Part 17

"By noon, I hope," said the physician with cheerful optimism.

"You see?" said Rockwell. "George can catch the noon train for Springfield and get there in time to take on the evening speech. Mr. Merriam will have made the two at Cairo and East St. Louis. He can go back to Riceville from Springfield."

Just then the telephone rang, and I believe every person in the room jumped.

Rockwell rose to answer it.

"Senator Norman? Yes, he is here. But he is engaged. This is Mr. Rockwell, his manager. You can give the message to me."

A moment later he put his hand over the receiver and turned to Merriam.

"He insists on speaking to the Senator. You'll have to answer. I think it's Crockett. For Heaven's sake, be careful!"

Merriam took the receiver:

"Hello!"

A voice which he remembered only too well from the night before at Jennie's replied:

"This is Mr. Crockett, I have the honour, I believe, of speaking to Mr. Merriam."

"You have the wrong number!" said Merriam and hung up.

But before he had had time to explain to the others or even to wonder whether he had done wisely, the bell jangled again. He turned back to the instrument. Rockwell came quickly to his side, and Merriam, taking down the receiver, held it so that his "manager" too should be able to hear what came over the wire.

"Hello!"

"Ah! Senator Norman, by your voice," said Crockett in tones of elaborate irony. "I wish to congratulate you, Senator, on your speech this noon. It was a magnificent effort. So full of progressive ideas and youthful virility!"

"Thank you," said Merriam.

"And, Senator, I really must see you right away. I am calling from the lobby. I will come up to your rooms at once, if I may. Or meet you anywhere else you say. It is of the utmost importance to you, Mr. Mer----" (he pretended to correct himself) "to you, Senator, as well as to me."

"Wait a minute," said Merriam. He put his hand over the mouthpiece and looked at Rockwell.

"Tell him you will see him at eight o'clock this evening, here."

Merriam repeated this message.

"At _eight_?" said Crockett, with significant emphasis on the hour. "Very good, Senator. Thank you." He hung up.

Rockwell and Merriam turned to the others. Aunt Mary and the rest had risen. They were standing by their places about the table, looking rather scared.

"_Eight_ o'clock?" questioned Aunt Mary, with an emphasis similar to Crockett's.

"Yes," said Rockwell doggedly. "Because"--he addressed Merriam--"your train goes at seven. At seven-thirty Miss Norman shall telephone Crockett, expressing your regret that you overlooked the fact that you would have to be gone by that time. Man alive!" he cried. "Don't you see? The Senator can't be sick now--after your public appearance this noon. Half the people who count in Chicago saw you--him, there--right as a trivet--obviously perfectly well. And we can't keep _you_ here, with Crockett and Thompson continually nosing 'round. There's nothing for it but for you to start on that trip. The trip's a godsend. Write your telegram to Riceville!"

Merriam glanced around the circle of faces. Mad as the thing was, they all seemed to agree with Rockwell. Mayor Black and Mr. Wayward and even Simpson seemed to be asking him, as man to man, to stand by them. Father Murray was timidly expectant. Dr. Hobart, he noticed, was staring down at the table as if in thought. Aunt Mary, looking him full in the eyes, gave an affirmative nod. Alicia's eyes and shoulders registered appeal as conspicuously as if she had been a movie actress. And Mollie June seemed to be begging him not to desert her.

With a gesture of resignation he went over to the writing table and sat down to compose his third mendacious telegram to Riceville.

*CHAPTER XXVI*

*THE BUSINESS OF BEING AN IMPOSTOR*

The writing of that telegram occupied Merriam for several minutes. He was distracted by scruples. He did not like lying, and he felt, truly enough, that he was cheating his employers, the Board of Education of Riceville, and the patrons of the school, and his boys and girls, by staying away from the work he was paid to do.

When, after a last momentary hesitation, he wrote his name and looked up, he found Simpson standing by him, ready to take the message. He noticed the man's new air of cheerfulness.

But he had no time to reflect on this phenomenon, for the party was breaking up.

There were four of them left--Merriam and Rockwell, Aunt Mary and Mollie June.

