The Ramrodders Part 33

He studied the faces on the platform. The United States Senator, smug and now satisfied that he had chosen aright for his personal interests, sat in the chairman's central seat, and studied his people from under eyelids half lowered while the parson prayed.

After the prayer, the routine proceeded hurriedly. For five minutes the convention seemed to be in a state of riot. Men were bellowing and yelping, and standing on settees. The counties were holding simultaneous caucuses for the purpose of selecting, each its vice-president of convention, its State committeeman, and member of the Committee on Resolutions--the resolutions then reposing in the breast-pocket of the Hon. Luke Presson.

The secretaries were announced, the temporary organization was made permanent, and, advancing against a blast of band-music and a salvo of applause, the Senator-chairman began his address.

"Now," remarked General Waymouth, grimly, "I am ready to open headquarters in earnest. My boy, in that anteroom across the stage you'll find your grandfather and Mr. Presson, and certain members of the State Committee. David Everett will be there, too. Inform them I send my urgent request that they meet, at _once,_ the Hon. Arba Spinney and a delegation in my room here. I think that combination will suggest to guilty consciences that they'd better hurry. If they show any signs of hesitating, you may intimate as much to them."

The plain and stolid men came in just then. They brought Mr. Spinney through the side door. The unhappy conspirator, jostled by his body-guard, was near collapse. He was now traitor to both sides.

Circ.u.mstances hemmed him in. But more than he feared the recriminations of Luke Presson and his a.s.sociates, he feared the papers in the breast-pocket of Varden Waymouth.

Harlan went on his errand, crossing the stage behind a backdrop. Senator Pownal had got well under way, and was setting forth the st.u.r.dy principles of the Republican party with all the power of his lungs.

Harlan did not knock at the anteroom door; he walked in, and for a moment he thought that the enraged chairman was about to leap at his throat.

"Spinney, eh?" he blazed at the young man's first word. "Explain to me, Mr. Thornton, what is meant by your a.s.sault on a decent and honest citizen? What do you mean by teaming him from the hotel to this convention hall with a body-guard to insult men who have business with him?"

The question was confession that the chairman had been unable to get at the political property he had paid dearly for. It indicated that he suspected but did not realize fully how deeply Spinney was in the toils.

"Explain!" shouted Presson, standing on tiptoe to thrust features convulsed with rage into the young man's face.

"General Waymouth is waiting to explain, sir. He's across the stage, there! And Mr. Spinney is with him. I'd advise you to hurry."

"I don't need any of your advice! If you've got him on exhibition at last where the public can be admitted, I can't get there any too quick."

He rushed out, charging like a bull, and the others followed.

The State committeeman who closed file with Harlan did not appreciate the gravity of the situation.

"You seem to be introducing new features into a State Convention to-day, cap'n," he observed, sarcastically. "The way you're handling Brother Spinney is like the song about

"'Old Jud Cole, who went by freight To Newry Corner in this State; Packed him in a crate to get him there, With a two-cent stamp to pay his fare.'"

He added, "Spinney is light enough to travel on that tariff, but you're going to find he's got friends that are heavier."

Young Thornton waited till all had entered the anteroom, and again took his post as guard on the inside of the door.

General Waymouth checked Presson at the first yelp of the outburst with which he had stormed into the room. Probably there was not another man in the State who could have prevailed by sheer force of dignity and carriage in that moment when the pa.s.sions of his opponents were so white-hot. But he was, in intellect, birth, breeding, and position, above them all, and they knew it. There, boxed in that little room, they faced him, and anger, rancor, spite, itch for revenge gave way before his stern, cold, inexorable determination to prevail in the name of the right.

"Gentlemen, I haven't called you here for the purpose of arguing or wrangling. You'll waste time by trying to do either. You are here to listen to what _must_ be done. You represent the warring factions. There are enough of us to straighten the matter out. There are not so many that the secret of this shameful mess cannot be kept, and our party saved at the polls."

He paused to draw the fateful doc.u.ments from his pocket.

In the hush of the little room they heard Senator Pownal declaiming: "And it is upon these firm principles, bedrock of inalienable rights guaranteed to the people, upon the broad issues of reform, inculcation of temperance, and the virtues of civic life, that the Republican party is founded."

Harlan, at the door, younger than the rest, found a suggestion of humor in what the orator was saying compared with what the party managers had met to hear. But there were no smiles on the faces of the group. The demeanor of the stricken Spinney, anger fairly distilling in his sweat-drops, hinted the truth to Presson. Thelismer Thornton tried to get near Spinney, understanding it all even better than the State chairman, but the plain and stolid men flanked their captive with determination.

"I have here five affidavits from eye-witnesses, swearing that Arba Spinney was bribed to sell out his faction at the last moment to-day, leaving only David Everett in the field. I have no time to waste in giving the details of that transaction to men who know them just as well as I do. And I want no interruption, sir!" He brandished the papers under the nose of Presson, who attempted to speak. "I do not propose to have my intelligence insulted by denials from you or any one else. If you don't believe I have full proof of what I charge, you walk out of that door and put the matter to the test! And I hasten to a.s.sure you, sir, that you'll be eternally disgraced!"

He waited a moment, because a roar of applause that greeted one of Senator Pownal's utterances resounded even in the remote anteroom.

