CHAPTER XICONFESSIONS OF WAITER NO. 73From a sleep which had been heavy but was becoming restless and dreamful, Merriam was awakened about seven o'clock the next morning by a knocking at his door. He leaned over and pulled the little chain of the night lamp, and as the light glowed asked, "Who is it?""Rockwell," came the answer.By a rather athletic bit of stretching Merriam was able to turn the key in his lock without getting out of bed. "Come in," he called.Rockwell entered, closed the door behind him, and stood looking down at Merriam, who had lain back on his pillow."Slept well?" he asked."Like a football player," laughed Merriam, somehow ashamed of this fact."Feeling fit?""Certainly. Always feel fit."For a moment longer Rockwell looked, with perhaps a touch of an older man's envy of the unconscionable imperturbability of youthful health. Then he said:"Well, I have news."Merriam waited."About half an hour ago I called up 'Jennie' again. When I said I was a friend of Norman's, she admitted he was there. By asking a good many questions I learned that he turned up about two o'clock this morning and that he was very drunk. I judge he's having a touch of D.T. 'Jennie' was evidently rather disgusted at his arriving so late and in that condition--after your affectionate tone earlier in the evening, you know."Merriam evaded this thrust with a question:"Where can he have been in the meantime?""That is a point on which we shall have to seek information from our friend Simpson. Since telephoning I have seen Miss Norman, and we have agreed to order breakfast for all of us in Senator Norman's rooms with Simpson to serve us. He goes on duty again at seven o'clock, and I have asked that he be sent here as soon as he reports to take a breakfast order.""Why here?""Well, he will be more likely to talk freely to you and me alone than to you and me and Miss Norman--to say nothing of Mrs. Norman. And, if he has played some trick on us, he might refuse to go to Senator Norman's suite, but this room will mean nothing to him. Of course, he may not show up at all this morning. Ah, there he is, I hope!"A vigorous knock had sounded at the door. It proved, however, to be only a porter with Merriam's suit case and hand bag, for which the industrious Rockwell had also sent so early that morning to the more modest hotel at which Merriam had been registered."Now I can dress," said Merriam. "I was afraid I should have to turn waiter myself, having only evening clothes to put on.""Yes, get into your things," said Rockwell, "and let me think some more. This conspiracy business takes a lot more thinking than mere Reform!"Merriam hurried through a bath--a tubful of hot water early in the morning was so unwonted a luxury to a citizen of Riceville that he could not bring himself to forego it even on this occasion--and began to dress carefully, realising with pleasant excitement that he was to have breakfast with Mollie June.He had no more than got into his trousers when another knock came at the door.Rockwell motioned to Merriam to step into the bathroom and himself went to the door. "Come in," he said and opened it, keeping behind it.Sure enough, Simpson stepped into the room with his napkin and order pad.Rockwell promptly closed the door behind him, locked it, and stood with his back against it. He also pushed the switch for the center chandelier--for only the dim night lamp had been on.In the sudden light Simpson whirled with a startled and most unprofessional agility to face Rockwell."Good morning, Simpson."The waiter fairly moistened his lips before he could answer."Good morning, Mr. Rockwell."The man's face was certainly haggard. His eyes even were a trifle bloodshot. It was clear he had had a strange night. But after a moment of hostile confrontation the professional impassivity of a waiter--which is perhaps the ultimate perfection ofsang froid--descended about him like a cloak and mask."I was sent to this room--Mr. Wilson's room, I understood--to take a breakfast order.""Right, Simpson!" cried Merriam cheerily, emerging from the bathroom in his shirt sleeves.For a moment the human gleamed again through the eyes of the functionary."Are you Mr. Wilson?" he asked. His manner was perfect servility, but there was mockery and malice in the tone."Yes, Simpson," said Merriam. "This morning I am Mr. Wilson. I have read of an English duke who puts on a new pair of trousers each morning. But I go him one better. I put on an entire new personality each morning.""Very good, sir," was the ironical, stage-butler reply to this sally. "The grapefruit is very good this morning. Will you have some?"Merriam glanced at Rockwell."Very likely we'll have some," said the latter, "but we want something else first.""Before the grapefruit?" inquired Simpson."Yes, before the grapefruit," said Rockwell, a trifle sharply. "And what we propose to have before the grapefruit is a bit of talk with you, Mr. Simpson--about last night. Do you care to sit down?" He pointed to a chair.Simpson was undoubtedly agitated, but he controlled himself excellently. He even lifted his eyebrows:"I hope I know my place, sir."He raised his pad and wrote on it."Grapefruit," he said with insolent suavity. "For two? And then what? We have some excellent ham.""Damn your ham!" cried Rockwell. He snatched the man's pad and threw it on the floor. "Sit down in that chair and drop this damned pose! We're going to talk to you man to man."But Simpson only stooped and picked up his pad."Mr. Rockwell," he said, "I know my place. It is a very humble one. It is to take orders--for meals, to be served in this hotel. So long as that is what you want I am yours to command. But"--the American citizen stood up in him; no European waiter could have said it--"outside of that I am my own master as much as you are. When you call me 'Mr. Simpson' and tell me to sit down, I don't have to do it. And I don't have to talk of my personal affairs unless I choose, any more than any one else!"For an instant he glared at Rockwell as one angry man at another, his equal. Then he quietly became the waiter again. He lifted his pad and poised his pencil:"Shall we say some ham?"Rockwell looked at him a moment longer. Then he laughed: "Ham let it be!""Yes, sir," said Simpson, deferentially writing. "And some baked potatoes, perhaps? And coffee?""Yes," said Rockwell, "and the telephone book. Hand me the telephone book, please."Simpson hesitated, but this was clearly within the line of his duties."Yes, sir," he said, and stepped towards the stand on which the book lay."Wait!" said Rockwell. "Perhaps it isn't necessary. I think you can tell me the number I want."He paused a moment to let this sink in. Then:"Miss Alicia Wayward's number. I see I shall have to bring her here. You see," he explained pleasantly, "I have locked the door. There are two of us against you."He indicated Merriam, who still stood in the bathroom door, following the progress of the interview with excited interest."We are going to keep you here, not by any authority that we as guests of this hotel may have over you--as you have very well pointed out, we have none in such a matter,--but by simple force, till Miss Wayward can come down. We shall see whether she can make you talk."To Merriam's astonishment the waiter, with a sound somewhere between a sigh and a groan, sank into the chair which he had thus far so pertinaciously refused to take. For a moment he stared at the floor. Then he raised his eyes to Rockwell:"What do you want to know?""That's better," said Rockwell, leaving the door and preparing to sit down opposite Simpson. "Will you have a cigar?"Simpson shook his head and repeated his question."What do you want?"Rockwell dropped into his chair and glancing at Merriam pointed to another seat. Merriam was too much excited to care to sit down, but he came forward and leaned on the back of the chair."We want to know about last night, of course," said Rockwell. "At five minutes to eight Senator Norman got into the taxi which you were driving. At about two o'clock this morning he tumbled into Madame Couteau's, delirious with drink. We want the whole story of what happened between eight and two."Simpson sat on the edge of his chair, his hands on his knees. His order pad was under one hand, and its flexure showed that he was exerting intense pressure. His napkin dangled loosely half off his arm. He was looking at the floor again.He remained in this position for a number of seconds, the other two men intently regarding him. Then he straightened up, pushed himself farther back in his chair, and looked at Rockwell."You shall have it," he said.For a moment he stared. Then:"I hate Senator Norman--enough