THE HANDS ARE DEALT
When Committeeman Wasgatt came into the room in tow of Harlan Thornton
he found silence prevailing there. It was silence that was marked by a
little restraint. The band outside was quiet now. A human voice was
bellowing. It was Arba Spinney's voice--a voice without words.
Wasgatt, short, stout, habitually pop-eyed and nervous, clutched his
papers in one hand and held his eyeglasses at arm's-length in the
other.
The others were in their chairs now, ranged about the sides of the room.
The General, alone, was standing near the table. Wasgatt turned to him
after a rapid scrutiny of the make-up of the party.
"I'd like to have the resolutions read," remarked the General, quietly.
"Go ahead, Wasgatt," commanded Presson; and the committeeman advanced to
the table under the chandelier and began to read.
The preamble was after the usual stereotyped form; the first sections
endorsed the cardinal principles of the party, and Mr. Wasgatt, getting
into the spirit of the thing, began to deliver the rounded periods
sonorously. General Waymouth leaned slightly over the table, propping
himself on the knuckles of his one hand. The light flowed down upon his
silvery hair, his features were set in the intentness of listening.
"'We view without favor the demagogic attempts to throttle enterprise,
check the proper development of our State, lock up the natural resources
away from the fostering hands of commerce and labor, thereby preventing
the establishment of industries that will extend their beneficent
influence to the workingman, dependent upon his daily wage.'"
"One moment, Wasgatt!" The General tapped a knuckle on the table, and
the reader waited.
Waymouth turned his gaze full upon the Senator when he spoke.
"Gentlemen, understand me aright at the start. I'm not here to try to
dictate. That would be presumptuous in me, for I am not yet your
candidate. To-morrow is not here."
Wasgatt's pop-eyes protruded still more. He stared from man to man, and
it became necessary for Thelismer Thornton to take one more into the
secret. He did it a bit ungraciously. He had not expected the General to
be so blunt and precipitate. The candidate waited patiently until the
brief explanation was concluded and Wasgatt had pledged fidelity.
"I want you fully to understand my spirit in this," went on the General.
"We'll be honest with each other; we know that the floor of a convention
is not the place to discuss the platform frankly; I don't want to wash
our linen in public. We'll settle it now between ourselves. That plank,
there, comes out of the platform if you expect me to stand on it."
The Senator, challenged by his eyes, spoke.
"You don't take exceptions to honest efforts to develop our State, do
you, General Waymouth?"
"I do not. But that proposition, no matter how good it sounds, is the
sugar-coated preface to an attempt to steal the undeveloped water-powers
of this State."
The Senator's fat neck reddened.
"You may be inclined to modify that rather rash statement, General
Waymouth, when I tell you that I suggested the insertion of that
resolution."
"I recognized it as yours, Senator. Some time ago my bankers gave me the
personnel of the group behind the Universal Development Company. In
making my statement, I understand perfectly what legislation that
resolution is leading up to."
"Vard," broke in the Duke, conciliatingly, "don't take so much for
granted. Why, there are folks suspicious enough to accuse Saint Peter of
starting Lent and ticking off Fridays from the meat programme simply
because he was in the fish business. Let's not get to fussing about a
set of convention resolutions. They're mostly wind, anyway."
But General Waymouth was not appeased.
"I know what resolutions stand for--how much and how little. I'm taking
this occasion, gentlemen, to set myself right with you. That resolution
will do for a text! I want no taunts later that I led you on into a
trap."
He struck the table with the flat of his hand.
"I'm laying my cards face up. Here's my hand! I halt right here on that
resolution. I'm certain I know what it means, no matter how it sounds.
I'm willing to take my hat and walk out right now. But if I stay--if you
promise to nominate me--I propose to have the saying of what kind of a
Governor I shall be!"
"That's rather blunt talk to make to gentlemen," protested the Senator,
showing a spark of ire.
"At my age there isn't time to make long speeches to shade the facts,"
returned General Waymouth. He was calm but intensely in earnest.
"Then you are all for reform--one of the new reformers, eh?" inquired
the Senator. He cast a look of reproach at Thornton, as though that
trusted manager had loosed a tiger on their defenceless party.
