The Landloper: The Romance of a Man on Foot
When they were on the street the honorable gentleman turned sharply
toward the Boulevard.
“I haven't any spirit or taste to-night for moonlight in the park, sir!
A nice trick you played on me.”
“I wanted you to get a first-hand notion of a state of affairs, Mr.
Converse.”
“But you ought to understand my temperament better--you ought to know
it's going to stick in my mind, worry me, vex me, set me to seeking for
remedies. It's just as if I'd been retained on a case. I feel almost
duty-bound to pitch in.”
“It's strange how a man gets pulled into a thing sometimes--into
something he had no idea of meddling with,” philosophized Farr, blandly.
“That's the way it has happened in my case.”
“It has, eh?” demanded Mr. Converse, sharply. He had tacitly accepted
the young man's companionship for the walk back to the Boulevard. “Now,
look here! Just who are you?”
“My name is Farr and I'm nothing.”
“You needn't bluff me--you're a politician--a candidate for something.”
“I'm not even a voter in this state. It's men like you, sir, who ought
to be candidates for the high offices.”
“My sainted father trained me to respect self-sacrifice, Mr. Farr. But
for a clean man to try to accomplish things for the people in politics
these days isn't self-sacrifice--it's martyrdom. The cheap politicians
heap the fagots, the sneering newspapers light the fire and keep blowing
it with their bellows, and the people stand around and seem to show a
sort of calm relish in watching the operation. And when it is all over
not a bit of good has been done.”
“I'm afraid I have wasted an evening for you, sir. I'm sorry. I hoped
the troubles of those men, when you heard them at first hand, would
interest you.”
“Interest me! Confound it all, you have wrecked my peace of mind! I knew
it all before. But I'm selfish, like almost everybody else. I kept
away where I couldn't hear about these things. Now, if I sleep soundly
to-night I'll be ashamed to look up at my father's portrait when I walk
into my office to-morrow morning. Why didn't you have better sense
than to coax me into your infernal meeting?” He rapped his cane angrily
against the curbstone as he strode on. “And the trouble with me is,”
continued Mr. Converse, with much bitterness, “I know the conditions are
such in this state that a meeting like that can be assembled in every
city and town--and the complaints will be just and demand help.
But there's no organization--it's only blind kittens miauling. It's
damnable!”
“But this is the kind of country where some mighty quick changes can be
made when the people do get their eyes open,” suggested the young man.
Mr. Converse merely grunted, tapping his cane more viciously.
They were on the frontier of the Eleventh Ward now. The brighter lights
of the avenues of up-town blazed before them.
“Then you will not go into politics?” inquired Farr.
“I'd sooner sail for India with a cargo of hymn-books and give
singing-lessons to Bengal tigers.”
“Good night, sir,” said Farr. He halted on the street corner which
marked the boundary of the ward.
“Good night, sir!” replied Mr. Converse, striding on.
The young man watched him out of sight. He heard the angry clack of the
cane on the stones long after the Honorable Archer Converse had turned
the next corner.
“Maxim in the case of a true gentleman,” mused Farr: “tap his conscience
on the shoulder, point your finger at the enemy, say nothing, simply
stand back and give conscience plenty of elbow-room--it needs no help.
There, by the grace of God, goes the next governor of this state.”
XX
CONSIDERATION: ONE DAUGHTER
On the morning following his discomfiture Richard Dodd posted himself
in a little tobacco-shop opposite the Trelawny Apartment-house. Lurking
behind cigar-boxes in the window, he held the door of the house under
surly espionage. It was plain to the shopkeeper that “the gent had made
a night of it.” Dodd's eyes were heavy, his face was flushed, and he
lighted one cigarette after another with shaky hands.
Shortly before nine o'clock Kate Kilgour came out and walked down the
avenue on the way to her work. Dodd stared after her until she was
out of sight. Shame and anger and desire mingled in the steady gaze
he leveled on her; in her crisp freshness she represented both the
longed-for and the unattainable. He was conscious of a new sentiment
in regard to her. In the past his impatience had been tempered by the
comforting knowledge that she had promised herself to him--that she was
his to own, to possess after a bit of tantalizing procrastination. Now
he was not at all sure of her. He had been just a bit patronizing in
the past--his successes with women had inflated his conceit--he had
exhibited a rather careless air of proprietorship--his manner had said
to her and to others, “This is mine; look at it!” But now when he had
watched her out of sight jealousy, anger, the sour conviction that
he had forfeited her regard combined to make him desperate, and the
excesses of the night before kindled a flame which heated all his evil
passions.
He threw away his cigarette, cursed roundly aloud, and hurried across
the street into the Trelawny.
When Mrs. Kilgour admitted him to her suite she clung to the
door-casing, exhibiting much trepidation.
He stepped in, closed the door, and put his back against it.
“Have you got those hysterics out of you so that you can listen to me
and then talk sense?” he demanded, coarsely.
She went into her sitting-room and he followed, muttering:
“No wonder you ran away from me last night--no wonder you didn't have
the face to stay and take what you deserve. How in tophet I ever allowed
you to plan and manage I can't understand.”
“You asked me to,” she faltered.
“I didn't ask you to rig up a dirty conspiracy to queer me.”