to kill him."The reader will observe that I use no exclamation points in punctuating Simpson's sentence. There were none in his delivery of it. But it was the more startling on that account."Do you know why?" he unexpectedly demanded."No," said Rockwell."Five years ago I was butler to Mr. Wayward. The--the-girl you call Madame Couteau was the parlour maid there. Her real name is Jennie Higgins. I was in love with her, and she had promised to marry me. I had a little money saved up. At that time Senator Norman's first wife was still alive, who was Mr. Wayward's sister, you know, Miss Wayward's aunt. Senator Norman came often to the house. He took a fancy to Jennie and turned her head. The fact that she was in his own brother-in-law's house made no difference to him. She--went off with him--on a lake cruise, in his yacht. When they came back he set her up in that flat and got her work as a manicurist. Ever since he has been her paramour!"The odd, old-fashioned word, which Simpson must have gleaned from some novel, came out queerly. But it served to express his bitterness as no ordinary word could have done."That's all. A parlour maid ruined. A butler cheated of his wife. It's nothing, of course."He was looking down again. Neither Rockwell nor Merriam ventured to speak. When he raised his eyes there was a gleam in them."Last night I had him in my power." (One sensed novels again.) "In my taxi, not knowing who I was. I was minded to kill him. You had told me to drive him directly to--to Jennie's. Not much! I drove as fast as I dared out Michigan Avenue. For a long time he suspected nothing. He thought he was on his way to the Mayor's, and that was the right direction. But when I turned into Washington Park he got scared. He called through the tube to know where in hell I was going. I answered, 'This is Simpson. You can try jumping, if you like--into hell!' I put the machine up to forty miles an hour. He opened the door once, but I guess he didn't dare try it. He shut it again. Of course, it was pure luck I didn't get stopped for speeding. But I got through Washington Park and across the Midway and out into a lonely place at the south end of Jackson Park. Then I stopped and got down and opened the door and ordered him out."The man stopped. When he spoke again there was more contempt than hatred in his voice."The coward. He went down on his knees on the wet road and cried and begged me not to hurt him. He said he was sorry, and he didn't know I cared so much, and he would make it all right yet. He would give me a lot of money and get me up in a business, and I could marry Jennie after all, and wouldn't I forgive him and go back to town and have a drink? The worm! I could have spit on him.SenatorNorman!"He saved his life all right," he added reflectively. "If he had showed fight I would have strangled him and thrown his body in the Lake." Simpson shuddered a little. "But you couldn't strangle a crying baby. I kicked him once or twice. But what more could I do? He kept begging me not to hurt him but to go back to town and have a drink. That gave me an idea. I jerked him up and pitched him into the car and drove back to a saloon. We sat at a table and drank, and he kept offering me money and saying I should marry Jennie. As if I would take his leavings! He drank a lot. I only took one or two to steady my nerves--poured out the rest. But he drank four or five cocktails. Then we went on in the taxi to another saloon and did it again. And then to another. And about midnight we ended up at a cheap dance hall on the West Side, and I turned him loose among the roughnecks and the women there."He was pretty drunk--told everybody who he was and showed his money,--and in a few minutes a lot of the girls were around him to get the money away from him. Most of the men they were with didn't mind--egged them on. Pretty soon he had a dozen couples in the bar with him and was paying for drinks all around. But one big foreigner, who was with the prettiest girl in the room, was ugly. When Norman, after buying a second round of drinks, tried to kiss his girl, he roared out at him and knocked him down. But Norman only stumbled up again with his lip bleeding and begged his pardon and handed the girl a fifty-dollar bill and bought drinks again. And then he got his arm about another girl and took her out to dance. It was an hour before I found him again. He was sitting on the stairs, with his collar off, crazy drunk--seeing things--and all cleaned out as to money."I though then he was about ripe for what I wanted. I carried him downstairs and put him in the taxi and drove to--Madame Couteau's! There I carried him up to her flat and propped him against the door and knocked and then waited part way down the stairs. When the door was opened he fell in, and I ran downstairs and took my taxi home."Evidently Simpson had finished his tale. And it had done him good to tell it. He was much less agitated than when he began. He looked steadily rather than angrily at Rockwell."That's the story you wanted," he said. "Of course now you can get me fired and blacklisted. It's little I'll care."Rockwell had let his cigar go out while Simpson talked. Now he lit it again with a good deal of deliberation. He was evidently thinking. Even Merriam perceived the point that was uppermost in his mind, namely, that with Norman still at Jennie's they had need of Simpson's silence and would be likely to need his help again. They must try to conciliate him and win his loyal support."I see no reason why I should do anything like that," Rockwell began, referring to Simpson's defiant suggestion. "I can hardly pronounce your conduct virtuous. But it was very natural--very excusable. It's lucky you did no worse!"(Merriam had a sudden vision of the horrid predicament they would have been in if Norman had actually been murdered in Jackson Park at the very time when he was impersonating him at the hotel.)"Still," continued Rockwell, "I think you made a mistake.""A mistake!" echoed Simpson."Yes.--Do you still love--Miss Higgins?""What's that to you?""Evidently you do. Why didn't you take his offer--his money, and marry her? It would have been the sensible thing to do and the kind thing to her. You might be happy after all. Of course, if you're too stern a moralist!"The man's face worked queerly. "It's not that. But she wouldn't have a waiter now. And he wouldn't have done it--let her alone.""Well, perhaps not, as things stood. But he will now. Have you seen the morning papers?""The papers? No, sir.""If you'll read them you'll find that Senator Norman has broken with all his old life and turned over a new leaf entirely, which he can't turn back. You have helped him do it, in fact!""What's the idea?" growled Simpson suspiciously."Listen, Mr. Simpson."Rapidly Rockwell sketched the principal events which had taken place at the hotel while the waiter was driving his enemy about Chicago: Merriam's impersonation, the Mayor's failure to veto the Ordinance in time, and the necessity which both the Mayor and Norman were now under of breaking with the "interests" and coming out as the candidates of the Reform League."In that rôle," he concluded, "George Norman will have to lead a strictly virtuous life. It will be the business of his friends and backers--my business, for example--to see that he does so. I will personally undertake to see that you get the money he promised you. All you will have to do is to make it up with Jennie. You may not be able or willing to do that right away. But in a few months---- There's no reason why you shouldn't be set up in a nice little business of your own--a delicatessen or caterer's, or a taxicab firm, or whatever you would like--in some other city, with Jennie for your wife. Will you think it over?"Simpson looked at Rockwell and then at Merriam."You certainly are as like as two plates," he said irrelevantly to the latter."Won't you think it over?" returned Merriam, as persuasively as if he had been reasoning with some irate patron of the Riceville High School."Yes," said Simpson after a bit, "I'll think it over.""In the meantime," said Rockwell, "you must keep still about all this, of course. And we may need your help again--for taxi driving and so forth.""What if I choose to blow the whole thing?""In that case you will do more than any one else could to help Norman to the thing he will most want--a reconciliation with Crockett and the rest of the gang. And he will go on in his old ways--Jennie included."Rockwell let Simpson digest that for a moment, and then said:"Well, think it over as you have promised. And now we really do want breakfast."Simpson got to his feet. He straightened the