John Rawn, Prominent Citizen

CHAPTER III
THE SILENT PARTNER

I

There are men who make a living, sometimes a very good one, through the process of teaching others to do what they themselves can not do. You can purchase for a price in any of many quarters printed maxims embodying full formula covering the secret of success; in each case from one who has not succeeded. Nothing is cheaper than maxims, in type, in worsted, or in transparencies. To be in the fashion you should have certain of these above your desk, and should incline your ear to those who profess to teach what can not be taught even by those most nearly fitted to teach.

John Rawn cared little for maxims, being above them, in his own belief, at least. In all likelihood he had never read the advice of the philosopher, to wit: that each man should hitch his wagon to a star. No, he knew something better. He hitched his to a river.

Very naturally, John Rawn selected the largest river that he could find. His silent partner was none less than the Father of the Waters!

There is this to be said about a river, that it is wholly tireless and immeasurably powerful; that it enters into no combinations against capital, and does its work without unseemly disturbances. Rawn was wise enough to know these things, nor asked any maxims to advise him therein. In his belief it was better to allow this sort of silent partner to furnish the industry and the economy.

II

Who shall measure the power of a river, for ever falling to the sea? How many millions of horses and men has it equalled in its wasted power in each generation, in each decade, in each year? Certainly sufficient to lift the entire burden of labor from the shoulders of the world.

What mind can measure the extent of such a force, or dream the possibilities of its application, if it could be set to work? What equivalent of human brain and brawn could be valued against this careless, ceaseless power, derived endlessly from the air and the earth—power given to the peoples of the earth before the arrival of our present political and industrial masters; given them in the time when the earth was the Lord's and the fullness thereof. The minerals under the earth, the food produced in the soil, the waters offering paths and power—before the earth and its fullness passed from the hands of the Lord into those of our present masters, these, it may be conceived, were intended as the Lord's gift to the peoples of the earth. That, however, was quite before the advent of John Rawn.

Toil has always been the human lot. We have carried the mechanical burdens as well as the mental burdens of life on our own human bodies and souls; although all the time thousands of patient giants were waiting, willing to serve us. John Rawn could see them waiting. He knew to whom one day would be due the power, and the kingdom, and the glory. He could look toward the white-topped mountains, foreseeing the day when they would be put under tribute, because they breed tumbling waters of immeasurable strength and utility. Their heritage of beauty and majesty is naught to minds such as that of John Rawn's. Utility is the one word in the maxims of such as these, men beloved of the immortal gods.

We speak of kings, of emperors, but what emperor in all the history of the world had servants such as these, submissive giants such as these, to work for him? We speak of miracles of old. What miracles ever equaled the business wonders, the money-piling miracles, of the last twenty years in America?

III

Where gat this silent partner of John Rawn's its own tremendous power? Out of the sun and the earth, the parents of humanity. The raindrop on the leaf, shot through with the shaft of the sun, fell to some near-by rill and, joined by other rills, marched on, alive, tireless, tremendous, toward the sea. Even far up toward their source, had your little boat lodged, counter to the current, on some rock or snag, and had you attempted to push it back against the thrust of the downcoming waters, you might have got some knowledge of the power of even a little stream. Ten feet below you, that power again would have been quite as great; and ten feet below that again as great; and so on, to the sea. It required the advice of no professional maxim makers to teach a few of our great men, our specially endowed superiors, John Rawn first among them, that this power one day must be used. In accordance as it shall be used, the burden of humanity may be lifted from human shoulders, or thrust crushingly down upon them until indeed humanity shall cease to hope. The earth and its fullness are no more the Lord's to-day. They are John Rawn's.

The simple plan of the International Power Company, was to make some strong obstruction inviting the enormous resistance of the Father of the Waters, tantalizing that power into being. Thus, in a manner perfectly simply, this force, once evoked and utilized, would turn numberless wheels endlessly, tirelessly. So much for the material side of manifested power. The essence, the soul, the intangible spirit of that material power was, in the plans of International, to be transmitted by wire at first, and later through the free air. Its sale in definite and merchantable quantities would come as near to the solution of the problem of perpetual motion and perpetual profit as may be arrived at in this world of limitations.

IV

Rawn asked nothing better than this idea. It was beautiful, and he valued it over all his many and various other ventures. He could let his silent partner put other men out of work; and so these could be rehired at such price as he himself cared to set. He saw the time approach when he would be able to retail at a price, remote from his silent, tireless partner's labors, merchantable packages of power, to feed a cart, a plow, a wheel of any sort; power to lift and labor, to toil ceaselessly without remonstrance. It was and is a splendid dream. Its bearing is as you be Rawn or Halsey. That power shall labor for or against mankind as ourselves shall say.

Shall we blame ourselves, or John Rawn, in this republic, that he saw on ahead only limitless personal power, limitless gold, jewels, wine, women, personal indulgence of any sort that appealed to him? Shall we blame Halsey for dreading the issue of these plans, delaying them all he could; clinging to the belief that the earth was the Lord's and the fullness thereof; and that the Lord gave it to all mankind? And shall we blame the stock-holders for being impatient at renewed delays? The wire transmission was installed, making every man in the International rich. Yet every man in the secret of the real ambition of this company burned inwardly at this enforced secrecy and this unseemly delay. The mysterious factory at the edge of the great inland city still was silent. The directors raged. They wanted to drain to the last drop the strength even of this tireless giant. They wanted to begin to bottle, measure and sell, sell for ever, the very force which holds the spheres in their places! In time we shall perhaps see completed what these men planned. There is no logical reason why, if one planet can be owned by a John Rawn or so, yet others should not!

V

For a long time Jim Sullivan, foreman at the factory of the International, wondered and pondered as to the real intent of these strange machines which he saw little by little growing up under the uncommunicative direction of the superintendent, Halsey. He had never seen anything like them, with their vast coils of insulation, their intricate cogs and wheels, their centrally-hidden huge glass jars, and the long, toothed ridge, like a delicate metal comb, which surmounted the top of each. There was something mysterious about it all. He was sure that Halsey did something with these machines when the men were not about. The very air seemed throbbing with some tense quality of mystery. The men themselves were suspicious, irritable. Never was the air in any factory more surcharged alike with ignorance and with anxiety. Man after man, good mechanic though he was, quit the place simply because he did not know what he was doing. The feeling of mystery was tense, oppressive.

