第55章

My eyes smarted from the tobacco smoke;and the events of the day,in disorderly manner,kept running through my head.The tide of my exhilaration had ebbed,and I found myself struggling against a revulsion caused,apparently,by the contemplation of Colonel Varney and his associates;the instruments,in brief,by which our triumph over our opponents was to be effected.And that same idea which,when launched amidst the surroundings of the Boyne Club,had seemed so brilliant,now took on an aspect of tawdriness.Another thought intruded itself,--that of Mr.Pugh,the president of the Ribblevale Company.My father had known him,and some years before I had traveled halfway across the state in his company;his kindliness had impressed me.He had spent a large part of his business life,I knew,in building up the Ribblevale,and now it was to be wrested from him;he was to be set aside,perhaps forced to start all over again when old age was coming on!In vain I accused myself of sentimentality,and summoned all my arguments to prove that in commerce efficiency must be the only test.The image of Mr.Pugh would not down.

I got up and turned on the light,and took refuge in a novel I had in my bag.Presently I grew calmer.I had chosen.I had succeeded.And now that I had my finger at last on the nerve of power,it was no time to weaken.

It was half-past six when I awoke and went to the window,relieved to find that the sun had scattered my morbid fancies with the darkness;and I speculated,as I dressed,whether the thing called conscience were not,after all,a matter of nerves.I went downstairs through the tobacco-stale atmosphere of the lobby into the fresh air and sparkly sunlight of the mild February morning,and leaving the business district I reached the residence portion of the little town.

The front steps of some of the comfortable houses were being swept by industrious servant girls,and out of the chimneys twisted,fantastically,rich blue smoke;the bare branches of the trees were silver-grey against the sky;gaining at last an old-fashioned,wooden bridge,I stood for awhile gazing at the river,over the shallows of which the spendthrift hand of nature had flung a shower of diamonds.And I reflected that the world was for the strong,for him who dared reach out his hand and take what it offered.It was not money we coveted,we Americans,but power,the self-expression conferred by power.A single experience such as I had had the night before would since to convince any sane man that democracy was a failure,that the world-old principle of aristocracy would assert itself,that the attempt of our ancestors to curtail political power had merely resulted in the growth of another and greater economic power that bade fair to be limitless.As I walked slowly back into town I felt a reluctance to return to the noisy hotel,and finding myself in front of a little restaurant on a side street,Ientered it.There was but one other customer in the place,and he was seated on the far side of the counter,with a newspaper in front of him;and while I was ordering my breakfast I was vaguely aware that the newspaper had dropped,and that he was looking at me.In the slight interval that elapsed before my brain could register his identity Iexperienced a distinct shock of resentment;a sense of the reintrusion of an antagonistic value at a moment when it was most unwelcome....

The man had risen and was coming around the counter.He was Hermann Krebs.

"Paret!"I heard him say.

"You here?"I exclaimed.

He did not seem to notice the lack of cordiality in my tone.He appeared so genuinely glad to see me again that I instantly became rather ashamed of my ill nature.

"Yes,I'm here--in the legislature,"he informed me.

"A Solon!"

"Exactly."He smiled."And you?"he inquired.

"Oh,I'm only a spectator.Down here for a day or two."He was still lanky,his clothes gave no evidence of an increased prosperity,but his complexion was good,his skin had cleared.I was more than ever baked by a resolute good humour,a simplicity that was not innocence,a whimsical touch seemingly indicative of a state of mind that refused to take too seriously certain things on which I set store.What right had he to be contented with life?

"Well,I too am only a spectator here,"he laughed."I'm neither fish,flesh nor fowl,nor good red herring.""You were going into the law,weren't you?"I asked."I remember you said something about it that day we met at Beverly Farms.""Yes,I managed it,after all.Then I went back home to Elkington to try to make a living.""But somehow I have never thought of you as being likely to develop political aspirations,Krebs,"I said.

"I should say not!he exclaimed.

"Yet here you are,launched upon a political career!How did it happen?""Oh,I'm not worrying about the career,"he assured me."I got here by accident,and I'm afraid it won't happen again in a hurry.You see,the hands in those big mills we have in Elkington sprang a surprise on the machine,and the first thing I knew I was nominated for the legislature.

A committee came to my boarding-house and told me,and there was the deuce to pay,right off.The Railroad politicians turned in and worked for the Democratic candidate,of course,and the Hutchinses,who own the mills,tried through emissaries to intimidate their operatives.""And then?"I asked.

"Well,--I'm here,"he said.

"Wouldn't you be accomplishing more,"I inquired,"if you hadn't antagonized the Hutchinses?""It depends upon what you mean by accomplishment,"he answered,so mildly that I felt more rued than ever.