McGrath has called," continued the Governor, "to explain the +attitude of the Union in the impending strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +I've been telling him of our conversation of yesterday afternoon, and +that, as you were to see Mr. Rathbawne last night, you would probably +have something to tell us in regard to his position. Were you able to +persuade him to a more reasonable view of the situation?" + +"I have nothing to add, sir, to what I said yesterday," replied Barclay. +"I told you then that I had no intention of endeavoring to influence Mr. +Rathbawne's judgment." + +"He spoke to you about it?" + +"Yes." + +"And asked your advice?" + +"He did." + +"And you replied?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor flushed. + +"I beg to suggest, sir," he answered, "that this is hardly the time for +me to commit myself as to that. I conceive it to be a matter of official +privacy. Mr. McGrath"-- + +"You have my authority to speak, Mr. Barclay," said the Governor. +"Indeed, I desire it. Since one side knows your views, there is no +reason why the other should not be informed as well. Mr. McGrath is the +president of the Union. It is best that he should know the attitude of +the state authorities in this controversy." + +"I am not in a position to question your wishes, sir. You should know +best." + +"One cannot pretend to be infallible, Mr. Barclay," answered the +Governor, rubbing his hands. "One can only do what seems to be right and +proper under the circumstances. By our conversation of yesterday, I in a +measure put the negotiations with Mr. Rathbawne into your hands." + +"It is a task I did not seek, sir. Pardon me if I say that it is also +one which I should hardly have accepted, had I been aware that in +speaking as you did you were actually asking me to assume it. Mr. +Rathbawne is my friend, and, moreover, my personal convictions"-- + +The Governor held up his hand. + +"There can be no question of friendship or of personal conviction, Mr. +Barclay, in the case of a duty imposed upon a state official. I realize +that what you--or I, for that matter--must do in the performance of our +obligations, is oftentimes disagreeable, oftentimes at variance with our +wishes. But that is unavoidable." + +Barclay moved uneasily. The intrusion of this pedantry, so conspicuously +insincere, with its implied rebuke, chafed him unspeakably, in view of +the presence of McGrath. The Governor had adopted the tone, half +authoritative, half reproachful, of a teacher reproving a refractory +child. + +"My time, as you must know, is inadequate to the demands made upon it. I +am forced, on occasions, to turn more or less important matters over to +others. To whom more naturally than to you, Mr. Barclay?" + +"May I suggest, sir, that there can be no profit in prolonging this +discussion? I appreciate the position perfectly, and I am quite prepared +to state what I know of Mr. Rathbawne's attitude toward the demands of +the Union." + +"Ah," said the Governor, "that is as it should be, and as satisfactory +as possible. Let me remind you, Mr. Barclay, that it was not I, but +yourself, who introduced this digression." + +He turned to the president of the Union. + +"You will understand from what I have said, Mr. McGrath," he added, +"both to the Lieutenant-Governor and to you, that in the matter of the +proposed strike, he is, to all intents and purposes, acting in my stead. +He was in a position to approach Mr. Rathbawne, and I was not. Now, Mr. +Barclay, if you please"-- + +The Lieutenant-Governor straightened himself instinctively, as, for the +first time, he addressed himself to the agitator. + +"Mr. McGrath," he said, "my confidence in Mr. Rathbawne's fairness and +integrity would have led me to approve any course which he might have +seen fit to take. As you have already heard me say, I had absolutely no +intention of endeavoring to influence his judgment. Greatly to my +surprise, Mr. Rathbawne himself consulted me in the matter, without any +suggestion on my part, and asked for my advice." + +"That's fortunate," put in McGrath, "very fortunate. You've been able to +sidetrack a lot of trouble." + +Barclay's eyes hardened at the hypocrisy of the sneer. + +"I have pleasure in informing you," he continued, "that, in reply, I +advised him to fight the Union in the present dispute to the utmost of +his means and ability. I should have counseled him further to hold out +until he had spent his last cent and shed his last drop of blood, except +that, knowing him as I do, I conceived such a recommendation to be +wholly superfluous. Mr. Rathbawne has his character and his record +behind him. There is about as much chance of his yielding you an inch of +ground as if he were standing with his back against the Capitol!" + +McGrath shrugged his shoulders. + +"It's a damned funny way you have of not influencing people's judgment," +he said. + +"I mis-stated my attitude in saying that," retorted the +Lieutenant-Governor coolly. "I should have said, what, after all, is +self-evident, that I had no intention of trying to influence Mr. +Rathbawne in favor of the Union, at least so long as it is acting under +your dictation. Its present character is well known--almost as well +known as yours, in fact--and I believe its position in this matter to be +entirely untenable, unjustifiable, and iniquitous. I may add that if it +is, indeed, Governor Abbott's resolve that I am to deal, in his stead, +with the question of your proposed strike, you may confidently rely upon +having to put the entire state force of Alleghenia out of business +before you can even so much as begin to bully Peter Rathbawne into +submission!" + +"If that's your opinion of the Union," said McGrath sullenly, "it might +be interesting to hear your opinion of me." + +"You are perfectly welcome to it," replied the Lieutenant-Governor +easily. "I consider you an unmitigated blackguard!" + +Governor Abbott tipped back his chair and looked at McGrath. + +"That's pretty plain talk," he said. "You see how it is, Mr. McGrath. +You'll have to go ahead on your own responsibility, and you mustn't be +surprised if the State steps in at the first evidence of disorder." + +McGrath rose, flecked some specks of dust from his waistcoat, and walked +toward the door without a word. On the threshold he turned, looked from +the Governor to the Lieutenant-Governor, and back again, and laughed. +Then he went out, closing the door softly behind him. + +At the Rathbawne Mills it was usual for a huge whistle to give one long +blast at noon as a signal for the lunch hour. On that day, however, +following McGrath's instructions, the single blast was replaced by five +short ones in rapid succession, and three minutes later the employees +were pouring through half a dozen gates into the streets surrounding the +mills, in laughing, chattering, excited streams. + +A majority of the men went directly to a hall in the neighborhood where +McGrath had called a mass-meeting for half-past twelve. A minority of +them crowded into the saloons of the vicinity, where they pounded on the +bars, and filled the close, smoke-grayed air with heated discussion. +Several of the discharged hands were in evidence, each surrounded by an +attentive group, and expounding more or less inflammatory views. The +women gathered in gossiping throngs on the sidewalks, laughing, and +pulling each other about by the arms. The boys played ball and leap-frog +in the streets, shouting, and whistling through their fingers. In brief, +the great strike was on, but, for the time being, it was masquerading +in the guise of a public holiday. + +At one o'clock the whistle blew again, and a thousand voices whooped a +derisive accompaniment, but no one of the throng in the streets made a +move toward the mills. Half an hour later, watchmen swung to and bolted +the gates, and, issuing presently from a small side entrance, in +company, were received with cheers, handshakes, and slaps upon the back. +Then the crowd gradually thinned,--many going to the already well-filled +hall where McGrath was delivering an address, and others to their +homes,--and a silence descended upon the neighborhood, broken only by +the voices of the men about the saloon doorways. + +At two, Peter Rathbawne, attended by his private secretary, came out of +the side entrance and walked slowly away in the direction of his home. +He held his head high, and his eyes straight to the front, and paid no +attention to the respectful greetings of those of the strikers who +saluted him, touching their hats. There were many among them whose +hearts sank at this attitude in a man who had made it his boast that he +knew every hand in his mills by sight, and who, in the past, had had a +nod or a friendly word for each and all of them. For the first time a +premonition settled upon them of what this strike, which had been +welcomed principally for novelty's sake, might mean. It was the first +the Rathbawne Mills had ever known. Some of those who saw the face of +Peter Rathbawne that afternoon were already hoping that it might be the +last. + +The Lieutenant-Governor returned to his apartment for lunch. Cavendish +was still sleeping as he had left him, with a stalwart negro porter, +summoned from the Capitol by telephone early that morning, watching in a +chair. Under Barclay's orders, a carpenter had already removed the +splintered door of the wine-closet, and an upholsterer had replaced it +by a slender brass rod from which swung a velvet curtain. With his own +hands the Lieutenant-Governor had taken away the fallen bottle, mopped +up the pool of absinthe, and put the room to rights. Now he dismissed +the negro, took from his pocket a little box of strychnine tablets, +obtained from his physician on his way from the Capitol, and, after a +brief survey of his surroundings to see that all was in order, went over +to the divan and shook the sleeping man by the shoulders. + +"Come, lazy-bones!" he said, with a laugh. "You've slept over twelve +hours. That will do--even for a nervous wreck." + +Cavendish opened his swollen eyes slowly, looked at him, and then closed +them again with a murmured "Oh, God!" which was like a groan. + +To this the Lieutenant-Governor paid no heed. Passing into the bathroom, +he turned on the cold water in the tub, poured a half glass of vichy +from a syphon, and then returned, carrying the tumbler in his hand. +Cavendish had raised himself on one elbow, and was looking stupidly +about the room. + +"Here you are," said Barclay cheerfully. "Stow this pill, and here's +vichy to wash it down. Your bath's running. By the time you've had it, +there'll be some clothes ready for you." + +Cavendish gulped down the tablet, and sat upright. + +"Last night"--he faltered. + +For the first time in his life, the Lieutenant-Governor called him by +his first name. + +"Last night, Spencer," he said, looking him fairly in the eye, "belongs +to the past, and is taboo. I won't hear a word about it. This is to-day. +Get up, and we'll set about putting wrong right. You're a man again. +Don't forget that. And I'm your friend. Don't forget that, either." + +His hand rested for an instant on the other's shoulder with a firm +pressure, and then he passed into his bedroom and shut the door. + +They had lunch together in the dining-room of the "Rockingham," and then +went up again to Barclay's rooms. At the door, Cavendish came to a halt. + +"I can't stand this," he said. + +"You'll have to," replied the Lieutenant-Governor, "so shut up!" + +"You've made a change," said Cavendish obstinately, pointing to the +curtained cupboard. + +Barclay's eyes did not follow the gesture. + +"So have you!" he answered. "Now, look here. There are twenty dollars in +the waistcoat of that suit, and a letter to Payson of the 'Kenton City +Sentinel.' Go down and see him this afternoon, and I think he'll give +you a job at reporting, which will fix you up for the present. In +another pocket you'll find a box, with three tablets like the one you +had before lunch. Take one of them every two hours. In still another +pocket there's a key to these rooms. I'm going to be busy till about ten +o'clock, so you'll have to shift for yourself. Make yourself at home, +and if you're awake I'll see you when I come in." + +Taking him suddenly by the shoulders, he twisted him about, facing the +chimney piece, on which stood a photograph of Natalie Rathbawne, smiling +out of a silver frame. + +"I'll leave you to talk it out with her," he added simply. + +In the hall, as he passed out, he caught a reflection of Cavendish in a +mirror. His hands were resting on the mantel-edge, and he was leaning +forward with his haggard face close to the photograph. Barclay looked at +his watch. + +"Two o'clock," he said to himself, "and all's well!" + + + + +VII + +THE MIRAGE OF POWER + + +Barclay was conscious of a feeling of exhilaration such as he had not +known for many weeks, as he swung into Bradbury Avenue late that +afternoon on his way to the Rathbawne residence. The duties of the day +had been inordinately petty and vexatious, but he had dispatched them +one and all with something approaching enthusiasm,--a touch of the old +Quixotic energy with which he had taken office. The morning conversation +in Governor Abbott's room had braced and toned him. He forgot its +inauspicious opening, and even his distress at the attempt to force him +into the position of mediator between Peter Rathbawne and the Union, in +the solid satisfaction of having been able to speak his mind to McGrath, +and call that worthy a blackguard to his face. He was a man who +despised a quarrel, but, for its own sake, loved a square, hard fight. + +Back, however, of this somewhat inadequate excuse for cheerfulness lay +the Governor's assurance that in the matter of the strike his lieutenant +was to have free rein. It was the first time since the beginning of +their official association that Elijah Abbott had placed an actual +responsibility in Barclay's hands. A corner-stone laying, a banquet here +and there, the opening of a trolley line, or a library, or a +sewer,--these were the major calls upon the Lieutenant-Governor's time. +The main current of routine was a hopeless monotony of official +correspondence, investigations, statistics, reading and reporting on the +interminable and flatulent maunderings of the Legislature,--duties +heart-breaking in their desperate tedium and maddening inutility. + +But at last here was responsibility, actual and deeply significant, +calling for the exercise of tact, courage, and immutable firmness. The +particular task was not one which he would have coveted, and yet he +welcomed it. Anything,--anything to assuage in him that sense of +ineptitude, of being ignored, a titled nonentity! + +With this vast lightening of spirit came, not only gratitude, but a +sense of lenity toward Governor Abbott. He encouraged himself to believe +that the note between them had been one of misunderstanding merely. It +might not be too late, after all! Gradually, he began to form a mental +picture of a growing sympathy and affiliation between them, large with +possibilities of improvement for Alleghenia. As he turned into the +Rathbawnes' gateway, he could have laughed aloud for very lightness of +heart. His optimism was not even impaired by running, in the hall, full +against Mrs. Rathbawne. + +"_Good_ gracious! Lieutenant-Governor, is that you?" + +Repeated and earnest endeavor on Barclay's part had never dissuaded her +from this form of address. + +"What _is_ the use of _having_ such a title, if one can't _call_ you by +it?" she would say, when he remonstrated. "Do _you_ suppose that, if +Natalie were engaged to a _prince_, I should be going around, calling +him Tom, Dick, or Harry, instead of 'Your Royal _Highness_'? You ought +to be _proud_ of your title. _I_ am!" + +"But, Mrs. Rathbawne"-- + +"Now, _please_ not, Lieutenant-Governor, _please_ not! I like it best +that way." + +The north wind was attentive and amenable to the voice of persuasion, in +comparison with Josephine Rathbawne. + +"Of _course_ you know the _strike_ is on!" she continued now, without +waiting for an assurance from Barclay that he was indeed none other than +himself. "Isn't it _awful_? I expect to hear the roar of the mob at +_any_ moment! Come into the drawing-room. Natalie _was_ there, only +_half_ an hour ago." + +And she swept through the doorway, Barclay following. + +"Natalie," she began, "here's the Lieu--why, _Dorothy_! I took you for +Natalie. And--er--oh! Why, Mr.--er--how de do? I didn't see you at +first. Oh, _do_ turn on the switch, my dear. The place is as black as +pitch." + +The electric light, flooding the room, revealed young Nisbet, one vast, +consuming blush, and Dorothy, with a dangerous light in her eyes, and +her lips tightly compressed. It was plain that Mrs. Rathbawne had fallen +foul of Dan Cupid's machinery once more! + +"Why, Mr. _Nisbet_! I thought you were in New York." + +"I had a telegram this morning, calling the date off," said young Nisbet +in pitiable confusion; "that is, I didn't have to go, you know. So I +just fell in here to explain. I thought some of you might spot me on the +street, and after I'd said"-- + +He began to flounder hopelessly, and cast a glance of mute appeal at +Dorothy. That facile young lady marched directly into the breach. + +"If you and John are looking for Natalie," she said, "you'll find her in +the library with Dad. How do you do, John?" + +"Pretty well, I thank you, Flibbertigibbet. It is really your husband +whom I came to see, Mrs. Rathbawne. I've a little business with him, so, +for the moment, I'll have to give Natalie the cold shoulder." + +"Oh!" said Mrs. Rathbawne, lifting her fat hands. "Of _course_, +Lieutenant-Governor! I understand _perfectly_. Business before pleasure, +_always_. Go right in, won't you, and send Natalie here to me. _I'll_ +stay here. Aren't we going to have tea, Dorothy? Oh, _do_ try to sit up +straight, my dear!" + +Natalie and her father were bending low over a great portfolio, their +heads close together in the yellow glow of the table-lamp, which was the +only light in the room. Rathbawne looked up with a grim smile, as the +Lieutenant-Governor entered. + +"Pottering over my autographs, again, you see," he remarked. "I've been +neglecting them shamefully, of late--eh, Natalie? Didn't have the time. +It looks just now as if I wouldn't have to complain again of lack of +leisure for quite a while!" + +"It was that I dropped in to see you about," said Barclay, striving, +with only partial success, to keep the exultation out of his voice. "You +may not be in for so much leisure as you imagine, Mr. Rathbawne. You may +not get much of a holiday, after all." + +Without for an instant losing the Lieutenant-Governor's eye, Rathbawne +reached out and touched his daughter on the arm. + +"Oh, Dad!" she said reproachfully. + +"There's no need for her to go, sir," added Barclay, "unless you wish +it. I bring only good news." + +Acquiescing, Rathbawne drew Natalie close to him, passing one arm across +her shoulders, so that his gnarled hand rested firmly on the delicate +fabric of her sleeve. Between these two there had always lain a +sympathy, an affection, a mutuality of comprehension, more like the +relation of husband and wife than that of child and parent. + +"Nothing but good news?" answered Rathbawne. "Go on. What is it?" + +"News not so much of actual happenings as of potentialities," said the +Lieutenant-Governor. "Last night I had to say to you that in the cause +of right I was as powerless to aid you as a baby. To-night, I have come +to tell you that I am in a position to see justice done, and that I +will." + +In detail, his voice ringing with enthusiasm and confidence, he +described the interview of that morning, his statement of Rathbawne's +position, his passage at arms with McGrath, finally, the Governor's +announcement that the strike was to be supervised by his lieutenant in +his stead. + +"I had almost lost hope," he concluded. "I thought my opportunity would +never come, and here it is, after all--the chance to act! And, somehow, +I feel that it is only the beginning--that, as he gets to understand me +better"-- + +Rathbawne suddenly left his daughter's side, and in three steps was +directly before the Lieutenant-Governor. As he interrupted him, his +fingers closed upon the lapels of the other's coat, and he punctuated +his words with little tugs at these, his knuckles coming together with +tiny muffled thuds. He spoke with a gravity that was vibrant with +suppressed anger and slow with sincere regret. + +"My boy," he said, "it's not a gracious thing to do to spoil an +enthusiasm like yours, but don't deceive yourself. Elijah Abbott as a +trickster is alone in his class. You were never more powerless to act +for the right than you are at this moment." + +"But I have his assurance"-- + +"Oh, _his_ assurance! It isn't worth the ash off your cigar. What, give +you a chance to interfere with the will of the Union which made him, and +owns him, body and soul? Never in God's world! Listen to me. I spent an +hour in his office this very afternoon, discussing the strike--_and he +never so much as mentioned your name_!