§4. Luke waited only until he heard the door close upon the departing clergyman. Then he turned to Betty with a relieved sigh."Phew!" he said. "I'm glad that's over."She was sitting opposite him in the full glare of light from an old-fashioned, crystal-hung chandelier. Betty could bear strong lights."Why?" she asked. Her brow was puckered, but her lips smiled. "I like him. He's very good, and he's doing a really great work. I like him ever so much.""Oh, yes," said Luke. "Nicholson's all right. He has what he admires in other men: high convictions and the courage of them. Most of us always admire in others what we don't have ourselves; but not Nicholson. He is doing a big work, too. But I'm glad he's gone, just the same.""Why?" repeated Betty.Luke rose. He came over to Betty and stood looking down at her, his arms folded across his chest."Because," he said, "I wanted to talk to you.""It didn't look so. It looked as if you wanted to talk to Mr. Nicholson.""I wanted to talk to you and about you."She stopped fencing. She gave him her full, frank gaze."Well?" she asked."You know what I want to say, Betty," he answered. "You've seen for a long time what I was coming to. I held off. I held off because I hadn't anything to offer you. Even now I haven't much. I haven't half enough. If I win this fight I'm in, it won't give me anything that would make me deserve you. I've not been a bit better than I should be." His voice grew tense. "When I come down to brass tacks, when I—I beg your pardon; but what I mean is that when I get to the point of telling you I love you, I see how far I've been from being what I should be. I—— Oh, hang it all, Betty!" He put out his hands. "I love you. I've never really loved anybody else and never can. If I win this confounded—blessed fight, will you marry me?"She got slowly to her feet: it seemed to Luke minutes before she had stood up and begun her answer. Then she took both his hands."You don't have to win the fight to win me, Luke," she said.The realization swept over him. He took her in his arms. He looked in her upturned face—the eyes wide, the sweet, fresh cheeks hot, the lips parted, breathing quickly—and then he felt the blood rush to his head, felt it hammer at his temples. It got into his eyes and blinded him. He ground his lips upon hers.The dull despair of his last months under Leighton commanded a reaction. The rushing changes of the last two days had set his nerves to a speed that would not now cease in whatever physical activities he engaged himself. These things flung him along a new road; they raced him down a way of which he had known but little. As he felt the warmth of her gracious young body next his, he was hurled with such violence down a course so unfamiliar to him that only the thought of losing his race by running it too swiftly could serve to lessen his straining speed. Like a quarter-mile runner stopping himself short in the last hundred yards before the tape, he almost fell as he forced himself to release her."Your father," he panted. He looked away from her: "I must see him now."Betty did not understand. She was only exalted by this new thing; she was only happy."Now?" she whispered."Yes." He looked back at her and, with a white face, smiled. "He has a right to know." He caught her hand, pressed it only as tightly as he dared. "I'll go to him in the library. Wait for me."§5. Forbes was seated at a round table, engaged in his regular nightly task of reading the editorial-page of theEvening Star, nodding his head when he agreed with its generalities and muttering maledictions upon it when it specifically ridiculed the Progressive Party. As Luke came in, Forbes was in the midst of one of the paper's attacks on progressivism, and his frown seemed to drive his beaked nose into his mustache."Oh, Huber," he said, without at once relaxing his scowl; "I didn't know you were here. Come in. Been here long?"Luke could not have guessed how long he had been in the house."Not very," he ventured."Sit down," said Forbes. He had not risen. He indicated an easy-chair near his own."Thanks," said Luke; but he did not sit down.Forbes at last noticed his visitor's nervousness."I suppose you've had a hard day," he said. "Pardon me for not congratulating you sooner on your success. This sheet"—he brandished theEvening Star—"doesn't want anything but to be against everything. It upsets me every evening. But you've done a big thing. I think you should have come clear over to our side, but I dare say you will do that in time. Meanwhile, I'm sincerely glad for your good fortune. You deserve it.""You're very good," said Luke. His eyes twinkled a little. "I wonder if you know about it—all.""Only what this mealy-mouthed sheet says. It's absolutely inexplicable to me, Huber, how a paper written by such able men can be so narrow-minded on broad subjects. However, I think they're going to supportyourparty, if they may be said ever to support anything.""I'm afraid theyarerather reticent about the real news," said Luke."They never tell anything that weighs against their theories.""They haven't had a chance to tell this."Forbes looked puzzled."What do you mean?""It's only just happened." Luke breathed deeply. "I'm engaged to be married," he said. He spoke with an unusual rapidity. "Engaged to be married, and I'd like it to come off—the wedding, I mean—right after the election."Forbes scrambled up. He wrung Luke's hand."Well, well," he said, "you are to be congratulated!""I am glad you think so," said Luke, "for you know the girl better than I do.""The girl? I know her better——" Forbes's voice rose. "You don't mean—— You don't mean to say——""Yes," Luke nodded. "Itisluck, isn't it? It's Betty.""Bless my soul!" Forbes brought his left hand down on Luke's right shoulder. "Bless my soul! My little girl! Huber, you—you rather knock the wind out of me."He said all the conventional things; his manner showed all the proper surprise; and both men understood that he had been expecting this news for a long time and wanting it."Huber," he said, "of course this is sudden, and of course I'm an old fool not to have got over considering Betty a child—a mere baby—but, now you're here with the announcement, I'm quite certain that, out of all the men who've been tagging after her, you're the one that I'd want for a son-in-law."Luke again mumbled his thanks."You're not standing still," pursued Forbes: "you're going ahead. You have a great deal to you, and Betty's the very girl to make you make the best of yourself"—Forbes's voice abandoned the commonplace note and fell to the note of genuine feeling—"then there's your interest in the Business. Huber, I've always regretted that I didn't have a son to leave the Business to, as my father left it to me and his father to him. If you'd married somebody else, and Betty had married some chap that had no interest in it, the Business might have gone over to you eventually, and so on to children of another stock than mine; whereas, now"—he looked around Luke to the doorway—"Betty!" he said.She had not obeyed Luke; she was standing at the door."I couldn't wait," she confessed; but she said it with an allegiance that was now all for Luke."Come here," her father ordered.He released Luke's hand and shoulder. The girl ran to him and put her arms about his neck."Please be nice, daddy," she whispered. "Please be nice."Forbes managed to draw a handkerchief and blow his nose."Iama fool," he said. "I—Betty, you're looking so much to-night the way your mother—By George, Iama fool! I think I must be getting old, Huber."§6. In the room at the end of the hall marked "Family Entrance" to a saloon in Fifty-second Street, near Eighth Avenue, a red-headed man dressed in cheap clothes of fashionable cut, was leaning across a table at which he was drinking raw whisky with a girl who, had she not been too heavily painted, would have had a face like that popularly ascribed to Joan of Arc.