CHAPTER XX
Ellen was staying at the Boyd house. She went downstairs the morningafter her arrival, and found the bread--bakery bread--toasted andgrowing cold on the table, while a slice of ham, ready to be cooked, wasnot yet on the fire, and Mrs. Boyd had run out to buy some milk.
Dan had already gone, and his half-empty cup of black coffee was on thekitchen table. Ellen sniffed it and raised her eyebrows.
She rolled up her sleeves, put the toast in the oven and the ham in thefrying pan, with much the same grimness with which she had sat the nightbefore listening to Mrs. Boyd's monologue. If this was the way theylooked after Willy Cameron, no wonder he was thin and pale. She threwout the coffee, which she suspected had been made by the time-savingmethod of pouring water on last night's grounds, and made a fresh pot ofit. After that she inspected the tea towels, and getting a tin dishpan,set them to boil in it on the top of the range.
"Enough to give him typhoid," she reflected.
Ellen disapproved of her surroundings; she disapproved of any woman whodid not boil her tea towels. And when Edith came down carefully dressedand undeniably rouged she formed a disapproving opinion of that younglady, which was that she was trying to land Willy Cameron, and that hewould be better dead than landed.
She met Edith's stare of surprise with one of thinly veiled hostility.
"Hello!" said Edith. "When did you blow in, and where from?"
"I came to see Mr. Cameron last night, and he made me stay."
"A friend of Willy's! Well, I guess you needn't pay for your breakfastby cooking it. Mother's probably run out for something--she never hasanything in the house--and is talking somewhere. I'll take that fork."
But Ellen proceeded to turn the ham.
"I'll do it," she said. "You might spoil your hands."
But Edith showed no offense.
"All right," she acceded indifferently. "If you're going to eat it you'dbetter cook it. We're rotten housekeepers here."
"I should think, if you're going to keep boarders, somebody would learnto cook. Mr. Cameron's mother is the best housekeeper in town, and hewas raised on good food and plenty of it."
Her tone was truculent. Ellen's world, the world of short hours andeasy service, of the decorum of the Cardew servants' hall, of luxuryand dignity and good pay, had suddenly gone to pieces about her. Shewas feeling very bitter, especially toward a certain chauffeur who hadprophesied the end of all service. He had made the statement thatbefore long all people would be equal. There would be no above andbelow-stairs, no servants' hall.
"They'll drive their own cars, then, damn them," he had said once, "ifthey can get any to drive. And answer their own bells, if they've gotany to ring. And get up and cook their own breakfasts."
"Which you won't have any to cook," Grayson had said irritably, fromthe head of the long table. "Just a word, my man. That sort of talk isforbidden here. One word more and I go to Mr. Cardew."
The chauffeur had not sulked, however. "All right, Mr. Grayson," he saidaffably. "But I can go on thinking, I daresay. And some of these daysyou'll be wishing you'd climbed on the band wagon before it's too late."
Ellen, turning the ham carefully, was conscious that her revolt had beenonly partially on Lily's account. It was not so much Lily's plightas the abuse of power, although she did not put it that way, that haddriven her out. Ellen then had carried out her own small revolution, andwhere had it put her? She had lost a good home, and what could she do?All she knew was service.
Edith poured herself a cup of coffee, and taking a piece of toast fromthe oven, stood nibbling it. The crumbs fell on the not over-cleanfloor.
"Why don't you go into the dining-room to eat?" Ellen demanded.
"Got out of the wrong side of the bed, didn't you?" Edith asked."Willy's bed, I suppose. I'm not hungry, and I always eat breakfast likethis. I wish he would hurry. We'll be late."
Ellen stared. It was her first knowledge that this girl, this paintedhussy, worked in Willy's pharmacy, and her suspicions increased. Shehad a quick vision, as she had once had of Lily, of Edith in the Cameronhouse; Edith reading or embroidering on the front porch while Willy'smother slaved for her; Edith on the same porch in the evening, with allthe boys in town around her. She knew the type, the sort that set anentire village by the ears and in the end left home and husband and ranaway with a traveling salesman.
Ellen had already got Willy married and divorced when Mrs. Boyd came in.She carried the milk pail, but her lips were blue and she sat down in achair and held her hand to her heart.
"I'm that short of breath!" she gasped. "I declare I could hardly getback."
"I'll give you some coffee, right off."
When Willy Cameron had finished his breakfast she followed him into theparlor. His pallor was not lost on her, or his sunken eyes. He lookedbadly fed, shabby, and harassed, and he bore the marks of his sleeplessnight on his face. "Are you going to stay here?" she demanded.
"Why, yes, Miss Ellen."
"Your mother would break her heart if she knew the way you're living."
"I'm very comfortable. We've tried to get a ser--" He changed colorat that. In the simple life of the village at home a woman whose onlytraining was the town standard of good housekeeping might go intoservice in the city and not lose caste. But she was never thought of asa servant. "--help," he substituted. "But we can't get any one, and Mrs.Boyd is delicate. It is heart trouble."
"Does that girl work where you do?"
"Yes. Why?"
"Is she engaged to you? She calls you Willy." He smiled into her eyes.
"Not a bit of it, or thinking of it."
