Part 19

“Look here, my fellow, now that I have you where I don't need to consider the presence of ladies, I want to ask you how you dared to mess into my private business?”

Farr, towering above him, beamed down on him with tolerant indifference and did not answer.

“That Lochinvar business may sound good in a poem, but it doesn't go here in Marion--not when it's my business and my girl.”

Dodd raised his voice. He seemed about to become a bit hysterical.

Farr set slow, gripping, commanding clutch about the young man's elbow.

“If your business with me can possibly be any talk about a lady,” he advised, “you'd better come along into the reading-room.”

“It is about a lady,” persisted Dodd when they had swung in behind a newspaper-rack. The room was apparently empty. “You understand what you came butting in upon, don't you?”

“I took it to be a rehearsal of a melodrama, crudely conceived and very poorly played.”

“Say, you use pretty big words for a low-lived iceman.”

“State your business with me if you have any,” Farr reminded him. “I have something else to do besides swap talk with a drunken man--and your breath is very offensive.”

Dodd began to tap a finger on Farr's breast.

“I want you to understand that I've got a full line on you; you have been chumming with a Canuck rack-tender, you deserted a woman, and she committed suicide, and you took the brat--”

Farr's big hand released the elbow and set itself around Mr. Dodd's neck. Thumb and forefinger bored under the jaw and Mr. Dodd's epiglottis ceased vibrating.

“I don't like to assault a man, but talk doesn't seem to fit your case and I can't stop long enough to talk, anyway. This choking is my comment on your lies.” He pushed Mr. Dodd relentlessly down into the nearest chair and spanked his face slowly and deliberately with the flat of his hand. “And this will indicate to you just how much I care for your threats. You'll remember it longer than you will recollect words.”

He finished and went away, leaving his victim getting his breath in the chair. Dodd, peering under the rack, saw him hasten and join the Honorable Archer Converse in the hotel lobby and they went up the broad stairs together.

The chief clerk of the state treasury sat there and smoothed his smarting face with trembling hands and worked his jaws to dislodge the grinding ache in his neck. But the stinging, malevolent rancor within him burned hotter and hotter. He started to get up out of the chair and sat back again, much disturbed.

A man who had been hidden by an adjoining rack of newspapers was now leaning forward, jutting his head past the ambuscade. He was an elderly man with an up-cocked gray mustache, and there was a queer little smile in his shrewd blue eyes. Dodd knew him; he was one Mullaney, a state detective.

“What are you doing here--practicing your sneak work?” demanded the young man. As a state official he did not entertain a high opinion of the free-lance organization to which Mullaney belonged.

“I'm here reading a paper--supposed it's what the room is for,” returned Detective Mullaney. “But excuse me--I'll get out. Room seems to be reserved for prize-fighters.”

“You keep your mouth shut about that--that insult.”

“I never talk--it would hurt my business.”

“I don't fight in a public place. I'm a gentleman. I want you to remember what you saw, Mullaney! I'll get to that cheap bum in a way he won't forget.”

“Do you mind telling me who your friend is?” asked the detective.

Dodd shot him a sour side-glance and muttered profanity.

“I couldn't help wondering what particular kind of business you and he could have, seeing how it was transacted,” pursued the detective.

Dodd glowered at the floor. “Look here, Mullaney! There's a whole lot about that man I want to know, if you can help me and keep your mouth closed. I haven't got much confidence in the work you fellows do--they tell me you can't detect mud on your own boots.”

Mr. Mullaney pulled his chair out from behind the papers and leaned back in it and crossed his hands over his stomach and smiled without a trace of resentment.

“I might tell you something right now about that tall friend of yours that would jump you, Mr. Dodd--I'm that much of a detective!”

“Tell me, then.”

“Just as it stands it's guesswork--considerable guesswork.”

“What does that amount to?”

“A great deal in my business. Take this city of one hundred thousand! I'm the only man in it who is making guesswork about strangers his special line of work. The rest of the citizens rub elbows with all passers and don't give a hoot. There are a good many thousand men in this country whom the law wants and whom the law can't find. That fellow may be one of them, for all I know. I guess he is, for instance. Then I make it my business to prove guesswork.”

“You must be doing a devil of a rushing business!” sneered Dodd.

“I manage to make a good living. I don't talk about my business, for if I should blow it I wouldn't have any. I say, I _guess_! Then I spend my spare time hunting through my books of pointers. For ten years I have read every newspaper I could get hold of. I come in here and study papers from all over. Every crime that has been committed, every man wanted, every chap who has got away, I write down all I can find out about him. Then, if anything comes up to make me guess about a man I begin to hunt my books through.”

