The Candidate: A Political Romance
"I know you are right," he said, "but I wish you did not have to do it.
The story puts me in a sensational light. It seems as if I were turning
aside from the great issues of a campaign for personal adventure."
"It was forced upon you."
"So it was, but that fact does not take from it the sensational look."
Harley was silent. He knew that Mr. Grayson's point was well made, but
he knew also that he must send the despatch.
The candidate made no further reference to the subject, and five minutes
later they saw horsemen rise out of the plain and gallop towards them.
As Harley had said, a presidential nominee was not lost in the dark and
the storm every night, and this little Western town was mightily
perturbed when Mr. Grayson failed to arrive. The others had come in
safely, but already all the morning newspapers of the country had
published the fact that the candidate was lost, swallowed up somewhere
on the dark prairie. And Mr. Grayson's instinct was correct, too,
because mingled with the wonder and speculation was much criticism. It
was boldly said in certain supercilious circles that he had probably
turned aside on an impulse to look after some minor matter, perhaps
something that was purely personal that had nothing to do with the
campaign. Churchill, late the night before, had sent to the _Monitor_ a
despatch written in his most censorious manner, in that vein of
reluctant condemnation that so well suited his sense of superiority. He
was loath to admit that the candidate was proving inadequate to his high
position, but the circumstances indicated it, and the proof was becoming
cumulative. He also sent a telegram to the Honorable Mr. Goodnight, in
New York, and the burden of it was the need of a restraining force, a
force near at hand, and able to meet every evil with instant cure.
But the Western horsemen who met Jimmy Grayson--they clung to their
affectionate "Jimmy"--were swayed by no such emotions. They repeated a
shout of welcome, and wanted to know how and where he had passed the
night, to all of which questions the candidate, with easy humor,
returned ready and truthful replies, although he did not say anything
for the present about the adventure of the old man and of the young one
who was now the old one's son-in-law.
The driver took them straight towards a large and attractive hotel, and
it seemed to Harley that half the population of the town was out to see
the triumphant entry of the candidate. With all the attention of the
crowd centred upon one man, Harley was able to slip quietly through the
dense ranks and enter the hotel, where he fell at once into the hands of
Sylvia Morgan. She came forward to meet him, impulsively holding out
her hands, the light of welcome sparkling in her eyes.
"We did not know what had become of you," she exclaimed. "We feared that
you had got lost in the quicksands of the river." And then, with a
sudden flush, she added, somewhat lamely, "We are all so glad that Uncle
James has got back safely."
Harley had read undeniable relief and welcome in her eyes, and it gave
him a peculiar thrill, a thrill at first of absolute and unthinking joy,
followed at once by a little catch. Before him rose the square and
massive vision of "King" Plummer, and he had an undefined sense of doing
wrong.
"We've brought him back safely," he said, after slight hesitation. "We
spent the night very comfortably in a farm-house on the prairie."
She noticed his hesitation, and her eyes became eager.
"I do believe that you have had an adventure," she exclaimed. "I know
that you have; I know by your look. You must tell it to me at once."
"We have had an adventure," admitted Harley, "and there is no reason why
I shouldn't tell you of it, as in a few hours a long account of it
written by me will be going eastward."
"I am waiting."
Harley began at once with his narrative, and they became absorbed in it,
he in the telling and she in the hearing. While he talked and she
listened "King" Plummer approached. Now the "King" in these later few
days had begun to study the ways of women, in so far as his limited
experience enabled him to do so, a task to which he had never turned his
attention before in his life. But the words of Mrs. Grayson rankled;
they kept him unhappy, they disturbed his self-satisfaction, and made
him apprehensive for the future. He had been in the crowd that welcomed
Jimmy Grayson, he had shaken the candidate's hand effusively, and now,
when he entered the hotel, he found Sylvia Morgan welcoming John Harley.
"King" Plummer did not like what he saw; it gave him his second shock,
and he paused to examine the two with a yellow eye, and a mind reluctant
to admit certain facts, among them the most obvious one, that they were
a handsome couple, and of an age. And this was a fact that did not give
the "King" pleasure. He did not dislike Harley; instead, he appreciated
his good qualities, but just then he regarded him with an unfriendly
glance; that reality of youth annoyed him. There was a glass on the
other side of the room, and the "King" looked at his own reflection. He
saw a large, powerful head and broad, strong features, the whole
expressing a man at the height of his powers, at the very flood-tide of
his strength. But it was not young. The hair was iron-gray, and there
were many deep lines in the face--not unhandsome lines, yet they were
lines.
"With all his shameless youth," were the "King's" unuttered thoughts, "I
could beat him at anything, except, perhaps, scribbling. I could live
and prosper where he would starve to death." And surging upon the "King"
came the memories of his long, triumphant, and joyous struggle with wild
nature. Then he approached the couple, and greeted Harley with the
good-nature that was really a part of him. Sylvia, with shining eyes,
told at second hand, though not with diminished effect, the story of the
night, and "King" Plummer was loud in his applause. He did not care
what criticism the supercilious might make, the act was to him
spontaneous and natural.
