The Plum Tree Part 6

"Mean?" said I, for once feeling no resentment at her manner.

"By leaving--this way," she explained with impatience.

"You heard Mr. Roebuck's telegram," said I.

"You are angry with me," she persisted.

"No, Carlotta," said I. "I was, but I am not. As soon as I saw what you wished, I was grateful, not angry."

"What did I wish?"

"To let me know as gently and kindly as you could that you purposed to end our engagement. And I guess you are right. We do not seem to care for each other as we ought if we--"

"You misunderstood me," she said, pale and with flas.h.i.+ng eyes, and in such a struggle with her emotions that she could say no more.

If I had not seen that only her pride and her vanity were engaged in the struggle, and her heart not at all, I think I should have abandoned my comfortable self-deception that my own pride forbade discussion with her. As it was, I was able to say: "Don't try to spare me, Carlotta, I'm glad you had the courage and the good sense not to let us both drift into irrevocable folly. I thank you." I opened the door into the hall.

"Let us talk no more about it. We could say to each other only the things that sting or the things that stab. Let us be friends. You must give me your friends.h.i.+p, at least." I took her hand.

She looked strangely at me. "You want me to humble myself, to crawl at your feet and beg your pardon," said she between her teeth. "But I shan't." She s.n.a.t.c.hed away her hand and threw back her head.

"I wish nothing but what is best for us both," said I. "But let us not talk of it now--when neither of us is calm."

"You don't care for me!" she cried.

"Do _you_ love _me_?" I rejoined.

Her eyes s.h.i.+fted. I waited for her reply and, when it did not come, I said: "Let us go to breakfast."

"I'll not go in just now," she answered, in a quiet tone, a sudden and strange s.h.i.+ft from that of the moment before. And she let me take her hand, echoed my good-by, and made no further attempt to detain me.

That was a gloomy breakfast despite my efforts to make my own seeming of good-humor permeate to the others. Mrs. Ramsay hid a somber face behind the coffee-urn; Ed ate furiously, noisily, choking every now and then.

He drove me to the station; his whole body was probably as damp from his emotions as were his eyes and his big friendly hand. The train got under way; I drew a long breath. I was free.

But somehow freedom did not taste as I had antic.i.p.ated. Though I reminded myself that I had acted as any man with pride and self-respect would have acted in such delicate circ.u.mstances, and though I knew that Carlotta was no more in love with me than I was with her, this end to our engagement seemed even more humiliating to me than its beginning had seemed. It was one more instance of that wretched fatality which has pursued me through life, which has made every one of my triumphs come to me in mourning robes and with a gruesome face. In the glittering array of "prizes" that tempts man to make a beast and a fool of himself in the gladiatorial show called Life, the sorriest, the most ironic, is the grand prize, Victory.

The parlor car was crowded; its only untaken seat was in the smoking compartment, which had four other occupants, deep in a game of poker.

Three of them were types of commonplace, prosperous Americans; the fourth could not be so easily cla.s.sed and, therefore, interested me--especially as I was in the mood to welcome anything that would crowd to the background my far from agreeable thoughts.

The others called him "Doc," or Woodruff. As they played, they drank from flasks produced by each in turn. Doc drank with the others, and deeper than any of them. They talked more and more, he less and less, until finally he interrupted their noisy volubility only when the game compelled. I saw that he was one of those rare men upon whom amiable conversation or liquor or any other relaxing force has the reverse of the usual effect. Instead of relaxing, he drew himself together and concentrated more obstinately upon his game. Luck, so far as the cards controlled it, was rather against him, and the other three players took turns at audacious and by no means unskilful play. I was soon admiring the way he "sized up" and met each in turn. Prudence did not make him timid. He advanced and retreated, "bluffed" and held aloof, with acuteness and daring.

At a station perhaps fifty miles from Chicago, the other three left,--and Doc had four hundred-odd dollars of their money.

I dropped into the seat opposite him--it was by the window--and amused myself watching him, while waiting for a chance to talk with him; for I saw that he was a superior person, and, in those days, when I was inconspicuous and so was not compelled constantly to be on guard, I never missed a chance to benefit by such exchanges of ideas.

He was apparently about forty years old, to strike a balance between the youth of eyes, mouth, and contour, and the age of deep lines and grayish, thinning hair. He had large, frank, blue eyes, a large nose, a strong forehead and chin, a grossly self-indulgent mouth,--there was the weakness, there, as usual! Evidently, the strength his mind and character gave him went in pandering to physical appet.i.tes. In confirmation of this, there were two curious marks on him,--a nick in the rim of his left ear, a souvenir of a bullet or a knife, and a scar just under the edge of his chin to the right. When he compressed his lips, this scar, not especially noticeable at other times, lifted up into his face, became of a sickly, bluish white, and transformed a careless, good-humored cynic into a man of danger, of terror.

His reverie began, as I gathered from his unguarded face, in cynical amus.e.m.e.nt, probably at his triumph over his friends. It pa.s.sed on to still more agreeable things,--something in the expression of the mouth suggested thoughts of how he was going to enjoy himself as he "blew in"

his winnings. Then his features shadowed, darkened, and I had my first view of the scar terrible. He shook his big head and big shoulders, roused himself, made ready to take a drink, noticed me, and said, "Won't you join me?" His look was most engaging.

