Chapter IX: Part 9

"Fine as silk! His father's in the insurance business at Hartford--he has two yachts and an aeroplane--I'm going to visit them next summer----"

"You've gotten thick already, I see. I'm glad she's getting married."

"And what do you suppose!" Ned's eyes grew round and mysterious. "Tom Cole's really dead at last! He got pneumonia, and died in three days. The funeral was in Lilydale--Nell 'n' me went!"

"Nell and I."

"Anyhow, mother sent the most wonderful bunch of white roses you ever saw--all that were growing on the mountain. I helped pick 'em. And we're living in a wonderful big house in Glen Kenmore! Gee, you ought to see it!"

"Old Peter's still on the mountain?"

"Yes, an' he's going to teach me how to fiddle! Father said I could learn."

"Here's your company road, now," as they reached the Fortieth Street gap road. "Give my love to mother and the girls."

Another death occurred, announced by a simple wire to Pelham signed "Grandma." Thoughtfully he pulled out of a desk compartment the slim file, regretting the unanswered note on top. He studied soberly the careful letters, the slight tremble in the curves and capitals. To think that that deep-channeled hand could never form another line!

The Barbour homestead came back to him, a richly scented recollection. His little room, peach-petal sprays rubbing their silken invitation on the rain-specked panes ... the teetering climb on unsteady branches, to the succulent prize just within fingers' reach ... the shaded colonnade of the oak avenue before ... the smell of flowers: pansies and roses, begonias and the white sweetness of magnolia fuscata....

His nose breathed in the memory of the fragrance; and of the indescribably musty odor he associated with old age, a compound of pungent pennyroyal pillows, of kerosene, which grandfather always rubbed in his hands to warn off the mosquitoes, of lavender and rose leaves in sachet pads on the bureau.... A scent unmistakable, anciently sweet. All day his office was full of it.

He took the telegram home to Jane at supper. They were staying at the Andersons', until their own home, a small two-story house on Haviland Avenue, was ready to accept them.

Jane reread the brief message. "Of course, we'll both go, Pelham. I'd wanted so to meet your grandfather! He meant so much to you...."

"I thought we could go this spring to see them...."

He stopped with Jane at the Jackson Hotel, over-shadowed now by the new Lomax House; although Uncle Derrell had long ago sold his interest, to move out on the Greenville Road. Alf Barbour, who had been elected to the legislature, was as glad to see him as his uncle and aunt; and Lil, who had been married two years, proudly displayed her fat six-months-old bundle of joy for Jane's appreciation. These were all Barbours, Pelham thought in curious detachment, as he was; he was at home with them. He imagined the cold formality of Pratt Judson's big house, and rejoiced again at the kinder heritage predominant in his own blood.

Why, the grandparents had been almost a second father and mother to him. Undisturbed he went through the old house again--Paul was stopping at Pratt's--reliving the old days; grandmother's dear frail hands clutched tremulously at his sleeve. "You were always such a comfort to him, Pell...."

She fell in love with Jane, too. The girl set herself out to be sweet and considerate--to say nothing that might jar or ruffle the kindly unprogressiveness of the people.

"You have a lovely wife, Pell; like one of the Barbours," grandmother whispered lovingly.

When he repeated this to Jane, she answered, "And that is her highest praise.... It means a lot to me."

At the graveyard, his mother's black figure stumbled heavily beside her husband's stiff preoccupation. Son and father did not look once at each other; there was no recognition. But Mary came over beside her brother, and his quietly sobbing family, and held Pelham to her breast. "Mother's own big boy.... He was always so fond of you."

Then she did an unexpected thing. With a quick motion she turned to the younger woman beside him, and kissed her cheek. "I pray God you make my son happy," she whispered. "May he never be unhappy...." She cast a half-broken look back to where she had been. Sobbing heavily, she left them.

The slow echoes of "The Sweet By-and-By" ceased; the simple service ended. The horses stepped down the dirt road to their next task. Jane packed to return on the morning train.

Pelham, in answer to Uncle Jimmy Barbour's questions, went into a restrained discussion of his new beliefs.

"I don't understand all about socialism," the uncle finally decided, "but it seems to be, as you say, for the brotherhood of man. And surely that is following in the Master's footsteps."

"And I know Mary's boy wouldn't do anything we could be ashamed of," said Aunt Lotta, in soft certainty.

The simple trust moved him.

As he was leaving, Pelham took his aunt aside. "Don't let grandmother worry too much over--it," he said softly. "It's all so beautiful, and natural. If you believe in a heaven, you know he is happier there than here. Just as flowers blossom and die, just as the leaves stretch out their green leaves and then grow bare under winter skies, grow old, and die, while their place is taken by the younger saplings--it is all natural, and beautiful. We wouldn't want an endless day, or an eternal spring; there must come night and winter, that the new blossoming may follow."

"It is a lovely idea," Aunt Lotta said brokenly. "It will comfort mother."

Then he and Jane turned north again, to take up the unfinished labors at Adamsville--the hazard of losing the strike, and the delight of building their home together.

XXIII

The iron city interrupted its bitter struggle for an event of local magnitude. January 17th, 1917--Adamsville celebrated its semi-centennial! Fifty years since the first farm-shack had been built on the farm beside Ross's Creek: ten years of sleepy and indeterminate farm growth, with a forty year waking that had made it the third largest city in the oldest quarter of the country! Fifty years between old Thaddeus Ross's unhitching his single horse to begin plowing, and the creation of the billion-dollar Gulf Iron and Steel Corporation, with his great-grandson Sam Ross as president, and Judge Florence and Paul Judson on the board.

