While Commander Lanigan talked with the mayor from a telephone-booth in a
drug-store under Central Labor Union hall, Post-Adjutant Demeter stood with
his nose pressed against the glass door, waiting anxiously.
Lanigan pushed open the door with one hand while he hung up the receiver
with the other, and by his precipitate exit nigh bowled his adjutant over;
Mr. Lanigan, it was plain to be seen, was wound up tightly that evening
and his mainspring was operating him by jumps.
"He's the boy! He's coming! Tell the world so! And I'll go back up-stairs
and tell them blistered sons o' seefo that there are such things as truth
and a bar o' soap in this country, spite o' the fact they have never used
either one!"
Demeter followed his commander into the street.
In spite of his haste, Lanigan was halted; he gazed up into the heavens,
his breath streaming on the crackly-cold air.
The skies were blazing with shuttlings of lambent flame. From nadir to
zenith the mystic light shivered and sheeted. Never had Lanigan beheld a
more vivid display of the phenomenon of the aurora borealis. He seemed to
be waiting for something. He sighed and shook his head.
"Peter, my heart jumped at first glimpse! 'Tis like the flash of the
Argonne big guns! Thank God, the thunder of 'em isn't following!"
"Yes, thank God!" murmured Demeter, his soul in his tones!
They stood there for a few minutes, shoulder to shoulder, the contact of
arm with arm serving for an exchange of thoughts between those veterans in
a silence that would have been profaned by words.
The phantasmagoria overhead was shifting infinitely and rapidly; there
were flashes that seemed to presage a thunderous roar of an explosion and
were more bodeful because the hush aloft in the heavenly spaces remained
unbroken; then the filaments and streamers of light made one mighty
oriflamme across the skies, an expanse of woven hues, wavering and lashing
as if a great wind were threshing across the main fabric and flinging its
attendant bannerets.
"It's in the air; it's in the nerves! It puts hell into a man, doesn't it,
Peter?"
"Yes!"
"It was in that telephone back there! It crackled and snapped! A lot of it
may be in those poor fools up in that hall--and they ain't knowing what
the matter is with 'em! You and I have been over in the Big Bow-wow, boy,
and we have had some good lessons in how to handle rattled nerves. I guess
it's up to us to hold things steady, as experts. Soothe 'em and smooth
'em! It was All-Wool Morrison's lesson to me to-day! Soft and careful with
'em, seeing that they're full of what's in the air this night, and don't
know just what ails 'em!"
He lowered his gaze from the skies. A man was passing on his way toward
the door of the hall.
Lanigan had just laid down a general rule of diplomatic conduct for the
evening, but he made a prompt exception. He leaped on the man, struggled
with him for a moment, and yanked off a red necktie, taking with it the
man's collar and a part of his shirt, "But some stuff that they're full of
can't be smoothed out--it's got to be whaled out!" panted Lanigan. He did
not release his captive. "The nerve o' ye, parading your red wattles on a
night like this, ye Tom Gobbler of a Bullshevist!"
"I have the right to pick the color of my own necktie!" snarled the man.
"Not for the reason why you picked it! Not to wear it up into that hall,
my bucko boy!"
When the man expostulated with oaths, Lanigan tripped him and held him on
the sidewalk. "Hush your yawp! You can't fool me about your taste in ties!
I know what's behind that color like I'd know what's behind an Orangeman's
yellow! I don't need to wait for him to hooray for the battle o' the Boyne
ere I get my brick ready! Peter, frisk his pockets!"
Demeter obeyed.
A crowd was collecting. Through the press rushed a young man. "Need help,
Commander?"
"Only keep your eye peeled to see that another Bullshevist don't sneak up
and kick me from behind, after the like o' the breed!"
Demeter's exploration produced a bulldog revolver, a slungshot, a packet
of pamphlets, and several small red flags.
"What's your name?" demanded the commander.
"No business of yours!"
Lanigan kneeled on the captive and roweled cruel thumbs into the man's
neck. "Out with it before I dig deeper for it."
