CHAPTER XII
A YELLOW JOURNALIST SECURES A SCOOP BUT FAILS TO GET AWAY WITH IT
Garbed in a suit of Varney's clothes, warmed beneath his belt by a libation from the Cypriani's choicest stock, eased as to his person by a pillow beneath his head and a comfortable rest for his feet, Charlie Hammerton threw back his head and laughed.
"I'm not crazy about those grand-stand plays as a rule," he said. "Because in the first place they're yellow, and in the second place they're a darned lot of bother. But I just had to see you—I guess you know why—and I couldn't think of anything else that struck me as really sure. How'd I do it? Fair imitashe, hey? And I only told one lie, which is pretty good for a proposition of this sort. I can swim, Mr. Varney. Like a blooming duck."
Varney laughed. "You're half an hour too late in telling me that, you know! But tell me how you managed all this: it was so clever! And do try one of these cigars."
They sat at ease on the awninged after-deck, a wicker table between them convivial with decanters and their recognized appurtenances, like two old friends met for a happy reunion. The Gazette's star reporter was as different from one's conception of a dangerous adversary as it is possible for a man to be. He seemed only a pleasant-faced, friendly boy of twenty-three or four, with an honest eye and a singularly infectious laugh.
"Don't mind if I do—thanks!" said Hammerton, to the proffer of cigars. "Well, it wasn't so very hard. After you steamed off, and left me gazing nervously out to sea like a deserted fisher's wife, I—"
"No, you don't!" laughed Varney. "Begin way back at the beginning. I'm as ignorant as a baby about all this, you know."
Hammerton rather liked the idea of lolling on a luxurious yacht and explaining to the outwitted owner just how he had done it.
"Well," he said, "it's like this. When you fellows jumped in and kidnapped Ryan and banged the administration in the eye and slapped the Gazette some stinging ones on the wrist, of course, we couldn't just sit still and go quietly on with our knitting. Nay, nay! So we played up that gossip about you as strong as we could, sort of guessing that it might hurt your feelings a little. I'm going to be frank with you, you see! And then another idea came to us that wasn't half bad. You said you were Mr. Laurence Varney of New York. Well, whether that was true or not—begging your pardon, of course!—that gave it a New York interest, don't you see? So Mr. Smith, more by way of a feeler than anything else, wired it off to the Daily—"
"Why," interrupted Varney, "I thought you were the correspondent of the Daily?"
"So I am. But this time it was only nominal. He's pretty fond of doing it himself, Smith is. Well, as soon as I got down this morning, he called me in and showed me the Daily. You've seen it, I suppose? Of course, we were struck with the way our story had caught on, and particularly with the postscript about Elbert Carstairs and the mystery idea. Smith said: 'There appears to be more in this than meets the eye, Charles. Hustle you down to the Cypriani, or ever the birds be flown.' So I hustled. But then I did a fool thing that nearly gummed the game entirely. Just at the edge of the woods, I met a boy coming up the hill.
"Maybe you remember that kid, Mr. Varney—the telegraph boy? He was just on his way back from the yacht when I ran into him."
"Come to think of it, I believe I did see that boy hanging around here."
"As hard a little nut," said Hammerton, "as you ever saw in your life. When he saw me, he stopped short and asked where I was going. I told him to the yacht. ''T ain't no use,' he said—I won't try to give his lingo—'they've gone.' And the little devil actually went on to tell me how he had overheard the two gentlemen talking—guys he called you—and how you had decided to return to New York at once, and how he had looked back from the shore and seen the yacht already steaming away."
Thus Varney learned that he had one friend in Hunston who was true to him, according to his poor little lights; and he felt that that kindly lie of Tommy Orrick's, if it was ever set down against him anywhere, must be the kind that is blotted out again in tears.
"Why, I've been good to that kid," said Hammerton, "giving him cigar-ends nearly every time I see him and that sort of thing. I never thought he had so much pure malice in him. Well, like a fool, I turned right around and went back. I felt so pleased about it—for of course that was just what the Gazette wanted—that I dropped in at the Ottoman for an eye-opener, and by Jove! it was nearly an hour before I got back to the office."
He laughed, at first ruefully, then merrily—for had not everything turned out in the most satisfactory way in the world?