The General smiled--smiled so sweetly that he almost disarmed their
resentment.
"No, the Arba Spinneys of this State are the reformers. I'm not under
salary to run round and make disturbances in settled order. I'm not a
bigot with a single idea, nor a fanatic insisting that the world ought
to follow the diet that my dyspepsia imposes upon me. I'm merely an old
man, gentlemen, who has got past a lot of the follies of youth and the
passions of manhood, and has had a chance to reflect for a few years. I
have not asked to return to public life. But if I do return, if you put
power into my hands, I propose to render unto the people the things that
are the people's, and that term includes every man in this room. It is
not a programme that should alarm honest gentlemen!"
There was appeal in the tone--there was a hint of rebuke in that final
sentence that troubled the conscience of even Senator Pownal. Thelismer
Thornton was in a chair close to him.
"Don't let a few little cranky notions about a platform scare you," he
mumbled in the Senator's ear. "You know Vard Waymouth as well as I do.
He's safe and all right. Give him his head. You don't want Spinney, do
you?"
"But that was devilish insulting," growled Pownal.
"Tipping backward a little, trying to stand straight, that's all. Blast
it, a Governor can't run the State. What are you afraid of? You've got a
lobby and a legislature, haven't you?"
If Waymouth noticed this _sotto voce_ conference he gave no sign.
"General," said Pownal, getting hold of himself manfully, even
desperately, "the resolution is not essential. I fear you misunderstand
what it really means, but we'll not discuss it now. I withdraw it."
The General bowed acknowledgment, and signed to Wasgatt to resume.
"'We believe in dividing the burden of taxation equitably and justly,
and will bend our efforts to that end.'"
"That is simply empty vaporing!" cried the General. "And it has been in
every platform for twenty years without meaning anything. The platform
that I stand on this year must declare for a non-partisan tax
commission, empowered to investigate conditions in this State--wild
lands, corporations, and all--and report as a basis for new
legislation."
In the silence that ensued they could hear Arba Spinney continuing his
harangue.
"Gentlemen, you've got to do something in this party to stop the mouths
of him and men like him," declared the General, solemnly. "You may make
up your minds that you've either got to pay in money, or else you'll pay
in votes that mean the bankruptcy of the party."
"I suppose you have the resolution all drawn," suggested Thelismer
Thornton, dryly.
"I have, and drawn according to good constitutional law," replied the
General. He drew the paper from his breast-pocket.
"Incorporate it, Wasgatt, ready for the final draft, and we'll all go
over the thing to-morrow morning." The Duke was grimly laconic. That
resolution whacked his pet interests.
Senator Pownal gave the proposer of this prompt surrender a glance of
mutual sympathy out of the corner of his eye, but the Duke remained
imperturbable. Wasgatt received the paper and went on.
"'We reaffirm our belief in the principle of the prohibition of the
liquor traffic, and pledge our earnest efforts to promote temperance.'"
Across the corridor revellers were bawling over and over in chorus:
"'Let's take a drink,
Let's take it now,
God only knows how dry I am!'"
"That's a good thing to reaffirm--I don't mean the song they're singing
in that room across there! It's a good thing to pledge ourselves to
promote temperance," said the General, "but that isn't the point at
issue. I have another plank that I've written for our platform."
He drew a second paper from his pocket.
"Gentlemen, some politicians, more than half a century ago, simply to
use a temperance movement for bait in a political campaign, dragged into
our party a moral, social, and economic question that belongs to the
whole people--not merely to us as a party. Let the people, when the
right time comes and they decide the matter differently, make a law that
the majority desires and will stand behind. Just now we have in our
constitution a law that forbids the manufacture and sale of intoxicating
liquors in this State. There is no option in the matter. Just so long as
our party, the dominant political power, uses that option, it is in
disgrace with all decent men. I--"
There was a knock at the door--the private door.
Harlan started up, but his grandfather pulled him back into his chair.
"Go on, General," he said.
"I have drawn a resolution. Here it is: 'As a party, we deplore the fact
that temperance, through the so-called prohibitory law, has become a
matter of politics, its football to the extent that holders of public
office, sworn to enforce the laws, turn from that enforcement in order
to cater to public opinion which otherwise might deprive them of office.
