CHAPTER VITo his office on the twentieth floor of a Wall Street skyscraper—that office with the mahogany table at its center and the engraving of George Washington between two windows—the master came at his usual time on the morning of the day following the North Bridge wreck. He was dressed neatly, as always, in a suit of russet brown. Breathing visibly, but noiselessly, he passed the resting ticker and walked to one of the windows overlooking the labyrinth. His near-sighted, beady eyes peered toward the web of streets below, on the cross-threads of which the black dots that were hurrying men and women bobbed like struggling flies.The master rang for his secretary."Rollins," he said, "what's in the——" He stopped. He had not looked up, yet he asked: "What's the matter with you this morning?""Nothing," said Rollins. "I——" He coughed behind his hand. "I didn't sleep well last night.""Take more exercise," said his master. "What's in the mail?""Thirty letters that need your personal attention, sir."Nimbly the master ran them through his short and stumpy fingers, the tips of which were delicately rounded. He dictated his terse instructions. With the daily routine again in motion, Rollins recaught his employer's calm."Simpson has the begging letters?""Yes, sir.""I guess," said the master in his most commonplace tone, "there were more than the usual number of anonymous threats.""Only ten or twelve more.""Burn them.""Yes, sir. I always do.""And, Rollins, draw up a letter to the cancer hospital and tell the management I have decided to give them a special ward for fibroid tumor cases. Their lawyers may consult with Judge Stein; I gave him the details last evening. Bring me the letter for revision.""Yes, sir."The master proceeded through his customary schedule."Rollins," he said, when it was at last completed and the secretary had been recalled. "Mr. Hallett and Mr. Rivington will be here"—he consulted his watch—"in five minutes. We are on no account to be disturbed."Hallett and Rivington came in, five minutes later. Hallett looked angry, and Rivington frightened. Though the hour was early, Hallett's white waistcoat, fresh every morning, showed wrinkles, and its wearer chewed hard at an unlighted cigar; there was a deep perpendicular line over his short, thick nose. Rivington, immaculate, pulled at his slightly gray mustache."Good-morning," said their host. His voice was as nearly cheerful as it was ever. "Sit down."They took their places at the table, where there was a pad of scribbling paper and a freshly sharpened pencil before each. Their host sat at the head of the table, his hands flat upon the table-top, their fingers extended, his elbows pointing ceilingward.Rivington began at the midst of what worried him."It's a terrible thing!" he groaned. "Think of it; twenty-five people—and the women too!"Hallett's comment was almost a bark."As soon as the coroner's jury lets 'em down easy," he said, "we've got to see that everybody's fired, from the division-superintendent to the president of the road; that's what we've got to do. There's one kind of carelessness that's not much better than murder.""Twenty-five people!" repeated Rivington. The numbers seemed to hypnotize him; he made a futile gesture. "And the morning papers—— Their tone—— I don't like it."The man at the head of the table watched them both, but said nothing."Oh, the newspapers never worry me," said Hallett. "We can stop all but one or two, and nobody cares what they say, anyhow. They've been talkin' for years. They've got to fill their columns.""Then there's the Board meeting," said Rivington. "Next Thursday—— I don't see—— Really I don't.""The Board of Directors of the M. & N.'s all right," Hallett reassured him."Perhaps. But then, too, there is this new reform element in town. Talk of a fusion movement: a fourth candidate for District-Attorney—— They will be only too eager to get hold of something, and this terrible accident—— It will give them just what they want.""They can't elect.""I am not so sure. The people—they aren't what they used to be. Something—I don't know what—has taken possession of them."Hallett bobbed assent to that."Yes," he said, "nowadays as soon as a man gets a vote he stops minding his own business. But we've still got our grip on the wires.""They may break." Rivington's fingers returned to their tugging at his mustache. "The wires, I mean. It's ugly. Twenty-five dead and a hundred hurt——""Wedidn't hurt 'em."Rivington looked toward the man at the head of the table, but he sat crouched and silent."No," said Rivington; "but——" His sentence ended in a helpless waving of the hand."Then what are you worryin' about?" Hallett challenged. "We were only tryin' to keep up dividends. We had to choose between a little risk and protecting the stockholders. Lots of the stockholders are widows and orphans. Besides, it wasn't a real risk; it was a recognized, legitimate business risk. Lots of other roads do it right along. Our own roads do.""That bridge——" said Rivington."The state inspectors passed it a month ago. And they passed the rails, too. It's all up to them."In his turn, Hallett glanced at the man at the head of the table. He saw the man's hairy hands, fat and white against the mahogany, begin to move as they always began to move before he made a verbal attack upon conversation; but the man did not speak."I know," Rivington was saying, "but with the four candidates for the district-attorneyship all looking for vote-getting material——""Buy 'em," said Hallett."Four?""Who's the fourth?""They haven't chosen him yet; but——""Buy 'em," repeated Hallett."Out of the four there might be one we couldn't——""Anybody can buy anybody. There are more ways than one. Anyhow, we're not even directors.""We own the road. Practically——""Nobody knows that.""It seems to me——""They don't!" Hallett spat to the floor a bit of tobacco that, bitten from the end of his cigar, had clung to his lips. "They only think they do. It'd be the hardest thing in the world to prove that was ever tried.""Would it?" Rivington questioned. "I really believe——"The quick, cold voice of the third man flashed across their talk. It was as if he leaped at them."We may own the road," he said; "but we don't operate it. Not one of us has officially any administrative power in the matter of its operation. You gentlemen have forgotten that." He smiled: his teeth were pointed."Still," said Rivington, "if the fusion movement——"He stopped there, not because of his habit of speaking in tangents, but because the door opened, and an old man timidly paused at its threshold.The master of the office turned his head slowly."Simpson?" he said."Yes, sir," said the man at the door."What does this mean? Where's Rollins?""He was using my room to compose that letter about the hospital, and so I took his place.""Didn't he tell you we were not to be disturbed?""Yes, sir; but this man"—Simpson held out an envelope—"got by everybody. He told me you would see him at once if you only received his message."The man at the head of the table reached for the envelope. He read a card that it had contained."Show him in," he said.He waited until Simpson had left to obey. Then, without wasting a glance on his associates, he explained:"This is the card of a man called Luke Huber, Assistant District-Attorney. He's written on it: 'Five minutes in regard to the North Bridge wreck and your letters about it.'""Letters?" said Hallett. "What letters?"As he replied, the strong jaw of the man at the head of the table worked as if he were chewing."That's what I mean to find out.""Here? Now?" Rivington gasped.The man addressed nodded. When a nod could save words, he saved words."Is that the careful thing?" asked Hallett."I'll bet his card's a bluff and he never expected to get in at all.""That is precisely why I am having him in.""Mr. Huber," announced Simpson.Huber was still a young man. He was so young, and his youth was so ostentatious, that he immediately courted the rebuke once administered to Pitt. Moreover, he seemed to lack energy. He was thin; his face, though pleasant, was white. The lids dropped wearily over eyes that were at first veiled from the three men who looked up, but did not rise at his entrance. His mouth, the lips of which were only a pale pink, might have appeared firm, but would certainly have given the impression of being tired of firmness, and, when he bowed gravely to his host, his bristling head inclined itself so slowly and so slightly that the effort of the inclination, whether mental or physical, was insultingly apparent.There was no form of presentation. Instead, there was a pause that only Huber seemed not to notice. Rivington drummed on the table with his long fingers. Hallett chewed his cigar. The other man smiled so enigmatically that it was impossible to say whether he intended to welcome or was amused by his friends' discomfiture."Bring a chair for Mr. Huber."Simpson did as he was bid.Luke deposited a carefully brushed hat on the table. Then he sank into the proffered chair opposite the leader of the trio and extended his long legs under the mahogany. His feet touched Rivington's, and Rivington jumped."Well?" asked the man at the head of the table.Huber did not raise his heavy lids."I am glad I found you three together," he said slowly in a low and extremely gentle voice, "because you are the three men that control the railroad."Hallett grinned a broad grin. This young fellow talked as if there were but one railroad in which the group was interested."What railroad?" he asked.Luke slowly drew in his legs. He regarded the figure of the Persian rug that happened to be between the points of his patent-leather boots."The railroad," said he, "that I suppose you have been talking most about this morning.""The Manhattan & Niagara?" blurted