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diff --git a/45866-8.txt b/45866-8.txt deleted file mode 100644 index b14c3c6..0000000 --- a/45866-8.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,12098 +0,0 @@ - THE SPIDER'S WEB - - - - -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 http://www.gutenberg.org/license. - - - -Title: The Spider's Web -Author: Reginald Wright Kauffman -Release Date: June 02, 2014 [EBook #45866] -Language: English -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SPIDER'S WEB *** - - - - -Produced by Al Haines. - - - - - -[Illustration: BETTY STOOD AT THE WINDOW IN THE FULL LIGHT OF THE -STREET-LAMP] - - - - - THE SPIDER'S WEB - - - BY - - REGINALD WRIGHT KAUFFMAN - - Author of "The House of Bondage," etc., etc. - - - - Illustrated by - JEAN PALEOLOGUE - - - - NEW YORK - MOFFAT, YARD AND COMPANY - 1913 - - - - - COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY MOFFAT, YARD AND COMPANY - _All Rights Reserved_ - Published October, 1913 - - - - - To - EVERETT HARRÉ - _Gratefully_ - - - - - That's the shout, the shout we shall utter - When, with rifles and spades, - We stand, with the old Red Flag aflutter - On the barricades! - --FRANCIS ADAMS. - - - Thou orb of many orbs! - Thou seething principle! Thou well-kept, latent germ! - Thou center! - Around the idea of thee the strange sad war revolving, - With all its angry and vehement play of causes, - (With yet unknown results to come, for thrice a thousand - years).... - --WHITMAN. - - - While three men hold together, - The kingdoms are less by three. - --SWINBURNE. - - - - - *LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS* - - -"Betty," he said, "do you understand what your father is asking me to -do?" . . . (Outside cover) (missing from book) - -Betty stood at the window in the full light of the street-lamp . . . . . -. . . . _Frontispiece_ - -He found it necessary to be emphatic - -The mob was using the coal from the dismantled wagon - - - - - *EXPLANATION* - - -In order to warn off trespassers, I have begun my novel with four -chapters that an expert bookmaker--indeed, my own book-maker--has -pronounced dull: I knew that only those to whom the book belonged would -persevere. By the same token, being aware that the story which is -prefaced by an apology is ended with suspicion, I preface this story -with an apology: I want to apologize to my friends for using them and to -my enemies for not giving them what they have expected; I want to create -in the minds of the former the suspicion that I am darker than I have -been painted, and in the minds of the latter the suspicion that I am not -a whited sepulcher but a blackened altar. - -In 1909 I projected, vaguely it is true, a cycle of four novels, each to -be independent of the others in plot and character, but all carrying -forward a definite view of life. As, however, the announcement of a -cycle is the surest means of alienating readers, not to mention -publishers, I held my tongue about the general plan and concerned -myself, in public, only with its separate parts. These were "The House -of Bondage," "The Sentence of Silence," "Running Sands" and "The -Spider's Web." - -Privately, the first question demanding answer was that of method. In -what I had to say I believed burningly, as I still believe deeply, and -the great thing with me was not to say it in the manner that most people -would call Art, but to say it in the manner that would convert as many -readers as possible to my way of thinking. I did not want to produce -the effect of a work of Art; I wanted to produce conviction of truth. -On the one hand, I must avoid even the appearance of a personal interest -in my characters, because that would divert my readers into the charge -of sentimentality; and on the other, I must not hesitate to marshal my -events in their largest force, even though the reviewers called this -melodrama. - -Here is a choice that is sure to come sooner or later to every writer of -fiction: the choice between what he has considered Art for Art's sake -and what he considers art for Man's sake. He has kept in mind the day -when his books will be judged solely by their own merits, when the -causes with which he sympathizes have been defeated and forgotten or -established and beyond the need of sympathy; when new evils demand new -remedies and old wounds are healed. He knows, as few of his -contemporary readers can know, that then he will be heavily handicapped -by all that is immediate or local in what he writes; that by nothing -save adherence to the eternal standards of Art can he endure. He may be -certain, in his own mind, that any true art is the expression, in the -manner best calculated to secure a desired effect, of the ideas -essential to the effect, but he will be equally sure that the world will -not so consider. If he sets any propaganda above Art, the future will -forget his work, the present meet it with prejudice, probably with -opposition; and against all this he has to set only his own faith in the -righteousness of the thing he has to say. - -I made my choice and began my cycle with that one of my four novels -which I knew would receive the readiest hearing. In "The House of -Bondage" I wanted to put before my readers the theory that the -superimposing of one human being's will, or the will of any group of -human beings, upon any other's is the Great Crime. For the purposes of -illustration, I chose for attack the chief present means of such -imposition or compulsion, the pressure of our economic system, and -depicted its effects in forcing women into prostitution. The result was -amazing: the book sold and, they tell me, is still selling in my own and -several other countries and tongues; it either originated or promoted a -series of sociological crusades and legislative investigations -concerning themselves with the symptoms and neglecting the disease, and -by no persons was it so heartily welcomed as by those who are themselves -the instruments of compulsion. I began to think that the instruments -were becoming conscious and that I might not be so unpopular after all. - -I was never more mistaken. In "The Sentence of Silence" I proceeded to -show other effects of the same evil compulsion: the effects of our -failure to instruct our children in sex-hygiene; of imposing upon our -heirs the moral code that our economic system has imposed upon us, and -of imposing upon our daughters an abstinence from which we absolve our -sons. In its circulation, this book left its publishers nothing to -complain of; but its reception was of a sort vastly different from that -of its predecessor. Parents that were loath to see other people's -daughters forced into prostitution were shocked at a proposal to educate -their own sons against the practice of seduction; husbands that lived in -secret polygamy were aghast at the idea of instructing their wives in -any code save that which they preached, but did not follow; and men that -took any woman's body they could get were horrified at the notion of any -woman sharing their liberty. - -The remarkable book-reviewer of the generally sane Philadelphia -"Inquirer" upbraided me because, after I had dragged my central -character, Dan Barnes, through the sewers of debauchery and venereal -disease, I did not "save" him by marrying him to a "pure" woman! - -Came the third novel, "Running Sands," and came a louder protest. I had -here tried to take a step further my argument against compulsion and to -show that, if I had been right before, then compulsion by matrimony--the -marriage of the old to the young and the knowing to the ignorant, rape -within wedlock and forcing of wives to become mothers against their -will--was wrong. Here again the people read and the instruments of -compulsion condemned me. Those persons who, without a wry face among -them, swallow the funny but futile jokes of another type of fiction were -so whole-hearted in their curses of my book that I was inclined to -believe their present bitterness enhanced by their recollection of how -they had once praised me. - -Now I have written "The Spider's Web," the last of my four, and I have -read that it is expected to be to its predecessors what Landor said the -fourth George was to his. For a good pair of eyes at the conventional -point of view, it is all this and more; but then there are no good eyes -at the conventional point of view, and so I fear that, without help, the -condemners of "The Sentence of Silence" and "Running Sands" may find -this novel innocent: there is only one "bad" woman among its -speaking-roles, and she appears but three brief times. In order that my -condemners may not miss what they want to find in me, I shall tell them -in a simpler form than the dramatic what I have done. - -I have made Luke Huber a man that comes to see the sin of compulsion -exerting itself against humanity in all the powers that conduct modern -society; in the ownership of men and things; in our entire system of -production and distribution, and in the creatures and ministers of that -system: Government, Politics, Law, and what passes by the name of -Religion. - -Such a mind as Huber's comes to Dora Marsden's conclusion: "Life is no -two days the same: the same measure never fits twice exactly; hence the -futility of state-making, law-making, moral-making, when all that is of -importance is life-augmenting, and that is the individual's affair." He -sees that only Labor creates wealth, and that nothing should be robbed -of a fraction of what it creates. He sees that actually government is -"not the president, congress and the courts, not any body or power -created by the Constitution, but always a combination of important -business interests,"[#] not even any individual, and that even if it -were completely constitutional it would still be compulsion--that to -"consent" to be governed is to consent to be compelled. - - -[#] Charles Edward Russell. - - -He would argue of politics: - -"We Americans pretend to hate kings, and so we devise a republic; -finding the rule of one man bad, we believe we can better it by -multiplying it by ninety millions; finding an ounce has evil effects, we -take a ton. We simply change the tyranny of one for the tyranny of -many. Even if the will of our fifteen million voters ruled us as they -tell us it does, then each one of the fifteen million would be giving -all the 14,999,999 others the right to interfere with him in return for -his one fifteen-millionth right to take a hand in interfering with them. -For that fraction of power over others, he would be giving away all his -power over himself." - -Huber would say of religion and law: - -"Both are tools in the hands of compulsion. Both try to belittle divine -humanity, the first making Man a pygmy before God and the second making -Man a pygmy before a few men. There can be no crime against God, since -God, or the force that created the world, is omnipotent; no crime -against law, since law is an instrument of the great crime. The law a -deterrent? It isn't. The statistics prove that, so far as statistics -can prove anything. But you prove it yourself. Why do you try to -refrain from conscious wrong? Not because you're afraid of the law in -heaven or on earth--you're not a coward. You simply want to do the -decent thing because it _is_ the decent thing. The desire to do the -decent thing: that's all the religion and law there is to-day among even -the people that make laws and religions for the purpose of ruling other -people by them. The rulers sin only because their system has dimmed -their judgment of the decent thing, and so they go on maintaining their -law and their religion. The ruled will want to do the decent thing just -as soon as they become responsible creatures through the abolition of -these compulsions, exactly as the rulers, though dulled by keeping up -their system, wanted to do it as soon as they became responsible -creatures by growing above the dictates of these compulsions." - -Other men, other religions. For some faith; for some denial. Huber's -religion was the Gospel of Negation. - -He came to this by conversion, which means the sudden revelation by the -sub-conscious self to the conscious self of the meanings that the -sub-conscious self has long been drawing from the conscious self's -experiences. The outward phenomena of such conversions--"being saved," -"receiving grace," "being regenerated," "experiencing religion"--are -perfectly familiar to all persons that have attended evangelical -churches, know the work of the Salvation Army, or have read Harold -Begbie's "Broken Earthenware." The psychology of the force causing them -has been elaborately, but not always scientifically, treated in William -James's stimulating volume, "Some Varieties of Religious Experience." -The force itself can, and often does, change the entire life of a man -from evil to good. The men so changed that we most hear of are changed -by an affirmation of faith, because they are men whose only spiritual -experience has been in connection with accepted religions and because -their change is generally first exhibited in the public meeting-place of -the followers of some such religion; but there are other men similarly -changed by a denial of faith, because they have had spiritual -experiences distinct from any accepted religion, and of them we hear -little, because their change is generally wrought in the solitude in -which they have had those spiritual experiences which are unconnected -with accepted religion. - -Huber was a man of the latter sort. Being of that sort, he says the -last word that follows logically from an acceptance of "The House of -Bondage." - -About the manner of this last word I should, perhaps, say something -more. I have not, I confess with shame, read M. Fabre's book on the -habits of the spider, but I have read other books and studied the spider -in my own garden; and the more I learned of web and spider the more I -realize how Huber would see their simulacra in our civilization and -learn at last that there the web outlived many spiders. That is how I -got my title, and that is why I have tried to construct my chapters with -a certain rough resemblance to the female diadem-spider's web. At the -end, both the web and Huber win: the former because it catches its fly -and goes on catching other and larger flies; the latter because his soul -has found itself. - -The method of procuring data requires a fuller explanation. The writer -who endeavors to present actual conditions in fictional form has -constantly to choose between truth and facts, and if his readers accept -his facts, they are inclined to doubt his imagination. In all of these -four books, I have been careful to present only types, but I have tried -to endow each type with character, and each character has assumed a -living personality in my own mind. I have used no person and no event -that was isolated; but, having individualized my types and chosen my -typical events, I have felt free to employ the latter in whatever way -seemed to me best fitted to enforce my argument, and at liberty to -imagine what the former would think and do under the stress of the -latter. I have heard of a dozen women in real life designated as the -originals of Mary Denbigh, three wives selected as Muriel Stainton, and -one man--myself--named as Dan Barnes. The discoverers of these -prototypes only flattered my powers of detection and portraiture at the -expense of my imagination and good taste. - -I intended to present, and I have presented, simply certain types -produced by our civilization and working in the media of our economic -system. I spent considerable time in New York last winter to procure -certain data; I found the data, selected what was typical as I saw it, -and made my story. "The Spider's Web," whether well done or ill, has -been done by my own imagination. - -Help I have had and eagerly sought. An historian always cites his -authorities and acknowledges his assistants; I could never see why a -novelist should be less honest or less courteous, since every realist -must delegate some of his research-work, and even the writer of that -fiction farthest from life must take something from the fancy of his -acquaintances. I know, and I shall not soon forget, how much "The House -of Bondage" owes to the encouragement given my work by its publishers. -During the latter part of the actual writing of "The Spider's Web," it -was impossible for either my wife or me to be in New York, and I taxed -the generous patience of many a friend by inquiries. I exacted tribute -from Max Eastman's editorials in "The Masses," Walter Lippmann's papers -in "The Forum," and C. P. Connolly's in "Everybody's Magazine" as -expressing three current phases of American opinion; I even seized a -picture from Mary Macdonald Brown's accounts of New York and secured -from an editorial in "The Nation" my reference to the past of the Astor -House. Molière took his own where he found it; I have taken other men's -at my need. To all of these my score is long; to those few and fine -newspaper and magazine critics and reviewers who have seen my purpose -and helped it--who, when they have differed or blamed, blamed or -differed honestly--to them, from whom I have learned so much, my -obligation is still greater. - -No opinions that are worth while are unalterable; only the insincere -have fixed convictions: my cycle of four books expresses an attitude -toward life that I may some day very well change. This series -completed, I am left with my conscience free and my brain at liberty to -turn toward work that I may try to design only by the more lasting -standards of Art, but no change of belief or work will make me regret -having expressed what I believed. I am thoroughly aware of how, if they -understood it, the condemners of "The Sentence of Silence" and "Running -Sands" would condemn this book. I am equally aware of how many persons -that are my comrades, friends, and well-wishers will alter their -relations toward me when they have read "The Spider's Web"; but, though -I shall be sorry to lose these, I shall not be sorry for the reason of -their loss. Horace Traubel, who puts most things well, has put this -well: - - "I have tried to stay in the house of comfort, - to sleep in my bed of ease, - But something not outside of me, something inside of me says: - This will not do.... - I have tried the easy way: it was hard: - Now I will try the hard way: I guess it will be easier." - -REGINALD WRIGHT KAUFFMAN. - -POSCHIAVO, SWITZERLAND, -8th September, 1913. - - - - - *CHARACTERS* - - - A MAN, - - the head of a group of men virtually controlling industrial, - financial, and political America. - - GEORGE J. HALLETT, one of his associates. - L. BERGEN RIVINGTON, another. - - - - *Politicians*. - - THE GOVERNOR OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK. - THE MAYOR OF NEW YORK CITY. - - HON. G. W. HUBER, U. S. Congressman, from - Doncaster County, Pennsylvania, - HON. JESSE KINZER, his successor. - SENATOR SCUDDER, the MAN'S lieutenant in the - Albany legislature, - HON. JARED SPARKS, his lieutenant in the Connecticut - legislature. - BRINLEY, commander of his lobby at - Washington. - KILGOUR, City Chamberlain of New York. - TIM HENEY, Leader of Tammany Hall. - SEELEY, an anti-Tammany Democratic - leader. - ELLISON, another. - THE POLICE-COMMISSIONER OF NEW YORK CITY. - GEORGE KAINDIAC, a U. S. Post-Office Inspector. - VENABLE, ) leaders of the Municipal - NELSON, ) Reform League. - YEATES, ) - JARVIE, a Municipal Reform League - "worker." - - - - *Lawyers*. - - BROUWER LEIGHTON, District-Attorney of New - York. A Republican. - LARRY O'MARA, a member of his staff, - UHLER, another member of Leighton's - staff. - - EX-JUDGE MARCUS F. STEIN, of the firm of Stein, Falconridge, - Falconridge & Perry, - corporation-lawyers. - IRWIN, a member of Stein's staff. - ANSON QUIRK, an underworld lawyer. - LUKE HUBER, a young lawyer. - - - - *Businessmen*. - - ROBERT M. DOHAN, president of the M. & N. R. R. - HENRY G. McKAY, his successor. - B. FRANK OSSERMAN, president of the East County - National Bank. - WALLACE K. FORBES, head of the firm of R. H. - Forbes & Son, manufacturers - of ready-made clothing, - ALEXANDER TITUS, financial-inquiry agent. - JAMES T. ROLLINS, the MAN'S secretary. - ATWOOD, his chief broker. - SIMPSON, his almoner. - CONOVER, one of his confidential clerks. - HERBERT CROY, manager of the Ruysdael estate. - WHITAKER, superintendent of the Forbes - factory. - THE DESK-CLERK, in the Arapahoe Apartment house. - CHARLEY, a clerk in the M. R. L. offices, - REV. PINKNEY NICHOLSON, rector of Church of St. Athanasius. - - - - *Miscellaneous Persons*. - - THE MAN'S NIECE. - CORNELIUS RUYSDAEL, a wealthy New Yorker of - good family. - MRS. RUYSDAEL, his wife. - TOMMY HALLETT, son of George J. - JOHN JAY PORCELLIS, a young man of leisure. - BETTY FORBES, daughter of Wallace K. Forbes. - MRS. HUBER, mother of Luke and wife of - G. W. Huber. - JANE HUBER, her daughter. - JAMES, the Forbes chauffeur. - MISS WESTON, a telephone operator. - BREIL, a strike-breaker. - AN I.W.W. ORGANIZER. - - - - *Policeman*. - - HUGH DONOVAN, a police-lieutenant - MITCHELL, ) - ANDERSON, ) patrolmen. - GUTH, ) - - - - *Militiamen*. - - CAPTAIN ANTONIO FACCIOLATI, of the New York N. G. - TERRY, first-lieutenant under Facciolati. - SCHMIDT, a sergeant. - - - - *Citizens of the Underworld*. - - A BUM. - GACE, an assassin. - A DISORDERLY WOMAN. - A WOMAN-RIOTER. - A DRUNKEN WOMAN. - REDDY RAWN, leader of an East Side "gang." - REDDY'S "GIRL." - THE KID, one of his associates, - CRAB ROTELLO. head of a rival gang. - ZANTZINGER, a gunman. - BUTCH DELLITT, another gunman. - - - - *Other Persons*. - - Women of the street, the brothel, the world. - Clothing-factory workers. - A mob. - Waiters in saloons. - Clerks and foremen in the Forbes factory. - Stenographers and typists. - Gamblers. - Other gangmen. - Other policemen. - Various minor Republican, Democratic, Reform, and Progressive - politicians. - Newspaper-reporters. - Some newspaper-editors. - A corps of strike-breakers. - Scabs. - Soldiers of the New York National Guard. - - - - - *THE SPIDER'S WEB* - - - - *CHAPTER I* - - -§1. Early that morning, Luke Huber stood before the Pennsylvania -Railroad Station at Americus and fancied himself a latter-day crusader -setting out to reconquer from the infidels the modern Holy City of God. -He had graduated from the Harvard Law-School in the previous June. Now -the Republican brother-in-law of one of his classmates, having been -elected District-Attorney of corruptly Democratic New York, offered a -place on his staff to Luke as soon as Huber should meet successfully the -necessary formalities. This new public-prosecutor was to "clean up" the -largest city in the country, and Luke, as his assistant, was to aid in -restoring to the metropolis the ideals of the framers of the -Constitution. - -A slim young man, with a smooth face too rugged to be handsome, and gray -eyes too keen to be always dreaming, Huber stood erect, the wide collar -of his woolen overcoat turned up, for the spring lingered that year in -the valleys of Virginia, and the brim of his Alpine hat pulled over his -nose. He disregarded the group of boys waiting for the "up-train" that -would bring the Philadelphia morning newspapers to his native -Pennsylvania town, disregarded the grimy station-buildings, and looked -toward the river, where the morning mists were lifting and the cold -sunshine was creeping through to light the Susquehanna hills. He was one -of those fortunate and few human beings who are born without the -original sin of superstition, but what he saw seemed to him almost a -favorable omen. He had come down early, because he disliked to prolong -the good-bys of his mother and sister, and because he felt that even the -walk to the station was an important advance in the quest which he was -so eager to begin. When he arrived beside the railway tracks and -allowed his father, the Congressman, to see to the checking of the -baggage--a concession that Luke made to his parent's desire for some -part in the great adventure--the entire river was hidden from view by a -thick dun curtain: one could see nothing beyond the point by the shore -where the black arms of a derrick, at the Americus Sand Company's works, -were silhouetted against that curtain and stretched over a tremendous -mound of sand, as if they were the arms of some gigantic skeleton -pronouncing the benediction at a Black Mass. But now, though the fog -really rose, it appeared to Luke to be torn from above, and as the sun -mounted over distant Turkey Hill and gradually gilded the pines on the -surrounding summits, it seemed to advance up the bed of the stream, -slowly descending of its own force along the dark hillsides, until, all -at once, the river was a rushing stream of gold. Luke found himself -thinking of the veil of the Temple, and how it was rent in twain from -the top to the bottom. - -His father, who was taller than Luke, but broad out of all proportion to -his height, came puffing back from the baggage-room. He held the checks -for Luke's luggage and a slip of pink paper. - -"Here are your checks," he said, "and here's your pass. I forgot to -give it to you. It came last night." - -Luke took the proffered paper. - -"I thought," he began, "that the Interstate Commerce Commission -didn't----" - -The Congressman interrupted with a deep chuckle. - -"Oh, that's all right," he said. "Don't let your conscience worry you -about that. This is for a continuous ride to a terminus of the road." - -"I see," said Luke; but what he saw was that his father, whom he loved -too much to hurt uselessly, had, out of kindness, strained a legal -definition. His father, he reflected, was not a man to abuse privilege -in large matters, and would be only hurt by a refusal in the present -trivial affair. Luke put the pass in the cuff of his overcoat and -silently decided to pay his fare to the conductor. The elder man, big -as he was, stamped his feet on the concrete pavement and complained of -the chill in the April air; the younger was too happy to notice the -cold. - -"Train's five minutes late," remarked the Congressman as, through a -cautiously unbuttoned overcoat, he drew and snapped open a heavy watch. - -"Is your time correct?" asked Luke. - -"Hasn't varied three seconds a week in ten years," his father assured -him. - -Neither was thinking of what was being said. The younger man was so -full of the high work ahead of him that he had already forgotten his -mother's ill-concealed tears at parting; the elder, granted political -favors rather because of his personal popularity and pliant good-nature -than for any ability at the game of vote-keeping, possessed at least the -chief virtue of the politician: he was a man of few words, and the more -truly he felt the less he spoke. - -The "up-train" arrived (it was the "down-train" that Luke must take), -and the Congressman was besieged by the newsboys, who knelt about him, -striking their rolls of newspapers on the pavement the quicker to burst -the wrappers in which the journals were closely confined. - -"_Press_, Mr. Huber?" - -"_North American_ or _Record_?" - -"_Ledger_?" - -The boys bobbed up, flourishing their wares. - -"Aw, I know what he wants," said an older lad, elbowing the rest. -"Here's yer _Inquirer_, Mr. Congressman." - -Luke's father smiled: he had never outgrown his liking for homage from -whatever quarter; but he bought a paper from each boy, giving each a -five-cent piece and telling him to keep the change. - -"You might as well take the lot," he said to Luke. "You'll want -something to read on the train." He was handing all the papers to Luke, -when his eyes were caught by a large headline on the first page of one -of them. "Hello!" he commented, his lips immediately pursing themselves -as if to whistle. As Luke took its fellows, the Congressman folded this -paper with the sudden skill of the confirmed newspaper-reader, who can -handle a journal in the open air as neatly as a trained yachtsman can -reef a top-sail before an undesirable wind. "I see the Big Man's been -giving some more testimony to that committee of the legislature up at -Albany." - -For the past few weeks, Luke had been too busy preparing for his -bar-examinations to keep track of current events. - -"Who's the Big Man?" he asked. - -The elder Huber raised his thick brows. - -"You know," said he, and he mentioned the name of one of the richest men -in America; not a man that had made his wealth even through the building -of a great industry, but one that had, by "editing" money and -combinations of money much in that manner in which a news-desk -copy-reader edits the reporters' "copy," made himself a member of the -triumvirate--rumor said made the triumvirate and made himself its -head--which had for years controlled alike the labor and capital of the -country. - -"What's he been saying?" asked Luke. - -"He's been answering questions about campaign contributions." - -"To the Democrats?" - -"Well, no." The Congressman was reluctant. "It seems it was to the -Republicans." - -Luke colored. - -"Of course," he said, "I always knew those fellows had no real political -convictions, and of course any party is bound to have some bad lots -among its small fry, but I do wish our National Committee would kick out -of the ranks the men that take money from such people." - -The father did not like this. Luke had been a great deal away from him, -first at boarding-school and then at college and the law-school, so that -the two had not seen much of each other for many years; but since the -younger had come home this last time, he had given frequent expression -to sentiments of the present sort, and the Congressman, although he -disliked argument as keenly as most Congressmen, felt that now it was -his duty to protest. - -"My boy," he said, "you won't go far if you go about talking that way. -This contribution went to the fund that elected your District-Attorney -Leighton." - -"I don't believe it!" - -"That's the testimony." - -"I don't believe it. This man's swearing to that so as to hurt the -party in New York." - -"This man?" Luke's father repeated the phrase interrogatively. His -usual taciturnity fell from him. "Why do you say that? How do you know -it? Why should he want to hurt the party? As a matter of fact, what do -you know about 'this man,' anyhow? Nothing but a lot of unfounded -gossip printed in papers that want him to come over to their side. Why -shouldn't he help our party? I do know something about him. I've never -met him, but I know the whole story of his career--know it -intimately--and I tell you that his is the greatest intellect in America -to-day, and he has used his intellect, and the wealth it got him, to -help--not only once, but again and again--to help and to save--yes, -save, the party and the prosperity of the nation. I tell you----" - -He did not tell any more. The down-train had been rumbling over the -last span of the river-bridge when he began talking; and now it rolled -before the station. - -Luke took his suitcase in one hand and extended the other in farewell. -Unexpectedly he felt a lump in his throat. - -"Good-by," he said. - -His father gripped the hand. His habitual inarticulateness redescended -upon him. "You've--I know you're all right, Luke. Don't forget to -write once a week: your mother worries." - -"I won't forget." - -They stood, hands clasped. - -Close by, the "train-crier" was calling in a high, nasal voice: - -"Train for Mountwille, Doncaster, Downington, Philadelphy, _and_ Noo -York! First stop Mountwille!" - -"And, Luke----" - -"Yes, father?" - -"Don't make charges when you don't know facts." - -"Perhaps I have a weakness that way," Luke smiled. - -His smile conjured another. - -"That's right; now you're showing the proper spirit." With his free -hand, the elder man patted the younger's shoulder. "Stick to your books -and stick to Leighton. Gratitude is the best virtue--and the rarest." - -Luke nodded. - -"Now, get aboard," concluded his counselor. "Got your pass?--and the -checks?--I'll be running over occasionally, I dare say.--And let me know -if I can do anything for you." - -Luke clambered into the smoking-car. He took a seat on the side near -the station and waved his hand to his father as the engine began to -snort. He paid his fare to the conductor, and, when Americus was well -behind him, he opened the window, tore the pink pass into a dozen small -pieces and let the clean April breeze carry them away. - -At Doncaster he changed to the Pullman car that was there attached to -the train; he again carefully chose his seat, this time selecting one on -the side from which he could the better enjoy his first view of New -York. He had always liked this view when it came to him on his returns -to Boston after his vacations; it wakened in him the dreams of the day -which should light him into the city, there to work for its salvation -and the nation's. His youthful dreams were still with him, and, since -the moment when the sun had rent the Susquehanna mists, he was looking -forward to that sight of the southernmost walls of New York towering -like the ramparts of a mighty fortress above the crowded waters of the -Jersey City ferry. Then, indeed, with the battle yet to be fought, he -would feel as the crusaders must have felt at their first sight of -Jerusalem. - -But Luke's train was late, and by the time that it reached the point -from which the city should have been visible, the mists had again -descended. They had deepened. All that Luke, with straining eyes, -could see were a few spectral turrets, distorted and ugly in the -thickened atmosphere, swaying overhead upon waves of yellow fog. - - -§2. Jack Porcellis, with his mother's motor, met Luke. They were -driven to the apartment-house in Thirty-ninth Street where, upon Jack's -advice, Huber had written to engage two small rooms and bath. It was -Jack Porcellis (his real name was John Jay Porcellis) who had -District-Attorney Leighton for a brother-in-law and had induced that -official to give Luke a place on the staff of the public prosecutor. - -Porcellis was considerably taller than Huber and very considerably -thinner. He was a quiet member of an old Knickerbocker family, who was -at home in every sort of society, had gone to law-school as an -intellectual diversion and now spent most of his time traveling, always -well within his income, through whatever lands chanced to attract his -continually changing fancy. - -"I hope you'll be comfortable here," he said, when they had been lifted -to the fifth floor of the house, which was dry and hot from the steam -radiators and smelled as all steam-heated houses smell. The elevator-boy -was unlocking the door to Luke's apartments while Porcellis spoke. He -stood aside as the two men entered. - -"I think I'll make out very well," said Luke. He handed the boy a tip -and dismissed him. "It's not so big as our rooms in Ware Hall, but then -there were two of us there." - -The quarters were indeed small. The parlor was almost diminutive, and -the bedroom, which opened from it, was an alcove; the front window gave -upon the busy street, with a bit of Broadway to the right, and the -bathroom, in American fashion, was as large as the parlor. - -"I did the best I could for you," Porcellis explained: he failed to -account for his friend's tone by the fact that Luke was fresh from the -spaciousness of a small town. - -Huber softened. - -"I didn't mean to criticise, Jack. I'm sure this will do splendidly. -After all, I'm in New York for hard work." - -"I know you are." Porcellis smiled faintly. "You were never anywhere -for anything else. Well, you'll probably get over that before you've -quite spoiled yourself for everything. It's a way New York has." - -Huber was tolerant. "Is it? You see, I don't know the town very well." - -"Who does? However, I'll show you what I can before I sail--I'm going -to Russia next week, you know--and by way of a beginning I've brought -you a ready-made engagement for to-night. We'll dine at my club, and -see the Follies, and after that--well, I've got you a card to Mrs. -Ruysdael's dance." - -"This doesn't sound like preparation for work," chuckled Luke; "but, -thank you--and who is Mrs. Ruysdael?" - -"Who is Mrs. Ruysdael?" Porcellis repeated. He was stroking the spot -where his blond mustache had been a year ago, but where, because -mustaches had since become unfashionable, it no longer grew. "Why, the -Mrs. Ruysdael, of course: Mrs. Cornelius Ruysdael." - -When he heard it in full, Luke remembered the name. Of Mrs. Ruysdael he -knew only that she was a woman of fashion; but her husband was -everywhere known as the worthy representative of a Dutch New York name -long eminent in the country's history. The family had been rich for -several generations, but they had proved themselves surprisingly able to -wear the cloak of wealth with dignity. - -"I remember now," said Luke. "They're said to be among the heaviest -real-estate owners in New York, aren't they?" - -Porcellis laughed. - -"Well, yes, they are," he conceded: "but none of us ever think of that. -I doubt if even they do. They leave their estate to their agents to -manage, and we leave the story of it to the yellow press to talk about." - -"I never knew there was any story connected with it." - -"No? Well, for my part, I don't believe there is. Some labor-agitator -searched the records and tried to prove they made their first fortune -buying condemned muskets from the British garrisons just before the -Revolution and selling them as good arms to the Continental Congress. -He said they invested the profits in New York land as soon as prices -fell after the Declaration of Independence was signed." - -"Was it true?" asked Luke. - -Porcellis shrugged. - -"It was all a long time ago, at any rate," he said, "and the Ruysdaels -are very nice people now: you would never guess they were worth more -than a million. Besides, Charley--that's my Wall Street cousin--says -they've somehow funded their landholdings with one of Old Nap's -concerns. I don't know. I don't pretend to understand finance." - -Luke felt extremely ignorant. - -"Old Nap?" he wondered. "Who's he?" - -In reply, Porcellis mentioned the name of the man of whom Luke's father -had spoken so highly that morning at the railway station in Americus. - -Huber pushed forward a chair. - -"Sit down," he said, "and have a cigarette. I want to ask you one -question more. You've been all over the map. You've got the -cosmopolitan point of view. What do you think of this man?" - -"I think," said Porcellis, accepting both the chair and the cigarette, -"that it doesn't make any difference what I think of him." He lit the -cigarette. "But I'm quite sure," he presently added, "he is the sort of -man nobody can help thinking _something_, about. Why do you ask?" - -"Because----" Luke was not certain why he did ask. He could not -politely inquire of Porcellis whether he believed that his -brother-in-law had accepted, to aid his election, money from a power -that could not but be interested in the official actions of a -District-Attorney of New York. "Because," he compromised, "my father -was speaking to me about him only this morning." - -"So were a lot of other fathers. So are a lot of other fathers every -morning. That's greatness. What I think is that Old Napoleon is the -greatest man this country has ever produced." - -"You think so well of him as that!" Luke was amazed. - -"I didn't say I thought he was good," Porcellis defined; "I said I -thought he was great. Greatness hasn't anything to do with good or bad, -or only accidentally. The greatest national figure a country produces -is the figure that most intensely and--well, and powerfully--expresses -that country. That's why Shakespeare was the greatest man produced by -Elizabethan England." - -"Oh--Shakespeare!" laughed Luke. - -"Why not?" asked Porcellis. "Shakespeare lived in a country and time of -expanding intellectual conceptions, and he expressed them the way I've -said. We live in a country and time of tremendous financial combination -and expansion; we're not working in the material of intellectual -conceptions, except as we conceive finance intellectually; we're working -with figures and dollar-marks and differentials and compound interest -and dividends as complicated as an astronomer's calculations. Well, -this little old man in Wall Street can see those figures before they -happen; he can make them come to life out of nothing--make them happen, -give them life just the way Shakespeare gave life to another sort of -ideas. These ideas are the ideas of our country; they are our country. -Here is a genius that most fully and powerfully, most intensely and -perfectly expresses them, and so I say he is the American Shakespeare." - -Luke writhed in his chair opposite Porcellis. He could withhold the -question no longer. - -"Then"--he almost blurted it out at last--"those campaign -contributions----" - -But Porcellis was scandal-proof. - -"Those!" he said lightly. "You'll have to ask Brouwer Leighton about -them." - - -§3. After they left the theater, the two young men were driven, again -in the motor belonging to Mrs. Porcellis, up the noisy river of yellow -light that was Broadway, where their vehicle joined a long procession, -until they reached a cross-street in the early Fifties. Then their car -darted from the parade and plunged through a dark thoroughfare to Fifth -Avenue. They drew up before a house where Luke could at first see -little save that from its doorway, high above the pavement, a long and -narrow tent of white canvas striped with red ran to the curb. Several -other motors were ahead of theirs, so theirs had to wait its turn. - -"Is this the place?" asked Luke. - -Porcellis nodded. - -"It does look rather like a barn from the outside," he said, guessing -his companion's thought and agreeing with it. "That's a Ruysdael way: -they maintain the old tradition of severe exteriors; they don't believe -in flaunting their wealth in the face of the public; they believe in -keeping the best for their friends." - -Luke leaned shamelessly forward. Whenever he had gone to dances -heretofore, the houses of his hostesses had shown lights in every window -and dispensed a glow of festivity to the streets; but this house, -essentially forbidding, stood dark and silent, its windows masked. -Except for the faint illumination of a street-lamp that sputtered bluely -at the corner, the only scintillations visible were two thin lines of -radiance, one along the pavement, at the bottom of the entrance-tent, -and a corresponding one above, between the walls of the tent and the -loose overhang of its roof: these and a glowing spot at the end of the -tent upon the curb where, between rows of ragged night figures watching -the scene, dismounting guests appeared and disappeared--white -shirt-fronts, and opera-cloaks, and the glint of jewels--like pictures -in dissolving views. - -With each arrival, motors swung away from the entrance, turned to the -other side of the street, and proceeded to the farther corner there to -await their recall, while their drivers gossiped in the darkness or -drank beer at a convenient bar. Thus, with starts and stops like those -of an American railway train leaving a station, the Porcellis car slowly -approached the canvas mouth. - -When that mouth yawned directly before them, Luke and Porcellis, the -door of their automobile held open by a servant in livery, descended -into the tent. A string of incandescent lamps had been hung in this -corridor--it was the light from these lamps which crept from above and -below the walls--and a thick carpet covered the pavement. Along it they -walked to the house-steps, where two turbaned East Indians stood ready -to relieve them of their hats and top-coats and show them to a room -prepared for incoming men-guests. - -"Now," said Porcellis, "you see what I was talking about." - -A greater contrast between the outside and the inside of the Ruysdael -house it would, indeed, have been hard to find. The reception hall was -of white marble and of a height generally seen only in public buildings. -Pillars held the distant ceiling; the staircase rose in a pentagonal -tower, a copy, Porcellis explained, of that in the Francis First wing of -the Château of Blois; the light, although its sources were hidden, was -almost blinding to eyes fresh from the darkness of the street; there was -music heard lightly from a distance, and the air was faint with the -scent of American Beauty roses. - -Porcellis and Luke went up the carved staircase in the tower, which was -open at each landing so as to command a view of the hall, and were -directed to the men's room, where three valets were in attendance. -Against the walls of this room were several dressing-tables, each with a -strong lamp before it and each covered with toilet articles. - -"I'm not sure," said Luke, in a whisper that was both amazed and amused, -"whether I'm in a belle's boudoir or a musical comedy star's -dressing-room." - -"It's a judicious combination," said Porcellis in a conversational tone -that disregarded the fluttering attendants. He picked up a gold-backed -buffer and polished his always coruscating finger-nails. - -Luke contented himself with a touch to his hair, which had a way of -standing upright, and a tug at his tie, which was forever straining -toward independence. - -"What's this?" he asked as he lifted a glass case. He removed its lid -and sniffed at the contents. "It looks like rouge," he added. - -"It is," said Porcellis. - -"But I thought this room was for men," said Luke. - -Porcellis drew down the corners of his sensitive mouth. - -"It is," he said again. - -They went toward the ballroom. - -A man-servant with those brief side-whiskers which, twenty years before, -were used to proclaim the millionaire, stood splendidly against the -crush about the doorway. He bent to each newcomer and secured a name, -which, turning his head, but not moving his body, he then shouted, from -an impassive face, into the ballroom. - -Porcellis nodded to him familiarly - -"Good-evening, James," he said. - -"Good-evening, Mr. Porcellis. And the other gentleman, sir?" - -"Mr. Huber," said Porcellis with careful distinctness. - -The servant turned his head toward the crowd in the room behind him. - -"Mr. Porcellis!" he cried, and then, as if it were an afterthought: "Mr. -Urer!" - -"It's all right," Porcellis hurriedly reassured Luke. "Nobody pays the -slightest attention to him, anyhow." - -Nobody did. As they shouldered their way forward, the huge apartment -that they now entered was like what Luke thought the rooms of state at -Versailles must be, and the great hall in the Brussels Palace of -Justice. All about the walls, and especially about the large entrance, -was a press of men and women, standing still, or moving slowly from -group to group through an invisible, but palpable, cloud formed by a -mixture of the odor of withering flowers, Parisian scents, and human -sweat. A band of music, concealed in a far-away balcony, blared -rag-time, but distinct from its impudence, there rose from all these -people the noise of shoe-leather dragged over parquette flooring, the -composite of laughter in many keys and the perplexed buzz of small-talk. -The moving figures of the women, over whom countless aigrettes quivered, -had a kaleidoscopic effect, curiously unreal: an effect of flashing -colors--crimson, ivory, blues, greens, and pinks--splashing against -white breasts and backs, falling away from dazzling shoulders, the waves -mounting in oily satin, feline velvet, or clinging peau de cygnes, and -breaking in the foam of lace and the flying spray of diamonds. Here -even the ordinary black-and-white of the men became black-and-gray or -black-and-lavender, with gems for waistcoat buttons. On the -dancing-floor many couples, hugging each other so tightly that their -bodies touched from chest to center, swayed to the sensuous music of a -one-step, the leaders' high collars wilting, the fingers of their right -hands spread wide along the women's upper vertebras, their partners -looking into their intent faces from narrowed eyes. - -The picture was too bright, too varied, for the unaccustomed mind to -seize it: Luke turned to Porcellis: - -"And Mrs. Ruysdael?" - -He was expecting his hostess to meet her guests at the door of the -ballroom. - -Porcellis, however, did not wholly understand. - -"Oh, she's about somewhere, I dare say," he responded--"though she -doesn't care for late hours and sometimes leaves after the third dance. -Come on. I'll introduce you to some worth-while people." - -He introduced Luke to a great many people, for he seemed to know them -all. There was the British Ambassador and a German baron, a string of -dowagers with marriageable daughters (Luke danced with each daughter and -liked her), an artist, a scientist, and a bibliophile, and several -debutantes that were not marriageable at all, but were quite frankly -determined to marry. - -As is the way when a name runs in one's brain, three out of five of the -people that Luke talked to sooner or later mentioned the man that the -elder Huber had spoken of that morning and that Porcellis had later so -highly extolled. The Ambassador said that this man had, by lending or -withholding tremendous sums, preserved the peace of nations; the artist -praised him as the only true patron of art in America; the scientist -told how the same man had established and equipped a now world-famous -institution for the study and cure of a world-plague; the bibliophile -envied his first editions and medieval manuscripts. - -Leading his prettiest partner across the floor, Luke's glance, in spite -of his will, rested on a diamond pendant that hung from a thread of gold -about her neck and fell above her beautiful bust. She was a girl with -the face of one of those Italian peasant girls that the early painters -loved to paint as Madonnas, and Huber felt that his regard must be an -insult. - -The girl, however, took the pendant between a white thumb and forefinger -and looked from it to him with pleased eyes. - -"You like it?" she asked. - -"I think it's wonderful," said he. - -"It is pretty," she replied. "My uncle gave it to me on my last -birthday. It used to be in a heathen god's crown in some Chinese or -Hindu temple or other." - -"The god ought to be pleased to lose it to you," said Luke, "even if it -didn't come to you directly." - -"Oh, but it did come to me directly," she laughed prettily. "That's -half the charm of it. Uncle sent right over there and got it for me." - -When Luke found Porcellis again, he asked him about this. - -"Who's that girl with the broad, low forehead," he inquired, "and the -expression of a stained-glass saint?" - -"You're aiming high," said Porcellis; "that's one of the richest girls -in New York." - -"Who's her uncle?" - -"Ah, she's been talking of him, has she? Well, I don't blame her. Her -uncle is the man I call the American Shakespeare. She'll get a lot of -his money, too, for he has no children of his own." - -"Is he here himself?" - -"Not he. He doesn't care for this sort of thing. That -football-playerish sort of fellow that the niece introduced you -to--that's young Hallett she's dancing with now--he's the son of George -J. And there's George J. himself!" - -Luke remembered that George J. Hallett was one of the financiers whose -name was most frequently associated with the donor of diamonds and -benefactor of medical research. - -"And," continued Porcellis, "do you see that stoutish, nervous pale man -over there talking to the British Ambassador? Oh, don't be alarmed: -they're probably not talking about anything more important than how they -hate dances. Well, that's the third member of the triumvirate: that's -L. Bergen Rivington." - -Luke went home in the early dawn, feeling that these were pleasant -people, however they came by their money, and that he had certainly -judged the one that was not there long before he knew much about him. - - -§4. Leighton was out of town--he, too, was before the legislature's -investigating committee at Albany--and the bar-examination was not to be -held for a week or more, so that Luke had the next few days to devote to -himself. The use that he put them to was an endeavor to learn what he -could of the city of which he had seen so little before he came to live -there. He saw what, considered of itself, was a great deal, but what, -considered as a part of New York, was minute; and at many turns, the -number of which surprised him--for long as he had known of the man's -power, he never before looked for its effects--he came across traces of -that financier who more and more seemed to him to be the controlling -force in America. - -He was shown a great college, handsomely housed, splendidly equipped, in -which the higher education was provided free to every graduate of the -public schools that chose to take advantage of it, and this, he was -told, had been given to New York by the great "money editor." He was -taken through a cancer hospital, where mesothorium, which cost about -$52,000 a grain, and radium at $64,000, had been bought and were kept -and used without charge in the treatment of poor patients--where -physicians and surgeons of international repute were engaged to spend -all their time searching for a true cure and final prevention--and this -institution had been largely endowed by the same man, whose first wife, -it appeared, had died of cancer. There were homes for destitute widows, -pure-milk depots, orphan asylums, all assisted by this man or his -associates. - -"Do you know him?" Luke asked Porcellis one evening as they sat at -dinner in the latter's club. They had been talking of many things, but -Luke found this one conspicuously interesting. - -"No," said Porcellis. "He doesn't go out much. I saw him once. I was -being shown through his library--it's a marvelous place, full of -treasure-trove that would make a scholar think he was in heaven--and the -librarian pointed him out to me: he was sitting in the alcove that held -the First Folios, and he was reading the current 'World Almanac.'" - -They both laughed. - -"Still," protested Luke, "he seems more Jovian than ever to me. I don't -know whether he's a good Jove or a bad one, but I don't see how he can -really be bad when he does so much good." - -Porcellis was still intolerant of the ethical question. He pointed out -that nobody of weight ever knew or cared whether Shakespeare's life was -moral or whether the effect of his work was immoral. What had happened -in regard to the American was that, because he had at last been secured -to come to a public hearing, people were beginning to realize that he -was a living man and not a force of nature. For a quarter of a century -he had been the greatest individual power in the United States, and for -all that time he had remained hidden. He had been doing daily -tremendous things, things that were epic in their sweep and yet affected -every man, woman, and child included in the census--and nobody knew of -them, no paper printed a word about them, until he had passed them out -of his own hands and into those of his lieutenants, not until, indeed, -his lieutenants had sent them so far from hand to hand that none could -tell precisely when and where they had started. - -"The man's a genius," said Porcellis, "and like all geniuses he's just -what we all are when his genius isn't at work. What he feels is just -what we'd feel if we were in his place." - -"Still," argued Luke, "the influence of such a man is too great; it's -dangerous. It oughtn't to be allowed in politics." - -"There you go again!" sighed Porcellis. "Allow? How are you going to -allow or disallow a force? It simply is. This man can give the big -politicians certain large advantages if they pass laws that suit him. -The big politicians can give the little politicians certain lesser -advantages if they furnish the votes. The lesser politicians can get -the votes if they let the police charge the criminals for protection in -crime. Each man seizes his opportunity, and that's all there is about -it." - -"You think so?" said Luke. "I can't believe it. I can't believe it -would be necessary if the right laws were passed and enforced. Wait -till your brother-in-law gets the District-Attorney's office cleaned out -and in working order. Then you'll see I'm right." - -§5. At ten o'clock on the following Sunday night, Luke, on a lonely -walk through the East Side, noticed that, whereas the front rooms of the -saloons were darkened, the back rooms were all alight. The doors to -these back rooms were forever swinging to the entrance and exit of -unmistakable customers, many of whom came out bearing foaming jugs of -beer under the indifferent noses of policemen at the corners. Luke -chose a saloon in Essex Street and entered it. - -The room was small, but crowded. The walls, which were papered in -green, bore a few framed prints in high colors, advertisements of -various brands of beer and whisky. All about were small tables at which -blowsy women and men in stained clothes were drinking. - -Luke hesitated. Nobody had questioned his entrance, there was no guard -and no password: the door hung free; but now his startled eye could not -see a vacant table, and he knew that he must appear an alien to this -place. - -Presently a nearby woman smiled at him. She looked to be about fifty -years old. There was a mangy peacock feather in her straw hat, which -was set a-slant of dank black hair touched with gray. - -"Hello, sweetheart," she said. "Come over here a minute." Her smile -was toothless. - -"Shut up, Mame," somebody else commanded. "You're drunk." - -Luke looked at the man that had spoken. He was sitting alone at a table -the length of the room away. He had a puffed face, red from liquor and -blue from an unshaven beard; his coat, once black, had turned green; he -wore no collar, and a part of the rim of his greasy derby-hat was torn -away. - -"Shut up," he repeated. "You're drunk." - -"Thank Gawd," the woman assented. Her acknowledgment of the accusation -was fervent; she returned her attention to the glass of whisky that -stood on the table before her. - -"You can sit here, if you want to," said the man, addressing Luke, and -nodding at a chair beside him. - -Luke crossed the room and took the chair. The other people in the room -were indifferent to his entrance with the same indifference that the -guests of Mrs. Ruysdael had shown. The woman that had invited him did -not look his way; even the man that had invited him remained for some -time silent. Luke ordered a glass of beer from an aproned waiter, who -came with a tray full of whisky glasses in one hand, and five foaming -beer-mugs in the fingers and thumb of the other. - -"Will you have a drink with me?" Luke inquired of the derelict beside -him. - -"Sure," said he, and Luke noticed that, though he did not cough, his -voice was hoarse. - -They gave their orders. - -"And perhaps your friend would have one?" Luke suggested. - -The man raised his rheumy eyes. - -"What friend?" - -"The--the one that spoke to me when I came in." - -"Who? That skirt? I never saw her before in my life." - -Their drinks came, and the men drank for a while in silence. - -"What's _your_ graft?" asked the man presently. - -"I'm a lawyer," said Luke. He was first proud of the answer and then -ashamed of himself for being proud of it. - -The man looked at him dreamily through watering eyes. - -"Quit yer kiddin'," he presently remarked. - -"I'm not kidding." - -"You're a lawyer?" - -"Yes." - -"Well, I'm a bum," said the man. He tilted up his bristled chin; his -seamed throat swelled; sounds that, because they were not speech, Luke -took to be song, came from his throat. He sang: - - "The Spring has came, I'm just out o' jail; - I haven't any money an' I haven't any bail! - _Hall_eyloolyah, I'm a bum--bum! - Halleyloolyah, bum again! - Halleyloolyah, give----" - - -He stopped abruptly. "I'm sorry for _you_," he said. - -"Why?" asked Luke. He thought the sentiment of that song as horrible as -the creature that sang it. - -"Because you're all tied up with everything. But me--there ain't -nothin' _can_ tie me. You fellers is in jail all the time an' don't -know it; I'm only in jail when you fellers can ketch me and put me -there." - -Luke realized that he had found a philosopher who, however mistaken in -his deductions, had seen quite as much of the world as Jack Porcellis. -He attempted the vernacular. - -"Is this a bums' joint?" he inquired. - -The philosopher sneered. - -"Naw," he said. "It's a bum joint, but it ain't a bums' joint. Too -much class for me. This bunch"--he included the entire company with a -wide gesture--"is all in the same jail with you. If they wasn't here, -you'd be where I am." - -"I suppose they do give us lawyers cases," Luke granted; "but they seem -to get around the laws pretty frequently: they're wide open to-night." - -"Sure they are. See that?" The other man indicated the waiter, who was -disappearing into the dark vestibule with two drinks on his tray. -"Them's for the cop on this beat, an' a vice-squad cop 'at's with him. -I'm wise. I seen Tony (that's the boss o' this joint) slip them a -fifty-dollar bill last Sunday--protection money." - -"But some day," urged Luke, who was trying to plumb the dark pool that -was this man's mind, "the Mayor or the District-Attorney will get proof -of that sort of thing--some day when the Mayor and the District-Attorney -are honest men----" - -"Don't make me laugh," the derelict interrupted: "me lip's cracked. The -Mayor and the District-Attorney's got to get elected, whoever they are, -don't they?" - -Luke supposed so. - -"Well, then. Tony an' his kind gets the votes. They can't elect without -the Tony kind says so. It's a fair trade. An' the Mayors an' the -District-Attorneys ain't got no easy thing of it, neither. Votes costs -money. They've got to get the money from the money-guys, the candidates -do, an' then they've got to let the money-guys kill as many people as -they wants to on their railroads without sendin' them to jail for -it.