After an age, it seemed to Graham, Mr. Phillips became calmer. His son-in-law, wholly at a loss what to say or do, started out of the door in search of a clearer atmosphere and a chance to regain his scattered faculties. The President looked around and saw him beating a retreat.
"Come back here!" he ordered sharply. "We can't leave this thing like this! Something must be done with it at once, or the scandal will be all over the—" He trembled with the passion of another outburst, but controlled himself by a mighty effort.
"I swear to you no scandal may rightly be laid at my door," said Graham with some dignity. The outrageous injustice of the thing gave him a little of the dignity of righteousness.
"Scandal doesn't depend on truth or falsehood, so we needn't discuss that now." Mr. Phillips cut him off short. "What we must do is to stop this scandal, for scandal it will be if it gets to the public. Where does this—this Porter live? How far from here?"
"About fifteen minutes drive, sir."
"Well—er—send Mr. O'Neill here—in a hurry."
Graham, glad to get action on himself, was out of the room and back with the secret service man in less than a minute. In that short space the President had taken a grip on his self-control.
"Here, O'Neill, take Hayward with you to show you the house, and go fetch Henry Porter up here to see me. He's not to be arrested, mind you, but is to come to see me at my request at once, and nobody is to know. And he is not to speak to anybody or see anybody, not even Hayward here, before you bring him to me. So get along and get him here as soon as you can. No force, remember; but he is to come along, at my request." ...
O'Neill and Hayward hurried out, and, finding a street cab, lost no time in getting to Henry Porter's house. On the way Hayward gave the officer some idea of the man he was to deal with and, bringing him to the door, left him to his own devices and himself took a car back home. When Old Henry came to the door O'Neill told him half a dozen lies in half as many minutes, and at the end of the time he had the worthy coloured gentleman safely in the cab and on the way to the White House.
The President was waiting for him, and when the two fathers were alone together he went at him with a directness calculated to take the negro's breath. Black Henry was much awed, in fact well-nigh overcome by the situation, and he was hardly in condition to make the most of his opportunities; but his native shrewdness did not entirely forsake him. In the drive to the White House he had had time to think it over, and he had concluded that the President wanted to see him very much or he would not have sent for him. He tried to keep that in mind all the time the negotiations were pending. It helped in some degree to steady his shaking confidence in himself.