On one certain Sunday morning Jim Sullivan strolled over to the vacant factory. He knew that the superintendent had spent almost the entire night there working alone on one of these mysterious machines. It stood there now. And—yes! it was different from what it had been when Sullivan last saw it! It was now apparently complete, so far as he could tell. There was no one near it. Halsey had gone home, to bed. Of late he had been very tired, pale, haggard; and he always was at his work in the factory, when good men slept, and knew light-winged dreams.

VI

Jim Sullivan, stood now looking at the grim, uncanny machine, hands in his pockets, wondering. He looked about him, superstitiously. There seemed to be something in the air, he could not explain what. He turned, looking behind him, and tiptoed to the front door, where Tim Carney, the blue-coated guardian, stood leaning against the wall.

"Tim!" he whispered, although there was none to hear. "Come on in here!"

"What is it, Jim?" asked the watchman.

"I dunno; that's why I'm callin' you."

"Has anny wan broke into th' place?"

"Not as I know, but somethin's happened here. I'm figurin' 'twas the boss done it. Come in and have a luk, now. He's gone home."

They stepped gingerly on across the floor, along the row of unfinished machines, and paused at the one farthest from the door, which had excited Jim's curiosity.

"Here's where the boss worked all last night!" whispered the foreman hoarsely. "'Twas daybreak when he come home, an' he was all in. He's been workin' on her before now, I know that. I'm thinkin' she's about done, belike!"

"Whatever kind of a spook joint is this, anyhow, Jim?" demanded the watchman. "What's she for, do ye think now?" They two, bullet-headed, hairy, heavy and powerful, stood looking at this contrivance, whose growth through many months they had been watching. The value of it either could measure in comprehensible terms. It was worth ten thousand dollars to either of them who would—and could—tell a certain man how it was made.

"I dunno what she's for," answered Jim slowly, "but I'm thinkin' it's no good at all. It's the devil, maylike. Not that she's so big neither. I could almost turn her over with a pinch bar." He pointed to an arm, or lever, which stood at the side of the machine. "She looks somethin' like one o' them drills I used to run in th' tunnel, time Hogan was mayor, do ye mind? Whin we wanted to throw her in we pushed down an arm, somethin' like this."

"Sure, Jim, 'tis you have the head fer machines. I dunno about thim at all," rejoined Tim, scratching his head. "But 'tis a shame we can't throw her in, now. Manny a time I've wondered what 'twas all about in here. Why shud strangers be so anxious as to—"

"She luks like a patent gate in a fince, as much as annything else," commented Jim. "But as fer throwin' her in, how cud we? She's attached to nothin' at all, so there's nothin' to throw her into. She's got no wire or cord runnin' to her, unless belike it comes up through the flure. She looks like she was some sort of motor, but how she's to run I dunno. Now if she was geared to annything, you cud throw her in, most-like, by this thing here. It luks like she was done, and if she is, I don't know why the boss wud go away and leave the roof open over her." He pointed to a sliding window in the roof directly above the machine. He then reached out and swung some of his weight upon the end of the engaged arm or lever. Then, to the joint surprise of the two observers, a very singular thing forthwith occurred.

VII

What happened, as nearly as either of them later could describe it, might have been called a duplication in large of the phenomena of Halsey's original motor, with which he burst the fan in the railway office at St. Louis. There was a low crackling in the air, a dancing series of blue flame points along the toothed ridge. Then began a low purr, as of a motor in full operation. They could see sparks emitted, somewhere at the interior of the intricate machinery. A living, splitting, crackling roar filled the air about them—the roar of the shackled river, far away, raging at the violence done it! A projecting shaft, fitted with a pulley head, began to revolve, faster and faster, until its speed left it apparently motionless.

Something had happened, they knew not what. The machine was alive! Some force seemed to come down out of the air, to locate itself somewhere within this intricate mechanism. They stood, two bullet-headed, hairy, powerful men, looking at what they had done.

"Do ye mind that now?" gasped Jim Sullivan, and wrenched at the lever, restoring it to its original position. The purring of the motor ceased, the blue sparks disappeared, the roar subsided growlingly.

VIII

"What was it?" demanded Tim Carney. "Throw her in again, Jim!"

"Not on yer life!" gasped Jim Sullivan. "I dunno what 'tis, but I'll take no chances with the divil an' his works, on a Sunday leastways. There's somethin' wrong in here, I'm tellin' you, Tim. What made her go, I dunno. She's under power, same like a compressed air drill—but where'd she git her power?—the divil's in it, that's all, Tim. I'm thinkin' the best we can, do is to git away from here. Come, shut the dure—an' watch it. Me, I'm goin' to the praste ag'in this very day! I see now what that felly wanted!"

Jim Sullivan locked the door and left his friend guarding it; then hurried across the street to the superintendent's cottage. Mrs. Sullivan, busy there about her morning duties, would have stopped him, but Jim would have no denial, and hastening up the stairs to Halsey's bedroom, impetuously demanded entrance. Halsey, drawn, haggard, unshorn, greeted him, half sitting up in bed.

"What's wrong, Jim?" he demanded. "Has anybody got into the works?"

"Hush, boy!" said Jim, his finger on his lips. "You need tell me nothin'. But I know what it's all about."

Halsey sat looking at him dumbly.

"Fire me if you like, my son," went on Jim Sullivan. "'Tis true I've done what I had no right to do. Mr. Halsey, sir, I throwed her in!"

"You did what?"

"I throwed her in. An' she worked—she worked like a bird! Then I throwed her out ag'in an' come away an' locked the door. Tim was there, too. 'Tis none of my business. But I've come to tell you the truth, an' you can fire me if you like! But it's hell, it's harnessed hell ye've got in there. An' others want to stale it."

By this time Halsey was getting into his clothing and only half listening to what his foreman said.

"What kills me is, I can't see how she works! She runs by herself all the time, chuggin' like a fire ingin. But where does she git it?"

Halsey made no answer. He was pale as a dead man. A few moments later they were hurrying down the stair, across the street, and through the long, deserted room with its rows of gaunt enginery. They stood before the completed receiver, whose motor so perfectly had caught the power of the free second current from the air—John Rawn's costless, stolen Power.

"What makes her go?" demanded Jim Sullivan. "Fer what is the hole in the roof yon?"

Halsey turned to him. "It's the Mississippi River makes it go, Jim. If we didn't leave a hole in the roof how could the river get through? Now do you understand?"