[image]HE FOUND IT NECESSARY TO BE EMPHATIC"I've got him showed to me," the man was saying. "He lives at the Arapahoe on Thirty-ninth Street. I'll play lighthouse. All you gotta do's put on them glad clothes an' get him into Pearl's Six' Av'nue place. He's in wrong, anyhow. Then I'll tip off Charley Guth, an' he'll put Donovan wise an' pinch the joint. See?"The girl that looked like Joan of Arc nodded comprehendingly."But the clothes has got to be real swell," she said.CHAPTER X§1. As Luke left the Forbes house that night, his step kept time with the beat of his pulses, and he walked fast. At last he thought that he saw happiness within reach.He was not yet happy; he was quite clear about this. One half of him, perhaps the nobler half, was engaged in a political battle with the forces of corruption, but it was so engaged that those forces affected it; they invaded his individuality and, therefore, curtailed his freedom and curtailed completeness. Happiness, if it was to be found at all, was to be found only in the perfect development of self, and such a development was impossible so long as self, seeking expression in politics, found expression thwarted by an evil opposition in the political field.Nevertheless, this opposition, Luke was sure, could be crushed and swept away; his ideal for the good of the city, which had become his own good, could be attained; and then, he told himself, that other part of him, the part that loved Betty and that Betty loved, could enjoy Betty as the reward of the whole man. It was as if he were one of two runners. Betty he saw not as the goal, but as the prize to be given him for leading at the goal; not a prize that any other runner could win by worsting him in the race, but a prize that he himself could deserve only if he were to lead at the finish.He was thinking of this when he left the Subway station and walked toward the Arapahoe, but under his conscious thoughts the subconscious self was still tingling with the emotions that had flamed up in him when he took Betty in his arms and felt her lips on his. He quivered with the physical recollection, and though the flame had burned, his flesh found the pain of it sweet.At the corner nearest the apartment house in which he lived, he became aware of a woman. The street was nearly empty, but until she was close beside him he did not notice her. How she came to be at his elbow he did not appreciate, nor did he at first realize whether she were young or old, beautiful or ugly."Will you tell me the time, please?" she asked.Luke's experience in Leighton's office had long ago taught him that such a request was the commonest form of watch-stealing, but he was not afraid of losing his watch. He stopped under a lamp-post."Certainly," he said."I know it's late," pursued the woman, "but I don't know how late."The words were thick. The voice was the voice of all the phantoms of the street, low in pitch and hoarse, but luring because of all that it connoted: because of the mystery, the adventure which, after all knowledge of her sordidness and all understanding of her frigidity, the woman who most reveals her body has maintained by that revelation's forced screening of her soul.Luke consulted his watch."It's a quarter to eleven," he said.He looked at her, and he was glad to look. That she was well-dressed, but overdressed and wore her clothes with the defiance of one unhabituated to them, did not impress him. What impressed him was the face that, in spite of its tokens of much evil done and more evil suffered, retained the fragile beauty which men associate with innocence. The calm, broad brow, the gray eyes wide and steady, the underlip timidly drawn back, the delicate chin upturned above a slim white throat, reminded him of the pictures of Joan of Arc on trial and foredoomed by her English accusers."Itislate, isn't it?" she said."Yes," said Luke. He had forgotten about his watch; he was holding it loosely in his hand."I wonder," said the woman, "if it's too late for you to take a little walk with me."Her eyes had narrowed coldly; a smile that was a trade grimace distorted her mouth.The change in her wakened Luke. He restored his watch to his pocket. He felt a slight chill at his heart and a self-accusation."No," he said brusquely; and started to walk away.The woman followed."Aw, come on," she urged. Her tone coarsened under his refusal."No," said Luke."Please?" her voice whined. She put her hand on his arm.Luke shook off the hand. He was too angry with himself to have pity for her."Stop this," he ordered."But won't you listen?" The woman's hand returned persistently; it clutched. "I got somethin' to——"Luke saw that they were at the door of the Arapahoe."I'm sorry," he said, "but I can't stop to listen to you."He went into the apartment house.§2. He really was sorry. Once inside the door of the Arapahoe, he said to himself that the woman had only been plying her trade, and that what he had visited upon her was a portion of the wrath against his own momentary weakness. He could never have given way to her, because he was so firm in his resolve to live worthily for Betty that he could not enough want to give way to offset the efficacy of his resolve; only the portion of him subject to his will without being a part of his will had momentarily weakened; it could not have rebelled victoriously, and although it merited punishment, the exterior cause of its weakness did not deserve censure. Altogether, Luke concluded, he had behaved in a rather contemptible fashion.His mind was immediately diverted. As he passed the clerk's desk in the hall, the clerk beckoned darkly to him."There are some reporters looking for you here," he whispered. "I sent them into the waiting-room so's you could get by them when you came in, if you wanted to. Do you?"Luke almost laughed as he reflected upon the figure he would have presented to the representatives of the press, had they been waiting for him at the door."Yes, I'll see them," he said.They came to him in a body, seven of them. They worked for the morning papers and, because the evening papers had printed Luke's letter about his resignation from the District-Attorney's staff, they wanted a fresh sensation for their journals.Luke leaned against a pillar in the lobby and talked to them. Most of them he had met while in Leighton's office. Personally, he was popular with them, and he liked them."I'll say anything you want," he agreed. "But what is there to say?"The spokesman was a keen man with curling black hair."You might develop the last part of your letter," he suggested: "the part about the big financiers that you're going gunning for.""I haven't got the gun yet," objected Luke. "Better wait and see if I'm nominated, boys.""Oh, you'll be nominated, all right. Come on, Mr. Huber.""You're going to support the League, anyhow," said a stout little fellow, whose paper opposed all reformers. "You can tell us how the League will go for the men at the top."To this Luke agreed. He began to speak and, as he saw the busy pencils noting his best phrases upon sheets of roughly-folded copy-paper, he fell into stride with his subject. He declared that the League meant to put an end to the influence of Big Business in municipal politics, and, although he mentioned no names, it was evident what big business men he had in mind.The reporters tried to make him mention names, but their efforts only seemed to restore his caution. They urged him to be specific in his charges against the present administration of the District-Attorney's office; but here again they encountered the impassive side of Luke with which they were more familiar."No, no," said Luke; "there may be a time for all that, but this isn't the time. Just wind up by saying we mean, once and for all, to put Wall Street out of politics and graft out of the administration of justice in New York City and to keep them out, if we have to send every financier and every policeman to jail."§3. The reporters made all that they could of what Luke gave them, and the next morning's papers were full of it. Leighton, on his way downtown, read them with anger against Luke and annoyance with himself for losing a man that might have been so valuable to him.He began to be afraid of the effect of Huber's implications regarding the District-Attorney's office. Remembering that his party was in no position to risk putting up a weak candidate, he telephoned to George J. Hallett and was granted an interview: he said he knew of the letters in Luke's possession and knew how Luke came by them.Hallett, whose office was almost the counterpart of that in which he consulted with his master and Rivington, sprawled in a deeply upholstered chair. He smoked steadily at a cigar, and when the letters were mentioned, he accepted the mention with complete composure."Who else knows about 'em?" he frankly inquired."Nobody," said Leighton—"unless Huber's been talking.""He's got 'em, hasn't he?""Had them the last time I saw him.""Anyway, you haven't 'em?""No, of course, I haven't."Hallett took his cigar from his mouth; he looked at the cigar, and from it to Leighton."I don't see what useyouare to us, then," he said.Leighton understood that the only satisfactory way to deal with this man was the direct way."I can't be any use to you except to tell you where the leak is these letters came through.""What do you want us to do for you?""I want your support at election time.""Can't promise it. The other side has just as good a claim on us.""Heney?""An' the whole Democratic organization, yes.""Would you promise not to interfere on either side?""Can't do it. You see, you haven't got much to sell."Leighton ran his fingers through his black hair."Look here, Mr. Hallett," he began again, "we don't know each other personally——""That's all right," said Hallett."Well, then, if I can't count on your influence for the election, may I count on it for the nomination?""Who stole those letters?" said Hallett."I can count on you people in the matter of the nomination?""Yes.""A man named Rollins."Late that afternoon it was found that Rollins had made an overcharge for postage-stamps in the course of his secretarial work. He was arrested and "railroaded" to jail.