With the accession to political control of Halloran and the old ring,
the influence of Horace Vanney and those whom he represented, became as
potent as it was secret. "Salutary measures" had been adopted toward the
garment-workers; a "firm hand" on the part of the police had succeeded
in holding down the strike through the fall and winter; but in the early
spring it was revived and spread throughout the city, even to the doors
of the shopping district. In another sense than the geographical it was
nearing the great department stores, for quiet efforts were being made
by some of the strike leaders to organize and unionize the underpaid
salesmen and saleswomen of the shops. Inevitably this drew into active
hostility to the strikers the whole power of the stores with their
immense advertising influence.
Very little news of the strike got into the papers except where some
clash with the police was of too great magnitude to be ignored; then the
trend of the articles was generally hostile to the strikers. The Sphere
published the facts briefly, as a matter of journalistic principle; The
Ledger published them with violent bias, as a matter of journalistic
habit; the other papers, including The Patriot, suppressed or minimized
to as great an extent as they deemed feasible.
That the troubles of some thousands of sweated wage-earners, employed
upon classes of machine-made clothing which would never come within the
ken of the delicately clad women of her world, could in any manner
affect Io Eyre, was most improbable. But the minor fate who manipulates
improbabilities elected that she should be in a downtown store at the
moment when a squad of mounted police charged a crowd of girl-strikers.
Hearing the scream of panic, she ran out, saw ignorant, wild-eyed girls,
hardly more than children, beaten down, trampled, hurried hither and
thither, seized upon and thrown into patrol wagons, and when she reached
her car, sick and furious, found an eighteen-year-old Lithuanian blonde
flopping against the rear fender in a dead faint. Strong as a young
panther, Io picked up the derelict in her arms, hoisted her into the
tonneau, and bade the disgusted chauffeur, "Home." What she heard from
the revived girl, in the talk which followed, sent her, hot-hearted, to
the police court where the arrests would be brought up for primary
judgment.
The first person that she met there was Willis Enderby.
"If you're on this strike case, Cousin Billy," she said, "I'm against
you, and I'm ashamed of you."
"You probably aren't the former, and you needn't be the latter," he
replied.
"Aren't you Mr. Vanney's lawyer? And isn't he interested in the strike?"
"Not openly. It happens that I'm here for the strikers."
Io stared, incredulous. "For the strikers? You mean that they've
retained you?"
"Oh, no. I'm really here in my capacity as President of the Law
Enforcement Society; to see that these women get the full protection of
the law, to which they are entitled. There is reason to believe that
they haven't had it. And you?"
Io told him.
"Are you willing to go on the stand?"
"Certainly; if it will do any good."
"Not much, so far as the case goes. But it will force it into the
newspapers. 'Society Leader Takes Part of Working-Girls,' and so-on. The
publicity will be useful."
The magistrate on the bench was lenient; dismissed most of the prisoners
with a warning against picketing; fined a few; sent two to jail. He
seemed surprised and not a little impressed by the distinguished Mrs.
Delavan Eyre's appearance in the proceedings, and sent word out to the
reporters' room, thereby breaking up a game of pinochle at its point of
highest interest. There was a man there from The Patriot.
With eager expectation Io, back in her Philadelphia apartment, sent out
for a copy of the New York Patriot. Greatly to her disgust she found
herself headlined, half-toned, described; but with very little about the
occasion of her testimony, a mere mention of the strike and nothing
whatsoever regarding the police brutalities which had so stirred her
wrath. Io discovered that she had lost her taste for publicity, in a
greater interest. Her first thought was to write Banneker indignantly;
her second to ask explanations when he called her on the 'phone as he
now did every noon; her third to let the matter stand until she went to
New York and saw him. On her arrival, several days later, she went
direct to his office. Banneker's chief interest, next to his
ever-thrilling delight in seeing her, was in the part played by Willis
Enderby.
"What is he doing in that galley?" he wondered.
To her explanation he shook his head. Something more than that, he was
sure. Asking Io's permission he sent for Russell Edmonds.
"Isn't this a new role for Enderby?" he asked.
"Not at all. He's been doing this sort of thing always. Usually on the
quiet."
"The fact that this is far from being on the quiet suggests politics,
doesn't it? Making up to the labor vote?"
"What on earth should Cousin Billy care for the labor vote?" demanded
Io. "Mr. Laird is dead politically, isn't he?"
"But Judge Enderby isn't. Mr. Edmonds will tell you that much."
"True enough. Enderby is a man to be reckoned with. Particularly if--"
Edmonds paused, hesitant.
"If--" prompted Banneker. "Fire ahead, Pop."
