It was a beautiful day in the early part of Summer. On the deck of
the _Marchioness_, only a short time ago put in commission, Peter V.
Wilkinson was lying back in his steamer chair, luxuriously. New York
was experiencing one of the season's first hot days, but under the
awning of the after deck of the _Marchioness_, and out of sight of
land as she was, a delicious ocean breeze made life worth living, so
it seemed, at any rate, to the two men sitting there, ever and anon
calling to the steward, and refreshing themselves with Wilkinson's
choicest wines and liqueurs with which the yacht was stocked.
"Do you know," remarked Wilkinson with a short laugh, as he threw over
the side an unfinished cigar and lighted a fresh one, "I ought to have
taken Leslie's original advice--ought to have sailed away on the
_Marchioness_ when they indicted me."
"You'd be in the thick of the trouble, Peter," returned his counsel
sagely.
"Huh!" grunted Wilkinson, "don't know but I'll do it now, and take you
with me, Colonel."
"Don't care if you do. It would end my troubles."
Wilkinson tapped the Colonel on the knee.
"Tell me, Colonel, how much money does that blatherskite get a year?"
"What blatherskite?"
"Gilchrist--the chap that had the nerve to sentence me."
Morehead told him; Wilkinson opened wide his eyes.
"You don't mean to tell me that's all he makes--his salary?"
The Colonel nodded.
"And do you mean to tell me that a man who only gets that much a year
has the power to put away a man like me--can do a thing like that? What
are we coming to in the United States?"
The Colonel laughed heartily.
"That man Gilchrist is a marked man from now on," went on Wilkinson.
"His degradation has begun. He sentenced me all right; and I've
sentenced him. I'll see to it that he's hounded out of New York. Any
man that tries to set himself up before me--may stand up for five
minutes or so, but he'll go down as sure as death and taxes. Every man
that's prosecuted me, touched me, laid his hands on me physically or
figuratively, is going to get it. I've got a heavy hand, Morehead, and
they're going to feel it. They're going to know it's me. Gilchrist will
get his, first."
The lawyer sniffed the breeze and closed his eyes in ecstasy.
"Oh, come now, Peter ...! I haven't enjoyed a day like this in years."
"You don't suppose I brought you along to have you enjoy yourself?"
bluntly.
"No, I wouldn't credit you with that nobility of character, Peter. But
I'm here no matter what your purpose may have been, and I propose to
enjoy myself."
The multi-millionaire received this remark in silence. Colonel Morehead
was one of the few independent men he had ever met. Wilkinson could
never quite make him out, and therefore was afraid of him. As a
matter of fact, Morehead's code was a simple one: he merely did his
duty towards his clients in his own way; and if they didn't like it,
that was their affair and not his. His acquired indifference was his
greatest capital.
"At any rate," growled his host, "I suppose I'm paying you by the
minute all the time you're here."
"Presume you are, Peter," sweetly answered the Colonel; "and that's a
pleasure, too, to both of us, I'm sure."
"Business before pleasure is my motto, you know," resumed Wilkinson.
"I brought you out here to have a quiet talk where even Flomerfelt or
Patrick Durand cannot hear it. I haven't been able to pin you down
to my case since my conviction. Look here, Morehead," he went on
appealingly, "we'll reverse this sentence a hundred times over, eh?"
The Colonel, who had been sprawling lazily across his steamer chair, at
this drew himself up to a sitting posture.
"Now look here, Wilkinson, we've appealed this case, and we've filed a
bond, and you're out on bail...."
"And we'll win out on appeal?"
"I was about to remark," went on the lawyer, quietly, "that your case
will go first to the Appellate Division, then to the Court of Appeals,
then--maybe to the United States Supreme Court. Then a few certificates
of reasonable doubt, motions, stays, etc. It will take months, months,
even if they rush it through. There's no hurry about discussing it; we
can take our time."
Wilkinson was about to speak, but Morehead raised his hand.
"Since we're talking business, Peter, I may as well get to it, so that
you can enjoy your pleasure afterward." He got up, yawned and stretched
himself. Then looking Peter straight in the eye, he added: "What I
wanted to impress upon you is, that after our last card is played, this
conviction and this sentence are going to be----"
"Reversed, as sure as guns!" cried out Wilkinson.
"This conviction and this sentence," went on the lawyer, ignoring
the interruption, "will be affirmed." And so saying he leaned back in
his chair and puffed away contentedly. A moment later he added: "Now,
Peter, business is over, let's enjoy ourselves. What do you call that
thing yonder--a schooner or a hermaphrodite brig?"
His wealthy client swaggered to the fore once more.
"Do you mean to tell me that a man who's worth a hundred million is
actually going to serve ten years in State's Prison at hard labour?
That's nonsense!"
"I mean precisely what I say," said Morehead, his voice ringing
prophetically, "that this verdict and this sentence are going to be
affirmed."
"I'll spend five--ten million to reverse it."
"Spend it, then, and I'll help you, and when you're through you'll know
that I spoke the truth--affirmance, not reversal." He stopped abruptly,
then rising and plunging his hands deep in his trousers pockets, he
suddenly put the question to him: "I wish you'd tell me, Peter, whom
your daughter is going to marry? I'm interested."
"What the devil has that got to do with this case?"
"By the way," went on Morehead, ignoring purposely the other's
outburst, "where is your daughter now?"
"Home."
