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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Conflict + +Author: David Graham Phillips + +Posting Date: September 27, 2008 [EBook #433] +Release Date: February, 1996 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CONFLICT *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Keller. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +THE CONFLICT +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +by +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +David Graham Phillips +</H2> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4> + <A HREF="#chap01">I</A> + <A HREF="#chap02">II</A> + <A HREF="#chap03">III</A> + <A HREF="#chap04">IV</A> + <A HREF="#chap05">V</A> + <A HREF="#chap06">VI</A> + <A HREF="#chap07">VII</A> + <A HREF="#chap08">VIII</A> + <A HREF="#chap09">IX</A> + <A HREF="#chap10">X</A> +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H3> + +<P> +Four years at Wellesley; two years about equally divided among Paris, +Dresden and Florence. And now Jane Hastings was at home again. At +home in the unchanged house—spacious, old-fashioned—looking down from +its steeply sloping lawns and terraced gardens upon the sooty, smoky +activities of Remsen City, looking out upon a charming panorama of +hills and valleys in the heart of South Central Indiana. Six years of +striving in the East and abroad to satisfy the restless energy she +inherited from her father; and here she was, as restless as ever—yet +with everything done that a woman could do in the way of an active +career. She looked back upon her years of elaborate preparation; she +looked forward upon—nothing. That is, nothing but marriage—dropping +her name, dropping her personality, disappearing in the personality of +another. She had never seen a man for whom she would make such a +sacrifice; she did not believe that such a man existed. +</P> + +<P> +She meditated bitterly upon that cruel arrangement of Nature's whereby +the father transmits his vigorous qualities in twofold measure to the +daughter, not in order that she may be a somebody, but solely in order +that she may transmit them to sons. "I don't believe it," she decided. +"There's something for ME to do." But what? She gazed down at Remsen +City, connected by factories and pierced from east, west and south by +railways. She gazed out over the fields and woods. Yes, there must be +something for her besides merely marrying and breeding—just as much +for her as for a man. But what? If she should marry a man who would +let her rule him, she would despise him. If she should marry a man she +could respect—a man who was of the master class like her father—how +she would hate him for ignoring her and putting her in her ordained +inferior feminine place. She glanced down at her skirts with an angry +sense of enforced masquerade. And then she laughed—for she had a keen +sense of humor that always came to her rescue when she was in danger of +taking herself too seriously. +</P> + +<P> +Through the foliage between her and the last of the stretches of +highroad winding up from Remsen City she spied a man climbing in her +direction—a long, slim figure in cap, Norfolk jacket and +knickerbockers. Instantly—and long before he saw her—there was a +grotesque whisking out of sight of the serious personality upon which +we have been intruding. In its stead there stood ready to receive the +young man a woman of the type that possesses physical charm and knows +how to use it—and does not scruple to use it. For a woman to conquer +man by physical charm is far and away the easiest, the most fleeting +and the emptiest of victories. But for woman thus to conquer without +herself yielding anything whatsoever, even so little as an alluring +glance of the eye—that is quite another matter. It was this sort of +conquest that Jane Hastings delighted in—and sought to gain with any +man who came within range. If the men had known what she was about, +they would have denounced her conduct as contemptible and herself as +immoral, even brazen. But in their innocence they accused only their +sophisticated and superbly masculine selves and regarded her as the +soul of innocence. This was the more absurd in them because she +obviously excelled in the feminine art of inviting display of charm. +To glance at her was to realize at once the beauty of her figure, the +exceeding grace of her long back and waist. A keen observer would have +seen the mockery lurking in her light-brown eyes, and about the corners +of her full red lips. +</P> + +<P> +She arranged her thick dark hair to make a secret, half-revealed charm +of her fascinating pink ears and to reveal in dazzling unexpectedness +the soft, round whiteness of the nape of her neck. +</P> + +<P> +Because you are thus let into Miss Hastings' naughty secret, so well +veiled behind an air of earnest and almost cold dignity, you must not +do her the injustice of thinking her unusually artful. Such artfulness +is common enough; it secures husbands by the thousand and by the tens +of thousands. No, only in the skill of artfulness was Miss Hastings +unusual. +</P> + +<P> +As the long strides of the tall, slender man brought him rapidly +nearer, his face came into plain view. A refined, handsome face, dark +and serious. He had dark-brown eyes—and Miss Hastings did not like +brown eyes in a man. She thought that men should have gray or blue or +greenish eyes, and if they were cruel in their love of power she liked +it the better. +</P> + +<P> +"Hello, Dave," she cried in a pleasant, friendly voice. She was +posed—in the most unconscious of attitudes—upon a rustic bench so +that her extraordinary figure was revealed at its most attractive. +</P> + +<P> +The young man halted before her, his breath coming quickly—not +altogether from the exertion of his steep and rapid climb. "Jen, I'm +mad about you," he said, his brown eyes soft and luminous with passion. +"I've done nothing but think about you in the week you've been back. I +didn't sleep last night, and I've come up here as early as I dared to +tell you—to ask you to marry me." +</P> + +<P> +He did not see the triumph she felt, the joy in having subdued another +of these insolently superior males. Her eyes were discreetly veiled; +her delightful mouth was arranged to express sadness. +</P> + +<P> +"I thought I was an ambition incarnate," continued the young man, +unwittingly adding to her delight by detailing how brilliant her +conquest was. "I've never cared a rap about women—until I saw you. I +was all for politics—for trying to do something to make my fellow men +the better for my having lived. Now—it's all gone. I want you, Jen. +Nothing else matters." +</P> + +<P> +As he paused, gazing at her in speechless longing, she lifted her +eyes—simply a glance. With a stifled cry he darted forward, dropped +beside her on the bench and tried to enfold her in his arms. The veins +stood out in his forehead; the expression of his eyes was terrifying. +</P> + +<P> +She shrank, sprang up. His baffled hands had not even touched her. +"David Hull!" she cried, and the indignation and the repulsion in her +tone and in her manner were not simulated, though her artfulness +hastened to make real use of them. She loved to rouse men to frenzy. +She knew that the sight of their frenzy would chill her—would fill her +with an emotion that would enable her to remain mistress of the +situation. +</P> + +<P> +At sight of her aversion his eyes sank. "Forgive me," he muttered. +"You make me—CRAZY." +</P> + +<P> +"I!" she cried, laughing in angry derision. "What have I ever done to +encourage you to be—impertinent?" +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing," he admitted. "That is, nothing but just being yourself." +</P> + +<P> +"I can't help that, can I?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," said he, adding doggedly: "But neither can men help going crazy +about you." +</P> + +<P> +She looked at him sitting there at once penitent and impenitent; and +her mind went back to the thoughts that had engaged it before he came +into view. Marriage—to marry one of these men, with their coarse +physical ideas of women, with their pitiful weakness before an emotion +that seemed to her to have no charm whatever. And these were the +creatures who ruled the world and compelled women to be their +playthings and mere appendages! Well—no doubt it was the women's own +fault, for were they not a poor, spiritless lot, trembling with fright +lest they should not find a man to lean on and then, having found the +man, settling down into fat and stupid vacuity or playing the cat at +the silly game of social position? But not Jane Hastings! Her bosom +heaved and her eyes blazed scorn as she looked at this person who had +dared think the touch of his coarse hands would be welcome. Welcome! +</P> + +<P> +"And I have been thinking what a delightful friendship ours was," said +she, disgustedly. "And all the time, your talk about your +ambition—the speeches you were going to make—the offices you were +going to hold—the good you were going to do in purifying politics—it +was all a blind!" +</P> + +<P> +"All a blind," admitted he. "From the first night that you came to our +house to dinner—Jen, I'll never forget that dress you wore—or the way +you looked in it." +</P> + +<P> +Miss Jane had thought extremely well of that toilet herself. She had +heard how impervious this David Hull, the best catch in the town, was +to feminine charm; and she had gone prepared to give battle. But she +said dejectedly, "You don't know what a shock you've given me." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I do," cried he. "I'm ashamed of myself. But—I love you, Jen! +Can't you learn to love me?" +</P> + +<P> +"I hadn't even thought of you in that way," said she. "I haven't +bothered my head about marriage. Of course, most girls have to think +about it, because they must get some one to support them——" +</P> + +<P> +"I wish to God you were one of that sort," interrupted he. "Then I +could have some hope." +</P> + +<P> +"Hope of what," said she disdainfully. "You don't mean that you'd +marry a girl who was marrying you because she had to have food, +clothing and shelter?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'd marry the woman I loved. Then—I'd MAKE her love me. She simply +couldn't help it." +</P> + +<P> +Jane Hastings shuddered. "Thank heaven, I don't have to marry!" Her +eyes flashed. "But I wouldn't, even if I were poor. I'd rather go to +work. Why shouldn't a woman work, anyhow?" +</P> + +<P> +"At what?" inquired Hull. "Except the men who do manual labor, there +are precious few men who can make a living honestly and +self-respectingly. It's fortunate the women can hold aloof and remain +pure." +</P> + +<P> +Jane laughed unpleasantly. "I'm not so sure that the women who live +with men just for shelter are pure," said she. +</P> + +<P> +"Jen," the young man burst out, "you're ambitious—aren't you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Rather," replied she. +</P> + +<P> +"And you like the sort of thing I'm trying to do—like it and approve +of it?" +</P> + +<P> +"I believe a man ought to succeed—get to the top." +</P> + +<P> +"So do I—if he can do it honorably." +</P> + +<P> +Jane hesitated—dared. "To be quite frank," said she, "I worship +success and I despise failure. Success means strength. Failure means +weakness—and I abominate weakness." +</P> + +<P> +He looked quietly disapproving. "You don't mean that. You don't +understand what you're saying." +</P> + +<P> +"Perfectly," she assured him. "I'm not a bit good. Education has +taken all the namby-pamby nonsense out of me." +</P> + +<P> +But he was not really hearing; besides, what had women to do with the +realities of life? They were made to be the property of men—that was +the truth, though he would never have confessed it to any woman. They +were made to be possessed. "And I must possess this woman," he +thought, his blood running hot. He said: +</P> + +<P> +"Why not help me to make a career? I can do it, Jen, with you to help." +</P> + +<P> +She had thought of this before—of making a career for herself, of +doing the "something" her intense energy craved, through a man. The +"something" must be big if it were to satisfy her; and what that was +big could a woman do except through a man? But—this man. Her eyes +turned thoughtfully upon him—a look that encouraged him to go on: +</P> + +<P> +"Politics interest you, Jen. I've seen that in the way you listen and +in the questions you ask." +</P> + +<P> +She smiled—but not at the surface. In fact, his political talk had +bored her. She knew nothing about the subject, and, so, had been as +one listening to an unknown language. But, like all women, having only +the narrowest range of interests herself and the things that would +enable her to show off to advantage, she was used to being bored by the +conversational efforts of men and to concealing her boredom. She had +listened patiently and had led the conversation by slow, imperceptible +stages round to the interesting personal—to the struggle for dominion +over this difficult male. +</P> + +<P> +"Anyhow," he went on, "no intelligent person could fail to be +interested in politics, once he or she appreciated what it meant. And +people of our class owe it to society to take part in politics. Victor +Dorn is a crank, but he's right about some things—and he's right in +saying that we of the upper class are parasites upon the masses. They +earn all the wealth, and we take a large part of it away from them. +And it's plain stealing unless we give some service in return. For +instance, you and I—what have we done, what are we doing that entitles +us to draw so much? Somebody must earn by hard labor all that is +produced. We are not earning. So"—he was looking handsome now in his +manly earnestness—"Jen, it's up to us to do our share—to stop +stealing—isn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +She was genuinely interested. "I hadn't thought of these things," said +she. +</P> + +<P> +"Victor Dorn says we ought to go to work like laborers," pursued David. +"But that's where he's a crank. The truth is, we ought to give the +service of leadership—especially in politics. And I'm going to do it, +Jane Hastings!" +</P> + +<P> +For the first time she had an interest in him other than that of +conquest. "Just what are you going to do?" she asked. +</P> + +<P> +"Not upset everything and tear everything to pieces, as Victor Dorn +wants to do," replied he. "But reform the abuses and wrongs—make it +so that every one shall have a fair chance—make politics straight and +honest." +</P> + +<P> +This sounded hazy to her. "And what will you get out of it?" asked she. +</P> + +<P> +He colored and was a little uneasy as he thus faced a direct demand for +his innermost secret—the secret of selfishness he tried to hide even +from himself. But there was no evading; if he would interest her he +must show her the practical advantages of his proposal. "If I'm to do +any good," said he, putting the best face, and really not a bad face, +upon a difficult and delicate matter—"if I'm to do any good I must win +a commanding position—must get to be a popular leader—must hold high +offices—and—and—all that." +</P> + +<P> +"I understand," said she. "That sounds attractive. Yes, David, you +ought to make a career. If I were a man that's the career I'd choose." +</P> + +<P> +"You can choose it, though you're a woman," rejoined he. "Marry me, and +we'll go up together. You've no idea how exciting campaigns and +elections are. A little while, and you'll be crazy about it all. The +women are taking part, more and more." +</P> + +<P> +"Who's Victor Dorn?" she suddenly asked. +</P> + +<P> +"You must remember him. It was his father that was killed by the +railway the day we all went on that excursion to Indianapolis." +</P> + +<P> +"Dorn the carpenter," said Jane. "Yes—I remember." Her face grew +dreamy with the effort of memory. "I see it all again. And there was +a boy with a very white face who knelt and held his head." +</P> + +<P> +"That was Victor," said Hull. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—I remember him. He was a bad boy—always fighting and robbing +orchards and getting kept after school." +</P> + +<P> +"And he's still a bad boy—but in a different way. He's out against +everything civilized and everybody that's got money." +</P> + +<P> +"What does he do? Keep a saloon?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, but he spends a lot of time at them. I must say for him that he +doesn't drink—and professes not to believe in drink. When I pointed +out to him what a bad example he set, loafing round saloons, he laughed +at me and said he was spending his spare time exactly as Jesus Christ +did. 'You'll find, Davy, old man,' he said, 'if you'll take the +trouble to read your Bible, that Jesus traveled with publicans and +sinners—and a publican is in plain English a saloonkeeper.'" +</P> + +<P> +"That was very original—wasn't it?" said Jane. "I'm interested in +this man. He's—different. I like people who are different." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't think you'd like him, Victor Dorn," said David. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes—in a way. I admire him," graciously. "He's really a +remarkable fellow, considering his opportunities." +</P> + +<P> +"He calls you 'Davy, old man,'" suggested Jane. +</P> + +<P> +Hull flushed. "That's his way. He's free and easy with every one. He +thinks conventionality is a joke." +</P> + +<P> +"And it is," cried Miss Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"You'd not think so," laughed Hull, "if he called you Jane or Jenny or +my dear Jenny half an hour after he met you." +</P> + +<P> +"He wouldn't," said Miss Hastings in a peculiar tone. +</P> + +<P> +"He would if he felt like it," replied Hull. "And if you resented it, +he'd laugh at you and walk away. I suspect him of being a good deal of +a poseur and a fakir. All those revolutionary chaps are. But I +honestly think that he really doesn't care a rap for classes—or for +money—or for any of the substantial things." +</P> + +<P> +"He sounds common," said Miss Hastings. "I've lost interest in him." +Then in the same breath: "How does he live? Is he a carpenter?" +</P> + +<P> +"He was—for several years. You see, he and his mother together +brought up the Dorn family after the father was killed. They didn't +get a cent of damages from the railroad. It was an outrage——" +</P> + +<P> +"But my father was the largest owner of the railroad." +</P> + +<P> +Hull colored violently. "You don't understand about business, Jen. +The railroad is a corporation. It fought the case—and the Dorns had +no money—and the railway owned the judge and bribed several jurors at +each trial. Dorn says that was what started him to thinking—to being +a revolutionist—though he doesn't call himself that." +</P> + +<P> +"I should think it would!" cried Miss Hastings. "If my father had +known——" She caught her breath. "But he MUST have known! He was on +the train that day." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't understand business, Jen. Your father wouldn't interfere +with the management of the corporation ." +</P> + +<P> +"He makes money out of it—doesn't he?" +</P> + +<P> +"So do we all get money out of corporations that are compelled to do +all sorts of queer things. But we can't abolish the system—we've got +to reform it. That's why I'm in politics—and want you——" +</P> + +<P> +"Something must be done about that," interrupted Jane. "I shall talk +to father——" +</P> + +<P> +"For heaven's sake, Jen," cried David in alarm, "don't tell your father +I'VE been stirring you up. He's one of the powers in politics in this +State, and——" +</P> + +<P> +"I'll not give you away, Davy," said Miss Hastings a little +contemptuously. "I want to hear more about this Victor Dorn. I'll get +that money for him and his mother. Is he very poor?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well—you'd call him poor. But he says he has plenty. He runs a +small paper. I think he makes about twenty-five dollars a week out of +it—and a little more out of lecturing. Then—every once in a while he +goes back to his trade—to keep his hand in and enjoy the luxury of +earning honest money, as he puts it." +</P> + +<P> +"How queer!" exclaimed Miss Hastings. "I would like to meet him. Is +he—very ignorant?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, no—no, indeed. He's worked his way through college—and law +school afterward. Supported the family all the time." +</P> + +<P> +"He must be tremendously clever." +</P> + +<P> +"I've given you an exaggerated idea of him," Davy hastened to say. +"He's really an ordinary sort of chap." +</P> + +<P> +"I should think he'd get rich," said Miss Hastings. "Most of the men +that do—so far as I've met them—seem ordinary enough." +</P> + +<P> +"He says he could get rich, but that he wouldn't waste time that way. +But he's fond of boasting." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't think he could make money—after all he did—going to +college and everything?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—I guess he could," reluctantly admitted Davy. Then in a burst of +candor: "Perhaps I'm a little jealous of him. If <I>I</I> were thrown on +my own resources, I'm afraid I'd make a pretty wretched showing. +But—don't get an exaggerated idea of him. The things I've told you +sound romantic and unusual. If you met him—saw him every day—you'd +realize he's not at all—at least, not much—out of the ordinary." +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps," said Miss Hastings shrewdly, "perhaps I'm getting a better +idea of him than you who see him so often." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, you'll run across him sometime," said Davy, who was bearing up no +better than would the next man under the strain of a woman's interest +in and excitement about another man. "When you do, you'll get enough +in about five minutes. You see, he's not a gentleman ." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not sure that I'm wildly crazy about gentlemen—AS gentlemen," +replied the girl. "Very few of the interesting people I've read about +in history and biography have been gentlemen." +</P> + +<P> +"And very few of them would have been pleasant to associate with," +rejoined Hull. "You'll admire Victor as I do. But you'll feel—as I +do—that there's small excuse for a man who has been educated, who has +associated with upper class people, turning round and inciting the +lower classes against everything that's fine and improving." +</P> + +<P> +It was now apparent to the girl that David Hull was irritatedly jealous +of this queer Victor Dorn—was jealous of her interest in him. Her +obvious cue was to fan this flame. In no other way could she get any +amusement out of Davy's society; for his tendency was to be heavily +serious—and she wanted no more of the too strenuous love making, yet +wanted to keep him "on the string." This jealousy was just the means +for her end. Said she innocently: "If it irritates you, Davy, we +won't talk about him." +</P> + +<P> +"Not at all—not at all," cried Hull. "I simply thought you'd be +getting tired of hearing so much about a man you'd never known." +</P> + +<P> +"But I feel as if I did know him," replied she. "Your account of him +was so vivid. I thought of asking you to bring him to call." +</P> + +<P> +Hull laughed heartily. "Victor Dorn—calling!" +</P> + +<P> +"Why not?" +</P> + +<P> +"He doesn't do that sort of thing. And if he did, how could I bring +him here?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why not?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well—in the first place, you are a lady—and he is not in your class. +Of course, men can associate with each other in politics and business. +But the social side of life—that's different." +</P> + +<P> +"But a while ago you were talking about my going in for politics," said +Miss Hastings demurely. +</P> + +<P> +"Still, you'd not have to meet SOCIALLY queer and rough characters——" +</P> + +<P> +"Is Victor Dorn very rough?" +</P> + +<P> +The interrupting question was like the bite of a big fly to a sweating +horse. "I'm getting sick of hearing about him from you," cried Hull +with the pettishness of the spoiled children of the upper class. +</P> + +<P> +"In what way is he rough?" persisted Miss Hastings. "If you didn't +wish to talk about Victor Dorn, why did you bring the subject up?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—all right," cried Hull, restraining himself. "Victor isn't +exactly rough. He can act like a gentleman—when he happens to want +to. But you never can tell what he'll do next." +</P> + +<P> +"You MUST bring him to call!" exclaimed Miss Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"Impossible," said Hull angrily. +</P> + +<P> +"But he's the only man I've heard about since I've been home that I've +taken the least interest in." +</P> + +<P> +"If he did come, your father would have the servants throw him off the +place." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, no," said Hiss Hastings haughtily. "My father wouldn't insult a +guest of mine." +</P> + +<P> +"But you don't know, Jen," cried David. "Why, Victor Dorn attacks your +father in the most outrageous way in his miserable little anarchist +paper—calls him a thief, a briber, a blood-sucker—a—I'd not venture +to repeat to you the things he says." +</P> + +<P> +"No doubt he got a false impression of father because of that damage +suit," said Miss Hastings mildly. "That was a frightful thing. I +can't be so unjust as to blame him, Davy—can you?" +</P> + +<P> +Hull was silent. +</P> + +<P> +"And I guess father does have to do a lot of things in the course of +business—— Don't all the big men—the leaders?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—unfortunately they do," said Hull. "That's what gives +plausibility to the shrieks of demagogues like Victor Dorn—though +Victor is too well educated not to know better than to stir up the +ignorant classes." +</P> + +<P> +"I wonder why he does it," said Miss Hastings, reflectively. "I must +ask him. I want to hear what he says to excuse himself." In fact, she +had not the faintest interest in the views of this queer unknown; her +chief reason for saying she had was to enjoy David Hull's jealousy. +</P> + +<P> +"Before you try to meet Victor," said Hull, in a constrained, desperate +way, "please speak to your father about it." +</P> + +<P> +"I certainly shall," replied the girl. "As soon as he comes home this +afternoon, I'm going to talk to him about that damage suit. That has +got to be straightened out." An expression of resolution, of +gentleness and justice abruptly transformed her face. "You may not +believe it, but I have a conscience." Absently, "A curious sort of a +conscience—one that might become very troublesome, I'm afraid—in some +circumstances." +</P> + +<P> +Instantly the fine side of David Hull's nature was to the fore—the +dominant side, for at the first appeal it always responded. "So have +I, Jen," said he. "I think our similarity in that respect is what +draws me so strongly to you. And it's that that makes me hope I can win +you. Oh, Jen—there's so much to be done in the world—and you and I +could have such a splendid happy life doing our share of it." +</P> + +<P> +She was once more looking at him with an encouraging interest. But she +said, gently: "Let's not talk about that any more to-day, Davy." +</P> + +<P> +"But you'll think about it?" urged he. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said she. "Let's be friends—and—and see what happens." +</P> + +<P> +Hull strolled up to the house with her, but refused to stop for lunch. +He pleaded an engagement; but it was one that could—and in other +circumstances would—have been broken by telephone. His real reason for +hurrying away was fear lest Jane should open out on the subject of +Victor Dorn with her father, and, in her ignorance of the truth as to +the situation, should implicate him. +</P> + +<P> +She found her father already at home and having a bowl of crackers and +milk in a shady corner of the west veranda. He was chewing in the +manner of those whose teeth are few and not too secure. His brows were +knitted and he looked as if not merely joy but everything except +disagreeable sensation had long since fled his life beyond hope of +return—an air not uncommon among the world's successful men. However, +at sight of his lovely young daughter his face cleared somewhat and he +shot at her from under his wildly and savagely narrowed eyebrows a +glance of admiration and tenderness—a quaint expression for those +cold, hard features. +</P> + +<P> +Everyone spoke of him behind his back as "Old Morton Hastings." +</P> + +<P> +In fact, he was barely past sixty, was at an age at which city men of +the modern style count themselves young and even entertain—not without +reason—hope of being desired of women for other than purely practical +reasons. He was born on a farm—was born with an aversion to physical +exertion as profound as was his passion for mental exertion. We never +shall know how much of its progress the world owes to the physically +lazy, mentally tireless men. Those are they who, to save themselves +physical exertion, have devised all manner of schemes and machines to +save labor. And, at bottom, what is progress but man's success in his +effort to free himself from manual labor—to get everything for himself +by the labor of other men and animals and of machines? Naturally his +boyhood of toil on the farm did not lessen Martin Hastings' innate +horror of "real work." He was not twenty when he dropped tools never +to take them up again. He was shoeing a horse in the heat of the cool +side of the barn on a frightful August day. Suddenly he threw down the +hammer and said loudly: "A man that works is a damn fool. I'll never +work again." And he never did. +</P> + +<P> +As soon as he could get together the money—and it was not long after +he set about making others work for him—he bought a buggy, a kind of +phaeton, and a safe horse. Thenceforth he never walked a step that +could be driven. The result of thirty-five years of this life, so +unnatural to an animal that is designed by Nature for walking and is +punished for not doing so—the result of a lifetime of this folly was a +body shrivelled to a lean brown husk, legs incredibly meagre and so +tottery that they scarcely could bear him about. His head—large and +finely shaped—seemed so out of proportion that he looked at a glance +senile. But no one who had business dealings with him suspected him of +senility or any degree of weakness. He spoke in a thin dry voice, +shrouded in sardonic humor. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't care for lunch," said Jane, dropping to a chair near the side +of the table opposite her father. "I had breakfast too late. Besides, +I've got to look out for my figure. There's a tendency to fat in our +family." +</P> + +<P> +The old man chuckled. "Me, for instance," said he. +</P> + +<P> +"Martha, for instance," replied Jane. Martha was her one +sister—married and ten years older than she and spaciously matronly. +</P> + +<P> +"Wasn't that Davy Hull you were talking to, down in the woods?" +inquired her father. +</P> + +<P> +Jane laughed. "You see everything," said she. +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't see much when I saw him," said her father. +</P> + +<P> +Jane was hugely amused. Her father watched her laughter—the dazzling +display of fine teeth—with delighted eyes. "You've got mighty good +teeth, Jenny," observed he. "Take care of 'em. You'll never know what +misery is till you've got no teeth—or next to none." He looked +disgustedly into his bowl. "Crackers and milk!" grunted he. "No teeth +and no digestion. The only pleasure a man of my age can have left is +eating, and I'm cheated out of that." +</P> + +<P> +"So, you wouldn't approve of my marrying Davy?" said the girl. +</P> + +<P> +Her father grunted—chuckled. "I didn't say that. Does he want to +marry you?" +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't say that," retorted Jane. "He's an unattached young man—and +I, being merely a woman, have got to look out for a husband." +</P> + +<P> +Martin looked gloomy. "There's no hurry," said he. "You've been away +six years. Seems to me you might stay at home a while." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I'd bring him here, popsy I've no intention of leaving you. You +were in an awful state, when I came home. That mustn't ever happen +again. And as you won't live with Martha and Hugo—why, I've got to be +the victim." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—it's up to you, Miss, to take care of me in my declining +years.... You can marry Davy—if you want to. Davy—or anybody. I +trust to your good sense." +</P> + +<P> +"If I don't like him, I can get rid of him," said the girl. +</P> + +<P> +Her father smiled indulgently. "That's A LEETLE too up-to-date for an +old man like me," observed he. "The world's moving fast nowadays. +It's got a long ways from where it was when your ma and I were young." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you think Davy Hull will make a career?" asked Jane. She had heard +from time to time as much as she cared to hear about the world of a +generation before—of its bareness and discomfort, its primness, its +repulsive piety, its ignorance of all that made life bright and +attractive—how it quite overlooked this life in its agitation about +the extremely problematic life to come. "I mean a career in politics," +she explained. +</P> + +<P> +The old man munched and smacked for full a minute before he said, +"Well, he can make a pretty good speech. Yes—I reckon he could be +taken in hand and pushed. He's got a lot of fool college-bred ideas +about reforming things. But he'd soon drop them, if he got into the +practical swing. As soon as he had a taste of success, he'd stop being +finicky. Just now, he's one of those nice, pure chaps who stand off +and tell how things ought to be done. But he'd get over that." +</P> + +<P> +Jane smiled peculiarly—half to herself. "Yes—I think he would. In +fact, I'm sure he would." She looked at her father. "Do you think he +amounts to as much as Victor Dorn?" she asked, innocently. +</P> + +<P> +The old man dropped a half raised spoonful of milk and crackers into +the bowl with a splash. "Dorn—he's a scoundrel!" he exclaimed, +shaking with passion. "I'm going to have that dirty little paper of +his stopped and him put out of town. Impudent puppy!—foul-mouthed +demagogue! I'll SHOW him!" +</P> + +<P> +"Why, he doesn't amount to anything, father," remonstrated the girl. +"He's nothing but a common working man—isn't he?" +</P> + +<P> +"That's all he is—the hound!" replied Martin Hastings. A look of +cruelty, of tenacious cruelty, had come into his face. It would have +startled a stranger. But his daughter had often seen it; and it did +not disturb her, as it had never appeared for anything that in any way +touched her life. "I've let him hang on here too long," went on the +old man, to himself rather than to her. "First thing I know he'll be +dangerous." +</P> + +<P> +"If he's worth while I should think you'd hire him," remarked Jane +shrewdly. +</P> + +<P> +"I wouldn't have such a scoundrel in my employ," cried her father. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, maybe," pursued the daughter, "maybe you couldn't hire him." +</P> + +<P> +"Of course I could," scoffed Hastings. "Anybody can be hired." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't believe it," said the girl bluntly. +</P> + +<P> +"One way or another," declared the old man. "That Dorn boy isn't worth +the price he'd want." +</P> + +<P> +"What price would he want?" asked Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"How should I know?" retorted her father angrily. +</P> + +<P> +"You've tried to hire him—haven't you?" persisted she. +</P> + +<P> +The father concentrated on his crackers and milk. Presently he said: +"What did that fool Hull boy say about Dorn to you?" +</P> + +<P> +"He doesn't like him," replied Jane. "He seems to be jealous of +him—and opposed to his political views." +</P> + +<P> +"Dorn's views ain't politics. They're—theft and murder and +highfalutin nonsense," said Hastings, not unconscious of his feeble +anti-climax. +</P> + +<P> +"All the same, he—or rather, his mother—ought to have got damages +from the railway," said the girl. And there was a sudden and startling +shift in her expression—to a tenacity as formidable as her father's +own, but a quiet and secret tenacity. +</P> + +<P> +Old Hastings wiped his mouth and began fussing uncomfortably with a +cigar. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't blame him for getting bitter and turning against society," +continued she. "I'd have done the same thing—and so would you." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings lit the cigar. "They wanted ten thousand dollars," he said, +almost apologetically. "Why, they never saw ten thousand cents they +could call their own." +</P> + +<P> +"But they lost their bread-winner, father," pleaded the girl. "And +there were young children to bring up and educate. Oh, I hate to think +that—that we had anything to do with such a wrong." +</P> + +<P> +"It wasn't a wrong, Jen—as I used to tell your ma," said the old man, +much agitated and shrill of voice. "It was just the course of +business. The law was with our company." +</P> + +<P> +Jane said nothing. She simply gazed steadily at her father. He +avoided her glance. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't want to hear no more about it," he burst out with abrupt +violence. "Not another word!" +</P> + +<P> +"Father, I want it settled—and settled right," said the girl. "I ask +it as a favor. Don't do it as a matter of business, but as a matter of +sentiment." +</P> + +<P> +He shifted uneasily, debating. When he spoke he was even more +explosive than before. "Not a cent! Not a red! Give that whelp money +to run his crazy paper on? Not your father, while he keeps his mind." +</P> + +<P> +"But—mightn't that quiet him?" pleaded she. "What's the use of having +war when you can have peace? You've always laughed at people who let +their prejudices stand in the way of their interests. You've always +laughed at how silly and stupid and costly enmities and revenges are. +Now's your chance to illustrate, popsy." And she smiled charmingly at +him. +</P> + +<P> +He was greatly softened by her manner—and by the wisdom of what she +said—a wisdom in which, as in a mirror, he recognized with pleasure +her strong resemblance to himself. "That wouldn't be a bad idea, Jen," +said he after reflection, "IF I could get a guarantee." +</P> + +<P> +"But why not do it generously?" urged the girl. "Generosity inspires +generosity. You'll make him ashamed of himself." +</P> + +<P> +With a cynical smile on his shrivelled face the old man slowly shook +his big head that made him look as top-heavy as a newborn baby. "That +isn't as smart, child, as what you said before. It's in them things +that the difference between theory and practice shows. He'd take the +money and laugh at me. No, I'll try to get a guarantee." He nodded +and chuckled. "Yes, that was a good idea of yours, Jen." +</P> + +<P> +"But—isn't it just possible that he is a man with—with principles of +a certain kind?" suggested she. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course, he THINKS so," said Hastings. "They all do. But you don't +suppose a man of any sense at all could really care about and respect +working class people?—ignorant, ungrateful fools. <I>I</I> know 'em. +Didn't I come from among 'em? Ain't I dealt with 'em all my life? No, +that there guy Dorn's simply trying to get up, and is using them to +step up on. I did the same thing, only I did it in a decent, +law-abiding way. I didn't want to tear down those that was up. I +wanted to go up and join 'em. And I did." +</P> + +<P> +And his eyes glistened fondly and proudly as he gazed at his daughter. +She represented the climax of his rising—she, the lady born and bred, +in her beautiful clothes, with her lovely, delicate charms. Yes, he +had indeed "come up," and there before him was the superb tangible +evidence of it. +</P> + +<P> +Jane had the strongest belief in her father's worldly wisdom. At the +same time, from what David Hull said she had got an impression of a +something different from the ordinary human being in this queer Victor +Dorn. "You'd better move slowly," she said to her father. "There's no +hurry, and you might be mistaken in him." +</P> + +<P> +"Plenty of time," asserted her father. "There's never any need to +hurry about giving up money." Then, with one of those uncanny flashes +of intuition for which he, who was never caught napping, was famous, he +said to her sharply: "You keep your hands off, miss." +</P> + +<P> +She was thrown into confusion—and her embarrassment enraged her +against herself. "What could <I>I</I> do?" she retorted with a brave +attempt at indifference. +</P> + +<P> +"Well—keep your hands off, miss," said the old man. "No female +meddling in business. I'll stand for most anything, but not for that." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was now all eagerness for dropping the subject. She wished no +further prying of that shrewd mind into her secret thoughts. "It's +hardly likely I'd meddle where I know nothing about the circumstances," +said she. "Will you drive me down to Martha's?" +</P> + +<P> +This request was made solely to change the subject, to shift her father +to his favorite topic for family conversation—his daughter Martha, +Mrs. Hugo Galland, her weakness for fashionable pastimes, her incessant +hints and naggings at her father about his dowdy dress, his vulgar +mannerisms of speech and of conduct, especially at table. Jane had not +the remotest intention of letting her father drive her to Mrs. +Galland's, or anywhere, in the melancholy old phaeton-buggy, behind the +fat old nag whose coat was as shabby as the coat of the master or as +the top and the side curtains of the sorrowful vehicle it drew along at +caterpillar pace. +</P> + +<P> +When her father was ready to depart for his office in the Hastings +Block—the most imposing office building in Remsen City, Jane announced +a change of mind. +</P> + +<P> +"I'll ride, instead," said she. "I need the exercise, and the day +isn't too warm." +</P> + +<P> +"All right," said Martin Hastings grumpily. He soon got enough of +anyone's company, even of his favorite daughter's. Through years of +habit he liked to jog about alone, revolving in his mind his business +affairs—counting in fancy his big bundles of securities, one by one, +calculating their returns past, present and prospective—reviewing the +various enterprises in which he was dominant factor, working out +schemes for getting more profit here, for paying less wages there, for +tightening his grip upon this enterprise, for dumping his associates in +that, for escaping with all the valuable assets from another. His +appearance, as he and his nag dozed along the highroad, was as +deceptive as that of a hive of bees on a hot day—no signs of life +except a few sleepy workers crawling languidly in and out at the low, +broad crack-door, yet within myriads toiling like mad. +</P> + +<P> +Jane went up to dress. She had brought an Italian maid with her from +Florence, and a mass of baggage that had given the station loungers at +Remsen City something to talk about, when there was a dearth of new +subjects, for the rest of their lives. She had transformed her own +suite in the second story of the big old house into an appearance of +the quarters of a twentieth century woman of wealth and leisure. In +the sitting room were books in four languages; on the walls were +tasteful reproductions of her favorite old masters. The excellence of +her education was attested not by the books and pictures but by the +absence of those fussy, commonplace draperies and bits of bric-a-brac +where—with people of no taste and no imagination furnish their houses +because they can think of nothing else to fill in the gaps. +</P> + +<P> +Many of Jane's ways made Sister Martha uneasy. For Martha, while +admitting that Jane through superior opportunity ought to know, could +not believe that the "right sort" of people on the other side had +thrown over all her beloved formalities and were conducting themselves +distressingly like tenement-house people. For instance, Martha could +not approve Jane's habit of smoking cigarettes—a habit which, by one +of those curious freaks of character, enormously pleased her father. +But—except in one matter—Martha entirely approved Jane's style of +dress. She hastened to pronounce it "just too elegant" and repeated +that phrase until Jane, tried beyond endurance, warned her that the +word elegant was not used seriously by people of the "right sort" and +that its use was regarded as one of those small but subtle signs of the +loathsome "middle class." +</P> + +<P> +The one thing in Jane's dress that Martha disapproved—or, rather, +shied at—was her riding suit. This was an extremely noisy plaid man's +suit—for Jane rode astride. Martha could not deny that Jane looked +"simply stunning" when seated on her horse and dressed in that garb +with her long slim feet and graceful calves encased in a pair of riding +boots that looked as if they must have cost "something fierce." But +was it really "ladylike"? Hadn't Jane made a mistake and adopted a +costume worn only by the fashionables among the demi-mondaines of whom +Martha had read and had heard such dreadful, delightful stories? +</P> + +<P> +It was the lively plaid that Miss Hastings now clad herself in. She +loved that suit. Not only did it give her figure a superb opportunity +but also it brought out new beauties in her contour and coloring. And +her head was so well shaped and her hair grew so thickly about brow and +ears and nape of neck that it looked full as well plaited and done +close as when it was framing her face and half concealing, half +revealing her charming ears in waves of changeable auburn. After a +lingering—and pardonably pleased—look at herself in a long mirror, +she descended, mounted and rode slowly down toward town. +</P> + +<P> +The old Galland homestead was at the western end of town—in a quarter +that had become almost poor. But it was so dignified and its grounds +were so extensive that it suggested a manor house with the humble homes +of the lord's dependents clustering about it for shelter. To reach it +Jane had to ride through two filthy streets lined with factories. As +she rode she glanced at the windows, where could be seen in dusty air +girls and boys busy at furiously driven machines—machines that +compelled their human slaves to strain every nerve in the monotonous +task of keeping them occupied. Many of the girls and boys paused long +enough for a glance at the figure of the man-clad girl on the big horse. +</P> + +<P> +Jane, happy in the pleasant sunshine, in her beauty and health and fine +raiment and secure and luxurious position in the world, gave a thought +of pity to these imprisoned young people. "How lucky I am," she +thought, "not to have been born like that. Of course, we all have our +falls now and then. But while they always strike on the hard ground, +I've got a feather bed to fall on." +</P> + +<P> +When she reached Martha's and was ushered into the cool upstairs +sitting room, in somehow ghastly contrast to the hot rooms where the +young working people sweated and strained, the subject persisted in its +hold on her thoughts. There was Martha, in comfortable, corsetless +expansiveness—an ideal illustration of the worthless idler fattening +in purposelessness. She was engaged with all her energies in preparing +for the ball Hugo Galland's sister, Mrs. Bertrand, was giving at the +assembly rooms that night. +</P> + +<P> +"I've been hard at it for several days now," said she. "I think at +last I see daylight. But I want your opinion." +</P> + +<P> +Jane gazed absently at the dress and accompanying articles that had +been assembled with so much labor. "All right," said she. "You'll look +fine and dandy." +</P> + +<P> +Martha twitched. "Jane, dear—don't say that—don't use such an +expression. I know it's your way of joking. But lots of people would +think you didn't know any better." +</P> + +<P> +"Let 'em think," said Jane. "I say and do as I please." +</P> + +<P> +Martha sighed. Here was one member of her family who could be a +credit, who could make people forget the unquestionably common origin +of the Hastingses and of the Morleys. Yet this member was always +breaking out into something mortifying, something reminiscent of the +farm and of the livery stable—for the deceased Mrs. Hastings had been +daughter of a livery stable keeper—in fact, had caught Martin Hastings +by the way she rode her father's horses at a sale at a county fair. +Said Martha: +</P> + +<P> +"You haven't really looked at my clothes, Jane. Why DID you go back to +calling yourself Jane?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because it's my name," replied her sister. +</P> + +<P> +"I know that. But you hated it and changed it to Jeanne, which is so +much prettier." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't think so any more," replied Miss Hastings. "My taste has +improved. Don't be so horribly middle class, Martha—ashamed of +everything simple and natural." +</P> + +<P> +"You think you know it all—don't you?—just because you've lived +abroad," said Martha peevishly. +</P> + +<P> +"On the contrary, I don't know one-tenth as much as I thought I did, +when I came back from Wellesley with a diploma." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you like my costume?" inquired Martha, eying her finery with the +fond yet dubious expression of the woman who likes her own taste but is +not sure about its being good taste. +</P> + +<P> +"What a lazy, worthless pair we are!" exclaimed Jane, hitting her boot +leg a tremendous rap with her little cane. +</P> + +<P> +Martha startled. "Good God—Jane—what is it?" she cried. +</P> + +<P> +"On the way here I passed a lot of factories," pursued Jane. "Why +should those people have to work like—like the devil, while we sit +about planning ball dresses?" +</P> + +<P> +Martha settled back comfortably. "I feel so sorry for those poor +people," said she, absently sympathetic. +</P> + +<P> +"But why?" demanded Jane. "WHY? Why should we be allowed to idle +while they have to slave? What have we done—what are we doing—to +entitle us to ease? What have they done to condemn them to pain and +toil?" +</P> + +<P> +"You know very well, Jane, that we represent the finer side of life." +</P> + +<P> +"Slop!" ejaculated Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"For pity's sake, don't let's talk politics," wailed Martha. "I know +nothing about politics. I haven't any brains for that sort of thing." +</P> + +<P> +"Is that politics?" inquired Jane. "I thought politics meant whether +the Democrats or the Republicans or the reformers were to get the +offices and the chance to steal." +</P> + +<P> +"Everything's politics, nowadays," said Martha, comparing the color of +the material of her dress with the color of her fat white arm. "As +Hugo says, that Victor Dorn is dragging everything into politics—even +our private business of how we make and spend our own money." +</P> + +<P> +Jane sat down abruptly. "Victor Dorn," she said in a strange voice. +"WHO is Victor Dorn? WHAT is Victor Dorn? It seems that I can hear of +nothing but Victor Dorn to-day." +</P> + +<P> +"He's too low to talk about," said Martha, amiable and absent. +</P> + +<P> +"Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"Politics," replied Martha. "Really, he is horrid, Jane." +</P> + +<P> +"To look at?" +</P> + +<P> +"No—not to look at. He's handsome in a way. Not at all common +looking. You might take him for a gentleman, if you didn't know. +Still—he always dresses peculiarly—always wears soft hats. I think +soft hats are SO vulgar—don't you?" +</P> + +<P> +"How hopelessly middle-class you are, Martha," mocked Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Hugo would as soon think of going in the street in a—in a—I don't +know what." +</P> + +<P> +"Hugo is the finest flower of American gentleman. That is, he's the +quintessence of everything that's nice—and 'nasty.' I wish I were +married to him for a week. I love Hugo, but he gives me the creeps." +She rose and tramped restlessly about the room. "You both give me the +creeps. Everything conventional gives me the creeps. If I'm not +careful I'll dress myself in a long shirt, let down my hair and run +wild." +</P> + +<P> +"What nonsense you do talk," said Martha composedly. +</P> + +<P> +Jane sat down abruptly. "So I do!" she said. "I'm as poor a creature +as you at bottom. I simply like to beat against the bars of my cage to +make myself think I'm a wild, free bird by nature. If you opened the +door, I'd not fly out, but would hop meekly back to my perch and fall +to smoothing my feathers.... Tell me some more about Victor Dorn." +</P> + +<P> +"I told you he isn't fit to talk about," said Martha. "Do you know, +they say now that he is carrying on with that shameless, brazen thing +who writes for his paper, that Selma Gordon?" +</P> + +<P> +"Selma Gordon," echoed Jane. Her brows came down in a gesture +reminiscent of her father, and there was a disagreeable expression +about her mouth and in her light brown eyes. "Who's Selma Gordon?" +</P> + +<P> +"She makes speeches—and writes articles against rich people—and—oh, +she's horrid." +</P> + +<P> +"Pretty?" +</P> + +<P> +"No—a scrawny, black thing. The men—some of them—say she's got a +kind of uncanny fascination. Some even insist that she's beautiful." +Martha laughed. "Beautiful! How could a woman with black hair and a +dark skin and no flesh on her bones be beautiful?" +</P> + +<P> +"It has been known to happen," said Jane curtly. "Is she one of THE +Gordons?" +</P> + +<P> +"Mercy, no!" cried Martha Galland. "She simply took the name of +Gordon—that is, her father did. He was a Russian peasant—a Jew. And +he fell in love with a girl who was of noble family—a princess, I +think." +</P> + +<P> +"Princess doesn't mean much in Russia," said Jane sourly. +</P> + +<P> +"Anyhow, they ran away to this country. And he worked in the rolling +mill here—and they both died—and Selma became a factory girl—and +then took to writing for the New Day—that's Victor Dorn's paper, you +know." +</P> + +<P> +"How romantic," said Jane sarcastically. "And now Victor Dorn's in +love with her?" +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't say that," replied Martha, with a scandal-smile. +</P> + +<P> +Jane Hastings went to the window and gazed out into the garden. Martha +resumed her habitual warm day existence—sat rocking gently and fanning +herself and looking leisurely about the room. Presently she said: +</P> + +<P> +"Jane, why don't you marry Davy Hull?" +</P> + +<P> +No answer. +</P> + +<P> +"He's got an independent income—so there's no question of his marrying +for money. And there isn't any family anywhere that's better than +his—mighty few as good. And he's DEAD in love with you, Jen." +</P> + +<P> +With her back still turned Jane snapped, "I'd rather marry Victor Dorn." +</P> + +<P> +"What OUTRAGEOUS things you do say!" cried Martha. +</P> + +<P> +"I envy that black Jewess—that—what's her name?—that Selma Gordon." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't even know them," said Martha. +</P> + +<P> +Jane wheeled round with a strange laugh. "Don't I?" cried she. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know anyone else." +</P> + +<P> +She strode to her sister and tapped her lightly on the shoulder with +the riding stick. +</P> + +<P> +"Be careful," cautioned Martha. "You know how easily my flesh +mars—and I'm going to wear my low neck to-night." +</P> + +<P> +Jane did not heed. "David Hull is a bore—and a fraud," she said. "I +tell you I'd rather marry Victor Dorn." +</P> + +<P> +"Do be careful about my skin, dear," pleaded Martha. "Hugo'll be SO +put out if there's a mark on it. He's very proud of my skin." +</P> + +<P> +Jane looked at her quizzically. "What a dear, fat old rotter of a +respectability it is, to be sure," said she—and strode from the room, +and from the house. +</P> + +<P> +Her mood of perversity and defiance did not yield to a ten mile gallop +over the gentle hills of that lovely part of Indiana, but held on +through the afternoon and controlled her toilet for the ball. She knew +that every girl in town would appear at that most fashionable party of +the summer season in the best clothing she could get together. As she +had several dresses from Paris which she not without reason regarded as +notable works of art, the opportunity to outshine was hers—the sort of +opportunity she took pleasure in using to the uttermost, as a rule. +But to be the best dressed woman at Mrs. Bertram's party was too easy +and too commonplace. To be the worst dressed would call for +courage—of just the sort she prided herself on having. Also, it would +look original, would cause talk—would give her the coveted sense of +achievement. +</P> + +<P> +When she descended to show herself to her father and say good night to +him, she was certainly dressed by the same pattern that caused him to +be talked about throughout that region. Her gown was mussed, had been +mended obviously in several places, had not been in its best day +becoming. But this was not all. Her hair looked stringy and +dishevelled. She was delighted with herself. Except during an illness +two years before never had she come so near to being downright homely. +"Martha will die of shame," said she to herself. "And Mrs. Bertram +will spend the evening explaining me to everybody." She did not +definitely formulate the thought, "And I shall be the most talked about +person of the evening"; but it was in her mind none the less. +</P> + +<P> +Her father always smoked his after-dinner cigar in a little room just +off the library. It was filled up with the plain cheap furniture and +the chromos and mottoes which he and his wife had bought when they +first went to housekeeping—in their early days of poverty and +struggle. On the south wall was a crude and cheap, but startlingly +large enlargement of an old daguerreotype of Letitia Hastings at +twenty-four—the year after her marriage and the year before the birth +of the oldest child, Robert, called Dock, now piling up a fortune as an +insider in the Chicago "brave" game of wheat and pork, which it is +absurd to call gambling because gambling involves chance. To smoke the +one cigar the doctor allowed him, old Martin Hastings always seated +himself before this picture. He found it and his thoughts the best +company in the world, just as he had found her silent self and her +thoughts the best company in their twenty-one years of married life. +As he sat there, sometimes he thought of her—of what they had been +through together, of the various advances in his fortune—how this one +had been made near such and such anniversary, and that one between two +other anniversaries—and what he had said to her and what she had said +to him. Again—perhaps oftener—he did not think of her directly, any +more than he had thought of her when they sat together evening after +evening, year in and year out, through those twenty-one years of +contented and prosperous life. +</P> + +<P> +As Jane entered he, seated back to the door, said: +</P> + +<P> +"About that there Dorn damage suit——" +</P> + +<P> +Jane started, caught her breath. Really, it was uncanny, this +continual thrusting of Victor Dorn at her. +</P> + +<P> +"It wasn't so bad as it looked," continued her father. He was speaking +in the quiet voice—quiet and old and sad—he always used when seated +before the picture. +</P> + +<P> +"You see, Jenny, in them days"—also, in presence of the picture he +lapsed completely into the dialect of his youth—"in them days the +railroad was teetering and I couldn't tell which way things'd jump. +Every cent counted." +</P> + +<P> +"I understand perfectly, father," said Jane, her hands on his shoulders +from behind. She felt immensely relieved. She did not realize that +every doer of a mean act always has an excellent excuse for it. +</P> + +<P> +"Then afterwards," the old man went on, "the family was getting along +so well—the boy was working steady and making good money and pushing +ahead—and I was afeared I'd do harm instead of good. It's mighty +dangerous, Jen, to give money sudden to folks that ain't used to it. +I've seen many a smash-up come that way. And your ma—she thought so, +too—kind of." +</P> + +<P> +The "kind of" was advanced hesitatingly, with an apologetic side glance +at the big crayon portrait. But Jane was entirely convinced. She was +average human; therefore, she believed what she wished to believe. +</P> + +<P> +"You were quite right, father," said she. "I knew you couldn't do a +bad thing—wouldn't deliberately strike at weak, helpless people. And +now, it can be straightened out and the Dorns will be all the better +for not having been tempted in the days when it might have ruined them." +</P> + +<P> +She had walked round where her father could see her, as she delivered +herself of this speech so redolent of the fumes of collegiate smugness. +He proceeded to examine her—with an expression of growing +dissatisfaction. Said he fretfully: +</P> + +<P> +"You don't calculate to go out, looking like that?" +</P> + +<P> +"Out to the swellest blow-out of the year, popsy," said she. +</P> + +<P> +The big heavy looking head wobbled about uneasily. "You look too much +like your old pappy's daughter," said he. +</P> + +<P> +"I can afford to," replied she. +</P> + +<P> +The head shook positively. "You ma wouldn't 'a liked it. She was +mighty partic'lar how she dressed." +</P> + +<P> +Jane laughed gayly. "Why, when did you become a critic of women's +dress?" cried she. +</P> + +<P> +"I always used to buy yer ma dresses and hats when I went to the city," +said he. "And she looked as good as the best—not for these days, but +for them times." He looked critically at the portrait. "I bought them +clothes and awful dear they seemed to me." His glance returned to his +daughter. "Go get yourself up proper," said he, between request and +command. "SHE wouldn't 'a liked it." +</P> + +<P> +Jane gazed at the common old crayon, suddenly flung her arms round the +old man's neck. "Yes—father," she murmured. "To please HER." +</P> + +<P> +She fled; the old man wiped his eyes, blew his nose and resumed the +careful smoking of the cheap, smelly cigar. He said he preferred that +brand of his days of poverty; and it was probably true, as he would +refuse better cigars offered him by fastidious men who hoped to save +themselves from the horrors of his. He waited restlessly, though it +was long past his bedtime; he yawned and pretended to listen while Davy +Hull, who had called for Jane in the Hull brougham, tried to make a +favorable impression upon him. At last Jane reappeared—and certainly +Letitia Hastings would have been more than satisfied. +</P> + +<P> +"Sorry to keep you waiting," said she to Hull, who was speechless and +tremulous before her voluptuous radiance. "But father didn't like the +way I was rigged out. Maybe I'll have to change again." +</P> + +<P> +"Take her along, Davy," said Hastings, his big head wagging with +delight. "She's a caution—SHE is!" +</P> + +<P> +Hull could not control himself to speak. As they sat in the carriage, +she finishing the pulling on of her gloves, he stared out into the +heavy rain that was deluging the earth and bending low the boughs. +Said she, half way down the hill: +</P> + +<P> +"Well—can't you talk about anything but Victor Dorn?" +</P> + +<P> +"I saw him this afternoon," said Hull, glad that the tension of the +silence was broken. +</P> + +<P> +"Then you've got something to talk about." +</P> + +<P> +"The big street car strike is on." +</P> + +<P> +"So father said at dinner. I suppose Victor Dorn caused it." +</P> + +<P> +"No—he's opposed to it. He's queer. I don't exactly understand his +ideas. He says strikes are ridiculous—that it's like trying to cure +smallpox by healing up one single sore." +</P> + +<P> +Jane gave a shiver of lady-like disgust. "How—nasty," said she. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm telling you what he said. But he says that the only way human +beings learn how to do things right is by doing them wrong—so while +he's opposed to strikes he's also in favor of them." +</P> + +<P> +"Even <I>I</I> understand that," said Jane. "I don't think it's difficult." +</P> + +<P> +"Doesn't it strike you as—as inconsistent?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—bother consistency!" scoffed the girl. "That's another middle +class virtue that sensible people loathe as a vice. Anyhow, he's +helping the strikers all he can—and fighting US. You know, your father +and my father's estate are the two biggest owners of the street +railways." +</P> + +<P> +"I must get his paper," said Jane. "I'll have a lot of fun reading the +truth about us." +</P> + +<P> +But David wasn't listening. He was deep in thought. After a while he +said: "It's amazing—and splendid—and terrible, what power he's +getting in our town. Victor Dorn, I mean." +</P> + +<P> +"Always Victor Dorn," mocked Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"When he started—twelve years ago as a boy of twenty, just out of +college and working as a carpenter—when he started, he was alone and +poor, and without friends or anything. He built up little by little, +winning one man at a time—the fellow working next him on his right, +then the chap working on his left—in the shop—and so on, one man +after another. And whenever he got a man he held him—made him as +devoted—as—as fanatical as he is himself. Now he's got a band of +nearly a thousand. There are ten thousand voters in this town. So, +he's got only one in ten. But what a thousand!" +</P> + +<P> +Jane was gazing out into the rain, her eyes bright, her lips parted. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you listening?" asked Hull. "Or, am I boring you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Go on," said she. +</P> + +<P> +"They're a thousand missionaries—apostles—yes, apostle is the name +for them. They live and breathe and think and talk only the ideas +Victor Dorn believes and fights for. And whenever he wants anything +done—anything for the cause—why, there are a thousand men ready to do +it." +</P> + +<P> +"Why?" said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Victor Dorn," said Hull. "Do you wonder that he interests me? For +instance, to-night: you see how it's raining. Well, Victor Dorn had +them print to-day fifty thousand leaflets about this strike—what it +means to his cause. And he has asked five hundred of his men to stand +on the corners and patrol the streets and distribute those dodgers. +I'll bet not a man will be missing." +</P> + +<P> +"But why?" repeated Jane. "What for?" +</P> + +<P> +"He wants to conquer this town. He says the world has to be +conquered—and that the way to begin is to begin—and that he has +begun." +</P> + +<P> +"Conquer it for what?" +</P> + +<P> +"For himself, I guess," said Hull. "Of course, he professes that it's +for the public good. They all do. But what's the truth?" +</P> + +<P> +"If I saw him I could tell you," said Jane in the full pride of her +belief in her woman's power of divination in character. +</P> + +<P> +"However, he can't succeed," observed Hull. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes, he can," replied Jane. "And will. Even if every idea he had +were foolish and wrong. And it isn't—is it?" +</P> + +<P> +David laughed peculiarly. "He's infernally uncomfortably right in most +of the things he charges and proposes. I don't like to think about +it." He shut his teeth together. "I WON'T think about it," he +muttered. +</P> + +<P> +"No—you'd better stick to your own road, Davy," said Jane with +irritating mockery. "You were born to be thoroughly conventional and +respectable. As a reformer you're ideal. As a—an imitator of Victor +Dorn, you'd be a joke." +</P> + +<P> +"There's one of his men now," exclaimed Hull, leaning forward excitedly. +</P> + +<P> +Jane looked. A working man, a commonplace enough object, was standing +under the corner street lamp, the water running off his hat, his +shoulders, his coat tail. His package of dodgers was carefully +shielded by an oilcloth from the wet which had full swing at the man. +To every passer-by he presented a dodger, accompanying the polite +gesture with some phrase which seemed to move the man or woman to take +what was offered and to put it away instead of dropping it. +</P> + +<P> +Jane sank back in the carriage, disappointed. "Is that all?" said she +disdainfully. +</P> + +<P> +"ALL?" cried Hull. "Use your imagination, Jen. But I forgot—you're a +woman. They see only surfaces." +</P> + +<P> +"And are snared into marrying by complexions and pretty features and +dresses and silly flirting tricks," retorted the girl sarcastically. +</P> + +<P> +Hull laughed. "I spoke too quick that time," said he. "I suppose you +expected to see something out of a fifteenth century Italian old +master! Well—it was there, all right." +</P> + +<P> +Jane shrugged her shoulders. "And your Victor Dorn," said she, "no +doubt he's seated in some dry, comfortable place enjoying the thought +of his men making fools of themselves for him." +</P> + +<P> +They were drawing up to the curb before the Opera House where were the +assembly rooms. "There he is now," cried Hull. +</P> + +<P> +Jane, startled, leaned eagerly forward. In the rain beyond the edge of +the awning stood a dripping figure not unlike that other which had so +disappointed her. Underneath the brim of the hat she could see a +smooth-shaven youngish face—almost boyish. But the rain streaming +from the brim made satisfactory scrutiny impossible. +</P> + +<P> +Jane again sank back. "How many carriages before us?" she said. +</P> + +<P> +"You're disappointed in him, too, I suppose," said Hull. "I knew you +would be." +</P> + +<P> +"I thought he was tall," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Only middling," replied Hull, curiously delighted. +</P> + +<P> +"I thought he was serious," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"On the contrary, he's always laughing. He's the best natured man I +know." +</P> + +<P> +As they descended and started along the carpet under the middle of the +awning, Jane halted. She glanced toward the dripping figure whom the +police would not permit under the shelter. Said she: "I want one of +those papers." +</P> + +<P> +Davy moved toward the drenched distributor of strike literature. "Give +me one, Dorn," he said in his most elegant manner. +</P> + +<P> +"Sure, Davy," said Dorn in a tone that was a subtle commentary on +Hull's aristocratic tone and manner. As he spoke he glanced at Jane; +she was looking at him. Both smiled—at Davy's expense. +</P> + +<P> +Davy and Jane passed on in, Jane folding the dodger to tuck it away for +future reading. She said to him: "But you didn't tell me about his +eyes." +</P> + +<P> +"What's the matter with them?" +</P> + +<P> +"Everything," replied she—and said no more. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H3> + +<P> +The dance was even more tiresome than Jane had anticipated. There had +been little pleasure in outshining the easily outshone belles of Remsen +City. She had felt humiliated by having to divide the honors with a +brilliantly beautiful and scandalously audacious Chicago girl, a Yvonne +Hereford—whose style, in looks, in dress and in wit, was more +comfortable to the standard of the best young men of Remsen City—a +standard which Miss Hastings, cultivated by foreign travel and social +adventure, regarded as distinctly poor, not to say low. Miss +Hereford's audacities were especially offensive to Jane. Jane was +audacious herself, but she flattered herself that she had a delicate +sense of that baffling distinction between the audacity that is the +hall mark of the lady and the audacity that proclaims the not-lady. +For example, in such apparently trifling matters as the way of smoking +a cigarette, the way of crossing the legs or putting the elbows on the +table or using slang, Jane found a difference, abysmal though narrow, +between herself and Yvonne Hereford. "But then, her very name gives her +away," reflected Jane. "There'd surely be a frightfully cheap streak in +a mother who in this country would name her daughter Yvonne—or in a +girl who would name herself that." +</P> + +<P> +However, Jane Hastings was not deeply annoyed either by the +shortcomings of Remsen City young men or by the rivalry of Miss +Hereford. Her dissatisfaction was personal—the feeling of futility, +of cheapness, in having dressed herself in her best and spent a whole +evening at such unworthy business. "Whatever I am or am not fit for," +said she to herself, "I'm not for society—any kind of society. At +least I'm too much grown-up mentally for that." Her disdainful +thoughts about others were, on this occasion as almost always, merely a +mode of expressing her self-scorn. +</P> + +<P> +As she was undressing she found in her party bag the dodger Hull had +got for her from Victor Dorn. She, sitting at her dressing table, +started to read it at once. But her attention soon wandered. "I'm not +in the mood," she said. "To-morrow." And she tossed it into the top +drawer. The fact was, the subject of politics interested her only when +some man in whom she was interested was talking it to her. In a +general way she understood things political, but like almost all women +and all but a few men she could fasten her attention only on things +directly and clearly and nearly related to her own interests. Politics +seemed to her to be not at all related to her—or, indeed, to anybody +but the men running for office. This dodger was politics, pure and +simple. A plea to workingmen to awaken to the fact that their STRIKES +were stupid and wasteful, that the way to get better pay and decent +hours of labor was by uniting, taking possession of the power that was +rightfully theirs and regulating their own affairs. +</P> + +<P> +She resumed fixing her hair for the night. Her glance bent steadily +downward at one stage of this performance, rested unseeingly upon the +handbill folded printed side out and on top of the contents of the open +drawer. She happened to see two capital letters—S.G.—in a line by +themselves at the end of the print. She repeated them mechanically +several times—"S.G.—S.G.—S.G."—then her hands fell from her hair +upon the handbill. She settled herself to read in earnest. +</P> + +<P> +"Selma Gordon," she said. "That's different." +</P> + +<P> +She would have had some difficulty in explaining to herself why it was +"different." She read closely, concentratedly now. She tried to read +in an attitude of unfriendly criticism, but she could not. A dozen +lines, and the clear, earnest, honest sentences had taken hold of her. +How sensible the statements were, and how obviously true. Why, it +wasn't the writing of an "anarchistic crank" at all—on the contrary, +the writer was if anything more excusing toward the men who were giving +the drivers and motormen a dollar and ten cents a day for fourteen +hours' work—"fourteen hours!" cried Jane, her cheeks burning—yes, +Selma Gordon was more tolerant of the owners of the street car line +than Jane herself would have been. +</P> + +<P> +When Jane had read, she gazed at the print with sad envy in her eyes. +"Selma Gordon can think—and she can write, too," said she half aloud. +"I want to know her—too." +</P> + +<P> +That "too" was the first admission to herself of a curiously intense +desire to meet Victor Dorn. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, to be in earnest about something! To have a real interest! To +find something to do besides the nursery games disguised under new +forms for the grown-up yet never to be grown-up infants of the world. +And THAT kind of politics doesn't sound shallow and dull. There's +heart in it—and brains—real brains—not merely nasty little +self-seeking cunning." She took up the handbill again and read a +paragraph set in bolder type: +</P> + +<P> +"The reason we of the working class are slaves is because we haven't +intelligence enough to be our own masters, let alone masters of anybody +else. The talk of equality, workingmen, is nonsense to flatter your +silly, ignorant vanity. We are not the equals of our masters. They +know more than we do, and naturally they use that knowledge to make us +work for them. So, even if you win in this strike or in all your +strikes, you will not much better yourselves. Because you are ignorant +and foolish, your masters will scheme around and take from you in some +other way what you have wrenched from them in the strike. +</P> + +<P> +"Organize! Think! Learn! Then you will rise out of the dirt where +you wallow with your wives and your children. Don't blame your +masters; they don't enslave you. They don't keep you in slavery. Your +chains are of your own forging and only you can strike them off!" +</P> + +<P> +Certainly no tenement house woman could be lazier, emptier of head, +more inane of life than her sister Martha. "She wouldn't even keep +clean if it wasn't the easiest thing in the world for her to do, and a +help at filling in her long idle day." Yet—Martha Galland had every +comfort and most of the luxuries, was as sheltered from all the +hardships as a hot-house flower. Then there was Hugo—to go no further +afield than the family. Had he ever done an honest hour's work in his +life? Could anyone have less brains than he? Yet Hugo was rich and +respected, was a director in big corporations, was a member of a +first-class law firm. "It isn't fair," thought the girl. "I've always +felt it. I see now why. It's a bad system of taking from the many for +the benefit of us few. And it's kept going by a few clever, strong men +like father. They work for themselves and their families and relatives +and for their class—and the rest of the people have to suffer." +</P> + +<P> +She did not fall asleep for several hours, such was the tumult in her +aroused brain. The first thing the next morning she went down town, +bought copies of the New Day—for that week and for a few preceding +weeks—and retreated to her favorite nook in her father's grounds to +read and to think—and to plan. She searched the New Day in vain for +any of the wild, wandering things Davy and her father had told her +Victor Dorn was putting forth. The four pages of each number were +given over either to philosophical articles no more "anarchistic" than +Emerson's essays, not so much so as Carlyle's, or to plain accounts of +the current stealing by the politicians of Remsen City, of the squalor +and disease—danger in the tenements, of the outrages by the gas and +water and street car companies. There was much that was terrible, much +that was sad, much that was calculated to make an honest heart burn +with indignation against those who were cheerily sacrificing the whole +community to their desire for profits and dividends and graft, public +and private. But there was also a great deal of humor—of rather a +sardonic kind, but still seeing the fantastic side of this grand game +of swindle. +</P> + +<P> +Two paragraphs made an especial impression on her: +</P> + +<P> +"Remsen City is no worse—and no better—than other American cities. +It's typical. But we who live here needn't worry about the rest of the +country. The thing for us to do is to CLEAN UP AT HOME." +</P> + +<P> +"We are more careful than any paper in this town about verifying every +statement we make, before we make it. If we should publish a single +statement about anyone that was false even in part we would be +suppressed. The judges, the bosses, the owners of the big +blood-sucking public service corporations, the whole ruling class, are +eager to put us out of existence. Don't forget this fact when you hear +the New Day called a lying, demagogical sheet." +</P> + +<P> +With the paper beside her on the rustic bench, she fell to +dreaming—not of a brighter and better world, of a wiser and freer +race, but of Victor Dorn, the personality that had unaided become such +a power in Remsen City, the personality that sparkled and glowed in the +interesting pages of the New Day, that made its sentences read as if +they were spoken into your very ears by an earnest, honest voice +issuing from a fascinating, humor-loving, intensely human and natural +person before your very eyes. But it was not round Victor Dorn's brain +that her imagination played. +</P> + +<P> +"After all," thought she, "Napoleon wasn't much over five feet. Most +of the big men have been little men. Of course, there were +Alexander—and Washington—and Lincoln, but—how silly to bother about +a few inches of height, more or less! And he wasn't really SHORT. Let +me see—how high did he come on Davy when Davy was standing near him? +Above his shoulder—and Davy's six feet two or three. He's at least as +tall as I am—anyhow, in my ordinary heels." +</P> + +<P> +She was attracted by both the personalities she discovered in the +little journal. She believed she could tell them apart. About some of +the articles, the shorter ones, she was doubtful. But in those of any +length she could feel that difference which enables one to distinguish +the piano touch of a player in another room—whether it is male or +female. Presently she was searching for an excuse for scraping +acquaintance with this pair of pariahs—pariahs so far as her world was +concerned. And soon she found it. The New Day was taking +subscriptions for a fund to send sick children and their mothers to the +country for a vacation from the dirt and heat of the tenements—for +Remsen City, proud though it was and boastful of its prosperity, housed +most of its inhabitants in slums—though of course that low sort of +people oughtn't really to be counted—except for purposes of swelling +census figures—and to do all the rough and dirty work necessary to +keep civilization going. +</P> + +<P> +She would subscribe to this worthy charity—and would take her +subscription, herself. Settled—easily and well settled. She did not +involve herself, or commit herself in any way. Besides, those who +might find out and might think she had overstepped the bounds would +excuse her on the ground that she had not been back at home long and +did not realize what she was doing. +</P> + +<P> +What should she wear? +</P> + +<P> +Her instinct was for an elaborate toilet—a descent in state—or such +state as the extremely limited resources of Martin Hastings' stables +would permit. The traps he had ordered for her had not yet come; she +had been glad to accept David Hull's offer of a lift the night before. +Still, without a carriage or a motor she could make quite an impression +with a Paris walking dress and hat, properly supported by fashionable +accessories of the toilet. +</P> + +<P> +Good sense and good taste forbade these promptings of nature. No, she +would dress most simply—in her very plainest things—taking care to +maintain all her advantages of face and figure. If she overwhelmed +Dorn and Miss Gordon, she would defeat her own purpose—would not +become acquainted with them. +</P> + +<P> +In the end she rejected both courses and decided for the riding +costume. The reason she gave for this decision—the reason she gave +herself—was that the riding costume would invest the call with an air +of accident, of impulse. The real reason. +</P> + +<P> +It may be that some feminine reader can guess why she chose the most +startling, the most gracefully becoming, the most artlessly physical +apparel in her wardrobe. +</P> + +<P> +She said nothing to her father at lunch about her plans. Why should +she speak of them? He might oppose; also, she might change her mind. +After lunch she set out on her usual ride, galloping away into the +hills—but she had put twenty-five dollars in bills in her trousers +pocket. She rode until she felt that her color was at its best, and +then she made for town—a swift, direct ride, her heart beating high as +if she were upon a most daring and fateful adventure. And, as a matter +of fact, never in her life had she done anything that so intensely +interested her. She felt that she was for the first time slackening +rein upon those unconventional instincts, of unknown strength and +purpose, which had been making her restless with their vague stirrings. +</P> + +<P> +"How silly of me!" she thought. "I'm doing a commonplace, rather +common thing—and I'm trying to make it seem a daring, romantic +adventure. I MUST be hard up for excitement!" +</P> + +<P> +Toward the middle of the afternoon she dropped from her horse before +the office of the New Day and gave a boy the bridle. "I'll be back in a +minute," she explained. It was a two-story frame building, dingy and +in disrepair. On the street floor was a grocery. Access to the New +Day was by a rickety stairway. As she ascended this, making a great +noise on its unsteady boards with her boots, she began to feel cheap +and foolish. She recalled what Hull had said in the carriage. "No +doubt," replied she, "I'd feel much the same way if I were going to see +Jesus Christ—a carpenter's son, sitting in some hovel, talking with +his friends the fishermen and camel drivers—not to speak of the women." +</P> + +<P> +The New Day occupied two small rooms—an editorial work room, and a +printing work room behind it. Jane Hastings, in the doorway at the +head of the stairs, was seeing all there was to see. In the editorial +room were two tables—kitchen tables, littered with papers and +journals, as was the floor, also. At the table directly opposite the +door no one was sitting—"Victor Dorn's desk," Jane decided. At the +table by the open window sat a girl, bent over her writing. Jane saw +that the figure was below, probably much below, the medium height for +woman, that it was slight and strong, that it was clad in a simple, +clean gray linen dress. The girl's black hair, drawn into a plain but +distinctly graceful knot, was of that dense and wavy thickness which is +a characteristic and a beauty of the Hebrew race. The skin at the nape +of her neck, on her hands, on her arms bare to the elbows was of a +beautiful dead-white—the skin that so admirably compliments dead-black +hair. +</P> + +<P> +Before disturbing this busy writer Jane glanced round. There was +nothing to detain her in the view of the busy printing plant in the +room beyond. But on the walls of the room before her were four +pictures—lithographs, cheap, not framed, held in place by a tack at +each corner. There was Washington—then Lincoln—then a copy of +Leonardo's Jesus in the Last Supper fresco—and a fourth face, bearded, +powerful, imperious, yet wonderfully kind and good humored—a face she +did not know. Pointing her riding stick at it she said: +</P> + +<P> +"And who is that?" +</P> + +<P> +With a quick but not in the least a startled movement the girl at the +table straightened her form, turned in her chair, saying, as she did +so, without having seen the pointing stick: +</P> + +<P> +"That is Marx—Karl Marx." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was so astonished by the face she was now seeing—the face of the +girl—that she did not hear the reply. The girl's hair and skin had +reminded her of what Martha had told her about the Jewish, or +half-Jewish, origin of Selma Gordon. Thus, she assumed that she would +see a frankly Jewish face. Instead, the face looking at her from +beneath the wealth of thick black hair, carelessly parted near the +centre, was Russian—was Cossack—strange and primeval, intense, dark, +as superbly alive as one of those exuberant tropical flowers that seem +to cry out the mad joy of life. Only, those flowers suggest the +evanescent, the flame burning so fiercely that it must soon burn out, +while this Russian girl declared that life was eternal. You could not +think of her as sick, as old, as anything but young and vigorous and +vivid, as full of energy as a healthy baby that kicks its dresses into +rags and wears out the strength of its strapping nurse. Her nose was +as straight as Jane's own particularly fine example of nose. Her dark +gray eyes, beneath long, slender, coal black lines of brow, were +brimming with life and with fun. She had a wide, frank, scarlet mouth; +her teeth were small and sharp and regular, and of the strong and +healthy shade of white. She had a very small, but a very resolute +chin. With another quick, free movement she stood up. She was indeed +small, but formed in proportion. She seemed out of harmony with her +linen dress. She looked as if she ought to be careening on the steppes +in some romantic, half-savage costume. Jane's first and instant +thought was, "There's not another like her in the whole world. She's +the only living specimen of her kind." +</P> + +<P> +"Gracious!" exclaimed Jane. "But you ARE healthy." +</P> + +<P> +The smile took full advantage of the opportunity to broaden into a +laugh. A most flattering expression of frank, childlike admiration +came into the dark gray eyes. "You're not sickly, yourself," replied +Selma. Jane was disappointed that the voice was not untamed Cossack, +but was musically civilized. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, but I don't flaunt it as you do," rejoined Jane. "You'd make +anyone who was the least bit off, furious." +</P> + +<P> +Selma, still with the child-like expression, but now one of curiosity, +was examining Jane's masculine riding dress. "What a sensible suit!" +she cried, delightedly. "I'd wear something like that all the time, if +I dared." +</P> + +<P> +"Dared?" said Jane. "You don't look like the frightened sort." +</P> + +<P> +"Not on account of myself," explained Selma. "On account of the cause. +You see, we are fighting for a new idea. So, we have to be careful not +to offend people's prejudices about ideas not so important. If we went +in for everything that's sensible, we'd be regarded as cranks. One +thing at a time." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's glance shifted to the fourth picture. "Didn't you say that +was—Karl Marx?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +"He wrote a book on political economy. I tried to read it at college. +But I couldn't. It was too heavy for me. He was a Socialist—wasn't +he?—the founder of Socialism?" +</P> + +<P> +"A great deal more than that," replied Selma. "He was the most +important man for human liberty that ever lived—except perhaps one." +And she looked at Leonardo's "man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." +</P> + +<P> +"Marx was a—a Hebrew—wasn't he?" +</P> + +<P> +Selma's eyes danced, and Jane felt that she was laughing at her +hesitation and choice of the softer word. Selma said: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—he was a Jew. Both were Jews." +</P> + +<P> +"Both?" inquired Jane, puzzled. +</P> + +<P> +"Marx and Jesus," explained Selma. +</P> + +<P> +Jane was startled. "So HE was a Jew—wasn't He?" +</P> + +<P> +"And they were both labor leaders—labor agitators. The first one +proclaimed the brotherhood of man. But he regarded this world as +hopeless and called on the weary and heavy laden masses to look to the +next world for the righting of their wrongs. Then—eighteen centuries +after—came that second Jew"—Selma looked passionate, reverent +admiration at the powerful, bearded face, so masterful, yet so +kind—"and he said: 'No! not in the hereafter, but in the here. Here +and now, my brothers. Let us make this world a heaven. Let us redeem +ourselves and destroy the devil of ignorance who is holding us in this +hell.' It was three hundred years before that first Jew began to +triumph. It won't be so long before there are monuments to Marx in +clean and beautiful and free cities all over the earth." +</P> + +<P> +Jane listened intensely. There was admiring envy in her eyes as she +cried: "How splendid!—to believe in something—and work for it and +live for it—as you do!" +</P> + +<P> +Selma laughed, with a charming little gesture of the shoulders and the +hands that reminded Jane of her foreign parentage. "Nothing else seems +worth while," said she. "Nothing else is worth while. There are only +two entirely great careers—to be a teacher of the right kind and work +to ease men's minds—as those four did—or to be a doctor of the right +kind and work to make mankind healthy. All the suffering, all the +crime, all the wickedness, comes from ignorance or bad health—or both. +Usually it's simply bad health." +</P> + +<P> +Jane felt as if she were devoured of thirst and drinking at a fresh, +sparkling spring. "I never thought of that before," said she. +</P> + +<P> +"If you find out all about any criminal, big or little, you'll discover +that he had bad health—poisons in his blood that goaded him on." +</P> + +<P> +Jane nodded. "Whenever I'm difficult to get on with, I'm always not +quite well." +</P> + +<P> +"I can see that your disposition is perfect, when you are well," said +Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"And yours," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I'm never out of humor," said Selma. "You see, I'm never +sick—not the least bit." +</P> + +<P> +"You are Miss Gordon, aren't you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—I'm Selma Gordon." +</P> + +<P> +"My name is Jane Hastings." Then as this seemed to convey nothing to +Selma, Jane added: "I'm not like you. I haven't an individuality of +my own—that anybody knows about. So, I'll have to identify myself by +saying that I'm Martin Hastings' daughter." +</P> + +<P> +Jane confidently expected that this announcement would cause some sort +of emotion—perhaps of awe, perhaps of horror, certainly of interest. +She was disappointed. If Selma felt anything she did not show it—and +Jane was of the opinion that it would be well nigh impossible for so +direct and natural a person to conceal. Jane went on: +</P> + +<P> +"I read in your paper about your fund for sick children. I was riding +past your office—saw the sign—and I've come in to give what I happen +to have about me." She drew out the small roll of bills and handed it +to Selma. +</P> + +<P> +The Russian girl—if it is fair thus to characterize one so intensely +American in manner, in accent and in speech—took the money and said: +</P> + +<P> +"We'll acknowledge it in the paper next week." +</P> + +<P> +Jane flushed and a thrill of alarm ran through her. "Oh—please—no," +she urged. "I'd not like to have my name mentioned. That would look +as if I had done it to seem charitable. Besides, it's such a trifle." +</P> + +<P> +Selma was calm and apparently unsuspicious. "Very well," said she. +"We'll write, telling what we did with the money, so that you can +investigate." +</P> + +<P> +"But I trust you entirely," cried Jane. +</P> + +<P> +Selma shook her head. "But we don't wish to be trusted," said she. +"Only dishonest people wish to be trusted when it's possible to avoid +trusting. And we all need watching. It helps us to keep straight." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I don't agree with you," protested Miss Hastings. "Lots of the +time I'd hate to be watched. I don't want everybody to know all I do." +</P> + +<P> +Selma's eyes opened. "Why not?" she said. +</P> + +<P> +Jane cast about for a way to explain what seemed to her a self-evident +truth. "I mean—privacy," she said. "For instance, if you were in +love, you'd not want everybody to know about it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, indeed," declared Selma. "I'd be tremendously proud of it. It +must be wonderful to be in love." +</P> + +<P> +In one of those curious twists of feminine nature, Miss Hastings +suddenly felt the glow of a strong, unreserved liking for this strange, +candid girl. +</P> + +<P> +Selma went on: "But I'm afraid I never shall be. I get no time to +think about myself. From rising till bed time my work pushes at me." +She glanced uneasily at her desk, apologetically at Miss Hastings. "I +ought to be writing this minute. The strike is occupying Victor, and +I'm helping out with his work." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm interrupting," said Jane. "I'll go." She put out her hand with +her best, her sweetest smile. "We're going to be friends—aren't we?" +</P> + +<P> +Selma clasped her hand heartily and said: "We ARE friends. I like +everybody. There's always something to like in everyone—and the bad +part isn't their fault. But it isn't often that I like anyone so much +as I do you. You are so direct and honest—quite different from the +other women of your class that I've met." +</P> + +<P> +Jane felt unaccountably grateful and humble. "I'm afraid you're too +generous. I guess you're not a very good judge of people," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"So Victor—Victor Dorn—says," laughed Selma. "He says I'm too +confiding. Well—why not? And really, he trusts everybody, +too—except with the cause. Then he's—he's"—she glanced from face to +face of the four pictures—"he's like those men." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's glance followed Selma's. She said: "Yes—I should imagine +so—from what I've heard." She startled, flushed, hid behind a +somewhat constrained manner. "Will you come up to my house to lunch?" +</P> + +<P> +"If I can find time," said Selma. "But I'd rather come and take you +for a walk. I have to walk two hours every day. It's the only thing +that'll keep my head clear." +</P> + +<P> +"When will you come?—to-morrow?" +</P> + +<P> +"Is nine o'clock too early?" +</P> + +<P> +Jane reflected that her father left for business at half-past eight. +"Nine to-morrow," she said. "Good-by again." +</P> + +<P> +As she was mounting her horse, she saw "the Cossack girl," as she was +calling her, writing away at the window hardly three feet above the +level of Jane's head when she was mounted, so low was the first story +of the battered old frame house. But Selma did not see her; she was +all intent upon the writing. "She's forgotten me already," thought +Jane with a pang of jealous vanity. She added: "But SHE has SOMETHING +to think about—she and Victor Dorn." +</P> + +<P> +She was so preoccupied that she rode away with only an absent thank you +for the small boy, in an older and much larger and wider brother's +cast-off shirt, suspenders and trousers. At the corner of the avenue +she remembered and turned her horse. There stood the boy gazing after +her with a hypnotic intensity that made her smile. She rode back +fumbling in her pockets. "I beg your pardon," said she to the boy. +Then she called up to Selma Gordon: +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Gordon—please—will you lend me a quarter until to-morrow?" +</P> + +<P> +Selma looked up, stared dazedly at her, smiled absently at Miss +Hastings—and Miss Hastings had the strongest confirmation of her +suspicion that Selma had forgotten her and her visit the instant she +vanished from the threshold of the office. Said Selma: "A +quarter?—oh, yes—certainly." She seemed to be searching a drawer or +a purse out of sight. "I haven't anything but a five dollar bill. I'm +so sorry"—this in an absent manner, with most of her thoughts +evidently still upon her work. She rose, leaned from the window, +glanced up the street, then down. She went on: +</P> + +<P> +"There comes Victor Dorn. He'll lend it to you." +</P> + +<P> +Along the ragged brick walk at a quick pace the man who had in such +abrupt fashion stormed Jane Hasting's fancy and taken possession of her +curiosity was advancing with a basket on his arm. He was indeed a man +of small stature—about the medium height for a woman—about the height +of Jane Hastings. But his figure was so well put together and his walk +so easy and free from self-consciousness that the question of stature +no sooner arose than it was dismissed. His head commanded all the +attention—its poise and the remarkable face that fronted it. The +features were bold, the skin was clear and healthy and rather fair. +His eyes—gray or green blue and set neither prominently nor +retreatedly—seemed to be seeing and understanding all that was going +on about him. He had a strong, rather relentless mouth—the mouth of +men who make and compel sacrifices for their ambitions. +</P> + +<P> +"Victor," cried Selma as soon as he was within easy range of her voice, +"please lend Miss Hastings a quarter." And she immediately sat down +and went to work again, with the incident dismissed from mind. +</P> + +<P> +The young man—for he was plainly not far beyond thirty—halted and +regarded the young woman on the horse. +</P> + +<P> +"I wish to give this young gentleman here a quarter," said Jane. "He +was very good about holding my horse." +</P> + +<P> +The words were not spoken before the young gentleman darted across the +narrow street and into a yard hidden by masses of clematis, morning +glory and sweet peas. And Jane realized that she had wholly mistaken +the meaning of that hypnotic stare. +</P> + +<P> +Victor laughed—the small figure, the vast clothes, the bare feet with +voluminous trousers about them made a ludicrous sight. "He doesn't +want it," said Victor. "Thank you just the same." +</P> + +<P> +"But I want him to have it," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +With a significant unconscious glance at her costume Dorn said: "Those +costumes haven't reached our town yet." +</P> + +<P> +"He did some work for me. I owe it to him." +</P> + +<P> +"He's my sister's little boy," said Dorn, with his amiable, friendly +smile. "We mustn't start him in the bad way of expecting pay for +politeness." +</P> + +<P> +Jane colored as if she had been rebuked, when in fact his tone forbade +the suggestion of rebuke. There was an unpleasant sparkle in her eyes +as she regarded the young man in the baggy suit, with the basket on his +arm. "I beg your pardon," said she coldly. "I naturally didn't know +your peculiar point of view." +</P> + +<P> +"That's all right," said Dorn carelessly. "Thank you, and good day." +And with a polite raising of the hat and a manner of good humored +friendliness that showed how utterly unconscious he was of her being +offended at him, he hastened across the street and went in at the gate +where the boy had vanished. And Jane had the sense that he had +forgotten her. She glanced nervously up at the window to see whether +Selma Gordon was witnessing her humiliation—for so she regarded it. +But Selma was evidently lost in a world of her own. "She doesn't love +him," Jane decided. "For, even though she is a strange kind of person, +she's a woman—and if she had loved him she couldn't have helped +watching while he talked with another woman—especially with one of my +appearance and class." +</P> + +<P> +Jane rode slowly away. At the corner—it was a long block—she glanced +toward the scene she had just quitted. Involuntarily she drew rein. +Victor and the boy had come out into the street and were playing +catches. The game did not last long. Dorn let the boy corner him and +seize him, then gave him a great toss into the air, catching him as he +came down and giving him a hug and a kiss. The boy ran shouting +merrily into the yard; Victor disappeared in the entrance to the +offices of the New Day. +</P> + +<P> +That evening, as she pretended to listen to Hull on national politics, +and while dressing the following morning Jane reflected upon her +adventure. She decided that Dorn and the "wild girl" were a low, +ill-mannered pair with whom she had nothing in common, that her +fantastic, impulsive interest in them had been killed, that for the +future she would avoid "all that sort of cattle." She would receive +Selma Gordon politely, of course—would plead headache as an excuse for +not walking, would get rid of her as soon as possible. "No doubt," +thought Jane, with the familiar, though indignantly denied, complacence +of her class, "as soon as she gets in here she'll want to hang on. She +played it very well, but she must have been crazy with delight at my +noticing her and offering to take her up." +</P> + +<P> +The postman came as Jane was finishing breakfast. He brought a note +from Selma—a hasty pencil scrawl on a sheet of printer's copy paper: +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Dear Miss Hastings: For the present I'm too busy to take my walks. +So, I'll not be there to-morrow. With best regards, S.G." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Such a fury rose up in Jane that the undigested breakfast went wrong +and put her in condition to give such exhibition as chance might tempt +of that ugliness of disposition which appears from time to time in all +of us not of the meek and worm-like class, and which we usually +attribute to any cause under the sun but the vulgar right one. "The +impertinence!" muttered Jane, with a second glance at the note which +conveyed; among other humiliating things, an impression of her own +absolute lack of importance to Selma Gordon. "Serves me right for +lowering myself to such people. If I wanted to try to do anything for +the working class I'd have to keep away from them. They're so +unattractive to look at and to associate with—not like those shrewd, +respectful, interesting peasants one finds on the other side. They're +better in the East. They know their place in a way. But out here +they're insufferable." +</P> + +<P> +And she spent the morning quarrelling with her maid and the other +servants, issuing orders right and left, working herself into a +horrible mood dominated by a headache that was anything but a pretense. +As she wandered about the house and gardens, she trailed a beautiful +negligee with that carelessness which in a woman of clean and orderly +habits invariably indicates the possession of many clothes and of a +maid who can be counted on to freshen things up before they shall be +used again. Her father came home to lunch in high good humor. +</P> + +<P> +"I'll not go down town again for a few days," said he. "I reckon I'd +best keep out of the way. That scoundrelly Victor Dorn has done so +much lying and inciting these last four or five years that it ain't +safe for a man like me to go about when there's trouble with the hands." +</P> + +<P> +"Isn't it outrageous!" exclaimed Jane. "He ought to be stopped." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings chuckled and nodded. "And he will be," said he. "Wait till +this strike's over." +</P> + +<P> +"When will that be?" asked Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Mighty soon," replied her father. "I was ready for 'em this +time—good and ready. I've sent word to the governor that I want the +militia down here tomorrow——" +</P> + +<P> +"Has there been a riot?" cried Jane anxiously. +</P> + +<P> +"Not yet," said Hastings. He was laughing to himself. "But there will +be to-night. Then the governor'll send the troops in to-morrow +afternoon." +</P> + +<P> +"But maybe the men'll be quiet, and then——" began Jane, sick inside +and trembling. +</P> + +<P> +"When I say a thing'll happen, it'll happen," interrupted her father. +"We've made up our minds it's time to give these fellows a lesson. +It's got to be done. A milder lesson'll serve now, where later on it'd +have to be hard. I tell you these things because I want you to +remember 'em. They'll come in handy—when you'll have to look after +your own property." +</P> + +<P> +She knew how her father hated the thought of his own death; this was +the nearest he had ever come to speaking of it. "Of course, there's +your brother William," he went on. "William's a good boy—and a mighty +good business man—though he does take risks I'd never 'a took—not +even when I was young and had nothing to lose. Yes—and Billy's +honest. BUT"—the big head shook impressively—"William's human, +Jenny—don't ever forget that. The love of money's an awful thing." A +lustful glitter like the shine of an inextinguishable fire made his +eyes fascinating and terrible. "It takes hold of a man and never lets +go. To see the money pile up—and up—and up." +</P> + +<P> +The girl turned away her gaze. She did not wish to see so far into her +father's soul. It seemed a hideous indecency. +</P> + +<P> +"So, Jenny—don't trust William, but look after your own property." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I don't care anything about it, popsy," she cried, fighting to +think of him and to speak to him as simply the living father she had +always insisted on seeing. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—you do care," said Hastings sharply. "You've got to have your +money, because that's your foundation—what you're built on. And I'm +going to train you. This here strike's a good time to begin." +</P> + +<P> +After a long silence she said: "Yes, money's what I'm built on. I +might as well recognize the truth and act accordingly. I want you to +teach me, father." +</P> + +<P> +"I've got to educate you so as, when you get control, you won't go and +do fool sentimental things like some women—and some men that warn't +trained practically—men like that Davy Hull you think so well of. +Things that'd do no good and 'd make you smaller and weaker." +</P> + +<P> +"I understand," said the girl. "About this strike—WHY won't you give +the men shorter hours and better pay?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because the company can't afford it. As things are now, there's only +enough left for a three per cent dividend after the interest on the +bonds is paid." +</P> + +<P> +She had read in the New Day that by a series of tricks the "traction +ring" had quadrupled the bonded indebtedness of the roads and +multiplied the stock by six, and had pocketed the proceeds of the +steal; that three per cent on the enormously inflated capital was in +fact eighteen per cent on the actual stock value; that seven per cent +on the bonds was in fact twenty-eight per cent on the actual bonded +indebtedness; that this traction steal was a fair illustration of how +in a score of ways in Remsen City, in a thousand and one ways in all +parts of the country, the upper class was draining away the substance +of the masses, was swindling them out of their just wages, was forcing +them to pay many times the just prices for every article of civilized +use. She had read these things—she had thought about them—she had +realized that they were true. +</P> + +<P> +She did not put to her father the question that was on her lips—the +next logical question after his answer that the company could not +afford to cut the hours lower than fourteen or to raise wages to what +was necessary for a man to have if he and his family were to live, not +in decency and comfort, but in something less than squalor. She did +not put the question because she wished to spare her father—to spare +herself the shame of hearing his tricky answer—to spare herself the +discomfort of squarely facing a nasty truth. +</P> + +<P> +Instead she said: "I understand. And you have got to look out for the +rights of the people who have invested their money." +</P> + +<P> +"If I didn't I'd be cheating them," said Hastings. "And if the men +don't like their jobs, why, they can quit and get jobs they do like." +He added, in absolute unconsciousness of his inconsistency, in absolute +belief in his own honesty and goodness, "The truth is our company pays +as high wages as can be got anywhere. As for them hours—when <I>I</I> was +working my way up, <I>I</I> used to put in sixteen and eighteen hours a day, +and was mighty glad to do it. This lazy talk of cutting down hours +makes me sick. And these fellows that're always kicking on their jobs, +I'd like to know what'd become of them and their families if I and men +like me didn't provide work for 'em." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, indeed!" cried Jane, eagerly seizing upon this attractive view of +the situation—and resolutely accepting it without question. +</P> + +<P> +In came one of the maids, saying: "There's a man wants to see you, Mr. +Hastings." +</P> + +<P> +"What's his name? What does he want?" inquired Hastings, while Jane +made a mental note that she must try to inject at least a little order +and form into the manners of announcing visitors. +</P> + +<P> +"He didn't give a name. He just said, 'Tell the old man I want to see +him.' I ain't sure, but I think it's Dick Kelly." +</P> + +<P> +As Lizzie was an ardent Democrat, she spoke the name +contemptuously—for Dick Kelly was the Republican boss. If it had been +House, the Democratic boss and Kelly's secret dependent and henchman, +she would have said "Mr. Joseph House" in a tone of deep respect. +</P> + +<P> +"Kelly," said Hastings. "Must be something important or he'd 'a +telephoned or asked me to see him at my office or at the Lincoln Club. +He never came out here before. Bring him in, Lizzie." +</P> + +<P> +A moment and there appeared in the doorway a man of perhaps forty years +who looked like a prosperous contractor who had risen from the ranks. +His figure was notable for its solidity and for the power of the +shoulders; but already there were indications that the solidity, come +of hard manual labor in early life, was soon to soften into fat under +the melting influence of prosperity and the dissipation it put within +too easy reach. The striking features of his face were a pair of keen, +hard, greenish eyes and a jaw that protruded uglily—the jaw of +aggressiveness, not the too prominent jaw of weakness. At sight of +Jane he halted awkwardly. +</P> + +<P> +"How're you, Mr. Hastings?" said he. +</P> + +<P> +"Hello, Dick," said the old man. "This is my daughter Jane." +</P> + +<P> +Jane smiled a pleasant recognition of the introduction. Kelly said +stiffly, "How're you, ma'am?" +</P> + +<P> +"Want to see me alone, I suppose?" Hastings went on. "You go out on +the porch, Jenny." +</P> + +<P> +As soon as Jane disappeared Kelly's stiffness and clumsiness vanished. +To head off Hastings' coming offer of a cigar, he drew one from his +pocket and lighted it. "There's hell to pay, Mr. Hastings," he began, +seating himself near the old man, tilting back in his chair and +crossing his legs. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I reckon you can take care of it," said Hastings calmly. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes, we kin take care of it, all right. Only, I don't want to do +nothing without consulting you." +</P> + +<P> +In these two statements Mr. Kelly summed up the whole of politics in +Remsen City, in any city anywhere, in the country at large. +</P> + +<P> +Kelly had started life as a blacksmith. But he soon tired of the +dullness and toil and started forth to find some path up to where men +live by making others work for them instead of plodding along at the +hand-to-mouth existence that is the lot of those who live by their own +labors alone. He was a safe blower for a while, but wisely soon +abandoned that fascinating but precarious and unremunerative career. +From card sharp following the circus and sheet-writer to a bookmaker he +graduated into bartender, into proprietor of a doggery. As every +saloon is a political club, every saloon-keeper is of necessity a +politician. Kelly's woodbox happened to be a convenient place for +directing the floaters and the repeaters. Kelly's political importance +grew apace. His respectability grew more slowly. But it had grown and +was growing. +</P> + +<P> +If you had asked Lizzie, the maid, why she was a Democrat, she would +have given no such foolish reason as the average man gives. +</P> + +<P> +She would not have twaddled about principles—when everyone with +eyeteeth cut ought to know that principles have departed from politics, +now that both parties have been harmonized and organized into agencies +of the plutocracy. She would not have said she was a Democrat because +her father was, or because all her friends and associates were. She +would have replied—in pleasantly Americanized Irish: +</P> + +<P> +"I'm a Democrat because when my father got too old to work, Mr. House, +the Democrat leader, gave him a job on the elevator at the Court +House—though that dirty thief and scoundrel, Kelly, the Republican +boss, owned all the judges and county officers. And when my brother +lost his place as porter because he took a drink too many, Mr. House +gave him a card to the foreman of the gas company, and he went to work +at eight a week and is there yet." +</P> + +<P> +Mr. Kelly and Mr. House belong to a maligned and much misunderstood +class. Whenever you find anywhere in nature an activity of any kind, +however pestiferous its activity may seem to you—or however good—you +may be sure that if you look deep enough you will find that that +activity has a use, arises from a need. The "robber trusts" and the +political bosses are interesting examples of this basic truth. They +have arisen because science, revolutionizing human society, has +compelled it to organize. The organization is crude and clumsy and +stupid, as yet, because men are ignorant, are experimenting, are +working in the dark. So, the organizing forces are necessarily crude +and clumsy and stupid. +</P> + +<P> +Mr. Hastings was—all unconsciously—organizing society industrially. +Mr. Kelly—equally unconscious of the true nature of his +activities—was organizing society politically. And as industry and +politics are—and ever have been—at bottom two names for identically +the same thing, Mr. Hastings and Mr. Kelly were bound sooner or later +to get together. +</P> + +<P> +Remsen City was organized like every other large or largish community. +There were two clubs—the Lincoln and the Jefferson—which well enough +represented the "respectable elements"—that is, those citizens who +were of the upper class. There were two other clubs—the Blaine and the +Tilden—which were similarly representative of the "rank and file" and, +rather, of the petty officers who managed the rank and file and voted +it and told it what to think and what not to think, in exchange taking +care of the needy sick, of the aged, of those out of work and so on. +Martin Hastings—the leading Republican citizen of Remsen City, though +for obvious reasons his political activities were wholly secret and +stealthy—was the leading spirit in the Lincoln Club. Jared +Olds—Remsen City's richest and most influential Democrat, the head of +the gas company and the water company—was foremost in the Jefferson +Club. At the Lincoln and the Jefferson you rarely saw any but +"gentlemen"—men of established position and fortune, deacons and +vestrymen, judges, corporation lawyers and the like. The Blaine and +the Tilden housed a livelier and a far less select class—the +"boys"—the active politicians, the big saloon keepers, the criminal +lawyers, the gamblers, the chaps who knew how to round up floaters and +to handle gangs of repeaters, the active young sports working for +political position, by pitching and carrying for the political leaders, +by doing their errands of charity or crookedness or what not. Joe +House was the "big shout" at the Tilden; Dick Kelly could be found +every evening on the third—or "wine," or plotting—floor of the +Blaine—found holding court. And very respectful indeed were even the +most eminent of Lincoln, or Jefferson, respectabilities who sought him +out there to ask favors of him. +</P> + +<P> +The bosses tend more and more to become mere flunkeys of the +plutocrats. Kelly belonged to the old school of boss, dating from the +days when social organization was in the early stages, when the +political organizer was feared and even served by the industrial +organizer, the embryo plutocrats. He realized how necessary he was to +his plutocratic master, and he made that master treat him almost as an +equal. He was exacting ever larger pay for taking care of the voters +and keeping them fooled; he was getting rich, and had as yet vague +aspirations to respectability and fashion. He had stopped drinking, +had "cut out the women," had made a beginning toward a less inelegant +way of speaking the language. His view of life was what is called +cynical. That is, he regarded himself as morally the equal of the +respectable rulers of society—or of the preachers who attended to the +religious part of the grand industry of "keeping the cow quiet while it +was being milked." +</P> + +<P> +But Mr. Kelly was explaining to Martin Hastings what he meant when he +said that there was "hell to pay": +</P> + +<P> +"That infernal little cuss, Victor Dorn," said he "made a speech in the +Court House Square to-day. Of course, none of the decent papers—and +they're all decent except his'n—will publish any of it. Still, there +was about a thousand people there before he got through—and the +thing'll spread." +</P> + +<P> +"Speech?—what about?" said Hastings. "He's always shooting off his +mouth. He'd better stop talking and go to work at some honest +business." +</P> + +<P> +"He's got on to the fact that this strike is a put-up job—that the +company hired labor detectives in Chicago last winter to come down here +and get hold of the union. He gave names—amounts paid—the whole damn +thing." +</P> + +<P> +"Um," said Hastings, rubbing his skinny hands along the shiny +pantaloons over his meagre legs. "Um." +</P> + +<P> +"But that ain't all," pursued Kelly. "He read out a list of the men +told off to pretend to set fire to the car barns and start the +riot—those Chicago chaps, you know." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know anything about it," said Hastings sharply. +</P> + +<P> +Kelly smiled slightly—amused scorn. It seemed absurd to him for the +old man to keep up the pretense of ignorance. In fact, Hastings was +ignorant—of the details. He was not quite the aloof plutocrat of the +modern school, who permits himself to know nothing of details beyond +the dividend rate and similar innocent looking results of causes at +which sometimes hell itself would shudder. But, while he was more +active than the conscience-easing devices now working smoothly made +necessary, he never permitted himself to know any unnecessary criminal +or wicked fact about his enterprises. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know," he repeated. "And I don't want to know." +</P> + +<P> +"Anyhow, Dorn gave away the whole thing. He even read a copy of your +letter of introduction to the governor—the one you—according to +Dorn—gave Fillmore when you sent him up to the Capitol to arrange for +the invitation to come after the riot." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings knew that the boss was deliberately "rubbing it in" because +Hastings—that is, Hastings' agents had not invited Kelly to assist in +the project for "teaching the labor element a much needed lesson." But +knowledge of Kelly's motive did not make the truth he was telling any +less true—the absurd mismanagement of the whole affair, with the +result that Dorn seemed in the way to change it from a lesson to labor +on the folly of revolt against their kind and generous but firm +employers into a provoker of fresh and fiercer revolt—effective +revolt—political revolt. So, as Kelly "rubbed," Hastings visibly +winced and writhed. +</P> + +<P> +Kelly ended his recital with: "The speech created a hell of a +sensation, Mr. Hastings. That young chap can talk." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," snapped Hastings. "But he can't do anything else." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not so sure of that," replied Kelly, who was wise enough to +realize the value of a bogey like Dorn—its usefulness for purposes of +"throwing a scare into the silk-stocking crowd." "Dorn's getting mighty +strong with the people." +</P> + +<P> +"Stuff and nonsense!" retorted Hastings. "They'll listen to any slick +tongued rascal that roasts those that are more prosperous than they +are. But when it comes to doing anything, they know better. They envy +and hate those that give them jobs, but they need the jobs." +</P> + +<P> +"There's a good deal of truth in that, Mr. Hastings," said Kelly, who +was nothing if not judicial. "But Dorn's mighty plausible. I hear +sensible men saying there's something more'n hot air in his facts and +figgures." Kelly paused, and made the pause significant. +</P> + +<P> +"About that last block of traction stock, Mr. Hastings. I thought you +were going to let me in on the ground floor. But I ain't heard +nothing." +</P> + +<P> +"You ARE in," said Hastings, who knew when to yield. "Hasn't Barker +been to see you? I'll attend to it, myself." +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you, Mr. Hastings," said Kelly—dry and brief as always when +receipting with a polite phrase for pay for services rendered. "I've +been a good friend to your people." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, you have, Dick," said the old man heartily. "And I want you to +jump in and take charge." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings more than suspected that Kelly, to bring him to terms and to +force him to employ directly the high-priced Kelly or +Republico-Democratic machine as well as the State Republico-Democratic +machine, which was cheaper, had got together the inside information and +had ordered one of his henchmen to convey it to Dorn. But of what use +to quarrel with Kelly? Of course, he could depose him; but that would +simply mean putting another boss in his place—perhaps one more +expensive and less efficient. The time had been when he—and the +plutocracy generally—were compelled to come to the political bosses +almost hat in hand. That time was past, never to return. But still a +competent political agent was even harder to find than a competent +business manager—and was far more necessary; for, while a big business +might stagger along under poor financial or organizing management +within, it could not live at all without political favors, immunities, +and licenses. A band of pickpockets might as well try to work a town +without having first "squared" the police. Not that Mr. Hastings and +his friends THEMSELVES compared themselves to a band of pickpockets. +No, indeed. It was simply legitimate business to blackjack your +competitors, corner a supply, create a monopoly and fix prices and +wages to suit your own notions of what was your due for taking the +"hazardous risks of business enterprise." +</P> + +<P> +"Leave everything to me," said Kelly briskly. "I can put the thing +through. Just tell your lawyer to apply late this afternoon to Judge +Lansing for an injunction forbidding the strikers to assemble anywhere +within the county. We don't want no more of this speechifying. This +is a peaceable community, and it won't stand for no agitators." +</P> + +<P> +"Hadn't the lawyers better go to Judge Freilig?" said Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"He's shown himself to be a man of sound ideas." +</P> + +<P> +"No—Lansing," said Kelly. "He don't come up for re-election for five +years. Freilig comes up next fall, and we'll have hard work to pull +him through, though House is going to put him on the ticket, too. +Dorn's going to make a hot campaign—concentrate on judges." +</P> + +<P> +"There's nothing in that Dorn talk," said Hastings. "You can't scare +me again, Dick, as you did with that Populist mare's nest ten years +ago." +</P> + +<P> +That had been Kelly's first "big killing" by working on the fears of +the plutocracy. Its success had put him in a position to buy a +carriage and a diamond necklace for Mrs. Kelly and to make first +payments on a large block of real estate. "It was no mare's nest, Mr. +Hastings," gravely declared the boss. "If I hadn't 'a knowed just how +to use the money we collected, there'd 'a been a crowd in office for +four years that wouldn't 'a been easy to manage, I can tell you. But +they was nothing to this here Dorn crowd. Dorn is——" +</P> + +<P> +"We must get rid of him, Dick," interrupted Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +The two men looked at each other—a curious glance—telegraphy. No +method was suggested, no price was offered or accepted. But in the +circumstances those matters became details that would settle +themselves; the bargain was struck. +</P> + +<P> +"He certainly ought to be stopped," said Kelly carelessly. "He's the +worst enemy the labor element has had in my time." He rose. "Well, Mr. +Hastings, I must be going." He extended his heavy, strong hand, which +Hastings rose to grasp. "I'm glad we're working together again without +any hitches. You won't forget about that there stock?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'll telephone about it right away, Dick—and about Judge Lansing. +You're sure Lansing's all right? I didn't like those decisions of his +last year—the railway cases, I mean." +</P> + +<P> +"That was all right, Mr. Hastings," said Kelly with a wave of the hand. +"I had to have 'em in the interests of the party. I knowed the upper +court'd reverse. No, Lansing's a good party man—a good, sound man in +every way." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm glad to hear it," said Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +Before going into his private room to think and plan and telephone, he +looked out on the west veranda. There sat his daughter; and a few feet +away was David Hull, his long form stretched in a hammock while he +discoursed of his projects for a career as a political reformer. The +sight immensely pleased the old man. When he was a boy David Hull's +grandfather, Brainerd Hull, had been the great man of that region; and +Martin Hastings, a farm hand and the son of a farm hand, had looked up +at him as the embodiment of all that was grand and aristocratic. As +Hastings had never travelled, his notions of rank and position all +centred about Remsen City. Had he realized the extent of the world, he +would have regarded his ambition for a match between the daughter and +granddaughter of a farm hand and the son and grandson of a Remsen City +aristocrat as small and ridiculous. But he did not realize. +</P> + +<P> +Davy saw him and sprang to his feet. +</P> + +<P> +"No—no—don't disturb yourselves," cried the old man. "I've got some +things to 'tend to. You and Jenny go right ahead." +</P> + +<P> +And he was off to his own little room where he conducted his own +business in his own primitive but highly efficacious way. A corps of +expert accountants could not have disentangled those crabbed, +criss-crossed figures; no solver of puzzles could have unravelled the +mystery of those strange hieroglyphics. But to the old man there +wasn't a difficult—or a dull—mark in that entire set of dirty, +dog-eared little account books. He spent hours in poring over them. +Just to turn the pages gave him keen pleasure; to read, and to +reconstruct from those hints the whole story of some agitating and +profitable operation, made in comparison the delight of an imaginative +boy in Monte Cristo or Crusoe seem a cold and tame emotion. +</P> + +<P> +David talked on and on, fancying that Jane was listening and admiring, +when in fact she was busy with her own entirely different train of +thought. She kept the young man going because she did not wish to be +bored with her own solitude, because a man about always made life at +least a little more interesting than if she were alone or with a woman, +and because Davy was good to look at and had an agreeable voice. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, who's that?" she suddenly exclaimed, gazing off to the right. +</P> + +<P> +Davy turned and looked. "I don't know her," he said. "Isn't she queer +looking—yet I don't know just why." +</P> + +<P> +"It's Selma Gordon," said Jane, who had recognized Selma the instant +her eyes caught a figure moving across the lawn. +</P> + +<P> +"The girl that helps Victor Dorn?" said Davy, astonished. "What's SHE +coming HERE for? You don't know her—do you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you?" evaded Jane. "I thought you and Mr. Dorn were such pals." +</P> + +<P> +"Pals?" laughed Hull. "Hardly that. We meet now and then at a +workingman's club I'm interested in—and at a cafe' where I go to get +in touch with the people occasionally—and in the street. But I never +go to his office. I couldn't afford to do that. And I've never seen +Miss Gordon." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, she's worth seeing," said Jane. "You'll never see another like +her." +</P> + +<P> +They rose and watched her advancing. To the usual person, acutely +conscious of self, walking is not easy in such circumstances. But +Selma, who never bothered about herself, came on with that matchless +steady grace which peasant girls often get through carrying burdens on +the head. Jane called out: +</P> + +<P> +"So, you've come, after all." +</P> + +<P> +Selma smiled gravely. Not until she was within a few feet of the steps +did she answer: "Yes—but on business." She was wearing the same +linen dress. On her head was a sailor hat, beneath the brim of which +her amazingly thick hair stood out in a kind of defiance. This hat, +this further article of Western civilization's dress, added to the +suggestion of the absurdity of such a person in such clothing. But in +her strange Cossack way she certainly was beautiful—and as healthy and +hardy as if she had never before been away from the high, wind-swept +plateaus where disease is unknown and where nothing is thought of +living to be a hundred or a hundred and twenty-five. Both before and +after the introduction Davy Hull gazed at her with fascinated curiosity +too plainly written upon his long, sallow, serious face. She, intent +upon her mission, ignored him as the arrow ignores the other birds of +the flock in its flight to the one at which it is aimed. +</P> + +<P> +"You'll give me a minute or two alone?" she said to Jane. "We can walk +on the lawn here." +</P> + +<P> +Hull caught up his hat. "I was just going," said he. Then he +hesitated, looked at Selma, stammered: "I'll go to the edge of the +lawn and inspect the view." +</P> + +<P> +Neither girl noted this abrupt and absurd change of plan. He departed. +As soon as he had gone half a dozen steps, Selma said in her quick, +direct fashion: +</P> + +<P> +"I've come to see you about the strike." +</P> + +<P> +Jane tried to look cool and reserved. But that sort of expression +seemed foolish in face of the simplicity and candor of Selma Gordon. +Also, Jane was not now so well pleased with her father's ideas and +those of her own interest as she had been while she was talking with +him. The most exasperating thing about the truth is that, once one has +begun to see it—has begun to see what is for him the truth—the honest +truth—he can not hide from it ever again. So, instead of looking cold +and repellant, Jane looked uneasy and guilty. "Oh, yes—the strike," +she murmured. +</P> + +<P> +"It is over," said Selma. "The union met a half hour ago and revoked +its action—on Victor Dorn's advice. He showed the men that they had +been trapped into striking by the company—that a riot was to be +started and blamed upon them—that the militia was to be called in and +they were to be shot down." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, no—not that!" cried Jane eagerly. "It wouldn't have gone as far +as that." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—as far as that," said Selma calmly. "That sort of thing is an +old story. It's been done so often—and worse. You see, the +respectable gentlemen who run things hire disreputable creatures. They +don't tell them what to do. They don't need to. The poor wretches +understand what's expected of them—and they do it. So, the +respectable gentlemen can hold up white hands and say quite truthfully, +'No blood-no filth on these—see!"' Selma was laughing drearily. Her +superb, primitive eyes, set ever so little aslant, were flashing with +an intensity of emotion that gave Jane Hastings a sensation of +terror-much as if a man who has always lived where there were no +storms, but such gentle little rains with restrained and refined +thunder as usually visit the British Isles, were to find himself in the +midst of one of those awful convulsions that come crashing down the +gorges of the Rockies. She marveled that one so small of body could +contain such big emotions. +</P> + +<P> +"You mustn't be unjust," she pleaded. "WE aren't THAT wicked, my dear." +</P> + +<P> +Selma looked at her. "No matter," she said. "I am not trying to +convert you—or to denounce your friends to you. I'll explain what +I've come for. In his speech to-day and in inducing the union to +change, Victor has shown how much power he has. The men whose plans he +has upset will be hating him as men hate only those whom they fear." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—I believe that," said Jane. "So, you see, I'm not blindly +prejudiced." +</P> + +<P> +"For a long time there have been rumors that they might kill him——" +</P> + +<P> +"Absurd!" cried Jane angrily. "Miss Gordon, no matter how prejudiced +you may be—and I'll admit there are many things to justify you in +feeling strongly—but no matter how you may feel, your good sense must +tell you that men like my father don't commit murder." +</P> + +<P> +"I understand perfectly," replied Selma. "They don't commit murder, +and they don't order murder. I'll even say that I don't think they +would tolerate murder, even for their benefit. But you don't know how +things are done in business nowadays. The men like your father have to +use men of the Kelly and the House sort—you know who they are?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"The Kellys and the Houses give general orders to their lieutenants. +The lieutenants pass the orders along—and down. And so on, until all +sorts of men are engaged in doing all sorts of work. Dirty, clean, +criminal—all sorts. Some of these men, baffled in what they are +trying to do to earn their pay—baffled by Victor Dorn—plot against +him." Again that sad, bitter laugh. "My dear Miss Hastings, to kill a +cat there are a thousand ways besides skinning it alive." +</P> + +<P> +"You are prejudiced," said Jane, in the manner of one who could not be +convinced. +</P> + +<P> +Selma made an impatient gesture. "Again I say, no matter. Victor +laughs at our fears——" +</P> + +<P> +"I knew it," said Jane triumphantly. "He is less foolish than his +followers." +</P> + +<P> +"He simply does not think about himself," replied Selma. "And he is +right. But it is our business to think about him, because we need him. +Where could we find another like him?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I suppose your movement WOULD die out, if he were not behind it." +</P> + +<P> +Selma smiled peculiarly. "I think you don't quite understand what we +are about," said she. "You've accepted the ignorant notion of your +class that we are a lot of silly roosters trying to crow one sun out of +the heavens and another into it. The facts are somewhat different. +Your class is saying, 'To-day will last forever,' while we are saying, +'No, to-day will run its course—will be succeeded by to-morrow. Let +us not live like the fool who thinks only of the day. Let us be +sensible, intelligent, let us realize that there will be to-morrow and +that it, too, must be lived. Let us get ready to live it sensibly. Let +us build our social system so that it will stand the wear and tear of +another day and will not fall in ruins about our heads.'" +</P> + +<P> +"I am terribly ignorant about all these things," said Jane. "What a +ridiculous thing my education has been!" +</P> + +<P> +"But it hasn't spoiled your heart," cried Selma. And all at once her +eyes were wonderfully soft and tender, and into her voice came a tone +so sweet that Jane's eyes filled with tears. "It was to your heart that +I came to appeal," she went on. "Oh, Miss Hastings—we will do all we +can to protect Victor Dorn—and we guard him day and night without his +knowing it. But I am afraid—afraid! And I want you to help. Will +you?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'll do anything I can," said Jane—a Jane very different from the +various Janes Miss Hastings knew—a Jane who seemed to be conjuring of +Selma Gordon's enchantments. +</P> + +<P> +"I want you to ask your father to give him a fair show. We don't ask +any favors—for ourselves—for him. But we don't want to see him—" +Selma shuddered and covered her eyes with her hands "—lying dead in +some alley, shot or stabbed by some unknown thug!" +</P> + +<P> +Selma made it so vivid that Jane saw the whole tragedy before her very +eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"The real reason why they hate him," Selma went on, "is because he +preaches up education and preaches down violence—and is building his +party on intelligence instead of on force. The masters want the +workingman who burns and kills and riots. They can shoot him down. +They can make people accept any tyranny in preference to the danger of +fire and murder let loose. But Victor is teaching the workingmen to +stop playing the masters' game for them. No wonder they hate him! He +makes them afraid of the day when the united workingmen will have their +way by organizing and voting. And they know that if Victor Dorn lives, +that day will come in this city very, very soon." Selma saw Davy Hull, +impatient at his long wait, advancing toward them. She said: "You will +talk to your father?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Jane. "And I assure you he will do what he can. You don't +know him, Miss Gordon." +</P> + +<P> +"I know he loves you—I know he MUST love you," said Selma. "Now, I +must go. Good-by. I knew you would be glad of the chance to do +something worth while." +</P> + +<P> +Jane had been rather expecting to be thanked for her generosity and +goodness. Selma's remark seemed at first blush an irritating attempt +to shift a favor asked into a favor given. But it was impossible for +her to fail to see Selma's sensible statement of the actual truth. So, +she said honestly: +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you for coming, Miss Gordon. I am glad of the chance." +</P> + +<P> +They shook hands. Selma, holding her hand, looked up at her, suddenly +kissed her. Jane returned the kiss. David Hull, advancing with his +gaze upon them, stopped short. Selma, without a glance—because +without a thought—in his direction, hastened away. +</P> + +<P> +When David rejoined Jane, she was gazing tenderly after the small, +graceful figure moving toward the distant entrance gates. Said David: +</P> + +<P> +"I think that girl has got you hypnotized." +</P> + +<P> +Jane laughed and sent him home. "I'm busy," she said. "I've got +something to do, at last." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H3> + +<P> +Jane knocked at the door of her father's little office. "Are you +there, father?" said she. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—come in, Jinny." As she entered, he went on, "But you must go +right away again. I've got to 'tend to this strike." He took on an +injured, melancholy tone. "Those fool workingmen! They're certain to +lose. And what'll come of it all? Why, they'll be out their wages and +their jobs, and the company lose so much money that it can't put on the +new cars the public's clamorin' for. The old cars'll have to do for +another year, anyhow—maybe two." +</P> + +<P> +Jane had heard that lugubrious tone from time to time, and she knew +what it meant—an air of sorrow concealing secret joy. So, here was +another benefit the company—she preferred to think of it as the +company rather than as her father—expected to gain from the strike. +It could put off replacing the miserable old cars in which it was +compelling people to ride. Instead of losing money by the strike, it +would make money by it. This was Jane's first glimpse of one of the +most interesting and important truths of modern life—how it is often +to the advantage of business men to have their own business crippled, +hampered, stopped altogether. +</P> + +<P> +"You needn't worry, father," said she cheerfully. "The strike's been +declared off." +</P> + +<P> +"What's that?" cried her father. +</P> + +<P> +"A girl from down town just called. She says the union has called the +strike off and the men have accepted the company's terms." +</P> + +<P> +"But them terms is withdrawn!" cried Hastings, as if his daughter were +the union. He seized the telephone. "I'll call up the office and +order 'em withdrawn." +</P> + +<P> +"It's too late," said she. +</P> + +<P> +Just then the telephone bell rang, and Hastings was soon hearing +confirmation of the news his daughter had brought him. She could not +bear watching his face as he listened. She turned her back, stood +gazing out at the window. Her father, beside himself, was shrieking +into the telephone curses, denunciations, impossible orders. The one +emergency against which he had not provided was the union's ending the +strike. When you have struck the line of battle of a general, however +able and self-controlled, in the one spot where he has not arranged a +defense, you have thrown him—and his army—into a panic. Some of the +greatest tactitians in history have given way in those circumstances; +so, Martin Hastings' utter loss of self-control and of control of the +situation only proves that he had his share of human nature. He had +provided against the unexpected; he had not provided against the +impossible. +</P> + +<P> +Jane let her father rave on into the telephone until his voice grew +hoarse and squeaky. Then she turned and said: "Now, father—what's +the use of making yourself sick? You can't do any good—can you?" She +laid one hand on his arm, with the other hand caressed his head. "Hang +up the receiver and think of your health." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't care to live, with such goings-on," declared he. But he hung +up the receiver and sank back in his chair, exhausted. +</P> + +<P> +"Come out on the porch," she went on, tugging gently at him. "The air's +stuffy in here." +</P> + +<P> +He rose obediently. She led him to the veranda and seated him +comfortably, with a cushion in his back at the exact spot at which it +was most comfortable. She patted his shrunken cheeks, stood off and +looked at him. +</P> + +<P> +"Where's your sense of humor?" she cried. "You used to be able to +laugh when things went against you. You're getting to be as solemn and +to take yourself as seriously as Davy Hull." +</P> + +<P> +The old man made a not unsuccessful attempt to smile. "That there +Victor Dorn!" said he. "He'll be the death of me, yet." +</P> + +<P> +"What has he done now?" said Jane, innocently. +</P> + +<P> +Hastings rubbed his big bald forehead with his scrawny hand. "He's +tryin' to run this town—to run it to the devil," replied he, by way of +evasion. +</P> + +<P> +"Something's got to be done about him—eh?" observed she, in a fine +imitation of a business-like voice. +</P> + +<P> +"Something WILL be done," retorted he. +</P> + +<P> +Jane winced—hid her distress—returned to the course she had mapped +out for herself. "I hope it won't be something stupid," said she. +Then she seated herself and went on. "Father—did you ever stop to +wonder whether it is Victor Dorn or the changed times?" +</P> + +<P> +The old man looked up abruptly and sharply—the expression of a shrewd +man when he catches a hint of a new idea that sounds as if it might +have something in it. +</P> + +<P> +"You blame Victor Dorn," she went on to explain. "But if there were no +Victor Dorn, wouldn't you be having just the same trouble? Aren't men +of affairs having them everywhere—in Europe as well as on this +side—nowadays?" +</P> + +<P> +The old man rubbed his brow—his nose—his chin—pulled at the tufts of +hair in his ears—fumbled with his cuffs. All of these gestures +indicated interest and attention. +</P> + +<P> +"Isn't the real truth not Victor Dorn or Victor Dorns but a changed and +changing world?" pursued the girl. "And if that's so, haven't you +either got to adopt new methods or fall back? That's the way it looks +to me—and we women have got intuitions if we haven't got sense." +</P> + +<P> +"<I>I</I> never said women hadn't got sense," replied the old man. "I've +sometimes said MEN ain't got no sense, but not women. Not to go no +further, the women make the men work for 'em—don't they? THAT'S a +pretty good quality of sense, <I>I</I> guess." +</P> + +<P> +But she knew he was busily thinking all the time about what she had +said. So she did not hesitate to go on: "Instead of helping Victor +Dorn by giving him things to talk about, it seems to me I'd USE him, +father." +</P> + +<P> +"Can't do anything with him. He's crazy," declared Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't believe it," replied Jane. "I don't believe he's crazy. And +I don't believe you can't manage him. A man like that—a man as clever +as he is—doesn't belong with a lot of ignorant tenement-house people. +He's out of place. And when anything or anybody is out of place, they +can be put in their right place. Isn't that sense?" +</P> + +<P> +The old man shook his head—not in negation, but in uncertainty. +</P> + +<P> +"These men are always edging you on against Victor Dorn—what's the +matter with them?" pursued Jane. "<I>I</I> saw, when Davy Hull talked about +him. They're envious and jealous of him, father. They're afraid he'll +distance them. And they don't want you to realize what a useful man he +could be—how he could help you if you helped him—made friends with +him—roused the right kind of ambition in him." +</P> + +<P> +"When a man's ambitious," observed Hastings, out of the fullness of his +own personal experience, "it means he's got something inside him, +teasing and nagging at him—something that won't let him rest, but +keeps pushing and pulling—and he's got to keep fighting, trying to +satisfy it—and he can't wait to pick his ground or his weapons." +</P> + +<P> +"And Victor Dorn," said Jane, to make it clearer to her father by +putting his implied thought into words, "Victor Dorn is doing the best +he can—fighting on the only ground that offers and with the only +weapons he can lay hands on." +</P> + +<P> +The old man nodded. "I never have blamed him—not really," declared +he. "A practical man—a man that's been through things—he understands +how these things are," in the tone of a philosopher. "Yes, I reckon +Victor's doing the best he can—getting up by the only ladder he's got +a chance at." +</P> + +<P> +"The way to get him off that ladder is to give him another," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +A long silence, the girl letting her father thresh the matter out in +his slow, thorough way. Finally her young impatience conquered her +restraint. "Well—what do you think, popsy?" inquired she. +</P> + +<P> +"That I've got about as smart a gel as there is in Remsen City," +replied he. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't lay it on too thick," laughed she. +</P> + +<P> +He understood why she was laughing, though he did not show it. He knew +what his much-traveled daughter thought of Remsen City, but he held to +his own provincial opinion, nevertheless. Nor, perhaps, was he so far +wrong as she believed. A cross section of human society, taken almost +anywhere, will reveal about the same quantity of brain, and the quality +of the mill is the thing, not of the material it may happen to be +grinding. +</P> + +<P> +She understood that his remark was his way of letting her know that he +had taken her suggestion under advisement. This meant that she had +said enough. And Jane Hastings had made herself an adept in the art of +handling her father—an accomplishment she could by no means have +achieved had she not loved him; it is only when a woman deeply and +strongly loves a man that she can learn to influence him, for only love +can put the necessary sensitiveness into the nerves with which moods +and prejudices and whims and such subtle uncertainties can be felt out. +</P> + +<P> +The next day but one, coming out on the front veranda a few minutes +before lunch time she was startled rather than surprised to see Victor +Dorn seated on a wicker sofa, hat off and gaze wandering delightedly +over the extensive view of the beautiful farming country round Remsen +City. She paused in the doorway to take advantage of the chance to +look at him when he was off his guard. Certainly that profile view of +the young man was impressive. It is only in the profile that we get a +chance to measure the will or propelling force behind a character. In +each of the two main curves of Dorn's head—that from the top of the +brow downward over the nose, the lips, the chin and under, and that +from the back of the head round under the ear and forward along the +lower jaw—in each of these curves Dorn excelled. +</P> + +<P> +She was about to draw back and make a formal entry, when he said, +without looking toward her: +</P> + +<P> +"Well—don't you think it would be safe to draw near?" +</P> + +<P> +The tone was so easy and natural and so sympathetic—the tone of Selma +Gordon—the tone of all natural persons not disturbed about themselves +or about others—that Jane felt no embarrassment whatever. "I've heard +you were very clever," said she, advancing. "So, I wanted to have the +advantage of knowing you a little better at the outset than you would +know me." +</P> + +<P> +"But Selma Gordon has told me all about you," said he—he had risen as +she advanced and was shaking hands with her as if they were old +friends. "Besides, I saw you the other day—in spite of your effort to +prevent yourself from being seen." +</P> + +<P> +"What do you mean?" she asked, completely mystified. +</P> + +<P> +"I mean your clothes," explained he. "They were unusual for this part +of the world. And when anyone wears unusual clothes, they act as a +disguise. Everyone neglects the person to center on the clothes." +</P> + +<P> +"I wore them to be comfortable," protested Jane, wondering why she was +not angry at this young man whose manner ought to be regarded as +presuming and whose speech ought to be rebuked as impertinent. +</P> + +<P> +"Altogether?" said Dorn, his intensely blue eyes dancing. +</P> + +<P> +In spite of herself she smiled. "No—not altogether," she admitted. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, it may please you to learn that you scored tremendously as far +as one person is concerned. My small nephew talks of you all the +time—the 'lady in the lovely pants.'" +</P> + +<P> +Jane colored deeply and angrily. She bent upon Victor a glance that +ought to have put him in his place—well down in his place. +</P> + +<P> +But he continued to look at her with unchanged, laughing, friendly blue +eyes, and went on: "By the way, his mother asked me to apologize for +HIS extraordinary appearance. I suppose neither of you would recognize +the other in any dress but the one each had on that day. He doesn't +always dress that way. His mother has been ill. He wore out his +play-clothes. If you've had experience of children you'll know how +suddenly they demolish clothes. She wasn't well enough to do any +tailoring, so there was nothing to do but send Leonard forth in his big +brother's unchanged cast-offs." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's anger had quite passed away before Dorn finished this simple, +ingenuous recital of poverty unashamed, this somehow fine laying open +of the inmost family secrets. "What a splendid person your sister must +be!" exclaimed she. +</P> + +<P> +She more than liked the look that now came into his face. He said: +"Indeed she is!—more so than anyone except us of the family can +realize. Mother's getting old and almost helpless. My brother-in-law +was paralyzed by an accident at the rolling mill where he worked. My +sister takes care of both of them—and her two boys—and of me—keeps +the house in band-box order, manages a big garden that gives us most of +what we eat—and has time to listen to the woes of all the neighbors +and to give them the best advice I ever heard." +</P> + +<P> +"How CAN she?" cried Jane. "Why, the day isn't long enough." +</P> + +<P> +Dorn laughed. "You'll never realize how much time there is in a day, +Miss Jane Hastings, until you try to make use of it all. It's very +interesting—how much there is in a minute and in a dollar if you're +intelligent about them." +</P> + +<P> +Jane looked at him in undisguised wonder and admiration. "You don't +know what a pleasure it is," she said, "to meet anyone whose sentences +you couldn't finish for him before he's a quarter the way through them." +</P> + +<P> +Victor threw back his head and laughed—a boyish outburst that would +have seemed boorish in another, but came as naturally from him as song +from a bird. "You mean Davy Hull," said he. +</P> + +<P> +Jane felt herself coloring even more. "I didn't mean him especially," +replied she. "But he's a good example." +</P> + +<P> +"The best I know," declared Victor. "You see, the trouble with Davy is +that he is one kind of a person, wants to be another kind, thinks he +ought to be a third kind, and believes he fools people into thinking he +is still a fourth kind." +</P> + +<P> +Jane reflected on this, smiled understandingly. "That sounds like a +description of ME," said she. +</P> + +<P> +"Probably," said Victor. "It's a very usual type in the second +generation in your class." +</P> + +<P> +"My class?" said Jane, somewhat affectedly. "What do you mean?" +</P> + +<P> +"The upper class," explained Victor. +</P> + +<P> +Jane felt that this was an opportunity for a fine exhibition of her +democracy. "I don't like that," said she. "I'm a good American, and I +don't believe in classes. I don't feel—at least I try not to +feel—any sense of inequality between myself and those—those +less—less—fortunately off. I'm not expressing myself well, but you +know what I mean." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I know what you mean," rejoined Victor. "But that wasn't what I +meant, at all. You are talking about social classes in the narrow +sense. That sort of thing isn't important. One associates with the +kind of people that pleases one—and one has a perfect right to do so. +If I choose to have my leisure time with people who dress a certain +way, or with those who have more than a certain amount of money, or +more than a certain number of servants or what not—why, that's my own +lookout." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm SO glad to hear you say that," cried Jane. "That's SO sensible." +</P> + +<P> +"Snobbishness may be amusing," continued Dorn, "or it may be +repulsive—or pitiful. But it isn't either interesting or important. +The classes I had in mind were the economic classes—upper, middle, +lower. The upper class includes all those who live without +work—aristocrats, gamblers, thieves, preachers, women living off men +in or out of marriage, grown children living off their parents or off +inheritances. All the idlers." +</P> + +<P> +Jane looked almost as uncomfortable as she felt. She had long taken a +secret delight in being regarded and spoken of as an "upper class" +person. Henceforth this delight would be at least alloyed. +</P> + +<P> +"The middle class," pursued Victor, "is those who are in part parasites +and in part workers. The lower class is those who live by what they +earn only. For example, you are upper class, your father is middle +class and I am lower class." +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you," said Jane demurely, "for an interesting lesson in +political economy." +</P> + +<P> +"You invited it," laughed Victor. "And I guess it wasn't much more +tiresome to you than talk about the weather would have been. The +weather's probably about the only other subject you and I have in +common." +</P> + +<P> +"That's rude," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Not as I meant it," said he. "I wasn't exalting my subjects or +sneering at yours. It's obvious that you and I lead wholly different +lives." +</P> + +<P> +"I'd much rather lead your life than my own," said Jane. "But—you are +impatient to see father. You came to see him?" +</P> + +<P> +"He telephoned asking me to come to dinner—that is, lunch. I believe +it's called lunch when it's second in this sort of house." +</P> + +<P> +"Father calls it dinner, and I call it lunch, and the servants call it +IT. They simply say, 'It's ready.'" +</P> + +<P> +Jane went in search of her father, found him asleep in his chair in the +little office, one of his dirty little account books clasped in his +long, thin fingers with their rheumatic side curve. The maid had seen +him there and had held back dinner until he should awaken. Perhaps +Jane's entrance roused him; or, perhaps it was the odor of the sachet +powder wherewith her garments were liberally scented, for he had a +singularly delicate sense of smell. He lifted his head and, after the +manner of aged and confirmed cat-nappers, was instantly wide awake. +</P> + +<P> +"Why didn't you tell me Victor Dorn was coming for dinner?" said she. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—he's here, is he?" said Hastings, chuckling. "You see I took your +advice. Tell Lizzie to lay an extra plate." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings regarded this invitation as evidence of his breadth of mind, +his freedom from prejudice, his disposition to do the generous and the +helpful thing. In fact, it was evidence of little more than his +dominant and most valuable trait—his shrewdness. After one careful +glance over the ruins of his plan, he appreciated that Victor Dorn was +at last a force to be reckoned with. He had been growing, +growing—somewhat above the surface, a great deal more beneath the +surface. His astonishing victory demonstrated his power over Remsen +City labor—in a single afternoon he had persuaded the street car union +to give up without hesitation a strike it had been planning—at least, +it thought it had been doing the planning—for months. The Remsen City +plutocracy was by no means dependent upon the city government of Remsen +City. It had the county courts—the district courts—the State courts +even, except where favoring the plutocracy would be too obviously +outrageous for judges who still considered themselves men of honest and +just mind to decide that way. The plutocracy, further, controlled all +the legislative and executive machinery. To dislodge it from these +fortresses would mean a campaign of years upon years, conducted by men +of the highest ability, and enlisting a majority of the voters of the +State. Still, possession of the Remsen City government was a most +valuable asset. A hostile government could "upset business," could +"hamper the profitable investment of capital," in other words could +establish justice to a highly uncomfortable degree. This victory of +Dorn's made it clear to Hastings that at last Dorn was about to unite +the labor vote under his banner—which meant that he was about to +conquer the city government. It was high time to stop him and, if +possible, to give his talents better employment. +</P> + +<P> +However, Hastings, after the familiar human fashion, honestly thought +he was showing generosity, was going out of his way to "give a likely +young fellow a chance." When he came out on the veranda he stretched +forth a graciously friendly hand and, looking shrewdly into Victor's +boyishly candid eyes, said: +</P> + +<P> +"Glad to see you, young man. I want to thank you for ending that +strike. I was born a working man, and I've been one all my life and, +when I can't work any more, I want to quit the earth. So, being a +working man, I hate to see working men make fools of themselves." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was watching the young man anxiously. She instinctively knew that +this speech must be rousing his passion for plain and direct speaking. +Before he had time to answer she said: "Dinner's waiting. Let's go in." +</P> + +<P> +And on the way she made an opportunity to say to him in an undertone: +"I do hope you'll be careful not to say anything that'll upset father. +I have to warn every one who comes here. His digestion's bad, and the +least thing makes him ill, and—" she smiled charmingly at him—"I HATE +nursing. It's too much like work to suit an upper-class person." +</P> + +<P> +There was no resisting such an appeal as that. Victor sat silent and +ate, and let the old man talk on and on. Jane saw that it was a severe +trial to him to seem to be assenting to her father's views. Whenever +he showed signs of casting off his restraint, she gave him a pleading +glance. And the old man, so weazened, so bent and shaky, with his bowl +of crackers and milk, was—or seemed to be—proof that the girl was +asking of him only what was humane. Jane relieved the situation by +talking volubly about herself—her college experiences, what she had +seen and done in Europe. +</P> + +<P> +After dinner Hastings said: +</P> + +<P> +"I'll drive you back to town, young man. I'm going in to work, as +usual. I never took a vacation in my life. Can you beat that record?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I knock off every once in a while for a month or so," said Dorn. +</P> + +<P> +"The young fellows growing up nowadays ain't equal to us of the old +stock," said Martin. "They can't stand the strain. Well, if you're +ready, we'll pull out." +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Dorn's going to stop a while with me, father," interposed Jane +with a significant glance at Victor. "I want to show him the grounds +and the views." +</P> + +<P> +"All right—all right," said her father. He never liked company in his +drives; company interfered with his thinking out what he was going to +do at the office. "I'm mighty glad to know you, young man. I hope +we'll know each other better. I think you'll find out that for a devil +I'm not half bad—eh?" +</P> + +<P> +Victor bowed, murmured something inarticulate, shook his host's hand, +and when the ceremony of parting was over drew a stealthy breath of +relief—which Jane observed. She excused herself to accompany her +father to his trap. As he was climbing in she said: +</P> + +<P> +"Didn't you rather like him, father?" +</P> + +<P> +Old Hastings gathered the reins in his lean, distorted hands. "So so," +said he. +</P> + +<P> +"He's got brains, hasn't he?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes; he's smart; mighty smart." The old man's face relaxed in a +shrewd grin. "Too damn smart. Giddap, Bet." +</P> + +<P> +And he was gone. Jane stood looking after the ancient phaeton with an +expression half of amusement, half of discomfiture. "I might have +known," reflected she, "that popsy would see through it all." +</P> + +<P> +When she reappeared in the front doorway Victor Dorn was at the edge of +the veranda, ready to depart. As soon as he saw her he said gravely: +"I must be off, Miss Hastings. Thank you for the very interesting +dinner." He extended his hand. "Good day." +</P> + +<P> +She put her hands behind her back, and stood smiling gently at him. +"You mustn't go—not just yet. I'm about to show you the trees and the +grass, the bees, the chickens and the cows. Also, I've something +important to say to you." +</P> + +<P> +He shook his head. "I'm sorry, but I must go." +</P> + +<P> +She stiffened slightly; her smile changed from friendly to cold. +"Oh—pardon me," she said. "Good-by." +</P> + +<P> +He bowed, and was on the walk, and running rapidly toward the entrance +gates. +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Dorn!" she called. +</P> + +<P> +He turned. +</P> + +<P> +She was afraid to risk asking him to come back for a moment. He might +refuse. Standing there, looking so resolute, so completely master of +himself, so devoid of all suggestion of need for any one or anything, +he seemed just the man to turn on his heel and depart. She descended +to the walk and went to him. She said: +</P> + +<P> +"Why are you acting so peculiarly? Why did you come?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because I understood that your father wished to propose some changes +in the way of better hours and better wages for the men," replied he. +"I find that the purpose was—not that." +</P> + +<P> +"What was it?" +</P> + +<P> +"I do not care to go into that." +</P> + +<P> +He was about to go on—on out of her life forever, she felt. "Wait," +she cried. "The men will get better hours and wages. You don't +understand father's ways. He was really discussing that very thing—in +his own mind. You'll see. He has a great admiration for you. You can +do a lot with him. You owe it to the men to make use of his liking." +</P> + +<P> +He looked at her in silence for a moment. Then he said: "I'll have to +be at least partly frank with you. In all his life no one has ever +gotten anything out of your father. He uses men. They do not use him." +</P> + +<P> +"Believe me, that is unjust," cried Jane. "I'll tell you another thing +that was on his mind. He wants to—to make reparation for—that +accident to your father. He wants to pay your mother and you the money +the road didn't pay you when it ought." +</P> + +<P> +Dorn's candid face showed how much he was impressed. This beautiful, +earnest girl, sweet and frank, seemed herself to be another view of +Martin Hastings' character—one more in accord with her strong belief +in the essential goodness of human nature. +</P> + +<P> +Said he: "Your father owes us nothing. As for the road—its debt +never existed legally—only morally. And it has been outlawed long +ago—for there's a moral statute of limitations, too. The best thing +that ever happened to us was our not getting that money. It put us on +our mettle. It might have crushed us. It happened to be just the thing +that was needed to make us." +</P> + +<P> +Jane marveled at this view of his family, at the verge of poverty, as +successful. But she could not doubt his sincerity. Said she sadly, +"But it's not to the credit of the road—or of father. He must +pay—and he knows he must." +</P> + +<P> +"We can't accept," said Dorn—a finality. +</P> + +<P> +"But you could use it to build up the paper," urged Jane, to detain him. +</P> + +<P> +"The paper was started without money. It lives without money—and it +will go on living without money, or it ought to die." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't understand," said Jane. "But I want to understand. I want to +help. Won't you let me?" +</P> + +<P> +He shook his head laughingly. "Help what?" inquired he. "Help raise +the sun? It doesn't need help." +</P> + +<P> +Jane began to see. "I mean, I want to be helped," she cried. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, that's another matter," said he. "And very simple." +</P> + +<P> +"Will YOU help me?" +</P> + +<P> +"I can't. No one can. You've got to help yourself. Each one of us is +working for himself—working not to be rich or to be famous or to be +envied, but to be free." +</P> + +<P> +"Working for himself—that sounds selfish, doesn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +"If you are wise, Jane Hastings," said Dorn, "you will +distrust—disbelieve in—anything that is not selfish." +</P> + +<P> +Jane reflected. "Yes—I see," she cried. "I never thought of that!" +</P> + +<P> +"A friend of mine, Wentworth," Victor went on, "has put it wonderfully +clearly. He said, 'Some day we shall realize that no man can be free +until all men are free.'" +</P> + +<P> +"You HAVE helped me—in spite of your fierce refusal," laughed Jane. +"You are very impatient to go, aren't you? Well, since you won't stay +I'll walk with you—as far as the end of the shade." +</P> + +<P> +She was slightly uneasy lest her overtures should be misunderstood. By +the time they reached the first long, sunny stretch of the road down to +town she was so afraid that those overtures would not be +"misunderstood" that she marched on beside him in the hot sun. She did +not leave him until they reached the corner of Pike avenue—and then it +was he that left her, for she could cudgel out no excuse for going +further in his direction. The only hold she had got upon him for a +future attempt was slight indeed—he had vaguely agreed to lend her +some books. +</P> + +<P> +People who have nothing to do get rid of a great deal of time in trying +to make impressions and in speculating as to what impressions they have +made. Jane—hastening toward Martha's to get out of the sun which +could not but injure a complexion so delicately fine as hers—gave +herself up to this form of occupation. What did he think of her? Did +he really have as little sense of her physical charm as he seemed? No +woman could hope to be attractive to every man. Still—this man surely +must be at least not altogether insensible. "If he sends me those +books to-day—or tomorrow—or even next day," thought Jane, "it will be +a pretty sure sign that he was impressed—whether he knows it or not." +</P> + +<P> +She had now definitely passed beyond the stage where she wondered at +herself—and reproached herself—for wishing to win a man of such +common origin and surroundings. She could not doubt Victor Dorn's +superiority. Such a man as that didn't need birth or wealth or even +fame. He simply WAS the man worth while—worth any woman's while. How +could Selma be associated so intimately with him without trying to get +him in love with her? Perhaps she had tried and had given up? +No—Selma was as strange in her way as he was in his way. What a +strange—original—INDIVIDUAL pair they were! +</P> + +<P> +"But," concluded Jane, "he belongs with US. I must take him away from +all that. It will be interesting to do it—so interesting that I'll be +sorry when it's done, and I'll be looking about for something else to +do." +</P> + +<P> +She was not without hope that the books would come that same evening. +But they did not. The next day passed, and the next, and still no +books. Apparently he had meant nothing by his remark, "I've some books +you'd be interested to read." Was his silence indifference, or was it +shyness? Probably she could only faintly appreciate the effect her +position, her surroundings produced in this man whose physical +surroundings had always been as poor as her mental surroundings—those +created by that marvelous mind of his—had been splendid. +</P> + +<P> +She tried to draw out her father on the subject of the young man, with +a view to getting a hint as to whether he purposed doing anything +further. But old Hastings would not talk about it; he was still +debating, was looking at the matter from a standpoint where his +daughter's purely theoretical acumen could not help him to a decision. +Jane rather feared that where her father was evidently so doubtful he +would follow his invariable rule in doubtful cases. +</P> + +<P> +On the fourth day, being still unable to think of anything but her +project for showing her prowess by conquering this man with no time for +women, she donned a severely plain walking costume and went to his +office. +</P> + +<P> +At the threshold of the "Sanctum" she stopped short. Selma, pencil +poised over her block of copy paper and every indication of impatience, +albeit polite impatience, in her fascinating Cossack face, was talking +to—or, rather, listening to—David Hull. Like not a few young +men—and young women—brought up in circumstances that surround them +with people deferential for the sake of what there is, or may possibly +be, in it—Davy Hull had the habit of assuming that all the world was +as fond of listening to him as he was of listening to himself. So it +did not often occur to him to observe his audience for signs of a +willingness to end the conversation. +</P> + +<P> +Selma, turning a little further in her nervousness, saw Jane and sprang +up with a radiant smile of welcome. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm SO glad!" she cried, rushing toward her and kissing her. "I've +thought about you often, and wished I could find time to come to see +you." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was suddenly as delighted as Selma. For Selma's burst of +friendliness, so genuine, so unaffected, in this life of blackness and +cold always had the effect of sun suddenly making summer out of a chill +autumnal day. Nor, curiously enough, was her delight lessened by Davy +Hull's blundering betrayal of himself. His color, his eccentric +twitchings of the lips and the hands would have let a far less astute +young woman than Jane Hastings into the secret of the reason for his +presence in that office when he had said he couldn't "afford" to go. +So guilty did he feel that he stammered out: +</P> + +<P> +"I dropped in to see Dorn." +</P> + +<P> +"You wished to see Victor?" exclaimed the guileless Selma. "Why didn't +you say so? I'd have told you at once that he was in Indianapolis and +wouldn't be back for two or three days." +</P> + +<P> +Jane straightway felt still better. The disgusting mystery of the +books that did not come was now cleared up. Secure in the certainty of +Selma's indifference to Davy she proceeded to punish him. "What a +stupid you are, Davy!" she cried mockingly. "The instant I saw your +face I knew you were here to flirt with Miss Gordon." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, no, Miss Hastings," protested Selma with quaint intensity of +seriousness, "I assure you he was not flirting. He was telling me +about the reform movement he and his friends are organizing." +</P> + +<P> +"That is his way of flirting," said Jane. "Every animal has its own +way—and an elephant's way is different from a mosquito's." +</P> + +<P> +Selma was eyeing Hull dubiously. It was bad enough for him to have +taken her time in a well-meaning attempt to enlighten her as to a new +phase of local politics; to take her time, to waste it, in +flirting—that was too exasperating! +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Hastings has a sense of humor that runs riot at times," said Hull. +</P> + +<P> +"You can't save yourself, Davy," mocked Jane. "Come along. Miss Gordon +has no time for either of us." +</P> + +<P> +"I do want YOU to stay," she said to Jane. "But, unfortunately, with +Victor away——" She looked disconsolately at the half-finished page +of copy. +</P> + +<P> +"I came only to snatch Davy away," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Next thing we know, he'll be one of Mr. Dorn's lieutenants." +</P> + +<P> +Thus Jane escaped without having to betray why she had come. In the +street she kept up her raillery. "And a WORKING girl, Davy! What would +our friends say! And you who are always boasting of your +fastidiousness! Flirting with a girl who—I've seen her three times, +and each time she has had on exactly the same plain, cheap little +dress." +</P> + +<P> +There was a nastiness, a vulgarity in this that was as unworthy of Jane +as are all the unlovely emotions of us who are always sweet and refined +when we are our true selves—but have a bad habit of only too often not +being what we flatter ourselves is our true selves. Jane was growing +angry as she, away from Selma, resumed her normal place in the world +and her normal point of view. Davy Hull belonged to her; he had no +right to be hanging about another, anyway—especially an attractive +woman. Her anger was not lessened by Davy's retort. Said he: +</P> + +<P> +"Her dress may have been the same. But her face wasn't—and her mind +wasn't. Those things are more difficult to change than a dress." +</P> + +<P> +She was so angry that she did not take warning from this reminder that +Davy was by no means merely a tedious retailer of stale commonplaces. +She said with fine irony—and with no show of anger: "It is always a +shock to a lady to realize how coarse men are—how they don't +discriminate." +</P> + +<P> +Davy laughed. "Women get their rank from men," said he coolly. +</P> + +<P> +"In themselves they have none. That's the philosophy of the +peculiarity you've noted." +</P> + +<P> +This truth, so galling to a lady, silenced Jane, made her bite her lips +with rage. "I beg your pardon," she finally said. "I didn't realize +that you were in love with Selma." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I am in love with her," was Davy's astounding reply. "She's the +noblest and simplest creature I've ever met." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't mean you want to marry her!" exclaimed Jane, so amazed that +she for the moment lost sight of her own personal interest in this +affair. +</P> + +<P> +Davy looked at her sadly, and a little contemptuously. +</P> + +<P> +"What a poor opinion at bottom you women—your sort of women—have of +woman," said he. +</P> + +<P> +"What a poor opinion of men you mean," retorted she. "After a little +experience of them a girl—even a girl—learns that they are incapable +of any emotion that isn't gross." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't be so ladylike, Jane," said Hull. +</P> + +<P> +Miss Hastings was recovering control of herself. She took a new tack. +"You haven't asked her yet?" +</P> + +<P> +"Hardly. This is the second time I've seen her. I suspected that she +was the woman for me the moment I saw her. To-day I confirmed my idea. +She is all that I thought—and more. And, Jane, I know that you +appreciate her, too." +</P> + +<P> +Jane now saw that Davy was being thus abruptly and speedily confiding +because he had decided it was the best way out of his entanglement with +her. Behind his coolness she could see an uneasy watchfulness—the +fear that she might try to hold him. Up boiled her rage—the higher +because she knew that if there were any possible way of holding Davy, +she would take it—not because she wished to, or would, marry him, but +because she had put her mark upon him. But this new rage was of the +kind a clever woman has small difficulty in dissembling. +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed I do appreciate her, Davy," said she sweetly. "And I hope you +will be happy with her." +</P> + +<P> +"You think I can get her?" said he, fatuously eager. "You think she +likes me? I've been rather hoping that because it seized me so +suddenly and so powerfully it must have seized her, too. I think often +things occur that way." +</P> + +<P> +"In novels," said Jane, pleasantly judicial. "But in real life about +the hardest thing to do is for a man to make a woman care for +him—really care for him." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, no matter how hard I have to try——" +</P> + +<P> +"Of course," pursued Miss Hastings, ignoring his interruption, "when a +man who has wealth and position asks a woman who hasn't to marry him, +she usually accepts—unless he happens to be downright repulsive, or +she happens to be deeply and hopefully in love with another man." +</P> + +<P> +Davy winced satisfactorily. "Do you suspect," he presently asked, +"that she's in love with Victor Dorn?" +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps," said Jane reflectively. "Probably. But I'd not feel +discouraged by that if I were you." +</P> + +<P> +"Dorn's a rather attractive chap in some ways." +</P> + +<P> +Davy's manner was so superior that Jane almost laughed in his face. +What fools men were. If Victor Dorn had position, weren't surrounded +by his unquestionably, hopelessly common family, weren't deliberately +keeping himself common—was there a woman in the world who wouldn't +choose him without a second thought being necessary, in preference to a +Davy Hull? How few men there were who could reasonably hope to hold +their women against all comers. +</P> + +<P> +Victor Dorn might possibly be of those few. But Davy Hull—the idea +was ridiculous. All his advantages—height, looks, money, +position—were excellent qualities in a show piece; but they weren't +the qualities that make a woman want to live her life with a man, that +make her hope he will be able to give her the emotions woman-nature +craves beyond anything. +</P> + +<P> +"He is very attractive," said Jane, "and I've small doubt that Selma +Gordon is infatuated with him. But—I shouldn't let that worry me if I +were you." She paused to enjoy his anxiety, then proceeded: "She is a +level-headed girl. The girls of the working class—the intelligent +ones—have had the silly sentimentalities knocked out of them by +experience. So, when you ask her to marry you, she will accept." +</P> + +<P> +"What a low opinion you have of her!" exclaimed Davy. "What a low view +you take of life!"—most inconsistent of him, since he was himself more +than half convinced that Jane's observations were not far from the +truth. +</P> + +<P> +"Women are sensible," said Jane tranquilly. "They appreciate that +they've got to get a man to support them. Don't forget, my dear Davy, +that marriage is a woman's career." +</P> + +<P> +"You lived abroad too long," said Hull bitterly. +</P> + +<P> +"I've lived at home and abroad long enough and intelligently enough not +to think stupid hypocrisies, even if I do sometimes imitate other +people and SAY them." +</P> + +<P> +"I am sure that Selma Gordon would no more think of marrying me for any +other reason but love—would no more think of it than—than YOU would!" +</P> + +<P> +"No more," was Jane's unruffled reply. "But just as much. I didn't +absolutely refuse you, when you asked me the other day, partly because +I saw no other way of stopping your tiresome talk—and your +unattractive way of trying to lay hands on me. I DETEST being handled." +</P> + +<P> +Davy was looking so uncomfortable that he attracted the attention of +the people they were passing in wide, shady Lincoln Avenue. +</P> + +<P> +"But my principal reason," continued Jane, mercilessly amiable and +candid, "was that I didn't know but that you might prove to be about +the best I could get, as a means to realizing my ambition." She looked +laughingly at the unhappy young man. "You didn't think I was in love +with you, did you, Davy dear?" Then, while the confusion following this +blow was at its height, she added: "You'll remember one of your chief +arguments for my accepting you was ambition. You didn't think it low +then—did you?" +</P> + +<P> +Hull was one of the dry-skinned people. But if he had been sweating +profusely he would have looked and would have been less wretched than +burning up in the smothered heat of his misery. +</P> + +<P> +They were nearing Martha's gates. Jane said: "Yes, Davy, you've got a +good chance. And as soon as she gets used to our way of living, she'll +make you a good wife." She laughed gayly. +</P> + +<P> +"She'll not be quite so pretty when she settles down and takes on +flesh. I wonder how she'll look in fine clothes and jewels." +</P> + +<P> +She measured Hull's stature with a critical eye. "She's only about +half as tall as you. How funny you'll look together!" With sudden +soberness and sweetness, "But, seriously, David, I'm proud of your +courage in taking a girl for herself regardless of her surroundings. +So few men would be willing to face the ridicule and the criticism, and +all the social difficulties." She nodded encouragingly. "Go in and +win! You can count on my friendship—for I'm in love with her myself." +</P> + +<P> +She left him standing dazedly, looking up and down the street as if it +were some strange and pine-beset highway in a foreign land. +</P> + +<P> +After taking a few steps she returned to the gates and called him: "I +forgot to ask do you want me to regard what you've told me as +confidential? I was thinking of telling Martha and Hugo, and it +occurred to me that you might not like it." +</P> + +<P> +"Please don't say anything about it," said he with panicky eagerness. +"You see—nothing's settled yet." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, she'll accept you." +</P> + +<P> +"But I haven't even asked her," pleaded Hull. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—all right—as you please." +</P> + +<P> +When she was safely within doors she dropped to a chair and burst out +laughing. It was part of Jane's passion for the sense of triumph over +the male sex to felt that she had made a "perfect jumping jack of a +fool" of David Hull. "And I rather think," said she to herself, "that +he'll soon be back where he belongs." This with a glance at the tall +heels of the slippers on the good-looking feet she was thrusting out +for her own inspection. "How absurd for him to imagine he could do +anything unconventional. Is there any coward anywhere so cowardly as +an American conventional man? No wonder I hate to think of marrying +one of them. But—I suppose I'll have to do it some day. What's a +woman to do? She's GOT to marry." +</P> + +<P> +So pleased with herself was she that she behaved with unusual +forbearance toward Martha whose conduct of late had been most trying. +Not Martha's sometimes peevish, sometimes plaintive criticisms of her; +these she did not mind. But Martha's way of ordering her own life. +Jane, moving about in the world with a good mind eager to improve, had +got a horror of a woman's going to pieces—and that was what Martha was +doing. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm losing my looks rapidly," was her constant complaint. As she had +just passed thirty there was, in Jane's opinion, not the smallest +excuse for this. The remedy, the preventive, was obvious—diet and +exercise. But Martha, being lazy and self-indulgent and not +imaginative enough to foresee to what a pass a few years more of +lounging and stuffing would bring her, regarded exercise as unladylike +and dieting as unhealthful. She would not weaken her system by taking +less than was demanded by "nature's infallible guide, the healthy +appetite." She would not give up the venerable and aristocratic +tradition that a lady should ever be reposeful. +</P> + +<P> +"Another year or so," warned Jane, "and you'll be as steatopygous as +the bride of a Hottentot chief." +</P> + +<P> +"What does steat—that word mean?" said Martha suspiciously. +</P> + +<P> +"Look in the dictionary," said Jane. "Its synonyms aren't used by +refined people." +</P> + +<P> +"I knew it was something insulting," said Martha with an injured sniff. +</P> + +<P> +The only concessions Martha would make to the latter-day craze of women +for youthfulness were buying a foolish chin-strap of a beauty quack and +consulting him as to whether, if her hair continued to gray, she would +better take to peroxide or to henna. +</P> + +<P> +Jane had come down that day with a severe lecture on fat and wrinkles +laid out in her mind for energetic delivery to the fast-seeding Martha. +She put off the lecture and allowed the time to be used by Martha in +telling Jane what were her (Jane's) strongest and less strong—not +weaker but less strong, points of physical charm. +</P> + +<P> +It was cool and beautiful in the shade of the big gardens behind the +old Galland house. Jane, listening to Martha's honest and just +compliments and to the faint murmurs of the city's dusty, sweaty toil, +had a delicious sense of the superiority of her lot—a feeling that +somehow there must be something in the theory of rightfully superior +and inferior classes—that in taking what she had not earned she was +not robbing those who had earned it, as her reason so often asserted, +but was being supported by the toil of others for high purposes of +aesthetic beauty. Anyhow, why heat one's self wrestling with these +problems? +</P> + +<P> +When she was sure that Victor Dorn must have returned she called him on +the telephone. "Can't you come out to see me to-night?" said she. +"I've something important—something YOU'LL think important—to consult +you about." She felt a refusal forming at the other end of the wire +and hastened to add: "You must know I'd not ask this if I weren't +certain you would be glad you came." +</P> + +<P> +"Why not drop in here when you're down town?" suggested Victor. +</P> + +<P> +She wondered why she did not hang up the receiver and forget him. +</P> + +<P> +But she did not. She murmured, "In due time I'll punish you for this, +sir," and said to him: "There are reasons why it's impossible for me +to go there just now. And you know I can't meet you in a saloon or on +a street corner." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not so sure of that," laughed he. "Let me see. I'm very busy. +But I could come for half an hour this afternoon." +</P> + +<P> +She had planned an evening session, being well aware of the favorable +qualities of air and light after the matter-of-fact sun has withdrawn +his last rays. But she promptly decided to accept what offered. "At +three?" +</P> + +<P> +"At four," replied he. +</P> + +<P> +"You haven't forgotten those books?" +</P> + +<P> +"Books? Oh, yes—yes, I remember. I'll bring them." +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you so much," said she sweetly. "Good-by." +</P> + +<P> +And at four she was waiting for him on the front veranda in a house +dress that was—well, it was not quite the proper costume for such an +occasion, but no one else was to see, and he didn't know about that +sort of thing—and the gown gave her charms their best possible +exposure except evening dress, which was out of the question. She had +not long to wait. One of the clocks within hearing had struck and +another was just beginning to strike when she saw him coming toward the +house. She furtively watched him, admiring his walk without quite +knowing why. You may perhaps know the walk that was Victor's—a steady +forward advance of the whole body held firmly, almost rigidly—the walk +of a man leading another to the scaffold, or of a man being led there +in conscious innocence, or of a man ready to go wherever his purposes +may order—ready to go without any heroics or fuss of any kind, but +simply in the course of the day's business. When a man walks like +that, he is worth observing—and it is well to think twice before +obstructing his way. +</P> + +<P> +That steady, inevitable advance gave Jane Hastings an absurd feeling of +nervousness. She had an impulse to fly, as from some oncoming danger. +Yet what was coming, in fact? A clever young man of the working class, +dressed in garments of the kind his class dressed in on Sunday, and +plebeianly carrying a bundle under his arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Our clock says you are three seconds late," cried she, laughing and +extending her hand in a friendly, equal way that would have immensely +flattered almost any man of her own class. "But another protests that +you are one second early." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm one of those fools who waste their time and their nerves by being +punctual," said he. +</P> + +<P> +He laid the books on the wicker sofa. But instead of sitting Jane +said: "We might be interrupted here. Come to the west veranda." +</P> + +<P> +There she had him in a leafy solitude—he facing her as she posed in +fascinating grace in a big chair. He looked at her—not the look of a +man at a woman, but the look of a busy person at one who is about to +show cause for having asked for a portion of his valuable time. She +laughed—and laughter was her best gesture. "I can never talk to you if +you pose like that," said she. "Honestly now, is your time so +pricelessly precious?" +</P> + +<P> +He echoed her laugh and settled himself more at his ease. "What did +you want of me?" he asked. +</P> + +<P> +"I intend to try to get better hours and better wages for the street +car men," said she. "To do it, I must know just what is right—what I +can hope to get. General talk is foolish. If I go at father I must +have definite proposals to make, with reasons for them. I don't want +him to evade. I would have gotten my information elsewhere, but I +could think of no one but you who might not mislead me." +</P> + +<P> +She had confidently expected that this carefully thought out scheme +would do the trick. He would admire her, would be interested, would be +drawn into a position where she could enlist him as a constant adviser. +He moved toward the edge of his chair as if about to rise. He said, +pleasantly enough but without a spark of enthusiasm: +</P> + +<P> +"That's very nice of you, Miss Hastings. But I can't advise +you—beyond saying that if I were you, I shouldn't meddle." +</P> + +<P> +She—that is, her vanity—was cut to the quick. "Oh!" said she with +irony, "I fancied you wished the laboring men to have a better sort of +life." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said he. "But I'm not in favor of running hysterically about +with a foolish little atomizer in the great stable. You are talking +charity. I am working for justice. It will not really benefit the +working man for the company, at the urging of a sweet and lovely young +Lady Bountiful, to deign graciously to grant a little less slavery to +them. In fact, a well fed, well cared for slave is worse off than one +who's badly treated—worse off because farther from his freedom. The +only things that do our class any good, Miss Hastings, are the things +they COMPEL—compel by their increased intelligence and increased unity +and power. They get what they deserve. They won't deserve more until +they compel more. Gifts won't help—not even gifts from—" His +intensely blue eyes danced—"from such charming white hands so +beautifully manicured." +</P> + +<P> +She rose with an angry toss of the head. "I didn't ask you here to +annoy me with impertinences about my finger nails." +</P> + +<P> +He rose, at his ease, good-humored, ready to go. "Then you should have +worn gloves," said he carelessly, "for I've been able to think only of +your finger nails—and to wonder WHAT can be done with hands like that. +Thank you for a pleasant talk." He bowed and smiled. "Good-by. +Oh—Miss Gordon sent you her love." +</P> + +<P> +"What IS the matter, Mr. Dorn?" cried the girl desperately. "I want +your friendship—your respect. CAN'T I get it? Am I utterly hopeless +in your eyes?" +</P> + +<P> +A curious kind of color rose in his cheeks. His eyes regarded her with +a mysterious steadiness. "You want neither my respect nor my +friendship," said he. "You want to amuse yourself." He pointed at her +hands. "Those nails betray you." He shrugged his shoulders, laughed, +said as if to a child: "You are a nice girl, Jane Hastings. It's a +pity you weren't brought up to be of some use. But you weren't—and +it's too late." +</P> + +<P> +Her eyes flashed, her bosom heaved. "WHY do I take these things from +you? WHY do I invite them?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because you inherit your father's magnificent persistence—and you've +set your heart on the whim of making a fool of me—and you hate to give +up." +</P> + +<P> +"You wrong me—indeed you do," cried she. "I want to learn—I want to +be of use in the world. I want to have some kind of a real life." +</P> + +<P> +"Really?" mocked he good-humoredly. +</P> + +<P> +"Really," said she with all her power of sweet earnestness. +</P> + +<P> +"Then—cut your nails and go to work. And when you have become a +genuine laborer, you'll begin to try to improve not the condition of +others, but your own. The way to help workers is to abolish the idlers +who hang like a millstone about their necks. You can help only by +abolishing the one idler under your control." +</P> + +<P> +She stood nearer him, very near him. She threw out her lovely arms in +a gesture of humility. "I will do whatever you say," she said. +</P> + +<P> +They looked each into the other's eyes. The color fled from her face, +the blood poured into his—wave upon wave, until he was like a man who +has been set on fire by the furious heat of long years of equatorial +sun. He muttered, wheeled about and strode away—in resolute and +relentless flight. She dropped down where he had been sitting and hid +her face in her perfumed hands. +</P> + +<P> +"I care for him," she moaned, "and he saw and he despises me! How COULD +I—how COULD I!" +</P> + +<P> +Nevertheless, within a quarter of an hour she was in her dressing room, +standing at the table, eyes carefully avoiding her mirrored eyes—as +she cut her finger nails. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IV +</H3> + +<P> +Jane was mistaken in her guess at the cause of Victor Dorn's agitation +and abrupt flight. If he had any sense whatever of the secret she had +betrayed to him and to herself at the same instant it was wholly +unconscious. He had become panic-stricken and had fled because he, +faced with her exuberance and tempting wealth of physical charm, had +become suddenly conscious of her and of himself in a way as new to him +as if he had been fresh from a monkery where no woman had ever been +seen. Thus far the world had been peopled for him with human beings +without any reference to sex. The phenomena of sex had not interested +him because his mind had been entirely taken up with the other aspects +of life; and he had not yet reached the stage of development where a +thinker grasps the truth that all questions are at bottom questions of +the sex relation, and that, therefore, no question can be settled right +until the sex relations are settled right. +</P> + +<P> +Jane Hastings was the first girl he had met in his whole life who was +in a position to awaken that side of his nature. And when his brain +suddenly filled with a torrent of mad longings and of sensuous +appreciations of her laces and silk, of her perfume and smoothness and +roundness, of the ecstasy that would come from contact with those warm, +rosy lips—when Victor Dorn found himself all in a flash eager +impetuosity to seize this woman whom he did not approve of, whom he did +not even like, he felt bowed with shame. He would not have believed +himself capable of such a thing. He fled. +</P> + +<P> +He fled, but she pursued. And when he sat down in the garden behind +his mother's cottage, to work at a table where bees and butterflies had +been his only disturbers, there was this SHE before him—her soft, +shining gaze fascinating his gaze, her useless but lovely white hands +extended tantalizingly toward him. +</P> + +<P> +As he continued to look at her, his disapproval and dislike melted. "I +was brutally harsh to her," he thought repentantly. +</P> + +<P> +"She was honestly trying to do the decent thing. How was she to know? +And wasn't I as much wrong as right in advising her not to help the +men?" +</P> + +<P> +Beyond question, it was theoretically best for the two opposing forces, +capital and labor, to fight their battle to its inevitable end without +interference, without truce, with quarter neither given nor taken on +either side. But practically—wasn't there something to be said for +such humane proposals of that of Jane Hastings? They would put off the +day of right conditions rightly and therefore permanently +founded—conditions in which master and slave or serf or wage-taker +would be no more; but, on the other hand, slaves with shorter hours of +toil and better surroundings could be enlightened more easily. +Perhaps. He was by no means sure; he could not but fear that anything +that tended to make the slave comfortable in his degradation must of +necessity weaken his aversion to degradation. Just as the worst kings +were the best kings because they hastened the fall of monarchy, so the +worst capitalists, the most rapacious, the most rigid enforcers of the +economic laws of a capitalistic society were the best capitalists, were +helping to hasten the day when men would work for what they earned and +would earn what they worked for—when every man's pay envelope would +contain his wages, his full wages, and nothing but his wages. +</P> + +<P> +Still, where judgment was uncertain, he certainly had been unjust to +that well meaning girl. And was she really so worthless as he had on +first sight adjudged her? There might be exceptions to the rule that a +parasite born and bred can have no other instructor or idea but those +of parasitism. She was honest and earnest, was eager to learn the +truth. She might be put to some use. At any rate he had been unworthy +of his own ideals when he, assuming without question that she was the +usual capitalistic snob with the itch for gratifying vanity by +patronizing the "poor dear lower classes," had been almost insultingly +curt and mocking. +</P> + +<P> +"What was the matter with me?" he asked himself. "I never acted in +that way before." And then he saw that his brusqueness had been the +cover for fear of of her—fear of the allure of her luxury and her +beauty. In love with her? He knew that he was not. No, his feeling +toward her was merely the crudest form of the tribute of man to +woman—though apparently woman as a rule preferred this form to any +other. +</P> + +<P> +"I owe her an apology," he said to himself. And so it came to pass +that at three the following afternoon he was once more facing her in +that creeper-walled seclusion whose soft lights were almost equal to +light of gloaming or moon or stars in romantic charm. +</P> + +<P> +Said he—always direct and simple, whether dealing with man or woman, +with devious person or straight: +</P> + +<P> +"I've come to beg your pardon for what I said yesterday." +</P> + +<P> +"You certainly were wild and strange," laughed she. +</P> + +<P> +"I was supercilious," said he. "And worse than that there is not. +However, as I have apologized, and you have accepted my apology, we +need waste no more time about that. You wished to persuade your father +to——" +</P> + +<P> +"Just a moment!" interrupted she. "I've a question to ask. WHY did you +treat me—why have you been treating me so—so harshly?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because I was afraid of you," replied he. "I did not realize it, but +that was the reason." +</P> + +<P> +"Afraid of ME," said she. "That's very flattering." +</P> + +<P> +"No," said he, coloring. "In some mysterious way I had been betrayed +into thinking of you as no man ought to think of a woman unless he is +in love with her and she with him. I am ashamed of myself. But I +shall conquer that feeling—or keep away from you.... Do you understand +what the street car situation is?" +</P> + +<P> +But she was not to be deflected from the main question, now that it had +been brought to the front so unexpectedly and in exactly the way most +favorable to her purposes. "You've made me uneasy," said she. "I +don't in the least understand what you mean. I have wanted, and I +still want, to be friends with you—good friends—just as you and Selma +Gordon are—though of course I couldn't hope to be as close a friend as +she is. I'm too ignorant—too useless." +</P> + +<P> +He shook his head—with him, a gesture that conveyed the full strength +of negation. "We are on opposite sides of a line across which +friendship is impossible. I could not be your friend without being +false to myself. You couldn't be mine unless you were by some accident +flung into the working class and forced to adopt it as your own. Even +then you'd probably remain what you are. Only a small part of the +working class as yet is at heart of the working class. Most of us +secretly—almost openly—despise the life of work, and dream and hope a +time of fortune that will put us up among the masters and the idlers." +His expressive eyes became eloquent. "The false and shallow ideas that +have been educated into us for ages can't be uprooted in a few brief +years." +</P> + +<P> +She felt the admiration she did not try to conceal. She saw the proud +and splendid conception of the dignity of labor—of labor as a +blessing, not a curse, as a badge of aristocracy and not of slavery and +shame. "You really believe that, don't you?" she said. "I know it's +true. I say I believe it—who doesn't SAY so? But I don't FEEL it." +</P> + +<P> +"That's honest," said he heartily. "That's some thing to build on." +</P> + +<P> +"And I'm going to build!" cried she. "You'll help me—won't you? I +know, it's a great deal to ask. Why should you take the time and the +trouble to bother with one single unimportant person." +</P> + +<P> +"That's the way I spend my life—in adding one man or one woman to our +party—one at a time. It's slow building, but it's the only kind that +endures. There are twelve hundred of us now—twelve hundred voters, I +mean. Ten years ago there were only three hundred. We'd expand much +more rapidly if it weren't for the constant shifts of population. Our +men are forced to go elsewhere as the pressure of capitalism gets too +strong. And in place of them come raw emigrants, ignorant, full of +dreams of becoming capitalists and exploiters of their fellow men and +idlers. Ambition they call it. Ambition!" He laughed. "What a +vulgar, what a cruel notion of rising in the world! To cease to be +useful, to become a burden to others! ... Did you ever think how many +poor creatures have to toil longer hours, how many children have to go +to the factory instead of to school, in order that there may be two +hundred and seven automobiles privately kept in this town and +seventy-four chauffeurs doing nothing but wait upon their masters? +Money doesn't grow on bushes, you know. Every cent of it has to be +earned by somebody—and earned by MANUAL labor." +</P> + +<P> +"I must think about that," she said—for the first time as much +interested in what he was saying as in the man himself. No small +triumph for Victor over the mind of a woman dominated, as was Jane +Hastings, by the sex instinct that determines the thoughts and actions +of practically the entire female sex. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—think about it," he urged. "You will never see it—or +anything—until you see it for yourself." +</P> + +<P> +"That's the way your party is built—isn't it?" inquired she. "Of those +who see it for themselves." +</P> + +<P> +"Only those," replied he. "We want no others." +</P> + +<P> +"Not even their votes?" said she shrewdly. +</P> + +<P> +"Not even their votes," he answered. "We've no desire to get the +offices until we get them to keep. And when we shall have conquered +the city, we'll move on to the conquest of the county—then of the +district—then of the state. Our kind of movement is building in every +city now, and in most of the towns and many of the villages. The old +parties are falling to pieces because they stand for the old politics +of the two factions of the upper class quarreling over which of them +should superintend the exploiting of the people. Very few of us +realize what is going on before our very eyes—that we're seeing the +death agonies of one form of civilization and the birth-throes of a +newer form." +</P> + +<P> +"And what will it be?" asked the girl. +</P> + +<P> +She had been waiting for some sign of the "crank," the impractical +dreamer. She was confident that this question would reveal the man she +had been warned against—that in answering it he would betray his true +self. But he disappointed and surprised her. +</P> + +<P> +"How can I tell what it will be?" said he. "I'm not a prophet. All I +can say is I am sure it will be human, full of imperfections, full of +opportunities for improvements—and that I hope it will be better than +what we have now. Probably not much better, but a little—and that +little, however small it may be, will be a gain. Doesn't history show +a slow but steady advance of the idea that the world is for the people +who live in it, a slow retreat of the idea that the world and the +people and all its and their resources are for a favored few of some +kind of an upper class? Yes—I think it is reasonable to hope that out +of the throes will come a freer and a happier and a more intelligent +race." +</P> + +<P> +Suddenly she burst out, apparently irrelevantly: "But I can't—I +really can't agree with you that everyone ought to do physical labor. +That would drag the world down—yes, I'm sure it would." +</P> + +<P> +"I guess you haven't thought about that," said he. "Painters do +physical labor—and sculptors—and writers—and all the scientific +men—and the inventors—and—" He laughed at her—"Who doesn't do +physical labor that does anything really useful? Why, you yourself—at +tennis and riding and such things—do heavy physical labor. I've only +to look at your body to see that. But it's of a foolish kind—foolish +and narrowly selfish." +</P> + +<P> +"I see I'd better not try to argue with you," said she. +</P> + +<P> +"No—don't argue—with me or with anybody," rejoined he. "Sit down +quietly and think about life—about your life. Think how it is best to +live so that you may get the most out of life—the most substantial +happiness. Don't go on doing the silly customary things simply because +a silly customary world says they are amusing and worth while. +Think—and do—for yourself, Jane Hastings." +</P> + +<P> +She nodded slowly and thoughtfully. "I'll try to," she said. She +looked at him with the expression of the mind aroused. It was an +expression that often rewarded him after a long straight talk with a +fellow being. She went on: "I probably shan't do what you'd approve. +You see, I've got to be myself—got to live to a certain extent the +kind of a life fate has made for me." +</P> + +<P> +"You couldn't successfully live any other," said he. +</P> + +<P> +"But, while it won't be at all what you'd regard as a model life—or +even perhaps useful—it'll be very different—very much better—than it +would have been, if I hadn't met you—Victor Dorn." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I've done nothing," said he. "All I try to do is to encourage my +fellow beings to be themselves. So—live your own life—the life you +can live best—just as you wear the clothes that fit and become you.... +And now—about the street car question. What do you want of me?" +</P> + +<P> +"Tell me what to say to father." +</P> + +<P> +He shook his head. "Can't do it," said he. "There's a good place for +you to make a beginning. Put on an old dress and go down town and get +acquainted with the family life of the street-car men. Talk to their +wives and their children. Look into the whole business yourself." +</P> + +<P> +"But I'm not—not competent to judge," objected she. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, make yourself competent," advised he. +</P> + +<P> +"I might get Miss Gordon to go with me," suggested she. +</P> + +<P> +"You'll learn more thoroughly if you go alone," declared he. +</P> + +<P> +She hesitated—ventured with a winning smile: "You won't go with +me—just to get me started right?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," said he. "You've got to learn for yourself—or not at all. If I +go with you, you'll get my point of view, and it will take you so much +the longer to get your own." +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps you'd prefer I didn't go." +</P> + +<P> +"It's not a matter of much importance, one way or the other—except +perhaps to yourself," replied he. +</P> + +<P> +"Any one individual can do the human race little good by learning the +truth about life. The only benefit is to himself. Don't forget that in +your sweet enthusiasm for doing something noble and generous and +helpful. Don't become a Davy Hull. You know, Davy is on earth for the +benefit of the human race. Ever since he was born he has been taken +care of—supplied with food, clothing, shelter, everything. Yet he +imagines that he is somehow a God-appointed guardian of the people who +have gathered and cooked his food, made his clothing, served him in +every way. It's very funny, that attitude of your class toward mine." +</P> + +<P> +"They look up to us," said Jane. "You can't blame us for allowing +it—for becoming pleased with ourselves." +</P> + +<P> +"That's the worst of it—we do look up to you," admitted he. +"But—we're learning better." +</P> + +<P> +"YOU'VE already learned better—you personally, I mean. I think that +when you compare me, for instance, with a girl like Selma Gordon, you +look down on me." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you, yourself, feel that any woman who is self-supporting and +free is your superior?" +</P> + +<P> +"In some moods, I do," replied Jane. "In other moods, I feel as I was +brought up to feel." +</P> + +<P> +They talked on and on, she detaining him without seeming to do so. She +felt proud of her adroitness. But the truth was that his stopping on +for nearly two hours was almost altogether a tribute to her physical +charm—though Victor was unconscious of it. When the afternoon was +drawing on toward the time for her father to come, she reluctantly let +him go. She said: +</P> + +<P> +"But you'll come again?" +</P> + +<P> +"I can't do that," replied he regretfully. "I could not come to your +father's house and continue free. I must be able to say what I +honestly think, without any restraint." +</P> + +<P> +"I understand," said she. "And I want you to say and to write what you +believe to be true and right. But—we'll see each other again. I'm +sure we are going to be friends." +</P> + +<P> +His expression as he bade her good-by told her that she had won his +respect and his liking. She had a suspicion that she did not deserve +either; but she was full of good resolutions, and assured herself she +soon would be what she had pretended—that her pretenses were not +exactly false, only somewhat premature. +</P> + +<P> +At dinner that evening she said to her father: +</P> + +<P> +"I think I ought to do something beside enjoy myself. I've decided to +go down among the poor people and see whether I can't help them in some +way." +</P> + +<P> +"You'd better keep away from that part of town," advised her father. +"They live awful dirty, and you might catch some disease. If you want +to do anything for the poor, send a check to our minister or to the +charity society. There's two kinds of poor—those that are working +hard and saving their money and getting up out of the dirt, and those +that haven't got no spunk or get-up. The first kind don't need help, +and the second don't deserve it." +</P> + +<P> +"But there are the children, popsy," urged Jane. "The children of the +no-account poor ought to have a chance." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't reckon there ever was a more shiftless, do-easy pair than my +father and mother," rejoined Martin Hastings. "They were what set me +to jumping." +</P> + +<P> +She saw that his view was hopelessly narrow—that, while he regarded +himself justly as an extraordinary man, he also, for purposes of +prejudice and selfishness, regarded his own achievements in overcoming +what would have been hopeless handicaps to any but a giant in character +and in physical endurance as an instance of what any one could do if he +would but work. She never argued with him when she wished to carry her +point. She now said: +</P> + +<P> +"It seems to me that, in our own interest, we ought to do what we can +to make the poor live better. As you say, it's positively dangerous to +go about in the tenement part of town—and those people are always +coming among us. For instance, our servants have relatives living in +Cooper Street, where there's a pest of consumption." +</P> + +<P> +Old Hastings nodded. "That's part of Davy Hull's reform programme," +said he. "And I'm in favor of it. The city government ought to make +them people clean up." +</P> + +<P> +"Victor Dorn wants that done, too—doesn't he?" said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"No," replied the old man sourly. "He says it's no use to clean up the +slums unless you raise wages—and that then the slum people'd clean +themselves up. The idea of giving those worthless trash more money to +spend for beer and whisky and finery for their fool daughters. Why, +they don't earn what we give 'em now." +</P> + +<P> +Jane couldn't resist the temptation to say, "I guess the laziest of +them earn more than Davy Hull or I." +</P> + +<P> +"Because some gets more than they earn ain't a reason why others +should." He grinned. "Maybe you and Davy ought to have less, but +Victor Dorn and his riff-raff oughtn't to be pampered.... Do you want +me to cut your allowance down?" +</P> + +<P> +She was ready for him. "If you can get as satisfactory a housekeeper +for less, you're a fool to overpay the one you have." +</P> + +<P> +The old man was delighted. "I've been cheating you," said he. "I'll +double your pay." +</P> + +<P> +"You're doing it just in time to stop a strike," laughed the girl. +</P> + +<P> +After a not unknown fashion she was most obedient to her father when +his commands happened to coincide with her own inclinations. +</P> + +<P> +Her ardor for an excursion into the slums and the tenements died almost +with Victor Dorn's departure. Her father's reasons for forbidding her +to go did not impress her as convincing, but she felt that she owed it +to him to respect his wishes. Anyhow, what could she find out that she +did not know already? Yes, Dorn and her father were right in the +conclusion each reached by a different road. She would do well not to +meddle where she could not possibly accomplish any good. She could +question the servants and could get from them all the facts she needed +for urging her father at least to cut down the hours of labor. +</P> + +<P> +The more she thought about Victor Dorn the more uneasy she became. She +had made more progress with him than she had hoped to make in so short +a time. But she had made it at an unexpected cost. If she had +softened him, he had established a disquieting influence over her. She +was not sure, but she was afraid, that he was stronger than she—that, +if she persisted in her whim, she would soon be liking him entirely too +well for her own comfort. Except as a pastime, Victor Dorn did not fit +into her scheme of life. If she continued to see him, to yield to the +delight of his magnetic voice, of his fresh and original mind, of his +energetic and dominating personality, might he not become +aroused—begin to assert power over her, compel her to—to—she could +not imagine what; only, it was foolish to deny that he was a dangerous +man. "If I've got good sense," decided she, "I'll let him alone. I've +nothing to gain and everything to lose." +</P> + +<P> +Her motor—the one her father had ordered as a birthday present—came +the next day; and on the following day two girl friends from +Cincinnati arrived for a long visit. So, Jane Hastings had the help +she felt she perhaps needed in resisting the temptings of her whim. +</P> + +<P> +To aid her in giving her friends a good time she impressed Davy Hull, +in spite of his protests that his political work made social fooling +about impossible. The truth was that the reform movement, of which he +was one of the figureheads, was being organized by far more skillful +and expert hands than his—and for purposes of which he had no notion. +So, he really had all the time in the world to look after Ellen +Clearwater and Josie Arthur, and to pose as a serious man bent upon +doing his duty as an upper class person of leisure. All that the +reform machine wished of him was to talk and to pose—and to ride on +the show seat of the pretty, new political wagon. +</P> + +<P> +The new movement had not yet been "sprung" upon the public. It was +still an open secret among the young men of the "better element" in the +Lincoln, the Jefferson and the University clubs. +</P> + +<P> +Money was being subscribed liberally by persons of good family who +hoped for political preferment and could not get it from the old +parties, and by corporations tired of being "blackmailed" by Kelly and +House, and desirous of getting into office men who would give them what +they wanted because it was for the public good that they should not be +hampered in any way. With plenty of money an excellent machine could +be built and set to running. Also, there was talk of a fusion with the +Democratic machine, House to order the wholesale indorsement of the +reform ticket in exchange for a few minor places. +</P> + +<P> +When the excitement among the young gentlemen over the approaching +moral regeneration of Remsen City politics was at the boiling point +Victor Dorn sent for David Hull—asked him to come to the Baker Avenue +cafe', which was the social headquarters of Dorn's Workingmen's League. +As Hull was rather counting on Dorn's support, or at least neutrality, +in the approaching contest, he accepted promptly. As he entered the +cafe' he saw Dorn seated at a table in a far corner listening calmly to +a man who was obviously angrily in earnest. At second glance he +recognized Tony Rivers, one of Dick Kelly's shrewdest lieutenants and a +labor leader of great influence in the unions of factory workers. +Among those in "the know" it was understood that Rivers could come +nearer to delivering the labor vote than any man in Remsen City. He +knew whom to corrupt with bribes and whom to entrap by subtle appeals +to ignorant prejudice. As a large part of his herd was intensely +Catholic, Rivers was a devout Catholic. To quote his own phrase, used +in a company on whose discretion he could count, "Many's the pair of +pants I've worn out doing the stations of the Cross." In fact, Rivers +had been brought up a Presbyterian, and under the name of Blake—his +correct name—had "done a stretch" in Joliet for picking pockets. +</P> + +<P> +Dorn caught sight of Davy Hull, hanging uncertainly in the offing. He +rose at once, said a few words in a quiet, emphatic way to +Rivers—words of conclusion and dismissal—and advanced to meet Hull. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't want to interrupt. I can wait," said Hull, who saw Rivers' +angry scowl at him. He did not wish to offend the great labor leader. +</P> + +<P> +"That fellow pushed himself on me," said Dorn. "I've nothing to say to +him." +</P> + +<P> +"Tony Rivers—wasn't it?" said Davy as they seated themselves at +another table. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm going to expose him in next week's New Day," replied Victor. +"When I sent him a copy of the article for his corrections, if he could +make any, he came threatening." +</P> + +<P> +"I've heard he's a dangerous man," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"He'll not be so dangerous after Saturday," replied Victor. "One by one +I'm putting the labor agents of your friends out of business. The best +ones—the chaps like Rivers—are hard to catch. And if I should attack +one of them before I had him dead to rights, I'd only strengthen him." +</P> + +<P> +"You think you can destroy Rivers' influence?" said Davy incredulously. +</P> + +<P> +"If I were not sure of it I'd not publish a line," said Victor. +</P> + +<P> +"But to get to the subject I wish to talk to you about. You are to be +the reform candidate for Mayor in the fall?" +</P> + +<P> +Davy looked important and self-conscious. "There has been some talk +of——" he began. +</P> + +<P> +"I've sent for you to ask you to withdraw from the movement, Hull," +interrupted Victor. +</P> + +<P> +Hull smiled. "And I've come to ask you to support it," said Hull. +"We'll win, anyhow. But I'd like to see all the forces against +corruption united in this campaign. I am even urging my people to put +one or two of your men on the ticket." +</P> + +<P> +"None of us would accept," said Victor. "That isn't our kind of +politics. We'll take nothing until we get everything.... What do you +know about this movement you're lending your name to?" +</P> + +<P> +"I organized it," said Hull proudly. +</P> + +<P> +"Pardon me—Dick Kelly organized it," replied Victor. "They're simply +using you, Davy, to play their rotten game. Kelly knew he was certain +to be beaten this fall. He doesn't care especially for that, because +House and his gang are just as much Kelly as Kelly himself. But he's +alarmed about the judgeship." +</P> + +<P> +Davy Hull reddened, though he tried hard to look indifferent. +</P> + +<P> +"He's given up hope of pulling through the scoundrel who's on the bench +now. He knows that our man would be elected, though his tool had the +support of the Republicans, the Democrats and the new reform crowd." +</P> + +<P> +Dorn had been watching Hull's embarrassed face keenly. He now said: +"You understand, I see, why Judge Freilig changed his mind and decided +that he must stop devoting himself to the public and think of the +welfare of his family and resume the practice of the law?" +</P> + +<P> +"Judge Freilig is an honorable gentleman," said Davy with much dignity. +"I'm sorry, Dorn, that you listen to the lies of demagogues." +</P> + +<P> +"If Freilig had persisted in running," said Victor, "I should have +published the list of stocks and bonds of corporations benefiting by +his decisions that his brother and his father have come into possession +of during his two terms on the bench. Many of our judges are simply +mentally crooked. But Freilig is a bribe taker. He probably believes +his decisions are just. All you fellows believe that upper-class rule +is really best for the people——" +</P> + +<P> +"And so it is," said Davy. "And you, an educated man, know it." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll not argue that now," said Victor. "As I was saying, while +Freilig decides for what he honestly thinks is right, he also feels he +is entitled to a share of the substantial benefits. Most of the judges, +after serving the upper class faithfully for years, retire to an old +age of comparative poverty. Freilig thinks that is foolish." +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose you agree with him," said Hull sarcastically. +</P> + +<P> +"I sympathize with him," said Victor. "He retires with reputation +unstained and with plenty of money. If I should publish the truth +about him, would he lose a single one of his friends? You know he +wouldn't. That isn't the way the world is run at present." +</P> + +<P> +"No doubt it would be run much better if your crowd were in charge," +sneered Hull. +</P> + +<P> +"On the contrary, much worse," replied Victor unruffled. "But we're +educating ourselves so that, when our time comes, we'll not do so +badly." +</P> + +<P> +"You'll have plenty of time for education," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"Plenty," said Victor. "But why are you angry? Because you realize +now that your reform candidate for judge is of Dick Kelly's selecting?" +</P> + +<P> +"Kelly didn't propose Hugo Galland," cried Davy hotly. "I proposed him +myself." +</P> + +<P> +"Was his the first name you proposed?" +</P> + +<P> +Something in Dorn's tone made Davy feel that it would be unwise to +yield to the impulse to tell a lie—for the highly moral purpose of +silencing this agitator and demagogue. +</P> + +<P> +"You will remember," pursued Victor, "that Galland was the sixth or +seventh name you proposed—and that Joe House rejected the others. He +did it, after consulting with Kelly. You recall—don't you?—that +every time you brought him a name he took time to consider?" +</P> + +<P> +"How do you know so much about all this?" cried Davy, his tone +suggesting that Victor was wholly mistaken, but his manner betraying +that he knew Victor was right. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, politicians are human," replied Dorn. "And the human race is +loose-mouthed. I saw years ago that if I was to build my party I must +have full and accurate information as to all that was going on. I made +my plans accordingly." +</P> + +<P> +"Galland is an honest man—rich—above suspicion—above corruption—an +ideal candidate," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"He is a corporation owner, a corporation lawyer—and a fool," said +Victor. "As I've told you, all Dick Kelly's interest in this fall's +local election is that judgeship." +</P> + +<P> +"Galland is my man. I want to see him elected. If Kelly's for +Galland, so much the better. Then we're sure of electing him—of +getting the right sort of a man on the bench." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not here to argue with you about politics, Davy," said Victor. "I +brought you here because I like you—believe in your honesty—and don't +want to see you humiliated. I'm giving you a chance to save yourself ." +</P> + +<P> +"From what?" inquired Hull, not so valiant as he pretended to be. +</P> + +<P> +"From the ridicule and disgrace that will cover this reform movement, +if you persist in it." +</P> + +<P> +Hull burst out laughing. "Of all the damned impudence!" he exclaimed. +"Dorn, I think you've gone crazy ." +</P> + +<P> +"You can't irritate me, Hull. I've been giving you the benefit of the +doubt. I think you are falling into the commonest kind of error—doing +evil and winking at evil in order that a good end may be gained. Now, +listen. What are the things you reformers are counting on to get you +votes this fall." +</P> + +<P> +Davy maintained a haughty silence. +</P> + +<P> +"The traction scandals, the gas scandals and the paving scandals—isn't +that it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Of course," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"Then—why have the gas crowd, the traction crowd and the paving crowd +each contributed twenty-five thousand dollars to your campaign fund?" +</P> + +<P> +Hull stared at Victor Dorn in amazement. "Who told you that lie?" he +blustered. +</P> + +<P> +Dorn looked at him sadly. "Then you knew? I hoped you didn't, Hull. +But—now that you're facing the situation squarely, don't you see that +you're being made a fool of? Would those people put up for your +election if they weren't SURE you and your crowd were THEIR crowd?" +</P> + +<P> +"They'll find out!" cried Hull. +</P> + +<P> +"You'll find out, you mean," replied Victor. "I see your whole +programme, Davy. They'll put you in, and they'll say, 'Let us alone +and we'll make you governor of the State. Annoy us, and you'll have no +political future.' And you'll say to yourself, 'The wise thing for me +to do is to wait until I'm governor before I begin to serve the people. +THEN I can really do something.' And so, you'll be THEIR mayor—and +afterward THEIR governor—because they'll hold out another inducement. +Anyhow, by that time you'll be so completely theirs that you'll have no +hope of a career except through them." +</P> + +<P> +After reading how some famous oration wrought upon its audience we turn +to it and wonder that such tempests of emotion could have been produced +by such simple, perhaps almost commonplace words. The key to the +mystery is usually a magic quality in the tone of the orator, evoking +before its hypnotized hearers a series of vivid pictures, just as the +notes of a violin, with no aid from words or even from musical form +seem to materialize into visions. +</P> + +<P> +This uncommon yet by no means rare power was in Victor Dorn's voice, +and explained his extraordinary influence over people of all kinds and +classes; it wove a spell that enmeshed even those who disliked him for +his detestable views. Davy Hull, listening to Victor's simple recital +of his prospective career, was so wrought upon that he sat staring +before him in a kind of terror. +</P> + +<P> +"Davy," said Victor gently, "you're at the parting of the ways. The +time for honest halfway reformers—for political amateurs has passed. +'Under which king, Bezonian? Speak or die!'—that's the situation +today." +</P> + +<P> +And Hull knew that it was so. "What do you propose, Dorn?" he said. +"I want to do what's right—what's best for the people." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't worry about the people, Hull," said Victor. +</P> + +<P> +"Upper classes come and pass, but the people remain—bigger and +stronger and more aggressive with every century. And they dictate +language and art, and politics and religion—what we shall all eat and +wear and think and do. Only what they approve, only that yoke even +which they themselves accept, has any chance of enduring. Don't worry +about the people, Davy. Worry about yourself." +</P> + +<P> +"I admit," said Hull, "that I don't like a lot of things about the—the +forces I find I've got to use in order to carry through my plans. I +admit that even the sincere young fellows I've grouped together to head +this movement are narrow—supercilious—self-satisfied—that they +irritate me and are not trustworthy. But I feel that, if I once get +the office, I'll be strong enough to put my plans through." Nervously, +"I'm giving you my full confidence—as I've given it to no one else." +</P> + +<P> +"You've told me nothing I didn't know already," said Victor. +</P> + +<P> +"I've got to choose between this reform party and your party," +continued Hull. "That is, I've got no choice. For, candidly, I've no +confidence in the working class. It's too ignorant to do the ruling. +It's too credulous to build on—for its credulity makes it fickle. And +I believe in the better class, too. It may be sordid and greedy and +tyrannical, but by appealing to its good instincts—and to its fear of +the money kings and the monopolists, something good can be got through +it." +</P> + +<P> +"If you want to get office," said Dorn, "you're right. But if you want +to BE somebody, if you want to develop yourself, to have the joy of +being utterly unafraid in speech and in action—why, come with us." +</P> + +<P> +After a pause Hull said, "I'd like to do it. I'd like to help you." +</P> + +<P> +Victor laid his hand on Davy's arm. "Get it straight, Davy," he said. +"You can't help us. We don't need you. It's you that needs us. We'll +make an honest man of you—instead of a trimming politician, trying to +say or to do something more or less honest once in a while and winking +at or abetting crookedness most of the time." +</P> + +<P> +"I've done nothing, and I'll do nothing, to be ashamed of," protested +Hull. +</P> + +<P> +"You are not ashamed of the way your movement is financed?" +</P> + +<P> +Davy moved uncomfortably. "The money's ours now," said he. "They gave +it unconditionally." +</P> + +<P> +But he could not meet Victor's eyes. Victor said: "They paid a +hundred thousand dollars for a judgeship and for a blanket mortgage on +your party. And if you should win, you'd find you could do little +showy things that were of no value, but nothing that would seriously +disturb a single leech sucking the blood of this community." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't agree with you," said Davy. He roused himself into anger—his +only remaining refuge. "Your prejudices blind you to all the +means—the PRACTICAL means—of doing good, Dorn. I've listened +patiently to you because I respect your sincerity. But I'm not going +to waste my life in mere criticism. I'm going to DO something." +</P> + +<P> +An expression of profound sadness came into Victor's face. "Don't +decide now," he said. "Think it over. Remember what I've told you +about what we'll be compelled to do if you launch this party." +</P> + +<P> +Hull was tempted to burst out violently. Was not this swollen-headed +upstart trying to intimidate him by threats? But his strong instinct +for prudence persuaded him to conceal his resentment. "Why the devil +should you attack US?" he demanded. +</P> + +<P> +"Surely we're nearer your kind of thing than the old parties—and we, +too, are against them—their rotten machines." +</P> + +<P> +"We purpose to keep the issue clear in this town," replied Victor. +"So, we can't allow a party to grow up that PRETENDS to be just as good +as ours but is really a cover behind which the old parties we've been +battering to pieces can reorganize." +</P> + +<P> +"That is, you'll tolerate in this market no brand of honest politics +but your own?" +</P> + +<P> +"If you wish to put it that way," replied Victor coolly. +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose you'd rather see Kelly or House win?" +</P> + +<P> +"We'll see that House does win," replied Victor. "When we have shot +your movement full of holes and sunk it, House will put up a straight +Democratic ticket, and it will win." +</P> + +<P> +"And House means Kelly—and Kelly means corruption rampant." +</P> + +<P> +"And corruption rampant means further and much needed education in the +school of hard experience for the voters," said Dorn. "And the more +education, the larger our party and the quicker its triumph." +</P> + +<P> +Hull laughed angrily. "Talk about low self-seeking! Talk about rotten +practical politics!" +</P> + +<P> +But Dorn held his good humor of the man who has the power and knows it. +"Think it over, Davy," counseled he. "You'll see you've got to come +with us or join Kelly. For your own sake I'd like to see you with us. +For the party's sake you'd better be with Kelly, for you're not really +a workingman, and our fellows would be uneasy about you for a long +time. You see, we've had experience of rich young men whose hearts +beat for the wrongs of the working class—and that experience has not +been fortunate." +</P> + +<P> +"Before you definitely decide to break with the decent element of the +better class, Victor, I want YOU to think it over," said Davy. "We—I, +myself—have befriended you more than once. But for a few of us who +still have hope that demagoguery will die of itself, your paper would +have been suppressed long ago." +</P> + +<P> +Victor laughed. "I wish they would suppress it," said he. "The result +would give the 'better element' in this town a very bad quarter of an +hour, at least." He rose. "We've both said all we've got to say to +each other. I see I've done no good. I feared it would be so." He +was looking into Hull's eyes—into his very soul. "When we meet again, +you will probably be my open and bitter enemy. It's a pity. It makes +me sad. Good-by, and—do think it over, Davy." +</P> + +<P> +Dorn moved rapidly away. Hull looked after him in surprise. At first +blush he was astonished that Dorn should care so much about him as this +curious interview and his emotion at its end indicated. But on +reflecting his astonishment disappeared, and he took the view that Dorn +was simply impressed by his personality and by his ability—was perhaps +craftily trying to disarm him and to destroy his political movement +which was threatening to destroy the Workingmen's League. "A very +shrewd chap is Dorn," thought Davy—why do we always generously concede +at least acumen to those we suspect of having a good opinion of us?—"A +VERY shrewd chap. It's unfortunate he's cursed with that miserable +envy of those better born and better off than he is." +</P> + +<P> +Davy spent the early evening at the University Club, where he was an +important figure. Later on he went to a dance at Mrs. Venable's—and +there he was indeed a lion, as an unmarried man with money cannot but +be in a company of ladies—for money to a lady is what soil and sun and +rain are to a flower—is that without which she must cease to exist. +But still later, when he was alone in bed—perhaps with the supper he +ate at Mrs. Venable's not sitting as lightly as comfort required—the +things Victor Dorn had said came trailing drearily through his mind. +What kind of an article would Dorn print? Those facts about the +campaign fund certainly would look badly in cold type—especially if +Dorn had the proofs. And Hugo Galland— Beyond question the mere list +of the corporations in which Hugo was director or large stockholder +would make him absurd as a judge, sitting in that district. And Hugo +the son-in-law of the most offensive capitalist in that section of the +State! And the deal with House, endorsed by Kelly—how nasty that +would look, IF Victor had the proofs. IF Victor had the proofs. But +had he? +</P> + +<P> +"I MUST have a talk with Kelly," said Davy, aloud. +</P> + +<P> +The words startled him—not his voice suddenly sounding in the profound +stillness of his bedroom, but the words themselves. It was his first +admission to himself of the vicious truth he had known from the outset +and had been pretending to himself that he did not know—the truth that +his reform movement was a fraud contrived by Dick Kelly to further the +interests of the company of financiers and the gang of +politico-criminal thugs who owned the party machinery. It is a nice +question whether a man is ever allowed to go in HONEST self-deception +decisively far along a wrong road. However this may be, certain it is +that David Hull, reformer, was not so allowed. And he was glad of the +darkness that hid him at least physically from himself as he strove to +convince himself that, if he was doing wrong, it was from the highest +motives and for the noblest purposes and would result in the public +good—and not merely in fame and office for David Hull. +</P> + +<P> +The struggle ended as struggles usually end in the famous arena of +moral sham battles called conscience; and toward the middle of the +following morning Davy, at peace with himself and prepared to make any +sacrifice of personal squeamishness or moral idealism for the sake of +the public good, sought out Dick Kelly. +</P> + +<P> +Kelly's original headquarters had, of course, been the doggery in and +through which he had established himself as a political power. As his +power grew and his relations with more respectable elements of society +extended he shifted to a saloon and beer garden kept by a reputable +German and frequented by all kinds of people—a place where his friends +of the avowedly criminal class and his newer friends of the class that +does nothing legally criminal, except in emergencies, would feel +equally at ease. He retained ownership of the doggery, but took his +name down and put up that of his barkeeper. When he won his first big +political fight and took charge of the public affairs of Remsen City +and made an arrangement with Joe House where—under Remsen City, +whenever it wearied or sickened of Kelly, could take instead Kelly +disguised as Joe House—when he thus became a full blown boss he +established a secondary headquarters in addition to that at Herrmann's +Garden. Every morning at ten o'clock he took his stand in the main +corridor of the City Hall, really a thoroughfare and short cut for the +busiest part of town. With a cigar in his mouth he stood there for an +hour or so, holding court, making appointments, attending to all sorts +of political business. +</P> + +<P> +Presently his importance and his ideas of etiquette expanded to such an +extent that he had to establish the Blaine Club. Joe House's Tilden +Club was established two years later, in imitation of Kelly. If you +had very private and important business with Kelly—business of the +kind of which the public must get no inkling, you made—preferably by +telephone—an appointment to meet him in his real estate offices in the +Hastings Building—a suite with entrances and exits into three +separated corridors. If you wished to see him about ordinary matters +and were a person who could "confer" with Kelly without its causing +talk you met him at the Blaine Club. If you wished to cultivate him, +to pay court to him, you saw him at Herrmann's—or in the general rooms +of the club. If you were a busy man and had time only to exchange +greetings with him—to "keep in touch"—you passed through the City +Hall now and then at his hour. Some bosses soon grow too proud for the +vulgar democracy of such a public stand; but Kelly, partly through +shrewdness, partly through inclination, clung to the City Hall stand +and encouraged the humblest citizens to seek him there and tell him the +news or ask his aid or his advice. +</P> + +<P> +It was at the City Hall that Davy Hull sought him, and found him. +</P> + +<P> +Twice he walked briskly to the boss; the third time he went by slowly. +Kelly, who saw everything, had known from the first glance at Hull's +grave, anxious face, that the young leader of the "holy boys" was there +to see him. But he ignored Davy until Davy addressed him directly. +</P> + +<P> +"Howdy, Mr. Hull!" said he, observing the young man with eyes that +twinkled cynically. "What's the good word?" +</P> + +<P> +"I want to have a little talk with you," Davy blurted out. "Where could +I see you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Here I am," said Kelly. "Talk away." +</P> + +<P> +"Couldn't I see you at some—some place where we'd not be interrupted? +I saw Victor Dorn yesterday, and he said some things that I think you +ought to know about." +</P> + +<P> +"I do know about 'em," replied Kelly. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you sure? I mean his threats to—to——" +</P> + +<P> +As Davy paused in an embarrassed search for a word that would not hurt +his own but recently soothed conscience, Kelly laughed. "To expose you +holy boys?" inquired he. "To upset the nice moral campaign you and Joe +House have laid out? Yes, I know all about Mr. Victor Dorn. But—Joe +House is the man you want to see. You boys are trying to do me +up—trying to break up the party. You can't expect ME to help you. +I've got great respect for you personally, Mr. Hull. Your father—he +was a fine old Republican wheel-horse. He stood by the party through +thick and thin—and the party stood by him. So, I respect his +son—personally. But politically—that's another matter. Politically I +respect straight organization men of either party, but I've got no use +for amateurs and reformers. So—go to Joe House." All this in perfect +good humor, and in a tone of banter that might have ruffled a man with +a keener sense of humor than Davy's. +</P> + +<P> +Davy was red to his eyes, not because Kelly was laughing at him, but +because he stood convicted of such a stupid political blunder as coming +direct to Kelly when obviously he should have gone to Kelly's secret +partner. "Dorn means to attack us all—Republicans, Democrats and +Citizens' Alliance," stammered Davy, trying to justify himself. +</P> + +<P> +Kelly shifted his cigar and shrugged his shoulders. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't worry about his attacks on me—on US," said he. "We're used to +being attacked. We haven't got no reputation for superior virtue to +lose." +</P> + +<P> +"But he says he can prove that our whole campaign is simply a deal +between you and House and me to fool the people and elect a bad judge." +</P> + +<P> +"So I've heard," said Kelly. "But what of it? You know it ain't so." +</P> + +<P> +"No, I don't, Mr. Kelly," replied Hull, desperately. "On the contrary, +I think it is so. And I may add I think we are justified in making +such a deal, when that's the only way to save the community from Victor +Dorn and his crowd of—of anarchists." +</P> + +<P> +Kelly looked at him silently with amused eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"House can't do anything," pursued Davy. "Maybe YOU can. So I came +straight to you." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm glad you're getting a little political sense, my boy," said Kelly. +"Perhaps you're beginning to see that a politician has got to be +practical—that it's the organizations that keeps this city from being +the prey to Victor Dorns." +</P> + +<P> +"I see that," said Davy. "I'm willing to admit that I've misjudged +you, Mr. Kelly—that the better classes owe you a heavy debt—and that +you are one of the men we've got to rely on chiefly to stem the tide of +anarchy that's rising—the attack on the propertied classes—the +intelligent classes." +</P> + +<P> +"I see your eyes are being opened, my boy," said Kelly in a kindly tone +that showed how deeply he appreciated this unexpected recognition of +his own notion of his mission. "You young silk stocking fellows up at +the University Club, and the Lincoln and the Jefferson, have been +indulging in a lot of loose talk against the fellows that do the hard +work in politics—the fellows that helped your fathers to make fortunes +and that are helping you boys to keep 'em. If I didn't have a pretty +level head on me, I'd take my hands off and give Dorn and his gang a +chance at you. I tell you, when you fool with that reform nonsense, you +play with fire in a powder mill." +</P> + +<P> +"But I—I had an idea that you wanted me to go ahead," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"Not the way you started last spring," replied Kelly. "Not the way +you'd 'a gone if I hadn't taken hold. I've been saving you in spite of +yourselves. Thanks to me, your party's on a sound, conservative basis +and won't do any harm and may do some good in teaching a lesson to +those of our boys that've been going a little too far. It ain't good +for an organization to win always." +</P> + +<P> +"Victor Dorn seemed to be sure—absolutely sure," said Hull. "And he's +pretty shrewd at politics—isn't he?" +</P> + +<P> +"Don't worry about him, I tell you," replied Kelly. +</P> + +<P> +The sudden hardening of his voice and of his never notably soft face +was tribute stronger than any words to Dorn's ability as a politician, +to his power as an antagonist. Davy felt a sinister intent—and he +knew that Dick Kelly had risen because he would stop at nothing. He +was as eager to get away from the boss as the boss was to be rid of +him. The intrusion of a henchman, to whom Kelly had no doubt signaled, +gave him the excuse. As soon as he had turned from the City Hall into +Morton Street he slackened to as slow a walk as his length of leg would +permit. Moving along, absorbed in uncomfortable thoughts, he startled +violently when he heard Selma Gordon's voice: +</P> + +<P> +"How d'you do, Mr. Hull? I was hoping I'd see you to-day." +</P> + +<P> +She was standing before him—the same fascinating embodiment of life +and health and untamed energy; the direct, honest glance. +</P> + +<P> +"I want to talk to you," she went on, "and I can't, walking beside you. +You're far too tall. Come into the park and we'll sit on that bench +under the big maple." +</P> + +<P> +He had mechanically lifted his hat, but he had not spoken. He did not +find words until they were seated side by side, and then all he could +say was: +</P> + +<P> +"I'm very glad to see you again—very glad, indeed." +</P> + +<P> +In fact, he was the reverse of glad, for he was afraid of her, afraid +of himself when under the spell of her presence. He who prided himself +on his self-control, he could not account for the effect this girl had +upon him. As he sat there beside her the impulse Jane Hastings had so +adroitly checked came surging back. He had believed, had hoped it was +gone for good and all. He found that in its mysterious hiding place it +had been gaining strength. Quite clearly he saw how absurd was the +idea of making this girl his wife—he tall and she not much above the +bend of his elbow; he conventional, and she the incarnation of +passionate revolt against the restraints of class and form and custom +which he not only conformed to but religiously believed in. And she +set stirring in him all kinds of vague, wild longings to run amuck +socially and politically—longings that, if indulged, would ruin him +for any career worthy of the name. +</P> + +<P> +He stood up. "I must go—I really must," he said, confusedly. +</P> + +<P> +She laid her small, strong hand on his arm—a natural, friendly gesture +with her, and giving no suggestion of familiarity. Even as she was +saying, "Please—only a moment," he dropped back to the seat. +</P> + +<P> +"Well—what is it?" he said abruptly, his gaze resolutely away from her +face. +</P> + +<P> +"Victor was telling me this morning about his talk with you," she said +in her rapid, energetic way. "He was depressed because he had failed. +But I felt sure—I feel sure—that he hasn't. In our talk the other +day, Mr. Hull, I got a clear idea of your character. A woman +understands better. And I know that, after Victor told you the plain +truth about the situation, you couldn't go on." +</P> + +<P> +David looked round rather wildly, swallowed hard several times, said +hoarsely: "I won't, if you'll marry me." +</P> + +<P> +But for a slight change of expression or of color Davy would have +thought she had not heard—or perhaps that he had imagined he was +uttering the words that forced themselves to his lips in spite of his +efforts to suppress them. For she went on in the same impetuous, +friendly way: +</P> + +<P> +"It seemed to me that you have an instinct for the right that's unusual +in men of your class. At least, I think it's unusual. I confess I've +not known any man of your class except you—and I know you very +slightly. It was I that persuaded Victor to go to you. He believes +that a man's class feeling controls him—makes his moral sense—compels +his actions. But I thought you were an exception—and he yielded after +I urged him a while." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know WHAT I am," said Hull gloomily. "I think I want to do +right. But—what is right? Not theoretical right, but the practical, +workable thing?" +</P> + +<P> +"That's true," conceded Selma. "We can't always be certain what's +right. But can't we always know what's wrong? And, Mr. Hull, it is +wrong—altogether wrong—and YOU know it's wrong—to lend your name and +your influence and your reputation to that crowd. They'd let you do a +little good—why? To make their professions of reform seem plausible. +To fool the people into trusting them again. And under cover of the +little good you were showily doing, how much mischief they'd do! If +you'll go back over the history of this town—of any town—of any +country—you'll find that most of the wicked things—the things that +pile the burdens on the shoulders of the poor—the masses—most of the +wicked things have been done under cover of just such men as you, used +as figureheads." +</P> + +<P> +"But I want to build up a new party—a party of honest men, honestly +led," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"Led by your sort of young men? I mean young men of your class. Led by +young lawyers and merchants and young fellows living on inherited +incomes? Don't you see that's impossible," cried Selma. "They are all +living off the labor of others. Their whole idea of life is exploiting +the masses—is reaping where they have not sown or reaping not only +what they've sown but also what others have sown—for they couldn't buy +luxury and all the so-called refinements of life for themselves and +their idle families merely with what they themselves could earn. How +can you build up a really HONEST party with such men? They may mean +well. They no doubt are honest, up to a certain point. But they will +side with their class, in every crisis. And their class is the +exploiting class." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't agree with you," said Davy. "You are not fair to us." +</P> + +<P> +"How!" demanded Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"I couldn't argue with you," replied Hull. "All I'll say is that +you've seen only the one side—only the side of the working class." +</P> + +<P> +"That toils without ceasing—its men, its women, its children—" said +the girl with heaving bosom and flashing eyes—"only to have most of +what it earns filched away from it by your class to waste in foolish +luxury!" +</P> + +<P> +"And whose fault is that?" pleaded Hull. +</P> + +<P> +"The fault of my class," replied she. "Their ignorance, their +stupidity—yes, and their foolish cunning that overreaches itself. For +they tolerate the abuses of the present system because each man—at +least, each man of the ones who think themselves 'smart'—imagines that +the day is coming when he can escape from the working class and gain +the ranks of the despoilers." +</P> + +<P> +"And you ask ME to come into the party of those people!" scoffed Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, Mr. Hull," said she—and until then he had not appreciated how +lovely her voice was. "Yes—that is the party for you—for all honest, +sincere men who want to have their own respect through and through. To +teach those people—to lead them right—to be truthful and just with +them—that is the life worth while." +</P> + +<P> +"But they won't learn. They won't be led right. They are as +ungrateful as they are foolish. If they weren't, men like me trying to +make a decent career wouldn't have to compromise with the Kellys and +the Houses and their masters. What are Kelly and House but leaders of +your class? And they lead ten to Victor Dorn's one. Why, any day +Dorn's followers may turn on him—and you know it." +</P> + +<P> +"And what of that?" cried Selma. "He's not working to be their leader, +but to do what he thinks is right, regardless of consequences. Why is +he a happy man, as happiness goes? Why has he gone on his way steadily +all these years, never minding setbacks and failures and defeats and +dangers? I needn't tell you why." +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Hull, powerfully moved by her earnestness. "I understand." +</P> + +<P> +"The finest sentence that ever fell from human lips," Selma went on, +"was 'Father, forgive them; they know not what they do.' Forgive +them—forgive us all—for when we go astray it is because we are in the +dark. And I want you to come with us, Mr. Hull, and help to make it a +little less dark. At least, you will then be looking toward the +light—and every one turned in that direction counts." +</P> + +<P> +After a long pause, Hull said: +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Gordon, may I ask you a very personal question?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said she. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you in love with Victor Dorn?" +</P> + +<P> +Selma laughed merrily. "Jane Hastings had that same curiosity," said +she. "I'll answer you as I answered her—though she didn't ask me +quite so directly. No, I am not in love with him. We are too busy to +bother about those things. We have too much to do to think about +ourselves." +</P> + +<P> +"Then—there is no reason why I should not ask you to be my wife—why I +should not hope—and try?" +</P> + +<P> +She looked at him with a peculiar smile. "Yes, there is a very good +reason. I do not love you, and I shall not love you. I shall not have +time for that sort of thing." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you believe in love?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't believe in much else," said she. "But—not the kind of love +you offer me." +</P> + +<P> +"How do you know?" cried he. "I have not told you yet how I feel +toward you. I have not——" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes, you have," interrupted she. "This is the second—no, the +third time you have seen me. So, the love you offer me can only be of +a kind it is not in the least flattering to a woman to inspire. You +needn't apologize," she went on, laughingly. "I've no doubt you mean +well. You simply don't understand me—my sort of woman." +</P> + +<P> +"It's you that don't understand, Selma," cried he. "You don't realize +how wonderful you are—how much you reveal of yourself at once. I was +all but engaged to another woman when I saw you. I've been fighting +against my love for you—fighting against the truth that suddenly came +to me that you were the only woman I had ever seen who appealed to and +aroused and made strong all that is brave and honest in me. Selma, I +need you. I am not infatuated. I am clearer-headed than I ever was in +my life. I need you. You can make a man of me." +</P> + +<P> +She was regarding him with a friendly and even tender sympathy. "I +understand now," she said. "I thought it was simply the ordinary +outburst of passion. But I see that it was the result of your struggle +with yourself about which road to take in making a career." +</P> + +<P> +If she had not been absorbed in developing her theory she might have +seen that Davy was not altogether satisfied with this analysis of his +feelings. But he deemed it wise to hold his peace. +</P> + +<P> +"You do need some one—some woman," she went on. "And I am anxious to +help you all I can. I couldn't help you by marrying you. To me +marriage means——" She checked herself abruptly. "No matter. I can +help you, I think, as a friend. But if you wish to marry, you should +take some one in your own class—some one who's in sympathy with you. +Then you and she could work it out together—could help each other. +You see, I don't need you—and there's nothing in one-sided +marriages.... No, you couldn't give me anything I need, so far as I +can see." +</P> + +<P> +"I believe that's true," said Davy miserably. +</P> + +<P> +She reflected, then continued: "But there's Jane Hastings. Why not +marry her? She is having the same sort of struggle with herself. You +and she could help each other. And you're, both of you, fine +characters. I like each of you for exactly the same reasons.... +Yes—Jane needs you, and you need her." She looked at him with her +sweet, frank smile like a breeze straight from the sweep of a vast +plateau. "Why, it's so obvious that I wonder you and she haven't +become engaged long ago. You ARE fond of her, aren't you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, Selma," cried Davy, "I LOVE you. I want YOU." +</P> + +<P> +She shook her head with a quaint, fascinating expression of +positiveness. "Now, my friend," said she, "drop that fancy. It isn't +sensible. And it threatens to become silly." Her smile suddenly +expanded into a laugh. "The idea of you and me married—of ME married +to YOU! I'd drive you crazy. No, I shouldn't stay long enough for +that. I'd be of on the wings of the wind to the other end of the earth +as soon as you tried to put a halter on me." +</P> + +<P> +He did not join in her laugh. She rose. "You will think again before +you go in with those people—won't you, David?" she said, sober and +earnest. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't care what becomes of me," he said boyishly. +</P> + +<P> +"But <I>I</I> do," she said. "I want to see you the man you can be." +</P> + +<P> +"Then—marry me," he cried. +</P> + +<P> +Her eyes looked gentle friendship; her passionate lips curled in scorn. +"I might marry the sort of man you could be," she said, "but I never +could marry a man so weak that, without me to bolster him up, he'd +become a stool-pigeon." +</P> + +<P> +And she turned and walked away. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +V. +</H3> + +<P> +A few days later, after she had taken her daily two hours' walk, Selma +went into the secluded part of Washington Park and spent the rest of +the morning writing. Her walk was her habitual time for thinking out +her plans for the day. And when it was writing that she had to do, and +the weather was fine, that particular hillside with its splendid shade +so restful for the eyes and so stimulating to the mind became her +work-shop. She thought that she was helped as much by the colors of +grass and foliage as by the softened light and the tranquil view out +over hills and valleys. +</P> + +<P> +When she had finished her article she consulted the little nickel watch +she carried in her bag and discovered that it was only one o'clock. +She had counted on getting through at three or half past. Two hours +gained. How could she best use them. The part of the Park where she +was sitting was separated from the Hastings grounds only by the winding +highroad making its last reach for the top of the hill. She decided +that she would go to see Jane Hastings—would try to make tactful +progress in her project of helping Jane and David Hull by marrying them +to each other. Once she had hit upon this project her interest in both +of them had equally increased. Yes, these gained two hours was an +opportunity not to be neglected. +</P> + +<P> +She put her papers into her shopping bag and went straight up the steep +hill. She arrived at the top, at the edge of the lawn before Jane's +house, with somewhat heightened color and brightened eyes, but with no +quickening of the breath. Her slim, solid little body had all the +qualities of endurance of those wiry ponies that come from the regions +her face and walk and the careless grace of her hair so delightfully +suggested. As she advanced toward the house she saw a gay company +assembled on the wide veranda. Jane was giving a farewell luncheon for +her visitors, had asked almost a dozen of the most presentable girls in +the town. It was a very fashionable affair, and everyone had dressed +for it in the best she had to wear at that time of day. +</P> + +<P> +Selma saw the company while there was still time for her to draw back +and descend into the woods. But she knew little about +conventionalities, and she cared not at all about them. She had come +to see Jane; she conducted herself precisely as she would have expected +any one to act who came to see her at any time. She marched straight +across the lawn. The hostess, the fashionable visitors, the +fashionable guests soon centered upon the extraordinary figure moving +toward them under that blazing sun. The figure was extraordinary not +for dress—the dress was plain and unconspicuous—but for that +expression of the free and the untamed, the lack of self-consciousness +so rarely seen except in children and animals. Jane rushed to the +steps to welcome her, seized her extended hands and kissed her with as +much enthusiasm as she kissed Jane. There was sincerity in this +greeting of Jane's; but there was pose, also. Here was one of those +chances to do the unconventional, the democratic thing. +</P> + +<P> +"What a glorious surprise!" cried Jane. "You'll stop for lunch, of +course?" Then to the girls nearest them: "This is Selma Gordon, who +writes for the New Day." +</P> + +<P> +Pronouncing of names—smiles—bows—veiled glances of +curiosity—several young women exchanging whispered comments of +amusement. And to be sure, Selma, in that simple costume, gloveless, +with dusty shoes and blown hair, did look very much out of place. But +then Selma would have looked, in a sense, out of place anywhere but in +a wilderness with perhaps a few tents and a half-tamed herd as +background. In another sense, she seemed in place anywhere as any +natural object must. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't eat lunch," said Selma. "But I'll stay if you'll put me next +to you and let me talk to you." +</P> + +<P> +She did not realize what an upsetting of order and precedence this +request, which seemed so simple to her, involved. Jane hesitated, but +only for a fraction of a second. "Why, certainly," said she. "Now +that I've got you I'd not let you go in any circumstances." +</P> + +<P> +Selma was gazing around at the other girls with the frank and pleased +curiosity of a child. "Gracious, what pretty clothes!" she cried—she +was addressing Miss Clearwater, of Cincinnati. "I've read about this +sort of thing in novels and in society columns of newspapers. But I +never saw it before. ISN'T it interesting!" +</P> + +<P> +Miss Clearwater, whose father was a United States Senator—by +purchase—had had experience of many oddities, male and female. She +also was attracted by Selma's sparkling delight, and by the magnetic +charm which she irradiated as a rose its perfume. "Pretty clothes are +attractive, aren't they?" said she, to be saying something. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know a thing about clothes," confessed Selma. "I've never +owned at the same time more than two dresses fit to wear—usually only +one. And quite enough for me. I'd only be fretted by a lot of things +of that kind. But I like to see them on other people. If I had my way +the whole world would be well dressed." +</P> + +<P> +"Except you?" said Ellen Clearwater with a smile. +</P> + +<P> +"I couldn't be well dressed if I tried," replied Selma. "When I was a +child I was the despair of my mother. Most of the people in the +tenement where we lived were very dirty and disorderly—naturally +enough, as they had no knowledge and no money and no time. But mother +had ideas of neatness and cleanliness, and she used to try to keep me +looking decent. But it was of no use. Ten minutes after she had +smoothed me down I was flying every which way again." +</P> + +<P> +"You were brought up in a tenement?" said Miss Clearwater. Several of +the girls within hearing were blushing for Selma and were feeling how +distressed Jane Hastings must be. +</P> + +<P> +"I had a wonderfully happy childhood," replied Selma. "Until I was old +enough to understand and to suffer. I've lived in tenements all my +life—among very poor people. I'd not feel at home anywhere else." +</P> + +<P> +"When I was born," said Miss Clearwater, "we lived in a log cabin up in +the mining district of Michigan." +</P> + +<P> +Selma showed the astonishment the other girls were feeling. But while +their astonishment was in part at a girl of Ellen Clearwater's position +making such a degrading confession, hers had none of that element in +it. "You don't in the least suggest a log cabin or poverty of any +kind," said she. "I supposed you had always been rich and beautifully +dressed." +</P> + +<P> +"No, indeed," replied Ellen. She gazed calmly round at the other girls +who were listening. "I doubt if any of us here was born to what you +see. Of course we—some of us—make pretenses—all sorts of silly +pretenses. But as a matter of fact there isn't one of us who hasn't +near relatives in the cabins or the tenements at this very moment." +</P> + +<P> +There was a hasty turning away from this dangerous conversation. Jane +came back from ordering the rearrangement of her luncheon table. Said +Selma: +</P> + +<P> +"I'd like to wash my hands, and smooth my hair a little." +</P> + +<P> +"You take her up, Ellen," said Jane. "And hurry. We'll be in the +dining-room when you come down." +</P> + +<P> +Selma's eyes were wide and roving as she and Ellen went through the +drawing-room, the hall, up stairs and into the very prettily furnished +suite which Ellen was occupying. "I never saw anything like this +before!" exclaimed Selma. "It's the first time I was ever in a grand +house. This is a grand house, isn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +"No—it's only comfortable," replied Ellen. "Mr. Hastings—and Jane, +too, don't go in for grandeur." +</P> + +<P> +"How beautiful everything is—and how convenient!" exclaimed Selma. "I +haven't felt this way since the first time I went to the circus." She +pointed to a rack from which were suspended thin silk dressing gowns of +various rather gay patterns. "What are those?" she inquired. +</P> + +<P> +"Dressing gowns," said Ellen. "Just to wear round while one is +dressing or undressing." +</P> + +<P> +Selma advanced and felt and examined them. "But why so many?" she +inquired. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, foolishness," said Ellen. "Indulgence! To suit different moods." +</P> + +<P> +"Lovely," murmured Selma. "Lovely!" +</P> + +<P> +"I suspect you of a secret fondness for luxury," said Ellen slyly. +</P> + +<P> +Selma laughed. "What would I do with such things?" she inquired. +"Why, I'd have no time to wear them. I'd never dare put on anything so +delicate." +</P> + +<P> +She roamed through dressing-room, bedroom, bath-room, marveling, +inquiring, admiring. "I'm so glad I came," said she. "This will give +me a fresh point of view. I can understand the people of your class +better, and be more tolerant about them. I understand now why they are +so hard and so indifferent. They're quite removed from the common lot. +They don't realize; they can't. How narrow it must make one to have +one's life filled with these pretty little things for luxury and show. +Why, if I lived this life, I'd cease to be human after a short time." +</P> + +<P> +Ellen was silent. +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't mean to say anything rude or offensive," said Selma, +sensitive to the faintest impressions. "I was speaking my thoughts +aloud.... Do you know David Hull?" +</P> + +<P> +"The young reformer?" said Ellen with a queer little smile. "Yes—quite +well." +</P> + +<P> +"Does he live like this?" +</P> + +<P> +"Rather more grandly," said Ellen. +</P> + +<P> +Selma shook her head. A depressed expression settled upon her +features. "It's useless," she said. "He couldn't possibly become a +man." +</P> + +<P> +Ellen laughed. "You must hurry," she said. "We're keeping everyone +waiting." +</P> + +<P> +As Selma was making a few passes at her rebellious thick hair—passes +the like of which Miss Clearwater had never before seen—she explained: +</P> + +<P> +"I've been somewhat interested in David Hull of late—have been hoping +he could graduate from a fake reformer into a useful citizen. But—" +She looked round expressively at the luxury surrounding them—"one +might as well try to grow wheat in sand." +</P> + +<P> +"Davy is a fine fraud," said Ellen. "Fine—because he doesn't in the +least realize that he's a fraud." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm afraid he is a fraud," said Selma setting on her hat again. "What +a pity? He might have been a man, if he'd been brought up properly." +She gazed at Ellen with sad, shining eyes. "How many men and women +luxury blights!" she cried. +</P> + +<P> +"It certainly has done for Davy," said Ellen lightly. "He'll never be +anything but a respectable fraud." +</P> + +<P> +"Why do YOU think so?" Selma inquired. +</P> + +<P> +"My father is a public man," Miss Clearwater explained. "And I've seen +a great deal of these reformers. They're the ordinary human variety of +politician plus a more or less conscious hypocrisy. Usually they're +men who fancy themselves superior to the common run in birth and +breeding. My father has taught me to size them up." +</P> + +<P> +They went down, and Selma, seated between Jane and Miss Clearwater, +amused both with her frank comments on the scene so strange to her—the +beautiful table, the costly service, the variety and profusion of +elaborate food. In fact, Jane, reaching out after the effects got +easily in Europe and almost as easily in the East, but overtaxed the +resources of the household which she was only beginning to get into +what she regarded as satisfactory order. The luncheon, therefore, was +a creditable and promising attempt rather than a success, from the +standpoint of fashion. Jane was a little ashamed, and at times +extremely nervous—this when she saw signs of her staff falling into +disorder that might end in rout. But Selma saw none of the defects. +She was delighted with the dazzling spectacle—for two or three +courses. Then she lapsed into quiet and could not be roused to speak. +</P> + +<P> +Jane and Ellen thought she was overwhelmed and had been seized of +shyness in this company so superior to any in which she had ever found +herself. Ellen tried to induce her to eat, and, failing, decided that +her refraining was not so much firmness in the two meals-a-day system +as fear of making a "break." She felt genuinely sorry for the silent +girl growing moment by moment more ill-at-ease. When the luncheon was +about half over Selma said abruptly to Jane: +</P> + +<P> +"I must go now. I've stayed longer than I should." +</P> + +<P> +"Go?" cried Jane. "Why, we haven't begun to talk yet." +</P> + +<P> +"Another time," said Selma, pushing back her chair. "No, don't rise." +And up she darted, smiling gayly round at the company. "Don't anybody +disturb herself," she pleaded. "It'll be useless, for I'll be gone." +</P> + +<P> +And she was as good as her word. Before any one quite realized what +she was about, she had escaped from the dining-room and from the house. +She almost ran across the lawn and into the woods. There she drew a +long breath noisily. +</P> + +<P> +"Free!" she cried, flinging out her arms. "Oh—but it was DREADFUL!" +</P> + +<P> +Miss Hastings and Miss Clearwater had not been so penetrating as they +fancied. Embarrassment had nothing to do with the silence that had +taken possession of the associate editor of the New Day. +</P> + +<P> +She was never self-conscious enough to be really shy. She hastened to +the office, meeting Victor Dorn in the street doorway. She cried: +</P> + +<P> +"Such an experience!" +</P> + +<P> +"What now?" said Victor. He was used to that phrase from the ardent +and impressionable Selma. For her, with her wide-open eyes and ears, +her vivid imagination and her thirsty mind, life was one closely packed +series of adventures. +</P> + +<P> +"I had an hour to spare," she proceeded to explain. "I thought it was +a chance to further a little scheme I've got for marrying Jane Hastings +and David Hull." +</P> + +<P> +"Um!" said Victor with a quick change of expression—which, however, +Selma happened not to observe. +</P> + +<P> +"And," she went on, "I blundered into a luncheon party Jane was giving. +You never saw—you never dreamed of such style—such dresses and dishes +and flowers and hats! And I was sitting there with them, enjoying it +all as if it were a circus or a ballet, when—Oh, Victor, what a silly, +what a pitiful waste of time and money! So much to do in the world—so +much that is thrillingly interesting and useful—and those intelligent +young people dawdling there at nonsense a child would weary of! I had +to run away. If I had stayed another minute I should have burst out +crying—or denouncing them—or pleading with them to behave themselves." +</P> + +<P> +"What else can they do?" said Victor. "They don't know any better. +They've never been taught. How's the article?" +</P> + +<P> +And he led the way up to the editorial room and held her to the subject +of the article he had asked her to write. At the first opportunity she +went back to the subject uppermost in her mind. Said she: +</P> + +<P> +"I guess you're right—as usual. There's no hope for any people of +that class. The busy ones are thinking only of making money for +themselves, and the idle ones are too enfeebled by luxury to think at +all. No, I'm afraid there's no hope for Hull—or for Jane either." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not sure about Miss Hastings," said Victor. +</P> + +<P> +"You would have been if you'd seen her to-day," replied Selma. "Oh, she +was lovely, Victor—really wonderful to look at. But so obviously the +idler. And—body and soul she belongs to the upper class. She +understands charity, but she doesn't understand justice, and never +could understand it. I shall let her alone hereafter." +</P> + +<P> +"How harsh you women are in your judgments of each other," laughed +Dorn, busy at his desk. +</P> + +<P> +"We are just," replied Selma. "We are not fooled by each other's +pretenses." +</P> + +<P> +Dorn apparently had not heard. Selma saw that to speak would be to +interrupt. She sat at her own table and set to work on the editorial +paragraphs. After perhaps an hour she happened to glance at Victor. +He was leaning back in his chair, gazing past her out into the open; in +his face was an expression she had never seen—a look in the eyes, a +relaxing of the muscles round the mouth that made her think of him as a +man instead of as a leader. She was saying to herself. "What a +fascinating man he would have been, if he had not been an incarnate +cause." +</P> + +<P> +She felt that he was not thinking of his work. She longed to talk to +him, but she did not venture to interrupt. Never in all the years she +had known him had he spoken to her—or to any one—a severe or even an +impatient word. His tolerance, his good humor were infinite. +Yet—she, and all who came into contact with him, were afraid of him. +There could come, and on occasion there did come—into those +extraordinary blue eyes an expression beside which the fiercest flash +of wrath would be easy to face. +</P> + +<P> +When she glanced at him again, his normal expression had returned—the +face of the leader who aroused in those he converted into +fellow-workers a fanatical devotion that was the more formidable +because it was not infatuated. He caught her eye and said: +</P> + +<P> +"Things are in such good shape for us that it frightens me. I spend +most of my time in studying the horizon in the hope that I can foresee +which way the storm's coming from and what it will be." +</P> + +<P> +"What a pessimist you are!" laughed Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"That's why the Workingmen's League has a thick-and-thin membership of +thirteen hundred and fifty," replied Victor. "That's why the New Day +has twenty-two hundred paying subscribers. That's why we grow faster +than the employers can weed our men out and replace them with +immigrants and force them to go to other towns for work." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, anyhow," said the girl, "no matter what happens we can't be +weeded out." +</P> + +<P> +Victor shook his head. "Our danger period has just begun," he replied. +"The bosses realize our power. In the past we've been annoyed a little +from time to time. But they thought us hardly worth bothering with. +In the future we will have to fight." +</P> + +<P> +"I hope they will prosecute us," said Selma. "Then, we'll grow the +faster." +</P> + +<P> +"Not if they do it intelligently," replied Victor. "An intelligent +persecution—if it's relentless enough—always succeeds. You forget +that this isn't a world of moral ideas but of force.... I am afraid of +Dick Kelly. He is something more than a vulgar boss. He SEES. My +hope is that he won't be able to make the others see. I saw him a +while ago. He was extremely polite to me—more so than he ever has +been before. He is up to something. I suspect——" +</P> + +<P> +Victor paused, reflecting. "What?" asked Selma eagerly. +</P> + +<P> +"I suspect that he thinks he has us." He rose, preparing to go out. +"Well—if he has—why, he has. And we shall have to begin all over +again." +</P> + +<P> +"How stupid they are!" exclaimed the girl. "To fight us who are simply +trying to bring about peaceably and sensibly what's bound to come about +anyhow." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—the rain is bound to come," said Victor. "And we say, 'Here's an +umbrella and there's the way to shelter.' And they laugh at OUR +umbrella and, with the first drops plashing on their foolish faces, +deny that it's going to rain." +</P> + +<P> +The Workingmen's League, always first in the field with its ticket, had +been unusually early that year. Although it was only the first week in +August and the election would not be until the third of October, the +League had nominated. It was a ticket made up entirely of skilled +workers who had lived all their lives in Remsen City and who had +acquired an independence—Victor Dorn was careful not to expose to the +falling fire of the opposition any of his men who could be ruined by +the loss of a job or could be compelled to leave town in search of +work. The League always went early into campaign because it pursued a +much slower and less expensive method of electioneering than either of +the old parties—or than any of the "upper class" reform parties that +sprang up from time to time and died away as they accomplished or +failed of their purpose—securing recognition for certain personal +ambitions not agreeable to the old established bosses. Besides, the +League was, like the bosses and their henchmen, in politics every day +in every year. The League theory was that politics was as much a part +of a citizen's daily routine as his other work or his meals. +</P> + +<P> +It was the night of the League's great ratification meeting. The next +day the first campaign number—containing the biographical sketch of +Tony Rivers, Kelly's right-hand man ... would go upon the press, and on +the following day it would reach the public. +</P> + +<P> +Market Square in Remsen City was on the edge of the power quarter, was +surrounded by cheap hotels, boarding houses and saloons. A few years +before, the most notable citizens, market basket on arm, could have +been seen three mornings in the week, making the rounds of the stalls +and stands, both those in the open and those within the Market House. +But customs had rapidly changed in Remsen City, and with the exception +of a few old fogies only the poorer classes went to market. The +masters of houses were becoming gentlemen, and the housewives were +elevating into ladies—and it goes without saying that no gentleman and +no lady would descend to a menial task even in private, much less in +public. +</P> + +<P> +Market Square had even become too common for any but the inferior +meetings of the two leading political parties. Only the Workingmen's +League held to the old tradition that a political meeting of the first +rank could be properly held nowhere but in the natural assembling place +of the people—their market. So, their first great rally of the +campaign was billed for Market Square. And at eight o'clock, headed by +a large and vigorous drum corps, the Victor Dorn cohorts at their full +strength marched into the centre of the Square, where one of the stands +had been transformed with flags, bunting and torches into a speaker's +platform. A crowd of many thousands accompanied and followed the +procession. Workingmen's League meetings were popular, even among +those who believed their interests lay elsewhere. At League meetings +one heard the plain truth, sometimes extremely startling plain truth. +The League had no favors to ask of anybody, had nothing to conceal, was +strongly opposed to any and all political concealments. Thus, its +speakers enjoyed a freedom not usual in political speaking—and Dorn +and his fellow-leaders were careful that no router, no exaggerator or +well intentioned wild man of any kind should open his mouth under a +league banner. THAT was what made the League so dangerous—and so +steadily prosperous. +</P> + +<P> +The chairman, Thomas Colman, the cooper, was opening the meeting in a +speech which was an instance of how well a man of no platform talent +can acquit himself when he believes something and believes it is his +duty to convey it to his fellow-men. Victor Dorn, to be the fourth +speaker and the orator of the evening, was standing at the rear of the +platform partially concealed by the crowd of men and women leaders of +the party grouped behind Colman. As always at the big formal +demonstrations of the League, Victor was watching every move. This +evening his anxiety was deeper than ever before. His trained political +sagacity warned him that, as he had suggested to Selma, the time of his +party's first great crisis was at hand. No movement could become +formidable with out a life and death struggle, when its aim frankly was +to snatch power from the dominant class and to place it where that +class could not hope to prevail either by direct means of force or by +its favorite indirect means of bribery. What would Kelly do? What +would be his stroke at the very life of the League?—for Victor had +measured Kelly and knew he was not one to strike until he could destroy. +</P> + +<P> +Like every competent man of action, Victor had measured his own +abilities, and had found that they were to be relied upon. But the +contest between him and Kelly—the contest in the last ditch—was so +appallingly unequal. Kelly had the courts and the police, the moneyed +class, the employers of labor, had the clergy and well-dressed +respectability, the newspapers, all the customary arbiters of public +sentiment. Also, he had the criminal and the semi-criminal classes. +And what had the League? +</P> + +<P> +The letter of the law, guaranteeing freedom of innocent speech and +action, guaranteeing the purity of the ballot—no, not guaranteeing, +but simply asserting those rights, and leaving the upholding of them +to—Kelly's allies and henchmen! Also, the League had the power of +between a thousand and fifteen hundred intelligent and devoted men and +about the same number of women—a solid phalanx of great might, of +might far beyond its numbers. Finally, it had Victor Dorn. He had no +mean opinion of his value to the movement; but he far and most modestly +underestimated it. The human way of rallying to an abstract principle +is by way of a standard bearer—a man—personality—a real or fancied +incarnation of the ideal to be struggled for. And to the Workingmen's +League, to the movement for conquering Remsen City for the mass of its +citizens, Victor Dorn was that incarnation. +</P> + +<P> +Kelly could use violence—violence disguised as law, violence candidly +and brutally lawless. Victor Dorn could only use lawful means—clearly +and cautiously lawful means. He must at all costs prevent the use of +force against him and his party—must give Kelly no pretext for using +the law lawlessly. If Kelly used force against him, whether the +perverted law of the courts or open lawlessness, he must meet it with +peace. If Kelly smote him on the right cheek he must give him the left +to be smitten. +</P> + +<P> +When the League could outvote Kelly, then—another policy, still of +calmness and peace and civilization, but not so meek. But until the +League could outvote Kelly, nothing but patient endurance. +</P> + +<P> +Every man in the League had been drilled in this strategy. Every man +understood—and to be a member of the League meant that one was +politically educated. Victor believed in his associates as he believed +in himself. Still, human nature was human nature. If Kelly should +suddenly offer some adroit outrageous provocation—would the League be +able to resist? +</P> + +<P> +Victor, on guard, studied the crowd spreading out from the platform in +a gigantic fan. Nothing there to arouse suspicion; ten or twelve +thousand of working class men and women. His glance pushed on out +toward the edges of the crowd—toward the saloons and alleys of the +disreputable south side of Market Square. His glance traveled slowly +along, pausing upon each place where these loungers, too far away to +hear, were gathered into larger groups. Why he did not know, but +suddenly his glance wheeled to the right, and then as suddenly to the +left—the west and the east ends of the square. There, on either side +he recognized, in the farthest rim of the crowd, several of the men who +did Kelly's lowest kinds of dirty work—the brawlers, the repeaters, +the leaders of gangs, the false witnesses for petty corporation damage +cases. A second glance, and he saw or, perhaps, divined—purpose in +those sinister presences. He looked for the police—the detail of a +dozen bluecoats always assigned to large open-air meetings. Not a +policeman was to be seen. +</P> + +<P> +Victor pushed through the crowd on the platform, advanced to the side +of Colman. "Just a minute, Tom," he said. "I've got to say a word—at +once." +</P> + +<P> +Colman had fallen back; Victor Dorn was facing the crowd—HIS +crowd—the men and women who loved him. In the clear, friendly, +natural voice that marked him for the leader born, the honest leader of +an honest cause, he said: +</P> + +<P> +"My friends, if there is an attempt to disturb this meeting, remember +what we of the League stand for. No violence. Draw away from every +disturber, and wait for the police to act. If the police stop our +meeting, let them—and be ready to go to court and testify to the exact +words of the speaker on which the meeting was stopped. Remember, we +must be more lawful than the law itself!" +</P> + +<P> +He was turning away. A cheer was rising—a belated cheer, because his +words had set them all to thinking and to observing. From the left of +the crowd, a dozen yards away from the platform, came a stone heavily +rather than swiftly flung, as from an impeded hand. In full view of +all it curved across the front of the platform and struck Victor Dorn +full in the side of the head. +</P> + +<P> +He threw up his hands. +</P> + +<P> +"Boys—remember!" he shouted with a terrible energy—then, he staggered +forward and fell from the platform into the crowd. +</P> + +<P> +The stone was a signal. As it flew, into the crowd from every +direction the Beech Hollow gangs tore their way, yelling and cursing +and striking out right and left—trampling children, knocking down +women, pouring out the foulest insults. The street lamps all round +Market Square went out, the torches on the platform were torn down and +extinguished. And in a dimness almost pitch dark a riot that involved +that whole mass of people raged hideously. Yells and screams and +groans, the shrieks of women, the piteous appeals of children—benches +torn up for weapons—mad slashing about—snarls and singings of +pain-stricken groups—then police whistles, revolvers fired in the air, +and the quick, regular tramp of disciplined forces. The +police—strangely ready, strangely inactive until the mischief had all +been done entered the square from the north and, forming a double line +across it from east to west, swept it slowly clean. The fighting ended +as abruptly as it had begun. Twenty minutes after the flight of that +stone, the square was empty save a group of perhaps fifty men and women +formed about Victor Dorn's body in the shelter of the platform. +</P> + +<P> +Selma Gordon was holding his head. Jane Hastings and Ellen Clearwater +were kneeling beside him, and Jane was wiping his face with a +handkerchief wet with whisky from the flask of the man who had escorted +them there. +</P> + +<P> +"He is only stunned," said Selma. "I can feel the beat of his blood. +He is only stunned." +</P> + +<P> +A doctor came, got down on his knees, made a rapid examination with +expert hands. As he felt, one of the relighted torches suddenly lit up +Victor's face and the faces of those bending over him. +</P> + +<P> +"He is only stunned, Doctor," said Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"I think so," replied the doctor. +</P> + +<P> +"We left our carriage in the side street just over there," said Jane +Hastings. "It will take him to the hospital." +</P> + +<P> +"No—home," said Selma, who was calm. "He must be taken home." +</P> + +<P> +"The hospital is the place for him," said the doctor. +</P> + +<P> +"No—home," repeated Selma. She glanced at the men standing round. +"Tom—Henry—and you, Ed—help me lift him." +</P> + +<P> +"Please, Selma," whispered Jane. "Let him be taken to the hospital." +</P> + +<P> +"Among our enemies?" said Selma with a strange and terrible little +laugh. "Oh, no. After this, we trust no one. They may have arranged +to finish this night's work there. He goes home—doesn't he, boys?" +</P> + +<P> +"That's right, Miss Gordon," replied one of them. +</P> + +<P> +The doctor shrugged his shoulders. "Here's where I drop the case," +said he. +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing of the kind," cried Jane imperiously. "I am Jane +Hastings—Martin Hastings' daughter. You will come with us, please—or +I shall see to it that you are not let off easily for such a shameful +neglect of duty." +</P> + +<P> +"Let him go, Jane," said Selma. "There will be a doctor waiting. And +he is only stunned. Come, boys—lift him up." +</P> + +<P> +They laid him on a bench top, softened with the coats of his followers. +At the carriage, standing in Farwell Street, they laid him across the +two seats. Selma got in with him. Tom Colman climbed to the box +beside the coachman. Jane and Miss Clearwater, their escorts and about +a score of the Leaguers followed on foot. As the little procession +turned into Warner Street it was stopped by a policeman. +</P> + +<P> +"Can't go down this way," he said. +</P> + +<P> +"It's Mr. Dorn. We're taking him home. He was hurt," explained Colman. +</P> + +<P> +"Fire lines. Street's closed," said the policeman gruffly. +</P> + +<P> +Selma thrust her head out. "We must get him home——" +</P> + +<P> +"House across the street burning—and probably his house, too," cut in +the policeman. "He's been raising hell—he has. But it's coming home +to him at last. Take him to the hospital." +</P> + +<P> +"Jane," cried Selma, "make this man pass us!" +</P> + +<P> +Jane faced the policeman, explained who she was. He became humbly +civil at once. "I've just told her, ma'am," said he, "that his house +is burning. The mob's gutting the New Day office and setting fire to +everything." +</P> + +<P> +"My house is in the next street," said Colman. "Drive there. Some of +you people get Dr. Charlton—and everything. Get busy. Whip up, +driver. Here, give me the lines!" +</P> + +<P> +Thus, within five minutes, Victor was lying upon a couch in the parlor +of Colman's cottage, and within ten minutes Dr. Charlton was beside him +and was at work. Selma and Jane and Mrs. Colman were in the room. The +others—a steadily increasing crowd—were on the steps outside, in the +front yard, were filling the narrow street. Colman had organized fifty +Leaguers into a guard, to be ready for any emergencies. Over the tops +of the low houses could be seen the vast cloud of smoke from the fire; +the air was heavy with the odors of burning wood; faintly came sounds +of engines, of jubilant drunken shouts. +</P> + +<P> +"A fracture of the skull and of the jaw-bone. Not necessarily +serious," was Dr. Charlton's verdict. +</P> + +<P> +The young man, unconscious, ghastly pale, with his thick hair mussed +about his brow and on the right side clotted with blood, lay breathing +heavily. Ellen Clearwater came in and Mrs. Colman whispered to her the +doctor's cheering statement. She went to Jane and said in an undertone: +</P> + +<P> +"We can go now, Jane. Come on." +</P> + +<P> +Jane seemed not to hear. She was regarding the face of the young man +on the couch. +</P> + +<P> +Ellen touched her arm. "We're intruding on these people," she +whispered. "Let's go. We've done all we can." +</P> + +<P> +Selma did not hear, but she saw and understood. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—you'd better go, Jane," she said. "Mrs. Colman and I will do +everything that's necessary." +</P> + +<P> +Jane did not heed. She advanced a step nearer the couch. "You are +sure, doctor?" she said, and her voice sounded unnatural. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, miss——" He glanced at her face. "Yes, Miss Hastings. He'll be +out in less than ten days, as good as ever. It's a very simple affair." +</P> + +<P> +Jane glanced round. "Is there a telephone? I wish to send for Dr. +Alban." +</P> + +<P> +"I'd be glad to see him," said Dr. Charlton. "But I assure you it's +unnecessary." +</P> + +<P> +"We don't want Dr. Alban," said Selma curtly. "Go home, Jane, and let +us alone." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall go bring Dr. Alban," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +Selma took her by the arm and compelled her into the hall, and closed +the door into the room where Victor lay. "You must go home, Jane," she +said quietly. "We know what to do with our leader. And we could not +allow Dr. Alban here." +</P> + +<P> +"Victor must have the best," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +She and Selma looked at each other, and Selma understood. +</P> + +<P> +"He HAS the best," said she, gentle with an effort. +</P> + +<P> +"Dr. Alban is the best," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"The most fashionable," said Selma. "Not the best." With restraint, +"Go home. Let us alone. This is no place for you—for Martin +Hastings' daughter." +</P> + +<P> +Jane, looking and acting like one in a trance, tried to push past her +and reenter the room. Selma stood firm. She said: "If you do not go I +shall have these men take you to your carriage. You do not know what +you are doing." +</P> + +<P> +Jane looked at her. "I love him," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"So do we," said Selma. "And he belongs to US. You must go. Come!" +She seized her by the arm, and beckoning one of the waiting Leaguers to +her assistance she pushed her quietly but relentlessly along the hall, +out of the house, out of the yard and into the carriage. Then she +closed the door, while Jane sank back against the cushions. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, he belongs to you," said Jane; "but I love him. Oh, Selma!" +</P> + +<P> +Selma suddenly burst into tears. "Go, Jane, dear. You MUST go," she +cried. +</P> + +<P> +"At least I'll wait here until—until they are sure," said Jane. "You +can't refuse me that, Selma." +</P> + +<P> +"But they are sure," said Selma. "You must go with your friends. Here +they come." +</P> + +<P> +When Ellen Clearwater and Joe Wetherbe—the second son of the chief +owner of the First National—reached the curb, Selma said to Wetherbe: +</P> + +<P> +"Please stand aside. I've something to say to this lady." +</P> + +<P> +When Wetherbe had withdrawn, she said: "Miss Hastings is—not quite +herself. You had better take her home alone." +</P> + +<P> +Jane leaned from the open carriage window. "Ellen," said she, "I am +going to stay here until Victor recovers consciousness, and I am SURE." +</P> + +<P> +"He has just come around," said Ellen. "He is certain to get well. +His mind is clear." +</P> + +<P> +"I must see for myself," cried Jane. +</P> + +<P> +Selma was preventing her leaving the carriage when Ellen quietly +interfered with a significant look for Selma. "Jane," she said, "you +can't go in. The doctor has just put every one out but his assistant +and a nurse that has come." +</P> + +<P> +Jane hesitated, drew back into the corner of the carriage. "Tell Mr. +Wetherbe to go his own way," said Ellen aside to Selma, and she got in +beside Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"To Mr. Hastings'," said Selma to the driver. The carriage drove away. +</P> + +<P> +She gave Ellen's message to Wetherbe and returned to the house. Victor +was still unconscious; he did not come to himself until toward +daylight. And then it was clear to them all that Dr. Charlton's +encouraging diagnosis was correct. +</P> + +<P> +Public opinion in Remsen City was publicly articulate by means of three +daily newspapers—the Pioneer, the Star, and the Free Press. The Star +and the Free Press were owned by the same group of capitalists who +controlled the gas company and the water works. The Pioneer was owned +by the traction interests. Both groups of capitalists were jointly +interested in the railways, the banks and in the principal factories. +The Pioneer was Republican, was regarded as the organ of Dick Kelly. +The Star was Democratic, spoke less cordially of Kelly and always +called for House, Mr. House, or Joseph House, Esquire. The Free Press +posed as independent with Democratic leanings. It indulged in +admirable essays against corruption, gang rule and bossism. But it was +never specific and during campaigns was meek and mild. For nearly a +dozen years there had not been a word of truth upon any subject +important to the people of Remsen City in the columns of any of the +three. During wars between rival groups of capitalists a half-truth +was now and then timidly uttered, but never a word of "loose talk," of +"anarchy," of anything but the entirely "safe, sane and conservative." +</P> + +<P> +Thus, any one who might have witnessed the scenes in Market Square on +Thursday evening would have been not a little astonished to read the +accounts presented the next day by the three newspapers. According to +all three the Workingmen's League, long a menace to the public peace, +had at last brought upon Remsen City the shame of a riot in which two +men, a woman and four children had lost their lives and more than a +hundred, "including the notorious Victor Dorn," had been injured. And +after the riot the part of the mob that was hostile to "the Dorn gang" +had swept down upon the office of the New Day, had wrecked it, and had +set fire to the building, with the result that five houses were burned +before the flames could be put out. The Free Press published, as a +mere rumor, that the immediate cause of the outbreak had been an +impending "scurrilous attack" in the New Day upon one of the political +gangs of the slums and its leader. The Associated Press, sending forth +an account of the riot to the entire country, represented it as a fight +between rival gangs of workmen precipitated by the insults and menaces +of a "socialistic party led by a young operator named Dorn." Dorn's +faction had aroused in the mass of the workingmen a fear that this +spread of "socialistic and anarchistic ideas" would cause a general +shut down of factories and a flight of the capital that was "giving +employment to labor." +</P> + +<P> +A version of the causes and the events, somewhat nearer the truth, was +talked about Remsen City. But all the respectable classes were well +content with what their newspapers printed. And, while some +broad-minded respectabilities spoke of the affair as an outrage, none +of them was disposed to think that any real wrong had been done. +Victor Dorn and his crowd of revolutionists had got, after all, only +their deserts. +</P> + +<P> +After forty-eight hours of careful study of public opinion, Dick Kelly +decided that Remsen City was taking the dose as he had anticipated. He +felt emboldened to proceed to his final move in the campaign against +"anarchy" in his beloved city. On the second morning after the riot, +all three newspapers published double-headed editorials calling upon +the authorities to safeguard the community against another such +degrading and dangerous upheaval. "It is time that the distinction +between liberty and license be sharply drawn." After editorials in +this vein had been repeated for several days, after sundry bodies of +eminently respectable citizens—the Merchants' Association, the +Taxpayers' League, the Chamber of Commerce—had passed indignant and +appealing resolutions, after two priests, a clergyman and four +preachers had sermonized against "the leniency of constituted authority +with criminal anarchy," Mr. Kelly had the City Attorney go before Judge +Lansing and ask for an injunction. +</P> + +<P> +Judge Lansing promptly granted the injunction. The New Day was +enjoined from appearing. The Workingmen's League was enjoined from +holding meetings. +</P> + +<P> +Then the County Prosecutor, also a henchman of Kelly's, secured from +the Grand Jury—composed of farmers, merchants and owners of +factories—indictments against Thomas Colman and Victor Dorn for +inciting a riot. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile Victor Dorn was rapidly recovering. With rare restraint +young Dr. Charlton did not fuss and fret and meddle, did not hamper +nature with his blundering efforts to assist, did not stuff +"nourishment" into his patient to decay and to produce poisonous blood. +He let the young man's superb vitality work the inevitable and speedy +cure. Thus, wounds and shocks, that have often been mistreated by +doctors into mortal, passed so quickly that only Selma Gordon and the +doctor himself realized how grave Victor's case had been. The day he +was indicted—just a week from the riot—he was sitting up and was +talking freely. +</P> + +<P> +"Won't it set him back if I tell him all that has occurred?" said Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"Talk to him as you would to me," replied Charlton. "He is a sensible +man. I've already told him pretty much everything. It has kept him +from fretting, to be able to lie there quietly and make his plans." +</P> + +<P> +Had you looked in upon Victor and Selma, in Colman's little transformed +parlor, you would rather have thought Selma the invalid. The man in +the bed was pale and thin of face, but his eyes had the expression of +health and of hope. Selma had great circles under her eyes and her +expression was despair struggling to conceal itself. Those +indictments, those injunctions—how powerful the enemy were! How could +such an enemy, aroused new and inflexibly resolved, be +combatted?—especially when one had no money, no way of reaching the +people, no chance to organize. +</P> + +<P> +"Dr. Charlton has told you?" said Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"Day before yesterday," replied Victor. "Why do you look so +down-in-the-mouth, Selma?" +</P> + +<P> +"It isn't easy to be cheerful, with you ill and the paper destroyed," +replied she. +</P> + +<P> +"But I'm not ill, and the paper isn't destroyed," said Victor. "Never +were either I or it doing such good work as now." His eyes were +dancing. "What more could one ask than to have such stupid enemies as +we've got?" +</P> + +<P> +Selma did not lift her eyes. To her those enemies seemed anything but +stupid. Had they not ruined the League? +</P> + +<P> +"I see you don't understand," pursued Victor. "No matter. You'll wear +a very different face two weeks from now." +</P> + +<P> +"But," said Selma, "exactly what you said you were afraid of has +occurred. And now you say you're glad of it." +</P> + +<P> +"I told you I was afraid Dick Kelly would make the one move that could +destroy us." +</P> + +<P> +"But he has!" cried Selma. +</P> + +<P> +Victor smiled. "No, indeed!" replied he. +</P> + +<P> +"What worse could he have done?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'll not tell you," said Victor. "I'd not venture to say aloud such a +dangerous thing as what I'd have done if I had been in his place. +Instead of doing that, he made us. We shall win this fall's election." +</P> + +<P> +Selma lifted her head with a sudden gesture of hope. She had unbounded +confidence in Victor Dorn, and his tone was the tone of absolute +confidence. +</P> + +<P> +"I had calculated on winning in five years. I had left the brutal +stupidity of our friend Kelly out of account." +</P> + +<P> +"Then you see how you can hold meetings and start up the paper?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't want to do either," said Victor. "I want those injunctions to +stand. Those fools have done at a stroke what we couldn't have done in +years. They have united the working class. They—the few—have +forbidden us, the many, to unite or to speak. If those injunctions hold +for a month, nothing could stop our winning this fall.... I can't +understand how Dick Kelly could be so stupid. Five years ago these +moves of his would have been bad for us—yes, even three years ago. +But we've got too strong—and he doesn't realize! Selma, when you want +to win, always pray that your opponent will underestimate you." +</P> + +<P> +"I still don't understand," said Selma. "None of us does. You must +explain to me, so that I'll know what to do." +</P> + +<P> +"Do nothing," said Victor. "I shall be out a week from to-day. I +shall not go into the streets until I not only am well but look well." +</P> + +<P> +"They arrested Tom Colman to-day," said Selma. "But they put the case +over until you'd be able to plead at the same time." +</P> + +<P> +"That's right," said Victor. "They are playing into our hands!" And +he laughed as heartily as his bandages would permit. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I don't understand—I don't understand at all!" cried Selma. +"Maybe you are all wrong about it." +</P> + +<P> +"I was never more certain in my life," replied Victor. "Stop worrying +about it, my dear." And he patted her hands gently as they lay folded +in her lap. "I want you—all our people—to go round looking sad these +next few days. I want Dick Kelly to feel that he is on the right +track." +</P> + +<P> +There came a knock at the door, and Mrs. Colman entered. She had been +a school teacher, and of all the occupations there is no other that +leaves such plain, such indelible traces upon manner, mind and soul. +Said she: +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Jane Hastings is outside in her carriage—and wants to know if +she can see you." +</P> + +<P> +Selma frowned. Victor said with alacrity: "Certainly. Bring her in, +Mrs. Colman." +</P> + +<P> +Selma rose. "Wait until I can get out of the way," she cried. +</P> + +<P> +"Sit down, and sit still," commanded Victor. +</P> + +<P> +Selma continued to move toward the door. "No—I don't wish to see +her," she said. +</P> + +<P> +Victor chagrined her by acquiescing without another word. "You'll look +in after supper?" he asked. +</P> + +<P> +"If you want me," said the girl. +</P> + +<P> +"Come back here," said Victor. "Wait, Mrs. Colman." When Selma was +standing by the bed he took her hand. "Selma," he said, "don't let +these things upset you. Believe me, I'm right. Can't you trust me?" +</P> + +<P> +Selma had the look of a wild creature detained against its will. "I'm +not worried about the party—and the paper," she burst out. "I'm +worried about you." +</P> + +<P> +"But I'm all right. Can't you see I'm almost well?" +</P> + +<P> +Selma drew her hand away. "I'll be back about half-past seven," she +said, and bolted from the room. +</P> + +<P> +Victor's good-natured, merry smile followed her to the door. When the +sound of her retreat by way of the rear of the house was dying away he +said to Mrs. Colman: +</P> + +<P> +"Now—bring in the young lady. And please warn her that she must stay +at most only half an hour by that clock over there on the mantel." +</P> + +<P> +Every day Jane had been coming to inquire, had been bringing or sending +flowers and fruit—which, by Dr. Charlton's orders, were not supposed +to enter the invalid's presence. Latterly she had been asking to see +Victor; she was surprised when Mrs. Colman returned with leave for her +to enter. Said Mrs. Colman: +</P> + +<P> +"He's alone. Miss Gordon has just gone. You will see a clock on the +mantel in his room. You must not stay longer than half an hour." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall be very careful what I say," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, you needn't bother," said the ex-school teacher. "Dr. Charlton +doesn't believe in sick-room atmosphere. You must treat Mr. Dorn +exactly as you would a well person. If you're going to take on, or put +on, you'd better not go in at all." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll do my best," said Jane, rather haughtily, for she did not like +Mrs. Colman's simple and direct manner. She was used to being treated +with deference, especially by the women of Mrs. Colman's class; and +while she disapproved of deference in theory, in practice she craved +it, and expected it, and was irritated if she did not get it. But, as +she realized how unattractive this weakness was, she usually took +perhaps more pains than does the average person to conceal it. That +day her nerves were too tense for petty precautions. However, Mrs. +Colman was too busy inspecting the details of Miss Hastings' toilet to +note Miss Hastings' manners. +</P> + +<P> +Jane's nervousness vanished the instant she was in the doorway of the +parlor with Victor Dorn looking at her in that splendidly simple and +natural way of his. "So glad to see you," he said. "What a delightful +perfume you bring with you. I've noticed it before. I know it isn't +flowers, but it smells like flowers. With most perfumes you can smell +through the perfume to something that's the very reverse of sweet." +</P> + +<P> +They were shaking hands. She said: "That nice woman who let me in +cautioned me not to put on a sick-room manner or indulge in sick-room +talk. It was quite unnecessary. You're looking fine." +</P> + +<P> +"Ain't I, though?" exclaimed Victor. "I've never been so comfortable. +Just weak enough to like being waited on. You were very good to me the +night that stone knocked me over. I want to thank you, but I don't +know how. And the flowers, and the fruit—You have been so kind." +</P> + +<P> +"I could do very little," said Jane, blushing and faltering. "And I +wanted to do—everything." Suddenly all energy, "Oh, Mr. Dorn, I heard +and saw it all. It was—INFAMOUS! And the lying newspapers—and all +the people I meet socially. They keep me in a constant rage." +</P> + +<P> +Victor was smiling gayly. "The fortunes of war," said he. "I expect +nothing else. If they fought fair they couldn't fight at all. We, on +this side of the struggle, can afford to be generous and tolerant. +They are fighting the losing battle; they're trying to hold on to the +past, and of course it's slipping from them inch by inch. But we—we +are in step with the march of events." +</P> + +<P> +When she was with him Jane felt that his cause was hers, also—was the +only cause. "When do you begin publishing your paper again?" she +asked. "As soon as you are sitting up?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not for a month or so," replied he. "Not until after the election." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I forgot about that injunction. You think that as soon as Davy +Hull's crowd is in they will let you begin again?" +</P> + +<P> +He hesitated. "Not exactly that," he said. "But after the election +there will be a change." +</P> + +<P> +Her eyes flashed. "And they have indicted you! I heard the newsboys +crying it and stopped and bought a paper. But I shall do something +about that. I am going straight from here to father. Ellen Clearwater +and I and Joe Wetherbe SAW. And Ellen and I will testify if it's +necessary—and will make Joe tell the truth. Do you know, he actually +had the impudence to try to persuade Ellen and me the next day that we +saw what the papers reported?" +</P> + +<P> +"I believe it," said Victor. "So I believe that Joe convinced himself." +</P> + +<P> +"You are too charitable," replied Jane. "He's afraid of his father." +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Hastings," said Victor, "you suggested a moment ago that you +would influence your father to interfere in this matter of the +indictment." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll promise you now that he will have it stopped," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"You want to help the cause, don't you?" +</P> + +<P> +Jane's eyes shifted, a little color came into her cheeks. "The +cause—and you," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"Very well," said Victor. "Then you will not interfere. And if your +father talks of helping me you will discourage him all you can." +</P> + +<P> +"You are saying that out of consideration for me. You're afraid I will +quarrel with my father." +</P> + +<P> +"I hadn't thought of that," said Victor. "I can't tell you what I have +in mind. But I'll have to say this much—that if you did anything to +hinder those fellows from carrying out their plans against me and +against the League to the uttermost you'd be doing harm instead of +good." +</P> + +<P> +"But they may send you to jail.... No, I forgot. You can give bail." +</P> + +<P> +Victor's eyes had a quizzical expression. "Yes, I could give bail. +But even if I don't give bail, Miss Hastings—even if I am sent to +jail—Colman and I—still you must not interfere. You promise me?" +</P> + +<P> +Jane hesitated. "I can't promise," she finally said. +</P> + +<P> +"You must," said Victor. "You'll make a mess of my plans, if you +don't." +</P> + +<P> +"You mean that?" +</P> + +<P> +"I mean that. Your intentions are good. But you would only do +mischief—serious mischief." +</P> + +<P> +They looked at each other. Said Jane: "I promise—on one condition." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes?" +</P> + +<P> +"That if you should change your mind and should want my help, you'd +promptly and freely ask for it." +</P> + +<P> +"I agree to that," said Victor. "Now, let's get it clearly in mind. +No matter what is done about me or the League, you promise not to +interfere in any way, unless I ask you to." +</P> + +<P> +Again Jane hesitated. "No matter what they do?" she pleaded. +</P> + +<P> +"No matter what they do," insisted he. +</P> + +<P> +Something in his expression gave her a great thrill of confidence in +him, of enthusiasm. "I promise," she said. "You know best." +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed I do," said he. "Thank you." +</P> + +<P> +A moment's silence, then she exclaimed: "That was why you let me in +to-day—because you wanted to get that promise from me." +</P> + +<P> +"That was one of the reasons," confessed he. "In fact, it was the +chief reason." He smiled at her. "There's nothing I'm so afraid of as +of enthusiasm. I'm going to be still more cautious and exact another +promise from you. You must not tell any one that you have promised not +to interfere." +</P> + +<P> +"I can easily promise that," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Be careful," warned Victor. "A promise easily made is a promise +easily forgotten." +</P> + +<P> +"I begin to understand," said Jane. "You want them to attack you as +savagely as possible. And you don't want them to get the slightest +hint of your plan." +</P> + +<P> +"A good guess," admitted Victor. He looked at her gravely. +"Circumstances have let you farther into my confidence than any one +else is. I hope you will not abuse it." +</P> + +<P> +"You can rely upon me," said Jane. "I want your friendship and your +respect as I never wanted anything in my life before. I'm not afraid to +say these things to you, for I know I'll not be misunderstood." +</P> + +<P> +Victor's smile thrilled her again. "You were born one of us," he said. +"I felt it the first time we talked together." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes. I do want to be somebody," replied the girl. "I can't content +myself in a life of silly routine ... can't do things that have no +purpose, no result. And if it wasn't for my father I'd come out openly +for the things I believe in. But I've got to think of him. It may be +a weakness, but I couldn't overcome it. As long as my father lives I'll +do nothing that would grieve him. Do you despise me for that?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't despise anybody for anything," said Victor. "In your place I +should put my father first." He laughed. "In your place I'd probably +be a Davy Hull or worse. I try never to forget that I owe everything +to the circumstances in which I was born and brought up. I've simply +got the ideas of my class, and it's an accident that I am of the class +to which the future belongs—the working class that will possess the +earth as soon as it has intelligence enough to enter into its kingdom." +</P> + +<P> +"But," pursued Jane, returning to herself, "I don't intend to be +altogether useless. I can do something and he—my father, I +mean—needn't know. Do you think that is dreadful?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't like it," said Victor. But he said it in such a way that she +did not feel rebuked or even judged. +</P> + +<P> +"Nor do I," said she. "I'd rather lead the life I wish to lead—say +the things I believe—do the things I believe in—all openly. But I +can't. And all I can do is to spend the income of my money my mother +left me—spend it as I please." With a quick embarrassed gesture she +took an envelope from a small bag in which she was carrying it. +"There's some of it," she said. "I want to give that to your campaign +fund. You are free to use it in any way you please—any way, for +everything you are and do is your cause." +</P> + +<P> +Victor was lying motionless, his eyes closed. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't refuse," she begged. "You've no right to refuse." +</P> + +<P> +A long silence, she watching him uneasily. At last he said, "No—I've +no right to refuse. If I did, it would be from a personal motive. You +understand that when you give the League this money you are doing what +your father would regard as an act of personal treachery to him?" +</P> + +<P> +"You don't think so, do you?" cried she. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I do," said he deliberately. +</P> + +<P> +Her face became deathly pale, then crimson. She thrust the envelope +into the bag, closed it hastily. "Then I can't give it," she murmured. +"Oh—but you are hard!" +</P> + +<P> +"If you broke with your father and came with us—and it killed him, as +it probably would," Victor Dorn went on, "I should respect you—should +regard you as a wonderful, terrible woman. I should envy you having a +heart strong enough to do a thing so supremely right and so supremely +relentless. And I should be glad you were not of my blood—should +think you hardly human. Yet that is what you ought to do." +</P> + +<P> +"I am not up to it," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Then you mustn't do the other," said Victor. "We need the money. I +am false to the cause in urging you not to give it. But—I'm human." +</P> + +<P> +He was looking away, an expression in his eyes and about his mouth that +made him handsomer than she would have believed a man could be. She +was looking at him longingly, her beautiful eyes swimming. Her lips +were saying inaudibly, "I love you—I love you." +</P> + +<P> +"What did you say?" he asked, his thoughts returning from their far +journey. +</P> + +<P> +"My time is up," she exclaimed, rising. +</P> + +<P> +"There are better ways of helping than money," said he, taking her +hand. "And already you've helped in those ways." +</P> + +<P> +"May I come again?" +</P> + +<P> +"Whenever you like. But—what would your father say?" +</P> + +<P> +"Then you don't want me to come again?" +</P> + +<P> +"It's best not," said he. "I wish fate had thrown us on the same side. +But it has put us in opposite camps—and we owe it to ourselves to +submit." +</P> + +<P> +Their hands were still clasped. "You are content to have it so?" she +said sadly. +</P> + +<P> +"No, I'm not," cried he, dropping her hand. "But we are helpless." +</P> + +<P> +"We can always hope," said she softly. +</P> + +<P> +On impulse she laid her hand in light caress upon his brow, then +swiftly departed. As she stood in Mrs. Colman's flowery little front +yard and looked dazedly about, it seemed to her that she had been away +from the world—away from herself—and was reluctantly but inevitably +returning. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VI +</H3> + +<P> +As Jane drove into the grounds of the house on the hilltop she saw her +father and David Hull in an obviously intimate and agitated +conversation on the front veranda. She made all haste to join them; +nor was she deterred by the reception she got—the reception given to +the unwelcome interrupter. Said she: +</P> + +<P> +"You are talking about those indictments, aren't you? Everyone else +is. There's a group on every corner down town, and people are calling +their views to each other from windows across the streets." +</P> + +<P> +Davy glanced triumphantly at her father. "I told you so," said he. +</P> + +<P> +Old Hastings was rubbing his hand over his large, bony, wizened face in +the manner that indicates extreme perplexity. +</P> + +<P> +Davy turned to Jane. "I've been trying to show your father what a +stupid, dangerous thing Dick Kelly has done. I want him to help me +undo it. It MUST be undone or Victor Dorn will sweep the town on +election day." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's heart was beating wildly. She continued to say carelessly, "You +think so?" +</P> + +<P> +"Davy's got a bad attack of big red eye to-day," said her father. +"It's a habit young men have." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm right, Mr. Hastings," cried Hull. "And, furthermore, you know I'm +right, Jane; you saw that riot the other night. Joe Wetherbe told me +so. You said that it was an absolutely unprovoked assault of the gangs +of Kelly and House. Everyone in town knows it was. The middle and the +upper class people are pretending to believe what the papers +printed—what they'd like to believe. But they KNOW better. The +working people are apparently silent. They usually are apparently +silent. But they know the truth—they are talking it among themselves. +And these indictments will make Victor Dorn a hero." +</P> + +<P> +"What of it? What of it?" said Hastings impatiently. "The working +people don't count." +</P> + +<P> +"Not as long as we can keep them divided," retorted Davy. "But if they +unite——" +</P> + +<P> +And he went on to explain what he had in mind. He gave them an +analysis of Remsen City. About fifty thousand inhabitants, of whom +about ten thousand were voters. These voters were divided into three +classes—upper class, with not more than three or four hundred votes, +and therefore politically of no importance AT THE POLLS, though +overwhelmingly the most influential in any other way; the middle class, +the big and little merchants, the lawyers and doctors, the agents and +firemen and so on, mustering in all about two thousand votes; finally, +the working class with no less than eight thousand votes out of a total +of ten thousand. +</P> + +<P> +"By bribery and cajolery and browbeating and appeal to religious +prejudice and to fear of losing jobs—by all sorts of chicane," said +Davy, "about seven of these eight thousand votes are kept divided +between the Republican or Kelly party and the Democratic or House +party. The other ten or twelve hundred belong to Victor Dorn's League. +Now, the seven thousand workingmen voters who follow Kelly and House +like Victor Dorn, like his ideas, are with him at heart. But they are +afraid of him. They don't trust each other. Workingmen despise the +workingman as an ignorant fool." +</P> + +<P> +"So he is," said Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"So he is," agreed Davy. "But Victor Dorn has about got the workingmen +in this town persuaded that they'd fare better with Dorn and the League +as their leaders than with Kelly and House as their leaders. And if +Kelly goes on to persecute Victor Dorn, the workingmen will be +frightened for their rights to free speech and free assembly. And +they'll unite. I appeal to you, Jane—isn't that common sense?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know anything about politics," said Jane, looking bored. "You +must go in and lie down before dinner, father. You look tired." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings got ready to rise. +</P> + +<P> +"Just a minute, Mr. Hastings," pleaded Hull. "This must be settled +now—at once. I must be in a position not only to denounce this thing, +but also to stop it. Not to-morrow, but to-day ... so that the morning +papers will have the news." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's thoughts were flying—but in circles. Everybody habitually +judges everybody else as both more and less acute than he really is. +Jane had great respect for Davy as a man of college education. But +because he had no sense of humor and because he abounded in lengthy +platitudes she had thought poorly indeed of his abilities. She had +been realizing her mistake in these last few minutes. The man who had +made that analysis of politics—an analysis which suddenly enlighted +her as to what political power meant and how it was wielded everywhere +on earth as well as in Remsen City—the man was no mere dreamer and +theorist. He had seen the point no less clearly than had Victor Dorn. +But what concerned her, what set her to fluttering, was that he was +about to checkmate Victor Dorn. What should she say and do to help +Victor? +</P> + +<P> +She must get her father away. She took him gently by the arm, kissed +the top of his head. "Come on, father," she cried. "I'll let Davy work +his excitement off on me. You must take care of your health." +</P> + +<P> +But Hastings resisted. "Wait a minute, Jenny," said he. "I must +think." +</P> + +<P> +"You can think lying down," insisted his daughter Davy was about to +interpose again, but she frowned him into silence. +</P> + +<P> +"There's something in what Davy says," persisted her father. "If that +there Victor Dorn should carry the election, there'd be no living in +the same town with him. It'd put him away up out of reach." +</P> + +<P> +Jane abruptly released her father's arm. She had not thought of +that—of how much more difficult Victor would be if he won now. She +wanted him to win ultimately—yes, she was sure she did. But—now? +Wouldn't that put him beyond her reach—beyond need of her? +</P> + +<P> +She said: "Please come, father!" But it was perfunctory loyalty to +Victor. Her father settled back; Davy Hull began afresh, pressing home +his point, making his contention so clear that even Martin Hastings' +prejudice could not blind him to the truth. And Jane sat on the arm of +a big veranda chair and listened and made no further effort to +interfere. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't agree with you, Hull," said the old man at last. "Victor +Dorn's run up agin the law at last, and he ought to get the +consequences good and hard. But——" +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Hastings," interrupted Davy eagerly—too fond of talking to +realize that the old man was agreeing with him, "Your daughter saw——" +</P> + +<P> +"Fiddle-fiddle," cried the old man. "Don't bring sentimental women +into this, Davy. As I was saying, Victor ought to be punished for the +way he's been stirring up idle, lazy, ignorant people against the men +that runs the community and gives 'em jobs and food for their children. +But maybe it ain't wise to give him his deserts—just now. Anyhow, +while you've been talking away like a sewing machine I've been +thinking. I don't see as how it can do any serious HARM to stop them +there indictments." +</P> + +<P> +"That's it, Mr. Hastings," cried Hull. "Even if I do exaggerate, as +you seem to think, still where's the harm in doing it?" +</P> + +<P> +"It looks as if the respectable people were afraid of the lower +classes," said Hastings doubtfully. "And that's always bad." +</P> + +<P> +"But it won't look that way," replied Davy, "if my plan is followed." +</P> + +<P> +"And what might be your plan?" inquired Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm to be the reform candidate for Mayor. Your son-in-law, Hugo, is +to be the reform candidate for judge. The way to handle this is for me +to come out in a strong statement denouncing the indictments, and the +injunction against the League and the New Day, too. And I'll announce +that Hugo Galland is trying to join in the fight against them and that +he is indignant and as determined as I am. Then early to-morrow +morning we can go before Judge Lansing and can present arguments, and +he will denounce the other side for misleading him as to the facts, and +will quash the indictments and vacate the injunctions." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings nodded reflectively. "Pretty good," said he with a sly grin. +"And Davy Hull and my son-in-law will be popular heroes." +</P> + +<P> +Davy reddened. "Of course. I want to get all the advantage I can for +our party," said he. "I don't represent myself. I represent the +party." +</P> + +<P> +Martin grinned more broadly. He who had been representing "honest +taxpayers" and "innocent owners" of corrupt stock and bonds all his +life understood perfectly. "It's hardly human to be as unselfish as +you and I are, Davy," said he. "Well, I'll go in and do a little +telephoning. You go ahead and draw up your statement and get it to the +papers—and see Hugo." He rose, stood leaning on his cane, all bent +and shrivelled and dry. "I reckon Judge Lansing'll be expecting you +to-morrow morning." He turned to enter the house, halted, crooked his +head round for a piercing look at young Hull. "Don't go talking round +among your friends about what you're going to do," said he sharply. +"Don't let NOBODY know until it's done." +</P> + +<P> +"Certainly, sir," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"I could see you hurrying down to that there University Club to sit +there and tell it all to those smarties that are always blowing about +what they're going to do. You'll be right smart of a man some day, +Davy, if you'll learn to keep your mouth shut." +</P> + +<P> +Davy looked abashed. He did not know which of his many indiscretions +of self-glorifying talkativeness Mr. Hastings had immediately in mind. +But he could recall several, any one of which was justification for the +rather savage rebuke—the more humiliating that Jane was listening. He +glanced covertly at her. +</P> + +<P> +Perhaps she had not heard; she was gazing into the distance with a +strange expression upon her beautiful face, an expression that fastened +his attention, absorbed though he was in his project for his own +ambitions. As her father disappeared, he said: +</P> + +<P> +"What are you thinking about, Jane?" +</P> + +<P> +Jane startled guiltily. "I? Oh—I don't know—a lot of things." +</P> + +<P> +"Your look suggested that you were having a—a severe attack of +conscience," said he, laughingly. He was in soaring good humor now, +for he saw his way clear to election. +</P> + +<P> +"I was," said Jane, suddenly stern. A pause, then she laughed—rather +hollowly. "Davy, I guess I'm almost as big a fraud as you are. What +fakirs we human beings are?—always posing as doing for others and +always doing for our selfish selves." +</P> + +<P> +Davy's face took on its finest expression. "Do you think it's +altogether selfishness for me to fight for Victor Dorn and give him a +chance to get out his paper again—when he has warned me that he is +going to print things that may defeat me?" +</P> + +<P> +"You know he'll not print them now," retorted Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed I don't. He's not so forbearing." +</P> + +<P> +"You know he'll not print them now," repeated Jane. "He'd not be so +foolish. Every one would forget to ask whether what he said about you +was true or false. They'd think only of how ungenerous and ungrateful +he was. He wouldn't be either. But he'd seem to be—and that comes to +the same thing." She glanced mockingly at Hull. "Isn't that your +calculation?" +</P> + +<P> +"You are too cynical for a woman, Jane," said Davy. "It's not +attractive." +</P> + +<P> +"To your vanity?" retorted Jane. "I should think not." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—good-by," said Davy, taking his hat from the rail. "I've got a +hard evening's work before me. No time for dinner." +</P> + +<P> +"Another terrible sacrifice for public duty," mocked Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"You must be frightfully out of humor with yourself, to be girding at +me so savagely," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-by, Mr. Mayor." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall be—in six weeks." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's face grew sombre. "Yes—I suppose so," said she. "The people +would rather have one of us than one of their own kind. They do look up +to us, don't they? It's ridiculous of them, but they do. The idea of +choosing you, when they might have Victor Dorn." +</P> + +<P> +"He isn't running for Mayor," objected Hull. "The League's candidate +is Harbinger, the builder." +</P> + +<P> +"No, it's Victor Dorn," said Jane. "The best man in a party—the +strongest man—is always the candidate for all the offices. I don't +know much about politics, but I've learned that much.... It's Victor +Dorn against—Dick Kelly—or Kelly and father." +</P> + +<P> +Hull reddened. She had cut into quick. "You will see who is Mayor +when I'm elected," said he with all his dignity. +</P> + +<P> +Jane laughed in the disagreeably mocking way that was the climax of her +ability to be nasty when she was thoroughly out of humor. "That's +right, Davy. Deceive yourself. It's far more comfortable. So long!" +</P> + +<P> +And she went into the house. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Davy's conduct of the affair was masterly. He showed those rare +qualities of judgment and diplomacy that all but insure a man a +distinguished career. His statement for the press was a model of +dignity, of restrained indignation, of good common sense. The most +difficult part of his task was getting Hugo Galland into condition for +a creditable appearance in court. In so far as Hugo's meagre +intellect, atrophied by education and by luxury, permitted him to be a +lawyer at all, he was of that now common type called the corporation +lawyer. That is, for him human beings had ceased to exist, and of +course human rights, also; the world as viewed from the standpoint of +law contained only corporations, only interests. Thus, a man like +Victor Dorn was in his view the modern form of the devil—was a +combination of knave and lunatic who had no right to live except in the +restraint of an asylum or a jail. +</P> + +<P> +Fortunately, while Hugo despised the "hoi polloi" as only a stupid, +miseducated snob can despise, he appreciated that they had votes and so +must be conciliated; and he yearned with the snob's famished yearning +for the title and dignity of judge. Davy found it impossible to +convince him that the injunctions and indictments ought to be attacked +until he had convinced him that in no other way could he become Judge +Galland. As Hugo was fiercely prejudiced and densely stupid and +reverent of the powers of his own intellect, to convince him was not +easy. In fact, Davy did not begin to succeed until he began to suggest +that whoever appeared before Judge Lansing the next morning in defense +of free speech would be the Alliance and Democratic and Republican +candidate for judge, and that if Hugo couldn't see his way clear to +appearing he might as well give up for the present his political +ambitions. +</P> + +<P> +Hugo came round. Davy left him at one o'clock in the morning and went +gloomily home. He had known what a prejudiced ass Galland was, how +unfit he was for the office of judge; but he had up to that time hidden +the full truth from himself. Now, to hide it was impossible. Hugo had +fully exposed himself in all his unfitness of the man of narrow upper +class prejudices, the man of no instinct or enthusiasm for right, +justice and liberty. "Really, it's a crime to nominate such a chap as +that," he muttered. "Yet we've got to do it. How Selma Gordon's eyes +would shame me, if she could see me now!" +</P> + +<P> +Davy had the familiar fondness for laying on the secret penitential +scourge—wherewith we buy from our complacent consciences license to +indulge in the sins our appetites or ambitions crave. +</P> + +<P> +Judge Lansing—you have never seen a man who LOOKED the judge more +ideally than did gray haired, gray bearded, open browed Robert +Lansing—Judge Lansing was all ready for his part in the farce. He +knew Hugo and helped him over the difficult places and cut him short as +soon as he had made enough of his speech to give an inkling of what he +was demanding. The Judge was persuaded to deliver himself of a +high-minded and eloquent denunciation of those who had misled the court +and the county prosecutor. He pointed out—in weighty judicial +language—that Victor Dorn had by his conduct during several years +invited just such a series of calamities as had beset him. But he went +on to say that Dorn's reputation and fondness for speech and action +bordering on the lawless did not withdraw from him the protection of +the law. In spite of himself the law would protect him. The +injunctions were dissolved and the indictments were quashed. +</P> + +<P> +The news of the impending application, published in the morning papers, +had crowded the court room. When the Judge finished a tremendous cheer +went up. The cheer passed on to the throng outside, and when Davy and +Hugo appeared in the corridor they were borne upon the shoulders of +workingmen and were not released until they had made speeches. Davy's +manly simplicity and clearness covered the stammering vagueness of hero +Galland. +</P> + +<P> +As Davy was gradually clearing himself of the eager handshakers and +back-slappers, Selma suddenly appeared before him. Her eyes were +shining and her whole body seemed to be irradiating emotion of +admiration and gratitude. "Thank you—oh, thank you!" she said, +pressing his hand. "How I have misjudged you!" +</P> + +<P> +Davy did not wince. He had now quite forgotten the part selfish +ambition had played in his gallant rush to the defense of imperilled +freedom—had forgotten it as completely as the now ecstatic Hugo had +forgotten his prejudices against the "low, smelly working people." He +looked as exalted as he felt. "I only did my plain duty," replied he. +"How could any decent American have done less?" +</P> + +<P> +"I haven't seen Victor since yesterday afternoon," pursued Selma. "But +I know how grateful he'll be—not so much for what you did as that YOU +did it." +</P> + +<P> +The instinct of the crowd—the universal human instinct—against +intruding upon a young man and young woman talking together soon +cleared them of neighbors. An awkward silence fell. Said he +hesitatingly: +</P> + +<P> +"Are you ready to give your answer?—to that question I asked you the +other day." +</P> + +<P> +"I gave you my answer then," replied she, her glance seeking a way of +escape. +</P> + +<P> +"No," said he. "For you said then that you would not marry me. And I +shall never take no for an answer until you have married some one else." +</P> + +<P> +She looked up at him with eyes large and grave and puzzled. "I'm sure +you don't want to marry me," she said. "I wonder why you keep asking +me." +</P> + +<P> +"I have to be honest with you," said Davy. "Somehow you bring out all +the good there is in me. So, I can't conceal anything from you. In a +way I don't want to marry you. You're not at all the woman I have +always pictured as the sort I ought to marry and would marry. +But—Selma, I love you. I'd give up anything—even my career—to get +you. When I'm away from you I seem to regain control of myself. But +just as soon as I see you, I'm as bad as ever again." +</P> + +<P> +"Then we mustn't see each other," said she. +</P> + +<P> +Suddenly she nodded, laughed up at him and darted away—and Hugo +Galland, long since abandoned by the crowd, had seized him by the arm. +</P> + +<P> +Selma debated whether to take Victor the news or to continue her walk. +She decided for the walk. She had been feeling peculiarly toward +Victor since the previous afternoon. She had not gone back in the +evening, but had sent an excuse by one of the Leaguers. It was plain +to her that Jane Hastings was up to mischief, and she had begun to +fear—sacrilegious though she felt it to be to harbor such a +suspicion—that there was man enough, weak, vain, susceptible man +enough, in Victor Dorn to make Jane a danger. The more she had thought +about Jane and her environment, the clearer it had become that there +could be no permanent and deep sincerity in Jane's aspirations after +emancipation from her class. It was simply the old, old story of a +woman of the upper class becoming infatuated with a man of a genuine +kind of manhood rarely found in the languor-producing surroundings of +her own class. Would Victor yield? No! her loyalty indignantly +answered. But he might allow this useless idler to hamper him, to +weaken his energies for the time—and during a critical period. +</P> + +<P> +She did not wish to see Victor again until she should have decided what +course to take. To think at her ease she walked out Monroe Avenue on +her way to the country. It was a hot day, but walking along in the +beautiful shade Selma felt no discomfort, except a slight burning of +the eyes from the fierce glare of the white highway. In the distance +she heard the sound of an engine. +</P> + +<P> +A few seconds, and past her at high speed swept an automobile. Its +heavy flying wheels tore up the roadway, raised an enormous cloud of +dust. The charm of the walk was gone; the usefulness of roadway and +footpaths was destroyed for everybody for the fifteen or twenty minutes +that it would take for the mass of dust to settle—on the foliage, in +the grass, on the bodies and clothing of passers-by and in their lungs. +Selma halted and gazed after the auto. Who was tearing along at this +mad speed? Who was destroying the comfort of all using that road, and +annoying them and making the air unfit to breathe! Why, an idle, +luxuriously dressed woman, not on an errand of life or death, but going +down town to amuse herself shopping or calling. +</P> + +<P> +The dust had not settled before a second auto, having a young man and +young woman apparently on the way to play tennis, rushed by, swirling +up even vaster clouds of dust and all but colliding with a baby +carriage a woman was trying to push across the street. Selma's blood +was boiling! The infamy of it! These worthless idlers! What utter +lack of manners, of consideration for their fellow beings. A GENTLEMAN +and a LADY insulting and bullying everyone who happened not to have an +automobile. Then—she laughed. The ignorant, stupid masses! They +deserved to be treated thus contemptuously, for they could stop it if +they would. "Some day we shall learn," philosophized she. "Then these +brutalities of men toward each other, these brutalities big and little, +will cease." This matter of the insulting automobiles, with insolent +horns and criminal folly of speed and hurling dust at passers-by, worse +than if the occupants had spat upon them in passing—this matter was a +trifle beside the hideous brutalities of men compelling masses of their +fellow beings, children no less than grown people, to toil at things +killing soul, mind and body simply in order that fortunes might be +made! THERE was lack of consideration worth thinking about. +</P> + +<P> +Three more autos passed—three more clouds of dust, reducing Selma to +extreme physical discomfort. Her philosophy was severely strained. +She was in the country now; but even there she was pursued by these +insolent and insulting hunters of pleasure utterly indifferent to the +comfort of their fellows. And when a fourth auto passed, bearing Jane +Hastings in a charming new dress and big, becoming hat—Selma, eyes and +throat full of dust and face and neck and hands streaked and dirty, +quite lost her temper. Jane spoke; she turned her head away, +pretending not to see! +</P> + +<P> +Presently she heard an auto coming at a less menacing pace from the +opposite direction. It drew up to the edge of the road abreast of her. +"Selma," called Jane. +</P> + +<P> +Selma paused, bent a frowning and angry countenance upon Jane. +</P> + +<P> +Jane opened the door of the limousine, descended, said to her +chauffeur: "Follow us, please." She advanced to Selma with a timid +and deprecating smile. "You'll let me walk with you?" she said. +</P> + +<P> +"I am thinking out a very important matter," replied Selma, with frank +hostility. "I prefer not to be interrupted." +</P> + +<P> +"Selma!" pleaded Jane. "What have I done to turn you against me?" +</P> + +<P> +Selma stood, silent, incarnation of freedom and will. She looked +steadily at Jane. "You haven't done anything," she replied. "On +impulse I liked you. On sober second thought I don't. That's all." +</P> + +<P> +"You gave me your friendship," said Jane. "You've no right to withdraw +it without telling me why." +</P> + +<P> +"You are not of my class. You are of the class that is at war with +mine—at war upon it. When you talk of friendship to me, you are +either false to your own people or false in your professions to me." +</P> + +<P> +Selma's manner was rudely offensive—as rude as Jane's dust, to which +it was perhaps a retort. Jane showed marvelous restraint. She told +herself that she felt compassionate toward this attractive, honest, +really nice girl. It is possible, however, that an instinct of +prudence may have had something to do with her ultra-conciliatory +attitude toward the dusty little woman in the cheap linen dress. The +enmity of one so near to Victor Dorn was certainly not an advantage. +Instead of flaring up, Jane said: +</P> + +<P> +"Now, Selma—do be human—do be your sweet, natural self. It isn't my +fault that I am what I am. And you know that I really belong heart and +soul with you." +</P> + +<P> +"Then come with us," said Selma. "If you think the life you lead is +foolish—why, stop leading it." +</P> + +<P> +"You know I can't," said Jane mournfully. +</P> + +<P> +"I know you could," retorted Selma. "Don't be a hypocrite, Jane." +</P> + +<P> +"Selma—how harsh you are!" cried Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Either come with us or keep away from us," said the girl inflexibly. +"You may deceive yourself—and men—with that talk of broad views and +high aspirations. But you can't deceive another woman." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not trying to deceive anybody," exclaimed Jane angrily. "Permit me +to say, Selma, that your methods won't make many converts to your +cause." +</P> + +<P> +"Who ever gave you the idea that we were seeking converts in your +class?" inquired Selma. "Our whole object is to abolish your +class—and end its drain upon us—and its bad example—and make its +members useful members of our class, and more contented and happier +than they are now." She laughed—a free and merry laugh, but not +pleasant in Jane's ears. "The idea of US trying to induce young ladies +and young gentlemen with polished finger nails to sit round in +drawing-rooms talking patronizingly of doing something for the masses! +You've got a very queer notion of us, my dear Miss Hastings." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's eyes were flashing. "Selma, there's a devil in you to-day. +What is it?" she demanded. +</P> + +<P> +"There's a great deal of dust from your automobile in me and on me," +said Selma. "I congratulate you on your good manners in rushing about +spattering and befouling your fellow beings and threatening their +lives." +</P> + +<P> +Jane colored and lowered her head. "I—I never thought of that +before," she said humbly. +</P> + +<P> +Selma's anger suddenly dissolved. "I'm ashamed of myself," she cried. +"Forgive me." +</P> + +<P> +What she had said about the automobile had made an instant deep +impression upon Jane, who was honestly trying to live up to her +aspirations—when she wasn't giving up the effort as hopelessly beyond +her powers and trying to content herself with just aspiring. She was +not hypocritical in her contrition. The dust disfiguring the foliage, +streaking Selma's face and hair, was forcing the lesson in manners +vigorously home. "I'm much obliged to you for teaching me what I ought +to have learned for myself," she said. "I don't blame you for scorning +me. I am a pretty poor excuse. But"—with her most charming +smile—"I'll do better—all the faster if you'll help me." +</P> + +<P> +Selma looked at her with a frank, dismayed contrition, like a child +that realizes it has done something very foolish. "Oh, I'm so horribly +impulsive!" she cried. "It's always getting me into trouble. You +don't know how I try Victor Dorn's patience—though he never makes the +least sign." She laughed up at Jane. "I wish you'd give me a +whipping. I'd feel lots better." +</P> + +<P> +"It'd take some of my dust off you," said Jane. "Let me take you to +the house in the auto—you'll never see it going at that speed again, I +promise. Come to the house and I'll dust you off—and we'll go for a +walk in the woods." +</P> + +<P> +Selma felt that she owed it to Jane to accept. As they were climbing +the hill in the auto, Selma said: +</P> + +<P> +"My, how comfortable this is! No wonder the people that have autos +stop exercising and get fat and sick and die. I couldn't trust myself +with one." +</P> + +<P> +"It's a daily fight," confessed Jane. "If I were married and didn't +have to think about my looks and my figure I'm afraid I'd give up." +</P> + +<P> +"Victor says the only time one ought ever to ride in a carriage is to +his own funeral." +</P> + +<P> +"He's down on show and luxury of every kind—isn't he?" said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"No, indeed," replied Selma. "Victor isn't 'down on' anything. He +thinks show and luxury are silly. He could be rich if he wished, for +he has wonderful talent for managing things and for making money. He +has refused some of the most wonderful offers—wonderful in that way. +But he thinks money-making a waste of time. He has all he wants, and +he says he'd as soon think of eating a second dinner when he'd just had +one as of exchanging time that could be LIVED for a lot of foolish +dollars." +</P> + +<P> +"And he meant it, too," said Jane. "In some men that would sound like +pretense. But not in him. What a mind he has—and what a character!" +</P> + +<P> +Selma was abruptly overcast and ominously silent. She wished she had +not been turned so far by her impulse of penitence—wished she had held +to the calm and deliberate part of her resolve about Jane—the part +that involved keeping aloof from her. However, Jane, the +tactful—hastened to shift the conversation to generalities of the +softest kinds—talked about her college life—about the inane and +useless education they had given her—drew Selma out to talk about her +own education—in the tenement—in the public school, at night school, +in factory and shop. Not until they had been walking in the woods +nearly two hours and Selma was about to go home, did Victor, about whom +both were thinking all the time, come into the conversation again. It +was Jane who could no longer keep away from the subject—the one +subject that wholly interested her nowadays. Said she: +</P> + +<P> +"Victor Dorn is REALLY almost well, you think?" +</P> + +<P> +After a significant pause Selma said in a tone that was certainly not +encouraging, "Obviously." +</P> + +<P> +"I was altogether wrong about Doctor Charlton," said Jane. "I'm +convinced now that he's the only really intelligent doctor in town. +I'm trying to persuade father to change to him." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, good-by," said Selma. She was eager to get away, for she +suddenly felt that Jane was determined to talk about Victor before +letting her go. +</P> + +<P> +"You altered toward me when I made that confession—the night of the +riot," said Jane abruptly. "Are you in love with him, too?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't see how you could help being," cried Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"That's because you don't know what it is to be busy," retorted Selma. +"Love—what you call love—is one of the pastimes with your sort of +people. It's a lazy, easy way of occupying the thoughts." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't know me as well as you think you do," said Jane. Her +expression fascinated Selma—and made her more afraid than ever. +</P> + +<P> +Impulsively Selma took Jane by the arm. "Keep away from us," she said. +"You will do no good. You can only cause unhappiness—perhaps most of +all to yourself." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't I know that!" exclaimed Jane. "I'm fighting it as hard as I +can. But how little control one has over oneself when one has always +been indulged and self-indulgent." +</P> + +<P> +"The man for you is David Hull," said Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"You could help him—could make a great deal of a person out of him." +</P> + +<P> +"I know it," replied Jane. "But I don't want him, and he—perhaps you +didn't know that he is in love with you?" +</P> + +<P> +"No more than you are with Victor Dorn," said Selma. "I'm different +from the women he has known, just as Victor is different from the men +you meet in your class. But this is a waste of time." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't believe in me at all," cried Jane. "In some ways you are +very unjust and narrow, Selma." +</P> + +<P> +Selma looked at her in that grave way which seemed to compel frankness. +"Do YOU believe in yourself?" she asked. +</P> + +<P> +Jane's glance shifted. +</P> + +<P> +"You know you do not," proceeded Selma. "The women of your class +rarely have sincere emotions because they do not lead sincere lives. +Part of your imaginary love for Victor Dorn is desire to fill up idle +hours. The rest of it is vanity—the desire to show your power over a +man who seems to be woman-proof." She laughed a little, turned away, +paused. "My mother used to quote a French proverb—'One cannot trifle +with love.' Be careful, Jane—for your own sake. I don't know whether +you could conquer Victor Dorn or not. But I do know IF you could +conquer him it would be only at the usual price of those conquests to a +woman." +</P> + +<P> +"And what is that?" said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Your own complete surrender," said Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"How wise you are!" laughed Jane. "Who would have suspected you of +knowing so much!" +</P> + +<P> +"How could I—a woman—and not unattractive to men—grow up to be +twenty-one years old, in the free life of a working woman, without +learning all there is to know about sex relations?" +</P> + +<P> +Jane looked at her with a new interest. +</P> + +<P> +"And," she went on, "I've learned—not by experience, I'm glad to say, +but by observation—that my mother's proverb is true. I shall not +think about love until I am compelled to. That is a peril a sensible +person does not seek." +</P> + +<P> +"I did not seek it," cried Jane—and then she halted and flushed. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-by, Jane," said Selma, waving her hand and moving away rapidly. +She called back—"On ne badine pas avec l'amour!" +</P> + +<P> +She went straight to Colman's cottage—to Victor, lying very pale with +his eyes shut, and big Tom Colman sitting by his bed. There was a +stillness in the room that Selma felt was ominous. Victor's +hand—strong, well-shaped, useful-looking, used-looking—not +ABUSED-looking, but USED-looking-was outside the covers upon the white +counterpane. The fingers were drumming softly; Selma knew that +gesture—a certain sign that Victor was troubled in mind. +</P> + +<P> +"You've told him," said Selma to Colman as she paused in the doorway. +</P> + +<P> +Victor turned his head quickly, opened his eyes, gave her a look of +welcome that made her thrill with pride. "Oh—there you are!" he +exclaimed. "I was hoping you'd come." +</P> + +<P> +"I saw David Hull just after it was done," said Selma. "And I thanked +him for you." +</P> + +<P> +Victor's eyes had a look of amusement, of mockery. "Thank you," he +said. +</P> + +<P> +She, the sensitive, was on the alert at once. "Didn't you want me to +thank him?" +</P> + +<P> +Victor did not answer. In the same amused way he went on: "So they +carried him on their shoulders—him and that other defender of the +rights of the people, Hugo Galland? I should like to have seen. It +was a memorable spectacle." +</P> + +<P> +"You are laughing at it," exclaimed the girl. "Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"You certainly are taking the news very queer, Victor," said Colman. +Then to Selma, "When I told him he got white and I thought I'd have to +send for Doctor Charlton." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—joy never kills," said Victor mockingly. "I don't want to keep +you, Tom—Selma'll sit with me." +</P> + +<P> +When they were alone, Victor again closed his eyes and resumed that +silent drumming upon the counterpane. Selma watched the restless +fingers as if she hoped they would disclose to her the puzzling secret +of Victor's thoughts. But she did not interrupt. +</P> + +<P> +That was one lesson in restraint that Victor had succeeded in teaching +her—never to interrupt. At last he heaved a great sigh and said: +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Selma, old girl—we've probably lost again. I was glad you came +because I wanted to talk—and I can't say what's in my mind before dear +old Tom—or any of them but my sister and you." +</P> + +<P> +"You didn't want those injunctions and indictments out of the way?" +said Selma. +</P> + +<P> +"If they had stood, we'd have won—in a walk," replied Victor. "As the +cards lie now, David Hull will win. And he'll make a pretty good show +mayor, probably—good enough to fool a large majority of our fellow +citizens, who are politically as shallow and credulous as nursery +children. And so—our work of educating them will be the harder and +slower. Oh, these David Hulls!—these good men who keep their mantles +spotless in order to make them the more useful as covers for the dirty +work of others!" Suddenly his merry smile burst out. "And they carried +Hugo Galland on their shoulders?" +</P> + +<P> +"Then you don't think Hull's motives were honorable?" inquired Selma, +perplexed and anxious. +</P> + +<P> +"How could I know his motives?—any man's motives?" replied Victor. +"No one can read men's hearts. All I ever consider is actions. And +the result of his actions is probably the defeat of the League and the +election of Dick Kelly." +</P> + +<P> +"I begin to understand," said Selma thoughtfully. "But—I do believe +his motive was altogether good." +</P> + +<P> +"My dear girl," said Victor, "the primer lesson in the life of action +is: 'Never—NEVER look at motives. Action—only actions—always +actions.' The chief reason the human race is led patiently round by +the nose is its fondness for fussing about motives. We are interested +only in men's actions and the results to our cause. Davy Hull's +motives concern only himself—and those who care for him." Victor's +eyes, twinkling mischievously, shot a shrewd glance at Selma. "You're +not by any chance in love with Davy?" +</P> + +<P> +Selma colored high. "Certainly not!" she exclaimed indignantly. +</P> + +<P> +"Why not? Why not?" teased Victor. "He's tall and handsome—and +superbly solemn—and women always fancy a solemn man has intellect and +character. Not that Davy is a fool—by no means. I'd be the last man +to say that—I whom he has just cleverly checkmated in one move." +</P> + +<P> +"You intended not to give bail! You intended to go to jail!" exclaimed +Selma abruptly. "I see it all! How stupid I was! Oh, I could cry, +Victor! What a chance." +</P> + +<P> +"Spilt milk," said Victor. "We must forget it, and plan to meet the +new conditions. We'll start the paper at once. We can't attack him. +Very clever of him—very clever! If he were as brave as he is shrewd, +I'd almost give up hope of winning this town while he was in politics +here. But he lacks courage. And he daren't think and speak honestly. +How that does cripple a man!" +</P> + +<P> +"He'll be one of us before very long," said Selma. "You misjudge him, +Victor." +</P> + +<P> +Dorn smiled. "Not so long as his own class gratifies his ambitions," +replied Victor. "If he came with us it'd be because his own class had +failed him and he hoped to rise through and upon—ours." +</P> + +<P> +Selma did not agree with him. But as she always felt presumptuous and +even foolish in disagreeing with Victor, she kept silent. And +presently Victor began to lay out her share in the task of starting up +the New Day. "I shall be all right within a week," said he, "and we +must get the first number out the week following." She was realizing +now that Hull's move had completely upset an elaborate plan of campaign +into which Victor had put all his intelligence and upon which he had +staked all his hopes. She marvelled as he talked, unfolding rapidly an +entirely new campaign, different in every respect from what the other +would have been. How swiftly his mind had worked, and how well! How +little time he had wasted in vain regrets! How quickly he had +recovered from a reverse that would have halted many a strong man. +</P> + +<P> +And then she remembered how they all, his associates, were like him, +proof against the evil effects of set-back and defeat. And why were +they so? Because Victor Dorn had trained them to fight for the cause, +and not for victory. "Our cause is the right, and in the end right is +bound to win because the right is only another name for the +sensible"—that had been his teaching. And a hardy army he had +trained. The armies trained by victory are strong; but the armies +schooled by defeat—they are invincible. +</P> + +<P> +When he had explained his new campaign—as much of it as he deemed it +wise at that time to withdraw from the security of his own brain—she +said: +</P> + +<P> +"But it seems to me we've got a good chance to win, anyhow." +</P> + +<P> +"A chance, perhaps," replied he. "But we'll not bother about that. +All we've got to do is to keep on strengthening ourselves." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, that's it!" she cried. "One added here—five there—ten yonder. +Every new stone fitted solidly against the ones already in place." +</P> + +<P> +"We must never forget that we aren't merely building a new party," said +Dorn. "We're building a new civilization—one to fit the new +conditions of life. Let the Davy Hulls patch and tinker away at trying +to keep the old structure from falling in. We know it's bound to fall +and that it isn't fit for decent civilized human beings to live in. +And we're getting the new house ready. So—to us, election day is no +more important than any of the three hundred and sixty-five." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +It was into the presence of a Victor Dorn restored in mind as well as +in body that Jane Hastings was shown by his sister, Mrs. Sherrill, one +afternoon a week or so later. +</P> + +<P> +All that time Jane had been searching for an excuse for going to see +him. She had haunted the roads and the woods where he and Selma +habitually walked. She had seen neither of them. When the pretext for +a call finally came to her, as usual, the most obvious thing in the +world. He must be suspecting her of having betrayed his confidence and +brought about the vacating of those injunctions and the quashing of the +indictments. She must go to him and clear herself of suspicion. +</P> + +<P> +She felt that the question of how she should dress for this crucial +interview, this attempt to establish some sort of friendly relations +with him, was of the very highest importance. Should she wear something +plain, something that would make her look as nearly as might be like +one of his own class? HIS class! +</P> + +<P> +No—no, indeed. The class in which he was accidentally born and bred, +but to which he did not belong. Or, should she go dressed frankly as +of her own class—wearing the sort of things that made her look her +finest and most superior and most beautiful? Having nothing else to do, +she spent several hours in trying various toilets. She was not long in +deciding against disguising herself as a working woman. That garb +might win his mental and moral approval; but not by mental and moral +ways did women and men prevail with each other. In plain garb—so Jane +decided, as she inspected herself—she was no match for Selma Gordon; +she looked awkward, out of her element. So much being settled, there +remained to choose among her various toilets. She decided for an +embroidered white summer dress, extremely simple, but in the way that +costs beyond the power of any but the very rich to afford. When she was +ready to set forth, she had never looked so well in her life. Her +toilet SEEMED a mere detail. In fact, it was some such subtlety as +those arrangements of lines and colors in great pictures, whereby the +glance of the beholder is unconsciously compelled toward the central +figure, just as water in a funnel must go toward the aperture at the +bottom. Jane felt, not without reason, that she had executed a stroke +of genius. She was wearing nothing that could awaken Victor Dorn's +prejudices about fine clothes, for he must have those prejudices. Yet +she was dressed in conformity with all that centuries, ages of +experience, have taught the dressmaking art on the subject of feminine +allure. And, when a woman feels that she is so dressed, her natural +allure becomes greatly enhanced. +</P> + +<P> +She drove down to a point in Monroe Avenue not far from the house where +Victor and his family lived. The day was hot; boss-ridden Remsen City +had dusty and ragged streets and sidewalks. It, therefore, would not +do to endanger the freshness of the toilet. But she would arrive as if +she had come all the way on foot. Arrival in a motor at so humble a +house would look like ostentation; also, if she were seen going through +that street afoot, people would think she was merely strolling a little +out of her way to view the ruins of the buildings set on fire by the +mob. She did pause to look at these ruins; the air of the neighborhood +still had a taint of burnt wood and paper. Presently, when she was sure +the street was clear of people of the sort who might talk—she hastily +entered the tiny front yard of Victor's house, and was pleased to find +herself immediately screened from the street by the luxuriant bushes +and creepers. +</P> + +<P> +There was nothing in the least pretentious about the appearance of the +little house. It was simply a well built cottage—but of brick, +instead of the usual wood, and the slate roof descended at attractive +angles. The door she was facing was superior to the usual +flimsy-looking door. Indeed, she at once became conscious of a highly +attractive and most unexpected air of substantiality and good taste. +The people who lived here seemed to be permanent people—long resident, +and looking forward to long residence. She had never seen such +beautiful or such tastefully grouped sun flowers, and the dahlias and +marigolds were far above the familiar commonplace kitchen garden +flowers. +</P> + +<P> +The door opened, and a handsome, extremely intelligent looking woman, +obviously Victor's sister, was looking pleasantly at her. Said she: +"I'm sorry to have kept you waiting. But I was busy in the kitchen. +This is Miss Hastings, isn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Jane, smiling friendlily. +</P> + +<P> +"I've heard my brother and Selma talk of you." (Jane wondered WHAT +they had said.) "You wish to see Victor?" +</P> + +<P> +"If I'd not be interrupting," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Come right in. He's used to being interrupted. They don't give him +five minutes to himself all day long—especially now that the +campaign's on. He always does his serious work very early in the +morning." +</P> + +<P> +They went through a hall, pleasantly odorous of baking in which good +flour and good butter and good eggs were being manufactured into +something probably appetizing, certainly wholesome. Jane caught a +glimpse through open doors on either side of a neat and reposeful +little library-sitting room, a plain delightfully simple little +bedroom, a kitchen where everything shone. She arrived at the rear +door somehow depressed, bereft of the feeling of upper-class +superiority which had, perhaps unconsciously, possessed her as she came +toward the house. At the far end of an arbor on which the grape vines +were so trellised that their broad leaves cast a perfect shade, sat +Victor writing at a table under a tree. He was in his shirt sleeves, +and his shirt was open at the throat. His skin was smooth and +healthily white below the collar line. The forearms exposed by his +rolled up sleeves were strong but slender, and the faint fair hair upon +them suggested a man, but not an animal. +</P> + +<P> +Never had she seen his face and head so fine. He was writing rapidly, +his body easily erect, his head and neck in a poise of grace and +strength. Jane grew pale and trembled—so much so that she was afraid +the keen, friendly eyes of Alice Sherrill were seeing. Said Mrs. +Sherrill, raising her voice: +</P> + +<P> +"Victor—here's Miss Hastings come to see you." Then to Jane: "Excuse +me, please. I don't dare leave that kitchen long." +</P> + +<P> +She departed. Jane waited while Victor, his pencil reluctantly +slackening and his glance lingeringly rising from the paper, came back +to sense of his surroundings. He stared at her blankly, then colored a +little. He rose—stiff, for him formal. Said he: +</P> + +<P> +"How d'you do, Miss Hastings?" +</P> + +<P> +She came down the arbor, recovering her assurance as she again became +conscious of herself, so charmingly dressed and no doubt beautiful in +his eyes. "I know you're not glad to see me," said she. "But I'm only +stopping a very little minute." +</P> + +<P> +His eyes had softened—softened under the influence of the emotion no +man can ever fail to feel at least in some degree at sight of a lovely +woman. "Won't you sit?" said he, with a glance at the wooden chair +near the other side of the table. +</P> + +<P> +She seated herself, resting one gloved hand on the prettily carved end +of her white-sunshade. She was wearing a big hat of rough black straw, +with a few very gorgeous white plumes. "What a delightful place to +work," exclaimed she, looking round, admiring the flowers, the slow +ripening grapes, the delicious shade. "And you—how WELL you look!" +</P> + +<P> +"I've forgotten I was ever anything but well," said he. +</P> + +<P> +"You're impatient for me to go," she cried laughing. "It's very rude +to show it so plainly." +</P> + +<P> +"No," replied he. "I am not impatient for you to go. But I ought to +be, for I'm very busy." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I shall be gone in a moment. I came only to tell you that you +are suspecting me wrongly." +</P> + +<P> +"Suspecting you?—of what?" +</P> + +<P> +"Of having broken my word. I know you must think I got father to set +Davy Hull on to upsetting your plans." +</P> + +<P> +"The idea never entered my head," said he. "You had promised—and I +know you are honest." +</P> + +<P> +Jane colored violently and lowered her eyes. "I'm not—not up to what +you say," she protested. "But at least I didn't break my promise. +Davy thought of that himself." +</P> + +<P> +"I have been assuming so." +</P> + +<P> +"And you didn't suspect me?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not for an instant," Victor assured her. "Davy simply made the move +that was obviously best for him." +</P> + +<P> +"And now he will be elected," said Jane regretfully. +</P> + +<P> +"It looks that way," replied Victor. And he had the air of one who has +nothing more to say. +</P> + +<P> +Suddenly Jane looked at him with eyes shining and full of appeal. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't send me away so quickly," she pleaded. "I've not been telling +the exact truth. I came only partly because I feared you were +suspecting me. The real reason was that—that I couldn't stay away any +longer. I know you're not in the least interested in me——" +</P> + +<P> +She was watching him narrowly for signs of contradiction. She hoped +she had not watched in vain. +</P> + +<P> +"Why should you be?" she went on. "But ever since you opened my eyes +and set me to thinking, I can do nothing but think about the things you +have said to me, and long to come to you and ask you questions and hear +more." +</P> + +<P> +Victor was staring hard into the wall of foliage. His face was set. +She thought she had never seen anything so resolute, so repelling as +the curve of his long jaw bone. +</P> + +<P> +"I'll go now," she said, making a pretended move toward rising. +</P> + +<P> +"I've no right to annoy you." +</P> + +<P> +He stood up abruptly, without looking at her. "Yes, you'd better go," +he said curtly. +</P> + +<P> +She quivered—and it was with a pang of genuine pain. +</P> + +<P> +His gaze was not so far from her as it seemed. For he must have noted +her expression, since he said hurriedly: "I beg your pardon. It isn't +that I mean to be rude. I—I—it is best that I do not see you." +</P> + +<P> +She sank back in the chair with a sigh. "And I—I know that I ought to +keep away from you. But—I can't. It's too strong for me." +</P> + +<P> +He looked at her slowly. "I have made up my mind to put you out of my +head," he said. "And I shall." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't!" she cried. "Victor—don't!" +</P> + +<P> +He sat again, rested his forearms upon the table, leaned toward her. +"Look at me," he said. +</P> + +<P> +She slowly lifted her gaze to his, met it steadily. "I thought so, +Victor," she said tenderly. "I knew I couldn't care so much unless you +cared at least a little ." +</P> + +<P> +"Do I?" said he. "I don't know. I doubt if either of us is in love +with the other. Certainly, you are not the sort of woman I could +love—deeply love. What I feel for you is the sort of thing that +passes. It is violent while it lasts, but it passes." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't care!" cried she recklessly. "Whatever it is I want it!" +</P> + +<P> +He shook his head resolutely. "No," he said. "You don't want it, and +I don't want it. I know the kind of life you've mapped out for +yourself—as far as women of your class map out anything. It's the only +kind of life possible to you. And it's of a kind with which I could, +and would, have nothing to do." +</P> + +<P> +"Why do you say that?" protested she. "You could make of me what you +pleased." +</P> + +<P> +"No," said he. "I couldn't make a suit of overalls out of a length of +silk. Anyhow, I have made up my life with love and marriage left out. +They are excellent things for some people, for most people. But not +for me. I must be free, absolutely free. Free to think only of the +cause I've enlisted in, free to do what it commands." +</P> + +<P> +"And I?" she said with tremendous life. "What is to become of me, +Victor?" +</P> + +<P> +He laughed quietly. "You are going to keep away from me—find some one +else to amuse your leisure. That's what's going to become of you, Jane +Hastings." +</P> + +<P> +She winced and quivered again. "That—hurts," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"Your vanity? Yes. I suppose it does. But those wounds are +healthful—when the person is as sensible as you are." +</P> + +<P> +"You think I am not capable of caring! You think I am vain and shallow +and idle. You refuse me all right to live, simply because I happen to +live in surroundings you don't approve of." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not such an egotistical ass as to imagine a woman of your sort +could be genuinely in love with a man of my sort," replied he. "So, +I'll see to it that we keep away from each other. I don't wish to be +tempted to do you mischief." +</P> + +<P> +She looked at him inquiringly. +</P> + +<P> +But he did not explain. He said: "And you are going now. And we +shall not meet again except by accident." +</P> + +<P> +She gave a sigh of hopelessness. "I suppose I have lowered myself in +your eyes by being so frank—by showing and speaking what I felt," she +said mournfully. +</P> + +<P> +"Not in the least," rejoined he. "A man who is anybody or has anything +soon gets used to frankness in women. I could hardly have gotten past +thirty, in a more or less conspicuous position, without having had some +experience.... and without learning not to attach too much importance +to—to frankness in women." +</P> + +<P> +She winced again. "You wouldn't say those things if you knew how they +hurt," she said. "If I didn't care for you, could I sit here and let +you laugh at me?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, you could," answered he. "Hoping somehow or other to turn the +laugh upon me later on. But really I was not laughing at you. And you +can spare yourself the effort of convincing me that you're sincere." +He was frankly laughing at her now. "You don't understand the +situation—not at all. You fancy that I am hanging back because I am +overwhelmed or shy or timid. I assure you I've never been shy or timid +about anything I wanted. If I wanted you—I'd—TAKE you." +</P> + +<P> +She caught her breath and shrank. Looking at him as he said that, +calmly and confidently, she, for the first time, was in love—and was +afraid. Back to her came Selma's warnings: "One may not trifle with +love. A woman conquers only by surrender." +</P> + +<P> +"But, as I said to you a while ago," he went on, "I don't want you—or +any woman. I've no time for marriage—no time for a flirtation. And +though you tempt me strongly, I like you too well to—to treat you as +you invite." +</P> + +<P> +Jane sat motionless, stunned by the sudden turning of the tables. +</P> + +<P> +She who had come to conquer—to amuse herself, to evoke a strong, +hopeless passion that would give her a delightful sense of warmth as +she stood safely by its bright flames—she had been conquered. +</P> + +<P> +She belonged to this man; all he had to do was to claim her. +</P> + +<P> +In a low voice, sweet and sincere beyond any that had ever come from +her lips before, she said: +</P> + +<P> +"Anything, Victor—anything—but don't send me away." +</P> + +<P> +And he, seeing and hearing, lost his boasted self-control. "Go—go," he +cried harshly. "If you don't go——" He came round the table, seizing +her as she rose, kissed her upon the lips, upon the eyes. "You are +lovely—lovely!" he murmured. "And I who can't have flowers on my table +or in sight when I've got anything serious to do—I love your perfume +and your color and the wonderful softness of you——" +</P> + +<P> +He pushed her away. "Now—will you go?" he cried. +</P> + +<P> +His eyes were flashing. And she was trembling from head to foot. +</P> + +<P> +She was gazing at him with a fascinated expression. "I understand what +you meant when you warned me to go," she said. "I didn't believe it, +but it was so." +</P> + +<P> +"Go—I tell you!" he ordered. +</P> + +<P> +"It's too late," said she. "You can't send me away now—for you have +kissed me. If I'm in your power, you're in my power, too." +</P> + +<P> +Moved by the same impulse both looked up the arbor toward the rear door +of the house. There stood Selma Gordon, regarding them with an +expression of anger as wild as the blood of the steppes that flowed in +her veins. Victor, with what composure he could master, put out his +hand in farewell to Jane. He had been too absorbed in the emotions +raging between him and her to note Selma's expression. But Jane, the +woman, had seen. As she shook hands with Victor, she said neither high +nor low: +</P> + +<P> +"Selma knows that I care. I told her the night of the riot." +</P> + +<P> +"Good-by," said Victor in a tone she thought it wise not to dispute. +</P> + +<P> +"I'll be in the woods above the park at ten tomorrow," she said in an +undertone. Then to Selma, unsmilingly: "You're not interrupting. I'm +going." Selma advanced. The two girls looked frank hostility into +each other's eyes. Jane did not try to shake hands with her. With a +nod and a forced smile of conventional friendliness upon her lips, she +passed her and went through the house and into the street. +</P> + +<P> +She lingered at the gate, opening and closing it in a most leisurely +fashion—a significantly different exit from her furtive and ashamed +entrance. Love and revolt were running high and hot in her veins. She +longed openly to defy the world—her world. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VII +</H3> + +<P> +Impulse was the dominant strain in Selma Gordon's character—impulse +and frankness. But she was afraid of Victor Dorn as we all are afraid +of those we deeply respect—those whose respect is the mainstay of our +self-confidence. She was moving toward him to pour out the violence +that was raging in her on the subject of this flirtation of Jane +Hastings. The spectacle of a useless and insincere creature like that +trifling with her deity, and being permitted to trifle, was more than +she could endure. But Victor, dropping listlessly to his chair and +reaching for his pencil, was somehow a check upon her impetuousness. +She paused long enough to think the sobering second thought. To speak +would be both an impertinence and a folly. She owed it to the cause +and to her friend Victor to speak; but to speak at the wrong time and +in the wrong way would be worse than silence. +</P> + +<P> +Said he: "I was finishing this when she came. I'll be done in a +minute. Please read what I've written and tell me what you think." +</P> + +<P> +Selma took up the loose sheets of manuscript and stood reading his +inaugural of the new New Day. As she read she forgot the petty matter +that had so agitated her a moment before. This salutatory—this +address to the working class—this plan of a campaign to take Remsen +City out of the hands of its exploiters and despoilers and make it a +city fit for civilized residence and worthy of its population of +intelligent, progressive workingmen—this leading editorial for the +first number was Victor Dorn at his greatest and best. The man of +action with all the enthusiasm of a dreamer. The shrewd, practical +politician with the outlook of a statesman. How honest and impassioned +he was; yet how free from folly and cant. Several times as she read +Selma lifted her eyes to look at him in generous, worshipful +admiration. She would not have dared let him see; she would not have +dared speak the phrases of adoration of his genius that crowded to her +lips. How he would have laughed at her—he who thought about himself +as a personality not at all, but only as an instrument. +</P> + +<P> +"Here's the rest of it," said he, throwing himself back in his chair +and relighting his pipe. +</P> + +<P> +She finished a moment later, said as she laid the manuscript on the +table: "That's the best you've ever done." +</P> + +<P> +"I think so," agreed he. "It seems to me I've got a new grip on +things. I needed a turn such as your friend Davy Hull gave me. +Nothing like rivalry to spur a man on. The old crowd was so +stupid—cunning, but stupid. But Hull injects a new element into the +struggle. To beat him we've got to use our best brains." +</P> + +<P> +"We've got to attack him," said Selma. "After all, he is the enemy. +We can't let him disarm us by an act of justice." +</P> + +<P> +"No, indeed," said Victor. "But we'll have to be careful. Here's what +I'm going to carry on the first page." +</P> + +<P> +He held up a sheet of paper on which he had written with a view to +effective display the names of the four most offensive local +corporations with their contribution—$25,000 each—to the campaign +fund of the Citizens' Alliance. "Under it, in big type," proceeded he, +"we'll carry a line asking, 'Is the Citizens' Alliance fooling these +four corporations or is it fooling the people?' I think that will be +more effective than columns of attack." +</P> + +<P> +"We ought to get that out on wall-bills and dodgers," suggested Selma, +"and deluge the town with it once or twice a week until election." +</P> + +<P> +"Splendid!" exclaimed Victor. "I'll make a practical politician of you +yet." +</P> + +<P> +Colman and Harbinger and Jocelyn and several others of the League +leaders came in one at a time, and the plan of campaign was developed +in detail. But the force they chiefly relied upon was the influence of +their twelve hundred men, their four or five thousand women and young +men and girls, talking every day and evening, each man or woman or +youth with those with whom he came into contact. This "army of +education" was disciplined, was educated, knew just what arguments to +use, had been cautioned against disputes, against arousing foolish +antagonisms. The League had nothing to conceal, no object to gain but +the government of Remsen City by and for its citizens—well paved, well +lighted, clean streets, sanitary houses, good and clean street car +service, honest gas, pure water, plenty of good schools—that first of +all. The "reform crowd"—the Citizens' Alliance—like every reform +party of the past, proposed to do practically the same things. But the +League met this with: "Why should we elect an upper class government to +do for us what we ought to do for ourselves? And how can they redeem +their promises when they are tied up in a hundred ways to the very +people who have been robbing and cheating us?" +</P> + +<P> +There were to be issues of the New Day; there were to be posters and +dodgers, public meetings in halls, in squares, on street corners. But +the main reliance now as always was this educated "army of +education"—these six thousand missionaries, each one of them in +resolute earnest and bent upon converting his neighbors on either side, +and across the street as well. A large part of the time the leaders +could spare from making a living was spent in working at this army, in +teaching it new arguments or better ways of presenting old arguments, +in giving the enthusiasm, in talking with each individual soldier of it +and raising his standard of efficiency. Nor could the employers of +these soldiers of Victor Dorn's complain that they shirked their work +for politics. It was a fact that could not be denied that the members +of the Workingmen's League were far and away the best workers in Remsen +City, got the best pay, and earned it, drank less, took fewer days off +on account of sickness. One of the sneers of the Kelly-House gang was +that "those Dorn cranks think they are aristocrats, a little better +than us common, ordinary laboring men." And the sneer was not without +effect. The truth was, Dorn and his associates had not picked out the +best of the working class and drawn it into the League, but had made +those who joined the League better workers, better family men, better +citizens. +</P> + +<P> +"We are saying that the working class ought to run things," Dorn said +again and again in his talks, public and private. "Then, we've got to +show the community that we're fit to run things. That is why the +League expels any man who shirks or is a drunkard or a crook or a bad +husband and father." +</P> + +<P> +The great fight of the League—the fight that was keeping it from +power—was with the trades unions, which were run by secret agents of +the Kelly-House oligarchy. Kelly and the Republican party rather +favored "open shop" or "scab" labor—the right of an American to let +his labor to whom he pleased on what terms he pleased. The Kelly +orators waxed almost tearful as they contemplated the outrage of any +interference with the ancient liberty of the American citizen. Kelly +disguised as House was a hot union man. He loathed the "scab." He +jeered at the idea that a laborer ought to be at the mercy of the +powerful employer who could dictate his own terms, which the laborers +might not refuse under stress of hunger. Thus the larger part of the +"free" labor in Remsen City voted with Kelly—was bought by him at so +much a head. The only organization it had was under the Kelly district +captains. Union labor was almost solidly Democratic—except in +Presidential elections, when it usually divided on the tariff question. +</P> + +<P> +Although almost all the Leaguers were members of the unions, Kelly and +House saw to it that they had no influence in union councils. That is, +until recently Kelly-House had been able to accomplish this. But they +were seeing the approaching end of their domination. The "army of +education" was proving too powerful for them. And they felt that at +the coming election the decline of their power would be +apparent—unless something drastic were done. +</P> + +<P> +They had attempted it in the riot. The riot had been a fizzle—thanks +to the interposition of the personal ambition of the until then +despised "holy boy," David Hull. Kelly, the shrewd, at once saw the +mark of the man of force. He resolved that Hull should be elected. He +had intended simply to use him to elect Hugo Galland judge and to split +up the rest of the tickets in such a way that some Leaguers and some +reformers would get in, would be powerless, would bring discredit and +ridicule upon their parties. But Hull was a man who could be useful; +his cleverness in upsetting the plot against Dorn and turning all to +his advantage demonstrated that. Therefore, Hull should be elected and +passed up higher. It did not enter his calculations that Hull might +prove refractory, might really be all that he professed; he had talked +with Davy, and while he had underestimated his intelligence, he knew he +had not misjudged his character. He knew that it was as easy to "deal" +with the Hull stripe of honest, high minded men as it was difficult to +"deal" with the Victor Dorn stripe. Hull he called a "sensible +fellow"; Victor Dorn he called a crank. But—he respected Dorn, while +Hull he held in much such esteem as he held his cigar-holder and pocket +knife, or Tony Rivers and Joe House. +</P> + +<P> +When Victor Dorn had first begun to educate and organize the people of +Remsen City, the boss industry was in its early form. That is, Kelly +and House were really rivals in the collecting of big campaign funds by +various forms of blackmail, in struggling for offices for themselves +and their followers, in levying upon vice and crime through the police. +In these ways they made the money, the lion's share of which naturally +fell to them as leaders, as organizers of plunder. But that stage had +now passed in Remsen City as it had passed elsewhere, and the boss +industry had taken a form far more difficult to combat. Kelly and +House no longer especially cared whether Republican party or Democratic +won. Their business—their source of revenue—had ceased to be through +carrying elections, had become a matter of skill in keeping the people +more or less evenly divided between the two "regular" parties, with an +occasional fake third party to discourage and bring into contempt +reform movers and to make the people say, "Well, bad as they are, at +least the regulars aren't addle-headed, damn fools doing nothing except +to make business bad." Both Kelly and House were supported and +enriched by the corporations and by big public contracting companies +and by real estate deals. Kelly still appropriated a large part of the +"campaign fund." House, in addition, took a share of the money raised +by the police from dives. But these sums were but a small part of +their income, were merely pin money for their wives and children. +</P> + +<P> +Yet—at heart and in all sincerity Kelly was an ardent Republican and +House was a ferocious Democrat. If you had asked either what +Republican and Democrat meant he would have been as vague and +unsatisfactory in his reply as would have been any of his followers +bearing torch and oilcloth cape in political processions, with no hope +of gain—beyond the exquisite pleasure of making a shouting ass of +himself in the most public manner. But for all that, Kelly was a +Republican and House a Democrat. It is not a strange, though it is a +profoundly mysterious, phenomenon, that of the priest who arranges the +trick mechanism of the god, yet being a devout believer, ready to die +for his "faith." +</P> + +<P> +Difficult though the task was of showing the average Remsen City man +that Republican and Democrat, Kelly and House, were one and the same +thing, and that thing a blood-sucking, blood-heavy leech upon his +veins—difficult though this task was, Victor Dorn knew that he had +about accomplished it, when David Hull appeared. A new personality; a +plausible personality, deceptive because self-deceiving—yet not so +thoroughly self-deceived that it was in danger of hindering its own +ambition. David Hull—just the kind of respectable, popular figurehead +and cloak the desperate Kelly-House conspiracy needed. +</P> + +<P> +How far had the "army of education" prepared the people for seeing +through this clever new fraud upon them? Victor Dorn could not judge. +He hoped for the best; he was prepared for the worst. +</P> + +<P> +The better to think out the various problems of the new situation, +complicated by his apparent debt of gratitude to Davy, Victor went +forth into the woods very early the next morning. He wandered far, but +ten o'clock found him walking in the path in the strip of woods near +the high road along the upper side of the park. And when Jane Hastings +appeared, he was standing looking in the direction from which she would +have to come. It was significant of her state of mind that she had +given small attention to her dress that morning. Nor was she looking +her best in expression or in color. Her eyes and her skin suggested an +almost sleepless night. +</P> + +<P> +He did not advance. She came rapidly as if eager to get over that +embarrassing space in which each could see the other, yet neither could +speak without raising the voice. When she was near she said: +</P> + +<P> +"You think you owe something to Davy Hull for what he did?" +</P> + +<P> +"The people think so," said he. "And that's the important thing." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—you owe him nothing," pursued she. +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing that would interfere with the cause," replied he. "And that +would be true, no matter what he had done." +</P> + +<P> +"I mean he did nothing for you," she explained. "I forgot to tell you +yesterday. The whole thing was simply a move to further his ambition. +I happened to be there when he talked with father and enlisted him." +</P> + +<P> +Victor laughed. "It was your father who put it through. I might have +known!" +</P> + +<P> +"At first I tried to interpose. Then—I stopped." She stood before +him with eyes down. "It came to me that for my own sake it would be +better that you should lose this fall. It seemed to me that if you won +you would be farther out of my reach." She paused, went steadily on: +"It was a bad feeling I had that you must not get anything except with +my help. Do you understand?" +</P> + +<P> +"Perfectly," said he cheerfully. "You are your father's own daughter." +</P> + +<P> +"I love power," said she. "And so do you. Only, being a woman, I'd +stoop to things to get it, that a man—at least your sort of man—would +scorn. Do you despise me for that? You oughtn't to. And you will +teach me better. You can make of me what you please, as I told you +yesterday. I only half meant it then. Now—it's true, through and +through." +</P> + +<P> +Victor glanced round, saw near at hand the bench he was seeking. "Let's +sit down here," said he. "I'm rather tired. I slept little and I've +been walking all morning. And you look tired, also." +</P> + +<P> +"After yesterday afternoon I couldn't sleep," said she. +</P> + +<P> +When they were seated he looked at her with an expression that seemed +to say: "I have thrown open the windows of my soul. Throw open yours; +and let us look at each other as we are, and speak of things as they +are." She suddenly flung herself against his breast and as he clasped +her she said: +</P> + +<P> +"No—no! Let's not reason coldly about things, Victor. Let's +feel—let's LIVE!" +</P> + +<P> +It was several minutes—and not until they had kissed many +times—before he regained enough self-control to say: "This simply +will not do, Jane. How can we discuss things calmly? You sit +there"—he pushed her gently to one end of the bench—"and I'll sit at +this end. Now!" +</P> + +<P> +"I love you, Victor! With your arms round me I am happy—and SO +strong!" +</P> + +<P> +"With my arms round you I'm happy, I'll admit," said he. "But—oh, so +weak! I have the sense that I am doing wrong—that we are both doing +wrong." +</P> + +<P> +"Why? Aren't you free?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, I am not free. As I've told you, I belong to a cause—to a +career." +</P> + +<P> +"But I won't hinder you there. I'll help you." +</P> + +<P> +"Why go over that again? You know better—I know better." Abruptly, +"Your father—what time does he get home for dinner?" +</P> + +<P> +"He didn't go down town to-day," replied Jane. "He's not well—not at +all well." +</P> + +<P> +Victor looked baffled. "I was about to propose that we go straight to +him." +</P> + +<P> +If he had been looking at Jane, he might have seen the fleeting flash +of an expression that betrayed that she had suspected the object of his +inquiry. +</P> + +<P> +"You will not go with me to your father?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not when he is ill," said she. "If we told him, it might kill him. +He has ambitions—what he regards as ambitions—for me. He admires +you, but—he doesn't admire your ideas." +</P> + +<P> +"Then," said Victor, following his own train of thought, "we must fight +this out between ourselves. I was hoping I'd have your father to help +me. I'm sure, as soon as you faced him with me, you'd realize that +your feeling about me is largely a delusion." +</P> + +<P> +"And you?" said Jane softly. "Your feeling about me—the feeling that +made you kiss me—was that delusion?" +</P> + +<P> +"It was—just what you saw," replied he, "and nothing more. The idea of +marrying you—of living my life with you doesn't attract me in the +least. I can't see you as my wife." He looked at her impatiently. +"Have you no imagination? Can't you see that you could not change, and +become what you'd have to be if you lived with me?" +</P> + +<P> +"You can make of me what you please," repeated she with loving +obstinacy. +</P> + +<P> +"That is not sincere!" cried he. "You may think it is, but it isn't. +Look at me, Jane." +</P> + +<P> +"I haven't been doing anything else since we met," laughed she. +</P> + +<P> +"That's better," said he. "Let's not be solemn. Solemnity is pose, +and when people are posing they get nowhere. You say I can make of you +what I please. Do you mean that you are willing to become a woman of +my class—to be that all your life—to bring up your children in that +way—to give up your fashionable friends—and maid—and carriages—and +Paris clothes—to be a woman who would not make my associates and their +families uncomfortable and shy?" +</P> + +<P> +She was silent. She tried to speak, but lifting her eyes before she +began her glance encountered his and her words died upon her lips. +</P> + +<P> +"You know you did not mean that," pursued he. "Now, I'll tell you what +you did mean. You meant that after you and I were married—or +engaged—perhaps you did not intend to go quite so far as marriage just +yet." +</P> + +<P> +The color crept into her averted face. +</P> + +<P> +"Look at me!" he commanded laughingly. +</P> + +<P> +With an effort she forced her eyes to meet his. +</P> + +<P> +"Now—smile, Jane!" +</P> + +<P> +His smile was contagious. The curve of her lips changed; her eyes +gleamed. +</P> + +<P> +"Am I not reading your thoughts?" said he. +</P> + +<P> +"You are very clever, Victor," admitted she. +</P> + +<P> +"Good. We are getting on. You believed that, once we were engaged, I +would gradually begin to yield, to come round to your way of thinking. +You had planned for me a career something like Davy Hull's—only freer +and bolder. I would become a member of your class, but would pose as a +representative of the class I had personally abandoned. Am I right?" +</P> + +<P> +"Go on, Victor," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"That's about all. Now, there are just two objections to your plan. +The first is, it wouldn't work. My associates would be 'on to' me in a +very short time. They are shrewd, practical, practically educated +men—not at all the sort that follow Davy Hull or are wearing Kelly's +and House's nose rings. In a few months I'd find myself a leader +without a following—and what is more futile and ridiculous than that?" +</P> + +<P> +"They worship you," said Jane. "They trust you implicitly. They know +that whatever you did would be for their good." +</P> + +<P> +He laughed heartily. "How little you know my friends," said he. "I am +their leader only because I am working with them, doing what we all see +must be done, doing it in the way in which we all see it must be done." +</P> + +<P> +"But THAT is not power!" cried Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"No," replied Victor. "But it is the career I wish—the only one I'd +have. Power means that one's followers are weak or misled or ignorant. +To be first among equals—that's worth while. The other thing is the +poor tawdriness that kings and bosses crave and that shallow, snobbish +people admire." +</P> + +<P> +"I see that," said Jane. "At least, I begin to see it. How wonderful +you are!" +</P> + +<P> +Victor laughed. "Is it that I know so much, or is it that you know so +little?" +</P> + +<P> +"You don't like for me to tell you that I admire you?" said Jane, +subtle and ostentatiously timid. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't care much about it one way or the other," replied Victor, who +had, when he chose, a rare ability to be blunt without being rude. +"Years ago, for my own safety, I began to train myself to care little +for any praise or blame but my own, and to make myself a very searching +critic of myself. So, I am really flattered only when I win my own +praise—and I don't often have that pleasure." +</P> + +<P> +"Really, I don't see why you bother with me," said she with sly +innocence—which was as far as she dared let her resentments go. +</P> + +<P> +"For two reasons," replied he promptly. "It flatters me that you are +interested in me. The second reason is that, when I lost control of +myself yesterday, I involved myself in certain responsibilities to you. +It has seemed to me that I owe it to myself and to you to make you see +that there is neither present nor future in any relations between us." +</P> + +<P> +She put out her hand, and before he knew what he was doing he had +clasped it. With a gentle, triumphant smile she said: "THERE'S the +answer to all your reasoning, Victor." +</P> + +<P> +He released her hand. "AN answer," he said, "but not the correct +answer." He eyed her thoughtfully. "You have done me a great +service," he went on. "You have shown me an unsuspected, a dangerous +weakness in myself. At another time—and coming in another way, I +might have made a mess of my career—and of the things that have been +entrusted to me." A long pause, then he added, to himself rather than +to her, "I must look out for that. I must do something about it." +</P> + +<P> +Jane turned toward him and settled herself in a resolute attitude and +with a resolute expression. "Victor," she said, "I've listened to you +very patiently. Now I want you to listen to me. What is the truth +about us? Why, that we are as if we had been made for each other. I +don't know as much as you do. I've led a much narrower life. I've +been absurdly mis-educated. But as soon as I saw you I felt that I had +found the man I was looking for. And I believe—I feel—I KNOW you +were drawn to me in the same way. Isn't that so?" +</P> + +<P> +"You—fascinated me," confessed he. "You—or your clothes—or your +perfume." +</P> + +<P> +"Explain it as you like," said she. "The fact remains that we were +drawn together. Well—Victor, <I>I</I> am not afraid to face the future, as +fate maps it out for us. Are you?" +</P> + +<P> +He did not answer. +</P> + +<P> +"You—AFRAID," she went on. "No—you couldn't be afraid." +</P> + +<P> +A long silence. Then he said abruptly: "IF we loved each other. But +I know that we don't. I know that you would hate me when you realized +that you couldn't move me. And I know that I should soon get over the +infatuation for you. As soon as it became a question of +sympathies—common tastes—congeniality—I'd find you hopelessly +lacking." +</P> + +<P> +She felt that he was contrasting her with some one else—with a certain +some one. And she veiled her eyes to hide their blazing jealousy. A +movement on his part made her raise them in sudden alarm. He had +risen. His expression told her that the battle was lost—for the day. +Never had she loved him as at that moment, and never had longing to +possess him so dominated her willful, self-indulgent, spoiled nature. +Yet she hated him, too; she longed to crush him, to make him suffer—to +repay him with interest for the suffering he was inflicting upon +her—the humiliation. But she dared not show her feelings. It would +be idle to try upon this man any of the coquetries indicated for such +cases—to dismiss him coldly, or to make an appeal through an +exhibition of weakness or reckless passion. +</P> + +<P> +"You will see the truth, for yourself, as you think things over," said +he. +</P> + +<P> +She rose, stood before him with downcast eyes, with mouth sad and +sweet. "No," she said, "It's you who are hiding the truth from +yourself. I hope—for both our sakes—that you'll see it before long. +Good-by—dear." She stretched out her hand. +</P> + +<P> +Hesitatingly he took it. As their hands met, her pulse beating against +his, she lifted her eyes. And once more he was holding her close, was +kissing her. And she was lying in his arms unresisting, with two large +tears shining in the long lashes of her closed eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, Jane—forgive me!" he cried, releasing her. "I must keep away +from you. I will—I WILL!" And he was rushing down the steep +slope—direct, swift, relentless. But she, looking after him with a +tender, dreamy smile, murmured: "He loves me. He will come again. If +not—I'll go and get him!" +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +To Jane Victor Dorn's analysis of his feeling toward her and of the +reasons against yielding to it seemed of no importance whatever. Side +by side with Selma's "One may not trifle with love" she would have put +"In matters of love one does not reason," as equally axiomatic. Victor +was simply talking; love would conquer him as it had conquered every +man and every woman it had ever entered. Love—blind, unreasoning, +irresistible—would have its will and its way. +</P> + +<P> +And about most men she would have been right—about any man +practically, of the preceding generation. But Victor represented a new +type of human being—the type into whose life reason enters not merely +as a theoretical force, to be consulted and disregarded, but as an +authority, a powerful influence, dominant in all crucial matters. Only +in our own time has science begun to make a notable impression upon the +fog which formerly lay over the whole human mind, thicker here, thinner +there, a mere haze yonder, but present everywhere. This fog made clear +vision impossible, usually made seeing of any kind difficult; there was +no such thing as finding a distinct line between truth and error as to +any subject. And reason seemed almost as faulty a guide as +feeling—was by many regarded as more faulty, not without justification. +</P> + +<P> +But nowadays for some of us there are clear or almost clear horizons, +and such fog banks as there are conceal from them nothing that is of +importance in shaping a rational course of life. Victor Dorn was one +of these emancipated few. All successful men form their lives upon a +system of some kind. Even those who seem to live at haphazard, like +the multitude, prove to have chart and compass and definite port in +objective when their conduct is more attentively examined. Victor +Dorn's system was as perfect as it was simple, and he held himself to +it as rigidly as the father superior of a Trappist monastery holds his +monks to their routine. Also, Victor had learned to know and to be on +guard against those two arch-enemies of the man who wishes to "get +somewhere"—self-excuse and optimism. He had got a good strong leash +upon his vanity—and a muzzle, too. When things went wrong he +instantly blamed HIMSELF, and did not rest until he had ferreted out +the stupidity or folly of which HE had been guilty. He did not grieve +over his failures; he held severely scientific post mortems upon them +to discover the reason why—in order that there should not again be +that particular kind of failure at least. Then, as to the other +arch-enemy, optimism, he simply cut himself off from indulgence in it. +He worked for success; he assumed failure. He taught himself to care +nothing about success, but only about doing as intelligently and as +thoroughly as he could the thing next at hand. +</P> + +<P> +What has all this to do with his infatuation for Jane? It serves to +show not only why the Workingmen's League was growing like a plague of +gypsy moth, but also why Victor Dorn was not the man to be conquered by +passion. Naturally, Jane, who had only the vaguest conception of the +size and power of Victor Dorn's mind, could not comprehend wherein lay +the difference between him and the men she read about in novels or met +in her wanderings among the people of her own class in various parts of +the earth. It is possible for even the humblest of us to understand +genius, just as it is possible to view a mountain from all sides and +get a clear idea of it bulk and its dominion. But the hasty traveler +contents himself with a glance, a "How superb," and a quick passing on; +and most of us are hasty travelers in the scenic land of +intellectuality. Jane saw that he was a great man. But she was +deceived by his frankness and his simplicity. She evoked in him only +the emotional side of his nature, only one part of that. +</P> + +<P> +Because it—the only phase of him she attentively examined—was so +impressive, she assumed that it was the chief feature of the man. +</P> + +<P> +Also, young and inexperienced women—and women not so young, and with +opportunity to become less inexperienced but without the ability to +learn by experience—always exaggerate the importance of passion. +Almost without exception, it is by way of passion that a man and a +woman approach each other. It is, of necessity, the exterior that +first comes into view. Thus, all that youth and inexperience can know +about love is its aspect of passion. Because Jane had again and again +in her five grown-up years experienced men falling passionately in love +with her, she fancied she was an expert in matters of love. In fact, +she had still everything to learn. +</P> + +<P> +On the way home she, assuming that the affair was as good as settled, +that she and Victor Dorn were lovers, was busy with plans for the +future. Victor Dorn had made a shrewd guess at the state of her mind. +She had no intention of allowing him to pursue his present career. +That was merely foundation. With the aid of her love and council, and +of her father's money and influence, he—he and she—would mount to +something really worth while—something more than the petty politics of +a third rate city in the West. Washington was the proper arena for his +talents; they would take the shortest route to Washington. No trouble +about bringing him around; a man so able and so sensible as he would +not refuse the opportunity to do good on a grand scale. Besides—he +must be got away from his family, from these doubtless good and kind +but certainly not very high class associates of his, and from Selma +Gordon. The idea of his comparing HER with Selma Gordon! He had not +done so aloud, but she knew what was in his mind. Yes, he must be +taken far away from all these provincial and narrowing associations. +</P> + +<P> +But all this was mere detail. The big problem was how to bring her +father round. He couldn't realize what Victor Dorn would be after she +had taken him in hand. He would see only Victor Dorn, the labor +agitator of Remsen City, the nuisance who put mischievous motives into +the heads of "the hands"—the man who made them think they had heads +when they were intended by the Almighty to be simply hands. How +reconcile him to the idea of accepting this nuisance, this poor, +common member of the working class as a son-in-law, as the husband of +the daughter he wished to see married to some one of the "best" +families? +</P> + +<P> +On the face of it, the thing was impossible. Why, then, did not Jane +despair? For two reasons. In the first place, she was in love, and +that made her an optimist. Somehow love would find the way. But the +second reason—the one she hid from herself deep in the darkest +sub-cellar of her mind, was the real reason. It is one matter to wish +for a person's death. Only a villainous nature can harbor such a wish, +can admit it except as a hastily and slyly in-crawling impulse, to be +flung out the instant it is discovered. It is another matter to +calculate—very secretly, very unconsciously—upon a death that seems +inevitable anyhow. Jane had only to look at her father to feel that he +would not be spared to her long. The mystery was how he had kept alive +so long, how he continued to live from day to day. His stomach was +gone; his whole digestive apparatus was in utter disorder. His body +had shriveled until he weighed no more than a baby. His pulse was so +feeble that even in the hot weather he complained of the cold and had +to be wrapped in the heaviest winter garments. Yet he lived on, and his +mind worked with undiminished vigor. +</P> + +<P> +When Jane reached home, the old man was sitting on the veranda in the +full sun. On his huge head was a fur cap pulled well down over his +ears and intensifying the mortuary, skull-like appearance of his face. +Over his ulster was an old-fashioned Scotch shawl such as men used to +wear in the days before overcoats came into fashion. About his wasted +legs was wrapped a carriage robe, and she knew that there was a +hot-water bag under his feet. Beside him sat young Doctor Charlton, +whom Jane had at last succeeded in inducing her father to try. +Charlton did not look or smell like a doctor. He rather suggested a +professional athlete, perhaps a better class prize fighter. The +weazened old financier was gazing at him with a fascinated +expression—admiring, envious, amused. +</P> + +<P> +Charlton was saying: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, you do look like a dead one. But that's only another of your +tricks for fooling people. You'll live a dozen years unless you commit +suicide. A dozen years? Probably twenty." +</P> + +<P> +"You ought to be ashamed to make sport of a poor old invalid," said +Hastings with a grin. +</P> + +<P> +"Any man who could stand a lunch of crackers and milk for ten years +could outlive anything," retorted Charlton. "No, you belong to the old +stock. You used to see 'em around when you were a boy. They usually +coughed and wheezed, and every time they did it, the family used to get +ready to send for the undertaker. But they lived on and on. When did +your mother die?" +</P> + +<P> +"Couple of years ago," said Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"And your father?" +</P> + +<P> +"He was killed by a colt he was breaking at sixty-seven." +</P> + +<P> +Charlton laughed uproariously. "If you took walks and rides instead of +always sitting round, you never would die," said he. "But you're like +lots of women I know. You'd rather die than take exercise. Still, +I've got you to stop that eating that was keeping you on the verge all +the time." +</P> + +<P> +"You're trying to starve me to death," grumbled Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you feel better, now that you've got used to it and don't feel +hungry?" +</P> + +<P> +"But I'm not getting any nourishment." +</P> + +<P> +"How would eating help you? You can't digest any more than what I'm +allowing you. Do you think you were better off when you were full of +rotting food? I guess not." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—I'm doing as you say," said the old man resignedly. +</P> + +<P> +"And if you keep it up for a year, I'll put you on a horse. If you +don't keep it up, you'll find yourself in a hearse." +</P> + +<P> +Jane stood silently by, listening with a feeling of depression which +she could not have accounted for, if she would—and would not if she +could. Not that she wished her father to die; simply that Charlton's +confidence in his long life forced her to face the only +alternative—bringing him round to accept Victor Dorn. +</P> + +<P> +At her father's next remark she began to listen with a high beating +heart. He said to Charlton: +</P> + +<P> +"How about that there friend of yours—that young Dorn? You ain't +talked about him to-day as much as usual." +</P> + +<P> +"The last time we talked about him we quarreled," said Charlton. "It's +irritating to see a man of your intelligence a slave to silly +prejudices." +</P> + +<P> +"I like Victor Dorn," replied Hastings in a most conciliatory tone. "I +think he's a fine young man. Didn't I have him up here at my house not +long ago? Jane'll tell you that I like him. She likes him, too. But +the trouble with him—and with you, too—is that you're dreaming all +the time. You don't recognize facts. And, so, you make a lot of +trouble for us conservative men." +</P> + +<P> +"Please don't use that word conservative," said Charlton. "It gags me +to hear it. YOU'RE not a conservative. If you had been you'd still be +a farm hand. You've been a radical all your life—changing things +round and round, always according to your idea of what was to your +advantage. The only difference between radicals like you robber +financiers and radicals like Victor and me is that our ideas of what's +to our advantage differ. To you life means money; to us it means +health and comfort and happiness. You want the world changed—laws +upset, liberty destroyed, wages lowered, and so on—so that you can get +all the money. We want the world changed so that we can be healthy and +comfortable and happy—securely so—which we can't be unless everybody +is, or is in the way to being." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was surprised to see that her father, instead of being offended, +was amused and pleased. He liked his new doctor so well that he liked +everything he said and did. Jane looked at Charlton in her friendliest +way. Here might be an ally, and a valuable ally. +</P> + +<P> +"Human nature doesn't change," said Hastings in the tone of a man who +is stating that which cannot be disputed. +</P> + +<P> +"The mischief it doesn't," said Charlton in prompt and vigorous +dissent. "When conditions change, human nature has to change, has to +adapt itself. What you mean is that human nature doesn't change +itself. But conditions change it. They've been changing it very +rapidly these last few years. Science—steam, electricity, a thousand +inventions and discoveries, crowding one upon another—science has +brought about entirely new and unprecedented conditions so rapidly that +the changes in human nature now making and that must be made in the +next few years are resulting in a series of convulsions. You +old-fashioned fellows—and the political parties and the +politicians—are in danger of being stranded. Leaders like Victor +Dorn—movements like our Workingmen's League—they seem new and radical +to-day. By to-morrow they'll be the commonplace thing, found +everywhere—and administering the public affairs." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was not surprised to see an expression of at least partial +admission upon her father's face. Charlton's words were of the kind +that set the imagination to work, that remind those who hear of a +thousand and one familiar related facts bearing upon the same points. +"Well," said Hastings, "I don't expect to see any radical changes in my +time." +</P> + +<P> +"Then you'll not live as long as I think," said Charlton. "We +Americans advance very slowly because this is a big country and +undeveloped, and because we shift about so much that no one stays in +one place long enough to build up a citizenship and get an education in +politics—which is nothing more or less than an education in the art of +living. But slow though we are, we do advance. You'll soon see the +last of Boss Kelly and Boss House—and of such gentle, amiable frauds +as our friend Davy Hull." +</P> + +<P> +Jane laughed merrily. "Why do you call him a fraud?" she asked. +</P> + +<P> +"Because he is a fraud," said Charlton. "He is trying to confuse the +issue. He says the whole trouble is petty dishonesty in public life. +Bosh! The trouble is that the upper and middle classes are milking the +lower class—both with and without the aid of the various governments, +local, state and national. THAT'S the issue. And the reason it is +being forced is because the lower class, the working class, is slowly +awakening to the truth. When it completely awakens——" Charlton made +a large gesture and laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"What then?" said Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"The end of the upper and the middle classes. Everybody will have to +work for a living." +</P> + +<P> +"Who's going to be elected this fall?" asked Jane. "Your man?