--Have another?" - -Luke consented to another drink. - -"This one's on me," said the other man, and he paid for the order. "No, -sir," he went on, as they were finishing their second drink together, -"there's only two sorts o' men that ain't tied up. One sort's me that -knows things an' ain't afraid to starve (there's lots of me); the other -sort's the guys at the top that does the tyin', an' there's only a few -of them, with the King as the boss-knotter." - -"The King?" repeated Luke. "Who's he?" - -But he had guessed the answer before the derelict gave it: the answer -was the man that Porcellis considered the greatest American..... - -All the way to his apartments in Thirty-ninth Street that night, Luke's -feet were pounding to the wretched derelict's wretched hymn: - - "_Hall_eyloolyah, I'm a bum--bum! - Halleyloolyah, bum again!" - - - - - *CHAPTER II* - - -On a morning of that same April in a large rear room on the twentieth -floor of a Wall Street skyscraper, three men were seated around a large -mahogany table. They were talking business. Each man had his own -offices and his own businesses, but they frequently and quietly met in -this, the inner office of one, because most of the businesses of each -were closely connected, at several points, with the business interests -of all. - -There was nothing unusual about the outward appearance of the public -actions of this trio; they were apparently but three units of the legion -that makes this portion of New York a city by day and a desert by night. -Each had come downtown in his own motor that morning, defying speed laws -and traffic regulations, just as scores of his business neighbors had -done. Each had descended at his own offices, passed through a -half-dozen doors guarded by six bowing attendants, and proceeded to his -own desk in his own private room, precisely as a small army of other -business men were doing at the same time within a radius of half a mile. -Each looked like the rest of that army. All three were men of about the -average in height, not noticeably either above or below it, and inclined -to bulkiness. They had pale faces and close mouths and quiet eyes, -which looked out upon the world from under bushy brows with glances that -gave the lie to the lethargic indications of the little pouches of loose -skin below their lower lids. Each man wore a flower in the lapel of his -dark coat; one wore a white waistcoat; the cropped mustache of one was -black; that of another was touched with gray; the man at the head of the -table was clean-shaven. - -The man at the head of the table was, for the most of the time, even -less remarkable than his companions. He was somewhat shorter and -heavier; his abdomen swelled so that his shoulders were somewhat farther -from the table than were those of his associates; his bushy eyebrows -were somewhat more bushy; his pale face somewhat paler; his calm eyes -somewhat sharper, yet more calm;--and his lips, in addition to closing -tightly, were so heavy that the compression of the mouth must have -resulted from a habit acquired only by a strong and long effort of the -will. He sat with his great hands flat upon the surface of the table, -his thick fingers extended, his elbows raised at right angles to his -torso and pointing ceilingward. His chest heaved visibly, but his -breathing was inaudible. His eyes were everywhere. He spoke rarely, -but when he did speak it was as if he darted over the table, seized -something, and returned: he was startlingly brief and sudden, and was -instantly back again in his quiet watchfulness, apparently heavy, -unruffled, slow. - -He had come to work that morning with his usual promptness--the moment -of his coming never changed--and in his usual temper. He had threaded -the maze of corridors with a springing step. In the mahogany-paneled -room with its heavy table and arm-chairs, and its one decoration, a rare -engraving of George Washington, hung between the two windows that gave -the place its only chance for sunlight, he found on his desk, in a -corner, a clean blotter, a fresh pen, a small pad of cheap paper for -memoranda, and nothing else. He pressed one of a row of worn buttons in -the side of the desk. He was ringing for his private secretary. - -The secretary, who patently tried to look as much like his master as -possible, and succeeded, entered, a sheaf of open letters in his hand, -and noiselessly closed the door behind him. - -"Good-morning," said his master. His voice was quite low; it was thin -and cool, but his words fell quickly. - -"Good-morning," said the secretary. - -"What's in the mail?" - -"Not much, sir. Only about twenty things that need your personal -attention." - -"_About_ twenty!" The master's words seemed to leap from him and -assault the secretary, but his face was set like a plaster-cast of calm -and his tone was even. "Do you mean nineteen or twenty-one?" - -The secretary was too used to this manner of speech to be alarmed by it. - -"Twenty-two," he said. He handed the letters to his master. - -That one ran them over with a quick hand and a quicker eye. In terse, -sharp sentences, he directed his secretary how to reply to them, the -latter taking rapid stenographic notes of the commands. - -"You have turned the begging communications over to Simpson to -investigate?" the employer inquired. - -"Yes, sir." - -"And the requests for contributions?" - -"Yes, sir. There was one for a new hospital at Akron. The rubber -people have given five thousand, and----" - -"Tell Simpson to write that I'll give ten thousand if the town raises -ten thousand more." - -"Very well, sir." - -"Has Mr. Brinley telephoned from Washington?" - -"Yes, sir. He says he is to take breakfast at the White House -to-morrow." - -"What's that? He was told to arrange it for to-day." - -"He was; but he said he'd got word from the----" - -"Never mind. To-morrow will do, if he only keeps his word this time. -Wire him: 'Right; but positively no more postponements.' Use the code -signature and send from somewhere uptown,--Anything from Albany?" - -"Yes. Senator Scudder says to tell you that bill will be reported -to-day and rushed through before evening." - -"Have Conover go up to the Astor and get Scudder on the 'phone and say -that the bill must be passed before noon recess. The Governor will sign -it immediately." - -"Yes, sir." - -"And Conover is not to mention names." - -"Of course not, sir." - -"Anything else?" - -"No--except somebody has been trying to get you on the long-distance -wire from Hartford." - -"That's Sparks.--Run over to the corner pay-station and call up the -legislative building at Hartford. Get Sparks on the 'phone. Be sure -it's the right man you're talking to. Tell him that the New York -gentleman he wanted to speak to--just that: the New York gentleman he -wanted to speak to--is out of town, but has telegraphed you to say to -him it is all right for him to go ahead. Got that?" - -"Yes, sir." - -"Read it." - -The secretary read from his notes. - -"Now," said the business man, "get Mr. Rivington and Mr. Hallett on your -own 'phone and ask them if they can find it convenient to come around -here to see me for a half-hour. Tell me what they say, and then give me -Atwood and the other brokers in the regular order." - -"Yes, sir." - -"And, Rollins----" - -"Yes, sir?" - -"When Mr. Hallett and Mr. Rivington arrive, we are not to be disturbed." - -The secretary went; the brokers were given their orders, and then came -L. Bergen Rivington and George J. Hallett, the two men with whom this -third man was now consulting. - -"About the Manhattan and Niagara----" began Rivington. He had a way of -moving his hands nervously when he spoke, and he rarely completed a -sentence. - -Hallett, who was the man in a white waistcoat, stopped chewing his cigar -to ask: - -"What are they kickin' about? We own seventy-five per cent. of the -preferred and sixty of the common." - -"And it is too much, I think," said Rivington. "We need it only to keep -from unsettling the N. Y. & N. J. interests, because---- Fifty-five of -the preferred and fifty-two of the common, perhaps, but seventy-five and -sixty----" - -"And, now," chimed Hallett, "this little fellow--what's his name?--the -president. Oh, yes: Dohan, that's it--starts out to launch a new -stock-issue to bridge the river five miles from town and come into New -York, an' all without as much as sayin' 'If you please' to us! We ought -to wreck his damned picayune road for him; that's what we ought to do." - -The two continued their indignant comments. Every little while they -paused to give the crouching man at the head of the table a chance to -speak, and more often they looked at him to see whether he wanted to -speak; but, though his eyes were always alert to meet theirs, he did -not, for some time, utter a word. - -"Of course," said Rivington, "we are not directors of the road, but -still----" - -"Oh, hell!" grunted Hallett disgustedly. "Didn't you just say between -us we owned all the stock worth ownin'? We ought to unload and smash -'em." - -"You may be right. I am inclined to think----" - -"Right? Of course I'm right. I'm not goin' to be bullied by a handful -of dummies when I can sell them up as if I was a sheriff closing down on -a crossroads grocery store!" - -"They certainly are impudent and----" - -"They're beggars on horseback! Wastin' our money like this!" - -"They have---- We should tell the legislature----" - -"Gentlemen,"--it was the clear, crisp voice of the man at the head of -the table that interrupted; he spoke in a tone somewhat different from -that in which he habitually addressed his clerks and his brokers, but he -spoke as suddenly and with all the authority that he used toward -them--"if the M. & N. comes into New York, it will not take one-half of -one per cent. of the profits away from our other roads. For all but its -last thirty-two miles, the new line taps territory new to us, and the -new stock will have paid for itself, and have paid a profit too, in five -years." - -Rivington and Hallett looked at each other. The latter took his cigar -between his fingers and folded his arms. - -"What do we care?" he asked, but his tone had lost the assertiveness -that had marked it a moment earlier. The man at the head of the table -did not answer this question directly. He proceeded: - -"Except for ourselves, most of the old stockholders are poor people. -They need the money, and the old holders are to have the first chance at -the new issue. In five years, then, the minor stockholders will have -realized a profit on their investment; so shall we. At that time we -could unload without hurting anybody but the officials that have defied -us. Always supposing," he added, "that the management observe a proper -economy." - -Hallett's eyes burned. - -"You're right," he said. "We can win both ways if we do that. The road -will be bankrupt, and we can buy it in." - -The man at the head of the table did not smile. He only said: - -"You have always been very naïve, Hallett; but I did think you would -have seen this point sooner." - -Rivington at length cut in: - -"But the cost of getting the bill through the legislature----" - -"The bill will pass this morning," said the man at the head of the -table. "The Governor will sign it immediately." - -His certainty silenced them for a moment; but Rivington, whom the -outside world pictured as a pirate, was still timid. - -"Yes," he said, "but the expense of the city ordinance----" - -"Oh, we'll take care of that," grinned Hallett. - -"And the cost of construction----" - -"I said," repeated the man at the head of the table: "'Always supposing -the management observe a proper economy.'" - -He settled back in his chair. He seemed to consider the subject closed, -and so, presently, did his companions. Within five minutes they had -left him, and he was ringing for Rollins. - -"Rollins," he said, "take this letter." - -The secretary seated himself at the far end of the table. - -His employer walked to a window and looked out. His hands were clasped -behind him now, and he did not turn his head as he rapidly dictated: - - -"Robert M. Dohan. (Send it to his house address, Rollins, and mark it -'Confidential.') I understand that the bill of which you have spoken to -me will be passed and become a law to-day. I have just seen Messrs. -Hallett and Rivington and have secured their agreement to the plan -outlined in my personal conversation with you last week. In view of the -favors that you have done me in the past, I think it fair to tell you, -for your own use only, (Underline that, Rollins), that my friends have -decided that they and I ought to do what you thought they might decide, -viz.: unload at the end of five years. Considering your contemplated -resignation next year, this will not affect you, except favorably in -case you care to manipulate your own holdings in accordance with this -news. - -"(Paragraph) I note what you say about the estimate submitted by the -construction-department; also the letter of the steel-rail manufacturers -which you inclosed, in which they say that the grade I suggested might -not wear well. I think their use of the word 'dangerous' is absurdly -exaggerated. We have used this grade on several of our roads and feel -sure from long experience that, with proper repair-gangs, it will wear -for five years as well as the best. - -"(Paragraph) My desire, and the desire of my associates, is to protect -the interests of the stockholders. With that in mind, I should state, -what you have probably already gathered, that we feel that the new line -must be built and operated with all possible economy. ---- Very truly -yours." - - -The secretary closed his book. - -"Is that all?" he asked. - -Without turning, his employer nodded, and Rollins left the room. - -In the corner by the desk, a stock-ticker was clicking out yards of tape -into a high wicker basket. The man that had just given the M. &. N. -Railway permission to enter New York started to walk to the ticker; but -he paused again, at the second window, to look down on the thoroughfare -and buildings below him. From that height the streets of the city -seemed to be threads leading in every direction; they seemed to radiate -from the building in which the watcher stood. On the threads black dots -that were hurrying men and women seemed to quiver like entangled flies. - - - - - *CHAPTER III* - - -§1. The legislature's committee made its report--the legislature was -heavily Republican that year--declaring that no wrong had been done, and -Luke accepted this verdict as a proof and triumph of right. He passed -his examinations and, shortly after Porcellis sailed for Russia, became -a member of the staff of the District-Attorney, who was to "clean up" -New York. - -District-Attorney Leighton was a pleasant man, still young at forty, who -had a plausible and engaging manner supported by that bluff and -downright good-humor which passes current as the legal tender of -honesty. He had been in politics, and on the losing side, since his -twenty-first year, and during all that time he was fighting toward the -office which he had ultimately attained. Even his relatives, who were -people of so high a position that they regarded voting as something -beneath their caste and would rather be pillaged than lay hands upon the -pillagers, had kept him at a distance and were a little ashamed of their -pride in his success now that he had secured it. With a few other men, -all his elders, he had found his party a ruined fortress and rebuilt it, -stone by stone, now seeing the work of months plundered in a day, now -resisting his assailants by their own sort of arms, until the -stronghold, still far from impregnable or potent to command the entire -city, could at least dominate that spot beneath its guns on which he had -been able to take up his present position. - -Under him Luke went cheerfully to work. He was at first disappointed -because his tasks were minor tasks and seemed to possess only the most -distant connection with the great crusade; but he was, in those times, -as modest as he was ardent, and he realized that he was still in his -novitiate. He tried petty offenders whose crimes were so insignificant -that he frequently found it hard to consider them crimes at all, and he -was often too sorry for the accused to be glad when he convicted them. -The first time he won a sentence, which was by no means the first time -he tried a case, he passed a sleepless night, because he feared that the -defendant's plea might have been the true one. It was long thereafter -before he could exult in a conviction that carried with it a term in -prison, even when he was certain of the condemned man's guilt. - -The other members of the staff, more experienced in criminal practice, -showed no compunctions. They were a rather jolly lot of men, ranging in -age from twenty-five to thirty, with a cynical tolerance of life and a -tendency to regard their work as a game that everybody played solely for -the sake of winning it, with the opposing lawyers as the rival players -and with the accused as insensate pawns. Luke forgave them only because -of their unanimous and unbounded loyalty to their high-purposing chief. - -"I got that case," declared one of these young men, a Larry O'Mara, when -he came through Luke's little office one afternoon after the court had -risen. - -"What case?" Luke inquired. - -"That one I had against Burroughs--and old Laurie was sitting, too. The -jury was only out ten minutes." - -O'Mara was pink with triumph. - -"What was the charge?" asked Luke. - -"Larceny. It was hard work to make out; but the fellow's past record -did for him. I got that in while Burroughs was asleep at the switch. -When he did object, Laurie ruled against me, but the jury'd heard it all -right. Laurie's the strictest man on the bench, and Burroughs is about -the cleverest criminal lawyer in town." - -Luke blushed for this victor: - -"Was the man guilty?" - -O'Mara's eyes were first wondering and then amused. - -"They all are," he said. "If he didn't do this he did something else we -didn't know about--lots else. They're all guilty." - -Luke supposed they were, but he could not understand his associates' -desire to secure convictions for the convictions' sake. - -The innocent did not always suffer, nor yet the guilty. Luke was not -directly attached to the homicide bureau, the name applied to that -branch of the staff regularly employed to investigate and try cases of -suspected murder. Nevertheless, Leighton believed in giving his men -some chance at many branches of practice, because he wanted them to be -what he called "all-round criminal practitioners" when the time should -come for them to leave his service, and so Luke was once or twice called -into a capital trial. On one such occasion he was helping young Uhler. -Leighton himself had tried a striker named Gace on the charge of -shooting and killing a detective during a strike-riot, and Gace, greatly -to the District-Attorney's chagrin, was acquitted. Some slight evidence -adduced at the Gace trial seemed to point to another striker, Reardon, -and, though there was small hope of convicting Reardon, popular clamor -forced Leighton to plead for a true bill against him and bring him to -trial. - -"I won't touch it any more, though," laughed Leighton. "Uhler, you'll -have to take it, and you might as well have Huber with you. We're bound -to lose, and so I'm going to give my assistants a chance to bear the -discredit. That's what you boys are here for." - -Smarting under his chief's prophecy, Uhler, one of the youngest of the -staff, went into court and fought hard, which was doubtless the -intention behind Leighton's words. His enthusiasm was strong and -contagious. He convinced himself of Reardon's guilt, and he ended by -convincing Luke. The proceedings, indeed, went largely in the State's -favor until, shortly after the defense had opened its case, the man -Gace, who had previously been acquitted, was called to the stand to -testify to some minor detail. His examination was about to be completed -when he quite calmly volunteered the statement that it was he who had -done the killing. - -"Cross-examine," said the defending lawyer and, covering amazement, sat -down. - -Uhler looked helplessly at Luke. Luke, now enough of a lawyer to -believe that this was no more than a clever ruse to secure an unjust -acquittal, sprang to his feet and shook an angry finger under the nose -of the witness murderer, whose confession, had it been expected, would -have been prevented. - -"So," he cried, "not satisfied with cheating justice in your own case, -you come back here to taunt it, do you?" - -"Oh, I don't know as I'm taunting anything," replied the witness. He -was a big man with the frame of a blacksmith and the eyes of a -ruminating cow. - -"Then," thundered Luke, "you really mean to tell this court that you -actually killed that man?" - -The faintest shadow of a smile brushed the murderer's lips. - -"They buried him, didn't they?" he inquired. - -That answer lost Luke's case. - - -§2. Luke's enthusiasm long resisted these miscarriages of justice and -the undeniably slow progress of his chief to secure indictments against -the Democratic politicians whose drastic punishment Leighton had -promised in his ante-election speeches. It resisted even the -callousness of the participants in the legal game, and the discovery -that the best minds at the Bar, of course seeking the most lucrative -field for their practice, were in the position of advisers to the great -financiers, their incomes, which far exceeded those of their more active -fellows, being composed almost entirely of the annual retaining fees and -"tips" for speculation. It required more and more resistance, but Luke -continued to hug tightly the faith that the wrongs of the world could be -set right through honest laws administered by honest men. - -As he loved his work, so also he came to love the scene of it. The -vortex of the city fascinated him. Broadway, one color by day and -another by night, one spot of color uptown, a second at its middle, and -a third below the street that lies across New York like a gorged but -devouring anaconda; the dark passages full of tenements; the quiet -pavements bordered by prosperous dwellings; the roar of every sort of -business and the crackle of all sorts of pleasure; the joy and suffering -eternally intermingled, yet so intermingled that he could not tell which -caused the other, or whether they were independent; the whole tremendous -whirlpool whirled him, a straw among uncounted straws, now on its -surface and now sucked below beyond all plummets' soundings, and -intoxicated him by its dizzy revolutions. - -He knew Fifth Avenue, Riverside Drive, and Central Park. Because he -felt it his duty, he learned the outsides of the houses in the Italian -quarter, the French quarter, the Syrian quarter. He walked the Bowery -and thought that he understood it. From that artery of America, he -turned a corner and found himself in China, in crooked streets heavy -with the smells of the East, among shops whose signs bore Oriental -characters, among crowds of impassive yellow faces--men and only -men--where there was no sound of English speech. Once, passing the door -of a slum mission, he saw a crowd of half-human things, their heads sunk -upon their chests, listlessly droning a popular hymn around a puffing -harmonium: on one side of the mission was a saloon and on the other a -shop that displayed the legend: - - +----------------+ - | BLACK EYES | - | PAINTED HERE | - +----------------+ - - -With some of his friends--for he made many friends both in the office -and out of it, and Mrs. Ruysdael and her husband, whom he finally met, -were exceedingly kind to him--he went on a tour of those cafés that -called themselves Bohemian. That night he descended from restaurants -where one drank champagne and heard songs by vaudeville performers who -thus earned more money than at the theaters which they had deserted, to -seats in shoddy beer-halls where there was dancing by women too old or -too unskilled to continue upon the stage; and on the way home from -"Little Hungary," a place in which a dull company drank strange wines to -the music of a good band, the motor that conveyed his party crept under -smoking naphtha lamps through a jumble of push-carts converted into -bargain counters, and past the overcrowded squalor of the quarter of the -Russian Jews. - -Poverty hurt him, or the sight of poverty. Somewhere he read that one -per cent. of the families in the United States owned more than the other -ninety-nine per cent., but he explained this by the theory that the one -per cent. had created the wealth that they owned. He was told that -there were four million paupers in the country; but he ascribed their -condition to their failure to take advantage of a republic's free -opportunities. Somebody said that, during the past winter, seventy -thousand New York children had gone hungry to the public schools; Luke -was sure that the schools would soon supply their pupils with free -meals. From a report of the New Jersey Department of Charities that -came into his hands, he learned that, in New Jersey, one person in every -two hundred and six of the population was a ward of the State; but his -reflection was only that New Jersey must be badly governed. His heart -ached over what he saw; but his intellect satisfactorily explained all -hearsay evidence. He could go out to Ellis Island and, listening to its -thousands of immigrants prattle their hopes in forty-three languages and -dialects, could share their hopes. Evil administrators had hurt the -country by overturning the purpose of its founders; the remedy lay in a -return to first principles. - -Already in men of the Leighton type and in their works, he saw signs of -the revival. He had more than one occasion to visit the Children's -Court. Its quarters near Third Avenue were cramped, but it was soon to -be fittingly housed, and already here especially adapted magistrates, -acting as judge, jury, and parent, conducted in kindly, quiet, and -colloquial fashion the cases of fourteen thousand children in one year. -These, all of them under the age of sixteen, were no longer herded with -mature criminals that completed their education in vice, though their -offenses ranged from mere waywardness to burglary. Their judges were -patient and sympathetic men. One was the president of a society called -the Big Brothers, the duty of whose members was to act in fraternally -helpful fashion to boys less fortunate than they themselves had been; -and some of the women probation officers of this court belonged to a -similar organization known as the Big Sisters. There were twenty-six -probation officers, some men and some women, and into their care were -given all the little offenders for whom the court entertained any hope -of reformation. - -Luke concluded that the public schools, because of bettered conditions, -were turning out fewer candidates for the Children's Court than ever -before. He saw with high hope the Washington Irving High School for -Girls, the result of an agitation begun by pupils. Here was a building -eight stories high, and Luke, with the American love for size and -numbers, wrote enthusiastically home to his sister that it was the -largest school in the world. - -"It cost half a million dollars," he told her; "it has a hundred and -sixty rooms and it holds six thousand pupils. Think of that! Six -thousand,--not your pasty-faced, moping diggers either, but all noisy, -laughing, healthy girls. The equipment is wonderful--just wonderful: -you girls from the old Americus High School would think you were in -Heaven if you came here. There are two big restaurants, chemical and -physical laboratories, a conservatory, a zoological garden and a -roof-garden, and laundries. There's a regular theater--stage, scenery, -and all that--a store, a bank, a housekeeping department, and an -employment bureau. They have an orchestra, and they dance. There are -nurseries with real babies in them--babies that can cry--and there is a -five-room model house, a hospital, and a section where they train -nurses. They use all these things really to _teach_, and this is in -addition to languages and the usual unpractical stuff. They teach -librarians' work, shorthand, typewriting, bookbinding, -costume-designing, and dressmaking. Why, Jane, the girls are taught to -make their own clothes. Every girl is expected to make her own -graduation dress, and only a few of the dresses cost more than a dollar -apiece. I'll bet you wouldn't like that part of it!" - -Even his social life served subtly to confirm him, during this period, -in the opinions he had brought to it. He mistrusted combinations of -capital, because he thought they tended to restrain honest trade, but he -believed such combinations could properly and effectively be curbed by -legislation, and he had a fine respect for such of his acquaintances as -had made their own money by building up their own industries. He -doubted certain men in whose hands lay the administration of government, -but he was sure that the cure for this was the election of honorable -men. He brought to New York, and long retained, what he called a -muscular Christianity (he had read Kingsley), and, under its control, he -sought a remedy for the world's evils that he could synthesize with, a -respect for authority and an acceptance of the dogma that the individual -man is nothing and the omnipotent Deity everything. - -He used often to be invited to dinners at the Ruysdaels' when there was -no other guest, because Ruysdael liked this earnest lad and enjoyed long -evening talks with him. On one such occasion, his host, little, sallow, -with almond eyes that gave him a strangely Japanese appearance, fell to -talking of these questions while the two men sat over a glass of -port--for Ruysdael liked the old-fashioned English custom of -after-dinner port--in the candle-lit, oak-paneled dining-room. - -"I can't understand," said Ruysdael, "the shortsightedness of these -really honest men who call property a crime." - -"They call it that," said Luke, "because it's the result of profit." - -"Yes, but what's profit?" - -"Selling dear what you buy cheap, I suppose." - -"Yes, that's one way of putting it, but it's really wages. It's the -wages that the employer draws for his executive ability: he must be paid -for his work if his employees are paid for theirs. It's the fair return -that he gets for the risk he's run in starting his business, and it's -his reward for his years of saving up his money till he had enough to -start that business." - -Luke agreed. - -"Of course," said he, "we don't want the man that's done these things to -use his power so as to prevent other men from doing them, but we haven't -any right to take from him what he's earned or to stop him from going on -earning it." - -In much Ruysdael's manner, Luke's father, during Luke's visits to his -home in Americus, would talk of government. Government, by which he -meant the particular form of government adopted by the United States, -was one of the few topics that could move the Congressman from his -characteristic reticence. He scorned the tyranny of Russia and the -English make-shift of a constitutional monarchy. In the United States -the people could rule; the means were provided; if they failed now and -then, it was for a brief time only. To Mr. Huber the majority was as -infallible in matters of government as, in matters of faith, the Pope is -to a devout Catholic, and the hope of the majority lay in that party -which had freed the negro from slavery and saved the country from -disruption. - -To these ideals Luke was true. He saw the rottenness of Tammany rule in -New York and knew it for a symptom of the disease that made a national -danger of the entire rank and file of the Democrats; he saw the -integrity of Leighton, and accepted it as a true token of Republican -virtue. He wanted the government restored to its pristine simplicity, -wealth curbed of its newly developed predatory instincts, religion -restored to its place in the daily thought and conduct of man. - - -§3. Leighton's announced intention to "clean up" New York was proving, -nevertheless, a slow process. He had great difficulty in obtaining -evidence against the Democratic politicians whose scalps he had promised -to hang to the belt of the public. Grand Juries had a way of including -enough partisans of these politicians to prevent the finding of true -bills. When true bills were found, petty juries generally contained -enough Democrats to persuade the other jurors to acquit or to hold out -for a disagreement. Even when convictions were secured, the appeals had -to be argued before appellate courts composed of men that owed their -positions to friends of the appellants. - -"It's rotten luck," said Leighton, "but I believe they've got us -scotched. We've tried seven cases, four of them twice and two three -times; we've had our hands full with appeals, and the only one of the -lot that we've sent to jail is a peanut politician from Second Avenue -who doesn't control ten votes." - -"Yes," said O'Mara, "and they let _him_ go because they believed he was -getting ready to go back on them next election." - -"We've got to begin lower down," concluded Leighton, "and work up." - -He began immediately. He found that, in violation of the law, cocaine -was sold at scores of places on the East Side, and that the use of the -drug was spreading alarmingly. Against these retailers he proceeded -with all the vigor he had shown in his larger and less productive -efforts. Evidence to convict the sources of supply was hard to get, -since those sources were high in Tammany politics, but small sellers and -street peddlers were rushed to jail with such commendable speed that the -trade soon seemed abolished. - -Luke appeared in some of these cases, and won most that he appeared in. -He had been feeling the chill of disappointment, but this gave him fresh -courage. One day, when Uhler was on vacation and Luke was taking the -work of the absent man, he thought he saw the chance to approach "the -people higher up," which they had all been waiting for. - -A gang-leader named Zantzinger had been dancing with his wife at a ball -on the second floor of a house in Avenue A. As he waltzed past the door -leading to the back stairs, a friend looked in and called Zantzinger -aside. - -"Excuse me a minute," said the gangster to his wife. - -He left her and went to his friend. - -"Well?" he demanded. - -"Butch Dellitt's down there," warned his friend, nodding toward the -door. "His crowd's after you 'cause they say you piped off Dutch's -brother-in-law's poolroom to the fly cops. He says he's goin' to croak -you." - -"Where is he?" - -"He'll be 'round front when you come out." - -"Where is he now?" - -"Down back." - -"Down these stairs?" - -The friend nodded. - -Zantzinger walked to his wife. - -"I've got a little business below," he explained. "Wait here: I'll be -right back." - -He opened the door and descended the stairs. As he went, he drew his -revolver. Dellitt was standing in the doorway, with his back to the -stairs, smoking a cigarette. Without warning, Zantzinger shot him -through the head. Then he returned to the ballroom, apologized to his -wife for leaving her so hurriedly, and resumed his interrupted dance. - -This was the story that came to the homicide bureau. Luke took it at -once to Leighton. - -"And this man Zantzinger," he reminded the District-Attorney, "is the -right-hand man of the Tammany leader in that ward." - -"Who saw him?" asked Leighton. - -"Three men on the street." - -"Got their names?" - -"We can get them." - -"Is the coroner on the case?" - -Luke thought he was. - -Leighton shrugged. - -"Then that'll be the end of it," he said. - -Luke could not credit this. - -"Oh, yes," said Leighton wearily, "I mean it. By the time he's done with -the case, he'll see to it nobody knows anything. Why, man alive, that -coroner's the cousin of the ward leader." - -"But you'll try?" urged Luke. "You'll fight?" - -Leighton swung back in his swivel-chair. He put his feet on his desk -and clasped his hands behind his head. - -"No," he said, "I won't. What's the use? I'm getting tired of trying -to do things with all the people taking no interest and a Democratic -Mayor and Police Commissioner fighting against me." He spoke like a man -at last driven to declare something he has long striven to conceal. "If -ever I want to be re-elected," he continued, "this office has got to be -more careful about taking up cases that are lost to begin with." - - -§4. Luke fought hard with the ugly doubt this incident raised. He -tried to convince himself that Leighton had spoken only in a moment of -passing weariness and discouragement; but he daily found this endeavor -more difficult. What suddenly turned his mind to other things was the -news that an aunt, his father's widowed sister who lived in -Philadelphia, had died, leaving him a hundred thousand dollars. - - - - - *CHAPTER IV* - - -§1. Luke had never expected to be possessed of so much money. His -father's income was comfortable, but it was well understood that the -family lived somewhat beyond it, and that what might be left at the -Congressman's death would go to his widow for life and, after that, to -Luke's sister Jane. The Philadelphia aunt had inherited her fortune from -her husband, and her affection for her relatives was generally supposed -to be slight. Luke, consequently, found himself in a position for which -he was totally unprepared. - -"I suppose," he said to Ruysdael, to whom he went for advice, "that I -ought to invest it." - -"You ought to lose no time," counseled Ruysdael. "A hundred thousand -dollars is too much for a young man to have at his call in New York. -It's not enough to spend, and it's too much to gamble with in the -bucket-shops." - -Ruysdael thought he knew a safe investment. - -"There's a man named Forbes," he said--"Wallace K. Forbes, who came to -the offices of our estate the other day when I happened to be there. He -wanted to borrow just the amount you name, and my agent says it's a good -thing; but we happened to have a bigger one on hand. His concern's an -old one, one of the oldest American firms in its line; this man's the -third generation of his family to be in it, so it's well-established and -has the good old-fashioned element of family pride behind it. Nowadays, -you don't find many men regard their businesses the way an English -landed gentleman used to regard his estates and his family honor; but -Forbes seems to be an exception." - -"What is the business?" asked Luke. - -"Ready-made clothing, and well made, too, I'm told." - -"Still, he does need money." - -"Yes, but you couldn't get in if he didn't need it. He only wants it to -complete some improvements he's begun. He's perfectly well-grounded, -but I suppose he has to keep up with the progress of the trade. Of -course, that very element of family pride might disincline him to give -an outsider any hold on the business, but if you want me to, I'll have -Croy--that's the man that runs our estate for us--look into the -situation and sound Forbes." - -Luke, after some satisfactory inquiries in other quarters, acquiesced in -this proposal. All the reports were good, and that of Herbert Croy, the -shriveled Ruysdael lawyer, was especially rosy. Forbes expressed his -willingness to meet Luke, and Luke called at the offices of the R. H. -Forbes & Son's factory in Brooklyn. - -The present head of the firm was a grave man with a direct and -unassuming manner. His aquiline nose gave his face the air of strength, -and his mustache and the hair about his temples being slightly touched -with gray, he seemed sober and conservative. He sat at a plain roll-top -desk, in a room simply furnished, and he lost no time in coming at once -to business. - -"Would you like to walk through the place?" he inquired, when he had -told Luke much of what Ruysdael had already said. - -"I suppose I ought to," smiled Luke; "though of course I don't know -enough about the business to appreciate what you show me." - -Forbes smiled sadly. - -"You are no different, then," he said, "from most modern investors, or, -for the matter of that, most owners of businesses either. In these -times the average president of a company thinks he earns his salary by -manipulating its stock; he seldom knows anything about the work that -makes the stock marketable. Our firm isn't like that." - -Under Forbes's care, Luke was accordingly taken through the factory, -with which, he noted, the office of the chief administrative was in -close touch. He was shown the room where the cloth manufacturers -brought their products; the scales to weigh the material; the -windmill-like machine that spread the offered fabric on its wide arms -and, turning at the will of the expert buyers, displayed its burden -before the examiners in a strong north light; the long boards on which, -having been re-rolled, the cloth, once its quality had been thus -determined, was again uncoiled, an ingenious contrivance attached to the -uncoiling-wheel stamping its measurements at every fifth revolution. - -"We have to be careful," Forbes explained. "Business isn't so honest as -it once was, and if the cloth-makers could gain an inch in ten yards, -they'd do it." - -The factory, which closed the end of a street, was built about four -sides of a small square, and the center of this square was occupied by a -large room with overhead ventilation and lighting, the glass fluted and -sloping as the ribs of a Venetian blind may be made to slope, so that, -in summer, the sun's rays would be tempered to the workers under it. -Here, at the tables nearest the entrance, men were employed at designing -patterns of cardboard and working, amid busy calculations, with rulers -and T-squares, like so many architects' draughtsmen. From them the -completed patterns were taken to other tables at which they met the -cloth accepted in the first room, other workmen tracing the designs in -chalk upon pieces of the cloth. The problem of these second workers, -Forbes explained, was to arrange the designs in such a way that almost -no shred of cloth was wasted. Luke observed that they solved it with -astonishing skill; and, as each piece was completed, a ticket was -roughly sewn on it with written directions for its further progress and -blanks to be filled in by the signature of each worker responsible for -its future steps. - -Then came what to Luke was the most wonderful part of the work. -Nineteen pieces of unmarked cloth to be made into suits of the same -style as that on which the chalk pattern had been outlined, were laid -under that piece and the whole bundle given to a man at a large table. -Through a slit in the center of this table, a knife of incredible -strength and keenness plunged rapidly up and down. The man in charge -forced the bundle against the knife, deftly pushing it forward, so that -the blade followed the lines drawn upon the top piece, and in three -minutes a score of suits of clothes were cut into their various parts -and were being sorted and ticketed and signed for waiting boys to carry -them to the sewing-machines. - -"Those patterns look like the parts of a jig-saw puzzle," said Luke, -"and that knife looks like a cross between a jig-saw and the -guillotine." - -"It cuts twenty suits at a time," said Forbes gravely, "and the bottom -one doesn't vary the thirtieth of an inch from the one on top." - -"Twenty suits!" Luke wanted to rub his eyes. - -"Yes; but the inventor is still at work on the knife. We hope soon to -get one that will do three dozen." - -At each corner of the building was an elevator and a stairway, the -latter walled in so to serve as a fire-escape. Forbes took Luke up one -of these stairways, a broad and easy flight of which the corners at each -landing were protected by curved wainscoting to prevent jamming in case -of panic. - -The three floors above ground contained the rooms in which the sewing -was done and one room known as the matching-room. All seemed well -lighted and well aired and well protected by the overhead pipes of an -automatic sprinkling-plant. - -In the matching-room girls especially trained to the task selected, from -vast quantities of samples, the fitting shades of thread and buttons -best adapted to the different bundles of cut fabric brought by elevators -from the cutting department below. Beside them were four other girls, -who worked at a contrivance in which, when covered buttons were -required, an uncovered button, a piece of tin and a bit of cloth were -inserted, a lever pulled and the three factors withdrawn ready clamped -together and complete for use. From here, after the tickets had been -signed, and the necessary further directions added to them, the cloth -was sent on to the sewing-rooms. - -Luke found those sewing-rooms crowded with machines of possibilities -that he had heretofore never dreamed machines could realize; machines -horrible because they seemed half-human, and diabolically intelligent; -machines that not only moved up and down in the manner of the old -foot-pumped sewing-machine in the second floor back of his home in -Americus, but twirled and danced over the cloth pressed under them by -women feeding them as a frightened keeper in a menagerie might feed an -angry beast. They were all of them run by steam or gasoline, and Forbes -told Luke that they were all made by one trust, which owned all the -patents. There were different machines for every kind of sewing, for -every loop that could be required of the thread: machines for hemming; -machines for the cord-stitch, the lock-stitch, the chain-stitch, and the -damask-stitch; machines for sewing the cloth together, for sewing the -lining, for sewing the trouser-seams; and there was one machine, the -needle of which moved in dizzy zigzag, for sewing, on a sort of -herring-bone design, the stiffening material into coats. - -Next Luke was shown a room in which, on benches a foot from the floor, -beside tables six inches high, sat rows of intent little girls, their -arms flying like flails as they stitched the shoulders into the coats, -and still another row in which still other girls, their arms flying in a -similar manner, sewed buttons on coats, waistcoats, and trousers--the -only two processes that invention was as yet unable wholly to deliver -over to machinery. Lastly, there was a half-floor given to what at -first looked like linotype machines, and at these sat brawny women who -passed over the coat-shoulders long flat-irons, each heated by flexible -tubes attached to it and reminiscent, for Luke, of those terrible -instruments that, immediately revolving, grind the heart and lungs out -of a patient's teeth. - -Forbes exhibited it all with a quiet pride. He said there was no work -sent out of the factory, and so no "sweating"; the factory was a union -shop; there had never been but one strike, and that one was speedily -adjusted by arbitration. - -Luke was impressed. He secured favorable reports from a financial -agency and from a firm of expert accountants. Then he invested his -fortune in R. H. Forbes & Son. - - -§2. About this time, the United States Senate happened to be -investigating itself and unavoidably stumbled upon a witness whose -testimony filled all the newspapers for several weeks and remained a -matter of public comment for quite two months. Perhaps because he had -fallen out with his employers, this witness insisted upon telling how he -had for ten years been hired by a combination of the ruling corporations -to influence national legislation. Five hundred letters and telegrams -substantiated his assertions; he gave dates and mentioned places; the -names of popular idols fell from his lips with infinite carelessness, -and the idols broke as their names fell. - -Speaking in unimpassioned detail, the informer showed how his activities -had covered the entire country and included the chiefs of both the large -parties with a splendid catholicity. He had bought the services of -labor leaders to end strikes, had broken up unions by purchasing -information from their members, and had ended one dispute by having -himself appointed a member of its arbitration board. He had operated in -congressional campaigns throughout the Union, and he told how he had -bought the defeat at the polls of members of Congress that sought -re-election after having opposed the corporate interests at Washington, -and how he had spent thousands of the trusts' dollars in electing -candidates who, personally or through their bosses, promised that they -would support a high tariff and prevent the passage of laws too kindly -to the working class. He had hired congressional clerks and pages, the -former to betray what advance information came to them, the latter to -pick up valuable gossip. He had the secretaries of Congressmen on his -salary-roll when he could not buy or defeat their masters or when, -having bought those masters, he feared treachery. He had secured the -appointment of those legislators in his pay to important committees, and -he had, he said, planned and secured the establishment of a national -tariff commission for the benefit of the powers he served. Those powers -were headed by the man that Jack Porcellis likened to Shakespeare and -that the derelict in the Essex Street saloon called the King. - -Luke, who of course had nothing to do with the management of the Forbes -company, nevertheless occasionally passed an evening at the quiet -Brooklyn home of its president, who was a widower living alone with his -only child, Betty, a pretty, high-colored, brown-eyed girl, as yet -unformed and only twenty-two years old. As a rule, these two men sat in -the parlor, a room that retained the character of Forbes's grandfather, -and talked of everything and nothing, the girl rarely intruding upon -them. It was inevitable that they should, during the floodtide of the -Washington scandal, speak of its revelations. - -"I don't know what to make of them," sighed Luke. "It seems as if the -fellows at the head of our party were no better than the fellows at the -head of the other." - -"They are not," said Forbes with conviction. "Here they all are -blackmailing the tariff, a system the country owes all its prosperity -to." - -"We shall have to pick honest leaders in the future," Luke reflected. -He still believed in the power of a party's individual members. "We've -simply been too easy-going in the past." - -Forbes thought this would avail nothing. - -"The parties themselves are rotten," he declared, "and the deeper a man -gets into them, no matter how well he starts out, the more certain he is -to be infected. You see how even the good measures are fraudulently put -through. Then here's our own state with a Governor we all believed -in--a Democrat, to be sure, but an anti-Tammany man. He comes out for a -fine thing like direct primaries. Well, the other day an Assemblyman I -know went to him and asked him to sign a bill this Assemblyman wanted -passed. What happened? The Governor said: 'Will you vote for the -direct primary law?' The Assemblyman happens to be a fool and against -that law. He said he'd vote against it, and he tells me the Governor -told him in that case the other bill wouldn't be signed. No, the thing -we need in this country is a brand-new party run by honest business men -on sound business principles." - -Luke could not yet consider such a revolution; but the next day the -papers contained further news of the senatorial investigation, which -lent weight to Forbes's opinion. A witness, after testimony further -entangling that great financier whose power seemed to pervade the -country's entire industrial system, described an alleged forgery in the -books of a railway known to be controlled by Porcellis's hero and eager -to evade the anti-trust laws. According to this witness, a "double -entry" of $2,000,000, representing securities that the road assumed in -taking over two other roads, was carried in the "Consolidated balance -sheet" for some time, then erased from one side of the ledger, and left -as a credit balance on the other side. - -"They took all the securities of the acquired roads," he swore, "and -used them as securities for a bond-issue. They got that money and used -it to finance two other outside transactions that they sold out at a -tremendous profit." - -He named as participants in this three Senators high in the councils of -Luke's party. - -"Of course they're a bad lot," Leighton cheerfully admitted when the -District-Attorney's staff gossiped about the latest revelation, "and the -party is no better right here in New York than it is in any other state. -But you can't repair an organization by smashing it. What we need is -reform within the party. The party must reform itself. And that's what -I'm trying to bring about." - -He did, indeed, give out interviews to this effect, and gathered a -considerable following. A little convention was called at Saratoga -where, fired by fresh faith, Luke made his first political speech, -holding up Leighton as the Erasmus of Republicanism. It was an -unfortunate simile, for the opposition press lost no time in lampooning -the District-Attorney as Erasmus at his weakest; but the movement grew, -and Luke, in common with his fellow-believers, began to see light in the -political darkness. - -He still possessed the beautiful power of dreaming, and when, by night, -coming from a theater or leaving the house of Mrs. Ruysdael or one of -her friends, he turned into Broadway and saw the myriad lights of its -cafés mount heavenward and mix with and illuminate the pillars of smoke -and steam rising from its chimneys, he could detect in their wreaths the -faces of grinning devils raised by the pestilential life below, laughing -at it, dipping enormous white claws to stir it, and then hissing skyward -as if to proclaim, because of what New York was, their defiance of God. -Once or twice, to escape from them, he walked as far downtown as Wall -Street and loitered through the silent night, where the three churches -stood on the modern battleground of mad finance to remind of its history -the city with the shortest memory in Christendom. Mentally, he -converted that portion of the town to what it once had been. He saw it -the home of a modest aristocracy in simple houses along shaded streets, -a center of good taste, of culture, of social well-being. - -The old Astor House, now fallen into shabby desuetude, he pictured as it -was when state banquets were given there, and when it was the one place -in which the distinguished visitor would stop. Close by the spot where -the Woolworth Building to-day houses eighteen thousand persons, the -Astor House had moved Horace Greeley to admiration because six hundred -and forty-seven persons slept under its roof. There Clay had received -the news of his nomination in 1844, and Webster the word of his defeat -at the hands of the Whig convention in 1852. That hotel had been -familiar to Pierce, Van Buren, Buchanan, and Taylor, to Seward, Choate, -and Douglas. Edward, Prince of Wales, had given it an almost royal -atmosphere, and recollections of Lincoln still hung about its tarnished -walls. - -Would the old spirit come back again? Could it return? Luke was sure -that it could and would. He was sure that Leighton, and the honest men -associated with him, had begun a movement that must end by restoring the -nation's lost ideals. Government would govern, honest property would be -protected, religion would again open man's eyes to his own littleness -and the omnipotence of the Deity. There would be legislation that would -be the end of industrial combinations, of the crushing of the small -manufacturer and the grinding of the faces of the poor. No more national -banks would be merged, none would engage in promoting or underwriting; -interlocking directorates would cease, and the concentration of credit, -the Money Trust, would forever after be an impossibility. It was so -easy. It needed but an awakened conscience in the majority of the -voters and a few conscientious men to lead. - - -§3. Luke's father died within three years after the young man entered -upon his duties under Brouwer Leighton. The elder Huber had embarked -his small fortune in an adventure that, as events soon proved, was -opposed to one of the interests of the great financier whom he had once -so much admired: those interests ruined the adventure and, more from -grief because of this than from any specific malady, the Congressman -fell in the fight. He died proud of his son--a pride that Mrs. Huber -and Jane zealously shared--and he left the family in Luke's care. - -The young man, who had loved his father in spite of all the differences -between them, and long felt the loss, met this situation without -complaint. Neither the mother nor the sister wanted to go to New York, -and, as Luke managed to live within his meager salary, he was able to -continue for them the home in Americus upon the income from his now -well-paying investment in R. H. Forbes & Son. Jane, indeed, soon -engaged herself and was married to a Doncaster lawyer who secured an -election to the late Mr. Huber's seat in Congress, so that Luke's -expenses in Americus were light. - -He began to fall in love with Betty Forbes. The women of the Ruysdael -set did not fail to attract him, but he never considered them as within -his means, and so speedily placed them outside of his desires. Forbes's -daughter, on the other hand, was the feminine counterpart of her father, -and, as she grew, she developed many of his qualities, being quiet, -determined, unobtrusive, and womanly in the sense in which men like -Forbes used that word before Woman began to give it a new significance. -Accepting the world in the garb in which Forbes thought it well to -present it to her, she owned only the finest standards of her type, and -there was no meanness in her. Physically, she had that rarity in young -women: height combined with grace. Her hair, as Luke saw it, was like -so much sunshine, her eyes were clear and brown, and the radiance of her -coloring not even a man that was not her lover could deny. Luke, for -his part, thought her far too good for him. He told himself she was all -that the people of the Ruysdael set should be and were not: she made -important and shameful the casual relations he had had with women of the -half-world and that in their occurrence--less frequent than is usual in -the lives of young men--had seemed trivial and matter-of-fact; and -therefore he determined to win her, so soon as he could make a place for -himself through the pursuit of his ideals. - - -§4. That pursuit grew daily more difficult. The candle of his faith in -Leighton, though it continued to burn steadily, burned less fiercely -than of old. The movement for reform within the party spread, but it -spread almost too rapidly; it came to include certain politicians who -were now for the first time in their careers evincing a desire for the -organization's betterment, and that only after the organization had -failed to re-elect them to office. These men, in one or two instances, -came into control, and it was soon necessary to reform the reformers. -Sometimes Leighton appeared disheartened, and Luke began to acquire a -weary and well-nigh uninterested manner in dealing with his part of the -crusade. - -"Look here," he once said to his chief, "that fellow you got a pardon -for last week has been in to see me." - -"Yes?" said Leighton. His feet were cocked on his desk and, in his -favorite attitude, he was leaning back in his chair with his fingers -clasped in his crisp, black hair. His face was not the face that Luke -had known when he first came to New York. - -"Well," continued the assistant, "he came in just after I got back from -the Ludlow Street Jail. That place is full of nobody but husbands who -won't pay alimony, but the keepers act as valets and barbers and do -light housekeeping for the prisoners." - -"It's the civil prison. We can't help it." - -"Couldn't you swing things so a Grand Jury would report on it?" - -"What's the use? And what has Ludlow Street got to do with Auburn, -where our pardoned friend has been?" - -"Only this: the rich men in Ludlow Street are living as if they were in -a hotel, but at Auburn, this fellow says, they've got a cell with -pointed nails in the floor so a prisoner sent to it for bad behavior -can't sit down or sleep. They've---- Oh, I can't go into it all now; -but the women are treated as bad as the men; the thing must be worse -than the Black Hole of Calcutta, and all the while the State's paying -for the warden's horses and carriages." - -Leighton showed some interest, but later, when Luke returned to the -subject, he said there was nothing to be done: the political situation -would not just then permit it. - -Came the unmasking of one of the new partisans of reform. This man, a -Simon Kaindiac, was an inspector in the New York post-office. Federal -detectives arrested him and showed him to have made a fortune by -extortion from swindling concerns that were using the United States -mails to entrap their victims. - -"I know, I know!" cried Leighton peevishly when Uhler brought him the -news in Luke's presence. "But how am I to blame for that? All the -papers will be at me for it. As if I were responsible for the business -morals of every man that happened to think as I do about the political -ethics of the party!" He turned to Luke. "What's on _your_ mind, -Huber?" - -Luke said that what was on his mind was this: the office had that -morning received the report of investigators who pointed out that, since -the success of the cocaine raids, heroin had taken the place of the -proscribed drug. - -"Well," said Leighton, "I'm sorry, but the laws governing the sale of -heroin aren't the same as those governing the sale of cocaine, and, -until they are, you'll find you can't successfully prosecute under -them." - -"We might get at the thing another way," Luke protested. His growing -love for Betty had given him new views on some old subjects. "They say -the girls in the houses----" - -Leighton swung his feet to the floor. His tired face worked irritably. - -"Now, don't begin on them," he commanded. "They're the police's affair, -anyhow. They've always existed and always will. They simply adapt -themselves to whatever form of society happens to exist. No really -effective method of regulation, let alone suppression, has ever been -devised or ever will be. Gee whiz, young man, do you know what you'll -get up against if you tackle this subject? For four thousand years the -high-brows have been trying to make it unpopular, and they haven't -succeeded yet." - -It was much the same when Luke and O'Mara came across the trail of -corruption among the police. They found one man who would make affidavit -to the fact that patrolmen had paid him to instigate burglaries in order -that the patrolmen might make arrests and win promotion. This man had -friends among the keepers of illegal resorts who would swear to paying -tribute to police captains. He introduced the two lawyers to a -collector who said that $2,400,000 were yearly paid in this way, that he -himself was the go-between for a police lieutenant, securing