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor winced as if the words had been the touch of a +lancet. Then he closed his eyes. + +"And I was in the next room," he said, almost as if to +himself,--"planning--my--control--of the situation! Good God!" + +"I went directly to him," continued Rathbawne, "because I knew that it +would be purely and simply a waste of time to parley with the lesser +officials who are either helpless or frankly his tools. I knew, too, +that no satisfactory result would come of appealing to him, but I wanted +to give him the chance. All I asked of him was an assurance that the +mills would have proper police protection, and that, if necessary, the +militia would be called out in support of order. The outcome was exactly +what I expected. Governor Abbott rubbed his hands, and smiled, and said: +'All in good time, Mr. Rathbawne, all in good time. When the conditions +seem to warrant it, we can discuss these measures.' That means that they +are free to blow the mills to kingdom come, before a finger will be +raised by the authorities to prevent them. And what's more, they'll do +it! Do you think I don't know McGrath?" + +As he had intended it should, this speech had given the other a chance +to recover himself. The Lieutenant-Governor's habitual poise was +already restored, and his voice, as he answered, was quite steady, but +eloquent of his desperate discouragement and weariness. + +"I hope it's not as bad as all that, Mr. Rathbawne. It's not necessary +to tell you, that for me there can never again be such a thing as +trusting the word of Governor Abbott; but, at the same time, I can +hardly bring myself to believe that he would openly countenance the +practical existence of anarchy in the capital city of Alleghenia." + +"Well, I can, then!" declared Rathbawne. "I can believe anything of him! +Mark my words, John, he's as sleek a scoundrel as you'll find outside of +the State's Prison. He cares less for Alleghenia and her capital city +than you do for one of the hairs on his rascally head. I tell you, the +Union has bought him, body and soul, and unless a miracle comes down +from heaven, I'm a beaten man!" + +Barclay bit his lips without replying. In his heart of hearts, he knew +that Peter Rathbawne's words were true. + +"He'll be impeached, sooner or later," continued the old man, "if +there's a speck of decency left in the Legislature--which I doubt. But +long before that, John, long before that, I'll be down and out. I would +to God you were Governor of Alleghenia, my boy. You're the only ray of +hope I can see for her." + +The Lieutenant-Governor fell back a step, and covered his face with his +hands. For a full minute there was absolute silence. Rathbawne had +returned to the table, and, with his fore-arms across the back of a +chair, and one foot on the lower cross-bar, was staring vacantly at his +autographs, his hands moulding and remoulding each other into an +infinity of forms. Natalie was at the window, her face in the crevice +between the curtains. The same impulse had prompted both father and +daughter. There are some things which it is better not to watch. + +They turned at the sound of his voice, to find him with his head flung +back, his hands clenched at his sides, his right foot planted firmly in +advance of his left, his whole bearing one of passionate earnestness. +And, though he was seemingly addressing Rathbawne, there was that in his +voice and in his words which was meant for every ear in the state! + +"Governor of Alleghenia!" he said, "I would to God I were! Sometimes I +almost--yes, sometimes I wholly despair. I love this state, Mr. +Rathbawne, as I love nothing else on earth--not even my girl there, not +even Natalie. You two are the only ones in the world who can understand +what it means when I say that. It has always been so, ever since I was +big enough to know what Alleghenia meant, and more than ever since I +have come to understand her shame, and her vital peril, and her dire +need. I've never tried to explain the feeling; I've never found any one +who seemed to share it with me. I hear other men talk of national +patriotism, and the flag, and all that, and I understand it, and honor +them for it. But--while it may be only a fancy of mine--for me Kenton +City comes even before Washington, and even before these United States +of America the sovereign state of Alleghenia! I would have her courts +incorruptibility itself, her government the perfect commingling of +equity and mercy; her press the vehicle of verity, intelligence, and +watchfulness; her public servants the faithful exponents of loyalty and +diligence; her people, one and all, whatever is best in our +interpretation of the word American--and then, something +more!--Alleghenians!--citizens, not only of the Republic, but of the +state which I would have shine brightest in the field of stars, and be +quoted, from Maine to California, and from Florida to Washington, as the +synonym for law and order, truth, integrity, and justice. You know how +far the dream is from the reality. We are held up to ridicule and +contempt as law-breakers, time-servers, and bribe-takers--and we deserve +it! I can't see help on any hand. I don't believe our people, as a +class, are actually vicious and corrupt--only callous and indifferent, +accustomed so long to the spectacle of political chicanery and depravity +that they have lost their ability to appreciate its significance. But, +so far as results are concerned, it all amounts to the same thing. Once, +I hoped I should be able to do something. But now--I'm a nonentity, Mr. +Rathbawne, as you know, and not only that, but a man who has taken a +false step, from which he can never recover. I'm dead, politically +speaking--as dead as Benjamin Butler!" + +He paused, drawing a deep breath. + +"We were speaking of your interview," he added, more evenly. "What was +the result?" + +"Nothing, beyond what I've told you," answered Rathbawne, shaking his +head. "All I can do is to keep my mouth shut, await developments, and +trust in a Providence which it takes a good bit of obstinacy to believe +hasn't deserted the state of Alleghenia for good and all. It isn't for +my own sake alone, John, that I pray the Union will give in before my +people begin to think of violence. You remember '94 in Chicago? Well, +we don't want anything like that in Kenton City. It would be the last +straw! Alleghenia has a big enough burden of disgrace to carry, as it +is." + +A servant entered, even as he was speaking, to summon him to the +telephone, and with an exclamation of impatience he left the room. +Immediately, Natalie stepped from her post at the window, and came +toward Barclay with outstretched hands. + +"Oh, Johnny boy," she said, "I'm _so_ sorry. How you've been hurt, dear, +and disappointed, and cruelly wronged!" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's hands clenched again at the sound of sorrow in +her voice, and he strove in vain to control the tremor of his lip. +Tenderly he put his arms about her. + +"I'm sorry, too, little girl--sorry you were here to see me make a fool +of myself and then squeal when I got hurt as I deserved. I shouldn't +have done that. But I was so proud--so grateful--I thought I was going +to be able"-- + +"_Johnny--Johnny!_" + +They held to each other rigidly for an instant, her face against his +sleeve, in an agony which no tears came to soothe. + +"There!" said Barclay presently. "I'm better already. It does one good +to blow off steam, now and again." + +His tone lightened perceptibly. + +"And look here," he added, "what's most important, after all, is that I +have news for you, and ought to be delivering it." + +As yet, they did not dare to meet each other's eyes, but Natalie took +the cue. + +"You can spare yourself the trouble, my lord," she retorted, sweeping +him a curtsy. "I can guess what it is, without your aid. You've found +him!" + +"How did you know?" + +"I didn't. But you will remember that I asked you to find him. The +inference is as plain as a pikestaff." + +"Arrogance! But you're right. I have. He has been at my rooms since last +night. He was frightfully shaky, and utterly despondent, but he's taking +something to settle his nerves, and I've no doubt a week or so of good +food and straight living will bring him around into something like his +old form." + +"Boy dear! And you're taking care of him?" + +"Oh, just directing the cure, that's all! I'll tell you more when I can +report definite progress. Do you suppose there is a single secluded +corner in all this mansion which has not already been preempted by +Dorothy and Nisbet?" + +He slipped his arm about her again, and together they went out, across +the wide hall, toward the drawing-room. Rathbawne was standing at the +telephone under the stairway, but, as they approached him, he replaced +the receiver, and stepped forth under the light of the chandelier. They +both halted, shocked into speechlessness by the look on his face. The +past ten minutes seemed to have added a decade to his age. His cheeks +were white and drawn, and with his hands he groped before him, as if he +had been stricken blind. As he came close to them, he lifted his head, +and peered first at his daughter, and then at Barclay, seeming barely to +recognize them. + +"Dad! What _is_ it?" said the girl, in a voice just above a whisper. + +Rathbawne raised his hand, and pushed back the hair from his forehead. + +"A message--from Payson--of the 'Sentinel,'" he mumbled. "It seems +there's a fire--a fire on Charles Street--near the mills--one of my +buildings--a shop--a shop. Some one in the crowd--threw a +torch in at the window--there is a great crowd--a throng of +strikers--watching--cheering the flames--hissing the firemen. They've +begun early--and this is only the beginning! My people--my people"---- + +He stumbled forward, and would have fallen, but that his daughter caught +him. To his dying day Barclay remembered how, as he sprang to aid her, +her hands gleamed, white and slender, against the black of Peter +Rathbawne's coat. + +The hush that followed was broken presently by the sound of the old +man's choking sobs, and the low, soothing tones of Natalie, murmuring +against his ear. From the drawing-room came indeterminate scraps of Mrs. +Wynyard's gay chatter, as she regaled Mrs. Rathbawne with the gossip +gleaned in a round of calls. She herself was partly visible, drawing off +her gloves before the fire. From the music-room beyond issued the chords +of Dorothy's none-too-sure accompaniment, and young Nisbet's superb, +full tenor:-- + + "'Ah, love, could you and I with fate conspire + To grasp the sorry scheme of things entire'"-- + +But, in the Lieutenant-Governor's imagination, another sound mingled +with and dominated these,--the voice of Michael McGrath, as he had heard +it that morning, through the open door of Governor Abbott's room:-- + +"It won't be a strike like other strikes, not so long as I'm running it, +that is. It's going to mean business from the word go!" + + + + +VIII + +THE GOVERNOR UNMASKS + + +One spotted peach will contaminate an entire basket, one drop of ink +cloud a full glass of clear water. It was so in the case of the strikers +at the Rathbawne Mills. Their unwonted idleness, the long succession of +empty hours, already, among the more improvident, the preliminary +pressure of privation's teeth,--all these made them easy prey for the +sophistries of men like McGrath and his associates. At first they simply +laughed at the arraignments of Peter Rathbawne as a plutocrat, a +slave-master, and an oppressor of the poor, knowing better in their +hearts. But the memory of past kindness is too apt to be the most +fleeting of human impressions. On the one side the gates of the +Rathbawne Mills remained obstinately closed, and, though Rathbawne +himself manifested no intention of resorting to the intolerable +importation of "scab" labor, he persisted in his refusal to treat with +the Union so long as the discharge of the fifteen men remained a subject +proposed for debate. On the other hand, the denunciations of McGrath and +the other Union orators were constant, unavoidable, and sufficiently +plausible to produce an impression, and linger in the mind. And, +meanwhile, to and fro among the strikers, stalked, arm in arm, the +spectres of idleness and starvation, the one smirking openly, the other, +as yet, half-veiled. Altogether it was fertile ground. + +After the burning of Mr. Rathbawne's shop, on the first night of the +strike, ensued a week of comparative quiet. The outrage had been +flagrant, the source, if not the very author, of it was known, and the +police did--nothing. For three days the press of Kenton City blazed with +indignation, excepting only the "Record," which openly favored the +strikers, and then all the papers alike suddenly ceased to refer to the +incident at all. For, while McGrath was not in favor of wasting the +funds of the Union, he was as well aware as the next man that a dollar, +as well as a stitch, in time, saves nine. + +Herein lay the cardinal peril of Alleghenia. As John Barclay had said, +it was not that her people, as a class, were corrupt or criminal, but +merely that they viewed with easy tolerance evidences of laxity and +lawlessness which would have set the citizens of another state by the +ears, and filled the newspaper columns and the public forums with +indignation and protest. In this respect, the papers of Kenton City were +the most flagrant offenders. Even the most reputable, the "Sentinel," +could be silenced at practically any moment by those cognizant of the +method, and in a position to command the price, of manipulation. As a +whited sepulchre it was a conspicuous success, being irreproachably +scholarly, dignified, and didactic in tone, and wholly destitute of +principle. + +Michael McGrath, demagogue though he was, knew his public as the +physician knows the pulse he feels. It was a feature of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills that no attempt was made to justify the cause of the +strikers in the eye of the disinterested public of Kenton City. McGrath +himself was fully alive to the slenderness of his pretext, and alive, as +well, to the strength of Peter Rathbawne's case, if it should come to a +discussion of the rights and wrongs involved, wherein his business +probity and his justice to, and consideration for, his employees, would +furnish arguments well-nigh unanswerable. He contented himself, +therefore, with standing upon a simple declaration of the will of the +Union, which was, in effect, his own; and, strong in his reliance, if +not upon the support, at least upon the non-interference of the state +authorities, devoted his attention to holding the press in check, by +methods long since found effectual, and confidently left the public to +think and act as it saw fit. + +There could have been no more contemptuous comment upon the moral and +intellectual status of the community than this insolent assumption of +its indifference to the commonest principles of justice, but for a time +his confidence had the appearance of being amply justified. The strike +went its way, characterized by an infinity of petty outrages and a +constant and consistent vilification of Peter Rathbawne, while--with the +exception of that first and promptly quashed protest on the part of the +press--no voice was raised in opposition. + +Reduced to its lowest terms, the struggle was one between Rathbawne and +McGrath, and that, not as representatives the one of a great industrial, +the other of a great socialistic organization, but as individuals. The +source of the stream which had thus reached its rapids, and was plunging +on toward its annihilating cataract, lay far back in the early days of +Rathbawne's commercial career. McGrath was a man who practiced neither +the vice of forgetfulness nor the virtue of forgiveness. As plain as the +event of a yesterday lay upon his memory his contemptuous dismissal from +Rathbawne's employ, charged in particular with a petty peculation, and +in general with the indisputable fact of being a bad influence in the +mills. His case had been in many ways identical with that of the men +whose cause he was now, for reasons of his own, espousing. + +But Peter Rathbawne, then less shrewd in estimating men than now, had +reckoned without due credit to the vindictiveness and pertinacity of the +man before him. McGrath--brutally handsome in those days, idle, +insolent, and independent--later had developed qualities of which at the +time there was little evidence. He had smiled and shrugged his +shoulders--a habit which had grown upon him--as Rathbawne gave his +verdict, and had instinctively resisted the temptation to threaten +revenge. For that inspiration he had been devoutly grateful ever since. +It had enabled him to work in silence and unseen, like a mole, toward +the goal at which he aimed. He was a poker player, was Michael McGrath, +of the class which pulls victory out of defeat by the aid of its own +personality and a low pair. The calm indifference with which he had +received his dismissal from the employ of Peter Rathbawne seemed to him, +on reflection, to have been the unconscious forerunner of the elaborate +_nonchalance_ with which he now viewed the unexpected filling of a +broken straight. It was certain that the other player had not guessed +the strength of his cards. + +He had never forgiven, never forgotten. It had taken a quarter-century +of unremitting effort, of indomitable perseverance, of calculated +ingenuity, to secure to him the position which he now felt to be +assured--that of being able to cope with the man who had been his +adversary, and so overwhelmingly his superior. The fight was on at +last,--a fight in which the odds were not only equal, but, if anything, +in favor of the former mill-hand, thus become one of the most powerful +men in Alleghenia; a fight to be fought to the bitter finish, with an +almost certain triumph as his reward. + +Added to these motives was another,--newer, it is true, but none the +less potent,--his hatred for the Lieutenant-Governor. He had been able +to laugh within a half-minute after the words "unmitigated blackguard" +had smitten his ears; but they had rankled for all that. It was not so +much the insult, as the knowledge that it was justified. He was +remarkably candid with himself, was Michael McGrath. + +Hence the unparalleled venom of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +McGrath's dual sense of wounded vanity prescribed a course of surpassing +vindictiveness. His personal resentment, reinforced by consummate +appreciation of the adversaries with whom he had to deal, dictated a +safe road to revenge, which enabled him to fling wide the floodgates of +his long-stored animosity, secure in his knowledge of having the upper +hand. Disorder, calumny, outrage, even open anarchy--he could venture +upon them unafraid. A corrupt Governor, whom he had created, stood +behind him, smiling tolerantly. An indifferent community would let him +have his will. Only he must proceed by degrees, and be ready at any +moment to take one backward step for the sake of being able presently +thereafter to take two in advance. + +Here precisely lay the weak point in his plan of campaign. With the +fatuity incidental on occasions to even the shrewdest minds, he had not +counted upon independence in the host which he believed slave to him, in +thought and word and deed. He rated himself the dictator, the prompter +without whose suggestion no one of all the players in this gigantic +tragedy could speak his line. As a matter of fact, like all leaders of +his class, he could drive his followers forward at will, while totally +unable to hold them back. He was wholly master so long as he used the +spur. The peril lay in the fancied efficacy of the curb. In short, he +was discovering already that he had unwittingly created a monster beside +which Frankenstein's was the veriest doll. + +Thus, shortly, the strain began to tell upon the four thousand +unemployed sets of nerves around the Rathbawne Mills. Meetings became +more frequent and more turbulent; drinking and disorder were observably +on the increase; and at the end of another four weeks one of the gates +of the mills was beaten down, and several hundred men and boys paraded +around shop after shop, breaking windows and singing ribald songs. It +was not a very serious demonstration in itself. Its ominous feature lay +in the fact that the police made no attempt to check it. There was +something else about it, to the thinking of McGrath. It was not so much +that events were moving too fast, but that they were moving without +intelligent control. + +Two nights later, another building belonging to Peter Rathbawne, and +situated only a half-block from the mills, was burned in the same manner +as the first, watched by an enormous crowd of strikers, who applauded +each fresh burst of flame, as if the fire had been a circus or a play. +Still there was no move on the part of the police. + +Then it was that the business men of Kenton City sat up in their office +chairs and began to think. This was an eventuality entirely outside the +calculations of McGrath. But the pachydermatous inertia of the citizens +of Alleghenia had yet its vulnerable spot, where the weapon might enter. +Vaguely these men had known that the state was rotten, but the fact had +never been brought to their attention in a manner so poignantly +suggestive before. Unwittingly McGrath had aroused the suspicion that it +was not the purse of Peter Rathbawne alone which was in danger. If it +was possible for disorder to go to such extremes in the very streets of +Kenton City without fear of interference or rebuke, then no man's +property was safe. That thought was the Achilles' heel of the community. +So it was that a Citizens' Committee, composed of presidents of two +insurance companies, directors from five banks, representatives from the +Chamber of Commerce and the Board of Trade, and, finally, Colonel Amos +Broadcastle, was appointed to wait upon the Mayor. That gentleman, as +was entirely to be expected, referred them to the Governor, and to the +Governor they went. + +Barclay was present at the interview. For his own reasons Governor +Abbott had kept his immediate subordinate well to the fore in all +matters pertaining to the strike since the latter's rebuke to +McGrath,--in all matters, that is to say, not involving the exercise of +actual authority. Of that, indeed, the Lieutenant-Governor had had no +hope after the conversation in Peter Rathbawne's library. He met the +representatives of the press, conducted the correspondence with +mill-owners and other negatively interested parties, and at the +Governor's request made what was palpably a farcical inspection of the +entire state militia--to judge of their readiness for strike service!--a +task which consumed a fortnight in constant travel, and visits to +armories all alike in insufficient equipment and utter slovenliness. The +Ninth Regiment alone remained, and this command was to parade for +inspection by the Governor himself that very evening. The coincidence +flashed through Barclay's mind as the Citizens' Committee entered, with +Broadcastle, in his capacity as spokesman, at its head. + +The dignity and air of command habitual to the Colonel of the Ninth were +doubly apparent as he advanced toward the Governor's table. Both Barclay +and Abbott rose to receive him, but the latter reseated himself, as soon +as Broadcastle had introduced his fellow-members of the Committee. He +listened to what followed with an air of thoughtfulness, tinged with a +faint and exasperating suggestion of amusement. At a neighboring table, +his official stenographer took down every word which fell. + +Colonel Broadcastle was not accustomed to mince matters, when the +occasion demanded brevity and conciseness. Now, he stepped to within a +few feet of the Governor's table, and stood rigidly confronting him, +with his hands clasped before him on the head of his stick, in the +position of parade-rest. + +"Governor Abbott," he said, in his curt, dry voice, "these gentlemen and +myself form a Committee appointed by a meeting of the business men of +Kenton City, to protest against the state of affairs now existing in +connection with the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. It is only generous +to presume that other matters have diverted your attention from an +appreciation of these conditions. The situation is without parallel in +the annals of Alleghenia. Disorder is rampant, and destruction of +property is freely indulged in by the strikers without any apparent fear +of molestation. Despite the fact that there is a large police-force, it +makes no effort to check these operations. The sole reply of Chief +Pendle to the protests of those interested in the promotion of law and +order has been that he will not suffer any outside interference in the +control of his department--the which, in view of his responsibility to +the public, can only be regarded as sheer and intolerable insolence! An +appeal to Mayor Goadby has elicited the response that the whole matter +lies in the Governor's hands." + +The Colonel paused. The Governor, leaning back in his chair, and +fingering a pencil, smiled slightly and nodded his head. + +"I suppose that is so," he said. "Continue, continue, Colonel +Broadcastle." + +"It is the sense of the law-abiding element of Kenton City," went on the +Colonel, flushing at the condescension of his tone, "that the limit of +endurance has been reached. If, willfully or otherwise, the police do +not act, my regiment is prepared to act as substitute. I have already +placed it at the service of the Adjutant-General. His reply, like the +Mayor's, was to refer me to you for orders. I am here to receive them, +sir." + +"Your offer is appreciated," said the Governor suavely. "We of Kenton +City have reason to be proud of the Ninth, Colonel Broadcastle. I +congratulate myself upon my privilege of reviewing it, to-night. And we +have reason to be proud, as well, of the intelligence which has made +such an organization possible. Your disinterested devotion"-- + +Broadcastle flung up his chin. + +"I am not here to receive compliments, sir!" he said abruptly. + +"Nor I to bestow them," answered the Governor, unruffled. "As +commander-in-chief of the state forces, I believe it is not outside my +province to render deserved commendation to a subordinate." + +"Oh, do not let us juggle with words, Governor Abbott! It is precisely +as commander-in-chief of the state forces that the time has come for you +to act; it is precisely as your subordinate that I am here to receive +your orders. Assume the responsibility which confronts you, issue the +commands proper to the emergency, and you will have no more tireless +executor of them than I. My regiment can be on duty at the Rathbawne +Mills inside of six hours"-- + +"But, my good Colonel Broadcastle," broke in the Governor, "the state +has no need of your regiment for the moment! Calling upon the militia is +no light matter, sir. You talk about my ordering out the Ninth as you +would advise me to ring for a messenger-boy!" + +"The welfare of the municipality, if not that of the commonwealth," +replied Colonel Broadcastle firmly, "demands that an immediate stop be +put to this lawlessness. We are dealing with extremities, sir!" + +The Governor swung forward, and placed his elbows on the table. + +"You will permit me to be the best judge of what the welfare of the +commonwealth may be," he retorted. "Whatever lawlessness exists--and I +think you have grossly exaggerated its extent, Colonel Broadcastle--is +due to the selfish obstinacy of one man. In my opinion, Mr. Rathbawne is +entirely in the wrong. He had fair warning, which he did not choose to +heed. If his property suffers at the hands of the strikers, he has only +himself to blame." + +"It is not a question of Mr. Rathbawne, or of any other individual," +said Broadcastle, "but of the integrity of the state of Alleghenia!" + +"The integrity of the state of Alleghenia," answered the Governor dryly, +"has been intrusted, by the vote of her citizens, to me, as chief +executive." + +"An action," exclaimed the Colonel, "which I venture to predict they +will shortly have reason most bitterly to regret!" + +Governor Abbott rose abruptly to his feet. + +"This interview is at an end, Colonel Broadcastle," he said, bringing +his fist down upon the table with a thud. "I take exception to your +remarks, from first to last. I consider myself fully competent to deal +with the situation, and you may depend, sir, I shall do so at my own +time, and in my own way. If Mr. Peter Rathbawne supposes that he can +defy reason and justice at will, and that the state authorities are +prepared to support him, he is grossly and fatally mistaken. Gentlemen, +I have the honor to bid you good-day!" + +For a quarter-minute, the two men stood facing each other, without +speaking. It was observable that the eyes of neither flinched. Then-- + +"It is my earnest hope, Elijah Abbott," said the Colonel slowly, "to see +you impeached by a righteously indignant community, and committed for a +term of years to the State's Prison at Mowberly, for rank malfeasance +in office!" + +The Governor shrugged his shoulders. + +"Your record and your position protect you, Colonel Broadcastle," he +said, with something of his usual suavity. "Will you have the goodness +to retire?" + +As the Citizens' Committee left the room the Lieutenant-Governor turned +on his heel, passed into his office, and closed the door. + +For a long time he sat motionless at his desk, with his temples in his +hands, staring at a frame upon the opposite wall, which contained the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia. These were a hand holding even balances, +upon a circular shield, supported by the nude figures of two young men, +representing Art and Labor. Above, upon a scroll, were the words, +"_Justitia. Lex. Integritas._" + +It was not only bad heraldry, but indifferently appropriate symbolism. + + + + +IX + +THE NINTH PASSES IN REVIEW + + +The huge armory of the Ninth, transformed, by the same system which had +metamorphosed the _personnel_ of the regiment itself, from a gaunt, +barn-like structure, ill-fitted to its purpose in all but size, to the +most cheerful, as well as the most completely equipped, of Alleghenian +arsenals, was blazing with light and echoing to the sound of many +voices. A steady stream of people poured in at the heavy doors, now +standing wide, but significant, with their great timbers, elaborate +locks and bolts, and precautionary peep-holes, of the possibility of an +attitude less hospitable. Threading their way at a rapid pace through +the more sluggish main current of the crowd, the members of the +regiment, in an infinite variety of civilian attire,--from tweeds and +knickerbockers to top-hats and evening-dress,--sought their respective +company-rooms, vanished therein, and, presently, reappeared in uniform. +It was as if behind those ten doors which lined the upper corridor there +were as many moulds, identical in form, whereinto this perplexing +diversity of raw material was plunged on entering, to be drawn forth +again in a constant reduplication of militiamen. + +As the hour for the review drew near, the proportion of these to the +throng with which they mingled, perceptibly increasing, seemed, little +by little, to leaven the whole lump. The dress-uniform of the Ninth was +everywhere, the black shakos and epaulettes, white pompons, cross-belts +and gloves, and multiplicity of brass buttons, lending the immense +assemblage a singular spirit and vivacity. + +On the floor of the drill-room the people spread in all directions, +fan-like, from the main doorway, the multitudinous footfalls mounting +murmurously into the spaces of the lofty roof, where forty arc-lights +hung, dizzily suspended, pallid in the thin haze of dust swung upwards +from the hurrying feet of the thousands below. + +"Precisely like an army of ants--and every one of them with an uncle or +two, and a round dozen of nephews and nieces!" said Mrs. Wynyard. + +She and the Rathbawne girls were looking down upon the drill-floor +from the balcony of the Colonel's room. Broadcastle and the +Lieutenant-Governor were deep in conversation inside, having seized the +delay in the arrival of Governor Abbott as an opportunity for a few +words in private. + +"How funny they are, scuttling along, all of them!" said Dorothy. "And +how immensely pleased the favored ones are, who have a soldier to show +them the way. I see a distinct difference in their walk from that of the +others, don't you, Natalie? They seem to be saying '_We_ were +_invited_--and by this splendiferous creature at our side!' See how they +strut! And look at the soldierless ones, how timidly they go--just as if +they had found their tickets in the street, or had crept in through the +basement windows. 'Please, kind Mr. Soldier-man, let us stay and see the +show. We'll be _awf'ly_ good!'" + +"How preposterous you are, Dorothy!" answered Mrs. Wynyard. "Look! The +people are taking to the sides of the room already, and the companies +are forming. What astonishing method and precision there is to it all! +Do you suppose each man has a little circle marked on the floor, to show +just where he is to stand?" + +"I haven't the most remote doubt of it," said Natalie, with a +smile,--"and his name neatly lettered inside it with gilt paint!" + +The long, enclosed racks at the ends of the drill-room were open now, +and the electric light winked upon the barrels of the Springfields, as +busy, white-gloved hands plied the polishing cloths along them. The +enormous drill-floor, cleared as if by magic from the disorderly +weed-growth which had encumbered it, began to make manifest its proper +crop--long lines of gray and white, like sprouting sage, at first but a +dot here and there, to indicate the direction, then a scattering, then +distinct clumps, finally a thick, serried row. In the distance, a bugle +sounded, followed by a long ruffle of drums, and Colonel Broadcastle +stepped quickly to the window of the balcony. + +"There's the Governor," he said. "Will you come in? I'll send my orderly +to show you to your seats." + +At the same moment, the door from the corridor opened, and the orderly +entered, his hand at his shako. + +"Sir, the Governor has arrived." + +Then, as the trio on the balcony stepped in through the window, he +turned suddenly and superlatively scarlet. As has been said, young +Nisbet was accustomed to getting what he wanted. In this instance what +he had wanted happened to be that the Adjutant should choose him from +the guard detail as Colonel's orderly. To be thus chosen was to be +admittedly the most immaculate of thirty men, all more immaculate than a +thousand immaculate others. The thing was not easy of achievement, but +Dorothy Rathbawne was to be present at the review, and so--there was no +second way about it--it simply had to be done. Young Nisbet's way of +doing it was an absolutely new uniform and gold-plated buttons and +accoutrements. Extravagance? Vanity? Perhaps! But at the present moment, +he was wearing one cross-belt where his thousand and odd comrades were +wearing two. There was no answer to such an argument as that. + +Colonel Broadcastle had reserved seats for the party on the temporary +reviewing stand, and, five minutes after they had taken their places, +the bugles sang again, a curt order--"'shun! 'shun!"--ran in varying +intonations from company to company, and the slack gray ranks before +them stiffened into absolute rigidity. Then from the broad hallway +beyond came a tremendous burst of sound, and, to the strains of the +famous old march of the Ninth, the regimental band swung into view, +followed by Governor Abbott and Colonel Broadcastle and the former's +staff. + +To the Lieutenant-Governor, but newly returned from his wearisome round +of the state armories, much of what followed was so stale as to be no +more than a constantly increasing strain upon nerves already overtaxed. +He deliberately allowed his attention to wander, until he felt rather +than actually perceived the steady tramp-tramp of the men, swinging, +fours right, into column, the occasional "hep! hep!" of an officious +file-closer, the endless succession of fours winking past him, like the +palings of a gray fence seen from the window of a train, the intervals +narrowed by short-step, widening again at the "Forward--_march_!" the +blare of the band, lessening as it approached the further end of the +building, then suddenly bursting into its former volume at the +right-about. He endured it all listlessly. It was tediously familiar, +stamped upon his brain by repetition after repetition. + +Moreover, he was completely fagged, and unutterably oppressed by his +burden of discouragement. The old wounds, in part healed by his recent +absence from the immediate vicinity of his constant discomfiture, had +been re-opened and set bleeding afresh by Governor Abbott's treatment of +the Citizens' Committee. Whatever lingering hope had remained in his +mind of peace with honor for the troubled capital of Alleghenia, seemed +to have been effectually dispelled by that interview. The most enduring +charity, the most fatuous credulity, the blindest partisanship--even +these could not have preserved a last spark of confidence in Elijah +Abbott. Still less was Barclay's indeterminate hope of the ultimate +triumph of right able to stand against such crushing evidence of its +instability. It was no longer a question of suspicions, of precedents, +of deductions from the significance of a host of former misdoings. Out +of his own mouth was the Governor convicted. "At my own time, and in my +own way," he had said. It was a phrase, nothing more, and could be +boiled down until its whole purport was contained in one word--Never! + +"Fours _left_--_March_! Compan_ee_--_halt_!" + +The entire regiment, as one man, swung from column of fours into +battalion front, halted, and then--cr-r-rick! boooo-m-m-m!--came to +order arms. The sides of the room were lined with a solid rampart of +white and gray and gold. Barclay was aware of the First Sergeants, +scurrying from their positions to report, of their voices, and those of +the Majors and the Adjutant, and, finally the Colonel:-- + +"Take your post, sir!" + +But his thoughts were anywhere and everywhere else. What a farce it all +was, this life which he was leading, this mental and moral martyrdom to +an impossible hope, this eternal and heart-sickening ordeal of hope +deferred, this waiting, waiting, waiting, for something which never +would and never could happen! Rotten, rotten to the core, this state for +which he would have given his heart's blood, and not only rotten, but +not caring a whit for her rottenness--glorying rather, in her own +degradation. The chief executive had flung back into their very faces +the appeal to his conscience of the most influential men in Kenton +City; the police, even now seated about their station stoves, were +sniggling at the predicament of the public which paid them for its +protection against precisely the kind of thing which they openly +tolerated and encouraged; yes, and even the militia, the guarantee of +law and order, Broadcastle's own command, were decked out in tinsel and +pipeclay, strutting to music in a palpable bid for applause and +admiration. And yonder--the tide of anarchy was slowly but surely rising +about the Rathbawne Mills, presaging riot, bloodshed, God alone knew +what!