The Ramrodders Part 20

CHAPTER XII

DEALS AND IDEALS

There was no one in the smoking-room of the car, so the Duke discovered with relief. It was late, and the pa.s.sengers were in their berths. There was no one to spy, ask questions, or guess.

"Complete!" he grunted, satisfiedly, as he sat down. "We've come through with the job in good shape, Harlan. It'll have to be a mind-reader that finds out what I've put up to-day."

He swung his feet upon the seat opposite and sighed.

"I'm a pretty old man to be tearing 'round nights in this fashion, bub, but I feel younger by twenty years just this minute. Now I didn't tell you my plans this morning. Reckoned I'd wait till I had a clear view ahead. I've got it now. I'll wire ahead to the junction for our baggage to be brought from the hotel and put on board this train. We'll stay on.

State capital next. Down to Luke's place. We'll stay there till State Convention. Finger right on the pulse after this."

He called the porter and arranged for his berths, and ordered the telegram sent from the next station.

He began leisurely to unfasten his necktie and collar.

"Got to tell Luke, you know. A close corporation of four--that's enough to know it. Can't trust the rest. We'll let 'em keep their old political hen sitting on their china egg. We'll hatch the good egg in our own nest. Then for a glorious old cackle! Vard Waymouth will be the next Governor of this State! Sure!"

"And this State will have the right man on the job with him as Governor!" cried the young man, enthusiastically. "I'm proud of what you did to-night, grandfather. I don't believe he would have listened to anyone else."

"Friendship, comradeship, mean something when you get old, my boy."

"I hope they'll all know who did it when the time comes right. Some of the men who have been growling about you behind your back will have their mouths shut for them."

"You've been hearing the old man cussed thoroughly and scientifically, eh?" drawled the Duke. He squinted, quizzically. "Well, a man who stays in politics fifty years and doesn't make enemies, stays too close to the ground to be worth anything. Good, healthy, vigorous enemies are a compliment."

"I wonder whether his party will say that when General Waymouth starts out in his reforms."

"What reforms?" demanded the old man, tugging off his collar.

"You heard what he said--about what he intended to do--the warning, as he called it."

Thornton looked at his grandson serenely and with a glint of humor in his eyes.

"You don't have any idea, do you, that Vard Waymouth is going to play politics with sugar-plums instead of with the chips he finds on the table? Get your wisdom teeth cut, young chap. That's another branch of the science for you to learn."

Harlan protested, his loyalty a bit shocked.

"I believe that General Waymouth meant what he said."

"Well, what did he say?"

"You _know_ what he said. I saw you listening pretty closely, grandfather. He intends a square deal for this State. I may be young, and I probably don't understand politics, but I know an honest gentleman when I see one."

"My boy, there's no question of dishonesty here. Don't pick up any of the patter that the demagogues are babbling--and they don't know just what they mean themselves. He _is_ an honest man. Have I known him all my life without finding that out? But he isn't going to start out and clinch any reputation for honesty by turning his back on his own party and its interests--not for the sake of having the cheap demagogues of the other side pat him on the back and pick his pockets at the same time. He knows politics too well. But we won't sit up here to-night and discuss that. Keep your faith in him. He's worth it."

With his coat on his arm he started for his berth.

"The idea is, then, the party is going to make him stand first of all for things that will help the party, without much regard for what will help the people of this State as a whole? That's politics according to the code, is it, grandfather?"

"That's politics, my boy," stated the Duke with decision. "Once in a while you find a fellow splitting off and trying to play it different, but he doesn't last. Why the devil should he? It's his party, isn't it, that puts him on the job?"

"It's the majority of the people that do it, if he's elected."

"Don't get fooled on this 'people' idea, Harlan. The people are no good without organization--and organization _is_ the party. I don't want to discourage you, son. You'll see some opportunities where you can grab in and turn a trick for the general good of all hands. But you can't dump your friends. You've got to stand by your own party first. You do anything else, and you'll simply get the reputation of being a kicker and an insurgent. And then you can't spin a thread. Your own party doesn't want you and the other side is afraid of you. _Ideals_ are blasted good in their way, but in politics cut out the _I_ and attend to the _deals_. It's the only way you'll get anywhere."

Harlan sat alone for a while and thought. Rebellion seethed in him. But it was rebellion against something vague--protest that was more instinct than actual understanding. He still lacked the p.r.i.c.k of party enthusiasm; party, as he had seen its operations, stood for some pretty sordid actualities. One thing comforted him: he had not lost his faith in General Waymouth. His grandfather's cynicism had not destroyed that.

He realized that his youth and his lack of experience would make him a very humble cog in the legislative machinery. But he had youth and high hopes, and his creed from boyhood had been to do everything that he had to do resolutely and to the full measure of his ability.

When he looked at his watch he decided that he would not go to his berth. The train would reach the State capital shortly after four in the morning. He dozed in his seat, the grateful breath of the summer night fanning his face through the screen. The Duke found him there, appearing as he had departed, his coat on his arm, his collar in his hand. He was full of the briskness of the dawn in spite of his short rations of sleep.

"You mustn't think because you've found sins in the party that you've been picked out for the atonement, boy," he chided, jocosely. "Get your sleep--always get your sleep. I wouldn't have been alive to-day if I'd been kept awake by worry and wonder."