Rivington."We're not directors of that road," said Hallett hurriedly."No," agreed Rivington."No," said Luke, quite as heartily, "you aren't directors, but you direct it.""We don't," snapped Rivington.The man at the head of the table raised a soothing hand. He was still smiling."Come, come," he said, with an air of good-nature that his friends had seldom seen him assume during business hours. "We're all gentlemen, I'm sure. Anything that Mr. Huber wants to say to us in confidence——"Huber interrupted."I never talk in confidence," said he; "and I don't want anybody to say anything to me that he would be ashamed to say in public."His eyes were still hidden, and he still spoke slowly and gently; but the mere import of his words brought up short even the leader of the trio before him. That one's manner changed. He was curt."We are busy men, Mr. Huber," he said. "There are not many people in New York that we would have allowed to take up our time this morning. What do you want?"Luke studied the figure on the rug."I want you three," he said in a tone not to be quickened, "to tear up every mile of rails on the M. & N. and replace those pieces of scrap-iron with rails of a grade fit to bear the traffic they have to carry."Rivington's drumming fingers closed into his palms. Hallett let out an ugly laugh. Only the man at the head of the table, again changing his manner, equaled Luke in tranquillity."Really, Mr. Huber," he said pleasantly, "without admitting for a moment that we have the power to do what you suggest, don't you think your request is a rather large one?" He had the air of indulgently correcting a mistaken child.The young man, gazing at the rug, shook his round head."No," he said, "not so large for you as its alternative.""And that? It is——"Rivington had put the question, but it was toward the man at the head of the table that Luke as he shot out his sudden reply, raised his eyes."Jail," said Luke."Do you mean to threaten us?" cried Rivington angrily.Hallett laughed.The man at the head of the table only smiled."Not at all," said Luke. "I am merely stating a fact. In coming here, the only thing I hesitated about was whether it would be better for the people to have safe transportation immediately guaranteed or to have you three in jail.""You seem to forget, young man," said Hallett, "who it was elected the man that made you assistant district-attorney."Luke gave him the briefest of glances."It was because I found out who elected him that I resigned the job," he answered. "I have just been offered the Municipal League's nomination for District-Attorney. WhenIam elected, it will be by the people.""That will be about 2000 A.D.," sneered Hallett.Luke shrugged his thin shoulders and returned his gaze toward the leader of the trio."A bridge falls on one of your roads in this county," he said. "It kills twenty-five people and wounds a hundred—all passengers in one of your trains. You will say the state inspectors declared the bridge O.K. Maybe they did, though they ought to go to the electric chair for it. That doesn't matter. What I can prove by thirty witnesses is that the train left the bridge before the bridge fell. A rail flattened and threw the train. Instead of sending you men to jail—and only because I think this is better for the safety of the public—I will give you one month to begin laying decent rails on this road—actually getbona fidework under way. If you don't do that, I'll make public the whole truth, get you indicted, go into court as a witness and produce two letters, one forwarded to you and the other signed by you. The first of these is a letter to the president of the road written by the steel manufacturers; it warns him that the cheap rails he's ordered are dangerous: that letter he sent to you. The second is a letter from you to the president of the road in which you say you want the poor-grade rails used because you don't want to increase the running expenses, and you order a general keeping-down of the road's expenses because of a plan for you three to unload your stock along about this December."Luke rose. He relapsed into the weary young man of ten minutes before."You have one month," he said.He picked up his hat, rubbed it with a caressing hand, and left the room.The three that he left stared at one another. Then both Hallett and Rivington looked at their leader."It's an infamous—it must be an infamous lie!" cried Rivington. "Letters like that—men don't write them!"Without moving a muscle of his face, the man at the head of the table looked at Rivington."All men say they don't," he corrected, "and all men do.""What?" asked Hallett. "You're joking, and this fellow can't ever make it good. It's a bluff.""Gentlemen," said the man at the head of the table, "it's the truth."CHAPTER VII§1. When Luke, on the afternoon preceding his Wall Street interview, had walked out of Leighton's office and the city's employ, it was with no certain plan for further action. His years of experience as an assistant prosecutor had demonstrated to him that something was drastically wrong with the modern administration of justice and practice of the law; his life in New York had shown him the evil influence of the money-power that seemed to be set in motion by the author of the Rollins letter and certainly corrupted the entire body of the nation, and his political work had discovered to him what he came to consider the inherent rottenness of the organized political parties. The effect of all this was made acute by the horror at the North Bridge wreck and the culmination of his mistrust in Leighton. Luke's sole immediate sensation was that of a man who finds himself in a bog: he did not think of draining the bog for the benefit of future pedestrians; he thought only of extricating himself from the mire.That night at his club, however, he began to consider the larger aspects of the case. He was in the writing-room, intent on composing for the next evening's papers a statement of his reasons for parting company with Leighton. In formulating these, he found his charges to be precisely the charges recently formulated by the group of municipal reformers who were clamoring for a fusion of the best elements of all parties to elect, by honest methods, honest men that would purge New York of its civic shame. He recalled how this Municipal Reform League, growing steadily, had worried Leighton, and how its promoters prophesied that, if successful in the place of its origin, it might well spread throughout the country. When he first heard of it, Luke had been too deep in the affairs of his chief to be warmed by it; but to-night his vision was cleared.He telephoned to two of the League's leaders. They came to his club and talked with him until long past midnight, themselves telephoning inquiries and instructions to friends and lieutenants, and summoning other leaders to join them.Luke told them much. He betrayed no secrets of his recent employer, but he could honorably tell enough to make it clear to them that their belief in the necessity of reform was correct, enough to have weight with the voters should he speak to them in the new cause. His public record, it appeared, had long impressed the reformers; the firmness underlying his slow habit of talk, and the determination imperfectly covered by his lazy manner, impressed them now. He moved and fired them.The Rollins letter he did not mention. He was more than once tempted, but he had resolved upon provisional silence before ever he sent for these leaders. He weighed carefully the merits of the courses open to him and decided that, large as would be the benefit of a public airing of his charges, and excellent as might prove the salutary example of a prison term for America's chief financiers, the airing might be lessened by those financiers' subtle influences upon popular opinion, the prison term might be escaped through similar influences, and all good results would in any case be long delayed. On the other hand, it was evident to him, in his present frame of mind, that the immediate safety of the M. & N.'s patrons was paramount, and that this safety could probably be secured by threatening those morally responsible for it. Such a threat, with a rigid time-limit, he therefore elected to administer.The first result of his conference with the reformers was unexpected. At eight o'clock next morning, three of their most prominent men, who had not been with him on the night before, came to his apartments at the Arapahoe in Thirty-ninth Street. They had been in all-night consultation, and they told him that their organization had determined to put a full ticket in the field at the coming municipal election, but to center efforts in a struggle for the district-attorneyship: they had chosen him for their candidate.Luke, in dressing-gown and pajamas, his unbrushed hair more than ever erect, looked from one of his callers to the other. There was Venable, a man of small but independent means, who had grown gray in the long war for civic betterment, meeting defeat at the polls and, what is harder to bear, disappointment in elected candidates, and again and again emerging to hope and fight on; Nelson, a successful wholesale druggist, whose business seemed divorced from politics, and whose hobby was the improvement of political conditions; and Yeates, a young man of family and fortune who belonged to Luke's club. Luke was flattered and confident, but did not show it."Do you really think I can do it?" he asked slowly. "Do you think I am the best man for the job?"Each of the committee assured him he was. They said he had given a good account of himself as assistant district-attorney, won influential friends in his daily life, and secured, through his political speech-making for Leighton, a strong following among the voters."Of