THEidea that her child might attain the highest honor within the reach of any man on earth had stirred Angela to the depths and given new meaning and dignity to life. She lifted her head. She had borne a child whose word might bend a million wills to his. The world was a bigger, nobler place in which to live.
She was stirred with sudden purpose to leave no stone unturned to bring this dream to pass. She bought books of the lives of the presidents. Twice she read the life of Abraham Lincoln, the humble backwoodsman rail-splitter who became president.
But her vivid Italian imagination loved the stories of George Washington, the first president, best. He was nearest in history to Columbus, the Italian who discovered America. She read the legends of little George Washington’s adventures and began to play the mighty drama of her own son’s career by guiding his feet in the same path.
She had laughed immoderately over George cutting his father’s cherry-tree. She was sure her bambinowas capable of that! If George cut cherry-trees, of course his father had cherries to eat. She got at once a lot of cherries and fed them to the boy, laughing and nursing her dream.
She found a picture of Washington in his Colonial dress. The style pleased her fancy. She went forthwith, bought the material and made her boy a suit with cockade hat exactly like it.
Tommaso was amazed on entering the living-room from the fruit store to find the kid arrayed in the strange garb. Angela was stuffing some cotton under the cockade hat to make it fit, studying the picture to be sure of the effect.
When she explained, Tommaso joined in the play with equal zest.
When the boy had exhausted the admiration of his father and mother he sallied forth into the street to meet his little friends and show his clothes.
He had scarcely cleared the door when “Sausage” emerged from the Schultz delicatessen store and the two met halfway. No hard feelings had lingered from their fight in the old Armory. Sausage’s admiration was boundless. He had just persuaded little Tommaso to go home and show them to his own mother when they turned and saw Meyer unloading a truck filled with curious looking long boxes.
They ran up to investigate just as a case fell and a gun dropped to the pavement.
The kids rushed to Benda’s to tell Angela and Tommaso.
“I told you that man was no good!” Angela exclaimed. “Go—and see quick and we tell Vasa’—”
Tommaso hurried across the street and found Meyer standing over the broken case. Meyer faced the Italian without ceremony:
“Cost your life to open your yap about these guns—see?”
Tommaso snapped his finger in the other’s face:
“Go t’ell!”
He turned on his heel to go, saw his wife and the children near, rushed back and snapped his finger again in Meyer’s face:
“Go t’ell two times—see—two times!”
Meyer merely held his gaze in a moment of angry silence and turned to his work.
Tommaso rushed back into his flat, pushed things from the table, seized a pen and wrote a hurried note to his leader.
Congressman Vasa:Men unload guns in our street. He say killa me if I tell. I tell him go t’ell. I tell him got’ell two times. I Americano. My kid he be president—maybe—Tommaso Benda.
Congressman Vasa:
Men unload guns in our street. He say killa me if I tell. I tell him go t’ell. I tell him got’ell two times. I Americano. My kid he be president—maybe—
Tommaso Benda.
He hurried Angela into her best new American cut dress and sent her with the boy to Long Island to tell Vassar.
The visit all but ended in a tragedy for poor Angela. While searching the spacious Holland grounds for her leader, the boy suddenly spied a hatchet with which the master had been mending a box in which he was cultivating a precious orange-tree that had been carefully guarded in a hothouse during the winter months.
The kid saw his chance to emulate the example of George Washington. He lost no time. The tree was well hacked before Holland pounced upon him.
The old man had him by the ear when Angela dashed to the rescue. She saw the scarred tree with horror and her apologies were profuse.
“Ah, pardon, signor! You see his little suit—he play George Wash—and cutta the cherry-tree—”
She paused and shook the boy fiercely.
“Ah—you maka me seek!”
Holland began to smile at the roguish beauty of the boy glancing up from the corners of his dark, beautiful eyes.
Vassar, Virginia, Zonia and Marya hearing the commotion, rushed up.
Angela extended her apologies to all.
“You see, he really think he’s leetle George Wash—I mak him speak his piece—you like to hear it?”
Her offer was greeted by a chorus of approval.
Angela fixed the child with a stern look.
“Speeka your piece!”
The boy shook his head.
“Speeka-your-piece!” The order was a threat this time and little Tommaso yielded.
Bowing gracefully, he faced the group and recited with brave accent:
My Country, ’tis of theeI cutta the cherry-tree,Sweet land of liberteeMy name is George Wash!
My Country, ’tis of theeI cutta the cherry-tree,Sweet land of liberteeMy name is George Wash!
My Country, ’tis of theeI cutta the cherry-tree,Sweet land of liberteeMy name is George Wash!
He bowed again as all laughed and applauded. Virginia took him in her arms and kissed him. While she was yet complimenting the boy on his fine speech Angela whispered to Vassar:
“My man Tommaso—he want to see you, signor! He send this—”
She slipped the note into Vassar’s hand, repeated her apologies and hurried from the lawn, shaking Tommaso:
“Ah, you leetle mik! You maka me seek—! I tella you play George Wash and cutta the cherry-tree—and oh, my Mother of God! You play hell and cutta theorange-tree!”
Little Tommaso took the scolding philosophically. Orange or cherry-trees were all the same to him. He merely answered his mother’s dramatic rage with a twinkle of his eye until she stooped at last and kissed him.
VASSARlooked at the scrawled note and saw that he must return to the city. The incident probably meant nothing and yet it brought to his mind a vague uneasiness.
He instinctively turned to Virginia who was looking at him with curious interest. She spoke with genuine admiration:
“I had no idea that any politician in America could win the hearts of his people in the way you hold yours—”
“It’s worth while, isn’t it?”
“Decidedly. It makes my regret all the more keen that you will not accompany me on my tour of the state—”
“You go soon?” he asked.
“I leave Monday morning for a month. It has been one of my dreams since we met that I’d win you—and we’d make a sort of triumphal tour together—”
“You’re joking,” he answered lightly.
“I know now that it is not to be, of course,” she said seriously.
He hadn’t thought of her being on such a fool trip. Waldron no doubt as her campaign financier would meet her at many points. The thought set the blood pounding from his heart.
“Shall we sit down a moment?” he suggested.
“By all means if I can persuade you,” she consented.