§4. It was somewhat later when the Republicans nominated Leighton and then, to the amazement of the public, the Democrats and Progressives each opposed him with candidates so weak that every politician understood this as a surrender to Leighton in order to defeat the candidate of the Municipal Reform League. In advance of their occurrence, however, all these things were gossiped about by the leaders of every faction and so confidently expected that plans were shaped in accordance with them. Somehow, they sent word ahead to the Reform headquarters even on the day of the happening that set them in motion, and Venable and Nelson, together with the other executives of the M. R. L. bestirred themselves."Where's Yeates?" asked Nelson, as he came into Luke's room, where Venable and Luke were busy. "That young fellow's never around when he's wanted.""He sent in word he had some other engagements," said Venable."Had to play golf with Hallett's son, I guess, if it wasn't L. Bergen Rivington," Nelson sneered. "There's too much society in that boy for any political usefulness."Luke looked up from the notes he was preparing for his formal letter accepting the nomination that the League was next day to offer him:"Is Yeates a friend of those people?" he asked. "I knew he knew some of them, but is he a friend?""Only socially," he said. "Yeates was born to it, but politically he is all right. He has high ideals and a really fine enthusiasm.""Hum," said Luke. "What do you think of this paragraph, Nelson?"He read from his notes:"During the past few years, those persons in a position to observe the inner workings of our politics, both in national and municipal affairs, have been alarmed to see the steady encroachment made upon them by High Finance. There is no longer any room left for doubt. The purpose of this invading power is clear: its purpose is conquest. Unless the free voters act, and act quickly, the true government of the United States in general, and of New York in particular, will not rest in the President or Congress, in Mayors and Boards of Aldermen, in the Constitution, the charter, or the courts: it will rest in a combination of Big Business interests that will control the men elected as representatives of the people."Nelson slapped his thigh."That's it!" he said. "That's the talk. We ought to have had some of that kind of medicine long ago. Look at all this recent drug-legislation, for instance. You can't imagine what my firm's been up against. They're getting an appetite for the wholesale drug-trade now, these big fellows are, and they're paving their way by lobbies at Washington and Albany and half a dozen state capitals!"The three worked over the letter for the rest of that day, having a scanty luncheon brought into the office from a nearby restaurant, and talking plans while they ate. All the time callers were sending in their names with requests for interviews, workers were reporting, men at the telephone were ringing up to ask instructions, and clerks and stenographers were running in and out to deliver telegrams and special-delivery letters and to receive replies.Luke's only appreciable pause was to read two notes of congratulation from his mother and Jane, the former commending him for adopting a course that the writer was sure her husband would have adopted had he lived, the latter full of pride in his approaching success, but ending with the postscript: "Jesse [Jesse Kinzer was Jane's husband, the new Congressman] says that conditions in New York are 'purely local,' whatever that means." Altogether, Luke had a busy day. He was a tired man when, at nine o'clock, he again rang the bell of the Forbes house in Brooklyn.§5. To Luke's surprise, it was Forbes himself that opened the door."I've been looking for you," he said seriously. "Can you come into the library? I want to see you for a few minutes. It's important."The concluding words were unnecessary. The tone of the words that preceded them would alone have been sufficient to warn Luke of trouble: Forbes's voice was husky, tense, uncertain."Of course," Luke assented.He followed Forbes into the library, and there, as the host closed the door, Luke saw in the face that confronted him an expression which conformed with the tone and import of Forbes's first words. The elder man's face was haggard."I shall have to tell you something," he was saying—"something that I ought to have told you long ago, or as much of it as had happened then. But, you see, I had no idea it could be so important—ever be so important." He broke off with a remembrance of his accustomed courtesy: "I beg your pardon. Won't you sit down, Huber? I quite forgot to ask you. For my part, I couldn't sit still if my life depended on it."Luke stood by the center-table."No, no," he said. "Don't bother—and don't worry." He thought that Forbes looked as if death were in the house. "Is anything wrong with Betty?" he suddenly asked."No, it's not that. It's what I say. Of course I never supposed your going in for the Municipal Reform League movement could have any business significance——"Luke, relieved about Betty, was unable to follow Forbes's disjointed sentences."It hasn't," he said. "It hasn't any business significance whatever.""Ah"—Forbes shook his head—"that's what I thought, too. But it has. Huber, this may mean the end of R. H. Forbes & Son. Think of it: it may mean the end of the Business—a business that has been honorably conducted by my family for three generations."What such a catastrophe would mean to Forbes nobody knew better than Luke, but how the Municipal Reform League could be concerned in it was beyond guessing."Won't you try to begin at the beginning?" said Luke. He was used to getting coherent stories in preliminary interviews with incoherent witnesses, and he fell into his professional manner."It's this way." Forbes turned his gray eyes away and fumbled with an ornament on the mantel-tree. "When you came into the Business, I had several loans outstanding—the Business had. They were all well secured, and you know how solid the concern's always been. With the money you put in and the earnings, I was able to take up some of them, but there were the improvements and extensions made necessary by fresh competition and the new inventions and the machine-trust's raise of prices. Well, I had to leave a loan outstanding at the East County National.""Yes," said Luke encouragingly. "How much was it?""Two hundred and fifty thousand. It was a good deal, I know, but, you see, when I negotiated it——""Never mind the reasons now. What were its terms?""It was a call-loan," said Forbes in a shaken voice.Luke's amazement conquered his reserve."What? And for two hundred and fifty thousand?""Yes. There was the competition. It was growing hot. The Business——""How did you ever arrange it?""I was surprised myself at the time to find it so easy, but I was too glad to get it to ask questions. Now, I wish I had. I believe the bank was influenced by some people that wanted to get us into trouble—want to form a ready-made clothing trust.""It's incredible!" cried Luke. "Not one of the agents that I had look into your business for me mentioned this.""I didn't know that, Huber." Forbes looked his appeal. "I ask you to believe me.""All right. It was my own fault. I should have asked you more questions. What puzzles me is how this loan was concealed.""It was at the request of the bank. They said it was so unusual that they didn't want it more widely known than was absolutely necessary, and I agreed because of the credit of the Business. Now I believe it was all a trap set by the men that want to form the trust."Luke