_ CHAPTER VI. A CAUCUS, AND HOW IT WAS RUN
The earlier arrivals had pushed the settees of the Fort Canibas town hall to one side. They were piled against an end wall. There were not enough of them to furnish seats for that mob. For that matter, voters seemed to have no inclination to sit down that day. There was barely enough standing-room when all had entered the hall.
Through them, friends and foes jostling each other, the Duke took his leisurely way. Presson was close behind him.
The rostrum, elevated a few feet above the main floor, was enclosed by boarding that came almost to the shoulders of those who stood within. Thornton, arrived at the front of the hall, put his shoulders against the boarding, shoved his hands into his trousers pockets, and gazed into the faces of his constituents. He was still amiable. But Presson sulked. It was hot in there, and the proletariat was unkempt and smoked rank tobacco.
"It's worth your while just the same, Luke," advised Thornton, in an undertone. He was conscious of the chairman's disgust, and it amused him. "They're going to have real caucuses in this State this year, they tell me. And this seems to be a nice little working model of the real thing. Better study it. It'll give you points on 'popular unrest,' as the newspapers are calling it."
The men in the pen above them were having an animated discussion. They were the members of the town committee. Thornton craned his neck and looked up at them. One of his loyal friends was there.
"What's the matter, Tom? Why not call to order?"
The man gave him a cautious wink before replying.
"There don't seem to be any copy of the call here, Squire. Some of 'em says we'll waive the reading of it. I say no. I say we don't want any holler to go out that this caucus wasn't run regular."
"It's only a 'technetical' point, anyway," protested one of the disputants.
"Well, I wouldn't allow too many of those 'technetical' points to get by in a caucus that you're ready to advertise under your reform headlines," advised the Duke. He settled himself against the boarding again. "Better give us straight work, boys."
It was not a threat. But it operated as effectually. A member of the town committee rapped for silence, and explained the situation rather shamefacedly. He asked the voters to be patient until the call could be prepared in the regular way.
"And now comes War Eagle Niles to help us kill time," observed Thornton. The agitator was pushing toward them. Men were urging him forward. It was evident that baiting their autocrat had become the favorite diversion of Fort Canibas' voters that day.
"Perhaps it was all right once for politicians to lead people by the nose, but it ain't all right now," stated Niles, as soon as he had squirmed into a favorable position for attack. "People didn't know, once. They didn't have newspapers, nor grange discussions, nor lecturers, nor anything to keep 'em posted. They let themselves be led."
"Don't let yourself be led, Ivus. You're more interesting as you are now, bolting with your head and tail up. But I wonder whether you know just what it was you shied at?"
"Know? You bet I know!" shouted the demagogue. "How about taxes? I'm paying more to-day on my little farm out back there than you're paying on a whole township of your wild lands. And don't you suppose I know how it's all arranged?"
"Why, Ivus, I suppose the chaps that have paid you to go around this district shooting your mouth off about 'tyrants' have supplied you with plenty of ammunition. Go ahead! I'd like to know how it was arranged, according to their notions."
"Who was that man that drove up to your house this morning in his devil machine, that cost more than my whole stand of farm buildings twice over--that man that's standing there beside you now, sneering at the voters of this State that he's been teaming? That's the Honor'ble Presson. He's chairman of the State Committee. He runs the big hotel down to the capital city. And where does he get money to buy automobiles with? I know. It's out of selling rum over his bar--and there's a law in the State constitution that makes selling rum a jail offence. But you don't see him in jail, do you?"
Astonishment that changed to fury nearly paralyzed the honorable chairman's tongue while Niles proceeded that far. When he did find his voice to protest, the War Eagle turned from him to the Duke like one who finds a weapon in each hand and becomes reckless.
"And no one sees you coming up and paying taxes on what you're really worth. It's all: 'You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours!' among the big fellows in this State. You can break all the laws you want to if you're in the right ring. And it's going to have a stop put to it!"
