The Candidate: A Political Romance

by Joseph A. Altsheler

Churchill spoke of the campaign, venturing upon polite criticisms of certain features that seemed objectionable to him, and, listening to him, she confirmed her opinion that he was the personal representative with Mr. Grayson of the chief elements within the party that could cause trouble. And she felt sure, too, that the letter he held in his hand would add fuel to the fire already burning. She happened also to be present several days later when a messenger-boy handed him a telegram, and, when he opened it, he made an involuntary motion to hide it, just as he had done with the letter. She pretended not to see, and walked away, but she knew as well as if he had told her that the telegram was the reply to the letter.

Mr. Goodnight himself sent the despatch, and he thanked Churchill warmly for the very important information told so luminously in his letter. The solid and respectable portion of the party had hoped much from the presence of Mr. Heathcote, but as he had yielded to the influence of another, instead of exerting his own, it would be necessary to take additional action later. Meanwhile he requested Mr. Churchill to keep him accurately and promptly informed of everything, and Churchill at once telegraphed: "Despatch received. Will be glad to comply with your request."

Then he congratulated himself, and felt good, his complacent demeanor forming a contrast to that of several others in the party. The latter were "King" Plummer, Sylvia Morgan, and John Harley, all of whom were unhappy.

Harley was troubled by his conscience, and he could not do anything to keep it from sticking those little pins into him. Sylvia Morgan, despite herself, drew him on, not the less because his first feeling towards her had been one of hostility. She had a piquant touch, a manner full of unconscious allurement—the radiation of a pure soul, though it was—that he had never seen in any other woman, and the harder he fought against it, the more surely it conquered him. He took from his valise a copy of that old Chicago newspaper, with her picture on the front page, and wondered how he could have intimated that she was the cause of its being there. As he knew her better, he knew that she could not have done it, and he knew, too, that she would have scornfully resented any insinuation of having done so by refusing to deny it.

The "King" was unhappy, too, in his way, and that was very bad indeed for him. He had tried an effusive gallantry, and it did not seem to succeed any better than obedience to his own impulses—on the whole, rather worse; and now, not knowing what else to do, he sulked. It was not any sly sulking, but genuine, open sulking in his large, Western way, thus leaving it apparent to all that the great "King" Plummer was sad. And that meant much to the party, because in a sense it was now personally conducted by him. In his joyous mood, which was his usual mood until the present, he had a large and pervasive personality that was a wonderful help to travel and social intercourse. They missed his timely, if now and then a trifle rough, jests, his vast knowledge of the mountains, which had some good story of every town to which they came, and his infinite zest and humor, which also communicated more zest and humor to every one with him. It was a grievous day for them all when "King" Plummer began to mourn. More than one guessed the cause, but wisely they refrained from any attempt to remove it. They could do nothing but endure the gloom in silence, until the clouds passed, as they hoped they would pass.

The candidate, too, was troubled, and sought the privacy of the special car's drawing-room more than usual. Sylvia Morgan had given him a hint that attacks upon him from a certain source were likely to be renewed, and, moreover, would increase in virulence. He soon found that she was right, as the copies of the Monitor that they now obtained were frankly cynical and unbelieving. All of its despatches from the West, Churchill's as well as others, were depreciatory. The candidate was invariably made to appear in a bad light—which is an easy matter to do, in any case, without sacrifice of the truth—that is, verbally, only the spirit being changed—and the editor reinforced them with strong criticisms, in which quotations from English writers and a French phrase now and then were freely employed. The whole burden of it was, "We support this candidate; but, oh, how hard it is for us to do it, how badly we feel about it, and how much easier it would be for us to support any other man!" It also printed many contributions from readers, in all of which the contributors spoke of themselves as belonging by nature and cultivation to the select few, "the saving remnant," who really knew what was good for the country. Here much latitude of expression was allowed, as the paper was not directly responsible for what these gentlemen said. They wrote of the way in which the dignity of a great party had been destroyed by the uncouth and talkative Westerner who had been lucky enough to secure the nomination. They felt that they had been shamed in the face of the world, and more than once asked the burning and painful question, "What will Europe say?" They asked, also, if it were yet too late to amend the error, and they threw forth the suggestion that the intelligent and cultured minority within the party might refrain from voting, when election day came, or, in a pinch, might vote for the other man.

These communications were signed, sometimes, with Latin names, and sometimes with names in modern English, but always they indicated a certain sense of superiority and of detachment from the crowd on the part of the signers.

The annoyance of the candidate increased as he read copies of the Monitor, which were sent to him in numbers. He knew that the paper was the chief spokesman of an influential minority within the party, and the divergence between the majority and the minority was already manifest. It was evident, too, that it was bound to become greater, and that was why the candidate was troubled. He wished to become President; it was his great desire, and he did not seek to conceal it; he considered it a legitimate, a noble ambition, one that any American had a right to have, and he was in the first flush of his great powers, when such a position would appeal most to a strong man. Now, even when the fight, with a united party, was desperate at best, he foresaw a defection, and hot wrath rose up in his veins against Goodnight, the Monitor, and all their following.

But the worst of the whole position to a man of Grayson's open and direct temperament was the necessity to keep silent, even to dissemble, or, at least, to do that which seemed to him very near to dissembling. Although he was under so fierce a fire, he would not allow any one to find fault with Churchill for his despatches; and this was not always easy to do, because many of the local politicians, who were on the train from time to time, would grow hot at sight of the criticisms, and want to attack the writer. But Jimmy Grayson always interfered, and reminded them that it was the right of the press to speak so if it wished. Churchill still wondered, why he was not a martyr, and wasted his regrets. Mrs. Grayson and Sylvia maintained an eloquent silence.

Meanwhile, an event destined to give Churchill and the Monitor a yet greater shock was approaching.