did not pause to waste reproaches over either his own stupid blindness or Forbes's culpable rashness. He pressed forward:"And now they're going to call the loan?"Forbes bowed his head."And we can't meet it?""If—if we tried, we could do it only by wrecking the Business.""But we can go somewhere else. The East County isn't the only bank in New York.""That is what I thought. It's what I said."Forbes was swallowing a sob. "I said it to Osserman—that's the president—I said it to him himself.""Well?" persisted Luke."Well"—Forbes's eyes met Huber's—"it wasn't any use.""Now, look here," said Luke. He put into his voice a calm that he did not feel. "Try to tell me just what happened. I can't advise you till I know that, even if I'm not the business-fool I seem to have proved myself to be. First of all, Osserman sent you some sort of word, didn't he?""Yes, of course.""What was it?""It was a letter—just a personal letter.""When did you get it?""About eleven this morning.""So then you went over to the bank?""Yes.""And asked to see this man Osserman?""Yes.""And what did he say?""Well," he said—"I can't tell you exactly; he was careful not to use definite words; but careful to make his meaning clear.""What was his meaning, then?""He said in effect that he understood you were interested in our Business.""What of it? That's what I want to know, Forbes. What's my interest in your firm got to do with your standing at the East County National?""Oh, he didn't say at first. At first he said he understood we were not sound.""So you told him he was mistaken and offered to show the books?""Of course I did." Forbes's chin shot upward. "I told him that the Forbes firm was one of the oldest and——""Yes, yes. And then he mentioned me. How did I hurt the firm's standing?""He was really very plausible about that. I must say, Huber, that he rather opened my eyes to a phase of your political activities I hadn't before thought of.""What phase?""To be quite frank, he called your public utterances wild. He said they attacked credit and might shake it. He even intimated that if you were elected, you'd go in for a course of action—you had pledged yourself to go in for one that would upset credit altogether. And that's true, Huber." Forbes gained a certain confidence. "When you come to think of it, the business interests of the city—I mean the sound conservative business interests—ought not to be made to suffer for the sins of the big financiers."Luke recaptured his composure. His face relaxed; he looked lazy and uninterested."So I suppose," he said, "that this banker asked you to tell me to get out of the fight.""Yes, but of course——""Really, that's the highest testimony to the League's strength that we've had yet.""Yes, but, of course, I told him I couldn't do that.""What did he say then?""He said he was afraid the City Chamberlain would withdraw all the city funds on deposit at the East County if the bank kept on carrying a loan you were interested in.""And you took all this like a child?""I didn't. You ought to know me better than that.""What did you do?""I was indignant. I told you I was. I said I would not have a loan from a concern that interfered with the political convictions of its creditors. I said I would go somewhere else.""Did you go?"The sob returned to Forbes's throat."Yes, I did," he said; "and it was the most humiliating experience of my career. When I thought of the firm of R. H. Forbes & Son begging credit, I could hardly bear it. But I went to the Lexington National.""They turned you down?""They listened very politely and said they would consider the proposition.""Well, then," said Luke, "you're crossing a bridge before you come to it.""No, I am not; for presently they sent over a messenger with a note that was no more than an insulting refusal.""You gave up then?""No, I tried again. I tried Clement & Co." Forbes seemed unable to conclude."And they?" urged Luke."They wouldn't consider it for a moment, Huber."Luke did not like to look at Forbes's suffering, but he had to hear the end."Well?" he said.Forbes flung out his hands."What more could I do?" he demanded. "If it became known that the firm was going begging—yes, begging—from bank to bank, what would happen to our credit? I didn't dare to go anywhere else. I—Huber, I went back to Osserman and asked him for time."Luke sat down. He picked up a paper and made a transparent pretense of glancing at it."Did he give you time?""He said he'd give me a week.""A whole week?" Luke tried to appear encouraged. "That's six good working days. You can get the money together in that time.""Huber"—Forbes came over to Luke and stood above the newspaper—"I've told you what it would do to our credit to try. But I've come to the conclusion that we could not get this money from any bank in America.""What do you mean? Not if we have security?""Not if we could offer the Metropolitan Life Building for security. Not from any bank in America."Luke put down the paper."But that——" He stopped a moment, and then went on: "But there's only one group of men in the country that could put up such a wall.""That," said Forbes simply, "is the group I mean."Luke's eyes were veiled. He rose and walked across the room. Presently, over his shoulder, he inquired sharply:"What makes you think this?"Forbes was frank:"I don't know. I can't tell you. A hundred little things. But I am sure.""I thought you said something about a clothing trust.""I did. It was the same crowd. Now they have some additional reason. Oh, I couldn't doubt it. It was behind every word Osserman said. It was standing back of his words, but it was on tiptoe, looking over them."Luke turned and came up to Forbes. He was quite calm again."I know what you want me to do," he said."Yes," said Forbes: it was his way of saying: "You have read my meaning, and I will stand by it.""Well, I can't do it."Luke spoke quietly. It hurt him to have to say this thing."I was afraid that was the way you'd take it," said Forbes."How else could I take it?""You know what it means to me, Huber?""Yes. I know what the firm means to you, but I can't do what you ask. You want me to give up what I think is right for the sake of saving your firm. I can't do it.""It's your firm, too, Huber.""Then I've got a right to hurt it.""I'm not asking you to do anything wrong; I'm only asking you to wait.""That's just what I can't do," said Luke.Forbes would hear no more. He twitched with a spasm of weak rage. His voice rang high."You're a fool!" he cried. "You talk as if I were trying to compound a felony with you. What am I asking? I'm only asking you to hold off for this campaign. I'm only asking you to stand by the man that took you into his business—my Business, the one that my grandfather founded and my father handed down to me. Haven'tIstood byyou? Didn't I trust you? I've kept out of all these big combinations, but I know how they work—nobody can help knowing these days—and when I took you in, how was I to be sure you weren't a dummy representing somebody else, and so on, higher and higher up, till the trail ended with just these same men? But no, I trusted you. I trusted you, and now—— You've no right to humiliate me! You've no right to wreck my Business! Do you know what you're doing? You're making a beggar out of my daughter—out of the girl you told me last night you wanted to be your wife!"Luke had been expecting this. The muscles about his mouth tightened, but all that he said was:"I suppose you have spoken to her?""Yes, I have. Of course I have!" cried Forbes."And what does she say?"Forbes tried to take Luke's hand."Why do you act this way?" he pleaded. "Why can't you wait? They haven't nominated you yet. Withdraw your name. That won't hurt the League, and it will only make you all the stronger for the next time; and by the next time we'll be ready to meet all opposition. This time you can't be elected even if you are nominated. Why do you want to jump into the fire?""What," insisted Luke, "does Betty say?"She was at the door. She came in as he asked the question. She looked from her lover to her father, and then she ran to her father and put her head on his shoulder.
§4. Luke waited only until he heard the door close upon the departing clergyman. Then he turned to Betty with a relieved sigh.
"Phew!" he said. "I'm glad that's over."
She was sitting opposite him in the full glare of light from an old-fashioned, crystal-hung chandelier. Betty could bear strong lights.
"Why?" she asked. Her brow was puckered, but her lips smiled. "I like him. He's very good, and he's doing a really great work. I like him ever so much."
