MR. STONE LEAVES BOBBY A PARTING COMMISSION AND A LEFT-HANDED BLESSING
It looked good to Bobby, that late extra of the _Bulletin_, and the
force that he had kept on duty to get it out greeted him, as he walked
through the office, with a running fire of comment and congratulation
that was almost like applause. He had bought a copy on the street as
he came in, and as he spread it out there came upon him a thrill of
realization that this ought to be the beginning of the end.
It was. The fact that Bobby, through the _Bulletin_, had forced this
action, made him a power to be reckoned with; and straws, whole bales
of them, began to show which way the wind was blowing.
One morning a delegation headed by the Reverend Doctor Larynx waited
upon him. The Reverend Doctor was a minister of great ingenuity and
force, who sought the salvation of souls through such vital topics as
Shall Men Go Coatless in Summer? The Justice of Three-Cent Car Fares,
and The Billboards Must Go. All public questions, civic, state or
national, were thoroughly thrashed out in the pulpit of the Reverend
Larynx, and turned adrift with the seal of his condemnation or
approval duly fixed upon them; and he managed to get his name and
picture in the papers almost as often as the man who took eighty-seven
bottles of Elixo and still survived. With him were four thoroughly
respectable men of business, two of whom wore side-whiskers and the
other two of whom wore white bow-ties.
"Fine business, Mr. Burnit," said the Reverend Doctor Larynx in a
loud, hearty voice, advancing with three strides and clasping Bobby's
hand in a vise-like grip; for he was a red-blooded minister, was the
Reverend Doctor Larynx, and he believed in getting down among the
"pee-pul." "The _Bulletin_ has proved itself a mighty fine engine of
reform, and the reputable citizens of this municipality now see a ray
of hope before them."
"I'm afraid that the reputable citizens," ventured Bobby, "have no one
but themselves to blame for their past hopeless condition. They're too
selfish to vote."
"You have hit the nail on the head," declaimed the Reverend Larynx
with a loud, hearty laugh, "but the _Bulletin_ will rouse them to a
sense of duty. Last night, Mr. Burnit, the Utopian Club was formed
with an initial membership of over seventy, and it selected a
candidate for mayor of whom the _Bulletin_ is bound to approve. Shake
hands with Mr. Freedom, the Utopian Club's candidate for mayor, Mr.
Burnit."
Bobby shook hands with Mr. Freedom quite nicely, and studied him
curiously.
He was one of the two who wore side-whiskers and a habitual Prince
Albert, and he displayed a phenomenal length from lower lip to chin,
which, by reason of his extremely high and narrow forehead, gave his
features the appearance of being grouped in tiny spots somewhere near
the center of a long, yellow cylinder. Mr. Freedom, he afterward
ascertained, was a respectable singing-teacher.
"Professor Freedom," went on the Reverend Doctor Larynx, still loudly
and heartily, "has the time to devote to this office, as well as the
ideal qualifications. He has no vices whatever. He does not even smoke
nor use tobacco in any form, and under his regime the saloons of this
town would be turned into vacant store-rooms, if there are laws to
make possible such action."
"I do not want the saloons put out of business," declared Bobby. "I
merely want them vacated at twelve every night, without exception."
When Doctor Larynx and his delegation went away in wrath the leader
was already preparing his sermon upon The Iniquity of the Sons of Rich
Fathers.
On the following day a delegation from the business men's club waited
upon him. The business men's club wanted a business administration.
This crowd Bobby handled differently. Upon his desk, tabulated in
advance against just such an emergency, he had statistics concerning
all the business men's administrations that had been tried in various
cities, and he submitted this statement without argument. It needed
none.
"Politics is in itself a distinct business," he explained. "You would
not one of you take up the duties of a surveyor without previous
training. The only trouble is that there are no restrictions placed
upon politicians. I propose to use them, but to regulate them."
He did not convert the delegation by this one interview, but he did by
cultivating these men and others of their kind separately. He ate
luncheons and dinners with them at the Traders' Club, played billiards
with them, smoked and talked with them; and the burden of his talk was
Chalmers. When he finally got ready for his campaign the business men
were with him unanimously, at least outwardly. Inwardly, there were
reservations, for the matter of special privileges was one to be very
gravely considered; and special privileges, at a price not entirely
prohibitive, was the bulwark of Stone's regime.
"But the Stone regime," Bobby advised them, coming brutally to the
point and telling them what he knew of their own affairs and Stone's,
"is about to come to an end. The handwriting is on the wall, and you
might just as well climb into the band wagon, for at last I have the
public on my side."
At last he had. For a solid year he had been trying to understand the
peculiar apathy of the public, and he did not understand it yet. They
seemed to like Stone and to look upon his wholesale corruption as a
joke; but by constant hammering, by showing the unredeemable
cussedness of Stone and his crowd, he had produced some impression--an
impression that, alas! was of the surface only--until the
investigating committee began its sessions. When it became understood,
however, that certain of the thieves might actually be sent to the
penitentiary, then who so loud in their denunciation as the public?