course," persisted Luke, "it's unnecessary to ask men of your standing that there shan't be anything but clean politics in our campaign."Venable tossed his head proudly."My record is a guarantee of that," he said."No undue influence?" asked Luke. "No outside interests coming in to boss us or affect us in any way?""Rot!" said Yeates."And I am to have an absolutely free hand?"They assured him of that.Luke's lowered lids hid his eyes, but his eyes gleamed. Here, at last, was his Great Chance. Here was what he had lived and hoped for. He wanted to shout his war-cry, to go out and fight at once. Would he be worthy? The wing of that doubt brushed the farthest edges of his conscience, but he was young, and he did not heed it. He thought of all that he could do with this opportunity; and he thought, too, of Betty Forbes.He had not seen much of Betty for some weeks. The lethargy that the slow process of his recent disillusionment flung over him, had left him despairing of her, kept her beyond his reach. But now he saw the way—saw that the way to win his ideals of honorable victory was also the way to win her.He asked again a hundred questions, some that he had asked of his other counselors the night before and more that he had not: questions about purpose, ways-and-means, finances, organization, headquarters, district leaders, probable support, the temper of the public mind. To all of them he received sanguine answers."And your other candidates?" asked Luke. "The Mayor? Comptroller? President of the Board of Aldermen and the Borough Presidents?"They gave him the names of known and honest men.Luke stood up, but his air was the languid air that had become part of him."Good," he said, "of course, I'm pleased that you think of me as you do, and I accept."§2. He would be a busy man now, but he must have that morning and afternoon to himself. However much he might want to start his campaign, he must make that visit to Wall Street, and after luncheon he intended to go to Betty.The Wall Street interview seemed to him as successful as he could have expected. He was unterrified by the strength of the fortress to be attacked, but he had not looked forward to speedy surrender, so he was satisfied with the conviction that he affected the three financiers more than they cared to show. If they did not obey him, he would make the Rollins letters a part of his appeal to the electors; but he felt that, in the end, he would be offered obedience.He lunched leisurely in the café attached to his apartment house, and then went to his own room to change his clothes before seeking Betty. He had completed the change and was about to leave when the telephone rang and the voice of the clerk below stairs announced a visitor:"Judge Marcus F. Stein."It had begun already. Luke knew who Stein was, though the two had never met. The man's title had been earned by a political appointment to fill the unexpired term of a judge that died while on the bench. Stein had begun his career as a young lawyer who specialized in damage suits against the N. Y. & N. J. railway. He was once charged, before the Bar Association—though the charges were never proved—with being a "hospital runner": that is, with employing men to hurry to the hospital, or the scenes of accidents, and induce victims to retain Stein to press their claims for damages against the railroad on which they had been injured. By devoting his best efforts against the N. Y. & N. J., he tried to make the corporation realize that it would be cheaper to employ him than to fight him, and he was, indeed, at last given a place on the legal staff of the company's claim department. There was an ugly story to the effect that, for a brief time before this charge was openly announced, he received a salary from the road while apparently acting for claimants against it and inducing them to compromise their claims for trivial sums.It was a subject of common rumor at the New York Bar. Stein soon worked his way to the head of the claim department and thoroughly reorganized it. He used old tactics for his new employers: he had the news of all accidents immediately communicated to him, whereupon he would despatch his agents, with no loss of time, to the hospital, there to persuade the wounded, half stupefied by pain or drugs, to sign releases in return for pittances in ready money. It was said he built up a secret service, composed of men and women from private detective agencies, whose duty it was to discover discreditable secrets in the lives of such claimants as refused to compromise, or, failing in discovery, to manufacture or invent such incidents. One married woman from Syracuse, who had been injured in a wreck in New York and came there to press her suit, was inveigled into a friendship with a woman detective commissioned to engage a neighboring room in the house where the plaintiff took temporary lodgings. The detective succeeded in getting the claimant drunk and brought her, in this condition, with two of the road's employees, to a house in which, when the four were partially unclothed, another detective took a flashlight photograph of them. Then when the victim's case was called for trial, she was told that, unless she dropped her suit, the picture would be shown to her husband. By methods of this sort, Stein was said to have reduced his road's expenses for damages by two-thirds in three years.Directly from his desk in the offices of the N. Y. & N. J., Stein was appointed to the bench, where he did not cease his usefulness to his employers. When his brief judicial term had ended, he took offices of his own, and cultivated the higher branches of corporation law. The men controlling the N. Y. & N. J. controlled many other corporations and saw to it that Stein received a regular annual retainer as a consulting lawyer from each of these. His business was not to win cases, but so to aid in directing his clients' plans that they would avoid litigation; he, therefore, rarely nowadays appeared in court and, though not one of the most learned men so engaged by his principals, he was one of the most serviceable, because to his merely crafty skill in the law he added a deep knowledge of practical politics and a wide intimacy with politicians.Luke's first impulse was to deny himself to this caller, for he wanted to hurry to Betty and he thought there might be a strategic value in refusing to negotiate with any emissary. Curiosity, however, proved strong, and he reflected that the emissary might just possibly come with a word of complete capitulation."Show him up," said Luke into the telephone.The ex-Judge was an imposing figure. He was big and broad and frock-coated, and he moved with befitting gravity. His hair was plentiful and white, his face clean-shaven. He had a strong nose and a wide, firm mouth, and his eyes were large and benevolent. His air was that of a man who has dealt with great interests for so many years that they have become the weighty commonplaces of his existence.Luke had resolved not to shake hands with his visitor, but the Judge gave him no opportunity for refusal. He bowed courteously, smiled politely, and settled into the most comfortable of Luke's chairs, which he deliberately turned so that the light from the windows fell full on his own face, thus leaving Luke to front him from the shadow.Luke, who had been prepared for the contrary move, managed to show no surprise. He sat down, extended his legs, and lowered his eyes. He made no inquiry concerning the reason of the Judge's call: he wanted the Judge to begin the talk.Stein required no urging."I have never had the pleasure of meeting you before, Mr. Huber," he said, speaking with what was evidently no more than characteristic deliberation, "but I have watched your career with a great deal of interest—a very great deal. It reminded me so much of my own early struggles." He was looking steadily at Luke, whose eyes remained lowered. "You will forgive an old man who is a scarred veteran of the law for speaking frankly with you and for taking such an interest, I'm sure.""Very kind of you, indeed," Luke murmured."I thought," said the Judge, "that you handled that Maretti case excellently, and the Dow trial, too; you showed an original cleverness there. More than that, Mr. Huber, you showed promise. There has been a great deal of promise in your professional work, and I thought I detected the same promise in the reports of your political speeches. With influential friends—for, of course, everybody needs influential friends in these days: people of real and solid standing—you ought to go far.""Thank you," said Luke."Now," the Judge pursued, "I see by the early evening papers you may be offered the candidacy for District-Attorney on the Municipal League ticket.""I believe there is some talk of that, Judge.""Well, we need such a movement as this reform movement: we need it badly. With proper backing, you ought to win. With proper backing, of course."Luke gave no sign of hearing this. Quite out of the air he drawled:"I suppose you came about those letters, Judge Stein?"For all the disturbance that he produced, he might as well have said that it was a pleasant day, or that he expected rain. When his eyes at this question were raised to meet the Judge's, the benevolent eyes of the Judge did not quiver: like his voice, they were steady and deliberate."Yes," said the Judge, "and I had them in mind when I spoke of your career. Now, Mr. Huber, my friends think, and I think, that you have been a little hasty and unreasonable because—and remember, it is an old man who tells you so—you are still rather young. But because I know you are an able young man, I have told them I was sure you would see your haste and unreasonableness when you came to consider the matter. As their friend and as a lawyer who has