"If Marrineal should declare in on the race for the governorship, next
fall."
"Without any state organization? Is that probable?" asked Banneker.
"Only in case he should make a combination with the old ring crowd, who
are, naturally, grateful for his aid in putting over Halloran for them.
It's quite within the possibilities."
"After the way The Patriot and Mr. Marrineal himself have flayed the
ring?" exclaimed Io. "It isn't possible. How could he so go back on
himself?"
Edmonds turned his fine and serious smile upon her. "Mr. Marrineal's
guiding principle of politics _and_ journalism is that the public never
remembers. If he persuades the ring to nominate him, Enderby is the
logical candidate against him. In my belief he's the only man who could
beat him."
"Do you really think, Mr. Edmonds, that Judge Enderby's help to the
arrested women is a political move?"
"That's the way it would be interpreted by all the politicians.
Personally, I don't believe it."
"His sympathies, professional and personal, are naturally on the other
side," pointed out Banneker.
"But not yours, surely Ban!" cried Io. "Yours ought to be with them. If
you could have seen them as I did, helpless and panic-stricken, with the
horses pressing in on them--"
"Of course I'm with them," warmly retorted Banneker. "If I controlled
the news columns of the paper, I'd make another Sippiac Mills story of
this." No sooner had he said it than he foresaw to what reply he had
inevitably laid himself open. It came from Io's lips.
"You control the editorial column, Ban."
"It's a subject to be handled in the news, not the editorials," he said
hastily.
The silence that fell was presently relieved by Edmonds. "It's also
being handled in the advertising columns. Have you seen the series of
announcements by the Garment Manufacturers' Association? There are four
of 'em now in proof."
"No. I haven't seen them," answered Banneker.
"They're able. But on the whole they aren't as able as the strikers'
declaration in rebuttal, offered us to-day, one-third of a page at
regular advertising rates, same as the manufacturers'."
"Enderby?" queried Banneker quickly.
"I seem to detect his fine legal hand in it."
Banneker's face became moody. "I suppose Haring refused to publish it."
"No. Haring's for taking it."
"How is that?" said the editor, astonished. "I thought Haring--"
"You think of Haring as if Haring thought as you and I think. That isn't
fair," declared Edmonds. "Haring's got a business mind, straight within
its limitations. He accepts this strike stuff just as he accepts
blue-sky mine fakes and cancer cures in which he has no belief, because
he considers that a newspaper is justified in taking any ad. that is
offered--and let the reader beware. Besides, it goes against his grain
to turn down real money."
"Will it appear in to-morrow's paper?" questioned Io.
"Probably, if it appears at all."
"Why the 'if'?" said Banneker. "Since Haring has passed it--"
"There is also Marrineal."
"Haring sent it to him?"
"Not at all. The useful and ubiquitous Ives, snooping as usual, came
upon it. Hence it is now in Marrineal's hands. Likely to remain there, I
should think."
"Mr. Marrineal won't let it be published?" asked Io.
"That's my guess," returned the veteran.
"And mine," added Banneker.
He felt her eyes of mute appeal fixed on him and read her meaning.
"All right, Io," he promised quietly. "If Mr. Marrineal won't print it
in advertising, I'll print it as editorial."
"When?" Io and Edmonds spoke in one breath.
"Day after to-morrow."
"That's war," said Edmonds.
"In a good cause," declared Io proudly.
"The cause of the independence of Errol Banneker," said the veteran. "It
was bound to come. Go in and win, son. I'll get you a proof of the ad."
"Ban!" said Io with brightened regard.
"Well?"
"Will you put something at the head of your column for me, if that
editorial appears?"
"What? Wait! I know. The quotation from the Areopagitica. Is that it?"
"Yes."
"Fine! I'll do it."
On the following morning The Patriot appeared as usual. The first of the
Manufacturers' Association arguments to the public was conspicuously
displayed. Of the strikers' reply--not a syllable. Banneker went to
Haring's office; found the business manager gloomy, but resigned.
"Mr. Marrineal turned it down. He's got the right. That's all there is
to it," was his version.
"Not quite," remarked Banneker, and went home to prove it.
Into the editorial which was to constitute the declaration of Errol
Banneker's independence went much thinking, and little writing. The
pronunciamento of the strikers, prefaced by a few words of explanation,
and followed by some ringing sentences as to the universal right to a
fair field, was enough. At the top of the column the words of Milton, in
small, bold print. Across the completed copy he wrote "Thursday. Must."
