"Can you give me a few minutes of your time?" he asked, stiffly.
"If it's business, and important, yes," returned Harlan, scowling.
"I should not bother you with anything except business. And as this is of a private nature, I must ask you to invite me to your room."
Harlan led the way to the elevator.
Linton did not remove his overcoat when they were closeted together. He stood with hat in his hand.
"It may surprise you to learn that my business concerns Miss Presson and the legislative ball to-morrow evening," began Linton, but Harlan indignantly broke in.
"You can have no possible business with me, sir, in which Miss
Presson's name may be mentioned. Don't you use her name—not in any way.
Do you understand?"
"I understand this: I know what I'm talking about and exactly why I've come here, and you're going to listen. Miss Presson has accepted your escort to the ball to-morrow evening. Don't you know, Thornton, why you can't take Madeleine Presson into public, this whole State looking on? I hate to say any more than that. I don't think it's necessary for me to say any more than that!" His face was hard, his tone accusing.
"I tell you, you have no right to mention Miss Presson to me!" cried the other.
"I'm taking it on myself, and I'm giving you a chance by doing it," retorted Linton. "The story is bad enough now. But you'll be drummed out of this State if you insult an innocent girl in the way you plan to do."
In his indignation Thornton had been slow to grasp the fact that his rival was making hints that both affronted and threatened. His conscience accused him of nothing. He felt the crackle of paper in his breast-pocket. He promptly suspected that Linton had gleaned a hint of the proposed legislation which would involve Madeleine's father.
He tried to control his anger.
"Will you kindly explain to me by just what right you say this," he sneered—"except, possibly, that you're jealous because Miss Presson chose me as her escort."
"I have a right as a friend of her mother, if nothing else! I am keeping this thing as still as I can for your sake, for in this case protecting you means protecting her. I don't want to say any more! But sudden illness must prevent you from accompanying Miss Presson into public at that ball."
Harlan beat a palm upon his own breast.
"I've had enough of this, Linton. You tell me what you're driving at."
It was plain that Linton hated to be more explicit. This culprit did not seem to quail before vague accusation, as he had expected him to do. He was faced by a young man whose face was lighted by wrath, curiosity, and kindred emotions that were obviously not those of guilt.
"Let me say this in my own defence," pleaded Linton. "Spinney was going right to Mr. and Mrs. Presson with the story. I got it from him almost by accident. We were talking over our railroad bill this evening, and he mentioned your stand. Then he out with the story that he picked up when he was in Fort Canibas. I do not listen to gossip, Mr. Thornton, but it is plain that Spinney has facts. I have inquired in a prudent way of other men from your section. He has the story, but what they say confirms it."
Harlan listened, his blank amazement depriving him of speech.
"I've said enough now, haven't I?" asked Linton, significantly.
"No, by God, you haven't!" shouted the other, coming out of his lethargy of astonishment. The recollection of Spinney's sinister hints came to him. "What do you mean?"
"I mean that a man who will fool and throw over a girl in a way that drives her away from home and friends is no fit escort—"
He got no further. He knew a thoroughly maddened and dangerous man when he saw one. He stepped back when Harlan dashed at him, and Thornton halted of his own accord. After a time he calmed himself enough to speak.
"I'll not begin with you, Linton. I'll begin with the man who started that damnable lie. Oh, that—that—!" He flailed his arms about his head, unable to express himself. "You've been lied to. You don't know any better than to say that. If you hadn't been jealous you'd never have brought the story to me. I'll make allowances," he raved on; "but the man who started that story will swallow it with teeth and blood mixed." He stamped about the room. It was so horrible that he could not grasp the enormity of the lie all at once.
Linton was impressed but not routed. He waited till Harlan was quieter.
"I hope you'll get it straightened out," he said, coldly. "But with a story like that extant, of course you'll see the wisdom of the course I've suggested. You cannot afford to drag Miss Presson's name into your affair."
"Into my affair! You dirty pup, do you dare to intimate—are you lunatic enough to take stock in any such story about me?"
The epithets sent the color into Linton's face. But he restrained himself.
"Your own grandfather had to take you in hand about the matter before you left Fort Canibas, Thornton. I heard him say that much myself. He gave no details. I don't care for any. I merely came to you to bring a hint as to what you ought to do. You don't seem to take the hint. If you haven't got manliness enough yourself to keep away from Miss Presson until this story—well, put it mildly, and say until this story is run down—then I propose to insist that you do so."
"Look here, Linton, I've usually got pretty good control of myself. I'm trying to hold myself in now—trying as hard as I can. What you have told me is a lie—a damnable lie. See? I say it calmly." He was quivering. "You don't know what you're talking about. I haven't the patience to explain to you. It's none of your business. You keep away from me. Now don't put any more strain on my self-control—in God's name, don't do it, Linton!"
"I am making no secret of my hopes in regard to Miss Presson," stated Linton, firmly. "I have been waiting until I could offer her what she has been accustomed to. You have the advantage of me in money, Thornton. But you're welcome to that! My hopes give me the right to guard her from scandal. I insist that you relieve her of your presence to-morrow evening!"
Harlan, shaken, gray with passion, his teeth set over his lower lip, rushed to the door and threw it open.
"D—n you, you get on the outside!" he panted. "I'm in the mood to kill you!"
Linton went. By his visit and his warning he had thrown a sop to his conscience. He had approached Harlan Thornton with something like desperation. Under his calmness he had long-hidden, consuming passion for Madeleine Presson—a love that had grown through the years, and now waited a fitting time of expression and the endorsement of assured position. If he had any doubts of the truth of the shameful story he had brought he concealed those doubts—he would not admit them to himself. He proposed to win the girl. He chose any weapons that would rout the interloper.
"I warn you that I shall protect her," he said, from the corridor.
"Take a warning from me, too: you get into my affairs, and you'll find hell fires cooler!"
"Your affairs do seem to have that flavor," declared Linton, walking away.
