The original of tliis bool< is in 
 tlie Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022185213 
 
PS 2972.H67"i^t2'""' '""^'^ 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
a 
 
 
h 
 
 Copyright, 1907, by 
 The Curtis Pubiuhino Compamt 
 
 Copyright, 1907, by 
 
 DOUBLEDAY, PaGE & CoMPANY 
 
 All rights reserved^ 
 
 including that b/ translation infafortign languaget 
 
 including (he Scandinavian. 
 
' I A Change of Lodging 
 
 II Music on the Pincio. 
 
 III Glamour 
 
 IV Good-Fellowship . . 
 
 V Lady Mount-Rhyswicke 
 
 VI Rake's Progress .* , 
 
 VII The Next Morning . 
 
 viii What Cornish Knew 
 
 IX Expiation 
 
 X The Cab at the Corner 
 
 rAGE 
 
 3 
 
 26 
 
 39 
 
 51 
 
 69 
 
 84 
 
 103 
 116 
 132 
 139 
 
PART II. 
 
 Mrs. Protheroe ^5S 
 
 Great Men's Sons 209 
 
H IS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
THE glass-domed "palm-room" 
 of the Grand Continental Ho- 
 tel Magniiique in Rome is of 
 vasty heights and distances, filled with a 
 mellow green light which filters down 
 languidly through the upper foliage of 
 tall palms, so that the two hundred peo- 
 ple who may be refreshing or displaying 
 themselves there at the tea-hour have 
 something the look of under-water crea- 
 tures playing upon the sea-bed. They 
 appear, however, to be unaware of their 
 condition; even the ladies, most like 
 t3l 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 anemones of that gay assembly, do not 
 seem to know it; and when the Hun- 
 garian band (crustacean-like in cos- 
 tume, and therefore well within the pic- 
 ture) has sheathed its flying tentacles 
 and withdrawn by dim processes, the 
 tea-drinkers all float out through the 
 doors, instead of bubbling up and away 
 through the filmy roof. In truth, some 
 such exit as that was imagined for them 
 by a young man who remained in the 
 aquarium after they had all gone, late 
 one afternoon of last winter. They had 
 been marvelous enough, and to him 
 could have seemed little more so had 
 they made such a departure. He could 
 almost have gone that way himself, so 
 charged was he with the uplift of his be- 
 lief that, in spite of the brilliant 
 U3 
 
HIS'OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 strangeness of the hour just past, he had 
 been no fish out of water. 
 
 While the waiters were clearing the 
 little tables, he leaned back in his chair 
 in a content so rich it was nearer ecstasy. 
 He could not bear to disturb the posses- 
 sion joy had taken of him, and, like a 
 half-awake boy clinging to a dream that 
 his hitherto unkind sweetheart has 
 kissed him, lingered on in the enchanted 
 atmosphere, his eyes still full of all they 
 had beheld with such delight, detaining 
 and smiling upon each revelation of this 
 fresh memory — the flashingly lovely 
 faces, the dreamily lovely faces, the 
 pearls and laces of the anemone ladies, 
 the color and romantic fashion of the 
 uniforms, and the old princes who had 
 been pointed out to him: splendid old 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 men wearing white mustaches and sin- 
 gle eye-glasses, as he had so long hoped 
 and dreamed they did. 
 
 "Mine own people!" he whispered. 
 "I have come unto mine own at last. 
 Mine own people !" After long waiting 
 (he told himself) , he had seen them — 
 the people he had wanted to see, wanted 
 to know, wanted to be of! Ever since he 
 had begun to read of the "beau monde" 
 in his schooldays, he had yearned to 
 know some such sumptuous reality as 
 that which had come true to-day, when, 
 at last, in Rome he had seen — as he 
 wrote home that night — "the finest es- 
 sence of Old- World society mingling in 
 Cosmopolis." 
 
 Artificial odors (too heavy to keep up 
 with the crowd that had worn them) 
 1:63 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 still hung about him; he breathed them 
 deeply, his eyes half-closed and his lips 
 noiselessly formed themselves to a quo- 
 tation from one of his own poems : 
 
 While trails of scent, like cobweb's films 
 
 Slender and faint and rare, 
 Of roses, and rich, fair fabrics. 
 
 Cling on the stirless air. 
 The sibilance of voices. 
 
 At a wave of Milady's glove, 
 Is stilled 
 
 He stopped short, interrupting him- 
 self with a half-cough of laughter as he 
 remembered the inspiration of these 
 verses. He had written them three 
 months ago, at home in Cranston, Ohio, 
 the evening after Anna McCord's "com- 
 ing-out tea." "Milady" meant Mrs, 
 McCord; she had "stilled" the conversa- 
 C73 
 
•HIS-OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 tion of her guests when Mary Kramer 
 (whom the poem called a "sweet, pale 
 singer") rose to sing Mavourneen; and 
 the stanza closed with the right word to 
 rhyme with "glove." He felt a con- 
 temptuous pity for his little, untrav- 
 eled, provincial self of three months 
 ago, if, indeed, it could have been him- 
 self who wrote verses about Anna Mc- 
 Cord's "coming-out tea" and referred to 
 poor, good old Mrs. McCord as "Mi- 
 lady"! 
 
 The second stanza had intimated a 
 conviction of a kind which only poets 
 may reveal : 
 
 She sang to that great assembly, 
 
 They thought, as they praised her tone ; 
 
 But she and my heart knew better : 
 Her song was for me alone. 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 He had told the truth when he wrote 
 of Mary Kramer as pale and sweiet, and 
 she was paler, but no less sweet, when he 
 came to say good-by to her before he 
 sailed. Her face, as it was at the final 
 moment of the protracted farewell, 
 shone before him very clearly now for a 
 moment: young, plaintive, white, too 
 lamentably honest to conceal how much 
 her "God-speed" to him cost her. He 
 came very near telling her how fond of 
 her he had always been; came near giv- 
 ing up his great trip to remain with her 
 always. 
 
 "Ah I" He shivered as one shivers 
 at the thought of disaster narrowly 
 averted. "The fates were good that I 
 only came near it!" 
 
 He took from his breast-pocket an en- 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 graved card, without having to search 
 for it, because during the few days the 
 card had been in his possession the ac- 
 tion had become a habit. 
 
 "Comtesse de Vaurigard," was the 
 name engraved, and below was written 
 in pencil : "To remember Monsieur Rob- 
 ert Russ Mellin he promise to come to 
 tea Hotel Magnifique, Roma, at five 
 o'clock Thursday." 
 
 There had been disappointment in the 
 first stages of his journey, and that had 
 gone hard with Mellin. Europe had 
 been his goal so long, and his hopes of 
 pleasure grew so high when (after his 
 years of saving and putting by, bit by 
 bit, out of his salary in a real-estate of- 
 fice) he drew actually near the shining 
 
 CIO] 
 
•HISOWNPEOPLE- 
 
 horizon. But London, his first stopping- 
 place, had given him some dreadful 
 days. He knew nobody, and had not 
 understood how heavily sheer loneliness 
 — which was something he had never 
 felt until then — would weigh upon his 
 spirits. In Cranston, where the young 
 people "grew up together," and where 
 he met a dozen friends on the street in a 
 half-hour's walk, he often said that he 
 "liked to be alone with himself." Lon- 
 don, after his first excitement in merely 
 being there, taught him his mis- 
 take, chilled him with weeks of for- 
 bidding weather, puzzled and troubled 
 him. 
 
 He was on his way to Paris when (as 
 he recorded in his journal) a light came 
 into his life. This illumination first 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 shone for him by means of one Cooley, 
 son and inheritor of all that had be- 
 longed to the late great Cooley, of Coo- 
 ley Mills, Connecticut. Young Cooley, 
 a person of cheery manners and bright 
 waistcoats, was one of Mellin's few sea- 
 acquaintances ; they had played shuffle- 
 board together on the steamer during 
 odd half -hours when Mr. Cooley found 
 it possible to absent himself from poker 
 in the smoking-room; and they encoun- 
 tered each other again on the channel 
 boat crossing to Calais. 
 
 "Hey!" was Mr. Cooley's lively 
 greeting. "I 'm meetin' lots of people I 
 know, to-day. You runnin' over to 
 Paris, too? Come up to the boat-deck 
 and meet the Countess de Vaurigard." 
 
 "Who?" said Mellin, red with pleas- 
 ni23 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 ure, yet fearing that he did not hear 
 aright. 
 
 "The Countess de Vaurigard. Queen ! 
 met her in London. Sneyd intro- 
 duced me to her. You remember Sneyd 
 on the steamer? Baldish Englishman 
 — red nose — does n't talk much — 
 younger brother of Lord Rugden, so 
 he says. Played poker some. Well, 
 yes!" 
 
 "I saw him. I did n't meet him." 
 "You did n't miss a whole lot. Fact 
 is, before we landed I almost had him 
 sized up for queer, but when he intro- 
 duced me to the Countess I saw my mis- 
 take. He must be the real thing. She 
 certainly is! You come along up and 
 
 see." 
 
 So Mellin followed, to make his bow 
 C133 
 
•HIS-OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 before a thin, dark, charmingly pretty 
 young woman, who smiled up at him 
 from her deck-chair through an enhanc- 
 ing mystery of veils; and presently he 
 found himself sitting beside her. He 
 could not help trembling slightly at 
 first, but he would have given a great 
 deal if, by some miraculous vision, 
 Mary Kramer and other friends of his in 
 Cranston could have seen him engaged 
 in what he thought of as "conversa- 
 tional badinage" with the Comtesse de 
 Vaurigard, 
 
 Both the lady and her name thrilled 
 him. He thought he remembered the 
 latter in Froissart: it conjured up "ba- 
 ronial halls" and "donjon keeps," rang 
 resonantly in his mind like "Let the 
 portcullis fall!" At home he had been 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 wont to speak of the "oldest families in 
 Cranston," complaining of the inva- 
 sions of "new people" into the social 
 territory of the McCords and Mellins 
 and Kramers — a pleasant conception 
 which the presence of a De Vaurigard 
 revealed to him as a petty and shameful 
 fiction ; and yet his humility, like his lit- 
 tle fit of trembling, was of short dura- 
 tion, for the gay geniality of Madame 
 de Vaurigard put him amazingly at 
 ease. 
 
 At Calais young Cooley (with a mat- 
 ter-of-course air, and not seeming to 
 feel the need of asking permission) ac- 
 companied her to a compartment, and 
 Mellin walked with them to the steps of 
 the coach, where he paused, murmuring 
 some words of farewell. 
 1:153 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 Madame de Vaurigard turned to him 
 with a prettily assumed dismay. 
 
 "What! You stay at Calais?" she 
 cried, pausing with one foot on the step 
 to ascend. "Oh I I am sorry for you. 
 Calais is ter-riblel" 
 
 "No. I am going on to Paris." 
 
 "So? You have frien's in another 
 coach which you wish to be wiz?" 
 
 "No, no, indeed," he stammered has- 
 tily. 
 
 "Well, my frien'," she laughed gayly, 
 "w'y don' you come wiz us?" 
 
 Blushing, he followed Cooley into 
 the coach, to spend five happy hours, ut- 
 terly oblivious of the bright French 
 landscape whirling by outside the win- 
 dow. 
 
 There ensued a month of conscien- 
 1:163 
 
•HIS -OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 tious sightseeing in Paris, and that un- 
 friendly city afforded him only one 
 glimpse of the Countess. She whizzed 
 by him in a big touring-car one after- 
 noon as he stood on an "isle of safety" 
 at the foot of the Champs Elysees. 
 Cooley was driving the car. The rafBsh, 
 elderly Englishman (whose name, Mel- 
 lin knew, was Sneyd) sat with him, and 
 beside Madame de Vaurigard in the ton- 
 jieau lolled a gross-looking man — un- 
 mistakably an American — with a jovial, 
 red, smooth-shaven face and several 
 chins. Brief as the glimpse was, Mellin 
 had time to receive a distinctly disagree- 
 able impression of this person, and to 
 wonder how Heaven could vouchsafe 
 the society of Madame de Vaurigard to 
 so coarse a creature. 
 
 1:173 
 
•HIS-OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 All the party were dressed as for the 
 road, gray with dust, and to all appear- 
 ances in a merry mood. Mellin's heart 
 gave a leap when he saw that the Coun- 
 tess recognized him. Her eyes, shining 
 under a white veil, met his for just the 
 instant before she was quite by, and 
 when the machine had passed a little 
 handkerchief waved for a moment from 
 the side of the tonneau where she sat. 
 
 With that he drew the full breath of 
 Romance. 
 
 He had always liked to believe that 
 "grandes dames" leaned back in the 
 luxurious upholstery of their victorias, 
 landaulettes, daumonts or automobiles 
 with an air of inexpressible though lan- 
 guid hauteur. The Newport letter in 
 the Cranston Telegraph often referred 
 D83 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 to it. But the gayety of that greeting 
 from the Countess' little handkerchief 
 was infinitely refreshing, and Mellin 
 decided that animation was more becom- 
 ing than hauteur — even to a "grande 
 dame." 
 
 That night he wrote (almost without 
 effort) the verses published in the Cran- 
 ston Telegraph two weeks later. They 
 began : 
 
 Marquise, ma belle, with your kerchief of 
 lace 
 Awave from your flying car. 
 And your slender hand — 
 
 The hand to which he referred was 
 
 the same which had arrested his gondola 
 
 and his heart simultaneously, five days 
 
 ago, in Venice. He was on his way to 
 
 D93 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 the station when Madame de Vauri- 
 gard's gondola shot out into the Grand 
 Canal from a narrow channel, and at 
 her signal both boats paused. 
 
 "Ah I but you fly away I" she cried, 
 lifting her eyebrows mournfully, as 
 she saw the steamer-trunk in his gon- 
 dola. "You are goin' return to Amer- 
 ica?" 
 
 "No. I 'm just leaving for Rome." 
 "Well, in three day' / am goin' to 
 Rome I" She clapped her hands lightly 
 and laughed. "You know this is three 
 time' we meet jus' by chance, though 
 that second time it was so quick — pf! 
 like that — we did n't talk much togez- 
 zerl Monsieur Mellin," she laughed 
 again, "I think we mus' be frien's. 
 Three time' — an' we are both goin' to 
 1:203 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 Rome I Monsieur Mellin, you believe 
 in Fate?" 
 
 With a beating heart he did. 
 
 Thence came the invitation to meet 
 her at the Magnifique for tea, and the 
 card she scribbled for him with a silver 
 pencil. She gave it with the prettiest 
 gesture, leaning from her gondola to his 
 as they parted. She turned again, 
 as the water between them widened, 
 and with her "Au revoir" offered 
 him a faintly wistful smile to remem- 
 ber. 
 
 All the way to Rome the noises of the 
 train beat out the measure of his Pari- 
 sian verses : 
 
 Marquise, ma belle, with your kerchief ot 
 lace 
 Awave from your flying car — 
 
•H ISOWNPEOPLE- 
 
 He came out of his reverie with a 
 start. A dozen men and women, dressed 
 for dinner, with a gold-fish officer or 
 two among them, swam leisurely 
 through the aquarium on their way to the 
 hotel restaurant. They were the same 
 kind of people who had sat at the little 
 tables for tea — ^people of the great 
 world, thought Mellin : no vulgar tour- 
 ists or "trippers" among them; and he 
 shuddered at the remembrance of his 
 pension (whither it was time to return) 
 and its conscientious students of Baede- 
 ker, its dingy halls and permanent smell 
 of cold food. Suddenly a high resolve 
 lit his face : he got his coat and hat from 
 the brass-and-blue custodian in the 
 lobby, and without hesitation entered 
 the "bureau." 
 
 1:223 
 
•H ISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "I 'm not quite satisjfied where I am 
 staying — where I 'm stopping, that is," 
 he said to the clerk. "I think I '11 take 
 a room here." 
 
 "Very well, sir. Where shall I send 
 for your luggage ?" 
 
 "I shall bring it myself," replied Mel- 
 lin coldly, "in my cab." 
 
 He did not think it necessary to re- 
 veal the fact that he was staying at one 
 of the cheaper pensions; and it may be 
 mentioned that this reticence (as well 
 as the somewhat chilling, yet careless, 
 manner of a gentleman of the "great 
 world" which he assumed when he re- 
 turned with his trunk and bag) very 
 substantially increased the rate put upon 
 the room he selected at the Magnifique. 
 However, it was with great satisfaction 
 
•H IS-OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 that he found himself installed in the 
 hotel, and he was too recklessly exhila- 
 rated, by doing what he called the "right 
 thing," to waste any time wondering 
 what the "right thing" would do to the di- 
 minishing pad of express checks he car- 
 ried in the inside pocket of his waistcoat. 
 
 "Better live a fortnight like a gentle- 
 man," he said, as he tossed his shoes into 
 a buhl cabinet, "than vegetate like a 
 tourist for a year." 
 
 He had made his entrance into the 
 "great world" and he meant to hold his 
 place in it as one "to the manor born." 
 Its people should not find him lacking : 
 he would wear their manner and speak 
 their language — no gaucherie should be- 
 tray him, no homely phrase escape his 
 lips. 
 
•HIS'OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 This was the chance he had always 
 hoped for, and when he fell asleep in his 
 gorgeous, canopied bed, his soul was up- 
 lifted with happy expectations. 
 
 t^Sl 
 
f m ^HE following afternoon found 
 him still in that enviable con- 
 
 1 
 
 dition as he stood listening to 
 the music on the Pincian Hill. He had 
 it of rumor that the Fashion of Rome 
 usually took a turn there before it went 
 to tea, and he had it from the lady her- 
 self that Madame de Vaurigard would 
 be there. Presently she came, reclining 
 in a victoria, the harness of her horses 
 flashing with gold in the sunshine. She 
 wore a long ermine stole; her hat was 
 ermine; she carried a muif of the same 
 
 n263 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 fur, and Mellin thought it a perfect 
 finish to the picture that a dark gentle- 
 man of an appearance most distin- 
 guished should be sitting beside her. An 
 Italian noble, surely! 
 
 She saw the American at once, nodded 
 to him and waved her hand. The vic- 
 toria went on a little way beyond the 
 turn of the drive, drew out of the line of 
 carriages, and stopped. 
 
 "Ah, Monsieur Mellin," she cried, as 
 he came up, "I am glad! I was so fool- 
 ish yesterday I did n' give you the ad- 
 dress of my little apartment an' I forgot 
 to ask you what is your hotel. I tol' you 
 I would come here for my drive, but still 
 I might have lost you for ever. See what 
 many people ! It is jus' that Fate again." 
 
 She laughed, and looked to the Italian 
 1:273 
 
•HISOWNPEOPLE- 
 
 for sympathy in her kindly merriment. 
 He smiled cordially upon her, then lifted 
 his hat and smiled as cordially upon 
 Mellin. 
 
 "I am so happy to fin' myself in Rome 
 that I forget" — Madame de Vaurigard 
 went on — "ever' sing! But now I mus' 
 make sure not to lose you. What is your 
 hotel?' 
 
 "Oh, the Magnifique," Mellin an- 
 swered carelessly. "I suppose every- 
 body that one knows stops there. One 
 does stop there, when one is in Rome, 
 does n't one?" 
 
 "Everybody go' there for tea, and to 
 eat, sometime, but to stay — ah, that is 
 for the American !" she laughed. "That 
 is for you who are all so abomin-a^-ly 
 rich!" She smiled to the Italian again, 
 1^1 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 and both of them smiled beamingly on 
 Mellin. 
 
 "But that is n't always our fault, is 
 it?" said Mellin easily. 
 
 "Aha! You mean you are of the new 
 generation, of the yo'ng American' who 
 come over here an' try to spen' these im- 
 mense fortune' — those 'pile' — your fa- 
 ther or your gran' father make! I know 
 quite well. Ah"?" 
 
 "Well," he hesitated, smiling, "I sup- 
 pose it does look a little by way of being 
 like that." 
 
 "Wicked fellow!" She leaned for- 
 ward and tapped his shoulder chidingly 
 with two fingers. "I know what you 
 wish the mos' in the worl' — you wish to 
 get into mischief. That is it! No, sir, I 
 will jus' take you in han' !" 
 1:293 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "When will you take me?" he asked 
 boldly. 
 
 At this, the pleasant murmur of laugh- 
 ter — half actual and half suggested — 
 with which she underlined the conversa- 
 tion, became loud and clear, as she al- 
 lowed her vivacious glance to strike 
 straight into his upturned eyes, and an- 
 swered : 
 
 "As long as a little turn roun' the hill, 
 now. Cavaliere Corni " 
 
 To Mellin's surprise and delight the 
 Italian immediately descended from the 
 victoria without the slightest appear- 
 ance of irritation; on the contrary, he 
 was urbane to a fine degree, and, upon 
 Madame de Vaurigard's formally intro- 
 ducing him to Mellin, saluted the latter 
 with grave politeness, expressing in good 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 English a hope that they might meet 
 often. When the American was in- 
 stalled at the Countess' side she spoke to 
 the driver in Italian, and they began to 
 move slowly along the ilex avenue, 
 the coachman reining his horses to a 
 walk. 
 
 "You speak Italian?" she inquired. 
 
 "Oh, not a great deal more than a 
 smattering," he replied airily — a truth- 
 ful answer, inasmuch as a vocabulary 
 consisting simply of "quanty costy" and 
 "troppo" cannot be seriously considered 
 much more than a smattering. Fortu- 
 nately she made no test of his linguistic 
 attainment, but returned to her former 
 subject. 
 
 "Ah, yes, all the worl' to-day know' 
 the new class of American," she said — 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "your class. Many year' ago we have 
 another class which Europe did n' like. 
 That was when the American was ter-ri- 
 ble ! He was the — what is that you call ? 
 — oh, yes; he 'make himself,' you say: 
 that is it. My frien', he was abomin- 
 ablel He brag'; he talk' through the 
 nose; yes, and he was niggardly, rich as 
 he was ! But you, you yo'ng men of the 
 new generation, you are gentlemen of 
 the idleness; you are aristocrats, with 
 polish an' with culture. An' yet you 
 throw your money away — yes, you 
 throw it to poor Europe as if to a 
 beggar !" 
 
