Front matter (continued 4)

Mr. Crockett was convinced. But he was a gentleman of considerable imperturbability. He merely straightened up and asked:

"Who are you?"

The younger man suddenly decided not to give his name. There was that in Mr. Crockett's blue eyes that suggested an uncomfortable pertinacity and ruthlessness in following up any clue he might get hold of.

"What business is that of yours?" said Merriam.

Mr. Crockett blinked. He was doubtless unaccustomed to such replies. But he merely asked another question:

"Where are you from?"

"Down State," said Merriam. That was both insolent and safe: Illinois is tolerably sizable.

"How old are you?"

Merriam saw an advantage in answering this query truthfully.

"Twenty-eight," he said. "What of it?"

"You don't happen to be a young nephew or cousin of Senator Norman's, do you?" asked Mr. Crockett, hitting the bull's-eye with his first arrow.

Merriam, somewhat startled, countered with a flat denial:

"No, I'm not. I've been told I look like him," he added. "Somebody took me for him last night. But I'm only related to him through Adam and Eve--so far as I know."

Mr. Crockett scanned him narrowly:

"Somebody took you for Norman last night?"

"They sure did." Having struck the slangy note by accident, Merriam was enough of an actor to keep it up.

"I should be much obliged if you will tell me about that."

Merriam's self-confidence returned. He had been realising how little this dialogue was developing in accordance with his pleasing anticipations. Instead of the rôle of a polished man of the world, delivering brilliant thrusts of irony and reducing his interlocutor to apologetic confusion, he had stumbled inadvertently on that of a slangy youth, submitting to be catechised by an individual who remained singularly composed and had proved dangerously shrewd. But at last he had led up adroitly enough to the story which Rockwell had charged him to tell. He set himself to tell it in character:

"Well, if you want to know, I came up to the City on business--yesterday. When I got my work done I thought I'd have a little fun--see the sights, you know. I don't know this town much, but I got hold of a taxi man who took me around. I looked in at several places. I guess I had a pretty good time. I don't remember much. I had more highballs than I'm used to. We ended up at a dance hall somewhere. There were some pretty girls there. Somebody said, 'You're Senator Norman, aren't you?' That struck me as funny. 'Sure, I am,' I said, and I kept it up. Soon everybody in the place was calling me 'Senator.' I treated the gang. Then I got into a fight. I don't remember how. Somebody knocked me down, I think. But I wasn't hurt any. After that I picked up this little girl that lives here--the one in pink,--and she brought me home with her. I had a bad head on this morning and a bad cold besides. The little girl is a good sport. She let me stay here all day. I'm going down home in the morning."

"I see," said Mr. Crockett slowly.

Merriam had need of all his self-command to conceal his elation as he perceived that his formidable antagonist had swallowed bait, hook, and sinker, as the idiom goes. He was obviously piecing Merriam's narrative together in his mind with the Tidbits story about Norman. Margery, who had remained standing unobtrusive and silent by the bureau, flashed Merriam a commendatory glance.

Stimulated thereby, he pertly followed up his advantage:

"Care for any more of my personal memoirs?"

"No, thank you," said Mr. Crockett with a rather sour smile. "Good night, Mr.--Mr.----"

He was angling for the name again, but with a feebleness unworthy of a great financier.

"Mr. Blank," said Merriam. "I've a bit of a reputation to keep up in my own home town."

"I see," said Mr. Crockett again. "Well, I'm sorry to have intruded. Take care of your reputation!"

He turned away towards the door.

In that open door Jennie had stood listening. Now her cue had come. She took it promptly. She advanced into the bedroom, stepping lightly on her toes, her pink skirt waving prettily. She smiled her brightest smile at Mr. Crockett.

"He isn't Senator Norman, is he?" she cried gaily.

"He certainly isn't," said Mr. Crockett, looking at her. No man could have helped looking at her.

"You were awfully rude about it," said Jennie, pouting. She had stopped about two feet in front of him.

"Was I?"

"I should say you were. Awfully! You ought to do something to make up for it."

"What ought I to do?" asked Mr. Crockett.

"You might stay for a little supper with Margery and me."

"Might I?"

Unexpectedly Mr. Crockett looked away from Jennie. He looked at Merriam, thoughtfully--a disconcerting thoughtfulness. Then he turned back to Jennie.

"Perhaps I might," he said, with a faint smile.

Merriam read his mind. He was sure he did. The man might or might not be slightly attracted by Jennie's prettiness, but what he was thinking was that he would be able to get more out of her than he had been able to get from Merriam. The latter at once perceived that Jennie's melodramatic scheme was dangerous and silly. It might have been all right with Thompson, but not with this man. She hadn't sense enough to see the difference. But he could do nothing to stop her.

Already she had cried, "Oh, goody!" like a little girl.

She stepped past Mr. Crockett, brushing him with her skirts, put her hands on his shoulders and began playfully to push him towards the dining room.

"It's all ready," she was saying. "We got it for the man inside, but he says he isn't hungry. We have sandwiches and olives and cheese and beer--and there's whiskey, if you like."

"I'll take beer," said Mr. Crockett, mustering a certain lightness and allowing himself to be pushed.

Merriam looked at Margery, still standing by the bureau. She too had changed her costume. She now wore an evening dress of black and gold, in which she looked very well, rather brilliant, in fact. But what Merriam noticed was the understanding look in her eyes. She had read Mr. Crockett's purpose as clearly as he had.

"We'll be careful," she said. "You did fine. Shall I turn out the light?"

"No," said Merriam. "Leave it, please."

She walked out of the room and closed the door.

CHAPTER XX

AN EVENTFUL SUPPER PARTY

Though Margery had closed the door Merriam could hear practically everything that went on in the adjoining room--as one commonly can in an apartment.

"Get the food from the ice chest, will you, Marge?" cried Jennie, in tones whose gaiety sounded genuine. "I'll set out the drinks. Let's have a cocktail to start with, Mr.----"

She interrupted herself:

"What's your first name?"

"Well," said Crockett, "one of my first names is Henry."

"Then I'll call you 'Harry.' I hate last names--and 'Mister' and 'Miss'!"

Merriam in his recumbent solitude made a cynically humorous grimace. She had used those very words with him--had begun the same way. Her regular formula doubtless.

"I'm 'Jennie,' you know," she continued. "Now, what kind of cocktail?"

"I'll stick to beer, please."

"But I want to start with a cocktail! Have one with me! Please!"

The tone was that of a teasing child. In his mind's eye Merriam could see vividly the trim pink figure (as it had pirouetted before him) and the pretty pouting face. But Crockett was apparently unmoved.

"Bye and bye," he said suavely. "Go ahead with your cocktail. We don't all have to drink the same things, do we? I'll start with beer and work up to cocktails."

"Well, then," said Jennie, with a swift return to unpetulant gaiety, "Marge is bringing your old beer. Oh, goody! See! Cheese sandwiches and chicken sandwiches and lettuce-and-mayonnaise sandwiches!"

Evidently Margery had returned well laden from the ice chest.

"Which kind will you have, Harry?"

"Cheese, thank you," said "Harry."

"There! With my own fingers!"

Jennie spoke with some confidence that the touch of her fingers would render bread and cheese ambrosial.

"Thank you," said "Harry" again, with the barest nuance of dryness in his tone. "I'll open the beer. What will you drink, Miss Milton?"

Undoubtedly he was snubbing Jennie! Those blue eyes of his might perhaps be attentive enough to white arms and tight waists and pink legs when he himself had sought them out, but they were not to be distracted by any such frivolous phenomena when serious business was afoot. Jennie would fail! Merriam was sure of it.

But at any rate she was not easily snubbed.

"Her name's Margery," she cried, consistent in her antipathy to surnames.

"Well, Margery?" said Crockett, complaisantly.

"Beer," said Margery.

It was the first word Merriam had heard her speak. Her taciturnity comforted him. Jennie was a little fool, but Margery would keep her head. They would waste their time and their sandwiches and beer on Crockett, but perhaps she would foil any inquiries he might presently attempt.

"Don't set things in the middle of the table, Marge," cried. Jennie. "Set 'em around the edge. I'm going to do a dance for you, Harry. Wouldn't you like to see me dancing on the table?"

"It would be very charming," said "Harry." But the tone was merely gallant; it betokened no quickening of pulse.

"I must have a sandwich first, though," said Jennie quickly. Even she perceived that she was not making progress.

There followed eating and drinking, accompanied by a patter of gay, disconnected sallies from Jennie, relating chiefly to the eatables and drinkables. "Harry," continually appealed to by that name, remained calmly polite. Margery, when addressed, responded in monosyllables. Ripe olives and cold tongue and mustard were produced. Jennie had her cocktail, and then another. She needed stimulant, poor girl, to keep up the gay vivacity which was meeting with so little encouragement. A second bottle of beer was opened for "Harry" and Margery.

Meanwhile Merriam, still listening, was engaged also in active cogitation. He saw well enough into Crockett's thought. The latter had been momentarily convinced by his, Merriam's, well-told tale. (Margery had said he had "done fine.") But the keen, realistic mind behind those blue eyes had almost immediately rebounded and seized upon the overwhelming inherent improbability of that yarn. That there should be a man without close relationship to Norman who resembled him so strongly was in itself decidedly remarkable. That this man should encounter Norman's mistress, by pure chance, at a public dance and go home with her was even more curious. And that all this should happen, merely fortuitously, on the very night on which Senator Norman had unaccountably broken, before nine o'clock, solemn promises given with every appearance of sincerity and willingness shortly before eight, and suddenly gone over to a party for which throughout a score of years he had expressed nothing but dislike and contempt--the mathematical chances against such a series of coincidences were simply incalculable.