watched your career and remembers his own start in life, I undertook to say so to you and to offer my advice."Luke's eyelids were again lowered. His hands were clasped in his lap. To a less astute man than Stein, he might have seemed asleep."I shall be glad," continued Stein, "if I can help you out of your embarrassing position.""Who are your friends, Judge?" asked Luke.The Judge smiled tolerantly."Come, come, Mr. Huber," he said; "you don't expect me to mention names, I know. All I will say on that point—all you can justly ask me to say—is that I don't come from them in my professional capacity. They haven't retained me to do this. They haven't even asked me to do it. I am acting entirely of my own volition, and on my own initiative, out of good will for all the parties concerned and not least of all for you.""Yet you seem prepared to plead their case.""I am—on my own initiative, I am, because their case is the right one, as I am sure you will end by seeing. In the first place, these letters are their property.""I doubt," said Luke, "whether they would go into court to prove property.""I do not think," said the unruffled Judge, "that they will go into court for any purpose—unless their burden of good nature is rendered intolerable. They can afford to appeal to their own conscience, because they are morally clear.""Of the North Bridge wreck?""Of the North Bridge wreck, Mr. Huber. Granting that those letters are admissible evidence—which I shouldn't grant, if I were in the case—the one is not an expert declaration; it is merely an expression of opinion from persons with many grades of rails to sell and naturally anxious to sell their most expensive and most profitable grade. As for the other letter, it is informed by the knowledge of what prompted the rail-makers' opinion, and in itself offers only a counter-opinion based on the writer's long and successful experience with the cheaper rails.""Yes—but the accident happened.""Exactly: it merely happened and it was an accident. In other words, it was something unforeseen and contrary to the experience of the writer of the second letter."The Judge waited a moment for a reply but, as Luke gave none, presently continued:"Now, the course I propose—quite personally, you will understand—is honorable, harmless, and in the best interests of all concerned: you, us, and even the public.""What is it?" asked Luke."All that I would grant my friends is the return of those letters, which are their own property, and are not admissible evidence in a court of law. That is all I would grant them. On their part, I should exact a pledge from them to have better rails laid throughout the suspected sections of the M. & N. road."Luke's eyes opened."That's allIasked them to do," he said."Ah, yes; but to do it at once would be taken as a public confession of guilt—and my friends are not guilty. You will see that the coroner's jury says so."Luke relapsed."It will," he said. "I'm sure of it.""Therefore, the thing must be done slowly and discreetly, and meanwhile we must protect the public by an increase of track-walkers and road-inspectors.""Would your friends," inquired Luke, "instruct the road not to fight the damage claims growing out of the wreck?""Of course not," chuckled Stein. "You are too good a lawyer to expect that, Mr. Huber, and too good a lawyer not to know how the sorrow or wounds of the claimants—yes, and the big appetites of their attorneys, too, I'm afraid—exaggerate their losses on the one hand and the riches of the company on the other. No, no; the most we could get for them would be liberal settlements. We mustn't bankrupt the road. There are more widows owning stock in it than there are widows caused by this wreck.""Well," said Luke, "I'm afraid you don't convince me, Judge.""Not if I could promise all this?""No. You see, there was a smaller wreck some months ago, and the additional track-walkers and inspectors were promised the public then."Undisturbed, the Judge repeated all his arguments. "I really think you must see this as I do," he concluded. "And all we want is the letters——. By the way, Mr. Huber, I congratulate you on getting hold of them. That was a clever piece of work. How did you manage it?"Luke grinned."I found them growing on an apple tree in Madison Square," he said.The Judge nodded a smiling approval."At any rate," he submitted, "you will not mind telling me if any other person knows of their existence?""No, I don't mind. Except you and your friends and me and the apple tree, there is only one other person that knows as yet, and he's in no position to mention them." Luke rose as if to end the interview. "I've told nobody because I keep my bargains, Judge. But I do keep my bargains to the letter. You haven't convinced me, and you can't. I've given your clients——""My friends," Stein suavely corrected."Your friends, then; I've given them one month. If they don't do as I've suggested——"The judge raised a hand gravely."I think you mean 'ordered,' Mr. Huber," said he."Thank you. Yes, of course, I meant 'ordered.' If they don't begin to do as I've ordered by one month from to-day, and do it in a way that convinces everybody of their intention to finish the job—yes, and their consciousness of guilt—I'll make those letters public."The Judge remained seated. He looked at Luke sadly, and his voice rang true as he said:"I wonder if you have fully considered, I shall not say the dangers, but the difficulties and annoyances your course may expose you to—may very well expose you to?""No," said Luke shortly. "I'm too busy.""A great many men have tried what you are trying," the Judge went on, "and they have all failed. I tried it once myself. None has succeeded; not one. Some of them, of course, entirely through their own faults, were ruined by it, Mr. Huber.""I dare say," said Luke, unmoved."And you," warned the Judge, "have the success of a new and valuable political movement in your hands. You are responsible for it and to it. This might end by losing you the nomination.""I can stand that.""It might even hurt the men in the movement that have trusted you.""I sha'n't blame myself for it, if it does.""And if it did not do these things, it would surely wreck the faction at the polls—a faction that you believe in and that, if successful, could do such a wide public good."Luke was standing above his caller, his hands deep in his pockets."Look here, Judge," he drawled, "are you by any chance threatening me?"The Judge was not at all threatening him. "I am only telling you," he frankly explained, "what a long life in New York has shown me. I like you, Mr. Huber; I believe you could make a great success in life if you were less hot-headed; but I believe your hot-headedness can ruin you at the bar, can ruin you socially and financially, and can put a stop to your political career forever. I knew one man that attempted something such as you are attempting and never had another client afterward. I knew another that people heard a nasty story about and shut all their doors against. I knew a dozen that became political corpses, and I knew more that went bankrupt."Luke smiled."And some," he suggested, "disappeared altogether, I dare say?"The Judge looked him full in the eyes."I have heard so," said he. Then he brightened somewhat. "But you will not defy the lightning," he continued. "You are too practical. I am quite sure you must see how very right I am and how very well disposed my friends are toward you, Mr. Huber. Think what they could do for you, socially, financially, politically. Think what they could do for you personally and for this reform movement."Luke's smile broke into a laugh."Help the reform?" he exploded. "Oh, Lord!" Then, as quickly, the laugh ended. "In plain terms," he said, "what have you been telling me?" His languor had disappeared, and a sharp rage succeeded it. His words cracked like a whip. "You've been telling me that if I handed the safety of the M. & N. patrons over to the men that hire you, and let those men go free on the strength of a promise already broken, they would make me rich, elect me District-Attorney to do their work for them, advance me in their own social set and maybe, if I kept on doing all they asked, turn me into a Judge or a Governor or a millionaire! And you've been saying if I don't do it, they'll have me forced out of politics, out of the practice of the law, out of decent people's houses—and maybe knocked over the head or shot in the back at a dark corner. Well, here's my answer: I don't believe they would help me, I don't believe they can hurt me, and I don't care a damn, one way or the other!"The Judge bowed. He rose. He knew the world too well to give way to anger: he never lost his temper; he only sometimes advisedly loosed it."Is this," he asked, "your final decision, Mr. Huber?""Yes," raged Luke; "and you may bet your last cent on that. It's my final decision, and it's a plain 'No.' If these fellows don't do what I've ordered, I'll show them up—the whole bunch of them. I'll do it—why, I'd do it if they were the seraphim and cherubim, and all the Thrones, Dominions, Virtues, Powers, Principalities, and Archangels rolled into one!"
CHAPTER VI
To his office on the twentieth floor of a Wall Street skyscraper—that office with the mahogany table at its center and the engraving of George Washington between two windows—the master came at his usual time on the morning of the day following the North Bridge wreck. He was dressed neatly, as always, in a suit of russet brown. Breathing visibly, but noiselessly, he passed the resting ticker and walked to one of the windows overlooking the labyrinth. His near-sighted, beady eyes peered toward the web of streets below, on the cross-threads of which the black dots that were hurrying men and women bobbed like struggling flies.