--but one thing, inevitably,--the absolute downfall of dignity and +rout of decency in Alleghenia! + +Suddenly, his old intrepid spirit of resolution reasserted itself, but +doubtfully, like the flame of a lamp flaring once out of dimness before +it dies forever. Was it for this that he had devoted the best thought of +his youth and his earlier manhood to plans for the betterment of his +state? Should he now, at this, the hour of her supremest political and +moral peril, desert her as irredeemable, and join the ranks of those who +sneered at her, and pointed mocking fingers at her shame and nakedness? + +"Your loquacity faintly suggests that of a mummy," said Natalie, at his +side. + +"I was alone with my thoughts," answered the Lieutenant-Governor, +turning to her with an attempt at a smile, "and pretty black ones they +were, at that!" + +"Alleghenia again?" + +"Alleghenia again--and always. This business is becoming an obsession +with me. I haven't had a chance to tell you, and I can't very well +explain now. I'll have to leave it till I see you to-morrow. But +something happened to-day which drove another nail--and one of the +last!--into the coffin of my faith. There's not a gleam of hope +anywhere." + +"Don't you see hope in all this?" asked Natalie, with a little, +indicative gesture toward the scene before them. "Somehow, it is +impressing me tremendously to-night--more than ever before. I seem to +understand better what it means, what it stands for." + +"It's a stale enough story with me," said Barclay. "Remember, I've been +doing just about nothing but watch this kind of thing for the past two +weeks. After all, what does it amount to but a thousand possibilities +parading like peacocks?" + +"How unlike you, that speech! It amounts to a vast deal more than that, +Johnny boy,--oh, infinitely more! I don't speak of the other regiments +you have seen. This is different. Well, what _does_ it amount to? Who +and what are these thousand peacocks of yours? Aren't they the very +flower of Kenton City, the youngest and best blood in our veins, +gathered by one good man's will into an organization of sterling +loyalty, with one great aim in view, and that the support and protection +and preservation of all that is best in Alleghenia? The very fact that +such a body of men exists among us is in the nature of a guarantee, it +seems to me, that we shall come out all right in the end. Have you +noticed their faces?--many of them so absurdly boyish, all of them so +honest, and manly, and--and--_American_, John! They are the +personifications of your ideal of that afternoon in the +library--Americans, and something more--Alleghenians! And, to prove it, +they are freely giving a portion of their time and their strength, in +order that there may be at least one thing in Kenton City which is +without fear and without reproach. I wonder--I wonder, John, whether it +isn't the old story, after all: whether you haven't been wandering all +over the world, like the prince in the fairy-book, looking for the magic +talisman that is to save the state you love, while, all the time, it has +been lying at your very door? Oh, this means something--I'm too stupid +to interpret it as you could--but I know it's there, and that it would +help you and encourage you. Let me try. Look there! A single purpose +animates them all--the maintenance of the standard which Colonel +Broadcastle set for them, and the record they have made for themselves." + +Colonel Broadcastle's voice was sweeping the armory, as he put the +regiment through the manual of arms. + +"One has only to hear one of them--Mr. Nisbet, for example--say 'the +Ninth' to find the hope of which you are in search. These men say it as +others say 'God' or 'my mother'--as you yourself, Johnny boy, say +'Alleghenia.'" + +"Charge--_bay'n'ts_!" + +With a single click, a thousand rifles fell into position, a thousand +left feet smote the floor in unison, and the light rippled and twinkled +along a solid line of flashing steel. + +"There! A single voice,--a single, mighty response! Don't you see the +wonderful suggestiveness of it? Don't you feel the presence of the +enormous reserve force which lies behind all this? Oh, believe me, John, +this is a weapon too mighty to lie unused, and too intelligent to be +misused, if the worst come to the worst. After all, as no one knows +better than yourself, it's not your own advancement you're looking for, +it's that of the state. Well, there may be other agencies, perhaps +entirely independent of you or of your influence, but none the less +invaluable. For example, you are close upon despair--and yet, before +your fears come true, the forces of wrong will have to fight their way, +step by step, through this rampart of American manhood!" + +Barclay touched her hand lightly, as she ceased speaking. In the midst +of the thousands about them, they were alone as they had never been +before. + +"Thank you," he said simply. "Thank you, littlest and wisest in the +world!" + +The regiment was in motion again, skirting the room in column of fours, +preparatory to the march-past: but now the Lieutenant-Governor surveyed +it from a new, and a dual point-of-view,--as a thousand individuals, +that is, each a potential factor for immeasurable good in the coming +rehabilitation of the state; and, then, as a vast fighting-machine +perfect in every detail, resistless and awe-inspiring in its very +integrity. He noted the faces as they passed--stern, intelligent faces, +young, for the most part, and curiously refined, intent upon correct +performance of the present duty, and touched, almost without exception, +with an enthusiasm born of the martial music and the rhythmic tramp of +advancing feet. He saw the quick, reciprocal glance of the pivot and +flank men, as the fours, in perfect alignment, swept round into +company-front; the long, easy compression and give of the compact lines, +acquiring correct adjustment; the rigid tenure of chests and shoulders; +the firm fling of slender gray legs, as regularly intervaled as the +teeth of a giant comb. Company by company, the regiment fell into the +cadence of full-step. Midway, the standards of the Republic and +Alleghenia rippled side by side. And so, with blare of brass and sharp +staccato of snare-drums, with sheen of rifles and accoutrements, with +flash of slender swords, raised in salute,--above all and always, with +that magnificent unanimity, that mighty pulse of the thunderous +advance, the Ninth swept past its Governor and its Colonel in review. + +And then, in an instant, as it seemed, the vast square was formed again, +a sharp command rang out, the rifles snapped to a present-arms, the +standards dipped, and the strains of the "Star-Spangled Banner" mounted +triumphantly to the great girders of the lofty roof. The multitude of +spectators rose at the sound, and the Lieutenant-Governor rose with +them, his heart aglow with new inspiration, new hope, and new resolve. +The band was almost speaking the words of the anthem on the dust-grayed +air:-- + + "Oh! say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave + O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?" + +To the accompaniment of a myriad clapping hands, the Lieutenant-Governor +resumed his seat, shaken by a novel, tremendous emotion. Yes! a thousand +times yes! The star-spangled banner, symbol of loftiest ideals and +purest purposes, mute memorial and reminder of devotion incalculable and +sacrifice without bound, guarantee of liberty and brotherhood, mercy, +equality, and justice--yet waved! And, part and indissoluble portion of +its inspiring memories and illustrious destinies, the star of Alleghenia +yet blazed upon its azure field! He had been living in a world of +unrealities, in a valley of shadow, grayed by portents of failure and +despair. His eyes had been narrowed to see the pitfalls which lined his +path, to the stumbling-blocks, the briers, the indescribable sordidness +of his personal position and his immediate surroundings. Now, he looked +up and horizonward. The thunder-clouds of official depravity and +duplicity which darkened the way of his endeavor--were they able, after +all, to blot out the memory of the clear, high sky above? + +As this thought came to him, it was almost as if, in actuality, a +brooding heaven had been rent asunder, revealing the steel-blue of the +infinite ether permeated with the supreme radiance of noon; and at the +incursion of this illuminating element the host of his discouragements +dwindled and disappeared, like noisome little prowlers of the night, +scuttling to cover at the abrupt break of a tropical day. For a moment, +he strove to realize whence the light had come, and in what consisted +this sovereign ally, hitherto uncalculated, of his optimism. As he +tracked his thought, it led him undeviatingly back to its direct +inspiration, the words of Natalie Rathbawne. + +"Before your fears come true"--she had said. + +Before his fears came true--well, what? The revelation leaped at him +full and fair now, and every nerve sang like a taut wire in answer to +its touch. Before his fears came true, this wretched little world of +petty chicanery and official corruption which surrounded and sickened +him would be wiped out of existence. Abbott--McGrath--their machinations +and their misdeeds--their lies and their ambitions--their power and +their pride,--they were newts that fouled a pool, gnats in the sunshine, +cinders on the snow. Towering above them, ready, at an instant's +notice, to crush them out of being, was the rock of ages, the righteous +spirit of Alleghenia, integral and indestructible, illumined by the +ancient, undimmed, and eternal sense of rectitude inherent in the +American people! + +Not by his agency, perhaps--perhaps not even in his day,--nevertheless +and infallibly, the right was bound to conquer in the end. The clear +eyes and the firm mouths of the men of the Ninth spoke it, their rifles, +their broad shoulders, and their precision confirmed and guaranteed it, +and back of these stood the great, taciturn figure of the People, a +smile upon its calm and silent lips. When those lips should speak, as +speak they would, their words would be the annihilation of Elijah Abbott +and of all his kind! + +Meanwhile--the bitterness--the disappointments--the humiliations--ah, in +a moment, how they had grown shrunken, and wizened, and old! For out of +the radiance of revelation, as Christ of old spoke to His disciples, so +now the spirit of Alleghenia spoke to her Lieutenant-Governor. + +"_What is that to thee? Follow thou Me!_" + +Like a woman, the spirit of her cried unto him, and, like a man, the +spirit of John Barclay answered. + + + + +X + +A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER + + +Much to Barclay's satisfaction, Cavendish had obtained his appointment +as a city reporter on the staff of the "Sentinel." Even the first week +of the new life thus entered upon had produced a vast change in his +manner and appearance. Though the Lieutenant-Governor had seen him but +once, when he came to repay the loan made him--in itself, of all signs +of restoration to a normal attitude, the most significant--he found that +his complexion had cleared and softened, and his eye perceptibly +brightened. He was clean-shaven once more, and his dress, while of +strict simplicity, was yet suggestive of the old days when he had been +called the most fastidious man in Kenton City. He held himself +straighter, too, with his shoulders thrown back and his head up; and +Barclay had noted, with quiet gratification, that there was not a +tremor about the hands which unfolded and smoothed the bills he had come +to return. One evidence alone remained of the desperate ordeal through +which he had passed. His voice, formerly firm and vibrant with a spirit +that was half gayety, half arrogance, was now indescribably modulated, +and touched with a melancholy which was not that of servility, still +less of shame. Rather, it was an unspeakably appealing regret, a +monotonous listlessness, a suggestion of hopeless surrender to something +tragic and inevitable. Barclay was puzzled by it. It seemed illogical, +and evaded him, like a melody with a dimly familiar _motif_ which he was +unable to place or even fully recall. It haunted him singularly, when +Cavendish had left, and afterwards, in his leisure moments, came back to +him, striving, as he fancied, to make itself understood. Intimately +candid as their recent relation had been, here was something +unexplained, which he could not come at, and which was yet eloquent of +vitality, of the need of comprehension. + +Since that time, three weeks before, the two men had not met. For this +there were several reasons. Barclay knew from a brief note that +Cavendish had taken a small room in a boarding-house, not far from the +"Rockingham," and that the pressure of his work for the "Sentinel" set +him afoot so early, and sent him home at night so brain and body weary, +that he had neither the strength nor the inclination for other things. +Added to this, had been the Lieutenant-Governor's absorption in his own +duties, and, in particular, his absence from Kenton City, on his round +of inspection of the state militia. But, just before the dinner hour, on +the evening following that of the review, Cavendish called, as Barclay +was in the act of dressing. + +"I had a suspicion I'd catch you just about this time," he said, +dragging a chair to the door of the bedroom, where he could watch the +Lieutenant-Governor struggling with a refractory white tie. "I'm getting +on famously, and I wanted you to know it." + +"That's right!" said Barclay, scowling into the mirror. "But then, I +knew you would. Your pessimism didn't produce much effect on me. I've +heard men talk like that before. And, of course, when a chap gets into +the condition you were in, back there, there's no such thing as making +him believe he can ever pull out. You talked like an ass, that first +night, Spencer." + +"And acted like a blackguard! I suppose you will allow me to refer to +that now?" + +"Now less than ever, my good sir. As I've told you already, all that +belongs to the past. You're yourself again. What's the use of dwelling +on a time gone by, when you were in reality somebody else--or, rather, +nobody at all? When are you going to call at the Rathbawnes'? The old +man is pretty ill, I'm afraid, but I think the rest would like to see +you again. They were speaking of you only the other day--that is, one of +them was!" + +"Not till this strike trouble is over, at all events; they have all they +can attend to at present, without being bothered by reformed drunkards. +And perhaps I sha'n't call at all. I haven't decided yet what would be +best." + +Then, before Barclay had time to speak, he added:-- + +"By the way, I'm to take up the strike to-morrow, for the 'Sentinel.'" + +"Are you?" exclaimed the Lieutenant-Governor, in a tone of the liveliest +interest. "That's good news. It must be about the most important +assignment they could give you, just now. Well, I wonder if you are +destined to be the only conscientious reporter in Kenton City, or +whether you will simply be like all the rest. Are you going to have the +courage of your convictions--which I think I can surmise, though you +haven't as yet confided them to me--or are you going to wear the +slave-chains of your fellows, and distort, and misrepresent, and truckle +and kow-tow to the policy of the most venal press in America?" + +"_On fait ce qu'on peut_," said Cavendish, with a shrug. "Orders are +orders, John. If the orders of the editor don't go, the orders on the +cashier don't come. That's about all there is to it. It would be rather +futile to attempt the Don Quixote act, if only for the reason that one +would never get into print. One can't do more than follow instructions. +The reporter's best policy is his paper's best honesty." + +"Honesty?" repeated the Lieutenant-Governor. "Where does the honesty +come in? Of course I understand your position. In a way, it is identical +with mine--subservience to a principle that you despise, acquiescence in +methods that you know to be utterly false and wrong! How sick I am of it +all! It's the old experience, all over again, which I used to have as a +child with the Tom Smith paper crackers. You are fascinated by the +tinsel, and the colored paper, and the gaudy label. You think that when +you've dissected one, and pulled it all to pieces, you'll find a bugle +and a gold crown inside--because that's what it says on the box. But, +the first thing you know, you'll find yourself blowing on a tin whistle +and wearing a fool's cap of green paper! Lord! how the press of Kenton +City needs a _man_--a man with the courage and the power to show up the +scoundrels who are responsible for all this--McGrath and his associates, +I mean. I'm sick and tired of reporters whose rascality is self-evident, +of editors who are bought and sold like chattels, of a state of affairs, +in general, so infamous as to surpass expression! You have my sympathy, +Spencer--the sympathy of a fellow-victim. To be a reporter on a +newspaper which dictates dishonesty; to be the lieutenant of a Governor +who enjoins duplicity--it's all just about one and the same thing!" + +"It's curious," commented Cavendish, "that it wasn't until about a week +after--after that night, that I knew you were Lieutenant-Governor. Then, +your name happened to be mentioned in the office, and somebody asked me +if I knew you." + +"Whereupon," said Barclay, conquering the tie at last, and turning from +the mirror, "you had the inexpressible privilege of saying that you knew +me intimately." + +"Whereupon," repeated Cavendish, in that so singular tone which had lain +heavy upon the other's memory, "I had the inexpressible privilege of +saying that I used to know you, but that we had quarreled, and were +now--strangers." + +"Why?" demanded the Lieutenant-Governor, wheeling abruptly upon him. +"What possessed you to say such a silly thing as that?" + +Cavendish leaned forward in his chair, with his elbows on his knees, and +his forehead against his interlaced fingers, staring at the floor. + +"I'm glad, in a way, to have you ask that question," he said slowly. "We +are wary of mock heroics, or even real heroics, men like you and me. And +yet there are things which must be explained, things not easy to +explain, because they come so close at times to melodrama. I've always +had a horror of emotional situations; and, from what I know of you, I'm +sure you have, as well. I'd avoid this explanation, if I could--indeed, +I've deliberately avoided it, thus far. Yet if I were a Romanist in the +presence of my priest, I think I should feel more at liberty to evade +confession than I do now. For both our sakes, I'll try to be as brief, +as simple, as lucid, as I can. And I'll trust you to understand, as well +as may be. Don't think there's any pose, any aim at effect, in what I'm +going to say. You've asked me a question, and I'm going to answer it, +that's all! I don't think, in my present frame of mind, I could bear to +have you entertain the suspicion that the answer was affected or lacking +in candor. _Allons!