CHAPTER IVHARVEY MEETS “A DEALER IN CATTLE”
Harvey threw the reins into Grogan’s lap and strode recklessly after Elsie. His good-natured face was flushed with anger.
“Say,” he demanded, “what’s the matter?”
The girl, unwilling, halted. “Nothing,” she replied, “what makes you ask that?”
“Why,” explained Harvey, hiding his anger and attempting to take her hand, “you’re out of breath.”
“Been running,” was the girl’s laconic explanation.
“You don’t usually run home from the mill, Elsie,” Harvey’s detective instinct was showing itself.
Elsie was extremely irritated by this unwished for interview.
“Well, I—” she stammered, “I wanted toget here because it’s Monday and mother’s washing day and—” She paused, her irritation getting the better of her. “I don’t see what right you have to question me, Harvey Spencer.”
Grogan had got down from the wagon and at this moment came through the gate.
“Young man,” he began, addressing Spencer. The girl interrupted him.
“Who are you?” she demanded. “Do you come from the mill?”
“I come from no mill,” retorted Grogan, piqued by the girl’s tone, “and if you’ll excuse me I don’t want to.”
“This is Mr. Michael Grogan of Chicago,” put in Harvey placatingly. “I’ve been showing him the town.”
“And,” added Grogan quickly, “I haven’t seen much.”
“That’s not at all strange,” said Elsie, “because there’s nothing to see.”
“And in Chicago, where I come from,” said Grogan sagely, “there’s altogether too much.”
Grogan saw by his two companions’ faces that he was an intruder.
“Young man,” he said, “I don’t think I’ll wait for you. I’ve some letters to write at the hotel. I think I’ll be strolling along.”
“Why,” said Harvey, hospitable in the face of intrusion, “you’re welcome to ride. Won’t you wait?”
“No, thanks,” said Grogan, “that grocery wagon of yours wasn’t built to accommodate a man of my size.”
Harvey and the girl watched Grogan disappear in the dusk. Then the young man turned to the girl.
“Elsie—” he began tenderly.
But the girl stopped him. “Now don’t begin to question me,” she ordered. “I won’t answer.”
“You are trying to hide something from me,” said Harvey, grasping the girl’s unwilling hand. The girl drew away from him.
“That’s not true,” she said. “I don’t want you to bother me.”
“I never used to bother you,” said Harvey, his face flushing.
“That was before—” began Elsie impulsively. “I mean now,” she went on, catchingherself. “I mean that you do now because you have changed.”
“No,” contradicted Harvey, “but you have.”
“What do you mean by that?” challenged the girl.
Harvey stood silent for a moment and jerked out a laugh of embarrassment. “I don’t know exactly what I mean,” he said, “but you know we were engaged.”
Elsie flushed. “We were not,” she said.
“I mean,” said Harvey miserably stumbling on, “we sort of were. We understood.” He brought one hand from his pocket. It held the box containing the ring. “Why, Elsie,” he said pleadingly, “I even bought the ring. Just a plain band of gold. I did so hope that some day, soon perhaps, you’d let me put it on your finger and take you to our home. It wouldn’t be much, but I’d love you and care for you. Why I’d work night and day just to make things easy for you. I love you. It all begins and ends with that.”
Elsie stood for a moment as though this honest appeal had touched her. Then she turned sharply.
“O, what’s the use,” she cried, “Look at this place. See how we live. And you—you want me to go on like this? No!”
Harvey stared at her stupidly.
“Don’t stare at me like that,” said the girl annoyed.
“I am wondering what has changed you so,” said Harvey apologetically.
“Nothing, I tell you.”
“Yes, there is something, or somebody.”
“Now Harvey, please don’t begin—” Elsie paused. Her glance left Harvey’s face. A young man in a brown tweed suit and carrying a light walking stick in his gloved hand was coming toward the gate.
“Hello,” he said easily, addressing Elsie and ignoring Spencer, “anybody at home?”
Elsie turned toward him with impulsive friendliness, then remembering her other suitor paused and tried to assume a manner of unconcern.
“Of course, there’s someone at home,” she said, “can’t you see there is?”
“Can’t be sure that such loveliness is real,” said the newcomer gallantly.
“You’re talking Chicagoese,” said the girl, not, however, displeased.
“Simple fact, believe me,” was the assured response.
Elsie saw that Harvey was eyeing the stranger with hostility. “Do you know Mr. Spencer, Mr. Druce?”