Behind a rich fir on the lawn stood a massive marble seat. They strolled to the spot and sat down. Hours of debate they had held here and neither had yielded an inch. A circular trellis of roses hid the house from view and sheltered the seat from the gaze of people who might be crossing the open space. The hedge along the turnpike completely hid them from the highway.
By a subtle instinct she felt the wave of emotion from his tense mind.
A long silence fell between them. Her last speech had given him the cue for his question. He had brooded over its possible meaning from the moment she had expressed the idea. He picked a pebble from the ground, shot it from his fingers as he had done with marbles when a boy.
Lifting his head with a serious look straight into her brown eyes he said:
“Did you believe for a moment that I could go with you on such a campaign tour?”
She met his gaze squarely.
“I thought it too good to be true, of course, and yet your unexpected sympathy and your—your—shall I say, frankly expressed admiration, led me into all sorts of silly hopes.”
“And yet you knew on a moment’s reflection that such a surrender of principle by a man of my character was out of the question.”
“It has turned out to be so,” she answered slowly.
“Could you have respected me had I cut a complete intellectual and moral somersault merely at the wave of your beautiful hand?”
“I could respect any man who yields to reason,” she fenced.
He smiled.
“I didn’t ask you that—”
“No?”
“You’re fencing. And I must come to the real issue between us. I do it with fear and trembling and with uncovered head. I had to be true to the best that’s in me with you for the biggest reason that can sway an honest man’s soul. I have loved you from the moment we met—”
He stopped short and breathed deeply, afraid to face her. His declaration had called for no answer. Sheremained silent. From the corner of his eye he noted the tightening of her firm lips.
“I’ve tried to tell you so a dozen times this week and failed. I was afraid, it meant so much to me. I had hoped to be with you another month at least in this beautiful world of sunlight and flowers, of moon and sea. I hoped to win you with a little more time and patience. But I couldn’t wait and see you go on this trip. I had to speak. I love you with the love a strong man can give but once in life. It’s strange that of all the women in the world I should have loved the one whose work I must oppose! You’ll believe me when I tell you that the fiercest battle I have ever fought was with the Devil when he whispered that I might win by hedging and trimming and lying diplomatically as men have done before and many men will do again. At least you respect me for the honesty with which I have met this issue?”
He had asked her a direct question at last. Her silence had become unendurable. Her answer was scarcely audible. She only breathed it.
“Yes, I understand and respect you for it—”
His heart gave a throb of hope.
“I don’t ask you if you love me now. I just want to know if I’ve a chance to win you?”
The impulse to seize her hand was resistless. Shemade no effort to withdraw it and he pressed it tenderly.
A wistful smile played about the sensitive mouth and she was slow to answer.
“Tell me—have I a chance?” he pleaded.
Her voice was far away but clear-toned music. He heard his doom in its perfect rhythm before the words were complete.
“I can’t see,” she began slowly, “how two people could enter the sweet intimacy of marriage with a vital difference of opinion dividing them. I couldn’t. Your honesty and intellectual strength I admire. This honesty and strength will keep us opponents. Such an union is unthinkable—”
“Not if we love one another,” he protested eagerly. “There is but one issue in human life between man and woman and that is love. If you love me, nothing else matters—”
She shook her head.
“It isn’t true. You love me—but other things matter. Otherwise you would give them up to win your love. I claim to be your equal in brain and heart if not in muscle. You say that if I love nothing else matters and yet you say in the same breath that you risk your love to save your principles. In your heart you know that other things do matter, and with me they matter deeply.I believe with every beat of my heart that the progress of the world waits on the advent of women in the organization of its industries, its politics and its thinking. This consciousness of her mission in the modern woman is the biggest fact of our century—”
She paused and faced him with a look of iron purpose.
“No matter if I did love you—I’d tear that love out of my heart if it held me back from the fulfilment of the highest ideal of duty to my sex—”
“What higher ideal can any woman hold than her home?”
“For the woman whose horizon is no larger there can be none. She can only see the world in which she moves. To some of us God has given the wider view. What is one life if it is sacrificed to this higher ideal? You are leading the renaissance of America. So am I. Our beautiful country with her teeming millions must rise in her glory and live forever when you and I have passed on. The soldier sees this vision when he dies in battle. So I see it today.”
He stooped again and gathered a handful of pebbles, rolling them thoughtfully in his hand. His eyes were on the ground.
“It isn’t Waldron?” he asked.
She smiled with a touch of mischief.
“No. But I confess such a man might tempt me—”
He threw the pebbles on the ground with a gesture of impatience.
“It’s not true!” he cried, facing her suddenly. With a fierce resolution he seized her hand.
“I won’t take any such answer,” he breathed desperately. “You’re not playing this game fairly with me. I’ve torn my heart open to you. You’re hedging and trimming. I won’t have it. You haven’t dared to deny your love. You can’t deny it. You love me and you know it and I know it—”
She lifted her free hand in a gesture of protest.
“You love me! I feel it! I know it!” he repeated fiercely.
With quick resolution he swept her into his arms and kissed her lips again and again. For just an instant he felt her body relax.
The next minute she had freed herself and faced him, her eyes blazing with anger. Her anger was not a pose. He saw to his horror that he had staked all on a mad chance and lost.
He stammered something incoherent and mopped his brow lamely.
“I suppose it’s useless for me to say I’m sorry—”
“Quite,” she said with cold emphasis.
“All right I won’t. Because I’m not sorry I did it.I’m only sorry you resent it. I love you. True love is half madness. I won’t apologize. If I must die for that one moment, it’s worth it.”
“There can be nothing more between us after this,” she said evenly.
He bowed in silence.
“Please play the little farce of polite society before my father and mother as you leave tonight. It’s the only favor I ask of you.”
“I understand,” he answered.
THEperfection with which Virginia played her part in the little drama of deception at their parting was a new source of surprise and anger to Vassar. Her acting was consummate. Neither the children nor her parents could suspect for a moment that there had been the slightest break in their relations.
Self-respect compelled him to act the part with equal care in detail.
The old soldier had grown very fond of Marya. He held her in his arms chattering like a magpie.
“Now don’t you go back on me when you get to town and fail to take that cottage!” he protested.
