The Mayor of Warwick

by Herbert M. Hopkins

"I 'm going wherever this car goes," he answered. "Evergreen Park, is n't it? I 'm gradually exploring the surrounding country, and one direction will do as well as another. But where are you bound for?"

"Politics," Emmet said briefly. Whether he had left the tower the previous evening with a sore heart and was inclined to identify his new friend with his old enemy, or whether he was merely occupied with his own thoughts, Leigh now felt that his manner really exhibited some constraint. He was a man of keen intuitions, and divined a sensitiveness on his companion's part in regard to the rather inglorious figure he had cut, in spite of Miss Wycliffe's openly expressed interest. After all, might not this interest of hers savour of ostentatious patronage? At this thought he experienced a kind of fellow-feeling for the candidate, a change of emotion which his manner was quick to register. His interest in politics was the academic interest of the typical Mugwump he had confessed himself to be, and too much confined to an occasional vote of protest. He had never attended a primary meeting in his life, always having been too busy with his own career to realise this duty, and too nomadic in his habits to acquire a personal interest in local affairs. To him politics was the pastime of the rich, who could afford it, or the business of the poor, who used it as a means of support. The very word, as Emmet used it, conveyed an impression to his mind like that which Borrow received when his gipsy friends mentioned the mysterious "business of Egypt." He made a comment that drew his companion on to speak of Cobbens with his former bitterness, though in a smothered tone, as if he feared some chance listener in the car that was now filling rapidly.

"But you'll find nothing doing in the park," Emmet said presently, with an abrupt change of subject. "The season has just closed, and there is n't a person on the place."

"So much the better," Leigh answered. "I 'm not in the mood for merry-go-rounds and picnickers."

The seat became crowded to the point of discomfort, and Emmet, with a significant look, went back to join the conductor on the platform. Leigh interpreted the look to mean that some of the political business on which he was bent lay with this man, and their earnest conversation confirmed his impression. Left alone, he took Emmet's place at the end of the seat and began to watch the passing scene. The car swung down a steep street and crossed a long bridge over the river, from which he had a view of a wide blue basin, where a score of little yachts lay motionless as floating gulls. In the other direction several sand-bars showed brown, ribbed backs, sparsely covered with coarse grass, and Leigh wished that he could find himself dropped upon one of them, that he might have the pleasure of wading ashore. The fancy put him in a better frame of mind, and the afternoon began to brighten. In front of him the open country beckoned, and before committing himself to it, he turned for a farewell look at Warwick. The city stood upon the high river wall, roof above roof shimmering in the hazy light, every line of chimney, spire, and tower softened by the distance, like a blurred etching against a pale blue background.

The country was similar to that through which he had passed the day before, only now the quality of the air was a little more drowsy, the quietude more absolute, and he awoke to the fact that the Indian Summer had begun. The car had gone about four miles before Emmet returned, and so absorbed had Leigh become that his reappearance was a surprise. They were now at the top of a long hill, from the summit of which the country fell away till it rose again far off in dark purple ridges of low mountains.

"I am reminded of California by that sky-line," Leigh remarked. "Only out there you see no patches of gorgeous foliage like those yonder. The autumn comes on by imperceptible gradations. The first thing you know, the leaves have shrivelled and gone."

"The park lies down there in the valley," Emmet said, on whom the comparison had evidently made no impression. "There's nothing to see, though, at this time of year. Why don't you go on to Pitkinton and visit the silk mills?"

"Because I 'm determined to explore the park," Leigh answered. He was not one to be swerved from his purpose by another's persistence; in fact, any effort in such a direction usually had an opposite effect. "I have no desire to see a lot of men working over machinery to-day who ought to be out enjoying the Indian Summer," he explained. "I'll reserve the mills for some other time."

The car came to a stop at a switch before a rustic gate, and they got off together. It occurred to Leigh that possibly he had been a little short with Emmet, somewhat unsympathetic with his practical and industrial interests. If this were so, it was merely because he realised the uselessness of explaining the peculiar intoxication of his mood, for he suspected that the other would regard such emotions as fit only for women and poets. "You might come for a walk with me," he suggested. "The exercise would do you good."