"Nicolai Krylovensky!"
"I knew it must be bad, but I didn't think it was as bad as that! I don't
blame ye for trying to keep it mum! And ye look as though it tasted bitter
coming up. I'll not poison me own mouth." He stood up and yanked the man
to his feet. "So I'll call ye Bill the Bomber! Where do ye work, or don't
ye work?"
"Conawin!"
"I thought so! One of that bunch down there that's trying to undermine the
best government on the face of the earth. Come along! I've got a bit o'
business on hand right now and I need you in it."
Then he turned, pushing the man ahead of him.
Lanigan became aware that the young fellow who had proffered aid was
muttering in a derogatory fashion.
"What's on your mind, Jeff?" demanded the commander, recognizing a member
of the post.
"Nothing!"
"I'm in an inquiring turn o' mind right now," rasped Lanigan. "And ye have
just seen me go after information. I heard ye damning something. Ye'd best
make me understand that you wasn't damning _me_!"
"I sure wasn't, sir! But as for this government being the best, I want to
say--"
Lanigan's yelp broke in like an explosion. "Hold this Bullshevist, Peter!
I want both hands free!"
"I wasn't saying anything against our government, Commander Lanigan! Not a
word!" wailed the overseas man. "So help me!"
"I'm in a soothing frame of mind this night," returned the ex-sergeant. "I
have been having some good lessons in soothing from the mayor of Marion,
God bless him! I was nigh making a fool of myself till he showed me that
the soothing way is the best way. And I shall keep right on soothing. But
this is a night when the plain truth and the word of man-to-man have got
to operate to prevent trouble! And I want the truth out o' ye, Jeff
Tolson, or else ye'll be calling for toast, well soaked, in the hospital
in the morning!"
"I went up to one of them sissy slackers--"
"Mind the kind of a name ye stick on to a soldier of the government! Do ye
see who's listening?" He grabbed his prisoner again and shook him. "Be
careful of what you say as an American citizen in the hearing of rats like
this, Tolson! It encourages 'em. They think we mean it. Get the bile out
of your system in a strictly family fuss! Spit out a lot you don't mean,
if it's going to make you feel better! But first slam down the windows so
that the outsiders can't overhear. I'll see you later!"
"But I want you to get me right, Commander," Tolson pleaded. "I went up to
one of the boys to show him how to hold his gun and he banged me with the
butt of it!"
"He did!" Lanigan clicked his teeth and showed that he was having hard
work to control his own resentment.
"I was only trying to be helpful. I tried to take his gun and show him.
And he insulted an overseas veteran!"
Lanigan had himself in hand again. "Tried to take away his gun, you say!
You in civics and he in uniform and on duty! Jeff, if it's that hard to
wake up and know that you're no longer a soldier, I reckon your
wrist-watch is acting too much like a reminder-string around a Jane's
finger! Better hang it from the end of your nose. It's a wonder he didn't
give you the bayonet!"
"The butt was aplenty, sir!"
"I can stand it better to be banged on the knob by a gun-butt by a good
American than batted in the eye by this color on a Bullshevist!" asserted
Lanigan, waving the red necktie that he still retained in his clutch. He
gave the owner of it another push. "Along with you, Bill the Bomber."
Tolson trailed. "But what are they trying to do up on Capitol Hill, sir?
What does it all mean?"
"I don't know," confessed the commander. He drove his way through the
bystanders. "You see, boys, I have started in along the way of telling the
truth to-night. So I own up that I don't know! We're going to find out
what it means!" He kept on toward the door of the hall with his prisoner.
"I've arranged to have a man come down here and tell us what it means and
tell us how to act."
"Well, he'll know more than anybody else I have tackled on the subject
to-night," said Tolson, sourly. "He's a wonder, if he does know!"
"He's All-Wool Morrison--and that's your answer, buddie," retorted
Lanigan. And that answer did seem to suffice for Tolson.
There were many men on the stairs leading up to the hall, and the elbowing
throng at the door of the auditorium furnished further evidence of the
overflowing nature of the gathering.