"Oh, yes," said Luke. "Nicholson's all right. He has what he admires in other men: high convictions and the courage of them. Most of us always admire in others what we don't have ourselves; but not Nicholson. He is doing a big work, too. But I'm glad he's gone, just the same."
"Why?" repeated Betty.
Luke rose. He came over to Betty and stood looking down at her, his arms folded across his chest.
"Because," he said, "I wanted to talk to you."
"It didn't look so. It looked as if you wanted to talk to Mr. Nicholson."
"I wanted to talk to you and about you."
She stopped fencing. She gave him her full, frank gaze.
"Well?" she asked.
"You know what I want to say, Betty," he answered. "You've seen for a long time what I was coming to. I held off. I held off because I hadn't anything to offer you. Even now I haven't much. I haven't half enough. If I win this fight I'm in, it won't give me anything that would make me deserve you. I've not been a bit better than I should be." His voice grew tense. "When I come down to brass tacks, when I—I beg your pardon; but what I mean is that when I get to the point of telling you I love you, I see how far I've been from being what I should be. I—— Oh, hang it all, Betty!" He put out his hands. "I love you. I've never really loved anybody else and never can. If I win this confounded—blessed fight, will you marry me?"
She got slowly to her feet: it seemed to Luke minutes before she had stood up and begun her answer. Then she took both his hands.
"You don't have to win the fight to win me, Luke," she said.
The realization swept over him. He took her in his arms. He looked in her upturned face—the eyes wide, the sweet, fresh cheeks hot, the lips parted, breathing quickly—and then he felt the blood rush to his head, felt it hammer at his temples. It got into his eyes and blinded him. He ground his lips upon hers.
The dull despair of his last months under Leighton commanded a reaction. The rushing changes of the last two days had set his nerves to a speed that would not now cease in whatever physical activities he engaged himself. These things flung him along a new road; they raced him down a way of which he had known but little. As he felt the warmth of her gracious young body next his, he was hurled with such violence down a course so unfamiliar to him that only the thought of losing his race by running it too swiftly could serve to lessen his straining speed. Like a quarter-mile runner stopping himself short in the last hundred yards before the tape, he almost fell as he forced himself to release her.
"Your father," he panted. He looked away from her: "I must see him now."
Betty did not understand. She was only exalted by this new thing; she was only happy.
"Now?" she whispered.
"Yes." He looked back at her and, with a white face, smiled. "He has a right to know." He caught her hand, pressed it only as tightly as he dared. "I'll go to him in the library. Wait for me."
§5. Forbes was seated at a round table, engaged in his regular nightly task of reading the editorial-page of theEvening Star, nodding his head when he agreed with its generalities and muttering maledictions upon it when it specifically ridiculed the Progressive Party. As Luke came in, Forbes was in the midst of one of the paper's attacks on progressivism, and his frown seemed to drive his beaked nose into his mustache.
"Oh, Huber," he said, without at once relaxing his scowl; "I didn't know you were here. Come in. Been here long?"
Luke could not have guessed how long he had been in the house.
"Not very," he ventured.
"Sit down," said Forbes. He had not risen. He indicated an easy-chair near his own.
"Thanks," said Luke; but he did not sit down.
Forbes at last noticed his visitor's nervousness.
"I suppose you've had a hard day," he said. "Pardon me for not congratulating you sooner on your success. This sheet"—he brandished theEvening Star—"doesn't want anything but to be against everything. It upsets me every evening. But you've done a big thing. I think you should have come clear over to our side, but I dare say you will do that in time. Meanwhile, I'm sincerely glad for your good fortune. You deserve it."
"You're very good," said Luke. His eyes twinkled a little. "I wonder if you know about it—all."
"Only what this mealy-mouthed sheet says. It's absolutely inexplicable to me, Huber, how a paper written by such able men can be so narrow-minded on broad subjects. However, I think they're going to supportyourparty, if they may be said ever to support anything."
"I'm afraid theyarerather reticent about the real news," said Luke.
"They never tell anything that weighs against their theories."
"They haven't had a chance to tell this."
Forbes looked puzzled.
"What do you mean?"
"It's only just happened." Luke breathed deeply. "I'm engaged to be married," he said. He spoke with an unusual rapidity. "Engaged to be married, and I'd like it to come off—the wedding, I mean—right after the election."
Forbes scrambled up. He wrung Luke's hand.
"Well, well," he said, "you are to be congratulated!"
"I am glad you think so," said Luke, "for you know the girl better than I do."
"The girl? I know her better——" Forbes's voice rose. "You don't mean—— You don't mean to say——"
"Yes," Luke nodded. "Itisluck, isn't it? It's Betty."
"Bless my soul!" Forbes brought his left hand down on Luke's right shoulder. "Bless my soul! My little girl! Huber, you—you rather knock the wind out of me."
He said all the conventional things; his manner showed all the proper surprise; and both men understood that he had been expecting this news for a long time and wanting it.
"Huber," he said, "of course this is sudden, and of course I'm an old fool not to have got over considering Betty a child—a mere baby—but, now you're here with the announcement, I'm quite certain that, out of all the men who've been tagging after her, you're the one that I'd want for a son-in-law."
Luke again mumbled his thanks.
"You're not standing still," pursued Forbes: "you're going ahead. You have a great deal to you, and Betty's the very girl to make you make the best of yourself"—Forbes's voice abandoned the commonplace note and fell to the note of genuine feeling—"then there's your interest in the Business. Huber, I've always regretted that I didn't have a son to leave the Business to, as my father left it to me and his father to him. If you'd married somebody else, and Betty had married some chap that had no interest in it, the Business might have gone over to you eventually, and so on to children of another stock than mine; whereas, now"—he looked around Luke to the doorway—"Betty!" he said.
She had not obeyed Luke; she was standing at the door.
"I couldn't wait," she confessed; but she said it with an allegiance that was now all for Luke.
"Come here," her father ordered.
He released Luke's hand and shoulder. The girl ran to him and put her arms about his neck.
"Please be nice, daddy," she whispered. "Please be nice."
Forbes managed to draw a handkerchief and blow his nose.
"Iama fool," he said. "I—Betty, you're looking so much to-night the way your mother—By George, Iama fool! I think I must be getting old, Huber."
§6. In the room at the end of the hall marked "Family Entrance" to a saloon in Fifty-second Street, near Eighth Avenue, a red-headed man dressed in cheap clothes of fashionable cut, was leaning across a table at which he was drinking raw whisky with a girl who, had she not been too heavily painted, would have had a face like that popularly ascribed to Joan of Arc.
[image]HE FOUND IT NECESSARY TO BE EMPHATIC
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HE FOUND IT NECESSARY TO BE EMPHATIC
"I've got him showed to me," the man was saying. "He lives at the Arapahoe on Thirty-ninth Street. I'll play lighthouse. All you gotta do's put on them glad clothes an' get him into Pearl's Six' Av'nue place. He's in wrong, anyhow. Then I'll tip off Charley Guth, an' he'll put Donovan wise an' pinch the joint. See?"
The girl that looked like Joan of Arc nodded comprehendingly.
"But the clothes has got to be real swell," she said.
CHAPTER X
§1. As Luke left the Forbes house that night, his step kept time with the beat of his pulses, and he walked fast. At last he thought that he saw happiness within reach.