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Doctor Charlton. "Victor Dorn thinks not. But he always +takes the gloomy view. And he doesn't meet and talk with the fellows +on the other side, as I do." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings was looking out from under the vizor of his cap with a +peculiar grin. It changed to a look of startled inquiry as Charlton +went on to say: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, we'll win. But the Davy Hull gang will get the offices." +</P> + +<P> +"Why do you think that?" asked old Hastings sharply. +</P> + +<P> +Charlton eyed his patient with a mocking smile. "You didn't think any +one knew but you and Kelly—did you?" laughed he. +</P> + +<P> +"Knew what?" demanded Hastings, with a blank stare. +</P> + +<P> +"No matter," said Charlton. "I know what you intend to do. Well, +you'll get away with the goods. But you'll wish you hadn't. You +old-fashioned fellows, as I've been telling you, don't realize that +times have changed." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you mean, Doctor, that the election is to be stolen away from you?" +inquired Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Was that what I meant, Mr. Hastings?" said Charlton. +</P> + +<P> +"The side that loses always shouts thief at the side that wins," said +the old man indifferently. "I don't take any interest in politics." +</P> + +<P> +"Why should you?" said the Doctor audaciously. "You own both sides. +So, it's heads you win, tails I lose." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings laughed heartily. "Them political fellows are a lot of +blackmailers," said he. +</P> + +<P> +"That's ungrateful," said Charlton. "Still, I don't blame you for +liking the Davy Hull crowd better. From them you can get what you want +just the same, only you don't have to pay for it." +</P> + +<P> +He rose and stretched his big frame, with a disregard of conventional +good manners so unconscious that it was inoffensive. +</P> + +<P> +But Charlton had a code of manners of his own, and somehow it seemed to +suit him where the conventional code would have made him seem cheap. +"I didn't mean to look after your political welfare, too," said he. +"But I'll make no charge for that." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I like to hear you young fellows talk," said Martin. "You'll sing +a different song when you're as old as I am and have found out what a +lot of damn fools the human race is." +</P> + +<P> +"As I told you before," said Charlton, "it's conditions that make the +human animal whatever it is. It's in the harness of conditions—the +treadmill of conditions—the straight jacket of conditions. Change the +conditions and you change the animal." +</P> + +<P> +When he was swinging his big powerful form across the lawns toward the +fringe of woods, Jane and her father looking after him, Jane said: +</P> + +<P> +"He's wonderfully clever, isn't he?" +</P> + +<P> +"A dreamer—a crank," replied the old man. +</P> + +<P> +"But what he says sounds reasonable," suggested the daughter. +</P> + +<P> +"It SOUNDS sensible," admitted the old man peevishly. "But it ain't +what <I>I</I> was brought up to call sensible. Don't you get none of those +fool ideas into your head. They're all very well for men that haven't +got any property or any responsibilities—for flighty fellows like +Charlton and that there Victor Dorn. But as soon as anybody gets +property and has interests to look after, he drops that kind of talk." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you mean that property makes a man too blind or too cowardly to +speak the truth?" asked Jane with an air of great innocence. +</P> + +<P> +The old man either did not hear or had no answer ready. He said: +</P> + +<P> +"You heard him say that Davy Hull was going to win?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why, he said Victor Dorn was going to win," said Jane, still simple +and guileless. +</P> + +<P> +Hastings frowned impatiently. "That was just loose talk. He admitted +Davy was to be the next mayor. If he is—and I expect Charlton was +about right—if Davy is elected, I shouldn't be surprised to see him +nominated for governor next year. He's a sensible, knowing fellow. +He'll make a good mayor, and he'll be elected governor on his record." +</P> + +<P> +"And on what you and the other men who run things will do for him," +suggested Jane slyly. +</P> + +<P> +Her father grinned expressively. "I like to see a sensible, ambitious +young fellow from my town get on," said he. "And I'd like to see my +girl married to a fellow of that sort, and settled." +</P> + +<P> +"I think more could be done with a man like Victor Dorn," said Jane. +"It seems to me the Davy Hull sort of politics is—is about played out. +Don't you think so?" +</P> + +<P> +Jane felt that her remark was a piece of wild audacity. But she was +desperate. To her amazement her father did not flare up but kept +silent, wearing the look she knew meant profound reflection. +</P> + +<P> +After a moment he said: +</P> + +<P> +"Davy's a knowing boy. He showed that the other day when he jumped in +and made himself a popular hero. He'd never 'a' been able to come +anywheres near election but for that. Dorn'd 'a' won by a vote so big +that Dick Kelly wouldn't 'a' dared even try to count him out.... +Dorn's a better man than Davy. But Dorn's got a foolish streak in him. +He believes the foolishness he talks, instead of simply talking it to +gain his end. I've been looking him over and thinking him over. He +won't do, Jinny." +</P> + +<P> +Was her father discussing the matter abstractly, impersonally, as he +seemed? Or, had he with that uncanny shrewdness of his somehow +penetrated to her secret—or to a suspicion of it? Jane was so +agitated that she sat silent and rigid, trying to look unconcerned. +</P> + +<P> +"I had a strong notion to try to do something for him," continued the +old man. "But it'd be no use. He'd not rise to a chance that was +offered him. He's set on going his own way." +</P> + +<P> +Jane trembled—dared. "I believe <I>I</I> could do something with him," +said she—and she was pleased with the coolness of her voice, the +complete absence of agitation or of false note. +</P> + +<P> +"Try if you like," said her father. "But I'm sure you'll find I'm +right. Be careful not to commit yourself in any way. But I needn't +warn you. You know how to take care of yourself. Still, maybe you +don't realize how set up he'd be over being noticed by a girl in your +position. And if you gave him the notion that there was a chance for +him to marry you, he'd be after you hammer and tongs. The idea of +getting hold of so much money'd set him crazy." +</P> + +<P> +"I doubt if he cares very much—or at all—about money," said Jane, +judicially. +</P> + +<P> +Hastings grinned satirically. "There ain't nobody that don't care +about money," said he, "any more than there's anybody that don't care +about air to breathe. Put a pin right there, Jinny." +</P> + +<P> +"I hate to think that," she said, reluctantly, "but I'm +afraid—it's—so." +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +As she was taking her ride one morning she met David Hull also on +horseback and out for his health. He turned and they rode together, +for several miles, neither breaking the silence except with an +occasional remark about weather or scenery. Finally Davy said: +</P> + +<P> +"You seem to be down about something, too?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not exactly down," replied Jane. "Simply—I've been doing a lot of +thinking—and planning—or attempt at planning—lately." +</P> + +<P> +"I, too," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"Naturally. How's politics?" +</P> + +<P> +"Of course I don't hear anything but that I'm going to be elected. If +you want to become convinced that the whole world is on the graft, take +part in a reform campaign. We've attracted every broken-down political +crook in this region. It's hard to say which crowd is the more +worthless, the college amateurs at politics or these rotten old +in-goods who can't get employment with either Kelly or House and, so, +have joined us. By Jove, I'd rather be in with the out and out +grafters—the regulars that make no bones of being in politics for the +spoils. There's slimy hypocrisy over our crowd that revolts me. Not a +particle of sincerity or conviction. Nothing but high moral guff." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, but YOU'RE sincere, Davy," said Jane with twinkling eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Am I?" said Davy angrily. "I'm not so damn sure of it." Hastily, "I +don't mean that. Of course, I'm sincere—as sincere as a man can be +and get anywhere in this world. You've got to humbug the people, +because they haven't sense enough to want the truth." +</P> + +<P> +"I guess, Davy," said Jane shrewdly, "if you told them the whole truth +about yourself and your party they'd have sense enough—to vote for +Victor Dorn." +</P> + +<P> +"He's a demagogue," said Davy with an angry jerk at his rein. "He knows +the people aren't fit to rule." +</P> + +<P> +"Who is?" said Jane. "I've yet to see any human creature who could run +anything without making more or less of a mess of it. And—well, +personally, I'd prefer incompetent honest servants to competent ones +who were liars or thieves." +</P> + +<P> +"Sometimes I think," said Davy, "that the only thing to do is to burn +the world up and start another one." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't talk like a man who expected to be elected," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—I'm worrying about myself—not about the election," said Hull, +lapsing into sullen silence. And certainly he had no reason to worry +about the election. He had the Citizen's Alliance and the Democratic +nominations. And, as a further aid to him, Dick Kelly had given the +Republican nomination to Alfred Sawyer, about the most unpopular +manufacturer in that region. Sawyer, a shrewd money maker, was an ass +in other ways, was strongly seized of the itch for public office. +Kelly, seeking the man who would be the weakest, combined business with +good politics; he forced Sawyer to pay fifty thousand dollars into the +"campaign fund" in a lump sum, and was counting confidently upon +"milking" him for another fifty thousand in installments during the +campaign. Thus, in the natural order of things, Davy could safely +assume that he would be the next mayor of Remsen City by a gratifyingly +large majority. The last vote of the Workingmen's League had been made +fifteen hundred. Though it should quadruple its strength at the coming +election—which was most improbable—it would still be a badly beaten +second. Politically, Davy was at ease. +</P> + +<P> +Jane waited ten minutes, then asked abruptly: +</P> + +<P> +"What's become of Selma Gordon?" +</P> + +<P> +"Did you see this week's New Day?" +</P> + +<P> +"Is it out? I've seen no one, and haven't been down town." +</P> + +<P> +"There was a lot of stuff in it against me. Most of it demagoguing, of +course, but more or less hysterical campaigning. The only nasty article +about me—a downright personal attack on my sincerity—was signed +'S.G.'" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—to be sure," said Jane, with smiling insincerity. "I had almost +forgotten what you told me. Well, it's easy enough to bribe her to +silence. Go offer yourself to her." +</P> + +<P> +A long silence, then Davy said: "I don't believe she'd accept me." +</P> + +<P> +"Try it," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +Again a long pause. David said sullenly: "I did." +</P> + +<P> +Selma Gordon had refused David Hull! Half a dozen explanations of this +astounding occurrence rapidly suggested themselves. Jane rejected each +in turn at a glance. "You're sure she understood you?" +</P> + +<P> +"I made myself as clear as I did when I proposed to you," replied Davy +with a lack of tact which a woman of Jane's kind would never forget or +forgive. +</P> + +<P> +Jane winced, ignored. Said she: "You must have insisted on some +conditions she hesitated to accept." +</P> + +<P> +"On her own terms," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +Jane gave up trying to get the real reason from him, sought it in +Selma's own words and actions. She inquired: "What did she say? What +reason did she give?" +</P> + +<P> +"That she owed it to the cause of her class not to marry a man of my +class," answered Hull, believing that he was giving the exact and the +only reason she assigned or had. +</P> + +<P> +Jane gave a faint smile of disdain. "Women don't act from a sense of +duty," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"She's not the ordinary woman," said Hull. "You must remember she +wasn't brought up as you and I were—hasn't our ideas of life. The +things that appeal to us most strongly don't touch her. She knows +nothing about them." He added, "And that's her great charm for me." +</P> + +<P> +Jane nodded sympathetically. Her own case exactly. After a brief +hesitation she suggested: +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps Selma's in love with—some one else." The pause before the +vague "some one else" was almost unnoticeable. +</P> + +<P> +"With Victor Dorn, you mean?" said Davy. "I asked her about that. No, +she's not in love with him." +</P> + +<P> +"As if she'd tell you!" +</P> + +<P> +Davy looked at her a little scornfully. "Don't insinuate," he said. +"You know she would. There's nothing of the ordinary tricky, evasive, +faking woman about her. And although she's got plenty of excuse for +being conceited, she isn't a bit so. She isn't always thinking about +herself, like the girls of our class." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't in the least wonder at your being in love with her, Davy," +said Jane sweetly. "Didn't I tell you I admired your taste—and your +courage?" +</P> + +<P> +"You're sneering at me," said Davy. "All the same, it did take +courage—for I'm a snob at bottom—like you—like all of us who've been +brought up so foolishly—so rottenly. But I'm proud that I had the +courage. I've had a better opinion of myself ever since. And if you +have any unspoiled womanhood in you, you agree with me." +</P> + +<P> +"I do agree with you," said Jane softly. She reached out and laid her +hand on his arm for an instant. "That's honest, Davy." +</P> + +<P> +He gave her a grateful look. "I know it," said he. "The reason I +confide things to you is because I know you're a real woman at bottom, +Jane—the only real person I've ever happened across in our class." +</P> + +<P> +"It took more courage for you to do that sort of thing than it would +for a woman," said Jane. "It's more natural, easier for a woman to +stake everything in love. If she hasn't the man she wants she hasn't +anything, while a man's wife can be a mere detail in his life. He can +forget he's married, most of the time." +</P> + +<P> +"That isn't the way I intend to be married," said Davy. "I want a wife +who'll be half, full half, of the whole. And I'll get her." +</P> + +<P> +"You mean you haven't given up?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why should I? She doesn't love another man. So, there's hope. Don't +you think so?" +</P> + +<P> +Jane was silent. She hastily debated whether it would be wiser to say +yes or to say no. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you think so?" repeated he. +</P> + +<P> +"How can I tell?" replied Jane, diplomatically. "I'd have to see her +with you—see how she feels toward you." +</P> + +<P> +"I think she likes me," said Davy, "likes me a good deal." +</P> + +<P> +Jane kept her smile from the surface. What a man always thought, no +matter how plainly a woman showed that she detested him. "No doubt she +does," said Jane. She had decided upon a course of action. "If I were +you, Davy, I'd keep away from her for the present—give her time to +think it over, to see all the advantages. If a man forces himself on a +queer, wild sort of girl such as Selma is, he's likely to drive her +further away." +</P> + +<P> +Davy reflected. "Guess you're right," said he finally. "My instinct +is always to act—to keep on acting until I get results. But it's +dangerous to do that with Selma. At least, I think so. I don't know. +I don't understand her. I've got nothing to offer her—nothing that +she wants—as she frankly told me. Even if she loved me, I doubt if +she'd marry me—on account of her sense of duty. What you said awhile +ago—about women never doing things from a sense of duty—that shows +how hard it is for a woman to understand what's perfectly simple to a +man. Selma isn't the sheltered woman sort—the sort whose moral +obligations are all looked after by the men of her family. The +old-fashioned woman always belonged to some man—or else was an +outcast. This new style of woman looks at life as a man does." +</P> + +<P> +Jane listened with a somewhat cynical expression. No doubt, in theory, +there was a new style of woman. But practically, the new style of woman +merely TALKED differently; at least, she was still the old-fashioned +woman, longing for dependence upon some man and indifferent to the +obligations men made such a fuss about—probably not so sincerely as +they fancied. But her expression changed when Davy went on to say: +</P> + +<P> +"She'd look at a thing of that sort much as I—or Victor Dorn would." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's heart suddenly sank. Because the unconscious blow had hurt she +struck out, struck back with the first weapon she could lay hold of. +"But you said a minute ago that Victor was a hypocritical demagogue." +</P> + +<P> +Davy flushed with confusion. He was in a franker mood now, however. +"I'd like to think that," he replied. "But I don't honestly believe +it." +</P> + +<P> +"You think that if Victor Dorn loved a woman of our class he'd put her +out of his life?" +</P> + +<P> +"That's hardly worth discussing," said Davy. "No woman of our +class—no woman he'd be likely to look at—would encourage him to the +point where he'd presume upon it." +</P> + +<P> +"How narrow you are!" cried Jane, derisive but even more angry. +</P> + +<P> +"It's different—entirely different—with a man, even in our class. +But a woman of our class—she's a lady or she's nothing at all. And a +lady couldn't be so lacking in refinement as to descend to a man +socially beneath her." +</P> + +<P> +"I can see how ANY woman might fall in love with Victor Dorn." +</P> + +<P> +"You're just saying that to be argumentative," said Davy with +conviction. "Take yourself, for example." +</P> + +<P> +"I confess I don't see any such contrast between Victor and you—except +where the comparison's altogether in his favor," said Jane pleasantly. +"You don't know as much as he does. You haven't the independence of +character—or the courage—or the sincerity. You couldn't be a real +leader, as he is. You have to depend on influence, and on trickery." +</P> + +<P> +A covert glance at the tall, solemn-looking young man riding silently +beside her convinced her that he was as uncomfortable as she had hoped +to make him. +</P> + +<P> +"As for manners—and the things that go to make a gentleman," she went +on, "I'm not sure but that there, too, the comparison is against you. +You always suggest to me that if you hadn't the pattern set for men of +our class and didn't follow it, you'd be absolutely lost, Davy, dear. +While Victor—he's a fine, natural person, with the manners that grow +as naturally out of his personality as oak leaves grow out of an oak." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was astonished and delighted by this eloquence of hers about the +man she loved—an eloquence far above her usual rather commonplace mode +of speech and thought. Love was indeed an inspirer! What a person she +would become when she had Victor always stimulating her. She went on: +</P> + +<P> +"A woman would never grow tired of Victor. He doesn't talk stale stuff +such as all of us get from the stale little professors and stale, +dreary text-books at our colleges." +</P> + +<P> +"Why don't you fall in love with him?" said Davy sourly. +</P> + +<P> +"I do believe you're envious of Victor Dorn," retorted Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"What a disagreeable mood you're in to-day," said Davy. +</P> + +<P> +"So a man always thinks when a woman speaks well of another man in his +presence." +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't suspect you of being envious of Selma. Why should you +suspect me of feeling ungenerously about Victor? Fall in love with him +if you like. Heaven knows, I'd do nothing to stop it." +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps I shall," said Jane, with unruffled amiability. "You're +setting a dangerous example of breaking down class lines." +</P> + +<P> +"Now, Jane, you know perfectly well that while, if I married Selma +she'd belong to my class, a woman of our class marrying Victor Dorn +would sink to his class. Why quarrel about anything so obviously true?" +</P> + +<P> +"Victor Dorn belongs to a class by himself," replied Jane. "You forget +that men of genius are not regarded like you poor ordinary mortals." +</P> + +<P> +Davy was relieved that they had reached the turning at which they had +to separate. "I believe you are in love with him," said he as a +parting shot. +</P> + +<P> +Jane, riding into her lane, laughed gayly, mockingly. She arrived at +home in fine humor. It pleased her that Davy, for all his love for +Selma, could yet be jealous of Victor Dorn on her account. And more +than ever, after this talk with him—the part of it that preceded the +quarrel—she felt that she was doing a fine, brave, haughtily +aristocratic thing in loving Victor Dorn. Only a woman with a royal +soul would venture to be thus audacious. +</P> + +<P> +Should she encourage or discourage the affair between Davy and Selma? +There was much to be said for this way of removing Selma from her path; +also, if a man of Davy Hull's position married beneath him, less would +be thought of her doing the same thing. On the other hand, she felt +that she had a certain property right in David Hull, and that Selma was +taking what belonged to her. This, she admitted to herself, was mean +and small, was unworthy of the woman who was trying to be worthy of +Victor Dorn, of such love as she professed for him. Yes, mean and +small. She must try to conquer it. +</P> + +<P> +But—when she met Selma in the woods a few mornings later, her dominant +emotions were anything but high-minded and generous. Selma was looking +her most fascinating—wild and strange and unique. They caught sight +of each other at the same instant. Jane came composedly on—Selma made +a darting movement toward a by-path opening near her, hesitated, stood +like some shy, lovely bird of the deep wilderness ready to fly away +into hiding. +</P> + +<P> +"Hello, Selma!" said Jane carelessly. +</P> + +<P> +Selma looked at her with wide, serious eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Where have you been keeping yourself of late? Busy with the writing, +I suppose?" +</P> + +<P> +"I owe you an apology," said Selma, in a queer, suppressed voice. "I +have been hating you, and trying to think of some way to keep you and +Victor Dorn apart. I thought it was from my duty to the cause. I've +found out that it was a low, mean personal reason." +</P> + +<P> +Jane had stopped short, was regarding her with eyes that glowed in a +pallid face. "Because you are in love with him?" she said. +</P> + +<P> +Selma gave a quick, shamed nod. "Yes," she said—the sound was +scarcely audible. +</P> + +<P> +Selma's frank and generous—and confiding—self-sacrifice aroused no +response in Jane Hastings. For the first time in her life she was +knowing what it meant to hate. +</P> + +<P> +"And I've got to warn you," Selma went on, "that I am going to do +whatever I can to keep you from hindering him. Not because I love him, +but because I owe it to the cause. He belongs to it, and I must help +him be single-hearted for it. You could only be a bad influence in his +life. I think you would like to be a sincere woman; but you can't. +Your class is too strong for you. So—it would be wrong for Victor Dorn +to love and to marry you. I think he realizes it and is struggling to +be true to himself. I intend to help him, if I can." +</P> + +<P> +Jane smiled cruelly. "What hypocrisy!" she said, and turned and walked +away. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VIII +</H3> + +<P> +In America we have been bringing up our women like men, and treating +them like children. They have active minds with nothing to act upon. +Thus they are driven to think chiefly about themselves. With Jane +Hastings, self-centering took the form of self-analysis most of the +time. She was intensely interested in what she regarded as the new +development of her character. This definite and apparently final +decision for the narrow and the ungenerous. In fact, it was no new +development, but simply a revelation to herself of her own real +character. She was seeing at last the genuine Jane Hastings, +inevitable product of a certain heredity in a certain environment. The +high thinking and talking, the idealistic aspiration were pose and +pretense. Jane Hastings was a selfish, self-absorbed person, ready to +do almost any base thing to gain her ends, ready to hate to the +uttermost any one who stood between her and her object. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm certainly not a lovely person—not a lovable person," thought she, +with that gentle tolerance wherewith we regard our ownselves, whether +in the dress of pretense or in the undress of deformed humanness. +"Still—I am what I am, and I've got to make the best of it." +</P> + +<P> +As she thought of Selma's declaration of war she became less and less +disturbed about it. Selma neither would nor could do anything sly. +Whatever she attempted in the open would only turn Victor Dorn more +strongly toward herself. However, she must continue to try to see him, +must go to see him in a few days if she did not happen upon him in her +rides or walks. How poorly he would think of her if he knew the truth +about her! But then, how poor most women—and men, too—would look in +a strong and just light. Few indeed could stand idealizing; except +Victor, no one she knew. And he was human enough not to make her +uncomfortable in his presence. +</P> + +<P> +But it so happened that before she could see Victor Dorn her father +disobeyed Dr. Charlton and gave way to the appetite that was the chief +cause of his physical woes. He felt so well that he ate the family +dinner, including a peach cobbler with whipped cream, which even the +robust Jane adventured warily. Martha was dining with them. She +abetted her father. "It's light," said she. "It couldn't harm +anybody." +</P> + +<P> +"You mustn't touch it, popsy," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +She unthinkingly spoke a little too commandingly. Her father, in a +perverse and reckless mood, took Martha's advice. An hour later Dr. +Charlton was summoned, and had he not arrived promptly—— +</P> + +<P> +"Another fifteen or twenty minutes," said he to the old man when he had +him out of immediate danger, "and I'd have had nothing to do but sign a +certificate of natural death." +</P> + +<P> +"Murder would have been nearer the truth," said Martin feebly. "That +there fool Martha!" +</P> + +<P> +"Come out from behind that petticoat!" cried Charlton. "Didn't I spend +the best part of three days in giving you the correct ideas as to +health and disease—in showing you that ALL disease comes from +indigestion—ALL disease, from falling hair and sore eyes to weak +ankles and corns? And didn't I convince you that you could eat only +the things I told you about?" +</P> + +<P> +"Don't hit a man when he's down," groaned Hastings. +</P> + +<P> +"If I don't, you'll do the same idiotic trick again when I get you +up—if I get you up." +</P> + +<P> +Hastings looked quickly at him. This was the first time Charlton had +ever expressed a doubt about his living. "Do you mean that?" he said +hoarsely. "Or are you just trying to scare me?" +</P> + +<P> +"Both," said Charlton. "I'll do my best, but I can't promise. I've +lost confidence in you. No wonder doctors, after they've been in +practice a few years, stop talking food and digestion to their +patients. I've never been able to convince a single human being that +appetite is not the sign of health, and yielding to it the way to +health. But I've made lots of people angry and have lost their trade. +I had hopes of you. You were such a hopeless wreck. But no. And you +call yourself an intelligent man!" +</P> + +<P> +"I'll never do it again," said Hastings, pleading, but smiling, +too—Charlton's way of talking delighted him. +</P> + +<P> +"You think this is a joke," said Charlton, shaking his bullet head. +"Have you any affairs to settle? If you have, send for your lawyer in +the morning." +</P> + +<P> +Fear—the Great Fear—suddenly laid its icy long fingers upon the +throat of the old man. He gasped and his eyes rolled. "Don't trifle +with me, Charlton," he muttered. "You know you will pull me through." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll do my best," said Charlton. "I promise nothing. I'm serious +about the lawyer." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't want no lawyer hanging round my bed," growled the old man. +"It'd kill me. I've got nothing to settle. I don't run things with +loose ends. And there's Jinny and Marthy and the boy—share and share +alike." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—you're in no immediate danger. I'll come early to-morrow." +</P> + +<P> +"Wait till I get to sleep." +</P> + +<P> +"You'll be asleep as soon as the light's down. But I'll stop a few +minutes and talk to your daughter." +</P> + +<P> +Charlton found Jane at the window in the dressing room next her +father's bedroom. He said loudly enough for the old man to overhear: +</P> + +<P> +"Your father's all right for the present, so you needn't worry. Come +downstairs with me. He's to go to sleep now." +</P> + +<P> +Jane went in and kissed the bulging bony forehead. "Good night, popsy." +</P> + +<P> +"Good night, Jinny dear," he said in a softer voice than she had ever +heard from him. "I'm feeling very comfortable now, and sleepy. If +anything should happen, don't forget what I said about not temptin' +your brother by trustin' him too fur. Look after your own affairs. +Take Mr. Haswell's advice. He's stupid, but he's honest and careful +and safe. You might talk to Dr. Charlton about things, too. He's +straight, and knows what's what. He's one of them people that gives +everybody good advice but themselves. If anything should happen——" +</P> + +<P> +"But nothing's going to happen, popsy." +</P> + +<P> +"It might. I don't seem to care as much as I did. I'm so tarnation +tired. I reckon the goin' ain't as bad as I always calculated. I +didn't know how tired they felt and anxious to rest." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll turn down the light. The nurse is right in there." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—turn the light. If anything should happen, there's an envelope +in the top drawer in my desk for Dr. Charlton. But don't tell him till +I'm gone. I don't trust nobody, and if he knowed there was something +waiting, why, there's no telling——" +</P> + +<P> +The old man had drowsed off. Jane lowered the light and went down to +join Charlton on the front veranda, where he was smoking a cigarette. +She said: +</P> + +<P> +"He's asleep." +</P> + +<P> +"He's all right for the next few days," said Charlton. "After that—I +don't know. I'm very doubtful." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was depressed, but not so depressed as she would have been had not +her father so long looked like death and so often been near dying. +</P> + +<P> +"Stay at home until I see how this is going to turn out. Telephone your +sister to be within easy call. But don't let her come here. She's not +fit to be about an ill person. The sight of her pulling a long, sad +face might carry him off in a fit of rage." +</P> + +<P> +Jane observed him with curiosity in the light streaming from the front +hall. "You're a very practical person aren't you?" she said. +</P> + +<P> +"No romance, no idealism, you mean?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +He laughed in his plain, healthy way. "Not a frill," said he. "I'm +interested only in facts. They keep me busy enough." +</P> + +<P> +"You're not married, are you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not yet. But I shall be as soon as I find a woman I want." +</P> + +<P> +"IF you can get her." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll get her, all right," replied he. "No trouble about that. The +woman I want'll want me." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm eager to see her," said Jane. "She'll be a queer one." +</P> + +<P> +"Not necessarily," said he. "But I'll make her a queer one before I +get through with her—queer, in my sense, meaning sensible and useful." +</P> + +<P> +"You remind me so often of Victor Dorn, yet you're not at all like him." +</P> + +<P> +"We're in the same business—trying to make the human race fit to +associate with. He looks after the minds; I look after the bodies. +Mine's the humbler branch of the business, perhaps—but it's equally +necessary, and it comes first. The chief thing that's wrong with human +nature is bad health. I'm getting the world ready for Victor." +</P> + +<P> +"You like him?" +</P> + +<P> +"I worship him," said Charlton in his most matter-of-fact way. +</P> + +<P> +"Yet he's just the opposite of you. He's an idealist." +</P> + +<P> +"Who told you that?" laughed Charlton. "He's the most practical, +sensible man in this town. You people think he's a crank because he +isn't crazy about money or about stepping round on the necks of his +fellow beings. The truth is, he's got a sense of proportion—and a +sense of humor—and an idea of a rational happy life. You're still +barbarians, while he's a civilized man. Ever seen an ignorant yap jeer +when a neat, clean, well-dressed person passed by? Well, you people +jeering at Victor Dorn are like that yap." +</P> + +<P> +"I agree with you," said Jane hastily and earnestly. +</P> + +<P> +"No, you don't," replied Charlton, tossing away the end of his +cigarette. "And so much the worse for you. Good-night, lady." +</P> + +<P> +And away he strode into the darkness, leaving her amused, yet with a +peculiar sense of her own insignificance. +</P> + +<P> +Charlton was back again early the next morning and spent that day—and +a large part of many days there-after—in working at the wreck, Martin +Hastings, inspecting known weak spots, searching for unknown ones, +patching here and there, trying all the schemes teeming in his +ingenious and supremely sensible mind in the hope of setting the wreck +afloat again. He could not comprehend why the old man remained alive. +He had seen many a human being go who was in health, in comparison with +this conglomerate of diseases and frailties; yet life there was, and a +most tenacious life. He worked and watched, and from day to day put +off suggesting that they telegraph for the son. The coming of his son +might shake Martin's conviction that he would get well; it seemed to +Charlton that that conviction was the one thread holding his patient +from the abyss where darkness and silence reign supreme. +</P> + +<P> +Jane could not leave the grounds. If she had she would have seen +Victor Dorn either not at all or at a distance. For the campaign was +now approaching its climax. +</P> + +<P> +The public man is always two wholly different personalities. There is +the man the public sees—and fancies it knows. There is the man known +only to his intimates, known imperfectly to them, perhaps an unknown +quantity even to himself until the necessity for decisive action +reveals him to himself and to those in a position to see what he really +did. Unfortunately, it is not the man the public sees but the hidden +man who is elected to the office. Nothing could be falser than the old +saw that sooner or later a man stands revealed. Sometimes, as we well +know, history has not found out a man after a thousand years of +studying him. And the most familiar, the most constantly observed men +in public life often round out a long career without ever having +aroused in the public more than a faint and formless suspicion as to +the truth about them. +</P> + +<P> +The chief reason for this is that, in studying a character, no one is +content with the plain and easy way of reaching an understanding of +it—the way of looking only at its ACTS. We all love to dabble in the +metaphysical, to examine and weigh motives and intentions, to compare +ourselves and make wildly erroneous judgment inevitable by listening to +the man's WORDS—his professions, always more or less dishonest, though +perhaps not always deliberately so. +</P> + +<P> +In that Remsen City campaign the one party that could profit by the +full and clear truth, and therefore was eager for the truth as to +everything and everybody, was the Workingmen's League. The Kelly +crowd, the House gang, the Citizens' Alliance, all had their ugly +secrets, their secret intentions different from their public +professions. All these were seeking office and power with a view to +increasing or perpetuating or protecting various abuses, however +ardently they might attack, might perhaps honestly intend to end, +certain other and much smaller abuses. The Workingmen's League said +that it would end every abuse existing law did not securely protect, +and it meant what it said. +</P> + +<P> +Its campaign fund was the dues paid in by its members and the profits +from the New Day. Its financial books were open for free inspection. +Not so the others—and that in itself was proof enough of sinister +intentions. +</P> + +<P> +Under Victor Dorn's shrewd direction, the League candidates published, +each man in a sworn statement, a complete description of all the +property owned by himself and by his wife. "The character of a man's +property," said the New Day, "is an indication of how that man will act +in public affairs. Therefore, every candidate for public trust owes it +to the people to tell them just what his property interests are. The +League candidates do this—and an effective answer the schedules make +to the charge that the League's candidates are men who have 'no stake +in the community.' Now, let Mr. Sawyer, Mr. Hull, Mr. Galland and the +rest of the League's opponents do likewise. Let us read how many +shares of water and ice stock Mr. Sawyer owns. Let us hear from Mr. +Hull about his traction holdings—those of the Hull estate from which +he draws his entire income. As for Mr. Galland, it would be easier for +him to give the list of public and semi-public corporations in which he +is not largely interested. But let him be specific, since he asks the +people to trust him as judge between them and those corporations of +which he is almost as large an owner as is his father-in-law." +</P> + +<P> +This line of attack—and the publication of the largest contributors to +the Republican and Democratic-Reform campaign fund—caused a great deal +of public and private discussion. Large crowds cheered Hull when he, +without doing the charges the honor of repeating them, denounced the +"undignified and demagogic methods of our desperate opponents." The +smaller Sawyer crowds applauded Sawyer when he waxed indignant over the +attempts of those "socialists and anarchists, haters of this free +country and spitters upon its glorious flag, to set poor against rich, +to destroy our splendid American tradition of a free field and no +favors, and let the best man win!" +</P> + +<P> +Sawyer, and Davy, all the candidates of the machines and the reformers +for that matter, made excellent public appearances. They discoursed +eloquently about popular rights and wrongs. They denounced corruption; +they stood strongly for the right and renounced and denounced the devil +and all his works. They promised to do far more for the people than +did the Leaguers; for Victor Dorn had trained his men to tell the exact +truth—the difficulty of doing anything for the people at any near time +or in any brief period because at a single election but a small part of +the effective offices could be changed, and sweeping changes must be +made before there could be sweeping benefits. "We'll do all we can," +was their promise. "Their county government and their state government +and their courts won't let us do much. But a beginning has to be made. +Let's make it!" +</P> + +<P> +David Hull's public appearance was especially good. Not so effective +as it has now become, because he was only a novice at campaigning in +that year. But he looked, well—handsome, yet not too handsome, upper +class, but not arrogant, serious, frank and kindly. And he talked in a +plain, honest way—you felt that no interest, however greedy, desperate +and powerful, would dare approach that man with an improper +proposal—and you quite forgot in real affairs the crude improper +proposal is never the method of approach. When Davy, with grave +emotion, referred to the "pitiful efforts to smirch the personal +character of candidates," you could not but burn with scorn of the +Victor Dorn tactics. What if Hull did own gas and water and ice and +traction and railway stocks? Mustn't a rich man invest his money +somehow? And how could he more creditably invest it than in local +enterprises and in enterprises that opened up the country and gave +employment to labor? What if the dividends were improperly, even +criminally, earned? Must he therefore throw the dividends paid him +into the street? As for a man of such associations and financial +interests being unfit fairly to administer public affairs, what +balderdash! Who could be more fit than this educated, high minded man, +of large private means, willing to devote himself to the public service +instead of drinking himself to death or doing nothing at all. You +would have felt, as you looked at Davy and listened to him, that it was +little short of marvelous that a man could be so self-sacrificing as to +consent to run the gauntlet of low mudslingers for no reward but an +office with a salary of three thousand a year. And you would have been +afraid that, if something was not done to stop these mudslingers, such +men as David Hull would abandon their patriotic efforts to save their +country—and then WHAT would become of the country? +</P> + +<P> +But Victor and his associates—on the platform, in the paper, in +posters and dodgers and leaflets—continued to press home the ugly +questions—and continued to call attention to the fact that, while +there had been ample opportunity, none of the candidates had answered +any of the questions. And presently—keeping up this line of +attack—Victor opened out in another. He had Falconer, the League +candidate for judge, draw up a careful statement of exactly what each +public officer could do under existing law to end or to check the most +flagrant of the abuses from which the people of Remsen City were +suffering. With this statement as a basis, he formulated a series of +questions—"Yes or no? If you are elected, will you or will you not?" +The League candidates promptly gave the specific pledges. Sawyer +dodged. David Hull was more adroit. He held up a copy of the list of +questions at a big meeting in Odd Fellows' Hall. +</P> + +<P> +"Our opponents have resorted to a familiar trick—the question and the +pledge." (Applause. Sensation. Fear lest "our candidate" was about +to "put his foot in it.") "We need resort to no tricks. I promptly +and frankly, for our whole ticket, answer their questions. I say, 'We +will lay hold of ANY and EVERY abuse, as soon as it presents itself, +and WILL SMASH IT." +</P> + +<P> +Applause, cheers, whistlings—a demonstration lasting nearly five +minutes by a watch held by Gamaliel Tooker, who had a mania for +gathering records of all kinds and who had voted for every Republican +candidate for President since the party was founded. Davy did not again +refer to Victor Dorn's questions. But Victor continued to press them +and to ask whether a public officer ought not to go and present himself +to abuses, instead of waiting for them to hunt him out and present +themselves to him. +</P> + +<P> +Such was the campaign as the public saw it. And such was in reality +the campaign of the Leaguers. But the real campaign—the one conducted +by Kelly and House—was entirely different. They were not talking; +they were working. +</P> + +<P> +They were working on a plan based somewhat after this fashion: +</P> + +<P> +In former and happier days, when people left politics to politicians +and minded their own business, about ninety-five per cent. of the +voters voted their straight party tickets like good soldiers. Then +politics was a high-class business, and politicians devoted themselves +to getting out the full party vote and to buying or cajoling to one +side or the other the doubtful ten per cent that held the balance of +power. That golden age, however, had passed. People had gotten into +the habit of fancying that, because certain men had grown very, very +rich through their own genius for money-making, supplemented perhaps by +accidental favors from law and public officials, therefore politics in +some way might possibly concern the private citizen, might account for +the curious discrepancy between his labor and its reward. The +impression was growing that, while the energy of the citizen determined +the PRODUCTION of wealth, it was politics that determined the +distribution of wealth. And under the influence of this impression, +the percentage of sober, steady, reliable voters who "stood by the +grand old party" had shrunk to about seventy, while the percentage of +voters who had to be worried about had grown to about thirty. +</P> + +<P> +The Kelly-House problem was, what shall we do as to that annoying +thirty per cent? +</P> + +<P> +Kelly—for he was THE brain of the bi-partisan machine, proposed to +throw the election to the House-Reform "combine." His henchmen and +House's made a careful poll, and he sat up all night growing haggard +and puffy-eyed over the result. According to this poll, not only was +the League's entire ticket to be elected, but also Galland, despite his +having the Republican, the Democratic and the Reform nominations, was +to be beaten by the League's Falconer. He couldn't understand it. The +Sawyer meetings were quite up to his expectations and indicated that +the Republican rank and file was preparing to swallow the Sawyer dose +without blinking. The Alliance and the Democratic meetings were +equally satisfactory. Hull was "making a hit." Everywhere he had big +crowds and enthusiasm. The League meetings were only slightly better +attended than during the last campaign; no indication there of the +League "landslide." +</P> + +<P> +Yet Kelly could not, dared not, doubt that poll. It was his only safe +guide. And it assured him that the long-dreaded disaster was at hand. +In vain was the clever trick of nominating a popular, "clean" young +reformer and opposing him with an unpopular regular of the most +offensive type—more offensive even than a professional politician of +unsavory record. At last victory was to reward the tactics of Victor +Dorn, the slow, patient building which for several years now had been +rasping the nerves of Boss Kelly. +</P> + +<P> +What should he do? +</P> + +<P> +It was clear to him that the doom of the old system was settled. The +plutocrats, the upper-class crowd—the "silk stockings," as they had +been called from the days when men wore knee-breeches—they fancied +that this nation-wide movement was sporadic, would work out in a few +years, and that the people would return to their allegiance. Kelly had +no such delusions. Issuing from the depths of the people, he +understood. They were learning a little something at last. They were +discovering that the ever higher prices for everything and stationary +or falling wages and salaries had some intimate relation with politics; +that at the national capitol, at the state capitol, in the county +courthouse, in the city hall their share of the nation's vast annual +production of wealth was being determined—and that the persons doing +the dividing, though elected by them, were in the employ of the +plutocracy. Kelly, seeing and comprehending, felt that it behooved him +to get for his masters—and for himself—all that could be got in the +brief remaining time. Not that he was thinking of giving up the game; +nothing so foolish as that. It would be many a year before the +plutocracy could be routed out, before the people would have the +intelligence and the persistence to claim and to hold their own. In +the meantime, they could be fooled and robbed by a hundred tricks. He +was not a constitutional lawyer, but he had practical good sense, and +could enjoy the joke upon the people in their entanglement in the toils +of their own making. Through fear of governmental tyranny they had +divided authority among legislators, executives and judges, national, +state, local. And, behold, outside of the government, out where they +had never dreamed of looking, had grown up a tyranny that was +perpetuating itself by dodging from one of these divided authorities to +another, eluding capture, wearing out the not too strong perseverance +of popular pursuit. +</P> + +<P> +But, thanks to Victor Dorn, the local graft was about to be taken away +from the politicians and the plutocracy. How put off that unpleasant +event? Obviously, in the only way left unclosed. The election must be +stolen. +</P> + +<P> +It is a very human state of mind to feel that what one wants somehow +has already become in a sense one's property. It is even more +profoundly human to feel that what one has had, however wrongfully, +cannot justly be taken away. So Mr. Kelly did not regard himself as a +thief, taking what did not belong to him; no, he was holding on to and +defending his own. +</P> + +<P> +Victor Dorn had not been in politics since early boyhood without +learning how the political game is conducted in all its branches. +</P> + +<P> +Because there had never been the remotest chance of victory, Victor had +never made preelection polls of his party. So the first hint that he +got of there being a real foundation for the belief of some of his +associates in an impending victory was when he found out that Kelly and +House were "colonizing" voters, and were selecting election officers +with an eye to "dirty work." These preparations, he knew, could not be +making for the same reason as in the years before the "gentlemen's +agreement" between the Republican and the Democratic machines. Kelly, +he knew, wanted House and the Alliance to win. Therefore, the +colonizations in the slums and the appointing of notorious buckos to +positions where they would control the ballot boxes could be directed +only against the Workingmen's League. Kelly must have accurate +information that the League was likely, or at least not unlikely, to +win. +</P> + +<P> +Victor had thought he had so schooled himself that victory and defeat +were mere words to him. He soon realized how he had overestimated the +power of philosophy over human nature. During that campaign he had +been imagining that he was putting all his ability, all his energy, all +his resourcefulness into the fight. He now discovered his mistake. +Hope—definite hope—of victory had hardly entered his mind before he +was organizing and leading on such a campaign as Remsen City had never +known in all its history—and Remsen City was in a state where politics +is the chief distraction of the people. Sleep left him; he had no need +of sleep. Day and night his brain worked, pouring out a steady stream +of ideas. He became like a gigantic electric storage battery to which +a hundred, a thousand small batteries come for renewal. He charged his +associates afresh each day. And they in turn became amazingly more +powerful forces for acting upon the minds of the people. +</P> + +<P> +In the last week of the campaign it became common talk throughout the +city that the "Dorn crowd" would probably carry the election. Kelly +was the only one of the opposition leaders who could maintain a calm +front. Kelly was too seasoned a gambler even to show his feelings in +his countenance, but, had he been showing them, his following would not +have been depressed, for he had made preparations to meet and overcome +any majority short of unanimity which the people might roll up against +him. The discouragement in the House-Alliance camps became so apparent +that Kelly sent his chief lieutenant, Wellman, successor to the +fugitive Rivers, to House and to David Hull with a message. It was +delivered to Hull in this form: +</P> + +<P> +"The old man says he wants you to stop going round with your chin +knocking against your knees. He says everybody is saying you have +given up the fight." +</P> + +<P> +"Our meetings these last few days are very discouraging," said Davy +gloomily. +</P> + +<P> +"What's meetin's?" retorted Wellman. "You fellows that shoot off your +mouths think you're doing the campaigning. But the real stuff is being +doped up by us fellows who ain't seen or heard. The old man says you +are going to win. That's straight. He knows. It's only a question of +the size of your majority. So pull yourself together, Mr. Hull, and +put the ginger back into your speeches, and stir up that there gang of +dudes. What a gang of Johnnies and quitters they are!" +</P> + +<P> +Hull was looking directly and keenly at the secret messenger. Upon his +lips was a question he dared not ask. Seeing the impudent, disdainful +smile in Wellman's eyes, he hastily shifted his glance. It was most +uncomfortable, this suspicion of the hidden meaning of the Kelly +message—a suspicion ALMOST confirmed by that mocking smile of the +messenger. Hull said with embarrassment: +</P> + +<P> +"Tell Mr. Kelly I'm much obliged." +</P> + +<P> +"And you'll begin to make a fight again?" +</P> + +<P> +"Certainly," said Davy impatiently. +</P> + +<P> +When he was alone he became once more involved in one of those internal +struggles to prevent himself from seeing—and smelling—a hideous and +malodorous truth. These struggles were painfully frequent. The only +consolation the young reformer found was that they were increasingly +less difficult to end in the way such struggles must be ended if a +high-minded young man is to make a career in "practical" life. +</P> + +<P> +On election day after he had voted he went for a long walk in the woods +to the south of the town, leaving word at his headquarters what +direction he had taken. After walking two hours he sat down on a log +in the shade near where the highroad crossed Foaming Creek. He became +so absorbed in his thoughts that he sprang to his feet with a wild look +when Selma's voice said, close by: +</P> + +<P> +"May I interrupt a moment, Mr. Hull?" +</P> + +<P> +He recovered slowly. His cheeks were pale and his voice uncertain as +he replied: +</P> + +<P> +"You? I beg your pardon. This campaign has played smash with my +nerves." +</P> + +<P> +He now noted that she was regarding him with a glance so intense that +it seemed to concentrate all the passion and energy in that slim, +nervous body of hers. He said uncomfortably: +</P> + +<P> +"You wished to see me?" +</P> + +<P> +"I wonder what you were thinking about," she said in her impetuous, +direct way. "It makes me almost afraid to ask what I came to ask." +</P> + +<P> +"Won't you sit?" said he. +</P> + +<P> +"No, thanks," replied she. +</P> + +<P> +"Then you'll compel me to stand. And I'm horribly tired." +</P> + +<P> +She seated herself upon the log. He made himself comfortable at its +other end. +</P> + +<P> +"I've just come from Victor Dorn's house," said she. "There was a +consultation among the leaders of our party. We have learned that your +people—Kelly and House—are going to steal the election on the count +this evening. They are committing wholesale frauds now—sending round +gangs of repeaters, intimidating our voters, openly buying votes at the +polling places—paying men as much not to vote as they usually pay for +votes." +</P> + +<P> +Davy, though latterly he had grown so much older and graver that no one +now thought of him as Davy, contrived to muster a smile of amusement. +"You oughtn't to let them deceive you with that silly talk, Miss +Gordon. The losers always indulge in it. Your good sense must tell +you how foolish it is. The police are on guard, and the courts of +justice are open." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—the police are on guard—to protect fraud and to drive us away +from the polls. And the courts are open—but not for us." +</P> + +<P> +David was gentle with her. "I know how sincere you are, Selma," said +he. "No doubt you believe those things. Perhaps Dorn believes them, +also—from repeating them so often. But all the same I'm sorry to hear +you say them." +</P> + +<P> +He tried to look at her. He found that his eyes were more comfortable +when his glance was elsewhere. +</P> + +<P> +"This has been a sad campaign to me," he went on. "I did not +appreciate before what demagogery meant—how dangerous it is—how +wicked, how criminally wicked it is for men to stir up the lower +classes against the educated leadership of the community." +</P> + +<P> +Selma laughed contemptuously. "What nonsense, David Hull—and from +YOU!" she cried. "By educated leadership do you mean the traction and +gas and water and coal and iron and produce thieves? Or do you mean the +officials and the judges who protect them and license them to rob?" +Her eyes flashed. "At this very moment, in our town, those thieves and +their agents, the police and the courts, are committing the most +frightful crime known to a free people. Yet the masses are submitting +peaceably. How long the upper class has to indulge in violence, and +how savagely cruel it has to be, before the people even murmur. But I +didn't come here to remind you of what you already know. I came to ask +you, as a man whom I have respected, to assert his manhood—if there is +any of it left after this campaign of falsehood and shifting." +</P> + +<P> +"Selma!" he protested energetically, but still avoiding her eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Those wretches are stealing that election for you, David Hull. Are you +going to stand for it? Or, will you go into town and force Kelly to +stop?" +</P> + +<P> +"If anything wrong is being done by Kelly," said David, "it must be for +Sawyer." +</P> + +<P> +Selma rose. "At our consultation," said she quietly and even with no +suggestion of repressed emotion, "they debated coming to you and laying +the facts before you. They decided against it. They were right; I was +wrong. I pity you, David Hull. Good-by." +</P> + +<P> +She walked away. He hesitated, observing her. His eyes lighted up +with the passion he believed his good sense had conquered. "Selma, +don't misjudge me!" he cried, following her. "I am not the scoundrel +they're making you believe me. I love you!" +</P> + +<P> +She wheeled upon him so fiercely that he started back. "How dare you!" +she said, her voice choking with anger. "You miserable fraud! You +bellwether for the plutocracy, to lead reform movements off on a false +scent, off into the marshes where they'll be suffocated." She looked +at him from head to foot with a withering glance. "No doubt, you'll +have what's called a successful career. You'll be their traitor leader +for the radicals they want to bring to confusion. When the people cry +for a reform you'll shout louder than anybody else—and you'll be made +leader—and you'll lead—into the marshes. Your followers will perish, +but you'll come back, ready for the next treachery for which the +plutocracy needs you. And you'll look honest and respectable—and +you'll talk virtue and reform and justice. But you'll know what you +are yourself. David Hull, I despise you as much as you despise +yourself." +</P> + +<P> +He did not follow as she walked away. He returned to the log, and +slowly reseated himself. He was glad of the violent headache that made +thought impossible. +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +Remsen City, boss-ridden since the Civil War, had experienced many a +turbulent election day and night. The rivalries of the two bosses, +contending for the spoils where the electorate was evenly divided, had +made the polling places in the poorer quarters dangerous all day and +scenes of rioting at night. But latterly there had been a notable +improvement. People who entertained the pleasant and widespread +delusion that statute laws offset the habits and customs of men, +restrain the strong and protect the weak, attributed the improvement to +sundry vigorously worded enactments of the legislature on the subject +of election frauds. In fact, the real bottom cause of the change was +the "gentlemen's agreement" between the two party machines whereunder +both entered the service of the same master, the plutocracy. +</P> + +<P> +Never in Remsen City history had there been grosser frauds than those +of this famous election day, and never had the frauds been so open. A +day of scandal was followed by an evening of shame; for to overcome the +League the henchmen of Kelly and House had to do a great deal of +counting out and counting in, of mutilating ballots, of destroying +boxes with their contents. Yet never had Remsen City seen so peaceful +an election. Representatives of the League were at every polling +place. They protested; they took names of principals and witnesses in +each case of real or suspected fraud. They appealed to the courts from +time to time and got rulings—always against them, even where the +letter of the decision was in their favor. They did all this in the +quietest manner conceivable, without so much as an expression of +indignation. And when the results were announced—a sweeping victory +for Hull and the fusion ticket, Hugo Galland elected by five hundred +over Falconer—the Leaguers made no counter demonstration as the +drunken gangs of machine heelers paraded in the streets with bands and +torches. +</P> + +<P> +Kelly observed and was uneasy. What could be the meaning of this meek +acceptance of a theft so flagrant that the whole town was talking about +it? What was Victor Dorn's "game"? +</P> + +<P> +He discovered the next day. The executive committee of the League +worked all night; the League's printers and presses worked from six +o'clock in the morning until ten. At half-past ten Remsen City was +flooded with a special edition of the New Day, given away by Leaguers +and their wives and sons and daughters—a monster special edition paid +for with the last money in the League's small campaign chest. This +special was a full account of the frauds that had been committed. No +indictment could have been more complete, could have carried within +itself more convincing proofs of the truth of its charges. The New Day +declared that the frauds were far more extensive than it was able to +prove; but it insisted upon, and took into account, only those frauds +that could be proved in a "court of justice—if Remsen City had a court +of justice, which the treatment of the League's protectors at the +Courthouse yesterday shows that it has not." The results of the +League's investigations were tabulated. The New Day showed: +</P> + +<P> +First, that while Harbinger, the League candidate for Mayor, had +actually polled 5,280 votes at least, and David Hull had polled less +than 3,950, the election had been so manipulated that in the official +count 4,827 votes were given to Hull and 3,980 votes to Harbinger. +</P> + +<P> +Second, that in the actual vote Falconer had beaten Hugo Galland by +1,230 at least; that in the official count Galland was declared elected +by a majority of 672. +</P> + +<P> +Third, that these results were brought about by wholesale fraudulent +voting, one gang of twenty-two repeaters casting upwards of a thousand +votes at the various polling places; also by false counting, the number +of votes reported exceeding the number cast by between two and three +thousand. +</P> + +<P> +As a piece of workmanship the document was an amazing illustration of +the genius of Victor Dorn. Instead of violence against violence, +instead of vague accusation, here was a calm, orderly proof of the +League's case, of the outrage that had been done the city and its +citizens. Before night fell the day after the election there was no +one in Remsen City who did not know the truth. +</P> + +<P> +The three daily newspapers ignored the special. They continued to +congratulate Remsen City upon the "vindication of the city's fame for +sound political sense," as if there had been no protest against the +official version of the election returns. Nor did the press of the +state or the country contain any reference to the happenings at Remsen +City. But Remsen City knew, and that was the main point sought by +Victor Dorn. +</P> + +<P> +A committee of the League with copies of the special edition and +transcripts of the proofs in the possession of the League went in +search of David Hull and Hugo Galland. Both were out of town, "resting +in retirement from the fatigue of the campaign." The prosecuting +attorney of the county was seen, took the documents, said he would look +into the matter, bowed the committee out—and did as Kelly counted on +his doing. The grand jury heard, but could not see its way clear to +returning indictments; no one was upon a grand jury in that county +unless he had been passed by Kelly or House. Judge Freilig and Judge +Lansing referred the committee to the grand jury and to the county +prosecutor. +</P> + +<P> +When the League had tried the last avenue to official justice and had +found the way barred, House meeting Kelly in the Palace Hotel cafe', +said: +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Richard, I guess it's all over." Kelly nodded. "You've got away +with the goods." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm surprised at Dorn's taking it so quietly," said House. "I rather +expected he'd make trouble." +</P> + +<P> +Kelly vented a short, grunting laugh. "Trouble—hell!" ejaculated he. +"If he'd 'a' kicked up a fight we'd 'a' had him. But he was too 'cute +for that, damn him. So next time he wins." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, folks ain't got no memories—especially for politics," said House +easily. +</P> + +<P> +"You'll see," retorted Kelly. "The next mayor of this town'll be a +Leaguer, and by a majority that can't be trifled with. So make hay +while the sun shines, Joe. After this administration there'll be a +long stretch of bad weather for haying." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm trying to get hold of Hull," said House, and it was not difficult +to read his train of thought. "I was a LEETLE afraid he was going to +be scared by that document of Dorn's—and was going to do something +crazy." +</P> + +<P> +Again Kelly emitted his queer grunting laugh. "I guess he was a LEETLE +afraid he would, too, and ran away and hid to get back his nerve." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, he's all right. He's a pushing, level-headed fellow, and won't +make no trouble. Don't you think so?" +</P> + +<P> +"Trouble? I should say not. How can he—if he takes the job?" +</P> + +<P> +To which obvious logic no assent was necessary. +</P> + +<P> +Davy's abrupt departure was for the exact reason Mr. Kelly ascribed. +And he had taken Hugo with him because he feared that he would say or +do something to keep the scandal from dying the quick death of all +scandals. There was the less difficulty in dissuading him from staying +to sun himself in the glories of his new rank and title because his +wife had cast him adrift for the time and was stopping at the house of +her father, whose death was hourly expected. +</P> + +<P> +Old Hastings had been in a stupor for several weeks. He astonished +everybody, except Dr. Charlton, by rousing on election night and asking +how the battle had gone. +</P> + +<P> +"And he seemed to understand what I told him," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Certainly he understood," replied Charlton. "The only part of him +that's in any sort of condition is his mind, because it's the only part +of him that's been properly exercised. Most people die at the top +first because they've never in all their lives used their minds when +they could possibly avoid it." +</P> + +<P> +In the week following the election he came out of his stupor again. He +said to the nurse: +</P> + +<P> +"It's about supper time, ain't it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," answered she. "They're all down at din—supper. Shall I call +them?