“I protest against the reading of a private letter in public,” he stammered.
“And quite right, too,” said Marsten. “I protested against the public discussion of a private quarrel; and the protest was held against me. Now I have no desire to push my opponent to the wall, and I will say at once that the letter in question may be as innocent as ‘Mary had a little lamb.’ I never read it and never saw it. I heard of it through a chance remark, but I know nothing of its contents. You see now how easy it is to ask a question a man may hesitate to answer, and you see of how little value circumstantial evidence is. Now, Gibbons, we are quits, and I am willing to let bygones be bygones if you are. I give you my word—and that is all I have to offer, for I’m the poorest among you—that I am not in the pay of any one on earth except yourselves. I swear to you that I have only one object in view, and that is the bettering of our condition. All I ask is fair play. Perhaps I can’t do what I think I can, but I want to try. If I fail, then let the next man come on and have his try, and he will have no more earnest supporter than I will be. With dissension in our ranks, nothing can be done; so I want the backing of every man in the Union, and more especially of the man who thinks I have been a traitor,—which I declare to him and to you I was not. Now, Gibbons, this has been an open question-and-answer meeting. There has been a free-for-all give and take here tonight. I have a last question to ask you: are you going to be my friend or my enemy?”
There were cries of “Toe the mark, Gibbons!”
“Time!”
“Speak up, my boy!”
“Show your hand, Gibbons!”
Gibbons, who had now recovered his equanimity, rose to his feet, and said: “I move, gentlemen, that Marsten be confirmed in his secretaryship of the Union, and I hope the vote will be unanimous. We will give him what he asks—a fair chance—and as long as he deals squarely with us, we will deal squarely with him. As far as my friendship or enmity is concerned, I may say that I’m a friend to any one who is loyal to the cause, and an enemy to those who are against it. I think that is all that can be asked of me or any other man present.”
The motion was seconded and carried unanimously, and the object for which the meeting was convened was lost sight of entirely.
Marsten went on with his work of organization, and met with much encouragement from the societies with which he entered into correspondence. Whatever opposition there was to him in his own Union, it at least did not show itself openly; but Marsten did not make the mistake of thinking Gibbons was his friend.