At eight o'clock that night Tim was facing his audience, and a fine,
large audience it was--not a hand's width in a single bench vacant; from
the front row, where sat Buck Malone, almost smiling, to the back wall,
where De Soto with some Indians and mailed companions was discovering
the Mississippi--from stage to entrance, not a vacant seat. What hopes
for a man in a fighting audience like that if he could but win them to
him!
Tim was alone on the stage.
"Gentlemen," he began, "the Republican party in New Ireland seems to be
very busy to-night. One-half of it has to attend a conference of bank
cashiers over in Rocktown; and Rocktown, it appears, is four miles in a
buggy over a rough road. That rough road and the buggy are, of course,
an incontrovertible argument, gentlemen. And the other half has a rich
prospective customer for a couple of town lots--also over in Rocktown. A
busy little place that Rocktown must be! I don't wonder you're smiling.
I smiled myself when they told me.
"But if they are not here, gentlemen, to accredit me, I am here to speak
for myself. And, as you see, there is the table, the chair, the
ice-water pitcher, the empty glass, all as"--he smiled down at the boss
in the front row--"as Mr. Malone said it would be. 'Twas this very
afternoon Mr. Malone spoke of it; and, myself happening to hear him, I
would not for a lord lieutenant's income disappoint him. 'Twas my good
old mother--God rest her soul!--who used to say--and many's the time she
said it: 'Timmie dear, don't never disappoint people if you can help
it.' And I never do--especially when it don't cost me anything; for
water is the only thing I had to bring into the hall to-night--and
water, gentlemen, is cheap."
"Yes, an' talk's cheap, too!"
Tim bowed to the voice and smiled with the laugh that followed.
"God knows it is cheap. If it wasn't 'tisn't the likes o' me could
afford to be handing it out to you to-night, and no charge for admission
at the door."
"Say, Buck, his ten minutes'll be used up before ever he gets started!"
came a voice from midway of the hall.
"True for you, boy. And so I'll be introducing myself. My history is
short. Riley is my name, Timothy Joseph Riley--baptized by Father Kiley,
in the parish of Ballymallow--and I'm a Republican."
"And there's what we'd like to have you tell us, Misther Riley--how came
you to be a Republican?"
"Yes, you blarneyin' turncoat--how came ye?"
A man in the front row stood up to say that last, a rugged-looking man,
who looked as if he would like mighty well to jump up on the stage and
haul Tim down off it. Toward him Tim stepped, leaning over the edge of
the stage so that the belligerent one would not miss a syllable.
"I'll tell how I came to be a Republican. When I landed in this country
and before I was fairly out of Castle Garden some thief of a pickpocket
or worse stole the few little dollars I had to keep me until I could get
a job. I was a seventeen-year-old boy, and that shy I couldn't beg. For
two days not a morsel of food went into my mouth. And there I was,
jumping sideways with the hunger, when a man comes along and saw me and
brought me into a grand restaurant, 'And how'll I ever pay you?' I asks
when I'd eaten my fill. He was a butcherman, with a white smock on him.
And he laughs and says: 'You can't now; but by and by, when you get a
vote, be sure and vote the Republican ticket.' And I says: 'Why the
Republican ticket?' And he says: 'Oh, just by way o' variety--just to
show that you people don't all go one way.'
"And"--Tim straightened up--"I took his hand, and 'Sir, I will!' I said.
He was joking, maybe; but I wasn't. And I did vote the Republican
ticket; and I'm still voting the Republican ticket. And I'm saying to
you all to-night--the one Republican among five hundred of ye--that I'm
not apologizing to any man in this hall or any other hall for it. And
I'm saying to you"--in the face of the inquiring man in the front row,
in the face of Buck Malone, in the face of the whole hall, Tim clinched
his fist--"I'm saying that the man of Irish blood who ever forgets the
promise that he's made to the one that befriended him--I say to ye all,
and I don't care whether ye like it or not--his blood's been crossed
somewhere; he's no Irish in him! No--nor fit to be called a man at all!"
Tim stepped back to pour out a glass of water; a form rose up midway of
the hall, and a voice roared out:
"Say, you Riley man, your politics are the divil's own, but you're Irish
all right. Go on!"