 "No, no," he protested with an indul- 
 gent laugh which confessed that the 
 truth was really "Yes, yes." 
 
 "Your smile betray' you I" she cried 
 1:323 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 triumphantly. "More than jus' bein' 
 guilty of that fault, I am goin' to tell 
 you of others. You are not the ole-time 
 — what is it you say? — Ah, yes, the 
 'goody-goody.' I have heard my great 
 American frien'. Honor-able Chanlair 
 Pedlow, call it the Sonday-school. Is 
 it not? Yes, you are not the Son- 
 day-school yo'ng men, you an' your 
 class!" 
 
 "No," he said, bestowing a long glance 
 upon a stout nurse who was sitting on a 
 bench near the drive and attending to 
 twins in a perambulator. "No, we 're 
 not exactly dissenting parsons." 
 
 "Ah, no !" She shook her head at him 
 
 prettily. "You are wicked! You are 
 
 up into all the mischief! Have I not 
 
 hear what wild sums you risk at your 
 
 1:333 
 
•HISOWNPEOPLE- 
 
 game, that poker? You are famous for 
 it." 
 
 "Oh, we play," he admitted with a 
 reckless laugh, "and I suppose we do 
 play rather high." 
 
 "High!" she echoed. "Souzands! 
 But that is not all. Ha, ha, ha, naughty 
 one ! Have I not observe' you lookin' at 
 these pretty creature', the little conta- 
 dina-girl, an' the poor ladies who have 
 hire' their carriages for two lire to drive 
 up and down the Pincio in their bes' 
 dress an' be admire' by the yo'ng Ameri- 
 can while the music play' ? Which one, 
 I wonder, is it on whose wrist you would 
 mos' like to fasten a bracelet of dia- 
 mon's? Wicked, I have watch' you look 
 at them " 
 
 "No, no," he interrupted earnestly. 
 l2Al 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "I have not once looked away from you, 
 I could n't!" 
 
 , Their eyes met, but instantly hers 
 were lowered; the bright smile with 
 which she had been rallying him faded, 
 and there was a pause during which he 
 felt that she had become very grave. 
 When she spoke, it was with a little 
 quaver, and the controlled pathos of her 
 voice was so intense that it evoked a 
 sympathetic catch in his own thrOat. 
 
 "But, my frien', if it should be that I 
 cannot wish you to look so at me, or to 
 speak so tome?" 
 
 "I beg your pardon!" he exclaimed, 
 almost incoherently. "I did n't mean to 
 hurt your feelings. I would n't do any- 
 thing you 'd think ungentlemanly for 
 the world !" 
 
 1:353 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 Her eyes lifted again to his with what 
 he had no difficulty in recognizing as a 
 look of perfect trust; but, behind that, 
 he perceived a darkling sadness. 
 
 "I know it is true," she murmured — 
 "I know. But you see there are time' 
 when a woman has sorrow — sorrow of 
 one kind — when she mus' be sure that 
 there is only — only rispec' in the hearts 
 of her frien's." 
 
 With that, the intended revelation 
 was complete, and the young man under- 
 stood, as clearly as if she had told him in 
 so many words, that she was not a widow 
 and that her husband was the cause of 
 her sorrow. His quickened instinct mar- 
 velously divined (or else it was con- 
 veyed to him by some intangible method 
 of hers) that the Count de Vaurigard 
 1:363 
 
•H ISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 was a very bad case, but that she would 
 not divorce him. 
 
 "I know," he answered, profoundly 
 touched. "I understand." 
 
 In silent gratitude she laid her hand 
 for a second upon his sleeve. Then her 
 face brightened, and she said gayly: 
 
 "But we shall not talk of me! Let us 
 see how we can keep you out of mischief 
 at leas' for a little while. I know very 
 well what you will do to-night : you will 
 go to Salone Margherita an' sit in a box 
 like all the wicked Americans " 
 
 "No, indeed, I shall not!" 
 
 "Ah, yes, you will!" she laughed. 
 "But until dinner let me keep you from 
 wickedness. Come to tea jus' wiz me, 
 not at the hotel, but at the little apart- 
 ment I have taken, where it is quiet. 
 C373 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 The music is finish', an' all those pretty 
 girl' are goin' away, you see. I am not 
 selfish if I take you from the Pincio now. 
 You will come?" 
 
 Cssn 
 
IT was some fair dream that would be 
 gone too soon, he told himself, as 
 they drove rapidly through the twi- 
 light streets, down from the Pincio and 
 up the long slope of the Quirinal. They 
 came to a stop in the gray courtyard of a 
 palazzo,andascendedinasleepy elevator 
 to the fifth floor. Emerging, they encoun- 
 tered a tall man who was turning away 
 from the Countess' door, whichhe had just 
 closed. The landing was not lighted, and 
 for a moment he failed to see the Amer- 
 ican following Madame de Vaurigard. 
 n393 
 
•HISO WN-PEOPLE 
 
 "Eow, it 's you, is it," he said infor- 
 mally. "Waitin' a devil of a long time 
 for you. I 've gawt a message for you. 
 He 's comin'. He writes that Cooley — " 
 
 "Attention!" she interrupted under 
 her breath, and, stepping forward 
 quickly, touched the bell. "I have 
 brought a f rien' of our dear, droll Cooley 
 with me to tea. Monsieur Mellin, you 
 mus' make acquaintance with Monsieur 
 Sneyd. He is English, but we shall for- 
 give him because he is a such ole frien' 
 of mine." 
 
 "Ah, yes," said Mellin. "Remember 
 seeing you on the boat, running across 
 the pond." 
 
 "Yes, ev coss," responded Mr. Sneyd 
 cordially. "I waws n't so fawchnit as 
 to meet you, but dyuh eold Cooley 's 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 talked ev you often. Heop I sh'll see 
 maw of you hyuh." 
 
 A very trim, very intelligent-looking 
 maid opened the door, and the two men 
 followed Madame de Vaurigard into a 
 square hall, hung with tapestries and lit 
 by two candles of a Brobdingnagian spe- 
 cies Mellin had heretofore seen only in 
 cathedrals. Here Mr. Sneyd paused. 
 
 "I weon't be bawthring you," he said. 
 "Just a wad with you, Cantess, and I 'm 
 off." 
 
 The intelligent-looking maid drew 
 back some heavy curtains leading to a 
 salon beyond the hall, and her mistress 
 smiled brightly at Mellin. 
 
 "I shall keep him to jus' his one word," 
 she said, as the young man passed be- 
 tween the curtains. 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 It was a nobly proportioned room that 
 he entered, so large that, in spite of the 
 amount of old furniture it contained, 
 the first impression it gave was one of 
 spaciousness. Panels of carved and 
 blackened wood lined the walls higher 
 than his head; above them, Spanish 
 leather gleamed here and there with 
 flickerings of red and gilt, reflecting 
 dimly a small but brisk wood fire which 
 crackled in a carved stone fireplace. His 
 feet slipped on the floor of polished tiles 
 and wandered from silky rugs to lose 
 themselves in great black bear skins as 
 in unmown sward. He went from the 
 portrait of a "cinquecento" cardinal to 
 a splendid tryptich set over a Gothic 
 chest, from a cabinet sheltering a collec- 
 tion of old glass to an Annunciation by 
 £42 3 
 
•H IS-OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 an unknown Primitive. He told him- 
 self that this was a "room in a book," 
 and became dreamily assured that he 
 was a man in a book. Finally he stum- 
 bled upon something almost grotesquely 
 out of place: a large, new, perfectly- 
 appointed card-table with a sliding top, 
 a smooth, thick, green cover and patent 
 compartments. 
 
 He halted before this incongruity, 
 regarding it with astonishment. Then 
 a light laugh rippled behind him, and 
 he turned to find Madame de Vaurigard 
 seated in a big red Venetian chair by the 
 fire. 
 
 She wore a black lace dress, almost 
 severe in fashion, which gracefully em- 
 phasized her slenderness; and she sat 
 with her knees crossed, the firelight 
 C433 
 
HISOWNPEOPLE 
 
 twinkling on the beads of her slipper, 
 on her silken instep, and flashing again 
 from the rings upon the slender fingers 
 she had clasped about her knee. 
 
 She had lit a thin, long Russian ciga- 
 rette. 
 
 "You see?" she laughed. "I mus' 
 keep up with the time. I mus' do some- 
 sing to hold my frien's about me. Even 
 the ladies like to play now — that 
 breedge w'ich is so tiresome — they play, 
 play, play! And you — you Americans, 
 you refuse to endure us if we do not let 
 you play. So for my frien's when they 
 come to my house — if they wish it, there 
 is that foolish little table. I fear" — she 
 concluded with a bewitching affectation 
 of sadness — "they prefer that to talkin' 
 wiz me." 
 
 1:443 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "You know that could n't be so, Com- 
 tesse" he said. "I would rather talk to 
 you than — than " 
 
 "Ah, yes, you say so, Monsieur I" She 
 looked at him gravely; a little sigh 
 seemed to breathe upon her lips; she 
 leaned forward nearer the fire, her face 
 wistful in the thin, rosy light, and it 
 seemed to him he had never seen any- 
 thing so beautiful in his life. 
 
 He came across to her and sat upon a 
 stool at her feet. "On my soul," he be- 
 gan huskily, "I swear " 
 
 She laid her finger on her lips, shaking 
 her head gently; and he was silent, 
 while the intelligent maid — at that mo- 
 ment entering — arranged a tea-table 
 and departed. 
 
 "American an' Russian, they are the 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 worse," said the Countess thoughtfully, 
 as she served him with a generous cup, 
 laced with rum, "but the American he is 
 the bes' to play wiz." Mellin found her 
 irresistible when she said "wiz." 
 
 "Why is that?" 
 
 "Oh, the Russian play high, yes — ^but 
 the American" — she laughed delight- 
 edly and stretched her arms wide — "he 
 make' it all a joke ! He is beeg like his 
 beeg country. If he win or lose, he don' 
 care! Ah, I mus' tell you of my great 
 American frien', that Honor-able Chan- 
 lair Pedlow, who is comin' to Rome. 
 You have heard of Honor-able, Chanlair 
 Pedlow in America?" 
 
 "I remember hearing that name." 
 
 "Ah, I shall make you know him. He 
 is a man of distinction; he did sit in 
 n463 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 your Chamber of Deputies — what you 
 call it? — yes, your Con-gress. He is 
 funny, eccentric — always he roar like a 
 lion — Boum! — but so simple, so good, 
 a man of such fine heart — so lovable I" 
 
 "I '11 be glad to meet him," said Mel- 
 lin coldly. 
 
 "An', oh, yes, I almos' forget to tell 
 you," she went on, "your frien', that 
 dear Cooley, he is on his way from 
 Monte Carlo in his automobile. I have 
 a note from him to-day." 
 
 "Good sort of fellow, little Cooley, 
 in his way," remarked her companion 
 graciously. "Not especially intellec- 
 tual or that, you know. His father was 
 a manufacturer chap, I believe, or some- 
 thing of the sort. I suppose you saw a 
 lot of him in Paris?" 
 l47l 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "Eh, I thought he is dead!" cried Ma- 
 dame de Vaurigard. 
 
 "The father is. I mean, little Cooley." 
 
 "Oh, yes," she laughed softly. "We 
 had some gay times, a little party of us. 
 We shall be happy here, too; you will 
 see. I mus' make a little dinner very 
 soon, but not unless you will come. You 
 will?" 
 
 "Do you want me very much?" 
 
 He placed his empty cup on the table 
 and leaned closer to her, smiling. She 
 did not smile in response; instead, her 
 eyes fell and there was the faintest, pa- 
 thetic quiver of her lower lip. 
 
 "Already you know that," she said in 
 a low voice. 
 
 She rose quickly, turned away from 
 him and walked across the room to the 
 C483 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 curtains which opened upon the hall. 
 One of these she drew back. 
 
 "My frien', you mus' go now," she 
 said in the same low voice. "To-mor- 
 row I will see you again. Come at four 
 an' you shall drive with me — ^but not — 
 not more — now. Please!" 
 
 She stood waiting, not looking at him, 
 but with head bent and eyes veiled. 
 As he came near she put out a limp hand. 
 He held it for a few seconds of distinctly 
 emotional silence, then strode swiftly 
 into the hall. 
 
 She immediately let the curtain fall 
 behind him, and as he got his hat 
 and coat he heard her catch her 
 breath sharply with a sound like a little 
 sob. 
 
 Dazed with glory, he returned to the 
 1:493 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 hotel. In the lobby he approached the 
 glittering concierge and said firmly: 
 
 "What is the Salone Margherita? 
 Can you get me a box there to-night?" 
 
 n5o3 
 
HE confessed his wickedness to 
 Madame de Vaurigard the 
 next afternoon as they drove 
 out the Appian Way. "A fellow must 
 have just a bit of a fling, you know," he 
 said; "and, really, Salone Margherita 
 is n't so tremendously wicked." 
 
 She shook her head at him in friendly 
 raillery. "Ah, that may be; but how 
 many of those little dancing-girl' have 
 you invite to supper afterward?" 
 
 This was a delicious accusation, and 
 though he shook his head in virtuous de- 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 nial he was before long almost con- 
 vinced that he had given a rather dash- 
 ing supper after the vaudeville and had 
 not gone quietly back to the hotel, only 
 stopping by the way to purchase an or- 
 ange and a pocketful of horse-chestnuts 
 to eat in his room. 
 
 It was a happy drive for Robert Russ 
 Mellin, though not happier than that of 
 the next day. Three afternoons they 
 spent driving over the Campagna, then 
 back to Madame de Vaurigard's apart- 
 ment for tea by the firelight, till the en- 
 raptured American began to feel that 
 the dream in which he had come to live 
 must of happy necessity last forever. 
 
 On the fourth afternoon, as he stepped 
 out of the hotel elevator into the corri- 
 dor, he encountered Mr. Sneyd. 
 
 ._ n523 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "Just stottin', eh?" said the English- 
 man, taking an envelope from his 
 pocket. "Lucky I caught you. This is 
 for you. I just saw the Cantess and she 
 teold me to give it you. Herry and 
 read it and kem on t' the Amairikin 
 Baw. Chap I want you to meet. Eold 
 Cooley's thyah too. Gawt in with his 
 tourin'-caw at noon." 
 
 "You will forgive, dear friend," wrote Mad- 
 ame de Vaurigard, "if I ask you that we re- 
 nounce our drive to-day. You see, I wish to 
 have that little dinner to-night and must make 
 preparation. Honorable Chandler Pedlow ar- 
 rived this morning from Paris and that droll Mr. 
 Cooley I have learn iscoincidentally arrived also. 
 You see I think it would be very pleasant to 
 have the dinner to welcome these friends on their 
 arrival. You will come surely — or I shall be 
 so truly miserable. You know it perhaps too 
 well ! We shall have a happy evening if you 
 
 1:533 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 come, to console us for renouncing our drive. 
 A thousand of my prettiest wishes for you. 
 
 "HfLENE." 
 
 The signature alone consoled him. 
 To have that note from her, to own it, 
 was like having one of her gloves or her 
 fan. He would keep it forever, he 
 thought; indeed, he more than half ex- 
 pressed a sentiment to that effect in the 
 response which he wrote in the aqua- 
 rium, while Sneyd waited for him at a 
 table near by. The Englishman drew 
 certain conclusions in regard to this re- 
 ply, since it permitted a waiting friend 
 to consume three long tumblers of 
 brandy-and-soda before it was finished. 
 However, Mr. Sneyd kept his reflec- 
 tions to himself, and, when the epistle 
 had been dispatched by a messcagcr, 
 C543 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 took the American's arm and led him to 
 the "American Bar" of the hotel, a re- 
 gion hitherto unexplored by Mellin. 
 
 Leaning against the bar were Cooley 
 and the man whom Mellin had seen loll- 
 ing beside Madame de Vaurigard in 
 Cooley' s automobile in Paris, the same 
 gross person for whom he had instantly 
 conceived a strong repugnance, a feel- 
 ing not at once altered by a closer view. 
 
 Cooley greeted Mellin uproariously 
 and Mr. Sneyd introduced the fat man. 
 "Mr. Mellin, the Honorable Chandler 
 Pedlow," he said; nor was the shock to 
 the first-named gentleman lessened by 
 young Cooley's adding, "Best feller in 
 the world!" 
 
 Mr. Pedlow's eyes were sheltered so 
 deeply beneath florid rolls of flesh that 
 
 Issl 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 all one saw of them was an inscrutable 
 gleam of blue; but, small though they 
 were, they were not shifty, for they met 
 Mellin's with a squareness that was al- 
 most brutal. He offered a fat paw, wet 
 by a full glass which he set down too 
 suddenly on the bar. 
 
 "Shake," he said, in a loud and husky 
 voice, "and be friends! Tommy," he 
 added to the attendant, "another round 
 of Martinis." 
 
 "Not for me," said Mellin hastily. 
 "I don't often—" 
 
 "What!" Mr. Pedlow roared sud- 
 denly. "Why, the first words Countess 
 de Vaurigard says to me this afternoon 
 was, 'I want you to meet my young 
 friend Mellin,' she says; 'the gamest lit- 
 tle Indian that ever come down the pike! 
 1:563 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 He 's game,' she says — 'he '11 see you 
 all under the table I' That 's what the 
 smartest little woman in the world, the 
 Countess de Vaurigard, says about you." 
 
 This did not seem very closely to echo 
 Madame de Vaurigard' s habit of phras- 
 ing, but Mellin perceived that it might 
 be only the fat man's way of putting 
 things. 
 
 "You ain't goin' back on her, are 
 you?" continued Mr. Pedlow. "You 
 ain't goin' to make her out a liar? I tell 
 you, when the Countess de Vaurigard 
 says a man 's game, he is game!" He 
 laid his big paw cordially on Mellin' s 
 shoulder and smiled, lowering his voice 
 to a friendly whisper. "And I '11 bet 
 ten thousand dollars right out of my 
 pants pocket you are game, too I" 
 1:57:1 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 He pressed a glass into the other's 
 hand. Smiling feebly, the embarrassed 
 Mellin accepted it. 
 
 "Make it four more, Tommy," said 
 Pedlow. "And here," continued this 
 thoughtful man, "I don't go bandying 
 no ladies' names around a bar-room — 
 that ain't my style — but I do want to 
 propose a toast. I won't name her, but 
 you all know who I mean." 
 
 "Sure we do," interjected Cooley 
 warmly. "Queen! That 's what she 
 is." 
 
 "Here 's fo her," continued Mr. Ped- 
 low. "Here 's to her — brightest and 
 best — and no heel-taps ! And now let 's 
 set down over in the corner and take it 
 easy. It ain't hardly five o'clock yet, 
 and we can set here comfortable, gittin' 
 
•H ISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 ready for dinner, until half-past six, 
 anyway." 
 
 Whereupon the four seated them- 
 selves about a tabouret in the corner, 
 and, a waiter immediately bringing 
 them four fresh glasses from the bar, 
 Mellin began to understand what Mr. 
 Pedlow meant by "gittin' ready for din- 
 ner." The burden of the conversation 
 was carried almost entirely by the Hon- 
 orable Chandler, though Cooley, whose 
 boyish face was deeply flushed, now and 
 then managed to interrupt by talking 
 louder than the fat man. Mr. Sneyd sat 
 silent. 
 
 "Good ole Sneyd," said Pedlow. 
 "He never talks, jest saws wood. Only 
 Britisher I ever liked. Plays cards like 
 a goat." 
 
 n593 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "He played a mighty good game on 
 the steamer," said Cooley warmly. 
 
 "I don't care what he did on the 
 steamer, he played like a goat the only 
 time / ever played with him. You know 
 he did. I reckon you was there!" 
 
 "Should say I was there ! He played 
 mighty well — " 
 
 "Like a goat," reiterated the fat man 
 firmly. 
 
 "Nothing of the sort. You had a run 
 of hands, that was all. Nobody can go 
 against the kind of luck you had that 
 night; and you took it away from Sneyd 
 and me in rolls. But we '11 land 
 you pretty soon, won't we, ole Sney- 
 die?" 
 
 "We sh'll have a shawt at him, at 
 least," said the Englishman. 
 n6o3 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "Perhaps he won't want us to try," 
 young Cooley pursued derisively. "Per- 
 haps he thinks / play like a goat, too!" 
 
 Mr. Pedlow threw back his head and 
 roared. "Give me somep'n easy! You 
 don't know no more how to play a hand 
 of cards than a giraffe does. I '11 throw 
 in all of my Blue Gulch gold-stock — 
 and it 's worth eight hundred thousand 
 dollars if it 's worth a cent^ — I '11 put it 
 up against that tin automobile of yours, 
 divide chips even and play you freeze- 
 out for it. You play cards'? Go learn 
 hop-scotch!" 
 
 "You wait!" exclaimed the other in- 
 dignantly. "Next time we play we '11 
 make you look so small you '11 think 
 you 're back in Congress!" 
 
 At this Mr. Pedlow again threw back 
 
 ceo 
 
•HIS'OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 his head and roared, his vast body so 
 shaken with mirth that the glass he held 
 in his hand dropped to the floor. 
 
 "There," said Cooley, "that 's the sec- 
 ond Martini you 've spilled. You 're 
 two behind the rest of us." 
 
 "What of it?" bellowed the fat man. 
 "There 's plenty comin', ain't there? 
 Four more, Tommy, and bring cigars. 
 Don't take a cent from none of these 
 Indians. Gentlemen, your money ain't 
 good here. I own this bar, and this is 
 my night." 
 
 Mellin had begun to feel at ease, and 
 after a time — as they continued to sit — 
 he realized that his repugnance to Mr. 
 Pedlow was wearing off; he felt that 
 there must be good in any one whom 
 Madame de Vaurigard liked. She had 
 1:623 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 spoken of Pedlow often on their drives ; 
 he was an "eccentric," she said, an "orig- 
 inal." Why not accept her verdict? 
 Besides, Pedlow was a man of distinc- 
 tion and force; he had been in Congress; 
 he was a millionaire ; and, as became evi- 
 dent in the course of a long recital of 
 the principal events of his career, most 
 of the great men of the time were his 
 friends and proteges. 
 
