THE END OF THE BEGINNING
It was the following night, and the hour was nine. Old Hosie stood in
the sheriff's office in Galloway County jail, while Jim Nichols
scrutinized a formal looking document his visitor had just delivered
into his hands.
"It's all right, isn't it?" said the old lawyer.
"Yep." The sheriff thrust the paper into a drawer. "I'll fetch him
right down."
"Remember, don't give him a hint!" Old Hosie warned again. "You're
sure," he added anxiously, "he hasn't got on to anything?"
"How many more times have I got to tell you," returned the sheriff, a
little irritated, "that I ain't said a word to him--just as you told
me! He heard some of the racket last night, sure. But he thought it
was just part of the regular campaign row."
"All right! All right! Hurry him along then!"
Left alone, Old Hosie walked excitedly up and down the dingy room,
whose sole pretension in an aesthetic way was the breeze-blown
"yachting girl" of a soap company's calendar, sailing her bounding
craft above the office cuspidor.
The old man grinned widely, rubbed his bony hands together, and a
concatenation of low chuckles issued from his lean throat. But when
Sheriff Nichols reappeared, ushering in Arnold Bruce, all these
outward manifestations of satisfaction abruptly terminated, and his
manner became his usual dry and sarcastic one with his nephew.
"Hello, Arn!" he said. "H'are you?"
"Hello!" Bruce returned, rather gruffly, shaking the hand his uncle
held out. "What's this the sheriff has just told me about a new
trial?"
"It's all right," returned Old Hosie. "We've fought on till we've made
'em give it to us."
"What's the use of it?" Bruce growled. "The cards will be stacked the
same as at the other trial."
"Well, whatever happens, you're free till then. I've got you out on
bail, and I'm here to take you home with me. So come along with you."
Old Hosie pushed him out and down the jail steps and into a closed
carriage that was waiting at the curb. Bruce was in a glowering,
embittered mood, as was but natural in a man who keenly feels that he
has suffered without justice and has lost all for which he fought.
"You know I appreciate your working for the new trial," he remarked
dully, as the carriage rattled slowly on. "How did you manage it?"
"It's too long a story for now. I'll tell you when we get home."
Bruce was gloomily silent for a moment.
"Of course the Blake crowd swept everything at the election to-day?"
"Well, on the whole, their majority wasn't as big as they'd counted
on," returned Old Hosie.
They rode on, Bruce sunk in his bitter, rebellious dejection. The
carriage turned into the street that ran behind the Court House, then
after rattling over the brick pavement for a few moments came to a
pause. Hosie opened the door and stepped out.
"Hello! what are we stopping here for?" demanded Bruce. "This is the
Court House. I thought you said we were going home?"
"So we are, so we are," Old Hosie rapidly returned, an agitation in
his manner that he could not wholly repress. "But first we've got to
go into the Court House. Judge Kellog is waiting for us; there's a
little formality or two about your release we've got to settle with
him. Come along." And taking his arm Old Hosie hurried him into the
Court House yard, allowing no time for questioning the plausibility of
this explanation.
But suddenly Bruce stopped short.
"Look at that, won't you!" he cried in amazement. "See how the front
of the yard is lighted up, and see how it's jammed with people! And
there goes the band! What the dickens----"
At that moment some one on the outskirts of the crowd sighted the
pair. "There's Bruce!" he shouted.
Immediately there was an uproar. "Hurrah for Bruce! Hurrah for Bruce!"
yelled the crowd, and began to rush to the rear of the yard, cheering
as they ran.
Bruce gripped Old Hosie's arm.
"What's this mean?"
"It means we've got to run for it!" And so saying the old man, with a
surprising burst of speed left over from his younger years, dragged
his nephew up the walk and through the rear door of the Court House,
which he quickly locked upon their clamorous pursuers.
Bruce stared at his uncle in bewilderment.
"Hosie--Hosie--what's this mean?"
The old man's leathery face was twitching in a manner remarkable to
behold.
"Drat it," he grumbled, with a quaver in his voice, "why don't you
read the _Express_ and keep up with the news!"
"What's this mean?" demanded Bruce.
"Well, here's a copy of your old rag. Read it and see for yourself."
Bruce seized the _Express_ the old man held out to him. Up in one
corner were the words "_Election Extra_," and across the top of the
page ran the great headline:
"BRUCE TICKET SWEEPS CITY"
Bruce looked slowly up, stupefied, and steadied himself with a hand
against the door.
"Is--is that true?"
"For my part," declared Old Hosie, the quaver in his voice growing
more prominent, "I don't believe more'n half I see in that dirty
sheet!"
"Then--it's true?"
"Don't you hear them wild Indians yelling for Mayor Bruce?"
Bruce was too dazed to speak for a moment.