He was not yet happy; he was quite clear about this. One half of him, perhaps the nobler half, was engaged in a political battle with the forces of corruption, but it was so engaged that those forces affected it; they invaded his individuality and, therefore, curtailed his freedom and curtailed completeness. Happiness, if it was to be found at all, was to be found only in the perfect development of self, and such a development was impossible so long as self, seeking expression in politics, found expression thwarted by an evil opposition in the political field.
Nevertheless, this opposition, Luke was sure, could be crushed and swept away; his ideal for the good of the city, which had become his own good, could be attained; and then, he told himself, that other part of him, the part that loved Betty and that Betty loved, could enjoy Betty as the reward of the whole man. It was as if he were one of two runners. Betty he saw not as the goal, but as the prize to be given him for leading at the goal; not a prize that any other runner could win by worsting him in the race, but a prize that he himself could deserve only if he were to lead at the finish.
He was thinking of this when he left the Subway station and walked toward the Arapahoe, but under his conscious thoughts the subconscious self was still tingling with the emotions that had flamed up in him when he took Betty in his arms and felt her lips on his. He quivered with the physical recollection, and though the flame had burned, his flesh found the pain of it sweet.
At the corner nearest the apartment house in which he lived, he became aware of a woman. The street was nearly empty, but until she was close beside him he did not notice her. How she came to be at his elbow he did not appreciate, nor did he at first realize whether she were young or old, beautiful or ugly.
"Will you tell me the time, please?" she asked.
Luke's experience in Leighton's office had long ago taught him that such a request was the commonest form of watch-stealing, but he was not afraid of losing his watch. He stopped under a lamp-post.
"Certainly," he said.
"I know it's late," pursued the woman, "but I don't know how late."
The words were thick. The voice was the voice of all the phantoms of the street, low in pitch and hoarse, but luring because of all that it connoted: because of the mystery, the adventure which, after all knowledge of her sordidness and all understanding of her frigidity, the woman who most reveals her body has maintained by that revelation's forced screening of her soul.
Luke consulted his watch.
"It's a quarter to eleven," he said.
He looked at her, and he was glad to look. That she was well-dressed, but overdressed and wore her clothes with the defiance of one unhabituated to them, did not impress him. What impressed him was the face that, in spite of its tokens of much evil done and more evil suffered, retained the fragile beauty which men associate with innocence. The calm, broad brow, the gray eyes wide and steady, the underlip timidly drawn back, the delicate chin upturned above a slim white throat, reminded him of the pictures of Joan of Arc on trial and foredoomed by her English accusers.
"Itislate, isn't it?" she said.
"Yes," said Luke. He had forgotten about his watch; he was holding it loosely in his hand.
"I wonder," said the woman, "if it's too late for you to take a little walk with me."
Her eyes had narrowed coldly; a smile that was a trade grimace distorted her mouth.
The change in her wakened Luke. He restored his watch to his pocket. He felt a slight chill at his heart and a self-accusation.
"No," he said brusquely; and started to walk away.
The woman followed.
"Aw, come on," she urged. Her tone coarsened under his refusal.
"No," said Luke.
"Please?" her voice whined. She put her hand on his arm.
Luke shook off the hand. He was too angry with himself to have pity for her.
"Stop this," he ordered.
"But won't you listen?" The woman's hand returned persistently; it clutched. "I got somethin' to——"
Luke saw that they were at the door of the Arapahoe.
"I'm sorry," he said, "but I can't stop to listen to you."
He went into the apartment house.
§2. He really was sorry. Once inside the door of the Arapahoe, he said to himself that the woman had only been plying her trade, and that what he had visited upon her was a portion of the wrath against his own momentary weakness. He could never have given way to her, because he was so firm in his resolve to live worthily for Betty that he could not enough want to give way to offset the efficacy of his resolve; only the portion of him subject to his will without being a part of his will had momentarily weakened; it could not have rebelled victoriously, and although it merited punishment, the exterior cause of its weakness did not deserve censure. Altogether, Luke concluded, he had behaved in a rather contemptible fashion.
His mind was immediately diverted. As he passed the clerk's desk in the hall, the clerk beckoned darkly to him.
"There are some reporters looking for you here," he whispered. "I sent them into the waiting-room so's you could get by them when you came in, if you wanted to. Do you?"
Luke almost laughed as he reflected upon the figure he would have presented to the representatives of the press, had they been waiting for him at the door.
"Yes, I'll see them," he said.
They came to him in a body, seven of them. They worked for the morning papers and, because the evening papers had printed Luke's letter about his resignation from the District-Attorney's staff, they wanted a fresh sensation for their journals.
Luke leaned against a pillar in the lobby and talked to them. Most of them he had met while in Leighton's office. Personally, he was popular with them, and he liked them.
"I'll say anything you want," he agreed. "But what is there to say?"
The spokesman was a keen man with curling black hair.
"You might develop the last part of your letter," he suggested: "the part about the big financiers that you're going gunning for."
"I haven't got the gun yet," objected Luke. "Better wait and see if I'm nominated, boys."
"Oh, you'll be nominated, all right. Come on, Mr. Huber."
"You're going to support the League, anyhow," said a stout little fellow, whose paper opposed all reformers. "You can tell us how the League will go for the men at the top."
To this Luke agreed. He began to speak and, as he saw the busy pencils noting his best phrases upon sheets of roughly-folded copy-paper, he fell into stride with his subject. He declared that the League meant to put an end to the influence of Big Business in municipal politics, and, although he mentioned no names, it was evident what big business men he had in mind.
The reporters tried to make him mention names, but their efforts only seemed to restore his caution. They urged him to be specific in his charges against the present administration of the District-Attorney's office; but here again they encountered the impassive side of Luke with which they were more familiar.
"No, no," said Luke; "there may be a time for all that, but this isn't the time. Just wind up by saying we mean, once and for all, to put Wall Street out of politics and graft out of the administration of justice in New York City and to keep them out, if we have to send every financier and every policeman to jail."
§3. The reporters made all that they could of what Luke gave them, and the next morning's papers were full of it. Leighton, on his way downtown, read them with anger against Luke and annoyance with himself for losing a man that might have been so valuable to him.
He began to be afraid of the effect of Huber's implications regarding the District-Attorney's office. Remembering that his party was in no position to risk putting up a weak candidate, he telephoned to George J. Hallett and was granted an interview: he said he knew of the letters in Luke's possession and knew how Luke came by them.
Hallett, whose office was almost the counterpart of that in which he consulted with his master and Rivington, sprawled in a deeply upholstered chair. He smoked steadily at a cigar, and when the letters were mentioned, he accepted the mention with complete composure.
"Who else knows about 'em?" he frankly inquired.
"Nobody," said Leighton—"unless Huber's been talking."
"He's got 'em, hasn't he?"
"Had them the last time I saw him."
"Anyway, you haven't 'em?"
"No, of course, I haven't."
Hallett took his cigar from his mouth; he looked at the cigar, and from it to Leighton.
"I don't see what useyouare to us, then," he said.
Leighton understood that the only satisfactory way to deal with this man was the direct way.