 " 'Well, Mack,' says I one day when 
 we were in the House together" — (thus 
 Mr. Pedlow, alluding to the late Presi- 
 dent McKinley)— "'Mack,' says I, 'if 
 you 'd drop that double standard busi- 
 ness' — he was waverin' toward silver 
 along then — 'I don't know but I might 
 git the boys to nominate you fer Presi- 
 dent.' 'I '11 think it over,' he says — '1 11 
 
 n633 
 
•H ISOWNPEOPLE- 
 
 think it over.' You remember me tellin' 
 you about that at the time, don't you, 
 Sneyd, when you was in the British Le- 
 gation at Washin'ton?" 
 
 "Pahfictly," said Mr. Sneyd, lighting 
 a cigar with great calmness. 
 
 "'Yes,' I says, 'Mack,' I says, 'if 
 you '11 drop it, I '11 turn in and git you 
 the nomination.' " 
 
 "Did he drop it?" asked Mellin in- 
 nocently. 
 
 Mr. Pedlow leaned forward and 
 struck the young man's knee a resound- 
 ing blow with the palm of his hand. 
 
 "He was nominated, was n't he?" 
 
 "Time to dress," announced Mr. 
 Sneyd, looking at his watch. 
 
 "One more round first," insisted 
 Cooley with prompt vehemence. "Let 's 
 1:643 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 finish with our first toast again. Can't 
 drink that too often." 
 
 This proposition was received with 
 warmest approval, and they drank 
 standing. 
 
 "Brightest and best!" shouted Mr. 
 Pedlow. 
 
 "Queen I What she is!" exclaimed 
 Cooley. 
 
 "Ma belle Marquise!" whispered 
 Mellin tenderly, as the rim touched his 
 lips. 
 
 A small, keen-faced man, whose 
 steady gray eyes were shielded by tor- 
 toise-rimmed spectacles, had come into 
 the room and now stood quietly at the 
 bar, sipping a glass of Vichy. He was 
 sharply observant of the party as it 
 broke up, Pedlow and Sneyd preceding 
 1:653 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 the younger men to the corridor, and, as 
 the latter turned to follow, the stranger 
 stepped quickly forward, speaking Cool- 
 ey's name. 
 
 "What 's the matter?" 
 
 "Perhaps you don't remember me. 
 My name 's Cornish. I 'm a newspaper 
 man, a correspondent." (He named a 
 New York paper.) "I 'm down here to 
 get a Vatican story. I knew your father 
 for a number of years before his death, 
 and I think I may claim that he was a 
 friend of mine." 
 
 "That 's good," said the youth cor- 
 dially. "If I had n't a fine start already, 
 and was n*t in a hurry to dress, we 'd 
 have another." 
 
 "You were pointed out to me in 
 Paris," continued Cornish. "I found 
 1:663 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 where you were staying and called on 
 you the next day, but you had just 
 started for the Riviera." He hesitated, 
 glancing at Mellin. "Can you give me 
 half a dozen words with you in pri- 
 vate?" 
 
 "You '11 have to excuse me, I 'm 
 afraid. I 've only got about ten minutes 
 to dress. See you to-morrow." 
 
 "I should like it to be as soon as pos- 
 sible," the journalist said seriously. "It 
 is n't on my own account, and I " 
 
 "All right. You come to my room at 
 ten t' morrow morning?" 
 
 "Well, if you can't possibly make it 
 to-night," said Cornish reluctantly. "I 
 wish " 
 
 "Can't possibly." 
 
 And Cooley, taking Mellin by the 
 l(>7l 
 
HIS-OWNPEOPLE 
 
 arm, walked rapidly down the corridor. 
 "Funny ole correspondent," he mur- 
 mured. "What do / know about the 
 Vatican?" 
 
 l^S'2 
 
THE four friends of Madame d 
 Vaurigard were borne to he 
 apartment from the Magnif 
 ique in Cooley's big car. They sailei 
 triumphantly down and up the hills in ; 
 cool and bracing air, under a moon tha 
 shone as brightly for them as it had fo 
 Caesar, and Mellin's soul was buoyan 
 within him. He thought of Cranstoi 
 and laughed aloud. What would Cran 
 ston say if it could see him in a sixty 
 horse touring-car, with two millionaire 
 and an English diplomat, brother of ai 
 C693 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 earl, and all on the way to dine with a 
 countess? If Mary Kramer could see 
 him! . . . Poor Mary Kramer! Poor 
 little Mary Kramer! 
 
 A man-servant took their coats in 
 Madame de Vaurigard's hall, where 
 they could hear through the curtains the 
 sound of one or two voices in cheerful 
 conversation. 
 
 Sneyd held up his hand. 
 
 "Listen," he said. "Shawly, that 
 is n't Lady Mount-Rhyswicke's voice! 
 She could n't be in Reom — always a 
 Rhyswicke Caws'l for Decembah. By 
 Jev, itis!" 
 
 "Nothin' of the kind," said Pedlow. 
 
 "I know Lady Mount-Rhyswicke as 
 
 well as I know you. I started her father 
 
 in business when he was clerkin' behind 
 
 1701 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 a counter in Liverpool. I give him the 
 money to begin on. 'Make good/ says 
 I, 'that 's all. Make good!' And he 
 done it, too. Educated his daughter fit 
 fer a princess, married her to Mount- 
 Rhyswicke, and when he died left her 
 ten million dollars if he left her a cent ! 
 I know Madge Mount-Rhyswicke and 
 that ain't her voice," 
 
 A peal of silvery laughter rang from 
 the other side of the curtain. 
 
 "They 've heard you," said Cooley. 
 
 "An' who could help it?" Madame 
 de Vaurigard herself threw back the cur- 
 tains. "Who could help hear our great, 
 dear, ole lion? How he roar' !" 
 
 She wore a white velvet "princesse" 
 gown of a fashion which was a shade less 
 than what is called "daring," with a 
 C713 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 rope of pearls falling from her neck and 
 a diamond star in her dark hair. Stand- 
 ing with one arm uplifted to the cur- 
 tains, and with the mellow glow of can- 
 dles and firelight behind her, she was so 
 lovely that both Mellin and Cooley 
 stood breathlessly still until she changed 
 her attitude. This she did only to move 
 toward them, extending a hand to each, 
 letting Cooley seize the right and Mel- 
 lin the left. 
 
 Each of them was pleased with what 
 he got, particularly Mellin. "The left 
 is nearer the heart," he thought. 
 
 She led them through the curtains, not 
 withdrawing her hands until they en- 
 tered the salon. She might have led 
 them out of her fifth-story window in 
 that fashion, had she chosen. 
 1:723 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "My two wicked boys I" she laughed 
 tenderly. 
 
 This also pleased both of them, 
 though each would have preferred to be 
 her only wicked boy — a preference 
 which, perhaps, had something to do 
 with the later events of the evening. 
 
 "Aha I I know you both; before 
 twenty minute' you will be makin' love 
 to Lady Mount-Rhyswicke. Behol' 
 those two already! An' they are only 
 ole frien's." 
 
 She pointed to Pedlow and Sneyd. 
 The fat man was shouting at a woman 
 in pink satin, who lounged, half-reclin- 
 ing, among a pile of cushions upon a 
 divan near the fire; Sneyd gallantly 
 bending over her to kiss her hand. 
 
 "It is a very little dinner, you see," 
 1731 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 continued the hostess, "only seven, but 
 we shall be seven time' happier." 
 
 The seventh person proved to be the 
 Italian, Corni, who had surrendered his 
 seat in Madame de Vaurigard's victoria 
 to Mellin on the Pincio. He presently 
 made his appearance followed by a 
 waiter bearing a tray of glasses filled 
 with a pink liquid, while the Countess 
 led her two wicked boys across the room 
 to present them to Lady Mount-Rhys- 
 wicke. Already Mellin was forming 
 sentences for his next letter to the Cran- 
 ston Telegraph: "Lady Mount-Rhys- 
 wicke said to me the other evening, 
 while discussing the foreign policy of 
 Great Britain, in Comtesse de Vauri- 
 gard's salon . . ." "An English peeress 
 of pronounced literary acumen has been 
 1741 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 giving me rather confidentially her 
 opinion of our American poets ..." 
 
 The inspiration of these promising 
 fragments was a large, weary-looking 
 person, with no lack of powdered shoul- 
 der above her pink bodice and a profu- 
 sion of "undulated" hair of so decided 
 a blond that it might have been sus- 
 pected that the decision had lain with 
 the lady herself. 
 
 "Howjdo," she said languidly, when 
 Mellin's name was pronounced to her. 
 "There 's a man behind you tryin' to 
 give you something to drink." 
 
 "Who was it said these were Marti- 
 nis?" snorted Pedlow. "They 've got 
 perfumery in 'em." 
 
 "Ah, what a bad lion it is I" Madame 
 de Vaurigard lifted both hands in mock 
 1751 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 horror. "Roar, lion, roar I" she cried. 
 "An' think of the emotion of our good 
 Cavaliere Corni, who have come an hour 
 early jus' to make them for us! I ask 
 Monsieur Mellin if it is not good." 
 
 "And I '11 leave it to Cooley," said 
 Pedlow. "If he can drink all of his I '11 
 eat crow!" 
 
 Thus challenged, the two young men 
 smilingly accepted glasses from the 
 waiter, and lifted them on high. 
 
 "Same toast," said Cooley. "Queen !" 
 
 "A la belle Marquise!" 
 
 Gallantly they drained the glasses at 
 a gulp, and Madame de Vaurigard 
 clapped her hands. 
 
 "Bravo!" she cried. "You see? Corni 
 and I, we win." 
 
 "Look at their faces!" said Mr. Ped- 
 1:763 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 low, tactlessly drawing attention to 
 what was, for the moment, an undeni- 
 ably painful sight. "Don't tell me an 
 Italian knows how to make a good Mar- 
 tini!" 
 
 Mellin profoundly agreed, but, as he 
 joined the small procession to the Coun- 
 tess' dinner-table, he was certain that an 
 Italian at least knew how to make a 
 strong one. 
 
 The light in the dining-room was 
 provided by six heavily-shaded candles 
 on the table; the latter decorated with 
 delicate lines of orchids. The chairs 
 were large and comfortable, covered 
 with tapestry; the glass was old Vene- 
 tian, and the servants, moving like use- 
 ful ghosts in the shadow outside the 
 circle of mellow light, were particularly 
 1:773 
 
•H IS-OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 efficient in the matter of keeping the 
 wine-glasses full. Madame de Vauri- 
 gard had put Pedlow on her right, 
 Cooley on her left, with Mellin directly 
 opposite her, next to Lady Mount-Rhys- 
 wicke. Mellin was pleased, because he 
 thought he would have the Countess's 
 face toward him. Anything would have 
 pleased him just then. 
 
 "This is the kind of table everybody 
 ought to have," he observed to the party 
 in general, as he finished his first glass of 
 champagne. "I 'm going to have it like 
 this at my place in the States — if I ever 
 decide to go back. I '11 have six separate 
 candlesticks like this, not a candela- 
 brum, and that will be the only light in 
 the room. And I '11 never have any- 
 thing but orchids on my table " 
 
 C783 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "For my part," Lady Mount-Rhys- 
 wicke interrupted in the loud, tired 
 monotone which seemed to be her only 
 manner of speaking, "I like more light. 
 I like all the light that 's goin'." 
 
 "If Lady Mount-Rhyswicke sat at my 
 table," returned Mellin dashingly, "I 
 should wish all the light in the world to 
 shine upon so happy an event." 
 
 "Hear the man I" she drawled. "He's 
 proposin' to me. Thinks I 'm a widow." 
 
 There was a chorus of laughter, over 
 which rose the bellow of Mr. Pedlow. 
 
 "'He 's game I' she says — and airit 
 he?" 
 
 Across the table Madame de Vauri- 
 
 gard's eyes met Mellin's with a mocking 
 
 intelligence so complete that he caught 
 
 her message without need of the words 
 
 [793 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 she noiselessly formed with her lips : "I 
 tol' you you would be makin' love to 
 her!" 
 
 He laughed joyously in answer. 
 Why should n't he flirt with Lady 
 Mount-Rhyswicke ? He was thoroughly 
 happy; his Helene, his belle Marquise^ 
 sat across the table from him sending 
 messages to him with her eyes. He 
 adored her, but he liked Lady Mount- 
 Rhyswicke — he liked everybody and 
 everything in the world. He liked Ped- 
 low particularly, and it no longer 
 troubled him that the fat man should be 
 a friend of Madame de Vaurigard. 
 Pedlow was a "character" and a wit as 
 well. Mellin laughed heartily at every- 
 thing the Honorable Chandler Pedlow 
 said. 
 
 1:803 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "This is life," remarked the young 
 man to his fair neighbor. 
 
 "What is? Sittin' round a table, 
 eatin' and drinkin' ?" 
 
 "Ah, lovely skeptic I" She looked at 
 him strangely, but he continued with 
 growing enthusiasm: "I mean to sit at 
 such a table as this, with such a chef, 
 with such wines — to know one crowded 
 hour like this is to live ! Not a thing is 
 missing; all this swagger furniture, the 
 rich atmosphere of smartness about the 
 whole place; best of all, the company. 
 It 's a great thing to have the real people 
 around you, the right sort, you know, so- 
 cially; people you 'd ask to your own 
 table at home. There are only seven, 
 but every one distingue, every one " 
 
 She leaned both elbows on the table 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 with her hands palm to palm, and, rest- 
 ing her cheek against the back of her left 
 hand, looked at him steadily. 
 
 "And you — are you distinguished, 
 too?" 
 
 "Oh, I would n't be much known over 
 here" he said modestly. 
 
 "Do you write poetry?" 
 
 "Oh, not professionally, though it is 
 published. I suppose" — he sipped his 
 champagne with his head a little to one 
 side as though judging its quality — "I 
 suppose I 've been more or less a dilet- 
 tante. I 've knocked about the world a 
 good bit." 
 
 "Helene says you 're one of these 
 leisure American billionaires like Mr. 
 Cooley there," she said in her tired voice. 
 
 "Oh, none of us are really quite 
 1:823 
 
HIS-O WN-PEOPLE 
 
 billionaires." He laughed deprecat- 
 ingly. 
 
 "No, I suppose not — not really. Go 
 on and tell me some more about life and 
 this distinguished company." 
 
 "Hey, folks I" Mr. Pedlow's roar 
 broke in upon this dialogue. "You two 
 are gittin' mighty thick over there. 
 We 're drinking a toast, and you '11 have 
 to break away long enough to join in." 
 
 "Queen! That 's what she is!" 
 shouted Cooley. 
 
 Mellin lifted his glass with the others 
 and drank to Madame de Vaurigard, 
 but the woman at his side did not change 
 her attitude and continued to sit with 
 her elbows on the table, her cheek on the 
 back of her hand, watching him thought- 
 fully. 
 
 n833 
 
MANY toasts were uproariously 
 honored, the health of each 
 member of the party in turn, 
 then the country of each: France and 
 England first, out of courtesy to the 
 ladies, Italy next, since this beautiful 
 and extraordinary meeting of distin- 
 guished people (as Mellin remarked in 
 a short speech he felt called upon to 
 make) took place in that wonderful 
 land, then the United States. This last 
 toast the gentlemen felt it necessary to " 
 honor by standing in their chairs. 
 1:843 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 [Song: "The Star-spangled Banner — 
 without words — by Mr. Cooley and 
 chorus. 1 
 
 When the cigars were brought, the 
 ladies graciously remained, adding tiny 
 spirals of smoke from their cigarettes to 
 the layers of blue haze which soon over- 
 hung the table. Through this haze, in 
 the gentle light (which seemed to grow 
 softer and softer) Mellin saw the face 
 of Helene de Vaurigard, luminous as an 
 angel's. She was an angel — and the 
 others were gods. What could be more 
 appropriate in Rome? Lady Mount- 
 Rhyswicke was Juno, but more beauti- 
 ful. For himself, he felt like a god too, 
 Olympic in serenity. 
 
 He longed for mysterious dangers. 
 How debonair he would stroll among 
 
HIS OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 them! He wished to explore the un- 
 known; felt the need of a splendid ad- 
 venture, and had a happy premonition 
 that one was coming nearer and nearer. 
 He favored himself with a hopeful 
 vision of the apartment on fire, Robert 
 Russ Mellin smiling negligently among 
 the flames and Madame de Vaurigard 
 kneeling before him in adoration. Im- 
 mersed in delight, he puffed his cigar and 
 let his eyes rest dreamily upon the face of 
 Helene. He was quite undisturbed by 
 an argument, more a commotion than a 
 debate, between Mr. Pedlow and young 
 Cooley. It ended by their rising, the 
 latter overturning a chair in his haste. 
 
 "I don't know the rudiments, don't 
 I?" cried the boy. "You wait! Ole 
 Sneydie and I '11 trim you down! 
 1:863 
 
■H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 Corni says he '11 play, too. Come on, 
 Mellin." 
 
 "I won't go unless Helene goes," said 
 Mellin. "What are you going to do 
 when you get there?" 
 
 "Alas, my frien'I" exclaimed Mad- 
 ame de Vaurigard, rising, "is it not what 
 I tol' you ? Always you are never content 
 wizout your play. You come to dinner an' 
 when it is finish' you play, play, play!" 
 
 "Flay?" He sprang to his feet. 
 "Bravo! That 's the very thing I 've 
 been wanting to do. I knew there was 
 something I wanted to do, but I could n't 
 think what it was." 
 
 Lady Mount-Rhyswipke followed the 
 others into the salon, but Madame de 
 Vaurigard waited just inside the door- 
 way for Mellin. 
 
 C87n 
 
• H I S • O W N • P E O P L E • 
 
 "High play!" he cried. "We must 
 play high ! I won't play any other way. 
 — I want to play high!" 
 
 "Ah, wicked one I What did I tell 
 you?" 
 
 He caught her hand. "And you must 
 play too, Helene." 
 
 "No, no," she laughed breathlessly. 
 
 "Then you '11 watch. Promise you '11 
 watch me. I won't let you go till you 
 promise to watch me." 
 
 "I shall adore it, my frien' !" 
 
 "Mellin," called Cooley from the 
 other room. "You comin' or not?" 
 
 "Can't you see me?" answered Mel- 
 lin hilariously, entering with Madame 
 de Vaurigard, who was rosy with laugh- 
 ter. "Peculiar thing to look at a man 
 and not see him." 
 
 C88n 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 Candles were lit in many sconces on 
 the walls, and the card-table had been 
 pushed to the centre of the room, little 
 towers of blue, white and scarlet count- 
 ers arranged upon it in orderly rows like 
 miniature castles. 
 
 "Now, then," demanded Cooley, "are 
 the ladies goin' to play?" 
 
 "Never!" cried Madame de Vauri- 
 gard. 
 
 "All right," said the youth cheer- 
 fully; "you can look on. Come and sit 
 by me for a mascot." 
 
 "You '11 need a mascot, my boy!" 
 shouted Pedlow. "That 's right, 
 though; take her." 
 
 He pushed a chair close to that in 
 which Cooley had already seated him- 
 self, and Madame de Vaurigard 
 CSqH 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 dropped into it, laughing. "Mellin, 
 you set there," he continued, pushing 
 the young man into a seat opposite 
 Cooley. "We '11 give both you young 
 fellers a mascot." He turned to Lady 
 Mount-Rhyswicke, who had gone to 
 the settee by the fire. "Madge, you 
 come and set by Mellin," he commanded 
 jovially. "Maybe he '11 forget you ain't 
 a widow again." 
 
 "I don't believe I care much about 
 bein' anybody's mascot to-night," she 
 answered. There was a hint of anger in 
 her tired monotone. 
 
 "What?" He turned from the table 
 and walked over to the fireplace. "I 
 reckon I did n't understand you," he 
 said quietly, almost gently. "You bet- 
 ter come, had n't you?" 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 She met his inscrutable little eyes 
 steadily. A faint redness slowly revealed 
 itself on her powdered cheeks; then she 
 followed him back to the table and took 
 the place he had assigned to her at Mel- 
 lin's elbow. 
 
 "I '11 bank," said Pedlow, taking a 
 chair between Cooley and the Italian, 
 "unless somebody wants to take it ofE 
 my hands. Now, what are we playing*?" 
 
 "Pokah," responded Sneyd with mild 
 sarcasm. 
 
 "Bravo !" cried Mellin. "That 's my 
 game. Ber-ravo!" 
 
 ^ This was so far true : it was the only 
 game upon which he had ever ventured 
 money; he had played several times 
 when the wagers were allowed to reach 
 a limit of twenty-five cents. 
 
•HIS'OWNPEOPLE 
 
 "You know what I mean, I reckon," 
 said Pedlow. "I mean what we are 
 playin' fer?" 
 
 "Twenty-five franc limit," responded 
 Cooley authoritatively. "Double for 
 jacks. Play two hours and settle when 
 we quit." 
 
 Mellin leaned back in his chair. "You 
 call that high*?" he asked, with a sniff 
 of contempt. "Why not double it?" 
 
 The fat man hammered the table with 
 his fist delightedly. " 'He 's game,' she 
 says. 'He 's the gamest little Indian 
 ever come down the big road!' she says. 
 Was she right? What? Maybe she 
 was n't! We '11 double it before very 
 long, my boy; this '11 do to start on. 
 There." He distributed some of the 
 small towers of ivory counters and made 
 1:923 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 a memorandum in a notebook. "There 
 four hundred apiece." 
 
 "That all?" inquired Mellin, when 
 upon Mr. Pedlow uproariously repeate 
 Madame de Vaurigard's alleged tributi 
 
 As the game began, the intelligen 
 looking maid appeared from the dining 
 room, bearing bottles of whisky an 
 soda, and these she deposited upo 
 small tables at the convenience of th 
 players, so that at the conclusion of th 
 first encounter in the gentle tournamer 
 there was material for a toast to the ga 
 lant who had won it. 
 
 "Here 's to the gamest Indian of v 
 all," proposed the fat man. "Did yo 
 notice him call me with a pair of tens 
 And me queen-high!" 
 
