Jap Herron Part 15

"We'd better keep him locked up for his own sake," declared Tom Granger. "For in Bill's present frame of mind he's likely to make an orphan of himself."

Flossy came in from the little sitting-room and leaned over the bed.

"I am going to see Brother William," she said quietly. "I am going to take Brent Roberts with me. William will give you boys a quitclaim bill to this property, for this dastardly deed."

She was an impersonation of righteous wrath as she swept into the jail, followed by Bloomtown's leading attorney. Judge Bowers had said more than once that Flossy had a willing tongue, but its full willingness was never conceived until she descended upon him that eventful day.

An arrangement, made by Ellis just before his departure, gave the contents of the office to the boys, on regular payments to Flossy. The ground on which the new building stood had been deeded to Ellis and Flossy on their wedding day; but the building, presumed to be a gift to Ellis, had been reclaimed by Bowers; it was held, however, as Bill's share in the firm. As yet no occasion had arisen that demanded the settling of the question of ownership. Whenever the Judge had an attack of bile he came into the office to remind Bill and j.a.p that the building was still his.

For one heated hour Flossy detailed the past, present and future of her cowering brother. When she left him he was a wiser, and probably a sadder, man, for she had deprived him of his weapon.

There was a big bonfire on the circus grounds, and a celebration in Court House Square that night. The next day there was a great vacuum in the City Hall, for the Board of Aldermen resigned unanimously. A special election was called, and before j.a.p was strong enough to sit at his case he had been elected Mayor of Bloomtown.

He looked sadly from the window of his bedroom, after the joyous crowd of serenaders that had come to congratulate him. Bill had followed in their wake, to escort Rosy home. It was late. The clock in the Presbyterian church spire chimed twelve, as he stood alone. He took his hat from the rack and went cautiously downstairs. On the pavement he paused a moment to steady himself. His head still reeled after any unwonted exertion. Then he walked slowly up Main street, across the railroad tracks, and out to the quiet village whose inhabitants slept 'neath marble and sod. Standing beside the grave of his first friend, he said:

"Ellis, make the town proud of your boy. Help me to be your right hand. If I can only fulfill your plan, I am willing that no other ambition be fulfilled."

A lonely night bird called softly. The willow branches waved in the breeze. Thick darkness hung over the City of the Dead. Suddenly the moon peered through the clouds, flooding the night with beauty, and j.a.p read from the stone the last message of Ellis:

"I go, but not as one unsatisfied. In G.o.d's plan, my work will live."

CHAPTER XIII

"Now that you've got it, j.a.p," asked Tom Granger, "what are you going to do with it?" j.a.p looked silently from the door.

"He put in about eight hours of thinking about that himself," Bill averred. "News is that ten saloons are loaded on freight cars, waiting word from j.a.p."

"You'll have to strike a happy medium," suggested Tom. "I know that you are the boy to deliver the goods."

"Ellis wasn't against saloons," commented Bill, "so j.a.p won't have that to chew over. Ellis wasn't either for or against 'em."

"No," Tom said seriously, "Ellis was dead set against hypocrisy. He hated a liar and a grafter worse than a murderer. He knew that the way to make people want a thing was to tell 'em they couldn't have it."

j.a.p's face was grave. A panorama of wretched pictures moved slowly before his wandering gaze, pictures that began and ended in Mike's place, in the half-forgotten village of Happy Hollow. He aroused himself with a start.

"I'm going to put it up to the new Board to allow as many saloons as want to, to come in," he said shortly.

Tom Granger let go a shrill whistle.

"At the license asked," continued j.a.p calmly. "The license will be three thousand dollars a year, and strict enforcement of all laws. At the first break, the lid will fall."

"Jumping cats!" howled Tom. "Where will you get the saloon that'll pay that?"

j.a.p smiled wearily. "I am not hunting a saloon for Bloomtown," he said, and turned toward the door in time to b.u.mp into Isabel Granger, her arms full of bundles. She blushed and dimpled prettily.

"I am looking for my papa," she cried, pinching Tom's cheek with her one free hand. "I want you to carry these packages for me."

"Run along, pet. I'm busy."

"You look it," she reproved. "I simply can't carry all these things.

My arm is almost broken now, and the dressmaker has to have them."

"j.a.p will tote them for you," chuckled Tom, watching the blood rush over j.a.p's sensitive face. To his surprise, j.a.p took the bundles and walked out with Isabel. He looked after them approvingly.

"Now there goes the likeliest boy in the state," he declared. "It's plumb funny the way he's got of getting right next to your marrow bones. I wish I had a boy like him."

"No great matter," drawled Bill, with tantalizing indefiniteness.

Tom looked up at him quizzically, as he picked absently at the pile of exchanges. Something in the young man's tone piqued him.

"If j.a.p wasn't so all-fired conscientious," Bill blurted, "you'd have a son, in quick order."

"Lord!" exploded Tom. "Dunderhead that I am!" He slapped his thigh, and a great, joyous laugh set his shoulders to heaving. "Bill, you're a genius for spying out mysteries. How did you get on to it?"

"Mysteries!" shouted Bill. "Why, everybody in Bloomtown, including Isabel, knows that j.a.p is fairly sapheaded about her."

"Well, what's hampering him?" inquired Tom. "Why don't he confide in me?"

"Confide your hat!" remarked Bill crisply. "Isabel will die of old age before j.a.p asks her. You see, he is such a durn fool that he thinks he isn't good enough for her. When the Lord made j.a.p Herron He made a man, I tell you!"

"Who said He didn't?" stormed Tom. "I can't know what is in the boy's mind, can I? What do you want me to do, kidnap him and get his consent? Bill, you're a fool. You needn't tell me that j.a.p Herron is such a mealy-mouth."

"All I know is that he won't ask Isabel," Bill said gloomily. "I'd like to get married myself, but as long as j.a.p stays single, I stick too." And thinking of Rosy's blue eyes, he sighed heavily.

"It beats me, the way young folks do. It was different when I went courting," Tom muttered, turning to go.

At the door he met Kelly Jones, who had come in to inquire what j.a.p intended to do about the "licker" business. He was too busy with his fall plowing to be running over to Barton for his jug of good cheer, and he didn't like the brand he could get at Bingham's drug store, on Doc Connor's prescription. While he was still holding forth, j.a.p came in, with half-a-dozen const.i.tuents, all busy with the same problem.

Bill took up his notebook and wandered out. At Blanke's drug store he met Isabel. She motioned for him to come back in the store.

"What do you want to know, Iz?" he asked with the familiarity born of long years of propinquity. "Reckon you want to ask what everybody else wants to know--when is j.a.p going to get a saloon?"

"You are too smart, Bill Bowers," she retorted, with annoyance. She had had a subject of more personal nature on the tip of her tongue. "I think that j.a.p will be able to answer his own questions without any help from you."

"It is to be hoped that he will make a better stagger at answering than he does at asking," remarked Bill shortly.

"Now, Bill Bowers, just what do you mean?" she demanded, her black eyes flashing angrily.

"What's the use?" said Bill, in disgust. "Rosy says that she's going to Kansas this fall, and I just will have to let her go because I can't ask her to stay."

"Pity about you," she snapped. "Thought you said j.a.p couldn't ask."

"I did," a.s.sented Bill, "for if he had gumption enough to get married, or even go courting, I might get by. But as long as he sticks alone I'm going to stick, too."

Isabel's face flamed. She stooped to pick up a hit of paper.

"What do you want to tell me about it for?" she complained. "My goodness, I'm not to blame."