{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_3737/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_3737","id":"gutenberg_3737","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3737","summary":null,"tags":["Bestsellers, American, 1895-1923","Category: American Literature","Category: Historical Novels","Category: Novels","Ethics -- Fiction","Religion and sociology -- Fiction","Upper class families -- Fiction"],"text":"Produced by Pat Castevans and David Widger\n\n\n\n\n\nA FAR COUNTRY\n\nBy Winston Churchill\n\n\nBOOK 2.\n\n\n\nX.\n\nThis was not my first visit to the state capital. Indeed, some of that\nrecondite knowledge, in which I took a pride, had been gained on the\noccasions of my previous visits. Rising and dressing early, I beheld out\nof the car window the broad, shallow river glinting in the morning\nsunlight, the dome of the state house against the blue of the sky. Even\nat that early hour groups of the gentlemen who made our laws were\nscattered about the lobby of the Potts House, standing or seated within\neasy reach of the gaily coloured cuspidors that protected the marble\nfloor: heavy-jawed workers from the cities mingled with moon-faced but\nastute countrymen who manipulated votes amongst farms and villages; fat\nor cadaverous, Irish, German or American, all bore in common a certain\nindefinable stamp. Having eaten my breakfast in a large dining-room that\nresounded with the clatter of dishes, I directed my steps to the\napartment occupied from year to year by Colonel Paul Barney,\ngeneralissimo of the Railroad on the legislative battlefield,--a position\nthat demanded a certain uniqueness of genius.\n\n\"How do you do, sir,\" he said, in a guarded but courteous tone as he\nopened the door. I entered to confront a group of three or four figures,\nsilent and rather hostile, seated in a haze of tobacco smoke around a\nmarble-topped table. On it reposed a Bible, attached to a chain.\n\n\"You probably don't remember me, Colonel,\" I said. \"My name is Pared, and\nI'm associated with the firm of Watling, Fowndes, and Ripon.\"\n\nHis air of marginality,--heightened by a grey moustache and goatee a la\nNapoleon Third,--vanished instantly; he became hospitable, ingratiating.\n\n\"Why--why certainly, you were down heah with Mr. Fowndes two years ago.\"\nThe Colonel spoke with a slight Southern accent. \"To be sure, sir. I've\nhad the honour of meeting your father. Mr. Norris, of North Haven, meet\nMr. Paret--one of our rising lawyers...\" I shook hands with them all and\nsat down. Opening his long coat, Colonel Varney revealed two rows of\ncigars, suggesting cartridges in a belt. These he proceeded to hand out\nas he talked. \"I'm glad to see you here, Mr. Paret. You must stay awhile,\nand become acquainted with the men who--ahem--are shaping the destinies\nof a great state. It would give me pleasure to escort you about.\"\n\nI thanked him. I had learned enough to realize how important are the\namenities in politics and business. The Colonel did most of the\nconversing; he could not have filled with efficiency and ease the\nimportant post that was his had it not been for the endless fund of\nhumorous anecdotes at his disposal. One by one the visitors left, each\nassuring me of his personal regard: the Colonel closed the door, softly,\nturning the key in the lock; there was a sly look in his black eyes as he\ntook a chair in proximity to mine.\n\n\"Well, Mr. Paret,\" he asked softly, \"what's up?\"\n\nWithout further ado I handed him Mr. Gorse's letter, and another Mr.\nWatling had given me for him, which contained a copy of the bill. He read\nthese, laid them on the table, glancing at me again, stroking his goatee\nthe while. He chuckled.\n\n\"By gum!\" he exclaimed. \"I take off my hat to Theodore Watling, always\ndid.\" He became contemplative. \"It can be done, Mr. Paret, but it's going\nto take some careful driving, sir, some reaching out and flicking 'em\nwhen they r'ar and buck. Paul Varney's never been stumped yet. Just as\nsoon as this is introduced we'll have Gates and Armstrong down\nhere--they're the Ribblevale attorneys, aren't they? I thought so,--and\nthe best legal talent they can hire. And they'll round up all the\ndisgruntled fellows, you know,--that ain't friendly to the Railroad.\nWe've got to do it quick, Mr. Paret. Gorse gave you a letter to the\nGovernor, didn't he?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" I said.\n\n\"Well, come along. I'll pass the word around among the boys, just to let\n'em know what to expect.\" His eyes glittered again. \"I've been following\nthis Ribblevale business,\" he added, \"and I understand Leonard\nDickinson's all ready to reorganize that company, when the time comes. He\nought to let me in for a little, on the ground floor.\"\n\nI did not venture to make any promises for Mr. Dickinson.\n\n\"I reckon it's just as well if you were to meet me at the Governor's\noffice,\" the Colonel added reflectively, and the hint was not lost on me.\n\"It's better not to let 'em find out any sooner than they have to where\nthis thing comes from,--you understand.\" He looked at his watch. \"How\nwould nine o'clock do? I'll be there, with Trulease, when you come,--by\naccident, you understand. Of course he'll be reasonable, but when they\nget to be governors they have little notions, you know, and you've got to\nindulge 'em, flatter 'em a little. It doesn't hurt, for when they get\ntheir backs up it only makes more trouble.\"\n\nHe put on a soft, black felt hat, and departed noiselessly...\n\nAt nine o'clock I arrived at the State House and was ushered into a great\nsquare room overlooking the park. The Governor was seated at a desk under\nan elaborate chandelier, and sure enough, Colonel Varney was there beside\nhim; making barely perceptible signals.\n\n\"It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Mr. Paret,\" said Mr.\nTrulease. \"Your name is a familiar one in your city, sir. And I gather\nfrom your card that you are associated with my good friend, Theodore\nWatling.\"\n\nI acknowledged it. I was not a little impressed by the perfect blend of\ncordiality, democratic simplicity and impressiveness Mr. Trulease had\nachieved. For he had managed, in the course of a long political career,\nto combine in exact proportions these elements which, in the public mind,\nshould up the personality of a chief executive. Momentarily he overcame\nthe feeling of superiority with which I had entered his presence;\nneutralized the sense I had of being associated now with the higher\npowers which had put him where he was. For I knew all about his \"record.\"\n\n\"You're acquainted with Colonel Varney?\" he inquired.\n\n\"Yes, Governor, I've met the Colonel,\" I said.\n\n\"Well, I suppose your firm is getting its share of business these days,\"\nMr. Trulease observed. I acknowledged it was, and after discussing for a\nfew moments the remarkable growth of my native city the Governor tapped\non his desk and inquired what he could do for me. I produced the letter\nfrom the attorney for the Railroad. The Governor read it gravely.\n\n\"Ah,\" he said, \"from Mr. Gorse.\" A copy of the proposed bill was\nenclosed, and the Governor read that also, hemmed and hawed a little,\nturned and handed it to Colonel Varney, who was sitting with a detached\nair, smoking contemplatively, a vacant expression on his face. \"What do\nyou think of this, Colonel?\"\n\nWhereupon the Colonel tore himself away from his reflections.\n\n\"What's that, Governor?\"\n\n\"Mr. Gorse has called my attention to what seems to him a flaw in our\nstatutes, an inability to obtain testimony from corporations whose books\nare elsewhere, and who may thus evade, he says, to a certain extent, the\nsovereign will of our state.\"\n\nThe Colonel took the paper with an admirable air of surprise, adjusted\nhis glasses, and became absorbed in reading, clearing his throat once or\ntwice and emitting an exclamation.\n\n\"Well, if you ask me, Governor,\" he said, at length, \"all I can say is\nthat I am astonished somebody didn't think of this simple remedy before\nnow. Many times, sir, have I seen justice defeated because we had no such\nlegislation as this.\"\n\nHe handed it back. The Governor studied it once more, and coughed.\n\n\"Does the penalty,\" he inquired, \"seem to you a little severe?\"\n\n\"No, sir,\" replied the Colonel, emphatically. \"Perhaps it is because I am\nanxious, as a citizen, to see an evil abated. I have had an intimate\nknowledge of legislation, sir, for more than twenty years in this state,\nand in all that time I do not remember to have seen a bill more concisely\ndrawn, or better calculated to accomplish the ends of justice. Indeed, I\noften wondered why this very penalty was not imposed. Foreign magistrates\nare notoriously indifferent as to affairs in another state than their\nown. Rather than go into the hands of a receiver I venture to say that\nhereafter, if this bill is made a law, the necessary testimony will be\nforthcoming.\"\n\nThe Governor read the bill through again.\n\n\"If it is introduced, Colonel,\" he said, \"the legislature and the people\nof the state ought to have it made clear to them that its aim is to\nremedy an injustice. A misunderstanding on this point would be\nunfortunate.\"\n\n\"Most unfortunate, Governor.\"\n\n\"And of course,\" added the Governor, now addressing me, \"it would be\nimproper for me to indicate what course I shall pursue in regard to it if\nit should come to me for my signature. Yet I may go so far as to say that\nthe defect it seeks to remedy seems to me a real one. Come in and see me,\nMr. Paret, when you are in town, and give my cordial regards to Mr.\nWatling.\"\n\nSo gravely had the farce been carried on that I almost laughed, despite\nthe fact that the matter in question was a serious one for me. The\nGovernor held out his hand, and I accepted my dismissal.\n\nI had not gone fifty steps in the corridor before I heard the Colonel's\nvoice in my ear.\n\n\"We had to give him a little rope to go through with his act,\" he\nwhispered confidentially. \"But he'll sign it all right. And now, if\nyou'll excuse me, Mr. Paret, I'll lay a few mines. See you at the hotel,\nsir.\"\n\nThus he indicated, delicately, that it would be better for me to keep out\nof sight. On my way to the Potts House the bizarre elements in the\nsituation struck me again with considerable force. It seemed so\nridiculous, so puerile to have to go through with this political farce in\norder that a natural economic evolution might be achieved. Without doubt\nthe development of certain industries had reached a stage where the units\nin competition had become too small, when a greater concentration of\ncapital was necessary. Curiously enough, in this mental argument of\njustification, I left out all consideration of the size of the probable\nprofits to Mr. Scherer and his friends. Profits and brains went together.\nAnd, since the Almighty did not limit the latter, why should man attempt\nto limit the former? We were playing for high but justifiable stakes; and\nI resented the comedy which an hypocritical insistence on the forms of\ndemocracy compelled us to go through. It seemed unworthy of men who\ncontrolled the destinies of state and nation. The point of view, however,\nwas consoling. As the day wore on I sat in the Colonel's room, admiring\nthe skill with which he conducted the campaign: a green country lawyer\nhad been got to introduce the bill, it had been expedited to the\nCommittee on the Judiciary, which would have an executive session\nimmediately after dinner. I had ventured to inquire about the hearings.\n\n\"There won't be any hearings, sir,\" the Colonel assured me. \"We own that\ncommittee from top to bottom.\"\n\nIndeed, by four o'clock in the afternoon the message came that the\ncommittee had agreed to recommend the bill.\n\nShortly after that the first flurry occurred. There came a knock at the\ndoor, followed by the entrance of a stocky Irish American of about forty\nyears of age, whose black hair was plastered over his forehead. His\nsea-blue eyes had a stormy look.\n\n\"Hello, Jim,\" said the Colonel. \"I was just wondering where you were.\"\n\n\"Sure, you must have been!\" replied the gentleman sarcastically.\n\nBut the Colonel's geniality was unruffled.\n\n\"Mr. Maker,\" he said, \"you ought to know Mr. Paret. Mr. Maker is the\nrepresentative from Ward Five of your city, and we can always count on\nhim to do the right thing, even if he is a Democrat. How about it, Jim?\"\n\nMr. Maker relighted the stump of his cigar.\n\n\"Take a fresh one, Jim,\" said the Colonel, opening a bureau drawer.\n\nMr. Maker took two.\n\n\"Say, Colonel,\" he demanded, \"what's this bill that went into the\njudiciary this morning?\"\n\n\"What bill?\" asked the Colonel, blandly.\n\n\"So you think I ain't on?\" Mr. Maker inquired.\n\nThe Colonel laughed.\n\n\"Where have you been, Jim?\"\n\n\"I've been up to the city, seem' my wife--that's where I've been.\"\n\nThe Colonel smiled, as at a harmless fiction.\n\n\"Well, if you weren't here, I don't see what right you've got to\ncomplain. I never leave my good Democratic friends on the outside, do I?\"\n\n\"That's all right,\" replied Mr. Maker, doggedly, \"I'm on, I'm here now,\nand that bill in the Judiciary doesn't pass without me. I guess I can\nstop it, too. How about a thousand apiece for five of us boys?\"\n\n\"You're pretty good at a joke, Jim,\" remarked the Colonel, stroking his\ngoatee.\n\n\"Maybe you're looking for a little publicity in this here game,\" retorted\nMr. Maker, darkly. \"Say, Colonel, ain't we always treated the Railroad on\nthe level?\"\n\n\"Jim,\" asked the Colonel, gently, \"didn't I always take care of you?\"\n\nHe had laid his hand on the shoulder of Mr. Maker, who appeared slightly\nmollified, and glanced at a massive silver watch.\n\n\"Well, I'll be dropping in about eight o'clock,\" was his significant\nreply, as he took his leave.\n\n\"I guess we'll have to grease the wheels a little,\" the Colonel remarked\nto me, and gazed at the ceiling....\n\nThe telegram apropos of the Ward Five leader was by no means the only\ncipher message I sent back during my stay. I had not needed to be told\nthat the matter in hand would cost money, but Mr. Watling's parting\ninstruction to me had been to take the Colonel's advice as to specific\nsums, and obtain confirmation from Fowndes. Nor was it any surprise to me\nto find Democrats on intimate terms with such a stout Republican as the\nColonel. Some statesman is said to have declared that he knew neither\nEasterners nor Westerners, Northerners nor Southerners, but only\nAmericans; so Colonel Varney recognized neither Democrats nor\nRepublicans; in our legislature party divisions were sunk in a greater\nloyalty to the Railroad.\n\nAt the Colonel's suggestion I had laid in a liberal supply of cigars and\nwhiskey. The scene in his room that evening suggested a session of a\nsublimated grand lodge of some secret order, such were the mysterious\ncomings and goings, knocks and suspenses. One after another the\n\"important\" men duly appeared and were introduced, the Colonel supplying\nthe light touch.\n\n\"Why, cuss me if it isn't Billy! Mr. Paret, I want you to shake hands\nwith Mr. Donovan, the floor leader of the 'opposition,' sir. Mr. Donovan\nhas had the habit of coming up here for a friendly chat ever since he\nfirst came down to the legislature. How long is it, Billy?\"\n\n\"I guess it's nigh on to fifteen years, Colonel.\"\n\n\"Fifteen years!\" echoed the Colonel, \"and he's so good a Democrat it\nhasn't changed his politics a particle.\"\n\nMr. Donovan grinned in appreciation of this thrust, helped himself\nliberally from the bottle on the mantel, and took a seat on the bed. We\nhad a \"friendly chat.\"\n\nThus I made the acquaintance also of the Hon. Joseph Mecklin, Speaker of\nthe House, who unbent in the most flattering way on learning my identity.\n\n\"Mr. Paret's here on that little matter, representing Watling, Fowndes\nand Ripon,\" the Colonel explained. And it appeared that Mr. Mecklin knew\nall about the \"little matter,\" and that the mention of the firm of\nWatling, Fowndes and Ripon had a magical effect in these parts. The\nPresident of the Senate, the Hon. Lafe Giddings, went so far as to say\nthat he hoped before long to see Mr. Watling in Washington. By no means\nthe least among our callers was the Hon. Fitch Truesdale, editor of the\nSt. Helen's Messenger, whose editorials were of the trite effectiveness\nthat is taken widely for wisdom, and were assiduously copied every week\nby other state papers and labeled \"Mr. Truesdale's Common Sense.\" At\ncountless firesides in our state he was known as the spokesman of the\nplain man, who was blissfully ignorant of the fact that Mr. Truesdale was\nowned body and carcass by Mr. Cyrus Ridden, the principal manufacturer of\nSt. Helen's and a director in several subsidiary lines of the Railroad.\nIn the legislature, the Hon. Fitch's function was that of the moderate\ncounsellor and bellwether for new members, hence nothing could have been\nmore fitting than the choice of that gentleman for the honour of moving,\non the morrow, that Bill No. 709 ought to pass.\n\nMr. Truesdale reluctantly consented to accept a small \"loan\" that would\nhelp to pay the mortgage on his new press....\n\nWhen the last of the gathering had departed, about one o'clock in the\nmorning, I had added considerably to my experience, gained a pretty\naccurate idea of who was who in the legislature and politics of the\nstate, and established relationships--as the Colonel reminded me--likely\nto prove valuable in the future. It seemed only gracious to congratulate\nhim on his management of the affair,--so far. He appeared pleased, and\nsqueezed my hand.\n\n\"Well, sir, it did require a little delicacy of touch. And if I do say it\nmyself, it hasn't been botched,\" he admitted. \"There ain't an outsider,\nas far as I can learn, who has caught on to the nigger in the wood-pile.\nThat's the great thing, to keep 'em ignorant as long as possible. You\nunderstand. They yell bloody murder when they do find out, but generally\nit's too late, if a bill's been handled right.\"\n\nI found myself speculating as to who the \"outsiders\" might be. No\nRibblevale attorneys were on the spot as yet,--of that I was satisfied.\nIn the absence of these, who were the opposition? It seemed to me as\nthough I had interviewed that day every man in the legislature.\n\nI was very tired. But when I got into bed, it was impossible to sleep. My\neyes smarted from the tobacco smoke; and the events of the day, in\ndisorderly manner, kept running through my head. The tide of my\nexhilaration had ebbed, and I found myself struggling against a revulsion\ncaused, apparently, by the contemplation of Colonel Varney and his\nassociates; the instruments, in brief, by which our triumph over our\nopponents was to be effected. And that same idea which, when launched\namidst the surroundings of the Boyne Club, had seemed so brilliant, now\ntook on an aspect of tawdriness. Another thought intruded itself,--that\nof Mr. Pugh, the president of the Ribblevale Company. My father had known\nhim, and some years before I had traveled halfway across the state in his\ncompany; his kindliness had impressed me. He had spent a large part of\nhis business life, I knew, in building up the Ribblevale, and now it was\nto be wrested from him; he was to be set aside, perhaps forced to start\nall over again when old age was coming on! In vain I accused myself of\nsentimentality, and summoned all my arguments to prove that in commerce\nefficiency must be the only test. The image of Mr. Pugh would not down.\n\nI got up and turned on the light, and took refuge in a novel I had in my\nbag. Presently I grew calmer. I had chosen. I had succeeded. And now that\nI had my finger at last on the nerve of power, it was no time to weaken.\n\nIt was half-past six when I awoke and went to the window, relieved to\nfind that the sun had scattered my morbid fancies with the darkness; and\nI speculated, as I dressed, whether the thing called conscience were not,\nafter all, a matter of nerves. I went downstairs through the\ntobacco-stale atmosphere of the lobby into the fresh air and sparkly\nsunlight of the mild February morning, and leaving the business district\nI reached the residence portion of the little town. The front steps of\nsome of the comfortable houses were being swept by industrious servant\ngirls, and out of the chimneys twisted, fantastically, rich blue smoke;\nthe bare branches of the trees were silver-grey against the sky; gaining\nat last an old-fashioned, wooden bridge, I stood for awhile gazing at the\nriver, over the shallows of which the spendthrift hand of nature had\nflung a shower of diamonds. And I reflected that the world was for the\nstrong, for him who dared reach out his hand and take what it offered. It\nwas not money we coveted, we Americans, but power, the self-expression\nconferred by power. A single experience such as I had had the night\nbefore would since to convince any sane man that democracy was a failure,\nthat the world-old principle of aristocracy would assert itself, that the\nattempt of our ancestors to curtail political power had merely resulted\nin the growth of another and greater economic power that bade fair to be\nlimitless. As I walked slowly back into town I felt a reluctance to\nreturn to the noisy hotel, and finding myself in front of a little\nrestaurant on a side street, I entered it. There was but one other\ncustomer in the place, and he was seated on the far side of the counter,\nwith a newspaper in front of him; and while I was ordering my breakfast I\nwas vaguely aware that the newspaper had dropped, and that he was looking\nat me. In the slight interval that elapsed before my brain could register\nhis identity I experienced a distinct shock of resentment; a sense of the\nreintrusion of an antagonistic value at a moment when it was most\nunwelcome....\n\nThe man had risen and was coming around the counter. He was Hermann\nKrebs.\n\n\"Paret!\" I heard him say.\n\n\"You here?\" I exclaimed.\n\nHe did not seem to notice the lack of cordiality in my tone. He appeared\nso genuinely glad to see me again that I instantly became rather ashamed\nof my ill nature.\n\n\"Yes, I'm here--in the legislature,\" he informed me.\n\n\"A Solon!\"\n\n\"Exactly.\" He smiled. \"And you?\" he inquired.\n\n\"Oh, I'm only a spectator. Down here for a day or two.\"\n\nHe was still lanky, his clothes gave no evidence of an increased\nprosperity, but his complexion was good, his skin had cleared. I was more\nthan ever baked by a resolute good humour, a simplicity that was not\ninnocence, a whimsical touch seemingly indicative of a state of mind that\nrefused to take too seriously certain things on which I set store. What\nright had he to be contented with life?\n\n\"Well, I too am only a spectator here,\" he laughed. \"I'm neither fish,\nflesh nor fowl, nor good red herring.\"\n\n\"You were going into the law, weren't you?\" I asked. \"I remember you said\nsomething about it that day we met at Beverly Farms.\"\n\n\"Yes, I managed it, after all. Then I went back home to Elkington to try\nto make a living.\"\n\n\"But somehow I have never thought of you as being likely to develop\npolitical aspirations, Krebs,\" I said.\n\n\"I should say not! he exclaimed.\n\n\"Yet here you are, launched upon a political career! How did it happen?\"\n\n\"Oh, I'm not worrying about the career,\" he assured me. \"I got here by\naccident, and I'm afraid it won't happen again in a hurry. You see, the\nhands in those big mills we have in Elkington sprang a surprise on the\nmachine, and the first thing I knew I was nominated for the legislature.\nA committee came to my boarding-house and told me, and there was the\ndeuce to pay, right off. The Railroad politicians turned in and worked\nfor the Democratic candidate, of course, and the Hutchinses, who own the\nmills, tried through emissaries to intimidate their operatives.\"\n\n\"And then?\" I asked.\n\n\"Well,--I'm here,\" he said.\n\n\"Wouldn't you be accomplishing more,\" I inquired, \"if you hadn't\nantagonized the Hutchinses?\"\n\n\"It depends upon what you mean by accomplishment,\" he answered, so mildly\nthat I felt more rued than ever.\n\n\"Well, from what you say, I suppose you're going in for reform, that\nthese workmen up at Elkington are not satisfied with their conditions and\nimagine you can help to better them. Now, provided the conditions are not\nas good as they might be, how are you going to improve them if you find\nyourself isolated here, as you say?\"\n\n\"In other words, I should cooperate with Colonel Varney and other\ndisinterested philanthropists,\" he supplied, and I realized that I was\nlosing my temper.\n\n\"Well, what can you do?\" I inquired defiantly.\n\n\"I can find out what's going on,\" he said. \"I have already learned\nsomething, by the way.\"\n\n\"And then?\" I asked, wondering whether the implication were personal.\n\n\"Then I can help--disseminate the knowledge. I may be wrong, but I have\nan idea that when the people of this country learn how their legislatures\nare conducted they will want to change things.\"\n\n\"That's right!\" echoed the waiter, who had come up with my griddle-cakes.\n\"And you're the man to tell 'em, Mr. Krebs.\"\n\n\"It will need several thousand of us to do that, I'm afraid,\" said Krebs,\nreturning his smile.\n\nMy distaste for the situation became more acute, but I felt that I was\nthrown on the defensive. I could not retreat, now.\n\n\"I think you are wrong,\" I declared, when the waiter had departed to\nattend to another customer. \"The people the great majority of them, at\nleast are indifferent, they don't want to be bothered with politics.\nThere will always be labour agitation, of course,--the more wages those\nfellows get, the more they want. We pay the highest wages in the world\nto-day, and the standard of living is higher in this country than\nanywhere else. They'd ruin our prosperity, if we'd let 'em.\"\n\n\"How about the thousands of families who don't earn enough to live\ndecently even in times of prosperity?\" inquired Krebs.\n\n\"It's hard, I'll admit, but the inefficient and the shiftless are bound\nto suffer, no matter what form of government you adopt.\"\n\n\"You talk about standards of living,--I could show you some examples of\nstandards to make your heart sick,\" he said. \"What you don't realize,\nperhaps, is that low standards help to increase the inefficient of whom\nyou complain.\"\n\nHe smiled rather sadly. \"The prosperity you are advocating,\" he added,\nafter a moment, \"is a mere fiction, it is gorging the few at the expense\nof the many. And what is being done in this country is to store up an\nexplosive gas that some day will blow your superstructure to atoms if you\ndon't wake up in time.\"\n\n\"Isn't that a rather one-sided view, too?\" I suggested.\n\n\"I've no doubt it may appear so, but take the proceedings in this\nlegislature. I've no doubt you know something about them, and that you\nwould maintain they are justified on account of the indifference of the\npublic, and of other reasons, but I can cite an instance that is simply\nlegalized thieving.\" For the first time a note of indignation crept into\nKrebs's voice. \"Last night I discovered by a mere accident, in talking to\na man who came in on a late train, that a bill introduced yesterday,\nwhich is being rushed through the Judiciary Committee of the House--an\napparently innocent little bill--will enable, if it becomes a law, the\nBoyne Iron Works, of your city, to take possession of the Ribblevale\nSteel Company, lock, stock, and barrel. And I am told it was conceived by\na lawyer who claims to be a respectable member of his profession, and who\nhas extraordinary ability, Theodore Watling.\"\n\nKrebs put his hand in his pocket and drew out a paper. \"Here's a copy of\nit,--House Bill 709.\" His expression suddenly changed. \"Perhaps Mr.\nWatling is a friend of yours.\"\n\n\"I'm with his firm,\" I replied....\n\nKrebs's fingers closed over the paper, crumpling it.\n\n\"Oh, then, you know about this,\" he said. He was putting the paper back\ninto his pocket when I took it from him. But my adroitness, so carefully\nschooled, seemed momentarily to have deserted me. What should I say? It\nwas necessary to decide quickly.\n\n\"Don't you take rather a--prejudiced view of this, Krebs?\" I said. \"Upon\nmy word, I can't see why you should accept a rumour running around the\nlobbies that Mr. Watling drafted this bill for a particular purpose.\"\n\nHe was silent. But his eyes did not leave my face.\n\n\"Why should any sensible man, a member of the legislature, take stock in\nthat kind of gossip?\" I insisted. \"Why not judge this bill by its face,\nwithout heeding a cock and bull story as to how it may have originated?\nIt is a good bill, or a bad bill? Let's see what it says.\"\n\nI read it.\n\n\"So far as I can see, it is legislation which we ought to have had long\nago, and tends to compel a publicity in corporation affairs that is much\nneeded, to put a stop to practices which every decent citizen deplores.\"\n\nHe drew the paper out of my hand.\n\n\"You needn't go on, Paret,\" he told me. \"It's no use.\"\n\n\"Well, I'm sorry we don't agree,\" I said, and got up. I left him twisting\nthe paper in his fingers.\n\nBeside the clerk's desk in the Potts House, relating one of his\nanecdotes, I spied Colonel Varney, and managed presently to draw him\nupstairs to his room. \"What's the matter?\" he asked.\n\n\"Do you know a man named Krebs in the House?\" I said.\n\n\"From Elkington? Why, that's the man the Hutchinses let slip\nthrough,--the Hutchinses, who own the mills over there. The agitators put\nup a job on them.\" The Colonel was no longer the genial and social\npurveyor of anecdotes. He had become tense, alert, suspicious. \"What's he\nup to?\"\n\n\"He's found out about this bill,\" I replied.\n\n\"How?\"\n\n\"I don't know. But someone told him that it originated in our office, and\nthat we were going to use it in our suit against the Ribblevale.\"\n\nI related the circumstances of my running across Krebs, speaking of\nhaving known him at Harvard. Colonel Varney uttered an oath, and strode\nacross to the window, where he stood looking down into the street from\nbetween the lace curtains.\n\n\"We'll have to attend to him, right off,\" he said.\n\nI was surprised to find myself resenting the imputation, and deeply. \"I'm\nafraid he's one of those who can't be 'attended to,'\" I answered.\n\n\"You mean that he's in the employ of the Ribblevale people?\" the Colonel\ninquired.\n\n\"I don't mean anything of the kind,\" I retorted, with more heat, perhaps,\nthan I realized. The Colonel looked at me queerly.\n\n\"That's all right, Mr. Paret. Of course I don't want to question your\njudgment, sir. And you say he's a friend of yours.\"\n\n\"I said I knew him at college.\"\n\n\"But you will pardon me,\" the Colonel went on, \"when I tell you that I've\nhad some experience with that breed, and I have yet to see one of 'em you\ncouldn't come to terms with in some way--in some way,\" he added,\nsignificantly. I did not pause to reflect that the Colonel's attitude,\nfrom his point of view (yes, and from mine,--had I not adopted it?) was\nthe logical one. In that philosophy every man had his price, or his\nweakness. Yet, such is the inconsistency of human nature, I was now\nunable to contemplate this attitude with calmness.\n\n\"Mr. Krebs is a lawyer. Has he accepted a pass from the Railroad?\" I\ndemanded, knowing the custom of that corporation of conferring this\ndelicate favour on the promising young talent in my profession.\n\n\"I reckon he's never had the chance,\" said Mr. Varney.\n\n\"Well, has he taken a pass as a member of the legislature?\"\n\n\"No,--I remember looking that up when he first came down. Sent that back,\nif I recall the matter correctly.\" Colonel Varney went to a desk in the\ncorner of the room, unlocked it, drew forth a black book, and running his\nfingers through the pages stopped at the letter K. \"Yes, sent back his\nlegislative pass, but I've known 'em to do that when they were holding\nout for something more. There must be somebody who can get close to him.\"\n\nThe Colonel ruminated awhile. Then he strode to the door and called out\nto the group of men who were always lounging in the hall.\n\n\"Tell Alf Young I want to see him, Fred.\"\n\nI waited, by no means free from uneasiness and anxiety, from a certain\nlack of self-respect that was unfamiliar. Mr. Young, the Colonel\nexplained, was a legal light in Galesburg, near Elkington,--the Railroad\nlawyer there. And when at last Mr. Young appeared he proved to be an oily\ngentleman of about forty, inclining to stoutness, with one of those\n\"blue,\" shaven faces.\n\n\"Want me, Colonel?\" he inquired blithely, when the door had closed behind\nhim; and added obsequiously, when introduced to me, \"Glad to meet you,\nMr. Paret. My regards to Mr. Watling, when you go back.\n\n\"Alf,\" demanded the Colonel, \"what do you know of this fellow Krebs?\"\n\nMr. Young laughed. Krebs was \"nutty,\" he declared--that was all there was\nto it.\n\n\"Won't he--listen to reason?\"\n\n\"It's been tried, Colonel. Say, he wouldn't know a hundred-dollar bill if\nyou showed him one.\"\n\n\"What does he want?\"\n\n\"Oh, something,--that's sure, they all want something.\" Mr. Young\nshrugged his shoulder expressively, and by a skillful manipulation of his\nlips shifted his cigar from one side of his mouth to the other without\nraising his hands. \"But it ain't money. I guess he's got a notion that\nlater on the labour unions'll send him to the United States Senate some\nday. He's no slouch, either, when it comes to law. I can tell you that.\"\n\n\"No--no flaw in his--record?\" Colonel Varney's agate eyes sought those of\nMr. Young, meaningly.\n\n\"That's been tried, too,\" declared the Galesburg attorney. \"Say, you can\nbelieve it or not, but we've never dug anything up so far. He's been too\nslick for us, I guess.\"\n\n\"Well,\" exclaimed the Colonel, at length, \"let him squeal and be d--d! He\ncan't do any more than make a noise. Only I hoped we'd be able to grease\nthis thing along and slide it through the Senate this afternoon, before\nthey got wind of it.\"\n\n\"He'll squeal, all right, until you smother him,\" Mr. Young observed.\n\n\"We'll smother him some day!\" replied the Colonel, savagely.\n\nMr. Young laughed.\n\nBut as I made my way toward the State House I was conscious of a feeling\nof relief. I had no sooner gained a front seat in the gallery of the\nHouse of Representatives when the members rose, the Senate marched\ngravely in, the Speaker stopped jesting with the Chaplain, and over the\nChaplain's face came suddenly an agonized expression. Folding his hands\nacross his stomach he began to call on God with terrific fervour, in an\nintense and resounding voice. I was struck suddenly by the irony of it\nall. Why have a legislature when Colonel Paul Varney was so efficient!\nThe legislature was a mere sop to democratic prejudice, to pray over it\nheightened the travesty. Suppose there were a God after all? not\nnecessarily the magnified monarch to whom these pseudo-democrats prayed,\nbut an Intelligent Force that makes for righteousness. How did He, or It,\nlike to be trifled with in this way? And, if He existed, would not His\ndisgust be immeasurable as He contemplated that unctuous figure in the\n\"Prince Albert\" coat, who pretended to represent Him?\n\nAs the routine business began I searched for Krebs, to find him presently\nat a desk beside a window in the rear of the hall making notes on a\npaper; there was, confessedly, little satisfaction in the thought that\nthe man whose gaunt features I contemplated was merely one of those\nimpractical idealists who beat themselves to pieces against the forces\nthat sway the world and must forever sway it. I should be compelled to\nadmit that he represented something unique in that assembly if he had the\ncourage to get up and oppose House Bill 709. I watched him narrowly; the\nsuggestion intruded itself--perhaps he had been \"seen,\" as the Colonel\nexpressed it. I repudiated it. I grew impatient, feverish; the monotonous\nreading of the clerk was interrupted now and then by the sharp tones of\nthe Speaker assigning his various measures to this or that committee,\n\"unless objection is offered,\" while the members moved about and murmured\namong themselves; Krebs had stopped making notes; he was looking out of\nthe window. At last, without any change of emphasis in his droning voice,\nthe clerk announced the recommendation of the Committee on Judiciary that\nHouse Bill 709 ought to pass.\n\nDown in front a man had risen from his seat--the felicitous Mr.\nTruesdale. Glancing around at his fellow-members he then began to explain\nin the impressive but conversational tone of one whose counsels are in\nthe habit of being listened to, that this was merely a little measure to\nremedy a flaw in the statutes. Mr. Truesdale believed in corporations\nwhen corporations were good, and this bill was calculated to make them\ngood, to put an end to jugglery and concealment. Our great state, he\nsaid, should be in the forefront of such wise legislation, which made for\njustice and a proper publicity; but the bill in question was of greater\ninterest to lawyers than to laymen, a committee composed largely of\nlawyers had recommended it unanimously, and he was sure that no\nopposition would develop in the House. In order not to take up their time\nhe asked: therefore, that it be immediately put on its second and third\nreading and allowed to pass.