It was a quick, clear perception of this abstract, apriori incredibility that Merriam had read in Crockett's final glance before Jennie playfully pushed him out of the bedroom. Doubtless he was still revolving it in his mind as he sat at Jennie's table, responding with merely mechanical politeness to her rather pitiful attempts to pique his interest and desire. Well, let him revolve it. The story all hung together. What could he make of it? Little enough, probably, with the data he had now. But that was why he was lingering here at Jennie's--in the hope of getting more data. After another cocktail or two Jennie would not know what she was saying. Then he would begin to hint, to ask questions. Could Margery keep her quiet? A single word might give him a clue.

Merriam became conscious of a wish that Rockwell were at hand to help. But that wish instantly gave birth to further fears. Rockwell had said he would telephone from the hotel as soon as they arrived. That message might come any minute now--with Crockett there! Whereabouts in the flat was the telephone? He had not noticed it anywhere. He looked about the bedroom. But it was not there, of course.

Ought not that message to have come already? Surely they should be at the hotel by now unless something had gone wrong. He suddenly envisaged all the perils of discovery, which he had hitherto been too much occupied to realise, involved in the transportation of the sick Senator across the roof--down through the other trapdoor into the other hall--down three flights of stairs--along two blocks of city street to the taxi. They might so easily have been noted by some of Thompson's, or Crockett's, watchers, and followed to the hotel. Then they would be caught indeed--in the very fact. Verily, the paths of the impostor are perilous!

Then Merriam's mind was brought sharply back from these alarming excursions to his own scarcely less dangerous situation. Crockett had for the first time volunteered a remark. It was just such a remark as Merriam had anticipated.

"Nice boy you have in there."

His voice was slightly lowered but only slightly. Perhaps he did not realise the perfection of the acoustic properties of flats.

"Very nice boy!" agreed Jennie cordially.

Merriam noticed with alarm just the faintest touch of the effect of cocktails in her accent. How many had the girl had by now?

"So you met him at Reiberg's, did you?" Crockett pursued.

"Reiberg's?" said Jennie doubtfully, "Reiberg's?"

"Yes," Margery cut in. "Picked him up there and brought him home. I call it a shame. Jen's never done that sort of thing before."

"I expect you took to him because he looks so much like Senator Norman," suggested Crockett, rather skillfully persistent.

"Yes," said Jennie, "looks very like George. But he's not George. He's John!"

"John what?" asked Crockett mildly.

"John Blank!" said Margery sharply. "He told you he didn't want to give his name. Jen, keep your face shut!"

"I beg your pardon, I'm sure," said Crockett.

"Have a cocktail now!" said Jennie, quite unabashed.

Crockett at last agreed to a cocktail, and it was fixed for him, and the conversation, if such it could be called, again concerned itself with incidents to the consumption of food and drink.

Thank God for Margery! She had won the first trick. But Crockett would try again. And Jennie would grow more and more difficult to handle. Aside from the danger, Merriam hated to think of Jennie's getting really drunk. Could not Margery get rid of the man? The trouble was he had stayed at Jennie's invitation. Could not he, Merriam, do something?

He felt under the bedclothes until he found the revolver. He drew it out and looked at it. But of what use was it, really? Would Crockett blench at the mere pointing of a pistol? He doubted it. It was loaded only with blanks, Jennie had said. And he dared not fire it anyway. The occupants of a dozen adjoining flats would hear the report. People would come bursting in. The police would be called. Well, was not that the solution? To have Crockett caught in that flat by the police in connection with a shooting? Perhaps, but not a nice one for himself. Not to be tried except as the very last resort. Besides, would it serve their purpose? A public exposure of Crockett would do no good. What they needed was a threat of possible exposure to hold over him--not the exposure itself.

If only Jennie could succeed in her purpose of enticing him into some display of amorousness, of which he and Margery might be witnesses. It would be pleasant to "have the goods on him," to use Jennie's phrase. Why did she not dance for him? But Crockett would not be enticed. He might, however, pretend to be. He might decide to "play up" in that way if through Margery's watchfulness he could get nothing out of Jennie without doing so.

But now there flashed into Merriam's mind a doubt of the efficacy of Jennie's scheme even if they should succeed in carrying it out. Suppose Crockett should catch hold of her after her dance and try to kiss her, and she should scream, and he should rush out with his revolver, and Crockett should be intimidated thereby into ignominious exit? That would be very good fun, but would it give them any hold over him in case of need? He could deny it. Against his word the only witnesses would be Jennie and Margery, whose testimony would not be taken very seriously, and himself--a nobody and an impostor. No wonder Margery, the clear-headed, had disapproved. They ought to get more tangible evidence--something in writing or a photograph.

He suddenly remembered the camera on the table in the living room, and recalled also a certain college episode, a rather lurid incident of his fraternity days, in which a camera and a girl and a priggish freshman had figured. It suggested to him a decidedly picturesque and venturesome procedure against Crockett. But he shook his head. It was too violent, too rough. All very well for a parcel of boys with a freshman. But with Mr. Crockett, the mighty capitalist! No! Hardly!

Just then he heard Jennie say:

"Get your mandolin, Marge. I'm going to dance now."

"Fine!" said Crockett. But he was still cool, amused.

Margery made no reply, but she evidently complied. In a moment there came a preliminary strumming on the mandolin.

"Help me up, Harry," said Jennie.

"With pleasure," said "Harry."

He was helping her to mount on to the table.

"Move that siphon off," Jennie said. "I might kick it over."

There was gay excitement in her voice. Cocktails had made her indifferent to appreciation. As for Merriam, the conscience of a realist compels me to report a sense of disappointment: he wanted to see the dance.

"Now sit down again," cried Jennie. "You can see better."

At this frankness Crockett laughed. There was the sound of his dropping into a chair.

"Now, Marge!" Jennie commanded.

But Margery did not strike into her tune and the dance did not begin, for at that instant the telephone rang.

It was in the dining room, then!

There was a quick movement of chairs and feet. Then Crockett's voice said, "Hello!"

He was answering it!

"That's not fair!" cried Margery. "It's not for you!"

"Keep off!" said Crockett in a quick, stern whisper, and then, evidently into the telephone, "Yes! Yes!"

Merriam leapt out of bed, revolver in hand, in his pajamas and flung open the door.

Crockett was standing by the wall at the telephone. Jennie, in her ballet costume, stood transfixed in the center of the table. Margery was rushing at Crockett.

"You--you spy!" she screamed.

Merriam, in the door, pointed his revolver.

"Drop it!" he cried, meaning the telephone receiver. "Hands up!"

But Crockett, catching Margery by the shoulder with his free hand, held her powerfully at arm's length and only smiled at Merriam's revolver.

"Why?" he asked into the telephone, and added quickly, "Nothing! These girls are romping so!"

But his words could hardly be heard for Margery's screaming. He dropped the receiver and put the hand thus freed over the mouthpiece.

"Shut up!" he said fiercely to Margery, and gave her shoulder a violent wrench.

"O--oh!" she groaned.

Something had to be done instantly, for Crockett was turning back to the telephone. With a sort of impulsive desperation Merriam threw the revolver at Crockett's head. The man dodged, and the revolver struck the opposite wall and fell to the floor. But the movement took him away from the telephone, and Merriam, rushing forward, added the impetus of a straight-arm thrust, which sent him staggering against the table.

Then Merriam caught up the receiver.

"Hello! Hello!" he cried into the mouthpiece.

For an instant no reply. Then Central's voice said sweetly:

"Your party's hung up." And added, in tones of unwonted interest: "What's the row there? Shall I send the police?"

"No, no!" said Merriam. "There's nothing wrong here."

He hung up and turned to face the room.

Crockett was still leaning against the table. Margery was clutching the arm which a moment before had gripped her, and Jennie had jumped down from the table and caught hold of his other arm. But the financier appeared very little ruffled. He even smiled at Merriam, not unpleasantly.

"Well, Mr. Merriam," he said, "suppose we sit down and talk it over--if these ladies will release me, that is."

"Mr. Merriam!" Then the message had been from Rockwell, and Crockett had got the name after all. How much more had he learned? Merriam was quite willing to talk in the hope of finding that out.

"Very well," he said. "Let him go, Margery,--Jennie."

"I'll dance for both of you!" cried Jennie, whose cheeks were decidedly flushed.

"No!" said Merriam. "Sit down, please."

"Sit down, Jen!" seconded Margery, viciously.

"Oh, well!" Jennie plopped petulantly into a chair.

The others sat, Merriam and Crockett across from each other. The financier looked steadily at the younger man.

"Miss Milton was right," he began quietly. "The message was not for me. It was for you, Mr. Merriam. I think I ought to give it to you."

"If you please," said Merriam.

"It was that you should 'come at once to the hotel.'"

Merriam managed not to blink.

"What hotel?" he asked.

For an instant Crockett weighed his answer. Then:

"The De Soto," he said.

But Merriam had read the meaning of the momentary pause: Rockwell had not named the hotel--he wouldn't, of course--Crockett was guessing.

"De Soto?" he asked, looking as puzzled as he could. "I thought it might be from the Nestor House." (He was using the first name that popped into his head.)

"Oh," said Crockett lightly, "Mr. Rockwell would be much more likely to telephone from the De Soto."

Merriam was startled, but he could only go on as he had begun.

"Rockwell?" he echoed, as if still further mystified.

"Come, come," said Crockett, "I recognised his voice. I know it perfectly."

"No friend of mine," Merriam persisted. There might be no advantage in continued denial, but certainly there could be none in admission.

"Really, Mr. Merriam, hadn't you better tell me the whole story? You'll not find me ungenerous. I'll let you down easy."

"The whole story?" said Merriam. "Thought I told you my whole story in the bedroom a while back. What more do you want?"

Crockett shrugged his shoulders. He smiled blandly:

"What I want is another cocktail, I guess. You'll join me, Mr. Merriam? You've had nothing all evening. It must have been dull for you, lying in there, while these pretty ladies have been entertaining me so charmingly. I understood you were sick, you know," he added slyly, "or I should have insisted on your coming out long ago." Then, quickly, so as to give Merriam no chance to reply: "Jennie, my dear, let's have your pretty dance now. We were interrupted."

