The Titan 44 страница

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An Anti-Pinski Republican (a young law clerk). " To hell with the

constitution! No fine words now, Pinski. Which way do you expect

to vote? For or against? Yes or no? "

A Voice (that of a bricklayer, anti-Pinski). " He daresn't say.

He's got some of that bastard's money in his jeans now, I'll bet. "

A Voice from Behind (one of Pinski's henchmen--a heavy, pugilistic

Irishman). " Don't let them frighten you, Sim. Stand your ground.

They can't hurt you. We're here. "

Pinski (getting up once more). " This is an outrage, I say. Ain't

I gon' to be allowed to say what I think? There are two sides to

every question. Now, I think whatever the newspapers say that

Cowperwood--"

A Journeyman Carpenter (a reader of the Inquirer). " You're bribed,

you thief! You're beating about the bush. You want to sell out. "

The Bony Plumber. " Yes, you crook! You want to get away with

thirty thousand dollars, that's what you want, you boodler! "

Mr. Pinski (defiantly, egged on by voices from behind). " I want

to be fair--that's what. I want to keep my own mind. The

constitution gives everybody the right of free speech--even me.

I insist that the street-car companies have some rights; at the

same time the people have rights too. "

A Voice. " What are those rights? "

Another Voice. " He don't know. He wouldn't know the people's

rights from a sawmill. "

Another Voice. " Or a load of hay. "

Pinski (continuing very defiantly now, since he has not yet been

slain). " I say the people have their rights. The companies ought

to be made to pay a fair tax. But this twenty-year-franchise idea

is too little, I think. The Mears bill now gives them fifty years,

and I think all told--"

The Five Hundred (in chorus). " Ho, you robber! You thief! You

boodler! Hang him! Ho! ho! ho! Get a rope! "

Pinski (retreating within a defensive circle as various citizens

approach him, their eyes blazing, their teeth showing, their fists

clenched). " My friends, wait! Ain't I goin' to be allowed to

finish? "

A Voice. " We'll finish you, you stiff! "

A Citizen (advancing; a bearded Pole). " How will you vote, hey?

Tell us that! How? Hey? "

A Second Citizen (a Jew). " You're a no-good, you robber. I know

you for ten years now already. You cheated me when you were in

the grocery business. "

A Third Citizen (a Swede. In a sing-song voice). " Answer me this,

Mr. Pinski. If a majority of the citizens of the Fourteenth Ward

don't want you to vote for it, will you still vote for it? "

Pinski (hesitating).

The Five Hundred. " Ho! look at the scoundrel! He's afraid to say.

He don't know whether he'll do what the people of this ward want

him to do. Kill him! Brain him! "

A Voice from Behind. " Aw, stand up, Pinski. Don't be afraid. "

Pinski (terrorized as the five hundred make a rush for the stage).

" If the people don't want me to do it, of course I won't do it.

Why should I? Ain't I their representative? "

A Voice. " Yes, when you think you're going to get the wadding

kicked out of you. "

Another Voice. " You wouldn't be honest with your mother, you

bastard. You couldn't be! "

Pinski. " If one-half the voters should ask me not to do it I

wouldn't do it. "

A Voice. " Well, we'll get the voters to ask you, all right. We'll

get nine-tenths of them to sign before to-morrow night. "

An Irish-American (aged twenty-six; a gas collector; coming close

to Pinski). " If you don't vote right we'll hang you, and I'll be

there to help pull the rope myself. "

One of Pinski's Lieutenants. " Say, who is that freshie? We want

to lay for him. One good kick in the right place will just about

finish him. "

The Gas Collector. " Not from you, you carrot-faced terrier. Come

outside and see. " (Business of friends interfering).

The meeting becomes disorderly. Pinski is escorted out by friends

--completely surrounded--amid shrieks and hisses, cat-calls, cries

of " Boodler! " " Thief! " " Robber! "

There were many such little dramatic incidents after the ordinance

had been introduced.