"How do you know what she's thinking? It's all over her. It's Willy thisand Willy that--and men are such fools."
There flashed into his mind certain things that he had tried to forget;Edith at his doorway, with that odd look in her eyes; Edith never goingto sleep until he had gone to bed; and recently, certain things she hadsaid, that he had passed over lightly and somewhat uncomfortably.
"That's ridiculous, Miss Ellen. But even if it were true, which itisn't, don't you think it would be rather nice of her?" He smiled.
"I do not. I heard you going out last night, Willy. Did you find her?"
"She is at the Doyles'. I didn't see her."
"That'll finish it," Ellen prophesied, somberly. She glanced around theparlor, at the dust on the furniture, at the unwashed baseboard, at theunwound clock on the mantel shelf.
"If you're going to stay here I will," she announced abruptly. "I owethat much to your mother. I've got some money. I'll take what they'dpay some foreigner who'd throw out enough to keep another family." Then,seeing hesitation in his eyes: "That woman's sick, and you've got to belooked after. I could do all the work, if that--if the girl would helpin the evenings."
He demurred at first. She would find it hard. They had no luxuries, andshe was accustomed to luxury. There was no room for her. But in theend he called Edith and Mrs. Boyd, and was rather touched to find Edithoffering to share her upper bedroom.
"It's a hole," she said, "cold in winter and hot as blazes in summer.But there's room for a cot, and I guess we can let each other alone."
"I wish you'd let me move up there, Edith," he said for perhaps thetwentieth time since he had found out where she slept, "and you wouldtake my room."
"No chance," she said cheerfully. "Mother would raise the devil if youtried it." She glanced at Ellen's face. "If that word shocks you, you'redue for a few shocks, you know."
"The way you talk is your business, not mine," said Ellen austerely.
When they finally departed on a half-run Ellen was established asa fixture in the Boyd house, and was already piling all the cookingutensils into a wash boiler and with grim efficiency was searching forlye with which to clean them.
Two weeks later, the end of June, the strike occurred. It was not,in spite of predictions, a general walk-out. Some of the mills,particularly the smaller plants, did not go down at all, and withreduced forces
kept on, but the chain of Cardew Mills was closed. Therewas occasional rioting by the foreign element in outlying districts, butthe state constabulary handled it easily.
Dan was out of work, and the loss of his pay was a serious matter inthe little house. He had managed to lay by a hundred dollars, and WillyCameron had banked it for him, but there was a real problem to befaced. On the night of the day the Cardew Mills went down Willy called ameeting of the household after supper, around the dining room table. Hehad been in to see Mr. Hendricks, who had been laid up with bronchitis,and Mr. Hendricks had predicted a long strike.
"The irresistible force and the immovable body, son," he said. "They'llstay set this time. And unless I miss my guess that is playing Doyle'shand for him, all right. His chance will come when the men have used uptheir savings and are growing bitter. Every strike plays into the handsof the enemy, son, and they know it. The moment production ceases pricesgo up, and soon all the money in the world won't pay them wages enoughto live on."
He had a store of homely common sense, and a gift of putting things intofew words. Willy Cameron, going back to the little house that evening,remembered the last thing he had said.
"The only way to solve this problem of living," he said, "is to see howmuch we can work, and not how little. Germany's working ten hours a day,and producing. We're talking about six, and loafing and fighting whilewe talk."
So Willy went home and called his meeting, and knowing Mrs. Boyd'sregard for figures, set down and added or subtracted, he placed a padand pencil on the table before him. It was an odd group: Dan sullen,resenting the strike and the causes that had led to it; Ellen, austereand competent; Mrs. Boyd with a lace fichu pinned around her neck,now that she had achieved the dignity of hired help, and Edith. Edithsilent, morose and fixing now and then rather haggard eyes on WillyCameron's unruly hair. She seldom met his eyes.
"First of all," said Willy, "we'll take our weekly assets. Of courseDan will get something temporarily, but we'll leave that out for thepresent."
The weekly assets turned out to be his salary and Edith's.
"Why, Willy," said Mrs. Boyd, "you can't turn all your money over tous."
"You are all the family I have just now. Why not? Anyhow, I'll haveto keep out lunch money and carfare, and so will Edith. Now as toexpenses."
Ellen had made a great reduction in expenses, but food was high. Andthere was gas and coal, and Dan's small insurance, and the rent. Therewas absolutely no margin, and a sort of silence fell.
"What about your tuition at night school?" Edith asked suddenly.
"Spring term ended this week."
"But you said there was a summer one."
"Well, I'll tell you about that," Willy said, feeling for words. "I'mgoing to be busy helping Mr. Hendricks in his campaign. Then nextfall--well, I'll either go back or Hendricks will make me chief ofpolice, or something." He smiled around the table. "I ought to get somesort of graft out of it."
"Mother!" Edith protested. "He mustn't sacrifice himself for us. Whatare we to him anyhow? A lot of stones hung around his neck. That's all."
