All-Wool Morrison Part 12

What does it all mean?"

"I don't know," confessed the commander. He drove his way through the bystanders. "You see, boys, I have started in along the way of telling the truth to-night. So I own up that I don't know! We're going to find out what it means!" He kept on toward the door of the hall with his prisoner.

"I've arranged to have a man come down here and tell us what it means and tell us how to act."

"Well, he'll know more than anybody else I have tackled on the subject to-night," said Tolson, sourly. "He's a wonder, if he does know!"

"He's All-Wool Morrison--and that's your answer, buddie," retorted Lanigan. And that answer did seem to suffice for Tolson.

There were many men on the stairs leading up to the hall, and the elbowing throng at the door of the auditorium furnished further evidence of the overflowing nature of the gathering.

"Gangway!" commanded Lanigan at the top of his voice. "Make way, there!

I'm bringing something straight in my mouth and something crooked in my mit, and neither one of 'em will ye have till free pa.s.sage is made to the platform."

The crowd's curiosity served effectively to clear that pa.s.sage.

Lanigan's captive went along, sullenly unresisting. There was no opportunity for rebellion in that mob that opened a narrow pa.s.sage grudgingly, only to pack together again in a solid ma.s.s. But certain men whom Krylovensky pa.s.sed or men who caught his eye by swift motions spat whispers at him in a language that Lanigan did not understand.

"Is it three cheers that your brother rattlesnakes are giving ye in the natural hissing way of 'em?" inquired the captor. "They're a fine bunch!"

With his hand twisted tightly into the slack of the man's coat and the torn s.h.i.+rt, the ex-sergeant forced the prisoner up the short stairs that conducted to the platform; Demeter followed.

Tobacco smoke streamed up in whirls from the banked faces that filled the hall from side to side, and the eddying clouds floated in strata above the rows of heads. Lanigan peered sternly at the crowd through the haze. "Here I am back! And I'm thanking the good saints for the few mouthfuls of fresh air I got outside and the news I got, and for this here I found and fetched along. I need him. I was on a jury once, in a murder case, and they had the tool that done the job and the lawyers tagged it Exhibit A.

This is it! He's got a name, but if I tried to say it, it would cramp my jaws and hold my mouth open so long that I'd get a.s.sifixiated with this smoke. This is Bill the Bomber! Demeter, hold up the goods we found on him!"

The post-adjutant obeyed the order.

"Now, Bill the Bomber," demanded Lanigan, "tell me and the bunch what's the big idea of the a.r.s.enal, in a peaceful American city?"

"Is it peaceful?" screamed the captive, at bay. "There are soldiers marching with guns. There are men threatening and cursing! There are--"

"Hold right on--right where you are! Are you naturalized?"

"No!"

"Well, let me tell you, you red-gilled Bullshevist, that till you're a voting American citizen, our private and personal and strictly family rows are none of your d.a.m.n' business! All American citizens kindly applaud!"

He was answered by cheers, stamping feet, and clapping hands.

"Contrary-minded?" he invited in the silence that followed.

"Hiss a few hisses, you snakes!" he urged. "Or show those red flags you're carrying in your pockets!"

There was no demonstration, either by act or by word.

Lanigan pushed his captive to the rear of the platform and jolted him down into a chair behind which, on the wall, was draped a large United States flag. "Set there and see if you can't absorb a little of the white and blue into your system, along with the red that's already there," counseled the patriot. "You're going to hear some man-talk in a little while, and I hope 'twill do you good!"

A man in the audience rose to his feet when Lanigan marched back to the front of the rostrum.

"I am a voter here, yet I was born in another country. Will you allow me to ask a question, Commander Lanigan?"

"Sure! But let's start even on names. What's yours?"

"Otto Weisner!"

Lanigan made a grimace. "But even at that I'm going to keep my word and I call on all present to back me up."

"See here!" bawled a voice from a far corner. "Let that Hun wait! How about your word to us in another matter? Where's the mayor of Marion?"

"The mayor of Marion is on his way to this hall!" The soldier's face was set into a grim expression and deep ridges lined his jaws. "I gave you all once to-night his word to me that he'd stand up for us on Capitol Hill, whatever it is they're trying to put over. I got the hoot from you when I said it. You wouldn't take my word and I just told him so. Now he's coming down here for himself! I say it. If some gent would like to hoot another hoot on that subject will he kindly step up here and hoot?" He doubled his fists.

There was no indication that anybody wanted to accept the invitation.

"Very well, then!" proceeded Lanigan. "I'm in a soothing frame of mind, myself, and I hope you're all soothed, too. And so that we won't be wasting any time on a busy evening I'll state that the meeting is now open for that question, Mister Weisner. Shoot!"

VI

THE MAN'S WORD OF THE MAYOR OF MARION

Commander Lanigan had const.i.tuted himself the presiding officer of the a.s.semblage that had been gathered under no special auspices and by no formal call. It was a flocking together of those uneasy persons who had been informing one another that they wanted to be shown! Mr. Lanigan's unconventional methods in the chair were tolerated because he had displayed much alacrity in putting the mob in the way of securing information from such high authority as the mayor of Marion. Chairman Lanigan's compelling methods in pumping this time-filler kept up the interest of the auditors.

"I belong to der Socialist party," stated Weisner.

"We don't want no Boche speeches!" warned a voice.

In his absorption in affairs, Lanigan was still hanging on to the captured red necktie. He noted that fact and held the danger signal aloft. "I don't approve of this color at this time," he remarked. "But when I have seen it waved in times past I have known that it meant a blast going off or a train coming on, and I have never taken foolish chances. Does the objecting gent down there in the corner need any further instruction from here, or shall I come down and whisper in his ear?"

Silence a.s.sured him and again he ordered Mr. Weisner to ask his question.

The querist ceased from showing deference to the volunteer in the chair; Weisner turned his back on Lanigan and addressed all in hearing, shaking his fist over his head: "Who tells me dis vhat I don'd know? Does Karl Trimbach his seat haf in der State House vhere der Socialists haf elected him?"

"If he has been elected, sure he'll have his seat," declared Lanigan, loyally. "That's the way we do things in this country! Why shouldn't he have his seat?"

"Den vhere--vhere is dot zertificate dot should show to Karl Trimbach dot he shall valk into der State House und sit on his seat? He don't get it.

Why don'd dey send it?" Weisner bellowed his questions. He threshed his arms wildly about him.

"This is no time to be starting anything, Weisner! Don't stand there and be a Dutch windmill--be an American citizen! Soothe yourself!"

Another gentleman arose. He was distinctly Hibernian. He wore an obtrusive ribbon-knot of green, white, and yellow, the colors of the flag of the Irish Republic. "Lanigan, ye may not be able to reply satisfact'rily to th' questions o' the sour-krauters, but when I ask ye whether or not the Hon'rable Danyel O'Donnell, riprisent'thive-ilict, put in that high office be th' votes o' th' Marion pathrits of a free Ireland, takes his sate, what does th' blood o' yer race say to me?"

Lanigan blinked and hesitated. He felt the sudden Celtic surging of a natural impulse to run with his kind, to swing the cudgel valiantly for the cause, and to ask questions after the s.h.i.+ndy was over.

"You know th' principles o' th' Hon'rable O'Donnell," insisted the speaker in loud tones. "Tis his intint to raise his voice in th' halls o' state and shout ear-rly and late, 'Whativer it is ye're about, gents, it all may be very well, but what will ye be doing for the cause o' free Ireland?'

That's th' kind of a hero we're putting in th' State House en the hill."

"Putting a pest there, ye mean!" returned Lanigan.