Henceforth on the streets, in the wards and outlying sections, and

even, on occasion, in the business heart, behold the marching

clubs--those sinister, ephemeral organizations which on demand of

the mayor had cropped out into existence--great companies of the

unheralded, the dull, the undistinguished--clerks, working-men,

small business men, and minor scions of religion or morality; all

tramping to and fro of an evening, after working-hours, assembling

in cheap halls and party club-houses, and drilling themselves to

what end? That they might march to the city hall on the fateful

Monday night when the street-railway ordinances should be up for

passage and demand of unregenerate lawmakers that they do their

duty. Cowperwood, coming down to his office one morning on his

own elevated lines, was the observer of a button or badge worn

upon the coat lapel of stolid, inconsequential citizens who sat

reading their papers, unconscious of that presence which epitomized

the terror and the power they all feared. One of these badges had

for its device a gallows with a free noose suspended; another was

blazoned with the query: " Are we going to be robbed? " On sign-boards,

fences, and dead walls huge posters, four by six feet in dimension,

were displayed.

WALDEN H. LUCAS

against the

BOODLERS

===========================

Every citizen of Chicago should

come down to the City Hall

TO-NIGHT

MONDAY, DEC. 12

===========================

and every Monday night

thereafter while the Street-car

Franchises are under consideration,

and see that the interests

of the city are protected against

BOODLEISM

=========

Citizens, Arouse and Defeat the Boodlers!

In the papers were flaring head-lines; in the clubs, halls, and

churches fiery speeches could nightly be heard. Men were drunk

now with a kind of fury of contest. They would not succumb to

this Titan who was bent on undoing them. They would not be devoured

by this gorgon of the East. He should be made to pay an honest

return to the city or get out. No fifty-year franchise should be

granted him. The Mears law must be repealed, and he must come

into the city council humble and with clean hands. No alderman

who received as much as a dollar for his vote should in this

instance be safe with his life.

Needless to say that in the face of such a campaign of intimidation

only great courage could win. The aldermen were only human. In

the council committee-chamber Cowperwood went freely among them,

explaining as he best could the justice of his course and making

it plain that, although willing to buy his rights, he looked on

them as no more than his due. The rule of the council was barter,

and he accepted it. His unshaken and unconquerable defiance

heartened his followers greatly, and the thought of thirty thousand

dollars was as a buttress against many terrors. At the same time

many an alderman speculated solemnly as to what he would do afterward

and where he would go once he had sold out.

At last the Monday night arrived which was to bring the final test

of strength. Picture the large, ponderous structure of black

granite--erected at the expense of millions and suggesting somewhat

the somnolent architecture of ancient Egypt--which served as the

city hall and county court-house combined. On this evening the

four streets surrounding it were packed with thousands of people.

To this throng Cowperwood has become an astounding figure: his

wealth fabulous, his heart iron, his intentions sinister--the

acme of cruel, plotting deviltry. Only this day, the Chronicle,

calculating well the hour and the occasion, has completely covered

one of its pages with an intimate, though exaggerated, description

of Cowperwood's house in New York: his court of orchids, his sunrise

room, the baths of pink and blue alabaster, the finishings of

marble and intaglio. Here Cowperwood was represented as seated

in a swinging divan, his various books, art treasures, and

comforts piled about him. The idea was vaguely suggested that in

his sybaritic hours odalesques danced before him and unnamable

indulgences and excesses were perpetrated.

At this same hour in the council-chamber itself were assembling

as hungry and bold a company of gray wolves as was ever gathered

under one roof. The room was large, ornamented to the south by

tall windows, its ceiling supporting a heavy, intricate chandelier,

its sixty-six aldermanic desks arranged in half-circles, one behind

the other; its woodwork of black oak carved and highly polished;

its walls a dark blue-gray decorated with arabesques in gold--thus

giving to all proceedings an air of dignity and stateliness. Above

the speaker's head was an immense portrait in oil of a former mayor

--poorly done, dusty, and yet impressive. The size and character

of the place gave on ordinary occasions a sort of resonance to the

voices of the speakers. To-night through the closed windows could

be heard the sound of distant drums and marching feet. In the

hall outside the council door were packed at least a thousand men

with ropes, sticks, a fife-and-drum corps which occasionally struck

up " Hail! Columbia, Happy Land, " " My Country, " Tis of Thee, " and

" Dixie. " Alderman Schlumbohm, heckled to within an inch of his

life, followed to the council door by three hundred of his

fellow-citizens, was there left with the admonition that they would

be waiting for him when he should make his exit. He was at last

seriously impressed.