Thornton hurried to the headquarters that the corporations maintained in the hotel for Spinney. Spinney was not there. He ran back to his room and telephoned to the clerk of the hotel. He was informed that Mr. Spinney had gone away for a few days.
It was late, but he threw on his coat and hastened up street to the Presson home. The windows were dark. He did not have the assurance to arouse the family at that time of night.
By that time, walking in the crisp air of the winter night, he had soothed, somewhat, his fever of anger, sorrow, and shame.
Calmer, he had thoughts only for the bitter wrong that had been done Clare Kavanagh. Somehow it seemed that all were leagued against her—and him! Memory of her unselfishness, her simple faith in him, her abnegation, her true, little-woman trust in his career—it all rushed upon him. For a time he was almost ashamed to face what memory brought to him. Then manfully he set himself to read his heart—at least, he tried to. In the end, hidden in his room, he wept—honest tears of a strong man conscious that he was unable by his strength to hold disaster from an innocent. Even his attempt to find the rogue, Spinney, was futile. He wept, thinking of Clare Kavanagh—exiled from her home, bravely solving her problem of life alone. He went to sleep thinking of Clare Kavanagh.
It was fortunate for his self-respect that she filled his mind so completely at that moment. Otherwise the reflection that he had led himself by degrees to covet the brains and beauty of Madeleine Presson would have convinced him that in his relations with women he was either fool or knave.
Youth, untried in the ways of women and the wiles of loving and the everlasting problem of what the heart most truly desires, has wondered and wept the long ages through!
CHAPTER XXV
WOMEN, AND ONE WOMAN
The next day brought the reign of woman. That festal day in mid-session which preceded the legislative ball had been made woman's field-day by long custom. The politicians arranged the programme in order to bunch events: for the women demanded that they be heard each session on the suffrage question; and the women pleaded for one opportunity to show their best gowns in parade for fashion's sake. So the politicians made one bite at the cherry; "took a double dose and had it over with," as Thelismer Thornton ungraciously expressed it. Frivolity was combined with feminine fervor on the suffrage question. One element was invited to neutralize the other. The politicians could endure the combination better than they could face each faction separately. The advocates of suffrage made their plea while their sisters promenaded the State House corridors to the music of the band. The festival spirit dominated.
The members of the Judiciary Committee wore fresh waistcoats, pinks in their buttonholes, and a genial air—and had not the least idea of granting the suffragists anything except a benignant hearing. The report of "ought not to pass" was a foregone conclusion.
But there were potted palms in the lobbies, decorations in the rotunda, and masses of flowers in the House chamber which was given over to the hearing. And sweet music softened legislative asperities. The women asked, smiling. The men refused, smiling.
The federated women's clubs of the State had the suffrage matter in their keeping. The delegates were not hard-faced women clutching umbrellas. They were the strictly modern suffragists—radiant matrons, fresh-complexioned girls, women who led in culture and fashion in their respective communities.
At the previous session the Legislative Committee had asked that the delegation of women be restricted to the usual number of persons that appeared at legislative hearings. When a dozen came with their petitions and arguments the Committee blandly stated that there seemed to be no general demand in the State for woman's suffrage—witness the attendance of women interested!
This year the women proposed to disprove that assumption. Every woman's literary, social, art, and economic club in the State sent two delegates. The State was raked for women, even the schools were ransacked. At ten o'clock in the forenoon the State House was packed and women were still crowding in. The galleries, aisles, and standing-room of House and Senate were choked with silks, furs, and feathers which decorated the beauty and brains of the State.
The routine was hurried through. Callous man, gasping for breath, wanted to escape.
The few in the lobby who dared to smoke soon hid their cigars under their coat-tails and departed to the hotels. The cuspidors were hidden. Gay frocks swept cigar stubs out of sight.
When the members of the Judiciary Committee attempted to enter the House chamber to conduct the hearing on suffrage, it required full ten minutes of persuasive eloquence and courteous pushing on the part of the messengers to break the jam of women that filled the door and packed the lobby floor adjacent. The fair lobbyists did not want to give up even that vantage-point in order to admit the men who were to listen. And after the committee had managed to wriggle its way in single file to the platform they had not the heart to expel the women who were occupying their chairs. They gallantly stood in a row against the rear wall of the Speaker's alcove and listened to the petitioners—each woman allowed two minutes! Not one member of the legislature, outside the committee, heard. It would have been an ungallant man, indeed, who did not surrender his place in the chamber to a woman who had come to present her cause. So the women amiably listened to themselves, and the committee listened to them in all politeness, and both sides understood that it was only a genial social diversion out of which nothing would come. In that gathering a suffragette would have been squelched by her own sex.
Harlan Thornton came to the State House early.
Morning had brought him wiser counsel. He felt no impulse to rush to the Presson house. He wondered now what he would have said if he had gained access to Madeleine Presson the night before. The astounding insult by Herbert Linton troubled him less. It had been a jealous outburst—Linton's confession of his love for the girl had revealed his animus. Probably Linton regretted it—in Harlan's calmer mood he trusted that such was the case. Conscious of his innocence, it did not seem to Harlan that any man would dare to deal further in such outrageous slander after what had been said in their interview.
Harlan was one of the first to escape from the House through the press of women. There were too many of them. Officious gentlemen had begun to introduce him to wives and daughters and friends. He was not shy, but the presence of so many women—chattering, vivacious, exchanging repartee, challenging retort from him, was disquieting. He made his way to his committee-room. It was in a far corner of the building and was quiet. He had not been able to inspect the bill that Governor Waymouth had placed in his hands. He determined to put behind himself for a time the presence of women and the thoughts of women—even those thoughts which had so occupied him the night before.
There was no one in the committee-room. The State House holiday had attracted his associates. He examined the measure that he was expected to sponsor.
