"Well if he wants to make a great speech why doesn't he do it?"

Visitors interrupted the conversation and Mr. Buckstone took his leave.

It was not of the least moment to Laura that her question had not been

answered, inasmuch as it concerned a thing which did not interest her;

and yet, human being like, she thought she would have liked to know.

An opportunity occurring presently, she put the same question to another

person and got an answer that satisfied her. She pondered a good while

that night, after she had gone to bed, and when she finally turned over,

to, go to sleep, she had thought out a new scheme. The next evening at

Mrs. Gloverson's party, she said to Mr. Buckstone:

"I want Mr. Trollop to make his great speech on the Pension bill."

"Do you? But you remember I was interrupted, and did not explain

to you--"

"Never mind, I know. You must' make him make that speech. I very.

particularly desire, it."

"Oh, it is easy, to say make him do it, but how am I to make him!"

"It is perfectly easy; I have thought it all out."

She then went into the details. At length Mr. Buckstone said:

"I see now. I can manage it, I am sure. Indeed I wonder he never

thought of it himself--there are no end of precedents. But how is this

going to benefit you, after I have managed it? There is where the

mystery lies."

"But I will take care of that. It will benefit me a great deal."

"I only wish I could see how; it is the oddest freak. You seem to go the

furthest around to get at a thing--but you are in earnest, aren't you?"

"Yes I am, indeed."

"Very well, I will do it--but why not tell me how you imagine it is going

to help you?"

"I will, by and by.--Now there is nobody talking to him. Go straight and

do it, there's a good fellow."

A moment or two later the two sworn friends of the Pension bill were

talking together, earnestly, and seemingly unconscious of the moving

throng about them. They talked an hour, and then Mr. Buckstone came back

and said:

"He hardly fancied it at first, but he fell in love with it after a bit.

And we have made a compact, too. I am to keep his secret and he is to

spare me, in future, when he gets ready to denounce the supporters of the

University bill--and I can easily believe he will keep his word on this

occasion."

A fortnight elapsed, and the University bill had gathered to itself many

friends, meantime. Senator Dilworthy began to think the harvest was

ripe. He conferred with Laura privately. She was able to tell him

exactly how the House would vote. There was a majority--the bill would

pass, unless weak members got frightened at the last, and deserted--a

thing pretty likely to occur. The Senator said:

"I wish we had one more good strong man. Now Trollop ought to be on our

side, for he is a friend of the negro. But he is against us, and is our

bitterest opponent. If he would simply vote No, but keep quiet and not

molest us, I would feel perfectly cheerful and content. But perhaps

there is no use in thinking of that."

"Why I laid a little plan for his benefit two weeks ago. I think he will

be tractable, maybe. He is to come here tonight."

"Look out for him, my child! He means mischief, sure. It is said that

he claims to know of improper practices having been used in the interest

of this bill, and he thinks be sees a chance to make a great sensation

when the bill comes up. Be wary. Be very, very careful, my dear.

Do your very-ablest talking, now. You can convince a man of anything,

when you try. You must convince him that if anything improper has been

done, you at least are ignorant of it and sorry for it. And if you could

only persuade him out of his hostility to the bill, too--but don't overdo

the thing; don't seem too anxious, dear."

"I won't; I'll be ever so careful. I'll talk as sweetly to him as if he

were my own child! You may trust me--indeed you may."

The door-bell rang.

"That is the gentleman now," said Laura. Senator Dilworthy retired to

his study.

Laura welcomed Mr. Trollop, a grave, carefully dressed and very

respectable looking man, with a bald head, standing collar and old

fashioned watch seals.

"Promptness is a virtue, Mr. Trollop, and I perceive that you have it.

You are always prompt with me."

"I always meet my engagements, of every kind, Miss Hawkins."

"It is a quality which is rarer in the world than it has been, I believe.

I wished to see you on business, Mr. Trollop."

"I judged so. What can I do for you?"

"You know my bill--the Knobs University bill?"

"Ah, I believe it is your bill. I had forgotten. Yes, I know the bill."

"Well, would you mind telling me your opinion of it?"

"Indeed, since you seem to ask it without reserve, I am obliged to say

that I do not regard it favorably. I have not seen the bill itself, but

from what I can hear, it--it--well, it has a bad look about it. It--"

"Speak it out--never fear."

"Well, it--they say it contemplates a fraud upon the government."

"Well?" said Laura tranquilly.

"Well! I say 'Well?' too."

"Well, suppose it were a fraud--which I feel able to deny--would it be

the first one?"

"You take a body's breath away! Would you--did you wish me to vote for

it? Was that what you wanted to see me about?"

"Your instinct is correct. I did want you--I do want you to vote for

it."

"Vote for a fr--for a measure which is generally believed to be at least

questionable? I am afraid we cannot come to an understanding, Miss

Hawkins."

"No, I am afraid not--if you have resumed your principles, Mr. Trollop."

"Did you send for we merely to insult me? It is time for me to take my

leave, Miss Hawkins."

"No-wait a moment. Don't be offended at a trifle. Do not be offish and

unsociable. The Steamship Subsidy bill was a fraud on the government.

You voted for it, Mr. Trollop, though you always opposed the measure

until after you had an interview one evening with a certain Mrs. McCarter

at her house. She was my agent. She was acting for me. Ah, that is

right--sit down again. You can be sociable, easily enough if you have a

mind to. Well? I am waiting. Have you nothing to say?"

"Miss Hawkins, I voted for that bill because when I came to examine into

it--"

"Ah yes. When you came to examine into it. Well, I only want you to

examine into my bill. Mr. Trollop, you would not sell your vote on that

subsidy bill--which was perfectly right--but you accepted of some

of the stock, with the understanding that it was to stand in your

brother-in-law's name."

"There is no pr--I mean, this is, utterly groundless, Miss Hawkins." But

the gentleman seemed somewhat uneasy, nevertheless.

"Well, not entirely so, perhaps. I and a person whom we will call Miss

Blank (never mind the real name,) were in a closet at your elbow all the

while."

Mr. Trollop winced--then he said with dignity:

"Miss Hawkins is it possible that you were capable of such a thing as

that?"

"It was bad; I confess that. It was bad. Almost as bad as selling one's

vote for--but I forget; you did not sell your vote--you only accepted a

little trifle, a small token of esteem, for your brother-in-law. Oh, let

us come out and be frank with each other: I know you, Mr. Trollop.

I have met you on business three or four times; true, I never offered to

corrupt your principles--never hinted such a thing; but always when I had

finished sounding you, I manipulated you through an agent. Let us be

frank. Wear this comely disguise of virtue before the public--it will

count there; but here it is out of place. My dear sir, by and by there

is going to be an investigation into that National Internal Improvement

Directors' Relief Measure of a few years ago, and you know very well that

you will be a crippled man, as likely as not, when it is completed."

"It cannot be shown that a man is a knave merely for owning that stock.

I am not distressed about the National Improvement Relief Measure."

"Oh indeed I am not trying to distress you. I only wished, to make good

my assertion that I knew you. Several of you gentlemen bought of that

stack (without paying a penny down) received dividends from it, (think of

the happy idea of receiving dividends, and very large ones, too, from

stock one hasn't paid for!) and all the while your names never appeared

in the transaction; if ever you took the stock at all, you took it in

other people's names. Now you see, you had to know one of two things;

namely, you either knew that the idea of all this preposterous generosity

was to bribe you into future legislative friendship, or you didn't know

it. That is to say, you had to be either a knave or a--well, a fool

--there was no middle ground. You are not a fool, Mr. Trollop."

"Miss Hawking you flatter me. But seriously, you do not forget that some

of the best and purest men in Congress took that stock in that way?"

"Did Senator Bland?"

"Well, no--I believe not."

"Of course you believe not. Do you suppose he was ever approached, on

the subject?"

"Perhaps not."

"If you had approached him, for instance, fortified with the fact that

some of the best men in Congress, and the purest, etc., etc.; what would

have been the result?"

"Well, what WOULD have been the result?"

"He would have shown you the door! For Mr. Blank is neither a knave nor

a fool. There are other men in the Senate and the House whom no one

would have been hardy enough to approach with that Relief Stock in that

peculiarly generous way, but they are not of the class that you regard as

the best and purest. No, I say I know you Mr. Trollop. That is to say,

one may suggest a thing to Mr. Trollop which it would not do to suggest

to Mr. Blank. Mr. Trollop, you are pledged to support the Indigent

Congressmen's Retroactive Appropriation which is to come up, either in

this or the next session. You do not deny that, even in public. The man

that will vote for that bill will break the eighth commandment in any

other way, sir!"

"But he will not vote for your corrupt measure, nevertheless, madam!"

exclaimed Mr. Trollop, rising from his seat in a passion.

"Ah, but he will. Sit down again, and let me explain why. Oh, come,

don't behave so. It is very unpleasant. Now be good, and you shall

have, the missing page of your great speech. Here it is!"--and she

displayed a sheet of manuscript.

Mr. Trollop turned immediately back from the threshold. It might have

been gladness that flashed into his face; it might have been something

else; but at any rate there was much astonishment mixed with it.

"Good! Where did you get it? Give it me!"

"Now there is no hurry. Sit down; sit down and let us talk and be

friendly."

The gentleman wavered. Then he said:

"No, this is only a subterfuge. I will go. It is not the missing page."

Laura tore off a couple of lines from the bottom of the sheet.

"Now," she said, "you will know whether this is the handwriting or not.

You know it is the handwriting. Now if you will listen, you will know

that this must be the list of statistics which was to be the 'nub' of

your great effort, and the accompanying blast the beginning of the burst

of eloquence which was continued on the next page--and you will recognize

that there was where you broke down."

She read the page. Mr. Trollop said:

"This is perfectly astounding. Still, what is all this to me? It is

nothing. It does not concern me. The speech is made, and there an end.

I did break down for a moment, and in a rather uncomfortable place, since

I had led up to those statistics with some grandeur; the hiatus was

pleasanter to the House and the galleries than it was to me. But it is

no matter now. A week has passed; the jests about it ceased three or

four days ago. The, whole thing is a matter of indifference to me, Miss

Hawkins."

"But you apologized; and promised the statistics for next day. Why

didn't you keep your promise."

"The matter was not of sufficient consequence. The time was gone by to

produce an effect with them."

"But I hear that other friends of the Soldiers' Pension Bill desire them

very much. I think you ought to let them have them."

"Miss Hawkins, this silly blunder of my copyist evidently has more

interest for you than it has for me. I will send my private secretary to

you and let him discuss the subject with you at length."

"Did he copy your speech for you?"

"Of course he did. Why all these questions? Tell me--how did you get

hold of that page of manuscript? That is the only thing that stirs a

passing interest in my mind."

"I'm coming to that." Then she said, much as if she were talking to

herself: "It does seem like taking a deal of unnecessary pains, for a

body to hire another body to construct a great speech for him and then go

and get still another body to copy it before it can be read in the

House."

"Miss Hawkins, what do yo mean by such talk as that?"

"Why I am sure I mean no harm--no harm to anybody in the world. I am

certain that I overheard the Hon. Mr. Buckstone either promise to write

your great speech for you or else get some other competent person to do

it."

"This is perfectly absurd, madam, perfectly absurd!" and Mr. Trollop

affected a laugh of derision.

"Why, the thing has occurred before now. I mean that I have heard that

Congressmen have sometimes hired literary grubs to build speeches for

them.--Now didn't I overhear a conversation like that I spoke of?"

"Pshaw! Why of course you may have overheard some such jesting nonsense.

But would one be in earnest about so farcical a thing?"

"Well if it was only a joke, why did you make a serious matter of it?

Why did you get the speech written for you, and then read it in the House

without ever having it copied?"

Mr. Trollop did not laugh this time; he seemed seriously perplexed. He

said:

"Come, play out your jest, Miss Hawkins. I can't understand what you are

contriving--but it seems to entertain you--so please, go on."

"I will, I assure you; but I hope to make the matter entertaining to you,

too. Your private secretary never copied your speech."

"Indeed? Really you seem to know my affairs better than I do myself."

"I believe I do. You can't name your own amanuensis, Mr. Trollop."

"That is sad, indeed. Perhaps Miss Hawkins can?"

"Yes, I can. I wrote your speech myself, and you read it from my

manuscript. There, now!"

Mr. Trollop did not spring to his feet and smite his brow with his hand

while a cold sweat broke out all over him and the color forsook his face

--no, he only said, "Good God!" and looked greatly astonished.