“Everybody in Millville knows Mr. Spencer,” replied Martin Druce, putting out his hand. “He’s a town institution.”
“Thank you,” said Harvey, mollified by what he thought a sincere compliment and shaking hands.
“Institution!” laughed Elsie.
Harvey stopped and withdrew the hand. It dawned on him that there was a secret understanding between Druce and the girl.
“Now hold on,” he asked. “Just what do you mean by that word ‘institution?’”
“Why you’re one of the landmarks here,” explained Druce, “the same as the bank or the opera house.” He brushed the lapel of Harvey’s coat with his gloved hand and straightened his collar. Then he soberly removed Harvey’s straw hat, fingered it intogrotesque lines and replaced it on his head. He stepped back to observe the effect, adding satirically: “I’ll bet you won’t stay long in this jay town.”
“You’re dead right there,” boasted Harvey. “Millville is all right and a rising place but—”
“I knew it,” said Druce gravely. “You’ll be coming up to Chicago to show Marshall Field how to run his store.”
“Well, I may—” began Harvey proudly.
“Oh!” Elsie’s voice was pained. “Don’t do that, Mr. Druce!” Then she turned to Spencer. “Why do you let him make a joke of you?”
“Who? Me?” Harvey looked at her in astonishment. He turned to Druce savagely. “Say,” he demanded, “are you trying to kid me?”
“Not on your life,” was the reply. “I knew better than to try to kid a wise young man like you. What I’m trying to say is that you’re too big for this town. Say, what’s your ambition?”
“Oh, I’ve got one, Mr. Druce. I’m going to be a detective.”
“Well, there’s lots of room for a real one in Chicago,” said Druce, suppressing a contemptuous smile.
“I may go there some day.”
“Come along,” said Druce, “the more the merrier.”
“Say, Mr. Druce,” asked Harvey, now completely taken in by the ingratiating stranger, “what’s your business?”
“Mine, why—” The man moved toward Elsie as he spoke, gazing at her steadily.
“Yes, you’ve got one, haven’t you?” persisted Harvey.
Druce seemed confused for a moment. Then his face broke into a genial smile. Both Elsie and Spencer were watching him curiously.
“Sure, I’ve got a business. It’s a mighty profitable one, too. I’m a dealer in live stock.”
“Oh, cattle?” said Harvey.
“You got me,” was the casual response, “just cattle.”
CHAPTER VA SERPENT WHISPERS AND A WOMAN LISTENS
The word cattle seemed to arouse the roan colt to his own existence. He whinnied ingratiatingly and tugged at his hitching strap. Whether or not his master had forgotten, he knew it was supper time. Harvey heard him.
“Well,” he said to Druce, backing away towards the gate. “I’ve got to be going. Drop into the store some time. I’ll give you a cigar.”
“Thanks,” laughed Druce. Then under his breath he added, “Like blazes I will.” He turned back to Elsie. “Is that the Rube,” he demanded, “who wants to marry you?”
“Yes,” defended Elsie hotly, “and he’s all right, too. I don’t think it was nice of you to make fun of him as you did.”
“Now, now,” said Druce soothingly. “Don’t be angry with me. I was just playingaround.” He paused and looked warily at the house. “Everything all right, eh?”
“Yes, I guess so,” replied Elsie, with an anxious look in the same direction. “Harvey frightened me when I first got home. For a moment I thought he knew that I had been out with you.”
“Well, what if he did? There’s no harm in going for a ride with me, is there?”
“No-o,” Elsie shook her head doubtfully. “But I don’t feel just right about it.”
“And that grocery fellow didn’t know after all, eh?”
“I think not. At least he said nothing.”
Druce shrugged his shoulders derisively.
“I think not. At least he said nothing.” he couldn’t detect a hair in the butter. I’m not worried about him. How is it with your own folks? Your mother doesn’t know?”
[Transcriber᾿s note: previous paragraph transcribed as printed, with apparent obfuscation by duplicated line.]
“No,” replied Elsie, uneasy again. “Anyway, mother wouldn’t matter so much, but dad—” She covered her face with her hands.
“Never mind,” said Druce tenderly, drawing her toward him and caressing her. “We had some ride, didn’t we?”
“Grand,” replied Elsie, brightened by the recollection.
“I told you it would be all right if I hired the car and picked you up around the corner from the mill. Say—” The man lowered his tone. “Gee, you’re prettier than ever today, Elsie!”
Something in his manner caused the girl to recoil. The shrinking movement did not escape Druce.