_ Already I'm growing too verbose!" + +He looked up with a wan smile. + +"Let's get down to facts. You ask me why I told my questioner that we no +longer knew each other. Well, then, let's have at it! It was because, +John Barclay, there is likely--no, there is sure--to come a time when +you won't care to acknowledge me as your friend. Oh, wait!" he added, as +the Lieutenant-Governor held up his hand in protest. "Hear me out. You +say I talked like an ass, that first night. Perhaps. But the fact +remains that I've been a drunkard--and that I'm bound to be one again! +I've been fighting against temptation for several weeks. It hasn't been +very strong, for some reason, and so I've managed to ground it so far. +But you remember the chap with whom old Hercules wrestled? Every time he +touched earth his strength was multiplied. Well, that's the way with +drink. I can throw the temptation for a while, but every time I do so it +rises, stronger many-fold. Sooner or later, I'm forced to give in. I +know it, as I know I'm sitting here. I'm doing my best now, because, in +the future, when the wrong that for a time you've righted goes wrong +again, I want you to remember that I made the effort--for you--and for +her--for the Fairy Princess. The end is as plain as day! It was born in +me, this. I think I've never told you that my father died of it, but +that's the truth. And the next time I drop, it will be for good and all. +I shall never make another effort to conquer the inevitable. If I can't +do it now, with the hope of redemption thus made plain, with a new +start, and a fresh chance, and--thanks to you, John--the past wiped off +the slate and a new sum set to solve, with the incentive of your +friendship and confidence, and the interest, so undeserved, of the Fairy +Princess, into the bargain,--if I can't do it now, I say, why surely I +can never do it. John, you can't know what I've been through. You, +who've never had the temptation, can't conceive of what it means. It's a +living actuality, this lust for drink. When your nerves go wrong, even +at the end of a day, or a week, or a year, during which you've kept +straight, when you're tired, discouraged, and, above all, _alone_!--then +it comes at you like a live thing,--speaks--grips your arm--drags you +wherever it wills! I've laughed at it, scoffed at it, in its absence, +tried to make myself believe it a fragment of an otherwise forgotten +dream, many and many and many a time. _But it always came back!_ Oh, +John Barclay, you others will never understand! A man has to have been +through it, in order to know, and that not once, but, as I have, a +hundred times." + +"I can well believe it to be a tremendous temptation," said the +Lieutenant-Governor gravely. + +"Temptation? It's more than that! A temptation gives you _some_ chance, +doesn't it? You may yield to it, but, at least, you've had your +fighting-chance. Well, in that sense, this is no temptation, though I've +been using the word myself to describe it. Why, John, it's madness, +sheer insanity. You probably remember that I never used to touch alcohol +at all. I promised my poor mother to let it alone until I reached my +majority. Of course, I didn't realize about the dear old man; he died +when I was too young for that. But her one great fear, and naturally, +was that the curse had descended to me--just as it had! Well, I stuck to +my promise till I was twenty-one, and kept along in the same way for +some time afterwards, just because there didn't seem to be any +particularly good reason for taking up something which I had managed to +get along very well without, all my life. Then came that time, you +know--three years ago--and out of mere recklessness, bravado, God knows +what, I began to drink. John, I was a doomed man from the first swallow! +That demon had been hiding inside me, without sound or movement or other +hint of his presence, for twenty-eight years--just waiting his chance! +You know the rest. The fight has been going on ever since, and the thing +has beaten every time. I've resisted. I've struggled. I've even prayed. +It's all useless." + +He pointed significantly to the curtain which hung where the door of the +wine-closet had been. + +"As I did that night," he continued, "I shall do again, and still again, +until the end. It's insanity, nothing more or less. It lurks at the back +of my brain--always--always--and then, suddenly, when I am least +expecting it, it comes forward with a rush, and I might as well try to +check the north wind or the incoming tide. I feel it tingling in my +fingers, scorching my throat, tearing at my reason. I swear I won't give +in, and, in the very act of so swearing, I get up and go out to meet it. +I could break down iron doors to get at the drink when it calls to me. +And, though I seem to be going straight enough now, the moment is coming +when it _will_ call and when I shall obey! Then you won't want to think +you've ever known me, John Barclay, still less to remember that the name +of the Fairy Princess has passed between us. And, in the midst of my +damnation, it will be a drop of cold water on my tongue to know that +I've left you a loophole through which to escape the acknowledgment of +these last few weeks. So far, no one but the 'Rockingham' people, and +Payson, and--and the Fairy Princess--know that we've been together +recently. The 'Rockingham' people don't even know my name. Payson won't +speak. And _she_ certainly won't. So far, so good. Further, I've come to +say good-by. Hereafter, we mustn't see each other"-- + +"Stop--stop!" broke in the Lieutenant-Governor. "What is all this rot +you're talking? Chuck it, will you? Look here! If you go back on +me--which is bad--and on your Fairy Princess--which is worse--and on +yourself--which is the worst of all"-- + +"Yes, yes," answered Cavendish, "that's all true. But I'm not talking +about _if_ I go back, I'm talking about _when_ I go back! As I said when +I began, there's no use trying to explain this thing to a man who +doesn't understand it, and no man _can_ understand it except through his +own experience. In this respect, if in no other, you and I talk +different languages, belong on different planets. Could I expect you to +comprehend with me that first give of self-control which lets the demon +loose, and the meaning of the sight or smell of drink at that exact +moment when the will is weakest--the first glass, hastily swallowed, as +a brute, long thirsty, gulps down the water it has craved--the second +and third, taken more slowly--and then, that slackening of every nerve, +that jettisoning of all the moral cargo, that sudden love and +appreciation of the sensuous side of life? Don't you see? It's another +world, that, which you simply can't understand, unless you travel to it +by the road by which I have come--which God forbid!" + +"In all this," said Barclay, "I can see no reason why our present +friendship should not continue, and should not be known." + +"Simply this," answered Cavendish: "I'm--nothing! You're the +Lieutenant-Governor,--who is spoken of, if you care to know it, in the +office of the 'Sentinel' as the only honest official in the state of +Alleghenia. You mustn't tie up to me, nor I to you. I've told you what +my end is going to be. You don't believe it, perhaps, but it's none the +less true. And yours--do you know that the law-abiding element looks up +to you as a kind of Messiah? Do you know that you are the dawn of honor +and integrity which lies behind the present black cloud of lawlessness? +I tell you, John, the promise of your future is such as might nerve a +beaten Napoleon to renewed endeavor. In your hands lies the salvation of +the state." + +"I wish I could think so," said the Lieutenant-Governor. "God knows I'd +willingly cut one of them off, if I thought its loss could benefit the +commonwealth. But, as I've had occasion to say to others, in the present +emergency I'm as helpless as a babe unborn. You see how things are +going--one might as well appeal, so far as any hope of success is +concerned, to McGrath himself as to Governor Abbott. There's no getting +around it, Spencer. It's a declaration of anarchy pure and simple, and +with the official seal of Alleghenia at the bottom of the document. +Iniquitous wrong is being done, not only to Mr. Rathbawne in refusing +him the protection of the law to which he is entitled, but to the cause +of the strikers themselves, if they can justly be said to have a cause. +Nothing ever was or ever will be gained for the benefit of the many by +the violence of the few. It can only end in one way: by the +interposition of the federal troops. You know what happened at Chicago. +It will be the same thing here; and before it is over we shall see +people shot down like rats in the streets of Kenton City." + +"I hope it won't come to that," said Cavendish; "but even so, all's well +that ends well. Provided that order is finally restored"-- + +"But what credit is it," broke in Barclay, "to the state of Alleghenia +to have her law-breakers suppressed by the national government? Don't +you see that it would be only a final proof that she is too incompetent +or too indifferent to do it herself? From the point of view of the +state's good name, I doubt which is worst, her present attitude or the +interference of federal force." + +"Will it come to the latter in any event?" + +"Undoubtedly. They've already tried to prevent the delivery of Mr. +Rathbawne's mail, both at the mills and at his house. You know what +that means, don't you? One carrier interfered with in the performance of +his duty is sufficient excuse for mobilizing a brigade." + +"But the Governor"-- + +Barclay came forward, laid his hand on Cavendish's shoulder, and looked +down at him, slowly nodding his head. + +"The Governor of Alleghenia is a dyed-in-the-wool scoundrel, my good +sir," he said. "It is his manifest duty to enforce the law rigidly and +at once, and if the police of Kenton City cannot or will not assist him, +to summon the militia to his aid. In that way only can the honor of +Alleghenia be saved. And that is what Elijah Abbott will never do. There +is anarchy open and flagrant in the streets of Kenton City--there is +anarchy silent and sneering in the Governor's chair. God save the +state!" + + + + +XI + +YOUNG NISBET FINDS HIS TONGUE + + +"I have promised to marry Colonel Broadcastle," announced Mrs. Wynyard +when the silence had lasted twenty minutes. + +Dorothy flung round from the window against which she had been +mercilessly pressing her pretty nose. + +"Why, Aunt Helen!" she exclaimed. "You really are the most startlingly +abrupt person I ever knew. Are you in earnest? What under the sun +possessed you to do that?" + +"I think it must have been Colonel Broadcastle," answered Mrs. Wynyard, +with an air of reflection. "It was last night when he was showing us +over the armory, after the review. He not only asked me, but appeared to +have quite set his heart upon my giving him an affirmative answer. And +he had been so extremely civil, Dorothy, about our seats and all that, +that I thought it would seem rather ungracious to refuse the first favor +he had ever asked of me. So I said yes." + +"Aunt Helen, Aunt Helen! One of these fine days you will be the death of +me. Did any one _ever_ hear of such a reason for accepting a man?" + +"I couldn't think of a better one for refusing him," said Mrs. Wynyard +serenely. "So there you are!" + +"Talk about logic!" said Dorothy. She came across the room, and seated +herself beside her aunt. "I never heard anything so exciting in my +life!" she added. "Do you really mean it? Are you really going to marry +him?" + +"That is the arrangement, as I understand it," replied Mrs. Wynyard. "Of +course, I haven't his promise in writing, but I think I can trust him. I +once looked him up in your father's business guide, and he had three A's +after his name. I'm sure I don't know what they can stand for, if it's +not Acquaintance, Appeal, and Acceptance. I don't really see what else +I could have done. It seems to have all been arranged without consulting +me at all. One can't very well set one's self up in opposition to a +business guide, you know." + +"But he's old enough to be your father, Aunt Helen!" + +"That's precisely the reason why there wouldn't have been any sense in +my promising to be a sister to him. You see, I was quite helpless in the +matter from start to finish." + +"And it was only last night that you called me preposterous!" laughed +Dorothy. "Really, Aunt Helen, people who live in glass houses shouldn't +throw stones. I think you are the most absurd creature in the world. Do +you love him?" + +"I can even go so far as to say that I think I do," said Mrs. Wynyard, +without a break in her gravity. "I have all the symptoms,--palpitation +of the heart, a morbid craving for Shelley and chocolate caramels, a +tendency to wake up singing, and a failing for flattening my nose +against the window-pane for twenty minutes at a stretch without saying a +word to my poor old aunt, on the mere chance that he may be coming down +the avenue." + +The blush which Dorothy paid as tribute to this subtle innuendo came +near to rivaling one of young Nisbet's celebrated performances in the +same line. + +"You're making fun of me," she said reproachfully. + +"I, my dear?--not the least in the world. It's all as true as the gospel +according to St. Valentine. I've told you first because we're not only +aunt and niece, but the very best friends possible besides, and I knew +you would like to hear the news before any one else. Colonel Broadcastle +is by all odds the finest man I know,--I won't even except John Barclay, +much as I admire him. He has paid me a very great honor. I respect him +tremendously; I trust him absolutely. These alone are good reasons; but +there's a better one,--so much better that nothing else really has any +bearing on the subject. Can you guess?" + +"Yes," said Dorothy softly, "you just love him. Isn't that it?" + +"Exactly. It's a curious thing, this love. There may be every reason why +one should marry a man, his own wish included, and yet one doesn't. +There may be no reason at all, so far as outsiders can see, and yet one +does! I've known a woman to throw over one suitor who had everything in +his favor--money, character, position--and accept another who had none +of these advantages--because she liked the way he parted his hair! +That's the way it goes. It's the most illogical thing in the world, if +we except the stock market and other women's gowns. And then, when it's +all arranged, his friends wonder what she could have seen in him, and +her friends what he could have seen in her! But I'm wandering from the +subject. Seriously, Dorothy dear, I love him very sincerely, and I have +been more happy than I can say ever since I found out that it wasn't +going to be one of those one-sided love-affairs which assure the incomes +of the poets and the lawyers. And now,--confidence for confidence, +Dorothy!" + +"Aunt Helen! I don't know what you mean." + +"Oh, Dorothy! 'I don't know what you mean' is one of those phrases like +'Not at home' and 'Yours very sincerely,' which are white lies on the +face of them. I don't want to force your confidence. We all have what +our friends recognize as our private affairs, with the accent--worse +luck!--on the _pry_! But this is very different. I'm very fond of you, +as you know, and my interest is far from being vulgar curiosity. Of a +woman's five cardinal failings--inquisitiveness, extravagance, vanity, +vacillation, and loquacity--I'm guiltless of all except the last and +most innocent. But don't we all need to talk at times? Don't we all long +for a trustworthy _confidante_? Aren't our little secrets often like +precious liquors?--if we don't make use of them, share them with our +friends, they either ferment and sour, or else lose all their sweetness +and significance by slow evaporation." + +"You would draw confidence from a stone," said Dorothy, with a little +smile, "but what have I to tell you?" + +"How should I know? Perhaps nothing--as yet; perhaps everything. Take +your time about it, dear. I'm not trying to get you to commit yourself. +I only want you to know that I'm ready to share your secret when it's +ready to be shared, and to help and counsel you in any way I can. I know +the main great fact already. Because, you see, Dorothy, one may conceal +an infinite amount, even from one's nearest and dearest, when they don't +understand--and they are so _apt_ not to understand, one's nearest and +dearest! And the financier may hide his schemes from his partners, or +the general his plan of campaign from his fellow-officers, or the +politician his ambitions from his most ardent supporters--but I doubt, +my dear, if a woman in love was ever able to hide very much from +another woman in the same lamentable condition! + +"If it were not," she added, taking Dorothy's hand in hers, "for the +great happiness which has come into my life, do you think that I should +have been able to divine that other great happiness which seems to be +hovering over yours? I am the physician afflicted with the disease which +it becomes his duty to study and to cure. Only, it's not a disease, +Dorothy, but a great, a beautiful revelation. I should have compared +myself, instead, to the prophet who is enabled to interpret the dreams +of others because they are identical with his own. There's my little +speech. And when you are prepared to answer it, you'll find me ready." + +As she was speaking the last words, the butler flung back the curtains +at the doorway of the drawing-room. + +"Mr. Nisbet," he announced imperturbably. + +Dorothy looked at her aunt, and then, with her frank laugh:-- + +"If there _is_ an answer," she said, "that's it!" + +As young Nisbet entered, Mrs. Wynyard was the first to greet him. + +"So," she observed, looking him over approvingly, "you've beaten your +swords into walking-sticks, and your spears into top-hats, as my friend +Isaiah so aptly observes! That's very commendable, but I almost think I +like you better in your war-paint. Do you know, a Colonel's orderly is +the spickest-and-spanest object upon which I've ever laid, or hope to +lay, my eyes?" + +"He just naturally has to be," said young Nisbet, with a grin. Somehow, +he was always more at his ease with Mrs. Wynyard than with other women. +"You see," he added, "if it wasn't that way, he wouldn't be it." + +Which was as near as he had ever come to making an epigram. + +"Well, I shall leave you to the tender mercies of Dorothy," said Mrs. +Wynyard. "I've promised to take a walk with your--what is it you call +him--instead of commanding officer, you know?" + +"K. O.," said young Nisbet. + +"Yes, that's it. How deplorably you militiamen spell! Well, at all +events, I'm going to walk with your K. O., and it's time I was getting +ready. Good-by." + +"Good-by, Mrs. Wynyard." + +"Day-day!" said Dorothy, from the divan. + +"She's a crack-a-jack!" exclaimed young Nisbet, after she had gone. + +"Mercy!" said Dorothy. "I never knew you to be so enthusiastic over any +one before. If you have any intention of falling in love with Aunt +Helen, I feel it to be my duty, as a friend and well-wisher, to warn you +in advance that there isn't the most remote show in the world for you." + +"Oh, it's not that!" protested young Nisbet with that stupendous +earnestness which made people want to hug him. "Why, Mrs. Wynyard would +have me talked to a standstill in two or seven minutes! Imagine me +trying to make love to a dame like that! She'd lose me so quick you +couldn't see me for the dust. Besides"-- + +"Besides what?" asked Dorothy with an elaborate air of unconcern, as he +hesitated. + +Young Nisbet was quite crimson now, and twitched at the creases in his +trousers where they passed over his knees, and turned in his toes +excessively. + +"There's somebody else in the running!" he blurted out desperately. + +There! It was out--a part of it, at least--not at all, to be sure, in +anything even remotely resembling one of the thousand manners he had +proposed to himself as effective, during long hours of wakefulness, when +there was nothing in the world but his crowding thoughts and the ticking +of his clock--but still, out! The ice was broken. It was impossible that +she should not understand. The rest would be easier. + +Alas for young Nisbet! He was, as he himself acknowledged, not "up on +women!" + +"Somebody else?" repeated Dorothy. "How ever did you find that out? She +only told _me_ about it twenty minutes ago." + +Alas, alas, for young Nisbet! He had thought his feet upon the beach at +last, whereas they had but touched a sand-bar in passing over. The +under-tow of embarrassment was worse than ever now, and threatened to +drag him down. + +"Oh, I don't mean Mrs. Wynyard. I wasn't talking of her--that is, I was, +at first--but afterwards--anyhow, I'm not talking of her now! When I say +there's somebody else, I mean--I mean"-- + +"I am going out for a moment, Dorothy--just over to the _doctor's_. +_How_ de do, Mr. Nisbet? _Wretched_ weather, _isn't_ it? Natalie's with +your father, my dear, and _I'll_ be back _almost_ immediately. +Er--_ahem_!" + +Mrs. Rathbawne went through a kind of rudimentary calisthenic exercise, +which consisted of squaring her shoulders and drawing in her chin. It +was accompanied by a meaning glance at her daughter, and was designed as +an inconspicuous substitute for the frank injunction to "sit up +straight, my dear," upon which Dorothy had finally placed a ban. + +"And _won't_ you feed the gold-fish, my dear?" she added. "I've been _so_ +occupied, and the poor things haven't had a _crumb_ for three days. I've +just told Thomas to take a plate of bread in at _once_. I'm sure Mr. +_Nisbet_ won't mind: get him to _help_ you. Er--_ahem_! And I'll be back +in about fifteen minutes, or so." + +For a time there was silence in the big, warm conservatory. Young Nisbet +had taken the dish from Dorothy's hands, and, after seating himself on +the low marble parapet surrounding the pool, devoted his energies to +feeding the gold-fish. He was thinking that it was all to be done over +again, and that it was harder than ever, if such a thing were possible, +to do. What was there about those few words which seemed to choke him? +For the moment, he took refuge in a commonplace question. + +"Is it one of your duties to feed these persons?" + +Dorothy laughed shortly, like a little chord of music. + +"No--it's the Mater's peculiar privilege," she answered. "She adores the +stupid little beasts. Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. Nisbet. She +feeds them regularly herself,--or did, until Dad began to require so +much of her time. But lately, the house has been so upset, and she has +been doing such a lot of going out, and coming in"-- + +"Yes," put in young Nisbet dryly, "I've noticed the coming in part." + +"So Natalie has been doing it for her," went on Dorothy, more rapidly. +"I suppose Natalie herself hasn't had the time, these last three days. +They _are_ hungry, aren't they? _Don't give them such large pieces, Mr. +Nisbet!_ Don't you see the poor things have only button-holes for +mouths?" + +There was another long pause, before either spoke again. + +"What defeats me about your mother," said young Nisbet slowly, "is the +way she manages to come in just at the wrong moment. At interruption, +she's the most star performer I've ever run up against. You don't mind +my saying that, do you? I'm not throwing any asparagus. I wouldn't be +disrespectful about her for the world. But really, for chopping into a +conversation, she's a dazzler!" + +"She _is_ a little inopportune at times," admitted Dorothy. + +"Inopportune? Yes,--she's all of that. When she marches in, I feel +exactly as if the boat had gybed, and the boom come over and knocked me +into thirty fathoms of water. Lord!" + +"Why, how ridiculous!" said Dorothy. "There's nothing about the Mater to +be afraid of. She's the dearest, most innocent old thing in the world! +She just blunders along like that, and nobody is less aware of her +mistakes than she is. And, after all, why shouldn't she interrupt us, so +long as we're not saying anything in particular? And if we _were_ +saying--anything in particular, we could always pick up the +conversation where we dropped it." + +"That's just what I find it so hard to do!" confessed young Nisbet. "I'm +a stupid sort of lout, you know, Miss Rathbawne. I've never had half a +chance to practice talking to dames, and where other lads fuss like +experts, I just can't make good. I foozle every stroke. I'm an +ass--that's all!" + +"You're nothing of the sort!" said Dorothy indignantly. "You're an +extremely attractive young man!" + +"As good as the average in some ways, perhaps. But--how can I explain +what I mean?--there always comes a day when a chap wants to be more, +wants to be the best ever, in every way! That's the proposition I'm up +against now. I seem to be just a bundle of misfits, and--and--oh, +shucks! my line of talk is all crooked, and I can't tell you what the +trouble is, but"-- + +"Your liver's out of kilter," interpolated Dorothy. + +"No, sir!" protested young Nisbet. "Nothing is ever out of kilter +inside me! If I'm nothing else, I'm blue-ribbon boy on the health +question. No, it's something I want, and that I'm pretty sure I can't +get." + +"I know perfectly well what it is," said Dorothy, "and you haven't even +asked for it!" + +Young Nisbet looked up suddenly. + +"Do you mean?"--he stammered, "do you mean?"-- + +Outside, the front door slammed, and Mrs. Rathbawne's voice became +audible, inquiring Dorothy's whereabouts of the butler. The girl +laughed. + +"There's the Mater back again," she said. "Oh, Mr. _Nisbet_!" + +For young Nisbet had dropped dish and bread-crumbs into the pool with a +great splash, electrifying the gold-fish into unheard-of activity, and +had risen, at the same moment, to his feet. He stood before her, his +honest face blazing, his hands outstretched. + +"I love you!" he said. "Will you marry me?" + +And whether or not he received an audible reply to this question he +never knew,--only she was in his arms, and gold-fish might feast or +starve, for all he cared about them. The wide doors of perfect bliss +swung open before him, and young Nisbet passed within. + +He was gazing ruefully into the water, as Mrs. Rathbawne entered. For +the first time in his experience, her presence did not embarrass him. + +"I've dropped a dish into your pool, Mrs. Rathbawne," he said, "and +scared the gold-fish into blue conniption fits. Look how they are +scurrying around. I hope I haven't done them any harm." + +"Oh, no," answered Mrs. Rathbawne placidly. "They are getting _so_ fat +that I should _think_ a little exercise, _now_ and again, would be +_good_ for them. We _might_ drop a dish into the pool every week or so, +Dorothy, just to stir them up." + +"It might go for a while," said young Nisbet, "but any old football +player like myself, Mrs. Rathbawne, will tell you that you can't work +the same trick more than just a certain number of times." + +"Interruption, for example!" added Dorothy, and laughed across at him, +deliciously, with her eyes. + + + + +XII + +DIOGENES + + +It was during the tenth week of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills that +the "Kenton City Record" made its long-remembered attack upon +Lieutenant-Governor Barclay. The arraignment was one unparalleled for +venom, even in the columns of that most notoriously scurrilous journal +in the state, and, withal, there was about it a devilish ingenuity, a +distortion of facts so slight as to defy refutation, and so plausible as +to carry conviction. It was the last blow in the long series of +discouragements which Barclay had suffered since his inauguration, and +for the moment he was completely unmanned. He was at no loss, however, +to trace the source from which the ingeniously perverted facts had been +obtained. Not even McGrath, with his intimate knowledge of all that went +forward at the capitol, could have supplied information so detailed. +The hand of Elijah Abbott was traceable in every line of the attack. +Their conversation, on the afternoon when he had first spoken to Barclay +of the impending strike, was reproduced almost word for word, as well as +that on the occasion when McGrath had been present, and therefrom the +"Record" went on to deduce that not even Peter Rathbawne, with all his +obstinacy, all his blindness to the welfare of his employees, was +responsible for their present destitution in the same sense as was the +Lieutenant-Governor, who might have avoided the strike by a conciliatory +word, and who, instead, had advised Mr. Rathbawne to fight the +working-people until the last cent of their money should be exhausted +and the last drop of their blood should be shed. + +"Incompetency," said the article in part, "is what we long since learned +to expect from John Hamilton Barclay. Gross neglect of public duty, +flagrant callousness to responsibility, contemptuous indifference to the +interests of the citizens whose votes placed him where he is,--all +these have been part and parcel of his attitude since the unfortunate +moment of his election. But even in him we had not looked for the +incredible spectacle of a public official deliberately precipitating the +incalculable distress which has followed in the wake of the strike at +the Rathbawne Mills. Overburdened with the cares of office, in a single +instance the Governor of Alleghenia turned over a question of vital +significance to the lieutenant from whom he had every reason to expect +compliance and support. Even so, he was careful to point out a line of +action by which the impending calamity might readily have been avoided. +And what was the result? Not only in total disregard of plain duty, but +in direct disobedience of the orders of his superior, the +Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia threw his influence into the scale to +outweigh law and order, and brought about the deplorable destitution now +facing the families of four thousand martyrs to principle. When men are +driven to desperation, when women turn to shame in order to maintain +life, when children are heard crying in our streets for bread, to whom +shall we point as the author of it all? To Peter Rathbawne, a poor, +doddering old man, barely responsible now, if rumor is to be believed, +for what he does? No! To John Hamilton Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of +Alleghenia!" + +This, and much more in the same strain, while passed over as sensational +bombast by the better element, did not fail of its effect upon the +strikers. A mass-meeting, held that morning, denounced Barclay in a set +of resolutions, as a traitor to his office and as the avowed enemy of +labor, and demanded his impeachment on the ground of neglect of duty. +During the day, half a score of threatening letters came to his office. +But what hurt him most, though he almost smiled at his own +sensitiveness, was that the doormen and porters at the Capitol greeted +his morning nod with a stare, and even the little office-boy, bending +low over his table in the ante-room, did not look up for the customary +wink. For his mother was a trimmer at the Rathbawne Mills. + +Once in his office, the Lieutenant-Governor found it impossible to +concentrate his mind upon the work before him. Sentence after sentence, +the words of his arraignment marched through his mind, as he sat with +his elbows on the desk and his chin in his doubled fists. A single +reading seemed to have stamped them indelibly and forever upon his +memory. Baffled by conflicting reflections he began, for the first time, +to doubt whether his had been the course of conscience, or merely that +of pride and perversity. Was not the "Record" right, perhaps, after all? +If it was true that the strike was driving men to crime and women to the +streets--and if it was not, as yet, true, it soon must be--who, indeed, +was to blame if not he himself, who had said "Fight them!" when he might +have kept peace by a word? + +Suddenly, the Lieutenant-Governor rose, and, crossing the room to where +the arms of Alleghenia hung upon the wall, took down the frame, laid +it, face up, upon the table, and, bending down, studied it intently. The +beautifully executed nude figures of Art and Labor stared steadfastly +back at him, their muscular hands grasping the circular shield, strength +and endurance in every line of their necks, shoulders, and thighs, +purity and purpose in their blue eyes and square-cut jaws. He was as +motionless as they for full five minutes. Presently his finger moved +slowly across the frame, and he said, quite softly: + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas._" + +Then he looked up, straight before him, out of the open window, where an +encircling wistaria was dotted with minute sprouts of green, and up at +the clear, wide sky. + +"I'm right!" he said aloud. "I'm right!" + + * * * * * + +At five that afternoon, Spencer Cavendish set out upon the most +unpleasant assignment which had ever fallen to his lot. When Payson had +told him that he was to procure an interview with Peter Rathbawne for +the "Sentinel," with a special eye to the mill-owner's failing health, +as reported in the morning's "Record," he had shrunk back instinctively +from a task so distasteful, and was on the point of refusing. But two +considerations checked this impulse. If the thing were to be done at +all, he thought, surely it had better be the work of one friendly to the +Rathbawnes and with their interests at heart than that of a bungling +outsider, with it in his power to hurt them beyond expression. The +argument was plausible, but behind its logic, at the back of Cavendish's +brain, there lay another reason, without which the first had been +insufficient to persuade him. He wanted to see Natalie again--to meet +her under the shield of some compatible excuse, so that he should not +seem to have sought her of his own will. He was thirsty for a word from +her, thirsty with the pitiable thirst of the shipwrecked sailor who +knows a swallow of salt water will but increase his torture, and who +craves it, none the less. Long since, he had forfeited his right to her +friendship--no sophistry could blind him to that. Moreover the ocean of +degradation not only lay behind him; it lay in front as well. It was as +he had told Barclay. He stood upon an island, not the mainland, of +redemption, and another plunge was inevitable. + +What he expected to gain by a word with Natalie Rathbawne, Cavendish +himself could hardly have told. At most, he was conscious of a faint +hope that in some turn or twist of the conversation he might have a +chance of thanking her, of telling her that he rejoiced in her +happiness, and of bidding her good-by. For paramount in his mind lay the +thought of his approaching downfall, inevitable, utter, and final. He +did not attempt to deceive himself. He knew what was coming. It had come +before. + +When Cavendish had sent in his card, a servant showed him through the +library into the conservatory, where Peter Rathbawne was seated in a +deep rattan chair watching his daughter, who stood at his side tossing +bread-crumbs to the gold-fish in the circular central pool. They both +turned at the sound of his footsteps, and Natalie held out her hand. + +"So you've come at last!" she said. "I should think it was quite time. +Dad, you remember Mr. Cavendish, don't you?" + +"Yes," answered her father. "Oh, yes!" + +Rathbawne's voice was without life, his face almost wholly void of +expression. Though he glanced at Cavendish, it was with the blank stare +of a delirious person whose attention is unconsciously caught by an +unusual noise rather than with any evidence of direct interest, and he +took no further part in the conversation, nor even seemed to realize +that his companions were speaking. When he had answered his daughter's +question and looked at Cavendish, he leaned back in his chair, and +wearily closed his eyes. + +"He is very much changed since you saw him," said the girl in a lower +tone, turning again to the pool, "and it's all come about in the past +six weeks. The strike has had a most curious, a most pathetic effect +upon him. Even the doctor is at a loss to account for it. I think that +I am, perhaps, the only one who really understands. He has always been +so proud of his mills and of his people, so loyal to them, so like a +father to them, one and all, that to have them turn against him like +this, and, what is worse, get to drinking and rioting, has almost broken +his heart. The doctor says only one thing can save him, and that is to +see the mills going again and the people happy and prosperous, as they +were before. And who knows when that will be? For, feeble and broken as +he is, he will never give in to the Union. Of that I'm sure." + +"I'm very sorry," said Cavendish softly. One look at Rathbawne had been +enough to show him that the interview for which he had been sent was an +impossibility. One look at Natalie sufficed to banish from his mind +every thought save that of her pitiful pallor and the pathetic quiver of +her lips. + +"I had no idea it was as bad as this," he continued. "Can't anything be +done? You are far from being in good shape yourself, Miss Rathbawne." + +"Tired and dispirited, that's all," she answered, trying to smile. "And +I fear nothing can be done as long as our fate lies in Governor Abbott's +hands. There's no use in harping on that, though. You know as well as I +what we have to expect from him. Did you see the attack on Mr. Barclay +this morning?" + +"An infamous libel!" exclaimed Cavendish hotly. + +Miss Rathbawne crumbled the bread between her fingers, and resumed her +feeding of the gold-fish. + +"You must know that I am the last person in the world to need that +assurance," she said slowly. "It is only another thread in all the +hideous tissue of injustice and iniquity which has been wrapped about us +like a pall. What a shame, is it not, that such a man as he should be +powerless to do the work I think God intended for him? And what a shame +that Alleghenia, needing his clear head and his strong arm and his +loyal heart as she does in this hour of emergency, should only be +sneering at him as a coward and a cad!" + +"I cannot believe," answered Cavendish, "that the venom of the 'Record' +is to be taken as the sentiment of the state. There must be many--there +must be a majority of Alleghenians who know, as we know, that no better +man breathes than John Barclay." + +"Thank you," said the girl. + +In the open spaces of water between the lily-pads the fat indolent +gold-fish mouthed at the crumbs, stirring the silence with little +sucking sounds, and sending tiny ripples widening on all sides. One +alone, dingy yellow in color, moped apart from his fellows, and took no +interest in the banquet. + +"That one's a cynic," said Miss Rathbawne presently. "My subtlest +cajoleries never win him from that attitude of sneering contempt. The +others get all the tid-bits, and he doesn't seem to care. He isn't even +ornamental--he's in a class by himself. I call him Diogenes, and I'm +thinking of buying him a tub all for himself, where he can sulk in +solitary grandeur to his heart's content." + +"Perhaps not altogether in a class by himself," said Cavendish. "There +are others, you know, who make no use of their opportunities, and who +can never hope to be anything but ugly and useless, while their fellows +are getting all the good things of life, and enjoying them, and giving +pleasure of one kind or another into the bargain." + +Something in his tone caused Natalie to look at him suddenly. + +"I'm not enough of a pessimist," she answered firmly, "to believe that +true in anything beyond appearances. We are all apt, no matter how +conceited we may be, to underestimate at times the extent of our own +usefulness--or, rather, we are unconscious of the direction in which it +is most productive. If what you say is so, then all that is lacking is +the opportunity, and that is sure to come. We may squander many +opportunities, and, hardly less probably, actually turn to account in a +way we do not perceive many which we seem to ourselves to squander. In +any event, others will come. A woman once said to me that the good in +her was not cultivated nor exercised with a view to _individual +immortality_. That seemed to me to mean so much that I've built up quite +a little creed on it. It's the principle, isn't it, upon which the whole +scheme of the world hinges? A million leaves fall and decay to enrich +the soil wherefrom two million more may spring. An infinity of little +shell-fish die, and the ages grind their shells to powder to make the +sands and the chalk cliffs. Countless raindrops sacrifice their identity +to maintain that of one great river. And why should it not be so with +us? If only we can contribute in the smallest degree to the uplifting of +our kind, to the advancement of the race, to the maintenance of what we +know to be right, what possible difference can it make whether, in the +effort to be of such service, we live or succumb? We were put here, it +seems to me, very much as separate notes are put into one great harmony. +Each note is struck at the proper time, serves its purpose, and goes +into nothingness. Each plays its part, however small. We can't all be +included in the wonderful final chords. Our place may seem trivial to +us, and yet in some sense we may be sure we are all contributors to the +unity and perfection of the whole. That ought to be enough. No one note +achieves individual immortality, but each does something to assure the +immortality of the composition of which it forms a part. If we don't +believe that, if we are not content to have it so, how is it possible to +believe in any divine purpose, any scheme of justice at all? Look at the +indescribable waste of life on all sides of us. If only in the case of +humanity, people are dying by hundreds every minute, unheeded, +unlamented, unrecorded. Human life is such a little thing!