It provided for a commission of three men to be appointed by the Governor and to remain under his direct control—a bipartisan board. These men were to appoint special deputies to any number desired. To any county, city, or town these deputies were to be dispatched when it became apparent that police or sheriffs were lax or dishonest in enforcing the prohibitory law. No limits were placed on the number of these men empowered to kill saloons and put liquor-peddlers out of business. No special amount of money was to be asked of the legislature—the bill provided that the State treasury should stand behind the movement.
The young man was quick to understand the tremendous power granted to the Governor by that bill. Under it no party management, no group of politicians, could club or coax the liquor interests into line at the polls by manipulation of the traffic. No sheriff could enrich himself by selling privileges. No city could govern itself in that respect—declaring that public opinion favored the saloons and making local law superior to the constitutional law of the State. The bill provided that a judge must impose both fines and imprisonment when convictions were secured, and, therefore, no judge could carry on any longer a practical system of low license by imposing fines alone.
It was the principle of enforced prohibition put on trial.
In the past the Luke Pressons of the State had laughed at interference by a Governor. Local politics, easily handled, had controlled the actions of cities, and police had kept their hands off the traffic for years.
Authority in liquor matters had been vested in the county high sheriffs, and these men were controlled from State headquarters wholly in the interests of politics.
Harlan was sufficiently familiar with the old plan to know how this new system would upset the entire political machine of his State. That folio of document was a bombshell.
He was holding it outspread in his hands when the door opened so suddenly that it startled him. Thelismer Thornton came in, shaking his shoulders disgustedly.
"Feathers and cackle!" he muttered. "This State House turned into a poultry yard! And half of 'em braced back trying to crow! When a hen crows and a woman votes—well, it's all the same thing!"
He relighted the cigar that he had brought through the press hidden in his big palm. He eyed his grandson keenly and with some disfavor as he puffed the cigar alight.
"Look here, bub," he burst out, "there are enough women around here to-day to remind me that I want to have a word with you on the woman question. You intend to marry Madeleine Presson, don't you?"
"Intend to marry her!" blazed his grandson. "You talk as though it was the fashion to grab a girl and carry her off as they did in the Stone Age."
"You know what I mean very well, sir. I take it you are still decent, and if you're decent you'll marry the girl you've beaued around for six months—providing she'll have you. That was the style in my day—and decency doesn't change much—at least, it ought not to."
Had it been the day before, Harlan Thornton would have declared to his grandfather what his intentions were toward Madeleine Presson. The thoughts of the past night's vigil came upon him now—he hesitated. He was angry with himself—angry with this blunt and persistent old man. He did not know whether resentment held him back from acknowledging that he had been a suitor for the hand of Luke Presson's daughter or whether it was the strange, new feeling toward Clare Kavanagh since he had learned that her good name was in such piteous need of his protection and defence.
"Have you asked her to marry you?" demanded the Duke.
"Yes, I have—that is—" he paused. His air irritated still more the testy humor of the old man, plainly provoked by earlier matters.
"'That is'!" he sneered. "'I have.' 'Perhaps I have!' 'Maybe I have—let's see what my notes say!' What in the devil is the matter with the young men nowadays, anyway? Blood in your veins about as thick as Porty Reek molasses! You say you have asked her to marry you? Well, if you've asked her and mean it, have you got anything to do with that Kavanagh girl being around this State House to-day?"
Harlan sprang to his feet. He threw the document upon the table. His heart leaped within him. Even while his emotions bewildered him he found himself asking his conscience why he had not searched for her in spite of Dennis Kavanagh and her own plain desire to avoid him. The bare knowledge that she was near sent the blood into his face. Her coming to him seemed reproach for his acceptance of her flight.
"Do you mean that?"
"You are certainly giving me a fine imitation of a man who is surprised," stated his grandfather. "Maybe you are! I hope so. But she's here. She's with a bunch of girls from some school or other, paraded around by a hatchet-faced woman—another crowing hen that's trying to teach parliamentary law, I suppose. Harlan, I hope you've been square with me about that girl! Now, if you're honest, and don't know she's here, keep out of sight. I've given you the tip. She'll be speaking to you—and it will mix matters for you. She'd like nothing better than to do it!"
"I'm sick of that kind of talk from you," protested the grandson, angrily. "Can't you mention the name of that innocent girl without a slur or an insult? And there's no reason why I cannot meet Clare Kavanagh any time and at any place."
"Your political rule of out-and-open, as you've been tutored by Vard Waymouth, may work with men, but I'm telling you that it won't operate with girls," replied the Duke. "You may mean all right, but I'm suspicious of you. You sneaked back to Fort Canibas last summer to see her—now didn't you?"
"I saw her."
"You don't pay much attention to my wishes, do you, Harlan?"
"I claim the right, in a few matters, to be my own master."
"Even to making a devilish fool of yourself! You want Madeleine Presson. I can see that you want her. I've been watching. And I'm coming out now and say that I want you to have her. She's my idea of a wife. Now you needn't go to talking about that Kavanagh girl and friendship! There's no such thing as that kind of friendship."
Harlan had no time then to vent the anger that was seething in him. It seemed that every one who willed took the liberty to intrude upon the affairs which he tried to keep sacred. While that thought was uppermost in his troubled emotions, Linton, the other chief offender, came in, Presson with him.
The chairman began briskly. He was serious, but he spoke kindly.
"I don't usually interfere in these matters, but we'd better have this thing straightened out for the good of all of us. I'm glad you're here, Thelismer. I want you to stand by and listen. Here are two mighty good boys, these two—and now we'll leave out all political differences. We can afford to. We're all better friends than we were when the session opened." In spite of his absorption in his own affairs Harlan thought of the legislative morrow and its possibilities. "Now, this isn't politics! As I say, I don't usually meddle in my wife's or my daughter's—"
"Just one moment, Mr. Presson!" Harlan strode forward. "Has this lying scoundrel dared to bring his dirty scandal to you?"
He looked over the head of the chairman into the defiant face of his rival. The little man threw up his hands, standing between them.