“What’s the matter, girlie?” he inquired. “Do you know that in all the weeks I have been coming down here from Chicago to see you, you haven’t even kissed me?”
“Please,” pleaded the girl, pushing him away. She scarcely understood her mood. She only knew she did not want Druce to touch her.
“What’s the matter?” repeated Druce, following close behind her.
“I—I don’t know,” faltered the girl, “I feel wicked somehow.”
“Why?” He led her to a bench and sat down beside her. “Haven’t I always treated you like a lady?”
“Yes, Martin, you’ve been good to me—but—I feel wicked.”
Druce laughed. “Nonsense, girlie,” he said, “you couldn’t be wicked if you tried. Do you know what you ought to do?”
“What?” she asked.
“Turn your back on this town where nothing ever happens and come to little old Chicago, the live village by the lake.”
“Chicago! What could I do there?”
“Make more money in a month than you can earn here in a year.”
“But how?”
“You can sing,” said Druce appraisingly. “You’re there forty ways when it comes to looks. Why they’d pay you a hundred dollars a week to sing in the cabarets.”
“Cabarets?” The girl’s interest was aroused. “What’s a cabaret?”
“A cabaret,” said Druce, “is a restaurant where ladies and gentlemen dine. A fine great hall, polished floors, rugs, palms, a lot of little tables, colored lights, flowers, silver, cut glass, perfumes, a grand orchestra—get that in your mind—and then the orchestra strikes up andyou come down the aisle, right through the crowd and sing to them.”
“Oh, I’d love to do that,” said the girl.
“Why not try it?”
“I—I wouldn’t know how to begin.”
“I’ll show you how.”
“Tell me, tell me how, quick.”
“Dead easy,” Druce explained smoothly. “I’m going back to Chicago on the evening train tonight. Now there’s no use having trouble with your folks. They wouldn’t understand. You tell them you are going over to one of the neighbors’, anything you can think of. That train slows down at the junction, right across the field there—you can always hear it whistle. I’ll be aboard the last car and I’ll take you to Chicago with me. Then when we get there we—”
He broke off abruptly for Elsie started up from the bench and moved slowly away.
“What’s the matter, girlie?” asked Druce.
“I—I don’t know,” the girl answered. “There isn’t anyone here but just us, is there?”
“No,” replied Druce, watching the girl closely, “why?”
“Because,” she half whispered, “it seemed to me just then that someone touched me on the arm and said, ‘Don’t go!’”
Druce started. He looked carefully around. Then he laughed.
“You’re hearing things tonight, Elsie,” he said. “There’s no one here but just you and me.” He took her by the hand and was drawing her down to the bench when suddenly the front door of the cottage opened and Mrs. Welcome appeared.
“Elsie,” she called. She stood framed in the lighted doorway, her eyes shaded with her hand. Like a shadow Druce faded from his seat beside the girl and dodged behind a tree out of sight, but in hearing.
“Is that you, Elsie?” asked the mother. “I thought I heard voices. Was Harvey here?”
“Yes,” replied the girl in confusion, “he has just gone.”
“You didn’t see anything of your father, did you?”
Elsie shook her head. “You—you don’t suppose dad’s drinking again?” the girl asked anxiously.
“I suppose so,” replied the mother wearily. “He hasn’t been here all day.”
“Oh, mother,” the girl wailed. “What shall we do?” She sank down on the seat.
Her mother took her in her arms. “Don’t cry,” she said. “Come in and help me get supper.”
“I’m waiting for Patience,” replied the girl. “I’ll be in the house in a moment. You go ahead with the work. When Patience comes we’ll both help you.”
Mrs. Welcome walked back into the cottage. As the door closed behind her Druce reappeared. He had not missed a word of the conversation between Elsie and her mother; as he now approached he outlined in his mind an immediate plan of attack.
“Elsie,” he said softly. The girl started.
“I thought you had gone,” she said. “No, don’t touch me. I’m in trouble. My father—” she covered her face with her hands.
“Yes, I know,” said Druce. “I heard it all. Why do you stay here? Why do you—”
“It isn’t that,” retorted the girl, too proud to accept sympathy. “You made me lie to mymother. That is the first time I ever deceived my mother.”
“Don’t cry,” said Druce. He drew her to the bench. “Come,” he went on, “be sensible. Dry those tears. Come with me to Chicago.”
“How do you know I could get a chance to sing in that place you told me of?” she demanded, open to argument.