"Go ahead, Ivus!" encouraged his object of attack.
"If she's as sick as all that, she needs medicine quick. Get out your dose."
"The people is going to be reckoned with now," declaimed Niles, banging his knotted fist against the boarding.
"You mean of course The People--spelled with a capital T and a capital P, the same as you see it in those reform newspapers you've mentioned! Now, boys, I want you all to listen to me just one moment. You know I'm no hand to make speeches. But just let's talk this over. It'll take only a jiffy. There's a little time to kill while we're getting this caucus started
regular. Now, some of these newspaper editors, who never get anywhere out of their offices except home to dinner, are writing a lot just now about THE PEOPLE--in capital letters, understand! Talking about 'em like as though they were a great force in politics--always organized and ready to support reform. Only needed to be called on. Fellows like Ivus here, that read and read and never bump up next to real things outside, get to think that The People make up an angel band that's all ready to march right up to the ballot-box and vote for just the right thing. Only have to be called on!"
The voters were crowding closer and listening. There was a half-smile on his face while he talked. He was not patronizing. But he took them into his confidence with simple directness.
"Boys, I don't know where you'll go to find that angel band!"
"The people of this State are gettin' woke up enough to know!" cried a voice. The man stepped forward. It was Davis. "I say to you again, Mr. Thornton, don't put us all on the plane of Ivus Niles."
The Duke was not ruffled by the interruption.
"Walt, I've been in politics a good many years. I was in the House in this State when Jim Blaine was there reporting for his newspaper. I want to tell you that when you get next to the real thing in politics you'll find that this people thing--the capital-letter idea--is a dream. Yes, it is, now! Don't undertake to dispute me! Here in one town you'll find a man or a set of men handling a bunch. A county clique handles another one. Some especial local interest makes this crowd vote one way; same thing will make another bunch in another town mad and they'll vote against it. It's all factions and self-interest, and you can't make it over into anything different. That's practical politics. Get out and you'll see it for yourself. You can swap and steer--that's politics. But as for uniting 'em into The People--well, try to weld a cat's tail and a tallow candle, and see how you get along!"
"It's high time we had less politics, then," cried Davis, "when politics lets the picked and chosen get rich selling rum or dodging taxes, and takes a poor man and pestles his head into the mortar till every cent is banged out of his pocket!"
"Davis, I'm patient with ramrodders when they're having an acute attack like you're having. It's the chronic cases I get after, the ones who are in it for profit, and have been poking you fellows up because they're paid for doing it. All of a sudden all of you are yapping at me because I've played the game. I'm talking business with you now. I suppose I might spread-eagle to you about our grand old State, and the call of duty and the noble principles of reform; I might fly up on this fence here and crow just as loud as any of those reform roosters, and not have any more sense in what I was saying than they do. I see you've got hungry for that revival hoorah. But I'm not going to perch and crow for the sake of getting three cheers! I'm going to stay right down here on the gravel with you, boys, and scratch a few times, and show you a few kernels, and cluck a little business talk. This district--you and your folks before you--has been sending me to the legislature for a good many years. I'm an ordinary man, and I've been against ordinary men down there at the State House. I should have played the game different with angels, but I couldn't find the angels."
He pointed through a window to a large building that occupied a hilltop just outside the village.
"Half the counties in the State were after that training seminary," he went on. "I beat the lobby, and got it. How much money do you and your neighbors make boarding the scholars? I have pulled out State money for more than a thousand miles of State roads in this county. I got the State to pay every cent of the expense of that iron bridge across the river. I lugged off bigger appropriations for my district than any other man who has been in the House--because I know the ropes and have the pull. I could have played angel, and not brought home a plum. Would that suit you?"
"I ain't detracting from what you got for us. But while you was dipping with your right hand for us, you was dipping with your left hand for yourself and them that trained with you," retorted Davis.