Laura handed him her commonplace-book and called his attention to the

fact that the handwriting there and the handwriting of this speech were

the same. He was shortly convinced. He laid the book aside and said,

composedly:

"Well, the wonderful tragedy is done, and it transpires that I am

indebted to you for my late eloquence. What of it? What was all this

for and what does it amount to after all? What do you propose to do

about it?"

"Oh nothing. It is only a bit of pleasantry. When I overheard that

conversation I took an early opportunity to ask Mr. Buckstone if he knew

of anybody who might want a speech written--I had a friend, and so forth

and so on. I was the friend, myself; I thought I might do you a good

turn then and depend on you to do me one by and by. I never let Mr.

Buckstone have the speech till the last moment, and when you hurried off

to the House with it, you did not know there was a missing page, of

course, but I did.

"And now perhaps you think that if I refuse to support your bill, you

will make a grand exposure?"

"Well I had not thought of that. I only kept back the page for the mere

fun of the thing; but since you mention it, I don't know but I might do

something if I were angry."

"My dear Miss Hawkins, if you were to give out that you composed my

speech, you know very well that people would say it was only your

raillery, your fondness for putting a victim in the pillory and amusing

the public at his expense. It is too flimsy, Miss Hawkins, for a person

of your fine inventive talent--contrive an abler device than that.

Come!"

"It is easily done, Mr. Trollop. I will hire a man, and pin this page on

his breast, and label it, 'The Missing Fragment of the Hon. Mr. Trollop's

Great Speech--which speech was written and composed by Miss Laura Hawkins

under a secret understanding for one hundred dollars--and the money has

not been paid.' And I will pin round about it notes in my handwriting,

which I will procure from prominent friends of mine for the occasion;

also your printed speech in the Globe, showing the connection between its

bracketed hiatus and my Fragment; and I give you my word of honor that I

will stand that human bulletin board in the rotunda of the capitol and

make him stay there a week! You see you are premature, Mr. Trollop, the

wonderful tragedy is not done yet, by any means. Come, now, doesn't it

improve?"

Mr Trollop opened his eyes rather widely at this novel aspect of the

case. He got up and walked the floor and gave himself a moment for

reflection. Then he stopped and studied Laura's face a while, and ended

by saying:

"Well, I am obliged to believe you would be reckless enough to do that."

"Then don't put me to the test, Mr. Trollop. But let's drop the matter.

I have had my joke and you've borne the infliction becomingly enough.

It spoils a jest to harp on it after one has had one's laugh. I would

much rather talk about my bill."

"So would I, now, my clandestine amanuensis. Compared with some other

subjects, even your bill is a pleasant topic to discuss."

"Very good indeed! I thought. I could persuade you. Now I am sure you

will be generous to the poor negro and vote for that bill."

"Yes, I feel more tenderly toward the oppressed colored man than I did.

Shall we bury the hatchet and be good friends and respect each other's

little secrets, on condition that I vote Aye on the measure?"

"With all my heart, Mr. Trollop. I give you my word of that."

"It is a bargain. But isn't there something else you could give me,

too?"

Laura looked at him inquiringly a moment, and then she comprehended.

"Oh, yes! You may have it now. I haven't any, more use for it." She

picked up the page of manuscript, but she reconsidered her intention of

handing it to him, and said, "But never mind; I will keep it close; no

one shall see it; you shall have it as soon as your vote is recorded."

Mr. Trollop looked disappointed. But presently made his adieux, and had

got as far as the hall, when something occurred to Laura. She said to

herself, "I don't simply want his vote under compulsion--he might vote

aye, but work against the bill in secret, for revenge; that man is

unscrupulous enough to do anything. I must have his hearty co-operation

as well as his vote. There is only one way to get that."

She called him back, and said:

"I value your vote, Mr. Trollop, but I value your influence more. You

are able to help a measure along in many ways, if you choose. I want to

ask you to work for the bill as well as vote for it."

"It takes so much of one's time, Miss Hawkins--and time is money, you

know."

"Yes, I know it is--especially in Congress. Now there is no use in you

and I dealing in pretenses and going at matters in round-about ways.

We know each other--disguises are nonsense. Let us be plain. I will

make it an object to you to work for the bill."

"Don't make it unnecessarily plain, please. There are little proprieties

that are best preserved. What do you propose?"

"Well, this." She mentioned the names of several prominent Congressmen.

"Now," said she, "these gentlemen are to vote and work for the bill,

simply out of love for the negro--and out of pure generosity I have put

in a relative of each as a member of the University incorporation. They

will handle a million or so of money, officially, but will receive no

salaries. A larger number of statesmen are to, vote and work for the

bill--also out of love for the negro--gentlemen of but moderate

influence, these--and out of pure generosity I am to see that relatives

of theirs have positions in the University, with salaries, and good ones,

too. You will vote and work for the bill, from mere affection for the

negro, and I desire to testify my gratitude becomingly. Make free

choice. Have you any friend whom you would like to present with a

salaried or unsalaried position in our institution?"

"Well, I have a brother-in-law--"

"That same old brother-in-law, you good unselfish provider! I have heard

of him often, through my agents. How regularly he does 'turn up,' to be

sure. He could deal with those millions virtuously, and withal with

ability, too--but of course you would rather he had a salaried position?"

"Oh, no," said the gentleman, facetiously, "we are very humble, very

humble in our desires; we want no money; we labor solely, for our country

and require no reward but the luxury of an applauding conscience. Make

him one of those poor hard working unsalaried corporators and let him do

every body good with those millions--and go hungry himself! I will try

to exert a little influence in favor of the bill."

Arrived at home, Mr. Trollop sat down and thought it all over--something

after this fashion: it is about the shape it might have taken if he had

spoken it aloud.

"My reputation is getting a little damaged, and I meant to clear it up

brilliantly with an exposure of this bill at the supreme moment, and ride

back into Congress on the eclat of it; and if I had that bit of

manuscript, I would do it yet. It would be more money in my pocket in

the end, than my brother-in-law will get out of that incorporatorship,

fat as it is. But that sheet of paper is out of my reach--she will never

let that get out of her hands. And what a mountain it is! It blocks up

my road, completely. She was going to hand it to me, once. Why didn't

she! Must be a deep woman. Deep devil! That is what she is;

a beautiful devil--and perfectly fearless, too. The idea of her pinning

that paper on a man and standing him up in the rotunda looks absurd at a

first glance. But she would do it! She is capable of doing anything.

I went there hoping she would try to bribe me--good solid capital that

would be in the exposure. Well, my prayer was answered; she did try to

bribe me; and I made the best of a bad bargain and let her. I am

check-mated. I must contrive something fresh to get back to Congress on.

Very well; a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush; I will work for

the bill--the incorporatorship will be a very good thing."

As soon as Mr. Trollop had taken his leave, Laura ran to Senator

Dilworthy and began to speak, but he interrupted her and said

distressfully, without even turning from his writing to look at her:

"Only half an hour! You gave it up early, child. However, it was best,

it was best--I'm sure it was best--and safest."

"Give it up! I!"

The Senator sprang up, all aglow:

"My child, you can't mean that you--"

"I've made him promise on honor to think about a compromise tonight and

come and tell me his decision in the morning."

"Good! There's hope yet that--"

Nonsense, uncle. I've made him engage to let the Tennessee Land bill

utterly alone!"

"Impossible! You--"

"I've made him promise to vote with us!"

"INCREDIBLE! Abso--"

"I've made him swear that he'll work for us!"

"PRE - - - POSTEROUS!--Utterly pre--break a window, child, before I

suffocate!"

"No matter, it's true anyway. Now we can march into Congress with drums

beating and colors flying!"

"Well--well--well. I'm sadly bewildered, sadly bewildered. I can't

understand it at all--the most extraordinary woman that ever--it's a

great day, it's a great day. There--there--let me put my hand in

benediction on this precious head. Ah, my child, the poor negro will

bless--"

"Oh bother the poor negro, uncle! Put it in your speech. Good-night,

good-bye--we'll marshal our forces and march with the dawn!"

Laura reflected a while, when she was alone, and then fell to laughing,

peacefully.

"Everybody works for me,"--so ran her thought. "It was a good idea to

make Buckstone lead Mr. Trollop on to get a great speech written for him;

and it was a happy part of the same idea for me to copy the speech after

Mr. Buckstone had written it, and then keep back a page. Mr. B. was

very complimentary to me when Trollop's break-down in the House showed

him the object of my mysterious scheme; I think he will say, still finer

things when I tell him the triumph the sequel to it has gained for us.

"But what a coward the man was, to believe I would have exposed that page

in the rotunda, and so exposed myself. However, I don't know--I don't

know. I will think a moment. Suppose he voted no; suppose the bill

failed; that is to suppose this stupendous game lost forever, that I have

played so desperately for; suppose people came around pitying me--odious!

And he could have saved me by his single voice. Yes, I would have

exposed him! What would I care for the talk that that would have made

about me when I was gone to Europe with Selby and all the world was busy

with my history and my dishonor? It would be almost happiness to spite

somebody at such a time."

CHAPTER XLIII.

The very next day, sure enough, the campaign opened. In due course, the

Speaker of the House reached that Order of Business which is termed

"Notices of Bills," and then the Hon. Mr. Buckstone rose in his place and

gave notice of a bill "To Found and Incorporate the Knobs Industrial

University," and then sat down without saying anything further. The busy

gentlemen in the reporters' gallery jotted a line in their note-books,

ran to the telegraphic desk in a room which communicated with their own

writing-parlor, and then hurried back to their places in the gallery; and

by the time they had resumed their seats, the line which they had

delivered to the operator had been read in telegraphic offices in towns

and cities hundreds of miles away. It was distinguished by frankness of

language as well as by brevity:

"The child is born. Buckstone gives notice of the thieving Knobs

University job. It is said the noses have been counted and enough votes

have been bought to pass it."

For some time the correspondents had been posting their several journals

upon the alleged disreputable nature of the bill, and furnishing daily

reports of the Washington gossip concerning it. So the next morning,

nearly every newspaper of character in the land assailed the measure and

hurled broadsides of invective at Mr. Buckstone. The Washington papers

were more respectful, as usual--and conciliatory, also, as usual. They

generally supported measures, when it was possible; but when they could

not they "deprecated" violent expressions of opinion in other

journalistic quarters.

They always deprecated, when there was trouble ahead. However, 'The

Washington Daily Love-Feast' hailed the bill with warm approbation. This

was Senator Balaam's paper--or rather, "Brother" Balaam, as he was

popularly called, for he had been a clergyman, in his day; and he himself

and all that he did still emitted an odor of sanctity now that he had

diverged into journalism and politics. He was a power in the

Congressional prayer meeting, and in all movements that looked to the

spread of religion and temperance.

His paper supported the new bill with gushing affection; it was a noble

measure; it was a just measure; it was a generous measure; it was a pure

measure, and that surely should recommend it in these corrupt times; and

finally, if the nature of the bill were not known at all, the 'Love

Feast' would support it anyway, and unhesitatingly, for the fact that

Senator Dilworthy was the originator of the measure was a guaranty that

it contemplated a worthy and righteous work.

Senator Dilworthy was so anxious to know what the New York papers would

say about the bill; that he had arranged to have synopses of their

editorials telegraphed to him; he could not wait for the papers

themselves to crawl along down to Washington by a mail train which has

never run over a cow since the road was built; for the reason that it has

never been able to overtake one. It carries the usual "cow-catcher" in

front of the locomotive, but this is mere ostentation. It ought to be

attached to the rear car, where it could do some good; but instead, no

provision is made there for the protection of the traveling public, and

hence it is not a matter of surprise that cows so frequently climb aboard

that train and among the passengers.

The Senator read his dispatches aloud at the breakfast table. Laura was

troubled beyond measure at their tone, and said that that sort of comment

would defeat the bill; but the Senator said:

"Oh, not at all, not at all, my child. It is just what we want.

Persecution is the one thing needful, now--all the other forces are

secured. Give us newspaper persecution enough, and we are safe.

Vigorous persecution will alone carry a bill sometimes, dear; and when

you start with a strong vote in the first place, persecution comes in

with double effect. It scares off some of the weak supporters, true,

but it soon turns strong ones into stubborn ones. And then, presently,

it changes the tide of public opinion. The great public is weak-minded;

the great public is sentimental; the great public always turns around and

weeps for an odious murderer, and prays for-him, and carries flowers to

his prison and besieges the governor with appeals to his clemency, as

soon as the papers begin to howl for that man's blood.--In a word, the

great putty-hearted public loves to 'gush,' and there is no such darling

opportunity to gush as a case of persecution affords."