--as little as +the life of the leaf or the raindrop. And yet in the death of these last +we are able to perceive the working of a vast system which must be the +outcome of a direct purpose, and whereby the best interest of each +species is furthered. And so, the human race. Why should it be less +than lesser things? One man dies in order that two may live. A +confederacy--as in the case of our own Rebellion--perishes in order that +a nation may endure. Everywhere, in short, the individual sacrifices his +individual existence in order that it may contribute to and fertilize +the growth of his species. So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly +content to have it so. I should ask nothing better, when my own time +comes, than the assurance that, in one way or another, my death had a +significance,--that it was for a person or a principle, and not merely a +natural phenomenon. I may not be able to believe that; but there is one +belief possible to all of us,--I mean that, if not in death, then +assuredly in life, we have been of service to our race and time. We are +often told that the indispensable thing does not exist. I think the same +may be said of the useless one. I don't believe even the humblest of +God's creatures goes out of life without having been at one time or +another an influence for good. I even have hopes of Diogenes. Some day +there will be a scrap of refuse or an ugly little bug which mars the +symmetry of the pool, and Diogenes will eat it,--and perhaps die of +indigestion as a martyr to principle!" + +The silence which followed her words was broken by a hoarse sob from Mr. +Rathbawne, and, turning, they saw that his head had fallen back against +the chair, with his eyes, wide and staring, fixed upon the glass roof, +and his breath coming in short, thick gasps from between his parted +lips. In an instant Natalie was on her knees by his side, with her arms +about him. + +"Don't be frightened," she said, looking up at Cavendish with a brave +little smile. "It's his heart. He has had these attacks frequently of +late. Will you get me the whiskey decanter and a glass? You'll find them +in the dining-room--on the sideboard--to the left." + +Decanter in hand, Cavendish stood watching her, as she tenderly poured a +little of the raw spirit between her father's lips. The effect was +almost instantaneous. Rathbawne choked, swallowed the restorative, and +presently raised his head and looked at her, patting her hand +tremulously with his own. They were so absorbed in each other that +neither noted a sudden, strange transformation in Cavendish's +expression. From the wide-mouthed decanter in his hand, the faint acrid +odor of Peter Rathbawne's fine old Scotch whiskey crept upward, stung +his nostrils, and, of a sudden, set him all a-quiver, like a startled +animal. The smell was almost that of pure alcohol, and set his mouth +watering, and drove his breath out in a little shuddering gasp that was +like a revulsion from some sickening medicine, just swallowed. But he +knew it, none the less, for something which belonged to and was part of +him. For weeks he had avoided it. Now it assailed him like that foe of +Hercules, of whom he had spoken to Barclay, whose strength was +multiplied a hundred-fold for every time his opponent trod him under +foot. + +As he told the Lieutenant-Governor, at the moment when least he +expected it, the demon touched his arm. For a minute he fought +desperately against the suggestion, with his eyes closed, and his teeth +cutting into his inner lip. He clung madly to the thought of the +presence in which he was, conscious that the girl's words had +uplifted him immeasurably, given him a clearer insight into the +essential significance of life than he had ever known. It was +useless--useless--useless! There was nothing left in the world but the +smell of the liquor that he loathed and that he loved! + +"If you were to leave us alone"-- + +At the suggestion, Cavendish bowed and went slowly back toward the +dining-room. Once out of sight of the others, he paused, glanced back +over his shoulder, and then, abruptly, supporting himself with one hand +against the side-post of the doorway, raised the decanter in the other +to his lips, and drank. + + + + +XIII + +THE INSTRUMENT OF FATE + + +The day had been deliciously warm and still, one of those eloquent +heralds of spring that are touched with a peculiar beauty rivaling her +own. As Cavendish came out of the Rathbawne residence, Bradbury Avenue +was splashed with huge blotches of dazzling yellow, where the light of +the westwardly sun poured between the houses and was spilled upon the +smooth pavement. The man choked slightly at the after-taste of the raw +whiskey he had just swallowed, but almost immediately he smiled. + +"I knew it would come," he said to himself as he turned out into the +avenue, "and here it is. I'm not surprised. I'm glad, God help me--I'm +_glad_!" + +His mouth was watering, and he felt, as it were, every inch of the +stimulant's progress through his veins, warming him with its familiar +glow. When he had left the conservatory, he had been trembling +pitifully. Now he was calm, and as steady as if his nerves had been +cords of steel. Responsibility, resolution, remorse--they had fallen +from him like so many discarded garments. He was sharply alive to the +pleasure of the moment, keenly appreciative of the sunlight, the soft +air, the laughter of the children romping in the streets. Of a singular +languor which had been wont to come over him toward the close of each +busy day of the past six weeks there was now no hint. He walked rapidly, +with his shoulders thrown back, and his chin well elevated, but his +course was not in the direction of his home, nor yet in that of the +"Sentinel" office. Instinctively, he had turned toward that part of the +city where were the large restaurants, the playhouses, and the more +pretentious saloons. + +At a corner, he wheeled abruptly into one of these last, and, seating +himself at a small table, called for an absinthe. The place was already +lighted, and each glass in the pyramids behind the bar twinkled with a +tiny brilliant reflection of the nearest incandescent globes. The air +was faintly redolent of lemon and the mingled odors of many liquors. To +Cavendish it was all very familiar, and all very pleasant. Again he told +himself that he was glad, glad that the restraint he had been exercising +was at an end. He was free, he thought, free to accomplish his own +inevitable damnation. He had no patience for the tedious operation of +dripping the water into his absinthe over a lump of sugar, but ordered +gum, and stirring the two rapidly together, filled the glass to the brim +from a little pitcher at his side. Then he drank, slowly but steadily, +barely touching the glass to the table between his sips. + +Presently, he was conscious of a slight numbness at his wrists, a barely +perceptible tingling in his knees and knuckles. His heart was +fluttering, and his temples pulsed pleasurably. He glanced toward the +glittering pyramids of glasses, and for a fraction of time they seemed +to shift in unison a foot to the right, returning immediately to their +original position with a jerk. Then he rose, and went toward the door, +catching sight of his face in a mirror as he passed. It was very pale, +and he crinkled his nose at it derisively, and then smiled at the +whimsical oddity of his reflected expression. On the threshold he +paused, looking toward the west, blazing with the red and saffron of the +departed sun. + +"Oof!" he said, with a downward tug at his waistcoat. "It comes quickly. +That's what it is to be out of practice." + +He dined alone in a corner of an unfrequented restaurant, eating little, +but drinking steadily, absinthe at first, then whiskey, four +half-goblets of it, barely diluted with water. Then he found himself +once more in the streets, now brilliantly lighted, going on and on +without purpose, save when the blazing colored glass of a saloon swerved +him from his path. He knew that he was walking steadily, avoiding +obstacles as if by instinct, stepping from and on to kerbs without any +actual perception of them. Faces swam past him, staring. Men, +particularly those at the bars he leaned against, were talking loudly, +but, as it seemed to him, brilliantly. He often smiled involuntarily, +and sometimes spoke to one of them, drank with him, and presently was +alone again, walking on and on. Occasionally a white-faced clock bulged +at him out of the night; and then he noticed that time was galloping. It +was close upon one when he found himself in a quarter which his recent +employment had made familiar--the neighborhood of the Rathbawne Mills. + +Here, suddenly, his mind emerged from a mist, and every detail of his +surroundings stood out sharp and clear-cut. The street was +insufficiently illuminated, but the light of a full moon cut across the +buildings on one side, half way between roof and sidewalk. Cavendish +perceived, with a kind of dull surprise, that the pavements were +thronged, and that almost every window framed a figure or two. A hoarse +murmur pulsed in the air, and his quickened ear was greeted on every +side by foul jests and grumbled oaths, broken now and again by drunken +imprecations, scuffles, or the shrill invective of women invisible in +the throng. Once a girl touched his arm, and he found her face close to +his, thin, haggard, and imploring. He shook her off, and turned +unsteadily into the doorway of a saloon; stumbling, as he did so, over a +little boy crying on the step. + +Inside, the air was reeking with rank smoke and the fumes of stale beer. +The floor was strewn with sawdust, streaked and circled by shuffling +feet; the mirror backing the bar was covered with soiled gauze dotted +with tawdry roses, and an indescribable dinginess seemed to have laid +its sordid fingers on all the fittings. + +The room was crowded, nevertheless--crowded not only with the men +themselves, but, to the stifling point, with their voices and their +gestures and the spirit of their unrest and discontent. Cavendish, +leaning against the end of the bar, looked wearily down the line of +flushed faces and backward at the disputing groups which rocked and +swayed, as the men argued and swore, grasping the lapels of each others' +coats, and spilling the liquor from their glasses as they gesticulated. +He was wholly sober now. It was the stage of dissipation which +experience had taught him to dread the most--the emergence from dulled +sensibility into a nervous tension upon which stimulant had no apparent +effect. He was trembling again, too, and his face, as he saw it in the +mirror through the clouding gauze, was as that of a stranger, a stranger +of whom he was afraid. He swallowed the whiskey he had ordered, and, +supporting himself by the bar, swung back and gave his attention to what +the men about him were saying. It did not need his sharpened perception +to appreciate the fact that he was in the thick of the worst element of +the Rathbawne strikers, or that the situation was a crisis. What little +restraint had characterized the earlier stages of the strike was now, +most evidently, at an end. Starvation was no longer a mere possibility, +or violence a mere threat. The men raved like wild creatures against +Rathbawne and John Barclay, recounting maudlinly the destitution of +their families, and, anon, flaming forth into cries for vengeance. How +long the babel lasted Cavendish could not have said. Long since, the +doors had been closed, and the lights half lowered, in mock deference to +a supposedly vigilant police, when suddenly a hush fell upon the +assemblage. A side door had opened, and Michael McGrath stood in the +midst of his followers, with his arms folded and a thin smile upon his +lips. There was not a whisper as he began to speak. The men leaned +toward him breathlessly, their mouths open, their eyes starting glassily +out of their sodden faces. + +"And how long is _this_ going to go on?" demanded their leader, with a +sneer. "Talk--talk--talk! That's always the way, and nothing done, after +all. Well, there's been about enough of it, and that's flat. You've +been living on the Union, and I suppose you think you can go on living +on it till hell freezes over. Now listen to me. When the strike began we +had plenty of funds, and more came to us from the Central Federation. +The funds are gone, d' you hear, and the Federation is asking what we +mean to do. There is six hundred and odd dollars in the treasury. No +need to tell you how far that much will go, is there? Not one day! And +with all your talk, you've everything your own way, if only you knew +it--a police that doesn't dare lift a finger against you, and a Governor +that won't budge an inch till I give the word! Well, to-morrow I give +the word, understand me? To-morrow I throw you over, and you can get out +of this the best way you can. I'm sick of your talk. I'm sick of your +doing nothing. Your daughters are on the streets, your wives and your +children are starving, and _you_--by God! _you_ are boozing in a bar +till daylight, and _talking_! So that's enough. To-morrow, the strike's +at an end. To-morrow, the Governor comes down on you like ten thousand +of brick! And I'm the man that gives the word! Unless"-- + +He paused and cast a keen glance at the faces which surrounded him. His +last words had been greeted by a low growl. + +"Unless," he continued, "you know your business, and make a move that's +worth the name." + +The hush of attention seemed to deepen into the leaden silence of +expectancy. + +"There are two men who must be put out of the way," said McGrath slowly, +"and that before another midnight. I don't care how it's done, but done +it must be, for the sake of example. It's easy enough to manage it, as +things are. There'll be a howl, but we have the authorities fixed. And +those two men must go!" + +In the tense silence which followed, a man's voice whispered two words +hoarsely:-- + +"Mr. Rathbawne!" + +"Ay, _Mr._ Rathbawne!" echoed McGrath, flashing into that passionate +manner of his which carried all before it. "_Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +starving you! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's making your sons drunkards! _Mr._ +Rathbawne, who's debauching your daughters! _Mr._ Rathbawne, who's +killing your wives by inches! _Mr._ Rathbawne, and _Mr._ John Hamilton +Barclay, Lieutenant-Governor of Alleghenia!" + +For a moment it seemed as if he would be swept off his feet by a torrent +of enthusiasm. The men crowded about him, slapping him upon the +shoulders, shouting their approval, reaching for his hand. One +brandished a revolver under his nose, with a shrill cry of "This'll do +it, Mac! This'll do it, by God!" The rest had turned to each other, +embracing frantically, and repeating his words in a kind of frenzy. + +Presently McGrath raised his hand, and, as silence was restored at the +signal, turned to the bar-tender with his thin smile. + +"Set 'em up, Dick," he said composedly. "It's on me, this time, and +we'll drink to better days." + +In the confusion Cavendish made his way to the side-door, and passing +through it into the street, hesitated, dazzled by a brilliant light. It +was broad day. + + * * * * * + +As the Lieutenant-Governor entered his ante-room that morning his eyes +contracted suddenly, and he stopped, with his hand upon the knob of the +door. There could be no mistaking the look in the face of the man who +sat facing him, gripping desperately at the arms of his chair. Cavendish +was as white as chalk, with the hunted look of despair which lay so +vividly on Barclay's remembrance of the night when they had met on +Bradbury Avenue. He rose as the Lieutenant-Governor appeared and drew +himself up with an effort at steadiness, conscious that the others +present were observing him narrowly. But Barclay's hesitation was as +brief as it had been involuntary. With a bare glance at his +subordinates, he came forward cordially to take Cavendish's hand, and +then, opening the door of his private office, motioned him to enter +first. + +"Glad to see you," he said steadily, as their hands met. + +Once inside, the manner of both men changed as abruptly as it had been +assumed. The Lieutenant-Governor went slowly toward his desk, with his +head bent, and Cavendish, throwing himself into the nearest chair, and, +with no attempt at concealment, drew a flask from his pocket and drank a +long draught. He looked up to find that the Lieutenant-Governor had +wheeled at the desk, and was standing with his eyes fixed upon him. + +"Wait a minute," said Cavendish, as Barclay seemed about to speak. "We +won't discuss this, for the moment, if you please." + +He held up the flask with a shrug. + +"In fact we needn't discuss it at all," he continued. "I've simply gone +to hell, that's all there is about it. I knew I would. I told you so +long ago. I didn't come here to make excuses--or to receive rebukes, +John Barclay. I've a means here of settling the problem which can give +cards and spades to all your projects of reform." And he tapped his +pocket, where the cloth bulged slightly, with a smile. The +Lieutenant-Governor made no attempt to interrupt him. + +"What I did come to say," went on Cavendish, more steadily, "is that +your life and Mr. Rathbawne's are in danger. You're to be put out of the +way, both of you, before twelve to-night. McGrath's determined on it, +and there's no lack of men to carry out his orders. The strikers are +desperate. I overheard their talk, while--well, while I was getting +drunk! _What's that?_" + +He stopped, with his hand to his ear. Some one was tapping at the +communicating door. + +"Put up that flask!" said Barclay under his breath, adding aloud, as +Cavendish obeyed: + +"Come in!" + +The door swung open softly, and Governor Abbott, smiling and rubbing his +hands, appeared upon the threshold. + +"I beg your pardon, Mr. Barclay," he said. "I did not know you were +engaged. We have the pleasure of another visit from the Citizens' +Committee, and, by a singularly opportune coincidence, Mr. McGrath has +called at the same time. Can you spare us a few moments of your time?" + +With a bow, and a glance at Cavendish, Barclay followed his superior +silently from the room. + +In the Governor's office he found a dozen men, all standing. McGrath, +with his back to the others, was examining with an elaborate air of +interest a map of Alleghenia which hung upon the wall. Colonel +Broadcastle and his fellow-members of the Citizens' Committee, stood +close to, and facing, the Governor's desk. The air was electric with +suggestion of a crisis about to come. + +When the Governor began to speak, it was in his habitually suave voice, +yet he was visibly nervous. + +"Colonel Broadcastle has been good enough to observe," he said, "that if +I do not call out the militia within three hours, to protect the +interests of Mr. Peter Rathbawne, his committee will appeal for aid to +the federal government. Now--er--now, in my place, and in such a +situation, Mr. Barclay--er--what would you do?" + +The Lieutenant-Governor's nerve, strained beyond endurance by the events +of the past twenty-four hours, snapped like a dry twig at the +contemptuous hypocrisy of the other's tone. + +"_Do!_" he thundered--"_do?_ Why, as God is my witness, Elijah Abbott, +if I were in your place I would do what any honest man would do! I would +do what my oath demanded of me! I would clap that man McGrath into jail +for iniquitous inciting to riot, and place Colonel Broadcastle, at the +head of his regiment, in charge of the city to restore order and the +reign of law, and to redeem Alleghenia from the disgrace that is +overwhelming her. _Do?