It was after Willy had declared that this was his home now, and he hada right to help keep it going, and after Ellen had observed that she hadsome money laid by and would not take any wages during the strike, thatthe meeting threatened to become emotional. Mrs. Boyd shed a few tears,and as she never by any chance carried a handkerchief, let them flowover her fichu. And Dan shook Willy's hand and Ellen's, and said thatif he'd had his way he'd be working, and not sitting round like a stiffletting other people work for him. But Edith got up and went out intothe little back garden, and did not come back until the meeting was bothactually and morally broken up. When she heard Dan go out, and Ellenand Mrs. Boyd go upstairs, chatting in a new amiability brought about bytrouble and sacrifice, she put on her hat and left the house.
Ellen, rousing on her cot in Edith's upper room, heard her come in sometime later, and undress and get into bed. Her old suspicion of the girlrevived, and she sat upright.
"Where I come from girls don't stay out alone until all hours," shesaid.
"Oh, let me alone."
Ellen fell asleep, and in her sleep she dreamed that Mrs. Boyd had takensick and was moaning. The moaning was terrible; it filled the littlehouse. Ellen wakened suddenly. It was not moaning; it was strange, heavybreathing, strangling; and it came from Edith's bed.
"Are you sick?" she called, and getting up, her knees hardly holdingher, she lighted the gas at its unshaded bracket on the wall and ran tothe other bed.
Edith was lying there, her mouth open, her lips bleached and twisted.Her stertorous breathing filled the room, and over all was the odor ofcarbolic acid.
"Edith, for God's sake!"
The girl was only partially conscious. Ellen ran down the stairs andinto Willy's room.
"Get up," she cried, shaking him. "That girl's killed herself."
"Lily!"
"No, Edith. Carbolic acid."
Even then he remembered her mother.
"Don't let her hear anything, It will kill her," he said, and ran up thestairs. Almost immediately he was down again, searching for alcohol;he found a small quantity and poured that down the swollen throat. Heroused Dan then, and sent him running madly for Doctor Smalley, witha warning to bring him past Mrs. Boyd's door quietly, and to bring anintubation set with him in case her throat should close. Then, on one ofhis innumerable journeys up and down the stairs he encountered Mrs. Boydherself, in her nightgown, and terrified.
"What's the matter, Willy?" she asked. "Is it a fire?"
"Edith is sick. I don't want you to go up. It may be contagious. It'sher throat."
And from that Mrs. Boyd deduced diphtheria; she sat on the stairs in hernightgown, a shaken helpless figure, asking countless questions of thosethat hurried past. But they reassured her, and after a time she wentdownstairs and made a pot of coffee. Ensconced with it in the lowerhall, and milk bottle in hand, she waylaid them with it as they hurriedup and down.
Upstairs the battle went on. There were times when the paralyzed musclesalmost stopped lifting the chest walls, when each breath was a newmiracle. Her throat was closing fast, too, and at eight o'clock came abrisk young surgeon, and with Willy Cameron's assistance, an operationwas performed. After that, and for days, Edith breathed through a tubein her neck.
The fiction of diphtheria was kept up, and Mrs. Boyd, having a childlikefaith in medical men, betrayed no anxiety after the first hour or two.She saw nothing incongruous in Ellen going down through the house whileshe herself was kept out of that upper room where Edith lay, consciousnow but sullen, disfigured, silent. She was happy, too, to have herold domain hers again, while Ellen nursed; to make again her flavorlessdesserts, her mounds of rubberlike gelatine, her pies. She brewed brothsdaily, and when Edith could swallow she sent up the results of hours ofcooking which Ellen cooled, skimmed the crust of grease from the top,and heated again over the gas flame.
She never guessed the conspiracy against her.
Between Ellen and Edith there was no real liking. Ellen did her duty,and more; got up at night; was gentle with rather heavy hands; bathedthe girl and brushed and braided her long hair. But there were hoursduring that simulated quarantine when a brooding silence held in thesick-room, and when Ellen, turning suddenly, would find Edith's eyes onher, full of angry distrust. At those times Ellen was glad that Edithcould not speak.
For at the end of a few days Ellen knew, and Edith knew she knew.
Edith could not speak. She wrote her wants with a stub of pencil, ormade signs. One day she motioned toward a mirror and Ellen took it toher.
"You needn't be frightened," she said. "When those scabs come off thedoctor says you'll hardly be marked at all."
But Edith only glanced at herself, and threw the mirror aside.
Another time she wrote: "Willy?"
"He's all right. They've got a girl at the store to take your place, butI guess you can go back if you want to." Then, seeing the hunger
in thegirl's eyes: "He's out a good bit these nights. He's making speeches forthat Mr. Hendricks. As if he could be elected against Mr. Cardew!"
The confinement told on Ellen. She would sit for hours, wondering whathad become of Lily. Had she gone back home? Was she seeing that otherman? Perhaps her valiant loyalty to Lily faded somewhat during thosedays, because she began to guess Willy Cameron's secret. If a girl hadno eyes in her head, and couldn't see that Willy Cameron was the finestgentleman who ever stepped in shoe leather, that girl had somethingwrong about her.
Then, sometimes, she wondered how Edith's condition was going to be keptfrom her mother. She had measured Mrs. Boyd's pride by that time, heralmost terrible respectability. She rather hoped that the sick womanwould die some night, easily and painlessly in her sleep, because deathwas easier than some things. She liked Mrs. Boyd; she felt a slightlycontemptuous but real affection for her.
