Chapter XVIII: Judy Plans a Campaign

Judy's summons brought Carley Farnsworth up into the mountains within the fewest possible hours after she gave it to her emissary to deliver. For Carley Farnsworth was Westover's friend, and in Virginia at that time friendship meant a readiness to serve at any cost or hazard.

It was nearing supper time when Farnsworth appeared at Judy's hospitable door and introduced himself.

"This is Mrs. Peters, I suppose?" he said as she confronted him.

"Judy Peters is my name," she answered in that spirit of mountain democracy which scorns titles and distinctions and shams of every other sort.

Farnsworth was quick to catch the underlying significance of her correction and both diplomacy and humor prompted him to play the game as she wanted it played.

"That's what I hoped for," he responded quickly; "for Judy Peters is the very person I most want to see in all the world just now. I am Carley Farnsworth, Judy. Of course Boyd has written the name 'Don Carlos' every time he has sent me game through you, and so you don't know me as 'Carley,' but that's what I am to all my friends, and I count you as one of the best of them because you're a friend of Boyd Westover, just as I am."

"Now that's spoke up like a real, natural young feller, an' not like a drasted stuck-up," responded Judy, shaking hands and bestowing him in a porch chair where a minute later she pressed a toddy of apple brandy upon his acceptance, as a sure cure for the weariness he must feel after his trapes up the mountain.

As he sipped the seductive beverage he and she talked. But neither alluded even in the most distant way to the occasion for his visit or to Judy's summons, or to anything else relating to Boyd Westover. They were both fencing for position. Each wanted to "size up" the other, before approaching matters of confidence and consequence. But by the time Judy's generous supper was at an end these two understood each other and each trusted the other. Judy had told him how many "hawgs" she sent down the mountain every year to be sold to planters, to be corn fed for three weeks, and converted into hams, bacon, souse, and all the rest of the good things in which Virginian appetites revelled. She had told him how many "bar'ls" of apple brandy she made "in a average year," how much cider, how much vinegar, and where her market was for all these things. Incidentally she had given him her picturesque opinions upon many questions of human character, life and conduct, and he in his turn had told her everything he could think of, concerning himself.

"Now you an' me's acquainted," Judy said when she thought the time ripe for the revelation of her plans. "You's the sort o' feller to git acquainted with, easy an' natural like, 'case you ain't got nothin' to keep up your sleeve, an' you ain't got up in a lot o' shams an' frills. You is straight goods, Carley, all wool, a yard wide an' dyed in the hanks. May be it's 'cause you's a real 'ristocrat what don't need to keep on tellin' 'bout it."

"Thank you for the compliment, Judy," said Farnsworth, interrupting.

"They ain't no compliment to thank anybody for," she replied. "They ain't never no compliments a flyin' about when Judy Peters is mixed up in the talk; or ef they is they's purty apt to git holes punched in 'em. Ef I thought you was a palaverin' liar, Carley, I'd tell you so straight out. Ef I thought you was a feller what would say one thing an' do another, you'd hear that opinion from Judy Peters's lips, an' what's more you wouldn't hear none o' the things I axed you to come up here to hear about. Now le's git down to business, as the feller said when the sheriff was slow about a hangin' of him. You see, Carley, Boyd Westover's had a shakin' up, an' he ain't right in his sperits. He's got a notion into his head that folks is down on him an' all that. S'long as he's up there a huntin' an' fishin' an' listenin' to Theonidas's yarns an' sleepin' tight he's all right. But that notion 'bout folks a bein' down on him is still a stickin' in his mind, like mutton gravy sticks in the roof of your mouth, an' you an' me's got to cure him of it. I's already laid out plans, an' ef you're game to help me, we'll rub that thing off'n his slate."

"I'm game to help you, Judy, in any way you like. You may bet all the apple brandy you've got on that."

"Is that a hint, like? Does you want another nip? 'Cause ef you do, it'll be here quicker'n lightnin'."

"No, Judy. I don't want another dram, and I never indulge in hints, especially with a straightforward person like you. If I wanted a drink I'd tell you so, but in fact I hardly ever taste liquor of any sort, and that toddy you gave me was the first I've sipped in a year or more."

"Yes, it's curious, but they's a good many young men nowadays as don't take to their drams natural like. I s'pose it's all right, but I don't understand it. Anyhow, that's no matter. As I was a sayin', Boyd Westover's got that notion in his head 'bout folks a bein' down on him, an' it'll come back to him when the snow drives him down out'n the mountings. Now the way to cure him of it's to git him 'lected to somethin', an' I's got the somethin' picked out. When he fin's as folks has voted for him agin t'other feller, he jes' naturally can't go on a thinkin' folks is down on him. See?"

