Still Jim

by Morrow, Honore

  "We are," replied Jim, "and yonder is the train."

  The automobile drew into the station with the train and Uncle Denny, with Henderson, helped embark poor Sara on his last ride, while Jim put Pen aboard the train. Pen followed Jim back onto the train platform. Jim shook hands with her and stood on the lower step waiting for the train to start. His face in the dawn light was very wistful. Suddenly Pen's lips quivered. Just as the train began to move, "Jim!" she whispered. And she leaned over and caught his face between her hands and kissed him quickly on the lips. Then she slipped into the coach. Jim dropped off the train and stood staring unseeingly at Uncle Denny and Henderson. A to-hee sang its morning song from a nearby cactus:

  "O yahee! O yahai!

  Sweet as arrow weed in spring!"

  "Put your hat on, me boy," said Uncle Denny, who had not seen the little episode, "and come on." He led the way to the machine and climbed in beside Jim. "Well, Still, she's gone!"

  Jim turned and looked at his Uncle Denny. "She's not gone for long. When I have finished the Project fight I shall go after her."

  "Did she agree?" asked Uncle Denny eagerly.

  "No," said Jim serenely. "She's in the frame of mind that's to be expected after the life she's lived with Sara. She is afraid of everything. After the election, I shall go to her. She and I have missed enough of each other."

  Dennis brought his fist down on his knee. "Then that's settled right, thank God!" he said to the dawn at large.

  The next day Mrs. Ames came up to the dam. She was inconsolable that she had not been sent for, to help Pen and Mrs. Flynn's air of superiority was not soothing. Uncle Denny took to Mrs. Ames at once.

  "I've done nothing but gad for Mr. Manning, lately," she said.

  "How are things going?" asked Mrs. Flynn. "Has Bill Evans got all the money yet?"

  "Eh? What's this?" exclaimed Uncle Denny.

  "Mrs. Pen thought it would do a lot of good if we could get the farmers' wives to working against Fleckenstein," said Jane. "I've been calling on a lot of them. Bill Evans takes me in his auto."

  "Who pays Bill?" asked Uncle Denny. "Ames?"

  "He does not, though he honestly offered to," said Jane. "This is a woman's job. Mrs. Flynn is paying for it. And don't you tell Mr. Manning. So far he hasn't asked any questions. Oscar says he's too worried over other things."

  "Bless us!" cried Uncle Denny. "That won't do! You must let me straighten it up."

  Mrs. Flynn rapped on the table with the dripping mixing spoon with which she had followed Jane in from the kitchen. "Michael Dennis! You will not! What's me money for if it ain't for him? Ain't he all I've got in the wide world and you grutch me that? God knows I never thought I'd come to this to be told I couldn't do for him! If God lets me live to spare my life I hope to spend every cent I've got back on the Boss."

  Uncle Denny nodded. "All right! You're a good woman, Mrs. Flynn. How is your campaign going, Mrs. Ames?"

  Jane shook her head. "You never know which way a woman will jump. If only Fleckenstein can be beaten, it will be Mr. Manning's personality that beats him, and after that he can do whatever he wants to with the valley. But the election is only a little way off and I'm scared to death. I've talked and visited until I'm ashamed of myself. And there's only one woman in the valley I'm sure of."

  "Who is she?" asked Uncle Denny.

  "That's Mrs. Cady, a rich widow who lives near Cabillo. She's the terror of the valley. She's a scold and she holds half the mortgages in the county. She stopped Mr. Manning a while ago and asked what he meant by running one of the canals the way it was. Then, just because he's always nice to a woman, Mr. Manning stands and lets her explain his business to him for half an hour. When she got through he thanked her and said it was always wise to trust a woman's intuition. She thought she'd taught him a real valuable lesson and she said he was the only man she ever saw that knew good advice when he got it. Well, when I went round to her the other day and told her what Mr. Manning was up against, she flew round like a wet hen. I've heard she threatened to foreclose on anyone that voted for Fleckenstein."

  Uncle Denny chuckled. "And the boy thinks he has no friends!"

  The fight into which Jim had thrown himself was an intangible one. He knew that he could not save his job for himself, but he believed that if he could defeat Fleckenstein, he would have made the farmers assume a responsibility for the Project that would never be lost.