Then one night Edith heard Willy's voice below, and indicated that shewanted to see him. He came in, stooping under the sheet which Mrs. Boydhad heard belonged in the doorway of diphtheria, and stood looking downat her. His heart ached. He sat down on the bed beside her and strokedher hand.
"Poor little girl," he said. "We've got to make things very happy forher, to make up for all this!"
But Edith freed her hand, and reaching out for paper and pencil stub,wrote something and gave it to Ellen.
Ellen read it.
"Tell him."
"I don't want to, Edith. You wait and do it yourself."
But Edith made an insistent gesture, and Ellen, flushed and wretched,had to tell. He made no sign, but sat stroking Edith's hand, only hestared rather fixedly at the wall, conscious that the girl's eyes werewatching him for a single gesture of surprise or anger. He felt noanger, only a great perplexity and sadness, an older-brother grief.
"I'm sorry, little sister," he said, and did the kindest thing he couldthink of, bent over and kissed her on the forehead. "Of course I knowhow you feel, but it is a big thing to bear a child, isn't it? It is theonly miracle we have these days."
"A child with no father," said Ellen, stonily.
"Even then," he persisted, "it's a big thing. We would have this onecome under happier circumstances if we could, but we will welcome andtake care of it, anyhow. A child's a child, and mighty valuable. And,"he added--"I appreciate your wanting me to know, Edith."
He stayed a little while after that, but he read aloud, choosing ahumorous story and laughing very hard at all the proper places. In theend he brought a faint smile to Edith's blistered lips, and a small liftto the cloud that hung over her now, day and night.
He made a speech that night, and into it he put all of his aching,anxious soul; Edith and Dan and Lily were behind it. Akers and Doyle.It was at a meeting in the hall over the city market, and the audience anew men's non-partisan association.
"Sometimes," he said, "I am asked what it is that we want, we men whoare standing behind Hendricks as an independent candidate." He wassupposed to bring Mr. Hendricks' name in as often as possible. "I answerthat we want honest government, law and order, an end to this convictionthat the country is owned by the unions and the capitalists, a fair dealfor the plain people, which is you and I, my friends. But I answer stillfurther, we want one thing more, a greater thing, and that thing weshall have. All through this great country to-night are groups of menhoping and planning for an incredible thing. They are not great innumbers; they are, however, organized, competent, intelligent anddeadly. They plow the land with discord to sow the seeds of sedition.And the thing they want is civil war.
"And against them, what? The people like you and me; the men with homesthey love; the men with little businesses they have fought and laboredto secure; the clerks; the preachers; the doctors, the honest laborers,the God-fearing rich. I tell you, we are the people, and it is time weknew our power.
"And this is the thing we want, we the people; the greater thing, thething we shall have; that this government, this country which we love,which has three times been saved at such cost of blood, shall survive."
It was after that speech that he met Pink Denslow for the first time.A square, solidly built young man edged his way through the crowd, andshook hands with him.
"Name's Denslow," said Pink. "Liked what you said. Have you time to runover to my club with me and have a high-ball and a talk?"
"I've got all the rest of the night."
"Right-o!" said Pink, who had brought back a phrase or two from theBritish.
It was not until they were in the car that Pink said:
"I think you're a friend of Miss Cardew's, aren't you?"
"I know Miss Cardew," said Willy Cameron, guardedly. And they were bothrather silent for a time.
That night proved to be a significant one for them both, as ithappened. They struck up a curious sort of friendship, based on a humbleadmiration on Pink's part, and with Willy Cameron on sheer hunger forthe society of his kind. He had been suffering a real mental starvation.He had been constantly giving out and getting nothing in return.
Pink developed a habit of dropping into the pharmacy when he happenedto be nearby. He was rather wistfully envious of that year in the camp,when Lily Cardew and Cameron had been together, and at first it wasthe bond of Lily that sent him to the shop. In the beginning the shopirritated him, because it seemed an incongruous background for the fieryyoung orator. But later on he joined the small open forum in the backroom, and perhaps for the first time in his idle years he began tothink. He had made the sacrifice of his luxurious young life to go towar, had slept in mud and risked his body and been hungry and cold andoften frightfully homesick. And now it appeared that a lot of madmenwere going to try to undo all that he had helped to do. He was surprisedand highly indignant. Even a handful of agitators, it seemed, could doincredible harm.
One night he and Willy Cameron slipped into a meeting of a RussianSociety, wearing old clothes, which with Willy was not difficult,and shuffling up dirty stairs without molestation. They came awaythoughtful.
"Looks like it's more than talk," Pink said, after a time.
"They're not dangerous," Willy Cameron said. "That's talk. But it showsa state of mind. The real incendiaries don't show their hand like that."
"You think it's real, then?"
"Some boils don't come to a head. But most do."
It was after a mob of foreigners had tried to capture the town ofDonesson, near Pittsburgh, and had been turned back by a hastily armedbody of its citizens, doctors, lawyers and shop-keepers, that a nebulousplan began to form in Willy Cameron's active mind.
If one could unite the plain people politically, or against a foreignwar, why could they not be united against an enemy at home? The Southhad had a similar problem, and the result was the Ku Klux Klan.
