Part 10

Morehead and Flomerfelt pulled Wilkinson down into his seat and held him there while a court officer stood over him threateningly. For a brief instant, only, Gilchrist let his cold, judicial gaze meet the hot belligerence of Peter V. Wilkinson; then he rose, gathered his robes about him, and passed on to his private chambers.

Immediately four New York newspaper men boldly took possession of the bench and got three flashlights of Wilkinson struggling in the grasp of his attorneys. It took less than three-quarters of an hour to clear the court-room, but within that time New York was reading the headlines: "Ten years at hard labour in State's Prison for Peter V. Wilkinson, the multi-millionaire." As a piece of news it was unquestionably quite worth while; and in an incredibly short space of time London and Paris had it; that night Constantinople had it; the world had it and gloated over it.

* * * * *

"What are they going to do to you, father?" cried Leslie, when two uniformed officers laid hands upon Wilkinson.

"That's what I'd like to know," he answered in alarm.

"Take him to the Tombs, of course," spoke up one of the officers. "What else is there to do?"

"No, I won't go back there! I refuse ..." cried Wilkinson, struggling.

Morehead laid a detaining hand upon the officer's arm.

"Wait a minute, officer," he said. "We'll file a notice of appeal inside of ten minutes. We're having it prepared now. We'll give bail--renew the bond...."

Murgatroyd stepped forward and said, clipping his words off as he spoke:

"I shall oppose this man's release on bail pending an appeal, unless his present bail is increased to double the amount."

"A million dollars! What are you talking about!" exclaimed Morehead.

"I'm talking about the new rule," returned the District Attorney; "and you know just as much about it as I do." And then smiling significantly he added: "I think Judge Gilchrist will do pretty much as I say. Maybe he'll ask for more because of your client's outburst when sentenced. If you want to see the Judge, come along with me."

"And in the meantime, Chief, shall we lock him up?" queried an officer.

"Wait a bit," put in Leech, courteously glancing at Leslie. "Suppose Mr. Wilkinson stays in my room until"--he looked at the Colonel now--"you can give bail this afternoon, can't you?"

"Not if it's a million dollars. Murgatroyd, this man has got to rely upon his daughter's money," he pleaded. "We couldn't raise a million dollars in a month."

"Yes we can," snapped Wilkinson, the cold sweat standing out on his forehead. "We can raise twice that in an hour."

There was an interval of silence in which Morehead tried to look unconcerned, and Murgatroyd winked at Leech.

"I thought he had it somewhere," whispered the District Attorney to his assistant.

With this proof before him that he was standing in the presence of a man far from bankrupt, Leech became doubly attentive.

"I think I can accommodate Mr. Wilkinson in my private office until five o'clock," he suggested smoothly. "Two officers can remain on guard outside, Chief. Is that all right?"

Murgatroyd nodded a tentative assent before saying:

"Come, Colonel, and we'll see the Judge...."

And an hour and a half later the bail had been fixed and matters arranged by Morehead and his colleagues with the surety company. But when the Colonel was back again in Leech's private office, he whispered to Wilkinson:

"Where's your nerve, you confounded idiot! Now you've given the whole thing away! If you'd gone back to the Tombs for a few days longer...."

Wilkinson gave him a look of withering scorn, and measuring his words carefully, declared:

"I'll never be locked up, Morehead, again--anywhere. I told you once, and I tell you now for all time, that they'll never get Peter V. Wilkinson again behind the bars."

Colonel Morehead made no comment, but favoured him with an enigmatical smile. After a moment or two, he went on to explain that if Wilkinson had kept quiet they could have hunted up some of his friends and had the thing fixed up in forty-eight hours; that now, after what had happened, everybody, and especially Ougheltree and the _Morning Mail_, would know that he had this money tucked away somewhere; and that before long they'd find out where the rest of it was, concluding with: "Somebody'll get it, Wilkinson--they'll get at it."

Wilkinson resented, with a shrug of the shoulders, this interference with what he considered his business, and made no answer. But turning to Leslie, he said irritably:

"Leslie, just put your name on the back of these things, will you. The surety company is waiting for them."

Leslie's face showed a peculiar change; and she turned the certificates over to read them before attaching her signature.