"And I wasn't to take any ordinary, human, business precautions about looking out for myself in any way, then?"
"You wasn't supposed to be representing yourself down there."
"For one hundred and fifty dollars every two years, and my mileage, I was to give up all my own business and my interests, and play statesman, pure and holy, for you up here? Refuse to help those men down there who helped me when I wanted something, and go down in the rotunda twice a day and thumb my nose at the portraits of the fathers of the State because they played politics in their time? That what you wanted me to do?"
"I've only got this to say," retorted Mr. Davis, afraid to argue: "You're proposing to jam your grandson down our throats, now that you've made your pile and got tired. You're going to have a man from this district that will do what you say and keep on flimflamming the people. I and them with me say no, and we'll show you as much in the caucus to-day."
"For the sake of having your own stubborn way--like most of the others that are howling about 'The People' in this State just now--you are ready to tip over this district's apple-cart, are you? Is that what you are trying to do? You take what I have given you, legislation and money that I've paid for labor in this section, and then propose to kick my pride in the tenderest place? I'll show you, Davis!"
"Well, show! We ain't a mite scared."
For some moments the throng in the town hall had shown waning interest in this discussion. There seemed to be matters outside that distracted the attention of those near the windows.
"There's a fire up Jo Quacca way!" called some one. The windows of town hall were high and uncurtained. All could see. Smoke, ominous and yellow, ballooned in huge volumes across the blue sky of the June day.
"There ain't no bonfire in that, gents," declared a man. "That fire has got a start, and if it's in that slash from that logging operation, it ain't going to be put out with no pint dipperful."
There was sudden hush in the big room. All men were gazing at the mounting masses that rolled into the heavens and blossomed bodefully over the wooded hills. Fat clouds of the smoke hung high and motionless. From the earth went up to them whirls and spirals and billowing discharges like smoke from noiseless artillery.
A man had climbed upon a window-sill of the hall in order to see more clearly.
"I tell you, boys," he shouted, "that's a racin' fire, and it's in that Jo Quacca slash! I, for one, have got a stand of buildin's in front of that fire."
He jumped down and started for the door. Several men followed him.
The chairman of the town committee began to shake a paper above his head.
"It's no time to be leaving a caucus," he pleaded. "We've fixed up a new call. We'll get down to business now."
"I know where my business is just this minute!" shouted the man who was leading the first volunteers. "And it ain't in politics."
The chairman tried to put a motion to adjourn, but at that moment the meeting-house bell began to clang its alarm.
"Save your property, you Jo Quacca fellows!" some one cried, and the crowd stampeded.
Thornton remained in his place in front of the rostrum. He noted who were running away. The deserters were the back-district voters--the opposition among whom his enemies had prevailed. The villagers remained. Here and there among them walked Talleyrand Sylvester. He was unobtrusive and he spoke low, but he was earnest.
When at last the chairman made his voice heard, Ivus Niles was shouting for recognition. That stern patriot had remained on guard.
"Maybe my house is burning, gents, but I ain't going to desert my post of duty till a square deal has been given. I call on you to adjourn this caucus till evening."
"Question!" was the chorus that assailed the chairman. The villagers crowded around the rostrum.
The motion to adjourn was voted down with a viva voce vote there was no disputing.
"It ain't just nor right!" squalled the War Eagle. "I'm here to protest! You ain't giving the voters a show! This thing shan't be bulled through this way!"
But that caucus was out of the hands of Mr. Niles and such as he, though some of the staunchest of Thornton's opposition had remained to fight.
Sylvester elbowed his way to the front, his followers at his back.
"I move, Mr. Chairman, that the check-list be dispensed with. It ain't ever been used in this caucus, anyway. And I'm in favor of hustling this thing so that we can all get up there and fight that fire. I don't believe in staying here caucusing, and let folks' property burn up."
