The Candidate: A Political Romance
overpowered, had fallen down and slowly frozen to death under the snow,
but he did not dare to whisper it to others.
It was heavy work going through the drifts and keeping the right way
over a plain that had the similarity of the sea, but the men did not
falter. Jimmy Grayson was always looking into the darkness, striving to
see the darker line or blur that would mark the hills, but he asked no
questions. The snow ceased, and after a while low, black slopes appeared
against the dusky horizon.
"The hills!" said the candidate, and the Grafton man nodded. They
increased their pace until they were almost running. Neither Mr. Grayson
nor Mr. Plummer knew it, but the Grafton man had little hope; he had
merely suggested the place as a last chance.
It took them much longer than they thought or hoped to reach the hills,
but when they came to them they began a rapid search. The "King" and the
candidate were still together, and the former had taken a lantern from
one of the men. They had been looking among the hills for about a
quarter of an hour, and they drew somewhat away from the others. The
"King" raised his lantern at intervals and threw ribbons of light along
the white slopes. They came to a hill a little higher than the rest, and
he raised the lantern again. It was not a white reflection that came,
but something misty and brown.
"Dead leaves!" cried the "King." "It's a cave or a hollow."
He raised the lantern higher, and the light shone directly in at the
opening; it shone, too, upon Sylvia's face as she lay asleep in Harley's
arms.
"Babes in the wood!" muttered Hobart, who had come up behind them.
The "King" paused a moment. The picture appealed to him, too, and he saw
then in Harley only the rescuer of "his little girl." His heart yearned
over Harley also. Then he uttered a joyous shout, dropped his lantern,
and seized Sylvia. "Daddy," she said, awakening and putting her arms
around his neck, "I've come back."
"God bless you, my child, my daughter!" he said.
To Harley it was all a dream; there was something the matter with
him--there was a sort of dull, unreal feeling, and these men that he
knew seemed to be very far away. Nor did he understand why they pulled
him out so roughly, rubbed snow on his face and ears, and chafed his
hands violently. Afterwards he remembered hearing dimly some one say,
"We're just in time; he was freezing to death," and then he wished they
would be gentler. Fiery stuff was poured down his throat, and he coughed
and struggled, but they had no mercy. Then they committed the crowning
outrage--they took him by the arms, held him up and made him run back
and forth in the snow. After that the pain came; there were strong
needle-pricks all through him, and he heard some one say in a foolish
tone of satisfaction, "He's coming around all right." Then they poured
more fiery stuff down his throat.
After a while the needle pains ceased, and Harley understood that they
had saved him from freezing to death. He thought at once of Sylvia;
there she stood wrapped from chin to heel in a great fur coat, and she
smiled at him.
It was a slow but happy walk back to Grafton. The "King's" joyful shout
had been repeated and passed on to all the searchers, and all the
lanterns had been whirled aloft in rejoicing signal. Messengers were
already hurrying on to Grafton with the news.
Harley walked by the side of Mr. Grayson, who had given his hand one
strong clasp and who had said, "Harley, it was like finding a brother."
Sylvia leaned on Mr. Plummer's arm because the whole of her strength had
not yet come back. "Daddy," she whispered, "where did you come from?
We've been waiting for you a long time."
"Something up there must have called me," he replied, reverently,
pointing to the heavens, in which the new stars twinkled. "Sylvia," he
continued, "I'm not a fool any more. Forgive your old daddy and you can
love the boy."
"Not unless you are really, truly, and wholly willing, daddy."
"Really, truly, and wholly, my little girl."
"Now you must tell him so, daddy."
"I'll tell him so."
They were startled by Sylvia suddenly stopping, throwing her arms around
Mr. Plummer's neck, and kissing him. But they ascribed it to the
hysteria natural in a woman under such circumstances.
The world was still unreal to Harley. Now and then the people with whom
he was walking seemed very far away, merely vague black shadows on the
white plain of snow; all but Sylvia, who smiled again at him, and who
he thought had drawn him back to earth.
As they approached the town the "King" gave Sylvia to her uncle and fell
back a little, until he was by the side of Harley.
"Lad," he said, and he used the word because he felt that Harley was
very much younger than he, "you've won her and she's yours; I'll give
her to you. I've played the part of father to her, and it's what I ought
to keep on playing. I see it now. I guess I keep a daughter and gain a
son."
Harley looked squarely into his eyes--the world was real now--and he saw
the utmost sincerity there.
"Mr. Plummer," he said, "you are one of God's noblemen."
The "King's" hand and Harley's met in a strong and true grip, and those
who noticed thought it was another incident due wholly to the stress of
the night and the storm.
When they reached the town Mrs. Grayson took Sylvia in her arms and the
others left her. Jimmy Grayson was to speak the next day at Freeport, a
village a little farther on, but that speech was never delivered, and
when the Freeport people heard the reason they made no complaint.
