CHAPTER III.—THE GENTLEMAN DISCOVERS A NEW KIND OF POWER
REMAINED at Rushwater to run the shop while McCarthy was beginning his legislative career. I was going about a good deal looking after branches in Chicago and New York. The hand-made gentleman was at home and doing something for Sal in the intervals of adjournment, but I saw little of him. Two or three times in my absence he called to see my mother and sister.
When I had returned from a long journey, one evening Sarah said to me:
“I have seen that girl.”
“What girl?”
“Mr. McCarthy's girl—the one you say he loves.”
“Has she been here?”
“Yes; and I don't like her.”
“Why?”
“I don't believe she cares for him, and she ought to be ashamed of herself.”
My sister turned away, her cheeks red with indignation.
“No woman has any right to marry a man that she does not love,” she went on. “Do you really think he cares for her?”
“So he told me.”
“Well, I do hope she makes him a good wife. They are to be married in June.”
“In June!”
“Yes; he spoke of it one evening to mother and me, and looked as if he were talking about his funeral.”
“It may be something has come between them,” I said; “but he will keep his word if he dies for it, unless—well, no sentimental reason would turn him.”
“What a wonderful man he is!” said Sarah; and then she brought my slippers to me, and came and sat on the arm of my chair and tenderly stroked my weary head.
“And what a wonderful sister you are, and how beautiful you have grown! Some day you will be getting married.”
“No,” she answered, as she put her arms around my neck; “I am going to live with you and mother, if you will let me.”
“There are many fine young fellows who come to see her,” said my mother, who had been sitting near us.
“But I do not care for them,” Sarah answered, as she rose and left us.
Meanwhile the hand-made gentleman was changing. The legislature adjourned in April, and then we saw much of him, and the wear of problems deeper than those I shared had begun to show in his face. Moreover, his plans had changed.
“I shall need you with me at Albany and everywhere,” he said, one evening when we were alone together in the office. “There are plenty of business men, but there is only one Jacob Heron. I've got another man for the shop, and you and I will start for Pittsburg in a day or two.”
“For Pittsburg!”
“Yes; they've asked me to 'look into the subject of rails and signals,'” he went on. “The superintendent of the Western Division of the Pennsylvania Railroad is a man of the name of Andrew Carnegie. He has invented a block-signal system to enable trains to keep their speed with safety. He knows more about iron than any other man in the world, and is the head of the Keystone Bridge Company.
“The fact is, we've got to have a new kind of iron. Our rails are breaking down. They can't stand up under heavy loads and big engines. The country will have to poke along at twenty miles an hour until we can get something better. On our way we'll stop in New York and see the Commodore.”
I began to think of my mother and sister, who had come to live with me in Rushwater. He seemed to read my thoughts, for he added:
“You can take the folks to Albany if you like. They've never seen much of city life; I'm sure they'd like it; and, say, do you—do you suppose they'd be willing to put up with me for a boarder?”
“I'm sure they'd be glad to have you,” I said.
“Don't tell 'em that I spoke of it, but just propose the thing and see what they say. You can be frank with me. We ought to know each other well enough for that. I'm afraid you're just a little too much inclined to please me.”
“Not without provocation,” I remarked, having great respect for him.
“But I want you to find fault with me,” he went on; “I'm far from perfect. Just remember that I'm trying to improve myself. All that I know I picked up here and there. If you hear me say anything that doesn't sound right, I want you to tell me. I want you to look over me a little every day, and tell me if I dress and act as a gentleman ought to. You've seen how people do in New York.”
“I've often thought that I would speak to you about the color of your neckties,” I suggested, mildly. “You seem to like red as well as I do, but it is not the best form.”
He turned, blushing, and took from his pocket a twenty-dollar bill, and said: “I'm glad you spoke of it. Take this and go and get me some good ties in the morning. If you see anything that you think I need, buy it; my credit is good here. But there's another matter—my soul is feeling a bit shabby and ashamed of itself; it needs a little advice.”
“What's the trouble?” I asked.
“Well, I've found a greater power than the push of steam or water or electricity. It can put them all out of business—it could stop every wheel in the world.”
He paused, and I looked into his eyes and guessed his meaning.
“It is love, and it has stopped me,” he went on—“stopped me on the brink of a precipice. I don't know what to do. I wish I were somebody—anybody but the low-bred, common, Pegleg McCarthy that I am.”
His voice began to tremble a bit, and he left his chair and walked up and down the room in silence.
“Don't throw mud on yourself,” I protested. “There are plenty of us who would like to be that same McCarthy.”
“I'm not so bad,” he went on. “The trouble is, I have the pride of a king in me and the blood of a hodman. But I may do something by-and-by. I've been reading about Lincoln. He was a man of humble birth and limited education. It gave me hope for myself.”
“What's the trouble?” I asked again.
“I have met the woman I love, and she is not Miss Manning,” he continued. “She is a lady—the sweetest, dearest lady in the land, and so far above me that we could never be man and wife. But I love her. God! she is more to me than all the rest of the world. I have nothing in me but the thought of her.”
He turned away and fussed with the papers on his desk.
“I care no more for business,” he continued, “and the honors I had hoped for are nothing to me now. All my plans are like the withered stems of a garden sticking out of the snow.”