"No," said Jennie, rather sleepily, "I'm tired."

"Have a cocktail," said Crockett promptly. "Then you'll be all right again."

Jennie looked up with interest. "Well," she said.

Crockett rose to mix the drinks.

"You'll have one, too, Mr. Merriam?"

But during the brief interchange between Crockett and Jennie, Merriam had been doing some quick thinking--wild thinking, perhaps. The plan suggested by his college memory, which before he had rejected as too violent, his mind now seized upon and was eagerly shaping to the present situation.

When Crockett addressed him, he rose.

"No," he said. "I'm tired too. I am sick." He simulated a slight dizziness. "I'll go lie down again. If you'll excuse me."

He moved to the bedroom door, affecting uncertainty in his steps. As he passed into the bedroom he called: "Margery!"

CHAPTER XXI

FLASH LIGHTS

In a moment Margery had followed him.

"Shut the door." He barely formed the words with his lips.

She obeyed.

"That camera--in the sitting room," he whispered. "Can you take a flash light with it?"

"Sure," came the whispered answer. "That's what we use it for."

"Have you any rope?"

"Rope?" echoed Margery's whisper. "There's a clothesline on the back porch."

"Bring it to me!"

Margery looked at him. But a high degree of mutual confidence had been established between these two. She nodded.

"Right away?"

"Yes. He mustn't see it."

"No."

She opened the door and closed it behind her. Merriam sat on the edge of the bed, thinking hard.

"He wants a drink of water," he heard her say to the others in the dining room.

With one ear, so to speak--that is to say, with so much of his mind as could attend to one ear,--he listened to Crockett and Jennie, engaged still in the business of mixing drinks. With the rest of his mind he was making plans, with a rapidity and confident daring that astonished himself.

In a moment Margery had returned. In her right hand she carried a glass of water. Her left hand, hanging at her side, seemed to hold carelessly only a newspaper, folded in two. But as soon as she had closed the door she produced from between the folds a fairly stout clothesline, loosely coiled.

Merriam tried its toughness and surveyed its length.

"All right," he whispered. "Now go back. Drink with them. Jennie must dance. And have Crockett sit where he was before."

This was at the end of the table nearest the telephone and nearest also to Merriam's door.

Again Margery looked at him. She glanced at the rope. But she asked no questions. Without a word she went out and closed the door behind her. Admirable girl!

Merriam's next actions were rather remarkable. He felt hastily in the pockets of his trousers, which lay over a chair, and produced a penknife. With this instrument he cut off four pieces of rope, each about four feet long. This left about ten feet in the main piece. With this main piece he proceeded to manufacture a slip noose, carefully testing both the strength of the slipknot and the readiness of its slipping. Then he gathered the noose and the four other pieces of rope into his left hand and rose and stood before the door, drawing a deep breath and listening.

He had, of course, kept track more or less of the happenings in the other room. Margery, on returning, had demanded another glass of beer and had yielded to insistence that she have a cocktail instead. Then she had suggested that Jennie dance. Jennie had already been assisted on to the table again, and Margery was picking tentatively at her mandolin.

"R-ready!" cried Jennie, a little unsteadily.

Merriam stepped back and turned the button of his electric bulb, so as to have no light behind him.

Then, as Margery struck into a bright quick tune, he softly opened the door with his right hand, holding his left hand with the ropes behind him, and stood looking at Jennie, whose pink toes had begun to patter merrily on the polished table.

Jennie saw him and laughed to him, her eyes and her cheeks bright.

"Come in, Johnny," she cried, and for a second one pink leg pointed straight at him as she turned.

"Couldn't resist, eh?" chuckled Crockett, who was leaning back in the heavy chair Merriam had wished him to occupy. He was apparently really pleased for the first time. "Don't blame you," he added. "Come on in."

His eyes, quite unsuspicious, returned to the circling skirts and the flushed face bobbing above them.

This was Merriam's moment.

He stepped quickly behind Crockett's chair, dropped the short pieces of rope on the floor, raised the noose with both hands, slipped it over the man's head, and pulled it suddenly tight about his neck.

Crockett emitted a strangled oath and started to rise, but Merriam with one hand on his shoulder thrust him down again, and with the other tightened the noose about his throat.

"Sit still," he threatened, "or I'll choke you!"

Margery's tune had stopped abruptly, and Jennie stood still on the table, staring down in frightened bewilderment.

"Margery!" Merriam commanded, "take one of these pieces of rope and tie his arm to the arm of the chair."

The arm referred to was immediately raised away from the chair, but the noose tightened with a further jerk, and the arm fell limply back. In fact Crockett was gasping and choking so desperately that Merriam was compelled to loosen the rope a little.

"Take it quietly," he cautioned, with perhaps a trifle more of youthful ferocity and exultation than the romantic hero should exhibit, "or I'll hang you sitting down!"

Margery, obedient as usual, had stepped quickly forward, picked up a piece of rope, and begun to bind the arm nearest her to the chair.

Crockett, somewhat eased, though still gasping a little, turned his head to look at Merriam. His first involuntary startled alarm was passing. The blue eyes looked steadily at the young man. A trace of their earlier cool amusement returned. He looked away again and sat perfectly still, acquiescent.

Merriam, however, remained warily at his post in charge of the slip noose while Margery tied both arms.

"Now tie his feet to the legs of the chair," said Merriam. "Jennie, you can help. Jump down and tie his right foot while Margery ties the left."

But Jennie, still on the table, shook her pretty head.

"I'd rather dance," she said, and regardless of the lack of music she folded her arms and began to do the steps of the Highland Fling.

"Let her alone," said Margery, who had gone down on her knees and was at work on the left foot.

Jennie tossed her head and quickened the tempo of her dance, keeping her eyes on Crockett, who, though still swallowing with difficulty, affected to regard her with interest.

Margery crossed to Crockett's other side and knelt again. In a moment she completed her labours and rose, her cheeks a little reddened by her posture and vigorous work.

"There!" she said, looking straight at Merriam, as if she were a soldier reporting to his officer.

"Thank you very much," said the young man.

He loosened the noose, leaving it still in place, however, about Crockett's neck. Then he stepped to the side of the table and held out his arms to Jennie.

"Come!" he said, "I'll lift you down."

She stood still. "You don't like my dancing," she pouted. "He likes it!" She pointed at Crockett, who, twisting his eased neck about, smiled.

"I'll like lifting you down," said Merriam.

Jennie smiled and approached the edge of the table. For a moment he held a rosy, fragrant burden in his arms, and in that moment Jennie raised her face to his as if to be kissed. She was really rather incorrigible.

On a different occasion the young man might have been irresistibly tempted (he had not thought of Mollie June for a long time), but just now he was no more in a mood to be enticed than Crockett had been an hour before.

He set her lightly and quickly on her feet.

"There!" he said.

She made a face at him and dropped petulantly into a chair.

Merriam turned to face his well-trussed victim.

The said victim was now sufficiently at ease to open the conversation.

"Well, Mr. Merriam," he said, "you've managed it rather cleverly. Very neat, in fact. You have me a prisoner all right. But what's the big idea? It seems to me you've only given yourself away. Before I only knew your name and that you were in connection with Rockwell and that your presence was desired at some hotel--the Nestor House, we'll say, to avoid argument, Now it's very clear that you are deeply implicated in the extraordinary events that have been happening. Otherwise you would have had no sufficient motive for this rather violent, not to say melodramatic, line of conduct." He glanced, with a smile, at his pinioned arms.

This point of view, however, had already occurred to Merriam; and the answer was that Crockett, knowing already of a direct, confidential connection between Senator Norman's double and Senator Norman's new manager, would in a few hours at most be able to work out the whole truth of the situation.

So he only answered his victim's smile with another smile equally good-humoured.

"I don't think I've given away anything much," he said. "And I felt it was time to take out a bit of insurance."

"Insurance?" repeated Crockett.

"Yes. Insurance that you will treat me with that generosity which you half promised a while ago."

"I promised nothing!" said Crockett, the smile fading out of his eyes. "I refuse to give any promise whatever."

"That's all right," said Merriam, still good-humouredly. "In fact, I shouldn't count much on promises anyway.

"You're married, I believe?" he continued to Crockett.

Crockett did not reply.

"And a church member, I presume? And a member of a number of highly respectable clubs?"

He paused and waited, smiling.

The smile was too much for Crockett. After a moment of holding in, he said sharply:

"Well?"

"Well, a gentleman who is all those things ought to be careful how he accepts entertainment from unattached young ladies, like our pretty Jennie here--in their flats at midnight." And then to Margery, "Go and get your camera ready.

"When I was in college," Merriam continued, "the fraternity I belonged to initiated a freshman who turned out to be goody-goody. He wouldn't play cards, wouldn't dance, wouldn't go to the theater, wouldn't smoke. Even refused coffee and tea. Above all he simply wouldn't look at a girl. All he would do was study and go to class--and to church and Sunday School. To make it worse he was a handsome cuss with loads of money and his own motor car. He got on the fellows' nerves. Then a show came to town with a girl in the chorus that two of the fellows knew. So a bunch of us went to the show, and afterwards the two fellows who knew the girl brought her back to the chapter house in a taxi, with an opera cloak over the black tights which she wore in the last act. We gave her a little supper, and then four of us went upstairs to get the good little boy. He hadn't gone to the show. He was studying his trigonometry. We didn't have to lasso him, of course, because there were four of us. When we brought him into the dining room, the girl stood up and dropped off her cloak. It was worth something to see his face. Then we tied him into a chair, just the same way you're tied now. We set a beer bottle and half-emptied glass handy, and the girl sat on his knees and cocked one black leg over the arm of the chair and put one hand under his chin and put her lips to his cheek. And then we took the flash."