from fifty -to five hundred dollars a month each from those who bought protection. -No discretion seemed to be used, and he showed checks to corroborate his -story. - -"Do you think you could do anything on such evidence?" sneered Leighton. -"You couldn't send a yellow dog to jail on it. This fellow confesses -he's a crook himself. Start an agitation to force the Police -Commissioner to resign as unfit? Not much! If he resigned, 'unfit' -would mean 'guilty.' His crowd's in the saddle, and if you want to -unhorse him, you've got to unhorse them." - -He walked up and down the floor. - -"The trouble with us is we don't fight the devil with fire," he said; -"and the trouble with the whole system is too many laws. There are too -many lawyers at Albany and Washington; they know all about law and -nothing about Man, so when the public conscience turns over and whines -in its sleep, these fellows think they can cure it of what ails it by -passing a few more laws. They pass a law against dance-halls, and they -breed brothels. That's the way it goes all down the line. They pass a -lot of such laws and then say: 'Now, let the District-Attorney do the -rest.' I wish they had my job for one day! People have got to -understand that other people don't indulge their tastes out of mere love -of law-breaking." - -He took another turn of the room. - -"And if we're going to whip political gangs," he said, "we must have a -political gang of our own, and one better than the one we happen to be -fighting. There's Tim Heney over on the East Side. He may be as crooked -as God makes them, but when people give him votes, he gives them coal in -winter and picnics in summer. He goes to their funerals and their -weddings, and he knows more about what the people of this country want -than Thomas Jefferson would have known if he'd lived to be a hundred. -And what's more, he can do what none of your statesmen ever can do: he -can keep them quiet. Do you wonder? Think what he does for them. Do -you wonder they stick to him?" - - -§5. Luke began to believe that Forbes was right: There was need of a -new party. Daily his lethargy increased; daily he lived more in his -love for Betty and in the dreams that emerged less and less upon the -plane of his actual life. - -His contact with the bar did not raise either it or the bench in his -estimation. In a file of documents at his office, the legacy of a -former administration, he came across vouchers for sums aggregating -$3,000 paid by a local railway to witnesses who had sworn against a -lawyer indicted for subornation of perjury in pressing a damage-case -against the company, and among these was one for $500 paid to the -referee that signed the report. He heard of a rural courthouse that by -night became a gambling-house conducted by court officers; there was a -judge on the Pacific Slope who sold a patent, the idea for which he -stole from the plaintiff in a patent case in his own court; the -District-Attorney of Doncaster County, in Pennsylvania, told Luke that -only the statute of limitations saved from jail three associate judges -of that county who had accepted bribes in the granting of liquor -licenses, and that a judge in a nearby county had accepted $3,500 toward -his campaign fund from brewing companies whose retailers must apply to -him for licenses. It seemed that of two of the most prominent judges of -the higher court in New York, one was chosen directly through the -efforts of Tim Heney, and the other was the brother of the principal -member of a trust which had cases in his court. A judge of a Federal -Court was forced from the bench because of his financial interests in a -company with which he had to deal in his judicial capacity, and a New -Jersey judge, a friend of Leighton, was said to be hearing suits to -which a certain railway was a party and then, during vacations, -appearing in a neighboring county court as a lawyer retained by the same -company. - -The follies of the law appeared to be more numerous than its faults. -One judicial decision enjoined members of a labor union from the -peaceable persuasion from work of individuals not under agreement to -work for the corporation in the mills of which a strike was in progress. -A Philadelphia jurist denied the right of free speech to aliens. In -Illinois, Smith appealed from a conviction for swindling Brown, and the -Supreme Court upheld him because the indictment, which read that Smith -"did unlawfully and feloniously obtain from Brown his money," was -indefinite and misleading: the learned court held that the pronoun "his" -might refer to either party, and that the Grand Jury might simply have -been indicating its belief that Brown obtained his own money unlawfully. - -Worse miscarriages of justice were, of course, common, even in -Leighton's office, and sentences were often out of all proportion to the -crimes that incurred them. The editor of a radical paper in Paterson -was given an indeterminate term in prison of not less than one year and -not more than fifteen years for criticising the Paterson police. The -larger the scope of a swindler's transactions, the better his chances of -immunity. One minor case long remained in Luke's memory. A clerk in a -trust company disappeared with $25,000, and a fugitive bill of -indictment was returned against him; the runaway opened negotiations -with his former employers by means of advertisements in the Paris -newspapers and then used his wife as an intermediary until the trust -company promised to have the District-Attorney submit the indictment for -a verdict of not guilty if the clerk would return with the $15,000 still -in his hands; the careful fugitive hid $7,500 in Germany, and returned -with the rest; he refused to tell the hiding-place until he was safe; -the company found the District-Attorney willing to follow its -suggestion; the verdict of Not Guilty was accordingly recorded, and the -clerk, free from further harm, made over to the company the remaining -$7,500 that he had left in Europe as an anchor to windward. - -There was probably no more laxity among lawyers than among men of other -professions, but to Luke's mind it seemed imperative that traders in -justice should be especially just. He came across countless cases of -pettifogging among shyster practitioners, and nearly as many suspicious -actions in the ranks of their cleverer and, therefore, more successful -and eminent brethren. - -Ever seeking remedies, he once drew up a list of such as he found. He -wanted more publicity and freedom of criticism; measures to curb the -bench's power to declare laws unconstitutional, to force it to give -fuller reasons in support of its decisions; he wanted devices to end -"the law's delays," simplified procedure and judges who were closer to -the people and farther from the corporations; he thought the courts of -appeal ought to be forced to decide every question in every case -appealed to them; and he advocated but one appeal in civil actions -together with the right of recall both in regard to judges and to their -decisions. - - -§6. He had come to a point where he doubted, not it is true Leighton's -intentions, but his ability to achieve them. Those were the days when -the Progressive Party was being formed, and Luke for some time -considered it as a hopeful sign. Forbes enlisted in the ranks of the -new organization and championed it wherever he went, not least among the -workers in his factory. Luke had joined a club of young men who had for -the most part inherited their money and were unanimous for the new -movement; it was time, they said, that politics should be taken out of -the hands of the muckers, and they came near to convincing Luke until, -in a moment of enthusiasm, he happened upon secrets which showed him -that the men in power in this party were not different from the men that -had spoiled Leighton's plan for the purification of the Republican Party -from within. From a source he could not doubt, he heard that even George -Hallett had talked of offering his support "because these old crowds are -too greedy; they're chargin' us too much; it's got to be highway robbery -that big business has to submit to, and I'm tired of it." - -For some time Luke lost faith in the possibility of any cure. There was -talk of a movement to fuse the reform voters of all parties, but it left -him cold. He had been a successful prosecutor, and his name was familiar -to newspaper readers; his advocacy of Leighton had won him a prominence, -even a certain following, among the public; but the irony of life was -too much for him; he had, at this period, an eye too appreciative of the -odds against him. He saw Betty two or three times a week, took her -motoring and to the theaters, but he refrained from showing her that he -loved her, because he saw no chance of offering her himself as a man -worth while. The lethargy of his manner became more marked. He began -to bear the outward tokens of one that does not care. To this he had -come after four years in New York. - - - - - *CHAPTER V* - - -§1. The hideous North Bridge disaster occurred on a spring morning -during the last year of Leighton's first term in office. The -District-Attorney, whose habitual disparagement of his post did not dull -his desire to retain it, was busy planning for re-election, and the work -of his staff, labor how they would, was congested. The assistants were -straining to make a record of convictions with which their chief might -go before the electors in the autumn, and were giving to participation -in political councils every half-hour that they dared spare from their -legal tasks; they were hard driven and worn to the nerves; yet the news -of the wreck of the Manhattan & Niagara Railway, immediately within the -city's limits, burst through doors that had been opened only to men with -power or appointments and swept, even from the collective mind of the -corps, the bulking thought of jury lists and ballots. - -The Manhattan and Niagara had entered New York only a few years before, -with a line that tapped fresh territory. Along this line real-estate -operators forthwith plotted ten or a dozen towns, and white-and-yellow -suburbs leaped up like mushrooms. They were peopled by clerks and small -businessmen that came into the city over the M. & N. every morning and -returned home by the same route each evening. - -From the opening of the new line, complaints had been common: it was -said that the service was inadequate, that the cars and other -rolling-stock were largely second-hand material purchased from the older -New York & New Jersey Railroad; that the rails were the cheapest -obtainable, the ties bought from an abandoned branch line near Buffalo. -One serious wreck had preceded that at the North Bridge, but had not -been followed by the improvements the company had promised. The patrons -had protested with all the vigor Americans exhibit when they feel that a -public-service corporation is cheating them, and had stopped as far on -the discreet side of action as protesting Americans usually stop: the M. -& N.'s parsimony became grist for the mill of the humorous weeklies and -produced no further reaction. This morning, a train crowded with men -going to their offices plunged through a bridge crossing an uptown -street: a hundred passengers were wounded and twenty-five killed. - -The earliest editions of the evening papers shrieked the news, and -special editions rushed from the presses. In most of them the M. & N. -had taken care to be a heavy advertiser, but here was an event so -clearly due to the railway's known policy that no paper could belittle -the culpability of the management: the bridge had been recently examined -and pronounced safe by state inspectors, yet all reports agreed that it -was constructed of the very lightest material, and the earliest evidence -showed that a rail had flattened and thrown the train. To persons -having a fair knowledge of current finance, it was known that the M. & -N. was controlled by the group of capitalists who were actively at the -management of the nominally rival N. Y. & N. J. - -Luke sent his office-boy to buy him the first edition that he heard -called beneath his window. It placed the dead at a hundred and the -injured at thrice that figure, and when Huber's eyes caught the obscure -paragraph that hinted at the real ownership of the road, his cheeks, now -so generally pale, reddened, and the hand that held the paper trembled. -Something of his old indignation and purpose woke in him. He ordered -the boy to bring him a copy of each fresh edition as it appeared on the -street, and though the lists of victims shrank to their true number, the -outstanding fact of the owners' guilt remained. - -Leighton passed through Luke's room on his return from luncheon. His -face was drawn with the long worry of his campaign; he had been eating -with two politicians and shaping plans while he bolted food. - -"Begins to look as if we can get the indorsement of the anti-Tammany -Democrats," he said as he hurried by. "I've just had a talk with Seeley -and Ellison. They're coming here at three o'clock." - -Luke held up his paper. - -"This is an awful thing," he said. - -"What?" asked Leighton. He passed beside Luke's desk. "Oh, the North -Bridge wreck? Yes, isn't it? When Ellison and Seeley come, don't let -anybody butt in on me." - -"You know who are really the responsible crowd in the M. & N.?" Luke -persisted. His manner was the sleepy manner that had grown upon him for -the past twelvemonth, but his eyes were keen. - -"Yes," said Leighton absently. He ran his fingers through his always -disordered hair. "Yes I know, but we couldn't prove it." He looked at -his watch. "Don't forget," he concluded, "you're to head off anybody -that comes after three o'clock, and if you're busy, then turn them over -to one of the other fellows." - -§2. At half-past four Luke's office-boy announced James T. Rollins. - -Luke looked up heavily from the latest edition of the _Evening World_. - -"Who's James T. Rollins?" he inquired. - -The boy did not know. "But he looks like he owned the Stock Exchange," -he said. "Wanted the Boss: I told him he was busy." - -Luke wearily laid aside his paper. - -"Very well, bring him in." - -The boy went out and straightway reopened the door to admit the visitor. - -Dressed in a russet brown, Rollins was short and stout; his eyebrows -were bushy, and he made an effort to keep his thick lips drawn in a firm -line. He so much resembled the pictures of the man just then predominant -in Luke's mind that the assistant District-Attorney was startled. - -"Mr. Rollins?" - -The visitor tried to speak, but seemed to be unable to accomplish -articulation. He nodded. He stood erect in the attitude of one -accustomed to receive orders, and his right hand tapped his stiff hat -against his thigh. - -Luke indicated a chair beside his desk. - -"Sit down." - -Rollins complied. He sat far forward in the chair, as if expecting to -be ordered out of it at the next moment. Both hands now clutched the -brim of his hat, which he held between his fat, outspread knees. - -"You wanted to see Mr. Leighton?" inquired Luke. - -Rollins coughed. - -"Yes, sir." - -"I'm sorry." Luke was accustomed to callers of the hesitant sort: he -wished that this one would go and leave him alone with the new idea that -was growing in his brain; but Leighton, like the good politician that he -was, had always given strict orders that every caller should be well -received. "I'm afraid Mr. Leighton's very busy now. He has some most -important business in hand." - -Rollins made an effort toward dignity; his words succeeded, but his -manner of uttering them failed: - -"My business is important, too." - -"And immediate?" - -"Yes, sir." - -"Then perhaps I can attend to it for you." - -Rollins shook his head. - -"I've got to see the District-Attorney." - -"But I am his assistant." - -"Yes, sir, I know. But this is confidential." - -Luke began to lose patience. - -"Well," he said, "as I told you, I'm sorry, but you can't see him." - -In spite of Leighton's orders and his own customary obedience to them, -Luke's voice had become sharp. It was just then only the sharpness of -an underling; but, because Rollins himself was an underling, the visitor -resented it, and this resentment gave him the courage he wanted. He -stood up, and he bore himself with an erectness which had a fresh -character. - -"It's him that will be sorry," he said. "I came here to give him -information that'd re-elect him." - -Notwithstanding the man's new attitude, Luke thought he scented the -crank. All sorts of cranks infested the District-Attorney's office, and -every sort was certain it could purge the city or re-elect Leighton. -Luke lost his temper. He spoke with the drawl with which he commonly -spoke, but his tone was bitter. His tongue laid hold of the uppermost -thought in his head. - -"I suppose," he said, "you've come here to place the blame for the North -Bridge wreck?" - -The breath caught in Rollins's throat. - -"How did you know?" he demanded. - -It was not a crank that asked that question: it was a sane man badly -startled. Luke recognized the distinction and instantly resolved to -push the advantage he had fortuitously gained. He rose, smiling slowly. - -"You've told me you knew I was one of the assistant district-attorneys -of New York," he drawled. "I would advise you to act on the knowledge, -Mr. Rollins, and not to lose any time about it." - -"I----" began Rollins; but bluster came to the aid of his timidity. -"No," he said, "I've got to see Mr. Leighton." - -Luke had no idea who his visitor was or what information he might -possess, but he was now certain that worth-while information was in -Rollins's possession. Without further fencing, the lawyer, therefore, -resorted to an old stratagem that he had learned when he first entered -the District-Attorney's office: on the bare chance that the evidence -might be documentary and within reach, he took a quick stride towards -Rollins, raising his right hand as if to seize him. At once the right -hand of Rollins shot upward and stopped protectingly over his breast. - -"Now then," said Luke, "hand me those papers that you've got in your -breast-pocket." - -"No," said Rollins; "no; they're for Mr. Leighton." - -"Hand them over.'" - -"They're mine." - -"If you don't hand them over," said Luke lazily, "I shall take them." - -"You've got no right to!" - -"You'd better save yourself trouble, Mr. Rollins." - -"I won't!" - -From under his lazy lids, Luke saw that the man was only frightened. -With a flash of inspiration, the lawyer guessed something of the truth. -This fellow was probably a clerk in the M. & N. offices. - -"You won't be arrested for robbing the office-files, if that's what -you're scared about," he said; "and you won't be told on and -discharged." - -Rollins was visibly relieved. - -"You give me your word, Mr. Huber?" - -"I do. Come on now: let's see what you've got." - -"And--I'm not a rich man, Mr. Huber." - -Luke's face showed his disgust. - -"I shan't pay you a cent," he said; "but I daresay Leighton won't mind -paying. Only even he won't buy a pig in a poke. Give me those papers. -If they're worth anything, I'll take you into the District-Attorney's -room right away--or, if there's somebody in there, I'll have him out -here." - -Rollins realized that Luke meant what he said. He believed, moreover, -that his inquisitor was merely cautious. - -"All right," he agreed, though with some reluctance. "This is a letter -from my employer to a man that always had to return such letters after -he's read them. The other letter is the letter from the rail -manufacturers that's referred to in the first one. I got them both -by----" - -"I can guess how," said Luke. - -He put out his hand and into it Rollins placed two sheets of paper, that -were headed on top simply by an embossed Wall Street address and dated -almost five years before. - -Luke read: - - -"_Confidential_. - "MR. ROBERT M. DOHAN, - "Delaware Avenue, - "Buffalo, N. Y. - -"DEAR MR. DOHAN: - - -"I understand that the bill of which you have spoken to me will be -passed and become a law to-day. I have just seen Messrs. Hallett and -Rivington and have secured their agreement to the plan outlined in my -personal conversation with you last week. In view of the favors that -you have done me in the past, I think it fair to tell you, _for your own -use only_, that my friends have decided that they and I ought to do what -you thought they might decide, viz.: unload at the end of five years. -Considering your contemplated resignation next year, this will not -affect you, except favorably in case you care to manipulate your own -holdings in accordance with this news. - -"I note what you say about the estimate submitted by the -construction-department; also the letter of the steel-rail manufacturers -which you inclosed, in which they say that the grade I suggested might -not wear well. I think their use of the word 'dangerous' is absurdly -exaggerated. We have used this grade on several of our roads and feel -sure from long experience that, with proper repair-gangs, it will wear -for five years as well as the best. - -"My desire and the desire of my associates is to protect the interests -of the stockholders. With that in mind, I should state, what you have -probably already gathered, that we feel that the new line must be built -and operated with all possible economy." - - -The signature was the signature that Luke expected. - -"Those rails," said Rollins, "weren't replaced. Dohan resigned, and -these letters have been in our office ever since. The crowd was -planning to unload in November." - -"Yes," said Luke dryly. His face was immobile and his voice calm, but -his heart seemed to beat against his ribs, demanding freedom. "Come on -in here to Mr. Leighton's office." - - -§3. He had forgotten Seeley and Ellison, but they were already gone, -and Leighton was alone. Apparently the conference had been satisfactory, -for the District-Attorney's face was a little less careworn. - -"Mr. Leighton," said Luke, closing the door, "this man"--he indicated -Rollins by a lazy movement of his hand--"is a secretary in the employ of -the person to whom these letters belong--or belonged." He held out the -letters that Rollins had given him. - -Leighton's face clouded. - -"Office business? I thought I told you I had some personal matters to -think over." - -Luke choked an impulse of resentment. - -"If you'll look at these letters," he said, "I believe you'll find they -apply to--both sorts of duties." - -Leighton took the papers with a gesture of annoyance, but when he saw -the signature to the more important of them, his eyes shone, and he -looked up quickly. - -"Where did you get these?" He flung the question at Rollins. - -The informer had been standing behind Luke, as if seeking his shelter. -His breath came heavily. - -"I found them in the office-files," he mumbled. - -"He stole them," said Luke quietly. - -"Oh, Mr. Huber, if you're going to talk like that----" - -"He stole them," Luke pursued--"or so he says. The only question in my -mind is: are they genuine?" - -Rollins showed signs of resenting this suggestion more keenly than the -declaration that he was a thief. Leighton, however, interrupted: he was -squinting at the letter that Luke had read in full. - -"No," he said, "this is real enough. I know the signature." - -"You know it?" Luke was surprised. - -"Yes, yes." Leighton read the letter through; then turned upon Rollins -with a resumption of his cross-examining manner. "How much d'you want -for these?" - -Rollins beat his hat upon his thigh. - -"Well," he said, "they ought to be worth a good deal to you, Mr. -Leighton." - -"I'll give you five hundred dollars." - -"Mr. Leighton!" Rollins was deprecating. "Five hundred dollars!" - -"What do you want, then? Speak up." - -"Five thousand would be nearer value, Mr. Leighton." - -Luke turned away. This was the part of the business that he loathed. - -"I'll give you two thousand and not a cent more," said Leighton. - -Rollins thought himself now in a commanding position. - -"I can't consider that," he said with the nearest approach to firmness -he had yet shown. - -"All right," said Leighton. "Huber!" He handed the letters to Luke. -"Put these in your safe while I telephone this fellow's employer." - -"Mr. Leighton!" Rollins bounded forward. His fat face worked with rage, -disappointment, and fear. "You wouldn't do that. This is robbery. -It's blackmail! For God's sake, Mr. Leighton----" - -"Two thousand dollars," said Leighton. - -"But think a minute, Mr. Leighton! I've been in my job for seven -years--worked up to it from office-boy. I could any time have sold tips -along the street for twice that money, and yet this is the first time -I've ever--ever----" - -"Ever double-crossed your boss. Well, why'd you do it?" - -"I don't know. It was because this wreck is so awful." - -"And what else?" - -"Nothing else." - -Leighton thrust a forefinger into the informer's face. - -"_What else?_" - -Rollins jumped back. - -"Well, he--he didn't raise my pay. I've got a big family, and there's a -mortgage on my little house in Roseville, and a man in my position has -to live well, or people'd talk." - -Leighton relaxed. He swung back in his chair and cocked his feet on the -desk. - -"I'll make it two thousand five hundred for your family's sake. That's -my last word." - -Luke, who had again turned his back on the hagglers, the letters safely -buttoned in an inside pocket of his coat, wondered how his chief could -afford such an outlay. - -"Is that really the best you can do?" whined Rollins. - -"It is the best I _will_ do," said Leighton. Without lowering his feet, -he pulled toward him the telephone, which was attached to his desk by an -arm that could be lengthened or shortened at the user's will. "Now, -then, your boss has gone home long ago; but I can get him at his house; -do you want to lose your job or make this money?" - -Rollins surrendered. - -"I guess I'll have to take your price," he said. "But it's almost a -charity I'm doing." - -"Right!" Leighton released the telephone, quickly swung his legs from -the desk and sat straight. - -"And you'll promise nobody'll ever know where you got these letters?" - -"Certainly." - -Rollins looked toward Luke's significant back. - -"And Mr. Huber, too?" - -Luke turned. - -"I've already promised you that," he said. - -Leighton smiled faintly as he said to Luke: - -"I guess you don't happen to have two thousand five hundred in loose -change about you, do you, Huber?" - -"No," said Luke. He saw nothing humorous anywhere in the situation. - -"Well, this is no affair for checks, and my bank's uptown," Leighton -continued. "I don't suppose," he said to Rollins, "you would care to -give credit, my dear sir?" - -Rollins could smile, if Luke could not. He shook his head. - -"My bank," said Luke, anxious to end the scene, "is just around the -corner. It's closed, but the clerks will still be there. They know me. -I can get them to let me in the side door, and I know they'll do me a -favor. I've got just about that much on deposit." He looked at -Leighton. "Shall I take Rollins along?" - -"Rollins? Yes." Leighton's good-humor seemed to have returned to stay. -"Then hurry back here--alone. I'll want to talk this thing over with -you." - - -§4. Luke paid and dismissed Rollins. Returning, he found Leighton -walking rapidly up and down his office. - -"Shut the door," said the District-Attorney. His face was flushed; he -spoke quickly. - -Luke shut the door. - -Leighton came forward and brought his hand down on Luke's shoulder with -a resounding smack. - -"Do you know what this means?" he cried. His mouth was wide with -laughter; the whole man exulted. "This re-elects me! Nothing can keep -us out now, Huber--not a thing on God's green footstool. All we've got -to do is use these letters and then sit back and fold our arms and -attend to office business. Politics? These two pieces of paper will -play all the politics we need, and more besides. I could shout, Huber; -I could sing a regular Song of Deborah. What about Mr. Timothy Heney, -_now_? And his Tammany? Gone the way of Sisera, my boy. Tim Heney! -'At her feet he bowed, he fell, he lay down; at her feet he bowed, he -fell: where he bowed, there he fell down dead!'" - -Luke's old enthusiasm was rekindled. He thought that he had been -misjudging Leighton. Of course the man had been discouraged: he had -never before been able to seize an efficient weapon with which to -shatter the forces of wrong; even at this time it was only reasonable -that his first thought should be of his immediate political opponents; -but the weapon was put into his hand at last, the blow would be given -against both Tammany and Wall Street; it would be the blow that Luke had -hoped for when he read the first accounts of the North Bridge wreck. - -"There must be a special Grand Jury to investigate the disaster," said -Luke, his words falling over one another much as Leighton's had done. -"We must keep the letters dark till it's in session, and then produce -them. We can give them to the papers right afterward. It will be jail -for the lot of them. Big as they are, it'll be that. It'll be the end -of the whole crowd!" - -Leighton drew away. His face changed. His entire attitude altered. - -"What are you talking about?" he asked dryly. - -"Why"--Luke was amazed--"about these letters, of course." - -"Well, do you think I'm green enough to waste them on a jury? Not -much!" - -Luke began to comprehend. He felt unsteady. He was standing close to -Leighton's desk, and he put out a hand and gripped the edge of its top -shelf. - -"Not give them to the jury?" But perhaps he was wrong. Of course he -was wrong. "Oh, I see," he said; "maybe it's better not to risk any -more lives by waiting. You're going to force this crowd to put down a -decent road-bed? Only if you do that---- Well, it's fine of you, but -you'll not be any better off politically." - -Leighton turned his swivel-chair and sat down in it. His manner became -that of an employer trying to be calm and to instill reason into an -annoying employee. - -"Young man," said he, "just you listen to me for about two minutes. -Those fellows do control this road, but they didn't operate it. In -spite of Rollins's blessed letters, you can't absolutely say they -operate it. But what they do operate, when they want to, are the -politics of this city, and if they tell Tammany, yes, or me, to hold off -and let an election go the way they want it, why, hold off Tammany or -anybody else has to. Nobody could win if they said 'No.' Now, -then"--Leighton punctuated his words with the rise and fall of an index -finger--"they're not actually morally responsible for the conduct of the -M. & N., but they'll know the publication of these letters would make -the public think they were. They'll know the publication would wreck -the road they're still interested in, smash all their other stocks and -depreciate all their other interests, start a panic that might swamp -even them, and maybe begin a public row that would send them close to -jail, on general principles, legal evidence or no legal evidence. To -stop that, they'd be willing to have me elected, which they weren't yet -quite certain about being to-day. I'll go to them quietly, and then -I'll surrender these letters, when they've kept their part of the -bargain I'll make. And don't you worry about loss of life. That -engineer was probably green or drunk, or the signal man got rattled. -You'll see the coroner's jury says so. But, anyhow, once I'm safely -re-elected, I'll take care the M. & N. is better regulated than it has -been. There's no use in a row: a little moral suasion will do the -trick." - -He tossed back, and clasped his hands behind his head. - -The explanation had been too long: it was long enough to allow Luke to -master the shock of what it implied. He saw his last illusions -concerning Leighton fall under the impact of Leighton's own words. He -was aghast. He was ashamed of his master; he was ashamed of himself for -ever having served such a master. But he was not crushed. As his chief -proceeded, Luke's soul rose through indignation to red revolt. By the -time that Leighton ceased speaking, Luke, except for two spots of -crimson on his cheeks, was captain of his rage. He leaned against the -desk-side indolently, his eyelids lowered, and when he replied it was -with an indifferent drawl. - -"It doesn't much matter whether the engineer was drunk or the signal man -rattled," he said: "the rail flattened, and the bridge fell. The rail -was drunk and the bridge was rattled." - -Leighton shook himself peevishly. - -"You're trying to be humorous," he said. - -"No; oh, no," said Luke gently. "What I'm getting at is, it seems to me -the men who directly controlled this road were directly responsible for -its operation. I mean that the men who authorized that letter, and -insisted on the policy it lays down, are guilty. It strikes me they -ought to be either reformed or punished." - -"Oh, hell!" said Leighton. Heretofore, Luke had always appeared to be -on his side, so that the District-Attorney did not know the meaning of -his assistant's outward calm. "Those letters aren't legal evidence -enough." - -"I think they are, Leighton. Besides, I think there are times when -moral evidence goes ahead of legal evidence, and ought to--and I think -this is one of those times." - -"Well," said Leighton, "I don't. So that ends it." - -"Of course," Luke calmly pursued, "if you could make these fellows -re-lay the road, it might be worth while to do no more than scare them, -at least if you don't consider the political ethics and consider only -the immediate protection of life." - -"I told you I'd take care of the regulation of the road as soon as I was -re-elected." - -"Ye-es. But could you?" - -"Certainly I could." - -"I should say that once they'd got their letters back, _you'd_ be in -_their_ power." - -Leighton got to his feet. He was angry. He faced Luke, who did not -shift his lazy pose. - -"Look here," he said, "we've been friends, and you've done good work for -me, especially this afternoon----" - -"Thanks," said Luke. - -"But it looks as if the time had come when you'd better understand who's -the head of this office." - -"You are," Luke assured his chief; and then added: "I'm glad to say." - -"Well, then, Huber, I've got to tell you that if you don't act -accordingly, we must part company." - -Luke raised his listless eyes. - -"You've quite made up your mind to do this thing, Leighton?" - -"Let you go? Not if you'll only be reasonable." - -"I mean this thing about the letters." - -"Yes." - -"You're going to make use of these fellows' money-power in politics?" - -"It's already in politics. It always has been." - -"But you are going to try to use it for yourself?" - -"Yes, I am. It's my own business." - -"Is it? That money is blood-money, Leighton." - -"You're a fool!" - -"I know I am. But it's you that I'm worried about. You're quite -determined?" - -"_Absolutely._" - -Luke shrugged his shoulders. He began to move slowly toward the door. - -"Here!" said Leighton sharply. "Where're you going?" - -Luke scarcely looked at him. - -"I'm going to write my resignation." - -Leighton was startled, but he tried not to show it. - -"Very well," he said, "write it. But don't be too fast: you may hand -over those letters first." - -"Letters?" Luke seemed never to have heard the word before. "What -letters?" - -"Why do you try so hard to be an ass, Huber?" The District-Attorney -extended his hand for the papers that he had given Luke during the -interview with Rollins. "Drop all this resignation rot--_My_ letters, -of course." - -Luke's face met Leighton's fairly. - -"The only letters I have about me," he said with quiet distinctness, -"are two that are my property. I bought them with the last two thousand -five hundred dollars of my own money." - -As the words came home to him, Leighton's face grew purple. His brows -met in a knot. At his temples two veins pulsed visibly. - -"What's that?" he cried with a straining throat. "What's that? You---- -Give them here this minute; they're mine! They're mine. They're mine! -You know damned well they're mine!" - -He had not counted on this. The unexpected disappointment tossed him -from the summit of the hopes to which, that afternoon, he had been so -unexpectedly lifted. He made a blind dash at Huber. - -Luke's two hands caught both of Leighton's wrists. By the exertion of a -superior strength that scarcely showed itself, the assistant forced down -the master's arms and held them at his flanks. - -"They are my letters," said Luke. - -"Let go!" Leighton wrenched at the imprisoning grip; but he wrenched -without effect. "Let me go!" - -"Certainly," said Luke. He freed the panting man. "I merely wanted to -protect myself and show you it wouldn't help you to use force." - -Leighton, his face still contorted, tried another tone. - -"It isn't fair of you, Huber. I'm sorry I went at you that way; but you -know well enough those letters belong to me." - -"They belong," said Luke, "to the man that can make the better use of -them." - -"What use can _you_ make?" - -"A better one than you say you will." - -"They were brought here for me." - -"By a thief." - -"Well, you're not going to restore them to their owner, are you?" - -"Perhaps." - -"What?" Leighton laughed cynically. "So _that's_ what your moral tone's -for, is it?" - -"Perhaps." - -"Oh, come on, Huber, I didn't mean that. Anyhow, you know, I only asked -you to lend me the money." - -"The letters," said Luke again, "belong to the man that can make the -better use of them." - -"I'll do the right thing by you, Huber, if you give them back to me." - -"Thank you. The real owner of the letters can do more--when I'm for -sale." - -Leighton bent forward and began to whisper. - -"I'll tell you what I'll do for you politically," he began. "I'll----" - -"No thank you," said Luke. - -"Well, then,"--Leighton, his face now white from fear of loss, appeared -to capitulate-"give them back and I'll use them the way you want them -used." - -The two men's eyes probed one another. - -"I don't believe you," said Luke. - -It was final, and it drove Leighton back to his purple rage. - -"I'll ruin you!" he threatened. "And they'll ruin you. Go ahead and -resign. Resign? You can't. You're fired! Do you hear that? You're -fired! Now go and try to do something. You can't do a thing but sell -those letters to the people they were stolen from. If you try that, -I'll show you up, and if you try anything else with those people, -they'll bury you so deep nobody ever can dig down far enough to find -you. Do you know who you're up against when you buck that crowd? They -won't let you walk the same earth with them! Go on. You'll be killed, -and I'll be damned glad of it. Fight them, will you? You might as well -draw a gun on God Almighty! Now, then, get out of here. Get out, or -I'll have you kicked out!" - - - - - *CHAPTER VI* - - -To his office on the twentieth floor of a Wall Street skyscraper--that -office with the mahogany table at its center and the engraving of George -Washington between two windows--the master came at his usual time on the -morning of the day following the North Bridge wreck. He was dressed -neatly, as always, in a suit of russet brown. Breathing visibly, but -noiselessly, he passed the resting ticker and walked to one of the -windows overlooking the labyrinth. His near-sighted, beady eyes peered -toward the web of streets below, on the cross-threads of which the black -dots that were hurrying men and women bobbed like struggling flies. - -The master rang for his secretary. - -"Rollins," he said, "what's in the----" He stopped. He had not looked -up, yet he asked: "What's the matter with you this morning?" - -"Nothing," said Rollins. "I----" He coughed behind his hand. "I -didn't sleep well last night." - -"Take more exercise," said his master. "What's in the mail?" - -"Thirty letters that need your personal attention, sir." - -Nimbly the master ran them through his short and stumpy fingers, the -tips of which were delicately rounded. He dictated his terse -instructions. With the daily routine again in motion, Rollins recaught -his employer's calm. - -"Simpson has the begging letters?" - -"Yes, sir." - -"I guess," said the master in his most commonplace tone, "there were -more than the usual number of anonymous threats." - -"Only ten or twelve more." - -"Burn them." - -"Yes, sir. I always do." - -"And, Rollins, draw up a letter to the cancer hospital and tell the -management I have decided to give them a special ward for fibroid tumor -cases. Their lawyers may consult with Judge Stein; I gave him the -details last evening. Bring me the letter for revision." - -"Yes, sir." - -The master proceeded through his customary schedule. - -"Rollins," he said, when it was at last completed and the secretary had -been recalled. "Mr. Hallett and Mr. Rivington will be here"--he -consulted his watch--"in five minutes. We are on no account to be -disturbed." - -Hallett and Rivington came in, five minutes later. Hallett looked angry, -and Rivington frightened. Though the hour was early, Hallett's white -waistcoat, fresh every morning, showed wrinkles, and its wearer chewed -hard at an unlighted cigar; there was a deep perpendicular line over his -short, thick nose. Rivington, immaculate, pulled at his slightly gray -mustache. - -"Good-morning," said their host. His voice was as nearly cheerful as it -was ever. "Sit down." - -They took their places at the table, where there was a pad of scribbling -paper and a freshly sharpened pencil before each. Their host sat at the -head of the table, his hands flat upon the table-top, their fingers -extended, his elbows pointing ceilingward. - -Rivington began at the midst of what worried him. - -"It's a terrible thing!" he groaned. "Think of it; twenty-five -people--and the women too!" - -Hallett's comment was almost a bark. - -"As soon as the coroner's jury lets 'em down easy," he said, "we've got -to see that everybody's fired, from the division-superintendent to the -president of the road; that's what we've got to do. There's one kind of -carelessness that's not much better than murder." - -"Twenty-five people!" repeated Rivington. The numbers seemed to -hypnotize him; he made a futile gesture. "And the morning papers---- -Their tone---- I don't like it." - -The man at the head of the table watched them both, but said nothing. - -"Oh, the newspapers never worry me," said Hallett. "We can stop all but -one or two, and nobody cares what they say, anyhow. They've been -talkin' for years. They've got to fill their columns." - -"Then there's the Board meeting," said Rivington. "Next Thursday---- I -don't see---- Really I don't." - -"The Board of Directors of the M. & N.'s all right," Hallett reassured -him. - -"Perhaps. But then, too, there is this new reform element in town. -Talk of a fusion movement: a fourth candidate for District-Attorney---- -They will be only too eager to get hold of something, and this terrible -accident---- It will give them just what they want." - -"They can't elect." - -"I am not so sure. The people--they aren't what they used to be. -Something--I don't know what--has taken possession of them." - -Hallett bobbed assent to that. - -"Yes," he said, "nowadays as soon as a man gets a vote he stops minding -his own business. But we've still got our grip on the wires." - -"They may break." Rivington's fingers returned to their tugging at his -mustache. "The wires, I mean. It's ugly. Twenty-five dead and a -hundred hurt----" - -"_We_ didn't hurt 'em." - -Rivington looked toward the man at the head of the table, but he sat -crouched and silent. - -"No," said Rivington; "but----" His sentence ended in a helpless waving -of the hand. - -"Then what are you worryin' about?" Hallett challenged. "We were only -tryin' to keep up dividends. We had to choose between a little risk and -protecting the stockholders. Lots of the stockholders are widows and -orphans. Besides, it wasn't a real risk; it was a recognized, -legitimate business risk. Lots of other roads do it right along. Our -own roads do." - -"That bridge----" said Rivington. - -"The state inspectors passed it a month ago. And they passed the rails, -too. It's all up to them." - -In his turn, Hallett glanced at the man at the head of the table. He -saw the man's hairy hands, fat and white against the mahogany, begin to -move as they always began to move before he made a verbal attack upon -conversation; but the man did not speak. - -"I know," Rivington was saying, "but with the four candidates for the -district-attorneyship all looking for vote-getting material----" - -"Buy 'em," said Hallett. - -"Four?" - -"Who's the fourth?" - -"They haven't chosen him yet; but----" - -"Buy 'em," repeated Hallett. - -"Out of the four there might be one we couldn't----" - -"Anybody can buy anybody. There are more ways than one. Anyhow, we're -not even directors." - -"We own the road. Practically----" - -"Nobody knows that." - -"It seems to me----" - -"They don't!" Hallett spat to the floor a bit of tobacco that, bitten -from the end of his cigar, had clung to his lips. "They only think they -do. It'd be the hardest thing in the world to prove that was ever -tried." - -"Would it?" Rivington questioned. "I really believe----" - -The quick, cold voice of the third man flashed across their talk. It -was as if he leaped at them. - -"We may own the road," he said; "but we don't operate it. Not one of us -has officially any administrative power in the matter of its operation. -You gentlemen have forgotten that." He smiled: his teeth were pointed. - -"Still," said Rivington, "if the fusion movement----" - -He stopped there, not because of his habit of speaking in tangents, but -because the door opened, and an old man timidly paused at its threshold. - -The master of the office turned his head slowly. - -"Simpson?" he said. - -"Yes, sir," said the man at the door. - -"What does this mean? Where's Rollins?" - -"He was using my room to compose that letter about the hospital, and so -I took his place." - -"Didn't he tell you we were not to be disturbed?" - -"Yes, sir; but this man"--Simpson held out an envelope--"got by -everybody. He told me you would see him at once if you only received -his message." - -The man at the head of the table reached for the envelope. He read a -card that it had contained. - -"Show him in," he said. - -He waited until Simpson had left to obey. Then, without wasting a -glance on his associates, he explained: - -"This is the card of a man called Luke Huber, Assistant -District-Attorney. He's written on it: 'Five minutes in regard to the -North Bridge wreck and your letters about it.'" - -"Letters?" said Hallett. "What letters?" - -As he replied, the strong jaw of the man at the head of the table worked -as if he were chewing. - -"That's what I mean to find out." - -"Here? Now?" Rivington gasped. - -The man addressed nodded. When a nod could save words, he saved words. - -"Is that the careful thing?" asked Hallett. - -"I'll bet his card's a bluff and he never expected to get in at all." - -"That is precisely why I am having him in." - -"Mr. Huber," announced Simpson. - -Huber was still a young man. He was so young, and his youth was so -ostentatious, that he immediately courted the rebuke once administered -to Pitt. Moreover, he seemed to lack energy. He was thin; his face, -though pleasant, was white. The lids dropped wearily over eyes that -were at first veiled from the three men who looked up, but did not rise -at his entrance. His mouth, the lips of which were only a pale pink, -might have appeared firm, but would certainly have given the impression -of being tired of firmness, and, when he bowed gravely to his host, his -bristling head inclined itself so slowly and so slightly that the effort -of the inclination, whether mental or physical, was insultingly -apparent. - -There was no form of presentation. Instead, there was a pause that only -Huber seemed not to notice. Rivington drummed on the table with his -long fingers. Hallett chewed his cigar. The other man smiled so -enigmatically that it was impossible to say whether he intended to -welcome or was amused by his friends' discomfiture. - -"Bring a chair for Mr. Huber." - -Simpson did as he was bid. - -Luke deposited a carefully brushed hat on the table. Then he sank into -the proffered chair opposite the leader of the trio and extended his -long legs under the mahogany. His feet touched Rivington's, and -Rivington jumped. - -"Well?" asked the man at the head of the table. - -Huber did not raise his heavy lids. - -"I am glad I found you three together," he said slowly in a low and -extremely gentle voice, "because you are the three men that control the -railroad." - -Hallett grinned a broad grin. This young fellow talked as if there were -but one railroad in which the group was interested. - -"What railroad?" he asked. - -Luke slowly drew in his legs. He regarded the figure of the Persian rug -that happened to be between the points of his patent-leather boots. - -"The railroad," said he, "that I suppose you have been talking most -about this morning." - -"The Manhattan & Niagara?" blurted Rivington. - -"We're not directors of that road," said Hallett hurriedly. - -"No," agreed Rivington. - -"No," said Luke, quite as heartily, "you aren't directors, but you -direct it." - -"We don't," snapped Rivington. - -The man at the head of the table raised a soothing hand. He was still -smiling. - -"Come, come," he said, with an air of good-nature that his friends had -seldom seen him assume during business hours. "We're all gentlemen, I'm -sure. Anything that Mr. Huber wants to say to us in confidence----" - -Huber interrupted. - -"I never talk in confidence," said he; "and I don't want anybody to say -anything to me that he would be ashamed to say in public." - -His eyes were still hidden, and he still spoke slowly and gently; but -the mere import of his words brought up short even the leader of the -trio before him. That one's manner changed. He was curt. - -"We are busy men, Mr. Huber," he said. "There are not many people in New -York that we would have allowed to take up our time this morning. What -do you want?" - -Luke studied the figure on the rug. - -"I want you three," he said in a tone not to be quickened, "to tear up -every mile of rails on the M. & N. and replace those pieces of -scrap-iron with rails of a grade fit to bear the traffic they have to -carry." - -Rivington's drumming fingers closed into his palms. Hallett let out an -ugly laugh. Only the man at the head of the table, again changing his -manner, equaled Luke in tranquillity. - -"Really, Mr. Huber," he said pleasantly, "without admitting for a moment -that we have the power to do what you suggest, don't you think your -request is a rather large one?" He had the air of indulgently -correcting a mistaken child. - -The young man, gazing at the rug, shook his round head. - -"No," he said, "not so large for you as its alternative." - -"And that? It is----" - -Rivington had put the question, but it was toward the man at the head of -the table that Luke as he shot out his sudden reply, raised his eyes. - -"Jail," said Luke. - -"Do you mean to threaten us?" cried Rivington angrily. - -Hallett laughed. - -The man at the head of the table only smiled. - -"Not at all," said Luke. "I am merely stating a fact. In coming here, -the only thing I hesitated about was whether it would be better for the -people to have safe transportation immediately guaranteed or to have you -three in jail." - -"You seem to forget, young man," said Hallett, "who it was elected the -man that made you assistant district-attorney." - -Luke gave him the briefest of glances. - -"It was because I found out who elected him that I resigned the job," he -answered. "I have just been offered the Municipal League's nomination -for District-Attorney. When _I_ am elected, it will be by the people." - -"That will be about 2000 A.D.," sneered Hallett. - -Luke shrugged his thin shoulders and returned his gaze toward the leader -of the trio. - -"A bridge falls on one of your roads in this county," he said. "It -kills twenty-five people and wounds a hundred--all passengers in one of -your trains. You will say the state inspectors declared the bridge O.K. -Maybe they did, though they ought to go to the electric chair for it. -That doesn't matter. What I can prove by thirty witnesses is that the -train left the bridge before the bridge fell. A rail flattened and -threw the train. Instead of sending you men to jail--and only because I -think this is better for the safety of the public--I will give you one -month to begin laying decent rails on this road--actually get _bona -fide_ work under way. If you don't do that, I'll make public the whole -truth, get you indicted, go into court as a witness and produce two -letters, one forwarded to you and the other signed by you. The first of -these is a letter to the president of the road written by the steel -manufacturers; it warns him that the cheap rails he's ordered are -dangerous: that letter he sent to you. The second is a letter from you -to the president of the road in which you say you want the poor-grade -rails used because you don't want to increase the running expenses, and -you order a general keeping-down of the road's expenses because of a -plan for you three to unload your stock along about this December." - -Luke rose. He relapsed into the weary young man of ten minutes before. - -"You have one month," he said. - -He picked up his hat, rubbed it with a caressing hand, and left the -room. - -The three that he left stared at one another. Then both Hallett and -Rivington looked at their leader. - -"It's an infamous--it must be an infamous lie!" cried Rivington. -"Letters like that--men don't write them!" - -Without moving a muscle of his face, the man at the head of the table -looked at Rivington. - -"All men say they don't," he corrected, "and all men do." - -"What?" asked Hallett. "You're joking, and this fellow can't ever make -it good. It's a bluff." - -"Gentlemen," said the man at the head of the table, "it's the truth." - - - - - *CHAPTER VII* - - -§1. When Luke, on the afternoon preceding his Wall Street interview, -had walked out of Leighton's office and the city's employ, it was with -no certain plan for further action. His years of experience as an -assistant prosecutor had demonstrated to him that something was -drastically wrong with the modern administration of justice and practice -of the law; his life in New York had shown him the evil influence of the -money-power that seemed to be set in motion by the author of the Rollins -letter and certainly corrupted the entire body of the nation, and his -political work had discovered to him what he came to consider the -inherent rottenness of the organized political parties. The effect of -all this was made acute by the horror at the North Bridge wreck and the -culmination of his mistrust in Leighton. Luke's sole immediate -sensation was that of a man who finds himself in a bog: he did not think -of draining the bog for the benefit of future pedestrians; he thought -only of extricating himself from the mire. - -That night at his club, however, he began to consider the larger aspects -of the case. He was in the writing-room, intent on composing for the -next evening's papers a statement of his reasons for parting company -with Leighton. In formulating these, he found his charges to be -precisely the charges recently formulated by the group of municipal -reformers who were clamoring for a fusion of the best elements of all -parties to elect, by honest methods, honest men that would purge New -York of its civic shame. He recalled how this Municipal Reform League, -growing steadily, had worried Leighton, and how its promoters prophesied -that, if successful in the place of its origin, it might well spread -throughout the country. When he first heard of it, Luke had been too -deep in the affairs of his chief to be warmed by it; but to-night his -vision was cleared. - -He telephoned to two of the League's leaders. They came to his club and -talked with him until long past midnight, themselves telephoning -inquiries and instructions to friends and lieutenants, and summoning -other leaders to join them. - -Luke told them much. He betrayed no secrets of his recent employer, but -he could honorably tell enough to make it clear to them that their -belief in the necessity of reform was correct, enough to have weight -with the voters should he speak to them in the new cause. His public -record, it appeared, had long impressed the reformers; the firmness -underlying his slow habit of talk, and the determination imperfectly -covered by his lazy manner, impressed them now. He moved and fired -them. - -The Rollins letter he did not mention. He was more than once tempted, -but he had resolved upon provisional silence before ever he sent for -these leaders. He weighed carefully the merits of the courses open to -him and decided that, large as would be the benefit of a public airing -of his charges, and excellent as might prove the salutary example of a -prison term for America's chief financiers, the airing might be lessened -by those financiers' subtle influences upon popular opinion, the prison -term might be escaped through similar influences, and all good results -would in any case be long delayed. On the other hand, it was evident to -him, in his present frame of mind, that the immediate safety of the M. & -N.'s patrons was paramount, and that this safety could probably be -secured by threatening those morally responsible for it. Such a threat, -with a rigid time-limit, he therefore elected to administer. - -The first result of his conference with the reformers was unexpected. -At eight o'clock next morning, three of their most prominent men, who -had not been with him on the night before, came to his apartments at the -Arapahoe in Thirty-ninth Street. They had been in all-night -consultation, and they told him that their organization had determined -to put a full ticket in the field at the coming municipal election, but -to center efforts in a struggle for the district-attorneyship: they had -chosen him for their candidate. - -Luke, in dressing-gown and pajamas, his unbrushed hair more than ever -erect, looked from one of his callers to the other. There was Venable, -a man of small but independent means, who had grown gray in the long war -for civic betterment, meeting defeat at the polls and, what is harder to -bear, disappointment in elected candidates, and again and again emerging -to hope and fight on; Nelson, a successful wholesale druggist, whose -business seemed divorced from politics, and whose hobby was the -improvement of political conditions; and Yeates, a young man of family -and fortune who belonged to Luke's club. Luke was flattered and -confident, but did not show it. - -"Do you really think I can do it?" he asked slowly. "Do you think I am -the best man for the job?" - -Each of the committee assured him he was. They said he had given a good -account of himself as assistant district-attorney, won influential -friends in his daily life, and secured, through his political -speech-making for Leighton, a strong following among the voters. - -"Of course," persisted Luke, "it's unnecessary to ask men of your -standing that there shan't be anything but clean politics in our -campaign." - -Venable tossed his head proudly. - -"My record is a guarantee of that," he said. - -"No undue influence?" asked Luke. "No outside interests coming in to -boss us or affect us in any way?" - -"Rot!" said Yeates. - -"And I am to have an absolutely free hand?" - -They assured him of that. - -Luke's lowered lids hid his eyes, but his eyes gleamed. Here, at last, -was his Great Chance. Here was what he had lived and hoped for. He -wanted to shout his war-cry, to go out and fight at once. Would he be -worthy? The wing of that doubt brushed the farthest edges of his -conscience, but he was young, and he did not heed it. He thought of all -that he could do with this opportunity; and he thought, too, of Betty -Forbes. - -He had not seen much of Betty for some weeks. The lethargy that the slow -process of his recent disillusionment flung over him, had left him -despairing of her, kept her beyond his reach. But now he saw the -way--saw that the way to win his ideals of honorable victory was also -the way to win her. - -He asked again a hundred questions, some that he had asked of his other -counselors the night before and more that he had not: questions about -purpose, ways-and-means, finances, organization, headquarters, district -leaders, probable support, the temper of the public mind. To all of -them he received sanguine answers. - -"And your other candidates?" asked Luke. "The Mayor? Comptroller? -President of the Board of Aldermen and the Borough Presidents?" - -They gave him the names of known and honest men. - -Luke stood up, but his air was the languid air that had become part of -him. - -"Good," he said, "of course, I'm pleased that you think of me as you do, -and I accept." - - -§2. He would be a busy man now, but he must have that morning and -afternoon to himself. However much he might want to start his campaign, -he must make that visit to Wall Street, and after luncheon he intended -to go to Betty. - -The Wall Street interview seemed to him as successful as he could have -expected. He was unterrified by the strength of the fortress to be -attacked, but he had not looked forward to speedy surrender, so he was -satisfied with the conviction that he affected the three financiers more -than they cared to show. If they did not obey him, he would make the -Rollins letters a part of his appeal to the electors; but he felt that, -in the end, he would be offered obedience. - -He lunched leisurely in the café attached to his apartment house, and -then went to his own room to change his clothes before seeking Betty. -He had completed the change and was about to leave when the telephone -rang and the voice of the clerk below stairs announced a visitor: - -"Judge Marcus F. Stein." - -It had begun already. Luke knew who Stein was, though the two had never -met. The man's title had been earned by a political appointment to fill -the unexpired term of a judge that died while on the bench. Stein had -begun his career as a young lawyer who specialized in damage suits -against the N. Y. & N. J. railway. He was once charged, before the Bar -Association--though the charges were never proved--with being a -"hospital runner": that is, with employing men to hurry to the hospital, -or the scenes of accidents, and