"Well, uncle, dear; if your theory is right, let us go into raptures,

for nobody can ask a heartier persecution than these editorials are

furnishing."

"I am not so sure of that, my daughter. I don't entirely like the tone

of some of these remarks. They lack vim, they lack venom. Here is one

calls it a 'questionable measure.' Bah, there is no strength in that.

This one is better; it calls it 'highway robbery.' That sounds something

like. But now this one seems satisfied to call it an 'iniquitous

scheme'. 'Iniquitous' does not exasperate anybody; it is weak--puerile.

The ignorant will imagine it to be intended for a compliment. But this

other one--the one I read last--has the true ring: 'This vile, dirty

effort to rob the public treasury, by the kites and vultures that now

infest the filthy den called Congress'--that is admirable, admirable!

We must have more of that sort. But it will come--no fear of that;

they're not warmed up, yet. A week from now you'll see."

"Uncle, you and Brother Balaam are bosom friends--why don't you get his

paper to persecute us, too?"

"It isn't worth while, my, daughter. His support doesn't hurt a bill.

Nobody reads his editorials but himself. But I wish the New York papers

would talk a little plainer. It is annoying to have to wait a week for

them to warm up. I expected better things at their hands--and time is

precious, now."

At the proper hour, according to his previous notice, Mr. Buckstone duly

introduced his bill entitled "An Act to Found and Incorporate the Knobs

Industrial University," moved its proper reference, and sat down.

The Speaker of the House rattled off this observation:

"'Fnobjectionbilltakuzhlcoixrssoreferred!'"

Habitues of the House comprehended that this long, lightning-heeled word

signified that if there was no objection, the bill would take the

customary course of a measure of its nature, and be referred to the

Committee on Benevolent Appropriations, and that it was accordingly so

referred. Strangers merely supposed that the Speaker was taking a gargle

for some affection of the throat.

The reporters immediately telegraphed the introduction of the bill.--And

they added:

"The assertion that the bill will pass was premature. It is said

that many favorers of it will desert when the storm breaks upon them

from the public press."

The storm came, and during ten days it waxed more and more violent day by

day. The great "Negro University Swindle" became the one absorbing topic

of conversation throughout the Union. Individuals denounced it, journals

denounced it, public meetings denounced it, the pictorial papers

caricatured its friends, the whole nation seemed to be growing frantic

over it. Meantime the Washington correspondents were sending such

telegrams as these abroad in the land; Under date of--

SATURDAY. "Congressmen Jex and Fluke are wavering; it is believed they

will desert the execrable bill."

MONDAY. "Jex and Fluke have deserted!"

THURSDAY. "Tubbs and Huffy left the sinking ship last night"

Later on:

"Three desertions. The University thieves are getting scared, though

they will not own it."

Later:

"The leaders are growing stubborn--they swear they can carry it, but it

is now almost certain that they no longer have a majority!"

After a day or two of reluctant and ambiguous telegrams:

"Public sentiment seems changing, a trifle in favor of the bill

--but only a trifle."

And still later:

"It is whispered that the Hon. Mr. Trollop has gone over to the pirates.

It is probably a canard. Mr. Trollop has all along been the bravest and

most efficient champion of virtue and the people against the bill, and

the report is without doubt a shameless invention."

Next day:

"With characteristic treachery, the truckling and pusillanimous reptile,

Crippled-Speech Trollop, has gone over to the enemy. It is contended,

now, that he has been a friend to the bill, in secret, since the day it

was introduced, and has had bankable reasons for being so; but he himself

declares that he has gone over because the malignant persecution of the

bill by the newspapers caused him to study its provisions with more care

than he had previously done, and this close examination revealed the fact

that the measure is one in every way worthy of support. (Pretty thin!)

It cannot be denied that this desertion has had a damaging effect. Jex

and Fluke have returned to their iniquitous allegiance, with six or eight

others of lesser calibre, and it is reported and believed that Tubbs and

Huffy are ready to go back. It is feared that the University swindle is

stronger to-day than it has ever been before."

Later-midnight:

"It is said that the committee will report the bill back to-morrow. Both

sides are marshaling their forces, and the fight on this bill is

evidently going to be the hottest of the session.--All Washington is

boiling."

CHAPTER XLIV.

"It's easy enough for another fellow to talk," said Harry, despondingly,

after he had put Philip in possession of his view of the case. "It's

easy enough to say 'give her up,' if you don't care for her. What am I

going to do to give her up?"

It seemed to Harry that it was a situation requiring some active

measures. He couldn't realize that he had fallen hopelessly in love

without some rights accruing to him for the possession of the object of

his passion. Quiet resignation under relinquishment of any thing he

wanted was not in his line. And when it appeared to him that his

surrender of Laura would be the withdrawal of the one barrier that kept

her from ruin, it was unreasonable to expect that he could see how to

give her up.

Harry had the most buoyant confidence in his own projects always; he saw

everything connected with himself in a large way and in rosy lines. This

predominance of the imagination over the judgment gave that appearance of

exaggeration to his conversation and to his communications with regard to

himself, which sometimes conveyed the impression that he was not speaking

the truth. His acquaintances had been known to say that they invariably

allowed a half for shrinkage in his statements, and held the other half

under advisement for confirmation.

Philip in this case could not tell from Harry's story exactly how much

encouragement Laura had given him, nor what hopes he might justly have of

winning her. He had never seen him desponding before. The "brag"

appeared to be all taken out of him, and his airy manner only asserted

itself now and then in a comical imitation of its old self.

Philip wanted time to look about him before he decided what to do.

He was not familiar with Washington, and it was difficult to adjust his

feelings and perceptions to its peculiarities. Coming out of the sweet

sanity of the Bolton household, this was by contrast the maddest Vanity

Fair one could conceive. It seemed to him a feverish, unhealthy

atmosphere in which lunacy would be easily developed. He fancied that

everybody attached to himself an exaggerated importance, from the fact of

being at the national capital, the center of political influence, the

fountain of patronage, preferment, jobs and opportunities.

People were introduced to each other as from this or that state, not from

cities or towns, and this gave a largeness to their representative

feeling. All the women talked politics as naturally and glibly as they

talk fashion or literature elsewhere. There was always some exciting

topic at the Capitol, or some huge slander was rising up like a miasmatic

exhalation from the Potomac, threatening to settle no one knew exactly

where. Every other person was an aspirant for a place, or, if he had

one, for a better place, or more pay; almost every other one had some

claim or interest or remedy to urge; even the women were all advocates

for the advancement of some person, and they violently espoused or

denounced this or that measure as it would affect some relative,

acquaintance or friend.

Love, travel, even death itself, waited on the chances of the dies daily

thrown in the two Houses, and the committee rooms there. If the measure

went through, love could afford to ripen into marriage, and longing for

foreign travel would have fruition; and it must have been only eternal

hope springing in the breast that kept alive numerous old claimants who

for years and years had besieged the doors of Congress, and who looked as

if they needed not so much an appropriation of money as six feet of

ground. And those who stood so long waiting for success to bring them

death were usually those who had a just claim.

Representing states and talking of national and even international

affairs, as familiarly as neighbors at home talk of poor crops and the

extravagance of their ministers, was likely at first to impose upon

Philip as to the importance of the people gathered here.

There was a little newspaper editor from Phil's native town, the

assistant on a Peddletonian weekly, who made his little annual joke about

the "first egg laid on our table," and who was the menial of every

tradesman in the village and under bonds to him for frequent "puffs,"

except the undertaker, about whose employment he was recklessly

facetious. In Washington he was an important man, correspondent, and

clerk of two house committees, a "worker" in politics, and a confident

critic of every woman and every man in Washington. He would be a consul

no doubt by and by, at some foreign port, of the language of which he was

ignorant--though if ignorance of language were a qualification he might

have been a consul at home. His easy familiarity with great men was

beautiful to see, and when Philip learned what a tremendous underground

influence this little ignoramus had, he no longer wondered at the queer

appointments and the queerer legislation.

Philip was not long in discovering that people in Washington did not

differ much from other people; they had the same meannesses,

generosities, and tastes: A Washington boarding house had the odor of a

boarding house the world over.

Col. Sellers was as unchanged as any one Philip saw whom he had known

elsewhere. Washington appeared to be the native element of this man.

His pretentions were equal to any he encountered there. He saw nothing

in its society that equalled that of Hawkeye, he sat down to no table

that could not be unfavorably contrasted with his own at home; the most

airy scheme inflated in the hot air of the capital only reached in

magnitude some of his lesser fancies, the by-play of his constructive

imagination.

"The country is getting along very well," he said to Philip, "but our

public men are too timid. What we want is more money. I've told

Boutwell so. Talk about basing the currency on gold; you might as well

base it on pork. Gold is only one product. Base it on everything!

You've got to do something for the West. How am I to move my crops?

We must have improvements. Grant's got the idea. We want a canal from

the James River to the Mississippi. Government ought to build it."

It was difficult to get the Colonel off from these large themes when he

was once started, but Philip brought the conversation round to Laura and

her reputation in the City.

"No," he said, "I haven't noticed much. We've been so busy about this

University. It will make Laura rich with the rest of us, and she has

done nearly as much as if she were a man. She has great talent, and will

make a big match. I see the foreign ministers and that sort after her.

Yes, there is talk, always will be about a pretty woman so much in public

as she is. Tough stories come to me, but I put'em away. 'Taint likely

one of Si Hawkins's children would do that--for she is the same as a

child of his. I told her, though, to go slow," added the Colonel, as if

that mysterious admonition from him would set everything right.

"Do you know anything about a Col. Selby?"

"Know all about him. Fine fellow. But he's got a wife; and I told him,

as a friend, he'd better sheer off from Laura. I reckon he thought

better of it and did."

But Philip was not long in learning the truth. Courted as Laura was by a

certain class and still admitted into society, that, nevertheless, buzzed

with disreputable stories about her, she had lost character with the best

people. Her intimacy with Selby was open gossip, and there were winks

and thrustings of the tongue in any group of men when she passed by.

It was clear enough that Harry's delusion must be broken up, and that no

such feeble obstacle as his passion could interpose would turn Laura from

her fate. Philip determined to see her, and put himself in possession of

the truth, as he suspected it, in order to show Harry his folly.

Laura, after her last conversation with Harry, had a new sense of her

position. She had noticed before the signs of a change in manner towards

her, a little less respect perhaps from men, and an avoidance by women.

She had attributed this latter partly to jealousy of her, for no one is

willing to acknowledge a fault in himself when a more agreeable motive

can be found for the estrangement of his acquaintances. But now, if

society had turned on her, she would defy it. It was not in her nature

to shrink. She knew she had been wronged, and she knew that she had no

remedy.

What she heard of Col. Selby's proposed departure alarmed her more than

anything else, and she calmly determined that if he was deceiving her the

second time it should be the last. Let society finish the tragedy if it

liked; she was indifferent what came after. At the first opportunity,

she charged Selby with his intention to abandon her. He unblushingly

denied it.

He had not thought of going to Europe. He had only been amusing himself

with Sellers' schemes. He swore that as soon as she succeeded with her

bill, he would fly with her to any part of the world.

She did not quite believe him, for she saw that he feared her, and she

began to suspect that his were the protestations of a coward to gain

time. But she showed him no doubts.

She only watched his movements day by day, and always held herself ready

to act promptly.

When Philip came into the presence of this attractive woman, he could not

realize that she was the subject of all the scandal he had heard. She

received him with quite the old Hawkeye openness and cordiality, and fell

to talking at once of their little acquaintance there; and it seemed

impossible that he could ever say to her what he had come determined to

say. Such a man as Philip has only one standard by which to judge women.

Laura recognized that fact no doubt. The better part of her woman's

nature saw it. Such a man might, years ago, not now, have changed her

nature, and made the issue of her life so different, even after her cruel

abandonment. She had a dim feeling of this, and she would like now to

stand well with him. The spark of truth and honor that was left in her

was elicited by his presence. It was this influence that governed her

conduct in this interview.

"I have come," said Philip in his direct manner, "from my friend

Mr. Brierly. You are not ignorant of his feeling towards you?"

"Perhaps not."

"But perhaps you do not know, you who have so much admiration, how

sincere and overmastering his love is for you?" Philip would not have

spoken so plainly, if he had in mind anything except to draw from Laura

something that would end Harry's passion.