He strode up and down the room and stopped before me, and something out of the depths of his heart shone in his countenance and lifted him to greatness, it seemed to me, so that he saw his way clearly.
“I shall do my work,” he said, solemnly. “I will do what my God tells me to do. I will try to be good enough for her—that is something—and I shall marry Miss Manning.”
“Do you think you ought to do that?” I asked. “I have promised, and a gentleman keeps his word unless—unless there's some good reason why he shouldn't.”
“I have sometimes thought that she was not the woman for you,” I suggested.
“So have I. Poor girl! We're quick to judge, and not any of us are perfect. My life isn't much; I'm glad to give it for a principle.”
“I know how you feel,” I said, thinking of my own troubles. “But then it may be that she doesn't care for you.”
“Well, I've got to believe her, haven't I?”
“Yes—if—if she's a lady,” was my answer. “Well, you see, I'm a pretty common fellow myself, and I must treat other people as I would have them treat me. Miss Manning is a good-hearted girl; she's had bad luck—the company stranded, and all that. In the morning I wish you to go to New York and find her. She lives at the Waverly Place Hotel. I'll give you a check signed in blank. Get a schedule of her debts, if possible; satisfy yourself as to the sum she really needs if it takes a week, and make the check for any amount you think best. When you're ready, wire me, and I'll meet you and we'll go on to Pittsburg. One moment,” he added, as I was leaving him, “you will be apt to find her at home about six. If she isn't there, her maid will tell you where she is, and you might look her up.”
It was a curious mission—the kind of duty one would rarely delegate to another. Yet, somehow, it was characteristic of the gentleman to be frank and businesslike, even in a matter of benevolence. But how was I to learn what sum “she really needed”?
I took a train in the morning, and about six that afternoon called at the rooms of Miss Manning, in Waverly Place. She had gone to dine at Delmonico's, the maid told me.
Delmonico's! I had heard of the famous café and restaurant, the resort of the rich and the high-born, where, it was soberly affirmed, one could pay, and many had paid, as much as ten dollars for a dinner. I had plenty of money, and a feeling of opulence, too, and decided that I would go and have a look at the place and the people and the food, for I had no notion that I should like the taste of it. So I put on my best clothes, and walked down Broadway, and entered as boldly as if I had been there every day of my life. A young man of the name of Gillette, whom I remembered meeting one day at a tea-party at Mrs. Schermerhom's, rose from one of the tables and greeted me. My memory was better than his, for I recollect that he addressed me as “Mr. Horn,” and talked so volubly that he gave me no opportunity of correcting him. He had heard of my injuries, and assured me of his sorrow, and asked me to join his dinnerparty at a large, round table.
“I really need you, old man,” he whispered. “You see, one of my friends has disappointed me, and there's an empty chair.”
I accepted his kindness, and he presented me as “Mr. Horn,” and as “my old friend, Mr. Horn,” so what could I do but accept the name and make the best of it. Well, to my great surprise, one of the ladies at the table was Miss Manning herself, and a very handsome girl she was. I was about to say that I knew a friend of hers when it occurred to me that if I did I should have to explain that my name was Heron and not Horn, and so embarrass the friendly Mr. Gillette. I said nothing, therefore, and was soon glad of my forbearance.
All were drinking freely save myself, and by-and-by the conversation grew oddly intimate and the manners most unrestrained. Miss Manning held the hand of the young man who sat beside her, and spoke freely of her “angel” up the State, who was going to marry her; and I could not hold up my head or heart in the midst of it, and excused myself and left them with a kind of world-sickness in me—the first touch of it that I had known. Yet, as the friend of a noble gentleman, I thanked God for it all, and the great soul of McCarthy himself could not have felt a keener pity.
I telegraphed to my friend that I had finished my work, and next evening he met me at the St. Nicholas. He came into my room and pressed my hand eagerly, and asked:
“What's new?”
“Nothing,” I said; “it's a rather old story.”
“You saw Miss Manning?”
“Yes.”
“And gave her the check?”
“No; I return the check to you,” I said, and briefly gave my reasons.
“Heron, most any one can obey orders, but the man who knows enough to disobey them to save a principal is above price,” he said, as he shook my hand again. “I couldn't say a word of my suspicions, for, you know, one has to be careful not to injure a lady. For fear of that I couldn't bring myself to engage a detective to watch her—it seemed so brutal and ruthless and cold-blooded.”
He turned away, and for a moment neither spoke.
“I was sure that you would know how to do the errand,” he added. .
Mr. McCarthy drew a letter from his pocket and flung it on the table, and said:
“You will understand me when you have read that.”
I drew the letter from the envelope, and read as follows:
Mr. McCarthy,—You are being deceived, and I write to warn you about Miss Manning. If you or any friend of yours would go to her hotel unexpected, almost any evening about dinner-time, you could learn where to find her. I could tell you many things, but you might as well learn them for yourself.
A Well-Wisher.
“I think it was written by her maid,” said McCarthy, as I returned the letter. “But come, come, we are due at the Commodore's.”
We hurried away, and as we left the inn I could not help thinking how cleverly he had planned my errand of good-will.