napkin on his arm and mechanically enunciated his servile formula:"Yes, sir.""And, Simpson!""Yes, sir?""I will talk with you again this afternoon. Till then, at least, keep your mouth shut and think. Think sensibly.""Very good, sir."Waiter No. 73 bowed gravely and left the bedroom.CHAPTER XIIGRAPEFRUIT AND TELEGRAMSWhen the door closed behind Simpson, Rockwell and Merriam naturally looked at each other."Poor fellow!" said Merriam.In spite of himself his mind was visited by a tantalising recollection of Jennie's voice as it had come to him over the telephone. With no more evidence than that he was inclined to think that Simpson was right in saying that she would not have a waiter now. But it was impossible to speak of this to Rockwell.The latter had apparently dismissed the incident and was looking at his watch."It's nearly eight o'clock," he said. "Put the rest of your things on and go down to Norman's rooms on the next floor. You're to have breakfast there with Miss Norman and Mrs. Norman. You'd better go down the stairs rather than in the elevator; you will be less likely to meet some one who will take you for the Senator. I am going to hunt up Dr. Hobart, the house physician here, and take him with me to this Madame Couteau's, or Jennie's, to see Norman. We must get him on his feet at once. A hotel physician will be the very man for that.""I must shave," said Merriam."Oh, never mind that. Time is precious."Merriam thought of the train which he now planned to take. It left at nine-fifteen and would get him to Riceville a little after noon. He remembered, too, that he must telegraph to his assistant principal that he would miss the morning session. And he thought of the coming breakfast hour with Mollie June. Certainly time was precious to him. Nevertheless he said decidedly:"I'm going to shave all the same."Rockwell looked at him with a comprehending smile. "All right, my boy," said the older man. "Doubtless it's very necessary. Hurry up and try not to cut yourself. I'll run along with the doctor."He moved to the door, stopped with his hand on the knob to say, "I shall probably drop in at the rooms before you're through breakfast," and was gone.Merriam sighed a certain relief and went into the bathroom to shave.A few minutes later, following Rockwell's injunction, he descended to the floor below by the stairs rather than the elevator. He forgot even to look at the pretty floor clerk on Floor Three, who last night was wearing his--Norman's--violets.When he knocked at the door labeled 323 it was the voice he most desired to hear that said, "Come in."He opened the door. The rose-and-white room was bright with morning sunshine, and half way down its length Mollie June, in a blue satin breakfast coat, with a lacy boudoir cap covering her hair, was standing before the little table which held the bowl of roses."Good morning, Mr.--John," she said.He half perceived that her voice sounded tired and a little sad. But the daintiness of breakfast coats and boudoir caps was as strange in Merriam's world as white shoulders were. His eyes drank it in delightfully. In his pleasure her note of sadness escaped him. He answered almost gaily:"Good morning--Mollie June!"His tone probably betrayed his mood, and I dare say Mollie June guessed the reason for his happiness. But she ignored both mood and reason. She had turned back to the roses."Come and help me," she said. "These flowers must have fresh water."Merriam pushed the door shut behind him and advanced rapidly. I am almost afraid he might have taken her in his arms. But Mollie June was already half way across the room with the roses, to lay them on a newspaper which she had previously spread on the seat of a straight-backed chair. So all that Merriam got his hands on was the bowl."Empty it in there," said Mollie June, indicating the bathroom between the sitting room and Norman's empty bedroom, "and fill it with cold water."Thankful that no reply was immediately demanded, Merriam did as he was bid.When he reëntered the sitting room with the fresh water, Mollie June stooped over the chair, gathered up the roses, and came towards him."Set it back in the same place," she said.Merriam did so, and she came up to him--that is to say, to the bowl--and inserted the stems all together, and with her pink fingers wet from the cool water deftly arranged the blossoms. Then, drying her finger tips on a very small handkerchief, she turned and raised her eyes to him gravely. He saw at last that she was pale--that she had been wakeful. Perhaps she had been crying. In sudden concern he stood dumb."Did you sleep well?" she asked.He mustered his forces to reply."I am afraid I did," he said, ashamed.She looked at him forgivingly."Of course you must have been dreadfully tired," she said. "I hardly slept at all," she added. "I am terribly worried about George. We didn't even know where he was until--a little while ago." Evidently Rockwell had already reported some part, at least, of Simpson's disclosure.For a moment they stood silent, tacitly avoiding reference to George Norman's ascertained whereabouts.Then Mollie June raised her eyes again."I'm worried, too, about--what we did last night. We mustn't do--so, again."She met his eyes, very serious."No!" Merriam assented."I can't call you 'Mr. Merriam,' though," she cried. "And I mustn't call you 'John.' I've decided to call you 'Mr. John'!""Thank you," said Merriam gravely. He was deeply touched by the unconscious confession.Mollie June turned away. "I must tell Aunt Mary you are here."Just then there came a knocking at the hall door.For an instant the boy and girl stared at each other as though in guilty alarm. Merriam started to go to the door. But Mollie June had recovered her wits."No," she said. "You must be careful about being seen. Sit there." She pointed to the armchair which still faced the gas log between the windows at the end of the room farthest from the hall. "I'll see who it is."It proved to be no one more dangerous than Simpson, who with an assistant was prepared to set up a table in the sitting room and serve the grapefruit.And even while Mollie June was bidding him come in, Aunt Mary entered from the bedroom. With her was Miss Alicia Wayward, apparently much excited, with her hands full of newspapers.Merriam stood up, and Alicia, catching sight of him, dropped on the floor the paper she held in her right hand and advanced with an air of eagerness."Oh, Mr.----," she began. Then, as Merriam took her hand, she stopped short in her sentence, laughed, and said, "Who are you this morning?"Merriam, whom Alicia always stimulated to play up, bowed over her hand as elegantly as he could and replied:"Senator Norman, I believe--at your service. Good morning, Miss Norman," he added, politely, to the older woman.Aunt Mary merely nodded, rather grimly, and turned away as if to inspect Simpson's preparation of the breakfast table. Merriam wondered how much of Simpson's confession Rockwell had found time to report to her.But Alicia gave him little time for speculation."Well, Senator," she rejoined, withdrawing her hand (you were always conscious when Alicia gave her hand and when she withdrew it), "you and the Mayor have made quite a noise in the world this morning. See!"She displayed the newspaper which she still held in her left hand. It was one of the leading Chicago dailies, which invariably prints one bold black headline across the top of the entire front page. The topic may be a world war or a dog fight, but the headline is always there in the same size and startling blackness of type. This morning it read:Mayor Black Signs OrdinanceAnd one of the columns below carried the further head:The Mayor and Senator NormanReported to Have BrokenWith Traction Interests"Oh!" exclaimed Mollie June, who had approached and read these captions. She looked at Merriam with wide-open eyes. I surmise that the newspaper headlines gave her, as indeed they gave to Merriam himself, the first actual realisation of the public interest attaching to what they had really felt to be a little private drama of their own.Aunt Mary had joined them."Mr. Black has definitely signed it, you see," she said, with a touch of triumph in her tone.It appeared that the Mayor had not gone to the Council meeting at all, and the paper did not fail to point out that the Ordinance had become law without his signature, under the provisions of the City Charter, at nine o'clock; but late in the evening, shortly before the Council adjourned, the document had arrived by a messenger, with the Mayor's signature attached.Reporters had immediately set out in relentless pursuit and had routed the Mayor out of bed at his house between