  Uncle Denny did not tell Jim that he knew that every day lessened Jim's term of office on the dam. He asked no embarrassing questions. One day, as they stood looking at the dam slowly emerging from the river bed to lie in the utter beauty of strength at the Elephant's feet, Jim said:

  "I wonder if another man will love the dam as I have. There is not a stone in it that I don't know and care for."

  But Uncle Denny only nodded and said in reply, "A man must love the thing he creates whether it's a dam or a child." But his heart ached within him.

  The Department of Agriculture had responded immediately and half a dozen experts already were at work on the Project. The older farmers resented any suggestions that were made regarding their methods, but little by little the newcomers were turning to the experts, and Jim believed that even in a year scientific farming would be a settled fact on the Project.

  Every moment that Jim could spare from hastening the work on the dam he spent in the valley with the farmers. He did not harangue. He had come to realize that deep within us all dwells a hunger of the soul on which, when roused, the world wings forward. So he induced these men to talk to him and listened, wondering at the deeps he touched. He did not realize that often they were ashamed to show him narrowness or selfishness when through his wistful silence they glimpsed his unsatisfied visioning. Nothing in life is so contagious as a great dream.

  As far as the Project was concerned, the story of Jim's alleged interview with Freet made little impression, after all. Insinuations and accusations had appeared so often about the engineers of the dam in the local papers that they had ceased to be a sensation. In the East, though, Jim knew the story would leave its permanent imprint. Murphy interviewed Fleckenstein and never would tell what he and the politician said to each other. But the threat of the letter never was carried out. Fleckenstein continued a vigorous campaign, however. Money and whiskey flowed freely and Fleckenstein saw every man that Jim saw.

  Uncle Denny was only temporarily dismayed by Jim's refusal to allow him to work openly against Fleckenstein. Mrs. Ames, having come to the end of her talking capacity, he hired Bill Evans and his machine for the remaining six weeks of the campaign. Bill was quite willing to let the hogs go hungry while he and his machine were in demand.

  Uncle Denny said: "A twenty-mile ride in Bill's tonneau is better as a flesh reducer than ten hours in a Turkish bath. It is the truth when I tell folks I'm riding for me health."

  Uncle Denny made himself newsgetter-in-chief for Jim. He scoured the valley for reports on the state of mind of every water user and business man on the Project. Oscar and Murphy, when not with Jim, devoted themselves to Uncle Denny. Both the men were frankly giving all their time to the Project these days.

  The weeks sped by all too rapidly. One evening Uncle Denny called a conference at Jim's house. Jim, coming home from the office at ten o'clock that night, found Murphy and Henderson and Oscar awaiting him with Uncle Denny as master of ceremonies.

  "Me boy," said Uncle Denny, "there's going to be a landslide for Fleckenstein."

  Jim nodded. "I think so. Well, anyhow, I've made one or two friends below who'll remember after I'm gone some of the things I've wanted for the Project."

  Uncle Denny, standing before the grate, looked at Jim in a troubled way. The Big Boss, as he loved to call Jim, was looking very tired.

  "Well," said Murphy, "Fleckenstein can't make much trouble for a year. Even after he takes his seat it will take time to start things even with the money from the Trust. And in the meantime the Big Boss will be able to put up a great
counter-irritant out here if what he's done the last few weeks is any sample."

  Jim lighted his pipe and leaned back in his chair. "I won't be here, boys," he said. "This is confidential. I have been asked for my resignation and it takes effect the day after election."

  There was utter silence in the room for a moment, then Henderson leaned forward and spat past Uncle Denny into the grate.

  "Hell's fire!" he said gently.

  "How long have you known this, Boss?" asked Murphy.

  "Nearly three months," answered Jim.

  "Pen told me," said Dennis. "Suma-theek told her."

  Jim looked up in astonishment, then he shook his head. "I'm sorry Pen has that to bother her, too."

  Murphy jumped to his feet. "And you have known this three months and never told us! Is that any way to treat your friends? Do you suppose we want to lie by and see you licked off this dam like a yellow cur? It's no use for you to ask this to be kept quiet, Boss. I won't do it."