\n\nHe sat down, and I looked at Krebs. Could he, could any man, any lawyer,\nhave the presumption to question such an obviously desirable measure, to\narraign the united judgment of the committee's legal talent? Such was the\nnote Mr. Truesdale so admirably struck. As though fascinated, I continued\nto gaze at Krebs. I hated him, I desired to see him humiliated, and yet\namazingly I found myself wishing with almost equal vehemence that he\nwould be true to himself. He was rising,--slowly, timidly, I thought, his\nhand clutching his desk lid, his voice sounding wholly inadequate as he\naddressed the Speaker. The Speaker hesitated, his tone palpably\nsupercilious.\n\n\"The gentleman from--from Elkington, Mr. Krebs.\"\n\nThere was a craning of necks, a staring, a tittering. I burned with\nvicarious shame as Krebs stood there awkwardly, his hand still holding\nthe desk. There were cries of \"louder\" when he began; some picked up\ntheir newspapers, while others started conversations. The Speaker rapped\nwith his gavel, and I failed to hear the opening words. Krebs paused, and\nbegan again. His speech did not, at first, flow easily.\n\n\"Mr. Speaker, I rise to protest against this bill, which in my opinion is\nnot so innocent as the gentleman from St. Helen's would have the House\nbelieve. It is on a par, indeed, with other legislation that in past\nyears has been engineered through this legislature under the guise of\nbeneficent law. No, not on a par. It is the most arrogant, the most\nmonstrous example of special legislation of them all. And while I do not\nexpect to be able to delay its passage much longer than the time I shall\nbe on my feet--\"\n\n\"Then why not sit down?\" came a voice, just audible.\n\nAs he turned swiftly toward the offender his profile had an eagle-like\neffect that startled me, seemingly realizing a new quality in the man. It\nwas as though he had needed just the stimulus of that interruption to\nelectrify and transform him. His awkwardness disappeared; and if he was a\nlittle bombastic, a little \"young,\" he spoke with the fire of conviction.\n\n\"Because,\" he cried, \"because I should lose my self-respect for life if I\nsat here and permitted the political organization of a railroad, the\nmembers of which are here under the guise of servants of the people, to\ncow me into silence. And if it be treason to mention the name of that\nRailroad in connection with its political tyranny, then make the most of\nit.\" He let go of the desk, and tapped the copy of the bill. \"What are\nthe facts? The Boyne Iron Works, under the presidency of Adolf Scherer,\nhas been engaged in litigation with the Ribblevale Steel Company for some\nyears: and this bill is intended to put into the hands of the attorneys\nfor Mr. Scherer certain information that will enable him to get\npossession of the property. Gentlemen, that is what 'legal practice' has\ndescended to in the hands of respectable lawyers. This device originated\nwith the resourceful Mr. Theodore Watling, and if it had not had the\napproval of Mr. Miller Gorse, it would never have got any farther than\nthe judiciary committee. It was confided to the skillful care of Colonel\nPaul Varney to be steered through this legislature, as hundreds of other\nmeasures have been steered through,--without unnecessary noise. It may be\nasked why the Railroad should bother itself by lending its political\norganization to private corporations? I will tell you. Because\ncorporations like the Boyne corporation are a part of a network of\ninterests, these corporations aid the Railroad to maintain its monopoly,\nand in return receive rebates.\"\n\nKrebs had raised his voice as the murmurs became louder. At this point a\nsharp-faced lawyer from Belfast got to his feet and objected that the\ngentleman from Elkington was wasting the time of the House, indulging in\nhearsay. His remarks were not germane, etc. The Speaker rapped again,\nwith a fine show of impartiality, and cautioned the member from\nElkington.\n\n\"Very well,\" replied Krebs. \"I have said what I wanted to say on that\nscore, and I know it to be the truth. And if this House does not find it\ngermane, the day is coming when its constituents will.\"\n\nWhereupon he entered into a discussion of the bill, dissecting it with\nmore calmness, with an ability that must have commanded, even from some\nhostile minds, an unwilling respect. The penalty, he said, was\noutrageous, hitherto unheard of in law,--putting a corporation in the\nhands of a receiver, at the mercy of those who coveted it, because one of\nits officers refused, or was unable, to testify. He might be in China, in\nTimbuctoo when the summons was delivered at his last or usual place of\nabode. Here was an enormity, an exercise of tyrannical power exceeding\nall bounds, a travesty on popular government.... He ended by pointing out\nthe significance of the fact that the committee had given no hearings; by\ndeclaring that if the bill became a law, it would inevitably react upon\nthe heads of those who were responsible for it.\n\nHe sat down, and there was a flutter of applause from the scattered\naudience in the gallery.\n\n\"By God, that's the only man in the whole place!\"\n\nI was aware, for the first time, of a neighbour at my side,--a solid,\nred-faced man, evidently a farmer. His trousers were tucked into his\nboots, and his gnarled and powerful hands, ingrained with dirt, clutched\nthe arms of the seat as he leaned forward.\n\n\"Didn't he just naturally lambaste 'em?\" he cried excitedly. \"They'll\ndown him, I guess,--but say, he's right. A man would lose his\nself-respect if he didn't let out his mind at them hoss thieves, wouldn't\nhe? What's that fellow's name?\"\n\nI told him.\n\n\"Krebs,\" he repeated. \"I want to remember that. Durned if I don't shake\nhands with him.\"\n\nHis excitement astonished me. Would the public feel like that, if they\nonly knew?... The Speaker's gavel had come down like a pistol shot.\n\nOne \"war-hoss\"--as my neighbour called them--after another proceeded to\ncrush the member from Elkington. It was, indeed, very skillfully done,\nand yet it was a process from which I did not derive, somehow, much\npleasure. Colonel Varney's army had been magnificently trained to meet\njust this kind of situation: some employed ridicule, others declared, in\nimpassioned tones, that the good name of their state had been wantonly\nassailed, and pointed fervently to portraits on the walls of patriots of\nthe past,--sentiments that drew applause from the fickle gallery. One\ngentleman observed that the obsession of a \"railroad machine\" was a sure\nsymptom of a certain kind of insanity, of which the first speaker had\ngiven many other evidences. The farmer at my side remained staunch.\n\n\"They can't fool me,\" he said angrily, \"I know 'em. Do you see that\nfellow gettin' up to talk now? Well, I could tell you a few things about\nhim, all right. He comes from Glasgow, and his name's Letchworth. He's\ndone more harm in his life than all the criminals he's kept out of\nprison,--belongs to one of the old families down there, too.\"\n\nI had, indeed, remarked Letchworth's face, which seemed to me peculiarly\nevil, its lividity enhanced by a shock of grey hair. His method was\nwithering sarcasm, and he was clearly unable to control his animus....\n\nNo champion appeared to support Krebs, who sat pale and tense while this\ndenunciation of him was going on. Finally he got the floor. His voice\ntrembled a little, whether with passion, excitement, or nervousness it\nwas impossible to say. But he contented himself with a brief defiance. If\nthe bill passed, he declared, the men who voted for it, the men who were\nbehind it, would ultimately be driven from political life by an indignant\npublic. He had a higher opinion of the voters of the state than those who\naccused him of slandering it, than those who sat silent and had not\nlifted their voices against this crime.\n\nWhen the bill was put to a vote he demanded a roll call. Ten members\nbesides himself were recorded against House Bill No. 709!\n\nIn spite of this overwhelming triumph my feelings were not wholly those\nof satisfaction when I returned to the hotel and listened to the\nexultations and denunciations of such politicians as Letchworth, Young,\nand Colonel Varney. Perhaps an image suggesting Hermann Krebs as some\nsplendid animal at bay, dragged down by the hounds, is too strong: he had\nbeen ingloriously crushed, and defeat, even for the sake of conviction,\nwas not an inspiring spectacle.... As the chase swept on over his\nprostrate figure I rapidly regained poise and a sense of proportion; a\n\"master of life\" could not permit himself to be tossed about by\nsentimentality; and gradually I grew ashamed of my bad quarter of an hour\nin the gallery of the House, and of the effect of it--which lingered\nawhile--as of a weakness suddenly revealed, which must at all costs be\novercome. I began to see something dramatic and sensational in Krebs's\nperformance....\n\nThe Ribblevale Steel Company was the real quarry, after all. And such had\nbeen the expedition, the skill and secrecy, with which our affair was\nconducted, that before the Ribblevale lawyers could arrive, alarmed and\nbreathless, the bill had passed the House, and their only real chance of\nhalting it had been lost. For the Railroad controlled the House, not by\nowning the individuals composing it, but through the leaders who\ndominated it,--men like Letchworth and Truesdale. These, and Colonel\nVarney, had seen to it that men who had any parliamentary ability had\nbeen attended to; all save Krebs, who had proved a surprise. There were\nindeed certain members who, although they had railroad passes in their\npockets (which were regarded as just perquisites,--the Railroad being so\nrich!), would have opposed the bill if they had felt sufficiently sure of\nthemselves to cope with such veterans as Letchworth. Many of these had\nallowed themselves to be won over or cowed by the oratory which had\ncrushed Krebs.\n\nNor did the Ribblevale people--be it recorded--scruple to fight fire with\nfire. Their existence, of course, was at stake, and there was no public\nto appeal to. A part of the legal army that rushed to the aid of our\nadversaries spent the afternoon and most of the night organizing all\nthose who could be induced by one means or another to reverse their\nsentiments, and in searching for the few who had grievances against the\nexisting power. The following morning a motion was introduced to\nreconsider; and in the debate that followed, Krebs, still defiant, took\nan active part. But the resolution required a two-thirds vote, and was\nlost.\n\nWhen the battle was shifted to the Senate it was as good as lost. The\nJudiciary Committee of the august body did indeed condescend to give\nhearings, at which the Ribblevale lawyers exhausted their energy and\ningenuity without result with only two dissenting votes the bill was\ncalmly passed. In vain was the Governor besieged, entreated,\nthreatened,--it was said; Mr. Trulease had informed protesters--so\nColonel Varney gleefully reported--that he had \"become fully convinced of\nthe inherent justice of the measure.\" On Saturday morning he signed it,\nand it became a law....\n\nColonel Varney, as he accompanied me to the train, did not conceal his\njubilation.\n\n\"Perhaps I ought not to say it, Mr. Paret, but it couldn't have been done\nneater. That's the art in these little affairs, to get 'em runnin' fast,\nto get momentum on 'em before the other party wakes up, and then he can't\nstop 'em.\" As he shook hands in farewell he added, with more gravity:\n\"We'll see each other often, sir, I guess. My very best regards to Mr.\nWatling.\"\n\nNeedless to say, I had not confided to him the part I had played in\noriginating House Bill No. 709, now a law of the state. But as the train\nrolled on through the sunny winter landscape a sense of well-being, of\nimportance and power began to steal through me. I was victoriously\nbearing home my first scalp,--one which was by no means to be\ndespised.... It was not until we reached Rossiter, about five o'clock,\nthat I was able to get the evening newspapers. Such was the perfection of\nthe organization of which I might now call myself an integral part that\nthe \"best\" publications contained only the barest mention,--and that in\nthe legislative news,--of the signing of the bill. I read with\ncomplacency and even with amusement the flaring headlines I had\nanticipated in Mr. Lawler's 'Pilot.'\n\n\"The Governor Signs It!\"\n\n\"Special legislation, forced through by the Railroad Lobby, which will\ndrive honest corporations from this state.\"\n\n\"Ribblevale Steel Company the Victim.\"\n\nIt was common talk in the capital, the article went on to say, that\nTheodore Watling himself had drawn up the measure.... Perusing the\neditorial page my eye fell on the name, Krebs. One member of the\nlegislature above all deserved the gratitude of the people of the\nstate,--the member from Elkington. \"An unknown man, elected in spite of\nthe opposition of the machine, he had dared to raise his voice against\nthis iniquity,\" etc., etc.\n\nWe had won. That was the essential thing. And my legal experience had\ntaught me that victory counts; defeat is soon forgotten. Even the\ndiscontented, half-baked and heterogeneous element from which the Pilot\ngot its circulation had short memories.\n\n\n\n\nXI.\n\nThe next morning, which was Sunday, I went to Mr. Watling's house in,\nFillmore Street--a new residence at that time, being admired as the\ndernier cri in architecture. It had a mediaeval look, queer dormers in a\nsteep roof of red tiles, leaded windows buried deep in walls of rough\nstone. Emerging from the recessed vestibule on a level with the street\nwere the Watling twins, aglow with health, dressed in identical costumes\nof blue. They had made their bow to society that winter.\n\n\"Why, here's Hugh!\" said Frances. \"Doesn't he look pleased with himself?\"\n\n\"He's come to take us to church,\" said Janet.\n\n\"Oh, he's much too important,\" said Frances. \"He's made a killing of some\nsort,--haven't you, Hugh?\"...\n\nI rang the bell and stood watching them as they departed, reflecting that\nI was thirty-two years of age and unmarried. Mr. Watling, surrounded with\nnewspapers and seated before his library fire, glanced up at me with a\nwelcoming smile: how had I borne the legislative baptism of fire? Such, I\nknew, was its implication.\n\n\"Everything went through according to schedule, eh? Well, I congratulate\nyou, Hugh,\" he said.\n\n\"Oh, I didn't have much to do with it,\" I answered, smiling back at him.\n\"I kept out of sight.\"\n\n\"That's an art in itself.\"\n\n\"I had an opportunity, at close range, to study the methods of our\nlawmakers.\"\n\n\"They're not particularly edifying,\" Mr. Watling replied. \"But they seem,\nunfortunately, to be necessary.\"\n\nSuch had been my own thought.\n\n\"Who is this man Krebs?\" he inquired suddenly. \"And why didn't Varney get\nhold of him and make him listen to reason?\"\n\n\"I'm afraid it wouldn't have been any use,\" I replied. \"He was in my\nclass at Harvard. I knew him--slightly. He worked his way through, and\nhad a pretty hard time of it. I imagine it affected his ideas.\"\n\n\"What is he, a Socialist?\"\n\n\"Something of the sort.\" In Theodore Watling's vigorous, sanity-exhaling\npresence Krebs's act appeared fantastic, ridiculous. \"He has queer\nnotions about a new kind of democracy which he says is coming. I think he\nis the kind of man who would be willing to die for it.\"\n\n\"What, in these days!\" Mr. Watling looked at me incredulously. \"If that's\nso, we must keep an eye on him, a sincere fanatic is a good deal more\ndangerous than a reformer who wants something. There are such men,\" he\nadded, \"but they are rare. How was the Governor, Trulease?\" he asked\nsuddenly. \"Tractable?\"\n\n\"Behaved like a lamb, although he insisted upon going through with his\nlittle humbug,\" I said.\n\nMr. Watling laughed. \"They always do,\" he observed, \"and waste a lot of\nvaluable time. You'll find some light cigars in the corner, Hugh.\"\n\nI sat down beside him and we spent the morning going over the details of\nthe Ribblevale suit, Mr. Watling delegating to me certain matters\nconnected with it of a kind with which I had not hitherto been entrusted;\nand he spoke again, before I left, of his intention of taking me into the\nfirm as soon as the affair could be arranged. Walking homeward, with my\nmind intent upon things to come, I met my mother at the corner of Lyme\nStreet coming from church. Her face lighted up at sight of me.\n\n\"Have you been working to-day, Hugh?\" she asked.\n\nI explained that I had spent the morning with Mr. Watling.\n\n\"I'll tell you a secret, mother. I'm going to be taken into the firm.\"\n\n\"Oh, my dear, I'm so glad!\" she exclaimed. \"I often think, if only your\nfather were alive, how happy he would be, and how proud of you. I wish he\ncould know. Perhaps he does know.\"\n\nTheodore Watling had once said to me that the man who can best keep his\nown counsel is the best counsel for other men to keep. I did not go about\nboasting of the part I had played in originating the now famous Bill No.\n709, the passage of which had brought about the capitulation of the\nRibblevale Steel Company to our clients. But Ralph Hambleton knew of it,\nof course.\n\n\"That was a pretty good thing you pulled off, Hughie,\" he said. \"I didn't\nthink you had it in you.\"\n\nIt was rank patronage, of course, yet I was secretly pleased. As the\nyears went on I was thrown more and more with him, though in boyhood\nthere had been between us no bond of sympathy. About this time he was\nbeginning to increase very considerably the Hambleton fortune, and a\nlittle later I became counsel for the Crescent Gas and Electric Company,\nin which he had shrewdly gained a controlling interest. Even toward the\ncolossal game of modern finance his attitude was characteristically that\nof the dilettante, of the amateur; he played it, as it were,\ncontemptuously, even as he had played poker at Harvard, with a cynical\naudacity that had a peculiarly disturbing effect upon his companions. He\nbluffed, he raised the limit in spite of protests, and when he lost one\nalways had the feeling that he would ultimately get his money back twice\nover. At the conferences in the Boyne Club, which he often attended, his\nmanner toward Mr. Dickinson and Mr. Scherer and even toward Miller Gorse\nwas frequently one of thinly veiled amusement at their seriousness. I\noften wondered that they did not resent it. But he was a privileged\nperson.\n\nHis cousin, Ham Durrett, whose inheritance was even greater than Ralph's\nhad been, had also become a privileged person whose comings and goings\nand more reputable doings were often recorded in the newspapers. Ham had\nattained to what Gene Hollister aptly but inadvertently called\n\"notoriety\": as Ralph wittily remarked, Ham gave to polo and women that\nwhich might have gone into high finance. He spent much of his time in the\nEast; his conduct there and at home would once have created a black\nscandal in our community, but we were gradually leaving our Calvinism\nbehind us and growing more tolerant: we were ready to Forgive much to\nwealth especially if it was inherited. Hostesses lamented the fact that\nHam was \"wild,\" but they asked him to dinners and dances to meet their\ndaughters.\n\nIf some moralist better educated and more far-seeing than Perry Blackwood\n(for Perry had become a moralist) had told these hostesses that Hambleton\nDurrett was a victim of our new civilization, they would have raised\ntheir eyebrows. They deplored while they coveted. If Ham had been told he\nwas a victim of any sort, he would have laughed.\n\nHe enjoyed life; he was genial and jovial, both lavish and\nparsimonious,--this latter characteristic being the curious survival of\nthe trait of the ancestors to which he owed his millions. He was growing\neven heavier, and decidedly red in the face.\n\nPerry used to take Ralph to task for not saving Ham from his iniquities,\nand Ralph would reply that Ham was going to the devil anyway, and not\neven the devil himself could stop him.\n\n\"You can stop him, and you know it,\" Perry retorted indignantly.\n\n\"What do you want me to do with him?\" asked Ralph. \"Convert him to the\nsaintly life I lead?\"\n\nThis was a poser.\n\n\"That's a fact,\" sand Perry, \"you're no better than he is.\"\n\n\"I don't know what you mean by 'better,'\" retorted Ralph, grinning. \"I'm\nwiser, that's all.\" (We had been talking about the ethics of business\nwhen Perry had switched off to Ham.) \"I believe, at least, in restraint\nof trade. Ham doesn't believe in restraint of any kind.\"\n\nWhen, therefore, the news suddenly began to be circulated in the Boyne\nClub that Ham was showing a tendency to straighten up, surprise and\nincredulity were genuine. He was drinking less,--much less; and it was\nsaid that he had severed certain ties that need not again be definitely\nmentioned. The theory of religious regeneration not being tenable, it was\nnaturally supposed that he had fallen in love; the identity of the\nunknown lady becoming a fruitful subject of speculation among the\nfeminine portion of society. The announcement of the marriage of\nHambleton Durrett would be news of the first magnitude, to be absorbed\neagerly by the many who had not the honour of his acquaintance,\n--comparable only to that of a devastating flood or a murder mystery\nor a change in the tariff.\n\nBeing absorbed in affairs that seemed more important, the subject did not\ninterest me greatly. But one cold Sunday afternoon, as I made my way, in\nanswer to her invitation, to see Nancy Willett, I found myself wondering\nidly whether she might not be by way of making a shrewd guess as to the\nobject of Hambleton's affections. It was well known that he had\nentertained a hopeless infatuation for her; and some were inclined to\nattribute his later lapses to her lack of response. He still called on\nher, and her lectures, which she delivered like a great aunt with a\nrecondite knowledge of the world, he took meekly. But even she had seemed\npowerless to alter his habits....\n\nPowell Street, that happy hunting-ground of my youth, had changed its\ncharacter, become contracted and unfamiliar, sooty. The McAlerys and\nother older families who had not decayed with the neighbourhood were\nrapidly deserting it, moving out to the new residence district known as\n\"the Heights.\" I came to the Willett House. That, too, had an air of\nshabbiness,--of well-tended shabbiness, to be sure; the stone steps had\nbeen scrupulously scrubbed, but one of them was cracked clear across, and\nthe silver on the polished name-plate was wearing off; even the act of\npulling the knob of a door-bell was becoming obsolete, so used had we\ngrown to pushing porcelain buttons in bright, new vestibules. As I waited\nfor my summons to be answered it struck me as remarkable that neither\nNancy nor her father had been contaminated by the shabbiness that\nsurrounded them.\n\nShe had managed rather marvellously to redeem one room from the\nold-fashioned severity of the rest of the house, the library behind the\nbig \"parlour.\" It was Nancy's room, eloquent of her daintiness and taste,\nof her essential modernity and luxuriousness; and that evening, as I was\nushered into it, this quality of luxuriousness, of being able to shut out\nthe disagreeable aspects of life that surrounded and threatened her,\nparticularly impressed me. She had not lacked opportunities to escape. I\nwondered uneasily as I waited why she had not embraced them. I strayed\nabout the room. A coal fire burned in the grate, the red-shaded lamps\ngave a subdued but cheerful light; some impulse led me to cross over to\nthe windows and draw aside the heavy hangings. Dusk was gathering over\nthat garden, bleak and frozen now, where we had romped together as\nchildren. How queer the place seemed! How shrivelled! Once it had had the\nwide range of a park. There, still weathering the elements, was the\nold-fashioned latticed summer-house, but the fruit-trees that I recalled\nas clouds of pink and white were gone.... A touch of poignancy was in\nthese memories. I dropped the curtain, and turned to confront Nancy, who\nhad entered noiselessly.\n\n\"Well, Hugh, were you dreaming?\" she said.\n\n\"Not exactly,\" I replied, embarrassed. \"I was looking at the garden.\"\n\n\"The soot has ruined it. My life seems to be one continual struggle\nagainst the soot,--the blacks, as the English call them. It's a more\nexpressive term. They are like an army, you know, overwhelming in their\nrelentless invasion. Well, do sit down. It is nice of you to come. You'll\nhave some tea, won't you?\"\n\nThe maid had brought in the tray. Afternoon tea was still rather a new\ncustom with us, more of a ceremony than a meal; and as Nancy handed me my\ncup and the thinnest of slices of bread and butter I found the intimacy\nof the situation a little disquieting. Her manner was indeed intimate,\nand yet it had the odd and disturbing effect of making her seem more\nremote. As she chatted I answered her perfunctorily, while all the time I\nwas asking myself why I had ceased to desire her, whether the old longing\nfor her might not return--was not even now returning? I might indeed go\nfar afield to find a wife so suited to me as Nancy. She had beauty,\ndistinction, and position. She was a woman of whom any man might be\nproud....\n\n\"I haven't congratulated you yet, Hugh,\" she said suddenly, \"now that you\nare a partner of Mr. Watling's. I hear on all sides that you are on the\nhigh road to a great success.\"\n\n\"Of course I'm glad to be in the firm,\" I admitted.\n\nIt was a new tack for Nancy, rather a disquieting one, this discussion of\nmy affairs, which she had so long avoided or ignored. \"You are getting\nwhat you have always wanted, aren't you?\"\n\nI wondered in some trepidation whether by that word \"always\" she was\nmaking a deliberate reference to the past.\n\n\"Always?\" I repeated, rather fatuously.\n\n\"Nearly always, ever since you have been a man.\"\n\nI was incapable of taking advantage of the opening, if it were one. She\nwas baffling.\n\n\"A man likes to succeed in his profession, of course,\" I said.\n\n\"And you made up your mind to succeed more deliberately than most men. I\nneedn't ask you if you are satisfied, Hugh. Success seems to agree with\nyou,--although I imagine you will never be satisfied.\"\n\n\"Why do you say that?\" I demanded.\n\n\"I haven't known you all your life for nothing. I think I know you much\nbetter than you know yourself.\"\n\n\"You haven't acted as if you did,\" I exclaimed.\n\nShe smiled.\n\n\"Have you been interested in what I thought about you?\" she asked.\n\n\"That isn't quite fair, Nancy,\" I protested. \"You haven't given me much\nevidence that you did think about me.\"\n\n\"Have I received much encouragement to do so?\" she inquired.\n\n\"But you haven't seemed to invite--you've kept me at arm's length.\"\n\n\"Oh, don't fence!\" she cried, rather sharply.\n\nI had become agitated, but her next words gave me a shock that was\nmomentarily paralyzing.\n\n\"I asked you to come here to-day, Hugh, because I wished you to know that\nI have made up my mind to marry Hambleton Durrett.\"\n\n\"Hambleton Durrett!\" I echoed stupidly. \"Hambleton Durrett!\"\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"Have you--have you accepted him?\"\n\n\"No. But I mean to do so.\"\n\n\"You--you love him?\"\n\n\"I don't see what right you have to ask.\"\n\n\"But you just said that you invited me here to talk frankly.\"\n\n\"No, I don't love him.\"\n\n\"Then why, in heaven's name, are you going to marry him?\"\n\nShe lay back in her chair, regarding me, her lips slightly parted. All at\nonce the full flavour of her, the superfine quality was revealed after\nyears of blindness.--Nor can I describe the sudden rebellion, the\nrevulsion that I experienced. Hambleton Durrett! It was an outrage, a\nsacrilege! I got up, and put my hand on the mantel. Nancy remained\nmotionless, inert, her head lying back against the chair. Could it be\nthat she were enjoying my discomfiture? There is no need to confess that\nI knew next to nothing of women; had I been less excited, I might have\nmade the discovery that I still regarded them sentimentally. Certain\nromantic axioms concerning them, garnered from Victorian literature,\npassed current in my mind for wisdom; and one of these declared that they\nwere prone to remain true to an early love. Did Nancy still care for me?\nThe query, coming as it did on top of my emotion, brought with it a\nstrange and overwhelming perplexity. Did I really care for her? The many\nyears during which I had practised the habit of caution began to exert an\ninhibiting pressure. Here was a situation, an opportunity suddenly thrust\nupon me which might never return, and which I was utterly unprepared to\nmeet. Would I be happy with Nancy, after all? Her expression was still\nenigmatic.\n\n\"Why shouldn't I marry him?\" she demanded.\n\n\"Because he's not good enough for you.\"\n\n\"Good!\" she exclaimed, and laughed. \"He loves me. He wants me without\nreservation or calculation.\" There was a sting in this. \"And is he any\nworse,\" she asked slowly, \"than many others who might be mentioned?\"\n\n\"No,\" I agreed. I did not intend to be led into the thankless and\ndisagreeable position of condemning Hambleton Durrett. \"But why have you\nwaited all these years if you did not mean to marry a man of ability, a\nman who has made something of himself?\"\n\n\"A man like you, Hugh?\" she said gently.\n\nI flushed.\n\n\"That isn't quite fair, Nancy.\"\n\n\"What are you working for?\" she suddenly inquired, straightening up.\n\n\"What any man works for, I suppose.\"\n\n\"Ah, there you have hit it,--what any man works for in our world.\nPower,--personal power. You want to be somebody,--isn't that it? Not the\nnoblest ambition, you'll have to admit,--not the kind of thing we used to\ndream about, when we did dream. Well, when we find we can't realize our\ndreams, we take the next best thing. And I fail to see why you should\nblame me for taking it when you yourself have taken it. Hambleton Durrett\ncan give it to me. He'll accept me on my own terms, he won't interfere\nwith me, I shan't be disillusionized,--and I shall have a position which\nI could not hope to have if I remained unmarried, a very marked position\nas Hambleton Durrett's wife. I am thirty, you know.\"\n\nHer frankness appalled me.\n\n\"The trouble with you, Hugh, is that you still deceive yourself. You\nthrow a glamour over things. You want to keep your cake and eat it too.\n\n\"I don't see why you say that. And marriage especially--\"\n\nShe took me up.\n\n\"Marriage! What other career is open to a woman? Unless she is married,\nand married well, according to the money standard you men have set up,\nshe is nobody. We can't all be Florence Nightingales, and I am unable to\nimagine myself a Julia Ward Howe or a Harriet Beecher Stowe. What is\nleft? Nothing but marriage. I'm hard and cynical, you will say, but I\nhave thought, and I'm not afraid, as I have told you, to look things in\nthe face. There are very few women, I think, who would not take the real\nthing if they had the chance before it were too late, who wouldn't be\nwilling to do their own cooking in order to get it.\"\n\nShe fell silent suddenly. I began to pace the room.\n\n\"For God's sake, don't do this, Nancy!\" I begged.\n\nBut she continued to stare into the fire, as though she had not heard me.\n\n\"If you had made up your mind to do it, why did you tell me?\" I asked.\n\n\"Sentiment, I suppose. I am paying a tribute to what I once was, to what\nyou once were,\" she said. A--a sort of good-bye to sentiment.\"\n\n\"Nancy!\" I said hoarsely.\n\nShe shook her head.\n\n\"No, Hugh. Surely you can't misjudge me so!\" she answered reproachfully.\n\"Do you think I should have sent for you if I had meant--that!\"\n\n\"No, no, I didn't think so. But why not? You--you cared once, and you\ntell me plainly you don't love him. It was all a terrible mistake. We\nwere meant for each other.\"\n\n\"I did love you then,\" she said. \"You never knew how much. And there is\nnothing I wouldn't give to bring it all back again. But I can't. It's\ngone. You're gone, and I'm gone. I mean what we were. Oh, why did you\nchange?\"\n\n\"It was you who changed,\" I declared, bewildered.\n\n\"Couldn't you see--can't you see now what you did? But perhaps you\ncouldn't help it. Perhaps it was just you, after all.\"\n\n\"What I did?\"\n\n\"Why couldn't you have held fast to your faith? If you had, you would\nhave known what it was I adored in you. Oh, I don't mind telling you now,\nit was just that faith, Hugh, that faith you had in life, that faith you\nhad in me. You weren't cynical and calculating, like Ralph Hambleton, you\nhad imagination. I--I dreamed, too. And do you remember the time when you\nmade the boat, and we went to Logan's Pond, and you sank in her?\"\n\n\"And you stayed,\" I went on, \"when all the others ran away? You ran down\nthe hill like a whirlwind.\"\n\nShe laughed.\n\n\"And then you came here one day, to a party, and said you were going to\nHarvard, and quarrelled with me.\"\n\n\"Why did you doubt met\" I asked agitatedly. \"Why didn't you let me see\nthat you still cared?\"\n\n\"Because that wasn't you, Hugh, that wasn't your real self. Do you\nsuppose it mattered to me whether you went to Harvard with the others?\nOh, I was foolish too, I know. I shouldn't have said what I did. But what\nis the use of regrets?\" she exclaimed. \"We've both run after the\npractical gods, and the others have hidden their faces from us. It may be\nthat we are not to blame, either of us, that the practical gods are too\nstrong. We've learned to love and worship them, and now we can't do\nwithout them.\"\n\n\"We can try, Nancy,\" I pleaded.\n\n\"No,\" she answered in a low voice, \"that's the difference between you and\nme. I know myself better than you know yourself, and I know you better.\"\nShe smiled again. \"Unless we could have it all back again, I shouldn't\nwant any of it. You do not love me--\"\n\nI started once more to protest.\n\n\"No, no, don't say it!\" she cried.\n\n\"You may think you do, just this moment, but it's only because--you've\nbeen moved. And what you believe you want isn't me, it's what I was. But\nI'm not that any more,--I'm simply recalling that, don't you see? And\neven then you wouldn't wish me, now, as I was. That sounds involved, but\nyou must understand. You want a woman who will be wrapped up in your\ncareer, Hugh, and yet who will not share it,--who will devote herself\nbody and soul to what you have become. A woman whom you can shape. And\nyou won't really love her, but only just so much of her as may become the\nincarnation of you. Well, I'm not that kind of woman. I might have been,\nhad you been different. I'm not at all sure. Certainly I'm not that kind\nnow, even though I know in my heart that the sort of career you have made\nfor yourself, and that I intend to make for myself is all dross. But now\nI can't do without it.\"\n\n\"And yet you are going to marry Hambleton Durrett!\" I said.\n\nShe understood me, although I regretted my words at once.\n\n\"Yes, I am going to marry him.\" There was a shade of bitterness, of\ndefiance in her voice. \"Surely you are not offering me the--the other\nthing, now. Oh, Hugh!\"\n\n\"I am willing to abandon it all, Nancy.\"\n\n\"No,\" she said, \"you're not, and I'm not. What you can't see and won't\nsee is that it has become part of you. Oh, you are successful, you will\nbe more and more successful. And you think I should be somebody, as your\nwife, Hugh, more perhaps, eventually, than I shall be as Hambleton's. But\nI should be nobody, too. I couldn't stand it now, my dear. You must\nrealize that as soon as you have time to think it over. We shall be\nfriends.\"\n\nThe sudden gentleness in her voice pierced me through and through. She\nheld out her hand. Something in her grasp spoke of a resolution which\ncould not be shaken.\n\n\"And besides,\" she added sadly, \"I don't love you any more, Hugh. I'm\nmourning for something that's gone. I wanted to have just this one talk\nwith you. But we shan't mention it again,--we'll close the book.\"...\n\nAt that I fled out of the house, and at first the thought of her as\nanother man's wife, as Hambleton Durrett's wife, was seemingly not to be\nborne. It was incredible! \"We'll close the book.\" I found myself\nrepeating the phrase; and it seemed then as though something within me I\nhad believed dead--something that formerly had been all of me--had\nrevived again to throb with pain.