The Passipnate Pilirim muel MerxxMO ^ THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Kit. OF CAUF. LIBRARY. LOS ANGELA Books by Samuel Merwin The Henry Calverly Sequence TEMPERAMENTAL HENRY HENRY IS TWENTY THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Other Novels and Narratives THE HONEY BEE THE TRUFFLERS THE CITADEL HIS LITTLE WORLD THE ROAD BUILDERS Romances ANTHONY THE ABSOLUTE ^ THE CHARMED LIFE OF MISS AUSTIN THE ROAD TO FRONTENAC THE WHIP HAND THE MERRY ANNE In Collaboration with Henry Kttchell Webster CALUMET K THE SHORT-LINE WAR COMRADE JOHN An Account of the Opium Traffic in China DRUGGING A NATION ,. He lifted her and placed her in the big chair. The Passionate Pilgrim Being the Narrative of an Oddly Dramatic Tear in the Life of Henry Cafoerly, By SAMUEL MERWIN JH.U8TRATID BY STOCKTON MULFORD INDIANAPOLIS THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY PUBLISHERS COPYRIGHT 1919 THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY Printed in the United State* of 4m0rfc MIAUNWOttTH A CO. OOK MANUFACTVMtim I.VN. M. V. TO EDNA THIS BOOK 2131465 CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I The Young Man Called Stanford, or Stafford, Makes His Appearance. And Mr. Hitt Thinks that Biography Might After All Be Better . . 1 II Indicating Something of How This Mr. Stanford, or Stafford, Appears to Feel about It. With a Foot-note by Margie Daw 12 III In Which Mary Maloney Makes Her Appearance, Sitting on the Top Step 21 IV In Which Margie Daw Starts after the Biggest Story in the World 29 V Emotions in Alpaca 39 VI Of a Strange Impulse that Calverly Calls the Power 43 VII Of Friendship, Love and the Job of Living . . 52 VIII In Which Calverly Sleeps at the Union Station . 60 IX An Interlude in Bedlam 66 X Of a Woman's Heart and the Web of Life ... 75 XI Of Mayors and Men from Mars 81 XII Indicating That a Man from Mars Would Fare Rather Better in Confining His Activities to That Planet 91 XIII The Tide of Life Runs Low 100 XIV Ebb; and the Turn 113 XV The Honorable Tim Is Perturbed to the Point of Protest. And Mr. Quakers Joins the Hunt . . 122 XVI Of Ships, a Narrow Door, and a Young Woman in a Wheel-Chair. Also, Briefly, of Mr. Amme . 130 XVII In Which Jim Cantey Speaks from the Grave ; and Calverly Finds that He Has Got to Carry Mi- riam Back 140 XVIII How Mr. Guard's Stenographer Went to Coney Island Saturday Evening. And How Miss Rus- sell Picked Up Ten Dollars 153 CONTENTS Continued CHAPTER PAGE XIX In Which Miriam Stands Alone 164 XX The Fever Called Love 173 XXI Oswald Quakers Undertakes to Close In ... 181 XXII Concerned with the Young Man Whose Price Wasn't Listed Down-Town 190 XXIII Fat Man's Misery 202 XXIV Of Publicity, Liquor and Free Will 207 XXV In Which a Dream Ends, as Dreams Do ... 214 XXVI The Intervention of Mr. Hitt, Mr. Holmes Hitt, and Perfect Porcelain 231 XXVII Thinking Perfect Porcelain 238 XXVIII In Which Margie Daw Finds Herself Useful as a Stimulant 252 XXIX On the Topic of Killing Writers 259 XXX What Quakers Said to the Mayor 270 XXXI In Which Esther and Will Appleby Come to an Understanding Regarding the One Difficult Topic 275 XXXII Quakers Finds the Hour Ripe 281 XXXIII The Spirit of Jim Cantey 289 XXXIV Of the Curious Relationship between Perfect Porcelain and the Divine Fire 302 XXXV In Which Margie Finds Herself Involved in the Greatest Story 311 XXXVI Of Creation and Coincidence 319 XXXVII In Which Hittie Takes a Personal Stand ... 326 XXXVIII Of Calverly's Callers, the Library at the Town Club, and Melodrama 335 XXXIX In Which the Local Napoleon Undertakes Some- thing in the Nature of a Return from Elba . . 341 XL Events of an Evening, Including a Fight and a Pursuit, with a Sidelight on How Men Feel about Dying 349 CONTENTS Concluded CHAPTER PAGE XLI Collateral Matters ; Including Mr. Amme's Call on Miriam, Mr. Hitt's Activities, and Further De- velopments of the Fever Called Love .... 359 XLII On the Topic of What May Be Done with Mayors. Leading up to Something of a Climax . . . 368 XLIII In Which Miriam, in Attempting to State Her Problem Quite Impersonally, Arrives, as Women Are Sometimes Said to Do, at a Rather Personal Solution 375 XLIV Of the Meeting in Jim Cantey's Study. Leading up to What Happened in Cincinnati 383 XLV Mere Business Details ; a New Publisher, a Still Newer President and General Manager, and the Beginning of a Long Fight. A Word, Too, about Hittie and the Instinct of the Race . . 392 XLVI Touching, with a Smile, on Critics, the Pattern, and Tennis 399 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM The Passionate Pilgrim CHAPTER ONE The Young Man Called Stanford, or Stafford, Makes His Appearance. And Mr. Hitt Thinks That Biography Might After Att Be Better IT was when he asked the elevator boy which would be the editorial floor that Mr. Hitt first became aware of him; perhaps because the musical quality in his speaking voice was a thought out of the common. It was then, too, just as the car started deliberately upward, that Margie Daw pressed her elbow against Mr. Hitt's and inclined her head discreetly toward the man. He stood very straight, with a self-conscious stiffening of the shoulders, apparently nervously aware of the others in the car and of himself. And after a moment of rather absurd hesitation he removed his hat. The little act marked him at once as a stranger. For it was an accepted fact in this middle-western city that a hat took up less space in a crowded elevator when on the head. He was thin, sensitive, somber ; clean shaven ; wearing small nose glasses with a cord. His clothes were wrinkled and would soon be shabby. He had a good forehead, and longish brown hair that strayed down toward his eyes. Mr. Hitt found himself studying the face. He thought he had seen it before. All the way up to the eighth the stranger studied the floor numbers; then stepped, hesitating, out, mumbling "I beg your pardon!" to somebody or other as he went. Which made him further conspicuous ; for they didn't beg pardon much in the News building. Mr. Hitt then realized that Miss Daw hadn't got out at the eighth, but was riding on up with him. He was glad 1 2 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM of this. The past few years of his working life had been spent in the long room up under the roof, one twisting flight above what the elevator boys regarded as the top floor, that was known variously as the library or the "morgue." The reference books and the back files of the paper were there, as were also the cabinet files, arranged in alcoves, in which were kept the down-to-date obituaries or condensed biographies of all prominent persons in the city, the nation and the world, alphabetically arranged and ready for instant use in the event of death or other con- spicuous occurrence calling sudden attention to one of them. It was not an exciting life to one who had "covered," as a seasoned reporter, any number of national conventions, great catastrophes and riots, who had been night city editor and, for nearly a year, Washington correspondent; and he had lately come to count that day forlorn in which Margie failed to run up-stairs to write in a quiet alcove, or look up this or that, or sit on his desk to steal a chat and a fur- tive smoke. He looked down at her now. At fifty-eight a man may look at a girl. She might have been a fresh- faced boy, in her straight little blue coat with side pockets (hands in them, of course), a pencil held within the breast pocket by a nickel clip, white shirt-waist with man's turnover collar and four-in-hand tie, plain felt hat pulled down over her round forehead. She looked twenty-two or three, and might have been at this time the spring of 1903 twenty-five or six. She had brought into the dingy office of the News, two years back, a touch of bright-colored personality. It was known that she had begun her newspaper career as a petted, precocious special correspondent in London, and that at one time she had lowered Nellie Ely's speed record around the world. It was understood that she had been on the stage, some- where out on the Pacific Coast, and that she had acquired, and discarded, two husbands. For the News she wrote signed "features" and occasional "sob stories." In the "morgue," with the door safely shut, she first THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 3 foraged over Mr. Hitt's desk for a match and lighted a cigarette; then remarked "You get him, don't you, Hittie?" " 'Get him ?' You mean that young fellow ? Why no, not quite. There's something about him " " 'Something about him !' Good God, Hittie, don't tell me you don't know Henry Calverly when you see him!" "Oh !" breathed Mr. Hitt, softly, and sank into his swivel chair. . . . "Oh!" "He's here under the name of Stanford, or Stafford. The idea of his dreaming he could get away with it! On a newspaper, of all places ! Timothy says they're putting him in my room. They moved a desk in there this morning." "What's he to do?" "Apparently act as assistant play reviewer under Archie Trent, and do books for Will Bevan." "Do they know who he is ?" Margie shook her head. "I don't believe any of them do. Men are stupid." She smoked reflectively. "I don't know as you can blame him for taking another name. The poor devil would have to do something. But getting a job on a newspaper! He should have gone off the Klondike or somewhere." "Wait a moment, Margie ! There was a book a romance by one Hugh Stafford, last year. Will Bevan sent it up here to be reviewed. The scene of that book was north- western Canada. And it seems to me I recall a story to the effect that Henry Calverly went to Alaska after his release, something that got into the papers. You see, a man can run off to Alaska, China, Africa and stay a year, two years, three years, but he comes back. There's a limit to it." There was a small row of books at the back of the desk, favorite volumes the Bab Ballads, that earlier, English Cal- verly 's Verses and Fly Leaves, Plain Tales from the Hills and Soldiers Three, the Essays of Elia, DeQuincey in two small leather-bound volumes, and Henry Calverly's Satraps of the Simple. Mr. Hitt reached for the last named, and turned the pages. 4 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "It's curious," he remarked, a few moments later, "that a young fellow could produce such a book, shake the world with it he did that, you know " Margie nodded. "Oh, I know ! I had some of the stories by heart, five or six years ago. 'Roc's Eggs. Strictly Fresh' ; I loved that ! And 'AH Anderson and the Four Policemen.' " "It's been a question in my mind," said Mr. Hitt, "whether 'Sinbad the Treasurer' isn't the finest short story in the lan- guage. And if it isn't, then 'A Curbstone Barmecide' is." "I like 'Roc's Eggs,' Hittie." "So do I. But I was about to say it's curious that a young fellow could produce such a book he was only twenty or twenty-one, you remember and then lose his hold completely. This 'Hugh Stafford' novel had no value." "It was the trial that knocked him, and all he went through. Isn't genius usually rather fragile, Hittie?" "Often, naturally. He looks sensitive. His case suggests that of Hugo Wolf, the composer of songs. He had periods of intense creative activity and between them, periods when he was unable to produce at all. As I recall the story, he finally went mad. Apparently, a man who is so highly sensi- tized as to become, at times, a medium through which genius can find expression is lacking in the commoner, sturdier qualities. It has to be genius or nothing with him. And then, as you say, the painful tragedy this boy went through evidently crushed him." Margie knocked the ash from her cigarette to his pen tray with a small white finger. "You're talking well this morning, Hittie," she remarked. He glanced up, a thought suspiciously, but found her al- most demure. "Quoting from your novel, I suspect." He moved his head in the negative; smiled a little. He was a patient-looking man, with the settled lines of age about his mouth. He wore a cropped white mustache and old- fashioned gold-rimmed spectacles. He was quite bald. The eyes behind the spectacles bespoke a shrewd but unassertive mind. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 5 "Let me borrow the book, Hittie. I want to read it again. And don't waste time on that novel. Write history. Or biography. How about the life of Jim Cantey? Won't somebody be getting that job pretty soon? It's more than a year since he died." "I don't know. I must say I haven't thought of it." "Why don't you speak to Mr. Listerly. He'll have some- thing to say about it, won't he ?" "Very likely. But why am I not to do the novel, Mar- gie?" "You're too old. I mean it kindly, Hittie. But there's no use lying about these real things. It's the young ones people with fire in them " She tapped the book. "They can do it." The cigarette was finished. She slid off the desk ; brushed a bit of ash from her skirt ; looked at him. "There's one recent novelist that we both admire, Margie, who began in his sixties." "Yes, but he'd made pottery." Mr. Hitt knit his brows over this. Margie often seemed to him irrelevant, or at least cryptic. "Wagner be>gan Parsifal at sixty-four," he said. "My dear old Hittie, Wagner began Parsifal when he be- gan composing operas." She picked up Henry Calverly's one great book. "What a career!" she mused aloud. "Just a boy and famous overnight. And then crushed flat. And still under thirty." She turned to go, pausing only to say this : "Hittie, why doesn't some really great novelist come along and tell the truth about women? Are they all cow- ards? Or don't they know?" Mr. Hitt gazed helplessly at her. She smiled, gave him a little bob of the head, and went out. An hour or so later, when his desk was clear, Mr. Hitt found the little scene in the elevator coming clear as a pic- ture in his mind. He could see again the somber, sensitive, rather shabby youth, so oddly, almost assertively self-con- scious among the workaday group in the car. He sat for 6 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM a time, considering the situation. It brought a mild thrill, the mere fact that the man should be here, working under the same roof. He even, after a time, went over to one of the filing cabinets, opened the deep drawer labeled "Cah- Cam," and drew out the folder marked "Henry Calverly." He moved to the window and looked through the collec- tion of newspaper clippings and typewritten memoranda. On top lay a typed script, bound with a wire clip. It bore the heading, "Henry Calverly Obit." He glanced through the twelve or fifteen pages. He recalled writing it back in 1899. For that matter, the date was marked in pencil. Nothing had been added since because Henry Calverly, after his sudden fame and his equally sudden and complete igno- miny, had disappeared, dropped out of life. Except for the gossip that he had drifted to Alaska ; that was represented by a clipping, but he had not thought it worth writing into the obituary. He read this through, now. Henry Calverly (it ran) was born in Sunbury, Ills., No- vember 7th, 1877. He first became prominent in 1898, when his collection of short stories entitled Satraps of the Sim- pie, after being published originally in the Sunbury Weekly Gleaner, of which he was part owner, reappeared in an eastern magazine and later in book form. The instant suc- cess of these stories made him for a brief time perhaps the most conspicuous literary figure in the English-speaking world. His art was frequently compared by competent crit- ics with that of the greatest living writers. The book was translated into virtually every European language. Phrases from his gifted pen found their way into the language. The English critics agreed, in the main, with those of Amer- ica that the book would stand as the truest and most bril- liant portrayal extant of small-town life in America. Then followed several pages of quotations from critical appreciations of his work ; after which came this : Shortly after the appearance of his book, when he was barely twenty-one, Calverly married Cicely Hamlin, who THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 7 had come to Sunbury as the niece and ward of Madame Watt, as she was then known. A few months after the wed- ding, Madame Watt, who had previously exhibited indications of an ungoverned temper, killed her husband, the former U. S. Senator, Hon. William M. Watt, during the dinner hour in their home, as the result of a violent altercation. The young Mrs. Calverly, who was dining there, was the sole witness of the tragedy. The resulting trial was probably the most dramatic and the most widely reported murder case in American history. Senator Watt had been known for fifteen years as author of and legislative sponsor for the Watt Currency Act, which at the time of its passage through Congress threatened to create a deep schism between the eastern states and the western. For some years prior to his marriage with Mad- ame Watt, or the Comtesse de la Plaine, as she was then known, he had lived in obscurity. It came out at the trial that the Comtesse de la Plaine, whose name was familiar to newspaper readers everywhere as that of a woman of wealth and highly colored personality, prominent at Paris, Nice, Monte Carlo and Rome, had be- gun life as one Fanny Brown in a small Illinois village on the bank of the Mississippi. This village has since crum- bled into the river. Her father was a ne'er-do-well and drunkard, her mother little better. Fanny Brown herself drifted early into evil ways and at the age of sixteen or sev- enteen, left home in company with a traveling salesman. For some years she appears to have led the life of an ad- venturess in eastern cities, at length becoming mistress to a secretary or attache of one of the European legations at Washington. This led to her traveling abroad, where, after many vicissitudes, she became companion to, and later wife of, the famous Comte de la Plaine. During the trial the prosecution succeeded in introducing evidence to the effect that she had tricked the comte into marrying her by brib- ing his physician to pronounce her on her death bed. At all events, through the marriage and the subsequent death of the comte, she came into a large fortune, including the 8 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM famous Chateau de Clumency, which she sold at the time of her departure from France. It was further brought out at the trial that Cicely Hamlin was not her niece but her daughter, born during her life with the comte but before their marriage. Her second marriage, to Senator Watt, took place during what appeared to be a campaign conducted by the woman to establish herself first in New York, and later in Sunbury, Ills., as a person of reputable character. It was established that she paid Senator Watt the sum of $10,000 to marry her. As Mrs. Calverly was the sole eye-witness of the mur- der, the prosecution compelled her to testify against the woman that she had just learned was her mother. The expe- rience told on her so severely that her husband on one occa- sion made a scene in court, charging that they were slowly torturing her to death. The incident was widely commented on at the time. She fell ill during the trial, and was put under the care of physicians, until finally, apparently in a frenzy of apprehension for her health and sanity, during the most dramatic period of the trial, Calverly abducted her. They were sought for everywhere in the United States, Canada and Mexico. Steamships were watched at Atlantic and Pacific ports. Rewards were offered for their discov- er}'. Their pictures were published in every city, town and hamlet. After nearly a fortnight, during which the trial was vir- tually blocked, they were found by newspaper men in a cabin in the woods of Northern Michigan, where Calverly was caring for her alone, even cooking their food, in a deter- mined effort to restore her health. They were promptly brought back, and Mrs. Calverly was called again to the stand. She fell ill again, became delirious, was taken to a Chicago hospital, and died there a few weeks later, of quick consumption. The case ended in a qualified acquittal for Madame Watt. Apparently, in spite of the almost fabulous cost of her de- fense, she had managed to save some considerable portion of her wealth, for she withdrew at once to a lonely spot THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 9 north of Chicago on the shore of Lake Michigan and there built for herself a castle of stone, modeled, it was said, on a part of the castle of Chinon in France. Calverly, though the prosecuting attorney seems not to have acted vigorously in the matter, was, indeed, quoted as urging clemency, was sentenced by the judge to six months' imprisonment in the state penitentiary for obstruction of justice. On his release, his wife dead, his own nerves nearly shattered, apparently, he managed to elude the numerous reporters and photographers who went down from Chicago to interview him, and disappeared. Mr. Hitt lowered the paper ; stood for a brief while think- ing it over; then replaced it in the folder and returned to the cabinet. It was quite a story. But it was, after all, life, as Mr. Hitt had seen it during his thirty-five years as a newspaper man. Life, indeed, he had found, ran that way to bold drama, not infrequently to melodrama. He could seldom feel reality in the pallid works of fiction that Will Bevan sent up, now and then, to be reviewed in odd moments ; mostly more or less deft rearrangements of familiar booky characters and situations, workings-out of the reasons why the particular he and the particular she decided to marry. He dealt not unkindly with these, but always with a sigh for the books that didn't seem able to get themselves writ- ten, the books he himself hungered for. These books would have to stir with the mighty pulse of life as it throbbed nightly through the city room down-stairs. There, he felt, was reality love and hate, jealousy and murder, the unex- pected, complicated, often bizarre, entanglements of life; the desperate upward struggle of the laboring poor ; corruption undermining complacency ; wrecks, fires, earthquakes, strikes and all the dramas that hang about them and trail after them! The endless film of life, he had come to feel, was run off fairly before his eyes every night. He saw, with the single purpose of the practical reporter, industrial kings, ramp?, politicians, fine ladies, sweatshop workers, promot- 10 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM ers, lynchers, reformers, street walkers, athletes, preachers, gamblers, dynamiters, mayors, actresses and presidents. To the seasoned newspaper man they were all alike. They strutted or stepped urbanely or skulked by. Their destiny as public figures was measured in lines, stick fuls or columns. Some were born to page six, among local mention. A few found their level on page five, opposite editorial. That would be Society and Dramatic, or Minor Obit. An occa- sional one, with abnormal or supernormal gifts, such as that extremely vigorous man, the president, or a certain amazing actress, or this Henry Calverly who had drifted so ignobly into the building one with the gift, or the fatality, of con- spicuousness had to meet his final fame or disaster on page one. . . . Here was the stuff of fiction, here in the morgue and in the back files of the paper. For life was here. And what was fiction to be if not life? He sighed as he replaced the folder and closed the drawer. His eyes rested on a label higher in the cabinet, "Can- Cat." He opened it ; ran through the folders to the first of several marked, "James H. Cantey." There, now, was a figure, and a life ! That was a shrewd enough suggestion of Margie's. Per- haps he was too old to begin. But biography ! He carried all the Cantey folders to his desk and dipped eagerly into the mass of printed and typewritten data within. Jim Cantey was an heroic figure, worlds away from the unlucky Calverly. He had been a local boy, and had kept his residence here, on the Hill, despite a life spent mostly in his private car, or on one of his ships, or in his New York offices, or in Europe. Years back, for some reason, he had purchased the News and put Mr. Listerly in as publisher. The Cantey Estate owned it now. Mr. Hitt's color rose a little as he went through the pa- pers, and his eyes brightened. Jim Cantey was a big man. There was epic stuff here. Though they'd hardly let you tell it ; not the real story of his fight. There would be family influences, and impenetrably THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 11 correct lawyers, and persons from banks. The wonderful rough vitality of the man would have to be ironed out. You would have to erect a false person in literary plaster of Faris, calm and benign of countenance, hand thrust in breast of coat, as nearly as possible like all the other false public presentments of creatures that were once head- strong, generous, fighting, sinning, wonderful men. But an hour later he was still at it. He had forgotten the unfortunate young man down-stairs. CHAPTER TWO Indicating Something of How This Mr. Stanford, or Staf- ford, Appears to Feel about It. With a Foot-note by Margie Daiv ALONG one wall of the large, crowded "city room" ex- tended a row of coop-like rooms behind a seven- foot partition of ground glass and wood, in which labored the somewhat favored individuals who headed editorial depart- ments or wrote signed "features." At about twenty minutes to six by the round white clock above the city editor's horseshoe desk, the door labeled "Fi- nance and Real Estate" opened and Abel H. Timothy ap- peared, buttoning his slightly spotted blue coat across his plump person. His wide, rather friendly mouth fitted com- fortably about a long unlighted cigar on which was a red- and-gold band, doubtless the gift of some one of the invest- ment bankers with whom Abel was much thrown. His wide soft hat was tipped genially on his large head. Half-way along the row he paused, glanced about the busy room guardedly, removed his cigar, straightened his crim- son necktie, and opened a few inches the door labeled, first, "Features," and then, under that, in smaller letters, "Miss Daw." "Hello, Marge," he murmured, through the opening. "Are you eating a bite ?" Margie Daw looked up from her typewriter, glanced about, as if from habit at the two desks nearer the window, which were, at the moment, closed, and then turned an almost demure face toward the corner behind the door. Abel leaned in, peered around. There, at a small desk, bending intently forward over a few sheets of copy paper on which he had apparently been drawing aimless diagrams and absurd faces of tramps and 12 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 13 angels, in an old alpaca office coat that had been worn clear through at the elbows, sat a strange young man. Abel's eyes opened wide in a mock stare, his under lip pressed its upper nearly against the somewhat flat nose above it. ^ Margie tapped the paper in her machine. "I've got to finish this/' she said. Abel's mouth formed a silent, "Oh!" Then aloud, he said, "I'll be over at Philippe's." After which he softly closed the door, replaced his cigar, smoothed his coat, and went on out to the elevator. Margie's typewriter, ticked busily for as much as five minutes. Then, as she removed a sheet of paper, she looked around at the young man in the corner. At that moment he raised his eyes. "Nearly six o'clock," she said, pleasantly enough, but un- able wholly to conceal the curiosity in her eyes. He was not looking at her, he seemed to be intent on something outside the window. She was not even sure that he heard until, after a long pause, he replied, vaguely: "Oh, is it as late as that ?" She nodded. "I'll have to run out. We pick up a bite when we can here. If we don't get it early, we're likely not to get it at all." He made no reply to this. A thought nettled, she added : "Of course, I don't know what work they've given you." "They haven't given me any," said he, and sighed. Margie glanced out the window ; then turned back to the machine, lifted the carriage as if to examine the ribbon ; considered. "Haven't you got a typewriter?" she asked. "No. I couldn't use one, anyhow." "But you'll have to, I should think. They don't like to take longhand." He had no reply to this. He seemed quite helpless. A moment more, and she heard him push back his chair. For a time he stood between chair and desk, gazing for- lornly at the wall. 14 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Margie, covertly watching him, found her shoulder draw- ing up in a quick little shiver. What was the matter with him? Why didn't he move? At length, still gazing at the wall, he took off the alpaca coat and hung it beside his street coat. Still hesitating, he reached up, took the alpaca coat down again and put it on, picked up his hat ; and stood by the door. "I was wondering " he began. "I'm not familiar with this part of town perhaps you could tell me where the people here get their supper." She replied in an almost snappy tone : "A good many go to Philippe's, around in the alley. But the Buffalo Lunch is as near and cheaper. I was just going around there. I'll show you the way." And as she sprang up and reached for her own little jacket, she added, "But I wouldn't wear that coat if I were you." She saw him look uncomprehendingly down ; saw the red color surge over his face; and herself moved to the door. "Meet you at the elevator," she said briskly, and rushed out. He walked stiffly by her side around a corner into a side street. Margie, who had chatted, at her ease, with presidents of insurance companies, wife-beaters, pickpockets and belted earls, found it difficult to keep the conversation barely alive. Though he replied once or twice, she wasn't sure that he heard all she said. The Buffalo Lunch was conducted on the "cafeteria" plan. You went to various counters for your food and carried it yourself to a row of chairs each of which had one wide arm that served for a table. At the doorway the young man stopped short, studying the crowded, chattering interior from under knit brows. Margie stood on the step, tapping one foot. Finally he said, "I don't really want much. Just a cup of coffee, I guess. I I'm not very hungry." The price list, a large placard, was hung on a column just within the door. She saw now that his eyes were bent on it. Once within, she took him in charge, getting price slips THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 15 for both, leading him to the counters and elbowing a way for him through the crowd. When she had her hot roast beef sandwich and coffee and he his coffee and roll, she led him to a post before two chairs whose occupants seemed nearly through, and there they stood, nibbling at their food, awaiting their turn. She was recovering her- self now ; she talked continuously, in a confidential tone. "I heard you were going to work for Trent and Bevan both," she remarked, as they stepped out on the street. "Well something like that. They haven't told me much yet." "You'll have your troubles. Bevan's all right when he's sober. When he's drunk a little he'll crowd you. Al- ways gets very busy and exacting. Wants to make people think he's sober. And don't forget to praise any shows you may review for Trent." "Why, I don't see how I can do that, unless " "Oh, find something to praise. Velvet on your hammer." "But if criticism means anything, it " "Criticism doesn't mean anything. Praise means adver- tising. And, besides, Archie Trent's got his own fences to look after." "Oh!" he breathed, deep in thought "Oh! ... I never thought of that." "My dear Mr. Mr. Stafford, you're in a rough world. You've got to keep your wits about you." "So it seems," said he, bitterly. She caught his sleeve and drew him off the crowded side- walk into a doorway. "Look here!" she said. "I don't want to see you get in wrong the first thing. It's lucky for you you're in my room. The thing for you to do is to bring your troubles to me. I've got a trained ear. Until you learn the ropes, you know." "That's kind of you," he murmured. "Not particularly. But I can help you." *Tm sure you can. You see I'm not used to my life has been so very everything's been so different " 16 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM He clamped his lips shut. A frightened expression crept in about his eyes. He turned away. "Guess I'll take a little walk," he remarked. "I suppose a few minutes more or less don't matter." And he rushed off. He went across town to the central post-office, walking more and more rapidly, his face drawn with nervous ten- sion. He was in a perspiration when he reached the grimy old building. At the general delivery window he asked if there was mail for H. Calverly. The clerk gave a slight start, looked narrowly at him, and as he turned away to the box, knit his brows as one does who tries to recapture a half-lost bit of memory. He re- turned with a letter. It was addressed in a familiar hand small, clear, almost like print. Henry turned it over. The back stamp was nearly forty-eight hours old. Then he felt the clerk's eyes on him and hurried away. He opened the letter on the street. It read : "Dear Old Hen! It was great to hear from you. I haven't time to write a letter now, but perhaps can do bet- ter. Have to be in Cincinnati on the 14th. Will take train arriving your town, Union Station, 10:50 p. M., on the 13th. Will be there about an hour if on time, taking Cincinnati train at 12:01. Wire me here. We'll have a few minutes' chat anyway. "Yours as ever, "H. W." He carefully tore up note and envelope into small bits and dropped them in a street-sweeper's cart. The color was rising in his face. He wondered, on the way back to the office, if he could get away. It was too late to telegraph, of course. Without that message, he wondered, would his friend come? He asked Miss Daw what he ought to do about leaving early. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 17 "You're not supposed to be on the city staff, are you?" she asked. "Then I'd wait. If Trent doesn't give you a show, there's no sense in waiting around. You can do Be- van's work in your own time." Trent did not give him a show ; and by ten-thirty he was waiting at the train gate. Humphrey Weaver tall, lean, well-clad, carrying his own bags through the swarm of porters came deliberately down the platform, his swarthy face wrinkling into a grin that faded a little as his quick gaze took in the thin figure in the wrinkled old suit. They sat in the waiting-room and tried to talk. But there were difficulties. They had been friends years back, in Sunbury, Illinois. Humphrey had taken the boy out of a forlorn solitude that seemed now curiously, in little, like the unhappy situation he was in to-day. They had lived together for a year or so. Together they had bought the Sunbury Weekly Gleaner, to sell it later, when Henry's success and his marriage, and an unfortunate love-affair of Humphrey's caused both to lose interest in it. From his boyhood Humphrey Weaver's real bent had been mechanical. With a little more capital he might have succeeded in flying ; he did work wonders in improving the Chanute gliders, and early mastered the gas engine, besides conducting curious and interesting experiments in the prin- ciples of torsion as they might be applied to automatic de- vices for swinging electric fans. His first successes had been with these appliances. Since then he had sold a num- ber of inventions and had come to be a director in several holding and merchandising companies. In years he was now approaching the middle thirties. He had the air of a man who, as we say, has struck his gait. There was nothing cheaply expensive about him. He didn't drink. He was a student, a worker, not a salesman or a trader. He was calm, thoughtful, even sober. Yet, the prosperity could not be denied. It came between the two old friends now in a way that neither could control. The older man sat back, soberly 18 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM picking his words. The younger man grew even more moody, silent, lost in that wilderness within his breast where his spirit had wandered for years. Each of them, as they sat there, fumbling about for some- thing that might be common tender among all the confused coinage of speech, felt the gulf between them ; and each, too, felt the hopeless nature of his individual effort to bridge it. Fate had touched them differently, that was all. Humphrey was casting about in his mind for some verbal approach to the problem of offering money, but could find none. This had come between them before, since the trial. He did manage to ask : "How'd you happen to come here ?" "Oh, I don't know. I was looking over the atlas one day. It's as good a town as the next. They they don't know me here." "Tell me what you're doing, Hen." "Working on a paper." "What one?" "The oh, it doesn't matter." "But . . . Are you fixed all right? I mean living arrangements, all that?" "Oh, yes. Boarding-house." "Hmm! I hope you're comfortable, Hen. I've noticed that the men I see now, the men who are handling big things, make a great point of taking care of themselves, saving themselves. It's pretty important to keep the nerves and muscles in trim. Do you get much exercise ?" "Oh, I walk some." "No golf, or tennis, or " Humphrey faltered here. His eyes were again taking in the shabby suit. He had forgot- ten that tennis and golf mean an income, that the clothing and outfits and club connections carry with them a distinct upper-class implication. His old friend recognized the pause only with a listless gesture. "Well I wish there was time for a real visit, Hen. We've got a little getting acquainted to do; some checking THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 19 up. I'm going to try to plan another trip here. I'm pretty busy. But you'd better give me your address." There was no reply. Humphrey had produced a little red book and a fountain pen. He looked up now. "Oh, may as well leave it just general delivery." Henry cleared his throat. "I may be moving around some." "Hen," Humphrey was facing him now, "what's the mat- ter? What is it? There's something wrong here. I want you to tell me." The young man sat brooding. Once he threw out his hand again in that listless way. Finally, obviously nerv- ing himself, he said : "Well, Hump, you know you know how it's been. What a hell of a fight it's been. Nothing does any good. I've got this tag on me. And that's all they can see just the tag. So I I'm not using my own name here." "Oh," said Humphrey, very soberly "that." "Yes. It's that." "Then, Hen, I want you to tell me the other name. I think I'd better have it." "You mean" this quickly "in case anything should happen." "No. Nothing's going to happen. But I want it. The name, and the name of your paper, and your boarding-house address." Henry told him ; and he wrote it down in the red book. "Now just this are you all right? Money enough, and so on ?" "Oh, yes, I'm all right." Then Humphrey hurried away to the Cincinnati sleeper. Late that night, her work done, Margie Daw ran up to the morgue for a cigarette. She wanted to talk about the mayor, one Maclntyre. "I've been trying to get Mr. Listerly interested, Hittie. The man's a crook. A girl I know that works at the County Railways is sure they're paying him money right along. We 20 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM haven't run any sort of a vice campaign this year. The paper's dead. If we could put it through you know, get him impeached we could pick up a good thirty thousand of circulation." Mr. Hitt covered a yawn. "But, my child," he remarked, "County Railways is Cantey Estate. What would Mr. Lis- terly's own job be worth if he brought County Railways down on the paper?" Margie considered this. "Hmm!" she mused. "That's what the chief meant when he said we'd be lucky to get out of such a campaign without losing more than thirty thousand in advertising." "That is what he meant." "Hmm! . . . Oh, by the way, I ran across this Mr. Stafford over at the Buffalo Lunch. We held brief con- verse. He will hardly tarry long in our midst." CHAPTER THREE In Which Mary Maloney Makes Her Appearance, Sitting On the Top Step THERE were boarding-houses, many of them, about the fringe of the residential districts of the southern part of the city, where the ground rolled gently upward toward the palaces of the rich ; but all these were on the fringe, as well, of the social area inhabited by all the people one knew, directly or indirectly, about, the people who had offices, per- haps motor-cars, certainly clubs and friends of standing and pews in church. Which fact was, of course, reflected in the price of board. The house in which Henry Calverly had, a few days earlier, engaged a small, top-floor room was in a wholly different section of the city as it was on a social level that was wholly beneath the consciousness, not only of snobs but simply and sincerely of all nice people. And as it was not low enough in the scale to come easily within the vision of settlement workers and city missionaries, you might have lived all your life and died in this city without ever becoming aware of the house or of the little street in which it stood. It was built like all the other houses in the street, of wood. It wanted paint. The houses on left and right crowded it so closely that there was good light only at the front and rear. Across the front, and only a few yards from the side- walk, was a somewhat rickety piazza with balusters of the sort turned out in thousand lots with machine lathes. Within (and without, as well) it smelled of cooking. The whole street, indeed, smelled of it, despite the subtle competition set up by the rendering plant across the river whenever the wind was right. The carpets were threadbare. The furni- ture was cheap elaborate rocking chairs and a worn and 21 22 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM lumpy red sofa in the parlor, with a marble-topped table and an old, odd upright piano, not all the notes of which re- sponded with certainty ; in the bedrooms a kitchen chair or two, an old wood or iron bed, a yellow oak bureau with some part of a rippling mirror remaining, and a washstand over the back of which hung two towels for each inhabitant that had to last half a week. In order to reach this part of town you took a River Street car and transferred, northbound, at Peck Avenue; leaving which corner you were soon in a canyon of factories, some of brick, more of wood. Farther out you passed a long row of lumber yards from which the whining song of planing mills rasped, all of every day, through the air. Above the rumbling and rattling and pounding of the flat- wheeled trolley cars (in which you could never find a seat except in the off-hour of mid-afternoon), above the puffing, whistling, bell-ringing locomotives in the railway yards on the western shore of the river, you could always, seven to twelve and one to six, hear the siren-like drone of the planers. It was about a quarter to one at night when Henry Cal- verly dropped wearily off a car opposite one of the lumber yards and turned into the little side-street. A moon rode the sky. In its soft light the crowded, cluttered houses, with their cheap little porches and bay windows and sawed-out ornaments and the occasional bat- tered picket fences, presented a softer aspect than he had before felt here. As he drew near the house he saw something dark on the top step. Probably, he thought, one of the girl boarders sitting out with her fellow. There were several girl board- ers: two or three couples of them on the second floor and one or two on the third who seemed to have rooms to them- selves. They gathered in the early evenings about the piano and sang popular songs. One of the third-floor girls, a lit- tle thing who appeared to be a Miss O'Brien or O'Reilly or something like that, played the simple accompaniments well enough. They had asked him to join them only last even- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 23 ing ; rather timidly, and with giggles. But the O'Brien per- son had not turned her head. He was glad she hadn't. He was afraid now that he must have seemed pretty rude. He had mumbled an unpleasant trick of his, lately and then rushed out, slamming the door as he went. He hadn't meant to slam it. He must have been moving rather quickly. Though, in a flickering, haunty way it now occurred to him that perhaps he had meant to slam it. In a queer way. He realized that much of the time he couldn't himself under- stand what he did mean to do. About anything. He saw, as he turned in, at the steps, that the dark object was not a couple, but a solitary girl. The Irish girl, appar- ently. She said, "Good evening!" very simply and naturally. He stopped short at the bottom step. "Good evening, Miss Miss O'Brien." She laughed a little, softly. It was almost a chuckle. "My name isn't O'Brien," she remarked. "Oh !" he murmured. "I thought you see " "It's Maloney. Mary Maloney." "You you I was wondering perhaps you're locked out" "Oh, no," she said. Her voice was low, even pleasant in quality. "I've been to the theater. The Little Minister. Don't you just love Maude Adams?" "I I used to. I haven't gone to the theater much, late years." She seemed to be looking at him rather steadily. He recalled now that he had noticed her eyes. She was not, in other respects, a particularly noticeable girl. She was short and perhaps slightly inclined to plumpness, with the smallest hands and feet he had ever seen. Despite his air of indifference, which was often, he feared, sheer rudeness, he had noted all this in the dining-room, while passing her on the stairs, or in the little third-floor hallway they two shared with a few others. And she had a quietly direct, practical way about her. But her eyes were unusually large, and were fringed with the longest black, or very dark 24 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM brown, lashes he had ever seen. It was the eyes, and her quiet, self-respecting way that gave her an air of personality something above that of the other girls in the house. "I love her. There isn't anybody else that makes me feel like that. And then we went to the Rivoli for supper." The Rivoli was one of the two or three showy restaurants of the city. He himself hadn't dreamed of going there; he had merely walked by. It gave him a little start now to realize that these girls of the lumber-yard district patronized the same expensive theaters and restaurants as the people on the Hill. He would have assumed the motion pictures and one of the Buffalo Lunch places. He didn't know that this was typical of America. And he couldn't have known that the clothing this small person was wearing at the moment was a curious mixture of the cheap machine-made with the fine hand-sewed, including a bit of French embroidery. "I've only been home a few minutes," she went on. "I went in at first, but as soon as my friend had gone I came out again. It's so nice out here. It sorta makes the play last longer." She looked up now, away from him, out through the thin foliage of the one poplar that decorated this portion of the street. The moonlight streamed gently down, full on her uplifted face, and made it momentarily beautiful. He stared at her. For a brief moment he forgot the drab little street, forgot that she was but Mary Maloney, a girl that worked some- where in the neighborhood and had on this evening seen a play, for the face had in it, under this ghostly light, the dream-quality, the mystery, of all young womanhood. It touched the weary, crushed artist-soul in the man, touched a raw spot that no crust could protect from a purely emo- tional appeal. He had almost to wrench his eyes away. He looked up with her at the moon. Then, brows knit pain- fully, lips compressed, slowly, hesitatingly, as one who does what he feels he must under no circumstances do, he sank down beside her on the steps. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 25 To him the act was momentous. But she seemed to take it quietly for granted. "I often come out here at night," she went on, in the same tone. "I don't sleep very well. And I can't read at night. I you see, I keep books over at the paper mill, and the light's not good there. My eyes trouble me some. I like to sit here alone oh, all hours. Nobody sees you. And it's the only time the street's pleasant. Besides, I guess I enjoy being alone more'n most girls." He started clumsily, self-consciously, at this. She reached out a tiny hand, laid it on his sleeve. He stared down at it. To her, apparently, it was a natural, wholly impersonal action. "This is all right," she said. "I didn't mean for you to go. Sometimes it's nice to have some one to talk to. Of course." He bit his lip. There was pain in his face. Suddenly, nervously, with a little catch in his throat, and an effort to speak hastily and casually an effort that failed he raised his hand, started to draw it back, then abruptly laid it on hers and pressed it against his sleeve. For a moment, then, he held his breath. But she, in that same simple, natural way, as if while in this mood she was glad to feel a friendly pressure, let her fingers settle gently about his. The emotions that were tearing at one another and at himself within his breast failed so much as to touch her. He felt this; knew it; and held her fingers gingerly. Thus they sat and looked up at the moon. "You ought to come in and sing with us sometimes," she said, after a time. "Or don't you sing?" He had a little difficulty with his voice in replying. It seemed to want to break out explosively. All he managed, at length, to say was "Not any more. I used to." "The girls are crazy to have you." 26 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "I I'm not likely to be here much at supper-time. I'm working on a newspaper." He said this as if not quite sure it was true. "Oh, is that so ! Do you write things ?" "Some. That is I have written things. Not very lately. I haven't been that is, I haven't been very well, these last few years." "Oh, that's too bad !" So far the same bafflingly impersonal tone. But now, for a moment, the personal snowed through. Almost defen- sively. "My friend's awfully good to me. He takes me to all the good plays and things. He's foreman in Peterson's lum- ber yard." Again they were silent. He found himself nervously pressing the soft little fin- gers. And groping among his confused thoughts, trying to puzzle out her code. Surely she had one. She was no silly little idler; he felt that. According to his own code, this was all wrong. It was breaking faith. Once let this drift set in and he would soon be losing hold on what little, what sadly little, he had to cling to in life. Apparently the drift had started. Warm little impulses were daring to raise their heads in his hungry heart. They were his trait- ors, these impulses ; he must steel himself to fight them. He wondered despairingly what was the matter with him this past year or more. Before that it had been, in a bitter sav- age way, easy to control himself. He had felt, every wak- ing moment, every dreaming moment, the gentle dark eyes and all the dainty little mannerisms (that had been as mir- acles to him) of the wife of his youth. He had felt a wild sort of joy in stamping out all other human fire. Life had run on, of course; but he had been glad of that. Life now had nothing for him. He was through with it. Let it run on ! ... Though it had a pitiless way of dragging you on with it. He had wondered often why he kept up the strug- gle. Some instinct kept him half-heartedly at it. He had THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 27 wanted to follow Cicely ; but found it impossible to take his own life. He had thought it over from every angle. But now was it to be like this the unceasingly persistent pressures of life searching out the weak spots in his defense, keeping at him, constantly throwing in his path fresh lures, threatening even to dim the heretofore vivid outlines of his most deeply precious memories? He suddenly gripped the girl's hand tightly, the hand of this little Mary Maloney whom he didn't even really know, who was nothing to him except as she might symbolize the feminine influence that has made or wrecked man the world over, throughout all history. He lifted her hand now, in a curious jerky way, toward his lips. Through four terrible years he had not kissed a woman's hand. Then, suddenly, she showed a trace of feeling. She made a slight effort to draw her hand away. Not an effectual effort she was still gazing dreamily at the moon, doubtless seeing herself in fancy as the romantic gipsy of the play but nevertheless a recognition of the fact that he was there and that he was a man. He gripped tighter, wondering savagely if he was hurting her. Then, as suddenly, he dropped her hand, sprang up, let himself into the house, ran up the two flights of stairs to his room, lighted the gas with trembling hands, dropped into a chair before the bureau, and sat, breathless, staring at the little snapshot, in a silver frame, of a girl of twenty with a delicately oval smiling face and gentle happy eyes. He must have sat there, motionless, for some time. He heard the front door open and close softly, and then a light step on the stairs. He rose ; stood irresolute ; tiptoed to the door ; stood there, gripping the knob, listening, holding his breath. She walked as usual, quietly but firmly, on her heels. He knew now how deeply he had been aware of her, how clear were the impressions his inner ear and eye had registered. 28 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM In a moment she would be coming by his door. He straightened up. His hand turned the knob, very softly, an inch. He was feverishly working out something in the way of self-justification for what he was, perhaps, about to do. He told himself that at least he must whisper a word of apology for his rudeness. Then she was by, and her own door had opened and closed. But still he stood there. There was sweat on his forehead, but his feet and hands were cold. He tore off his coat and collar and shoes ; threw himself on the narrow bed. An hour or so later he got up, undressed, put out his light, and, after a time of staring into the darkness, drifted into a disturbed light sleep, the only sort he had known for years. CHAPTER FOUR In Which Margie Daw Starts After the Biggest Story in the World IN mid-afternoon of the next day Henry sat at his desk reading Montaigne, or staring, at least, at the fine print in the pocket-size volume. The chapter that so closely held his attention was entitled, "How the Soule Dischargeth her Passions upon False Objects when the True Faile it." At one of the desks by the window old Mr. Upham was writing. He did Popular Science for the Sunday paper. Margie Daw was clicking- off her day's "story" on her typewriter. Henry glanced over at her. He wondered how she could work like that, composing on the machine, never so much as pausing for a word. She was taking out a sheet now, and inserting another. And now her fingers were flying again. . . . He was faintly sorry. He could have stood a little talk. He wished old Mr. Upham would go. Miss Daw, at least, seemed human. The rest of the office depressed him dreadfully ; it was a driving hostile place where, apparently, you fought for a footing, and failing it were left to slip out and down unheeded. It was the grim struggle of life, intensified, run off at high speed. . . . This girl had the speed. Almost a soft little thing, with a pleasantly feminine voice and nice eyes, she could yet drive through her work with the best of them. A young person of boundless self- reliance. If a cynical office-neighbor had told him just then of Margie's two husbands, both casually relegated to the limbus of the elsewhere, he would have found the informa- tion incredible. If he could have read what she was writ- ing, even, with those pretty little fingers, he would have ex- perienced a new bewilderment ; for, as it happened, Margie had just spent three hours trying to wring a confession of 29 30 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM murder from an hysterical woman. She hadn't succeeded ; but had picked up a good day's grist. Henry sighed ; slipped the book into his pocket ; fell to drawing aimless designs on the copy paper before him. They hadn't given him work to do. It was going to be hard, sitting here, nothing to do but think. If only one could stop thinking. And now to the painful thoughts he had had to live with all these years, was added this fresh confusion of Mary Maloney. Opening up all the old trouble. He would have to do something about that. He had been rude. She would be wondering. It was an accident, of course ; finding her on the top step. He couldn't be blamed for that. But he shouldn't have sat down. There was where he had made his mistake. From that point on, the fault was his. They would be meeting again in the dining-room, on the stairs, up in that third-floor corridor. In imagination he could hear her now, walking by his door on her heels. He tried drawing her profile. Then suddenly tore the paper into small bits and put them almost furtively in the waste-basket. He thought, weakly, of moving to another boarding- house; then, as weakly, asked himself what good it would do. He would have to say something, anyway. In running away from himself and her he had settled nothing. . . . He glanced again toward Miss Daw. Her fingers were still flying. A little dynamo, that girl! He had never known anybody like her. And she seemed kind. If she would talk to him it might in some degree crowd out this Mary Maloney problem. She might have supper again with him. Perhaps she'd suggest it. Miss Daw, at least, didn't appeal to his protecting instinct. You wouldn't feel responsible for her. Archie Trent came in then, breezily, spring overcoat fly- ing open, gloves and stick in hand, a pink carnation on his lapel. He devoted himself to Margie, ignoring the pale young man behind the door as he ignored the old man by the window. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 31 "Well, I'm going out among 'em to-night," he announced. "Sounds and looks,'' thus Margie, barely glancing up, "like Miss Meyne." "Guessed right the very first time. She opens to-night in But a Rose. She's dining with me first at the Rivoli. Says I have a calming effect on her nerves." Margie looked straight up at him now ; considered him newly trimmed and brushed beard, cool pale eyes, dapper costume then resumed her work. "Well, will I do, Margie?" She half-smiled; said nothing. He turned to Henry's desk; said, "I want you to cover the show at the Cantey Square, Stafford. Be in the lobby a little after eight. I'll look in then and introduce you." He laid two tickets on the desk, and then, with a "Ta-ta, Margie!" went out. During something more than four years Henry hadn't entered a theater, or a church, or a lecture or concert hall. He hadn't so much as walked through a railway station without avoiding crowded platforms and main waiting- rooms. Even in unfamiliar cities he commonly used back streets, and never walked even there without self -conscious- ness. All this was habit now ; it was his life. He had known, these two days, that Trent would be sending him to the theater. He thought he had made up his mind on it, accepting it as simply a hard fact of life that must be faced. It was what he had come to. He had to do it to keep alive. He had supposed that he would go through with it. Diffi- cult as the thing was to face, he hadn't for a moment fore- seen what would be the effect on him of these first two bits of pasteboard. He found himself in a state of nervous collapse. He had to lie back in his chair. His mouth was dry. It was difficult to breathe. After a moment he pulled himself up and glanced around to see if the others had noted his condition. Apparently they hadn't Miss Daw's typewriter was clicking swiftly away. 32 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM The thing to do was to keep quiet until he could get his breath. He got the tickets into his fingers. It was hard to focus his eyes on them. They were for row E of the Orchestra. He would be walking in at the front entrance, mingling with a merry crowd in the foyer, marching nearly all the way down the aisle. He would be there as the News critic ; a marked man, singled out, pointed at. And Trent had said something about "introducing" him. To whom ? What did he mean ? He brushed an unsteady hand across his eyes. He got up, slowly, awkwardly ; took down his shapeless gray spring overcoat and with some difficulty slipped it on. The typewriter stopped now. He felt Miss Daw's eyes on him ; turned ; tried to smile ; then, in a daze, went out. Margie looked after him. He had left the door open. She glanced at Mr. Upham ; got up to close the door ; stood there, pursing her lips, looking down at the queer little pic- tures he had been drawing on the copy paper on his desk. She decided to take these as soon as Mr. Upham left. He would be going pretty soon. Over the night Margie had reread his one great book. It was great. It had moved her. She had nothing but re- spect, touched with awe, for the author of "A Curbstone Barmecide" and "Roc's Eggs, Strictly Fresh" and "AH An- derson and the Four Policemen." Old Hittie had always raved over them. Hittie was right. But this odd being who preferred to call himself Hugh Stafford exhibited no sign of the greatness that had been in Henry Calverly. It had been in him. It might appear in him again. For he was, after all, young surely under thirty perhaps no older than her trim little self. Mr. Upham was closing his desk and looking around for his hat. Margie moved about the room, softly humming. Mr. Upham said good night, and left. Margie closed the door after him, too. She pounced then on the aimless drawings. Margie had poured over works on morbid psychology that Henry Cal- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 33 verly had never heard of ; just as she had studied, fascinated, the evidence in famous murder trials and the pitiful squirm- ings of spitted criminals under the probings of hard eager prosecutors out for a conviction. Though these squirmers had never seemed particularly pitiful to Margie. They were merely interesting. They were cases. As cases she de- lighted in them. And so these idle wanderings of Henry Calverly's pencil delighted her. They were slight but authentic glimpses of a disordered genius. She looked into his waste-basket; found the bits he had torn; carefully gathered them all. It wouldn't be difficult to paste them up in an odd half-hour. On the \vall hung a wrinkled, threadbare coat that be- longed to the only suit she had seen him wear thus far. He must have gone off in that old alpaca thing. It was a remarkable garment, the alpaca. He must have worked in it for years and years. She wondered now, with a thrill, if he could have worn it when he wrote "Roc's Eggs." Dur- ing some period red ink had played a part in his life ; there was an extraordinary amount of it all about the lower part of the coat. As if he had wiped his pen on it thousands of times. And one side pocket was ripped half off and hung flapping. All this she had carefully noted. She reached up to the coat he had left here, turning the collar back and examining the label. Yes, it was ready- made ; as also would be the old gray overcoat. The trial had wrecked his finances, of course. The side pockets bulged with papers. And the inside breast pocket was full. Above the noise of the city room, outside the partition, a step sounded in the passage. Margie instantly composed her face and slipped back to her own desk. The step passed .... She leaned back in her chair, re- flecting. She had heard old newspaper men term the Watt- Cal verly tragedy the "greatest" human interest story (in the popular newspaper usage of that word) since Guiteau murdered President Garfield. The bizarre history of Madr.me la Comtesse, the eminent place in American his- 34 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM tory occupied by old Senator Watt, the appealing beauty of Cicely Calverly and her pitiful death, the blighted fame of Henry Calverly, his imprisonment, his disappearance from public view ; these and other items made it a fascinating case. It was peculiarly, above all other cases in a rough and dra- matic world, the sort that is exhaustively reopened in the papers whenever, for any reason, any one of the parties to it becomes conspicuous again. Why, the judge who sen- tenced Henry Calverly to the penitentiary couldn't so much as break a rib in an automobile accident without bringing it all back to page one ! Or any one of the lawyers. A number of prominent court alienists dated their fame from that trial. While old Madame Watt couldn't do anything, any moment die, or attack a servant, or build another cas- tle, without tearing wide open every newspaper morgue in the United States. And that done, this absurd "Hugh Staf- ford" blunder would be oil on the flames. They'd finish him then, this sensitive, helpless young fellow. They'd make a job of it this next time. Margie's eyes were glistening now in sheer excitement. And her heart was beating high. For this biggest story in the world had walked innocently in only yesterday through the doorway in the seven-foot partition and seated itself right here in the corner. Certain of the documents in the case sidelights, surely, on a puzzling, a really baffling character were in the pockets of that ready-made coat on the wall. It was even possible that among them were letters from the hand of the mad old countess, who was surely still living in that absurd castle in Illinois. Margie would have given anything in the world just then for those papers. She even, with hesitation, moved her chair back, considering the temptation to take them and read them. But she shook her head over it. "Too risky," she told herself. Margie's code was personal and peculiar. Her loyalty to the newspaper she happened to be working for was THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 35 among her deepest traits, almost her religion. Men she regarded, at times, in certain moods, as legitimate prey. Toward them, in all personal relations, she had few scruples; she was not, in the common understanding of the word, innocent; yet it was generally believed among the little Bohemian newspaper community that she had never yet used her considerable personal charm to advance herself. She knew women that had, and despised them. This prin- ciple cropped out oddly on the surface of her life ; for one small fact she went about, ate, and on occasions drank with men, but always paying her share of the bill. She insisted on this. Her men friends accepted it. But the pursuit of a "story" was another matter. She would then stop at little. Her spirit rose to it. Her color was rising, her eyes intent and alight. She bit her lip. "I'll make him read them to me," she decided. She turned to the typewriter then, and with a deliberate exercise of will finished her script. After which, quieter now but still intent, she went out for a bit of supper. It was early, only a little after five. Her thoughts were full of Henry Calverly. She found him, stumbled on him, in a doorway next to the corner drug store, leaning there, gray and haggard of face, his eyes helplessly following this or that passer-by. "You look ill," she said. "Oh, it's it's nothing much. I'll be all right." "Do you live near here?" "Oh why no, not very." "Where?" "What was that?" "Where do you live ?" "Oh . . . Well, out Peck Avenue way." "Good heavens ! You can't go 'way out there." "Oh, yes ! In a few minutes. I went over to the post " He caught himself. "I was waiting for a River Street car. I felt a little queer oh, just dizzy ..." Margie looked out about the street. An old four-wheel 36 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM cab stood across the way. She caught the driver's eye. He drove across. Henry Calverly couldn't follow even this. He still leaned against the building. Margie looked up and down the walk for acquaintances. Then she led him, resisting only a little in a contused way, to the curb. Then, bewildered, he stepped aside to make way for her. "No," she said quickly, "get in." He obeyed. She hurried in after him, saying nervously aloud, to her- self, "It's taking an awful chance." She glanced up then, quickly, to see if he had heard her. He hadn't. They drove over two streets and pulled up before an old red-brick flat building. He had said, "I don't understand why I let you do this." She had the money ready. Before he could half voice his rather crude protest he was across the sidewalk and mount- ing a flight of dark stairs. She unlocked a door. He found himself in a tiny and rather disorderly apartment. A morn- ing wrap lay across the sofa. She threw it aside to make room for him. As he sank down, he found himself look- ing into a bedroom. Some feminine things were on a chair ; slippers on the floor, just as they had been kicked off. He felt extremely uncomfortable; tried to sit up straight, with- out making much of a job of it ; cleared his throat. "It's very good of you," he began, confused. The color was returning to his face. He could feed it. She stood before him; spread her small feet a little; thrust her hands into her coat pockets; critically surveyed him. "You'd better do as I tell you," she said now. "Take off some of your things, coat and collar, anyway. There ought to be a man's bathrobe here somewhere. Wait a minute." She rummaged in the closet ; called back, "Here it is ! Put it on. Now stretch out and try to be comfortable . . . No, do as I tell you ! You're all in, and you don't know it. I'll get you some Scotch." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 37 "No no!" said he, with the first touch of vigor he had shown. "Really, I won't drink anything!" "Hum! Wait a minute I'll get spirits of ammonia." And she ran down the stairs and across the way to a drug store. He saw her from the window. He found himself drinking the stuff. They had an odd conversation then. Altogether matter- of-fact. She curled up in the one big upholstered chair and lit a cigarette. He felt weakly that he mustn't appear to notice it; though he had seen few women smoke. He hadn't realized how pretty she was. At the office she seemed brisker; more like a young fellow. Here she seemed a thought older. He found himself growing afraid of her. The thought came that it would be awkward to be caught here this way in this bathrobe . . . The stimulant was clearing his head. It was nothing anyway ! A foolish little attack of nerves. He'd had them before ; often in the old days ; had always driven right through them. She talked with utter ease ; smiling a little ; very kind ; and practical. Indeed, her logic was difficult to meet out of a tired, emotion-clouded mind. "You're living in a boarding-house, I take it." He bowed. "Beastly game ! I'd die first." "I know. But what can you do?" She waved her cigarette about the room. "This. You can't do better than seven or eight a week, at best." "Eight." "Then there's car fares, and the awful wear and tear." "I know." "You can pick up something pretty cheap here in this building. Eat as you like. You're independent. And you don't have to pay for meals you aren't there to eat." "I know. That's bothered me some. I was thinking I'd go out there for supper to-night. You see, it costs a good deal, paying out there and eating down-town." "I'd offer to put you up here until you " 38 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Oh, no! I wouldn't put you to that trouble." " but I simply haven't got room. Just the one bedroom, and this little coop, and bathroom. I keep a tin refrigerator and alcohol stove in there. It's crowded, but at least it's not a boarding-house." Henry tried to consider the apartment idea calmly, prac- tically; tried to imagine this extraordinary Miss Daw as the frank, bright young fellow she sometimes seemed. This effort was unsuccessful. His temples were pounding. It hadn't occurred to him that a woman could hold a cigarette so gracefully. He thought, as from a distance, of Mary Maloney. It might solve that problem. Though this .... He heard her saying "You'd better stretch out here and get some sleep. I'll call up about half past seven and see if you're able to go to the theater." "Oh, yes, surely" "If you're not, I'll manage to cover it, one way or the other. So don't worry. You can stay here to-night, if you think you could be comfortable on the sofa. You certainly won't want to drag yourself out to a Peck Avenue boarding- house unless you feel a lot better than this. Help yourself to my books." It seemed to him, when he tried to reconstruct the picture later in memory, that she stood for a time, after she had pulled down her becoming little felt hat and rubbed out the stub of her cigarette, hands in pockets, studying him with a curious intentness. He knew that he grew very red, and looked down awkwardly at the bathrobe. And then, with a smile and a positive, triumphant little whip of her head, she left him there, CHAPTER FIVE Emotions in Alpaca FOR a time half or three-quarters of an hour Calverly sat, rather uncomfortably, on the edge of the sofa staring at the wall. His mental self was afloat, adrift, on a wide sea of emotion. He was only vaguely aware of the stuffy little apartment, of his own old alpaca office coat and his collar and tie lying across the books on the table. Once or twice he emerged from his reverie, saw again the femi- nine things about him, glanced down at the strange old bath- robe in which he was wrapped, and flushed. Then, almost at once, he was back on that confused and boundless sea of feeling. He caught himself muttering aloud. About going to the theater. This seemed to be what he was really thinking about. He wondered if he was just an ordinary coward. "What's the difference" he was muttering again "if they do recognize me ! What can they do ? Why, nothing ! How can they stop me doing the job I'm sent there to do? They can't. Of course! I've got a right to live, haven't I ? Suppose I was a soldier and got sent . . . though that would be easy." He sprang up, nerves suddenly alert, quivering; tore off the bathrobe. Who did it belong to, anyway ! Why was it here in Miss Daw's rooms ? It was a man's garment . . . Why was he himself here? Hurriedly, breathless again, really in an odd, shamefaced panic, a complete revulsion, he got collar and tie on, then coat and overcoat. He rushed out, headlong. He was relieved at getting unseen into the cross-street. He waited on a corner among a crowd of gum-chewing, giggling shopgirls. He moved away from them. He hung from a strap in a crowded car ; waited again at 39 40 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM a transfer station ; rode out Peck Avenue clinging to the rear step in a tightly packed group of laboring men. They were dirty, and smelled of sweat. The car was dirty. The conductor's reaching hand was dirty. A pall of smoke from the planing mills and the rendering plant and the box factories hung over the gray street. It was supper-time at the boarding-house. He felt people staring at him as he walked through the dim, dingy, dining- room. It seemed to him that they must know his secret and all he was going through. Else why should they stare so ? As he stepped out into the hall after supper he realized that the piano was going. And pleasant young voices were singing. He moved slowly, wistfully, past the parlor door. They saw him. There must have been six or seven girls there altogether. Two or three turned. There was a pause in the song, and some whispering. Mary Maloney, at the piano, called : "Won't you come in, Mr. Stafford?" He stood a moment, bit his lip. He told himself that it was absurd to take it so hard. It couldn't hurt anybody for him to go in there and sing a little. He used to love singing. It had been one of his curious group of gifts. But it had been, more recently, the one gift he had most fiercely sup- pressed. It seemed now, for a moment, that in merely crossing that threshold he would be releasing all the desper- ately chained forces of life within him. If he were to let himself enjoy one thing, why not another? And how could he make friends as Hugh Stafford ? What would the end be? He had taken it for granted that he didn't want friends. He went in. He felt them looking at him in some surprise. One girl giggled outright and turned away in confusion. Mary Ma- loney hurriedly rummaged among the heaps of songs on the piano-top; selected one, quietly asked Henry if he knew it, and struck into the accompaniment. The girls at once began to sing. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 41 Henry tried his voice, softly at first, even timidly. It came as a surprise that he could still sing. After the years. He was in a tremor of self-consciousness about it. Once or twice he caught himself letting out a little, and instantly brought his voice down to a whisper. He knew that the moment he let it go he would become the most conspicuous person in the boarding-house. For it was a good voice. And in it was something of the individual quality, the stir- ring, even thrilling power, that was inherent in the man. . . . But finally, after three or four songs, he did let it go. Shortly after this the little gathering broke up. The girls went their several ways of the evening. Mary Maloney waited, sorting out the music ; and then, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, left the room at his side. Out in the dim hall she looked confidently up at him. "That was splendid," she said. "I love your voice." He made a depreciatory gesture ; but the flush of success was on him the first small success in four years. ''I have to go to a show to-night/' he found himself say- ing, in an eager tumble of words, "for the paper. At the Cantey Square. Would you care to go? There's two tickets." Her eyes opened wide. "Oh," she murmured "oh why yes, I'd love to. That is, I think oh yes, it'll be all right. I did have a sort of half engagement, but if you don't mind stopping at the drug store I can telephone." "We'd better start pretty soon," said he. She was looking him over, thoughtfully. "You're absent-minded, aren't you ?" said she. I_ w hy oh! ..." He saw now the old alpaca coat. She took the flapping pocket between her fingers and pulled him around to the parlor light. "I could sew this up, all right, but I don't know what we could do about all those ink-stains. And I could never fix the elbows. You'd better put on another coat." 42 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "It's at the office," he said, after a brief hesitation. "If you don't mind, I'll run up there and change." Mary didn't mind. She was ready in a few moments, and they set out. Henry, walking once again of an even- ing with an attractive girl at his side, felt with a touch of dread that he was letting go indeed. "Well go to the Rivoli afterward and have a bite," he said. "That'd be awfully nice," replied Mary Maloney. CHAPTER SIX Of a Strange Impulse That Calverly Calls the Power THE editorial and composing rooms of the News were in an "annex," back of the business office, reached through an alley. Half-way down this alley Henry paused. Up there on the eighth floor was his coat. He had to go for it. He could hardly admit that he was afraid to. But likely as not Miss Daw would be there, perhaps alone in the room. What on earth could he say to her? Why, he wasn't even ill now! He felt pretty well; a little strung up, but all right. He glanced back. Mary Maloney, loitering at the corner, smiled and waved her hand. He could see the smile by the light from the drug-store windows. He went on ; dove into the building ; went up in the ele- vator. Miss Daw was out. With a deep sigh of relief he changed coats and hurried back. He had gone up there without a plan, headlong, as he had done so many things during the dreadful years. He would have said something, of course ; would have had to; a confused and inadequate something, doubtless. Miss Daw would have thought him queer. Peo- ple did. Though he wouldn't mind that so much. What he did seem to mind was the curious lurking fear that she would go on being kind to him, taking him shrewdly, quietly for granted. It amounted, this hazy fear, to a dread that she would prove too shrewd for him. He didn't know just how ; at least he didn't try to think it out. He was sure he didn't want her in his life. It was pleasant to have Mary at his side again. He wasn't afraid of her; only, in lucid moments, of the weakness, or 43 44 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM softness, or whatever it was in himself that her warm little nature appealed to. Archie Trent was in the lobby of the theater, talking with two men of a type unfamiliar to Henry. One was old and fat, the other young and fat. The older proved to be the manager, the other press agent for the show, which bore the rather alluring title, Tlie Isle of Delight. Archie brought another man, thin, Jewish, from a narrow door beside ticket window, and introduced him as the "house manager." He also made occasion to whisper in Henry's ear, "These are good people. They treat the paper white. You can figure on anything up to a column." Archie rushed away then. The house manager, after a keen insolent study of the new young man from the News. went back through his narrow door. The fat old company manager nodded curtly and moved off to the entrance. The press agent said, cordially: "Be around here in the intermission, won't you, Mr. Staf- ford? I'd like to take you back and introduce you to some of the girls." Henry accepted the invitation at its face value. Appar- ently it was a part of what was expected of him. He said, clumsily enough, to Mary, when they were set- tled in their seats and the orchestra had struck up the medley of cheap song-hits that served for overture: "I've done a rather dreadful thing. When I asked you, I forgot I had to write a review to-night. I I haven't done much of this work." "You mean after?" said she, quickly, glancing up at him. He knew that she was surprised and impressed by his con- nections and his work ; and in this curious hour he was not above enjoying it. She added, "That's all right. I'll go along home. I'm used to knocking around alone." "You'll do no such thing," he replied, with a vigor that surprised himself. 'Til manage it. We'll go to the Rivoli just the same." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 45 She accepted this announcement as she had accepted the idea of returning alone, naturally, sensibly. "But it was nice of you to take it that way," said he, behind his program. "I was stupid. I often am. I do out- rageous things." He was chuckling. She chuckled too. "You're absent-minded, that's all. It's because you write, and things. But I really am that way. You see, I've had some knocks. And you learn, working around places, to take things as you find 'em." "Aren't you pretty young to have worked out that philos- ophy ?" "I'm nearly twenty-four. That isn't young. Not when you work." "I can see that you're a very comfortable person to have around." She chuckled again. "My friend once said that I'm like an old glove." He considered this. A faint twinge of jealousy had ar- rested his expansive thoughts. "Well," he remarked gravely, "your friend has figured you out about right, I imagine." The curtain rose then, and for a few moments they watched the prancing about of a lot of half -dressed chorus girls. Then two young men in naval uniforms came in and outlined the plot in sketchy dialogue. A soubrette sang one of the cheap songs and danced the inevitable steps. The principal comedian appeared, in eccentric make-up, and climbed out over the footlights to the top of a piano in the orchestra pit, from which point of vantage he began a brief comic speech that soon ran off into personal banter with friends in the audience. The audience clearly thought it an excellent show. The crowded house rocked with laughter and applause. But Henry was utterly out of touch with the mental attitude in which the entertainment was conceived by the producers and performers and received by the audience. The jokes dealt with subjects which were current in the minds of all ; the with sub_ 46 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM songs were rearrangements of bits of tune and rhythm that were popular musical language of the day ; to Henry it was an alien tongue. But it was clearly the tongue of the peo- ple who worked in the stores and offices and crowded the dirty street-cars in the rush hours. It even seemed to be in some degree the language of the more well-to-do. For the Hill was largely represented; many prosperous couples were scattered among the orchestra seats; there was the glint of silk and silver and the soft shine of powdered shoulders. Henry looked about from the stage to the peo- ple in the darkened auditorium with a sinking of the heart. He wondered what he could possibly say about the per- formance that those people would accept. His thoughts wandered off again into the vague, dreamlike region in which much of his mental life had been spent. The old depression, from moment to moment, was coming back over his momentarily revived spirit. It was, therefore, a relief to feel Mary leaning against his shoulder and speaking softly at his ear. He had thought her deep in the performance; certainly she had been humming a little with the singers. He didn't know that he had been sitting for a long time in moody silence, and that she had glanced up at him more than once. "I am like that," she was saying, "like an old glove, I mean. You'd be surprised at the things I really like. . . . Oh, cooking, things like that. And sewing, too. Funny ! Most of the girls aren't like that. They're crazy over these shows and parties and all. Like 'em well enough, but I like the other things better. Lots of evenings, when I ju.