Seven Keys to Baldpate Part 40

"Well, Mr. Magee?" asked Professor Bolton, laying down the paper which he had been perusing at a distance of about an inch from his nose.

"Once again, Professor," laughed Magee, "reporters have entered your life."

The old man sighed.

"It was very kind of her," he said, "not to mention that I was the person who compared blondes of the peroxide variety with suffragettes.

Others will not be so kind. The matter will be resurrected and used against me at the trial, I'm sure. A plucky girl, Mr. Magee--a very plucky girl. How times do change. When I was young, girls of her age would scarcely have thought of venturing forth into the highways on such perilous missions. I congratulate you. You showed unusual perception.

You deserve a great reward--the young lady's favor, let us say."

"You got to get me out of this," Max was still telling the mayor.

"For G.o.d's sake," cried Cargan, "shut up and let me think." He sat for a moment staring at one place, his face still lacking all emotion, but his eyes a trifle narrower than before. "You haven't got me yet," he cried, standing up. "By the eternal, I'll fight to the last ditch, and I'll win. I'll show Drayton he can't play this game on me. I'll show the _Star_. That dirty sheet has hounded me for years. I'll put it out of business. And I'll send the reformers howling into the alleys, sick of the fuss they started themselves."

"Perhaps," said Professor Bolton. "But only after the fight of your life, Cargan."

"I'm ready for it," cried Cargan. "I ain't down and out yet. But to think--a woman--a little bit of a girl I could have put in my pocket--it's all a big joke. I'll beat them--I'll show them--the game's far from played out--I'll win--and--if--I--don't--"

He crumbled suddenly into his seat, his eyes on that unpleasant line about "Prison Stripes for the Mayor". For an instant it seemed as though his fight was irrevocably lost, and he knew it. Lines of age appeared to creep from out the fat folds of his face, and stand mockingly there. He looked a beaten man.

"If I don't," he stammered pitifully, "well, they sent him to an island at the end. The reformers got Napoleon at the last. I won't be alone in that."

At this unexpected sight of weakness in his hero, Mr. Max set up a renewed babble of fear at his side. The train was in the Reuton suburbs now. At a neat little station it slowed down to a stop, and a florid policeman entered the smoking-car. Cargan looked up.

"h.e.l.lo, Dan," he said. His voice was lifeless; the old-time ring was gone.

The policeman removed his helmet and s.h.i.+fted it nervously.

"I thought I'd tell you, Mr. Cargan," he said "I thought I'd warn you.

You'd better get off here. There's a big crowd in the station at Reuton.

They're waiting for you, sir; they've heard you're on this train. This lying newspaper, Mr. Cargan, it's been telling tales--I guess you know about that. There's a big mob. You better get off here, sir, and go down-town on a car."

If the mighty Cargan had looked limp and beaten for a moment he looked that way no more. He stood up, and his head seemed almost to touch the roof of the car. Over that big patrolman he towered; his eyes were cold and hard again; his lips curved in the smile of the master.

"And why," he bellowed, "should I get off here? Tell me that, Dan."

"Well, sir," replied the embarra.s.sed copper, "they're ugly. There's no telling what they might do. It's a bad mob--this newspaper has stirred 'em up."

"Ugly, are they?" sneered Cargan. "Ever seen the bunch I would go put of my way for, Dan?"

"I meant it all right, sir," said Dan. "As a friend to a man who's been a friend to me. No, I never saw you afraid of any bunch yet, but this--"

"This," replied Cargan, "is the same old bunch. The same lily-livered crowd that I've seen in the streets since I laid the first paving stone under 'em myself in '91. Afraid of them? h.e.l.l! I'd walk through an ant hill as scared as I would through that mob. Thanks for telling me, Dan, but Jim Cargan won't be in the mollycoddle cla.s.s for a century or two yet."

"Yes, sir," said the patrolman admiringly. He hurried out of the car, and the mayor turned to find Lou Max pale and fearful by his side.