twelve and one o'clock and obtained a brief interview; the substance of which was that the public interest of the city demanded the improved conditions which the new law would insure, and that he was proud to complete with his approval the public-spirited action of the Councilmen in passing it.The rest was mere rumour and speculation, interlarded with many prudent "it is said's," but it seemed that some if not all of it must have been inspired by the Mayor. "It was said" that an important representative of the Traction interests had seen Senator Norman in his rooms at the Hotel De Soto early in the evening and pleaded with him the cause of the interested bondholders and stockholders, whose investments would be imperilled by the changes involved, but that he had stood firm on the ground of the public welfare. "It was said," too, that later Mayor Black had had a long conference with the Senator--well, ithadbeen rather long,--and that they had agreed that the interests of the plain people of Chicago must at all costs decide the issue. "It was said," finally, that both Senator Norman and Mayor Black would probably join forces with the Reform League, whose program they had finally so powerfully supported, in demanding and obtaining other needed improvements in municipal conditions.From all of which it seemed to be clear that the Mayor, having taken an hour or so to think over the situation in which he found himself, had become convinced of the soundness of Aunt Mary's logic and had decided, without waiting for any further communication from the Norman camp, to claim the credit for the Ordinance and appeal for popular support thereon, taking care, however, to involve Senator Norman's name so that the real Norman should be compelled to join forces with him in his new departure.By the time the column of news and comment and a brief and cautious editorial on the occurrence had been read out by Alicia and one or two other papers glanced at, Simpson had set up and laid his table and had his first course served. He respectfully approached and inquired if they were ready for breakfast."Certainly!" said Aunt Mary.Merriam looked at his watch. It was half past eight."I ought to send my telegram to Riceville first," he said, "to let them know I shall be there on the noon train.""After the grapefruit," said Aunt Mary, with a decided note in her voice which led Merriam to look at her inquiringly.But he desired to exhibit the coolness of a man of the world, to whom telegrams were customary incidents of daily living and who habitually ran close to the wind in the matter of trains. So he acquiesced with a bookish "As you please," and moved with the others to the table.Simpson had decorated the center of the board with one of the hotel's slim glass vases holding a couple of pink carnations. Mollie June regarded this ornament with disfavour."Let's have the roses instead, Mr. John," she said.And Merriam, to the scandal of Simpson, himself removed the carnations and set the bowl of roses in their place.They said little over the grapefruit. Alicia added a few humorous comments on points in the newspaper article, but Aunt Mary was divided between an anxious absent-mindedness and a curious questioning scrutiny of Merriam, and Merriam was distracted between a suppressed worry over his telegram and approaching train time and the delight of stolen glances at--Mrs. Senator Norman. As for Mrs. Senator Norman, she devoted herself chiefly to the fruit. Once or twice, in looking up, she almost unavoidably intercepted one of Merriam's guilty glances. When this happened, she met his eyes frankly but with a gravity that was pathetically, forgivingly rebuking.Presently Simpson was removing the fruit rinds and placing finger bowls. Merriam looked quickly at his watch again and spoke to the waiter:"Bring me a telegraph form, please."Aunt Mary's absent-mindedness instantly vanished."What message are you going to send?" she asked in a restrained voice."Missed night train. Will arrive at noon.""No!" said Aunt Mary. "Mr. Merriam," she pursued quickly, "until George is brought back here you must stay. After all this in the papers this morning there will be scores of people to see him to-day. He is known to be a late riser and never sees any one before ten or they would have been here before this. In a very few minutes they will begin to come. We will put off most of them, of course. But there are likely to be some whom we can't put off. We can't tell where George is, and we can't say we don't know where he is, and there will be one or two to whom we can't say we won't tell where he is. We must have you in reserve. You shall go to bed in George's room, ill with--with--lumbago. Dr. Hobart will attend you. When absolutely necessary we can show a man into the room, and you can say a few words. I will tell you what to say in each case. You can have your head half way under the covers, and can make your voice weak and husky. You will be safe enough from detection. Then by this evening at the latest we shall bring George back, and you can go down to Riceville on the night train. You will only have missed one day, and you will have saved us from a most serious dilemma."There was an appeal in the elderly woman's voice to which Merriam was not insensible, though the pull of habitual regularity at his school was strong in him.It is to be feared that Alicia spoiled Aunt Mary's effect. Across the table from Merriam, she was partly hidden from him by the flowers. But she leaned forward, bringing her face almost beside the roses, and spoke in her most honeyed tones:"Oh, do, Mr. Merriam! How can you resist it?" she added. "If I were a man and had the chance to be Mollie June's husband even for a day----"She stopped with her archest smile.Mollie June, with possibly the slightest augmentation of colour, brought forward a practical argument."Since you will miss the morning anyway, it won't much matter if you miss the whole day. You haven't but one class in the afternoon, have you?""Only senior algebra," said Merriam."Miss Eldon can take that.""I suppose she could," said Merriam, who was realising that on this particular day advanced algebra would be to him the most distasteful of all branches of human learning."Then you'll stay and help us--Mr. John!"The reader will perceive that this simple appeal was really much superior to any which the too sophisticated and calculating Alicia could contrive. A touch of wistfulness came into Mollie June's face with the word "help." His high promise of the night before was irresistibly recalled. And "Mr. John" reminded him of the delightfulness of fresh water for roses and of the unconscious confession which her compromise name for him had implied. Alicia discreetly retired behind the roses, and Aunt Mary waited with lips somewhat grimly pursed.Then, while Merriam hesitated, with his eyes on Mollie June's face--we must suppose that he was weighing her very practical argument,--the telephone rang.Simpson, with telegraph blanks in his hand, answered it, and reported that Mr. Rockwell wished to speak to Senator Norman."This is--Norman," said Merriam cautiously into the telephone."Ah!" said Rockwell's voice. "Well, you'll be pleased to learn that you are quieter. You aren't seeing things any more." (I'm not sure of that, thought Merriam.) "But you, he has a severe cold--fever and a cough--touch of bronchitis, probably. Hobart says he can't possibly be moved till to-night. Anyway, I don't see how we could get him into the hotel till then. You must stay, Merriam.""All right," said Merriam, surprising his interlocutor by his ready acquiescence, "I'll stay.""Good! I'll be down at the hotel in half an hour." Rockwell rang off.Merriam turned to face the three women.When Aunt Mary heard the news about George, she held out her hand to Simpson for the telegraph forms and wrote.In a moment she read:"'Ill with a touch of bronchitis. Hope to be back to-morrow. John Merriam.' Will that do?""I suppose so," he assented.His words were almost drowned by a loud knock at the door."Our day has begun," said Aunt Mary, rising with admirable composure. She handed the telegram to Simpson. "Send it at once. Into the bedroom, Mr. Merriam. Get into bed as soon as you can. You have bronchitis, you know,--not lumbago."But before Merriam could obey the door was suddenly opened.
CHAPTER XI
CONFESSIONS OF WAITER NO. 73
From a sleep which had been heavy but was becoming restless and dreamful, Merriam was awakened about seven o'clock the next morning by a knocking at his door. He leaned over and pulled the little chain of the night lamp, and as the light glowed asked, "Who is it?"
"Rockwell," came the answer.
