_ PART I CHAPTER IX
Therewith Dolly rose and went to the platform. Silence fell on the room as she made a pretty, hesitating bow. To Mostyn she was a marvel of beauty, animation, and reserved force as she stood lightly brushing back her flowing hair.
"I'm going to tell you all the plain truth," she began. "You don't know the facts in this case. The able-bodied men behind me, all rigged out in their best togs for this occasion, simply got tired of having the side I was on win so many times, and they put their heads together to change it. They decided, in their sneaking, menlike way, that I won because the women usually voted on my side, so they asked me one day if I'd let them pick a theme; and, being too busy doing my work to suspect trickery, I consented; and then what did they do? Why, they promptly threw the defense of this--I started to say silly question on my shoulders, but I won't call it silly, because, do you know, as I sat there listening to Warren Wilks reel off all that harangue it occurred to me that he was employing exactly the same threadbare method of browbeating women that has been the style with
men ever since the world began to roll. Now, listen--you women that blistered your hands clapping just now--how are you ever going to get at the straight of this thing if you hug and kiss the men every time they tell you that you are narrow between the eyes and haven't a thimbleful of brains? Do you know what is at the bottom of it all? Why, nothing but old-fashioned, green-eyed jealousy, as rank as stagnant water in a swamp. The men don't
want you to get up-to-date. Up-to-date women don't hop out of bed on a cold, frosty morning and make a blazing fire for their lords and masters to dress by. Up-to-date women are not willing to stand shoe-mouth deep in mud in a cow-lot milching a cow and holding off a calf while their husbands are swapping tales at the cross-roads store."
A laugh started and swept over the room. There was considerable applause, both from the men and the women.
"Well, that's one thing I wouldn't do for narry man that ever wore shoe-leather!" came from Mrs. Timmons, who seemed to think that Dolly's fixed glance in her direction called for an open opinion.
Dolly smiled and nodded. "That is the right spirit, Mrs. Timmons," she said. "So many robust men wouldn't have skinny-looking, consumptive wives if they would draw the line at the cow-lot." Then she resumed her speech:
"The masculine opinion that women haven't got much sense originated away back in the history of the world.
We get it from the savages. I'll tell you a tale. Among the Indians in the early days there was a certain big chief. They called him Frog-in-the-face because his nose looked like a toad upside down trying to crawl between his thick lips. He and the other braves loafed about the wigwams in disagreeable weather, and on fine days went hunting. Now, Frog-in-the-face, savage as he was, was a quite up-to-date man. He would please the women in this audience mightily, and the men would elect him to office. He didn't believe squaws had enough sense to shoot straight or catch fish on the bank of a river, so he made his wife cook the grub, clean up the wigwam, and with a wiggling papoose strapped to her back hoe corn in the hot sun. This was the regular red-man custom, but one day a meddlesome squaw began to think for herself. She called some other squaws together while Frog-in-the-face and his braves were off hunting, and she had the boldness to tell them that she believed they could shoot as well as the men. She said she could, because she had tried it on the sly. With that they got out some old worn-out bows and arrows and went into the woods to try their luck. Well, do you know, those squaws killed so many bears and deer and ducks and turkeys that, loaded down with a baby each, they had hard work getting the meat home, but somehow they did. Well, as luck would have it, Frog-in-the- face and his sharp-shooters had got hold of some fire-water and smoking-tobacco, and they didn't do any hunting that day at all, but came back hungry and tired out over a big pow-wow they had had about another tribe infringing on their rights away off somewhere. Then the women brought out the roast meat, owned up like nice little squaws, and expected to get some petting and praise, for they had done well and knew it. But, bless you! what happened? The more the braves gorged themselves on the turkey and duck, the madder they got, and after supper they all met out in the open and began to fret and fume. They sat down in a ring and passed a pipe from one to another, and Frog-in- the-face laid down the law. Squaws were having too much liberty. If they were allowed to go hunting it wouldn't be long before they would want to take part in the councils of war, and then what would become of the papooses? Who would grind the corn and till the soil and do all the rest of the dirty work? So they passed a new law. The first squaw that ever touched a bow and arrow in the future would be severely punished."
As Dolly paused at this point there was great laughter among both men and women. Even Mrs. Timmons was clapping her hands.