"Oh, goody!" cried Jennie, ecstatically pleased by this climax. But Crockett by this time was staring at the story-teller with really venomous eyes.

Merriam avoided those eyes and addressed himself to Jennie, the appreciative.

"That was all," he said. "We gave the girl a twenty-dollar bill and the roses and sent her back to the hotel in the taxi. We could only show the picture to a few chaps, of course. One of the fellows did finally tell the story to one girl whom a lot of us knew and showed her the picture. It worked fine. The good little boy's reputation was made, and he had to live up to it, to the extent at least of becoming human. He became one of the finest fellows we ever had. The year after he graduated," Merriam finished reflectively, "he married the one girl who had seen the picture, and the chapter gave it to her with their wedding present."

During this sequel Margery had returned with the camera and with some flash-light powder, for which she had had to search, in a dust pan.

"Damn you!" cried the great financier virulently, straining helplessly at the ropes which confined his arms and legs. "If you think it will do you any good to take an indecent picture of me----"

"Cut that!" said Merriam sharply. "Do you want me to tighten that noose again?"

Crockett subsided with a snort that might have made whole boards of directors tremble.

"Indecent!" said Merriam, enjoying himself hugely, as if he were still in college. "Certainly not! Only pretty. Very pretty. Come, Jennie! How about the pose?"

"I'll show you!" cried Jennie. Half dancing on her toes, with skirts fluttering, and eyes sparkling the more, it seemed, because of Crockett's bitterly hostile regard, she tripped around the table and stood by his side, facing the same way he faced. She plucked the rose from her hair and stuck it behind Crockett's ear. It drooped grotesquely over his thin hair. Then, laughing at the rose, she put one bare arm about his neck, her hand extending beyond his face on the other side.

"Give me a cocktail glass in that hand!" she cried. "Never mind what's in it. Anything!"

Merriam filled a glass from the siphon and put it into the hand referred to.

Then Jennie raised a pink leg and put it on the table, stretching straight in front of herself and Crockett towards the center of the board, amid the plates and glasses and crumpled napkins. She put her other hand under Crockett's chin as if about to tickle him, dropped her face close to his, and looked at Merriam with eyes of laughing inquiry.

"Fine!" said Merriam. "Are you ready, Margery?"

Margery was already pointing the camera.

"Not yet," she said.

He addressed himself to the victim:

"Mr. Crockett, you can, of course, wink or twist your face to spoil the picture. If you do, I'll simply have to choke you a little before we try again. So you'd better look pleasant!"

"Ready!" said Margery.

Merriam set the dust pan, with the little heap of powder in the center of it, on a plate on the sideboard beside Margery, lit a match, and, with a last glance at Jennie's extraordinary pose and laughing face, switched off the lights and touched the powder.

CHAPTER XXII

VIRTUE TRIUMPHANT

Immediately after the flash Merriam switched on the lights, and his eyes sought Crockett. Apparently the man had faced the camera stolidly--a grotesque figure surmounted by the dangling flower and enveloped as it were in Jennie's acrobatic pose.

"All right!" said Merriam, coughing in the smoke which filled the small room. "But we'll take one more. You never can be sure of a single film. Got some more powder, Margery?"

"Yes," said Margery, who had set the camera down and stepped aside to open a window. She passed into the sitting room.

Jennie gingerly removed her leg from the table and her arm from about Crockett's neck. In the latter process she spilled a little of the water from the cocktail glass--unintentionally, let us hope--on Crockett's head.

"Damn!"

Jennie, quite regardless, eased herself on her two legs again.

"Gee!" she said. "I couldn't have held that pose much longer. In another second I'd have split at the waist!"

Merriam laughed. "Look what you've done," he said.

Jennie caught up a napkin and mopped the face and head.

"Sorry!" she cried sympathetically. "I didn't mean to wet him! There!" and she dropped a light kiss on the cleansed cheek and smiled her rosiest smile at the trussed victim.

Crockett answered Jennie's smile with a glare that might have caused a panic on the Stock Exchange.

It had no very serious effect, however, on Jennie. She shrugged her pretty shoulders and daintily chucked him under the chin.

"That isn't a nice look!" she said.

At this point Margery returned with a package of flash-light powder and began to pour a second little pile on the dust pan.

"Take your pose!" said Merriam to Jennie.

"Not that one," said Jennie. "It's too hard. Look!"

She picked the rose from above Crockett's ear and stepped behind his chair. Then she stooped till her chin rested on the top of his head and let her two bare arms drop past his cheeks till her hands came together on his shirt front. In her hands she held the rose pointing upward so that the blossom was just below his chin.

The effect was distinctly comical--Crockett's dour countenance, with its angry eyes, framed above by Jennie's pretty laughing face, resting on the very top of his head, at the sides by her round white arms, and below by the rose under his chin.

"Fine!" Merriam laughed. "It's better than the other. Ready, Margery?"

"Yes."

A second time he switched off the lights and touched a match to the powder.

Again Crockett had not even blinked so far as Merriam could judge. Well satisfied, the latter spoke to Margery:

"Put that camera away, will you, please, where it could not be easily found except by yourself."

Margery picked up the camera and departed into the kitchenette.

Then, "Let him alone, Jennie," he said. For Jennie had left the back of Crockett's chair and perched herself on the edge of the table beside him and was flicking him under the chin with the rose.

"All right," she said. "He's no fun. He's very cross!"

She slid off the table and dropped into a chair, transferring her attention to Merriam, as though in the hope that he might be less obdurately disposed.

But Merriam addressed himself to the other man.

"Now, Mr. Crockett," he said, "this little supper party and entertainment are over, I believe. If you wish to leave, I shall be glad to release you and permit you to do so."

Crockett's reply was a sound between a grunt and a growl.

Merriam walked around the table and picked up the revolver where it had fallen by the wall.

"I don't believe," he continued, "that it will do you any good to start any rough-house when I have freed you. If you do, Jennie and Margery will scream, and I shall fire this revolver. That will bring in neighbours and probably the police, whose testimony would thus be added to that of the pictures we have taken as to your manner of spending your evening. You will understand that while I shall have those pictures developed the first thing in the morning I shall not show them to any one except Mr. Rockwell unless you compel me to do so."

By this time Crockett had become articulate.

"Compel you to do so?" he repeated stiffly. "May I ask what you mean by that?"

"Well," said Merriam, "you see I am an enthusiastic supporter of the Reform League as led by Mr. Rockwell and Senator Norman and Mayor Black. You, I understand, are opposed to the League and its policies. So long as your opposition relates itself only to those policies and involves only open public discussion of their merits, I shall, of course, have no reason to interfere. But if your opposition should take the form of any personal attack, on Senator Norman, let us say, I should feel compelled to retaliate by a personal attack upon you, making use of these pictures we have taken to-night and the story that will readily weave itself about them. Do you see?"

"See!" Crockett cried. "Of course I see. Blackmail! How much do you want for that camera? Name your price."

"It has no cash price," returned Merriam steadily. "Now if I release you, will you leave quietly?"

For a long moment the financier stared at the younger man who had worsted him. Then:

"At this moment," he said acridly, "I certainly have no other desire than to get away from this place and to be rid of my present companionship."

Merriam was tempted to laugh at the stilted dignity of this phraseology, but he managed to keep a straight face.

"Very well," he said. "Margery,"--for Margery had just returned from the kitchenette minus the camera,--"help me untie him, will you? Feet first."

Margery and Merriam knelt for a moment at the two sides of Crockett's chair and released his two legs. Then Merriam again put the table between himself and Crockett and stood waiting, revolver in hand, leaving to Margery the work of unbinding the arms. He was afraid that his own near presence to Crockett when the latter found himself free might tempt him irresistibly to personal assault.

In the moment during which he stood waiting he became conscious that Jennie, half reclining in the chair into which she had dropped, was smiling at him--a pretty, confidential smile which he did not understand.

But he had no time to consider Jennie just then, for Margery had completed her work. The last piece of rope fell on the floor, and she lifted the slip noose from about Crockett's neck. He had been rather tightly bound and did not instantly have the full use of his limbs. Margery took his arm to assist him.

"My coat and hat!" he said, not looking at Merriam.

"In the sitting room," said Margery.

He turned himself in that direction and in a jerky walk, with some support from Margery, moved towards and through the portières. He had disdained to cast so much as a glance at either Merriam or Jennie.

Jennie resented this. "Old crosspatch!" she cried.

Merriam stepped hastily to the portières and peeped through. Crockett had caught up his light overcoat and silk hat from a chair. He refused Margery's offer to help him on with his coat and made, already moving more naturally, for the hall door. Margery followed him. The door opened--closed again. Margery returned from the hallway.

Merriam advanced through the portières into the sitting room.

"Well!" he exclaimed.

"Well!" returned Margery, with a dry laugh--the first laugh Merriam had heard from her during the whole evening.

"See what he does in the street," she added. "Raise the shade about a foot. I'll turn off the light."

Merriam acted promptly on this excellent hint. In a moment the room was in darkness, and he was kneeling by the window watching the street below, which was fairly well illuminated from arc lights at either corner. Part way down the block on the other side of the roadway a car, presumably a taxi, stood by the curb, with a man walking up and down beside it. Jennie's flat was too high up for Merriam to be able to see the sidewalk immediately below. If, therefore, Crockett on emerging from the building merely walked away, he would see nothing. But this was hardly likely.

Presently, sure enough, the taxi showed sudden signs of life. The man hastily got in, and the car rolled forward, crossing the street diagonally, and stopped directly below Merriam's window. Crockett had come out and signalled it. A moment later it shot away down the block and turned the corner.

Merriam still knelt by the window, peering into the street. He was looking for signs of any remaining watchers, for he had his own exit to think of: Rockwell had wanted him to "come at once to the hotel."

As he knelt there in the dark he suddenly sensed a warm fragrant body close beside his own. A pair of soft bare arms slipped about his neck.