"But I don't see why you should have been with Jimmy Grayson then," he
said, frankly, to Harley. "You are an Easterner, new to these parts, and
it isn't right that just you should be along when the interestin' things
happen."
Harley could not help laughing at the naive remark, but he liked "King"
Plummer all the better for it. The "King," however, gave him no more
chance to talk alone that day with Sylvia. Mr. Plummer showed the
greatest regard for Miss Morgan's health and comfort, and did not try to
hide his solicitude; he was continually about her, arranging little
conveniences for the journey, and introducing Idaho topics, familiar to
them, but to which Harley was necessarily a stranger. The "King," with
his wide sense of Western hospitality, would not have done this at
another time, but in view of the close relationship between himself and
Sylvia he regarded it as pardonable.
The watchful Mrs. Grayson saw it all, and at first she regarded the
"King" with an approving eye, but by-and-by the approval changed to a
frown. There was something forced in his manner; it was just the least
bit unconvincing. It was clear to her that he was overdoing it, and in
her opinion that was as bad as not doing it at all. Nor did she like the
spectacle of a middle-aged man of affairs trying to play the gallant;
there was another manner, one just as good, that would become him more.
She was impelled to admonish him again, but she restrained herself,
reflecting that she had not improved matters by her first warning, and
she might make them worse by her second. Nevertheless, she summoned the
nominee of a great party to the American Presidency to a conference, and
he came with more alacrity than he would have obeyed the call of a
conference of governors.
"Sylvia is doing what it is natural for her to do," she said, abruptly.
"Then, my dear, why find fault with me because of it?" replied the
mystified candidate.
"I don't find fault with you; I merely want your advice, although I know
that you can have none to give."
The candidate wisely kept silent, and waited for the speaker of the
house to proceed.
"Sylvia is your niece, and Mr. Plummer is your most powerful political
supporter in the West," she said. "If she jilts him because of any fancy
or impulse--well, you know such things can make men, especially elderly
men, do very strange deeds. I speak of it because I am sure it must have
been in your thoughts."
The candidate stirred uneasily.
"It is a thing that I do not like to take into consideration," he said.
"Nor do I, but it forces itself upon us."
"It is right that Harley should pay her attention. They are members of
this party, and they are of an age likely to make them congenial."
"That is where the danger lies. It may not amount at present to anything
more than a fancy, but a fancy can make a very good beginning."
They talked on at length and with much earnestness, but they could come
to no other conclusion than to use that last refuge, silence and
waiting.
Meanwhile Sylvia was enjoying herself. She was young and vigorous, and
she had a keen zest in life. She was surrounded by men, some young,
too, who had seen much of the world, and they interested her; neither
would she have been human, nor of her sex, if their attentions had not
pleased her; and there, too, was the great campaign throwing its glow
over everything. She was gracious even to the "King," whom she had been
treating rather worse than he deserved for several days. She seemed to
appreciate his increased gallantry, and it was "dear old daddy" very
often now, whether in the comparative privacy of the Grayson family
circle or in the larger group of the young correspondents and
politicians. The "King" was delighted with the change, and his own
manner became easy and happy. He looked once or twice at the lady whom
he considered his mentor, Mrs. Grayson, and expected to see approval and
satisfaction on her face, too, but she was stern and impenetrable, and
the "King" said to himself that after all she was not so startlingly
acute.
Sylvia was telling some anecdote of the West to her new friends, and, as
the incident was rather remarkable, she thought it necessary to have
confirmation.
"It happened before I was born, but you were there then, and you know
all about it, don't you, daddy?"
"King" Plummer quickly nodded confirmation and smiled at the memory. The
event had interested him greatly, and he was glad to vouch for its
truth. He was pleased all the more when he saw the others looking at him
with the respect and deference due to--his thoughts halted suddenly in
their course and turned into another channel. Then he found himself
frowning. He did not like the conjunction of "dear old daddy" and of a
thing that had happened many years ago.
The "King" quietly slipped away from the party, and he noticed with
intense gloom that his departure did not seem to make as much difference
as it should. For a whole afternoon he was silent, and many corrugations
formed temporarily in his brow, indicating resolved thought. Nor were
appearances wrong, because the "King" was laboriously dragging himself
up to the edge of a mighty resolution. He was physically as brave a man
as ever walked; in early and rougher days he had borne a ready
Winchester, but this emergency was something new in his experience, and
naturally he hesitated at the venture. However, just after supper, when
Sylvia was alone in the drawing-room of the car, he approached her. She
looked up at him and smiled, but the "King's" face was set with the
power of his resolve.
"Come in, daddy," she said.
The "King" did not smile, nor did he sit down.
"Sylvia," he said, "I have a favor to ask of you."