All-Wool Morrison, Holman Day [historical books to read txt] 📗

girl was distinctly peculiar. "According to what we can get in the way of reports, Lana, the last time Morrison was seen in public he was talking with you. If he has talked with anybody since then the folks he has talked with are keeping mighty mum about it. Perhaps he has told you where he was going."
Miss Corson exhibited an emotion that was more profound than mere embarrassment.
"Pardon me! But I'd like to know, Lana! It's mighty important to me in the line of my business right now."
"What? Can't you find the mayor of the city in a time like this?"
"He's not at home! He's not at City Hall. The chief of police won't say a word. And he's not in the crowd outside the State House."
Lana did not disclose the fact that she had suggested to the mayor, in a way, the rabble as Morrison's probable destination, and that he had agreed with her.
"And a fine chance he has of being let inside the State House," Tasper went on, with conviction, "after the attitude he has taken in regard to the administration!"
"He may be there, nevertheless!" Whether hope that he was there or fear that he might be there prompted Lana's suggestion was not clear from her manner.
"You'll sooner find a rat down the back of my neck than find Stewart Morrison inside that State House after the brags he has been making around this city in the past few hours," declared Tasper, with the breezy freedom of long friendship with the caller. "He is A Number One in the list of those who can't get in!"
"But Captain Sweetsir is his mill-student!"
"Captain Sweetsir, in this new importance of his, is leaning so far backward, in trying to stand straight, that he's scratching the back of his head on his heels. His own brother is one of our reporters and what Dan did to Dave when Dave made a holler at the door is a matter of record on the emergency-hospital blotter. That's straight! Inch of sword-blade. Not dangerous, but painful!"
All through this interview Lana had maintained the demeanor of one who was poised on tiptoes, ready to run. She gathered her coat's broad collar more tightly in its clasp of her throat, and started for the door. But she whirled and ran back to Tasper.
"You say that Stewart Morrison is no politician! But I noticed the queer flash in your eyes, Billy Tasper! Do you think he is a coward and has run away?"
"Tut, tut! Not so strong!" The newspaper man put up a protesting palm. "I simply state that His Honor the Mayor is under-somewhere! I never saw any signs of his being a coward--but a lot of us have never been tested by a real crisis, you know!"
"You say he has no power in politics! Could he do anything in a case like this?"
Tasper clawed his hand over his head and the crest of his pompadour bristled more horrently. "He could at least try to undo some of the trouble he has caused by his tongue. He could be at City Hall, where he belongs. The fact that he isn't there--that he can't be found--speaks a whole lot to the people of this city, Lana Corson! Why, there isn't a policeman to be seen on the streets of Marion to-night! We can't get any explanation from police headquarters. A devil of a mayor, say I!"
She turned and fled to the door.
"Lana!" called the editor. "He has made promises that he can't back up--and he has ducked. That's the story We're going to say so in the _Monitor_. We can't say anything else!"
She made no reply.
She did not wait for the elevator to take her down the single flight of stairs; she ran, holding her wrap about her.
Coventry Daunt, on the watch for her, opened the limousine's door and she plunged in. "Wallace! To the State House! Quick!" she commanded.
When Tasper returned to the city-room he was told that somebody was waiting on the telephone. It was one of the men assigned to the matter on Capitol Hill; he was calling from a drug-store booth in that neighborhood.
"Boss, it looks as if they're going to mix it. The tough mutts are ready to grab any excuse and they won't listen to men like Commander Lanigan of the Legion."
"If there's a fight pulled off all we can do is to see that we have a good story. What else?"
"I think I've located the mayor. I can't get anything at all out of those tin Napoleons at the doors, but Lanigan says that Morrison is in the State House--'on his job,' so Lanigan puts it."
"Lanigan is a liar!" the city editor yelped. "He has been a two-legged Hurrah-for-Morrison ever since his high-school days. I like a good lie when it's told to help a friend! This one isn't good enough! Stewart Morrison is in that State House like tissue-paper napkins are in Tophet."
"But sha'n't I send in what Lanigan says?" "We won't have any room for the joke column in the morning," returned the city editor, hanging up.


XVII
THE CAPITOL IN SHADOW
Capitol Square was choked with men. The gathering was characteristically a mob made up of diverse elements. It was not swayed by a set purpose and a common motive. It was not welded by coherence of intent. Its eddies rushed here or filtered there, according as arguments or protests gained attention by sharp clamor above the continuous diapason of voices. One who was versed in the natures and the moods of mobs would have found that mass particularly menacing by reason of the lack of unanimity. Too many men of the component elements did not know what it was all about! The arguments pro and con were developing animosities that were new, fresh, of the moment, creating factions, collecting groups that were ready to jump into an affray that would enable them to avoid embarrassing explanations of why they were there.