Druce pressed his advantage. “Why,” he said, “I’m interested in one myself. I think I could arrange to place you.”
“Martin,” said Elsie, “you said you were in the live stock business.”
Druce hesitated a moment, toying with his cane. “I am,” he said slowly. “This cabaret—er—is a little speculation on the side. Come now, say you’ll be at the train at eight o’clock.”
The girl considered long.
“Think,” said Druce, “with one hundred dollars a week you will be able to take your mother out of this hole. Why, you’ll be independent! You owe it to your family not to let this opportunity escape you.”
“I’ll go,” said Elsie.
“Good! Good for you, I mean,” said Druce.
“On one condition,” the girl went on.
“What do you mean?”
Elsie got up from her seat embarrassed. “It all depends,” she said.
“On what?” demanded Druce.
“On you, Martin.”
“Me?” Druce laughed uneasily.
“Yes,” said the girl walking close to him and looking him in the face. “There is only one way I can go to Chicago with you.”
“How’s that, girlie?” was Druce’s astonished question.
Elsie held up her left hand timidly. “With a plain gold ring on that finger, Martin,” she said. She was now blushing furiously. She knew that she had virtually proposed to Druce. He laughed and something in his laugh jarred her.
“Oh, marriage,” he said.
“You know that Martin, don’t you? I couldn’t go to Chicago with you any other way.”
Druce took off his hat. “Elsie,” he said, “you’re as good as gold. I honor you for your scruples.”
He paused to think for a moment. “I’ll tell you,” he said. “You come along with me and I’ll marry you as soon as we reach Chicago. Meanwhile I’ll telegraph ahead and arrange to have you taken care of by my old aunt. You’ll be as safe with her as if you were in your own home.”
“You promise to marry me?”
“Sure I do, girlie.” He broke off blusteringly. “What do you take me for? Do you think I’d lure you to Chicago and then leave you?”
“Martin,” said Elsie gravely, “a girl must protect herself.”
“You’ll go, honey?” Druce persisted.
“I can’t tell,” replied the girl desperately, anxious to promise and yet afraid.
“You’ll go,” said Druce positively, “at eight o’clock—”
A cool voice broke in on his sentence. Druce started like a man suddenly drenched with cold water.
“What’s that is going to happen at eight o’clock, Mr. Druce?”
The speaker was Patience Welcome.
CHAPTER VIA ROMANCE DAWNS—AND A TRAGEDY
Patience Welcome shared all the prejudices of her employer, John Price, against “city chaps.” Her observation of those who had presented themselves in Millville had not raised her estimate of them. As a class she found them overdressed and underbred. They came into her small town obsessed with the notion of their superiority. Patience had been at some pains in a quiet way to puncture the pretensions of as many as came within scope of her sarcasm. She was not, like many girls of Millville, so much overwhelmed by the glamour of Chicago that she believed every being from that metropolis must be of a superior breed. She had penetration enough to estimate them at their true value. In her frankness, she made no effort to conceal her sentiments toward them.
But recently there had come into her acquaintance a product of Chicago whom she could not fit into Mr. Price’s city chap category. This was Harry Boland.
Young Boland, the son of Chicago’s “electrical king,” was himself president of his father’s Lake City Electrical Company. He was good looking, quiet, competent and totally lacking in the bumptiousness that Patience found so offensive in other Chicago youths. Toward him Patience had been compelled to modify her usual attitude of open aversion to mere cold reserve. She did not quite comprehend him and until conviction of his merits came she was determined to occupy the safe ground of suspicion.
Patience and Harry Boland had first met on a basis that could scarcely have been more formal. The young man, early in his business career, had been his father’s collector. Part of his duties had consisted of collecting the rents of a large number of workmen’s cottages which the elder Boland owned at Millville. The Welcomes occupied one of these cottages. As Tom Welcome not infrequentlywas unable to pay the rent when it was due, Boland had had numerous opportunities for seeing Patience, who was treasurer of the Welcome household.
Her attitude toward him had at first amused, then annoyed and finally interested him. When he began to understand what was back of her coldness a respect, such as he had felt for no other girl, developed in him. The more she held him off the more eager he became for a better acquaintance. This desire was fed by her repulses. Long ago he had made up his mind that he loved her. Now, in spite of the social chasm that yawned between them, he was determined to win her. His intentions toward her were honor itself. He was determined to marry her.
When Harvey Spencer drove off, after having introduced Patience to Grogan, the girl started toward her home. She had gone only a short distance when a quick step behind her appraised her that she was followed. A moment later Harry Boland appeared at her side, hat in hand.