The Chief of Police was convinced that a plan was being formulated torepeat the Seattle experiment against the city. The Mayor was dubious.He was not a strong man; he had a conviction that because a thing neverhad happened it never could happen.
"The mob has done it before," urged the Chief of Police one day. "Theytook Paris, and it was damned disagreeable."
The Mayor was a trifle weak in history.
"Maybe they did," he agreed. "But this is different. This is America."
He was rather uneasy after that. It had occurred to him that the Chiefmight have referred to Paris, Illinois.
Now and then Pink coaxed Willy Cameron to his club, and for those rareoccasions he provided always a little group of men like themselves,young, eager, loyal, and struggling with the new problems of the day. Inthis environment Willy Cameron received as well as gave.
Most of the men had been in the army, and he found in them an eageranxiety to face the coming situation and combat it. In the end thenucleus of the new Vigilance Committee was formed there.
Not immediately. The idea was of slow growth even with its originator,and it only reached the point of speech when Mr. Hendricks stopped inone day at the pharmacy and brought a bu
ndle which he slapped down onthe prescription desk.
"Read that dynamite," he said, his face flushed and lowering. "A man Iknow got it translated for me. Read it and then tell me whether I'm analarmist and a plain fool, or if it means trouble around here."
There was no question in Willy Cameron's mind as to which it meant.
Louis Akers had by that time announced his candidacy for Mayor, andorganized labor was behind him to an alarming extent. When WillyCameron went with Pink to the club that afternoon, he found Akers underdiscussion, and he heard some facts about that gentleman's private lifewhich left him silent and morose. Pink knew nothing of Lily's friendshipwith Akers. Indeed, Pink did not know that Lily was in the city, andWilly Cameron had not undeceived him. It had pleased Anthony Cardew toannounce in the press that Lily was making a round of visits, and thesecret was not his to divulge. But the question which was always in hismind rose again. What did she see in the man? How could she have thrownaway her home and her family for a fellow who was so obviously what Pinkwould have called "a wrong one"?
He roused, however, at a question.
"He may," he said; "with three candidates we're splitting the vote threeways, and it's hard to predict. Mr. Cardew can't be elected, but heweakens Hendricks. One thing's sure. Where's my pipe?" Silence while Mr.Cameron searched for his pipe, and took his own time to divulge thesure thing. "If Hendricks is elected he'll clear out the entire bunch ofanarchists. The present man's afraid. But if Akers can hypnotize laborinto voting for him, and he gets it, it will be up to the city toprotect itself, for he won't. He'll let them hold their infamousmeetings and spread their damnable doctrine, and--you know what they'vetried to do in other places." He explained what he had in mind then,finding them expectant and eager. There ought to be some sort ofcitizen organization, to supplement the state and city forces. Nothingspectacular; indeed, the least said about it the better. He harked backthen to his idea of the plain people, with homes to protect.
"That needn't keep you fellows out," he said, with his whimsical smile."But the rank and file will have to constitute the big end. We don'twant a lot of busybodies, pussy-footing around with guns and looking fortrouble. We had enough of that during the war. We would want some menwho would answer a riot call if they were needed. That's all."
He had some of the translations Hendricks had brought him in his pocket,and they circulated around the group.
"Do you think they mean to attack the city?"
"That looks like it, doesn't it? And they are getting that sort of stuffall the time. There are a hundred thousand of them in this end of thestate."
"Would you make it a secret organization?"
"Yes. I like doing things in the open myself, but you've got to fight arat in his hole, if he won't come out."
"Would you hold office?" Pink asked.
Willy Cameron smiled.
"I'm a good bit like the boy who dug post holes in the daytime and tookin washing at night to support the family. But I'll work, if that's whatyou mean."
"We'd better have a constitution and all that, don't you think?" Pinkasked. "We can draw up a tentative one, and then fix it up at the firstmeeting. This is going to be a big thing. It'll go like a fire."
But Willy Cameron overruled that.
"We don't need that sort of stuff," he said, "and if we begin that wemight as well put it in the newspapers. We want men who can keep theirmouths shut, and who will sign some sort of a card agreeing to standby the government and to preserve law and order. Then an office and afiling case, and their addresses, so we can get at them in a hurry if weneed them. Get me a piece of paper, somebody."
Then and there, in twenty words, Willy Cameron wrote the now historicoath of the new Vigilance Committee, on the back of an old envelope. Itwas a promise, an agreement rather than an oath. There was a littlehush as the paper passed from hand to hand. Not a man there but felt acertain solemnity in the occasion. To preserve the Union and the flag,to fight all sedition, to love their country and support it; the verysimplicity of the words was impressive. And the mere putting of it intovisible form crystallized their hitherto vague anxieties, pointed to areal enemy and a real danger. Yet, as Willy Cameron pointed out, theymight never be needed.
"Our job," he said, "is only as a last resort. Only for real trouble.Until the state troops can get here, for instance, and if theconstabulary is greatly outnumbered. It's their work up to a certainpoint. We'll fight if they need us. That's all."
It was very surprising to him to find the enterprise financedimmediately. Pink offered an office in the bank building. Some oneagreed to pay a clerk who should belong to the committee. It waspractical, businesslike, and--done. And, although he had protested, hefound himself made the head of the organization.
"--without title and without pay," he stipulated. "If you wish a titleon me, I'll resign."