Tim held the glass toward the speaker.
"And, ma bouchal, 'tis you has the Irish heart in you, too. Here's to
you! You stubborn, unconverted, hereditary Democrat, here's to you!" He
drained the glass.
"Go on! Tell us more!"
"Yes; go on--talk up!"
"You'll get a show here. Go on!"
Tim glanced down at Buck Malone, swept the benches for the sight of a
more cheerful face and caught the friendly eyes of Peter Kearney. Also
he suddenly recognized the face of Malone's henchman--the man to whom he
had given the cigar. He was wagging his head encouragingly.
"Gentlemen, I will go on--and thank you for the chance. And, with your
permission, gentlemen, I'll speak of something besides politics. It is
of charity. Gentlemen, a great quality is charity. Only because of the
spirit of charity in you, gentlemen, am I allowed to speak to you here
to-night; but it's another phase of charity I'd like to speak of. I will
put it in the form of a story--and, gentlemen, not too long a story.
"There was an old lady in the old country, who received a letter from
her oldest son, John, with passage-money for her second son, Pat, to
come over and join him. She gave her consent. Why wouldn't she--when
the living was so hard? Pat went, leaving his mother of nigh seventy and
the last of his brothers with her. One son had already gone to South
America and another to Australia; and now only a boy was left to
her--and him with one leg gone in a railroad accident, for which they'd
never got a farthing."
At this point Tim heard the side door softly open and close. He took a
quick backward peek. Dinnie and old Nanna Nolan were waiting in the
wings. Tim signed to them to remain there. He stepped to the front of
the stage then, just in time to see Malone, whose every move he was
watching, uncross his legs and half rise in his seat. Tim looked at him
steadily and waited. Malone did not move farther, and Tim resumed:
"Well, the two sons in America, strong and willing, worked side by side,
earning their dollar and a quarter and their dollar and a half a day,
with now and again a day's or a week's layoff to set them back, but
managing always between them to save four dollars in the week and send
it over every month to the old mother--until by and by, she scrimping
and saving, too, there was passage-money for herself and the lad to come
to America. They took the steamer at Queenstown; and 'twas like a grand
dream to them--until one day there came a great storm and the ship
leaped and jumped, and the poor, helpless, crippled boy was thrown down
an iron ladder; and when some one thought to help the poor mother pick
him up he was dead. Well--But, gentlemen, maybe I'm trying your
patience?"
"Go on!" came a voice, and "Go on!" came another; and then three, four,
a dozen voices called for him to continue.
"Thank you. Well, gentlemen, a tempest in the great ocean, with its
tremendous winds and mountains of seas, must be a terrible sight; but
surely a more terrible sight is to see that same ocean, as smooth as
oil, and the blue heavens smiling down, while the body of one that's
dear to you is lowered into it! So it was. With loose, wide stitches
they'd sewed the boy into canvas; and to the one foot of him they tied a
piece of an old grate-bar, and dropped him into that great ocean."
Tim saw Malone shoot a furtive glance sideways to learn how they were
taking it in the front row. Plainly he was not liking it, for he stood
up straight then and surveyed the rows of voters behind him. Tim waited,
and every man there knew why he waited. There was an indrawing of
breaths all over the hall. Malone, without showing the ordering
forefinger, sat down again.
Tim bowed to him. "Thank you, Mr. Malone, for that fighting chance,"
which remark brought out a quick burst of applause.
"Well, gentlemen, that poor old woman landed in the strange country.
Grief-stricken she was, but not yet utterly discouraged. The son Pat was
to meet her at the dock. He was not there. Well, she could see a good
reason for that. They could not leave their work--sometimes the bosses
were strict--they had often written so in their letters. No matter. With
not much left of her little savings, she bought a ticket and took the
train for the town where her two sons were working. Well, neither was
Pat at the station to greet her--but by and by she learned why.
"There had been a premature explosion in the quarries, and a fall of
rock had knocked Pat senseless; and as he lay there, unconscious, a
second blast came and killed him. Well, that was an awful thing; but
still there was the son John. And they had then to tell her of John.