"Tell me--how did it happen?"
"Oh, read your old rag and see!"
"For God's sake, Hosie, don't fool with me!" he cried. "How did it
happen? Somebody has been at work. Who did it?"
"Eh! You really want to know that?"
"Yes, yes! Who did it?"
"It was done," said Old Hosie, looking at him very straight and
blinking his eyes, "by a party that I understand you thought couldn't
do much of anything."
"But who? Who?"
"If you really want to know, the party's name is Miss Katherine West."
Bruce's stupefaction outdid itself.
"Katherine West!" he repeated.
Old Hosie could maintain his role no longer.
"Yes, Katherine West!" he burst out in triumphant joy, his words
tumbling over one another. "She did it all--every bit of it! And that
mob out in front is there to celebrate your election. We knew how
things were going to turn out, so we were safe in getting this thing
ready in advance. And I don't mind telling you, young fellow, that
this celebration is just as much for her as it is for you. The town
has simply gone crazy about her and is looking for a chance to kiss
her feet. She said she wouldn't come to-night, but we all insisted. I
promised to bring her, and I've got to be off. So good-by!"
Bruce caught his arm.
"Wait, Hosie! Tell me what she did! Tell me the rest!"
"Read that paper I gave you! And here, I brought this for you, too."
He took from his inside pocket a copy of the extra Katherine and Billy
Harper had got out the night before. "Those two papers will tell you
all there is to tell. And now," he continued, opening a door and
pushing Bruce through it, "you just wait in there so I'll know where
to find you when I want you. I've got to hustle for a while, for I'm
master of ceremonies of this show. How's that for your old uncle? It's
the first time I've ever been connected with a popular movement in my
life except to throw bricks at it, and I ain't so sure I can stand
popularity for one whole night."
With that he was gone. Bruce recognized the room into which he had
been thrust as the court room in which he had been tried and
sentenced, in which Katherine had pleaded her father's case. Over the
judge's desk, as though in expectation of his coming, a green-shaded
drop lamp shed its cone of light. Bruce stumbled forward to the desk,
sank into the judge's chair, and began feverishly to devour the two
copies of his paper.
Billy Harper, penitently sober and sworn to sobriety for all his days,
had outdone himself on that day's issue. He told how the voters
crowded to the polls in their eagerness to vote for Bruce, and he gave
with a tremendous exultation an estimate of Bruce's majority, which
was so great as to be an almost unanimous election. Also he told how
Blind Charlie Peck had prudently caught last night's eleven o'clock
express and was now believed to be repairing his health down at Hot
Springs, Arkansas. Also he gave a deal of inside history: told how
the extra had been gotten out the night before, with the Blake
mass-meeting going on beneath the _Express's_ windows; told of the
scene at the home of Blake, and Blake's strange march to jail; and,
freed from the restraint of Katherine's presence, who would have
forbidden him, he told with a world of praise the story of how she had
worked up the case.
The election extra finished, Bruce spread open the extra of the night
before, the paper that had transferred him from a prison cell to the
mayor's office, and read the mass of Katherine's evidence that Billy
had so stirringly set forth. Then the head of the editor of the
_Express_, of the mayor of Westville, sank forward into his folded
arms and he sat bowed, motionless, upon the judge's desk.
A great outburst of cheering from the crowd, though louder far than
those that had preceded it, did not disturb him; and he did not look
up until he heard the door of the court room open. Then he saw that
Old Hosie had entered, and with him Katherine.
"I'll just leave you two for a minute," Old Hosie said rapidly, "while
I go out and start things going by introducing the Honourable Hiram
Cogshell."
With that the old man took the arm of Katherine's father, who had been
standing just behind, slipped through the door and was gone. A moment
later, from in front, there arose a succession of cheers for Doctor
West.
Bruce came slowly down from behind the railing of Judge Kellog's desk
and paused before Katherine. She was very white, her breath came with
a tremulous irregularity, and she looked at him with wide, wondering,
half-fearful eyes.
At first Bruce could not get out a word, such a choking was there in
his throat, such a throbbing and whirling through all his being. He
dizzily supported himself with a hand upon the back of a bench, and
stood and gazed at her.
It was she that broke the silence.
"Mr. Hollingsworth did not tell me--you were here. I'd better go." And
she started for the door.
"No--no--don't!" he said. He drew a step nearer her. "I've just
read"--holding up the two papers--"what you have done."
"Mr. Harper has--has exaggerated it very much," she returned. Her
voice seemed to come with as great a difficulty as his own.
"And I have read," he continued, "how much I owe you."
"It's--it's----" She did not finish in words, but a gesture disclaimed
all credit.
"It has made me. And I want to thank you, and I do thank you. And I do
thank you," he repeated lamely.