“Oh, we’re coming on Tuesday—aren’t we, Uncle John?” she cried.
Virginia watched his face. He caught the look and answered its challenge by an instant reply.
“Certainly, dear. Everything’s fixed. I can’t be with you much but grandpa’ll be here every day.”
The child clapped her hands.
“You see”—
“All right,” Holland answered. “I’ll meet you atthe station! The fact is—“ his voice dropped to confidential tones—“between you and me—I haven’t any little girl. My girl’s grown clean up and out of my world. She’s going on a wild goose chase over the country and leave her old daddy here to die alone. But you’ll be my little girl, won’t you, honey?”
Marya slipped her arms around his neck and whispered:
“I’d like two granddaddies. I never had but one you know—”
Virginia wondered at Vassar’s audacity in persisting in the plan of thrusting himself and his people under her nose. She had thought he would have the decency to change his plans now that any further association between them had become impossible. She listened in vain for any protest on his part against the plans of happiness between her father and his little niece. His face was a mask of polite indifference.
She had worked herself into a rage when he extended his hand in parting. The others were looking or he would have omitted the formality. He made up his mind to part without a word.
The children and his father turned to enter the coach. Billy was saying good-bye to Zonia assuring her for the tenth time that he would drive with his father to the train for them on Tuesday.
With the touch of her hand Vassar’s angry resolution melted. Soul and body was fused suddenly into a resistless rush of tenderness. If she felt this she was complete mistress of her emotions. There was no sign.
In a voice of studied coldness she merely said:
“Good-bye.”
His hand closed desperately on hers in spite of her purpose to withdraw it instantly.
“I won’t say it,” he answered fiercely. “I won’t give you up. You haven’t treated me fairly. I won’t submit. I’m coming again—do you hear?”
She stared at him a moment with firmly set lips and answered:
“There is nothing in common between us, Mr. Caveman. We live in different worlds. We were born in different ages—”
He dropped her hand and sprang to the platform of the moving train without looking back.
ARRIVINGat Stuyvesant Square, Vassar decided to go at once and see Angela’s husband.
The door of his tiny apartment opened on the little crooked street before the old Armory. He caught the gay colors of Angela’s dress at the window. She was leaning far out over the flower boxes, and gesticulating to her man in the street below.
Benda, the center of a group of children, was playing the hand organ which Pasquale had given the boy. The kids were dancing.
He stopped short his music at the sight of his leader, waved the children aside and hurried to meet him.
“Ah, you come so soon, signor!” he exclaimed. “I am glad. Angela—she tell you?”
“Yes. What’s the trouble?”
“You see the house over dere?”
He pointed to the low apartment across the way.
“Yes.”
“Well, signor, men unload and swing boxes—beeg—long boxes inside. One of them fell and brak—”
He stopped and looked about.
“It was guns, signor!—all bright, new. I ask them what for they put so many guns in the old house. The boss say I must join his Black Hand Alliance—“ Benda laughed. “I tell him go t’ell—
“He say it’s war and I die unless I do—I tell him go t’ell two times. And I send word to you, signor. What you tink?”
“I don’t know. I’ll find the owner of the building and tell you. Thanks, Tommaso,” he added cordially. “I appreciate your confidence. I’ll see about it.”
“Si, si, signor!”
With another wave of his hand to the children Benda resumed his concert.
Vassar walked to the door and glanced at the building. There was nothing to mark it from a number of dingy structures along the East River. A speculator was probably buying old guns from our government for their transfer in secret to the agent of a faction in Mexico or South America. Naturally the trader must use the utmost caution or a Secret Service man would nip his plans in the bud. He was so sure of the explanation that he took it for granted, and dismissed the incident from his mind.
He was destined to recall it under conditions that would not be forgotten.
VASSARplunged next day into his fight. Waldron had moved rapidly. His opponents had already nominated an Independent Democrat of foreign birth, a Bohemian of ability, whom he knew to be a man of ambition and good address.
The women had begun a house to house canvass of voters and the number of fairy-tales they had started for the purpose of undermining his position and influence was a startling revelation of their skill in the art of lying.
Virginia Holland was booked for a canvass of each election district the last week in October. He knew what that meant. Waldron had held his trump card for the supreme moment.
The depths of vituperation, mendacity and open corruption to which the campaign descended on the part of his opponents was another revelation to Vassar of woman’s adaptability to practical methods. Never since the days of Tweed’s régime had the East Side seen anything that approached it.
He steadfastly refused to lower his standard to their level. That Virginia Holland knew the methods which Waldron had adopted was inconceivable. Vassar watched the approach of her canvass with indifference. If his people were weak enough to fall for Waldron and his crowd of hirelings, he had no desire longer to represent the district.
He ceased to worry about results. He foresaw that his majority would be reduced. He decided to let it go at that.
The gulf which separated him now from the woman he loved was apparently too deep to be bridged. On the last night of the canvass he slipped into the meeting at which she spoke just to hear her voice again. He half hoped that she might say something so false and provoking about his record that he might hate her for it. Her address was one of lofty and pure appeal for the redemption of humanity through the trained spiritual power of womanhood. She even expressed her regret at the necessity of opposing a man of the type of John Vassar.
A hundred of Vassar’s partisans were present and burst into a fierce round of applause at the mention of his name. He watched the effect with breathless interest. The cheers were utterly unexpected on the part of the speaker, and threw her for the moment offher balance. She blushed and smiled and hesitated, fumbling for words.
Vassar’s heart was pounding like a trip hammer. He could have taken the boys in his arms and carried them through the streets for that cheer. No one knew of his presence. He had slipped into a back seat in the gallery unrecognized in the dim light.
Why had she blushed when they cheered his name? The crowd, of course, could not know of the secret between them. Would she have blushed from the mere confusion of mind which the hostile sentiment of her hearers had provoked? It was possible. And yet the faintest hope thrilled his heart that she cared for him. He had played the fool to lose his head that day. He realized it now. Such a woman could not be taken by storm. Every instinct of pride and intellectual dignity had resented it.
He went home happy over the incident with the memory of her scarlet cheeks and the sweet seriousness of her voice filling his soul. His managers brought glowing reports of the situation in his district. It didn’t matter if he had a chance to win Virginia.