"Hold on! Hold on! You haven't come to me in the usual way, but as near as I can find out both of you are after my daughter. I know of my own knowledge, Harlan, that you have been interested up-country. I simply want to have a general understanding. I brought Linton here with me. No use in running between! Let's have our say face to face."
Harlan controlled himself.
"I think I understand just what prompts you, Mr. Presson," he said. "I respect your motives. You've been imposed upon. But you're not to blame. I know what you're going to ask me. I'll save you the trouble. I admire your daughter greatly. I have intended to ask her hand in marriage." He was suddenly conscious that the determination to persist in that suit was not acute.
"That wasn't what I was going to ask you," said Presson with decision.
"It's about the girl whom I saw—"
"The name of no other person belongs in this discussion," broke in Harlan, firmly. "I refuse to permit that name to be dragged in, for it's insult and scandal."
There was silence in the room. The chairman looked at Harlan, impressed by his demeanor. He knew the young man well enough to think twice before he persisted. Thelismer Thornton smoked hard, scowling. He was a little cautious about thrusting himself further into a matter that he knew would test the Thornton spirit in his grandson.
But Linton was determined to win his point. He thought he saw his opportunity. He hoped he could force a break between Presson and the other suitor.
"I'm interested in this matter as much as any one," he declared. "I have not told you the full story, Mr. Presson. But I'm here to see this matter straightened out for good and all, and unless you get an answer from this man, as a father ought to, I'll see that you have the facts to put you right."
"Linton, didn't I tell you last night that you were circulating a lie?"
Harlan's face was gray.
"If it's a lie why are you afraid of telling Mr. Presson the whole truth and explaining the matter?" insisted Linton with a lawyer's pertinacity in extracting evidence. He realized that if young Thornton talked, even to admit the facts that information from the north country seemed to prove, a bit of impromptu cross-examination might yield results that would help the Linton cause.
"I refuse because every word that is said on the subject is a gross insult to an innocent girl," declared Harlan, passionately. "And I warn you that if you open your mouth again you'll get the only thing a man can give you and remain a man!"
"You'd better take the hint, Linton," advised the Duke. "I don't know exactly what you're driving at, but you're heading toward trouble. They don't do things up our way as they do in a city court-room."
Linton was angry, desperate, and he was as stalwart as the other. He was not inclined to let that opportunity pass.
Defiantly he plunged into the story that Spinney had reported. To his astonishment Harlan rushed for the door. He went out and slammed it behind him.
A project had come to him, prompted by his furious rage which mocked common-sense. A man more accustomed to the conventions would not have attempted it. But all his north-country passion rioted in him at that moment.
The night before he had wept because the peace and good name of Clare Kavanagh were threatened and he could only beat the ugly phantom of scandal helplessly.
Now suddenly he found work for his hands—and his hands had always been his means of expressing his soul in toil, achievement, and in passion.
He hurried down the stairs into the State House rotunda where the throngs were. The hearing before the committee was adjourned. The band was playing. He thrust himself through the press of the women. Maids and matrons stared after him. His face was pale, his lips made a straight-edge and his eyes swept every group with eagerness that was almost wild. It was search that was distracting. There were women, women. There were so many faces to scan! Chance led him to her—good fortune and the sudden thought that she would probably be found near some object of interest, were she escorted by a teacher. He saw the group near the great case that held the State's battle-flags. He caught her arm and her startled face was turned up to his.
"Come," he whispered, hoarsely. "Come! Do not ask me why. Only come.
Hurry!"
With the trustfulness she had always shown in him she did not hesitate. She did not even offer excuses to the tall woman who stepped forward to inquire the intentions of this abrupt young man. She went, as she went in the north country when he called to her. Clinging to his arm she hurried up the broad marble stairway.
She did not ask why. Her faith was complete. But his demeanor frightened her.
"I was sorry after I got here," she gasped, as they hurried on. "But the others came from the school, and I thought it would be such a great place here that no one would notice me. I thought you would not see me, Harlan. But I wanted to learn about—about what you did—what the lawmakers did, so that—so that—"
"Hurry," he urged her. He feared that they would be gone.
This brusqueness, his haste, his sternness troubled her more and more. They were alone in the corridor that led to the committee-room. She stopped, holding him back with her strong young arms. He had hardly looked at her till then. She had changed in the months since he had seen her. Womanly dignity was mingled with the high spirit that had inspired the child. Her garb, her new mien made her beauty brilliant.
"I never lied to you yet, Big Boy," she cried. "I came here because I was hungry for a sight of you. Then I would go back to my work comforted. Now my conscience is clear. Take me where you will."
In that moment his heart was revealed to him. In the stress of new emotions he understood himself at last. He understood that the love which mates, which sweeps away all calculation, which welds, trusts, and never pauses to analyze or compute, is love that disdains mere admiration of intellect or lure of beauty.
His quiet nature had depths. They had never been stirred till then. The child-love had been budding there ready for blossom. It had been fed by faith and ripened by association. Passion now brought it to fruition. Madeleine Presson had appealed only to one side of him. This girl rounded out the whole philosophy of love. She was not a divinity. His nature did not crave divinity. In his strength, sincerity, ingenuousness, his man's soul, primitive as the free woods, required the mate—one to be cherished and protected. And so, now, when all his soul was stirred, this girl, so bitterly in need of protection—the girl whom the years had endeared to him—came into his heart to reign there.
Words, emotion choked him. But he could not wait, then. She saw something in his eyes she had never seen there till that moment. But before she could understand he carried her along with him.
"Come! I can't wait!" he cried.
When he flung open the door of the committee-room the men in it were standing in silence. Presson had picked up the "Thornton Bill" and was reading it, scowling. Whatever Linton had said, it was plain that the father of Madeleine Presson had just found something which diverted his attention from family matters.
Harlan shut the door behind. He locked it. He stepped away from the girl, leaving her standing there. She was a picture to confute slander.