Why, Stone had robbed them right and left; why, Stone was an enemy to
mankind; why, Stone and all his friends were monsters whom it were a
good and a holy thing to skewer and flay and cast into everlasting
brimstone!
Facts were uncovered that set the entire city in turmoil. More than
fifty men who had never been born had been carried upon the city and
county pay-rolls, and half of their salaries went directly into
Stone's pocket, the other half going to the men who conducted this
paying enterprise. Contracts for city paving and other improvements
were let to favored bidders at an enormous figure, and Stone
personally had one-fourth of the huge profits on "scamped" work,
another fourth going to those who arranged the details and did the
collecting. Innumerable instances of this sort were brought out; but
the biggest scandal of all, in that it involved men who should have
been unassailable, was that of the banks. The relentless probe brought
out the fact that all city and county funds had been distributed among
four banks, the deposits yielding no revenue whatever to either
commonwealth. These funds, however, had paid privately two per cent.
interest, and this interest was paid in cash, in sealed envelopes, to
the city and county auditors and treasurers, who took the envelopes
unbroken to Stone for distribution. The amounts thus diverted from the
proper channels totaled to an enormous figure, and, as this money was
the most direct and approachable, Chalmers, who had the interesting
role of inquisitor, set out to get it. The officials who had been
longest at the crib, grown incautious were now men of property, and by
the use of red-hot pincers Chalmers was able to restore nearly sixty
thousand dollars of stolen money, with the possibility of more in
sight.
It was upon the heels of this that Chalmers' candidacy for mayor was
announced, and the manner in which the Stone machine dropped to pieces
was laughable. Chalmers, and the entire slate so carefully prepared by
Bobby in conjunction with the shrewd old fox, Cal Lewis, won by a
majority so overwhelming as to be almost unanimous. Immediately upon
Chalmers' election heads began to drop, and the first to go was
Cooley, chief of police, in whom, four years later, Bobby recognized
the driver of his ice wagon. Coincident with the election came
well-founded rumors of grand jury indictments. Two of Stone's closest
and busiest lieutenants, who were most in danger of being presented
with nice new suits of striped clothing, quietly converted their
entire property into cash and then just as quietly slipped away to
Honduras.
Late one afternoon, as Bobby sat alone in his room in the almost
deserted _Bulletin_ building, so worried over his business affairs
that he had no time for elation over his political and personal
triumphs, the door opened and Stone stood before him. The pouches
under Stone's eyes were heavier and darker, his cheeks drooped
flabbily and he seemed to have fallen away inside his clothes, but
upon his face there sat the same stern impassiveness. Bobby instantly
rose, having good cause to want to be well planted upon his feet with
this man near him. Stone carefully closed the door behind him and
advanced to the other side of Bobby's desk.
"Well, you win," he said huskily.
Bobby drew a long breath.
"It has cost me a lot of money, Mr. Stone. It has left me almost flat
broke--but I got you."
"I give you credit," admitted Stone. "I didn't think anybody could do
it, least of all a kid; but you got me and you got me good. It's been
a hard fight for all of us, I guess. I'm a little run down," and he
hesitated curiously; "my doctor says I got to take an ocean trip." He
suddenly blazed out: "Damn it, you might as well be told! I'm running
away!"
Bobby found himself silent. For two years he had planned and hoped for
this moment of victory. Now that the exultant moment had come he found
himself feeling strangely sorry for this big man, in spite of his
unutterable rascality.
"I ain't coming back," Stone went on after a pause, "and there's
something I want to ask you to do for me."
"I should be glad to do it, Mr. Stone, if it is anything I can allow
myself to do."
"Aw, cut it!" growled Stone. "Look here. I got a list of some poor
mutts I been looking out for, and I've just set aside a wad to keep it
going. I want you to look after 'em and see that the money gets spread
around right. I know you're square. I don't know anybody else to give
it to."
To Bobby he handed a list of some fifty names and addresses, with
monthly amounts set down opposite them. They were widows and orphans
and helpless creatures of all sorts and conditions, blind and deaf and
crippled, whom Stone, in the great passion that every man has for some
one to love and revere him, and in the secret tenderness inseparable
from all big natures, had made his pensioners.
"There ain't a soul on earth knows about these but me, and every one
of 'em is wise to it that if they ever blat a word about it the pap's
cut off. I don't want a thing, not even a hint, printed about
this--see? I ain't afraid that you'll use it in the paper after me
asking you not to, so I don't ask you for any promise."
"I'll do it with pleasure," offered Bobby.
"Well, I guess that's about all," said Stone, and turned to go.
Bobby came from behind his desk.
"After all, Stone," he said, with some hesitation, "I'm sorry to lose
an enemy so worth while. I wish you good luck wherever you are going,"
and he held out his hand.
Stone looked at the proffered hand and shook his head.
"I'd rather smash your face," he growled, and passed out of the door.
