All-Wool Morrison Part 39

"I'd like to know who did all that realizing you're speaking of!"

"It's not in good taste for an errand-boy of my caliber to gossip about the business of those for whom he is doing errands. I'll merely say, Matthewson, that the people of this state can always depend on the broad-gaged good sense of United States Senator Corson to suggest a solution of a political difficulty. And you may be sure that the state government will back him up. Go down-town and ask the boys of the guard who it was that gave the command for them to leave the State House. After that you'd better go home to bed. That's good advice for all of you."

A shrill voice from the center of the ma.s.sed throng cut in sharply. "Go home like chickens and wait to have your necks wrung! Go home like sheep and wait for the shearer and the butcher."

The mayor leaned forward and tried to locate the agitator. "Hasn't the gentleman anything to say about goats? He's missing an excellent opportunity!" Morrison showed the alert air of a hunter trying to flush game in a covert.

The provoking query had its effect. "Yes, that's what you call us-all you rulers call us the goats!"

A brandished fist marked the man's position in the mob.

"Ah, there you are, my friend! What else have you on your mind?"

"I'll tell you what you have on your face. You have the mark of an honest man's hand there! I saw him plant that mark!"

"And what's the answer?" asked Stewart, pleasantly.

"You're a coward! You're not fit to advise real men what to do!"

"I'm afraid you have me sized up all too well!" There was something like wistful apology in Morrison's smile.

Lanigan had forced his way close to the foot of the plinth where the mayor was elevated. The commander's head was tipped back, his goggling eyes were full of anguished rebuke, and his mouth was wide open.

The man in the crowd yelped again, encouraged by his distance and by Morrison's pa.s.sivity under attack. "You think you own a mill. Your honest workmen own it. You are a thief!"

"My Gawd!" Lanigan squawked, hoa.r.s.ely. "Ain't it in you? Ain't a spark of it in you?"

Morrison delivered sharp retort in an undertone. "Don't you know better than to tangle my lines when I'm playing a fish? Shut up!" He tossed his hand at the individual in the crowd, inviting him to speak further.

"You're a liar, tool," responded the disturber.

"That's a tame epithet, my friend. Commonly used in debate. I'm afraid you're running out of ammunition. Haven't you anything really important to say, now that I'm giving you the floor?"

Men were beginning to remonstrate and to threaten in behalf of the mayor of the city.

"Hold on, boys!" Morrison entreated. "We must give our friend a minute more if he really has anything to say. Otherwise we'll adjourn--"

The bait had been dangled ingratiatingly; a movement had been made to jerk it away--the "fish" bit, promptly and energetically.

"I'll say it--I'll say what ought to be said--I'll shame the cowards here!"

"Let Brother What's-his-name come along, boys! Please! Please!" The mayor stretched forth his arms and urged persuasively. "Keep your hands off him!

Let him come!"

"They're going over him for a gat, Mister Mayor," called Lanigan. "I've given 'em one lesson in that line this evening, already!"

The volunteers who were patting the disturber released him. The patting had not been in the way of encouragement. "Nothing on him! Let him go!"

commanded one of the searchers.

The man who came forcing his way through the press, his clinched fists waving over his head, was young, pallid, typically an academic devotee of radicalism, a frenetic disciple, obsessed by _furor loquendi_ He was calling to the mob, trying to rouse followers. "You have been standing here, freezing in the night, d.a.m.ning tyrants, boasting what you would do.

Why don't you do it? Do you let a smirking ruler bluff all the courage of real men out of you? He's only doing the bidding of those higher up. He admits it! He's a tool, too! He's a fool, along with you, if he tries to excuse tyranny. You have your chance, now, and all the provocation that honest men need. The rulers tried to scare you with guns. But you have called the bluff. Their hired soldiers have run away. Now is your time!