A "White Way" had been opened up both sides of the four main avenues, with five great white globes every thirty feet. Streamers of patriotic tri-colored lights lined the side streets, converging to a tapering pole in the center of Main Park--a vast pyramid of glitter and sparkle. Two new bandstands flashed back the twinkle from their shining woodwork; an ornate speakers' stand lifted above between them. Bunting draped the thoroughfares, the national emblem interwoven with the flags of France, England, Belgium, Russia, Japan, thickest over the court house and jail, the big retail houses, the offices of the mining and furnace companies, and the rambling cotton mills. Here the gay cloth framed the faces of women and children, busily bending, in the half gloom, above vast black machines--noisily weaving, in the human silence, cloth for more bunting.

The new Commercial Club building, a transplanted Greek temple, marble white, was to be dedicated, as part of the celebration. The gleaming symbol of adamantine prosperity was christened with champagne; the punch bubbled for gay members and wives, who applauded the eloquence of Dudley Randolph, the retiring president, as he relinquished the gavel to Paul Judson.

"This is the man who has saved Adamsville. I may be giving away a secret, but--we all know Paul Judson's backbone. But for it, we might have union miners swaggering down our avenues and boulevards. Instead, we have the militia, our sons under the waving banners of red and white and blue----" Frantic cheers submerged the rest of the sentence. "Mark my words: the time's coming when these law-defying strikers will feel the militia's iron insistence upon the majesty of the law!

"We can handle Adamsville; but that is not enough." His pulsing tones shook and trembled above their heads. "I want to see those same boys marching under that same flag, side by side with the tricolor of France and the Union Jack, against another autocracy greater than the domestic tyranny of the labor union carpet-bagger!" The shouts were whole-hearted, one veteran attempting the yodelled "Coo-ee" of the rebel yell.

"Let the rest of the South hang back," his strident tones shouted, "because of the loss of its cotton trade with Germany. We've got the iron and steel here to lay the rails straight down Unter den Linden, to forge the 42-centimeter guns that will blast the hated house of Hohenzollern into its home, the reddest sub-cellar of Hell! We demand that our country avenge the _Lusitania_--avenge the rape of Belgium--avenge the foul assault on the soul of civilization. And when her citizens speak, Columbia will not lag behind!"

There was a riot of joy as Paul Judson echoed the vigor of the old iron-master. "We have strangled the foe within," his clearly enunciated syllables stretched forth. "This undemocratic, anti-American principle of union-labor slavery, of a socialism sired by Prussian autocracy, and damned by all the forces of law and order throughout the world----" The reporters could not catch his next words.

"It is a time of prosperity for Adamsville. From the marble palaces of East Highlands to the poorest hovel in Scrubtown or Jones' Hill, we find a united citizenry stepping forth, 'Boost Adamsville' the motto shown on the button on every coat. Let us be united, to lead into the time when democracy has established its universal sway, under the flag that shines with the very stars of Heaven...."

"The old-time eloquence of the South," observed the editor of the _Times-Dispatch_ approvingly, "has not left its gifted sons of to-day."

In the packed stuffiness of Arlington Hall, the miners' union held its meeting the same night, to hear the report from the strike committee and act on it. One matter came up first--the motion for the expulsion of Ed Cole from the union. It was John McGue's quick mind that had suspected the negro's treachery, it was he who had seen the actual transfer of the roll of bills from the covetous hands of Jim Hewin to the greedy negro's. Ed Cole, feeling behind him the hidden support of Jack Bowden and the old union crowd, defended himself with schooled dignity. But he could not explain away the money, and McGue's word was not doubted by the members. John Dawson, more age-scarred and mountain-like than ever, led the weary fight to purge the movement. The balloting was four to one for expulsion.

One ugly side-glance of hatred shot out of the negro's face as he left the hall, a look directed toward the corner where the radical unionists bunched. Then he disappeared.

And now, the real fight. The committee's report was short and definite. The company had refused to accede to the demands for unionization, even with a waiver of all other claims. The committee recommended that the strike be abandoned as lost, or fought out on the same plan, with the additional difficulty caused by the presence of the soldiers.

Bowden was on his feet, a vindictive snarl in his whole bearing. His eyes swept the crammed benches confidently. He was sure of this crowd.

"I ain't sayin' nothin' against John Dawson, and his runnin' of this strike. But it's failed. Even a blind man can see that. I been in conference--Bob Bivens, John Pooley an' me--with Mr. Kane, the company's adjustment man. He has given me this offer direct from headquarters." His look drove this remark straight at Dawson. "The company is willing to settle the matter"--every attention was frozen to the twisted frown of the weak figure erect in the center of the room--"take the men back, on the same terms as before, with the promise of a raise if there is any profit to make it from, laying aside the question of recognition for the future. And I move that resolution, and that the strike committee be discharged--instead of that bull the committee handed us."

"Second the motion!" Pooley's voice blended with a dozen others.

The floor swirled with demands for recognition. The chairman picked out the brawny bulk of Dawson, imperatively calling for the chance to reply. He understood the crisis, and strove to meet it.

"I've been a union man twenty-three years, and I never laid down on a fight yet!"

There was tumultuous applause from the Socialists and the more aggressive of the miners; but it came from a bare half of the hall.

"I'd lie down and die before I'd give up to a gang like that! Accept this dirty proposition which Jack Bowden brings to you--he offered the same thing six months ago, and you wouldn't listen to him--and you set back the union movement in Adamsville ten years. You'll admit you are licked off the map. I don't care whether you call the strike ended, and get into other work here or elsewhere, or keep on fighting--I'll stay here as long as there's any hope, I'll make the national keep me here....