Never had Banneker felt in finer fettle for war than when he awoke that
Thursday morning. Contrary to his usual custom, he did not even look at
the copy of The Patriot brought to his breakfast table; he wanted to
have that editorial fresh to eye and mind when Marrineal called him to
account for it. For this was a challenge which Marrineal could not
ignore. He breakfasted with a copy of "The Undying Voices" propped
behind his coffee cup, refreshing himself before battle with the
delights of allusive memory, bringing back the days when he and lo had
read and discovered together. It was noon when he reached the office.
From the boy at the entrance he learned that Mr. Marrineal had come in.
Doubtless he would find a summons on his desk. None was there. Perhaps
Marrineal would come to him. He waited. Nothing. Taking up the routine
of the day, he turned to his proofs, with a view to laying out his
schedule.
The top one was his editorial on the strikers' cause.
Across it was blue-penciled the word "Killed."
Banneker snatched up the morning's issue. The editorial was not there.
In its place he read, from the top of the column: "And though all the
winds of doctrine blow"--and so on, to the close of Milton's proud
challenge, followed by:
"Would You Let Your Baby Drink Carbolic?"
For the strike editorial had been substituted one of Banneker's typical
"mother-fetchers," as he termed them, very useful in their way, and
highly approved by the local health authorities. This one was on the
subject of pure milk. Its association with the excerpt from the
Areopagitica (which, having been set for a standing head, was not cut
out by the "Killed") set the final touch of irony upon the matter. Even
in his fury Banneker laughed.
He next considered the handwriting of the blue-penciled monosyllable. It
was not Marrineal's blunt, backhand script. Whose was it? Haring's?
Trailing the proof in his hand he went to the business manager's room.
"Did you kill this?"
"Yes." Haring got to his feet, white and shaking. "For God's sake, Mr.
Banneker--"
"I'm not going to hurt you--yet. By what right did you do it?"
"Orders."
"Marrineal's?"
"Yes."
With no further word, Banneker strode to the owner's office, pushed open
the door, and entered. Marrineal looked up, slightly frowning.
"Did you kill this editorial?"
Marrineal's frown changed to a smile. "Sit down, Mr. Banneker."
"Marrineal, did you kill my editorial?"
"Isn't your tone a trifle peremptory, for an employee?"
"It won't take more than five seconds for me to cease to be an
employee," said Banneker grimly.
"Ah? I trust you're not thinking of resigning. By the way, some reporter
called on me last week to confirm a rumor that you were about to resign.
Let me see; what paper? Ah; yes; it wasn't a newspaper, at least, not
exactly. The Searchlight. I told her--it happened to be a woman--that
the story was quite absurd."
Something in the nature of a cold trickle seemed to be flowing between
Banneker's brain and his tongue. He said with effort, "Will you be good
enough to answer my question?"
"Certainly. Mr. Banneker, that was an ill-advised editorial. Or, rather,
an ill-timed one. I didn't wish it published until we had time to talk
it over."
"We could have talked it over yesterday."
"But I understood that you were busy with callers yesterday. That
charming Mrs. Eyre, who, by the way, is interested in the strikers,
isn't she? Or was it the day before yesterday that she was here?"
The Searchlight! And now Io Eyre! No doubt of what Marrineal meant. The
cold trickle had passed down Banneker's spine, and settled at his knees
making them quite unreliable. Inexplicably it still remained to paralyze
his tongue.
"We're reasonable men, you and I, Mr. Banneker," pursued Marrineal in
his quiet, detached tones. "This is the first time I have ever
interfered. You must do me the justice to admit that. Probably it will
be the last. But in this case it was really necessary. Shall we talk it
over later?"
"Yes," said Banneker listlessly.
In the hallway he ran into somebody, who cursed him, and then said, oh,
he hadn't noticed who it was; Pop Edmonds. Edmonds disappeared into
Marrineal's office. Banneker regained his desk and sat staring at the
killed proof. He thought vaguely that he could appreciate the sensation
of a man caught by an octopus. Yet Marrineal didn't look like an
octopus.... What did he look like? What was that subtle resemblance
which had eluded him in the first days of their acquaintanceship? That
emanation of chill quietude; those stagnant eyes?
He had it now! It dated back to his boyhood days. A crawling
terror which, having escaped from a menagerie, had taken refuge
in a pool, and there fixed its grip upon an unfortunate calf, and
dragged--dragged--dragged the shrieking creature, until it went under.
A crocodile.
His reverie was broken by the irruption of Russell Edmonds. An inch of
the stem of the veteran's dainty little pipe was clenched firmly between
his teeth; but there was no bowl.
"Where's the rest of your pipe?" asked Banneker, stupefied by this
phenomenon.
"I've resigned," said Edmonds.
"God! I wish I could," muttered Banneker.