Part 4

"All because of me, sir," replied Rockwell, in excellent spirits. "The Mayor abhors me and all my works so sincerely that I feel I have not lived in vain.--Now, then, sit in that big chair before the fireplace. Here, light this cigar. I'll start the gas log going and bring in the tray with the siphon and glasses and rye that I saw in the other room.--Ah!"

The telephone had rung, and Merriam had leapt out of his chair.

"Answer it," said Rockwell.

Merriam stepped to the telephone, which was on the wall, laid down his cigar, gripped his nerve hard, and put the receiver to his ear:

"Hello!"

A deep voice, boomingly suave, replied:

"Senator Norman?"

"Yes."

"This is Mr. Black. Have you got rid of Rockwell yet?"

"No, not yet."

"Well, can't you throw him out? I am due at the Council meeting at nine, of course. And I don't care to discuss--matters--with you in his presence, naturally. When shall I come up?"

Now the Mayor's rather long speech had given Merriam time to think. He recalled his great idea, and a new inspiration, as to ways and means, came to him.

"Eight-thirty," he replied curtly.

"But, good God!" cried the Mayor, "that gives us so little time. Can't you----"

"I said eight-thirty, damn you!"

And Merriam hung up and turned to face Rockwell at his elbow.

"But why eight-thirty?" demanded the latter as soon as he understood that it had been the Mayor. "Man alive, we ought to be gone by then! What are we to do with the next twenty minutes? You must have lost your head. Call him again. Call the desk and have him paged and told to come right up."

Without a word Merriam turned to the telephone again and asked for the desk.

But a moment later he gave Philip Rockwell one of the major surprises of the latter's life. For what he said was:

"Please page Mrs. George Norman, with the message that Senator Norman would like to see her right away in their rooms. Repeat that, please.--That's right. Thank you!"

"What in hell!" cried Rockwell, belatedly released by the click of the receiver from a paralysis of astonishment.

Merriam picked up his cigar, walked back to the easy chair, and seated himself comfortably. He was excited now to the point of a quite theatrical composure.

"Nothing in hell," he said. "Quite the contrary, in fact. I want to have a few minutes' conversation with Mrs. Norman. That's all."

"See here!" said Rockwell. "What funny business is this? I won't have----"

"Won't you? All right. Just as you say. If you don't like the way I'm playing my part, I'll drop it and walk right out of that door. I have a ticket for the theater to-night. I can still be in time."

The other man stared and gulped. It was hard for him to realise that this young cub was master of the situation, and not he, Rockwell.

"But this is serious!" he cried. "The Ordinance! The Reform League! The whole city of Chicago! You can't risk these for----"

He stopped. Then:

"Do you realise, you young fool, that if we're caught in this room, it will mean jail for both of us?"

But Merriam in his present mood was incapable of realising anything of the sort. In his mind's eye he saw Mollie June stepping into the elevator and saving in a voice of heavenly sweetness to the happy elevator man, "Three, please!"

An outer crust of his consciousness made pert reply to Rockwell:

"That would be bad for the Reform League, wouldn't it?" and added, "But you're willing to risk it for the Ordinance?"

"Yes, I am," began Rockwell, "but----"

"Would you risk it for Alicia?" Merriam interrupted.

"What has Alicia got to do with it?"

But he understood, and knew that argument was useless, and stared in helpless anger and alarm while the younger man carefully, grandly blew a beautifully perfect smoke ring into the air.

It was the youngster who spoke, still theatrically calm:

"You'd better go into the bedroom. She'll be here in a moment. Shut the door, please. And keep away from it!"

It was one of the secrets of Philip Rockwell's success in politics that, masterful as he was, he knew when to yield. He took a step towards one of the bedrooms.

"Make it short," he pleaded.

"Eight-thirty!" said Merriam.

A gentle knocking sounded at the door.

Merriam was on his feet without volition of his own, while Rockwell, almost as instinctively, slipped into the bedroom.

Then the younger man recovered himself, sat down, his feet to the gas log and his back to the door, and called, "Come in!"

*CHAPTER VII*

*BOY AND GIRL*

The door was opened and closed. John Merriam's straining ears could catch no definite sound of footsteps or skirts, and he did not dare to look around. Yet by some sixth sense, it seemed, he was aware of Mollie June's progress half way across the room and aware that she had stopped, some feet away from him.