"I can't be any use to you except to tell you where the leak is these letters came through."
"What do you want us to do for you?"
"I want your support at election time."
"Can't promise it. The other side has just as good a claim on us."
"Heney?"
"An' the whole Democratic organization, yes."
"Would you promise not to interfere on either side?"
"Can't do it. You see, you haven't got much to sell."
Leighton ran his fingers through his black hair.
"Look here, Mr. Hallett," he began again, "we don't know each other personally——"
"That's all right," said Hallett.
"Well, then, if I can't count on your influence for the election, may I count on it for the nomination?"
"Who stole those letters?" said Hallett.
"I can count on you people in the matter of the nomination?"
"Yes."
"A man named Rollins."
Late that afternoon it was found that Rollins had made an overcharge for postage-stamps in the course of his secretarial work. He was arrested and "railroaded" to jail.
§4. It was somewhat later when the Republicans nominated Leighton and then, to the amazement of the public, the Democrats and Progressives each opposed him with candidates so weak that every politician understood this as a surrender to Leighton in order to defeat the candidate of the Municipal Reform League. In advance of their occurrence, however, all these things were gossiped about by the leaders of every faction and so confidently expected that plans were shaped in accordance with them. Somehow, they sent word ahead to the Reform headquarters even on the day of the happening that set them in motion, and Venable and Nelson, together with the other executives of the M. R. L. bestirred themselves.
"Where's Yeates?" asked Nelson, as he came into Luke's room, where Venable and Luke were busy. "That young fellow's never around when he's wanted."
"He sent in word he had some other engagements," said Venable.
"Had to play golf with Hallett's son, I guess, if it wasn't L. Bergen Rivington," Nelson sneered. "There's too much society in that boy for any political usefulness."
Luke looked up from the notes he was preparing for his formal letter accepting the nomination that the League was next day to offer him:
"Is Yeates a friend of those people?" he asked. "I knew he knew some of them, but is he a friend?"
"Only socially," he said. "Yeates was born to it, but politically he is all right. He has high ideals and a really fine enthusiasm."
"Hum," said Luke. "What do you think of this paragraph, Nelson?"
He read from his notes:
"During the past few years, those persons in a position to observe the inner workings of our politics, both in national and municipal affairs, have been alarmed to see the steady encroachment made upon them by High Finance. There is no longer any room left for doubt. The purpose of this invading power is clear: its purpose is conquest. Unless the free voters act, and act quickly, the true government of the United States in general, and of New York in particular, will not rest in the President or Congress, in Mayors and Boards of Aldermen, in the Constitution, the charter, or the courts: it will rest in a combination of Big Business interests that will control the men elected as representatives of the people."
Nelson slapped his thigh.
"That's it!" he said. "That's the talk. We ought to have had some of that kind of medicine long ago. Look at all this recent drug-legislation, for instance. You can't imagine what my firm's been up against. They're getting an appetite for the wholesale drug-trade now, these big fellows are, and they're paving their way by lobbies at Washington and Albany and half a dozen state capitals!"
The three worked over the letter for the rest of that day, having a scanty luncheon brought into the office from a nearby restaurant, and talking plans while they ate. All the time callers were sending in their names with requests for interviews, workers were reporting, men at the telephone were ringing up to ask instructions, and clerks and stenographers were running in and out to deliver telegrams and special-delivery letters and to receive replies.
Luke's only appreciable pause was to read two notes of congratulation from his mother and Jane, the former commending him for adopting a course that the writer was sure her husband would have adopted had he lived, the latter full of pride in his approaching success, but ending with the postscript: "Jesse [Jesse Kinzer was Jane's husband, the new Congressman] says that conditions in New York are 'purely local,' whatever that means." Altogether, Luke had a busy day. He was a tired man when, at nine o'clock, he again rang the bell of the Forbes house in Brooklyn.
§5. To Luke's surprise, it was Forbes himself that opened the door.
"I've been looking for you," he said seriously. "Can you come into the library? I want to see you for a few minutes. It's important."
The concluding words were unnecessary. The tone of the words that preceded them would alone have been sufficient to warn Luke of trouble: Forbes's voice was husky, tense, uncertain.
"Of course," Luke assented.
He followed Forbes into the library, and there, as the host closed the door, Luke saw in the face that confronted him an expression which conformed with the tone and import of Forbes's first words. The elder man's face was haggard.
"I shall have to tell you something," he was saying—"something that I ought to have told you long ago, or as much of it as had happened then. But, you see, I had no idea it could be so important—ever be so important." He broke off with a remembrance of his accustomed courtesy: "I beg your pardon. Won't you sit down, Huber? I quite forgot to ask you. For my part, I couldn't sit still if my life depended on it."
Luke stood by the center-table.
"No, no," he said. "Don't bother—and don't worry." He thought that Forbes looked as if death were in the house. "Is anything wrong with Betty?" he suddenly asked.
"No, it's not that. It's what I say. Of course I never supposed your going in for the Municipal Reform League movement could have any business significance——"
Luke, relieved about Betty, was unable to follow Forbes's disjointed sentences.
"It hasn't," he said. "It hasn't any business significance whatever."
"Ah"—Forbes shook his head—"that's what I thought, too. But it has. Huber, this may mean the end of R. H. Forbes & Son. Think of it: it may mean the end of the Business—a business that has been honorably conducted by my family for three generations."
What such a catastrophe would mean to Forbes nobody knew better than Luke, but how the Municipal Reform League could be concerned in it was beyond guessing.
"Won't you try to begin at the beginning?" said Luke. He was used to getting coherent stories in preliminary interviews with incoherent witnesses, and he fell into his professional manner.
"It's this way." Forbes turned his gray eyes away and fumbled with an ornament on the mantel-tree. "When you came into the Business, I had several loans outstanding—the Business had. They were all well secured, and you know how solid the concern's always been. With the money you put in and the earnings, I was able to take up some of them, but there were the improvements and extensions made necessary by fresh competition and the new inventions and the machine-trust's raise of prices. Well, I had to leave a loan outstanding at the East County National."
"Yes," said Luke encouragingly. "How much was it?"
"Two hundred and fifty thousand. It was a good deal, I know, but, you see, when I negotiated it——"
"Never mind the reasons now. What were its terms?"
"It was a call-loan," said Forbes in a shaken voice.
Luke's amazement conquered his reserve.
"What? And for two hundred and fifty thousand?"
"Yes. There was the competition. It was growing hot. The Business——"
"How did you ever arrange it?"
"I was surprised myself at the time to find it so easy, but I was too glad to get it to ask questions. Now, I wish I had. I believe the bank was influenced by some people that wanted to get us into trouble—want to form a ready-made clothing trust."
"It's incredible!" cried Luke. "Not one of the agents that I had look into your business for me mentioned this."
"I didn't know that, Huber." Forbes looked his appeal. "I ask you to believe me."
"All right. It was my own fault. I should have asked you more questions. What puzzles me is how this loan was concealed."
"It was at the request of the bank. They said it was so unusual that they didn't want it more widely known than was absolutely necessary, and I agreed because of the credit of the Business. Now I believe it was all a trap set by the men that want to form the trust."