"Then you'd better swing the _Marchioness_ about. When you get home you
can find out if you do not already know."
"How should I know? There's a dozen cubs hanging around--none of them
good enough for her. Leslie's got to marry well."
"Has she? A fine chance she has, with her father a convict under a
prison sentence! Come, come, man, why don't you give your captain
orders? I want to know whom this girl of yours is going to marry--and
right away."
Wilkinson chuckled.
"Might send a wireless...."
"You'd get a most remarkable answer, Peter." Morehead was now striding
up and down, nervous, energetic strides they were, for he had shaken
off his tendency to enjoyment. "I say," he went on, "I haven't heard
you mention a word about the political situation so far; you're usually
pretty enthusiastic."
"How can a man be enthusiastic about politics when he's got the sword
of Damocles over his head."
"You're going to open fire on Gilchrist, aren't you?"
"Sure."
"That's politics," said Morehead, "and now that we're on the subject,
I want you to do me a favour. Wilkinson, I want my man put up for
governor this year, and I want your backing, you understand--your
influence, your money, all to back my man. Can I count on you, Peter?"
Wilkinson thought a moment before answering.
"Who is your man?"
"Um," smiled Morehead, "I don't know that--yet."
* * * * *
A short time after Wilkinson's return from the yachting trip, Leslie
received a message that her father would like to see her. She found
him with an unlighted cigar between his fingers sitting in his big
arm-chair in the Den, gazing into space, his face like a mask.
"You sent for me, father, and I came," she said, entering, a faint
smile on her lips.
"I sent for you," he told her in a level unemotional voice, "to find
out something--something that you can tell me if you will. Strange
things are happening nowadays. There are matters I'd like to settle
before----"
"Before what?" she asked, startled.
"Before I plunge into this appeal and forget everything else," he
answered easily; but now with just enough anxiety in his manner
to alarm her, he repeated: "There's something that I've got to
know--something that only you can tell me, girlie."
"I'll tell you anything, father," she answered softly.
Wilkinson caught her by the hand and drew her to him, asking so
suddenly that she started: "Who's the man you're going to marry?"
The girl disengaged herself from her father's embrace. The blood rushed
to her face, and she laughed a little uneasily. After a moment she
answered:
"How can I tell! He--nobody's asked me. Has anybody asked you, father?"
Wilkinson chuckled over her reply, though her evasiveness slightly
irritated him.
"Come," he said, "is it Berry Broughton, or Larry Pendexter, or
Montgomery?" Her father rattled on without giving her a chance to
answer, the girl's face growing more and more scarlet as he proceeded.
"It must be Eliot Beekman or Tommy Cadwalader," he declared, searching
her face. But still Leslie made no answer, though there was the same
embarrassed flush upon her countenance.
"Well, can't you tell me who it is?" he questioned impatiently.
"I don't know," she protested, "really, I do not."
"But I've got to know," persisted her father.
But whether she could not or would not tell him, his efforts were
unsuccessful, for she merely fled in a panic from the room. So that it
was in a voice whose tone was one of defeat that he called out:
"You can come now, Colonel!"
From the heavy curtains Colonel Morehead emerged--a grim figure lying
in ambush, he seemed, as he asked:
"Well! who's the lucky man?"
"Blamed if I could find out."
"But I did. Eliot Beekman is the lucky man, Peter."
"How do you know?"
"You may think you know men, but, at any rate, you don't know women,
Peter. I merely watched her face."
"So did I," spluttered Wilkinson, "but I didn't...."
"Peter, you asked me the name of my candidate for governor," said
Morehead himself in a manner that suggested that he was quite ready to
get down to business.
"Well?"
"His name is Eliot Beekman."
Peter V. Wilkinson looked his surprise.
"And why Beekman?"
"One reason is because he's going to marry your daughter. I was
satisfied of that, even before I heard this interview. But there are
other reasons: he's a partisan; he's taken sides with you; the boy
believes in you; and as long as your daughter sticks to him he's bound
to believe in you, and he'll stick to you, too. Now, Peter, do you see
why I've picked him for governor, and why I want your backing?"
"There's one thing I don't quite see, and that is your real reason for
wanting him for governor. Tell me that, will you, Colonel?"
Colonel Morehead took his cigar from his mouth, and thrusting his face
close to Wilkinson's, he said, speaking very distinctly so that his
client should not misunderstand his meaning:
"Because, my dear Peter, after you've spent your millions on appeals
and bribes and legal curlyques--when you find at the end of the race
that a ten-year term is still staring you in the face, it will be a
deuced comfortable thing, Peter, to know that up in Albany you've got a
friend, a partisan, a son-in-law _who's got the power to pardon_."
There was a pregnant pause in which both men watched each other with a
curious expression on their faces. Finally Wilkinson rose and strode
around the end of the desk, and holding out his hand, he said:
"Colonel, I've been curt and disagreeable in my talk to you. I want to
say now that I take back everything, except the good things, that I've
said. You're a wonder--a perfect wonder!"
"Remember, I'm to manage this campaign," warned the Colonel.
"Everything will be done from the outside. No one, not even Leslie nor
Beekman, must know a word about it. You promise?"
"I promise to keep my hands off," agreed Wilkinson, but the next
instant he added: "Come to think of it, though, I don't see why we
have to do it. I'm sure that my conviction will never get that far. If
necessary I'll buy up every judge from here to Washington."