 Mellin drained a deep glass in hone 
 CQSn 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 of himself. "On my soul, Chan' Ped- 
 low, I think you 're the bes' fellow in 
 the whole world," he said gratefully. 
 "Only trouble with you — you don't 
 want to play high enough." 
 
 He won again and again, adding 
 other towers of counters to his original 
 allotment, so that he had the semblance 
 of a tiny castle. When the cards had 
 been dealt for the fifth time he felt the 
 light contact of a slipper touching his 
 foot under the table. 
 
 That slipper, he decided (from the 
 nature of things) could belong to none 
 other than his Helene, and even as he 
 came to this conclusion the slight pres- 
 sure against his foot was gently but dis- 
 tinctly increased thrice. He pressed the 
 slipper in return with his shoe, at the 
 n943 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 same time giving Madame de Vaurigard 
 a look of grateful surprise and tender- 
 ness, which threw her into a confusion 
 so evidently genuine that for an un- 
 worthy moment he had a jealous suspi- 
 cion she had meant the little caress for 
 some other. 
 
 It was a disagreeable thought, and, in 
 the hope of banishing it, he refilled his 
 glass; but his mood had begun to 
 change. It seemed to him that Helene 
 was watching Cooley a great deal too 
 devotedly. Why had she consented to 
 sit by Cooley, when she had promised to 
 watch Robert Russ Mellin"? He ob- 
 served the pair stealthily. 
 
 Cooley consulted her in laughing 
 whispers upon every discard, upon 
 every bet. Now and then, in their 
 1:953 
 
•H IS-OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 whisperings, Cooley's hair touched hers; 
 sometimes she laid her hand on his the 
 more conveniently to look at his cards. 
 Mellin began to be enraged. Did she 
 think that puling milksop had as much 
 as a shadow of the daring, the devilry, 
 the carelessness of consequences which 
 lay within Robert Russ Mellin ? "Con- 
 sequences?" What were they? There 
 were no such things! She would not 
 look at him — well, he would make her ! 
 Thenceforward he raised every bet by 
 another to the extent of the limit agreed 
 upon. 
 
 Mr. Cooley was thoroughly happy. 
 He did not resemble Ulysses; he would 
 never have had himself bound to the 
 mast; and there were already sounds of 
 unearthly sweetness in his ears. His 
 1:963 
 
•HIS-O WN-PEOPLE- 
 
 conferences with his lovely hostess 
 easily consoled him for his losses. In 
 addition, he was triumphing over the 
 boaster, for Mr. Pedlow, with a very ill 
 grace and swearing (not under his 
 breath) , was losing too. The Countess, 
 reiterating for the hundredth time that 
 Cooley was a "wicked one," sweetly con- 
 stituted herself his cup-bearer; kept his 
 glass full and brought him fresh cigars. 
 
 Mellin dealt her furious glances, and 
 filled his own glass, for Lady Mount- 
 Rhyswicke plainly had no conception of 
 herself in the role of a Hebe. The hos- 
 pitable Pedlow, observing this neglect, 
 was moved to chide her. 
 
 "Look at them two cooing doves over 
 there," he said reproachfully, a jerk of 
 his bulbous thumb indicating Madame 
 n973 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 de Vaurigard and her young protege. 
 "Madge, can't you do nothin' fer our 
 friend the Indian ? Can't you even help 
 him to sody?" 
 
 "Oh, perhaps," she answered with the 
 slightest flash from her tired eyes. Then 
 she nonchalantly lifted Mellin's replen- 
 ished glass from the table and drained 
 it. This amused Cooley. 
 
 "I like that!" he chuckled. "That 's 
 one way of helpin' a feller! Helene, 
 can you do any better than that?" 
 
 "Ah, this dear, droll Cooley!" 
 
 The tantalizing witch lifted the 
 youth's glass to his lips and let him 
 drink, as a mother helps a thirsty child. 
 "Bebe!" she laughed endearingly. 
 
 As the lovely Helene pronounced 
 that word, Lady Mount-Rhyswicke was 
 
 n983 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 leaning forward to replace Mellin's 
 empty glass upon the table. 
 
 "I don't care whether you 're a widow 
 or not I" he shouted furiously. And he 
 resoundingly kissed her massive shoul- 
 der. 
 
 There was a wild shout of laughter; 
 even the imperturbable Sneyd (who had 
 continued to win steadily) wiped tears 
 from his eyes,' and Madame de Vauri- 
 gard gave way to intermittent hysteria 
 throughout the ensuing half -hour. 
 
 For a time Mellin sat grimly observ- 
 ing this inexplicable merriment with a 
 cold smile. 
 
 "Laugh on !" he commanded with bit- 
 ter satire, some ten minutes after play 
 had been resumed — and was instantly 
 obeyed. 
 
 1:993 
 
• H I S • O W N • P E O P L E • 
 
 Whereupon his mood underwent an- 
 other change, and he became convinced 
 that the world was a warm and kindly 
 place, where it was good to live. He 
 forgot that he was jealous of Cooley and 
 angry with the Countess; he liked every- 
 body again, especially Lady Mount- 
 Rhyswicke. "Won't you sit farther for- 
 ward?" he begged her earnestly; "so 
 that I can see your beautiful golden 
 hair?" 
 
 He heard but dimly the spasmodic 
 uproar that followed. "Laugh on!" he 
 repeated with a swoop of his arm, "I 
 don't care! Don't you care either, Mrs. 
 Mount-Rhyswicke. Please sit where I 
 can see your beautiful golden hair. 
 Don't be afraid I '11 kiss you again. I 
 would n't do it for the whole world. 
 DooH 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 You 're one of the noblest women I ever 
 knew. I feel that 's true. I don't know 
 how I know it, but I know it. Let 'em 
 laugh!" 
 
 After this everything grew more and 
 more hazy to him. For a time there was, 
 in the centre of the haze, a nimbus of 
 light which revealed his cards to him 
 and the towers of chips which he con- 
 stantly called for and which as con- 
 stantly disappeared — like the towers of 
 a castle in Spain. Then the haze thick- 
 ened, and the one thing clear to him was 
 a phrase from an old-time novel he had 
 read long ago : 
 
 "Debt of honor." 
 
 The three words appeared to be 
 written in flames against a background 
 of dense fog. A debt of honor was a 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 promissory note which had to be paid 
 on Monday, and the appeal to the ob- 
 durate grandfather — a peer of England, 
 the Earl of Mount-Rhyswicke, in fact 
 — was made at midnight, Sunday. The 
 fog grew still denser, lifted for a mo- 
 ment while he wrote his name many 
 times on slips of blue paper; closed 
 down once more, and again lifted — out- 
 of-doors this time — to show him a luna- 
 tic ballet of moons dancing streakily 
 upon the horizon. 
 
 He heard himself say quite clearly, 
 "All right, old man, thank you; but 
 don't bother about me," to a pallid but 
 humorous Cooley in evening clothes; 
 the fog thickened; oblivion closed upon 
 him for a seeming second. . . . 
 
 nio2 3 
 
SUDDENLY he sat up in bed in his 
 room at the Magnifique, gazing 
 upon a disconsolate Cooley in 
 gray tweeds who sat heaped in a chair at 
 the foot of the bed with his head in his 
 hands. 
 
 Mellin's first sensation was of utter 
 mystification; his second was more cor- 
 poreal: the consciousness of physical 
 misery, of consuming fever, of aches 
 that ran over his whole body, converging 
 to a dreadful climax in his head, of a 
 throat so immoderately parched it 
 nio33 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 seemed to crackle, and of a thirst so avid 
 it was a passion. His eye fell upon a 
 carafe of water on a chair at his bedside; 
 he seized upon it with a shaking hand 
 and drank half its contents before he set 
 it down. The action attracted his com- 
 panion's attention and he looked up, 
 showing a pale and haggard coun- 
 tenance. 
 
 "How do you feel?" inquired Cooley 
 with a wan smile. 
 
 Mellin's head dropped back upon the 
 pillow and he made one or two painful 
 efforts to speak before he succeeded in 
 finding a ghastly semblance of his voice. 
 
 "I thought I was at Madame de Vauri- 
 gard's." 
 
 "You were," said the other, adding 
 grimly: "We both were." 
 C1043 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE 
 
 "But that was only a minute ago." 
 
 "It was six hours ago. It 's goin' on 
 ten o'clock in the morning." 
 
 "I don't understand how that can be. 
 How did I get here?" 
 
 "I brought you. I was pretty bad, but 
 
 you 1 never saw anything like you ! 
 
 From the time you kissed Lady Mount- 
 Rhyswicke " 
 
 Mellin sat bolt upright in bed, staring 
 wildly. He began to tremble violently. 
 
 "Don't you remember that?" asked 
 Cooley. 
 
 Suddenly he did. The memory of it 
 came with inexorable clarity; he crossed 
 forearms over his horror-stricken face 
 and fell back upon the pillow. 
 
 "Oh," he gasped. "Un-speakable ! 
 Un-speakable!" 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "Lord! Don't worry about that! I 
 don't think she minded." 
 
 "It 's the thought of Madame de Vau- 
 rigard — it kills me I The horror of it — 
 that I should do such a thing in her 
 house ! She '11 never speak to me again, 
 she ought n't to; she ought to send her 
 groom to beat me! You can't think 
 what I 've lost " 
 
 "Can't I?" Mr. Cooley rose from his 
 chair and began to pace up and down 
 the chamber. "I can guess to within a 
 thousand francs of what I 've lost! I 
 had to get the hotel to cash a check on 
 New York for me this morning. I 've a 
 habit of carrying all my money in bills, 
 and a fool trick, too. Well, I 'm cured 
 of it!" 
 
 "Oh, if it were only a little money 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 and nothing else that I 'd lost! The 
 money means nothing." Mellin choked. 
 
 "I suppose you 're pretty well fixed. 
 Well, so am I," Cooley shook his head, 
 "but money certainly means something 
 tome!" 
 
 "It would n't if you 'd thrown away 
 the most precious friendship of your 
 life." 
 
 "See here," said Cooley, halting at the 
 foot of the bed and looking at his 
 stricken companion from beneath frown- 
 ing brows, "I guess I can see how it is 
 with you, and I '11 tell you frankly it 's 
 been the same with me. I never met such 
 a fascinatin' woman in my life: she 
 throws a reg'ler ole-fashioned spell over 
 you! Now I hate to say it, but I can't 
 help it, because it plain hits me in the 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 face every time I think of it; the truth is 
 — well, sir, I 'm afraid you and me have 
 had little red soldier-coats and caps put 
 on us and strings tied to our belts while 
 we turned somersets for the children," 
 
 "I don't understand. I don't know 
 what you 're talking about." 
 
 "No? It seems to get more and more 
 simple to me. I 've been thinking it all 
 over and over again. I can't help it! 
 See here: I met Sneyd on the steamer, 
 without any introduction. He sort of 
 warmed into the game in the smoking- 
 room, and he won straight along the 
 trip. He called on me in London and 
 took me to meet the Countess at her 
 hotel. We three went to the theatre 
 and lunch and so forth a few times ; and 
 when I left for Paris she turned up on 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 the way: that 's when you met her. 
 Couple of days later, Sneyd came over, 
 and he and the Countess introduced me 
 to dear ole friend Pedlow. So you see, I 
 don't rightly even know who any of 'em 
 really are: just took 'em for granted, as 
 it were. We had lots of fun, I admit 
 that, honkin' about in my car. We only 
 played cards once, and that was in her 
 apartment the last night before I left 
 Paris, but that one time Pedlow won fif- 
 teen thousand francs from me. When I 
 told them my plans, how I was goin' to 
 motor down to Rome, she said she would 
 be in Rome — and, I tell you, I was 
 happy as a poodle-pup about it. Sneyd 
 said he might be in Rome along about 
 then, and open-hearted ole Pedlow said 
 not to be surprised if he turned up, too. 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 Well, he did, almost to the minute, and 
 in the meantime she 'd got you hooked 
 on, fine and tight." 
 
 "I don't understand you," Mellin 
 lifted himself painfully on an elbow. 
 "I don't know what you 're getting at, 
 but it seems to me that you 're speaking 
 disrespectfully of an angel that I 've in- 
 sulted, and I " 
 
 "Now see here, Mellin, I '11 tell you 
 something." The boy's white face 
 showed sudden color and there was a 
 catch in his voice. "I was — I 've been 
 mighty near in love with that woman! 
 But I 've had a kind of a shock; I 've got 
 my common-sense back, and I 'm not^ 
 any more. I don't know exactly how 
 much money I had, but it was between 
 thirty-five and thirty-eight thousand 
 
 Dio3 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 francs, and Sneyd won it all after we 
 took off the limit — over seven thousand 
 dollars — at her table last night. Putting 
 two and two together, honestly it looks 
 bad. It looks mighty bad! Now, I 'm 
 pretty well fixed, and yesterday I did n't 
 care whether school kept or not, but 
 seven thousand dollars is real money to 
 anybody! My old man worked pretty 
 hard for his first seven thousand, I guess, 
 and" — he gulped — "he 'd think a lot of 
 me for lettin' go of it the way I did last 
 night, would n't he? You never see 
 things like this till the next morning! 
 And you remember that other woman sat 
 where she could see every hand you 
 
 drew, and the Countess " 
 
 "Stop!" Mellin flung one arm up 
 violently, striking the headboard with 
 Dii3 
 
H IS-OWNPEOPLE 
 
 his knuckles. "I won't hear a syllable 
 against Madame de Vaurigard!" 
 
 Young Cooley regarded him steadily 
 for a moment. "Have you remembered 
 yet," he said slowly, "how much you lost 
 last night?" 
 
 "I only remember that I behaved like 
 an unspeakable boor in the presence of 
 the divinest creature that ever " 
 
 Cooley disregarded the outburst, and 
 said: 
 
 "When we settled, you had a pad of 
 express company checks worth six hun- 
 dred dollars. You signed all of 'em and 
 turned 'em over to Sneyd with three 
 one-hundred-lire bills, which was all the 
 cash you had with you. Then you gave 
 him your note for twelve thousand 
 francs to be paid within three days. You 
 
•HIS-OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 made a great deal of fuss about its being 
 a 'debt of honor.' " He paused. "You 
 had n't remembered that, had you*?" 
 
 Mellin had closed his eyes. He lay 
 quite still and made no answer. 
 
 "No, I '11 bet you had n't," said 
 Cooley, correctly deducing the fact. 
 "You 're well off, or you would n't be at 
 this hotel, and, for all I know, you may 
 be fixed so you won't mind your loss as 
 much as I do mine; but it ought to make 
 you kind of charitable toward my sus- 
 picions of Madame de Vaurigard's 
 friends." 
 
 The six hundred dollars in express com- 
 pany checks and the three hundred-lire 
 bills were all the money the unhappy 
 Mellin had in the world, and until he 
 could return to Cranston and go back to 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 work in the real-estate office again, he 
 had no prospect of any more. He had 
 not even his steamer ticket. In the shock 
 of horror and despair he whispered 
 brokenly: 
 
 "I don't care if they 're the worst peo- 
 ple in the world, they 're better than I 
 am: 
 
 The other's gloom cleared a little at 
 this. "Well, you have got it!" he ex- 
 claimed briskly. "You don't know how 
 different you '11 feel after a long walk in 
 the open air." He looked at his watch. 
 "I 've got to go and see what that news- 
 paper-man, Cornish, wants; it 's ten 
 o'clock. I '11 be back after a while; I 
 want to reason this out with you. I don't 
 deny but it 's possible I 'm wrong; any- 
 way, you think it over while I 'm gone. 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 You take a good hard think, will you?" 
 As he closed the door, Mellin slowly 
 drew the coverlet over his head. It was 
 as if he covered the face of some one who 
 had just died. 
 
 nii53 
 
Two hours passed before young 
 Cooley returned. He knocked 
 twice without a reply; then 
 he came in. 
 
 The coverlet was still over Mellin's 
 head. 
 
 "Asleep?" asked Cooley. 
 "No." 
 
 The coverlet was removed by a shak- 
 ing hand. 
 
 "Murder!" exclaimed Cooley sym- 
 pathetically, at sight of the other's face. 
 "A night off certainly does things to 
 
 you ! Better let me get you some " 
 
 Di63 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "No. I '11 be all right— after while." 
 "Then I '11 go right ahead with our 
 little troubles. I 've decided to leave 
 for Paris by the one-thirty and have n't 
 got a whole lot of time. Cornish is here 
 with me in the hall : he 's got something 
 to say that 's important for you to hear, 
 and I 'm goin' to bring him right 
 in." He waved his hand toward 
 the door, which he had left open, 
 "Come along, Cornish. Poor ole 
 Mellin '11 play Du Barry with us and 
 give us a morning leevy while he 
 listens in a bed with a palanquin to it. 
 Now let 's draw up chairs and be 
 sociable." 
 
 The journalist came in, smoking a 
 long cigar, and took the chair the youth 
 pushed toward him; but, after a twin- 
 kling glance through his big spectacles 
 
•HISOWNPEOPLE 
 
 at the face on the pillow, he rose and 
 threw the cigar out of the window. 
 
 "Go ahead," said Cooley. "I want 
 you to tell him just what you told me, 
 and when you 're through I want to see 
 if he does n't think I 'm Sherlock 
 Holmes' little brother." 
 
 "If Mr. Mellin does not feel too ill," 
 said Cornish dryly; "I know how pain- 
 ful such cases sometimes " 
 
 "No." Mellin moistened his parched 
 lips and made a pitiful effort to smile. 
 "I '11 be all right very soon." 
 
 "I am very sorry," began the journal- 
 ist, "that I was n't able to get a few 
 words with Mr. Cooley yesterday eve- 
 ning. Perhaps you noticed that I tried 
 as hard as I could, without using actual 
 force" — he laughed^"to detain him." 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE. 
 
 "You did your best," agreed Cooley 
 ruefully, "and I did my worst. Nobody 
 ever listens till the next day!" 
 
 "Well, I 'm glad no vital damage was 
 done, anyway," said Cornish. "It would 
 have been pretty hard lines if you two 
 young fellows had been poor men, but 
 as it is you 're probably none the worse 
 for a lesson like this." 
 
 "You seem to think seven thousand 
 dollars is a joke," remarked Cooley. 
 
 Cornish laughed again. "You see, it 
 flatters me to think my time was so valu- 
 able that a ten minutes' talk with me 
 would have saved so much money." 
 
 "I doubt it," said Cooley. "Ten to 
 one we 'd neither of us have believed 
 you — last night !" 
 
 "I doubt it, too." Cornish turned to 
 1:1193 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 Mellin. "I hear that you, Mr. Mellin, 
 are still of the opinion that you were 
 dealing with straight people?" 
 
 Mellin managed to whisper "Yes." 
 "Then," said Cornish, "I 'd better tell 
 you just what I know about it, and you 
 can form your own opinion as to whether 
 I do know or not. I have been in the 
 newspaper business on this side for fif- 
 teen years, and my headquarters are in 
 Paris, where these people are very well 
 known. The man who calls himself 
 'Chandler Pedlow' was a faro-dealer for 
 Tom Stout in Chicago when Stout's 
 place was broken up, a good many years 
 ago. There was a real Chandler Pedlow 
 in Congress from a California district in 
 the early nineties, but he is dead. This 
 man's name is Ben Welch: he 's a pro- 
 D203 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 fessional swindler; and the Englishman, 
 Sneyd, is another; a quiet man, not so 
 well known as Welch, and not nearly so 
 clever, but a good 'feeder' for him. The 
 very attractive Frenchwoman who calls 
 herself 'Comtesse de Vaurigard' is gen- 
 erally believed to be Sneyd's wife, 
 though I could not take the stand on 
 that myself. Welch is the brains of the 
 organization : you might n't think it, but 
 he 's a very brilliant man — he might 
 have made a great reputation in busi- 
 ness if he 'd been straight — and, with 
 this woman's help, he 's carried out some 
 really astonishing schemes. His man- 
 ner is clumsy ; he knows that, bless you, 
 but it 's the only manner he can manage, 
 and she is so adroit she can sugar-coat 
 even such a pill as that and coax people 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE' 
 
 to swallow it. I don't know anything 
 about the Italian who is working with 
 them down here. But a gang of the 
 Welch- Vaurigard-Sneyd type has ten- 
 tacles all over the Continent; such peo- 
 ple are in touch with sharpers every- 
 where, you see." 
 
 "Yes," Cooley interpolated, "and 
 with woolly little lambkins, too." 
 
 "Well," chuckled Cornish, "that 's 
 the way they make their living, you 
 know." 
 
 "Go on and tell him the rest of it," 
 urged Cooley. 
 
 "About Lady Mount-Rhyswicke," 
 said Cornish, "it seems strange enough, 
 but she has a perfect right to her name. 
 She is a good deal older than she looks, 
 and I 've heard she used to be remark- 
 D223 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 ably beautiful. Her third husband was 
 Lord George Mount-Rhyswicke, a man 
 who 'd been dropped from his clubs, and 
 he deserted her in 1903, but she has not 
 divorced him. It is said that he is some- 
 where in South America; however, as to 
 that I do not know." 
 
 Mr. Cornish put the very slightest 
 possible emphasis on the word "know," 
 and proceeded : 
 
 "I 've heard that she is sincerely at- 
 tached to him and sends him money 
 from time to time, when she has it — 
 though that, too, is third-hand informa- 
 tion. She has been declasse ever since 
 her first divorce. That was a 'celebrated 
 case,' and she 's dropped down pretty 
 far in the world, though I judge she 's a 
 good deal the best of this crowd. Ex- 
 1:1233 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 actly what her relations to the others are 
 I don't know, but I imagine that she 's 
 pretty thick with 'em." 
 