The chairman gazed at her in astonishment. He had not expected such prompt incarnation of the topic.
"I know what foul lies have just been uttered in this room by that fellow!" Harlan leaned forward and drove an accusatory finger at Linton. "Now here stands the woman you have insulted. Look at her, you lying hound! There's only one thing you can do! Acknowledge yourself a liar and apologize!"
Linton did not speak. He raised his eyebrows; it was unspoken comment on the peculiar actions of this young savage from the woods.
"Presson, get out of here and bring help," muttered the Duke. "Hell is going to break loose!"
The chairman slipped the document into his pocket and tiptoed around the side of the room. Harlan paid no attention to him. His eyes were for Linton.
"Are you going to apologize?"
"I'll wait until—" began the lawyer, but he got no further.
The Thornton temper had been strained beyond the breaking-point. Harlan was upon him.
"Bring a dozen!" yelled the Duke after the chairman who had been tugging at the door, and now escaped.
Linton was tall and muscular, but law-practice is not lumbering. He struck viciously at Harlan, ducking to and fro with the briskness of the trained boxer. But the woodsman merely leaped upon him, heedless of his blows. He bore him down. He drove resistless knees into his shoulders. He thrust Linton's face against the floor and ground it against the boards. Then he dragged the limp figure past the cursing Duke toward the girl. She had fled to a corner, covering her eyes and sobbing in terror.
"D—n you, you'll apologize to the girl who's going to be my wife," raved Harlan.
When Presson returned at the head of volunteers the victor was grinding the bleeding face on the floor once more and Linton was screaming appeals.
There were enough of them to separate the men. They dragged Harlan away out of the room in spite of his struggles. The mere sight of the lawyer seemed to infuriate him more.
The Duke hurried the girl out and away while the peacemakers were struggling with the young combatants.
"Stop that blubbering," he commanded, roughly. "If you've got any grit left in you, brace up. Don't let people here notice!"
He was trying to hide as much of the true reason for the affray as he could. He wanted to get the girl out of sight.
"I didn't know—I did nothing—if it was about me I didn't—" He stopped her brutally.
"About you, you little fool? Of course it wasn't about you! My grandson is going to marry Luke Presson's daughter."
She stiffened in the hook of his arm. They were in the corridor and had not come into the view of the people.
"Every one knows it," he hurried on. He saw an opportunity to get in a cruel blow at the romance he suspected and hated. "They have been going together for months. She'll be the right kind of a wife for him. They were fighting about her—those two young hyenas."
She pulled away from him. The tears were on her cheeks, but she held herself straight and looked him in the eye.
"That's a lie, Mr. Thornton!"
"It's the truth. He'll marry her if you haven't spoiled it all for him—spoiled his good name and stirred up all this scandal for him just as he was getting ready to amount to something in the world, with a wife that could help him! You get away from here as quickly as you can. You hear me? If his career is spoiled you've done it. Don't stay around here and disgrace him any more. It's bad enough, as it is, for him and Miss Presson!"
She stared at him, stricken and puzzled. Then she left him.
"I don't need any further escort," she informed him, turning after she had gone a few steps. It was Dennis Kavanagh's girl speaking now. "I have been escorted by the Thorntons quite enough during the past ten minutes. I tell you again, I believe you lie. But I propose to understand something more about this—and I'll not disgrace you nor your grandson!"
"Go ask some questions!" he called after her. He felt sure that gossip would confirm him. But to make sure that Harlan did not follow her and find her and discredit gossip he turned back down the corridor purposing to keep that belligerent young man under watch and ward for a time.
CHAPTER XXVI
THE WAY OF A MAID WITH A MAID
The Duke found his grandson in an anteroom where the half dozen excited, wondering men had conveyed him.
The old man and the young man stood for a few moments and gazed at each other. Harlan was breathless, disheveled, his knuckles were bleeding.
"Where is she?"
The Duke came close to him. "She went away. Now keep your mouth closed. You talk about disgracing a girl," he muttered in his grandson's ear; "if you haven't disgraced her and yourself and all of us here to-day it isn't because you haven't done your best! God only knows why I didn't leave you in the woods where you belong!"
"I'm going out to find her," insisted his grandson. "This is my own business from now on."
"You try to leave this room in the shape you're in and I'll have you committed to the insane asylum across the river. The girl has more sense than you've got."
While he was speaking Presson came in. He pulled the House bill from his pocket.
"Thornton," he said, walking up to Harlan, "I didn't think there could be anything more important just now than the damnable performance you've just been through and the part my family plays in it. But here's something I propose to take while it's hot!" He shook the document at the young man. Harlan swept it out of his grasp before he could prevent, and buttoned it in his breast-pocket.
"That is mine," he stated, not flinching under the indignant protest.
"If it's yours will you inform me what you intend to do with it?"
"I intend to introduce it in the House at to-morrow's session and work for its passage."
"He's got a bill there," roared the chairman, turning to the Duke, "that's written by the Devil himself! It makes old Waymouth archfiend of all the ramrodders in this State! Our sheriffs are made his deputies and the Russian Tsar becomes a hog-reeve beside him." He blurted out the purport of the measure, garnishing the recital with good, round oaths.
"So you're loaded with that, are you?" inquired the elder Thornton. He was as careless of the presence of the listeners as the chairman had been. He began invective, but the young man broke in.
"Grandfather," he said, firmly, "I've listened long enough to that kind of talk from you and Mr. Presson—I've listened to all kinds of reasons why a man should come here and sell his soul for the sake of getting ahead in politics." He was thinking of the temptation that had come to him in the form of Madeleine Presson. "I don't want any more of it. I don't know of any reason why this State shouldn't obey its laws so long as they remain laws. As to my private business, I suggest that the two of you keep still."
They had no appetite for further discourse with this young madman just then.
The Duke turned on his heel and walked out. Presson followed.
