Though usually a light sleeper, my touch on his wrist did not arouse him; his pulse was regular, and bending low, I could not detect the fumes of liquor. No, Hiram Strong, Jr., was just tired out—worried into fatigue that called for sleep. He was going through the fire that either refines or destroys. Would he stand it? That was my anxiety as I returned to my room to prepare for dinner.
"Ben, is that you?" he called presently in a sleepy voice.
For answer I came to the door, wiping my hands and looking interested.
"I fell asleep waiting for you to come, Ben. I want to tell you that I acted the damned cad this morning." Then coming over, he put two strong hands on my shoulders and looked straight at me with clear eyes.
"Ben," he continued, as though suddenly realizing he was taking himself too seriously, "I know you are on the square with me, I know you are doing everything you can for me, but your movements are maddeningly deliberate. You act as though you were an old-stager at the game and was going sure. But I feel like I was bound hand and foot with these fellows darting javelins into my skin every time they look at me; and you know I can't see Anna Bell Morgan until——" He dropped his hands from my shoulders and looked out of the window. "Perhaps I am expecting too much—you cleaned up that Quarryville matter so——"
"But, Hiram, this is a big matter, reaching God only knows how far. It involves a number of men, clever in crookedness, and perhaps women. There's more to it than a bone-headed, love-sick German and a case of dynamite. The amounts involved are big, and it must move slowly. I know how you feel, but you've got to grin and bear it. But about Anna Bell Morgan, I think you are foolish. If she is the kind of girl you should marry she would want very much to stand by you. But if you adopt a drastic code of your own and insist on living up to it, how can she or any one help you in that respect?"
"Ben," he began deliberately, after taking a chair and cocking himself back against the window-sill, "I know that Anna Bell Morgan wants to help me. I am nursing the delusion, perhaps, that she would give one of her hands—make any sacrifice—but I don't believe a real man, under similar circumstances, would bid for help from the woman whom he really loves. If this thought proves a delusion I must stand it somehow, but I don't believe I will ever have faith in a woman again. I am beginning to see things differently now. I can see more and more why the Gold-Beater was given that name by friend and enemy. He fought fair and in the open and took punishment without a whimper. Ben, he made a mistake with me, but he gave me a decent sense of honor, and lately I realize he has given me a good-sized body that will stand real punishment. No, sir, my 'drastic code,' as you call it, has got to go. And now, with that out of my system, I am going to give you a real shock."
Then, with exasperating deliberation, he lighted his pipe, drew his feet up on the lower front rungs of his chair, meanwhile watching me as I walked back and forth before him intensely interested.
"I am going to quit the railroad and——"
"No, you are not—not now——" I warned. But he interrupted me as I paused in front of him, pointing a finger at him, and I soon saw that I might as well have raised my arm to stay the flood of Niagara.