 "Just a little I" exclaimed Cooley. 
 "She sits behind one of the lambkins and 
 Helene behind the other while they get 
 their woolly wool clipped. I suppose 
 the two of 'em signaled what was in 
 every hand we held, though I 'm sure 
 they need n't have gone to the trouble ! 
 Fact is, I don't see why they bothered 
 about goin' through the form of playin' 
 cards with us at all. They could have 
 taken it away without that! Whee!" 
 Mr. Cooley whistled loud and long. 
 "And there 's loads of wise young men 
 on the ocean now, hurryin' over to take 
 our places in the pens. Well, they can 
 have mine! Funny, Mellin: nobody 
 D243 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 would come up to you or me in the 
 Grand Central in New York and try to 
 sell us greenbacks just as good as real. 
 But we come over to Europe with our 
 pockets full o' money and start in to see 
 the Big City with Jesse James in a false 
 mustache on one arm, and Lucresha 
 Borgy, under an assumed name, on the 
 other!" 
 
 "I am afraid I agree with you," said 
 Cornish; "though I must say that, from 
 all I hear, Madame de Vaurigard might 
 put an atmosphere about a thing which 
 would deceive almost any one who 
 was n't on his guard. When a Pari- 
 sienne of her sort is clever at all she 's 
 irresistible." 
 
 "I believe you," Cooley sighed 
 deeply. 
 
 D253 
 
•HIS'OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 "Yesterday evening, Mr. Mellin," 
 continued the journalist, "when I saw 
 the son of my old friend in company 
 with Welch and Sneyd, of course I tried 
 to warn him. I 've often seen them in 
 Paris, though I believe they have no 
 knowledge of me. As I 've said, they 
 are notorious, especially Welch, yet they 
 have managed, so far, to avoid any diffi- 
 culty with the Paris police, and, I 'm 
 sorry to say, it might be hard to actually 
 prove anything against them. You 
 could n't prove that anything was 
 crooked last night, for instance. For 
 that matter, I don't suppose you want 
 to. Mr. Cooley wishes to accept his loss 
 and bear it, and I take it that that will be 
 your attitude, too. In regard to the note 
 you gave Sneyd, I hope you will refuse 
 
•HISO WN-PEOPLE- 
 
 to pay; I don't think that they would 
 dare press the matter." 
 
 "Neither do I," Mr. Cooley agreed. 
 "I left a silver cigarette-case at the 
 apartment last night, and after talkin' 
 to Cornish a while ago, I sent my man 
 for it with a note to her that '11 make 'em 
 all sit up and take some notice. The 
 gang 's all there together, you can be 
 sure. I asked for Sneyd and Pedlow in 
 the office and found they 'd gone out 
 early this morning leavin' word they 
 would n't be back till midnight. 
 And, see here; I know I 'm easy, but 
 somehow I believe you 're even a 
 softer piece o' meat than I am. I 
 want you to promise me that what- 
 ever happens you won't pay that 
 I O U." 
 
 ni273 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 Mellin moistened his lips in vain. He 
 could not answer. 
 
 "I want you to promise me not to pay 
 it," repeated Cooley earnestly. 
 
 "I promise," gasped Mellin. 
 
 "You won't pay it no matter what 
 they do?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 This seemed to reassure Mr. Cooley. 
 
 "Well," he said, "I 've got to hustle 
 to get my car shipped and make the 
 train. Cornish has finished his job down 
 here and he 's goin' with me. I want to 
 get out. The whole thing 's left a 
 mighty bad taste in my mouth, and I 'd 
 go crazy if I did n't get away from it. 
 Why don't you jump into your clothes 
 and come along, too?" 
 
 "I can't." 
 
 D283 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "Well," said the young man with a 
 sympathetic shake of the head, "you 
 certainly look sick. It may be better if 
 you stay in bed till evening: a train 's a 
 mighty mean place for the day after. 
 But I would n't hang around here too 
 long. If you want money, all you have 
 to do is to ask the hotel to cash a check 
 on your home bank; they 're always glad 
 to do that for Americans." He turned 
 to the door. "Mr. Cornish, if you 're 
 goin' to help me about shippin' the car, 
 I 'm ready." 
 
 "So am I. Good-by, Mr. Mellin." 
 
 "Good-by," Mellin said feebly — 
 "and thank you." 
 
 Young Cooley came back to the bed- 
 side and shook the other's feverish hand. 
 "Good-by, ole man. I 'm awful sorry 
 ni293 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 it 's all happened, but I 'm glad it did n't 
 cost you quite as much money as it did 
 me. Otherwise I expect it 's hit us about 
 equally hard. I wish — I wish I could 
 find a nice one" — the youth gulped over 
 something not unlike a sob — "as fascir 
 natin' as her!" 
 
 Most people have had dreams of ap- 
 proaching dangers in the path of which 
 their bodies remained inert; when, in 
 spite of the frantic wish to fly, it was im- 
 possible to move, while all the time the 
 horror crept closer and closer. This was 
 Mellin's state as he saw the young man 
 going. It was absolutely necessary to 
 ask Cooley for help, to beg him for a 
 loan. But he could not. 
 
 He saw Cooley's hand on the door- 
 knob; saw the door swing open. 
 
\ -HIS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 "Good-by, again," Cooley said; "and 
 good luck to you!" 
 
 Mellin's will strove desperately with 
 the shame that held him silent. 
 
 The door was closing. 
 
 "Oh, Cooley," called Mellin hoarsely. 
 
 "Yes. What?" 
 
 "J-j-just good-by," said Mellin. 
 
 And with that young Cooley was 
 gone. 
 
 ni3in 
 
A MULTITUDINOUS clangOF of 
 bells and a dozen neighboring 
 chimes rang noon; then the 
 rectangular oblongs of hot sunlight that 
 fell from the windows upon the carpet 
 of Mellin's room began imperceptibly 
 to shift their angles and move eastward. 
 From the stone pavement of the street 
 below came the sound of horses pawing 
 and the voices of waiting cabmen; then 
 bells again, and more bells; clamoring 
 the slow and cruel afternoon into the 
 past. But all was silent in Mellin's 
 ni32 3 
 
HIS-O WN-PEOPLE 
 
 room, save when, from time to time, a 
 long, shuddering sigh came from the 
 bed. 
 
 The unhappy young man had again 
 drawn the coverlet over his head, but 
 not to sleep: it was more like a forlorn 
 and desperate effort to hide, as if he 
 crept into a hole, seeking darkness to 
 cover the shame and fear that racked 
 his soul. For though his shame had been 
 too great to let him confess to young 
 Cooley and ask for help, his fear was as 
 great as his shame; and it increased as 
 the hours passed. In truth his case was 
 desperate. Except the people who had 
 stripped him, Cooley was the only per- 
 son in all of Europe with whom he had 
 more than a very casual acquaintance. 
 At home, in Cranston, he had no friends 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 susceptible to such an appeal as it was 
 vitally necessary for him to make. His 
 relatives were not numerous : there were 
 two aunts, the widows of his father's 
 brothers, and a number of old-maid 
 cousins; and he had an uncle in Iowa, a 
 country minister whom he had not seen 
 for years. But he could not cable to any 
 of these for money; nor could he quite 
 conjure his imagination into picturing 
 any of them sending it if he did. And 
 even to cable he would have to pawn his 
 watch, which was an old-fashioned one 
 of silver and might not bring enough to 
 pay the charges. 
 
 He began to be haunted by fragment- 
 ary, prophetic visions — confused but 
 realistic in detail, and horridly probable 
 — of his ejectment from the hotel, per- 
 1:1343 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 haps arrest and trial. He wondered 
 what they did in Italy to people 
 who "beat" hotels; and, remember- 
 ing what some one had told him of 
 the dreadfulness of Italian jails, 
 convulsive shudderings seized upon 
 him. 
 
 The ruddy oblongs of sunlight 
 crawled nearer to the east wall of the 
 room, stretching themselves thinner and 
 thinner, until finally they were not there 
 at all, and the room was left in deepen- 
 ing grayness. Carriages, one after the 
 other, in unintermittent succession, rum- 
 bled up to the hotel-entrance beneath 
 the window, bringing goldfish for the 
 aquarium from the music pond on the 
 Pincio and the fountains of Villa Bor- 
 ghese. Wild strains from the Hunga- 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 rian orchestra, rhapsodical twankings of 
 violins, and the runaway arpeggios of a 
 zither crazed with speed-mania, skipped 
 along the corridors and lightly through 
 
 Mellin's door. In his mind's eye he 
 saw the gay crowd in the watery 
 light, the little tables where only 
 five days ago he had sat with the 
 loveliest of all the anemone-like la- 
 dies. . . . 
 
 The beautifully-dressed tea-drinkers 
 were there now, under the green glass 
 dome, prattling and smiling, those peo- 
 ple he had called his own. And as the 
 music sounded louder, faster, wilder 
 and wilder with the gipsy madness — 
 then in that darkening bedchamber his 
 soul became articulate in a cry of hu- 
 miliation : 
 
 C1363 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "God in His mercy forgive me, how 
 raw I was I" 
 
 A VISION came before his closed eyes; 
 the maple-bordered street in Cranston, 
 the long, straight, wide street where 
 Mary Kramer lived; a summer twilight; 
 Mary in her white muslin dress on the 
 veranda steps, and a wistaria vine climb- 
 ing the post beside her, half-embowering 
 her. How cool and sweet and good she 
 looked! How dear — and how kind! — 
 she had always been to him. 
 
 Dusk stole through the windows: the 
 music ceased and the tea-hour was over. 
 The carriages were departing, bearing 
 the gay people who went away laugh- 
 ing, calling last words to one another. 
 
•HISOWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 and, naturally, quite unaware that a 
 young man, who, five days before, had 
 adopted them and called them "his 
 own," was lying in a darkened room 
 above them, and crying like a child upon 
 his pillow. 
 
 ni383 
 
jAT ten o'clock, a page bearing a 
 /% card upon a silver tray 
 X 5^ knocked upon the door, and 
 stared with wide-eyed astonishment at 
 the disordered gentleman who opened 
 it. 
 
 The card was Lady Mount-Rhys- 
 wicke's. Underneath the name was 
 written : 
 
 If you are there will you give me a few 
 minutes ? I am waiting in a cab at the next 
 corner by the fountain. 
 
 Mellin's hand shook as he read. He 
 D393 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 did not doubt that she came as an emis- 
 sary; probably they meant to hound him 
 for payment of the note he had given 
 Sneyd, and at that thought he could 
 have shrieked with hysterical laughter. 
 
 "Do you speak English?" he asked. 
 
 "Spik little. Yes." 
 
 "Who gave you this card?" 
 
 "Coachman," said the boy. "He wait 
 risposta." 
 
 "Tell him to say that I shall be there 
 in five minutes." 
 
 "Fi' minute. Yes. Good-by." 
 
 Mellin was partly dressed — he had 
 risen half an hour earlier and had been 
 distractedly pacing the floor when the 
 page knocked — and he completed his 
 toilet quickly. He passed down the cor- 
 ridors, descended by the stairway (feel- 
 
 HhoH 
 
•H IS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 ing that to use the elevator would be 
 another abuse of the confidence of the 
 hotel company) and slunk across the 
 lobby with the look and the sensations 
 of a tramp who knows that he will be 
 kicked into the street if anybody catches 
 sight of him. 
 
 A closed cab stood near the fountain 
 at the next corner. There was a trunk 
 on the box by the driver, and the roof 
 was piled with bags and rugs. He ap- 
 proached uncertainly. 
 
 "Is — is this — is it Lady Mount-Rhys- 
 wicke?" he stammered pitifully. 
 
 She opened the door. 
 
 "Yes. Will you get in? We '11 just 
 drive round the block if you don't mind. 
 I '11 bring you back here in ten minutes." 
 And when he had tremulously complied, 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "Avanti, cocchiere" she called to the 
 driver, and the tired little cab-horse be- 
 gan to draw them slowly along the de- 
 serted street. 
 
 Lady Mount-Rhyswicke maintained 
 silence for a time, while her companion 
 waited, his heart pounding with dread- 
 ful apprehensions. Finally she gave a 
 short, hard laugh and said : 
 
 "I saw your face by the corner light. 
 Been havin' a hard day of it?" 
 
 The fear of breaking down kept him 
 from answering. He gulped painfully 
 once or twice, and turned his face away 
 from her. Light enough from a street- 
 lamp shone in for her to see. 
 
 "I was rather afraid you 'd refuse," 
 she said seriously. "Really, I wonder 
 you were willin' to come !" 
 CH23 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 "I was — I was afraid not to." He 
 choked out the confession with the reck- 
 lessness of final despair. 
 
 "So?" she said, with another short 
 laugh. Then she resumed her even, 
 tired monotone: "Your little friend 
 Cooley's note this morning gave us all a 
 rather fair notion as to what you must be 
 thinkin' of us. He seems to have found 
 a sort of walkin' 'Who's- Who-on-the- 
 Continent' since last night. Pity for 
 some people he did n't find it before ! I 
 don't think I 'm sympathetic with your 
 little Cooley. I 'guess,' as you Yankees 
 say, 'he can stand it.' But" — hervoicesud- 
 denly became louder — "I 'm not in the 
 business of robbin' babies and orphans, no, 
 my dear friends, nor of helpin' anybody 
 else to rob them either I — Here you are !" 
 
 ChsH 
 
HIS-OWNPEOPLE- 
 
 She thrust into his hand a small 
 packet, securely wrapped in paper and 
 fastened with rubber bands. "There 's 
 your block of express checks for six hun- 
 dred dollars and your I O U to Sneyd 
 with it. Take better care of it next 
 time." 
 
 He had been tremulous enough, but 
 at that his whole body began to shake 
 violently. 
 
 "What!" he quavered. 
 
 "I say, take better care of it next 
 time," she said, dropping again into her 
 monotone. "I did n't have such an easy 
 time gettin' it back from them as you 
 might think. I 've got rather a sore 
 wrist, in fact." 
 
 She paused at an inarticulate sound 
 from him. 
 
 ni443 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE" 
 
 "Oh, that 's soon mended," she 
 laughed drearily. "The truth is, it 's 
 been a good thing for me — your turning 
 up. They 're gettin' in too deep water 
 for me, Helene and her friends, and I 've 
 broken with the lot, or they 've broken 
 with me, whichever it is. We could n't 
 hang together after the fightin' we 've 
 done to-day. I had to do a lot of threat- 
 enin' and things. Welch was ugly, so I 
 had to be ugly too. Never mind" — she 
 checked an uncertain effort of his to 
 speak — "I saw what you were like, soon 
 as we sat down at the table last night — 
 how new you were and all that. It 
 needed only a glance to see that Helene 
 had made a mistake about you. She 'd 
 got a notion you were a millionaire like 
 the little Cooley, but I knew better from 
 1:1453 
 
H IS-OWN-PEOPLE' 
 
 your talk. She 's clever, but she 's 
 French, and she can't get it out of her 
 head that you could be an American and 
 not a millionaire. Of course, they all 
 knew better when you brought out your 
 express checks and talked like somebody 
 in one of the old-time story-books about 
 'debts of honor.' Even Helene under- 
 stood then that the express checks were 
 all you had." She laughed. "I did n't 
 have any trouble gettin' the note back I" 
 She paused again for a moment, then 
 resumed: "There is n't much use our 
 goin' over it all, but I want you to know 
 one thing. Your little friend Cooley 
 made it rather clear that he accused 
 Helene and me of signalin'. Well, I 
 did n't. Perhaps that 's the reason you 
 did n't lose as much as he did; I can't 
 1:146: 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 say. And one thing more : all this is n't 
 goin' to do you any harm. I 'm not very 
 keen about philosophy and religion and 
 that, but I believe if you 're let in for a 
 lot of trouble, and it only half kills you, 
 you can get some good of it." 
 
 "Do you think," he stammered — "do 
 you think I 'm worth saving?" 
 
 She smiled faintly and said : 
 
 "You 've probably got a sweetheart in 
 the States somewhere — a nice girl, a 
 pretty young thing who goes to church 
 and thinks you 're a great man, perhaps? 
 Is it so?" 
 
 "I am not worthy," he began, choked 
 suddenly, then finished — "to breathe the 
 same air I" 
 
 "That 's quite right," Lady Mount- 
 Rhyswicke assured him. "Think what 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 you 'd think of her if she 'd got herself 
 into the same sort of scrape by doin' the 
 things you 've been doin' ! And remem- 
 ber that if you ever feel impatient with 
 her, or have any temptations to superior- 
 ity in times to come. And yet" — for the 
 moment she spoke earnestly — "you go 
 back to your little girl, but don't you tell 
 her a word of this. You could n't even 
 tell her that meetin' you has helped me, 
 because she would n't understand." 
 
 "Nor do I. I can't." 
 
 "Oh, it 's simple. I saw that if I was 
 gettin' down to where I was robbin' 
 babies and orphans . . ." The cab 
 halted. "Here 's your corner. I told 
 him only to go round the block and come 
 back. Good-by. I 'm off for Amalfi. 
 It 's a good place to rest." 
 
HIS-OWN-PEOPLE 
 
 He got out dazedly, and the driver 
 cracked his whip over the little horse; 
 but Mellin lifted a detaining hand. 
 
 "A spef" called Lady Mount-Rhys- 
 wicke to the driver. "What is it, Mr. 
 Mellin?" 
 
 "I can't — I can't look you in the 
 face," he stammered, his attitude per- 
 fectly corroborative of his words. "I 
 would — oh, I would kneel in the dust 
 here before you " 
 
 "Some of the poetry you told me you 
 write?" 
 
 "I 've never written any poetry," he 
 said, not looking up. "Perhaps I can — 
 now. What I want to say is — I 'm so 
 ashamed of it — I don't know how to get 
 the words out, but I must. I may never 
 see you again, and I must. I 'm sorry — 
 lH9l 
 
•HIS-OWN-PEOPLE- 
 
 please try to forgive me — I was n't my- 
 self when I did it " 
 
 "Blurt it out; that 's the best way." 
 
 "I 'm sorry," he floundered — "I 'm 
 sorry I kissed you." 
 
 She laughed her tired laugh and said 
 in her tired voice the last words he was 
 ever destined to hear from her : 
 
 "Oh, I don't mind, if you don't. It 
 was so innocent, it was what decided 
 me." 
 
 One of the hundreds of good saints 
 that belong to Rome must have over- 
 heard her and pitied the young man, for 
 it is ascribable only to some such special 
 act of mercy that Mellin understood 
 (and he did) exactly what she meant. 
 
 ( THE END ) 
 
PART II. 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 
 
w. 
 
 HEN Alonzo Rawson took his seat as the 
 Senator from Stackpole in the upper branch of 
 the General Assembly of the State, an expression 
 of pleasure and of greatness appeared to be 
 permanently imprinted upon his countenance. 
 He felt that if he had not quite arrived at all 
 which he meant to make his own, at least he 
 had emerged upon the arena where he was to 
 win it, and he looked about him for a few other 
 strong spirits with whom to construct a focus of 
 power which should control the senate. The 
 young man had not long to look, for within a 
 week after the beginning of the session these 
 others showed themselves to his view, rising 
 above the general level of mediocrity and tim- 
 idity, party-leaders and chiefs of faction, men 
 who were on their feet continually, speaking 
 half-a-dozen times a day, freely and loudly. To 
 
 165 
 
156 m THE AKENA 
 
 these, and that house at large, he felt it neces- 
 sary to introduce himself by a speech which must 
 prove him one of the elect, and he awaited im- 
 patiently an opening. 
 
 Alonzo had no timidity himself. He was not 
 one of those who first try their voices on motions 
 to adjourn, written in form and handed out to 
 novices by presiding oflficers and leaders. He was 
 too conscious of his own gifts, and he had been 
 "accustomed to speaking" ever since his days 
 in the Stackpole City Seminary. He was under 
 the impression, also, that his appearance alone 
 would command attention from his colleagues 
 and the gallery. He was tall; his hair was long, 
 with a rich waviness, rippling over both brow and 
 collar, and he had, by years of endeavour, suc- 
 ceeded in moulding his features to present an 
 aspect of stern and thoughtful majesty when- 
 ever he "spoke." 
 
 The opportunity to show his fellows that new 
 greatness was among them delayed not over- 
 long, and Senator Rawson arose, long and bony 
 in his best clothes, to address the senate with a 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 157 
 
 huge voice in denunciation of the " Sunday Base- 
 ball Bill," then upon second reading. The classi- 
 cal references, which, as a born orator, he felt it 
 necessary to introduce, were received with ac- 
 clamations which the gavel of the Lieutenant- 
 Governor had no power to still. 
 
 "What led to the De-cline and Fall of the 
 Roman Empire?" he exclaimed. "I await an 
 answer from the advocates of this <ie-generate 
 measure! I demand an answer from them! Let 
 me hear from them on that subject! Why don't 
 they speak up .'' They can't give one. Not because 
 they ain't familiar with history, no sir! That's 
 not the reason! It's because they daren't, because 
 their answer would have to go on record against 
 'em ! Don't any of you try to raise it against me 
 that I ain't speakin' to the point, for I tell you 
 that when you encourage Sunday Baseball, or 
 any kind of Sabbath-breakin' on Sunday, you're 
 tryin' to start this State on the downward path 
 that beset Rome! I'll tell you what ruined it. The 
 Roman Empire started out to be the greatest 
 nation on earth, and they had a good start, too. 
 
1S8 IN THE ARENA 
 
 just like the United States has got to-day. Then 
 what happened to 'em ? Why, them old ancient 
 fellers got more interested in athletic games and 
 gladiatorial combats and racing and all kinds of 
 out-door sports, and bettin' on 'em, than they 
 were in oratory, or literature, or charitable insti- 
 tutions and good works of all kinds! At first they 
 were moderate and the country was prosperous. 
 But six days in the week wouldn't content 'em, 
 and they went at it all the time, so that at last 
 they gave up the seventh day to their sports, the 
 way this bill wants us to do, and from that time 
 on the result was (Ze-generacy and de-gredation! 
 You better remember that lesson, my friends, 
 and don't try to sink this State to the level of 
 Rome!" 
 
 When Alonzo Rawson wiped his dampened 
 brow, and dropped into his chair, he was satis- 
 fied to the core of his heart with the effect of his 
 maiden effort. There was not one eye in the place 
 that was not fixed upon him and shining with 
 surprise and delight, while the kindly Lieutenant- 
 Governor, his face very red, rapped for order. 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 169 
 
 The young senator across the aisle leaned over 
 and shook Alonzo's hand excitedly. 
 