"Smith's a beaut," he said, shaking his head reminiscently. "I don't believe anything ever got away from him since he was big enough to sit in front of a desk. When I told him that you fellows had gone back to New York, he never batted an eye. He just pulled a telescope out of the bottom drawer of his desk and went up to the roof. In two minutes he was down again. 'Charles,' he said in that quiet biting way of his, 'God may have put bigger fools than you into this world, but in his great mercy he has not sent them to retard the work of the Gazette. The yacht lies precisely where she has lain for these two days. Will it be quite convenient for you to drop down there and have a talk, or do you design to wait until the gentlemen call at your desk and beg the privilege of telling you all?'"
He laughed again, this time without a trace of resentment; and so merry and spontaneous was this laugh that Varney could not help joining in.
"I suppose old Smith can tell you to go-to-hell more politely, yet more thoroughly, than any man that ever lived. I ran—and I was just in time at that, hey? Well, when you fellows steamed off, I kind of suspected that you weren't going very far. So I got a boy and had him trail you down the old River road on a wheel. By the time he got back and told me that I had sized it up about right, I had my plans arranged and my make-up all ready. That make-up was rather neat, I thought, what? Meantime, a long wire had come in from the Daily office, which made me keener than ever to see you. So I hired another wheel, ran on down, borrowed a canoe from a man I know here, and I guess you know the rest."
"I should say I did," said Varney. "Ha, ha! I should rather say I did."
One reason why it was so advantageous to make the boy talk was that it gave one a chance to think. All the time that he had listened so pleasantly to this garrulous chatter, Varney had been swiftly planning. Now he had the situation pretty well analyzed and saw all the ways that there were.
He might send the reporter away convinced that there was nothing in this new theory, after all, that the Gazette's trump card in fighting Maginnis and Reform was still his own unhappy resemblance to the outlawed author. Or he might send him off with enough of a new theory to make him think it unnecessary to go to Mrs. Carstairs or her daughter—the fatal possibility. Or, if both of these proved impracticable as they almost certainly would, there was only one course left: he would not let Hammerton go away at all.
"But have another little drop or two, won't you? Those dips with your clothes on aren't a bit good for the health."
"Well, just a little tickler," said Charlie Hammerton. But he permitted himself to be helped quite liberally, with no protesting "when." "My regards, Mr. Varney! Also my compliments and thanks for accepting the situation like such a genuine game one."
Varney nodded. "The fortunes of war, Mr. Hammerton. But do go on. You have no idea how interesting the newspaper game is to an outsider, particularly—ha, ha!—when it walks right across his own quiet career. As I understand it, you're on the regular staff of the Gazette, and then are a special correspondent of the Daily, besides?"
Hammerton, cocksure of his game and pleasantly cheered by the potent draught, thought that he had never interviewed so agreeable a man.
"That's it exactly. Then, besides, we run a little news-bureau at the Gazette, you know—sell special stuff, whenever there's anything doing, to papers all over the country. The bureau didn't touch this story last night—why, I thought it was too 'it-is-understood' and 'rumor-has-it' and all that, to go even with the Daily—in your old own town. It'll be different to-night, all right. We'll query our whole string on it now—unless," he added with frank despondency, "the darned old Associated Press decides to pinch it."
"Query them, Mr. Hammerton?"
"Yes, wire them a brief, kind of piquant outline of the story, you know, and ask them if they don't want it. And I sort of guess they'll all want it, all right!"
"We'll see about that in a minute," laughed Varney. "There's lots of time. Tell me about that brilliant young editor of yours, Mr. Smith. The men in the office all like him and sympathize with his policies, I suppose?"
Hammerton laughed, doubtfully. "Well, they all look up to him and respect him as one of the cleverest newspaper men in the country. Personally, I like old Smith fine, though nobody ever gets close to him a bit. He's mighty good to me—lets me write little editorials two or three times a week, and says I'm not so awful at it. As for sympathizing with his policies—well, you know I'm not sure Smith sympathizes with 'em much himself. I have a kind of private hunch that he's gotten sore on his job and would sell out if somebody—well, suppose we say our friend Ryan—would offer him his price. No, I'm not so keen for these indirect methods, Mr. Varney. At the same time, it's part of the game, I suppose, and I always believe in playing a game right out to the end, for everything there is in it."
At the unmistakable significance in his tone, Varney looked up and found the reporter's eyes fixed upon him in an odd gaze which made him look all at once ten years older and infinitely difficult to baffle: a gaze which made it plain, in fact, that the wearer of it was not to be put off with anything short of the whole truth. The next second that look broke into an easy laugh, and Hammerton was a chattering boy again.
But Varney's mood rose instantly to meet the antagonism of the reporter's look, and hung there. He pulled a silver case from his pocket, selected a cigarette with care and lit it with deliberation. He had learned everything that he wanted to know; the conversation was beginning to grow tiresome; and he found the boy's careless self-confidence increasingly exasperating.