I accepted and we were soon sociable, each taking an instinctive liking to the other. We talked of the business situation, of the news in the papers, and then of political affairs. Each of us saw that there he was at the other's keenest interest in life. He knew the game,--practical politics as distinguished from the politics talked by and to the public.

But he evaded, without seeming to do so, all the ingenious traps I laid for drawing from him some admission that would give me a clue to where he "fitted in." I learned no more about him than I thought he learned about me.

"I hope we shall meet again," said I cordially, as we parted at the cab-stand.

"Thank you," he answered, and afterward I remembered the faint smile in his eyes.

I, of course, knew that Roebuck was greatly interested in my project for putting political business on a business basis; but not until he had explained why he sent for me did I see how it had fascinated and absorbed his mind. "You showed me," he began, "that you must have under you a practical man to handle the money and do the arranging with the heelers and all that sort of thing."

"Yes," said I; "it's a vital part of the plan. We must find a man who is perfectly trustworthy and discreet. Necessarily he'll know or suspect something--not much, but still something--of the inside workings of the combine."

"Well, I've found him," went on Roebuck, in a triumphant tone. "He's a G.o.dless person, with no character to lose, and no conception of what character means. But he's straight as a string. Providence seems to have provided such men for just such situations as these, where the devil must be fought with fire. I've been testing him for nearly fifteen years. But you can judge for yourself."

I was the reverse of pleased. It was not in my calculations to have a creature of Roebuck's foisted upon me, perhaps--indeed, probably--a spy.

I purposed to choose my own man; and I decided while he was talking, that I would accept the Roebuck selection only to drop him on some plausible pretext before we began operations. I was to meet the man at dinner,--Roebuck had engaged a suite at the Auditorium. "It wouldn't do to have him at my house or club," said he; "neither do we want to be seen with him."

Coincidence is so familiar a part of the daily routine that I was not much surprised when my acquaintance, the astute poker player with the scar, walked in upon us at the Auditorium. But Roebuck was both astonished and chagrined when we shook hands and greeted each other like old friends.

"How do you do, Mr. Sayler?" said Woodruff.

"Glad to see you, Doctor Woodruff," I replied. "Then you knew me all the time? Why didn't you speak out? We might have had an hour's business talk in the train."

"If I'd shown myself as leaky as all that, I guess there'd have been no business to talk about," he replied. "Anyhow, I didn't know you till you took out your watch with the monogram on the back, just as we were pulling in. Then I remembered where I'd seen your face before. I was up at your state house the day that you threw old Dominick down. That's been a good many years ago."

That chance, easy, smoking-compartment meeting, at which each had studied the other dispa.s.sionately, was most fortunate for us both.

The relation that was to exist between us--more, much more, than that of mere employer and employe--made fidelity, personal fidelity, imperative; and accident had laid the foundation for the mutual attachment without which there is certain to be, sooner or later, suspicion on both sides, and cause for it.

The two hours and a half with Woodruff, at and after dinner, served to reinforce my first impression. I saw that he was a thorough man of the world, that he knew politics from end to end, and that he understood the main weaknesses of human nature and how to play upon them for the advantage of his employers and for his own huge amus.e.m.e.nt. He gave a small exhibition of that skill at the expense of Roebuck. He appreciated that Roebuck was one of those unconscious hypocrites who put conscience out of court in advance by a.s.suming that whatever they wish to do is right or _they_ could not wish to do it. He led Roebuck on to show off this peculiarity of his,--a jumbling, often in the same breath, of the most sonorous piety and the most shameless business perfidy. All the time Woodruff's face was perfectly grave,--there are some men who refuse to waste any of their internal enjoyment in external show.

Before he left us I arranged to meet him the next morning for the settlement of the details of his employment. When Roebuck and I were alone, I said: "What do you know about him? Who is he?"

"He comes of a good family here in Chicago,--one of the best. Perhaps you recall the Bowker murder?"

"Vaguely," I answered.

"It was Woodruff who did it. We had a hard time getting him off. Bowker and Woodruff's younger brother were playing cards one day, and Bowker accused him of cheating. Young Woodruff drew,--perhaps they both drew at the same time. At any rate, Bowker shot first and killed his man,--he got off on the plea of self-defense. It was two years before Bowker and Doc met,--in the lobby of the Palmer House,--I happened to be there. I was talking to a friend when suddenly I felt as if something awful was about to happen. I started up, and saw Bowker just rising from a table at the far end of the room. I shan't ever forget his look,--like a bird charmed by a snake. His lips were ajar and wrinkled as if his blood had fled away inside of him, and his throat was expanding and contracting."

Roebuck wiped beads of sweat from his forehead. "It was Doc Woodruff walking slowly toward him, with a wicked smile on his face, and that scar--you noticed the scar?"

I nodded.

"Well, you can imagine how that scar stood out. He came slowly on, n.o.body able to move a muscle to stop him. When he was about ten feet from Bowker and as near me as you are now, Bowker gave a kind of shudder and scream of fright, drew his pistol, and fired. The bullet clipped Woodruff's ear. Quick as that--" Roebuck snapped his fingers--"Doc drew, and sent a bullet into his heart. He fell forward across the table and his pistol crashed on the marble floor. Doc looked at him, gave a cold sort of laugh, like a jeer and a curse, and walked out into the street.

When he met a policeman he said, 'I've killed d.i.c.k Bowker. Here's my gun. Lock me up'--perfectly cool, just as he talked to us to-night."

"And you got him off?"