Every Man for Himself

by Herbert Joseph Moorhouse

It was a problem which Podmore was forced to solve without consulting anyone. He could not go boldly to his supposed partners with his discovery; for thereby he would reveal to Nickleby and Alderson his own attempt at double dealing. That he had to be very careful what he did, Mr. Hughey Podmore realized,—very careful indeed. For this mix-up held many possibilities for personal misfortune. In fact, the situation suddenly had become fraught with positive danger. There were moments, therefore, when the cautious Mr. Podmore felt qualms which though not born of a troubled conscience, were nonetheless disagreeable. Conscience in the case of Hughey Podmore, if it had ever existed, had been a stunted affair which because of malnutrition long since had given up the ghost. Its place had been pre-empted by Argus-eyed regard for all matters affecting the preservation of Mr. Podmore's precious epidermis—the safety of his own skin. And Hughey Podmore was well aware that a large contribution to campaign funds by a construction company would be a matter of immediate suspicion among opponents of the Government if it became known. Such things had got people into trouble before this. It had been one of the things which had landed the famous Honorable Harrington Rives in jail—and others who were involved.

Hughey Podmore knew all about that strenuous period of political chaos. Twelve years ago he had been an eager-eyed young reporter with a large appreciation of newspaper sensations. His skill at ferreting into hidden recesses by unscrupulous methods had made him a valuable man for a paper which was willing to ignore certain time-honored traditions of the press. Under editorial stimulus Hughey had blossomed forth among the flowers of the journalistic profession as a yellow chrysanthemum. "Mum" became the word wherever Hughey showed himself! His reputation finally had ostracised him into other fields of endeavor.

Those had been the days! If only he and Rives had been working together! If he had been managing Rives' campaigns there would have been no crude mistakes to land the "people's idol" behind the bars, Waring or no Waring. He would have seen that every dainty dish was properly cooked before it was set before the King, its inner rawness safely covered, done up brown. By all means let there be lemon filling, but smothered in a beaten white purity that would pass the public censor! Under his management there would have been no tangible evidence to show that favored contractors, bidding upon public works, had been secretly advised that their tenders were too low, and instructed as to the amounts to which it was safe for them to raise their new tenders; there would have been no evidence of election contributions from these favored contractors for the amounts thus squeezed out of the public treasury.

With such an example of folly to warn him, it was no wonder that the Honorable Milton Waring had told Nickleby and Alderson he would have nothing to do with their proposed campaign fund contribution. Nickleby must have a pretty strong connection even to dare such an approach; evidently he had felt pretty sure of himself to go ahead with the plan on his own initiative.

Nickleby believed that Ferguson had the money now. What would he say if he knew the facts—that the money was really in the hands of some person unknown, some person perhaps who was interested in gathering evidence that would upset the present Government? There was only one thing for Mr. Podmore to do, now that his own pet scheme had failed, and that was to keep quiet as to his own ambitions and stick to the three-handed game which he was supposed to be playing with Nickleby and his henchman, Alderson; for Nickleby was worth tying to.

Thus ran the reflections of Hughey Podmore as he lounged comfortably in a leather chair aboard the private car, "Obaska," and idly watched the endless flow of the Algoma wilderness pass the windows monotonously. The car had taken an inspection party west to the head of the lakes, but a wire from the Vice-President was sending the President back to headquarters unexpectedly. Besides President Wade, Podmore and Taylor, the steward, the only person on board was Bob Cranston. Cranston was chief of the railroad's Special Service Department. Taylor was busy in his kitchen, preparing dinner. Cranston and the President had the brass-railed observation platform at the rear of the car to themselves and were deep in earnest conversation; they had shut the door at their backs and the sound of their voices was lost in the roar of the wheels.

Hughey Podmore smiled cynically as he watched them. There was nothing in President Wade's fine strong profile to indicate the trend of talk. Both, in fact, were men who seldom allowed what they were thinking to reflect in their facial expressions too readily. Nevertheless, the perspicacious Mr. Podmore could surmise the subject of conversation, or at any rate give a guess which was close enough to satisfy his own curiosity.

He amused himself by running over the list of possible topics. Wade was a big man in financial circles, a man of rugged and plain-spoken dealings who commanded the confidence of every associate and was respected even by his enemies. There were many matters of moment which he might have discussed with bankers or lawyers or statesmen, but which he would hardly attempt with a bull-necked bonehead like Cranston. Government railway bond issues, franchises and stock-quotations were beyond that cheap stiff's depth. Probably Cranston was holding forth in regard to some petty theft which his crew of spotters had discovered, some ticket-scalping conductor——

Or there was old Nat Lawson's case in which Wade was interested; it was a topic that was often uppermost in the railway President's mind, as Podmore knew, and Hughey smiled inscrutably at the smoke curling from his cigarette. Old Nat, the founder and former president of the Interprovincial Loan & Savings Company—the honest old fool whom Nickleby had succeeded in overcoming by a trick, and whose shoes J. Cuthbert was now wearing! It would take more than the friendship of a Benjamin Wade, powerful though that was, to salvage Old Nat. That nanny-whiskered old galoot was sunk in too many fathoms of water ever to wade ashore. (He smiled at his poor pun.) The missing power-of-attorney that had scuttled the Lawson supporters would continue missing for all time to come. Mr. J. Cuthbert Nickleby, the then genial secretary, had seen to that once for all; in fact, it had been a charred fragment of the document which Mr. Hugh Podmore had used as a card of introduction when he had had his first long and very interesting session with Friend Nickleby.

Some class to Nickleby all right. Here were methods which Mr. Podmore could understand and admire. It was because the minds of Messrs. Podmore and Nickleby ran in the same grooves that he had been able to unearth enough of Nickleby's very private plans to persuade that "rising young financier" that it was better to set another plate at the head table than to have the dishes smashed and Lucullus waylaid before he could reach the banquetting-hall.