The Wrong Twin Part 43

"Meaning that we cannot accept another dollar of tainted money for our great work," said Merle, crisply.

"Oh," said Sharon, "but that's what your pa just told you! You accepted it till he shut off on you."

"Against my better judgment and with many misgivings," returned the apostle of light. "Now we can go to the bitter end with no false sense of obligation."

"But your magazine will have to stop, I fear," interposed Gideon gently.

Merle smiled wanly, shaking his head the while as one who contradicts from superior knowledge.

"You little know us," he retorted when the full effect of the silent, head-shaking smile had been had. "The people are at last roused. Money will pour in upon us. Money is the last detail we need think of. Our movement is solidly grounded. We have at our back"--he glanced defiantly at each of the three Whipples--"an awakened proletariat."

"My!" said Gideon.

"You are out of the current here," explained Merle, kindly. "You don't suspect how close we are to revolution. Yet that glorious rising of our comrades in Russia might have warned you. But your cla.s.s, of course, never is warned."

"Dear me!" broke in Harvey D. "You don't mean to say that conditions are as bad here as they were in Russia?"

"Worse--a thousand times worse," replied Merle. "We have here an autocracy more hateful, more hideous in its injustices, than ever the Romanoffs dreamed of. And how much longer do you think these serfs of ours will suffer it? I tell you they are roused this instant! They await only a word!"

"Are you going to speak it?" demanded Sharon.

"Now, now!" soothed Harvey D. as Merle turned heatedly upon Sharon, who thus escaped blasting.

"I am not here to be baited," protested Merle.

"Of course not, my boy," said the distressed Harvey D.

Merle faced the latter.

"I need not say that this decision of yours--this abrupt withdrawal, of your cooperation--must make a profound difference in our relations. I feel the cause too deeply for it to be otherwise. You understand?"

"He's casting you off," said Sharon, "like the other one said he would."

"_Ssh_!" It was Gideon.

"I shall stay no longer to listen to mere buffoonery," and for the last time that night Merle swept back the ever-falling lock. He paused at the door. "The old spirit of intolerance," he said. "You are the sort who wouldn't accept truth in France in 1789, or in Russia the other day."

And so he left them.

"My!" exclaimed Gideon, forcefully.

"Dear me!" exclaimed Harvey D.

"Shucks!" exclaimed Sharon.

"But the boy is goaded to desperation!" protested Harvey D.

"Listen!" urged Sharon. "Remember what his own father said! He's only half goaded. The other half is showing off--to himself and us. That man knew his own flesh and blood. And listen again! You sit tight if you want to get him back to reason!"

"Brother, I think you're right," said Gideon.

"Dear me!" said Harvey D. He straightened an etched cathedral, and then with a brush from the hearth swept cigar ashes deeper into the rug about the chair of Sharon. "Dear me!" he sighed again.

Early the following morning Merle Whipple halted before the show window of Newbern's chief establishment purveying ready-made clothing for men.

He was about to undergo a novel experience and one that would have profoundly shocked his New York tailors. There were suits in the window, fitted to forms with glovelike accuracy. He studied these disapprovingly, then entered the shop.

"I want," he told the salesman, "something in a rough, coa.r.s.e, common-looking suit--something such as a day labourer might wear."

The salesman was momentarily puzzled, yet seemed to see light.

"Yes, sir--right this way, sir," and he led his customer back between the lines of tables piled high with garments. He halted and spanned the chest of the customer with a tape measure. From halfway down a stack of coats he pulled one of the proper size.

"Here's a snappy thing, sir, fitted in at the back--belted--cuffs on the trousers, neat check----"

But the customer waved it aside impatiently.

"No, no! I want something common--coa.r.s.e cloth, roughly made, no style; it mustn't fit too well."

The salesman deliberated sympathetically.

"Ah, I see--masquerade, sir?"

The customer again manifested impatience.

"No, no! A suit such as a day labourer might wear--a factory worker, one of the poorer cla.s.s."

The salesman heightened his manifestation of sympathy.

"Well, sir"--he deliberated, tapping his brow with a pencil, scanning the long line of garments--"I'm afraid we're not stocked with what you wish. Best go to a costumer, sir, and rent one for the night perhaps."

The customer firmly pushed back a pendent lock of hair and became impressive.

"I tell you it is not for a masquerade or any foolishness of that sort.

I wish a plain, roughly made, common-looking suit of clothes, not too well fitting--the sort of things working people wear, don't you understand?"

"But certainly, sir; I understand perfectly. This coat here is what the working people are buying; sold a dozen suits myself this week to some of the mill workers--very natty, sir, and only sixty-five dollars. If you'll look closely at the workers about town you'll see the same suits--right dressy, you'll notice. I'm afraid the other sort of thing has gone a little out of style; in fact, I don't believe you'll be able to find a suit such as you describe. They're not being made. Workers are buying this sort of garment." He picked up the snappy belted coat and fondled its nap affectionately. "Of course, for a fancy-dress party----"

"No, no, no! I tell you it isn't a masquerade!"

The salesman seemed at a loss for further suggestions. The customer's eye lighted upon a pile of coats farther down the line.

"What are those?"

"Those? Corduroy, sir. Splendid garments--suitable for the woods, camping, hunting, fishing. We're well stocked with hunting equipment.

Will you look at them?"

"I suppose so," said the customer, desperately.