He went home that night very exalted and very humble.
CHAPTER XXI
For a time Lily remained hidden in the house on Cardew Way, walkingout after nightfall with Louis occasionally, but shrinkingly keeping toquiet back streets. She had a horror of meeting some one she knew,of explanations and of gossip. But after a time the desire to see hermother became overwhelming. She took to making little flying visitshome at an hour when her grandfather was certain to be away, going in ataxicab, and reaching the house somewhat breathless and excited. She wasdriven by an impulse toward the old familiar things; she was homesickfor them all, for her mother, for Mademoiselle, for her own rooms, forher little toilet table, for her bed and her reading lamp. For the oldhouse itself.
She was still an alien where she was. Elinor Doyle was a perpetualenigma to her; now and then she thought she had penetrated behind thegentle mask that was Elinor's face, only to find beyond it somethinginscrutable. There was a dead line in Elinor's life across which Lilynever stepped. Whatever Elinor's battles were, she fought them alone,and Lily had begun to realize that there were battles.
The atmosphere of the little house had changed. Sometimes, after shehad gone to bed, she heard Doyle's voice from the room across the hall,raised angrily. He was nervous and impatient; at times he dropped theunctuousness of his manner toward her, and she found herself lookinginto a pair of cold blue eyes which terrified her.
The brilliant little dinners had entirely ceased, with her coming. Asort of early summer lethargy had apparently settled on the house.Doyle wrote for hours, shut in the room with the desk; the group ofintellectuals, as he had dubbed them, had dispersed on summer vacations.But she discovered that there were other conferences being held in thehouse, generally late at night.
She learned to know the nights when those meetings were to occur. Onthose evenings Elinor always made an early move toward bed, and Lilywould repair to her hot low-ceiled room, to sit in the darkness by thewindow and think long, painful thoughts.
That was how she learned of the conferences. She had no curiosity aboutthem at first. They had something to do with the strike, she considered,and with that her interest died. Strikes were a symptom, and ultimately,through great thinkers like Mr. Doyle, they would discover the cure forthe disease that caused them. She was quite content to wait for thattime.
Then, one night, she went downstairs for a glass of ice water, and foundthe lower floor dark, and subdued voices coming from the study. Thekitchen door was standing open, and she closed and locked it, placingthe key, as was Elinor's custom, in a table drawer. The door was partlyglass, and Elinor had a fear of the glass being broken and thus the keyturned in the lock by some intruder.
On toward morning there came a violent hammering at her bedroom door,and Doyle's voice outside, a savage voice that she scarcely recognized.When she had thrown on her dressing gown and opened the door he hadinstantly caught her by the shoulder, and she bore the imprints of hisfingers for days.
"Did you lock the kitchen door?" he demanded, his tones thick with fury.
"Yes. Why not?" She tried to shake off his hand, but failed.
"Non
e of your business why not," he said, and gave her an angry shake."Hereafter, when you find that door open, you leave it that way. That'sall."
"Take your hands off me!" She was rather like her grandfather at thatmoment, and his lost caution came back. He freed her at once and laugheda little.
"Sorry!" he said. "I get a bit emphatic at times. But there are timeswhen a locked door becomes a mighty serious matter."
The next day he removed the key from the door, and substituted a bolt.Elinor made no protest.
Another night Elinor was taken ill, and Lilly had been forced to knockat the study door and call Doyle. She had an instant's impression of theroom crowded with strange figures. The heavy odors of sweating bodies,of tobacco, and of stale beer came through the half-open door andrevolted her. And Doyle had refused to go upstairs.
She began to feel that she could not remain there very long. Theatmosphere was variable. It was either cynical or sinister, and shehated them both. She had a curious feeling, too, that Doyle both wantedher there and did not want her, and that he was changing his attitudetoward her Aunt Elinor. Sometimes she saw him watching Elinor from underhalf-closed eyelids.
But she could not fill her days with anxieties and suspicions, and sheturned to Louis Akers as a flower to the open day. He at least was whathe appeared to be. There was nothing mysterious about him.
He came in daily, big, dominant and demonstrative, filling the housewith his presence, and demanding her in a loud, urgent voice. Hardly hadthe door slammed before he would call:
"Lily! Where are you?"
Sometimes he lifted her off her feet and held her to him.
"You little whiffet!" he would say. "I could crush you to death in myarms."
Had his wooing all been violent she might have tired sooner, becausethose phases of his passion for her tired her. But there were times whenhe put her into a chair and sat on the floor at her feet, his handsomeface uplifted to hers in a sort of humble adoration, his arms across herknees. It was not altogether studied. He was a born wooer, but he hadhis hours of humility, of vague aspirations. His insistent body wasalways greater than his soul, but now and then, when he was physicallyweary, he had a spiritual moment.
"I love you, little girl," he would say.
It was in one of those moments that she extracted a promise from him.He had been, from his position on the floor, telling her about thecampaign.
"I don't like your running against my father, Louis."
"He couldn't have got it, anyhow. And he doesn't want it. I do, honey.I need it in my business. When the election's over you're going to marryme."
She ignored that.
"I don't like the men who come here, Louis. I wish they were not friendsof yours."
"Friends of mine! That bunch?"