\n\nIt is not surprising that the acuteness of my suffering was of short\nduration, though I remember certain sharp twinges when the announcement\nof the engagement burst on the city. There was much controversy over the\nquestion as to whether or not Ham Durrett's reform would be permanent;\nbut most people were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt; it was\ntime he settled down and took the position in the community that was to\nbe expected of one of his name; and as for Nancy, it was generally agreed\nthat she had done well for herself. She was not made for poverty--and who\nso well as she was fitted for the social leadership of our community?\n\nThey were married in Trinity Church in the month of May, and I was one of\nHam's attendants. Ralph was \"best man.\" For the last time the old Willett\nmansion in Powell Street wore the gala air of former days; carpets were\nspread over the sidewalk, and red and white awnings; rooms were filled\nwith flowers and flung open to hundreds of guests. I found the wedding\nsomething of an ordeal. I do not like to dwell upon it--especially upon\nthat moment when I came to congratulate Nancy as she stood beside Ham at\nthe end of the long parlour. She seemed to have no regrets. I don't know\nwhat I expected of her--certainly not tears and tragedy. She seemed\ntaller than ever, and very beautiful in her veil and white satin gown and\nthe diamonds Ham had given her; very much mistress of herself, quite a\ncontrast to Ham, who made no secret of his elation. She smiled when I\nwished her happiness.\n\n\"We'll be home in the autumn, Hugh, and expect to see a great deal of\nyou,\" she said.\n\nAs I paused in a corner of the room my eye fell upon Nancy's father.\nMcAlery Willett's elation seemed even greater than Ham's. With a gardenia\nin his frock-coat and a glass of champagne in his hand he went from group\nto group; and his familiar laughter, which once had seemed so full of\nmerriment and fun, gave me to-day a somewhat scandalized feeling. I heard\nRalph's voice, and turned to discover him standing beside me, his long\nlegs thrust slightly apart, his hands in his pockets, overlooking the\nscene with typical, semi-contemptuous amusement.\n\n\"This lets old McAlery out, anyway,\" he said.\n\n\"What do you mean?\" I demanded.\n\n\"One or two little notes of his will be cancelled, sooner or\nlater--that's all.\"\n\nFor a moment I was unable to speak.\n\n\"And do you think that she--that Nancy found out--?\" I stammered.\n\n\"Well, I'd be willing to take that end of the bet,\" he replied. \"Why the\ndeuce should she marry Ham? You ought to know her well enough to\nunderstand how she'd feel if she discovered some of McAlery's financial\ncoups? Of course it's not a thing I talk about, you understand. Are you\ngoing to the Club?\"\n\n\"No, I'm going home,\" I said. I was aware of his somewhat compassionate\nsmile as I left him....\n\n\n\n\nXII.\n\nOne November day nearly two years after my admission as junior member of\nthe firm of Watling, Fowndes and Ripon seven gentlemen met at luncheon in\nthe Boyne Club; Mr. Barbour, President of the Railroad, Mr. Scherer, of\nthe Boyne Iron Works and other corporations, Mr. Leonard Dickinson, of\nthe Corn National Bank, Mr. Halsey, a prominent banker from the other\ngreat city of the state, Mr. Grunewald, Chairman of the Republican State\nCommittee, and Mr. Frederick Grierson, who had become a very important\nman in our community. At four o'clock they emerged from the club:\ncitizens in Boyne Street who saw them chatting amicably on the steps\nlittle suspected that in the last three hours these gentlemen had chosen\nand practically elected the man who was to succeed Mr. Wade as United\nStates Senator in Washington. Those were the days in which great affairs\nwere simply and efficiently handled. No democratic nonsense about leaving\nthe choice to an electorate that did not know what it wanted.\n\nThe man chosen to fill this high position was Theodore Watling. He said\nhe would think about the matter.\n\nIn the nation at large, through the defection of certain Northern states\nneither so conservative nor fortunate as ours, the Democratic party was\nin power, which naturally implies financial depression. There was no\nquestion about our ability to send a Republican Senator; the choice in\nthe Boyne Club was final; but before the legislature should ratify it, a\nyear or so hence, it were just as well that the people of the state\nshould be convinced that they desired Mr. Watling more than any other\nman; and surely enough, in a little while such a conviction sprang up\nspontaneously. In offices and restaurants and hotels, men began to\nsuggest to each other what a fine thing it would be if Theodore Watling\nmight be persuaded to accept the toga; at the banks, when customers\ncalled to renew their notes and tight money was discussed and Democrats\nexcoriated, it was generally agreed that the obvious thing to do was to\nget a safe man in the Senate. From the very first, Watling sentiment\nstirred like spring sap after a hard winter.\n\nThe country newspapers, watered by providential rains, began to put forth\ntender little editorial shoots, which Mr. Judah B. Tallant presently\ncollected and presented in a charming bouquet in the Morning Era. \"The\nVoice of the State Press;\" thus was the column headed; and the remarks of\nthe Hon. Fitch Truesdale, of the St. Helen's Messenger, were given a\nspecial prominence. Mr. Truesdale was the first, in his section, to be\ninspired by the happy thought that the one man preeminently fitted to\nrepresent the state in the present crisis, when her great industries had\nbeen crippled by Democratic folly, was Mr. Theodore Watling. The Rossiter\nBanner, the Elkington Star, the Belfast Recorder, and I know not how many\nothers simultaneously began to sing Mr. Watling's praises.\n\n\"Not since the troublous times of the Civil War,\" declared the Morning\nEra, \"had the demand for any man been so unanimous.\" As a proof of it,\nthere were the country newspapers, \"which reflected the sober opinion of\nthe firesides of the common people.\"\n\nThere are certain industrious gentlemen to whom little credit is given,\nand who, unlike the average citizen who reserves his enthusiasm for\nelection time, are patriotic enough to labour for their country's good\nall the year round. When in town, it was their habit to pay a friendly\ncall on the Counsel for the Railroad, Mr. Miller Gorse, in the Corn Bank\nBuilding. He was never too busy to converse with them; or, it might\nbetter be said, to listen to them converse. Let some legally and\npolitically ambitious young man observe Mr. Gorse's method. Did he\ninquire what the party worker thought of Mr. Watling for the Senate? Not\nat all! But before the party worker left he was telling Mr. Gorse that\npublic sentiment demanded Mr. Watling. After leaving Mr. Gorse they\nwended their way to the Durrett Building and handed their cards over the\nrail of the offices of Watling, Fowndes and Ripon. Mr. Watling shook\nhands with scores of them, and they departed, well satisfied with the\nflavour of his cigars and intoxicated by his personality. He had a\nmarvellous way of cutting short an interview without giving offence. Some\nof them he turned over to Mr. Paret, whom he particularly desired they\nshould know. Thus Mr. Paret acquired many valuable additions to his\nacquaintance, cultivated a memory for names and faces that was to stand\nhim in good stead; and kept, besides, an indexed note-book into which he\nput various bits of interesting information concerning each. Though not\nimmediately lucrative, it was all, no doubt, part of a lawyer's\neducation.\n\nDuring the summer and the following winter Colonel Paul Varney came often\nto town and spent much of his time in Mr. Paret's office smoking Mr.\nWatling's cigars and discussing the coming campaign, in which he took a\nwhole-souled interest.\n\n\"Say, Hugh, this is goin' slick!\" he would exclaim, his eyes glittering\nlike round buttons of jet. \"I never saw a campaign where they fell in the\nway they're doing now. If it was anybody else but Theodore Watling, it\nwould scare me. You ought to have been in Jim Broadhurst's campaign,\" he\nadded, referring to the junior senator, \"they wouldn't wood up at all,\nthey was just listless. But Gorse and Barbour and the rest wanted him,\nand we had to put him over. I reckon he is useful down there in\nWashington, but say, do you know what he always reminded me of? One of\nthose mud-turtles I used to play with as a boy up in Columbia\nCounty,--shuts up tight soon as he sees you coming. Now Theodore Watling\nain't like that, any way of speaking. We can get up some enthusiasm for a\nman of his sort. He's liberal and big. He's made his pile, and he don't\nbegrudge some of it to the fellows who do the work. Mark my words, when\nyou see a man who wants a big office cheap, look out for him.\"\n\nThis, and much more wisdom I imbibed while assenting to my chief's\ngreatness. For Mr. Varney was right,--one could feel enthusiasm for\nTheodore Watling; and my growing intimacy with him, the sense that I was\nhaving a part in his career, a share in his success, became for the\nmoment the passion of my life. As the campaign progressed I gave more and\nmore time to it, and made frequent trips of a confidential nature to the\ndifferent counties of the state. The whole of my being was energized. The\nnational fever had thoroughly pervaded my blood--the national fever to\nwin. Prosperity--writ large--demanded it, and Theodore Watling\npersonified, incarnated the cause. I had neither the time nor the desire\nto philosophize on this national fever, which animated all my associates:\nanimated, I might say, the nation, which was beginning to get into a\nfever about games. If I remember rightly, it was about this time that\ngolf was introduced, tennis had become a commonplace, professional\nbaseball was in full swing; Ham Durrett had even organized a local polo\nteam.... The man who failed to win something tangible in sport or law or\nbusiness or politics was counted out. Such was the spirit of America, in\nthe closing years of the nineteenth century.\n\nAnd yet, when one has said this, one has failed to express the national\nGeist in all its subtlety. In brief, the great American sport was not so\nmuch to win the game as to beat it; the evasion of rules challenged our\ningenuity; and having won, we set about devising methods whereby it would\nbe less and less possible for us winners to lose in the future. No better\nillustration of this tendency could be given than the development which\nhad recently taken place in the field of our city politics, hitherto the\nbattle-ground of Irish politicians who had fought one another for\nsupremacy. Individualism had been rampant, competition the custom; you\nbought an alderman, or a boss who owned four or five aldermen, and then\nyou never could be sure you were to get what you wanted, or that the\naldermen and the bosses would \"stay bought.\" But now a genius had\nappeared, an American genius who had arisen swiftly and almost silently,\nwho appealed to the imagination, and whose name was often mentioned in a\nwhisper,--the Hon. Judd Jason, sometimes known as the Spider, who\norganized the City Hall and capitalized it; an ultimate and logical\neffect--if one had considered it--of the Manchester school of economics.\nEnlightened self-interest, stripped of sentiment, ends on Judd Jasons. He\nran the city even as Mr. Sherrill ran his department store; you paid your\nprice. It was very convenient. Being a genius, Mr. Jason did not wholly\nbreak with tradition, but retained those elements of the old muddled\nsystem that had their value, chartering steamboats for outings on the\nriver, giving colossal picnics in Lowry Park. The poor and the wanderer\nand the criminal (of the male sex at least) were cared for. But he was\nnot loved, as the rough-and-tumble Irishmen had been loved; he did not\nmake himself common; he was surrounded by an aura of mystery which I\nconfess had not failed of effect on me. Once, and only once during my\nlegal apprenticeship, he had been pointed out to me on the street, where\nhe rarely ventured. His appearance was not impressive....\n\nMr. Jason could not, of course, prevent Mr. Watling's election, even did\nhe so desire, but he did command the allegiance of several city\ncandidates--both democratic and republican--for the state legislature,\nwho had as yet failed to announce their preferences for United States\nSenator. It was important that Mr. Watling's vote should be large, as\nindicative of a public reaction and repudiation of Democratic national\nfolly. This matter among others was the subject of discussion one July\nmorning when the Republican State Chairman was in the city; Mr. Grunewald\nexpressed anxiety over Mr. Jason's continued silence. It was expedient\nthat somebody should \"see\" the boss.\n\n\"Why not Paret?\" suggested Leonard Dickinson. Mr. Watling was not present\nat this conference. \"Paret seems to be running Watling's campaign,\nanyway.\"\n\nIt was settled that I should be the emissary. With lively sensations of\ncuriosity and excitement, tempered by a certain anxiety as to my ability\nto match wits with the Spider, I made my way to his \"lair\" over Monahan's\nsaloon, situated in a district that was anything but respectable. The\nsaloon, on the ground floor, had two apartments; the bar-room proper\nwhere Mike Monahan, chamberlain of the establishment, was wont to stand,\nred faced and smiling, to greet the courtiers, big and little, the party\nworkers, the district leaders, the hangers-on ready to be hired, the city\nofficials, the police judges,--yes, and the dignified members of state\ncourts whose elections depended on Mr. Jason's favour: even Judge Bering,\nwhose acquaintance I had made the day I had come, as a law student, to\nMr. Watling's office, unbent from time to time sufficiently to call there\nfor a small glass of rye and water, and to relate, with his owl-like\ngravity, an anecdote to the \"boys.\" The saloon represented Democracy, so\ndear to the American public. Here all were welcome, even the\nlight-fingered gentlemen who enjoyed the privilege of police protection;\nand who sometimes, through fortuitous circumstances, were hauled before\nthe very magistrates with whom they had rubbed elbows on the polished\nrail. Behind the bar-room, and separated from it by swinging doors only\nthe elite ventured to thrust apart, was an audience chamber whither Mr.\nJason occasionally descended. Anecdote and political reminiscence gave\nplace here to matters of high policy.\n\nI had several times come to the saloon in the days of my apprenticeship\nin search of some judge or official, and once I had run down here the\ncity auditor himself. Mike Monahan, whose affair it was to know everyone,\nrecognized me. It was part of his business, also, to understand that I\nwas now a member of the firm of Watling, Fowndes and Ripon.\n\n\"Good morning to you, Mr. Paret,\" he said suavely. We held a colloquy in\nundertones over the bar, eyed by the two or three customers who were\npresent. Mr. Monahan disappeared, but presently returned to whisper:\n\"Sure, he'll see you,\" to lead the way through the swinging doors and up\na dark stairway. I came suddenly on a room in the greatest disorder, its\ntables and chairs piled high with newspapers and letters, its windows\nstreaked with soot. From an open door on its farther side issued a voice.\n\n\"Is that you, Mr. Paret? Come in here.\"\n\nIt was little less than a command.\n\n\"Heard of you, Mr. Paret. Glad to know you. Sit down, won't you?\"\n\nThe inner room was almost dark. I made out a bed in the corner, and\npropped up in the bed a man; but for the moment I was most aware of a\npair of eyes that flared up when the man spoke, and died down again when\nhe became silent. They reminded me of those insects which in my childhood\ndays we called \"lightning bugs.\" Mr. Jason gave me a hand like a woman's.\nI expressed my pleasure at meeting him, and took a chair beside the bed.\n\n\"I believe you're a partner of Theodore Watling's now aren't you? Smart\nman, Watling.\"\n\n\"He'll make a good senator,\" I replied, accepting the opening.\n\n\"You think he'll get elected--do you?\" Mr. Jason inquired.\n\nI laughed.\n\n\"Well, there isn't much doubt about that, I imagine.\"\n\n\"Don't know--don't know. Seen some dead-sure things go wrong in my time.\"\n\n\"What's going to defeat him?\" I asked pleasantly.\n\n\"I don't say anything,\" Mr. Jason replied. \"But I've known funny things\nto happen--never does to be dead sure.\"\n\n\"Oh, well, we're as sure as it's humanly possible to be,\" I declared. The\neyes continued to fascinate me, they had a peculiar, disquieting effect.\nNow they died down, and it was as if the man's very presence had gone\nout, as though I had been left alone; and I found it exceedingly\ndifficult, under the circumstances, to continue to address him. Suddenly\nhe flared up again.\n\n\"Watling send you over here?\" he demanded.\n\n\"No. As a matter of fact, he's out of town. Some of Mr. Watling's\nfriends, Mr. Grunewald and Mr. Dickinson, Mr. Gorse and others, suggested\nthat I see you, Mr. Jason.\"\n\nThere came a grunt from the bed.\n\n\"Mr. Watling has always valued your friendship and support,\" I said.\n\n\"What makes him think he ain't going to get it?\"\n\n\"He hasn't a doubt of it,\" I went on diplomatically. \"But we felt--and I\nfelt personally, that we ought to be in touch with you, to work along\nwith you, to keep informed how things are going in the city.\"\n\n\"What things?\"\n\n\"Well--there are one or two representatives, friends of yours, who\nhaven't come out for Mr. Watling. We aren't worrying, we know you'll do\nthe right thing, but we feel that it would have a good deal of influence\nin some other parts of the state if they declared themselves. And then\nyou know as well as I do that this isn't a year when any of us can afford\nto recognize too closely party lines; the Democratic administration has\nbrought on a panic, the business men in that party are down on it, and it\nought to be rebuked. And we feel, too, that some of the city's Democrats\nought to be loyal to Mr. Watling,--not that we expect them to vote for\nhim in caucus, but when it comes to the joint ballot--\"\n\n\"Who?\" demanded Mr. Jason.\n\n\"Senator Dowse and Jim Maher, for instance,\" I suggested.\n\n\"Jim voted for Bill 709 all right--didn't he?\" said Mr. Jason abruptly.\n\n\"That's just it,\" I put in boldly. \"We'd like to induce him to come in\nwith us this time. But we feel that--the inducement would better come\nthrough you.\"\n\nI thought Mr. Jason smiled. By this time I had grown accustomed to the\ndarkness, the face and figure of the man in the bed had become\ndiscernible. Power, I remember thinking, chooses odd houses for itself.\nHere was no overbearing, full-blooded ward ruffian brimming with\nvitality, but a thin, sallow little man in a cotton night-shirt, with\niron-grey hair and a wiry moustache; he might have been an overworked\nclerk behind a dry-goods counter; and yet somehow, now that I had talked\nto him, I realized that he never could have been. Those extraordinary\neyes of his, when they were functioning, marked his individuality as\nunique. It were almost too dramatic to say that he required darkness to\nmake his effect, but so it seemed. I should never forget him. He had in\ntruth been well named the Spider.\n\n\"Of course we haven't tried to get in touch with them. We are leaving\nthem to you,\" I added.\n\n\"Paret,\" he said suddenly, \"I don't care a damn about Grunewald--never\ndid. I'd turn him down for ten cents. But you can tell Theodore Watling\nfor me, and Dickinson, that I guess the 'inducement' can be fixed.\"\n\nI felt a certain relief that the interview had come to an end, that the\nmoment had arrived for amenities. To my surprise, Mr. Jason anticipated\nme.\n\n\"I've been interested in you, Mr. Paret,\" he observed. \"Know who you are,\nof course, knew you were in Watling's office. Then some of the boys spoke\nabout you when you were down at the legislature on that Ribblevale\nmatter. Guess you had more to do with that bill than came out in the\nnewspapers--eh?\"\n\nI was taken off my guard.\n\n\"Oh, that's talk,\" I said.\n\n\"All right, it's talk, then? But I guess you and I will have some more\ntalk after a while,--after Theodore Watling gets to be United States\nSenator. Give him my regards, and--and come in when I can do anything for\nyou, Mr. Paret.\"\n\nThanking him, I groped my way downstairs and let myself out by a side\ndoor Monahan had shown me into an alleyway, thus avoiding the saloon. As\nI walked slowly back to the office, seeking the shade of the awnings, the\nfigure in the darkened room took on a sinister aspect that troubled\nme....\n\nThe autumn arrived, the campaign was on with a whoop, and I had my first\ntaste of \"stump\" politics. The acrid smell of red fire brings it back to\nme. It was a medley of railroad travel, of committees provided with\nbadges--and cigars, of open carriages slowly drawn between lines of\nbewildered citizens, of Lincoln clubs and other clubs marching in serried\nranks, uniformed and helmeted, stalwarts carrying torches and banners.\nAnd then there were the draughty opera-houses with the sylvan scenery\npushed back and plush chairs and sofas pushed forward; with an ominous\ntable, a pitcher of water on it and a glass, near the footlights. The\nhouses were packed with more bewildered citizens. What a wonderful study\nof mob-psychology it would have offered! Men who had not thought of the\ngrand old Republican party for two years, and who had not cared much\nabout it when they had entered the dooms, after an hour or so went mad\nwith fervour. The Hon. Joseph Mecklin, ex-Speaker of the House, with whom\nI traveled on occasions, had a speech referring to the martyred\nPresident, ending with an appeal to the revolutionary fathers who\nfollowed Washington with bleeding feet. The Hon. Joseph possessed that\nmost valuable of political gifts, presence; and when with quivering voice\nhe finished his peroration, citizens wept with him. What it all had to do\nwith the tariff was not quite clear. Yet nobody seemed to miss the\nconnection.\n\nWe were all of us most concerned, of course, about the working-man and\nhis dinner pail,--whom the Democrats had wantonly thrown out of\nemployment for the sake of a doctrinaire theory. They had put him in\ncompetition with the serf of Europe. Such was the subject-matter of my\nown modest addresses in this, my maiden campaign. I had the sense to see\nmyself in perspective; to recognize that not for me, a dignified and\nsubstantial lawyer of affairs, were the rhetorical flights of the Hon.\nJoseph Mecklin. I spoke with a certain restraint. Not too dryly, I hope.\nBut I sought to curb my sentiments, my indignation, at the manner in\nwhich the working-man had been treated; to appeal to the common sense\nrather than to the passions of my audiences. Here were the statistics!\n(drawn, by the way, from the Republican Campaign book). Unscrupulous\ndemagogues--Democratic, of course--had sought to twist and evade them.\nLet this terrible record of lack of employment and misery be compared\nwith the prosperity under Republican rule.\n\n\"One of the most effective speakers in this campaign for the restoration\nof Prosperity,\" said the Rossiter Banner, \"is Mr. Hugh Paret, of the firm\nof Watling, Fowndes and Ripon. Mr. Paret's speech at the Opera-House last\nevening made a most favourable impression. Mr. Paret deals with facts.\nAnd his thoughtful analysis of the situation into which the Democratic\nparty has brought this country should convince any sane-minded voter that\nthe time has come for a change.\"\n\nI began to keep a scrap-book, though I locked it up in the drawer of my\ndesk. In it are to be found many clippings of a similarly gratifying\ntenor....\n\nMecklin and I were well contrasted. In this way, incidentally, I made\nmany valuable acquaintances among the \"solid\" men of the state, the local\ncapitalists and manufacturers, with whom my manner of dealing with public\nquestions was in particular favour. These were practical men; they rather\npatronized the Hon. Joseph, thus estimating, to a nicety, a mans value;\nor solidity, or specific gravity, it might better be said, since our\nuniverse was one of checks and balances. The Hon. Joseph and his like,\nskyrocketing through the air, were somehow necessary in the scheme of\nthings, but not to be taken too seriously. Me they did take seriously,\nthese provincial lords, inviting me to their houses and opening their\nhearts. Thus, when we came to Elkington, Mr. Mecklin reposed in the\nCommercial House, on the noisy main street. Fortunately for him, the\nclanging of trolley cars never interfered with his slumbers. I slept in a\nwide chamber in the mansion of Mr. Ezra Hutchins. There were many\nHutchinses in Elkington,--brothers and cousins and uncles and\ngreat-uncles,--and all were connected with the woollen mills. But there\nis always one supreme Hutchins, and Ezra was he: tall, self-contained,\nelderly, but well preserved through frugal living, essentially American\nand typical of his class, when he entered the lobby of the Commercial\nHouse that afternoon the babel of political discussion was suddenly\nhushed; politicians, traveling salesmen and the members of the local\ncommittee made a lane for him; to him, the Hon. Joseph and I were\nintroduced. Mr. Hutchins knew what he wanted. He was cordial to Mr.\nMecklin, but he took me. We entered a most respectable surrey with\ntassels, driven by a raw-boned coachman in a black overcoat, drawn by two\nsleek horses.\n\n\"How is this thing going, Paret?\" he asked.\n\nI gave him Mr. Grunewald's estimated majority.\n\n\"What do you think?\" he demanded, a shrewd, humorous look in his blue\neyes.\n\n\"Well, I think we'll carry the state. I haven't had Grunewald's\nexperience in estimating.\"\n\nEzra Hutchins smiled appreciatively.\n\n\"What does Watling think?\"\n\n\"He doesn't seem to be worrying much.\"\n\n\"Ever been in Elkington before?\"\n\nI said I hadn't.\n\n\"Well, a drive will do you good.\"\n\nIt was about four o'clock on a mild October afternoon. The little town,\nof fifteen thousand inhabitants or so, had a wonderful setting in the\nwidening valley of the Scopanong, whose swiftly running waters furnished\nthe power for the mills. We drove to these through a gateway over which\nthe words \"No Admittance\" were conspicuously painted, past long brick\nbuildings that bordered the canals; and in the windows I caught sight of\ndrab figures of men and women bending over the machines. Half of the\nbuildings, as Mr. Hutchins pointed out, were closed,--mute witnesses of\ntariff-tinkering madness. Even more eloquent of democratic folly was that\npart of the town through which we presently passed, streets lined with\nrows of dreary houses where the workers lived. Children were playing on\nthe sidewalks, but theirs seemed a listless play; listless, too, were the\nmen and women who sat on the steps,--listless, and somewhat sullen, as\nthey watched us passing. Ezra Hutchins seemed to read my thought.\n\n\"Since the unions got in here I've had nothing but trouble,\" he said.\n\"I've tried to do my duty by my people, God knows. But they won't see\nwhich side their bread's buttered on. They oppose me at every step, they\nvote against their own interests. Some years ago they put up a job on us,\nand sent a scatter-brained radical to the legislature.\"\n\n\"Krebs.\"\n\n\"Do you know him?\"\n\n\"Slightly. He was in my class at Harvard.... Is he still here?\" I asked,\nafter a pause.\n\n\"Oh, yes. But he hasn't gone to the legislature this time, we've seen to\nthat. His father was a respectable old German who had a little shop and\nmade eye-glasses. The son is an example of too much education. He's a\nnotoriety seeker. Oh, he's clever, in a way. He's given us a good deal of\ntrouble, too, in the courts with damage cases.\"...\n\nWe came to a brighter, more spacious, well-to-do portion of the town,\nwhere the residences faced the river. In a little while the waters\nwidened into a lake, which was surrounded by a park, a gift to the city\nof the Hutchins family. Facing it, on one side, was the Hutchins Library;\non the other, across a wide street, where the maples were turning, were\nthe Hutchinses' residences of various dates of construction, from that of\nthe younger George, who had lately married a wife, and built in bright\nyellow brick, to the old-fashioned mansion of Ezra himself. This, he told\nme, had been good enough for his father, and was good enough for him. The\npicture of it comes back to me, now, with singular attractiveness. It was\nof brick, and I suppose a modification of the Georgian; the kind of house\none still sees in out-of-the way corners of London, with a sort of\nDickensy flavour; high and square and uncompromising, with small-paned\nwindows, with a flat roof surrounded by a low balustrade, and many\nsubstantial chimneys. The third storey was lower than the others,\nseparated from them by a distinct line. On one side was a wide porch.\nYellow and red leaves, the day's fall, scattered the well-kept lawn.\nStanding in the doorway of the house was a girl in white, and as we\ndescended from the surrey she came down the walk to meet us. She was\nyoung, about twenty. Her hair was the colour of the russet maple leaves.\n\n\"This is Mr. Paret, Maude.\" Mr. Hutchins looked at his watch as does a\nman accustomed to live by it. \"If you'll excuse me, Mr. Paret, I have\nsomething important to attend to. Perhaps Mr. Paret would like to look\nabout the grounds?\" He addressed his daughter.\n\nI said I should be delighted, though I had no idea what grounds were\nmeant. As I followed Maude around the house she explained that all the\nHutchins connection had a common back yard, as she expressed it. In\nreality, there were about two blocks of the property, extending behind\nall the houses. There were great trees with swings, groves, orchards\nwhere the late apples glistened between the leaves, an old-fashioned\nflower garden loath to relinquish its blooming. In the distance the\nshadowed western ridge hung like a curtain of deep blue velvet against\nthe sunset.\n\n\"What a wonderful spot!\" I exclaimed.\n\n\"Yes, it is nice,\" she agreed, \"we were all brought up here--I mean my\ncousins and myself. There are dozens of us. And dozens left,\" she added,\nas the shouts and laughter of children broke the stillness.\n\nA boy came running around the corner of the path. He struck out at Maude.\nWith a remarkably swift movement she retaliated.\n\n\"Ouch!\" he exclaimed.\n\n\"You got him that time,\" I laughed, and, being detected, she suddenly\nblushed. It was this act that drew my attention to her, that defined her\nas an individual. Before that I had regarded her merely as a shy and\nprovincial girl. Now she was brimming with an unsuspected vitality. A\ncertain interest was aroused, although her shyness towards me was not\naltered. I found it rather a flattering shyness.\n\n\"It's Hugh,\" she explained, \"he's always trying to be funny. Speak to Mr.\nParet, Hugh.\"\n\n\"Why, that's my name, too,\" I said.\n\n\"Is it?\"\n\n\"She knocked my hat off a little while ago,\" said Hugh. \"I was only\ngetting square.\"\n\n\"Well, you didn't get square, did you?\" I asked.\n\n\"Are you going to speak in the tows hall to-night?\" the boy demanded. I\nadmitted it. He went off, pausing once to stare back at me.... Maude and\nI walked on.\n\n\"It must be exciting to speak before a large audience,\" she said. \"If I\nwere a man, I think I should like to be in politics.\"\n\n\"I cannot imagine you in politics,\" I answered.\n\nShe laughed.\n\n\"I said, if I were a man.\"\n\n\"Are you going to the meeting?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes. Father promised to take me. He has a box.\"\n\nI thought it would be pleasant to have her there.\n\n\"I'm afraid you'll find what I have to say rather dry,\" I said.\n\n\"A woman can't expect to understand everything,\" she answered quickly.\n\nThis remark struck me favourably. I glanced at her sideways. She was not\na beauty, but she was distinctly well-formed and strong. Her face was\noval, her features not quite regular,--giving them a certain charm; her\ncolour was fresh, her eyes blue, the lighter blue one sees on Chinese\nware: not a poetic comparison, but so I thought of them. She was\napparently not sophisticated, as were most of the young women at home\nwhom I knew intimately (as were the Watling twins, for example, with one\nof whom, Frances, I had had, by the way, rather a lively flirtation the\nspring before); she seemed refreshingly original, impressionable and\nplastic....\n\nWe walked slowly back to the house, and in the hallway I met Mrs.\nHutchins, a bustling, housewifely lady, inclined to stoutness, whose\ncreased and kindly face bore witness to long acquiescence in the\ndiscipline of matrimony, to the contentment that results from an\nessentially circumscribed and comfortable life. She was, I learned later,\nthe second Mrs. Hutchins, and Maude their only child. The children of the\nfirst marriage, all girls, had married and scattered.\n\nSupper was a decorous but heterogeneous meal of the old-fashioned sort\nthat gives one the choice between tea and cocoa. It was something of an\noccasion, I suspected. The minister was there, the Reverend Mr.\nDoddridge, who would have made, in appearance at least, a perfect Puritan\ndivine in a steeple hat and a tippet. Only--he was no longer the leader\nof the community; and even in his grace he had the air of deferring to\nthe man who provided the bounties of which we were about to partake\nrather than to the Almighty. Young George was there, Mr. Hutchins's\nnephew, who was daily becoming more and more of a factor in the\nmanagement of the mills, and had built the house of yellow brick that\nstood out so incongruously among the older Hutchinses' mansions, and\nmarked a transition. I thought him rather a yellow-brick gentleman\nhimself for his assumption of cosmopolitan manners. His wife was a\npretty, discontented little woman who plainly deplored her environment,\nlonged for larger fields of conquest: George, she said, must remain where\nhe was, for the present at least,--Uncle Ezra depended on him; but\nElkington was a prosy place, and Mrs. George gave the impression that she\ndid not belong here. They went to the city on occasions; both cities. And\nwhen she told me we had a common acquaintance in Mrs. Hambleton\nDurrett--whom she thought so lovely!--I knew that she had taken Nancy as\nan ideal: Nancy, the social leader of what was to Mrs. George a\nmetropolis.\n\nPresently the talk became general among the men, the subject being the\ncampaign, and I the authority, bombarded with questions I strove to\nanswer judicially. What was the situation in this county and in that? the\nnational situation? George indulged in rather a vigorous arraignment of\nthe demagogues, national and state, who were hurting business in order to\nobtain political power. The Reverend Mr. Doddridge assented, deploring\nthe poverty that the local people had brought on themselves by heeding\nthe advice of agitators; and Mrs. Hutchins, who spent much of her time in\ncharity work, agreed with the minister when he declared that the trouble\nwas largely due to a decline in Christian belief. Ezra Hutchins, too,\nnodded at this.\n\n\"Take that man Krebs, for example,\" the minister went on, stimulated by\nthis encouragement, \"he's an atheist, pure and simple.\" A sympathetic\nshudder went around the table at the word. George alone smiled. \"Old\nKrebs was a free-thinker; I used to get my glasses of him. He was at\nleast a conscientious man, a good workman, which is more than can be said\nfor the son. Young Krebs has talent, and if only he had devoted himself\nto the honest practice of law, instead of stirring up dissatisfaction\namong these people, he would be a successful man to-day.\"\n\nMr. Hutchins explained that I was at college with Krebs.\n\n\"These people must like him,\" I said, \"or they wouldn't have sent him to\nthe legislature.\"\n\n\"Well, a good many of them do like him,\" the minister admitted. \"You see,\nhe actually lives among them. They believe his socialistic doctrines\nbecause he's a friend of theirs.\"\n\n\"He won't represent this town again, that's sure,\" exclaimed George. \"You\ndidn't see in the papers that he was nominated,--did you, Paret?\"\n\n\"But if the mill people wanted him, George, how could it be prevented?\"\nhis wife demanded.\n\nGeorge winked at me.\n\n\"There are more ways of skinning a cat than one,\" he said cryptically.\n\n\"Well, it's time to go to the meeting, I guess,\" remarked Ezra, rising.\nOnce more he looked at his watch.\n\nWe were packed into several family carriages and started off. In front of\nthe hall the inevitable red fire was burning, its quivering light\nreflected on the faces of the crowd that blocked the street. They stood\nsilent, strangely apathetic as we pushed through them to the curb, and\nthe red fire went out suddenly as we descended. My temporary sense of\ndepression, however, deserted me as we entered the hall, which was well\nlighted and filled with people, who clapped when the Hon. Joseph and I,\naccompanied by Mr. Doddridge and the Hon. Henry Clay Mellish from\nPottstown, with the local chairman, walked out on the stage. A glance\nover the audience sufficed to ascertain that that portion of the\npopulation whose dinner pails we longed to fill was evidently not present\nin large numbers. But the farmers had driven in from the hills, while the\nmerchants and storekeepers of Elkington had turned out loyally.