 "That was beautiful, Senator Rawson!" he 
 whispered. "I'm for the bill, but I can respect a 
 masterly opponent." 
 
 "I thank you, Senator Truslow," Alonzo re- 
 turned graciously. " I am glad to have your good 
 opinion. Senator." 
 
 " You have it, Senator," said Truslow enthu- 
 siastically. "I hope you intend to speak often?" 
 
 "I do. Senator. I intend to make myself 
 heard," the other answered gravely, "upon all 
 questions of moment." 
 
 "You will fill a great place among us. Sen- 
 ator!" 
 
 Then Alonzo Rawson wondered if he had 
 not underestimated his neighbour across the 
 aisle; he had formed an opinion of Truslow 
 as one of small account and no power, for 
 he had observed that, although this was Trus- 
 low's second term, he had not once demanded 
 recognition nor attempted to take part in a de- 
 bate. Instead, he seemed to spend most of his 
 
160 IN THE ARENA 
 
 time frittering over some desk work, though now 
 and then he walked up and down the aisles talk- 
 ing in a low voice to various senators. How such 
 a man could have been elected at all, Alonzo 
 failed to understand. Also, Truslow was physi- 
 cally inconsequent, in his colleague's estimation 
 — "a little insignificant, dudish kind of a man," 
 he had thought; one whom he would have darkly 
 suspected of cigarettes had he not been dumb- 
 founded to behold Truslow smoking an old black 
 pipe in the lobby. The Senator from Stackpole 
 had looked over the other's clothes with a dis- 
 approval that amounted to bitterness. Truslow's 
 attire reminded him of pictures in New York 
 magazines, or the dress of boys newly home from 
 college, he didn't know which, but he did know 
 that it was contemptible. Consequently, after re- 
 ceiving the young man's congratulations, Alonzo 
 was conscious of the keenest surprise at his own 
 feeling that there might be something in him 
 after all. 
 
 He decided to look him over again, more care- 
 fully to take the measure of one who had shown 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 161 
 
 himself so frankly an admirer. Waiting, there- 
 fore, a few moments until he felt sure that Trus- 
 low's gaze had ceased to rest upon himself, he 
 turned to bend a surreptitious but piercing scru- 
 tiny upon his neighbour. His glance, however, 
 sweeping across Truslow's shoulder toward the 
 face, suddenly encountered another pair of eyes 
 beyond, so intently fixed upon himself that he 
 started. The clash was like two search-lights 
 meeting — and the glorious brown eyes that shot 
 into Alonzo's were not the eyes of Truslow. 
 
 Truslow's desk was upon the outer aisle, and 
 along the wall were placed comfortable leather 
 chairs and settees, originally intended for the use 
 of members of the upper house, but nearly always 
 occupied by their wives and daughters, or " lady- 
 lobbyists," or other women spectators. Leaning 
 back with extraordinary grace, in the chair near- 
 est Truslow, sat the handsomest woman Alonzo 
 had ever seen in his life. Her long coat of soft 
 grey fur was unrecognizable to him in connection 
 with any familiar breed of squirrel; her broad 
 flat hat of the same fur was wound with a grey 
 
162 IN THE ARENA 
 
 veil, underneath which her heavy brown hair 
 seemed to exhale a mysterious glow, and never, 
 not even in a lithograph, had he seen features so 
 regular or a skin so clear! And to look into her 
 eyes seemed to Alonzo like diving deep into clear 
 water and turning to stare up at the light. 
 
 His own eyes fell first. In the breathless awk- 
 wardness that beset him they seemed to stumble 
 shamefully down to his desk, like a country-boy 
 getting back to his seat after a thrashing on the 
 teacher's platform. For the lady's gaze, pro- 
 foundly liquid as it was, had not been friendly. 
 
 Alonzo Rawson had neither the habit of pet- 
 ty analysis, nor the inclination toward it; yet 
 there arose within him a wonder at his own emo- 
 tion, at its strangeness and the violent reaction 
 of it. A moment ago his soul had been steeped in 
 satisfaction over the figure he had cut with his 
 speech and the extreme enthusiasm which had 
 been accorded it — an extraordinarily pleasant 
 feeling: suddenly this was gone, and in its place 
 he found himself almost choking with a dazed 
 sense of having been scathed, and at the same 
 
MBS. PROTHEROE 163 
 
 time understood in a way in which he did not 
 understand himself. And yet — he and this most 
 unusual lady had been so mutually conscious of 
 each other in their mysterious interchange that 
 he felt almost acquainted with her. Why, then, 
 should his head be hot with resentment ? Nobody 
 had said anything to him ! 
 
 He seized upon the fattest of the expensive 
 books supplied to him by the State, opened it 
 with emphasis and began not to read it, with 
 abysmal abstraction, tinglingly alert to the cir- 
 cumstance that Truslow was holding a low- 
 toned but lively conversation with the unknown. 
 Her laugh came to him, at once musical, quiet, 
 and of a quality which irritated him into saying 
 bitterly to himself that he guessed there was just 
 as much refinement in Stackpole as there was in 
 the Capital Gity, and just as many old families ! 
 The clerk calling his vote upon the "Baseball 
 Bill" at that moment, he roared "No!" in a tone 
 which was profane. It seemed to him that he was 
 avenging himself upon somebody for something 
 and it gave him a great deal of satisfaction. 
 
164 IN THE ARENA 
 
 He returned immediately to his imitation of 
 Archimedes, only relaxing the intensity of his 
 attention to the text (which blurred into jargon 
 before his fixed gaze) when he heard that light 
 laugh again. He pursed his lips, looked up at the 
 ceiling as if slightly puzzled by some profound 
 question beyond the reach of womankind; solved 
 it almost immediately, and, setting his hand to 
 pen and paper, wrote the capital letter "O" sev- 
 eral hundred times on note-paper furnished by 
 the State. So oblivious was he, apparently, to 
 everything but the question of statecraft which 
 occupied him, that he did not even look up when 
 the morning's session was adjourned and the law- 
 makers began to pass noisily out, until Truslow 
 stretched an arm across the aisle and touched him 
 upon the shoulder. 
 
 "In a moment, Senator!" answered Alonzo in 
 his deepest chest tones. He made it a very short 
 moment, indeed, for he had a wild, breath-taking 
 suspicion of what was coming. 
 
 "I want you to meet Mrs. Protheroe, Senator," 
 said Truslow, rising, as Rawson, after folding 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 166 
 
 his writings with infinite care, placed them in his 
 breast pocket. 
 
 "I am pleased to make your acquaintance, 
 ma'am," Alonzo said in a loud, firm voice, as he 
 got to his feet, though the place grew vague about 
 him when the lady stretched a charming, slen- 
 der, gloved hand to him across Truslow's desk. 
 He gave it several solemn shakes. 
 
 " We shouldn't have disturbed you, perhaps ?" 
 she asked, smiling radiantly upon him. "You 
 were at some important work, I'm afraid." 
 
 He met her eyes again, and their beauty and 
 the thoughtful kindliness of them fairly took his 
 breath. "I am the chairman, ma'am," he replied, 
 swallowing, "of the committee on drains and 
 dikes." 
 
 " I knew it was something of great moment," 
 she said gravely, "but I was anxious to tell you 
 that I was interested in your speech." 
 
 A few minutes later, without knowing how he 
 had got his hat and coat from the cloak-room, 
 Alonzo Rawson found himself walking slowly 
 through the marble vistas of the State house to 
 
166 IN THE AHENA 
 
 the great outer doors with the lady and Truslow. 
 They were talking inconsequently of the weather, 
 and of various legislators, but Alonzo did not 
 know it. He vaguely formed replies to her ques- 
 tions and he hardly realized what the questions 
 were; he was too stirringly conscious of the rich 
 quiet of her voice and of the caress of the grey fur 
 of her cloak when the back of his hand touched 
 it — rather accidentally — now and then, as they 
 moved on together. 
 
 It was a cold, quick air to which they emerged 
 and Alonzo, daring to look at her, found that 
 she had pulled the veil down over her face, the 
 colour of which, in the keen wind, was like that 
 of June roses seen through morning mists. At 
 the curb a long, low, rakish black motor-car was 
 in waiting, the driver a mere swaddled cylinder 
 of fur. 
 
 Truslow, opening the little door of the ton- 
 neau, offered his hand to the lady. "Come over 
 to the club. Senator, and lunch with me," he said. 
 "Mrs. Protheroe won't mind dropping us there 
 on her way." 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 187 
 
 That was an eerie ride for Alonzo, whose feet 
 were faUing upon strange places. His pulses 
 jumped and his eyes swam with the tears of 
 unlawful speed, but his big ungloved hand 
 tingled not with the cold so much as with the 
 touch of that divine grey fur upon his little finger. 
 
 "You intend to make many speeches, Mr. 
 Truslow tells me," he heard the rich voice say- 
 ing. 
 
 "Yes ma'am," he summoned himself to an- 
 swer. " I expect I will. Yes ma'am." He paused, 
 and then repeated, "Yes ma'am." 
 
 She looked at him for a moment. "But you 
 will do some work, too, won't you?" she asked 
 slowly. 
 
 Her intention in this passed by Alonzo at the 
 time. "Yes ma'am," he answered. "The com- 
 mittee work interests me greatly, especially drains 
 and dikes." 
 
 "I have heard," she said, as if searching his 
 opinion, "that almost as much is accomplished 
 in the committee-rooms as on the floor ? There — 
 and in the lobby and in the hotels and clubs ?" 
 
168 IN THE ARENA 
 
 "I don't have much to do with that!" he re- 
 turned quickly. "I guess none of them lobbyists 
 will get much out of me! I even sent back all their 
 railroad tickets. They needn't come near me!" 
 
 After a pause which she may have filled with 
 unexpressed admiration, she ventured, almost 
 timidly: "Do you remember that it was said that 
 Napoleon once attributed the secret of his power 
 over other men to one quality ?" 
 
 "I am an admirer of Napoleon," returned the 
 Senator from Stackpole. "I admire all great 
 men." 
 
 "He said that he held men by his reserve." 
 
 "It can be done," observed Alonzo, and stop- 
 ped, feeling that it was more reserved to add 
 nothing to the sentence. 
 
 "But I suppose that such a policy," she smiled 
 upon him inquiringly, "wouldn't have helped 
 him much with women ? " 
 
 "No," he agreed immediately. "My opinion 
 is that a man ought to tell a good woman every- 
 thing. What is more sacred than — " 
 
 The car, turning a corner much too quickly. 
 
MRS. PHOTHEROE 169 
 
 performed a gymnastic squirm about an unex- 
 pected street-car and the speech ended in a gasp, 
 as Alonzo, not of his own volition, half rose and 
 pressed his cheek closely against hers. Instanta- 
 neous as it was, his heart leaped violently, but not 
 with fear. Could all the things of his life that had 
 seemed beautiful have been compressed into one 
 instant, it would not have brought him even the 
 suggestion of the wild shock of joy of that one, 
 wherein he knew the glamorous perfume of Mrs. 
 Protheroe's brown hair and felt her cold cheek 
 firm against his, with only the grey veil between. 
 
 " I'm afraid this driver of mine will kill me 
 some day," she said, laughing and composedly 
 straightening her hat. "Do you care for big 
 machines.?" 
 
 " Yes ma'am," he answered huskily. "I haven't 
 been in many." 
 
 "Then I'll take you again," said Mrs. Pro- 
 theroe. "If you like I'll come down to the State 
 house and take you out for a run in the country." 
 
 "When.!^" said the lost young man, staring 
 at her with his mouth open. " When ?" 
 
170 IN THE ARENA 
 
 " Saturday afternoon if you like. I'll be there at 
 two." 
 
 They were in front of the club and Truslow 
 had already jumped out. Mrs. Protheroe gave 
 him her hand and they exchanged a glance sig- 
 nificant of something more than a friendly good- 
 bye. Indeed, one might have hazarded that there 
 was something almost businesslike about it. The 
 confused Senator from Stackpole, climbing out 
 reluctantly, observed it not, nor could he have 
 understood, even if he had seen, that delicate 
 signal which passed between his two companions. 
 
 When he was upon the ground Mrs. Pro- 
 theroe extended her hand without speaking, but 
 her lips formed the word, "Saturday." Then she 
 was carried away quickly, while Alonzo, his 
 heart hammering, stood looking after her, born 
 into a strange world, the touch of the grey fur 
 upon his little finger, the odour of her hair faintly 
 about him, one side of his face red, the other pale. 
 
 "To-day is Wednesday," he said, half aloud. 
 
 "Come on. Senator." Truslow took his arm 
 and turned him toward the club doors. 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 171 
 
 The other looked upon his new friend vaguely. 
 "Why, I forgot to thank her for the ride," he 
 exclaimed. 
 
 "You'll have other chances, Senator," Trus- 
 low assured him. "Mrs. Protheroe has a hobby 
 for studying politics and she expects to come 
 down often. She has plenty of time — she's a 
 widow, you know." 
 
 "I hope you didn't think," responded Alonzo 
 indignantly, "that I thought she was a married 
 woman!" 
 
 After lunch they walked back to the State 
 house together, Truslow regarding his thought- 
 ful companion with sidelong whimsicalness. Mrs. 
 Protheroe's question, suggestive of a diflference 
 between work and speechmaking, had recurred 
 to Alonzo, and he had determined to make him- 
 self felt, oflF the floor as well as upon it. He set to 
 this with a fine energy, that afternoon, in his 
 committee-room, and the Senator from Stack- 
 pole knew his subject. On drains and dikes he 
 had no equal. He spoke convincingly to his col- 
 leagues of the committee upon every bill that 
 
172 IN THE ARENA 
 
 was before them, and he compelled their hum- 
 blest respect. He went earnestly at it, indeed, 
 and sat very late that night, in his room at a near- 
 by boarding house, studying bills, trying to keep 
 his mind upon them and not to think of his 
 strange morning and of Saturday. Finally his 
 neighbour in the next room. Senator Ezra Trum- 
 bull, long abed, was awakened by his praying and 
 groaned slightly. Trumbull meant to speak to 
 Rawson about his prayers, for Trumbull was an 
 early one to bed and they woke him every night. 
 The partition was flimsy and Alonzo addressed 
 his Maker in the loud voice of one accustomed 
 to talking across wide out-of-door spaces. Trum- 
 bull considered it especially unnecessary in the 
 city; though, as a citizen of a county which loved 
 but little his neighbour's district, he felt that in 
 Stackpole there was good reason for a person to 
 shout his prayers at the top of his voice and even 
 then have small chance to carry through the dis- 
 tance. Still, it was a delicate matter to mention 
 and he put it off from day to day, 
 Thursday passed slowly for Alonzo Rawson, 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 173 
 
 nor was his voice lifted in debate. There was 
 little but routine; and the main interest of the 
 chamber was in the lobbying that was being 
 done upon the "Sunday Baseball Bill" which 
 had passed to its third reading and would come 
 up for final disposition within a fortnight. This 
 was the measure which Alonzo had set his heart 
 upon defeating. It was a simple enough bill: it 
 provided, in substance, that baseball might be 
 played on Sunday by professionals in the State 
 capital, which was proud of its league team. 
 Naturally, it was denounced by clergymen, and 
 deputations of ministers and committees from 
 women's religious societies were constantly ar- 
 riving at the State house to protest against its 
 passage. The Senator from Stackpole reassured 
 all of these with whom he talked, and was one 
 of their staunchest allies and supporters. He was 
 active in leading the wavering among his col- 
 leagues, or even the inimical, out to meet and 
 face the deputations. It was in this occupation 
 that he was engaged, on Friday afternoon, when 
 he received a shock. 
 
174 IN THE ARENA 
 
 A committee of women from a church society 
 was waiting in the corridor, and he had rounded- 
 up a reluctant half-dozen senators and led them 
 forth to be interrogated as to their intentions 
 regarding the bill. The committee and the law- 
 makers soon distributed themselves into little 
 argumentative clumps, and Alonzo found him- 
 self in the centre of these, with one of the ladies 
 who had unfortunately — but, in her enthusiasm, 
 without misgivings — begun a reproachful ap- 
 peal to an advocate of the bill whose name was 
 Goldstein. 
 
 "Senator Goldstein," she exclaimed, "I could 
 not believe it when I heard that you were in favour 
 of this measure! I have heard my husband speak 
 in the highest terms of your old father. May I ask 
 you what he thinks of it.? If you voted for the 
 desecration of Sunday by a low baseball game, 
 could you dare go home and face that good old 
 man.?" 
 
 "Yes, madam," said Goldstein mildly; "we 
 are both Jews." 
 
 A low laugh rippled out from near-by, and 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 175 
 
 Alonzo, turning almost violently, beheld his lady 
 of the furs. She was leaning back against a broad 
 pilaster, her hands sweeping the same big coat 
 behind her, her face turned toward him, but her 
 eyes, sparklingly delighted, resting upon Gold- 
 stein. Under the broad fur hat she made a pic- 
 ture as enraging, to Alonzo Rawson, as it was 
 bewitching. She appeared not to see him, to be 
 quite unconscious of him — and he believed it. 
 Truslow and five or six members of both houses 
 were about her, and they all seemed to be bending 
 eagerly toward her. Alonzo was furious with her. 
 Her laugh lingered upon the air for a moment, 
 then her glance swept round the other way, 
 omitting the Senator from Stackpole, who, im- 
 mediately putting into practice a reserve which 
 would have astonished Napoleon, swung about 
 and quitted the deputation without a word of 
 farewell or explanation. He turned into the cloak- 
 room and paced the floor for three minutes with 
 a malevolence which awed the coloured atten- 
 dants into not brushing his coat; but, when he 
 returned to the corridor, cautious inquiries ad- 
 
178 IN THE ARENA 
 
 dressed to the tobacconist, elicited the informa- 
 tion that the handsome lady with Senator Trus- 
 low had departed. 
 
 Truslow himself had not gone. He was loung- 
 ing in his seat when Alonzo returned and was 
 genially talkative. The latter refrained from re- 
 plying in kind, not altogether out of reserve, but 
 more because of a dim suspicion (which rose 
 within him, the third time Truslow called him 
 "Senator" in one sentence) that his first opin- 
 ion of the young man as a light-minded person 
 might have been correct. 
 
 There was no session the following afternoon, 
 but Alonzo watched the street from the windows 
 of his committee-room, which overlooked the 
 splendid breadth of stone steps leading down 
 from the great doors to the pavement. There 
 were some big bookcases in the room, whose 
 glass doors served as mirrors in which he more 
 and more sternly regarded the soft image of an 
 entirely new grey satin tie, while the conviction 
 grew within him that (arguing from her behaviour 
 of the previous day) she would not come, and that 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 177 
 
 the Stackpole girls were nobler by far at heart 
 than many who might wear a king's-ransom's- 
 worth of jewels round their throats at the opera- 
 house in a large city. This sentiment was heartily 
 confirmed by the clock when it marked half -past 
 two. He faced the bookcase doors and struck his 
 breast, his open hand falling across the grey tie 
 with tragic violence; after which, turning for the 
 last time to the windows, he uttered a loud ex- 
 clamation and, laying hands upon an ulster and 
 a grey felt hat, each as new as the satin tie, ran 
 hurriedly from the room. The black automobile 
 was waiting. 
 
 "I thought it possible you might see me from 
 a window," said Mrs. Protheroe as he opened 
 the little door. 
 
 '* I was just coming out," he returned, gasping 
 for breath. " I thought — from yesterday — 
 you'd probably forgotten." 
 
 "Why 'from yesterday' ?" she asked. 
 
 "I thought — I thought — " He faltered to a 
 stop as the full, glorious sense of her presence 
 overcame him. She wore the same veil. 
 
178 IN THE ARENA 
 
 You thought I did not see you yesterday in 
 the corridor?" 
 
 " I thought you might have acted more — 
 
 more — " 
 
 "More cordially?" 
 
 "Well," he said, looking down at his hands, 
 "more like you knew we'd been introduced." 
 
 At that she sat silent, looking away from him, 
 and he, daring a quick glance at her, found 
 that he might let his eyes remain upon her face. 
 That was a dangerous place for eyes to rest, yet 
 Alonzo Rawson was anxious for the risk. The car 
 flew along the even asphalt on its way to the coun- 
 try like a wild goose on a long slant of wind, and, 
 with his foolish fury melted inexplicably into 
 honey, Alonzo looked at her — and looked at 
 her — till he would have given an arm for 
 another quick corner and a street-car to send his 
 cheek against that veiled, cold cheek of hers 
 again. It was not until they reached the alter- 
 nate vacant lots and bleak Queen Anne cottages 
 of the city's ragged edge that she broke the si- 
 lence. 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 179 
 
 "You were talking to some one else," she said 
 almost inaudibly. 
 
 "Yes ma'am, Goldstein, but — " 
 
 "Oh, no!" She turned toward him, lifting her 
 hand. "You were quite the lion among ladies." 
 
 "I don't know what you mean, Mrs. Proth- 
 eroe," he said, truthfully. 
 
 "What were you talking to all those women 
 about.?" 
 
 "It was about the 'Sunday Baseball Bill.'" 
 
 "Ah! The bill you attacked in your speech, 
 last Wednesday ? " 
 
 "Yes ma'am." 
 
 "I hear you haven't made any speeches since 
 then," she said indifferently. 
 
 "No ma'am," he answered gently. "I kind 
 of got the idea that I'd better lay low for a while, 
 at first, and get in some quiet hard work." 
 
 " I understand. You are a man of intensely re- 
 served nature." 
 
 "With men,"said Alonzo, "I am. With ladies 
 I am not so much so. I think a good woman 
 ought to be told — " 
 
180 m THE ARENA 
 
 "But you are interested," she interrupted, "in 
 defeating that bill?" 
 
 "Yes ma'am," he returned. "It is an in- 
 iquitous measure." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "Mrs. Protheroe!" he exclaimed, taken aback. 
 "I thought all the ladies were against it. My own 
 mother wrote to me from Stackpole that she'd 
 rather see me in my grave than votin' for such a 
 bill, and I'd rather see myself there!" 
 