"You are always with them."
"I draw a salary for being with them, honey."
"But what do you draw a salary for?" He was immediately on the alert,but her eyes were candid and unsuspicious. "They are strikers, aren'tthey?"
"Yes."
"Is it legal business?"
"Partly that."
"Louis, is there going to be a general strike?"
"There may be some bad times coming, honey." He bent his head and kissedher hands, lying motionless in her lap. "I wish you would marry me soon.I want you. I want to keep you safe."
She drew her hands away.
"Safe from what, Louis?"
He sat back and looked up into her face.
"You must remember, dear, that for all your theories, which are verysweet, this is a man's world, and men have rather brutal methods ofsettling their differences."
"And you advocate brutality?"
"Well, the war was brutal, wasn't it? And you were in a white heatsupporting it, weren't you? How about another war,"--he chose his wordscarefully--"just as reasonable and just? You've heard Doyle. You knowwhat I mean."
"Not now!"
He was amazed at her horror, a horror that made her recoil from him andpush his hands away when he tried to touch her. He got up angrily andstood looking down at her, his hands in his pockets.
"What the devil did you think all this talk meant?" he demanded. "You'veheard enough of it."
"Does Aunt Elinor know?"
"Of course."
"And she approves?"
"I don't know and I don't care." Suddenly, with one of the quick changesshe knew so well, he caught her hands and drawing her to her feet, puthis arms around her. "All I know is that I love you, and if you say theword I'll cut the whole business."
"You would?"
He amended his offer somewhat.
"Marry me, honey," he begged. "Marry me now. Do you think I'll letanything in God's world come between us? Marry me, and I'll do more thanleave them." He was whispering to her, stroking her hair. "I'll cut thewhole outfit. And on the day I go into your house as your husband I'lltell your people some things they want to know. That's a promise."
"What will they do to you?"
"Your people?"
"The others."
He drew himself to his full height, and laughed.
"They'll try to do plenty, old girl," he said, "but I'm not afraid ofthem, and they know it. Marry me, Lily," he urged. "Marry me now. Andwe'll beat them out, you and I."
He gave her a sense of power, over him and over evil. She felt suddenlyan enormous responsibility, that of a human soul waiting to be upliftedand led aright.
"You can save me, honey," he whispered, and kneeling suddenly, he kissedthe toe of her small shoe.
He was strong. But he was weak too. He needed her. "I'll do it, Louis,"she said. "You--you will be good to me, won't you?"
"I'm crazy about you."
The mood of exaltation upheld her through the night, and into the nextday. Elinor eyed her curiously, and with some anxiety. It was a longtime since she had been a girl, going about star-eyed with power over aman, but she remembered that lost time well.
At noon Louis came in for a hasty luncheon, and before he left hedrew Lily into the little study and slipped a solitaire diamond on herengagement finger. To Lily the moment was almost a holy one, but heseemed more interested in the quality of the stone and its appearance onher hand than in its symbolism.
"Got you cinched now, honey. Do you like it?"
"It makes me feel that I don't belong to myself any longer."
"Well, you've passed into good hands," he said, and laughed his great,vibrant laugh. "Costing me money already, you mite!"
A little of her exaltation died then. But perhaps men were like that,shyly covering the things they felt deepest.
She was rather surprised when he suggested keeping the engagement asecret.
"Except the Doyles, of course," he said. "I am not taking any chances onlosing you, child."
"Not mother?"
"Not unless you want to be kidnaped and taken home. It's only a matterof a day or two, anyhow."
"I want more time than that. A month, anyhow."
And he found her curiously obstinate and determined. She did notquite know herself why she demanded delay, except that she shrank fromdelivering herself into hands that were so tender and might be so cruel.It was instinctive, purely.
"A month," she said, and stuck to it.
He was rather sulky when he went away, and he had told her the exactamount he had paid for her ring.
Having forced him to agree to the delay, she found her mood ofexaltation returning. As always, it was when he was not with he that shesaw him most clearly, and she saw his real need for her. She had a senseof peace, too, now that at last something was decided. Her future, forbetter or worse, would no longer be that helpless waiting which hadbeen hers for so long. And out of her happiness came a desire to do kindthings, to pat children on the head, to give alms to beggars, and--tosee Willy Cameron.
She came downstairs that afternoon, dressed for the street.
"I am going out for a little while, Aunt Nellie," she said, "and when Icome back I want to
tell you something."
"Perhaps. I can guess."
"Perhaps you can."
She was singing to herself as she went out the door.
Elinor went back heavy-hearted to her knitting. It was very difficultalways to sit by and wait. Never to raise a hand. Just to wait andwatch. And pray.
Lily was rather surprised, when she reached the Eagle Pharmacy, to findPink Denslow coming out. It gave her a little pang, too; he looked soclean and sane and normal, so much a part of her old life. And it hurther, too, to see him flush with pleasure at the meeting.
"Why, Lily!" he said, and stood there, gazing at her, hat in hand, thesun on his gleaming, carefully brushed hair. He was quite inarticulatewith happiness. "I--when did you get back?"
"I have not been away, Pink. I left home--it's a long story. I amstaying with my aunt, Mrs. Doyle."
"Mrs. Doyle? You are staying there?"