"But as for undercutting Hare," laughed Hammerton, "I don't like it a—"
"Tell me this," Varney interrupted coolly. "When the Gazette prepared its story about me last night, did it believe for one moment that I was this man Stanhope?"
"Why, I'm not the Gazette, of course," said Hammerton, a little taken aback by the cool change of both topic and manner, "but my private suspicion is that it entertained a few doubts on the subject. What do we think now? Look here, Mr. Varney," the boy said amiably, "you've been white about this business, and I do really want to show that I appreciate it."
He fumbled in the side-pocket of his wet coat, which hung on a near-by chair, produced a damp paper of the familiar yellow, smoothed it out and handed it across the table.
"I guess I won't keep any secrets from you, Mr. Varney."
Varney, taking the telegram with a nod, read the following:
Gazette, HUNSTON:
Varney-Stanhope story good stuff, but lacking details, vague and inaccurate. Stanhope located in Adirondacks, though not reached. See Daily to-day. Man on yacht Varney. Apparent secrecy surrounding departure from here. Interview him sure and secure full statement as to business which brought him to Hunston. Also interview Mrs. Elbert Carstairs in Hunston. She separated from husband years ago. His yacht there with name erased suggests mystery. Rush fullest details day-rate if necessary. Pictures made. Expect complete story and interviews early to-night sure. S. P. STOKES.
"Now," said Charlie Hammerton, when Varney looked up, "you see why I went to such a lot of trouble to get hold of you."
"Yes," said Varney, slowly, his eye upon him, "I see."
He folded the telegram, laid it at Hammerton's elbow, got up and stood with his hands on the back of his chair, looking down. At the thought that he had ever hoped to call the reporter off, to stop this deadly machinery of journalism, once it had been started, he could have laughed. The Daily telegram showed how impossible that had always been. Now it was suddenly and overwhelmingly plain that to force a fight on Hammerton, which had been his favorite purpose from the beginning, even to seize and lock him up, would be of no avail whatever. Other reporters in endless procession, waited behind him, ready to step into his place; and the pitiless machinery, in which he, Varney, happened to be caught at the moment, would go steadily grinding on till it had crushed out the heart of the hidden truth.
He saw no way out at all. His mind revolved at fever heat, while he said calmly: "Go back to your employers, Mr. Hammerton, and report that you have no story to sell them. Say further that since they knowingly printed a lying slander about me this morning, you, as an honorable man, insist upon their making full retractions and apologies to-morrow."
Hammerton, who had taken his interview as a foregone conclusion, looked momentarily astounded; but on top of that his manner changed again, to meet Varney's changed one, in the wink of an eye.
"You can't mean," he said briskly, ignoring Varney's last remark entirely, "that you decline to make a statement for our readers?"
"Why should I encourage your readers to stick their infernal noses into my business?"
"For your own sake, Mr. Varney—because everybody has started asking questions. To refuse to answer them, from your point of view, is the worst thing you could do. As you know, newspapers always have other sources of information, and also ways of making intelligent guesses. While these guesses are usually surprisingly accurate, it sometimes happens that we work out a theory that is a whole lot worse than the truth."
"Of course," said Varney, with sudden absentness. "That's the way you sell your dirty papers, is n't it?"
"Mr. Varney, why did you come—?" began Hammerton, but stopped short, perceiving that the other no longer listened, and quite content to leave him to a little reflection.
For Varney, struck by a thought so new that it was overwhelming, had unexpectedly turned away. He leaned upon the rail and looked out over the blue, sunny water. A brilliant plan had flashed into his mind—a big daring plan which, far more than anything else he had thought of, might be effective and final. Instead of making an enemy of Hammerton, which could accomplish nothing, it would turn him into a champion, which meant victory.
It was a desperate solution, but it was a solution.
After all, what else remained? To dismiss the boy with nothing would be to send him straight to the Carstairs house with no one knew what results. To manhandle him would be simply to start another sleuth on the trail. But this plan, if it worked, would avoid that, and every other, risk of trouble. And if it failed, he would be no worse off than he was now; for in that case he would not allow Hammerton to go back to the Gazette at all that day.
He dropped his cigarette over the side, turned and found the eye of the press firmly fastened upon him.
"Mr. Varney," said Hammerton, with swift acuteness, "maybe I'm not as bad a fellow as you think. Why can't you trust me with this story—of what brought you to Hunston, and what made you run away this morning and hide? If it's really something that newspapers haven't got anything to do with, I'll go straight back to the office and make them leave you alone. Oh, I have enough influence to do it, all right! And if it's something different and—well, a little unusual, I'll promise to put you in the best light possible. Why don't you trust me with it?"