" What is this? " he asked of his neighbor and nearest associate,

Alderman Gavegan, when he gained the safety of his seat. " A free

country? "

" Search me! " replied his compatriot, wearily. " I never seen such

a band as I have to deal with out in the Twentieth. Why, my God!

a man can't call his name his own any more out here. It's got so

now the newspapers tell everybody what to do. "

Alderman Pinski and Alderman Hoherkorn, conferring together in one

corner, were both very dour. " I'll tell you what, Joe, " said

Pinski to his confrere; " it's this fellow Lucas that has got the

people so stirred up. I didn't go home last night because I didn't

want those fellows to follow me down there. Me and my wife stayed

down-town. But one of the boys was over here at Jake's a little

while ago, and he says there must 'a' been five hundred people

around my house at six o'clock, already. Whad ye think o' that? "

" Same here. I don't take much stock in this lynching idea. Still,

you can't tell. I don't know whether the police could help us

much or not. It's a damned outrage. Cowperwood has a fair

proposition. What's the matter with them, anyhow? "

Renewed sounds of " Marching Through Georgia" from without.

Enter at this time Aldermen Ziner, Knudson, Revere, Rogers, Tiernan,

and Kerrigan. Of all the aldermen perhaps Messrs. Tiernan and

Kerrigan were as cool as any. Still the spectacle of streets

blocked with people who carried torches and wore badges showing

slip-nooses attached to a gallows was rather serious.

" I'll tell you, Pat, " said " Smiling Mike, " as they eventually made

the door through throngs of jeering citizens; " it does look a

little rough. Whad ye think? "

" To hell with them! " replied Kerrigan, angry, waspish, determined.

" They don't run me or my ward. I'll vote as I damn please. "

" Same here, " replied Tiernan, with a great show of courage. " That

goes for me. But it's putty warm, anyhow, eh? "

" Yes, it's warm, all right, " replied Kerrigan, suspicious lest his

companion in arms might be weakening, " but that'll never make a

quitter out of me. "

" Nor me, either, " replied the Smiling One.

Enter now the mayor, accompanied by a fife-and-drum corps rendering

" Hail to the Chief. " He ascends the rostrum. Outside in the halls

the huzzas of the populace. In the gallery overhead a picked

audience. As the various aldermen look up they contemplate a sea

of unfriendly faces. " Get on to the mayor's guests, " commented

one alderman to another, cynically.

A little sparring for time while minor matters are considered, and

the gallery is given opportunity for comment on the various communal

lights, identifying for itself first one local celebrity and then

another. " There's Johnnie Dowling, that big blond fellow with the

round head; there's Pinski--look at the little rat; there's Kerrigan.

Get on to the emerald. Eh, Pat, how's the jewelry? You won't get

any chance to do any grafting to-night, Pat. You won't pass no

ordinance to-night. "

Alderman Winkler (pro-Cowperwood). " If the chair pleases, I think

something ought to be done to restore order in the gallery and

keep these proceedings from being disturbed. It seems to me an

outrage, that, on an occasion of this kind, when the interests of

the people require the most careful attention--"

A Voice. " The interests of the people! "

Another Voice. " Sit down. You're bought! "

Alderman Winkler. " If the chair pleases--"

The Mayor. " I shall have to ask the audience in the gallery to

keep quiet in order that the business in hand may be considered. "

(Applause, and the gallery lapses into silence. )

Alderman Guigler (to Alderman Sumulsky). " Well trained, eh? "

Alderman Ballenberg (pro-Cowperwood, getting up--large, brown,

florid, smooth-faced). " Before calling up an ordinance which bears

my name I should like to ask permission of the council to make a

statement. When I introduced this ordinance last week I said--"

A Voice. " We know what you said. "

Alderman Ballenberg. " I said that I did so by request. I want

to explain that it was at the request of a number of gentlemen who

have since appeared before the committee of this council that now

has this ordinance--"

A Voice. " That's all right, Ballenberg. We know by whose request

you introduced it. You've said your little say. "

Alderman Ballenberg. " If the chair pleases--"

A Voice. " Sit down, Ballenberg. Give some other boodler a chance. "

The Mayor. " Will the gallery please stop interrupting. "