"My boy," said Jim kindly, laying a large hand on his shoulder, "you're off your nut, of course. I don't blame ye, workin' so long as ye have, an' worryin'. 'Tis a rest ye must be takin' now, or they'll be puttin' ye in the bughouse fer fair!"

"You're right!" said Halsey. "I think I'll just take a little ride this afternoon. Jim, come here and help me. I want to see if we can charge up this electric car. If I can do that, Jim, my boy, I'll be richer by six o'clock than either of us ever dreamed of being!"

Shaking his head dubiously, the big foreman lent a hand, and between them they managed to roll the car into place.

"Want to throw her down again, Jim?" demanded Halsey, motioning to the lever and grinning. That worthy shook his head.

"I'm scared of her, Mr. Halsey, that I am!"

"And well you may be!" was Halsey's comment. He himself threw down an arm on the opposite side of the receiver. This time the motor did not resume its purring, the shaft did not revolve.

"She's bruk!" said Jim. Halsey only pointed to the blue tips of toothed ridge. "No," said he, "she's only doing another part of her work. The power is going into the auto's motor instead of this. Two forms, you see, Jim."

A faint spark showed at the transmitter connection. "Come!" said Halsey. "Let her work! We don't need to now."

IX

That afternoon, Charles Halsey took his seat at the steering wheel of an electric car which had been charged with power taken from the air without wire transmission. His task was done. He had accomplished what he had started out to do. Throbbing beneath him was Power, the power of yonder distant silent partner, power taken from the earth, and the air, and the water; power of the elements; and power now definite, segregant, merchantable!

Halsey kicked in the gear and rolled out into the street. Pale, preoccupied, he hardly noted where he was going; but found himself half automatically directing the car through a maze of ill-paved, crowded thoroughfares; until at length he reached the West-Side boulevard system. Thence he crossed the river to the East, and headed north. Strong and true, under a limit charge, the motor purred beneath him. The mechanism of the car operated without defect. Nothing in the least seemed wrong at any particular, nor did the car in any particular differ in appearance from others of its humble and inconspicuous class.

X

None the less, midway of one of the large parks along the lake shore, young Halsey suddenly disengaged the gear, cut off his power, and applied the brakes. He was perhaps half way from his home on the journey to Graystone Hall.... For a little time he sat in the car, pale, almost motionless, deep in thought; careless of the passing throng of other vehicles, the occupants of which regarded him curiously. Then, suddenly, he threw in the gear again, turned on the current; and, quickly turning about, retraced his course. He had been gone less than an hour when he stood once more at the curb of his cottage near the factory in the western suburb of the city.

"So you're back again, sir!" commented Jim Sullivan. "An' did ye get all that sudden wealth ye was tellin' me about, at all?"

Halsey sat staring at him for a time. "No," said he, "I've changed my mind. I'm going to wait a while."

The foreman turned and tiptoed off to find his wife. "Annie," said he, his voice low and anxious, "try if ye can get the boss to bed, an' make him sleep as long as ever he can. He's goin' off his head, an' talkin' like a fool. Somethin's wrong here, that's sure! Hell's goin' to break loose, in yon facth'ry some day. But whativer comes, the boss is crazy!"

CHAPTER IV
THE BAKER'S DAUGHTER

I

A large part of our ambitious American population is prone boastfully to ascribe its origin to one or other of those highly respectable, if really little known monarchs to whom is commonly accorded the foundation of Old World nobilities. We have built up a pretty fiction regarding so-called blue blood, on the flattering, but wholly unsupported supposition that royal qualities are transmissible to the thirtieth and fortieth generation; so that 'tis a poor American family indeed can not boast its coat of arms, harking back to royal days of Charlemagne or William the Conqueror. It may be. Their Majesties were active, morganatically at least no doubt, much-married men!

But continually there arise disturbing instances to upset us in our beliefs regarding aristocracy. There are so very many worthless aristocrats, in whom the theory of descent did not work out according to accepted schedule; and there are so very many worthy but wholly disconcerting men who are not aristocrats—so continually do Lincolns arise who, claiming nothing of birth or breeding, show themselves to be possessed of manhood, show themselves, moreover, masters of those instincts and practices which go with the much-abused title of gentleman; a matter in which not all descendants of Charles or William join them.

II

It is well known among theatrical managers that no real lady can imitate a real lady. The highest salaries in ladies' theatrical rôles are paid to ladies who are not ladies, but who play the parts of ladies as they think ladies really would act in actual life. If you seek a woman to carry off a gown, one to assume such really regal air as shall bring the name of William or Charlemagne impulsive to your lips, find one still owning not more than one of the requisite three generations which are set as the lowest limit for the production of a gentleman or a lady.

Continually in our American aristocracy—and in that, par consequence, of Europe—we find ladies whose fathers were laborers, shop-keepers, soap-makers, butchers, this or that, anything you like. So only they had money, they did as well as any to wear European coronets, to assist at royal coronations. And, having proved their powers in swift forgetfulness, they offer as good proof as any, of the scientific fact that gentleness of heart and soul and conduct are not things transmissible even to the third or fourth generation, either in America or Europe. Your real aristocrat perhaps after all, is made, not born.

As to Virginia Delaware, daughter of the baker, John Dahlen, in St. Louis, she started out in life with the deliberate intent of being a lady, knowing very well that this is America, where all things come to him or her who does not wait. In some way, as has been said, she had achieved graduation at a famous school where the art of being a lady is dispensed. She had, indeed, even now and then seen a lady in real life; not to mention many supposed ladies in theatrical life, playing the part as to them seemed fit, and far better than any lady could.

III

The soul finds its outward expression in the body. The ambition shapes the soul. It was wholly logical and natural that, having her particular ambition—that of many American girls—Virginia Delaware should grow up tall, dignified, beautiful, composed, self-restraining, kindly, gracious; these being qualities which in her training were accepted as properly pertaining and belonging to all aristocrats. We have already seen that, put to the test, in the midst of our best aristocrats—those who frequent the most highly gilded and glazed hotels in New York—she was accepted unhesitatingly as of the charmed circle, even by the head waiters. Had you yourself seen her upon the Chicago streets, passing to her daily occupation, you also in all likelihood would have commented upon her as a rich young woman, and one of birth, breeding and beauty. We have spoken somewhat regarding the futility of mottoes and maxims in the case of an ambitious man. As much might be said regarding their lack of applicability to the needs of an ambitious woman. Virginia Delaware would have made her own maxims, had she needed any; and had she been obliged to choose a coat of arms, she surely would have selected the Christian motto of "Onward and Upward."