It was announced the next morning that Mrs. Grayson and Sylvia would
leave at once for the candidate's home, as their part of the campaign
was finished, but Harley found Sylvia alone in the little parlor of the
hotel. She was sitting by the window looking out at the vast snowy
plains and the dim blue mountains afar, and apparently she did not hear
him as he entered, although he closed the door behind him with a slight
noise. He leaned over her and took one of her hands in both of his.
"Sylvia," he said, "won't you come away from the window a moment?"
He did not wait for her answer, but drew her away.
"I do not want any one in the street to see me kiss you," he said, and
he kissed her.
Her cheeks, already red, grew redder.
"You mustn't do that," she said.
"I can't help myself," he said, humbly, and did it again.
"I have the right," he added, "because you are mine now. Last night Mr.
Plummer, of his own free will and volition, gave you to me."
"Good old daddy!" she murmured.
XXIII
ELECTION NIGHT
At last came the great day which was to tell whether their efforts were
a brilliant success or a dire failure--there was no middle ground--and
the special train took them to the small city in which the candidate
lived. All the correspondents were yet with him, as on the eventful
night following the eventful day they must tell the world how Jimmy
Grayson looked and what he said when the wires brought the news, good or
bad. A few faithful political friends had been invited also to stay with
him to the end, and they completed the group which would share the
hospitality of the candidate, who must smile and be the good host while
the nation was returning his sentence. Harley thought it a bitter
ordeal, but it could not be helped.
After his recognition of the great fact that Sylvia and Harley loved
each other and belonged to each other, "King" Plummer had gone to Idaho
for a while, but he rejoined them on the homeward journey, and his
spirits seemed fully recovered. He drifted easily in conversation about
her into the old paternal relationship with Sylvia which became him so
well, and he never again alluded to that vain dream of his that he might
be something else. Moreover, after his temporary alienation he had
become a more ardent Graysonite than ever, and would not hear of
anything except his triumphant election, despite the immense power of
the forces allied against him.
While they changed cars often in the West, the one that bore them to the
candidate's town had been their home for several weeks, and even the
engine was the same; thus the train attendants fell under the spell of
Jimmy Grayson, and when he walked down their car-steps for the last time
they came around him in their soiled working clothes and wished him
success. It was scarcely dawn then, the east was not yet white, but
Harley could see sincerity written all over their honest faces, and
Jimmy Grayson, who had listened to ten thousand words of the same kind,
some true and some false, was much moved.
"Sir," said the engineer, "at midnight, when the tale is told, I shall
be three hundred miles from here, but if you are not the man, then it is
a tale that I shall not care to hear."
"Friends," said Jimmy Grayson, gravely, "I am glad to have your good
wishes; the good wish is the father of the good act, and whatever tale
the coming night has to tell let us endure it without vaunting or
complaint."
As Mr. Grayson and his friends walked away in the growing dawn, the
railroad men raised a cheer. A little later Harley heard the puff, puff
of a locomotive followed by the grinding of wheels, and the train which
had been their home whirled away into that West where they had seen and
done so many strange things. Harley tried to follow it awhile with his
eyes, because this was like a parting with a human being, an old and
faithful friend; he felt, too, that the most vivid chapter yet in his
life was closing. Unconsciously he raised his hand and waved good-bye;
the others, noticing the act, understood and were silent.
All were under the influence of the morning, which was dawning slowly
and ill. There are fine days in November, yet we cannot depend upon it,
and now the month was in one of its bad humors. An overcast sun was
struggling through brown, ominous clouds, and its light was pale and
cold. A sharp wind whistled against the houses, yet shuttered and silent
in these early morning hours. The city was still asleep, and did not
know that the candidate had come home to hear his fate.
"Is this ugly sky an omen of ill?" asked Churchill, who, despite his
supercilious nature and the fact that he represented an opposition
newspaper, had come at last under the spell of Jimmy Grayson and was in
a way one of the band.
"If it is a gray sky for Mr. Grayson, it is a gray sky for the other
man, too, and I draw no inference from the circumstance," replied
Harley.
Nevertheless there was an oppression over the whole group--perhaps it
was because they were so near the end; and scarcely another word was
said as they walked along the silent street, each thinking of the day at
hand and the night to follow.
The candidate had offered all the hospitality of his house, but none
would accept, not wishing to intrude upon the first freshness of his
family reunion; they intended to register at the hotels and come to his
home later on for the news of the day. So they stopped at a street
corner, bade him a short farewell, and allowed him to go on alone.
But Harley could not resist the temptation of looking back. They had
arrived in the town two hours ahead of time, and he knew that the
candidate's family were not yet expecting him, but he could see the
house behind its shield of trees, now swept of foliage, and already
there were signs of life about it. He saw the candidate's wife run down
the steps and meet her husband, and then he looked away.
"This is one part of a Presidential campaign that we must not watch," he
said to the group about him, and without a word they walked to their
hotel, not glancing back again, although more than one in the group was
secretly envious of Harley, because of the welcome that they knew
awaited him a little later.