“How do you do, Miss Welcome?”
“I’m very well, thank you,” replied Patience, primly.
“Beautiful day, isn’t it?” demanded Harry inanely.
“Yes,” agreed Patience, “I love the spring and even Millville is beautiful now.”
“I think it the most beautiful place in the world,” declared Harry enthusiastically.
Patience looked at him in surprise, then colored and laughed. “Do you?” she said with the accent on the first word.
“I hope,” said Harry, “that you don’t mind if I smoke.”
“Not at all.”
There was an awkward silence.
“Patience,” Harry used the girl’s name for the first time with deliberation, “why don’t you speak to me?”
Patience did not resent the familiarity. “I am thinking,” she replied.
“You act as though you do not like me. What have I done?”
“It’s not that,” replied Patience shortly.
“Then you are trying to avoid me.”
“I am.”
“Why?”
“Don’t you know?” She turned and looked at him squarely. She was determined to dispose of his attentions then and there.
“I’m not good at riddles.”
“Think a moment, then. You are Harry Boland, only son of the richest and most powerful man in Chicago. I am Patience Welcome, daughter of a broken inventor, tenant in a cottage which you own, where I cannot pay the rent. Can there be anything in common between us?”
Harry ignored the question. “You have forgotten one fact,” he said. There was determination in his voice. “Or don’t you know it?”
“What is that?” asked Patience over her shoulder, for she had turned from him.
“That Harry Boland is in love with Patience Welcome.”
“What an absurdity!”
“You don’t believe me?”
“How can you talk like that to me?” said the girl, now agitated. “Look at me. You know we are in arrears for rent.”
“Don’t worry about that.”
She turned on him defiantly and looked into his eyes. Then her glance fell under his more burning one. She flushed and turned away.
“I suppose,” she said, huskily with humiliation, “that you have paid the rent yourself.” She was almost in tears.
“Now don’t take it like that,” pleaded Harry. “No one but you and me will ever know. And if you will let me I will take you away from all this.”
Patience raised her head. She had recovered her composure.
“All men come to that finally,” she said coldly. “Even in my slight experience I have learned the phrase almost by heart. All men say that. They offer—”
“Just a moment.” Harry put out his hand emphatically. “Wait! All the men in your slight experience may have said it, but all have not meant it. I mean that if I take you away from all this I shall take you as Mrs. Harry Boland—as my wife.”
“Harry!” His name was wrenched from the girl’s very heart by her surprise.
“Do you believe that I love you now?” demanded Boland.
“Yes. I didn’t know, I didn’t understand. I have wronged you ever since I have known you. Forgive me. But your father?”
“Let me call your attention to the fact,” said Harry, planting himself firmly before her, “that I am many years past the age of seven—and can choose a wife for myself.”
“But your father?” insisted Patience.
“Oh, he may rage and fume,” retorted Harry, “but I have a standing of my own. I am president of the Lake City Electric Company that controls dad’s patent light.”
“My father was interested in electricity, too—before—”
But Harry interrupted her. “Never mind our fathers,” he said. “We are the chief characters in this romance, you know.”
They had reached the path leading to the Welcome cottage. Patience, eager to end the interview which had thrown her into a state of consternation, such as she had never experienced before, seized the present opportunity.
“Harry,” she said, “please go. We are expectingfather home and—I’m afraid—it won’t be pleasant.”
“You haven’t answered me. I’m off to Chicago tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow!” Patience caught her breath quickly.
“Yes, in my new car. I’m going to drive back. I’ve overstayed my time and there are business calls which I simply cannot ignore. I’ll not insist on an answer tonight, but will you write me?”
The girl put out her hand which Harry grasped. Her lips quivered and she breathed, “Yes.”
He lifted the hand to his lips, but the girl drew it from him, whispered “goodby” and darted away. He stood watching her until she disappeared. Patience hurrying toward the cottage was roused from her tumult of emotion by the sound of voices. Once she heard the words “eight o’clock,” without recognizing the speaker. When they were spoken again she knew the voice as that of Martin Druce. She disliked Druce. The thought of his being alone with Elsie chilled her.
She came toward him swiftly but in silence. Her question: “What did you say was going to happen at eight o’clock, Mr. Druce?” was a complete surprise.
“Eh—why—” stammered Druce, off his guard.
“Why Patience, how late you are,” interrupted Elsie to conceal Druce’s confusion.