Alderman Horanek (jumping to his feet). " This is an outrage. The

gallery is packed with people come here to intimidate us. Here

is a great public corporation that has served this city for years,

and served it well, and when it comes to this body with a sensible

proposition we ain't even allowed to consider it. The mayor packs

the gallery with his friends, and the papers stir up people to come

down here by thousands and try to frighten us. I for one--"

A Voice. " What's the matter, Billy? Haven't you got your money

yet? "

Alderman Hvranek (Polish-American, intelligent, even artistic

looking, shaking his fist at the gallery). " You dare not come

down here and say that, you coward! "

A Chorus of Fifty Voices. " Rats! " (also) " Billy, you ought to

have wings. "

Alderman Tiernan (rising). " I say now, Mr. Mayor, don't you think

we've had enough of this? "

A Voice. " Well, look who's here. If it ain't Smiling Mike. "

Another Voice. " How much do you expect to get, Mike? "

Alderman Tiernan (turning to gallery). " I want to say I can lick

any man that wants to come down here and talk to me to my face.

I'm not afraid of no ropes and no guns. These corporations have

done everything for the city--"

A Voice. " Aw! "

Alderman Tiernan. " If it wasn't for the street-car companies we

wouldn't have any city. "

Ten Voices. " Aw! "

Alderman Tiernan (bravely). " My mind ain't the mind of some people. "

A Voice. " I should say not. "

Alderman Tiernan. " I'm talking for compensation for the privileges

we expect to give. "

A Voice. " You're talking for your pocket-book. "

Alderman Tiernan. " I don't give a damn for these cheap skates and

cowards in the gallery. I say treat these corporations right.

They have helped make the city. "

A Chorus of Fifty Voices. " Aw! You want to treat yourself right,

that's what you want. You vote right to-night or you'll be sorry. "

By now the various aldermen outside of the most hardened characters

were more or less terrified by the grilling contest. It could do

no good to battle with this gallery or the crowd outside. Above

them sat the mayor, before them reporters, ticking in shorthand

every phrase and word. " I don't see what we can do, " said Alderman

Pinski to Alderman Hvranek, his neighbor. " It looks to me as if

we might just as well not try. "

At this point arose Alderman Gilleran, small, pale, intelligent,

anti-Cowperwood. By prearrangement he had been scheduled to bring

the second, and as it proved, the final test of strength to the

issue. " If the chair pleases, " he said, " I move that the vote by

which the Ballenberg fifty-year ordinance was referred to the joint

committee of streets and alleys be reconsidered, and that instead

it be referred to the committee on city hall. "

This was a committee that hitherto had always been considered by

members of council as of the least importance. Its principal

duties consisted in devising new names for streets and regulating

the hours of city-hall servants. There were no perquisites, no

graft. In a spirit of ribald defiance at the organization of the

present session all the mayor's friends--the reformers--those who

could not be trusted--had been relegated to this committee. Now

it was proposed to take this ordinance out of the hands of friends

and send it here, from whence unquestionably it would never reappear.

The great test had come.

Alderman Hoberkorn (mouthpiece for his gang because the most skilful

in a parliamentary sense). " The vote cannot be reconsidered. " He

begins a long explanation amid hisses.

A Voice. " How much have you got? "

A Second Voice. " You've been a boodler all your life. "

Alderman Hoberkorn (turning to the gallery, a light of defiance

in his eye). " You come here to intimidate us, but you can't do

it. You're too contemptible to notice. "

A Voice. " You hear the drums, don't you? "

A Second Voice. " Vote wrong, Hoberkorn, and see. We know you. "

Alderman Tiernan (to himself). " Say, that's pretty rough, ain't

it? "

The Mayor. " Motion overruled. The point is not well taken. "

Alderman Guigler (rising a little puzzled). " Do we vote now on

the Gilleran resolution? "

A Voice. " You bet you do, and you vote right. "

The Mayor. " Yes. The clerk will call the roll. "

The Clerk (reading the names, beginning with the A's). " Altvast? "

(pro-Cowperwood).

Alderman Altvast. " Yea. " Fear had conquered him.

Alderman Tiernan (to Alderman Kerrigan). " Well, there's one baby

down. "

Alderman Kerrigan. " Yep. "

" Ballenberg? " (Pro-Cowperwood; the man who had introduced the

ordinance. )

" Yea. "

Alderman Tiernan. " Say, has Ballenberg weakened? "

Alderman Kerrigan. " It looks that way. "

" Canna? "

" Yea. "

" Fogarty? "

" Yea. "

Alderman Tiernan (nervously). " There goes Fogarty. "

" Hvranek? "

" Yea. "

Alderman Tiernan. " And Hvranek! "

Alderman Kerrigan (referring to the courage of his colleagues).