\n\nThe chairman, in introducing me, proclaimed me as a coming man, and\ndeclared that I had already achieved, in the campaign, considerable\nnotoriety. As I spoke, I was pleasantly aware of Maude Hutchins leaning\nforward a little across the rail of the right-hand stage box--for the\ntown hall was half opera-house; her attitude was one of semi-absorbed\nadmiration; and the thought that I had made an impression on her\nstimulated me. I spoke with more aplomb. Somewhat to my surprise, I found\nmyself making occasional, unexpected witticisms that drew laughter and\napplause. Suddenly, from the back of the hall, a voice called out:--\"How\nabout House Bill 709?\"\n\nThere was a silence, then a stirring and craning of necks. It was my\nfirst experience of heckling, and for the moment I was taken aback. I\nthought of Krebs. He had, indeed, been in my mind since I had risen to my\nfeet, and I had scanned the faces before me in search of his. But it was\nnot his voice.\n\n\"Well, what about Bill 709?\" I demanded.\n\n\"You ought to know something about it, I guess,\" the voice responded.\n\n\"Put him out!\" came from various portions of the hall.\n\nInwardly, I was shaken. Not--in orthodox language from any \"conviction of\nsin.\" Yet it was my first intimation that my part in the legislation\nreferred to was known to any save a select few. I blamed Krebs, and a hot\nanger arose within me against him. After all, what could they prove?\n\n\"No, don't put him out,\" I said. \"Let him come up here to the platform.\nI'll yield to him. And I'm entirely willing to discuss with him and\ndefend any measures passed in the legislature of this state by a\nRepublican majority. Perhaps,\" I added, \"the gentleman has a copy of the\nlaw in his pocket, that I may know what he is talking about, and answer\nhim intelligently.\"\n\nAt this there was wild applause. I had the audience with me. The offender\nremained silent and presently I finished my speech. After that Mr.\nMecklin made them cheer and weep, and Mr. Mellish made them laugh. The\nmeeting had been highly successful.\n\n\"You polished him off, all right,\" said George Hutchins, as he took my\nhand.\n\n\"Who was he?\"\n\n\"Oh, one of the local sore-heads. Krebs put him up to it, of course.\"\n\n\"Was Krebs here?\" I asked.\n\n\"Sitting in the corner of the balcony. That meeting must have made him\nfeel sick.\" George bent forward and whispered in my ear: \"I thought Bill\n709 was Watling's idea.\"\n\n\"Oh, I happened to be in the Potts House about that time,\" I explained.\n\nGeorge, of whom it may be gathered that he was not wholly\nunsophisticated, grinned at me appreciatively.\n\n\"Say, Paret,\" he replied, putting his hand through my arm, \"there's a\nlittle legal business in prospect down here that will require some\nhandling, and I wish you'd come down after the campaign and talk it over,\nwith us. I've just about made up my mind that you're he man to tackle\nit.\"\n\n\"All right, I'll come,\" I said.\n\n\"And stay with me,\" said George....\n\nWe went to his yellow-brick house for refreshments, salad and ice-cream\nand (in the face of the Hutchins traditions) champagne. Others had been\ninvited in, some twenty persons.... Once in a while, when I looked up, I\nmet Maude's eyes across the room. I walked home with her, slowly, the\nlength of the Hutchinses' block. Floating over the lake was a waning\nOctober moon that cast through the thinning maples a lace-work of shadows\nat our feet; I had the feeling of well-being that comes to heroes, and\nthe presence of Maude Hutchins was an incense, a vestal incense far from\nunpleasing. Yet she had reservations which appealed to me. Hers was not a\ngushing provincialism, like that of Mrs. George.\n\n\"I liked your speech so much, Mr. Paret,\" she told me. \"It seemed so\nsensible and--controlled, compared to the others. I have never thought a\ngreat deal about these things, of course, and I never understood before\nwhy taking away the tariff caused so much misery. You made that quite\nplain.\n\n\"If so, I'm glad,\" I said.\n\nShe was silent a moment.\n\n\"The working people here have had a hard time during the last year,\" she\nwent on. \"Some of the mills had to be shut down, you know. It has\ntroubled me. Indeed, it has troubled all of us. And what has made it more\ndifficult, more painful is that many of them seem actually to dislike us.\nThey think it's father's fault, and that he could run all the mills if he\nwanted to. I've been around a little with mother and sometimes the women\nwouldn't accept any help from us; they said they'd rather starve than\ntake charity, that they had the right to work. But father couldn't run\nthe mills at a loss--could he?\"\n\n\"Certainly not,\" I replied.\n\n\"And then there's Mr. Krebs, of whom we were speaking at supper, and who\nputs all kinds of queer notions into their heads. Father says he's an\nanarchist. I heard father say at supper that he was at Harvard with you.\nDid you like him?\"\n\n\"Well,\" I answered hesitatingly, \"I didn't know him very well.\"\n\n\"Of course not,\" she put in. \"I suppose you couldn't have.\"\n\n\"He's got these notions,\" I explained, \"that are mischievous and\ncrazy--but I don't dislike him.\"\n\n\"I'm glad to hear you say that!\" she answered quietly. \"I like him,\ntoo--he seems so kind, so understanding.\"\n\n\"Do you know him?\"\n\n\"Well,--\" she hesitated--\"I feel as though I do. I've only met him once,\nand that was by accident. It was the day the big strike began, last\nspring, and I had been shopping, and started for the mills to get father\nto walk home with me, as I used to do. I saw the crowds blocking the\nstreets around the canal. At first I paid no attention to them, but after\na while I began to be a little uneasy, there were places where I had to\nsqueeze through, and I couldn't help seeing that something was wrong, and\nthat the people were angry. Men and women were talking in loud voices.\nOne woman stared at me, and called my name, and said something that\nfrightened me terribly. I went into a doorway--and then I saw Mr. Krebs.\nI didn't know who he was. He just said, 'You'd better come with me, Miss\nHutchins,' and I went with him. I thought afterwards that it was a very\ncourageous thing for him to do, because he was so popular with the mill\npeople, and they had such a feeling against us. Yet they didn't seem to\nresent it, and made way for us, and Mr. Krebs spoke to many of them as we\npassed. After we got to State Street, I asked him his name, and when he\ntold me I was speechless. He took off his hat and went away. He had such\na nice face--not at all ugly when you look at it twice--and kind eyes,\nthat I just couldn't believe him to be as bad as father and George think\nhe is. Of course he is mistaken,\" she added hastily, \"but I am sure he is\nsincere, and honestly thinks he can help those people by telling them\nwhat he does.\"\n\nThe question shot at me during the meeting rankled still; I wanted to\nbelieve that Krebs had inspired it, and her championship of him gave me a\ntwinge of jealousy,--the slightest twinge, to be sure, yet a perceptible\none. At the same time, the unaccountable liking I had for the man stirred\nto life. The act she described had been so characteristic.\n\n\"He's one of the born rebels against society,\" I said glibly. \"Yet I do\nthink he's sincere.\"\n\nMaude was grave. \"I should be sorry to think he wasn't,\" she replied.\nAfter I had bidden her good night at the foot of the stairs, and gone to\nmy room, I reflected how absurd it was to be jealous of Krebs. What was\nMaude Hutchins to me? And even if she had been something to me, she never\ncould be anything to Krebs. All the forces of our civilization stood\nbetween the two; nor was she of a nature to take plunges of that sort.\nThe next day, as I lay back in my seat in the parlour-car and gazed at\nthe autumn landscape, I indulged in a luxurious contemplation of the\npicture she had made as she stood on the lawn under the trees in the\nearly morning light, when my carriage had driven away; and I had turned,\nto perceive that her eyes had followed me. I was not in love with her, of\ncourse. I did not wish to return at once to Elkington, but I dwelt with a\npleasant anticipation upon my visit, when the campaign should be over,\nwith George.\n\n\n\n\nXIII.\n\n\"The good old days of the Watling campaign,\" as Colonel Paul Varney is\nwont to call them, are gone forever. And the Colonel himself, who stuck\nto his gods, has been through the burning, fiery furnace of\nInvestigation, and has come out unscathed and unrepentant. The flames of\ninvestigation, as a matter of fact, passed over his head in their vain\nattempt to reach the \"man higher up,\" whose feet they licked; but him\nthey did not devour, either. A veteran in retirement, the Colonel is\nliving under his vine and fig tree on the lake at Rossiter; the vine\nbears Catawba grapes, of which he is passionately fond; the fig tree, the\nBartlett pears he gives to his friends. He has saved something from the\nspoils of war, but other veterans I could mention are not so fortunate.\nThe old warriors have retired, and many are dead; the good old methods\nare becoming obsolete. We never bothered about those mischievous things\ncalled primaries. Our county committees, our state committees chose the\ncandidates for the conventions, which turned around and chose the\ncommittees. Both the committees and the conventions--under advice--chose\nthe candidates. Why, pray, should the people complain, when they had\neverything done for them? The benevolent parties, both Democratic and\nRepublican, even undertook the expense of printing the ballots! And\ngenerous ballots they were (twenty inches long and five wide!),\ndistributed before election, in order that the voters might have the\nopportunity of studying and preparing them: in order that Democrats of\ndelicate feelings might take the pains to scratch out all the Democratic\ncandidates, and write in the names of the Republican candidates.\nPatriotism could go no farther than this....\n\nI spent the week before election in the city, where I had the opportunity\nof observing what may be called the charitable side of politics. For a\nwhole month, or more, the burden of existence had been lifted from the\nshoulders of the homeless. No church or organization, looked out for\nthese frowsy, blear-eyed and ragged wanderers who had failed to find a\nplace in the scale of efficiency. For a whole month, I say, Mr. Judd\nJason and his lieutenants made them their especial care; supported them\nin lodging-houses, induced the night clerks to give them attention; took\nthe greatest pains to ensure them the birth-right which, as American\ncitizens, was theirs,--that of voting. They were not only given homes for\na period, but they were registered; and in the abundance of good feeling\nthat reigned during this time of cheer, even the foreigners were\nregistered! On election day they were driven, like visiting notables, in\ncarryalls and carriages to the polls! Some of them, as though in\ncompensation for ills endured between elections, voted not once, but many\ntimes; exercising judicial functions for which they should be given\ncredit. For instance, they were convinced that the Hon. W. W. Trulease\nhad made a good governor; and they were Watling enthusiasts,--intent on\nsending men to the legislature who would vote for him for senator; yet\nthere were cases in which, for the minor offices, the democrat was the\nbetter man!\n\nIt was a memorable day. In spite of Mr. Lawler's Pilot, which was as a\nvoice crying in the wilderness, citizens who had wives and homes and\nresponsibilities, business men and clerks went to the voting booths and\nrecorded their choice for Trulease, Watling and Prosperity: and\nworking-men followed suit. Victory was in the air. Even the policemen\nwore happy smiles, and in some instances the election officers themselves\nin absent-minded exuberance thrust bunches of ballots into the boxes!\n\nIn response to an insistent demand from his fellow-citizens Mr. Watling,\nthe Saturday evening before, had made a speech in the Auditorium, decked\nwith bunting and filled with people. For once the Morning Era did not\nexaggerate when it declared that the ovation had lasted fully ten\nminutes. \"A remarkable proof\" it went on to say, \"of the esteem and\nconfidence in which our fellow-citizen is held by those who know him\nbest, his neighbours in the city where he has given so many instances of\nhis public spirit, where he has achieved such distinction in the practice\nof the law. He holds the sound American conviction that the office should\nseek the man. His address is printed in another column, and we believe it\nwill appeal to the intelligence and sober judgment of the state. It is\nreplete with modesty and wisdom.\"\n\nMr. Watling was introduced by Mr. Bering of the State Supreme Court (a\ncandidate for re-election), who spoke with deliberation, with owl-like\nimpressiveness. He didn't believe in judges meddling in politics, but\nthis was an unusual occasion. (Loud applause.) Most unusual. He had come\nhere as a man, as an American, to pay his tribute to another man, a\nlong-time friend, whom he thought to stand somewhat aside and above mere\nparty strife, to represent values not merely political.... So\naccommodating and flexible is the human mind, so \"practical\" may it\nbecome through dealing with men and affairs, that in listening to Judge\nBering I was able to ignore the little anomalies such a situation might\nhave suggested to the theorist, to the mere student of the institutions\nof democracy. The friendly glasses of rye and water Mr. Bering had taken\nin Monahan's saloon, the cases he had \"arranged\" for the firm of Watling,\nFowndes and Ripon were forgotten. Forgotten, too, when Theodore Watling\nstood up and men began, to throw their hats in the air,--were the\ncavilling charges of Mr. Lawler's Pilot that, far from the office seeking\nthe man, our candidate had spent over a hundred thousand dollars of his\nown money, to say nothing of the contributions of Mr. Scherer, Mr.\nDickinson and the Railroad! If I had been troubled with any weak, ethical\ndoubts, Mr. Watling would have dispelled them; he had red blood in his\nveins, a creed in which he believed, a rare power of expressing himself\nin plain, everyday language that was often colloquial, but never--as the\nsaying goes--\"cheap.\" The dinner-pail predicament was real to him. He\nwould present a policy of our opponents charmingly, even persuasively,\nand then add, after a moment's pause: \"There is only one objection to\nthis, my friends--that it doesn't work.\" It was all in the way he said\nit, of course. The audience would go wild with approval, and shouts of\n\"that's right\" could be heard here and there. Then he proceeded to show\nwhy it didn't work. He had the faculty of bringing his lessons home, the\nimagination to put himself into the daily life of those who listened to\nhim,--the life of the storekeeper, the clerk, of the labourer and of the\nhouse-wife. The effect of this can scarcely be overestimated. For the\nAmerican hugs the delusion that there are no class distinctions, even\nthough his whole existence may be an effort to rise out of once class\ninto another. \"Your wife,\" he told them once, \"needs a dress. Let us\nadmit that the material for the dress is a little cheaper than it was\nfour years ago, but when she comes to look into the family stocking--\"\n(Laughter.) \"I needn't go on. If we could have things cheaper, and more\nmoney to buy them with, we should all be happy, and the Republican party\ncould retire from business.\"\n\nHe did not once refer to the United States Senatorship.\n\nIt was appropriate, perhaps, that many of us dined on the evening of\nelection day at the Boyne Club. There was early evidence of a Republican\nland-slide. And when, at ten o'clock, it was announced that Mr. Trulease\nwas re-elected by a majority which exceeded Mr. Grunewald's most hopeful\nestimate, that the legislature was \"safe,\" that Theodore Watling would be\nthe next United States Senator, a scene of jubilation ensued within those\nhallowed walls which was unprecedented. Chairs were pushed back, rugs\ntaken up, Gene Hollister played the piano and a Virginia reel started; in\na burst of enthusiasm Leonard Dickinson ordered champagne for every\nmember present. The country was returning to its senses. Theodore Watling\nhad preferred, on this eventful night, to remain quietly at home. But\npresently carriages were ordered, and a \"delegation\" of enthusiastic\nfriends departed to congratulate him; Dickinson, of course, Grierson,\nFowndes, Ogilvy, and Grunewald. We found Judah B. Tallant there,--in\nspite of the fact that it was a busy night for the Era; and Adolf Scherer\nhimself, in expansive mood, was filling the largest of the library\nchairs. Mr. Watling was the least excited of them all; remarkably calm, I\nthought, for a man on the verge of realizing his life's high ambition. He\nhad some old brandy, and a box of cigars he had been saving for an\noccasion. He managed to convey to everyone his appreciation of the value\nof their cooperation....\n\nIt was midnight before Mr. Scherer arose to take his departure. He seized\nMr. Watling's hand, warmly, in both of his own.\n\n\"I have never,\" he said, with a relapse into the German f's, \"I have\nnever had a happier moment in my life, my friend, than when I\ncongratulate you on your success.\" His voice shook with emotion. \"Alas,\nwe shall not see so much of you now.\"\n\n\"He'll be on guard, Scherer,\" said Leonard Dickinson, putting his arm\naround my chief.\n\n\"Good night, Senator,\" said Tallant, and all echoed the word, which\nstruck me as peculiarly appropriate. Much as I had admired Mr. Watling\nbefore, it seemed indeed as if he had undergone some subtle change in the\nlast few hours, gained in dignity and greatness by the action of the\npeople that day. When it came my turn to bid him good night, he retained\nmy hand in his.\n\n\"Don't go yet, Hugh,\" he said.\n\n\"But you must be tired,\" I objected.\n\n\"This sort of thing doesn't make a man tired,\" he laughed, leading me\nback to the library, where he began to poke the fire into a blaze. \"Sit\ndown awhile. You must be tired, I think,--you've worked hard in this\ncampaign, a good deal harder than I have. I haven't said much about it,\nbut I appreciate it, my boy.\" Mr. Watling had the gift of expressing his\nfeelings naturally, without sentimentality. I would have given much for\nthat gift.\n\n\"Oh, I liked it,\" I replied awkwardly.\n\nI read a gentle amusement in his eyes, and also the expression of\nsomething else, difficult to define. He had seated himself, and was\nabsently thrusting at the logs with the poker.\n\n\"You've never regretted going into law?\" he asked suddenly, to my\nsurprise.\n\n\"Why, no, sir,\" I said.\n\n\"I'm glad to hear that. I feel, to a considerable extent, responsible for\nyour choice of a profession.\"\n\n\"My father intended me to be a lawyer,\" I told him. \"But it's true that\nyou gave me my--my first enthusiasm.\"\n\nHe looked up at me at the word.\n\n\"I admired your father. He seemed to me to be everything that a lawyer\nshould be. And years ago, when I came to this city a raw country boy from\nupstate, he represented and embodied for me all the fine traditions of\nthe profession. But the practice of law isn't what it was in his day,\nHugh.\"\n\n\"No,\" I agreed, \"that could scarcely be expected.\"\n\n\"Yes, I believe you realize that,\" he said. \"I've watched you, I've taken\na personal pride in you, and I have an idea that eventually you will\nsucceed me here--neither Fowndes nor Ripon have the peculiar ability you\nhave shown. You and I are alike in a great many respects, and I am\ninclined to think we are rather rare, as men go. We are able to keep one\nobject vividly in view, so vividly as to be able to work for it day and\nnight. I could mention dozens who had and have more natural talent for\nthe law than I, more talent for politics than I. The same thing may be\nsaid about you. I don't regard either of us as natural lawyers, such as\nyour father was. He couldn't help being a lawyer.\"\n\nHere was new evidence of his perspicacity.\n\n\"But surely,\" I ventured, \"you don't feel any regrets concerning your\ncareer, Mr. Watling?\"\n\n\"No,\" he said, \"that's just the point. But no two of us are made wholly\nalike. I hadn't practised law very long before I began to realize that\nconditions were changing, that the new forces at work in our industrial\nlife made the older legal ideals impracticable. It was a case of choosing\nbetween efficiency and inefficiency, and I chose efficiency. Well, that\nwas my own affair, but when it comes to influencing others--\" He paused.\n\"I want you to see this as I do, not for the sake of justifying myself,\nbut because I honestly believe there is more to it than expediency,--a\ngood deal more. There's a weak way of looking at it, and a strong way.\nAnd if I feel sure you understand it, I shall be satisfied.\n\n\"Because things are going to change in this country, Hugh. They are\nchanging, but they are going to change more. A man has got to make up his\nmind what he believes in, and be ready to fight for it. We'll have to\nfight for it, sooner perhaps than we realize. We are a nation divided\nagainst ourselves; democracy--Jacksonian democracy, at all events, is a\nflat failure, and we may as well acknowledge it. We have a political\nsystem we have outgrown, and which, therefore, we have had to nullify.\nThere are certain needs, certain tendencies of development in nations as\nwell as in individuals,--needs stronger than the state, stronger than the\nlaw or constitution. In order to make our resources effective,\ncombinations of capital are more and more necessary, and no more to be\ndenied than a chemical process, given the proper ingredients, can be\nthwarted. The men who control capital must have a free hand, or the\nstructure will be destroyed. This compels us to do many things which we\nwould rather not do, which we might accomplish openly and unopposed if\nconditions were frankly recognized, and met by wise statesmanship which\nsought to bring about harmony by the reshaping of laws and policies. Do\nyou follow me?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" I answered. \"But I have never heard the situation stated so\nclearly. Do you think the day will come when statesmanship will recognize\nthis need?\"\n\n\"Ah,\" he said, \"I'm afraid not--in my time, at least. But we shall have\nto develop that kind of statesmen or go on the rocks. Public opinion in\nthe old democratic sense is a myth; it must be made by strong individuals\nwho recognize and represent evolutionary needs, otherwise it's at the\nmercy of demagogues who play fast and loose with the prejudice and\nignorance of the mob. The people don't value the vote, they know nothing\nabout the real problems. So far as I can see, they are as easily swayed\nto-day as the crowd that listened to Mark Antony's oration about Caesar.\nYou've seen how we have to handle them, in this election and--in other\nmatters. It isn't a pleasant practice, something we'd indulge in out of\nchoice, but the alternative is unthinkable. We'd have chaos in no time.\nWe've just got to keep hold, you understand--we can't leave it to the\nirresponsible.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" I said. In this mood he was more impressive than I had ever known\nhim, and his confidence flattered and thrilled me.\n\n\"In the meantime, we're criminals,\" he continued. \"From now on we'll have\nto stand more and more denunciation from the visionaries, the\ndissatisfied, the trouble makers. We may as well make up our minds to it.\nBut we've got something on our side worth fighting for, and the man who\nis able to make that clear will be great.\"\n\n\"But you--you are going to the Senate,\" I reminded him.\n\nHe shook his head.\n\n\"The time has not yet come,\" he said. \"Confusion and misunderstanding\nmust increase before they can diminish. But I have hopes of you, Hugh, or\nI shouldn't have spoken. I shan't be here now--of course I'll keep in\ntouch with you. I wanted to be sure that you had the right view of this\nthing.\"\n\n\"I see it now,\" I said. \"I had thought of it, but never--never as a\nwhole--not in the large sense in which you have expressed it.\" To attempt\nto acknowledge or deprecate the compliment he had paid me was impossible;\nI felt that he must have read my gratitude and appreciation in my manner.\n\n\"I mustn't keep you up until morning.\" He glanced at the clock, and went\nwith me through the hall into the open air. A meteor darted through the\nNovember night. \"We're like that,\" he observed, staring after it, a\n\"flash across the darkness, and we're gone.\"\n\n\"Only--there are many who haven't the satisfaction of a flash,\" I was\nmoved to reply.\n\nHe laughed and put his hand on my shoulder as he bade me good night.\n\n\"Hugh, you ought to get married. I'll have to find a nice girl for you,\"\nhe said. With an elation not unmingled with awe I made my way homeward.\n\nTheodore Watling had given me a creed.\n\nA week or so after the election I received a letter from George Hutchins\nasking me to come to Elkington. I shall not enter into the details of the\nlegal matter involved. Many times that winter I was a guest at the\nyellow-brick house, and I have to confess, as spring came on, that I made\nseveral trips to Elkington which business necessity did not absolutely\ndemand.\n\nI considered Maude Hutchins, and found the consideration rather a\ndelightful process. As became an eligible and successful young man, I was\ncareful not to betray too much interest; and I occupied myself at first\nwith a review of what I deemed her shortcomings. Not that I was thinking\nof marriage--but I had imagined the future Mrs. Paret as tall; Maude was\nup to my chin: again, the hair of the fortunate lady was to be dark, and\nMaude's was golden red: my ideal had esprit, lightness of touch, the\nfaculty of seizing just the aspect of a subject that delighted me, and a\nknowledge of the world; Maude was simple, direct, and in a word\nprovincial. Her provinciality, however, was negative rather than\npositive, she had no disagreeable mannerisms, her voice was not nasal;\nher plasticity appealed to me. I suppose I was lost without knowing it\nwhen I began to think of moulding her.\n\nAll of this went on at frequent intervals during the winter, and while I\nwas organizing the Elkington Power and Traction Company for George I\nfound time to dine and sup at Maude's house, and to take walks with her.\nI thought I detected an incense deliciously sweet; by no means\noverpowering, like the lily's, but more like the shy fragrance of the\nwood flower. I recall her kind welcomes, the faint deepening of colour in\nher cheeks when she greeted me, and while I suspected that she looked up\nto me she had a surprising and tantalizing self-command.\n\nThere came moments when I grew slightly alarmed, as, for instance, one\nSunday in the early spring when I was dining at the Ezra Hutchins's house\nand surprised Mrs. Hutchins's glance on me, suspecting her of seeking to\ndivine what manner of man I was. I became self-conscious; I dared not\nlook at Maude, who sat across the table; thereafter I began to feel that\nthe Hutchins connection regarded me as a suitor. I had grown intimate\nwith George and his wife, who did not refrain from sly allusions; and\nGeorge himself once remarked, with characteristic tact, that I was most\nconscientious in my attention to the traction affair; I have reason to\nbelieve they were even less delicate with Maude. This was the logical\ntime to withdraw--but I dallied. The experience was becoming more\nengrossing,--if I may so describe it,--and spring was approaching. The\nstars in their courses were conspiring. I was by no means as yet a\nself-acknowledged wooer, and we discussed love in its lighter phases\nthrough the medium of literature. Heaven forgive me for calling it so!\nAbout that period, it will be remembered, a mushroom growth of volumes of\na certain kind sprang into existence; little books with \"artistic\"\nbindings and wide margins, sweetened essays, some of them written in\nbeautiful English by dilettante authors for drawing-room consumption; and\ncollections of short stories, no doubt chiefly bought by philanderers\nlike myself, who were thus enabled to skate on thin ice over deep water.\nIt was a most delightful relationship that these helped to support, and I\nfondly believed I could reach shore again whenever I chose.\n\nThere came a Sunday in early May, one of those days when the feminine\nassumes a large importance. I had been to the Hutchinses' church; and\nMaude, as she sat and prayed decorously in the pew beside me, suddenly\nincreased in attractiveness and desirability. Her voice was very sweet,\nand I felt a delicious and languorous thrill which I identified not only\nwith love, but also with a reviving spirituality. How often the two seem\nto go hand in hand!\n\nShe wore a dress of a filmy material, mauve, with a design in gold thread\nrunning through it. Of late, it seemed, she had had more new dresses: and\ntheir modes seemed more cosmopolitan; at least to the masculine eye. How\ndelicately her hair grew, in little, shining wisps, around her white\nneck! I could have reached out my hand and touched her. And it was this\ndesire,--although by no means overwhelming,--that startled me. Did I\nreally want her? The consideration of this vital question occupied the\nwhole time of the sermon; made me distrait at dinner,--a large family\ngathering. Later I found myself alone with heron a bench in the\nHutchinses' garden where we had walked the day of my arrival, during the\ncampaign.\n\nThe gardens were very different, now. The trees had burst forth again\ninto leaf, the spiraea bushes seemed weighted down with snow, and with a\nnote like that of the quivering bass string of a 'cello the bees hummed\namong the fruit blossoms. And there beside me in her filmy dress was\nMaude, a part of it all--the meaning of all that set my being clamouring.\nShe was like some ripened, delicious flower ready to be picked.... One of\nthose pernicious, make-believe volumes had fallen on the bench between\nus, for I could not read any more; I could not think; I touched her hand,\nand when she drew it gently away I glanced at her. Reason made a valiant\nbut hopeless effort to assert itself. Was I sure that I wanted her--for\nlife? No use! I wanted her now, no matter what price that future might\ndemand. An awkward silence fell between us--awkward to me, at least--and\nI, her guide and mentor, became banal, apologetic, confused. I made some\nidiotic remark about being together in the Garden of Eden.\n\n\"I remember Mr. Doddridge saying in Bible class that it was supposed to\nbe on the Euphrates,\" she replied. \"But it's been destroyed by the\nflood.\"\n\n\"Let's make another--one of our own,\" I suggested.\n\n\"Why, how silly you are this afternoon.\"\n\n\"What's to prevent us--Maude?\" I demanded, with a dry throat.\n\n\"Nonsense!\" she laughed. In proportion as I lost poise she seemed to gain\nit.\n\n\"It's not nonsense,\" I faltered. \"If we were married.\"\n\nAt last the fateful words were pronounced--irrevocably. And, instead of\nqualms, I felt nothing but relief, joy that I had been swept along by the\nflood of feeling. She did not look at me, but gazed straight ahead of\nher.\n\n\"If I love you, Maude?\" I stammered, after a moment.\n\n\"But I don't love you,\" she replied, steadily.\n\nNever in my life had I been so utterly taken aback.\n\n\"Do you mean,\" I managed to say, \"that after all these months you don't\nlike me a little?\"\n\n\"'Liking' isn't loving.\" She looked me full in the face. \"I like you very\nmuch.\"\n\n\"But--\" there I stopped, paralyzed by what appeared to me the\nquintessence of feminine inconsistency and caprice. Yet, as I stared at\nher, she certainly did not appear capricious. It is not too much to say\nthat I was fairly astounded at this evidence of self-command and\ndecision, of the strength of mind to refuse me. Was it possible that she\nhad felt nothing and I all? I got to my feet.\n\n\"I hate to hurt your feelings,\" I heard her say. \"I'm very sorry.\"... She\nlooked up at me. Afterwards, when reflecting on the scene, I seemed to\nremember that there were tears in her eyes. I was not in a condition to\nappreciate her splendid sincerity. I was overwhelmed and inarticulate. I\nleft her there, on the bench, and went back to George's, announcing my\nintention of taking the five o'clock train....\n\nMaude Hutchins had become, at a stroke, the most desirable of women. I\nhave often wondered how I should have felt on that five-hour journey back\nto the city if she had fallen into my arms! I should have persuaded\nmyself, no doubt, that I had not done a foolish thing in yielding to an\nimpulse and proposing to an inexperienced and provincial young woman, yet\nthere would have been regrets in the background. Too deeply chagrined to\nsee any humour in the situation, I settled down in a Pullman seat and\nwent over and over again the event of that afternoon until the train\nreached the city.\n\nAs the days wore on, and I attended to my cases, I thought of Maude a\ngreat deal, and in those moments when the pressure of business was\nrelaxed, she obsessed me. She must love me,--only she did not realize it.\nThat was the secret! Her value had risen amazingly, become supreme; the\nvery act of refusing me had emphasized her qualifications as a wife, and\nI now desired her with all the intensity of a nature which had been\npermitted always to achieve its objects. The inevitable process of\nidealization began. In dusty offices I recalled her freshness as she had\nsat beside me in the garden,--the freshness of a flower; with Berkeleyan\nsubjectivism I clothed the flower with colour, bestowed it with\nfragrance. I conferred on Maude all the gifts and graces that woman had\npossessed since the creation. And I recalled, with mingled bitterness and\ntenderness, the turn of her head, the down on her neck, the half-revealed\ncurve of her arm.... In spite of the growing sordidness of Lyme Street,\nmy mother and I still lived in the old house, for which she very\nnaturally had a sentiment. In vain I had urged her from time to time to\nmove out into a brighter and fresher neighbourhood. It would be time\nenough, she said, when I was married.\n\n\"If you wait for that, mother,\" I answered, \"we shall spend the rest of\nour lives here.\"\n\n\"I shall spend the rest of my life here,\" she would declare. \"But\nyou--you have your life before you, my dear. You would be so much more\ncontented if--if you could find some nice girl. I think you live--too\nfeverishly.\"\n\nI do not know whether or not she suspected me of being in love, nor\nindeed how much she read of me in other ways. I did not confide in her,\nnor did it strike me that she might have yearned for confidences; though\nsometimes, when I dined at home, I surprised her gentle face--framed now\nwith white hair--lifted wistfully toward me across the table. Our\nrelationship, indeed, was a pathetic projection of that which had existed\nin my childhood; we had never been confidants then. The world in which I\nlived and fought, of great transactions and merciless consequences\nfrightened her; her own world was more limited than ever. She heard\ndisquieting things, I am sure, from Cousin Robert Breck, who had become\nmore and more querulous since the time-honoured firm of Breck and Company\nhad been forced to close its doors and the home at Claremore had been\nsold. My mother often spent the day in the scrolled suburban cottage with\nthe coloured glass front door where he lived with the Kinleys and\nHelen....\n\nIf my mother suspected that I was anticipating marriage, and said\nnothing, Nancy Durrett suspected and spoke out.\n\nLife is such a curious succession of contradictions and surprises that I\nrecord here without comment the fact that I was seeing much more of Nancy\nsince her marriage than I had in the years preceding it. A comradeship\nexisted between us. I often dined at her house and had fallen into the\nhabit of stopping there frequently on my way home in the evening. Ham did\nnot seem to mind. What was clear, at any rate, was that Nancy, before\nmarriage, had exacted some sort of an understanding by which her\n\"freedom\" was not to be interfered with. She was the first among us of\nthe \"modern wives.