"What is it--George?" she asked.

It was only too clear that Mollie June's lord and master was not in the habit of sending for her.

"Where is--Miss Norman?"

Merriam was conscious that Senator Norman probably did not refer to his sister in that fashion, but he did not know her given name.

"Aunt Mary? I left her in the lobby. Did you want her too?"

There was a note of eagerness in the question.

"No!"

Silence. Mollie June stood waiting in the center of the room. The significance of her failure to approach her husband was unmistakable.

Then he said: "Would you very much mind if you should miss the theater to-night?"

"Why--no. Is there anything the matter, George?"

"Not for me," said Merriam, and he rose and faced her.

"I was afraid--" She stopped, looked hard.

"George, you look--oh!"

She passed her hand across her eyes. It was a stage gesture, but when stage situations occur in real life the conventional "business" of the boards is often justified.

She looked again.

"Mr. Merriam!"

John Merriam stepped quickly forward. It occurred to him that she might faint. He had read many novels.

But Mollie June did nothing of the sort.

"Mr. Merriam!" she cried again. "How do you come here? Where is--Mr. Norman? How did you get in _that_?"

She pointed to the famous smoking jacket. Her bewilderment was increasing. She looked nervously about, as if suspecting that Merriam, for the sake of the crimson garment, had murdered her husband and concealed his body.

Merriam had stopped. Almost he might have wished that she had fainted. It would have been delicious to carry her in his arms and place her in the Senator's easy chair and bring water and when her eyes opened wonderingly upon him softly whisper her name. As it was he could only say formally:

"Let me take your cloak--Mrs. Norman--won't you? And sit down."

Mechanically she let him take the opera cloak from her shoulders, and when he caught hold of the senatorial chair and swung it around and pushed it towards her she sat tremblingly erect on the edge of it. Her eyes dwelt upon his face as if fascinated.

"Isn't it funny you look so _much_ alike? I never realised it--so much. But--where is _he_? Why----?"

Merriam caught up a small chair, placed it in front of hers, and sat down.

"Listen, Mollie June," he said pleadingly, using unconsciously the name that ran in his thoughts.

His plan, as it had taken shape while he talked with Mayor Black on the telephone, was to tell her in advance of Rockwell's plot and to carry it through only with her approval or consent--for was not his first loyalty to her? His original idea, and his real motive, of course, had been only to see her. And now that he had her there he found he hated to waste time on explanations. But there was nothing for it. She could not be at ease or clear in her mind until she understood. So, rapidly and candidly, he related how at the instance of Mr. Rockwell the Senator had been decoyed away, while he was there to impersonate him with Mayor Black, so that the latter should sign instead of vetoing the Traction Ordinance. Then he waited for he knew not what--amazement, fright, anger, dissuasion.

But Mollie June did not seem much interested in traction ordinances. Presumably Senator Norman had not cared to educate his young wife about political matters.

"Why did you send for _me_?" she asked.

Her question was almost too direct for him. He could not say, to ask her approval of the plan against her husband.

"I had to see you," was all he could reply.

"Why?"

But she knew the real reason. The turning of her eyes away from him confessed it.

It was his chance to say, "Because I love you." An older man might have said it. But the young are timid and conventional--not bold and reckless, as is alleged. He remembered that she was another man's wife and only spoke her name:

"Mollie June!"

Perhaps that did as well. In fact it was, in the reticent dialect of youth, the same thing.

She looked at him a moment, then quickly away again.

"You never called me that but once before--to-night," she said.

At first he found no answer. His mind scarcely sought one. He was absorbed in merely looking at her. She was indeed girlishly perfect as she sat there, almost primly upright, in her white frock, her slender figure framed in the rose-coloured tapestry of the big chair's back and arms, which gave an effect as of a blush to her cheeks and to the white shoulders which he had never seen before except across the spaces of the Peacock Cabaret. To the eyes of middle age she would have been, perhaps, merely "charming." In his she shone with the divine radiance of Aphrodite. And his were right, of course.

He was almost trembling when at length he said:

"That was on--that last night."

"Yes," said Aphrodite, who is always chary of speech.

Suddenly he saw that her averted face was wistful, sad.

"Are you happy, Mollie June?" he cried.