“Well, if I'm any good on a guess,” snorted Dodd, “that renegade who just insulted me is down in your books, somewhere. You'd better hunt.”

“It's slow work and eats up time,” sighed Mr. Mullaney.

Dodd looked at him for a time and then began to pull crumpled bills from his waistcoat pocket. He straightened five ten-dollar bills, creased them into a trough, and stuck the end toward the detective.

“Follow his trail back. I never heard of your book scheme before. Take this money for a starter. If you can't find him in your books, pick out half a dozen of the worst crimes any man can commit and hitch 'em on to him somehow,” urged Dodd, with fury. “Go after him. And when we get him good and proper I want to do some gloating through the bars. He's the first man who ever smacked my face for me--and I'll see that he gets his.”

He left Mr. Mullaney stowing the money away in a big wallet which was stuffed with newspaper clippings. He hurried in to the bar, gulped down a drink, and then went to the office desk and examined the hotel register. Anger and zest for revenge were stimulating in him a lively interest in that meeting which Farr seemed to be promoting. Mr. Dodd did not care especially what kind of meeting it was. He had set forth to camp on Walker Farr's trail and do him what hurt he could.

Dodd was a well-posted political worker. The names of the men were not names especially prominent in state politics, but his suspicions were stirred when he saw that all counties in the state were represented. And no more were arriving. He decided that the conference must be in session.

Dodd avoided the elevator. He tramped up the broad stairs to the floor above the office. The doors of the large parlor were closed. He turned the knob cautiously; the doors were locked. He heard within the dull mumble of many voices--men in conversation. It was evident that the formal meeting, whatever it might be, had not begun its session. He tiptoed away from the door and climbed another flight of stairs.

There were no nooks and corners of the old National Hotel which Richard Dodd did not understand in all their intricacies. As his uncle's political scout it had been his business to know them.

He hunted along the corridor until he found a maid.

“Is there anybody in Number 29?” he asked.

“Two of that new crowd that just came in have it, Mr. Dodd. But they have gone down-stairs again.”

He wadded a bill in his palm and jammed it into her hand. “Let me in with your pass-key, that's a good girl. It's all right. I won't disturb their stuff. I only want to listen. You understand! There's a political game on. I want to get to that ventilator in the closet--you know it!”

“Oh, if it's only politics, Mr. Dodd!” she sniffed, with the scorn of a girl who has seen many conventions come and go, knew the little tricks, and had developed for the whole herd of politicians lofty disdain; she knew them merely as loud-talking men who had little consideration for hotel maids, men who littered their rooms with cigar stubs and whisky-bottles. She started for the door, swinging the pass-key on its cord. “If it's just politics, sure you can go in. Many a buck I've let in to listen to their old palaver down in that parlor.”

Dodd bolted the door behind him.

He felt entirely safe, for he understood that the rightful tenants of that room were locked into the parlor below. He climbed upon a chair in the closet and put his ear to the grating of the ventilator.

He heard only one man's voice. He recognized its crisp tones--it was the Honorable Archer Converse.

“I repeat, gentlemen, that this interest of yours would amaze me if I had not been prepared by reports from our agents who have been so well captained by Mr. Walker Farr. Remember that this is simply a conference, prior to organization. Every man of you is a chief in it. Let us be calm, discreet, sensible, and silent.

“I'm not going over the details of the unrest in this state. The fact that so many of you are present here from all sections is sufficient commentary on that unrest. We understand perfectly well that a certain clique of self-seekers has arrogated to itself supreme control of the party. A party must be controlled, I admit. If that control were in the hands of honest and patriotic men we would not be here today.

“I'm not going to bother you with details of what has been going on in departments in our State House. The employees are the tools of the ring and they have misused their power. I'm afraid of what may be uncovered there when the house-cleaning begins. But the honor of our party demands such a house-cleaning.”

Richard Dodd's hands trembled as he clung to the ventilator bars.

“However, we are faced by something in the way of an issue that's bigger than graft.”

Now his earnestness impressed more than ever the listener at the grating.

“Gentlemen, to a certain extent graft is bound to be fostered and protected by any party; but when a party is used to protect and aggrandize those who monopolize the people's franchise rights it's time for the honest men in that party to be _men_ instead of partisans. Don't you allow those monopolists to hold you in line by whining about party loyalty. And don't let them whip you into line by their threats, either. I refuse, for one, as much as I love my party, to have its tag tied into my ear if that tag isn't clean!”