IV

The best aid in any ambition lies in the intensity of that ambition. We all are what we really desire to be, each can have what he really covets, if he will pay the price for it. In her gentleness with her associates, in her dignity and composure with her employer, in her conduct upon the street and in the crowded car, in all situations and conditions arising in her life, Virginia Delaware diligently played the part of lady as best she comprehended that; because she had the intense ambition to be a lady. She continually was in training. Moreover, she had that self-restraint which has been owned by every woman who ever reached any high place in history. She kept herself in hand, and she held herself not cheap. Likewise, after the fashion of all successful politicians, she cast aside acquaintances who might be pleasant but who probably would be of little use, and pinned her faith to those who promised to be of future value. Such a woman as that can not be stopped—unless she shall, unfortunately, fall in love.

If there was calumny, Virginia Delaware heeded it not. She accosted all graciously and with dignity, as a lady should. And all this time her great personal beauty increased to such point as to drive most of her fair associates about the headquarters' offices to the verge of rage. To be beautiful and aristocratic both assuredly is to invite hatred! It is almost as bad as to be rich. Miss Delaware allowed hatred to run its course unnoted. She needed no maxims over her desk, required no ancestral coat of arms. She was an aristocrat, and meant to be accepted as such. In all likelihood—though simple folk may not read a woman's mind—she saw further into the future than did John Rawn himself.

There remained, then, as against the ambition of Virginia Delaware, the one pitfall of love, and even this she easily avoided. Beautiful as she unquestionably was, admired as she certainly was, if there had been fire in this girl's heart for any man, she kept it either extinguished or well banked for a later time. She had gently declined the heart and hand of every male clerk in the office. She had chosen her own ways, and was not to be diverted. Cool, ambitious, perfectly in hand, she went her way, and bided her time.

Cool, ambitious, perfectly in hand, John Rawn also went his way in life. Two more ambitious souls than these, or two more alike, you scarcely could have found in all the descendants of the two bucaneer-monarchs we have named.

V

And Rawn continually found something responsive in the soul of this young woman, something that never found its way into speech on either side. She was the type of devotion and of efficiency. Gently, without any ostentation, she took upon herself a vast burden of detail; and she added thereto an unobtrusive personal service upon which Rawn unconsciously came more and more to depend. Did he lack any little accustomed implement or appliance, she found it for him forthwith. Did he forget a name, a date, a filing record, it was she who supplied it out of a memory infallible as a fine machine. From this, it was but an easy step to the point where the young woman's unobtrusive aid became useful even beyond business hours. John Rawn had never studied to play in any social rôle. Did he need counsel in any social situation, she, tactfully hesitant and modest, always was ready to tell him what he should do, what others should do. Had he an appointment, it was she who reminded him of it, and it was she who had made it. Were there personal bills to pay, it was she who paid them. She presided over his personal bank account, and there was no hour when she could not have named the dollars and cents in his balance. Did he wish to avoid an unwelcome visitor, it was arranged for him delicately and without offense. Little by little, she had become indispensable, both in a business and a social way—a fact which John Rawn did not fully realize, but which she knew perfectly well. It had never been within her plan to be anything less than that. She knew, although he did not, that John Rawn also was indispensable to her.

Rawn came from no social station himself, and as we have seen, had grown up ignorant of conventional life, so that now he remained careless of it, as had he originally. He made it matter of routine now that this young woman should attend in all his visits to the East in business matters—where, in short, he could not have got along without her. There was talk over this—unjust talk—and much amused comment on the fact that the two seemed so inseparable. Rawn did not know or note it. They literally were running together, hunting in couple in the great chase of ambition. Few knew now what the salary of the president's private secretary represented in round figures. Certainly she dressed as a lady. Certainly also she comported herself as one. It was, in the opinion of John Rawn, no one's business that he registered himself at the New York hotels, and either did not register his companion at all, or else contented himself with the wholly descriptive word "Lady" opposite the number of the room whose bills he told the clerk to charge to his account.

VI

Never was there the slightest ground for suspicion of actual impropriety between John Rawn and Miss Delaware. Abundance of bad taste there certainly was, for Rawn, without explanation or apology to any, always ate in company of his assistant, was constantly seen with her on the streets, at the opera, the play. He showed, in short, that he found her society wholly agreeable upon every possible occasion. If this was in bad taste, if many or most, in the usual guess, put it at the point of impropriety, John Rawn gave himself no concern. The Rawn aristocracy began in him. He founded it, was its Charlemagne, its William the Conqueror, as ruthless, as regardless of others, as selfish, as megalomaniac as the best of kings. Here, therefore, were two aristocrats! They ran well in couple.

It is not to be supposed that a girl so shrewd as Virginia Delaware could fail to realize the full import of all this. She let the slings and arrows fall upon the buckler of her perfect dignity and her perfect beauty, but she felt their impact. She was perfectly in hand, knew perfectly well her mind, knew perfectly well the price she must pay. She let matters take their course, knowing that they were advancing safely and surely in one direction, that which she desired. She was more skilled in human nature than her employer, saw deeper into a man's heart than he had ever looked into a woman's!

And then, at last, the life schedule of Virginia Delaware was verified. At last, the inevitable happened.

VII

On one of these many trips to New York, Miss Delaware had been alone in her apartments at the hotel for most of the afternoon. In the evening, before the dinner hour, she was summoned to meet Mr. Rawn in one of the hotel parlors. At once she noted his suppressed excitement. He scarce could wait until they were alone, in a far corner of the room, before explaining to her the cause.

"I don't like to say this, Miss Delaware," he began, "but I've got to do it!"

"What do you mean, Mr. Rawn?" she replied in her usual low and clear tones.

"There's been talk!"

"Talk? About what?"

"Us!"

"About us? What can you mean, Mr. Rawn?" she asked.

"The world is so confoundedly small, my dear girl, that it seems everything you do is known by everybody else. Of course, a man like myself is in the public eye; but we've always minded our business, and it ought not to have been anybody else's business beyond that."

"You disturb me, Mr. Rawn! What has happened?"

