Carmel Lee had been told by everybody, ever since she could remember
being told anything, that she was headstrong and impulsive. Her parents
had impressed it upon her and, rather proudly, had disseminated the
fact among the neighbors until it became a tradition in the little
Michigan town where she was born. People held the idea that one must
make allowances for Carmel and be perpetually ready to look with
tolerance on outbursts of impulse. Her teachers had accepted the
tradition and were accustomed to advise with her upon the point. The
reputation accompanied her to the university, and only a few weeks
before, upon her graduation, the head of the Department of Rhetoric
(which included a course in journalism) spent an entire valuable hour
beseeching her to curb her willfulness and to count as high as fifty
before she reached a decision.
So Carmel, after being the victim of such propaganda for sixteen or
seventeen years, could not be censured if she believed it herself. She
had gotten to be rather afraid of Carmel and of what Carmel might do
unexpectedly. Circumspection and repression had become her watchwords,
and the present business of her life was to look before she leaped. She
had made a vow of deliberation. As soon as she found herself wanting
to do something she became suspicious of it; and latterly, with grim
determination, she had taken herself in hand. Whenever she became aware
of a desire to act, she compelled herself to sit down and think it
over. Not that this did a great deal of good, but it gave her a very
pleasing sensation of self-mastery. As a matter of fact, she was not
at all introspective. She had taken the word of bystanders for her
impulsiveness; it was no discovery of her own. And now that she was
schooling herself in repression, she did not perceive in the least that
she failed to repress. When she wanted to do a thing, she usually did
it. The deliberation only postponed the event. When she forced herself
to pause and scrutinize a desire, she merely paused and scrutinized
it--and then went ahead and did what she desired.
It may be considered peculiar that a girl who had inherited a
newspaper, as Carmel had done, should have paid so cursory a first
visit. It would have been natural to rush into the shop with enthusiasm
and to poke into corners and to ransack the place from end to end,
and to discover exactly what it was she had become owner of. However,
Carmel merely dropped in and hurried away.... This was repression. It
was a distinct victory over impulse. She wanted to do it very much, so
she compelled herself to turn her back and to go staidly to lunch at
the hotel.
She ate very little and was totally unaware of the sensation she
created in the dining room, especially over at the square table which
was regarded as the property of visiting commercial travelers. It was
her belief that she gave off an impression of dignity such as befitted
an editor, and that a stern, businesslike air sat upon her so that none
could mistake the fact that she was a woman of affairs. Truthfulness
compels it to be recorded that she did not give this impression at
all, but quite another one. She looked a lovely schoolgirl about to go
canoeing with a box of bonbons on her lap. The commercial travelers who
were so unfortunate as to be seated with their back toward her acquired
cricks in their necks.
After dinner (in a day or two she would learn not to refer to it as
luncheon) she compelled herself to go up to her room and to remain
there for a full fifteen minutes. After this exercise, so beneficial
to her will, she descended and walked very slowly to the office of the
_Free Press_. Having thus given free rein to her bent for repression,
she became herself and _pounced_. She pounced upon the office; she
pounced upon the shop. She made friends with the cylinder press much
as an ordinary individual would make friends with a nice dog, and
she talked to the little job press as to a kitten and became greatly
excited over the great blade of the paper cutter, and wanted Tubal to
give her an instant lesson in the art of sticking type. For two hours
she played with things. Then, of a sudden, it occurred to her to wonder
if a living could be made out of the outfit.
It was essential that the paper should provide her with a living, and
that it should go about the business of doing so almost instantly. At
the moment when Carmel first set foot in Gibeon she was alone in the
world. Old Man Nupley had been her last remaining relative. And--what
was even more productive of unease of mind--she was the owner of
exactly seventy-two dollars and sixteen cents!
Therefore she pounced upon the records of the concern and very quickly
discovered that Old Man Nupley had left her no placer mine out of which
she could wash a pan of gold before breakfast. She had, she found,
become the owner of the right to pay off a number of pressing debts.