"It was fine!" Jennie's voice whispered in his ear. "You're a nice boy!"

She had crept up behind him in the dark. Margery must have left the room.

For a moment Merriam knelt in fascinated silent rigidity. When he moved it was only to turn his head. And the turning of his head brought his face close to Jennie's, which, with the dim light from the street upon it, smiled at him with a kind of saucy tenderness. It was the face of a pretty child, with the lure of womanhood added, but with nothing else of maturity in it.

Her lips puckered. "Kiss me!" she whispered.

As he still only stared she quickly leaned forward a couple of inches more--her lips rested on his.

I am very much afraid that for an instant Merriam's lips responded. He half turned on one knee. His arms involuntarily closed about the seductive little body. He felt the short silk skirts crush deliciously against his legs.

And then a grotesque sort of composite picture of all the things he ought to remember, including Rockwell, Norman, Mollie June, and the members of the Riceville School Board, rushed across his mind. He struggled to his feet, pushing Jennie not roughly--away.

"Margery!" he called.

"Yes?" came Margery's voice from the dining room.

"Turn on the lights!"

By the time Margery had stepped through the portières and pushed the switch Jennie had thrown herself face downward on the davenport, crying.

"Nobody loves me!" she sobbed.

Margery, standing by the switch, looked from Merriam at the window to Jennie on the couch and back again. Her expression indicated no bewilderment--rather a humorously cynical comprehension. She knew her Jennie.

At any rate, that glance steadied the young man. After meeting it for a moment he turned to Jennie. Poor little girl! He felt that he understood her perfectly. There was a side of himself that was like that. Only he had other sides powerfully developed, and Jennie had no other sides. All his young chivalry rose up, in alliance with the missionary spirit of the teacher. He desired greatly to help her.

After an instant's hesitation he crossed the room and drew up a chair beside the davenport.

"Jennie," he said, "listen!"

"Go away!" said Jennie.

"I am going away in a minute. But I want to tell you something first."

Her sobbing ceased, but he waited till she asked:

"Well, what?"

"There is somebody who loves you."

Hopefully Jennie raised her head and turned her face to him--still oddly pretty in spite of the tear-streaked rouge. But after a moment's look she said resentfully:

"It isn't you!"

"No," said Merriam, "it isn't I."

Even at this rate the discussion was apparently interesting enough to rouse her. With a sudden movement she curled herself up, half sitting, half reclining, in a corner of the davenport, and smoothed the crumpled skirts over her knees.

"Do you mean George?" she asked.

"No," said Merriam, "I mean Mr. Simpson."

"Mister Simpson!" She laughed derisively, not prettily at all. "A waiter!"

"Listen, Jennie. Simpson is a fine fellow, with lots of brains and lots of courage. He has shown both within the last twenty-four hours. He's rendered a very important service to Mr. Rockwell and Senator Norman, and they're going to give him a lot of money for a reward. I don't know how much--maybe five thousand dollars. And he's crazy about you. He'll marry you in a minute if you'll let him, in spite of--George. He'll take you away on a fine trip--anywhere you want to go. And afterwards he'll set up in a business of his own--a café or whatever he likes. You'll have a real home and a husband and money enough and friends. It'll be a lot better than this stuff--like to-night. It really would. Think it over, Jennie!"

On the last words he rose.

"He's right!" cried Margery, who had drawn near.

"Shut up, Marge!" said Jennie.

But Merriam, looking closely at her with the sharp eye of a teacher to see whether or not his point had gone home, was satisfied. He was sure that she would think it over in spite of herself.

He looked at his watch. It was ten minutes after one.

"I must telephone at once to Mr. Rockwell in Senator Norman's rooms at the Hotel De Soto," he said to Margery.

"Yes," said Margery. "The hotel number is Madison 1-6-8-1."

"Thank you."

Without looking again at Jennie, he went to the telephone in the dining room. In a moment he had the hotel and had asked to be connected with Senator Norman's rooms. It was Rockwell's voice that answered, "Hello!"

"This is Merriam."

"Thank God! Where are you?"

"At Jennie's."

"Still? What the devil was the ruction there when I called up?"

"I'll tell you about that later. Do you still want me to come to the hotel?"

"Certainly. As fast as you can."

"You got the Senator back all right?"

"Yes. But he's pretty sick. Caught more cold, I guess. Hobart's worried about him. You'll have to stay over another day all right. And make that speech."

Merriam groaned.

"Listen!" said Rockwell. "You'll have to be mighty careful about getting into the hotel. You aren't Senator Norman just now, you know. The Senator has already returned to the hotel, openly, with me, three hours ago, and is sick in his rooms. We'll have to smuggle you in without any one's seeing you. But I have a plan--or rather Simpson has. You'd better come down on the Elevated. That'll be better than a taxi this time. No chauffeur to tell on you. Be sure you get away from there without being followed. Margery'll show you a way. Get off at Madison and Wabash. Simpson will meet you there and smuggle you in the back way. You can come right away?"

"Yes."

"Then for Heaven's sake come! We'll talk after you get here." He hung up.

Merriam stared at the instrument as he slowly replaced his own receiver. Another day. "And make that speech!" Would this kaleidoscopic, unreal phantasm of adventures never end? When would he wake up? He perceived suddenly that he was very tired. But he must brace up sufficiently to get back to the hotel. There doubtless he would be permitted to go to bed and snatch at least a few hours' sleep--before the speech!

He turned and found Margery standing between the portières, watching him.

"Well!" she said sharply.

"I must--must--get dressed," he finished, realising for the first time since he had leapt out of bed with his revolver to divert Crockett from the telephone that he was attired only in pajamas. "Rockwell says you can tell me a way to get away from here without being seen by any watchers."

"Yes," said Margery. "Go and dress. I'll attend to that."

He went into the bedroom and began to get into his clothes, working mechanically.

Presently he was ready--though with such a loose and rakish bow as he had never before disported--and emerged into the dining room.

There he encountered a cheering spectacle. Margery was seated at the table between a coffee percolator, efficiently bubbling, and an electric toaster. She was buttering hot toast. Jennie sat at one side of the table. A pale blue kimono now covered her dancing costume, and she looked quite demure. She raised her eyes almost shyly as Merriam entered.

"Well!" he exclaimed. "This is grand. Margery, you certainly are a trump!"

Margery's rather sallow cheeks flushed slightly. "You'll need it," was all she said, and proceeded to fill a cup for him from the percolator.

"How do I get away?" Merriam asked as he sipped.

"Back stairs," said Margery succinctly. "I'll show you."

Munching toast, he enquired the whereabouts of the nearest Elevated station and was duly instructed.

He had a second cup of the black coffee. Margery did not take any and would not give Jennie any.

"We go straight to bed," she said decidedly.

From time to time Merriam cast an unwilling glance at Jennie, sitting downcast and out of it on Margery's other side. About the third time Jennie intercepted his glance and answered it with a small wistful smile. After that he would not look again. In a few minutes, of course, this very early breakfast--it was somewhere around two o'clock--was over, and Merriam rose.

"I must be off," he said, and hesitated. "I am very much indebted to both of you for--all the help you have given me this evening!" (Inwardly he abused himself for his stiltedness; it was like his telling Mollie June he was glad to have helped her in algebra.)

Jennie rose too and came around the table towards him. She had suddenly summoned back a smile, and she moved daintily inside the blue kimono. Above the stalk of that straight, demure, Japanesy blue, her head nodded like a bright blossom--with its fair, wavy hair, blue eyes, and childishly rounded cheeks, still gaudy with the remains of rouge.

She tripped forward till she was almost touching Merriam, stopped, and suddenly raised her eyes to him.

"Kiss me good-bye!" she said.

We may suspect that it was a sort of point of honour with Jennie to retrieve the rebuff she had received in the sitting room. As for Merriam, in spite of the obvious deliberateness of this assault, I am not perfectly sure I could answer for him if it had not been for Margery. But Margery's presence saved him from serious temptation.

Instead of stooping to kiss the lifted lips he caught Jennie's hand that hung at her side, and, stepping back half a step, raised the hand and kissed it.

Sometimes the inspirations of youth are singularly happy. It seems to me that this one was of that kind: it involved neither yielding nor discourtesy.

Jennie was somewhat taken aback, yet she could not be hurt by a gesture so gallant.

"Good-bye, Jennie," he said. "I hope to be the best man at your wedding before long."

"Oh!" she said, and withdrew her hand. Then: "Good-bye!"

After a moment's hesitation and a last quite shy glance at Merriam she suddenly gathered up the skirts of the kimono and ran into the sitting room.

"Are you ready?" said Margery dryly.

"My coat. I haven't a hat," he added, remembering that under Rockwell's instructions he had left this article in the taxi in which they had come to the flat.

"Your coat's in the hall," said Margery. "I can get you a hat too."

The dining room was connected directly with the hallway, and in a moment Margery had returned with Merriam's light overcoat and with a man's derby--probably Norman's property.

"Thank you," said Merriam, taking them.

"This way," she replied, moving towards the kitchenette.

In the kitchenette he was momentarily surprised to see Margery opening a tin box labeled "Bread." Was she going to equip him with a lunch? But she drew out, not a loaf, but the camera.

"You'll want to take this along," she said.

"Indeed, yes."

Then he followed her out on to the back porch, where earlier--ages ago, it seemed--he had deposited the stepladder.

"Now," said Margery, "you go down these stairs and diagonally across the court to that archway. See?" She pointed. "That brings you out on the other side of the block. Nobody will be looking for you there. And the Elevated station is three and one-half blocks west. Put on your hat and coat. I'll hold it."

"Thank you so much," said Merriam, as the coat slipped on.

Then he turned, took off his hat again, and held out his hand.

"Good-bye, Margery," he said, shaking hands heartily. "Thank you--for everything."

For a moment they looked at each other with mutual respect.

Then Merriam said:

"I'm going to send Simpson around to see Jennie. Shan't I?"