We declare against this intolerable system of protection of lawbreakers.
Until the people shall repeal the law, we, the dominant party of the
State and in control of enforcement, do pledge ourselves to faithfully
enforce it, employing such law as we now have and invoking new powers
through the legislature to assist us, so long as the prohibitory law
shall remain in our constitution.'"
It was now Chairman Presson's turn to look uncomfortable.
"Look here, Vard," exploded Thornton, "I've been pretty patient while
you've been amputating a few fingers and toes of the Republican party of
this State, but I'll be damned if I propose to see you cut its throat."
There was fresh knocking at the door, but the group within the parlor
had enough to think about just then without entertaining callers.
"Now you're talking simply about yourselves and your office-holders and
your dirty profits. You're calling that mess of nasty confederacy 'Our
Party,'" declared General Waymouth, passionately. "When honesty kills a
party, let it die--let its men get out and organize another one. But I
tell you, you can't kill it by being honest, Thelismer. The trouble is
you're sitting here and building for to-night--for to-morrow. I'm a
Republican--you can't take that name away from me. But the badge doesn't
belong on men who are using that name to cover up a rum-selling
business."
Chairman Presson was livid. He leaped from his chair and drove his fist
down on the table,
"Now you're insulting me personally!" he shouted.
"I deal in no personalities, sir. So long as I hide myself under the
name of Republican and allow this thing to go on as it's going, I'm in
the traffic myself; and I don't propose to continue in it--not when I
have power placed in my hands."
"By the eternal gods, you won't have the power placed there!" roared the
chairman of the State Committee.
Now some one called to them from outside the door, repeating the
rapping.
"When you say that, you're confessing that the Republican party is a
sneak, Presson," declared the General.
The Duke came along to the table. He ticked his forefinger against the
paper that Waymouth was holding.
"Vard, you're pledging yourself in advance of election to the most rabid
of the prohibition fanatics."
"I'm pledging myself to obey the one State law that occupies the most
space in public attention, causes the most discussion, makes the most
row. It's a damnable bloodsucker to be hitched on to any political
party! But it's on ours, and I'm going to grab it with both hands!"
"Hold a proxy from the ramrodders, eh?" sneered the State chairman,
thoroughly a rebel.
"No, nor from the State rumsellers. If the people of his State want to
have rum sold, let 'em vote to have it sold. But as it now stands, they
can't enlist me to head the lawbreakers and shield the lawbreaking. I'm
through playing the hypocrite!"
"We've got to set ourselves above petty bickerings and personal
differences," interposed the Senator, cracking the party whip. "I'm a
Republican, first of all!"
"Talk sense, Pownal!" snapped the General, impatiently. "This isn't a
political rally. We're grown men and friends that can talk plain. His
principles make a Republican--or ought to--not his protestations! And
establishing a system of low license and sheriff-made local option under
a prohibitory law is unprincipled, and you know it!"
Thelismer Thornton, god of that particular machine that was then
grinding so ominously and rattling so badly, felt that he needed a few
moments in which to mend belts and adjust cogs. He wanted an opportunity
to think a little while. He had discovered a new Waymouth all of a
sudden. He wanted to get acquainted with him. He wished to find out
whether he would be really as dangerous as his astonishing threats
indicated.
The persistent man at the door was now clamorous. The Duke strode that
way and flung it open. Whoever it might be, the interruption would give
him time to think, to plan, to investigate.
The intruder was the Hon. David Everett. He stepped in, and Thornton
relocked the door after him.
Mr. Everett was not amiable. His little eyes snapped from face to face
suspiciously. It was immediately and perfectly plain to him that he had
forced admission to a conference that had not expected him, did not want
him, and was embarrassed at finding him present. In the state of mind
they were in, the men in that room would have glowered at any one.
Everett detected something more than mere personal resentment at his
intrusion--he sniffed a plot against him. There was no hand outstretched
to him, no welcome, no explanation offered why these leaders of the
party had met thus without intimation to him that anything was afoot.
Choleric red suffused his face--it had been gray with passion when he
entered, because a corridor filled with curious men is not a happy arena
for a candidate shut out of committee headquarters.