By a rather athletic bit of stretching Merriam was able to turn the key in his lock without getting out of bed. "Come in," he called.
Rockwell entered, closed the door behind him, and stood looking down at Merriam, who had lain back on his pillow.
"Slept well?" he asked.
"Like a football player," laughed Merriam, somehow ashamed of this fact.
"Feeling fit?"
"Certainly. Always feel fit."
For a moment longer Rockwell looked, with perhaps a touch of an older man's envy of the unconscionable imperturbability of youthful health. Then he said:
"Well, I have news."
Merriam waited.
"About half an hour ago I called up 'Jennie' again. When I said I was a friend of Norman's, she admitted he was there. By asking a good many questions I learned that he turned up about two o'clock this morning and that he was very drunk. I judge he's having a touch of D.T. 'Jennie' was evidently rather disgusted at his arriving so late and in that condition--after your affectionate tone earlier in the evening, you know."
Merriam evaded this thrust with a question:
"Where can he have been in the meantime?"
"That is a point on which we shall have to seek information from our friend Simpson. Since telephoning I have seen Miss Norman, and we have agreed to order breakfast for all of us in Senator Norman's rooms with Simpson to serve us. He goes on duty again at seven o'clock, and I have asked that he be sent here as soon as he reports to take a breakfast order."
"Why here?"
"Well, he will be more likely to talk freely to you and me alone than to you and me and Miss Norman--to say nothing of Mrs. Norman. And, if he has played some trick on us, he might refuse to go to Senator Norman's suite, but this room will mean nothing to him. Of course, he may not show up at all this morning. Ah, there he is, I hope!"
A vigorous knock had sounded at the door. It proved, however, to be only a porter with Merriam's suit case and hand bag, for which the industrious Rockwell had also sent so early that morning to the more modest hotel at which Merriam had been registered.
"Now I can dress," said Merriam. "I was afraid I should have to turn waiter myself, having only evening clothes to put on."
"Yes, get into your things," said Rockwell, "and let me think some more. This conspiracy business takes a lot more thinking than mere Reform!"
Merriam hurried through a bath--a tubful of hot water early in the morning was so unwonted a luxury to a citizen of Riceville that he could not bring himself to forego it even on this occasion--and began to dress carefully, realising with pleasant excitement that he was to have breakfast with Mollie June.
He had no more than got into his trousers when another knock came at the door.
Rockwell motioned to Merriam to step into the bathroom and himself went to the door. "Come in," he said and opened it, keeping behind it.
Sure enough, Simpson stepped into the room with his napkin and order pad.
Rockwell promptly closed the door behind him, locked it, and stood with his back against it. He also pushed the switch for the center chandelier--for only the dim night lamp had been on.
In the sudden light Simpson whirled with a startled and most unprofessional agility to face Rockwell.
"Good morning, Simpson."
The waiter fairly moistened his lips before he could answer.
"Good morning, Mr. Rockwell."
The man's face was certainly haggard. His eyes even were a trifle bloodshot. It was clear he had had a strange night. But after a moment of hostile confrontation the professional impassivity of a waiter--which is perhaps the ultimate perfection ofsang froid--descended about him like a cloak and mask.
"I was sent to this room--Mr. Wilson's room, I understood--to take a breakfast order."
"Right, Simpson!" cried Merriam cheerily, emerging from the bathroom in his shirt sleeves.
For a moment the human gleamed again through the eyes of the functionary.
"Are you Mr. Wilson?" he asked. His manner was perfect servility, but there was mockery and malice in the tone.
"Yes, Simpson," said Merriam. "This morning I am Mr. Wilson. I have read of an English duke who puts on a new pair of trousers each morning. But I go him one better. I put on an entire new personality each morning."
"Very good, sir," was the ironical, stage-butler reply to this sally. "The grapefruit is very good this morning. Will you have some?"
Merriam glanced at Rockwell.
"Very likely we'll have some," said the latter, "but we want something else first."
"Before the grapefruit?" inquired Simpson.
"Yes, before the grapefruit," said Rockwell, a trifle sharply. "And what we propose to have before the grapefruit is a bit of talk with you, Mr. Simpson--about last night. Do you care to sit down?" He pointed to a chair.
Simpson was undoubtedly agitated, but he controlled himself excellently. He even lifted his eyebrows:
"I hope I know my place, sir."
He raised his pad and wrote on it.
"Grapefruit," he said with insolent suavity. "For two? And then what? We have some excellent ham."
"Damn your ham!" cried Rockwell. He snatched the man's pad and threw it on the floor. "Sit down in that chair and drop this damned pose! We're going to talk to you man to man."
But Simpson only stooped and picked up his pad.
"Mr. Rockwell," he said, "I know my place. It is a very humble one. It is to take orders--for meals, to be served in this hotel. So long as that is what you want I am yours to command. But"--the American citizen stood up in him; no European waiter could have said it--"outside of that I am my own master as much as you are. When you call me 'Mr. Simpson' and tell me to sit down, I don't have to do it. And I don't have to talk of my personal affairs unless I choose, any more than any one else!"
For an instant he glared at Rockwell as one angry man at another, his equal. Then he quietly became the waiter again. He lifted his pad and poised his pencil:
"Shall we say some ham?"
Rockwell looked at him a moment longer. Then he laughed: "Ham let it be!"
"Yes, sir," said Simpson, deferentially writing. "And some baked potatoes, perhaps? And coffee?"
"Yes," said Rockwell, "and the telephone book. Hand me the telephone book, please."
Simpson hesitated, but this was clearly within the line of his duties.
"Yes, sir," he said, and stepped towards the stand on which the book lay.
"Wait!" said Rockwell. "Perhaps it isn't necessary. I think you can tell me the number I want."
He paused a moment to let this sink in. Then:
"Miss Alicia Wayward's number. I see I shall have to bring her here. You see," he explained pleasantly, "I have locked the door. There are two of us against you."
He indicated Merriam, who still stood in the bathroom door, following the progress of the interview with excited interest.
"We are going to keep you here, not by any authority that we as guests of this hotel may have over you--as you have very well pointed out, we have none in such a matter,--but by simple force, till Miss Wayward can come down. We shall see whether she can make you talk."
To Merriam's astonishment the waiter, with a sound somewhere between a sigh and a groan, sank into the chair which he had thus far so pertinaciously refused to take. For a moment he stared at the floor. Then he raised his eyes to Rockwell:
"What do you want to know?"
"That's better," said Rockwell, leaving the door and preparing to sit down opposite Simpson. "Will you have a cigar?"
Simpson shook his head and repeated his question.
"What do you want?"
Rockwell dropped into his chair and glancing at Merriam pointed to another seat. Merriam was too much excited to care to sit down, but he came forward and leaned on the back of the chair.
"We want to know about last night, of course," said Rockwell. "At five minutes to eight Senator Norman got into the taxi which you were driving. At about two o'clock this morning he tumbled into Madame Couteau's, delirious with drink. We want the whole story of what happened between eight and two."
Simpson sat on the edge of his chair, his hands on his knees. His order pad was under one hand, and its flexure showed that he was exerting intense pressure. His napkin dangled loosely half off his arm. He was looking at the floor again.
He remained in this position for a number of seconds, the other two men intently regarding him. Then he straightened up, pushed himself farther back in his chair, and looked at Rockwell.
"You shall have it," he said.
For a moment he stared. Then:
"I hate Senator Norman--enough to kill him."