A cab took their luggage to the hotel. They walked up the hill. It was the old man's suggestion.

"It'll do us good. This air beats any c.o.c.ktail you can get over Luke's bar--and they serve as good a one as you'll get anywhere, even if this is a prohibition State."

"Wasn't it Governor Waymouth who signed the first prohibition bill in this State?" asked Harlan.

"Still dwelling on visions of reform, eh?" inquired his grandfather, smiling broadly. He did not reply immediately. He stepped ahead, for they were obliged to walk in single file past a man who was sweeping sawdust across the sidewalk. In the windows that flanked the open doors of his shop dusty cigar boxes were piled. The shelves within were empty.

Harlan recognized the nature of the establishment. It was a grog-shop in its partial disguise. He got the odor of stale liquors from the open door as he pa.s.sed.

"I was present when he signed it," said the Duke, as soon as they were walking side by side once more. "Something had to be done politically with the Washingtonian movement, you know; it had cut the cranks out of the main herd. You'd think, nowadays, to hear some of the things that are said about conditions in the old times, that every man in this State picked up his rum-bottle and pipe and threw 'em to Tophet and got onto the wagon. You weren't born then. Let me tell you how it really happened. It was mostly politics. The disorganized mob of prohibitionists didn't do it--it was our party. We needed the cranks to swing the balance of power. They were all herded, ready to follow the bell. Needed a shepherd. Didn't know which one of the old parties to run to. It's a crime in politics not to grab in a bunch of the unbranded when it's that size. We put prohibition into the platform and carried the election. Then the boys went to the Governor and told him, privately, that they really didn't mean it, and framed it up that they'd pa.s.s the bill in the legislature all right and then he'd veto it--and the party would be saved, and he wouldn't be hurt, because every one knew that he couldn't be accused of acting in the interests of the rumsellers, but only stood on the const.i.tutional law ground--and there was great talk those days, son, of personal liberty and inherent rights.

But Vard picked up his pen and told us he wasn't much of a hand for playing practical jokes on the people. He signed it. And he was a license man, at that, those days. Guess he is now."

"I don't see how you can say he has played politics--not after he stood out like that."

Thelismer Thornton laughed silently. They were half-way up the long hill. The bland morning was already growing warm. The old man stopped for a moment, hat off, under a dewy maple.

"Bub, do you think Vard Waymouth, lawyer that he is, didn't know just about how much that act would amount to after it got to operating? About all it did was to proclaim the rum business contraband. No teeth, no claws, not much machinery for enforcement--and public sentiment cussing it, after it began to hit men individually. Reform in politics is popular just so long as it doesn't hit individuals."

"There's teeth enough in the law _now_", remarked Harlan.

"Oh, it's easier to put 'em in than it is to fight the mouths of the professional ramrodders who come down to the legislature. We put in the teeth right along and leave off the enforcement muscle. The old thing can't chaw! Then the ramrodders have got the law to hoorah about and read over in the parlor, and they'll go right past such a place as we saw down the street there and not know it's a rumshop. After they get all the law they ask for, it's a part of their game to say that the rumshops aren't doing business. They're the kind that believe that just having the law makes every one good--they don't want to go back on their own scheme. Come along!" He went out into the sunshine. "I don't like to get talking prohibition. The play is not to talk it. It runs best when you don't talk about it. It's running good now. Saloons open, and all the prohibitory law-frills the old fuss-budgets can crochet and hang onto the original bush! Both sides satisfied!"

"It may be good politics--it may seem all right to you, because you were in the thing from the start and saw how the tricks had to be played,"

grumbled the young man. "But I haven't had that kind of training. I've been brought up in business, grandfather. And a State that will do what this State is doing now--I'm not saying who's at fault--but the State that will handle a law in this way is a blackleg. I believe in General Waymouth. I believe he's got something up his sleeve in the way of real reform. I believe he meant what he said. I don't want to see you hurt personally in your plans, grandfather, but I want to tell you frankly I'm with the other side in this thing."

The Duke glanced at him inquiringly.

"I mean, politics or no politics, I want to see a law enforced so long as it's a law. If a party cannot hold together and keep on top with any other system, then the party is 'in' wrong. I don't believe General Waymouth intends to straddle. He'll enforce the law."

"And kill his party?" inquired the old man, sarcastically. "Oh no, my boy. The party has looked out for that. It isn't taking any chances with a man who might get morally rambunctious. The Governor of this State hasn't anything to do with enforcing the prohibitory law. We've kept all the clubs out of his hands. When the W. C. T. U. converted old Governor Levett, he got ambitious and tried it on. And the only thing he found he could do was to issue a proclamation to the sheriffs 'to do their duty.'

The most of 'em framed it and hung it up in their offices; it was too good a joke to keep hid."

They walked on in silence. Harlan did not find it easy to continue that line of talk. His deameanor did not accord with the fair face of the morning. But the old man sauntered on under the trees, plainly contented with the world and all that was in it.

"Let's see, you haven't met Madeleine, Luke's girl, since she was little, have you?" he inquired, stealing one of his shrewd side glances at his grandson.