The results proved that his guess of a reduced majority was correct. He barely pulled through by the skin of his teeth. His margin was a paltry sevenhundred and fifty. At the election two years before it had been more than six thousand.
When Congress met in December he was confronted with a situation unique in the history of the Republic. A lobby had gathered in Washington so distinguished in personnel, so great in numbers, so aggressive in its purpose to control legislation, that the national representatives were afraid of their shadows.
The avowed aim of this vast gathering was the defeat of his bill for the adequate defense of the nation. The outlines of his measures had been published and had the unanimous backing of the Army and Navy Boards, the National Security League and all the leaders of the great political parties.
Both of our ex-Presidents, Roosevelt and Taft, had endorsed it and asked for its adoption. It was known that the President and his Cabinet approved its main features. And yet its chances of adoption were considered extremely doubtful.
The lobby, which had swarmed into Washington, overran its hotels, and camped in the corridors of the Capitol, was composed of a class of men and women who had never before ventured on such a mission. What they lacked of experience they made up in aggressive insolence—an insolence so cocksure of itself that aCongressman rarely ventured from the floor of the Chamber if he could avoid it.
The leaders of the movement were apparently acting under the orders of the Reverend A. Cuthbert Pike, President of the Peace Union. Vassar was amazed to find that this Union was composed of more than six hundred chartered peace societies. He had supposed that there might be half a dozen such associations in the country. To be suddenly confronted by five thousand delegates representing six hundred organizations was the shock of his political life. But one society alone, the National Security League, was there to preach the necessity of insurance against war by an adequate defense.
Against this lone organization were arrayed in a single group the five thousand delegates from the six hundred peace societies. They demanded the defeat of any bill to increase our armaments in any way, shape or form. Their aim was the ultimate complete disarmament of every fort and the destruction of our navy.
In co-operation with this host of five thousand fanatics stood the Honorable Plato Barker with a personal following in the membership of Congress as amazing as it was dangerous to the future of the Republic. The admirers of the silver-tongued orator labored under the conviction that their leader had beeninspired of God to guide the destinies of America. They believed this with the faith of children. For sixteen years they had accepted his leadership without question and his word was the law of their life.
Barker was opposed to the launching of another ship of war, or the mounting of another gun for defense. He was the uncompromising champion of moral suasion as the solution of all international troubles. He believed that an eruption of Mount Vesuvius could be soothed by a poultice and cured permanently by an agreement for arbitration. He preached this doctrine in season and out of season. The more seriously out of season the occasion, the louder he preached it.
That he would have a following in Congress was early developed in the session. Barker was not only on the ground daily; his headquarters had been supplied with unlimited money for an active propaganda and his office was thronged by delegates from his mass meetings called in every state of the Union.
The Socialists had once more swamped the American labor unions with their missionaries and the labor federations were arrayed solidly against an increase of our army or navy.
But by far the most serious group of opponents by whom Vassar was confronted were the United Women Voters of America, marshalled under the leadershipof the brilliant young Joan of Arc of the Federated Clubs. In the peculiar alignment of factions produced by the crisis of the world war the women voters held the balance of power. They practically controlled the Western states while the fear of their influence dominated the Middle West and seriously shaped public opinion in the East. Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York had defeated the amendments for woman’s suffrage, yet the vote polled by their advocates had been so large the defeat was practically a triumph of their principles.
A convention of five hundred delegates, representatives of the women voters, had been called to decide on the casting of the votes of their senators and representatives. That their orders would be obeyed was a foregone conclusion. To refuse meant political suicide.
The thing which puzzled Vassar beyond measure was the mysterious unifying power somewhere in the shadows. The hand of this unseen master of ceremonies had brought these strangely incongruous forces together in a harmony so perfect that they spoke and wrote and campaigned as one man. Behind this master hand there was a single master mind tremendous in grip, baffling, inscrutable, always alert, always there. That Waldron was this mysterious force he suspectedfrom the first. On the day he was booked to make the final address in closing the debate on his bill, the banker boldly appeared in the open as the responsible leader of the movement for the defeat of national defense.
Vassar, with a sense of sickening rage, saw him in conference with Virginia Holland and her executive committee. They held their little preliminary caucus at the door of the House of Representatives, as if to insult him with a notice of coming defeat. The young leader knew that if there were yet a man in the House who could be reached by money, Waldron would find him. And he knew that there were some who had their price.
The influence of such a man in a free democracy was to Vassar a cause of constant grief and wonder. That he despised the principles of a democratic government he scarcely took the trouble to conceal. His pose was for higher ends than party gains or even the selfish glory of nation. He was large, his vision world-wide. He pleaded always for the advancement of humanity. His following was numerous and eminently respectable. Vassar had never for one moment believed in Waldron’s adherence to the principles of American democracy. That he would form a monarchy if given the chance was a certainty. One of his hobbies was the criminal extravagance and inefficiency of our state and municipalgovernments as compared to the imperial kingdoms of the Old World. In season and out of season he proclaimed the superiority of centralized power over the ignorant, slipshod ways of the Republic. The Emperor of Germany and the German ways of ruling were his models.
To accuse Waldron of a conspiracy with the crowned heads of the Old World would be received with scornful incredulity. And yet there were moments in his brooding and thinking when Vassar felt that that was the only rational solution of the man’s life and character. That he was the personal friend of three crowned heads was well known. That he was in constant consultation with the ambassadors of a dozen European nations was also well known. The explanation of this fact, however, was so simple and plausible that no suspicion of treachery would find credence in America. His bank had branch establishments in London, Paris, Berlin, Petrograd, Vienna, Constantinople and Rome.
And yet, why in God’s name, Vassar kept asking himself, should all these peace societies and all these labor organizations and all these women’s clubs move heaven and earth in unison to kill this one measure of defense, and leave our nation at the mercy of any first-class European power? Their sentimental leaningswere against arms and armaments—of course. But who set them all barking at the same moment? Who had kept them at it in chorus continuously from the first throb of the patriotic impulse to put ourselves in readiness to defend our life? Who had held them together in this fierce and determined assault on the Capitol to arouse and threaten Congress? No such movement could be caused by spontaneous combustion. Such an agitation against patriotic defense could not happen by accident. The world war could not have caused it. The great war should have been the one influence to have had precisely the opposite effect. The world war should have spoken to us in thunder tones:
“Remember Belgium! Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty!”