The reader will observe that I use no exclamation points in punctuating Simpson's sentence. There were none in his delivery of it. But it was the more startling on that account.
"Do you know why?" he unexpectedly demanded.
"No," said Rockwell.
"Five years ago I was butler to Mr. Wayward. The--the-girl you call Madame Couteau was the parlour maid there. Her real name is Jennie Higgins. I was in love with her, and she had promised to marry me. I had a little money saved up. At that time Senator Norman's first wife was still alive, who was Mr. Wayward's sister, you know, Miss Wayward's aunt. Senator Norman came often to the house. He took a fancy to Jennie and turned her head. The fact that she was in his own brother-in-law's house made no difference to him. She--went off with him--on a lake cruise, in his yacht. When they came back he set her up in that flat and got her work as a manicurist. Ever since he has been her paramour!"
The odd, old-fashioned word, which Simpson must have gleaned from some novel, came out queerly. But it served to express his bitterness as no ordinary word could have done.
"That's all. A parlour maid ruined. A butler cheated of his wife. It's nothing, of course."
He was looking down again. Neither Rockwell nor Merriam ventured to speak. When he raised his eyes there was a gleam in them.
"Last night I had him in my power." (One sensed novels again.) "In my taxi, not knowing who I was. I was minded to kill him. You had told me to drive him directly to--to Jennie's. Not much! I drove as fast as I dared out Michigan Avenue. For a long time he suspected nothing. He thought he was on his way to the Mayor's, and that was the right direction. But when I turned into Washington Park he got scared. He called through the tube to know where in hell I was going. I answered, 'This is Simpson. You can try jumping, if you like--into hell!' I put the machine up to forty miles an hour. He opened the door once, but I guess he didn't dare try it. He shut it again. Of course, it was pure luck I didn't get stopped for speeding. But I got through Washington Park and across the Midway and out into a lonely place at the south end of Jackson Park. Then I stopped and got down and opened the door and ordered him out."
The man stopped. When he spoke again there was more contempt than hatred in his voice.
"The coward. He went down on his knees on the wet road and cried and begged me not to hurt him. He said he was sorry, and he didn't know I cared so much, and he would make it all right yet. He would give me a lot of money and get me up in a business, and I could marry Jennie after all, and wouldn't I forgive him and go back to town and have a drink? The worm! I could have spit on him.SenatorNorman!
"He saved his life all right," he added reflectively. "If he had showed fight I would have strangled him and thrown his body in the Lake." Simpson shuddered a little. "But you couldn't strangle a crying baby. I kicked him once or twice. But what more could I do? He kept begging me not to hurt him but to go back to town and have a drink. That gave me an idea. I jerked him up and pitched him into the car and drove back to a saloon. We sat at a table and drank, and he kept offering me money and saying I should marry Jennie. As if I would take his leavings! He drank a lot. I only took one or two to steady my nerves--poured out the rest. But he drank four or five cocktails. Then we went on in the taxi to another saloon and did it again. And then to another. And about midnight we ended up at a cheap dance hall on the West Side, and I turned him loose among the roughnecks and the women there.
"He was pretty drunk--told everybody who he was and showed his money,--and in a few minutes a lot of the girls were around him to get the money away from him. Most of the men they were with didn't mind--egged them on. Pretty soon he had a dozen couples in the bar with him and was paying for drinks all around. But one big foreigner, who was with the prettiest girl in the room, was ugly. When Norman, after buying a second round of drinks, tried to kiss his girl, he roared out at him and knocked him down. But Norman only stumbled up again with his lip bleeding and begged his pardon and handed the girl a fifty-dollar bill and bought drinks again. And then he got his arm about another girl and took her out to dance. It was an hour before I found him again. He was sitting on the stairs, with his collar off, crazy drunk--seeing things--and all cleaned out as to money.
"I though then he was about ripe for what I wanted. I carried him downstairs and put him in the taxi and drove to--Madame Couteau's! There I carried him up to her flat and propped him against the door and knocked and then waited part way down the stairs. When the door was opened he fell in, and I ran downstairs and took my taxi home."
Evidently Simpson had finished his tale. And it had done him good to tell it. He was much less agitated than when he began. He looked steadily rather than angrily at Rockwell.
"That's the story you wanted," he said. "Of course now you can get me fired and blacklisted. It's little I'll care."
Rockwell had let his cigar go out while Simpson talked. Now he lit it again with a good deal of deliberation. He was evidently thinking. Even Merriam perceived the point that was uppermost in his mind, namely, that with Norman still at Jennie's they had need of Simpson's silence and would be likely to need his help again. They must try to conciliate him and win his loyal support.
"I see no reason why I should do anything like that," Rockwell began, referring to Simpson's defiant suggestion. "I can hardly pronounce your conduct virtuous. But it was very natural--very excusable. It's lucky you did no worse!"
(Merriam had a sudden vision of the horrid predicament they would have been in if Norman had actually been murdered in Jackson Park at the very time when he was impersonating him at the hotel.)
"Still," continued Rockwell, "I think you made a mistake."
"A mistake!" echoed Simpson.
"Yes.--Do you still love--Miss Higgins?"
"What's that to you?"
"Evidently you do. Why didn't you take his offer--his money, and marry her? It would have been the sensible thing to do and the kind thing to her. You might be happy after all. Of course, if you're too stern a moralist!"
The man's face worked queerly. "It's not that. But she wouldn't have a waiter now. And he wouldn't have done it--let her alone."
"Well, perhaps not, as things stood. But he will now. Have you seen the morning papers?"
"The papers? No, sir."
"If you'll read them you'll find that Senator Norman has broken with all his old life and turned over a new leaf entirely, which he can't turn back. You have helped him do it, in fact!"
"What's the idea?" growled Simpson suspiciously.
"Listen, Mr. Simpson."
Rapidly Rockwell sketched the principal events which had taken place at the hotel while the waiter was driving his enemy about Chicago: Merriam's impersonation, the Mayor's failure to veto the Ordinance in time, and the necessity which both the Mayor and Norman were now under of breaking with the "interests" and coming out as the candidates of the Reform League.
"In that rôle," he concluded, "George Norman will have to lead a strictly virtuous life. It will be the business of his friends and backers--my business, for example--to see that he does so. I will personally undertake to see that you get the money he promised you. All you will have to do is to make it up with Jennie. You may not be able or willing to do that right away. But in a few months---- There's no reason why you shouldn't be set up in a nice little business of your own--a delicatessen or caterer's, or a taxicab firm, or whatever you would like--in some other city, with Jennie for your wife. Will you think it over?"
Simpson looked at Rockwell and then at Merriam.
"You certainly are as like as two plates," he said irrelevantly to the latter.
"Won't you think it over?" returned Merriam, as persuasively as if he had been reasoning with some irate patron of the Riceville High School.
"Yes," said Simpson after a bit, "I'll think it over."
"In the meantime," said Rockwell, "you must keep still about all this, of course. And we may need your help again--for taxi driving and so forth."
"What if I choose to blow the whole thing?"
"In that case you will do more than any one else could to help Norman to the thing he will most want--a reconciliation with Crockett and the rest of the gang. And he will go on in his old ways--Jennie included."
Rockwell let Simpson digest that for a moment, and then said:
"Well, think it over as you have promised. And now we really do want breakfast."
