AFTER AN ANXIOUS NIGHT.
McElwin arose after a night of cat-naps. He was up long before
breakfast. He stood at the gate, looking up and down the road; and
when a peddler came along the banker hailed him and asked if there
were any news in the town. The fellow held up a chicken. McElwin shook
his head and repeated the inquiry. The fellow put the chicken back
into his cart and held up a duck, whereupon McElwin ordered him to
move on. At the breakfast table he sat with an unseeing stare. The
clouds were gone, the day was bright and the air came sweet from the
garden. His daughter spoke to him and he broke his stare and looked at
her.
"Did you speak to me?" he asked.
"I said I was afraid you were not well this morning."
"Oh, yes, quite well, I thank you. But I didn't sleep very much."
"You might say you didn't sleep at all," his wife spoke up; "and I
don't think you ought to go down town today."
This preposterous suggestion made him nervous. "Gracious alive, don't
make an invalid of me," he replied. "I am all right, but an
over-concern about my health will make me sick. Did you ever notice
that when the newspapers begin to discuss a man's health he dies
pretty soon? It's a fact. One newspaper comes out and says that Mr.
Jones is not looking well. Another paper declares that Mr. Jones is
looking better than he has looked for years. Then all the papers have
their fling and the first thing you know Mr. Jones is dead."
Eva laughed; the idea struck her as being so humorously true, and Mrs.
McElwin smiled, but it was the sad smile of protest. "James," she
said, "you are a man of wonderful judgment, but sometimes you persist
in looking at life through stained glass. Something is wrong with you
and you ought to see a doctor at once."
"There you go," he cried, winking at his daughter. "Call in a doctor
and that would settle it. The newspapers would then have their fling
and that would fix me. I am worried, I acknowledge that, but it won't
last long. Who is that at the gate?" he broke off, looking through the
window. "He's moving off now. I thought at first that it was old
Jasper Staggs."
It was his custom to read a newspaper in the library after breakfast,
but this morning he did not tarry a moment, but went straightway
toward the bank. At the wooden bridge he met Caruthers, and halted to
speak to him. It was the first time that the lawyer had ever received
the great man's attention, but knowing the cause of the interest now
manifested, he was determined to dally with it as a sort of revenge.
"Any news, Mr. Caruthers?"
"Oh, you know my name. I am much flattered, I assure you. Of course I
have known you for many years, but I didn't think you remembered me."
McElwin stood blinking at the sun. "I think I have spoken to you on an
average of once a day for the last fifteen years," said he. "I am not
a gusher, however. I have not seen a newspaper this morning and ask
you if there is any news."
"Oh, I suppose there must be," Caruthers replied, leaning back against
the rail of the bridge. "I haven't seen a newspaper either and I don't
know what may have happened in the outside world."
"Any news about town?"
"No, nothing unusual, I believe. A dog was found dead on the public
square, I understand; and I hear that old Mart Henley's son has been
suspected of stealing a ham from Avery's meat house. Let me see." He
passed his hand over his brow, as if in deep meditation. "Maxey's cow
tramped down the roses in Donalson's yard and Thompson's hogs, covered
with mud, have rubbed themselves against Tillman's white fence."
"Such occurrences are of no interest to me," said the banker.
"No, nor to me either. Well, I'll bid you good morning. Wait a
moment," he added. "There was something else on my mind. Oh, did you
hear of the White Caps?"
"No!" McElwin said with a gasp. "What about them?"
"Well, they went last night to have some fun with Sam Lyman."
"Ah, and they took him out and whipped him?"
"Well, hardly. He wore out a chair over them, and about three miles
from town, I understand that old Doc Mason has been kept pretty busy
since midnight sewing up their heads. Lyman didn't tell me, but I got
it pretty straight that somebody stole the pistol out of his room; and
if it hadn't been for that the undertaker would have had no cause to
complain of the dullness of the season."
"You don't tell me!"
"Yes, I am inclined to think I do. Old Jasper had a visitor early in
the evening; the women went out calling, and the visitor got the old
man drunk."
"And it is suspected that the visitor had something to do with the
subsequent call of the White Caps?"
"Well, it is not only suspected, but pretty well established. I
suppose you could guess the name of the visitor."
"How could I, sir?"
"Well, I have heard it said that the visitor never makes an investment
without consulting you, and it is thought more than likely that he
consulted you on the occasion of this bad investment."
Caruthers leered and the banker winced. "As yet I am at a loss as to
who the visitor might have been," said McElwin; "but no matter who, I
wish to say that he did not consult me. I have never been known to
violate the law, sir."
"Oh, no one would suspect you of that, Mr. McElwin. We all know that
you never break the law, but we don't know that you are not sometimes
aware that the law is going to be broken. Good morning."
"Wait a moment, sir. Do you mean to tell me that I am suspected of
complicity in this infamous outrage?"
"No, I don't mean to tell you that. Neither do I mean to say that you
would be wrong in doing so. You have had cause. Lyman's stubbornness
is quite enough to rasp a saint. I couldn't stand it; and between me
and you, I wish they had lashed him till he would have craved the
privilege of going away."
"Wait just one more moment, Mr. Caruthers. Is what you have told me in
reality suspected by the people or did you evolve it out of your own
richness of observation?"
Caruthers bowed his head under the outpour of this compliment. "It is
not public talk," he admitted.
"Ah, thank you. Drop in at the bank some time and see me, sir. Good
morning."