“Just a little, dear,” replied Patience, now confused herself. “I have been busy at the store.” Then she turned to Druce again. “What is it about eight o’clock—is it something concerning Elsie?” she persisted.
“O, I was just saying that I had to meet a man at the hotel at eight,” returned Druce, full of assurance again.
“Ah!” said Patience, “well, you’ll catch him all right—if you start now.”
Druce laughed. “Here’s your hat—what’s your hurry, eh?”
“Patience, how can you?” demanded Elsie.
“I didn’t mean to be rude,” retorted Patience serenely, “only I wouldn’t have him miss that man.”
“Oh, I can take a hint.” Druce started forthe gate. As he reached it he turned back to the two girls and added:
“I sure hope that man keeps his appointment to meet me at eight o’clock.”
CHAPTER VIIHARRY BOLAND HEARS FROM HIS FATHER
Harry Boland strode away from his interview with Patience deeply occupied with tumultuous reflections, not seeing the beauties of Millville which, but a short time before, he had been enthusiastically celebrating. He was, in fact, a young man walking in a dream. Every word the girl had uttered, every inflection of her voice, the involuntary confession of affection won from her by his own no less sudden avowal of love, projected themselves against his excited mind with all the vividness of kinetoscope pictures. He was very happy with these reflections that come to the youth in love when a familiar voice suddenly recalled him to mundane things.
“Hello, there Harry,” said the voice.
It was Grogan’s.
“Hello,” replied Harry, roused but not displeased to meet his father’s intimate political adviser in this part of the world, “what are you doing in this part of Illinois?”
“I’m on my way home,” replied Grogan, laconically.
“Ah, yes, Dad wrote me. You went to Kansas City, didn’t you?”
“I did. Your father caught me on the wire at St. Louis.”
“What did the governor want?”
“Nothing much. He told me you were here and suggested that I meet you. He thought it would be pleasant for us both to have company home.”
It dawned on Harry that perhaps his father had not been quite disinterested in this.
“You’re a good politician, Mike,” he said shortly.
“Is that a compliment now, or a slander against my character?” Grogan demanded, smiling.
“Neither,” replied Harry. “It’s a fact.”
“And why, might I ask, have you recalled it at this particular moment?”
“Because your conversation in this particular instance seemed to me to be that of a person who was concealing something. Politician’s talk, Grogan, is specious, but notable for its reticence.”
“Well, Harry,” returned Grogan, “your own line of talk is not particularly illuminating, either.”
“What do you mean, Mike?”
“Well, here I am, an old friend of your father’s, mixed up with him in half a dozen deals. I’ve known you ever since you sat in a high chair and spooned gruel from a bowl. I come on you in this out of the way corner and you say never a word of why you’re here, or what you’re doing. I think Clam is your middle name.”
“Why,” replied Harry, “I came down to Millville to collect some rents.”
“Only rents?” queried Grogan pointedly.
“What the devil do you mean?”
“Youngsters of your age sometimes amuse themselves collecting—shirtwaists.”
“Stop that, Grogan,” retorted Harry angrily.
“Stop what, me boy?”
“I don’t like that sort of insinuation.”
“Ho,” said Grogan, “angry, eh? Then it’s as I thought. There’s always fire in the heart when a young man flares up about a girl.”
“Look here, Grogan—”
“Easy, boy,” interrupted the older man. “I’m your friend and I don’t want to see you get into trouble—with your father, I mean.”
“Did he send you to spy on me?” demanded Harry hotly.
“Not at all,” returned Grogan suavely, “only he’s worried.”
“Worried, what the devil about?”
Grogan did not reply.
“I know I’ve overstayed my time,” Harry went on, “but some of these people have been difficult. I couldn’t throw them into the street when they promised to pay and—”
“I know, I know,” put in Grogan. “It’s not about you. Your father’s worried about business. One of these crazy reform waves has started in Chicago. A vice investigating committee is raising ructions.”
“What do you mean by a reform wave?What can a vice investigating committee have to do with my father?”
“Well, you see,” Grogan was picking his words carefully, “your father has large interests. An investigation of that sort unsettles business.”
“What started the reform wave?”
“A girl.”
“A what?”
“I said a girl,” replied Grogan evenly.
Harry laughed.
“Yes,” said Grogan, “they all laughed at her at first, just as you are doing now. But the joke is beginning to lose its point.”
“Who is she?”
“Her name,” returned Grogan, “is Mary Randall.”