Simpson got to his feet. He straightened the napkin on his arm and mechanically enunciated his servile formula:
"Yes, sir."
"And, Simpson!"
"Yes, sir?"
"I will talk with you again this afternoon. Till then, at least, keep your mouth shut and think. Think sensibly."
"Very good, sir."
Waiter No. 73 bowed gravely and left the bedroom.
CHAPTER XII
GRAPEFRUIT AND TELEGRAMS
When the door closed behind Simpson, Rockwell and Merriam naturally looked at each other.
"Poor fellow!" said Merriam.
In spite of himself his mind was visited by a tantalising recollection of Jennie's voice as it had come to him over the telephone. With no more evidence than that he was inclined to think that Simpson was right in saying that she would not have a waiter now. But it was impossible to speak of this to Rockwell.
The latter had apparently dismissed the incident and was looking at his watch.
"It's nearly eight o'clock," he said. "Put the rest of your things on and go down to Norman's rooms on the next floor. You're to have breakfast there with Miss Norman and Mrs. Norman. You'd better go down the stairs rather than in the elevator; you will be less likely to meet some one who will take you for the Senator. I am going to hunt up Dr. Hobart, the house physician here, and take him with me to this Madame Couteau's, or Jennie's, to see Norman. We must get him on his feet at once. A hotel physician will be the very man for that."
"I must shave," said Merriam.
"Oh, never mind that. Time is precious."
Merriam thought of the train which he now planned to take. It left at nine-fifteen and would get him to Riceville a little after noon. He remembered, too, that he must telegraph to his assistant principal that he would miss the morning session. And he thought of the coming breakfast hour with Mollie June. Certainly time was precious to him. Nevertheless he said decidedly:
"I'm going to shave all the same."
Rockwell looked at him with a comprehending smile. "All right, my boy," said the older man. "Doubtless it's very necessary. Hurry up and try not to cut yourself. I'll run along with the doctor."
He moved to the door, stopped with his hand on the knob to say, "I shall probably drop in at the rooms before you're through breakfast," and was gone.
Merriam sighed a certain relief and went into the bathroom to shave.
A few minutes later, following Rockwell's injunction, he descended to the floor below by the stairs rather than the elevator. He forgot even to look at the pretty floor clerk on Floor Three, who last night was wearing his--Norman's--violets.
When he knocked at the door labeled 323 it was the voice he most desired to hear that said, "Come in."
He opened the door. The rose-and-white room was bright with morning sunshine, and half way down its length Mollie June, in a blue satin breakfast coat, with a lacy boudoir cap covering her hair, was standing before the little table which held the bowl of roses.
"Good morning, Mr.--John," she said.
He half perceived that her voice sounded tired and a little sad. But the daintiness of breakfast coats and boudoir caps was as strange in Merriam's world as white shoulders were. His eyes drank it in delightfully. In his pleasure her note of sadness escaped him. He answered almost gaily:
"Good morning--Mollie June!"
His tone probably betrayed his mood, and I dare say Mollie June guessed the reason for his happiness. But she ignored both mood and reason. She had turned back to the roses.
"Come and help me," she said. "These flowers must have fresh water."
Merriam pushed the door shut behind him and advanced rapidly. I am almost afraid he might have taken her in his arms. But Mollie June was already half way across the room with the roses, to lay them on a newspaper which she had previously spread on the seat of a straight-backed chair. So all that Merriam got his hands on was the bowl.
"Empty it in there," said Mollie June, indicating the bathroom between the sitting room and Norman's empty bedroom, "and fill it with cold water."
Thankful that no reply was immediately demanded, Merriam did as he was bid.
When he reëntered the sitting room with the fresh water, Mollie June stooped over the chair, gathered up the roses, and came towards him.
"Set it back in the same place," she said.
Merriam did so, and she came up to him--that is to say, to the bowl--and inserted the stems all together, and with her pink fingers wet from the cool water deftly arranged the blossoms. Then, drying her finger tips on a very small handkerchief, she turned and raised her eyes to him gravely. He saw at last that she was pale--that she had been wakeful. Perhaps she had been crying. In sudden concern he stood dumb.
"Did you sleep well?" she asked.
He mustered his forces to reply.
"I am afraid I did," he said, ashamed.
She looked at him forgivingly.
"Of course you must have been dreadfully tired," she said. "I hardly slept at all," she added. "I am terribly worried about George. We didn't even know where he was until--a little while ago." Evidently Rockwell had already reported some part, at least, of Simpson's disclosure.
For a moment they stood silent, tacitly avoiding reference to George Norman's ascertained whereabouts.
Then Mollie June raised her eyes again.
"I'm worried, too, about--what we did last night. We mustn't do--so, again."
She met his eyes, very serious.
"No!" Merriam assented.
"I can't call you 'Mr. Merriam,' though," she cried. "And I mustn't call you 'John.' I've decided to call you 'Mr. John'!"
"Thank you," said Merriam gravely. He was deeply touched by the unconscious confession.
Mollie June turned away. "I must tell Aunt Mary you are here."
Just then there came a knocking at the hall door.
For an instant the boy and girl stared at each other as though in guilty alarm. Merriam started to go to the door. But Mollie June had recovered her wits.
"No," she said. "You must be careful about being seen. Sit there." She pointed to the armchair which still faced the gas log between the windows at the end of the room farthest from the hall. "I'll see who it is."
It proved to be no one more dangerous than Simpson, who with an assistant was prepared to set up a table in the sitting room and serve the grapefruit.
And even while Mollie June was bidding him come in, Aunt Mary entered from the bedroom. With her was Miss Alicia Wayward, apparently much excited, with her hands full of newspapers.
Merriam stood up, and Alicia, catching sight of him, dropped on the floor the paper she held in her right hand and advanced with an air of eagerness.
"Oh, Mr.----," she began. Then, as Merriam took her hand, she stopped short in her sentence, laughed, and said, "Who are you this morning?"
Merriam, whom Alicia always stimulated to play up, bowed over her hand as elegantly as he could and replied:
"Senator Norman, I believe--at your service. Good morning, Miss Norman," he added, politely, to the older woman.
Aunt Mary merely nodded, rather grimly, and turned away as if to inspect Simpson's preparation of the breakfast table. Merriam wondered how much of Simpson's confession Rockwell had found time to report to her.
But Alicia gave him little time for speculation.
"Well, Senator," she rejoined, withdrawing her hand (you were always conscious when Alicia gave her hand and when she withdrew it), "you and the Mayor have made quite a noise in the world this morning. See!"
She displayed the newspaper which she still held in her left hand. It was one of the leading Chicago dailies, which invariably prints one bold black headline across the top of the entire front page. The topic may be a world war or a dog fight, but the headline is always there in the same size and startling blackness of type. This morning it read:
Mayor Black Signs Ordinance
And one of the columns below carried the further head:
The Mayor and Senator NormanReported to Have BrokenWith Traction Interests
"Oh!" exclaimed Mollie June, who had approached and read these captions. She looked at Merriam with wide-open eyes. I surmise that the newspaper headlines gave her, as indeed they gave to Merriam himself, the first actual realisation of the public interest attaching to what they had really felt to be a little private drama of their own.
Aunt Mary had joined them.
"Mr. Black has definitely signed it, you see," she said, with a touch of triumph in her tone.