\"\n\nHam, whose heartstrings and purse-strings were oddly intertwined, had\nstipulated that they were to occupy the old Durrett mansion; but when\nNancy had made it \"livable,\" as she expressed it, he is said to have\nremarked that he might as well have built a new house and been done with\nit. Not even old Nathaniel himself would have recognized his home when\nNancy finished what she termed furnishing: out went the horsehair, the\nhideous chandeliers, the stuffy books, the Recamier statuary, and an army\nof upholsterers, wood-workers, etc., from Boston and New York invaded the\nplace. The old mahogany doors were spared, but matched now by Chippendale\nand Sheraton; the new, polished floors were covered with Oriental rugs,\nthe dreary Durrett pictures replaced by good canvases and tapestries.\nNancy had what amounted to a genius for interior effects, and she was the\nfirst to introduce among us the luxury that was to grow more and more\nprevalent as our wealth increased by leaps and bounds. Only Nancy's\nluxury, though lavish, was never vulgar, and her house when completed had\nrather marvellously the fine distinction of some old London mansion\nfilled with the best that generations could contribute. It left Mrs.\nFrederick Grierson--whose residence on the Heights had hitherto been our\n\"grandest\"--breathless with despair.\n\nWith characteristic audacity Nancy had chosen old Nathaniel's sanctum for\nher particular salon, into which Ham himself did not dare to venture\nwithout invitation. It was hung in Pompeiian red and had a little\nwrought-iron balcony projecting over the yard, now transformed by an\nexpert into a garden. When I had first entered this room after the\nmetamorphosis had taken place I inquired after the tombstone mantel.\n\n\"Oh, I've pulled it up by the roots,\" she said.\n\n\"Aren't you afraid of ghosts?\" I inquired.\n\n\"Do I look it?\" she asked. And I confessed that she didn't. Indeed, all\nghosts were laid, nor was there about her the slightest evidence of\nmourning or regret. One was forced to acknowledge her perfection in the\npart she had chosen as the arbitress of social honours. The candidates\nwere rapidly increasing; almost every month, it seemed, someone turned up\nwith a fortune and the aspirations that go with it, and it was Mrs.\nDurrett who decided the delicate question of fitness. With these, and\nwith the world at large, her manner might best be described as difficult;\nand I was often amused at the way in which she contrived to keep them at\narm's length and make them uncomfortable. With her intimates--of whom\nthere were few--she was frank.\n\n\"I suppose you enjoy it,\" I said to her once.\n\n\"Of course I enjoy it, or I shouldn't do it,\" she retorted. \"It isn't the\nreal thing, as I told you once. But none of us gets the real thing. It's\npower.... Just as you enjoy what you're doing--sorting out the unfit.\nIt's a game, it keeps us from brooding over things we can't help. And\nafter all, when we have good appetites and are fairly happy, why should\nwe complain?\"\n\n\"I'm not complaining,\" I said, taking up a cigarette, \"since I still\nenjoy your favour.\"\n\nShe regarded me curiously.\n\n\"And when you get married, Hugh?\"\n\n\"Sufficient unto the day,\" I replied.\n\n\"How shall I get along, I wonder, with that simple and unsophisticated\nlady when she appears?\"\n\n\"Well,\" I said, \"you wouldn't marry me.\"\n\nShe shook her head at me, and smiled....\n\n\"No,\" she corrected me, \"you like me better as Hams' wife than you would\nhave as your own.\"\n\nI merely laughed at this remark.... It would indeed have been difficult\nto analyze the new relationship that had sprung up between us, to say\nwhat elements composed it. The roots of it went back to the beginning of\nour lives; and there was much of sentiment in it, no doubt. She\nunderstood me as no one else in the world understood me, and she was fond\nof me in spite of it.\n\nHence, when I became infatuated with Maude Hutchins, after that Sunday\nwhen she so unexpectedly had refused me, I might have known that Nancy's\nsuspicions would be aroused. She startled me by accusing me, out of a\nclear sky, of being in love. I denied it a little too emphatically.\n\n\"Why shouldn't you tell me, Hugh, if it's so?\" she asked. \"I didn't\nhesitate to tell you.\"\n\nIt was just before her departure for the East to spend the summer. We\nwere on the balcony, shaded by the big maple that grew at the end of the\ngarden.\n\n\"But there's nothing to tell,\" I insisted.\n\nShe lay back in her chair, regarding me.\n\n\"Did you think that I'd be jealous?\"\n\n\"There's nothing to be jealous about.\"\n\n\"I've always expected you to get married, Hugh. I've even predicted the\ntype.\"\n\nShe had, in truth, with an accuracy almost uncanny.\n\n\"The only thing I'm afraid of is that she won't like me. She lives in\nthat place you've been going to so much, lately,--doesn't she?\"\n\nOf course she had put two and two together, my visits to Elkington and my\nmanner, which I had flattered myself had not been distrait. On the chance\nthat she knew more, from some source, I changed my tactics.\n\n\"I suppose you mean Maude Hutchins,\" I said.\n\nNancy laughed.\n\n\"So that's her name!\"\n\n\"It's the name of a girl in Elkington. I've been doing legal work for the\nHutchinses, and I imagine some idiot has been gossiping. She's just a\nyoung girl--much too young for me.\"\n\n\"Men are queer creatures,\" she declared. \"Did you think I should be\njealous?\"\n\nIt was exactly what I had thought, but I denied it.\n\n\"Why should you be--even if there were anything to be jealous about? You\ndidn't consult me when you got married. You merely announced an\nirrevocable decision.\"\n\nNancy leaned forward and laid her hand on my arm.\n\n\"My dear,\" she said, \"strange as it may seem, I want you to be happy. I\ndon't want you to make a mistake, Hugh, too great a mistake.\"\n\nI was surprised and moved. Once more I had a momentary glimpse of the\nreal Nancy....\n\nOur conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Ralph Hambleton....\n\n\n\n\nXIV.\n\nHowever, thoughts of Maude continued to possess me. She still appeared\nthe most desirable of beings, and a fortnight after my repulse, without\nany excuse at all, I telegraphed the George Hutchinses that I was coming\nto pay them a visit. Mrs. George, wearing a knowing smile, met me at the\nstation in a light buck-board.\n\n\"I've asked Maude to dinner,\" she said....\n\nThus with masculine directness I returned to the charge, and Maude's\ncontinued resistance but increased my ardour; could not see why she\ncontinued to resist me.\n\n\"Because I don't love you,\" she said.\n\nThis was incredible. I suggested that she didn't know what love was, and\nshe admitted it was possible: she liked me very, very much. I told her,\nsagely, that this was the best foundation for matrimony. That might be,\nbut she had had other ideas. For one thing, she felt that she did not\nknow me.... In short, she was charming and maddening in her defensive\nruses, in her advances and retreats, for I pressed her hard during the\nfour weeks which followed, and in them made four visits. Flinging caution\nto the winds, I did not even pretend to George that I was coming to see\nhim on business. I had the Hutchins family on my side, for they had the\nsense to see that the match would be an advantageous one; I even summoned\nup enough courage to talk to Ezra Hutchins on the subject.\n\n\"I'll not attempt to influence Maude, Mr. Paret--I've always said I\nwouldn't interfere with her choice. But as you are a young man of sound\nhabits, sir, successful in your profession, I should raise no objection.\nI suppose we can't keep her always.\"\n\nTo conceal his emotion, he pulled out the watch he lived by. \"Why, it's\nchurch time!\" he said.... I attended church regularly at Elkington....\n\nOn a Sunday night in June, following a day during which victory seemed\nmore distant than ever, with startling unexpectedness Maude capitulated.\nShe sat beside me on the bench, obscured, yet the warm night quivered\nwith her presence. I felt her tremble.... I remember the first exquisite\ntouch of her soft cheek. How strange it was that in conquest the tumult\nof my being should be stilled, that my passion should be transmuted into\nawe that thrilled yet disquieted! What had I done? It was as though I had\nsuddenly entered an unimagined sanctuary filled with holy flame....\n\nPresently, when we began to talk, I found myself seeking more familiar\nlevels. I asked her why she had so long resisted me, accusing her of\nhaving loved me all the time.\n\n\"Yes, I think I did, Hugh. Only--I didn't know it.\"\n\n\"You must have felt something, that afternoon when I first proposed to\nyou!\"\n\n\"You didn't really want me, Hugh. Not then.\"\n\nSurprised, and a little uncomfortable at this evidence of intuition, I\nstarted to protest. It seemed to me then as though I had always wanted\nher.\n\n\"No, no,\" she exclaimed, \"you didn't. You were carried away by your\nfeelings--you hadn't made up your mind. Indeed, I can't see why you want\nme now.\"\n\n\"You believe I do,\" I said, and drew her toward me.\n\n\"Yes, I--I believe it, now. But I can't see why. There must be so many\nattractive girls in the city, who know so much more than I do.\"\n\nI sought fervidly to reassure her on this point.... At length when we\nwent into the house she drew away from me at arm's length and gave me one\nlong searching look, as though seeking to read my soul.\n\n\"Hugh, you will always love me--to the very end, won't you?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" I whispered, \"always.\"\n\nIn the library, one on each side of the table, under the lamp, Ezra\nHutchins and his wife sat reading. Mrs. Hutchins looked up, and I saw\nthat she had divined.\n\n\"Mother, I am engaged to Hugh,\" Maude said, and bent over and kissed her.\nEzra and I stood gazing at them. Then he turned to me and pressed my\nhand.\n\n\"Well, I never saw the man who was good enough for her, Hugh. But God\nbless you, my son. I hope you will prize her as we prize her.\"\n\nMrs. Hutchins embraced me. And through her tears she, too, looked long\ninto my face. When she had released me Ezra had his watch in his hand.\n\n\"If you're going on the ten o'clock train, Hugh--\"\n\n\"Father!\" Maude protested, laughing, \"I must say I don't call that very\npolite.\"...\n\nIn the train I slept but fitfully, awakening again and again to recall\nthe extraordinary fact that I was now engaged to be married, to go over\nthe incidents of the evening. Indifferent to the backings and the\nbumpings of the car, the voices in the stations, the clanging of\nlocomotive bells and all the incomprehensible startings and stoppings,\nexalted yet troubled I beheld Maude luminous with the love I had\namazingly awakened, a love somewhere beyond my comprehension. For her\nindeed marriage was made in heaven. But for me? Could I rise now to the\nideal that had once been mine, thrust henceforth evil out of my life?\nLove forever, live always in this sanctuary she had made for me? Would\nthe time come when I should feel a sense of bondage?...\n\nThe wedding was set for the end of September. I continued to go every\nweek to Elkington, and in August, Maude and I spent a fortnight at the\nsea. There could be no doubt as to my mother's happiness, as to her\napproval of Maude; they loved each other from the beginning. I can\npicture them now, sitting together with their sewing on the porch of the\ncottage at Mattapoisett. Out on the bay little white-caps danced in the\nsunlight, sail-boats tacked hither and thither, the strong cape breeze,\nladen with invigorating salt, stirred Maude's hair, and occasionally\nplayed havoc with my papers.\n\n\"She is just the wife for you, Hugh,\" my mother confided to me. \"If I had\nchosen her myself I could not have done better,\" she added, with a smile.\n\nI was inclined to believe it, but Maude would have none of this illusion.\n\n\"He just stumbled across me,\" she insisted....\n\nWe went on long sails together, towards Wood's Hole and the open sea, the\nsprays washing over us. Her cheeks grew tanned.... Sometimes, when I\npraised her and spoke confidently of our future, she wore a troubled\nexpression.\n\n\"What are you thinking about?\" I asked her once.\n\n\"You mustn't put me on a pedestal,\" she said gently. \"I want you to see\nme as I am--I don't want you to wake up some day and be disappointed.\nI'll have to learn a lot of things, and you'll have to teach me. I can't\nget used to the fact that you, who are so practical and successful in\nbusiness, should be such a dreamer where I am concerned.\"\n\nI laughed, and told her, comfortably, that she was talking nonsense.\n\n\"What did you think of me, when you first knew me?\" I inquired.\n\n\"Well,\" she answered, with the courage that characterized her, \"I thought\nyou were rather calculating, that you put too high a price on success. Of\ncourse you attracted me. I own it.\"\n\n\"You hid your opinions rather well,\" I retorted, somewhat discomfited.\n\nShe flushed.\n\n\"Have you changed them?\" I demanded.\n\n\"I think you have that side, and I think it a weak side, Hugh. It's hard\nto tell you this, but it's better to say so now, since you ask me. I do\nthink you set too high a value on success.'\n\n\"Well, now that I know what success really is, perhaps I shall reform,\" I\ntold her.\n\n\"I don't like to think that you fool yourself,\" she replied, with a\nperspicacity I should have found extraordinary.\n\nThroughout my life there have been days and incidents, some trivial, some\nimportant, that linger in my memory because they are saturated with\n\"atmosphere.\" I recall, for instance, a gala occasion in youth when my\nmother gave one of her luncheon parties; on my return from school, the\nhouse and its surroundings wore a mysterious, exciting and unfamiliar\nlook, somehow changed by the simple fact that guests sat decorously\nchatting in a dining-room shining with my mother's best linen and\ntreasured family silver and china. The atmosphere of my wedding-day is no\nless vivid. The house of Ezra Hutchins was scarcely recognizable: its\ndoors and windows were opened wide, and all the morning people were being\nescorted upstairs to an all-significant room that contained a collection\nlike a jeweller's exhibit,--a bewildering display. There was a massive\npunch-bowl from which dangled the card of Mr. and Mrs. Adolf Scherer, a\nreally wonderful tea set of old English silver given by Senator and Mrs.\nWatling, and Nancy Willett, with her certainty of good taste, had sent an\nold English tankard of the time of the second Charles. The secret was in\nthat room. And it magically transformed for me (as I stood, momentarily\nalone, in the doorway where I had first beheld Maude) the accustomed\nscene, and charged with undivined significance the blue shadows under the\nheavy foliage of the maples. The September sunlight was heavy, tinged\nwith gold....\n\nSo fragmentary and confused are the events of that day that a cubist\nliterature were necessary to convey the impressions left upon me. I had\nsomething of the feeling of a recruit who for the first time is taking\npart in a brilliant and complicated manoeuvre. Tom and Susan Peters flit\nacross the view, and Gene Hollister and Perry Blackwood and the\nEwanses,--all of whom had come up in a special car; Ralph Hambleton was\n\"best man,\" looking preternaturally tall in his frock-coat: and his\nmanner, throughout the whole proceeding, was one of good-natured\ntolerance toward a folly none but he might escape.\n\n\"If you must do it, Hughie, I suppose you must,\" he had said to me. \"I'll\nsee you through, of course. But don't blame me afterwards.\"\n\nMaude was a little afraid of him....\n\nI dressed at George's; then, like one of those bewildering shifts of a\ncinematograph, comes the scene in church, the glimpse of my mother's\nwistful face in the front pew; and I found myself in front of the austere\nMr. Doddridge standing beside Maude--or rather beside a woman I tried\nhard to believe was Maude--so veiled and generally encased was she. I was\nthinking of this all the time I was mechanically answering Mr. Doddridge,\nand even when the wedding march burst forth and I led her out of the\nchurch. It was as though they had done their best to disguise her, to put\nour union on the other-worldly plane that was deemed to be its only\njustification, to neutralize her sex at the very moment it should have\nbeen most enhanced. Well, they succeeded. If I had not been as\nconventional as the rest, I should have preferred to have run away with\nher in the lavender dress she wore when I first proposed to her. It was\nonly when we had got into the carriage and started for the house and she\nturned to me her face from which the veil had been thrown back that I\nrealized what a sublime meaning it all had for her. Her eyes were wet.\nOnce more I was acutely conscious of my inability to feel deeply at\nsupreme moments. For months I had looked forward with anticipation and\nimpatience to my wedding-day.\n\nI kissed her gently. But I felt as though she had gone to heaven, and\nthat the face I beheld enshrouded were merely her effigy. Commonplace\nwords were inappropriate, yet it was to these I resorted.\n\n\"Well--it wasn't so bad after all! Was it?\"\n\nShe smiled at me.\n\n\"You don't want to take it back?\"\n\nShe shook her head.\n\n\"I think it was a beautiful wedding, Hugh. I'm so glad we had a good\nday.\"...\n\nShe seemed shy, at once very near and very remote. I held her hand\nawkwardly until the carriage stopped.\n\nA little later we were standing in a corner of the parlour, the\natmosphere of which was heavy with the scent of flowers, submitting to\nthe onslaught of relatives. Then came the wedding breakfast: croquettes,\nchampagne, chicken salad, ice-cream, the wedding-cake, speeches and more\nkisses.... I remember Tom Peters holding on to both my hands.\n\n\"Good-bye, and God bless you, old boy,\" he was saying. Susan, in view of\nthe occasion, had allowed him a little more champagne than usual--enough\nto betray his feelings, and I knew that these had not changed since our\ncollege days. I resolved to see more of him. I had neglected him and\nundervalued his loyalty.... He had followed me to my room in George's\nhouse where I was dressing for the journey, and he gave it as his\ndeliberate judgment that in Maude I had \"struck gold.\"\n\n\"She's just the girl for you, Hughie,\" he declared. \"Susan thinks so,\ntoo.\"\n\nLater in the afternoon, as we sat in the state-room of the car that was\nbearing us eastward, Maude began to cry. I sat looking at her helplessly,\nunable to enter into her emotion, resenting it a little. Yet I tried\nawkwardly to comfort her.\n\n\"I can't bear to leave them,\" she said.\n\n\"But you will see them often, when we come back,\" I reassured her. It was\nscarcely the moment for reminding her of what she was getting in return.\nThis peculiar family affection she evinced was beyond me; I had never\nexperienced it in any poignant degree since I had gone as a freshman to\nHarvard, and yet I was struck by the fact that her emotions were so\nrightly placed. It was natural to love one's family. I began to feel,\nvaguely, as I watched her, that the new relationship into which I had\nentered was to be much more complicated than I had imagined. Twilight was\ncoming on, the train was winding through the mountain passes, crossing\nand re-crossing a swift little stream whose banks were massed with alder;\nhere and there, on the steep hillsides, blazed the goldenrod....\nPresently I turned, to surprise in her eyes a wide, questioning\nlook,--the look of a child. Even in this irrevocable hour she sought to\ngrasp what manner of being was this to whom she had confided her life,\nand with whom she was faring forth into the unknown. The experience was\nutterly unlike my anticipation. Yet I responded. The kiss I gave her had\nno passion in it.\n\n\"I'll take good care of you, Maude,\" I said.\n\nSuddenly, in the fading light, she flung her arms around me, pressing me\ntightly, desperately.\n\n\"Oh, I know you will, Hugh, dear. And you'll forgive me, won't you, for\nbeing so horrid to-day, of all days? I do love you!\"\n\nNeither of us had ever been abroad. And although it was before the days\nof swimming-pools and gymnasiums and a la carte cafes on ocean liners,\nthe Atlantic was imposing enough. Maude had a more lasting capacity for\npleasure than I, a keener enjoyment of new experiences, and as she lay\nbeside me in the steamer-chair where I had carefully tucked her she would\nexclaim:\n\n\"I simply can't believe it, Hugh! It seems so unreal. I'm sure I shall\nwake up and find myself back in Elkington.\"\n\n\"Don't speak so loud, my dear,\" I cautioned her. There were some very\nformal-looking New Yorkers next us.\n\n\"No, I won't,\" she whispered. \"But I'm so happy I feel as though I should\nlike to tell everyone.\"\n\n\"There's no need,\" I answered smiling.\n\n\"Oh, Hugh, I don't want to disgrace you!\" she exclaimed, in real alarm.\n\"Otherwise, so far as I am concerned, I shouldn't care who knew.\"\n\nPeople smiled at her. Women came up and took her hands. And on the fourth\nday the formidable New Yorkers unexpectedly thawed.\n\nI had once thought of Maude as plastic. Then I had discovered she had a\nmind and will of her own. Once more she seemed plastic; her love had made\nher so. Was it not what I had desired? I had only to express a wish, and\nit became her law. Nay, she appealed to me many times a day to know\nwhether she had made any mistakes, and I began to drill her in my silly\ntraditions,--gently, very gently.\n\n\"Well, I shouldn't be quite so familiar with people, quite so ready to\nmake acquaintances, Maude. You have no idea who they may be. Some of\nthem, of course, like the Sardells, I know by reputation.\"\n\nThe Sardells were the New Yorkers who sat next us.\n\n\"I'll try, Hugh, to be more reserved, more like the wife of an important\nman.\" She smiled.\n\n\"It isn't that you're not reserved,\" I replied, ignoring the latter half\nof her remark. \"Nor that I want you to change,\" I said. \"I only want to\nteach you what little of the world I know myself.\"\n\n\"And I want to learn, Hugh. You don't know how I want to learn!\"\n\nThe sight of mist-ridden Liverpool is not a cheering one for the American\nwho first puts foot on the mother country's soil, a Liverpool of\nyellow-browns and dingy blacks, of tilted funnels pouring out smoke into\nan atmosphere already charged with it. The long wharves and shed roofs\nglistened with moisture.\n\n\"Just think, Hugh, it's actually England!\" she cried, as we stood on the\nwet deck. But I felt as though I'd been there before.\n\n\"No wonder they're addicted to cold baths,\" I replied. \"They must feel\nperfectly at home in them, especially if they put a little lampblack in\nthe water.\"\n\nMaude laughed.\n\n\"You grumpy old thing!\" she exclaimed.\n\nNothing could dampen her ardour, not the sight of the rain-soaked stone\nhouses when we got ashore, nor even the frigid luncheon we ate in the\nlugubrious hotel. For her it was all quaint and new. Finally we found\nourselves established in a compartment upholstered in light grey, with\ntassels and arm-supporters, on the window of which was pasted a poster\nwith the word reserved in large, red letters. The guard inquired\nrespectfully, as the porter put our new luggage in the racks, whether we\nhad everything we wanted. The toy locomotive blew its toy whistle, and we\nwere off for the north; past dingy, yellow tenements of the smoking\nfactory towns, and stretches of orderly, hedge-spaced rain-swept country.\nThe quaint cottages we glimpsed, the sight of distant, stately mansions\non green slopes caused Maude to cry out with rapture:--\"Oh, Hugh, there's\na manor-house!\"\n\nMore vivid than were the experiences themselves of that journey are the\nmemories of them. We went to windswept, Sabbath-keeping Edinburgh, to\nhigh Stirling and dark Holyrood, and to Abbotsford. It was through Sir\nWalter's eyes we beheld Melrose bathed in autumn light, by his aid\nrepeopled it with forgotten monks eating their fast-day kale.\n\nAnd as we sat reading and dreaming in the still, sunny corners I forgot,\nthat struggle for power in which I had been so furiously engaged since\nleaving Cambridge. Legislatures, politicians and capitalists receded into\na dim background; and the gift I had possessed, in youth, of living in a\nrealm of fancy showed astonishing signs of revival.\n\n\"Why, Hugh,\" Maude exclaimed, \"you ought to have been a writer!\"\n\n\"You've only just begun to fathom my talents,\" I replied laughingly. \"Did\nyou think you'd married just a dry old lawyer?\"\n\n\"I believe you capable of anything,\" she said....\n\nI grew more and more to depend on her for little things.\n\nShe was a born housewife. It was pleasant to have her do all the packing,\nwhile I read or sauntered in the queer streets about the inns. And she\ntook complete charge of my wardrobe.\n\nShe had a talent for drawing, and as we went southward through England\nshe made sketches of the various houses that took our fancy--suggestions\nfor future home-building; we spent hours in the evenings in the inn\nsitting-rooms incorporating new features into our residence, continually\nmodifying our plans. Now it was a Tudor house that carried us away, now a\nJacobean, and again an early Georgian with enfolding wings and a\nwrought-iron grill. A stage of bewilderment succeeded.\n\nMaude, I knew, loved the cottages best. She said they were more\n\"homelike.\" But she yielded to my liking for grandeur.\n\n\"My, I should feel lost in a palace like that!\" she cried, as we gazed at\nthe Marquis of So-and-So's country-seat.\n\n\"Well, of course we should have to modify it,\" I admitted.\n\"Perhaps--perhaps our family will be larger.\"\n\nShe put her hand on my lips, and blushed a fiery red....\n\nWe examined, with other tourists, at a shilling apiece historic mansions\nwith endless drawing-rooms, halls, libraries, galleries filled with\nfamily portraits; elaborate, formal bedrooms where famous sovereigns had\nslept, all roped off and carpeted with canvas strips to protect the\nfloors. Through mullioned windows we caught glimpses of gardens and\ngeometrical parterres, lakes, fountains, statuary, fantastic topiary and\ndistant stretches of park. Maude sighed with admiration, but did not\ncovet. She had me. But I was often uncomfortable, resenting the vulgar,\ngaping tourists with whom we were herded and the easy familiarity of the\nguides. These did not trouble Maude, who often annoyed me by asking naive\nquestions herself. I would nudge her.\n\nOne afternoon when, with other compatriots, we were being hurried through\na famous castle, the guide unwittingly ushered us into a drawing-room\nwhere the owner and several guests were seated about a tea-table. I shall\nnever forget the stares they gave us before we had time precipitately to\nretreat, nor the feeling of disgust and rebellion that came over me. This\nwas heightened by the remark of a heavy, six-foot Ohioan with an\ninfantile face and a genial manner.\n\n\"I notice that they didn't invite us to sit down and have a bite,\" he\nsaid. \"I call that kind of inhospitable.\"\n\n\"It was 'is lordship himself!\" exclaimed the guide, scandalized.\n\n\"You don't say!\" drawled our fellow-countryman. \"I guess I owe you\nanother shilling, my friend.\"\n\nThe guide, utterly bewildered, accepted it. The transatlantic point of\nview towards the nobility was beyond him.\n\n\"His lordship could make a nice little income if he set up as a side\nshow,\" added the Ohioan.\n\nMaude giggled, but I was furious. And no sooner were we outside the gates\nthan I declared I should never again enter a private residence by the\nback door.\n\n\"Why, Hugh, how queer you are sometimes,\" she said.\n\n\"I maybe queer, but I have a sense of fitness,\" I retorted.\n\nShe asserted herself.\n\n\"I can't see what difference it makes. They didn't know us. And if they\nadmit people for money--\"\n\n\"I can't help it. And as for the man from Ohio--\"\n\n\"But he was so funny!\" she interrupted. \"And he was really very nice.\"\n\nI was silent. Her point of view, eminently sensible as it was,\nexasperated me. We were leaning over the parapet of a little-stone\nbridge. Her face was turned away from me, but presently I realized that\nshe was crying. Men and women, villagers, passing across the bridge,\nlooked at us curiously. I was miserable, and somewhat appalled;\nresentful, yet striving to be gentle and conciliatory. I assured her that\nshe was talking nonsense, that I loved her. But I did not really love her\nat that moment; nor did she relent as easily as usual. It was not until\nwe were together in our sitting-room, a few hours later, that she gave\nin. I felt a tremendous sense of relief.\n\n\"Hugh, I'll try to be what you want. You know I am trying. But don't kill\nwhat is natural in me.\"\n\nI was touched by the appeal, and repentant...\n\nIt is impossible to say when the little worries, annoyances and\ndisagreements began, when I first felt a restlessness creeping over me. I\ntried to hide these moods from her, but always she divined them. And yet\nI was sure that I loved Maude; in a surprisingly short period I had\nbecome accustomed to her, dependent on her ministrations and the normal,\ncosy intimacy of our companionship. I did not like to think that the keen\nedge of the enjoyment of possession was wearing a little, while at the\nsame time I philosophized that the divine fire, when legalized, settles\ndown to a comfortable glow. The desire to go home that grew upon me I\nattributed to the irritation aroused by the spectacle of a fixed social\norder commanding such unquestioned deference from the many who were\ncontent to remain resignedly outside of it. Before the setting in of the\nLiberal movement and the \"American invasion\" England was a country in\nwhich (from my point of view) one must be \"somebody\" in order to be\nhappy. I was \"somebody\" at home; or at least rapidly becoming so....\n\nLondon was shrouded, parliament had risen, and the great houses were\nclosed. Day after day we issued forth from a musty and highly respectable\nhotel near Piccadilly to a gloomy Tower, a soggy Hampton Court or a\nmournful British Museum. Our native longing for luxury--or rather my\nnative longing--impelled me to abandon Smith's Hotel for a huge hostelry\nwhere our suite overlooked the Thames, where we ran across a man I had\nknown slightly at Harvard, and other Americans with whom we made\nexcursions and dined and went to the theatre. Maude liked these persons;\nI did not find them especially congenial. My life-long habit of\nunwillingness to accept what life sent in its ordinary course was\nasserting itself; but Maude took her friends as she found them, and I was\nsecretly annoyed by her lack of discrimination. In addition to this, the\nsense of having been pulled up by the roots grew upon me.\n\n\"Suppose,\" Maude surprised me by suggesting one morning as we sat at\nbreakfast watching the river craft flit like phantoms through the\nyellow-green fog--\"suppose we don't go to France, after all, Hugh?\"\n\n\"Not go to France!\" I exclaimed. \"Are you tired of the trip?\"\n\n\"Oh, Hugh!\" Her voice caught. \"I could go on, always, if you were\ncontent.\"\n\n\"And--what makes you think that I'm not content?\"\n\nHer smile had in it just a touch of wistfulness.\n\n\"I understand you, Hugh, better than you think. You want to get back to\nyour work, and--and I should be happier. I'm not so silly and so ignorant\nas to think that I can satisfy you always. And I'd like to get settled at\nhome,--I really should.\"\n\nThere surged up within me a feeling of relief. I seized her hand as it\nlay on the table.\n\n\"We'll come abroad another time, and go to France,\" I said. \"Maude,\nyou're splendid!\"\n\nShe shook her head.\n\n\"Oh, no, I'm not.\"\n\n\"You do satisfy me,\" I insisted. \"It isn't that at all. But I think,\nperhaps, it would be wiser to go back. It's rather a crucial time with\nme, now that Mr. Watling's in Washington. I've just arrived at a position\nwhere I shall be able to make a good deal of money, and later on--\"\n\n\"It isn't the money, Hugh,\" she cried, with a vehemence which struck me\nas a little odd. \"I sometimes think we'd be a great deal happier\nwithout--without all you are going to make.\"\n\nI laughed.\n\n\"Well, I haven't made it yet.\"\n\nShe possessed the frugality of the Hutchinses. And some times my\nlavishness had frightened her, as when we had taken the suite of rooms we\nnow occupied.\n\n\"Are you sure you can afford them, Hugh?\" she had asked when we first\nsurveyed them.\n\nI began married life, and carried it on without giving her any conception\nof the state of my finances. She had an allowance from the first.\n\nAs the steamer slipped westward my spirits rose, to reach a climax of\nexhilaration when I saw the towers of New York rise gleaming like huge\nstalagmites in the early winter sun. Maude likened them more happily--to\ngigantic ivory chessmen. Well, New York was America's chessboard, and the\nGreat Players had already begun to make moves that astonished the world.\nAs we sat at breakfast in a Fifth Avenue hotel I ran my eye eagerly over\nthe stock-market reports and the financial news, and rallied Maude for a\nlack of spirits.\n\n\"Aren't you glad to be home?\" I asked her, as we sat in a hansom.\n\n\"Of course I am, Hugh!\" she protested. \"But--I can't look upon New York\nas home, somehow. It frightens me.\"\n\nI laughed indulgently.\n\n\"You'll get used to it,\" I said. \"We'll be coming here a great deal, off\nand on.\"\n\nShe was silent. But later, when we took a hansom and entered the streams\nof traffic, she responded to the stimulus of the place: the movement, the\ncolour, the sight of the well-appointed carriages, of the well-fed,\nwell-groomed people who sat in them, the enticement of the shops in which\nwe made our purchases had their effect, and she became cheerful again....\n\nIn the evening we took the \"Limited\" for home.\n\nWe lived for a month with my mother, and then moved into our own house.\nIt was one which I had rented from Howard Ogilvy, and it stood on the\ncorner of Baker and Clinton streets, near that fashionable neighbourhood\ncalled \"the Heights.\" Ogilvy, who was some ten years older than I, and\nwho belonged to one of our old families, had embarked on a career then\nbecoming common, but which at first was regarded as somewhat meteoric:\ngradually abandoning the practice of law, and perceiving the\npossibilities of the city of his birth, he had \"gambled\" in real estate\nand other enterprises, such as our local water company, until he had\nquadrupled his inheritance. He had built a mansion on Grant Avenue, the\nwide thoroughfare bisecting the Heights. The house he had vacated was not\nlarge, but essentially distinctive; with the oddity characteristic of the\nrevolt against the banal architecture of the 80's. The curves of the\ntiled roof enfolded the upper windows; the walls were thick, the note one\nof mystery. I remember Maude's naive delight when we inspected it.\n\n\"You'd never guess what the inside was like, would you, Hugh?\" she cried.\n\nFrom the panelled box of an entrance hall one went up a few steps to a\ndrawing-room which had a bowed recess like an oriel, and window-seats.\nThe dining-room was an odd shape, and was wainscoted in oak; it had a\ntiled fireplace and (according to Maude) the \"sweetest\" china closet\nbuilt into the wall. There was a \"den\" for me, and an octagonal\nreception-room on the corner. Upstairs, the bedrooms were quite as\nunusual, the plumbing of the new pattern, heavy and imposing. Maude\nexpressed the air of seclusion when she exclaimed that she could almost\nimagine herself in one of the mediaeval towns we had seen abroad.\n\n\"It's a dream, Hugh,\" she sighed. \"But--do you think we can afford\nit?\"...\n\n\"This house,\" I announced, smiling, \"is only a stepping-stone to the\npalace I intend to build you some day.\"\n\n\"I don't want a palace!\" she cried. \"I'd rather live here, like this,\nalways.\"\n\nA certain vehemence in her manner troubled me. I was charmed by this\ndisposition for domesticity, and yet I shrank from the contemplation of\nits permanency. I felt vaguely, at the time, the possibility of a future\nconflict of temperaments. Maude was docile, now. But would she remain\ndocile? and was it in her nature to take ultimately the position that was\ndesirable for my wife? Well, she must be moulded, before it were too\nlate. Her ultra-domestic tendencies must be halted. As yet blissfully\nunaware of the inability of the masculine mind to fathom the subtleties\nof feminine relationships, I was particularly desirous that Maude and\nNancy Durrett should be intimates. The very day after our arrival, and\nwhile we were still at my mother's, Nancy called on Maude, and took her\nout for a drive. Maude told me of it when I came home from the office.\n\n\"Dear old Nancy!\" I said. \"I know you liked her.\"\n\n\"Of course, Hugh. I should like her for your sake, anyway. She's--she's\none of your oldest and best friends.\"\n\n\"But I want you to like her for her own sake.\"\n\n\"I think I shall,\" said Maude. She was so scrupulously truthful! \"I was a\nlittle afraid of her, at first.\"\n\n\"Afraid of Nancy!\" I exclaimed.\n\n\"Well, you know, she's much older than I. I think she is sweet. But she\nknows so much about the world--so much that she doesn't say. I can't\ndescribe it.