“Mary Randall,” repeated Harry. The words meant nothing to him. “Who is she?”
“I don’t know,” replied Grogan. “I’ve never met the lady. That’s the mystery of her and she’s keeping it well. She belongs to the Randalls of Chicago—society folk—that’s all I know. But she isn’t one of these Michigan boulevard tea party reformers. They justtalk. She goes out and delivers the goods. She’s a fighter.”
Harry laughed again. “This is good,” he said. “An unknown girl, a society bud, working single handed stirs up Chicago until she gets all of you alleged smart politicians worrying. Grogan, I’m going to write a comedy about that.”
“Are you now?” said Grogan. “Well, I don’t approve of your idea. It’s not funny. The other night they raided the Baker Club and when they came into court they had evidence enough to hang them all. This Randall girl had worked in the club for a month as a waitress and she KNEW.”
“Still, Mike, that shouldn’t affect father.”
“Not directly—no,” replied Grogan, again picking his words with care, “but it gives the whole city an unsteady feeling. People won’t invest their money. If I were in your place, my boy, I’d go home.”
“I’m off tomorrow in my new car. Better come with me.”
“Make it tonight and I will,” replied Grogan.
“You’re on,” agreed Harry. “We’ll go tonight.” He surveyed the sky. “It’s going to storm,” he said; “but even if it does, unless there’s a flood the roads will be good. We’ll go tonight.”
CHAPTER VIIITHE DEATH OF TOM WELCOME
Both Harry Boland and Grogan fell silent after having reached their agreement to return to Chicago immediately. To a degree both men regretted the decision.
Grogan had accomplished the purpose for which the elder Boland had despatched him to Millville—that of disentangling Harry from his romance—but what he had seen of Patience Welcome had led him to dislike his task.
Harry had no sooner promised to drive back to Chicago in the night than he was assailed with yearning to see the girl again. Each occupied himself with his own thoughts. Dusk descended on the village. They had reached the corner of the street that led to their hotel when they were arrested by a maudlin voice.
“I’m all right, I tell you, Harve.”
Two men came out from beneath the shadow of the trees and could be seen dimly under the sickly gleam of a street light. One leaned heavily against the other.
“Sure, you’re all right,” replied the drunken man’s companion in a voice both recognized as that of Harvey Spencer. “I’m just going to see you as far as your house.” He spoke in the voice people use in humoring drunken men and children.
“I hain’t drunk, Harve,” insisted Harvey’s companion.
“Of course, you ain’t,” replied Harvey, “come on.”
“I’m just overcome with the heat. I—”
The reeling man broke off suddenly. He saw Harry and Grogan.
“Who the devil are you?” he demanded truculently.
“My name is Harry Boland,” replied the young man.
“Oh, the son of John Boland, eh?” jeered the drunken man. “Son of John Boland, ’lectric light king. John Boland’s son, eh?”
“Yes,” replied Harry sharply, “what of it?”
“Nothing I can prove,” retorted Welcome, grimly, “only—give my regards to your father. Just tell him Tom Welcome sends his regards. He’ll know.” He began to whimper softly. “Poor old Tom Welcome, who might have been riding in his carriage this day.” He stopped whining abruptly and snarled at the young man: “If there was any justice on God’s earth—”
Welcome lurched forward. Harry grasped his wrist and peered into his bloated face.
“What do you mean by that?” he demanded.
Grogan interrupted a good deal agitated. “He doesn’t mean anything,” he said, “he’s just drunk. Come, boy, let’s get out of here.”
“I want to know—” persisted Harry, but he dropped Welcome’s arm.
“Don’t be a fool,” commanded Grogan, “can’t you see the man’s drunk? Come on.”
“But I tell you I want to know—”
“Oh, you don’t know anything!”
Harry was about to retort angrily when Grogan seized his wrist with an iron grip and swung him around the corner. Half dragging the young man along with him he got him tothe hotel. There Grogan succeeded in convincing him of the folly of engaging in a street argument with a dipsomaniac he did not know.
Meanwhile Harvey and Welcome continued their slow and stumbling journey to the Welcome cottage. Welcome, after his interview with Harry Boland was in a savage mood. A debauch of two days had left him virtually a mad man. It required all of Harvey’s diplomacy to get him into his house quietly.
The lights were burning in the living room when they arrived. Harvey convoyed his swaying companion to the back of the house, opened the door quietly and pushed him in. Mrs. Welcome and the two girls were in the living room, but the wind was sighing without and they heard nothing. A storm had come up with the setting of the sun and occasional flashes of lightning lighted the darkened room where Welcome found himself while the thunder deadened the sound of his stumbling feet. He made his way through the kitchen to a bedroom and sank down exhausted on a bed.