It appeared that the Mayor had not gone to the Council meeting at all, and the paper did not fail to point out that the Ordinance had become law without his signature, under the provisions of the City Charter, at nine o'clock; but late in the evening, shortly before the Council adjourned, the document had arrived by a messenger, with the Mayor's signature attached.
Reporters had immediately set out in relentless pursuit and had routed the Mayor out of bed at his house between twelve and one o'clock and obtained a brief interview; the substance of which was that the public interest of the city demanded the improved conditions which the new law would insure, and that he was proud to complete with his approval the public-spirited action of the Councilmen in passing it.
The rest was mere rumour and speculation, interlarded with many prudent "it is said's," but it seemed that some if not all of it must have been inspired by the Mayor. "It was said" that an important representative of the Traction interests had seen Senator Norman in his rooms at the Hotel De Soto early in the evening and pleaded with him the cause of the interested bondholders and stockholders, whose investments would be imperilled by the changes involved, but that he had stood firm on the ground of the public welfare. "It was said," too, that later Mayor Black had had a long conference with the Senator--well, ithadbeen rather long,--and that they had agreed that the interests of the plain people of Chicago must at all costs decide the issue. "It was said," finally, that both Senator Norman and Mayor Black would probably join forces with the Reform League, whose program they had finally so powerfully supported, in demanding and obtaining other needed improvements in municipal conditions.
From all of which it seemed to be clear that the Mayor, having taken an hour or so to think over the situation in which he found himself, had become convinced of the soundness of Aunt Mary's logic and had decided, without waiting for any further communication from the Norman camp, to claim the credit for the Ordinance and appeal for popular support thereon, taking care, however, to involve Senator Norman's name so that the real Norman should be compelled to join forces with him in his new departure.
By the time the column of news and comment and a brief and cautious editorial on the occurrence had been read out by Alicia and one or two other papers glanced at, Simpson had set up and laid his table and had his first course served. He respectfully approached and inquired if they were ready for breakfast.
"Certainly!" said Aunt Mary.
Merriam looked at his watch. It was half past eight.
"I ought to send my telegram to Riceville first," he said, "to let them know I shall be there on the noon train."
"After the grapefruit," said Aunt Mary, with a decided note in her voice which led Merriam to look at her inquiringly.
But he desired to exhibit the coolness of a man of the world, to whom telegrams were customary incidents of daily living and who habitually ran close to the wind in the matter of trains. So he acquiesced with a bookish "As you please," and moved with the others to the table.
Simpson had decorated the center of the board with one of the hotel's slim glass vases holding a couple of pink carnations. Mollie June regarded this ornament with disfavour.
"Let's have the roses instead, Mr. John," she said.
And Merriam, to the scandal of Simpson, himself removed the carnations and set the bowl of roses in their place.
They said little over the grapefruit. Alicia added a few humorous comments on points in the newspaper article, but Aunt Mary was divided between an anxious absent-mindedness and a curious questioning scrutiny of Merriam, and Merriam was distracted between a suppressed worry over his telegram and approaching train time and the delight of stolen glances at--Mrs. Senator Norman. As for Mrs. Senator Norman, she devoted herself chiefly to the fruit. Once or twice, in looking up, she almost unavoidably intercepted one of Merriam's guilty glances. When this happened, she met his eyes frankly but with a gravity that was pathetically, forgivingly rebuking.
Presently Simpson was removing the fruit rinds and placing finger bowls. Merriam looked quickly at his watch again and spoke to the waiter:
"Bring me a telegraph form, please."
Aunt Mary's absent-mindedness instantly vanished.
"What message are you going to send?" she asked in a restrained voice.
"Missed night train. Will arrive at noon."
"No!" said Aunt Mary. "Mr. Merriam," she pursued quickly, "until George is brought back here you must stay. After all this in the papers this morning there will be scores of people to see him to-day. He is known to be a late riser and never sees any one before ten or they would have been here before this. In a very few minutes they will begin to come. We will put off most of them, of course. But there are likely to be some whom we can't put off. We can't tell where George is, and we can't say we don't know where he is, and there will be one or two to whom we can't say we won't tell where he is. We must have you in reserve. You shall go to bed in George's room, ill with--with--lumbago. Dr. Hobart will attend you. When absolutely necessary we can show a man into the room, and you can say a few words. I will tell you what to say in each case. You can have your head half way under the covers, and can make your voice weak and husky. You will be safe enough from detection. Then by this evening at the latest we shall bring George back, and you can go down to Riceville on the night train. You will only have missed one day, and you will have saved us from a most serious dilemma."
There was an appeal in the elderly woman's voice to which Merriam was not insensible, though the pull of habitual regularity at his school was strong in him.
It is to be feared that Alicia spoiled Aunt Mary's effect. Across the table from Merriam, she was partly hidden from him by the flowers. But she leaned forward, bringing her face almost beside the roses, and spoke in her most honeyed tones:
"Oh, do, Mr. Merriam! How can you resist it?" she added. "If I were a man and had the chance to be Mollie June's husband even for a day----"
She stopped with her archest smile.
Mollie June, with possibly the slightest augmentation of colour, brought forward a practical argument.
"Since you will miss the morning anyway, it won't much matter if you miss the whole day. You haven't but one class in the afternoon, have you?"
"Only senior algebra," said Merriam.
"Miss Eldon can take that."
"I suppose she could," said Merriam, who was realising that on this particular day advanced algebra would be to him the most distasteful of all branches of human learning.
"Then you'll stay and help us--Mr. John!"
The reader will perceive that this simple appeal was really much superior to any which the too sophisticated and calculating Alicia could contrive. A touch of wistfulness came into Mollie June's face with the word "help." His high promise of the night before was irresistibly recalled. And "Mr. John" reminded him of the delightfulness of fresh water for roses and of the unconscious confession which her compromise name for him had implied. Alicia discreetly retired behind the roses, and Aunt Mary waited with lips somewhat grimly pursed.
Then, while Merriam hesitated, with his eyes on Mollie June's face--we must suppose that he was weighing her very practical argument,--the telephone rang.
Simpson, with telegraph blanks in his hand, answered it, and reported that Mr. Rockwell wished to speak to Senator Norman.
"This is--Norman," said Merriam cautiously into the telephone.
"Ah!" said Rockwell's voice. "Well, you'll be pleased to learn that you are quieter. You aren't seeing things any more." (I'm not sure of that, thought Merriam.) "But you, he has a severe cold--fever and a cough--touch of bronchitis, probably. Hobart says he can't possibly be moved till to-night. Anyway, I don't see how we could get him into the hotel till then. You must stay, Merriam."
"All right," said Merriam, surprising his interlocutor by his ready acquiescence, "I'll stay."
"Good! I'll be down at the hotel in half an hour." Rockwell rang off.
Merriam turned to face the three women.
When Aunt Mary heard the news about George, she held out her hand to Simpson for the telegraph forms and wrote.
In a moment she read:
"'Ill with a touch of bronchitis. Hope to be back to-morrow. John Merriam.' Will that do?"
"I suppose so," he assented.
His words were almost drowned by a loud knock at the door.
"Our day has begun," said Aunt Mary, rising with admirable composure. She handed the telegram to Simpson. "Send it at once. Into the bedroom, Mr. Merriam. Get into bed as soon as you can. You have bronchitis, you know,--not lumbago."
But before Merriam could obey the door was suddenly opened.