"Gentlemen," said the young man to those who remained, "I have no quarrel with you. I do not want any. Do you understand?" He wiped his hands with his handkerchief, smoothed his hair, and walked past them.
As calmly as he could he hurried through the lobbies and the rotunda of the State House. The crowds were thinning. The band had gone. The women had scattered to prepare for the ball of the evening. Among the few that were left he could not find her.
He went back to his committee-room and pondered until dusk fell.
One matter presented itself to his mood as a duty. He called a carriage and was driven to the Presson home.
Madeleine came down in answer to his card. But as she entered the reception-room her father followed at her heels, beginning threats as he came in.
"Father," she said, quietly, "I have just listened to you. You need not fear that I do not understand myself and my duty. I ask you to retire."
He stood there a moment, still muttering his wrathful protest, but in the end her dignity mastered him. He went away.
What she did next amazed the young man who stood there waiting. She came to him and patted his cheek.
"My poor boy," she said, softly, and drew him down beside her on a couch.
For a moment the words he had come prepared to say deserted him. He could not speak. He found sincere compassion in her eyes—sympathy and something else which he did not fathom.
"I can do at least one decent thing to-day," he burst out. "I can come to you man-fashion and ask you to release me from our engagement of this evening. I know, of course, you wouldn't go to the ball with me after what has happened. But there's a deeper reason. I am going to tell it to you. Don't misunderstand me. I don't know the right words to use. Any way I put it may sound as though I were a cad. But understand me, Madeleine—as my friend, understand me—for God's sake, do! You have been wise. You have counselled me. I need a friend now!" His voice broke, and she waited. "I've come to my senses. Oh, it's no discredit to you that I thought I loved you. I thought so."
"Your love would honor any woman, Harlan."
He looked at her piteously. He understood how his confession would sound. Only his resolve to be honest with her availed to drive him to the confession he intended to make.
"I couldn't say it to some girls," he cried. "They would not see how it was. But I can only tell you the truth!"
"Wait a moment," she said, interrupting. "You are not just yourself. Let me talk to you. Only a little while ago a girl came to me."
He started up, but she restrained him.
"Listen! She had heard. There were plenty to tell her when she asked. We have given occasion for gossip. Gossip has eyes and ears and good imagination. It has even been reported that our engagement would be announced after the legislative ball. Wait! She heard all that from the first one she asked. She has told me so. She believes it!"
"Believes it! What did you tell her?"
"Wait, I say! I have shown patience this afternoon. I waited for her to speak. Let me tell you what she said while I waited. She said she wanted you to be a great man. She knew, so she told me, that she only brought trouble and distress to you. She wanted to see me so that she might know if I were the one who could help you in your career. I'll not tell you what she said to me about myself. She is a sweet and gracious girl, that little Clare, Harlan! She said she knew I could help you in your work in life. And she wanted to tell me the little story of you two—she wanted to forestall gossip that might hurt you in my eyes. And she gave you to me. Harlan, I have heard of that kind of love—but I didn't believe it existed. Did you?"
Tears were on his cheeks.
"I know her!" he choked.
She understood his answer. She waited a little while.
"And I love her above all the honors and treasures of this world!"
She stood up.
"I'm going to find her," he went on. "You understand me, don't you,
Madeleine?"
"I understand. But you shall not go to find her"—she smiled into his startled eyes—"for she is hidden in my room, waiting to tell me more—waiting until I tell her something that will take the burden from her heart. I had been listening to her when my father came in with his story; I had not made my confession. It would have comforted her—it will comfort her, for I can tell her truthfully I have not yet met the man I can love, Harlan—you were not the one!" She left with him the consolation of a smile and hastened away. She did not even reproach him because of his affair with Linton.
He stood waiting at the door. He heard the steps on the stairs. He was ready to clasp her.
But Madeleine Presson came in alone. "The girl has gone, Harlan. The maid said she ran away after I left her. I was a fool. I dropped your card!"
He stood dumb and motionless.
"Gone, believing that!" he gasped.
She shook him. "But you can find her. Remember that she is young. She believed gossip too quickly. You must find her. Hurry! She will only have to see your eyes to know that they all lied."
He rushed to the door.
"Bring her to me," cried the girl. "I'll know how to help you."
At the railroad station he was told that the special trains had gone with the visitors who were not in town for the ball.
He did not even know the name of the school from which she had come.
At the State House he at last found some one who had seen and known the group—an attaché of the State educational department. There was no train that way until midnight. He took it. How he passed the time of waiting he never knew. He was at the doors of the institution as early as decency permitted. He did not wish to compromise her.
He was assured in a manner that left no room for doubt that Miss Kavanagh had not returned with the others. They were much worried and had notified her father.
Harlan sent an appealing telegram to him, daring even to solicit that ogre of the North. But no word came to him.
He wired orders to his caretaker at "The Barracks" to investigate at that end, and returned to the State capital, distracted, baffled, not knowing what step to take next. The session had not closed for the day when he arrived at the State House.
Men in the lobby stared at him as he passed. It was evident that tongues had been busy with his affairs. His grandfather, striding up and down, tried to intercept him, but he kept on to his seat. All the eyes of the House were on him. Word of the "Thornton Bill" had gone abroad. Now, in spite of his mental distress, he remembered his duty.
When he rose to ask the privilege of introducing a bill, interrupting the order of business, he anticipated objection.
No objection was made.
The opposition did not propose to waste effort on pettifogging preliminaries.
The bill went in and on its way—and that night the capital buzzed with the discussion of it.
Harlan Thornton spent half the night at the telegraph-office, his mind intent on something far from prospective legislation.
But no word came to comfort him—no clew that he could pursue.
Days grew into weeks. He did not attempt search in person. It would have been vague wandering about the country. He remained to hold up the hands of Governor Waymouth, finding relish for fight in the rancor that settled within him.
He and Linton silently faced the gossip that beat about them in regard to their encounter—and kept away from each other. Theirs was a balanced account.
