A Republic Without a President, and Other Stories, Herbert D. Ward [top 100 novels txt] 📗

not approach her, he stooped and picked up the disdained mistletoe. When he had raised himself she shot out this awful question, looking at him as she did when they first met.

"Are you—He?"

The young man bowed his head before her. If he had set fire to her place, or robbed her father's grave, she could not have regarded him with a more crushing scorn. She tried to speak again, but her passion choked her.

"I—I give you back your home," he protested humbly. "It is mine no longer. It is your own Don't blame me. I love you."

"My father did not bring me up to take valuable presents from—Boston—gentlemen!" blazed the Southern girl.

She waved him aside, swept by him without another look, and melted out of the room. But he noticed that she took the mortgage papers with her.

In the course of the morning he threw himself upon the mercy of Mrs. McCorkle.

"I have a right," he said; "I want to make her my wife."

"Georgiella is not behaving prettily," said Mrs. McCorkle severely. "If a Northerner does act like a gentleman, the least a Southern girl can do is to behave like a lady. I will speak to Georgiella, sir."

Georgiella came to the Christmas dinner with blazing eyes. She ate in silence, looking like an offended goddess, dressed in an old black silk gown of her mother's trimmed with aged Valenciennes lace.

But after dinner she stayed in the dining-room while Mrs. McCorkle and Aunt Betsey went into the kitchen. She walked up to the Ming vase and stood before it. Ellesworth followed her.

"I have been thinking it over," she began abruptly in a quaint affectation of a business-like tone. "I will keep the mortgage—thank you, sir. It is my home, you know," she put in pugnaciously. "But I will pay for it, if you please."

"Pay for it!" gasped Ellesworth.

"Yes, sir; I will sell you the Ming vase," returned Miss Benson calmly, "and the two Revolutionary papers, and the coin of George the Second and the rest—" She waved her hand toward the glass-case. "You may take them to Boston with you."

These were her assets. Ellesworth looked at her for a moment, torn between astonishment, pity, amusement and love; but love got the better of them all, and he answered solemnly,—

"Yes, I will take the Ming vase, and the Revolutionary papers, and the old coins and you too, my darling!"

"Well, I do like you," admitted Georgiella. Suddenly she began to droop and tremble, and then to sob. Then he held her.

"You must give me a first mortgage; you must," demanded the young man. "I must have everything—the whole—no other claims to come in from any quarter of the universe. You understand. You've got to be my wife!" he exploded in a kind of glorious anger.

She could not deny him, for she thought it was the Northern way of wooing, and smiled divinely.

"And now—may I?" He took the mistletoe branch from the Ming vase and held it over her head. Their eyes closed in ecstacy.

Mrs. McCorkle gave a funny little feminine scream of dismay. She had heard no sound, and had come in from the kitchen to see if they were quarreling.

"And I'll put it in the trust deed," he whispered humbly, "that I will make you happy, dear!"

When Ellesworth rode over to Sunshine for his next mail he found the following letter awaiting him:

1111 Court Street,
Boston, Mass., Dec. 22, 1890.

Mr. Francis B. Ellesworth:

Dear Frank,—What the deuce do you mean by countermanding Benson's foreclosure at this time of day? It makes a peck of trouble. In Boston we are too busy to fool with affairs this way.

Messrs. Screw & Claw desire me to enclose their little bill. Mine will keep until you get here.

Yours truly,
Joseph Todd.

COLONEL ODMINTON A SEQUEL TO "A REPUBLIC WITHOUT A PRESIDENT."

The Colonel paced his cabin alone. The new expression which success models was becoming intensified from day to day upon his face. He had outwitted the greatest nation in the world; he had defied the best detective service of modern times; he was rich beyond his dizziest dreams; he could aspire to any position; he would be an eastern prince perhaps, and drowsy-looking girls should wave peacock fans and soothe his memory to rest with crooning songs. What a delicious future he saw rising before him! His consummate stroke of piracy should purchase him a life of lotus ease.

The Colonel, had at last achieved; and, as is too often the case with extraordinary success, his stupendous act had robbed him of vitality and invention. Already he felt and acknowledged a dismemberment of his will. But a few days before, he was of all men, the most alert, the most ingenious, the most courageous, the most ambitious; while now, he lived in dreams, which he evoked as persistently as the witch of Endor evoked the ghost of Saul. His nature had undergone a revolution, in which he gloried. Had he been poor, he would not have accepted his sudden enervation without a struggle. But he was rich—thank God! rich—and rejoiced that he was to gratify his new-born languor.

His son alone had access to his luxurious cabin. That boy, who had been the ready and ignorant accomplice of his father's picturesque villainy, had already begun to grow thin with shame. He saw his father transformed from a virile into a sleek man. He himself had changed during the few days of his knowledge of the secret from a pliant boy into a silent accusation. The Colonel could not look his son straight in the eyes. This was the first warning to his diseased mind that he was not the greatest man of his age.

The Colonel had moreover a sense of security that unapprehended malefactors cannot feel. The pledge of the United States Government had been solemnly given. He could not be punished. His freedom was assured. Whenever he paced the deck, he filled his lungs with the pure, salt air, and allowed them to expand without stint. There was nothing contracted on his horizon. True, he had lost his country—but he had gained wealth. He felt sure of admiration, and of some applause. He remembered that an unextradited bank-robber had purchased a barony from the King of W�rtemburg, and had lived there much respected. What position might he not buy with his American gold?

