The Dual Alliance Part 17

"Lord, Mrs. Trent, I don't know when the man eats or sleeps. I don't think he does much of either."

"How can I find out where he is to speak to-night? He does not know I'm here and I want to surprise him."

"We've got some hand bills here."

"Thanks! I'll be here until to-morrow night."

She went to her own sitting-room which Trent was supposed to use during her absence. She ventured into his rooms, which looked unused and cheerless. She had a bath, dressed with unusual care, dined alone in her room studying Paul's itinerary between bites. Eight meetings announced him as headliner, with Cooper Union as the climax. She shook her head over it; he would be dead of weariness.

At eight o'clock she called a taxi and started to the first meeting. She could not get within a block of the place. She tried the next and the next with the same results, so she ordered the driver to Cooper Union, hoping to beat the crowd there, as Paul was not announced until late.

She paid her man and joined the ma.s.s of people wedged into a solid block of resistance before the building.

"Is the hall full?" she asked the policeman.

"Full? Sure, it's been full since six o'clock, Ma'am."

"What's the attraction?"

"Paul Trent, the nixt governor, is speakin' here to-night."

"He must be popular."

"Sure he's popular. He's got the right dope, that feller. He's the people's ch'ice, all roight, all roight."

"I couldn't possibly get in there, could I?"

"The governor's wife couldn't git in. If ye had a platform ticket ye might get in there."

"How do I get to the platform door?"

"I'll get ye through. Have yer ticket ready."

He pushed and beat a way for her to the stage door, which was guarded by a fellow officer.

"Tickut, lady?" he demanded.

"I want to see Mr. John Kent."

"He's Trent's manager. He's with him at the other meetings."

"Who has this meeting in charge?"

"If ye haven't got yer tickut, it's no use," he said, inspecting her suspiciously.

"The idea of one Irishman sayin' no use to another," she laughed.

"Are ye Irish?"

"Phwat's the matter with yer eyes, man?"

He grinned.

"Give me your pencil."

He obeyed. She wrote on her card and handed it to him. "You get that to the chairman of the meeting."

He read it deliberately.

"Fer the love av the green!" said he. "'Tis yersilf. I seen ye at the Comedy Theatre onct. Well, well!"

The chairman himself hurried to the door to meet her in reply to the summons.

"Miss Garratry-- I should say, Mrs. Trent, this is a pleasure."

"I'd no idea I had to have a pa.s.sport to hear my own husband speak."

He led her in.

"Let me sit back where no one will see me, please. Mr. Trent has no idea I am in town. I'd rather he didn't see me until after his speech."

The chairman nodded, but he was much too astute a stage manager to let this opportunity pa.s.s. They stood at the back of the stage until the speaker finished, and then with an air he led Barbara down the very middle of the stage to a seat in the front row.

"So sorry," he said, "the back seats are all full."

Then he took the stage and introduced the next speaker, smiling at Barbara in such a way that every eye in the great mob was fixed upon her. The speaker began the regulation political speech, and Bob gave herself up to an excited study of the house, black with people to the very dome. She was too well versed in audiences not to feel its quality.

In the meantime Paul was making slow progress from one meeting to the next. In the cab between stops he tried the mechanical transposition of himself into the mountains, according to Bob's suggestion. He must find some way to rest his tired brain. He pretended that he was sitting in the theatre in Boston watching Bob's play; he repeated the midnight walk they once took up the avenue. He wished he might ask her advice about the speech at Cooper Union. It would count a good deal, and her experienced knowledge of the psychology of audiences had helped him out many times before. She would know just the most effective thought to leave in the minds of the men who were to answer him at the polls to-morrow.

For the first time he felt the need of her, not as brain or partner, but just as woman and wife. He wanted to put his tired head down on her shoulder and feel her cheek on his hair, her tenderness about him. He roused himself with a start.

"What meeting is this, John?"

"Eighth. Twenty-fifth ward."

"Cooper Union after this!"

"Yes. It's eleven now; we ought to make it by eleven-thirty."

"Bother. We won't get through before one," said Paul, thinking of the long distance call to Boston.

Back at Cooper Union the speaker sawed the air, and yelled himself hoa.r.s.e, in the approved political speaking style of the old school. The crowd was bored with him. They kept up their enthusiasm by yelling, just to keep awake. When the orator sat down, some man in the audience leapt to his feet.

"Mr. Chairman," he shouted, "let Bob speak. She can tell the truth about Paul Trent--she's married to him."

In a flash the house had grasped the idea.

"We want the Governor's lady! We want the Governor's lady!" they chanted. The place was a roar of sound. Bob's heart clamped tight with terror. She turned a white face to the chairman, who stood with raised hand, trying to quiet them. It was like pushing back the waves of the sea, the sound surged higher and more tempestuous. Into Bob's atrophied mind pierced the thought that this was her chance to help Paul, that she could play her own popularity to forward his cause, if she had the nerve.