\"\n\nI smiled.\n\n\"It's only her manner. You'll get used to that, when you know what she\nreally is.\"\n\n\"Oh, I hope so,\" answered Maude. \"I'm very anxious to like her--I do like\nher. But it takes me such a lot of time to get to know people.\"\n\nNancy asked us to dinner.\n\n\"I want to help Maude all I can,--if she'll let me,\" Nancy said.\n\n\"Why shouldn't she let you?\" I asked.\n\n\"She may not like me,\" Nancy replied.\n\n\"Nonsense!\" I exclaimed.\n\nNancy smiled.\n\n\"It won't be my fault, at any rate, if she doesn't,\" she said. \"I wanted\nher to meet at first just the right people your old friends and a few\nothers. It is hard for a woman--especially a young woman--coming among\nstrangers.\" She glanced down the table to where Maude sat talking to Ham.\n\"She has an air about her,--a great deal of self-possession.\"\n\nI, too, had noticed this, with pride and relief. For I knew Maude had\nbeen nervous.\n\n\"You are luckier than you deserve to be,\" Nancy reminded me. \"But I hope\nyou realize that she has a mind of her own, that she will form her own\nopinions of people, independently of you.\"\n\nI must have betrayed the fact that I was a little startled, for the\nremark came as a confirmation of what I had dimly felt.\n\n\"Of course she has,\" I agreed, somewhat lamely. \"Every woman has, who is\nworth her salt.\"\n\nNancy's smile bespoke a knowledge that seemed to transcend my own.\n\n\"You do like her?\" I demanded.\n\n\"I like her very much indeed,\" said Nancy, a little gravely. \"She's\nsimple, she's real, she has that which so few of us possess\nnowadays--character. But--I've got to be prepared for the possibility\nthat she may not get along with me.\"\n\n\"Why not?\" I demanded.\n\n\"There you are again, with your old unwillingness to analyze a situation\nand face it. For heaven's sake, now that you have married her, study her.\nDon't take her for granted. Can't you see that she doesn't care for the\nthings that amuse me, that make my life?\"\n\n\"Of course, if you insist on making yourself out a hardened,\nsophisticated woman--\" I protested. But she shook her head.\n\n\"Her roots are deeper,--she is in touch, though she may not realize it,\nwith the fundamentals. She is one of those women who are race-makers.\"\n\nThough somewhat perturbed, I was struck by the phrase. And I lost sight\nof Nancy's generosity. She looked me full in the face.\n\n\"I wonder whether you can rise to her,\" she said. \"If I were you, I\nshould try. You will be happier--far happier than if you attempt to use\nher for your own ends, as a contributor to your comfort and an auxiliary\nto your career. I was afraid--I confess it--that you had married an\naspiring, simpering and empty-headed provincial like that Mrs. George\nHutchins' whom I met once, and who would sell her soul to be at my table.\nWell, you escaped that, and you may thank God for it. You've got a\nchance, think it over.\n\n\"A chance!\" I repeated, though I gathered something of her meaning.\n\n\"Think it over, said Nancy again. And she smiled.\n\n\"But--do you want me to bury myself in domesticity?\" I demanded, without\ngrasping the significance of my words.\n\n\"You'll find her reasonable, I think. You've got a chance now, Hugh.\nDon't spoil it.\"\n\nShe turned to Leonard Dickinson, who sat on her other side....\n\nWhen we got home I tried to conceal my anxiety as to Maude's impressions\nof the evening. I lit a cigarette, and remarked that the dinner had been\na success.\n\n\"Do you know what I've been wondering all evening?\" Maude asked. \"Why you\ndidn't marry Nancy instead of me.\"\n\n\"Well,\" I replied, \"it just didn't come off. And Nancy was telling me at\ndinner how fortunate I was to have married you.\"\n\nMaude passed this.\n\n\"I can't see why she accepted Hambleton Durrett. It seems horrible that\nsuch a woman as she is could have married--just for money.\n\n\"Nancy has an odd streak in her,\" I said. \"But then we all have odd\nstreaks. She's the best friend in the world, when she is your friend.\"\n\n\"I'm sure of it,\" Maude agreed, with a little note of penitence.\n\n\"You enjoyed it,\" I ventured cautiously.\n\n\"Oh, yes,\" she agreed. \"And everyone was so nice to me--for your sake of\ncourse.\"\n\n\"Don't be ridiculous!\" I said. \"I shan't tell you what Nancy and the\nothers said about you.\"\n\nMaude had the gift of silence.\n\n\"What a beautiful house!\" she sighed presently. \"I know you'll think me\nsilly, but so much luxury as that frightens me a little. In England, in\nthose places we saw, it seemed natural enough, but in America--! And they\nall your friends--seem to take it as a matter of course.\"\n\n\"There's no reason why we shouldn't have beautiful things and well served\ndinners, too, if we have the money to pay for them.\"\n\n\"I suppose not,\" she agreed, absently.\n\n\n\n\nXV.\n\nThat winter many other entertainments were given in our honour. But the\nconviction grew upon me that Maude had no real liking for the social side\nof life, that she acquiesced in it only on my account. Thus, at the very\noutset of our married career, an irritant developed: signs of it, indeed,\nwere apparent from the first, when we were preparing the house we had\nrented for occupancy. Hurrying away from my office at odd times to\nfurniture and department stores to help decide such momentous questions\nas curtains, carpets, chairs and tables I would often spy the tall,\nuncompromising figure of Susan Peters standing beside Maude's, while an\nobliging clerk spread out, anxiously, rugs or wall-papers for their\ninspection.\n\n\"Why don't you get Nancy to help you, too!\" I ventured to ask her once.\n\n\"Ours is such a little house--compared to Nancy's, Hugh.\"\n\nMy attitude towards Susan had hitherto remained undefined. She was Tom's\nwife and Tom's affair. In spite of her marked disapproval of the modern\ntrend in business and social life,--a prejudice she had communicated to\nTom, as a bachelor I had not disliked her; and it was certain that these\nviews had not mitigated Tom's loyalty and affection for me. Susan had\nbeen my friend, as had her brother Perry, and Lucia, Perry's wife: they\nmade no secret of the fact that they deplored in me what they were\npleased to call plutocratic obsessions, nor had their disapproval always\nbeen confined to badinage. Nancy, too, they looked upon as a renegade. I\nwas able to bear their reproaches with the superior good nature that\nsprings from success, to point out why the American tradition to which\nthey so fatuously clung was a things of the past. The habit of taking\ndinner with them at least once a week had continued, and their arguments\nrather amused me. If they chose to dwell in a backwater out of touch with\nthe current of great affairs, this was a matter to be deplored, but I did\nnot feel strongly enough to resent it. So long as I remained a bachelor\nthe relationship had not troubled me, but now that I was married I began\nto consider with some alarm its power to affect my welfare.\n\nIt had remained for Nancy to inform me that I had married a woman with a\nmind of her own. I had flattered myself that I should be able to control\nMaude, to govern her predilections, and now at the very beginning of our\nmarried life she was showing a disquieting tendency to choose for\nherself. To be sure, she had found my intimacy with the Peterses and\nBlackwoods already formed; but it was an intimacy from which I was\ngrowing away. I should not have quarrelled with her if she had not\ndiscriminated: Nancy made overtures, and Maude drew back; Susan presented\nherself, and with annoying perversity and in an extraordinarily brief\ntime Maude had become her intimate. It seemed to me that she was always\nat Susan's, lunching or playing with the children, who grew devoted to\nher; or with Susan, choosing carpets and clothes; while more and more\nfrequently we dined with the Peterses and the Blackwoods, or they with\nus. With Perry's wife Maude was scarcely less intimate than with Susan.\nThis was the more surprising to me since Lucia Blackwood was a\ndyed-in-the-wool \"intellectual,\" a graduate of Radcliffe, the daughter of\na Harvard professor. Perry had fallen in love with her during her visit\nto Susan. Lucia was, perhaps, the most influential of the group; she\nscorned the world, she held strong views on the higher education of\nwomen; she had long discarded orthodoxy for what may be called a\nCambridge stoicism of simple living and high thinking; while Maude was a\nstrict Presbyterian, and not in the least given to theories. When, some\nmonths after our homecoming, I ventured to warn her gently of the dangers\nof confining one's self to a coterie--especially one of such narrow\nviews--her answer was rather bewildering.\n\n\"But isn't Tom your best friend?\" she asked.\n\nI admitted that he was.\n\n\"And you always went there such a lot before we were married.\"\n\nThis, too, was undeniable. \"At the same time,\" I replied, \"I have other\nfriends. I'm fond of the Blackwoods and the Peterses, I'm not advocating\nseeing less of them, but their point of view, if taken without any\nantidote, is rather narrowing. We ought to see all kinds,\" I suggested,\nwith a fine restraint.\n\n\"You mean--more worldly people,\" she said with her disconcerting\ndirectness.\n\n\"Not necessarily worldly,\" I struggled on. \"People who know more of the\nworld--yes, who understand it better.\"\n\nMaude sighed.\n\n\"I do try, Hugh,--I return their calls,--I do try to be nice to them. But\nsomehow I don't seem to get along with them easily--I'm not myself, they\nmake me shy. It's because I'm provincial.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\" I protested, \"you're not a bit provincial.\" And it was true;\nher dignity and self-possession redeemed her.\n\nNancy was not once mentioned. But I think she was in both our minds....\n\nSince my marriage, too, I had begun to resent a little the attitude of\nTom and Susan and the Blackwoods of humorous yet affectionate tolerance\ntoward my professional activities and financial creed, though Maude\nshowed no disposition to take this seriously. I did suspect, however,\nthat they were more and more determined to rescue Maude from what they\nwould have termed a frivolous career; and on one of these occasions--so\nexasperating in married life when a slight cause for pique tempts husband\nor wife to try to ask myself whether this affair were only a squall,\nsomething to be looked for once in a while on the seas of matrimony, and\nweathered: or whether Maude had not, after all, been right when she\ndeclared that I had made a mistake, and that we were not fitted for one\nanother? In this gloomy view endless years of incompatibility stretched\nahead; and for the first time I began to rehearse with a certain cold\ndetachment the chain of apparently accidental events which had led up to\nmy marriage: to consider the gradual blindness that had come over my\nfaculties; and finally to wonder whether judgment ever entered into\nsexual selection. Would Maude have relapsed into this senseless fit if\nshe had realized how fortunate she was? For I was prepared to give her\nwhat thousands of women longed for, position and influence. My resentment\nrose again against Perry and Tom, and I began to attribute their lack of\nappreciation of my achievements to jealousy. They had not my ability;\nthis was the long and short of it.... I pondered also, regretfully, on my\nbachelor days. And for the first time, I, who had worked so hard to\nachieve freedom, felt the pressure of the yoke I had fitted over my own\nshoulders. I had voluntarily, though unwittingly, returned to slavery.\nThis was what had happened. And what was to be done about it? I would not\nconsider divorce.\n\nWell, I should have to make the best of it. Whether this conclusion\nbrought on a mood of reaction, I am unable to say. I was still annoyed by\nwhat seemed to the masculine mind a senseless and dramatic performance on\nMaude's part, an incomprehensible case of \"nerves.\" Nevertheless, there\nstole into my mind many recollections of Maude's affection, many passages\nbetween us; and my eye chanced to fall on the ink-well she had bought me\nout of the allowance I gave her. An unanticipated pity welled up within\nme for her loneliness, her despair in that room upstairs. I got up--and\nhesitated. A counteracting, inhibiting wave passed through me. I\nhardened. I began to walk up and down, a prey to conflicting impulses.\nSomething whispered, \"go to her\"; another voice added, \"for your own\npeace of mind, at any rate.\" I rejected the intrusion of this motive as\nunworthy, turned out the light and groped my way upstairs. The big clock\nin the hall struck twelve.\n\nI listened outside the door of the bedroom, but all was silent within. I\nknocked.\n\n\"Maude!\" I said, in a low voice.\n\nThere was no response.\n\n\"Maude--let me in! I didn't mean to be unkind--I'm sorry.\"\n\nAfter an interval I heard her say: \"I'd rather stay here,--to-night.\"\n\nBut at length, after more entreaty and self-abasement on my part, she\nopened the door. The room was dark. We sat down together on the\nwindow-seat, and all at once she relaxed and her head fell on my\nshoulder, and she began weeping again. I held her, the alternating moods\nstill running through me.\n\n\"Hugh,\" she said at length, \"how could you be so cruel? when you know I\nlove you and would do anything for you.\"\n\n\"I didn't mean to be cruel, Maude,\" I answered.\n\n\"I know you didn't. But at times you seem so--indifferent, and you can't\nunderstand how it hurts. I haven't anybody but you, now, and it's in your\npower to make me happy or--or miserable.\"\n\nLater on I tried to explain my point of view, to justify myself.\n\n\"All I mean,\" I concluded at length, \"is that my position is a little\ndifferent from Perry's and Tom's. They can afford to isolate themselves,\nbut I'm thrown professionally with the men who are building up this city.\nSome of them, like Ralph Hambleton and Mr. Ogilvy, I've known all my\nlife. Life isn't so simple for us, Maude--we can't ignore the social\nside.\"\n\n\"I understand,\" she said contentedly. \"You are more of a man of\naffairs--much more than Tom or Perry, and you have greater\nresponsibilities and wider interests. I'm really very proud of you.\nOnly--don't you think you are a little too sensitive about yourself, when\nyou are teased?\"\n\nI let this pass....\n\nI give a paragraph from a possible biography of Hugh Paret which, as then\nseemed not improbable, might in the future have been written by some\naspiring young worshipper of success.\n\n\"On his return from a brief but delightful honeymoon in England Mr. Paret\ntook up again, with characteristic vigour, the practice of the law. He\nwas entering upon the prime years of manhood; golden opportunities\nconfronted him as, indeed, they confronted other men--but Paret had the\nforesight to take advantage of them. And his training under Theodore\nWatling was now to produce results.... The reputations had already been\nmade of some of that remarkable group of financial geniuses who were\nchiefly instrumental in bringing about the industrial evolution begun\nafter the Civil War: at the same time, as is well known, a political\nleadership developed that gave proof of a deplorable blindness to the\nlogical necessity of combinations in business. The lawyer with initiative\nand brains became an indispensable factor,\" etc., etc.\n\nThe biography might have gone on to relate my association with and\nimportant services to Adolf Scherer in connection with his constructive\ndream. Shortly after my return from abroad, in answer to his summons, I\nfound him at Heinrich's, his napkin tucked into his shirt front, and a\ndish of his favourite sausages before him.\n\n\"So, the honeymoon is over!\" he said, and pressed my hand. \"You are right\nto come back to business, and after awhile you can have another\nhoneymoon, eh? I have had many since I married. And how long do you think\nwas my first? A day! I was a foreman then, and the wedding was at six\no'clock in the morning. We went into the country, the wife and I.\"\n\nHe laid down his knife and fork, possessed by the memory. \"I have grown\nrich since, and we've been to Europe and back to Germany, and travelled\non the best ships and stayed at the best hotels, but I never enjoyed a\nholiday more than that day. It wasn't long afterwards I went to Mr.\nDurrett and told him how he could save much money. He was always ready to\nlisten, Mr. Durrett, when an employee had anything to say. He was a big\nman,--an iron-master. Ah, he would be astonished if only he could wake up\nnow!\"\n\n\"He would not only have to be an iron-master,\" I agreed, \"but a financier\nand a railroad man to boot.\"\n\n\"A jack of all trades,\" laughed Mr. Scherer. \"That's what we are--men in\nmy position. Well, it was comparatively simple then, when we had no\nSherman law and crazy statutes, such as some of the states are passing,\nto bother us. What has got into the politicians, that they are indulging\nin such foolishness?\" he exclaimed, more warmly. \"We try to build up a\ntrade for this country, and they're doing their best to tie our hands and\ntear it down. When I was in Washington the other day I was talking with\none of those Western senators whose state has passed those laws. He said\nto me, 'Mr. Scherer, I've been making a study of the Boyne Iron Works.\nYou are clever men, but you are building up monopolies which we propose\nto stop.' 'By what means?'\" I asked. \"'Rebates, for one,' said he, 'you\nget preferential rates from your railroad which give you advantages over\nyour competitors.' Foolishness!\" Mr. Scherer exclaimed. \"I tell him the\nrailroad is a private concern, built up by private enterprise, and it has\na right to make special rates for large shippers. No,--railroads are\npublic carriers with no right to make special rates. I ask him what else\nhe objects to, and he says patented processes. As if we don't have a\nright to our own patents! We buy them. I buy them, when other steel\ncompanies won't touch 'em. What is that but enterprise, and business\nforesight, and taking risks? And then he begins to talk about the tariff\ntaking money out of the pockets of American consumers and making men like\nme rich. I have come to Washington to get the tariff raised on steel\nrails; and Watling and other senators we send down there are raising it\nfor us. We are building up monopolies! Well, suppose we are. We can't\nhelp it, even if we want to. Has he ever made a study of the other side\nof the question--the competition side? Of course he hasn't.\"\n\nHe brought down his beer mug heavily on the table. In times of excitement\nhis speech suggested the German idiom. Abruptly his air grew mysterious;\nhe glanced around the room, now becoming empty, and lowered his voice.\n\n\"I have been thinking a long time, I have a little scheme,\" he said, \"and\nI have been to Washington to see Watling, to talk over it. Well, he\nthinks much of you. Fowndes and Ripon are good lawyers, but they are not\nsmart like you. See Paret, he says, and he can come down and talk to me.\nSo I ask you to come here. That is why I say you are wise to get home.\nHoneymoons can wait--eh?\"\n\nI smiled appreciatively.\n\n\"They talk about monopoly, those Populist senators, but I ask you what is\na man in my place to do? If you don't eat, somebody eats you--is it not\nso? Like the boa-constrictors--that is modern business. Look at the\nKeystone Plate people, over there at Morris. For years we sold them steel\nbillets from which to make their plates, and three months ago they serve\nnotice on us that they are getting ready to make their own billets, they\nbuy mines north of the lakes and are building their plant. Here is a big\ncustomer gone. Next year, maybe, the Empire Tube Company goes into the\nbusiness of making crude steel, and many more thousands of tons go from\nus. What is left for us, Paret?\"\n\n\"Obviously you've got to go into the tube and plate business yourselves,\"\nI said.\n\n\"So!\" cried Mr. Scherer, triumphantly, \"or it is close up. We are not\nfools, no, we will not lie down and be eaten like lambs for any law.\nDickinson can put his hand on the capital, and I--I have already bought a\ntract on the lakes, at Bolivar, I have already got a plant designed with\nthe latest modern machinery. I can put the ore right there, I can send\nthe coke back from here in cars which would otherwise be empty, and\nmanufacture tubes at eight dollars a ton less than they are selling. If\nwe can make tubes we can make plates, and if we can make plates we can\nmake boilers, and beams and girders and bridges.... It is not like it was\nbut where is it all leading, my friend? The time will come--is right on\nus now, in respect to many products--when the market will be flooded with\ntubes and plates and girders, and then we'll have to find a way to limit\nproduction. And the inefficient mills will all be forced to shut down.\"\n\nThe logic seemed unanswerable, even had I cared to answer it.... He\nunfolded his campaign. The Boyne Iron Works was to become the Boyne Iron\nWorks, Ltd., owner of various subsidiary companies, some of which were as\nyet blissfully ignorant of their fate. All had been thought out as calmly\nas the partition of Poland--only, lawyers were required; and ultimately,\nafter the process of acquisition should have been completed, a delicate\ndocument was to be drawn up which would pass through the meshes of that\nannoying statutory net, the Sherman Anti-trust Law. New mines were to be\npurchased, extending over a certain large area; wide coal deposits;\nlittle strips of railroad to tap them. The competition of the Keystone\nPlate people was to be met by acquiring and bringing up to date the plate\nmills of King and Son, over the borders of a sister state; the\nSomersworth Bridge and Construction Company and the Gring Steel and Wire\nCompany were to be absorbed. When all of this should have been\naccomplished, there would be scarcely a process in the steel industry,\nfrom the smelting of the ore to the completion of a bridge, which the\nBoyne Iron Works could not undertake. Such was the beginning of the\n\"lateral extension\" period.\n\n\"Two can play at that game,\" Mr. Scherer said. \"And if those fellows\ncould only be content to let well enough alone, to continue buying their\ncrude steel from us, there wouldn't be any trouble.\"...\n\nIt was evident, however, that he really welcomed the \"trouble,\" that he\nwas going into battle with enthusiasm. He had already picked out his\npoints of attack and was marching on them. Life, for him, would have been\na poor thing without new conflicts to absorb his energy; and he had\nalready made of the Boyne Iron Works, with its open-hearth furnaces, a\nmarvel of modern efficiency that had opened the eyes of the Steel world,\nand had drawn the attention of a Personality in New York,--a Personality\nwho was one of the new and dominant type that had developed with such\namazing rapidity, the banker-dinosaur; preying upon and superseding the\nindustrial-dinosaur, conquering type of the preceding age, builder of the\nrailroads, mills and manufactories. The banker-dinosaurs, the gigantic\nones, were in Wall Street, and strove among themselves for the industrial\nspoils accumulated by their predecessors. It was characteristic of these\nmonsters that they never fought in the open unless they were forced to.\nThen the earth rocked, huge economic structures tottered and fell, and\nmuch dust arose to obscure the vision of smaller creatures, who were\nbewildered and terrified. Such disturbances were called \"panics,\" and\nwere blamed by the newspapers on the Democratic party, or on the\nreformers who had wantonly assailed established institutions. These\ndominant bankers had contrived to gain control of the savings of\nthousands and thousands of fellow-citizens who had deposited them in\nbanks or paid them into insurance companies, and with the power thus\naccumulated had sallied forth to capture railroads and industries. The\nrailroads were the strategic links. With these in hand, certain favoured\nindustrial concerns could be fed, and others starved into submission.\n\nAdolf Scherer might be said to represent a transitional type. For he was\nnot only an iron-master who knew every detail of his business, who kept\nit ahead of the times; he was also a strategist, wise in his generation,\nmaking friends with the Railroad while there had yet been time, at length\nsecuring rebates and favours. And when that Railroad (which had been\nconstructed through the enterprise and courage of such men as Nathaniel\nDurrett) had passed under the control of the banker-personality to whom I\nhave referred, and had become part of a system, Adolf Scherer remained in\nalliance, and continued to receive favours.... I can well remember the\ntime when the ultimate authority of our Railroad was transferred,\nquietly, to Wall Street. Alexander Barbour, its president, had been a\ngreat man, but after that he bowed, in certain matters, to a greater one.\n\nI have digressed.... Mr. Scherer unfolded his scheme, talking about\n\"units\" as calmly as though they were checkers on a board instead of\nhuge, fiery, reverberating mills where thousands and thousands of human\nbeings toiled day and night--beings with families, and hopes and fears,\nwhose destinies were to be dominated by the will of the man who sat\nopposite me. But--did not he in his own person represent the triumph of\nthat American creed of opportunity? He, too, had been through the fire,\nhad sweated beside the blasts, had handled the ingots of steel. He was\none of the \"fittest\" who had survived, and looked it. Had he no memories\nof the terrors of that struggle?... Adolf Scherer had grown to be a\ngiant. And yet without me, without my profession he was a helpless giant,\nat the mercy of those alert and vindictive lawmakers who sought to\nrestrain and hamper him, to check his growth with their webs. How\nstimulating the idea of his dependence! How exhilarating too, the thought\nthat that vision which had first possessed me as an undergraduate--on my\nvisit to Jerry Kyme--was at last to be realized! I had now become the\nindispensable associate of the few who divided the spoils, I was to have\na share in these myself.\n\n\"You're young, Paret,\" Mr. Scherer concluded. \"But Watling has confidence\nin you, and you will consult him frequently. I believe in the young men,\nand I have already seen something of you--so?\"...\n\nWhen I returned to the office I wrote Theodore Watling a letter\nexpressing my gratitude for the position he had, so to speak, willed me,\nof confidential legal adviser to Adolf Scherer. Though the opportunity\nhad thrust itself upon me suddenly, and sooner than I expected it, I was\ndetermined to prove myself worthy of it. I worked as I had never worked\nbefore, making trips to New York to consult leading members of this new\nbranch of my profession there, trips to Washington to see my former\nchief. There were, too, numerous conferences with local personages, with\nMr. Dickinson and Mr. Grierson, and Judah B. Tallant,--whose newspaper\nwas most useful; there were consultations and negotiations of a delicate\nnature with the owners and lawyers of other companies to be \"taken in.\"\nNor was it all legal work, in the older and narrower sense. Men who are\nplaying for principalities are making war. Some of our operations had all\nthe excitement of war. There was information to be got, and it was\ngot--somehow. Modern war involves a spy system, and a friendly telephone\ncompany is not to be despised. And all of this work from first to last\nhad to be done with extreme caution. Moribund distinctions of right and\nwrong did not trouble me, for the modern man labours religiously when he\nknows that Evolution is on his side.\n\nFor all of these operations a corps of counsel had been employed,\nincluding the firm of Harrington and Bowes next to Theodore Watling, Joel\nHarrington was deemed the ablest lawyer in the city. We organized in due\ntime the corporation known as the Boyne Iron Works, Limited; a trust\nagreement was drawn up that was a masterpiece of its kind, one that\ncaused, first and last, meddling officials in the Department of Justice\nat Washington no little trouble and perplexity. I was proud of the fact\nthat I had taken no small part in its composition.... In short, in\naddition to certain emoluments and opportunities for investment, I\nemerged from the affair firmly established in the good graces of Adolf\nScherer, and with a reputation practically made.\n\nA year or so after the Boyne Company, Ltd., came into existence I chanced\none morning to go down to the new Ashuela Hotel to meet a New Yorker of\nsome prominence, and was awaiting him in the lobby, when I overheard a\nconversation between two commercial travellers who were sitting with\ntheir backs to me.\n\n\"Did you notice that fellow who went up to the desk a moment ago?\" asked\none.\n\n\"The young fellow in the grey suit? Sure. Who is he? He looks as if he\nwas pretty well fixed.\"\n\n\"I guess he is,\" replied the first. \"That's Paret. He's Scherer's\nconfidential counsel. He used to be Senator Watling's partner, but they\nsay he's even got something on the old man.\"\n\nIn spite of the feverish life I led, I was still undoubtedly\nyoung-looking, and in this I was true to the incoming type of successful\nman. Our fathers appeared staid at six and thirty. Clothes, of course,\nmade some difference, and my class and generation did not wear the sombre\nand cumbersome kind, with skirts and tails; I patronized a tailor in New\nYork. My chestnut hair, a little darker than my father's had been, showed\nno signs of turning grey, although it was thinning a little at the crown\nof the forehead, and I wore a small moustache, clipped in a straight line\nabove the mouth. This made me look less like a college youth. Thanks to a\nstrong pigment in my skin, derived probably from Scotch-Irish ancestors,\nmy colour was fresh. I have spoken of my life as feverish, and yet I am\nnot so sure that this word completely describes it. It was full to\noverflowing--one side of it; and I did not miss (save vaguely, in rare\nmoments of weariness) any other side that might have been developed. I\nwas busy all day long, engaged in affairs I deemed to be alone of vital\nimportance in the universe. I was convinced that the welfare of the city\ndemanded that supreme financial power should remain in the hands of the\ngroup of men with whom I was associated, and whose battles I fought in\nthe courts, in the legislature, in the city council, and sometimes in\nWashington,--although they were well cared for there. By every means\ningenuity could devise, their enemies were to be driven from the field,\nand they were to be protected from blackmail.\n\nA sense of importance sustained me; and I remember in that first flush of\na success for which I had not waited too long--what a secret satisfaction\nit was to pick up the Era and see my name embedded in certain dignified\nnotices of board meetings, transactions of weight, or cases known to the\ninitiated as significant. \"Mr. Scherer's interests were taken care of by\nMr. Hugh Paret.\" The fact that my triumphs were modestly set forth gave\nme more pleasure than if they had been trumpeted in headlines. Although I\nmight have started out in practice for myself, my affection and regard\nfor Mr. Watling kept me in the firm, which became Watling, Fowndes and\nParet, and a new, arrangement was entered into: Mr. Ripon retired on\naccount of ill health.\n\nThere were instances, however, when a certain amount of annoying\npublicity was inevitable. Such was the famous Galligan case, which\noccurred some three or four years after my marriage. Aloysius Galligan\nwas a brakeman, and his legs had become paralyzed as the result of an\naccident that was the result of defective sills on a freight car. He had\nsued, and been awarded damages of $15,000. To the amazement and\nindignation of Miller Gorse, the Supreme Court, to which the Railroad had\nappealed, affirmed the decision. It wasn't the single payment of $15,000\nthat the Railroad cared about, of course; a precedent might be\nestablished for compensating maimed employees which would be expensive in\nthe long run. Carelessness could not be proved in this instance. Gorse\nsent for me. I had been away with Maude at the sea for two months, and\nhad not followed the case.\n\n\"You've got to take charge, Paret, and get a rehearing. See Bering, and\nfind out who in the deuce is to blame for this. Chesley's one, of course.\nWe ought never to have permitted his nomination for the Supreme Bench. It\nwas against my judgment, but Varney and Gill assured me that he was all\nright.\"\n\nI saw Judge Bering that evening. We sat on a plush sofa in the parlour of\nhis house in Baker Street.\n\n\"I had a notion Gorse'd be mad,\" he said, \"but it looked to me as if they\nhad it on us, Paret. I didn't see how we could do anything else but\naffirm without being too rank. Of course, if he feels that way, and you\nwant to make a motion for a rehearing, I'll see what can be done.\"\n\n\"Something's got to be done,\" I replied. \"Can't you see what such a\ndecision lets them in for?\"\n\n\"All right,\" said the judge, who knew an order when he heard one, \"I\nguess we can find an error.\" He was not a little frightened by the report\nof Mr. Gorse's wrath, for election-day was approaching. \"Say, you\nwouldn't take me for a sentimental man, now, would you?\"\n\nI smiled at the notion of it.\n\n\"Well, I'll own up to you this kind of got under my skin. That Galligan\nis a fine-looking fellow, if there ever was one, and he'll never be of a\nbit of use any more. Of course the case was plain sailing, and they ought\nto have had the verdict, but that lawyer of his handled it to the queen's\ntaste, if I do say so. He made me feel real bad, by God,--as if it was my\nown son Ed who'd been battered up. Lord, I can't forget the look in that\nman Galligan's eyes. I hate to go through it again, and reverse it, but I\nguess I'll have to, now.\"\n\nThe Judge sat gazing at the flames playing over his gas log.\n\n\"Who was the lawyer?\" I asked.\n\n\"A man by the name of Krebs,\" he replied. \"Never heard of him before.\nHe's just moved to the city.\"\n\n\"This city?\" I ejaculated.\n\nThe Judge glanced at me interestedly.\n\n\"This city, of course. What do you know about him?\"\n\n\"Well,\" I answered, when I had recovered a little from the shock--for it\nwas a distinct shock--\"he lived in Elkington. He was the man who stirred\nup the trouble in the legislature about Bill 709.\"\n\nThe Judge slapped his knee.\n\n\"That fellow!\" he exclaimed, and ruminated. \"Why didn't somebody tell\nme?\" he added, complainingly. \"Why didn't Miller Gorse let me know about\nit, instead of licking up a fuss after it's all over?\"...\n\nOf all men of my acquaintance I had thought the Judge the last to grow\nmaudlin over the misfortunes of those who were weak or unfortunate enough\nto be defeated and crushed in the struggle for existence, and it was not\nwithout food for reflection that I departed from his presence. To make\nMr. Bering \"feel bad\" was no small achievement, and Krebs had been\nresponsible for it, of course,--not Galligan. Krebs had turned up once\nmore! It seemed as though he were destined to haunt me. Well, I made up\nmy mind that he should not disturb me again, at any rate: I, at least,\nhad learned to eliminate sentimentality from business, and it was not\nwithout deprecation I remembered my experience with him at the Capital,\nwhen he had made me temporarily ashamed of my connection with Bill 709. I\nhad got over that. And when I entered the court room (the tribunal having\ngraciously granted a rehearing on the ground that it had committed an\nerror in the law!) my feelings were of lively curiosity and zest. I had\nno disposition to underrate his abilities, but I was fortified by the\nconsciousness of a series of triumphs behind me, by a sense of\nassociation with prevailing forces against which he was helpless. I could\nafford to take a superior attitude in regard to one who was destined\nalways to be dramatic.\n\nAs the case proceeded I was rather disappointed on the whole that he was\nnot dramatic--not even as dramatic as he had been when he defied the\npowers in the Legislature. He had changed but little, he still wore\nill-fitting clothes, but I was forced to acknowledge that he seemed to\nhave gained in self-control, in presence. He had nodded at me before the\ncase was called, as he sat beside his maimed client; and I had been on\nthe alert for a hint of reproach in his glance: there was none. I smiled\nback at him....\n\nHe did not rant. He seemed to have rather a remarkable knowledge of the\nlaw. In a conversational tone he described the sufferings of the man in\nthe flannel shirt beside him, but there could be no question of the fact\nthat he did produce an effect. The spectators were plainly moved, and it\nwas undeniable that some of the judges wore rather a sheepish look as\nthey toyed with their watch chains or moved the stationery in front of\nthem. They had seen maimed men before, they had heard impassioned,\nsentimental lawyers talk about wives and families and God and justice.