Kate added musingly: “He has lost so much, we can afford to be generous, can we not?”
Then Reuben felt that there could be no answer possible except “yes.” His heart pleaded with his brain for a lover’s interpretation of this speech; and his tongue, to evade the issue, framed some halting words about allowing him to go over the whole case to-morrow, and postponing a final decision until that had been done.
The consent of silence was accorded to this, and everybody at the table knew that there would be no prosecutions. Upon the instant the atmosphere grew lighter.
“And now for the real thing,” said Kate, gayly. “I am commissioned on behalf of the entire family to formally thank you for coming to our rescue tonight. Mamma did not hear your speech—she resolutely sat in the library, pretending to read, during the whole rumpus, and we were in such a hurry to get up-stairs that we didn’t tell her when you began—but she couldn’t help hearing the horns, and she is as much obliged to you as we are; and that is very, very, very much indeed!”
“Yes, indeed,” assented Mrs. Minster. “I don’t know where the police were, at all.”
“The police could have done next to nothing, if they had been here,” said Reuben. “The visit of the crowd was annoying enough, and discreditable in its way, but I don’t really imagine there was ever any actual danger. The men felt disagreeable about the closing of the works and the importation of the French Canadians, and I don’t blame them; but as a body they never had any idea of molesting you. My own notion is that the mob was organized by outsiders—by men who had an end to serve in frightening you—and that after the crowd got here it didn’t know what to do with itself. The truth is, that the mob isn’t an American institution. Its component parts are too civilized, too open to appeals to reason. As soon as I told these people the facts in the case, they were quite ready to go, and they even cheered for you before they went.”
“Ethel tells me that you promised them the furnaces should be opened promptly,” said the mother, with her calm, inquiring glance, which might mean sarcasm, anger, approval, or nothing at all.
Reuben answered resolutely: “Yes, Mrs. Minster, I did. And so they must be opened, on Monday. Let us be frank about the matter. It is my dearest wish that I should be able to act for you all in this whole business. But I have gone too far now, the interests involved are too great, to make a pause here possible. The very essence of the situation is that we should defy the trust, and throw upon it the onus of stopping us if it can. We have such a grip upon the men who led you into that trust, and who can influence the decisions of its directors, that they will not dare to show fight. The force of circumstances has made me the custodian of your interests quite as much as of your daughters’. I am very proud and happy that it is so. It is true that I have not your warrant for acting in your behalf; but if you will permit me to say so, that cannot now be allowed to make the slightest difference in my action.”
“Yes, mamma, you are to be rescued in spite of yourself,” said Ethel, merrily.
The young people were all smiling at one another, and to their considerable relief Mrs. Minster concluded to smile also.