"You can try it," said Margery. "Good-bye."

She went back into the kitchenette and closed the door.

CHAPTER XXIII

RETURN

"Madison and Wabash!" shouted the guard.

Merriam started, picked up his camera, and made for the door. He had scarcely heard the other stations called and thanked his stars that he had waked up for this one.

He descended the stairs from the Elevated platform and found Simpson waiting.

"Good morning, Simpson."

"Good morning."

"Mr. Rockwell says you can get me into the hotel unnoticed."

Simpson looked at him sideways, hesitated, then turned and started slowly west.

Merriam fell into step beside him and for a moment wondered obtusely what ailed the man. Then he understood. Of course! He wanted news of Jennie. Perhaps he was suspicious as to how Merriam might have spent his time in that apartment. Perhaps he, like Margery, knew his Jennie only too well.

To set his mind at rest, Merriam plunged at once into a sketchy summary of the events at the flat--Crockett's arrival--"almost as soon as you had left," he placed it--his own telling of his story--Crockett's being half convinced--Jennie's plan--the supper party (without reference to Jennie's change of costume or the dancing on the table)--Rockwell's telephone call--the tying up and the flash lights.

"I have the films here," he added, exhibiting the camera as tangible evidence that he was not yarning. "Can you get them developed for me in the morning?"

"Yes," said Simpson, in a much less frigid tone than before. He took the camera.

"After Crockett had gone," Merriam continued smoothly, "I talked to Jennie about you. I told her she ought to marry you, and how well you've shown up in this affair, and that Senator Norman and Rockwell are going to pay you a bit of money for it, which you've certainly earned, and that you would take her away on a little trip anywhere she wanted to go, and then set up in a business of your own somewhere, and that she would be a lot happier that way than now."

An older man, more sensitive to the dynamite in the situation, would probably have spoken less freely and less successfully. Whatever else Simpson may have felt, he could not question his companion's youthful candour and good will. After perhaps a dozen steps he spoke in a carefully controlled voice:

"What did she say?"

"She didn't answer me," lied Merriam. "I told her to think it over. She was impressed all right. And when I left I told Margery I was going to send you around."

"What did Margery say?" asked Simpson quickly.

"She said yes, you should come."

Simpson drew a deep breath and stopped short at a corner.

"I'm very much obliged to you, sir," he said, looking quickly at Merriam and quickly away again.

Merriam held out his hand.

"Good luck!" he said.

Simpson grasped the hand and shook it intensely. Then, resuming his really admirable self-control, he said:

"We turn down here. I'm going to take you up a fire escape. It's the only way. You can't go into a hotel in the regular way even at this time of night without being seen."

They turned into an alley which ran behind the Hotel De Soto, and presently came to a door--a servants' entrance--in the ugly blank wall of yellow brick.

Simpson opened the door, and they passed into a bare hallway, pine-floored, plaster-walled, lighted at intervals by unshaded, low-powered incandescents.

Many doors of yellow pine opened on both sides of this hall, but Simpson, walking rapidly and quietly, passed them all, turned into a further stretch of hallway, narrower and still more dimly lighted, and stopped before a door of iron--evidently a fire door. He got out a key and unlocked this door, and they emerged into the air again in the inner court of the hotel, a great dismal well, the depository of drifts of soot, accentuated here and there by scraps of paper and other rubbish, and the haunt, for reasons difficult to understand, of the indomitable, grimy wild pigeons of the Loop.

Simpson closed the iron door behind them and began a searching scrutiny of the rows of windows. All but half a dozen or so were dark. It looked safe.

Satisfied, Simpson walked twenty feet or more along the side of the court and stopped below a fire escape. The platform at the lower end of the iron stairway was placed too high for a man to reach it from the ground unaided.

"Give me a boost," said Simpson. He stooped and placed the camera on the ground.

In a moment Merriam had hoisted him up, so that he could catch hold of the end of the platform and pull himself on to it. Then Simpson lay down on his stomach and dropped his arms over the edge of the platform. Merriam first handed up the camera and then with a little jump caught his hands and was drawn up until he in his turn could get hold of the edge of the landing and scramble on to it.

A moment later they were erect and had begun stealthily to mount the narrow stairs.

It seemed to Merriam that they went up interminably--a short flight--a turn--another short flight--along a platform past sleeping windows--another flight. He got out of breath, and began to feel very tired. The effect of Margery's coffee was wearing off.

But at last Simpson stopped on one of the platforms and peered through a window. It was one of which the shades were not drawn at all and was open about two inches at the bottom.

"This is it," said Simpson, and he stooped, opened the window, and climbed in.

As soon as Merriam had followed, Simpson closed the window and drew the shade. Then he crossed the dark room and pushed a switch.

"Where are we?" asked Merriam.

"This room is next to Senator Norman's bedroom," said Simpson, "on the other side from the sitting room. The couple who had it left this evening, and Mr. Rockwell has taken it for you under the name of Wilson. Mr. Rockwell will be expecting us."

He moved to a door at the side and knocked softly four times--once, twice, and once again.

Almost immediately a key was turned on the other side, the door was opened, and Rockwell stood surveying them.

There was only a dim light in the room behind him. With a glance over his shoulder at the bed where the sick Senator lay--the same bed in which Merriam had played at being sick on the previous afternoon,--he entered the new room and closed the door.

"You've made it!" he said. "Thank Heaven! You weren't seen, Simpson?"

"I think not, sir."

He looked closely at Merriam. "You're tired," he said.

"I sure am."

"Well, so am I. What a day! And to-morrow will be as bad. Maybe worse. Never again will I father an impostor. But we've got to see it through this time. Sit down. Have a cigarette, and tell me what happened at the flat. Then I'll let you go to bed and snatch a few hours' sleep. You must be in fighting trim to-morrow, you know--for the speech!"

Merriam took the proffered cigarette and dropped gratefully into a chair. Rockwell and Simpson also sat down.

"How's Senator Norman?" Merriam asked.

"Sick. Hobart looks serious, but he says he'll pull around in a day or two. He's dosing him heavily. You've simply got to stay by us and play the game until he's on his feet again."

"I suppose so. Well----"

He was about to repeat the summary of the events of his evening which he had already given Simpson, so as to get it over and get to bed. But before he could begin a knock sounded at the side door through which Rockwell had entered.

Simpson went to the door and opened it. It was Dr. Hobart.

"Miss Norman and Mrs. Norman want to come in," he said.

Rockwell hesitated. No doubt he would have preferred to hear Merriam's story himself first, without even Aunt Mary present.

Merriam meanwhile sat up, suddenly forgetting his fatigue: he was to see Mollie June still that night. He had not hoped for that.

"I supposed they would have gone to bed," he said, to cover his involuntary show of interest.

"No," said Rockwell. "After the dinner party they waited for me to come back with Norman, of course. Then he was so ill that Hobart kept us all busy for a couple of hours doing things. We didn't want to get in a nurse on account of--you, you know. And then they wanted to wait till you came. We expected you a long time ago. Well," he added, turning to the physician, "tell them to come along."

It was at least a minute before they arrived. Merriam was oddly nervous. He had been through strange scenes since he had left Mollie June in the Peacock Cabaret, and she must have divined as much.

They entered, Aunt Mary first with Mollie June behind her, and Merriam and Rockwell rose. The two women were dressed just as they had been at the dinner party--Aunt Mary in the black evening gown and Mollie June in the filmy rose. Mollie June looked just a little pale and tired, but Aunt Mary had not turned a hair.

"Well, young man," began the older woman briskly, "you've kept us up till a pretty time of night. What was happening there where you were when Mr. Rockwell telephoned? Sit down and tell us."

Evidently Aunt Mary, conscious of the ungodly hour, did not think it necessary to allow Merriam time for even a formal greeting of her young sister-in-law, who had stopped uncertainly in the doorway.

But Merriam was not to be hurried to quite that degree, whatever the time of night or morning might be. He turned to Mollie June.

"You're coming in, aren't you? Take this chair."

He pushed a rocker towards her, concerned at her evident fatigue.

She came forward and sat down, then raised her eyes to him with a grave "Thank you."

For a moment Merriam did not understand that steady, unsmiling look. Then he thought he did understand. It had a questioning quality. Mollie June's mind was at ease now about her husband, since he was back and not supposed to be seriously ill, and she, like Simpson earlier, was wondering--not that it concerned her, of course--how Merriam had spent the night--so large a part of it--at Jennie's flat. She, too, knew Jennie, to the extent at least of having seen and in a measure comprehended her. Perhaps even in a Mollie June there is that which enables her to understand a Jennie and her lure for a youthful male. He remembered Mollie June's description of her and the cool detachment with which it had been uttered: "She's pretty and sweet, and--warm."

For just an instant Merriam was slightly confused. He had verified that description--all of it.

It is to be feared that his embarrassment, slight and merely instantaneous though it was, did not escape Mollie June. She dropped her eyes, still unsmiling.

Merriam's second sketch of his evening's adventures differed from the one he had given Simpson in being fuller and in two particular points: first, of course, in omitting reference to his missionary efforts in Simpson's behalf, which, however laudable, were hardly for the ears of Mollie June; and, second, in including mention of Jennie's change into her ballet costume--because he realised as he talked that the pictures, to be developed in the morning, would exhibit that detail most unmistakably and that he would do well to prepare Mollie June's mind--and Simpson's, for that matter--in advance. But he laid his emphasis on the more dramatic episodes--the hurled revolver, the tying up, the flash lights, and Crockett's angry exit. He told it humorously and well, and was rewarded by Mollie June's interest. Her questioning gravity disappeared, and she followed him with eager attention and with a return of pretty colour to her cheeks.

Aunt Mary and Rockwell--not to mention Simpson--also listened attentively. When Merriam had finished they looked at each other.