\nKrebs did none of this. Just how he managed to bring the thing home to\nthose judges, to make them ashamed of their role, just how he managed--in\nspite of my fortified attitude to revive something of that sense of\ndiscomfort I had experienced at the State House is difficult to say. It\nwas because, I think, he contrived through the intensity of his own\nsympathy to enter into the body of the man whose cause he pleaded, to\nfeel the despair in Galligan's soul--an impression that was curiously\nconveyed despite the dignified limits to which he confined his speech. It\nwas strange that I began to be rather sorry for him, that I felt a\ncertain reluctant regret that he should thus squander his powers against\noverwhelming odds. What was the use of it all!\n\nAt the end his voice became more vibrant--though he did not raise it--as\nhe condemned the Railroad for its indifference to human life, for its\ncontention that men were cheaper than rolling-stock.\n\nI encountered him afterward in the corridor. I had made a point of\nseeking him out, perhaps from some vague determination to prove that our\nlast meeting in the little restaurant at the Capital had left no traces\nof embarrassment in me: I was, in fact, rather aggressively anxious to\nreveal myself to him as one who has thriven on the views he condemned, as\none in whose unity of mind there is no rift. He was alone, apparently\nwaiting for someone, leaning against a steam radiator in one of his\nawkward, angular poses, looking out of the court-house window.\n\n\"How are you?\" I said blithely. \"So you've left Elkington for a wider\nfield.\" I wondered whether my alert cousin-in-law, George Hutchins, had\nmade it too hot for him.\n\nHe turned to me unexpectedly a face of profound melancholy; his\nexpression had in it, oddly, a trace of sternness; and I was somewhat\ntaken aback by this evidence that he was still bearing vicariously the\ntroubles of his client. So deep had been the thought I had apparently\ninterrupted that he did not realize my presence at first.\n\n\"Oh, it's you, Paret. Yes, I've left Elkington,\" he said.\n\n\"Something of a surprise to run up against you suddenly, like this.\"\n\n\"I expected to see you,\" he answered gravely, and the slight emphasis he\ngave the pronoun implied not only a complete knowledge of the situation\nand of the part I had taken in it, but also a greater rebuke than if his\naccusation had been direct. But I clung to my affability.\n\n\"If I can do anything for you, let me know,\" I told him. He said nothing,\nhe did not even smile. At this moment he was opportunely joined by a man\nwho had the appearance of a labour leader, and I walked away. I was\nresentful; my mood, in brief, was that of a man who has done something\nfoolish and is inclined to talk to himself aloud: but the mood was\ncomplicated, made the more irritating by the paradoxical fact that that\nlast look he had given me seemed to have borne the traces of\naffection....\n\nIt is perhaps needless to add that the court reversed its former\ndecision.\n\n\n\n\nXVI.\n\nThe Pilot published a series of sensational articles and editorials about\nthe Galligan matter, a picture of Galligan, an account of the destitute\nstate of his wife and family. The time had not yet arrived when such\nnewspapers dared to attack the probity of our courts, but a system of law\nthat permitted such palpable injustice because of technicalities was\nbitterly denounced. What chance had a poor man against such a moloch as\nthe railroad, even with a lawyer of such ability as had been exhibited by\nHermann Krebs? Krebs was praised, and the attention of Mr. Lawler's\nreaders was called to the fact that Krebs was the man who, some years\nbefore, had opposed single-handed in the legislature the notorious Bill\nNo. 709. It was well known in certain circles--the editorial went on to\nsay--that this legislation had been drawn by Theodore Watling in the\ninterests of the Boyne Iron Works, etc., etc. Hugh Paret had learned at\nthe feet of an able master. This first sight of my name thus\nopprobriously flung to the multitude gave me an unpleasant shock. I had\nseen Mr. Scherer attacked, Mr. Gorse attacked, and Mr. Watling: I had all\nalong realized, vaguely, that my turn would come, and I thought myself to\nhave acquired a compensating philosophy. I threw the sheet into the waste\nbasket, presently picked it out again and reread the sentence containing\nmy name. Well, there were certain penalties that every career must pay. I\nhad become, at last, a marked man, and I recognized the fact that this\nassault would be the forerunner of many.\n\nI tried to derive some comfort and amusement from the thought of certain\noperations of mine that Mr. Lawler had not discovered, that would have\nbeen matters of peculiar interest to his innocent public: certain\nextra-legal operations at the time when the Bovine corporation was being\nformed, for instance. And how they would have licked their chops had they\nlearned of that manoeuvre by which I had managed to have one of Mr.\nScherer's subsidiary companies in another state, with property and assets\namounting to more than twenty millions, reorganized under the laws of New\nJersey, and the pending case thus transferred to the Federal court, where\nwe won hands down! This Galligan affair was nothing to that.\nNevertheless, it was annoying. As I sat in the street car on my way\nhomeward, a man beside me was reading the Pilot. I had a queer sensation\nas he turned the page, and scanned the editorial; and I could not help\nwondering what he and the thousands like him thought of me; what he would\nsay if I introduced myself and asked his opinion. Perhaps he did not\nthink at all: undoubtedly he, and the public at large, were used to Mr.\nLawler's daily display of \"injustices.\" Nevertheless, like slow acid,\nthey must be eating into the public consciousness. It was an\noutrage--this freedom of the press.\n\nWith renewed exasperation I thought of Krebs, of his disturbing and\nalmost uncanny faculty of following me up. Why couldn't he have remained\nin Elkington? Why did he have to follow me here, to make capital out of a\ncase that might never have been heard of except for him?... I was still\nin this disagreeable frame of mind when I turned the corner by my house\nand caught sight of Maude, in the front yard, bending bareheaded over a\nbed of late flowers which the frost had spared. The evening was sharp,\nthe dusk already gathering.\n\n\"You'll catch cold,\" I called to her.\n\nShe looked up at the sound of my voice.\n\n\"They'll soon be gone,\" she sighed, referring to the flowers. \"I hate\nwinter.\"\n\nShe put her hand through my arm, and we went into the house. The curtains\nwere drawn, a fire was crackling on the hearth, the lamps were lighted,\nand as I dropped into a chair this living-room of ours seemed to take on\nthe air of a refuge from the vague, threatening sinister things of the\nworld without. I felt I had never valued it before. Maude took up her\nsewing and sat down beside the table.\n\n\"Hugh,\" she said suddenly, \"I read something in the newspaper--\"\n\nMy exasperation flared up again.\n\n\"Where did you get that disreputable sheet?\" I demanded.\n\n\"At the dressmaker's!\" she answered. \"I--I just happened to see the name,\nParet.\"\n\n\"It's just politics,\" I declared, \"stirring up discontent by\nmisrepresentation. Jealousy.\"\n\nShe leaned forward in her chair, gazing into the flames.\n\n\"Then it isn't true that this poor man, Galligan--isn't that his\nname?--was cheated out of the damages he ought to have to keep himself\nand his family alive?\"\n\n\"You must have been talking to Perry or Susan,\" I said. \"They seem to be\nconvinced that I am an oppressor of the poor.\n\n\"Hugh!\" The tone in which she spoke my name smote me. \"How can you say\nthat? How can you doubt their loyalty, and mine? Do you think they would\nundermine you, and to me, behind your back?\"\n\n\"I didn't mean that, of course, Maude. I was annoyed about something\nelse. And Tom and Perry have an air of deprecating most of the\nenterprises in which I am professionally engaged. It's very well for them\nto talk. All Perry has to do is to sit back and take in receipts from the\nBoyne Street car line, and Tom is content if he gets a few commissions\nevery week. They're like militiamen criticizing soldiers under fire. I\nknow they're good friends of mine, but sometimes I lose patience with\nthem.\"\n\nI got up and walked to the window, and came back again and stood before\nher.\n\n\"I'm sorry for this man, Galligan,\" I went on, \"I can't tell you how\nsorry. But few people who are not on the inside, so to speak, grasp the\nfact that big corporations, like the Railroad, are looked upon as fair\ngame for every kind of parasite. Not a day passes in which attempts are\nnot made to bleed them. Some of these cases are pathetic. It had cost the\nRailroad many times fifteen thousand dollars to fight Galligan's case.\nBut if they had paid it, they would have laid themselves open to\nthousands of similar demands. Dividends would dwindle. The stockholders\nhave a right to a fair return on their money. Galligan claims that there\nwas a defective sill on the car which is said to have caused the wreck.\nIf damages are paid on that basis, it means the daily inspection of every\ncar which passes over their lines. And more than that: there are certain\ndefects, as in the present case, which an inspection would not reveal.\nWhen a man accepts employment on a railroad he assumes a certain amount\nof personal risk,--it's not precisely a chambermaid's job. And the lawyer\nwho defends such cases, whatever his personal feelings may be, cannot\nafford to be swayed by them. He must take the larger view.\"\n\n\"Why didn't you tell me about it before?\" she asked.\n\n\"Well, I didn't think it of enough importance--these things are all in\nthe day's work.\"\n\n\"But Mr. Krebs? How strange that he should be here, connected with the\ncase!\"\n\nI made an effort to control myself.\n\n\"Your old friend,\" I said. \"I believe you have a sentiment about him.\"\n\nShe looked up at me.\n\n\"Scarcely that,\" she replied gravely, with the literalness that often\ncharacterized her, \"but he isn't a person easily forgotten. He may be\nqueer, one may not agree with his views, but after the experience I had\nwith him I've never been able to look at him in the way George does, for\ninstance, or even as father does.\"\n\n\"Or even as I do,\" I supplied.\n\n\"Well, perhaps not even as you do,\" she answered calmly. \"I believe you\nonce told me, however, that you thought him a fanatic, but sincere.\"\n\n\"He's certainly a fanatic!\" I exclaimed.\n\n\"But sincere, Hugh-you still think him sincere.\"\n\n\"You seem a good deal concerned about a man you've laid eyes on but\nonce.\"\n\nShe considered this.\n\n\"Yes, it is surprising,\" she admitted, \"but it's true. I was sorry for\nhim, but I admired him. I was not only impressed by his courage in taking\ncharge of me, but also by the trust and affection the work-people showed.\nHe must be a good man, however mistaken he may be in the methods he\nemploys. And life is cruel to those people.\"\n\n\"Life is-life,\" I observed. \"Neither you nor I nor Krebs is able to\nchange it.\"\n\n\"Has he come here to practice?\" she asked, after a moment.\n\n\"Yes. Do you want me to invite him to dinner?\" and seeing that she did\nnot reply I continued: \"In spite of my explanation I suppose you think,\nbecause Krebs defended the man Galligan, that a monstrous injustice has\nbeen done.\"\n\n\"That is unworthy of you,\" she said, bending over her stitch.\n\nI began to pace the room again, as was my habit when overwrought.\n\n\"Well, I was going to tell you about this affair if you had not\nforestalled me by mentioning it yourself. It isn't pleasant to be\nvilified by rascals who make capital out of vilification, and a man has a\nright to expect some sympathy from his wife.\"\n\n\"Did I ever deny you that, Hugh?\" she asked. \"Only you don't ever seem to\nneed it, to want it.\"\n\n\"And there are things,\" I pursued, \"things in a man's province that a\nwoman ought to accept from her husband, things which in the very nature\nof the case she can know nothing about.\"\n\n\"But a woman must think for herself,\" she declared. \"She shouldn't become\na mere automaton,--and these questions involve so much! People are\ndiscussing them, the magazines and periodicals are beginning to take them\nup.\"\n\nI stared at her, somewhat appalled by this point of view. There had,\nindeed, been signs of its development before now, but I had not heeded\nthem. And for the first time I beheld Maude in a new light.\n\n\"Oh, it's not that I don't trust you,\" she continued, \"I'm open to\nconviction, but I must be convinced. Your explanation of this Galligan\ncase seems a sensible one, although it's depressing. But life is hard and\ndepressing sometimes I've come to realize that. I want to think over what\nyou've said, I want to talk over it some more. Why won't you tell me more\nof what you are doing? If you only would confide in me--as you have now!\nI can't help seeing that we are growing farther and farther apart, that\nbusiness, your career, is taking all of you and leaving me nothing.\" She\nfaltered, and went on again. \"It's difficult to tell you this--you never\ngive me the chance. And it's not for my sake alone, but for yours, too.\nYou are growing more and more self-centred, surrounding yourself with a\nhard shell. You don't realize it, but Tom notices it, Perry notices it,\nit hurts them, it's that they complain of. Hugh!\" she cried appealingly,\nsensing my resentment, forestalling the words of defence ready on my\nlips. \"I know that you are busy, that many men depend on you, it isn't\nthat I'm not proud of you and your success, but you don't understand what\na woman craves,--she doesn't want only to be a good housekeeper, a good\nmother, but she wants to share a little, at any rate, in the life of her\nhusband, in his troubles as well as in his successes. She wants to be of\nsome little use, of some little help to him.\"\n\nMy feelings were reduced to a medley.\n\n\"But you are a help to me--a great help,\" I protested.\n\nShe shook her head. \"I wish I were,\" she said.\n\nIt suddenly occurred to me that she might be. I was softened, and alarmed\nby the spectacle she had revealed of the widening breach between us. I\nlaid my hand on her shoulder.\n\n\"Well, I'll try to do better, Maude.\"\n\nShe looked up at me, questioningly yet gratefully, through a mist of\ntears. But her reply--whatever it might have been--was forestalled by the\nsound of shouts and laughter in the hallway. She sprang up and ran to the\ndoor.\n\n\"It's the children,\" she exclaimed, \"they've come home from Susan's\nparty!\"\n\nIt begins indeed to look as if I were writing this narrative upside down,\nfor I have said nothing about children. Perhaps one reason for this\nomission is that I did not really appreciate them, that I found it\nimpossible to take the same minute interest in them as Tom, for instance,\nwho was, apparently, not content alone with the six which he possessed,\nbut had adopted mine. One of them, little Sarah, said \"Uncle Tom\" before\n\"Father.\" I do not mean to say that I had not occasional moments of\ntenderness toward them, but they were out of my thoughts much of the\ntime. I have often wondered, since, how they regarded me; how, in their\nlittle minds, they defined the relationship. Generally, when I arrived\nhome in the evening I liked to sit down before my study fire and read the\nafternoon newspapers or a magazine; but occasionally I went at once to\nthe nursery for a few moments, to survey with complacency the medley of\ntoys on the floor, and to kiss all three. They received my caresses with\na certain shyness--the two younger ones, at least, as though they were at\na loss to place me as a factor in the establishment. They tumbled over\neach other to greet Maude, and even Tom. If I were an enigma to them,\nwhat must they have thought of him? Sometimes I would discover him on the\nnursery floor, with one or two of his own children, building towers and\ncastles and railroad stations, or forts to be attacked and demolished by\nregiments of lead soldiers. He was growing comfortable-looking, if not\nexactly stout; prematurely paternal, oddly willing to renounce the\nfiercer joys of life, the joys of acquisition, of conquest, of youth.\n\n\"You'd better come home with me, Chickabiddy,\" he would say, \"that father\nof yours doesn't appreciate you. He's too busy getting rich.\"\n\n\"Chickabiddy,\" was his name for little Sarah. Half of the name stuck to\nher, and when she was older we called her Biddy.\n\nShe would gaze at him questioningly, her eyes like blue flower cups, a\nstrange little mixture of solemnity and bubbling mirth, of shyness and\nimpulsiveness. She had fat legs that creased above the tops of the absurd\nlittle boots that looked to be too tight; sometimes she rolled and\ntumbled in an ecstasy of abandon, and again she would sit motionless, as\nthough absorbed in dreams. Her hair was like corn silk in the sun,\ntwisting up into soft curls after her bath, when she sat rosily presiding\nover her supper table.\n\nAs I look back over her early infancy, I realize that I loved her,\nalthough it is impossible for me to say how much of this love is\nretrospective. Why I was not mad about her every hour of the day is a\npuzzle to me now. Why, indeed, was I not mad about all three of them?\nThere were moments when I held and kissed them, when something within me\nmelted: moments when I was away from them, and thought of them. But these\nmoments did not last. The something within me hardened again, I became\nindifferent, my family was wiped out of my consciousness as though it had\nnever existed.\n\nThere was Matthew, for instance, the oldest. When he arrived, he was to\nMaude a never-ending miracle, she would have his crib brought into her\nroom, and I would find her leaning over the bedside, gazing at him with a\nrapt expression beyond my comprehension. To me he was just a brick-red\nmorsel of humanity, all folds and wrinkles, and not at all remarkable in\nany way. Maude used to annoy me by getting out of bed in the middle of\nthe night when he cried, and at such times I was apt to wonder at the odd\ntrick the life-force had played me, and ask myself why I got married at\nall. It was a queer method of carrying on the race. Later on, I began to\ntake a cursory interest in him, to watch for signs in him of certain\ncharacteristics of my own youth which, in the philosophy of my manhood, I\nhad come to regard as defects. And it disturbed me somewhat to see these\nsigns appear. I wished him to be what I had become by force of will--a\nfighter. But he was a sensitive child, anxious for approval; not robust,\nthough spiritual rather than delicate; even in comparative infancy he\ncared more for books than toys, and his greatest joy was in being read\nto. In spite of these traits--perhaps because of them--there was a\nsympathy between us. From the time that he could talk the child seemed to\nunderstand me. Occasionally I surprised him gazing at me with a certain\nwistful look that comes back to me as I write.\n\nMoreton, Tom used to call Alexander the Great because he was a fighter\nfrom the cradle, beating his elder brother, too considerate to strike\nback, and likewise--when opportunity offered--his sister; and\nappropriating their toys. A self-sufficient, doughty young man, with the\nround head that withstands many blows, taking by nature to competition\nand buccaneering in general. I did not love him half so much as I did\nMatthew--if such intermittent emotions as mine may be called love. It was\na standing joke of mine--which Maude strongly resented--that Moreton\nresembled Cousin George of Elkington.\n\nImbued with the highest ambition of my time, I had set my barque on a\ngreat circle, and almost before I realized it the barque was burdened\nwith a wife and family and the steering had insensibly become more\ndifficult; for Maude cared nothing about the destination, and when I took\nany hand off the wheel our ship showed a tendency to make for a quiet\nharbour. Thus the social initiative, which I believed should have been\nthe woman's, was thrust back on me. It was almost incredible, yet\nindisputable, in a day when most American women were credited with a\ncraving for social ambition that I, of all men, should have married a\nwife in whom the craving was wholly absent! She might have had what other\nwomen would have given their souls for. There were many reasons why I\nwished her to take what I deemed her proper place in the community as my\nwife--not that I cared for what is called society in the narrow sense;\nwith me, it was a logical part of a broader scheme of life; an auxiliary\nrather than an essential, but a needful auxiliary; a means of dignifying\nand adorning the position I was taking. Not only that, but I felt the\nneed of intercourse--of intercourse of a lighter and more convivial\nnature with men and women who saw life as I saw it. In the evenings when\nwe did not go out into that world our city afforded ennui took possession\nof me: I had never learned to care for books, I had no resources outside\nof my profession, and when I was not working on some legal problem I\ndawdled over the newspapers and went to bed. I don't mean to imply that\nour existence, outside of our continued intimacy with the Peterses and\nthe Blackwoods, was socially isolated. We gave little dinners that Maude\ncarried out with skill and taste; but it was I who suggested them; we\nwent out to other dinners, sometimes to Nancy's--though we saw less and\nless of her--sometimes to other houses. But Maude had given evidence of\ndomestic tastes and a disinclination for gaiety that those who\nentertained more were not slow to sense. I should have liked to take a\nlarger house, but I felt the futility of suggesting it; the children were\nstill small, and she was occupied with them. Meanwhile I beheld, and at\ntimes with considerable irritation, the social world changing, growing\nlarger and more significant, a more important function of that higher\nphase of American existence the new century seemed definitely to have\ninitiated. A segregative process was away to which Maude was wholly\nindifferent. Our city was throwing off its social conservatism; wealth\n(which implied ability and superiority) was playing a greater part,\nentertainments were more luxurious, lines more strictly drawn. We had an\nelaborate country club for those who could afford expensive amusements.\nMuch of this transformation had been due to the initiative and leadership\nof Nancy Durrett....\n\nGreat and sudden wealth, however, if combined with obscure antecedents\nand questionable qualifications, was still looked upon askance. In spite\nof the fact that Adolf Scherer had \"put us on the map,\" the family of the\ngreat iron-master still remained outside of the social pale. He himself\nmight have entered had it not been for his wife, who was supposed to be\n\"queer,\" who remained at home in her house opposite Gallatin Park and\nmade little German cakes,--a huge house which an unknown architect had\ntaken unusual pains to make pretentious and hideous, for it was Rhenish,\nMoorish and Victorian by turns. Its geometric grounds matched those of\nthe park, itself a monument to bad taste in landscape. The neighbourhood\nwas highly respectable, and inhabited by families of German extraction.\nThere were two flaxen-haired daughters who had just graduated from an\nexpensive boarding-school in New York, where they had received the polish\nneedful for future careers. But the careers were not forthcoming.\n\nI was thrown constantly with Adolf Scherer; I had earned his gratitude, I\nhad become necessary to him. But after the great coup whereby he had\nfulfilled Mr. Watling's prophecy and become the chief factor in our\nbusiness world he began to show signs of discontent, of an irritability\nthat seemed foreign to his character, and that puzzled me. One day,\nhowever, I stumbled upon the cause of this fermentation, to wonder that I\nhad not discovered it before. In many ways Adolf Scherer was a child. We\nwere sitting in the Boyne Club.\n\n\"Money--yes!\" he exclaimed, apropos of some demand made upon him by a\ncharitable society. \"They come to me for my money--there is always\nScherer, they say. He will make up the deficit in the hospitals. But what\nis it they do for me? Nothing. Do they invite me to their houses, to\ntheir parties?\"\n\nThis was what he wanted, then,--social recognition. I said nothing, but I\nsaw my opportunity: I had the clew, now, to a certain attitude he had\nadopted of late toward me, an attitude of reproach; as though, in return\nfor his many favours to me, there were something I had left undone. And\nwhen I went home I asked Maude to call on Mrs. Scherer.\n\n\"On Mrs. Scherer!\" she repeated.\n\n\"Yes, I want you to invite them to dinner.\" The proposal seemed to take\naway her breath. \"I owe her husband a great deal, and I think he feels\nhurt that the wives of the men he knows down town haven't taken up his\nfamily.\" I felt that it would not be wise, with Maude, to announce my\nrather amazing discovery of the iron-master's social ambitions.\n\n\"But, Hugh, they must be very happy, they have their friends. And after\nall this time wouldn't it seem like an intrusion?\"\n\n\"I don't think so,\" I said, \"I'm sure it would please him, and them. You\nknow how kind he's been to us, how he sent us East in his private car\nlast year.\"\n\n\"Of course I'll go if you wish it, if you're sure they feel that way.\"\nShe did make the call, that very week, and somewhat to my surprise\nreported that she liked Mrs. Scherer and the daughters: Maude's likes and\ndislikes, needless to say, were not governed by matters of policy.\n\n\"You were right, Hugh,\" she informed me, almost with enthusiasm, \"they\ndid seem lonely. And they were so glad to see me, it was rather pathetic.\nMr. Scherer, it seems, had talked to them a great deal about you. They\nwanted to know why I hadn't come before. That was rather embarrassing.\nFortunately they didn't give me time to talk, I never heard people talk\nas they do. They all kissed me when I went away, and came down the steps\nwith me. And Mrs. Scherer went into the conservatory and picked a huge\nbouquet. There it is,\" she said, laughingly, pointing to several vases.\n\"I separated the colours as well as I could when I got home. We had\ncoffee, and the most delicious German cakes in the Turkish room, or the\nMoorish room, whichever it is. I'm sure I shan't be able to eat anything\nmore for days. When do you wish to have them for dinner?\"\n\n\"Well,\" I said, \"we ought to have time to get the right people to meet\nthem. We'll ask Nancy and Ham.\"\n\nMaude opened her eyes.\n\n\"Nancy! Do you think Nancy would like them?\"\n\n\"I'm going to give her a chance, anyway,\" I replied....\n\nIt was, in some ways, a memorable dinner. I don't know what I expected in\nMrs. Scherer--from Maude's description a benevolent and somewhat stupid,\nblue-eyed German woman, of peasant extraction. There could be no doubt\nabout the peasant extraction, but when she hobbled into our little\nparlour with the aid of a stout, gold-headed cane she dominated it. Her\nvery lameness added to a distinction that evinced itself in a dozen ways.\nHer nose was hooked, her colour high,--despite the years in\nSteelville,--her peculiar costume heightened the effect of her\npersonality; her fire-lit black eyes bespoke a spirit accustomed to rule,\nand instead of being an aspirant for social honours, she seemed to confer\nthem. Conversation ceased at her entrance.\n\n\"I'm sorry we are late, my dear,\" she said, as she greeted Maude\naffectionately, \"but we have far to come. And this is your husband!\" she\nexclaimed, as I was introduced. She scrutinized me. \"I have heard\nsomething of you, Mr. Paret. You are smart. Shall I tell you the smartest\nthing you ever did?\" She patted Maude's shoulder. \"When you married your\nwife--that was it. I have fallen in love with her. If you do not know it,\nI tell you.\"\n\nNext, Nancy was introduced.\n\n\"So you are Mrs. Hambleton Durrett?\"\n\nNancy acknowledged her identity with a smile, but the next remark was a\nbombshell.\n\n\"The leader of society.\"\n\n\"Alas!\" exclaimed Nancy, \"I have been accused of many terrible things.\"\n\nTheir glances met. Nancy's was amused, baffling, like a spark in amber.\nEach, in its way, was redoubtable. A greater contrast between two women\ncould scarcely have been imagined. It was well said (and not snobbishly)\nthat generations had been required to make Nancy's figure: she wore a\ndress of blue sheen, the light playing on its ripples; and as she stood,\napparently wholly at ease, looking down at the wife of Adolf Scherer, she\nreminded me of an expert swordsman who, with remarkable skill, was\nkeeping a too pressing and determined aspirant at arm's length. I was\nkeenly aware that Maude did not possess this gift, and I realized for the\nfirst time something of the similarity between Nancy's career and my own.\nShe, too, in her feminine sphere, exercised, and subtly, a power in which\nhuman passions were deeply involved.\n\nIf Nancy Durrett symbolized aristocracy, established order and prestige,\nwhat did Mrs. Scherer represent? Not democracy, mob rule--certainly. The\nstocky German peasant woman with her tightly drawn hair and heavy jewels\nseemed grotesquely to embody something that ultimately would have its\nway, a lusty and terrible force in the interests of which my own services\nwere enlisted; to which the old American element in business and\nindustry, the male counterpart of Nancy Willett, had already succumbed.\nAnd now it was about to storm the feminine fastnesses! I beheld a woman\nwho had come to this country with a shawl aver her head transformed into\na new species of duchess, sure of herself, scorning the delicate\neuphemisms in which Fancy's kind were wont to refer to asocial realm,\nthat was no less real because its boundaries had not definitely been\ndefined. She held her stick firmly, and gave Nancy an indomitable look.\n\n\"I want you to meet my daughters. Gretchen, Anna, come here and be\nintroduced to Mrs. Durrett.\"\n\nIt was not without curiosity I watched these of the second generation as\nthey made their bows, noted the differentiation in the type for which an\nAmerican environment and a \"finishing school\" had been responsible.\nGretchen and Anna had learned--in crises, such as the present--to\nrestrain the superabundant vitality they had inherited. If their\ncheekbones were a little too high, their Delft blue eyes a little too\nsmall, their colour was of the proverbial rose-leaves and cream. Gene\nHollister's difficulty was to know which to marry. They were nice\ngirls,--of that there could be no doubt; there was no false modesty in\ntheir attitude toward \"society\"; nor did they pretend--as so many silly\npeople did, that they were not attempting to get anywhere in particular,\nthat it was less desirable to be in the centre than on the dubious outer\nwalks. They, too, were so glad to meet Mrs. Durrett.\n\nNancy's eyes twinkled as they passed on.\n\n\"You see what I have let you in for?\" I said.\n\n\"My dear Hugh,\" she replied, \"sooner or later we should have had to face\nthem anyhow. I have recognized that for some time. With their money, and\nMr. Scherer's prestige, and the will of that lady with the stick, in a\nfew years we should have had nothing to say. Why, she's a female\nNapoleon. Hilda's the man of the family.\"\n\nAfter that, Nancy invariably referred to Mrs. Scherer as Hilda.\n\nIf Mrs. Scherer was a surprise to us, her husband was a still greater\none; and I had difficulty in recognizing the Adolf Scherer who came to\nour dinner party as the personage of the business world before whom\nlesser men were wont to cringe. He seemed rather mysteriously to have\nshed that personality; become an awkward, ingratiating, rather too\nexuberant, ordinary man with a marked German accent. From time to time I\nfound myself speculating uneasily on this phenomenon as I glanced down\nthe table at his great torso, white waist-coated for the occasion. He was\nplainly \"making up\" to Nancy, and to Mrs. Ogilvy, who sat opposite him.\nOn the whole, the atmosphere of our entertainment was rather electric.\n\"Hilda\" was chiefly responsible for this; her frankness was of the\nbreath-taking kind. Far from attempting to hide or ignore the struggle by\nwhich she and her husband had attained their present position, she\nreferred with the utmost naivete to incidents in her career, while the\nwhole table paused to listen.\n\n\"Before we had a carriage, yes, it was hard for me to get about. I had to\nbe helped by the conductors into the streetcars. I broke my hip when we\nlived in Steelville, and the doctor was a numbskull. He should be put in\nprison, is what I tell Adolf. I was standing on a clothes-horse, when it\nfell. I had much washing to do in those days.\"\n\n\"And--can nothing be done, Mrs. Scherer?\" asked Leonard Dickinson,\nsympathetically.\n\n\"For an old woman? I am fifty-five. I have had many doctors. I would put\nthem all in prison. How much was it you paid Dr. Stickney, in New York,\nAdolf? Five thousand dollars? And he did nothing--nothing. I'd rather be\npoor again, and work. But it is well to make the best of it.\"...\n\n\"Your grandfather was a fine man, Mr. Durrett,\" she informed Hambleton.\n\"It is a pity for you, I think, that you do not have to work.\"\n\nHam, who sat on her other side, was amused.\n\n\"My grandfather did enough work for both of us,\" he said.\n\n\"If I had been your grandfather, I would have started you in puddling,\"\nshe observed, as she eyed with disapproval the filling of his third glass\nof champagne. \"I think there is too much gay life, too much games for\nrich young men nowadays. You will forgive me for saying what I think to\nyoung men?\"\n\n\"I'll forgive you for not being my grandfather, at any rate,\" replied\nHam, with unaccustomed wit.\n\nShe gazed at him with grim humour.\n\n\"It is bad for you I am not,\" she declared.\n\nThere was no gainsaying her. What can be done with a lady who will not\nrecognize that morality is not discussed, and that personalities are\ntabooed save between intimates. Hilda was a personage as well as a\nTartar. Laws, conventions, usages--to all these she would conform when it\npleased her. She would have made an admirable inquisitorial judge, and\nquite as admirable a sick nurse. A rare criminal lawyer, likewise, was\nwasted in her. She was one of those individuals, I perceived, whose\nloyalties dominate them; and who, in behalf of those loyalties, carry\nchips on their shoulders.\n\n\"It is a long time that I have been wanting to meet you,\" she informed\nme. \"You are smart.\"\n\nI smiled, yet I was inclined to resent her use of the word, though I was\nby no means sure of the shade of meaning she meant to put into it. I had,\nindeed, an uneasy sense of the scantiness of my fund of humour to meet\nand turn such a situation; for I was experiencing, now, with her, the\nsame queer feeling I had known in my youth in the presence of Cousin\nRobert Breck--the suspicion that this extraordinary person saw through\nme. It was as though she held up a mirror and compelled me to look at my\nsoul features. I tried to assure myself that the mirror was distorted. I\nlost, nevertheless, the sureness of touch that comes from the conviction\nof being all of a piece. She contrived to resolve me again into\nconflicting elements. I was, for the moment, no longer the self-confident\nand triumphant young attorney accustomed to carry all before him, to\ncommand respect and admiration, but a complicated being whose unity had\nsuddenly been split. I glanced around the table at Ogilvy, at Dickinson,\nat Ralph Hambleton. These men were functioning truly. But was I? If I\nwere not, might not this be the reason for the lack of synthesis--of\nwhich I was abruptly though vaguely aware between my professional life,\nmy domestic relationships, and my relationships with friends. The loyalty\nof the woman beside me struck me forcibly as a supreme trait. Where she\nhad given, she did not withdraw. She had conferred it instantly on Maude.\nDid I feel that loyalty towards a single human being? towards Maude\nherself--my wife? or even towards Nancy? I pulled myself together, and\nresolved to give her credit for using the word \"smart\" in its\nunobjectionable sense. After all; Dickens had so used it.\n\n\"A lawyer must needs know something of what he is about, Mrs. Scherer, if\nhe is to be employed by such a man as your husband,\" I replied.\n\nHer black eyes snapped with pleasure.\n\n\"Ah, I suppose that is so,\" she agreed. \"I knew he was a great man when I\nmarried him, and that was before Mr. Nathaniel Durrett found it out.\"\n\n\"But surely you did not think, in those days, that he would be as big as\nhe has become? That he would not only be president of the Boyne Iron\nWorks, but of a Boyne Iron Works that has exceeded Mr. Durrett's wildest\ndreams.