"But don't lie down! They're licked now, and they know it, if you sit steady and don't let them provoke you to violence. You've won, unless----

"You know," he thundered suddenly, his hairy arm out-stretched toward the shrinking form of the local agent, "all of you know, that the curse of the American labor movement is the white-livered skunk that sells it out!"

There was wild applause at this, even from the other side of the house.

"I ain't namin' no names, but I say that self-appointed committee that's always runnin' in with offers from the company is treadin' slippery ground ... just like that nigger we fired out of here for takin' money from company men. It looks rotten--and, by God, no man can say that anything I ever did looks rotten! I call on you men to show 'em that Adamsville miners haven't a drop of quitters' blood in their veins!"

Ben Spence was on his feet, tightening his lips nervously. To keep in the good graces of the Socialists and radicals, and at the same time continue to represent the union in its legal affairs, required all of the tact that he possessed.

"Here, brothers, there ain't no use in calling names or showing hard feelings. All of us know what John Dawson's done for us--all of us know that Jack Bowden's been a faithful union man for more years than a horse has teeth."

There was a grin at this, and a weak rattle of applause, which encouraged him.

"If we can win by agreement, there's no use turning anything down cold. This offer from Mr. Kane may be just a feeler; maybe the company's ready now to do more. Why not instruct the strike committee, working with brothers Bivens, Pooley, and Bowden, to get in touch with the office again, and see if we can't get more out of them? I believe in using sense at all times. I move that."

There was a scowl on the faces of the _Voice of Labor_ crowd as the motion was put, but, after all, Bowden reflected, it was at least a half victory. The motion was carried overwhelmingly, and the committee was instructed to act at once.

When he got to his room at the Mecca Hotel, tired and down-hearted, John Dawson stretched at once on the bed. The phone rang abruptly.

"It's for you, Mac," he called to McGue, who sat scratching his head over a game of solitaire on the greasy wash-stand top.

The shorter man hung up the receiver, puzzled. "It's from Mr. Brant, of the _Register_, he says--and he wants me to go over to Mr. Judson's office right away to see him on something important."

"I'm goin' to bed. See you when you come back." He skidded the huge shoes toward the side of the cheap oak bureau.

There was a knock on the door, a scant six minutes later. John Dawson, brain half asleep, his head screwed into the pillow, grumbled a "Come in!" and turned over slowly.

He sat up quickly, flinging his feet over the edge of the bed to the floor, as Ed Cole's ingratiating face came around the corner of the door.

"Well?" He sat up tensely. He wondered whether to reach for the pistol under his pillow, cursing the fact that McGue had gone. Then he reflected that this negro would never have courage enough to plan any harm.

"What do you want, Cole?"

"You ain' treat me right, Mr. Dawson," said the negro, who kept his hands in a shabby overcoat reaching to the ground. "Ah ain' took no money f'um dat Jim Hewin."

"Come around and see me to-morrow at headquarters. I'm in bed now." He pretended a yawn, still keenly alert.

"You done me dirt, Mr. Dawson. Ah ain' stan' fer dat f'um no man, white or black."

Dawson rose to his feet, and swayed menacingly on his bare toes. "I don't let nobody disturb me after I've gone to bed, Cole. Git out of here." His hand started working its way back along the sheeting.

The negro's startled eyes saw the slow motion; Dawson heard the chatter of his teeth.

"Ah'm--Ah'm gon'ter fix you, Mr. Dawson"--he raised the right hand, weighted with an ugly forty-five.

Dawson acted with all his speed. He threw himself toward the floor sideways, grasping his pistol as he fell. The gun in the hands of the negro roared, flamed; the smoke blinded Dawson's eyes, stung his nostrils. He fumbled with the trigger of his pistol.

Cole's foot shot out; the chair between them bounded grotesquely at him, crashing into his arm, spoiling his aim. He heard the pistol click again. He rose, aiming.

As he saw the direct flare of the hot breath toward him, his own pistol clicked impotently. At dizzy speed his mind traveled--should he try again, or swing the cylinder to the next shell?

How had the negro missed him at that distance?

Then came the sense of the terrific blow caving in his ribs, gutting its way throughout his inside. His huge face, which seemed to the negro to reach almost to the ceiling, gasped into a wrenched grimace of pain; the eyes closed, the mouth popped oddly open, like a frog's. An explosive intake of breath shivered horribly.

Ed Cole retreated in terror, aiming the pistol again, his eyes fascinated by the dark dampness spilling over the crumpled white nightgown. Then his eyes came back to the face.

Steadied against the wall, the wounded mountain that had been a man fumbled at the weapon. His fingers edged open spasmodically. The pistol clattered against the fallen chair.

The great paws reached out toward the negro's face; Cole could imagine their wide clutch rounding his neck. Then they doubled up abruptly, the big form swayed, the knees collapsed, the body crumpled upon the stained floor.

Throwing his pistol out of the window, Ed Cole ran for the stairs. Halfway down he stumbled, crashing noisily into the wooden railing. The clerk dozed, half-awake, trying to make up his mind whether the noise he had heard above called for an investigation or not. He jerked to his feet, his hand aimed for the drawer where his automatic was kept. Before he had reached it, the negro was in the street.

The clerk ran to the doorway, shouting unintelligibly.

Half a block away, two policemen lounging before the station had straightened at the first shot. They saw the running form almost as soon as they started for the hotel. A negro! "Hai! Stop there, you damn' nigger, or we'll shoot you----"

Ed halted, hands in the air. "Ah ain't done nothin'."

The second officer searched him, while the other kept the big automatic rubbed against his stomach. "Nothin' doin', Jim."

"What was that shot back there?"

Ed Cole's wits came back to him. "A white gen'lman, suh, he shot me, an' Ah shot back at him."