"And is sincere love so rare, Mr. Sterling?" asked Laura, moving her foot

a little, and speaking with a shade of sarcasm.

"Perhaps not in Washington," replied Philip,--tempted into a similar

tone. "Excuse my bluntness," he continued, "but would the knowledge of

his love; would his devotion, make any difference to you in your

Washington life?"

"In respect to what?" asked Laura quickly.

"Well, to others. I won't equivocate--to Col. Selby?"

Laura's face flushed with anger, or shame; she looked steadily at Philip

and began,

"By what right, sir,--"

"By the right of friendship," interrupted Philip stoutly. "It may matter

little to you. It is everything to him. He has a Quixotic notion that

you would turn back from what is before you for his sake. You cannot be

ignorant of what all the city is talking of." Philip said this

determinedly and with some bitterness.

It was a full minute before Laura spoke. Both had risen, Philip as if to

go, and Laura in suppressed excitement. When she spoke her voice was

very unsteady, and she looked down.

"Yes, I know. I perfectly understand what you mean. Mr. Brierly is

nothing--simply nothing. He is a moth singed, that is all--the trifler

with women thought he was a wasp. I have no pity for him, not the least.

You may tell him not to make a fool of himself, and to keep away. I say

this on your account, not his. You are not like him. It is enough for

me that you want it so. Mr. Sterling," she continued, looking up; and

there were tears in her eyes that contradicted the hardness of her

language, "you might not pity him if you knew my history; perhaps you

would not wonder at some things you hear. No; it is useless to ask me

why it must be so. You can't make a life over--society wouldn't let you

if you would--and mine must be lived as it is. There, sir, I'm not

offended; but it is useless for you to say anything more."

Philip went away with his heart lightened about Harry, but profoundly

saddened by the glimpse of what this woman might have been. He told

Harry all that was necessary of the conversation--she was bent on going

her own way, he had not the ghost of a chance--he was a fool, she had

said, for thinking he had.

And Harry accepted it meekly, and made up his own mind that Philip didn't

know much about women.

CHAPTER XLV.

The galleries of the House were packed, on the momentous day, not because

the reporting of an important bill back by a committee was a thing to be

excited about, if the bill were going to take the ordinary course

afterward; it would be like getting excited over the empaneling of a

coroner's jury in a murder case, instead of saving up one's emotions for

the grander occasion of the hanging of the accused, two years later,

after all the tedious forms of law had been gone through with.

But suppose you understand that this coroner's jury is going to turn out

to be a vigilance committee in disguise, who will hear testimony for an

hour and then hang the murderer on the spot? That puts a different

aspect upon the matter. Now it was whispered that the legitimate forms

of procedure usual in the House, and which keep a bill hanging along for

days and even weeks, before it is finally passed upon, were going to be

overruled, in this case, and short work made of the, measure; and so,

what was beginning as a mere inquest might, torn out to be something very

different.

In the course of the day's business the Order of "Reports of Committees"

was finally reached and when the weary crowds heard that glad

announcement issue from the Speaker's lips they ceased to fret at the

dragging delay, and plucked up spirit. The Chairman of the Committee on

Benevolent Appropriations rose and made his report, and just then a

blue-uniformed brass-mounted little page put a note into his hand.

It was from Senator Dilworthy, who had appeared upon the floor of the

House for a moment and flitted away again:

"Everybody expects a grand assault in force; no doubt you believe,

as I certainly do, that it is the thing to do; we are strong, and

everything is hot for the contest. Trollop's espousal of our cause

has immensely helped us and we grow in power constantly. Ten of the

opposition were called away from town about noon,(but--so it is

said--only for one day). Six others are sick, but expect to be

about again tomorrow or next day, a friend tells me. A bold

onslaught is worth trying. Go for a suspension of the rules! You

will find we can swing a two-thirds vote--I am perfectly satisfied

of it. The Lord's truth will prevail.

"DILWORTHY."

Mr. Buckstone had reported the bills from his committee, one by one,

leaving the bill to the last. When the House had voted upon the

acceptance or rejection of the report upon all but it, and the question

now being upon its disposal--Mr. Buckstone begged that the House would

give its attention to a few remarks which he desired to make. His

committee had instructed him to report the bill favorably; he wished to

explain the nature of the measure, and thus justify the committee's

action; the hostility roused by the press would then disappear, and the

bill would shine forth in its true and noble character. He said that its

provisions were simple. It incorporated the Knobs Industrial University,

locating it in East Tennessee, declaring it open to all persons without

distinction of sex, color or religion, and committing its management to a

board of perpetual trustees, with power to fill vacancies in their own

number. It provided for the erection of certain buildings for the

University, dormitories, lecture-halls, museums, libraries, laboratories,

work-shops, furnaces, and mills. It provided also for the purchase of

sixty-five thousand acres of land, (fully described) for the purposes of

the University, in the Knobs of East Tennessee. And it appropriated

[blank] dollars for the purchase of the Land, which should be the

property of the national trustees in trust for the uses named.

Every effort had been made to secure the refusal of the whole amount of

the property of the Hawkins heirs in the Knobs, some seventy-five

thousand acres Mr. Buckstone said. But Mr. Washington Hawkins (one of

the heirs) objected. He was, indeed, very reluctant to sell any part of

the land at any price; and indeed--this reluctance was justifiable when

one considers how constantly and how greatly the property is rising in

value.

What the South needed, continued Mr. Buckstone, was skilled labor.

Without that it would be unable to develop its mines, build its roads,

work to advantage and without great waste its fruitful land, establish

manufactures or enter upon a prosperous industrial career. Its laborers

were almost altogether unskilled. Change them into intelligent, trained

workmen, and you increased at once the capital, the resources of the

entire south, which would enter upon a prosperity hitherto unknown.

In five years the increase in local wealth would not only reimburse the

government for the outlay in this appropriation, but pour untold wealth

into the treasury.

This was the material view, and the least important in the honorable

gentleman's opinion. [Here he referred to some notes furnished him by

Senator Dilworthy, and then continued.] God had given us the care of

these colored millions. What account should we render to Him of our

stewardship? We had made them free. Should we leave them ignorant?

We had cast them upon their own resources. Should we leave them without

tools? We could not tell what the intentions of Providence are in regard

to these peculiar people, but our duty was plain. The Knobs Industrial

University would be a vast school of modern science and practice, worthy

of a great nation. It would combine the advantages of Zurich, Freiburg,

Creuzot and the Sheffield Scientific. Providence had apparently reserved

and set apart the Knobs of East Tennessee for this purpose. What else

were they for? Was it not wonderful that for more than thirty years,

over a generation, the choicest portion of them had remained in one

family, untouched, as if, separated for some great use!

It might be asked why the government should buy this land, when it had

millions of yes, more than the railroad companies desired, which, it

might devote to this purpose? He answered, that the government had no

such tract of land as this. It had nothing comparable to it for the

purposes of the University: This was to be a school of mining, of

engineering, of the working of metals, of chemistry, zoology, botany,

manufactures, agriculture, in short of all the complicated industries

that make a state great. There was no place for the location of such a

school like the Knobs of East Tennessee. The hills abounded in metals of

all sorts, iron in all its combinations, copper, bismuth, gold and silver

in small quantities, platinum he--believed, tin, aluminium; it was

covered with forests and strange plants; in the woods were found the

coon, the opossum, the fox, the deer and many other animals who roamed in

the domain of natural history; coal existed in enormous quantity and no

doubt oil; it was such a place for the practice of agricultural

experiments that any student who had been successful there would have an

easy task in any other portion of the country.

No place offered equal facilities for experiments in mining, metallurgy,

engineering. He expected to live to see the day, when the youth of the

south would resort to its mines, its workshops, its laboratories, its

furnaces and factories for practical instruction in all the great

industrial pursuits.

A noisy and rather ill-natured debate followed, now, and lasted hour

after hour. The friends of the bill were instructed by the leaders to

make no effort to check it; it was deemed better strategy to tire out the

opposition; it was decided to vote down every proposition to adjourn, and

so continue the sitting into the night; opponents might desert, then, one

by one and weaken their party, for they had no personal stake in the

bill.

Sunset came, and still the fight went on; the gas was lit, the crowd in

the galleries began to thin, but the contest continued; the crowd

returned, by and by, with hunger and thirst appeased, and aggravated the

hungry and thirsty House by looking contented and comfortable; but still

the wrangle lost nothing of its bitterness. Recesses were moved

plaintively by the opposition, and invariably voted down by the

University army.

At midnight the House presented a spectacle calculated to interest a

stranger. The great galleries were still thronged--though only with men,

now; the bright colors that had made them look like hanging gardens were

gone, with the ladies. The reporters' gallery, was merely occupied by

one or two watchful sentinels of the quill-driving guild; the main body

cared nothing for a debate that had dwindled to a mere vaporing of dull

speakers and now and then a brief quarrel over a point of order; but

there was an unusually large attendance of journalists in the reporters'

waiting-room, chatting, smoking, and keeping on the 'qui vive' for the

general irruption of the Congressional volcano that must come when the

time was ripe for it. Senator Dilworthy and Philip were in the

Diplomatic Gallery; Washington sat in the public gallery, and Col.

Sellers was, not far away. The Colonel had been flying about the

corridors and button-holing Congressmen all the evening, and believed

that he had accomplished a world of valuable service; but fatigue was

telling upon him, now, and he was quiet and speechless--for once. Below,

a few Senators lounged upon the sofas set apart for visitors, and talked

with idle Congressmen. A dreary member was speaking; the presiding

officer was nodding; here and there little knots of members stood in the

aisles, whispering together; all about the House others sat in all the

various attitudes that express weariness; some, tilted back, had one or

more legs disposed upon their desks; some sharpened pencils indolently;

some scribbled aimlessly; some yawned and stretched; a great many lay

upon their breasts upon the desks, sound asleep and gently snoring.

The flooding gaslight from the fancifully wrought roof poured down upon

the tranquil scene. Hardly a sound disturbed the stillness, save the

monotonous eloquence of the gentleman who occupied the floor. Now and

then a warrior of the opposition broke down under the pressure, gave it

up, and went home.

Mr. Buckstone began to think it might be safe, now, to "proceed to

business." He consulted with Trollop and one or two others. Senator

Dilworthy descended to the floor of the House and they went to meet him.

After a brief comparison of notes, the Congressmen sought their seats and

sent pages about the House with messages to friends. These latter

instantly roused up, yawned, and began to look alert. The moment the

floor was unoccupied, Mr. Buckstone rose, with an injured look, and said

it was evident that the opponents of the bill were merely talking against

time, hoping in this unbecoming way to tire out the friends of the

measure and so defeat it. Such conduct might be respectable enough in a

village debating society, but it was trivial among statesmen, it was out

of place in so august an assemblage as the House of Representatives of

the United States. The friends of the bill had been not only willing

that its opponents should express their opinions, but had strongly

desired it. They courted the fullest and freest discussion; but it

seemed to him that this fairness was but illy appreciated, since

gentlemen were capable of taking advantage of it for selfish and unworthy

ends. This trifling had gone far enough. He called for the question.

The instant Mr. Buckstone sat down, the storm burst forth. A dozen

gentlemen sprang to their feet.

"Mr. Speaker!"

"Mr. Speaker!"

"Mr. Speaker!"

"Order! Order! Order! Question! Question!"

The sharp blows of the Speaker's gavel rose above the din.

The "previous question," that hated gag, was moved and carried. All

debate came to a sudden end, of course. Triumph No. 1.

Then the vote was taken on the adoption of the report and it carried by a

surprising majority.

Mr. Buckstone got the floor again and moved that the rules be suspended

and the bill read a first time.

Mr. Trollop--"Second the motion!"

The Speaker--"It is moved and--"

Clamor of Voices. "Move we adjourn! Second the motion! Adjourn!

Adjourn! Order! Order!"

The Speaker, (after using his gavel vigorously)--"It is moved and

seconded that the House do now adjourn. All those in favor--"

Voices--"Division! Division! Ayes and nays! Ayes and nays!"

It was decided to vote upon the adjournment by ayes and nays. This was

in earnest. The excitement was furious. The galleries were in commotion

in an instant, the reporters swarmed to their places. Idling members of

the House flocked to their seats, nervous gentlemen sprang to their feet,

pages flew hither and thither, life and animation were visible

everywhere, all the long ranks of faces in the building were kindled.

"This thing decides it!" thought Mr. Buckstone; "but let the fight

proceed."