-t stay home and mend things and maybe read a little, I'm happiest." A dreamy smile came over Henry's face. Her hand lay on his arm of the seat. He dropped his over it. Once again her fingers twisted about his in the simple responsive- ness that so disarmed him. And once again the warmth of all womankind, of all human relationship, seemed to find a way through her to his heart. His eyes filled. He was glad of the darkness. Though it didn't matter. She would THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 47 have taken tears as she took everything, without question, simply. Even when she said, "I seen this Adele Hilde- brande last year in Butterfly Beth," he was not disturbed by the solecism. That her environment had been in certain respects unfortunate didn't seem to matter. Indeed so fortified was he by her friendship that he went through the ordeal of moving about the stage and the dingy dressing-rooms, during the intermission, without open dis- courtesy to any one, least of all to the effusive press agent who showed him around. He was cold within, as he per- ceived, in a moment of illumination, the craft of this man. It was the plan to weave a web about him, a web of girls. A fact stood out, an exciting fact. He had braved the theater management, the audience and the people of the stage now, and had not been recognized. The years had not passed in vain. Life had closed over his head and gone busily on without him. He was in almost a gay mood as he and Mary walked to the Rivoli. He moved in proudly among the throng of after-theater patrons. His mind, so long deadened, was quickening to the little task before him. They found a table in the rear of the vast room, half- hidden behind the platform on which the small orchestra played and a young woman sang sentimental ballads. Here, during one tense moment, he felt painfully in his pocket for money. It was all right ; he had enough. He ordered lav- ishly. Mary, though she protested, was flattered. The crowd settled all about them at the dim little tables, each with its candle under a red shade. The music crashed in their ears. The waiters and bus boys moved silently about through the aisles. And the invisibly joined mirrors that lined the walls and encased the square columns multi- plied the picture and intensified the color and movement. And then, his color high, a kindling glow in his pleasant gray-blue eyes (they were abnormally dark now, the pupils much enlarged), Henry produced a wad of copy paper and plunged at the task of writing his review. He worked ten- tatively, at first, with many erasures and much crumpling of paper, then with increasing sureness and speed, until 48 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM finally his pencil was flying over the paper, sheet after sheet of it. His food came. He moved it aside and wrote on. Mary nibbled hers, and watched without a word. He didn't know that any woman of feeling, simple or sophisticated, would have found him all but irresistibly attractive in this hour. But he was aware of Mary. Occasionally he gave her a smile. Once he said, "Go on and eat. Don't mind me." People at near-by tables glanced at him. There was a developing force in him that seemed to reach out and com- pel attention from every side. At length he finished. He leaned over then and read it to Mary in a low eager voice. She was a thought bewildered. She heard only a phrase here and there. She was think- ing that he ought to have his suit pressed. And the top button of his coat was loose. Somebody ought to look after him. A woman. From the little she did hear, Mary realized that she was sharing, in a way, a brilliant performance. He hadn't liked The Isle of Delight. That was plain. Though during the performance there had been no indication that he outright loathed it But for that matter, this piece about it that he had just written so intently didn't sound like him. It was a rush of bright crackling words. She thought it wonderful. Under the spell of his voice and his biting witty phrases, her own simple enjoyment of the jingling tunes faded out. He lifted her with him. Though she could never have per- ceived the bad qualities he felt in the show the crude creaking mechanism of its structure, the staleness of the jokes, utter want of sparkle and spontaneity in the comedy, the lack of grace and originality in the dancing, the hope- lessly vulgar appeal of the whole performance, aimed, as it flatly was, at the lowest emotions of the audience she now felt with him, saw it through his eyes. The difficulty was, she felt, that she couldn't hold herself at that high mental level without help. And the moisture that came to her eyes was drawn there partly by this thought (it was partly, of course, sheer excitement) that he was too high above her. that he would soon be mounting where . THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 49 he belonged, with the bright rich people on Hill, or in New York. He'd never be staying long in a cheap little boarding-house out Peck Avenue way. She knew that unerr- ingly. She wondered if he would lend her books that would help her ; books about real people that lived and worked and loved. Though she had on several occasions, in passing along the third-floor hall, glanced into his room, and had seen few books there. For some reason he was very poor. And he was in trouble. She had sensed that, of cour.se, at the start. It would be a woman. . . . He might be willing to suggest a list of books that she could get from the library. He called for a messenger boy. Magnificently, she thought. And she couldn't help seeing that he tipped the boy a quarter for a fifteen-cent errand. She wanted to sug- gest that they walk around by the News office instead ; but said nothing. He ate his cold food ravenously. He was exuberant; talked a good deal. They sat with their elbows on the table sipping coffee until the orchestra men packed their instruments and the crowd thinned down to a few couples, and the waiters began piling the chairs on the tables and switching off the lights. She had never known such a man. He said strange thrilling things. "There've been some wonderful times in my life. Not of late years but when I was younger. A sort of power that comes over me. Makes you feel that you can do anything. Play with ideas and people and life. Like a god sitting up there looking down on all of us. It's wonderful. You don't know. I didn't think I'd ever feel it again. But I've got it! Oh, I've got it! And now I know that it's still there, that it'll keep on coming, even if only once in a great while. And whatever happens, give me that and they can't lick me. ot quite. Not for good." She was watching him, wide-eyed, her cheeks on her two little hands. She knew that she hardly mattered to him. She didn't mind this much. 50 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "They won't lick you," she said, unable to take her eyes from his face, over which a shadow was crossing now. That would be his trouble again. She wondered what manner of woman it could be that could be cruel to such a man. Why, he was a child! Mary knew men well enough, the men of her own world, their good points and their crude rough demands. She took them as a matter of course. Until last night and to-night she hadn't known that there was another kind outside of books and plays. All the way home in the street-car she sat close to him. At the transfer station she slipped her hand through his arm without a thought. They lingered a little while on the front steps and looked again at the moon. Their voices were hushed with a sort of happiness. He put his arm about her shoulders, and she cuddled against him. Once she glanced up timidly, but he didn't stoop to meet her. Instead, he gazed out at the moon behind the poplar tree. And a moment later he said: "It's pretty late, Mary." They went in then, and ascended the two flights together, very quietly. Before his door they paused. Rather breathlessly she whispered : "How still it is ! They're all asleep." Then they stood, silent. Her physical nearness brought a thrill that frightened him. He felt himself swaying toward her. He bit his lip ; tried to get his clouded brain clear ; moved half a step, irresolute, toward his door; stopped. Then she whispered, "Wait !" and tiptoed away. He heard her moving about in her room looking for matches ; saw the yellow glow when she lit the gas ; faintly saw her coming back with something in her hand. It proved to be a spool of thread. He had to wait while she threaded a needle. Then she sewed on tightly the top button of his coat. He smiled in the dark ; all nerves. She leaned forward, bit off the thread, and stepped away. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 51 But, with a whispered good night, she leaned forward, bit off the thread, and slipped away. Henry softly opened and closed the door of his own room, and lit the gas. There was a strange suit-case on a chair. He whirled about. Humphrey Weaver lay on the sofa, half dressed and covered with his overcoat and Henry's threadbare quilt. Good old Hump ! It was fine of him to come back. But Henry couldn't talk now. His head was in a whirl. He stood, irresolute, trying to think ; and ended by turning out the gas, undressing in the dark and slipping into bed. CHAPTER SEVEN Of Friendship, Love and the Job of Living THEY had breakfast at the Rivoli. "Finished up in Cincinnati yesterday noon," said Humphrey. He had had to make talk all the way in on the street-cars. "It gave me a little extra time, so I ran up here." Henry gloomily sipped his coffee. "Fact is" Humphrey clipped an imported cigar "that little chat of ours the other night struck me as curiously un- satisfactory." Henry bowed over his cup. "Of course, Hen we've seen so little of each other these recent years, and we've been going on in our separate roads there would be a little adjusting to do. We'd have to find each other out, as we're doing now. Friends have to allow for that of course, as time goes along." It wasn't a good beginning. Humphrey took refuge in the business of lighting his cigar. Then he held it up and watched the smoke curl away from it. His brows were knit, as they always were when his mind was intent on a problem; his long swarthy face had broken into a hundred wrinkles. "Been thinking you over, Hen. You mustn't mind. But first. . . . Look here, tell me a little about yourself what you're doing, how you're living." "There's darn little to tell." "I'm going to talk right out. I want to help you, Hen. And it's well, difficult. You are the most gifted man I've ever known. You're young. How old? Twenty-eight nine" "Twenty-seven," Henry mumbled. "Good lord! That's only the beginning of things! And you've got as much health as a man needs. I doubt if 52 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 53 you've been eating just right, but that isn't serious at your age. I don't think you've ever done much of any drinking, have you?" Henry's head moved in the negative. "Well, there we are ! But you look I'm talking out all in, seedy. Now tell me, how far have you gone with this false name, this 'Stafford' thing?" Henry's hand moved in an uncomfortable little gesture. "It's my name here," he replied. "It's all they know about me." "Well I don't know as that matters much. It hasn't gone far. I've come over here, Hen, with the idea of suggesting that you let me in on it." "How how do you mean ?" "Oh, do the sensible thing let you have a little money, put you somewhere out in the country where you can work outdoors and write if you " Henry's hand waved again, listlessly. "I've done all that, Hump. It's no good. Just means debts, and too much thinking." "But anyway, just as a start, I want to get you away from this town. It looks like a false start to me." "They've all been false starts, Hump." Then the mem- ory of something he had felt so strongly years ago, and again, unexpectedly, rather wonderfully, only a few hours ago, in this very restaurant, gathered strength among his thoughts, gathered strength enough, indeed, to override mo- mentarily the depression Humphrey's appearance had caused a sensation that had been intensified by the steady intent look of prosperity in the man's strong face, by the cut of his imported clothes, his silk-and-gold watch-fo5, his heavy silk tie, the Havana cigar he was smoking, the money he was so easily spending on this rather elaborate break- fast. "Last night a big thing happened, Hump. I did a real piece of writing. The first since those days in Sunbury. I I got pretty excited over it. Oh, it didn't amount to much ; just a play review they sent me out to do. But it was 54 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM good. The real stuff. You can always tell, you know; it gets to coming with a rush, so you just can't write fast enough to keep up with it, and then you feel empty and happy afterward. That's the sure sign, I think when it leaves you feeling that way." There was a glow in his eyes now, behind the glasses. And his color was rising. He lowered his eyes and fingered his cup. Humphrey studied him. His intent frown deepened. He smoked and thought. Henry was telling him what he most feared to hear. At any moment the boy's genius might break out ; and then the crazy little house of cards in which he thought he was hiding himself from the world would come tumbling in a breath about his ears. And it was more difficult, each moment, to think out a course. None of the plans Humphrey had laid out on the train seemed to apply now. He had counted on talking sense to Henry, "from the shoulder." But you couldn't talk to Henry from the shoulder. Everything had been taken from him, long since, except the personal direction, for better or worse, of his life. Humphrey was seeing now that you couldn't take that from him if you wanted to. You could only hurt him, drive him farther off, intensify his solitude. Humphrey knew well enough that any human -spirit is the most fragile thing in the world ; but in his eagerness to help his old friend he had rushed his judgment. Debts wouldn't help any. Henry was right enough there. . . . The prob- lem began to look again as it had looked for years ; it was, after all, one of those cases from which you must stand aside, hiding your concern, and hoping that some day there might come a chance to help. Yes, Humphrey saw the whole thing now. The gulf be- tween them, that both had felt so clearly during the awk- ward little talk in the railway station, was real. Nothing could be done about it. Humphrey's own success, the definite outlook on life that comes with money in pocket and bank, the surface hardening that comes with years of bar- gaining and planning and driving toward tangible results, THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 55 the opportunity to rise above small personal worries and let the mind range, keep it ranging all this showed, of course, in his eyes, his carriage, the tone of his voice. It couldn't be hidden; it was fact. While Henry's moody lassitude of spirit, his poverty, his pitiful detachment from life, his shab- biness these were all fact, too. A curious complication was Henry's strength. For he was strong, in his yielding, dreamy, elusive way. Humphrey felt none too sure that he could have endured what Henry had. The boy had never for a moment in his life surrendered his judgment to another. It had never been conscious resist- ance ; it was simply that he couldn't. He didn't even know that that was what you did. Humphrey recalled with a faint twisted smile, certain occasions, away back in the old Sunbury days, when Henry had tried to work for other men. But he was speaking, talking out at last. "Do you think, Hump do you think a man can love more than one woman in his life?" Humphrey pursed his lips. "Well, Hen, it's never hap- pened to me but the one time. But it's possible. At least it seems to happen. I'm not sure that I know just what that word 'love' means. It may be a combination of emotions and needs that takes different forms at times. Perhaps a man can love two women for wholly differing reasons, or with different sides of his nature. I don't know. Or per- haps he is really a different being at different times in his life." "I think that's what I was wondering." "Is there some one now, Hen ?" "No, there isn't. But I've been puzzled. I started to make love to a girl last night. It seems to have had some- thing to do with that piece of writing. Or it really began the night before. She's a very nice little girl a working girl but I don't love her. She's hardly even a definite per- son to me. She's just gentle, unobtrusive, very kind and comfortable." 56 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM He hesitated. There was a drawn look about his eyes now, and his color had gone down. "You see, Hump, it's it's the first time anything like that has happened. I've been well, I've felt that I just wanted to live alone with Cicely's memory. I I couldn't bear to think of anything like this." "It's not unnatural, Hen." "I know. It's what people do. But I thought " His voice faltered. Humphrey leaned forward on the table. "Hen," he said abruptly, "you're making it possible for me to say part of what I really came over here to say to you. I didn't know before how to get to it. I've had no such terrible experience as yours, but I was torn all to pieces for years ; you know with love for a woman. I'm only just getting over it. I can see now and I'm applying this, now, only to myself, not to you that I was coddling my grief, indulging myself. That may sound hard, but it's my present judgment. I can see now that I may marry some day. Perhaps it will be another deep love; perhaps it will be just loneliness and the desire to share my life and have children and to give myself up, as a service, to making them all happy. Has it ever occurred to you, Hen, that in the case of a man who has married and stayed married, and reared and educated a family, and made a good clean job of it for thirty or forty years, to a respectable death, that you can't possibly know to what extent he may have been inspired by the emotion we call love. Why, you can't even say, if it wasn't love, but an instinct for service and deepen- ing affection and the sense for a good job, that the man would have been anywhere near as happy if he had indulged some flaming passion for a particular woman." "I don't know's I ever thought of that," mused Henry. And after a moment, he added, gloomily, "Of course, I haven't made a good job of it." "There are circumstances, Hen, in which any sort of a job is impossible. That's what you've had to go through. You couldn't help it." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 57 "No I don't see how I could have." "Absolutely, you couldn't." "But I can't tell you it sort of bewilders me how I feel about all this. I mean, finding I can even look at a woman, and feeling a little, just a touch, of the power again and well, it's got me upset, I suppose. It makes me realize how far I've been from life, and what a tangle it is when you get drawn into it, and . . ." His voice trailed off. "Yes, Hen, it's a tangle for all of us. But we're all in it, keeping our heads up the best we can. I suppose that the little girl is just one of the tentacles of life reaching for you." "I'm afraid so. I wish I could see. . . . It's very puzzling. . . . These years have been bitter, Hump, but they've been wonderful, too. I've been alone, but I've been exalted, sort of." His voice was unsteady now. "I used to think I could stay like that." Humphrey slowly, almost grimly, shook his head. But his voice and manner, when he spoke, were very gentle. "I'm afraid you can't stay up on that plane, Hen. You've got, sooner or later, to pitch into the big row with the rest of us. One way or another. It's it's a better way to build a monument, Hen. You may even love a woman. Yes, you may ! And it would be better. For you, particu- larly. I can, if it comes to that, go it alone. But I'm harder stuff than you. You've got too much feeling in you. Sooner or later, as you get your feet back on the ground, you've got to give that feeling to somebody. Don't waste it on lit- tle girls that you can't take along with you." Henry threw out his hands. "Oh, I couldn't do that, Hump! I I've been thinking perhaps I'd leave that board- ing-house." "It might be well. And Hen" they were starting now for Humphrey's train "if it does work out in your mind that you'd like to quit this town and begin to work the thing out under your own name, why well, remember I'd 58 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM be proud to have you let me help. Any old way money, time, anything." "But I've really got something started here," said Henry, eagerly now. "You don't know how it stirred me to feel the old thing working again. And it's bound to make a dif- ference at the paper. Don't you suppose I know that they don't get a piece of writing like that very often! They'll have to give me a real chance now." This was the hopelessly impractical Henry. He didn't realize the fix he was in. And there was no way to point it out without, perhaps, crushing him again. At least Hum- phrey couldn't think of any. The prospect, to Humphrey's keen and orderly vision, was black, black. Better, perhaps, after all, to leave him with his moment of enthusiasm. They stood again in the sooty, noisy train shed. "Just one other thing, Hen. I don't know just how you feel about it now, but things are rather bad out there in Illinois." "You you mean oh, that?" "Yes, Madame Watt. She's been getting out of hand. They thought two or three times she was dying. Then she fired the doctors and took up some new mental treatment, a fad of some sort. The lawyers have been after me to know where you are." "Hump, you haven't " "Not a word ! But I must tell you the situation." "Oh, I can't! You don't know " "Please try to listen, Hen. It's not pleasant, but I prom- ised that lawyer I'd at least tell you. He's come clear to New York twice after me. You see, I want to give him some word, or he'll have to run you down himself and make more trouble for you." Henry steeled himself to listen. "They can't do a thing with her. She's doing queer things with her money now getting it away from them, and then it disappears." "Hump, you know I don't " "Wait, please. She has you on her mind. She asks for THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 59 you. This lawyer what's his name, Parker, H. C. or H. B. Parker has a notion that she's already hired a detective agency to find you." The last faint color left Henry's face. "If that's true, of course they will find you. They won't care how much of her money they spend. It may be neces- sary, at least, for you to run out there and see this man Parker. I wouldn't let him find you here, with things as they are " "Oh, no, of course not !" "Then there's another thing. She hasn't a person in the world to cling to. It's a question, even considering every- thing, whether you can leave the woman to die like an animal." Henry stood silent, downcast. "I hate to bother you with this, Hen, but there's a pos- sibility that you may have to take some action. If it comes to choosing between humoring her a little or standing some pretty mean publicity." "You think I ought to to try to see her?" He spoke huskily, pausing to moisten his lips. "I'll tell you what, Hen, I'll keep in touch with Parker, and wire you if it really seems necessary for you to go." Henry said, "Thank you." "Tell me this, Hen have you any cash at all? _in,ough for a trip, and well, clothes?" Henry nodded quickly. There was no telling what was in his mind now. Humphrey had to run foj his train, CHAPTER EIGHT In Which Calverly Sleeps at the Union Station WHEN Mr. Hitt got to his desk at noon of the follow- ing day, he found a manuscript written, legibly, in pencil, on rough copy paper lying there. Clipped to it was a scrawl from Mr. Listerly: "H. R. H. "Please read the attached. "R. B. L." Late that night, toward one o'clock when the telegraph instruments down on the eighth floor were at last quiet, the city room turned over to the cleaners, and the night switch- board girl yawning behind her novel, Mr. Listerly closed his desk, put on his hat, threw his overcoat over his arm, and then, before leaving the building, drifted up to the library, where Mr. Hitt, like himself and his down-stairs employees, exhibited signs of closing up for the night. Mr. Listerly lay on his elbow across Mr. Hitt's desk. He was a man of fifty-odd, with a cropped grayish mus- tache, tired eyes, and a rather firm mouth. "They're going to unveil the Cantey Memorial Fountain," he remarked casually. "Are you up on the Cantey stuff?'* Mr. Hitt stepped to the "Can-Cat" drawer in the first alcove of filing cabinets, and returned with several manila folders. The publisher glanced through the top folder, said ab- sently, "That's good," sat up, clasped his knee, talked around his cigar. "This man Stafford's a curious case. Know anything about him?" Mr. Hitt was glad, for a moment, that he could busy him- 60 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 61 self with the cigar his chief had given him. Evasion never came easily to him. "Very little. I reviewed his book." "How was it?" "Oh fair. An honest enough job. The man has gifts." "Hmm!" Mr. Listerly smoked for a little while. "Wish I knew what to do with him. You see, Guard sent him to me." Mr. Guard was head of the book publishing business at Hannah and Guard, in New York. He had been a college classmate of Mr. Listerly, and had worked with him, years back, shortly after James H. Cantey bought the paper, here on the News. "He published that book, and took an interest in Staf- ford. Seemed to think a little knockabout newspaper expe- rience would make a man of him. . . . Hmm! . . . Did you read that review he wrote ?" Mr. Hitt nodded. "What did you think of it?" "The best piece of writing I've ever seen here." "Hmm ! . . . Yes, it was well written. But can you use good writing in a newspaper? I wonder." Mr. Hitt smiled dryly. Mr. Listerly smiled slightly him- self ; then said: "I don't know what on earth to do with him. I've had to take him off Trent's hands, of course. The thing made a bit of a row last night. Trent wasn't here seems to have been having a nice little supper with this Madeline Meyne person. He'd sent in his own review of the Meyne play. But they stopped this thing of Stafford's at the copy desk. Then it came up to me. I sent out and brought Trent in. He had to sit down and write a review that we could print. He was quite excited about it." "I wonder, Mr. Listerly really why couldn't we have a little real criticism, like that? Don't you think that the sparkle and snap in it might " "Absolutely not. Our readers aren't interested in the drama as art, but as entertainment. Entertaining is a legiti- 62 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM % mate business. Hazardous, difficult, but legitimate. We have no more right to attack this show at the Cantey Square than we have to attack the Rumpelheims because we don't like their taste in striped shirtings." Mr. Hitt knew that it was never worth while opposing Mr. Listerly's views. He suppressed a sigh. "The theater people would raise Ned, of course," he finally admitted. "They" Mr. Listerly smoked reflectively "would raise hell. Morton would have to go to them on his knees to get their advertising back. . . . But about this Stafford person. I had an odd little session with him. Extraordi- narily naive. Inclined to make a scene. Doesn't seem to hear all you say to him. Trent evidently gave him a good dressing down. So then he came to me. Tried to make me admit the thing was good writing. As if it mattered. Then he seemed to tire out got meek, almost abject. I was afraid he'd be telling me his troubles, so I sent him along to Winterbeck for a little try-out on the city staff. But I'm afraid he's a genius, in which case we certainly shan't be able to use him. Winterbeck told him to come in to-morrow. But he's as doubtful as I. If Guard hadn't unloaded him on me. . . ." The door burst open just then, and the man himself came running in, carrying a battered old traveling bag. "Oh, Mr. Listerly!" he cried, somewhat out of breath, "they said you might be up here. I just wanted to say that I can't report to Mr. Winterbeck to-morrow. I thought you'd want to know. A very important personal matter has come up a telegram and I've got to go to Chicago right away. There's a train at eight-something this morning. But I expect to be back in a few days, and I'll report to him then the first thing." It came out in a tumble of words. Mr. Hitt stared at him ; fascinated, in a way. Qearly it hadn't struck the man as odd that he should run the chief into a corner and shout at him. And he had no thought of asking leave to go; what thought he had seemed to amount to a confused notion that 63 he might be saving Mr. Listerly some inconvenience by tell- ing him. And then he stood mopping his face with a handkerchief and feeling for his watch.' Mr. Hitt's gaze wandered back to the easy, comfortable figure of his chief, sprawled across the desk. Mr. Listerly was a patient man. He exhibited no annoyance now ; merely smoked. Mr. Hitt looked again at the man who called himself Hugh Stafford. It was the first opportunity he had found to study that face. He saw evidences of past suffering there, as of present excitement. It seemed to him an un- worldly face, if not altogether poetic. The eyes were that, to be sure. He felt that those eyes might haunt him for a time. And he had never seen so sensitive a mouth in a grown man. . . . The speaking voice had touched him ; it was musical, not too high, with natural timbre. The sort of man, Mr. Hitt reflected, that might be pursued a good deal by emotional women; vrith his eyes and mouth, and that voice. And the look of youth about him was bewildering. The high days of his rocket fame seemed so long ago. The rather fantastic reflection claimed Mr. Hitt's thoughts now that if one could have known Balzac when he was so desperately hiding from his creditors, or the outcast and outrageous Wagner during his exile in Paris and Zurich, or poor Burns, or even Milton in prison the list extended itself surprisingly over the history of creative literature, far off to the poverty-stricken, epileptic Dostoyevsky and far back to the rogue, Villon it would have been difficult, see- ing him in the flesh, to picture any one of these unfortu- nates as a living genius with a future of achievement and a final resounding fame. Hitt shook his head over it. After he had stood there a while, the man asked : "Is is it all right, Mr. Listerly?" This was the meek side. The chief inclined his head, and Calverly, after hesitating 64 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM a moment, glancing rather nervously from one to the other, looking as if about to launch forth on a torrent of words, rushed out. Mr. Listerly's only comment was, dryly: "He neglected to explain whether his pay is to go on in his absence." Abel H. Timothy was in the elevator when they went down, the usual unlighted cigar projecting from a corner of his wide mouth, his wide-brimmed felt hat tipped back on his large head. Abel grinned genially at the librarian, and winked. As they passed out, he said : "You missed it. Fine little row on the eighth. Archie called this fellow Stanford, down hard. The fellow that is in Miss Daw's room. He's a nut. Archie was wild. Tore his hair." Calverly went on down to the Union Station and sat in a corner of the men's waiting-room. He had spent the even- ing with Mary Maloney, down by the river. She had seemed, after the disheartening experience of the day, the only bit of reality left in life. In the shadows of the front porch he had kissed her. They thought it best after that not to risk being seen going up-stairs together. He found the telegram under his door. He read it again now. "Find urgent letter here you better go to Chicago only way avoid unpleasant publicity telegraph H. C. Parker six hun- dred two Sangamon Building good luck. "H. W." He sat limply trying, trying to think. First the trouble at the office, then the kiss, then this message, each was a blow. "I'm a shuttle-cock," he thought. "There's just sim- ply no use trying. What can I do? Nobody cares what becomes of me. Except a crazy old woman in Illinois. And oh, Hump, of course." There was some one else; a girl in a dingy boarding- house, out Peck Avenue way. But he couldn't formulate THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 65 any thoughts of her. He was confused about her. It seemed almost as if she were still with him, close by his side. Perhaps she was lying awake, now, wondering why he had rushed out so abruptly (she must have heard him go; he knew that she hadn't even shut her door tight) listening for the sound of his returning step on the stairs. His im- agination took hold of that thought. But in a queerly detached corner of his mind he was coldly honest. He had felt, while sitting alone on the steps, that he ought to walk the streets all night rather than fol- low her up those stairs. There had been a momentary touch of the old bitter exaltation in this thought. He couldn't hold it; he had gone up. The telegram was, in a savage way, pure luck. It had struck him like cold water in the face. And now that he had somehow actually got himself down here to the station, he wouldn't go back. Not now. So he slept there, on the bench ; fitfully, with a rush of dreams. Among these were the nightmares that had dwelt with him for a year and more after his release from prison. They hadn't come so often of late years. In all of them Madame Watt figured, a big imposing woman with beetling black eyes and a hawk-like nose. CHAPTER NINE An Interlude in Bedlam THE Chicago lawyer was thin, dark, quick, over-eager in his questions. They took a mid-morning train out of the old red-brick Chicago station. The suburban countryside, like the smoky city, was a haunt to Henry. Scenes from his boyhood and young manhood raced across the screen of his inner vision. He saw, as the train slowed for the stop at Sunbury station, the spire of the old First Presbyterian church, where he and Cicely were married. In the space of a few vividly painful moments he lived again through the ceremony, as he had, earlier, break fasting forlornly in a railway restaurant in the city, lived again through the trial and his imprisonment and the day of his release. How the reporters had trailed him that day eager to heap again on him the notoriety of six months earlier! ... It was a nightmare. He was being dragged through it. He brushed a limp hand across his eyes. As they drew near their destination Parker grew nervous. He whistled the refrain of a music-hall song, and tapped out the rhythm on the handle of the seat. Henry dug his knuckles into his cheek, leaned on the window-sill, and stared at the fresh green foliage and the clusters of houses that at short intervals came together in villages. He thought the buildings smaller than in the old days. And it was a long time since he had seen so much white Milwaukee brick He wished the lawyer would keep still. Parker said: "Madame may or may not be up and around. You never can tell how you'll find her. She's had a sort of stroke, you know. Don't excite her if you can help it, and don't 66 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 67 get excited yourself. I'll admit it's a relief to have you here. My position as her attorney isn't altogether enviable." The train stopped. The station was a mere three-sided shelter. They walked around it, and came upon a costly limousine, upholstered in plum color. They stepped in. The car rolled away eastward over a rough country road. Henry considered suddenly opening the door and leaping from the car. He could do it. Parker couldn't stop him. He had come voluntarily. Though if she was scouring the country for him with de- tectives. . . . He shivered. Why couldn't she leave him alone! Snatches of Humphrey's earnest talk rose in his mind. One bit in particular : ". . . It's a tangle for all of us. But we're all in it, keeping our heads up the best we can." That was it! Somehow you went on keeping your head up. It was strange the way old Hump had suddenly struck his gait. Everything was rolling his way now. He had suffered, too. Yes, Hump had been through it. A success- ful inventor ! Success ! It came that way, apparently like a stroke of happy lightning. In the old country newspaper days he had always had his "shop" ; all sorts of interesting machines, and gas engines, and belts overhead run from a water motor. And Hump had done all the electric wiring with his own hands, and had installed the plumbing. They were riding through one of the oak groves that are found along the clay bluffs on the western shore of Lake Michigan. Henry looked down at the beach, fifty to eighty feet below, and gazed moodily out over the lake that was ruffling and roaring under the lash of a fresh breeze. They passed through a gateway with stone posts and wound in among the trees. At intervals Henry caught glimpses of a strange appearing structure ; apparently a castle, or like a castle. A moment more and it stood re- 68 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM vealed ; a huge pile of rough gray stone, with round towers at the corners and on either side the center doorway that were crowned with battlements and machicolations. Ex- cepting in the corner tower nearer the lake, the windows were mere slits in the stone ; those at the corner were rectan- gular with small glass panes. Evidently a great deal of time and labor had been spent in grading and planting the two or three acres of cleared land about the building, but it had been allowed to run to weeds. A shallow moat, perhaps twenty feet in width, had been dug close to the castle and, apparently, sodded and planted with shrubbery; but it was not adequately drained, or the outlet was choked, for considerable pools of water stood in it. From the front entrance a drawbridge lay across the moat, partly supported by great rusty chains that sagged down from the twin central towers. Parker was making talk now. Henry barely heard him. They stepped down at the bridge and walked across. A sullen maid led them along a corridor and into a drawing- room. It was the corner room, with the rectangular win- dows. Henry suppressed a shiver, wondering what the other rooms might supply in the way of cheer with their slits of windows. They sat very still, hats on knees, looking at the furniture and the pictures. An odd faint sound came to Henry's ears ; a sound as of many shuffling feet. Parker got up and moved to a window, saying : "See here!" Henry sprang with nervous alertness to his side. Swinging around the rear corner of the building came a queer company men, women, boys and girls in their teens in columns of fours, marching raggedly, each with a stick at the right shoulder, each with eyes fixed on the remark- able figure at their head. This was Madame Watt, tall, nearly erect, limping a THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 69 little, wearing a French officer's chapeau of some earlier period, and carrying a sword, stiffly, at the shoulder. It was his first sight of her since they led him, the last time, from the court room. The sullen maid appeared out there, spoke to her. Madame turned, raised her sword, shouted an order. The ragtag company came to a halt and broke ranks. Another moment and Madame came into the room, still wearing the chapeau, carrying the sword lightly in her left hand, limp- ing, very thin, the hooked nose more prominent than ever and the black eyes burning out of an emaciated gray face. Henry turned white, stiffened, stood motionless, then heard himself mumbling, "Oh, how do you do!" Madame extended her left hand. He took it ; then, with a slight effort, withdrew his. "I knew you'd come," she was saying. "They lie to me. Everybody lies to me. But I knew you'd come. The num- bers told me that. You see it was just a matter of concen- trating. I knew that all along. Then, with the numbers right, you would come. It's an orderly world, after all." Henry felt that he was staring at the grotesque creature, and averted his eyes. Within, he was quivering with un- controllable emotion. He thought "I must keep steady steady." The attorney wandered unnoticed from the room. Henry felt those burning black eyes upon him. She moved toward him, and he shrank back. "She mustn't touch me again," ran his thoughts. "She mustn't! I can't bear it!" But then, in sheer fear of being a coward he stood still. She came very close, lifted a gaunt hand, took a lapel of his coat between thumb and forefinger and slowly rubbed the cloth. "Henry," she said, "you oughtn't to wear these ready- made things." He was silent. "It isn't right, you know. It isn't fair to me. Henry, 70 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM sit down here !" She drew him to a sofa. "I couldn't tell you this with that man in the room. But there was a con- spiracy to rob me. The lawyers. You can't trust lawyers. They worm their way into your confidence. I had to get rid of the lot. I employed this man because he doesn't know too much about me. Oh, he knows a little, of course about my trouble he'd know that but he doesn't know how much money I've got. Nobody on earth knows that but myself. And you I'm going to tell you." Henry sprang up. She caught his sleeve. "Sit down," she cried eagerly. "Sit down, Henry! I'm a poor old woman. I must talk to somebody, or I'll go mad. It's frightful, Henry this solitude of mind this being alone against the world. Of course, I have no right to com- plain, after the after the mistake I made. It's undoubt- edly part of my punishment. . . . Now, Henry, listen to me ! I'm an old woman. I'm not strong. There's only one thing they haven't robbed me of, and that's money. Now, Henry, there's where you must help me. We've got to straighten this thing out, you and I. You're a gifted boy. But life has gone hard with you." She was chattering like a parrot. In the cold corner of his mind Henry knew that she had frequently rehearsed this scene, perhaps for years. And now she was saying it all at once. "You've suffered, Henry. You've suffered terribly. So have I. Well, we must draw together. For one thing it's hardly enough to speak of, between us, it's a trivial point you must have money. It's only fair. It would have been Cicely's." Her voice seemed to Henry to be receding into the dis- tance; small and thin it sounded. He sat motionless, his hands limp across his thighs, eyes downcast, mouth droop- ing. The thought flitted across his nearly stunned brain that this was the sort of incredibly painful experience that one can only sit through, yielding as a tree yields to a tem- pest, and waiting, living somehow through it. He thought, too, wincing, but curiously clearly, that he had actually been THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 71 able to sit here and let this woman speak the name of his dead wife. An hour earlier it would not have seemed within the range of possibility. She got up now, looked out into the corridor, went to the window and leaned out, looking. "Mr. Parker!" she screamed, so suddenly and stridently that Henry sprang up and stood, all aquiver, his hands clenched at his sides. "Just calling that man," she remarked, with self-conscious, rather strained amiability, turning back into the room. "Hell be here in a minute. Sit down, Henry." She pointed to the sofa with her sword. "Everything's all right. Sit down. I've so much to tell you and show you. You saw my refugees out there ? Don't they drill well ? It takes pa- tience, but I've accomplished a lot already. They're an in- teresting lot, left destitute when the religious colony failed, up near the State Line. They're lace makers from Holland and Belgium. Only a few of them speak English." As she talked she drew herself up, sword against shoulder. "I drill them for discipline. That's very important, Henry discipline. For ourselves, and others." . . . She glanced down at the sword, held it out. "But perhaps this thing alarms you, Henry. . . . You might think I'd Oh, you'd have a right to think it! I've been a violent woman. An ungoverned, passionate woman. You have a right to think anything of me. It's nothing but an heirloom, at that. It belonged to my husband's grandfather, the fifth Count de la Plaine. My my first husband, that was. Here, Henry, you take it. That will show" her voice was rising shrilly ; there were hot points of light in her eyes. She broke off with : "Here's that man ! Come in, Mr. Parker! Did you bring the will?" The lawyer bowed. "Then read it. Read it to my son-in-law." Parker drew an envelope from an inner pocket. Henry moved away. "Xo," he said unsteadily "no, no! I don't want I won't hear ii !" 72 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Madame caught his sleeve, first with one hand, then with both. The sword clanged to the ground between them. Henry jerked away. Madame staggered weakly. The lawyer caught her arm and steadied her. "Read it!" she was crying. "Read it to him!" "Really, Countess," murmured the lawyer, "if he " "Read it! He must hear it! It's my life now, that will! Oh, Henry, you won't hold against me the " Now Henry turned on her, a blaze at last in the gray-blue eyes that for the moment rivaled, met, conquered the light in her black ones. "No!" he cried. "I will not hear it. I'm not interested! You've wrecked every life you've touched. You are an evil thing. You killed your husband. And you killed the only woman I have ever loved. You destroyed my life. All I ask of you now is to leave me alone. Understand? I want to be left alone ! You've hounded me with detectives " "Oh, but Henry, that was the only way I could " "There is no way you can see me again. I won't have it ! I won't have you hounding me ! Do you understand that ? It's got to stop! I don't want you, or your filthy money! You dare talk to me of suffering! What do you know of suffering? You killed a man, and went free. But Cicely didn't go free. Even I I didn't go free. They sent me to prison. What do you know about prisons what they do to a man !" His face was hotly red now. He beat a clenched fist against his chest. "You've destroyed my life. There's next to nothing left. The heart is gone. I'm a burnt-out husk. And still you follow me, send dirty detectives after me, try to fasten your ugly life on mine. You won't even let me try to make a poor little beginning in the world. I'm tell- ing you I won't stand it ! I'm warning you I don't know what I might do ! You're to leave me alone !" He rushed out of the room, along the corridor, out over the absurd drawbridge; and took the road along the bluff, walking very rapidly, breathing hard and muttering. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 73 He was half-way to the little flag station when an auto- mobile passed him and stopped just ahead. Parker opened the door. "Better get in," he said. "I fetched your coat and hat." Henry stood off, trying to think. Already his passion was spent. The dull gray of his life was again in view ahead; the sort of thing one went miserably but quietly on with. He would of course go on with it, like all the rest somehow. He was going back to begin life once more So many, many times he had begun it ! this time as a com- mon reporter. He was lucky even to have that chance. . . . . He got into the car, and put on his hat. It was, after all, the sensible thing ; it was what one did. Parker left him alone on the train ; went up to the smok- ing car. And they walked in something near silence across the city. They stood on a busy corner. "I go up here," said the lawyer. "There's just this I've got to ask. Suppose it should be necessary for me to get in touch with you. There's nobody else. What am I to do?" Calverly studied the pavement He was beyond thought now weak, spiritually empty. He had caught a cold, at some stage of his journey, and now couldn't muster up a desire to fight it. He had touched bottom. So, not caring, he gave the man his false name and the boarding-house address. It seemed hardly to matter. At the moment he wasn't even sure he would go back. This notion grew as he walked the streets or sat in cheap little motion-picture houses. He couldn't feel that he had any roots at all. He considered starting farther west, traveling as far as his money would take him, then working his way. He thought of California, Honolulu, Australia or Japan. Why not? It has been done often enough, and by all sorts of penniless men. He slept in a cheap hotel. Overnight the personal sense of direction that had lately been growing in him returned. He had started a fight with life. He didn't want to quit. It appeared to him now as unreal the city he had chosen, his 74 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM work that had begun so badly, his life, the people he had met. The people, in particular. . . . The one called Margie Daw, now ; an unusual, distinctly interesting per- sonality. Out here in Chicago it was difficult to believe that he had been afraid of her. For he had been. And Mary Maloney she was now the most unreal of all. He tried to visualize her, and failed. He remembered that she was small, with unusual eyes that were shaded by long lashes. . . . And Trent, Mr. Listerly, and the quiet old librarian up under the roof ; they were like creatures out of a dim past, faint, half-forgotten. It was after six the next evening when he dropped off a street-car and entered the dingy, strange little street that he unquestionably lived in now. The boarding-house, with its scaling paint outside and its worn stair carpet and smell of onions inside, he knew for his. Some girls descending from the third floor to the second, called him "Mr. Stafford." Yes, surely he knew them. He had sung with them. And the name seemed to belong to him. The second door beyond his stood ajar. His pulse quick- ened. He entered the plain little room that was his and dropped his bag on a chair. An envelope lay on the bureau. It was addressed to "Mr. Hugh Stafford." The return card bore the name, "Ackers, Hutt and Parker, Attorneys at Law, Sangamon Building, Chicago." It was that fellow Parker. What could he be writing for! So soon, too; must have posted it that same day. He heard a light step in the hall, and looked up, his nerves tightening. His door swung slowly open. Mary Maloney appeared, blushing, smiling a little ; slipped in, moved the door nearly to behind her; then, evidently confused, closed it. "Perhaps it's better to shut it," he heard her saying. CHAPTER TEN Of a Woman's Heart and the Web of Life THEY stood in a silence which she finally broke with a nervous little laugh. "Where on earth have you been?" she asked. "I had to go to Chicago. Unexpectedly." "Oh! . . . Well, I just wondered, I I suppose it's time to go down to supper. I just thought I'd " He was gazing at her, his brows knit, trying to recall just what had passed between them, trying to make it come real. It seemed as if he ought to be making it easy for her. He was sorry for her. She looked very pretty, her color up that way, her eyes downcast, showing the long lashes. She was moving back toward the door. With a confused idea of gaining time until he could get his mind clear, think up some way to be nice to her cer- tainly he couldn't let her go like this he said : "Do you mind if I open this? Just a moment! I've been through a painful experience." He tore off the end of the envelope and drew out a letter. He could only half read it. There were enclosures. A receipt for him to sign. And something about oh, yes! "Madame is prostrated ; but she got to the telephone in per- son just now and instructed me to send it to you. I am therefore merely carrying out her expressed wish. If you will permit me to advise you, I think you had better not send it back. The effect on Madame might be most unfor- tunate. It would even be better, if you feel, on reflection, that you can not accept it for yourself, to give it to some deserving charity. You will see that the check is made out in the name you gave me. If you can get some one who knows you there to identify you, no questions are likely to . . ." 75 76 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM He tore up the letter. He drew out the receipt and tore that up, dropping the bits of paper on the floor. "Oh," cried Mary softly, "you shouldn't do that!" She dropped on her knees and picked them up. He found the other enclosure now. It was a cashier's check, from the biggest national bank in Chicago. It brought up a picture of huge, shiny marble columns, long glass and mahogany partitions, prosperous-looking men with keen eyes and close mouths sitting at mahogany desks, wide areas of mosaic flooring. Mary was standing close to him now. She shouldn't have come in like that. But here she was; and standing there, still, all feeling, she was setting up a warm counter-current to the black mood that had been on him. He wished weakly that she would go. Then, flushing, weak at heart, his mouth set as with pain, he took her in his arms. And thus they stood for a little time, without a sound. The thought filled his mind that this girl really, person- ally, so little in his life was but a revivified memory of Cicely. For the moment he could almost tell himself that it was Cicely. Then his mind cleared. He realized that he was holding her tightly, and that she had let her face droop against his coat. She seemed to be whispering something, over and over. He bent his head to hear. It was : "Don't kiss me !" He went cold. The picture suddenly came clear the bare room, this little girl so full of pent-up emotion that must not be squandered on the wrong man ; himself, beaten down by the pitiless bludgeonings of chance to the point of accepting, out of his sheer bitter need, what he couldn't hope to return. His arms relaxed a little ; but he stopped that. It would hurt her. He mustn't hurt her. Not while she was giving him her trust. Another thought came ; the sort of worldly thought that had not been in his mind for years that he was freely of- fered, if not happiness, at least its nearest earthly substi- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 77 tute. As her life stood, she herself had small chance of any higher happiness. Even marriage, the sort she could get, offered her little more than a form of slavery. He knew that what she was tacitly, almost innocently, offering him could never, precisely, be given to another. The moralistic view, he reflected, was not necessarily sound. It was within the range of possibility, admitting all the risk, that she might be little the worse for him or he for her. Such affairs hap- pened everywhere, all the time, and only came to light when they went in some way wrong. Celibacy was by no means, despite a wide racial pretension, the invariable custom among lonely people in cities. Or elsewhere, for that matter. His arms tightened again. For a moment the hunger of the years overpowered him. He kissed her. Then, as abruptly, he pushed her away. "You mustn't stay," he said roughly. "Please go !" "I know," she murmured, and lingered. He drew her toward the door. "You dropped this," she said, and picked up the check. "You mustn't be careless about things like that, Hugh." "Wait," he whispered, "I'll see if any one's in the hall." Their eyes met. And now he had her again in his arms. "Quick go !" he muttered. "This won't do. It won't do, Mary! I can't stay here. I'll pack up now and go." He gave a bitter little laugh. "Precious little to pack up! But we can't go on living here like this." "I've been thinking, too, Hugh." He winced at the false name. It was on his tongue to tell her that it was a lie, that he himself was a lie. She went on, "I've thought maybe I'd go." "No," said he, "I will. And you mustn't stay here now." They were silent again. "My friend wants me to get married," she said, very softly. "Do it, Mary! That's honest. Make a job of it. You'll be happier." 78 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM She didn't answer this. He carefully opened the door and peeped into the haJl; then moved her part way out. But she slipped back. "We're forgetting this," she said, handing him the check. "I don't want it. Keep it, Mary. Use it to start on. Things for your home. Wait, I'll endorse it !" "Hugh No, of course I couldn't Why Hugh ! Look !" She was staring at the paper. He glanced at it, hardly saw it. "Twenty thousand dollars!" she breathed. "Careful they'll hear!" "But, Hugh!" "Wait, Mary! Shut the door. I'll endorse it. I'm so glad ! Money does help. It's one thing I can give you." She closed the door, came to him, deliberately slipped her arms about his neck, looked full into his eyes, said "It's im- possible, Hugh. You know it is." "No, really" "It's impossible. I'm going down-stairs now. I'm going I think yes, I'm going to tell my friend that I'll marry him. You can't give me any money. But you're the most won- derful man in the world." The tears were running unheeded down her face. She drew herself up and kissed him, frankly, sweetly. And he knew that he was being permitted to look straight into a woman's heart. "Please," he muttered weakly. "I don't want you to catch this cold." "I don't care about a cold, Hugh. I was thinking, per- haps you'd better be the one to go. It won't make the talk it would if I went." For a moment more she clung to him. Then she left the room, closed the door behind her, and ran lightly down the stairs. He crumpled the check into a ball, thrust it into a pocket, and forgot it. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 79 All his few effects went into two bags. He hurried out with them, caught a car and rode down-town. He was profoundly depressed. He had won this particu- lar battle, yet had lost ground. Because of it life had a stronger hold on him. He told himself that he would hunt up a room where he could resume the old solitude. Board- ing houses clearly weren't the thing. But what he did was to go to the building Margie Daw lived in and take a tiny apartment. He wondered, all sensi- tive nerves, what he could do about references. But it came out in his brief talk with the officiating janitor that they weren't much interested in references. What they wanted was the money, a month's rent down. He paid it, deeply relieved. But this, following the trip to Chicago, took nearly all of his small fund of reserve cash. The fact brought up the idea of work. That was the thing, work ! He went over to the News office and sat at one of the long reporter's desks, where Mr. Winterbeck could easily enough see him if he chose. On the way out of his new residence he had found him- self a little stirred in passing Miss Daw's door. He even paused and read her name there. He felt that he didn't particularly want to see her he would hardly be looking her up but it was a help to know that some degree of friendly companionship was within reach. He knew now that he would need it. Even at some cost. What this might come to he couldn't face. Life, it seemed, came down at times, at critical times, to what you had to have if you weren't to quit utterly. Miss Daw left her office very trim and pretty and went out to the elevator. She didn't see him. He was rather glad she didn't. For an hour and a half he sat there. Men were called, one by one, to the city editor's horseshoe desk and given their orders. Snappy orders, for Mr. Winterbeck was a snappy man. The thought came to Henry that he must be sure to listen 80 when his turn came, if it should come. Mr. Winterbeck clearly wasn't the sort to be patient with wandering minds. What a grind it was ! What a drive ! He wished he could shake off his cold. It seemed to be working into every part of his body. The reporters were nearly all gone now. Mr. Winterbeck, speaking first into this telephone and then into that quick, low, positive jotting down lightning notes, apparently in shorthand, running his fingers down lists, suddenly called: "Stafford!" Henry sat and looked at him. "Stafford!" Henry found himself moving over to the horseshoe desk. "Go to the mayor's house and interview him about the arrangements for the unveiling of the Cantey Memorial." And Henry, with hardly a notion of how to go about it but aware that he mustn't ask questions here, set forth on his first task as a reporter. CHAPTER ELEVEN Of Mayors and Men from Mars MR. HITT stood before the drug store, looking now out at the street traffic, now at the man called Stafford. They had just come down in the elevator. He had spoken. He was speaking now ; suggesting a bite of supper. And Stafford his secret knowledge that the man was in reality Henry Calverly burned within his breast ; he could hardly trust his tongue; out of the instinct of a born writing and printing man he could see now before his inner eye the title page of Calverly's great book, and other pages, pre- cisely the type, spacing, margins, and Calverly's odd, indi- vidual way with words Stafford (he must think "Stafford" hard, or he'd surely say the other) was remarking some- thing about interviewing the mayor. Mr. Hitt couldn't leave him alone. He made talk. "You were saying oh, yes, the mayor. There's a char- acter! Probably as typical as any in America. He will interest you. If you've a few moments, I'd like to show you. . . . Only four or five blocks. You can transfer from there to the Hill cars." The man Stafford seemed hardly to care where he went. He had a cold, he said. And pains in his back. Mr. Hitt suggested aspirin. They walked across town, out of the business sections, past a block or two of grimy whole- sale houses, into a region of tenements, small shops, unkempt children playing on sidewalks and pavement and innumer- able saloons. They stood on a corner. Mr. Hitt pointed up at a clut- tered fire-escape, two floors above one of the saloons. "Tim Maclntyre the mayor, you know lived up there. He played in the street, like these youngsters, he and his sister. The father was a truckman; drank himself to death. 81 82 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM The mother died a little after him. Tim was ambitious. As was his sister. They were a bright pair. Tim got himself through high school somehow, and put his sister through a business college. She became a stenographer in the County Railways office. Later she worked for James H. Cantey himself. Then she married; a young clerk who has done very well, I understand. She lives on the Hill now. And Tim is mayor. He hasn't kept up. Something of a drunk- ard. Yet he is bright. He'll interest you. The machine he has built utterly controls the city. ... I think it will interest you, going directly from his old home here to the new one. He lives on the Hill, too, now, you know. And he's never done anything but politics. Oh, he had a little law business ambulance chasing but he was poor as a crow at the time he was made city attorney. And even when he first ran for mayor, he made a campaign issue of his poverty. He was talking reform then. A gifted dema- gogue. . . . You will see how he lives now." Mr. Hitt hailed a street-car. Just before his new ac- quaintance swung aboard he added: "We are a naive people, we Americans." The young man seemed hardly to have heard. He was preoccupied; gloomily wrapped in self. Mr. Hitt, despite his old journalist's eye, couldn't know that he had snapped an extraordinarily vivid picture on a highly sensitized mind. Twenty minutes later Calverly stood before the mansion of the Honorable Timothy J. Maclntyre, on the Hill. There must have been an acre of sloping lawn; and ground up here, as in the business district, sold by the square and not the running foot. There were groups of rare shrubs, some in their spring blossoming; and a hedge of close-clipped privet. The house was big, of pressed brick, with carved mahogany about the windows and about the front door. There was a mahogany bay on either side of the door. Something not unlike a rose window, of stained glass and steel, set off the second story. The roof was covered red tiles. It was a house meant to be impressive, to domi- nate; about it, up and down and across the shaded street, THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 83 the houses of mere merchants and manufacturers and bank- ers shrank modestly back among the trees and shrubbery, yielding the street to the Honorable Tim. Calverly found himself waiting in a huge high drawing- room. Everything movable in the room was marble or ma- hogany or gilt. The walls were paneled in mahogany ; the ceiling was supported by thirty-foot beams of it. The room to the rear, beyond the red-and-gold portieres, was paneled in a gray satiny wood, like that used in the show windows at Rumpelheim's, probably Circassian walnut. The other great room across the hall suggested the pictures one saw of the Palace at Versailles ; a "period" room, all gilt and brocades and imitation tapestries. The door man reappeared he wore a blue uniform, with a striped yellow vest and led the caller up-stairs. In a rear "study" behind an enormous flat mahogany desk, nerv- ous eyes shifting brightly about the room, sat the mayor himself. The wavy hair, worn rather long, was almost jet black ; a thick lock of it had slipped down over the high white fore- head, suggesting familiar pictures of Napoleon. Indeed the man looked a little like the great adventurer-emperor. His chin was drawn in, his brows knit, as if to complete the picture. And when he rose and with what was perhaps intended for courtly gravity motioned Calverly to the arm- chair by the desk, despite the wrinkled gray suit he wore he managed to convey an impression that he was trying to stand like Napoleon. Calverly declined a cigar, and sinking back into the leather chair gave rein to a suddenly quickened curiosity. Directly back of the mayor's chair, shelf on shelf of them, were rows of volumes in rich red and gilt bindings, the titles all bearing on Napoleon, his early life, his rise, his campaigns, his em- pire, the Hundred Days and Waterloo, St. Helena. There was a set of commentaries on the Code Napoleon. Another set of five or six volumes dealt with his amours. Above the book-shelves about the room, were engravings, all of the .n, his battles, his e.\ 84 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Calverly's brightening eyes returned from the surround- ings to the man. There was a tray on the table, with glasses, a bottle of whisky and a soda siphon. The mayor's cheeks were flushed. His skin was oddly delicate. He was an alert nervous man, despite his pose. He pushed the tray toward his caller; then poured out a big drink for himself. "I'm killing a cold," he announced, in something the man- ner of one who addresses a public meeting. "See here, my friend, you're coughing yoursef. Have a bit. It's the real stuff, from the old country. I import it in the wood." Calverly, in declining, studied the man with quickening interest. "You're from the News," pursued the mayor. Calverly bowed. "You'll be a new man here. I know all the newspaper boys, you see; and they know me. I was a reporter once myself. We get on. We see things alike. There's no such help in developing a city and making it known as clever newspaper men. And you'll find you can do well here. There's odd jobs to be picked up for your spare time, of course. You'll find you'll draw close to big men in this city. We've got 'em. And they'll treat you right. They'll help you. They'll tip you off. If they don't, you come straight to me. I've got my hand on the pulse of the town. For that matter, of the state, too. They daren't ignore me." He poured out another drink ; tossed it down. "There's a big man coming up here this evening. Harvey O'Rell. Met him yet? No? You will, then. Shortly. You must know O'Rell. He's general manager of County Rail- ways. And he comes to me as mayor and as man. Under- stand? Very able. Great executive. A power here. But he comes to me. They all come to me. A word from me and he'll give you anything you ask for. And remember this, Tim Maclntyre takes care of his friends. Tim never forgets." He paused ; mopped his moist forehead ; drank. Calverly, speaking abruptly, with a touch of eagerness, said: THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 85 "The Cantey Memorial is to be unveiled " "Oh, now, there was a great man ! James H. Cantey. He was my friend and my benefactor. He owned this city. And ruled it wisely, kindly. A great-hearted gentleman. And he made the ideal ruler, a benevolent despot. You can't govern a city with a town meeting. There must be author- ity, power to act. So-called democracy has broken down. It is the big men who rule us, the men of vision and power, the builders of our railways, our factories, our banks. How could it be otherwise? Nature is an unending struggle. Power gravitates to the strongest and best. These are at- tacked, yes ; but by whom ? Why, by the rabble, the out-at- elbows, the agitator who seeks personal advancement in ar- raying poverty against wealth, class against class!" Calverly was fascinated now. He had read, or glanced through only one of Maclntyre's speeches ; but that had been the speech of a cheap demagogue, a man who bragged of his simplicity, his old clothes, his friendship for the common man. T-he Honorable Tim drank again. "You'll be making a speech at the unveiling," suggested Calverly. "Yes, I'm coming to that." Calverly noted now that the desk was littered with type- written sheets. "I was going to say, my boy about that speech my sec- retary will send it to the papers. But I'm going to do more than that for you. Now listen to me. I propose to put power into your hands. Power. That's what I think of you. I see friendship in your face. When I see friendship, I give it back in kind. Now listen ! This is a tip from the inner- most councils. From what they call the Big Cinch." He fell into a defensive whine. "Well, suppose it is the Big Cinch ! There has to be one, doesn't there ? All the serious vested interests of a great city can't be left at the mercy of any stray agitator, can they? No. Well, listen to this! Buy County Railways. Buy now ; put in every cent you can scrape up. But buy this week. Do just that, and next week 86 THE PASSK XATE PILGRIM you'll be a rich man. Got any money? No? Well, then, to show that friendship is no idle word with me, I'll carry you for ten thousand. Why, certainly! Do it as easy as not. You get me, don't you ? County Railways is cutting a melon next week. And we've got the stock down. New York is in on it. I'm in heavy. Within a week from to-night within five 'days this is confidential, mind : in friendship I'll be tucking away something between fifty and eighty thousand. Not a bad little turnover. You see they have to come to me. O'Rell has to tell me. He can't hide a thing from me. Do you see why ? Because, if he tried it, I'd go over his head. The Cantey Estate can't hide it from me. My boy" he pushed back his chair, got unsteadily up, clutched at the desk, and stood swaying there "My boy, I've been suc- cessful. They call me a rich man now. It's right. I'm a rich man. I'll tell you how I've done it. I've been smart. I've had power. I've used power. To-day I'm the biggest man in this end of the state. And they all know. Let 'em try to fool me, let 'em break faith just once O'Rell, or these bankers here, or the contractors and I'll get 'em in a day. I'd go over their heads, over all their heads. I'd turn the Cantey Estate loose on 'em. I could do it. Even the Cantey Estate has to come to me. That's where I was smart, right at the beginning. I've got a toe in the crick of the Cantey door! Get that? That's where I was smart, twelve years ago ! I tell you, I've got a toe in the crack of the Cantey door. They're afraid of me, the whole bunch! Understand? They're afraid of me ! Of me! . . . "There was something else something I wanted to say oh, yes ! Now about this speech." He fumbled about the desk ; gathered up the sheets ; turned ; stumbled ; dropped them. They scattered all about the floor. Calverly sprang to pick them up. The Honorable Tim flopped down on his hands and knees and started about the room, picking up a sheet at a time. Calverly heard a sound and glanced up. In the door stood a large man, frowning down at them. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 87 Maclntyre was saying, as he crawled about: "Buy County Railways. You see I'm trusting you with a sacred confidence. That shows the kind of friend I am. Understand? I'm trusting you!" Calverly stepped aside ; embarrassed ; looking from one to the other. Maclntyre caught sight of the newcomer ; sat back on the floor ; said with dignity : "Dropped my speech, Max. That's all." He suddenly chuckled. "I call him Max. Max O'Rell. Little joke. Name's Harvey. But I call him Max." Mr. O'Rell proved himself a man of decision. He said to Calverly : "Come out here !" Then, in the hall, added : "Who are you ?" "I'm from the News." "You have no business here now." "I was shown up." "You'd better go. And see that you keep your head shut." Mr. O'Rell returned to the study, closed the door, and, leaving the Honorable Tim chuckling on the floor, called up the News office. Mr. Listerly had gone to New York, it seemed ; would be back to-morrow evening. He spoke then to Mr. Winterbeck. Said : "Harvey O'Rell speaking. Who is this man you sent up to Mayor Maclntyre?" "A new man, name of Stafford." "What do you know about his discretion?" "Very little. But I think he's all right." "An awkward situation has arisen here. It would be much the best thing not to let that fellow write his impres- sions. I'll get hold of Tutterville and have him do a story for you at once. What is it you wanted? General com- ments from the mayor apropos of the Cantey Memorial celebration? I'll have that for you by ten o'clock." Sam Tutterville was press agent for County Railways. 88 Winterbeck gave a very brief moment to thought. O'Rell was not a man you spoke carelessly to. Then he said, in his quick decisive way: "Thank you. Don't trouble. We shall have the monu- ment story well enough covered. Good-by." When the new reporter came into the city room, half an hour later, and dropped down at one of the long desks, the city editor looked intently at him, considered calling him over, but finally let him alone. The man had a far-away look. He began writing at once, writing hard. He seemed hardly to know where he was; he just wrote with all his being, when he wasn't coughing, bent over the paper, his face working now and then, as if his emotions were deeply involved in his task. It would do no harm to wait and look over what he had to say. Though it would be easier if he would only use a typewriter. Mr. Listerly, however, seemed bent on giving the fellow every kind of chance. . . . He was clever. His review of the girl show at the Cantey Square had been an extraordinary bit of writing, however impossible for a time-serving newspaper. . . . What on earth could have brought O'Rell to the point of calling up direct ! Had the man Stafford done some outrageous thing? His review had shown he hadn't a glimmer of the worldly wisdom a man must have to get on. Or had the Honorable Tim gone on the warpath? Either was possible. But in either event, direct dictation from the mighty O'Rell stirred the blood. It was the first time. Perhaps Mr. Listerly had to take it, from County Railways as from the Cantey Na- tional Bank crowd. Winterbeck himself didn't like the feeling of it. At this time the News had no managing editor. Mr. Lis- terly, as publisher, kept close enough to his desk to cover a part of the job; and Winterbeck, through sheer ability, did the rest of it. It was perhaps not the best sort of organiza- tion, arising as it did from the personalities of 'the two men ; but they had drifted into it. Winterbeck was a quick hard thinker, blunt and driving. He always told Mr. Listerly what was what. And the publisher liked him for his rugged THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 89 outlines and for the way his quality turned up all through the paper as dignity and vigor. A newspaper had to have character. It had to have other qualities, as well, in Mr. Lis- terly's judgment restraint, a subtle skill in threading its way among the claims of local interests, a measure of sub- servience but these he could supply himself. He was older, more adroit, mellower in expression. And through the sim- ple expedient of keeping Winterbeck off the editorial page which was, after all, merely proper organization he could and did give him just about all the rope he could use. It was after eleven when the man Stafford came over to Winterbeck's horseshoe desk. He looked wan, indifferent, coughed a good deal. "I've written some stuff about the mayor/' he began. Winterbeck clapped a hand over, a telephone transmitter, and listened. "Just what came to me. I don't know if it's what you want." The editor finished telephoning; snapped the receiver on the hook. "What happened up there ?" he asked sharply. "Why well, the man was drunk." "He often is. What else?" "Oh well, I got sort of interested. Just watching him, and thinking of him as the mayor of the city." That was all he had to say, apparently. He looked almost ill, but in a wandering way seemed pleased with himself. Winterbeck said: "Leave it here. That'll be all for to-night." He began skimming the interview, but was drawn quickly into a close reading. Telephones rang ; reporters came in ; brass-and-rubber carriers popped out of the pneumatic tubes. He met the interruptions with a practised brain. After two pages he went back and edited the copy himself, in pencil. Here and there he cut a phrase or a sentence; but most of it stood intact. After he had turned the last page, he looked up at the ceiling, intently, and drummed with nervous fingers on the 90 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM desk. It was the most difficult moment so far in the life of Frank Winterbeck ; a moment of high decision. Stafford, whoever, whatever he might be, wrote like a man from Mars. His detachment from the familiar web of life seemed positively inhuman. He had written what one never writes, the truth ; beginning with a perfect word picture of the mayor's early home in the corner tenement over a saloon, passing lightly thence to the amazing mansion on the Hill, presenting the Honorable Tim at his desk backed and sur- rounded by evidences of his Napoleonic megalomania, quot- ing what he had said in language that bore in its utter rhe- torical verisimilitude every internal evidence of being Tim Maclntyre's own, reaching a climax in the scene of the mayor sprawling on the floor and the entrance of O'Rell, and concluding with that gentleman's final rough orders in the hall. "So County Railways are cutting a melon next week, are they!" mused Winterbeck. "That's why they've been run- ning the stock down. And Tim's in on it. In so deep he can afford to throw away ten thousand or so on a reporter !" It wasn't criminal evidence, exactly. But it was unques- tionably accurate. Tim and O'Rell appeared each perfectly in character. And they couldn't very well deny it. The public would see in it that explanation of the Maclntyre mansion they had for several years been groping rather helplessly for. It was the perfect answer to the stinging question : "Where did he get it ?" And it was, Winterbeck knew, the finest picture of a dishonest political charlatan that had ever been drawn. It would be copied everywhere. Other time-serving papers would reprint it out of a sheer joy in the thing as literature. In its detachment, in its calm unconscious honesty, it was irresistible. It had the simple finality of the Judgment Seat. "It will kill Tim," Winterbeck reflected. "But that's a good act." He scrawled his initials on the first page, thrust the manu- script into a carrier, and shot it down the tube. CHAPTER TWELVE Indicating That a Man from Mars Would Fare Rather Better in Confining His Activities to that Planet THE Honorable Tim Maclntyre, on the following morn- ing, looked over the News in bed. Nearly four columns of page three he found devoted to himself. The headings disturbed him. What he read beneath disturbed him more. At first he wasn't sure what it all meant ; his head was none too clear. He was accustomed to columns upon columns about himself in the local papers, most of it praise. Not a week passed but he saw himself, in two- or three-column half-tone cut laying a cornerstone or addressing a visiting convention. Certain opposition papers attacked his work, of course ; but never his personal life. The present long article didn't read like an attack. It was simply, pleasantly written. References to his rise from a tenement corner al- ways pleased him; they were indeed a part of his own politi- cal rhetoric. And at first he liked the picture of himself as a modern Napoleon with his books and engravings about him. But he couldn't understand the restrained but never- theless vivid word picture of himself crawling about the floor. And all that about cutting in on the County Rail- ways melon; that dazed him a bit. It shouldn't have been said. It wasn't until he got into his slippers and went into the bathroom to shave that the force of the picture began to strike him. That quiet green young fellow was making him ridiculous. He didn't like it. He'd see about it. He'd set- tle that young fellow. He'd show him who was running this town. Still the significance of the printed picture was trickling slowly into his consciousness. It was very quietly handled, all that about County Railways, but he couldn't possibly have 91 92 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM said it. Not he. It was the sort of thing people wouldn't understand. Or was it? He went back to the bedroom and read that part again, the lather drying unpleasantly on his face. Then he rushed back into his study and snatched up the telephone. His impulse had been to call up O'Rell. But this job was too big for Harvey. County Railways was Cantey Estate ; the News was Cantey Estate ; in a sense O'Rell and Listerly were rival department heads. O'Rell would never admit that; but Listerly would be inclined to take a position on it. He considered calling Listerly; then reconsidered. He had his dignity to consider, his position. And he mustn't let Listerly draw him. Yet he must act quickly. They'd have the Grand Jury down on him before night, if he didn't look out. They'd be asking him to account for this and that. They'd be dipping into his personal relations with a certain great contracting company. It was odd, but for a time now his thoughts centered on the small business of the grand stand in Cantey Square, erected during the week just gone for the public ceremony about the statue. It was one of his particular little perquisites, this putting up a temporary stand on the smallest public excuse. The city paid the con- tractors twelve thousand dollars for the job; the contrac- tors paid twelve hundred dollars back to the mayor. It was an understood thing. But he had thought several times lately that it was a bit too crude. Indirection was better; for instance, this matter of sharing in the County Railways killing, while it could be criticized, might, indeed, make trouble, still it wasn't bribery. Not technical bribery. Among all the complexities of the law, there were ways out, main-traveled ways. He decided he was back at his shaving mirror now, and was muttering aloud that the thing to do was to put Henry MacKennon, his sister's husband, into the contracting com- pany, and let it come to Henry in the form of extra divi' dends, or as salary. The trouble was, Henry would be shak- ing him down ag^in. Henry was getting greedier and THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 93 greedier, was expanding constantly in his ambitions and his living expenses. And Anna, though she was quieter about it a deep girl, Anna! had hardened up a lot of recent years and wanted always more. The telephone was ringing. It was O'Rell. His tone frightened the mayor. O'Rell was blazing, was for coming down hard on the paper. Maclntyre said, expansively : "You keep quiet, Harvey! Leave it to me. I'll handle the fool." After which he sat shaking. He finally pushed the telephone instrument away ; turned to the works on Napoleon ; rose ; looked up at the engraving of the greatest adventurer standing alone on a hill on St. Helena; unconsciously fell into a similar attitude, even to thrusting his right hand in between the frogs on his pa- jamas. Habit was asserting itself. The old notion was gaining ground among his bewildered thoughts that he, like Napoleon, was a fighter, a leader, a prince of men, rising above all mere petty disaster. Henry MacKennon called up next. Maclntyre told him roughly to sit tight, keep his shirt on. John Milhenning, the mayor's secretary, shortly appeared, and sat by while his honor finished dressing. "Don't you worry," cried his honor, with a petulant jovial- ity, "I see through the whole thing. It's Bob Listerly hitting at O'Rell through me." The secretary shook his head, heavily. "That's what it is, my boy. You watch me for a few hours. I'll show you. It's a flank attack. It calls for a sharp counter-attack, which I shall make before noon. Then we'll see where Bob stands." "Listerly isn't here, though. Won't be until to-night. He's in New York." "But don't you see," cried the mayor eagerly, turning for a moment from the mirror, "that's just what he'd do run off leave a goat in charge." l 'Xo," the secretary insisted. "It's too early in the day to 94 Till-. PASSIONATE PILGRIM get hold of the newspaper boys, of course, but this much I have learned Frank Winterbeck put this through on his own." "Ha!" muttered the mayor. "He did that, did he! Well, that makes it just so much easier. Winterbeck's small fry. We'll soon dispose of him !" Hardly an hour later it was between nine and ten Frank Winterbeck was awakened out of a sound sleep by a messenger boy bearing a note from John Milhenning re- questing the editor to come at once to the city attorney's office. Winterbeck sent a verbal refusal and went promptly back to bed. The mayor kept his house until eleven. Serious men came and went, a number of them. The city attorney called up at short intervals. Listerly, it appeared, was on the train ; couldn't be reached. Harvey O'Rell sat in the mayor's study from nine o'clock until his honor left, hovering over the telephone. By half past ten County Railways had jumped from one hundred twenty-two and three-quarters to one hundred and thirty- seven, and was still rising. Every small gambler in town who so much as knew the way to a broker's office was buy- ing. Over the wires came the word that New York, Phila- delphia and Boston were buying. The melon was already assured of a wide, almost democratic distribution. "There's this to consider," said O'Rell. "They're running wild. They won't know when to stop. It won't stand more than one hundred and forty to one hundred and forty-three. If they put it to one hundred and forty-five we can start selling; sell 'em all they can carry away. Bound to be a reaction then." He said this as much as anything to cheer up the mayor. It had already been necessary to take his liquor away. The man, now, was frightened almost to death. Winterbeck had been reached now the city attorney had gone straight to his apartment when the messenger came back without him, and routed him out. The story came in over the telephone, THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 95 toward eleven. Winterbeck had told him to go to hell. At the threat of action, he laughed. To the demand that he print a retraction on the front page of to-morrow's News, he replied that they would have to see Mr. Listerly. Mr. Listerly could have his resignation in one minute. But he wouldn't backwater for anybody else. And he wouldn't print a retraction even for him. "Tim Maclntyre's a con- temptible crook," he said. "Everybody knows it, but be- fore this we've never caught him. We've got him on the run now. This ought to be enough to stir up a little inquiry into paving contracts. For that matter, we might look into this grandstand habit of his." O'Rell repeated all this verbatim to the mayor, thinking it might stir his fighting blood. But the mayor collapsed in his swivel chair. They let him have a drink of whisky then just to keep him going. He revived quickly. At eleven he sent John Milhenning out for the mayor's automobile. And ordering them all to mark time until his return, he disappeared. The nature of his errand has its points of interest. Some fifty-odd miles away lived, on his great country estate, Sena- tor Painter, the richest man in the state, one of the most powerful men in the United States. The Painter money flowed unrecognized into hundreds of solid business enter- prises, into banks, insurance companies, traction interests, railroads and hotels. A corps of skilful and subservient lawyers appeared for it here and there on boards of direc- tors. Senator Painter and James H. Cantey had been friends ; the one shrewd, reflective, born to be a background figure, a manipulator of puppets, the other bold, dynamic. Their interests had interlocked in a hundred ways. Though County Railways was Cantey Estate, there was Painter money in it and a Painter man or two on the board. There was Painter money even in the News, a fact known to few. And Painter influence, always quiet and unseen, reached into the private councils of nearly every bank in the city. William H. Painter, as it happened, had sat for eleven 96 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM years in the Senate of the United States as an old-school Republican, almost a War Republican. Tim Maclntyre and his crowd were Democrats. The city, in fact, had been Democratic for fourteen years. But it is money, after all, that rules ; and money has no party. So it was to Senator Painter, as to a final boss of bosses, that the Honorable Tim rushed in his dire extremity. Mr. Listerly picked up a copy of the News at noon, in the Pittsburgh station, as he came through ; and read that third page matter in the dining-car ; folded it back and propped it against the water bottle. After which, deliberately enough, back in the observation car, he wrote two telegrams and had the porter drop them off for him. The one to his broker read simply "Sell County Railways," the other, to Frank Winterbeck, read "Meet me at the junction four fifteen." "Have a cigar," said the chief to Winterbeck, when they met. "Keep the dust out of your throat. Been a dusty trip. Never saw the country so dry in spring. Who wrote the story?" "Stafford." "Hmm ! Thought so. Brilliant young man." "You told me once not to go after Maclntyre until I got the goods on him. This thing came out of the clear sky. I sent Stafford for the usual palaver, re the Unveiling. He came back and wrote this. It's the goods on Tim, all right. It's unanswerable. Perfectly done. They could answer a lot of formal evidence, or an indictment, or even an arrest. But they'll never be able to answer this. It's the most pow- erful blow Tim's ever had. Makes a monkey of him." "Yes, it does that. So you decided to run it as it stood." "Oh, I cut it a little. Tim's bragging that he had his 'foot in the Cantey door.' A gem! But I cut that. No good involving the Cantey Estate." "No," Mr. Listerly smoked easily, "no good in that." "And now, Mr. Listerly, I want your permission to follow it up. This hooks up with all that old stuff we've had on Tim. I want to go after him; make a job of it. He's a crook." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 97 "Oh, yes, he's that." "We can break him." Mr. Listerly considered this. "Well," he said, at length. "I don't know as there'll be anybody very anxious to defend him, nobody that counts. I don't know but what we can afford it. The advertisers'll hardly dare make an issue of it. The readers'll like it. I should say well yes, go ahead." By eight that evening Winterbeck had his follow-up story planned in detail three of his best men were out on the case when Mr. Listerly strolled out and sat on a corner of the horseshoe desk. "Got a little disappointment for you, Frank," he said. He tossed a typed paragraph on the desk. Winterbeck snatched it up, and read: "The News yesterday, during the absence of the pub- lisher from the city, published a story purporting to be an interview with Mayor T. J. Maclntyre that was, on its face, libelous, scurrilous, utterly false. It was written by a new member of the staff, who, needless to say, has since been discharged. "The publisher of the News deeply regrets that this paper should have been made, for one day, the vehicle for so ma- licious an assault, apparently instigated by interests out- side the city, on the character of our mayor. Personally and in the name of the paper I hereby apologize to Mr. Macln- tyre, and further beg to assure him that the News hereby pledges to him its continued unqualified support. "(Signed) R. B. LISTERLY, Publisher." Winterbeck's face slowly paled. He seemed to be read- ing the paper over and over. "I had dinner with Oswald Quakers at the club just now." Thus Mr. Listerly. "He made it plain that we've got to do this. We're to run it in a box not less than three columns wide above the middle line of page one to-morrow. All editions." Oswald Qualters was known as attorney for the Painter interests. 98 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Painter doesn't own the News," snapped Winterbeck. "Only part of it, Frank. But with a word he could call our loans, tie up our next delivery of paper, throw us on the town." "It wouldn't help him much to wreck the property." "No, but he could install another publisher and another staff." "I don't believe Senator Painter'd stand for this. Why don't you call him up?" "Did that. From the club. He advised me to do what I thought right." "That all?" "No, when I pressed him, he explained that he really didn't know a thing about it, and that I'd better talk to Quakers. No, Frank, it's thumbs down. We can't help ourselves. I'm sorry to upset your plans." He rose. He didn't seem to care much ; was his usual casual, quizzical self. Winterbeck reached for a sheet of copy paper; wrote his resignation, to go into effect the moment that the apology was sent to the composing room ; silently handed it to his chief. It was after he had read it that Mr. Listerly gave his first faint display of feeling. He sighed. "Frank," he said, "don't do this. Think it over. You're taking it too hard. A newspaper, after all, is a piece of property. We have no right to make it a vehicle for our personal notions." "Is that thing going down ?" asked Winterbeck. "Why yes, we have no choice about that." "Then you'll have to O. K. it yourself, Mr. Listerly." Ten minutes later the city editor was gone, for good; and a man from the telegraph desk was sitting in his place. Mr. Listerly sighed a number of times during the evening. But before midnight he had the great machine running fairly well. One thing, he decided to get a mar <:itor. Under the old system there had been altogether too i desk work for himself. In some respects the new arrange- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 99 ment would be a good thing. Frank had been taking a good deal on himself lately, anyway ; a shake-up would do him good. The man Stafford was mildly on Mr. Listerly's mind. He had lunched with Guard in New York, and had listened, to the verge of boredom, to praise of that young man. Guard was ready to plan publication of the Cantey biography, and was keen to give Stafford a try at the job. As a matter of fact, Mr. Listerly recalled that he had promised to put this through. Guard couldn't hold him to it, of course. Though he had been curiously insistent ; had made quite a point of it. And the promise had passed. . . . Mr. Listerly wavered, during the evening, in regard to this. He even sent out inquiries regarding Stafford ; but the man had dis- appeared, apparently, off the face of the earth. No one had seen him, for twenty-four hours. Abel Timothy, who seemed interested to the point of curiosity, looked up the address Winterbcck had; an obscure boarding-house, ap- parently, away out Peck Avenue by the lumber yards. But a telephoned inquiry brought the report that Mr. Stafford had packed up and left the evening before without a word. He had acted queerly on previous occasions. The landlady felt relieved to be rid of him. Mr. Listerly decided then that the man by his own actions was releasing him from any slight moral obligation he may have incurred in the chat with Guard. He'd consider giv- ing the job to Hitt ; think it over a few days ; there wasn't any great hurry. The old boy was wild to do it. He'd be safe, if uninspired. Guard had been rather extravagant, anyway. At this point Mr. Listerly dismissed the Stafford person from his mind as a nuisance. CHAPTER THIRTEEN The Tide of Life Runs Low MARGIE DAW slipped into her boyish blue coat ; pulled down on her head her little felt hat ; opened the door of her apartment. It was eleven in the morning. Miss Daw's day was about to begin. A folded paper lay on the sill. Her name was on it, writ- ten in pencil in a small even hand. Quickly she opened it. "Dear Miss Daw," it read, "I'm ill here, and haven't any phone. Would you be willing to send a doctor to 321 ? "H. STAFFORD." She stepped back into her minute living-room; pressed a finger to her lips. No note had lain there when she took in her morning paper, an hour earlier. "Here," and "321" must mean this very building. So he had come ! She was glad he was ill ; it put him quite in her hands. There were problems to be worked out ; in her eagerness the other day she hadn't bothered to consider them. But now that he was unexpectedly, actually here. . . . She went up to 321, on the floor next above ; tapped softly ; then tried the door. It opened. She slipped in and quickly closed it behind her. It was just as well not to be seen com- ing in here. It was one of the furnished apartments. There was a "golden oak" table, a stuffy upholstered chair, an ornate rocker, a picture or two a print of an English cathedral, another of sheep on a road, the familiar platter, toad and crying child a worn carpet rug. A shabby traveling bag stood open on a chair. The one window here in the living- room gave on a court, facing other windows. This was awkward. She listened a moment, and heard heavy hoarse 100 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 101 breathing; he was in the bedroom, asleep. She crossed quickly to the window and drew down the shade. A photograph stood on the table in a silver frame a deli- cately pretty girl of nineteen or twenty. She studied it. It was a little old-fashioned ; the ballooning sleeves of five or six years back, and stiff linen collar, and severe "sailor" straw hat. It was it must have been his dead wife. The picture fascinated her. It brought up in Miss Daw's rich quick imagination the whole story of the trial. In the next room he coughed, thrashed about, muttered. She put down the picture ; tiptoed part way to the door ; hesitated for Margie, despite her marital experience and the hardening she had gone through in the rough give and take of newspaper work, was only twenty-six, and was, therefore, at moments, governed by the impulses and reti- cences of youth. I think, too, that the importance of the quarry in this curious hunt of hers (for it was a hunt) the thought that the man she had tracked and, now, run down was none other than Henry Calverly gave her, just for the moment, a sensation not so remote from what the literal hunter knows as "buck ague." So she hesitated. Even considered turning back. Then, a thought breathless, her color up a little, her eyes very bright, she advanced to the bedroom door. He was stretched out in bathrobe and slippers ; unshaven ; longish hair tousled; haggard of face. He was deeply flushed; fever surely. And his bronchial passages were choked so that he breathed with difficulty. He went off now into a paroxysm of coughing. His eyes opened. He didn't seem to take in at first that she was standing beside the bed. Then he tried to speak. She thought he said, "Oh, I didn't mean to make you come here." "That's all right," said she. She was surprised, even net- tled, at her own breathlessness ; told herself that there was no sense in letting herself get stirred up. She laid her hand on his hot forehead. It soothed him. 102 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM She went then to the bathroom, wrung out a towel in cold water, and laid that on his head. "Looks like grippe," said she. "Do you ache?" His reply was a moan. Then he said: "Will you tell them at the office?" And went into another fit of coughing. With a tightening of her nerves and an even higher color, she sank on the edge of the bed; sat there; pressed the towel about his temples. So he didn't know that he was in utter and final disgrace ! She glanced about the room ; there was no sign of the morn- ing paper. And he couldn't have seen hers. The public retraction, in its three-column box above the middle of page one, had made her wince. There had been a few moments of sheer disgust with the paper, with Mr. Listerly, with the city itself, during which she had consid- ered, as she usually did in such moments, chucking it up altogether and going down to New York. There ought to be chances there for an experienced and not bad-looking girl. There was, here and there in New York, some snappy, independent journalism. The town was bigger, the indi- vidual advertiser less imminent. She decided now that he mustn't see that paper at all. Not, at least, while he was down this way. Likely as not he'd go kill himself or something ; and then where would she be, especially if ... no, she knew, however exciting the decision, whatever difficulties it stirred up, that she in- tended seeing this through. He must, just now, be cared for. And he must be protected from a world that he never had belonged in. She rummaged through her wrist-bag. "Now listen !" she said. "I'm going to send a doctor right up here. You'll need a nurse, too." He seemed to protest at this. "You've got to be taken care of. Please leave it to me. Somebody's got to get your food and things. And I'm go- ing to leave my key here on the bureau. If you feel up to walking down the stairs again, I want you to use my THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 103 rooms. The air's better there. I'll explain that to the doe- tor. And I'll look you up for a minute at supper-time." She returned to her own rooms and telephoned her doc- tor. It was characteristic that she did tell him that the sick man and the nurse were to have free use of her apartment. And she accounted for him simply as a friend of hers. She hid away the morning News in a bureau drawer. At the office she found old Mr. Upham, deep in work at his desk by the window. For a moment, at the sight of him, she compressed her lips. She purposely left the door wide open. At every sound along the passage she glanced up, rather nervously. At length she heard a slow heavy step ; leaned back, ir- resolute ; bent forward again and made a pretense of adjust- ing her typewriter ; looked sidelong at the door. The portly person of Abel Timothy appeared, and paused there, hat pushed back off his wide forehead, unlighted cigar in mouth. He removed the cigar ; raised his eyebrows ; looked as if he might, under very slight pressure, come in. She shook her head ; and with her lips framed the words : "Not now. Later." He lingered. She glanced toward Mr. Upham; then moved swiftly to the door and said, low : "I'll try to be at Philippe's about five." "Of course," he said, "if you really want things to go on like this, I guess I can be as good a sport as the next fellow. . . ." "Not here!" she murmured. "Keep your head, Abe!" And returned to her work. In a corner alcove at Philippe's they had a drink. "Now look here, Marge," said he, "I've been willing enough " "I'm not particularly strong for that 'Now look here,' " said she. "I can't figure it out, Marge. There's a difference. You're hostile." 101 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "No, I'm not hostile, Abe." She was fingering her glass, thinking hard. She had a delicate course to steer. She knew that any single superfluous word might start endless complications. It was a rule of her life never to tell an unnecessary lie. This was the sort of situation, she decided, in which you told the necessary lie as directly as possible and let it go at that. "Yes, that's it. You're hostile." "Listen, Abe! You're looking at me wrong, all wrong. I'm not your property. I never was. I'm a hard working girl. I'm changeable. I have moods. . . ." "Moods !" This was a bitter exclamation. He was chew- ing and chewing his cigar. "Yes, moods. There are times you ought to know that, Abe when I simply have to be alone. This is one of those times. I must I will be let alone. I I'm fond of you, but . . ." "But !" "Yes, but. Now Abe, another thing. It oughtn't to be difficult, but it is, a little. It's difficult because I'm afraid I know just the train of thought it's going to start in your mind. And you'll be wrong. . . . Abe, I've lost my key." "Oh !" he muttered, after a long silence "that !" "No, not that! It's perfectly simple, natural. If you can bring yourself to think sensibly for just one minute, you'll see how simple it is. A coincidence, yes. I do want to be alone. I'm tired of men for a while. Tired even of you, Abe. If you want me to be fond of you you'll accept that and wait me out. I can't help how I feel. And now, at this same time, I've lost my key. I've got to tell you, no matter what elaborate and unpleasant stories you work up in your own mind. Because I haven't any key." She spread her hands. "I can't get in to-night. I simply haven't got it." For a long time he stared at the threadbare table-cloth, rolling the cigar around and around in a corner of his wide mouth. Then he muttered again : THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 105 "I guess you'll get in all right !" "Now, Abe, you are making it hard for me even to be fond of you." He looked at her, smiled unpleasantly, drew out his key- ring and furtively glancing about to see if a waiter was near, detached a key and tossed it to her. She quietly put it in her bag. "Abe," she said, "I've simply got to believe that you'll laugh, yourself, at this ugly mood of yours when you've had an hour to think it over. I can't, even to protect your feelings, stay locked out of my own rooms." But all he said, and this was just before they parted, out on the main street, was : "I guess I can let you alone, all right." A week later, at the end of an afternoon, Margie came brightly into her apartment, called a cheerful greeting, dropped her coat and hat on the living-room table, tidied her hair, and then went into the bedroom, curling up comfort- ably at the foot of the bed, and surveyed her patient, who was propped up on pillows (hers and his) at the other end of the bed, with an approving bob of her pretty head. He put down his book and smiled, wanly. "It's a pretty good job," said she, thoughtfully. "Nobody ever shaved pneumonia quite so close and escaped. Where's Miss Elaine ?" She said this brightly, naturally; but then, touched unex- pectedly by self -consciousness, drooped her eyes. He colored, and fingered in some confusion the pages of the book. After a moment, he cleared his throat and replied : "She went up-stairs to pack her things." They fell silent. Then she, with evident effort, began chattering about this and that at the office. But the effort was not wholly successful. She went into the living-room to find a cigarette. The nurse came in. Calverly heard them talking, very low. Then the nurse stepped into the bedroom, said good-by, 106 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM and with a glance of not altogether controllable curiosity from her patient to the feminine things about the room, and from these to the smartly pretty young woman who leaned in the doorway smoking a cigarette, picked up her suit-case and left. Calverly looked out the window for what seemed to him an embarrassingly long time. Miss Daw perched comfortably on the foot of the bed, leaned back, swung a pretty foot, and smoked reflectively. "I'll move up-stairs," said he. "You'll do no such thing." "But" "I'm only asking you to be sensible. You're weaker than you think. Take a day or two to get up gradually. To- morrow, if you feel still better, you can dress. Try mov- ing around a little. But I won't hear of you're moving to-day." "But you're" "I'm perfectly comfortable up there." "There's another thing . . . Miss Blaine . . . about paying her." "I attended to that." "But" "I'm keeping track. Now listen, please ! You're strapped, aren't you? . . . Well, I'm not not completely and what little I can do you're more than welcome to. It's the way we do. Good heavens ! do you suppose I haven't bor- rowed? Well, I have! I'm going to let you pay it back, when you get to earning again. Now please behave." "How much was it?" "At the proper time, Hugh, you shall have an itemized statement. . . . Do you know, this chance to study you, especially in the days when you hardly knew what you were saying, has been worth a lot to me." She smiled ; knocked the ash off her cigarette with a re- flective little finger. "You strike me as an extraordinarily interesting person. You're very gifted. Very. You've got no end of feeling. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 107 I can imagine you as coming through with something like power. You've got fancy, too. Delicacy. I love the way your mind works, about some things. And then, all at once, you get Victorian. As about this money. . . . By the way, I brought in fruit and things. And I'll make coffee. We'll have a nice little supper, by ourselves. And I'll come in in the morning and get your breakfast. We'll have great fun. Quite a little honeymoon." She caught the way his eyes opened sharply and fixed themselves on something outside the window. That was enough of that strain. She started humming; got some of her things out of the closet. "I'll just run up-stairs with these," she said briskly. "Then I'll come back and fix the supper. I got some grape- fruit. They're fine now." "It it's costing a lot," said he, miserably. "Please, Hugh !" "I think maybe I can get back to the office to-morrow, Margie." "Hardly." "But don't you see" "I'm going up now. Be down directly." "Do they have they I was just wondering if they asked about me any." She paused in the doorway, looked back at him. "The office is a pretty busy place, Hugh." "Yes of course." "I'm not sure it's the place for you." "But" "I mean just this. You're wasted there. The Nevus isn't an organ of public opinion and literary power. It's a busi- ness enterprise. Take your Maclntyre story. It's the best piece of writing that's ever been printed in the paper." "Oh, do you really" "Yes. But they don't appreciate it. Oh, I do. And Hit- tie does. A few. Frank Winterbeck did does. He's got brains. Some character, even. But the paper hasn't char- 108 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM acter. Maclntyre's a crook. The town's rotten. We've got a chance, there on the News, for real leadership moral, civic. But do you think we'll take it ? Hardly !" Margie was near forgetting herself. Conviction rang in her voice ; her eyes snapped. She hurried out. But her earnestness had brought her closer to Calverly than her schemes ever could have. He seemed to enjoy their little supper together. And she was quick to seize the small opportunity. She kept herself quiet and friendly. For the time he even stopped worrying about the paper. At least, he talked more impersonally than he had at all before. The next morning, when she let herself in, she was sur- prised to find him up and dressed. "I'm all right," he explained, a thought defiantly. "Silly to be staying here, babying myself. I I can't tell you how kind you've been. But . . ." "It won't hurt you to try a little walk." "I'm going to the office." "That's impossible." "No, really . . ." "Try it around the block once. You'll be surprised to find how weak you are." He stood over her, spread his hands. She glanced up at him, then away. She found him deeply attractive. But it wouldn't do to show it. It never did. "It doesn't matter particularly how weak I am," he was saying. "Surely you see that I can't well, go on like this." His thin hands were moving to include the little apart- ment, her apartment. "Anyway," she remarked, "we need some breakfast." While she busied herself about this, he walked the floor. His look was that of a man who fights himself, struggles to rouse himself. She found some difficulty in making talk over the break- fast. The very intimacy of their surroundings weighed on THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 109 both. At the end of the meal she found herself no nearer a plan for handling him. He looked about the room ; prowled in the little hall. "What is it ?" she called, quickly, nervously. "I was looking for my hat. Perhaps it's up-stairs." "It is. I'll get it." He put out a hand to detain her ; but she pressed by him. "Just once around the block, mind," she commanded, as she gave it to him. He came back into the living-room then ; sat on the arm of the Morris chair; looked down at the floor for a time, then, with unexpected frankness, up at her. "I've got to go to the office," he said. "Can't you see, Margie? You're so good you're wonderful but I've got to." "I simply won't let you." "I'm sorry. Perhaps it isn't sensible. But it's all I've got work. It's the only thing. I've got to go." "Then," said she. "What?" He, too, was quick, nervous. "Well it had to come, sooner or later. . . ." "What? What is it?" She went to the bureau in the bedroom. He started up in apprehension. He had to lean on the table. She spread out there the News of a week earlier. "What ? I don't see what you mean !" "The box, there. The retraction." He read it. He seemed slow, even stupid, with it. "Well," said she, in as matter-of-fact a voice as she could manage, "there it is. You've got to know it." How slug- gish he was! "You'd better just sit down. We'll talk it over. It needn't be so terribly serious, with all the talent you've got." She wished he would move. "Sit down," she said again. But he was still leaning on the table. He must have read the statement through sev- 110 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM eral times. Now, by the way his eyes shifted, she could see that he was beginning it again. But finally he lifted his head. "It's me, of course my story," he said. "Yes. It's you." "I'm discharged publicly, that way." "The News isn't the only paper," she began, hotly. "Oh, but you know," he said "after this. . . ." "But there are other cities." He repeated this slowly after her, as if forgetting that she was there: "Yes, there are other cities." Then he looked about the room and drew a hand across his eyes. "But all this the nurse, and the doctor, and the food and all " "Please!" "I can't help it. You see I'd used all my money." He sank again to the arm of the Morris chair. "I haven't a thing of any value. I I want you to tell me what it's all come to." "Of course I'll tell you. It won't run over fifty dollars. And what's that ! It isn't the important thing now." She was trying to hold herself to that casual manner. But it was difficult. "You're taking it hard, Hugh. I don't wonder. It is hard. But the thing now is to get you well. No matter how hard it is for you, I've got to do that first. This is just a problem. Get your feet back on the ground, and you'll handle it. I'll help you all I can all you'll let me." Now was her moment. She kept her voice under control, but her color would rise, and her eyes were shining more than she knew. She came gradually closer to him ; finally, with a curious sense of shock that made it seem like a vio- lent act, laid her hand on his shoulder. "Listen! Let's be sensible. We're not children. We're not in a money-making business. It's incidental money. I've got some, a few hundred. I'm independent. Nobody can keep me from doing as I like. Let me help you. Let's work it out together, while you're getting hold of things. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 111 You're gifted. You're sensitive. Somebody's got to take care of you. We've drifted into it by accident, but well, it seems to work pretty well. I'm not the sort to make de- mands. . . ." He was getting up. Her hand trailed rather awkwardly from his shoulder down his sleeve and caught there, as she followed him. He fumbled at the knob of the outer door. "Don't look like that!" she said sharply. "Please come back. I can't let you go this way." But he had the door open now. She could have thrown her arms around his neck ; but not here in the corridor. She lowered her voice. "You mustn't go like this, Henry !" But he broke away and walked swiftly along the dim cor- ridor and down the stairs. She started after him, then turned back to close the door. Then, in the shadows just beyond she saw a man, a portly figure, and an unlighted cigar in a wide familiar face. She stood motionless. "Sorry, Marge." He removed the cigar. White of face, cold of eye, she looked him up and down. "Spying !" she said. "No, Marge, not spying. Looking for the bell. You never made me look for it before, you know. Then I heard you, and well, I stepped aside. It was a little sur- prising." They stood there. He chewed his cigar. "Wanted to catch you before you got down to the paper," he added. Then, "Well, I caught you." She drew him into her own hallway and closed the door. "He's been ill," she said. "And he's down on his luck. It's it's Hugh Stafford." "You called him Henry, Marge." There was another long silence. "Come in," she said then. "He is Henry Calverly." "Not" "Yes. It isn't what you think. I am interested in him." 112 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Well, naturally" "Please don't be ugly!" He spread his hands. "I see it's no use trying to talk with you, Abe." "I'll go, Marge. We used to say, if a change came we'd be frank about it." "It isn't that sort of a change." He turned away, but not before she caught the twist in his usually placid mouth. "Perhaps we'd better not try to talk now," she said. "Perhaps we'd better not," said he. "He doesn't think I know who he is, Abe." "But you called him" "He doesn't know what I called him. He's beside him- self, Abe. It's pretty serious. If you don't mind, I'll slip out first. I'm sorry sorry you won't or can't see this as it is. At least, you may as well help me keep his secret." "Marge," he said, coldly deliberate, "you're lying to me." "Oh, Abe, don't" His voice was rising. "You're in love with him. It's an affair. You're " "Well, say I am! I can't help it, can I? You don't ex- pect me to " "But, my God, Marge " This wouldn't do. He was catching at her with both hands. She eluded him and hurried away. When Abel Timothy walked over toward Cantey Square, a few minutes later, he saw Margie on a corner gazing anxiously this way and that. Ebb; and the Turn CALVERLY was in the writing-room of the Cantey Square Hotel until some time after noon. He wrote a long letter to Humphrey, trying to explain the steps that had brought him down to the final act. It seemed to him that Humphrey was entitled to know. But he found the explanation difficult. More than once he considered tear- ing up all he had written and saying simply that life had proved too strong for him. The trouble with that sort of note was that it was just the sort they usually left. And it seemed to him that his case was different from the others. This point he felt strongly impelled to make clear. He wanted Hump to know that he was giving up quietly, in a sense sweetly. He was sane; indeed his perceptions, like his feelings, seemed keen to a point above rather than below normal. The world had thrown him aside. It had nothing for him ; he had nothing for it He had done his best ; his best was, it seemed, peculiarly the thing that was not wanted. His solitude had finally become intolerable. His feelings surged high. He wanted Hump to know in some words or other he must make it clear that he ad- mired and loved him. He thought with a curious, almost impersonal tenderness of Mary Maloney. He finally wrote to her a friendly note, wishing her luck, urging her to make a job of it. She was a dear little thing; his heart ached for her. He even had to struggle with a capricious impulse to see her again before. . . . She, alone out of all the world, had brought him a touch of human warmth. He didn't want Hump to know of the money Margie had spent. So he wrote direct to Mr. Guard about that, not caring what Guard might think. It was rather wonderful not to care. These pretensions, these conventions, didn't 113 114 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM matter now. He asked Mr. Guard to pay her the first fifty dollars that might come in on account of royalties, and then turn whatever might be left over to Hump. It wouldn't be much. Royalties, even on Satraps of the Simple, had dwindled of late years nearly to nothing. He wandered out then; caught a street-car; rode to the river. The river had seemed the thing. He was taking it rather for granted. But now, as he leaned on the bridge-rail and stared down at the dimpling current, he thought less well of it. The temptation might come to swim out. And he didn't want to weaken. He might weight his pockets, of course. He wandered on along the bridge. Beyond the south bank it continued over the railway yards. He stopped here. Looked down. There were nearly a score of tracks. Freight cars stood in long rows. Porters and scrub women were at work in and about the sleeping and "parlor" cars. Wagons and trucks moved in and out. The two central tracks were kept clear for the passenger traffic to and from the Union Station. A train, just made up, was pushed by a switching engine toward the station. Then, from the station, a long, vestibuled train came one of the New York-Chicago through trains drawn by an enormous locomotive, gathering head swiftly, roaring under the viaduct. Calverly stared down at it ; breathed the hot air from the little smokestack. A new thought came to him to jump down there. Not now. He shrank from the conspicuous act. But at night. When the yard was all twinkling points of light, red and green and white, and the headlight of the locomotive made the rails shine, illumined the precise spot. It would be quick, sure. A good way. A bitter exaltation was rising in him now. But it wasn't the old feeling. Three years, two years ago even a year he would have killed himself for Cicely, to be with her. Now subtly, curiously there were other considerations. The fact stood out that when he was thinking only of Cicely, however great his suffering, he had never come down to it. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 115 He hadn't touched bottom ; not quite. He was going now because, .having lost something of Cicely, something of his vivid memory of her, nothing had come to take her place. Because they hadn't liked his best work on the News the work that had brought, for a few thrilling moments, the old stir and sense of godlike power; though not because they had discharged him. That seemed incidental. No, because, as he wrote Humphrey, he had offered his best, and his best wasn't wanted. It had been his last great effort. After four awful years. "A fellow's got to have a little success, once in a while," he muttered no\v. He decided on ten o'clock in the evening; for no reason that he knew of. It seemed a good hour. The Chicago Flyer left the station then, and would reach the viaduct within two or three minutes. If it wasn't late. Though that wouldn't matter. He would wait. With his eyes he marked the precise spot, directly over the west-bound track. He decided to let himself over the railing, and drop carefully, so as not to miss, just as the locomotive was reaching the farther side of the viaduct. Of course, if people were near, he might have to wait for a later train. That would be a matter of luck ; one way or the other. He wandered back into the city ; rested a while on a bench in a west side park, playing with the squirrels. He picked up a mid-afternoon meal in a convenient Buffalo Lunch. At eight o'clock he went to his rooms. Margie was sure to be at the office then. He put on a clean collar and his better tie ; and brushed his suit and his shoes. He found the key to Margie's rooms in his pocket ; con- sidered sealing it in an envelope addressed to her and leav- ing it here on the table. They would find it. It seemed hardly to matter. People in the building assumed, of course, that they were living together. Others in the building, for that matter, were pretty clearly in the same boat. He reconsidered ; took the key down-stairs ; listened at her door; let himself in; laid the key on her table; looked 116 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM about with a sudden choke in his throat. She had, after all, been extraordinarily kind. His eyes filled. It seemed as if he weren't treating her well. Of course, he hadn't harmed her. In little ways she had painstakingly made it clear that he couldn't harm her, that he mustn't feel responsible for her. She knew that a decent man shrinks from assuming responsibility for a woman if he can't carry it through. And Calvery had sensed her attitude. It was one of the things about her, paradoxically, that repelled him. He shrank from the subtle signs she unconsciously gave out of experience, experience with men. He walked the streets for a time ; then looked at his watch. It was twenty-five minutes to nine. Nearly an hour and a half. Time was dragging now. Girls walking by twos and threes in the shadows of these back streets, giggled as they brushed by him. He watched them, thoughtfully, wondering how it would seem to laugh. He leaned against a lamp post. He certainly wasn't strong yet. He thrust his hands into his coat pockets and found the letters there. It occurred to him that they might be de- stroyed with him. He hesitated over leaving them at his rooms, as over mailing them. He decided then to take off his coat ; leave it on the viaduct. His fingers settled on a crumpled bit of paper, and drew it out. He straightened it ; held it up to the light. It was the Chicago cashier's check for twenty thousand dollars. He stared at it. It would be a godsend to somebody. It didn't occur to him to offer it to Margie as he had to Mary. That was a different case. What had Parker written? . . . "It would be better, if you feel, on reflection, that you can not accept it for yourself, to give it to some deserv- ing charity." . . . Parker was right. The money must be put to some use. He grew excited about this; took to THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 117 talking very fast, thinking hard, muttering. There was no one he could consult. Oh, he might send it to Hump. Then he thought of Mr. Listerly; and, as he considered him, bent his steps toward the News building. I don't think he dwelt at all on Mr. Listerly as the man who had dis- charged him, publicly, in that craven retraction. There was no resentment in him. He saw the publisher now simply as an older man, a man of wide business experience who was kindly enough in manner ; was, in fact, accessible. And he went up, without a personal thought, to the editorial floor. The girl at the switchboard said that Mr. Listerly would see him in a few minutes. He sat on one of the benches. Others were sitting there. The stoutish real estate editor the name was something like Timothy came out of the publisher's office, started and stared at him, removed his unlighted cigar, then recovered himself and went out without a word. It was depressing to wait. The minute hand on the big electric clock in the hall moved up to the hour; came slowly down the other side of the dial. Calverly calculated that it would take about fifteen min- utes to catch a car and reach the viaduct. He ought to be there by ten sharp. He had waited three-quarters of an hour now. It was depressing. Mr. Listerly came out now, hat on, stick in hand, hurry- ing toward the elevator. He had forgotten. Calverly, confused, rose. The switchboard girl called Mr. Listerly's attention to him. "Oh !" remarked the chief. "Oh, yes, Stafford er How are you ! You wished to see me ?" "Well if I might for a moment. . . ." Mr. Listerly glanced up at the clock ; led the way into his office ; sat on a corner of his desk, leaving his caller standing. "It's only this," that young man managed to say. "I thought maybe you could . . ." Mr. Listerly studied the check ; turned it over ; looked up 118 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM with a flicker of interest in his tired eyes. Money actual ready cash could always stir his blood. It was he felt this profoundly, unconsciously; would have been honestly puzzled by an apparently opposite point of view the one natural preoccupation of all human life. If you hadn't it you worked for it ; when you had it you worked with it. Possession of it meant real superiority in either one's self or one's forerunners. It flowered not only into power and standing but also into culture and beauty. It was the warm arterial blood of civilization. "This is a good deal of money, Mr. Stafford." "I know, and that's why . . . It's no good to me you see. ... I thought maybe you'd " "I don't see why it's no good to you." "Oh, well, there are personal reasons. I don't want it. But I'd hate to think of it not being used in some way." "Naturally." Mr. Listerly kept his face straight. He was nonplussed. But with that check actually in his hand he couldn't wholly conceal his interest. The young man glanced hurriedly at his watch. "I've only got a minute, Mr. Listerly. But I wondered isn't there some deserving charity here you know, some place where they do things for children, or a hospital that . . . suppose I just endorse it, and you can " "Just a moment, Mr. Stafford. Do have a chair. We must think this over carefully." "I really haven't much time." Mr. Listerly smiled now ; put his hat and stick away. His interest was rising. The control of twenty thousand dollars was no small matter. They would think more of him over at the Cantey National; or, for that matter, at the City Trust Company, by way of extending his personal influence. "Are you really determined to give this money away, Mr. Stafford?" "Oh, yes. I can't touch it. But I'd like it you know to do some good." "Of course there are institutions enough that need money. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 119 One occurs to me the plan for a public bath for children. With this" "That would be all right Let's do that 1" "With this amount in hand it would be easy enough to raise the balance. We might offer it conditionally on the giving of an equal amount. Full credit would be given you, of course, Mr. Stafford. For that matter we could easily arrange to put your name on the building carve it in the stone " "Oh, no, no ! I can't have that ! My name mustn't appear at all." He looked again at his watch. It was twenty min- utes to ten. "I must go. Let me endorse it to you." "But I can hardly let you do that. Don't you see that you'll be putting the money in my hands without any check on the use of it." "But you'll use it for the baths. I have your word for that." Mr. Listerly looked up at the wall ; chewed his mustache. In that curious moment he decided that Guard was right. The boy was a genius. Something must be done about him. "No," he said, gravely and kindly, "I'm afraid we can't do it quite so offhand. It's possible, of course, if you still feel that you don't want to appear in it, after you've thought it over " Henry interrupted now. He was on his feet, glancing toward the door, nervously fingering his hat brim. The un- expected note of kindness in the publisher's voice had touched him, shaken him. "I liave thought it over !" he cried. "Then I'll tell you what we'll do. You keep the check now. To-morrow I'll take you around to the bank" Mr. Listerly was not above picturing himself there, dwelling a moment on the offhand manner he would use; it was a pleasant thought "and we can arrange to put it by on a special account while the plans are maturing " It was a quarter to ten. "No!" cried Henry. "No! No! I can't. You don't un- 120 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM derstand!" His voice shook with emotion. He bit his lip; glanced nervously about; suddenly snatched up a pen and wrote his name across the back. "There !" he cried. "Just do good with it, that's all. Help somebody !" And turned to go. Mr. Listerly sprang up and laid a hand on his shoulder. "Stafford," he said, "you're in trouble. Unless I miss my guess you need help yourself. Some sort. Tell me this Have you any other money ?" "No !" muttered the young man, struggling away. "Have you work plans ?" "No no work. I don't want need " The hand on his shoulder was firm, strong. It was friendly, like the voice. It was unnerving. He thought until this moment he hadn't weakened "I can't go like this. Have to catch a later train. It'll be all the same." And sat down. It was hard to evade Mr. Listerly's keen questions. And the warmth that his voice and the touch of his strong hand had stirred in Henry's heart spreading through his thoughts, fanned by his own swift imagination, brought confusion; in which the publisher, could he have known the glowing im- age of himself that was rapidly growing up in the thoughts of the pale dispirited young man who sat limp, moody, curi- ously difficult in the leather chair, would have shared. In the end he agreed to go to the bank in the morning; beyond that he was not to be known as a party to the trans- action. And he further agreed to begin work on the bi- ography of James H. Cantey. He left in weak bewilderment His life had been saved. He was to have another chance; not miserably alone this time, but with kindly support. Mr. Guard, it appeared had great faith in him. He found difficulty in believing it. He got out of the building without meeting Margie, and stole into his apartment. He couldn't have faced her. He slept like a child, and slipped out in the morning, bags in band, down past Margie's door, before she was up. He saw her morning paper lying there. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 121 He had refused to go again to the office ; he and Mr. Lis- terly were to meet at the City Trust Company at eleven. He checked his bags at the hotel. He would find quar- ters later, somewhere on the Hill. They were paying him enough. And he would put aside something every week toward Margie's fifty dollars. Mr. Listerly, when he had gone that night, flopped back in his chair ; tapped his fingers on the desk ; shook his head. A queer case! But interesting oh, interesting! Hitt would be disappointed. Have to do something about that. He framed a note to the librarian ; then decided to let the thing slip along and explain itself. Hitt, after all, had his job. And they couldn't both write the biography. CHAPTER FIFTEEN The Honorable Tim is Perturbed to the Point of Protest. And Mr. Quakers Joins the Hunt HARVEY O'RELL was on the Board of the City Trust Company. Like Hannibal Simmons, First Vice-Presi- dent of City Trust, he was an ardent golfer. The two were interrupted, while playing the eighth hole, by a passing shower. They holed out, then stepped over to the County Highway, which bounded the course on the west, and sat in a three-walled trolley shelter. Mr. Simmons, who, like so many bankers and mathemati- cians, was of a verse-writing, imaginative turn, glanced about quizzically at the hundreds of initials and inscriptions carved in the walls and on the bench, produced his own knife, and set unsmilingly to work in the nearest smooth space. Neatly he cut out the letters "H. S." By way of em- bellishment he added a decoration beneath them. CXRell, who was not whimsical in spirit, watched him in easy good humor; rather admired his neatness of hand. Thus, two leading citizens occupied themselves during a not unpleasant half -hour. Then, the shower over, they went on to the ninth tee. Mr. Simmons, a little grizzled man, with the first horn- rimmed spectacles ever seen in the city outside the His- torical Society Museum, reflected, as he walked, on the initials, "H. S." and on a coincidence that on its face seemed hardly worth a thought. "An odd thing," he said. "Bob Listerly opened a special account this morning. Twenty thousand. It was a Chicago cashier's check to a young fellow named Hugh Stafford." O'Rell knit his brows a very little; then composed his face and walked on. For Simmons wasn't a man you told 122 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 123 everything to. He held quaint notions; for instance, that politics was in some measure a thing apart, with which a gentleman didn't soil his hands. That your political ma- chine might in reality be a device, a buffer, standing between the vaguely, incoherently excitable mass of ordinary citi- zens and organized, predatory wealth ; that the political boss didn't live whose power could be explained by personal ability or even trickery, he seemed unable to grasp. Simmons was proud of his city; and with considerable reason. If the street-cars were dirty, noisy, crowded to the bumpers and (on occasion) to the roofs, he took them as a casual fact of life and was glad that he had rarely to ride in them. If County Railways held perpetual fran- chises, for which it made no return to the community, and if, with these as a basis, it was able to pile bond issue on bond issue, stock on stock, why this, too, seemed a fact of life. Besides, he had found the bonds and stocks person- ally profitable. . . . Mayor Tim was to him a rather despicable creature whom irresponsible people insisted on electing and re-electing. The trouble appeared to be that too many were allowed to vote. Of the elaborately organ- ized machinery for securing the votes and for destroying those of tfie opposition he knew nothing. It was simply a distasteful subject. If any one had told him that O'Rell (with certain others) had a hand in directing this machinery he would have regarded the assertion as an insult to an able and high-minded friend. If any one had laid before him an analysis of the situation, leading to the simple con- clusion that it is five times more profitable to put up the money for a lax, dishonest city administration than to sub- mit to a sound and sweeping enforcement of existing law, he would have been pained, but not convinced. His mind, keen in banking routine, clever at versification, would have stopped short of the necessary general conclusions. So O'Rell resumed his solidly inscrutable front. And Simmons talked on : "This Stafford just endorsed the check, blank. Bob wrote his name on it, and took a certificate of deposit. Said 124 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM something about its being used toward the public baths. An outright gift. Queer. And the young fellow is to write the Cantey biography, at thirty-five a week. Seemed glad to get it. He starts working to-morrow, up at the house, in Jim's study. Amme is to turn over the papers. We're to make the weekly payments and charge to the Estate." O'Rell's remark, by way of reply, came while the banker was teeing his ball. It was: "My guess is that you'll come back to the Conqueror ball, Han. You certainly aren't getting the distance out of those things." But before half past seven that evening he called up the mayor. Shortly after eight the city attorney called up Oswald Quakers. The attorney for the Painter interests suggested that the mayor come around. At ten-thirty, say. After making which suggestion Quakers called O'Rell and got the facts. He always got the facts. The mayor appeared at ten-twenty-five. Qualters him- self opened the door; and after one glance at the wild per- son before him, hurried him back to his library. "Better have a cigar," remarked Mr. Qualters, whose method was that of casual good humor. "And sit down. What's the matter?" Mayor Tim sat down ; then sprang up. It was a moment in which he had to be on his feet. Qualters, sensing imminent oratory, lighted his own cigar 2nd settled back comfortably. "Bob Listerly's double-crossed me !" he cried dramatically. "How do you figure that out, Tim ?" "Well, I ask you didn't he agree to fire that young fellow?" "Fire who?" "This Stafford. I ask you didn't he agree to fire him ?" "My impression is that we wrote the retraction he printed. And that stated that the man had already been discharged, didn't it?" "It did. But now see what he's done. My God, if " THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 125 "What's he done?" Quakers made it a rule always to ask, never to tell. "He's put the man in to write the Jim Cantey book. That's what he's done." "Stafford writes well enough, Tim." Qualters was smiling. The mayor strode impatiently to the window and back ; thrust his fingers through his hair; sputtered angrily. "Sit down, Tim. Take it easy. This situation can't get away from us." "It can't, can't it? Well it just has! Look here, Mr. Qualters, I'm a plain-spoken man. I'll talk to the point. I knew Jim Cantey. He was my benefactor. We had things in common. He was a man who kept a tight hand on all his own affairs. You know that." Qualters nodded. "Oh, he used Amme and the rest. But he kept his own papers. I know about that. There's a safe up there in his study, on the Hill. Many's the evening I've sat there with him. Talking. Intimate. Like you and I are talking now." His manner and voice dropped into mystery. He moved closer; shook his hair back; dropped a tense hand on the table. Qualters reflected "Tim should have gone on the stage." "It's full of secrets, that safe. Jim Cantey 's own per- sonal papers business affairs deals here in town Har- vey's secrets the senator's yours mine! . . ." His voice rose to a climax on that speech ; lingered dra- matically on the "yours," a thought tremulously on the "mine." "Stafford's not going to crack the safe, Tim." The mayor threw back his head ; sighed ; dropped into a chair. "I won't stand for it!" he muttered. "Well, how're you going to stop it? The choice of the biographer was left to Bob in the will. All that side of the Estate." 126 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "A lot that's got to do with it. I'm a plain man, Mr. Quakers. But the man doesn't live who can cross me and get away with it. You've got the power to stop this dirty game." "Xo, I haven't." "You have ! You can't" "Easy, Tim." "I guess Bob Listerly'll do what you say, quick enough, if you'll really say it." Quakers considered this. "After all," he said musingly, "we've made Bob eat crow once this week. . . ." "Let him eat it twice then! I'll teach Bob Listerly he can't put it over me. I see through his game now. The coward! As if he didn't turn this man loose on me!" "He didn't. I happen to know that." "They why's he turning him loose on me again." "How? I don't quite get this, Tim. Just why are you so worked up over the Cantey biography ?" The mayor said, "I ain't worked up !" Then, "I tell you he's using that fellow to hurt me. He brought him here for that! Big bluffer hasn't got the heart to fight me in the open !" Quakers smoked ; studied the ceiling. "I wonder who's got the combination to that safe, Tim." The mayor, gripping the arms of his chair, started for- ward, in open amazement. "You don't mean to tell me " "Oh, you think I've got it? Well, I haven't, Tim." "You drew the will." "No. Wait a moment." Quakers reached for the tele- phone; called a number. "Hello! Amme? How about this man Stafford that Bob Listerly's putting in to write the book? Don't know anything about him? Neither do I. Who vouches for him? . . . Oh, the publishers. I see. Well, tell me, is he to work there at the house? . . . Any private papers he's likely to get into? . . . Oh, naturally. Yes, yes! That's good. . . . How about that safe of Mr. Cantey's? . . . Hmm! Hadn't you THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 127 better take them out? Might keep them in the vault. I should think. . . ." Amme talked for some time. Then Quakers said "Oh, well, that ought to be safe enough. An odd situation. Nothing vre can do, I guess. Thanks! Good-by!" "Queer," he remarked, turning slowly toward his visitor. "What is? What is it? Tell me!" "It's all right, Tim. Mr. Cantey, you know, made a con- fidante of his daughter Miriam. Like all of us, he had to talk freely to somebody, out of hours. At least, he wasn't careless with women, like so many. Certainly not of recent years. And he didn't use clairvoyants, like the senator. Well, all his personal papers are in that safe the whole inside Cantey story. For either blackmail or biography it would be a gold mine. But " "Well, see here, why can't Amme " "Amme's as helpless as the rest of us." "Yes, you're helpless !" "My dear fellow, we are! Mr. Cantey left the safe and everything in it, along with the Cummings Avenue prop- erty, to Miriam. He gave that new property, on Chase Avenue, to the other daughter when she was married. But the old place is Miriam's, outright. And she and her father were the only ones that ever had the combination to that safe." Quakers was interested then in studying his caller. This information was clearly crushing to him. He sank back in the chair ; his drink-flushed face almost pale. He seemed to have difficulty in breathing. Quakers reflected. It would be interesting to know just what the relationship was between the cheap little dema- gogue before him and the great Jim Cantey. Of course, there had, at times, been rumors rumors that hadn't run far. . . . Tim might have blackmailed Cantey. That was understandable. Any big dynamic man had a vulner- able spot here and there. And Tim would have struck like the cheerful pirate he was. But and this was the really interesting query. How could it have worked out the other 128 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM way around? What could Cantey have had on Tim that the rest of them didn't have? . . . Plainly enough, the man was frightened almost to death. He was talking again; excitedly; gathering head for a speech: "It ain't for myself, Mr. Quakers! But think what it means to to the city 1" "Of course, letting an irresponsible young fool like that " "That's it! You've said it! He's an irresponsible fool. Who is he, anyway, I'd like to know? Where's he come from ? Who knows a thing about him ?" "But Miriam Cantey isn't going to hand over to a hired stranger documents that would damage her father's " "But they're putting him right into the house! What if they're thrown together! What if she fell in love with him ! It's happened before now that " "But she's an invalid, Tim !" Quakers had really a bit of a time getting the mayor quieted and headed homeward. He kept coming back to it ; ranted a good deal. Something was certainly in that safe that Tim knew a lot about. Quakers had to promise to take it up with Listerly. In- deed, though he wouldn't admit it to the Honorable Tim, the situation was anything but reassuring. Writing Jim Cantey's biography was not the job for a stranger; too many large interests and current transactions were inter- twined with the Cantey properties. They met, Quakers and Listerly, rather coolly, at the Down-town Club at noon of following day ; met, in fact, in the washroom. "Bob," said Quakers, feeling for a towel, "Tim feels that you've crossed him holding on to that man Stafford." "I discharged him, as I agreed. He has nothing to do with the paper." "Of course, I understand " "The biography job came up from a wholly different an- gle. I'm trying him out there. It hardly concerns Tim." Quakers, sensing that Bob felt inclined to make a stand on this point, let it drop. Now and then, pressed a little too THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 129 far, Bob could be obstinate. And he was an extremely valu- able man. Tim would simply have to keep his shirt on for a day or so. No help for it. Until Bob could be called off. And meantime, it oughtn't to be difficult to put the Canteys a little on their guard. There was no immediate danger, really. What interested him more sharply was the curious busi- ness of the check for twenty thousand dollars. Giving it away. Tim evidently didn't know about that. He himself had it direct from O'Rell. He decided to look Stafford up. There were ways. CHAPTER SIXTEEN Of Ships, a Narrow Door, and a Young Wotnan in a Wheel-Cliair. Also, Briefly, of Mr. Amme CALVERLY was shaky on the second morning ; whitely sensitive, his eyes large and unusually dark, with a blazing light in them. But he appeared, promptly at nine, at the huge old Cantey residence. A man in livery conducted him up a long flight. He glanced shyly, in passing, at the heavy old furniture, the ornate ceilings and chandeliers, a great marble mantel. There were glimpses of spacious drawing- and dining-rooms, and paintings in heavy frames with hooded lights above them. The house of the mayor had reeked of the profes- sional "period" decorator; this, on the contrary, however confused in taste, was a home ; it had grown up into mag- nificence with the rise to power and fame of James H. Can- tey. Comfortable old sofas and armchairs mixed in on the second floor, with the slimmer chairs and tables of the recent Colonial renaissance; an expression, perhaps, these latter, of the taste of the younger generation of Canteys. Of these present Canteys, Calvery knew only vaguely. There were two or three sisters; two, he recalled now, one mar- ried and living somewhere on the Hill, another, an invalid, gifted in some way, at least much talked about. James H. Cantey had been dead two or three years. His death, like his life, was dramatic. It was on his private car, the "Pioneer," coming back from San Francisco, where his daughter the invalid one (there had been pictures in the papers everywhere of the girl in a wheel-chair on the staging) had christened his biggest ship, the Congo. That ship marked the climax of his career. His railway system was built. His vast fleet of freighters and liners ranged the Pacific from Brisbane to Batavia, Singapore, Manila, 130 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 131 Shanghai, Vladivostok, Honolulu and home. He was dic- tating to his secretary, there on the train personal notes of thanks for the telegrams of congratulation that had poured in on him, when he paused, breathed rather hard for a moment, reached for his handkerchief, said something that was not clearly understood, and sank back in his chair. The daughter thus was with him when he died, as she had been with him much during his life. The servant led Calverly up another flight. Up here, in the hall, there were more paintings, but the several doors were closed, excepting one at the rear, at which the man left him, saying merely: "You are to use the study, here, I believe, sir. Mr. Amme is expected at any moment." The "study" proved to be a large room lined with book- shelves. On a table at one side lay a pile of atlases. Oppo- site stood the largest globe Calverly had ever seen. Be- hind it was the black-and-gilt front of a safe. On either side of the door were filing cabinets of steel. The flat-top desk stood at the farther end, where the light from the two windows fell on it. Between the windows, above the swivel chair, hung a wall map of the Pacific General Rail- way System, such a map as might have hung in any ticket office. But the feature that drew Calverly slowly into the room was the line of model ships along the top of the book-shelves. These were perfect miniatures of the Cantey liners, com- plete to the last derrick and block, glass in every port, shin- ing brass-work, and on each bridge brass binnacle and engine-room signals. The hulls were a glistening black with bright red bottoms, the rails in natural teak, the cabins, ventilators and life-boats white, and the funnels black with the one white ring between two red that marked a Cantey ship anywhere in the world. The sight of these ships opened to Henry Calverly, unex- pectedly, the door of romance which he had thought forever closed to him. Pie moved eagerly from model to model, studying out the fine details of construction, with delighted 132 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM eyes. All the more famous of the ships were there the Mississippi, the Missouri, the Columbia, the Hudson, the Amazon, the Yangtze, the Volga, the Congo. He even, after a quick glance back into the hall, mounted a chair to examine the most widely advertised of all, the Congo. With a thrill of imaginative interest he noted the outdoor swim- ming pool, the tennis court, the outdoor restaurant with its tables and chairs and tiny green plants in tubs. He saw it, with the quick eye of his mind, in some far-away port, where brown men dived from the boat deck for silver coins, and catamarans sailed alongside laden with golden mounds of tropical fruits, and stately junks moved by, and yellow merchants spread out embroideries, cloisonne and tortoise- shell. If his geography was confused, the picture was none the less vivid. He stepped down and moved circumspectly toward the desk ; noted the wire baskets of documents arranged across it in an orderly row (placed there, very likely, for himself) ; dropped into the swivel chair, stirred by the thought that he was to sit and work at the very desk, in the very chair, where Jim Cantey had sat and worked stirred so deeply that he surprised himself by chuckling aloud. Then he heard or felt a presence, and swung around. Recessed between the shelves and the end wall, was a narrow door. Beyond it, in a wheel-chair, a young woman sat erect, startled. She was slender, of medium coloring. Her hands, resting on the wheels, were long, with quick sensitive fingers. The face was delicate, yet not over-thin ; the mouth fine and sensitive, not, had he known it, unlike his own; the forehead white, broad. All this he saw, or sensed, in his first startled look, as he sensed, though more vaguely, the long lines of the filmy costume she wore and her slim, slippered feet on the footboard of the chair; but what arrested him, held him during that curious instant be- fore he could spring to his feet with the confused explana- tions and apologies, all in a breath, that were so character- istic, was her coloring. Not of face, but of eyes and hair. The eyes were bluer, richer in pigment, than any he had THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 133 ever seen. The hair was thick, fine, wavy beyond the possi- bility of smoothing, of a chestnut brown but with an under- tone of auburn red and with the shine of gold in every straying, waving thread of it. There was, he saw now, a faint tinge of color in the face itself ; it hadn't, certainly, the pinched look of the invalid; but framed in that wonderful hair and lighted by those vital eyes, any but a ruddy, outdoor coloring would have seemed white. He was on his feet, murmuring something in the way of an apology. A book lay in her lap, bound in a familiar green and gold cover his "Hugh Stafford" book. This strangely thrilling young person was looking him up. . . . The wall be- hind her, like the walls of the room he was in, was lined with books. A desk, by the window, was littered with pa- pers and books. Among these his eyes picked it out un- erringly was his other book, Satraps of the Simple, by Henry Calverly. Did she know ? It was a curiously long moment he, pale, breathless, leaning on Jim Cantey's desk, that bright light in his eyes; she slowly sinking back in her chair, like himself all eyes a moment charged with electricity. She said, with some hesitation : "I must ask you to close the door." He shut it without a word. Then saw that the key was on his side, and opened it again. He heard her catch her breath. "It's the key," he explained. He was coloring now. "I thought perhaps you'd . . ." "That isn't necessary," said she. But he fitted it into her side of the door. He hesitated then. It was painfully difficult to shut it again. He felt clumsy, stupid ; he was groping through a dim mind for something to say that would leave a decent impression of him, or at least explain him. He had never seen such hair or such eyes ; they reached him with a sort of force. And the wheel-chair touched him. It was the invalid Miss Can- 134 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM tey, of course. The deep, terrible heart hunger in the man, that had tortured him through simple little Mary Maloney, and again, in some measure, through Margie Daw, rose in him now, overwhelmed him. His throat was dry ; his hands unsteady; and swimming points of light moved in and out of the rim of his vision. It was a spiritual blow, so violent as to unnerve him. In relaxing the bitter self -suppression of the years he had released a force that was, he knew now, utterly beyond his power to resist. He wanted to be hon- est, to cry out that he was not Hugh Stafford but Henry Calverly, regardless of consequences. He couldn't shut the door. He felt faint. He sank back into Jim Cantey's swivel chair, and covered his eyes with his hands. Her under lip slipped in between her teeth ; she glanced about, clearly in confusion ; then impulsively rolled her chair forward to the door. "You are ill?" she asked. "Oh, no. ... Please! ... I'm sorry." He managed to sit up. "I've been ill. Grippe. But that's over. I'm very sorry." "You're Mr. Stafford, of course. I've just started your book. . . ." She didn't know! "It's interesting to think that you're to work on father's life. I'm Miss Cantey." "Yes, of course." ''Father and I were together a great deal. That's why we ^fitted up this den for me next to his, and cut the door .through." "I don't know that I can ever do this job." He was now utterly naive. It was one of the moments in which he had no reserve at all. He was quivering with intense nervous responsiveness, his emotional self all exposed. "I've never tried biography. And the ones I've read except Bos well have bored me." "Of course," said she, quoting some early instructor, i( 'autobiography's what biography ought to be.' " THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 135 She waited a moment, reflecting. He sat staring moodily at the floor. "Father was wonderful. He wasn't like the statue in the square." He waved a hand at the model ships. "I feel that. He was alive. He felt those ships." "He loved them." "He created." "He had imagination." "Of course the ships." The hand waved again. "And the map." "He loved maps." "I know. All those atlases. People with imagination do love them. It's almost a sure sign." "I never thought of that. Perhaps it is. I believe you're right." "If only I could have known him talked with him felt him!" "You'd have loved him." Her voice was low in pitch, of a contralto quality. There was a slight edge to it now, a thrill. He felt this. "And he would have talked to you. Because you have imagination, too." "I know. That's another sign. It's the little men that are formal and cautious." She gave an odd, almost self-conscious little laugh at that. "Cautious ! Father was hardly that." "Now this" he waved at the row of wire baskets; and threw open a box of van-colored index cards "all this! 'Shipping and Railroad Activities! Early life and struggles! Political Life! Acquaintances with Famous Men! Summary of Achievement!' I don't know what to do with it. It's making me doubt the whole thing or my connection with it. Files! Indexes! System! I've never worked that way. I I'm afraid they've got the wrong man." She was studying him intently. "That," she said slowly "oh, that's Mr. Amme. He used to be one of father's secretaries. He's one of the lawyers now." 136 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Oh, yes, the man said a Mr. Amme was coming." Cal- verly's nervous hand tapped the desk. "Father wasn't like that," said she, thoughtfully. "But he why he was the most romantic man that's lived for a century, a man like Columbus, or Cecil Rhodes, or Na- poleon. He had to use these careful little people, of course." "But he isn't here, and they are. I see it now. I know what they want the sort of nice little plaster image that modern biographers make. And what earthly good is it! Building up a cheap conventional picture of a man, a wooden thing, all hollow; not a line of real life in it. Say a man has a big dream " He sprang up ; there was a ring in his voice; his color was rising. She watched him with fas- cinated eyes, her own sensitive face working in unconscious sympathy with his facile changes of expression "A man has a big dream. He tries to work it out. Other men with other dreams, or with none, try to block him. He fights them. It's war hot rough war, with passion in it, and blunders, and disasters. He does things he shouldn't. He leaves wreckage behind him. He sacrifices an outpost here and there, and hardly knows or cares. He can't. He's too close to it. He couldn't quit if he wanted to. So he fights on. Through dust and blood. You know in a sense. Maybe there's a w r oman in it. Love. Passion. Hatred. Because he's got the fire in him because it's war he protects himself with every trick he knows, seizes every advantage he can. He's got to. It's primitive, and strength and cunning count. Finally after years and years of it he wins. He's a victor. And then his biographer comes along, and works out a funny little lie about habits of industry, and correctness of deportment, and the im- portance of saving burnt matches while you're young qualities that would land a man at forty-five as a head bookkeeper." He didn't seem to know that he was pouring out a torrent of eloquence, that he was utterly fascinating. "And a man that's big like that has himself to fight. He's THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 137 full of tremendous forces passions that he must convert into work or they'll turn on him and tear him to pieces. If he's a real man, he does fight himself. He turns these forces into achievement; gets them out of his system; builds big beautiful things a bridge or a book, a symphony or a ship . . . and then his biographer again! It was because he studied the classics, or the Bible because he was a cau- tious little person about pennies because he never drank . . . God! Likely as not he was working his heart out just to keep from drinking! . . . It's the worst kind of lying, of course. Because it gives a false picture. The im- portant thing is to learn what life is, and why. . . . It's the families that object, of course. Oh, you can't blame them. They're victims of the same universal lie. But it would be wonderful, just once, to find an honest, brave family and get the truth told!" He paced down the room and back. Her slim fingers were gripping nervously the wheels be- side her. "Wait !" she cried, in a radiant eagerness, "I've something to show you. Father would have It's in the safe there" she wheeled forward "I can't get through, but I must show you It's sheer Providence that a man like you should come " She caught her breath ; gave a quick little laugh that might have been clear excitement. He was staring at her chair, that was just too wide for the door. Far off an electric bell sounded. Their eyes met. There were men's voices, faint, far below. "Mr. Amme !" she breathed. The men were coming up-stairs. "I'll close the door," he said. She wheeled back without a word. Mr. Amme was small, precise in feature, in dress, in movement. He was almost completely bald ; the entire top of his head was a glistening dome. His graying beard was 138 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM trimmed to a point. Between his brows was a permanent furrow. He extended his hand, a thought briskly, without smiling. Calverly's heart sank as he took it. The man's voice was dry and small. "I have arranged my digests of the principal departments of Mr. Cantey's life in these six baskets, Mr. Stafford. You will doubtless have your own method, but these will serve as a guide at the start. I have had a selection made of all correspondence that seemed of value under the various heads, which you will find in the two steel files by the door, alphabetically arranged, by writers. The cross index of general subjects is in this box." He indicated the colored cards. "Like the public library," thought the younger man, raguely. "You understand, of course, Mr. Stafford, that any cleri- cal assistance you may require will be provided. You have only to call me at the office." Again their hands met. Each considered the other dur- ing a sober moment. Calverly broke away. "I I " he began falteringly ; then picked up with this "I'm not much good at all this business " he waved a nerv- ous hand "filing indexing. I guess I'll oh, well, I'll just have to fumble at it in my own way. You know I'm really " On what he really might be his mouth clamped shut ; and he colored. The pucker deepened between Mr. Amme's brows. His beard, or the chin beneath it, set disapprovingly. What a dry, hard little man he was ! "You will naturally use your own method," he said. "Good morning." And he walked out, neatly, firmly. Calverly followed irresolutely ; stood fingering the door- knob, listening to the sound of his heels on the stairs, stood until the street door faintly slammed ; then, suddenly all alive, all blazing again, shut himself in and hurried back to THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 139 the narrow door in the recess. He reached up to knock; faltered ; turned away ; turned back, and tapped. She answered rather faintly. He opened the door. She looked up with a quick brightening. The "Hugh Stafford" book lay just as it had in her lap; she hadn't stirred, really. "I " he began, "I you said you wanted to " "Yes 1" she cried. The chair was rolling forward. "It's in the safe. I can't get through." She glanced, doubtfully, toward the hall door. "Could I" Her eyes, like his, were overbright ; the low-pitched voice was none too steady. "Father used to put me in that big chair, by the safe " she was explaining quickly, confusedly. "It was my regu- lar place He told me everything Nobody knew the com- bination but us two ; nobody but me now They've tried to get it." She laughed a little. "You see I have to open it" He was looking from her chair to the safe and back. Suddenly the color rushed, red, into his face. "I could I could" "You see, if I" "I could carry you in." "Father always carried me. We were wonderful friends." "If you" His soul was stepping out now, across a line. He lifted her she was so unexpectedly light and placed her in the big chair, very gently. Neither spoke. He could hear himself breathing. She leaned hurriedly toward the safe. He could hear the roll of the lock, and the clicks. He stood straight, head thrown back, and looked up wildly, exultantly, at the ro- mantically perfect model of Jim Cantey's master product, the Congo, on the bookcase. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN In Which Jim Cantey Speaks from live Grave; and Calverly Finds that He Has Got to Carry Miriam Back HIS gaze came slowly down from the model ship. He was trembling with emotion ; more than a little fright- ened at the discovery that his feelings could slip so unex- pectedly and so far out of control. Mary Maloney was but a passing memory in this uprush of feeling. Of Margie Daw he thought not at all. He w r as thinking, "I mustn't carry her again. But what can I do? She'll have to get back, somehow. ... I must be natural. I mustn't stand here like this. But I can't look at her ! I can't !" The discovery that she wasn't looking at him made it easier. She was leaning over the arm of the big chair, trying to reach the things in the safe. The inner compart- ments were stuffed with documents, many of them yellow- about the edges. There were packets of letters; piles of manila folders full of papers ; a heap of old note-books. What hair she had ! It had loosened a little when he car- ried her. The glint of red in it was stronger now. Hardly aware, he moved a step to get the light on it. He was striv- ing to remember her eyes . . . vivid, blue . . . stirring eyes. In only a moment he had lost the feeling they gave him. He knew, blindly, that he would have to see them again. . . . And she seemed so fragile; she had felt so light in his arms ! She sank back in the big chair ; wan. He sprang forward ; dropped on one knee by the safe. "The top three or four of the folders," she said, low of voice, a little breathless. "And some of the books. Just let me have them." He put them on her lap. She picked out one of the note- books at random ; handed it to him, without lifting her eyes. 140 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 141 It was dog-eared; the old red leather was worn and curved from long wear in a pocket. Glad of any small activity to cover the thumping of his heart, he turned the pages ; then, in a moment, forgot him- self. The book was a part of an alert, highly colored per- sonality. The bold hand, the rough pencil sketches of faces, the diagrams, apparently of business problems, the columns and groups of figures, estimates of this or that, the curious bits of writing (much of this scratchy, as if done on a moving train) confessions apparently, or attempts to jot down a personal philosophy all this was like a picture of a mind. You could feel the human pulse in it. It smelt of a man. "Father would have liked to write," he heard her say- ing. She was fingering the papers, still looking down. "Some of the notes in these books were for his autobi- ography." "Then he meant to write that himself?" She smiled faintly. "Oh, yes. There's a lot of it here oh, disconnected notes and beginnings of chapters. It would have made a stir. You see, he was determined to tell the truth. His friends were frightened about it. That's why, when you what you said about biography and life except that father couldn't express himself quite as you do, it was almost like having him here again. It startled me. That's why I " She stopped, caught her breath, drew her delicate under lip in between her teeth. She glanced up uncertainly then at the note-book he held; moved her hands as if to replace the papers in the safe; hesitated again; looked toward the nar- row doorway and her wheel-chair, waiting just beyond. He didn't see. He was stalking about the room now, de- vouring the book. "Here !" he cried, so abruptly that she started. "Here you have it !" And read aloud, " 'We're moral cowards, of course, we Americans. We're governed through our preju- dices and our fears. Any really unprincipled crook can rule us, if he's clever. By a kind of blackmail. We're none of 142 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM us what we pretend to be. Life isn't what we want to think it. I never could see much in the fallen angel theory, any- way. We were never angels. We were animals. We're animals yet, struggling up. But we daren't let on. The smart man sees what we are, winks at it, talks copy-book buncombe. What we're afraid of is that he'll give us away, give life away. We can't have that. " 'If we could be honest with ourselves, all of us, for one day, a lot of the trouble in life would fall away, I think. If we could let on, just for that one day, that we're struggling animals, tortured by a vision of something higher and finer than the animal, every one of us guilty downright guilty of occasional sin, why, the crooks that flourish now wouldn't have a leg left to stand on. Take a cheap little rascal like Tim Maclntyre he lives by blackmailing me. Because I, like the others, put a high price on reputation, Tim thrives. And I let him go on robbing a whole cityful of hardwork- ing people. That's part of the price.' " Calverly looked at her now. She felt that he hardly saw her. He was flushed ; his eyes shone. "Fine big man!" he cried. "Saw right into things!" Calverly didn't see the hand was now unquestionably reaching for the book. " 'Yes, I'm afraid, too,' " he read on. " 'Because I know that the rank and file can't stand the truth. I wonder how it would work to be honest with children. Could they stand it? Custom, tradition, are powerful things. But on the other hand, I find it hard to believe that lies are sound things. We don't find them much use as governing princi- ples in business. Suppose I were to bring the girls here into my study and explain to them that Tim runs and robs the city because I can't bear to hurt them. . . .'" Calverly, at this, came to himself. "I'm sorry," he said, simply ; and brought her the book. She let it drop on the others in her lap ; pressed a hand to her eyes. "You're tired," he said, very gently. "No. Oh, I am, of course, but that isn't what it is. I THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 143 was trying to think. I don't quite know how we got where we are. But since we have. . . ." She was looking swiftly through one of the folders. "Maclntyre meant something like that, of course," said he, "when he told me how did he put it ? Oh, 'I've got a toe in the crack of the Cantey door. That's where I was smart, twelve years ago.' " "Timothy Maclntyre said that to you?" "Yes. I was interviewing him. But they didn't put that part of it in the paper. He was drunk." Her head drooped now. She fingered one of the papers. "I'm trying to think," she said. "It seems to be rushing along faster than I still Oh, well, I'm going to show you this." It was a half-sheet of paper, dated six years earlier. "Father wrote out the statement " "Yes, I can see it's in his hand." "And made Mr. Maclntyre sign it." "I hereby acknowledge the receipt on this day, of ten thousand dollars ($10,000.00) in cash from Harvey O'Rell, General Manager of County Railways, paid me as a bribe, in return for which sum I agree to veto the Mergenthal Three-Cent-Fare Bill passed this day by the City Council. "Timothy J. Maclntyre." Calverly whistled. "There are some others. Mr. Maclntyre knew one thing about father " "Yes, I" "And father simply decided to get the whip-hand. He told me, before he -died." She watched him as she said this, a nervous alertness, almost an eagerness, in the blue eyes. Then she pressed on he found her bewilderingly direct now ; unquestionably there was in her a strain of the fight- ing Jim Cantey with this : "And here's something else I want you to read, since we've : ." 144 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM The document was in a long envelope, addressed : "To my daughter Miriam, Not to be opened until after my death. James H. Cantey." "Read it !" she said, in that same low, breathless way. "It's an elaboration of the other. Father hated hypocrisy." It was written, with many crossings-out and interlinings, in the now familiar hand : "My Dear Girl," it ran, "I've just finished Phil Hem- ming's autobiography. You're asleep now. The nurse thinks I am. But this book has stirred me all up. And I find, as so often these last few years, I turn to you. I want to talk to you. I can do it this way, perhaps, with a pen. I don't seem to have the courage to say these things by word of mouth. Yet I hate to go leaving them unsaid. The end is very near, little girl nearer than you know. "About Phil Hemming's book. From cover to cover the thing is one huge lie. In the first place it isn't his. He hired a fellow to write it. That's the way it's usually done, you know. The only true statements in it are the dates of his birth and marriage. Phil was a drunkard, but had the physique to last through forty years of it and come out with something left. He was a thief he stole the Summervale Western through a legal trick, and then bought the judge that settled the case in his favor. That transaction broke old H. T. Delancey, wrecked the family, robbed something over two thousand stockholders. "He says he dropped out of Pacific Lines in '86 because of ill health. That's true, in a funny way. He was drunker than usual that year. And he was seriously entangled with women. That he pulled out of it somehow and went along in Wall Street and lived to make another fortune and give three millions to Hemming University before he died and six millions more afterward is due not to moral stamina but physical. He was crooked to his last breath. "Reading this poor stuff the book is all rigged up to make you think Phil the kind of correct person everybody THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 145 wants to be thought makes me wonder about other auto- biographies and biographies. It makes me wonder about a lot of the famous figures of history. It's clear to me I've known great statesmen, business leaders, others that they were none of them what people think. You've got to turn to the Old Testament, Shakespeare, Benvenuto, St. Simon and Machiavelli to realize the human drama and the stuff men and women are made of. Reading Phil's mess of lies written by a hired hand I turn with a good deal of affec- tion to Benvenuto and Machiavelli. They were honest men. They didn't lie, they told what happened, as they saw it. If only we could all do that, we'd come a lot closer to a work- able understanding of life. "Take my own experience. And God knows I've had a lot of that ! Business, as I've found it, is lawless, cruel. It's warfare in which the shrewdest and strongest survive. Men are tricked, crushed, sometimes murdered outright. Governments municipal, state, national are confused, cor- rupted, sometimes virtually destroyed. It's a cynical, hard- headed fight to a finish, a battle royal. Political government isn't much more than a superstition anyway, nowadays. La- bor is slavery we admit it when we speak of the labor market. It's no way to build a nation to do that you've got to breed for sound citizenship, organize for it but it's a cruel beautiful game, all the same. Like war. And I guess this country can stand it for another fifty years or so. Until the land is settled thicker, and the limits of our nat- ural resources come in sight. Then, I suppose it'll become some kind of socialist state, but for the present, while the going's good, no power on earth can stop it. Law ? That's mostly what the judges make it. And business our na- tional habit, our work, our energy, our main concern breeds the judges. Congress? That's only a place. And a place can't stop anything, or start anything. It's where the hired men of the great business forces meet and fight to neutralize one another. They can't tell me anything about Congress. I've put too many hired men in there myself. House and Senate. Government isn't a force, anyway. It 146 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM isn't a cause of anything. It's a result. It's a focus of na- tional forces, economic and sentimental. That's all I can see forces, with strong men riding them, perhaps manag- ing to steer them a little, more often dragged along by them. These forces gather, focus, in two places, at Washington and in Wall Street. "I've tried, so many times, these last few years, to write down what I think, or feel, about all this puzzling business the whole business of living, really. I've wanted to tell just what my experience has been. You know. We've talked about that. In a way, of course, my experience ought to be interesting. This business of developing and organiz- ing a continent has been one of the most interesting things in the history of man. It's all happened, really, since the Civil War, forty years. And I've had a hand in it. But to save my soul I don't know what value my experience can have if I'm not to be allowed to tell it. I certainly would be no good as an imaginative writer. The facts, yes I know some of those! They'd be valuable, too, if only as a study of the human critter riding forces that are too big for him. But if whitewash is what they want, they can get it out of a pail. Or from Phil Hemming. I can't give it to them, that's sure ! "It's been thrilling, you see, like war. But looked at close to, it's every bit as ugly as war. "These reformers that have sprung up so thick lately, at- tacking all our business leaders everybody who's won a few fights and made a little money they're right enough, as far as they really go. Oh, they get most of their facts wrong, but still they're right enough. Things are every bit as bad as they say. The trouble comes when they try to solve a problem. They all leave the ground there go right up in the air. I've tried to work with them, you know. I've had scores of them speaking in our railway yards dur- ing the noon hour, and in both the eastern and western ship- yards all over the place. After some years of listening to them I've come to the conclusion that they haven't much to contribute. They're gadflies. Perhaps they're stimulants. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 147 Perhaps they'll finally prove to be really destructive forces. Though I doubt that. As far back as I've read, there's al- ways been about so many reformers to the thousand of population. They're always found, through history, in about the same attitude, saying about the same thing in the lan- guage of their particular time. About three-eighths of one per cent, of any people, any time, are reformers, I should say. "The trouble with this present lot, I think, is that they mistake the man for the force he's riding. They attack the man, and let the force alone. Now and then they even do for the man, but they never stop the force. The deep laws of nature work on regardless. And it's just luck they never know whether the man they kill is a smart devil gambling with the forces or a constructive leader. At that, the crook I mean the man whose personal motives are crooked may be the man more than any other that is steer- ing or combining forces in a way that will help everybody. And the man with the best personal motives may be work- ing the deepest harm. History seems to record that Louis XI was the builder of Modern France, a strong king; but he certainly was a crook. "I'm not so optimistic as I'd like to be about the whole game. I think you know pretty well how I feel. It comes down, with me, to something near fatalism. I can't follow the reformers, or the religious fanatics, or any of the talk- ers, because they always seem to me to run off into sheer opinion, or dogma, or some other place in the air. You know in modern business we don't care much about dogma traditions of any kind or about assertions of opinion. We can't. We're digging all the time for facts for new facts, and evidences of change in the old ones. Such opin- ions as we do indulge in we draw from such facts as we can get hold of. "That's the attitude I've been trained to, the only attitude I have. That's why I'm so nonplussed over this matter of the autobiography. The facts aren't wanted. And they're all I have to offer. As a people we shrink from the facts 148 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM about life and living. We live in a curious sort of play world make believe. Sometimes it seems to me that we're going to come down some day with an awful bump. For we're up in the air, seventy millions of us. And you can't stay in the air. Not very long, as history runs. "Take my life now. I could no more open up every hour of it to the inspection of innocent boys and girls than George Washington could, or W. E. Gladstone, or Henry V, or any political bishop, or Robert Bruce. There are queer, strong strains in my nature, queer spots in my his- tory. Yet I know that I'm certainly not below the aver- age, as life runs. I've not been a life-long drunkard, like Phil Hemming. I've never been out-and-out weak with women, like a certain very eminent man who has been con- sistently lied about in history. I've not been a sniveling, cruel little beast, like old Louis. I've taken hard blows and I've given them. The moments of passion or weakness (I don't know what to call them) have been incidents. Yet any one of them the Anna Maclntyre story, for instance I'm going to tell you about it shortly would, in the falsely trained public mind, outweigh a whole lifetime of conscien- tious hard work and some fairly solid achievement. "Even so, I'd rather, on the whole, they knew it. Because it's been a factor in my life. There's been a restlessness in me, and a passionate sort of bruskness. They've called me rough. I've been a dreamer, too. All my life I've been torn between the two tendencies. As a boy, I felt the strug- gle. That's why I held myself down to school and college it was a deliberate act of will. Perhaps it's why I've been such a reader. But we are what we are. It works out. "Certain things I've done. I put the Pacific lines to- gether after Phil Hemming wrecked them, and built up the system. It took sixteen years. "That I did. "And I built up the Cantey Line. I put the flag back on the seas. You'll never know what a fight it was, or the punishment I had to take from '93 to '95. It was awful. I paid a good many prices for the Cantey Line, one way or THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 149 another, gave hostages to fortune. There was bitter, ugly righting. I was unjust to some men. I crushed others. I couldn't stop without facing destruction for myself and for the men who had stood by me, so I went on. They called me ruthless. I was. "That success turned my head. I went into politics, landed in the Senate. You thought that an honor. Esther is prouder of it to this day than of anything else. She likes to think of herself as the senator's daughter. Well, dear, I bought the senatorship. It was weakness, vanity. Worse, it was a mistake. I stepped out of my game into theirs. They set traps for me and nearly got me. It be- came necessary to build up a strong political machine at home here. I did it, paying a lot more prices. By that time I despised myself. "After your mother's death I struggled a little, now and then, with drink. And there were several women in my life. I didn't care for them, but there they were. I won't try to build up excuses. You are to have the truth now. I've lost faith in everything else. "One of these women was a trap, Anna Maclntyre. Her brother was a cheap, crooked little lawyer. He blackmailed me through her. He is our mayor now, because of it. He has used me, I've used him. "And then, just about as I was groping out of this dark period, came your accident. It shook me to the roots of my life. The thought that you you were the most beautiful child I ever knew, and the gayest and brightest could never hope to walk again seemed more than I could bear. But it brought me up standing. When your mind runs back over all your dreadful suffering, at least remember that. It brought me up. God, how I've clung to you, how I've leaned on you ! I've kept you with me, built the special car for you just so I could keep you with me. You know some- thing of what these few wonderful years of our companion- ship have been. But you couldn't possibly know all they've meant to me. For they brought me out of the wilderness. I cut clear of the political mess and plunged back into my 150 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM own work, the only work for which I was fitted, building up the Cantey Line, solidifying the railroad system, and knitting them more closely together. After finally coming back to my senses I was frightened at seeing how far the old organizations had drifted. And strong young men were coming on to fight me. There was barely time to get a fresh grip. I want you to know that it was you your fresh clear, young mind, your sympathy and faith that saved me and all of us. "I've had luck. I must have started with gifts and op- portunities above the average. And few men began with such a wife as mine or ended with such a daughter. "Now about the biography. Some day we're going to study human life as we study plants and animals and stones. We'll dig for the facts, and weigh them, and construct new dogma. It will be better than the old dogma. For a while, anyway. It will clear out this present growth of hypocrisy. Once we come to admit a few truths about life, about char- acter, once we puncture for good and all this bubble of hu- man perfection, it will at least be harder for scoundrels to rule us and rob us through blackmail. "So, if you feel that you can, have them tell the truth about me, Miriam. I've got to leave the decision with you now. But if you do try it, don't for a moment forget that they'll fight like rats. They'll see it means telling the truth about them, too. Don't let Amme have a hand in it, or O'Rell, or those. Perhaps Listerly would help. I tried to put the idea before him one night on the train, going to New York. He seemed then to sense what I meant. He's cautious, shrewd, a trimmer. But he's not hard shell, like the others. His mind's fairly flexible. "Perhaps there is, somewhere in the English-speaking world, a man who can write fearlessly and sympathetically. Sympathy there must be. Real understanding. For I've not been a bad man, as men go. And I don't want the hypo- crites to get off so easily. "It must be a man with power, and with great detach- ment of mind. No hack could do it THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 151 "I couldn't lay this before Esther. She'd fight us, too. No, as it stands now, with the thing still unwritten, you're the only person in the world that I can be honest with. An odd reflection on life, isn't it! And we talk so much about honesty ! Too much ! We haven't, as a people, a glimmer of the true meaning of the word. "Am I too brusk with you, dear girl ? "I've leaned on you so . . ." Calverly lowered the paper. She was lying back in the big chair, her cheek on her hand. There was moisture in the blue eyes. He came slowly toward her ; with a curious, sudden touch of awe in his heart, laid the document on the heap of other papers in her lap. "You can see," she said, trying to smile, "why I was well, what you said It rather swept me off my feet be- cause, well, it was what father . . ." "I would give anything in the world," he began ; then paused, reddened, leaned back, confused, against the desk ; thrust his hands into his pockets. "You're the man, of course," she said now. "It was the last thing he asked of me." "But you don't know me well enough. You don't you see . . ." She moved a hand, wearily. "The surface things don't matter. You said it. Before you read this. The identical thing. Of course you're the man." "I wonder if if the surface things don't matter," he breathed, staring up at the ships. "No. They don't. You must do it for me and for him. Just as he asked." "We must think. All these other people. . . ." "I know. Up to now I've felt pretty helpless. I was so alone. But you've come. You can do it. I don't want to think of consequences, all that. I want his wish carried out. Because it was well, his faith." "He was a great man." 152 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "I felt that you would know that. He was." Calverly, his eyes shining now, looked down at her. "You're very tired," he said. "Yes. It's been pretty stirring. And I'm not strong" this with a touch of impatience. "I must . . ." She glanced toward the door and the wheel-chair. His eyes followed hers. She colored, and bit her lip. "Yes," she said, "I must go back." "I if you don't mind I'll have to carry you . . ." She lay back for a long moment with closed eyes. Then, with an abruptness that startled him it was the Jim Cantey strain in her again she began replacing the papers in the safe. He helped with this ; then pushed the steel door to for her, and spun the knob. And then teeth set, pulse racing, the hot color suddenly flooding cheeks and temples hesitating a little, hesitating too long, he bent to pick her up. She raised a hand. "It's understood?" she asked, a note of timidity in her voice that he found unnerving. "You'll write it as he wished." "I'll try," he said huskily, and took her hand. "It's understood?" she asked again. "Yes . . . it's understood." Then he lifted her and carried her back to her chair. And her hair brushed his cheek. He stood over her. "There's one thing I must tell you," he began hotly. "Please!" she breathed. She couldn't look up at him now. "I'm sorry I must rest." He sank down in Jim Cantey's swivel chair ; stared at the narrow door that he had closed on her; sprang up and rushed toward it ; came slowly back ; sat again, staring now at the row of wire baskets set out so neatly by Mr. Amme ; and then dropped his head on his arms and sobbed. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN How Mr. Guard's Stenographer Went to Coney Island Sat- urday Evening. And How Miss Russell Picked Up Ten Dollars THE talk, that evening, between Quakers and Amme, was in the Quakers home. Amme was well away before Mayor Tim came. Amme was disturbed. "Oswald," said he, when the study door was safely closed, "what was on your mind yesterday when you called up about this fellow Stafford?" "Nothing much. Cigar?" "Xo, thanks. What do you know about him?" "Nothing at all." "Nor I. What does Bob know?" "Hardly more, I think. We've got to go a little easy with Bob." "Yes, I know, but" "The publishers pressed him on Bob. Guard and he are old friends." "Then they know." "Possibly. They published a book he wrote." "Can't we run him down there?" "I'll take it up. Have you talked with the man?" "A little, this morning." "How'd he impress you?" "Very badly. Utterly incompetent, I should say." "Hardly that. He can write." "I know, but he's irresponsible. . . . See here, Os- wald, hadn't we better lay the situation frankly before Bob? Really, we ought to know a little something about the man." Quakers meditated ; shook his head. "No, let's not talk 153 154 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM to Bob. We'd just ruffle him more. Leave it to me for a few days." "Yes, but meantime there he is, with access to a consider- able part of the correspondence." "You went through it first, of course?" "Oh, yes. But there are leads, here and there, among the business letters " "Which an utterly incompetent man would hardly have the brains to follow up." "True enough. I suppose we needn't feel hurried. At best a man could spend weeks months reading the things I set out for him. But can you keep Tim Maclntyre quiet?" "Tim hasn't been to you?" "Yes." Quakers frowned. "One thing," he remarked, casually "when does Miriam come into the property?" "She has the house and contents now." "Yes, but" "Oh, the whole thing, you mean?" "Yes Cantey Estate." "On her twenty-fifth birthday October sixth." "Next October?" Amme bowed. "We've got time enough to turn around, then. Who are the other trustees ?" "Besides myself? Harvey O'Rell and Bob Listerly." "Esther gets only cash, doesn't she ?" "And securities. About a third. Mr. Cantey figured on her husband doing a bit of the providing." A little later, when he had again carefully closed the study door, he turned sharply on the flushed, slightly drunken mayor. "Tim, I told you to keep your shirt on." "Now, see here " "Don't talk that way to me! I'm attending to this little THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 155 matter at the Canteys'. I don't want you running around talking!" "Really, Quakers " "Drop that bluff, Tim! You've been to Amme. Stop it! Keep still!" "But that fellow" "I'm attending to that. I'm going to New York to-night. You've got to keep quiet. Don't go around reminding peo- ple of the contents of that safe, or you'll have 'em look- ing it up." "See here!" The mayor was on his feet, standing over the quietly smoking Qualters ; his voice rising to an oratori- cal pitch; a tremulous forefinger waving high. "What do you know about the contents of that safe? I'd like you to understand " "Sit down, Tim. I know more than you think. Let me see if I can make you understand this. Responsible busi- ness men aren't in the habit of telling their daughters of their little personal weaknesses. And invalid young ladies aren't given to studying business documents." The mayor here spoke in a surprisingly sensible, if de- jected tone. He even sat down to it. "Mr. Cantey," was his remark, "was honester than the rest of us, and more outspoken. He gave that girl the com- bination of the safe. And God knows what he didn't tell her! That's that's why I'm scared, Qualters." "But why didn't you stop at a little blackmailing, Tim? Couldn't you let well enough alone ?" "How could I help it, I'd like to know? It was years later. And Anna had to go and get married. Where was I then ? Tell me that ! She had a reputation of her own to look out for. And he saw it. He had me." "But at that, you needn't have put it in writing." "Oh, I needn't!" Mayor Tim sprang up again. "A lot you know about it. I'd like to have seen you face him down. I had to have the money. Anna was stinging me hard then. She's never let up on me. And there we were, 156 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM in Mr. Cantey's study. He stood over us wrote it out with his own hand. Told me to sign or he'd break my damned neck, and he'd have done it." "But couldn't the two of you " "Would you have had us kill him? Jim Cantey? I tell you, Quakers, he had us! Why Harvey " He stopped short. His mouth sagged at the corners, his eyes bulged, his breath went short. Qualters had risen. Perhaps he hadn't heard. He was going through some papers on his desk. "I've got to make the ten o'clock, Tim. Be glad to talk longer with you, but not to-night." Qualters had several important conferences and a direc- tors' meeting or two to attend in New York ; but he found time to take up, in his quietly offhand way, the Stafford mat- ter. Not wishing to appear in it himself, he first called up the manager of a detective agency that had done much work for the Painter interests, and later took a friendly news- paper publisher into his confidence. The publisher passed the query along to his "literary editor." An "operative" from the detective agency took Guard's stenographer to Coney Island on the Saturday evening. Meantime Harvey O'Rell found occasion to remark to Hannibal Simmons that an outright gift to the city of twenty thousand dollars on the part of an unknown young man who was glad to pick up a hack literary job at thirty- five a week had a queer smell. Fishy. Might easily be that there were papers in Jim Cantey's study that the Pa- cific Northeastern people or the enterprising group that had lately bought into the Middle Seas Line would give a for- tune to get hold of. Might even be blackmail along some new and clever line. And on a large scale. It would be rather interesting to know a little more about that check. Thirty-five-dollar-a-week men weren't commonly philan- thropists. He changed the subject there. But Simmons, his curios- ity stirred, started an inquiry of his own. It was rather delicate; he couldn't press it far. But he was able to inform THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 157 his friend, on the Saturday, that the man Stafford had no account in the Chicago bank that drew the check to him. So far as could be learned he had no bank-account at all ; certainly none here in the city. Mr. Amme took the matter up with Will Appleby, Esther Cantey's husband. This at the Town Club, over the high- balls. Will had fairly large manufacturing interests, down along the river. "It's a bit awkward, Will," he said. "In a way the mat- ter of the book was left in Bob's hands. But he shouldn't have gone ahead and put a man actually in there without so much as consulting the other trustees. He was touchy over the row with Tim Maclntyre." "But who is this fellow ?" "That's what we can't find out. Except that he's the man that wrote the Maclntyre story in Bob's paper. A complete stranger." "And Bob has put him in there? Turned him loose in Mr. Cantey's study?" Mr. Amme bowed. "But that can't be ! That book is a job for an old friend, or at least for a tactful man, known to the family. Bob spoke once of old Hitt. . . ." "One would naturally look for some one like that. We're a bit worried. For one thing he's young. And presentable enough, in a way. An out-and-out adventurer, clearly. Now, with Miriam there in the . . . this thought has occurred to me. Couldn't Esther persuade her to take a trip? Run over to England, say. The sea air would be good. And it would give us time to get hold of the situation." Will Appleby pursed his lips ; slowly shook his head. "Miriam's a strange girl," he said. "She and Esther have next to nothing in common. She oughtn't to live alone there with only Mrs. Bentley and Miss Russell, and the servants. Esther has spoken of it. But Miriam just gets mad. We're helpless. She's been an invalid so long, and Mr. Cantey made so much of her those last years . . . the fact is, 158 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM I doubt if Miriam can be managed at all. She'd never let Esther carry her off." Mr. Amme's quick, neat little thoughts were darting keenly about as he listened. It was true enough; the two girls had little in common. Esther was pretty, ambitious, eager for money an insatiable little spendthrift, if you came right down to it. Miriam was utterly careless of money; a girl who got excited over books and lived much in the creative world inhabited by her father. If it hadn't been for her accident there was really no telling what she might or mightn't have done gone into business, anything ! The accident had shut her up, of course, turned her thoughts in. Illness, suffering, do that. Here she was, now, distinct- ly, with all the romantic fire that had been in Jim Cantey but with none of his experience and stability. In pos- session of God-knew-what secrets and documents. Strong- headed wrong-headed, even as her father. . . . Through a queer caprice it was Miriam who would hold the real power, Esther, the power-hungry one, who must take the smaller portion and work out her problems through her husband a husband who was a nice fellow and a good enough business man but not a Jim Cantey. . . . And all the while that mad young adventurer was loose in the house ! "Could Miriam be influenced at all through Mrs. Bent- ley?" Will Appleby shook his head again ; threw out a hand. "Mrs. Bentley is, when all's said and done, a hired house- keeper. And she knows who's paying her." "And Miss Russell's a hired nurse." "Exactly." There seemed to be nothing, at the moment, to be done. Mr. Amme walked briskly to his office, brows knit, eyes intent on the pavement. Will Appleby smoked fast as he rode in his automobile to the factory. Oswald Quakers was back Monday morning. Faintly smiling he called up Harvey O'Rell and suggested lunch. Since Tim's little disclosure he had smiled a good deal over Harvey. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 159 Amme joined them and offered a report concerning the check and the Stafford finances. CXRell let him do the talk- ing. Said Quakers: "That'll help some. We'll get this man. He's an out-and- out crook." "I should hardly have thought that." This from Amme. Quakers lighted a cigarette. "The name Stafford's an alias." "You know that ?" Quakers drew from an inner pocket a typewritten docu- ment. It proved to be the Thursday to Sunday record of the New York operative. In spots it was amusing. Guard's stenographer had told all she knew. Most of it, however interesting, didn't apply. But she was clear about this "Stafford" name. Guard had told her that, among other things. She urged secrecy on her new young man. "Staf- ford" had never come to the office. But she had once taken a note to him for Mr. Guard. He was then staying at a mean little hotel far over on the lower West Side, near the steamship piers. The "Kelly Square Hotel" she believed it was called. She thought it hardly a reputable place, and was glad to get away from the quarter. But the young man interested her. She had tried to learn his real name, but it was nowhere in the files, and Mr. Guard wouldn't tell. "I've got lines out," said Quakers. "Have the name shortly. We ought to find out a little more about the check, too. Then we can close in on him." "Close in ?" The question was O'Rell's. Quakers nodded. "Going over Bob's head?" "Bob's had his chance. I'm going to take it up with the fellow direct." "But he'll go straight to Bob." "Not when I'm through with him. No, he won't go to Bob. He'll leave town, if he's lucky enough to keep out of jail." 160 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM The Applebys discussed the matter at home, while dress- ing for a dance at the Golf Club, guardedly. For there were profound reticences between them in the matter of Cantey Estate. "Saw Mrs. Bentley down-town," said Esther. She stood before her mirror, doing up her hair. She was shorter than her sister, and of a plumper mold. Her face was round, pretty, smoothly expressionless. "Miriam's flat again. Wear- ing herself out trying to run that big place. Why can't she make up her mind she's an invalid and let it go at that! I'm sure we'd all be glad to do what we could to make it easy for her." "Mrs. Bentley say anything" Will was buttoning a shoe "she say anything about the young fellow they've got working there?" "No." Esther stood motionless, her shapely white arms about her head. "What young fellow? What do you mean ?" "A queer chapa writer. Bob Listerly put him in to write your father's biography." "They wouldn't do that without consulting us!" "They have." "But just as a matter of common courtesy my own father" "Bob's turned him loose there, in the study." "Who is he?" "Nobody seems to know. Amme's worried. Seems to be an adventurer." "But Miriam's rooms are right next the Mr. List- shouldn't have done a thing like that!" "I know. But I didn't know quite what to say." "I should think you could have protested." Will began on the other shoe. "It isn't as if Miriam were a sophisticated girl used to men " Esther, brows knit, caught herself thinking aloud. "You know, Will, if it should ever come to a question of her marrying I mean if she were well enough, and it was a man we knew would be good to her I wouldn't for one THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 161 moment stand in her way. Not for one moment. . . . Why did he have to let him work right there in the house?" "The papers are all there." Esther was distrait, if smooth and smiling, all the even- ing. Shortly after breakfast the next morning she dropped in at the old Cantey place. Mrs. Bentley gray, calm to the point of stupidity, re- spectful met her in the hall. She thought Miss Cantey was feeling a little better. "The young man is working here to-day, is he?" "Mr. Stafford? Yes, he w r ent up a few minutes ago. He comes at nine." ' Esther's glance rested a moment on the housekeeper ; then she went on up-stairs. The study door was shut. She eyed it with cold curi- osity. To the nurse, she said: "My sister is ill, Miss Russell?" "Doctor Martin has just left, Mrs. Appleby. He says she is better." "What's the trouble?" "It's hard to say. Temperature, and a little delirium. A nervous setback. She insisted on getting up this morning, but Doctor Martin told her she must stay abed another day. I've thought " Miss Russell, hesitating, glanced toward the study door. Esther's gaze followed. "Well," said Esther then, "what have you thought?" "It's not a thing I'd speak of, Mrs. Appleby, but I should think it would be disturbing to have a stranger up here, working among Mr. Cantey's things. She's almost lived in that room. It meant a great deal to her." All the time she was sitting at Miriam's bedside Esther was considering this speech. Had the girl meant to place an emphasis on it? Curiosity burned in her brain. Miriam, too, seemed strung up, touchy. Esther told herself that she had some rights in the mat- ter. Even if her father had left the control of his vast 162 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM properties to this girl, surely her only sister was responsi- ble to the extent of advising her, guiding her. And he had thought of her as getting stronger; he hadn't pictured her as an out-and-out invalid, with a temperature, and a little delirium. If he had realized how helpless she was going to be, he would at least have given Will some little say in the matter. Leaving it to Miriam was all right ; nobody could question that; but how about leaving it to the designing men that were already worming their way into her confi- dence, or at least into the inmost secrets of Cantey Estate? She decided that Miriam had already seen this Stafford. Something had happened. She knew Miriam too well ; you couldn't fool her ! Before her very brief call was over Esther had built up in her own mind a point of view, complete, hard, fortified at every point with eager self- justification. The little sis- terly quarrel they had but set her thoughts the more firmly. Esther said after expressing sympathy and telling of the party of the club looking critically about her: "You ought to give up this big place, Miriam. Though goodness knows I don't want the care of it, myself. But you're simply wearing yourself out. You ought to take Miss Russell and Mrs. Bentley and go to a sanatorium and really rest. You can't carry all this burden." Miriam said she was really more comfortable here at home. "But, my dear, here are Will and I. I'm sure Will would be glad to help in any way he could. Business advice, that sort of thing. Here you are, you see, within a few months of taking over the Estate from the trustees, and you aren't even as well as you were last year." Esther walked down the hall with Miss Russell. They stopped before the study door, tacitly. A man's steps could be heard, pacing the floor. "He does that a great deal," remarked Miss Russell, in a discreet tone. Esther felt in her purse ; selected a bank-note ; glanced down and saw that it was for five dollars. That seemed THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 163 a good deal. Miss Russell had glanced down at it too, and was standing motionless. Esther had often heard Will say: "When I want a thing, I don't haggle or delay. I go after it. I get it." She was confused. Her pulse was beating high. She found another five-dollar note ; crumpled the two together; placed both in Miss Russell's oddly con- venient palm. Though Miss Russell was protesting a very little ; discreetly. "Let me know how things get along," said Esther; and fled down the stairs. CHAPTER NINETEEN In Which Miriam Stands Alone AFTER the scene with Miriam, Calverly found himself struggling with a sort of madness. Not since the first few awful weeks after Cicely's death had he sobbed as he sobbed there on Jim Cantey's desk. There was relief in it. But his mind was reeling. Love had come to him. It had fairly struck him. A love so sudden and so fantastically impossible as to seem grotesque. At one moment he was bitterly afraid of it ; the next moment he passionately wel- comed it. Over and over he tried to feel again the thrill he had felt when he picked her up that second time, had her in his arms, felt her hair brushing his cheek. It seemed the end and the beginning of life. The imperative desire to tell her the truth about himself was a fire in his brain. He quivered with impatience. At each sound in the house he sprang toward the narrow door. He felt that he couldn't bear it until another day; he couldn't bear it an hour. The dominant impulse during most of the day was simply to tell her and then go drop the job, the pay, the thrill of carrying out that fine strong desire of Jim Cantey's drop everything, plunge again into life Europe, Africa, China, anywhere. But next time with his own name. He didn't even think of suicide now. That thought had been born of depression. Now he was at a dizzy height. Twice during the afternoon, beside himself, he tapped at the narrow door. There was no response. That evening, in his new, not uncomfortable room on the back slope of the Hill, he sat long before the picture of Cicely in its little silver frame. A miracle had touched him. He needn't hide this great new experience from Cicely. He could face her picture now. She wouldn't mind. It would even please her. It was a renewal, if not of the old love, 164 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 165 then of the power to love. It was the rebirth of his dead heart. He knew now that he might, in time, have yielded to the mothering instinct of a Mary Maloney or to the subtle moral undermining of a Margie Daw. It would have been disheartening, but it would probably have happened. At living alone he had reached the end of his rope. If he was to live on at all, there must be some sense of companion- ship, somebody to care for or at least somebody to care for him. But now, by a sort of divine luck, it had come right. It wasn't weakness, it was strength. Nor was it bit- ter. The very touch of hopelessness in it exalted him. It wasn't desire ; not wholly desire. It was contact again with the creative thrill of life. It was the Power of his youth. It was health to his body, light to his eyes. . . . He could do something now. Something 1 But the heavenly madness burned at his nerves. He wrote until two in the morning on his confession, pour- ing his heart out on the paper. Then he tore it up. The difficulty was going to be, not in any failure of his desire to tell Miriam, but that against the confused hurt, the crushing sense of injury that his years of disaster and bitter struggle came to in his present thoughts, he couldn't make headway. These years were too close, too overpow- ering. It was the sort of thing a sensitive man can't talk about. He knew that he would literally break down if he tried. There was no sense in breaking down. But she must have the kernel of the truth. Given his real name, she could fill in all the sorry details. Everybody knew them. . . . He tried writing it briefly, simply; tore that up. . . . Talking was better. The direct thing. He knew that he would have to tell her in the morning. The moment he saw her. He couldn't wait. He tossed in bed ; dozed off now and then ; watched the red sunrise steal up the street through the trees; felt again that wisp of hair against his cheek. . . . And then for four days he entered the Cantey house at nine sharp; marched up the two flights to Jim Cantey's study; struggled to get his mind somehow on those wire 166 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM baskets of correspondence; walked the floor; jumped like a cat at every sound; watched that narrow door between the book-shelves and the window. He constructed letters to send through the post. It was the only channel of communication open to him. But he found he couldn't quite do it. She could see him if she chose. It rested with her. He must wait. Somehow he did wait; if not repressing the fires within him, at least concealing them. He found himself making acquaintances in his new home. There was one odd, dry little talk with Mr. Amme walking up the street in the morning. And he wrote to Margie Daw, enclosing a ten-dollar note on account ; wrote two letters, in fact the first stiff to the point of brusk- ness, which he couldn't send because of what he felt to be her kindness. The second he sent. There was gratitude in it, which she, in the curious frenzy of the woman who has overreached and is driven to make her point, misread. She replied by messenger, in a brisk penciled scrawl, enclosing a theater ticket for the evening. He would find her in the next seat. Afterward, if he'd see her back to the rooms, she'd cook up a rabbit. It was too late to be answered. It disturbed him. He tried to rouse himself to the situation, feeling that he must at least appear to handle it like a man of the world Margie was such an impulsively good sort and ended by letting the evening slip by; doing nothing. The next morning, after eleven, she called up. He was standing on a chair, elbows on the top book-shelf, moodily studying out the details of the model ship, the Congo; pushing open little doors, drawing thread-ropes through pulleys, peeping in at minute portholes. He heard the bell. There was a desk telephone. He hadn't used it. He stared down at it now. Pictures of Miriam Cantey swam, wavering in emotional clouds, before his inner eye. The bell rang again. He answered now. It didn't occur to him that anybody in the outside world knew he was here. Or cared. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 167 Margie's voice seemed dry, a little hard. It came out of a remote past, before something, when life was all of an- other color, when it was something else. He had to think quickly to catch her tone. "Sorry you couldn't get around," she said. She was pleasantly offhand, yet he felt the exigent strain in her. "Yes, I was sorry," he heard himself saying. "You've got to come and see me, Henry. I must hear all about it." "Not much to tell," said he. "Not yet. Just groping around, getting started." "How are you fixed for to-night ?" "Well to-night I'm pretty busy to-night, Margie." She called up again at four. It seemed that Julia Mar- lowe was coming to town. If he wanted to go, she'd have to apply well ahead for seats. Margie seemed a little gushing now, or girlish. Agaia he put her off. He felt a boor. But the miracle had come to him here in Jim Cantey's study. And somewhere be- yond the narrow door was Miriam. The place was sacred, a room of dreams. The thought that Margie, anybody, could intrude at any moment over the wire, struck a chill into his heart. She called up the next day. This time just to wish him a good morning. She was a little worried about him, she said. How could she be sure he was really better? He must show himself; report. Who was taking care of him now, anyway? . . . Before he could work through the mumbling into a coherent reply, she had rung off, with a "Well, I must run along. Do take care of yourself, Henry. Let me know if I can do anything. And please don't be silly about that money. I'm not broke. I'd tell you if I was. So long!" He hung up the receiver; sank back in his chair. Had he involved himself? Had he let Margie into his life? Suddenly he could see himself lying sick in her room, in her bed ; and she there smoking a cigarette ; and a nurse, 168 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM dressed to go, unpleasantly taking the two of them in with a look. He brushed a tired hand across his eyes. He looked wistfully up at the Congo. Jim Cantey had worked his dream out. He had been able to. Some men, with the best efforts, couldn't. Luck and gifts entered there. Jim Cantey knew that. Calverly thought of a ship becalmed in the Gulf Stream. There was a figure! Life seemed like that. You coukl work endlessly on your ship; you could work your heart out, on deck, in the rigging, below. But you couldn't stop it drifting. Jim Cantey 's sails had caught the trade winds. There was a tap at the narrow door. He sat limp, motionless; fought for his breath. He hadn't foreseen it would be like this. He was trembling. Again the tapping, a little stronger. Somehow he got up ; opened the door. She was there, in the wheel-chair. "I've been ill," she said ; and caught her breath. "I couldn't get word to you. Not very well." "I tired you," he said, "that day." "Xo. Or yes, perhaps. I don't mind that. It's better to be tired sometimes. I'ye been so useless." "Oh no!" "Yes, I have. It's no good going on like that." He was feasting his eyes on her. She was frailer, sweeter. What wonderful hair she had! There was red gold in it. And her eyes that extraordinarily vivid blue! Over and over and over he had tried to bring her distinctly before his mind's eye, each time failing. And now here she was! His pulse was pounding at his temples. He leaned against the door-frame. "And you," she asked, hesitating "how have you been ?" "Oh, all right, only .... I've wanted to see you." "Yes, I know. I've wanted I promised you the papers. I've wondered what you'd think." "Oh, I knew ... of course. . . ." He waved toward the desk. . . . "I've been wrestling with this stuff. Haven't got very far with it." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 169 "Of course not. I'm going to give you the others. So you'll have them by you, in case I " Her eyes were taking him in, with a curious touch of timidity. Her voice was none too steady. "I wonder," she went on, "if you have any safe way of keeping them." "You mean, if I " "You might want to take them home with you. We we agreed, you know. You are to help me carry out father's wish. There was a strong box here. There on the bot- tom shelf, in the corner." He brought the box to the desk, "We can put them the important ones in that." They were both looking at tbe safe now. "I I'll have to get them out," she said, rather hurriedly. "I may have to to trouble you to well, help me this one time. Afterward I shan't have to trouble you." There was a pause. He found himself moving toward her. Once he glanced at her; she was studying the floor. A wave of delicate color was flooding her pale skin. She bent her head lower as if to hide it. At the door he stopped short. He knew, suddenly, that if he were so much as to touch her his resolution would give way. As for taking her up again in his arms . . . "Xo," he heard himself saying. "No. Not to-day. I might lose them. You see, I have to go through all this stuff anyway, first. I could I could let you know when " It was curiously difficult to get the words past his thick tongue and throat. He drew himself up, hands clenched, at his sides, breath- ing deeply. "There's something I must tell you. My name isn't Staf- ford." He could feel rather than see the look of blank amazement that came over her face. The color had gone. And there were the beginnings of pain there. He rushed, blundering, on. "It isn't Stafford. I'm not bad. Not exactly. I've had trouble. You'll understand, perhaps, when I tell you . . ." 170 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM But he couldn't tell her. The breakdown was upon him. He stood there, fighting it; feeling her great blue eyes full on his face. He choked down a sob; came forward. She shrank back a little way in the chair. But, very gently, he wheeled her aside, then rushed past her across the room her own sitting-room to the desk by the window ; snatched up a book that lay there, Satraps of the Simple, by Henry Calverly, and thrust it into her wondering hands. "That's my name !" he cried. "That's who I am ! Now you know !" He left her then; wandered back into the study; stared out a window; stood there a long time, until an odd new rustling sound startled him into turning. She was walking across the study, balancing with her arms and reaching out to catch a corner of the desk. Just before touching it she sank to the floor. He was lifting her now; breathing out the feeling that was overflowing his heart. Once his lips brushed her fore- head. "I love you !" he was whispering. "It's dreadful. I mustn't tell you. I'll go. That's why I didn't want " "Please !" she said gently. "Not that !" "Oh, I know I'm" "Help me up. You don't know all these years it's my first step !" He saw now that she was intent on her own great ex- perience. "But you mustn't! It will hurt you! It may kill you! Oh, please !" "I don't care ! Just steady me. Let me walk. Over here, by the safe." She sank down in the big chair, white, eyes closed, lips compressed in pain. After a moment she laid a frail hand on her breast. He stood over her, white himself, tense, in an agony. She was speaking, very low, without opening her eyes. He had to bend over. "It's wonderful!" THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 171 "But you" "I don't care. I'm going to walk every day. I must stand alone." "But if you the doctors " "Please ! I simply don't care. They've kept me down all these years. I'm changing. This is new." She stopped abruptly ; rested a little longer ; then, clearly still in pain, stopping often for breath, opened the safe. They made a selection among the note-books and papers. "There's a bell in my room there," she said then, "be- tween the windows. Please ring it. I'll have Miss Russell carry me back. . . . Somebody in the house is sure to know anyway. You have to trust somebody. Father often said that." He rang; then came back and stood over her. "If I could only help you!" he said, sadly. "Help me!" And to his amazement she gave a little laugh. Then, abruptly, she said "I hear her coming. You'd better put those things in the box. The key's inside, I think." He hurriedly filled the box. Miss Russell stood in the narrow doorway. Her startled gaze rested on Miriam, darted to the open safe, the strong box on the desk, the slender, sensitive young man who was just putting some papers in it and locking it, and back to the girl in the big chair. "Please carry me back," said Miriam. "But " The nurse looked again at the young man. "I walked here, Miss Russell," said Miriam, wearily. "I'll ask you to carry me back." "You walked f" "Yes. No more, please !" And when the nurse had placed her carefully in the wheel-chair, she added, "You may go now." Slowly, eyes rolling, lips pursed, Miss Russell went, clos- ing a door behind her. There was a long, long silence. 172 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "I'll close the door," he said. "No, wait a little." She had Satraps of the Simple in her hands again; was studying it, turning the leaves. She didn't look up. "I don't see why you trust me so." "Father followed his instincts." "I I shouldn't have told you what I " "Perhaps you won't see me for a few days again." "It would be better." His tone was despondent. "That's why I wanted you to have the papers." "After all I've been through all they would tell you about me. . . . It's been such a fight." "Perhaps that's why," she said He looked puzzled. "I mean," she said, "that perhaps it's because you've had to fight and suffer that I get this wonderful inspira- tion from you. You don't you can't know what it means what you've done. I've been like a dead girl. I'm awake now. My fight is just beginning. To-day! My fight!" She raised a hand. He came in ; clasped it. Once again color came to the two finely sensitive faces. "You you'll want to work," said she. "You're very tired," said he. "I will rest now." "I'll close the door." It didn't occur to him then, thrilled with terrible happiness, that an invalid girl, however intelligent, how- ever deeply in the confidence of her father, may know little or nothing of the daily narrative of crime and disaster in the newspapers. He had assumed that the mere men- tion of his real name would recall to her every hideous de- tail of the Watt trial, his imprisonment, everything. He took it for granted now. CHAPTER TWENTY The Fever Called Love MISS RUSSELL, her face a mask, moved briskly about, putting Miss Cantey's room to rights. Miss Cantey herself lay on the bed, propped up with pillows, her reading lamp lighted, a book, Satraps of the Simple, in her lap. It was half past seven. The dinner tray had gone down. Yet Miss Cantey in a curious silent state of excitement had refused, sharply for her, to be undressed for the night. And the wheel-chair was right there by the bed. Miss Russell hesitated in the doorway. "I'm very comfortable here," said Miss Cantey, abruptly. "I'll ring when I need you. No, don't close the door. I want the air." Miss Russell moved discreetly away. The study door stood open. She paused there, looking at the telephone instrument on the desk. She went on down-stairs. There was another such instrument on the lower stair landing, but Mrs. Bentley was in the living-room reading the paper. To her Miss Russell spoke, in a voice of professional quiet. "I'm going to run over to the drug store. If Miss Cantey rings I'll be right back." From a telephone booth in the drug store she spoke to Mrs. Appleby. A little scene followed at the Applebys'. The manufacturer was roused from a comfortable absorp- tion in the evening paper by a tremulously indignant Esther. "Will ! Listen ! Something's got to be done at once !" "What on earth's the matter, Esther?" "That fellow Miriam's been in father's study with him. He must have carried her in. She claims she walked. Imagine! What can we have been thinking of to let things run so loose! She opened the safe for him. They put some 173 174 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM of the papers into a strong box. Miss Russell saw him carry the box away when he went home." "But how does Miss Russell" "She she says she thought I ought to know. Miriam called her in. She actually sa\r it. The thing's gone further than any of us dreamed. . . . Will, don't sit there like that ! Get up ! Do something 1" "Yes, I know, dear, but " Will slowly rose; leaned rather helplessly against the center table "But you must give me a minute to think." "Why ? What is there to think about ? It's time to act now. There isn't a minute. He's coming back this evening. Miriam wouldn't let Miss Russell undress her. She's sure there's some understanding . . . Don't stand there like that! Can't you do something?" "At the moment I don't see just what, dear. Miriam's twenty-four years old. She's living there on her own prop- erty. We" Esther stamped. Over the pleasantly round, usually placid face clouded emotions were racing, hints of the gath- ering storm behind it. "How can you talk like that!" she cried. "Her own property! Oh, I've been patient with her. I've been kind and yielding. And this is what I get in return! I've never taken the slightest step to contest the will. Father made her his pet, gave her everything I never said a word. And now, when my worst fears are realized, now when she's fallen into the clutches of this unknown man, this cheap rascal, and is actually taking steps to blacken my own father's name " "But my dear, how do you know " "Oh, don't speak to me! If you can't speak like a man! Can't you see what's happening? The girl's a helpless in- valid. What can she know about the world, about men! Here's a blackmailer worms his way in there and in less than a week she's turning over to him all my father's secrets. ... I suppose you'll say we can't legally do anything !" THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 175 "Well, my dear, now wait just a moment " "That's it! Wait! Wait! Wait! And meantime he packs father's secrets into a tin box and carries them away ! And meantime Miriam's waiting there to give him more, hopelessly infatuated !" She drew herself up, flushed with a burning rage. "Why" she cried "why didn't I marry a man ! A man !" And stormed out. The person she had happened to marry thrust his hands into his trousers pockets and for a brief time paced the floor. Then he snatched up a cap and rushed out of the house and down the Hill to Mr. Amme's. Amme said, "If you'll just leave this to me I think some- thing may be done." To which Will, in some relief, replied, "Good! And call on me if I can help." And to the still excited woman wait- ing on his front porch he remarked : "I've started things, my dear. Now you must try to keep patient. You and I mustn't appear too much in this. Everything that can be done's being done." Miriam lay motionless listening. The front door opened and closed, a faint but familiar sound, far below. She lifted her head. Color crept into her pale cheeks. Then her head sank back on the pillows. The step on the stairs was Miss Russell's. The nurse glanced in at the door. "You may go out for a while, if you like," said Miriam, in a breathless voice. "But but you'll be going to bed, Miss Cantey." "Oh, no! Not now. I'm comfortable enough this way. I'd rather be alone. When I'm ready for bed I'll call Mrs. Bentley." Miss Russell slightly pursed her lips ; but recollected her- self and moved discreetly away. "And you might just leave the door open," said Miss Cantey. "I like the air." The nurse's mouth twisted into a queer half-smile as she moved off down the hall. Miss Cantey didn't seem to know 176 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM that she had spoken twice about the door. Things were going along at a great rate ! Miriam listened while Miss Russell went to her own room, then down-stairs and out of the house. Through the open window came the sound of her quick light step on the stone sidewalk, a sound that died away. Miriam still listened. Her eyes sought the clock on the mantel. She glanced at the book in her lap ; held it up (the effort brought a twinge of pain) and restlessly turned the pages. It was a book she loved. For years she had loved it, the fresh nervous English, the deft merciless charac- terizations each in a sentence or two the almost casual wit. The Henry Calverly who had written it had seemed as remote as Lord Tennyson. The amazing thing to her, just now, was his youth. He seemed a boy. And he had suffered. The world had in some way nearly broken him. No wonder a genius, sensi- tive, delicate of mind, hopelessly lacking in the crust that a man must have who is to live in the world of men and women! Ah, women! She wondered; what sort had he known ? She lay back on the pillows ; closed her eyes ; tried to compose her thoughts. It would be difficult ; she knew that. After years of suffering and solitude, he had come like a mad angel into her life. All her secret imaginings were suddenly, irresistibly embodied in him. Her reason, she knew, was going, was gone. It seemed a day since she had seen him. There was another step on the stone walk. Her quick ear selected it from the other familiar sounds of the city. Heedless of the pain in a curious way welcoming it she raised herself on an elbow. What was pain now! She had stood alone. He had done that to her, after all these years. She resented all the others Esther, this nurse who suddenly seemed a stranger, Mrs. Bentley, Doctor Martin fiercely resented them. The feeling was so near hatred that it frightened her, left her confused. They had kept her down, cautiously surrounded her ; but he, the merest thought THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 177 of him, was a flame in her breast. For him she had risen and walked. She thought of it, now, as a miracle. During the years she had forgotten how to want to walk. Now she was torn by new wild dreams of another sort of life. For the first time since her late girlhood she saw herself walking about like other people, on the street, on the golf course, living, working, even laughing. The fear came that she might not have the physical strength to endure this excitement. That almost familiar step turned in at the front walk. It was a man. Could it be he? The bell rang, far below. There was a long wait. Then the door opened ; there were faint voices and a step on the stairs. He came up, and up. Her color was coming and going; her pulse beat high in her temples. He was right here now, on this floor. He went into the study and quietly closed the door. She lay there, struggling desperately to clear away the unreason that clouded her thoughts. Then, unsuccessful in this, swept helplessly, blindly along on a torrent of sheer feeling, heedless of the pain the effort brought, she some- how got herself from the bed to her chair, and, white now, propelled herself back into her sitting-room. The narrow door was closed. For a long moment she lay back, motionless, gazing at it. She heard him then, moving about. The fear seized her that he might suddenly go. He might have come for a paper or a book. She wheeled around and tapped at the door. It opened so quickly that she started. The strong box stood on the desk; he had brought it back. He spoke first. This was a relief. She felt that she couldn't have broken that silence. "I had to come," he was saying. "I couldn't wait over- night. If you hadn't been here I was going to send for Miss Russell and ask to see you. I brought those papers back. You must put them in the safe." 178 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM His manner, his voice, depressed her. She spoke now, to ward off what was coming. "Very likely you're right," she heard herself saying, in an almost matter-of-fact voice. "I'll tell you I'll give you the combination. Then you can get them out as you need them." "Oh! no- o " "Please. I think I'd better not try to walk again to- night." They couldn't look at each other now ; the possi- bility of his carrying her, as matters stood, had so plainly passed. "Listen, please !" And she quietly recited the com- bination. He stood motionless. "Please!" she said again. "If you'll go to the safe " He obeyed now, following her directions until the steel door swung open. "You can get the box in, I think," she said. "Yes," said he, "there's room enough. I'll lay the key on it." "Or keep it," said she. "It doesn't matter." "I'm afraid it does. I can't keep it. I can't do this." "You mean?" "This work. I'm going to Mr. Listerly to-night. I can't do it. I've had to trust that you'd understand. It's rather difficult to talk about it, but . . ." His voice trailed into silence. He closed the safe and sank on the arm of the big chair to which he had carried her. He gazed dismally out the window, then up at the row of model ships . . . Jim Cantey's sails had caught the trade winds ! Her eyes wandered downward. There was his book in her lap. She couldn't remember bringing it. She fingered it. It was as nearly impossible now to bring her spirits up to the level of reason as it had been, a few moments earlier, to bring them down to that level. "It's been like a wonderful dream," he said, without taking his eyes from the ships. "I spoiled it. I lost my- self. I told you I loved you." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 179 "I think," said she, very low, intently studying the cover of the book, "we needn't talk about that." "I'm sorry." His voice was gentler. "But that's what makes it so plain, of course. All these years I've thought I could never love again. It's been a problem every day, just to want to live, keep going. I didn't know there was a girl like you in the world. I shall know now, always, after I'm I'm gone, that you've brought me to life again. It isn't fair to bother you with it, but I do want you to know that. I want you to know that you've helped me. You see, I've made such a mess of my life." There was a long silence. Then she said, still looking down "I thought I had your promise to do the book. You see, I had about given up hope of ever working it out as father wished. I I didn't know there was a man like you." He threw out a hand. "It's so clearly impossible," he was bitter. "I'm poor, useless. I can't even use my own name. Oh, it's impossible! I can offer you nothing a thousand times worse than nothing. It would injure you even to be known as my friend." "Oh," said she, "you mean reputation that!" "Certainly." "I don't think I care." "You would have to care." "But father didn't. Not for himself. He thought of protecting Esther and me. Every one protects me. They've been dreadfully wrong about it. Couldn't we can't we regard this thing well, impersonally ?" He sprang up ; strode to a window ; stood, hands in pockets, staring out. "No," he muttered, "we can't. Or I can't: I'm sorry. I know I'm failing you. Probably I'm weak. Anyway, the fact that I can't settles it. I'm no good. That's one fact that appears to be established." She lifted her eyes. "Of course that's absurd 1 You are Henry Calverly! You wrote this book." She held it up. "You're young. You lost the touch for a while, but it will come back. You'll write other books. There's no 180 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM one in the world quite like you. In your heart you know that ; you know I'm speaking the truth !" He turned on her, a somber light in his eyes. "Do you really think that? Do you believe I'll get it again?" "Of course! What right have you to be discouraged? At your age ?" "But look at the mess I'm in! An utter failure! When you come right down to it, an outcast !" "Hasn't every artist suffered every real artist? Just think back. Hardly one of the great ones has got on in the world; any number have been outcasts!" She could feel his eyes ; they had been gray-blue, but now they were dark. The telephone rang. "I'll answer," he said, absently, reaching for the instru- ment. Then turned on her with this. "I must ask you not to make it hard. The least I can do is to quit, go. I've broken down at everything else. It won't do to break down at this stay aimlessly on make love to you fasten my wrecked life on yours. And if I look at you much longer Again the bell. "You'd better answer it," she said. And added, "You've made me walk." He clapped a hand over the transmitter. "Queer," he said. "It's Amme. Wants me to go to a Mr. Quakers' house at once. Seems to think it's important. Nobody else will do." He listened again, then replied with, "All right, Mr. Amme. I'll be over. . . . Yes, at once." He came to the door now. "Did he say what it was ?" she asked, fingering the book. "No. Something about a serious conference. I I think the best thing would be to say good-by." He stood over her. She didn't look up. He turned, hesi- tated, listened vainly for a sound from her, finally walked out and down the stairs. The sound, when it came, failed to reach his ears. It was a sob. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE Oswald Qualters Undertakes to Close In AM ME, more cautious than Will Appleby, wouldn't trust his news to the telephone. He hurried over to Qual- ters' house. "The time has come to close down on that chap," he said, when the library door was safely shut. "I hardly think so. There are reports still to come to me. I haven't even his real name yet." "Can't wait for it. He's got into the safe." Quakers was lighting a cigar. He glanced up- sharply, "How do you know that?" Amme told him. Quakers smoked and considered. After a short while, chatting easily on other topics, he reached for his tele- phone. "Calling Harvey O'Rell," he explained. Mr. O'Rell was not at home. The Golf Club was sug- gested. Finally he was found at the Town Club. "Oh, Harvey," said Quakers then, "a little problem has come up. Hop in your car and drive around to my place. Yes, right away. . . . Excuse yourself, then. I need you here. It won't keep. . . . Con- cerns the papers in Jim Cantey's safe. The one at his house. . . . All right. Come right along." It wasn't customary to order Harvey O'Rell about like that. Amme's keen, dry little face exhibited surprise and curiosity which Quakers met with only a faint smile. When O'Rell came, Quakers left Amme to call up the young man known as Stafford, trying his boarding-house first, then the Cantey home. He showed his guest into a reception room and closed the doors. 181 182 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM O'Rell watched him guardedly. "Bit of a scrape, Harvey," said the host easily. "Our young friend has fascinated Miriam Cantey and got into the safe up there. He took some of Jim's old papers to his boarding-house this evening, in a strong box of Jim Cantey's. It's no time to stop at trifles. You can't afford to let him keep those papers." Their eyes met. O'Rell, physically big and strong, con- sidered the rather dapper lawyer. "Why do you include me?" he asked bruskly. "Harvey," Qualters replied, "better drop it. I have the facts." "What facts?" "For one thing, a curious little document involving you and Tim Maclntyre in a straight bribe of ten thousand dollars." Again, eye to eye, they weighed each other. O'Rell was the first to turn away. "Well ?" he remarked, quietly enough. "I want you to go straight to Tim, now, and order him to get that box back." "Any suggestions as to the method ?" There was a trace of sarcasm in O'Rell's voice. "It's easy enough. Have one of his precious police cap- tains send a porch-climber around. Tim's got thugs that would kill you for fifteen dollars and call it a pretty fair day. Don't let him give you a word of nonsense. lie's got to get that box and deliver it here to me by ten to-night. Meantime, I'll hold this Stafford here. And I want you to send Tim around. Tell him to come to the side door. Bet- ter get back as soon as you can, yourself." "What are you going to do to Stafford ?" "Break him. I'll do that for you." O'Rell said, "Very well. I'll see Tim." Qualters detained him a moment ; found that Stafford had been located at the Cantey home, and was on his way ; then sent him forth. He and Amme then smoked and waited in the study. He THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 183 employed himself writing a note in pencil, which he sealed in an envelope, addressed to Senator Painter, stamped, and slipped into his pocket. It read : "My dear Senator: "It's working out more rapidly than I've dared hope. I've got both Maclntyre and O'Rell where I want them. O'Rell was the real stumbling block. I think I can promise you that very shortly now the remains of the Cantey Machine will be in our hands. "Q" A quarter of an hour later Stafford was announced. Quakers sent down word for him to wait. Another quarter-hour passed. Quakers talked lightly of this and that. Amme grew even quieter, and watched his host. He knew the power of the man. "Old Painter's right eye," Jim Cantey had called him, a year or so before he died. But this chatty side was interesting. A facile person, clearly ; with a sure light hand ! O'Rell came up the stairs ; grave, silent. He gave Qual- ters a slight inclination of the head. It was report enough. "The man's down-stairs," he said. "Yes," said Quakers, "I know." He rose now, laid down his cigar, for a moment considered the room critically; then he drew out a chair to the center of the room, not too near the table-desk, turned out the wall lights behind it, drew two other chairs nearly in a line with his own, backs to the mantel, and switched on the other lamps on this same side of the room, so that a strong light would fall on the occupant of the single chair. He even tilted a little the shade of the desk-lamp, throwing that light glaringly on the wall behind and above the single chair, about where the unfortunate young man's eyes would be. Then he rang, and said to the answering servant, "Ask Mr. Stafford to step up here." The young man, stepping hesitatingly forward against the light, impressed all three as looking distinctly seedy and 184 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM not overstrong. And each in his own way wondered what on earth Bob could have been thinking of. He was any- thing but a businesslike young fellow; lacked address; appeared to be confused, glancing from one to another of the three inscrutable men before him. "I'm Mr. Qualters," said the central one of these. "You've met Mr. Amme. And this is Mr. O'Rell." "I've met Mr. O'Rell, too," said the man. The general manager of County Railways ignored thi.s little thrust. If it was a thrust. Very likely it wasn't. The man didn't look as if he were capable of thrusting. He stood in a rather awkward position; shifted his feet; took off his glasses and then had to hunt from pocket to pocket for his handkerchief. "Sit down," said Quakers sharply, indicating the chair in the light. The man glanced at it, then at the row against the man- tel. His sensitive mouth twitched a very little. Then he sat down, like a tired person, settling back and shading his eyes with his hand. The three took the other chairs. Their faces were shad- owed, but he could feel their hard eyes on him. Then, cutting through the silence, came the sharp voice jpf Mr. Quakers. "What is your name?" Calverly sat motionless. "Come ! Out with it ! We want the truth !" Calverly weakly shifted his position. It was suddenly tfifficult, if not impossible, to keep the old lie going. He moistened his lips. "Perhaps you don't know your own name!" Calverly moved a hand ; it might have been in protest. ''Will you tell us what you call yourself, then?" Calverly looked at them from under his shading hand. He 'flt himself recovering. The wait down-stairs had been trying. And Mr. Quakers had, for a moment, taken his breath away. Then the arrangement of chairs and lights had been so flatly hostile. He thought of the Inquisition. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 185 But he was swiftly recovering; he felt it, and drew a long breath. The little scene with Miriam had curiously, unex- pectedly, put heart into him. He wouldn't see her again; would leave town, if it came to that; but he knew deeply that she wanted him to go on. Now that the scene was over, he recalled every vivid instant of it. She had all but put her life in his hands. It wouldn't do ... still, she had ! Sitting down-stairs there, alone, it had begun to come clear to him and give him strength. Oswald Quakers was an extremely astute man. He was more than equal to most of the men he met. He knew their desires, their evasions, their self-justifications, sensed their strength or weakness, could usually, in a lightning calcula- tion that was partly intuition, partly clear brain, estimate their price. All these others were deeply involved in the fight for profits or for office. It was so absurdly easy to see what they wanted. But this young man puzzled him. Not seriously; he was sure he could break him; still the fellow was elusive, didn't readily place himself in Quakers' mind. That there could be such a thing in life as a seedy youngster who didn't want anything in the world that wealth could give, whose one dream was to recover firmly the great gi ft he had lost, was, in some some degree at the moment, at least beyond Quakers. Such a thought didn't occur to him. This fact was Calverly's strength. He sensed it, gripped it. These men were after him with a gun ; that much was clear from the very way they sat, bent their black looks on him. Well, he wouldn't give them much satisfaction. Very likely the jig was up. They had him. They meant pitilessly to expose him. But he hardly cared. The jig was up any- way. They couldn't expose him to Miriam Cantey. For she knew. And what else mattered ! He sat up straight ; dropped his hand and faced the light ; then abruptly rose. The three started apprehensively. "I'll just turn this a little," he said, in an explanatory voice, and moved the desk-lamp. 186 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Then standing opposite them, looking down, his mouth twisted in a wry, slightly self-conscious smile: "What's it all about?" he asked. "You asked me to come I came. Now you put me in the witness chair and turn your lights on me. What's the idea ?" "Sit where you like," said Quakers bruskly. "What is your name ? Will you tell us that ?" "I'm trying to think up some reason why I should tell you anything." "You call yourself Hugh Stafford." . Calverly couldn't, just then, have uttered that name him- self, but he bowed. He could do that, barely. Qualters leaned forward on the table. "Who sent you here, anyway?" The only reply was that same almost contemptuous smile. "Answer that, please! Who sent you here?" "Nobody." "Then why are you here?" No answer. "You must be aware, Mr. well, to save discussion I'll call you Stafford you must be aware that a man who uses a false name to worm himself into the confidence of " "Wait, please; I've wormed myself nowhere. If you mean the Cantey biography, Mr. Listerly offered me that job. I'd never heard of it. I took it because I needed the money." "Oh, you needed it?" "Yes." His color was rising. "I needed it." "The pay is thirty-five dollars a week, I believe." "Perhaps well yes, it is." "And you had no money nothing else?" "No, I didn't. Though that might be thought my own business." "Yours, and ours." "My business has been with Mr. Listerly. Why isn't he here?" "Two of the three trustees of the Cantey Estate are here. You tell me you had no money. You needed this thirty- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 187. five dollars a week. Yet, through Mr. Listerly, you are pro- posing to give twenty thousand dollars outright toward the public baths. How about that?" Miriam's chair was still before the narrow door when Miss Russell unexpectedly returned. "You needn't have hurried back," said Miriam, in a breathless voice. "I had nowhere particular to go. Wouldn't you like to go to bed now, Miss Cantey?" There was a silence. Miss Russell came briskly in ; stood near. "Shan't I put you to bed, Miss Cantey?" "No-o. No!" "I'm afraid you'll be tired." Miriam seemed not to hear this. She looked tired now. Her eyes were brighter than normal. Miss Russell watched her hands and thought her very nervous. "Carry me in there, please 1" "Where, Miss Cantey?" "Into the study, of course !" Yes, she was nervous. "Put me in the big chair, between the desk and the safe." "I really think you'd better" "I didn't ask you what you thought. Please do as I tell you!" It was not like her to speak irritably. The nurse, as she obeyed, decided that things were going on very fast. "Now leave me, please !" "But really, Miss Cantey" "Please ! And shut the hall door." The nurse went out. Miriam settled back and closed her eyes. He had carried her to this chair. She dwelt on the memory. She felt again his strong young arms about her. The color, as she indulged the dream, flowed again into her wan cheeks. She had been like a dead girl. But he had brought life. He had broken through the walls of habit that had shut in her soul and let the warm light in. And she had reached out to him. What was a little pain 188 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM now! What were the accidents of wealth and reputation! The feelings stirring in her now were not like the self she had been ; they were more, perhaps, like the father she had worshipped elemental, divinely reckless. He wouldn't come back. He would struggle on, suffer on, without her. But he loved her. Her delicate lips curved in a smile. He loved her! She hadn't told Miss Russell when to come back. And she could never, alone, reach the bell. Her fall of the afternoon told her that. Even if the doctors had been wrong, her old injury healed, the supposed paralysis but a bad habit, there were muscles to be trained, a new habit to be built up. She would have to learn to walk. Every day she would try it a little, fight it out, work free of nurses, doctors, housekeepers; begin, at last, to live. . . . The recklessness grew. A new magic had touched and quick- ened her spirit. She knew now how terribly alone she had lived since her father's death. In a way the new life would be harder. All this care had brought her, she felt, to a sort of paralysis of the mind. It wasn't to be easy to throw that off. She would have to take up work, some sort. What if Miss Russell shouldn't come back! What if she were to be left here all night, in a chair! Why not! She found the notion thrilling. She felt like a child who runs away. The telephone bell broke in on her reverie. She stared at the instrument, her pulse leaping. It stood on the desk, more than an arm's length away. She got out of the chair, reached for the desk, fell beside it, but somehow drew herself along, reached the instrument, lifted it down, and sitting in a heap against the desk, put the receiver to her ear. Mrs. Bentley was on the wire, down-stairs. A woman was speaking to her. Miriam caught the words "Miss Daw, Miss Margie Daw, of the News. Is Mr. Staf- ford there?" "No-no, I think not," said Mrs. Bentley. Miriam heard her own voice then, unexpectedly firm and THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 189 strong. "Ill answer, Mrs. Bentley," it said "Xes, Miss Cantey. Never mind now. I'll answer." There was a click. Mrs. Bentley was off the wire. Miriam smiled in sheer excitement at the thought of the stupefaction she must feel. "Yes, Miss Daw," she said, "this is Miss Cantey speak- ing. Of the News, you said? . . . Mr. Stafford isn't here now. I think we could reach him if it is important." ''It's pretty important," said Miss Daw. "We got word a little while ago that Mr. Stafford's room was broken into this evening, and I came right over. I'm speaking from his boarding-house. The case has a queer look. A second- story man got in at one of the side windows while every one was down-stairs and on the porch. He rummaged through two or three of the rooms on the third floor, but took noth- ing. Finally he found Mr. Stafford's room and just about tore it to pieces pulled out every drawer, turned up the carpet, took the mattress off the bed. He must have been looking for something he didn't find, for there was a little money in the top bureau drawer. He didn't touch that. He was creeping away when a maid met him in the hall. He knocked her down and escaped by the back stairs. That's all we know at present." "Thank you, Miss Daw," said Miriam. "I'll try to get word to him." The telephone sank to her lap. She ?at, bewildered. The strong box came to mind. He had brought it back. It was in the safe. Though surely . . . She wondered who this Miss Daw was; why she should exhibit such interest. Her father had always kept the telephone directory hang- ing at the end of the desk. She felt for it ; it was there. She looked through; found Mr. Quakers' number. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO Concerned with the Young Man Whose Price Wasn't Listed Down-Tou-n IN Quakers' study, Caverly was again on his feet. "I'm not on trial!" he was crying. "I came here as a matter of courtesy, because Mr. Amme asked me. And now you three gentlemen" he paused an instant on the word "are cross-examining me, hounding me, trying to discredit me!" "And succeeding," said Quakers. "Not at all ! Why" "You have refused to tell us your name, your place of birth, even your residence before you came to this city. You have told us that this check for twenty thousand dollars was a gift that on personal grounds you couldn't accept, but you don't tell us who gave it or why. Now let me ask you once more: Is Stafford your real name, or is it not." Calverly walked the floor. Three pairs of cold practical eyes followed him, to and fro. The very sound of that false name disgusted him. He kept silent ; dropped, finally, into the chair. "You can't answer that question ?" He shook his head wearily. "I won't," he replied. "Very well. Now about three years ago you stopped for a time at a rather unpleasant little hotel in New York known as the 'Kelly Square.' What were you doing there?" Calverly started and stared. "I see you haven't forgotten that. I know, of course, that you weren't using the name Stafford then." He sat motionless. One fact stood out; if they had the faintest suspicion of his name they wouldn't beat about the bush like this. He really hardly cared now; but he wouldn't help them. 190 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 191 Impulsively he drew his chair forward to the table and confronted them. "I think you'd better tell me what I'm charged with," he said. "You're not acting even decently. It's unfair! It's not human ! You're treating me as if I were a common " The word "criminal" had been on the end of his tongue, but he couldn't say it. For the moment his wits scattered. He could feel his color rising. The impassive O'Rell leaned a little forward. "I'm going to try to show you the figure you make," he said. "Just as we see it. You are a stranger here. You have to-night refused to tell us who you are, where you came from, why you are here. We know that you are liv- ing under an assumed name. You admit that you need the small salary paid for this hack work, yet you are giving away a large sum of money. Mr. Amme and I are trustees of the Cantey Estate, and can not forget our obligation to protect the property and the Cantey name. Looking at the matter in the light of simple common sense in a human light, if you like the word we have every right to be sus- picious of you and to object to your presence in the Cantey household. More than this and now I'm going to touch on a very difficult matter we, particularly Mr. Amme and I, are old friends of the family. We feel deeply responsible for Miss Cantey. We have seen her grow up from child- hood, then a beautiful girl, now a helpless invalid. We know something of what she meant to her father during his later years." Calverly felt an impulse to spring up, shout them down, forbid them so much as to mention her name. But what he did was to sit very still, looking down at the desk. He knew he couldn't trust his voice. "Now just consider what has occurred. You have never mind how ; I will make no charges on that count you have made her acquaintance, there in the house, under circum- stances of some intimacy. You haven't hesitated to take full advantage of this situation. You have gone so far as to carry her from her chair into the study. You have let 192 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM her open for you her father's safe and put in your hands some of his private papers." So they knew all that! Calverly's throat was dry. He moistened his lips. "Whatever or whoever you may be, I can see clearly enough that you are a man of imagination. I think you understand what I am getting at. Whatever your motives, you have put yourself in the position of an unscrupulous adventurer Wait! I am not now calling you that. I'm calling you nothing. But there you are! Now just as a matter of common human decency, don't you think you'd better be frank with us ?" He reflected for a long time. They watched him. "Perhaps I had," he said. And then, as they settled back and glanced at one another, added "But not quite in the way you expect." O'Rell had talked convincingly, almost kindly. But with evident reservations. They were still gunning for him. They wanted something very definite, something more than what they called frankness. That quick glance, passing from man to man, undid most of what O'Rell had accom- plished, stiffened him. "First, as to your charges. I think I may safely call them that." "Oh, yes," said Quakers, lighting a fresh cigar. "They're charges." "As to who I am, then, all I'll say now is, it really doesn't matter. I come from nowhere. I represent nobody. My interest isn't in anything you gentlemen could offer me. Certainly not money. I've thrown that away, before now. About this twenty thousand dollars I told the literal truth. It was the gift of a connection with whom I will have noth- ing to do. As there were some difficulties in the way of sending it back, I simply gave it away. I don't want ever to hear of it again." Mr. Amme spoke now, for the first time dry, sharp. "May I ask what it is that you're interested in, Mr. Mr. Stafford?" he asked. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 193 Calverly glanced at him. "That's not an easy question to answer " "Oh, then" "Wait, please! Perhaps I'd better say that I'm interested if in anything, in the art of writing." And noting the puz- zled expression on Amme's neat little face, he added, "I recognize that you may find it a little hard to believe that.'' "Oh, no," put in Quakers easily, "we're capable of un- derstanding that. Go on." "Mr. Listerly offered me this job. I didn't ask for it didn't know anything about it. I didn't think at first I'd care for it. But I had to do something. As a newspaper man I was a failure. They didn't like my work. So I began at this. Then a curious thing happened." He paused. O'Rell mumbled something that sounded like, "Very curious," and hitched forward. "Yes," said Calverly simply. "In the course of my work I met Miss Cantey. We spoke of her father. I told her pretty frankly, doubtless that most of the standard biog- raphies seem to me untrue to human character and a false influence in the training of the young." "You'll admit that discretion has its uses." This from Amme. The young man glanced at him, said "Sometimes I won- der," and pressed on. He had seemed calm enough. But now the inner excitement, the nerve tension that would in- evitably cause such stable business men and lawyers as these to classify him as an irresponsible egotist, became evident. It was a part of him ; he couldn't conceal it long. "Miss Cantey showed me her father's last request, writ- ten in his own hand. It bore on this matter of the biography. I think I can remember part of his language. He said: 'If you feel that you can, have them tell the truth about* me. Don't for a moment forget that they'll fight like rats. Don't let Amme have a hand in it, or O'Rell, or those. Perhaps Listerly would help. lie's a trimmer, but he's not hard shell, like the others.' " He threw it at them, and stared them down. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "That," he said, "was what he thought of you gentlemen." Amme knit his brows. O'Rell's face clouded. Quakers laughed softly. ''Miss Cantey knew my views. They were, are, the same as her father's. The neat wire baskets of colorless docu- ments you set out for me, Mr. Amme, were just what he didn't want and what I don't want. From the way you're going at me, all of you, I see that you're bent on doing what he said you'd do. You're fighting like rats. That's why you brought me here to-night. And now we seem to be facing the question, are Mr. Cantey's wishes to be respected or are they not ? Is the last great purpose of Mr. Cantey's life to be carried out, or not?" O'Rell was leaning heavily on the desk. "Have you seen all the papers in that safe?" "No." This reply brought momentary relief to the general man- ager of County Railways. He said, more easily : "What you say about Mr. Cantey's last wishes is only an assertion." This brought a nod from Amme. "You never knew the man. We were his intimates for many years. We know a good deal more about his attitude toward life than you." "I tell you I've read his own words." O'Rell waved a disgusted hand. Quakers now tapped on the table with his pencil. "You talk rather well," he said, "whoever you are. But we've given about time enough to this. If we choose, we can make you pretty unhappy in this town. We have about evidence enough now to put you away for a little term in prison. We may yet decide to do that. Using an assumed name to get access to important business secrets isn't nice. Doesn't look well. But first I'm willing to give you a chance to get quietly out of town. What do you say ?" "I don't know as I can subscribe to that, Oswald," said O'Rell. "I'd like to know what other papers he's read there." Calverly looked at him, and as he looked, his spirits, which 195 had risen a little in the heat of the quiet but intense con- flict, sank again. They were the world, these men. And what was he ? It was the old trouble all over again, like his two pitilessly illuminating experiences in the News office. Truth wasn't wanted. There were too many established properties to protect. He wondered a little at his own vanity he called it that in withholding the fact that he had already given up the Cantey job. Why bother? What difference did anything make, now? A telephone bell rang. He listened indifferently as Qual- ters took up the receiver. Then he started, all alert. For be distinctly heard a woman's voice say the odd grating voice that can sometimes be heard at some distance from the telephone: "Is Mr. Stafford there?" There was only one woman who knew where he might be. There was only one woman in his heart. He heard Qualters say, pleasantly, casually: "No. There's no such person here." He sprang forward; reached for the receiver, jerked it and Quakers' hand away from the hook, shouted, "Yes, I am here!" Quakers relinquished the instrument, with a shrug. Calverly forgot the rich room and the hard hostile men in it. The voice was Miriam Cantey's. Suddenly he felt her presence ; he could see her eyes, he could feel her in his arms. All his firmness melted away. She was saying: "I'd rather not say much over the wire. But they've broken into your room at your boarding-house I believe they were after father's papers. Could you could you come up here?" "Yes," he replied, "I will. Very soon." "I'm in the study." "All right." "I'm wondering I'll tell you all about the other matter i but I'm wondering if you feel as I'm beginning to that 196 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM we oughtn't to well, let ourselves be beaten. Father wanted it so. Oughtn't we to fight it through?" "It's I it's difficult." "I know. Either way. We must try to think it out. I'll wait here in the study. We can talk better here. The house is quiet." There was a heavy uncertain step in the hall. The door burst open, and the Honorable Tim Maclntyre stood before them, hat awry, face flushed, straggling lock of black hair hanging low on the Napoleonic forehead. "It's not there!" he cried. "And Max O'Rell ! if you think you can make a monkey out o* me taking chances like that " O'Rell muttered an oath, sprang up, tried to crowd the excited mayor straight back out the door. The heavy odor of liquor pervaded the room. Calverly only half-heard. Miriam's voice was at his ear. He couldn't catch what she was saying. "Just a moment," he said, and placed a hand over the transmitter. The Honorable Tim had by this time eluded O'Rell and was plunging toward the desk. Amme had risen, and was pulling nervously at his neatly trimmed beard. Quakers sat tipped back in his chair, bal- ancing a paper knife across a steady forefinger, looking on with much the expression he might have exhibited at a good play. Calverly himself was up now; he backed around the desk, still holding the telephone. Mayor Tim banged a fist on the desk. "There's a limit to what I'll do for you, O'Rell ! When it comes to coarse work " Quakers caught his inflamed eye, and with the paper knife indicated the young man at the telephone. Maclntyre knit his brows; drew himself up; stared in blank confusion. Calverly spoke into the telephone. "What was that? I didn't quite catch it. Sorry." "I can't talk now. But don't worry. I'll come soon." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 197 "I said you won't be long?" "Xo. A few minutes. Just as soon as I can manage." "What was all that noise ? You're not in trouble ?" "I'm supposed to be. I don't seem to care." "That's good." The mayor was bellowing, "What's he doing here ?" For a moment he had Calverly's arm, but was promptly shaken oft". Then O'Rell caught him and pressed him toward the door. "What is it?" Thus Miriam. "I'm getting pretty nerv- ou*. I wish you were here." Calverly chuckled. "It's the burglar, I think," he said. He could feel Quakers' cool eyes look up, at this, and study him. Mayor Tim heard it, too, and came plunging back, drag- ging O'Rell after him. Calverly raised an elbow to ward him off. "I can't talk now," he said. "This is bedlam. But don't worry. I'll come soon." "I think" "What was that? They're making so much noise." "I think I need you !" It was the voice of love tender, frank beyond all evasion. He compressed his lips. His eyes shone. He shook his head as if to throw off the ugly world that pressed him so, and held the telephone jealously away from the hostile ears that surrounded him. "I'll come," he said; and put the instrument down. The words were commonplace enough, hers and his, but in his ears, in his heart, they might have been the song of unimaginable angels. And now, dimly at first, then with a sobering brain, he be- came aware that the mayor was still bellowing at him. Quakers said, "Oh, keep still, Tim !" "But he used an ugly word a vi'lent word an' he'll apol'gize ri' now, ri' here! I'm th* mayor o' this He said 'burglar' !" Calverly seated himself on a corner of the de.-k. 198 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Well," he asked, "what are you?" The mayor again drew himself up, but found it difficult to hold the picture. He seemed to be trying to frown majes- tically. "It seems that somebody broke into my room," said Cal- verly. "And your mayor talks as if he knew something about it. I gather, too, that Mr. O'Rell put him up to it. Well, it isn't the first time these two precious birds have shared dirty work. There was the County Railways melon. And Mr. Cantey left a record of a ten-thousand-dollar bribe they both had a hand in. Some years back." This brought O'Rell himself to Calverly's side. "I've taken about all I care to take from you," he said roughly. "Will you take our offer and leave town to-night, or have we got to break you ?" Calverly gravely considered this; spread his hands. "I think I'll tell you," he said, musing aloud. "Go on," said Quakers. "Tell us. Sit down, Harvey." But O'Rell shook his head and stood angrily listening. The mayor, however, found an armchair helpful. "I took home a box of papers from Mr. Cantey's safe this afternoon," said Calverly. "That was what your burglar was after, I suppose. But I took them back this evening. They're in the safe now." "Why did you take them back ?" asked Quakers. "Because I decided not to go on with the work." "That's interesting. Why?" "I don't know that the reasons are any of your business," "Perhaps not. Go on." "That's all. All there was." "Was ? Is there more now ?" "I rather think so. Yes, it begins to seem so." "You're considering reopening the matter?" Calverly gravely bowed. "Writing the book ?" He bowed again. "Why?" "Because you're all a lot of crooks! Because it's the THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 199 duty of somebody to expose you. Jim Cantey felt that, and was willing to play Sampson to get it done. Oh, God, for a little truth, a little decency ! I'm not much, Heaven knows I but at least I may be a vehicle for this thing. It's got to be done." "Oswald, how long are you going to stand this!" cried O'Rell. Quakers raised a soothing hand. Almost confidentially, very quietly, he asked of Calverly. "Was that Miss Cantey that called you ?" "I well, yes." "Sounded like her voice. You realize, of course, that you're taking advantage of her. This name business is sure to come out. They'll have to call you a fortune hunter. It's going to hurt her." But Calverly merely compressed his lips again. A moment later, though, he turned on O'Rell. The mayor was growing sleepy and didn't matter. ''Probably I ought to be afraid of you," he said, "but I don't seem to be. Do what you like. I don't care. Of course you can have one of the mayor's friends hit me over the head. Do it to-night, if you like. I'm going direct to the Canteys' from here. A little later I'll be walking from there to my boarding-house. Fairly early, too, as I imagine my room'll have to be put to rights, after your friend's visit." He walked out. O'Rell sprang up; but Quakers waved him aside ; said, "Oh, let him go !" Amme excused himself then. Amme was not the sort of man who had rough contacts with life. He had been spared a good deal. He was plainly disturbed now ; a little shocked. Quakers indulged in a smile over him. O'Rell helped the mayor home. Quakers walked out with them as far as the mail box on the corner. He put off the deeply angry O'Rell with a quiet, "We'll have to play him a little. That book isn't published yet. It isn't even written. There's time enough." When they were gone, an oddly comic couple the mayor 200 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM walking wide, the general manager of County Railways arm in arm with him, dragging him on, soothing him in the mo- ments of song Quakers took a letter from his pocket and dropped it into the box. The Cantey financial machine was still strong, but the Cantey political machine was cracking badly, was about gone. Harvey would do pretty much as he was told, after this. It had been quite a day for the Painter interests. . . . Quaint ideas that boy had ! And a queer mystery about him! . . . Interesting! Calverly, as he hurried up the Hill, believed that he was thinking about the biography. So intent was he on thinking about it that he muttered aloud. The excitement that was steadily, irresistibly rising within him he couldn't explain then. He had no outside eye on it. lie knew, yet didn't know, that he was being swept along, more and more swiftly, to his emotional Niagara. He rang, all confusion ; brushed past the door man with the slightly raised eyebrows; ran lightly, quickly, up the stairs. The study door was closed. He paused before it. His breath was quite gone ; his heart was beating uncontrollably high. The book ! They must talk about that ! . . . She said she would be in the study. But how had she managed that ? There was a rustle in the hall. He started ; turned ; saw a woman just disappearing through a doorway. The nurse, doubtless! Miriam trusted her! With an all but overpowering sensation of taking an ir- revocable step, crossing a rubicon fighting impulses to stop longer, get his head clear, think it out he opened the door, stepped in and closed it softly behind him. There was Miriam, a filmy white heap, on the floor by the desk, leaning wanly against it. He sprang forward, saying something he never knew what and tenderly lifted her in his arms. He placed her in the big chair between the safe and the THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 201 desk. Her hands were clinging to his sleeve. His mind was a whirl of pure feeling. "You fell!" he was murmuring. "That was nothing. But you were so long !" "I hurried." "I know. But I wanted you so to come." "You wonderful girl !" "Oh, nof Weak, pitiful! But I'm beginning!" "You'll let me help you ?" "Oh-o-oh, yes !" They were groping for each other. Very gently he knelt close at her side ; drew her head to his shoulder ; kissed her. "It had to be," she murmured. "Yes, dear, it had to be. ... I'm a wreck of a man " "No, dear!" "But such as I am my life is yours. It would be so easy to die for you. But I must live for you. I'm beginning, too." Time floated by. Miss Russell stood apologetically in the doorway. They looked down at her from the heights. "You are tired, sweet," he whispered, "I'm going to let her take you to bed." And standing beside the woman of his heart he said: "Miss Russell, we can trust your discretion for the present. An announcement will be made later. For Miss Cantey has promised to be my wife." CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE Fat Man's Misery OSWALD QUALTERS came down the elevator, late on the following afternoon, paused at the sidewalk en- trance to light a cigarette, glanced up the street, and beheld a trim young woman approaching from the direction of the News building. She wore a straight blue coat with side pockets, man's turnover collar and four-in-hand tie, felt hat pulled down over an almost boy like face. The sight of her mildly pleased him ; for like many another man about town (the trite phrase described Quakers in his lighter phase of this period) he had an eye for a slim figure. Also it started his quick brain. He greeted her ; walked along with her. "You don't run in any more and ask me questions," said he, lightly. "I'm doing features and drammer now." "That's so. I think I've seen some of your things. You're signing them." "Oh, yes ! Getting to have quite a name." "Tell me was there a fellow named Stafford worked there on the News for a whi' "Not long. They didn't like him. He wrote well." "Hm ! Curious thing. Friends of mine a little excited over him. He's been put in to write the Cantey bi- ography" "Yes, I'd heard that!" "And they've got an idea that he's sailing under a false name. Know anything about it?" "Not a thing." "Hm! It would be rather a mistake, of course, to turn the wrong man loose among Mr. Cantey 's letters and things." 202 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 203 "I should think so. This is my corner." Quakers lingered a moment to look after her. Anywhere but here in his home city he would have considered taking her out to dinner. "Snappy little thing!" he mused. But since it was the home city he strolled over to his own house. Margie Daw walked briskly around the block. She was strolling toward the Nezi's building, a little later, when the plump person of Abel H. Timothy appeared his wide, soft hat tipped back on his large head, an unlighted cigar in a corner of his wide mouth. She had avoided him lately. But she had heard him about the office, talking and laughing more loudly than of old, making a show of cheery inde- pendence. For her ears, of course. She studied him now with a feeling of quick nervous repugnance, wondering how she could ever have fancied him ; he looked so fat she noted the deep wrinkles where his coat pulled across his middle, and the spots on the blue cloth. And he always would wear a flaming red tie. He saw her now; he was holding his head high, but the cigar shifted suddenly to the other corner of his mouth and back, a little trick of his when he was surprised or nervous. They spoke. He fell into step with her. The talk came a little hard. She could fairly feel his pressing injured pride. And she herself was more self-conscious than she would have thought possible. There were unexpected, nerv- ous uprtishes of memory, flitting ghosts of memory, things they had done and said. She decided that there was no good in beating about the bush. "Never was so rushed in my life," she remarked. This seemed to cover in some measure her avoidance of him. There was, as well, a confessional impulse in it which she brushed over, particularly as she sensed deepening resent- ment, rising self-pity in him. Those nervous muscles about his mouth were shifting the cigar back and forth, back and forth. Then he removed it and pressed his upper lip up almost against his flat nose. "Just met Oswald Qualters. Funny thing! He asked me if I knew Hugh Stafford's real name." 204 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Well, you do," said Timothy ; he nearly muttered it. And added, under his breath, "So do 1 1" "They're after him, trying to figure him out. I told him I didn't know anything about him." "Naturally." There was biting sarcasm in this. "Yes, naturally. It's the only decent attitude to take." "Decent !" "Don't be ugly, Abel !" "Why are you telling this to me?" "Because you know, too." "And you want me to help keep him covered." "Yes. I should expect it of you." "In God's name, why!" "Don't be tragic, Abel !" "But you ask me me! After all that's " "All nonsense, Abel. I'm not seeing him." "But good" "Please don't work yourself up. I tell you there's nothing between him and me." Timothy snorted ; replaced his cigar ; chewed it savagely. "There isn't!" "Whose fault is it then?" "That is simply an insult, Abel." "Insult? But but good God, you had him living at your place, didn't you?" "He was ill. When he got well he went away. I haven't seen him since. It isn't likely that I shall see anything of him. But he's a nice fellow, and he's terribly up again-t it. I don't see why we should let a man like Quakers into his secret as long as he feels it is his secret. Why, he doesn't even suspect I know." "Oh, he doesn't!" "No, Abel, he doesn't ! I've got to run over home now. All I'm asking of you is to keep quiet about it. Or suggest- ing it, rather. Just not to give him away when it's nothing to you." Her voice was quiet enough, but she had put it a little too strongly. And his ill-suppressed emotions were rising, lie THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 205 said, "What you hurrying home for, I'd like to know?" Then, a slight whine in his voice, he went on with, "I sup- pose you haven't gdt anybody over there, eh!" At which she stopped short and stared at him in hard still anger. He had lost himself now. He couldn't speak pleasantly to her, and couldn't leave her. He pleaded with her and roughly abused her in a breath ; followed her clear to her apartment building, kept her talking in the hall, went up the stairs clinging to her elbow, kept her standing at her door until, in angry despair, white about the mouth, evading his burning eyes, she let herself in. He pressed in after her ; caught her in his arms. She said, coldly, "The door's open, Abel." He kicked it shut ; caught her again. She stood, unresist- ing, unresponsive, like a woman of ice, even when he kissed her. "You've turned against me!" he cried. "No, I haven't turned against you, Abel." "But you want me to go 1" "Yes, I want you to go." Her eyes took him in as he stood before her a fat man in helpless torture. She studied again the wrinkled, spotted coat ; looked impersonally at the flushed working face, now hopelessly out of control. She felt only a cold relief when he rushed, muttering, away. She quietly closed the door after him, feeling that she had made rather a mess of it. Her mistake lay, of course, in speaking on a snap judgment. Still, it had seemed the thing to do. With so shrewd a man as Oswald Quakers probing into Henry's case, there wasn't much time to lose. She knew that every apparently light remark of that man meant something. He worked that way. He wanted to know. He would ask others. And the News office was the place to ask. Abel, now, traveling con- stantly up and down the street, mixing with lawyers and bankers and business men. . . . She gave a shrug and dismissed the matter. A moving picture of Abel Timothy during the quarter- hour or so that followed his headlong exit from Margie's 206 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM apartment would be interesting if not altogether pleasing. He rushed about back streets so rapidiy that his face shone with sweat and his collar wilted around his neck. He was torn between desire, rage and self-reproach. The rage pre-< dominated. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR Of Publicity, Liquor and Free Will Hittie!" thought Miss Daw. "He knows too!" She went back to the office, pausing only for a cup of coffee in a lunch room. As she passed a corner drug store, within which was an inconspicuous telephone booth that she had before now found useful, she considered calling Henry. Not at the Cantey house ; it had been a bit awkward, yester- day, finding Miss Cantey herself on the line; by this time he would doubtless be back at his room. She was thinking of reassuring him, and perhaps as well of taking credit for the effort she was expending in his behalf. But she thought better of this, and hurried to the News building and went clear to the roof. Mr. Hitt was sitting in the first alcove of his "morgue." She could see his bald head, bent over the "Can-Cam" drawer and the shine on the gold rims of his spectacles. She paused behind him to light a cigarette; then sat on his desk and swung her little feet. "Working hard, Hittie ?" she queried, through the smoke. He smiled, and held up a folder that was packed with clippings and typewritten matter. "This," he said. "What's this?" "The Calvery story. Haven't you heard?" "No. I came straight up here." "Madame Watt died this afternoon. Alone, in her castle. The servants had all left. Left everything to her son-in- law. They're looking for him now, all the way to Alaska." "He'll be rich, then?" "Oh, yes!" Margie smoked thoughtfully. Then remarked, offhand: "What are you going to do about it ?" 207 208 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Do about it ?" She nodded. "Going to give him away?" Mr. Hitt settled back in his chair. "I don't know," he said. "Been considering it. I'll con- fess I have had I seem to have now a good deal of feel- ing for the boy. And he's chosen this other name." "And he was one of us here, if only for a few days," said she, easily. "I know. But would it make a particle of difference? They'll find him out before morning." "They may not. You and I are the only ones to tell. And we're not supposed to know it." "But we're going to run his picture to-morrow. There's an order for it there. I think you're sitting on it. Every paper in the country will run it." Margie continued to smoke and think. "I feel a little as you do, Hittie," she remarked. "I'd like to be easy on him. Though goodness knows he's nothing to me. ... I was thinking. You remember that circu- lation stunt they tried here year before last printed a man's picture every day, with and without a hat, full face and profile, told what part of the city he'd be wandering around that day, and offered a hundred dollars to any one that rec- ognized him? And in eight days nobody got the hundred. This'll be an old cut, of course. No, I'm not at all sure they'd find him out." "True," mused Mr. Hitt. "There's a good deal in that. And the poor devil's had publicity enough in his life without dragging him through this hell again." "Oh, he'll have to take a lot anyway," said she. "But if he can slip by, around here, under the name of Stafford, it would be a little more bearable, I should think. For that matter, even if it came out later, it wouldn't hit him as it would right now, when the whole story's being played. No, I'm willing to keep still if you are." "All right," Mr. Hitt agreed. "And now, my dear, if you'll let me have my desk they're in a hurry for this stuff." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 209 "Did the new man send up?" The "new man" was the managing editor who had suc- ceeded Winterbeck. He was a burly, close-mouthed young man from New York, with driving ways, and a brisk, even aggressive superiority to middle-western manners. "Yes. And he'll be sending again if I don't rush it down." Mr. Hitt sighed, and the patient lines about his mouth set- tled more deeply. "Things are different." "Oh, yes, they're different." Margie jumped down, and flicked the ashes from her skirt. "Frank was snappy, but thank Heaven he wasn't this efficiency thing. We'll be punching a clock soon." Mr. Hitt smiled faintly, then plunged at the mass of pa- pers before him. During this hour, from six to seven of a pleasant sum- mer evening, a task more or less similar to that now being performed by Mr. Hitt was being got through in every con- siderable newspaper office in America. The Watt story had "broken" again. News came in the form of an Associated Press despatch. This in itself, despite its dignified, even bald condensation, was a striking account of the last hours of the most sensationally picturesque woman in North America. Her extraordinary castle was described, with the refugee rabble that had melted away during the last few weeks, when she was too ill to care for them. The bizarre story of her earlier life was retold, as was the dramatic killing of Senator Watt and, in detail, the most notorious of all trials in recent American history. The pathetic death of Cicely figured, of course, with Henry's defiance of the court and his subsequent imprisonment. Toward the latter part of the despatch, the emphasis shifted from madame and the senator and Cicely to Henry himself, as the only one of that strangely assorted quartet now left on earth. Much was made of his sudden world-wide fame, followed so swiftly by the shock of his imprisonment, and, some time after that, his disappearance from civilized life. He had been reported from Alaska, as from China, parts of Europe, Morocco, and obscure villages in the United States. His publishers, in 210 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM New York, denied the slightest knowledge of his present whereabouts, beyond the bare announcement that they had received no definite word of his death. The attorney for the Watt estate, one H. C. Parker, of Chicago, had "nothing to say" to the reporters. This touch of present mystery gave an added journalistic value to the announcement that Calverly was madame's sole heir. The estate, even after the strain of the trial and madame's extravagance since, was estimated as having a value of between one and two mil- lion dollars. There were many valuable securities, real prop- erty in Sunbury, Illinois, and New York, besides the castle by the lake and at least two large properties in France which had belonged to her first husband, the Comte de la Plaine. His other properties she sold at the time of her return to America. It was about this literary skeleton that all but a few of the principal newspapers of the country at once proceeded to build out the flesh and blood and clothing of "personal inter- est." Flashily clever reporters were set at work elaborating the narrative. "Sob" writers dwelt feverishly on the fate of Cicely Calverly, or on madame's madness as an inevitable judgment on her for the evil nature of her early life. Popu- lar ministers were interviewed regarding her pathetic strug- gles to convert a bad name into a good one by the lavish use of the wealth she had acquired. Some even pointed out that the wrecking of the brilliant young Henry Calverly's career had come about through his own lawlessness. Indeed, de- spite the clarity of the Associated Press despatch on this point, it became evident that the reasons underlying Henry's defiance of the court, his instinctive, even primitive at- tempt to save the life of his young wife, had evaporated in the minds of most of these newspaper people. Apparently their opinions were made out of the ail-but universal Amer- ican interest in what have been called "results." Calverly had certainly been sentenced and imprisoned. There had been no appeal. For a few months he had been one of the really famous men of the world ; after that, an outcast. He had written no more "Satraps." He was even referred to, THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 211 here and there, as a "convict." The judge who sentenced him was sitting, still, in the same court in Chicago, a widely known and respected jurist. There seemed to be no reason for believing that Calverly had been right. Certainly there was no commonly understood reason for believing Judge Wattemy wrong. So the thing was happening that for years now had hung over Henry Calverly like a continuous nightmare. The Watt-Calverly case had been reopened. The enormous, ter- ribly casual force that is called, loosely, "publicity," was to strike him again. More than ever before was it to set him in the wrong before the vast, impersonal, sensation loving pub- lic. More than ever before was it to be true that no right action on his part, no mere decent effort could affect his reputation. That was, as it had been from the day "The Caliph of Simpson Street" the first of the "Satraps" stories appeared in Galbraith's Magazine, nearly five years back, hopelessly out of his own control. And now there was the false name to be added to the count against him. That would be accepted by the man in the street everywhere, as an evidence of guilt, or at least of weakness. For the al- most racial doctrine of Free Will works out curiously and often cruelly in the personal judgments of the Anglo-Saxon. It is deeply reflected in the Common Law. It dominates, of course, in religious thought. It refracts through all busi- ness life. Everywhere it has been our habit to assume that the individual is responsible for his own acts, that he is to be personally credited with his financial and moral success, personally debited with his failure. Until very lately, the really determining accidents of birth and breeding, environ- mental influences and quite irresistible social pressures have played little or no part in our judgments of men and women. We have run an individualistic race. We have held the individual responsible for the result. And we have crudely let it go at that. To admit that there are life cur- rents in which no strong swimmer could fail to reach a shin- ing goal would be to undermine our heroes ; and we have clung to our heroes. To admit that other currents exist 212 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM which no swimmer can breast, would be to undermine our philosophy, our law, our very religion; and we have clung to these. . . . Henry Calverly, for better or worse, was back on page one. It couldn't have been later than half past six or a quarter to sev^n when Abel Timothy, flabbily black of countenance, walking heavily and slow, returning to the News building to take up the night grind, met a reporter named Ruggles, who was rushing around to a certain old alley tavern for a drink. Timothy gladly joined him. To Timothy's casual, "What's on?" Ruggles replied: "Got to pitch in on this dam' Watt row. Writing a 'Margie Daw' story." "Why ? Can't she do her own ?" "Doesn't seem able to do this. I believe Archie's using her at the theater to-night. Anyhow she's begged off. So I'm sobbing." "What's the Watt row?" "Oh, that old countess. Murdered Senator Watt. Left her money to Henry Calverly a wad of it and they can't find him." Timothy left Ruggles at the curb. The liquor glowed warmly within him. He stood there, watching the early evening crowd flow by, wishing Margie would happen along. He had thought of a thing or two to say to her. She was taking shape in his temporarily disordered mind as a deceit- ful and ungrateful woman. Another thought was creeping in. He moved along the street now. His glance was furtive. His color was rising a little. He paused before the News building; started up the alley that led to the "annex," stopped, came back to the street, moved along a little way and stood staring in at the drug-store window. Finally, with a quick glance about, he pulled down his coat, adjusted his red tie, straightened his hat, and started for Oswald Quakers' home, in the older aristocratic section, almost down-town, just before you reached the Hill. Quakers, who had no illusions as to the stuff of which THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 213 great reputations are made, and made it a point to be agree- able to newspaper people, had just sat down to dinner with his family, but came in at once to see his unexpected caller. Timothy, uneasy, somewhat wandering in speech, told his story. "You don't say!" said Quakers. "So Stafford is Cal- verly. A jailbird, eh! Well, my friends will be interested to learn that! You say it's coming out in to-morrow's paper?" "No no, I don't think it is, as it stands now.'* "But why not?" "Well, you see he worked with us for a little while. There's only one or two of us that know who he is, and we'd hardly give him away. But if the other papers heard of it they'd camp right on his trail. He couldn't dodge 'em. Then it would come to us through the City Press, and we'd have to run it, too. Our managing editor wouldn't care a damn, any- way. He didn't know Stafford. And he'd run anything. He's from New York. . . . You understand, I don't care to appear in this in any way. And I'd rather you wouldn't take it up with the News. Not direct. Just let it come around through the City Press." He left an impression of a fat man acting under great emotional pressure. Personal feeling, of course. Curious! . . . Before returning to the dining-room Qualters called up Harvey O'Rell and instructed him to send at once for reporters from the Herald, Press, and Globe and set them on Mr. Stafford-Calverly. O'Rell thought the best way would be to have one of the police officials let it out to the newspaper bureau at headquarters. They left it that way. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE In Which a Dream Ends; As Dreams Do THE excitement of the past few days had told heavily on Miriam. Her temperature rose during the night. Doctor Martin was in before breakfast, and instructed Miss Russell to keep her abed. Calverly, when he shut himself in the study, found the narrow door open and the wheel-chair empty by the window. But Miss Russell brought him a note. Miriam had insisted on writing it. "Please answer this right away!" she wrote. "I've had an awful night. I want to know that you're there, working. It wasn't a dream, was it !" To which he replied : "It wasn't a dream, dear. Though the night hasn't been simple for me either. Are we right ? Do you dare believe we're right ? I bring you so much less than nothing noth- ing but love. I think of you, surrounded by all these old influences. The moment they hear of our engagement they will make it terribly hard for you. All our plans, our hopes, our faith, must run counter to the whole world the world in which those people live. I can see those three men now. Your father was right, in this as in everything. They'll fight so. And to-day I can see that all the trouble ahead of us is to bear on you. You've suffered so much ! Is it right for me to make it still harder for you. Can you endure it, brave girl? You must search your heart. If you can give me up, you must do it. I think I could bear it. I'm used to disappointment." She answered this with : 214 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 215 "You dear silly boy! I shan't give you up. You're all my world. I could never make this fight without you. To- gether we'll defy them all. And oh, it will be living! I've been dead so long. And don't forget that you've suffered, too. In a queer way that's the joy of it. We're beginning together." Along toward twelve-thirty, when Miss Russell started down-stairs for Miss Cantey's luncheon, she found him wait- ing near the study door, hat in one hand, a note in the other. He was pale, and a bit disheveled ; he must have been sitting there running his fingers through his hair without knowing. He looked tired about the eyes, a little strained. She thought him rather jumpy. Part of this note read: "There is one serious thing, dear. I've got to think it out. It's hard to think of anything but what happened last evening. But it's plain to me now that I made an awful blunder when I took this other name. At the time it seemed reasonable. They had hounded me so wouldn't let me alone. I had lost everything. I didn't want fo disturb any one just to be left alone to work my life out some- how. But it's getting clearer now that I was wrong. If I could only get it really clear ! But my whole being is filled with radiant thoughts of you. I'm half mad with love. And it won't do to be mad." After luncheon he found her reply under a paper-weight on the desk. "It's serious, in a way," she said. "But after all, it's only a part of the fight we have to make. It's not as if you had done something to disgrace your name. Don't forget, dear boy, that you're famous. And you're not the first famous man that has chosen to go about unknown. No, I don't believe it is so serious. You're making too much of it. , s , The serious problem is me! I'm so disgustingly 216 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM weak. I've got to get well. I've got to learn/to stand this glorious excitement better. And 1 will, boy K I will ! And you'll help me. You made me walk, now you'll make me strong, a lit partner." 1 He was in such a daze that the force of this revelation didn't begin to touch his conscious mind until he was walking over to the boarding-house, toward six o'clock. For the present, life was running too fast for him. He couldn't keep up with it. He felt himself dragged along. And then the thrill of this absurd correspondence was ris- ing, in them both. He couldn't work. During the after- noon something of the glow they had experienced the night before came again to them. The little notes grew tender, became love letters. By mid-afternoon they were writing feverishly. Hardly a quarter-hour passed without the solid tread of Miss Russell sounding in the hall. The two of them simply forgot her, except to use her. She hadn't had a moment off in the twenty-four hours. She felt, conscien- tiously enough, that Miss Cantey must somehow be quieted or she wouldn't answer for the consequences. Things were getting altogether out of hand, running away. It was nearly dinner-time before she managed to slip out and run over to Mrs. Appleby's. He was gone. Miss Can- tey was resting, after a fashion. Miss Russell was wholly out of sympathy with her. She regarded this love-affair as she would have regarded an out-and-out mental disorder. Though when the doctor privately asked her what on earth was going on to upset Miss Cantey's nerves like this, she managed an evasion. The person to know first of the acute personal problem was Miss Cantey's own sister, not Doctor Martin. So she broke the news to Esther, talking quietly but with an undertone of excitement all of it, the amazing confes- sion of an engagement to marry, the resulting over-excite- ment and exhaustion, the love idyl that had taken the form of incessant note-writing, the doctor's shrewd question ; added her own earnest conclusion that something should be . THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 217 done at once. She believed Doctor Martin would jump at the suggestion of a change, a long journey, perhaps, any- way complete change of scene. She had worked up this idea during the day, and had mentally tried out various ways of putting it, rehearsing even the phrases that she felt might most quickly catch Mrs. Appleby's attention. She used what she felt to be the most effective of these phrases now. "That's a good idea," said Esther, eyes snapping with temper but voice dignified, almost calm. The little matter of the ten dollars came to mind. She had never bribed be- fore, and found the notion a bit disconcerting that this young woman had become virtually her property in return for so small a sum. She was not practised in handling this sort of property. Dignity was her only recourse. She was glad when Miss Russell left. And she knew she must think hard. The situation had gone beyond snap judgments or heedless action. What was to be done must be done sharply, surely, to a purpose. One thing, Miriam must not be allowed to see this man again. He would be coming around in the morning, and must be forestalled. Will, when she laid the matter rather heatedly before him, at the dinner table, complicated her mental processes by remarking: "To-morrow? My dear girl, if he's as completely daffy over her as the nurse's story makes out he won't sit around until to-morrow. He'll be calling this evening. I should say, she can look for him about twenty minutes to eight." Esther laid down her knife and fork. A pucker appeared between her pretty eyebrows. "Will," she said, "we must go straight over there." "The thing has awkward aspects. It's her own house. After all" "Do you really expect me to sit here and listen to that kind of talk?" "Well, my dear, I feel about this much as you do just as you do, in fact but in all difficult business transactions we men find it a good thing to" 218 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Will, that girl's my own sister, my younger sister. It's high time we stopped feeling delicate about the property. There's such a thing as human responsibility. There's such a thing as duty. You'll admit that ?" "Of course, dearest, but " "My own little sister has fallen into the hands of a de- signing adventurer. It isn't the property. It's so much more than that that I don't see how you can hesitate one minute. It's that girl's life and it's father's name." Mr. Amme called up then. \Yill went to the phone. He returned with a genuinely distressed countenance. "Dearest," he said, "I'll never again distrust a woman's intuition. They've run this fellow down. He's Henry Calverly." "Henry?" ''The writer. A notorious chap." "Henry Calverly! Wait! I remember " "Oh, the Watt trial. All that mess." "He wasn't he" "He's the fellow. Went to prison. And afterward dis- appeared off the face of the earth." "A widower, too, isn't he?" "A widower and a jailbird and God knows what else!" "We must go now, Will. This thing must be stopped to- night." "Just how, sweet ?" "I'll take care of Miriam. My duty is clear. I'll have to drop everything, of course. But a time like this who wouldn't sacrifice themselves !" "You're thinking of taking her off?'' "Somewhere, yes. I was just thinking of Bermuda. But" "California might be easier to manage. Amme could run vour father's car out. You're not a good sailor, you know, dear." "You can call Mr. Amme up from her house, Will. We'll go now." So they set out. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 219 "I suppose it's only fair that Miriam should stand the expense, seeing it's " "Well, I should rather think so! It's her fault. We're acting in her interest. And as you'll have to come " "Me?" "Of course, Will ! Don't be stupid ! You'll have to see us settled comfortably somewhere, won't you?" "It's no time for indecision. You must call up Mrs. Harper, too, and have her come in to-night to pack. Miss Russell and Mrs. Bentley can help, too. You'll find Mrs. Harper under Wilson and Harper in the telephone book. If you can't reach her call up Genevieve Grant on Harrison Avenue. She does hair dressing, but she's an experienced packer, too. You must call up Mr. Listerly, too. He's responsible for this." Esther walked in on her sister, all calm, high decision. Miss Russell, furtively discreet, seeing, hearing nothing, moved about the room and in and out. On the way over Esther had waylaid Doctor Martin. That somewhat routine person welcomed her decision. "You're a sick girl, Miriam," said Esther, soothingly, at the bedside. "I'm going to take care of you for a while." "I get all the care I need, Esther." She was flushed, utterly exhausted, blue eyes wide open. "Doctor Martin has sent some medicine." "I don't want it." "He says you simply must sleep. You're wearing your- self out." "Oh, Esther, please leave me alone. I can't talk now. But I don't want to sleep." "The time has come, child, when we can't stop to consult your wishes. I tell you we're going to take care of you." "I won't take veronal. I'm through with all that." "This is something else. He sent it over by me." "Miss Russell, is this true?" "Miriam, how can you " Esther's voice trailed off. She recalled that you humored invalids. 220 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Doctor Martin telephoned, Miss Cantey," said the nurse very quietly. "He instructed me to give you the medicine Mrs. Appleby would bring." Miriam glanced nervously from one to the other. What did they know? Why were they surrounding her like this? She tried to rally the strength she had felt in the afternoon. His notes were under her pillow. She felt now as she had never felt before the disheartening effect of sheer physical weakness on the will. She wanted to tell the truth, but hesi- tated. Esther, sitting calmly, positively there, subtly, surely held the advantage. Now that the exaltation of the day had passed, one puzzling thought was undermining her se- cret happiness her mental efforts to argue it down were unsuccessful the curious problem of the false name. It felt more serious now. It wasn't serious, of course. But she must know all about it, in order not to be made ridicu- lous in an argument. For she knew, of old, that Esther would argue, would fall back on her prerogative as the elder sister. . . . Her head burned. Her mouth was dry. She asked for water, and moistened it. Miss Russell made her use a glass tube. She resented it. ... Perhaps he would come back this evening. He had come last evening. She would make them bring him in. He would face them all. The divine fire that had been in Henry Calverly, that had crept wonderfully into the last few of these little notes of his, would be too much for them. . . . During the day she had glowed with the thought of mothering him. Now, in every conscious thought, she was leaning on what she could remember of his young strength. The finest qual- ity in him was his utter, naive honesty. She became con- fused, however, trying to think out the problem of bringing such a literal mind as Esther's to the point of reconciling naive honesty with an alias. Some imp of the fancy popped that ugly word in among her thoughts. She tried to forget it. That was why he had changed his name, of course ; because he was naive. He was a babe in the woods of the world, an artist-soul. She dwelt on that thought. Esther was speaking. It seemed now that she had been THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 221 speaking for some time. About a journey. California was mentioned sunshine, rest and something about a gradual building up. "I'm not going away," her own voice said. "Now dearie, you just lie quietly and leave it all to us. We're doing everything possible to make you comfortable. Mr. Amme is having father's car got ready. Will and I are going with you. And either Doctor Martin, or his assistant. And Miss Russell, of course. Mrs. Bentley will close the house. It's all arranged. You're not to worry about a thing." The evening and the night that followed remained as lit- tle more than a confused memory to Miriam. There were clear but unrelated mental pictures of Esther, irritat- ingly deliberate and placid, moving about, and of a quietly efficient mulatto woman that they called "Mrs. Harper," and of the white-clad Miss Russell, and of the gravely dominant Doctor Martin, who seemed to have been in the room a long time without definitely entering or leaving, and a rather apologetic Will Appleby at the door, whispering and mop- ping a glistening red face, and of Mr. Amme tiptoeing in and out but staying mostly in the hall. Her skin was hot, her head reeling. She couldn't trust her tongue. In her own thoughts she was eagerly, intensely, defending Henry Calverly, though they did not speak of him. Then, after a while it must have been late everybody seemed to be talking about him, all at once. She couldn't think how this began, whether she herself finally brought it all up, or whether they had known. One way or the other, they knew; about the engagement, the papers, everything. Their reproaches were veiled, and were the harder to meet for that. Her own position grew unexpectedly hard to de- fend. She could fall back only on her love, and that ap- peared to amount to nothing more than the impression he had made on her. Said Esther: "But how can you say you love him, when you don't even 222 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM knotv him ! You haven't known him a week ! A man with an alias!'' "I know all about that !" she cried. "He told me. He is Henry Calverly." "Wouldn't it have been just a little fairer to have con- sulted me before you gave father's most intimate secrets to a stranger?" This provoked discussion. She remembered Esther say- ing, "A man's public life is one thing, his private life an- other. There are some things that can't be shouted to the rabble. Surely other people, nice people, have to be con- sidered. And you'd think the immediate family had a few rights !" All this was trying. They pressed about her. She couldn't escape. Nowhere was there sympathy. She was to all of them no more than a wilful child. When she demanded that they send for Henry and give him, give them both, a chance to face them all, they tried to soothe her. A sense of hope- lessness came over her. She hadn't the strength to assert herself. She had forgotten the strength of the family re- lationship, as of the group that had surrounded her father. The authority of her older sister, so suddenly revived, had still a strength that was disarming. Of late years, she had all but forgotten it ; Ksther had let her alone so. Once Esther stood over the bed. "You are making it very hard for us, Miriam," she said. "You have been a foolish girl. We are going to save you from yourself, whether you like it or not. We have no choice. We aren't doing this for ourselves. Certainly, I'm not dropping everything overnight and leaving for a long journey to indulge myself. You'll never know what a sacri- fice I'm making for you. It doesn't matter, of course. . . . I want to ask you this: You say this man told you everything. Did he tell you that he has been a con- vict?" That was what finally broke Miriam's will. She couldn't answer it. For that matter, she hadn't even known that he was a widower. And they saw that she hadn't. There was THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 223 no possible explanation of his failure to tell the whole truth. Esther brought Will in at this point, and called Doctor Mar- tin up-stairs, even dragged in prim little Mr. Amme. They all gravely confirmed these stories. Mr. Amme, in some em- barrassment, explained that the man was, in literal truth, a nameless and penniless adventurer. He had been tried on the News as a common reporter, but had to be discharged almost at once for utter lack of discretion. Miriam felt as if her mind were going. All the years of her life girlhood associations, memories of her mother, the years with her father, seemed to rise upon her and overwhelm these few amazing days. She couldn't by any mental effort, make them or Henry come real again, even with her hand under the pillow clutching his notes. Her heart ached for him. He must have suffered during these heavily shadowed years beyond anything in her own experi- ence. But he should have told her everything. It was the only possible basis. When Esther asked her bluntly if she were actually willing to wreck her own and her father's name by plunging on into this ill-considered, almost uncon- sidered love-affair, just to gratify a sudden quite wild im- pulse, just as heedless self-indulgence, when you came right down to it, she couldn't reply. There were moments when it might be thought to look like that. It was bewildering. Oh, why hadn't he told her ! She remembered storming at them all; and sensing the futility of it. She remembered, still later, being alone with Miss Russell and storming at her. One thought obsessed her now, she must not leave all her father's papers, even in the safe. Those men were strong, determined, ruthless. At least she could take the strong box. He had brought it back. She made Miss Russell carry her in there the one small con- cession made to her during that difficult night. She remem- bered a vivid bit among the confusions that assailed her having trouble with the combination of the safe. Ap- parently she had stormed at that, too. She remembered having Miss Russell put the box in a trunk, and tying the 224 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM key around her neck. It seemed a tie that still bound her to Henry, that key lying cold against her skin, a reminder of what he had seemed to be, at least of what she had thought him. Perhaps they might yet work it out, some- how. . . . Though she promised Esther, at last, that she would wait a few months, give herself a reasonable chance to think. Esther had said that she couldn't do less. And they had utterly beaten her down. Esther herself slept that night on the second floor. It seemed wise not to let herself slacken in this great responsi- bility. She was doing her duty. She was going through with it, relentlessly. For Esther, too, had much of Jim Cantey in her, and a humorless touch of iron from the Puri- tans back of her mother. Jim Cantey's forebears had been other stock, from the South. His grandfather had come over the Blue Ridge into the wilderness nearly a century earlier. Will was right about Calverly. He came before eight. Naturally they didn't tell Miriam. He proved somewhat difficult to handle. For a few moments he quite insisted on going up to the study. He said he had work to do there. Will found him rather interesting. He was, when all was said and done, one of those literary chaps, but apart from that didn't make such a bad impression. He was obviously down on his luck, but it would be like Miriam not to mind that ; even to find it romantically pleasing. It wasn't hard to see how he had captured the heart of a lonely, imaginative girl, walking in on her unexpectedly like that. After insisting for a little while, he evidently made up his mind to yield. Will took it that he didn't want to risk saying too much. Which might have indicated either a decent desire to let Miriam do her own telling, or, on the other hand, the moral obliquity of the fellow. Finally he went away. . . . There was an element of excitement in standing there, talking with him and blocking off the THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 225 doorway. He had been, after all, a really conspicuous pub- lic figure. Everybody had heard of him. Why, they Esther and himself had belonged to a reading circle, some years back, where Satraps of the Simple was discussed as a masterpiece! Phrases from that one great book had crept into his own speech. All that, of course, was when the young fellow was on the crest of his wave, before peo- ple found out what he really was. Even at that, Will was a little awed. For the fellow was, after all, Henry Cal- verly. The more impossible, the more dangerous, of course, for that fact ; but none the less Henry Calverly ! The subject of this reverie walked the streets for a time, trying to puzzle out this unexpected circumstance. He had never before seen the man in the doorway. So Miriam was ill, and the house must be kept quiet! That seemed odd. She hadn't been so ill as that. Her notes filled one of his coat pockets; he slipped his hand in around them. He sensed it rather as the hostility she had dreaded. Very likely the man was her brother-in-law. Perhaps they had found out. It was alarming. He ought to see her ; but he couldn't very well break in. They couldn't stop her getting word to him. She would do that, surely. But it was none- theless difficult to calm himself. He found a florist's shop and sent a huge bunch of sweet peas, writing his initials on one of the florist's cards. She was not to see these flowers. Esther, acting on the smooth plane of self-evident duty, gave them to Mrs. Bentley, who said she loved sweet peas. He had never before in his life felt the want of money as he felt it now. Hitherto money had seemed desiraHe only as it was needed to meet casual expenses, only, really, because people pressed for it. But now he desired the freedom of action that it brings, the power to do. He wanted to lavish gifts on her; and to plan for her without considering the wealth that depressed him so whenever he permitted himself to think of it. That was why they sur- rounded her so, of course. Nobody bothered much about poor girls. Mary Maloney came to mind. . . . He 226 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM thought rather wildly of Storming the embattled hills of wealth, cutting out a place for himself, and going then to Miriam. It would be simple enough then. That was the bitter irony of life. He could write to her. In some way the fire within him had to blaze out. He had to find expression. He turned back to the boarding-house. It stood on a pleasant quiet street. The maples arched over the pave- ment. The houses were set back on green lawns. Here and there were masses of flowering 1 shrubs. A few of the older places still had their fences, of pickets, or iron piping, or sanded timbers. Girls in white sat on front porches or lounged in hammocks. There was the inter- mittent chatter of fresh young voices. A slim youth of eighteen or twenty, in clean white flan- nels came by, lugging a canvas guitar case. Only seven or eight years back, in Sunbury, Henry Calverly might have been seen, at just this time of a June evening, when the first dusk came down, going, with a guitar, to the house of this or that girl. And it would have been on just such a street as this, with lawns, and shrubs, and arching maples, and girls on porches. It was a poignant memory. Even the boarding-house had been somebody's home- stead a square old mansion, of wood, surmounted by a square "cupola" and with a porch across the entire front. A path had been worn from the corner of the property across the rather casually kept lawn to the front steps. He took this path. The usual summer evening groups were out on the porch. He had barely met these people. He had caught none of the names. There were several elderly women, a few colorless couples in later middle life, one very young and very anx- ious couple with a baby that cried a good deal, some maiden ladies, and an assortment of young people, most of whom seemed to work in the business district. They all made a point of bowing to him. Another group all men and all strangers were sitting now on the steps ; five or six of them. They wore their hats THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 227 at odd angles, and their pockets bulged with papers. A wide belt of what appeared to be cigarette stubs lay across the front walk near the bottom step. The youngest, a youth with blond curls and a curiously seamed face, was violently chewing gum. He had a hazily familiar look. Calverly had known him or seen him somewhere. Could it have been in the News office? His steps faltered. The whole group was hazily familiar now not the individuals, but the kind. They were like other groups of casually cruel, pitilessly persistent young men in the black past. He found himself unnerved. He nearly stood still; had to drive himself forward. The porch above seemed suddenly fiery with eyes. The gum chewer got up, languidly. "Howd'do, Mr. Calverly," he said. "I don't know's you remember me. I saw you some up in the old Annex. Name of Hadley. This is Mr. Watson, of the Globe, and Mr. " The offhand introductions went on. Calverly stood looking guardedly from one to another. Something had happened, and he didn't know what. He couldn't make up his mind whether or not to answer to the name. And what did they mean by using it so baldly? To trap him, perhaps. . . . He simply stood there, looking. ''Perhaps you haven't heard the news, Mr. Calverly ?" It was the one called Hadley. Calverly bent a blank face on him. "Mrs. Watt died this afternoon. Just too late for the afternoon papers." The phrase, "Mrs. Watt," had a curiously incongruous sound. They had invariably spoken of her, back in Sun- bury, as "Madame." The voice was going on. And the others were putting in questions. More intensely than at any other time during the past twenty-four hours he had the feeling of being dragged along. In his mind he couldn't keep up. He knew, of course, on the surface of his mind, that of all the blows that had lately fallen on him, this, it would certainly appear 228 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM later on, was the hardest. Still, he couldn't feel it, grasp it, believe it. It might almost have been falling on some- body else. "What are you going to do with the money?" asked a sallow, and cynical, young man, after a scrutiny that took in his hat, clothes, shoes. He managed to reply with a "What money ?" hopelessly trying to gain a little time in which to think the situation out and shape a course. But all he could think, with the little time gained, was that he had had to knot one of his shoe-strings that morning. He wished the man would stop looking at it. He knew well enough that he looked seedy. "She left it all to you, you know. About two millions." "Sounds pretty good," put in the gum chewer. Calverly could only throw out a hand in ineffectual pro- test. "Are you going out there ?" asked another. Calverly shook his head. He collected himself now enough to frame a negative attitude. "I can't talk to you," he said. "Not even about your experiences living under the other name ?" This was a sharp shot, from one who hadn't spoken before. Calverly turned a troubled gaze on him, but made no reply. "Did Mrs. Watt know that you called yourself Staf- ford?" asked Mr. Watson. Again he merely shook his head. "Did this Chicago lawyer know what's his name? Parker?" "I simply can't talk to you," he said. " 'Nothing to say,' " remarked Hadley, lightly but with a touch of passing friendliness. For, after all, Calverly had worked, however briefly, on his paper and the protective clan instinct was at work within him. The others kept up their questions for a time, but finally they were gone. Calverly went up to his room. If he could only think! THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 229 Some sort of a position he must take. Probably he would have to step out now under his own name. It would be a relief, if only it didn't call for too much explaining. A good deal depended on the morning papers. He indulged "himself in the weak hope that they would be easy on him. But his inner self knew only too well how weak the hope was. It stung him that night on a rack of nightmares. In the morning, when he walked into the dining-room, the whole room stiffened against him. He felt it. A few spoke coolly. One or two stared. Others looked down at their newspapers. He sat patiently through the ordeal of breakfast. Then he went out to the corner and bought all the papers. Not wishing to be seen bringing them back into the boarding-house, he walked over to a small park and sat there on a bench, now trying to read the bewildering "story," now watching the squirrels that played about the bench. Still he couldn't grasp it. He left the papers there half read, and walked the streets. One marked change had taken place in his spirit which he was in no condition to note. He took it for granted that he would stay here in the city. It didn't even occur to him to leave the boarding-house where he must now be addressed by a new name. They had known all this, obviously, at the Canteys', the evening before. They had undertaken to protect Miriam from him. The notoriety would be hard for her. He had tried to let her see this great difficulty in the course of the feverish note-writing, but she had lightly dismissed it. It seemed to him now that the direct blow might easily prove a good thing. It cleared the air; put him in a posi- tion to begin the long fight standing squarely on his two feet. The thing to do was to insist on releasing her. She would perhaps, in her turn, insist on waiting for him. He loved her. She loved him. But he had a fight to win before he could permit her to accept him. ... He must tell her 230 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM that. No man at the door would stop him this morning. Anyway, it was high time to begin the day's work. And no love-letters to-< ve been weak about this'' so ran his thoughts "but that's all done with. Thank God, I'm shaken out of that now ! I've got a battle to win. \Ye must make that book the absolute condition. If I can do it as it should be done, then perhaps we may talk. Not before. It's got to be so good that it can't be resisted. One thing on our side Guard'll know if it's good! He'll be interested in the real thing. And if it is real, he'll help us fight for it." The trouble, clearly, was the old difficulty of Henry Cal- verly's life. He was plunged again, willy nilly, into the rough and tumble of the actual world, in which he had never found a place. He was no more fitted to under Esther Appleby than he had been fitted to understand that irate judge in Chicago. In all this groping he was missing the point. He walked with a good deal of determination to the Cantey home. The man servant blocked the door as effectually as had "Will Appleby, merely handing him a long, softly : envelope. He opened it, standing in the vestibule. Within were a number of bank-notes, and a curt : letter from a minor officer of the Trust Company with an indecipherable signature. The letter informed him that his services in the matter of the biography of the late 1 H. Cantey were no longer required and that salary for two weeks was enclosed in lieu of any other notice. He read it a number of times! "Oh," he exclaimed then, "I can't take this!" The door man stood motionless. "Here! Take it!" He thrust the money into the ser- vant's hand. "I must see Miss Cantey at once." 'iss Cantey left this morning for California. On the eight-thirty. That is all, I think, sir." And then he closed the door. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX The Intervention of Mr. Hitt, Mr. Holmes Hitt, and Perfect Porcelain THE fact that in this crisis he didn't think seriously of self-destruction and at all only at moments in the night is not uninteresting. The forces of reconstruction appeared now to be at work within him. They took the form, in his thoughts, of an unreasoned, unguided flutter of energy. It seemed that he must be starting something. He sat, in the old alpaca work coat, at the marble-topped table in his bedroom, staring at a pad of white paper, blindly moved to write he knew not what, get it started to-day. On the money side, it was immediately necessary to do some- thing or other. He knew that. It was a grim fact. . . . During the moments when his thoughts got away from his will and wandered off into the sort of reverie that had, it now seemed, been the curse of his life (he couldn't see now that it had at times been and might again be the blessing of it) the bare notion of such an unfortunate being as him- self aspiring to the hand of Miriam Cantey appeared gro- tesque. He was, in these moments, humble about it. At other moments, however, his spirit tortured him by soaring. . . . The difficulty was, perhaps, that the wonderful experience had come and gone so quickly. He should, perhaps, fight his way to her and protect her from the hostile folk about her. But these folk were her own kin and kind. They were her own family, her father's friends and the trustees of his estate. They were the dominant folk of the city ; and he was an impoverished, il nobody. It was like a mad dream. . . . He was still in the grip of a paralysis of the spirit. He had nothing, could cling to nothing, but the spark of vitality that in a sense seemed to have nothing to do with him, to 231 232 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM come from without, but that none the less was burning, if faintly, within him. It seemed to have a direct bearing on the fact that a week's board would have to be paid in a few days. So he stared at the white paper. And at intervals, in an effort to re-orientate himself, read random paragraphs in his Montaigne. He was staring it was about noon now when Mrs. Clark, the landlady, thinly anxious, knocked at his door. "It's a man to see you," she said, extending a card, "Mr. Mr. I hardly know what we're to call you now. . . ." "It may as well be Calverly, I suppose." "Mr. Calverly. Shall I tell him to come up?" The card read, "Mr. Hazlitt R. Hitt." No address, no business. "Oh, yes," said Calverly, "I'll see him." It didn't seem to matter, one way or the other. The caller came slowly up the second flight of stairs, and paused at the top for a breath. Calverly, waiting, finally came to the door. Mr. Hitt proved to be a patient-looking man with gold- rimmed spectacles, a bald head and a cropped white mus- tache. The face was familiar. "I've seen you at the News office," remarked Mr. Hitt, with a good deal of quiet dignity. "I am librarian there." "Oh, yes ! Of course." "I called on a rather personal matter, Mr. Calverly. First let me say that for some years now I've kept your Satraps on my desk to read now and then when I need freshening up as you perhaps read your" his eyes were roving over the table "your Montaigne. I love that book. And I have long wanted to meet you." Calverly guardedly bowed. This sort of talk always con- fused him. "My business touches on the matter of the Cantey biog- raphy. Let me ask have you given up that work ?" Calverly drew forth the crumpled note of the morning, smoothed it out, and handed it to his caller. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 233 "That's how it stands," he said, simply. "Rather cavalier treatment, Mr. Calverly." "It seemed so to me, but ... oh well 1" "You have no idea of reopening it?" Calverly threw out his hands. "No." "I had to ask you this. The trustees have offered the work to me. I couldn't consider it while you planned to do it." "I don't. You are quite free. I appreciate your calling." "There's another matter. It may seem a bit delicate, but Mr. Calverly, I'm a much older man than you more than twice your age. I know something of what you've been through. I don't imagine that you've been able to put much by. I know from experience that a small legacy is anything but ready money, and I imagine a large one is even more deliberate." Calverly looked puzzled, then annoyed. "Oh, that money!" he exclaimed. "I can't touch that!" "Not at once, certainly." "Never!" Mr. Hitt considered this. "Well," he said after a little, "if you'd care to take an- other job for the present, by way of picking up a live- lihood, I think I can be of use." Calverly was touched. The man seemed like a father. But he threw out his hands again. "Who'd want me?" he replied. "I've considered that. Of course this notoriety must be very unpleasant for you. For a little while now you're bound to be conspicuous. But there's one line of business in which almost any sort of notoriety is welcomed the advertising business. I have a rather distant connection who is at the head of an agency here. He's very enterprising. He told me just now that he'd be glad to give you some work. And, after all, we do have to keep alive." "I wonder," said Calverly, "if I could be of the slightest use to him." 234 THE PASSIONATE .;alc linen, with a tie of cool blue silk. The wide ribbon l-.-il hung from his nose glasses was blue, matching the tie. he merest corner of a handkerchief, bordered with palest 244 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM blue, showed above the breast pocket. The smooth young face was quietly, pleasantly, yet unsmilingly alert. "Good morning," he said ; glanced at the papers, and, per- haps with amusement, at Calverly's tousled hair ; drew up a chair. "What are you doing?" "Oh, just trying an advertisement." "Let me see." But before looking over the scribbled pages, the calm eyes of Holmes Hitt surveyed the room. They rested on the newspaper parcel, on a chair. He reached under the table. A buzzer sounded faintly. The decorative secretary promptly appeared. Holmes Hitt's gaze indicated the parcel. The secretary glanced from it to Calverly. "It's mine," said that young man, a little flushed, feeling, like his parcel, more than ever out of place. "Oh, all right," remarked Holmes Hilt. The secretary disappeared. "As for this stuff," remarked Holmes Hitt, fingering the papers, "what you've done is to write nice phrases. And too many of them. Nothing in that. Later to-day I'll take you over to the factory. You must see the work and get the feeling of the men behind it, their ability and energy and faith in their product. You must eat, breathe, dream Perfect Porcelain until you're fairly bursting with the impulse to tell people not only how good it is but how necessary it is. Then you must visualize the woman you'll be writing at." "Woman?" "Certainly. You're dealing with homes. Every home means a woman. You've got to think Perfect Porcelain so hard that you think it straight from your head into hers, get her to dwelling on the thought of Perfect Porcelain until nothing else will do nothing in the world. Give up your whole being to it. Fight for those six thousand homes, one by one. Win them. There's no other way. It must crowd out of your mind every other " A soft buzzer sounded. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 245 Calmly Holmes Hitt rose, slid back a panel over the desk, and drew out a telephone instrument. "It's for you," he said. A feminine voice fell on Calverly's ear. A familiar voice. "It's me," said the voice ; adding, after a moment, "Mary Maloney. This is Mr. Staf Mr. Calverly, isn't it ? ... I called up the News, and they said I might find you here. I had an awful time getting anybody there that would say anything. . . . Where am I? Why, right down here by the News building, in the drug store. Listen! Could you come down for just a minute? Two telegrams came. They just left them lying on the table in the hall, and I thought they might be important, and so I . , ." Calverly turned. Already the secretary had entered, with mail. She stood at Holmes Hitt's elbow while he went swiftly through the thick pile of papers, pausing now and then to outline a brief reply. "I'm afraid I I'd better step out, just for a moment." Holmes Hitt merely moved his head. Uncomfortably aware that he was being drawn mo- mentarily farther from Perfect Porcelain and the new relation with life, Calverly went down to the drug store. Mary's little plump person rose from a stool by the soda fountain. Her face was suffused with color. She was smiling expectantly. She seemed unexpectedly pretty. Her great, curiously honest eyes moved him to a feeling of gentle regard, even of tenderness, that was yet like a faint revival of an old memory, of something that had happened very long ago. One telegram was from Parker, in Chicago. It read, in the familiar telegraphic jumble of words, > "Can you come at once discuss estate as there is no other legatee I prefer take no steps without advice from you and there are many matters should be gone over carefully or if you can not come will go to you important." 246 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM This stirred no particular interest in his breast, so he slipped it into a coat pocket. The other was from Humphrey Weaver, offering either to come at once or to send money. A few extra words of cordial import warmed his heart as such words do when found on a telegram form. He walked out with Mary to the street. His preoccupation fell away for the moment. Here she was; on his hands; rather confused. Something must be said. And her manner, simple, almost alarmingly open, made it evident that she had been thinking every moment of him. She even seemed to assume, like a child, that he, too, must have been thinking of her. "You were good to come, Mary," he said. "Oh no. I thought you ought to have them. And I Jdidn't think they'd object at the office. I never asked for time off before, this way. I didn't care much. I've thought lately I might look up another job. You get tired of doing 'just one thing." He couldn't reply to this. "The girls were awfully excited," she ventured. "At the news, I mean," Her eager confusion was fading. "I I could see that you were going through trouble," she added, timidly. "I was, Mary." His voice was so gentle that she glanced up at him. "I still am." "I'm sorry," she murmured. On the step of a River Street car she hesitated; looked back. He was standing motionless, holding his hat above his head. She bit her lip. The car rolled away. She went in and looked with swimming eyes for a seat. Calverly returned to the room at the top of the City Trust Building, pausing only to telegraph Humphrey that he had a job, was in excellent spirits, and needed no help. Holmes Hitt made room for him at the table. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 247 "There's no other way," said Holmes Hitt, taking up a half-tone of an elaborately equipped bathroom. "By the sheer power of words you have to move Perfect Porcelain from the factory to the freight yards, over hundreds, even thousands, of miles of railroads, through wholesale and retail plumbing establishments, into six thousand of those homes. You have to get specifications for Perfect Porcelain into the plans for six thousand new houses. You can only do that by stirring six thousand women to the point of insisting, even of overcoming the objections of their archi- tects. All you really have, of course, is the white paper before you. That's all white paper, plus a brain. You can write. No man on earth can make a phrase live as you can. But can you, with a phrase, lift that Perfect Porcelain bathtub, shower, wash-stand, out of the factory, and install it in a house?" Calverly had sunk back in his chair. "I don't know," he replied. "I doubt it." "I don't, Calverly. Not for a minute." Calverly regarded the smooth face, the calm eyes, the studiously arranged color-scheme of the young man before him ; considered him against the background of the im- pressively rich room. And studying the man, all he could think was "Perfect Porcelain! Perfect Porcelain!" For Holmes Hitt was hard, shiny, clean; was smoothly impene- trable. "There are other makes of bathroom fixtures, aren't there?" he asked, dully. "Certainly." "Some of them about as good as this?" "None of them better." "And it's going to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to exploit this make. That'll be added to the price, won't it ? This room, part of your income, even my little income, will all be added to the price ?" "Certainly." "Why not save all that money and let the woman buy any make she likes?" 248 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Because we shall be raising the standard of comfort and cleanliness in the homes of America. We shall be stimulating business, stimulating life itself. Energy put out in the mercantile field creates new markets, new business. Life isn't an accumulation of things! Life is energy, and energy is life. The money spent in pushing Perfect Por- celain will force a higher standard of manufacture. It will stabilize small businesses all over America. It will improve advertising itself. But above all it will make better homes. Homes that are more livable-in." It was difficult to withstand this flow of easy vet alert talk. "But how about the poor devil who has to pay for all this, that woman's husband? We're going to force it on him, by stirring his wife's desire for it. Aren't we?" "Certainly." "Is that sound economy?" "Certainly. Better homes make better men. . . . P.y the way, note that phrase down 'Better homes make better men.' " Calverly obediently wrote it down. "And remember this : life isn't a stable thing. You can't put life away on a shelf and expect to find the same thing you left there. It's fluid. It's volatile. Business is always either shrinking or growing. Men are either growing or shriveling. I personally stand for growth. Every time I improve a home by installing a Milhenning bathroom, by 'just that much I improve America." Calverly bent forward over the papers. "You've got to think, feel, believe Perfect Porcelain with every ounce of energy in your mind and spirit, before you can write a sound line of copy." Calverly looked at him, a kindling light in his eye, a touch of color in his cheeks. "All right," he said, "I'll do it. I'll put everything else aside. It's worth the chance." "It is your chance," said Holmes Hitt. The door opened. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 249 "There are several newspaper men outside," said the secretary, quietly, "to see Mr. Calverly." "I won't see them !" cried that young man. Holmes Hitt thought this over. "Yes you will," he said. "You'll have to. May as well get it over with." "But I've told them all I " And Calverly, sputtering, went out to the bare little coop by the outer door. Three young 1 men were sitting on the bench. Two of them he seemed to know. They had doubtless been in the group at the boarding-house. "Mr. Calverly," said one, "we hear from Chicago that your attorney in Chicago expects you out there to-day." Calverly spread his hands. "He confirms the news that the entire fortune has been left to you. You're a millionaire, of course. When are you leaving?" "I'm not leaving." Another spoke up. "Of course, Mr. Calverly, you'll understand that this is a very dramatic occurrence. The papers can hardly ignore it. Won't you tell us something about your plans for the future? Will you take up novel- writing again?" "No," muttered Calverly, in great discomfort. "I don't know ! I can't talk to you !" He shut his eyes. He could feel again the slow torture of that dragged-out trial, and the slower torture of the prison life that followed it. Why couldn't they let him alone? He could have screamed at them. "You said you were not going to Chicago?" "I said that. I'm not." "Then this Mr. Parker will be coming here ?" "No. I don't know." "Of course, Mr. Calverly, you must realize that in taking this attitude you are suggesting a bigger 'story* than any we've got so far. Do you mean to stay that you are refusing this fortune?" "Yes!" The inner pressures at last found an outlet in voice, gesture, blazing eye. "I mean just that! I won't 250 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM touch her filthy money ! I don't want ever to hear it spoken of again. Now get out and leave me alone !" He slammed the door on them. The girl at the window looked after him, mildly surprised. Doors weren't slammed in the establishment of Holmes Hitt, Inc. He loitered in the corridor. He must think Perfect Porcelain. He set his face ; marched back doggedly. Then, before the unruffled, momentarily exasperating Holmes Hitt he exploded. "I don't care for advertising!" he cried. ''It's debasing! It's vicious ! Just because the wide reading of magazines and newspapers gives you a chance because this new scheme of putting into people's minds the thing you want them to think " \Yithout lifting an eyelid or shifting a foot, Holmes Hitt, at this point, surprisingly, dramatically, brought down a flat hand on the table with a bang. "New?" he said, with only a little more vigor than usual. "New? My dear man, don't you know that adver- tising has been the greatest force in the world since life began! New? Why, bless your heart! do you know who v r ere the greatest advertising men in history? They were Alexander, Julius Caesar, Ghengis Kahn, Peter the Great, Martin Luther, Ben Franklin. . . . Caesar writes his own 'Commentaries'; puts them into every school in the civilized world. Why? Advertising! . . . Luther bums the Pope's Bull. Where ? In his old porcelain stove ? Not a bit of it! He burns it at the city gate. Why? Adver- tising! . . . Kings travel around laying cornerstones and addressing orphan asylums and attending teas ; have their pictures taken in every kind of costume. Why? Advertising! . . . Whistler, the painter, ties a rib- bon around that white lock of his; insults people; wears queer clothes. Why? Advertising! . . . What were Tennyson's old wide-brimmed hat and long cloak ? Adver- tising!" "Oh come! Those things aren't a parallel to this com- mercial " THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 251, "Aren't they though! Commercial? What's commerce? Selling things, isn't it? Suppose a man gives his life to building up a manufacturing business. Suppose he makes honest goods; believes they're the best. He wants people to know about them, doesn't he?" "He wants their money." "Money, nothing ! He wants success, power, yes. That's human. What does your soldier, your statesman, your reformer, your novelist, want ? Success, fame, power ! One man sells his goods, another sells himself. What's tha difference ?"' Again the soft buzzer sounded. "For you," said Holmes Hitt, with a quizzical glance. And again it was a woman's voice. "It's Margie Margie Daw Henry. I want to see you." "Well I I'm busy just now." "Are you engaged for lunch ?" "For lunch why, no, I don't think so." "Well then, meet me let's see, I don't want to go to Philippe's I'll tell you! You're a millionaire now! Meet me at the Rivoli, at one." Calverly came slowly back toward the table. He knew, now, that Holmes Hitt was a force. He would have given almost anything in the world just then to feel even a little of that clear mental energy in his own worn out brain. He thought of it as worn out. Even so, the man fired him. The trite phrase, "Energy is Life," rang in his ears like a new gospel. He felt those steady eyes on him. "It all comes down to thinking it," said Holmes Hitt. "And thinking it means wanting to do it. You can put Perfect Porcelain into six thousand homes if you want to. The question is, Do you want to?" "Yes," said Calverly, "I do." CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT In Which Margie Daw Finds Herself Useful as a Stimulant "'TpHEY'RE pounding you pretty hard, aren't they?" JL observed Margie. She looked fresh, pretty, more than usually boyish. The gaiety and clatter of the restau- rant suited her to-day. Calverly inclined his head. His sensitive mouth twitched. "But I don't care," he said. Holmes Hitt wouldn't have cared. "That's hardly true, Henry. Of course you care. And you've got to do something about it." "Work's the thing!" said he, with sudden emphasis. ''What work? Advertising business?" He nodded. She shook her head ; firmly. "It is. You don't know, Margie. How I've lived. It's practical life. It's the world. I've got to take my place in it." Again her little head moved in a decided negative. "What else?" She nibbled at her salad ; considered ; finally leaned her elbows on the table and let her bright eyes rest thought- fully on him. "Henry, I've just learned it's really why I called you up that we've taken a Sunday syndicate story about you from the National Feature Service. The Sunday editor arranged it by wire this morning. It's going to be one of those hideous things colored picture of Henry Calverly as a famous writer wearing a laurel wreath ; another of Henry Calverly in a striped suit looking out between iron bars" He shivered. His eyes she thought them like a dog's jnow hung on hers. She knew she was torturing him. 252 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 253 "Yes, really. I was there when he ordered the drawings. The story is to dwell on the sensational ups and downs of your life." His lips moved. She caught the one word : "Please!" "But we've got to consider this, Henry. It's a fact. That story's going all over the country. There'll be others. They'll pound you right down if you let them. The ques- tion is, What are you going to do ? How are you going to meet it?" He shaded his eyes with his hand. He was silent so long that she fell to eating again. "I'll ignore it," she thought he said. "But you can't, Henry !" "I can. They can't touch my private life." He faltered a little on this. They could and they would. "You're going to make me speak plainly " "Why talk of it at all!" "Perhaps I can help. I'd like to." He was silent ; head on hand ; eyes downcast now. Play- ing with his fork. He couldn't eat ; she was bearing so on those old worn nerves. "You're a page one problem, Henry. Your whole life. Hiding your head in Holmes Hitt's office can't change that fact." "I don't think I know what you mean," he murmured. "You're a man with a public name. There's a public Henry Calverly. He isn't so, but he's the only you that the public knows or cares about." "I don't care about the public." "Oh, but you do! You've got to. All your real work, until you die, has got to be done in the public eye. And what the public thinks of you, thinks you are, will make you or break you. It will carry you on to success, or pin failure on you at every turn, no matter what you may per- sonally try to do." Again he was touched with that involuntary little shiver. She couldn't see his eyes. She wondered, with swift in- 254 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM sight, what recent deep hurt she had probed. Sure of her reasoning firmly, in fact, on her own ground she pressed on. "Let's look at the hard fact. You're tagged now, Henry. Your name suggests prisons and aliases. It's unjust. Most reputations, one way or the other, are unjust. Every public man bears a tag. The shrewd men see to it that their tags are pleasing, popular. Hence press agents ! Poli-i ticians have them, and preachers, and bankers, and actresses. Their job is to build up a fictitious personality. They find out what the public likes in bankers, preachers, actresses, statesmen, and make their employers look like that. Very few newspaper reputations but are false. You surely know, that. Even the great names Washington and that inspired cherry tree yarn. Of course, George Washington told lies. From all I can gather he had violent moments; but the cherry tree triumphed and Gilbert Stuart finished the job with his undying portrait of frozen virtue. . . . Take Gladstone! The photographs of him chopping down trees at Hawarden. William E. Gladstone was anything but a simple husbandman. He was an astute and a properly un- scrupulous politician. But he saw to it that he was tagged right And the Gladstone myth survives over mere fact." For one swift instant Calverly's deep eyes swung up in a sharp glance ; then dropped again. She was puzzled, un- aware that Holmes Hitt had within the two hours laid the foundation for her talk. "The simple fact is, Henry, you're tagged wrong." "Work," he said again "I'll work it out, little by little." "It won't do it. Reprobates have gone down in history as paragons of virtue. Human angels have gone down as devils. We've got to change your tag. Big job." She glanced about the crowded restaurant. "I'm dying for a smoke. If I tried it in this place they'd throw us out, I suppose." She mused aloud. "Publicity is the greatest force in the world. The great dear public doesn't see straight and it never will. It's full of notions, cant. It's just got to have, THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 255 all the time, its heroes and its monsters. People, of course, are neither." He turned toward the music ; moodily watched the vio- linist ; said something about the cheapness of these popular songs. She went on studying him. Clearly he didn't see it. It seemed tragic. They'd simply pound him to death ; there'd be no let-up, no mercy. The public was merciless, casually but persistently cruel. They smashed one so Her eyes dwelt on the hair that straggled down over his forehead. It was a good forehead. And the texture of his skin was finer than was common with men. Her pulse quickened. She found him more than ever fascinating. . . . The change of name had been the worst blunder of all. Though when you come to think of all he must have been going through, what could he do? He must have been beside himself. He could have had it changed legally. But what good would that have done? Just that much more publicity, likely. "That's what you're up against, Henry. Yours is a pub- licity problem. Nothing else. I don't know whether I can make you see it. If I can't " He shrugged this off ; peered out from under his hand at the musicians. "When do you get the money, Henry?" He shook his head. "One or two years, I suppose. These things take time. Has the will been probated?" No answer. "You do get it, don't you, Henry ?" "Oh, please !" It was hardly more than a sigh. "You're awfully difficult. More than anybody else in the world you need a publicity man right now. Time is pass- ing. We'd have to catch it right at the top of all this row. Maybe, even then, we couldn't do it. It's a chance. And, of course, if you won't help against your will I can't do a thing. I could if . . ." She leaned across the table. Her voice dropped a little and softened. A warm glow 256 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM spread through her body and brain. "Supposing it's hope- less, Henry, after all supposing you just have to clear out again I can't bear to think of your going alone. We might work it out together. You need a woman awfully, to take care of you. And to work through you. I'd take a chance with you, Henry. My life isn't so much. I'd pack up and go oh, anywhere! Africa, South America, China! It doesn't much matter where. It would be one more experi- ence. There'd be a thrill in it. Perhaps that's what you need. I find . . . the way I feel about the little time you were at my place . . . I'm fussy; some men I'd loathe, just seeing them around you know, coats off shaving Oh, I know all about it ! I'm not a green little thing. I've been married. But I'm young enough. And I wouldn't set up claims on you smother you make exac- tions strike a hard bargain like these innocent little marrying things." There was a long tense silence. Finally he looked up at her, seemed in a hesitating way about to speak. "I've got to get back," he said. "Up to the office. It's my first day there, you see." And he faintly, almost apolo- getically, smiled. The warm color faded from her face. She had again let herself go too far; her usually quick mind couldn't make this turn in time. She couldn't speak at all ; walked out with him in silence. "I don't want you to think I don't appreciate all you've said," was his stiffly inadequate remark. From this sort of thing she could only turn away, tell- ing herself bitterly that she was a fool. And he went back to the City Trust Building to carry on his dogged, grotesquely heroic little struggle with what seemed to him, for the moment, reality. Holmes Hitt, it appeared, had shut himself in at precisely two. Calverly recalled dimly that he had spoken, a full day earlier, of doing that. The man seemed to him quite wonderful. He couldn't himself imagine knowing, a day in advance, that he could shut off all departments but one THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 257 of an active brain and coolly call on that one department to function. He felt now the admiration and a touch of the envy that the emotional man must feel at times for the suc- cessfully methodical man. He wandered out of the office and took the elevator down. He was disturbed, and curiously stimulated. He walked across town and out to his own room; shut him- self in there. The quick plausible mind of Holmes Hitt seemed almost to have substituted itself for his own. Margie had added emphasis to this pervading, compelling force of the man, without successfully intruding herself. If anything, she had driven Calverly's thoughts precipitately back to him. She had intensified his rather blind, certainly desperate determination to lay hold of every-day life. By reviving that emotional tension between them she had driven him off, sharpened his will, brought his best, his emotional, faculties into play. . . . He had none of the Perfect Porcelain, data there in his room; but that was what he went at. He drew rough sketches of the perfect bathroom; even of the typical suburban home it was to make better. He wrote phrases, prose descriptions, verse. Ideas came; he played with them. . . . He worked there until night, and on nearly till morning, pausing only to rush out and buy some magazines and a cup of coffee. It seemed to him that he couldn't go into the boarding-house dining-room; not as he felt now. Something near the old creative pressure was on him. He poured over the adver- tising pages of the magazines; tried imitating their effec- tive points, then altering them, twisting them around ; then hit on the idea of designing an advertisement that would compete effectually with the hundreds of others in a par- ticular magazine. He began to see the possibilities of type, white spaces, contrasting thicknesses and qualities of paper, colored inks, drawings and designs. Little by little the vulgarity of his subject and of advertising in general faded out ; he saw, felt, the business enterprise that lay back of each commodity, the drive, strain, power in competition that was represented on these pages. He even felt drama 258 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM in it. ... After all, wasn't it life? Wasn't it ambition, energy, the struggle for preeminence? Wasn't it, at bot- tom, the old, old human drama, worked out in the terms of the moment? . . . He even began to sense romance in it. The next morning it was near noon he appeared, dis- heveled, hollow-eyed, but in a curious way nearly happy, at the office. Holmes Hitt exhibited no surprise over his disappearance the day before; merely studied him with calm, slightly amused eyes ; then looked through the little heap of papers that Calverly placed before him. These held his interest. Once or twice he even nodded approvingly. "This," he said, tapping them, "is a start. We'll go out to the factory to-day. I want you to see porcelain made. And I want you to talk with the workmen. I want you to realize that each of them is a human being, supporting a family, working something out. Then you'd better chat with the firm. They're big men. You'll feel humble. All through it you'll find beauty. And after that say to- morrow evening we'll sit down, you and I, and talk over the campaign that our copy is just a detail in. I want you to get a little notion of the problems of distribution. You'll find it big, stirring stuff." And so Henry Calverly was swept off his feet and into a current in which he had to exert every faculty to the utmost in order merely to keep afloat. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE On the Topic of Killing Writers DURING the earlier part of his talk with Margie she had spoken, casually, of the older Mr. Hitt. At the time he had seemed hardly to hear. Later, as was often the case in Henry's odd brain, it came up. There was a new managing editor on the News, it appeared. He had discharged the old librarian without a moment's warning as an unjustifiable expense to the paper. A ten-dollar-a-week filing clerk would do, he said. This performance had so upset Mr. Listerly according to Margie that he stayed away from the office; put in a day or so playing golf. Until, added the shrewd Margie, Hittie could get his things away and not be hanging un- comfortably around. Then Calverly's fresh trouble had solved the little personal problem for him; he transferred the biography job from the younger man to the elder. "But it was the City Trust Company that wrote me," Henry explained. "Of course, my dear! It was with Hannibal Simmons, of the City Trust, that he was playing golf. Mr. Listerly never discharged anybody in his life. He lets other people do the disagreeable things." "He came to me, Mr. Hitt did," said Henry. "He wanted to be sure I was really out." "He's a dear!" said Margie. All this came strongly to mind one evening when Henry met Mr. Hitt and, warmed by the mere sight of the quietly friendly face and the kindly eyes behind the glasses, walked with him along the street. They dropped into a Buffalo Lunch Room together. After this they sat in Can- tey Square and talked. At eight they drifted around to a theater, climbing to inexpensive seats; and talked until iearly morning over mugs of beer. 259 260 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM It was a moving experience to Calverly. It was so long since he had known a man friend that until this evening he had forgotten how to be really aware of the want. Hum- phrey Weaver, he always knew, would do anything for him, any imaginable kind act. But the old friendship had painfully changed. Humphrey had gone on up, to that plane of success where dwelt Holmes Hitt, and Mr. Lis- terly, and the reticent, golf-playing men he could see at the mahogany desks in the City Trust rooms whenever he passed in and out of the building. He and Humphrey could feel toward each other to the point of a delicate tenderness, but they couldn't talk. There is a freemasonry for each human plane, and a mintage of thought, feeling and speech for each. Old Mr. Hitt, now, knew poverty, disillusionment, patient routine. And a contributing fact was the genuine respect and affection he felt for those old stories of Henry's. By the end of the evening they were friends. There was a thrill in the experience. They talked eagerly, hotly. And finally Henry told of his love for Miriam. Mr. Hitt had a young heart. He listened like a boy. "I'm not sure that you oughtn't to write her," he observed. "No." Henry shook his head. "I've thought and thought until my head split. I can't! There was just that one awful mistake between us. I thought she'd know the whole story the minute I told her my name. God, it's seemed as if the whole world knew it !" "I know !" breathed Mr. Hitt. "I see now that she didn't. If she had don't you see? . . . " He spread his hands. Mr. Hitt turned this over in his mind. "It would have had to make a difference. Don't you see? I've been pretty naive about it, I'm afraid. It's been hard to see it with other people's eyes." "Of course. We can't any of us do that." "It wasn't until I got my head a little clear, and just sat down and put my story together, that I began to get it straight. There we were she rich, I poor ; she a sheltered invalid, I an outcast . . ." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 261 Mr. Hitt smiled gently at the rhetorical touch. Henry pressed on : "She's really pretty defenseless in the hands of all those people about her. She's had no business experience, no worldly life at all. The whole story broke on her at once. She thought my change of name was just to escape unpleas- ant notoriety. She didn't dream that I'd been a convict." Mr. Hitt winced at the word. "It's true. It's the word. She she loved me, you see . . . His voice broke a little here. "Then she still loves you." "That would make it harder. I almost hope she doesn't. . . . No, I can't say that!" "Of course you can't." "But here's what it conies down to." . . . Henry leaned earnestly over the table; spoke with sudden clear conviction. . . . "A woman who has given her heart to a man has a right to be proud of him. Hasn't she ?" Mr. Hitt thought a long time. "Yes," he finally had to admit, "she has that right." "Well . . . !" Again Henry spread his hands. "That puts it straight up to me. You see ! I've got to make good ! I've got to build a new name for Henry Calverly ! I've got to! As soon as possible. Every day that the thing rests this way makes it just that much harder for her. When they say to her as they will 'The man you love is nothing but that, and that!' she must be able to reply with 'Yes, but he is also this!' You see? . . . And I can't so much as write her a note until I've worked it out, somehow. Better this slow pain than stirring it up, torturing her." Mr. Hitt slowly nodded. A touch of moisture came to his patient eyes. The thought of this ardent boy he seemed that building the new name in that corner room of Holmes Hitt, Inc., the thought of "Hitt Panatelas" and "Per- fect Porcelain" all this was curiously touching. The boy's problem was so much bigger, clearly, than he was able to see. "It's really a publicity problem, on a large scale," thought Mr. Hitt, unaware that he was substantially 262 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM quoting a certain brisk young woman of his acquaintance. Knowing Satraps of the Simple almost word for word ; he had often read one or another of the stories at gatherings of friends he had an illuminating cross light on the curi- ously ingenious young man before him, who didn't seem able to perceive that his life was a wreck, and who was, after all, so appealingly young. His youth appeared to be, at the moment, his only hope. Yet he might work through, in some unexpected way. Life was such a dramatic hodge- podge of downs and ups ; you could never be sure. . . . And Mr. Hitt felt sorry, too, for Miriam Cantey. He had seen her; he had a memory of a delicate girl with unex- pectedly vivid coloring of hair and eyes, Jim Cantey's coloring. There was another chance for the boy, of course. He spoke of it. "I notice that you leave the money out of account, in all this talk. It will help, you know." Calverly looked at him, directly, with a touch of surprise, and more than a touch of dignity. "I shall never touch that," he said, simply. It came down, in Mr. Hitt's mind, to the question, What, what on earth, were you to do with him ! Beyond standing by! On another evening they took a trolley ride to an amuse- ment park, up the river. Here, stretched comfortably out on a grassy bank, looking idly out at the boating parties, they fell to talking of the Cantey biography. Henry asked his friend, hesitatingly, even shyly, how he meant to handle it. "I don't know. Conventionally, I suppose. I'm plugging through Amme's assortment of papers. It's an excellent picture of Amme's mind the whole selection. And the way they're classified. I can see just the book he wants. It'll look like all the standard biographies. It'll please the family. And it will be worthless." Henry glanced up quickly, warmly. Little had passed between them on this topic, so important to each. From THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 263 moment to moment he was discovering new points of mental and spiritual contact with this singularly youthful old man. For to twenty-six, fifty-eight is indeed age ! "It won't please all the family," he said, an almost de- votional softness in his voice. "Not Miriam." *'Oh, it will, my boy! It'll have to. Jim Cantey was rugged, sometimes rough, what we mean when we use the term 'big.' He'd have wanted nothing but the truth, I think, himself." "She knows that. And she knows a good deal of the truth. He left it with her." "No! That's interesting! Not unlike him, though. It was an unusual friendship, that ; father and daughter. They traveled together a lot. Mr. Listerly used to talk about it. I've heard that he told her even his business problems." "I know. He did. And he was determined to have an honest biography. He meant, up to the very last, to write his own." "It wouldn't have turned out to be what he wanted, of course. He wasn't a writing man. And no, it can't be written." Mr. Hitt slowly shook his head. "The difficulty i it's fundamental people just naturally won't have it. Our racial attitude toward morals and life is a good deal like the Japanese feeling for art and the Chinese feeling for literature. It has settled down to a pattern. The man whose life doesn't appear to run true to the pattern is at once dismissed as abnormal, or 'bad,' or something like that. The pattern is, of course, quite largely false. Almost wholly false. Human life doesn't run that way. It must be why every life being lived about us is in some degree a pretense. So long as the great rank and file feel that way, what are you going to do about it? If I were to picture Jim Cantey as I've seen him, a fine, big, forthright man with blood in him fighting like a pirate, sometimes driving great deals through ruthlessly leaving wrecks here and there as he plunged on but big, always big! you know well enough what they'd say: either that Jim Cantey was a bad lot or that I was." 264 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "This sounds a little," remarked Calverly dryly, "like talk I've heard lately about 'publicity.' " "I'm not sure that any biography mightn't be properly catalogued as just that." "Apparently you first find out what the public wants to think about the subject of your biography, and then manu- facture that sort of person for them, using what real data you can, calmly leaving out what you can't." "Yes, it's that. Oh, I'd love to do the other! There's never been such romantic stuff as this business development of America. The stakes were so big. It was so lawless. Certainly Jim Cantey was lawless ! Such a big swing to it. I've always loved to ride through Pittsburgh at night, so I could raise the window curtain a little, and lie in my berth and look out at the miles of red fire from the blast fur- naces. It's thrilling. Especially when you know a little of the great business kings and freebooters and labor leaders that stand back of it, and what they're fighting for. Pitts- burgh alone is a greater epic than all of Homer. . . . Take the fight of the railroad kings for the empires of our own West wonderful!" "Jim Cantey saw all that," mused Henry. "He would have. Yes, he did." "And you see it. Why not write some of it, at least?" Mr. Hitt pursed his lips, and looked a long time at the river. "No," he finally said "no. Certainly not in the biogra- phy. It's not my book, to do as I like with. You couldn't make it fit the pattern. Never in the world. It's too rough glorious, but rough, barbaric. Blood and sweat and bitterness in it." Henry said, after a little, humbly, "I don't seem able to see this pattern. That's why nobody wants my work, I suppose." Mr. Hitt sighed. "And I can see it," he said. "That's why they want mine." I^ater, walking across town. Mr. Hitt stopped before the wide plate-glass windows of the post-office. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 265 "There was a fellow named Harkwright," he said, "who put through the Peck Avenue trolley, back in 1893. A year or two later Jim Cantey he was forming County Railways then got the control away from him. Beat him in the stock market. Harkwright took to drinking, went from bad to worse, and let the thing prey on him so that he went around threatening to shoot Mr. Cantey on sight. They met in there, by that first marble column. Jim Cantey walked straight up to him, took him by the scruff of the neck and the seat of his trousers, and pitched him out here through the glass. He landed about where we're standing. That was all from Mr. Harkwright. It was a touch of the real Jim Cantey." They sat then, for an hour, on a bench in Cantey Square. The great dark office buildings loomed high into the night about them. In the City Trust Building, a huge, gray- white faqade, a few lights twinkled. An occasional late street-car rumbled by, each with its dimly decipherable let- tering, "County Railways." Two policemen stood chatting under the street light, at the corner. On other benches, here in the park, human derelicts sprawled and slumbered un- easily. Calverly was looking about at these. "I'm always sorry for them," he explained, in a hushed voice. "I've slept on park benches many a night." And added, "In winter, too." Mr. Hitt was silent. He had met Holmes Hitt at noon, and they had discussed Henry Calverly. He was working, it seemed, like mad. Too earnestly. Almost too humbly. Holmes said, "I must have talked to him harder than I meant. He's taken it like a child. And his nerves are all strung up. I don't believe he's got any safety valve. But if he doesn't burst, he'll write great copy. I was right about him. If I get time, later, I'll take him East for a week. Atlantic City, and around. Slacken him up a bit." Calverly was speaking now, dreamily, gazing up at the higher lights in the great front of the City Trust Building. "I've been thinking over what you said, up the river 266 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM about Pittsburgh being an epic. It's rather wonderful that you and I should see things so much alike. I feel that. If you and Jim Cantey and I could have sat down together we might have composed an epic. If we were big enough. Jim Cantey knew the facts. It's a job for a Dumas and a Balzac rolled into one that big push westward, the rail- roads, the mines, the grazing, oil, the development of manu- facturing, the trusts, the big pirates and politics, of course. It's been bigger drama, I think, than the days of the French kings. It's amusing I find myself thinking of Jim Cantey as a sort of modern Charles the Bold." "They were not unlike," said Mr. Hitt. He stole a glance at the young dreamer beside him. Calvery's voice, quiet enough at first, had taken on timbre and color as he talked. It was a musical voice. Two automobiles stood before the City Trust, a taxicab and a limousine. Two men came out of the building, one, a little unsteady of foot, the other, tall and slender, carrying a suit-case and a golf bag. The taxi was paid off and spun away. The two stood by the limousine. There was a brief argu- ment. Then they got into the car and were driven rapidly off. "Hum !" mused Mr. Hitt, aloud. "That's curious !" "I didn't notice who they were." "Mayor Tim and Oswald Quakers. Together!" "It's not the first time." "One doesn't think of them as having anything in com- mon." "Why not?" "Well, Quakers is a gentleman and has been chairman of the Republican State Committee. Tim isn't a gentleman and is boss of the Democratic Machine here." "I don't think party lines mean anything to Quakers. He's interested in power. Anyway, he's bossing the mayor just now." Mr. Hitt was frankly surprised. "I didn't know you knew Quakers," he said. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 267, Henry hesitated. "I do, a little. He's a shrewd man, I think." "Very, very shrewd." They fell silent. "Money!" Henry exclaimed softly. "There's the heart of the modern epic. Oh, why doesn't somebody write it! It's what they're all fighting for. It's power. Gold in the ground ! Digging it out ! The modern West began in forty- nine. And the Klondike. . . ." his voice dropped . . . "I was there. And steel, and copper, and wheat, and oil! . . . Why write about little individual sor- rows or joys except as they reflect the big drama we're all actors in, dragged along in !" Mr. Hitt pointed at a belated pushcart, over at the corner, laden with fruit. "There's a touch of world-drama," he said quietly. "We build ships and send them into the Car- ibbean, and push in commercial agents and little railroads, and back it up with gunboats and stage a revolution in some little Central American republic, and men are killed for what? To sell us those bananas at a cent or two apiece ?" "I know. Other men are building new railways up here, and throwing out great fleets across the seas. Others are cornering the steel and coal they've got to use. And they fight as the old warrior-kings fought, but in the stock mar- ket and the wheat pit." Calverly leaned forward. There was a glow in his face that Mr. Hitt could feel rather than see. Though when the fine young head turned he could see the eyes. He felt, now that the boy was unquestionably rousing, talking out, a touch of something like awe. It was thrilling to hear, now and then, a phrase from his lips that recalled the one great book. There had been magic in Henry Calverly. There seemed to be magic in him now. Perhaps they hadn't crushed him yet. "There's our modern Macbeth, our Hamlet, our Henry Fifth, our Scot, Dumas and Balzac right around us in the business world. It's a terrific struggle for existence, sue- 268 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM cess, power. Men break and die. Women weave into it. There are spies and treason. Lawyers in corners, spinning their webs. Judges bought and Mjld, or going down to honest oblivion. The few big men that fight their way to the top, and have to go on fighting until they drop. It's the world-drama, in a new setting, played at a new pace drama with music ; and the orchestra is steam hammers, and pneumatic riveters, and the hiss of steam, and the screech of locomotives, and and Pittsburgh! It's energy it's life itself. And all through it runs the glitter of gold." He stopped, and for a liule while seemed to be thinking. "And against this terrific background," he suddenly cried out, "you see young girls with nice manners and pretty clothes and a queer little faith that life's all comfortably settled ; and young men sent to sleepy old colleges where they browse around the edges of old dead things and learn to despise life wherever it presents itself." "The pattern," murmured Mr. Hitt. "Yes, the pattern! And they read pretty little stories about why she married him, or why he married her . . . with this tremendous drama swirling around their very heads. And if a bit of it breaks through their foolish little crusts if a comfortably rich father shoots himself, or a girl gets whirled away into the great rough, real game, or there's a big strike with fighting, bloodshed, they think it an unfortunate exception. . . . Why doesn't the game itself get into books? Why always the juve- nile pattern? If somebody'd only write it the real stuff!" "Now and then it does get into the books," said Mr. Hitt. "But the crowd never read that kind. Balzac got some of it in, and Hugo, and Dostoyevsky." Mr. Hitt forgot that night that he was tired. He walked up the Hill to Henry's boarding-house. "My boy," he said, almost tenderly, gripping his hand, "I can't write the real stuff. I know that now. Margie Daw you'd hardly know her Margie says I'm too old. She's right. I'm going to do my nice little pattern biogra- phy. A book that Esther Appleby and Amme and Harvey THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 269 O'Rell will think really good. They may even call it 'literary.' You and I will know better, but . . . Well, never mind that. I'm thinking about you. You've had a terrible time. There's trouble, perhaps endless struggling, ahead of you. But a fact stands out your youth. And I know now that you're going to do the real work. I know it!" Calverly moodily shook his head. "I'm going to put Perfect Porcelain into six thousand American homes," he said. "I've got to. It's the one thing between me and V "My boy" the older man smiled out through his spec- tacles "let me tell you one thing. The only way they can kill a writer is to cut off his head. So long as there's paper and pencil in the world, or birch bark and charcoal, or ink, or blood, they can't kill a writer. Never let yourself forget that fact." Calverly again shook his head; said good night with a wry smile. But within his breast was a warm glow. For one thing, he had, at last, a friend ! CHAPTER THIRTY What Qualters Said to the Mayor IN ANY busy community the rise to power of a particular man is an interesting phenomenon. The power itself is often as not unconnected with office of any sort. It vests less in the titular head of the dominant political party or the president of the strongest bank than in the man to whom these leaders turn when in a quandary. But it is, I think, always directly connected with great concentrations of money. Oswald Qualters had been a quiet force in the com- munity for a decade or two. His easy, even light way of dismissing little difficulties, his sure hand with graver prob- lems, made him early popular on club directorates. No one had ever seen him even momentarily nonplussed. He never talked lengthily or wasted time, except in pleasure. And back of him, like a mighty tower, loomed the wealth and political strength of Senator Painter. He handled all the senator's legal business in the northern part of the state, ad- ministered his properties, represented him on boards of directors. In all these business activities, as in his personal and club life, he never hesitated to accept responsibility, was never ruffled, or tired, or ill-humored ; talked golf, or tarpon fishing, or pictures, at times when other men were staggering under threats of panic or nervously evading the attacks of eager young reformers. Gradually a knowledge of his easy skill spread among the solider business men. It was known that he had handled this matter, or that, conspicuously well. It became known, too, far beyond the city, among shrewdly managed inter- state financial groups, that in local matters it was well to "see" Qualters. And the occasional evidences of this out- side influence were not overlooked in the neighborhood of 270 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 271 Cantey Square. He became a factor on the board of the Cantey National Bank as well as of City Trust, which latter was more frankly in the way of being a Painter property. Observant eyes had lately noted that Bob Lis- terly turned to him, on occasions, that even the gruff, driving Harvey O'Rell was consulting him. Cantey Estate still seemed to dominate the city, financially and politically; still, the Cantey tradition was wearing a little threadbare. Among the trustees there was no clear unity of political purpose. Amme was an academic little man, shining by a reflected light, with no real grasp on the rough facts of life. Listerly had no vigor; merely ability. He made it a rule to play safe with the News, quietly selecting editorial writers who would discourse on sports or the weather or the need of hurrying the construction of the public baths when any real political or financial crisis impended. O'Rell was the only strong man in the group, and he had grown quiet and cautious of late. Among them the Cantey inter- ests simply drifted. In Quakers' own mind the outstanding difficulty had been Amme. The interesting little scene in his own study when a drunken mayor broke in on the talk with young Calverly had given him his first real hold. Amme had distinctly failed to rise to the situation. He had been shocked and confused. The recollection of the scene more than once brought a momentary smile to Quakers. Amme had been so naive. He really hadn't seemed to know that beneath the surface of club and political and business life a certain amount of rough work had to go on ; that the most resplendent king couldn't long hold his power without a concealed army of spies and plotters and even assassins undermining his foes. A result of the incident was that Amme forever lost faith in O'Rell. The man who had for years stood in his mind for strong, dignified business vigor was now revealed with feet in the mire. It was disquieting. It was unsettling. He had talked pretty freely with O'Rell always. He had to go on, now, appearing to talk freely with him; they had too 272 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM many common interests to permit of a crude break; but his tongue belied his thoughts. And you had to lean a little, now and then, on somebody. Then disquieting news came, in the form of a letter from Will Appleby. It was really a matter for the trustees. But you couldn't confide in Bob Listerly. Bob would hardly let you. And he had lost Harvey. For a matter of hours he struggled with the bold idea of going it alone; getting matters into his own hands and coming gradually to dom- inate the other two ; in a breathless word, to grasp substan- tial control of Cantey Estate. But it was too big for him. He ended, shortly after lunch, over at the Town Club, by leading Oswald Quakers up into a corner of the deserted library and showing him the letter. It was not altogether a satisfactory interview. Quakers, he felt, didn't take it as seriously as it deserved. He asked only a few questions. He hadn't much time ; said rather abruptly that he was going away for a week or so. His questions were as follows: "The tru?t dissolves pretty soon, doesn't it?" "This fall. Miriam will be twenty-five then." "And she gets absolute control?" "Yes." "She'll agree to a voluntary renewal of the trust, won't she?" "I'm afraid not." "At least she'll have to leave things in your hands ?" "I proposed something of that sort. You see what Appleby says." "Hmm ! She still has those papers of her father's ?" "She took some of them with her. The ones Calverly had. Will sees as clearly as you or I that it's unjust to established business to leave them in existence. But he naturally feels a delicacy about taking them by force." "Of course." And that was about all the satisfaction Amme could get, at the moment. But within an hour Quakers called Mayor Maclntyre THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 273 on the telephone and ordered him to come to his office, by the private stairway, at eleven that night. The mayor was inclined to sputter at this treatment, but Quakers cut him off. When he came, Quakers put him in an armchair and looked him over, coldly. "Tim," he said, "you've taken your last drink." "Look ahere, Quakers, I'd like to know " "I've no time to argue. You're going with me, to-night, down to Aberdeen. I've taken a private ward for you there. I'm going to pay your bills there. I'm going to get the booze out of you, and keep it out." "Well, of all the" "Do you like being mayor, Tim?" Maclntyre, flushed, speechless, stared weakly up at him. Quakers lighted a cigarette. "Because if you do, you've got just one chance of getting re-elected." "Who's to hinder?" "I am. You're taking orders from me now." "Oh, I am!" Quakers nodded. "You're skating on the thinnest ice of your career, Tim. I want to drive that into your head. I've got to shock you sober, right now. When you're drunk, you talk. And a man that's as close to prison bars as you are, right now, has got to keep his mouth shut. You have no choice. Do exactly as I tell you, and you may slip by." "I guess we'll see what Harvey O'Rell's got to say about " "O'Rell's taking orders from me, too." Quakers flicked his cigarette. "What if I tell him you said that?" "Told him myself, this evening. An hour ago. Get this straight, and then shut up. You can be mayor, O'Rell can stay with County Railways, but only if you both obey orders. I could cut you both loose without loosing much sleep. As for you, I've got enough evidence to put you in the penitentiary for ninety-five to a hundred and ten years, on all counts." 274 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Mayor Tim's jaw sagged. "Some of it's here in my safe; some of it's in Miss Can- tey's trunk, out in California; the rest is in the bank vault clown-stairs here where none of your precious friends could get it if they tried. . . . Are you sobering up a little? Have a drink of water ! . . . Now listen ! The Cantey Estate Trust dissolves this fall, on Miss Cantey's twenty- fifth birthday. That invalid girl, without an hour of busi- ness experience, comes into control of the entire property County Railways, Cantey National, the News, all the real estate, the votes on thirty or forty other boards " "But a girl like that couldn't . . ." "Of course she couldn't! But" ''Where's Amme, I'd like to know! Ain't he supposed to" "Shut up, Tim! Amme has admitted to me to-day that he can't control the situation. That's wkat's the matter." "Then" ''Then some other man will. Whoever she happens to be interested in. She may even turn back to Calverly. If she does, you're done." "Well well, I guess I can drag you down with me I" "Not for a minute! I'm clear. You can't touch me. But a young reformer, a dreamer, once in Miss Cantey's con- fidence, could raise hell with pretty nearly everything in town." "You were going to put him in prison, too, Quakers. You talked big. Why didn't you do it ?" "It proved not to be a prison case. It's got to be handled in another way." "But he's right here! Got a job in this building!" "Leave him to me. I'm going to take you to Aberdeen now. Remember, unless you want me to kick you into the gutter, where you belong, keep sober and keep still." "What are you going to do? If I " Quakers raised a steady hand. "Just that" he said, "keep still! I'm going to drive over to Dayton from Aber- deen and catch a train for California. Come along." CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE ]n Which Esther and Will Applcby Come to an Under- standing Regarding the One Difficult Topic ESTHER APPLEBY lay on a couch by an open window ; a novel in her lap, a box of chocolates at her elbow. The warm California sunshine poured in at the western windows. The air was richly heavy with the scent of flowers. She heard her husband's solid step on the walk out- side. He came stamping back through the bungalow. The door opened. He was warm from walking. She noted the way his hair lay, wet and straight against his forehead. Faint streaks of gray were visible in it. He would be tak- ing a bath ; then she would dress, and they would sit down, with Miriam, to dinner. Little would be said. Will would make talk, in his clumsy way. He would certainly try to joke a little. . . . Miriam insisted on being helped in to dinner now. She walked a little every day, in spite of evident weakness and puzzling little setbacks. She was slender, pale, dignified ; a queer girl, Esther thought, all hos- tile silences. Will was growing fat. Esther noted now the roll at the back of his neck above the limp collar. And his hair was thin on top. Every morning and evening her eyes rested on these little indications of approaching middle age. At these times she usually spoke rather quickly of impersonal things, trifling things. He stood now, squared away from her, his solid legs planted a little apart, lighting a cigar. She reached for a fan. She wished he wouldn't smoke in here. . . . Dur- ing the past year or so he had thickened about the shoulders. He took off his coat. Her irritation deepened. Will there was no getting around it was a small manufacturer. He looked like one. He chewed a cigar like one. His mind 275 276 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM dwelt to the point of brooding on price quotations and problems of the shop. He quoted his foreman a good deal. He thought much of the encouraging or discouraging nature of his personal relations with the dominant business men and bankers at home. His spirits rose and fell as these relationships seemed to be strengthening or weakening. He used the Golf Club and the Town Club shamelessly in devel- oping business connections ; in his heart, she thought, never dreamed that clubs had any other use. . . . She drew never a flash from him, never a touch of unlooked-for quality, never a thrill she, who had grown up in an atmos- phere breathed by men big in imagination and courage. Just now his spirits were rather high. She could tell by his walk; by the way he stood. There was a faint touch of arrogance about him. He had received a good letter from the factory; or perhaps had met a prominent man and been well treated. Esther hardly cared. She spoke, in a slightly querulous voice. "Miriam walked out in the garden to-day. With Miss Russell, of course." "That girl ought to be careful," said Will, without turn- ing. "It was too much." "Next thing she'll break down for keeps." "That's what I told her. She was rude about it. It's come to a point now where she simply won't listen to me. It seems rather unfair, after the sacrifice I've made to come out here. And you, of course two trips. I wonder if she thinks your business is nothing to us." "Money never meant much to her," Will muttered. This approached perilously the one most difficult topic. Esther responded with a low "How could it?" After which they fell silent. Will disappeared in the direction of their bathroom. Shortly she heard him puffing and splashing. She wished he would bathe more quietly. Her almost humorless mind, alert as always, dwelt on the strange girl, shut up now in her room at the end of the THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 277 long hall. Miriam's hostility was evident, yet elusive. After the one painful night of illness and argument, and after the long ride westward, she had seemed to accept the situation. She fell in with every plan made for her except the one of staying at the old Jim Cantey ranch; she had quietly insisted on being nearer town. It was impossible now to divine her thoughts. The only outstanding fact was her firm resolve to walk and be well a purpose in which the local physician tacitly encouraged her. Esther had talked a little with him about it, pointing out Miriam's weakness and her curious, half-suppressed nervousness ; but all she could draw from this doctor was, "We may as well trust her instinct." Esther's only clue to the thoughts back of the quiet, rather sad face was the fact that she watched from hour to hour for the mail. She was never far away when the postman's time drew around. She always sent Miss Rus- sell at once for it. Miss Russell reported, however, that no letter had come from the Stafford-Calverly person. She knew his writing. Esther idly watched her husband dress. "I'm not sure we wouldn't 'a' done better to have Martin run out here again. Costs a lot, of course." Thus Will, in an unnatural voice, as he was struggling to button his collar. "This man may be all right, but he doesn't understand Mi- riam's case." "That's it," replied Esther, guardedly. "He doesn't un- derstand her. First thing we know she'll be flat on her back, a helpless invalid." "Of course we can't go on like this," said Will. "Not forever, certainly." "Not much longer." "Well, we can't take her back. That fellow is still there. Working in the City Trust Building. You read Mr. Amme's letter. And she hasn't given him up. She can't fool me." "It's a question in my mind whether your father ever meant it as they say. He wouldn't have left everything well, practically everything . . ." 278 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Will's voice faded out. He knit his brows over the prob- lem of knotting a tie. Esther compressed her lips. "It does raise the question of her responsibility. When you think of men like Mr. Amme and Mr. O'Rell and Mr. Listerly actually having to wait on the whims of a neuras- thenic girl. . . . And it's coming down to a matter of weeks now. It does seem as if we might do something." "It isn't just those men," remarked Will, turning for a side view of his coat in the mirror, ''it's what they repre- sent. County Railways and the Cantey National and the News institutions! Of course, if Miriam was if she was well, normal, you'd say it was just the chances of life. Even if she lost her head and married some irresponsible young fool, I don't suppose we could very well say any- thing. We've got to assume that your father knew what he was doing." "If he did it." "Say, what do you mean by that ?" "Don't call me 'say,' Will, please! I mean simply this: The search for a later will never satisfied me." Her husband was touched with a thrill of pure excite- ment. She had never before, during the years, spoken so directly to the point. He brushed his clothes more violently and longer than was necessary. He said something that Esther couldn't hear. "If you'll stop mumbling and put down that brush I may be able to understand you," she said. "I say whatever papers there were must have been in the safe. Nobody knows exactly what zvas there." "Some of them are here a tin box full. She made Mi>s Russell carry her in that last night, while we were sleep- ing. She wears the key around her neck. She gets more suspicious every day. It's almost a persecution mania now. . . . Miss Russell tried to get the combination of the safe, but the light wasn't very good." "Pretty hard to pick up a combination that way," said Will, aiming at an offhand manner. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 279 "I was wondering . . . Esther, heedless of ap- proaching dinner, nibbled a chocolate. She too was deeply excited. "Times do come, you know, when people have to be looked after. . . . You know, a young woman who isn't in normal health can't expect to control great prop- erties and at the same time let herself fall under the influ- ence of the first ne'er-do-well that has the audacity to make love to her." A touch of huskiness was creeping into Esther's voice. A daring concept was taking form for the first time in her brooding mind. Her husband felt the change in her. She was not queru- lous now. She was getting at something. For that matter they were both getting at something. He couldn't trust his own voice at the moment. His brain was stirring strangely, and his pulse was bounding. He turned to the mirror and covered his confusion by carefully straightening his tie. "You know perfectly well, Will, that these things have to be handled." Esther was sitting up now. "Of course," he muttered quickly. "Sure they do." "Oh, handled nicely, of course. With the greatest care. People's feelings must be considered. There are places Oh, nice places; very comfortable; best of attention! . . ." There was a knock. Miss Russell stood at the door. She said: "Miss Cantey isn't feeling well, Mrs. Appleby. She says she won't join you at dinner." "She overdid to-day, I suppose." "I think so. I cautioned her. But she feels that she must walk a little farther every day." "She'll break down altogether next." "I'm afraid so, Mrs. Appleby. But Doctor Wells said I was to let her try." "I know! Oh, I know! . . . That's all now, Miss Russell." The door closed. Esther got up to dress. "We must be careful not to talk it over before Miss Rus- sell or the servants," she said. "I'm sure there must be 280 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM quiet institutions where invalids and people that aren't wholly responsible can be taken care of." "Plenty of 'em! Only thing is, I don't know just how those things are done. Have to get a little advice on it." This brought up another thought. "Oswald Quakers is here." "Oswald Qualters here? . . . Where?" "Over at the hotel. I had a cocktail with him. A mighty decent fellow." "But what's he doing away out here?" "Oh, he has interests out this way. There's an able man, now ! Likely to turn up most anywhere, when you least ex- pect him." "I wonder" . . . Esther mused. "I wonder if it mightn't be possible to advise with him. He knows the city. He's very shrewd." "Oh, he's that !" "We couldn't talk with Mr. Amme." "No. That's funny, too. Amme's with us, all right. He feels, as we do, that it would be outrageous to let Cantey Estate he scattered to the four winds of Heaven by an irresponsible girl. But he's Amme's " "He hasn't a spark of imagination," Esther cut in shortly. "Tell me, how long is Mr. Qualters to be here?" "A few days, anyway, I gather. He's asked me to go out fishing with him, after the big fish. I told him I'd think it over." "Listen, Will! We mustn't speak a word of this in the dining-room. But you look him up to-night and lay the matter straight before him. He's a man we could talk to. Don't mince matters. Make it clear. He'll see quickly enough where we stand. If we don't protect the Cantey name and the well, the Cantey wealth, from utter destruc- tion, nobody will. We can't leave Miriam around loose. Be frank about it he'll understand. We can't have her marrying. Not now. And not that convict. He's played on her sympathies. She's acted like a romantic child. We've got to stop it, squarely and surely. We owe that much to her." CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO Qualters Finds the Hour Ripe WILL APPLEBY sat on the hotel veranda. The soft night air was soothing to the spirit. Also soothing, to Will, was the excellent cigar he was smoking. Within the hotel an orchestra was playing. Best of all, right at hand, sprawled out comfortably in a rocker, sat Oswald Quakers, chatting in an easy impersonal way that Will found himself imitating with, he fancied, a good deal of success. The mere thought that Quakers was so courteous, so downright friendly, in giving up his time like this was thrilling to Will Appleby. It stirred him to an expansive- ness that he knew well enough he must curb. Quakers didn't give his time unless he thought it worth while. Behind his lightly casual manner lay a mind like a smooth, well-oiled, complicated piece of machinery. It was just as well not to talk carelessly to Quakers, no matter how easy and friendly he seemed. Will wished that Quakers would give him an opening: ask how Miriam was, or speak of their being out West here, or something. But Quakers appeared to have nothing on his mind b'ut fishing. In his quiet way He was like a boy about it. Finally, during a lull in the talk, Will's pressing thoughts leaped out in the form of words. "Curious problem my wife and I've got just now." Quakers, listening courteously, held out his cigar case. Will took one ; bit off the end ; lighted it from the stub of the other. "You see my wife's sister she's always been a prob- lem. ..." "Oh ves, Miss Cantey. I did hear she was out here with you. How is she?" "Not right. That is, not at all well. She's carried away 281 282 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM with the idea that Doctor Martin's been misleading her all these years that she'll be well as soon as she can develop her muscles a little. And the fellow we've got here's en- couraging her." "She's had a hard time of it, poor girl." "She's what's that? Oh, yes, she has. I talked with this man Wells yesterday. Haven't told my wife. It hardly seemed necessary. He's non-committal. Damn these doc- tors, anyhow ! Why do they have to keep up all this mys- tery? Why can't they speak out, now and then, like the rest of us?" "Apparently they can't." "That's a fact ! Well, he says it's quite possible that she was as badly hurt as they thought, but it's also possible that she's really all right now. Or that she'd get all right in time. He said something about difficulties in diagnosis. Protecting the other doctors, I suppose. They all do that. They're organized against us. We can't do a thing." "We can pay the bills." "That's right. They certainly have us there! ' Well, I pointed out the nervous condition she's in. He wouldn't talk much about that. Except to ask if she'd had any unusual mental shock lately. . . . Well, she has, of course." "Oh, is that so?" "Yes. I'm telling you this with my eyes open, Quakers. The fact is, we've got to have advice, my wife and I. In some way one way or another I'm afraid we've got to act. And the time is short. . . . Are you familiar with the provisions of Mr. Cantey's will?" "Oh, in a general way." "Well, for some reason he virtually passed over my wife, his older daughter. Oh, he left something to her money, and some property : shares in this and that but only about a quarter to a third of the estate. He was a little rough' about it, too, a year or so before his death ; said she had her health and a husband, and he wouldn't worry about her. Everything else went to Miriam. . . ." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 283 Qualters raised a hand. He disliked long explanations. "I do remember," he said. "And Miss Cantey now con- trols most of the corporate property." "Every damn' thing! County Railways, Cantey National, the News, all but one or two of the railway properties, the Cantey Line outright ! and a lot more." "You'd hardly say she controls it. There was a trust. I remember that O'Rell, Listerly, and " "And Amme." ''Yes, Amme." "The trust expires this year. When she's twenty-five. Meantime, she's become infatuated with an out-and-out adventurer that's turned up at home. Called himself Staf- ford. An alias. Real name " "Calverly. I've followed that case a little. Interesting. Picturesque, that is." "He's a bad egg. A jailbird. She's already let him make love to her. Called it an engagement, herself ; but had to admit that he hadn't told her of his prison experience. She'd already let him in on Mr. Cantey's private papers. . . . You see, men haven't figured much in her life. She went wild over him. Utterly unreasonable. There was only one thing to do. We had to bring her away." "Does she show signs of getting over this infatuation?" "Hard to say. But we think not. She watches the mails every minute. And she won't talk. Just keeps plugging at this exercise thing. . . . Any one can see she's a nervous wreck. You know, over-intense. . . . Here's the trouble. We can't let her come into control of all that property. Now, can we? My God, try to imagine her and this adventurer throwing all conservatism to the winds; married, likely as not raising hell with Cantey Estate !" He was raising his voice. Very calmly and deliberately Qualters asked "What can you do?" "Well now here's where we really need counsel it looks as if we'd have to act firmly. That girl is in no con- dition to control vast properties. Any unprejudiced court 284 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM would decide that. These things mustn't be put into her hands. We've thought my wife came to it first, her own sister! that the kindest thing and the fairest to all these important business interests that are absolutely dependent on sound management and you see. . . ." "You're thinking of shutting her away in some insti- tution?" "Well, I don't know's I'd put it just " "But that's what it comes down to?" "Well, of course" "Hum!" Qualters pursed his lips. In the dim light, Will, glancing sidelong, could just make out his features. "You don't think it's a good plan ?" "Xo." Qualters shook his head. That was all he said about it. But he was clearly thinking about it. Will would have given a week's income to know just what he was thinking. "I'll tell yon," the small manufacturer finally broke out "suppose you I wonder if You have as intimate a knowledge as anybody of the business fabric of our city. I can't talk to Amme. . . ." "Amme has handled the family affairs, hasn't he?" "Yes. For years. Ever since Bellwether died." "Shouldn't he have been able to hold Miss Cantey's con- fidence guide her ?" "That's just what I tell my wife. But he's fallen down. Flat! She won't think of turning to him. Now you you know these properties you've got a big stake in the com- munity. . . . I'll tell you, considering all that's at stake, would you mind stepping around to the house with me ? I'd like my wife to see you." Casually, talking again of fishing. Quakers stepped around. Will said next to nothing. He was preoccupied, and breathed rather hard. He felt that he was putting through a large and complicated undertaking. He was excited. Soon he would be tired. It would affect his sleep that nierht. Qualters found the little triangular conspiracy interest- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 285 ing, even amusing. They sat on the veranda, their voices hushed. Miss Cantey was somewhere within. . . . Esther Appleby impressed him as curiously self-centered, even, at moments, passionately vehement in a suppressed \vay. She was burning with self- justification. Over and over she mentioned the sacrifice she was making ; she spoke, at some length, of her responsibility as elder sister. And her husband, evidently safe under her thumb, broke in, at intervals, with puffy bits of corroboration. \Yhile they talked, and while he quietly, soothingly an- swered them, Quakers thought deeply ; mainly of various possible plans, weighing one scheme after another and dis- carding them in turn. Finally his mind settled on one. After this his thoughts roved afield. It was no good lis- tening to all these earnest, eager words. He read Esther as he had read her husband, through and through. Before she had talked five minutes he knew every thought that was in her strong, ungoverned mind and every deep desire that underlay the conscious thought. He dwelt a little on great fortunes. They were interesting, fortunes; pregnant with drama, with conflict and bitterness, with lust of power, the whole human comedy. And Quakers found the human comedy always absorbing. . . . Take Esther Cantey, here Esther Appleby, rather. A woman without subtlety, without shadows ; more direct than most. Rather a pretty woman, still. With a touch of her father's driving power, at least of his big want. Jim Cantey had wanted hugely more and more power. That burning want had carried him almost to the very top of the business structure; it had carried him into the Senate at Washington ; it had made his name literally a household word in the United States, Canada and England, in a hundred ports of the Pacific, all through the Orient and the South Seas. And this personable little Mrs. Appleby, with her dub of a husband "dub" was the word in Quakers' mind wanted, wanted, wanted. For the bulk of the Cantey fortune, for the power and prominence it would give her in New York, London, Paris, among the Old World aristocracy, she was willing 286 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM virtually to imprison her invalid younger sister. She had clearly persuaded herself that it was the only right thing to do. All of half an hour was lost in quietly arguing her out of it. And the sister was interesting. She didn't seem to care a hang about power and place. What she wanted, appar- ently, was a young man of a literary turn who literally couldn't support himself, a boy who had made an utter failure of his life. Quite a picturesque little mix-up. "But what are we to do?" Thus pretty Mrs. Appleby. "You surely don't advocate letting the thing drift." "No," said Qualters, "certainly not. Miss Cantey doesn't want all this business coming down on her personally. She can't undertake to direct the operation of County Railways, or sit in directors' meetings. Somebody's got to do all that for her. It's been done through the Trust. We could easily enough form a new Trust agreement, made up a little differently. Or we could incorporate Cantey Estate, make it a legal holding company for all the properties. But if we did that, either she, or somebody acting in her interest, would have to direct just the same. On the whole, I think her interests would be best protected through a new Trust agreement. She would give complete power of attor- ney to the Trust for five years, ten years, as long as she liked, and in return would receive a yearly allowance with full accounting. Tin's would stabilize the properties. And it would protect her, save her from being worn out by business troubles. She doesn't want those." Esther, her eyes burning in the half light, her voice husky, leaned forward. "Would you be willing to serve on the new Trust, Mr. Qualters ?" ' For one brief moment Qualters hesitated. A picture rose in his mind of an odd little gathering in his library, at home. Amme had been there proper, confused little Amme and Harvey O'Rell, and an extremely drunk mayor, and this Henry Calverly who had managed, without means and without an atom of business intelligence, to make a devil THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 287 of a lot of trouble in town. He heard again the ring of the telephone ; caught the tones of Miriam Cantey's voice asking for "Mr. Stafford" ; heard his own voice responding with a quiet little lie. Then Calverly had snatched the instrument away and answered her. . . . She had known Calverly was there. She must have known that Amme called him up and asked him to come there. How much more did she know? ... He leaned back and blew out a long arrow of smoke. It was his method to control through other men, never to appear in a matter where some one else would do, to pull the strings from behind the local scene. . . . But he had to answer Mrs. Appleby's question. And he had to keep close to Cantey Estate or suffer what might turn out to be the greatest setback of his life. "I'm pretty busy," he said. "Of course," said Mrs. Appleby quickly. "It would be an imposition. I understand that. But you see what a position we're in." "As a public sen-ice," the husband put in. Qualters considered it a moment longer; then, quietly but with remarkable dismissive force, said: "If Miss Cantey herself will ask it, I'll undertake it." "Splendid !" breathed Mrs. Appleby. "We must emphasize that point of protecting her!" said Will, eagerly. Qualters and Esther were silent. For one oddly long moment their eyes met. She was still leaning forward, her whole being focussed on the desire to win him to her service. And he, suddenly, quite unexpectedly, felt her presence almost as if there were physical contact between them. And in the moment his quick, cold mind ranged far. She uvs pretty. There was a nervous force in her that her heavy- witted husband could never so much as sense. An affair with her might be pleasing and stimulating. He considered it fully, quickly. . . . There were draw- backs. She had no humor. Her wants were, after all, im- mense. She might be exigent; almost certainly would be. 288 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM It seemed hardly likely that she had the discretion necessary to such an adventure. She probably wouldn't be what he regarded as a good sport; and she would have to be that. Then it would be, again, a home-town affair ; they had too many common acquaintances who would be quick to catcli evidence. . He decided against it. The decision was final. A little later, when he rose to go, and Will was occupied for a moment, her hand lingered a thought too long in his ; she spoke rather breathlessly of this or that, something about the new plan; he thought she was flushing. He dropped her hand ; spoke genially, including her hus- band ; and left. Esther, standing at Will's side, looked after Quakers' shadowy figure. Still breathless, strung high, she suddenly laughed in a way that brought Will's brows down in a slight, puzzled scowl. "How wonderfully he grasps things!" she cried softly. "And everything seems so easy, the way he puts it. He's a big man." Then, with a quick glance up at her husband, and an abrupt change of key, she slipped her arm through his ; said, "Well, let's go in, Will. Now that he's taken hold, I feel that I can sleep." Again, very softly, she laughed. Her husband's brows drew down a little closer. "It's easy to do it that way," he remarked, vaguely irritated, "when you hold all the good cards. I guess I'd know how to play a good hand if I had it. ... You see, he's got Senator Painter squarely back of him. It's Painter's money that he operates with. Pretty soft !" CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE Tlie Spirit of Jim Cantey ESTHER herself carried in Miriam's tray in the morn- ing. She was almost cooingly sweet in manner. She smiled; asked Miriam how she had slept; pleasantly sug- gested a day of quiet rest. Miriam glanced at her, puzzled; then soberly sipped her coffee. "Who do you think Will ran across last evening the merest chance he's out here on a fishing trip Oswald Quakers !" Miriam, more and more puzzled, repeated the words, "Oswald Quakers." "Yes, we had a little visit. You had gone to bed. We were speaking of one thing and another I don't remember now how the talk swung around to you we were speaking of fifty things and I asked him, or Will, one of us what on earth we were to do with you when all this business comes down on you, I mean the business details " Miriam's eyes flashed up. Esther hurried on "Oh, these great responsibilities. You can't be expected to go to directors' meetings, and hire men for County Rail- ways, and do things at the bank, and go to New York for meetings of the Cantey Line Oh, there's a thousand things ! Mr. Amme's done them, and Harvey O'Rell, and Mr. Lis- terly Will happened to speak of it only the other day, \vondering how on earth you'd ever carry all that load. You see, dear, when the Trust expires, on your birthday, those men won't have any right to make all those decisions for you. Something'll have to be done. The most difficult sort of business decisions, you know." Esther felt those great blue eyes on her, and talked hard and fast. It seemed to her that the important thing was 2X9 290 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM to get the whole idea out at once, presented fully and right end to. "One of us Will, I think happened to say to Mr. Qualters that we've worried some over your condition you see, he'd asked about you, how you were and Will explained that it bothered him to think of all these tre- mendous problems being plumped suddenly on your shoul- ders and he'd wondered what on earth could be done to save you from it. And Mr. Quakers said it was the easiest thing in the world, simply for you to consent to a new Trust being formed to manage Cantey Estate for a term of years, you know and make you a regular allowance and account to you every year. . . ." Miriam's eyes were downcast now. She was pale; her sensitive lips were slightly compressed. Esther caught her breath, and, with diminishing assur- ance, pressed on. "We all knew, you see, that the present Trust hasn't been altogether satisfactory. Mr. Quakers is a very discreet man, and he wouldn't criticize anybody, but I'm sure he understands your hesitation in confiding in Mr. Amme or in a man like Harvey O'Rell. He did say that the new Trust ought to be made up a little differently. I asked him then he understood perfectly that I had no right to speak for you I asked him if he would be willing, as a matter of public spirit, to serve on the Trust. He thought it over, and said yes, he would, if you asked him. He wouldn't consider it under any other conditions. It would have to be on your request." Miss Russell tapped at the door. "Telephone, Mrs. Appleby, please," she said. When Esther had gone, Miriam asked, very quietly, of the nurse "Didn't I hear the postman?" "Yes, Miss Cantey. There was nothing for you." Miriam's eyes again sought the tray. "You didn't sleep well?" asked Miss Russell. "Oh well enough ! . . . You may take the tray." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 291 "But you haven't eaten !" "Take the tray, please. And leave my cane here by the bed. I'll ring if I need you." The nurse obeyed. The door closed. Miriam lay back against the pillows and pressed her hands to her face. She lay there a long time. At moments the tears came to her eyes. Finally they ran unheeded down her cheeks. With some effort she got to her trunk ; brought the strong box to the bed ; took the key from her neck and opened it. She rummaged through the note-books and folders ; found a long envelope on which was written, in the rough strong hand of Jim Cantey, "To my daughter Miriam. Not to be opened until after my death." She drew out the enclosed document and settled back to read it through. She felt utterly weak and helpless. She was clinging to the hope that her wonderful father would come real again in her thoughts. She must see him again with her mind's eye; feel him near; hear his boyish laugh, his quick, strong speaking voice. Find him again she must. There was no one else, no one in the world. He would have made nothing of the business responsi- bilities that were soon to be hers. She found the mere thought of them, or even of deciding on a method of ap- proaching the problem, overwhelming. Oh, for strength! . . . She hadn't looked at any of the papers since that amazing day with the man she had known as Hugh Staf- ford. She read her father's confessional now with feverish absorption. It was wonderful to her that he could have written so naturally, in his own sometimes rough vernacu- lar. He had always counted on Mr. Amme and other em- ployees to rephrase his public utterances. One paragraph she read twice : "And then, just about as I was groping out of tins dark period, came your accident. It shook me to the roots of my life. The thought that you you were the most beautiful child I ever knew, and the gayest and brightest 292 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM could never hope to walk again seemed more than I could bear. But it brought me up standing. When your mind runs back over all your dreadful suffering, at least remember that. It brought me up. God, how I've clung to you, how I've leaned on you ! . . . You know something of what these few wonderful years of our companionship have been. But you couldn't possibly know all they've meant to me. For they brought me out of the wilderness." Her eyes roved about the room; rested on a patch of sunshine. She was wishing that some one might be at hand to bring her out of the wilderness. "... I want you to know that it was you your fresh clear young mind, your sympathy and faith that saved me. . . ." Her mind seemed anything but fresh and clear now. She was drifting on toward new and great responsibilities with- out a plan; with, indeed, nothing but a confused, hopeless spirit. She was taking it, as she had come to take Esther's authority and this western journey, like a fatalist. She read on ; she was determined to read on. There was vitality even in her father's dead words. Some of that vital- ity she must have ; somehow she must feel it. "So, if you feel that you can, have them tell the truth about me, Miriam. I've got to leave the decision with you now. But if you do try it, don't for a moment forget that they'll fight like rats. They'll see it means telling the truth about them, too. Don't let Amme have a hand in it, or O'Rell, or those ... I couldn't lay this before Esther. She'd fight us, too. No, as it stands now, with the thing still unwritten, you're the only person in the world that I can be honest with. An odd reflection on life, isn't it ! And we talk so much about honesty ! Too much ! "Am I too brusk with you, little girl? "I've leaned on you so. . . ." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 293 How well he knew them Mr. Amme, Mr. O'Rell, his own elder daughter ! And he had leaned on herself. At the mere thought, she could have laughed bitterly. But she fought the bitterness. He wouldn't like that. She closed her eyes and lay very still. She could recall now his blue, blue eyes, now his smile, now his big frame, now his thick hair with the reddish tinge touched only lightly with gray. But she couldn't put the picture together. Her thoughts got out of hand then, as they so often did at night, and tried to bring Henry Calverly real. And mem- ory-sensations came tantalizing, half-real, like the mind- pictures of the time he had kissed her. And of the other time, the first, when he carried her in his arms. She couldn't think how this had come about, what suddenly forged chain of little incidents had drawn them so swiftly together. They had been caught on a mighty current of feeling. She tried catching desperately at little elusive half-memories to reconstruct these incidents. . . . But these reveries were devastating. They always left her utterly tired. Something she must do, something active. With no way to turn she must make a way. That was what Jim Cantey would have done. So often he had told her the stories of this and that business fight, of the ugly years when he had struggled in the dark, without any particular hope, just fighting on. It seemed now like a heritage, his best heritage to her, better than money. Her spirit was picking up a little now. There was one effort she had never made. Perhaps it was her way out. She might write the biography herself. It was doubtless an absurd thought. But she must do something. She could try. She got up again. Found paper and pencil. For an hour she wrestled with the wholly unfamiliar problem of planning a book. She didn't know how or where to begin. A nervous fear of Oswald Quakers rose in her mind. She knew he was quiet but strong. He was one of them. She sensed him as silently spinning a web from which it 294 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM might not be easy for her to escape. This subtle sugges- tion of a new Trust for the Estate, what could it mean? And why all this indirection? He had never appeared in matters relating to the Estate, yet they took Henry Cal- verly to his house that night. Why ? . . . And here he was, dropping curiously disturbing suggestions 1 For a time, during the second hour, it seemed to her that if she worked very rapidly on the book she might build a way out. It was absurd, of course! She couldn't write a substantial work of biography before her birthday. Peo- ple took years for such tasks. Yet time seemed to press, desperately. She tried jotting down such rough notes as came to her. Esther's familiar step sounded in the hall. There was a tap at the door. Miriam called out she couldn't help speaking coldly that she preferred not to be disturbed. Later, quite late in the morning, in fact, Miss Russell slipped down the hall and opened the door. Miriam started; looked up. She had heard no sound. The strong box was beside her on the bed ; all about were scattered note-books, documents, manila folders full of papers. Miss Russell's eyes took it all in. Could she, too, be one of them? That thought had not before taken shape in her mind ; it had come up only as a rather irritating lit- tle suspicion, to be put down promptly on the sensible ground that the nurse hardly mattered. She tried to put it down as promptly and sensibly now. But Miss Russell shouldn't now be standing, motionless, intently looking, in the doorway. It was slightly but strikingly out of charac- ter. She should be coming briskly in; or else she should have spoken at once. Finally she did speak ; quite naturally. "Are you planning to go out, Miss Cantey?" "No, I hardly think I shall get up before this afternoon. J will ring if I want you." Miriam's own eyes were more intent than she knew. They THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 295 were fixed on Miss Russell until she had backed clear out and softly closed the door. She relaxed then. A slight nervous shiver passed through her. She closed her eyes a moment, then slowly opened them. "I've got to get control of this thing," she thought. "It's this feeling of hostility all about me that's so unsettling, of course. I'll be getting positively morbid about it. It's nothing to what father faced all his life. I've got to face this thing, that's all. I will face it." Again it seemed that the best way to face it was to work on the biography. But that was a large task. And she had made but an exceedingly small beginning. She read her few notes over now, and promptly tore them up. Tore them into very small pieces. Writing a book was tardly a matter to be under- taken on the spur of the moment. It called for a trained mind, long practice, great skill ; for a rich mental back- ground and a full-bodied philosophy of life. She was beginning to wonder if she had any philosophy. She had had memories of her father, and now there were these new mad memories of Henry ; but both her father and Henry had been taken from her. What was left? She was quite discouraged now. Her mental picture of Henry was unexpectedly growing clearer. She saw him, almost as she had seen him on the first day, when he walked the library floor and talked the biography of truth. She felt again the change in him from dogged, sensitive timidity to flashing force. Stronger and stronger grew the vivid sense of him. She couJdn't resist it. Often, since that painful night at home, this awareness of him had come upon her. She had fought it. Then, as to-day, when it was no longer with her, she had groped miserably to find it again. She knew now that the passing of it would leave her tired and very unhappy. It was not unlike a sort of drunkenness. She re-experienced that first magic moment in his arms ; she felt again his beautiful, 296 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM hesitant awkwardness about carrying her back to her chair. And the other moments. . . . Satraps of the Simple was in her trunk. She got it out; turned the pages, sitting on the edge of the bed; felt again the thrill of his crisp, vital sentences. She couldn't have been wholly mistaken in him! He had this fine quality ! Here it was again, in his book ! At least she was growing stronger. It was a dishearten- ingly slow process ; almost better to stay frankly an invalid than to struggle like this. But Jim Cantey had struggled, for years on end. He had never been afraid. Over and over again he had risked everything. He didn't care if they killed him; he only cared if he failed. And he never failed for long. He never lost ground that he didn't sooner or later win back. She decided, abruptly, to dress. Alone, for once. She didn't want Miss Russell in the room. She put all the books and papers loosely in the box, and replaced that in the trunk. She started to lock the box, but hesitated. For the first time she was a little afraid of her own suspicions. She had seen suspicious old women; they were dreadful. It was absurd to brood over that look on Miss Russell's face. It bordered on the morbid. Miss Russell, after these two years of patient care, wasn't going to turn into a sneakthief. Esther might eat too many choc- olates between meals, but she had hardly been caught prying into other people's papers. Nor had heavy-footed Will. And Oswald Quakers wasn't coming in with a jimmy. She left it unlocked. She dressed, then, laboriously ; and, cane in hand, moved as quietly as she could out through the side door to the garden. She met no one. Esther was out, doubtless. She let herself down on a bench. The old fear that she might overdo arose, only to be put down with a new cour- age, a courage in kind like Jim Cantey's. "What earthly difference does it make?" she mused. "I was of no use whatever the old way. It would be better to die. But I shan't die. Not just yet. I'll try living." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 297 She saw now clearly what a factor the mind had been in her long illness. Doctor Wells, very gently, had hinted at that. She remembered sitting by a window, watching the people walking by in the street without having in herself the faintest memory of walking or the faintest desire to walk. The thought that lies back of walking had gone from her. And they had coddled her, kept her down. She didn't resent her father's devoted care ; she understood that. Still even he had kept her down. There had been baths, electric treatments, massages, but no healthy natural exercise. Her father's fearful care of her had dominated the minds of all about. Once an eminent consultant had suggested that perhaps she had suffered no lasting injury. She overheard that, was fired by it, and tried, during one excited moment, to walk alone. The painful results of that effort had driven Jim Cantey nearly frantic. And she had sunk back into invalidism. Doctor Wells' suggestion that she watch people walk- ing, even running children, and put her mind on the physical process, had proved curiously stimulating. She was doing that every day; quietly following the movements of Miss Russell, Esther, Will. Her mind dwelt a little on these two last. She was utterly puzzled about them. They could have had no deeply ulterior motive in dragging her out here. They were taking great trouble on her account. She had been upset, un- questionably, had been put in a dreadful position, and they had taken hold. Their judgment might be questioned, as their tact might be. But then neither had ever possessed tact. And she was getting stronger; to that extent they had been proved right. Toward the matter in her own thoughts, she had no consistent attitude. The merest thought of Henry could still stir that divine madness in her soul. She couldn't speak of it. She could hardly face it herself, as a fact. She certainly couldn't, in the difficult circumstances, justify it. She could only watch, with an increasing nervous tension, for a letter. No letter came. And that fact, in itself, might be thought. . 298 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM She closed her eyes on this. It was the old intense cir- cular thinking. She knew she mustn't indulge in it. One thing was certain : until she could be sure of herself she had no right to judge Esther and Will. Meantime she must fight the hostile feelings that came and came. She raised her eyes; let them rest, hardly seeing, on a window ; then knit her brows and looked more closely. Unmistakably the curtain moved. Unmistakably it was Miss Russell's face that drew back into the shadows. Their eyes hadn't met. Miss Russell couldn't know that she had been seen. For in that event she would have come rieht out. Minutes passed and she didn't come out. This was odd. A little thing, but odd. It was somehow vrrong; it felt wrong. As she sat there, trying to think it out, the suspicions came running back among her thoughts. She fought them back. They were silly. She got up. She felt quite indifferent to weariness or pain. She was weak, of course. It would have been wi-er to eat a little breakfast. Physical strength you have to have that! Without it, without building it, you couldn't have, or hold, mental strength. Jim Cantey had been strong, strong. Still, in a way, right now, she literally didn't care. She went into the house. She had not since her girlhood walked so rapidly or so straight. As she came into the hall from the side door Miss "Rus* sell was just opening Esther's door. She carried something a box the strong box! She passed in and closed the door after her. Miriam went straight to the door and opened it. M iss Russell was moving Esther's box of chocolates from the table by the couch to make room for the box. Esther lay on the couch, in her usual negligee costume. They both started and looked up. Miriam stood there, looking firmly at them out of blazing eyes. For the moment all three were silent. Miriam was animated now only by an honest, whole-souled anger. It was the Cantey temper. It was the spirit that had THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 299 moved Jim Cantey when he pitched one Harkwright through the plate-glass front of the post-office. ''Miss Russell," she said very quietly, "bring that box over here." "I'll take it back to your room, Miss Cantey." "You'll do exactly as I tell you! Come over here." There was a small table near the door on which stood the telephone instrument. Beside it was a chair. Miriam sat here. "Let me have the box please." She glanced into it. The papers were just as she had left them. She had come in time. She locked it now. Miss Russell was edging toward the door. Miriam said, in that same ominously quiet voice: "Stand where you are, Miss Russell." Esther here spoke for the first time. "Miriam, really" she cleared her throat "if you'll just be " "Please!" Miriam broke in. "Don't speak to me!" She found the telephone book; deliberately looked up a number ; called for it. "Is Doctor Wells there?" she asked. Then, "Oh, good morning, Doctor! Could you come over here right away? . . . Yes, please! . . . Thank you. Oh, I'm ever so much better." "Now, Miss Russell," she said, "please bring the box to my room." "Miriam," said Esther, speaking up again, "you really must not overdo like " "It will be easier if you won't try to speak with me." In the doorway, Miss Russell, solicitous, took Miriam's arm, but was shaken off with surprising vigor. The box was replaced in the trunk. Miss Russell asked, in a husky voice, if Miss Cantey wished to lie down. "I wish nothing whatever from you," said Miss Cantey, "except to pack your things and go. You should be able to get out of the house in twenty minutes to half an hour." 300 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "But Miss Cantey " "\Ve will say twenty minutes. You'd better be about it I will pay your fare back." Esther heard her, a quarter-hour later, telephoning for an expressman. There were hot whispered words. Esther, quite beyond herself, called Miss Russell an indiscreet fool. .Miss Russell, flushed with rage, talked back. Esther gave her a final payment of all she had in her pocketbook ; then, hesitating a good deal, trying to construct a mental attitude that would hold together and not succeeding, went to Miriam's door, tapped softly, opened it a little way. Miriam was sitting in an armchair. "I really wish you'd lie down, dear" thus Esther. "You've been through a trying exj>erienee and I'm sure " "Please!" "But, my dear girl, you surely can't hold me responsible for that woman's acts !" "I can and I do, Esther." "But, Miriam, that is utterly unreasonable. You're not yourself." "I am, thank God, at last !" "I must say," Esther muttered, wavering in the doorway, "things have come to a pretty pass . . . ." "Evidently they have." Doctor Wells' voice came down the hall from the front door. It was a strong likable voice. Miriam stood irresolute. Finally, without a plan, she moved a few steps into the room. The physician glanced keenly at her, then at his patient. "Well," he remarked, "this looks good. You're sitting tip like anybody." "Doctor Wells," said Miriam firmly, "an unexpected situ- ation has come up. I'm going home, to-day if possible. To my own house. I've discharged Miss Russell. I shall want somebody, for a little longer, anyway." "Yes, you'd better have somebody." The physician's face was gravely expressionless. "Perhaps more of a companion than a nurse. I think I have the woman. But to-day is rather short notice. Still " THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 301 "I really don't want to sleep again in this house. I was going to ask you, too, if you could make the journey with me." Doctor Wells thought for a moment. He was, like his patient, quite ignoring Esther, who stood by the foot of the bed, deeply uncomfortable, looking covertly from one to the other. Finally he replied: "I'll do it." "Oh, I'm so glad, Doctor!" "There's a train at the end of the afternoon. I'll go now and see if I can't bring Miss Bryce right back with me. She can pack for you." He stepped forward then, thoughtfully considering the rather high color that was throbbing under her delicate skin. He shook his thermometer and thrust it under her tongue ; then felt her pulse. Esther, beyond words, hopelessly unable now to get hold of her scattered faculties, unable even to leave the room, aware of nothing but a growing sense of outraged pride, of injury, looked miserably at the slim erect figure with the glowing hair and great blue Cantey eyes, and the ther- mometer projecting from the sensitive mouth. Doctor Wells replaced the thermometer in its case. "Miss Cantey," he said, "you are going to get well." Miriam's face twisted into a wistful, fleeting smile. "I don't know," she said, musingly. "I hardly seem to care. All I know is, I'm never going on like that any more, just being an invalid." "That's it," said the doctor "the fighting spirit." "Father had it." "Yes. We know that, here in California." "lie used to say that he'd rather be a dead lion than a living dog. I'm afraid I've been just that for years a living dog." Then, before he could break in reassuringly, she threw out her slender arms. "But not any more!" she cried softly, as if to herself. "It's got to be the fighting spirit now !" CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR Of the Curious Relationship Between Perfect Porcelain and the Divine Fire THE night of Calverly's stirring talk with Mr. Ilitt proved eventful. It must have been one in the morning when he wrung the hand of the older man and let himself into the boarding- house on the Hill. He closed the door behind him and then stood motionless, looking about at the dim front hall and peering into the dark parlor. He felt like an intruder. He was living here ; no question about that ! But it wasn't where he belonged. The gas-jet was down to a bead within its glass globe ; but he could see the polished floor, the rugs, table, hatrack, chairs, and the long stairway with its walnut balustrade. It was a comfortable enough place. The rooms were neatly kept ; the food pretty good. But it wasn't where he belonged. He pressed a tense hand to his eyes. That was an ex- traordinary remark of old Hittie's: "So long as there's paper and pencil in the world, or birch bark and charcoal, or ink, or blood, they can't kill a writer. . . ." A letter and a telegram lay on the table. He held them to the light; both were for him. He stuffed them into a pocket. He tiptoed up the stairway, and on up. Through open transoms came rhythmical breathing with here and there a snore. Two score human beings lived with him in this house, ate and slept within these four walls, but all were strangers. Softly, slowly, he opened and closed the door of his room ; struck a match and lighted the gas. The next thing, it ap- peared, was to go to bed. He took off coat and collar, slowly, moodily, thinking, or rather feeling swiftly out into 302 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 303 that twinkling spaciousness where wild high thoughts range unfettered by the arithmetic of earth. The "power" of his youthful triumphs was on him again, lifting him, swinging him out there where dwell the gods. On a table, under the light, lay a scattered heap of papers, notes, scrawlings ; the quaint diagrams he often plotted out while thinking. He picked up a few of the sheets; looked them over. "Pittsburgh alone is a greater epic than all of Homer." Mr. Hitt had said that. And he had painted a word-picture of the blast furnaces at night, from a car window. Advertising! . . . He fingered these sheets, all scrawled with his own writing. The business struggle ... the great rough romance of America! He drew up the little straight-backed, cane-seated chair, and sharpened a pencil. The words, PERFECT PORCE- LAIN, took shape in his mind's eye. He could see them, all at once, vividly, on a printed page. And other words came, all as part of that clear mental picture. He wrote them out . . . Hoknes Hitt, he thought now, was right; the porcelain makers were heart and soul in the struggle of life. They were giving their best. He felt them, with a thrill of kindling power. He felt, too, the women in those six thousand homes. At three o'clock of the following afternoon he appeared at the offices of Holmes Hitt, Inc., and patiently made his way, with one or two long waits, to the corner room where the paintings were. Young Hitt was in blue to-day. He found himself re- ceiving a baggy, wrinkled, even (to stake all on truth) a slightly unwashed young man, blazing eyes in a haggard face. Those eyes touched and stirred him. The extraor- dinary Calverly hadn't before exhibited this rather thrilling quality. It would be in him, of course; else whence had come Satraps of the Simple, even the delicious interview with Mayor Tim that had (Holmes Hit happened to know) raised hell in the News office and sent Frank Winterbeck into exile. Frank was working on a Cincinnati paper now. 3(H THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM A good fellow, Frank, and a really good newspaper man. Had character. Listerly would have had to get rid of him anyway, sooner or later. For character can be an uncom- fortable bedfellow. There was hardly place for it in Lis- terly's organization. "First," said Calverly, with a slight husky weariness of voice that contrasted oddly with the fire in his eyes ; and the shrewdly observant Holmes Hitt, taking him all in, asked himself what was to come second . . . "First, I suppose I ought to show you these." He was sitting, this amusing Calverly person, on the edge of the mahogany chair, stiffly, knees together, hands clasped on them (after handing over a little bundle of papers), a purposeless, almost limp figure, until you looked again at the eyes. One odd fact Holmes Hitt noted as he turned to the papers. From this strange being he looked only for dis- order, yet the very top paper was extraordinarily neat. Calverly had drawn, with a ruler, a rectangle which the practised eyes of Holmes Hitt recognized as "double-column width." At the top he had printed out. painstakingly, rather prettily, the simple phrase, SELF RESPECT. At the bot- tom, same size, was that other phrase, PERFECT POR- CELAIN. Between, in a fine clear hand, was a little block of text with wide white margins around it. Holmes Hitt laid this sheet aside. The second looked exactly like it, except for an evident divergence in the text. So with the third, fourth, fifth and sixth ... He leaned back in his chair, pursed his lips, and surveyed the paint- ings on the farthest wall. Calverly, a little disconcerted, began mumbling. Some- thing about the thing being no good, of course ; he realized it wasn't his game : just a sort of feeble try at it ; probably they'd want something more striking, snappier, but out there at the factory and in the offices he'd been so struck by the dignity of those men . . . Holmes Hitt motioned him to be quiet. Sat there, quite motionless, thinking. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 305 Finally he came back to earth, and turned to Calverly, calmly. "This is it," he said. "It's what we'll use." "But but you haven't read them!" "No. Do that later. I'm wondering a little if you realize ;what you've done here." "Well, of course, the things you said, and the factory "Probably you don't. No matter. You've got it. I will tie up those two phrases so tight that two years from now no one in America will be able to think of the words 'self respect' without thinking at the same time of Perfect Porcelain." Calverly threw out a hand in a listless gesture. The corners of Holmes Hitt's mouth curved slightly upward. "This is it," he said again. Then: "There was some- thing else ?" "Oh, yes !" Calverly started a little. "I I've had a rather curious experience. You know how it is when something happens that stirs you up and you sort of find yourself you know, when ideas begin to come and you know you can do things " Holmes Hitt, watching him, slowly nodded. " Well, I haven't felt that way for years oh, just a little once or twice lately my life's been rather depressing, and for years I couldn't write except by pounding it out, and then it wasn't any good what they call nervous pros- tration, I must have had ..." He appeared to be lost in a jungle of words. He stopped, collected himself, and plunged at it, whatever it was, from another side. "I really came here to thank you. I'm sure you don't know how you've helped me. I mean made me feel the dignity of business and the human quality that underlies it. The beauty in it. Of course, when you come to look straight at it, all this activity that we call business is nothing on earth but the human struggle itself." "Of course," observed Holmes Hitt. 306 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "You've helped me to see that clearly . . . your point of view ... I want to thank you. And I've got to give this up." He waved at the papers. "I'm in the fight again. For myself. I didn't know how you'd feel about my quitting you so soon " "You're quirting me?" Calverly threw out both hands. "I've got to ! Don't you see? It's a book. I'm all torn up with it. Even if it isn't fair to you, I can't help it. I don't know as if you feel that I haven't earned this week's pay " "You've earned it," said Holmes Hitt shortly. "What's the new book ? A novel ?" "Why no, not exactly. Though maybe, in a way. It's about a man like Jim Cantey, and the development of the West you know, the romance and drama, the fighting, and the rich color of it. You don't know what it means to me, just to feel like this. I'm a little short of sleep. But there's always that fear that the thing'll slip away from you if you leave it for a minute. I must get back." He rose. "Wait a minute !" said Holmes Hitt. "How about money? Are the lawyers advancing you some ?" "Lawyers?" "Yes. The Watt estate." Calverly's lips pressed together. A look of pain crept into rm eyes. He shook his head. "I have an old friend in New York. He'll help me." "But they ought to look out for you." "Please don't talk about that. I won't touch that money." "But isn't that rather Quixotic?" Calverly was not ordinarily a profane man. But his nerves were strung tight this day. And every one, every- where, would, he knew, mention that dirty money. "I dont care a damn what it is!" he shouted, with an abruptness and vigor that made the usually imperturbable Holmes Hitt start a little and then smile. "If your friend fail? to come through, let me know," he replied, turning back to the papers. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 307 "Oh," said Calverly, "thank you !" And started for the door. "By the way, Margie Daw, of the Neii\s, just called up. Wants to see you. Says it's important." Calverly stood motionless, then moved his lips inarticu- lately, then reached for the door. "Just one word. You're in for a hounding, Calverly. No possible escape. Don't make the fatal mistake of talking at the newspaper people as you talked at me just now. Keep your shirt on. Smile if you can . . . Good luck!" Calverly stood at the curb, looking out at the street traffic and at the trees of Cantey Square just beyond. Holmes Hitt's advice was sound, of course. But how was he to follow it, with a world of tumult in his breast ! He crossed the street, and turned idly in at the corner drug store just below the Neu's building. What could Margie Daw be wanting now? He wasn't afraid of her. Not now. In a wonderful, almost terrible way he was riding the world. He sat on a stool and ordered an ice-cream soda. While he was eating it, Margie appeared, coming from the telephone booths in the rear of the store. In her little soft hat, her trim tailored suit with its boyish pockets, her stiff boy's collar and "four-in-hand" tie, she looked as fresh and girlish as when he had first seen her. "Oh," she said, slipping in on the stool next to his, "you're here ! I just called up again." And when the aproned dis- penser of sweet fluids and solids had moved a little way along the fountain, she shot in this low-voiced remark : "Your lawyer's expected here by evening. He's reserved a room at the Cantey Square. The clerk told me." "I haven't any lawyer," Calverly mumbled. "Madame Watt's lawyer, then. Name of Parker." "Oh!" was all he could say. He wished she would leave him alone. The creative glow was still red within him. lie didn't know what he might say, under pressure. "Come out with me," she said, under her breath. "I've t to say a few things." 308 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM They sat on a bench in Cantey Square. "You saw the story the other day in the afternoon papers " He moved his head quickly in the negative. She had never seen him so nervous; or, at least, so oddly self- absorbed. "You must have shouted at the reporters." He glanced up; then down. ''You swore you wouldn't take the money." "I won't." ''What are you going to do with it?" "Nothing. It's nothing to me." "You can't give it to the lawyers. The court won't let you." He made an impatient gesture. "You'll have to do something, of course." "No." "You'll have to." "Why?" "There it is. All that money. Yours by law. You can take it. You can give it away. You can't ignore it." "Then I'll give it away." She sat quiet, considering this. "Henry," she cried softly, "will you?" He bowed. "You'll have to really do it, of course. Give thought: to it." He stirred. "You'll have to ! It's a responsibility you can't evade." "I have a friend that understands all those things. Humphrey Weaver. You don't know him. He'll help me." His pulse quickened as he thought of the man, spoke his name. He had asked Humphrey, by wire, for a hundred dollars. It had suddenly been easy to do, the natural thing. It had been wholly an impulsive act. He didn't know that it was sound finance, borrowing against work, against pro- duction. He knew only that it felt natural now. There was no longer a gulf between them. His heart warmed toward THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 309 his old friend. He wished he could see him, tell him about the new book . . . There was a live thing, that book ! He felt it now, pulling at mind, heart, nerves. He wanted to be back writing it. Why wouldn't Margie leave him alone! How could he get away from her? "Henry !" Her hand was on his arm. She was excited, crisp, quick. "You've suffered!" He stared at her. He hadn't before found understanding in her; not like this. "Give that money to the poor devils that have felt what you've felt prison disgrace! Establish a fund. Yes, that's it ! For men and women released from prison. Help them get a start, get back on their feet." "Yes," he said slowly, "I'd love to do that." She could see that it wasn't now, had never been real to him, this actual fortune. But her idea appealed to him. "You'll do it ?" she asked, watching him intently. "Yes, of course!" "That's a promise. One thing more. You won't tell any one? You'll leave it in my hands during this week." He really didn't understand this. "Promise me that. I don't want the other papers to have it. They mustn't." "Look here, Margie," he said, coming momentarily to life, "for God's sake don't put any more in the papers!" At this she sprang up. Remembering herself, she glanced discreetly about ; then, a hand on the back of the bench, casual enough in manner, but with a thrilling quality in her voice, she cried softly : "In the papers! God love you, Henry Calverly, you were born to page one, you'll live and die on page one ! The one thing we can do is to put you right instead of wrong. Re- tnember, you're giving the money as I say ; and remember, too, it's my story !" Then she hurried off. And Calverly, who hadn't caught all her words but had caught the thrill of her voice and answered it in every tingling nerve-end all feeling, all fire rushed away to hts 310 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM boarding-house on the Hill and plunged, almost happy in a wild way, at the book. He began writing the moment his pen touched the paper, wrote straight and fast, with hardly a correction or interlineation. He hadn't planned a sentence of it, but the sentences clear, fluid, firm flowed out on the paper in a stream. As if it came straight down from the stars. Now and then he would stop, read back a little way, and laugh aloud. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE In Which Margie Daw Finds Herself Involved in the Greatest Story MARGIE paused before the News building. Out- wardly she was her usual trim self ; but in her heart she knew she had crossed her Rubicon. Thoughts of Henry Calverly filled her waking and sleeping mind. She was helplessly full of him. She had known no other man like him. He was so elusive as utterly to fascinate her; a man to be wooed or never won. She knew that she must capture him for herself or face life on some new plane of interest ; and at the moment she was finding that new plane difficult to picture. Her Rubicon had really been crossed during his illness. She had lost herself then; had declared herself, or tried to. Her little outbreak at the Rivoli had followed inevitably. One thing she had learned ; these outbreaks repelled him. She wouldn't make that mistake again. The central problem of such a life as Margie's is not simple. She was by nature an active, independent woman. The home-building instinct was not in her. And the other, deeper, related instinct that guides the immense majority of girls through marriage into motherhood had never yet stirred in her breast. Though she was now, without formu- lating the feeling into thought, nearer it than ever before : nearer, perhaps, than she would ever be again. She loved work. She had much of the artist's feeling for life ; at least she wasn't after money. Freedom was, I think, essential to her spirit. She couldn't work in chains, even in the chains of love, particularly in the chains of domesticity. This fact added, doubtless, a touch of confusing bitterness to her pres- ent intense desire to possess Henry, envelope him, shut others away from him. 311 312 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Apparently Margie's various emotional experiences, though not altogether happy, had touched her hardly more deeply than certain high-powered types of men are touched by similar experiences. Yet behind her busy, rather cold brain, and confused with it, lay a deep, vital emotional qual- ity that at times moved strongly toward expression. Though never before she met Henry had her emotions overrun her mind. Like others of us, whatever our occasional excesses in conduct or thought, Margie had months of high dream- which her various experiments in the region of the affections had, if anything, intensified. It was to this side of her nature that Henry appealed with such bewildering strength. What it came doun to, she knew, was that she was out-and-out fighting for him. It would be interesting to look more deeply into Margie's life, perhaps even to follow her career after she went down to Xew York. She was one of the more interesting of the many persons who played a part in Henry's life during this, for him, critical period. Indeed she had already contributed more to the stimulus that \vns driving his long-slumbering genius forward and upward than he was ever to know. From their first meeting there had been between them an emotional friction that had through his very resistance to her, brought warmth and light to his brain. We can deal here only with her effect on him. Margie herself, is,, after all, to quote from that other precocious genius with whose work the earlier Calverly stories were so often compared, "another story." One fact that I find not uninteresting is that Margie, standing there before the News building, swiftly, clearly thinking, did not for a moment allow the confused state of her emotions to becloud her plans for the evening's work. It came down to a matter of time. She decided to call up her friend behind the desk at the Cantey Square Hotel and request him to let her know the moment Mr. Parker ar- rfved. He would do that for her. She wanted to see Parker before the other reporters got at him. She could work through the supper hour and on into the evening. Unless THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 313 Parker had already come in on the afternoon train, he couldn't arrive now until nine-thirty. Holmes Hitt also figured in her plans, but she could catch him now, before he left his office. "I've got a big story," she explained to Holmes Hitt "about Henry Calverly. You won't mind helping him?" "Not at all. He's an extremely interesting person.'' "Yes, I know. I'll mention you in the story. It's proper enough. He's been working for you . . , He won't take that money." "So I've gathered." "He's just promised me that he'll give it the whole thing to help put unfortunate jailbirds on their feet." Holmes Hitt considered this. "It's a big thing, you see," she went on "a new Calverly sensation. Feature stuff. And just what he needs to put him right." Holmes Hitt nodded. "I could sell it to a syndicate. But I want to make it bigger than that. I want to plaster the country with it. That's where you come in. You see what it is an expert publicity job." "Yes, I see." "If we do it right, we can put him back on his feet ' overnight." Margie paused ; then, slowly, her eyes drooped and a wave of warm color crept over her clear young face. Holmes Hitt studied her calmly. It was the first evidence of human feeling he had happened to see in Margie Daw. It made her extraordinarily attractive. Calverly, he de- cided, was rather to be envied. Though likely as not the boy wouldn't grasp the situation. And somebody'd catch her on the rebound. He wondered, with a mild quickening of interest, who. She raised her eyes, as slowly. During a brief, illuminat- ing moment they met his. Her color deepened. Then her face seemed to set defiantly. "And of course" this rather lamely, as she rose to go "the bigger we make it the more in it for me." 314 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Naturally. You'll want to put it right through." "Yes. This week." "Write your story, and we'll sit down together and map out a campaign. I'll be glad to help." Margie opened the door marked "Features. Miss Daw" and closed it behind her. Briskly, all business, she hung up her coat, smoothed her "waist,"' drew up to her type- writer, and went to work. Shortly the telephone rang. It was her friend the hotel clerk. Mr. Parker, it appeared, was already in town, had doubtless come in on the afternoon train, for the porter had his bags, but had not yet registered. Margie said : "Listen ! I must see him before any other newspaper people get at him. . . . Yes, really impor- tant. To him, too ... I do mean it ! I don't want an interview. No, nothing from him, nothing whatever. I'm not asking him, I'm telling him . . . Don't fail me! Tell him I'm a nice person . . . Well, I am. . . . Oh no, he's just an old lawyer, from Chicago. He's not dangerous . . . What's that? You are? Yes, I know it. ... But you never ask me! . . . Certainly, I will. I'd love it. Sunday's my slack day. I'll tell you call me up at home Sunday noon. It's in the book. And don't fail me to-night with the Parker man. When he comes in hide him quick and call me up. I'm counting on you. Good-by" She sat back, drew in a long sober breath, and stared at the wood-and-glass partition before her. Then she looked around at the old desk behind the door they hadn't taken it away where Henry Calverly had worked, or sat, during two or three unhappy days. Her eyes rested then on the hook on which he had hung his coat the ragged old alpaca with the purple ink-stains. Her eyes slowly filled. She went again at the typewriter. Her skilled fingers spun over the keys. Again the telephone, and the clerk. But there was a dif- ferent note in his voice. He was talking with another man. Masculine humor was passing current. Margie's brows drew together. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 315 The clerk said, "Allow me to present Mr. Parker, from Chicago." Then came another voice, "How do you do, Miss Daw ! I'm sure it's a pleasure to meet you." Margie answered crisply. Could she see him in half an hour, in regard to a really important matter? And would he avoid reporters meanwhile ? "But my dear young lady," he replied jauntily, she felt "the place is full of reporters. They're waiting for me now. I'd have to slip out a window I'll ask them to wait, and look for a side door. Yes wait! I'll tell you! It ought to be possible to pick up an automobile. It's a de- lightful evening. I'll be out here on the square on the dark side, across from the hotel. We can take a little run up the river and talk in peace." She pursed her lips over this. The clerk had been talking ; no doubt about that. She wished, rather irritably, she could know what he had said. And this Mr. Parker (could he have known it!) was already classified and filed away in Margie's experienced mind. A gentleman, more or less ; not very young; probably married, with three or four children; not quite used enough to being away from home to know what to do with his freedom. There was a note in his voice slight but unmistakable of over-eagerness, pressure. Bachelors didn't have that ; didn't need it. Bachelors were cool. And his planning a ride, before he had so much as seen her ; bachelors didn't have to do that, either. Too many women, single and married, pursued them. No, Mr. Parker, of Chicago, was just a little on the loose. She knew him knew hundreds of him. Every attractive business girl knows him. Now and than a thoughtful girl sees deeper, recognizes in him in his very naivete a not uninteresting living com- mentary on the institution of marriage itself. For the Mr. Parkers are not "bad" men; they are men, ordinarily calm and methodical enough, to whom occasional flights into freedom are over-stimulating. The particular Mr. Parker ran true to type. Before the car had passed the last factory and was rolling smoothlv along the state road, he was holding her hand. She let him. It was nothing to her. And he was confiding this curious, 316 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM rather self-conscious little man his deep, deep need of an occasional moment of human relaxation, such as the present. "Human" was his word. He rather lingered on it. Then, very gradually, very casually, he slipped an arm around her shoulders. Or he meant it to appear casual ; but toward the last was slightly breathless about it. He told her, in \vhat seemed to himself a burst of honesty, that he was married. He had married young, before character and tastes could form. These things were always puzzling. You couldn't plan your life. You were drawn into it; you took your chance; tried to be a sport about it. Margie could have screamed. But he blundered on. Could Mrs. Parker have heard him Mrs. Parker, who got no pleasant little business outings and to whom he was outwardly (and nearly all the time, doubtless, inwardly) a good husband, even a sincerely loyal husband she would have been crushed. He was a little disturbed about it himself. Margie caught his hedging; wandering into a curious moral and ethical labyrinth. She passed over the insulting implications. These, too, were nothing to her. They were simply too old a story. She had a more or less steady contempt for men, anyway. You had to take them as they came, play with them or not, as you might choose. He was getting himself rather heavily involved. Even this Mr. Parker seemed capable of perceiving that love- making, even to a mystifyingly silent if apparently com- plaisant young person, mustn't be wholly impersonal. He told Margie she was beautiful. Commented on the delicate texture of her skin. And he found her eyes thrilling. From the first she had touched something deeply respon- sive in him. Suddenly she pinned him down. "How could I have appealed to you so?" she asked, calm- ly. "You hadn't even seen me when you suggested this ride." "It it must have been your voice," said he. "These things are strange" her voice was a thought softer "these sudden attractions." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 317 "Strange and wonderful." "I'm going to ask you to take your arm away." "Oh no !" "Please!" "But aren't we even friends?" "Of course! But hardly more this first hour. No sit this way. I want to talk seriously. We can't talk like that. Not seriously." She told him of her plan and of Henry's consent. She also mentioned Holmes Hitt's part in it. "You see," she explained, "as his lawyer, you've got to work it out see the proper authorities organize it on the charity side. And I suppose there'll be legal papers, all that. Mr. Hitt and I will be working out the publicity. You'll have to put it through with Mr. Calverly, too. Sign him up to it. He may balk. He's queer." "He's that!" sighed Mr. Parker. "It's a great big story. Handled right, it'll put him on his feet. But if a word leaks to the other papers, it's no good. So please be careful." On the way back he got into a fresh state of breathless- ness over the idea of kissing her. For a time she fought him off out of sheer annoyance. Then, when they were nearly back in town, she yielded. It was an extraordinarily meaningless performance. She had to fight down a repug- nance that threatened to break out in words. She wasn't sure she could get away on the following even- ing. He could call up, of course, at the paper. She saiff nothing of her apartment. It came out that he had been looking up Henry at his old boarding-house, but no one there knew where he had gone. She gave him the new ad- dress. He agreed eagerly to work on the legal aspect of the plan in the morning, in order that he might present it effectively to Calverly. His first thought was that it would be best to have the money available simply as a fund from which any existing charitable organization, settlement or individual social worker could draw after proper scrutiny of the particular case. He said that new organizations were 318 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM costly and uncertain things. He was intelligent enough about this. She left him at the square. More from force of habit than for any reason for her work was in for the night she turned up the alley toward the "annex." A wan stepped out into the light and accosted her. He was tall, shabby, with the uncertain eyes and the in-pressing mouth of the drunkard. She stopped short. It was her first husband, one Joel Mason. He had been sporting editor of a paper in Buffalo when she worked there. He was a drinker then, but younger and more pleasing ; she was little more than an adventurous girl. For just a moment she couldn't remember his first name. A curious moment. In answer to his pleas for a visit with her for even a brief talk she spoke guardedly, evasively. She felt that she ought to be kind, or at least generous. To Margie generosity, of a spasmodic sort, had always come more easily than kindness. Still, Joel had a sort of claim on her feelings, repulsive as he was. Finally, with a vague promise to meet him within a day or so, she g"ot away, slipped into the building, around back of the elevator and out through the circulation and adver- tising office to the street. She hurried, then, to her rooms, got out her little traveling typewriter, and plunged at the Calverly story. She wrote all night. For fatigue of body and desperation of mind can act oddly like the sharpest stimulus. At ten in the morning she was in Holmes Hitt's office, bright and trim. Young Mr. Hitt had evolved over- night a plan to put the story into more than a thousand newspapers. She found he was thinking too of the "boiler plate" matter that went to other thousands of country dailies and weeklies. "The job," he said, "is to rebuild a reputation, from the ground up. In one quick sensation. Play on their feelincr?. Make them love him. . . . But for God's sake don't let him suspect," CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX Of Creation and Coincidence ON the same evening, toward nine o'clock, Henry Cal- verly laid down his pen, raised his weary though throbbingly exalted head, and surveyed the room. The floor was half covered with sheets of paper; they had drifted in under wash-stand and bed; a few had gone as far as the door. He pushed back his chair ; then winced. The ache in his back, of which he had been half conscious, sharpened; and pains shot down his thighs and calves. For nearly five hours he had been sitting stiffly there; leg-muscles drawn up tight, heels raised, toes digging down into his shoes. He .got up with a little groan. The story if it could be called a story ; it was rather a picture of a man in a setting, a picture of the developing West of the eighteen- seventies and eighteen-eighties was clear in his head ; sharply, wonderfully clear ; so clear that he found a little dif- ficulty in focusing his eyes on the littered things about him and at catching the significance of what his eyes told him. He gazed back longingly at the half-written page on the table. He was seized with a tremulous fear that this won- derful thing would leave him ; there was an urge in his breast to write till he dropped follow on from one melting sentence to the next on and on to the very end. It wouldn't do, of course. He closed his eyes; pressed the hot lids down ; again looked about. Painfully he gathered the sheets and stacked them on the table. "I must number them," he thought, helplessly. Any ef- fort, outside of writing feverishly on, stirred that helpless sensation. "I'll get some coffee," he thought next. "That's the thing r-coffee!" 319 320 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM He found his hat ami went out. The people he passed down-stairs were shadows to him. An oddly familiar figure was loitering, near the corner, in the shade of the maples. A little, plumpish girl, who moved, when she saw him, on her heels. He stopped, with a flutter of misgivings. He couldn't talk now. He had been pouring out his inmost soul. He was all open ; all emotion ; no worldly crust whatever protected him, or protected others from him. He was really a little frightened. And here was Mary Maloney . . . coming slowly toward him. . . . "This came for you," she said ; and gave him a telegram. He moved over to the curb, and opened it under the street light. It was from Humphrey, who again managed, by throwing in an unnecessary extra word or two to express a heartiness uncommon in telegrams. He was coming in person the next day. Mary was saying, shyly "I was just trying to get my courage up to take it in there." He turned on her. "There were some other things, Mary a telegram, and a letter I've got them somewhere -don't believe I opened them . . ." They stood, on the shadowy sidewalk, looking at each other. "... you didn't bring those, Mary?" "Yes. I brought them. I I wanted to ask if you were in : then I thought I'd better not." "You're a dear girl, Mary." "Oh no . . ." They walked slowly along. "You were " she hesitated "going out somewhere." "Only for some coffee. Been writing like fury. It's won- derful. I've felt nothing like it for years. I'm doing a big book at last." "I'm so glad!" she cried softly. He became aware of her again. "You " he began "you . . . was there something? Oh, the telegram, of course." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 321 She let this pass. They went into a little lunch room. She watched him while he drank two big cups of coffee and ate rolls. Then he discovered that he was hungry and ate other things. She thought he ate faster than was good for him. He talked a good deal too. He was away up in the clouds. Said things she couldn't understand. She had never found him so exciting. Then they found themselves on the street again. She started to speak but faltered. For a wonder he noticed it. "What is it, Mary ?" he asked gently. "Oh, nothing. You you'll be going back to your work." "I ought to. Mary, there's something on your mind." "Oh no," she replied. Then, without further comment they wandered down to the river and sat, prosaically enough, on a lumber pile. "You mustn't run errands for me like this," he said. "I'll give the post-office my change of address." "I don't mind," she said. "But it isn't right ..." "I did want to see you to-night," she remarked, after a pause. "That is, I hoped, sort of, you'd be around." He made no reply to this. "You see," she said, clearly groping for words, "I I don't think I'll keep books any more. It's on my nerves, I guess." Still he was silent. "I've been thinking about marrying my friend we talked about that " "Yes, we did," said he, rather quickly. "The truth is I haven't known what to do. I can see clearly enough just as clearly as you can that it wouldn't do for you and me . . . I've felt that you were fond of me. And nobody ever made me feel the way you have. Oh yes, I may as well own up. I love you, I guess. What- ever it is. I couldn't say no to you. We aren't the same kind" her voice was unsteady at this point "it seems too bad. If we could I mean if I could help you instead of 322 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM being a drag on you and if you wanted me, I I'd come to you. I'd have to, the way I feel. I don't think I'd care what became of me. Far as I can see you run risks either way. The girls I know that have married have had it hard enough . . . I'd go to you. I wouldn't ask you to marry me. All I'd ask would be that you wouldn't get me into trouble. And I hope I'd be good sport enough not to whimper if you did. You see, I could always well, get work. I'd cook for you, and mend your clothes, and help you save ; I'd . . . Her voice trailed off. She was very still. But she didn't seem to be crying. A little hand stole into his. "Mary," he said, "I'm going to tell you I love another woman." There was a long, long silence. "Does she love you?" Mary asked breathlessly. "No . . . Well no." Her fingers twisted tightly about his. For a time they watched the river. A passenger train roared by on the farther bank. Red fire spurted from the smoke stack. The car windows were a long streak of light. They caught a fleeting glimpse of white linen and glitter- ing plate and glass in the dining-car at the rear. It disap- peared around the bend. "I'll tell you the thing for me to do," she said. Her firm voice reassured him. He saw, in this moment of illumina- tion, that she had the quality of strength that is implied in the word character; more, perhaps, than he had before seen in a human creature. She stood alone, making her way through an ugly world. And she wasn't hard or bitter ; she was brimming with woman-feeling. That made it the more difficult, of course. "Tell you what I've got to do," she began again . . . "Oh Mary, why not go through with it marry your friend !" "That's it !" she replied. "I've got to. It it's the next thing. One way or the other, I've got to go through with THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 323 this thing now. Then later on if I have to go back to bookkeeping, why, that'll be the next thing then." They parted on a street corner. She said she'd walk out home alone, if he didn't mind. She wasn't afraid. So Henry, moved to the point of bewilderment by the poignantly gloomy beauty of life, went back to his task. Since Cicely died he had not been on such frank terms with a woman. And even Cicely, during their brief married life, would have had to express her feelings through indi- rection where Mary spoke out with such astonishing frank- ness. As there wasn't an atom of cynicism in Henry's make- up, it didn't so much as occur to him to think of the re- markable literary value in the experience and in his own reactions to it. Obviously this value was great. It was pure coincidence that the experience should have come just when his need of constant and even increasing stimulation was deepest. But so it happened. There is a time in nearly every interesting career, after the blind forces of life have been long hostile, when the lane comes to its turning and all the forces work together for good. Henry's long, long lane had come to such a turning. Helpful coincidents were now, and, for a time were to be, every-day matters with him. One other such should now claim our interest ; one which we must approach through other eyes. The elder Mr. Hitt was by this time established in the old Cantey house on the Hill ; in the very room where the course of Henry's life had been, for better or worse, changed ; settled comfortably enough at Jim Cantey's desk, the railway map behind him, Mr. Amme's neatly arranged wire baskets before him, the books, the globe, the closed safe, and the fleet of model ships on the bookcases. Mr. Hitt, like Henry before him, found these ships a delight. He could tip back in Jim Cantey's swivel chair, light his pipe, gaze up at the Yangtze, the Volga or the Congo, half close his eyes, and glide straightway out over the Seven Seas of fancy. 324 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM On the working side and here habit and conscience ruled he was building up what he thought of as a neat little job. The perfect plaster-of-Paris biography. Jim Cantey, the child and youth ; James Cantey, the schoolboy ; James H. Cantey, the able and industrious young business man. And so on. Altogether safe and sane. The sort of thing that all the established "literary" journals would pronounce "sound" and even "scholarly" . . . More and more, in his own mind particularly now that he was slipping back a little out of the influence of the dynamic, highly colored Calverly Mr. Hitt was inclined to justify this conservative treatment. The world, after all, was as powerful as the flesh and the devil. It wanted what it was used to. Above all it resented being roused and compelled to think. If you butted your head against it, you cracked your head ; and that was about all you did. . . . Mr. Hitt, it is clear, was all of his fifty-eight years. Once upon a time he had been a blazing young revolutionary. Those years were still a pleasantly sentimental memory. He could even yet talk like a radical thinker ; had so talked with Calverly, meaning every word of it. But when it came down to the daily task he was well, fifty-eight. He missed Calverly; meant to look him up. He even worried about him. And browsed occasionally in Satraps of the Simple with a queer sense of unreality that at mo- ments bordered on awe. Then one day Miss Cantey came home. There was a great bustling about. Trunks were moved in. Servants ran up and down the stairs. And Mr. Hitt sat at the desk working only intermittently, thinking ten- derly of Henry. He decided to look him up that evening. The boy might be in want. Or he might have learned of Miss Cantey's return and be suffering the damnable tortures of the sen- sitive, imaginative soul. Miss Cantey, that afternoon, sent in a courteous little note. She was glad to know that work on the biography THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 325 was advancing. It would be pleasant to have him join her at tea. He felt curiously shy about it ; but went. His clothes felt a little shabby. And he hadn't much small talk. He was shown into an up-stairs sitting-room. A maid with black hair waited on them. Mrs. Bentley, the housekeeper and companion, sat in a corner with her knitting. Miss Cantey rose to greet him. His surprise must have been evident, for she promptly spoke of her recovery from the years of invalidism. "I'm not right yet," she said, in her pleasantly direct way : "there were atrophied muscles. It's quite a job building them up. I've had to learn to walk. But the worst is over now." She looked delicate, he thought, but extraordinarily beau- tiful. It was mainly in her coloring, of course. Despite her gentle, thoughtful ways, it was difficult for Mr. Hitt to talk with her. She told him to call on her for any help he thought she might give in the way of personal reminiscence. So they talked, impersonally. As soon as he decently could, he got away and out of the house. He headed straight for Calverly's boarding place. Perhaps the boy would have a bite of dinner with him. Anyway they must talk. Something must be done. The look in those blue eyes lingered in his brain. He could see them, here on the street. They urged him, as his own heart urged him, toward the man who had said "A woman who has given her heart to a man has a right to be proud of him hasn't she?" What was Calverly doing, these late days, to make the girl proud of him? For she was a princess of the blood! . . . So ran the romantic thoughts of fifty-eight. Mr. Hitt, clearly, was excited. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN In Which Hittie Takes a Personal Stand MR. HITT turned up the side-street under the wide- arching maples. The early autumn twilight was settling over the street, but he could see the big square boarding-house with its old-fashioned square "cupola" out- lined against a dimly glowing sky. There were lights in the windows. He could see, in the large corner room, a wait- ress setting a table. He took the path that cut diagonally across the lawn to the steps. A man sat there ; a dim figure, smoking a cigarette. Paus- ing at the bottom step, peering up at him, Mr. Hitt saw long, well-clad legs, a light overcoat thrown open with what appeared to be a roll of manuscript bulging out one side pocket, a long face under a tipped-back hat. The natural thing would have been to accept this young- ish man, seated in so matter-of-fact an attitude on the steps, as one of the boarders and pass him by without a thought. But he was clearly not a boarder. There was still a little light in the sky, and other, yellow, light came from the windows. The man looked up, for one thing, with a faint, but, to the trained sensitive gaze of old Hittie, perceptible curiosity. And for another thing, his clothes, indistinct as they were, were of a smarter cut than was commonly seen about town. Hittie, after a second's thought, placed them at New York. And that wad of loosely rolled paper in the overcoat pocket ! He wasn't a reporter, of course. Whatever it was, Hittie waited, one foot on the bottom step. "I believe Mr. Calverly lives here," said Hittie, with something the sensation of one who utters a momentous falsehood, yet moved uncontrollably to make talk. 326 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 327 The long head bowed. Then: "What do you want of him ?'' asked the stranger. The remark was not so brusk in sound as the bare words might appear. Indeed, they warmed Hittie's heart, for they established a relationship; possibly, probably, an intimate relationship. "Merely to visit with him," he replied. "I had some thought of dragging him out to dinner, if he was at home." "He's at home," remarked the man from New York, rather dryly, "but he's pretty busy." "Busy? Not not writing?" The man bowed again. "I'm glad of that. It is the one thing he needed the thrill of creative work. We had a long talk the other night. When I left him he seemed more alive than I'd seen him before." "He's alive now, all right." "I'm so glad. We were both a bit excited the other night. Just talking." There was a silence. Mr. Hitt felt a pair of quick, quizzical brown eyes taking him swiftly and surely in. Then the man asked, rather abruptly : "Are you Mr. Hitt, of the News ?" Hittie bowed. "I thought likely. Henry spoke of that talk, too. It seems to have been one of the things that stirred him up." Another silence. "If you don't mind," said the man from New York, final- ly ; "let's not disturb him. I've got a lot of the stuff here" he rested a hand on the bulging pocket. "Thought I'd wan- der off to a cafe and look it over. He talked six things at once. I ran away. Do you mind joining me? We can have a stein of beer; perhaps a bite to eat. My name's Weaver." "You don't think we ought to drag the boy out?' "No. Let nature take its course. I've been through all this before with Henry. He wrote Satraps of the Simple all over my living-room." 328 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Hittie gazed at him in something near awe. As if, almost, a man had said, "Keats borrowed my pencil to write A Grecian Urn." They moved down the path. Weaver looked back; took Hittie's arm and said, "Listen!" A baritone voice, rather pleasant in quality, was booming out through the still evening air. "It'sCalverly?" Weaver nodded. They saw him then, through a third-floor window, strid- ing about and waving his arms as he sang. Over a table in a little cafe, they looked through the manuscript. They were two or three hours at this. "What do you make of it ?" asked Weaver. "It's extraordinary. It's the real West as it was just when Jim Cantey was about to appear on the scene. Setting the stage for him." Weaver, pulling at an imported cigar, long legs stretched out under the table, hands deep in pockets, chin on breast, swarthy mobile face wrinkling with his swiftly passing thoughts, considered this. At length he said : "You're a literary man, Mr. Hitt. How good do you think it is?" "I'd want to read it over, slowly." "But it is good?" "Unquestionably." "You think he has come back." "I don't think he's been very far away. He couldn't fight the world, alone." "No. Of course." "My impression is that he has stepped out far ahead of any earlier work." "That's saying a lot." "I know that. But look" ... he turned the pages; read a sentence here and there, quite at random . . . "just get the sound of those. The freshness of it. The sure, light hand. And an extraordinary sense of person- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 329 ality back of the words of a rich, warm, keen mind. It's interesting, you never feel just that when you're with him. But it was in Satraps of tlie Simple" Weaver nodded. "Yes, I feel all that. But I don't trust my judgment where Hen is concerned. I've worried so over him." ''What I'd like to know," remarked Hittie, musingly, "is how on earth he can write so fast, all of a sudden." "It's uncanny. He said, when he was writing the other stories, that it was like taking dictation." "What gets me, too, is his amazing knowledge of the Old West" "Oh, he's roamed around out there some. And he must have read a lot, at odd times. And he was at the Public Library last night until they turned him out. But most of it comes through his pores. That's Hen. You have to allow for that in figuring him out ... I can't tell you what this means. They'll never get him now. He's step- ping out on the highroad. If you've never seen him when he was stepping high " "I never have " Hittie broke in, eagerly. " then there's some amusement ahead of you." "He's been a rather dismal figure here." "Naturally. He's had a hell of a time, for years." "But he did blaze up the other night in our talk." Weaver chuckled. "Just wait," he said. . . . "I'm taking the midnight to New York. You keep the manu- script until I can get back here. I'll tell Hen you have it. And slip in, now and then, if you can, and gather it up. Don't trust him with it. And if you could help a little at the library . . . he's not used to research. And he wants a lot of data. Particularly about railroads and busi- ness combines and the operations of big financial men. I can help some, when I get back." Hittie walked slowly to his own rooms. He returned to the Cantey house, later in the evening, and shut himself in the library. Calverly's manuscript never left his hand. 330 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM He read it through, sitting at Jim Cantey's desk. He had already written a few tentative chapters of his own more formal biography. He got these out now and read them. Next he skimmed through the notes he had made bearing on later chapters. Then he laid his little heap of script on the desk beside Calverly's and for a long time sat staring at the two. Finally, tired, depressed, he tiptoed down-stairs, let him- self out, and wandered, roundabout, to his rooms. The next day was Sunday. Miriam Cantey breakfasted in her room. The morning paper the News came up with her tray. She turned the pages, idly, as she sipped her coffee. Then, moved by a half -memory, incredulous, her pulse accelerating a little, she turned back to page one. It was odd; her eyes had passed over a certain black heading. They must have caught it without at once com- municating it to her brain. It was Margie Daw and Holmes Hitt's widely syndicated story of Henry Calverly's renunciation of a fortune. She read, breathless ; followed the narrative to an inside page. There Henry's picture appeared. She gazed long at it. And as she read on she paused at short intervals to look up at the features that were familiar yet strange. . . . For the first time she learned the circumstances attending Henry's trouble with the court. For the first time she pictured him with that lovely young wife confused, tortured, led by his feelings into technical fault. She read resolutely on through a mist of tears that frequently hid the print. . . . Margie had gone to old files of the Chicago papers in the public library for her data. She told the story, now, simply, clearly, without over-writing, led by a sound and well- trained instinct to set out the unadorned facts. Over and over Miriam struggled through the story. The thing was a nervous shock. He had refused to accept the money. A part of it had already gone, it appeared, to the new public baths. All the rest was to go to a fund to help unfortunate first offenders on their release from prison. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 331 The pain about her eyes and the throbbing in the back of her head alarmed her a little. But more alarming still was the chaotic state of her thoughts. She tried lying down ; but after only a moment was on her elbow reading it again. With the same difficulty, however; she could see bits of the picture but not all of it at once. It was as if there were rays of memory and understanding that came to a focus at a point somewhere past and behind her brain. The story was personally close to her. The man was too close . . . She read his notes again. It was like a fever, as it had been during their day of happiness in each other, but more press- ing, more poignant. She wondered how she was going to endure through it. It would pass, doubtless. Everything seemed to pass, in time. At least the passion in it would die down. A thought that took form an hour or so later seemed curiously to derive from it, or to bear on it. Since her father's death, and during her invalidism, she had never dwelt on the fact that she, a young woman, was living alone in the big house, with none but paid servants about her. She had early come to like the arrangement. But now, during these few days since her return from California a slightly unpleasant self-conscious- ness had proved disturbing. She was not yet strong, but she used a cane now only during her short walks in the street, moving about the house without such aid. In a word, she was on the reasonably rapid road to becoming an attractive and desirable young woman. And attractive and desirable young women did not make it a practise, in 1903, to keep house alone. It was puzzling. She put it a little differently to herself; but that was about what it came down to. Esther, in a last attempt to make up their quarrel, had dwelt on the point. Had driven it home, in fact. Late in the morning the black-haired maid brought a message from the gentleman who was working in the study. He would like a few words with Miss Cantey. Where was he? Why there, in the study. 332 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Miriam said she would join him there. He rose and stood gravely behind the desk as she came in and seated herself in the big chair by the safe. She thought him very attractive; a gentle man. There was something comfortable about his bald head and his close-cut gray mustache and the quiet eyes behind his glasses. But he was grave; and paler than yesterday, she thought. He had two little heaps of manuscript before him on the desk that he fingered rather nervously after he sat down. She wished for a fluttering moment that she had ar- ranged to meet him in some other room. It was going to be difficult in here. Everything was the same, even to Mr. Amme's row of wire baskets with their neat piles of cor- respondence and notes. "Miss Cantey," he began; then hesitated and looked thoughtfully at the two manuscripts . . . She wondered, rather wildly, if he was going to make a speech. It seemed that he must surely hear her heart beat. He started again. "I feel that I must speak with you about this before I take any other steps. As you know, I've been trying to well, write a biography of your father. I find that I can't go on with it. I will come for a day or two more. That will be enough to leave things in order." She sat motionless; looked at him out of wide blue eyes. What was coming next? He, too this older man was stirred by some strong emotion. And it concerned her. "I have been sitting here this morning" ?o he continued "trying to think out the right course. I haven't exactly succeeded in that." He smiled, rather wistfully. "Hut right or not, I find I must tell you of my difficulty. This" he laid a hand on one pile of script "is the work I have been doing here. It is a conventional beginning of a conventional biography. This" his hand moved over to the other script, and played about, turning up the pages at one corner "is the beginning of what will be classified, I suppose, as a work of fiction. What it really is, is the biography I'm supposed to be writing." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 333 Miriam leaned a little forward. She was pale. Her lips parted slightly. She was nearly breathless. Her eyes were fixed, as if fascinated, on the script. "It was written it is being written now, day and night by my predecessor here, Mr. Henry Calverly." He was embarrassed about this; rather stilted. For a curious moment their eyes met. "He isn't using actual names, of course, but the thing he is doing takes the ground from under my feet." Miriam here made her first remark. She felt inadequate. "Is there " her voice failed her ; she had to begin again "is there any reason why both can't go on ?" "None whatever. Excepting in so far as I myself am a reason. Miss Cantey, we've talked over this biography problem, he and I. We see it alike. But I'm getting to be an old man. When all's said and done" his voice was none too steady "I am a literary hack. But he's a genius. A great genius, I think. This" he tapped the script "is the finest thing I know of so far in American literature. As a picture, that is, of a people and a time." A hush crept into his voice. "To me it is a miracle. That boy, without half the data he needs, with nothing but the fire that is in his soul, borrowing money to keep himself barely alive in that boarding-house. . . ." His voice died out. It was just as well. He knew that he had lost control of it. He sat gazing ruefully down at the desk. There was a rustle. He started, and looked up. Miss Cantey was on her feet. She looked as if she were about to speak ; even threw out one hand as if for emphasis ; but turned away and actually hurried out. She did say some- thing ; it sounded like, "You'll excuse me, I'm sure." Hardly more than that. An hour later she asked the new maid if Mr. Hitt was still in the study. It appeared that he had gone out. Miriam waited until the maid had got down-stairs, the 334 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM went back through her own den to the narrow door ; stood listening; opened the door; then stepped into the larger room. It was the second time she had walked through that little door. The first time had been to him. . . . The desk was not quite in order. Mr. Hitt would be back, surely, in the afternoon. If not well, she could call a messenger boy. She could do something. She knelt by the safe and worked out the combination. She took out an armful of note-books and papers, and carried them, with some effort, to her own room. The tin box she got from her trunk. She rang then, and curtly (for her) asked the maid to bring twine and paper. She made a large parcel, tying it securely and sealing all the knots with wax stamped with her own seal. She addressed it to Henry in Mr. Hitt's care. It occurred to her, with a twinge of new pain, that she didn't know his address. She wrote a few lines, asking Mr. Hitt if he would be so kind as to see that the parcel was placed safely in Mr. Cal- verly's hands. It was risky business, but she found she didn't care. Noth- ing mattered. She had it placed, with the note on top, on the desk in the study. She went to bed later, more than a little frightened by the state she was in; but not before satisfying herself that Mr. Hitt had come again and gone with the parcel. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT Of Calverly's Callers, the Library at the Town Club, and Melodrama CA.LVERLY had two callers on Sunday ; one late in the afternoon, the other earl)' in the evening. The first was Mr. Hitt, with a parcel. Henry in his shirt-sleeves, hair in wild confusion, thumb and first two fingers of his right hand stained with ink put the parcel vaguely in a corner, by the wash-stand, and talked radiantly of his book. "I've just been figuring up/' he cried, "and it runs over thirty thousand words! You'll admit that that's tearing it off." Hittie tried to smile. "But are you getting any rest ?" he asked. "Yes, I sleep. Oh, I dream a lot. You know all tight. But it's worth it. God, to feel this power take it right in your two hands and mold it it's the big thrill !" Hittie sat on a stiff-backed chair; studied him; glanced down at the parcel ; finally indicated it with a movement of head and eyes. "Henry," he said, "Miss Cantey asked me to put that safely in your hands." Henry caught this ; settled back in his chair ; paled. "Miss Miss Cantey?" Hittie bowed. They were still for a long moment. Then Henry asked, "Did she say anything?" Hittie shook his head. "I've been thinking of you," said Hittie, feeling very clumsy, "and well, of her. I wish you'll let me say this, Henry? I wish you could feel like communicating with her." He was talking at the young man's rigid back. It was difficult. But he pressed on. 335 336 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "One thought comes up. Her wealth . . . well, nat- urally, it must have stood in the way, as you saw it." He thought Henry stirred a little, and quickened his speech. "But now it would be false pride, my boy. You've thrown away a fortune that was as clean as most. Have you seen the morning News, Henry?" Calverly shook his head. Hittie sat a little longer; then rose, and picked up hat and stick. Calverly heard him, and turned. He was white. "Can't you see how I'm fighting for her!" he cried. "It's luck or Providence that the old power has come back to help me. But I'd have to fight anyway. It's everything or nothing now. In a day or two more, if I can just keep up this pace, I'll have all the introductory story as I want it as it's got to be. Then do you know what I'm going to do? Hop on the special and go straight to New York and make Guard read it. I wired him this afternoon, a night message. . Then if he takes it if he thinks it's a real book, and ad- vances money you know, backs me, so I'll feel that Fm a going concern again I'll come back and ask to see her." There was a ring in his voice. He was really a rather be- wildering young fellow. So many sides to him. Henry Calverly, the genius, was not to be talked down offhand. Hittie, hesitating a little, moved to the door, then out into the hall. Calverly followed ; took his arm, suddenly shy. "How" Hittie waited. "How did she seem to be ?" "Oh, much better. She is walking now." It took Calverly a long moment to get this news well into his mind. "Do you know what's in that package ?" Hittie shook his head. And Calverly let him go then ; went back, locked himself in, and broke the seals. For a long time then one or two hours he pored over the note- books and other private papers of Jim Cantey. Though THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 337 during much of the time he set staring at nothing, lost on a wild sea of pure feeling. Why had she sent them ? Why ? There were moments when he asked himself seriously if he could stand the painful ecstasy they brought him. His brain seemed blinded, deafened, beaten back into a tumult of emotions that racked him to the very edge of endurance. He tried turning back to his work ; but literally threw up his hands. He carefully tied up the Cantey papers, locked them in the closet, and, hat in hand, went down-stairs. A tall slender man was strolling along the path toward the steps, just coming within the light of the front windows as Henry came out the front door. They met at the steps. He recognized Oswald Quakers and stopped dead. Qualters at least had the grace not to offer his hand. He stood, quite at ease ; said, "Hello, Calverly. I was just going to look you up. I need your advice. You know all about books." "No," Henry replied, truthfully, eying him, "I don't." "But you know something. Going anywhere in par- ticular?" Henry didn't want to lie to the man. He said, "No. I I'm a little tired." "Out for the air, eh ? Tell you what stroll to the Town Club with me. Have a bite to eat, if you feel like it." Calverly hesitated ; then, without any definite reason, went. The man had from their first encounter engaged his inter- est. One oddly detached thought, flitting through his mind, was that this very Oswald Qualters wouldn't serve badly at all in a study of financier types. He was more an adroit, lawyer-minded manipulator than a promotor or builder; but the West had known such. He and his kind were cer- tainly factors in the great confused result that was called America. So Henry, as they walked and, later, ate a pleas- ant little supper in the huge club dining-room, took the man in, felt his metal. "I'xc got to go over the club library," said Quakers. "That's my trouble. Why should a club have a library. 338 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM anyway? There are three good ones in town. We can't compete. Think I'll chuck most of it out. Keep the cyclo- pedias, atlases, almanacs and things and label them 'bet- settlers.' Then buy a lot of detective stories and truck for bed reading. Put those around handy in the sleeping- rooms. And perhaps a department of books about the city history, manufactures, all that. Wouldn't that about cover the pos- sibilities ?" Henry thought it would. Quakers' talk veered around. ''We've treated you pretty rotten here, haven't we? I should think you'd loathe the place. . . . Decent of you to stay on. We're not so bad run about the average but we got you all wrong, from the start. . . . Why don't you come into the club, here? Good way to meet the men on their human side. Do them good to know you. You see, we're all business. Your kind scares us to death." And later this: "I'm motoring down the state to-morrow. Why don't you come along? I've got to stop off and cheer up our poor souse of a mayor. Then on down to Senator Painter's. He's got a fine stock farm. Great show place. . . . Got to work ? Well, as you like. If you feel to-morrow morning that you'd like to ride, call me up. Glad of your company. I shall hardly get away before noon." From his mail box Quakers drew a copy of Satraps of the Simple. "Would you put your name in it ?" he asked, in his cheer- ily offhand way. "Promised my wife I'd try to get it." And Henry, not wholly proof against such flattery, chok- ing down an uprush of bitter exultation, stood, an honored guest, in the Town Club, which he had so often passed as an outcast, autographing a copy of his book. Quakers, stepping briskly up-stairs to the card room, left his debonair good humor behind. He stood in the doorway, very grave. Harvey O'Rell, lounging in there, came quickly out. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 339 "I saw him here with you, didn't I ?" asked O'Rell. Quakers nodded crisply. "Any results?" "Progress." "Will he go down to the senator's with you?" "Probably not. You'd better keep pretty quiet until you see me again." O'Rell flashed a questioning eye at him. Then said : "Miriam is back, isn't she?" "Yes, she's back." "Have they met ?" "Not yet. But they will." "Has she gone into the safe again?'' "Yes. But be quiet, Harvey. No more of that rough work." "But good God! . . ." "It has come down to capturing the man himself. I'm afraid you'll have to leave it to me. When is the County Railways meeting Friday ?'' "No, Wednesday." "And her birthday" "Tuesday. We have something less than forty-eight hours, Quakers. When is Amme to see her?" "To-morrow evening." "He'll fail." "Almost certainly." "And there's no other influence we can bring to bear on her." "None. She has broken with her sister." "You figure that she'll dismiss Amme and turn to Cal- verly? ... I see." "And then Calverly will have to turn to some one pos- sibly to me, possibly not." With which Mr. Quakers went away, as briskly as he had come. Quakers' oddly precise information came from within the Cantey household. In the casual course of managing the intricate and enor- 340 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM mous business and political interests of Senator Painter, a large detective agency was employed around the calendar. \\'e have already seen, in following the sinuous course of Oswald Qualters, evidence of this fact. The senator had for a generation pinned his faith to the Pickerings. The black-haired up-stairs maid who had attended Miriam Can- tey since her return from the West was William Pickering's private secretary. Life is more primitive than fiction. The facts, probably, lie closer to what we choose to call melodrama than to our subtler artifices. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE /H Which the Local Napoleon Undertakes Something in the Xatnrc of a Return from Elba MAYOR TIM was undergoing a severe but swift treat- ment for inebriety. A few days more and he would be sent back to what he was in the habit of referring to as his work. Quakers found him, a wan, utterly empty figure of a man, sprawled on a couch on a glassed-in roof, with flower boxes all about and canary birds trilling overhead; and thought whimsically of Napoleon at St. Helena. "Well, how's it going?" he asked, lightly enough. The mayor raised himself on an elbow ; ran a shaking hand through straggling hair. "Oh, well enough. They're most through with me. How's things going up there ? That's what I want to know." Quakers thoughtfully took in the weak vain face, the nerve-shaken body, the disorderly dress of the city's chief executive. He spoke crisply. "Just at the moment, pretty badly. Miss Cantey is back, and won't renew the trust. She has turned all those papers over to Calverly again." The mayor's eyes wavered up from the carpet. "Well, you can do something about that, can't you!" he cried, in a weak husky voice. "I think so." "You think so! Well, that's cool!" "Don't raise your voice, Tim." "But but " "The annual meeting of County Railways comes Wed- nesday. After that, we'll have some idea of where we stand. Get a rough idea of how to approach the Cantey 'National Bank meeting next week." 341 342 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM The mayor was swearing, softly, richly, pouring out a stream of vilely vivid phrases. "Even if we should have a bad week or two, it'll work out, Tim. Don't lose you head altogether. As it is you're my only real worry. You're such a hopeless damn fool." The mayor sat up now ; swung his slippered feet over the side of the couch. "That's an insult," he said. "You can't insult me, Oswald Quakers you, nor Senator Painter none of you !" "It isn't so bad as it sounds, Tim. Miss Cantey could never handle the smallest details of Cantey Estate." "But that fellow ?" "Calverly ? He's worse. He's a genius. He'd be coming to Harvey or me for advice the second morning." "But if he publishes" "Publish? What? Where? He can't start any muck- raking in the News. Bob's safe. And you know who con- trols the Herald. There's nothing else that counts. No, you've got to let me protect you in my own way. There's nothing you can do. Except to stay right here until you hear from me. And keep still." Quakers left then ; got into his limousine ; rolled smoothly on down the state toward the senator's country home. To bulldoze Tim Maclntyre, keep him sick with fright, seemed to him the safest method. It had worked fairly well up to the present. And with the liquor boiled out of him Tim wouldn't, at least, be crazy. With some sort of mental atti- tude patched up for him, something to take the place of courage, a partial restoration of his great, sometimes rather amusing vanity, perhaps they could all bluff it out together. That there was vastly more iniquity to keep covered than has been even hinted at during the present narrative goes, to any really close observer of American municipal practices of the period, without saying. There were obscure, highly profitable alliances with powerful operators in the gambling and liquor-selling industries, as with the disagreeable per- sons who controlled much of the local prostitution. There yrere the usual contracts with "insiders" ; among which the THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 343 little scandal of the reviewing stands was one of the least significant. There were connivances with large and small, reputable and disreputable evaders of the law. Quakers knew well enough that the local business inter- ests wouldn't permit exposure that might tend to "hurt the town." Even in the rough give and take of partisan poli- tics, there was little danger of things going too far. The party in power as good as lived off the pretty well organ- ized graft of the community. Neither the ins nor the outs were going to kill the goose that laid the golden eggs. It was more than a tacit understanding, it was an iron tradi- tion that they should base all their campaign fighting, all their mudslinging, on minor not major issues. . . . All this was routine experience. But little Miss Cantey, recover- ing from her long invaliclism, with, unquestionably, a spark of old Jim's fire in her or, at least, of his stubbornness presented a problem. And Calverly, an untamed genius, an ungoverned, alarming force, hugely complicated the prob- lem. There was no telling how far they might go. While he had spoken confidently enough to O'Rell of "capturing" Henry, he was not over-confident of success in that direc- tion. He was as far as ever from a notion of the man's price. And a man has got to want something before you can buy him with it. other thing, Calverly 's tide had turned. There had been an extraordinary newspaper story. People were talk- ing about it. Thanks to a shrewd trick of publicity on the part of somebody or other hardly of the man himself Henry Calverly had become again, overnight, an appealing figure. And a very strong one. A man with a following. With a sentimental following ; the worst kind. If the fellow only knew it, he could run for mayor on that newspaper story and probably win. liters felt a passing relief, in thinking back a little way, that he hadn't picked up the possibility of an affair with r Appleby. If she were able to control or influence her younger sister, it might have been worth the risk. But the sisters were fighting. It was an out-and-out break. 344 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM And there was no good in being tied to the wrong one ; the beaten one. All the way down to the senator's he ruminated on the problem. But made no progress \\ hatever. Apparently they could do nothing until Wednesday. Go into the meeting blind and see what happened. Even at that it might work out. They were shrewd, experienced men. They knew all the intricate ins and outs of the property. Miriam Cantey knew nothing of it. Calverly knew nothing of it. Besides, they hadn't met yet, those two, and had cer- tainly not made plans. Miriam might turn up at the meet- ing with a brand-new lawyer, but if the reports of Picker- ing's "female operative" were to be trusted she hadn't even looked one up. The operative's reports seldom ran to an hour later than about eight o'clock. But Miriam went to bed early; read in her room, and that sort of thing. Her letters were always left on a table for the maid to stamp and post. Of course, anything might happen before Wednesday ; but the chances weren't so bad. It was even possible that Amme might get a fresh hold on Cantey Estate. He told Senator Painter that things were coming along smoothly enough. Some curious little personal problems. Required delicate handling. He was dwelling a little on the idea of having Mayor Maclntyre impeached. It would be easy enough to do. Discredit him and his whole machine, then put up a good respectable figurehead at the next elec- tion and sweep the city. It would cost about a hundred and twenty thousand, he said, but was a necessary prelimi- nary to breaking finally the old Cantey Machine and swing- ing the state in solidly behind that eminent favorite son, Senator Painter. Bob Listerly had some sort of a deal on with the Bryan crowd. Bob would give his eyes for a seat in the cabinet, and would accept one of the lesser legations South America or Asia. He would have to be brought around somehow to see the light. Harvey O'Rell could be dropped a little later ; when they had Cantey Estate where they wanted it. And then they'd simply own the state. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 345 As regarded Mayor Tim, Quakers was the victim of a misleading impression. The mayor wasn't so sick as he looked. He hadn't had much food for a week, and had been dosed with powerful drugs. Then, merely to lie abed a few days robs the cheek of its color and the eye of its luster. He was weak, yes. Which doubtless explains why the full force of Quakers' revelation didn't reach him until some few minutes after that adroit attorney had gone. It is true that Tim Maclntyre had drifted into a state of serious demoralization. He was a thief and a drunkard. He had lost heart. But that was mainly, after all, because he was a drunkard. And by now they had removed very nearly the last traces of alcoholic poisoning from his system. He sat for a long time on the edge of the cot ; until an- other patient came up in the elevator, attended by a nurse. Then, as if he had been on the point of getting up any- way, he rose and made his way down to the room they were keeping him in. Tim was a deeply ambitious man. Quite as ambitious as that fatally brilliant little corporal whose life and deeds dominated his day dreams ; of whom he thought every time he looked in a mirror. And he was an actor who played every waking moment to an enraptured audience of one. And he was sober. That bit of paper that had lain for so many years in Jim Cantey's private safe with his signature at the foot of it was the one incriminating document now out against him. Incriminating acts and entanglements weren't, after all, so bad. Not quite. They could almost always be explained away, or muddled over, or so involved with the entangle- ments of other men in the public eye as to force support from those others. liut the thought of that paper, out of the safe again, and again in the hands of a young man who didn't, couldn't play the game had, apparently, never so much as heard of the game brought him to a state of real terror. He was very quiet now. He moved aimlessly about his room ; stared out the window for a while; finally stood before the mirror, 346 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM muttering little orations out of a sternly set face. The thought came swiftly to be a burning thing v/ithin him. And at last, after perhaps an hour of this curious, not wholly sane performance, he changed his clothes, buttoned an overcoat about his shivering frame, turned up the col- lar, and slipped out of the building. To an attendant he remarked, rather unnecesfarily, that he thought he'd take a little walk. The fire burned hotter and higher within him. He was perturbed to find his body weak and shaky on his legs. The hospital was in a pleasant countryside, the outskirts of a small village. Across the street from the railway station was a saloon. He went in there and drank Scotch. It seemed to help. He ate greedily of the "free lunch." This helped, too. Then he drank some more. The men here knew he was from the hospital, he felt sure. He even thought they recognized him. This, somehow, was an alarming thought. He drank more Scotch. He decided that tobacco would soothe his outrageously jumpy nerves, and filled a vest pocket with the best cigars he could find. It seemed unwise to drink any more in here, so he walked a block down the street to another saloon. When he boarded the train, and settled in a rear seat of the smoking-car, with a newspaper across his knees, his courage was high. And confused bold projects were form- ing in his brain. Napoleon, a ghostly, majestic figure, moved in and out among these thoughts. One project the one, I believe, that he thought, mostly, he was going to work out was to go straight to this fellow Calverly and talk turkey to him. Show him who was who. Face him as man to man. That was the idea face him as man to man. But this notion got itself confused in queer ways with other notions. . . . i Calverly received a telegram that afternoon from Hum- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 347 phrey, stating that he and Guard were on their way from New York and would be at the Cantey Square House before evening. He went over there from the public library. They had registered, it appeared, but were not in their rooms. He wandered about the lobby and restaurant, and looked down-stairs in barber shop and billiard room, but without finding them. Then he caught a Hill car and went back to the boarding-house. It was rather exciting to think that Guard was here. Hump had talked him into it, of course. A dear old boy, Hump was ! . . . Guard, then, had never really lost in- terest in him! Had gone to all this trouble to see him and the new book ! It was a thought to put heart into a man ! It was the more stirring because the library had again, as usual, proved disappointing. Once you got away from Bret Harte and Mark Twain and his own narrative was well past their period now there was little in the way of honest pictures of the living West. Oh, cowboys, and express rob- bers, and that ! But when it came down to actual study of the men and events centering about early railway develop- ment and the cattle barons and the political struggles there was next to nothing. Hardly more than the first one or two of Frank Norris's novels. The biographies and autobiog- raphies were all false from cover to cover, were all neatly tinted pictures of public benefactors and eminent statesmen. The muckrakers came much nearer the truth, in spite of- their own peculiar strain of falsity. These eager, indignant young analysts of municipal and state corruption and of the stirring fights of great and growing corporations to kill off competition and to get and keep financial and political power ran truer to life as you saw it, felt it, about you. Hump and Guard were not at the boarding-house. Not yet. He scanned the porch as he crossed the lawn. He looked into the parlor; then went on up the two flights to his room. He opened the door ; stepped over the sill ; stopped there, balancing on his forward foot, while his breath abruptly failed him. 348 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM A man stood behind the marble-topped table, buttoned up to chin and ears in an overcoat, soft hat pulled down over his eyes. The table drawer was open ; papers were spilled about the floor. The intruder, too, stood motionless. Henry wondered, during that brief moment of lightning-like thought, why he didn't shoot. Probably he would in a moment. Then, his breath about restored, Henry made the curious but interesting discovery that he didn't particularly care whether the man shot or not. He stepped on into the room and closed the door behind him. There was something hauntingly familiar about the fel- low; something interesting in the rather dramatic pose, hinting at bluster, with chin drawn down and shoulders high. 'If you don't move quicker I'll beat your skull in." CHAPTER FORTY Events of on Evening, Including a Fight and a Pursuit; with a Sidelight on How Men Feel about Dying DURING a curious breathless moment the two men stood without moving. It was not fear that held Calverly motionless, but sur- prise that was mixed with contempt. And the excitement that at first tightened his nerves was rising swiftly into anger. On only a few occasions in Henry Calverly 's life did he become so angry as to forget himself utterly. The present occasion was to take its place as one of these. He sprang forward, beat aside two ineffectually waving arms, and snatched off the burglar's hat, disclosing the Na- poleonic head of Mayor Tim Maclntyre. "Good lord !" said Calverly. The mayor's reply was not intelligible, though he seemed to be saying something or other. "Adding burglary to your other little crimes, eh?" Cal- verly 's voice was deliberate, caustic, almost quiet. "What are you going to do about it !" muttered the mayor. Adding, with a touch of bluster, "Give me back my hat !" The hat, however, was not returned. Not at all. Calverly still had it when he left the house. It must have disappeared during the little scene on the front lawn. Calverly was confronting the man now, taking in the situation. The closet door hadn't been opened. "Well," asked the mayor, "what about it? What you going to do ?" "I'm trying to make up my mind whether to kick you down-stairs before the police come." "The police won't touch me !" 349 350 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "They will, or I'll find out why. And if they don't I'll just about beat you to death." "Oh, hell, Calverly, what's the good o' that kind o' talk !" There was no reply to this. Calverly was thinking. The telephone was in the front hall, down-stairs. "Open out your pockets," he commanded, quietly. "All of them." "Look here " the mayor began, rather weakly. Calverly glanced about. On the table stood a pint bot- tle of ink. He reached for this; clasped it by the neck. "Turn them inside out," he said. "But there's private papers and money, and Now you look here . . ." "If you don't move quicker," said Calverly, weighing the bottle in his hand, "I'll beat your skull in." "You mean to say you're going to take my own " "Oh, no," said Calverly, "I just want to see what you've got of mine." "Not a thing! Honest!" "I'll decide that when I see what you have got." A hand mirror lay near the edge of the bureau. Mayor Tim's wandering gaze, searching for a possible weapon, rested on it. He moved, sidelong, toward it. "Stay where you are !'' said Calverly. Then the mayor obeyed ; meekly enough turned his pock- ets inside out. Papers, gloves, money, a note-book, keys, a handkerchief, a wallet, pencils and other intimately mas- culine articles lay about him on the floor. His watch dan- gled from its chain. He glanced covertly at his captor. "All right," said the latter. "Pick them up." And then, "Walk down-stairs ahead of me. Remember, walk, don't run." Again his honor obeyed. They went down the upper flight in silence. On the second-floor landing two dim figures moved aside to let them pass. "Hen," cried the taller of these, "what on earth ! . . ." The voice was that of Humphrey Weaver. The other man was, of course, Mr. Guard. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 351 "Oh, hello!" said Calverly. And to Mr. Guard, "How do you do !" To his captive he said then, "Stand there a min- ute. Against the wall." "It's the mayor," he explained. "If you'll just wait a lit- tle. ... I can't very well visit with you until. . . . Hump, come down and telephone for a policeman, will you?" The two men stared at him. Calverly, suddenly aware of the bottle in his hand, gave it to the publisher, saying, "If you don't mind. . . ." Then he marched his man on down the stairs past a group of startled fellow-boarders, out-of-doors and a little way along the path to a small tree, which he studied critically. Guard followed. "I'll tell you," said Calverly, thoughtfully, "we can an- chor him to this. Just set down the bottle, will you. Now, put his legs around the tree. No, bend the right foot under so that it catches inside the left knee." The publisher had forgotten the boyhood trick of so fast- ening another's legs about a tree that he can not get up with- out help, but Calverly made a rapid job of it. Once the mayor struggled. Calverly hit him on the nose, and he quieted down. Humphrey came out then and surveyed the odd little scene. "Cop'll be here in a minute," he said. "Who did you say it was?" "The mayor." Guard his first words asked, explosively: "The what?" "The mayor." "But" "He broke into my room. Though I guess the door wasn't locked. He was after some papers there." "But that's burglary." Calverly said, "Oh, yes!" "But if it's the mayor " this from Humphrey, who was on one knee, studying, quite impersonally, the abject figure embracing the tree "the police may not want to take him." 352 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "They will," said Calverly. "They've got to." "They won't," put in Tim Maclntyre. "You keep quiet !" said Calverly. The mayor kept quiet. A large, rather fat policeman came hurrying across the lawn. "I want this man arrested," said Calverly. ''What's the charge?" asked the officer, glancing curiously at the human heap at the base of the sapling. "Burglary." This from Humphrey. The officer reached down, with a "Come up here, you !" jerked the man to his feet. "Ouch!" cried the man. "You sure had him locked in!" remarked the officer. Then, "Good God, it's Mayor Tim !" "Yes," said Calverly. "It's the mayor." "But see here " The officer relaxed his hold on hia honor's collar. "You said burglary!" "Yes, burglary ! I caught him in my room." "But Mayor Tim . . . burglary . . . Oh, you're crazy !" "What'd I tell you !" cried his honor. "Keep quiet !" said Calverly. The officer turned on Calverly. "What I'd like to know is who are you?" Humphrey, a quick, authoritative person, broke in here. "The man was caught in the act, officer," he said. The only reply the nonplussed policeman could offer, at the moment, was a gruff, "Aw, gawn !" "Are we to understand that you refuse to arrest him?" Humphrey went on. "Refuse to arrest him?" The officer was puffing a little now. "Say, what do you think I am, anyway ! ... I'd like to know who you all are, that's what I'd like to know ! There's something queer here! ... I reckon you're strangers in town. And beating up our mayor! The best mayor the city's ever had, bar none!" The best mayor, rapidly taking in the situation and find- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 353 ing it turning momentarily to his advantage, began moving, slowly, cautiously, a step at a time, toward the street. Calverly, half listening to the policeman's harangue, watched him. The mayor, feeling safer every moment, now took several rapid steps ; then turned to see the effect. It was then that Henry sprang at him. The policeman, suddenly turning and divining his intent, would have followed, but Guard and Humphrey, moved by one of those perhaps telepathic impulses that on occasions of high feeling will move two minds as one, stepped in his way. It can not be said, I think, that either of them laid a hand upon this representative of the majesty of the law ; they were merely in the way. But they managed to stay in the way for some little time. At any rate, the fat policeman succeeded in making exactly no progress whatever toward the harassed chief of all the city's officers ; until, that is, with a good deal of puffing and sotto vocc profanity he con- trived to get his night stick free of his belt. Every grown man is a compound of many and diverse pasts. Of Henry's pasts one had been of mildly athletic nature. Those who knew him in earlier narratives will re- call that he had, in his high-school period, local fame in Sunbury, Illinois, as a sprinter. He had also played foot- ball, baseball and tennis. And, in a healthy, boyish way, without acquiring marked skill, he had boxed. He was boxing now ; rather neatly, with his thumbs bent down out of the way, landing many clean blows on the cheek, nose and jaw of the bewildered, inarticulately angry mayor. He first backed him into a tree and hit solid straight-arm blows with plenty of shoulder and back in them ; then, when the mayor ducked low in an effort to dodge away, uppercut him savagely and sent him reeling. Calverly, hot after him, jerked him around and raised a lump over the right cheek-bone. By this time his hands were slippery with blood ; he rubbed them on his coat, then sprang again at the unsteady chief magistrate of the city. 354 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM But that worthy had enough. He seemed to be sobbing; at any rate queer sounds came from him. He stumbled back- ward, turned, and ran, gradually finding his feet as he went. Calverly followed. Humphrey came after him, then Guard, and last, steadily losing ground, the policeman. It was a curious performance, this of Calverly's, a sudden breaking out into action of feelings that had been so long bottled up within his troubled spirit. Whatever these feel- ings were, there could be no question that they were all coming out. With every blow his suddenly, newly mascu- line soul exulted. He was striking the one man who more than any other symbolized in his person the loosely corrupt organization of the city. It seemed as if each blow landed not only on the mayor but as well on Harvey O'Rell and Oswald Qualters and little Mr. Amme and R. B. Listerly, together with all the locally dominant promoters and specu- lators who loved money and hated truth. The fire of a long line of St. Georges and Martin Luthers and John Browns and other great nonconformists whom men have called im- practical burned in his eyes. He was hitting out for old, big Jim Cantey, who hadn't been a hypocrite; for Miriam, who knew only truth; in an odd half -conscious way for Frank Winterbeck who wasn't on the News any more ; for all that was honest, natural, in a city of false faces; for elemental justice in a city of law and intrigue. Curiously, as he ran after the mayor, down the back slope of the Hill toward the factories and the lower lumber yards and the river, his thoughts dwelt, more than on Miriam, more than on himself, on this Frank Winterbeck, whom he knew hardly at all. Unexpectedly, all in a moment, in his brightly lighted mind, Winterbeck, too, became a symbol. Mayor Tim, once his head cleared, ran surprisingly well. Calverly, who had put out the greater effort, was winded, and gained not a yard. Toward the end of the race, indeed, he lost. Mayor Tim turned up an alley. Calverly followed. Hum- phrey missed the turn and ran straight on to the muddy road along the wharves, as did Guard and the fat policeman. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 355 The mayor looked back, paused, made a false start or two, then rounded the corner, crossed the river road under a buzzing arc light, ran down the mud flats between a lum- ber pier and the westernmost frame building of Will Apple- by's manufacturing plant, let himself rather carefully down the low clay bank and waded into the river. Calverly paused on the bank. His first thought was that the man purposed wading around the pier to find some tem- porary hiding-place, and he considered going out there on the pier. It would be easy enough to follow the man's clumsy movements. But he didn't turn around the end of the pier; he kept on wading out, until the water was waist deep, and then breast deep. A moment more and he would be stepping off the channel bank into the deep current. So that was it! He meant to drown himself. A poor cheap little soul giving up miserably ! Calverly watched him as he would have watched a char- acter in a play; except that it was hardly interesting. He didn't care. Then a policeman appeared, at the edge of the pier, half- way out, between two lumber piles; not far, indeed, from the wading figure. He shouted something. The mayor looked up ; hesitated, then pressed on. The officer shouted again. This time Calverly caught his words. They were : "Come out of there, or I'll kill you." And he caught, too, the shine of a revolver barrel in the light of the street lamp. Once more the mayor looked up ; just the head and shoul- ders and balancing arms of a wet shivering man who was determined to kill himself. And then, in fear of being killed, he came slowly out. The officer met him at the bank ; spoke roughly ; then recognized him and temporarily lost his voice. Calverly said : "I want this man locked up." 356 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "What for?" asked the officer, gruffly, "attempted suicide ?" "If you like. And burglary." "Burglary?" "Yes. I caught him in my room and chased him here." "But this gentleman is mayor of the city." The mayor, dripping, shivering, the last shreds of his self- respect fallen away, now came unexpectedly out for the prosecution. "I'm not a burglar!" he cried. "I suppose," said Calverly wearily, "you'll deny that I caught you in my room." "It wasn't burglary !" insisted the mayor. "What's your name for it?" "Self-defense! . . ." He rather fancied this. "Self- defense, that's what it was ! You've got Jim Cantey's papers up there. My good name's involved. My good name ! That's why I was in your room, and you know it !" "He came to steal a document," Calverly explained, in that same world-weary tone, to the policeman. The others joined them now. The two policemen drew apart, obviously in disagree- ment ; and the mayor sat miserably on a snubbing post. "Look here," he broke out, "can't you see I'll catch cold, sitting around here like this !" The second policeman returned, obviously much per- plexed. "I don't see how I can lock up the mayor," he remarked. Then, more roughly, "You gentlemen had better give me your names and addresses." "Of course he can't lock me up," cried the shivering per- son on the snubbing post. "Anybody could see that !" "You can put him under surveillance," remarked Hum- phrey, in a manner of quiet authority. "He tried to commit suicide. You were a witness to that. Something's the mat- ter. Either he's a criminal or else he's insane. It won't do to leave him at large." The mayor looked up at Humphrey now, shivering, terror THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 357 in his eyes. He saw a tall vigorous man in New York clothes, a man accustomed to be heard with respect. . . . He turned away ; sat a moment longer; then, as if a sudden, unexpected hope had come to his fuddled brain, got up, caught Calverly's arm and pulled him aside. "Just a minute," he was saying. "Just a minute! You and I understand each other. We can talk as man to man. . . . I know all about you. You're clever ; You've out- witted us. I know it. O'Rell knows it. Quakers knows it. You've been the smart one. You went straight to the girl. And that's where you turned the trick." Calverly struggled with an impulse to hit him again. But the mayor, all eyes and all nerves, caught the quick stiffening of the young man's shoulders and the slight drawing up of the right arm, and hurriedly came to the point. "But never mind how you did it. Let that stand. Here's the question now you hold the whip-hand. What are you going to do with it? Are you going to act like a decent fel- low, or are you going to tear things down, destroy confi- dence, disrupt business and array class against class ? That's what I want to know ! Are you going to do that ? Or are you going to be a decent fellow?" Something of the old Napoleonic look was coming back to Tim Maclntyre as oratory set in. And his arms spread in a sweeping gesture. Humphrey drew near. Then Guard. Finally the two policemen. "I don't deny you can make trouble. Just at the moment you hold the whip-hand. Just at the moment. . . . I'll be frank with you. Let's call it quits, you and I. Let's come to terms. I'll play fair. Just tell me what you want me to do. I'll be reasonable. If you say so, I'll resign. If you ask it, I'll pack up and leave town. All I ask is that you act like a decent fellow and give me a chance to do the same." Humphrey's eyes were bright with eager interest. He watched Henry, wondering what on earth the boy had been up to. Always a surprise, was Henry ; a creature of amaz- 358 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM ing contrasts ; now fire, now ashes ; now an outcast, now a dictator. There was, there had always been, a dynamic quality in him. Never, for one moment, had he been com- monplace, never uninteresting. Never had he surrendered to the world. Now, in some extraordinary manner, he seemed to be riding it as a conqueror rides. And yet, he was just Henry ; standing thoughtfully there under the street light ; his clothing shabby as ever. And, curiously, in this moment of real drama, Calverly, by his very quiet, inspired confidence. Amid the routine and trickery of ordinary business, as among the social conven- tions, he had always been helpless as a lost child. But here and now, where men spoke not from behind the barriers of convention and worldly habit but straight out of naked souls, he was at home. There was no mistaking the fact. Humphrey felt it ; found it thrilling. Guard felt it, and stood in respectful silence. The policemen, each in his clumsy way, felt it and waited out the scene. There could be no doubt that Tim Maclntyre, in this his moment of utter catastrophe, knew whom he had to talk to. Calverly turned to Humphrey, after long thought, and remarked, with a sort of casual patience : "He wants me to let him get away with all he's stolen." A moment longer he considered this ; then said : "Maclntyre, if I let you go now, will you come and see me to-morrow?" The mayor swallowed, straining a little; then nodded quickly. And after that he said, huskily, "Yes, I will. I'll give you my hand on it." "No," said Calverly, almost impersonally, "I won't take your hand. But I think yes, I'll take your word." The mayor's reply provided a not unfitting conclusion to this grotesque, all but fantastic little scene. It was : "Thank you." CHAPTER FORTY-ONE Collateral Matters; Including Mr. Amme's Call on Miriam, Mr. Hitt's Activities, and Further Developments of the Fever Called Love AND on the same evening, at the same hour, Mr. Amme called at the Cantey home. As he had come frankly on business, Miriam received him in the study; entering it from her own sitting-room, by the narrow door. He wore a manner of almost breathless solemnity; and carried a portfolio that bulged with papers. These he ar- ranged on the desk in neat piles, taking a little time to do it, delaying as long as he well could the talk that had to be gone through. Miriam's color was high, her eyes were bright. He found her a little impatient beneath the surface courtesy; pre- occupied, rather baffling. Several times she seemed to catch herself tapping nervously on the arm of the Morris chair and folded her hands in her lap. He spoke, gravely, of the pleasure it gave him to see her so nearly herself after all the invalid years. She smiled, pleasantly enough; but seemed to take the improvement rather for granted, he thought. It was clear enough that she wasn't living in the past. "Up to now," he began, then cleared his throat and pulled at his neat little beard "up to this week, the affairs of your father's estate have been managed by the trustees " "Yes," she said, quickly, "I know." He pressed on: "That is, by Mr. Listerly, Mr. O'Rell and myself. These affairs are anything but simple. They include watching the stock and bond markets in order to protect your father's large investments; also exercising a controlling interest in 359 360 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM many corporations, including the Cantey Line, the railroad companies, the Cantey National Bank, County Railways, the News, and many others. In addition, these large business interests entail some political responsibility." He paused and looked at her. It had seemed to him that so formidable a statement might well bring her to her senses. But so far as he could see, it brought no result at all. She sat there, all alert, brightly watching him, but without any humility that he could detect. There was no way of telling what might be in her mind. Something, surely ; her eyes were so brightly blue. He thought, caught by such a wave of emotional memory as seldom disturbed his orderly little mind, of moments in years long gone by when James H. Cantey's blue eyes had looked like that. They had always been a little difficult to face, the Cantey eyes. "If you will permit me to offer a word of counsel," . . . he paused. "Of course," she said. "Well, you will find it absolutely necessary to employ the best legal advice available. Each of the large interests pre- sents complicated problems all its own. The best business judgment you are likely to find and hired business judg- ment is never the best will be none too good. A business property, Miss Miriam, is no better than its management. It can not take care of itself. There isn't one of the Cantey properties but what has, at some time, taxed your father's ability and courage. Since his death they have made heavy demands on the time and energy of the trustees." He cleared his throat again. He didn't seem to be pro- gressing. He went on : "Each of these properties must be guided with a firm progressive hand or it will slip backward into demoraliza- tion and serious loss. Miss Miriam, if at any time Mr. O'Rell and Mr. Listerly and I had neglected this very exact- ing trust your income would have been very materially af- fected. Because we have not neglected it, your income has grown instead of shrinking." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 361 He laid a hand on one little pile of papers. "Here, for instance, is County Railways. The annual meeting is right upon us. Mr. O'Rell will render an account of his stewardship and will ask continued support. He will expect, and properly, that his very complicated problems will be dealt with by minds fitted to understand them. If the support of Cantey Estate should be withdrawn from him, or if his relation to the estate should be in any way altered, the entire property would quickly be affected. There would soon be a noticeable change in the morale of the company. Discipline would suffer. Laxity and waste would take the place of the present sharp economy. The company, which has very large dividend and interest charges to meet, would soon be facing losses instead of profits." "What do you think of Mr. O'Rell?" asked Miriam. Mr. Amme controlled a nervous impulse to start. But he was surprised, distinctly. Just why had she asked that question? And was there not hostility in it? He rather thought there was. His brows drew together. He spoke slowly, carefully. "It is easy to criticize a man in Mr. O'Rell's position. He must have vigor and firmness. He makes enemies. But County Railways has not passed a dividend since your father placed him in charge." This seemed to him utterly convincing. But her expres- sion did not change as much as he hoped. "Here, you see," he said, "we are confronted by an imme- diate problem. Either you must attend the annual meeting of County Railways or you must place your proxies in com- petent hands to be voted for you. Either you must under- take the management it amounts to that or you must trust others to do it for you. The present trustees will attend the meeting as individual stockholders, but will no longer be empowered to speak for Cantey Estate." She considered this, or seemed to. Then asked : "What do you think I ought to do, Mr. Amme?'' "You wish my advice?" 362 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Yes." "Well I can only say that I think you ought to renew the trust." "You do?" "Yes. I don't see how you can possibly undertake to manage all these properties yourself." "It would be difficult, wouldn't it?" She caught her breath ; laughed a little. "Very. Really impossible." "And I ought to make up my mind pretty soon ?" "Miss Miriam really at this moment everything hangs in suspense. Plans must be made. There is really no time at all." "Hmm ! . . . You think the trust should be made up of the same men as in the past ?" "Well." . . . He shot a keen glance at her ; what was she getting at? Did she know more than he supposed? Had that irresponsible young fellow been talking again ; or (it was barely possible) had the powerful Cantey mind come to life with her improved health? . . . "Well, I could withdraw. But I really don't see how Mr. O'Rell or Mr. Listerly could." "But who would take your place, Mr. Amme? I suppose it would have to be some one who understands tlie legal side of things." "Naturally." "And the banking interests." "Well" "Are you thinking of Mr. Quakers?" He was silenced. She looked like a girl, sitting there. Doubtless he was tiring her. But what could he do? And what could he say? This curious tension underlying the conversation what did it mean? I low had it crept in? Mr. Amme's nature was the sort that always finds solace in the process known as getting down to cases. "If you will permit me," he said, very calmly, "I will lay before you the problem of County Railways." He was spreading out the papers, all figures. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 363 She broke in; irrelevantly, he felt, with deepening irri- tation : "Supposing we didn't renew the trust right away, Mr. Amne. What would Mr. O'Rell do?" "But you would have to take some definite action. You could hardly go into the meeting and vote independently on a score of complicated matters." "But suppose I just gave you my proxies and let the other matter go over." "The trust?" "Yes." Her eyes were snapping. "What would Mr. O'Rell do?" "He would resign instantly." "You are sure?" Mr. Amme bowed. "And that would plunge the company into confusion?" Mr. Amme spread his hands. "Hmm !" mused Miriam. Mr. Amme, as we well know, was not a man of penetrat- ing insight or large imagination. He was not what we term a big man. But he was honest and he had feelings. He had been, all his early business life, in Jim Cantey's confi- dence. That confidence had made him. It was the deepest tradition of his life. And now to sit here and feel this curi- ously impenetrable hostility on the part of Jim Cantey's daughter stirred him as he hadn't been stirred since he pro- posed marriage to the present Mrs. Amme. "Miss Miriam," he said now, "for myself, I ask nothing. I have endeavored to administer your father's estate as I believe he would have wished. No one could know, as I know, how extremely complex the business of the estate is. But if you wish other counsel than mine please let me ad- vise you to lose no time in arranging for it. This is a criti- cal time. We somebody working in your interest must act with the greatest promptness. And let me say that if you do secure other counsel, I stand ready to cooperate in every possible way that may help him arrive at an under- standing of your affairs." 364 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM She took him in. Her eyes grew thoughtful ; even moist- ened a little. She knew he was honest. She respected hrm. Of course she couldn't within live years of close stady grasp all the intricate legal and business details of Cantey Estate. She knew that as well as he. But what he didn't know what he could never know was that she understood him through and through. She knew he was a little man. She knew that O'Rell and Quakers had sent him here, that he mattered hardly more than a well-trained errand boy. She had no plan of action; her only guide was a deeply disturbing excitement that throbbed (even now) at her tem- ples, that buoyed her up while it tired her. She rose. "I am a little tired, Mr. Amme," she said. "Let me just sleep over this." "But" he sprang up "but there is really no time " "To-morrow." She smiled faintly. "Call me up at noon, please." "But . . ." She went into her sitting-room, drawing to the narrow door behind her. She stood in there, listening, while he gathered up his papers. She heard him go down the stairs ; deliberately, with prim little steps. Then, with more color, she turned to her desk. A manuscript lay there. She had been reading it when Mr. Amme came, and had laid an ivory paper knife in it to mark the place. Mr. Hitt had left it with her, at the end of the afternoon. He had been quaint about it. He had no right, he had said. But leave it he must. And read it she must. She was beginning to love Hazlitt Hitt. And to worry a little about him. She sank down with the script in the window-seat and read swiftly on to the last page, the last broken sentence. Then she leaned back, closed her eyes, tried to think ; but her mind raced. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 365 This was clear, he had seized on the West, her father's West. She felt now, as he must have been feeling, the model ships in the next room, the railway map on the wall behind the desk, Jim Cantey's note-books. He saw, was thrilled by, an immensely romantic picture of a lusty young people conquering and breaking to business harness an untrained continent. ... It was a picture Mr. Amme would never see. But Henry Calverly saw it as clearly as had Jim Cantey, a leading actor in the drama. What a pity Jim Can- tey couldn't be alive now ! How he would love to shut out the intriguing business men and play with Henry Calverly ! He always had proteges; but never such an one as this thrilling young man. He had loved unconventional imagina- tion in others. He would, she definitely knew, discern in- stantly the wild greatness in Henry. She rested a flushed cheek on a slim hand ; tried to calm herself, bring her thoughts under some sort of control. They had been kept apart, she and Henry. It had been a dreadful time. She had no means of knowing what he thought of her now. There had been no word. Perhaps probably, she thought misunderstandings had been grow- ing into a tangle of weedy doubts, into hostility, even. She couldn't know. Yet his book was their common dream. It was herself and her father, as it was Henry. It was wonderful to think that he was writing away at it now, that a new thing was growing on earth. And she had helped a little in bringing it first to life; though so pitifully little! Jim Cantey never had patience with misunderstandings. He brushed them aside, or cut straight through them. Then it was a little startling even to herself she broke into a chuckle. For she had actually forgotten Mr. Amme, and the other trustees, and the annual meeting of County Railways, and the confusion of demoralization about to undermine all the vast, interlocking Cantey interests unless she, Miriam Can- tey, a girl oh, it was grotesque, monstrous! a girl who 366 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM couldn't keep her personal check-stubs straight, should make up her mind. All those great businesses in a way her background, as distinctly the source of her livelihood were dependent on some sort of decision in that highly-colored kaleidoscope, her mind. She laughed. For the moment she was near bitterness. And it wouldn't keep until to-morrow, this momentous decision of hers. A business empire hung, tottering, wait- ing for her word. A shrewd moment came. She thought of little, neat Mr. Amme, of driving, able, unscrupulous Harvey O'Rell, of suave, spineless Mr. Listerly. They were clear to her. She couldn't go on with them. And she didn't care what might become of them. Nice old Mr. Hitt came up then, preceded by the maid with his card. He was apologetic. It was getting late. He had meant only to ask for the manuscript. It seemed that Mr. Cal- verly's publisher was in town and wished to read it over- night. There had been some excitement. Mr. Calverly And there he hesitated. "Not an accident?" she cried, breathlessly. "Well in a way." "He he wasn't . . ." "I haven't been able to put the story quite together, Miss Cantey. It's an extraordinary circumstance." She was relieved to see him smile at this point. "Apparently Mayor Maclntyre himself broke into Mr. Calverly's room." "Oh !" cried Miriam. "Those papers !" "Yes." "He didn't attack Mr. Calverly?" "No. From what Mr. Guard tells me I gather that Henry attacked him, beat him unmercifully, then chased him to the river and nearly drowned him." "Oh! . . . I'm so glad!" breathed Miriam, sitting very still. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 367 "I hope you've had time to read the manuscript, Miss Cantey." She nodded, brightly. "I had no right, of course ... I couldn't resist . . ." She gave it to him. "I don't know, of course, what impression it made on you." "I liked it very much," she said. And that was all she could say. It disappointed him, of course. He was quite wild about it. She loved him for the very look on his face as he spoke of it. But she couldn't talk. After he had gone she wrote a note to Henry, and her- self took it out to the box. It seemed a queer thing to do. But some sort of deci- sion had to be reached this night. And why not, after all, cut through to the heart of the problem? CHAPTER FORTY-TWO On the Topic of What May Be Done with Mayors. Lead- ing Up to Something of a Climax IN the morning Henry breakfasted at the hotel with Hum- phrey and Guard. And there, for the first time in years, he tasted what seemed, at the moment, joy absolute. Guard had fallen utterly under the spell of his new book. For that matter, so had Humphrey. The two men frankly, almost naively, looked at him with new eyes. They had been up most of the night over it. To sit back and let them talk it over from this angle and that, with as great respect as they would have shown in discussing Stevenson or Dick- ens or Shakespeare himself, was like a writer's any writ- er'sdream of heaven upon earth. Guard spoke of taking him east and opening up his own country home in Connecticut in order that Henry might complete the book in comfortable seclusion; spoke casually of money ("No trouble about that, Calverly!"); planned audibly a new edition of Satraps of the Simple; commented on the need of extensive "publicity." This word in more than one respect the fatal word in the life of Henry Calverly brought up a recollection. "By the way," Guard said, "who put out the new story about you?" Henry looked blank. "There have been so many stories," he said, with a twinge of the old mental pain. But he could speak of them now. That was something. "There haven't been many like this, Calverly." "He means," Humphrey put in, watching his old friend closely, "the friendly one, about your refusing the Watt money." "Oh!" said Henry, trying to think. "Oh, that one! I think I did see it" 368 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 369 "You think you saw it! Good lord!" Guard smiled. "You know what it did, don't you?" Henry slowly shook his head. "It came pretty near putting your name back where it stood in the old days. At one stroke. Set thoughtful people talking about you all over the country." "No!" cried Henry. "Certainly ! And more, it started up a new sale for $- traps of the Simple." "Why," murmured Henry, trying to believe the news, "that's extraordinary !" "It is, all of that. Oh, we're not printing it in thirty-thou- sand lots this time, but it's something, isn't it, to have a dead book come to life on your hands?" "I should think so !" said Henry politely. "You mean to say you don't know who did it ?" Henry shook his head. Then remarked, vaguely, "Oh, that must have been what Parker meant." "Most remarkable!" said the publisher. "Somebody de- liberately planned it. One of the best worked out things I ever saw. Why, it appeared simultaneously in more than a hundred cities. And the boiler-plate weeklies had it, three or four thousand of them. I put the clipping bureaus at work on it, and they're dragging in no end of stuff. Follow-up matter, even. Editorials. And a lot of stuff in the literary weeklies. Do you mean to say you don't know who did it?" "I don't." This was true enough ; but he was beginning to think, rather uncomfortably, of Margie Daw. "Why, it's what brought me on here." "Why didn't Hump?" "Weaver, here? No, he called up two hours before train time. My bag was in the office, packed." They walked with him to the boarding-house. At the corner by the News building, Henry saw a trim girlish figure approaching, and in a moment recognized Margie Daw. But Margie wore a new appearance. The boyish blue suit and soft felt hat had been laid aside for a traveling suit of a more feminine cut. She wore a hat 370 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM with flowers on it. And there was a soft mass of lace at her throat. She looked really pretty, and remarkably dif- ferent. He stopped short. The two other men walked on a lit- tle way. One thought in Henry's mind was that she had not yet acknowledged his final payment to her. He spoke with a touch of constraint. "How do you do," he said, lamely. She smiled, and took his hand. "You you got my note ?" This was clumsy enough. He was never quick to adapt himself among the complexities of human environment. "Yes," she replied. "Thanks. I should have acknowl- edged it." Here their talk died out. He saw that she was carrying a small hand-bag. "Oh " he said, "you you're going away?" "Yes. To New York. To seek my fortune, Henry. I have friends there." "Oh !" he said. Then, "Oh !" "Time for my train," said she. "I'll say good-by, Henry. And good luck 1" "Good luck to you, Margie !" They clasped hands. And now he contrived to get a sort of footing among his confused thoughts. "No one has been kinder to me than you," he said. "I do know that." Her eyes met his for an instant. The comers of her mouth moved a little of the way toward a smile. "It wasn't kindness," she said. "Oh, yes !" he cried. "No not altogether." Again, for the briefest of moments, their eyes met. And in hers was a cool challenge that he found, for the moment, disturbing. "Good luck!" she said again. "If you get to New York, any time, look me up. A note to the Evening Earth will always reach me." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 371 And then she was gone. He was not to see her again for a long time. lie felt, as he hurried after the others, oddly baffled. She had been kind. As for other motives well, she had been rather attractively frank about those. He liked her. But he knew for the moment a fact that had a way of slipping, for periods of time, out of his ken that a man like himself can not safely like women. Such friendships were always to be difficult for him. They entered the boarding-house. On the hall table lay a letter addressed to Henry Calverly. He picked it up, with an instant quickening of his pulse. A maid came out of the "parlor" and said: "There's a man to see you, Mr. Calverly." He looked in. On the sofa sat Mayor Tim, rather stiffly, hat on knees, overcoat collar turned up, face patched here and there with court-plaster. Henry hesitated ; glanced down at the handwriting on the envelope ; then stepped into the room. Tim Maclntyre rose. "Well," he asked "well, what are you going to say to me?" His submissiveness had lasted overnight, then. It seemed extraordinary. Henry considered. He had as good as forgotten the man. But something must be done. He found, rather to his sur- prise, that his own position stood about as it had in the evening. The Power was on him. And those who know Henry Calverly will be surprised at nothing he might do at such a time. He looked the man over. Anger and disgust rose again. And impatience ; for the letter in his hand might be was the most important thing in the world. He dared not think what words might be in it. There was a growing pressure in his head ; his scalp seemed suddenly too small ; he had to catch a long breath. ''I'm going to let you go," he said roughly. "Well I'd like to know just what you mean by that, Calverly." 372 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "What I say! You're to go! Get out! . . . But wait a moment." He stepped to the door and called Guard and Humphrey into the room. "Write out your resignation as mayor," he commanded. It was necessary to find paper. Guard had a fountain pen. There was a discussion as to proper forms of ex- pression in which Henry's two friends took part. And when the document was completed and signed, all three witnessed it. It was a curious document ; one that might some day acquire value in the eyes of local historians. In it, Tim- othy Maclntyre resigned from the office of mayor, re- nounced "all and every claim" for compensation on the part of the city to himself, and pledged himself to leave forever, within twenty-four hours, the city and the state. "Well," he asked nervously, after Humphrey had read it through, aloud, "does that satisfy you?" "Satisfy me? Yes." Thus Calverly. Who then turned so abruptly on the man that he shrank back a step. "Now you can pack up your things and leave town. And you can thank your stars I don't ask for the key of your box in the safe deposit vault." Pale, in a great hurry, Tim Maclntyre left. "I wonder if just this thing was ever done before," mused Guard. ''I'm wondering," thus Humphrey, "if you shouldn't have made him disgorge. You say he's a thief." "Henry could hardly have done more," said Guard. "He's fired the mayor, as it stands. If the city wants to sue, later, for restitution of stolen moneys, there's nothing to stop them." "True," said Humphrey. "Hen, now that you've got this remarkable document, what are you going to do with it ?" "I don't know," replied Henry, who had moved in a preoccupied way to the window and was nervously twisting the curtain string. "I wonder if it would stand in law," mused Humphrey. Henry, all nervously at sea, hummed (THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 373 "The Law is ti: ^ true embodiment Of everything that's excellent. It has no sort of fault or flaw, And I, my Lords, embody the Law !" "The extraordinary things" Guard was pursuing the topic "is that he should pick out Henry here to resign to. The merest of private citizens. Come to think of it, not even a citizen here. It's as if he thought " This brought Henry's mind straight down to the letter in his hand. He tore it open. "If you folks will excuse me," he muttered. He was growing red. "It's very important." They waited. He read this "Could you, Henry, come to me as soon as you receive this, in the morning? If you can help me, you must. There's no one else. And I must take some course. They're pes- tering me so. "MIRIAM." He turned on them hotly, fiercely. "You'll have to excuse me!" he cried. "There's a very important matter. We can talk the book over oh, this noon! Some time! I'll call you up at the hotel!" He rushed past them ; ran out and down the steps ; raced across the lawn. "Well !" exclaimed the publisher. Humphrey laughed softly. "You take it lightly, Weaver. . . . What is all this, anyway ? What have we got into !" "We've got into a story beside which the one Henry's writing is a pale thing." "Hm ! Rather looks like it." "We might stroll back to the hotel. He won't appear again this morning. Give you time to jot down a few notes for the biography of Henry Calverly that you'll be publish- ing one of these days." 374 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM Guard smiled. Then, as they walked down the steps, abruptly asked: "Look here, Weaver, are you in on this? Do you know why the mayor of this city handed his resignation to that boy?" "No," said Humphrey, "but I begin to suspect that the real reason may have some connection with that letter. And my guess is that you and I are going to have a rather amusing few days." Henry, meanwhile, walking at a feverish gait, made his way to the Cantey residence. He rang. Then waited. And waited. His nails were digging into his palms. His head felt as if it might burst. The butler very deliberately opened the door. "Good morning, Mr. Calverly," he said, respectfully, "will you come this way, please." And led him up-stairs. Then up another flight. He was to be taken to the study ! His mind took in the familiar furniture, the paintings, the wall paneling, as if it were a highly sensitized photographic plate. The man opened the study door. Henry stepped within, and the door closed behind him. The room was empty. For an instant his heart sank ; then inexplicably rose again. . . . There were the model ships, the maps, the globe, the safe ! And the desk ! And Jim Cantey's old swivel chair ! There was a sound. He moved forward ; then stood motionless, breathless. ... A door-knob turned. He thought his heart would stop beating. Then the narrow door between the bookcase and the win- dow swung open and Miriam stood there .... stood! Moved slowly but easily forward ! The color came to her lovely face as it was now, at last coming to his. She said, rather faintly "Henry . . . won't you sit down?" CHAPTER FORTY-THREE In Which Miriam, in Attempting to State Her Problem Quite Impersonally, Arrives, as Women Are Some- times Said to Do, at a Rather Personal Solution THERE was a long silence. Henry dropped, in his con- fusion, into the big chair by the safe, the chair to which he had carried her, that first day. Miriam sat on the farther side of the room. She seemed actually well. His mind couldn't take in the fact. The narrow door stood open, but beyond it in her comfortable den there was no sign of the wheel-chair. In all his thoughts of her she had been a helpless girl. But now she appeared, to his bewildered eyes, a curiously unapproachable young woman. She was slender, but appar- ently strong enough. Her face was delicate, sensitive, and would soon be pale, as it had been when she first appeared in the doorway, but the color in her eyes and hair had never been so vivid. It occurred to him, glancing hesitantly about the room, that there had been a remarkable vigor in the Cantey strain ; perhaps it was yet to appear in Miriam. Sure- ly it would. Mentally she had never lost it; and that was the main thing. . . . More and more inaccessible she seemed. He was a little absurd about it, of course; to the extent of forgetting the significant fact that she had sent for him. But then, in a period of such intense feeling as the present Henry would inevitably have absurd moments. To his dying day he would have them. He said : ''It's nice to see you so well." "Oh, yes," she replied, nervously, breathlessly quick, "it's quite wonderful, really. But it makes me feel ashamed." "Oh no, it shouldn't. You mustn't." Silence again. He was lost in a jungle of unutterable 375 376 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM thoughts. But he must say something. Something that didn't matter. "You've been out West," was what he finally got out. A rather unpromising speech. "Yes, I didn't stay a great while. I I didn't want to." The tension was growing more and more nearly unendur- able. "I sent for you" her voice seemed fainter, farther off "because I need advice dreadfully." "I'll be glad to help if I can." He had no means of know- ing that he was presenting a front of almost frigid dignity. "The trouble is somebody's got to help. It's business. I'll try to explain it as clearly as I can. Mr. Amme came over last evening." "Ohl" Henry interjected, rather politely. "It seems that the Trust has expired. They want me to renew it. Mr. Amme, you know, and Mr. O'Rell, and Mr. Listerly. They've administered father's estate up to now. I don't seem to want to put everything back in their hands. But the trouble is, Henry" she knit her brows, deter- mined to be businesslike "there's so much to look after. Corporations, and banks, and the News, and County Rail- ways." "Oh!" said he again. Then, "I'm afraid I can't help much that way. I'm no earthly good at business." "But neither am I, Henry." Her hands fluttered up in a self-conscious little gesture. "That's the trouble. And there's nobody else to turn to. We've seen these things so much alike, you know." That "we" brought up a fresh tangle of little mental difficulties for both. He knit his brows now. The thing to do, of course, was to listen sympathetically and then think out some way of helping her. Yes, that was the thing. Be definite about it. Get down to brass tacks, and stay there. "The real difficulty is County Railways. The annual meeting. It comes right away. This week. And there have to be plans. Of course, I couldn't accomplish much THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 377 by just going to the meeting and trying to vote on all their complicated business. I'd demoralize the Company. And Mr. O'Rell would resign instantly." Henry brightened a little at this. "That wouldn't be so bad," he murmured. "No, but it seems that while he may do some things that make him open to criticism, he's a good manager and the Company has never passed a dividend." Henry knit his brows again over this. Clearly it was a problem ! He sprang up. He didn't see her nervous lit- tle start, but strode to the window and gazed moodily out. "You see," she explained further, "I suppose I in a way own the Company. It seems silly. But it's a responsi- bility. Really a public responsibility. There are lots of employees and their families. And then there's the matter of service to the city. Father always thought a good deal of that." She rose now; moved over to the big globe and stood slowly turning it as she talked. "The trouble is, of course, if I did go into the meeting, there wouldn't be any way I could tell what things meant statements, and figures, and business policies." "Of course not," said he. "They'd have you at every point. And I'd be worse." "I wonder if you would." "Oh, yes!" "Well ... I wondered if you . . . mightn't know of some one." She was faltering a little now. "No, I don't. Except Hump. He knows a lot about business and corporations and things like that." "Who is he, Henry?" "A dear old friend of mine. Humphrey Weaver. We owned a country paper together once. Back in Sun- bury. He was inventing then, nights, and Sundays, until . . . and then he's been very successful. He he's the one friend that's stood by me through through every- thing." The words were out before he could stop them. Now, 378 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM that they were out he could have bitten his tongue off. The color left his face; it was gray with pain. He turned back to the window and stared out. She made no sound. Surely he had hurt her terribly. He wondered what she was thinking. A rustle told him now that she was moving a little. Then the silence fell again. Her voice, when she did speak, in some degree reassured him. "Could he be reached, Henry? Your friend?" "Why why, yes! He's in town now!" "The thing is" clearly she was determined to see it through "it's really awfully important. Here I am, with all this responsibility, and I'm well, alone, Henry." She tried to smile. "I don't understand business, but 1 do understand these men. They're against us, Henry against everything you and I believe in. I know, I really know, that if father could come back now he'd throw every man of them out. When he was alive there was a spirit alive in the city. But it died with him. These men have no spirit, no faith." She threw out her hands. Her voice was none too steady, but she didn't pause. "You see how it is. You fought them. If you hadn't, I know I would have drifted on. Likely as not I'd have re- newed the Trust. I wouldn't have known what else to do. But your spirit has brought up the old feeling. I've got to fight them now. And I don't know how. I'm so alone. I don't know what to do." His lips moved, but he didn't speak. He had turned, and was watching her so intently, so hungrily, that her own eyes wandered off to the ships on the bookcase. And then, abruptly, he chuckled. Almost instantly he controlled his features. Her expression of dumb amazement brought from him the mumbled, rather shamefaced explanation >. "I was thinking of the mayor." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 379 "The mayor?" she breathed. "Yes. We had a fight last night." "Oh! . . . a fight. . . ." "Yes, fists. It must have been pretty awful. I don't know when I've lost my temper like that. I almost killed him, Miriam." It was the first time he had spoken her name. At the sound of it the extreme nervous tension against which she had been struggling relaxed a very little. Then, as abruptly as he, she laughed softly. "It's queer," Henry went on. "He caved in. He came around this morning, and signed this. ... I had it somewhere." He was rummaging through his pockets, bringing out numerous papers and small articles. "Oh, here it is." And he gave her the mayor's document, with its formidable column of signatures. "Good gracious!" she said. "He's resigned, Henry." "Yes, and I'm having him leave town." They both laughed at this. "I don't suppose it would stand in law," said he then, "but it's good reading." "It would stand in the papers," said she. "Once that's published, he'll have to go anyway." "Oh, yes, but what paper would publish it?" "Hum!" she mused. "That, of course. We'll have to do something about that, too." She knit her brows again. Her task was not yet accomplished. "Henry, I'm going to make an extraordinary request of you. It's difficult, after what's happened. I'd like you, if you can, to consider it impersonally . . . whatever you may think of me . . . it's clear enough, just from the way they've made us feel, that all these men are awfully wrong. They're somehow going wrong." "A man at the boarding-house said yesterday that Oswald Quakers has overthrown the old Cantey Machine and is organizing the city for Senator Painter," said Henry. "I caught the name, and listened. He said it was the talk 380 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "Hm! It gets pretty complicated, doesn't it?** "It does." "But never mind that. I've tried to state my problem, Henry. I've got to make a stand, wherever it may land me. I can't do it alone. There has to be a man in it. I can't even talk to them." "Neither can I. I can't follow their tricks." "No " her restraint fell away; suddenly her voice was rich with emotion "but you can drive that dishonest mayor out of town. Alone, without money and without friends." "Oh, he must have gone out of his head," was Henry's comment. "And when all of them had you alone at Mr. Quakers' house and tried to drive you out of town, they failed. You haven't gone yet." Henry sobered at this. It was true enough as an isolated fact. "You see what I'm getting at so clumsily. I don't know any other way to go about it. There's no time, you see. I've thought if you would help me not for my sake, but because it's decent and right oh, because it's got to be done somehow if you'd help, we might find some young lawyer that isn't contaminated yet by these influences . . . they do seem to touch almost everything, don't they? Why why, we could just have him draw up a paper a power of attorney it would be, wouldn't it? giving you the right to administer the Estate. . . ." It was extraordinarily difficult to come down on the literal words, to bring all this talk to the necessary point. But she did it, by main strength ; then had to stop for breath. He looked bewildered. "Of course," she began again, "I know it's a very big thing to ask. . . ." "It isn't that," said he, studying the rug. "I can imagine a little of what it would mean to you Henry. With your book on your mind." "My book. . . , You know? . . ." "Mr. Hitt let me read it. Last night. It wasn't his THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 381 fault. I made him. . . . I'll tell you, I really don't believe you'd have to give so much time to it. That isn't it. Senator Painter doesn't. None of the men do who hold the real power. And you'd hold the power. A lot of it, I should imagine from the way they're righting over it." He had glanced up at the mention of his book. But now his attention was centered again on the floor. He looked moody; uninterested, she thought. She could have reached out and shaken him. He had even picked up a glass paper- weight from the desk, and was looking through it at a pat- tern in the rug, tipping the glass slowly from side to side and squinting his eyes. She bit her lip. She flatly couldn't go on. Finally he said this. "You'd trust me, Miriam with all that ?" "I'd have to. There's nobody else." And then he really almost angered her. "What on earth would people think?" he asked. She dismissed this with a movement of one hand. "I don't care," she said shortly. Then, "I realize that I have no right to ask it. Breaking in on your work this way." He stared so long, after this, through the glass block that she could have screamed. But at last he straightened up, put it back on the desk, and looked at her. "It seems funny," he said, "I mean that it should be me. But probably I ought to do it. Try it, I mean." It seemed to her now that he was taking it rather lightly, all at once. But she told herself that this feeling was nerves, and to be ignored. "Then you will?" she asked. "Yes, I'll try." They rose. "I suppose I'd better see Hump first, and explain what he's to do." "Are you sure he'll help?" "Far as I can see, he's got to." They moved slowly, side by side, toward the door, and paused there. Each sensed the physical nearness of the 382 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM other. She was stirred to the point of what at one moment was a painful ecstasy of desire for him and at another was almost like an extreme unreasonable irritation. That he could look so calm, and could think, as he had apparently been thinking, of trifles, confused her. She even wondered, in a flutter of nerves, if he hated her. It seemed to her that he had grounds for it. She hadn't stood by through everything. Apparently, now, he didn't even need her. That, if it were true, put her in a pretty awkward position; sending for him. She had subconsciously emphasized the business predicament ; but now, in a wave of shame, she felt the personal implications. If only he hadn't assumed the burden so lightly! It was his book, of course. That was what steadied him. She had to compress her lips at the thought. For a brief moment she was savagely jealous of that book. She could have torn it up. Because it was so good. "Mr. Amme will be here in a few minutes," she said. "After all, he's the only one that really knows the whole Estate. I suppose he'll have to help with the paper. It will be an ordeal for him. But he can't help that." "Perhaps," said Henry, "I'd better bring Hump back here. We'll find a lawyer. I was just thinking Holmes Hitt or his uncle could help there. They both look at things pretty independently." "Then I'll ask Mr. Amme to wait until you come back." "Yes. That's the best way. I'll go now." Then they stood motionless. Each was breathless. Be- tween them lay the unexplained silence that they had so painstakingly avoided in all that had been said. He moved a half step forward into the doorway. Then paused again. She was fingering the lock. It seemed to her that all his and her eternity was hanging on the impulse that might or might not govern this moment. Then she heard him make an odd sound. And then his arms were about her ; bis lips were on hers ; she was clinging to him. CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR Of the Meeting in Jim Canters Study. Leading Up to What Happened in Cincinnati * *T T'S twelve o'clock, Henry! You must go!" I "I know. It is important." "It isn't as if we weren't to be together again. Just think, Henry . . . always!" "I know. But I can't think. I my head's swimming, dear. How can I go down there and talk to them! And Mr. Amme ! . . ." "It's wonderful. But we absolutely must be serious. Just think, Henry!" "I dread it a little. Parts of it. It's one more item for the papers. They'll call me a fortune hunter." "No." She shook her head firmly. "They can't. We both inherited money, Henry. And everybody knows you gave yours up. No, they can't." "I forgot that," he said. "Henry, you're so humorous." "I did. You know, in a way. It never seemed real to me, that money. It never meant things to me the things that money can mean." "I was so proud of you !" "Were you? Proud of me? . . . Isn't that wonder- ful !" "Think of all we'll have to talk about ! Your book . . . Oh, you'll never know how you've thrilled me with that!" "Really? You liked it?" "Henry ! You're teasing me." "No. Honestly. I well, from the way you just men- tioned it you kiv>w, when we were talking I was afraid you . . ." "Henry ! Stop t I can't talk about it now. My head's in 383 384 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM a whirl. But I love it ! It's a sort of well, miracle to me. It makes me a little afraid of you. But you must go, dear. Mr. Amme'll be coming any minute. He's terribly prompt." "He would be. Well, I'll go. We'll be businesslike now. But you mustn't look at me. Please! Or I'll never get away." "All right. Don't be long." Henry met Mr. Amme on the stairs ; stood aside for him ; murmured politely "I'll get back as soon as I can, Mr. Amme." And left the little lawyer to stare after him in amazement. Humphrey could get nothing out of him ; after one good look at him gave it up. It was clear enough that the Power was on him. It was really rather thrilling to stand quietly by and watch this slimly vigorous young man who was talking vaguely and continuously about everything on earth except- ing the thing he really meant, whose cheeks were flushed with excitement and whose eyes were shining with an almost unearthly light. He looked so like the boy Humphrey had known, back in Sunbury, long ago. A century ago, it seemed. Henry called up Holmes Hitt from a booth. There was a young lawyer, said that alert advertising man, name of Hiram P. Dugway, who was always running for mayor or district attorney on some obscure little reform ticket. A bit of a born reformer, but bright enough. Knew the town through and through. Delighted in denouncing the "Big Cinch." And Holmes Hitt, promptly sensing amusement, undertook to call him up and have him at the hotel within ten minutes, if he was in his office. He was in his office ; and was delighted to look up Henry Calverly. He was a neatly dressed young man, this Mr. Dugway, of pleasant manner and not untouched with imagination. This was the period, it is to be recalled, in the earlier years of the first decade of the twentieth century, when eager young reformers were everywhere beating down the established idols of trade, politics and finance. Roosevelt THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 385 was president, and was himself actively tearing to pieces the old, undoubtedly corrupt machinery of party politics and substituting for it a fresh ideal of public service. Rich men "malefactors of great wealth," the phrase-coining president had dubbed them were everywhere on the de- fensive. There was eager excited talk of a new sort of democracy. A great nation that had for a century and more called itself young, was stirring and arousing to the astonishing discovery that it was in reality old and back- ward, was examining with sudden feverish energy its set- tled bad habits and striking out to form a new sort of good habits, was purging itself and facing the new century with new eyes. There were dreams of a happier era for the hu- man race, when all the miracles of applied science, all the amazing new material equipment of civilization, were to be brought into the service of still newer social ideals. Every one, somehow, was to be happy. Education was to be put on a new plane. The immense producing power of society, better organized, was to be used in some way as yet a little vague through some equally vague fresh method of distri- bution to enhance individual life everywhere. Every other prosperous family indulged its own young socialist ; yet no one clearly knew, beyond the phrases, what socialism was or meant. Few perceived, in America, that beneath this dream-surface itself probably a result of ma- terial plenty rough, primitive animal life was stripping and arming itself for the most bloodthirsty war ever fought by man ; for, in so far as it might be able to compass it, the destruction of all organized society and a new crude begin- ning on the ruins of a great and, on the whole, happy epoch. It was, then, the day of youth and hope and young causes, when each eager young social Messiah found a nervously receptive audience awaiting him. It was on this plane of thought uncrystallized, even undefined, yet clearly enough felt that Henry Calverly and Hiram Dugway clasped hands. With Humphrey Weaver they stepped into a taxicab and were whirled up the Hill to the Cantey home. 386 Miriam and Mr. Ainme were waiting in the study, rather stiffly making talk. Henry presented his new and his old friend. At sight of the rebelliously young Mr. Dugway Mr. Amme's little gray beard pressed firmly upward against his neatly trimmed mustache, and his bald shining head drew up and back. Dugway, who had been able to gather little beyond the fact that he was being employed by two likable outsiders in some extraordinary but delightful upheaval within the sacrosanct confines of Cantey Estate, smiled quietly and a little demurely, bowed to the oddly radiant Miss Cantey, and found a chair. Upheavals of any sort delighted his soul. Cantey Estate was, to local reformers, the very Citadel of "Privilege." Humphrey Weaver knew instantly when Miss Cantey's hand met his, and her blue eyes swiftly took him in, that he had made a new friend. And he knew, before a word had been spoken, that she knew it as well as he. They sat about the room. Mr. Amme, who was accus- tomed to guiding discussion, appeared to be about to ask the meaning of this really extraordinary gathering when Miriam forestalled him. She spoke quickly, nervously; but said just what she meant in the fewest words possible. "My father's estate has been administered by three trus- tees until to-day. I believe the Trust has now expired." Mr. Amme nodded professionally. "At noon," he said. "It has been proposed that I agree to a renewal of the Trust. I feel that I can not do that. As the property is now in my hands, and as I can't very well manage it personally, I've asked you gentlemen here to advise in drawing up a paper a power of attorney? giving Mr. Calverly absolute right to act for me." Humphrey's hand came down on his knee with a start- lingly loud sound. Mr. Amme sat motionless, stunned; grew older before their eyes. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 387 Dugway's faint hovering smile broadened a little. Then they went at it. Mr. Amme quietly raised little difficulties ; very technical, lawyer-like, designed first to ob- struct, later to weaken the document. Dugvvay met him skilfully. Humphrey made a few shrewd suggestions. And Miriam was surprisingly clear. The document, as finally drawn, was brief and clear. Miriam signed it proudly. The others signed as witnesses. Mr. Amme found it difficult to refuse. Miriam then asked Dugway to act as her attorney in re- ceiving and checking up the final report of the trustees on all the properties. And then, with a formal leave-taking, Mr. Amme locked his portfolio and left the house. Embarrassment followed. Dugway drew Henry to the window for a talk. Humphrey, a question in his quizzical eyes, his long dark face wrinkling into a kindly smile, moved to Miriam's side. "You've taken an extraordinary step, Miss Cantey," he said. "Yes," said she, "and I'm so glad." "A wise step, I think," he went on ; "of course, Henry is the worst business man on earth." "Oh, of course," said she, with an unmistakably happy smile. "He'd be no good on the details. But you'll let me say this, Miss Cantey?" "Oh, yes!" "I've known Henry many years. It was in my rooms that he wrote that first book. I've seen him in success and in well, disaster. And I love him." "O-oh !" she breathed excitedly, glancing up at him, all quick delicate color, "so do I." Then her eyes dropped. He was silent. "Why not," she said then, "why not tell ? I I am trust- ing him with my life, Mr. Weaver." 388 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM "I gathered that. And you will be proud of him." "I am now." "Yes, but we were saying . . ." "Oh, yes ; about the business details. . . ." "Yes. He'd fumble those. But there are always people for details. In the real essentials you'll find him the well, the Tightest man on earth." "I know," she murmured, smiling over his emphasis on that odd word "rightest." She liked the colloquial emphasis in this man's speech. She felt in it something of her fath- er's rich vocabulary. That word, "fumble," too. It brought to mind an amusing picture. "That's the point with Hen," he pressed on. "He's so eternally right. Dishonesty, meanness, make him uncom- fortable. He feels them instantly. And he can't keep still about them. I'm glad he is to have happiness at last. Life has gone pretty hard with him. And they've never let him alone. It's a wonder they haven't crushed all the spirit out of him. But look at him !" This last phrase was in a low tone; for Henry, all sup- pressed excitement, was charging across the room at them. "Hump," he was saying, "are you good for a night of it? Dugway and I are going to Cincinnati." "To Cincinnati ?" "Yes. It's the first thing. I'll tell you about it. Dug- way's going to call up about trains." "You could take the touring car," suggested Miriam. This took Henry by surprise. Speech left him. It was going to be nearly as difficult for him to realize the mean- ing of Miriam's wealth in terms of personal convenience and luxury as it had been in the case of his own wealth, when it lay, undesired, at his hand. "Of course," said Humphrey. "That will really save time. We can get back some time in the morning." "There's the County Railways meeting to-morrow after- noon," said Miriam. "That's important, isn't it?" "We'll be there," was Henry's cheerful reply. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 389 "What are you going to do at that meeting?" asked the practical Humphrey. "Don't know. We'll have to think that out as we go along. Or after we get there. . . . One thing, if there is a Cantey political machine, and they tell me there is, we'll use it to put Dugway in as mayor." They rode all the rest of the afternoon and on into the night, through villages, towns and cities, across vast reaches of yellow prairie land. At last they found themselves speeding in through the suburbs of the large city by the river, and then rolling on into the business district among the high buildings. A few inquiries along the way brought them to the ten-story structure that housed a certain newspaper. They walked up and down the pavement to stretch their stiff muscles. Then they stepped into an elevator and moved upward. The odor that hovers about every printing house in the world floated to their nostrils as the elevator as- cended. It can not be discribed ; but there is the smell of damp print paper in it, and ink, and machine oil. It is quite distinctive. Sometimes you catch a whiff of it from your morning paper; or even, faintly, from a book, if you hold the opened leaves close to the nose. Henry and Humphrey sniffed it at the same moment. Their eyes met, each alive with quick gentle memories. It was the smell of the old front room business office and editor's sanctum in one, where they had worked side by side of The Weekly Voice of Sunbury. It was the smell of the Gleaner offke, one long flight up, over Hemple's meat market, where, a little later, the firm known as "Weaver & Calverly" had struggled through a stormy business experi- ence after buying out Robert A. McGibbon. And both these men loved it, as the old rider loves the smell of tanback. They had never been so close in friendship as now, these two curiously different men. Humphrey's heart was still warm, besides, from that unpremeditated little speech he 390 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM had made to Miriam. And Henry, now that he was definitely "a going concern," had forgotten the gulf that lay between them when they met in the Union Station and, later, when they breakfasted at the Rivoli. The world had spun round since then. To-night Henry was treading the stars. Henry asked for Mr. Winterbeck. It seemed that he was night city editor here. They were kept waiting for a time. Then Henry grew impatient and prowled about outside the railing, hunting for the office boy. Finally, he caught the eye of a reporter at one of the desks. And at last the three of them were shown back behind a jog in the wall to a wide desk where sat Frank Winterbeck, broad of shoulder, low but sharp in speech, impassive of face, the inevitable two or three telephones at his elbow. He looked up without a smile. "How do you do, Mr. Calverly," he said, as if this sud- den appearance were a common occurrence. "Our man is trying to find you up in your town. Have you seen this?" It was a typed note asking for verification of the rumor that Miss Miriam Cantey had announced her engagement to Mr. Henry Calverly, the author. "No, I haven't," said that young man. "Anything to say?" "Not about that. But about this, yes." He spread before Winterbeck the document they had drawn up that day. The editor read it swiftly but carefully, his face impas- sive as ever. Then came a telephone interruption; for a few moments he was busy. Reporters came and went. He glanced over typewritten sheets, scrawled cabalistic signs on them; tossed them to an assistant, who rolled them in brass carriers and shot them down tubes. In the next free moment he asked : "Is this for publication ?" "Decidedly not," said Henry. "It's for you my author- ity. I want you back on the News." THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 391 "In what capacity?" "Publisher." For just a moment Winterbeck seemed to be holding his breath. Then he asked: "Where's Mr. Listerly?" "Anywhere you suggest." "I can't work with him." "Then he'll go." "When would you want me?" "To-night." "I could arrange to come to-morrow. But what will you expect of me?" "I want to read the kind of newspaper I think you'd like to make." Winterbeck indulged in a soft whistle. "That's a wonderful opportunity, Mr. Calverly. But what makes you think we could get away with it. The old town'll still be there." "No," put in Dugway, his first words, "it's going to be a new town." Henry was frowning a little, deep in thought. "Look here," he said, abruptly, "couldn't you come back with us to-night?" "That's pretty quick. Perhaps, when I lock up, I could ask the chief. But why ? What's up ?" "Everything. It's a sort of emergency. We're going into the County Railways meeting to-morrow. We want you handy. You know the town. And we don't want the News wobbling at such a time." Winterbeck looked at him in frank admiration. "Have you a car here?" he asked. "Yes." "Well thunder I'll go if the chief'll stand for it." The chief stood for it. He went. CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE Mere Business Details; a New Publisher, a Still Newer President and General Manager, and the Beginning of a Long Fight. A Word, Too, about Hittic and the Instinct of the Race IT WAS the habit of R. B. Listerly to appear at the News Annex at one o'clock. He came, on the Wednesday, a little late, direct from Amme's office. Beneath him the firm earth had melted. Suddenly, for the whim of a girl, the intricate local fabric of trade and credit had gone threadbare; appeared as what it actually was, a fabric, nothing more. Whispers were flying about Cantey Square and farther down-town. In response to dis- turbed and disturbing questions, close-lipped men, behind mahogany in the Trust Company, in the Cantey National, in other banks, shook their heads non-committally ; advised waiting and seeing. County Railways shares were dropping. No one knew, in fact, what might happen, overnight, to County Railways. In inner circles it was understood that there was no way of finding out. It seemed to hang on whatever might be de- cided by Miss Cantey, or by this young outsider she now, it was known, purposed marrying. For the first time in its history, County Railways faced an annual meeting for which the management had no set plan. The Town Club was crowded at noon. Men, lunching in quiet little groups of two and three and four, or lounging about the main hall, watched for Harvey O'Rell, for Amme and Listerly, even for their lesser associates. None of these appeared. O'Rell was at home, deep in a conference with Oswald Qualters. And Listerly, who hadn't much appetite to-day, nibbled a sandwich up in Amme's office, and sipped dispiritedly a glass of milk. So far as the News was con- 392 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 393 cerned, the only possible course was to sit back and wait. Anything might develop, or nothing. It was disturbing, un- settling. But there seemed the chance that they'd let the paper alone. Under Listerly it was a richly paying prop- erty. They couldn't get around that. Queer stories were afloat about the mayor. The day before he had visited the Savings Vault with a political friend and a suit-case. One of the stories was to the effect that he had been seen leaving town in an automobile loaded with baggage. The rumor appeared to be general that a furniture moving firm was dismantling his house. But of all this not a word had appeared as yet in the newspapers. A queer rumor that he had, in some curiously irresponsible manner, resigned his office, had drifted out from associates of the chief of police, but stood unverified. Telephone calls on his office in the city hall brought nothing more than the stereotyped phrase, from a nearly distracted official secre- tary, that the mayor was not in. And it wasn't known when he would be. At his house a brisk feminine voice invariably answered to the same effect. And the mayor's sister, at her own home, said flatly, with irritation that increased during the day, that she knew nothing whatever about him. Listerly, distrait in manner, a settled tired look about his eyes and mouth, stepped from the elevator and moved along the corridor of the eighth floor to his private door. The waiting-room door stood open. As he passed he was aware of figures, two or three, sitting in there. He didn't turn to look. But he thought one of them started up. He hung up hat and coat and dropped into his swivel chair. A thick heap of mail lay before him, under a paper- weight. He looked heavily at it. He was unquestionably tired. "Bad way to start the day," he thought. "Who could those men be, out there, beyond the closed door. Was it possible that Calverly . . . already . . .?" His fingers reached for the paper-weight ; fumbled with it. His secretary came in. "Mr. Calverly wants to see you," she remarked. "Two 394 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM other gentlemen are with him. One is Mr. Winterbeck, who used to be here." "I'll see them," said Mr. Listerly. The third man proved to be a knowing quiet chap. Name of Weaver. Apparently from New York. They took chairs. "Well, gentlemen?" was all Listerly could say, looking from one to another of them. Then, to his surprise there was even a slight element of shock in the experience, so unexpected was it the strange young genius known as Henry Calverly, took hold. "Mr. Listerly," he said, quietly, rather gently, "I am here representing Cantey Estate " Listerly broke in here, with a "Yes, Mr. Calverly, I under- stand about that." "I am sorry, Mr. Listerly, but I must ask for your resig- nation, to take effect immediately." Listerly reached for a pen ; wrote his resignation in a sentence ; signed it ; handed it politely across the desk. Calverly took it. "Mr. Winterbeck will take charge of the paper," he said. Listerly bowed to that strong, serious young man. "I will, of course, be glad to help in any way." "Thank you, Mr. Listerly. Don't feel that you must hurry. I'll work in another corner until you have your things out." They stood about then, and spoke for a moment or two on trifling topics. Then Henry and Humphrey went on to the County Railways meeting, leaving Frank Winterbeck in command of the paper from which he had been discharged for truth-telling. There was a thrill in the experience. The Board of County Railways met in the Cantey National Bank Building. Dugway was in the hall, smilingly silent in the face of a bombardment of questions from re- porters, and entered with Henry, while Humphrey stepped over to the hotel to catch up, in some measure, with his rapidly accumulating business correspondence. They stood or sat about the room, quiet, habitually pow- THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 395 erful men: Hannibal Simmons, Harvey O'Rell, Atnme, Oswald Quakers, several other bankers and lawyers, Will Appleby. Listerly, it appeared, couldn't be present. The earliest of new business was the electing of Henry Calverly to the Board. Amme and O'Rell put this through briskly. Then, with Dugway at his elbow, Henry took his seat at the long table. Dugway had said, in the hall, "As a matter of common business decency, Mr. Calverly, Harvey O'Rell will have to stay a little while with the company. We can't be ex- pected to find our new manager overnight. O'Rell is a hard proposition, but he won't want to put an item of petu- lant wrecking on his business record." But as business is little else than the eternal human strug- gle expressed in terms of our own time, so human quality often and unexpectedly intrudes into business councils. O'Rell demanded that his resignation take effect imme- diately. He was thoroughly angry. Even the grim fact of that bit of paper for so long in Jim Cantey's hands, now in the hands of this same Henry Calverly, convicting him as a bribe-giver, bore not the slightest weight in his decision. He was a strong man. Flatly, clearly, he didn't care what happened to the Com- pany. And he seemed to feel competent to handle any per- sonal difficulties. Even his old associates on the Board were aroused against him. There was not one but had money in the business; not one cared to throw his holdings on a falling market. Henry and Dugway whispered together. "It's a fix," said the lawyer. "He means it. He knows he's got you in a hole." "What do you think we can do?" Dugway pondered. Henry turned back to the table. "Since Mr. O'Rell finds himself unable to give the Company any further assistance, I move you that the position of general manager be offered to Mr. Humphrey Weaver." There was utter silence in the room. Then a question or 396 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM two was asked. But as nearly sixty per cent, of the capital stock of the Company now lay under the irresponsible hand of this young Mr. Calverly, to be voted as he might choose, the motion found a seconder and went through. Humphrey, called by wire, a little puzzled by the peremp- tory nature of the summons, came across the square. He found Henry and his lawyer waiting on the steps of the building. "Hump," said Hen, who appeared to be suppressing an impulse to chuckle, "I've just done an awful thing to you. You are now President and General Manager of County Railways." ""We're arranging the transfer of a little stock, Mr. Weaver," thus Dugway himself in some excitement. "You're elected to the Board. Of course, you'll have to preside." Humphrey said, "Good God!" There was quick eager talk. "It's impossible!" cried Hump. "No" Henry seemed now cool, unshakable "no, Hump, you're an engineer, you're used to the ways of corporations, you've got brains and character, you're in sympathy with all we hope to do. . . . No, the more I think of it the more clearly I see that you're the man. I'm afraid you'll just have to arrange your other affairs and take hold." All this out there on the steps. Humphrey stood motionless for a long moment. His face wrinkled in thought. He looked up, quizzically, from Dugway to Henry. "It's the sportiest thing I ever heard of," he remarked thoughtfully, "but I'll" his eyes lighted "I'll do it." A moment later the three entered the Board room. And the bewildered, angry gentlemen of the Board found them- selves, one by one, taking the hand of the astonishing Mr. Weaver, a youngish man, direct of eye, quiet in manner, clearly, to their keen eyes, a vigorous, forcible thinker, a man, who, surprisingly, spoke their language. It was, in some degree, reassuring. It was depressing to Harvey O'Rell. THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 397 Oswald Quakers caught up with them in the hall. "Mr. Weaver," he remarked, pleasantly, "I won't say I haven't dreaded this little upheaval. But I like your looks and I'm going to help you all I can. The city won't be any the worse for a little toning up. And I'm beginning to think we're going to get it just that. Good luck to you! And call on me, if I can help you." Then he said this to Henry : "Well, Calverly, you're having such an experience as falls to few writers. I suppose we may expect novels of business life now. Not a bad idea. Drop in on me now and then. I don't see enough of you. We don't run across much in the way of refreshing ideas in this town. Or we didn't before you turned up. You're good for us, at that. We didn't know it, but we needed you." As he walked off toward the elevator and his own office, Dugway remarked quietly, with a little shake of the head, ''He'll never let go, Mr. Calverly. Our fight has only begun." Henry found an hour for Miriam in the evening. They sat before a glowing fire in her sitting-room. "I've been thinking about Mr. Hitt," she said. "I'm not altogether clear in my mind. You're going on with your book, of course. You'll have to." "I know," said he, very thoughtfully and deeply happy. "I'll have to. If you could hear Guard talk . . ." "Of course, Henry, but ... I hate, in a way, to compromise on this thing . . . but maybe, since you're going to express father's spirit so wonderfully in your own book, we might let the formal biography go on, too. Only . . ." "You're thinking of keeping Mr. Hitt busy." "Yes. That, and . . ." "I've no doubt Winterbeck could always make room for him on the News." "But perhaps he'd better do the book first. Of course, it will be just what father hated so. But a letter came to- day, Henry, from some other publishers. They want to do 398 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM a life of father in a series of volumes on what they call The Makers of Young America. It's occurred to me that people will be doing biographies, with our consent or with- out." "Hm !" mused Henry. "I hadn't thought of that." "It would be rather painful to find life beating us, after all swamping our feelings, and father's bringing his mem- ory down to the conventional average, along with every- thing else. And, of course, if it would only mean his view that they'd call him bad and let it go at that . . that would hurt, of course." "Of course," said Henry, slowly and thoughtfully, "that would hurt. It's a question, I suppose, to what extent indi- vidual opinion can survive when it's opposed to what seems to be the instinct of the race. When I get to thinking about that, I well, it puzzles me." "And me," she admitted. CHAPTER FORTY-SIX Touching, With a Smile, on Critics, the Pattern, and Tennis HENRY CALVERLY'S third book was called simply, The Builder. It rode into the public ken on a wave, almost a tidal wave, of shrewdly devised "publicity." Be- ginning before the extensive comment on his renunciation of the Walt fortune had died down, and nearly coinciding with the news of his romantic engagement and marriage to the interesting younger daughter of the famous James H. Cantey, interest in the forthcoming volume mounted stead- ily. Fresh and widely-advertised editions of Satraps of the Simple appeared, one of them a "gift edition" in leather, specially autographed by the author. Henry signed these few hundred copies without any particular thought as to their significance. It was gratify- ing to see the work of his pen so handsomely printed and bound. And it was naturally pleasant to feel that a grow- ing public was again his. He asked no questions of it; merely worked the harder on the new book, stimulated by thoughts of healthy honest success. On the day of publication Miriam and Henry, a few months married, sailed for Bermuda to play and rest. They were utterly happy, in work, in life, in each other. With returning health, Miriam was growing to a surpris- ing extent in vigor, color, humor. She mothered Henry, taking from day to day and week to week an increasing delight in his curious mixture of acute perception and ma- ture judgment with absurdedly boyish naivete. She pro- tected him from the distracting world. Once or twice dur- ing the later progress of the book she spirited him away for a little rest. One such trip was to his boyhood home in Sunbury. Here, unknown to old associates, he motored about with her, walked and picnicked by the great lake 399 400 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM that, with the maples and oaks that made almost a forest of the village, had curiously dominated his youthful mind. And finally he came to confiding in her about Cicely, and that boyhood marriage. The Cantey honesty, the odd quiet directness of thought, that grew in her with health, made this possible. She felt, I think, for that young Henry and his girl wife, so sadly dead, a deep gentle affection. Miriam Cantey was extraordinarily beautiful at this time. Her vivid though subtle coloring was probably at its best during this period. Curiously, the color in her skin was never particularly high ; yet color was and was always to be her most striking personal attribute. It was a matter, partly, of what we have called extra pigmentation. It was a manifestation of the inherent vigor of the Cantey stock. On a morning, in Bermuda, a ship came in from New York, red, white and black, picking her way among the islands, past the white hotel by the blue water, to the sunny, sleepy wharf. Shortly, mail appeared at the hotel. And this mail, a bit of it, affected Henry curiously ; depressed him ; drove him, with a touch of unconvincing gaiety that was meant for and was an apology, down to the waterside. Miriam, with a thoughtful glance, let him go, and read her own letters. Though her thoughts drifted back more than once to the large yellow envelope a fat envelope that had so stirred him. Half an hour later she joined him. He lay on the sand ; moody ; very still. The yellow en- velope lay, with others, beside him. He watched her approaching. Moody or not, it stirred him to see her walking with that easy unconscious grace. She was all in white, as was he ; they had planned a little tennis for the later morning. She dropped beside him on the sand, and dug tunnels, girlishly. Finally she remarked : "Want to be let alone, dear; or would it help you to sputter?" THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 401 "Why . . . stay here, please. Yes, I'll sputter." He had to smile. "It's the reviews." "Of the book? Oh, Henry, you don't mean that they're bad." "Not that, no. I suppose they're wonderful, really. But my eye fell on certain paragraphs . . . they bewilder me." "Why?" "Oh ... it ... well, here! Read some of these." She did. He waited. "They're wonderful," she said, finally. "Oh, Henry, wonderful ! Listen !" And she read from one and another. "Henry, dear boy, I'm so proud! What disturbed you?" "Well they're like a biography. They all talk about Satraps and then they all just cut my life out as it was between that book and this. The very papers that pub- lished all the prison story the papers that hounded me so all ignore it now. They just pretend it never happened. Even all the talk about me when when Madame Watt died they ignore that, too." "I wonder if you should object to that." "I hate it. It's as if they'd decided that I'm respectable enough now to make possible a common agreement among the papers to ignore the dreadful past. The very reasons they give for what they're good enough to call my growth in 'style' whatever that is are all wrong. They must knows it. Good lord, they must know that if I am writing better it is because I had those hard years." " 'Out of my deep hurt make I my little songs/ " quoted Miriam, tenderly. "Yes! That! But will they look all that in the face? Never! . . . It's our old Anglo-Saxon conspiracy to keep the facts of life suppressed. It's what Hittie calls the Pattern. Why, listen to this ! And he read : " 'Mr. Calverly has set an example of Spartan self-con- trol that our horde of young writers would do well to fol- low. Satraps of the Simple appeared at least five years 402 THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM ago. Since then he has published only one other book, which, from its subject and treatment, was clearly a by- product of the studies he must have made while preparing the ground work of The Builder. We may, then, dismiss the second work by terming it a collection of chips from Mr. Calverly's workshop. It is fair to say that The Builder represents the labor of at least five years. The volume it- self is a living monument to the loving years of labor that brought it into being. And it is a living rebuke to those over-eager, over-commercialized writers who try to hope that a good book can be written in six months.' " "The Builder took you just a little over five months," said she, musingly. "Exactly, I'm going to write and tell that paper so." "Of course, you aren't going to do anything of the sort." "Well" he waved his arms "it makes you wonder about a lot of the famous figures of history. What were they really doing when according to the biographies they were writing great books or formulating great policies ? It's sure they weren't not a man among 'em what people are now determined to think them. It's the great weakness, I think. We won't face what are called 'unpleasant' truths. We won't face life. They accept me now, yes. But why? Why, by pretending I'm their kind. And I'm notl I won't be! I'm not respectable! . . . What are you smiling at?" "Forgive me, dear, but it is rather funny. You're talking exactly as father used to. And I'm afraid sometimes, as I think it all over, that they have beat him. Even you and I are agreeing to Mr. Hitt's book." "I know. That's true." "And they're going to beat you, dear. If you can't be avoided as one of their heroes, at least they can insist on making you over into one of their familiar kind." "But" "It isn't just the newspapers, the thousands of pattern books, the endless lecturers. It's the millions and millions of mouths repeating day by day the old words and phrases, and rephrasing the easy, comfortable old accepted ideas. But THE PASSIONATE PILGRIM 403 it is something when you think what a stodgy old pattern it would have become by this time if there hadn't been any great independent spirits to change it a little now and then." "It leaves you so helpless, Miriam." "At least," said she, smiling, and rising to her feet, "we can play tennis." He looked up at her; watched her slender lovely figure against the bright blue-and-white sky; then sprang up be- side her. Her eyes, a thought shyly, searched his face; found a twinkle there, and a faint little flicker of a smile. "In a way, of course, they'll never beat you," said she. "The individual must count. It's only that the rest of the world is so big." "And meantime," said he, smiling now, as he was so rap- idly learning to, "we can play tennis." THE END A 000 111 163 2 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY Los Angeles This book is DUE on the last date stani|>ed below. 5 i 1971 Form L'J-Series 444