The plant was mortgaged. It owed for paper; there were installments due
on the job press; there were bills for this, that, and the other thing
which amounted to a staggering total....
She was not daunted, however, until she examined the credit side of
the affair. The year had brought the _Free Press_ a grand total of
five hundred and sixty-one paid subscriptions; the advertising, at the
absurd rate of fifteen cents an inch, had been what politicians call
scattering; and the job work had hardly paid for the trouble of keeping
the dust off the press. The paper was dead on its feet, as so many
rural weeklies are. She could not help thinking that her uncle Nupley
had died in the nick of time to avoid bankruptcy.
It is worth recording that Carmel did not weep a tear of
disappointment, nor feel an impulse to walk out of the place and go the
thousand miles back to Michigan to take the job of teaching English in
the home high school. No. The only emotion Carmel felt was anger. Her
eyes actually glinted, and a red spot made its appearance upon each
cheek. She had arrived in Gibeon with a glowing illusion packed in her
trunk; unkind fact had snatched it away and replaced it with clammy
reality.
She got up from her desk and walked into the shop, where Tubal was
pretending to be busy.
“Gibeon is the county seat, isn’t it?” she asked.
“Yes ’m.”
“How many people live here?”
“We claim two thousand. Ol’ Man Nupley allowed the’ was four thousand
in the township.”
“Then” (her manner put Tubal in the wrong at once and compelled him to
fumble about for a defense) “why have we only a little more than five
hundred subscribers?”
“Wa-al, one thing or another, seems as though. Folks never took to
this paper much.... Mostly they take in the _Standard_ from over to
Litchfield.”
“Why?”
Tubal shifted the blame to Gibeon. “Seems like this hain’t much of a
town.... It’s a dum funny town. I guess folks didn’t set much store by
this paper on account of Abner Fownes.”
“Abner Fownes? Who is he, and what has he to do with it?”
“Abner,” said Tubal, “comes clost to bein’ a one-man band. Uh huh!...
Owns the saw mills, owns half of Main Street, owns the Congo church and
the circuit judge and the selectmen, and kind of claims to own all the
folks that lives here.... Ol’ Man Nupley was a kind of errand boy of
his’n.”
Carmel’s intuition carried her to the point. “And the people didn’t
take this paper because they didn’t trust it. That was it, wasn’t
it--because this Abner Fownes--owned Uncle Nupley.”
“I calc’late,” said Tubal, “you’re twittin’ on facts....” He chuckled.
“Las’ fall the folks kind of riz ag’in’ Abner and dum nigh trompled on
him at election time. Yes, sir. Made a fight fer it, but they didn’t
elect nobody but one sheriff. Good man, too.... But Abner was too
slick for ’em and he run off with all the other offices.... He holds a
chattel mortgage onto this plant.”
“Is he a bad man?”
“Wa-al I dunno’s a feller could call him bad. Jest pig-headed, like,
and got the idee nobody knows nothin’ but him. _My_ notion is he gits
bamboozled a lot. The Court House crowd tickles his ribs and makes him
work for ’em. No, he hain’t bad. Deacon, and all that.”
“The local politicians flatter him and make use of the power his money
gives him, is that it?”
“You hit the nail plumb on the head.”
“Who is the _real_ boss?”
“Wa-al now, that’s kind of hard to say. Kind of a ring. Half a dozen of
’em. Calc’late Supervisor Delorme is close to bein’ the queen bee.”
She could visualize Abner Fownes, smug, fatuous, in a place of power
which he did not know how to use, a figurehead and cat’s-paw for abler
and wickeder men.... It must be confessed that her interest in him
was not civic, but personal. He was, at that moment, of no importance
to her except as the man who held a chattel mortgage on her plant and
whose influence over her uncle had withered the possible prosperity of
the paper.