\"\n\nShe shook her head complacently.\n\n\"Do you know what I told him when he married me? I said, 'Adolf, it is a\npity you are born in Germany.' And when he asked me why, I told him that\nsome day he might have been President of the United States.\"\n\n\"Well, that won't be a great deprivation to him,\" I remarked. \"Mr.\nScherer can do what he wants, and the President cannot.\"\n\n\"Adolf always does as he wants,\" she declared, gazing at him as he sat\nbeside the brilliant wife of the grandson of the man whose red-shirted\nforeman he had been. \"He does what he wants, and gets what he wants. He\nis getting what he wants now,\" she added, with such obvious meaning that\nI found no words to reply. \"She is pretty, that Mrs. Durrett, and\nclever,--is it not so?\"\n\nI agreed. A new and indescribable note had come into Mrs. Scherer's\nvoice, and I realized that she, too, was aware of that flaw in the\nredoubtable Mr. Scherer which none of his associates had guessed. It\nwould have been strange if she had not discovered it. \"She is beautiful,\nyes,\" the lady continued critically, \"but she is not to compare with your\nwife. She has not the heart,--it is so with all your people of society.\nFor them it is not what you are, but what you have done, and what you\nhave.\"\n\nThe banality of this observation was mitigated by the feeling she threw\ninto it.\n\n\"I think you misjudge Mrs. Durrett,\" I said, incautiously. \"She has never\nbefore had the opportunity of meeting Mr. Scherer of appreciating him.\"\n\n\"Mrs. Durrett is an old friend of yours?\" she asked.\n\n\"I was brought up with her.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" she exclaimed, and turned her penetrating glance upon me. I was\nstartled. Could it be that she had discerned and interpreted those\nrenascent feelings even then stirring within me, and of which I myself\nwas as yet scarcely conscious? At this moment, fortunately for me, the\nwomen rose; the men remained to smoke; and Scherer, as they discussed\nmatters of finance, became himself again. I joined in the conversation,\nbut I was thinking of those instants when in flashes of understanding my\neyes had met Nancy's; instants in which I was lifted out of my humdrum,\ndeadly serious self and was able to look down objectively upon the life I\nled, the life we all led--and Nancy herself; to see with her the comic\nirony of it all. Nancy had the power to give me this exquisite sense of\ndetachment that must sustain her. And was it not just this sustenance she\ncould give that I needed? For want of it I was hardening, crystallizing,\ngrowing blind to the joy and variety of existence. Nancy could have saved\nme; she brought it home to me that I needed salvation.... I was struck by\nanother thought; in spite of our separation, in spite of her marriage and\nmine, she was still nearer to me--far nearer--than any other being.\n\nLater, I sought her out. She looked up at me amusedly from the\nwindow-seat in our living-room, where she had been talking to the Scherer\ngirls.\n\n\"Well, how did you get along with Hilda?\" she asked. \"I thought I saw you\nstruggling.\"\n\n\"She's somewhat disconcerting,\" I said. \"I felt as if she were turning me\ninside out.\"\n\nNancy laughed.\n\n\"Hilda's a discovery--a genius. I'm going to have them to dinner myself.\"\n\n\"And Adolf?\" I inquired. \"I believe she thought you were preparing to run\naway with him. You seemed to have him hypnotized.\"\n\n\"I'm afraid your great man won't be able to stand--elevation,\" she\ndeclared. \"He'll have vertigo. He's even got it now, at this little\nheight, and when he builds his palace on Grant Avenue, and later moves to\nNew York, I'm afraid he'll wobble even more.\"\n\n\"Is he thinking of doing all that?\" I asked.\n\n\"I merely predict New York--it's inevitable,\" she replied. \"Grant Avenue,\nyes; he wants me to help him choose a lot. He gave me ten thousand\ndollars for our Orphans' Home, but on the whole I think I prefer Hilda\neven if she doesn't approve of me.\"\n\nNancy rose. The Scherers were going. While Mr. Scherer pressed my hand in\na manner that convinced me of his gratitude, Hilda was bidding an\naffectionate good night to Maude. A few moments later she bore her\nhusband and daughters away, and we heard the tap-tap of her cane on the\nwalk outside....\n\n\n\n\nXVII.\n\nThe remembrance of that dinner when with my connivance the Scherers made\ntheir social debut is associated in my mind with the coming of the\nfulness of that era, mad and brief, when gold rained down like manna from\nour sooty skies. Even the church was prosperous; the Rev. Carey Heddon,\nour new minister, was well abreast of the times, typical of the new and\nefficient Christianity that has finally buried the hatchet with\nenlightened self-interest. He looked like a young and prosperous man of\nbusiness, and indeed he was one.\n\nThe fame of our city spread even across the Atlantic, reaching obscure\nhamlets in Europe, where villagers gathered up their lares and penates,\nmortgaged their homes, and bought steamship tickets from\nphilanthropists,--philanthropists in diamonds. Our Huns began to arrive,\ntheir Attilas unrecognized among them: to drive our honest Americans and\nIrish and Germans out of the mills by \"lowering the standard of living.\"\nStill--according to the learned economists in our universities,\nenlightened self-interest triumphed. Had not the honest Americans and\nGermans become foremen and even presidents of corporations? What greater\nvindication for their philosophy could be desired?\n\nThe very aspect of the city changed like magic. New buildings sprang high\nin the air; the Reliance Trust (Mr. Grierson's), the Scherer Building,\nthe Hambleton Building; a stew hotel, the Ashuela, took proper care of\nour visitors from the East,--a massive, grey stone, thousand-awninged\naffair on Boyne Street, with a grill where it became the fashion to go\nfor supper after the play, and a head waiter who knew in a few weeks\neveryone worth knowing.\n\nTo return for a moment to the Huns. Maude had expressed a desire to see a\nmill, and we went, one afternoon, in Mr. Scherer's carriage to\nSteelville, with Mr. Scherer himself,--a bewildering, educative, almost\nterrifying experience amidst fumes and flames, gigantic forces and\ntitanic weights. It seemed a marvel that we escaped being crushed or\nburned alive in those huge steel buildings reverberating with sound. They\nappeared a very bedlam of chaos, instead of the triumph of order,\norganization and human skill. Mr. Scherer was very proud of it all, and\nours was a sort of triumphal procession, accompanied by superintendents,\nmanagers and other factotums. I thought of my childhood image of\nShadrach, Meshach and Abednego, and our progress through the flames\nseemed no less remarkable and miraculous.\n\nMaude, with alarm in her eyes, kept very close to me, as I supplemented\nthe explanations they gave her. I had been there many times before.\n\n\"Why, Hugh,\" she exclaimed, \"you seem to know a lot about it!\"\n\nMr. Scherer laughed.\n\n\"He's had to talk about it once or twice in court--eh, Hugh? You didn't\nrealize how clever your husband was did you, Mrs. Paret?\"\n\n\"But this is so--complicated,\" she replied. \"It is overwhelming.\"\n\n\"When I found out how much trouble he had taken to learn about my\nbusiness,\" added Mr. Scherer, \"there was only one thing to do. Make him\nmy lawyer. Hugh, you have the floor, and explain the open-hearth\nprocess.\"\n\nI had almost forgotten the Huns. I saw Maude gazing at them with a new\nkind of terror. And when we sat at home that evening they still haunted\nher.\n\n\"Somehow, I can't bear to think about them,\" she said. \"I'm sure we'll\nhave to pay for it, some day.\"\n\n\"Pay for what?\" I asked.\n\n\"For making them work that way. And twelve hours! It can't be right,\nwhile we have so much, and are so comfortable.\"\n\n\"Don't be foolish,\" I exclaimed. \"They're used to it. They think\nthemselves lucky to get the work--and they are. Besides, you give them\ncredit for a sensitiveness that they don't possess. They wouldn't know\nwhat to do with such a house as this if they had it.\"\n\n\"I never realized before that our happiness and comfort were built on\nsuch foundations;\" she said, ignoring my remark.\n\n\"You must have seen your father's operatives, in Elkington, many times a\nweek.\"\n\n\"I suppose I was too young to think about such things,\" she reflected.\n\"Besides, I used to be sorry for them, sometimes. But these men at the\nsteel mills--I can't tell you what I feel about them. The sight of their\ngreat bodies and their red, sullen faces brought home to me the cruelty\nof life. Did you notice how some of them stared at us, as though they\nwere but half awake in the heat, with that glow on their faces? It made\nme afraid--afraid that they'll wake up some day, and then they will be\nterrible. I thought of the children. It seems not only wicked, but mad to\nbring ignorant foreigners over here and make them slaves like that, and\nso many of them are hurt and maimed. I can't forget them.\"\n\n\"You're talking Socialism,\" I said crossly, wondering whether Lucia had\ntaken it up as her latest fad.\n\n\"Oh, no, I'm not,\" said Maude, \"I don't know what Socialism is. I'm\ntalking about something that anyone who is not dazzled by all this luxury\nwe are living in might be able to see, about something which, when it\ncomes, we shan't be able to help.\"\n\nI ridiculed this. The prophecy itself did not disturb me half as much as\nthe fact that she had made it, as this new evidence that she was\nbeginning to think for herself, and along lines so different from my own\ndevelopment.\n\nWhile it lasted, before novelists, playwrights, professors and ministers\nof the Gospel abandoned their proper sphere to destroy it, that Golden\nAge was heaven; the New Jerusalem--in which we had ceased to\nbelieve--would have been in the nature of an anticlimax to any of our\narchangels of finance who might have attained it. The streets of our own\ncity turned out to be gold; gold likewise the acres of unused, scrubby\nland on our outskirts, as the incident of the Riverside Franchise--which\nI am about to relate--amply proved.\n\nThat scheme originated in the alert mind of Mr. Frederick Grierson, and\nin spite of the fact that it has since become notorious in the eyes of a\nvirtue-stricken public, it was entered into with all innocence at the\ntime: most of the men who were present at the \"magnate's\" table at the\nBoyne Club the day Mr. Grierson broached it will vouch for this. He\ncasually asked Mr. Dickinson if he had ever noticed a tract lying on the\nriver about two miles beyond the Heights, opposite what used to be in the\nold days a road house.\n\n\"This city is growing so fast, Leonard,\" said Grierson, lighting a\nspecial cigar the Club kept for him, \"that it might pay a few of us to\nget together and buy that tract, have the city put in streets and sewers\nand sell it in building lots. I think I can get most of it at less than\nthree hundred dollars an acre.\"\n\nMr. Dickinson was interested. So were Mr. Ogilvy and Ralph Hambleton, and\nMr. Scherer, who chanced to be there. Anything Fred Grierson had to say\non the question of real estate was always interesting. He went on to\ndescribe the tract, its size and location.\n\n\"That's all very well, Fred,\" Dickinson objected presently, \"but how are\nyour prospective householders going to get out there?\"\n\n\"Just what I was coming to,\" cried Grierson, triumphantly, \"we'll get a\nfranchise, and build a street-railroad out Maplewood Avenue, an extension\nof the Park Street line. We can get the franchise for next to nothing, if\nwe work it right.\" (Mr. Grierson's eye fell on me), \"and sell it out to\nthe public, if you underwrite it, for two million or so.\"\n\n\"Well, you've got your nerve with you, Fred, as usual,\" said Dickinson.\nBut he rolled his cigar in his mouth, an indication, to those who knew\nhim well, that he was considering the matter. When Leonard Dickinson\ndidn't say \"no\" at once, there was hope. \"What do you think the property\nholders on Maplewood Avenue would say? Wasn't it understood, when that\navenue was laid out, that it was to form part of the system of\nboulevards?\"\n\n\"What difference does it make what they say?\" Ralph interposed.\n\nDickinson smiled. He, too, had an exaggerated respect for Ralph. We all\nthought the proposal daring, but in no way amazing; the public existed to\nbe sold things to, and what did it matter if the Maplewood residents, as\nRalph said; and the City Improvement League protested?\n\nPerry Blackwood was the Secretary of the City Improvement League, the\nobject of which was to beautify the city by laying out a system of\nparkways.\n\nThe next day some of us gathered in Dickinson's office and decided that\nGrierson should go ahead and get the options. This was done; not, of\ncourse, in Grierson's name. The next move, before the formation of the\nRiverside Company, was to \"see\" Mr. Judd Jason. The success or failure of\nthe enterprise was in his hands. Mahomet must go to the mountain, and I\nwent to Monahan's saloon, first having made an appointment. It was not\nthe first time I had been there since I had made that first memorable\nvisit, but I never quite got over the feeling of a neophyte before\nBuddha, though I did not go so far as to analyze the reason,--that in Mr.\nJason I was brought face to face with the concrete embodiment of the\nphilosophy I had adopted, the logical consequence of enlightened\nself-interest. If he had ever heard of it, he would have made no pretence\nof being anything else. Greatness, declares some modern philosopher, has\nno connection with virtue; it is the continued, strong and logical\nexpression of some instinct; in Mr. Jason's case, the predatory instinct.\nAnd like a true artist, he loved his career for itself--not for what its\nfruits could buy. He might have built a palace on the Heights with the\ntolls he took from the disreputable houses of the city; he was contented\nwith Monahan's saloon: nor did he seek to propitiate a possible God by\nendowing churches and hospitals with a portion of his income. Try though\nI might, I never could achieve the perfection of this man's contempt for\nall other philosophies. The very fact of my going there in secret to that\ndark place of his from out of the bright, respectable region in which I\nlived was in itself an acknowledgment of this. I thought him a thief--a\nnecessary thief--and he knew it: he was indifferent to it; and it amused\nhim, I think, to see clinging to me, when I entered his presence, shreds\nof that morality which those of my world who dealt with him thought so\nneedful for the sake of decency.\n\nHe was in bed, reading newspapers, as usual. An empty coffee-cup and a\nplate were on the littered table.\n\n\"Sit down, sit down, Paret,\" he said. \"What do you hear from the\nSenator?\"\n\nI sat down, and gave him the news of Mr. Watling. He seemed, as usual,\ndistrait, betraying no curiosity as to the object of my call, his lean,\nbrown fingers playing with the newspapers on his lap. Suddenly, he\nflashed out at me one of those remarks which produced the uncanny\nconviction that, so far as affairs in the city were concerned, he was\nomniscient.\n\n\"I hear somebody has been getting options on that tract of land beyond\nthe Heights, on the river.\"\n\nHe had \"focussed.\"\n\n\"How did you hear that?\" I asked.\n\nHe smiled.\n\n\"It's Grierson, ain't it?\"\n\n\"Yes, it's Grierson,\" I said.\n\n\"How are you going to get your folks out there?\" he demanded.\n\n\"That's what I've come to see you about. We want a franchise for\nMaplewood Avenue.\"\n\n\"Maplewood Avenue!\" He lay back with his eyes closed, as though trying to\nvisualize such a colossal proposal....\n\nWhen I left him, two hours later, the details were all arranged, down to\nMr. Jason's consideration from Riverside Company and the \"fee\" which his\nlawyer, Mr. Bitter, was to have for \"presenting the case\" before the\nBoard of Aldermen. I went back to lunch at the Boyne Club, and to receive\nthe congratulations of my friends. The next week the Riverside Company\nwas formed, and I made out a petition to the Board of Aldermen for a\nfranchise; Mr. Bitter appeared and argued: in short, the procedure so\nfamiliar to modern students of political affairs was gone through. The\nMaplewood Avenue residents rose en masse, supported by the City\nImprovement League. Perry Blackwood, as soon as he heard of the petition,\nturned up at my office. By this time I was occupying Mr. Watling's room.\n\n\"Look here,\" he began, as soon as the office-boy had closed the door\nbehind him, \"this is going it a little too strong.\"\n\n\"What is?\" I asked, leaning back in my chair and surveying him.\n\n\"This proposed Maplewood Avenue Franchise. Hugh,\" he said, \"you and I\nhave been friends a good many years, Lucia and I are devoted to Maude.\"\n\nI did not reply.\n\n\"I've seen all along that we've been growing apart,\" he added sadly.\n\"You've got certain ideas about things which I can't share. I suppose I'm\nold fashioned. I can't trust myself to tell you what I think--what Tom\nand I think about this deal.\"\n\n\"Go ahead, Perry,\" I said.\n\nHe got up, plainly agitated, and walked to the window. Then he turned to\nme appealingly.\n\n\"Get out of it, for God's sake get out of it, before it's too late. For\nyour own sake, for Maude's, for the children's. You don't realize what\nyou are doing. You may not believe me, but the time will come when these\nfellows you are in with will be repudiated by the community,--their money\nwon't help them. Tom and I are the best friends you have,\" he added, a\nlittle irrelevantly.\n\n\"And you think I'm going to the dogs.\"\n\n\"Now don't take it the wrong way,\" he urged.\n\n\"What is it you object to about the Maplewood franchise?\" I asked. \"If\nyou'll look at a map of the city, you'll see that development is bound to\ncome on that side. Maplewood Avenue is the natural artery, somebody will\nbuild a line out there, and if you'd rather have eastern capitalists--\"\n\n\"Why are you going to get this franchise?\" he demanded. \"Because we\nhaven't a decent city charter, and a healthy public spirit, you fellows\nare buying it from a corrupt city boss, and bribing a corrupt board of\naldermen. That's the plain language of it. And it's only fair to warn you\nthat I'm going to say so, openly.\"\n\n\"Be sensible,\" I answered. \"We've got to have street railroads,--your\nfamily has one. We know what the aldermen are, what political conditions\nare. If you feel this way about it, the thing to do is to try to change\nthem. But why blame me for getting a franchise for a company in the only\nmanner in which, under present conditions, a franchise can be got? Do you\nwant the city to stand still? If not, we have to provide for the new\npopulation.\"\n\n\"Every time you bribe these rascals for a franchise you entrench them,\"\nhe cried. \"You make it more difficult to oust them. But you mark my\nwords, we shall get rid of them some day, and when that fight comes, I\nwant to be in it.\"\n\nHe had grown very much excited; and it was as though this excitement\nsuddenly revealed to me the full extent of the change that had taken\nplace in him since he had left college. As he stood facing me, almost\nglaring at me through his eye-glasses, I beheld a slim, nervous,\nfault-finding doctrinaire, incapable of understanding the world as it\nwas, lacking the force of his pioneer forefathers. I rather pitied him.\n\n\"I'm sorry we can't look at this thing alike, Perry,\" I told him. \"You've\nsaid solve pretty hard things, but I realize that you hold your point of\nview in good faith, and that you have come to me as an old friend. I hope\nit won't make any difference in our personal relations.\"\n\n\"I don't see how it can help making a difference,\" he answered slowly.\nHis excitement had cooled abruptly: he seemed dazed. At this moment my\nprivate stenographer entered to inform me that I was being called up on\nthe telephone from New York. \"Well, you have more important affairs to\nattend to, I won't bother you any more,\" he added.\n\n\"Hold on,\" I exclaimed, \"this call can wait. I'd like to talk it over\nwith you.\"\n\n\"I'm afraid it wouldn't be any use, Hugh,\" he said, and went out.\n\nAfter talking with the New York client whose local interests I\nrepresented I sat thinking over the conversation with Perry. Considering\nMaude's intimacy with and affection for the Blackwoods, the affair was\nawkward, opening up many uncomfortable possibilities; and it was the\nprospect of discomfort that bothered me rather than regret for the\nprobable loss of Perry's friendship. I still believed myself to have an\naffection for him: undoubtedly this was a sentimental remnant....\n\nThat evening after dinner Tom came in alone, and I suspected that Perry\nhad sent him. He was fidgety, ill at ease, and presently asked if I could\nsee him a moment in my study. Maude's glance followed us.\n\n\"Say, Hugh, this is pretty stiff,\" he blurted out characteristically,\nwhen the door was closed.\n\n\"I suppose you mean the Riverside Franchise,\" I said. He looked up at me,\nmiserably, from the chair into which he had sunk, his hands in his\npockets.\n\n\"You'll forgive me for talking about it, won't you? You used to lecture\nme once in a while at Cambridge, you know.\"\n\n\"That's all right--go ahead,\" I replied, trying to speak amiably.\n\n\"You know I've always admired you, Hugh,--I never had your ability,\" he\nbegan painfully, \"you've gone ahead pretty fast,--the truth is that Perry\nand I have been worried about you for some time. We've tried not to be\ntoo serious in showing it, but we've felt that these modern business\nmethods were getting into your system without your realizing it. There\nare some things a man's friends can tell him, and it's their duty to tell\nhim. Good God, haven't you got enough, Hugh,--enough success and enough\nmoney, without going into a thing like this Riverside scheme?\"\n\nI was intensely annoyed, if not angry; and I hesitated a moment to calm\nmyself.\n\n\"Tom, you don't understand my position,\" I said. \"I'm willing to discuss\nit with you, now that you've opened up the subject. Perry's been talking\nto you, I can see that. I think Perry's got queer ideas,--to be plain\nwith you, and they're getting queerer.\"\n\nHe sat down again while, with what I deemed a rather exemplary patience,\nI went over the arguments in favour of my position; and as I talked, it\nclarified in my own mind. It was impossible to apply to business an\nindividual code of ethics,--even to Perry's business, to Tom's business:\nthe two were incompatible, and the sooner one recognized that the better:\nthe whole structure of business was built up on natural, as opposed to\nethical law. We had arrived at an era of frankness--that was the\ntruth--and the sooner we faced this truth the better for our peace of\nmind. Much as we might deplore the political system that had grown up, we\nhad to acknowledge, if we were consistent, that it was the base on which\nour prosperity was built. I was rather proud of having evolved this\nargument; it fortified my own peace of mind, which had been disturbed by\nTom's attitude. I began to pity him. He had not been very successful in\nlife, and with the little he earned, added to Susan's income, I knew that\na certain ingenuity was required to make both ends meet. He sat listening\nwith a troubled look. A passing phase of feeling clouded for a brief\nmoment my confidence when there arose in my mind an unbidden memory of my\nyouth, of my father. He, too, had mistrusted my ingenuity. I recalled how\nI had out-manoeuvred him and gone to college; I remembered the March day\nso long ago, when Tom and I had stood on the corner debating how to\ndeceive him, and it was I who had suggested the nice distinction between\na boat and a raft. Well, my father's illogical attitude towards boyhood\nnature, towards human nature, had forced me into that lie, just as the\nsenseless attitude of the public to-day forced business into a position\nof hypocrisy.\n\n\"Well, that's clever,\" he said, slowly and perplexedly, when I had\nfinished. \"It's damned clever, but somehow it looks to me all wrong. I\ncan't pick it to pieces.\" He got up rather heavily. \"I--I guess I ought\nto be going. Susan doesn't know where I am.\"\n\nI was exasperated. It was clear, though he did not say so, that he\nthought me dishonest. The pain in his eyes had deepened.\n\n\"If you feel that way--\" I said.\n\n\"Oh, God, I don't know how I feel!\" he cried. \"You're the oldest friend I\nhave, Hugh,--I can't forget that. We'll say nothing more about it.\" He\npicked up his hat and a moment later I heard the front door close behind\nhim. I stood for a while stock-still, and then went into the living-room,\nwhere Maude was sewing.\n\n\"Why, where's Tom?\" she inquired, looking up.\n\n\"Oh, he went home. He said Susan didn't know where he was.\"\n\n\"How queer! Hugh, was there anything the matter? Is he in trouble?\" she\nasked anxiously.\n\nI stood toying with a book-mark, reflecting. She must inevitably come to\nsuspect that something had happened, and it would be as well to fortify\nher.\n\n\"The trouble is,\" I said after a moment, \"that Perry and Tom would like\nto run modern business on the principle of a charitable institution.\nUnfortunately, it is not practical. They're upset because I have been\nretained by a syndicate whose object is to develop some land out beyond\nMaplewood Avenue. They've bought the land, and we are asking the city to\ngive us a right to build a line out Maplewood Avenue, which is the\nobvious way to go. Perry says it will spoil the avenue. That's nonsense,\nin the first place. The avenue is wide, and the tracks will be in a grass\nplot in the centre. For the sake of keeping tracks off that avenue he\nwould deprive people of attractive homes at a small cost, of the good air\nthey can get beyond the heights; he would stunt the city's development.\"\n\n\"That does seem a little unreasonable,\" Maude admitted. \"Is that all he\nobjects to?\"\n\n\"No, he thinks it an outrage because, in order to get the franchise, we\nhave to deal with the city politicians. Well, it so happens, and always\nhas happened, that politics have been controlled by leaders, whom Perry\ncalls 'bosses,' and they are not particularly attractive men. You\nwouldn't care to associate with them. My father once refused to be mayor\nof the city for this reason. But they are necessities. If the people\ndidn't want them, they'd take enough interest in elections to throw them\nout. But since the people do want them, and they are there, every time a\nnew street-car line or something of that sort needs to be built they have\nto be consulted, because, without their influence nothing could be done.\nOn the other hand, these politicians cannot afford to ignore men of local\nimportance like Leonard Dickinson and Adolf Scherer and Miller Gorse who\nrepresent financial substance and' responsibility. If a new\nstreet-railroad is to be built, these are the logical ones to build it.\nYou have just the same situation in Elkington, on a smaller scale.\n\n\"Your family, the Hutchinses, own the mills and the street-railroads, and\nany new enterprise that presents itself is done with their money, because\nthey are reliable and sound.\"\n\n\"It isn't pleasant to think that there are such people as the\npoliticians, is it?\" said Maude, slowly.\n\n\"Unquestionably not,\" I agreed. \"It isn't pleasant to think of some other\ncrude forces in the world. But they exist, and they have to be dealt\nwith. Suppose the United States should refuse to trade with Russia\nbecause, from our republican point of view, we regarded her government as\ntyrannical and oppressive? or to cooperate with England in some\nundertaking for the world's benefit because we contended that she ruled\nIndia with an iron hand? In such a case, our President and Senate would\nbe scoundrels for making and ratifying a treaty. Yet here are Perry and\nTom, and no doubt Susan and Lucia, accusing me, a lifetime friend, of\ndishonesty because I happen to be counsel for a syndicate that wishes to\nbuild a street-railroad for the convenience of the people of the city.\"\n\n\"Oh, no, not of dishonesty!\" she exclaimed. \"I can't--I won't believe\nthey would do that.\"\n\n\"Pretty near it,\" I said. \"If I listened to them, I should have to give\nup the law altogether.\"\n\n\"Sometimes,\" she answered in a low voice, \"sometimes I wish you would.\"\n\n\"I might have expected that you would take their point of view.\"\n\nAs I was turning away she got up quickly and put her hand on my shoulder.\n\n\"Hugh, please don't say such things--you've no right to say them.\"\n\n\"And you?\" I asked.\n\n\"Don't you see,\" she continued pleadingly, \"don't you see that we are\ngrowing apart? That's the only reason I said what I did. It isn't that I\ndon't trust you, that I don't want you to have your work, that I demand\nall of you. I know a woman can't ask that,--can't have it. But if you\nwould only give me--give the children just a little, if I could feel that\nwe meant something to you and that this other wasn't gradually becoming\neverything, wasn't absorbing you more and more, killing the best part of\nyou. It's poisoning our marriage, it's poisoning all your relationships.\"\n\nIn that appeal the real Maude, the Maude of the early days of our\nmarriage flashed forth again so vividly that I was taken aback. I\nunderstood that she had had herself under control, had worn a mask--a\nmask I had forced on her; and the revelation of the continued existence\nof that other Maude was profoundly disturbing. Was it true, as she said,\nthat my absorption in the great game of modern business, in the modern\nAmerican philosophy it implied was poisoning my marriage? or was it that\nmy marriage had failed to satisfy and absorb me? I was touched--but\nsentimentally touched: I felt that this was a situation that ought to\ntouch me; I didn't wish to face it, as usual: I couldn't acknowledge to\nmyself that anything was really wrong... I patted her on the shoulder, I\nbent over and kissed her.\n\n\"A man in my position can't altogether choose just how busy he will be,\"\nI said smiling. \"Matters are thrust upon me which I have to accept, and I\ncan't help thinking about some of them when I come home. But we'll go off\nfor a real vacation soon, Maude, to Europe--and take the children.\"\n\n\"Oh, I hope so,\" she said.\n\nFrom this time on, as may be supposed, our intercourse with both the\nBlackwoods began to grow less frequent, although Maude continued to see a\ngreat deal of Lucia; and when we did dine in their company, or they with\nus, it was quite noticeable that their former raillery was suppressed.\nEven Tom had ceased to refer to me as the young Napoleon of the Law: he\nclung to me, but he too kept silent on the subject of business. Maude of\ncourse must have noticed this, must have sensed the change of atmosphere,\nhave known that the Blackwoods, at least, were maintaining appearances\nfor her sake. She did not speak to me of the change, nor I to her; but\nwhen I thought of her silence, it was to suspect that she was weighing\nthe question which had led up to the difference between Perry and me, and\nI had a suspicion that the fact that I was her husband would not affect\nher ultimate decision. This faculty of hers of thinking things out\ninstead of accepting my views and decisions was, as the saying goes,\ngetting a little \"on my nerves\": that she of all women should have\ndeveloped it was a recurring and unpleasant surprise. I began at times to\npity myself a little, to feel the need of sympathetic companionship\n--feminine companionship....\n\nI shall not go into the details of the procurement of what became known\nas the Riverside Franchise. In spite of the Maplewood residents, of the\nCity Improvement League and individual protests, we obtained it with\nabsurd ease. Indeed Perry Blackwood himself appeared before the Public\nUtilities Committee of the Board of Aldermen, and was listened to with\ndeference and gravity while he discoursed on the defacement of a\nbeautiful boulevard to satisfy the greed of certain private individuals.\nMr. Otto Bitter and myself, who appeared for the petitioners, had a\nsimilar reception. That struggle was a tempest in a tea-pot. The reformer\nraged, but he was feeble in those days, and the great public believed\nwhat it read in the respectable newspapers. In Mr. Judah B. Tallant's\nnewspaper, for instance, the Morning Era, there were semi-playful\neditorials about \"obstructionists.\" Mr. Perry Blackwood was a\nwell-meaning, able gentleman of an old family, etc., but with a sentiment\nfor horse-cars. The Era published also the resolutions which (with\ninteresting spontaneity!) had been passed by our Board of Trade and\nChamber of Commerce and other influential bodies in favour of the\nfranchise; the idea--unknown to the public--of Mr. Hugh Paret, who wrote\ndrafts of the resolutions and suggested privately to Mr. Leonard\nDickinson that a little enthusiasm from these organizations might be\nhelpful. Mr. Dickinson accepted the suggestion eagerly, wondering why he\nhadn't thought of it himself. The resolutions carried some weight with a\npublic that did not know its right hand from its left.\n\nAfter fitting deliberation, one evening in February the Board of Aldermen\nmet and granted the franchise. Not unanimously, oh, no! Mr. Jason was not\nso simple as that! No further visits to Monahan's saloon on my part, in\nthis connection were necessary; but Mr. Otto Bitter met me one day in the\nhotel with a significant message from the boss.\n\n\"It's all fixed,\" he informed me. \"Murphy and Scott and Ottheimer and\nGrady and Loth are the decoys. You understand?\"\n\n\"I think I gather your meaning,\" I said.\n\nMr. Bitter smiled by pulling down one corner of a crooked mouth.\n\n\"They'll vote against it on principle, you know,\" he added. \"We get a\nlittle something from the Maple Avenue residents.\"\n\nI've forgotten what the Riverside Franchise cost. The sum was paid in a\nlump sum to Mr. Bitter as his \"fee,\"--so, to their chagrin, a grand jury\ndiscovered in later years, when they were barking around Mr. Jason's hole\nwith an eager district attorney snapping his whip over them. I remember\nthe cartoon. The municipal geese were gone, but it was impossible to\nprove that this particular fox had used his enlightened reason in their\nprocurement. Mr. Bitter was a legally authorized fox, and could take\nfees. How Mr. Jason was to be rewarded by the land company's left-hand,\nunknown, to the land company's right hand, became a problem worthy of a\ngenius. The genius was found, but modesty forbids me to mention his name,\nand the problem was solved, to wit: the land company bought a piece of\ndowntown property from--Mr. Ryerson, who was Mr. Grierson's real estate\nman and the agent for the land company, for a consideration of thirty\nthousand dollars. An unconfirmed rumour had it that Mr. Ryerson turned\nover the thirty thousand to Mr. Jason. Then the Riverside Company issued\na secret deed of the same property back to Mr. Ryerson, and this deed was\nnot recorded until some years later.\n\nSuch are the elaborate transactions progress and prosperity demand.\nNature is the great teacher, and we know that her ways are at times\ncomplicated and clumsy. Likewise, under the \"natural\" laws of economics,\nnew enterprises are not born without travail, without the aid of legal\nphysicians well versed in financial obstetrics. One hundred and fifty to\ntwo hundred thousand, let us say, for the right to build tracks on\nMaplewood Avenue, and we sold nearly two million dollars worth of the\nsecurities back to the public whose aldermen had sold us the franchise.\nIs there a man so dead as not to feel a thrill at this achievement? And\nlet no one who declares that literary talent and imagination are\nnonexistent in America pronounce final judgment until he reads that\nprospectus, in which was combined the best of realism and symbolism, for\nthe labours of Alonzo Cheyne were not to be wasted, after all. Mr.\nDickinson, who was a director in the Maplewood line, got a handsome\nunderwriting percentage, and Mr. Berringer, also a director, on the bonds\nand preferred stock he sold. Mr. Paret, who entered both companies on the\nground floor, likewise got fees. Everybody was satisfied except the\ntrouble makers, who were ignored. In short, the episode of the Riverside\nFranchise is a triumphant proof of the contention that business men are\nthe best fitted to conduct the politics of their country.\n\nWe had learned to pursue our happiness in packs, we knew that the Happy\nHunting-Grounds are here and now, while the Reverend Carey Heddon\ncontinued to assure the maimed, the halt and the blind that their kingdom\nwas not of this world, that their time was coming later. Could there have\nbeen a more idyl arrangement! Everybody should have been satisfied, but\neverybody was not. Otherwise these pages would never have been written.","title":"A Far Country \u2014 Volume 2","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":51518}