Though she turned only partly to him he saw that her eyes were more a woman's eyes than he had known them and were full of tears.

"Not--very," she said.

He sat dumbly on his chair, full of pain for her, yet not altogether saddened that she should not be entirely happy with another man.

But now her face was fully towards him, and her eyes had become dry and looked past him.

"Oh, Mr. Merriam--you don't know! I can't tell you----"

He was filled with horror--almost boyishly terrified--by such dim visions as a man may have of what her lot might be.

"If I could only help you!" he cried, as earnestly as all the other separated lovers in the world have said those very words.

The eyes that looked beyond him came back to his face. The Mollie June whom he had known had had her girlish poise, and this more tragic Mollie June did not lose her self-control for long.

"You _have_ helped me--Mr. Merriam. Oh, I am glad you brought me here! When I saw you in--the Cabaret, I just ran away from you. I couldn't even let you speak to me. Afterwards I waited upstairs in the lobby. I thought--I might see you there. But you didn't come. Then I thought George had sent for me!"

She stopped as if that was a climax.

Merriam leaned forward. He wanted to put his hand over one of hers that lay on the arm of her chair, but did not dare to. His tongue, however, was released at last.

"If ever I can help you in any way, Mollie June, you must let me know. I would do anything for you. I will always be ready."

He paused abruptly, though only for a second. A dark thought had crossed his mind: after all the "Boy Senator" was an old man (from the standpoint of twenty-eight), and leading a life unhealthy for old men. He hurried on:

"I will wait for you always. Perhaps some day----"

Did she comprehend his meaning? He could not tell, and he did not know whether to hope she did or did not. But stress of conflicting emotions made him venturesome. He did put his hand over hers.

Hers did not move.

His fingers slipped under hers, ready to raise her hand.

"That last night in Riceville, Mollie June, I kissed your--glove. To-night I want to kiss your hand--to make me yours--if you should need me."

She did not draw her hand away, but she said:

"You oughtn't to--now--Mr. Merriam."

The formal name by which she had continually addressed him pricked.

"Won't you call me 'John,' Mollie June, just for this quarter of an hour before the Mayor comes?"

"Oh, the Mayor!" she cried in alarmed remembrance.

"Call me 'John,' dear--for fifteen minutes!"

In his voice and eyes were both entreaty and command, and Mollie June could not resist them.

"John!" she whispered.

And he raised her hand and bent quickly forward, and his lips pressed her fingers. A bare second. Yet it was in his mind a solemn, a sacramental kiss. He straightened up triumphant, happy. Youth asks so little.

"Now you know you have a right to me!" he cried. "To send for me. To use me any way, any time!"

There came a loud knocking at the door.

Mollie June started half way out of the chair and then sank back. Merriam, on his feet and part way across the floor, stopped confused. He perceived that he ought to get Mollie June out of the room.

The knocking resounded again. And immediately the door was tried and opened, and a man stepped in. It was the large man with the white hair who had started to enter the elevator--Mayor Black.

*CHAPTER VIII*

*PASSAGES WITH MAYOR BLACK*

Mayor of the great city of Chicago was hurriedly apologetic:

"I beg your pardon, Senator. You said eight-thirty, you know, and it's that now. I came up and knocked. Evidently you did not hear. A man I met in the lobby told me that you had left the hotel in a taxi half an hour ago. He said he saw you go. So I tried the door and when it opened stepped in, just to make sure. I am sorry to have intruded."

Apparently, however, he did not intend to withdraw.

Mollie June crouched frightened in her chair, but Merriam was rapidly pulling himself together.

"It is I who should apologise for keeping you waiting, Mayor Black," he said. "I will ask Mrs. Norman to excuse us. Will you step into the next room for a few minutes, Mollie June? We shall not be long."

He went back to her chair and held out his hand.

She took it and rose. Her spirit, too, was reasserting itself. She faced the Mayor with a smile:

"Good evening, Mr. Black."

"Good evening, Mrs. Norman." He bowed gallantly. "I am very sorry----"

"Oh," she cried lightly, one would have said happily, "business is business, I know." Then to Merriam: "You won't belong?"

"Only a minute--dear."

(Perhaps we can hardly blame him for profiting by the license his role gave him to address her so.)