He realized that he had been a spectacle inciting interest and some
amusement while he was hammering on the door.
One object of the Duke had been attained when he admitted Everett--the
wrangling ceased. But the embarrassment was intensified. The situation
was more complex.
"I beg your pardon, gentlemen, if I am interrupting serious business,"
began Everett, intending to force some sort of explanation.
He waited. No one spoke. The others were waiting, too.
The candidate looked from one to the other, and then surveyed Wasgatt
and the papers he was clutching. He eyed General Waymouth with much
interest and some surprise. He had not been informed of that gentleman's
presence in the hotel. The General returned the gaze with serenity,
creasing his sheet of manuscript on the table with his thin fingers.
"I expected to be called in when you were ready to go over the
platform," continued Everett, sourly. "I'm supposed to know as early as
any one, I presume, what it is I'm going to stand on."
Thelismer Thornton decided that it was up to him to speak. He leaned
against the table, half sitting on it, and swung his foot.
"You have a perfect right, Dave, to inquire about any platform that
you're going to stand on. And when we get your platform ready for you
we'll call you in and submit it. But allow me to remind you that you
haven't been nominated yet." The band was blaring again outside. "The
convention is yet to be held, and has yet to declare its platform."
"I don't expect you to call Arba Spinney in here and consult with
him--if that's what your hints mean. But there's no need of your using
that 'round-the-barn talk with me, Thelismer. You know that so far as
the real Republican party is concerned Spinney is an outsider; I'm the
logical candidate, and I demand to be taken into the conference. I don't
recognize that there are two Republican candidates before the
convention."
"I do," said the Duke, firmly and with significance. He was preparing to
resent this autocratic manner.
"Well, I _don't_!" cried the State chairman. Secretly he had been
offended by Thornton's high-handed assumption of control, ever since
their talk on the morning after the Fort Canibas caucus. He had promptly
recognized the political sagacity of the old man's plan. In his fear of
the Spinney agitation--in his apprehension lest all control should be
wrested from his faction of the party--he had been eager to compromise
on General Waymouth, hoping that he would prove to be as amenable to
party reason as he knew Everett already was. But this intractable old
Spartan, with his dictation of party principles that meant the loss of
policy, power, and profits, had angered him to his marrow. He was ready
to declare himself now, Thornton or mo Thornton. He turned on the Duke.
"Perhaps you can lick me--that's the only way you can get it!" he
declared. "But you needn't expect me to stand here and grin and hand it
over."
Thornton stared at him understandingly, accepting the challenge.
"There was a man up our way, Luke, who fought two highway robbers a
whole hour, and when they had finally torn his clothes all off him, he
only had two cents in his pockets. He told the robbers, then, that he
hadn't fought to save his two cents, but because he didn't want his
financial condition revealed."
Candidate Everett was finding this conversation hard to follow.
"There's something here that isn't on the level, and I suspected it the
minute I came into this room. Presson, is the State Committee behind
me?"
"It is, and it's behind you to stay," declared the chairman. Again he
turned to Thornton.
"It's up to you, now, whether Arba Spinney gets the nomination or not.
If you keep on and split us, he gets it; but I shall make it mighty
plain to the boys as to whose fault it was, Thelismer."
"What's all this about?" demanded Everett.
Presson hesitated only a moment.
"There was a movement on inside the party to run General Waymouth as a
compromise candidate. It has been talked over. I declare myself now.
I'm against it. The State Committee stands for you, Everett!"
The candidate revolved slowly on his heels in order to study the faces
of all of them. He did not find much enthusiasm to back up Presson's
declaration. He realized that he was in the company of those who had
been plotting to shelve him, and he had the wit to understand that only
their quarrel over some issue had availed to save him from being knifed.
His temper got away from him.
"You've held your nose up pretty high in this world, General Waymouth!
Do you call a trick to steal my nomination away from me at the last
moment gentlemanly or decent? I've put in my time and my money and my
efforts. I've made a campaign. And I've waited for this!"
"You needn't insult the General in that fashion, Dave," broke in
Thornton. "Address your talk to me. I'm responsible."