_ Before God, the Republic, and the state, +Governor Abbott, I would do my duty as a man!" + +"_Then do it!_" + +The words, spoken from the threshold of Barclay's office, rent the +silence like a thunderclap, and before those present had time to turn, +there came the sound of a pistol-shot, and Governor Abbott, wheeling +slowly on his heels, crashed headforemost through the plate-glass window +behind him, and lay, limp and motionless, across the sill. + +"Then do it, by God, _Governor Barclay_!" repeated Cavendish, and flung +his revolver into the centre of the room. + +The apartment was already filled with those attracted from the corridors +and adjacent offices by the sound of the shot. Several seized Cavendish, +who stood without movement, smiling. Barclay, Colonel Broadcastle, and +the other members of the committee lifted the Governor's body from the +position in which it had fallen, and laid it upon a couch. After a brief +examination, the Colonel looked up into Barclay's eyes. + +"He's dead, sir," he said. "The assassin was right. You are Governor of +Alleghenia." + +For an instant, Barclay returned his glance with one of earnest inquiry. + +"Even in the face of this tragedy," added Colonel Broadcastle in a low +voice, "I trust you will not forget the exigencies of the situation. It +is for you to act, sir." + +Barclay suddenly raised himself to his full height, and faced the silent +gathering. + +"Gentlemen," he said firmly, "the Governor is dead. For the moment, at +least, I act in his stead. Kenton City is under martial law. Those who +have the assassin in charge will see that he is immediately turned over +to the chief of police. Mr. McGrath, you will consider yourself under +arrest. Colonel Broadcastle, you will immediately assemble your regiment +at its armory, issue three days' rations, and twenty rounds of ball +cartridge, and hold yourself and your command in readiness for riot +duty, subject to my orders." + +Then he faced Cavendish. + +"There's a message I'd like to have delivered, to the Fairy Princess," +said the latter, still smiling. "It is that Diogenes has eaten the ugly +little bug." + + + + +XIV + +THE VOICE OF ALLEGHENIA + + +As Barclay had foreseen, the adoption of stringent measures was all that +was needed to break the back-bone of the strike at the Rathbawne Mills. +The presence of the Ninth Regiment, under command of that noted +disciplinarian, Colonel Broadcastle, and terribly in earnest, as was +evinced by the ball cartridges gleaming in their belts, was sufficient +to discourage any further attempts at disorder; the sudden shift of base +of the newspapers which had formerly supported the rioters, and now, +taking their cue from the policy of the new Governor, counseled +immediate surrender; above all, the trial, conviction, and sentence of +their moving spirit, McGrath, to a term of years for inciting to +riot--all were irresistible factors in the Union's capitulation. Two +weeks after the death of Governor Abbott, the Rathbawne Mills were +running once more, and Peter Rathbawne himself, though whiter of hair +and but a shadow of his old self, was, nevertheless, on the high road to +recovery. + +The trial and conviction of Spencer Cavendish were accomplished with +unexampled celerity. He would admit of no defense, although the lawyer +appointed for him by the court was strenuous for a plea of insanity, +based upon the singular remark which he had made upon the announcement +of Elijah Abbott's death, and which was construed by those who heard it +as ample proof of irresponsibility. Called upon in court to give his +defense, Cavendish stated in a loud, clear voice that he was strictly +accountable for his act, that he was in full possession of his senses at +the time, and that he had killed the Governor in the firm conviction +that he was a menace to the safety of the community, and that the +latter's sole salvation lay in his removal, and the succession of the +Lieutenant-Governor to the position of chief executive. + +"I desire," he concluded, with the same odd smile that he had worn at +the moment of the Governor's death, "nothing but the full penalty of the +law." + +The next day Spencer Cavendish was sentenced to be executed on the +thirtieth of the following month at the State's Prison at Mowberly. + +Then followed the most remarkable manifestation of popular sentiment +ever known in Alleghenia. As Barclay had once said of them, the citizens +of his long degraded state were less vicious than callous, and their +callousness was effectively cured by the dramatic event which had +removed a corrupt official from the head of the state government, and +put in his place a man whose first acts were proofs positive of +strength, integrity, and singleness of purpose. The revulsion of feeling +was overwhelming. Even the press which had sneered at and cried down +John Barclay was forced to the other extreme. Relieved from the burden +of lawlessness which had lain on Kenton City for close upon three +months, the citizens went over in a body to the support of their new +Governor. He was cheered on his every appearance in public as +assiduously as he had been ignored before, and, responding with the +whole force of his sensitive nature to this longed-for and unexpected +popularity, he devoted himself more and more earnestly, day by day, to +the welfare of the state which was his idol. + +But following in the wake of this revulsion of feeling in favor of +Barclay came one, hardly less complete, in favor of Spencer Cavendish. +While strictly speaking there could be no condoning his act, it was none +the less evident to even the most rigid adherents of law that by it he +had conferred an indisputable benefit upon the state of Alleghenia, and +his open statement of his reasons at the time of his trial militated for +rather than against him. So it was that a public petition was framed and +circulated, asking, at the hands of Governor Barclay, the commutation of +the death sentence to one of life imprisonment. Little by little the +list of signatures grew, until, a week before the date fixed for +Cavendish's execution, they were numbered by tens of thousands. Then the +petition, rolled into a cylinder, was presented to the Governor by a +committee, and left for his consideration. + +To Barclay the intervening time had passed with almost incredible +rapidity. His days, filled as they were to overflowing with numberless +and complex duties, were yet the pleasantest he had ever known. At last, +he was what he had dreamed of being--an active factor, the most active +of all factors, in the advancement of his state. Redeemed, as if by a +miracle, from the disgrace which had laid her low, Alleghenia arose, in +his eyes, like a phoenix, throwing off the ashes of her reproach, and +blazing, with new wings of burnished beauty, in the sunlight of hope and +peace. + +Barclay had retained his old office, not caring to make use of a room so +permeated with associations of recent tragedy as was that which had +formerly been Governor Abbott's. Now, with the windows open and the +soft May air stirring the papers on his desk, he sat, looking vacantly +across the room, with the huge petition spread out before him. His +attention, long absorbed by the problem in hand, was diverted by a tap +on the ante-room door, and, in answer to his call, Natalie Rathbawne +stood before him, smiling out of the exquisite daintiness of a fresh +spring frock. + +"You've forgotten!" she said immediately, at sight of his knit brows. + +"Forgotten what?" inquired the Governor inadvisedly. + +The girl's little foot stamped almost noiselessly upon the thick carpet. + +"Upon my word!" she exclaimed, "if there's one thing worse than being +engaged to the Lieutenant-Governor, it's being engaged to the Governor +himself! Forgotten, of course, that we are to lunch together, and look +at wall-papers afterwards! Do you know, John Barclay, I don't believe +you mean to marry me, after all? We'll be just approaching the altar, +when"-- + +She was interrupted in characteristic fashion, and disengaged herself, +with a great air of indignation, from Barclay's arms. + +"If you want to take lunch in the company of a rag carpet," she said +severely, "that's the very best way to go about it. Get your hat." + +There was a little pause as Barclay filed some papers in his private +safe, and then one startled word from the girl. + +"_John!_" + +Wheeling abruptly, he saw her standing at the desk, with her hand on the +petition, and her eyes, wide and wonderstruck, searching his face. + +"Dearest!" he said impulsively, "I wish you hadn't." + +But Natalie only laughed joyfully. + +"But I'm glad, Johnny boy," she answered, "glad--glad--glad! What a +wonderful thing it is to be Governor, boy dear! I don't think I ever +really understood before. Think of it! To have the power of life and +death--to be able to right the wrongs of justice with a single stroke of +the pen. Oh, John! Sign it now--before we go. I shall be so much +happier." + +The Governor made no reply. He stood, with his head bent, smoothing his +hat with the fingers of his right hand. Gradually the expression of +eager expectation on her face changed to one of anxiety. + +"John," she said in a half whisper, "you _are_ going to sign it, aren't +you, boy dear?" + +"I'm not sure," faltered the Governor. "I'm not quite sure, dearest. It +is the hardest problem I've ever had given me to solve. I can understand +now the meaning of something your father said to me just before the +strike,--that, for the first time in his life, he didn't know what to +do, because right seemed to be hopelessly entangled with wrong, and +wrong with right. When a man does evil in order that good may come, one +tries to find an excuse for him, tries to palliate his offense in any +reasonable way. That is human instinct. That is what accounts for the +petition there, with the signatures of many of the most conscientious +men in Alleghenia attached. They have managed to find the excuse, or +they think they have, which, so far as their personal convictions are +concerned, amounts to about the same thing. And I've been saying to +myself that when public opinion points out a course as justifiable it +can hardly be possible for a single individual to say that it is not. +And yet the wrong is there, isn't it? No matter how confused a question +may seem to us, there must absolutely, when we come to think of it, be +some one great elemental principle upon which it not only can, but must, +be decided--some boundary line between justice and injustice which we +may be too blind to see, but which exists, and calls for observance, +none the less. Right is right, wrong is wrong. No confusion between the +two can possibly exist except in appearance. Strive to elude truth as we +will, it remains eternal truth, and cannot be evaded in the end. And +where it seems to be beyond us, all we can do is to strive to find the +silken thread which will surely lead us out of the labyrinth into the +searching light of day. It is that clue which I have been groping for. +What is it? How am I to know it when I see it? What am I to do? At first +I thought the case was clear--what he said, you know--about Diogenes--it +seemed so odd--every one thought so--it might be construed as--as +insanity"-- + +"Oh, _no_, John! Why, _we_ know what that meant! No--no! The best part +of it all was his sanity, his wonderful courage, his braving of almost +certain death for what he believed--and knew, John--_knew_ to be right +and best. Think what he did for Alleghenia, Johnny boy. He has been +almost as great an instrument in her salvation as you. Think what he has +done for all of us--for you, in giving you this opportunity--for me--for +Dad! John, how _can_ you hesitate?" + +The Governor shook his head. + +"Dearest," he said, "you're on the wrong track, just as I have been, a +dozen times since the petition came. Don't you suppose I've thought of +all that? Its significance, not only to me, but, as you say, to the +state, is so tremendous that, at the first glance, it seems to be an +unanswerable argument. But--don't you see?--no sophistry, no +contemplation of the results achieved, can ever make it justifiable for +a man to arrogate to himself the power of taking human life, which is +the prerogative of God and the law alone. The peculiar circumstances of +Cavendish's crime plead eloquently, almost irresistibly, for his pardon. +He has saved the state--yes! But the case is one in a million, and it is +not an individual case alone which hangs upon my decision,--it is the +establishment of a precedent, the maintenance of a principle." + +"But, John," broke in Natalie eagerly, "what you've just said--isn't +that the clue for which you have been groping? He saved the state! I've +heard you talk of Alleghenia too often, of what you hoped for her, and +what you despaired of ever bringing to pass, not to know what those four +words must mean to you. Think of it! _He saved the state!_ Without any +possibility of selfish object he did this extraordinary thing--made it +possible for Alleghenia to win back the honor and respect she had so +nearly lost forever! He killed the man who had no thought of her purity +and dignity, who used the power the people had given him for the +furtherance of his own selfish and wicked ends, who made her justice a +mockery, who played with her law as if"-- + +"Stop!" exclaimed the Governor. "Stop--I must think. Wait a moment. I +must think--I must think!" + +After a minute he began to speak again, this time in a lower tone, a +tone which suggested self-communion rather than direct address to the +girl before him. + +"Yes, that's it. Wait now,--let me be sure! He killed the man who had no +thought of Alleghenia's purity, who used his power to serve his own +ends, who made her justice"--he was speaking very slowly, dwelling on +each word as it left his lips--"her _justice_ a mockery, who played with +her law--her law--her _Law_"-- + +He paused once more, his brows knit, his firm hand slowly stroking his +chin. Then, of a sudden, he drew a deep breath, flung back his +shoulders, and looked at her. His eyes were blazing, his voice touched +with a new meaning, an eloquence deep, firm, conclusive. + +"Natalie," he said, "come here." + +"You've struck the keynote," he added, when they stood face to face, a +foot or two apart. "It isn't what you thought, or what you meant, but it +is the keynote, just the same. The Law!" + +He wheeled slowly, and stepped forward, until he was directly before the +emblazoned arms of Alleghenia which hung upon his wall. + +"_Justitia--Lex--Integritas!_" he said. "Many a time, when the way +seemed darkest, I've read those words over to myself, and found hope in +them. Events changed, crises came and went, portents loomed thick, +despair seemed omnipotent, failure and disgrace inevitable--but the +motto of Alleghenia remained the same. Steadfast, purposeful, and +commanding, it has endured through the trivial changes of political +significance which have been as impotent to sully the actuality of her +fair fame as are sun-spots to dim the radiance of the sun. It is only +natural, perhaps, that the discouragements which were but transient +should have seemed to me to be vital, damning, irremediable. Just as the +Israelites of old turned from the promises of God to worship Baal, so +have I turned from the assurance given me by these arms of Alleghenia, +to prostrate myself before false idols of doubt and despair. I should +have remembered how they called me, in the first instance, from a life +of idleness and ease, to fight my way through the desert of difficulty, +toward the promised land of honor. I should have remembered how in my +darkest hours they went before me as a pillar of fire, how in the famine +of my soul these words were the manna of encouragement, how in my thirst +they struck clear water from the rock of adverse circumstance. But the +Israelites came back to their true God at last; so I, little girl, to my +true ideal. The Law!--you said the word--the Law is the clue, the +keynote, the boundary between right and wrong!" + +She was at his side, and he slipped one arm around her, and held her +close to him as with his finger he traced again the motto of Alleghenia. + +"Do you know what this means?" he asked. "_Justitia_,--to be just to all +men, without fear or favor, lenient to our enemies, rigid and +unyielding, if need be, to our friends; putting aside personal +considerations, striving so far as in us lies to be impartial, merciful +in the face of prejudice, relentless in that of conviction--fair! +_Lex_,--to abide by the law, in spirit only if our inmost conviction +warrants that course, but in letter absolutely where there is the +smallest hint of doubt; secure in the knowledge that, however fallible +it be, it is the best that man has yet been able to do in imitation of +the immutable decrees of God. _Integritas_,--to be true to the oaths we +have sworn, faithful to the promises we have made, loyal to the office +intrusted to us by the people, to whom and for whom we are responsible. +Dearest, I am no mere man. Were I that, were I to consult my will alone, +and it lay, as now it lies, in my power to accomplish, Spencer Cavendish +should go free to-day. I know what he has done; I appreciate his +sacrifice; I see that by a single act he has accomplished what the rest +of us were powerless to cure; I admire his courage; I condone his crime; +I could forget all his weaknesses for the sake of this one great +evidence of his strength. And yet--listen to me, dearest!--in what he +strove to do he has failed utterly, if in removing a corrupt official +who made a mockery of Alleghenia's law he has not replaced him by one +who with all the force of his conscience and all the power of his +influence will see that law administered. And whatever we may say of his +crime, whatever its causes, whatever its wonderful results, it was and +is a crime. 'Thou shalt not kill!' God has said it; Alleghenia by the +voice of her law has ratified it. And not even the fact that Cavendish +has made possible all my fondest and worthiest hopes, the fact that he +has rescued from suffering all I hold most dear"-- + +Barclay suddenly covered his face with his free hand, as he had covered +it on that afternoon in Peter Rathbawne's library, weeks before; then he +looked up again, his lips trembling. + +"Dearest," he said, "I am Governor of Alleghenia, and as such owe an +allegiance, an obedience, which personal prejudice cannot impugn. On +the day when you spoke to me of meeting Cavendish you pointed out the +course of a gentleman and a friend. On the night of the Ninth's +review you taught me the creed of an American and an Alleghenian. +To-day--unconsciously perhaps, but none the less surely--you have made +clear the duty of a public servant. God bless you, my life, my heart, my +conscience! May I be worthy of you and of the commonwealth I serve. +Where I doubted before, now I am sure. It is hard--God only knows how +hard--but listen to Alleghenia's bidding! _Justitia_, _Lex_, +_Integritas_,--equity, the code, and good faith, in the sight of God and +man, heaven and earth, the American people and the commonwealth of +Alleghenia. God save the state!" + +"John," whispered the girl brokenly,--"John, you're right. God save the +state!" + +Slowly, tenderly, the Governor of Alleghenia led her back to the table, +and taking up a pen, with a firm hand wrote five words, heavily +underscored, at the head of the Cavendish petition. And these were:-- + + "_Disapproved._ + _John Hamilton Barclay_, + _Governor._" + +Then, turning to the girl who loved him, he took her in his arms. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Lieutenant-Governor, by Guy Wetmore Carryl + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR *** + +***** This file should be named 30448.txt or 30448.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/4/4/30448/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Woodie4 and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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