But Tom Welcome could not sleep. Every nerve in his body jangled. The interview with young Boland, for reasons which will be apparent to the reader later, had aroused in him a smouldering anger. He tossed restlessly on his couch.
While he lay there he heard some one knocking at the front door. All of his perceptions had grown abnormally keen. He heard a boy’s voice and recognized it as that of a neighbor’s son.
“It’s me, Jimmie,” said the boy. “Pa sent me over with Elsie’s veil. She dropped it while she was out in the auto this afternoon.”
He heard the door close and then the accusing voice of his wife demanding:
“Elsie, who have you been out with, automobiling?”
“I was out this afternoon with Martin Druce,” replied the girl defiantly.
“Then,” went on the mother, conscious that a crisis of some sort between her and her daughter was approaching, “you were talking to him this evening and not to Harvey Spencer? You told me a falsehood?”
“What if I did?” Elsie’s tone was low and stubborn.
Mrs. Welcome began to sob.
“Mother, mother,” pleaded Patience, “Elsie didn’t mean—”
“I did mean it,” flared back Elsie. “I did mean it! Why shouldn’t I go autoing when I have the chance? Isn’t life in Millville hard enough without—” She paused overcome by a wave of passion. “I’m tired of Millville,” she exclaimed, “I’m tired of the factory. I’m tired of living here as we do in this miserable, tumble-down place we call home. I’m tired of working like a slave, while a drunken father—”
The words had scarcely left the girl’s lips when Tom Welcome, red-eyed, dishevelled, swaying, appeared in the doorway behind her. His face was lit with demoniac passion. He rushed at the girl and she screamed in terror. With a vicious lunge he struck her down and then, seizing her by the hair, dragged her into the bedroom where, amid her cries, he rained blow after blow upon her.
Harvey Spencer, just passing through thegate, heard the first scream. He rushed back into the house as Welcome, finished for the moment with Elsie, had returned to the cottage living room and was approaching his wife menacingly. He seized the raging man by the collar and hurled him into a corner.
“Stay there,” he said, “or I’ll brain you.”
Welcome stood for a moment glaring at the intruder. He attempted to speak, but foam flecked his lips and seemed to choke his voice. His eyes acquired a fixed and unearthly stare. He raised his fist as though to strike and then plunged headlong to the floor.
Patience was the first to reach her father’s side. A vivid flash of lightning followed by a terrific detonation of thunder rocked the cottage.
“He’s dying,” screamed Patience.
Mrs. Welcome, forgetting past injuries, sprang to her husband’s side.
“Tom,” she wailed, “speak to me. Tom—Tom, I’m your wife—”
The dying man tried to sit up. His mania had passed. He patted his wife’s shoulder feebly and smiled. A great weakness hadcome into his face. “Forgive me,” he said, “I didn’t know—I didn’t know what I was doing. It was the drink. I am going. Call Elsie!”
Patience sprang toward the bedroom, but it was empty. The open doors through the kitchen showed how she had fled. As she searched frantically for her sister, the little clock on the mantel slowly struck the hour of eight.
“She’s gone,” cried Patience. A premonition of the tragedy of Elsie’s flight flashed upon her mind. “Oh,” she cried, “my little lost sister! My little lost sister!”
“Gone,” cried Harvey. “Gone where?” He opened the door. The rain was falling pitilessly. “Not out into this storm. Someone must find her.” He rushed out into the darkness.
“Gone!” echoed Tom Welcome. His voice was hollow as a knell. The drink-racked body stiffened in a spasm and then dropped limply into his weeping wife’s arms. “Gone!” he gasped.
Tom Welcome was dead.
Another flash of lightning and a roar of thunder. The two women strove to revive the corpse. At last the dreadful realization came to them that Tom Welcome would never speak again. The wind smote the cottage and the light in the single lamp in the room fluttered as though in mortal terror. The skies were shattered with a final climactic crash of thunder. The mother and daughter, alone in that chamber of death, clung to each other silently feeling themselves isolated from all mankind, with even the elements storming against them.
While they waited, blanched and terror-stricken, for the last reverberations of the thunder, the whistle of the Fast Express, bound from Millville to the great city, rose wildly on the air, like the scream of an exultant demon, and died away in a series of weird and mocking echoes into the night.