"I think I'm the one that is responsible at this stage," insisted
General Waymouth. "I'll talk to you, Mr. Everett, if you please. You
addressed me. Any Republican in this State is entitled to seek
nomination as Governor. It is a worthy and proper ambition. It is an
honor that belongs to the people. It isn't a heritage to be passed on
from one bunch of politicians to another. It isn't to be bought and
bartered. I realize that precedent has given you that impression. But
it's a pernicious precedent. It's time to do away with it. That's why
I'm here to-night, dipping into slime that I hoped never to be soiled
with again. I've been frank with these other gentlemen. I'm going to be
frank with you, Mr. Everett. I know you stand for The System. I don't
have to tell you what that is. You propose to continue the nullification
programme, bar-rooms tolerated on payment of fines, tax reform slicked
over, water powers and other State resources peddled out to favorites.
It's useless to deny. We've all been in politics together too many
years."
Mr. Everett did not deny. It was too intimate a gathering for that.
"This is not the way I'd like to be called to the Governor's chair of my
State," went on the General, "but it's the way of politics. I've got to
meet you on the politician's level, so far as securing the nomination
goes. But I stand here and tell you, Mr. Everett"--he took two steps
forward and stood close to the other candidate, and his voice
rose--"that I can be a better Governor of this State than you--in the
sort of days that are on us now. This is not egotism--it's truth. I say
it because I know you and the men behind you as well as I know myself."
"It's a sneak trick, just the same!" shouted Everett.
"So are many tricks in politics--and, God help me, I'm back in
politics!" returned the General. He looked them over there in the room,
from face to face and eye to eye. "You cannot accuse me of vanity,
self-seeking, or ambition at my age, gentlemen. I've been Governor of
this State once. I didn't enjoy the experience. I'm going into this
thing again simply because I believe that I can put some honesty into
public affairs. This State is calling for it. And that object justifies
me in what I'm doing. I am a candidate!"
"By ----!" roared Everett, furious, realizing how this candidacy
threatened his hopes, "run if you want to. But I'll see to it that these
delegates know how you're running--cutting under a man that's made an
honest canvass!" He started for the door, tossing his arms above his
head--a politician beginning to run amuck.
Presson grabbed his arm and held him back.
"Don't be a lunatic, Dave," he buzzed in his ear. "If you go to
advertising this around the hotel to-night you'll be giving Spinney the
tip and starting Waymouth's boom for him. Damn it, you want to keep your
teeth shut tight and your tongue behind them! There'll be no blabbers go
out of this room--I'll see to that! I'll put a dozen members of the
State Committee at work on the delegates to-night." He was walking
Everett toward the door, getting him out of earshot of the others.
"Weymouth has got a platform there that sounds as though it was drawn up
by the House Committee of Paradise. He's got to be licked--great Judas,
he's _got_ to be licked! I've got five thousand that the liquor crowd
has sent into the State for the campaign, but this is the place to use
it--right here now! And it'll be used. Don't you worry, Dave! And keep
your mouth shut!"
It was a colloquy that no one else in the room heard--Everett putting in
suggestions as the chairman whispered hoarsely in his ear. Harlan
Thornton, looking on, guessed what it might be. Linton, at his side,
ironically hinted at the possibilities of that hurried conference in the
corner. Senator Pownal walked about the room, chewing his short beard
and incapable of a word--for his re-election came before the next
legislature, and to jump the wrong way now in the gubernatorial matter
was political suicide.
Thelismer Thornton remained in his place on the corner of the table,
staring reflectively at General Waymouth.
Presson ended his whispered exhortations with a rather savage reference
to the manner in which the Duke had involved the campaign. Everett shot
a baleful glance at the man who had so cold-bloodedly planned his
undoing.
"Look here, Thornton," he called out, as he started for the door, "you
and I will have our reckoning later. We use old horses for fox bait up
our way, too, but we always make sure that the horses are dead first."
He went out and slammed the door.
Thornton did not turn his head. He kept his eyes on Waymouth.
"Vard," he said, "I reckon I haven't been keeping my political charts up
to date. I had you down as a peninsula, jutting out _some_ from the
Republican party, but still hitched on to it. I find you're an island,
standing all by yourself, and with pretty rocky shores."