" It's coming out of their hair. "

In exactly eighty seconds the roll-call was in and Cowperwood had

lost--41 to 25. It was plain that the ordinance could never be

revived.

Chapter LXII

The Recompense

You have seen, perhaps, a man whose heart was weighted by a great

woe. You have seen the eye darken, the soul fag, and the spirit

congeal under the breath of an icy disaster. At ten-thirty of

this particular evening Cowperwood, sitting alone in the library

of his Michigan Avenue house, was brought face to face with the

fact that he had lost. He had built so much on the cast of this

single die. It was useless to say to himself that he could go

into the council a week later with a modified ordinance or could

wait until the storm had died out. He refused himself these

consolations. Already he had battled so long and so vigorously,

by every resource and subtlety which his mind had been able to

devise. All week long on divers occasions he had stood in the

council-chamber where the committee had been conducting its hearings.

Small comfort to know that by suits, injunctions, appeals, and

writs to intervene he could tie up this transit situation and leave

it for years and years the prey of lawyers, the despair of the

city, a hopeless muddle which would not be unraveled until he and

his enemies should long be dead. This contest had been so long

in the brewing, he had gone about it with such care years before.

And now the enemy had been heartened by a great victory. His

aldermen, powerful, hungry, fighting men all--like those picked

soldiers of the ancient Roman emperors--ruthless, conscienceless,

as desperate as himself, had in their last redoubt of personal

privilege fallen, weakened, yielded. How could he hearten them to

another struggle--how face the blazing wrath of a mighty populace

that had once learned how to win? Others might enter here

--Haeckelheimer, Fishel, any one of a half-dozen Eastern giants

--and smooth out the ruffled surface of the angry sea that he had

blown to fury. But as for him, he was tired, sick of Chicago,

sick of this interminable contest. Only recently he had promised

himself that if he were to turn this great trick he would never

again attempt anything so desperate or requiring so much effort.

He would not need to. The size of his fortune made it of little

worth. Besides, in spite of his tremendous vigor, he was getting

on.

Since he had alienated Aileen he was quite alone, out of touch

with any one identified with the earlier years of his life. His

all-desired Berenice still evaded him. True, she had shown lately

a kind of warming sympathy; but what was it? Gracious tolerance,

perhaps--a sense of obligation? Certainly little more, he felt.

He looked into the future, deciding heavily that he must fight on,

whatever happened, and then--

While he sat thus drearily pondering, answering a telephone call

now and then, the door-bell rang and the servant brought a card

which he said had been presented by a young woman who declared

that it would bring immediate recognition. Glancing at it,

Cowperwood jumped to his feet and hurried down-stairs into the one

presence he most craved.

There are compromises of the spirit too elusive and subtle to be

traced in all their involute windings. From that earliest day

when Berenice Fleming had first set eyes on Cowperwood she had

been moved by a sense of power, an amazing and fascinating

individuality. Since then by degrees he had familiarized her with

a thought of individual freedom of action and a disregard of current

social standards which were destructive to an earlier conventional

view of things. Following him through this Chicago fight, she had

been caught by the wonder of his dreams; he was on the way toward

being one of the world's greatest money giants. During his recent

trips East she had sometimes felt that she was able to read in the

cast of his face the intensity of this great ambition, which had

for its ultimate aim--herself. So he had once assured her. Always

with her he had been so handsome, so pleading, so patient.

So here she was in Chicago to-night, the guest of friends at the

Richelieu, and standing in Cowperwood's presence.

" Why, Berenice! " he said, extending a cordial hand.

" When did you arrive in town? Whatever brings you here? " He had

once tried to make her promise that if ever her feeling toward him

changed she would let him know of it in some way. And here she

was to-night--on what errand? He noted her costume of brown silk

and velvet--how well it seemed to suggest her cat-like grace!

" You bring me here, " she replied, with an indefinable something

in her voice which was at once a challenge and a confession. " I

thought from what I had just been reading that you might really

need me now. "

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