"Well," said Rockwell, "I'm not sure but that it would have been better to let him go as soon as you had told him your yarn, but on the whole I think you did mighty well. Those pictures may come in handy."

Aunt Mary rose. "You certainly are an enterprising young man, Mr. Merriam," she said dryly. "Now go to bed and get some sleep. You make your début as an orator at noon, you know! Come, Mollie June."

"Good night, Miss Norman," said Merriam, and he advanced to Mollie June, who had also risen.

"Good night, Mrs. Mollie June." He dropped his voice for the last three words and held out his hand.

She took it with an unconscious happy smile.

"Good night--Mr. John," she said.

Whatever she may have feared or suspected his story had established an alibi for him.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE REFORM LEAGUE

"Quarter to ten," said Rockwell cheerily. "I've let you sleep to the last possible moment. Here's your breakfast on the stand. Better eat it and drink your coffee first. Then a shave and get at this." He indicated a small pile of manuscript on the writing table. "Your speech, Senator!" he grinned.

"Good Lord!" groaned Merriam, remembering everything. He perceived also that he was to breakfast alone--no Mollie June. But the sight of the manuscript fascinated and aroused him. He realised, as he had not done before, that within a few hours he was to make a public address in a great Chicago club before many of the city's most prominent men and women--on what subject even he had no idea!

"Good Lord!" he said again and put his feet out. "How's Senator Norman?" he asked.

"Sleeping now," said Rockwell. "Hobart thinks he can get him on his feet by night. He's due to start for Cairo this evening, you know, on a stumping trip." Then quickly: "You'll find these sliced oranges refreshing. Have your bath first if you want to."

Merriam was in the midst of his breakfast when Rockwell returned. "By the way," he said, "here are your pictures," and he took some unmounted prints from an envelope.

Merriam reached for them with curiosity and something like trepidation. They were not good flash lights--a little blurred,--but the faces and attitudes were unmistakable. Jennie's foot and leg extending forward across the table were very much in evidence in the first of them.

"Rather striking poses," commented Rockwell.

"Jennie's invention," said Merriam defensively.

"No doubt. Well, they could hardly be better for their purpose. I think Crockett will go slow all right."

"Have--has Miss Norman seen them?"

"Yes. And Simpson, of course." For a moment Rockwell quizzically regarded Merriam's face, in which a further unspoken question was anxiously plain. Then he answered it: "No one else. Mrs. Norman is still sleeping. I'm not sure Aunt Mary will consider them proper pictures for her to see anyway. Come," he added briskly, "you've eaten only one piece of toast. You must get outside of at least one more piece. And then shave. I'll strop your razor for you. I'm your valet this morning, Senator."

With a sigh Merriam glanced at the waiting speech and tackled a second piece of toast, with the feeling that its mastication was a task of almost impossible difficulty. He achieved it, however, to the rhythmic accompaniment of Rockwell's stropping, consumed another cup of coffee--his third, I regret to say,--and proceeded to shave.

At last Merriam was collared and tied and was slipping into his coat. Rockwell rose and laid down the manuscript.

"Ready?" he said. "Very good. You can get to work. It's a quarter past ten. The luncheon is at twelve-thirty. But we shan't appear at the luncheon itself. Too dangerous. You'd have to meet a lot of men who know the Senator--meet them face to face in cold daylight and talk to them. We'd never get away with it. So I'll telephone that you've been detained by important business but will be in for the speeches. That way we'll come in by ourselves, with everybody else set and no opportunity for personal confabulations. You'll have to run the gauntlet of their eyes, of course. But you can do that."

Earnestly for a moment he scrutinised Merriam's face and figure, as if to reassure himself that the astounding imposture had been and was still really possible.

"Yes," he continued confidently, "that'll be all right. The speeches are scheduled to begin at one-fifteen. We'll leave here at five or ten minutes after one. That gives you nearly three hours to salt down the speech. You can learn it verbatim or only master the outline and substance and give it in your own words. Perhaps you'd better learn a good deal of it just as it is. Aunt Mary has it chock-full of the Senator's pet words and phrases. Your own style might be too different. Do you commit easily?"

"Fairly so," said Merriam. As a matter of fact the speech itself presented few terrors to him. He had done a good deal of debating and declaiming in college, and of course in his capacity as principal of the high school he was called upon for "a few words" on every conceivable occasion in Riceville.

"Good. Go to it, then. I'll make myself scarce. Here are cigarettes. You won't be disturbed. Au revoir, Senator! If you want anything, knock on this door. Either Hobart or I will answer."

Grinning, Rockwell departed into the real, the sick Senator's, bedroom, leaving Merriam with the typewritten manuscript.

He worked away for a couple of hours, sometimes sitting down, more often walking back and forth, occasionally refreshing himself with a cigarette, and faithfully learning by heart Aunt Mary's Senator Norman's speech on "Municipal Reform."

By half past twelve he had mastered it to his satisfaction. He decided to go through with it once more by the clock. It was designed, as he knew from a pencil note at the top of the first page, to take thirty minutes. He did so, and came out at the end by five minutes to one.

Evidently his delivery was a little more rapid than Senator Norman's. He must remember to speak slowly.

He had just reached this conclusion when a knock sounded at the side door and Rockwell entered.

"I've got it by heart," said Merriam.

"Good! Come into the sitting room, then. You're to have a cup of coffee and a sandwich before you start."

"Fine. I am a bit hollow. How's the Senator?"

Rockwell looked worried, but answered, "Sleeping again now. Come along if you're ready."

"In a minute."

Merriam bathed his face and hands, folded the speech and put it in his pocket, and followed Rockwell across the Senator's bedroom, with just a glance at the sick man in the bed and a nod to Dr. Hobart, who sat by the window with a newspaper into the sitting room.

After his morning of intense, solitary labour he was somewhat nonplused for a moment by the size of the company he found assembled there--Aunt Mary and Mollie June, of course, Alicia, Mr. Wayward, and Father Murray. He said good morning to each of them.

Alicia reminded him that it was really afternoon now.

"We shall meet Black in the car," said Rockwell. "Then the roll of the conspirators will be complete!"

Mollie June, who had had no speech to learn, had slept late and was now as blooming as ever.

"We're all going to hear you," she said as she gave Merriam her hand.

"Good Heavens!" he said, with a twinge of the stage fright which he had thus far had no time to feel. "I shouldn't mind the others, but you----"

He left that dangerous remark unfinished.

To Aunt Mary he said: "I've learned the speech by heart. I admire it very much," and was pleased to note that even Aunt Mary had an author's susceptibility to praise.

Meanwhile Simpson, who was in attendance, had poured out a cup of coffee, and Mollie June brought it to him with a sandwich on a plate.

"Won't you sit down to eat it?" she asked, regarding him with a look of awe which flattered him enormously and served to quiet his rising nervousness.

(Mollie June had taken oratory of all degrees and on all possible occasions on the part of Norman as a matter of course, but the thought that John Merriam, who was only a little older than herself and had taken her to "sociables" and had wanted to make love to her but had not dared, was about to address the distinguished Urban Club of Chicago at one of its formidable luncheons filled her with admiration.)

"Thank you," he said, taking the coffee and the sandwich. "No, I think I'll eat it standing." But he smiled at her with the confidence which her admiration had given him, thereby increasing the admiration--a pleasing psychological circle.

But now Rockwell was at his side and barely gave him time to finish his sandwich and gulp down the coffee.

"Miss Norman and the Senator and I go with Mayor Black in the Senator's car," said that master of ceremonies and conspiracies. "The other four of you are to follow in the Mayor's machine. Here's your coat and hat."

Along the hall--down in the elevator--through the lobby to the pavement--Merriam had only a dazed sense of being part of an irresistible, conspicuous procession which was carrying him whither he had no strong desire to go.

A limousine was already drawn up at the curb, and the hotel starter was deferentially holding the door.

Mayor Black was already within the car.

"Ah, Senator," the Mayor ejaculated, "I'm glad to see you up again, and to have you--really you--coming to the Reform League!"

For an instant Merriam did not understand. Then he realised that the Mayor thought he was addressing the real Senator Norman. It was a good omen for the continued success of his impersonation.

He sank into the seat opposite the Mayor, who was facing forward with Aunt Mary beside him. Rockwell climbed in and sat next to Merriam. The door slammed, and the machine started.

Then, as the Mayor still beamed at him and as neither of the others spoke, Merriam said gently:

"I'm still the impostor, I'm afraid, Mr. Mayor."

"Eh!"

The Mayor leaned forward to scrutinise his face and then turned as if bewildered and still unconvinced to Rockwell.

"Yes," said Rockwell. "I tried to get you on the 'phone this morning, but your line was busy, and I didn't have a chance to try again. The Senator is still sick. Worse, in fact. Mr. Merriam is going to keep the Senator's engagement at the Urban Club for him."

"My God!" cried the Mayor. "Speak before all those people! You never can do it!"

"Yes, we can," said Rockwell, with smiling serenity. "You were fooled again yourself just now," he pointed out.

The Mayor groaned. "Then we still don't know where Senator Norman himself will stand when he's up," he said.

"I telephoned you yesterday that he had agreed to everything," said Aunt Mary coldly. "That was true."

"While he was sick," said Black. "Will he stick to it when he's well again?"

"He'll have to stick," said Rockwell. "Ten times more so after this speech. He can't possibly go back on that."

"If this Mr.--Mr. Merriam," said the Mayor, eyeing him with profound dislike, "is unmasked at the Urban Club, it would be the utter ruin of us all."

"It undoubtedly would," replied Rockwell cheerfully. "All the more reason why we should all keep a stiff upper lip and play up for him."

"No!" cried the Mayor. "It's insane! Stop the car! I'll step into the nearest store and telephone that the Senator has fainted in the cab and can't appear. Anything is better than this awful risk."

He put out his hand for the cord to signal to the chauffeur. But Rockwell roughly struck his arm down.