Take your government into your hands! Down with aristocrats! Smash 'em like we smash their windows. They hold up an idol and ask you to bow down and be slaves to it; but you're only bowing to the drivers of slaves! They hide behind that idol and work it for all it's worth. They point to it and tell you that you must empty your pockets to add to their wealth, and work your fingers off for their selfish ends."

He halted a short distance from the plinth, declaiming furiously.

Morrison broke in, snapping out his words. "Down to cases, now! What is the idol?"

"A patchwork of red, white, and blue rags!"

Morrison whirled, crouched on his hands and knees, set his fingers on the edge of the plinth, and slid down the side. He swung for an instant at the end of his arms and dropped the rest of the way to the pavement.

Lanigan had started for the man, but Stewart overtook the commander, seized him by the collar and coattail slack, and tossed him to one side.

"Here's a case at last where I don't need any help or advice from you, Joe!"

"Punch the face offn him!" adjured Lanigan, even while he was floundering among the legs of the men against whom he had been thrown.

The mayor plunged through the crowd in the direction of the vilifier.

The man did not attempt to escape. "Strike me! Strike me down. I offer myself for my cause to shame these cowards!"

But Morrison did not use his fists, though Lanigan continued to exhort.

"There are altogether too many of you would-be martyrs around this city to-night. I can't accommodate you all!" Stewart made the same tackle he had used in the case of Lanigan and Spanish-walked his captive back toward the _porte-cochere_.

"I reckon I do need your help, after all, Joe!" confessed Morrison, noting that Lanigan was on his feet again. "Give me your back and a boost!"

Then the captor suddenly tripped the captive and laid him sprawling at Lanigan's feet; before the fallen man was up, Morrison, using the commander's st.u.r.dy shoulders and the thrust of the willing arms of his helper, had swung himself back to the top of the plinth. He kneeled and reached down his hands. "Up with him, Joe! Toss! I won't miss him!"

Lanigan was helped by a comrade in making the toss. Morrison grasped the man and yanked him upright and held him in a firm clutch.

The mayor was receiving plenty of advice from the crowd by that time. The gist of the counsel followed Lanigan's suggestion about punching off the fellow's face. But the mob was by no means unanimous. Men were daring to voice threats against Morrison.

As it had availed before that evening, Morrison's imperturbable silence secured quiet on the part of others.

"The opinion of the meeting seems to be divided," he said. He had recovered his poise along with his breath. "But no matter! I shall not adopt the advice of either side. I shall not let this fellow go until I have finished my business with him. I shall not punch his face off him.

I'll not flatter him to that extent. A good American reserves his fists for a man-fight with a real man." He shook the captive, holding him at arm's-length. "Here's a young fool who has been throwing stones at windows. Here's a fresh rowdy who has been sticking out his tongue at authority. I know exactly what he needs!"

"He insulted the flag of this country! Turn him over to the police!"

somebody insisted, and a roar of indors.e.m.e.nt hailed the demand.

"Citizens, that would be like giving a mongrel cur a court trial for sheep-killing! This perverted infant simply needs--_dingbats!_" He shouted the last word. He twisted the radical off his feet, stooped, and laid the victim across a knee that was as solid as a tree-trunk, and with the flat of a broad hand began to whale the culprit with all his might.

The onlookers were silent for a few moments. Then there was a chorus of jeering approbation.

When the shamed, humiliated, agonized radical--thus made a mark for gibes instead of winning honor as a martyr for the cause--began to wail and plead the men who were nearest the scene of flagellation started to laugh.

The laughter spread like a fire through dry brambles. It ran crackling from side to side of the great square. It mounted into higher bursts of merriment. It became hilarity that was expended by a swelling roar that split wide the night silence and came beating back in riotous echoes from the facade of the State House. That amazing method of handling anarchy had snapped the tense strain of a situation which had been holding men's emotions in leash for hours. The ludicrousness of the thing was heightened by the nervous solemnity immediately preceding. Men beat their neighbors on the back in instant comrades.h.i.+p of convulsed, rollicking jubilation.