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," said he. "I want to go down to her room." +</P> + +<P> +"To Miss Jane's room?" asked the puzzled nurse. +</P> + +<P> +"To my wife's room," said Hastings crossly. +</P> + +<P> +The nurse, a stranger, thought his mind was wandering. "Certainly," +said she soothingly. "In a few minutes—as soon as you've rested a +while." +</P> + +<P> +"You're a fool!" mumbled Hastings. "Call Jinny." +</P> + +<P> +The nurse obeyed. When he repeated his request to Jane, she hesitated. +The tears rolled down his cheeks. "I know what I'm about," he pleaded. +"Send for Charlton. He'll tell you to let me have my way." +</P> + +<P> +Jane decided that it was best to yield. The shrunken figure, weighing +so little that it was terrifying to lift it, was wrapped warmly, and +put in an invalid chair. With much difficulty the chair was got out +into the hall and down the stairs. Then they wheeled it into the room +where he was in the habit of sitting after supper. When he was +opposite the atrocious crayon enlargement of his wife an expression of +supreme content settled upon his features. Said he: +</P> + +<P> +"Go back to your supper, Jinny. Take the nurse woman with you. I want +to be by myself." +</P> + +<P> +The nurse glanced stealthily in from time to time during the next hour. +She saw that his eyes were open, were fixed upon the picture. When +Jane came she ventured to enter. She said: +</P> + +<P> +"Do you mind my sitting with you, father?" +</P> + +<P> +He did not answer. She went to him, touched him. He was dead. +</P> + +<P> +As a rule death is not without mitigations, consolations even. Where it +is preceded by a long and troublesome illness, disrupting the routine +of the family and keeping everybody from doing the things he or she +wishes, it comes as a relief. In this particular case not only was the +death a relief, but also the estate of the dead man provided all the +chief mourners with instant and absorbing occupation. If he had left a +will, the acrimony of the heirs would have been caused by +dissatisfaction with his way of distributing the property. Leaving no +will, he plunged the three heirs—or, rather, the five heirs, for the +husband of Martha and the wife of the son were most important +factors—he plunged the five heirs into a ferment of furious dispute as +to who was to have what. Martha and her husband and the +daughter-in-law were people of exceedingly small mind. Trifles, +therefore, agitated them to the exclusion of larger matters. The three +fell to quarreling violently over the division of silverware, jewelry +and furniture. Jane was so enraged by the "disgusting spectacle" that +she proceeded to take part in it and to demand everything which she +thought it would irritate Martha Galland or Irene Hastings to have to +give up. +</P> + +<P> +The three women and Hugo—for Hugo loved petty wrangling—spent day +after day in the bitterest quarrels. Each morning Jane, ashamed +overnight, would issue from her room resolved to have no part in the +vulgar rowdyism. Before an hour had passed she would be the angriest +of the disputants. Except her own unquestioned belongings there wasn't +a thing in the house or stables about which she cared in the least. +But there was a principle at stake—and for principle she would fight +in the last ditch. +</P> + +<P> +None of them wished to call in arbitrators or executors; why go to that +expense? So, the bickering and wrangling, the insults and tears and +sneers went on from day to day. At last they settled the whole matter +by lot—and by a series of easily arranged exchanges where the results +of the drawings were unsatisfactory. Peace was restored, but not +liking. Each of the three groups—Hugo and Martha, Will and Irene, +Jane in a group by herself—detested the other two. They felt that +they had found each other out. As Martha said to Hugo, "It takes a +thing of this kind to show people up in their true colors." Or, as +Jane said to Doctor Charlton, "What beasts human beings are!" +</P> + +<P> +Said he: "What beasts circumstance makes of some of them sometimes." +</P> + +<P> +"You are charitable," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"I am scientific," replied he. "It's very intelligent to go about +distributing praise and blame. To do that is to obey a slightly higher +development of the instinct that leads one to scowl at and curse the +stone he stumps his toe on. The sensible thing to do is to look at the +causes of things—of brutishness in human beings, for example—and to +remove those causes." +</P> + +<P> +"It was wonderful, the way you dragged father back to life and almost +saved him. That reminds me. Wait a second, please." +</P> + +<P> +She went up to her room and got the envelope addressed to Charlton +which she had found in the drawer, as her father directed. Charlton +opened it, took out five bank notes each of a thousand dollars. She +glanced at the money, then at his face. It did not express the emotion +she was expecting. On the contrary, its look was of pleased curiosity. +</P> + +<P> +"Five thousand dollars," he said, reflectively. "Your father certainly +was a queer mixture of surprises and contradictions. Now, who would +have suspected him of a piece of sentiment like this? Pure sentiment. +He must have felt that I'd not be able to save him, and he knew my bill +wouldn't be one-tenth this sum." +</P> + +<P> +"He liked you, and admired you," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"He was very generous where he liked and admired." +</P> + +<P> +Charlton put the money back in the envelope, put the envelope in his +pocket. "I'll give the money to the Children's Hospital," said he. +"About six months ago I completed the sum I had fixed on as necessary +to my independence; so, I've no further use for money—except to use it +up as it comes in." +</P> + +<P> +"You may marry some day," suggested Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Not a woman who wishes to be left richer than independent," replied +he. "As for the children, they'll be brought up to earn their own +independence. I'll leave only incubators and keepsakes when I die. +But no estate. I'm not that foolish and inconsiderate." +</P> + +<P> +"What a queer idea!" exclaimed Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"On the contrary, it's simplest common sense. The idea of giving +people something they haven't earned—that's the queer idea." +</P> + +<P> +"You are SO like Victor Dorn!" +</P> + +<P> +"That reminds me!" exclaimed Charlton. "It was very negligent of me to +forget. The day your father died I dropped in on Victor and told +him—him and Selma Gordon—about it. And both asked me to take you +their sympathy. They said a great deal about your love for your +father, and how sad it was to lose him. They were really distressed." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's face almost brightened. "I've been rather hurt because I hadn't +received a word of sympathy from—them," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"They'd have come, themselves, except that politics has made a very +ugly feeling against them—and Galland's your brother-in-law." +</P> + +<P> +"I understand," said Jane. "But I'm not Galland—and not of that +party." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes, you are of that party," replied Charlton. "You draw your +income from it, and one belongs to whatever he draws his income from. +Civilization means property—as yet. And it doesn't mean men and +women—as yet. So, to know the man or the woman we look at the +property." +</P> + +<P> +"That's hideously unjust," cried Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't be utterly egotistical," said Charlton. "Don't attach so much +importance to your little, mortal, WEAK personality. Try to realize +that you're a mere chip in the great game of chance. You're a chip with +the letter P on it—which stands for Plutocracy. And you'll be played +as you're labeled." +</P> + +<P> +"You make it very hard for any one to like you." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—good-by, then." +</P> + +<P> +And ignoring her hasty, half-laughing, half-serious protests he took +himself away. She was intensely irritated. A rapid change in her +outward character had been going forward since her father's death—a +change in the direction of intensifying the traits that had always been +really dominant, but had been less apparent because softened by other +traits now rapidly whithering. +</P> + +<P> +The cause of the change was her inheritance. +</P> + +<P> +Martin Hastings, remaining all his life in utter ignorance of the showy +uses of wealth and looking on it with the eyes of a farm hand, had +remained the enriched man of the lower classes, at heart a member of +his original class to the end. The effect of this upon Jane had been +to keep in check all the showy and arrogant, all the upper class, +tendencies which education and travel among the upper classes of the +East and of Europe had implanted in her. So long as plain old Martin +lived, she could not FEEL the position she had—or, rather, would some +day have—in the modern social system. But just as soon as he passed +away, just as soon as she became a great heiress, actually in +possession of that which made the world adore, that which would buy +servility, flattery, awe—just so soon did she begin to be an +upper-class lady. +</P> + +<P> +She had acquired a superficial knowledge of business—enough to enable +her to understand what the various items in the long, long schedule of +her holdings meant. Symbols of her importance, of her power. She had +studied the "great ladies" she had met in her travels and visitings. +She had been impressed by the charm of the artistic, carefully +cultivated air of simplicity and equality affected by the greatest of +these great ladies as those born to wealth and position. To be gentle +and natural, to be gracious—that was the "proper thing." So, she now +adopted a manner that was if anything too kindly. Her pose, her mask, +behind which she was concealing her swollen and still swelling pride +and sense of superiority, as yet fitted badly. She "overacted," as +youth is apt to do. She would have given a shrewd observer—one not +dazzled by her wealth beyond the power of clear sight—the impression +that she was pitying the rest of mankind, much as we all pity and +forbear with a hopeless cripple. +</P> + +<P> +But the average observer would simply have said: "What a sweet, +natural girl, so unspoiled by her wealth!"—just as the hopeless +cripple says, "What a polite person," as he gets the benefit of +effusive good manners that would, if he were shrewd, painfully remind +him that he was an unfortunate creature. +</P> + +<P> +Of all the weeds that infest the human garden snobbishness, the +commonest, is the most prolific, and it is a mighty cross breeder, +too—modifying every flower in the garden, changing colors from rich to +glaring, changing odors from perfumes to sickening-sweet or to +stenches. The dead hands of Martin Hastings scattered showers of +shining gold upon his daughter's garden; and from these seeds was +springing a heavy crop of that most prolific of weeds. +</P> + +<P> +She was beginning to resent Charlton's manner—bluff, unceremonious, +candid, at times rude. He treated women exactly as he treated men, and +he treated all men as intimates, free and easy fellow travelers afoot +upon a dusty, vulgar highway. She had found charm in that manner, so +natural to the man of no pretense, of splendid physical proportions, of +the health of a fine tree. She was beginning to get into the state of +mind at which practically all very rich people in a civilized society +sooner or later arrive—a state of mind that makes it impossible for +any to live with or near them except hirelings and dependents. The +habit of power of any kind breeds intolerance of equality of level +intercourse. This is held in check, often held entirely in check, +where the power is based upon mental superiority; for the very +superiority of the mind keeps alive the sense of humor and the sense of +proportion. Not so the habit of money power. For money power is +brutal, mindless. And as it is the only real power in any and all +aristocracies, aristocracies are inevitably brutal and brutalizing. +</P> + +<P> +If Jane had been poor, or had remained a few years longer—until her +character was better set—under the restraining influence of her +unfrilled and unfrillable father, her passion for power, for +superiority would probably have impelled her to develop her mind into a +source of power and position. Fate abruptly gave her the speediest and +easiest means to power known in our plutocratic civilization. She +would have had to be superhuman in beauty of character or a genius in +mind to have rejected the short and easy way to her goal and struggled +on in the long and hard—and doubtful—way. +</P> + +<P> +She did not herself appreciate the change within herself. She fancied +she was still what she had been two weeks before. For as yet nothing +had occurred to enable her to realize her changed direction, her +changed view of life. Thus, she was still thinking of Victor Dorn as +she had thought of him; and she was impatient to see him. She was now +free FREE! She could, without consulting anybody, have what she +wanted. And she wanted Victor Dorn. +</P> + +<P> +She had dropped from her horse and with her arm through the bridle was +strolling along one of the quieter roads which Victor often took in his +rambles. It was a tonic October day, with floods of sunshine upon the +gorgeous autumnal foliage, never more gorgeous than in that fall of the +happiest alternations of frost and warmth. She heard the pleasant +rustle of quick steps in the fallen leaves that carpeted the byroad. +She knew it was he before she glanced; and his first view of her face +was of its beauty enhanced by a color as delicate and charming as that +in the leaves about them. +</P> + +<P> +She looked at his hands in which he was holding something half +concealed. "What is it?" she said, to cover her agitation. +</P> + +<P> +He opened his hands a little wider. "A bird," said he. "Some hunter +has broken its wing. I'm taking it to Charlton for repairs and a fair +start for its winter down South." +</P> + +<P> +His eyes noted for an instant significantly her sombre riding costume, +then sought her eyes with an expression of simple and friendly +sympathy. The tears came to her eyes, and she turned her face away. +She for the first time had a sense of loss, a moving memory of her +father's goodness to her, of an element of tenderness that had passed +out of her life forever. And she felt abjectly ashamed—ashamed of her +relief at the lifting of the burden of his long struggle against death, +ashamed of her miserable wranglings with Martha and Billy's wife, +ashamed of her forgetfulness of her father in the exultation over her +wealth, ashamed of the elaborately fashionable mourning she was +wearing—and of the black horse she had bought to match. She hoped he +would not observe these last flauntings of the purely formal character +of a grief that was being utilized to make a display of fashionableness. +</P> + +<P> +"You always bring out the best there is in me," said she. +</P> + +<P> +He stood silently before her—not in embarrassment, for he was rarely +self-conscious enough to be embarrassed, but refraining from speech +simply because there was nothing to say. +</P> + +<P> +"I haven't heard any of the details of the election," she went on. +"Did you come out as well as you hoped?" +</P> + +<P> +"Better," said he. "As a result of the election the membership of the +League has already a little more than doubled. We could have quadrupled +it, but we are somewhat strict in our requirements. We want only those +who will stay members as long as they stay citizens of Remsen City. +But I must go on to Charlton or he'll be out on his rounds." +</P> + +<P> +She caught his glance, which was inclined to avoid hers. She gave him +a pleading look. "I'll walk with you part of the way," she said. +</P> + +<P> +He seemed to be searching for an excuse to get away. Whether because +he failed to find it or because he changed his mind, he said: "You'll +not mind going at a good gait?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'll ride," said she. "It's not comfortable, walking fast in these +boots." +</P> + +<P> +He stood by to help her, but let her get into the saddle alone. She +smiled down at him with a little coquetry. "Are you afraid to touch +me—to-day?" she asked. +</P> + +<P> +He laughed: "The bird IS merely an excuse," he admitted. "I've got +back my self-control, and I purpose to keep it." +</P> + +<P> +She flushed angrily. His frankness now seemed to her to be flavored +with impertinent assurance. "That's amusing," said she, with an +unpleasant smile. "You have an extraordinary opinion of yourself, +haven't you?" +</P> + +<P> +He shrugged his shoulders as if the subject did not interest him and +set off at a gait that compelled her horse to a rapid walk. She said +presently: +</P> + +<P> +"I'm going to live at the old place alone for the present. You'll come +to see me?" +</P> + +<P> +He looked at her. "No," he said. "As I told you a moment ago, that's +over. You'll have to find some one else to amuse you—for, I +understand perfectly, Jane, that you were only doing what's called +flirting. That sort of thing is a waste of time—for me. I'm not +competent to judge whether it's a waste for you." +</P> + +<P> +She looked coldly down at him. "You have changed since I last saw +you," she said. "I don't mean the change in your manner toward me. I +mean something deeper. I've often heard that politics makes a man +deteriorate. You must be careful, Victor." +</P> + +<P> +"I must think about that," said he. "Thank you for warning me." +</P> + +<P> +His prompt acceptance of her insincere criticism made her straightway +repentant. "No, it's I that have changed," she said. "Oh, I'm +horrid!—simply horrid. I'm in despair about myself." +</P> + +<P> +"Any one who thinks about himself is bound to be," said he +philosophically. "That's why one has to keep busy in order to keep +contented." He halted. "I can save a mile and half an hour by +crossing these fields." He held the wounded bird in one hand very +carefully while he lifted his hat. +</P> + +<P> +She colored deeply. "Victor," she said, "isn't there any way that you +and I can be friends?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," replied he. "As I told you before, by becoming one of us. +Those are impossible terms, of course. But that's the only way by +which we could be of use to each other. Jane, if I, professing what I +do profess, offered to be friends with you on any other terms, you'd be +very foolish not to reject my offer. For, it would mean that I was a +fraud. Don't you see that?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," she admitted. "But when I am with you I see everything exactly +as you represent it." +</P> + +<P> +"It's fortunate for you that I'm not disposed to take advantage of +that—isn't it?" said he, with good-humored irony. +</P> + +<P> +"You don't believe me!" +</P> + +<P> +"Not altogether," he confessed. "To be quite candid, I think that for +some reason or other I rouse in you an irresistible desire to pose. I +doubt if you realize it—wholly. But you'd be hard pressed just where +to draw the line between the sincere and the insincere, wouldn't +you—honestly?" +</P> + +<P> +She sat moodily combing at her horse's mane. +</P> + +<P> +"I know it's cruel," he went on lightly, "to deny anything, however +small, to a young lady who has always had her own way. But in +self-defense I must do it." +</P> + +<P> +"Why DO I take these things from you?" she cried, in sudden +exasperation. And touching her horse with her stick, she was off at a +gallop. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IX +</H3> + +<P> +From anger against Victor Dorn, Jane passed to anger against herself. +This was soon followed by a mood of self-denunciation, by astonishment +at the follies of which she had been guilty, by shame for them. She +could not scoff or scorn herself out of the infatuation. But at least +she could control herself against yielding to it. Recalling and +reviewing all he had said, she—that is, her vanity—decided that the +most important remark, the only really important remark, was his +declaration of disbelief in her sincerity. "The reason he has repulsed +me—and a very good reason it is—is that he thinks I am simply amusing +myself. If he thought I was in earnest, he would act very differently. +Very shrewd of him!" +</P> + +<P> +Did she believe this? Certainly not. But she convinced herself that +she believed it, and so saved her pride. From this point she proceeded +by easy stages to doubting whether, if Victor had taken her at her +word, she would have married him. And soon she had convinced herself +that she had gone so far only through her passion for conquest, that at +the first sign of his yielding her good sense would have asserted +itself and she could have retreated. +</P> + +<P> +"He knew me better than I knew myself," said she—not so thoroughly +convinced as her pride would have liked, but far better content with +herself than in those unhappy hours of humiliation after her last talk +with him. +</P> + +<P> +From the beginning of her infatuation there had been only a few days, +hardly more than a few hours, when the voice of prudence and good sense +had been silenced. Yes, he was right; they were not suited to each +other, and a marriage between them would have been absurd. He did +belong to a different, to a lower class, and he could never have +understood her. Refinement, taste, the things of the life of luxury +and leisure were incomprehensible to him. It might be unjust that the +many had to toil in squalor and sordidness while the few were +privileged to cultivate and to enjoy the graces and the beauties; but, +unjust or in some mysterious way just, there was the fact. Her life +was marked out for her; she was of the elect. She would do well to +accept her good fortune and live as the gods had ordained for her. +</P> + +<P> +If Victor had been different in that one respect! ... The +infatuation, too, was a fact. The wise course was flight—and she fled. +</P> + +<P> +That winter, in Chicago and in New York, Jane amused herself—in the +ways devised by latter day impatience with the folly of wasting a +precious part of the one brief life in useless grief or pretense of +grief. In Remsen City she would have had to be very quiet indeed, +under penalty of horrifying public sentiment. But Chicago and New York +knew nothing of her grief, cared nothing about grief of any kind. +People in deep mourning were found in the theaters, in the gay +restaurants, wherever any enjoyment was to be had; and very sensible it +was of them, and proof of the sincerity of their sorrow—for sincere +sorrow seeks consolation lest it go mad and commit suicide—does it not? +</P> + +<P> +Jane, young, beautiful, rich, clever, had a very good time indeed—so +good that in the spring, instead of going back to Remsen City to rest, +she went abroad. More enjoyment—or, at least, more of the things that +fill in the time and spare one the necessity of thinking. +</P> + +<P> +In August she suddenly left her friends at St. Moritz and journeyed +back to Remsen City as fast as train and boat and train could take her. +And on the front veranda of the old house she sat herself down and +looked out over the familiar landscape and listened to the katydids +lulling the woods and the fields, and was bored and wondered why she +had come. +</P> + +<P> +In a reckless mood she went down to see Victor Dorn. "I am cured," she +said to herself. "I must be cured. I simply can't be small and silly +enough to care for a country town labor agitator after all I've been +through—after the attentions I've had and the men of the world I've +met. I'm cured, and I must prove it to myself ." +</P> + +<P> +In the side yard Alice Sherrill and her children and several neighbor +girls were putting up pears and peaches, blackberries and plums. The +air was heavy with delicious odors of ripe and perfect fruit, and the +laughter, the bright healthy faces, the strong graceful bodies in all +manner of poses at the work required made a scene that brought tears to +Jane's eyes. Why tears she could not have explained, but there they +were. At far end of the arbor, looking exactly as he had in the same +place the year before, sat Victor Dorn, writing. He glanced up, saw +her! Into his face came a look of welcome that warmed her chilled heart. +</P> + +<P> +"Hel-LO!" he cried, starting up. "I AM glad to see you." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm mighty glad to be back," said she, lapsing with keen pleasure into +her native dialect. +</P> + +<P> +He took both her hands and shook them cordially, then looked at her +from head to foot admiringly. "The latest from the Rue de la Paix, I +suppose?" said he. +</P> + +<P> +They seated themselves with the table between them. She, under cover +of commonplaces about her travels, examined him with the utmost +calmness. She saw every point wherein he fell short of the men of her +class—the sort of men she ought to like and admire. But, oh, how dull +and stale and narrow and petty they were, beside this man. She knew +now why she had fled. She didn't want to love Victor Dorn, or to marry +him—or his sort of man. But he, his intense aliveness, his keen, +supple mind, had spoiled her for those others. One of them she could +not marry. "I should go mad with boredom. One can no more live +intimately with fashion than one can eat gold and drink diamonds. And, +oh, but I am hungry and thirsty!" +</P> + +<P> +"So you've had a good time?" he was saying. +</P> + +<P> +"Superb," replied she. "Such scenery—such variety of people. I love +Europe. But—I'm glad to be home again." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't see how you can stand it," said Victor. +</P> + +<P> +"Why?" inquired she in surprise. +</P> + +<P> +"Unless I had an intense personal interest in the most active kind of +life in a place like this, I should either fly or take to drink," +replied he. "In this world you've either got to invent occupation for +yourself or else keep where amusements and distractions are thrust at +you from rising till bed-time. And no amusements are thrust at you in +Remsen City." +</P> + +<P> +"But I've been trying the life of being amused," said Jane, "and I've +got enough." +</P> + +<P> +"For the moment," said Victor, laughing. "You'll go back. You've got +to. What else is there for you?" +</P> + +<P> +Her eyes abruptly became serious. "That's what I've come home to find +out," said she. Hesitatingly, "That's why I've come here to-day." +</P> + +<P> +He became curiously quiet—stared at the writing before him on the +table. After a while he said: +</P> + +<P> +"Jane, I was entirely too glad to see you to-day. I had——" +</P> + +<P> +"Don't say that," she pleaded. "Victor, it isn't a weakness——" +</P> + +<P> +His hand resting upon the table clenched into a fist and his brows drew +down. "There can be no question but that it is a weakness and a +folly," he pushed on. "I will not spoil your life and mine. You are +not for me, and I am not for you. The reason we hang on to this is +because each of us has a streak of tenacity. We don't want each other, +but we are so made that we can't let go of an idea once it has gotten +into our heads." +</P> + +<P> +"There is another reason," she said gently. "We are, both of us, +alone—and lonesome, Victor." +</P> + +<P> +"But I'm not alone. I'm not lonesome——" And there he abruptly +halted, to gaze at her with the expression of awakening and +astonishment. "I believe I'm wrong. I believe you're right," he +exclaimed. "I had never thought of that before." +</P> + +<P> +"You've been imagining your work, your cause was enough," she went on +in a quiet rational way that was a revelation—and a +self-revelation—of the real Jane Hastings. "But it isn't. There's a +whole other side of your nature—the—the—the private side—that's the +expression—the private side. And you've been denying to it its +rights." +</P> + +<P> +He reflected, nodded slowly. "I believe that's the truth," he said. +"It explains a curious feeling I've had—a sort of shriveling +sensation." He gazed thoughtfully at her, his face gradually relaxing +into a merry smile. +</P> + +<P> +"What is it?" asked she, smiling in turn. +</P> + +<P> +"We've both got to fall in love and marry," said he. "Not with each +other, of course—for we're not in any way mated. But love and +marriage and the rest of it—that's the solution. I don't need it +quite as much as you do, for I've got my work. But I need it. Now +that I see things in the right light I wonder that I've been so +stupidly blind. Why do we human beings always overlook the obvious?" +</P> + +<P> +"It isn't easy to marry," said Jane, rather drearily. "It isn't easy +to find some one with whom one would be willing to pass one's life. +I've had several chances—one or two of them not entirely mercenary, I +think. But not one that I could bring myself to accept." +</P> + +<P> +"Vanity—vanity," said Victor. "Almost any human being is interesting +and attractive if one will stop thinking about oneself and concentrate +on him or her." +</P> + +<P> +She smiled. "It's evident you've never tried to fall in love." +</P> + +<P> +"The nearest I ever came to it was with you," replied he. "But that +was, of course, out of the question." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't admit that," said she, with an amusing kind of timid obstinacy. +</P> + +<P> +"Let's be honest and natural with each other," urged he. "Now, Jane, +admit that in your heart of hearts you feel you ought not to marry me." +</P> + +<P> +Her glance avoided his. +</P> + +<P> +"Come—own up!" cried he. +</P> + +<P> +"I have thought of that side of it," she conceded. +</P> + +<P> +"And if I hadn't piqued you by thinking of it, too, you'd never have +lingered on any other side of it," said he. "Well! Now that we've +cleared the ground—there's Davy. He's to be nominated by the +Republicans for Governor next week." +</P> + +<P> +"Davy? I had almost forgotten him. I'll think of Davy—and let you +know ... And you? Who is there for you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh—no one you know. My sister has recommended several girls from +time to time. I'll see." +</P> + +<P> +Jane gave the freest and heartiest laugh that had passed her lips in +more than a year. It was thus free and unrestrained because he had not +said what she was fearing he would say—had not suggested the woman +nearest him, the obvious woman. So eager was she to discover what he +thought of Selma, that she could hardly restrain herself from +suggesting her. Before they could say anything more, two men came to +talk with him. Jane could not but leave. +</P> + +<P> +She dined that night at Mrs. Sherlock's—Mrs. Sherlock was Davy's +oldest sister. Davy took her in, they talked—about his +career—through dinner, and he walked home with her in the moonlight. +He was full of his approaching nomination. He had been making what is +known as a good record, as mayor. That is, he had struck out boldly at +sundry petty abuses practised by a low and comparatively uninfluential +class of exploiters of the people. He had been so busy with these +showy trifles that there had been no time for the large abuses. True, +he had publicly warned the gas company about its poor gas, and the +water company about its unwholesome water for the low-lying tenement +districts, and the traction company about the fewness and filthiness of +its cars. The gas company had talked of putting in improved machinery; +the water company had invited estimates on a filtration plant; the +traction company had said a vague something about new cars as soon as +car manufacturers could make definite promises as to delivery. But +nothing had been done—as yet. Obviously a corporation, a large +investment of capital, must be treated with consideration. It would +not do for a conservative, fair minded mayor to rush into demagogery. +So, Davy was content to point proudly to his record of having "made the +big corporations awaken to a sense of their duty." An excellent +record, as good as a reform politician, with a larger career in +prospect, could be expected to make. People spoke well of Mayor Hull +and the three daily papers eulogized him. Davy no longer had qualms of +conscience. He read the eulogies, he listened to the flatteries of the +conservative leading citizens he met at the Lincoln and at the +University, and he felt that he was all that he in young enthusiasm had +set out to be. +</P> + +<P> +When he went to other cities and towns and to county fairs to make +addresses he was introduced as the man who had redeemed Remsen City, as +a shining example of the honest SANE man in politics, as a man the +bosses were afraid of, yet dared not try to down. "You can't fool the +people." And were not the people, notably those who didn't live in +Remsen City and had only read in their newspapers about the reform +Republican mayor—weren't they clamorous for Mayor Hull for governor! +Thus, Davy was high in his own esteem, was in that mood of profound +responsibility to righteousness and to the people wherein a man can get +the enthusiastic endorsement of his conscience for any act he deems it +expedient to commit in safeguarding and advancing his career. His +person had become valuable to his country. His opponents were +therefore anathema maranatha. +</P> + +<P> +As he and Jane walked side by side in the tender moonlight, Jane said: +</P> + +<P> +"What's become of Selma Gordon?" +</P> + +<P> +A painful pause; then Davy, in a tone that secretly amused Jane: +"Selma? I see her occasionally—at a distance. She still writes for +Victor Dorn's sheet, I believe. I never see it." +</P> + +<P> +Jane felt she could easily guess why. "Yes—it is irritating to read +criticisms of oneself," said she sweetly. Davy's self-complacence had +been most trying to her nerves. +</P> + +<P> +Another long silence, then he said: "About—Miss Gordon. I suppose +you were thinking of the things I confided to you last year?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I was," confessed Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"That's all over," said Mayor and prospective Governor Hull. "I found I +was mistaken in her." +</P> + +<P> +"Didn't you tell me that she refused you?" pressed Jane, most unkindly. +</P> + +<P> +"We met again after that," said Davy—by way of proving that even the +most devoted apostle of civic righteousness is yet not without his +share of the common humanity, "and from that time I felt differently +toward her.... I've never been able to understand my folly.... I +wonder if you could forgive me for it?" +</P> + +<P> +Davy was a good deal of a bore, she felt. At least, he seemed so in +this first renewing of old acquaintance. But he was a man of purpose, +a man who was doing much and would do more. And she liked him, and had +for him that feeling of sympathy and comprehension which exists among +people of the same region, brought up in much the same way. Instead of +cutting him off, she temporized. Said she with a serenely careless +laugh that might have let a man more expert in the ways of women into +the secret of how little she cared about him: "You mean forgive you +for dropping me so abruptly and running after her?" +</P> + +<P> +"That's not exactly the way to put it," objected he. +</P> + +<P> +"Put it any way you like," said Jane. "I forgive you. I didn't care +at the time, and I don't care now." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was looking entrancing in that delicate light. Davy was +noting—was feeling—this. Also, he was reflecting—in a high-minded +way—upon the many material, mental and spiritual advantages of a +marriage with her. Just the woman to be a governor's wife—a senator's +wife—a president's wife. Said he: +</P> + +<P> +"Jane, my feeling for you has never changed." +</P> + +<P> +"Really?" said Jane. "Why, I thought you told me at one time that you +were in love with me?" +</P> + +<P> +"And I always have been, dear—and am," said Davy, in his deepest, +tenderest tones. "And now that I am winning a position worthy of +you——" +</P> + +<P> +"I'll see," cut in Jane. "Let's not talk about it tonight." She felt +that if he kept on she might yield to the temptation to say something +mocking, something she would regret if it drove him away finally. +</P> + +<P> +He was content. The ice had been broken. The Selma Gordon business +had been disposed of. The way was clear for straight-away love-making +the next time they met. Meanwhile he would think about her, would get +steam up, would have his heart blazing and his words and phrases all in +readiness. +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +Every human being has his or her fundamental vanity that must be kept +alive, if life is to be or to seem to be worth living. In man this +vanity is usually some form of belief in his mental ability, in woman +some form of belief in her physical charm. Fortunately—or, rather, +necessarily—not much is required to keep this vanity alive—or to +restore it after a shock, however severe. Victor Dorn had been +compelled to give Jane Hastings' vanity no slight shock. But it +recovered at once. Jane saw that his failure to yield was due not to +lack of potency in her charms, but to extraordinary strength of purpose +in his character. Thus, not only was she able to save herself from any +sense of humiliation, but also she was without any feeling of +resentment against him. She liked him and admired him more than ever. +She saw his point of view; she admitted that he was right—IF it were +granted that a life such as he had mapped for himself was better for +him than the career he could have made with her help. +</P> + +<P> +Her heart, however, was hastily, even rudely thrust to the background +when she discovered that her brother had been gambling in wheat with +practically her entire fortune. With an adroitness that irritated her +against herself, as she looked back, he had continued to induce her to +disregard their father's cautionings and to ask him to take full charge +of her affairs. He had not lost her fortune, but he had almost lost +it. But for an accidental stroke, a week of weather destructive to +crops all over the country, she would have been reduced to an income of +not more than ten or fifteen thousand a year—twenty times the income +of the average American family of five, but for Miss Hastings +straitened subsistence and a miserable state of shornness of all the +radiance of life. And, pushing her inquiries a little farther, she +learned that her brother would still have been rich, because he had +taken care to settle a large sum on his wife—in such a way that if she +divorced him it would pass back to him. +</P> + +<P> +In the course of her arrangings to meet this situation and to prevent +its recurrence she saw much of Doctor Charlton. He gave her excellent +advice and found for her a man to take charge of her affairs so far as +it was wise for her to trust any one. The man was a bank cashier, +Robert Headley by name—one of those rare beings who care nothing for +riches for themselves and cannot invest their own money wisely, but +have a genius for fidelity and wise counsel. +</P> + +<P> +"It's a pity he's married," said Charlton. "If he weren't I'd urge you +to take him as a husband." +</P> + +<P> +Jane laughed. A plainer, duller man than Headley it would have been +hard to find, even among the respectabilities of Remsen City. +</P> + +<P> +"Why do you laugh?" said Charlton. "What is there absurd in a sensible +marriage?" +</P> + +<P> +"Would you marry a woman because she was a good housekeeper?" +</P> + +<P> +"That would be one of the requirements," said Charlton. "I've sense +enough to know that, no matter how much I liked a woman before +marriage, it couldn't last long if she were incompetent. She'd irritate +me every moment in the day. I'd lie awake of nights despising her. +And how she would hate me!" +</P> + +<P> +"I can't imagine you a husband," laughed Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"That doesn't speak well for your imagination," rejoined Charlton. "I +have perfect health—which means that I have a perfect disposition, for +only people with deranged interiors are sour and snappy and moody. And +I am sympathetic and understanding. I appreciate that women are +rottenly brought up and have everything to learn—everything that's +worth while if one is to live comfortably and growingly. So, I +shouldn't expect much at the outset beyond a desire to improve and a +capacity to improve. Yes, I've about all the virtues for a model +husband—a companionable, helpful mate for a woman who wants to be more +of a person every day she lives." +</P> + +<P> +"No, thanks," said Jane, mockingly. "The advertisement reads well, but +I don't care to invest." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I looked you over long ago," said Charlton with a coolness that +both amused and exasperated her. "You wouldn't do at all. You are very +attractive to look at and to talk with. Your money would be useful to +some plans I've got for some big sanatoriums along the line of +Schulze's up at Saint Christopher. But—-" He shook his head, smiling +at her through a cloud of cigarette smoke. +</P> + +<P> +"Go on," urged Jane. "What's wrong with me?" +</P> + +<P> +"You've been miseducated too far and too deeply. You KNOW too much +that isn't so. You've got the upper class American woman habit of +thinking about yourself all the time. You are an indifferent +housekeeper, and you think you are good at it. You don't know the +practical side of life—cooking, sewing, house furnishing, marketing. +You're ambitious for a show career—the sort Davy Hull—excuse me, +Governor David Hull—is making so noisily. There's just the man for +you. You ought to marry. Marry Hull." +</P> + +<P> +Jane was furiously angry. She did not dare show it; Charlton would +merely laugh and walk away, and perhaps refuse to be friends with her. +It exasperated her to the core, the narrow limitations of the power of +money. She could, through the power of her money, do exactly as she +pleased to and with everybody except the only kind of people she cared +about dominating; these she was apparently the less potent with +because of her money. It seemed to put them on their mettle and on +their guard. +</P> + +<P> +She swallowed her anger. "Yes, I've got to get married," said she. +"And I don't know what to do about it." +</P> + +<P> +"Hull," said Charlton. +</P> + +<P> +"Is that the best advice you can give?" said she disdainfully. +</P> + +<P> +"He needs you, and you need him. You like him—don't you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Very much." +</P> + +<P> +"Then—the thing's done. Davy isn't the man to fail to seize an +opportunity so obviously to his advantage. Not that he hasn't a heart. +He has a big one—does all sorts of gracious, patronizing, kind +things—does no end of harm. But he'd no more let his emotions rule +his life than—than—Victor Dorn—or I, for that matter." +</P> + +<P> +Jane colored; a pathetic sadness tinged the far-away expression of her +eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"No doubt he's half in love with you already. Most men are who know +you. A kindly smile and he'll be kneeling." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't want David Hull," cried Jane. "Ever since I can remember +they've been at me to marry him. He bores me. He doesn't make me +respect him. He never could control me—or teach me—or make me look +up to him in any way. I don't want him, and I won't have him." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm afraid you've got to do it," said Charlton. "You act as if you +realized it and were struggling and screaming against manifest destiny +like a child against a determined mother." +</P> + +<P> +Jane's eyes had a look of terror. "You are joking," said she. "But it +frightens me, just the same." +</P> + +<P> +"I am not joking," replied he. "I can hear the wedding bells—and so +can you." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't!" pleaded Jane. "I've so much confidence in your insight that I +can't bear to hear you saying such things even to tease me.... Why +haven't you told me about these sanatoriums you want?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because I've been hoping I could devise some way of getting them +without the use of money. Did it ever occur to you that almost nothing +that's been of real and permanent value to the world was built with +money? The things that money has done have always been badly done." +</P> + +<P> +"Let me help you," said Jane earnestly. "Give me something to do. +Teach me how to do something. I am SO bored!—and so eager to have an +occupation. I simply can't lead the life of my class. +</P> + +<P> +"You want to be a lady patroness—a lady philanthropist," said +Charlton, not greatly impressed by her despair. "That's only another +form of the life of your class—and a most offensive form." +</P> + +<P> +"Your own terms—your own terms, absolutely," cried Jane in desperation. +</P> + +<P> +"No—marry Hull and go into upper and middle class politics. You'll be +a lady senator or a lady ambassador or cabinet officer, at least." +</P> + +<P> +"I will not marry David Hull—or anybody, just yet," cried Jane. "Why +should I? I've still got ten years where there's a chance of my being +able to attract some man who—attracts me. And after that I can buy as +good a husband as any that offers now. Doctor Charlton, I'm in +desperate, deadly earnest. And I ask you to help me." +</P> + +<P> +"My own terms?" +</P> + +<P> +"I give you my word." +</P> + +<P> +"You'll have to give your money outright. No strings attached. No +chance to be a philanthropist. Also, you'll have to work—have to +educate yourself as I instruct you." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—yes. Whatever you say." +</P> + +<P> +Charlton looked at her dubiously. "I'm a fool to have anything to do +with this," he said. "You aren't in any way a suitable person—any +more than I'm the sort of man you want to assist you in your schemes. +You don't realize what tests you're to be put through." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't care," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"It's a chance to try my theory," mused he. "You know, I insist we are +all absolutely the creatures of circumstance—that character adapts +itself to circumstance—that to change a man or a town or a nation—or +a world—you have only to change their fundamental circumstances." +</P> + +<P> +"You'll try me?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'll think about it," said Charlton. "I'll talk with Victor Dorn +about it." +</P> + +<P> +"Whatever you do, don't talk to him," cried Jane, in terror. "He has no +faith in me—" She checked herself, hastily added—"in anybody outside +his own class." +</P> + +<P> +"I never do anything serious without consulting Victor," said Charlton +firmly. "He's got the best mind of any one I know, and it is foolish +to act without taking counsel of the best." +</P> + +<P> +"He'll advise against it," said Jane bitterly. +</P> + +<P> +"But I may not take his advice literally," said Charlton. "I'm not in +mental slavery to him. I often adapt his advice to my needs instead of +adopting it outright." +</P> + +<P> +And with that she had to be content. +</P> + +<P> +She passed a day and night of restlessness, and called him on the +telephone early the following morning. As she heard his voice she said: +</P> + +<P> +"Did you see Victor Dorn last night?" +</P> + +<P> +"Where are you?" asked Charlton. +</P> + +<P> +"In my room," was her impatient answer. +</P> + +<P> +"In bed?" +</P> + +<P> +"I haven't gotten up yet," said she. "What IS the matter?" +</P> + +<P> +"Had your breakfast?" +</P> + +<P> +"No. I've rung for it. It'll be here in a few minutes." +</P> + +<P> +"I thought so," said Charlton. +</P> + +<P> +"This is very mysterious—or very absurd," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Please ring off and call your kitchen and tell them to put your +breakfast on the dining-room table for you in three-quarters of an +hour. Then get up, take your bath and your exercises—dress yourself +for the day—and go down and eat your breakfast. How can you hope to +amount to anything unless you live by a rational system? And how can +you have a rational system unless you begin the day right?" +</P> + +<P> +"DID you see Victor Dorn?" said Jane—furious at his impertinence but +restraining herself. +</P> + +<P> +"And after you have breakfasted," continued Charlton, "call me up +again, and I'll answer your questions." +</P> + +<P> +With that he hung up his receiver. Jane threw herself angrily back +against her pillow. She would lie there for an hour, then call him +again. But—if he should ask her whether she had obeyed his orders? +True, she might lie to him; but wouldn't that be too petty? She +debated with herself for a few minutes, then obeyed him to the letter. +As she was coming through the front hall after breakfast, he appeared +in the doorway. +</P> + +<P> +"You didn't trust me!" she cried reproachfully. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes," replied he. "But I preferred to talk with you face to face." +</P> + +<P> +"DID you see Mr. Dorn?" +</P> + +<P> +Charlton nodded. "He refused to advise me. He said he had a personal +prejudice in your favor that would make his advice worthless." +</P> + +<P> +Jane glowed—but not quite so thrillingly as she would have glowed in +the same circumstances a year before. +</P> + +<P> +"Besides, he's in no state of mind to advise anybody about anything +just now," said Charlton. +</P> + +<P> +Jane glanced sharply at him. "What do you mean?" she said. +</P> + +<P> +"It's not my secret," replied Charlton. +</P> + +<P> +"You mean he has fallen in love?" +</P> + +<P> +"That's shrewd," said Charlton. "But women always assume a love +affair." +</P> + +<P> +"With whom?" persisted Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, a very nice girl. No matter. I'm not here to talk about +anybody's affairs but yours—and mine." +</P> + +<P> +"Answer just one question," said Jane, impulsively. "Did he tell you +anything about—me?" +</P> + +<P> +Charlton stared—then whistled. "Are YOU in love with him, too?" he +cried. +</P> + +<P> +Jane flushed—hesitated—then met his glance frankly. "I WAS," said +she. +</P> + +<P> +"WAS?" +</P> + +<P> +"I mean that I'm over it," said she. "What have you decided to do +about me?" +</P> + +<P> +Charlton did not answer immediately. He eyed her narrowly—an +examination which she withstood well. Then he glanced away and seemed +to be reflecting. Finally he came back to her question. Said he: +</P> + +<P> +"To give you a trial. To find out whether you'll do." +</P> + +<P> +She drew a long sigh of relief. +</P> + +<P> +"Didn't you guess?" he went on, smilingly, nodding his round, +prize-fighter head at her. "Those suggestions about bed and +breakfast—they were by way of a beginning." +</P> + +<P> +"You must give me a lot to do," urged she. "I mustn't have a minute of +idle time." +</P> + +<P> +He laughed. "Trust me," he said. +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +While Jane was rescuing her property from her brother and was +safeguarding it against future attempts by him, or by any of that +numerous company whose eyes are ever roving in search of the most +inviting of prey, the lone women with baggage—while Jane was thus +occupied, David Hull was, if possible, even busier and more absorbed. +He was being elected governor. His State was being got ready to say to +the mayor of Remsen City, "Well done, good and faithful servant. Thou +hast been faithful over a few things; I will make thee ruler over many." +</P> + +<P> +The nomination was not obtained for him without difficulty. The +Republican party—like the Democratic—had just been brought back under +"safe and sane and conservative" leadership after a prolonged debauch +under the influence of that once famous and revered reformer, Aaron +Whitman, who had not sobered up or released the party for its sobering +until his wife's extravagant entertaining at Washington had forced him +to accept large "retainers" from the plutocracy. The machine leaders +had in the beginning forwarded the ambitions of Whitman under the +impression that his talk of a "square deal" was "just the usual dope" +and that Aaron was a "level-headed fellow at bottom." It had +developed—after they had let Aaron become a popular idol, not to be +trifled with—it had developed that he was almost sincere—as sincere +as can be expected of an ambitious, pushing fellow. Now came David +Hull, looking suspiciously like Whitman at his worst-and a more +hopeless case, because he had money a plenty, while Whitman was luckily +poor and blessed with an extravagant wife. True, Hull had the backing +of Dick Kelly—and Kelly was not the man "to hand the boys a lemon." +Still Hull looked like a "holy boy," talked like one, had the popular +reputation of having acted like one as mayor—and the "reform game" was +certainly one to attract a man who could afford it and was in politics +for position only. Perhaps Dick wanted to be rid of Hull for the rest +of his term, and was "kicking him upstairs." It would be a shabby +trick upon his fellow leaders, but justifiable if there should be some +big "job" at Remsen City that could be "pulled off" only if Hull were +out of the way. +</P> + +<P> +The leaders were cold until Dick got his masters in the Remsen City +branch of the plutocracy to pass the word to the plutocracy's general +agents at Indianapolis—a certain well-known firm of political bankers. +Until that certification came the leaders, having no candidate who +stood a chance of winning, were ready to make a losing campaign and +throw the election to the Democrats—not a serious misfortune at a time +when the machines of the two parties had become simply friendly rival +agents for the same rich master. +</P> + +<P> +There was a sharp fight in the convention. The anti-machine element, +repudiating Whitman under the leadership of a shrewd and honest young +man named Joe Bannister, had attacked Hull in the most shocking way. +Bannister had been reading Victor Dorn's New Day and had got a notion +of David Hull as man and mayor different from the one made current by +the newspapers. He made a speech on the floor of the convention which +almost caused a riot and nearly cost Davy the nomination. That +catastrophe was averted by adjournment. Davy gave Dick Kelly's second +lieutenant, Osterman, ten thousand in cash, of which Osterman said +there was pressing need "for perfectly legitimate purposes, I assure +you, Mr. Mayor." Next day the Bannister faction lost forty and odd +sturdy yeomen from districts where the crops had been painfully short, +and Davy was nominated. +</P> + +<P> +In due time the election was held, and Mayor Hull became Governor Hull +by a satisfactory majority for so evenly divided a State. He had +spent—in contributions to the machine campaign fund—upwards of one +hundred thousand dollars. But that seemed a trifling sacrifice to make +for reform principles and for keeping the voice of the people the voice +of God. He would have been elected if he had not spent a cent, for the +Democratic machine, bent on reorganizing back to a sound basis with all +real reformers or reformers tainted with sincerity eliminated, had +nominated a straight machine man—and even the politicians know that +the people who decide elections will not elect a machine man if they +have a chance to vote for any one else. It saddened David Hull, in the +midst of victory, that his own town and county went against him, +preferring the Democrat, whom it did not know, as he lived at the other +end of the State. Locally the offices at stake were all captured by +the "Dorn crowd." At last the Workingmen's League had a judge; at last +it could have a day in court. There would not be a repetition of the +great frauds of the Hull-Harbinger campaign. +</P> + +<P> +By the time David had sufficient leisure to reopen the heart department +of his ambition, Jane was deep in the effort to show Doctor Charlton +how much intelligence and character she had. She was serving an +apprenticeship as trained nurse in the Children's Hospital, where he +was chief of the staff, and was taking several extra courses with his +young assistants. It was nearly two weeks after David's first attempt +to see her when her engagements and his at last permitted this meeting. +Said he: +</P> + +<P> +"What's this new freak?" +</P> + +<P> +"I can't tell you yet," replied she. "I'm not sure, myself." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't see how you can endure that fellow Charlton. They say he's as +big a crank in medicine as he is in politics." +</P> + +<P> +"It's all of a piece," said Jane, tranquilly. "He says he gets his +political views from his medicine and his medical ideas from his +politics." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you think he's a frightful bounder?" +</P> + +<P> +"Frightful," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"Fresh, impudent—conceited. And he looks like a prize fighter." +</P> + +<P> +"At some angles—yes," conceded Jane. "At others, he's almost +handsome." +</P> + +<P> +"The other day, when I called at the hospital and they wouldn't take my +name in to you—" David broke off to vent his indignation—"Did you +ever hear of such impertinence!" +</P> + +<P> +"And you the governor-elect," laughed Jane. "Shall I tell you what +Doctor Charlton said? He said that a governor was simply a public +servant, and anything but a public representative—usually a public +disgrace. He said that a servant's business was attending to his own +job and not hanging round preventing his fellow servants from attending +to their jobs." +</P> + +<P> +"I knew he had low and vulgar views of public affairs," said David. +"What I started to say was that I saw him talking to you that day, +across the court, and you seemed to be enjoying his conversation." +</P> + +<P> +</P> + +<P> +"ENJOYING it? I love it," cried Jane. "He makes me laugh, he makes me +cold with rage, he gives me a different sensation every time I see him." +</P> + +<P> +"You LIKE—him?" +</P> + +<P> +"Immensely. And I've never been so interested or so happy in my life." +She looked steadily at him. "Nothing could induce me to give it up. +I've put everything else out of my mind." +</P> + +<P> +Since the dismal end of his adventure with Selma Gordon, David had +become extremely wary in his dealings with the female sex. He never +again would invite a refusal; he never again would put himself in a +position where a woman might feel free to tell him her private opinion +of him. He reflected upon Jane's words. They could have but the one +meaning. Not so calmly as he would have liked, but without any +embarrassing constraint, he said: +</P> + +<P> +"I'm glad you've found what suits you, at last. It isn't exactly the +line I'd have thought a girl such as you would choose. You're sure you +are not making a mistake?" +</P> + +<P> +"Quite," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +"I should think you'd prefer marriage—and a home—and a social +circle—and all that," ventured David. +</P> + +<P> +"I'll probably not marry." +</P> + +<P> +"No. You'd hardly take a doctor." +</P> + +<P> +"The only one I'd want I can't get," said Jane. +</P> + +<P> +She wished to shock David, and she saw with pleasure that she had +succeeded. Indeed so shocked was he that in a few minutes he took +leave. And as he passed from her sight he passed from her mind. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Victor Dorn described Davy Hull's inaugural address as "an +uninteresting sample of the standard reform brand of artificial milk +for political infants." The press, however, was enthusiastic, and +substantial people everywhere spoke of it as having the "right ring," +as being the utterance of a "safe, clean man whom the politicians can't +frighten or fool." In this famous speech David urged everybody who was +doing right to keep on doing so, warned everybody who was doing wrong +that they would better look out for themselves, praised those who were +trying to better conditions in the right way, condemned those who were +trying to do so in the wrong way. It was all most eloquent, most +earnest. Some few people were disappointed that he had not explained +exactly what and whom he meant by right and by wrong; but these carping +murmurs were drowned in the general acclaim. A man whose fists +clenched and whose eyes flashed as did David Hull's must "mean +business"—and if no results came of these words, it wouldn't be his +fault, but the machinations of wicked plutocrats and their political +agents. +</P> + +<P> +"Isn't it disgusting!" exclaimed Selma, reading an impassioned +paragraph aloud to Victor Dorn. "It almost makes me despair when I see +how people—our sort of people, too—are taken in by such guff. And +they stand with their empty picked pockets and cheer this man, who's +nothing but a stool pigeon for pickpockets." +</P> + +<P> +"It's something gained," observed Victor tranquilly, "when politicians +have to denounce the plutocracy in order to get audiences and offices. +The people are beginning to know what's wrong. They read into our +friend Hull's generalities what they think he ought to mean—what they +believe he does mean. The next step is—he'll have to do something or +they'll find him out." +</P> + +<P> +"He do anything?" Selma laughed derisively. "He hasn't the courage—or +the honesty." +</P> + +<P> +"Well—'patience and shuffle the cards,' as Sancho Panza says. We're +winning Remsen City. And our friends are winning a little ground here, +and a little there and a little yonder—and soon—only too soon—this +crumbling false politics will collapse and disappear. Too soon, I +fear. Before the new politics of a work-compelling world for the +working class only is ready to be installed." +</P> + +<P> +Selma had been only half attending. She now said abruptly, with a +fluttering movement that suggested wind blowing strongly across open +prairies under a bright sky: +</P> + +<P> +"I've decided to go away." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, you must take a vacation," said Victor. "I've been telling you +that for several years. And you must go away to the sea or the +mountains where you'll not be harassed by the fate of the human race +that you so take to heart." +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't mean a vacation," said Selma. "I meant to Chicago—to work +there." +</P> + +<P> +"You've had a good offer?" said Victor. "I knew it would come. You've +got to take it. You need the wider experience—the chance to have a +paper of your own—or a work of your own of some kind. It's been +selfishness, my keeping you all this time." +</P> + +<P> +Selma had turned away. With her face hidden from him she said, "Yes, I +must go." +</P> + +<P> +"When?" said Victor. +</P> + +<P> +"As soon as you can arrange for some one else." +</P> + +<P> +"All right. I'll look round. I've no hope of finding any one to take +your place, but I can get some one who will do." +</P> + +<P> +"You can train any one," said Selma. "Just as you trained me." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll see what's to be done," was all he said. +</P> + +<P> +A week passed—two weeks. She waited; he did not bring up the subject. +But she knew he was thinking of it; for there had been a change in his +manner toward her—a constraint, a self-consciousness theretofore +utterly foreign to him in his relations with any one. Selma was +wretched, and began to show it first in her appearance, then in her +work. At last she burst out: +</P> + +<P> +"Give that article back to me," she cried. "It's rotten. I can't +write any more. Why don't you tell me so frankly? Why don't you send +me away?" +</P> + +<P> +"You're doing better work than I am," said he. "You're eager to be +off—aren't you? Will you stay a few days longer? I must get away to +the country—alone—to get a fresh grip on myself. I'll come back as +soon as I can, and you'll be free. There'll be no chance for vacations +after you're gone." +</P> + +<P> +"Very well," said she. She felt that he would think this curtness +ungracious, but more she could not say. +</P> + +<P> +He was gone four days. When he reappeared at the office he was +bronzed, but under the bronze showed fatigue—in a man of his youth and +strength sure sign of much worry and loss of sleep. He greeted her +almost awkwardly, his eyes avoiding hers, and sat down to opening his +accumulated mail. Although she was furtively observing him she started +when he abruptly said: +</P> + +<P> +"You know you are free to go—at any time." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll wait until you catch up with your work," she suggested. +</P> + +<P> +"No—never mind. I'll get along. I've kept you out of all reason.... +The sooner you go the better. I've got to get used to it, and—I hate +suspense." +</P> + +<P> +"Then I'll go in the morning," said Selma. "I've no arrangements to +make—except a little packing that'll take less than an hour. Will you +say good-by for me to any one who asks? I hate fusses, and I'll be back +here from time to time." +</P> + +<P> +He looked at her curiously, started to speak, changed his mind and +resumed reading the letter in his hand. She turned to her work, sat +pretending to write. In fact she was simply scribbling. Her eyes were +burning and she was fighting against the sobs that came surging. He +rose and began to walk up and down the room. She hastily crumpled and +flung away the sheet on which she had be scrawling; he might happen to +glance at her desk and see. She bent closer to the paper and began to +write—anything that came into her head. Presently the sound of his +step ceased. An uncontrollable impulse to fly seized her. She would +get up—would not put on her hat—would act as if she were simply going +to the street door for a moment. And she would not return—would +escape the danger of a silly breakdown. She summoned all her courage, +suddenly rose and moved swiftly toward the door. At the threshold she +had to pause; she could not control her heart from a last look at him. +</P> + +<P> +He was seated at his table, was staring at its litter of letters, +papers and manuscripts with an expression so sad that it completely +transformed him. She forgot herself. She said softly: +</P> + +<P> +"Victor!" +</P> + +<P> +He did not hear. +</P> + +<P> +"Victor," she repeated a little more loudly. +</P> + +<P> +He roused himself, glanced at her with an attempt at his usual friendly +smile of the eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Is there something wrong that you haven't told me about?" she asked. +</P> + +<P> +"It'll pass," said he. "I'll get used to it." With an attempt at the +manner of the humorous philosopher, "Man is the most adaptable of all +the animals. That's why he has distanced all his relations. I didn't +realize how much our association meant to me until you set me to +thinking about it by telling me you were going. I had been taking you +for granted—a habit we easily fall into with those who simply work +with and for us and don't insist upon themselves." +</P> + +<P> +She was leaning against the frame of the open door into the hall, her +hands behind her back. She was gazing out of the window across the +room. +</P> + +<P> +"You," he went on, "are as I'd like to be—as I imagined I was. Your +sense of duty to the cause orders you elsewhere, and you go—like a +good soldier, with never a backward glance." +</P> + +<P> +She shook her head, but did not speak. +</P> + +<P> +"With never a backward glance," he repeated. "While I—" He shut his +lips together firmly and settled himself with fierce resolution to his +work. "I beg your pardon," he said. "This is—cowardly. As I said +before, I shall get myself in hand again, and go on." +</P> + +<P> +She did not move. The breeze of the unseasonably warm and brilliant +day fluttered her thick, loosely gathered hair about her brow. Her +strange, barbaric little face suggested that the wind was blowing +across it a throng of emotions like the clouds of a driven storm. +</P> + +<P> +A long silence. He suddenly flung out his arms in a despairing gesture +and let them fall to the table. At the crash she startled, gazed +wildly about. +</P> + +<P> +"Selma!" he cried. "I must say it. I love you." +</P> + +<P> +A profound silence fell. After a while she went softly across the room +and sat down at her desk. +</P> + +<P> +"I think I've loved you from the first months of your coming here to +work—to the old office, I mean. But we were always together—every +day—all day long—working together—I thinking and doing nothing +without your sharing in it. So, I never realized. Don't +misunderstand. I'm not trying to keep you here. It's simply that I've +got the habit of telling you everything—of holding back nothing from +you." +</P> + +<P> +"I was going," she said, "because I loved you." +</P> + +<P> +He looked at her in amazement. +</P> + +<P> +"That day you told me you had decided to get married—and asked my +advice about the girls among our friends—that was the day I began to +feel I'd have to go. It's been getting worse ever since." +</P> + +<P> +Once more silence, both looking uneasily about, their glances avoiding +each other. The door of the printing room opened, and Holman, the +printer, came in, his case in his grimy hand. Said he: +</P> + +<P> +"Where's the rest of that street car article?" +</P> + +<P> +"I beg your pardon," said Selma, starting up and taking some manuscript +from her desk and handing it to him. +</P> + +<P> +"Louis," said Victor, as Holmes was retreating, "Selma and I are going +to be married." +</P> + +<P> +Louis paused, but did not look round. "That ain't what'd be called +news," said he. "I've known it for more than three years." +</P> + +<P> +He moved on toward his room. "I'll be ready for that leading article +in half an hour. So, you'd better get busy." +</P> + +<P> +He went out, closing the door behind him. Selma and Victor looked at +each other and burst out laughing. Then—still laughing—they took +hold of hands like two children. And the next thing they knew they +were tight in each other's arms, and Selma was sobbing wildly. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +X +</H3> + +<P> +When Jane had finished her apprenticeship, Doctor Charlton asked her to +marry him. Said Jane: +</P> + +<P> +"I never knew you to be commonplace before. I've felt this coming for +some time, but I expected it would be in the form of an offer to marry +me." +</P> + +<P> +She promptly accepted him—and she has not, and will not regret it. So +far as a single case can prove a theory, Jane's case has proved +Charlton's theory that environment determines character. His +alternations of tenderness and brusqueness, of devotion to her and +devotion to his work, his constant offering of something new and his +unremitting insistence upon something new from her each day make it +impossible for her to develop the slightest tendency toward that +sleeping sickness wherewith the germ of conventionality inflicts any +mind it seizes upon. +</P> + +<P> +David Hull, now temporarily in eclipse through over caution in radical +utterance, is gathering himself for a fresh spurt that will doubtless +place him at the front in politics again. He has never married. The +belief in Remsen City is that he is a victim of disappointed love for +Jane Hastings. But the truth is that he is unable to take his mind off +himself long enough to be come sufficiently interested in another human +being. There is no especial reason why he has thus far escaped the +many snares that have been set for him because of his wealth and +position. Who can account for the vagaries of chance? +</P> + +<P> +The Workingmen's League now controls the government of Remsen City. It +gives an honest and efficient administration, and keeps the public +service corporations as respectful of the people as the laws will +permit. But, as Victor Dorn always warned the people, little can be +done until the State government is conquered—and even then there will +be the national government to see that all the wrongs of vested rights +are respected and that the people shall have little to say, in the +management of their own affairs. As all sensible people know, any +corrupt politician, or any greedy plutocrat, or any agent of either is +a safer and better administrator of the people's affairs than the +people themselves. +</P> + +<P> +The New Day is a daily with a circulation for its weekly edition that +is national. And Victor and Selma are still its editors, though they +have two little boys to bring up. +</P> + +<P> +Jane and Selma see a great deal of each other, and are friendly, and +try hard to like each other. But they are not friends. +</P> + +<P> +Dick Kelly's oldest son, graduated from Harvard, is the leader of the +Remsen City fashionable set. Joe House's only son is a professional +gambler and sets the pace among the sports. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Conflict, by David Graham Phillips + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CONFLICT *** + +***** This file should be named 433-h.htm or 433-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/4/3/433/ + +Produced by Charles Keller. HTML version by Al Haines. + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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