"I've a mind to kill you now. Let's give him twenty feet, Jim, then let him have it!"

Cole's arteries seemed frozen. "It was--it was dat union feller, suh--Mr. Dawson. He drawed a gun on me fu'st."

A peculiar look passed from one policeman to another, an expression significant with doubt. There was more in this than mere murder. "Come with us, nigger. If you try any tricks----" The pistol bored into his back.

"Lawd knows, boss," the whites of his eyes tumbled in desperation, "Ah ain' gwinter do no tricks."

The policemen, with two others who had come up, examined the room carefully. One phoned for the wagon, another located the pistol thrown into the littered lot beside.

"Ah was so scared," Cole admitted, his shifty eyes reassured by the attitude of the police, "Ah jus' th'owed dat gun anywhar."

The first officer picked up the weapon beside the chair, sprung the cylinder, and revealed the dented shell. He threw out the charge; each shell had been emptied.

"You say he shot at you first? Don't lie to me, nigger."

"Dat's de Lawd's trufe, sir. Ah ain' lie to no policeman."

Ed Cole was hurried off to the city lock-up, to await removal to the county jail, charged with murder in the first degree.

XXIV

Pelham and Jane came back from their trip to Jackson in a gentle mood. Death quiets the footfall and lowers the voice instinctively; their joy in the final preparation of the house on Haviland Avenue was unconsciously hushed.

He had his word about the various purchases; but his haphazard taste began to defer regularly to her sense of artistic home-making. The little clashes that came smoothed themselves away.

While she was superintending the unpacking of a treasured dinner set, her aunt's contribution, Pelham volunteered to hang the pictures on the living-room and study walls. She edged out to watch him, and interrupted at once, "Oh, never, never, Pelham! Pictures must be hung at eye-level."

Perturbed eyes met hers. "Ours hang near the ceiling, at home."

"They were probably larger. Mrs. Anderson taught me that. There.... And don't you agree now that my taste in wall paper is excellent? This gray oatmeal, as a background----"

"It is cool and lovely. I've grown up among flowers and curlicues."

They did not buy many things, Pelham's uncertain income being a chief cause. While with the company, he had lived up to his salary; from the few pay checks as state inspector he had not been able to lay aside a great sum. This, with a legacy kept untouched from college days, and an income that Jane had from her father's estate, put them beyond immediate worry; but there was no idle surplus for expensive furnishings. The election, as well as the wedding trip, had cut into his savings; and his present potboiling work--statistical researches for the United Charities reports--did not go very far, nor promise a future.

Remembering these facts, Jane's natural economy sought the less pretentious stores. The dining-room set and the bedroom furniture were substantial, but inexpensive for the taste they showed; the piano and bookcases were paid for on what Lily, the cook and maid-of-all-tasks, called "de extortion plan."

As she approved of the final placing of the pictures, Jane reflected with satisfaction on the fine showing their funds had made; and Pelham, his mind rather on the total shown by the bank's balance slip the first of the month, was glad that the bulk of the buying was ended.

Thoughtfully she studied the room. "That couch could stand two or three pillows.... I saw some ruby cretonne that would go wonderfully with that cover."

When she had purchased it and made it up, he had to admit that it was the most colorful spot in the house.

And what a colorful time those first days were! Many of the ordinary achievements toward the joint home brought positive ecstasy.

The puffed pride of those ruby cushions marked the end of the metamorphosis of the house into a home. "It's really presentable, now," she sighed contentedly, as she sat in their own chair, on their own porch of their own dwelling.

Pelham lounged back against her knee, studying the dark countenance of the mountain; somehow its spell had drawn toward it the face of the house, and the unlidded gaze of its blind-less front eyes. There was a pleasant rustle in his ears, as his wife bent over her sewing; Jane could not resist an occasional tingle of embarrassment at this preoccupation, in his presence, with the intimate mends in her garments. Would she ever dare mend his! What shameless and delightful publicity marriage entailed!

Abstractedly he thought over the outstanding raptures of these days. What simple stuff made the enduring pleasures! There was the thrill, for instance, when he had, with studied casualness, pulled out of his pocket the signed lease, for her inspection. What an unimportant thing, yet wearing somehow the grace of man's protecting, shelter-building role! Then the zest of standing beside her while they chose furniture ... rugs, table, bedroom furniture.... The emotional exaltation had been immense. And the first meal they had had in the dining-room, with matter-of-fact Lily in and out in matter-of-fact fashion, and Jane across the white and silver expanse, her face softened by the soft lighting--these moments might become habitual, but the ecstasy of their first tasting had welded a permanent bond connecting the two. Added to this delight in things was the growing joy in each other--the day's cordial comradeships, the splendor of cool nights sacred to love, and reverent gray dawns in which he woke to watch the loveliness of her calm face asleep on the pillow's rumpled primness--these shook him with their intimate beauty.

"Tired, dear?" He put up his hands and caught hers.

"Not a bit. I sighed through sheer animal comfort, I think."

"You've earned a holiday--busy since morning with the house. Get your wraps; you don't choose the club--let's go up to the crest, and watch for Canopus.... If we're in luck, he'll be visible in a quarter of an hour."

They reached the vantage place; despite the fitful waverings of the horizon air, they saw the star's golden torch drag fierily over the tree-fretted heights of Shadow Mountain. There was a sullen reddish smolder over the face of this alien sun; but the brief glimpse of the burning visitant from southern skies was an unforgettable experience.

"If we could only watch it from the old top of the mountain."

"The old top, Pelham?"

He traced Nathaniel Guild's idea of the mighty sky-piercing ridge that had once united the iron strata of this crest and the West Adamsville one, with an overlap of sandstone whose grayed relics still crumbled in the small hills flanking the two iron ranges.