"—But now, to-night, now—just a little while ago—I met this fellow Ackerman—you know him—big man in the company—used to be general traffic manager down in St. Louis, on the old railroad where I began—well, he was drunk, and he talked."

"What could he say?"

"He got me by the coat collar and proceeded to tell me how much—how much—well, to tell the truth, he connected your name and mine. If he wasn't drunk—and a director—I'd go down there yet and smash his face for him! What business was it of his? Of course, men don't mind such things so much. But when it comes to you—why, my dear girl!"

VIII

The truth has already been stated regarding John Rawn; that, batrachian, half-dormant for almost half a century, and then putting into business what energy most men put into love and sex, he had passed a life of singular innocence, or ignorance, as to womankind. He had never countenanced much gossip about women, because he had little interest in the topic. The grande passion marks most of us for its own now and again, or is to be feared now and again; but the grande passion had passed by John Rawn. He was now approaching fifty years of age. Married he had been, and divorced; but he had not yet been in love.

He now spoke to his like, his mate in the hunt, of the opposite sex, a young woman who at that very moment was as beautiful a creature as might have been found on all Manhattan, a woman known in all Manhattan now as the mysterious "Lady of the Lightnings," the goddess of the stock certificates of one of the most mammoth American corporations, a creature over whom Manhattan's most critical libertines were crazed—and helpless; moreover, a woman who, out of all those in the great caravanserai at that moment, might as well as any have been chosen as the very type of gentle breeding and of gentle womanhood alike. But she had not yet been in love.

IX

"I don't understand, Mr. Rawn," repeated she slowly. "What possible ground could Mr. Ackerman have had? You surely don't think he could have spoken to any one else?"

"I wouldn't put that past Ackerman when he's drunk. If he'd talk to me, he would to others. And you know perfectly well that when talk begins about a woman, it never stops!"

"No, that is the cruel part of it."

Her voice trembled just enough, her eyes became just sufficiently and discreetly moist; she choked a little, just sufficiently.

"It is cruel," she said, with a pathetic little sigh, "but the hand of every man seems to be against a woman. Did you ever stop to think, Mr. Rawn, how helpless, how hopeless, we really are, we women?"

He flung himself closer upon the couch beside her, his face troubled, as she went on with her gentle protest.

"All my life I've done right as nearly as I knew, Mr. Rawn. Perhaps I was wrong in coming to trust so much to you—to depend on you so much. It all seemed so natural, that I've just let matters go on, almost without any thought. I've only been anxious to do my work—that was all. But this cruel talk about us—well—it can have but one end. I must go."

"Go? Leave me? You'll do nothing of the sort! I'll take care of this thing myself, I say—I'll stand between you and all that sort of talk."

"Mr. Rawn, I don't understand you."

X

They sat close together on this brocaded couch among many other brocaded couches. Crystal and color and gilt and ivory were all about them; pictures, works of art in bronze and marble and costly porcelains. The air was heavy with fragrance, dripping with soft melody of distant music. She was beautiful, a beautiful young woman. He caught one glance into her wide, pathetic eyes ere she turned and bent her head. He caught the fragrance of her hair—that strange fragrance of a woman's hair. Dejected, drooping as she sat, her hands clasped loosely in her lap, he could see the bent column of her beautiful white neck, the curve of her beautiful shoulders, white, flawless.

The flower on her bosom rose and fell in her emotion. She was a woman. She was beautiful. She was young. Something subtle, powerful, mysterious, stole into the air.

She was a woman!

Suddenly this thought came to John Rawn like a sudden blow in the face. It came in a sense hitherto unknown to him in all his life. Now he understood what life might be, saw what delight might be! He saw now that all along he had admired this girl and only been unconscious of his admiration. God! what had he lost, all these years! He, John Rawn, had lived all these years, and had not loved!

He reached out timidly and touched her round white arm, to attract her attention. She flinched from him a trifle, and he also from her. Fire ran through his veins as from a cup of wine, heady and strong. He was a boy, a young man discovering life. The glory of life, the reason, had been here all this time, and he had not suspected it. What deed for pity had been wrought! He, John Rawn, never before had known what love might be! He was the last man on Manhattan to go mad over Virginia Delaware.

She drew back from, him, seeing the flush upon his face, color rising to her own. Indeed, the power of the man, his sudden vast passion, were not lost upon her, different as he was from the idol of a young girl's dreams. But Virginia Delaware saw more than the physical image of this man beside her. She knew what he had to share, what power, what wealth, what station. She knew well enough what John Rawn could do; and she gaged her own value to him by the flush on his face, the glitter in his eye.

For one moment she paused. For one moment heredity, the way of her own people, had its way. For one moment she saw another face, different from this flushed and corded one bent near. It was for but a moment; then ambition once more took charge of her soul and her body alike.

XI

The net was thrown. Silently, gently, she tightened its edges with the silken cords. He loved her. The rest was simple. She saw the world unrolling before her like a scroll. All else was but matter of detail. Above all, she exulted in her strength at this crucial moment. She knew that love is dangerous for a woman, always had feared, as any woman may, that love might sweep her away from her own safe moorings. She rejoiced now to see this danger past, rejoiced to find her pulses cool and even, her voice under control, herself mistress of herself. She did not love him.

But she drew back now apparently startled, apprehensive. "We must go, Mr. Rawn," she said; and would have risen.

He put out a hand, almost rude in its vehemence. "You shall not go! I've got to tell you. Sit down! Listen! We'll separate in one way, yes. You're done now with your clerking days for ever. But you're going to be my wife. I want you; and, by God, I love you!"

His voice rose until she was almost alarmed. She looked about in real apprehension. She turned, to see John Rawn's face convulsed, suffused, his protruding lower lip trembling, his eyes almost ready to burst into tears. She might almost have smiled, so easily was it all done for her. Yet this baker's daughter dared to make no mistake in a situation such as this!