"Half a million more!" she gasped. "Why, I don't own that much, father. They can't be mine to sign away, can they?"

"Do as I tell you," ordered her father, gruffly, taking them out of her hand and turning them face down. "Sign your name on the back of every one of them." And when she had done so, he said to a waiting messenger: "There, now, Surety Company, fork over that new bond." And motioning to Morehead: "Call Leech--there's his bail."

XII

Peter V. Wilkinson was taken to his home in his big Mastodon car. With him, besides the chauffeur, were his daughter Leslie and Colonel Morehead. The news of the verdict, the sentence, and the release on bail had travelled even faster than the sixty-horse-power machine whose passengers had to fight their way through an impacted mass of humanity which filled the sidewalk and the street in front of Wilkinson's big place on the Drive. But then it was not every day that people had the chance to look upon an ex-multi-millionaire who had been sentenced to ten years at hard labour and had given a million-dollar bail!

With difficulty they reached the door, and a moment later it closed upon them.

"Where's Mrs. Wilkinson?" asked the multi-millionaire of the first footman he came across. And in an aside to Morehead: "I suppose the missus will have a few remarks to make."

He was informed that Mrs. Wilkinson was in her room and feeling poorly,--"Very, very poorly," the servant had been told to say,--a condition of late chronic with the lady. And she had developed another alarming condition: her increasing avoirdupois, the disappearance of the last remnants of her charms, the palpable bankruptcy of her husband, and her envy of her step-daughter Leslie--the only member of the household who still had grace of mind and face and figure, to say nothing of wealth--all these had developed in the lady a latent ferocity, a tigerish temper which seemed to hold unlimited force behind it. All over the great house her shrill virago's voice could be heard terrifying the servants; in short, her sudden rise to power was, perhaps, best described by another member of the household. "The missus rules the roost now," was the way her husband put it, and he knew whereof he spoke. Indeed, for that matter, Wilkinson, himself hitherto fearing no one, and priding himself in the fact, actually trembled now during the few moments that he was compelled to be in the lady's presence.

"Colonel, you've got to come with me," begun Wilkinson.

"Not I," was the brief refusal.

"You've got to come if I have to pay you to do it," insisted the husband. "I won't go up alone."

And Colonel Morehead would probably have used an even more forcible expression of refusal to do the husband's bidding had he known that at that very moment his right-hand man was closeted upstairs with his wife, and was telling her,-- with one of his inscrutable smiles,--a smile that was intended to convey that it rested wholly with him whether Wilkinson would get off or not,--that Wilkinson was convicted, because the men who took the witness stand happened to tell the truth and had ended emphatically with: "The whole truth, and nothing but the truth."

But it happened that when they entered on tiptoe the lady's boudoir--Morehead having been finally persuaded, much against his will--the lady did not deign to acknowledge Morehead's presence, but sobbed out to her husband:

"You did not stop to consider me! Why did you let them do this thing to you? It all falls on me. The intolerable disgrace, shame, humiliation! You, a felon, a convict, a common thief, a forger!" One after another she hurled these epithets at him, while Flomerfelt discreetly withdrew.

Wilkinson looked at Morehead for sympathy; then he answered with illy assumed contrition:

"Yes, my dear."

"I can't face anybody--not my dearest friends," went on the lady. "I shall never be able to go anywhere again--never."

Wilkinson grinned feebly at his lawyer.

"They say I won't, either, for the next ten years," he said, in soothing tones.

His jibe aroused the sleeping tigress in her. The lady rose and pointed toward the door. Her gown was a masterpiece of dressmaking art, for singular as it may seem her income had not been stopped. Upon her breast lay jewels worth many thousands; about her neck was clasped a dog-collar weighted with heavy pearls; and her fingers sparkled with gems.

"You can go!" exclaimed the lady, stamping her foot--this lady who would have been nobody without the wealth that this man had lavished on her. "All these years you've considered everybody but your wife," she went on. "I've had to bear the brunt of it all. I--I.... The idea of you letting them send you up for ten years, of heaping all this infamy on me! I shall sue for divorce, do you hear, divorce!"