"It shrivels our puny importance, doesn't it, dear, to think of the former majesty of these hills!"

"We're as important to ourselves, Pelham."

Together in spirit they climbed the airy darkness that had been the old mountain; their fancies winged back to the shaken ages before man's weak restlessness hid in trees and caves, and came out into the open, to clear away and shape the forests, and split apart the everlasting hills for the malleable wealth hid within them.

But the ecstatic moods could not last forever. The graying embers of the strike re-won their efforts; the inevitable selfishnesses and littlenesses of life came in, to break the filmy web of romance and delight. Man can stay on the high peaks, whether of spirituality or intellect, of surging emotion or unstrung sentiment, but a little while; their rarefied atmosphere, the height of man's upward groping, will not sustain vigorous animal life. When such moments come, if we are in tune we pass into their magnetic sway whole-heartedly; let the little daily frets, the appetites and prejudices, be in control, and the height is unclimbed, the high emotion lifting another passes unnoticed over our stooping backs.

The two differing personalities found life together a perpetual welter of adjustment. Insofar as they were adaptable, these adjustments were easy; but neither his training, as a favored first son, nor her self-sure nature, helped cushion the continual shocks. Neither had reached the opinionated thirties, when inconsiderate habits have rutted too deeply to permit habitual considerateness; but the two determined wills had no easy task to come to agreement upon even small details of the home life.

Pelham's "picturesque" pipes, as he reminded her the unmarried Jane had always described them, showed a depraved tendency to roost wherever their master finished with them.

"But, darling, you _must_ remember," she insisted, in affectionate exasperation. "Lily found one on the piano this morning; I barely moved the sugar bowl, and look at this table cloth! Your old ashes have made it simply filthy. The hall table's marked; your bureau----"

"I always mean to put 'em on the rack," he urged in contrition.

She sniffed distastefully, holding out the offender at the end of dainty fingers. "Here it is."

Again, he would become unreasonably exasperated when she insisted upon asking what meat he would prefer for dinner, when she had him to shop with her. "Mm-hmm, it's a lovely steak," he would agree abstractedly. "Yes, I like ham, too.... Or a roast. Darling, I don't care. Get anything."

She felt aggrieved at his callousness upon the momentous topic.

Upon other matters connected with eating he was not so unopinionated. "Just look here, Jane! Lily's douched the potatoes in fat again. You know that fried starch----"

"Yes, dear, I know ... by now. You needn't eat any; she'll bring some mashed ones for you."

He grinned surlily. "I'll try a few, Jane; I like them, though they're not good for me.... Another spoonful, please."

The country club was another viand of contention. Jane had never enjoyed the inconsequential chatter and watery flirtations that were its chief offer; Pelham found in them a forgetfulness from strike worries and the increasing financial problem.

The week after their sight of Canopus, he announced a determination to drop by for tennis with Lane Cullom, and the dinner afterwards.

"You may see Hollis; it's his spring holiday," his wife observed without inflection.

"I saw he was back. I don't mind, if he doesn't.... Sure you don't want to come? For dinner, or afterwards for a few minutes?"

"Dances are so boring, Pell."

"Once in a while I like 'em."

"I'll go next week, if you go then.... Don't make a scene with Hollis."

He jerked with needless viciousness at his belt. "Why make such an assumption? I'm not going to make a scene."

Her pen scratched raspingly over the businesslike letter-heads of the State Suffrage Association. "You almost had a fight with John Birrell, at the bowling tournament."

"You exaggerate everything, Jane. There was nothing like it----"

"You told me----"

"I told you, very plainly, that there would have been a fight, if we hadn't held in our tempers. He's a decent fellow; he's still sore about my mining report. The State is again investigating them."

She did not look up.

"Good-night, dear," planting an indecisive kiss on her hair.

"Good-night."

Probably Hollis would be in uniform, he reflected. The boy hadn't lost any time in joining the Yale Battery, when the President's initial break with Germany foreshadowed war.

Just after dinner, his brother Ned charged up. "Hell-o, Pell! Didn't expect to see me, did you? Father let me come, because Hollis was here."

"Aren't we the young sport!"

"There he is--Hey, Hollis! Here's Pell!"

The brother, fine-looking in his well-pressed khaki, came over unhurriedly. "Hello, Pelham. How you making out?"

"Oh, all right. I'm working for the United Charities, you know--Labor Legislation Committee."

"Still fooling with that socialist crew?"

"I'm still a member of the party, Hollis."

"You aren't a foreigner; why don't you get out?"

Pelham's eyes snapped. "Why not learn something about the movement, before you pass judgment on it?"

"You'll wake up soon. The heads of the movement are all pro-German; everybody says so. The government's liable to arrest 'em any minute."

The older brother grinned. "We won't quarrel about it."

"I don't care. I think it's outrageous, agitating against the government, when we may have war----"

Ned's bright eyes went from one to the other. "Pell's right, you don't know much about socialism, Hollis. I've been reading books at the library--it's great stuff!"

"Let father catch you!"

"I'm glad to see you back, anyhow," Pelham smiled. "Drop by the Charities building some morning and we'll talk over Sheff."

Hollis called, and the brothers had lunch together. Although the younger said nothing of it, Pelham could not help feeling the other's distaste at the dingy side-office in the Charities building where the older did his work now. And Pelham observed with a twinge of envy his brother's lavish order for the meal, his excessive tipping. Hollis planned nothing for the good of the world; money was his without asking; while in his own case....