Instead of this, the advocates of peace suddenly rose as a swarm of locusts to tell us that, as umbrellas cause rain so guns cause war, and the only way to save ourselves in a world of snarling, maddened wild beasts is to lay down our arms and appeal to their reason! This strange crusade to make the richest nation of the world defenseless was no accident. The movement was sinister. Vassar felt this on the last day of his struggle in the House with increased foreboding.
He rose to deliver his final appeal with quivering heart. His eye rested on Waldron’s stolid, sneeringface in the gallery. On his right sat Barker, on his left Virginia Holland.
Every seat on the floor and in the galleries was packed. Every foot of standing room above and below was crowded. A solemn hush fell on the throng as the young leader of the House rose.
He began his address in low tones of intense emotion:
“Mr. Speaker, I rise to give to this House my solemn warning that on the fate of this bill for the defense of the nation hangs our destiny. I’ve done my work. I’ve fought a good fight. The decision is in your hands. A few things I would repeat until they ring their alarm in every soul within the sound of my voice today.
“I tell you with the certainty of positive knowledge that while we are the richest nation of the known world we are the least prepared to defend ourselves under the conditions of modern war. Our navy is good—what there is of it. But if it is inadequate, it is of no value whatever. I tell you that it is inadequate and my statement is backed by every expert in the service. If we were attacked tomorrow by any nation of Germany’s sea power our ships would sink to their graves, our men to certain death.
“No braver men walk this earth than ours. Theyare ready to die for their country. We have no right to murder them for this reason. If they die, it should be to some purpose. We should give them the best weapons on earth and the best training. They have the right to a fair chance with any foe they face. We have a mobile army of thirty thousand men with which to defend a hemisphere! We assert our guardianship of all America. It is known to all men that a modern army of one hundred and fifty thousand landed on our shores could complete the conquest of the Atlantic seaboard in twelve days.
“Our friends who clamor for peace in a world at war tell us that an attack on our nation is a possibility too remote for discussion. The same men in June, 1914, declared that war in Europe was a physical and psychological impossibility. Now they tell us with equal solemnity that this war, which they declared could never be, is so appalling that it will be the last. They tell us that the world will now disarm andwe must lead the way!
“If the world disarms, Europe must lead the way. We are already practically disarmed.
“Who in Europe will dare to lead in such a movement!
“Will Germany disarm?
“Will she at this late hour surrender her ambitionsto expand? Will she sign the death warrant to the aspirations of the men who created her mighty Empire? Will she expose her eastern frontier to the raids of Cossack hordes?
“Could Russia disarm?
“Would she consent to risk the dismemberment of her vast domain?
“Could England with her empire on which the sun does not set—could England disarm and lay her centers of civilization open to the attack of black and yellow millions?
“To ask the question is to answer it.
“The disarmament of the modern world is the dream of an unbalanced mind.
“Take any group of nations. If the Allies win, would Germany and Austria-Hungary agree to disarm? If they should ever tear the German Empire into pieces could they stamp out the fighting soul of the Germanic race?
“If Germany and Austria-Hungary win, can England, France, Italy, and Russia disarm before the menace of world dominion?
“Do you believe that out of the vast horror of this war a compact of international peace may be signed by all nations?
“Let us remind you that the heart of Europe is aristocraticand imperial. Their rulers hate democracy as the devil hates holy water. The lion and the lamb cannot yet lie down together—except the lamb be inside the lion.
“This nation is the butt of ridicule, jibes, caricatures and coarse jests of the aristocrats of the Old World. Our government and our people are cordially loathed.
“International peace can rest only on international democracy. The great war has brought us face to face with grim realities. We must see the thing that is—not the thing our fancy says ought to be.
“Belgium has taught us that the only scrap of paper we can be sure of is one backed by millions of stout hearts with guns in their hands, aeroplanes above their heads, ships under the seas and afloat and big black steel eyes high on their shores bent seaward.
“Men of America! I call you from your sleep of fancied safety! The might of kings is knocking at your doors demanding that you give a reason for your existence! If you are worthy to live you will prove it by defending your homes and your flag. If you are not worth saving, your masters will make your children their servants.
“The fate of a nation is in your hands. The sea is no more. The world has become a whispering gallery. And such a world cannot remain half slaveand half free. It is for you to decide whether your half shall sink again into the abyss of centuries of human martyrdom and human tyranny.
“I warn you that the fight between autocracy and democracy has just begun. Poland attempted to establish a free commonwealth in Central Europe. She was ground to powder between imperial powers. The one big issue in this world today is the might of kings against the liberties of the people. Never before in human history has imperial power been so firmly entrenched. And the rulers of Europe know that sooner or later they must crush American democracy or be crushed by its reflex influence.”
Vassar ceased to speak and resumed his seat amid a silence that was painful. His eloquence had swept the House with tremendous force. So intense was the spell that a demonstration of any kind was impossible. A murmur of relief rippled the crowd and the hum of whispered comment at last broke the tension.
Waldron’s keen cold eye had seen the effect of the young leader’s appeal. He lost no time in taking measures to neutralize its influence.
THEcaucus of the delegates of the Women’s Convention was booked to meet at six o’clock. The House would hold a night session and the vote on the Defense Bill would be called between ten and eleven.
To prevent the possibility of any influence from Vassar’s speech reaching the caucus, Waldron succeeded in changing the hour to three o’clock. He would prolong the discussion until six and deliver their orders to the members of Congress in ample time.
Vassar saw him whispering in earnest conference with Barker and Virginia, guessed instinctively a change of program and in ten minutes his secretary had confirmed his suspicions.
There was no time to be lost. He made up his mind instantly to throw pride to the winds and make a personal appeal to the one woman whose influence in the crisis could dominate the councils of the opposition.
He called a cab and reached the Willard at the moment Barker was handing Virginia from Waldron’s car.
An instant of hesitating doubt swept him as he thought of the possibility of a public refusal to meet or confer. He couldn’t believe she would be so ungracious. He must risk it. The situation was too critical to stand on ceremony.