"It all means, gentlemen, that I'm to be the nominee of this convention to-day. It's time for a clean-up, and I'm going to start one. The men who are running our party are not fit to be in charge of it. The voters deserve a better show. I've called you here to give you an opportunity to save yourselves, personally. I'm willing to submit to a little by-play for that purpose. You are to allow Spinney's name to go before the convention, according to the regular programme. That's to divert the attention of the convention and the State-at-large from what otherwise would seem a split in the recognized management of the party. Spinney has been only a rank outsider, politically considered. We have to consider the campaign, gentlemen, and the material we may furnish our friends, the enemy. Then, you gentlemen of the State Committee, each in his county delegation, are to start a demonstration in my behalf. This is no time for me to be mock-modest. On the heels of that demonstration Everett's name is to be withdrawn with the explanation that such an apparently spontaneous demand from the voters should be recognized. Mr.

Everett is to declare that under the circ.u.mstances he does not wish to stand in the way of popular choice, and he is to announce that much and present me to the convention. I a.s.sure you, Mr. Everett, that I ask this last with no intent of wounding your feelings or indulging in cheap triumph--it is necessary in order that the mouths of political gossips may be shut."

A rather stupid silence followed that declaration of programme. The voice of the Senator rose and fell without.

The General met their staring eyes calmly. "It may be a rather surprising development of the convention," he said. "But as soon as the surprise is over it will commend itself as a perfectly natural and graceful concession to public opinion--as public opinion can be set in motion by the members of the State Committee on the floor of the convention. In fact, the plan commended itself to my friend Thelismer, here, and Chairman Presson some weeks ago."

The State chairman was stirred as though galvanically by that statement.

The bitter memory of how he had groomed the dark horse that was now kicking his master's political brains out rose in him.

"By the everlasting G.o.ds," he shouted, "I'll go down fighting! If the house has got to come down, I'll go down with it."

"Samson had two arms. I have only one," returned General Waymouth. "But I've got that arm around the central pillar of your political roof, gentlemen--and I've got the strength to handle it! You've stated your position as a politician, Presson. Now I'll state mine. Rather than see the Republican temple made any longer a house of political ill-fame I'll pull it down on you prost.i.tutes."

It was bitter taunt--an insult delivered with calm determination to sting. Presson stamped about the room in his wrath.

"I'm making no pact or promise," went on the General. "I declare that you are the men who are wrecking our party. Now if you propose to wreck it completely, we'll go smashing all together in the ruins. It may as well be wrecked now as later!"

There was another hush in the room.

"So I call upon you, men of office, shop, and farm, bone and sinew of our grand old party," exhorted Senator Pownal from the forum outside, "to forget the petty bickerings of faction and stand shoulder to shoulder in your march to the polls. Nail the principles of justice, truth, and honesty to the flagstaff, and follow behind that banner, winning the suffrages of those who believe in the right."

"It sounds as though the Senator might be arriving close to his amen,"

suggested General Waymouth, ironically. "You have only a few minutes in which to decide. I hold the proxy of one of these delegates to the convention." He pointed to one of the stolid and plain men. "You know that I can get the ear of that convention--you can't work any gag-rule on me--I have been listened to too often by the men of this State when I've had something to say. And you know what effect these affidavits will have!"

There was further silence, broken only by the voice of the Senator without and Presson within, who was scuffling about, babbling disjointed oaths.

Suddenly a great outburst of applause signified that the Senator had concluded.

"Go ahead out and kill your party!" barked Presson. "Give it your strychnine! It may as well die right now, in a spasm, as to have a lingering death later with you at the head of it, Waymouth. You can't team _me_!"

"You let me say a word right here!" bl.u.s.tered Everett. "I wash my hands of any deal with Spinney. I've got the bulk of that convention behind me. I don't propose to be shunted."

"I supposed you all remembered the details of what you did last evening," returned the General, coldly. "Is it necessary for me to remind you, Mr. Everett, that Chairman Presson turned over to Spinney a paper in which you agreed to appoint him to a State office? That transaction was noted along with the rest, sir."

"I'll have as many witnesses as you," declared Presson, "I'll--"

"Stop!" It was a tone that cowed the chairman, struggling with his guilty conscience. "I have warned you that I'm not here to argue this matter with you. I'll not be drawn into any discussion. What I have, I have!" He waved his papers above his head. "What I can do that I'll do!

I would remind you, gentlemen, that the convention is waiting."

Thelismer Thornton caught the secretary of the State Committee by the arm and propelled him toward the door, ordering Harlan to open it.

"Signal that band! Start it to going!" he directed. "Keep those delegates easy." He turned on the chairman. "Now, Luke, you're licked.

And it's your own deadfall that's caught you. I know just how you feel, but here's a laundry-bag that you've got to draw the puckering-strings on. Shut up! I'm going to save you from yourself. You're running amuck, now. You're a lunatic, and not responsible." He dragged the defiant chairman back into the room. He held him in firm grip. "There's a new bribery law in this State. You haven't forgotten it, have you! It's State prison!"

"Look here, gentlemen," he went on, addressing the members of the State Committee, "you've got just five minutes leeway between a devilish good political walloping and striped suits. Get out on the floor. Get busy with those delegations. And the man of all of you who dares to say one word too much about what's been done here to-day will peek through bars and wish his tongue had been torn out by the roots before he talked!

Presson, this thing is out of your hands. You shan't cut your own throat, I say! Get onto that floor, men!"

They went. It was the rush of men to save themselves. Each man as he pa.s.sed out cast a glance upon the papers that General Waymouth clutched, and a second glance at Harlan, brawny guard, at his side.