A mob of that sort is easily stampeded!
Some men who captained the factions did know why they were there! A few of them harangued; others went about, whispering and muttering, inciting malice by their counsel.
The scum of that yeasty gallimaufry was on the outskirts.
When the Corson limousine rolled into the square and sought to part its way through that scum somebody in the crowd made a proposition that was promptly favored as far as the votes by voices went: "Tip the lapdog kennel upside down!"
Chauffeur Wallace met the emergency with quick tactics. He reversed and drove the car backward. The fingers of the attackers slipped from the smooth varnish and the wheels threatened those who tried to grab the running-boards. Men who seized the fender-bar were dragged off their feet.
When Coventry Daunt showed a praiseworthy inclination to jump out and whip a few hundred of them, so he declared in his ire, he was pushed back into a corner by his sister.
The chauffeur made a long drive in reverse, circling, and then put the car ahead with a rush and they escaped into a side-street.
"Wallace, get us home as quick as the good Lord will let you!" Mrs. Stanton's command was hysterically shrill.
"Wallace, take the first turn to the left," countermanded the mistress. "Then around the State House to the west portico."
"You crazy girl, what--after that--why--what are you trying to do?" demanded Mrs. Stanton, fear making her furious.
"I'm trying to get into that building--and I'm going to get in!"
"You can't get in! They won't let you in! Lana Corson, you sha'n't endanger our lives again!"
"Here, Wallace! This turn!"
The driver obeyed.
Doris set rude hands upon Lana and shook her. "There's nothing sensible you can do if you do get in!"
"Perhaps not! But my father is there; he has asked me to help and I'm going to explain to him how I did my best. Doris, I must tell him, so that he won't get into worse danger by waiting and depending on that idiot of a sheriff."
"You are the idiot!"
"I may be. But I'm going in there!'
"Coventry, you are sitting like a prune glacé! Help me to prevail on this girl to use some common sense!"
"You'll help me very much if you'll do some prevailing with your sister, Coventry," affirmed Miss Corson, resentfully, trying to unclasp the chaperon's vigorous hands.
"After what has been happening, I don't think Lana needs any more shaking, Dorrie," the brother remonstrated. "Everything having been well shaken, it's time to do a little taking. Won't you take some advice, Lana?"
"If it's advice about going home and deserting my father I'll not take it."
"I was afraid you wouldn't. But do you really think you can get into the State House?"
The girl did not disclose the discouraging information given to her by Editor Tasper on the subject of effecting an entrance. "I'm going to try! And I warn you, Doris, that I'm about at the end of my endurance."
Mrs. Stanton sat back and gritted her teeth.
The car traversed a boulevard; the arc-lights showed that it was deserted. A narrow street, empty of humankind, led to the west portico. That entrance, so Lana knew, was used almost wholly by the State House employees. The door was closed; nobody was in sight.
"If you insist on the venture, I'll go with you, of course," offered the young man. When the car stopped he stepped out.
"I'm afraid you'll only make it harder for me, Coventry. I know the captain of the guard. But it will never do for me to bring a stranger."
She hurried into the shadow of the portico. "Get back into the car! You must! Wallace, drive Mrs. Stanton and Mr. Daunt to the house."
When Coventry protested indignantly she broke in: "I haven't any time to argue with you. We may be watched. Wait at the corner yonder with the car. If you see me go in, take Doris home and send the car back. Wallace, I'll find you down there at the fountain!" She designated with a toss of her hand the statuary, gleaming in the starlight, and when the car moved on she ran up the steps of the State House.
The big door had neither bell nor knocker. She turned her back on it and kicked with the heel of her slipper.
The voice that inquired "Who's there?" revealed that the warder was not wholly sure of his nerves.
"I am Senator Corson's daughter!"
She received no reply.
"I tell you I am Senator Corson's daughter! I want to come in. My father is there!"
She was answered by a different voice; she recognized it. It was the unmistakable drawl and nasal twang of Perley Wyman. Her girlhood memories of Perley's voice had been freshened very recently because he had been assigned to the Corson mansion by Thompson the florist as her chief aide in decorating for the reception. "Wal, I should say he was here--and then some! This was the door he came in through."
"Open it! Open it at once, Perley Wyman!"
"I dunno about that, Miss Corson! We've got orders about politicians and mobbers--"
"I'm neither. I command you to open this door."
"Who else is there?"
"I'm alone."
Soldier Wyman pulled the bolts and opened. "I ain't feeling like taking any more chances with the Corson family this evening," he admitted, with a grin that set his long jaw awry. "Your father nigh cuffed my head up to a peak when I tried to tell him what my orders were."
Miss Corson was not interested in the troubles of Guard Wyman. He was talking through a narrow crack; she set her hands against the door and pushed her way in. "Where is