A Poor Wise Man Part 29

"Why, what's the matter with the room?" he said. "Just wait until I've got busy in it! I'm a paper hanger and a painter, and--"

"You're a dear, too," said Edith.

So on the first of May he moved in, and for some evenings Political Economy and History and Travel and the rest gave way to anxious cuttings and fittings of wall paper, and a pungent odor of paint. The old house took on new life and activity, the latter sometimes pernicious, as when w.i.l.l.y Cameron fell down the cellar stairs with a pail of paint in his hand, or Dan, digging up some bricks in the back yard for a border the seeds of which were already sprouting in a flat box in the kitchen, ran a pickaxe into his foot.

Some changes were immediate, such as the white-washing of the cellar and the unpainted fence in the yard, where w.i.l.l.y Cameron visualized, later on, great draperies of morning glories. He papered the parlor, and coaxed Mrs. Boyd to wash the curtains, although she protested that, with the mill smoke, it was useless labor.

But there were some changes that he knew only time would effect.

Sometimes he went to his bed worn out both physically and spiritually, as though the burden of lifting three life-sodden souls was too much.

Not that he thought of that, however. What he did know was that the food was poor. No servant had been found, and years of lack of system had left Mrs. Boyd's mind confused and erratic. She would spend hours concocting expensive desserts, while the vegetables boiled dry and scorched and meat turned to leather, only to bring pridefully to the table some flavorless mixture garnished according to a picture in the cook book, and totally unedible.

She would have ambitious cleaning days, too, starting late and leaving off with beds unmade to prepare the evening meal. Dan, home from the mill and newly adopting w.i.l.l.y Cameron's system of cleaning up for supper, would turn sullen then, and leave the moment the meal was over.

"h.e.l.l of a way to live," he said once. "I'd get married, but how can a fellow know whether a girl will make a home for him or give him this?

And then there would be babies, too."

The relations between Dan and Edith were not particularly cordial. w.i.l.l.y Cameron found their bickering understandable enough, but he was puzzled, sometimes, to find that Dan was surrept.i.tiously watching his sister.

Edith was conscious of it, too, and one evening she broke into irritated speech.

"I wish you'd quit staring at me, Dan Boyd."

"I was wondering what has come over you," said Dan, ungraciously. "You used to be a nice kid. Now you're an angel one minute and a devil the next."

w.i.l.l.y spoke to him that night when they were setting out rows of seedlings, under the supervision of Jinx.

"I wouldn't worry her, Dan," he said; "it is the spring, probably. It gets into people, you know. I'm that way myself. I'd give a lot to be in the country just now."

Dan glanced at him quickly, but whatever he may have had in his mind, he said nothing just then. However, later on he volunteered:

"She's got something on her mind. I know her. But I won't have her talking back to mother."

A week or so after w.i.l.l.y Cameron had moved, Mr. Hendricks rang the bell of the Boyd house, and then, after his amiable custom, walked in.

"Oh, Cameron!" he bawled.

"Upstairs," came w.i.l.l.y Cameron's voice, somewhat thickened with carpet tacks. So Mr. Hendricks climbed part of the way, when he found his head on a level with that of the young gentleman he sought, who was nailing a rent in the carpet.

"Don't stop," said Mr. Hendricks. "Merely friendly call. And for heaven's sake don't swallow a tack, son. I'm going to need you."

"Whaffor?" inquired w.i.l.l.y Cameron, through his nose.

"Don't know yet. Make speeches, probably. If Howard Cardew, or any Cardew, thinks he's going to be mayor of this town, he's got to think again."

"I don't give a tinker's dam who's mayor of this town, so long as he gives it honest government."

"That's right," said Mr. Hendricks approvingly. "Old Cardew's been running it for years, and you could put all the honest government he's given us in a hollow tooth. If you'll stop that hammering, I'd like to make a proposition to you."

w.i.l.l.y Cameron took an admiring squint at his handiwork.

"Sorry to refuse you, Mr. Hendricks, but I don't want to be mayor."

Mr. Hendricks chuckled, as w.i.l.l.y Cameron led the way to his room. He wandered around the room while Cameron opened a window and slid the dog off his second chair.

"Great snakes!" he said. "Spargo's Bolshevism! Political Economy, History of--. What are you planning to be? President?"

"I haven't decided yet. It's a hard job, and mighty thankless. But I won't be your mayor, even for you."

Mr. Hendricks sat down.

"All right," he said. "Of course if you'd wanted it!" He took two large cigars from the row in his breast pocket and held one out, but w.i.l.l.y Cameron refused it and got his pipe.

"Well?" he said.

Mr. Hendrick's face became serious and very thoughtful. "I don't know that I have ever made it clear to you, Cameron," he said, "but I've got a peculiar feeling for this city. I like it, the way some people like their families. It's--well, it's home to me, for one thing. I like to go out in the evenings and walk around, and I say to myself: 'This is my town.' And we, it and me, are sending stuff all over the world. I like to think that somewhere, maybe in China, they are riding on our rails and fighting with guns made from our steel. Maybe you don't understand that."

"I think I do."

"Well, that's the way I feel about it, anyhow. And this Bolshevist stuff gets under my skin. I've got a home and a family here. I started in to work when I was thirteen, and all I've got I've made and saved right here. It isn't much, but it's mine."

w.i.l.l.y Cameron was lighting his pipe. He nodded. Mr. Hendricks bent forward and pointed a finger at him.

"And to govern this city, who do you think the labor element is going to put up and probably elect? We're an industrial city, son, with a big labor vote, and if it stands together--they're being swindled into putting up as an honest candidate one of the dirtiest radicals in the country. That man Akers."

He got up and closed the door.

"I don't want Edith to hear me," he said. "He's a friend of hers. But he's a bad actor, son. He's wrong with women, for one thing, and when I think that all he's got to oppose him is Howard Cardew--" Mr. Hendricks got up, and took a nervous turn about the room.

"Maybe you know that Cardew has a daughter?"

"Yes."

"Well, I hear a good many things, one way and another, and my wife likes a bit of gossip. She knows them both by sight, and she ran into them one day in the tea room of the Saint Elmo, sitting in a corner, and the girl had her back to the room. I don't like the look of that, Cameron."

w.i.l.l.y Cameron got up and closed the window. He stood there, with his back to the light, for a full minute. Then:

"I think there must be some mistake about that, Mr. Hendricks. I have met her. She isn't the sort of girl who would do clandestine things."

Mr. Hendricks looked up quickly. He had made it his business to study men, and there was something in w.i.l.l.y Cameron's voice that caught his attention, and turned his shrewd mind to speculation.

"Maybe," he conceded. "Of course, anything a Cardew does is likely to be magnified in this town. If she's as keen as the men in her family, she'll get wise to him pretty soon." w.i.l.l.y Cameron came back then, but Mr. Hendricks kept his eyes on the tip of his cigar.

"We've got to lick Cardew," he said, "but I'm cursed if I want to do it with Akers."

When there was no comment, he looked up. Yes, the boy had had a blow.

Mr. Hendricks was sorry. If that was the way the wind blew it was hopeless. It was more than that; it was tragic.

"Sorry I said anything, Cameron. Didn't know you knew her."