“Richard, you are not yourself. You have been drinking!” She tried to
exhibit protesting indignation and failed. “Come to me when you are
yourself.”
“There's no more of this to-morrow business goes with me, Mrs. Kilgour.
I'll admit that you're Kate's mother. But just now you are something
else. You have tried to do me, and nobody gets by with that stuff--man,
woman, or child. We'll have our settlement here and now.”
“I did the best I could,” she wailed.
“Out of what damnation novel did you get that idea?” he raged.
“It seemed to be a good plan, Richard. I swear by everything sacred I
thought it would come out all right. Don't rave at me.” Her voice sunk
to an appealing whisper. She picked up a book from her table. “If you
will only listen--”
“So you did get it out of a novel! My God! what have your fool ideas
done to me?”
“How do you dare to talk to Kate's mother like that?”
“I am not talking to Kate's mother, I tell you! I'm talking to a woman
who has put me into a hell on earth. I'm talking to you, Mrs. Kilgour,
and you don't know the whole story yet.”
“All my life it has been the same--only trouble and sorrow and to be
misunderstood.” She began to sob.
“Is there anything in that novel about ringing in an iceman to break
up a marriage? I say it was all a conspiracy. You didn't intend to be
square. You intended to rig a scheme so that you could duck out from
under. You have always done that, Mrs. Kilgour.”
“I had nothing to do with that man coming in.”
“Don't try to fool me any more. You told me to come, didn't you? You
must have told some yarn to your daughter to have her come.”
“I did--it was all--”
“And then you told that plug-ugly to come in, too, and break it up so
as to queer me. Why did I ever fall for such lunacy? If I hadn't been
desperate I would never have let you drag me into such a devilish
scheme. But now you have got to do your part to square me. It's going to
be straight talk from now on, Mrs. Kilgour. There must be a settlement
between us.”
She looked away from him. She was plainly searching her soul for excuses
to postpone that settlement.
“That person who came in, Dicky! I swear I did not arrange any such
thing. He is only an iceman. I don't know the man. It was some accident.
If the matter hadn't been interrupted! It was going along all right.”
“What's the matter with your intellect? You know it wasn't going along
at all! You simply had us chasing shadows. Good God! I ought to have
made you tell me what you were planning. Think of it! Think of me
waltzing down there like a boob and thinking you had something real to
offer.”
“But you frightened her with that jailbird. You should have brought a
real clergyman.”
“The man I brought has the power to perform marriages! I would have made
a nice spectacle towing a clergyman into that mess, wouldn't I?”
She broke in upon his further speech. She wrung her hands, paltering,
pleading, trying to explain, trying more desperately to postpone that
settlement he was demanding.
“But, honestly, it did seem to be a good plan, Dicky. I'm her mother. I
know her nature. You know how some natures have to be handled! She is so
self-centered. She has to be taken by surprise. She has to know that she
is making a sacrifice. That is why I arranged it all for Rose Alley and
borrowed that house. And I had it all planned out what to say to her at
the last moment there.”
“Well, what was this great thing you were going to say?” He glared at
her, disgust and suspicion in his eyes.
She flushed. She hesitated, unable to meet his gaze.
“It's no use to tell you now, Dicky. Somehow, now that I come to think
it all over, it sounds rather tame. It all did seem so plausible, what
I was going to say when I sat down and planned out the thing. And the
romance of it--you know even self-centered girls like to feel that a man
wants them so much that he gets desperate--and she said once that she
would marry you some time--perhaps--and--”
“Oh, you--you--” He broke in and then stopped, lacking words. “What's
the use?” he muttered. “You don't even know your own daughter. She has
been enduring me because you have been keeping at her. I understand it
now. You told me you could hurry it up. You have made me look like a
melodrama villain. You have made her hate me. Now own up! Didn't she
rave to you after you got home and tell you she hated me? You have
nailed me to the cross for ever where she is concerned--now haven't you?
Own up.”
“I can win her back, Dicky. Give me a little time.” But she was not able
to look at him. “Don't scold me any more. I'm her mother. She will obey
her own mother in time. Don't hurt my sensitive nature any more.” She
began to weep, twisting her rings on her trembling fingers.
He scowled at her, narrowing his eyes. “You haven't been playing square
with me, Mrs. Kilgour.”
“Call me Mother Kilgour, Dicky, just as you always have.”
“I won't stand for any more bluffing, Mrs. Kilgour. Kate has sworn to
you that she will never marry me--now hasn't she?”
“But I can talk her around--you can win her back. I'll tell her it was
my plan--I'll have courage to tell her later--”
“So you have been laying that crazy idea all to me?”
“But I'll get up courage to tell her some day--and your devotion will
win her back--devotion always wins. You can--”
“Mrs. Kilgour, I know you pretty well. I repeat, I know you have always
ducked out from under--that's your nature. But here's a thing you can't
dodge. You've got to come to time. You know how I love Kate. There isn't
any reason why she shouldn't marry me. There's no excuse for her holding
me off the way she does. You've got to fix it for me--quick! Understand?
This fluff talk about 'devotion' and 'some day' doesn't go. I want
action. Now hold on! I don't mean to threaten--I've been square with you
till now. Good gad, you don't realize what a price I've paid!”
“And now on top of your other insults you are going to twit me again