My guards expected to be recalled on Tuesday. But Melville heard what Crawford had done about me, and straightway used his influence to have me detained until the new grip of the old gang was secure. Saturday afternoon we put in at Newport for the daily communication with the shore. When the launch returned, Mulholland brought the papers to me, lounging aft in a mass of cushions under the awning. “We are going ashore,” said he. “The order has come.”
I had a sudden sense of loneliness. “I’ll take you down to New York,” said I. “I must put my guests off where I took them up.”
As we steamed slowly westward I read the papers. The country was rapidly readjusting itself, was returning to the conditions before the upheaval. The “financiers”—the same old gang, except for a few of the weaker brethren ruined and a few strong outsiders who had slipped in during the confusion—were employing all the old, familiar devices for deceiving and robbing the people. The upset milking-stool was righted, and the milker was seated again and busy, the good old cow standing without so much as shake of horn or switch of tail. “Mulholland,” said I, “what do you think of this business of living?”
“I’ll tell you, Mr. Blacklock,” said he. “I used to fuss and fret a good deal about it. But I don’t any more. I’ve got a house up in the Bronx, and a bit of land round it. And there’s Mrs. Mulholland and four little Mulhollands and me—that’s my country and my party and my religion. The rest is off my beat, and I don’t give a damn for it. I don’t care which fakir gets to be President, or which swindler gets to be rich. Everything works out somehow, and the best any man can do is to mind his own business.”
“Mulholland—Mrs. Mulholland—four little Mulhollands,” said I reflectively. “That’s about as much as one man could attend to properly. And—you are ‘on the level,’ aren’t you?”
“Some say honesty’s the best policy,” replied he. “Some say it isn’t. I don’t know, and I don’t care, whether it is or it isn’t. It’s my policy. And we six seem to have got along on it so far.”
I sent my “guests” ashore the next morning. “No, I’ll stay aboard,” said I to Mulholland, as he stood aside for me to precede him down the gangway to the launch. I went into the watch pocket of my trousers and drew out the folded two one-thousand-dollar bills I always carried—it was a habit formed in my youthful, gambling days. I handed him one of the bills. He hesitated.
“For the four little Mulhollands,” I urged.
He put it in his pocket. I watched him and his men depart with a heavy heart. I felt alone, horribly alone, without a tie or an interest. Some of the morning papers spoke respectfully of me as one of the strong men who had ridden the flood and had been landed by it on the heights of wealth and power. Admiration and envy lurked even in sneers at my “unscrupulous plotting.” Since I had wealth, plenty of wealth, I did not need character. Of what use was character in such a world except as a commodity to exchange for wealth?
“Any orders, sir?” interrupted my captain.