The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him

by Paul Leicester Ford

  CHAPTER XXIV.

  MISUNDERSTANDINGS AND UNDERSTANDINGS.

  "Did you understand what it all meant, Cousin Anneke?" asked Dorothy, asthey were coming downstairs.

  "No. The man who got so angry seemed to think Mr. Stirling had--"

  She stopped short. A group of men on the sidewalk were talking, and shepaused to hear one say:

  "To see that young chap Stirling handling Maguire was an eye-opener."

  Another man laughed, rather a deep, quiet laugh. "Maguire understandseverything but honesty," he said. "You can always beat him with that."

  Miss De Voe would have like to stay and listen, but there were too manymen. So the ladies entered the carriage.

  "At least we know that he said he was trying to tell the truth," shewent on, "and you just heard what that man said. I don't know why theyall laughed."

  "He didn't seem to mind a bit."

  "No. Hasn't he a funny half-embarrassed, half-cool manner?"

  "He wasn't embarrassed after he was fairly speaking. You know he wasreally fine-looking, when he spoke."

  "Yes," said Dorothy. "You said he had a dull, heavy face."

  "That was the first time I saw him, Dorothy. It's a face which variesvery much. Oliver, drive to the United States. We will take him home todinner."

  "Oh, good," cried the youngest. "Then he will tell us why they laughed."

  As they drove up to the hotel, Peter had just reached the steps. Heturned to the carriage, the moment he saw that they wanted him.

  "We wish to carry you off to a simple country dinner," Miss De Voe toldhim.

  "I am going to take the special to New York, and that leaves in half anhour."

  "Take a later train."

  "My ticket wouldn't be good on it."

  Most men Miss De Voe would have snubbed on the spot, but to Peter shesaid: "Then get another ticket."

  "I don't care to do that," said Peter.

  "Oh, please, Mr. Stirling," said Minna. "I want to ask you a lot ofquestions about the convention."

  "Hush, Minna," said Miss De Voe. She was nettled that Peter shouldrefuse, and that her niece could stoop to beg of "a criminal lawyer andward politician," as she put it mentally. But she was determined not toshow it "We are sorry. Good-evening. Home, Oliver."

  So they did not learn from Peter why the convention laughed. The subjectwas brought up at dinner, and Dorothy asked the opinion of the voters ofthe family.

  "Probably he had made a fluke of some kind," one said.

  "More probably he had out-sharped the other side," suggested a second.

  "It will be in the papers to-morrow," said the first suggestor.

  The three women looked in the next day's papers, but the reporters wereas much at sea in regard to the Stirling-sixth-ward incident, as hadbeen the rank-and-file in the convention. Three took their views fromMaguire, and called it "shameful treason," and the like. Two called it"unprincipled and contradictory conduct." One alone said that "Mr.Stirling seemed to be acting conscientiously, if erratically." Just whateffect it had had on the candidates none of the papers agreed in. Onesaid it had killed Porter. Another, that "it was a purely personalmatter without influence on the main question." The other papers shadedbetween these, though two called it "a laughable incident." Theopposition press naturally saw in it an entire discrediting of bothfactions of the Democratic party, and absolute proof that the nomineefinally selected was unfit for office.

  Unable to sift out the truth, the ladies again appealed to the voters ofthe family.

  "Oh," said one, "Stirling did something tricky and was caught in it."

  "I don't believe that," said Miss De Voe.

  "Nor I," said Dorothy.

  "Well, if you want to make your political heeler an angel, I have noobjection," laughed the enfranchised being.

  "I don't think a man who made that speech about the children can be ascoundrel," said Dorothy.

  "I don't either," said Minna.

  "That's the way you women reason," responded he of the masculineintellect. "Because a man looks out for some sick kittens, ergo, he is apolitical saint. If you must take up with politicians, do takeRepublicans, for then, at least, you have a small percentage of chancein your favor that they are gentlemen."

  "Don't be a Pharisee, Lispenard," said Miss De Voe, utilizing Peter'srebuke.

  "Then don't trouble me with political questions. Politics are so vulgarin this country that no gentleman keeps up with them."

  Miss De Voe and the two girls dropped the "vulgar" subject, but Miss DeVoe said later:

  "I should like to know what they laughed at?"

  "Do ask him--if he comes to call on you, this winter, Cousin Anneke."

  "No. I asked him once and he did not come." Miss De Voe paused a moment."I shall not ask him again," she added.

  "I don't think he intends to be rude," said Dorothy.

  "No," responded Miss De Voe. "I don't think he knows what he is doing.He is absolutely without our standards, and it is just as well for boththat he shouldn't call." Woman-like, Miss De Voe forgot that she hadsaid Peter was a gentleman.

  If Peter had found himself a marked man in the trip up, he was doubly soon the return train. He sat most of the time by himself, pondering onwhat had happened, but he could not be unconscious of the number ofpeople to whom he was pointed out. He was conscious too, that his coursehad not been understood, and that many of those who looked at him withinterest, did so without approbation. He was not buoyed up either, by asense that he had succeeded in doing the best. He had certainly hurtPorter, and had made enemies of Maguire and Kennedy. Except for the factthat he had tried to do right, he could see no compensating balance.

  Naturally the newspapers the next morning did not cheer him, thoughperhaps he cared less for what they said than he ought. He sent them,good, bad, and indifferent, to his mother, writing her at the same timea long letter, telling her how and why he had taken this course. Hewrote also a long letter to Porter, explaining his conduct. Porter hadalready been told that Peter was largely responsible for his defeat, butafter reading Peter's letter, he wrote him a very kind reply, thankinghim for his support and for his letter. "It is not always easy to dowhat one wants in politics," he wrote, "but if one tries with highmotives, for high things, even defeat loses its bitterness. I shall notbe able to help you, in your wished-for reforms as greatly as I hoped,but I am not quite a nonentity in politics even now, and if at any timeyou think my aid worth the asking, do not hesitate to call on me forit. I shall always be glad to see you at my house for a meal or a night,whether you come on political matters or merely for a chat."