The voting began, and every sound ceased but the calling if the names

and the "Aye!" "No!" "No!" "Aye!" of the responses. There was not a

movement in the House; the people seemed to hold their breath.

The voting ceased, and then there was an interval of dead silence while

the clerk made up his count. There was a two-thirds vote on the

University side--and two over.

The Speaker--"The rules are suspended, the motion is carried--first

reading of the bill!"

By one impulse the galleries broke forth into stormy applause, and even

some of the members of the House were not wholly able to restrain their

feelings. The Speaker's gavel came to the rescue and his clear voice

followed:

"Order, gentlemen--! The House will come to order! If spectators offend

again, the Sergeant-at-arms will clear the galleries!"

Then he cast his eyes aloft and gazed at some object attentively for a

moment. All eyes followed the direction of the Speaker's, and then there

was a general titter. The Speaker said:

"Let the Sergeant-at Arms inform the gentleman that his conduct is an

infringement of the dignity of the House--and one which is not warranted

by the state of the weather." Poor Sellers was the culprit. He sat in

the front seat of the gallery, with his arms and his tired body

overflowing the balustrade--sound asleep, dead to all excitements, all

disturbances. The fluctuations of the Washington weather had influenced

his dreams, perhaps, for during the recent tempest of applause he had

hoisted his gingham umbrella, and calmly gone on with his slumbers.

Washington Hawkins had seen the act, but was not near enough at hand to

save his friend, and no one who was near enough desired to spoil the

effect. But a neighbor stirred up the Colonel, now that the House had

its eye upon him, and the great speculator furled his tent like the Arab.

He said:

"Bless my soul, I'm so absent-minded when I, get to thinking! I never

wear an umbrella in the house--did anybody 'notice it'? What-asleep?

Indeed? And did you wake me sir? Thank you--thank you very much indeed.

It might have fallen out of my hands and been injured. Admirable

article, sir--present from a friend in Hong Kong; one doesn't come across

silk like that in this country--it's the real--Young Hyson, I'm told."

By this time the incident was forgotten, for the House was at war again.

Victory was almost in sight, now, and the friends of the bill threw

themselves into their work with enthusiasm. They soon moved and carried

its second reading, and after a strong, sharp fight, carried a motion to

go into Committee of the whole. The Speaker left his place, of course,

and a chairman was appointed.

Now the contest raged hotter than ever--for the authority that compels

order when the House sits as a House, is greatly diminished when it sits

as Committee. The main fight came upon the filling of the blanks with

the sum to be appropriated for the purchase of the land, of course.

Buckstone--"Mr. Chairman, I move you, sir, that the words 'three millions

of' be inserted."

Mr. Hadley--"Mr. Chairman, I move that the words two and a half dollars

be inserted."

Mr. Clawson--"Mr. Chairman, I move the insertion of the words five and

twenty cents, as representing the true value of this barren and isolated

tract of desolation."

The question, according to rule, was taken upon the smallest sum first.

It was lost.

Then upon the nest smallest sum. Lost, also.

And then upon the three millions. After a vigorous battle that lasted a

considerable time, this motion was carried.

Then, clause by clause the bill was read, discussed, and amended in

trifling particulars, and now the Committee rose and reported.

The moment the House had resumed its functions and received the report,

Mr. Buckstone moved and carried the third reading of the bill.

The same bitter war over the sum to be paid was fought over again, and

now that the ayes and nays could be called and placed on record, every

man was compelled to vote by name on the three millions, and indeed on

every paragraph of the bill from the enacting clause straight through.

But as before, the friends of the measure stood firm and voted in a solid

body every time, and so did its enemies.

The supreme moment was come, now, but so sure was the result that not

even a voice was raised to interpose an adjournment. The enemy were

totally demoralized. The bill was put upon its final passage almost

without dissent, and the calling of the ayes and nays began. When it was

ended the triumph was complete--the two-thirds vote held good, and a veto

was impossible, as far as the House was concerned!

Mr. Buckstone resolved that now that the nail was driven home, he would

clinch it on the other side and make it stay forever. He moved a

reconsideration of the vote by which the bill had passed. The motion was

lost, of course, and the great Industrial University act was an

accomplished fact as far as it was in the power of the House of

Representatives to make it so.

There was no need to move an adjournment. The instant the last motion

was decided, the enemies of the University rose and flocked out of the

Hall, talking angrily, and its friends flocked after them jubilant and

congratulatory. The galleries disgorged their burden, and presently the

house was silent and deserted.

When Col. Sellers and Washington stepped out of the building they were

surprised to find that the daylight was old and the sun well up. Said

the Colonel:

"Give me your hand, my boy! You're all right at last! You're a

millionaire! At least you're going to be. The thing is dead sure.

Don't you bother about the Senate. Leave me and Dilworthy to take care

of that. Run along home, now, and tell Laura. Lord, it's magnificent

news--perfectly magnificent! Run, now. I'll telegraph my wife. She

must come here and help me build a house. Everything's all right now!"

Washington was so dazed by his good fortune and so bewildered by the

gaudy pageant of dreams that was already trailing its long ranks through

his brain, that he wandered he knew not where, and so loitered by the way

that when at last he reached home he woke to a sudden annoyance in the

fact that his news must be old to Laura, now, for of course Senator

Dilworthy must have already been home and told her an hour before. He

knocked at her door, but there was no answer.

"That is like the Duchess," said he. "Always cool; a body can't excite

her-can't keep her excited, anyway. Now she has gone off to sleep again,

as comfortably as if she were used to picking up a million dollars every

day or two"

Then he vent to bed. But he could not sleep; so he got up and wrote a

long, rapturous letter to Louise, and another to his mother. And he

closed both to much the same effect:

"Laura will be queen of America, now, and she will be applauded, and

honored and petted by the whole nation. Her name will be in every

one's mouth more than ever, and how they will court her and quote

her bright speeches. And mine, too, I suppose; though they do that

more already, than they really seem to deserve. Oh, the world is so

bright, now, and so cheery; the clouds are all gone, our long

struggle is ended, our, troubles are all over. Nothing can ever

make us unhappy any more. You dear faithful ones will have the

reward of your patient waiting now. How father's Wisdom is proven

at last! And how I repent me, that there have been times when I

lost faith and said, the blessing he stored up for us a tedious

generation ago was but a long-drawn curse, a blight upon us all.

But everything is well, now--we are done with poverty, sad toil,

weariness and heart-break; all the world is filled with sunshine."

CHAPTER XLVI.

Philip left the capitol and walked up Pennsylvania Avenue in company with

Senator Dilworthy. It was a bright spring morning, the air was soft and

inspiring; in the deepening wayside green, the pink flush of the

blossoming peach trees, the soft suffusion on the heights of Arlington,

and the breath of the warm south wind was apparent, the annual miracle of

the resurrection of the earth.

The Senator took off his hat and seemed to open his soul to the sweet

influences of the morning. After the heat and noise of the chamber,

under its dull gas-illuminated glass canopy, and the all night struggle

of passion and feverish excitement there, the open, tranquil world seemed

like Heaven. The Senator was not in an exultant mood, but rather in a

condition of holy joy, befitting a Christian statesman whose benevolent

plans Providence has made its own and stamped with approval. The great

battle had been fought, but the measure had still to encounter the

scrutiny of the Senate, and Providence sometimes acts differently in the

two Houses. Still the Senator was tranquil, for he knew that there is an

esprit de corps in the Senate which does not exist in the House, the

effect of which is to make the members complaisant towards the projects

of each other, and to extend a mutual aid which in a more vulgar body

would be called "log-rolling."

"It is, under Providence, a good night's work, Mr. Sterling. The

government has founded an institution which will remove half the

difficulty from the southern problem. And it is a good thing for the

Hawkins heirs, a very good thing. Laura will be almost a millionaire."

"Do you think, Mr. Dilworthy, that the Hawkinses will get much of the

money?" asked Philip innocently, remembering the fate of the Columbus

River appropriation.

The Senator looked at his companion scrutinizingly for a moment to see if

he meant any thing personal, and then replied,

"Undoubtedly, undoubtedly. I have had their interests greatly at heart.

There will of course be a few expenses, but the widow and orphans will

realize all that Mr. Hawkins, dreamed of for them."

The birds were singing as they crossed the Presidential Square, now

bright with its green turf and tender foliage. After the two had gained

the steps of the Senator's house they stood a moment, looking upon the

lovely prospect:

"It is like the peace of God," said the Senator devoutly.

Entering the house, the Senator called a servant and said, "Tell Miss

Laura that we are waiting to see her. I ought to have sent a messenger

on horseback half an hour ago," he added to Philip, "she will be

transported with our victory. You must stop to breakfast, and see the

excitement." The servant soon came back, with a wondering look and

reported,

"Miss Laura ain't dah, sah. I reckon she hain't been dah all night!"

The Senator and Philip both started up. In Laura's room there were the

marks of a confused and hasty departure, drawers half open, little

articles strewn on the floor. The bed had not been disturbed. Upon

inquiry it appeared that Laura had not been at dinner, excusing herself

to Mrs. Dilworthy on the plea of a violent headache; that she made a

request to the servants that she might not be disturbed.

The Senator was astounded. Philip thought at once of Col. Selby. Could

Laura have run away with him? The Senator thought not. In fact it could

not be. Gen. Leffenwell, the member from New Orleans, had casually told

him at the house last night that Selby and his family went to New York

yesterday morning and were to sail for Europe to-day.

Philip had another idea which, he did not mention. He seized his hat,

and saying that he would go and see what he could learn, ran to the

lodgings of Harry; whom he had not seen since yesterday afternoon, when

he left him to go to the House.

Harry was not in. He had gone out with a hand-bag before six o'clock

yesterday, saying that he had to go to New York, but should return next

day. In Harry's-room on the table Philip found this note:

"Dear Mr. Brierly:--Can you meet me at the six o'clock train,

and be my escort to New York? I have to go about this

University bill, the vote of an absent member we must have

here, Senator Dilworthy cannot go.

Yours, L. H."

"Confound it," said Phillip, "the noodle has fallen into her trap. And

she promised she would let him alone."

He only stopped to send a note to Senator Dilworthy, telling him what he

had found, and that he should go at once to New York, and then hastened

to the railway station. He had to wait an hour for a train, and when it

did start it seemed to go at a snail's pace.

Philip was devoured with anxiety. Where could they, have gone? What was

Laura's object in taking Harry? Had the flight anything to do with

Selby? Would Harry be such a fool as to be dragged into some public

scandal?

It seemed as if the train would never reach Baltimore. Then there was a

long delay at Havre de Grace. A hot box had to be cooled at Wilmington.

Would it never get on? Only in passing around the city of Philadelphia

did the train not seem to go slow. Philip stood upon the platform and

watched for the Boltons' house, fancied he could distinguish its roof

among the trees, and wondered how Ruth would feel if she knew he was so

near her.

Then came Jersey, everlasting Jersey, stupid irritating Jersey, where the

passengers are always asking which line they are on, and where they are

to come out, and whether they have yet reached Elizabeth. Launched into

Jersey, one has a vague notion that he is on many lines and no one in

particular, and that he is liable at any moment to come to Elizabeth.

He has no notion what Elizabeth is, and always resolves that the next

time he goes that way, he will look out of the window and see what it is

like; but he never does. Or if he does, he probably finds that it is

Princeton or something of that sort. He gets annoyed, and never can see

the use of having different names for stations in Jersey. By and by.

there is Newark, three or four Newarks apparently; then marshes; then

long rock cuttings devoted to the advertisements of 'patent medicines and

ready-made, clothing, and New York tonics for Jersey agues, and Jersey

City is reached.

On the ferry-boat Philip bought an evening paper from a boy crying

"'Ere's the Evening Gram, all about the murder," and with breathless

haste--ran his eyes over the following:

SHOCKING MURDER!!!

TRAGEDY IN HIGH LIFE!! A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN SHOOTS A DISTINGUISHED

CONFEDERATE SOLDIER AT THE SOUTHERN HOTEL!!! JEALOUSY THE CAUSE!!!

This morning occurred another of those shocking murders which have

become the almost daily food of the newspapers, the direct result of

the socialistic doctrines and woman's rights agitations, which have

made every woman the avenger of her own wrongs, and all society the

hunting ground for her victims.

About nine o'clock a lady deliberately shot a man dead in the public

parlor of the Southern Hotel, coolly remarking, as she threw down

her revolver and permitted herself to be taken into custody, "He

brought it on himself." Our reporters were immediately dispatched

to the scene of the tragedy, and gathered the following particulars.