Well, he did not need to worry yet. He was not making enough to support himself and Jane; but their fund was still sizable; and as soon as the strike uncertainty was over, he could get into something permanent. There was more cause for worry in the stagnation of the mine struggle. Thanks to the men's dogged persistence, production on the mountain was less than half normal. The companies could not hold out forever. Still, the inaction was wearing; he felt a restlessness against the whole fettering situation ... including the pestering details of the house on Haviland Avenue.

Other causes, unknown to him, egged on this unrest. The years of affection absorbed in his mother had so accustomed him to her that in his later loves he constantly looked for her characteristics, her most trifling traits. Jane was like her, in many ways; but he was discovering more ways in which she was dissimilar. Her directness, for one thing, was not the Barbour sweetness. And since she was not a reincarnation of Mary, and the door to the mountain was shut, not only by the present situation but by the rooted inhibition which forever banned his mother as the object of his man's affections, the deep imperative urged him forth again. He would be finally content, although he did not phrase it this clearly, with no less than perfection in woman--perfection to him meaning Mary; which is another way of saying that he could not be content. Thus he must still seek. The headstrong wildness of the mountain intensified the gipsying urge. Sooner or later, he felt vaguely, these forces would push him to some definite move. The uncertainty lay as to when, and in what direction, the outbreak would occur.

Opportunity never delays, when the strong heart demands it. A note from Louise told of her arrival in the city, and gave her phone number. First impulse was to ring her up at once; he had not realized how much he wanted to see her. He thought over the matter; there was no harm in one last ride.

He called up both women, alleging a visit to strike headquarters to one, and preempting the other for the afternoon. Just before three he claimed the New Orleans girl.

"Come on," he told her delightedly, holding her cool hands hidden in his. "It's too fine an afternoon to rust indoors."

A short while later he experimented diffidently. "You know, I'm married."

"Yes, Mr. Lover; I suppose I saw the lady in my city."

"Well?"

She mimicked his uncertainty. "Well?"

After all, what was the harm? Louise set certain strings in his nature ringing in response to her obvious lure, strings that Jane's finer person did not touch. Why should he cripple himself by denying a rounded development, a full self-expression to his nature?

The fresh majesty of these thoughts quite persuaded him; how could they have escaped mankind so long? He had never been taught that desire is the parthenogenetic parent of logic, the shaper of all intellectual decisions.

They swung aimlessly into the country club grounds, almost deserted this early in the afternoon. Up to the big billiard garret, the rough beams above, the window-seats in the gables, he took her.

"With a few more cushions----"

He lugged over an armful, and bent to nest them around her. The intangible sheath of the _lilas_ surrounding her enwrapped him, mingled with the delicately acrid breath of her body, that unmistakable exhalation of feminine pores which summons the man as the drowsy odor of sweet clover draws the boisterous flight of the bee.

His throat choked, a tingling warmness washed throughout him.

"Don't ... you're----" Provocative fingers pushed him back.

The conventional protest died away. He kissed her fiercely, with a passionate brutality strange to his experience. Her fervor matched his; she gave herself enough to increase his desire, yet withheld wilfully with that simulation of the chase which blows up the flame to its maddest height. At length, the racking storm quiescent for a moment, he knelt weakly beside her, spin-drift battered by the inner surge of the tempest.

"I'm married," he parroted his earlier statement.

"I know----"

The stored-up frenzy shook him in restless helplessness, overcoming all restraints. "I'll leave Jane to-morrow, if you say.... Anything you want--There's nothing you can't have from me. Just say it--now--Hurt me some way----"

"I don't want to hurt you, you dear big silly boy. I love you."

He brought her head down until he could feel her parted teeth lightly touching his neck. "Hurt me ... kill me...."

An icy shiver of rapture gripped him as the tiny teeth tightened; as if the fangs of the serpent of forbidden love tentatively touched him, gloating in their power ... saving him for further sacrifice.

"There.... Are you satisfied, Mr. Lover?"

Curbing the tumult in his blood, he drew up a chair and faced her. "I ... we mustn't let this happen again, Louise _ma cherie_. Kisses ... and all ... I once said--do you remember?--are only the preludes to the finale of love. I am married; it won't hurt me; but you're--you're not."

Her hand rested lightly on his. "You aren't the first man who has ... loved me. You needn't worry about ... me."

Uncertainly his eyes searched the liquid deeps of hers. "Not the first?..."

She flushed unconsciously, returning his level look. Her words came slowly. "Why, no, inquisitive Mr. Lover. There was another man ... we intended to marry.... I'm glad, anyhow." The last three sentences came in soft haste; such frankness embarrassed her. She covered it, changing the theme. "It isn't fair to Jane----"

"Life isn't fair to any of us." His compelling gaze was put on to hide the fleeting emotion of inner timidity. "Where shall we...."

"Lydia Hasson isn't nearly as ... careful as the Tollivers. They're away a lot...."

She readjusted the pillows swiftly, as steps and scraps of conversation floated up the hollow shaft of the circular stairway. "Hadn't we better go?"

The Hassons were not at home, when he called two nights later; but their car might roll up any minute. "This is tantalizing, heart-love," he complained.

"It's something to have you here, anyway," as she cuddled deeper into the wide couch-swing behind the ferns on the wide railing. "We must be careful. If Lydia suspected----" Expressive eyes capped the meaning.

Jane had the Cades in for dinner, the next night; when Pelham arrived from the office, Harvey was entertaining the women with a nasal rendition of Judge Roscoe Little's mannerisms while enunciating a decision for both sides at once. The lawyer's welcome contrasted with some hidden constraint beneath Jane's tempered greeting. Throughout the meal and the talk afterwards he sensed that something was wrong. He could not quite make out what it was; perhaps it lay in his imagination.

His wife swished quickly inside, as the guests chugged away, leaving him to rearrange the porch chairs and follow more slowly. Something was up, that was clear.

