The Guarded Heights Part 30

When he arose Allen wore an air of getting through with a formality. He insisted on the fact that his candidate was working his way through college, and would always be near the top scholastically. He represented a section of the cla.s.s that the more fortunate of the students were p.r.o.ne to forget. And so on--a condensation of his complaints to George.

The room filled with suspense, which broke into loud laughter when Allen named a man of absolutely no importance or colour, who couldn't poll more than the votes of his personal friends. A trick, George guessed it, and everyone else. But Wandel was quickly moving that the nominations be closed. Allen glanced around with a worried, expectant air. Then George saw that Rogers was up--a flushed, nervous figure--and had got the floor. He spoke rapidly, nearly unintelligibly.

"My candidate doesn't need any introduction," he recited. "All factions can unite on him--the man that smashed the Yale and Harvard Freshmen.

The man who is going to smash the Yale and Harvard varsities this year--George Morton!"

A cheer burst out, loud, from the heart. George saw that it came from both sides. The poor men had been stampeded, too.

Goodhue was on his feet, his arms upraised, demanding recognition.

Suddenly George realized what this meant to Goodhue, and temper replaced his amazement. He sprang up, shouting:

"I won't have it----"

A dozen pairs of hands dragged him down. A dozen voices cried in his ears:

"Shut up, you d.a.m.ned fool!"

XXIV

Goodhue got the floor and withdrew his name, but the chairman wouldn't see or hear George. He declared the nominations closed. It was as if he and all the lesser men, who weren't leading factions, had seen in George the one force that could pull the cla.s.s together. The vote was perfunctory, and Allen lazily moved to make it unanimous. George took the chair, frowning, altogether unhappy in his unforeseen victory. He had a feeling of having shabbily repaid Goodhue's loyalty and sacrifice, yet it hadn't been his fault; but would Goodhue know that?

"Speech! Shoot something, George! Talk up there, Mr. President!"

He'd give them a speech to chew over.

"Back-door politicians have done their best to split the cla.s.s. The cla.s.s has taken matters into its own hands. There isn't going to be a split. It won't be long before you'll have Prospect Street off your minds. That seems to be two thirds of the trouble. Let's forget it, and pull together, and leave Princeton a little better than we found it. If you think anything needs reform let's talk about it openly and sensibly, clubs and all. I appreciate the honour, but d.i.c.k Goodhue ought to have had it, would have had it, if he hadn't been born with a silver spoon.

Ought a man's wealth or poverty stand against him here? Think it over.

That's all."

There was no opposition to Goodhue's election as Secretary.

Allen slipped to George at the close of the meeting.

"About what I'd have expected of you, anyway."

But George was looking for Goodhue, found him, and walked home with him.

"Best thing that could have happened," Goodhue said. "They're all marvelling at your nerve for talking about Prospect Street as you did."

George spied Rogers, and beckoned the freshly prominent youth.

"See here, young man, please come to my room after practice."

Rogers, with a frightened air, promised. Wandel appeared before, quite as if nothing had happened. He wouldn't even talk about the election.

"Just the same, Warwick," George said, "I'm not at all sure a poler named Allen couldn't tell you something about juggling crowns."

"A penetrating as well as a great president," Wandel smiled. "I haven't thanked you yet for joining our club."

George looked straight at him.

"But I've thanked d.i.c.ky for it," he said.

Rogers, when he arrived after Wandel's departure, didn't want to confess, but George knew how to get it out of him.

"You've put your finger in my pie without my consent," he said. "I'll hold that against you unless you talk up. Besides, it won't go beyond Goodhue and me. It's just for our information."

"All right," Rogers agreed, nervously, "provided it doesn't go out of this room. And there's no point mentioning names. A man we all know came to me this morning and talked about the split in the cla.s.s. He couldn't get Goodhue elected because he didn't have any way of buying the support of the poor men. Allen, he figured, was going to nominate a lame duck, and then have somebody not too rich and not too poor spring his own name, figuring he would get the votes of the bulk of the cla.s.s which just can't help being jealous of Goodhue and his little crowd. This chap thought he could beat Allen at that game by stampeding the cla.s.s for you before Allen could get himself up, and he wanted somebody representative of the bulk of the cla.s.s, that holds the balance of power, to put you in nomination. He figured even the poor men would flock to you in spite of Allen's opposition."

"And what did he offer you?" George sneered.

Rogers turned away without answering.

"Like Driggs," Goodhue said, when Rogers had gone. "He couldn't have what he wanted, but he got about as good. Politically, what's the difference? Both offices are in his crowd, but he's avoided making you look like his president."

George grinned.

"I don't wonder you call him Spike."

XXV

George, filled with a cold triumph, stared for a long time at Sylvia's portrait that night. If she thought of him at all she would have to admit he had come closer. At Princeton he was as big a man as her rich brother was at Yale. He belonged to a club where her own kind gathered.

Give him money--and he was going to have that--and her att.i.tude must alter. He bent the broken crop between his fingers, his triumph fading.

He had come closer, but not close enough to hurt.

The Baillys and Betty congratulated him at practice the next day.

"You were the logical man," Betty said, "but the politicians didn't seem to want you."

Bailly drew him aside.

"It was scandal in the forum," he said, "that money and the clubs were an issue in this election."

George fingered his headgear, laughing unpleasantly.

"Yes, and they elected a poor man; a low sort of a fellow with a shadowed past."

"Forget your past," Bailly pled, "and remember in the present that the poor men, who helped elect you, are looking for your guidance. They need help."

"Then," George said, "why didn't they get themselves elected so they could help themselves?"

"Into the world there are born many cripples," Bailly said, softly.

"Would you condemn them for not running as fast as the congenitally sound?"

"Trouble is, they don't try to run," George answered.

He looked at the other defiantly. Bailly had to know. It was his right.