Yesterday afternoon arrived at the hotel from Washington, Col.

George Selby and family, who had taken passage and were to sail at

noon to-day in the steamer Scotia for England. The Colonel was a

handsome man about forty, a gentleman Of wealth and high social

position, a resident of New Orleans. He served with distinction in

the confederate army, and received a wound in the leg from which he

has never entirely recovered, being obliged to use a cane in

locomotion.

This morning at about nine o'clock, a lady, accompanied by a

gentleman, called at the office Of the hotel and asked for Col.

Selby. The Colonel was at breakfast. Would the clerk tell him that

a lady and gentleman wished to see him for a moment in the parlor?

The clerk says that the gentleman asked her, "What do you want to

see him for?" and that she replied, "He is going to Europe, and I

ought to just say good by."

Col. Selby was informed; and the lady and gentleman were shown to

the parlor, in which were at the time three or four other persons.

Five minutes after two shots were fired in quick succession, and

there was a rush to the parlor from which the reports came.

Col. Selby was found lying on the floor, bleeding, but not dead.

Two gentlemen, who had just come in, had seized the lady, who made

no resistance, and she was at once given in charge of a police

officer who arrived. The persons who were in the parlor agree

substantially as to what occurred. They had happened to be looking

towards the door when the man--Col. Selby--entered with his cane,

and they looked at him, because he stopped as if surprised and

frightened, and made a backward movement. At the same moment the

lady in the bonnet advanced towards him and said something like,

"George, will you go with me?" He replied, throwing up his hand and

retreating, "My God I can't, don't fire," and the next instants two

shots were heard and he fell. The lady appeared to be beside

herself with rage or excitement, and trembled very much when the

gentlemen took hold of her; it was to them she said, "He brought it

on himself."

Col. Selby was carried at once to his room and Dr. Puffer, the

eminent surgeon was sent for. It was found that he was shot through

the breast and through the abdomen. Other aid was summoned, but the

wounds were mortal, and Col Selby expired in an hour, in pain, but

his mind was clear to the last and he made a full deposition. The

substance of it was that his murderess is a Miss Laura Hawkins, whom

he had known at Washington as a lobbyist and had some business with

her. She had followed him with her attentions and solicitations,

and had endeavored to make him desert his wife and go to Europe with

her. When he resisted and avoided her she had threatened him. Only

the day before he left Washington she had declared that he should

never go out of the city alive without her.

It seems to have been a deliberate and premeditated murder, the

woman following him to Washington on purpose to commit it.

We learn that the, murderess, who is a woman of dazzling and

transcendent beauty and about twenty six or seven, is a niece of

Senator Dilworthy at whose house she has been spending the winter.

She belongs to a high Southern family, and has the reputation of

being an heiress. Like some other great beauties and belles in

Washington however there have been whispers that she had something

to do with the lobby. If we mistake not we have heard her name

mentioned in connection with the sale of the Tennessee Lands to the

Knobs University, the bill for which passed the House last night.

Her companion is Mr. Harry Brierly, a New York dandy, who has been

in Washington. His connection with her and with this tragedy is not

known, but he was also taken into custody, and will be detained at

least as a witness.

P. S. One of the persons present in the parlor says that after

Laura Hawkins had fired twice, she turned the pistol towards

herself, but that Brierly sprung and caught it from her hand, and

that it was he who threw it on the floor.

Further particulars with full biographies of all the parties in our

next edition.

Philip hastened at once to the Southern Hotel, where he found still a

great state of excitement, and a thousand different and exaggerated

stories passing from mouth to mouth. The witnesses of the event had told

it over so many time that they had worked it up into a most dramatic

scene, and embellished it with whatever could heighten its awfulness.

Outsiders had taken up invention also. The Colonel's wife had gone

insane, they said. The children had rushed into the parlor and rolled

themselves in their father's blood. The hotel clerk said that he noticed

there was murder in the woman's eye when he saw her. A person who had

met the woman on the stairs felt a creeping sensation. Some thought

Brierly was an accomplice, and that he had set the woman on to kill his

rival. Some said the woman showed the calmness and indifference of

insanity.

Philip learned that Harry and Laura had both been taken to the city

prison, and he went there; but he was not admitted. Not being a

newspaper reporter, he could not see either of them that night; but the

officer questioned him suspiciously and asked him who he was. He might

perhaps see Brierly in the morning.

The latest editions of the evening papers had the result of the inquest.

It was a plain enough case for the jury, but they sat over it a long

time, listening to the wrangling of the physicians. Dr. Puffer insisted

that the man died from the effects of the wound in the chest. Dr. Dobb

as strongly insisted that the wound in the abdomen caused death. Dr.

Golightly suggested that in his opinion death ensued from a complication

of the two wounds and perhaps other causes. He examined the table

waiter, as to whether Col. Selby ate any breakfast, and what he ate, and

if he had any appetite.

The jury finally threw themselves back upon the indisputable fact that

Selby was dead, that either wound would have killed him (admitted by the

doctors), and rendered a verdict that he died from pistol-shot wounds

inflicted by a pistol in the hands of Laura Hawkins.

The morning papers blazed with big type, and overflowed with details of

the murder. The accounts in the evening papers were only the premonitory

drops to this mighty shower. The scene was dramatically worked up in

column after column. There were sketches, biographical and historical.

There were long "specials" from Washington, giving a full history of

Laura's career there, with the names of men with whom she was said to be

intimate, a description of Senator Dilworthy's residence and of his

family, and of Laura's room in his house, and a sketch of the Senator's

appearance and what he said. There was a great deal about her beauty,

her accomplishments and her brilliant position in society, and her

doubtful position in society. There was also an interview with Col.

Sellers and another with Washington Hawkins, the brother of the

murderess. One journal had a long dispatch from Hawkeye, reporting the

excitement in that quiet village and the reception of the awful

intelligence.

All the parties had been "interviewed." There were reports of

conversations with the clerk at the hotel; with the call-boy; with the

waiter at table with all the witnesses, with the policeman, with the

landlord (who wanted it understood that nothing of that sort had ever

happened in his house before, although it had always been frequented by

the best Southern society,) and with Mrs. Col. Selby. There were

diagrams illustrating the scene of the shooting, and views of the hotel

and street, and portraits of the parties. There were three minute and

different statements from the doctors about the wounds, so technically

worded that nobody could understand them. Harry and Laura had also been

"interviewed" and there was a statement from Philip himself, which a

reporter had knocked him up out of bed at midnight to give, though how he

found him, Philip never could conjecture.

What some of the journals lacked in suitable length for the occasion,

they made up in encyclopaedic information about other similar murders and

shootings.

The statement from Laura was not full, in fact it was fragmentary, and

consisted of nine parts of, the reporter's valuable observations to one

of Laura's, and it was, as the reporter significantly remarked,

"incoherent", but it appeared that Laura claimed to be Selby's wife,

or to have been his wife, that he had deserted her and betrayed her, and

that she was going to follow him to Europe. When the reporter asked:

"What made you shoot him Miss. Hawkins?"

Laura's only reply was, very simply,

"Did I shoot him? Do they say I shot him?". And she would say no more.

The news of the murder was made the excitement of the day. Talk of it

filled the town. The facts reported were scrutinized, the standing of

the parties was discussed, the dozen different theories of the motive,

broached in the newspapers, were disputed over.

During the night subtle electricity had carried the tale over all the

wires of the continent and under the sea; and in all villages and towns

of the Union, from the. Atlantic to the territories, and away up and

down the Pacific slope, and as far as London and Paris and Berlin, that

morning the name of Laura Hawkins was spoken by millions and millions of

people, while the owner of it--the sweet child of years ago, the

beautiful queen of Washington drawing rooms--sat shivering on her cot-bed

in the darkness of a damp cell in the Tombs.

CHAPTER XLVII.

Philip's first effort was to get Harry out of the Tombs. He gained

permission to see him, in the presence of an officer, during the day,

and he found that hero very much cast down.

"I never intended to come to such a place as this, old fellow," he said

to Philip; "it's no place for a gentleman, they've no idea how to treat a

gentleman. Look at that provender," pointing to his uneaten prison

ration. "They tell me I am detained as a witness, and I passed the night

among a lot of cut-throats and dirty rascals--a pretty witness I'd be in

a month spent in such company."

"But what under heavens," asked Philip, "induced you to come to New York

with Laura! What was it for?"

"What for? Why, she wanted me to come. I didn't know anything about

that cursed Selby. She said it was lobby business for the University.

I'd no idea what she was dragging me into that confounded hotel for.

I suppose she knew that the Southerners all go there, and thought she'd

find her man. Oh! Lord, I wish I'd taken your advice. You might as

well murder somebody and have the credit of it, as get into the

newspapers the way I have. She's pure devil, that girl. You ought to

have seen how sweet she was on me; what an ass I am."

"Well, I'm not going to dispute a poor, prisoner. But the first thing is

to get you out of this. I've brought the note Laura wrote you, for one

thing, and I've seen your uncle, and explained the truth of the case to

him. He will be here soon."

Harry's uncle came, with; other friends, and in the course of the day

made such a showing to the authorities that Harry was released, on giving

bonds to appear as a witness when wanted. His spirits rose with their

usual elasticity as soon as he was out of Centre Street, and he insisted

on giving Philip and his friends a royal supper at Delmonico's, an excess

which was perhaps excusable in the rebound of his feelings, and which was

committed with his usual reckless generosity. Harry ordered, the supper,

and it is perhaps needless to say, that Philip paid the bill.

Neither of the young men felt like attempting to see Laura that day,

and she saw no company except the newspaper reporters, until the arrival

of Col. Sellers and Washington Hawkins, who had hastened to New York

with all speed.

They found Laura in a cell in the upper tier of the women's department.

The cell was somewhat larger than those in the men's department, and

might be eight feet by ten square, perhaps a little longer. It was of

stone, floor and all, and tile roof was oven shaped. A narrow slit in

the roof admitted sufficient light, and was the only means of

ventilation; when the window was opened there was nothing to prevent the

rain coming in. The only means of heating being from the corridor, when

the door was ajar, the cell was chilly and at this time damp. It was

whitewashed and clean, but it had a slight jail odor; its only furniture

was a narrow iron bedstead, with a tick of straw and some blankets, not

too clean.

When Col. Sellers was conducted to this cell by the matron and looked

in, his emotions quite overcame him, the tears rolled down his cheeks and

his voice trembled so that he could hardly speak. Washington was unable

to say anything; he looked from Laura to the miserable creatures who were

walking in the corridor with unutterable disgust. Laura was alone calm

and self-contained, though she was not unmoved by the sight of the grief

of her friends.

"Are you comfortable, Laura?" was the first word the Colonel could get

out.

"You see," she replied. "I can't say it's exactly comfortable."

"Are you cold?"

"It is pretty chilly. The stone floor is like ice. It chills me through

to step on it. I have to sit on the bed."

"Poor thing, poor thing. And can you eat any thing?"

"No, I am not hungry. I don't know that I could eat any thing, I can't

eat that."

"Oh dear," continued the Colonel, "it's dreadful. But cheer up, dear,

cheer up;" and the Colonel broke down entirely.

"But," he went on, "we'll stand by you. We'll do everything for you.

I know you couldn't have meant to do it, it must have been insanity, you

know, or something of that sort. You never did anything of the sort

before."

Laura smiled very faintly and said,

"Yes, it was something of that sort. It's all a whirl. He was a

villain; you don't know."

"I'd rather have killed him myself, in a duel you know, all fair. I wish

I had. But don't you be down. We'll get you the best counsel, the

lawyers in New York can do anything; I've read of cases. But you must be

comfortable now. We've brought some of your clothes, at the hotel. What

else, can we get for you?"

Laura suggested that she would like some sheets for her bed, a piece of

carpet to step on, and her meals sent in; and some books and writing

materials if it was allowed. The Colonel and Washington promised to

procure all these things, and then took their sorrowful leave, a great

deal more affected than the criminal was, apparently, by her situation.

The colonel told the matron as he went away that if she would look to

Laura's comfort a little it shouldn't be the worse for her; and to the

turnkey who let them out he patronizingly said,

"You've got a big establishment here, a credit to the city. I've got a

friend in there--I shall see you again, sir."