The master rang for his secretary.
"Rollins," he said, "what's in the——" He stopped. He had not looked up, yet he asked: "What's the matter with you this morning?"
"Nothing," said Rollins. "I——" He coughed behind his hand. "I didn't sleep well last night."
"Take more exercise," said his master. "What's in the mail?"
"Thirty letters that need your personal attention, sir."
Nimbly the master ran them through his short and stumpy fingers, the tips of which were delicately rounded. He dictated his terse instructions. With the daily routine again in motion, Rollins recaught his employer's calm.
"Simpson has the begging letters?"
"Yes, sir."
"I guess," said the master in his most commonplace tone, "there were more than the usual number of anonymous threats."
"Only ten or twelve more."
"Burn them."
"Yes, sir. I always do."
"And, Rollins, draw up a letter to the cancer hospital and tell the management I have decided to give them a special ward for fibroid tumor cases. Their lawyers may consult with Judge Stein; I gave him the details last evening. Bring me the letter for revision."
"Yes, sir."
The master proceeded through his customary schedule.
"Rollins," he said, when it was at last completed and the secretary had been recalled. "Mr. Hallett and Mr. Rivington will be here"—he consulted his watch—"in five minutes. We are on no account to be disturbed."
Hallett and Rivington came in, five minutes later. Hallett looked angry, and Rivington frightened. Though the hour was early, Hallett's white waistcoat, fresh every morning, showed wrinkles, and its wearer chewed hard at an unlighted cigar; there was a deep perpendicular line over his short, thick nose. Rivington, immaculate, pulled at his slightly gray mustache.
"Good-morning," said their host. His voice was as nearly cheerful as it was ever. "Sit down."
They took their places at the table, where there was a pad of scribbling paper and a freshly sharpened pencil before each. Their host sat at the head of the table, his hands flat upon the table-top, their fingers extended, his elbows pointing ceilingward.
Rivington began at the midst of what worried him.
"It's a terrible thing!" he groaned. "Think of it; twenty-five people—and the women too!"
Hallett's comment was almost a bark.
"As soon as the coroner's jury lets 'em down easy," he said, "we've got to see that everybody's fired, from the division-superintendent to the president of the road; that's what we've got to do. There's one kind of carelessness that's not much better than murder."
"Twenty-five people!" repeated Rivington. The numbers seemed to hypnotize him; he made a futile gesture. "And the morning papers—— Their tone—— I don't like it."
The man at the head of the table watched them both, but said nothing.
"Oh, the newspapers never worry me," said Hallett. "We can stop all but one or two, and nobody cares what they say, anyhow. They've been talkin' for years. They've got to fill their columns."
"Then there's the Board meeting," said Rivington. "Next Thursday—— I don't see—— Really I don't."
"The Board of Directors of the M. & N.'s all right," Hallett reassured him.
"Perhaps. But then, too, there is this new reform element in town. Talk of a fusion movement: a fourth candidate for District-Attorney—— They will be only too eager to get hold of something, and this terrible accident—— It will give them just what they want."
"They can't elect."
"I am not so sure. The people—they aren't what they used to be. Something—I don't know what—has taken possession of them."
Hallett bobbed assent to that.
"Yes," he said, "nowadays as soon as a man gets a vote he stops minding his own business. But we've still got our grip on the wires."
"They may break." Rivington's fingers returned to their tugging at his mustache. "The wires, I mean. It's ugly. Twenty-five dead and a hundred hurt——"
"Wedidn't hurt 'em."
Rivington looked toward the man at the head of the table, but he sat crouched and silent.
"No," said Rivington; "but——" His sentence ended in a helpless waving of the hand.
"Then what are you worryin' about?" Hallett challenged. "We were only tryin' to keep up dividends. We had to choose between a little risk and protecting the stockholders. Lots of the stockholders are widows and orphans. Besides, it wasn't a real risk; it was a recognized, legitimate business risk. Lots of other roads do it right along. Our own roads do."
"That bridge——" said Rivington.
"The state inspectors passed it a month ago. And they passed the rails, too. It's all up to them."
In his turn, Hallett glanced at the man at the head of the table. He saw the man's hairy hands, fat and white against the mahogany, begin to move as they always began to move before he made a verbal attack upon conversation; but the man did not speak.
"I know," Rivington was saying, "but with the four candidates for the district-attorneyship all looking for vote-getting material——"
"Buy 'em," said Hallett.
"Four?"
"Who's the fourth?"
"They haven't chosen him yet; but——"
"Buy 'em," repeated Hallett.
"Out of the four there might be one we couldn't——"
"Anybody can buy anybody. There are more ways than one. Anyhow, we're not even directors."
"We own the road. Practically——"
"Nobody knows that."
"It seems to me——"
"They don't!" Hallett spat to the floor a bit of tobacco that, bitten from the end of his cigar, had clung to his lips. "They only think they do. It'd be the hardest thing in the world to prove that was ever tried."
"Would it?" Rivington questioned. "I really believe——"
The quick, cold voice of the third man flashed across their talk. It was as if he leaped at them.
"We may own the road," he said; "but we don't operate it. Not one of us has officially any administrative power in the matter of its operation. You gentlemen have forgotten that." He smiled: his teeth were pointed.
"Still," said Rivington, "if the fusion movement——"
He stopped there, not because of his habit of speaking in tangents, but because the door opened, and an old man timidly paused at its threshold.
The master of the office turned his head slowly.
"Simpson?" he said.
"Yes, sir," said the man at the door.
"What does this mean? Where's Rollins?"
"He was using my room to compose that letter about the hospital, and so I took his place."
"Didn't he tell you we were not to be disturbed?"
"Yes, sir; but this man"—Simpson held out an envelope—"got by everybody. He told me you would see him at once if you only received his message."
The man at the head of the table reached for the envelope. He read a card that it had contained.
"Show him in," he said.
He waited until Simpson had left to obey. Then, without wasting a glance on his associates, he explained:
"This is the card of a man called Luke Huber, Assistant District-Attorney. He's written on it: 'Five minutes in regard to the North Bridge wreck and your letters about it.'"
"Letters?" said Hallett. "What letters?"
As he replied, the strong jaw of the man at the head of the table worked as if he were chewing.
"That's what I mean to find out."
"Here? Now?" Rivington gasped.
The man addressed nodded. When a nod could save words, he saved words.
"Is that the careful thing?" asked Hallett.
"I'll bet his card's a bluff and he never expected to get in at all."
"That is precisely why I am having him in."
"Mr. Huber," announced Simpson.
Huber was still a young man. He was so young, and his youth was so ostentatious, that he immediately courted the rebuke once administered to Pitt. Moreover, he seemed to lack energy. He was thin; his face, though pleasant, was white. The lids dropped wearily over eyes that were at first veiled from the three men who looked up, but did not rise at his entrance. His mouth, the lips of which were only a pale pink, might have appeared firm, but would certainly have given the impression of being tired of firmness, and, when he bowed gravely to his host, his bristling head inclined itself so slowly and so slightly that the effort of the inclination, whether mental or physical, was insultingly apparent.
There was no form of presentation. Instead, there was a pause that only Huber seemed not to notice. Rivington drummed on the table with his long fingers. Hallett chewed his cigar. The other man smiled so enigmatically that it was impossible to say whether he intended to welcome or was amused by his friends' discomfiture.
"Bring a chair for Mr. Huber."
Simpson did as he was bid.
Luke deposited a carefully brushed hat on the table. Then he sank into the proffered chair opposite the leader of the trio and extended his long legs under the mahogany. His feet touched Rivington's, and Rivington jumped.
"Well?" asked the man at the head of the table.
Huber did not raise his heavy lids.
"I am glad I found you three together," he said slowly in a low and extremely gentle voice, "because you are the three men that control the railroad."