"Well," said Rockwell, with a sigh, "we're off again. You'd better go to your own room--Mr. Wilson's room. I promised the reporters to see them at half past four, and it's nearly that now. You'll need to pack. Take these speeches with you. I'll let you know when the taxi comes."

In a moment Merriam was crossing the Senator's room. Involuntarily he cast a glance at the sick man in the bed. In a small chair by the head of the bed Mollie June was sitting, her eyes on her husband. She looked up as Merriam traversed the room, met his gaze soberly for an instant, and then looked back at Norman.

Merriam passed through the door on the other side into his own room. He closed the door softly behind him, set the portfolio on a chair, and put his hand to his forehead. The tiny connubial tableau of which he had just had a glimpse had brought home to him, as nothing before had done, the fact that Mollie June really was another man's wife. The acute realisation left him blank. He crossed over, sank into a chair by the window, and stared out across the fire escape. Another man's wife! And he loved her. Of course he loved her, just as he had always done. And she loved him, a little at least. That such a thing should happen to him--and her! Because he had been a coward three years ago in Riceville!

How long he sat dully revolving such thoughts as these he had no idea. He was startled by the opening of the door from the Senator's bedroom. He sprang to his feet with the involuntary thought that it might be Mollie June--though of course she would have knocked. It was Simpson.

"Shall I pack your things, sir?"

"Why--yes," said Merriam.

He knew from novels that the valet of the hero always packs his bag. Evidently Simpson had come in this capacity. To Merriam's American self-sufficiency it seemed an absurd practice. Why shouldn't any man put his own things into a grip for himself? But he was glad of company.

"You can help," he added, and took a couple of steps in the direction of the bureau, with the idea of taking things out of drawers.

"Oh, don't bother, sir!" said Simpson quickly. In his tone there was something subtly patronising. For he who has been a butler and a waiter and a valet among the real elite feels even himself to be socially superior to the unbutlered and unvaleted.

"Simpson," said Merriam suddenly, "you've seen Jennie!"

Simpson stopped absolutely still for a moment with a couple of folded shirts in his hands. Then he placed the shirts in the suit case, straightened up, and looked at Merriam.

"Yes, Mr."--he hesitated and decided to use the real name--"yes, Mr. Merriam, I have. I went out there this morning, as you suggested."

"She let you in?"

"Yes she did. She let me sit down on the sofa with her, and we had a long talk. I ended by asking her again to marry me--and she said she would."

"And she kissed you!" Merriam cried gaily. He had for the moment forgotten his own troubles in Simpson's happiness, for which he rightly felt he might claim some credit, and in an appreciative recollection of Jennie's temperament. Within a dozen hours she had also kissed Crockett and himself. But Jennie was born to kiss.

Simpson looked quickly at the younger man and returned to his packing. "Yes," he said, "she did."

Merriam regretted his exclamation, which had, in fact, told too much. For several minutes he watched in silence the deft, efficient work of his companion. Then he asked:

"When is it to be?"

"The wedding, sir?"

"Yes."

"As soon as you and Mr. Rockwell can spare me, sir."

Simpson closed the hand bag, closed the suit case and strapped it.

"Is there anything else I can do, sir?"

"I believe not."

The waiter hesitated. Then he decided to speak what was in his heart:

"I am very greatly indebted to you, sir," he said, with an admirable combination of dignity and feeling. "You have made a happy man of a very wretched one and have--saved a young girl who was on a very wrong track. If ever I can render you any service, you can always command me, sir."

Merriam sprang up and advanced, holding out his hand.

"I'm tremendously glad," he said. "I have accomplished one thing anyway with all this miserable imposture."

Simpson shook his hand heartily. Then:

"Shall I leave you now, sir?"

"Why, yes, please," said Merriam. He was loth, to be left alone, but there was clearly nothing more to be said between him and Simpson.

In a moment the waiter had withdrawn through the door into the Senator's bedroom. Merriam's thoughts followed him into that room, where Mollie June doubtless still sat by her husband's bed.

But just then a knock sounded at the hall door. He looked up startled. He was not expecting any one to approach from that direction. Who could have any business with "Mr. Wilson"?