"Yes, my dear," said Wilkinson, again meekly glancing at his counsel.

"Go!" she exclaimed; then added with commendable melodramatic force: "You and your paid hireling there, leave me!"

Colonel Morehead grew purple in the face. He advanced toward his client's wife.

"Madam," he began angrily.

"Come, Morehead, come away!" exclaimed Wilkinson, and he led him out into the hall where he said: "Don't you know she'd have scratched your face if you'd stayed there any longer?"

Tumultuously they descended the stairs and crept into the den on the floor below.

"That's over," sighed the husband, setting the decanter on the table and passing the cigars. And for a while, at least, the two men smoked in peace.

* * * * *

Blissfully happy was the condition that Leslie told herself that she was in that evening. They had assured her after the council of war behind closed doors that everything would come out right. And now, last but not least, Beekman was alone with her and telling her the same thing.

"The verdict is ridiculous," he said. "Public prejudice, that's all. The Appellate Division will fill it full of holes."

"You're sure?" she asked, still a trifle dubious.

Beekman smiled confidently.

"Look here, Leslie," he returned consolingly, "lots of rich men have been indicted and tried lately, haven't they? You haven't heard of any of them having been imprisoned so far, have you? It's just a bit of hysteria, but the Appellate courts don't get hysterical. We'll win out upon appeal."

"There's--there's something, Eliot, I wanted to say to you." She hesitated a moment, and then went on: "If I'd been on that jury and a murderer had been on trial, after hearing your defence, no matter what I knew your man had done, I would have acquitted him, I know. I think you're wonderful!"

"If only our jury had felt as you feel, Leslie," he responded soberly. "If only they had acquitted," --and he was looking into her eyes now,--"why, things would be different to-night, so far as you and I are concerned."

The girl flushed prettily, but did not dare to meet his glance.

"We're going to fight it to a finish, aren't we?" she faltered.

"That's the compact," he returned. "You're right--we'll fight it to a finish--first."

"To see you, Miss Wilkinson." The voice was that of Jeffries, and he was handing her a card. Leslie took it and, turning slightly pale, started to leave the room. Before going out, however, she stopped and made her excuse to Eliot, begging him to wait until she returned. In the hall she asked Jeffries where her caller was to be found; she was told that he was in the music-room. In front of the door she paused and considered a moment. Not that she was not genuinely grateful for all that Leech had done for her father that afternoon, but out of all that day's experiences one thing clung to her memory more persistently than any other: the audacious admiration in the glance of the man who had spoken to her in the court-room and was now waiting for her.

However, she swept into the room and held out her hand.

"Miss Wilkinson," said Leech, meeting her half way and holding her hand in his longer than necessary, "I had to come here to explain my part in your father's prosecution. Personally I am not responsible for it. I am a mere machine. Murgatroyd presses the button and we--I start up and go through the day's work, willy nilly. I wanted you to know, as I said before, that I am not responsible."

Never once did the man's eyes leave the girl's face; his look was one of bold admiration. He wanted the dainty girl before him, wanted the things that she stood for: the ease, the excitement, the power that great wealth brings. Besides, he was assured of something that Beekman did not even suspect, that Leslie, even, didn't know, and that was that Peter V. Wilkinson had somewhere millions upon millions, and that the man who married Leslie Wilkinson would sip the nectar of the gods from the first tolling of the marriage bell.

"I know, Mr. Leech, you merely did your duty," she answered somewhat coldly, lowering her eyes under his frank gaze. "We have intelligence enough for that. We're not altogether narrow here."

"I wanted to be sure that you understood my position," he proceeded, "to feel that my sympathies are with your father--with you. Yes, to the extent that were I a free agent, and not bound by my oath to the People, I'd turn in and work my fingers to the bone for your father." He moved a little closer to her, and added significantly, "for you."

When Leslie returned to Beekman, singularly enough, she said nothing to Beekman of the Assistant District Attorney's brief visit; nor later did she mention it to her father. It would have disturbed Beekman; it would have pleased Wilkinson; but she could not know that.