"Mr. Rawn," she began, casting down her eyes, although she allowed him to retain her hand, "what can you mean? Surely you must be in jest. Have you no regard for a poor girl who is trying to make her way in the world? I've done my best—and now—"

"Make your way in the world! What do you mean? It's made now! Look down the list as far as you like. Is there anywhere you want to go? Is there anything you want to do? Can you think of anything I'll not get for you? Look at your neck, your hands—you've worn those jewels almost ever since you selected them, and no one else has, though I told you once there was a string to them. There's no string to them now. The first time you wore them, down there in the dining-room, below, I told you they were not yours, that they were only loaned to you for one night, that we were only both of us masquerading, trying ourselves out! I told you then you'd do; but I didn't know what I meant. I don't believe I loved you then, although now it seems I always have. I know I always will. Those things are nothing—you shall have everything you want—handfuls of jewels. There's nothing you want to do that you shall not do. You can't dream of anything that I'll not get for you! You were made for me in every way in the world—every little way, as I've come to know, little by little, all this time. But now, to-night, it's all come over me at once. I don't know that I planned, when I came here, to do more than to stand between you and talk! But—this—caught me all at once, I don't know how. It's the truth before God! I never loved a woman before now—I didn't know what it was. Virginia—Jennie—girl—I love you! We're going to be married to-morrow!"

"Mr. Rawn," she said, her voice trembling, "I must ask you to consider well before you make any mistake—a mistake which would mean everything for—for me. You have no right to jest."

"I'll show you who's in earnest!" he retorted, his hand cruelly hard on her wrist as he forced her back into the seat. "We'll go home from here as man and wife, that's what we'll do. We'll go from the train, not to the office, but to Graystone Hall. I'll find a preacher in the morning here. It's wonderful! I love you! If they want to talk, we'll give them something to talk about! Let them come to the Little Church Around the Corner—to-morrow—and see us, you and me!"

He had both her hands in his large ones now, and was looking into her eyes, intoxicated, mad. She leaned just gently toward him. Forgetful of their situation, he caught her in his arms, and kissed her full.

XII

"Mr. Rawn, how could you!" she said at last, softly, seeking to disengage her hand. "It's like a dream! I have worked so hard, so long. Life has had so little for me!"

"But you love me—you can?" he demanded.

"Oh, Mr. Rawn!" she said, lifting her eyes to his face, then gently turning them aside.

"You do—you have—tell me! Confess it!"

She laughed now, ripplingly, her color rising, and at least was spared that instance of her perjury. John Rawn accepted it as her oath.

They parted after a time, she scarce remembered how, he to a couch which knew no sleep, she to one that long remained untouched.

In her own room Virginia Delaware stood for a long time before her mirror, in silent questioning of herself, her brows just drawn into a faint vertical frown. At last she nodded approvingly, satisfied that she would do. A wave of sensuousness, of delight in her own triumph, swept across her. She stood straight, swung back her shoulders, gazed at the superb image in the glass through half-shut eyes. There was no question of it! She was a very beautiful woman, stately, gracious—and aristocratic. So. It was done. She had won. She caught glimpses of the jewels blazing at her throat. She removed them and tossed them lightly on the dresser top as she turned to call for her maid.

"Madam is very beautiful to-night," ventured that tactful creature when at last she had performed her closing duties for the day.

Virginia Delaware looked down upon her with the amused tolerance of the superior classes.

"You may perhaps find a little silver on the dresser, maid," said she graciously.

END OF BOOK THREE

BOOK FOUR

CHAPTER I
THE ROYAL PROGRESS OF MR. AND MRS. RAWN

I

So they were married. Graystone Hall at last had a mistress worthy of its architect and decorator when—love and affection and other good considerations moving thereto, as the law hath it—the new Mrs. Rawn moved into the place of the old Mrs. Rawn. Thereafter matters went at least as merry as most marriage bells celebrating the nuptials of middle age and youth, of wealth and beauty.

As Mr. Rawn had spent a million dollars to free himself from one wife, he seemed willing to spend much more in the process of taking on another. It became current rumor that the one great diamond show of the western city was Virginia Rawn. The sobriquet, "The Lady of the Lightnings," passed from New York to Chicago and became permanent there. Not that that lady delighted in display; but there were occasional operatic or theatrical events which demanded compliance with her husband's wishes, in which event she blazed almost better than the best.

But, gradually, she showed the tastes of the aristocrat, as alien to vulgar display as to crude manners. Gradually the tone, color, atmosphere, of Graystone Hall began to change. The porcelains which Virginia Rawn purchased were not large and gorgeous, but a connoisseur would have called them worthy. The vast and brilliantly framed paintings came down one by one, and one by one masterpieces went up, selected by one who knew. The walks, the grounds, took on simpler and cleaner lines. Rawn of the International got a new credit as a person of taste. He was accepted as a collector, a patron of the arts, a connoisseur, in fact, yet more a worthy and a rising citizen.

The hospitality of Mr. Rawn's mansion house also now increased perceptibly, and, delighted that at last numbers came to see him, Mr. Rawn at first did not analyze those numbers very closely. Even the fastidious, many of whom came to be amused, were unanimous in the feeling that Mr. Rawn's house, its furnishings, its decorations, its pictures, its works of art, its hospitality also, were beyond reproach. The trace of gaucherie was gone. The spirit of the place was delicately reserved, dignified, yet well assured. The seal of approval was placed upon Graystone Hall. Who, indeed, should smile at the man who had made so meteoric a rise, who had by a few years of labor become master of this mansion, its furnishings and its mistress? Who, upon the other hand, might smile at that mistress, whose appearance upon the front page of the leading journals of the city became now a matter of course—a lady of such reserved tastes as led her to forsake the larger marts, and to set the seal of fashionable approval upon a little florist, a little modiste, a little milliner all her own—even a little surgeon hither-to unknown, who honored a little hospital and made it fashionable, by taking there this distinguished patient for a little operation?

II

Rawn himself expanded in all this social success. He saw doors hitherto closed, opening before him, saw his future unrolling before him also like a scroll. A hundred times a week he walked to his young wife, caught her in his arms, uxoriously infatuated with her youth, her beauty, her aplomb, her fitness for this life which he had chosen. For once he almost forgot to regard himself as a collector of beautiful objects, although the truth was that his wife, Virginia, became more beautiful each day, more superb of line, more calmly easy in air, more nearly faultless of garb and demeanor. She took her place easily and surely among the young matrons of the wealthier circles of the western city. Whereas thousands of auto-cars had passed by Graystone Hall and only a dozen stopped, scores now, of the largest, drove up its winding walks and halted at its doors. The dearest dream of both seemed realized. The hunt in couple had won! They had gained what they desired; that is to say, self-indulgence, ease, idleness, adulation, freedom from care. What more is there to seek? And is not this America?