"Warren Wilks," Dolly resumed, with a pleased smile, "drew a funny picture just now of an election under the new idea. You all laughed heartily when he spoke of there being so many fine hats and waving plumes and women with low-necked dresses and open-work stockings about the polls that bashful men would be afraid to vote. But, mind you, Warren Wilks was making all
that up. Listen to me, and I'll tell you what one of your elections really looks like. I've seen one, and that was enough for me. At the precinct of Ridgeville, where only two hundred votes have ever been polled, there were at the last county election fully a hundred drunk from morning to night, including the candidates. They had ten fights that day; three men were cut and two shot. The price of a vote was a drink of whisky, but a voter seldom closed a trade till he had ten in him, and then the candidate who was sober enough to carry him to the box on his back got the vote." [Laughter, long and loud.]
"Go it, Miss Dolly! You've got 'em on the run!" Farmer Timmons cried. "Swat 'em good an' hard! They started it!"
"That's the way men conduct their elections," Dolly went on, smilingly. "But the women of the present day wouldn't stand it. They would change it right away. They wouldn't continue giving the men an excuse two or three times a year to engage in all that carnage and debauchery for no rational reason. Do you know the sort of election the women will hold, Warren, if they ever get a chance?"
"I'm afraid I don't," Wilks answered, dryly. "It would be hard to imagine."
"Well, I'll tell you," Dolly said to the audience. "They will do away with all that foolishness I've been talking about. That day at Ridgeville a dozen carriages were hired at a big expense to bring voters to the polls. Hundreds of dollars were spent on whisky, doctors' bills, lawyers' fees, and fines at court. But sensible women will wipe all that out. On election day in the future a trustworthy man will ride from house to house on a horse or mule with the ballot- box in his lap. It will be brought to the farmhouse door. The busy wife will leave her churning, or sweeping, or sewing for a minute. She will scribble her name on a ticket and drop it in the slit while she asks the man how his family is. She may offer him a cup of hot coffee or a snack to eat. She will go to the back door and call her husband or sons in from the field to do their voting, and then the polls of that election will be closed as far as she is concerned."
"Good, good, fine, fine!" Timmons shouted. "That's the racket!"
"But," Dolly went on, sweeping the faces of the masculine row beside her and turning to the audience, "this stalwart bunch of Nature's noblemen here on the platform will tell you that women haven't got sense enough to vote. That's it, Mrs. Timmons, they think at the bottom of their hearts that women have skulls as thick as a pine board. They don't know this: they don't know that some of the most advanced thinkers in the world are now claiming that intuition is the greatest faculty given to the human race and that woman has the biggest share of it. Oh no, women oughtn't to be allowed to take part in any important public issue! Away back in France, some centuries ago, a simple, uneducated country-girl, seventeen years of age--Joan of Arc--noticed that the men of the period were not properly managing the military affairs of her country, and she took the matter under consideration. She stepped in among great generals and diplomats and convinced them that she knew more about what to do than all the men in the realm. The King listened to her, gave her power to act, and she rode at the head of thousands of soldiers to victory first and a fiery death later. Now, Warren Wilks will tell you that a woman of that sort ought never be allowed to do a thing but rock a cradle, scrub a floor, or look pretty, according to her husband's disposition or pocket-book.
"Then, after all, did you all know--while you are talking so much about the harm of a woman voting--that if it hadn't been for a woman there wouldn't have been a single vote cast in all these United States? In fact, you wouldn't be sitting here now but for that woman. Away back (as I was teaching my history class the other day) Columbus tramped all over the then civilized land trying to get aid to make his trial voyage, and nobody would listen to him. He was taunted and jeered at everywhere he went. Men every bit as sensible as we have to- day said he was plumb crazy. He was out of heart and ready to give up as he rode away from the court of Spain on a mule, when Isabella called him back and furnished the money out of her own pocket to buy and man his ships. Folks, that is the kind of brain Warren Wilks and his crowd will tell you ought to be kept at the cook-stove and the wash-tub. Oh, women will be given the vote in time, don't you bother!" Dolly said, with renewed conviction. "We can't have progress without change. I never thought about it myself before, but it is as plain as the nose on your face. It has to come because it is simple justice. A law which is unfair to one single person is not a perfect law, and many a woman has found herself in a position where only her vote would save her from disaster. Women are purer by nature than men, and they will purify politics. That's all I'm going to say to-night. Now, I'm not managing this debate, but it is getting late and I want everybody that feels like it to vote on my side. Stand up now. All in favor, rise to your feet. That's right, Mrs. Timmons--I knew you would wake up. Now, everybody! That's the way!" Dolly was waving her hands like an earnest evangelist, while Wilks, with a look of astonishment, was struggling to his feet to offer some sort of protest.