She was saying to herself: “I’ve got to find a way. I’ve got to make a
success of this. I can’t go back home and admit I couldn’t do it....
Everybody said I couldn’t run a paper. But I can. I _can_.”
The field was there, a prosperous town with a cultivated countryside
to the south and rich forest lands to north and west. There was a
sufficient population to support well a weekly paper; there was all of
Main Street, two dozen merchants large and small, whose advertising
patronage should flow in to the _Free Press_.
“What it needs,” she told herself, “is somebody to get behind and push.”
As a matter of fact she was convinced the failure of the paper was not
due to Abner Fownes, nor to politics or outside influences, but to the
lack of initiative and ability of her uncle. So much of the town as
she had seen was rather pleasing; it had no appearance of resting over
subterranean caverns of evil, nor had the men and women she saw on the
streets the appearance of being ground down by one man’s wealth, or of
smarting under the rule of an evil political ring. On the contrary, it
seemed an ordinary town, full of ordinary people, who lived ordinary
lives in reasonable happiness. She discounted Tubal’s disclosures and
jumped to a conclusion. No, she told herself, if she proved adequate,
there was no reason why she could not succeed where Uncle Nupley failed.
The telephone interrupted her reflections and she lifted the receiver.
“Is this the _Free Press_?” asked a voice.
“Yes.”
“Wait a moment, please.”
After some delay another voice, a large, important voice, repeated the
question, and Carmel admitted a second time the identity of the paper.
“This,” said the voice, evidently impressed by the revelation it was
making, “is Abner Fownes.”
“Yes,” said Carmel.
“Are you the young woman--Nupley’s niece?”
“I am.”
“Will you step over to my office at once, then. I want to see you?”
Carmel’s eyes twinkled and her brows lifted. “Abner Fownes,” she said.
“The name has a masculine sound. Your voice is--distinctly masculine?”
“Eh?... What of it?”
“Why,” said Carmel, “the little book I studied in school says that when
a gentleman wishes to see a lady he goes to her. I fear I should be
thought forward if I called on you.”
“Not at all.... Not at all,” said the voice, and Carmel knew she had to
deal with a man in whom resided no laughter.
“I shall be glad to see you whenever you find it convenient to call,”
she said--and hung up the receiver.
As she turned about she saw a young man standing outside the railing,
a medium-sized young man who wore his shoulders slightly rounded and
spectacles of the largest and most glittering variety. The collar of
his coat asked loudly to be brushed and his tie had the appearance
of having been tied with one hand in a dark bedroom. He removed
his hat and displayed a head of extraordinarily fine formation. It
was difficult to tell if he were handsome, because the rims of his
spectacles masked so much of his face and because his expression was
one of gloomy wrath. Carmel was tempted to laugh at the expression
because it did not fit; it gave the impression of being a left-over
expression, purchased at a reduction, and a trifle large for its wearer.
“May I ask,” he said, in a voice exactly suited to his stilted diction,
“if you are in charge of this--er--publication?”
“I am,” said Carmel.
“I wish,” said the young man, “to address a communication to the
citizens of this village through the--er--medium of your columns.”
So this, thought Carmel, was the sort of person who wrote letters to
newspapers. She had often wondered what the species looked like.
“On what subject?” she asked.
“Myself,” said he.
“It should be an interesting letter,” Carmel said, mischievously.
The young man lowered his head a trifle and peered at her over the
rims of his glasses. He pursed his mouth and wrinkled one cheek,
studying her as a naturalist might scrutinize some interesting, but not
altogether comprehensible, bug. Evidently he could not make up his mind
as to her classification.
“I fancy it will be found so,” he said.
“May I ask your name?”
He fumbled in an inner pocket and continued to fumble until it
became an exploration. He produced numerous articles and laid them
methodically upon the railing--a fountain pen, dripping slightly,
half a dozen letters, a large harmonica, a pocket edition of Plato’s
_Republic_, a notebook, several pencils, and a single glove. He stared
at the glove with recognition and nodded to it meaningly, as much as
to say: “Ah, there you are again.... Hiding as usual.” At last he
extracted a leather wallet and from the wallet produced a card which he
extended toward Carmel.