Gradually John Rawn had been losing the rusticity which had accompanied him well up to middle age. The city now began to leave its imprint. The waistcoat of Mr. Rawn gradually attained a curve unknown to it in earlier years, so that his watch fob now hung in free air when he stood erect. His face was perhaps more florid, his hair certainly more gray. His skin remained fresh and clean, and always he was well-groomed, having the able assistance of his wife now in the selection of his tailoring, as well as her coaching in social usage. They always looked their part. At morning, at noon, or at dewy eve, in any assemblage or any chance situation, they both played in the rôle assigned to them in their own ambitions. Born of environment wholly unconventional, they now took on that of conventionality as though born to that instead. You could not have found a more perfect type of respectability than John Rawn, a more absolutely valid exemplar of good social form than his wife, Virginia. All things prospered under their magic touch, the genii of the lamp seemed theirs. No problems remained for them to solve. They had in their own belief attained what may be attained in American life, and they were happy. Or, that is to say, they should at least have been happy, if their theory of life and success, and of those like to theirs, be correct. At least they were what they were—products of a wonderful country which makes millionaires overnight and produces out of bakeries women of one generation fit to be the wives of princes born of forty kings.

III

We are, some of us at least, accustomed to worship such as these as they ride by upon the high car of success, accustomed to envy and to emulate them. If that vehicle be the car of Juggernaut, crushing under its wheels multitudes of those who worship, it is no concern of those who sit aloft. For a long time Mr. Rawn and his wife remained ignorant of the fact that one victim under the wheels of their success was none other than Mr. Rawn's daughter, Grace.

Alas! for that young lady. She unfortunately had been now for almost a year an aspirant in her own right to a seat upon the car of ease and luxury; yet here she saw herself swiftly supplanted, and worse than that, swiftly forgotten! Her year of quasi-place and power had left her unwilling to return to her own humble home. She remained on at Graystone Hall, now rarely visited by her husband. She found herself calmly accepted, yet calmly neglected as well. Very naturally she hated the new Mrs. Rawn with all her soul; a hatred which that lady repaid with nothing better than a straight look into Grace's dark eyes, a look innocent, calm, and wholly fearless. Grace must now see the very jewels her own mother should have worn, blazing at the neck and hands of her stepmother; must see that lady taking assuredly and as of right, what Grace could now never ask or expect for herself. With an unapproachable and wholly hateful air of distinction and good breeding which rankled most of all in crude Mrs. Halsey's heart, Virginia Rawn sat high on the car of Juggernaut; and the car of Juggernaut passed on. In pride and delight over his young wife, John Rawn really forgot his daughter. The young new wife did the same, or appeared to do so.

IV

John Rawn had told the truth to his wife when first he had declared his sentiments toward her—he never before that time really had known love, or at least had not known infatuated love such as that he felt for her. He exulted in the vistas of delight which he saw before them, fancying them endless. The very sight of his wife, cool, faultless, self-possessed, haughty, filled him with a sense of his own importance, making him feel that he was one of God's chosen. She was his, he had found her, discovered her, collected her. She was his to put upon a pedestal, to admire, to display, to worship, to load down with jewels. He had something now which other men coveted and envied. He flaunted his ownership of such a woman in their faces. What more can a rich man do than that same? Is that not the dream and test of power—to secure what others may not have, to secure special privileges in this life? And is not the quest of beauty the first business of him who has attained power? Of all these special privileges which had come to John Rawn so swiftly in these late rapid years, none so delicately and warmly filled his heart as that of being able to call Virginia Rawn his own. Why blame him? The sultans of thirty or forty generations have devised nothing better than this test of power.

John Rawn, with all properly aristocratic leanings toward sultanry, lacked certain elements of sultanhood in strength, but had others in weakness. He did not know that in reality he was in the hands of a stronger nature than his own. "She's got him jumping through hoops," was the comment of one young man. "He'll sit up and bark whenever she gives the word!" But Rawn did not know that he was barking and jumping, his tongue hanging out excitedly. In all his mental pictures of himself he fancied himself to be a figure of dignity, of strength, indeed of majesty.

CHAPTER II
FOUR BEING NO COMPANY

I

Happy in his newly-found domestic delights, Mr. Rawn was perhaps more careless than otherwise he would have been regarding business affairs, and that at a time when they needed care. The truth was that matters still lagged at the factory, as Rawn ought to have known. Indeed, he did know; but always his curious helplessness in regard to Halsey—who alone knew the last secrets of the most intricate devices of the company's property—continued to oppress him. And always here was his wife to console him and to interest him.

The distance between Graystone Hall and the factory apparently was becoming greater from month to month. Sometimes Halsey came to visit his wife, but these visits of late became fewer and fewer, as that lady became more and more discontented, less and less eager to receive the attentions of him who had so signally failed to place her where Virginia sat in power. This alone left Halsey none too happy himself at the prospect of any of his perfunctory calls; and moreover, he found himself expected now to be more careful in his attire, in his conduct about Graystone Hall, where full evening dress tacitly was desired at dinner, and where an aristocratic chill was habitual at any hour; things not customary in Ann Sullivan's household on the factory side of the city. Not that Halsey needed to excite social misgivings. He was a clean-faced, manly chap, lean, sinewy and strong, and might, save for his rather toil-marked hands, have passed for any of the throng of young men who at times came under one pretense or other to visit Mr.—and Mrs.—Rawn.

II

These, in company with Grace, he one evening found alone, seated on the wide gallery that overlooked the lake front. He did notice then, as he never before at any time had noticed, a singular truth—Virginia Rawn's eyes seemed almost reluctant to leave him. He was half her husband's age. Moreover, there was something in the somber glow of his eye, in the occasional look of his face—rapt, absorbed, remote, pondering on things not made patent to all about him—which held for her ever a stronger fascination. She wondered if things were known in his philosophy no longer reckoned in her own; but which once might have been germane to her as well. She often looked at him.

The evening was clear and cool, the lake stirred with no more than a gentle breeze. The silver ladder of the moon's light was flung down across the gently moving waters. The breath of flowers was all about. Calm, ease, assuredness were here. The voice of the hostess was delightfully low and sweet. All things seemed in keeping.

Rawn welcomed his son-in-law with his customary largeness of air. "Come on out, Charles," said he, "join us; the evening is pleasant. Won't you have a cigar?" He fetched with his own hands the box of weeds—"Take several, my boy, take as many as you like. I give two dollars apiece for these by the box at my club, and you can't beat them in the city or anywhere else."

