CHAPTER XX
Bill jumped from bed as the rattle of the latch announced the arrival of a visitor. Without waiting for the formality of more than a bathrobe, Rosy Raymond's last birthday gift to him, he bolted down the stairs and across the office. He flung the door open and disclosed the hazy features of Kelly Jones, peering at him through the November fog.
"What, ho! Kelly, what brings you to our door in the glooming?"
Kelly shook the rain from his slicker and came inside.
"Wife called me at three o'clock," he announced. "Had my breakfast and rid like hell to git to town early. I want to cast the fu'st vote for Wat for governor."
Bill yawned.
"You could have ridden more leisurely, and saved us a couple of hours' sleep," he complained. "There are at least a thousand voters of Bloomtown with that same laudable intention. Tom Granger has been missing since seven o'clock last night. It is believed that he is locked in the booth so that his vote will skin the rest."
Kelly looked ruefully back into the rain.
"I reckon that I will come in and set a while, that bein' the report."
"Any man found voting for Jones is to be lynched at sunset," declared Bill, pushing a chair forward.
"Reckon this'll be a big day for the Democrats," commented Kelly, stretching his feet across the table comfortably. "'Tain't nothin' to keep 'em home, so they'll kill time, votin'. That's why I allus cussed my daddy for raisin' me a Democrat. Bein' as I am one, I've got to stick by and see the durn fools shuckin' corn while the Republicans are haulin' their grand-daddies in town to vote the Republicans in."
Bill retired to don a few garments and Jap tumbled from bed, for this was a big day in Bloomtown. Before six o'clock the roads were lined with vehicles, as for an Independence holiday. The county was coming in to help the town vote for her favorite son.
About noon Harlow came creeping up the alley and slipped in at the back door. He wore a slicker that he had borrowed from some constituent who was short. It hung sorrowfully about his knees. Bill remembered that in spike-tail coat and white necktie Wat Harlow looked enough like a governor to pass for one, but just now he resembled nothing so much as a draggled rooster. The stove in the little private office hissed and sputtered as he shook the rain from the coat.
"I thought that the only place that victory would be complete would be the Herald office," he said, relaxing into a chair. "And if we are beat, I could meet it better here." He took a paper in his shaking hands and tried to read.
The rain poured in torrents, but Bloomtown cast her record vote—and not one scurrilous vote against him dropped into the ballot box. At sunset a wild yell proclaimed that Bloomtown had done her duty. It was now up to the rest of the state whether Wat Harlow, proclaimed from border to border as an honest man, would be its next governor. On his record as opposed to State University graft, he had once been elected to the legislature when the running was close. On that same record, as opposed to higher education, he was defeated for United States Congressman, and on that same record he was running for governor of his state.
The Herald office lighted up. All the big men of Bloomtown smoked the air blue, waiting for the returns. First good, then crushingly bad, they varied. By the tone of the operator's yell, the waiters guessed each bulletin. If he came silent, they all coughed and waited for some one to take the fatal slip of paper. The dawn was graying when they dispersed, with the issue still in doubt. It was late afternoon before they knew that Harlow was elected. Bill grinned joyously, for the first time since Rosy Raymond carried her heart to Barton and left it there.
"How many roosters have we?" he asked impishly, as he walked over to the telephone.
"Why?" queried Jap.
"I am going to 'phone Jones that we want to borrow all that he don't need," said Bill, taking the receiver from the hook.
"We done it!" yelled Kelly Jones, slapping his slouch hat against the door. "And I'm goin' over to Barton and git on the hell-firedest drunk that that jay town ever seen. Whoopee!" And off he set at a run to catch the local freight.
About half of Bloomtown seemed inspired with the same spirit, and the freight pulled out amid wild yells of joy. Several of the most agile among the jubilant ones draped the box cars with strips of faded, soggy bunting, and Harlow's picture adorned the cow-catcher. The yelling, that had been discontinued for economic reasons, was resumed in raucous chorus as the train rolled into Barton to celebrate Harlow's victory in Jones's town.