induce victims to retain Stein to press -their claims for damages against the railroad on which they had been -injured. By devoting his best efforts against the N. Y. & N. J., he -tried to make the corporation realize that it would be cheaper to employ -him than to fight him, and he was, indeed, at last given a place on the -legal staff of the company's claim department. There was an ugly story -to the effect that, for a brief time before this charge was openly -announced, he received a salary from the road while apparently acting -for claimants against it and inducing them to compromise their claims -for trivial sums. - -It was a subject of common rumor at the New York Bar. Stein soon worked -his way to the head of the claim department and thoroughly reorganized -it. He used old tactics for his new employers: he had the news of all -accidents immediately communicated to him, whereupon he would despatch -his agents, with no loss of time, to the hospital, there to persuade the -wounded, half stupefied by pain or drugs, to sign releases in return for -pittances in ready money. It was said he built up a secret service, -composed of men and women from private detective agencies, whose duty it -was to discover discreditable secrets in the lives of such claimants as -refused to compromise, or, failing in discovery, to manufacture or -invent such incidents. One married woman from Syracuse, who had been -injured in a wreck in New York and came there to press her suit, was -inveigled into a friendship with a woman detective commissioned to -engage a neighboring room in the house where the plaintiff took -temporary lodgings. The detective succeeded in getting the claimant -drunk and brought her, in this condition, with two of the road's -employees, to a house in which, when the four were partially unclothed, -another detective took a flashlight photograph of them. Then when the -victim's case was called for trial, she was told that, unless she -dropped her suit, the picture would be shown to her husband. By methods -of this sort, Stein was said to have reduced his road's expenses for -damages by two-thirds in three years. - -Directly from his desk in the offices of the N. Y. & N. J., Stein was -appointed to the bench, where he did not cease his usefulness to his -employers. When his brief judicial term had ended, he took offices of -his own, and cultivated the higher branches of corporation law. The men -controlling the N. Y. & N. J. controlled many other corporations and saw -to it that Stein received a regular annual retainer as a consulting -lawyer from each of these. His business was not to win cases, but so to -aid in directing his clients' plans that they would avoid litigation; -he, therefore, rarely nowadays appeared in court and, though not one of -the most learned men so engaged by his principals, he was one of the -most serviceable, because to his merely crafty skill in the law he added -a deep knowledge of practical politics and a wide intimacy with -politicians. - -Luke's first impulse was to deny himself to this caller, for he wanted -to hurry to Betty and he thought there might be a strategic value in -refusing to negotiate with any emissary. Curiosity, however, proved -strong, and he reflected that the emissary might just possibly come with -a word of complete capitulation. - -"Show him up," said Luke into the telephone. - -The ex-Judge was an imposing figure. He was big and broad and -frock-coated, and he moved with befitting gravity. His hair was -plentiful and white, his face clean-shaven. He had a strong nose and a -wide, firm mouth, and his eyes were large and benevolent. His air was -that of a man who has dealt with great interests for so many years that -they have become the weighty commonplaces of his existence. - -Luke had resolved not to shake hands with his visitor, but the Judge -gave him no opportunity for refusal. He bowed courteously, smiled -politely, and settled into the most comfortable of Luke's chairs, which -he deliberately turned so that the light from the windows fell full on -his own face, thus leaving Luke to front him from the shadow. - -Luke, who had been prepared for the contrary move, managed to show no -surprise. He sat down, extended his legs, and lowered his eyes. He -made no inquiry concerning the reason of the Judge's call: he wanted the -Judge to begin the talk. - -Stein required no urging. - -"I have never had the pleasure of meeting you before, Mr. Huber," he -said, speaking with what was evidently no more than characteristic -deliberation, "but I have watched your career with a great deal of -interest--a very great deal. It reminded me so much of my own early -struggles." He was looking steadily at Luke, whose eyes remained -lowered. "You will forgive an old man who is a scarred veteran of the -law for speaking frankly with you and for taking such an interest, I'm -sure." - -"Very kind of you, indeed," Luke murmured. - -"I thought," said the Judge, "that you handled that Maretti case -excellently, and the Dow trial, too; you showed an original cleverness -there. More than that, Mr. Huber, you showed promise. There has been a -great deal of promise in your professional work, and I thought I -detected the same promise in the reports of your political speeches. -With influential friends--for, of course, everybody needs influential -friends in these days: people of real and solid standing--you ought to -go far." - -"Thank you," said Luke. - -"Now," the Judge pursued, "I see by the early evening papers you may be -offered the candidacy for District-Attorney on the Municipal League -ticket." - -"I believe there is some talk of that, Judge." - -"Well, we need such a movement as this reform movement: we need it -badly. With proper backing, you ought to win. With proper backing, of -course." - -Luke gave no sign of hearing this. Quite out of the air he drawled: - -"I suppose you came about those letters, Judge Stein?" - -For all the disturbance that he produced, he might as well have said -that it was a pleasant day, or that he expected rain. When his eyes at -this question were raised to meet the Judge's, the benevolent eyes of -the Judge did not quiver: like his voice, they were steady and -deliberate. - -"Yes," said the Judge, "and I had them in mind when I spoke of your -career. Now, Mr. Huber, my friends think, and I think, that you have -been a little hasty and unreasonable because--and remember, it is an old -man who tells you so--you are still rather young. But because I know -you are an able young man, I have told them I was sure you would see -your haste and unreasonableness when you came to consider the matter. -As their friend and as a lawyer who has watched your career and -remembers his own start in life, I undertook to say so to you and to -offer my advice." - -Luke's eyelids were again lowered. His hands were clasped in his lap. -To a less astute man than Stein, he might have seemed asleep. - -"I shall be glad," continued Stein, "if I can help you out of your -embarrassing position." - -"Who are your friends, Judge?" asked Luke. - -The Judge smiled tolerantly. - -"Come, come, Mr. Huber," he said; "you don't expect me to mention names, -I know. All I will say on that point--all you can justly ask me to -say--is that I don't come from them in my professional capacity. They -haven't retained me to do this. They haven't even asked me to do it. I -am acting entirely of my own volition, and on my own initiative, out of -good will for all the parties concerned and not least of all for you." - -"Yet you seem prepared to plead their case." - -"I am--on my own initiative, I am, because their case is the right one, -as I am sure you will end by seeing. In the first place, these letters -are their property." - -"I doubt," said Luke, "whether they would go into court to prove -property." - -"I do not think," said the unruffled Judge, "that they will go into -court for any purpose--unless their burden of good nature is rendered -intolerable. They can afford to appeal to their own conscience, because -they are morally clear." - -"Of the North Bridge wreck?" - -"Of the North Bridge wreck, Mr. Huber. Granting that those letters are -admissible evidence--which I shouldn't grant, if I were in the case--the -one is not an expert declaration; it is merely an expression of opinion -from persons with many grades of rails to sell and naturally anxious to -sell their most expensive and most profitable grade. As for the other -letter, it is informed by the knowledge of what prompted the -rail-makers' opinion, and in itself offers only a counter-opinion based -on the writer's long and successful experience with the cheaper rails." - -"Yes--but the accident happened." - -"Exactly: it merely happened and it was an accident. In other words, it -was something unforeseen and contrary to the experience of the writer of -the second letter." - -The Judge waited a moment for a reply but, as Luke gave none, presently -continued: - -"Now, the course I propose--quite personally, you will understand--is -honorable, harmless, and in the best interests of all concerned: you, -us, and even the public." - -"What is it?" asked Luke. - -"All that I would grant my friends is the return of those letters, which -are their own property, and are not admissible evidence in a court of -law. That is all I would grant them. On their part, I should exact a -pledge from them to have better rails laid throughout the suspected -sections of the M. & N. road." - -Luke's eyes opened. - -"That's all _I_ asked them to do," he said. - -"Ah, yes; but to do it at once would be taken as a public confession of -guilt--and my friends are not guilty. You will see that the coroner's -jury says so." - -Luke relapsed. - -"It will," he said. "I'm sure of it." - -"Therefore, the thing must be done slowly and discreetly, and meanwhile -we must protect the public by an increase of track-walkers and -road-inspectors." - -"Would your friends," inquired Luke, "instruct the road not to fight the -damage claims growing out of the wreck?" - -"Of course not," chuckled Stein. "You are too good a lawyer to expect -that, Mr. Huber, and too good a lawyer not to know how the sorrow or -wounds of the claimants--yes, and the big appetites of their attorneys, -too, I'm afraid--exaggerate their losses on the one hand and the riches -of the company on the other. No, no; the most we could get for them -would be liberal settlements. We mustn't bankrupt the road. There are -more widows owning stock in it than there are widows caused by this -wreck." - -"Well," said Luke, "I'm afraid you don't convince me, Judge." - -"Not if I could promise all this?" - -"No. You see, there was a smaller wreck some months ago, and the -additional track-walkers and inspectors were promised the public then." - -Undisturbed, the Judge repeated all his arguments. "I really think you -must see this as I do," he concluded. "And all we want is the -letters----. By the way, Mr. Huber, I congratulate you on getting hold -of them. That was a clever piece of work. How did you manage it?" - -Luke grinned. - -"I found them growing on an apple tree in Madison Square," he said. - -The Judge nodded a smiling approval. - -"At any rate," he submitted, "you will not mind telling me if any other -person knows of their existence?" - -"No, I don't mind. Except you and your friends and me and the apple -tree, there is only one other person that knows as yet, and he's in no -position to mention them." Luke rose as if to end the interview. "I've -told nobody because I keep my bargains, Judge. But I do keep my -bargains to the letter. You haven't convinced me, and you can't. I've -given your clients----" - -"My friends," Stein suavely corrected. - -"Your friends, then; I've given them one month. If they don't do as I've -suggested----" - -The judge raised a hand gravely. - -"I think you mean 'ordered,' Mr. Huber," said he. - -"Thank you. Yes, of course, I meant 'ordered.' If they don't begin to -do as I've ordered by one month from to-day, and do it in a way that -convinces everybody of their intention to finish the job--yes, and their -consciousness of guilt--I'll make those letters public." - -The Judge remained seated. He looked at Luke sadly, and his voice rang -true as he said: - -"I wonder if you have fully considered, I shall not say the dangers, but -the difficulties and annoyances your course may expose you to--may very -well expose you to?" - -"No," said Luke shortly. "I'm too busy." - -"A great many men have tried what you are trying," the Judge went on, -"and they have all failed. I tried it once myself. None has succeeded; -not one. Some of them, of course, entirely through their own faults, -were ruined by it, Mr. Huber." - -"I dare say," said Luke, unmoved. - -"And you," warned the Judge, "have the success of a new and valuable -political movement in your hands. You are responsible for it and to it. -This might end by losing you the nomination." - -"I can stand that." - -"It might even hurt the men in the movement that have trusted you." - -"I sha'n't blame myself for it, if it does." - -"And if it did not do these things, it would surely wreck the faction at -the polls--a faction that you believe in and that, if successful, could -do such a wide public good." - -Luke was standing above his caller, his hands deep in his pockets. - -"Look here, Judge," he drawled, "are you by any chance threatening me?" - -The Judge was not at all threatening him. "I am only telling you," he -frankly explained, "what a long life in New York has shown me. I like -you, Mr. Huber; I believe you could make a great success in life if you -were less hot-headed; but I believe your hot-headedness can ruin you at -the bar, can ruin you socially and financially, and can put a stop to -your political career forever. I knew one man that attempted something -such as you are attempting and never had another client afterward. I -knew another that people heard a nasty story about and shut all their -doors against. I knew a dozen that became political corpses, and I knew -more that went bankrupt." - -Luke smiled. - -"And some," he suggested, "disappeared altogether, I dare say?" - -The Judge looked him full in the eyes. - -"I have heard so," said he. Then he brightened somewhat. "But you will -not defy the lightning," he continued. "You are too practical. I am -quite sure you must see how very right I am and how very well disposed -my friends are toward you, Mr. Huber. Think what they could do for you, -socially, financially, politically. Think what they could do for you -personally and for this reform movement." - -Luke's smile broke into a laugh. - -"Help the reform?" he exploded. "Oh, Lord!" Then, as quickly, the -laugh ended. "In plain terms," he said, "what have you been telling -me?" His languor had disappeared, and a sharp rage succeeded it. His -words cracked like a whip. "You've been telling me that if I handed the -safety of the M. & N. patrons over to the men that hire you, and let -those men go free on the strength of a promise already broken, they -would make me rich, elect me District-Attorney to do their work for -them, advance me in their own social set and maybe, if I kept on doing -all they asked, turn me into a Judge or a Governor or a millionaire! -And you've been saying if I don't do it, they'll have me forced out of -politics, out of the practice of the law, out of decent people's -houses--and maybe knocked over the head or shot in the back at a dark -corner. Well, here's my answer: I don't believe they would help me, I -don't believe they can hurt me, and I don't care a damn, one way or the -other!" - -The Judge bowed. He rose. He knew the world too well to give way to -anger: he never lost his temper; he only sometimes advisedly loosed it. - -"Is this," he asked, "your final decision, Mr. Huber?" - -"Yes," raged Luke; "and you may bet your last cent on that. It's my -final decision, and it's a plain 'No.' If these fellows don't do what -I've ordered, I'll show them up--the whole bunch of them. I'll do -it--why, I'd do it if they were the seraphim and cherubim, and all the -Thrones, Dominions, Virtues, Powers, Principalities, and Archangels -rolled into one!" - - - - - *CHAPTER VIII* - - -§1. Ex-Judge Marcus Stein had mastered, in common with most truly -dignified men, the art of acting quickly without hurrying. Upon leaving -Luke's apartments, he exercised this art. - -His motor-car was waiting for him at the door. He climbed into it with a -judicial deliberation and gave his order to the chauffeur. The car -started noiselessly. By proceeding with an even speed that avoided -blind dashes into the back-waters of the traffic-stream, it made better -time than its more impetuous peers and, without jolt or pause, bore its -occupant quickly to the building in which the firm of Stein, -Falconridge, Falconridge & Perry had their offices. - -As Judge Stein passed through the outer room of the suite, he spoke to -the girl who was seated at the firm's telephone switchboard: - -"Good-afternoon, Miss Weston." - -The girl's neurasthenic face lighted with pleasure: Marcus Stein was -liked and respected by his office-force. - -"Good-afternoon, Judge Stein," she said. - -"I think," said the Judge, "that you might see if you can get Mr. -Hallett on his private wire, and connect him with my telephone. Will -you, please?" - -Miss Weston always felt that the Judge conferred a favor when he asked -one. Consequently, she made a practice of giving his calls precedence -over those of anybody else connected with the firm. - -"Right away," she said. "And if he's left his office, shall I try his -house or his club?" - -"Both, please, Miss Weston. But I have an idea that he will be at his -office." - -The Judge passed on to his own handsome room overlooking the turmoil of -lower Broadway. He had scarcely reached his desk, and was just bending -to smell of the two Abel Chatney roses that stood in a vase there, when -the soft bell of his telephone tinkled. - -"Stein?" asked Hallett's voice through the black receiver that the Judge -placed to his ear. - -"Yes. This is Mr. Hallett?" - -"Yes." - -"I was about to telephone you, and I have just been to see our young -friend." - -"Well--well?" - -"It is no use, Mr. Hallett." - -Hallett's voice was incredulous: "The fool won't give up?" - -"Not yet." - -"How much does he want?" - -"Nothing." - -"Well, but didn't you throw the fear of God into him?" - -"We can't purchase and we can't coerce--at least not by mere threats." - -"Then, we've got to frighten him by something else, Stein. How'd he get -those things that he's got?" - -"He wouldn't say. I scarcely expected that he would." - -"Did you put on the political screws?" - -"I put on all, as far as was wise. He is a clever young man, and he -knows we can't hurt him so long as he has certain things in his -possession." - -The situation apparently passed Hallett's comprehension: it was outside -of his experience. - -"But what does he want? He must want something." - -"I'm afraid not," the Judge sighed. - -"Hell! Of course, he must. Everybody does." - -"If he does, I couldn't find it out." - -"Well, then," asked Hallett, "what's he goin' to do?" - -"Nothing--for a month." - -"You don't think he'll keep his word?" - -"I'm sure of it." - -"Wait a minute," said Hallett. - -The Judge waited fifteen minutes. At the end of that time, Hallett's -voice, regretful, but firm, sounded again in the telephone: - -"Well," he said, "we've got to get those things he's got. We're all -agreed on that. Understand?" - -"Yes?" - -"Yes--and it's up to you, Judge." - -"Have you any course to suggest?" - -"No, we haven't, and we don't want to know anything about courses. -That's your job." - -As if Hallett were in the room, Stein bowed his white head to him. - -"Very well," he said, and hung up the receiver. - -He bent to the pink roses again, and again inhaled their cultivated -fragrance. His face was not perplexed, but it was sad. - -"I am sorry," he seemed to be saying. "A nice young man. I am very -sorry, indeed." - -He returned the telephone-receiver to his ear. - -"Miss Weston?" - -"Yes, Judge Stein?" - -"Thank you for getting that call so promptly. Now, will you please get -me Mr. Titus?" - -"Mr. William Titus, or Titus & Titherington, the mercantile agency?" - -"Mr. Alexander Titus, of Titus & Titherington: the one that I was -speaking to before I went out to luncheon." - -"Yes, Judge Stein. Just a minute." - -There was no long wait before Titus, who owed half of his business as a -financial-agent to Stein and Stein's chief employer, was in conversation -with the Judge. - -"Have you secured that report yet?" asked Stein. - -"Which one, Judge?" - -"The one I asked you for at lunch-time." - -"It's being typed now. I'll send it over as soon as it's finished." - -"I wish you would. Meantime, get the chief points from the man that -looked into the matter and 'phone them to me." - -"All right, Judge." - -"Call me up. I have somebody to talk to while I'm waiting." - -The Judge rang off and then another time spoke to Miss Weston. - -"Is Mr. Irwin in his office?" - -Miss Weston said he was. - -"Then, please ask him to step in to see me for a moment." - -Mr. Irwin was a member of the Judge's firm whose name did not appear -upon its letter-heads, although he had been attached to it for more -years than Mr. Perry or even the younger Mr. Falconridge. He was a -little man with a gray Vandyck beard, pink cheeks, and twinkling blue -eyes. - -In the fewest possible words, Stein gave him a description of the -letters that were in Luke Huber's possession. He did not say who wanted -these letters, or why they were wanted, but he left no doubt about the -urgency of the commission he was delivering. - -"It is rather a difficult assignment," he concluded, "but it must be -done. There are great interests at stake." - -"I think I can manage it," said Irwin cheerfully. - -"I am afraid you will have to manage it," said the Judge. - -"I'll simply tell my friend----" - -The Judge raised his hand and smiled. - -"No details, please," said he. - -"Very well," Irwin, still cheerful, agreed. - -"All that I need add," said the Judge, "is this: we must take only one -step at a time. If we can succeed by persuasion, there is no need to -use other measures. I do not want to use other measures unless he -forces us to use them. Remember that. The first thing to do is to -convince him that we are too strong for him. For instance, he has this -reform nomination for the district-attorneyship. If he could be made to -see that we could take that nomination away from him, he might listen to -reason." - -"I see." - -"You will report results to me. Not methods, Irwin: only the results, -but please report the results step by step. And understand that whoever -undertakes this matter must not know too much to be dangerous, but must -know enough to make no error." - -"How soon do you want the letters, Judge?" - -"As soon as I can get them." - -"And the outside limit?" - -"The first step must be immediate. We must not run so fast that we -stumble; but for the completion it will be impossible to wait long. Say -twenty-eight days from date." - -"Right," said Irwin, and walked briskly from the room. - -Irwin had a manner of telephoning that was more hurried than the -Judge's, and Miss Weston treated him with greater deliberation. -However, he had soon called up the office of Anson Quirk and learned -that Quirk was there. - -"Then, stay there for twenty minutes, will you?" asked Irwin. "I'm -coming right around to see you." - -Anson Quirk was a lawyer who had a small office and a large reputation -on the East Side. His round, smiling face shone in every important case -where was endangered the liberty or life of minor politicians or major -thugs; the number of acquittals to his credit was surpassed only by the -number of clients whom he had saved from ever appearing in court. He -called every patrolman, magistrate, and tipstaff in the City and County -of New York by his first name. He was successful before a judge, but he -was magnificent before a magistrate, and with a police-officer he was a -worker of miracles. In his own world, Quirk, whom Stein would have -refused to shake hands with, was what Stein was upon a somewhat higher -plane. - -He talked with the bright-eyed Irwin for less than half an hour. Then -he showed his visitor from his dusty office full of law-books that were -never consulted. - -"Easy?" he chuckled as he bowed Irwin out. "It's a hundred-to-one shot. -I'll tell you what I'll do: I'll----" - -"No, you won't tell me," laughed Irwin. "The less I know, the better -for me. All I want to be sure of is that I can count on you." - -"Sure, you can." - -"And don't do everything at once." - -"Not me. The frame-up comes first." - -"Let me know as soon as it's tried. Then we'll talk about the next -move--if one's needed." - -"I understand. And whatever's needed, I'll deliver the goods inside of -three weeks." - -Irwin said he hoped nothing more would be needed and that a few days -would suffice, and Quirk, screwing a derby-hat on one side of his head, -walked around the corner to the police-station to see his friend, the -red-faced, genial Hugh Donovan, lieutenant of police. - - -§2. Ex-Judge Stein, in the handsome room overlooking Broadway, had been -having another telephone-conversation with the head of the Titus & -Titherington Mercantile Agency while Mr. Irwin was consulting with Mr. -Quirk. - -"That man has saved a bit," Alexander Titus was reporting; "but outside -of his salary he has really only a hundred thousand dollars, and it's -all invested in the R. H. Forbes & Son clothing firm over in Brooklyn." - -The Judge made a note of this on a desk-pad. - -"I see," he said. "Who is the head of that firm, now?" - -"Wallace K. Forbes; I think he's a grandson of old R. H." - -The Judge made another note. - -"How do they stand? Oddly enough, I have a client interested in their -affairs, too." - -"The Forbes people? Pretty well. I had to get a report on them last -week." - -"Have they any heavy loans?" - -"Only one that might hurt them: two hundred and fifty thousand dollars -at call with the East County National." - -The Judge's pencil was still busy. - -"I want to be quite clear about this," he said--"quite clear: my client -in this Forbes matter is considering an investment. Am I to understand -that if the East County National should call this loan, if it could not -be renewed elsewhere, the firm would become insolvent?" - -"Oh, there's no doubt about that. But then, there's no doubt about its -not being called, either. The company's quite sound, Judge." - -"Thank you," said Stein. "You will have that other full report sent -over?" - -"It's on its way now." - -"Thank you again. You had better follow it with a copy of the Forbes -report. If that bears out all you say, I shall instruct my client to go -ahead." - -"He'll be safe if he does, Judge." - -"Very well. Good-afternoon," said Stein. - -He called Miss Weston again. - -"Miss Weston," he said, "please get me City Chamberlain Kilgour, and, -while I am speaking to him, call up the East County National and ask -where you can find president Osserman. He will have left the bank, but -I should like to reach him before I go home to-day." - -Miss Weston obeyed with her usual readiness to serve this one of her -employers. - - -§3. Police Lieutenant Donovan had not listened to half a dozen of -Quirk's words before he rose quickly and closed the door of his private -room. His was one of those voices that cannot whisper, but it descended -now to a hoarse muttering. - -"How much is there in this for me?" he demanded. - -"Nothin'," grinned Quirk. - -Donovan's broad palm banged the table at which he sat. - -"Then good-_night_," said he. - -Quirk was undisturbed. - -"Could you do the trick?" he inquired. - -"You mean if it was worth my while?" - -"I mean what I say: could you do it?" - -"Could I do it? Of course, I could. It'd be like takin' pennies from a -blind man." - -"Then," said Quirk, rattling some coins in a pocket beneath his round -abdomen, "I guess you'd better get busy." - -Donovan's eyes narrowed. - -"What's your game, Quirk?" he asked. - -"It's not _my_ game, Hughie," smiled the lawyer. - -"Well, you're not in it for your health, I know that damn well. If it -ain't your game, whose is it?" - -"I don't know for sure," said Quirk. - -"Oh, come on. You know me: you've got to cough up if you want me to -help." - -Quirk did know the police-lieutenant. He had expected all along to be -forced into an admission; but he was aware that by letting Donovan -suspect reluctance he could the more speedily gain his point. - -"Well," he said, "it didn't come to me straight, but I'll tell you how -it did." - -He embarked upon a narrative brief and abounding in gaps that Donovan's -imagination was not, however, slow to fill as Quirk intended it should. - -The officer nodded comprehendingly. "Then who's at the back of it?" he -asked. - -Quirk walked quietly to the door. He opened it suddenly: nobody had -been listening at the keyhole; so he turned to Donovan and said a -certain name. - -The police-lieutenant's red face grew redder. He opened and shut his -mouth twice before he spoke. - -"Again?" he muttered. - -Quirk nodded. - -"That's all I know about it," he said. - -"Well, why in hell didn't you tell me this right off at first?" asked -the querulous Donovan. - -"Because I didn't think I'd have to," pleaded Quirk. - -"Have to? Looks to me like the have-to business all came on to me! How -long've I got to put this across?" - -Quirk appeared to consider. - -"You'd have to begin with the first thing right away," he said, "and let -me know about that. If it didn't work, I'd get my party to give me -fuller instructions, and then I guess you'd have eighteen days." - -"I'm gettin' sick of the whole game," said Donovan. - -"So am I," said the lawyer blithely. "But what are we going to do about -it? We've got to make a living, don't we?" - -"I ain't so sure of that." - -"Anyhow, we've got to buy shoes for our kids, Hughie." - -"Oh, come on," muttered Donovan, "let's talk business." - -They talked business until Quirk remembered another appointment and had -to leave. When the lawyer had gone, Donovan put his head into the large -room next his own and called to a sleepy officer seated at a desk. - -"Anderson," he asked, "where's Patrolman Guth?" - -Anderson yawned. - -"Just come in, Lieutenant," he vouchsafed: "him and Mitchell. He's in -the locker-room." - -"Send him in here." - -Donovan closed the door and sat at his table, frowning at its surface, -until Guth entered. - -"Hello, Bill," said the Lieutenant. - -Guth was as big as the Lieutenant and more powerful. He would have been -handsome, but his mouth had been torn in some obscure street-fight, and -the scar from this wound carried the line of his lips to the left corner -of his jaw-bone. - -"_How're_ you, Lieutenant?" he replied. - -Donovan resumed his study of the table. - -"What's Reddy Rawn doin' these days?" he presently continued. - -Guth shifted his weight from one leg to the other. As much as that scar -would permit, he smiled, the right corner of his mouth shooting upward -and the left turning down. - -"Well," he said, "you know how it is. I warned him he'd got to keep in -the quiet ever since that night him and the Kid shot-up Crab Rotello for -tryin' to steal Reddy's girl." - -"Rotello's still in Bellevue, ain't he?" - -"Won't be out for near a month yet." - -"He hasn't squealed?" - -"Naw. You know these here guys: wouldn't tell if they was dyin'--rather -leave it to their own gang to square things. Crab'll wait till he gets -well, an' then he'll fix Reddy's feet for himself." - -"Still, you told Reddy what I said you should?" - -"Tol' him we was on." - -"Find him to-night." - -"All right, Lieutenant." - -"Tell him Rotello's squealed: he'll believe it because he hates him. -Tell him the Dago's goin' to croak an's give me an ante-mortem -statement--see?" - -The patrolman stolidly bowed assent. - -"Tell him the only way for him to square me's to do me a good turn," -continued Donovan. - -Guth nodded again. - -"Same's we worked on the Crab himself ten or twelve weeks ago," he said. -"I got you." - -"That's it. Remember, I don't know much, an' you know a lot less, an' -this guy's got to know less than you do. He's got to pull it off inside -of two weeks. Now, sit down here, an' I'll tell you what he's got to -do. There maybe'll be more later, but this is the start." - - -§4. The last talk that Judge Stein had that day was one with a brisk, -bald-headed man, whose close-cropped mustache only accentuated the heavy -mouth below it. This man called in person at the offices of Stein, -Falconridge, Falconridge & Perry; he seemed to have come in a hurry, and -he handed Miss Weston a card bearing the legend: - - +-----------------------------+ - | B. FRANK OSSERMAN | - | *PRESIDENT* | - | EAST COUNTY NATIONAL BANK | - +-----------------------------+ - - -With him the Judge began by being as deliberate as he had been with Luke -Huber. He mentioned the names of the three men upon whom Huber had that -morning paid so unusual a visit to Wall Street; but this time Stein -frankly declared that these three men empowered him to speak. - -At the mention of their names, Osserman's fingers played with a thin -gold watch-chain that ran taut through a buttonhole of his waistcoat, -from one pocket to another. - -"I dare say that you will remember," pursued the Judge, "that I have -acted with you for these gentlemen on one or two previous occasions." - -Osserman cleared his throat. "I hope there is no trouble," he said. - -"No. Oh, no; there need be no trouble," said the Judge. Then he sat -and watched Osserman move uneasily in his chair. - -The bank-president by saying nothing tried to force Stein to explain; -Stein, by the same means, tried to force Osserman to make a confession -of weakness. At last Stein won. - -"Of course," said Osserman, "I know the favors they've done us." - -"Exactly," said the Judge; but he said only that. - -"And so," continued Osserman, as one who cannot turn back, "our bank -will be glad to do anything we can for them." He paused and looked at -Stein; but Stein only looked pityingly at him. "Indeed," the banker -ruefully resumed, "their connection with our investments and securities -is such that we would have to." - -"Exactly," repeated the Judge, bending his face toward the pink roses at -his elbow. But he was a little sorry for Osserman, and so he added: -"Not that the East County is in a position very different, in that -respect, from most of the other banks." - -Osserman took a deep breath. - -"Well," he said, "what is it?" - -"You are carrying," said the Judge, "a call-loan at two hundred and -fifty thousand to R. H. Forbes & Son." - -The banker showed his relief. It was clear that he had expected -something more important. - -"Are we?" he asked. "I dare say we are." - -"Mr. Osserman," said the Judge, "the finances of the R. H. Forbes -company are not long going to be what they should be. In the interest -of your depositors, I should advise you to stand ready to call that loan -when I give you the word." - -The banker looked at the Judge and knew that, before this loan would be -called, the Judge's clients would see to it that no other bank would -take it up. That, however, was no affair of Osserman's: he considered -that he was escaping by means of a small service. - -"If there's any danger of the Forbes people failing," he said, "it would -be only good business to do as you say." - -"Yes," the Judge assented. "The fact of the matter is this, Mr. -Osserman: that young man named Huber, who has been backing Leighton, is -leaving Leighton and will be the candidate for the reform people to -succeed him." - -"I saw something about it in the afternoon papers." - -"Yes. Now, my clients have no objection to those reformers; we see that -they may do a great deal of good, if they put a temperate man at the -head of their ticket. But we happen to know that this Huber is a young, -hot-headed demagogue. He is the kind of man that attracts the crowd. -He might be elected. If he was not, he would hurt credit by his wild -speeches; if he was, he would undoubtedly upset it by trying to put his -impossible promises into action. The safest thing for Business is to -take the nomination away from him before he gets started: then nobody is -hurt. What money he has (it is not much) is invested in this Forbes -concern. My advice to you is to see Mr. Forbes to-morrow; make him -appreciate how your bank feels about the unsettling nature of this -candidacy, and tell him that you will have to call his loan if the -candidacy continues." - - -§5. That was a busy night for the president and cashier of more than -one bank in New York City, and for certain gentlemen whose business it -is to negotiate for loans from banks in other cities. Judge Stein's -telephonic talk with City Chamberlain Kilgour was as effective as the -conversation with president Osserman. It is in the chamberlain's -official province to deposit municipal funds with almost whatsoever -institution he chooses, and to withdraw such funds as he may elect: the -thin, energetic figure of Kilgour, long familiar to the tents of -Tammany, was this evening hurrying from private houses to Madison Square -Clubs and from clubs to Broadway cafés. The swift, quiet motor-car of -ex-Judge Stein was busy, too. - - -§6. Somebody else was busy: Patrolman Guth. Patrolman Guth, in -citizen's garb, was standing almost invisible in the shadowy alley -behind a saloon near Forty-third Street and Third Avenue, and was -muttering to the darkness. And at last the darkness answered. - -"I'm on," said the darkness. - - - - - *CHAPTER IX* - - -§1. "No, sir; she's gone out," said the servant that answered Luke's -ring at the door of the Forbes house and his inquiry for Betty on the -afternoon of his interview with Judge Stein. - -"To town?" asked Luke. - -"Yes, sir; I think so. I think she's gone over to Mr. Nicholson's -Hester Street mission." - -Luke had frequently met the Rev. Pinkney Nicholson; he liked him. The -young clergyman was a friend of both Forbes and Forbes's daughter. The -latter often helped in Nicholson's slum-missionary work; an attendance -at Nicholson's church of St. Athanasius was the only occupation that -brought Forbes and Betty even slightly into touch with the world of the -Ruysdaels. With Betty, Luke often went to the Sunday morning services. -Indeed, he had recently become a consistent member of the congregation, -partly because Betty liked the church and partly because Luke himself -admired Nicholson's simple and forcible eloquence and believed enough in -Nicholson's philanthropy to forgive a ritualism that in itself had only -a superficial appeal for him. - -"She didn't say when she would be back?" Luke inquired. Until this -moment he had not known how badly he wanted to see her. - -"No, sir. By dinner-time, I guess. Would you like to leave any -message, Mr. Huber?" - -"Only that if she isn't going out this evening, I'll call." - -"Very well, sir." - -Luke had hurried to the Forbes house in Brooklyn as soon as Stein left -him, for he knew that Betty was usually at home from three o'clock in -the afternoon until five; but the Judge had consumed some time; there -was a block in the subway and another block on the surface-line at the -subway's end: Luke had missed Betty. There was nothing to be done but -to return to town, where he should have remained in order to be in touch -with the new friends that were announcing him as their certain chance -for the district-attorneyship. - -He considered himself ready for the fight. He knew that Stein, although -checked in the engagement at the Thirty-ninth Street apartments, would -not be defeated and would resume the offensive from some other quarter -at some later date; but Luke looked for no serious oppilation by these -secret enemies before the end of the month that he had given them in -which to come to terms. He underestimated, in short, both the power and -the unencumbered license of his foes. He would not realize the handicap -that his grant of a four weeks' armistice placed on his own movements, -he would not believe that his antagonists might violate the truce, and -he refused to credit them with the vast influence and free conscience -which were at their command. - -The open war, the war that the reformers and the public saw, was, -however, waging. The Municipal Reform League had taken city -headquarters in an office-building in Broadway below Madison Square -weeks ago, before they began their search for a candidate. At that time -divisional headquarters were opened in every ward in New York, and the -remnants of an older reform organization, left from a defeat ten years -old, were gathered and cemented for present use. Nelson, Venable, and -Yeates were working day and night with their lieutenants, and when Luke -returned to his apartments, the loneliness that he was beginning to feel -because of the sudden end of his duties under Leighton, was banished by -the news that the League headquarters had been telephoning madly for -him. - -He bought a newspaper on his way downtown and discovered what was one of -the things that his associates wanted to see him about: Leighton had -issued a statement saying that he had forced Luke's resignation from the -District-Attorney's staff because of Luke's inefficiency. - -"You must nail that lie immediately!" cried Venable as soon as Luke -entered the offices of the League. The old man was standing at a desk -with Yeates and Nelson beside him. - -"Why did he fire you, anyway?" asked Yeates. "I always thought Leighton -was a rather decent kind of fellow." - -"Jealousy," suggested Nelson. "He was afraid of him." - -Luke sat on a table and dangled his long legs. He did not like the -necessity that Leighton had put upon him. - -"Of course, he didn't discharge you at all," said Venable. "We all know -that. But we have called the committee for the day after to-morrow, and -you must make the public see the matter as we do." - -"I'm not so sure that he didn't fire me," said Luke. He chose to be -blind to his hearers' astonishment. "It was a race to see whether he'd -chuck me or me him, and I think it ended in a dead-heat." - -"Oh, come off!" said Yeates. - -Venable stroked his white hair. - -"But the reason?" he commanded. "You must give the full story to the -public. We stand for absolute honesty in politics, and we can't begin -with any suppression of facts in public office." - -"Well," said Luke, "I think I gave Leighton, in a general way, to -understand I believed he was willing to use the Money Power in politics, -if he could get it to use." He smiled at them. "Does sound rather -vague, doesn't it?" - -Nelson puffed out his cheeks. "Men don't break up a partnership for -such things," said he. - -"Leighton and I did." - -"Perhaps you did, but people won't think so." - -Venable cut in: - -"We don't want to pry into your private affairs, and, of course, we -don't expect you to violate any personal confidences that you naturally -had with Mr. Leighton; but a broad statement of the basic facts has to -go to the papers at once. The charge wouldn't be so serious if it was -specific and vulgar, because then you would have no trouble in -disproving it; but Mr. Leighton is a thorough politician; he knows the -value of vagueness, and he gives the impression that he could tell a -great deal if he wasn't so much of a gentleman as to want to spare your -feelings." - -Luke slowly got down from the table. - -"I will say this much," he replied; "I will answer Leighton in his own -language: I will say he tried to get hold of some documents that would -make trouble for a group of unscrupulous and influential men, and he -wasn't going to use those documents in court or out of it to stop those -men in a wrong they were doing, but only as a means to force them to -give him their political support." - -Venable reflected. - -"I think it would suit if you published that," he said. - -"Did he get the documents?" asked Nelson. - -"No," said Luke, "he didn't. Now, send me in a stenographer, and I'll -dictate a statement along those lines." - - -§2. The headquarters of the Municipal Reform League occupied a half of -the second floor. They were accessible by either the stairs, or any of -the three elevators that all day long shot down and up narrow shafts -from the roof to the hall opening on Broadway. Entering the offices, one -came first to a reception-room; beyond that, one passed along the -cleared side of a railing in the large apartment, behind which sat the -company of stenographers and typewriters, and so came to a series of -offices with ground-glass doors and windows giving upon the street. It -was one of these offices which was permanently assigned to Luke. - -Here, pacing the floor between the roll-top desk at one side and the -small safe for private papers on the other, Luke dictated his public -letter. He tried to word it in such a way that its facts would not -sound incredible to the uninitiated reader, would not seem so vague as -to excite suspicion, and would yet convey to both Leighton and Stein the -threat of complete publicity to be fulfilled if the writer were pushed -too far. It was a hard task, but Luke, after several revisions, was -satisfied with it. - -"Yes," said Venable, "I think that will do. The reporters are waiting -outside; I sent for them. I have only one addition to suggest." - -"What's that?" asked Luke. - -"You deal exclusively with your resignation, and yet you are issuing -this statement from the League's headquarters. Don't you think you had -better say something about your candidacy? - -"Hadn't I better wait till I get it?" - -"You will have it as soon as the committee meets. Everybody knows that. -I don't propose that you should anticipate all the good points of your -letter of acceptance, but merely that you should state what you will -stand for. You could say that your name has been mentioned for the -nomination and that, if nominated, you will make your campaign on such -and such issues." - -"All right." Luke shrugged his lean shoulders. He turned to the waiting -stenographer. "Take this," he said: - -"In conclusion, I wish to say that my recent experience in the service -of the city has convinced me of the crying need of a new movement for -civic improvement: a non-partisan movement in which the one object shall -be the purification of municipal government and the fearless -administration of the law, all of its supporters working together not -for any man or party, but for the good of New York. Such a movement is -that now started by the conscientious men who compose the Municipal -Reform League. - -"My name has been mentioned as a candidate for office on the ticket of -this league, and I shall feel honored, indeed, if I receive my -nomination under such happy auspices. In that event, I shall go before -the people with a frank appeal to them to drive the money-changers out -of the Temple of Justice, the grafters out of the police-force, vice and -crime from the streets; and, if elected, I should attempt to do these -things, as the will of the people who placed me in power, with favor to -no persons, or combination of persons, in Greater New York. But whether -I am nominated or not, I shall take my coat off and roll up my sleeves -and go to work for the Municipal Reform League as for the only present -hope of this city's moral regeneration." - - -Luke turned to Venable. - -"How's that?" he inquired. - -Venable agreed that it ought to do. - -"_I_ think it's stodgy enough," said Luke. - -Venable visibly winced, but passed the comment by. - -"I am not quite sure," he said, "about that expression concerning taking -off your coat and so on. Our first appeal has to be made to the -cultivated voters, you see, and we don't want to sound too--well, too -agricultural." - -Luke smiled his weary smile. No doubt Venable was right. - -"Change that," said Luke to the stenographer--"change it to: 'I shall -put on my armor and take up my broadsword to go into this battle.'" - - -§3. "Miss Forbes got back?" Luke asked that evening when he again rang -the bell at the Forbes house. - -"Yes, sir," said the servant, "she's in the parlor. Mr. Forbes is in the -library. Shall I----" - -"I think I can make out with only Miss Forbes--for a while," Luke -interrupted. He started to walk past the servant. - -"Mr. Nicholson is there, too," the careful servant warned him. "He -stayed to dinner." - -"Oh, that's good," said Luke. "Well, I'll be glad to see him." But his -tone was not so enthusiastic as it had been, and his step hesitated -half-way to the parlor door. - -The door was open. Through it Betty heard him, and through it she now -hurried into the hall to meet him, her hands outstretched. - -"How splendid of you!" she was saying. "We've just been reading your -letter in the paper, The papers are full of you, and you don't know how -proud we are to know you, and how proud that you come here to see us at -such a busy time." - -Her cheeks were flushed, her brown eyes shone. Luke noted a little curl -that escaped from the mass of golden hair, so like a saint's glory to -her head, and seemed to caress one coral ear. - -"It's all nothing but my good luck," he said as he took both her hands -in his and thought not half so much of her words as of the woman that -uttered them. "But I didn't expect your father's approval." - -"You have it, anyway," she assured him. "Of course, he's a Progressive, -and he thinks you would have done better to come into his party; but he -does admire your courage, and so does Mr. Nicholson." - -"Does he?" said Luke dryly. "I hope not: it might go to my head." He -remembered that Nicholson believed in celibacy for the clergy, and he -was glad of it. - -The young priest rose as his hostess and her new guest came into the -Eighteen-Sixty parlor. He was a handsome man and his eyes were kindly, -yet he had the face of an ascetic. - -"Miss Forbes is right," he said. "New York needs men with high -convictions and the courage of them." - -"So does the Church," replied Luke heartily--"and she is getting them -now." - -They sat down. - -"The Church," said Nicholson, "has always had them. What she lacked was -the co-operation of such men in the practical world. If all of our -millionaires were like some few of them, our work would be easy; but now -we scarcely know which is more dangerous: the evil tyrant or the evil -demagogue." - -He talked for some time in this strain, not to weariness, but with the -completeness of the zealot. Nicholson regarded wealth as a sacred trust, -a gift from God given to the great intellects of the world only that it -might be administered for the benefit of the lesser of God's creatures. -He mentioned no specific instance, but he saw in many of the country's -rich men souls that were proving worthy of their trust and others that -were using their money selfishly and even cruelly. For the former he -had the highest regard, for the latter the severest condemnation; the -spiritual and physical welfare of the poor he considered as the especial -care of the more fortunate, and charity was not only the right of -penury: it was the salvation of the rich. - -Betty listened to him with a rapt face; Luke honored him, but sincerely -hoped that he would go. Fearing that this desire was becoming too -patent, Luke said: - -"The Manhattan and Niagara people don't seem to share your views." - -"Ah," said Nicholson, "there you touch a vexed problem, because there -you have to do with a corporation, and it is almost a fact that -corporations have no souls." - -"If that corporation ever had any, it is damned," said Luke; "but what -I'm driving at is that the individuals composing a corporation have -moral responsibilities." - -The clergyman agreed, but in corporations, he thought, responsibility -was so intricately subdivided and so sinuously delegated that no one man -had much left to him or could incur much guilt for his individual -errors. In connection with most such accidents as a railway wreck, -there was really an ethical basis for the legal phrase "an act of God." - -"Not in the North Bridge wreck," said Luke. "It's been shown that the -company used cheap material, didn't have any proper system for checking -its work-reports so as to tell whether ordered repairs were made, and -didn't hire competent men. The company can't get out of this mess by -saying its experts were forced on it by the unions: it hasn't any legal -right to delegate its choice of experts to a union. It's a common -carrier and, if it can't do its work properly, then it ought to stop -work." - -Nicholson saw this much as Luke did, and said so at a good deal of -length. It was some time before his part of the conversation lagged and -he rose to go. - - -§4. Luke waited only until he heard the door close upon the departing -clergyman. Then he turned to Betty with a relieved sigh. - -"Phew!" he said. "I'm glad that's over." - -She was sitting opposite him in the full glare of light from an -old-fashioned, crystal-hung chandelier. Betty could bear strong lights. - -"Why?" she asked. Her brow was puckered, but her lips smiled. "I like -him. He's very good, and he's doing a really great work. I like him -ever so much." - -"Oh, yes," said Luke. "Nicholson's all right. He has what he admires in -other men: high convictions and the courage of them. Most of us always -admire in others what we don't have ourselves; but not Nicholson. He is -doing a big work, too. But I'm glad he's gone, just the same." - -"Why?" repeated Betty. - -Luke rose. He came over to Betty and stood looking down at her, his -arms folded across his chest. - -"Because," he said, "I wanted to talk to you." - -"It didn't look so. It looked as if you wanted to talk to Mr. -Nicholson." - -"I wanted to talk to you and about you." - -She stopped fencing. She gave him her full, frank gaze. - -"Well?" she asked. - -"You know what I want to say, Betty," he answered. "You've seen for a -long time what I was coming to. I held off. I held off because I -hadn't anything to offer you. Even now I haven't much. I haven't half -enough. If I win this fight I'm in, it won't give me anything that -would make me deserve you. I've not been a bit better than I should -be." His voice grew tense. "When I come down to brass tacks, when I--I -beg your pardon; but what I mean is that when I get to the point of -telling you I love you, I see how far I've been from being what I should -be. I---- Oh, hang it all, Betty!" He put out his hands. "I love -you. I've never really loved anybody else and never can. If I win this -confounded--blessed fight, will you marry me?" - -She got slowly to her feet: it seemed to Luke minutes before she had -stood up and begun her answer. Then she took both his hands. - -"You don't have to win the fight to win me, Luke," she said. - -The realization swept over him. He took her in his arms. He looked in -her upturned face--the eyes wide, the sweet, fresh cheeks hot, the lips -parted, breathing quickly--and then he felt the blood rush to his head, -felt it hammer at his temples. It got into his eyes and blinded him. -He ground his lips upon hers. - -The dull despair of his last months under Leighton commanded a reaction. -The rushing changes of the last two days had set his nerves to a speed -that would not now cease in whatever physical activities he engaged -himself. These things flung him along a new road; they raced him down a -way of which he had known but little. As he felt the warmth of her -gracious young body next his, he was hurled with such violence down a -course so unfamiliar to him that only the thought of losing his race by -running it too swiftly could serve to lessen his straining speed. Like -a quarter-mile runner stopping himself short in the last hundred yards -before the tape, he almost fell as he forced himself to release her. - -"Your father," he panted. He looked away from her: "I must see him -now." - -Betty did not understand. She was only exalted by this new thing; she -was only happy. - -"Now?" she whispered. - -"Yes." He looked back at her and, with a white face, smiled. "He has a -right to know." He caught her hand, pressed it only as tightly as he -dared. "I'll go to him in the library. Wait for me." - - -§5. Forbes was seated at a round table, engaged in his regular nightly -task of reading the editorial-page of the _Evening Star_, nodding his -head when he agreed with its generalities and muttering maledictions -upon it when it specifically ridiculed the Progressive Party. As Luke -came in, Forbes was in the midst of one of the paper's attacks on -progressivism, and his frown seemed to drive his beaked nose into his -mustache. - -"Oh, Huber," he said, without at once relaxing his scowl; "I didn't know -you were here. Come in. Been here long?" - -Luke could not have guessed how long he had been in the house. - -"Not very," he ventured. - -"Sit down," said Forbes. He had not risen. He indicated an easy-chair -near his own. - -"Thanks," said Luke; but he did not sit down. - -Forbes at last noticed his visitor's nervousness. - -"I suppose you've had a hard day," he said. "Pardon me for not -congratulating you sooner on your success. This sheet"--he brandished -the _Evening Star_--"doesn't want anything but to be against everything. -It upsets me every evening. But you've done a big thing. I think you -should have come clear over to our side, but I dare say you will do that -in time. Meanwhile, I'm sincerely glad for your good fortune. You -deserve it." - -"You're very good," said Luke. His eyes twinkled a little. "I wonder -if you know about it--all." - -"Only what this mealy-mouthed sheet says. It's absolutely inexplicable -to me, Huber, how a paper written by such able men can be so -narrow-minded on broad subjects. However, I think they're going to -support _your_ party, if they may be said ever to support anything." - -"I'm afraid they _are_ rather reticent about the real news," said Luke. - -"They never tell anything that weighs against their theories." - -"They haven't had a chance to tell this." - -Forbes looked puzzled. - -"What do you mean?" - -"It's only just happened." Luke breathed deeply. "I'm engaged to be -married," he said. He spoke with an unusual rapidity. "Engaged to be -married, and I'd like it to come off--the wedding, I mean--right after -the election." - -Forbes scrambled up. He wrung Luke's hand. - -"Well, well," he said, "you are to be congratulated!" - -"I am glad you think so," said Luke, "for you know the girl better than -I do." - -"The girl? I know her better----" Forbes's voice rose. "You don't -mean---- You don't mean to say----" - -"Yes," Luke nodded. "It _is_ luck, isn't it? It's Betty." - -"Bless my soul!" Forbes brought his left hand down on Luke's right -shoulder. "Bless my soul! My little girl! Huber, you--you rather knock -the wind out of me." - -He said all the conventional things; his manner showed all the proper -surprise; and both men understood that he had been expecting this news -for a long time and wanting it. - -"Huber," he said, "of course this is sudden, and of course I'm an old -fool not to have got over considering Betty a child--a mere baby--but, -now you're here with the announcement, I'm quite certain that, out of -all the men who've been tagging after her, you're the one that I'd want -for a son-in-law." - -Luke again mumbled his thanks. - -"You're not standing still," pursued Forbes: "you're going ahead. You -have a great deal to you, and Betty's the very girl to make you make the -best of yourself"--Forbes's voice abandoned the commonplace note and -fell to the note of genuine feeling--"then there's your interest in the -Business. Huber, I've always regretted that I didn't have a son to leave -the Business to, as my father left it to me and his father to him. If -you'd married somebody else, and Betty had married some chap that had no -interest in it, the Business might have gone over to you eventually, and -so on to children of another stock than mine; whereas, now"--he looked -around Luke to the doorway--"Betty!" he said. - -She had not obeyed Luke; she was standing at the door. - -"I couldn't wait," she confessed; but she said it with an allegiance -that was now all for Luke. - -"Come here," her father ordered. - -He released Luke's hand and shoulder. The girl ran to him and put her -arms about his neck. - -"Please be nice, daddy," she whispered. "Please be nice." - -Forbes managed to draw a handkerchief and blow his nose. - -"I _am_ a fool," he said. "I--Betty, you're looking so much to-night -the way your mother--By George, I _am_ a fool! I think I must be -getting old, Huber." - -§6. In the room at the end of the hall marked "Family Entrance" to a -saloon in Fifty-second Street, near Eighth Avenue, a red-headed man -dressed in cheap clothes of fashionable cut, was leaning across a table -at which he was drinking raw whisky with a girl who, had she not been -too heavily painted, would have had a face like that popularly ascribed -to Joan of Arc. - -[Illustration: HE FOUND IT NECESSARY TO BE EMPHATIC] - -"I've got him showed to me," the man was saying. "He lives at the -Arapahoe on Thirty-ninth Street. I'll play lighthouse. All you gotta -do's put on them glad clothes an' get him into Pearl's Six' Av'nue -place. He's in wrong, anyhow. Then I'll tip off Charley Guth, an' -he'll put Donovan wise an' pinch the joint. See?" - -The girl that looked like Joan of Arc nodded comprehendingly. - -"But the clothes has got to be real swell," she said. - - - - - *CHAPTER X* - - -§1. As Luke left the Forbes house that night, his step kept time with -the beat of his pulses, and he walked fast. At last he thought that he -saw happiness within reach. - -He was not yet happy; he was quite clear about this. One half of him, -perhaps the nobler half, was engaged in a political battle with the -forces of corruption, but it was so engaged that those forces affected -it; they invaded his individuality and, therefore, curtailed his freedom -and curtailed completeness. Happiness, if it was to be found at all, -was to be found only in the perfect development of self, and such a -development was impossible so long as self, seeking expression in -politics, found expression thwarted by an evil opposition in the -political field. - -Nevertheless, this opposition, Luke was sure, could be crushed and swept -away; his ideal for the good of the city, which had become his own good, -could be attained; and then, he told himself, that other part of him, -the part that loved Betty and that Betty loved, could enjoy Betty as the -reward of the whole man. It was as if he were one of two runners. Betty -he saw not as the goal, but as the