XIII

It was a beautiful day in the early part of Summer. On the deck of the _Marchioness_, only a short time ago put in commission, Peter V. Wilkinson was lying back in his steamer chair, luxuriously. New York was experiencing one of the season's first hot days, but under the awning of the after deck of the _Marchioness_, and out of sight of land as she was, a delicious ocean breeze made life worth living, so it seemed, at any rate, to the two men sitting there, ever and anon calling to the steward, and refreshing themselves with Wilkinson's choicest wines and liqueurs with which the yacht was stocked.

"Do you know," remarked Wilkinson with a short laugh, as he threw over the side an unfinished cigar and lighted a fresh one, "I ought to have taken Leslie's original advice--ought to have sailed away on the _Marchioness_ when they indicted me."

"You'd be in the thick of the trouble, Peter," returned his counsel sagely.

"Huh!" grunted Wilkinson, "don't know but I'll do it now, and take you with me, Colonel."

"Don't care if you do. It would end my troubles."

Wilkinson tapped the Colonel on the knee.

"Tell me, Colonel, how much money does that blatherskite get a year?"

"What blatherskite?"

"Gilchrist--the chap that had the nerve to sentence me."

Morehead told him; Wilkinson opened wide his eyes.

"You don't mean to tell me that's all he makes--his salary?"

The Colonel nodded.

"And do you mean to tell me that a man who only gets that much a year has the power to put away a man like me--can do a thing like that? What are we coming to in the United States?"

The Colonel laughed heartily.

"That man Gilchrist is a marked man from now on," went on Wilkinson. "His degradation has begun. He sentenced me all right; and I've sentenced him. I'll see to it that he's hounded out of New York. Any man that tries to set himself up before me--may stand up for five minutes or so, but he'll go down as sure as death and taxes. Every man that's prosecuted me, touched me, laid his hands on me physically or figuratively, is going to get it. I've got a heavy hand, Morehead, and they're going to feel it. They're going to know it's me. Gilchrist will get his, first."

The lawyer sniffed the breeze and closed his eyes in ecstasy.

"Oh, come now, Peter ...! I haven't enjoyed a day like this in years."

"You don't suppose I brought you along to have you enjoy yourself?" bluntly.

"No, I wouldn't credit you with that nobility of character, Peter. But I'm here no matter what your purpose may have been, and I propose to enjoy myself."

The multi-millionaire received this remark in silence. Colonel Morehead was one of the few independent men he had ever met. Wilkinson could never quite make him out, and therefore was afraid of him. As a matter of fact, Morehead's code was a simple one: he merely did his duty towards his clients in his own way; and if they didn't like it, that was their affair and not his. His acquired indifference was his greatest capital.

"At any rate," growled his host, "I suppose I'm paying you by the minute all the time you're here."

"Presume you are, Peter," sweetly answered the Colonel; "and that's a pleasure, too, to both of us, I'm sure."

"Business before pleasure is my motto, you know," resumed Wilkinson. "I brought you out here to have a quiet talk where even Flomerfelt or Patrick Durand cannot hear it. I haven't been able to pin you down to my case since my conviction. Look here, Morehead," he went on appealingly, "we'll reverse this sentence a hundred times over, eh?"

The Colonel, who had been sprawling lazily across his steamer chair, at this drew himself up to a sitting posture.

"Now look here, Wilkinson, we've appealed this case, and we've filed a bond, and you're out on bail...."

"And we'll win out on appeal?"

"I was about to remark," went on the lawyer, quietly, "that your case will go first to the Appellate Division, then to the Court of Appeals, then--maybe to the United States Supreme Court. Then a few certificates of reasonable doubt, motions, stays, etc. It will take months, months, even if they rush it through. There's no hurry about discussing it; we can take our time."

Wilkinson was about to speak, but Morehead raised his hand.

"Since we're talking business, Peter, I may as well get to it, so that you can enjoy your pleasure afterward." He got up, yawned and stretched himself. Then looking Peter straight in the eye, he added: "What I wanted to impress upon you is, that after our last card is played, this conviction and this sentence are going to be----"

"Reversed, as sure as guns!" cried out Wilkinson.

"This conviction and this sentence," went on the lawyer, ignoring the interruption, "will be affirmed." And so saying he leaned back in his chair and puffed away contentedly. A moment later he added: "Now, Peter, business is over, let's enjoy ourselves. What do you call that thing yonder--a schooner or a hermaphrodite brig?"

