George Kibbe Turner

“ Melody, sitting back, considering, after his dismissal of his attorneys, Goldfish & Goldfish, could not but be pleased with the whisper he was now sending out through the active medium of the so-called Umja, or Unmarried Mothers' Justice Association—to lisp from mouth to mouth through all those teeming millions of Chibosh until softly, without one printed or loud-spoken word, it should grip all those eager, restless minds with the conviction that John Henry Peters would never do for mayor of that great city ”

“ Justice for all women—poor as well as rich, black as well as white, erring as well as pure; justice, justice—the least as well as the most that can be given man or woman—justice for all women. Such must be the watchword of our future, of our civilization, if civilization as we know it is to survive. ”

“ Melody replied; “just the opposite.”
“What?”
“A whisper—with a punch,” he told her. “A knock-out for this Peters boy from the women.”
They were getting to use them now more and more in politics—both local and national of course—these whispering campaigns about the candidates—since the women came into the voting. They've got to have their nominees all moral—the women voters; home family men, like Mayor True. And you can send a whisper through them all down the line, like a fire in an oil works, if you only get it started right. ”

“ They'll follow the baby anywhere, regardless of party or anything else, trampling down everything else before them. The baby is the women's flag in politics; it works fine always.
Dorna Dare, the woman-vote expert, sat tense, nervous, thinking, considering ways and means.
“Some place—some good live women's society to start your whisper from,” she murmured half aloud.
“Yes,” said Mr. Melody, getting out of her way, sitting back easy while she worked it out. All at once he saw her start, look up, speak.
“The Umja!” she said. “That's what you want!” ”

“ Melody, now entering the conversation.
“I never put on an act like this before, I give you my word,” said the young actress, looking now markedly at Mr. Melody and markedly away from the hard-eyed younger Mr. Goldfish. “I give you my word, I never done much mother work before. Why should I? I'm too young.”
“That's just it,” said Mr. Melody, reassuring her. “That's just why you fit in here.”
“The younger they are,” said the rounder, rosier, kinder-spoken Mr. Goldfish, “the harder they fall for them in this.” ”

“ A cheery, chubby infant, leading a flesh-eating dinosaur on a leash, illustrated the child spirit leading the baser passions of mankind. The entire front page of Peoples Pictures was devoted to babies, unclothed.
In Great American Hall the great annual babies' carnival, under the auspices of Mayor and Mrs. True—the home family mayor of all the people, and Mother True, so called in all the journals when shown with all the photographs of her own children, or while wheeling her first grandchild.
Babies—a great hall full of babies! Of the health of babies, of the betterment of babies. ”

“ And then the older started in reading him Chinese Meeghan's card—what the women had on the great boss who governed those who governed all Chibosh.
“You see,” said the younger one, “we'll be fighting him with his own weapons.”
“As we always have the men,” added the other; “as they always make us do.”
“I'm with you,” said Mr. Melody, his eyes and mouth still open, after listening to that card that they had on Meeghan. “Anything you want!” ”

“ All the billboards, all the street cars, all the minds and hearts of that great teeming panes simultaneously full of babies—baby likenesses, baby advertising, baby thoughts! The great urge of a great primitive emotion never once slackening! ”

“ Who can count the candidates who have gone down into untimely political graves, buried deep under an awful avalanche of winks, nods and whispers—especially in these past few critical years, when the coming of women to the polls has brought the higher moral standards of that sex into our public life? ”

“ Melody right away, taking his feet down from the desk and letting his chair legs down upon the floor. That was it of course—the Umja.
And she reminded him how the Morning Truth was working all that stuff, using that shorter term they all knew it by in all the newspaper offices and publicity factories—the Umja.
“It's got more kick with the women than all the sob stuff for years. it's got a double hold on them. It waves the baby, and at the same time brings in all that justice-for-women stuff that's been going so strong on the women's pages ever since the war,” she said. ”

“ She can't get on any of her jealous fits now, with the opening of the annual baby carnival coming on tomorrow.”
“I should say not,” said Dorna Dare, “after all these years we've put in, grooming them and getting them in line for the mother vote of Chibosh.”
So they framed it up between them—for her to hold her off while Mr. Melody looked out to see what he could do to keep the thing from as again. When she had gone Mr. Melody turned immediately to his telephone to carry out that idea. But he was unable to get in touch with the beautiful young actress at the Chibosh Theatrical Agency. ”

“ A great hothouse of babies in all possible stages of dress and undress—cooing, kicking, gurgling, dimpling, howling—being dressed, undressed, weighed, smoothed, rumpled, poked, examined and reëxamined by bright-eyes mothers and grandmothers, aunts; by hard-eyed doctors and weary nurses, whose emotions had been fed up with babies years ago! Babies of all kinds and colors displayed for the continuous contests, and awards for the best in the scientifically arranged classes intended to include all the babies of Chibosh. ”

“ Naturally, he would know it, having got up and made the programs for Mayor True's baby carnival from the beginning; ever since he and Dorna Dare had worked up the thing, staging Mayor and Mother True for the mothers' vote the last two years—waving the baby.
Mr. Melody sat silent, thinking, a new light coming into his eyes gradually.
“The Umja,” he repeated, in a deep study.
“Look,” said Dorna Dare, going on, seeing she had him with her. “Why isn't there something in this?”
Mr. Melody observed her closely.
“They're live wires in there,” she repeated; “always working out into new territory. ”

“ Melody; “as much as possible.”
That is what they all do now, of course, locally and nationally; that is the one sure thing they know about the women in politics. They all wave the baby if possible in maternity bills and child-welfare bills in the legislatures or in whispering campaigns with the voters, and the women will always rise to it. ”

“ Melody saw, been watching the way the work of the Phantom Factory had been let down in those past few weeks—to satisfy those two women with the card catalogue who were out to elect John Henry Peters mayor, During all that time not one issue with a kick had been put out, not one new phantom organization formed, not one old one started shouting ”

“ Melody.
“Sure, sure,” said the older Mr. Goldfish, and recalled the convention of women that his last successful campaign whisper had started from.
“It's always the women,” asserted the more taciturn younger Goldfish. ”

“ And yet he must certainly get busy and clean up this man Peters for Chinese Meeghan right away.
There was only one thing left; a thing just the opposite of publicity—whispers. Whispers among the women.
II DORNA DARE, the lady political adviser of the True administration and the Phantom Factory, sat around the corner of the desk from Mr. Melody, her thin face calmer than his own. A celebrated lady newspaper investigator, she was now also the closest personal counselor of Mayor and Mrs. True. A live wire, a natty dresser and a keen, active mind, Mr. ”