She sat at her living-room desk, a litter of letters hurriedly pulled out before her. At his entrance, she raised frosty eyes to his. Without words she observed him. Disquieted by the confident, almost hostile stare, he sat heavily, clutching a handy magazine from the fresh pile beneath the reading lamp.

She did not speak. He exhaled noisily, and turned to the opening story.

"I met Lane Cullom this afternoon," she began in a moment, her voice leveled and restrained.

"What did he have to say?"

"He told me about ... about your driving with that Richard woman yesterday afternoon."

"Mmm.... Yes, she is a friend of Lane's. He introduced me, I believe."

Her eyes fired. "You said you were at strike headquarters."

"So I was, until I took a little run out Hazelton way. Then I came back and finished up my work," he lied recklessly.

"He saw you at Catawba. That's ten miles beyond Hazelton.... You didn't get back until midnight last night, Pelham."

"Why, I was here for supper! Then I had to go down town...."

"You were with Miss Richard again." She ventured a chance shot.

His jaw stiffened, the occasional look of childish petulance smoldering around his eyes. "What if I was? Do you expect me to be locked in by a keeper every night?"

"You never mentioned her ... except meeting her."

His mind squirmed. "We have so much else to talk about."

She pushed the disorder of letters backward with a gesture of irritation. "It was a risk marrying you. Every one said so; you had been splendid with me, but before that--you told me yourself--you'd switched from this girl to that.... You had something up with 'Thea Meade, I never asked what.... And the girls while you were in college, Nellie Tolliver and the rest. I never minded them; that was before I knew you. But this.... Do you think I have no shame, even if you haven't?"

"What a lot of side about nothing! Here I merely meet a young lady, take her riding, drop by to see her--what's wrong in that?"

Her low, tense indictment went on, partly to herself. "I always promised myself that I wouldn't marry a ladies' man. It isn't so much what you've done in this case, as the tendency," she continued illogically. "If everything was above-board, why didn't you tell me that you were with her yesterday afternoon and night?"

"Because it was my business, and not yours." His tones rose angrily. "Must I render an account to you for every minute of my time? Can't I have some self-respect left? Do you expect to keep me tied to your apron-strings all my life?"

"You needn't tell me, Pelham Judson, that you took her riding to show her the scenery. I know you better--by now. She made a few large eyes at you; you thought at once that you saw your soul-mate. Told her you were misunderstood at home, of course--that she could understand you." He failed completely to detect the scorn, intended to wither his defense.

"What if I did? It's true, isn't it? We get along finely on lots of things, Jane; but there are some things in which we can't agree."

"We both agree, I suppose, that the marriage agreement doesn't call for you to make love to other girls, when you are married to me. Of course, you kissed her----"

"What if I did?" His retort slipped from his lips too quickly; he wished at once that he had held it back. "There's surely no harm----"

"I won't dare hold up my head in her sight!"

"We're grown men and women, Jane. We're not old fogies. We realize, surely, that love can't be bought and sold, to be locked up forever in a marriage license. Love must be free; and when it comes----"

"You can have your 'love' as free as you wish, Pelham. Only, count me out of it." She rose, the commotion stirred by her quick motion setting the loose sheets flying, drifting to the new carpet they had been so proud of a week ago. Furious, she stooped to pick them up, her ire mounting as the unexpected enormity of his conduct became apparent.

"You talk like a fool, Jane. I haven't done anything----"

"I'll tell you what you've done. You've let a passing fancy for a woman make you forget that you're my husband. I won't share you with another woman, even if she will."

"Why, last night, when I came home, you were as loving----"

Her glance bayoneted him. "I've told you before of that Allie Durfield, the poor girl who'd ended up on Butler's Avenue. I've told you the bitterness with which she said, 'You engaged girls cause us the trouble. After your man's spent an evening with you, we pay for it.' I didn't understand her then; I do now. You spend the evening with this woman, then come home ... you call me loving! I wonder you can look me in the face!"

"You exaggerate everything, as usual. We haven't done a thing----"

"You've kissed her."

"That was nothing."

"It's this much. Either you give me your word now that you will not see her again, or--see only her ... and whoever else your fancy dictates. I'm through. I'll go back to Mrs. Anderson's and let you ... let you...." Her voice broke; she tumbled weakly, weeping and distraught, against the couch.

He was at her side in an instant. She rose, flinging the tears flying. "Keep away! How _dare_ you touch me! I suppose you thought I'd cry and make up?... Will you give me your word?" There was a plaintive affection even through the sternness. "Dearest, we can't have our marriage on a rotten foundation."

He fumed to the front door and back, the discarded magazine rustling unnoticed upon the scattered letters. "I'll do anything in reason, Jane. But this is unreasonable, and you know it. You mustn't carry your penchant for running away from situations too far." She flushed at the reference. "I'll agree, of course, not to be unfaithful; but you can't choose whom I may and may not speak to. Common decency----It's ridiculous."

"We can't have a half-way marriage. This has gone too far.... Make your choice. You can't burn both ends of your candle...."

"Anything within reason, Jane."

"You'll promise, then?"

"No." The cruel monosyllable crushed the joy rising in her voice. "It's too ridiculous," he repeated.

There was a dangerous hush in her voice. "You understand the alternative? I leave to-morrow."

"If you're bound to be foolish, I can't stop you. I won't force you to stay here."

"I should say not!"

"You'll come to your senses soon enough. A good night's sleep will cure your tantrum."

Casually he jerked a match against the sole of his shoe. The sputtering head spun smokily into the carpet. He stamped it out, and lit another. Shielding the flame from the night breeze, he relit his pipe. When he looked up, she had left the room.