By the next day something more of Laura's own story began to appear in

the newspapers, colored and heightened by reporters' rhetoric. Some of

them cast a lurid light upon the Colonel's career, and represented his

victim as a beautiful avenger of her murdered innocence; and others

pictured her as his willing paramour and pitiless slayer. Her

communications to the reporters were stopped by her lawyers as soon as

they were retained and visited her, but this fact did not prevent--it may

have facilitated--the appearance of casual paragraphs here and there

which were likely to beget popular sympathy for the poor girl.

The occasion did not pass without "improvement" by the leading journals;

and Philip preserved the editorial comments of three or four of them

which pleased him most. These he used to read aloud to his friends

afterwards and ask them to guess from which journal each of them had been

cut. One began in this simple manner:--

History never repeats itself, but the Kaleidoscopic combinations of

the pictured present often seem to be constructed out of the broken

fragments of antique legends. Washington is not Corinth, and Lais,

the beautiful daughter of Timandra, might not have been the

prototype of the ravishing Laura, daughter of the plebeian house of

Hawkins; but the orators add statesmen who were the purchasers of

the favors of the one, may have been as incorruptible as the

Republican statesmen who learned how to love and how to vote from

the sweet lips of the Washington lobbyist; and perhaps the modern

Lais would never have departed from the national Capital if there

had been there even one republican Xenocrates who resisted her

blandishments. But here the parallel: fails. Lais, wandering away

with the youth Rippostratus, is slain by the women who are jealous

of her charms. Laura, straying into her Thessaly with the youth

Brierly, slays her other lover and becomes the champion of the

wrongs of her sex.

Another journal began its editorial with less lyrical beauty, but with

equal force. It closed as follows:--

With Laura Hawkins, fair, fascinating and fatal, and with the

dissolute Colonel of a lost cause, who has reaped the harvest he

sowed, we have nothing to do. But as the curtain rises on this

awful tragedy, we catch a glimpse of the society at the capital

under this Administration, which we cannot contemplate without alarm

for the fate of the Republic.

A third newspaper took up the subject in a different tone. It said:--

Our repeated predictions are verified. The pernicious doctrines

which we have announced as prevailing in American society have been

again illustrated. The name of the city is becoming a reproach.

We may have done something in averting its ruin in our resolute

exposure of the Great Frauds; we shall not be deterred from

insisting that the outraged laws for the protection of human life

shall be vindicated now, so that a person can walk the streets or

enter the public houses, at least in the day-time, without the risk

of a bullet through his brain.

A fourth journal began its remarks as follows:--

The fullness with which we present our readers this morning the

details of the Selby-Hawkins homicide is a miracle of modern

journalism. Subsequent investigation can do little to fill out the

picture. It is the old story. A beautiful woman shoots her

absconding lover in cold-blood; and we shall doubtless learn in due

time that if she was not as mad as a hare in this month of March,

she was at least laboring under what is termed "momentary insanity."

It would not be too much to say that upon the first publication of the

facts of the tragedy, there was an almost universal feeling of rage

against the murderess in the Tombs, and that reports of her beauty only

heightened the indignation. It was as if she presumed upon that and upon

her sex, to defy the law; and there was a fervent, hope that the law

would take its plain course.

Yet Laura was not without friends, and some of them very influential too.

She had in keeping a great many secrets and a great many reputations,

perhaps. Who shall set himself up to judge human motives. Why, indeed,

might we not feel pity for a woman whose brilliant career had been so

suddenly extinguished in misfortune and crime? Those who had known her

so well in Washington might find it impossible to believe that the

fascinating woman could have had murder in her heart, and would readily

give ear to the current sentimentality about the temporary aberration of

mind under the stress of personal calamity.

Senator Dilworthy, was greatly shocked, of course, but he was full of

charity for the erring.

"We shall all need mercy," he said. "Laura as an inmate of my family was

a most exemplary female, amiable, affectionate and truthful, perhaps too

fond of gaiety, and neglectful of the externals of religion, but a woman

of principle. She may have had experiences of which I am ignorant, but

she could not have gone to this extremity if she had been in her own

right mind."

To the Senator's credit be it said, he was willing to help Laura and her

family in this dreadful trial. She, herself, was not without money, for

the Washington lobbyist is not seldom more fortunate than the Washington

claimant, and she was able to procure a good many luxuries to mitigate

the severity of her prison life. It enabled her also to have her own

family near her, and to see some of them daily. The tender solicitude of

her mother, her childlike grief, and her firm belief in the real

guiltlessness of her daughter, touched even the custodians of the Tombs

who are enured to scenes of pathos.

Mrs. Hawkins had hastened to her daughter as soon as she received money

for the journey. She had no reproaches, she had only tenderness and

pity. She could not shut out the dreadful facts of the case, but it had

been enough for her that Laura had said, in their first interview,

"mother, I did not know what I was doing." She obtained lodgings near,

the prison and devoted her life to her daughter, as if she had been

really her own child. She would have remained in the prison day and

night if it had been permitted. She was aged and feeble, but this great

necessity seemed to give her new life.

The pathetic story of the old lady's ministrations, and her simplicity

and faith, also got into the newspapers in time, and probably added to

the pathos of this wrecked woman's fate, which was beginning to be felt

by the public. It was certain that she had champions who thought that

her wrongs ought to be placed against her crime, and expressions of this

feeling came to her in various ways. Visitors came to see her, and gifts

of fruit and flowers were sent, which brought some cheer into her hard

and gloomy cell.

Laura had declined to see either Philip or Harry, somewhat to the

former's relief, who had a notion that she would necessarily feel

humiliated by seeing him after breaking faith with him, but to the

discomfiture of Harry, who still felt her fascination, and thought her

refusal heartless. He told Philip that of course he had got through with

such a woman, but he wanted to see her.

Philip, to keep him from some new foolishness, persuaded him to go with

him to Philadelphia; and, give his valuable services in the mining

operations at Ilium.

The law took its course with Laura. She was indicted for murder in the

first degree and held for trial at the summer term. The two most

distinguished criminal lawyers in the city had been retained for her

defence, and to that the resolute woman devoted her days with a courage

that rose as she consulted with her counsel and understood the methods of

criminal procedure in New York.

She was greatly depressed, however, by the news from Washington.

Congress adjourned and her bill had failed to pass the Senate. It must

wait for the next session.

CHAPTER XLVIII

It had been a bad winter, somehow, for the firm of Pennybacker, Bigler

and Small. These celebrated contractors usually made more money during

the session of the legislature at Harrisburg than upon all their summer

work, and this winter had been unfruitful. It was unaccountable to

Bigler.

"You see, Mr. Bolton," he said, and Philip was present at the

conversation, "it puts us all out. It looks as if politics was played

out. We'd counted on the year of Simon's re-election. And, now, he's

reelected, and I've yet to see the first man who's the better for it."

"You don't mean to say," asked Philip, "that he went in without paying

anything?"

"Not a cent, not a dash cent, as I can hear," repeated Mr. Bigler,

indignantly. "I call it a swindle on the state. How it was done gets

me. I never saw such a tight time for money in Harrisburg."

"Were there no combinations, no railroad jobs, no mining schemes put

through in connection with the election?

"Not that I knew," said Bigler, shaking his head in disgust. "In fact it

was openly said, that there was no money in the election. It's perfectly

unheard of."

"Perhaps," suggested Philip, "it was effected on what the insurance

companies call the 'endowment,' or the 'paid up' plan, by which a policy

is secured after a certain time without further payment."

"You think then," said Mr. Bolton smiling, "that a liberal and sagacious

politician might own a legislature after a time, and not be bothered with

keeping up his payments?"

"Whatever it is," interrupted Mr. Bigler, "it's devilish ingenious and

goes ahead of my calculations; it's cleaned me out, when I thought we had

a dead sure thing. I tell you what it is, gentlemen, I shall go in for

reform. Things have got pretty mixed when a legislature will give away a

United States senatorship."

It was melancholy, but Mr. Bigler was not a man to be crushed by one

misfortune, or to lose his confidence in human nature, on one exhibition

of apparent honesty. He was already on his feet again, or would be if

Mr. Bolton could tide him over shoal water for ninety days.

"We've got something with money in it," he explained to Mr. Bolton,

"got hold of it by good luck. We've got the entire contract for Dobson's

Patent Pavement for the city of Mobile. See here."

Mr. Bigler made some figures; contract so; much, cost of work and

materials so much, profits so much. At the end of three months the city

would owe the company three hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars-two

hundred thousand of that would be profits. The whole job was worth at

least a million to the company--it might be more. There could be no

mistake in these figures; here was the contract, Mr. Bolton knew what

materials were worth and what the labor would cost.

Mr. Bolton knew perfectly well from sore experience that there was always

a mistake in figures when Bigler or Small made them, and he knew that he

ought to send the fellow about his business. Instead of that, he let him

talk.

They only wanted to raise fifty thousand dollars to carry on the

contract--that expended they would have city bonds. Mr. Bolton said he

hadn't the money. But Bigler could raise it on his name. Mr. Bolton

said he had no right to put his family to that risk. But the entire

contract could be assigned to him--the security was ample--it was a

fortune to him if it was forfeited. Besides Mr. Bigler had been

unfortunate, he didn't know where to look for the necessaries of life for

his family. If he could only have one more chance, he was sure he could

right himself. He begged for it.

And Mr. Bolton yielded. He could never refuse such appeals. If he had

befriended a man once and been cheated by him, that man appeared to have

a claim upon him forever. He shrank, however, from telling his wife what

he had done on this occasion, for he knew that if any person was more

odious than Small to his family it was Bigler.

"Philip tells me," Mrs. Bolton said that evening, "that the man Bigler

has been with thee again to-day. I hope thee will have nothing more to

do with him."

"He has been very unfortunate," replied Mr. Bolton, uneasily.

"He is always unfortunate, and he is always getting thee into trouble.

But thee didn't listen to him again?"

"Well, mother, his family is in want, and I lent him my name--but I took

ample security. The worst that can happen will be a little

inconvenience."

Mrs. Bolton looked grave and anxious, but she did not complain or

remonstrate; she knew what a "little inconvenience" meant, but she knew

there was no help for it. If Mr. Bolton had been on his way to market to

buy a dinner for his family with the only dollar he had in the world in

his pocket, he would have given it to a chance beggar who asked him for

it. Mrs. Bolton only asked (and the question showed that she was no mere

provident than her husband where her heart was interested),

"But has thee provided money for Philip to use in opening the coal mine?"

"Yes, I have set apart as much as it ought to cost to open the mine,

as much as we can afford to lose if no coal is found. Philip has the

control of it, as equal partner in the venture, deducting the capital

invested. He has great confidence in his success, and I hope for his

sake he won't be disappointed."

Philip could not but feel that he was treated very much like one of the

Bolton-family--by all except Ruth. His mother, when he went home after

his recovery from his accident, had affected to be very jealous of Mrs.

Bolton, about whom and Ruth she asked a thousand questions

--an affectation of jealousy which no doubt concealed a real heartache,

which comes to every mother when her son goes out into the world and

forms new ties. And to Mrs. Sterling; a widow, living on a small income

in a remote Massachusetts village, Philadelphia was a city of many

splendors. All its inhabitants seemed highly favored, dwelling in ease

and surrounded by superior advantages. Some of her neighbors had

relations living in Philadelphia, and it seemed to them somehow a

guarantee of respectability to have relations in Philadelphia.

Mrs. Sterling was not sorry to have Philip make his way among such

well-to-do people, and she was sure that no good fortune could be too

good for his deserts.

"So, sir," said Ruth, when Philip came from New York, "you have been

assisting in a pretty tragedy. I saw your name in the papers. Is this

woman a specimen of your western friends?"

"My only assistance," replied Philip, a little annoyed, was in trying to

keep Harry out of a bad scrape, and I failed after all. He walked into

her trap, and he has been punished for it. I'm going to take him up to

Ilium to see if he won't work steadily at one thing, and quit his

nonsense."

"Is she as beautiful as the newspapers say she is?"

"I don't know, she has a kind of beauty--she is not like--'

"Not like Alice?"

"Well, she is brilliant; she was called the handsomest woman in

Washington--dashing, you know, and sarcastic and witty. Ruth, do you

believe a woman ever becomes a devil?"

"Men do, and I don't know why women shouldn't. But I never saw one."

"Well, Laura Hawkins comes very near it. But it is dreadful to think of

her fate."

"Why, do you suppose they will hang a woman? Do you suppose they will be

so barbarous as that?"

"I wasn't thinking of that--it's doubtful if a New York jury would find a

woman guilty of any such crime. But to think of her life if she is

acquitted."