The assemblage applauded that sentiment.

“I'm going to call names, gentlemen. Colonel Symonds Dodd has this state by its throat. With Colonel Dodd stand all the financial interests--the railroads, the corporations, even the savings-banks. He is intrenched behind that law which limits the indebtedness of our cities and towns. Municipalities cannot own their own plants under present conditions. Those men are even using the people's own money against them! They scare depositors by threats of financial havoc if present conditions and the big interest are bothered by any legislation.

“I must warn you, gentlemen, that it's a long and difficult road ahead of us. But we must start. I have not intended to discourage you by stating the obstacles to be overcome.

“I have explained them so that, if we make slow progress at first, we shall not be discouraged.

“We will organize prevailing unrest and the innate honesty in this state. We will establish a branch of the Square Deal Club in every town and city. It must be done carefully, conservatively, and as secretly as possible.” The lawyer's cautious fear of too much haste now displayed itself. “The most we can hope to do is send to the state convention some men who will leaven that lump of ring politics. Party usage and tradition are so strong that we must renominate Governor Harwood, I suppose, for a complimentary second term.”

“I think we can do better,” cried a voice.

“Possibly,” returned Mr. Converse, dryly, “but we must do that 'better' carefully and slowly. In politics, gentlemen, we cannot transform the ogre into the saint merely by waving the magic wand and expecting the charm to operate instantly. Possibly we can control the next legislature. I do not know just what legislation we may be able to devise and pass, but I hope for inspiration.

“I will say now that I am with you. My purse is open. Command my services for all questions of law. I will establish myself at the capital for the legislative session.

“But there is one thing I will not do under any circumstances--I will not accept political office.”

“You bet you won't,” muttered young Dodd, at the grating. “You wouldn't be elected a pound-keeper in the town of Bean Center.”

But if Mr. Dodd could have seen through that grating as well as hear he would have been greatly interested just then in the expression on the face of Walker Farr. The face was not exactly the face of a prophet, but it had a large amount of resolution written over it.

“I don't want to be the first one to throw any cold water on our prospects,” declared a voice, after Mr. Converse had announced that the meeting was open for general discussion; “it really does seem to me that we stand a good show of getting control of the next legislature. But after we do get control what prospect is there of passing any legislation that will help us? Wherever there is a water system in this state the municipality has been so loaded down with debts our machine politics have plastered into it that the legal debt limit has been reached. The only way this water question can be cleared up is by taking the systems away from those monopolists--making them the property of towns and cities. But if towns and cities can't borrow any more money, just how is this to be done? Mr. Converse hasn't told us! We can clean up politics, perhaps, but it seems to me that we'll never be able to clean up the dirtiest and most dangerous mess.”

On the silence that followed broke a voice which made Dodd, his ear to the grating, grate his teeth. His hatred recognized this speaker. It was Walker Farr.

“I apologize for venturing to speak in this meeting,” he said. “But if that gentleman's question isn't answered here and now in some way I'm afraid men will go away discouraged. I have heard the same question, Mr. Converse, as I have traveled about the state lately. I have thought about this matter constantly, in my poor fashion. And because I went into that job of pondering with an open mind is the reason, perhaps, why a strange idea has come to me. You know they say that strange notions are born out of ignorance. The better way would have been, possibly, to submit the plan first of all to your legal mind, Mr. Converse. I will keep silence now and confer with you, sir, if you think best.” His tone was wistful.

“Talk it out in open meeting,” cried the cordial voice of Mr. Converse. “Free speech and all of us taken into confidence--that's the spirit of this movement of ours!”

“Has it ever occurred to anybody to form a new municipality for water purposes only? I have studied your state constitution, and the language in which the debt limit of five percent is provided I find applies strictly to towns and cities. Suppose the citizens of Marion, together with the adjoining towns of Weston and Turner, all of them now served by the Consolidated, should unite simply as individuals for the common purpose of owning and operating their own water-plant--form, say a water district?”

“An independent body politic and corporate?” It was Converse's voice and it betrayed quick interest and some astonishment.

“I suppose that would be the legal name, sir. Wouldn't it be possible to organize such a combination of the people, distinct from other municipal responsibilities? Then if we can elect the right men to our legislature we can go to the State House and ask for some legislation that will enable us to take over systems by the right of eminent domain, provide a plan of fair appraisal, give us a law which will make water-district bonds a legal investment for savings-banks. In short, gentlemen, I repeat, this plan is nothing more than an organization of the desired territory and people into a new, distinct, and separate municipality for water purposes only, leaving all other forms of municipal government to pursue their accustomed functions precisely as though the district had not been organized. That's the idea as best I can state it in few words.”