prize to be given him for leading at -the goal; not a prize that any other runner could win by worsting him in -the race, but a prize that he himself could deserve only if he were to -lead at the finish. - -He was thinking of this when he left the Subway station and walked -toward the Arapahoe, but under his conscious thoughts the subconscious -self was still tingling with the emotions that had flamed up in him when -he took Betty in his arms and felt her lips on his. He quivered with -the physical recollection, and though the flame had burned, his flesh -found the pain of it sweet. - -At the corner nearest the apartment house in which he lived, he became -aware of a woman. The street was nearly empty, but until she was close -beside him he did not notice her. How she came to be at his elbow he -did not appreciate, nor did he at first realize whether she were young -or old, beautiful or ugly. - -"Will you tell me the time, please?" she asked. - -Luke's experience in Leighton's office had long ago taught him that such -a request was the commonest form of watch-stealing, but he was not -afraid of losing his watch. He stopped under a lamp-post. - -"Certainly," he said. - -"I know it's late," pursued the woman, "but I don't know how late." - -The words were thick. The voice was the voice of all the phantoms of -the street, low in pitch and hoarse, but luring because of all that it -connoted: because of the mystery, the adventure which, after all -knowledge of her sordidness and all understanding of her frigidity, the -woman who most reveals her body has maintained by that revelation's -forced screening of her soul. - -Luke consulted his watch. - -"It's a quarter to eleven," he said. - -He looked at her, and he was glad to look. That she was well-dressed, -but overdressed and wore her clothes with the defiance of one -unhabituated to them, did not impress him. What impressed him was the -face that, in spite of its tokens of much evil done and more evil -suffered, retained the fragile beauty which men associate with -innocence. The calm, broad brow, the gray eyes wide and steady, the -underlip timidly drawn back, the delicate chin upturned above a slim -white throat, reminded him of the pictures of Joan of Arc on trial and -foredoomed by her English accusers. - -"It _is_ late, isn't it?" she said. - -"Yes," said Luke. He had forgotten about his watch; he was holding it -loosely in his hand. - -"I wonder," said the woman, "if it's too late for you to take a little -walk with me." - -Her eyes had narrowed coldly; a smile that was a trade grimace distorted -her mouth. - -The change in her wakened Luke. He restored his watch to his pocket. -He felt a slight chill at his heart and a self-accusation. - -"No," he said brusquely; and started to walk away. - -The woman followed. - -"Aw, come on," she urged. Her tone coarsened under his refusal. - -"No," said Luke. - -"Please?" her voice whined. She put her hand on his arm. - -Luke shook off the hand. He was too angry with himself to have pity for -her. - -"Stop this," he ordered. - -"But won't you listen?" The woman's hand returned persistently; it -clutched. "I got somethin' to----" - -Luke saw that they were at the door of the Arapahoe. - -"I'm sorry," he said, "but I can't stop to listen to you." - -He went into the apartment house. - - -§2. He really was sorry. Once inside the door of the Arapahoe, he said -to himself that the woman had only been plying her trade, and that what -he had visited upon her was a portion of the wrath against his own -momentary weakness. He could never have given way to her, because he -was so firm in his resolve to live worthily for Betty that he could not -enough want to give way to offset the efficacy of his resolve; only the -portion of him subject to his will without being a part of his will had -momentarily weakened; it could not have rebelled victoriously, and -although it merited punishment, the exterior cause of its weakness did -not deserve censure. Altogether, Luke concluded, he had behaved in a -rather contemptible fashion. - -His mind was immediately diverted. As he passed the clerk's desk in the -hall, the clerk beckoned darkly to him. - -"There are some reporters looking for you here," he whispered. "I sent -them into the waiting-room so's you could get by them when you came in, -if you wanted to. Do you?" - -Luke almost laughed as he reflected upon the figure he would have -presented to the representatives of the press, had they been waiting for -him at the door. - -"Yes, I'll see them," he said. - -They came to him in a body, seven of them. They worked for the morning -papers and, because the evening papers had printed Luke's letter about -his resignation from the District-Attorney's staff, they wanted a fresh -sensation for their journals. - -Luke leaned against a pillar in the lobby and talked to them. Most of -them he had met while in Leighton's office. Personally, he was popular -with them, and he liked them. - -"I'll say anything you want," he agreed. "But what is there to say?" - -The spokesman was a keen man with curling black hair. - -"You might develop the last part of your letter," he suggested: "the -part about the big financiers that you're going gunning for." - -"I haven't got the gun yet," objected Luke. "Better wait and see if I'm -nominated, boys." - -"Oh, you'll be nominated, all right. Come on, Mr. Huber." - -"You're going to support the League, anyhow," said a stout little -fellow, whose paper opposed all reformers. "You can tell us how the -League will go for the men at the top." - -To this Luke agreed. He began to speak and, as he saw the busy pencils -noting his best phrases upon sheets of roughly-folded copy-paper, he -fell into stride with his subject. He declared that the League meant to -put an end to the influence of Big Business in municipal politics, and, -although he mentioned no names, it was evident what big business men he -had in mind. - -The reporters tried to make him mention names, but their efforts only -seemed to restore his caution. They urged him to be specific in his -charges against the present administration of the District-Attorney's -office; but here again they encountered the impassive side of Luke with -which they were more familiar. - -"No, no," said Luke; "there may be a time for all that, but this isn't -the time. Just wind up by saying we mean, once and for all, to put Wall -Street out of politics and graft out of the administration of justice in -New York City and to keep them out, if we have to send every financier -and every policeman to jail." - - -§3. The reporters made all that they could of what Luke gave them, and -the next morning's papers were full of it. Leighton, on his way -downtown, read them with anger against Luke and annoyance with himself -for losing a man that might have been so valuable to him. - -He began to be afraid of the effect of Huber's implications regarding -the District-Attorney's office. Remembering that his party was in no -position to risk putting up a weak candidate, he telephoned to George J. -Hallett and was granted an interview: he said he knew of the letters in -Luke's possession and knew how Luke came by them. - -Hallett, whose office was almost the counterpart of that in which he -consulted with his master and Rivington, sprawled in a deeply -upholstered chair. He smoked steadily at a cigar, and when the letters -were mentioned, he accepted the mention with complete composure. - -"Who else knows about 'em?" he frankly inquired. - -"Nobody," said Leighton--"unless Huber's been talking." - -"He's got 'em, hasn't he?" - -"Had them the last time I saw him." - -"Anyway, you haven't 'em?" - -"No, of course, I haven't." - -Hallett took his cigar from his mouth; he looked at the cigar, and from -it to Leighton. - -"I don't see what use _you_ are to us, then," he said. - -Leighton understood that the only satisfactory way to deal with this man -was the direct way. - -"I can't be any use to you except to tell you where the leak is these -letters came through." - -"What do you want us to do for you?" - -"I want your support at election time." - -"Can't promise it. The other side has just as good a claim on us." - -"Heney?" - -"An' the whole Democratic organization, yes." - -"Would you promise not to interfere on either side?" - -"Can't do it. You see, you haven't got much to sell." - -Leighton ran his fingers through his black hair. - -"Look here, Mr. Hallett," he began again, "we don't know each other -personally----" - -"That's all right," said Hallett. - -"Well, then, if I can't count on your influence for the election, may I -count on it for the nomination?" - -"Who stole those letters?" said Hallett. - -"I can count on you people in the matter of the nomination?" - -"Yes." - -"A man named Rollins." - -Late that afternoon it was found that Rollins had made an overcharge for -postage-stamps in the course of his secretarial work. He was arrested -and "railroaded" to jail. - - -§4. It was somewhat later when the Republicans nominated Leighton and -then, to the amazement of the public, the Democrats and Progressives -each opposed him with candidates so weak that every politician -understood this as a surrender to Leighton in order to defeat the -candidate of the Municipal Reform League. In advance of their -occurrence, however, all these things were gossiped about by the leaders -of every faction and so confidently expected that plans were shaped in -accordance with them. Somehow, they sent word ahead to the Reform -headquarters even on the day of the happening that set them in motion, -and Venable and Nelson, together with the other executives of the M. R. -L. bestirred themselves. - -"Where's Yeates?" asked Nelson, as he came into Luke's room, where -Venable and Luke were busy. "That young fellow's never around when he's -wanted." - -"He sent in word he had some other engagements," said Venable. - -"Had to play golf with Hallett's son, I guess, if it wasn't L. Bergen -Rivington," Nelson sneered. "There's too much society in that boy for -any political usefulness." - -Luke looked up from the notes he was preparing for his formal letter -accepting the nomination that the League was next day to offer him: - -"Is Yeates a friend of those people?" he asked. "I knew he knew some of -them, but is he a friend?" - -"Only socially," he said. "Yeates was born to it, but politically he is -all right. He has high ideals and a really fine enthusiasm." - -"Hum," said Luke. "What do you think of this paragraph, Nelson?" - -He read from his notes: - -"During the past few years, those persons in a position to observe the -inner workings of our politics, both in national and municipal affairs, -have been alarmed to see the steady encroachment made upon them by High -Finance. There is no longer any room left for doubt. The purpose of -this invading power is clear: its purpose is conquest. Unless the free -voters act, and act quickly, the true government of the United States in -general, and of New York in particular, will not rest in the President -or Congress, in Mayors and Boards of Aldermen, in the Constitution, the -charter, or the courts: it will rest in a combination of Big Business -interests that will control the men elected as representatives of the -people." - - -Nelson slapped his thigh. - -"That's it!" he said. "That's the talk. We ought to have had some of -that kind of medicine long ago. Look at all this recent -drug-legislation, for instance. You can't imagine what my firm's been -up against. They're getting an appetite for the wholesale drug-trade -now, these big fellows are, and they're paving their way by lobbies at -Washington and Albany and half a dozen state capitals!" - -The three worked over the letter for the rest of that day, having a -scanty luncheon brought into the office from a nearby restaurant, and -talking plans while they ate. All the time callers were sending in -their names with requests for interviews, workers were reporting, men at -the telephone were ringing up to ask instructions, and clerks and -stenographers were running in and out to deliver telegrams and -special-delivery letters and to receive replies. - -Luke's only appreciable pause was to read two notes of congratulation -from his mother and Jane, the former commending him for adopting a -course that the writer was sure her husband would have adopted had he -lived, the latter full of pride in his approaching success, but ending -with the postscript: "Jesse [Jesse Kinzer was Jane's husband, the new -Congressman] says that conditions in New York are 'purely local,' -whatever that means." Altogether, Luke had a busy day. He was a tired -man when, at nine o'clock, he again rang the bell of the Forbes house in -Brooklyn. - - -§5. To Luke's surprise, it was Forbes himself that opened the door. - -"I've been looking for you," he said seriously. "Can you come into the -library? I want to see you for a few minutes. It's important." - -The concluding words were unnecessary. The tone of the words that -preceded them would alone have been sufficient to warn Luke of trouble: -Forbes's voice was husky, tense, uncertain. - -"Of course," Luke assented. - -He followed Forbes into the library, and there, as the host closed the -door, Luke saw in the face that confronted him an expression which -conformed with the tone and import of Forbes's first words. The elder -man's face was haggard. - -"I shall have to tell you something," he was saying--"something that I -ought to have told you long ago, or as much of it as had happened then. -But, you see, I had no idea it could be so important--ever be so -important." He broke off with a remembrance of his accustomed courtesy: -"I beg your pardon. Won't you sit down, Huber? I quite forgot to ask -you. For my part, I couldn't sit still if my life depended on it." - -Luke stood by the center-table. - -"No, no," he said. "Don't bother--and don't worry." He thought that -Forbes looked as if death were in the house. "Is anything wrong with -Betty?" he suddenly asked. - -"No, it's not that. It's what I say. Of course I never supposed your -going in for the Municipal Reform League movement could have any -business significance----" - -Luke, relieved about Betty, was unable to follow Forbes's disjointed -sentences. - -"It hasn't," he said. "It hasn't any business significance whatever." - -"Ah"--Forbes shook his head--"that's what I thought, too. But it has. -Huber, this may mean the end of R. H. Forbes & Son. Think of it: it may -mean the end of the Business--a business that has been honorably -conducted by my family for three generations." - -What such a catastrophe would mean to Forbes nobody knew better than -Luke, but how the Municipal Reform League could be concerned in it was -beyond guessing. - -"Won't you try to begin at the beginning?" said Luke. He was used to -getting coherent stories in preliminary interviews with incoherent -witnesses, and he fell into his professional manner. - -"It's this way." Forbes turned his gray eyes away and fumbled with an -ornament on the mantel-tree. "When you came into the Business, I had -several loans outstanding--the Business had. They were all well -secured, and you know how solid the concern's always been. With the -money you put in and the earnings, I was able to take up some of them, -but there were the improvements and extensions made necessary by fresh -competition and the new inventions and the machine-trust's raise of -prices. Well, I had to leave a loan outstanding at the East County -National." - -"Yes," said Luke encouragingly. "How much was it?" - -"Two hundred and fifty thousand. It was a good deal, I know, but, you -see, when I negotiated it----" - -"Never mind the reasons now. What were its terms?" - -"It was a call-loan," said Forbes in a shaken voice. - -Luke's amazement conquered his reserve. - -"What? And for two hundred and fifty thousand?" - -"Yes. There was the competition. It was growing hot. The -Business----" - -"How did you ever arrange it?" - -"I was surprised myself at the time to find it so easy, but I was too -glad to get it to ask questions. Now, I wish I had. I believe the bank -was influenced by some people that wanted to get us into trouble--want -to form a ready-made clothing trust." - -"It's incredible!" cried Luke. "Not one of the agents that I had look -into your business for me mentioned this." - -"I didn't know that, Huber." Forbes looked his appeal. "I ask you to -believe me." - -"All right. It was my own fault. I should have asked you more -questions. What puzzles me is how this loan was concealed." - -"It was at the request of the bank. They said it was so unusual that -they didn't want it more widely known than was absolutely necessary, and -I agreed because of the credit of the Business. Now I believe it was -all a trap set by the men that want to form the trust." - -Luke did not pause to waste reproaches over either his own stupid -blindness or Forbes's culpable rashness. He pressed forward: - -"And now they're going to call the loan?" - -Forbes bowed his head. - -"And we can't meet it?" - -"If--if we tried, we could do it only by wrecking the Business." - -"But we can go somewhere else. The East County isn't the only bank in -New York." - -"That is what I thought. It's what I said." - -Forbes was swallowing a sob. "I said it to Osserman--that's the -president--I said it to him himself." - -"Well?" persisted Luke. - -"Well"--Forbes's eyes met Huber's--"it wasn't any use." - -"Now, look here," said Luke. He put into his voice a calm that he did -not feel. "Try to tell me just what happened. I can't advise you till -I know that, even if I'm not the business-fool I seem to have proved -myself to be. First of all, Osserman sent you some sort of word, didn't -he?" - -"Yes, of course." - -"What was it?" - -"It was a letter--just a personal letter." - -"When did you get it?" - -"About eleven this morning." - -"So then you went over to the bank?" - -"Yes." - -"And asked to see this man Osserman?" - -"Yes." - -"And what did he say?" - -"Well," he said--"I can't tell you exactly; he was careful not to use -definite words; but careful to make his meaning clear." - -"What was his meaning, then?" - -"He said in effect that he understood you were interested in our -Business." - -"What of it? That's what I want to know, Forbes. What's my interest in -your firm got to do with your standing at the East County National?" - -"Oh, he didn't say at first. At first he said he understood we were not -sound." - -"So you told him he was mistaken and offered to show the books?" - -"Of course I did." Forbes's chin shot upward. "I told him that the -Forbes firm was one of the oldest and----" - -"Yes, yes. And then he mentioned me. How did I hurt the firm's -standing?" - -"He was really very plausible about that. I must say, Huber, that he -rather opened my eyes to a phase of your political activities I hadn't -before thought of." - -"What phase?" - -"To be quite frank, he called your public utterances wild. He said they -attacked credit and might shake it. He even intimated that if you were -elected, you'd go in for a course of action--you had pledged yourself to -go in for one that would upset credit altogether. And that's true, -Huber." Forbes gained a certain confidence. "When you come to think of -it, the business interests of the city--I mean the sound conservative -business interests--ought not to be made to suffer for the sins of the -big financiers." - -Luke recaptured his composure. His face relaxed; he looked lazy and -uninterested. - -"So I suppose," he said, "that this banker asked you to tell me to get -out of the fight." - -"Yes, but of course----" - -"Really, that's the highest testimony to the League's strength that -we've had yet." - -"Yes, but, of course, I told him I couldn't do that." - -"What did he say then?" - -"He said he was afraid the City Chamberlain would withdraw all the city -funds on deposit at the East County if the bank kept on carrying a loan -you were interested in." - -"And you took all this like a child?" - -"I didn't. You ought to know me better than that." - -"What did you do?" - -"I was indignant. I told you I was. I said I would not have a loan -from a concern that interfered with the political convictions of its -creditors. I said I would go somewhere else." - -"Did you go?" - -The sob returned to Forbes's throat. - -"Yes, I did," he said; "and it was the most humiliating experience of my -career. When I thought of the firm of R. H. Forbes & Son begging -credit, I could hardly bear it. But I went to the Lexington National." - -"They turned you down?" - -"They listened very politely and said they would consider the -proposition." - -"Well, then," said Luke, "you're crossing a bridge before you come to -it." - -"No, I am not; for presently they sent over a messenger with a note that -was no more than an insulting refusal." - -"You gave up then?" - -"No, I tried again. I tried Clement & Co." Forbes seemed unable to -conclude. - -"And they?" urged Luke. - -"They wouldn't consider it for a moment, Huber." - -Luke did not like to look at Forbes's suffering, but he had to hear the -end. - -"Well?" he said. - -Forbes flung out his hands. - -"What more could I do?" he demanded. "If it became known that the firm -was going begging--yes, begging--from bank to bank, what would happen to -our credit? I didn't dare to go anywhere else. I--Huber, I went back -to Osserman and asked him for time." - -Luke sat down. He picked up a paper and made a transparent pretense of -glancing at it. - -"Did he give you time?" - -"He said he'd give me a week." - -"A whole week?" Luke tried to appear encouraged. "That's six good -working days. You can get the money together in that time." - -"Huber"--Forbes came over to Luke and stood above the newspaper--"I've -told you what it would do to our credit to try. But I've come to the -conclusion that we could not get this money from any bank in America." - -"What do you mean? Not if we have security?" - -"Not if we could offer the Metropolitan Life Building for security. Not -from any bank in America." - -Luke put down the paper. - -"But that----" He stopped a moment, and then went on: "But there's only -one group of men in the country that could put up such a wall." - -"That," said Forbes simply, "is the group I mean." - -Luke's eyes were veiled. He rose and walked across the room. -Presently, over his shoulder, he inquired sharply: - -"What makes you think this?" - -Forbes was frank: - -"I don't know. I can't tell you. A hundred little things. But I am -sure." - -"I thought you said something about a clothing trust." - -"I did. It was the same crowd. Now they have some additional reason. -Oh, I couldn't doubt it. It was behind every word Osserman said. It was -standing back of his words, but it was on tiptoe, looking over them." - -Luke turned and came up to Forbes. He was quite calm again. - -"I know what you want me to do," he said. - -"Yes," said Forbes: it was his way of saying: "You have read my meaning, -and I will stand by it." - -"Well, I can't do it." - -Luke spoke quietly. It hurt him to have to say this thing. - -"I was afraid that was the way you'd take it," said Forbes. - -"How else could I take it?" - -"You know what it means to me, Huber?" - -"Yes. I know what the firm means to you, but I can't do what you ask. -You want me to give up what I think is right for the sake of saving your -firm. I can't do it." - -"It's your firm, too, Huber." - -"Then I've got a right to hurt it." - -"I'm not asking you to do anything wrong; I'm only asking you to wait." - -"That's just what I can't do," said Luke. - -Forbes would hear no more. He twitched with a spasm of weak rage. His -voice rang high. - -"You're a fool!" he cried. "You talk as if I were trying to compound a -felony with you. What am I asking? I'm only asking you to hold off for -this campaign. I'm only asking you to stand by the man that took you -into his business--my Business, the one that my grandfather founded and -my father handed down to me. Haven't _I_ stood by _you_? Didn't I trust -you? I've kept out of all these big combinations, but I know how they -work--nobody can help knowing these days--and when I took you in, how -was I to be sure you weren't a dummy representing somebody else, and so -on, higher and higher up, till the trail ended with just these same men? -But no, I trusted you. I trusted you, and now---- You've no right to -humiliate me! You've no right to wreck my Business! Do you know what -you're doing? You're making a beggar out of my daughter--out of the -girl you told me last night you wanted to be your wife!" - -Luke had been expecting this. The muscles about his mouth tightened, -but all that he said was: - -"I suppose you have spoken to her?" - -"Yes, I have. Of course I have!" cried Forbes. - -"And what does she say?" - -Forbes tried to take Luke's hand. - -"Why do you act this way?" he pleaded. "Why can't you wait? They -haven't nominated you yet. Withdraw your name. That won't hurt the -League, and it will only make you all the stronger for the next time; -and by the next time we'll be ready to meet all opposition. This time -you can't be elected even if you are nominated. Why do you want to jump -into the fire?" - -"What," insisted Luke, "does Betty say?" - -She was at the door. She came in as he asked the question. She looked -from her lover to her father, and then she ran to her father and put her -head on his shoulder. - - -§6. Luke took a short breath. He wanted to leave them. He felt that -he could not face much more. He wondered what Forbes had said to her -and how much she had heard of what Forbes and he were saying. - -"Betty!" said her father. He patted her head. Luke thought that the -caressing hand looked old. "Betty!" - -She spoke with her face hidden: - -"Oh, Luke, you wouldn't hurt father?" - -"It isn't that, Betty." Luke was angry. The girl was behaving as he -thought that a girl placed as she was ought to behave, and he loved her -no less for that, but he was angry at her father's weakness in putting -her in such a position, "It isn't that, Betty, I've got to do it. You -don't understand these things. You can't understand them." - -"She knows that _I_ understand them," Forbes interposed. - -"What of it?" challenged Luke. "Betty, I've got to do what I think's -right. You wouldn't have me go against everything I believe, would you? -You wouldn't have me do something I thought was wrong?" - -Betty half raised her head: - -"But it can't be wrong not to ruin us!" - -Luke turned his words on Forbes. - -"I'll withdraw from the company," he said. - -"I couldn't buy you out," Forbes answered. He bit his lip; shame -colored his cheeks. "And if you sold to anybody else it would be sure -to be letting in our enemies. Even the mere report that you wanted to -sell would wreck us, coming on top of those bank interviews." - -Luke knew Forbes was right. - -"Betty," he said, "a lot of men that believe in me are going to offer me -this nomination. It's a nomination to a place that makes its holder an -officer of the court, an officer of justice, yet the plain truth is your -father wants me to let these other men's money, or the power of their -money, buy me off from doing justice to them." - -"Nonsense!" Forbes was strengthened by his daughter's meed of comfort. -"You won't be elected if you are nominated." - -"They seem to think I will," said Luke. - -"And somebody else," urged Betty, "could do just as well against them, -Luke." - -"That's not the point, Betty. It's a personal question, a question of -personal morals; it's a matter of my own conscience." - -She turned until she stood no longer between the two men. She stood at -her father's side. Her cheeks were damp from weeping, but her eyes -shone. - -"But think, Luke," she said. "You _are_ young. Father's twice as old, -and he _must_ know more. He must be right. He wouldn't ask you to do -anything that was wrong, would you, father?" - -Forbes shook his head. - -"I know it's a lot for you to have to give up," she went on; "but you -ought to be willing to give up a lot if--if you----" - -"If I love you?" asked Luke. - -She met him. - -"Yes," she said. - -"She's right, Luke," nodded her father. - -"Then," pursued Luke--the tone was his laziest--"what about her love for -me? Isn't it to----" - -Betty interrupted. She had taken Forbes's hand: - -"You're not going to make me choose between you and father, are you?" -she pleaded. - -"I tell you," said Luke, "it isn't anything of that sort, Betty. I've -got to do what I'm going to do. You haven't any choice, and neither have -I. You might almost say it's a religious question. It's like saving my -soul. I've got to do it; I've just got to; just because it's the one -right thing, I've got to do it. Why"--his manner grew tense--"you don't -know; even your father doesn't know. This North Bridge wreck, with all -those people killed and wounded: that's what these men did, these men -that are trying to keep me out of the district-attorneyship." - -"The North Bridge wreck?" snapped Forbes. "That was on the M. & N. What -are you talking about, Huber?" - -Luke realized that he had gone further than the limits of his promise of -temporary silence concerning the letters, but he was too bitterly tried -not to go still further. - -"Yes," he said, "I mean just that. Everybody knows the N. Y. & N. J. -crowd own the majority of the stock in the M. & N., and you know it, -too. What's more, this wreck was their direct fault. I can prove that -and I mean to. That's why they're after me: I mean to prove it if they -don't square things. And so they're afraid of me." - -"Ridiculous!" said Forbes. "That's just the trouble with you, Huber: -you're going about making wild, unfounded statements like this." - -"I ought not to tell even you two," Luke answered; "but the fact is, I -have letters written by one of these men that will substantiate every -word I say." - -"You mean they'll show these people owned the road?" - -"Practically, and ordered the poor rails that caused that wreck." - -"Absurd: they couldn't do that. They didn't operate the road. This -sort of thing is what is upsetting legitimate business: a few men going -on the way you are. I don't think these people at the top are any -better than they should be--I've often said so to you--but you can't go -around calling them murderers. That's ridiculous." - -Before Luke could reply, Betty again shifted the issue. - -"Luke, you won't do it?" she appealed. "You'll give it up--for father's -sake?" - -He started to speak, but she dropped her father's hand and came to him -with hers upraised. - -"No," she said; "don't tell me now. Don't say anything now. Don't -speak. You'll only be sorry. You're hurt and angry. Of course, you -are. Go away. Wait. Go away just for to-night and think it over, and -come back to-morrow." Her hand crept into his. "I know it's awfully -hard for you to give it all up, even for a few years. I know what it -means to you. Don't think I don't know, Luke. But----" She looked into -his face. "Please, dear?" - -His face was set. - -"Good-by," he said. - -"You'll be back to-morrow?" - -He freed himself. - -"Yes," he said. "Good-night." - - -§7. It was simply that he could not stay any longer. He left the house -with his mind made up; he would not withdraw from the fight for the -district-attorneyship. To keep his word, he would go back to see her -next day, but he would go back only to end what he had not the heart to -end to-night. - -The thing had ended itself. This was the conclusion of all his chances -for Betty. They were over. - -He loved her. He went away from her with the certainty that nothing -which life might henceforth rob him of could be the equal of this loss. - -Yet he did not blame her. Brought up as he had been, he believed that -her attitude was the inevitable one and the right. He had ventured that -single question about the test of her love for him, but he felt that it -was an unfair question. Until a girl married, her first duty was toward -her parents. His own duty and Betty's duty clashed. There was no -possibility of compromise. Forbes was a weakling, but, in cleaving to -Forbes, Betty, Luke felt, did the only thing that she rightly could do. - -He wondered what would come of that side of his life which she had gone -out of. As much as might be, he would crowd its borders with the -activities of his professional and political work, but something of the -space would remain: it belonged. He was still black with the despair of -his loss when he turned into Thirty-ninth Street and saw, standing there -as if waiting for him, the girl that looked like Joan of Arc. - -"I've been waitin' for you," she said. - -Her cheeks and mouth were not painted to-night, and their lines were -softer; they spoke only of what she had suffered and not of what she had -inflicted. Her eyes were wet with tears; her underlip quivered. - -"I thought I told you last night," began Luke. - -"I know," she said. "An' then I wanted what you thought. But not now, -not to-night." She spoke rapidly as if determined that he should hear -her out before he could escape. "Don't mind the way I talk. I just -kind of talk that way because it gets like a habit. What I want's help. -I'm in trouble. Honest to God I am." - -She was surely in trouble, and she was beautiful. - -"You mean----" His hand went to his pocket. - -"No, not money," she said. "It ain't that. It's about my sister. -They've got her; my fellow has. Listen." She seized his wrist. "Will -you listen a minute, please? Here, if you don't want no one to see you -in this here apartment house, come on over here toward Six' Av'nue. -They've got her: my kid sister!" - -Luke looked at the woman. He could see nothing but sincerity. He was -not afraid of an attempt at robbery, and he could think of no other -reason for her request except the one she gave. - -"Yes, I'll go with you," he said. - -She hurried him into the darker street. - -"Listen," she said: "I'm in the business. You know that. I don't let -on to be nothin' much. But I've got a kid sister that lives home; an' -she's straight, Jenny is. Well, I was talkin' to her to-night when my -fellow came up, an' he sent me on an errand--we was all standin' right -over on that corner--an' when I come back, they was gone, both of -them--an' I know he's got her in here in Pearl's Six' Av'nue place." - -"How do you know that?" - -"I guessed it, an' then I rang the bell an' one o' the girls told me I -was on, an' then Pearl came down an' yelled for the bouncer an' they -throwed me out." - -In the lamplight of the street her face looked like the face of an -innocent girl. - -"Why didn't you call a policeman?" asked Luke. - -"Aw, you know them. Pearl stands in." - -"But they'd have got your sister, anyhow." - -"Not the cop on this beat. I wouldn't give up to him the other night, -and he run me in." - -They stopped at a narrow door. There was a shop on one side of it and a -saloon on the other. - -"This is the place," said the girl. "Pearl's joint's over the store." - -"You want me," asked Luke, "to go in and bring your sister out?" - -The girl assented. "She's only a kid. I know what I am all right; but -she's only a kid, an' she's straight; she's always been straight. You -won't have no trouble. They're always scared of anybody like you. -You'll do it, won't you?" She leaned toward him. "You ain't afraid?" - -The infamy burned him. - -"Afraid?" he said slowly. "No, I'm not afraid." He rang the bell. - -The girl wrung her hands. - -"You're good. You're awful good. Mamie'll owe just everything to you." - -"Who will?" asked Luke. - -"Mamie. That's my sister's name. She'll----" - -"I see," said Luke. - -The door opened. A negro servant stood in the darkened hallway before -them. Luke and the girl stepped inside. - -"Wait a minute," said Luke quietly. - -He brushed the servant's hand from the knob. He saw the two women -standing open-mouthed, but before words came to them, he stepped back -into the street, closing the door behind him. The girl's slip about her -sister's name had saved him. - - -§8. He was glad to be in the light. He hurried across the street with -no purpose but that of getting as quickly and as far from the house as -possible. He was escaping. - -For a minute or more he did not know what it was that he was escaping -from. Then he glanced back toward the doorway. - -Three policemen were entering the doorway. As Luke reached the corner, -a gong clanged and a patrol-wagon turned into Sixth Avenue. - -A messenger-boy, who had been standing on the corner, began to trot -after the wagon. Luke stopped him. - -"What's the matter?" asked Luke. - -The boy turned to him a leering face: - -"It's a raid, I guess. I knowed there was somethin' doin' when I seen -that patrol standin' over on Thirty-nint' Street." - - - - - *CHAPTER XI* - - -§1. Luke wanted to dismiss the episode of the raid as a coincidence. -He tried to argue that the girl had been a stool-pigeon employed to get -him into the Sixth Avenue house solely for the purpose of robbery by -confederates waiting for her there. Schemes of that sort were common -enough in New York and succeeded in spite of their clumsiness; the more -often one was reported in the papers and brought to the attention of the -papers, the readier a certain portion of the public was to succumb to -the next attempts. Luke wanted to believe that the appearance of the -police might have proved welcome enough for him. - -It was the news Forbes had given him that weighed against any such -supposition. If his enemies were at work to ruin him financially, they -might well be at work to break him and bring him to terms by means of a -scandal in the police courts. It was all very well to say that the -attack on the Forbes company ought to suffice them: Luke began to feel -that these foes were the kind who want certainty enough to use more than -one method of securing it. He had heard of a rebellious city official -thus captured in a raid on a gambling-house. That man, he had been -told, was released from the police station only upon signing a -compromising paper, which was thereafter held by his political superiors -as a bond to assure his future obedience to their wishes. Luke saw how -a similar course could have been followed in regard to himself. - -What worried him most, however, was, of course, the break with Betty and -the difficulties in which he had innocently entangled her father. He -was sincerely sorry for Forbes, whose shortcomings were forgivable -because of worship of tradition, and the loss of Betty meant a descent -into the pit of despair. - -It was early morning before a sudden hope came to Luke. He had lain -sleepless for hours, not trying to solve his financial riddle, but only -contemplating its apparent impossibility of solution, and he had turned -from that to the machinations of his enemies with genuine relief. This -time the change must have rested his resourcefulness, for, in the midst -of tearing at the sticky strands in which Stein and the men behind Stein -had enmeshed him, the name of Ruysdael shot into his mind as the name of -one who could and might advance the money to save Forbes and bring back -Betty. He would go to Ruysdael at the earliest possible moment. - -With that thought, he could dismiss all memory of the raid in Sixth -Avenue. Almost immediately he fell asleep. - - -§2. The next day was not without its fresh warnings from the powers -that opposed him, and the first of these came from the headquarters of -the Municipal Reform League itself. Luke thought it better taste for -him to remain away from the headquarters while the formalities of the -nomination were gone through with by the committee that was then to make -its ticket regular by means of petition. But it was too early in the -day to call on Ruysdael, so he remained in his rooms at the Arapahoe, -and here, at eleven o'clock, Venable telephoned him. - -"The meeting is over," said Venable. - -"Good," said Luke. "The ticket is the one agreed on?" - -"Yes. You have my congratulations, Mr. Huber." - -"Thank you." Luke thought that the tone of his supporter was somewhat -strained. "I hope everything went off smoothly," he added. - -"Well, no," said Venable, "it didn't. It is all right now, but I am -bound to tell you that a little opposition had developed against you. -We overcame it, but it was there and from some men that we had every -reason to believe would support you. I don't understand it, Mr. Huber; -it was mysterious." - -"I'm coming right down," said Luke. - -At headquarters he learned little more. The committee had met with no -indication of approaching trouble. Save for two or three persons whose -means of livelihood were the practical organization of reform political -movements, nearly all the members were business men, in small but sound -industries, each of unquestioned probity. The candidates slated for -every other post were accepted as a matter of course; but when Luke's -name was brought up by Venable for the district-attorneyship, one of the -politicians and several of the business men opposed acceptance. They -were dogged, but vague. The politician at last spoke of Luke as having -courted too much animosity from the upper regions of finance. - -"He has talked too wild," said this one. "He oughtn't to have -threatened till after election. Of course, I know what he's got to do -if he's elected, but he needn't have begun it beforehand. I haven't got -anything against him, but he's shown his hand too soon, and so he won't -make a good candidate." - -The business men spoke much as Forbes had spoken. The Municipal Reform -League was a radical organization, but it ought to be radical within -reason. Huber's public utterances had been too sweepingly radical. -They feared him; they thought him too hot-headed. He was still too -young. In pursuing Big Business, he was sure to trample smaller, -legitimate business; he would upset credit. - -The majority of the committee was loyal to Luke and had its way. Luke -received the nomination, but such dissenters as were converted came to -him half-heartedly, and two of the timorous business men withdrew from -the organization. - -"Then, there is Yeates, too," said Venable. "He wasn't at the meeting, -but he telephoned he was coming here to see you about this time, and I -gathered that he isn't in a particularly pleasant frame of mind." - -Luke thought of Venable's long years of battle for reform. - -"You know what's at the back of all this?" he said. - -"I think I do," said Venable. - -"I mean: you know _who's_ back of it?" - -"I can guess. Your published attack was rather clear, Mr. Huber." - -"Then, are you and the League prepared to go right ahead?" - -"Yes, we are." - -"You, too? You individually?" - -Venable's old eyes glittered. - -"I always suspected these people," he said. "I always felt sure they -were against us. They were never so strongly against us as they are -now, but their being so much more against us now only makes me the more -certain that what we are doing is right." - -"They have a good deal of power, Mr. Venable." - -"I know that better than you do, my boy; but they can't hurt me -personally, if that is what you mean. What little money I have comes -from the rents of an uptown apartment house. It's in a good -neighborhood and full of steady people. Nobody can take that away from -me. It isn't as if I drew my income from bonds, but if I did, and if -these people could ruin me"--he took Luke's hand--"I should go right -ahead." - -They had been talking in Luke's office. Shortly after Venable left it, -Yeates was shown in. The young man was excited. - -"Look here, Huber," he said. "A little bit's good, but you're going -pretty damned far." - -He dragged a chair toward Luke's desk, turned it about, and sat down -astride of it with his arms folded across its back. - -A smile twitched at Luke's mouth. - -"What way-station do you want to get off at?" he inquired. - -"I don't want you to make a monkey out of the League," said Yeates. -"I've been reading over your letters and interviews and things, and I -think you ought to realize that this is a reform organization and not a -bunch of Anarchists." - -"You're a slow reader, Yeates. Haven't you been hearing these things -talked over, too?" - -Yeates blushed, but he did not flinch. - -"Well, what if I have? The people I've heard talking are the people -you've been slamming, and I want to tell you that those people are the -backbone of this country." - -"I haven't mentioned any names." - -"Oh, don't think I'm a fool, Huber, and don't think these people are -fools, either. Everybody knows. What do you do it for? It won't catch -any votes, if that's what you want." - -"I rather wanted to do some good." - -"Good? Good?" Yeates laughed angrily. "What are you talking about? -You're talking as if these men were pirates. You're talking like one of -those fellows that make speeches on a soap-box on the corner. It's all -right to fight police-graft, and it's all right to run the crooks out of -town--that's what the League's for and why I'm for the League--but I'm -not going to keep on with an organization that's mixing up the biggest -men in America with that sort of cattle. I won't stand for having my -personal friends called thieves. I can't stand for it, and I won't!" - -Luke looked at his watch. He rose. - -"I have to be uptown in half a hour," he said. - -"But see here----" Yeates's chair clattered to the floor as Yeates -sprang up. - -"When this nomination was offered to me," said Luke, "you were present. -Do you remember something you said--something about outside influences -and so on?" - -"Oh, rot! Who's talking about outside influences?" - -"I am. The nomination was given me along with certain promises. I've -accepted it. I mean to act on the strength of those promises." - -"You mean you're going crazy." - -"Then, the League's going crazy, too. As the only sane man in it, I'm -afraid you won't find yourself in congenial company, Yeates. You'd -better get out." - -"Get out?" Yeates could scarcely credit his ears. - -"Get out," Luke repeated. - -"I like that!" shouted Yeates. "This is a nice reform party, this is! -Anti-boss! Why, you're more of a boss than Tim Heney ever dreamed of -being." - -Luke had not looked at the matter that way. He saw now that he was -indeed using boss-methods, but he also saw that boss-methods were -unavoidable. - -"This League," he said, "is pledged to a course of action you don't -agree with, so you can't consistently remain in it." - -"I will!--I _will_ get out!" cried Yeates. "I'd like to know who had -more to do with this League: you or me. Why, you only came in the other -day, and it was me and my friends got you in. But I'll get out all -right: you needn't worry about that. I'm through." - -He left the room. It was a few weeks later when Luke heard of Yeates's -engagement to the girl whose diamond pendant Luke had admired the first -time that he went to the Ruysdaels' house. That, Huber knew, was indeed -coincidence, but the previous connection of Yeates with the Municipal -Reform League served the more to shake Luke's confidence in the -radicalism of some of its remaining members. - - -§3. His mission to Ruysdael was far more satisfactory than his talk -with Yeates. Luke did not tell the millionaire the circumstances that -made it necessary for R. H. Forbes & Son to borrow money, nor, as things -fell out, did he have to explain why the Ruysdael estate, and not a -bank, was wanted as a creditor. He went into details only concerning -the nature of the securities that Forbes could offer; he was honest -about the chances of the business, which he believed to be good, and he -was no more pressing in his request than he thought it wise to be. - -"So," said Ruysdael, smiling, "you find some use for predatory wealth, -after all?" - -Luke remembered Jack Porcellis's assertion that the Ruysdaels were in -some way connected with the forces now opposed to the loan, but the -connection, if it existed, must be slight. The Ruysdael money was not -in a form that could well be hurt by Luke's enemies; and Ruysdael, -though subsequent pressure might well stop him from further aid, was the -sort of man who, having gone into such a venture as the present one, -would not undo anything he had already done. - -"I don't consider you one of the pirates," said Luke. - -"No? Well, I'm not active, perhaps," Ruysdael reassured him. "I was -just thinking you rather strong in some of your public utterances. -There's no use in attacks unless they can win, you know." - -The swarthy man was interested in Huber's request, though solely on -Huber's own account. Ruysdael felt that he had been in a measure -responsible for Luke's investment, and he was anxious to protect that -investment so long as the protection was real and not a mere tossing of -good money after bad. He took Luke at once to the offices of the -Ruysdael estate. - -There it was clear that, whatever influence Luke's enemies might have, -they had issued no orders against him. Perhaps they had not thought of -the possibility of his turning in this direction, perhaps they had meant -to do no more than frighten him by their show of power with the banks. -In any case, old Herbert Croy, the manager of the estate, was amiable -and suggested that Forbes be sent for without delay. - -It was a moment of triumph for Luke. He met Forbes in one of the outer -offices of the suite used for the administration of the Ruysdael estate, -and he was not entirely sorry to find Forbes contrite. - -"Is it--it's really true?" asked Forbes. - -He had been having a bad time. His face was drawn, and the feverish -hand that grasped Luke's was trembling. - -"Yes," said Luke. "I think I've induced Ruysdael to advance the money." - -Forbes looked away. - -"I'm sorry--very sorry for my attitude last night, Huber; and yet, you -must have seen----" - -"That's all right. Forget it." - -"I know. You're good. But I do want you to understand. And you have -turned out to be the real business man of the pair of us, after all!" - -"So it seems," said Luke dryly. - -Forbes missed the reflection on his own ability. - -"Oh, but you have! Huber, you've--you've saved the Business!" - -"No; that's up to you. I've only made it possible for you to get the -money. You have to finish convincing these people; so buck up." - -"I will, I will." - -"And they'll probably turn in and fight us in the market." - -"We'll see about that." All of Forbes's courage had come back to him. -"Let them try. Huber, I can't thank you enough. I never can." - -"Then don't try to." Luke took Forbes by the arm and led him to the -door behind which Ruysdael and Croy were waiting. - -But Forbes felt that there was more to be said. "It was splendid of -you," he continued, as Luke drew him forward. - -"Was it? You overlook the fact that I stood to lose a little money of -my own--if nothing else!" - -"I did. I actually did! By Jove, I don't see how you can forgive me, -Huber." - -Luke's answer was to push open the door. Within half an hour the -interview was concluded. Forbes had deposited his securities and -received a certified check. It was all so simple that, while Luke was -wondering why he had not thought of it twelve hours before, Forbes was -saying to himself: - -"How was it _I_ didn't think of it last night?" - - -§4. Luke intended to go from the Ruysdael offices to those of the -League, but as he parted from Forbes on the street after the loan had -been secured, something happened that changed his plans. At the foot of -the elevator-shaft of the building, he noticed a little man leaning -against the marble-paneled wall: the man was an unostentatious fellow, -commonplace as to both face and clothes, but Luke thought he had seen -the figure before. - -He passed with Forbes through the revolving doors of the office-building -and walked to the curb. He glanced back and saw the commonplace man -coming through the doorway behind him. Then he remembered: when he left -the Arapahoe that morning, he saw this man walking down the other side -of Thirty-ninth Street. He had thought nothing of it at the time, but -now his experience of detectives told him that this man bore the marks -of the detective. - -Luke called a taxicab. The man, he saw, prepared to call another. - -"I'll try to keep my promise to see Betty to-night," said Luke to -Forbes. - -"You must," said Forbes. His gratitude, though not so hot as it had -been, was still warm. - -"I'll try. There's a lot to be done--politically, you know. But I'll -try-" - -They shook hands. Forbes started away. Luke gave his chauffeur that -address in Wall Street at which he had issued his orders to the men who -were now fighting him. - -He was disappointed; the person whom he sought was not there. Luke -doubted the statement of the doorkeeper, but could get no other. He -went to the offices of Hallett and to those of Rivington, but with no -better luck. At each descent from his taxi, he caught sight of the -detective and knew that the detective meant to be seen. Then he sought -the quarters of Stein, Falconridge, Falconridge & Perry, and was -immediately admitted to the presence of the head of that firm. - -The Judge sat at his handsome desk, a telephone at one elbow and a vase -of Abel Chatney roses at the other. His plentiful white hair and his -smooth frock-coat still potent, still spread around him the aura of -dignity. He rose slowly as Luke came in and bowed with magisterial -calm. - -"How do you do, Mr. Huber?" he said pleasantly. "I am glad to see -you--very glad, indeed." - -He resumed his chair. Luke took a chair close by. - -"The papers," pursued the Judge, "tell me that you are open to -congratulations. You have mine." - -"Thank you," said Luke. He stretched his legs. "Yes, I got the -nomination. There was a little opposition, but I got it." - -"Opposition?" The Judge raised his white eyebrows. "Hum! Well, of -course, Mr. Huber, you had to expect that in the circumstances." - -"What were the circumstances, Judge?" - -Stein shook his head and smiled benignantly. - -"There you go," he said. "You will insist on flattering me with your -assumptions of my omniscience." - -"But not of your omnipotence, Judge; for I did get the nomination. What -were the circumstances?" - -The Judge still smiled: - -"You can't expect to hurt the more important business interests without -hurting the lesser ones; and the lesser dislike being hurt even more -than the greater, Mr. Huber." - -"I gathered that you might think so." - -This time the Judge's smile was a song without words. - -"Very well," said the younger man. "As I say, I overcame the opposition -inside the League. I believe I can overcome the same opposition at the -polls." - -"I hope so," Stein answered. "But it is a pity that you have not more -powerful backing." - -"I have a very active following at any rate." - -"It will require a great deal of activity to overcome the prejudices of -the majority." - -"Yes, but I'm not talking about the activity of the voters. I am -talking about the active following I am having from my apartments to my -office, and from my office wherever else I go." - -Judge Stein leaned over to smell the roses on his desk. When he looked -up, his firm mouth seemed innocent. He offered the vase to Luke. - -"Aren't they beautiful?" he asked. - -"Quite." - -"I often think it is such a pity that they haven't more perfume. What -they have is good, but it is not a great deal. What we gain in form, we -lose in scent. The law of compensation, I suppose." - -"I know this detective had orders to let me see he was following me." - -The Judge put down the vase. - -"I am sorry you don't care for roses," he said. "Yes, Mr. Huber, I dare -say you are followed. You are fighting the Democratic police force and -the Republican District-Attorney's office; they both have detectives -attached to them, and I have heard that they frequently use their -detectives to watch their political rivals. You are fighting the -Progressive organization, too, and they could use private detectives. I -quite agree with you that it isn't pleasant." - -"This fellow isn't on the job to watch me. He's only used to frighten -me. I'm not easily frightened, Judge." - -"No?" - -"No. If I had been, I'd have turned tail when your friends tried to -ruin a business I am interested in, or when they tried to have me caught -in a police-raid." Luke spoke as if he were mentioning incidents in the -lives of people dead these thousand years. "The raiders didn't find me, -as you, of course, know. What you don't know is that the business move -has failed just as badly." - -If he had not known it, the Judge's face betrayed no surprise. - -"Really, Mr. Huber, I told you at our last interview that I had no -professional interest in this matter." - -"You admitted that the people back of all this were your friends." - -"I _said_ that I was a friend of certain persons." - -"Then, you might as well say now that your friends intend to prevent my -election and that they'll use any means to do it." - -"Don't get excited, Mr. Huber." The Judge's right hand waved a -deliberate protest against Luke's violent language. "Of course, I say -nothing of the sort. What I do say is that you must understand that -your own plan of action is bound to alienate the voters. There are more -people interested in this election than you and me--more even than my -friends. A great many people don't want to see you elected -District-Attorney. There are the business men, there are the police, -and there are the people of the underworld. You have been reckless -enough to make no ethical distinctions. You lump the good with the bad, -and attack everybody. Well, you must not be surprised at the result." - -Luke kept to his low key. - -"I only came here to tell you that I couldn't be scared." - -"Why to me?" - -"Perhaps just because I like to talk to you, Judge." - -The Judge bowed a sincere acknowledgment. - -"I have already told you," he said, "that I think you could go far if -you were cooler. Now you are confusing possible legitimate influence--I -say possible, not certain--with physical attack." - -"They've both seemed probable, Judge." - -"The former may be. As to the latter--well, like most young -enthusiasts, you have forgotten that elections go by majorities, and -that the majorities are controlled by the lower forces of society. That -is the one flaw in our republican system, and nothing but social -evolution, generations of free education, will cure it. You have not -only very wrongly assailed legitimate business; you have quite properly -threatened to close to the criminal classes their chief sources of -revenue. It is their livelihood against yours. My friends can have -nothing in common with these people. We cannot control them. You must -know that." - -Luke shrugged his shoulders. Stein continued: - -"As a politician and a lawyer, you must have counted on the opposition -of the criminal classes when you began your campaign. If you did not" -the Judge bent his head to the roses--"well, I don't want to alarm you, -but if I were in your place, I should leave the fight." - -Luke got up. - -"The alternative?" he inquired. - -The Judge did not answer. He merely looked at Luke. - -"I won't take it," said Luke. - -"I tell you again, that we have nothing to do with the forces that seem -to worry you most." - -"I know you say so. Well, we haven't got much further than at our last -talk, have we?" - -"At that talk, Mr. Huber, I said to you that you could help yourself, -your party, the public good----" - -"If I'd do what you wanted? I won't. I merely thought that if I told -you you'd failed so far, you might do what _I_ asked." - -The Judge sadly shook his head. - -"If you would only listen to reason!" - -"I'll wait for the month and not a day longer. Meanwhile, I'm not the -kind that's easy scared. Nothing you can do--you, and your friends, or -anybody hired by your friends--will stop me." - -The Judge stood up. - -"I am afraid you will be stopped," he said. - -"Try it," said Luke. "Good-by." - -"Good-day, Mr. Huber," Stein replied. "I shall always be glad to have a -call from you. I am interested in your career--more genuinely -interested than you suppose." - - -§5. That night it was Betty who came to the door when Luke rang the -bell. She ran to it. - -"Luke," she cried, "father told me! I knew you would find a way out. -And, oh, Luke, I don't believe, in the end, I could have given you up, -even if you hadn't found one!" - - - - - *CHAPTER XII* - - -Luke had been lied to at the offices of Hallett and at those of -Rivington, but at the first office at which he had called, he was told -the truth: the stout man, with the bright, short-sighted eyes and the -pointed teeth was not at work that day. He was not at work for several -days, and breaths of rumors, tremulous, expectant, began to shake the -threads which centered at his working-place. - -The business of that place proceeded with its usual regularity and -speed. Conover, promoted to the post of confidential clerk, went back -and forth from Wall Street to his master's house in one of his master's -motor-cars. Atwood and the other brokers telephoned hourly for orders -to the house uptown. Simpson saw callers. But in the inner room, -Washington wasted his stupid solemnity on emptiness, the ticker spun its -yards and yards of tape for none to see, and nobody looked from the high -windows down the maze of streets on which the people buzzed like flies. - -All this had been thus before, and more frequently thus during the past -few years; the man with the hairy hands and crooked arms often suffered -attacks from some malady that the newspapers did not name. His world, -therefore, should not have taken the present seizure too seriously; but -it always leaped to the belief that each seizure was the last. Rumor -never learned from precedence, and on each occasion expected the worst. -Now official bulletins and authorized announcements of a slight cold and -a catarrhal affection of the mucous membrane of the throat did not check -rumor. The doctors said no more than that, the papers printed no more; -but news of another sort spread with a stronger conviction than the -doctors could secure and a wider circulation than the circulation of all -the newspapers combined. - -Rumor said that the sick man had always been a glutton, and that now, at -last, his digestion had given way. Rumor said that he had been in the -habit of rising early and working late, in the dawn and through the -night, planning the crowded actions of the too brief business day; and -rumor added that the price of these exertions must, at last, be paid. -Rumor said that the man overworked his brain and nerves, and that, at -last, the brain was working no more and the nerves strained to -breaking-point. Rumor whispered of a