And Madeleine Presson somewhat ostentatiously permitted the attentions of the young Secretary of State!
CHAPTER XXVII
THE EVERLASTING PROBLEM
Day after day, during that session, an old man sat in the executive chamber of the State House. His face grew as white as his hair. There were deeper lines in his countenance than mere old age had tooled across the skin. One after the other the men of the two branches of the legislature came before him at his summons. He did not entreat of them. There was no more of that suave political diplomacy in the executive chamber, after the fashion of the old days of easy rule. This Governor declared himself to be the mouthpiece of the people of his State. He showed to the legislators their path toward absolute honesty. He ordered them to follow it. One or two of the first ones who were called upon the carpet dared to refuse—attempted to evade. He promptly issued statements to the press, holding those men up to the people of their State as traders and tricksters. Voters had always understood that trades and tricks were in progress in the legislature, and had never bothered their heads much about the matter. But this incisive showing up of individuals was new and startling and effective. It afforded no opportunity for the specious reasoning along mere political lines which had excused dishonesty in the past.
Protests poured in on the would-be rebels. Their experience warned the others. The State was in a mood to try reform. The reform was promised on the usual broad lines. Individuals did not stop to reflect what effect the suggested legislation would have on their own interests. Every man was after "the other fellow."
"I'll keep you here until you pass these laws," stated the grim old man in the executive chamber, "even if you stay here till snow flies again."
Legislators are paid by the session, not by the week. The prospect of spending the summer fighting an obstinate old man, with the people behind him, was not alluring when personal expenses were considered. Even lobbyists and corporations and political considerations fail to hold sway under such conditions.
The Governor's bills went through.
"They've abolished fees," drawled Thelismer Thornton, one day in the lobby, "to get square with Constable Emerson Pike up my way. Em went down to replevin some hens, and after he'd chased each hen a dozen times around the barn he sat down and charged up mileage to the county. The rest of this legislation is on the same basis. Here's a legislature that's like Dave Darrington's hogs. After old Dave lost his voice and couldn't holler to the hogs, he used to rap on the trough with his cane at feeding-time. Then a woodpecker made his home in the pig-pen and the hogs went crazy. Vard Waymouth is all bill! I'd reckoned I'd go home. But I guess I'll stay and see just how far dam foolishness can go!"
So he patrolled the lobby, puffing everlastingly at his cigar, watching the activity of Harlan with a disgust that he did not try to conceal and occasionally flinging a sour remark at that devoted young man.
"A calf leaving the cow to chase a steer," he growled. "He'll know better when it comes supper-time!"
One day a man halted him. "You may be interested in what's going on in the House, just now, Mr. Thornton. Your grandson is making a speech."
"Then he has lost his mind!" snapped the Duke. "I'd only suspected it up to now!"
But when he edged in at the door he discovered that his grandson was not making the usual spectacle which the untried orator affords. The zeal which had driven him into the fight was supporting him as he faced the men who were his associates. He stood at his desk, pale—but unfaltering. He was talking to them, man to man.
"It has met me to my face, it has followed at my back through all these weeks," he was saying. "I'm accused of helping to wreck my party. You know better than that, gentlemen. You know who did the wrecking. It has been going on for years. And we have been asked to hide the retreat of the wreckers. I refuse to allow those men who have wrecked our party to call themselves the true prophets and summon us to follow them. Our party is not simply the men who hold office for their personal gain. If making them honest or putting them out is destroying the party, then let's destroy and rebuild.
"We need to rebuild.
"Up in our woods it's dangerous to leave slash on the ground after a winter's cutting. The politicians have left a lot of slash in this State. The fire has got into it. It is burning up the old dead branches and tops, but it is hurting the standing timber, too—I understand that. Why not see to it after this that the men who leave political slash shall not be allowed to operate!
"It's a bad litter, gentlemen, that has been left around the roots of our prohibitory law. I have introduced the bill that's now under consideration. It has nothing to do with the principle of prohibition—the theory of that was threshed out in these chambers before I was born. But isn't it time, gentlemen, to have a test of the practice of prohibition?
"I know little about politics. I am merely one of the hundreds of young men in this State who stand on the outside of politics and want the opportunity to be honest when we vote. We appeal to the older men of this State to drop the game for a little while and give us a chance to start fair. The biggest corporation in this State is the State itself, and I like to think that all of us, young or old, are partners or stockholders. I've been brought up in business. We know what we'd all do in straight business. Why can't we do it in State affairs? Too many influences surround a legislature to make its work really deliberative. After the heat and arguments of this session have died away we ought to have a meeting on a real business basis.
"Let the churches, the grange, the radicals, the liberals, the hotel men, the liquor men, all send their delegates. Let that assemblage take thought on a plan which will lift out of politics a question that doesn't belong there. Let's end civil war on this question. Give the young men some other picture as their eyes open on the politics of this State."
It was the earnest, ingenuous appeal of one crying out of the wilderness of human uncertainty—of one who saw the evils in those attempts of men to curb greed and appetite—of one earnestly seeking a remedy, but not clearly understanding that so long as the world shall endure, with men and women weak and human, some problems must remain unsettled.
"I'll suggest a place for that convention," muttered Thelismer Thornton to those who stood about him. "Hold it in Purity Park in Paradise! Settle the rum question!" he sneered. "Noah hadn't been stamping around on dry ground long enough to get his quilts aired out before he was drunk on Noah's Three Star! And Japheth probably got mad and passed a prohibitory law and thought he had the trouble fixed forever."
When the legislature finally adjourned the protestations that had been wrung out of it promised much in the way of honest reorganization.
Harlan Thornton remained with Governor Waymouth for a time. His
Excellency found him indispensable.
The commissions were at work.
Office-holders whined, taxpayers squirmed. Honesty was greeted everywhere by wry faces.