It was the last that Bobby ever saw of him, and all that the
_Bulletin_ carried about his flight was the "fact," not at all too
prominently displayed for the man's importance as a public figure,
that Stone's health was in jeopardy and that he was about to take an
ocean voyage upon the advice of his physician; and on that day Stone's
picture disappeared from the place it had occupied upon the front page
of the _Bulletin_.
It was a victory complete and final, but it was not without its sting,
for on that same day Bobby faced an empty exchequer. It was Johnson
who brought him the sad but not at all unexpected tidings, at a moment
when Chalmers and Agnes happened to be in the office. Seeing them,
Johnson hesitated at the door.
"What is it, Johnson?" asked Bobby.
"Oh, nothing much," said Mr. Johnson with a pained expression. "I'll
come back again."
He had a sheet of paper with him and Bobby held out his hand for it.
Still hesitating, old Johnson brought it forward and laid it down on
Bobby's desk.
"You know you told me, sir, to bring this to you."
Had the others not been present he would have added the reminder that
he had been instructed to bring this statement a week in advance of
the time when Bobby should no longer be able to meet his payroll.
Bobby looked up from the statement without any thought of reserve
before these three.
"Well, it's come. I'm broke."
"Not so much a calamity in this instance as it has been in others,"
said Agnes sagely. "Fortunately, your trustee is right here, and your
trustee's lawyer, who has two hundred and fifty thousand dollars still
to your account."
Bobby listened in frowning silence, and old Johnson, who had prepared
himself before he came upstairs for such a contingency, quietly laid
upon Bobby's desk one of the familiar gray envelopes and withdrew. It
was inscribed:
_To My Son Robert, Upon the Turning Over to Him of His Sixth
and Last Experimental Fund_
"If a man fails six times he'd better be pensioned and left to
live a life of pleasant ease; for everybody has a right to be
happy, and not all can gain happiness through their own
efforts. So, if you fail this last time, don't worry, my boy,
but take measures to cut your garment according to the income
from a million and a half dollars, invested so safely that it
can yield you but two per cent. If the fault of your ill
success lies with anybody it lies with me, and I blame myself
bitterly for it many times as I write this letter.
"Remember, first, last and always, that I want you to be
happy."
Bobby passed the letter to Agnes and the envelope to Chalmers.
"This is a little premature," he said, smiling at both of them, "for
I'm not applying for the sixth portion."
Agnes looked up at him in surprise.
"Not applying for it?"
"No," he declared, "I don't want it. I understand there is a provision
that I can not use two of these portions in the same business."
Both Chalmers and Agnes nodded.
"I don't want money for any other business than the _Bulletin_,"
declared Bobby, "and if my father has it fixed so that he won't help
me as I want to be helped, I don't want it at all."
"There is another provision about which you perhaps don't know,"
Chalmers informed him; "if you refuse this money it reverts to the
main fund."
Bobby studied this over thoughtfully.
"Let it revert," said he. "I'll sink or swim right here."
The next day he went to his bank and tried to borrow money. They liked
Bobby very much indeed over at the bank. He was a vigorous young man,
a young man of affairs, a young man who had won a great public
victory, a young man whom it was generally admitted had done the city
an incalculable amount of good; but they could not accept Bobby nor
the _Bulletin_ as a business proposition. Had they not seen the
original fund dwindle and dwindle for two years until now there was
nothing left? Wouldn't another fund dwindle likewise? It is no part of
a bank's desire to foreclose upon securities. They are quite well
satisfied with just the plain interest. Moreover, the _Bulletin_
wasn't such heavy security, anyhow.
Bobby tried another bank with like results, and also some of his firm
business friends at the Traders' Club. In the midst of his dilemma
President De Graff of the First National came to him.
"I understand you have been trying to borrow some money, Burnit?"
It sounded to Bobby as if De Graff had come to gloat over him, since
he had been instrumental in dragging De Graff and the First National
through the mire.
"Yes, sir, I have," he nevertheless answered steadily.
"Why didn't you come to us?" demanded De Graff.
"To you?" said Bobby, amazed. "I never thought of you in that
connection at all, De Graff, after all that has happened."
De Graff shrugged his shoulders.
"That was like pulling a tooth. It hurt and one dreaded it, but it was
so much better when it was out. Until you jumped into the fight Stone
had me under his thumb. The minute the exposure came he had no further
hold on me. It is the only questionable thing I ever did in my life,
and I'm glad it was exposed. I admire you for it, even though it will
hurt me in a business way for a long time to come. But about this
money now. How much do you need at the present time?"
"I'd like an account of about twenty-five thousand."
"I can let you have it at once," said De Graff, "and as much more as
you need, up to a certain reasonable point that I think will be amply
sufficient."
"Is this Stone's money?" asked Bobby with sudden suspicion.
De Graff smiled.
"No," said he, "it is my own. I have faith in you, Burnit, and faith
in the _Bulletin_. Suppose you step over to the First National with me
right away."