His wealthy client swaggered to the fore once more.

"Do you mean to tell me that a man who's worth a hundred million is actually going to serve ten years in State's Prison at hard labour? That's nonsense!"

"I mean precisely what I say," said Morehead, his voice ringing prophetically, "that this verdict and this sentence are going to be affirmed."

"I'll spend five--ten million to reverse it."

"Spend it, then, and I'll help you, and when you're through you'll know that I spoke the truth--affirmance, not reversal." He stopped abruptly, then rising and plunging his hands deep in his trousers pockets, he suddenly put the question to him: "I wish you'd tell me, Peter, whom your daughter is going to marry? I'm interested."

"What the devil has that got to do with this case?"

"By the way," went on Morehead, ignoring purposely the other's outburst, "where is your daughter now?"

"Home."

"Then you'd better swing the _Marchioness_ about. When you get home you can find out if you do not already know."

"How should I know? There's a dozen cubs hanging around--none of them good enough for her. Leslie's got to marry well."

"Has she? A fine chance she has, with her father a convict under a prison sentence! Come, come, man, why don't you give your captain orders? I want to know whom this girl of yours is going to marry--and right away."

Wilkinson chuckled.

"Might send a wireless...."

"You'd get a most remarkable answer, Peter." Morehead was now striding up and down, nervous, energetic strides they were, for he had shaken off his tendency to enjoyment. "I say," he went on, "I haven't heard you mention a word about the political situation so far; you're usually pretty enthusiastic."

"How can a man be enthusiastic about politics when he's got the sword of Damocles over his head."

"You're going to open fire on Gilchrist, aren't you?"

"Sure."

"That's politics," said Morehead, "and now that we're on the subject, I want you to do me a favour. Wilkinson, I want my man put up for governor this year, and I want your backing, you understand--your influence, your money, all to back my man. Can I count on you, Peter?"

Wilkinson thought a moment before answering.

"Who is your man?"

"Um," smiled Morehead, "I don't know that--yet."

* * * * *

A short time after Wilkinson's return from the yachting trip, Leslie received a message that her father would like to see her. She found him with an unlighted cigar between his fingers sitting in his big arm-chair in the Den, gazing into space, his face like a mask.

"You sent for me, father, and I came," she said, entering, a faint smile on her lips.

"I sent for you," he told her in a level unemotional voice, "to find out something--something that you can tell me if you will. Strange things are happening nowadays. There are matters I'd like to settle before----"

"Before what?" she asked, startled.

"Before I plunge into this appeal and forget everything else," he answered easily; but now with just enough anxiety in his manner to alarm her, he repeated: "There's something that I've got to know--something that only you can tell me, girlie."

"I'll tell you anything, father," she answered softly.

Wilkinson caught her by the hand and drew her to him, asking so suddenly that she started: "Who's the man you're going to marry?"

The girl disengaged herself from her father's embrace. The blood rushed to her face, and she laughed a little uneasily. After a moment she answered:

"How can I tell! He--nobody's asked me. Has anybody asked you, father?"

Wilkinson chuckled over her reply, though her evasiveness slightly irritated him.

"Come," he said, "is it Berry Broughton, or Larry Pendexter, or Montgomery?" Her father rattled on without giving her a chance to answer, the girl's face growing more and more scarlet as he proceeded.

"It must be Eliot Beekman or Tommy Cadwalader," he declared, searching her face. But still Leslie made no answer, though there was the same embarrassed flush upon her countenance.

"Well, can't you tell me who it is?" he questioned impatiently.

"I don't know," she protested, "really, I do not."

"But I've got to know," persisted her father.

But whether she could not or would not tell him, his efforts were unsuccessful, for she merely fled in a panic from the room. So that it was in a voice whose tone was one of defeat that he called out:

"You can come now, Colonel!"

From the heavy curtains Colonel Morehead emerged--a grim figure lying in ambush, he seemed, as he asked:

"Well! who's the lucky man?"

"Blamed if I could find out."

"But I did. Eliot Beekman is the lucky man, Peter."

"How do you know?"