"Yes, I see that, and your idea is a good one, Judy, if we can get him to run for some office."

"Git him to run? We won't ax him. We'll jes' run him ourselves, an' we'll 'lect him too, ef the big figgers tops the little ones as I's always seed 'em do in a 'lection count."

Judy was apt to be confident in her predictions, chiefly for the reason that she never made a prediction till she knew all the facts that might bear in any way upon its fulfilment.

"That's what I wanted to see you about, Carley. This is the way of it. You kin help, an' I'm a bettin' my fingers agin fishhooks you'll do it."

"It's a good bet, Judy," he interrupted. "I'd do anything imaginable for Westover, and, now that I know you, I'd do even more than that for you. Go on. What's your plan?"

"Well, you see that measly little soap-locked sap-head, William Wilberforce Webb--they's more name to the man than man to the name--has gone an' got hisself enominated fer the Senate. That suits me down to the ground. You an' me is a goin' to beat him out'n his boots, an' 'lect Westover in his stid. That's the game an' the way the wind blows, an' the lay o' the land."

"But, Judy, can we do it? You see Webb has secured the regular Whig nomination, and this is a strong Whig district."

"That's all right," answered Judy, confident of the "figgerin'" she had made Marcellus McGrath do on her slate. "You see it's this a'way. The Democrats ain't got no chanst to 'lect a man o' their own, but they're a layin' low to rip the righteousness out'n the reg'lar Whig candidate ef they git the chanst, an' you an' me's a goin' to give 'em the chanst. We'll enominate Westover as a 'Independent Whig candidate' an' every Democrat in the distric' 'll vote for him. They won't be no Democrat candidate."

"Are you sure of that, Judy? With two Whigs running they might think they had a chance to slip a Democrat in."

"They mout, of course, but they won't," answered Judy, confidently. "I's seen to that. You don't s'pose Judy Peters was borned day before yesterday, do you, Carley?" Then, without waiting for him to protest a greater respect for her age and experience, she continued:

"Shouldn't wonder ef the Democrats got some local offices this year. You see the mounting vote is uncertain. Anyhow, they won't enominate anybody for the Senate; or, yes they will. They's a makin' the enomination to-day. But after you an' me has got Westover a goin' their candidate will withdraw hisself an' urge all Democrats to vote fer Westover an' 'lect him. You see the Democrat vote is a leetle more'n twenty-five per cent. in this Senate distric'. I got Marcellus McGrath to figger that out. An' twenty-five per cent. is a quarter, Mark says, an' he knows. Now the vote up here in the mountings is more'n half o' the whole, 'cause us folks up here raises more children than the planter people does. They ain't no profit in boastin', but I kin tell you jes' confidential like, that ef Judy Peters lets her tongue git too loose an' the secret slips out that she wants Boyd Westover 'lected, you could count on your fingers an' toes the votes the other feller'd git up here in the mountings. Seems to me like a sure thing, Carley."

With that Judy chuckled in satisfaction.

"But you've hearn talk o' 'moral effec',' haven't you, Carley?"

Farnsworth intimated that he had some small perception of the meaning of the terms, and Judy went on:

"Well, what you an' me's a playin' for is moral effec' on Boyd Westover. As fer 'lectin' him, they won't be no trouble 'bout that. But ef the moral effec' is to be strong, we mus' git the biggest vote we kin for him down among the plantation people. Fust off, then, he's got to be enominated by that sort o' folks, without no hint o' Judy Peters or the mountings in it. That's your fust job. You go down there, sayin nothin' 'bout Judy Peters or the mountings, an' git a lot o' the stuck-ups to jine you in enominatin' him."

In those days the "Reformers" who plead for independence in politics had not yet invented their ingenious devices for compelling the voter to make a choice of evils in deciding for whom he would vote. There were no such things as "official ballots" limiting the choice of the voter to men formally nominated. Every man was free, as every man everywhere ought to be, to vote for whomsoever he pleased without consulting an "Australian" ballot sheet to find out what men he was permitted to vote for. And any man who aspired to office was at liberty to announce his candidacy in person or through friends as an appeal to his fellow citizens for their free suffrages, without asking permission of any caucus or boss or primary or convention, and without the necessity of spending money corruptly in order to secure the privilege of being voted for if his fellow citizens wished to vote for him.