Halsey listened almost absent-mindedly, and Rawn returned to his seat near his wife, a little apart on the gallery. The master of Graystone Hall was intoxicated more than usually this evening with her. She sat now in the dim light, a cool, dainty and beautiful picture, in blue and ivory Duchesse satin and filmy laces, gowned fit for a wedding or a ball, as she always was of an evening at home, with just a gem gleaming here and there in the occasional glimpse of light which broke through the windows at the back of the gallery as their curtains shifted in the breeze. At that moment John Rawn would have been glad to have the entire world share boxes of cigars with him. John Rawn, collector—what man on all the North Shore Drive at that moment could claim such surroundings as these?

"I thank you, Mr. Rawn," said Halsey, taking a single cigar from the box which his host had placed upon the near-by tabouret. "I think I'll be content with one. I mustn't get into bad habits; I'm afraid Jim Sullivan and I can't afford them at two dollars apiece just yet!"

III

He moved now quietly and dutifully apart toward the end of the gallery where sat a less resplendent figure, that of his wife, Grace. She had not risen to meet him.

"Well," said he, as he sank into a seat beside her.

"Well, then?" she answered, and turned upon him a face dour, inexpressive, pasty, almost frowning.

"Is that all you have to say to me?" she began later, as he sat smoking.

"I haven't had much chance yet," he commented.

"No, I should say not! This is the first time you've been here for four weeks! Have you stopped to think of that? You seem to care little enough how I get on!"

Halsey paused for a moment before replying. "That hardly seems fair to me."

"Why isn't it fair? It's the truth."

"Well, I've been busy all the time, as you know. Besides again, when it comes to that, it doesn't seem to me that you've been altogether anxious to have me come."

"You talk as though you worked day and night and had nothing else to do."

"Well, I suppose I could come over—every night after dinner—wash the soot and the cinders from me, get out my four-hundred-dollar go-cart, and come over here to call on my wife in my thirty-dollar evening togs, couldn't I? She lives in Graystone Hall. Where do I live? What do I get out of life, when it comes to that, Grace? When I do come here, you begin to nag me before I get settled down. I always used to say when I was a young man, that if I ever found myself married to a nagging woman, I'd just quit her!"

"What do you mean by that?" she demanded imperiously.

IV

Again Halsey was deliberate, although he half sighed as he replied: "Pretty much what I say, Mrs. Halsey, since you ask me. The truth is, you quit me when I needed you. I have had worry enough from this business at the factory. I don't particularly care to have all other kinds of worry on top of that. You had all this place to fall back on. Your father's taken care of you. But he hasn't taken care of me very well. The fact is, I've been scapegoat about long enough!"

"You seem to have learned the factory ways of talking!"

"Yes, I don't know but I am getting rather plain, and common, and vulgar. It's a little different here—even from Kelly Row, let alone our place on the West Side. I fancy you're getting the North Shore accent, along with other things.—It all only means that we're that much further apart, Grace. Did you ever stop to think of that?"

"I've had time to think of plenty of things," she answered bitterly.

"You had plenty of time to think of some of them before you came over here," he rejoined. "You didn't like what your husband could offer you, and you chose something better which your father did offer you. You've quit me, practically. You've not been in our home twice since you came to live here. I've seen that poor baby of ours only once in a while since you left our home for this. You've not been a wife to me. That's the truth about it—I might as well not be married! That comes mighty near being the situation, since you put it up to me to answer."

"Then what do you mean?"

"The courts would make it a case of desertion, if you force me to say that," answered Halsey. "Now, I don't want to live on this way for ever! I'm a young man, and my career's ahead of me! I've got to choose regarding my life before long! And I'm going to choose. I'm not going to let things run on in this way any further."

"That's what my father always said! Your career; your life! Where does your wife come in?"

"You come in precisely where you say you want to come in, Grace. We get what we earn in this world. If you leave me and take up a life which I can't share, if you leave my house and don't care for what I can give you—why there's not much left to talk about as to where you come in. You come in here. I belong over there."

"You're selfish! All men are, I think."

"I'm not going to argue about that in the least, Grace, except to say that it's the Rawn half of you that said that. The Rawn half of you can't see anything but its own part of the world. It wasn't the Rawn half of you that I married. You were different, then. You're not much like your mother, Grace! And I married the part of you that was like your mother. She was a good woman, and a good wife."

"You must not speak of her!"

"Oh, yes, I must, and I shall when I like. It's all in evidence. There's the record." He nodded toward the two dim figures at the other end of the gallery. "She's very beautiful, yes, very beautiful!" His eyes lingered on the figure of Virginia Rawn, faintly outlined, cool in satin and laces.

"She'd like to hear you say that!" sneered his wife.

"I perceive, my dear, that you two love each other very much. But as I was saying, you don't seem to me, Grace, to be much like your own mother—you're more like your stepmother, over there, in some ways. Your mother didn't change. She made good—if you'll let me use some more factory slang—on the old ways, on her own old lines. That's what I call class, breeding, blood, if you like—just plain North American sincerity and simplicity. She didn't pretend, she didn't try to climb where she knew she couldn't go. That's what I call blood!"

"Thank you! You're sincere also, at least."

V

He seemed not to hear her. He went on. "But you've changed. You dropped me. Your head was turned with all this sort of thing.... Since these things are true, are you coming back to me?" He found himself wrenching his eyes away from the cool dim figure far down the long gallery.

She straightened up suddenly, pale. "Back!—to that? To live in that hole—?"

"Yes, just back to that, Grace. It's all I have to offer you. Just that hole."

"I'm not happy here."

"Then why do you stay here? Why don't you come back to me?"

"Because I couldn't be happy over there any more, either! I know it. I admit it. It's got me—I couldn't go back to the old ways, the ways we'd have to live. Why can't you come here—why doesn't Pa give us money enough—"

He turned to her now gravely. "I suppose it's the pace—yes, it's got you, and a lot of others. But I'm not taking that sort of money just yet. And that doesn't answer my question. I've come over to-night to arrive at some understanding about us two. I want to know where I am. There are going to be changes, one way or another."

She turned to him suddenly again. "What's wrong over at that factory, Charley?" she asked. "Why haven't you made good before this? My father has been on the point of tearing up things a dozen times! He's sore at you—awfully sore."

"Yes? How do you know I haven't made good?"

"Then why has Pa talked so?"