"Well," said Varney with a stormy smile, "suppose I do, then!"
"Good!" cried Hammerton cordially, observing him, however, with some intentness. "Honestly, it's the very best thing you could do."
Varney rested upon the back of his chair again and stood staring down at the reporter for some time in silence.
"Mr. Hammerton," he began presently, "I know that the great majority of newspaper men are fair and honorable and absolutely trustworthy. I know that it is a part of their capital to be able to keep a secret as well as to print one. For this reason, I have upon reflection decided to confide—certain facts to you, feeling sure that they will never go any further—"
"Of course, Mr. Varney," the reporter interrupted, "you understand that
I can't make any promises in advance."
"Let the risk be mine," said Varney. "I am certain that when you have heard what I have to tell you, you will report to your papers that my 'mysterious errand' turns out to be simply a matter of personal and private business, with which the public has no concern, and whose publication at this time would hopelessly ruin it. Mr. Hammerton, I came to Hunston to see Miss Mary Carstairs."
A gleam came into Hammerton's eye. Varney, watching that observant feature, knew that no detail of his story, or of his manner in telling it, would escape a most critical scrutiny.
"The fewer particulars the better," he said grimly. "I shall tell the substance because that seems now, after all, the best way to protect the interests of those concerned. Mr. Hammerton, as the Daily told you, Mr. Carstairs and his wife have separated, though they are still on friendly terms with each other. Their only child remains with the mother. Mr. Carstairs is getting old. He is naturally an affectionate man, and he is very lonely. In short, he has become most anxious to have his daughter spend part of her time with him. Mrs. Carstairs entirely approves of this. The daughter, however, absolutely refuses to leave her mother, feeling, it appears, that nothing is due her father from her. Arguments are useless. Well, what is to be done? Mr. Carstairs, because his great need of his daughter grows upon him, conceives an unusual plan. He will send an ambassador to Hunston—unaccredited, of course, a man, young, not married, who—don't think me a coxcomb—but who might be able to arouse the daughter's interest. This ambassador is to go on Mr. Carstairs's own yacht, the name, of course, being erased, so that the daughter may not recognize it. He is to meet the young lady, cultivate her, make friends with her—all without letting her dream that he comes from her father, for that would ruin everything. And, then—"
He broke off, paused, considered. In Hammerton's eye he saw a light which meant sympathy, kindly consideration, human interest. He knew that the battle was half won. He had only to say: "And then talk to her about her poor old father, who loves her, and who is growing old in a big house all by himself; and tell her how he needs her so sorely that old grudges ought to be forgotten; and ask her, in the name of common kindness, to come down and pay him a visit before it is too late." He had only to say that, and he knew, for he read it in Hammerton's whole softened expression, that the boy would go away with his lips locked.
But he couldn't say that, the reason being that it was not true.
"And then," he said, with a truthfulness so bold that he was sure the reporter would not follow it, "and then—don't you see? he is to try to make her go down to New York and pay a visit to that lonely old father who needs her so badly. Since she is so obstinate about it, he must find some way to make her go before it is too late. Now do you understand, Mr. Hammerton? Now do you perceive why the thought of having all this pitiful story scareheaded in a penny paper is insufferable to me?"
He towered above Hammerton, crisp words falling like leaden bullets, stern, insistent, determined to be believed. But he saw a look dawn on the younger man's face which made him instantly fear that he had told too much.
And then suddenly Hammerton sprang to his feet, keen eyes shot with light, ruddy cheek paled a little with excitement, fronting Varney in startled triumph over the drinks they had shared.
"Make her!" he blurted in a high shrill voice. "Mr. Varney, you came up here to kidnap her!"
The two men stared at each other in a moment of horrified silence. Something in the reporter's air of victory, in the kind of thrilling joy with which he pounced upon the carefully guarded little secret and dragged it out into the light, made him all at once loathsome in Varney's eyes, a creature unspeakably repellent.
Suddenly he leaned across the little table and struck Hammerton lightly across the mouth with the back of his hand.
"You cad," he said whitely.
But Hammerton, never to be stopped by details now, ignored both the insult and the blow. He was on the rail like a cat, ready to swim for it, hot to take his great scoop to Mrs. Carstairs, to Coligny Smith, to readers of newspapers all over the land.