He knocked considerately on her door at breakfast time. A muffled voice told him that she had a headache, and was not coming out. Well, if she was going to act that way! She was bound to see the matter more reasonably. Probably she was ashamed now to admit that she had been wrong.

He was glad that he had only admitted one kiss....

Disturbed at the thought of the unfinished quarrel, he ran out unannounced to the house for lunch. Voluble Lily, her eyes rolling, informed him that Miss' Jane had left an hour before, and that her trunk had gone too. "An' she said dat you'ud know whar she had gone, Mr. Judson."

"That's all right, Lily. You needn't have supper for me to-night."

Angry with himself, with the inquisitive negro, with the fascination of Louise, which had precipitated this, most of all with headstrong Jane, he shot past the traffic policeman into the swirl of the city. He would show his wife that she couldn't keep him under her little finger!

XXV

The next day began the trial of Ed Cole, for the killing of John Dawson. Militia, equipped by profits from the mountain's wealth, guarded the courthouse; the strikers, realizing that their salvation lay in preventing an armed clash, ignored the provocative slurs and taunts of these guardians of order; but the glint of guns followed wherever they were, a continuing menace. Ben Spence had finally twisted a half-hearted consent from the county prosecutor to let him act with the State. "But they double-cross me every chance they get, Judson," he said as they walked to the county courthouse together. "That young Chippen, who is about as much of a lawyer as I am a South Sea Islander, is to handle the State's case--the youngest and poorest hanger-on around the county attorney's office. And against him, Dick Mabry, _and_ Hilary, Leach, Pugh and Garfunkel!"

"They're a good criminal firm----"

"Best in the South. Darned fools, three of them; Tipton Leach is a lawyer. Darned crooks, all four. The company will do anything to get the nigger off. And 'Willy' Hawkes, Tuttle's old partner, holds this term!"

Spence took his seat beside Chippen, Pelham with a row of socialists just behind. Judge Hawkes entered with his usual nervous jerk, twitching his apologetic way to the raised bench. Richard Mabry, smiling in velvety assurance, bowed ostentatiously to His Honor; the defendant's table was otherwise empty. Deputies escorted in the negro, his face bright with a frightened interest, mixed with delight at his sudden importance, and confidence in the last whispered instructions of his lawyers, given half an hour before. The court-room filled rapidly; there was an uneasy rustle, a half-restrained chatter.

"Is the State ready to proceed?" came the case-weary accents from the bench.

"We are ready." Chippen's young voice wobbled uncertainly.

"The defendant ready?"

"If the Court please," in Mabry's meticulous accents, "my colleagues--in a moment----"

The judge leaned back, closing his eyes.

A sudden hush at the door. A stretching of necks from all the fringes of the room. Walking daintily, with a glaze of dignity which never lost its underwash of the furtive, came Meyer Garfunkel, youngest of the firm. Spence leaned forward to Pelham. "Biggest crook in six states! Does all their dirtiest jobs.... They always come in this way; it impresses the courthouse crowd."

The door swung again; a succession of breathless "There he is!"-es, as Colonel Lysander G. Pugh stamped heavily in, with his invariable atmosphere of busied haste, bowing affably left and right, his weathered broad-brim clutched beside his brief case.

Another shifting of interest. Tipton Leach, narrow-eyed, a permanent sneer around his mouth, walking slowly, speculatively. "He is the brains," continued Spence. "The corporations fear him like sin, in damage cases. He bleeds them and his clients indiscriminately. But he knows more law than all the local bench."

Last of all, preceded by his law clerk, Zebulun Hilary himself, his little red face, under the thinned mop of white hair, sticking out of his wide collar like a turtle's. "Over eighty, and indestructible! Even his conscience is asbestos."

There was a leisurely deliberation among the five counsel for the defendant. Five heads came together, five brains bent their scheming toward freeing the accused negro, ten eyes quivered with satisfaction at the prospect.

"Defendant ready?" The jaded judge roused himself to make this interjection.

Colonel Pugh rose in sallow majesty, his vulture eye sweeping the front half of the room in indiscriminate defiance of the court, the State, and, if necessary, the whole United States. Catch Lysander G. Pugh unready? Impossible! In precise affability his round tones rolled out. "The defendant is ready, if it please Your Honor." He sat down in complacent vindication.

An irrepressible ripple of appreciation quivered through the place. Here was a lawyer who knew how to law!

The plea of "not guilty" was entered; the panel of talesmen called from the jury room.

Spence leaned over to Pelham again. "First case since the Whitney scandal when all four have appeared together. They have the perfect system, Judson. Garfunkel does the second-story work; Leach knows enough law for all four of them; Zeb Hilary and Colonel Pugh get the business. They belong to everything--there isn't a lodge of any kind that they don't flock to. These two go into every political fight, one on one side, one on the other; they get 'em coming and going. It'll be a treat to hear them address the jury." He closed his eyes expressively. "Whew!"

Two men lounged in from the clerk's office and took their places at the defendant's table, as the selection of the jury began. Pelham watched their activity in bewilderment; as each name was called, they bent over long lists, and consulted with the lawyers while the talesmen were being examined. He noticed the deference with which their whispers were received.

At the first chance, he spoke to Spence again. "Who are those--more lawyers?"

Ben flashed him a sudden glance. "Don't you know 'Chicory' Jasper, and Bill Letcher? They're two of the company's 'jury strikers'--'jury fixers.' They have the dope on each man; interview them in advance, and all. If a man's ever said anything against a corporation, off he goes."

"But is that ... legal?"

"Supreme Court has ruled that it is." He turned back, to insist on Chippen's challenging a venireman who had worked in the company's office before getting state employment.