Another knock. Merriam hesitated. Should he go to the door, or simply sit tight till the knocker became convinced that there was no one within and went away? He decided upon the latter course. Any one whom he ought to see Rockwell would bring to him.

A third time the knock sounded, discreet but persistent. Then suddenly a key was inserted in the lock and turned, the door opened, and in stepped--Crockett!

Merriam sprang to his feet but did not speak.

"Thank you," said Crockett over his shoulder--to whom Merriam could not see.

He closed the door and advanced:

"Is it Mr. Wilson?" he asked ironically, "or Mr. Merriam--or Senator Norman?"

"Is it Mr. Crockett, the financier, or a house-breaker?" Merriam retorted.

Mr. Crockett laughed, but it was an unpleasant, forced laugh.

"Since you do not answer my question," he said, "I don't see that I need answer yours. See here," he continued, with a change of tone, "how much is it worth to you to turn over to me those pictures you took last night--films and all, of course--and get out of this?"

"You won't accomplish anything by insulting me!" cried Merriam, a flare of youthful anger somewhat impairing his dignity.

"Insulting you!" echoed Crockett sneeringly. "My dear sir, as a complete impostor you can hardly expect to get away with that pose. I'll admit you're good at it. That impersonation of the Senator before the Urban Club this noon was a masterpiece. But what's the game? Does Rockwell really suppose he can swing Senator Norman over permanently to the so-called Reformers? Let me tell you that as soon as the real Norman is on his feet again Thompson and I and the rest of us will get hold of him and bring him around in no time. We know too many things about your handsome Boy Senator. He can't shake us now. So what's the use? Unless," he added suddenly, "the plan is to kill him off and substitute you permanently!"

"Hardly so desperate as that," said Merriam, smiling. The other man's long speech had given him time to recover himself.

"Well, then, why not make a good thing out of it for yourself and get away while you can? It isn't as if no one had suspected you. _I_ not only suspect but know. I haven't told any one else yet, but you can hardly expect me to keep your secret indefinitely."

"You forget the pictures," said Merriam, as sweetly as he could.

Crockett obviously mastered a "damn" and chased the expression that rose to accompany it from his face.

"Let's keep to business," he said. "How much is Rockwell paying you for this job?"

"No monetary consideration has been mentioned between us," said Merriam. It was the truth, of course, but perhaps he need not have been so stilted about it.

"You surely don't expect me to believe that. Come! Whatever the amount is, I'll double it. All I ask of you is, first, to hand over to me the pictures, and, second, to pick up your bags, which I see are already packed, and walk out of that door with me. We'll step across the street to my bank, I'll pay you the sum in cash, and you can skidoo. No exposure is involved, you see--of you or your friends. I'm not revengeful. I don't need to be. All I have to do is to wait until I can get hold of Norman. In the meantime you get clear of a situation that otherwise is likely to prove very nasty for you personally and very nasty likewise for your Reformer associates. You will note that I trust to your honour to give me all the copies of the pictures and not to sting me on the amount I am to pay you."

"Honour among thieves?" queried Merriam.

"Who's insulting now?" Crockett demanded.

"I am," said Merriam. "At least, I'm trying my best to be. Mr. Crockett, you spoke of walking out of that door. I'll thank you to do that very thing--at once! If you don't, I'll call in Mr. Rockwell, and we'll put you out. I'm tempted to try it by myself, but I don't care to risk any noisy scuffling."

"Prudent young man!" sneered Crockett, retreating nevertheless in the direction of the hall door. "I understand that you reject my offer?"

"I certainly do."

"Very good. I hereby serve notice on you that I shall immediately expose the whole of your atrocious masquerade! It will be the ruin of you and Rockwell and Norman and Mayor Black and every other person who has been mixed up in it. Oh, you'll be a nine days' wonder in the city, but no one of you will ever have a scrap of public credit again!"

"And on the following day," retorted Merriam, "those pretty pictures we know of will be published in _Tidbits_. They'll be running sketches called 'A Financier in a Flat' in every music hall in town."

"You blackmailer!"

"On the contrary you've tried to get me to take blackmail and I've refused it."