Judy continued:

"When you git all the big-bug signatures you kin, jest send a nigger round to post up the enomination papers everywhere. Have 'em printed, Carley, 'cause print sort o' carries weight, an' printin' don't cost much, an' even ef it did, 'twouldn't make no difference, 'cause I'd pay the bill."

"You can't do that, Judy. Westover's friends down there'll attend to that. I'll have twenty or twenty-five signatures to the paper, and I'll have five or six hundred printed, so as to post one on every gate post and every tree that anybody's likely to look at. How many do you want, for use in the mountains?"

"None at all! Not one!" answered Judy, emphatically. "They won't be needed up here, 'cause I'm a takin' care o' the mounting vote, an' I ain't a sayin' nothin'. Let 'em keep a guessin' 'bout how the mountings is a goin' till they hears the answer to the riddle when the polls is closed. You see ef they find out the mountings is agin 'em they'll try to do somethin' up here, an' ef they's uncertain they won't care to stir up things. But besides all that, there's the drymatic climax to think of. Tom Hardaway tole me all about that wunst, so I know what a drymatic climax is, an' I mean to have one this time, jest for the sake o' that banty rooster, William Wilberforce Webb, who'll find all his tail feathers pulled out by the roots when the 'lection's over."

It will perhaps be inferred from Judy's utterances that her hatreds were implacable as her likings were limitless. For explanation it is only necessary to remember that Judy Peters was an entirely natural person, unaffected by any of the agencies of civilization. To her, in sentiment and emotion, compromises were as impossible as concessions; qualifications as unthinkable as cowardice itself--and there was no cowardice in Judy. Toward those whose conduct had aroused neither animosity nor affection in her soul, she was always fair with a frankness that had no hypocrisy and no reserve in it; toward those whom she cherished as friends her loyalty was of a sort that knew no bounds and asked no questions; toward those whom she recognized as her enemies, and still more toward those who were the enemies of her friends, she cherished a malevolence that knew no mercy and that stopped at nothing in the accomplishment of its malignant purposes.

Such was Judy--a typical representative of the human animal in his untamed and natural state.

"Then they's another thing, Carley, an' it's fust an' foremost in my thinkin'."

"What is it, Judy?"

"Well, it's this aways. You see you an' me's a workin' an' a plannin' to bring Westover round all right again. Now the 'lection '11 do a mighty sight that way, but 'twon't do it all. What Boyd needs is a good, hard fight, an' that's what you an' me's got to give him. He ain't to know nothin' 'bout the way the 'lection's a goin' when he hears of his enomination. He ain't to know as how Judy Peters had anything to do with it. He's jest to be told as how a lot o' you stuck-ups has enominated him, and how nobody knows where he's a been, an' how they's a sayin' an' a insinuatin' all sorts o' things, an' specially that he's afeard to face his constituents. That'll stir up all the fightin' blood they is in him, an' they's apt to be a lot o' that sort o' blood in a Westover. It'll set him hot when he gits down your way, an' from then tell the 'lection's over he'll fight like a catamount when a dozen hounds gits him cornered. That's what he needs, an' when the thing's over, an' he fin's himself 'lected by a large majority, an' sees that water-soaked piece o' cheap soap that calls hisself William Wilberforce Webb a slinkin' off into his hole like a drownded rat, he won't git to thinkin' agin' that folks is down on him."

Judy's metaphors were a trifle mixed perhaps, but her rhetoric had behind it an intensity and a sincerity of purpose that left her auditor in no doubt as to her meaning.

"Judy, you're a brick!" exclaimed Carley Farnsworth rising and grasping her hand. "You've got blood in your veins, and sand in your gizzard, and a headpiece on your shoulders. I'm with you, all over and clear through. I'm going back down the mountain to-morrow morning. I'll get the nomination papers out, and I'll speak three times a day for Westover. I never made a speech in my life, but I can do it now, and all between the speeches I'll talk. The words'll flow out of me like water through a mill-tail. And one thing more, Judy; I'm a little fellow, as you know. I don't weigh a hundred and ten pounds, I'm only five feet three in my shoes, but I can pull a trigger. I'll see to it that nobody says anything shameful about Boyd Westover without being called to an interview with me at ten paces."

So was the compact made. Judy went inside and brewed a bowl of hot apple toddy which she insisted that Carley should share with her "jes' to bind the bargain," she said, and Carley, unused as he was to such indulgence, took the risk of a next morning's headache by drinking fair with her.