The Bloomtown Herald did itself proud that week. A mammoth picture of the Lone Pine stood forth on the front page. Around it fluttered one hundred flags. Every page sported roosters and flags in each available space, between local readers and editorial paragraphs. It was a thing of beauty and a joy forever—at least to Wat Harlow. One other cut found place at the bottom of the editorial page. Bill did not forget to boomerang Wilfred Jones by reprinting the weeping angel. For a week there were bonfires every night, and a number of Bloomtown's citizens sought to lighten Barton's woes by buying fire-water there. Wat swelled until he looked more like a corpulent oak than a lone pine.
"My house is yours," he cried, alternately wringing Jap and Bill by their weary hands. He had come across once more from his headquarters in the Court House to make sure his appreciation was understood. Jap smiled wanly as the village band followed him with its intermittent serenade.
Bloomtown had long since outgrown the village class; but not a drum nor a horn had encroached upon the old traditions of that band. Mike Hawkins was far too conservative to permit innovation, and as there was no provision for retiring the bandmaster on half pay, the problem of dividing nothing in half having as yet been unsolved, Mike continued to hold the job. All day the band had been vibrating between the Court House and the Herald office, having delivered ten serenades at each side of Main street, for it was understood that the Herald shared the victory with Harlow. As the Governor-elect retreated to the other side of the street, the band at his heels, Bill groaned aloud.
"I wish that that bunch of musicians had had more confidence that Wat was going to get it," he sighed, "so that they could have learned one tune good."
Kelly Jones was capering down the street. Kelly had absorbed enough of Barton booze to make him believe he owned the half of Bloomtown that did not belong to Wat Harlow. He had been having what Bill described as "one large, full time." As he came in sight, Bill's brow darkened.
"I've been afraid that Kelly would burst and catch fire," he said morosely, "and now, by jolly, I wish he would. It's funny how much your good friends will get in your way when they pair off with John Barleycorn. Kelly is certainly one ding-buster when he is lit up."
Jap leaned from the door to watch the procession that had formed for the purpose of escorting Wat Harlow to the station.
"Kelly's time is wrinkling," he laughed. "Here comes Mrs. Kelly Jones, with worriment on her brow."
Bill ran his inky fingers through his hair. Something was troubling him.
"Jap," he said as he walked toward the door of the composing room, "that skunk of a Jones——"
"Who? Kelly?"
"Oh, no." Bill wheeled, and his face was deadly earnest. "Kelly's not a skunk, even when he has soaked up all the rotgut in Barton. But I had Kelly Jones in the back of my head, just the same, when I mentioned the honorable Editor of the Barton Standard. It's getting under my skin, Jap, the way he has of tempting these Bloomtown fools over to his filthy village to get the booze we won't let 'em have at home, and then holding them up to ridicule when they make asses of themselves."
"It's one of the angles of this problem that I haven't figured out yet," Jap said earnestly. "Do you think it would do any good to go gunning for Jones?"
"I've thought of that possibility several times," and Bill's tone was not entirely humorous.
Jap shoved his stool to the case. As he climbed upon it, he sighed uneasily. It had been sixteen months since Wilfred Jones turned the neat trick that left Bill disconsolate, and still the venom lingered in the bereft boy's heart. To Jap, with his standard of womanhood established by Flossy and Isabel, the thing was monstrous, inconceivable. And yet it was a fact to be faced.
"We'll have to get busy, Bill," he said. "We've got enough job work on the hooks to keep us up till midnight for a week. We haven't done a thing the last month but elect Wat Harlow."
"I hope to grab he won't run for another office till I have six sons to help me," Bill snorted.
Jap heaved a sudden sigh of relief.
"Looking out again, Bill?" he asked, jerking his thumb in the direction of the vacant photograph frame above Bill's case.