There was a long period of silence.

Dodd, listening to the mutterings of a revolt which threatened the whole political fabric which protected him, his interest clearing his brain of the liquor fog, could imagine the scene below. That assemblage was staring wide-eyed at Archer Converse, the law's best-grounded man in the state.

“It is very modest to call that suggestion an idea,” stated Mr. Converse, at last. “Mr. Farr, if I can find the necessary law in our statutes to back it up, it's an inspiration.”

There was the ring of conviction in his tones.

Mr. Dodd left the grating and escaped from the hotel.

He fairly cantered to headquarters in the First National block; he felt a politician's frightened conviction that he had something mighty important to tell his uncle.

XXV

A GIRL AND A MATTER OF HONOR

It had been a protracted session.

Judge Ambrose Warren, corporation counsel for the Consolidated, leaned back in his chair and gazed at the ceiling over the peak of the skeleton structure he had erected in front of his nose with his fingers.

Colonel Dodd squinted first at his nephew and then at the bouquet on his desk.

The nephew had been attempting by all the methods known to the appealing male to win only one return glance from Kate Kilgour; but the young lady held her eyes on her note-book, poised her pencil above the page, and waited for more of that conversation and statement of which she had been the silent recorder.

“You think you have given us all the main points of what you overheard, do you, Mr. Dodd?” inquired the judge, turning sharp gaze on the young man.

“I can't remember any more.”

“You think you recognized voices sufficiently well to be sure that this person named Farr made that novel suggestion in regard to what was called a 'water district'?”

“There was no mistaking his voice,” said Dodd, with the malevolence of bitter recollection.

Another prolonged silence. Then the judge asked, his eyes again on the ceiling, “Just who is this Walker Farr?”

Richard Dodd, keeping jealous espionage on all the girl's emotions and movements saw a flush suffuse her cheeks; her hands trembled. She raised her eyes in a quick glance and he detected eager inquiry.

“I don't know who he is,” growled the colonel.

“You'd better find out,” advised the corporation counsel.

“Why?”

“Of course this thing has been put up to me very suddenly. I can give you only a snap judgment. But that scheme has possibilities.”

“As a lawyer you don't mean to tell me that a crazy idea like that can be put through in this state against the combination we control?”

“It will not be a case of combination and money and politics, Colonel, when it gets to the high court. It will be _law_. And I'm sorry you can't tell me any more about the man who has devised the plan. I'd like to know how he dug it out.”

“But a gang of pirates can't organize like that and confiscate our property! We're going to tap the lakes. We're going ahead right away. But can that fool's scheme scoop in the Consolidated Water Company?”

“That's to be found out. I am going to tell you now that I believe an organization of citizens into an independent water district can be made legally and be independent of other debts. Colonel Dodd, if that opposition gets control of the next legislature you can depend upon it that the necessary legislation will be passed. We may as well look facts in the face: they're getting mighty restive in this state; the people have been penned in by the Machine very effectually to date--but show 'em a place now where they can jump the fence and they're going to do it.”

“But what's the good of paying you twenty-five thousand dollars a year for law if you can't keep the bars up?” The tone was that of the impatient tyrant.

“You'll please remember that this thing is likely to go to the United States court. When you go in there you've got to leave your side-arms of politics--pull and pocket-book--at the door. I will say this: the Federal Constitution guarantees protection against any irregular, illegal, or confiscatory action under state authority. That is, no states shall pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. Now, of course, a corporation is a person in the meaning of the law, and therefore we can carry the matter to the United States Supreme Court, but I want to tell you that if the next legislature enacts law permitting water districts, and the state authorities proceed to condemn your plants, you may as well get ready to step out from under. You are a shrewd man and you understand the spirit of these times in regard to giving to the people their full rights in public utilities. I say again, you'd better get a line on this Walker Farr, because it's either a case of ignorance inspired or else he's a deep one. He has started with a plan that can be defended by law--and the judges in these days are handing the people's rights and property back to them when there is a legal opportunity.”

“Why, this Farr is a nothing--nobody. Dug in our trenches for a while until he was discharged. Briggs looked him up for me. The only man in this city he has been at all intimate with is an old Canuck named Provancher who tends the rack down at Gamonic Mill. You can judge him by the company he keeps.”

“Well, he seems to be fraternizing with better men just now,” drawled the judge. “Archer Converse, for instance!”