He raised his hat and bowed with awkward excitement.
“May I have a few minutes of your time, Miss Holland?” he asked.
She blushed, hesitated and answered nervously.
“Certainly, Mr. Congressman. Your speech was eloquent but unconvincing. I congratulate you on your style if I can’t agree with your conclusions.”
Barker laughed heartily and Waldron’s face remained a stolid mask.
“You will excuse me, gentlemen,” she said to her associates. “I’ll see you in ten minutes—”
She paused and smiled politely to Vassar:
“The ladies’ parlor?”
“Yes,” he answered, leading the way to the elevator, and in two minutes faced her with his hands tightly gripped behind his back, his eyes lighted by the fires of tense emotion.
Her control was perfect, if she felt any unusual stir of feeling. He marvelled at her composure. He had vaguely hoped this first meeting after their breakmight lead to a reconciliation. But her bearing was as coldly impersonal as if he were a book agent trying to sell her a set of ancient histories.
He throttled a mad impulse to tell her again that he had loved her with every beat of his heart every moment since they had parted.
“You know, of course,” he began, “that in this crisis you hold the balance of power in a struggle that may decide the destiny of America?”
“I have been told so—”
“It is so,” he rushed on, “and I’ve come to you for a last appeal to save the nation from the appalling danger her defenseless condition will present at the close of this war. My bill will place us beyond the danger line. If we are reasonably ready for defense no great power will dare to attack us—”
“Preparation did not prevent the war of the twelve nations—“ she interrupted sharply.
“Certainly not. Fire engines do not prevent fires, but our organized fire department can and does prevent the burning of the whole city. Preparation in Europe did not prevent war. But it did save France from annihilation. It did save Germany from invasion. It did save England from death. The lack of it snuffed out the life of Belgium. I only ask that a millionof our boys shall be taught to hold a rule on a mark and shoot straight—”
“And that mark a human body over whose cradle a mother bent in love. I do not believe in murder—”
“Neither do I! I’m trying to prevent it. Can’t you see this? Our fathers shot straight or this Republic had never been born. Your father shot straight or the Union could never have been preserved. Conflict is the law of progress, I didn’t make this so, but it’s true, and we must face the truth. You are the daughter of a soldier. I beg of you for the love of God and country to save our boys from butchery, our daughters from outrage and our cities from devastation!”
“I’m going to do exactly that by doing my level best to prevent all war—”
Vassar lifted his hand and she saw that it was trembling violently.
“Your decision is final?” he asked.
“Absolutely—”
“Then all I can say is,” he responded, “may God save you from ever seeing the vision my soul has dreamed today!”
She smiled graciously in response to his evident suffering.
“I shall not see it,” was the firm answer. “Your fears are groundless. I will be a delegate to the firstParliament of Man, the Federation of the World which this war will create.”
He turned to go, paused, and slowly asked:
“And I may not hope to see you occasionally? You know that I love you always, right or wrong—”
She shook her head and gazed out of the window for a moment on the majestic shaft of the Washington Monument white and luminous against the azure skies of Virginia. Her voice was tender, dreamlike, impersonal.
“Our lives were never quite so far apart as now—”
He turned abruptly and left her, the sense of tragic failure crushing his heart.
WOMAN’Spolitical power was hurled solidly against an increase of armaments, and Vassar’s Bill for National Defense was defeated.
Waldron’s triumph was complete. His lawyers drew the compromise measure which Congress was permitted to pass a few weeks later. It made provision for a modest increase of the Army, Navy and the National Guard.
The banker’s newspapers led the chorus of approval of this absurd program and the nation was congratulated on its happy deliverance from the threatened curse of militarism.
Waldron chartered two trains and took the entire delegation of five hundred women members of the Convention as his guests. He entertained them for a week at the best hotels and closed the celebration with a banquet at his palatial home in honor of Virginia Holland.
At the close of the dinner when the last speaker had finished a brilliant panegyric of praise for the modernJoan of Arc, the master of the feast whispered in her ear:
“Will you remain a few minutes when the others have gone? I’ve something to tell you.”
She nodded her consent and Waldron hurried their departure.
She wondered vaguely what new scheme his fertile brain had hatched, and followed him into the dimly lighted conservatory without a suspicion of the sensation he was about to spring. In his manner there was not the slightest trace of excitement. He found a seat overlooking an entrancing view of the cold, moonlit river below, and began the conversation in the most matter of fact way.
“I have a big announcement to make to you, Miss Holland,” he began evenly.
“Indeed?”
“My life work is rapidly reaching its consummation. You like this place?”
He adjusted his glasses and waved his hand comprehensively. The gesture took in the house, the grounds, the yacht, the river and possibly the city.
Virginia started to the apparently irrelevant question. In her surprise she forgot to answer.
“You like it?” he repeated.
“Your place,” she stammered, “why, yes, of course,it’s beautiful, and I think the banquet a triumph of generosity. Our leaders will never cease sounding your praises. I must say that you’re a master politician. I wonder that you became a banker—”
Waldron’s cold smile thawed into something like geniality.
“I had good reasons for that choice, you may rest assured. The man who does things, Miss Holland, leaves nothing to chance which his will may determine. It was not by accident that I became a multi-millionaire. It was necessary—”
He stopped abruptly and fixed her with his steel-gray eyes.
“The triumph of my life work is in sight. I may breathe freely for the first time. I have chosen you to be the queen of this house. I offer you my hand in marriage—”
Virginia caught her breath in genuine amazement. Never before had he even hinted that the thought of marriage had entered his imagination. He had made his proposal with a cocksure insolence which assumed that the honor was so high the girl had not been born who could refuse it.
A little angry laugh all but escaped before she repressed it. The situation was dramatic. She would play with him a moment—and test his sense of humor.
“You honor me beyond my deserts, Mr. Waldron,” she answered naively.
“I must differ with you,” he answered briskly. “On the other hand I am sure there is not a woman in America who could grace these halls with your poise, your brilliance, your beauty. The home I have built is worthy of you—yes. That you will fill the high position to which I have called you with dignity and grace I am sure—”
She lifted her hand with a movement of impatience—a mischievous smile playing about her mouth.