  Jim rose and pointed his pipe at Murphy. "Murphy, if you try to use this confidential talk to raise sentiment for me, I'll fire you!"

  "You can't fire my friendship!" shouted Murphy. "You can have my job any time you want it!"

  Here Oscar Ames spoke for the first time. "When's Mrs. Penelope coming back?"

  "Don't you get her out here," said Jim. "She can do no good and she needs peace and quiet."

  * * *

  CHAPTER XXVI

  THE END OF THE SILENT CAMPAIGN

  "The dream in them of a greater good lifts humans from the level of brutes. Take this dream from them and they are like quenched comets."

  Musings of the Elephant.

  It was Oscar's turn to get to his feet. "Manning," he said, "ain't you learned your lesson yet? Who was it kicked me out of the dirty political scrape I was getting into and made me see straight? Huh? Who was it? Well, it was my wife. And who woke my wife up? It was Mrs. Pen, wasn't it? And who, by your own admission, showed you things you'd been seeing crooked all your life? Huh? 'Twas Mrs. Pen, wasn't it? You're as moss-bound in lots of ways as a farmer. Now I've learned my lesson. I'm willing to admit that women folks has got intuitions that beat our fine ideas all hollow. She may not do us any good. But I want to know what she thinks about things. I'll be yelling votes for women next. Gimme her address. I'm going to send her a night message they'll have to use an adding machine to count the words in."

  "What can be done in a week?" asked Jim, with his first show of irritation. "I won't have her bothered, I tell you."

  "Still Jim," said Uncle Denny, "do you suppose she's thought of anything else but the situation out here, excepting, of course, poor Sara? And Pen's Irish! Even long distance fighting has charms for her."

  Henderson looked at Jim's dark circled eyes and his compressed lips. "Go to bed, Boss," he said in his tender voice. "See if you can't get some sleep. You have done your best. Is there anyone in the valley you ain't seen yet?"

  "Two or three," said Jim.

  "See them," said Henderson. "We are going to put up a fight to keep you here, Mr. Manning."

  Jim started for his bedroom door, then he came back and said slowly: "I don't want you fellows to misunderstand me. I'm the least important item in this matter. I admit that it's crucifying me to leave the dam, but there is no doubt they can find a better man than I am for the job. I woke up too late. You folks must keep on in one last fight against Fleckenstein. For Fleckenstein stands for repudiation. Repudiation means the undermining of the basic principle of the Reclamation Service. And the loss of that principle means the loss of the Projects as a great working ideal for America. It was that principle that was the real kernel of the New England dream in this country. We've got to work not so much for equality in freedom as for equality in responsibility to the nation. Don't waste a moment on keeping me here. Make one last effort to defeat Fleckenstein."

  Then Jim went into his room and closed the door.

  When he had gone, Murphy said in a low voice: "It's too late to lick Fleckenstein. Are we going to lie down on the Boss losing his job, boys?"

  "Not till I've beaten the face off Fleckenstein," said Henderson, softly.

  "I want to get in touch with Mrs. Pen," said Oscar Ames.

  "Aw, forget it, Ames!" said Murphy. "I don't doubt she's a smart girl, but this is no suffragette meeting."

  "Don't try to start anything," said Oscar. "Wait till you're married for thirty years like me and maybe you'll have learned a thing or two."

  "Don't quarrel, boys," said Uncle Denny. "Me heart is like lead within me. How can I think of Jim as anywhere but with the Service?"

  "If he goes, I go," said Henderson. "The only reason I stayed up on the Makon was because of him. What's the matter with the wooden heads in this country? I'd like to be fool killer for a year."

  Murphy was chewing his cigar. "You'd have to commit suicide if you was," he said. "I've tried everything against Fleckenstein except the one way to swing votes in America and that's with whiskey or dollars. Under the circumstance we can't use either. I'm going to turn in. I'm at the end of my rope."

  Henderson followed Murphy to the door. Oscar Ames forgot to lower his voice. He squared his big shoulders and shouted: "You blame quitters! I ain't ashamed to ask women for ideas if you are. The women got me into this fight and I'll bet they get me out."