"What ails you now?" he asked.

"I'm afraid," cried Max. "Did you hear what he said? A mob. I saw a mob once. Never again for me." He tried to smile, to pa.s.s it off as a pleasant jest, but he had to wet his lips with his tongue before he could go on. "Come on, Jim. Get off here. Don't be a fool."

The train began to move.

"Get off yourself, you coward," sneered Cargan. "Oh, I know you. It doesn't take much to make your stomach shrink. Get off."

Max eagerly seized his hat and bag.

"I will, if you don't mind," he said. "See you later at Charlie's." And in a flash of tawdry attire, he was gone.

The mayor of Reuton no longer sat limp in his seat. That brief moment of seeming surrender was put behind forever. He walked the aisle of the car, fire in his eyes, battle in his heart.

"So they're waiting for me, eh?" he said aloud. "Waiting for Jim Cargan.

Now ain't it nice of them to come and meet their mayor?"

Mr. Magee and the professor went into the day coach for their baggage.

Mrs. Norton motioned to the former.

"Well," she said, "you know now, I suppose. And it didn't do you no harm to wait. I sure am glad this to-do is all over, and that child is safe.

And I hope you'll remember what I said. It ain't no work for a woman, no how, what with the shooting and the late hours."

"Your words," said Mr. Magee, "are engraven on my heart." He proceeded to gather her baggage with his own, and was thus engaged when Kendrick came up. The shadow of his discovery in the smoking-car an hour before still haunted his sunken eyes, but his lips were half smiling with the new joy of living that had come to him.

"Mr. Magee," he began, "I hardly need mention that the terrible thing which happened--in there--is between you and me--and the man who's dead.

No one must know. Least of all, the girl who is to become my wife--it would embitter her whole life--as it has mine."

"Don't say that," Magee pleaded. "You will forget in time, I'm sure. And you may trust me--I had forgotten already." And indeed he had, on the instant when his eyes fell upon the _Reuton Star_.

Miss Thornhill approached, her dark smiling eyes on Magee. Kendrick looked at her proudly, and spoke suddenly, determinedly:

"You're right, I will forget. She shall help me."

"Mr. Magee," said the girl, "I'm so pleased at the splendid end to your impulsive philanthropy. I just knew the adventure couldn't have anything but a happy ending--it was so full of youth and faith and--and charity or its synonym. This mustn't be good-by. You must come and see me--come and see us--all."

"I shall be happy to," answered Magee sincerely. "It will always be a matter of regret to me that I was not able to serve you--also--on Baldpate Mountain. But out of it you come with something more precious than fine gold, and that shall be my consolation."

"Let it be," smiled Myra Thornhill, "as it is surely mine. Good-by."

"And good luck," whispered Magee, as he took Kendrick's hand.

Over his shoulder, as he pa.s.sed to the platform, he saw them look into each other's eyes, and he felt that the memory of the admiral's game would in time cease to haunt David Kendrick.

A shadow had fallen upon the train--the shadow of the huge Reuton station. In the half-light on the platform Mr. Magee encountered the mayor of Reuton. Above the lessening roar of the train there sounded ahead of them the voices of men in turmoil and riot. Mr. Cargan turned upon Magee a face as placid and dispa.s.sionate as that of one who enters an apple orchard in May.

"The boys," he smiled grimly, "welcoming me home."

Then the train came to a stop, and Mr. Magee looked down into a great array of faces, and heard for the first time the low unceasing rumble of an angry mob. Afterward he marveled at that constant guttural roar, how it went on and on, humming like a tune, never stopping, disconnected quite from the occasional shrill or heavy voices that rang out in distinguishable words. The mayor looked coolly down into those upturned faces, he listened a moment to the rumble of a thousand throats, then he took off his derby with satiric politeness.

"Glad to see one and all!" he cried.

And now above the mutterings angry words could be heard, "That's him,"