The opposition howled their wrath. They understood all the hypocrisy of this bland assertion, but protest amounted to nothing. The voters were behind Sylvester. That gentleman promptly put in nomination the name of Harlan Thornton for representative to the legislature from the Canibas class of towns and plantations, and the choice was affirmed by a yell that made the protesting chorus seem only a feeble chirp. And then the caucus adjourned tumultuously.
Through it all Thelismer Thornton stood with shoulders against the boarding, that quizzical half-smile on his face. He walked out of the hall past the outraged Ivus Niles without losing that smile, though the demagogue followed him to the door with frantic threats and taunts.
The meeting-house bell still chattered its alarm, an excited ringer rolling the wheel over and over.
Chairman Presson, who had found speech inadequate for some time, followed the Duke to the stairway outside, and stood beside him, gazing up at the conflagration. Smoke masked the hills. Fire-flashes, pallid in the afternoon light, shot up here and there in the yellow billows rolling nearest the ground.
"I tell you, Thelismer, you'll never get across with this! It's too devilish rank!"
Elder Dudley marched past, leading the last stragglers of his following from the hall. His face was flushed with passion, but he had neither word nor look for the Duke. Even Niles was silent, bringing up the rear of the retreat, pumped dry of invective.
"You'll be up against Dudley, there, at the polls, running on an independent ticket. He's sure to do it!" went on Presson, watching them out of sight.
"You don't know the district," said Thornton, serenely. "And what's more important, I've got almost three months to meet that possibility in. I had only three hours to-day. You needn't worry about the election, Luke."
With his eyes still on the seething smoke vomiting up from the Jo Quacca hills he lighted a fresh cigar.
"There's something up there that's worrying me more. Cobb has got fire enough to break up a State convention."
Certain columns of smoke shot up, bearing knobs like hideous mushrooms. The knobs were black with cinders and spangled with sparks. The menace they bore could be descried even at that distance. A breeze wrenched off one of those knobs, and carried it out from the main conflagration. The roof of a barn half-way down the hillside began to smoke. Sparks had dropped there. After a time the two men could see trickles of fire running up the shingles.
"There goes one stand of buildings," announced Thornton.
"I swear, you take this thing cool enough!"
"Well, I'm not a rain-storm or a pipe-line, Luke. There's nothing more I can do. When Sylvester gets there with his crowd I'll have a hundred men or so of my own fighting it. And if a man sets fire on his land the law makes him pay the neighbors if the fire gets away and damages them. I'm prepared to settle without beating down prices. Let's go over to The Barracks."
Presson went along grumbling.
"You ought to have stayed in this fight this year for yourself, Thelismer. There was no need of all this uproar in ticklish times. A proposition like this makes the general campaign all the harder." He kept casting apprehensive glances behind at the swelling smoke-clouds.
"I'm paying the freight, Luke."
"There'd have been no fight to it if you'd stayed in yourself. Even your old whooping cyclone of a Niles, there, said that much. You've gone to work and got your grandson nominated, but between him and the bunch and that fire up there it looks to me as though your troubles were just beginning. Say, look here, Thelismer, honest to gad, you're using our politics just to grind your own axes with!"
"And you never heard of anybody except patriots in politics, eh?"
"When you prejudice a State campaign in order to break up a spooning-match and to give your grandson a course of sprouts outside a lumbering operation, you're making it a little too personal--and a little too expensive for all concerned."
The State chairman had his eyes on the fire again.
"As far as my business goes--that's
my business," said the Duke, placidly. "As for the expense--well, I never got a great deal of fun out of anything except politics, and politics is always more or less expensive. When the bills get in for what has happened to-day I reckon I'll find the job was worth the price. You needn't worry about me, Luke--not about my failing to get my money's worth. For when I walk across the lobby of the State House, and they can say behind my back, 'There's old Thornton--a gone-by. Got licked in his district!' When they can say that, Luke, life won't be worth living, not if I've got thousand-dollar bills enough to wad a forty-foot driving-crew quilt!" _