The table was between them, and it went over with a crash. Quick as he was, Varney was barely in time. His hand fell upon the reporter's coat when another fraction of a second would have been too late. Then he flung backward with a wrench, and Hammerton came toppling heavily to the deck.
Smarting with the pain of the fall, hot with anger at last, the reporter was up in an instant, spitting blood, and they clenched with the swiftness of lightning. Then they broke away, violently, and went at it in grim earnest.
It was the fight of a lifetime for each of them and they were splendidly matched. Hammerton was two inches the shorter, but he had twenty pounds of solid weight to offset that; and in close work, especially, his execution was polished. They had it up and down the deck, hammer and tongs, swinging, landing, rushing, sidestepping. At the first crash of broken glass on the deck, the crew had begun to appear, unobtrusively from all directions. Now cabin-hatch, galley-hatch, deck-house, every coign of vantage along the battlefield held its silent cluster of wondering figures. But McTosh, familiar old family retainer, slipped nearer at the first opportunity and whispered, in just that eager tone with which he pressed a side-dish upon one's notice:
"Can't I give you a little help, sir?"
"Keep away, steward," said Varney, between clenched teeth, "or you'll get hurt."
Saying which, he received a savage blow on the point of the chin and struck the deck with a thud.
"Oh, my Gawd, sir!" breathed McTosh.
But his young master was on his feet like a tiger, in a whirl of crazy passion. He had resolved all along that Hammerton would have to kill him before he should get away with that secret. Now it came to him like a divine revelation that the way to avoid this was to kill Hammerton. To that pleasant end, he goaded his adversary with a light blow, side-stepped his rush, uppercutted and the reporter went down, almost head first, and cruelly hard.
He came up dazed, game but very wild, and Varney got another chance promptly, which was just as well. Hammerton went down again, head on once more, and this time he did not come up at all.
The crew, unable to repress themselves, let out a cheer, and came crowding on the deck. But Varney, standing over Hammerton's limp body, waved them back impatiently.
"Hold your noise!" he ordered. "And stand back! I'm attending to this job!"
He picked Hammerton up in his arms, staggered with him to his own stateroom, and laid him down on the bunk. The boy did not stir, gave no visible sign of life. But when Varney put his hand over the other's heart, he found it beating away quite firmly. His breathing and pulse were regular—everything was quite as it should be. He would come round in half an hour, and be as good a man as ever. And he would have a long, idle time to rest, and look after his bruises and get back his strength again.
Varney took the key from the door, put it in outside, turned it and came on deck again. The crew had vanished to their several haunts. Two deck-hands in blouses and red caps had just completed the rehabilitation of the deck, and at sight of him discreetly vanished forward.
"Ferguson," called Varney, "a word with you, please."
The grizzled sailing-master came quickly, obviously curious for an explanation of these strange matters.
Rapidly Varney explained to him that the incarcerated man was a reporter who thought that he had got hold of a scandalous story about Mr. Carstairs, and was most anxious to get ashore so that he could publish this scandal all over the country.
"I am obliged to go to town immediately," he continued. "Rumors of this ugly story have already been started, and I must do everything I can to nail them. I am going to trust the responsibility here to you. As soon as I leave the yacht, I want you to start her down the river. That is to get the gentleman and the yacht out of the way. Go straight ahead for two or three hours and then come back. Make your calculations so that you'll get back here at—say ten o'clock to-night—here, mind you, not the old anchorage. I'll be ready to come aboard by that time. Have two men guard that stateroom constantly every minute. Give the gentleman every possible attention, but don't let him make any noise, and don't let him get out. No matter what he says or does, don't let him get out. Do you follow me?"
"I do, sir. To the menootest detail."
"If you carry the matter through, you may rely upon Mr. Carstairs's gratitude. If, on the other hand, you fail—"
"Oh, I'll not fail, sir. Have no fear of that."
"I am speaking to you man to man, Ferguson, when I say, for God's sake don't."
He walked away to arrange himself a little for the town, seeing clearly that there was but one possible way out of all this for him now. The sailing-master stared after him with a very curious expression upon his weather-beaten face.
At about the same moment, in a tiny room four miles away, an elderly, melancholy man sat bowed over a telegraph board and drowsily plied his keys. He was the Gazette's special operator, and, having his orders from Mr. Parker, who looked after the news bureau when Hammerton was away, he was methodically going through his list like this:
Tribune, PITTSBURG:
Ferris Stanhope or Laurence Varney? Baffling mystery surrounding prominent men, one of whom now hiding here. Probable scandal, one thousand words.
Press, CINCINNATI:
Ferris Stanhope or Laurence Varney? Baffling mystery—