projected sea-voyage and a change -of scene to Biskra or the Riviera, and rumor sagely shook its many -heads. - -The luxurious house in which the sick man lived among the best things -that his money had bought him, and from which he used to dart out each -morning to his office in the maze, was closed to the reporters and to -most of the acquaintances who called there. L. Bergen Rivington went in -and came out, worried and elliptical. George J. Hallett went and came -out with loud, but brief, denials. The newspaper men, from the steps of -a house directly across the street, watched in relays and, every hour, -rang the muffled bell of the sick man's house and asked the same -questions, and were given the same answers, from the servant who came to -the door. - -Then, one morning, at its old-accustomed hour, the motor-car that the -sick man had most affected purred up to the house. The door opened. -The sick man, apparently no longer a sick man, came out, neat and trim -in a suit of russet brown, stepped into the car and was started for his -office before the quickest reporter could get a word with him. - -"He has quite recovered," said the doctors, when the newspaper men -overhauled them, and, although they swathed the answer in long phrases, -they would say no more than that. - -"He's quite well again and will not leave New York," said Simpson to the -representatives of the press when they reached his Wall Street offices; -and Simpson would add nothing save that his employer was too busy with -accumulated work to have time for press interviewers. - -Simpson, however, and Conover too, and all the office-force and all the -brokers, knew something more. They knew that, whereas their master was -generally not quick of temper, he had returned to work in an ugly mood. - -There was, indeed, a great deal of work for him to do: enough to ruffle -the temper of any man. He did it all grimly, speedily, with no waste of -words. He attended to each detail with as much energy and care as he -gave to every other detail, and one detail that he dealt with in a -necessarily long talk with Hallett he dealt with thus: - -"What about that Huber matter?" he asked. - -Rivington was not in the room, but the master of the room was seated at -the head of the table just as he always seated himself when both Hallett -and Rivington were there. He crouched with his large hands on the -mahogany surface, the thick fingers extended, his elbows raised at right -angles to his torso and pointing ceilingward. - -Hallett was as near to nervousness as he could be brought. - -"Nothin' yet," he said. - -"Hasn't any action been taken?" snapped the man at the head of the -table. - -"A lot of action's been taken, but nothin's come of it yet." - -"He hasn't been bought?" - -"Stein says----" - -"I know that. He hasn't been stopped?" - -"No." - -"Stop him. He's got to be stopped. Don't you know that he really might -hurt us? Stop him." - -"All right," said Hallett. - -"And now what about this Memphis & New Orleans deal?" the man in russet -brown went on. His beady eyes glittered, and the tips of his stumpy -fingers caressed the shining surface of the table. - - - - - *CHAPTER XIII* - - -§1. Luke was no longer inclined to doubt the wide extent and the -unscrupulous power of the influences opposing him. When he had first -come to acknowledge their evil, he thought it latent rather than active. -Disillusioned in this respect, he then minimized its activity, -maintaining that there was a vast difference between merely questionable -moves in the game of business and the hiring of criminal violence. He -assumed a tolerant skepticism toward the vague stories of how his -enemies, long before they became his personal enemies, employed the -basest tactics to crush rivals or gain ends, and even when he narrowly -escaped arrest in the raid on the house in Sixth Avenue, he tried to -tell himself that these enemies were only endeavoring to frighten him. -Now his second interview with Stein convinced him of the truth. - -Notwithstanding this, he stubbornly persevered. He no more belittled the -puissance of the wrong against which he had arrayed himself, but he -believed too firmly in the strength of his own right. Had he accurately -perceived relative values, he might have broken his promise and tried to -make the Rollins letters public; but he was sure that he could evade -harm until the month was past, and so he kept his word and went about -his hurrying and harrowing political work with the letters scornfully -bestowed in an inside pocket among a collection of trivial memoranda. - -Events moved rapidly. The Ruysdael loan served its turn, but its turn -soon gave evidence of being brief. As if from plans matured at least a -year before, the ready-made clothing trust that Forbes had feared sprang -into full being. It issued from the offices of Hallett, but it -originated, almost as frankly, from the brain of the man whose -lieutenant Hallett was. It threatened the life of the Forbes firm. -Controlling nearly all the other large firms of the country, it could -dictate to the retail trade, and secure favors from the railways. It so -combined its mills as to reduce running-expenses as a whole while -lowering prices on the one hand and, on the other, raising wages in its -consolidated factories. - -Luke had no doubt that this trust had been long prepared; he also had no -doubt that its birth had been hurried as a new move in the war against -him. He knew that the combination was contrary to the most rudimentary -business ethics, and he hastened to inquire into its charter and -organization, in the hope of finding some chink in its armor through -which the blade of the Sherman anti-trust law might be thrust. He -overhauled the law-reports in the libraries, he consulted the most -eminent corporation authorities in his profession; but he discovered -nothing to his liking. The trust was built upon the statute itself; the -weakness of the latter was the firm rock on which the former was -founded. Its strength lay in its iniquity. - -"It is absurd for us to suppose," the greatest lawyer in New York told -him, "that we can end the trust by passing laws. The trusts are a step -in social evolution, and you can't successfully legislate against -evolution. When the trusts can't hire the law's makers, they will still -be able to hire better lawyers to build new trusts within the law than -such lawyers as the voters can afford to elect to Congress to frame new -anti-trust laws. The laws against the trusts are of no more practical -use than the laws in favor of the unions." - -Luke returned to Forbes with this dictum. - -"Can't we get some of the outside firms to join us?" asked Luke. - -Forbes did not approve the idea. - -"I have had several offers of the kind," he said, "and I am suspicious -of them. I think the firms that made them weren't really independent. -I think it was a move to let the trust into our concern. Besides, this -house has always been a Forbes house, and it must remain that or go down -honorably." - -"There'll be trouble," Luke prophesied. - -"I think I know something about the trade," Forbes said: he had moments -when he did not wholly like the superior ability shown by Luke in -securing the Ruysdael loan. "This is my part of the Business." - -Luke was too much occupied by the political campaign not to acknowledge -that, weak or strong, Forbes must be left in control of the firm. The -battle for votes was four-cornered without being square; it was hot and -bitter. On the issue of the district-attorneyship, the Democrats and -Progressives were helping Leighton and the Republicans by directing all -their energies against Luke and the Municipal Reform League. They -raised high the accusation of demagogism and appealed to business large -and small to rescue credit from the hurts that Huber threatened. -Leighton, supported by the full strength of his organization, was -pretending that Luke's disaffection was that of a discharged servant; -the District-Attorney pleaded for a safe and sane conduct of the office -of the public prosecutor. - -Although the League's lesser workers undertook the task of canvassing -the city, treating with politicians and employers, advertising, arguing, -pleading, promising, and threatening, doing all the mysterious multitude -of things that are necessary to practical politics; although, too, the -other candidates and the volunteer and hired speakers performed heavy -shares of the speech-making from cart-ends and stages, on street and in -hall, Luke was constantly being called on to help his associates and had -more than enough in his own department to keep him busy from the time -when he got out of bed of a morning until, often the next morning, he -got in again. - -By telegraph, telephone, motor-car, and messenger, he had to be in -perpetual touch with every election-precinct in the city and with every -important Leaguer in every precinct. He had to answer hundreds of -letters, see hundreds of callers, give out scores of interviews, compose -and deliver from three to a dozen speeches a day to as many different -sorts of audiences. There was nothing considered too small to merit his -attention, nothing too large to be beyond his watchfulness. Once every -day he was in each quarter of New York, and he was nowhere for more than -half an hour at a time. - -Only his elaborately acquired calm and his inherited strength of -constitution saved him from nervous breakdown. Except for them, his -burning sincerity, his zeal, and the endless calls made upon these -characteristics, would have driven him to a hospital. Even so, his body -grew leaner and his face deeply lined. He was fighting with every ounce -of muscle and every particle of brain. - -For now, as in every alley and at every turning, his political progress -revealed some new though ever partial phase of the power he attacked, -Luke saw all that he hated centered in one figure, originated by one -mind. He individualized Evil. That entire meshwork of wrong which he -was trying to tear into shreds, he traced directly to the plump, pale -man in russet brown, the malignant thing with the hairy hands and beady -eyes, the creature that he had once seen crouched at the end of a -mahogany table in a Wall Street skyscraper, from the windows of which -the maze of streets resembled the strands of a web with men and women -struggling on them like entangled flies. - -Of all the fine and fatal threads that were snaring alike the helpless -and the strong, what threads were not spun by _him_? Of all the -corruption that was poisoning the country and infecting the ideals of -the Republic, what was there that did not proceed from his fangs? Luke -seemed to see it all now--was certain that he saw it--with awful -clarity. The Rollins letters, the interview in Wall Street, the action -of the banks, and Osserman's hint from the City Chamberlain, the part -played by the street-girl, the raid by the police, the talks with Stein -and the daily partial liftings of the political curtain: these, reviewed -in the lurid glow of the campaign, confirmed the accumulated gossip of -years, corroborated every wild story that came to him on the teeming -battlefield: of bribery and thieving, of perjury and murder, of all the -crimes that men have known, each committed again and again and -again--safely committed in the dark, cravenly done under the protection -of bought-and-paid-for law. - -What mattered now this power's culture? What mattered its benefactions, -its colleges for the ignorant, its hospitals for the ill? As Luke saw -them now, these were only dust for the eyes of the public, cheap -peace-offerings for intricate wrongs. The good could be counted on the -fingers of the hand, the evil was as the sands of the sea. - -It was everywhere. It mocked religion, because It supported churches; -It debauched Government, because It governed the governors; It destroyed -Law, because It controlled the Law's administrators. It was master of -the means of production and distribution; It owned the storehouses of -wealth; the clothes upon the backs of the people, the houses that they -lived in; the meat on the tables of the rich, the bread in the bellies -of the poor. It secured Its own prices for them, and withheld them as -It chose. Directly or indirectly, the whole nation took Its wages--such -wages as It chose to pay. - -At the great League meeting in Cooper Union, Luke, fronting a wilderness -of faces, shouted his defiance of this Power. He said no name, but none -that heard him could doubt whom he meant. For that night, Luke Huber's -friends no longer knew the languid young lawyer in this shouting, -quivering, torch-bearing evangel on the historic Cooper Union Stage. -The boy had died that, bound for New York, thought himself as a Templar -entering Jerusalem, but from his ashes there rose a new Peter the Hermit -preaching a new crusade. - -"If we had the eyes to see," he said, "we'd know that from this city, -the center of our civilization, slender threads, so numerous as to be -beyond our counting, run out to every corner of the land. Slender -threads: the merest gossamer, but so tough that, once entangled in them, -no man escapes. No man, no woman, and no child. The delicate filaments -catch and hold us by the thousand every day. They catch us at our birth -and they hold us till our death: life-prisoners even when we are unaware -of it, more desperately prisoners when we are unaware of it. The good -and the bad and the hopelessly neither-good-nor-bad; efficient and -inefficient, every sort and condition, men and boys, women and -girls--the net has use for us all: for the labor of the child, the body -of the woman, the hand or the brain, the money or the muscles, of the -man. It has uses for our virtues and more use for our vices. All are -needed, none that is caught goes free. If we had the eyes to see, we -should see it; but the strands are as fine as they are tough, and only -when a victim has so much blood in him that his dying struggles -ensanguine the thread that holds him do we, noting his blood, note what -has received his blood--and even there, we rarely consider that thread -in relation to its fellows, hardly ever realize that it is part of a -plan, hardly ever trace it to its center." - -Luke followed the Power along thread after thread through the labyrinth -of American life, and he made it clear that the Power was one man. He -pictured the stock-market, where the trade in traitors began and where -the fortunes of speculators and the riches of the country were counters -in the game of roulette that this Power conducted with a braced wheel. -He passed on, across the map of the Union, through the wrecks of -industries that this Power had razed. He showed how it had ruined -numberless houses and spoiled countless lives. He pointed to the -bloated bodies of the suicides it had flung into rivers it had never -seen, the graves it had filled in the potters' fields of distant towns, -the twisted limbs of children it had enslaved, the bodies of women it -had forced into the arms of lust, the muscles of men it had condemned to -lifelong servitude. He described its command over Congress, -legislatures, and judges; its collar around the necks of the police, who -brought to its service, in return for criminal immunity, gamblers, -thieves, highwaymen, tramps, prostitutes, and pimps. He clutched its -hairy hand in the ballot-box, and called upon his hearers to end this -Power's practices as they loved their souls. - -Luke pledged himself, if elected, to drive the thing out of every -department of the city's life that the District-Attorney could in any -way influence. He pledged himself to fear no man and to serve none. - -"You have the eyes!" he shouted. "If you'll only use them, you have the -eyes to see. Look about you, and what you see will give you the -strength you need. This thing thwarts and perverts the purposes of -Government, and you know it! The men that are pledged to the people, it -buys with gold. These are its crimes, but not the worst of its crimes. -The worst it does is not what it does to things material. The worst it -does is what it does to things spiritual. The spoiling of high aims, -the rape and ravage of honorable purposes: these are its sins against -the Holy Ghost!" - - -§2. Betty had gone to the mass-meeting, and so had the Rev. Pinkney -Nicholson. Even in the rush of his campaign, Luke had found time to see -Betty every day, and, because the Ruysdael loan had resolved all her -doubts, she was his most ardent supporter. He sent her two -stage-tickets to the gathering at Cooper Union, one of which he hoped -that her father would use; but Forbes was busy with plans to meet the -competition of the clothing trust and to quiet the grumblings of his -employees, who wanted a raise of wages to the sums paid by his rivals, -and so was kept late at the offices of the firm. Betty, therefore, -brought Nicholson with her, and Nicholson, thinking that it would not be -wise for a clergyman to seem to give the sanction of the Church to any -party in a political fight, had taken her not to the stage, but to the -body of the auditorium. - -The girl listened to Luke's speech with parted lips and flushed face. -She was inspired by her lover's every word and proud for each -interruption of applause. She was so inspired and so proud that she did -not notice the increasing frigidity of her companion. - -"Isn't he wonderful?" she demanded of Nicholson as the meeting ended -with the entire audience on its feet. - -The band was playing "The Star-Spangled Banner," and it had been hoped -that the crowd would sing that national anthem. Most of the people -present did not, however, know the words, and those who did know them -had voices of too slight a range to accede to the severe demands of the -music. - -"Isn't he just wonderful?" repeated Betty. She caught Nicholson's arm. -"He reminds me of a French orator father and I once heard in the Chamber -of Deputies in Paris. You must take me up to the stage to tell him so." - -Nicholson had listened with mixed emotions. His attention, moreover, -was loose because he had lately been much worried by the presence of a -heavy debt on his church. - -"I think he is an excellent speaker," said Nicholson, "but I'm afraid I -don't approve of his tone." - -"His tone?" Betty turned sharply. "What's the matter with his tone?" - -Nicholson's ascetic face relaxed. He quoted: - - "Too rash, too unadvis'd, too sudden; - Too like the lightning." - - -"He isn't rash; he's brave," said Betty. "And he isn't unadvised or -sudden, for he has been thinking of all these things for a long time. -But he is like the lightning, and these people he says are so wrong will -find that out." - - -§3. Mr. Irwin was at the mass-meeting, too; he of the gray Vandyck -beard and pink cheeks and twinkling eyes, the member of the law firm of -Stein, Falconridge, Falconridge & Perry, whose name did not appear on -the firm's letter-heads. - -Irwin left Cooper Union directly the chief speech of the evening ended. -He had been seated in an unostentatious corner high in air and close -beneath the roof. The people about him must have thought him a warm -admirer of the speaker, since he was so busy taking notes of what was -said that he had leisure for only the most perfunctory applause. Irwin -hurried down the Bowery. He went into the nearest public telephone -booth, and from it he called up the hotel in which ex-Judge Stein made -his home. - - -§4. Ex-Judge Stein had himself experienced a trying day, and Irwin was -absent from the office, or he would have known it. Somebody, it seemed, -had asked embarrassing questions of George J. Hallett and issued -exacting orders to Hallett, who had passed on the embarrassing questions -and the exacting orders to Stein. The questions and the orders gained -in intensity by transmission, and Stein was upset. - -"Yes, yes, this is Judge Stein," he answered into the black transmitter -of the telephone when Irwin called him. "Who's talking, please?" - -"Irwin." - -"Eh? Well, where have you been, Mr. Irwin? I have wanted you to-day on -some important business. - -"I think I have been attending to it, Judge." - -"Where have you been?" - -"Several places. To-night I've been to that mass-meeting in Cooper -Union." - -"Yes. Was there much enthusiasm?" - -"A great deal." - -"Spontaneous? Genuine?" - -"Partly." - -"And the tone of the speech?" - -Mr. Irwin went at some length into that side of the subject. He read -excerpts from his notes. It was evident that, since the afternoon when -his senior partner had first discussed Huber with him, necessity, had -forced a greater degree of confidence. - -The present conversation continued for several minutes. No -eavesdropper, unless previously acquainted with the facts of the case, -could have gathered much from it, but it was intelligent and significant -to the principals. At its end, Stein said: - -"There is very little time left us, and this young man means us to -understand that he will keep his word. The people for whom we are -acting are rather importunate, Mr. Irwin. They are not satisfied; not -at all satisfied; and I've already had to extend to you the time-limit I -first gave you. I have received instructions to the effect that we must -act at once." - -"Yes, sir." - -"You understand?" - -"I understand." - -"At once." - -"All right, Judge." - -"That had better mean to-night." - -"I'll do my best." - -"I think you had better, Mr. Irwin. I sha'n't be going to bed for two -or three hours yet." - - -§5. Irwin left the telephone and hailed the first taxicab that passed. -It was free, and he had himself driven to a political club with quarters -not far from the office of Anson Quirk. - -The quarters were over a saloon in Second Avenue. The entrance was a -hallway and a stairway back of the saloon. Here Irwin rang a bell, -which was immediately answered by a man in his shirt-sleeves. - -"Mr. Quirk upstairs?" - -"No," said the man. He eyed the questioner sullenly in the twilight of -the hall. "I don't think he is," he added. - -Irwin took a card from his pocket. He placed it in a blank envelope, -sealed the envelope, and handed it to the doorkeeper. - -"Give him this," he said, and stepped back into the street to wait. - -The man closed the door upon him. It was presently reopened by Quirk, -his round face smiling, his manner jovial. - -"Hello," said Quirk. "It's time good little boys were in bed, but I'm -glad to see you, anyhow. Come in and have a drink." - -"No, thank you," Irwin replied. "I'll be back here in two hours. -There's something you've got to do in the meantime." - -"Me? Now?" - -"You; right away. We've been too slow about that little business, -Quirk. We can't stand them off much longer. There's not much more time -for delay, and the people higher up want to be shown action." - -"Want to see the goods, do they?" chuckled Quirk. He rattled some coins -in the pocket under his round abdomen. - -"Yes." - -"Well, what do they want me to do?" - -"Show the goods, I guess." - -"Any suggestions?" - -"No, that's up to you." - -"I'm on," said Quirk. "Come back in two hours. I'll run right upstairs -and get my hat. An' here, if you won't take a drink, have a cigar: it's -a long wait. See you later." - - -§6. The great bulk of Police Lieutenant Donovan was hunched up in an -upholstered armchair beside the table in his private office when Quirk -entered. He looked as if his caller was not welcome. - -"Nothin' doin' so far," he said. - -Quirk, too, was serious. - -"I know it," said he. "They fell down so hard in that raid scheme that -they must have had all the sense knocked out of them. Well, you've got -to put some in." - -Donovan's growl was wordless. - -"You've got to," said Quirk. "To-night." - -"To-night?" Donovan stood up. "What in hell do you think I am?" - -The lawyer leaned across the table. - -"I think you're a bluff," he said. - -"Do you? Well, I'd just like you to have my job." - -"Donovan," said Quirk, "if you don't put this thing across, an' do it -soon, somebody'll have your job sooner than you think." - -"What's that?" thundered the lieutenant. But before a reply was -possible, his tone changed; his hands thrust deep in his pockets, he -turned away, his shoulders drooping. "Oh, I know you've got the -evidence to use for an excuse," he said: "I know you could do it, an' I -know you would." - -"I wouldn't do it if I didn't have to," said Quirk gently; "but you know -how I'm fixed myself. Don't take it so hard, Hughie. You can pull this -thing across, if you'll only try. I'm sorry, but if I haven't something -to show pretty soon, I'll get it in the neck--hard, I will." - -Donovan walked to the door of the rollroom. He opened it. - -"Say, one o' you fellows," he called to a group of officers in plain -clothes. "Go out an' find Guth an' tell him to come in here right away. -I want him." Then he turned to Quirk: "It's got to be to-night?" - -Quirk nodded: - -"Make it an hour and a half if you can." - -"Well, I can't." - -"Then as near as you can." - -"Gee," said Donovan, "I certainly am sick of this whole business! -Well--come back in an hour an' forty-five minutes an' we'll see what's -doin'." - - -§7. He greeted Guth with a roar. - -"You're a hell of a cop, you are! What sort of a job do you think -you've got, anyway? Rag-pickin'?" - -Guth, who was used to these rages, stood at attention. The scar from -his mouth to the corner of his jaw-bone twitched heavily. - -"I done all I could, Lieutenant," he said. - -"You're a liar!" said Donovan. "You've been on this job Gawd knows how -long, an' your foot's slipped twice. All you've found is that he hasn't -got any safety-deposit box. You know he must have the goods at his -office, an' you're afraid to get 'em." - -"They might be at his apartment house," said Guth. He shifted his feet -uneasily. - -"They might be, but they ain't. I had Anderson play that end of it. -What d'you mean lettin' Reddy Rawn t'row you down this way?" - -"He ain't t'rowed me down. He wouldn't dare." - -"Wouldn't he? Well, then, he's stallin' you all right, all right, an' -he's had a cinch doin' it. This thing's got to stop. I got to have -them letters right off. To-night. Now. Get that?" - -The giant subordinate gnawed his upper lip. - -"That's goin' some, Lieutenant," he said. - -"If you don't do it, you'll be goin' more: you'll be goin' off the -force. Now then: you beat it. Get Reddy on the job. Tell him Mitchell -knows the officer on that beat an' 'll see he an' his friends ain't -interfered with. Nobody'll be in the offices to-night; they've all been -over to Cooper Union an' 'll be tired out. Reddy'll be as safe as if he -was at home in bed. He'd better have the Kid to help him." Donovan -banged the table with his fist. "I want you back here in an hour with -everything that's inside that fellow Huber's safe. See?" - - -§8. In that shadowy alley near Forty-third Street and Third Avenue, -where he had talked to Reddy Rawn before, Patrolman Guth talked now with -Reddy Rawn and the Kid. - -"It ain't my fault," he said. "I've stood him off as long as I could. -You gotta do it now, an' if you don't he'll have you two up for Crab -Rotello's assault. I know it. He means business this time. You can -crack a safe, Kid, can't you?" - - -§9. On the stage at Cooper Union, Luke was holding an impromptu -reception. Hundreds of people were streaming by him and shaking his -hand. His arm ached, but he was proud and glad. - -At the end of the stream came Betty and Nicholson. Luke saw the girl -long before she could reach him, and he smiled to her over the heads of -the crowd. - -"You dear!" she whispered when, at last, her hand caught his. "I'm -proud of you. I'm so proud!" - -He pressed her hand. - -"That's the best praise of all," he said, and to her companion: "I'm -glad you're here, Mr. Nicholson." - -Nicholson shook hands. - -"I was glad to be here. I admired your delivery even where I -disapproved of your treatment." - -"What?" laughed Luke. "Is the church going to make friends with the -mammon of unrighteousness?" He was hoarse and hot and nervous, but he -was too warmly aglow with his success to heed seriously the reply that -Nicholson was beginning when one of his friends on the stage plucked his -sleeve. He turned. "What is it?" he asked. - -"Nelson wants to see you. I don't know what about, but he says it's -very important." - -"All right." Luke faced Betty and Nicholson again. "You'll forgive me -for just a moment, won't you?" he said. "I'll be right back, and then, -if you'll let me, I'll drive over to Brooklyn with you both. I have a -note from your father, Betty, asking me to come to the house." - -"I thought he was at the office," said Betty; "but I do hope you'll come -with us." - -"He's back at the house now. This note came by messenger." - -"Then," said Nicholson, "I shan't interfere with business. I'll go home -from here. Run along, Mr. Huber. I'll guard Miss Forbes while you're -gone." - -Luke followed the man that had sought him and found Nelson standing at -the farthest corner of the stage. - -The wholesale druggist was in evident distress. He was an honorable man -and a practical, and these qualities spoke in the lines of his troubled -face. As soon as they were left together, Nelson came to the point. - -"Huber," he said, "I've got to get out." - -"Out? What of?" - -"The League. I've got to leave it." - -Nelson was almost the last man that Luke would have expected to desert. -Moreover, he had so long been prominent in the reform movement that his -defection would be a serious blow to the League. Luke had to call -loudly on his lethargic manner to conceal his anxiety and surprise. - -"Why?" he inquired. "What's wrong?" - -"This speech of yours to-night," explained Nelson. "You've been getting -nearer and nearer that fellow all along, but I'd no idea you meant to go -right at him." - -"What was the matter with the speech? I didn't tell anything but the -truth." - -"No, I dare say you didn't, but I can't honorably stand by you, Huber, -now that you've openly taken this line." - -Nelson swallowed hard. It was plain that he did not like the dish -prepared for him. - -"I don't understand," said Luke. "If it was true, and if we're to make -a real fight for real reform, we've got to begin at the cause of -corruption." - -"I know. I admit it was the truth, but it wasn't the whole truth. He -does lots of good." - -"Good and bad are relative. Relatively he doesn't do any good." - -"I'm not so sure of that." - -"I am." - -"Yes, but there's the League to think of." - -"The League nominated me," - -"Of course it did, but you're not the whole ticket nor the whole -movement." - -This was a detail that Luke in his triumph had forgotten. - -"Still," he said, "we can't dodge the facts. I won't dodge them, -Nelson." - -"I understand," Nelson said. "Perhaps you're right. Anyhow, right or -wrong, you've done what you've done, and so I've got to go." - -"But why?" - -Nelson fidgeted. - -"I may as well tell you," he at last said. "You know my business has -always been one that didn't cross these fellows' trail. But lately -they've been coming toward us. I think I mentioned that?" - -Luke nodded. - -"Well, I've been hard up. The other day I needed money badly. I had to -have money or I'd have failed. I have a wife and family to think of, -Huber. I tried everywhere to raise the wind, and there was only one -place where I could raise it." - -"You mean--" Luke wet his lips. "You mean that crowd?" - -"Yes." - -"It came from _him_?" - -"It came direct from L. Bergen Rivington. But, of course, it really -came from _him_." - -Luke put out his hand. Nelson wrung it. - -"I wasn't bought, Huber," he said. "You don't think that?" - -"I know," said Luke kindly. - -"I wish I'd told you sooner, Huber. I didn't expect you'd go so far." - -"I'd have gone just as far, Nelson. I'm sorry." - -"I'm sorry, too, Huber. Good-night." - - -§10. "Betty," said Luke, as the girl nestled against him in the -darkness of the cab that drove them toward her home, "this is going to -be a hard battle." - -"Then you'll win because you're right." - -"I'm not so sure." - -Her arms went round his neck. - -"I don't care whether you win or not," she whispered, "so long as you -ought to win." - - -§11. Forbes was waiting for them in the library. His rapidly-graying -hair was disordered, and his face was even more worried than Nelson's -had been. - -"You'd better run to bed, dear," he said to Betty as he kissed her. -"It's late, and I've some heavy business to talk about to Luke." - -"I'm wide awake," protested Betty. "I couldn't sleep if I did go to -bed. I'll sleep late to-morrow." - -"But then there is the business we must talk about." - -"I don't care. I'll like it. I won't interrupt." She looked at Luke. -"May I stay?" she asked. - -Luke smiled. - -"I wish you would," he said. - -Forbes made a gesture of surrender. - -"All right," said he. He turned to Luke and, as Betty seated herself -between the two men, who remained standing, he continued: "They're going -to strike." - -"At the factory?" Luke had feared this. "What do they want?" - -"They want us to meet the hours and the wages that the trust is giving." - -"We can meet them as to hours, can't we?" - -"We might. It would hurt us, but we might." - -"But not the wages?" - -"Not in five years." - -Luke lit a cigarette. He noted that his hand was steady, and its -steadiness gratified him. - -"They're well enough paid, aren't they?" - -"You know the scale." - -"Well, it's a fair one, isn't it?" - -"What does that matter to them when they think they can get more?" - -"But you say they can't, Forbes." - -"I can't convince them of it. Their attitude is that if we can't pay -them what they want, the Business had better go out of existence.' - -"You saw the men's committee?" - -"This evening. That's why I couldn't come to your meeting." - -"And they won't compromise?" - -"They might have, but things have gone too far. A lot of these I.W.W. -organizers and agitators have been at work among them. I don't know -what will happen to the Business now." - -"We can get in strike-breakers and run the factory in spite of them." - -"If we do, there'll be rioting. They might burn the building. These -Industrial Workers of the World--you don't know them." - -"I don't see that we have any choice." - -Forbes looked away. - -"We have one," he muttered. - -Luke caught his wrist. - -"Look here," he demanded, "do you mean to say that this may have a -political origin?" - -"I believe it has. I believe those letters you told me about----" - -"You want me to knuckle under?" asked Luke. - -Forbes looked at him. - -"Think what a strike might do to you politically," he said. - -"I don't care about that." - -"Your friends might." - -"Not if they want to stay my friends. Besides, it can't be true. The -writer of those letters hates the I.W.W. like poison. He can't have -inspired them." - -"Oh, not that. I know he can't. But if you'd be sensible about those -letters, I believe he'd be willing to put down the trust's wages and -join us in this fight." - -"What did you tell the men's committee?" - -"I didn't show them what I felt," said Forbes. "That would never do. -You can't tell workmen what you really think. I just said if they -wanted to strike, they would have to strike." - -Luke flung aside Forbes's arm. - -"Then stick to that," he said. - -"But, Huber----" - -Luke interrupted. He fronted Betty. - -"Betty," he said, "do you understand what your father is asking me to -do? You know how I am placed, and you heard my speech to-night. Now, -your father wants me to go back on all that in order to save him from -poverty and you from poverty and me from poverty and defeat. I won't do -it. Whether you like it or not, I won't do it!" - -The girl got up slowly and put a hand on his shoulder. Her eyes, as she -looked from one man to the other, were very beautiful, but they were -firm. - -"Father," she said, "I've learned a lot lately. Luke's right and--and -I'm with him." - -Forbes turned toward her irritably. - -"Oh, go to bed!" said he. - -Luke laughed and, reaching up, patted the hand that was on his shoulder. - -"No, no," he protested, "you mustn't intrigue with my allies, Forbes." - -"Well," said Forbes, "you'll see that I'm right if you keep on -antagonizing these people." - -"We can starve them out." - -"Not before there is violence." - -"The law will defend us there. We'll have the police: they can't deny -us adequate protection in such a matter--and if we have to, we'll get -the Governor to call out the troops." - -Forbes argued and pleaded for a long time, but to no avail. Luke would -not go over to his enemies: the strike must proceed. - -"I've got to leave you now," he said. "I'll have to have a statement -ready about this for the papers first thing in the morning. Perhaps -I'll get out of the Subway at Fourteenth Street and open up the League's -headquarters and get it ready there." - -It was Betty that stopped this plan. - -"You'll do nothing of the sort," she ordered. "You're tired out. I -won't let you kill yourself." She kissed him on the mouth. "You must -promise me to go straight to the Arapahoe and to sleep." - -At the touch of her lips, he softened. - -"All right," he promised, "but I'm no more sleepy now than you said you -were an hour ago." - - -§12. Luke would not have had to open the offices of the Municipal -League; that was being attended to. While he was still in the Subway -train returning from Brooklyn to Manhattan, two men, one of them -carrying a small bundle, crossed Union Square and turned down Broadway. -Before the entrance to the building in which the League was housed, they -paused to speak to a policeman. - -"That's all right," he told them. "I know. I got me orders ten minutes -ago. That's why I'm standin' here. But get a move on, you fellows. I -don't want to stick here all night." - -The two men rounded a corner. - -In the deserted street, the officer of the law walked up and down, -twenty paces to the north, then twenty to the south. A party of strayed -revelers came by and tried to talk with him; but he ordered them to move -on if they didn't want him to arrest them. He resumed his walk when -they had gone, his thumbs tucked in his belt, his lips pursed and -whistling softly a popular tune. Once he heard the sound of a window -opened overhead. A little later he saw a dim light pass from one window -to another in the building above him. A dulled report sounded from -behind the walls: the Elevated is not near Broadway at this spot, but in -the night noises travel far, and this noise might have been the crash of -a late train. The officer of the law did not raise his head.... - -Around the corner came two figures. Both of them carried bundles now. - -The officer of the law strolled past them. He did not stop as he spoke. - -"All right?" he asked. - -"All right," said one of the figures. - -The officer of the law walked on, whistling his popular tune. - - -§13. Somewhat nearer the hour of sunrise, Mr. Irwin, his merry eyes -grown weary, stood in the sitting-room of the Hon. Marcus Stein's suite -of hotel apartments. He was bending over a table on which lay an opened -bundle. - -Stein was bending over the table, too. His dignified demeanor was -ruffled. - -"This is nothing but a collection of junk," he was saying. "It is no -use to anybody but its owners. Get it out of here at once, Mr. Irwin, -and tell your friends to return it to the place they got it from." - - - - - *CHAPTER XIV* - - -§1. As every man has his day in court, so nearly every man has his day -in the newspapers, and which is the more trying it is difficult to -decide. The day following the night of the Cooper Union meeting was -Luke's: the morning papers seemed to contain little news that did not -refer to him; the editorial columns presented satiric paragraphs and -serious leaders regarding his speech and his position before the public, -and spread over the first pages were accounts of his address and stories -of the strike in the factory, with which his connection was now loudly -heralded. - -Comment on the speech was about equally divided. Half of the press -ridiculed it as the vaporing of a misinformed dreamer, and half -denounced it as an anarchistic appeal to the violence of the mob. Some -journals gave stenographic reports of the entire matter; most printed -only those portions which, lifted from their context, were best suited -to the policy of the paper using them. The extremes were shown by two -headlines. One read: - - NIGHTMARES OF A CANDIDATE - - Br'er Huber Consults His Dream-Book - And Says Innocent New York Is - Being Tortured Without - Knowing It - - -And the other flung across eight columns, in letters of vermilion, the -legend: - - CANDIDATE PREACHES PRIVATE WAR - WITH FIRE AND SWORD! - - -In the treatment of the strike, Luke fared even worse. He was held up -as a hypocrite that championed the People from the platform and sweated -the poor in the shops. He was paraded as the real owner of R. H. Forbes -& Son. The papers generally most bitter against labor movements -published long accounts of the strike, denunciatory interviews with the -strike-leaders, and tables showing how badly the wages paid by the -Forbes firm compared with the wage-scale already in operation in the -factories controlled by the clothing-trust. There was a hurriedly drawn -cartoon that depicted Luke wearing a Liberty-cap and hurling a bomb at a -figure labeled "Conservative Business": he was addressing a mob from a -soap-box that was supported by the bowed shoulders of his oppressed -employees. The most respectable newspaper in New York hinted that his -political attack was made against his business rivals solely because -they were his business rivals, and the least respectable declared that -his quarrel with the workers stamped his election doctrines as the -gospel of Murder for Profit. - -As Luke entered the door of the Broadway building in which the Municipal -Reform League had its headquarters, he came up with Venable also going -in. The old man's hand trembled as he greeted the candidate. - -"We seem to have raised a real thunderstorm," said Luke, smiling. "I -hope it'll clear the atmosphere." - -"Then you know?" asked Venable. "You've seen it in the papers?" - -"How could I help it?" said Luke. "It's all over them." - -"Oh, the speech?" - -"That and this strike at the Forbes factory, yes." - -"I didn't mean those things," said Venable. "I meant this." - -He took from his coat-pocket a folded newspaper open at the financial -and real estate page. He pointed a shaking finger at first one and then -another obscure paragraph, both printed in small type and far separated. - -Luke read the paragraphs. Each applied to the same block of an uptown -street. The former said that a new branch of an elevated railroad would -be run through this street, and the latter curtly announced that two of -the apartment houses in the block were about to be converted into -tenements for negroes. - -"My apartment house," said Venable simply, "the one that all my money is -invested in, will have those 'L'-tracks running in front of its -second-floor windows. It is just between the two houses that are to to -be made into tenements." - -Luke swore softly. - -"Who's back of this?" he demanded. - -"You know what influences control that elevated road," said Venable. - -"And the tenements?" - -"They've just been bought by Hallett." - -"It's ruin?" - -"It will be very close to it." - -Luke gripped Venable's shoulder. - -"You get out of this," he commanded. "Leave the League and go to them; -they'll change their plans: that's why they've made their plans the way -they have." - -"No," said Venable, "I won't do it. I can't. I'm pretty old to be poor, -but I'm too old to change my opinions." - -He was still talking in this manner when they entered the League's -quarters and were greeted with the news that burglars had been there the -night before. - -"Nothin's been touched in any of the offices but yours, Mr. Huber," said -the breathless clerk who poured out this story to them; "but there the -safe's been blown open, and I don't know what's missin'. I sent for the -police right away." - -"The police?" said Luke. "Stop your joking, Charley." - -"I'm not jokin', Mr. Huber. I did send for them. They've been here. -They said they'd have a detective over from headquarters before long." - -Luke hurried to his office. Bits of charred blanket and several -match-ends lay about the floor. The door of the safe swung lamely upon a -single hinge. Inside was a tumbled mass of papers. Otherwise the room -seemed undisturbed. - -Quickly, Luke ran over the papers in the yawning safe. He looked up at -Venable. - -"Everything's here," he said. - -"Are you sure?" asked Venable. - -"Quite." Luke went to his desk. Its lock had been forced. There had -been a rude attempt to restore the contents to the order in which Luke -had left them when he quitted the office the day before, but he saw at -once that everything had been examined. "And they didn't get anything -from here, either," he added. - -"I wonder what they were after?" said Venable. - -"So do I," said Luke acridly. "At any rate, they didn't get it." The -telephone rang as he bent beside it. He took the receiver from its -hook. "Yes?" he said. "Oh, Mr. Venable? Yes, he's here--right: he's -here in my office, I say. Want to talk to him?" He held up the -receiver. "It's that new worker, Jarvie," he explained. "He wants to -talk to you." - -Rapidly as events had of late happened to Luke and the Municipal Reform -League, they were happening this morning with a speed theretofore -unequaled. Venable had not exchanged a dozen sentences over the -telephone before he told Jarvie to wait a minute and, ringing off, faced -Luke, with his cheeks gone gray. - -"This--this is the worst thing yet!" he gasped. - -Luke was leaning against the desk, his hands closed over its edge. - -"What is?" - -"This, that Jarvie says. It's--Oh!" Venable flung up his hands. "It's -too much!" - -Luke's grip tightened. - -"Tell me what it is." - -Venable crumpled into the chair before the telephone. - -"A couple of the Progressives' detectives have caught Jarvie trying to -buy one of Heney's lieutenants." - -"What?" cried Luke. The veins stood out, big and blue, on his gripping -hands. - -"Of course the Heney man was really working with the detectives," moaned -Venable; "but that won't help. They had a dictaphone in the hotel -room----" - -"In what hotel room?" - -"The one that Jarvie was to meet the Heney man in. I thought he'd be -more careful. I told him----" - -Luke stood erect. He folded his arms. Venable's confession shook him, -but he exerted all his strength of will to command himself. - -"What are you telling me?" he asked. "Are you telling me that the -League has been going in for rotten work of that sort? Are you telling -me that you--you of all people--have been engineering it?" - -Venable's terror gave quick place to amazement. - -"You don't mean to say you didn't understand that?" he countered. "How -do you suppose politics are run, anyway? Where have you been all these -years under Leighton?" Anger came to his aid; his loose jaw wagged. -"Don't try to get out of this trouble by pretending you didn't know -about it. What we do, we do for the best ends, but I have always -said--always--that the only way to beat the devil is to fight him with -fire." - -"Wait, please," said Luke. "I want to get this thing straight. You say -that all your reform movements have had some of this element in them?" - -"I say we have always fought the devil with fire." - -"And this campaign. You've used your fire in it?" - -"As little as possible. We never used more than we could help." - -"Did the committee know it?" - -Venable reached for the telephone. - -"I can't waste time over such quibbles now," he said. "Jarvie's -arrested and we must get him out and learn the details to prepare our -defense." - -"But the committee knew?" - -"Oh, ask them yourself! They have a meeting this afternoon. Of course, -they knew! They have been in these fights since long before you were -sent to school, and they are not fools." - -"You bet I _will_ ask them!" said Luke. - -He walked out of his office, out of the League headquarters and into the -street. - - -§2. His tired brain demanded action. It presented one picture, a -canvas as full of figures as a battlefield by Delacroix. There he saw -all that he had done or caused to be done: Yeates turned back to the -baser cause, Nelson forced to follow, Venable facing financial disaster -and soiling his old hands with crime; burglary, prostitution, and fraud -stimulated to defeat him; police, city officials, and bankers corrupted -to ensnare him; his little fortune, on which hung his mother's living, -imperiled; Betty imperiled, Forbes and the honorable business history of -his firm imperiled; the factory's employees fronting starvation and -threatening violence; the elder political parties dragged into a -repetition of their former offenses, the reform organization sharing in -the evils it sought to reform--these were the present results of his -endeavors to civic righteousness. Could mankind be so closely linked? -Was there no end to the lives and souls that must be wronged or made -wrong by one man trying to do right? He could not contemplate the -question. - -To escape thought and find action, he went to Brooklyn. He took a taxi -to the factory. - -The huge brown building rose taciturn before him, ugly, dour. It ran -the whole way across the end of the street and was flanked by rows of -tumbledown dwellings. One tenuous column of smoke curled from the -chimney of its engine-room, but, all about, the streets had an air to -which Luke was wholly unaccustomed. The traffic that used to rattle -through them had ceased; they seemed at first sight empty; yet at every -corner were groups of men and women, idle with that idleness which sits -like the outward tokens of a contagious disease upon workers who have -ceased their work in anger. - -Luke saw them glance up at him as his open taxicab whirled past them: -uncouth, slouching figures, with stooped shoulders and sullen faces. He -had not supposed that he could be known to a score of them, but the -portraits of him distributed for campaign purposes had made him -familiar: the first few groups merely looked at him and sneered; then -someone shouted an obscene epithet after him, and when the cab drew up -before the office-door of the factory, a half-brick, tossed from the -farther side of the street, shattered the glass windscreen at the -chauffeur's back. - -Luke's impulse was toward physical reprisal. He jumped from the taxi -and darted around it. - -On the other side of the street there was only a single figure in sight: -a figure that leaned against a lamp-post. Once it had been a woman; now -it was only misery. Red toes burst from its bulging shoes from which -the stockings fell so far that, the filthy skirt held up by a claw-like -hand, at least six inches of thin shank, a pale blue, were visible. The -ragged jacket hung open over an open blouse that showed a flat chest. -Tangled hair, hatless, fell about and almost hid a red and swollen face. -Through the hair a loose mouth gaped, and a pair of eyes burned yellow. -The right hand was extended, clenched. - -"You go to hell, you hypocrite!" croaked the figure. - -Luke turned toward the factory-door. To reach it, he had to press -through a double line of men and women, silent, ominous: the strikers' -picket-line. The woman's voice croaked from across the street: - - "_Hall_eyloolyah, I'm a bum--bum! - _Hall_eyloolyah, bum again!" - - -Luke's memory saw a small, crowded room papered in green, with framed -advertisements about the walls and many tables, at one of which sat an -unshaven, uncollared man who wore a greasy derby hat.... - -Luke pushed open the office-door and hurried to Forbes's office. - - -§3. The office was crowded. Forbes, determined, sat at his desk; he -faced a line of slouching men in shabby clothes, who held their hats in -their hands and shuffled their uneasy feet, and were headed by one man, -dressed as they were, but better fed and brawny, his large face hard, -his hat upon his head. Luke knew that this was the workers' committee -led by the organizer. - -"I haven't another word to say," Forbes was declaring. A hint of relief -came to his voice when he saw Luke. "Oh, Huber," he broke off: -"Good-morning. Come over here and sit down. I am just telling these men -for the last time that we will meet them in the matter of hours, but we -can't and won't grant them the ruinous increase of wages they want." As -Luke took a chair beside him, he continued, addressing his employees and -carefully avoiding the organizer: "I have one gang of men coming here in -half an hour to take your jobs. There are more where they came from, -and we'll be running full blast this time to-morrow. If you're not back -at work by the time the first gang of men gets here, you'll never get -back." - -Luke expected a growl of anger: there was no sound from them. - -The organizer coughed. - -"Mr. Forbes----" he began. - -Forbes smacked his hands together. - -"I don't know you!" he snapped. - -"You know who I am," said the organizer calmly. "I told you." - -"I don't recognize your right to be here." - -"I haven't any right, because it's against the principles of our -organization to treat with employers, but I thought----" - -Raging, Forbes stood up. - -"Against _your_ principles, is it?" he cried. "Well, it's against the -principles of this firm to talk to _you_!" - -"Mr. Forbes----" - -"That's all I've got to say." - -The organizer was unruffled. He maintained a rather terrifying dignity. -He turned to the men. - -"Come on, fellows," he said. - -With a loud scraping of feet, the strikers and their leader passed out -of the room. - -Luke and Forbes remained quiet. Even for some time after the room was -empty, they said nothing, and while they sat thus, a boyish voice rose -from the street: - - "Oh, I love my boss: - He's a good friend o' mine; - An' that's why I'm starving - Out in the bread-line!" - - -Somebody laughed, and several voices took up the chorus: - - "_Hall_eyloolyah, I'm a bum--bum!..." - - -The boyish voice continued: - - "Oh, why don't you work - Like other men do? - _How in Hell can I work_ - _When there's no work to do?