With a sound remarkably like the snarling "bah" which regularly accompanies the retreat of the foiled villain of melodrama, Crockett turned towards the door through which he had been invited to depart. But in the course of the three or four steps which he had to take to reach, that exit he recovered something of his dignity and finesse.

Having opened the door, he turned and bowed ironically.

"Good evening, Senator," he said. "I'm afraid I shall be prevented from keeping my appointment with you at eight. If you should change your mind within the next half hour, you can reach me by 'phone at the Union League. Otherwise, look out!"

On this warning note he closed the door behind him.

Merriam found himself with a whirling brain. As a quiet pedagogue he was not accustomed to scenes of battle such as he had just passed through. He walked up and down and mechanically lit a cigarette.

As he did so, his mind seized upon one question. Who had unlocked the door for Crockett? Some chambermaid or bell boy? Or the floor clerk? At any rate it must have been done with her connivance and by her authority, for she was the commanding general of Floor Three. Why had she done or permitted this outrageous thing? Suddenly Merriam recalled her studied ignoring of him on the last two occasions of his passing her desk, and compared it with her whispered "The violets are lovely" when he first asked for Senator Norman's key. There had been something between her and Norman. He, Merriam, in taking on the Senator's role had dropped out that part of it, and she was offended. How seriously he could not tell.

He concluded that he must attempt to reinstate himself--Norman--in the pretty floor clerk's good graces, and rather hastily decided upon a plan, He went to the telephone and asked for the hotel florist. How much were violets? Well, they had some lovely large bunches for five dollars. This figure rather staggered the rural pedagogue, but he promptly asked to have one of those bunches sent up at once to "Mr. Wilson," giving his room number, 325. He would present his peace offering in person. "I am sure these flowers will look lovely on your desk--or if you will wear them at your waist?" he would say, or something of the sort. This was probably not the way Senator Norman would have done--he would have run no such open risk,--but we must make allowances for Merriam's inexperience.

But he never carried out his ill-conceived plan. For he had barely left the telephone when he was arrested by a light knock on the door leading into the Senator's bedroom. This time he was sure it was Mollie June, and he was right.

When he opened the door she stood there with a finger at her lips.

"Aunt Mary has taken my place with George," she said in a low tone. "She says I may give you some tea. It will be late before you can get your dinner on the train. Would you like it?"

"Tremendously," said Merriam sincerely.

"Come into the sitting room, then."

She crossed the sick room to the door at the other side which led to the sitting room, and he followed, with a nod to Aunt Mary, who now sat by the sleeping Senator's bed.

Arrived in the sitting room, he was further delighted to find that neither Rockwell nor Simpson was present. It was to be a genuine tete-a-tete. By one of the windows stood a small table with the tea things upon it, the kettle already singing over an alcohol flame. Beside the table stood a large armchair and a small rocker.

"The big chair is for you," said Mollie June, seating herself in the rocker and adjusting the flame.

"Thank you," he said and sat. Then a mingling of pleasure and embarrassment held him awkwardly silent.

Mollie June was apparently quite composed.

"George is ever so much better," she said. "He was awake a few minutes ago, and he seemed almost well. He has only a very little fever left."

She smiled brightly at Merriam, who dimly realised that it was to the fact that her mind was now at ease about her husband that he owed this treat.

Mollie June set a brightly flowered cup on a saucer to match and placed a small spoon beside it. Then she took up the sugar tongs, and her hand hovered over the bowl.

"One lump or two?"

"Two, please," said Merriam, noting the slenderness and whiteness of the fingers that held the tongs and the pinkness of the small nails. (Why else except to display charming fingers and nails were sugar tongs invented?)

"Lemon or cream?"

Merriam was sophisticated enough to know that the right answer was "Lemon," but he preferred cream, and an admirable instinct of honesty led him to say so.

Through the open window came the pleasant air of the spring afternoon. The canyon-like street without, being an east-and-west street, was flooded with sunlight. With the breeze there entered also the stimulating roar of the city's lively traffic. The breeze stirred Mollie June's soft wavy hair. It also caused the alcohol flame under the brass kettle to flutter and sputter, and Mollie June leaned forward to regulate it. The youthful firmness of her cheeks and chin showed like a lovely cameo in the bright light, which would have been unkind to an older face. Having adjusted the flame, she suddenly looked up at Merriam and smiled.