"Gangway!" commanded Lanigan at the top of his voice. "Make way, there!
I'm bringing something straight in my mouth and something crooked in my
mit, and neither one of 'em will ye have till free passage is made to the
platform."
The crowd's curiosity served effectively to clear that passage.
Lanigan's captive went along, sullenly unresisting. There was no
opportunity for rebellion in that mob that opened a narrow passage
grudgingly, only to pack together again in a solid mass. But certain men
whom Krylovensky passed or men who caught his eye by swift motions spat
whispers at him in a language that Lanigan did not understand.
"Is it three cheers that your brother rattlesnakes are giving ye in the
natural hissing way of 'em?" inquired the captor. "They're a fine bunch!"
With his hand twisted tightly into the slack of the man's coat and the
torn shirt, the ex-sergeant forced the prisoner up the short stairs that
conducted to the platform; Demeter followed.
Tobacco smoke streamed up in whirls from the banked faces that filled the
hall from side to side, and the eddying clouds floated in strata above the
rows of heads. Lanigan peered sternly at the crowd through the haze. "Here
I am back! And I'm thanking the good saints for the few mouthfuls of fresh
air I got outside and the news I got, and for this here I found and
fetched along. I need him. I was on a jury once, in a murder case, and
they had the tool that done the job and the lawyers tagged it Exhibit A.
This is it! He's got a name, but if I tried to say it, it would cramp my
jaws and hold my mouth open so long that I'd get assifixiated with this
smoke. This is Bill the Bomber! Demeter, hold up the goods we found on
him!"
The post-adjutant obeyed the order.
"Now, Bill the Bomber," demanded Lanigan, "tell me and the bunch what's
the big idea of the arsenal, in a peaceful American city?"
"Is it peaceful?" screamed the captive, at bay. "There are soldiers
marching with guns. There are men threatening and cursing! There are--"
"Hold right on--right where you are! Are you naturalized?"
"No!"
"Well, let me tell you, you red-gilled Bullshevist, that till you're a
voting American citizen, our private and personal and strictly family rows
are none of your damn' business! All American citizens kindly applaud!"
He was answered by cheers, stamping feet, and clapping hands.
"Contrary-minded?" he invited in the silence that followed.
"Hiss a few hisses, you snakes!" he urged. "Or show those red flags you're
carrying in your pockets!"
There was no demonstration, either by act or by word.
Lanigan pushed his captive to the rear of the platform and jolted him down
into a chair behind which, on the wall, was draped a large United States
flag. "Set there and see if you can't absorb a little of the white and
blue into your system, along with the red that's already there," counseled
the patriot. "You're going to hear some man-talk in a little while, and I
hope 'twill do you good!"
A man in the audience rose to his feet when Lanigan marched back to the
front of the rostrum.
"I am a voter here, yet I was born in another country. Will you allow me
to ask a question, Commander Lanigan?"
"Sure! But let's start even on names. What's yours?"
"Otto Weisner!"
Lanigan made a grimace. "But even at that I'm going to keep my word and I
call on all present to back me up."
"See here!" bawled a voice from a far corner. "Let that Hun wait! How
about your word to us in another matter? Where's the mayor of Marion?"
"The mayor of Marion is on his way to this hall!" The soldier's face was
set into a grim expression and deep ridges lined his jaws. "I gave you all
once to-night his word to me that he'd stand up for us on Capitol Hill,
whatever it is they're trying to put over. I got the hoot from you when I
said it. You wouldn't take my word and I just told him so. Now he's coming
down here for himself! I say it. If some gent would like to hoot another
hoot on that subject will he kindly step up here and hoot?" He doubled his
fists.
There was no indication that anybody wanted to accept the invitation.
"Very well, then!" proceeded Lanigan. "I'm in a soothing frame of mind,
myself, and I hope you're all soothed, too. And so that we won't be
wasting any time on a busy evening I'll state that the meeting is now open
for that question, Mister Weisner. Shoot!"