"Don't pay attention to him!" Dolly cried. "Vote now and be done with it!"
The house was in a turmoil of amused excitement. Timmons stood by his wife's side waving his hat and slapping his thigh.
"Stand up, boys--every man-jack of you!" he yelled. "Them fellers got this thing up agin that gal. Give it to 'em good an' sound."
The entire audience was on its feet laughing and applauding. Dolly stood waving her hands with the delight of a happy child. She turned to the teachers behind her, and one by one she gradually enticed them to their feet.
"That makes it unanimous," she said, and, flushed and panting, she tripped down the steps to the floor.
Mostyn edged his way through the chattering throng toward her. He was beside himself with enthusiasm. A lump of tense emotion filled his throat; he would have shouted but for the desire not to appear conspicuous.
"Wonderful, wonderful!" he said, when he finally reached her, and caught her hand and shook it.
"Do you think so?" she said, absent-mindedly; and he noticed that she was staring anxiously toward the door.
"Why, you beat them to a finish!" he cried. "You fairly wiped up the ground with them."
"Oh, I don't know!" she said, excitedly. "Come on, please. I want to-- to get out."
Wondering what could be in her mind, he followed her as well as he could through the jostling throng. Women and men extended their hands eagerly; but she hurried on, scarcely hearing their congratulations and good-natured jests. At the door she reached back, caught Mostyn's hand, and drew him out into the open. A few paces away stood a couple under a tree. And toward them Dolly hastened, now holding to the arm of her companion. Then he recognized Ann and saw that she was with a tall, ungainly young man of eighteen or twenty. The two stood quite close together.
"Ann," Dolly said, sharply, pausing a few feet from the pair, "come here, I want to see you."
Doffing his straw hat, the young man moved away, and Ann slowly and doggedly approached her sister.
"What do you want, Dolly?"
"I want you to walk straight home!" Dolly retorted. "I'll talk to you there, not here."
"I wasn't doing anything," Ann began; but Dolly raised her hand.
"Go on home, I tell you. I'm ashamed of you--actually ashamed to call you sister."
Without a word Ann turned and walked homeward.
"You certainly got the best of those fellows," Mostyn chuckled, still under the heat of her triumph. "I never was so surprised in my life. It was funny to watch their faces."
"I couldn't do myself justice," Dolly answered. "I don't know how it sounded, I'm sure. I know I never can do my best when I have anything on my mind to bother me. I'll tell you about it. You saw that fellow with Ann just now? Well, it was Abe Westbrook, one of the worst young daredevils in the valley. He belongs to a low family, and he hasn't a speck of honor. For the last two months he has been trying to turn Ann's head. I stopped him from coming to our house, but as soon as I stepped on the platform to-night I saw him and her on the back seat. He was whispering to her all the time, bending over her in the most familiar way. Once I saw him actually brush her hair back from her shoulder and pinch her ear. Oh, I was crazy! If I said anything to the point in my speech it is a wonder, for I could hardly think of anything but Ann's disgraceful conduct."
They were now entering a shaded part of the road. Ann was almost out of sight and walking rapidly homeward. There was no one close behind Mostyn and Dolly. A full moon shone overhead, and its beams filtered through the foliage of the trees. He felt the light and yet trusting touch of her hand on his arm. A warm, triumphant sense of ownership filled him. How beautiful, how pure, how brave and brilliant she was! What man of his acquaintance could claim such a bride as she would make? A few months in his social set and she would easily lead them all. She was simply a genius, and a beautiful one at that. He had a temptation to clasp her hand, draw her to him, and kiss her as he had kissed her three years before. Yet he refrained. He told himself that, soiled by conventional vice as he was soiled, he would force himself to respect in the highest this wonderful charge upon his awakened sense of honor. He found something new and assuring in checking the passion that filled him like a flood at its height. Yes, she should be his wife; no other living man should have her. Fate had rescued him in the nick of time from the temptation to wed for ulterior motives. Another month in Atlanta and he would have lost his chance at ideal happiness. Yes, this was different! Irene Mitchell, spoiled pet of society that she was, could never love him as this strong child of Nature would, and without love life would indeed be a failure. He walked slowly. She seemed in no hurry to reach home. Once she raised her glorious eyes to his, and he felt her hand quiver as she shrank from his ardent gaze. Another moment, and he would have declared himself, but, glancing ahead, he saw that her father and mother and John Webb had paused and were looking toward them.
"I can wait," Mostyn said to himself, with fervor. "She is mine--she is mine." _