Hallett grinned a broad grin. This young fellow talked as if there were but one railroad in which the group was interested.
"What railroad?" he asked.
Luke slowly drew in his legs. He regarded the figure of the Persian rug that happened to be between the points of his patent-leather boots.
"The railroad," said he, "that I suppose you have been talking most about this morning."
"The Manhattan & Niagara?" blurted Rivington.
"We're not directors of that road," said Hallett hurriedly.
"No," agreed Rivington.
"No," said Luke, quite as heartily, "you aren't directors, but you direct it."
"We don't," snapped Rivington.
The man at the head of the table raised a soothing hand. He was still smiling.
"Come, come," he said, with an air of good-nature that his friends had seldom seen him assume during business hours. "We're all gentlemen, I'm sure. Anything that Mr. Huber wants to say to us in confidence——"
Huber interrupted.
"I never talk in confidence," said he; "and I don't want anybody to say anything to me that he would be ashamed to say in public."
His eyes were still hidden, and he still spoke slowly and gently; but the mere import of his words brought up short even the leader of the trio before him. That one's manner changed. He was curt.
"We are busy men, Mr. Huber," he said. "There are not many people in New York that we would have allowed to take up our time this morning. What do you want?"
Luke studied the figure on the rug.
"I want you three," he said in a tone not to be quickened, "to tear up every mile of rails on the M. & N. and replace those pieces of scrap-iron with rails of a grade fit to bear the traffic they have to carry."
Rivington's drumming fingers closed into his palms. Hallett let out an ugly laugh. Only the man at the head of the table, again changing his manner, equaled Luke in tranquillity.
"Really, Mr. Huber," he said pleasantly, "without admitting for a moment that we have the power to do what you suggest, don't you think your request is a rather large one?" He had the air of indulgently correcting a mistaken child.
The young man, gazing at the rug, shook his round head.
"No," he said, "not so large for you as its alternative."
"And that? It is——"
Rivington had put the question, but it was toward the man at the head of the table that Luke as he shot out his sudden reply, raised his eyes.
"Jail," said Luke.
"Do you mean to threaten us?" cried Rivington angrily.
Hallett laughed.
The man at the head of the table only smiled.
"Not at all," said Luke. "I am merely stating a fact. In coming here, the only thing I hesitated about was whether it would be better for the people to have safe transportation immediately guaranteed or to have you three in jail."
"You seem to forget, young man," said Hallett, "who it was elected the man that made you assistant district-attorney."
Luke gave him the briefest of glances.
"It was because I found out who elected him that I resigned the job," he answered. "I have just been offered the Municipal League's nomination for District-Attorney. WhenIam elected, it will be by the people."
"That will be about 2000 A.D.," sneered Hallett.
Luke shrugged his thin shoulders and returned his gaze toward the leader of the trio.
"A bridge falls on one of your roads in this county," he said. "It kills twenty-five people and wounds a hundred—all passengers in one of your trains. You will say the state inspectors declared the bridge O.K. Maybe they did, though they ought to go to the electric chair for it. That doesn't matter. What I can prove by thirty witnesses is that the train left the bridge before the bridge fell. A rail flattened and threw the train. Instead of sending you men to jail—and only because I think this is better for the safety of the public—I will give you one month to begin laying decent rails on this road—actually getbona fidework under way. If you don't do that, I'll make public the whole truth, get you indicted, go into court as a witness and produce two letters, one forwarded to you and the other signed by you. The first of these is a letter to the president of the road written by the steel manufacturers; it warns him that the cheap rails he's ordered are dangerous: that letter he sent to you. The second is a letter from you to the president of the road in which you say you want the poor-grade rails used because you don't want to increase the running expenses, and you order a general keeping-down of the road's expenses because of a plan for you three to unload your stock along about this December."
Luke rose. He relapsed into the weary young man of ten minutes before.
"You have one month," he said.
He picked up his hat, rubbed it with a caressing hand, and left the room.
The three that he left stared at one another. Then both Hallett and Rivington looked at their leader.
"It's an infamous—it must be an infamous lie!" cried Rivington. "Letters like that—men don't write them!"
Without moving a muscle of his face, the man at the head of the table looked at Rivington.
"All men say they don't," he corrected, "and all men do."
"What?" asked Hallett. "You're joking, and this fellow can't ever make it good. It's a bluff."
"Gentlemen," said the man at the head of the table, "it's the truth."
CHAPTER VII
§1. When Luke, on the afternoon preceding his Wall Street interview, had walked out of Leighton's office and the city's employ, it was with no certain plan for further action. His years of experience as an assistant prosecutor had demonstrated to him that something was drastically wrong with the modern administration of justice and practice of the law; his life in New York had shown him the evil influence of the money-power that seemed to be set in motion by the author of the Rollins letter and certainly corrupted the entire body of the nation, and his political work had discovered to him what he came to consider the inherent rottenness of the organized political parties. The effect of all this was made acute by the horror at the North Bridge wreck and the culmination of his mistrust in Leighton. Luke's sole immediate sensation was that of a man who finds himself in a bog: he did not think of draining the bog for the benefit of future pedestrians; he thought only of extricating himself from the mire.
That night at his club, however, he began to consider the larger aspects of the case. He was in the writing-room, intent on composing for the next evening's papers a statement of his reasons for parting company with Leighton. In formulating these, he found his charges to be precisely the charges recently formulated by the group of municipal reformers who were clamoring for a fusion of the best elements of all parties to elect, by honest methods, honest men that would purge New York of its civic shame. He recalled how this Municipal Reform League, growing steadily, had worried Leighton, and how its promoters prophesied that, if successful in the place of its origin, it might well spread throughout the country. When he first heard of it, Luke had been too deep in the affairs of his chief to be warmed by it; but to-night his vision was cleared.
He telephoned to two of the League's leaders. They came to his club and talked with him until long past midnight, themselves telephoning inquiries and instructions to friends and lieutenants, and summoning other leaders to join them.
Luke told them much. He betrayed no secrets of his recent employer, but he could honorably tell enough to make it clear to them that their belief in the necessity of reform was correct, enough to have weight with the voters should he speak to them in the new cause. His public record, it appeared, had long impressed the reformers; the firmness underlying his slow habit of talk, and the determination imperfectly covered by his lazy manner, impressed them now. He moved and fired them.
The Rollins letter he did not mention. He was more than once tempted, but he had resolved upon provisional silence before ever he sent for these leaders. He weighed carefully the merits of the courses open to him and decided that, large as would be the benefit of a public airing of his charges, and excellent as might prove the salutary example of a prison term for America's chief financiers, the airing might be lessened by those financiers' subtle influences upon popular opinion, the prison term might be escaped through similar influences, and all good results would in any case be long delayed. On the other hand, it was evident to him, in his present frame of mind, that the immediate safety of the M. & N.'s patrons was paramount, and that this safety could probably be secured by threatening those morally responsible for it. Such a threat, with a rigid time-limit, he therefore elected to administer.
The first result of his conference with the reformers was unexpected. At eight o'clock next morning, three of their most prominent men, who had not been with him on the night before, came to his apartments at the Arapahoe in Thirty-ninth Street. They had been in all-night consultation, and they told him that their organization had determined to put a full ticket in the field at the coming municipal election, but to center efforts in a struggle for the district-attorneyship: they had chosen him for their candidate.
Luke, in dressing-gown and pajamas, his unbrushed hair more than ever erect, looked from one of his callers to the other. There was Venable, a man of small but independent means, who had grown gray in the long war for civic betterment, meeting defeat at the polls and, what is harder to bear, disappointment in elected candidates, and again and again emerging to hope and fight on; Nelson, a successful wholesale druggist, whose business seemed divorced from politics, and whose hobby was the improvement of political conditions; and Yeates, a young man of family and fortune who belonged to Luke's club. Luke was flattered and confident, but did not show it.
"Do you really think I can do it?" he asked slowly. "Do you think I am the best man for the job?"
