I
Bunny was alone in the roaring city of New York—six or seven millions of people, and not many known to him. There were reporters, of course—it made a “human interest” story, fate snatching one of the oil magnates away from the Senate inquisitors. The country was near the end of a bitter presidential campaign, and the smallest item about the oil scandal was of importance. Also Bunny had cablegrams and telegrams of sympathy—from Verne and Annabelle, from Paul and Ruth, from Rachel and her father and brothers; yes, and one from the Princess Marescu, signing herself, with old-time nearness, “Vee-Vee.”
He purchased his ticket home, by way of Washington, and on the train he read the back newspapers, with the day by day account of what happened to his boyhood dream of a great oil field: enormous oceans of flame rolling over the earth, turning night into day with the glare, turning day into night with thunder clouds of smoke; rivers of blazing oil rushing down the valleys, and a gale of wind sweeping the fire from one hill to the next. A dozen great storage tanks had gone, and the whole refinery, with all its tanks, and some three hundred derricks, licked up and devoured in that roaring furnace. It was the worst oil fire in California history, eight or ten million dollars loss.
In Washington was someone for Bunny to tell his troubles to—Dan Irving! They took a long walk, and the older man put his arm about Bunny and told him that he had done everything possible in a difficult situation. Dan could assure him that he didn’t have to think of his father as a bad man; Dan had made it his business to know, and could confirm Bunny’s judgment, American big business men all purchased government, they all justified the purchase of government. It was something that had shocked Dan in the beginning, but he had come to realize now that it was a system; without the purchase of government, American big business could not exist. You saw it written plain in the instinctive reaction of the whole business world to the oil scandals, the determinaton to damp them down, to make nothing of them, to indict and prosecute, not the criminals, but the exposers of the crime.
So they got to talking politics, which was the best thing for Bunny, to divert his mind and get him back to his job. Dan had been doing what he could in this presidential campaign, but he was sick with the sense of impotence. The whole capitalist publicity machine had been set to work on a new job, to glorify “Cautious Cal” to the American people—this pitiful little man, a fifth-rate country politician, a would-be store-keeper, he was the great strong silent statesman and the plain people’s hero! One thing, and one only, the business men expected of him, to cut down their income taxes; in everything else he would be a cipher. The newspaper men were disgusted by their job, but all were helpless, their papers at home would take only one kind of news. And here was poor Dan with his labor press service, a score or two of obscure papers, perhaps a hundred thousand circulation in all, and most of the time not enough money for the office rent.
“That’s what I want to talk to you about,” said Bunny. “Before I left France, Dad gave me a million dollars in Ross Consolidated stock. I don’t know what it’ll be worth since the fire, but Verne says there’s full insurance. I’m not going to touch the principal till I have time to think things over, but I’ll put a thousand dollars a month of the income into your work, if that will help.”
“Help? My God, Bunny, that’s more money than we’ve ever thought of! I’ve been trying to raise an extra hundred a month, so as to mail free copies where they would count.”
Said Bunny, “I’ll turn the money over to you with only one provision—that you’re to have two hundred a month salary. There’s no reason why you should run yourself into debt financing the radical movement.”
Dan laughed. “No reason, except that there wouldn’t be any radical movement if some didn’t do that. You’re the first really fat angel that has appeared in my sky.”
“Well, wait,” said Bunny, “till I find out just how fat I’m going to be. I’ve an idea my friend Vernon Roscoe will do what he can to keep me lean. He knows that whatever I get will go to making trouble for him.”
“My gosh!” said Dan. “Have you seen the things we’ve been sending out about Roscoe’s foreign concessions, and what the state department is doing to make him rich? That story would beat the Sunnyside lease, if we could get the Senate to investigate it!”