He moved to the door opposite to that through which Rockwell had slipped away fifteen minutes earlier and opened it for her. She passed through into the darkness of the other room. He felt for the switch and pushed it.

As the light went on she turned and smiled at him:

"Thank you."

For an instant it seemed to him--perhaps to both of them--that she was really his wife, who was leaving him for a few minutes only, whom he would soon rejoin.

Then he turned to face Mayor Black.

"I need stay only a minute, Senator," the Mayor was saying. "If I had known you were engaged with Mrs. Norman, I shouldn't have bothered you. It wasn't really necessary. I met Mr. Crockett downstairs while I was waiting. He told me the answer. But since I had the engagement with you I came up. If I may, I'll write the veto right here, and then I can go on to the Council meeting."

As he spoke he drew a thick roll of paper from his overcoat pocket, unfolded it, opened it at the last sheet, and laid it on a small writing table.

"I shan't give any reasons," he added, sitting down and picking up a pen. "Least said, soonest mended--eh, Senator?"

"But you're not to veto! You're to sign!" cried Merriam.

Perhaps if he had more fully grasped the significance of the other's statement about Mr. Crockett he would have been less abrupt; but that mighty financier was only a dim name to his mind.

"What?" said Black, turning in his chair.

The Mayor's tone gave Merriam some realisation of the seriousness of the new situation. But he could only stand to his guns.

"You're to _sign_! I don't care what Crockett said. I don't care a damn what he said," he corrected himself. "You do what I say, damn you!"

"But how is this?" exclaimed the Mayor. "Crockett said you fully agreed that the best interests----"

He stopped, looking intently at Merriam.

In the excitement of the dialogue which had followed Merriam's sending for Mollie June Rockwell had neglected the precaution he had had in mind of having only side lights on. Rockwell had planned, also, that Merriam should sit facing the gas log with his back to the room and look at the Mayor as little as possible. Now the boy stood where the full glare of the chandelier shone on his face. Perhaps, too, the emotions of a youthful love scene, such as he had just passed through, were not the best preparation in the world for counterfeiting the slightly worn cheeks and slightly tired eyes of an elderly if well-preserved politician.

"Who in hell are you?" gasped the Mayor.

Merriam was certainly startled. Perhaps he showed it just a little. But he stood up bravely.

"You know damn well who I am. And you do as I say or get out of Chicago politics. I'll attend to Crockett," he added. "That's my affair."

"Is that so? Well, I guess it's my affair who makes a monkey of me! I----"

Again the Mayor stopped abruptly and stared. Then suddenly he rose.

"I was told the Senator had left the hotel. I think I was correctly informed. What sort of a trick is this? Who _are_ you?"

"Damn you----" Merriam began, with realistic sincerity, but with the vaguest ideas as to what more substantial statement should follow.

At this moment, however, Rockwell opened his door and stepped into the room.

"Aha!" cried the Mayor. No stage villain could have said it better. "Mr. Rockwell! Of the Reform League, I believe!" He bowed sardonically. "'One-Thing-at-a-Time Rockwell!' Well, one thing at a time like this"--he pointed at Merriam--"ought to be enough for a reformer!"

"Good evening, Mayor Black," said Rockwell. "I believe you were about to sign the Ordinance."

"I was _not_. In spite of the _Senator_ here. I don't get a chance to defy Senator Norman every day. I rather enjoy it!--And let me tell you," he added, "if you and your friends in that damned League make any more trouble for me or Senator Norman or the Ordinance or anything else after this--if you don't shut up and lie low and keep pretty damn quiet, we'll show you up, my boy. This would make a pretty little story for the newspapers--and for the State's Attorney, too! We might call it 'The Ethics of Reform!' Oh, we have you where we want you now, Mr. Reformer! As for this young impostor here, we'll have to look him up a bit. A very promising young gentleman!"

The Mayor evidently enjoyed the center of the stage. He towered tall and imposing and righteous, and looked triumphantly from Rockwell to Merriam and back again.

"I really think you'd better sign it," said Rockwell. He spoke rather low.

"What do you mean?" cried the Mayor.

Then he thought he saw.

"Oh, it's strong-arm work next, is it?"

