"A man outside--says his name's Riley," announced the youth who guarded
the outer door. "A big husky!" he added when he saw the chairman did not
look pleased.
The state chairman nodded round the table. "This is that new man the
senator's been talking about." From a neat pile of letters the chairman
picked out one.
"Here is what he sent in the other day. From it you can obtain an idea
of the calibre of the man. Listen: 'As you ask me what I think about the
crowd up here, I'll say that I think they've had their own way so long
they've got to where they figure they don't have to make good. They seem
to think that to be in politics is to be trying to fool everybody. They
would rather--the most of them--get ten votes by faking than a hundred
by straightforward work. They don't seem to see that nowadays people
know more about the inside of things than they used to--that they're
doing more thinking for themselves in political matters.'
"And"--the chairman reinserted the letter in the neat pile--"there's
more drool of the same kind. I don't believe he ever wrote that letter.
As I understand it, he's a coal-heaving sort who ought to have gone into
the prize-ring and not politics; but, whether he wrote it or not, we
will have to humor him because of the senator, who is of course the
boss"--he shot a glance round the table--"the boss now. We'll give this
fellow a little rope. A couple of the boys up where he comes from tipped
me off about him--and we'll let the senator see him for what he is. I've
seen these wonders before."
"And I guess you don't have to see too much of a man to be able to size
him up either!" This from a faithful one on the chairman's right.
The chairman's lips kneaded shut. "Well, in political life--I don't say
this in a boasting spirit, you understand, gentlemen--if a man in my
position can't size a man up fairly well at a glance he might as well
get out. His letter alone would tell me that he knows it all, and the
word I get from the county chairman up his way is that he is one of the
turbulent, fighting kind. However, we'll have him in here and look him
over. Show him in, George."
And Riley stepped into the room. From the moment of his entrance not a
soul there had a doubt of the chairman's prejudgment; but, that his
less acute associates might judge for themselves, the chairman allowed
the man by his own words to portray himself, which, after all, was the
most convincing proof of all. It was the senior senator's own way of
doing it.
The new man--an agile, powerful figure--had bowed with a conventional
show of pleasure to each in turn as he was introduced; but, that over
with, he had faced squarely toward the chairman, waiting. And the
chairman began:
"I take it, Mr. Riley, that you are not the kind of man who would stand
up on a platform and dodge an argument with the most excitable of
opponents?"
"Dodge? What from?"
"Not from the hoots and the jeers, or vegetables--or even the
half-bricks--eh?"
Riley waved a contemptuous arm. "I'd rather see half bricks coming my
way than be looking down on staring empty benches, or benches emptying
swiftly when a man's at the height of his speech." Riley paused by way
of emphasis. "It is to try a man's soul--a frosty greeting; but, a
warm-blooded opposition--that's only to stir a man up."
The state chairman waited for the new man to leap into the air, knock
his heels together and yell:
"Hurroo!" The new man did not do that. He gazed steadily into the face
of the chairman. However, every specimen could not be expected to meet
every requirement. No doubt of it--here was the made-to-order creature
for clever manipulation; and there followed then the suggestion to visit
New Ireland, with artful words to whet a fighting man's appetite for
that kind of job.
"And now for one last little touch before we send the poor boob to his
political extinction," whispered the chairman to his next at hand. Aloud
he said:
"Yes, sir--I believe in frankness, Mr. Riley. And I will tell you now
that we didn't poll many votes in New Ireland last year. I don't just
remember how many--I have mislaid the figures; but I wish to tell you
frankly--frankly, I say--that we did not poll many. What they need
there, I think, is a determined man like yourself to pile into them
hammer and tongs. That would be the way, I think. And you show me, Mr.
Riley, a fair Republican increase in New Ireland--fifty out of five
hundred, say--and you can lay out your own itinerary for the rest of the
campaign. Now isn't that fair?"
"Why, yes; that seems all right." As he said it, however, the new man,
his eyes ever on the chairman's, had a feeling that it was not all
right. And, as he was one of those intuitive ones with whom to feel was
almost to prove, his attitude changed from the subjective to the
objective. He had not liked this man a bit from the first, and he was
liking him less and less; that finishing "Now isn't that fair?" was
surely not meant for his benefit.
The new man left the committee-rooms with a disturbed soul, and on his
way to the elevator he began to think things over. Among a dozen other
things which flashed through his kindling brain he recalled the glint of
what now he knew was mockery brightening the pale eyes of the chairman
as the door closed behind him.