 "But are you sure that you understand it ?" 
 
 "I only know it desecrates the Sabbath. That's 
 enough for me!" 
 
 She leaned toward him and his breath came 
 quickly. 
 
 "No. You're wrong," she said, and rested the 
 tips of her fingers upon his sleeve. 
 
 "I don't understand why — why you say 
 that," he faltered. " It sounds kind of — sur- 
 prising to me — " 
 
 "Listen," she said. "Perhaps Mr. Truslow 
 told you that I am studying such things. I do 
 not want to be an idle woman; I want to be of use 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 181 
 
 to the world, even if it must be only in small 
 ways." 
 
 "I think that is a noble ambition!" he ex- 
 claimed. "I think all good women ought — " 
 
 "Wait," she interrupted gently. "Now, that 
 bill is a worthy one, though it astonishes you to 
 hear me say so. Perhaps you don't understand 
 the conditions. Sunday is the labouring-man's 
 only day of recreation — and what recreation is 
 he offered.?" 
 
 "He ought to go to church," said Alonzo 
 promptly. 
 
 "But the fact is that he doesn't — not often — 
 not at all in the afternoon. Wouldn't it be well 
 to give him some wholesome way of employing 
 his Sunday afternoons ? This bill provides for 
 just that, and it keeps him away from drinking 
 too, for it forbids the sale of liquor on the 
 grounds." 
 
 "Yes, I know," said Alonzo plaintively. "But 
 it ain't right! I was raised to respect the Sabbath 
 and — " 
 
 "Ah, that's what you should do! You think I 
 
182 IN THE ARENA 
 
 could believe in anything that wouldn't make it 
 better and more sacred?" 
 
 "Oh, no, ma'am!" he cried reproachfully. 
 "It's only that I ion't see — " 
 
 "I am telling you," She lifted her veil and let 
 him have the full dazzle of her beauty. "Do you 
 know that many thousands of labouring people 
 spend their Sundays drinking and carousing 
 about the low country road-houses because the 
 game is played at such places on Sunday ? They 
 go there because they never get a chance to see it 
 played in the city. And don't you understand that 
 there would be no Sunday liquor trade, no work- 
 ing-men poisoning themselves every seventh day 
 in the low groggeries, as hundreds of them do 
 now, if they had something to see that would 
 interest them ? — something as wholesome and 
 fine as this sport would be, under the conditions 
 of this bill; something to keep them in the open 
 air, something to bring a little gaiety into their 
 dull lives!" Her voice had grown louder and it 
 shook a little, with a rising emotion, though its 
 sweetness was only the more poignant. " Oh, my 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 183 
 
 dear Senator," she cried, "don't you see how 
 wrong you are? Don't you want to help these 
 poor people?" 
 
 Her fingers, which had tightened upon his 
 sleeve, relaxed and she leaned back, pulling the 
 veil down over her face as if wishing to conceal 
 from him that her lips trembled slightly ; then rest- 
 ing her arm upon the leather cushions, she turned 
 her head away from him, staring fixedly into the 
 gaunt beech woods lining the country road 
 along which they were now coursing. For a time 
 she heard nothing from him, and the only 
 sound was the monotonous chug of the machine. 
 
 " I suppose you think it rather shocking to hear 
 a woman talking practically of such common- 
 place things," she said at last, in a cold voice, 
 just loud enough to be heard. 
 
 "No ma'am, " he said huskily. 
 
 "Then what do you think?" she cried, turning 
 toward him again with a quick imperious gesture. 
 
 " I think I'd better go back to Stackpole," he an- 
 swered very slowly, " and resign my job. I don't 
 see as I've got any business in the Legislature. " 
 
184 IN THE ARENA 
 
 "I don't understand you." 
 
 He shook his head mournfully. " It's a simple 
 enough matter. I've studied out a good many bills 
 and talked 'em over and I've picked up some in- 
 fluence and — " 
 
 " I know you have. " she interrupted eagerly. 
 "Mr. Truslow says that the members of your 
 drains and dikes committee follow your vote on 
 every bill. " 
 
 "Yes ma'am," said Alonzo Rawson meekly, 
 "but I expect they oughtn't to. I've had a lesson 
 this afternoon." 
 
 "You mean to say — " 
 
 "I mean that I didn't know what I was doing 
 about that baseball bill. I was just pig-headedly 
 goin' ahead against it, not knowing nothing about 
 the conditions, and it took a lady to show me 
 what they were. I would have done a wrong 
 thing if you hadn't stopped me. " 
 
 "You mean," she cried, her splendid eyes 
 widening with excitement and delight; "you 
 mean that you — that you — " 
 
 "I mean that I will vote for the bill!" He 
 
MKS. PROTHEROE 185 
 
 struck his clenched fist upon his knee. " I come to 
 the Legislature to do right!" 
 
 "You will, ah, you will do right in this!" Mrs. 
 Protheroe thrust up her veil again and her face 
 was flushed and radiant with triumph. "And 
 you'll work, and you'll make a speech for the 
 bill?" 
 
 At this the righteous exaltation began rather 
 abruptly to simmer down in the soul of Alonzo 
 Rawson. He saw the consequences of too violent- 
 ly reversing, and knew how diflicult they might 
 be to face. 
 
 "Well, not — not exactly," he said weakly. 
 "I expect our best plan would be for me to 
 lay kind of low and not say any more about 
 the bill at all. Of course, I'll quit workin' 
 against it; and on the roll-call I'll edge up 
 close to the clerk and say 'Aye' so that only 
 him'U hear me. That's done every day — and 
 I — well, I don't just exactly like to come out 
 too publicly for it, after my speech and all I've 
 done against it. " 
 
 She looked at him sharply for a short second, 
 
186 IN THE ARENA 
 
 and then offered him her hand and said: "Let's 
 shake hands now, on the vote. Think what a 
 triumph it is for me to know that I helped to 
 show you the right. " 
 
 "Yes ma'am," he answered confusedly, too 
 much occupied with shaking her hand to know 
 what he said. She spoke one word in an under- 
 tone to the driver and the machine took the 
 very shortest way back to the city. 
 
 After this excursion, several days passed, before 
 Mrs. Protheroe came to the State house again. 
 Rawson was bending over the desk of Senator 
 Josephus Battle, the white-bearded leader of 
 the opposition to the "Sunday Baseball Bill," 
 and was explaining to him the intricacies of a 
 certain drainage measure, when Battle, whose 
 attention had wandered, plucked his sleeve and 
 whispered : 
 
 " If you want to see a mighty pretty woman 
 that's doin' no good here, look behind you, over 
 there in the chair by the big fireplace at the back 
 of the room. " 
 
 Alonzo looked. 
 
MES. PEOTHEROE 187 
 
 It was she whose counterpart had been in his 
 dream's eye every moment of the dragging days 
 which had been vacant of her living presence. 
 A number of his colleagues were hanging over 
 her almost idiotically; her face was gay and her 
 voice came to his ears, as he turned, with the 
 accent of her cadenced laughter running through 
 her talk like a chime of tiny bells flitting through 
 a strain of music. 
 
 "This is the third time she's been here," said 
 Battle, rubbing his beard the wrong way. " She's 
 lobbyin' for that infernal Sabbath-Desecration 
 bill, but we'll beat her, my son. " 
 
 " Have you made her acquaintance. Senator ? '* 
 asked Alonzo stiffly. 
 
 "No, sir, and I don't want to. But I knew her 
 father — the slickest old beat and the smoothest 
 talker that ever waltzed up the pike. She married 
 rich; her husband left her a lot of real estate 
 around here, but she spends most of her time 
 away. Whatever struck her to come down and 
 lobby for that bill I don't know yet — but I 
 will! Truslow's helping her to help himself; he's 
 
188 IN THE ARENA 
 
 got stock in the company that runs the baseball 
 team, but what she's up to — well, I'll bet there's 
 a nigger in the woodpile somewhere!" 
 
 "I expect there's a lot of talk like that!" said 
 Alonzo, red with anger, and taking up his papers 
 abruptly. 
 
 "Yes, sir!" said Battle emphatically, utterly 
 misunderstanding the other's tone and manner. 
 "Don't you worry, my son. We'll kill that ven- 
 omous bill right here in this chamber! We'll kill 
 it so dead that it won't make one flop after the axe 
 hits it. You and me and some others'U tend to 
 that ! Let her work that pretty face and those eyes 
 of hers all she wants to ! I'm keepin' a little look- 
 out, too — and I'll — " 
 
 He broke off, for the angry and perturbed 
 Alonzo had left him and gone to his own desk. 
 Battle, slightly surprised, rubbed his beard the 
 wrong way and sauntered out to the lobby to 
 muse over a cigar. Alonzo, loathing Battle with a 
 great loathing, formed bitter phrases concerning 
 that vicious-minded old gentleman, while for a 
 moment he affected to be setting his desk in or- 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 189 
 
 der. Then he walked slowly up the aisle, con- 
 scious of a roaring in his ears (though not aware 
 how red they were) as he approached the semi- 
 circle about her. 
 
 He paused within three feet of her in a sudden 
 panic of timidity, and then, to his consternation, 
 she looked him squarely in the face, over the 
 shoulders of two of the group, and the only sign 
 of recognition that she exhibited was a slight 
 frown of unmistakable repulsion, which appeared 
 between her handsome eyebrows. 
 
 It was very swift; only Alonzo saw it; the others 
 had no eyes for anything but her, and were not 
 aware of his presence behind them, for she did 
 not even pause in what she was saying. 
 
 Alonzo walked slowly away with the worm- 
 wood in his heart. He had not grown up among 
 the young people of Stackpole without similar 
 experiences, but it had been his youthful boast 
 that no girl had ever "stopped speaking" to 
 him without reason, or "cut a dance" with him 
 and afterward found opportunity to repeat the 
 indignity. 
 
190 m THE ARENA 
 
 " What have I done to her ? " was perhaps the 
 hottest cry of his soul, for the mystery was as 
 great as the sting of it. 
 
 It was no balm upon that sting to see her pass 
 him at the top of the outer steps, half an hour later, 
 on the arm of that one of his colleagues who had 
 been called the "best-dressed man in the Legis- 
 lature. " She swept by him without a sign, laugh- 
 ing that same laugh at some sally of her escort, 
 and they got into the black automobile together 
 and were whirled away and out of sight by the 
 impassive bundle of furs that manipulated the 
 wheel. 
 
 For the rest of that afternoon and the whole of 
 that night no man, woman, or child heard the 
 voice of Alonzo Rawson, for he spoke to none. 
 He came not to the evening meal, nor was he seen 
 by any who had his acquaintance. He entered his 
 room at about midnight, and Trumbull was 
 awakened by his neighbour's overturning a chair. 
 No match was struck, however, and Trumbull 
 was relieved to think that the Senator from Stack- 
 pole intended going directly to bed without 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 191 
 
 troubling to light the gas, and that his prayers 
 would soon be over. Such was not the case, for no 
 other sound came from the room, nor were Al- 
 onzo's prayers uttered that night, though the un- 
 happy statesman in the next apartment could not 
 get to sleep for several hours on account of his 
 nervous expectancy of them. 
 
 After this, as the day approached upon which 
 hung the fate of the bill which Mr. Josephus 
 Battle was fighting, Mrs. Protheroe came to the 
 Senate Chamber nearly every morning and after- 
 noon. Not once did she appear to be conscious of 
 Alonzo Rawson's presence, nor once did he allow 
 his eyes to delay upon her, though it cannot be 
 truthfully said that he did not always know when 
 she came, when she left, and with whom she stood 
 or sat or talked. He evaded all mention or discus- 
 sion of the bill or of Mrs. Protheroe ; avoided Trus- 
 low (who, strangely enough, was avoiding him) 
 and, spending upon drains and dikes all the energy 
 that he could manage to concentrate, burned the 
 midnight oil and rubbed salt into his wounds to 
 such marked effect that by the evening of the 
 
192 IN THE ARENA 
 
 Governor's Reception — upon the morning fol- 
 lowing which the mooted bill was to come up — 
 he offered an impression so haggard and worn 
 that an actor might have studied him for a make- 
 up as a young statesman going into a decline. 
 
 Nevertheless, he dressed with great care and 
 bitterness, and placed the fragrant blossom of a 
 geranium — taken from a plant belonging to his 
 landlady — in the lapel of his long coat before he 
 set out. 
 
 And yet, when he came down the Governor's 
 broad stairs, and wandered through the big 
 rooms, with the glare of lights above him and 
 the shouting of the guests ringing in his ears, a 
 sense of emptiness beset him; the crowded place 
 seemed vacant and without meaning. Even the 
 noise sounded hollow and remote — and why had 
 he bothered about the geranium ? He hated her 
 and would never look at her again — but why 
 was she not there ? 
 
 By-and-by, he found himself standing against 
 a wall, where he had been pushed by the press of 
 people. He was wondering drearily what he 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 193 
 
 was to do with a clean plate and a napkin 
 whidh a courteous negro had handed him, half- 
 an-hour earlier, when he felt a quick jerk at 
 his sleeve. It was Truslow, who had worked 
 his way along the wall and who now, standing 
 on tiptoe, spoke rapidly but cautiously, close to 
 his ear. 
 
 "Senator, be quick," he said sharply, at the 
 same time alert to see that they were unobserved. 
 "Mrs. Prothferoe wants to speak to you at once. 
 You'll find her near the big palms under the 
 stairway in the hall. " 
 
 He was gone — he had wormed his way haH 
 across the room — before the other, in his simple 
 amazement could answer. When Alonzo at last 
 found a word, it was only a monosyllable, which, 
 with his accompanying action, left a matron of 
 years, who was at that moment being pressed 
 fondly to his side, in a state of mind almost as 
 dumbfounded as his own. "Here!" was all he 
 said as he pressed the plate and napkin into her 
 hand and departed forcibly for the hall, leaving a 
 spectacular wreckage of trains behind him. 
 
194, IN THE ARENA 
 
 The upward flight of the stairway left a space 
 underneath, upon which, as it was screened (save 
 for a narrow entrance) by a thicket of palms, the 
 crowd had not encroached. Here were placed a 
 divan and a couple of chairs; there was shade 
 from the glare of gas, and the light was dim and 
 cool. Mrs. Protheroe had risen from the divan 
 when Alonzo entered this grotto, and stood wait- 
 ing for him. 
 
 He stopped in the green entrance-way with 
 a quick exclamation. 
 
 She did not seem the same woman who had 
 put such slights upon him, this tall, white vision 
 of silk, with the summery scarf falling from her 
 shoulders. His great wrath melted at the sight of 
 her; the pain of his racked pride, which had been 
 so hot in his breast, gave way to a species of fear. 
 She seemed not a human being, but a bright spirit 
 of beauty and goodness who stood before him, 
 extending two fine arms to him in long, white 
 gloves. 
 
 She left him to his trance for a moment, then 
 seized both his hands in hers and cried to him 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 195 
 
 in her rapturous, low voice: "Ah, Senator, you 
 have come! I knew you understood!" 
 
 "Yes ma'am," he whispered chokily. 
 
 She drew him to one of the chairs and sank 
 gracefully down upon the divan near him. 
 
 "Mr. Truslow was so afraid you wouldn't," 
 she went on rapidly, " but I was sure. You see I 
 didn't want anybody to suspect that I had 
 any influence with you. I didn't want them to 
 know, even, that I'd talked to you. It all came to 
 me after the first day that we met. You see I've 
 believed in you, in your power and in your re- 
 serve, from the first. I want all that you do to seem 
 to come from yourself and not from me or any 
 one else. Oh, I believe in great, strong men who 
 stand upon their own feet and conquer the world 
 for themselves! That's your way. Senator Raw- 
 son. So, you see, as they think I'm lobbying for 
 the bill, I wanted them to believe that your speech 
 for it to-morrow comes from your own great, 
 strong mind and heart and your sense of right, 
 and not from any suggestion of mine. " 
 
 "My speech!" he stammered. 
 
196 IN THE ARENA 
 
 " Oh, I know, " she cried ; " I know you think I 
 don't believe much in speeches, and I don't or- 
 dinarily, but a few, simple, straightforward and 
 vigorous words from you, to-morrow, may carry 
 the bill through. You've made such 'progress, 
 you've been so reserved, that you'll carry great 
 weight — and there are three votes of the drains 
 and dikes that are against us now, but will fol- 
 low yours absolutely. Do you think I would have 
 'cut' you if it hadn't been best?" 
 
 "But I—" 
 
 " Oh, I know you didn't actually promise me 
 to speak, that day. But I knew you would when 
 the time came! I knew that a man of power goes 
 over all obstacles, once his sense of right is arous- 
 ed! I knew — I never doubted it, that once you 
 felt a thing to be right you would strike for it, 
 with all your great strength — at all costs — at 
 all — " 
 
 " I can't — I — I — can't ! " he whispered 
 nervously. " Don't you see — don't you see — 
 I — " 
 
 She leaned toward him, lifting her face close to 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 197 
 
 his. She was so near him that the faint odour of her 
 hair came to him again, and once more the un- 
 fortunate Senator from Stackpole risked a meet- 
 ing of his eyes with hers, and saw the light shin- 
 ing far down in their depths. 
 
 At this moment the shadow of a portly man 
 who was stroking his beard the wrong way 
 projected itself upon them from the narrow, 
 green entrance to the grotto. Neither of them 
 perceived it. 
 
 Senator Josephus Battle passed on, but when 
 Alonzo Rawson emerged, a few moments later, he 
 was pledged to utter a few simple, straightfor- 
 ward and vigorous words in favour of the bill. And 
 • — let the shame fall upon the head of the scribe 
 who tells it — he had kissed Mrs. Protheroe! 
 
 The fight upon the "Sunday Baseball Bill," 
 the next morning, was the warmest of that part 
 of the session, though for a while the reporters 
 were disappointed. They were waiting for Sena- 
 tor Battle, who was famous among them for the 
 vituperative vigour of his attacks and for the kind 
 
198 IN THE ABENA 
 
 of personalities which made valuable copy. And 
 yet, until the debate was almost over, he content- 
 ed himself with going quietly up and down 
 the aisles, whispering to the occupants of the 
 desks, and writing and sending a multitude of 
 notes to his colleagues. Meanwhile, the orators 
 upon both sides harangued their fellows, the 
 lobby, the unpolitical audience, and the patient 
 presiding officer to no effect, so far as votes went. 
 The general impression was that the bill would 
 pass. 
 
 Alonzo Rawson sat, bent over his desk, his 
 eyes fixed with gentle steadiness upon Mrs. 
 Protheroe, who occupied the chair wherein he 
 had first seen her. A senator of the opposition 
 was finishing his denunciation, when she turned 
 and nodded almost imperceptibly to the young 
 man. 
 
 He gave her one last look of pathetic tender- 
 ness and rose. 
 
 "The Senator from Stackpole!" 
 
 "I want," Alonzo began, in his big voice: "I 
 want to say a few simple, straightforward but 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 199 
 
 vigorous words about this bill. You may remem- 
 ber I spoke against it on its second reading — " 
 
 "You did that!" shouted Senator Battle sud- 
 denly. 
 
 "I want to say now," the Senator from Stack- 
 pole continued, "that at that time I hadn't stud- 
 ied the subject sufficiently. I didn't know the con- 
 ditions of the case, nor the facts, but since then a 
 great light has broke in upon me — " 
 
 " I should say it had ! I saw it break ! " was Sen- 
 ator Battle's second violent interruption. 
 
 When order was restored, Alonzo, who had 
 become very pale, summoned his voice again. " I 
 think we'd ought to take into consideration that 
 Sunday is the working-man's only day of recre- 
 ation and not drive him into low groggeries, but 
 give him a chance in the open air to indulge his 
 love of wholesome sport — " 
 
 "Such as the ancient Romans enjoyed!" inter- 
 posed Battle vindictively. 
 
 "No, sir!" Alonzo wheeled upon him, stung to 
 the quick. " Such a sport as free-born Americans 
 and only free-born Americans can play in this 
 
200 IN THE ARENA 
 
 wide world — the American game of baseball, 
 in which no other nation of the Earth is our 
 equal!" 
 
 This was a point scored and the cheering lasted 
 two minutes. Then the orator resumed: 
 
 "I say: 'Give the working-man a chance!' Is 
 his life a happy one ? You know it ain't! Give him 
 his one day. Don't spoil it for him with your laws 
 — he's only got one! I'm not goin' to take up any 
 more of your time, but if there's anybody here 
 who thinks my well-considered opinion worth 
 following I say: ' Vote for this bill.' It is right and 
 virtuous and ennobling, and it ought to be passed! 
 I say: 'Vote for it.'" 
 
 The reporters decided that the Senator from 
 Stackpole had " wakened things up. " The gavel 
 rapped a long time before the chamber quieted 
 down, and when it did, Josephus Battle was on 
 his feet and had obtained the recognition of the 
 chair. 
 
 "I wish to say, right here," he began, with a 
 rasping leisureliness, "that I hope no member of 
 this honoured body will take my remarks as per- 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 201 
 
 sonal or unparliamentary — but" — he raised a 
 big forefinger and shook it with menace at the 
 presiding oflScer, at the same time suddenly lift- 
 ing his voice to an unprintable shriek — "I say 
 to you, sir, that the song of the siren has been 
 heard in the land, and the call of Delilah has been 
 answered! When the Senator from Stackpole rose 
 in this chamber, less than three weeks ago, and 
 denounced this iniquitous measure, I heard him 
 with pleasure — we all heard him with pleasure 
 — and respect! In spite of his youth and the poor 
 quality of his expression, we listened to him. We 
 knew he was sencere! What has caused the 
 change in him ? What has, I ask ? I shall not tell 
 you, upon this floor, but I've taken mighty good 
 care to let most of you know, during the morn- 
 ing, either by word of mouth or by note of hand! 
 Especially those of you of the drains and dikes 
 and others who might follow this young Samson, 
 whose locks have been shore! I've told you all 
 about that, and more — I've told you the inside 
 history of some facts about the bill that I will not 
 make public, because I am too confident of our 
 
20ie IN THE ARENA 
 
 strength to defeat this devilish measure, and pre- 
 fer to let our vote speak our opinion of it! Let me 
 not detain you longer. / thank you!" 
 