She acknowledged his gratitude with an inclination of her head.
Motions came easier than words.
"And since I owe it all to you, since I owe nothing to any political
party, I want to tell you that I am going to try to make the very best
mayor that I can!"
"I am sure of that," she said.
"I realize that it's not going to be easy," he went on. "The people
seem to be with me now, thanks to you--but as soon as I try to carry
out my ideas, I know that both parties will rise up and unite against
me. The big fight is still ahead. But since--since you have done it
all--I want you to know that I am going to fight straight ahead for
the people, no matter what happens to me."
"I know," she said.
"My eyes have been opened to many things about politics," he added.
She did not speak.
Silence fell between them; the room was infiltered by a multitudinous
hum from without. Presently the thought, and with it the fear, that
had been rising up stronger and stronger in Bruce for the last half
hour, forced itself through his lips.
"I suppose that now--you'll be going back to New York?"
"No. I have had several cases offered me to-day. I am going to stay in
Westville."
"Oh!" he said--and was conscious of a dizzy relief. Then, "I wish you
success."
"Thank you."
Again there was a brief silence, both standing and looking in
constraint at one another.
"This celebration is very trying, isn't it?" she said. "I suppose we
might sit down while we wait."
"Yes."
They each took the end of a different bench, and rather stiffly sat
gazing into the shadowy severity of the big room. Sounding from the
front of the Court House they heard rather vaguely the deep-chested,
sonorous rhetoric of the Honourable Hiram.
But they heard it for but an instant. Suddenly the court room door
flew open and Old Hosie marched straight up before them.
"You're the dad-blastedest pair of idiots I ever saw!" he burst out,
with an exasperation that was not an entire success, for it was
betrayed by a little quaver.
They stood up.
"What's the matter?" stammered Bruce.
"Matter?" cried Old Hosie. "What d'you suppose I left you two people
here together for?"
"You said you had to start----"
"Well, couldn't I have another and a bigger reason? I've been
listening outside the door here, and the way you people have acted!
See here, you two know you love one another, and yet you act toward
each other like a pair of tame icebergs that have just been
introduced!"
He turned in a fury upon his nephew, blinking to keep the moisture
from his eyes.
"Don't you love her?" he demanded, pointing to Katherine, who had
suddenly grown yet more pale.
"Why--yes--yes----"
"Then why in the name of God don't you tell her so?"
"I'm--I'm afraid she won't care to hear it," stammered Bruce, not
daring to look at Katherine.
"Tell her so, and see what she says," shouted Old Hosie. "How else are
you going to find out? Tell her what a fool you've been. Tell her
she's proved to you you're all wrong about what you thought she ought
to do. Tell her unless you get some one of sense to help run you,
you're going to make an all-fired mess of this mayor's job. Tell
her"--there was a choking in his voice--"oh, boy, just tell her what
you feel!
"And now," he added quickly, and again sharply, "that mob outside
won't listen to the Honourable Hiram much longer. They want you folks.
I give you just two minutes to fix things up. Two minutes--no more!"
And pulling his high hat down upon his forehead, Old Hosie turned
abruptly and again left the room.
Bruce looked slowly about upon Katherine. His rugged, powerful face
was working with emotion.
"What Uncle Hosie has said is all true," he stammered fearfully. "You
know I love you, Katherine. And there isn't anything you'll want to do
that I'll not be glad to have you do. Won't you forget, Katherine, and
won't you--won't you----"
He stretched out his arms to her. "Oh, Katherine!" he cried. "I love
you! I want you! I need you!"
While he spoke her face had grown radiant. "And I--and I"--she
choked, then her voice went on with an uprush of happiness--"and
I--oh, Arnold, I need you!"
* * * * *
When Old Hosie reentered a minute later and saw what there was to be
seen, he let out a little cry of joy and swooped down upon them.
"Look out, Katherine," he warned, quaveringly, "for I'm going to kiss
you!" But despite this warning the old man succeeded in his
enterprise. "This is great!--great!" he cried, shaking a hand of each.
"But we'll have to cut this hallelujah business short till that little
picnic outside is over. I just pulled the Honourable Hiram down--and,
say, just listen to that roar!"
A roar it was indeed. Of a bursting brass band, of thousands of eager
people.
"And who do you suppose they're shouting for?" inquired the joyous
Hosie.
Katherine smiled a tear-bright smile at Bruce.
"For the new mayor," she said.
"No, no! All for you!" said he.
"Well, come on and we'll see who it's for!" cried Old Hosie.
And taking an arm of each he led them out to face the cheering
multitude.
THE END
THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS
GARDEN CITY. N. Y.
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:
Minor changes have been made to correct typesetters' errors;
otherwise, every effort has been made to remain true to the
author's words and intent.