  He nodded belligerently at Uncle Denny and strode out into the night. Uncle Denny, left alone in the living room, stood long on the hearthrug, talking to himself and now and again shaking his head despondently.

  "I mind how after he found himself, he was always making trails in front of the old fireplace in the brownstone front. I mind how he first heard of the Reclamation Service. 'How'd you like that, Uncle Denny,' he said, 'James Manning, U.S.R.S.' What'll he do now, poor lad?

  "Thank God his father's dead, for if he felt worse than I do he'd kill himself. No! No! I'll not say that! He'd have felt like meself that 'twas worth all the sorrow to hear Still put his idea ahead of himself as he did tonight. That's the test of a man's sincerity. And in her heart, his mother'll be glad. She's always worried lest he get killed on one of his dams, bless her heart."

  Uncle Denny moved about the room, closing the door and putting away the cigars. He picked Jim's hat off the floor and patted it softly as he hung it up.

  "What'll he do now, poor boy?" he murmured. Then he turned out the light and went to bed.

  Jim received a message the next morning, saying that a certain Herr Gluck would reach the dam that afternoon.

  "And who is he?" asked Uncle Denny.

  "He's an engineer the German government is sending over to see some of the stunts I've been doing on the dam," said Jim. "I'll show him round, then I'll turn him over to you for the hour before supper. I want to see old Miguel, who is coming up to the dam."

  "I'm itching to lay hands on him. Does he speak English?"

  Jim laughed. "Better than I do. He's written me a couple of times."

  Jim brought Herr Gluck in over the great road. The German was full of enthusiasm. "Blasted from solid rock! How not like America! This was built for the future! How did you come to do it?"

  Jim smiled and shrugged his shoulders.

  "You belong not to this country," Herr Gluck went on, "you belong to the old world where they build for their descendants."

  Jim thoroughly enjoyed the long afternoon on the dam with the German. Herr Gluck's questions were searching and invigorating. They took Jim out of himself and he showed Herr Gluck a scientific knowledge and enthusiasm that few people were fitted to appreciate.

  At five o'clock Jim took Herr Gluck up to his house and turned him over to Uncle Denny. The rotund, flaxen-haired German and the rotund, gray-haired Irishman took stock of each other. Uncle Denny moved two chairs before the open door.

  Herr Gluck sat down. "Himmel! What beauty!" he exclaimed, as the faint lavender distances with the far mountains flashing sunset gold met his gaze. "Not strange that Mr. Manning has enthusiasm."
/>
  Uncle Denny sighed in a relieved way as if he had catalogued the newcomer.

  "They say," said Dennis, "that a man must close his soul to the Big Country or else he will become great or go mad. And do you think me boy has done good work here, Herr Gluck?"

  The German made some extraordinary rings of smoke and nodded his head slowly. "He has done some daring things well that may not be great in themselves, but they show imagination. That is the point. He has imagination. Many are the engineers who are accurate, who are trustworthy, but imagination, creative ability, no! You observe the shape of his head, his jaw, his hands—the dreamer, urged into action. And the impudence of his sand-cement idea! In my country we dare make our concrete only very rich. He shows me this afternoon that diluted rightly with sand, cement can be made stronger." Herr Gluck chuckled delightedly.

  Uncle Denny almost purred. "He was so as a lad. He was captain of his school football teams because he could think of more wild tactics than all the rest of them put together. And always got away with them, looking sad and never an unnecessary word."

  Herr Gluck nodded. "He is so valuable here that I think it not possible I get him to come to Germany yet?"

  Michael Dennis got red in the face and took a long breath. "But they don't appreciate him here. He's been asked to resign in a few days now."

  The German's round eyes grew rounder. "Nein! And why? Has he got into foolishness? He is young, they must remember."

  "It's a long tale," said Uncle Denny, "but I'll tell it to you," and he plunged into the story of the Project.

  Herr Gluck listened breathlessly.

  "And so you see," Dennis ended, "that for all he has done he feels he's failed, for everything the dam has stood for in his mind has come to naught. And that's a bad feeling for a man as young as Jim. He'll never readjust himself, Jim won't. He can get another job but his life's big dream will have gone to smash. His inspiration will be gone. And what will he do then, poor boy?"