_" - - -"That's their logic," said Forbes fretfully. He nodded toward the -street. "How can you argue with people of that sort?" - -"It didn't strike me that you were arguing," said Luke. "What are you -going to do?" - -"What I said." - -"You meant it, then?" - -"Every word. I've taken your advice, after all: I've employed that -strike-breaker: Breil, you know." - -Luke had heard of him. Breil, he knew, owned several hundred -fighting-men and took them to all parts of the country under the -pretense that they were workers anxious to start the wheels of -industries stopped by strikers. Wherever Breil went, trouble followed. - -"Then you'd better employ the Pinkertons, too," said Luke. - -"They're too expensive," Forbes said. "Besides," he added, "that sort -of thing's un-American. We won't need detectives to protect the right of -the worker to work. If we need any help, we'll call in the police. I -thought you understood that. I'm afraid you will never learn the art of -handling men, Huber." - -Luke was anxious for a fight. The corruption that he had discovered in -the League fired his primitive instincts. He was angry, and it was of -small consequence to him upon whom he visited his anger. Here his own -fortune, honestly come by, was threatened; his mother's support, -Forbes's and Betty's. It was an excellent opportunity. - -"I'm with you," he said. "When do you expect the first contingent of -Breil's men?" - -"When I said: in half an hour." - -"Have you 'phoned police headquarters?" - -"No. What's the use? I don't want to court a fight. The presence of -the police before there was a fight might only start one. Headquarters -sent me down two extra men this morning when I asked for them, and -that's enough for the present." - -Luke bent to the telephone. - -"I don't agree with you," he said. - -Forbes's protest was mild. Luke called police headquarters and stated -his case. When he mentioned his name, he was told that the Police -Commissioner was not to be found. - -"Then find him," said Luke. - -"I think he's gone out," came the answer. - -"If you don't find him after what I've told you, I'll show up your -action at the next meeting I speak at," said Luke. - -The Commissioner was found. - -"But what trouble have you had so far?" he demanded. - -"We haven't had any so far," said Luke. "What we want is to avoid -trouble." - -"I think you're easy scared," laughed the Commissioner. "Have there -been any threats?" - -"No." - -"Well, what's itching you, anyhow? My department's got three campaign -parades and a dozen meetings on its hands to-day besides its regular -business. I can't spare my men unless I know they're needed." - -He rang off. - - -§4. Luke wanted to stay for the arrival of Breil's men; but there was -something else that he had to do and could not postpone. He left the -factory a few minutes before the hour at which the strike-breakers were -to arrive. He passed into a street slowly filling with strikers, but he -reassured himself by the reflection that what he had to do would be -brief and that he would soon be free to return. He hurried to the -League's headquarters, where he knew that the Committee would soon be in -session. - -For, under all his absorption in the affairs of the factory, and in -spite of his desire to abjure thought for action, his brain had been -busy. It was telling him something new about politics. It was -receiving the truth about parties as, from his vantage-ground, he had -seen it. - -He did not stop in his own office. He went at once to the -committee-room, which opened from that of the typists'. The Committee -must have received a special summons and begun its work before the usual -time. Business, as Luke entered, was already under weigh, and the room -was filled. In the body of the narrow hall a crowd of men lounged upon -rows of those collapsible chairs, clamped together, which undertakers -hire out for funerals; most of the men had cigars in their mouths, and -the smoky air smelled of tobacco and the fumes from the action of -alcohol on the digestive juices. On a small platform at one end of the -room sat Venable, who was chairman, and, among the several persons -grouped about him, Luke was surprised to note both Yeates and Nelson. -Nearly all of the company looked at the newcomer, and Venable, after -looking, glanced quickly away. Several committeemen whispered together, -and one laughed. - -Luke sat in the first vacant chair that he could find. - -"It is moved and seconded," Venable was saying, "that the order of -business be suspended. All those in favor will signify their consent in -the usual manner." - -A droning assent answered him. - -"So ordered," said Venable, and looked uneasily in Luke's direction. - -There was an embarrassed pause. Finally Yeates got to his feet. - -"Mr. Chairman," he said. - -Venable bowed. - -Yeates's hands were in his pockets; his glance was fixed on the floor. - -"I propose this resolution," he said, his voice low, his words coming -rapidly: "That it is the belief of the Executive Committee of the -Municipal Reform League of New York that Mr. Luke Huber should be asked -to withdraw from its ticket, on which he now appears as its candidate -for District-Attorney, and that he is hereby so asked to do." - -There was no hubbub; everybody but Luke appeared to have known what was -coming. If there was any discomposure, it was plainly due to Luke's -unexpectedly early appearance. Everybody looked at him again. - -From a front seat, one man, evidently assigned to the task, rose -abruptly. - -"Second the motion," he mumbled, and sat down. - -Luke was standing before Venable could ask: - -"Any remarks?" - -"Yes," said Luke. - -"Question! Question!" called a dozen voices. - -Luke's voice was raised above theirs. - -"I want----" he began. - -"Sit down!" yelled somebody behind him. - -Luke turned, but the interrupter did not reveal himself. - -"I want to say one word about this motion," Luke began. He swept the -room with a steady gaze and then let his eyes rest on the chairman. - -Perhaps because their candidate had never seemed more lazy or -unconcerned, the Committee offered no immediate objection. It was -Venable that, without meeting Luke's glance, interposed. - -"Considering the topic under discussion," said he, "it would be more in -accord with the usual procedure if Mr. Huber were not in the hall." - -"Good for you!" cried a man in the back row of chairs. - -"No! Give him a chance!" cried another. - -Luke raised his hand to quiet them. - -"Considering that this is supposed to be a meeting of the Executive -Committee of the League," he said, "it would be more in accord with the -usual procedure if any motions made to it were made by members of the -Committee. Mr. Yeates is not even a member of the League." - -"_Sit_ down!" said the voice from the back row. - -"Oh, sit _down_!" echoed a neighbor wearily. - -"We can easy find somebody else if Yeates won't do!" cried another -voice. - -"I am well aware of that," said Luke, "and so I don't propose to -quibble----" - -"Ain't he obligin'?" called the back-row man. - -"And besides," Luke continued, "if you would only listen to me for a -minute, you'll find out that I came here with my mind made up to do just -what you're now asking me to do." - -He could feel their amazement at his words and so he no longer heeded -the back-row man's comment: - -"You mean you came here to sit down?" - -"Have I the floor?" asked Luke of Venable. - -The chairman writhed. - -"In that case," Luke pursued, choosing to accept Venable's movement as a -sign of assent, "I only want to say that I made up my mind this morning, -_of my own free will_, to leave the ticket and the League." - -He was interrupted by a roar of disapproval. The crowd had recovered its -wits. Resignation would not suit its purpose. Dismissal alone would -suit that. A turmoil of voices arose. - -As if to climb above their noise, Luke stood on tiptoe. - -"Because this morning," he shouted, "I discovered----" - -Old Venable banged his desk with the gavel - -"Out of order!" he bawled. - -Luke waved him down. - -"That this League," he yelled, "was as corrupt as----" - -They were all on their feet. Some were standing on their chairs. The -men next to Luke tugged at his coat. Other men rushed at him crying -threats. They shook their fists and cursed him. - -Luke was as mad as any of them now. His hands struck out at the -twisting figures about him. The tendons of his throat swelled like -knots as he screamed: - -"----as corrupt as its enemies! Corrupt! Corrupt! Corrupt! And I -leave you to your own rottenness!" - -He fought his way through them to the door. He flung one man across a -chair that crashed under its sudden burden. Another man who stood in -his way, he struck with an upper-cut under the chin and sent him -bouncing against the wall. Hooting, swearing, yelling, they crowded -behind him, and he fought his way clear and almost ran through the outer -room full of astonished stenographers. - -A girl ran after him. - -"Someone was wantin' you on the telephone, Mr. Huber," she panted. "I -think he said his name was Forbes and I know he said it was very -important." - -Luke paused, looked at her as if she were speaking an alien tongue and, -unanswering, pressed on to the elevators. - - -§5. What now? - -He thought about the newspapers, because his whole soul was still set -upon self-justification. He went to the Union Square Hotel; found the -public stenographer, dictated to her, and signed, copies of a statement -briefly saying that he had left the ticket of the League because he had -found the organization corrupt; posted these to the press, and then, -already wondering why he had bothered to follow a course of publicity -that was really directed solely by habit, turned again into the street. - -The idea of party had been torn out of him, and he felt as if an arm or -a leg had been torn out of him. He could not imagine a man being whole -without being part of a party and thereby having a party as part of him. -Even yet the lingering hope of the impossible made its claim. - -But his reason fought that claim with the sword of remembered -experiences. It recalled his faith in the party into which, almost -literally, he had been born, and how that faith was shattered; his -subsequent belief in the theory of reform within the party, or the -party's ability to reform itself, and how that belief was broken; his -intimate knowledge of corruption at the head of the other two parties; -his discovery, that morning, of the same baseness in independent reform -movements. Certain as he was of the rightness of his attitude toward -those strikers at the Forbes mill, he was yet able to see that even the -working-class, cheated by one political organization after the other, -could not win its ultimate desires through any political organization, -though they formed one of their own. Where was the entity? What was a -party but the people that composed it? Could a party be a -thing-in-itself? Could it have any existence save in and through its -members? That mattered nothing. Whether the members imposed evil upon -the organization that they created, or whether the thing that they -created imposed evil on its creators, the evil was inherent in Party. -The irrefutable fact was that the disease lay not in the form of a party -and political system, but in the system itself: parties were wrong ab -initio, politics were evil in their conception and being. Not this or -that party was responsible, nor were these or those politics; parties -were not diseased, politics were not diseased. Party in the abstract, -Politics in themselves were the disease. - -Nevertheless, he would hold those letters for a little while.... - - -§6. That turn of his passing thought toward the position of Labor -reminded him of the message that the stenographer had given him. He -went to a telephone and called up the factory. - -Over the wire, Forbes's voice came in a broken cry. Breil's men had -arrived on time, and the strikers were waiting for them. There was a -pitched battle in the street. The few policemen on duty disappeared. -The strike-breakers fled into the factory, where two of them now lay -dangerously wounded and a dozen others were badly cut and bruised. - -"Why didn't you telephone sooner?" Forbes demanded. "It's awful! I -sent for doctors and nurses. I've been trying everywhere to get you. -There's one man--I couldn't find you anywhere--I don't know----" - -Luke gritted his teeth. - -"Haven't you 'phoned for more police?" he asked. - -"Of course I have; but the Commissioner said it wasn't anything but a -street-fight." - -"Then I'll try the Mayor." - -"I have done that, Huber." - -"What did he say?" - -"He said--you would hardly believe it--he said that these matters were -the Commissioner's business." - - -§7. Luke went himself to the Commissioner and the Mayor, and was given -the answers that Forbes had been given. The Commissioner said that he -had the reports of his patrolmen, and that these spoke of the matter as -trivial when it happened and described it as now ended. In the Mayor's -office he was told: - -"I have to depend on the word of my Commissioner." - -Luke spent the remainder of the afternoon trying by long-distance -telephone to reach the executive office at Albany. When he got an -answer, it was from the Governor's secretary, and was to the effect that -he now expected: no troops could be called out for service in any county -of the State until the local civil authorities asked for them. - - -§8. That night, when there was a lull in the turmoil around the -factory, Luke and Forbes sat late in the library of Forbes's house, -trying to devise some plan to save the situation. It was two o'clock in -the morning when Luke walked into the darkened hall; but there Betty's -warm arms were around his neck, and Betty's voice was whispering in his -ear: - -"It will come out all right. I know it will come out all right, because -_we're_ right." - -He kissed her. - -"I hope I do better at this than I did in politics," he said. "I -haven't had time to tell you, but I lost there, dear." - -"No, you didn't." He felt her hair brush his cheek as she shook her -head in contradiction. "No, you didn't. You had your choice between -doing what was right and what was wrong. The only way to win was the -way they thought was losing. But you did what was right--and so it was -they that lost, and it was my brave man that won!" - - - - - *CHAPTER XV* - - -Something had gone wrong again with the head of that office in the Wall -Street skyscraper where George Washington watched the stock-ticker and -where the windows looked down on filmy streets full of figures bobbing -like entangled flies: the plump man in brown, the man with the pointed -teeth and the beady eyes, was once more absent. The slight cold that -the doctors mentioned, the catarrhal affection, had returned; the mucous -membranes of the throat were re-inflamed; the malady that no newspaper -gave a name to renewed its war. - -As always, the office work proceeded with silent regularity. Simpson, -the almoner, saw callers. Atwood, the chief broker, telephoned for -orders uptown. Conover, the confidential clerk, traveled several times -a day between his master's house and his master's place of business in -one of his master's motor-cars. At the brown man's home, the famous -physicians issued their non-committal bulletins; L. Bergen Rivington and -George J. Hallett came in and went out, the former worried and -elliptical, the latter loud in denial. And directly across the street -the relays of reporters resumed their watching, asked hourly the same -questions and received always the same replies. Rumor once more hinted -dark things about a ruined digestion and an overworked brain. - -Nevertheless, there was a difference between this occasion and its -predecessors, and the delicate nerves of the financial world quivered -with their subtle and sure appreciation of it. The interval of good -health had been briefer than ever before. Simpson looked grave. Atwood -received few orders. Conover more often than not failed to see whom he -sought. The famous physicians called other famous physicians into -consultation. Rivington and Hallett were sometimes denied audience. -The reporters sent their chiefs a word that made every newspaper-office -in the country hunt up a certain long-prepared obituary, set it in type -and keep it standing on the bank with a slug-line that read, "Hold for -Orders." Rumor shook its thousand heads, and this time rumor was right: -the thumbs of the gods were turned down. - -No more rising early and working late for the man with the beady eyes -and hairy hands. No more gluttony. No more scheming. All hours are -alike in the sickroom; his only food was tepid broth, and about a brain -too tired to scheme for itself, the only scheming was how to drag -forward from minute to minute its life that was death-in-life. - -In the street straw had one day been strewn to quiet the noise of -traffic, and the next day commands from City Hall closed that street to -traffic. Outside was silence, and silence was inside, behind the -brownstone walls and shuttered windows, over the rich rugs, among the -pictures by the great dead artists. - -In a darkened room, in a big Louis XV. bed, bought from the poor -descendant of a Provençal marquis for whose mistress it was made, the -patient lay. His legs were beneath the covers, but an upholstered -bed-rest propped him so that his trunk was almost upright, wrapped in a -house-jacket of French flannel, russet brown. Freshly shaven and -carefully brushed, he was as neat as if he were about to go to business; -but his cheeks hung like folds of dough over his heavy jaw-bone; his -short-sighted eyes were fixed on the tapestried canopy above him, which -showed the rape of Europa; his lips, turned pale, were pulled back -tightly over his yellow fangs. On the edge of the coverlet, high-drawn, -his hairy hands gave the only sign of life in all his body: the rounded -tips of their stumpy fingers moved constantly as if they were spinning -... spinning... - -He would not go to business any more. - -It was the day on which Luke's month of promised suppression was to -expire. In the sick-room of the man in russet-brown two doctors stood -at one side of the bed now, with a nurse between them. L. Bergen -Rivington and George J. Hallett were admitted to the room, and Rivington -stood at the foot of the bed with his trembling hand before his face, -while Hallett, beside him, squared his jaw and looked at the dying man, -who did not look at him. Some servants that had worked in the house for -twenty years hovered in the shadows and sobbed, because they loved their -master and had long cause to love him. A clergyman, in his vestments, -knelt at the side of the bed opposite the doctors and read from a little -book. - -"O Almighty God," read the clergyman, his voice sounding loud in the -quiet of the room--"with whom do live the spirits of just men made -perfect, after they are delivered from their earthly prisons; we humbly -commend the soul of thy servant, our dear brother, into thy hands..." - -One doctor quietly reached out and placed a seeking finger on the dying -man's wrist. - -"... that it may be precious in thy sight..." - -The doctor looked over his shoulder at his colleague. The colleague's -eyes asked a question. The examining doctor nodded. - -"... it may be presented pure and without spot before thee." - -Then the man on the bed died. He died silently, speedily, grimly. The -stumpy fingers stopped their weaving motion; they shot into the palms of -the hands, and the hands clenched until only their hairy backs were -visible. The lips tightened for a moment until the pointed fangs seemed -to have bitten through them; the beady eyes protruded still farther from -their sockets; the crooked arms curved stiffly toward the belly; the -crooked knees shot toward the chest; the whole figure seemed to curl up; -the mouth fell open. - -The clergyman looked, hesitated and continued: - -"... teach us who survive, in this and other like daily spectacles of -mortality, to see how frail and uncertain our own condition is; and so -to number our days, that we may seriously apply our hearts to that holy -and heavenly wisdom, whilst we live here, which may in the end bring us -to life everlasting, through the merits of Jesus Christ, thine only Son -our Lord. Amen." - - -Far down in the offices on the twentieth floor of a Wall Street -skyscraper, everything was going on as usual. Only one room of the -suite was empty, and even in it, under the solemn Washington, the -stock-ticker was weaving out its yards and yards of tape by the windows -that looked to the web of streets on which the people buzzed always like -entangled flies. - - - - - *CHAPTER XVI* - - -§1. Public opinion had been unanimous concerning Luke's break with the -Municipal Reform League. Only in the terms of their condemnation did the -newspapers differ: they were all agreed that Luke was anathema. His -letters to the press served him to small purpose; the Executive -Committee issued a statement declaring that his withdrawal had been -requested "because of inflammatory utterances and practical policies -contrary to the spirit and purpose of the organization." The official -statement was accepted and his individual version treated as a futile -attempt to blacken a reputable, if mistaken, movement. It was -everywhere believed that he had been forced to resign because of his -Cooper Union speech, and it was in some quarters hinted that his former -comrades held him responsible for the attempt to bribe the Heney -lieutenant--a scandal made the most of during the subsequent period of -the campaign and thereafter dropped before it reached the courts. In -spite of the fact that the Committee had met in secret session, some of -its members gave their own story of its turbulent dénouement to the -reporters, and this was published in a form that made Luke appear as a -cornered bully. - -"Mr. Huber [said the most dignified editorial on the subject] was once -doubtless a well-intentioned young man, but his first taste of popular -applause seems to have intoxicated him, made him see visions of one real -evil in every impossible quarter and caused a fit of that acute mania -wherein one's best friends are mistaken for one's worst enemies. This -is the only charitable explanation of the tragic end to a promising -career, but on that end the Municipal Reform League is certainly to be -congratulated." - - -Other editorials laughed at Luke's habit of hitting at vast conspiracies -of which he never produced proof, and some charged him with flagrant -dishonesty. He reverted for a time to his belief in publicity and -bombarded the papers with letters of explanation; but the papers at -first garbled and then forgot to print what he wrote. He sent for -reporters to give them interviews, but, although the men still liked -him, and politely took down his every word, they could never get their -"copy" beyond the editorial desks. Within a few days, the former -candidate was a newspaper joke. - -He had, of course, written to his mother and sister about his engagement -to Betty, since publicly announced, and they had replied with kindly -letters, glad because of his planned marriage to the daughter of a man -of good family supposed to be well-to-do, and hopeful for his continued -happiness. Now, with the news of his political overthrow published -broadcast, Jane wrote to ask him why he had been so foolish and to quote -her husband the Congressman, to the effect that what Luke needed was an -apprenticeship at practical politics; his mother's comment was one of -love triumphant over the defects of the loved object and forgiveness for -behavior inexplicable in his father's son. - -The strike dragged on wearily. After the first outbreak of violence, -the leaders were able, for a time, to prevail upon the strikers to use -more peaceable methods; but the resulting days of siege were as trying -for both sides as the active warfare had been. Forbes's boasts to the -contrary notwithstanding, the firm, handicapped by the unskilled labor -of the strike-breakers, found itself unable to fulfil its contracts; the -new recruits were all raw men, whereas much of the factory's work was -intended for trained women: badly needed money was being forfeited. The -dispossessed employees, on the other hand, rapidly exhausted their own -supplies; because they had gone over to industrial unionism, the -American Federation of Labor, to which their old "local" had been -attached through the trade-union that it was a part of, refused help and -forbade the union to give any; there had been a national reaction -against the I.W.W., and it could furnish but little money. The strikers -held angry meetings and faced starvation; Luke and Forbes met in long -conferences and faced ruin. - -In those days, only Luke's love for Betty sustained him, and Betty, -being new to both love and disaster, remained loyal. She was confident -that the politicians and the papers were conspiring against him, and, -knowing her father's gentleness in his home, she was equally confident -that the strikers were wrong. - -Luke did not inquire as to the reasons of her steadfastness. In the -first darkness of disaster, he was too glad for support to quarrel with -its origin. She was warm and human, sympathetic and at hand; she loved -him. With all his heart and soul, he returned her love. In the last -analysis, he fought, he told himself, for an ideal that, if greater than -them both or separately, was yet necessary to them. The ideal had an -undeniable lien upon the best of his strength of body and mind; yet -whatever of these the ideal could spare was not for him, but for Betty. - -Then came the death of the man whom Luke had regarded as the -personification of the evils from which the country was suffering. It -came close enough upon the Cooper Union speech to make that speech -appear in the worst possible taste; but it was an event considered of -such tremendous importance in itself that Luke was forgotten and once -for all swept from the columns of the newspapers. - -Those papers, even the daring few that had once or twice had the -temerity feebly to question the lesser schemes of the man who now -pursued no more schemes, were crowded with reverential accounts of his -illness, awed pictures of his last moments, laudatory descriptions of -his Napoleonic career, and editorials that spoke only of his undeniable -greatness and his outstanding benefactions. The country talked as if -its king had died; the achievements of none of the three presidents -killed while in office had received louder praise or more lengthy -attention. He left two large fortunes to individuals: one to the niece -to whom Yeates was engaged, and one to be divided among more distant -relatives, with bequests to faithful servants in his house and -businesses; but the bulk of his money went to the colleges and hospitals -that he had so magnificently assisted during his life. Firmly, the -entire press observed the Latin maxim: they let nothing but good be -spoken of the dead. - -Luke was by this time prepared for such an attitude on the part of the -papers, but, on his own part, he permitted no illusions. The fact of -death must always be solemn; but the force that ended wrong-doing did -not palliate it. This blow was like a judgment from Heaven. Luke did -not think so much of how it would benefit him as of how it would benefit -the country, but he was of too common clay not to spare some reflection -to the influence of the event upon his own affairs: it would probably -mean the dissolution of the antagonism to him in business; it would -surely mean the cessation of the personal persecution that had already -wrecked his political and professional career. Yet it was more for the -triumph of the larger and broader good that he felt ready to chant a -_Jubilate_. - -Once the thoughts crossed his mind: If Heaven were just, and this death -were indeed Heaven's judgment, why had Heaven's judgment been so long -delayed? And, since Heaven had been tardy when the death of a single -man could thus ease the world and make for social righteousness, how -could he have held it wrong had some sufferer from that evil struck, in -Heaven's default, this single blow for the freedom of society? But he -was in no mood to front casuistry: the thing had happened, and that was -happiness enough. - -He was reading the news in his rooms at the Arapahoe. He had sat up -late with Forbes the night before and had risen late this morning, -breakfasting in the apartment house. He knew that he ought to go to the -factory, but he could not go at once. - -He began again to dream dreams as he used to dream them. His personal -failure counted for nothing in what must happen now. Suppose he were -discredited and unable to win back the public confidence: somebody, -without party and without politics, a larger and better man than he had -been, would assume a national leadership, where his had been small and -local, and would now bring the whole country back to the simple -political faith and the plain, honest financial and industrial policies -of the nation's founders. The mercenaries of darkness that had served -the evil mind could not now, with the evil mind in perdition, stand for -one day against the Army of Light. - -Himself? He would begin over again, with Betty and for her. In the new -order, under the reign of equity, public opinion would soon clarify, and -he could re-establish himself and perform some part, however small, of -the mighty work of reconstruction. He had been too busy of late with -love and politics and business to continue in the social life in which -Jack Porcellis had launched him. Porcellis's sporadic returns to New -York--the man was just now in India on the pretense of studying its -religions--were, latterly, Luke's sole occasions of approaching that -existence. Save to secure the loan, he now contritely recalled, he had -neglected Ruysdael, whose agent as yet evinced no misgivings over the -effect of the strike upon Forbes's securities, and on his last -incursions into Mrs. Ruysdael's set, though Luke had found himself -liked, he was made aware that the liking for his small-talk was severely -tempered by scorn for his enthusiasms. He must overcome all that now. -To be of use, to help Betty, he must regain. - -When he was a small boy, his ambition in life had been carpentry. At -some remote time or other, he must have seen and admired one of those -journeymen joiners of the elder type that used to tramp the country -roads from small town to town and keep alive by doing odd jobs at the -houses on their endless way. He loved tools and he loved wandering; -even yet he loved them, and this figure had once represented Romance to -him as definitely as the dead man in russet brown, long afterward, -represented Evil. This morning, while he smiled at the memory of those -young imaginings, Luke felt a little of their charm: it seemed -impossible for him to form, as he should, his new plans while he sat in -an apartment house in the city in which his plans must eventually be -applied; he wished that he could drop everything for the day and go -somewhere far out into the country to tramp the dusty roads and dream at -ease. - -It was then that the telephone announced a caller: ex-Judge Stein. - - -§2. The Judge, as he entered, presented the same dignified figure that -he had presented when Luke last talked with him. His strong face was -solemn, but undisturbed by its solemnity. He arranged with care the -tails of his frock-coat as he seated himself in the best chair, but on -this occasion he came directly to the point of his visit. - -"Mr. Huber," he said, "a great many things have happened since we met." - -Luke shrugged his shoulders. - -"I'll admit you've kept me pretty busy, Judge." - -"I was not referring to the unnecessary trouble in which you involved -yourself. I was referring to the fact that your month has elapsed and -that the man you threatened is dead." - -The news of the morning had temporarily annulled Luke's sense of time. -Only yesterday he had wondered what use he should make of the Rollins -letters, now carried in a safer place than his coat-pocket; to-day he -had forgotten them. - -"Yes," he said, gathering his thoughts behind his impassive face: "the -month's over and the man's dead." - -The Judge leaned impressively forward. He shook his white head gravely. - -"Death," said the Judge, "wipes out all animosities. I know you would -not use those letters now, Mr. Huber, because I know you would not -strike a dead man. So I have come to ask you to deliver them to me." -He held out his opened hand. - -Luke blinked at it. - -"I don't understand," said he. "I thought you always represented -yourself as--well, as not professionally retained in this matter?" - -"I am now," said the Judge. - -"Oh! By the estate?" - -"Not directly and not altogether." Stein chose his words. "I am -retained by the company whose property those letters are." - -"I thought you had left the railroad-claim business long ago. Perhaps -you are specially retained for this one job?" - -The Judge looked hurt. His firm mouth quivered. - -"Mr. Huber," he said, "I am in no frame of mind for joking to-day. This -man is dead, and he was my friend----" - -"I'm sorry to have seemed to joke," Luke interrupted. - -Stein bowed and went on: - -"He is dead, and whatever his faults--we all have our faults, Mr. -Huber--they died with him. I am here only to ask you to show a decent -respect for the memory of a dead enemy. I am here to ask you to be -magnanimous, Mr. Huber." - -"Magnanimous? You talk as if I had won!" - -"The living are always the winners," said the Judge. - -Luke began to doubt that theory. - -"And so you want me to surrender these letters?" - -"Exactly. What use can they be to you now?" - -"There were other people involved. Are they willing to accept my terms? -I know they can't hurt me, because I know they haven't the courage or -the power of the man you've been talking about. But that's neither here -nor there: will they accept my terms?" - -"They did not write either of the letters, Mr. Huber." - -"They're inculpated by them." - -"Not legally." - -"Enough inculpated to serve my purpose." - -"If you think that," said the Judge, "I can only repeat the offer I made -you when I called here before." - -Luke smiled. - -"And I can only refuse it." - -"Mr. Huber," the Judge began again, "the man is dead----" - -Luke's nerves had been strained for many a day. He leaped to his feet. - -"Of course the man's dead!" he cried. "He was dead this morning, and -he's still dead. Why do you keep saying that over and over? I'm tired -of hearing it." He saw the look of pain return. "I beg your pardon," -he said; "but I might as well tell you first and last that I won't -surrender those letters, no matter what you plead or threaten. I won't -tell you what I intend to do with them, either. And the only reason I -know that they must be of use to me is your coming here and saying they -aren't any use." - -The Judge rose also. - -"Mr. Huber," said he, "I am very sorry to hear you speak this way. I -can't tell you how sorry I am. You ought to know by this time----" - -"I couldn't know anything," Luke cut in, "that would make me change my -mind." - -"But suppose," said the Judge heavily, "suppose my friends happen to -know that the situation of the Forbes Company----" - -Luke's face went very white. - -He opened the door. - -"Good-morning, Judge," he said. - - -§3. Stein's polite, but portentous adieux were not a quarter of an hour -old before Luke sought the office of the newspaper that had been the -last to refuse him space in its columns for his political explanations. -The man that was dead had, it seemed, left a something of his influence -behind him: Luke resolved to strike at it. - -The office-boy was a long time returning, and, when he did, it was to -announce: - -"He says ter find out whatcher want." - -"Give me my card," said Luke. - -He scribbled on the card: "Non-political." - -"Now," he said, "try him again." - - -§4. The editor was one of those men whom newspaper-work so affects that -they look any age between thirty and fifty. His nervous face was full -of tense lines, and every few minutes his mouth twitched. - -Luke told his story and showed the letters. The editor read them. - -"Why do you want to do this?" he asked. - -"Why?" Luke was amazed. "Because I want to protect the public." - -"Then you'd better go to the M. & N. railroad." - -"But you know they wouldn't do anything. They've promised before." - -"I can't believe that," said the editor. - -"I know it," said Luke. - -"I can't believe it. You have always been too sudden, Mr. Huber--if -you'll pardon my saying so. At any rate, we can't print these things." -He returned the letters. "After all, the man's dead, you know." - -"What's that got to do with it?" Luke's voice rose in reply to the hated -phrase. "I want to keep some other people from dying." - -The editor picked up a proof-sheet and began to read it. - -"It would be bad taste for us to print that, just now," he said. "Come -around in a couple of weeks, and we may think about it. Why, the body's -hardly cold yet." - - -§5. As Forbes had once gone from bank to bank, Luke went that morning -from newspaper-office to newspaper-office. Yet there was this -difference: that, whereas Forbes had only tried a few banks, Luke tried -a dozen newspaper-offices. His search included the papers notoriously -controlled by the money or the advertising of the power that opposed -him; he even tried some of those journals of the city which are printed -in foreign tongues, and he tried the radical press. He tried all in -vain. - -Most of the editors were men that had fought him when he was the -candidate of the Municipal Reform League; some that he sought were of -those who had tired of him when he pestered them with explanations of -his political overthrow. Many refused to see him; one or two pronounced -him mad. The radicals shared the view of the man with whom he first -spoke: they would not be guilty of bad taste. Wherever he got word with -a person in authority, the word was the same; he met with that -all-sufficient argument: - -"After all, the man's dead." - - -§6. When, finally, he acknowledged defeat, his wearied nerves -manifested their condition through deep physical exhaustion. He could -not front the thought of passing the remainder of the day at the -factory; could not go at once from one losing fight to another. However -much he might be needed, he could not do it. Until he had rested, he -would be useless, and worse than useless. - -He did not go back to the Arapahoe. Instead, with the open country -calling him, he went to the Grand Central Station and took a train into -Connecticut. - -The day was Saturday, and the cars were filled with released workers, -but Luke avoided them by going far and descending at the least important -of the train's stops. Tired though he was, he walked beyond the little -town. He cut across fields to a hill crowned by a clump of trees and -there, in the shade, threw himself on the ground and lay for hours -thinking of nothing and looking at white clouds sailing across a blue -sky. He wished that he could lie here forever.... - -It was one o'clock in the morning before he returned to his rooms. It -was far too late to reply to the score of telephone-calls that, he was -told, Forbes had made on him. - -Luke remembered that he had promised Betty to go with her to service at -Nicholson's church. - - -§7. He was strengthened by his brief rest, and he went to Betty with a -heart renewed. - -"Father's still asleep," she said, as she met him in the hall of the -Forbes house, her gloved fingers busied with her hair, preventing the -escape of one of the yellow wire pins that held the few strands too -short for her pins of tortoise-shell. "He wanted to be called, but he -was so tired out, I told the maid not to disturb him. He sat up ever so -late, waiting for you. Where were you, Luke?" - -Luke had rarely seen her looking better. The Sunday calm had erased all -the tokens of the recent trying days from her face: it was rosy and -young; it was appealingly almost childish. The morning sun was in her -hair; her brown eyes were wide and bright. He did not want to spoil her -by the story of his yesterday's defeat, and so he passed it by with some -facile excuses for his absence from the factory. - -"We're late," he said, as he helped her into the Forbes motor-car. - -The chauffeur ran close to the speed-laws all the way to Manhattan. -They reached their journey's end immediately after the choir had taken -its position in the chancel. - -The ritualistic church of St. Athanasius is one of the handsomest in New -York. It was built in close imitation of Beverley Minster, and so -elaborate was the work done upon it that, in spite of its wealthy -congregation's assistance, it still staggered under the load of a heavy -debt. It has the Yorkshire building's two Early English transepts, -Perpendicular towers, and a Late Decorated nave with flying and -pinnacled buttresses. Inside, as Luke and Betty entered it, the -warmly-colored light fell through many Lancet windows on the crowd of -fashionable worshipers kneeling before narrow chairs. Nicholson's -voice, coming from behind the choir-screen, sounded clear but far away. - -Luke and Betty walked up the nearest aisle and took the seats assigned -to the Forbes family, close to the carved pulpit and under the -triforium. The high arches were carried on clustered pillars, and, down -the perspective of the nave, Luke could see into the choir, to the -Decorated reredos, where, as in Beverley, the piers increased in size by -successive groups of shafts that projected like corbels. He knelt -beside her and tried to give his mind to the service; but his eyes, -familiar though they were with the church, wandered to the north aisle's -windows and the ogee and foliated arcade under them, to the people in -front of him, and so, inevitably, to the girl at his side. - -The service proceeded. The people said the Lord's Prayer; Nicholson -recited the collect, and then read the Ten Commandments of Moses, the -congregation responding. - -"Lord have mercy upon us and incline our hearts to keep this law." - -After the creed, Nicholson walked to the pulpit. He climbed its steps, -and for a few moments only his clasped hands were visible as he knelt -inside. Then rising, he took his stole from the pulpit rail, kissed the -cross embroidered at the top of the stole, and put it on. - -"In the Book of Ecclesiastes," he began, "in the ninth chapter and the -second verse, it is written: - -"'All things come alike to all: there is one event to the righteous, and -to the wicked; to the good, and to the clean, and to the unclean; to him -that sacrificeth, and to him that sacrificeth not.'" - -Nicholson's face was earnest. It was at once stern and irradiated, the -face of an ascetic turned seer. - -"And in the General Epistle of St. James," he proceeded, "in the second -chapter and the twenty-second verse: - -"'Seest thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith -made perfect?'" - -Nicholson spoke without notes, but without hesitation. - -"A great man," he said, "has just died. We have heard evil report of -him, and good report. We have heard whispers against him, and we have -seen good that he has done; but his greatness no man questioned. To-day -he has passed to his last account. To-day the dead man stands before his -Eternal Judge. One of those events that happen to the rich and poor -alike has happened to him. With what he has done that is over, the -Court of Heaven now alone, in all its boundless mercy, has to deal. We -that remain here on earth may not judge of that. We that remain on -earth must consider the things that he has done and are not over, the -things he has left behind; we must concern ourselves only with what -concerns us; it is our duty to remember him by the works that he has -made his monument." - -The preacher dwelt upon the dead man's rise from poverty to vast riches, -a hopeful lesson in the reward of thrift and wisdom to every poor boy in -a republic that grants equal opportunity to all. He spoke with an -admiration of the genius that had carved its way to power until its will -was felt in the uttermost corners of the earth. - -As he proceeded, Nicholson seemed to forget his admonition against the -judgment of things over and done with. He made direct reference to -Luke's Cooper Union speech, and he looked full in Luke's face as he made -it. - -"Not long ago," he said, "while this man was tottering upon the brink of -eternity, another man, a sincere, but misguided man, made terrible -charges against him, charges that reflected, however veiled, upon the -character and motives not only of the man now dead, but a whole group of -people eminent in public and business life. And what was the result? -Nothing that lent the least credit to the accuser's intelligence or -appreciation of the value of evidence, for nothing at all was proven, -nothing even corroborated." - -Luke flushed. He felt Betty looking at him, but he would not return her -gaze. He felt other people in the congregation turned toward him. He -could not guess what had changed Nicholson. - -The sermon was proceeding with praises of the dead man's benefactions. -One by one they were described and extolled. - -"His greatness," said Nicholson, "would have availed him nothing at this -one event for the righteous and the wicked if he had not had charity, -for we are told that though we speak with the tongues of men and of -angels and have not charity, we are become as sounding brass and -tinkling cymbal. Charity, however, this man had. The institutions that -he supported and has endowed have given and now forever will give -learning to thousands who, but for them, would have lived in -ignorance--healing to thousands who, but for them, would have died in -agony. - -"Charity: but charity alone will not suffice. Sounding brass itself, -unless it is informed by faith! And this man's sublime faith even his -worst enemy cannot deny. For his counsel and advice, for his -painstaking and sagacious investment of its funds the Church is indebted -to this man as it is to no other. Many a denomination outside our own -fold can truly say the same of him and should say and does say how much -we owe him, also, for the unceasing flow of his money into our -treasuries. He did not speak of these things. He did not let his right -hand know what his left hand did; but we of the Church remember that he -gave millions of dollars to the faith. - -"The faith of men of money is tested by their money; yet this man's -faith had many another test and rose triumphant from them all. His -attendance at the Church's services--not only on Sundays, but on -fast-days and holidays, on saints'-days and work-days--never failed. -His wisdom was free to our councils, and I have been told on reliable -authority that he never rose in the morning, went to bed at night, or -embarked on any business enterprise, however small, without first humbly -and privately asking direction of the Most High. He knew in his every -act that the greatest man is as nothing before God; and when he came to -die, he died like a Christian, a priest of God by his side and the words -of God's mercy sounding in his dulling ears. From first to last, his -works and his faith were one: 'Seest thou how faith wrought with his -works, and by works was faith made perfect?' For us who are Christians, -that is enough. It is enough to make us each pray to meet his end, each -at his own station in life, as this great man met his. _De mortuis nil -nisi bonum_." - -Only amazement had held Luke in his chair. At this phrase, he half -rose. - -Nicholson, however, was concluding: - -"There is but one word more, a word personal to us of this congregation, -to be said. I need not recall to you the heavy privations that this -church in which we now are has undergone. They were generously met and -nobly borne, but, in spite of all your nobility and all your generosity, -the time came, a week since, when it seemed indeed as if the forces of -evil were about to conquer, and as if, unless Heaven intervened, this -beautiful building must pass out of our hands. - -"Three days before the death of the man I have been speaking of this -morning, an impulse came to me, and I wrote him a letter. My friends, I -do not believe that that impulse was of this world. - -"I have since been told that when the letter reached him, his eyes were -too dim to read it; yet, when he was informed of its purport, he asked -that it be read to him. It was read, and then, with a hand already -trembling at the touch of death, he took a pen and signed the last check -of his career. That check was our emancipation; it was a check for the -entire sum for which this Church of St. Athanasius--this beautiful -church in which it is our privilege to worship God--stood indebted. I -ask you to join in prayer for the soul of our dead benefactor and then -to unite in the doxology for thanksgiving to God. 'Seest thou how faith -wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect?'" - - -§8. "Where are you going?" gasped Betty. - -The people were kneeling, but Luke was on his feet. - -"I'm going to get out of here," he answered. "I'm going to get into the -open. I want fresh air." - -He strode down the aisle under the clustered pillars of the triforium, -and Betty hurried after. At the church door stood a table bearing a -pile of leaflets, and unconsciously he took one as he passed. - - -§9. In the sunlit street, he felt a little ashamed of his impetuosity. -Betty was indignant. - -"Why did you make such a scene?" she asked. - -"I'm sorry," said Luke. "I simply couldn't stand it. A priest talking -like that! And Nicholson the priest!" - -"He shouldn't have attacked you," Betty granted, "but you didn't put him -in the wrong by behaving impolitely." - -"Oh, I don't care about putting him in the wrong, and I don't care about -his attacking me!" Luke helped her into the waiting motor, and the car -started smoothly on its return journey. "What I couldn't stand was the -Church making a hero out of such a man; the Church selling itself for a -few thousand dollars." - -"But the man did do good, Luke." - -"How much--compared with the evil he did?" - -"I can't know that. Who can?" - -"You talk like Nicholson!" - -"No, I don't." She put her hand on his. "But what good can come of -abusing the man?" - -"I don't want him abused: I only don't want God's Church to make a saint -out of him." - -"Nobody's doing that, Luke. They're simply being decent about him. -After all, he _is_ dead." - -Luke shook her hand free. Then, suddenly, he tossed back his head and -broke into a high laugh. He frightened her. - -"Luke! What is it?" - -He could not at once answer. - -"Oh, what is the matter?" she pleaded. - -"You!" he laughed. "You, too!" To control himself he unfolded and -looked at the leaflet that he had picked up in the church doorway, and -had been heedlessly folding and unfolding ever since. His mirth -stopped. "Listen to this," he ordered. "By Jove, it's not Nicholson -alone; it's the whole bunch, and speaking officially, too! Listen to -this. It's a printed statement issued by the General Executive -Committee of the whole church--not St. Athanasius alone, but the entire -denomination--and it's worse than Nicholson's sermon." His eyes ran -from line to line. "'We call upon the prayers of the faithful,'" he -read as well as the motion of the car permitted.... "'He has not buried -his talent nor hidden his candle under a bushel.... So far as a man's -life can, his life exemplified Law and Order, realized the truth uttered -by Richard Hooker: "Of Law there can be no less acknowledged, than that -her seat is in the bosom of God, the harmony of the world."'" - -Betty had been listening attentively. - -"Well?" she asked. - -"'Well?'" repeated Luke. "'Well?' Don't you see? The whole Church is -standing up for him. And not our Church alone: all churches. He'd -bought them--bought them!" - -"Luke! How can you?" - -"Yes, he has. One way or another. He or his kind: for I'm beginning to -see at last he wasn't alone--never was and never will be. And seeing -that, I'm not blaming him so much--any of the _hims_. I don't say, any -more, he was worse than the rest of us; he was only stronger. Maybe he -was only the average man in extraordinary circumstances. He didn't make -them--I'm beginning to believe that, too,--they made him. But the -Church! The churches! They've sinned against the light. They're -liars. They're--why, they must be founded on a lie: their light must be -darkness!" - -The girl had edged away from him, her brown eyes big with horror at his -blasphemy. The motor was drawing up before the door of the Forbes -house; it was drawing up in a quiet Brooklyn street. And there, in that -Sunday stillness, and among those surroundings of commonplace -respectability, suddenly the Marvel came to him. - -It came to him, this denial of Religion, as a profound religious -experience. It was Miracle, burning, blinding, transfiguring. -Elemental, tremendous. It was a stroke that affected his entire being; -suffused him; changed him, spiritually, in every atom. It hurled him -from all his old bases and set him in a new relation to the universe. -It was not reformation; it was revolution. Luke was another -personality: this was the "new birth." He saw the glory of -individuality, the divinity of his humanity. In the flash of -revelation, he learned to walk and knew that for all his life he had -been permitting himself to be carried. Without guessing it, he had -been, he now knew, all these years, afraid, and now, with this new -inspiration, he faced all things and feared none. Believing, he had been -dead, but denying, was alive again; faithful, he had been lost, -faithless, he was found, and not by any other help than his own: he had -found himself. It was the thing that, in the twinkling of an eye, can -make an honest man of a liar, an abstainer of a dipsomaniac, good out of -evil. It was the same thing that happens to a penitent at the moment of -"conversion," of "receiving grace," of "experiencing religion"; the same -force operating with the same power and the same manner, but in an -opposite direction. - -As St. Paul rose from the earth after his vision near Damascus, so Luke -staggered from the Forbes motor-car. His hands groped at the air. - -"Betty!" he gasped; "tell your father I can't see him. Not now.--I'll -be back later.--Perhaps in a little while.--Later." - -She put out her arms to him. - -"What is it, Luke?" she cried. "What's the matter?" - -His eyes looked at her, but he did not see her. He turned from her to -the street. - -"I don't know," he said, "but I think--I think I'm Being Saved." - - - - - *CHAPTER XVII* - - -§1. For an hour, for two hours, he tried to adjust his mental and -spiritual sight to the blazing illumination; but adjustment, he at -length realized, must be a matter of many days. The illumination was -too sudden and too intense. He could no more assess moral values and -determine ethical duties than a new-born baby can know the use of those -objects most habitual to its elders--a new-born baby to whom the lamp on -a table and the moon in the sky are one and the same. There must be -false starts on wrong roads; there must be disappointment and stumbling; -there must even be moments of relapse. The great thing for Luke was -that, as the lives of some men are changed forever for the better by an -affirmation of faith, his life had now forever been changed for the -better by a rejection of faith. He had denied the superhuman in man's -affairs, and the banishment of the superhuman raised the human; it left -the man no longer a pigmy trembling before a giant, but himself a giant, -limited and mortal, yet self-sufficient and divine. He had found what -was for him the ultimate strength; for the knowledge of how to use that -strength rightly he could wait. - -Meanwhile, there was the patent obligation to Forbes. Forbes needed -him; Luke returned to the Forbes house. - - -§2. Forbes was waiting in the library. - -"Where were you yesterday? Are you going crazy, Huber? You knew I -needed you." - -The elder man had borne disaster hardly. He looked tired and ill. - -"I'm sorry," said Luke. "I was busy." - -"Busy? What could have kept you busy in town when you knew this strike -was going on? And you went to church this morning instead of waking me! -Betty says you're sick. Are you?" - -"No. I'm only getting well." - -Forbes's tone was more considerate: - -"Anyhow, you might have come in to luncheon. Have you had anything to -eat?" - -"I'm all right," said Luke. - -"But Betty says----" - -"Where is she?" - -"She's in her room. I told her to lie down. She's all upset. Really, -Huber----" - -Luke seated himself by the table covered with magazines and sprawling -sections of the Sunday newspapers. Outwardly, he was as self-contained -as during his days in Leighton's office. - -"What was it you wanted to see me about?" he interrupted. - -Forbes took a chair opposite. He assumed the voice of persuasion. - -"I want to be perfectly frank with you, Huber," he began. - -Luke thought: "I wonder what he is going to keep back." All that he -said was: "Yes?" - -"Yes," resumed Forbes, "and I want you to be perfectly frank with me. -You once told me you'd made enemies of the people who've since made such -trouble for us, because you had some letters or other that belonged to -them, didn't you?" - -Luke bowed assent. He knew now what to expect. - -"Well," Forbes went on, "the only use those letters were to you was -political. Now that you can't use them politically, why don't you give -them up?" - -"You mean now that I've been chucked out of politics?" - -"Well, you know you've ruined yourself there. You can never get back -again. When you can't hurt your enemies, why not make them your -friends?" - -"No, thank you." - -"But these letters are of no use to you." - -"How do you know that?" asked Luke quietly. - -Forbes blushed. - -"Are they?" he countered. - -"And why," persisted Luke, "didn't you suggest this to me days ago?" -His eyes probed the man before him. "What else did Judge Stein say to -you?" he demanded. - -Forbes drew back in his chair. His flush deepened, but presently he -made an impatient gesture. - -"Oh, very well," he said defiantly, "the Judge did see me yesterday, and -if you had been at the factory, as you should have been, you'd have seen -him, too." - -Luke thought it unnecessary to remark that he had been honored by a -previous call from Stein. - -"What else did he say?" Luke repeated. - -"He said a great deal; but the upshot of it was that he would induce -your enemies, who are the men that control the trust we're competing -with, to lower wages and join the fight against the employees, if you -would agree to surrender those letters." - -"I won't do it," said Luke. - -"Don't be hasty," Forbes implored. "Think of me. Think of Betty----" - -Luke winced. - -"Don't begin that," he commanded. - -"But what have you to gain?" asked Forbes. - -"Nothing. I've nothing to gain. I've only something to keep: my -self-respect." - -"Your self-conceit, you mean. Be reasonable, Huber. These people won't -give in." - -"So I must?" - -"They won't give in, and you can't get back to politics and can't get -any paper to take up your case." - -"Oh,"--Luke could have laughed--"so Stein told you that, too, did he?" - -"Never mind what he told me. The point is: his people can help you if -you'll only acknowledge defeat, now that you're defeated. They can give -you back all you've lost, and nobody else can." - -"And if I don't admit I'm whipped, they'll whip me some more?" - -"They'll finish what they've begun, Huber; they will wipe out the -Business, too." - -"I'm sorry," said Luke--"very sorry for you, I mean. But there's no use -arguing: I won't give in." - -Forbes exhausted his every resource. He pleaded for the business, for -Luke, for Betty. For an hour he sent the squadrons of his appeal -against the impregnable wall of Luke's determination. - -"What have you to gain?" he reiterated; and once he said: "The worst of -the crowd is dead, anyhow." - -Luke was not listening. He was saying to himself: - -"What is it I am to do next? There is still a little money left to my -account at the bank. It will keep me for a year and mother for a -year--and then? I'm making Forbes hold out against the trust, and if he -does hold out his mill is doomed. No hope there! Can I go back to the -Law? I can't, because the Law is just what the Church is. The Law was -made by the powerful, it is interpreted by their paid servants and -administered by their slaves. It is a game devised by the crafty -powerful to cheat the simple weak. The last five years have proved that -to me, and I'm ashamed that it took me so long to learn. Betty----" - -He did not dare to think of Betty. He thought rather of the open -country, of the smell of the earth on which he had been lying -twenty-four hours ago, and the coolness and freedom of the white clouds -against that sky of blue.... - -Forbes was saying something about his grandfather and the Business. -Luke got up. - -"There's no use your wasting your breath," he declared. "Nothing that -you could say would change me--no, nothing that even Betty could say! -But I'll do this: I'll never be away from the factory again when I ought -to be there; I'll stand by you till we've beaten these strikers or till -they've ruined us." - -He walked out of the room and closed the door before Forbes could answer -him, and he walked into Betty's arms. - - -§3. "Luke," she whispered, "what was the matter this morning? Won't -you tell me, dear?" - -He felt the blood mount hotly to his head. Her hair was sweet to his -nostrils. - -"Don't," he said sharply. - -"But, Luke----" - -He drew her hands from his neck. He imprisoned her wrists in his grasp. - -"I don't quite know what's the matter--yet," he said. "It's all come -too suddenly. But, Betty--O, Betty, I don't believe I'm the man for -you!" - -She asked him what he meant, and he could not tell her. She pressed -him, and he could only repeat his conviction. - -"Do you mean"--she drew her hands away--"that you like some other girl -better?" - -He laughed rudely. - -"No," he said, "not that." - -"But you don't care for me?" She recovered all her dignity. "If you -don't care for me, why aren't you brave enough to say so?" - -The afternoon sun fell through the hall-window and showed her to him -very fair. - -"Betty," he said slowly, "there are only two kinds of marriages you -understand: there is the Church, but I don't believe any more in any -church; and there's the Law, but the Law can't make a marriage for me." - -At least the immediate purport of the words she understood. Her face -burned red and then became white and still. - -"You mean----" she began. Her hands clenched. "Oh!" she cried. - -She tried to pass him. - -Passion left him, but a great sorrow took its place as his master. He -wanted to justify himself; he even so wanted to repair the hurt done her -that he would have shut his eyes to the new light. He seized her hand. - -"Betty!" - -She wrenched her hand. - -"Let me go! I want to go to father! Let me go!" - -"But, Betty, wait--listen----" - -She freed her hand. - -"I shan't tell him. Don't be afraid. He has enough to worry him. Only -don't let me ever see you again!" - - -§4. All that night Luke walked the streets. It was breakfast-time when -he returned to the Arapahoe. His letters and the morning papers were -lying on the floor of his sitting-room where they had fallen when the -bell-boy dropped them through the slit in the door. - -He read the letters first. There were not many, for his correspondence -had of late declined to almost nothing. The only things of interest -were a note from Porcellis, announcing that he would soon return to New -York and a letter from Luke's mother, saying that she had written Betty -to pay her a visit: "It is only right that your fiancée should do this," -wrote Mrs. Huber, "and that I should have an early chance of knowing the -girl that is to be my son's wife." - -Luke wondered how Betty would reply to the invitation. As he was -thinking of this, his eye caught the heaviest headlines on the first -page of the newspaper: during the night, a body of strikers at the -Forbes factory had marched to the main entrance and battered down the -door in an endeavor to drag out the Breil men who slept there as guards -by night and worked there by day; the Breil men resisted; there was a -general battle with at least two deaths; the attacking party were -repulsed, but the police, summoned by a riot-call, gained what appeared -to be no more than a preliminary skirmish, for the entire neighborhood -was in arms and more bloodshed was expected to-day. - -Luke dropped the paper with an oath. He was more hungry than before for -a part in this fight--in any fight. If Religion was a coward, he would -make one more appeal to Government, to force. He called Albany on the -long-distance telephone. He kept on calling until he had brought the -Governor to the other end of the wire, and then he was astonished to -hear that the proper civil authorities in New York had already asked for -troops. - -"It is always best," he was told, "not to drag local men into an affair -of this sort, if it can be helped; so I'm having the Adjutant General -send down a company from Poughkeepsie. That ought to be enough for the -present, and they ought to get there by noon." - -Luke muttered his thanks and rang off. - -"I know why that was done," he said to himself: "They think they'll make -more trouble for us with the militia here than without it. Well, we'll -see." - -He stripped off his clothes, went to the bathroom, and began to run the -water for a cold plunge. He was talking to himself. - -"The worst of the crowd's dead," he said. "That was Forbes's way of -putting it. There he had a glimpse. Started down to rock-bottom. But -he didn't arrive. I felt that way till only a little while ago. But I -see I was wrong. I thought this was a one-man show; I believed in a -sort of personal Devil. I wish I'd been right. It would have been all -so simple, if I'd been right in that. But I wasn't. It isn't the men; -it's the system. The man didn't make the system; the system made the -man." - -He was wonderfully clear about that now. All his fight against evil had -been directed toward one man, and the man was dead and the evil -remained. He could almost pity that man in russet brown. That man who -had sat at the fountain of forces reaching up and down through all the -life of the world, seemed to originate the forces and use them for his -own malign purpose; but now--and herein lay one of the reasons for -Luke's present wonder at life--he perceived certainly that the man had -been only a little better treated by the forces than the forces treated -all the rest of mankind, was their creation and their slave just as -wholly as the most obscure victim. Industrial evolution, working -through the collective ignorance of the race, had devised the Great -Evil. Here was a web that no spider wove, a web that killed spiders as -well as flies, lived on with a life of its own, grew and spread of -itself. So long as the web existed, there would always be a spider. -The Web remained. It was the Web that must be broken. - -Yet he wanted to fight. He would fight. The Gospel of Negation had -given him its light; it had yet to teach him to see. - - -§5. Other forces vitally affecting Luke were at work that day, at first -far distant from the factory. They were forces that had affected him -imperfectly heretofore, but that now were set in motion in a manner no -longer to be diverted. - -Ex-Judge Stein was summoned from his office almost at the moment of his -appearance there. His motor-car took him into Wall Street, to a certain -skyscraper, into which he went and was taken as far as the twentieth -floor. - -He entered an unmarked door and passed an attendant who bowed to him -respectfully. He passed another attendant. A third, at sight of him, -got up and went through a second door, leaving the Judge to wait in -dignified repose. Then the last attendant reappeared and nodded, and -the Judge passed the second door. - -He remained inside for an hour. When he came out his mien was -undisturbed, but his strong and kindly face was even graver than usual. -He almost forgot to return the farewells of the attendants as he left -them. He rang twice for the elevator, although the elevator was not -long delayed. - -"The office," he said to his chauffeur as he climbed again into the car. - - -§6. Returned at his own quarters at half-past ten, he sent immediately -for Irwin, to whom he talked for perhaps forty-five minutes. He spoke -with a sad inevitability. - -"No more excuses, no more extensions of time, no more delays," he -concluded--"and no more failures." - -The twinkle left Irwin's eyes. - -"I understand," he said. - -He could not fail to understand. His superior had been once and for all -explicit. Judge Stein, during his service to the public on the bench, -had never been called upon to pronounce a sentence of death, but, had he -been so called upon, he would have spoken much as he now spoke to Irwin. - - -§7. "I hate to have to tell you this," said Irwin to Quirk at noon in -the latter's shabby law-office, "but if that job isn't done before -to-morrow morning, those affidavits charging you with jury-fixing are -going to be turned over to the District-Attorney, and the people that -have them are now in a position to make Leighton act on them, too." - -Irwin also had become specific. The plump Mr. Quirk lost his habitual -smile. - -"It's a rotten business," he said. - -"It is," Irwin agreed; "but your arrest would be a worse one--for you." - -"We may have to go the limit," said Quirk. - -"Then," said Irwin, "you'd better go it. That's no affair of mine." - - -§8. "This time," said Quirk, "you've got till to-night to make up your -mind." - -He was talking to Police-Lieutenant Donovan. It was just after -lunch-time. - -"What about?" asked Donovan. - -"Whether you want to bluff us again or lose your job." - -"We never did bluff you." - -"Well, then: whether you want to get those letters or get fired. Not -_try_ to get them: _get_ them. It's get them or get out." All the -kindliness and good-fellowship was missing from Quirk's voice. "It's -one thing or the other. We got evidence to fire you on. You knew we -had, last time I talked to you. Well, they were easy on you then, -Hughie. This time they mean business." - -Donovan looked at Quirk. - -"Suppose somebody gets hurt?" he said. - -Quirk shrugged his shoulders. - - -§9. When Guth came in late in the afternoon, Donovan said: - -"I got a warrant in my desk for you, Guth. A friend o' mine swore it -out. If I don't stop him, it means a criminal trial where you won't -have the chance of a goat. You know what it's for: that little girl up -in Fifty-second Street. The only way I can get