Well, while Pat lay there helpless, another man had run in to carry him
out of danger. He was a brave man, that second man, for the flame of the
second fuse was then almost to the charge; but he ran in and he had the
injured man in his arms when the second explosion came. They were killed
together. That second man was her other son, John."
Tim paused; but he no longer had to ask their leave to speak. He was in
full swing; and out there, beyond the ends of his nervous, spreading
fingers, they were swinging with him. Sitting up straight and still they
were--or leaning forward, bent and eager.
A potent gift, the orator's. A writer may never hope to achieve
instantly his great intention. He is limited to monotonous-looking black
words on a blank page. But a speaker! Added to the words are eyes, lips,
hands, head, body, and the immeasurable force of personality. Tim's
voice softened and deepened, halted and quickened, rounded and trembled;
the ruddy cheek took on a ruddier color; his deep-set eyes grew deeper
and darker, and by and by they flamed. He grew taller; his body
expanded. He spread his hands--fine, shapely hands, with nervous,
expressive fingers--and as he gestured he quivered to his very
finger-tips, and down there on the benches they quivered with him. The
cold words--he warmed and revivified them. Under the caress of his
beautiful, barely perceptible brogue the commonest, harshest lines took
on smoothness and roundness; and from out his mouth the fine, tender
words bloomed like summer flowers; and the larger, colorful words
flashed like gems.
Tim, in short, was an orator. And when he said: "There, gentlemen, you
have the story--and you know whose story it is. Poor old Nanna
Nolan's--yes:" when he had said that, with arms and hands no longer
gesturing, but drooping straight and motionless by his side, no one
stirred--but a great sigh went up.
And not till that moment did Malone wake up to it that he had waited too
long; but that moment he desperately chose to take his position at the
end of the aisle and face his hitherto unbroken constituency; and while
Malone was doing that Tim was motioning to Dinnie in the wings; and now
Dinnie was leading her out--old Nanna Nolan, halting and bewildered,
blinking at the audience--as Tim held up one hand for a last word.
"Here she is! I've tried to tell you her story, gentlemen; but there's
only one living person can tell that story right, and I'm not that one.
If you could have heard her telling it--she in her little cabin on that
windy hillside, before her little stove, with the dark coming down and
the lights beginning to shine through----"
And that instant, while Tim's arm was across her poor thin shoulders,
covered as ever with the worn man's coat--that instant Malone, whose
back was to the stage, chose to raise his fateful forefinger.
And Tim waited. And Malone waited.
[Illustration: "That two-faced chairman of yours--he never tipped me off
you could fight any way except with your hands."]
Not a man left the hall.
Malone turned and faced Tim.
"You win," he said; "but that two-faced chairman of yours--and he ain't
any friend of yours--he never tipped me off you could fight any way
except with your hands. Speak the rest of your piece. You win!"
* * * * *
Back at headquarters the state chairman had been for an hour trying to
extract a little comfort from the newspaper story of the New Ireland
upheaval when the tall boss came in. To the boss, of course, he had to
make some comment, and he made it.
"This man Riley," he began cautiously, "I've been trying to discover
whether he's a Republican or a Democrat by what he says here."
"How's that?"
"He says: 'Take your leaders: and if they don't carry out your will fire
'em out! If the men you have set on high betray you,' he puts it, 'lasso
'em off their pedestals and set 'em on the street level again!' If that
isn't----"
"--government by the people?"
"I wasn't going to say that, sir."
"Why not? Isn't that what it amounts to? Let me see your paper, please.
H-m! I don't see what there is here to object to. He is not against a
party government; in fact, he's all for party. Only make sure the party
leaders are honest, he says, in politics, religion, business--in
everything; and if they do not live up to their promises read them their
lesson. Well, why not? I think he's right. The people know more than
they did and we might as well reckon with that new knowledge. The men
who don't do that might as well give up the leadership!"
There was a whole page of it in the New Ireland _Record_ about Tim. The
senator read it all. When he at last looked up he murmured:
"Raised twelve hundred and odd dollars for the widow Nolan. That was
surely well done! Two hundred and fifty votes pledged to him before he
left the hall. He surely has the touch! And Malone says he's going to
stick to his contracting hereafter. Good idea!"