Each of the committee assured him he was. They said he had given a good account of himself as assistant district-attorney, won influential friends in his daily life, and secured, through his political speech-making for Leighton, a strong following among the voters.
"Of course," persisted Luke, "it's unnecessary to ask men of your standing that there shan't be anything but clean politics in our campaign."
Venable tossed his head proudly.
"My record is a guarantee of that," he said.
"No undue influence?" asked Luke. "No outside interests coming in to boss us or affect us in any way?"
"Rot!" said Yeates.
"And I am to have an absolutely free hand?"
They assured him of that.
Luke's lowered lids hid his eyes, but his eyes gleamed. Here, at last, was his Great Chance. Here was what he had lived and hoped for. He wanted to shout his war-cry, to go out and fight at once. Would he be worthy? The wing of that doubt brushed the farthest edges of his conscience, but he was young, and he did not heed it. He thought of all that he could do with this opportunity; and he thought, too, of Betty Forbes.
He had not seen much of Betty for some weeks. The lethargy that the slow process of his recent disillusionment flung over him, had left him despairing of her, kept her beyond his reach. But now he saw the way—saw that the way to win his ideals of honorable victory was also the way to win her.
He asked again a hundred questions, some that he had asked of his other counselors the night before and more that he had not: questions about purpose, ways-and-means, finances, organization, headquarters, district leaders, probable support, the temper of the public mind. To all of them he received sanguine answers.
"And your other candidates?" asked Luke. "The Mayor? Comptroller? President of the Board of Aldermen and the Borough Presidents?"
They gave him the names of known and honest men.
Luke stood up, but his air was the languid air that had become part of him.
"Good," he said, "of course, I'm pleased that you think of me as you do, and I accept."
§2. He would be a busy man now, but he must have that morning and afternoon to himself. However much he might want to start his campaign, he must make that visit to Wall Street, and after luncheon he intended to go to Betty.
The Wall Street interview seemed to him as successful as he could have expected. He was unterrified by the strength of the fortress to be attacked, but he had not looked forward to speedy surrender, so he was satisfied with the conviction that he affected the three financiers more than they cared to show. If they did not obey him, he would make the Rollins letters a part of his appeal to the electors; but he felt that, in the end, he would be offered obedience.
He lunched leisurely in the café attached to his apartment house, and then went to his own room to change his clothes before seeking Betty. He had completed the change and was about to leave when the telephone rang and the voice of the clerk below stairs announced a visitor:
"Judge Marcus F. Stein."
It had begun already. Luke knew who Stein was, though the two had never met. The man's title had been earned by a political appointment to fill the unexpired term of a judge that died while on the bench. Stein had begun his career as a young lawyer who specialized in damage suits against the N. Y. & N. J. railway. He was once charged, before the Bar Association—though the charges were never proved—with being a "hospital runner": that is, with employing men to hurry to the hospital, or the scenes of accidents, and induce victims to retain Stein to press their claims for damages against the railroad on which they had been injured. By devoting his best efforts against the N. Y. & N. J., he tried to make the corporation realize that it would be cheaper to employ him than to fight him, and he was, indeed, at last given a place on the legal staff of the company's claim department. There was an ugly story to the effect that, for a brief time before this charge was openly announced, he received a salary from the road while apparently acting for claimants against it and inducing them to compromise their claims for trivial sums.
It was a subject of common rumor at the New York Bar. Stein soon worked his way to the head of the claim department and thoroughly reorganized it. He used old tactics for his new employers: he had the news of all accidents immediately communicated to him, whereupon he would despatch his agents, with no loss of time, to the hospital, there to persuade the wounded, half stupefied by pain or drugs, to sign releases in return for pittances in ready money. It was said he built up a secret service, composed of men and women from private detective agencies, whose duty it was to discover discreditable secrets in the lives of such claimants as refused to compromise, or, failing in discovery, to manufacture or invent such incidents. One married woman from Syracuse, who had been injured in a wreck in New York and came there to press her suit, was inveigled into a friendship with a woman detective commissioned to engage a neighboring room in the house where the plaintiff took temporary lodgings. The detective succeeded in getting the claimant drunk and brought her, in this condition, with two of the road's employees, to a house in which, when the four were partially unclothed, another detective took a flashlight photograph of them. Then when the victim's case was called for trial, she was told that, unless she dropped her suit, the picture would be shown to her husband. By methods of this sort, Stein was said to have reduced his road's expenses for damages by two-thirds in three years.
Directly from his desk in the offices of the N. Y. & N. J., Stein was appointed to the bench, where he did not cease his usefulness to his employers. When his brief judicial term had ended, he took offices of his own, and cultivated the higher branches of corporation law. The men controlling the N. Y. & N. J. controlled many other corporations and saw to it that Stein received a regular annual retainer as a consulting lawyer from each of these. His business was not to win cases, but so to aid in directing his clients' plans that they would avoid litigation; he, therefore, rarely nowadays appeared in court and, though not one of the most learned men so engaged by his principals, he was one of the most serviceable, because to his merely crafty skill in the law he added a deep knowledge of practical politics and a wide intimacy with politicians.
Luke's first impulse was to deny himself to this caller, for he wanted to hurry to Betty and he thought there might be a strategic value in refusing to negotiate with any emissary. Curiosity, however, proved strong, and he reflected that the emissary might just possibly come with a word of complete capitulation.
"Show him up," said Luke into the telephone.
The ex-Judge was an imposing figure. He was big and broad and frock-coated, and he moved with befitting gravity. His hair was plentiful and white, his face clean-shaven. He had a strong nose and a wide, firm mouth, and his eyes were large and benevolent. His air was that of a man who has dealt with great interests for so many years that they have become the weighty commonplaces of his existence.
Luke had resolved not to shake hands with his visitor, but the Judge gave him no opportunity for refusal. He bowed courteously, smiled politely, and settled into the most comfortable of Luke's chairs, which he deliberately turned so that the light from the windows fell full on his own face, thus leaving Luke to front him from the shadow.
Luke, who had been prepared for the contrary move, managed to show no surprise. He sat down, extended his legs, and lowered his eyes. He made no inquiry concerning the reason of the Judge's call: he wanted the Judge to begin the talk.
Stein required no urging.
"I have never had the pleasure of meeting you before, Mr. Huber," he said, speaking with what was evidently no more than characteristic deliberation, "but I have watched your career with a great deal of interest—a very great deal. It reminded me so much of my own early struggles." He was looking steadily at Luke, whose eyes remained lowered. "You will forgive an old man who is a scarred veteran of the law for speaking frankly with you and for taking such an interest, I'm sure."
"Very kind of you, indeed," Luke murmured.
"I thought," said the Judge, "that you handled that Maretti case excellently, and the Dow trial, too; you showed an original cleverness there. More than that, Mr. Huber, you showed promise. There has been a great deal of promise in your professional work, and I thought I detected the same promise in the reports of your political speeches. With influential friends—for, of course, everybody needs influential friends in these days: people of real and solid standing—you ought to go far."
"Thank you," said Luke.
"Now," the Judge pursued, "I see by the early evening papers you may be offered the candidacy for District-Attorney on the Municipal League ticket."
"I believe there is some talk of that, Judge."
"Well, we need such a movement as this reform movement: we need it badly. With proper backing, you ought to win. With proper backing, of course."
Luke gave no sign of hearing this. Quite out of the air he drawled:
"I suppose you came about those letters, Judge Stein?"
For all the disturbance that he produced, he might as well have said that it was a pleasant day, or that he expected rain. When his eyes at this question were raised to meet the Judge's, the benevolent eyes of the Judge did not quiver: like his voice, they were steady and deliberate.