Luke did not pause to waste reproaches over either his own stupid blindness or Forbes's culpable rashness. He pressed forward:
"And now they're going to call the loan?"
Forbes bowed his head.
"And we can't meet it?"
"If—if we tried, we could do it only by wrecking the Business."
"But we can go somewhere else. The East County isn't the only bank in New York."
"That is what I thought. It's what I said."
Forbes was swallowing a sob. "I said it to Osserman—that's the president—I said it to him himself."
"Well?" persisted Luke.
"Well"—Forbes's eyes met Huber's—"it wasn't any use."
"Now, look here," said Luke. He put into his voice a calm that he did not feel. "Try to tell me just what happened. I can't advise you till I know that, even if I'm not the business-fool I seem to have proved myself to be. First of all, Osserman sent you some sort of word, didn't he?"
"Yes, of course."
"What was it?"
"It was a letter—just a personal letter."
"When did you get it?"
"About eleven this morning."
"So then you went over to the bank?"
"Yes."
"And asked to see this man Osserman?"
"Yes."
"And what did he say?"
"Well," he said—"I can't tell you exactly; he was careful not to use definite words; but careful to make his meaning clear."
"What was his meaning, then?"
"He said in effect that he understood you were interested in our Business."
"What of it? That's what I want to know, Forbes. What's my interest in your firm got to do with your standing at the East County National?"
"Oh, he didn't say at first. At first he said he understood we were not sound."
"So you told him he was mistaken and offered to show the books?"
"Of course I did." Forbes's chin shot upward. "I told him that the Forbes firm was one of the oldest and——"
"Yes, yes. And then he mentioned me. How did I hurt the firm's standing?"
"He was really very plausible about that. I must say, Huber, that he rather opened my eyes to a phase of your political activities I hadn't before thought of."
"What phase?"
"To be quite frank, he called your public utterances wild. He said they attacked credit and might shake it. He even intimated that if you were elected, you'd go in for a course of action—you had pledged yourself to go in for one that would upset credit altogether. And that's true, Huber." Forbes gained a certain confidence. "When you come to think of it, the business interests of the city—I mean the sound conservative business interests—ought not to be made to suffer for the sins of the big financiers."
Luke recaptured his composure. His face relaxed; he looked lazy and uninterested.
"So I suppose," he said, "that this banker asked you to tell me to get out of the fight."
"Yes, but of course——"
"Really, that's the highest testimony to the League's strength that we've had yet."
"Yes, but, of course, I told him I couldn't do that."
"What did he say then?"
"He said he was afraid the City Chamberlain would withdraw all the city funds on deposit at the East County if the bank kept on carrying a loan you were interested in."
"And you took all this like a child?"
"I didn't. You ought to know me better than that."
"What did you do?"
"I was indignant. I told you I was. I said I would not have a loan from a concern that interfered with the political convictions of its creditors. I said I would go somewhere else."
"Did you go?"
The sob returned to Forbes's throat.
"Yes, I did," he said; "and it was the most humiliating experience of my career. When I thought of the firm of R. H. Forbes & Son begging credit, I could hardly bear it. But I went to the Lexington National."
"They turned you down?"
"They listened very politely and said they would consider the proposition."
"Well, then," said Luke, "you're crossing a bridge before you come to it."
"No, I am not; for presently they sent over a messenger with a note that was no more than an insulting refusal."
"You gave up then?"
"No, I tried again. I tried Clement & Co." Forbes seemed unable to conclude.
"And they?" urged Luke.
"They wouldn't consider it for a moment, Huber."
Luke did not like to look at Forbes's suffering, but he had to hear the end.
"Well?" he said.
Forbes flung out his hands.
"What more could I do?" he demanded. "If it became known that the firm was going begging—yes, begging—from bank to bank, what would happen to our credit? I didn't dare to go anywhere else. I—Huber, I went back to Osserman and asked him for time."
Luke sat down. He picked up a paper and made a transparent pretense of glancing at it.
"Did he give you time?"
"He said he'd give me a week."
"A whole week?" Luke tried to appear encouraged. "That's six good working days. You can get the money together in that time."
"Huber"—Forbes came over to Luke and stood above the newspaper—"I've told you what it would do to our credit to try. But I've come to the conclusion that we could not get this money from any bank in America."
"What do you mean? Not if we have security?"
"Not if we could offer the Metropolitan Life Building for security. Not from any bank in America."
Luke put down the paper.
"But that——" He stopped a moment, and then went on: "But there's only one group of men in the country that could put up such a wall."
"That," said Forbes simply, "is the group I mean."
Luke's eyes were veiled. He rose and walked across the room. Presently, over his shoulder, he inquired sharply:
"What makes you think this?"
Forbes was frank:
"I don't know. I can't tell you. A hundred little things. But I am sure."
"I thought you said something about a clothing trust."
"I did. It was the same crowd. Now they have some additional reason. Oh, I couldn't doubt it. It was behind every word Osserman said. It was standing back of his words, but it was on tiptoe, looking over them."
Luke turned and came up to Forbes. He was quite calm again.
"I know what you want me to do," he said.
"Yes," said Forbes: it was his way of saying: "You have read my meaning, and I will stand by it."
"Well, I can't do it."
Luke spoke quietly. It hurt him to have to say this thing.
"I was afraid that was the way you'd take it," said Forbes.
"How else could I take it?"
"You know what it means to me, Huber?"
"Yes. I know what the firm means to you, but I can't do what you ask. You want me to give up what I think is right for the sake of saving your firm. I can't do it."
"It's your firm, too, Huber."
"Then I've got a right to hurt it."
"I'm not asking you to do anything wrong; I'm only asking you to wait."
"That's just what I can't do," said Luke.
Forbes would hear no more. He twitched with a spasm of weak rage. His voice rang high.
"You're a fool!" he cried. "You talk as if I were trying to compound a felony with you. What am I asking? I'm only asking you to hold off for this campaign. I'm only asking you to stand by the man that took you into his business—my Business, the one that my grandfather founded and my father handed down to me. Haven'tIstood byyou? Didn't I trust you? I've kept out of all these big combinations, but I know how they work—nobody can help knowing these days—and when I took you in, how was I to be sure you weren't a dummy representing somebody else, and so on, higher and higher up, till the trail ended with just these same men? But no, I trusted you. I trusted you, and now—— You've no right to humiliate me! You've no right to wreck my Business! Do you know what you're doing? You're making a beggar out of my daughter—out of the girl you told me last night you wanted to be your wife!"
Luke had been expecting this. The muscles about his mouth tightened, but all that he said was:
"I suppose you have spoken to her?"
"Yes, I have. Of course I have!" cried Forbes.
"And what does she say?"
Forbes tried to take Luke's hand.
"Why do you act this way?" he pleaded. "Why can't you wait? They haven't nominated you yet. Withdraw your name. That won't hurt the League, and it will only make you all the stronger for the next time; and by the next time we'll be ready to meet all opposition. This time you can't be elected even if you are nominated. Why do you want to jump into the fire?"
"What," insisted Luke, "does Betty say?"
She was at the door. She came in as he asked the question. She looked from her lover to her father, and then she ran to her father and put her head on his shoulder.