There was a note of alarm mingled with his irony, and the magnificence of his pose weakened a little. Rockwell was a determined-looking fellow, and there was Merriam to help him, and the Mayor was not really a very brave man. But he went on talking to save his face:

"You certainly are a jewel of a reformer, Rockwell!"

Then he saw a point and quickly recovered his full grandeur.

"I don't quite see how you're going to manage, though. Of course, if it were a case of _preventing_ me from signing, you might do it--the two of you! But signing's rather different, isn't it? You can lead a horse to water---- Of course, you can club me or hold a revolver to my head. But, you see, I know you wouldn't dare to fire a revolver here in this room. So just how will you force my fingers to form the letters? Or perhaps you will try forgery? Is forgery the next act, Mr. Reformer?"

Rockwell smiled. He was in no hurry to reply. Merriam still stood, as he had throughout this unforeseen dialogue, a rigid spectator.

Then, in the moment's silence, very inopportunely, a clock, somewhere outside, struck the hour--a quarter to nine.

Rockwell tried to drown it, saying, "I'm hardly so versatile as that."

But the Mayor had heard and understood.

"Oh, that's it!" he cried.

"Yes, that's it!" said Rockwell, and the center of the stage automatically shifted to him. "If that Ordinance is not returned to the Council with your veto by nine o'clock to-night, it becomes a law whether you sign it or not! You're a bit slow, Mr. Mayor, but you've got it at last!"

The Mayor did not answer. He shifted slightly on his feet. His hand shot out. He grabbed the Ordinance from the waiting table and rushed for the door.

"Catch him!" shouted Rockwell. "Hold him!"

Merriam had been a football player. As if released from a spring he darted after the Mayor. From habit he tackled low. They went down with something of a crash, knocking over an ash stand as they fell, and the Mayor gave a groan. If he had ever known how to fall properly, he had forgotten. Merriam hoped there were no bones broken.

But Rockwell was wasting no thoughts on commiseration. He was kneeling over the fallen ruler of the city with his hands clapped over his mouth--to prevent further groans or other outcry.

"Get the paper!" he said.

Merriam scrambled forward and tried to pull the Ordinance from the hand at the end of the outstretched arm. It was held tight. He was afraid of tearing it.

"Twist his arm," said Rockwell.

A very little twist sufficed. The Mayor gave up. Merriam rose to his feet with the document.

"Will you be quiet?" Rockwell demanded in the Mayor's ear, and released his mouth enough to enable him to answer.

"Yes," said the Mayor feebly. "Let me up."

"All right. That's better. If you make any rumpus we'll down you again, you know, and tie you up and gag you.--Give me the paper," he added to Merriam, "and help him up, will you?"

He stood watching while the younger man assisted the Mayor in the ponderous job of getting on his feet.

"I hope you aren't hurt, sir," said Merriam.

The Mayor looked sourly at him. "Thanks!" He felt of his arms and passed his hands up and down over his ribs. "I guess I'm all right--except my clothes."

In fact his white shirt front was crumpled and his broadcloth coat and trousers were dusty with cigar ash from the fallen stand. Merriam was in little better condition. They were not dressed for football practice. Rockwell only was still immaculate.

"I'll get a brush," said Merriam. No longer a Senator, he felt very boyish and anxious to be useful.

As he spoke he turned to the room--the fall had occurred near the door into the hall--and stopped nonplused. For in her bedroom door stood Mollie June, her eyes full at once of eagerness and of apprehension.

How much she had heard I do not pretend to know. Perhaps some of Merriam's unprofessorial profanity, possibly the Mayor's triumphant irony, certainly Rockwell's shout, "Catch him!" and the fall. Doubtless the silence after that thud had been too much for her self-control.

The Mayor's rueful gaze travelling past Merriam also rested on Mollie June. A light came into his eyes. He drew himself up.

"Come in, Mrs. Norman," he said. "Your _husband_"--with a significant emphasis on the word--"has been giving a demonstration of his athletic prowess. He is indeed the Boy Senator and a suitable mate for a woman as young and pretty as yourself."

He paid no attention to Merriam's angry and threatening glance but turned to Rockwell.

"Mr. Rockwell," he said, "I think you'd better give me that Ordinance after all."

Rockwell spoke in a low tone to Merriam:

"Get her out!"

The Mayor had no objection to that. The older men watched while Merriam walked rapidly across the room to Mollie June.