“But you haven’t told me that you love me—“ she protested.
“You are a modern woman. You have outgrown the forms of the past—is it necessary to repeat the formula? Can’t you take that much for granted in the offer of my hand?”
Virginia shook her head.
“I’ve traveled pretty far from the old ways, I know,” she admitted. “I can’t give up all the past. I’ve an idea that a man and woman should love before marriage—”
“If the centuries have taught Europe anything,” he argued, “it is that reason, not passion, should determine marriage. I hold to the wisdom of the ages on the point. I ask you to be my wife. Don’t joke. You cannot refuse me.”
Virginia rose with decision.
“But I do refuse you.”
The banker was too surprised to speak for a moment. It was incredible. That a girl with a paltry dowry of a hundred thousand should refuse his offer of millions, his palace in New York, his estates in Europe—a feeling of blind rage choked him.
“You cannot mean it?” his cold voice clicked.
“Such high honor is not for me,” she firmly replied. “I do not intend to marry—”
He studied her with keen eyes, rubbed his glasses and readjusted them again.
“You will accept the position I offer without marriage?” he asked eagerly.
Her face went white and her body stiffened.
“If you will call the car please—I will go—”
Waldron’s heels came together with a sharp military click, his big neck bent in the slightest bow, and he led the way into the hall without a word.
He made no pretense at politeness or apology. He left her to his servants and mounted the grand stairway in a tumult of blind rage.
FORtwo years the nation drifted without a rational policy of defense, while the world war continued to drench the earth in blood. The combination of forces represented by Waldron had succeeded in lulling the people into a sense of perfect security. We had always been lucky. A faith that God watched over children and our Republic had become one of the first articles of our creed.
John Vassar became an officer in the National Security League and attempted to extend its organization into every election district of the Union. For two years he had given himself body and soul to the task. At every turn he found an organized and militant opposition. They had money to spend and they had leaders who knew how to fight.
In spite of his hatred of Waldron he was compelled to acknowledge his genius for leadership, and the inflexible quality of his will. Within a week of the date his Security League was organized in a district, a fighting “peace” organization appeared overnight to destroy his work.
The optimism of the American people was the solid rock against which his hopes were constantly dashed.
He ignored the fact that Virginia Holland was the most eloquent and dangerous opponent of his propaganda. It was the irony of fate that he should feel it his solemn duty to devote every energy of his life to combating the cause for which she stood. It was the will of God. He accepted it now in dumb submission.
In the midst of his campaign for Congressmen pledged to national defense, the great war suddenly collapsed and the professional peace advocates filled the world with the tumult of their rejoicing.
It was useless to argue. The danger had passed. Men refused to listen. Vassar was regarded with a mild sort of pity.
The first rush of events were all with his enemies and critics. The war had been fought to an impassable deadlock.
Germany entrenched had proven invincible against the offensive assaults of the Allies. The Allies were equally impotent to achieve an aggressive victory. When the conviction grew into practical certainty that the struggle might last for ten years, the German Emperor gave the hint to the Pope. The Pope sounded the warring nations and an armistice was arranged.
Embodied in this agreement to suspend hostilities for thirty days was the startling announcement that the nations at war, desiring to provide against the recurrence of so terrible and costly an experiment as the struggle just ending, had further agreed to meet at The Hague in the first Parliament of Man and establish the Federation of the World!
Waldron proclaimed this achievement the greatest step in human progress since the dawn of history. He claimed also that his newspapers and his associates in their fight against armaments had won this victory. He announced the dawn of the new era of universal peace and good will among men.
John Vassar was the most thoroughly discredited statesman in the American Congress. His hobby was the butt of ridicule. Woman’s suffrage swept the northern section of the eastern seaboard in every state which held an election in November.
The Parliament of Man met at The Hague. The preliminary session was composed of the rulers of the leading states, nations and empires of the world.
Through the influence of Japan, the four hundred millions of China were excluded.
It was well known in the inner councils of the great powers of Europe that the real reason for her exclusion was the avowed purpose of the rulers ofEurope and Japan to divide the vast domain of the Orient into crown dependencies and reserve them for future exploitation.
Their scholars had winked gravely at the charge of a lack of civilization. What they meant was a lack of the weapons of offense and defense. China was the center of art and learning when America was an untrodden wilderness and the fathers of the kings of Europe were cracking cocoanuts and hickory nuts in the woods with monkeys. China had lost the art of shooting straight—that was all. India had lost it too and her three hundred millions were not even permitted the courtesy of representation in the person of an alien viceroy. A handful of Englishmen had ruled her millions for a century. India had ceased to exist as a nation.
One-half the human race were thus excluded at the first session of the Committee.
When the roll was finally called, each nation answered in alphabetical order, its ruler advanced and took the seat assigned amid the cheers of the gallery. The President of Argentina, the Emperor of Austria-Hungary, the King of Belgium, the President of Brazil, the King of Bulgaria, the President of Chile, the King of Denmark, the President of France, the Emperor of Germany, and King of Prussia,—and with him the King ofBavaria, the King of Saxony, the King of Wurtemburg, the Duke of Anhalt, the Grand Duke of Baden, the Duke of Brunswick, the Grand Duke of Hesse, the Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, the Grand Duke of Oldenburg, the Duke of Saxe-Altenberg, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, the Duke of Saxe-Meiningen, the Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar, the Prince of Weldeck,—the King of Great Britain and Emperor of India, the King of Greece, the King of Italy, the Mikado of Japan, the Grand Duchess of Luxembourg, the President of Mexico, the Queen of the Netherlands, the King of Norway, the President of Portugal, the King of Roumania, the Tzar of Russia, the King of Servia, the King of Spain, the King of Sweden, the President of Switzerland, the Sultan of Turkey and the President of the United States of America.
Virginia Holland saw the Chief Magistrate of the foremost republic of the world answer to the last name called on the roll and take his seat beside the Sultan of Turkey.
The minor republics of South and Central America had all been excluded by the Committee on Credentials as unfitted either in the age of their governments, or their wealth, population and power for seats in this august assembly. Only Argentina, Brazil and Chilefrom South America, and Mexico from Central America were allowed seats.