"Why not? My father's sister."
His young face took on a certain sternness.
"If you knew what I suspect about Doyle, Lily, you wouldn't let the sameroof cover you." But he added, rather wistfully, "I wish I might see yousometimes."
Lily's head had gone up a trifle. Why did her old world always try toput her in the wrong? She had had to seek sanctuary, and the Doyle househad been the only sanctuary she knew.
"Since you feel as you do, I'm afraid that's impossible. Mr. Doyle'sroof is the only roof I have."
"You have a home," he said, sturdily.
"Not now. I left, and my grandfather won't have me back. You mustn'tblame him, Pink. We quarreled and I left. I was as much responsible ashe was."
For a moment after she turned and disappeared inside the pharmacy doorhe stood there, then he put on his hat and strode down the street,unhappy and perplexed. If only she had needed him, if she had not lookedso self-possessed and so ever so faintly defiant, as though she daredhim to pity her, he would have known what to do. All he needed was to beneeded. His open face was full of trouble. It was unthinkable that Lilyshould be in that center of anarchy; more unthinkable that Doyle mighthave filled her up with all sorts of wild ideas. Women were queer; theyliked theories. A man could have a theory of life and play with it andboast about it, but never dream of living up to it. But give one to awoman, and she chewed on it like a dog on a bone. If those Bolshevistshad got hold of Lily--!
The encounter had hurt Lily, too. The fine edge of her exaltation wasgone, and it did not return during her brief talk with Willy Cameron.He looked much older and very thin; there were lines around his eyesshe had never seen before, and she hated seeing him in his presentsurroundings. But she liked him for his very unconsciousness of thosesurroundings. One always had to take Willy Cameron as he was.
"Do you like it, Willy?" she asked. It had dawned on her, with a sortof panic, that there was really very little to talk about. All that theyhad had in common lay far in the past.
"Well, it's my daily bread, and with bread costing what it does, I clingto it like a limpet to a rock."
"But I thought you were studying, so you could do something else."
"I had to give up the night school. But I'll get back to it sometime."
She was lost again. She glanced around the little shop, where onceEdith Boyd had manicured her nails behind the counter, and where now amiddle-aged woman stood with listless eyes looking out over the street.
"You still have Jinx, I suppose?"
"Yes. I--"
Lily glanced up as he stopped. She had drawn off her gloves, and hiseyes had fallen on her engagement ring. To Lily there had always been afeeling of unreality about his declaration of love for her. He hadbeen so restrained, so careful to ask nothing in exchange, so withoutexpectation of return, that she had put it out of her mind as animpulse. She had not dreamed that he could still care, after thesemonths of silence. But he had gone quite white.
"I am going to be married, Willy," she said, in a low tone. It isdoubtful if he could have spoken, just then. And as if to add afinishing touch of burlesque to the meeting, a small boy with a swollenjaw came in just then and demanded something to "make it stop hurting."
He welcomed the interruption, she saw. He was very professionalinstantly, and so absorbed for a moment in relieving the child's painthat he could ignore his own.
"Let's see it," he said in a businesslike, slightly strained voice."Better have it out, old chap. But I'll give you something just to easeit up a bit."
Which he proceeded to do. When he came back to Lily he was quite calmand self-possessed. As he had never thought of dramatizing himself, northought of himself at all, it did not occur to him that drama requiressetting, that tragedy required black velvet rather than tooth-brushes,and that a small boy with an aching tooth was a comedy relief badlyintroduced.
All he knew was that he had somehow achieved a moment in which to steadyhimself, and to find that a man can suffer horribly and still smile. Hedid that, very gravely, when he came back to Lily.
"Can you tell me about it?"
"There is not very much to tell. It is Louis Akers."
The middle-aged clerk had disappeared.
"Of course you have thought over what that means, Lily."
"He wants me to marry him. He wants it very much, Willy. And--I know youdon't like him, but he has changed. Women always think they have changedmen, I know. But he is very different."
"I am sure of that," he said, steadily.
There was something childish about her, he thought. Childish andinfinitely touching. He remembered a night at the camp, when some of thetroops had departed for over-seas, and he had found her alone and cryingin her hut. "I just can't let them go," she had sobbed. "I just can't.Some of them will never come back."
Wasn't there something of that spirit in her now, the feeling that shecould not let Akers go, lest worse befall him? He did not know. All heknew was that she was more like the Lily Cardew he had known then thanshe had been since her return. And that he worshiped her.
But there was anger in him, too. Anger at Anthony Cardew. Anger at theDoyles. And a smoldering, bitter anger at Louis Akers, that he shouldtake the dregs of his life and offer them to her as new wine. That heshould dare to link his scheming, plotting days to this girl, so wiseand yet so ignorant, so clear-eyed and yet so blind.
"Do they know at home?"
"I am going to tell mother to-day."
"Lily," he said, slowly, "there is one thing you ought to do. Go home,make your peace there, and get all this on the right footing. Then havehim there. You have never seen him in that environment, yet that is theworld he will have to live in, if you marry him. See how he fits there."
"What has that got to do with it?"
"Think a minute. Am I quite the same to you here, as I was in the camp?"
He saw her honest answer in her eyes.
A Poor Wise Man Page 21
