"It isn't the people who appear at the crises of one's life, like the
hero on the stage, that really help. I'm afraid the crises, the real
crises of real life, must always be met alone."
"Alone," he said in an undertone. The sky was blue now--cloudless
blue; but in that word alone he could hear the rumble of storms below
the horizon, storms past, storms to come.
"The real helpers," she went on, "are those who strengthen us day by
day, hour by hour. And when no physical presence would do any good,
when no outside aid is possible--they--it's like finding a wall at
one's back when one's in dread of being surrounded. I suppose you
don't realize how much it means to--to how many people--to watch a man
who goes straight and strong on his way--without blustering, without
trampling anybody, without taking any mean advantage. You don't mind
my saying these things?"
She felt the look which she did not venture to face as he answered: "I
needed to hear them to-day. For it seemed to me that I, too, had got
to the limit of my strength."
"But you hadn't." She said this confidently.
"No--I suppose not. I've thought so before; but somehow I've always
managed to gather myself together. This time it was the work of years
apparently undone--hopelessly undone. They"--she understood that
"they" meant the leaders of the two corrupt rings whose rule of the
state his power with the people menaced--"they have bought away some of
my best men--bought them with those 'favors' that are so much more
disreputable than money because they're respectable. Then they came to
me"--he laughed unpleasantly--"and took me up into a high mountain and
showed me all the kingdoms of the earth, as it were. I could be
governor, senator, they said, could probably have the nomination for
president even,--not if I would fall down and worship them, but if I
would let them alone. I could accomplish nearly all that I've worked
so long to accomplish if I would only concede a few things to them. I
could be almost free. ALMOST--that is, not free at all."