"It is dreadful," said Ruth, thoughtfully, "but the worst of it is that

you men do not want women educated to do anything, to be able to earn an

honest living by their own exertions. They are educated as if they were

always to be petted and supported, and there was never to be any such

thing as misfortune. I suppose, now, that you would all choose to have

me stay idly at home, and give up my profession."

"Oh, no," said Philip, earnestly, "I respect your resolution. But,

Ruth, do you think you would be happier or do more good in following your

profession than in having a home of your own?"

"What is to hinder having a home of my, own?"

"Nothing, perhaps, only you never would be in it--you would be away day

and night, if you had any practice; and what sort of a home would that

make for your husband?"

"What sort of a home is it for the wife whose husband is always away

riding about in his doctor's gig?"

"Ah, you know that is not fair. The woman makes the home."

Philip and Ruth often had this sort of discussion, to which Philip was

always trying to give a personal turn. He was now about to go to Ilium

for the season, and he did not like to go without some assurance from

Ruth that she might perhaps love him some day; when he was worthy of it,

and when he could offer her something better than a partnership in his

poverty.

"I should work with a great deal better heart, Ruth," he said the morning

he was taking leave, "if I knew you cared for me a little."

Ruth was looking down; the color came faintly to her cheeks, and she

hesitated. She needn't be looking down, he thought, for she was ever so

much shorter than tall Philip.

"It's not much of a place, Ilium," Philip went on, as if a little

geographical remark would fit in here as well as anything else, "and I

shall have plenty of time to think over the responsibility I have taken,

and--" his observation did not seem to be coming out any where.

But Ruth looked up, and there was a light in her eyes that quickened

Phil's pulse. She took his hand, and said with serious sweetness:

"Thee mustn't lose heart, Philip." And then she added, in another mood,

"Thee knows I graduate in the summer and shall have my diploma. And if

any thing happens--mines explode sometimes--thee can send for me.

Farewell."

The opening of the Ilium coal mine was begun with energy, but without

many omens of success. Philip was running a tunnel into the breast of

the mountain, in faith that the coal stratum ran there as it ought to.

How far he must go in he believed he knew, but no one could tell exactly.

Some of the miners said that they should probably go through the

mountain, and that the hole could be used for a railway tunnel. The

mining camp was a busy place at any rate. Quite a settlement of board

and log shanties had gone up, with a blacksmith shop, a small machine

shop, and a temporary store for supplying the wants of the workmen.

Philip and Harry pitched a commodious tent, and lived in the full

enjoyment of the free life.

There is no difficulty in digging a bole in the ground, if you have money

enough to pay for the digging, but those who try this sort of work are

always surprised at the large amount of money necessary to make a small

hole. The earth is never willing to yield one product, hidden in her

bosom, without an equivalent for it. And when a person asks of her coal,

she is quite apt to require gold in exchange.

It was exciting work for all concerned in it. As the tunnel advanced

into the rock every day promised to be the golden day. This very blast

might disclose the treasure.

The work went on week after week, and at length during the night as well

as the daytime. Gangs relieved each other, and the tunnel was every

hour, inch by inch and foot by foot, crawling into the mountain. Philip

was on the stretch of hope and excitement. Every pay day he saw his

funds melting away, and still there was only the faintest show of what

the miners call "signs."

The life suited Harry, whose buoyant hopefulness was never disturbed.

He made endless calculations, which nobody could understand, of the

probable position of the vein. He stood about among the workmen with the

busiest air. When he was down at Ilium he called himself the engineer of

the works, and he used to spend hours smoking his pipe with the Dutch

landlord on the hotel porch, and astonishing the idlers there with the

stories of his railroad operations in Missouri. He talked with the

landlord, too, about enlarging his hotel, and about buying some village

lots, in the prospect of a rise, when the mine was opened. He taught the

Dutchman how to mix a great many cooling drinks for the summer time, and

had a bill at the hotel, the growing length of which Mr. Dusenheimer

contemplated with pleasant anticipations. Mr. Brierly was a very useful

and cheering person wherever he went.

Midsummer arrived: Philip could report to Mr. Bolton only progress, and

this was not a cheerful message for him to send to Philadelphia in reply

to inquiries that he thought became more and more anxious. Philip

himself was a prey to the constant fear that the money would give out

before the coal was struck.

At this time Harry was summoned to New York, to attend the trial of Laura

Hawkins. It was possible that Philip would have to go also, her lawyer

wrote, but they hoped for a postponement. There was important evidence

that they could not yet obtain, and he hoped the judge would not force

them to a trial unprepared. There were many reasons for a delay, reasons

which of course are never mentioned, but which it would seem that a New

York judge sometimes must understand, when he grants a postponement upon

a motion that seems to the public altogether inadequate.

Harry went, but he soon came back. The trial was put off. Every week we

can gain, said the learned counsel, Braham, improves our chances. The

popular rage never lasts long.

CHAPTER XLIX.

"We've struck it!"

This was the announcement at the tent door that woke Philip out of a

sound sleep at dead of night, and shook all the sleepiness out of him in

a trice.

"What! Where is it? When? Coal? Let me see it. What quality is it?"

were some of the rapid questions that Philip poured out as he hurriedly

dressed. "Harry, wake up, my boy, the coal train is coming. Struck it,

eh? Let's see?"

The foreman put down his lantern, and handed Philip a black lump. There

was no mistake about it, it was the hard, shining anthracite, and its

freshly fractured surface, glistened in the light like polished steel.

Diamond never shone with such lustre in the eyes of Philip.

Harry was exuberant, but Philip's natural caution found expression in his

next remark.

"Now, Roberts, you are sure about this?"

"What--sure that it's coal?"

"O, no, sure that it's the main vein."

"Well, yes. We took it to be that"

"Did you from the first?"

"I can't say we did at first. No, we didn't. Most of the indications

were there, but not all of them, not all of them. So we thought we'd

prospect a bit."

"Well?"

"It was tolerable thick, and looked as if it might be the vein--looked as

if it ought to be the vein. Then we went down on it a little. Looked

better all the time."

"When did you strike it?"

"About ten o'clock."

"Then you've been prospecting about four hours."

"Yes, been sinking on it something over four hours."

"I'm afraid you couldn't go down very far in four hours--could you?"

"O yes--it's a good deal broke up, nothing but picking and gadding

stuff."

"Well, it does look encouraging, sure enough--but then the lacking

indications--"

"I'd rather we had them, Mr. Sterling, but I've seen more than one good

permanent mine struck without 'em in my time."

"Well, that is encouraging too."

"Yes, there was the Union, the Alabama and the Black Mohawk--all good,

sound mines, you know--all just exactly like this one when we first

struck them."

"Well, I begin to feel a good deal more easy. I guess we've really got

it. I remember hearing them tell about the Black Mohawk."

"I'm free to say that I believe it, and the men all think so too. They

are all old hands at this business."

"Come Harry, let's go up and look at it, just for the comfort of it,"

said Philip. They came back in the course of an hour, satisfied and

happy.

There was no more sleep for them that night. They lit their pipes, put a

specimen of the coal on the table, and made it a kind of loadstone of

thought and conversation.

"Of course," said Harry, "there will have to be a branch track built, and

a 'switch-back' up the hill."

"Yes, there will be no trouble about getting the money for that now. We

could sell-out tomorrow for a handsome sum. That sort of coal doesn't go

begging within a mile of a rail-road. I wonder if Mr. Bolton' would

rather sell out or work it?"

"Oh, work it," says Harry, "probably the whole mountain is coal now

you've got to it."

"Possibly it might not be much of a vein after all," suggested Philip.

"Possibly it is; I'll bet it's forty feet thick. I told you. I knew the

sort of thing as soon as I put my eyes on it."

Philip's next thought was to write to his friends and announce their good

fortune. To Mr. Bolton he wrote a short, business letter, as calm as he

could make it. They had found coal of excellent quality, but they could

not yet tell with absolute certainty what the vein was. The prospecting

was still going on. Philip also wrote to Ruth; but though this letter

may have glowed, it was not with the heat of burning anthracite. He

needed no artificial heat to warm his pen and kindle his ardor when he

sat down to write to Ruth. But it must be confessed that the words never

flowed so easily before, and he ran on for an hour disporting in all the

extravagance of his imagination. When Ruth read it, she doubted if the

fellow had not gone out of his senses. And it was not until she reached

the postscript that she discovered the cause of the exhilaration.

"P. S.--We have found coal."

The news couldn't have come to Mr. Bolton in better time. He had never

been so sorely pressed. A dozen schemes which he had in hand, any one

of which might turn up a fortune, all languished, and each needed just

a little more, money to save that which had been invested. He hadn't

a piece of real estate that was not covered with mortgages, even to the

wild tract which Philip was experimenting on, and which had, no

marketable value above the incumbrance on it.

He had come home that day early, unusually dejected.

"I am afraid," he said to his wife, "that we shall have to give up our

house. I don't care for myself, but for thee and the children."

"That will be the least of misfortunes," said Mrs. Bolton, cheerfully,

"if thee can clear thyself from debt and anxiety, which is wearing thee

out, we can live any where. Thee knows we were never happier than when

we were in a much humbler home."

"The truth is, Margaret, that affair of Bigler and Small's has come on me

just when I couldn't stand another ounce. They have made another failure

of it. I might have known they would; and the sharpers, or fools, I

don't know which, have contrived to involve me for three times as much as

the first obligation. The security is in my hands, but it is good for

nothing to me. I have not the money to do anything with the contract."

Ruth heard this dismal news without great surprise. She had long felt

that they were living on a volcano, that might go in to active operation

at any hour. Inheriting from her father an active brain and the courage

to undertake new things, she had little of his sanguine temperament which

blinds one to difficulties and possible failures. She had little

confidence in the many schemes which had been about to lift her father

out of all his embarrassments and into great wealth, ever since she was

a child; as she grew older, she rather wondered that they were as

prosperous as they seemed to be, and that they did not all go to smash

amid so many brilliant projects. She was nothing but a woman, and did

not know how much of the business prosperity of the world is only a,

bubble of credit and speculation, one scheme helping to float another

which is no better than it, and the whole liable to come to naught and

confusion as soon as the busy brain that conceived them ceases its power

to devise, or when some accident produces a sudden panic.

"Perhaps, I shall be the stay of the family, yet," said Ruth, with an

approach to gaiety; "When we move into a little house in town, will thee

let me put a little sign on the door: DR. RUTH BOLTON?"

"Mrs. Dr. Longstreet, thee knows, has a great income."

"Who will pay for the sign, Ruth?" asked Mr. Bolton.

A servant entered with the afternoon mail from the office. Mr. Bolton

took his letters listlessly, dreading to open them. He knew well what

they contained, new difficulties, more urgent demands fox money.

"Oh, here is one from Philip. Poor fellow. I shall feel his

disappointment as much as my own bad luck. It is hard to bear when one

is young."

He opened the letter and read. As he read his face lightened, and he

fetched such a sigh of relief, that Mrs. Bolton and Ruth both exclaimed.

"Read that," he cried, "Philip has found coal!"

The world was changed in a moment. One little sentence had done it.

There was no more trouble. Philip had found coal. That meant relief.

That meant fortune. A great weight was taken off, and the spirits of the

whole household rose magically. Good Money! beautiful demon of Money,

what an enchanter thou art! Ruth felt that she was of less consequence

in the household, now that Philip had found Coal, and perhaps she was not

sorry to feel so.

Mr. Bolton was ten years younger the next morning. He went into the

city, and showed his letter on change. It was the sort of news his

friends were quite willing to listen to. They took a new interest in

him. If it was confirmed, Bolton would come right up again. There would

be no difficulty about his getting all the money he wanted. The money

market did not seem to be half so tight as it was the day before.

Mr. Bolton spent a very pleasant day in his office, and went home

revolving some new plans, and the execution of some projects he had long

been prevented from entering upon by the lack of money.

The day had been spent by Philip in no less excitement. By daylight,

with Philip's letters to the mail, word had gone down to Ilium that coal

had been found, and very early a crowd of eager spectators had come up to

see for themselves.

The "prospecting" continued day and night for upwards of a week, and

during the first four or five days the indications grew more and more

promising, and the telegrams and letters kept Mr. Bolton duly posted.

But at last a change came, and the promises began to fail with alarming

rapidity. In the end it was demonstrated without the possibility of a

doubt that the great "find" was nothing but a worthless seam.