"Perhaps so," admitted the General.
"This has been a sort of a heart-to-heart meeting here to-night. In the
general honesty I'll be honest myself. I can't support you."
"Then you lack honesty."
"No, but your scheme of honesty takes you right into the king-row of the
ramrodders, and I can't train with the bunch that will flock to you.
Your theory is good--but the _practice_ will break your heart just as
sure as God hasn't made humans perfect! You'll be up against it! You're
going to test man to the limit of his professions--and it isn't a safe
operation, if you want to come out with any of your ideals left
unsmashed. If you start on that road you'll have to travel it without
me."
"Well, there's a little common sense left in the Republican party,"
snapped Presson. "General Waymouth, you've had considerable many honors
in your life, and the party gave 'em to you. That calls for some
gratitude. You can show it by keeping your hands off this thing."
"That would have been an argument once, when I was a wheel-horse with my
political blinders on; it has been an argument that has kept a good many
decent men from doing their duty. It will not work with me now." He put
his folded paper into his pocket, and reached and took the other
document that he had handed to Wasgatt earlier in the evening. "I'll not
disfigure the perfect structure of your platform now, Presson, but I'll
see how these sound from the floor of the convention, in spite of your
resolutions to shut off free speech! Good-night, gentlemen." He turned
to leave, still serene with the poise of one who has experienced all and
is prepared for all. "I used to have pretty good luck playing a lone
hand in our old card-playing days, Thelismer. I'll see what I can do in
politics."
"General Waymouth, have you a few moments to give me if I come to your
room now?" inquired Harlan Thornton. "I want to offer my services!"
"I'll join the party too, if I may!" suggested Linton.
Colonel Wadsworth was twisting his imperial with one hand and fingering
his Loyal Legion button with the other.
"I'm not the kind that waits for a draft, General," he said. "I didn't
in '61. I volunteer now."
General Waymouth smiled, bowed the three ahead of him through the door
of the parlor, and softly closed it behind himself and his little party.
"Well, Thelismer," raved the State chairman, "you can certainly take
rank, at your time of life and after all you've been through, as a
top-notch hell of a politician. You start out to run a State campaign,
and you wind up by not being able to run even your grandson!"
"What I started running seems to be still running," said the old man,
undisturbed by the attack.
"And it's costing the Republican party something, this mix-up," Presson
went on.
"You think it looks expensive, taking the thing right now at apparent
face value?"
"Look here! I don't relish humor--not now! I'm not in a humorous mood.
You can see what it's costing--blast that infernal band!"
Mr. Spinney's serenaders had not had their fill of music. There was din
outside. The tune, "A Hot Time in the Old Town To-night," won a grunt
of approval from Mr. Wasgatt, still holding his documents, more pop-eyed
than ever.
"Pretty expensive, eh?" said the Duke, lifting his knee between his
hands and leaning back on the table. "You heard about--"
"I don't want any more of your cussed stories! Not to-night!" Presson
rushed out. He went into the main parlor, where the members of the State
Committee were in informal session.
Wasgatt was left with the Duke, and the latter fixed him with benevolent
gaze.
"Old Zavanna Dodge, up our way, got to courting two old maids, trying to
make up his mind which he'd take--and the one he didn't take sued him
for breach o' promise. After Zavanna put in his evidence in court, he
sat across from the court-house in the tavern window, waiting for the
arguments to be made and the case to be decided. Toward night Squire
Enfield, his lawyer, came across. 'How did she end out?' says Zavanna.
'Agin ye--for eight hundred,' says the Squire. 'Pretty expensive, Zav!'
Zavanna tucked a spill of whisker between his lips and chewed on it and
rocked for a little while. 'Unh huh!' says he, figuring it over. And
then he spoke up cheerful: 'Well, Squire, I reckon there's that much
difference between the two women.'"
Wasgatt chuckled.
"The point to that is--but no matter! It was to Luke that I was going to
show the point."
The old man got his hat from the window-sill and trudged toward the
private door, saying, partly to Wasgatt, partly to himself: "I reckon
I'll go to bed! Just at this minute the campaign doesn't seem to be
needing my help."