But the "Thornton law," its deputies superseding county and city authority, was the bitterest political pill of all. The results discouraged the righteous—Governor Waymouth predicted them accurately with the old-age cynicism of one who understood human nature. The flagrantly open places were closed. But innumerable dives thereby secured the business which had gone to the open places in the days of toleration. An army could not have closed the dives—the proprietors of which, in most cases, carried their villanous concoctions on their persons. Express companies were organized for the sole purpose of dealing in liquors by the parcel system, and the State's liquor agencies, established under the protection of the prohibitory law itself, were besieged by patrons who stood in queues of humanity like buyers at a theatre ticket-window.
Reformation of human nature by mere statute was a failure!
But mere political disaster did not daunt the stern old man who held his commissioners to their task. The people themselves began to complain of the cost of the new system of enforcement—the money paid to make them obey their own laws. When their complaints were loudest the Governor allowed himself the luxury of a smile.
Reform for the mass. Admirable!
Reform for the individual. Atrocious infringement of personal liberty!
"I cannot make them good," he said to Harlan. "But I can give them such a picture of their own iniquity that perhaps they'll realize it and make themselves good. You can't reform folks in this world on much of any basis except that!"
It was late summer and they were in the garden of the brick house at
Burnside.
Harlan had been at his chief's side day after day, shielding him as much as possible from those who came to solicit, to threaten, to complain. In the opportunity given him to meet every man of importance in the State he had won respect, even regard. His personality removed him from the ranks of the radicals and relieved him from the imputation that attached to them. His sincerity was evident. He was frank to express his disappointment at the results of the legislation he had assisted in procuring. He listened attentively to the suggestions of others. He made it plain that he was not unalterably wedded to a law because he had been instrumental in adding it to the code. He made known to all his willingness to compromise on everything except honesty, and day by day he made men understand better the basis of the system advocated by his chief and himself.
They had burnished the mirror of politics; they held its new and brighter surface up to the people that they might gaze on themselves. And in time the people came to realize what service had been done. And, as they realized it, the name of young Thornton went abroad in the State from mouth to mouth—men speaking of him as one who was entitled to the praise that attaches to honesty unsmirched by bigotry.
His optimism softened the asperities which men found in the character of the Governor. He attracted to the grim old man the loyalty of the youth of the State, and at the same time won that loyalty for himself. He had come forward at a time when men were ready to accept new ideals, even if they were obliged to wade to them through such mire as now soiled the execution of the new laws.
That proposed convention for the unprejudiced consideration of the liquor laws was taking form. The intemperate radicals were the only ones declaiming against "compromise with the devil." But the new conditions were revealing the real colors of those impractical zealots, and it was plain that their noisy minority would no longer be allowed to bluster down the truer and more equable spirit of "the best for all the people." The men and women of the State were taking time to analyze some of those high-sounding phrases with which so-called temperance had disguised vicious theories which left human nature out of the equation.
The politicians of the old school remained aloof.
They were pointing to "the wreck of the party."
"And I'll be passed down to history as the wrecker," said the Governor, talking to Harlan under the big elm. "But you've got strong arms, my boy. I can see that you'll have much to do in building anew out of the wreck, you and those who are beginning to appreciate you. I can see a future of much promise for you, Harlan."
"I'll be politely, but firmly, invited to go back to the woods," protested the young man.
"You'll not be allowed to do it," replied the Governor, quietly. "You have been tested for your honesty. These newer times have eyes to recognize that quality. And the rogues are being smoked out. But remember that even the end of time will not find all questions solved. That thought will have to serve you for consolation."
That was hardly the consolation that would satisfy impetuous youth and zeal in accomplishment.
But Harlan had been learning lessons in consolation.
The thought of Clare Kavanagh was with him night and day. In spite of all his searching she remained hidden. He did not confide his grief to any one. It brought pallor to his face and listlessness in the daily duties that bore upon him. Governor Waymouth took note at last. And when the young man asked for permission to go home to the north country for a time he reluctantly sent him away.
On the eve of his departure, which had been announced by a press that now followed his movements with the attention accorded to a man of importance in State affairs, he obeyed a summons from Madeleine Presson. She put a letter into his hands. It was addressed to Clare Kavanagh.
"You will find her, Harlan," she said, comfortingly. "Love will search her out. And when you find her, give her this letter. There are words from woman to woman that woman understands."
Harlan found his grandfather sitting on the broad porch of "The
Barracks," smoking and looking out across the river valley.
The spirit in which he had left that hateful legislature seemed to have departed from the Duke. The old quizzical glint was in his eyes as he grasped Harlan's hand. After their greeting they sat together in silence.
"It's a beautiful game, hey, my boy?" remarked the Duke, at last. "I see that some of the country papers have already begun to talk of you for Governor of the State. The editors haven't seen you, but from what they've heard they probably think you're a hundred years old and have grown to enormous size!"
"Don't make game of me, grandfather," said Harlan, coloring.
"Oh, I'm only expressing a wicked hope. There are some men in this State that I'd like to see punished to that extent." He chuckled. "Put me down for fifty thousand dollars, first subscriber to your campaign fund."
"I can appreciate the humor of that joke," said Harlan. "For I've had a liberal education in the past year—I've found out just how little I know." He added wearily, "And I've found out how hard it is to be what you want to be."
His grandfather tipped his head back into his clasped hands, his characteristic attitude. He squinted out across the hills.
"Bub," he said, "I had the first real blow of my life the other day. A man pointed me out on the train and told another man, loud enough so that I overheard him, that I was Harlan Thornton's grandfather—'and I forget his first name,' he said, 'it begins with T.'"
They ate supper together in the old mess-hall, back on their former footing. Word by word it came out of the Duke—his admiration for this boy who had made his own way. Every blow he had dealt his grandfather's personal pride had brought the reactionary glow of appreciation of this scion who could hit so hard and so surely.
He watched him saddle his horse after supper. He did not ask where he was going.
Harlan did not know. His longing drew him down the long street and across the big bridge, his horse walking slowly.