The principle of monarchy was represented by thirty-four reigning emperors, kings, princes and dukes; the principle of democracy by eight presidents. The first article on which the organization agreed was the reservation by each of the full rights of sovereignty with the right to withdraw at any moment if conditions arose which were deemed intolerable.
To find a working basis of development, therefore, it was not merely necessary to obtain a majority vote, it was absolutely necessary that the vote should be unanimous, otherwise each decision would cause the loss of one or more members of the Federation.
Queen Wilhelmina, of the Netherlands, the only full-fledged woman sovereign was unanimously elected the presiding officer of the assembly.
The women representatives of the suffrage states of the American Union were admitted to the gallery as spectators. They rose en masse and cheered when the gracious Queen ascended the dais and rapped for order.
They kept up the demonstration until the Emperor of Germany became so enraged that on consultation with the Emperors of Austria-Hungary and the Tzar of Russia, the sergeant-at-arms was ordered to clearthe women’s gallery. The American women continued their cheers in the streets until dispersed by the police.
For the first time in her career Virginia Holland lost patience with her associates. She was in no mood to shout for royalty, either in trousers, knickerbockers or skirts. Her keen intelligence had caught the first breath of a deep and fierce hostility to the land of her birth. She had watched the growing isolation of the President of the United States with slowly rising wrath. But a single member of the august body had agreed with him on everything. The President of Switzerland alone appeared to have anything in common with our Chief Magistrate. Even the French President appeared to have been reared in the school of monarchy in spite of the form of his government. The President of little Portugal was too timid to express an opinion. And the four presidents of South and Central America were the social lions of royalty from the day the assembly had gathered in an informal greeting in the Palace of Peace. The South Americans had been wined and dined, fêted and petted until they had lost their heads. They treated the President of the United States not only with indifference, but in the joy over their triumphant reception had begun to openly voice their contempt.
The President of the United States accepted the situationin dignified silence. The Parliament of Man was less than one day old before he realized that he was a single good-natured St. Bernard dog in a cage of Royal Bengal tigers. How long his position would remain tolerable he could not as yet judge. As a Southern-born white man he rejoiced that the full right of secession had been firmly established in this Union!
He composed his soul in patience.
The first three days were consumed in congratulations and harmless flights of oratory. The kings had never had such a chance before to indulge in declamation. They were like a crowd of high-school boys on a picnic. They all wished to talk at one time and each apparently had a desire to consume the whole time. The smaller the kingdom, the louder the voice of the king.
On the fourth day the Parliament got down to business. The treaty of peace which closed the great war had fixed the boundaries of the belligerent nations. They were practically identical with the status preceding the struggle.
The Parliament unanimously reaffirmed the decision of this treaty and fixed the boundaries for all time.
The partition of China was immediately raised by Japan and again the United States of America andSwitzerland alone stood out for the rights of 400,000,000 men of the yellow race.
France and Portugal, Brazil, Chile, Argentina and Mexico sided with the royalist spoilers against our protest.
China was divided into spheres of influence by a vote of forty against two. Both the United States and Switzerland registered their protest in writing and recorded their possible secession.
The continent of Africa was next divided by the same recorded vote forty against two.
The President of the United States rose from his uncomfortable seat beside the Sultan of Turkey and was recognized by the presiding Queen in a silence that was deathlike.
“With the permission of your Majesty,” he began gravely, “I wish to introduce at once the following resolutions.” He calmly adjusted his glasses and read:
“Resolved: That the Parliament of Man recognize the principle that a people shall have the right to maintain the form of government which they may choose consistent with the laws of civilization. That the Western Hemisphere, comprising the Americas, have chosen the form of free democracy. That the Monroe Doctrine shall therefore be affirmed as the second basic principle on which the Federation of the World shallbe established, and that the royal rulers unanimously agree that their standards shall never be lifted on the continents of North or South America.”
The sensation could not have been greater had an anarchist’s bomb exploded beneath the presiding Queen.
A babel of angry protests broke forth from the thirty-three royal and imperial rulers. France and Portugal remained silent and distressed. Brazil, alone, of the South American republics, raised a voice in support of the proposition. Even Switzerland smiled skeptically. Argentina, Chile and Mexico joined the pandemonium of abuse with which the crowned rulers of the world received the first American tender of principle.
The session ended in confusion bordering on riot. In vain the gracious Queen attempted to restore order. The President of the United States stood with folded arms and watched the indignant sovereigns sweep their robes about their trembling figures and stalk from the Palace.
A caucus of imperial rulers was held at which the Emperor of Germany presided. It was unanimously resolved that the proposition of the United States was an insult to every monarch of the world and in the interests of peace and progress he was asked to withdraw it.
Our President stood his ground, refused to retreat an inch and demanded a hearing. His demand was refused by a strict division of monarchy against democracy, thirty-three imperial rulers casting their votes solidly against the eight presidents.
The moment this vote was announced, the President of the United States seized his hat and started to leave the chamber. The South Americans crowded around him and begged him to stay. The little President of Chile, the fighting cock of the South Pacific, led the chorus of appeal.
“Stay with us,” he cried, “and I promise to pour oil on the troubled waters. I have a compromise which will be unanimously accepted. I have conferred with the three great emperors and they have assured me of their support.”
Our President smiled incredulously but resumed his seat.
Chile declared that South America had always scorned the assumptions of the Monroe Doctrine. The monarchs cheered. He declared that the nations of the South no longer needed or desired the protection of the United States. They sought the good will of all men. They feared invasion by none. He proposed an adjournment of six months in order that a Pan-American Congress representing all interests mightmeet in Washington and decide this issue for themselves. Their decision could then be reported to the Parliament of Man.
His suggestion was unanimously adopted and the Parliament successfully weathered its first storm by adjourning for six months.
Again the world rang with the shouts of the orators of peace. A beginning had actually been made in the new science of war prevention. The Appeal to Reason had triumphed.
Waldron remained a day to congratulate his friends among the crowned heads and hurried home to organize a great Jubilee to celebrate this meeting of the Pan-American Congress and hail its outcome as the first fruits of the reign of universal peace.
Virginia Holland returned to her home with a great fear slowly shaping itself in her heart.