Before she read it she had a feeling there would be numerous letters
upon it, and she was not disappointed. It said:
Evan Bartholomew Pell, A.B., Ph.D., LL.D., A.M.
“Ah!” said Carmel.
“Yes,” said the young man with some complacency.
“And your letter.”
“I am,” he said, “or, more correctly, I _was_, superintendent of
schools in this village. There are, as you know, three schools only one
of which gives instruction in the so-called high-school branches.”
“Indeed,” said Carmel.
“I have been removed,” he said, and stared at her with lips compressed.
When she failed to live up to his expectations in her manifestations
of consternation, he repeated his statement. “I have been removed,” he
said, more emphatically.
“Removed,” said Carmel.
“Removed. Unjustly and unwarrantably removed. Autocratically and
tyrannically removed. I am a victim of nepotism. I have, I fancy,
proven adequate; indeed, I may say it is rare to find a man of my
attainments in so insignificant a position.... But I have been cast out
upon the streets arbitrarily, that a corrupt and self-seeking group of
professional politicians may curry favor with a man more corrupt than
themselves. In short and in colloquial terms, I have been kicked out to
provide a place for Supervisor Delorme’s cousin.”
Carmel nodded. “And you wish to protest.”
“I desire to lay before the public my ideas of the obligation of the
public toward its children in the matter of education. I desire to
protest against glaring injustice. I desire to accuse a group of men
willing to prostitute the schools to the level of political spoils. I
wish to protest at being set adrift penniless.”
His expression as he uttered the word “penniless” was one of helpless
bewilderment which touched Carmel’s sympathy.
“Penniless?” she said.
“I am no spendthrift,” he said, severely. “I may say that I
am exceedingly economical. But I have invested my savings,
and--er--returns have failed to materialize from the investment.”
“What investment?”
The young man eyed her a moment as if he felt her to be intruding
unwarrantably in his private concerns, but presently determined to
reply.
“A certain gold mine, whose location I cannot remember at the moment.
It was described as of fabulous wealth, and I was assured the return
from my investment of five hundred dollars would lift me above the
sordid necessity of working for wages.... I regret to say that hitherto
there has been no material assurance of the truth of the statements
made to me.”
“Poor lamb!” said Carmel under her breath.
“I beg your pardon?”
Carmel shook her head. “So you are--out of a job--and broke?” she said.
“Broke,” he said, lugubriously, “is an exceedingly expressive term.”
“And what shall you do?”
He looked about him, at his feet, through the door into the shop, under
the desk, at the picture on the wall in a helpless, bewildered way as
if he thought his future course of action might be hiding some place in
the neighborhood.
“I haven’t the slightest idea,” he said.
Carmel considered. Inexperienced as she was, new to the intrigues
of Gibeon, she was able to perceive how the professor’s letter was
loaded with dynamite--not for him, but for the paper which published
it. Notwithstanding, it was her impulse to print it. Indeed, her mind
was firmly made up to print it. Therefore she assumed an attitude of
deliberation, as she had schooled herself to do.
“If you give me the letter,” she said, “I will read it and consider the
wisdom of making it public.”
“I shall be obliged to you,” he said, and turned toward the door.
Midway he paused. “If,” he said, “you chance to hear of a position--as
teacher or otherwise--to which I may be adapted, I shall be glad to
have you communicate with me.”
He moved again toward the door, opened it, paused again, and turned
full to face Carmel. Then he made a statement sharply detached from
the context, and astonishing not so much for the fact it stated as
because of the man who stated it, his possible reasons for making the
statement, and the abruptness of the change of subject matter.
“Sheriff Churchill has disappeared,” he said. Having made the
statement, he shut the door after him and walked rapidly up the street.