Still, he was haunted by a feeling of mingled dissatisfaction and unrest that marred the pride he felt in his own achievement. Was it due to his son's speechless denunciation? Or did it come from the fact that his authority seemed to be impaired? There was no insubordination nor mutiny among the sailors. It had not gone so far as that, with the well-paid and well-fed men. Perhaps it never would. But men do not easily obey a scoundrel or an outlaw except when it is understood that they are felons themselves.

In a certain sense the crew of the "Lightning" rejoiced in their master's superb feat. The venom of piracy had entered their veins. They firmly believed that Colonel Odminton would soon cast off his mask, and turn the most wonderful product of marine architecture into an irresistible pirate craft.

They dreamed of an inaccessible island—of confused wealth, of many vices, and unrestricted carousals. Therefore they still obeyed readily, but with an air of abandon that puzzled their commander. But Colonel Odminton did not suspect these natural speculations, for he was looking forward to a life of great respectability as well as of unrivalled luxury.

For ten days or so, the "Lightning" danced over the Atlantic. Of course, it must come to shore somewhere. People cannot live on gold. They must eat. The superb electric vessel had ice-making machines; and retorts for distilling the salt water into fresh; but no electrodes were there, to reduce wood to sugar or coal to beef. The Colonel felt his cheek sting with the excitement of coming to land. At the same time he felt a reluctance to do so. He dreaded to meet men. He could not expel the consciousness that is common to all culprits,—namely, the feeling that he would be the centre of observation. He could not be apprehended; but supposing that he were not well received?

On the other hand, when the crew learned of the decision to make for land, they were almost riotous with joy. They were mad for the long-delayed chance to spend their high wages in vice and drink. If nations would conspire to pass an international law to prohibit women and rum at every port, what a magnificent stride to uninterrupted manhood all sailors would be forced to take!

But Captain Hans Christian shook his head as the "Lightning" forged toward the land.

There were some traits that Rupert did not inherit. His limpid heart understood the disgrace of his position. He pined for freedom and gradually wasted away. With feverish eyes he watched for the English coast. It is possible that he had, bereft of an honest father, meditated desertion at his first opportunity.

Now, at last, they sighted land. The vessel that was swifter than all other ships afloat, was undisguised. The Colonel had no thought of converting her into the "Mary Jane" again. No flight, no concealment was now necessary. It was just past sunrise when the "Lightning" glided into the troubled harbor of Penzance.

The inhabitants of Land's End are no stay-a-beds, and when the oil-skinned fishermen, who were ready to push their boats off in the rising tide, lifted up their eyes and beheld the graceful monster mysteriously undulating in, with no help of sails or steam, they called to each other, they uttered direful exclamations, and they assembled in ever increasing groups upon the sands. One ran to the public house and brought back to the throng a greasy proclamation, upon which the picture of a vessel was stamped.

Upon the cliffs, red-coats pointed to the stranger, and shook their heads ominously.

Before the "Lightning" had dropped her anchor, the whole population of Penzance was out, gesticulating, pointing, execrating.

"That's she, sure enough. That's her sheer in the pictur'. Them's the di-mensions given. Blast the pirates! Old England hain't no place for them."

"'Ere, Bill! you get the Colonel down. We'll send 'em buzzin' to Davy Jones' locker if they ventur' ashore here!"

The "Lightning" had come to anchor without colors at her stern. As she had no mast, there was no opportunity to fly a signal at her head, or the Union Jack at her peak. After the manner of steam yachts she had a pole that could be fitted in a raking position aft.

"As it isn't eight bells, we need no flags," explained Colonel Odminton.

"Shall we fly the Union Jack, then?" asked Captain Hans Christian.

The Colonel changed color. "Fly?" he snarled, "By ——! Fly nothing!"

The men on board had noticed the confusion on the shore. They thought little of it.

When they had escaped down the Potomac with the ransom, they forgot that a hundred cameras were trained upon them. Even their stupendous speed could not outstride the sensitive plate that can catch a perfect likeness in one two-thousandth part of a second. The duplex shutter is craftier than the criminal. The camera can outwit the cannon ball.

It did not occur to the Colonel that the United States Government would send proclamations to every friendly nation in the world, begging each to distribute them broadcast to every port; and that these contained a reproduced picture of Colonel Odminton's venture, with a description of himself; calling upon the nations to do him no harm, but to grant him no hospitality whatever. While the Colonel was dawdling across the water, the telegraph and the swift "Liners," had alarmed the world.

There was neither admiration nor mercy in the hearts of the millions who were watching for the "Lightning's" appearance. For once, there were no sentimental women waiting to cosset the bandit. He had held the President's wife his prisoner. At last the soft heart of womanhood was turned to stone.

In short, Colonel Odminton and his crew were declared outcasts from the world; and even the most abandoned nations sprang to the appeal of the United States, and stood ready to enforce the decree.

Colonel Odminton watched his launch approaching the beach. He had not allowed his son to go, and the two stood together facing the enraged town. Already the coast guards were drawn up, awaiting the launch. When it had come within fifty yards of the pier, the man in command, cried:—"Stop her!" in a loud voice.

Captain Christian obeyed quickly. He and his crew were near enough to see that the hand of every inhabitant had grasped a stone, ready to hurl. Hate distorted the faces of the honest Englishmen, who traditionally loathed a pirate worse than a papist.

"We will give you half an hour to leave the harbor!" bawled the Captain at the launch. "My orders are to fire upon every