  Peter found his constituents torn with dissensions over his andKennedy's course in the convention. He did not answer in kind the blameand criticism industriously sowed by Kennedy; but he dropped into ahalf-a-dozen saloons in the next few days, and told "the b'ys" a prettyfull history of the "behind-the-scenes" part.

  "I'm afraid I made mistakes," he frankly acknowledged, "yet even now Idon't see how I could have done differently. I certainly thought I wasdoing right."

  "An' so yez were," shouted Dennis. "An' if that dirty beast Kennedyshows his dirty face inside these doors, it's a washin' it will get widthe drainin' av the beer-glasses. We wants none av his dirty bargainshere."

  "I don't know that he had made any bargain," said Peter.

  "But we do," shouted one of the men. "It's a bargain he's alwaysmakin'."

  "Yes," said Dennis. "It's Kennedy looks out for himself, an' we'll lethim do it next time all by himself." It could not be traced to itsorigin, but in less than a week the consensus of opinion in the ward wasthat: "Kennedy voted for himself, but Stirling for us."

  The ward, too, was rather proud of the celebrity it had achieved. Thepapers had not merely paragraphed Peter, and the peculiar position ofthe "district" in the convention, but they had begun now askingquestions as to how the ward would behave. "Would it support Catlin?""Was it true that the ward machine had split, and intended to nominateri
val tickets?" "Had one faction made a deal with the Republicans?"

  "Begobs," said Dennis, "it's the leaders an' the papers are just aftherdiscoverin' there is a sixth ward, an' it's Misther Stirling's made themdo it."

  The chief party leaders had stayed over at Saratoga, but Peter had acall from Costell before the week was out.

  "The papers gave it to you rather rough," Costell said kindly, "but theydidn't understand it. We thought you behaved very square."

  "They tell me I did Porter harm."

  "No. It was Maguire did the harm. You simply told about it. Of courseyou get the blame."

  "My constituents stand by me."

  "How do they like Catlin?"

  "I think they are entirely satisfied. I'm afraid they never cared muchwho got it."

  "I'm told Kennedy is growling, and running amuck?"

  "He's down on Catlin and me."

  "Well, if you think best, we'll placate him? But Gallagher seemed tothink he couldn't do much?"

  "I don't think he has much of a following. Even Moriarty, who was hisstrong card, has gone back on him."

  "Will you make a couple of speeches for us in this ward?"

  "If you'll let me say what I want?"

  "You can support us?"

  "Yes."

  "Then we'll leave it to you. Only beware of making too many statements.You'll get dates and places from the committee as soon as they aresettled. We pay twenty-five dollars a night. If you hit the right key,we may want you in some of the other wards, too."

  "I shall be glad to talk. It's what I've been doing to small crowds inthe saloons."

  "So I'm told. You'll never get a better place. Men listen there, as theynever will at a mass-meeting." Costell rose. "If you are free nextSunday, come up into Westchester and take a two o'clock dinner with me.We won't talk politics, but you shall see a nice little woman, who'sgood enough to make my life happier, and after we've looked over mystables, I'll bring you back to the city behind a gray mare that willpass about anything there is on the road."

  So Peter had a half day in the country and enjoyed it very much. Helooked over Mrs. Costell's flower-garden, in which she spent almost herwhole time, and chatted with her about it. He saw the beautiful stables,and their still more beautiful occupants. He liked the couple very much.Both were simple and silent people, of little culture, but it seemed toPeter that the atmosphere had a gentle, homely tone that was verypleasing. As he got into the light buggy, he said to Mrs. Costell:

  "I'll get the seed of that mottled gillyflower from my mother as soon aspossible. Perhaps you'll let me bring it up myself?"

  "Do," she said. "Come again, whether you get the seed or not."

  After they had started, Mr. Costell said: "I'm glad you asked that. Mrs.Costell doesn't take kindly to many of the men who are in politics withme, but she liked you, I could see."

  Peter spoke twice in the next week in small halls in his ward. He hadgood audiences, and he spoke well, if simply.

  "There ain't no fireworks in his stuff," said the ward satirist. "Hedon't unfurl the American flag, nor talk about liberty and theconstitution. He don't even speak of us as noble freemen. He talks justas if he thought we was in a saloon. A feller that made that speechabout the babies ought to treat us to something moving."

  That was what many of the ward thought. Still they went because theywanted to see if he wouldn't burst out suddenly. They felt that Peterhad unlimited potentialities in the way of eloquence (for eloquence tothem meant the ability to move the emotions) and merely saved hispowers. Without quite knowing it they found what he had to sayinteresting. He brought the questions at issue straight back toelementary forms. He showed just how each paragraph in the platformwould directly affect, not the state, but the "district."

  "He's thoroughly good," the party leaders were told. "If he would abusethe other side a little more, and stick in a little tinsel and calciumlight he would be great."

  So he was called upon to speak elsewhere in the city. He worked at oneof the polls on election day, and was pleased to find that he was ableto prevent a little of the "trading" for which Kennedy had arranged. Hisward went Democratic, as was a foregone conclusion, but by an unusuallylarge majority, and Peter found that he and Dennis were given the creditfor it, both in the ward, and at headquarters. Catlin was elected, andthe Assembly had been won. So Peter felt that his three months' work hadnot been an entire failure. The proceeds of his speeches had added alsotwo hundred and fifty dollars to his savings bank account, and onehundred more to the account of "Peter Stirling, Trustee."