"Sit still!" he commanded savagely. "Do you want us to choke you again? This car goes on to the Urban Club. Senator Norman has a fine speech, and he'll make it well. No one will suspect. The thing has the one essential characteristic of successful imposture--boldness to the point of impossibility. If any one notices any slight change in his appearance or voice or manner, it will be put down to his illness. It will cinch the whole thing as nothing else could. You've got to go through with it, Mayor."

Mr. Black groaned again and relapsed into a dismal silence.

Fortunately he did not have long to brood, nor Merriam long to work up the nervousness which this dialogue had naturally renewed in him. In a couple of minutes after the Mayor's second and more lamentable groan the limousine stopped before the imposing entrance of the Urban Club.

"Sit tight, Mayor!" Rockwell warned.

Then the doorman of the Club opened the car, and Rockwell descended and helped Aunt Mary out and Merriam and the Mayor followed.

Inside their coats and the men's hats were quickly taken from them by efficient checkroom boys, and they were guided immediately to the elevator. The speeches had already begun upstairs, some one said.

They stepped out into the hallway outside the Club's big dining room. From inside came the noise of clapping. Some one had just finished speaking.

"This is our chance," said Rockwell, meaning doubtless that they could best enter during the interlude between speeches. "Go ahead, Senator. Take the Mayor's arm!"

In a moment they were passing through a group of tuxedoed servants at the door. Merriam was conscious of a large room in pleasant tones of brown with a low raftered ceiling and many windows of small leaded panes. The tables were arranged in the form of a great horseshoe, with the closed end--the speakers' table--opposite the door. The horseshoe was lined inside and out with guests, perhaps two hundred in all--men who looked either distinguished or intelligent, occasionally both, and women who were either distinguished or intelligent or beautiful--from some points of view the great city's best.

Then came the turning of many eyes to look at himself and Mayor Black, and the toastmaster at the center of the speakers' table rose and called to them:

"Senator! Mayor! This way."

He pointed to two empty chairs on either side of his own.

Merriam nodded, and, still propelling the semi-comatose Black, circled one side of the horseshoe, giving the line of guests as wide a berth as he could, to avoid possible contretemps from personal greetings to which he might be unable to make suitable response.

Arrived at the speakers' table, he shook hands warmly with the toastmaster--a bald, benevolent-looking man of much aplomb, whose name he never learned--and with two or three other men from nearby chairs--evidently personal acquaintances of Senator Norman's--who rose to welcome him, making talk the while of apologies for being late. Presently he found himself seated at the toastmaster's right, facing the distinguished company. No one had betrayed any suspicion. The imposture was, in fact, as Rockwell had said, so bold as to be unthinkable.

Mayor Black had meanwhile been seated at the toastmaster's left, and Rockwell and Aunt Mary had been guided to two vacant seats at the left end of the speakers' table. The necessity of greeting friends had somewhat roused the Mayor, who had found his tongue and managed to respond, though for him haltingly.

The toastmaster leaned towards Merriam and whispered:

"You're to speak last, Senator. Colonel Edwards is next, then Mayor Black, then you."

With that he rose and felicitated the company on the arrival of the two distinguished servants of the City and the Nation between whom he now had the honour to sit.

He then introduced Colonel Edwards, a stout, quite unmilitary-looking gentleman, who was earnestly interested and mildly interesting on the subject of good roads for the space of fifteen minutes.

Merriam's attention was distracted almost at the beginning of Colonel Edwards' speech by the arrival at the entrance of the dining room, now directly opposite him, of the second taxi-load from the hotel. Alicia caught Merriam's eye and smiled at him mischievously. Evidently she was enjoying the situation to the full. Mollie June, on the other hand, though deliciously crowned with a small blossomy hat of obvious expensiveness, was entirely grave, her eyes fixed almost too steadily and too anxiously on our youthful hero, where he sat in the seats of the mighty, outwardly at least as much at ease as if he had been accustomed for thirty years to find himself at the speakers' table of historic clubs.

Colonel Edwards suddenly sat down. He was one of those rare public speakers who occasionally disconcert their audiences by stopping when they are through.

The toastmaster gasped, but rose to his feet and the occasion and called upon Mayor Black.

As the Mayor slowly rose Merriam was most uncomfortably anxious--uncertain whether the city's chief executive was even yet sufficiently master of himself to face an audience successfully. But Mr. Black was one of those gentlemen, not uncommon in public life, who are apparently more at ease before an audience than in any other situation. His great mellow voice boomed forth, and Merriam relaxed. That speech was hardly, perhaps, one of the Mayor's masterpieces. But that mattered little, of course. He produced an admirably even flow of head tones. It sounded like a perfectly good speech.

Merriam, at any rate, was quite oblivious of any lack of strict logical coherence in the Mayor's remarks. He was suddenly smitten by the realisation that his own turn came next. For a moment he fought a panic of blankness, then mentally grabbed at the opening sentences of what he had so carefully committed during the morning. Outwardly serene and attentive to the speaker, inwardly he hastily rehearsed his first half dozen paragraphs, and, winking his eyes somewhat rapidly perhaps, fixed the outline of the rest of it in his mind.

The Mayor rose to a climax of thunderous tone and eloquent gesture and sat. Loud applause followed.

Across the clapping hands Merriam glanced at Mr. Wayward and Alicia and Mollie June where they sat at one side of the horseshoe. The other two were clapping, but Mollie June was not. He thought she looked pale, but of course he was too far away to be sure. "She is afraid for me," he thought, and gratitude for her interest mingled with a fine resolve to show her that she had no cause for fear--that he would give a good account of himself anywhere--for her.

The glow of that resolution carried him through the ordeal of the toastmaster's introduction and brought him to his feet with smiling alacrity at the proper moment.

The applause was hearty. There is magic still, strange as it may seem, in the word "senator." He was forced to bow again and again.

Then he struck into his speech--Aunt Mary's speech. He found himself letter-perfect. He had at least half his mind free to attend to his delivery. He gave it slowly, impressively, grandly facing first one part of his audience and then another. George Norman himself before packed galleries in the Senate Chamber at Washington had never done better. And it was a good speech, deftly conceived, clearly reasoned, aptly worded. Merriam himself in all his morning's study of it had not realised how perfectly it was adapted to the occasion and the audience. Down at the far end of the speakers' table, the female author of it sat unnoticed, watching with tight-pressed lips its effect; her only right to be there, if any one had asked you, the accident of her relationship to the wonderful Senator.

He reached the end. As he rounded out the last sentence his eyes rested triumphantly for a second on Mollie June. Whether or not her cheeks had been pale before, they were flushed now. He sat down.

The room rocked. The applause this time was no mechanical reaction. It was an ovation. The toastmaster leaped to his feet with ponderous agility and grabbed for Merriam's hand. The latter found himself standing, the center of a group of excited men, all of whom he must pretend to know, overwhelming him with congratulations.

Behind him he caught a remark that was doubtless not intended for his ears: "How the devil does he keep his youthful looks and fire? He might be twenty-five!"

Then Rockwell charged into the group, excited himself, but persistent with the formula, "Pressing engagement," and got him out of the room, and into the elevator, and through the hallway on the first floor, with his hat and coat restored, and into the limousine, which darted away for the hotel.

CHAPTER XXV

SECOND COUNCIL OF WAR

Merriam and Rockwell were alone in the Senator's car.

Merriam leaned back against the cushions and closed his eyes. He was at once fatigued and excited. It almost seemed to him that he was still addressing the Urban Club. Then he seemed to be talking still but to a single auditor--a girl with flushed cheeks and eyes that shone with excited pride.

He opened his eyes. Rockwell was regarding him steadily. "I don't wonder you feel done up," he said. "It was splendid, my boy. You spoke like a veteran. You ought to go into public life on your own. Perhaps you will." He seemed to meditate. Then: "You saw Crockett, I suppose?"

"No!" exclaimed Merriam.

"Didn't you? He was seated six places to your right at the speakers' table. Right in line with you, of course. Not strange you missed him. Just as well, perhaps. It might have shaken even your nerve."

The phrase "even your nerve" was pleasant praise to Merriam. He had never thought of himself as possessed of any exceptional sang froid. But perhaps he had behaved with rather creditable composure in a trying situation.

"He was shaken, I can tell you," Rockwell was saying. "Lord, I was on pins! I didn't know but what when you rose to speak he would jump up and denounce you. But not he. He simply lay back and stared and kept moistening his lips. I suppose he couldn't make up his mind for sure whether you were the Senator or the double or whether he himself had gone crazy or not. We'll hear from him, though," he added reflectively.

"I suppose so," said Merriam wearily. "I wish to Heaven we were clean through the thing!" That feeling had come suddenly, and for the moment he meant it, though he was having the time of his life.

"So do I," said Rockwell heartily. "But we're not. Not by a long shot. So you must buck up. Here's the hotel. You shall have a real meal now. That'll put heart into you again."

The machine stopped, and the door was opened.

"Quick time, now!" Rockwell whispered.

Senator Norman and his new political manager, Mr. Rockwell of the Reform League, rushed almost precipitately into the lobby of the Hotel De Soto and made a bee line for the nearest elevator. It was obvious that important business urgently called them, for they merely nodded hurriedly in response to several cordial salutations.

As the elevator shot up Rockwell leaned heavily against the side of the car, took off his hat, though there was no one with them, drew a deep breath, and comically winked both eyes at Merriam.

"What a life!" he ejaculated.

Stepping out at Floor Three, they were greeted by the spectacle of Dr. Hobart bending over the floor clerk's desk and evidently having a delightful tête-à-tête with the handsome young mistress of that sanctum, whose eyes were coquettishly raised to his, though her head was slightly bent--for she was smelling an American Beauty rose. A large vase of the same expensive flowers adorned one corner of her desk.

Only a momentary glimpse did Merriam and Rockwell have of this pretty tableau, for Dr. Hobart at once straightened up as if in some embarrassment and came towards them.