"Yes," said the Judge, "and I had them in mind when I spoke of your career. Now, Mr. Huber, my friends think, and I think, that you have been a little hasty and unreasonable because—and remember, it is an old man who tells you so—you are still rather young. But because I know you are an able young man, I have told them I was sure you would see your haste and unreasonableness when you came to consider the matter. As their friend and as a lawyer who has watched your career and remembers his own start in life, I undertook to say so to you and to offer my advice."
Luke's eyelids were again lowered. His hands were clasped in his lap. To a less astute man than Stein, he might have seemed asleep.
"I shall be glad," continued Stein, "if I can help you out of your embarrassing position."
"Who are your friends, Judge?" asked Luke.
The Judge smiled tolerantly.
"Come, come, Mr. Huber," he said; "you don't expect me to mention names, I know. All I will say on that point—all you can justly ask me to say—is that I don't come from them in my professional capacity. They haven't retained me to do this. They haven't even asked me to do it. I am acting entirely of my own volition, and on my own initiative, out of good will for all the parties concerned and not least of all for you."
"Yet you seem prepared to plead their case."
"I am—on my own initiative, I am, because their case is the right one, as I am sure you will end by seeing. In the first place, these letters are their property."
"I doubt," said Luke, "whether they would go into court to prove property."
"I do not think," said the unruffled Judge, "that they will go into court for any purpose—unless their burden of good nature is rendered intolerable. They can afford to appeal to their own conscience, because they are morally clear."
"Of the North Bridge wreck?"
"Of the North Bridge wreck, Mr. Huber. Granting that those letters are admissible evidence—which I shouldn't grant, if I were in the case—the one is not an expert declaration; it is merely an expression of opinion from persons with many grades of rails to sell and naturally anxious to sell their most expensive and most profitable grade. As for the other letter, it is informed by the knowledge of what prompted the rail-makers' opinion, and in itself offers only a counter-opinion based on the writer's long and successful experience with the cheaper rails."
"Yes—but the accident happened."
"Exactly: it merely happened and it was an accident. In other words, it was something unforeseen and contrary to the experience of the writer of the second letter."
The Judge waited a moment for a reply but, as Luke gave none, presently continued:
"Now, the course I propose—quite personally, you will understand—is honorable, harmless, and in the best interests of all concerned: you, us, and even the public."
"What is it?" asked Luke.
"All that I would grant my friends is the return of those letters, which are their own property, and are not admissible evidence in a court of law. That is all I would grant them. On their part, I should exact a pledge from them to have better rails laid throughout the suspected sections of the M. & N. road."
Luke's eyes opened.
"That's allIasked them to do," he said.
"Ah, yes; but to do it at once would be taken as a public confession of guilt—and my friends are not guilty. You will see that the coroner's jury says so."
Luke relapsed.
"It will," he said. "I'm sure of it."
"Therefore, the thing must be done slowly and discreetly, and meanwhile we must protect the public by an increase of track-walkers and road-inspectors."
"Would your friends," inquired Luke, "instruct the road not to fight the damage claims growing out of the wreck?"
"Of course not," chuckled Stein. "You are too good a lawyer to expect that, Mr. Huber, and too good a lawyer not to know how the sorrow or wounds of the claimants—yes, and the big appetites of their attorneys, too, I'm afraid—exaggerate their losses on the one hand and the riches of the company on the other. No, no; the most we could get for them would be liberal settlements. We mustn't bankrupt the road. There are more widows owning stock in it than there are widows caused by this wreck."
"Well," said Luke, "I'm afraid you don't convince me, Judge."
"Not if I could promise all this?"
"No. You see, there was a smaller wreck some months ago, and the additional track-walkers and inspectors were promised the public then."
Undisturbed, the Judge repeated all his arguments. "I really think you must see this as I do," he concluded. "And all we want is the letters——. By the way, Mr. Huber, I congratulate you on getting hold of them. That was a clever piece of work. How did you manage it?"
Luke grinned.
"I found them growing on an apple tree in Madison Square," he said.
The Judge nodded a smiling approval.
"At any rate," he submitted, "you will not mind telling me if any other person knows of their existence?"
"No, I don't mind. Except you and your friends and me and the apple tree, there is only one other person that knows as yet, and he's in no position to mention them." Luke rose as if to end the interview. "I've told nobody because I keep my bargains, Judge. But I do keep my bargains to the letter. You haven't convinced me, and you can't. I've given your clients——"
"My friends," Stein suavely corrected.
"Your friends, then; I've given them one month. If they don't do as I've suggested——"
The judge raised a hand gravely.
"I think you mean 'ordered,' Mr. Huber," said he.
"Thank you. Yes, of course, I meant 'ordered.' If they don't begin to do as I've ordered by one month from to-day, and do it in a way that convinces everybody of their intention to finish the job—yes, and their consciousness of guilt—I'll make those letters public."
The Judge remained seated. He looked at Luke sadly, and his voice rang true as he said:
"I wonder if you have fully considered, I shall not say the dangers, but the difficulties and annoyances your course may expose you to—may very well expose you to?"
"No," said Luke shortly. "I'm too busy."
"A great many men have tried what you are trying," the Judge went on, "and they have all failed. I tried it once myself. None has succeeded; not one. Some of them, of course, entirely through their own faults, were ruined by it, Mr. Huber."
"I dare say," said Luke, unmoved.
"And you," warned the Judge, "have the success of a new and valuable political movement in your hands. You are responsible for it and to it. This might end by losing you the nomination."
"I can stand that."
"It might even hurt the men in the movement that have trusted you."
"I sha'n't blame myself for it, if it does."
"And if it did not do these things, it would surely wreck the faction at the polls—a faction that you believe in and that, if successful, could do such a wide public good."
Luke was standing above his caller, his hands deep in his pockets.
"Look here, Judge," he drawled, "are you by any chance threatening me?"
The Judge was not at all threatening him. "I am only telling you," he frankly explained, "what a long life in New York has shown me. I like you, Mr. Huber; I believe you could make a great success in life if you were less hot-headed; but I believe your hot-headedness can ruin you at the bar, can ruin you socially and financially, and can put a stop to your political career forever. I knew one man that attempted something such as you are attempting and never had another client afterward. I knew another that people heard a nasty story about and shut all their doors against. I knew a dozen that became political corpses, and I knew more that went bankrupt."
Luke smiled.
"And some," he suggested, "disappeared altogether, I dare say?"
The Judge looked him full in the eyes.
"I have heard so," said he. Then he brightened somewhat. "But you will not defy the lightning," he continued. "You are too practical. I am quite sure you must see how very right I am and how very well disposed my friends are toward you, Mr. Huber. Think what they could do for you, socially, financially, politically. Think what they could do for you personally and for this reform movement."
Luke's smile broke into a laugh.
"Help the reform?" he exploded. "Oh, Lord!" Then, as quickly, the laugh ended. "In plain terms," he said, "what have you been telling me?" His languor had disappeared, and a sharp rage succeeded it. His words cracked like a whip. "You've been telling me that if I handed the safety of the M. & N. patrons over to the men that hire you, and let those men go free on the strength of a promise already broken, they would make me rich, elect me District-Attorney to do their work for them, advance me in their own social set and maybe, if I kept on doing all they asked, turn me into a Judge or a Governor or a millionaire! And you've been saying if I don't do it, they'll have me forced out of politics, out of the practice of the law, out of decent people's houses—and maybe knocked over the head or shot in the back at a dark corner. Well, here's my answer: I don't believe they would help me, I don't believe they can hurt me, and I don't care a damn, one way or the other!"
The Judge bowed. He rose. He knew the world too well to give way to anger: he never lost his temper; he only sometimes advisedly loosed it.
"Is this," he asked, "your final decision, Mr. Huber?"
"Yes," raged Luke; "and you may bet your last cent on that. It's my final decision, and it's a plain 'No.' If these fellows don't do what I've ordered, I'll show them up—the whole bunch of them. I'll do it—why, I'd do it if they were the seraphim and cherubim, and all the Thrones, Dominions, Virtues, Powers, Principalities, and Archangels rolled into one!"