"Mollie June," he cried, "there is nothing lovelier in the world than your eyes when you look up and smile like that!"

He had not meant to say anything of that sort, but it was forced out of him.

Mollie June's smile lingered, and the cameo became faintly, charmingly tinted. But she evidently felt that some rebuke was needed.

"_Mrs._ Mollie June, you must remember," she said gently.

Then, taking up her cup and leaning back in her small rocker, she asked:

"How did you get along with the speeches?"

"Not very well," said Merriam. He hesitated in his mind whether to tell her of Crockett's interruption but decided not to. It would take too long--he could not waste the precious minutes so. "I'll have the dickens of a time with them," he added.

"Oh, no, you won't!" she cried, as if shocked at the idea. "You were wonderful this noon. I was so proud of you."

"You had a right to be," said Merriam. "It was because you were there that I could do well." Which was perhaps partially true.

"Why don't you go into it yourself?" asked Mollie June.

"Public life? Perhaps I will. I may go back to the University for a law course and then try to get into politics."

This plan had just occurred to Merriam, but he did not disclose that fact. In uttering one's inspirations to a pretty woman one usually presents them as though they were the fruit of mature consideration.

"That would be fine," said Mollie June without much enthusiasm. "But you'll be at Riceville next year?"

"I suppose so. I'll have to save up a bit more."

"I may be at home for Christmas," she said. "I'll see you then."

Merriam considered this painfully.

"No," he said at last slowly. "I shan't be there. I shall be away for the holidays."

"You could stay over," said Mollie June, wonderingly reproachful.

"I suppose I could. But I mustn't. Just to see you--publicly, is too hard on me. And if I see you alone like this,--I say things I oughtn't to--make love to you."

Mollie June sat drooping, with downcast eyes, her cup in her lap.

Suddenly he was on his knees beside her. He put his arms about her, to the great peril of flowered china.

"Mollie June!" he whispered. He softly kissed her cheek.

She raised her eyes and looked deep into his.

"John!" she whispered back, though she seemed to struggle not to do so.

After a moment he smiled sadly and got to his feet.

"I mustn't have any more tea," he said, as if that beverage was too intoxicating, as indeed under the circumstances it was.

Fortunately--since of all things what they needed was a diversion,--Merriam at that moment became conscious of a portentous knocking on a distant door. He realised that it was on the door to "Mr. Wilson's" room and remembered. The flowers--for the floor clerk!

He hurried to the hall and called the boy from the second door down the corridor, where he was about to pound again.

In a moment he reentered the room, bearing a lovely great bunch of fragrant English violets--and thinking hard. But he was equal to the emergency.

He advanced to Mollie June, who stood now with her back to the window, her slender form outlined against the light, her face in shadow.

"I've never given you anything, Mollie June," he said. "These are for you--and the sick room." He held them for her to smell.

She took them from him, barely touching his hand as she did so, and buried her face in them for a long minute. Then she raised her eyes to him over them.

"Thank you, Mr. John," she said with a sad smile.

And just then Aunt Mary entered from the Senator's bedroom.

"See what Mr. Merriam has ordered for George!" said Mollie June. "Isn't he thoughtful?"

"Very," said Aunt Mary, in her customary dry tone.

*CHAPTER XXVII*

*THE CODE TELEGRAM*

Rockwell had returned with Alicia. He briskly declared that it was time to start for the train. Mayor Black, it appeared, was below in his car and was going to the station with them.

"I've told Simpson to take your bags down. Except the portfolio. You'd better keep that in your own hands. What progress with the speeches?"

"Not much," said Merriam. "But I shall have the whole evening on the train. I'll get them."

He crossed the sick room, where Dr. Hobart was now bending over the Senator, apparently making an examination. He thrust the pile of manuscripts back into the portfolio. Then, after a glance about the room, reminiscent of his burglarious entry the night before, he caught up his coat and hat and returned to the sitting room again.

"Are we ready?" he asked of Rockwell.

"Waiting for Hobart--for a final report on the Senator's condition."

"Aren't you coming to the station with us, Mollie June?" Alicia was saying.