him to hold off's for -you to get Reddy Rawn to do what you'd ought t' got him to do long ago. -If somebody gets hurt, it ain't our fault." - - -§10. At eight p.m. in the shadowy alley near Forty-third Street and -Third Avenue, Patrolman Guth's twisted mouth was menacing the darkness. - -"He's down at the Forbes factory now," said Guth. "There's sure to be a -fight there to-night, an' anybody can get in. It's a cinch." - -The darkness did not reply. - -"Anyhow, you got to," said Guth. "The old man's crazy mad. He says -it's the chair for yours if you fall down this time. Crab Rotello's got -worse. He can't live the night, an' the old man says he's goin' to have -you railroaded soon as Crab cashes in, if you don't do what he says. He -means it, too, Reddy." - -Out of the darkness came the answer: - -"I'll maybe have to croak this guy." - -"That's up to you," said Guth. "It'll look like some strikers done it. -It's his own fault for bein' a fool. What in hell do you care, anyway? -We'll look out for you." - -"All right," said the darkness. - -"Mind you," Guth repeated, "no more stallin' this time. If you don't -get the goods, an' get 'em to-night, you're a dead boy, Reddy." - -There was an instant of silence. Then the darkness spoke again: - -"It won't be me's the dead one." - - - - - *CHAPTER XVIII* - - -§1. The text of the newspaper article, which Luke read carefully while -he dressed, added few facts to those marshaled in its headlines. To -Luke it was evident that the past few days had brought the strikers to -desperation. Their own funds were gone, and they had no help from -outside. They were not strong in numbers, and many of them were women. -The ranks of the men had, however, been swelled to a formidable figure -by unsought additions from the hundreds of hooligans that, in every -city, are attracted to seats of industrial war, and these provided an -element which the leaders were unable to control. The affair had gone -the usual way: a picket had jeered at a non-union worker; two policemen -attacked the offending picket; the crowd ran to the rescue, and a -general disturbance, with the assault on the mill, was the inevitable -result. Now there was no telling to what extent the trouble might go. - -Luke was savagely glad that physical action was imperative. He wanted -something that would stop thought. He wanted rest from thought: from -the spiritual strain, from the yearning for Betty. Again and again, as -he hurried through a breakfast forced upon himself only by the knowledge -of his need, he found his mind playing with the childish idea of the -carpenter that he wanted to be, tramping the country roads from casual -job to job. He might well come to that. Meanwhile, it was good to have -this chance for a fight. - - -§2. Luke drove to the factory in a taxicab that he insisted should be -open. As he neared his destination through rows of grimy buildings and -vacant lots in which goats grazed among ash-heaps and tin cans and "For -Sale" signs, the streets began to look as if a heavy skirmish had been -fought through them. Knots of idle sightseers already lined the uneven -sidewalks and pointed to the relics of the conflict; at corners the -former workers were gathered in low-speaking groups--shrunken figures; -slouching forms in poor clothing, whose business was the making of -better clothes for luckier beings; faces angry and sullen, faces savage, -debased, hungry; women's faces as sexless as the men's--and everywhere, -furtive and sinister, those other faces, the faces most to be feared, of -the gathered condors of the underworld, the feeders on economic carrion, -who had slunk here from the darkest corners of Manhattan, Brooklyn, -Jersey City, rising from a hundred alleys and pot-houses, and circling -toward the factory as birds of prey come from the four quarters of the -compass toward a battlefield; he saw them crouched at the shadowy -thresholds of tumble-down dwellings, leering from fetid passageways, -peering from the swinging doors of stinking saloons, stealthy, -determined. - -Overhead the sky was clear sapphire. A strong breeze came in from the -Sound, laden with health. It fanned the memories of yesterday out of his -brain and for a moment made the present seem a picture from the remote -past. It was unreal: he felt himself an unimportant spectator of some -unconvincing play. - -Then, rising above rows of rickety houses, the mill came into sight, -blocking the street-end, and restored his appreciation of the imminent. -A wrecked coal-wagon lay horseless in the middle of the street opposite -a bent lamp-post, the coal heaped where it had fallen. Battered hats -were in the gutter, and on the pavement was a coat, torn and muddy. No -smoke curled to-day from the chimney of the mill's engine-room, and in -front of its shattered main-door, rudely repaired by unpainted planks of -fresh pine, two policemen lounged, facing a string of mute pickets. - -Luke passed the door unmolested and entered the office. The -superintendent, a whiskered man named Whitaker, was there, and one or -two pasty and frightened clerks. - -"Mr. Forbes down yet?" asked Luke briskly. - -"No, sir," said Whitaker. "He just sent word he was sick." - -"Sick? What's the matter with him?" - -"I don't know exactly, Mr. Huber. It was Miss Forbes telephoned, and -she said he'd had a kind of fainting fit right after breakfast." - -Luke sat down at the desk and called up the Forbes house. - -"Mr. Forbes there?" he asked of the maid that answered him. - -"No, sir. Mr. Forbes is in bed." - -"Ill?" - -"Not very well." - -"Ask Miss Forbes to come to the 'phone. This is Mr. Huber talking. I'm -at the factory, and I must know something about Mr. Forbes' condition." - -The maid assented, but, after he had waited, it was again she that spoke -to him. - -"Miss Forbes asks you please to excuse her. She's very busy. She says -to tell you Mr. Forbes was a little dizzy and had to lie down. He -thinks he can get to his office late in the day." - -Luke felt the mortification that it was patently intended he should -feel; but he lost no time over it. He turned at once to Whitaker and the -clerks, and secured from them what verification he could of the -newspaper's story. Then he sent for the brawny, flannel-shirted Breil -and learned what remained for him to know. - -"You think there'll be more trouble?" he asked, after he had sent -Whitaker and his assistant from the room. - -"Sure there will," said Breil cheerfully, "but not before to-night." - -"When'll the soldiers get here?" - -"'Long about noon, I guess." - -"How many police have they given us?" - -"Half a dozen. I couldn't beg more." - -"Better send some of them out to have that coal cleared away." - -"I tried to, but they said it wasn't their duty, an' I couldn't get any -satisfaction at City Hall. You know how these cops are." - -"Couldn't you have a detail of your own men do it?" - -"I'd like to first-rate; but it'd mean a fight, an' we don't want to put -ourselves in the position, to the public, of courtin' that. Mr. Forbes -said Saturday----" - -"He was right. How many men have you in good shape?" - -"Seventy-two. I'd send for more, but they're on a job at Hazleton." - -"Will City Hall send more police if there's trouble?" - -"Not till they can't help doin' it." - -The hours passed slowly. Luke made the rounds of the mill as the -commander of a fortress inspects it before an attack. He saw that the -strike-breakers, an anxious lot of men, were stationed at the vulnerable -places, and he talked again with Breil. - -Forbes did not appear, and Luke was too proud to try a second time to -question Betty about him; but reporters came and sent in urgent requests -for a statement from the company. Luke refused to see them. It was his -turn to refuse the newspapers. - -"Better feed 'em a little pap," Breil advised. - -"I won't so much as look at them," said Luke. - -"They'll knock us if you don't." - -"That can't hurt us. I won't see them and you're not to talk to them -either, Breil." - -He began to chafe under the delay. He made the rounds of the mill again -and smoked incessantly at cigars that he found in a box in Forbes's -desk. He bolted a cold lunch sent in at noon, and he wondered why the -soldiers were late. - -The soldiers came at two o'clock. Out in the street there were some -derisive shouts, and then the regular tramp of marching feet. Luke -hurried to an office above Forbes's, a room furnished with a small desk -at one side, a large table in the center, and a few chairs, and there, -from a window, saw the column of men in khaki, advancing four abreast, -down the street. - -"They're nothing but a lot of boys," he said as, when they drew nearer, -he looked at their young faces. "It's a shame to send a lot of kids -like that into--a mix-up of this kind." - -He received the Captain and the first-lieutenant in the main office. -The Captain had taken off his broad-brimmed service hat and was mopping -his face with a blue bandana handkerchief. - -"Phew!" he said. "This looks as if it was goin' to be the real thing!" - -"It _is_ the real thing," said Luke. - -"You haven't got a drink handy, have you?" asked the Captain. He was an -olive-complexioned young man of twenty-two or -three with a girlish -mouth and bright black eyes. - -Luke produced a bottle and glasses, and the Captain drank. He spoke in -the high tone of excitement as he rattled on: - -"Somebody threw a brick at us just up here. Did you see 'em? It near -cracked Sergeant Schmidt's coco. Poor old Schmidt; he was scared -yellow, wasn't he, Terry?" - -Terry was the lieutenant, a raw Irish lad with the face of a fighter. - -"You bet," said he. - -Luke drew the Captain aside. - -"You may as well understand at once," said he, "that this isn't any -picnic. You've been sent here to protect our property, and you may have -a hot time doing it. We have seventy-two strike-breakers here under Mr. -Breil; the superintendent; one or two clerks; and five foremen who've -remained loyal to the company. That, with me, makes up the inside -force. There's half a dozen police, too. What I want you to do is to -draw a cordon of your men along the front of the building. Stand them -on the pavement. Breil's men'll watch the back. Half your people had -better go on duty now and be relieved by the other half at five o'clock. -But from seven on, we'll need your whole company on the job." - -The Captain looked serious and worried. - -"You think there'll be real trouble to-night?" - -"I shouldn't be a bit surprised, especially as I see the Governor's sent -us just enough of you fellows to excite a mob and yet be powerless -against it. What were your instructions from up top?" - -"I was to use my own discretion." - -Luke looked at the young man and smiled at the idea of intrusting men's -lives to such discretion. - -"Well, the main thing is not to lose your head," said Luke. - -"They'll outnumber us?" - -"If they attacked, yes--undoubtedly." - -The Captain returned to the whiskey bottle. - -"And we'd be powerless, unless----" He hesitated. - -"Unless you fired," Luke concluded for him. - -They looked at each other, the man and the boy. - -"You mustn't fire," said Luke. - -"No," said the boy. - -"Unless you have to," said the man.... - -The afternoon dragged by. Luke gave up all hope of Forbes and spent -most of the time in the upper office, looking at the soldiers stationed -in front of the building and at the groups of men staring at the -soldiers. It seemed to Luke that the numbers of the staring men were -increasing.... - - -§3. The night was dark. The purple arc-lamp that burned directly in -front of the main entrance to the factory flared vividly upon a circle -of the street beneath it, but beyond this circle, which was long empty, -one could scarcely see, one could rather only feel, the presence of a -slowly gathering, silent crowd. In the main office, Luke was again -consulting with the Captain, Breil, and a policeman. The policeman, as -if acting under instructions, had sneered at the idea of further trouble -so long as the crowd was unmolested, and Luke would not ask again for -aid from City Hall. His lieutenants were standing about the room in -attitudes of uncertainty. All were agreed against precipitating a fight -by attempts to disperse the enemy. - -The Captain drew up his boyish form. - -"My men----" he began. - -"Your kids," corrected Breil. - -"We're all right, anyhow," the Captain lamely concluded, his cheeks hot -under this indignity. - -Raucous cries came now and then from the street. - -"You've got enough to take care of with your own affairs," said Luke. -He turned to the policeman. - -"Are there many in that crowd out there?" he asked. - -"Not many," said the policeman, "but I think there's more comin'!" - -Still smarting under Breil's rebuke, the Captain felt some show of his -bravery to be a duty to the organization to which he belonged. - -"We can handle 'em all right," he said, "however many there are. -They're mostly nothin' but foreigners, anyhow." - -Luke wanted above all to preserve harmony in his ranks, but an imp of -perversity whipped his tongue. - -"What's your name?" he asked the Captain. - -"Antonio Facciolati," said the Captain, "but I'm a naturalized American -citizen." - -Luke patted his shoulder. - -"That's all right," he said reassuringly. "What have your men got in -their guns, Captain? Blank cartridges?" - -"Not much," said the Captain boldly: "ball." - -"Good," Luke smiled. "But don't use it. Butts are best for this work." - -He decided that Forbes, well or ill, ought to know how things were -going. He bent to the telephone, placing the receiver to his ear. - -There was no answer. He rattled the hook impatiently. - -"What's the matter with this 'phone?" he growled. - -He rattled the hook again, but could get no reply. - -Breil left the room. Presently he returned. - -"I've tried the one in the hall," he said, "and the one in the -cloth-room. The wires are cut." - -For a moment nobody spoke. Facciolati's hand crept to his sword-hilt, -and the sword clattered. From somewhere far up the street came a choral -murmur of voices: - - "_Hall_eyloolyah, I'm a bum--bum!" - - -Breil stepped to the window. - -"That's them. That's the others. They're comin'," he said. - - -§4. The men ran to their posts. Luke climbed to the upper office and -went to its window. - -They were coming indeed. They were there, vividly from the circle of -light beneath him, vaguely to the walls of the tumbledown dwellings -across the street. At his feet was a line of khaki-clad militiamen, -standing at ease beside their magazine-rifles, along the curb; beyond -them a few yards of open street, and then what at first looked to Luke -like a field of wheat under a high gale, gigantic wheat, black of stalk -and white of head, tossing in the wind: the shoving, swaying bodies, the -gesticulating arms, the threatening faces of the mob. - -They had come to complete the work of the previous night. His startled -eyes could pick out no one individual, his ears could select no single -word; but he could see leaders, who had lost their leadership, making -gestures of despair; men, who had seized license, waving fists and -shaking sticks; could hear a turmoil of cries and curses. The whole -impression was blurred and general; yet, as he looked, the wheatfield -changed to a roaring sea, the black pitching and tossing of a terrible -tide ever mounting nearer, nearer to the soldiers drawn up in front of -the broken factory door. - -The thought mastered him: this was his property which only that frail -door separated from them--that frail door and those frightened boys in -khaki. They were going to destroy his property--his! - -A second street-lamp, farther up the way, lighted the rear of the crowd, -and into the circle of its illumination Luke saw running a motor-car. -He saw the mob scatter, the car stop, the crowd close around it. He -heard more distant shouts above the shouts that were nearer. - -The broken section of the crowd swayed, hesitated, attacked the car. -For an instant, the arms of the chauffeur beat at the man that climbed -to his seat, and then the chauffeur was pulled to the ground. Luke -strained his eyes to see if the car were familiar to him. It was. There -was a woman in it: its only occupant. It was the Forbes car, and the -woman must be Betty. - - -§5. Luke circled the center table and ran down the steps three at a -time. He nearly fell upon the huge form of Breil, coatless, a revolver -in his hand, hurtling from one group of his forces to another. Luke -pushed him away. - -"Where are you going?" cried Breil. - -Luke did not answer. He was tugging at the door. - -Breil's heavy hand fell on Luke's arm. - -"Here! Stop that!" he bellowed. "Where d'you think you're goin'?" - -"Get away!" shouted Luke. "I'm going out." - -The door leaped open. The howls of the mob beat upon the two men's -faces. - -Breil thrust his lips against Luke's ear. - -"Are you crazy?" he yelled. - -"Yes!" said Luke. - -He slipped through the door. - -Facciolati was there, white-faced, standing behind his soldiers. - -Luke made an egress through the ranks by shoving away a soldier with -either hand. - -"You're not going out _there_?" cried the Captain. "They'll kill you!" - -Luke jumped to the curb. - -"I don't care!" he answered. - -He was crazy, and he didn't care whether he was killed or not. Of these -two things he was certain. He was mad from the torments of his conflict -between logic and desire, and death would be an easy solution--perhaps -it was the only one. It flashed upon him that such a solution might be -cowardly; but the next instant he had but one impulse; he was going to -save Betty, and that was enough. A new madness, the madness of what -seemed an absolutely unselfish act, of an act that intoxicated him with -its unselfishness, gave him the strength of ten and fired a berserker -rage in his breast, hurled him forward like a rock from a ballista. He -was going to save Betty, and he was a hundred yards away from her in the -midst of a mob that hated him. - -The ocean of raging men closed over his head; its pandemonium smashed -his ear-drums; but he was deep in the crowd before any of its members -realized whence he had come. He was clearing a way, striking, kicking, -biting, shouting he knew not what--shrill oaths and guttural -threats--thrusting their heavy bodies from side to side. He felt their -hot breath, encountered their resisting arms and legs, smelled the sweat -of them. - -"Stop him!" yelled somebody. "He came out of the factory!" - -He saw a host of faces about him, dark with anger; eyes big with hunger -and hate. He felt blows that could not hurt him, felt his own fists -sink into flabby bellies, crack upon stout skulls. - -"The scab!" - -A hand fell across his mouth, and he used his teeth like a were-wolf; he -tasted the smooth salt blood before it began to trickle down his jowl. -A second hand snatched at his collar, another grabbed his arm. He pulled -frenziedly, he struck out blindly, he threw all his weight far forward. -He knew that his coat ripped; he twisted his arm free, lowered his head -and dodged forward, men sprawling before him. He had gained the -motor-car. - -Betty was standing up in the tonneau. Her hands were clasped before her -breast, her face was set. She saw him falling toward her. - -Luke jumped beside her, his coat gone, his shirt torn, his face bleeding -from a cut above the right eye, his hair matted over his forehead. She -did not know him as he seized her roughly and picked her up in his arms; -but, in the moment that he balanced on the edge of the car, with the -light full in his face, the crowd knew him. - -"That's him! That's Huber!" they shrieked. - -He jumped with her directly back into the crowd. - -While he was still in the air, he thought that was the worst thing to -have done. Without him, she might have had some chance; with him she -would have almost no chance at all. But it was too late now; he could -only fight until he could fight no more, and then they must die -together.... - - -§6. They did not die. Somebody, as the mob laid hold of them, broke -through its ranks--somebody with still some shred of authority left him. - -"Get back, you fools! Get back! Do you want to kill the woman?" - -It was that organizer of the strikers whom Luke had seen in Forbes's -office when the employees made their last appeal to Forbes. It was the -man Forbes had ignored. - -With infinite slowness, against infinite opposition, the rescuer made -way for them. Grumbling, growling, threatening, the crowd fell back. -It menaced, it cursed, it hurled ribald jokes; but it fell back before -the leader that it no longer obeyed in anything else, until he, followed -by Luke with Betty in his arms, came to the line of soldiers at the -battered factory door. - -Luke swayed a little. Facciolati stepped up and tried to steady him, -but he tossed Facciolati away. Luke turned to the organizer. - -"Won't you come inside?" he panted. - -The man shook his head. - -"I'm--I can't tell you how much I owe you for this," said Luke. - -"Oh, you go to Hell," said the man. - - -§7. Inside the factory, Luke would not waste a glance on the -strike-breakers that gathered, open-mouthed, around him. - -"Get away," he ordered. "I'm taking her to the upper office. Nobody is -to disturb her there. You understand? Nobody." - - -§8. During all that frightful progress back through the mob, she had -lain in his arms silent, her eyes closed. Only now, when he brought her -to the upper office, banged the door behind them and put her in an -arm-chair, which he kicked the length of the room in order to place her -as far as might be from the window, did she look at him. - -"I didn't faint," she said. "I only pretended. I thought that was -safest." - -He had dropped to his knees beside her and had begun to chafe her hands. -He was unconscious of the renewed din outside. Thus alone with her, he -was thinking only how much he wanted her. - -She was leaning far back in the chair. The rays of the street-lamp were -the only light in the room, and they made her face seem as peaceful as -the faces of the dead. When she opened her eyes, her eyes were -luminous. - -"You're safe," she continued. "You're safe, aren't you?" - -He kissed her hand hotly. - -"You!" he said. "I'm all right. But you?" - -She stood up, smiling. - -"Quite." - -He rose also. - -"The brutes! the beasts! I'd like to--I'll do it, too!" - -He had stepped into the light. His shirt was torn, his hair dank. -Blood caked over the cut on his forehead, and his jaws were red with the -blood of the man whose hand he had bitten. - -"Luke! You _are_ hurt!" - -She came toward him. - -"No, I'm not," he persisted, but he let her fingers touch the wound on -his head, and her fingers thrilled him. - -"Luke," she said, when she had convinced herself that the cut was -superficial, "I'm glad it was you." - -"That came for you?" - -"Yes." - -"I didn't do much. I was nearly the death of you. For a minute I -thought it was death. That other fellow's the one you have to thank." - -"Anyhow, I thank you." She pressed his hand. - -A shout came from the mob. It brought him back to material concerns. - -"How did you come to this part of town?" - -She had complete command of herself. - -"Can't you guess?" she asked. - -Her eyes were unafraid. - -"Don't say you came on my account." - -"But I did; I did. Father's too ill to ask questions. It was a slight -heart attack, the doctor said: he's been so worried lately, Father has, -and so overworked. But I wanted to know, and I tried to telephone here, -but they said the connection was broken. Then I was sorry for not -answering that call you made before, and when they said you hadn't got -back to the Arapahoe, I was afraid. So I told Father I was going to Mr. -Nicholson's mission--he must have thought me dreadfully unkind to leave -him for that--and I had James drive me--Oh!" she broke off: "I wonder if -_he's_ hurt?" - -"The chauffeur?" Luke remembered. "I saw him just as I got to the car," -he chuckled. "He'd reached the outskirts of the crowd and was running -for dear life. I don't think they'll catch him." - -The noise of the mob would grow from a hoarse mutter to a loud howl and -then sink to a low murmur. - -"Luke," she said, "it _was_ you rescued me." - -He listened to the noise. - -"Then I've probably only rescued you from the frying-pan to dump you -into the fire. I wish I'd had the sense to take you in the opposite -direction. I don't know what I could have been thinking of. Of course, -they'll simply have to send more police soon and attack these fellows -from the rear: the soldiers haven't the right to drive away the crowd, -and Breil's men daren't leave the building. But I do wish I hadn't -brought you here!" - -"You've brought me where _you_ are," said Betty. - -Her eyes were wide, her lips parted. Luke's breath caught in his -throat. - -"Betty," he said, "do you mean----" - -She did not quail. - -"I mean I love you." - -"What?" He drew back, afraid of her, afraid of himself. - -"I know you weren't yourself," she said. "I know how all this trouble -has upset you. I know you didn't mean those things." - -The reversal was too much for him. He leaned against the table and -burst into laughter. An instant ago the roar of the crowd had seemed -miles away, had seemed no more than any recurrent noise of city life. -They two, Betty and he, had seemed to him set apart from it all, remote -from it, together. Now---- - -"Luke!" she was crying. - -A picture drifted into his mind. It was a picture of pine trees and the -sun in a blue sky full of fleecy clouds and a long white road winding, -dusty and carefree, to the end of the world. - -"Luke----" - -He could not hear her now. He saw terror in her face, but the noise -from the street rose, rattled at the window-pane, and engulfed her -words. - -A new cry rang out from the mob--a cry so sharp and loud that both the -persons in the room forgot themselves and ran to the window. They -looked out upon the tossing faces below. - -The crowd had turned. It was elbowing, straining necks, rising on -tiptoe, gazing backward. - -Far back there something dark fluttered in the night air. It was seized -and passed from hand to hand. It reached the circle of light and waved -high above the center of the crowd, a banner of crimson, tossing like a -beacon over the swarm of black heads, defiant, audacious: the Red Flag. - -And then came a new sound. It began in the heart of the mob and spread -outwards like circles in water broken by a dropped stone. It did not -stop the other noises; it assimilated them. It was low, but strong; it -seemed to contain all the history of past wrongs, all the arsenal of -present determination; but it was touched with far hopes and freighted -with tremendous dreams. It was a chant, a song, a hymn, and all the -crowd was singing it with the strength of a thousand pair of lungs. - -"What's that?" asked Luke, although he expected no answer. - -But the girl gave him one. - -"It's a thing called 'The International,'" she said, her voice -trembling. "I heard it once in Paris. It's a terrible song." - -Luke's eyes were caught by a movement at the window of one of the -tumbledown dwellings across the street. He saw the window open and a -frowsy woman lean out. She held something white in her hands. She -raised it, then dashed its contents toward the nearest soldier. The -shot fell short, and two men in the crowd were drenched. - -The hymn ended in a shriek. The mob believed that the insult had come -from the factory and instantly resolved itself into a fuming whirlpool. -Luke saw tossed aside people who were evidently strike-leaders -frantically trying to quiet their one-time followers, but he did not -guess the purport of the new commotion in the seething mass. Then he -saw something that made him jerk Betty away from the window and fling -her against the wall at its side. - -There was a crash--a pause--a tinkling. A gust of air, fresh and cool, -invaded the room. A missile had broken the window. A whole volley -followed, smashing more glass and battering at the factory walls. The -mob was using the coals from the dismantled wagon that Luke had noticed -in the street hours ago. - -[Illustration: THE MOB WAS USING THE COAL FROM THE DISMANTLED WAGON] - -Somebody had been pounding unheard at the office-door. Luke saw the door -bend and ran to it. He flung it wide. - -Breil stood there, his revolver in his hand. - -"I've got to disturb you----" he began, and, though he shouted, his -voice did not reach to where Betty stood against the wall. - -"That's all right," called Luke. "I've been a fool and a coward to stay -here. Give me that gun." - -He wrenched the weapon from Breil's resisting hand. He leaped to Betty -and slipped the revolver to her. - -"Got to go downstairs," he cried to her, for the broken window let in a -roar that made ordinary speaking tones futile. "Bolt the door after us! -You'll be safe! We'll fall back to the stairs, if we have to fall back. -Good-bye!" - -He would not look back. His last sight of her was of a woman standing -erect, alert, comprehending, the revolver shining in her hand. Then, -with the following Breil calling out that he must go to his own men at -the rear, Luke ran down the stairs, opened the main door and, leaving it -gaping behind him, plunged outside. - - -§9. Coherent purpose he had none. All that he realized was this: here -was a struggle; here was a final endeavor to destroy his property, -which, however endangered by the trust, was almost his sole means of -support. There would be no more chance given him for delay; there would -be no further help from the police--the half-dozen sent that morning had -disappeared--until help was too late; there was only the boyish -soldiery. He would go to them, and he would fight. - -As he emerged upon the street, he saw the circle of light empty of the -human mass that had lately swirled there. A resounding cacophony from -the darkness, and dimly perceived objects moving a hundred yards and -more away, told him that the rioters had withdrawn to the upturned coal -wagon. At the moment of understanding this, he heard a rending staccato -noise. - -The frightened Facciolati heard it, too. He was standing on the -pavement by the door and had drawn up his men in a closer column before -him. His bared sword was in his right hand. - -"What's that?" asked Luke. - -"It's the tongue of that coal wagon," gasped the Captain, "they're -rippin' it off." - -"What? For a battering-ram? For this door?" - -The Italian nodded. - -"Yes. I heard someone yell for them to do it. Then they all ran over -there." - -A terrible stillness fell. Behind the curtain of the night, the mob -only hummed and shuffled its feet. - -"Well?" asked Luke. - -His eyes pierced Facciolati's. His voice was pregnant with meaning. - -"What had I better do?" faltered the Captain. - -Before Luke could reply, a strident yell came from the invisible ranks -of the mob: - -"Now then: come on! Burn their damned shop!" - -A thousand voices echoed: - -"Burn it! Burn it down!" - -The Captain turned to Luke. - -"You've got to stop them," said Luke. - -The din increased. - -"O my God!" said Facciolati. - -In Luke blazed up all the furnace of battle. He gripped the Captain's -collar and shook the man as if he were a frightened, disobedient child. - -"Give the order!" he commanded. He hated this boy. - -In a shrill, hysterical voice that cut the rising noise of the mob, -Facciolati gave the preliminary order, and the rows of lads in khaki, -standing on the curb, raised their black-blue rifles to their shoulders. - -"We won't shoot!" he called into Luke's ear. "We'll only frighten 'em!" - -"Burn it----" From the street the cries were merged into a wordless -roar. There was the wild rush of two thousand feet, and into the light -burst the mob again: a long trotting column with the Red Flag swaying -overhead, and in the midst five or six men bearing the wagon-tongue -leveled like a lance. - -A veil of crimson seemed to flutter before Luke's eyes--the eyes of the -man that had counseled caution and the use of only the butts of rifles. -He did not think, he could only feel--only feel that here at last was -the chance, here the unavoidable need of action that had the splendid -conclusiveness of brutality. This was man's work. This was no rescuing -of a girl: it was war. The world had meshed him in a net of -intellectual doubts and quibbles: here was his moment to cut the net, -and to cut his way to freedom, to take vengeance on the world. - -That and something more. Betty was in danger and the property that was -partly his, that in part he owned and had bought. But above all this, -riding it all, goading it, spurning it, mad with its mastery, the -blood-lust, the Sense of Power, the dizzy knowledge that he could kill. - -The mob was almost upon them. It was a tidal wave. - -"Now!" shouted Luke to the Italian. - -But the Captain caught his hand. He gabbled the nothings of panic. -Luke threw the boy to the pavement. With all the breath in his body he -vociferated: - -"_Fire!_" - - -§10. Hell belched its flames: a thunder-clap, a thunder-cloud knifed by -red flashes of lightning. - -Luke felt his head bashed against the wall of the factory. He was -choking in a cloud of smoke. He could see nothing, but once he thought -he heard the crack of other shots from somewhere above. - -Then he felt his knees clutched. He felt a pawing at his elbow; and -presently he heard the chattering voice of Facciolati screaming against -his cheek: - -"Why in Hell did you do that? How in Hell did you dare?--Don't you know -what you might have done? Who's in command here?" - -"Shut up," bellowed Luke, "or I'll show you who's in command." He tried -vainly to see through the smoke. "Take your hands off me!" - -It was as if he were in the crater of an erupting volcano. The -reverberation split his head, and through it came shrieks, groans, -curses, and then, as the smoke slowly lifted, the pound of two thousand -feet on the paving-stones, while, with the Red Flag sagging to and fro -like a wounded eagle above it, the mob fled pell-mell up the street. - -But the Captain had not heeded Luke's warning. - -"Now they'll be back!" he was wailing. "We'll all be goners now. Why -did you give that order? Why didn't you let me change it?--I'd -instructed the men to fire over their heads--An' you didn't let me -change it--An' of course they _did_ fire over their heads--an' nobody's -hurt--Do you know what that means? They'll be back and kill all of us!" - -It was impossible for Luke to believe. Then, not fear, but the rage of -thwarted blood-lust sent out his clawing hands. - -"You did that?" - -He caught Facciolati under the arm-pits and raised him clear of the -ground. - -"You----" - -A new sound interrupted him. At first he thought that the mob had -wheeled a machine-gun into the street and turned it on the factory. -Then the sound became a clatter and, looking through the ranks of -soldiers, Luke saw, far ahead, a tangle of rearing horses and falling -men: even City Hall had been unable longer to hold its hand; one of the -patrolmen who had fled to the factory must have telephoned a final word -to headquarters; the mounted police were charging the crowd; the riot -was ended. - - -§11. Luke ran up the stairs to the upper office and found the door -unbolted. He did not know what he went for. He was not glad that the -riot was ended; he was raging like a man-eating tiger foiled of its -quarry. - -Betty stood at the window in the full light of the street-lamp. He -scarcely knew her face. He had never seen her look like this. He had -never dreamed that she could look like this. Her hat had fallen to the -floor; her golden hair tossed above her head like licking tongues of -flame; her eyes were bright coals; her cheeks were scarlet; her white -upper teeth bit deep into the vermilion of her lower lip. As if to give -freer play to a breast that panted, she had torn open her dress at the -base of her splendid throat. The revolver was in her hand. It was -cocked and smoking. She looked like Bellona invoked and materialized -from the fire and smoke of that roaring inferno of the street. - -"How many?" she gasped. "How many have we killed?" - -Luke stopped at the door. He knew now that he had indeed heard shots -from overhead. He knew that the same primæval passion which had made -him a tiger--and still maintained its sway--had worked this -metamorphosis also, had changed this gentle girl into what he saw. At -another time, in another mood, he would have loathed it; but in his -present mood he gloried in it. He thought that he had never seen her so -beautiful or imagined her so splendid; her madness matched his own. - -He came toward her, circling the table that stood between them. - -"None!" he cried. "That fool Captain told the men to shoot high." - -He put out his arms. He wrenched her to him. His right arm clutched her -about the supple shoulders, the fingers of his right hand sinking into -her firm left breast. With his left hand he shoved her face upwards. -Brown from the caked blood of the man he had bitten, his opened mouth -closed upon hers. - -He heard the revolver clatter to the floor. She writhed in his embrace. -He had expected the perfect response. Meeting an abrupt refusal, he was -taken off his guard, and she escaped from him. - -She staggered into a corner. The devil that possessed him had lost its -power over her. She had reverted to her natural being. She did not -cry, but she stood there with her hands pressed tight against her -breast, the fingers mechanically busied with repairing the opened -blouse, her face all horror at the thing she had been. - -"What must you think of me?" she was moaning--"I don't know what came -over me!--What must you think of me?" - -He thought nothing. He could think nothing. He could realize only that -he was again to be robbed. Twice to-night the cheat that played with men -at the game of life had given him the winning hand, only to sweep the -stakes from the board just as Luke reached for what he had won. The -blood-lust changed its form; it assumed an ungovernable fury. Something -crackled in his brain as he had seen imperfect feed-wires at the touch -of a trolley-wheel. The crimson veil fluttered again before his eyes. - -He turned and bolted the door. He turned again and ran to her. His -face was wet with sweat, black with powder, terrible. - -She understood. She lowered her head and tried to dodge past him. She -cried out. - -His strong fingers caught her hair. The hair streamed down. Her -forward lurch brought it taut. He jerked at it; she fell toward him. -His free hand caught her throat and stopped her fall. He tossed her -against the table; her feet brushed the floor, but he pressed her -shoulders tight to the table's top. He bent over her, one hand at her -throat, the other raised to stop her mouth, his beating breath on her -face. - -She was wholly in his power now. The outside world was impotent because -the outside world could not have heeded her appeal; the woman herself -was helpless because her captor's was the strongest body. Again came to -Luke the frightful sense of Power, again the dizzy knowledge that he -could do whatever he chose. - -At that instant the madness fell from him. - -A physical motive there of course was, since the more intense the -passion the briefer is its duration; but even if it originated in the -physical, this reaction transcended things material and wheeled about to -crush them. It was the second and fuller phase of that revelation which -had come to him in the Sunday quiet of the Brooklyn streets. Burning, -blinding, transfiguring, the Marvel and the Miracle, elemental and -tremendous, returned, and what they had once done from the flesh to the -spirit, they now did from the spirit to the flesh. They returned to -remain. They completed the revolution, the new birth. - -Luke saw yet more dazzlingly the glory of individuality, the holiness of -his humanity; but it was as if scales fell from his eyes, for he saw -entire. Here had been one of the false starts on a wrong road, one of -the moments of relapse that he had expected. The individuality was -divine; physical passion was a splendid thing; but when the individual's -physical passion stooped to force or cunning, what had been splendid -became foul, and what had been divine was bestial. Luke, in his denial -of revealed Religion, was no longer a pygmy trembling before a giant; he -was himself a giant; but what he was in actuality he must recognize as -potential in his fellow creatures. His mental and spiritual sight was -at last adjusted to the new illumination. He could assess moral values, -could determine ethical duties now. It remained only to find their -reason and decipher their credentials. On Sunday he had gained his -strength; to-night he had gained the knowledge of how rightly to use it. - -He ran to the door and tore back the bolt. - -"Whitaker!" he called. - -The superintendent came cringing from the main office, where he had -cowered through all the riot. - -"Get two policemen and have them see Miss Forbes safely home." - -Betty was secure now, and the mill was safe. He borrowed a hat too -large for him, and put over his ragged shirt the alpaca office-coat of -some clerk, which he found in a locker. He walked out into the street. -Far away he heard a woman's strident voice singing: - - "Oh, why don't you save - All the money you earn? - _If I did not eat_ - _I'd have money to burn._" - - -There was the sound of a distant shot. - -Then silence. - - - - - *CHAPTER XIX* - - -§1. He could not stay in the factory while she was there. To go to the -upper office where he had left her, to attempt to explain, to offer a -shoddy apology--this would be to add the last insult to the wrong that -he had done her. He thought that worse than to have completed the thing -that he had begun. - -He cut northwestward toward the more peopled part of the borough, not -because he wanted to be among people, but because he did not even yet -want to have to think. He tried to think, but he did not want to. He -saw clearly his new duties and his new restrictions; but they presented -themselves to him as isolated facts which, offending his reason, spurred -his reason to demand their credentials, and these he could not yet read. -Moreover, the memory of the scene with Betty would rise before his -restless mind, burning all else away, and, to burn memory away, his -heart drove him into the more crowded streets. - -Women of the streets accosted him. He passed a house from a window on -the ground-floor of which two girls with painted faces beckoned. He -passed brightly lighted saloons that sent into the street inviting -streams of light and the lure of clinking glasses and laughter. In a -jostling thoroughfare he noticed that passersby were looking strangely -at him and, recollecting what a queer picture his disordered clothes and -bloody face must present, he blamed himself for not repairing the -damages of the fight before setting out. He turned again into the less -frequented quarters. - -Here he looked at his watch, but his watch had stopped at half-past -seven, the moment, probably, of his charge to Betty's rescue. Seeing -the lighted window of a jeweler's shop near by, he went to it and looked -at the clock displayed there. It was nine o'clock. As he could not -have been walking for more than an hour, and as the active rioting must -have begun no later than seven-fifteen, all the events of the riot must -have been massed within forty-five minutes. He turned back toward the -factory. He hated these city thoroughfares. His boyish dreams of the -open road and the tramping carpenter returned to him.... - -If he could only read his credentials.... - - -§2. When Luke entered the office on the ground floor, the little -militia captain was there. He had come for whiskey and finished the -bottle. He was quite drunk, and evinced a thick but facile desire to -describe the victory that his troops had won. - -"Oh, go away!" said Luke. - -He turned Facciolati out. - -Breil came next, and some of the policemen, the former anxious to report -the present condition of the mill, the latter that of the streets; but -to these men Luke was scarcely more civil than he had been to the -Italian. Whether he liked it or not, he must think things out. - -"There's no reason for you to stay any longer, if you don't want to," -said Breil. - -Luke looked at him vacantly. - -"I do want to," he said. - -One of the policemen glanced significantly at the empty whiskey-bottle -and smiled. - -"I have some things to think about," said Luke. "I'll go up to the -office over this. Tell the fellows I don't want anybody to butt in, -Breil." - -He decided that it would be well for him to do his thinking in the room -in which he had so nearly done Betty what she must consider the ultimate -wrong. He went there. - - -§3. He closed, but did not lock the door; he trusted to his orders -against intrusion. - -The street-lamp furnished the room with sufficient illumination. Luke -saw that one of the chairs had been overturned and lay close beside the -table. He must have overturned it while struggling with Betty, but, so -far as he could recollect--and his mind for some time employed itself -with such trifles--he had not remarked the fall at the moment of its -occurrence. - -He went to the broken window and lounged there, now looking out upon the -scene of the street-battle, now back at the scene of the essentially -similar combat that had been fought inside. It was astonishing how -little he remembered of the details of either, but perhaps the reason -for that was to be found in the size of their results. - -Something glittered in the lamplight on the floor at his feet. He -stooped and picked it up; it was one of those yellow wire hairpins that -Betty used to supplement the pins of tortoiseshell. Down in the street -he saw a draggled necktie that had been torn from the throat of some -striker. His gaze wandered from one object to the other and back again. - -He stood there for a long time.... - -He was beginning to find out at last the logic that he had sought. - -Betty was lost to him, and if she were not lost he must give her up. -All that was vital in what he had all along felt for her was only one of -the forces that go to make up complete love--right enough, he told -himself, when combined with its fellow elements; right enough upon -occasion when frankly acknowledged between a free woman and a free man; -but, he determined, disastrously insufficient to be made the sole -element of anything more than the briefest union between two -individuals, and criminal when it was the only motive of but one of the -individuals in any union. About what Betty had felt for him he was -equally clear; it was another of the forces that compose real love; it -was the element of Romance, just as insufficient and just as wrong, when -it was alone, or when it existed on the one side only, as was the merely -physical. Real love was the fusion of the physical, the romantic, the -spiritual and the comradely, the fusion of two people for whom there was -but one means of salvation. He knew now, beyond all questioning, that, -however they had deceived themselves, Betty's thoughts and his, her -hopes and his, her aims and his, her work and his, were and had always -been divided beyond the possibility of junction. No marriage service -that might have been performed between them could have married but the -least of their outlying selves. Not Church and State together could -have joined their true selves that, living where there was no church and -no state, had yet no natural relationship to each other. Some day real -love might come to him; some day it would surely come to Betty. To-day, -though it tore his heart, though it was as if he were ripping the heart -out of his breast, he must, for Betty's sake--since she was the -weaker--even more than for his own, tear her out of his life. His -desire for her would long remain; the moments would be full of her when -he sank from waking into sleep, or climbed from sleep to waking; but -though he might regain the power to enslave her soul and make a servant -of the self of which he could not make a work-fellow, to use that power -would be to sin against what was best in her. He must not see her -again, even were she willing to see him, and he must leave her thinking -the worst of him in order that she might the sooner want to forget him. - -He tossed the gilt pin out of the window. Following its flight, his -glance came again to the worker's necktie, lying in the street. - -What right had he over the man who had worn that? What right that he -did not have over Betty? - -His reason answered: None. - -There, he tremendously realized, was the key to his credentials. He -leaned heavily against the window-sill. He understood. It was a bitter -lesson, but he learned it, there and then. - -What he had done to these men was what he had tried to do to Betty, not -in the riot only, but in accepting the position that society had offered -him in relation to them; it was what every employer, from the actual -boss to the smallest shareholder, everywhere was doing. It was living -upon the work of others, profiting by values for the creation of which -the pay had to be low enough to permit of profit. It was compulsion. -If he sold dear what he bought cheap, what was it that he bought cheap -but their labor? If he wanted pay for executive ability, what executive -ability did he, or any shareholder in any company, exercise? If he -claimed a return for the risk of his investment, what return did these -men get, who invested that labor-power which was their whole capital? -If any stockbuyer talked of profits as the reward of previous years of -saving, how could he explain the fact that his savings would secure no -profit until they employed labor to produce it? He had been fighting -against his own ideals. It was the workers that had been right and he -that had been wrong. What the man in russet brown had been to him, that -he and all who directly or indirectly employed labor for profit, had -been and were to the employed. - -So, quite as suddenly as he had come to see life in the new light, he -came now, in the little office of the lonely factory, to see the reason -from which the light proceeded; there was only one evil in the world and -that was Compulsion; only one good, and that was power over one's self. - -The awful thing, he said to himself as one who reads what is written, -was not to have too little power over others; it was to have too much. -To have the means of oppression was to go mad and use them; it was to -confuse the means with the right. Too much power over others and too -little over himself, both states a result of a system based upon -compulsion, had made the man in russet brown all that the man in russet -brown had been; it made Luke a potential murderer and ravisher. He saw -all life as endlessly creating and no two hours the same. Seeing this, -he understood why it was that, when authority was laid upon any one, -that one rebelled in proportion to his vitality. He saw the present -wrong and the future impotence of churches and laws, of politics, -governments, and property. To believe in any one of them, to traffic -with any of them, was now to exercise compulsion over his fellows and -now to delegate to his fellows his power over himself. - -He must give up everything that was easy and comfortable--the easy -thought and faith as freely as the easy food and lodging. He must join -the oppressed. - -He leaned through the battered window and filled his lungs with the pure -night air. He looked up to the patch of heaven overhead where a yellow -moon was riding. - -"I haven't let their corruption destroy my purpose," he said to the -moon. "I've simply put myself where they can't destroy _me_. I've put -myself where they can't lie to me again. I'll fight them as one man -against the world; I'll lose, but I won't be using their weapons; I -won't be what they are, and I'll lose as a free man. So far as the -world inside of me's concerned, they invaded it and bossed it. I've -chucked them out of it, and _I've_ destroyed _them_!" - -It seemed wonderfully simple now and wonderfully peaceful. He would go -to Forbes to-morrow and draw up a legal paper, the last legal paper he -would ever put his name to, his last compromise, turning over his -interest in this factory to his mother; and Forbes--poor old Forbes! He -was sorry for Forbes, but he knew what would happen; left alone, Forbes -would end by selling out, profitably, to the trust. And then for Luke -the open road, the old open road that he had always loved, the learning -of a manual trade, the sale of his labor-power no more than was -necessary to keep him alive and free to go wherever slaves fought the -system of corruption for their liberty, until sometime, when the -soldiers would have Luke before them instead of behind them, and did not -shoot over the heads of the mob. He was tasting of contentment for the -first time in his life. He was glad that he had not died out there in -the riot. There was so much to do. There was so much to do in this -life that he did not see how he had ever had time to think of any other. -And now he was about to do his part of it conscientiously, with open -eyes and with all his soul, and to do it with complete power over -himself, using no compulsion upon others and allowing no other to use -compulsion upon him. Luke had conquered. For every soul there is, -somewhere, a separate road to salvation. Luke had found his own.... - -Somewhere out in the city a clock struck eleven. He knew that he had -been standing at the window for a long time, but he had no idea it was -so long as this. If he had been so engrossed, what, he wondered, had -finally roused him. He remembered: it was something about the door. He -had not heard it move; he merely thought that it was moving. He turned -to it, but it did not move. Perhaps a draught of air had deceived him. - -The factory was very quiet.... - - -§4. "Don't open your trap! I got you covered! If you let out one yip, -I'll croak you." - -The door had opened and closed, letting in a figure that quickly bolted -it and then discreetly avoided the light from the window. Luke saw a -dim form in the shadow. All that projected into the shaft of light was -a fist tightly clenched about a leveled revolver. - -"What do you want?" asked Luke. - -He was not afraid to disregard this intruder's command to silence. He -was curiously fearless. He supposed that this unseen man was some -fanatic from the mob. Anybody could have slipped into the factory -through the door that Luke had left open when the terror of the -soldiers' fire swept the street and the smoke of it clouded the doorway. -This was an avenger thus arrived. Luke felt the presence of a certain -crude justice. He had deserved this. - -"Don't worry; I'm not going to yell," he said. - -He was expecting death now, expecting absolute extinction; but he faced -it with a serenity that mildly surprised him. This was not the mad -courage, too sudden to be fine, which had hurled him into the crater of -the riot to rescue Betty. It was a courage that weighed results. He -thought of the dusty, open road. He was rather sorry to have to miss -that, but no doubt he would never have got it anyhow. - -"Well," he said with a faint touch of impatience, "why don't you answer -my question? What do you want?" - -The barrel of the revolver wavered ever so slightly. - -The intruder's voice came again out of the darkness; it was as if the -darkness itself made answer: - -"I want them letters." - -Luke's teeth came together with a snap. He had been carrying the -letters in a money-belt about his middle, next his body. It was hours -since he had thought of them. He had just now been feeling that perhaps -he ought to be shot, but this feeling had no origin in the affair of the -letters. They were a different matter. For the letters he had fought -so much and so fairly that he was ready and willing to fight for them -once more. He tried to gain time. - -"What letters?" he asked. - -"I dunno," said the darkness. "But you do. Come on, now; don't try to -flimflam me: them letters you got in your coat." - -Luke glanced at the alpaca coat that he had put on when he last left the -factory. - -"If you want anything that was in my coat, you'll have to look in the -street for it: I left it there." - -The intruder did not at once reply. Luke saw the revolver advance -toward him in the light. It was followed by a thick, short arm, and the -arm was followed by a short thick man. He wore a velours Alpine hat. -It was pushed to one side of his head, and Luke saw that the hair below -it was red. - -That was almost the last thing he did see before the shot was fired. -Luke made a flying leap at the red-headed man and tried to knock the -revolver into the air. As he did so, the revolver spat at him. - -A loud report. A darting arrow of flame. - -Luke lay on the office floor. The red-headed man's skilled fingers ran -deftly through his clothes. Then the killer raised the shattered window -and dropped into the street. - - -§5. One of Breil's strike-breakers, making his round of the factory, -heard the shot and came running toward the noise. He ran to the upper -office and burst into the room. - -A curling cloud of lazy smoke was weaving graceful figures in the shaft -of light from the street-lamp outside; it embraced an overturned chair, -and circled the top of the center table. Above it the strike-breaker -saw the upper half of a disheveled figure, the figure of Luke Huber, -leaning out of the window and shaking its fist at all the city round -about. In a high, cracked voice, Luke was yelling curses at the world. - -"God damn your system and your politics!" yelled he. "God damn your law -and your government! God damn your god!" - -He turned toward the noise behind him and showed himself with matted -hair and staring eyes, with a cut in his forehead and a white face that -had brown stains about its lolling mouth, with a slowly broadening patch -of blood in his torn shirt. - -"Mr. Huber!" gasped the strike-breaker. He ran forward. - -As he did so, Huber's voice howled into shattered song: - - "Hallelujah, I'm a bum--bum! - Hallelujah, I'm a----" - - -He lurched forward into the strike-breaker's arms. Before those arms -closed about him, he was dead. - - - - - *CHAPTER XX* - - -On the twentieth floor of a Wall Street skyscraper, in that office where -the engraving of George Washington hung between the windows, three men -sat in the mid-morning light, about the mahogany table. They were -talking business. Each man had his own offices and his own businesses, -but they frequently and quietly met in this one because most of the -businesses of each were closely allied with the business-interests of -all. - -There was nothing unusual about the outward appearance or public actions -of this trio; they were apparently but three units of the legion that -makes this portion of New York a city by day and a desert by night. -Each had come down town in his own motor that morning, defying -speed-laws and traffic regulations, just as scores of his business -neighbors had done. Each had descended at his own offices, passed -through half a dozen doors guarded by six bowing attendants, and -proceeded to his own desk in his own private room, precisely as a small -army of other business men were doing at the same time within a radius -of half a mile. Each looked like the rest of that army. All three were -men of about the average height, not noticeably either above or below -it, and two were inclined to bulkiness. Those two had pale faces and -close mouths and steady eyes, which looked out from under bushy brows -with glances that gave the lie to the lethargic indications of the -little pouches of lax skin below their lower lids. They wore flowers in -the lapels of their coats; one wore a white waistcoat; the cropped -mustache of one was black; that of the other was touched with grey. -Hallett chewed leisurely at the end of an unlighted cigar; Rivington's -slim hand stroked his mustache with a contemplative movement. - -The man at the head of the table was almost of the age of the man that -used to sit there, but he was somewhat shorter, and he was thin. His -clothes fell loosely about his bony frame. His eyes were narrow. He -sat before a neat pile of memoranda, with his thin hands, the blue veins -of which marked them like a map, tapping upon the surface of the table. -Like his predecessor's, his elbows were raised at right angles to his -torso and pointed ceilingward; his chest heaved visibly, but his -breathing was inaudible. His eyes were everywhere. - -He had come to his office betimes that morning. He had read his letters, -directed his charities, instructed his brokers, given his orders to -lieutenants at the state capitals and to such lieutenants at the -national capital as needed them. Now he was receiving his fellow -commanders in council. - -"McKay?" he said in thin comment on some remark of Rivington. "What -McKay?" - -"Henry," said Rivington. "Dohan's successor in the M. & N. He's the -sort of man----" - -"We can unload this stock," said Hallett, "any time now." - -Rivington began a question. - -"It's all right," nodded Hallett. "And by the way, that little Forbes -concern's come into the combine." - -"I know," said Rivington; "but those letters--You remember----" - -"Stein sent 'em over to me yesterday morning. We'll burn 'em this time." - -The man at the head of the table rapped with his spatulate finger-ends. - -"We are too busy to bother with trifles," he said. "I've got here"--he -indicated the memoranda--"all the reports on the proposed foodstuffs -monopoly. I must decide on that right away...." - - -After a momentary silence, the stock-ticker, with metallic insistence, -went on weaving out its yards of tape beside the windows that looked -down to the web of radiating streets, on which minute black objects that -were men and women bobbed and buzzed like entangled flies.... - - - - THE END - - - - * * * * * * * * - - - - - *BOOKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR* - - -THE HOUSE OF BONDAGE -THE GIRL THAT GOES WRONG -THE SENTENCE OF SILENCE -THE WAY OF PEACE -WHAT IS SOCIALISM? -RUNNING SANDS -THE THINGS THAT ARE CÆSAR'S -ETC., ETC. - - - - - - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SPIDER'S WEB *** - - - - -A Word from Project Gutenberg - - -We will update this book if we find any errors. - -This book can be found under: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/45866 - -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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