* * * * *
Warren stepped out of the room, merely nodding to McElwin as he
passed. Lyman got up, handed McElwin a chair, and without speaking,
sat down again. McElwin stood with his hands on the back of the chair,
looking at Lyman, and evidently embarrassed as to what he ought to
say. "Beautiful morning," said Lyman, seeing his embarrassment and
feeling that it was his duty as host to help him out of it.
"Yes, very bright after the rain."
"That's a fact; it did rain last night."
"Mr. Lyman, I heard something this morning that has grieved me very
much."
"Oh, about the White Caps. Sit down, won't you?"
McElwin sat down. "Yes, the White Caps." He was silent for a moment
and then he continued: "The intercourse between you and me has been
far from friendly. I do not deny that I should like to see you leave
this place, never to return; I acknowledge that I would bribe you to
go, but I would not give countenance to a mob that would force you to
leave."
Lyman looked at him with a cool smile. "Do you mean to tell me, Mr.
McElwin, that Sawyer did not speak to you of his intention to take me
out as if I were a thief or a wife-beater--"
"Stop, sir!" McElwin commanded, holding up his hand. "I forbid you
to--"
"Forbid is rather a strong word. Don't you think that request would be
better?"
"Well," said McElwin, softening, "we will say request. As I tell you,
your presence in this community is distasteful to me, and your
farcical marriage stands directly opposed to my plans. But I would not
violate the law and commit a misdemeanor to drive you off. You have
reasons for believing that Mr. Sawyer--"
"Yes, he was the organizer."
"But not with my sanction, sir."
"No? But perhaps not without your knowledge."
"Sir!"
"Keep your seat. Now I am going to tell you what I believe. I believe
that Sawyer came to you, after I had burned the check, and told you
what he intended to do."
"He did, and I told him not to do it."
"Ah. But did you go to the law and enter a protest against an outrage
which you knew he was going to commit? Did you send me a word of
warning or did you quietly wait in the hope that the result might rid
you of me?"
"Mr. Lyman, I am going to tell you the absolute truth. I advised
against it, and after he was gone, I went out to look for him, but he
had driven down into the country to--"
"To organize his mob," Lyman suggested.
"Well, yes, we will say that he had gone for that purpose. And at
night I came down town in the rain to see if I could not find him, and
when I failed in this, I thought that I would come up here to warn
you." He hesitated, with a slight cough.
"But you didn't come."
"No, not all the way. I halted on the stairs and turned back. I felt
that I--" He hesitated.
"You felt that you could not afford to antagonize Mr. Sawyer."
McElwin coughed. "It was not exactly that, Mr. Lyman. But I did think
that it was meddling with something that--that did not concern me."
"Didn't concern you? I thought you were deeply concerned, enough at
least to feel yourself warranted in attempting to buy me, to hire me
to leave."
"You don't quite understand, Mr. Lyman."
"Oh, yes I do. The trouble with you is that I understand too well. Go
ahead with your absolute truth."
McElwin cleared his husky throat. "I went home, sir, and passed a most
anxious night; I suffered, sir, far more than you did."
"No doubt of that. I enjoyed myself."
"Mr. Lyman, will you please not make a joke of this affair."
"Oh, I won't make a joke of it. It will be earnest enough by the time
it is over with. I am informed that Mrs. Sawyer is very old and that
to introduce her son's name in connection with the White Caps would
greatly distress her, and I have resolved not to do this. But there
are punishments, moral lessons to be served out, and I think it well
to begin with you."
"Mr. Lyman, we are not friends, but would you ruin me in the
estimation of the public?"
"No, I will say nothing to the public. I will tell your daughter."
McElwin started. His mind had been so directly fixed upon the public
that he had not thought of his home. Being the master there he could
command respect, and it was on the tip of his tongue now to say that
his daughter would not believe Lyman, but, as if a bitter taste had
suddenly arisen in his mouth, he felt that this man's word out-weighed
his own. He had a strong hope that when his daughter should be set
free and left to choose at will, her judgment would finally settle
upon Sawyer. But he knew that should she be convinced that her father
had counciled him to engage the services of lawless men or had even
connived at the brutal procedure--he knew that, convinced of this, she
would turn in scorn upon Sawyer and, in a moment, wreck the plans that
it had taken years to build.
"Mr. Lyman," he said, "I admit that I am largely to blame, and I now
throw myself upon your mercy, sir. Please don't tell my daughter."
All his dignity and arrogance had vanished, and the chair creaked
under him. His brown beard, usually so neatly trimmed, looked ragged
now, and his eyes, which Lyman had thought were full of sharp and
cutting inquiry, now looked dull and questionless. "I throw myself
upon your mercy," he repeated.
"Then, sir, you knock my props from under me," Lyman replied. "I am
not equipped with that firmness which men call justice. Nature
sometimes makes sport of a man by giving him a heart. And what does it
mean? It means that he shall suffer at the hands of other men, and
that when his hour for revenge has come, his over-grown heart rises up
and commands him to be merciful. McElwin, I ought to publish you--I
ought to tell your wife and daughter that you have conspired with
ruffians to have me whipped from the town, but I will not. You may go
now."
The banker's arrogance flew back to him. "You may go" were words that
pierced him like a three-pronged fork, but he controlled himself, for
now his judgment was stronger than his dignity. He arose and stepped
up close to Lyman. "I am under deep obligations to you," he said.
"You are a kind and generous man."
"Why don't you say that you are thankful to find me a fool?"
McElwin took no notice of this remark. "And I hope that I may be able
to do something for you," he said. Still he stood there, as if he had
not struck the proper note. "Do something for you. And if you
need--need money, I shall be glad to let you have it."
"Oh, you couldn't get away without mentioning your god-essence, could
you? Good day."