 Long before he had finished, the Senator from 
 Stackpole was being held down in his chair by 
 Truslow and several senators whose seats were 
 adjacent; and the vote was taken amid an uproar 
 of shouting and confusion. When the clerk man- 
 aged to proclaim the result over all other noises, 
 the bill was shown to be defeated and "killed," 
 by a majority of five votes. 
 
 A few minutes later, Alonzo Rawson, his neck- 
 wear disordered and his face white with rage, 
 stumbled out of the great doors upon the trail of 
 Battle, who had quietly hurried away to his hotel 
 for lunch as soon as he had voted. 
 
 The black automobile was vanishing round 
 a corner. Truslow stood upon the edge of the 
 pavement staring after it ruefully: 
 
 "Where is Mrs. Protheroe.?" gasped the Sen- 
 ator from Stackpole. 
 
 " She's gone, " said the other. 
 
 "€rone where?" 
 
MBS. PROTHEROE B03 
 
 "Gone back to Paris. She sails day after to- 
 morrow. She just had time enough to catch her 
 train for New York after waiting to hear how the 
 vote went. She told me to tell you good-bye, and 
 that she was sorry. Don't stare at me Rawson! I 
 guess we're in the same boat! — Where are you 
 going ? " he finished abruptly. 
 
 Alonzo swung by him and started across the 
 street. "To find Battle!" the hoarse answer came 
 back. 
 
 The conquering Josephus was leaning medi- 
 tatively upon the counter of the cigar-stand of his 
 hotel when Alonzo found him. He took one look 
 at the latter's face and backed to the wall, tight- 
 ening his grasp upon the heavy-headed ebony 
 cane it was his habit to carry, a habit upon which 
 he now congratulated himself. 
 
 But his precautions were needless. Alonzo 
 stopped out of reaching distance. 
 
 "You tell me," he said in a breaking voice; 
 "you tell me what you meant about Delilah and 
 sirens and Samsons and inside facts ! You tell 
 me!" 
 
204 IN THE ARENA 
 
 "You wild ass of the prairies," said Battle, "I 
 saw you last night behind them pa'ms! But don't 
 you think I told it — or ever will ! I just passed the 
 word around that she'd argued you into her way 
 of thinkin', same as she had a good many others. 
 And as for the rest of it, I found out where the 
 nigger in the woodpile was, and I handed that out, 
 too. Don't you take it hard, my son, but I told you 
 her husband left her a good deal of land around 
 here. She owns the ground that they use for the 
 baseball park, and her lease would be worth con- 
 siderable more if they could have got the right to 
 play on Sundays!" 
 
 Senator Trumbull sat up straight, in bed, that 
 night, and, for the first time during his martyr- 
 dom, listened with no impatience to the prayer 
 which fell upon his ears. 
 
 " O Lord Almighty, " through the flimsy par- 
 tition came the voice of Alonzo Rawson, quaver- 
 ingly, but with growing strength : " Aid Thou me 
 to see my way more clear! I find it hard to tell 
 right from wrong, and I find myself beset with 
 
MRS. PROTHEROE 205 
 
 tangled wires. O God, I feel that I am ignorant, 
 and fall into many devices. These are strange 
 paths wherein Thou hast set my feet, but I feel 
 that through Thy help, and through great an- 
 guish, I am learning!" 
 
GREAT MEN'S SONS 
 
MmE. BERNHARDT and M. Coquelin were 
 playing "L'Aiglon." Toward the end of the sec- 
 ond act people began to slide down in their seats, 
 shift their elbows, or casually rub their eyes; 
 by the close of the third, most of the taller gentle- 
 men were sitting on the small of their backs with 
 their knees as high as decorum permitted, and 
 many were openly coughing ; but when the fourth 
 came to an end, active resistance ceased, hope- 
 lessness prevailed, the attitudes were those of the 
 stricken field, and the over-crowded house was 
 like a college chapel during an interminable 
 compulsory lecture. Here and there — but most 
 rarely — one saw an eager woman with bright 
 eyes, head bent forward and body spellbound, 
 still enchantedly following the course of the play. 
 Between the acts the orchestra pattered rag- 
 time and inanities from the new comic operas, 
 
 209 
 
210 IN THE ARENA 
 
 while the audience in general took some heart. 
 When the play was over, we were all enthus- 
 iastic; though our admiration, however vehe- 
 ment in the words employed to express it, was 
 somewhat subdued as to the accompanying man- 
 ner, which consisted, mainly, of sighs and re- 
 signed murmurs. In the lobby a thin old man 
 with a grizzled chin-beard dropped his hand 
 lightly on my shoulder, and greeted me in a tone 
 of plaintive inquiry: 
 
 "Well, son.?" 
 
 Turning, I recognized a patron of my early 
 youth, in whose woodshed I had smoked my 
 first cigar, an old friend whom I had not seen for 
 years; and to find him there, with his long, dust- 
 coloured coat, his black string tie and rusty hat, 
 brushed on every side by opera cloaks and feath- 
 ers, was a rich surprise, warming the cockles of 
 my heart. His name is Tom Martin; he lives in a 
 small country town, where he commands the trade 
 in Dry Goods and Men's Clothing; his speech is 
 pitched in a high key, is very slow, sometimes 
 whines faintly; and he always calls me "Son." 
 
GREAT MEN'S SONS 211 
 
 "What in the world!" I exclaimed, as we 
 shook hands. 
 
 " Weil," he drawled, " I dunno why I shouldn't 
 be as meetropolitan as anybody. I come over 
 on the afternoon accommodation for the show. 
 Let's you and me make a night of it. What say, 
 son.?" 
 
 "What did you think of the play.?" I asked, 
 as we turned up the street toward the club. 
 
 "I think they done it about as well as they 
 could." 
 
 "That all?" 
 
 "Well," he rejoined with solemnity, "there 
 was a heap of it, wasn't there!" 
 
 We talked of other things, then, until such 
 time as we found ourselves seated by a small 
 table at the club, old Tom somewhat uneasily 
 regarding a twisted cigar he was smoking and 
 plainly confounded by the " carbonated " syphon, 
 for which, indeed, he had no use in the world. 
 We had been joined by little Fiderson, the young- 
 est member of the club, whose whole nervous 
 person jerkily sparkled "L'Aiglon" enthusiasm. 
 
212 IN THE ARENA 
 
 "Such an evening!" he cried, in his little spiky 
 voice. "Mr. Martin, it does one good to realize 
 that our country towns are sending representa- 
 tives to us when we have such things; that they 
 wish to get in touch with what is greatest in Art. 
 They should do it often. To think that a journey 
 of only seventy miles brings into your life the 
 magnificence of Rostand's point of view made 
 living fire by the genius of a Bernhardt and a 
 Coquelin!" 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. Martin, with a curious help- 
 lessness, after an ensuing pause, which I refused 
 to break, "yes, sir, they seemed to be doing it 
 about as well as they could." 
 
 Fiderson gasped slightly. "It was magnificent! 
 Those two great artists ! But over all the play — 
 the play! Romance new-born; poesy marching 
 with victorious banners; a great spirit breath- 
 ing! Like 'Cyrano' — the birth-mark of immor- 
 tality on this work! " 
 
 There was another pause, after which old 
 Tom turned slowly to me, and said: "Homer 
 Tibbs's opened up a cigar-stand at the deepo. 
 
GREAT MEN'S SONS 213 
 
 Carries a line of candy, magazines, and fruit, 
 too. "Home's a hustler." 
 
 Fiderson passed his hand through his hair. 
 
 "That death scene!" he exclaimed at me, giv- 
 ing Martin up as a log accidentally rolled in 
 from the woods. "I thought that after 'Wagram' 
 I could feel nothing more; emotion was ex- 
 hausted; but then came that magnificent death! 
 It was tragedy made ecstatic; pathos made into 
 music; the grandeur of a gentle spirit, conquered 
 physically but morally unconquerable ! Goethe's 
 'More Light' outshone!" 
 
 Old Tom's eyes followed the smoke of his per- 
 plexing cigar along its heavy strata in the still 
 air of the room, as he inquired if I remembered 
 Orlando T. Bickner's boy, Mel. I had never 
 heard of him, and said so. 
 
 "No, I expect not," rejoined Martin. "Prob'ly 
 you wouldn't; Bickner was Governor along in my 
 early days, and I reckon he ain't hardly more 
 than jest a name to you two. But we kind of 
 thought he was the biggest man this country had 
 ever seen, or was goin' to see, and he was a big 
 
214 IN THE ARENA 
 
 man. He made one president, and could have 
 been it himself, instead, if he'd be'n willing to 
 do a kind of underhand trick, but I expect with- 
 out it he was about as big a man as anybody'd 
 care to be; Governor, Senator, Secretary of State 
 — and just owned his party! And, my law! — the 
 whole earth bowin' down to him; torchlight pro- 
 cessions and sky-rockets when he come home in 
 the night; bands and cannon if his train got in, 
 daytime; home-folks so proud of him they 
 couldn't see; everybody's hat off; and all the 
 most important men in the country following at 
 his heels — a country, too, that'd put up con- 
 sider'ble of a comparison with everything Na- 
 poleon had when he'd licked 'em all, over 
 there. 
 
 "Of course he had enemies, and, of course, 
 year by year, they got to be more of 'em, and 
 they finally downed him for good; and like other 
 public men so fixed, he didn't live long after 
 that. He had a son, Melville, mighty likable 
 young fellow, studyin' law when his paw died. I 
 was livin' in their town then, and I knowed Mel 
 
GREAT MEN'S SONS 215 
 
 Bickner pretty well; he was consider'ble of a 
 man. 
 
 "I don't know as I ever heard him speak of 
 that's bein' the reason, but I expect it may've 
 be'n partly in the hope of carryin' out some of 
 his paw's notions, Mel tried hard to git into poli- 
 tics; but the old man's local enemies jumped on 
 every move he made, and his friends wouldn't 
 help any; you can't tell why, except that it gen- 
 erally is thataway. Folks always like to laugh at 
 a great man's son and say he can't amount to 
 anything. Of course that comes partly from fel- 
 lows like that ornery little cuss we saw to-night, 
 thinkin' they're a good deal because somebody 
 else done something, and the somebody else hap- 
 pened to be their paw; and the women run after 
 'em, and they git low-down like he was, and so 
 on. 
 
 " Mr. Martin," interrupted Fiderson, with in- 
 dignation, "will you kindly inform me in what 
 way 'L'Aiglon' was 'low-down' ?" 
 
 "Well, sir, didn't that huntin '-lodge appoint- 
 ment kind of put you in mind of a camp-meetin' 
 
216 IN THE ARENA 
 
 scandal?" returned old Tom quietly. "It did 
 me." 
 
 "But—" 
 
 "Well, sir, I can't say as I understood the 
 French of it, but I read the book in English be- 
 fore I come up, and it seemed to me he was 
 pretty much of a low-down boy; yet I wanted 
 to see how they'd make him out; hearin' it was 
 thought, the country over, to be such a great 
 play; though to tell the truth all I could tell 
 about that was that every line seemed to end in 
 'awze' ; and 't they all talked in rhyme, and it 
 did strike me as kind of enervatin' to be expected 
 to believe that people could keep it up that long; 
 and that it wasn't only the boy that never quit on 
 the subject of himself and his folks, but pretty 
 near any of 'em, if he'd git the chanst, did the 
 same thing, so't almost I sort of wondered if 
 Rostand wasn't that kind." 
 
 " Go on with Melville Bickner," said I. 
 
 "What do you expect," retorted Mr. Martin 
 with a vindictive gleam in his eye, "when you 
 give a man one of these here spiral staircase 
 
GREAT MEN'S SONS 217 
 
 cigars ? Old Peter himself couldn't keep straight 
 along one subject if he tackled a cigar like this. 
 Well, sir, I always thought Mel had a mighty 
 mean time of it. He had to take care of his 
 mother and two sisters, his little brother and an 
 aunt that lived with them; and there was mighty 
 little to do it on; big men don't usually leave 
 much but debts, and in this country, of course, a 
 man can't eat and spend long on his paw's repu- 
 tation, like that little Dook of Reishtod — " 
 
 "I beg to tell you, Mr. Martin — " Fiderson 
 began hotly. 
 
 Martin waved his bony hand soothingly. 
 
 "Oh, I know; they was money in his mother's 
 family, and they give him his vittles and clothes, 
 and plenty, too. His paw didn't leave much 
 either — though he'd stole more than Boss 
 Tweed. I suppose — and, just lookin' at things 
 from the point of what they'd earned, his maw's 
 folks had stole a good deal, too; or else you can 
 say they were a kind of public charity; old Met- 
 ternich, by what I can learn, bein' the only one 
 in the whole possetucky of 'em that really did 
 
218 IN THE ARENA 
 
 anything to deserve his salary — " Mr. Mar- 
 tin broke off suddenly, observing that I was 
 about to speak, and continued : 
 
 " Mel didn't git much law practice, jest about 
 enough to keep the house goin' and pay taxes. 
 He kept workin' for the party jest the same 
 and jest as cheerfully as if it didn't turn him 
 down hard every time he tried to git anything 
 for himself. They lived some ways out from 
 town; and he sold the horses to keep the little 
 brother in school, one winter, and used to walk 
 in to his office and out again, twice a day, over 
 the worst roads in the State, rain or shine, snow, 
 sleet, or wind, without any overcoat; and he got 
 kind of a skimpy, froze-up look to him that 
 lasted clean through summer. He worked like a 
 mule, that boy did, jest barely makin' ends 
 meet. He had to quit runnin' with the girls and 
 goin' to parties and everything like that; and I 
 expect it may have been some hard to do; for if 
 they ever was a boy loved to dance and be gay, 
 and up to anything in the line of fun and junk- 
 etin' round, it was Mel Bickner. He had a laugh 
 
GREAT MEN'S SONS 219 
 
 I can hear yet — made you feel friendly to every- 
 body you saw; feel like stoppin' the next man 
 you met and shakin' hands and havin' a joke 
 with him. 
 
 "Mel was engaged to Jane Grandis when 
 Governor Bickner died. He had to go and tell 
 her to take somebody else — it was the only 
 thing to do. He couldn't give Jane anything but 
 his poverty, and she wasn't used to it. They say 
 she offered to come to him anyway, but he 
 wouldn't hear of it, and no more would he let her 
 wait for him; told her she mustn't grow into an 
 old maid, lonely, and still waitin' for the lightning 
 to strike him — that is, his luck to come ; and 
 actually advised her to take 'Gene Callender, 
 who'd be'n pressin' pretty close to Mel for her 
 before the engagement. The boy didn't talk to 
 her this way with tears in his eyes and mourning 
 and groaning. No, sir! It was done cheerful; and 
 so much so that Jane never was quite sure after- 
 werds whether Mel wasn't kind of glad to git rid 
 of her or not. Fact is, they say she quit speakin' 
 to him. Mel knowed; a state of puzzlement or 
 
220 IN THE ARENA 
 
 even a good mod's a mighty sight better than 
 bein' all harrowed up and grief -stricken. And he 
 never give her — nor any one else — a chanst to 
 be sorry for him. His maw was the only one heard 
 him walk the floor nights, and after he found 
 out she could hear him he walked in his socks. 
 
 "Yes, sir! Meet that boy on the street, or go 
 up in his oflSce, you'd think that he was the gay- 
 est feller in town. I tell you there wasn't any- 
 thing pathetic about Mel Bickner! He didn't 
 believe in it. And at home he had a funny story 
 every evening of the world, about something 
 'd happened during the day; and 'd whistle to 
 the guitar, or git his maw into a game of cards 
 with his aunt and the girls. Law! that boy didn't 
 believe in no house of mourning. He'd be up at 
 four in the morning, hoein' up their old garden; 
 raised garden-truck for their table, sparrow- 
 grass and sweet corn — yes, and roses, too; al- 
 ways had the house full of roses in June-time; 
 never was a house sweeter-smellin' to go into. 
 
 "Mel was what I call a useful citizen. As I 
 said, I knowed him well. I don't recollect I ever 
 
GREAT MEN'S SONS 221 
 
 heard him speak of himself, nor yet of his father 
 but once — for that, I reckon, he jest couldn't; 
 and for himself; I don't believe it ever occurred 
 to him. 
 
 "And he was a smart boy. Now, you take it, 
 all in all, a boy can't be as smart as Mel was, and 
 work as hard as he did, and not git somewhere — 
 in this State, anyway! And so, about the fifth 
 year, things took a sudden change for him; his 
 father's enemies and his own friends, both, had 
 to jest about own they was beat. The crowd that 
 had been running the conventions and keepin' 
 their own men in all the offices, had got to be 
 pretty unpopular, and they had the sense to see 
 that they'd have to branch out and connect up 
 with some mighty good men, jest to keep the 
 party in power. Well, sir, Mel had got to be 
 about the most popular and respected man in 
 the county. Then one day I met him on the street; 
 he was on his way to buy an overcoat, and he was 
 lookin' skimpier and more froze-up and genialer 
 than ever. It was March, and up to jest that 
 time things had be'n hardest of all for Mel. I 
 
222 IN THE ARENA 
 
 walked around to the store with him, and he was 
 mighty happy; goin' to send his mother north in 
 the summer, and the girls were goin' to have a 
 party, and Bob, his little brother, could go to the 
 best school in the country in the fall. Things had 
 come his way at last, and that very morning the 
 crowd had called him in and told him they were 
 goin' to run him for county clerk. 
 
 "Well, sir, the next evening I heard Mel was 
 sick. Seein' him only the day before on the street, 
 out and well, I didn't think anything of it — 
 thought prob'ly a cold or something like that; 
 but in the morning I heard the doctor said he was 
 likely to die. Of course I couldn't hardly believe 
 it; thing like that never does seem possible, but 
 they all said it was true, and there wasn't any- 
 body on the street that day that didn't look blue 
 or talked about anything else. Nobody seemed 
 to know what was the matter with him exactly, 
 and I reckon the doctor did jest the wrong thing 
 for it. Near as I can make out, it was what they 
 call appendicitis nowadays, and had come on 
 him in the night. 
 
GREAT MEN'S SONS 223 
 
 "Along in the afternoon I went out there to 
 see if there was anything I could do. You know 
 what a house in that condition is like. Old Fes 
 Bainbridge, who was some sort of a relation, and 
 me sat on the stairs together outside Mel's room. 
 We could hear his voice, clear and strong and 
 hearty as ever. He was out of pain; and he had 
 to die with the full flush of health and strength on 
 him, and he knowed it. Not wantin' to go, 
 through the waste and wear of a long sickness, 
 but with all the ties of life clinchin' him here, and 
 success jest comin.' We heard him speak of us, 
 amongst others, old Fes and me; wanted 'em to 
 be sure not forget to tell me to remember to vote 
 for Fillmore if the ground-hog saw his shadow 
 election year, which was an old joke I always 
 had with him. He was awful worried about his 
 mother, though he tried not to show it, and 
 when the minister wanted to pray fer him, we 
 heard him say, ' No, sir, you pray fer my mam- 
 ma!* That was the only thing that was different 
 from his usual way of speakin'; he called his 
 mother ' mamma,' and he wouldn't let 'em pray 
 
«24 IN THE AKENA 
 
 for him neither; not once; all the time he could 
 spare for their prayin* was put in for her. 
 
 " He called in old Fes to tell him all about his 
 life insurance. He'd carried a heavy load of it, 
 and it was all paid up; and the sweat it must 
 have took to do it you'd hardly like to think 
 about. He give directions about everything as 
 careful and painstaking as any day of his life. 
 He asked to speak to Fes alone a minute, and 
 later I helped Fes do what he told him. ' Cousin 
 Fes,' he says, 'it's bad weather, but I expect 
 mother'U want all the flowers taken out to the 
 cemetery and you better let her have her way. 
 But there wouldn't be any good of their stayin* 
 there; snowed on, like as not. I wish you'd wait 
 till after she's come away, and git a wagon and 
 take 'em in to the hospital. You can fix up the 
 anchors and so forth so they won't look like 
 funeral flowers. * ' 
 
 "About an hour later his mother broke out 
 with a scream, sobbin' and cryin', and he tried 
 to quiet her by tellin' over one of their old-time 
 family funny stories ; it made her worse, so he quit. 
 
GKKAT JMKM'S SONS 225 
 
 'Oh, Mel,' she says, 'you'll be with your 
 father — ' 
 
 " I don't know as Mel had much of a belief in 
 a hereafter; certainly he wasn't a great church- 
 goer. 'Well,' he says, mighty slow, but hearty 
 and smiling, too, 'if I see father, I — guess — 
 I'll — be — pretty — well — fixed ! ' Then he jest 
 lay still, tryin' to quiet her and pettin' her head. 
 And so — that's the way he went." 
 
 Fiderson made one of his impatient little ges- 
 tures, but Mr. Martin drowned his first words 
 with a loud fit of coughing. 
 
 "Well, sir," he observed, "I read that 'Leg- 
 long' book down home; and I heard two or three 
 countries, and especially ourn, had gone mid- 
 dling crazy over it; it seemed kind of funny that 
 we should, too, so I thought I better come up and 
 see it for myself, how it was, on the stage, where 
 you could look at it; and — I expect they done 
 it as well as they could. But when that little boy, 
 that'd always had his board and clothes and 
 education free, saw that he'd jest about talked 
 himself to death, and called for the press notices 
 
226 IN THE ARENA 
 
 about his christening to be read to him to soothe 
 his last spasms — why, I wasn't overly put in 
 mind of Melville Bickner." 
 
 Mr. Martin's train left for Plattsville at two 
 in the morning. Little Fiderson and I escorted 
 him to the station. As the old fellow waved us 
 good-bye from within the gates, Fiderson turned 
 and said : 
 
 "Just the type of sodden-headed old pioneer 
 that you couldn't hope to make understand a 
 beautiful thing like 'L'Aiglon' in a thousand 
 years. I thought it better not to try, didn't you ? " 
 
 THE END 
 
 THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GASDEZT CITY, M. T* \ 
 

 ill 
 
 'iiii