He pressed the button for the elevator; but before the upcoming car
reached his floor he decided not to descend. He would have it out. He
almost ran back to the committee-rooms and, brushing by the knowing but
inefficient outer guard, made for the room where the leaders were.
Already he could hear the laughter--yes, and the roaring at something or
other; and as he placed his hand on the knob of the inner door he heard:
"He's come here from the other end of the State, with a reputation for
burning things up. Let him try to burn up New Ireland--and then go back
to where he came from. Why, let his kind come butting in on us and soon
we would all be out of jobs." The chairman's voice, that was.
Tim opened the door, and when they looked up and saw him it was as if
they had all been clutched by the windpipes.
"Go to the devil--all of you!" exploded the new man. "Do you hear? Every
mother's son of you!"
From out the silence some one at last said: "You mean, Mr. Riley, you
are going to desert the party?"
Tim whirled on him.
"No; it doesn't mean I'm going to desert the party. Did ever you know a
man who was any good to desert any party or anything, good or bad, under
fire?"
"I'm glad to hear that." The chairman had come to life. "And not alone
because we would lose you, eloquent though you are reported to be. So
many of our people have maintained that no Irishman----"
"Cut that Irishman stuff! My chance to make a living, and my children's
chance after me, I owe to this country."
"But, Mr. Riley, you are of Irish blood."
"Irish blood? You may be sure I am, and so proud of it that when I speak
of it I slop over; but I'm an American citizen too. However, if you
don't mind, we'll leave that for private discussion and not for
political trading."
The chairman recovered.
"That's all very well; but when we ask your people to make sacrifices
for the principles of our party----"
"Principles of the party--slush! Save that for your platform speeches.
You're in the party because there's more in it for you. I'm in it
because a man who gave me a square meal when I was starving asked me to
join it. And, once in a fight, I stick. I stick because I don't know how
to do anything else--and I'm going to stick now. And I'm going out now
to New Ireland and talk to them."
The door behind Tim opened and a smooth, carefully trained voice said:
"What's this about New Ireland?"
Tim knew the voice, even before he turned to greet him. It was the tall
boss, the real boss, the senior senator, the man who ordered the State
committee round even as they ordered the campaign speakers.
"New Ireland?" the senator repeated. "No, Mr. Riley. I can give you
something better than that. That would be a waste of time. I'll change
that right now. Here----"
"Excuse me, sir; but I'm going to New Ireland. I don't know what kind
of a place it is or what kind they are there, except what the name tells
me, and I don't care--I'm going there. No gang of men ever picked me for
an omadhaun in the morning but found out they were mistaken before
night. And I'll say further"--indignation in Tim always disposed him to
classic periods--"if there are those who wave the green flag to tatters
at every Irish meeting, and then betray her to those who hate her, there
are also those who, though they have never made a sacrifice in their
lives for this country, would prevent all but their own little kind from
breathing the free air of it. As for me, I've come to this city to do
something; and I'll stay here until I've done it. A while ago I agreed
to go to New Ireland, and to New Ireland I'm going. Good day!" And the
windows rattled with the banging of the door behind him.
"A proper bull-headed Irishman, that fellow," observed the chairman
presently.
"Or is it he has convictions and is not afraid to voice them?" The
senator had a habit of scratching his beard with his finger-nails, and
again of drawing his chin in on his chest and looking over his
gold-rimmed pince-nez. He drew in his chin now, and the chairman did not
like it. He never did.
"A good fighter, I should say." The tall boss scratched his beard with
his finger-nails. "An encouraging thing to meet a good fighter
in these fat days; but let us see." He stepped over to where a
blue-and-red-spotted map of the State was hanging and laid a finger on a
blue spot: "New Ireland, which we can safely call the enemy's banner
town for its size in the United States. If Riley can leave his mark on
that place it will be proof to me that he can make breaches all along
the line."
"More likely, I think, that the place will leave its mark on him. More
likely they will crack his skull, I think. He may love a fight; but New
Ireland is full of men who love fighting too--and they are not with us."
"That's true--they are not." The boss drew his chin in to his neck
again. "Too bad they are not. Suppose we wait, however, and see how
Riley makes out. His reputation is that of a most resourceful man. And
if he does make an impression on New Ireland he can have anything I can
give him in this State."