Harold MacGrath

“ THE day we declared war on Austria, there was no mentionable excitement in Washington. Nobody threw up hats; and the newsboys yelled no louder than usual. Nothing will ever excite us again—except sudden peace. We have shuddered all our shudders. ”

“ In the west, however, our vision was still obscured to this fact. The feeling up to the day we entered the war was passively anti-British. On the glorious Fourth, if you were a political spellbinder, you could always get a rousing cheer by twisting the lion's tail, Whether he felt it or not did not matter. Out there it was a part of your oath of office. How otherwise were we going to keep the fires of patriotism going? England—we couldn't jump on anybody else. ”

“ Johnny laughed; but Kitty's eyes filled.
“Seven days,” she said, “without seeing a human being! And nothing to look at but those dreadful pictures on the wall!”
“You laid down the proposition, and it was my move. Besides, you ought to be singing pæns of joy.”
“I am, Johnny; but it seemed cruel.”
“Nonsense! Why, he's the happiest old rooster in Washington to-day. He's wading in all on his own for the first time in his life. He's swimming without a life-preserver.”
“What the dickens are you two talking about?” I demanded.
“The limousine gave me the idea.” ”

“ I went to a famous restaurant for dinner that night, and in a cosy corner I saw Johnny Conroy and Kitty, about to give their orders. They insisted that I make the duo a trio, I was agreeable enough. To sit at a table with Kitty was an honor widely sought in Washington. I sha'n't try to describe her. I'll leave it to your imagination. Take down those jolly and tender old love poets—Prior, Suckling, Lovelace and Herrick—and pick out all the beautiful things they said to their Phyllises and Chloes, and you'll have a fair idea how lovely Kitty is. ”

“ In fact, for one hundred and sixty-eight hours the Senator never laid eyes on a human being. But he did hear at times human sounds in the kitchen, and these gave him a grip on his dignity. He never shouted for help, though occasionally he fell to haranguing out loud, because he was able to find comfort in the sound of his voice. ”

“ But that Kitty should fall in love with Johnny—that was quite as puzzling as Johnny's escape from the gallows. Kitty could have married a duke, a handsome duke, with barrels of money all his own; but she had set her heart on Johnny, and that was all there was to it.
I wonder if you have ever noticed how many beautiful women marry ugly men? I mean ugly in physiognomy. Personal magnetism, that's the word; and your handsome man rarely has that. It flowed from Johnny like ozone from a wireless operator's den. There was only one human being it did not seem able to reach—the Senator. ”

“ When the Senator got an idea in his head, it stuck; if it began to show signs of falling off, he restuck it. He believed it a mark of moral weakness to recant. Know him? Probably you do. He's a type.
Like many Americans in public life, when in doubt he twisted the tail of the British lion. It never failed to fill the gap and to bring profit in the form of encomiums. He was anti-British, and nothing less than a ton of dynamite would have succeeded in dislodging him from his archaic stand. He was eventually dislodged, however, but by an Idea. It is the Idea I'm going to tell you about. ”

“ I bet my last dollar on a blind horse with good legs. I've always had a pretty good idea what the old boy was like, inside, sown under the political moss and chickweed and wild mustard. For years he's been meandering about in a fog of his own creation—vocal.”
“Johnny!”—from Kitty.
“Well, it's the truth. Ever see a fence-post in a fog? Looks as big as a barn until you get close up and have a good look. That was how the old boy saw Great Britain. If you talk long enough on any subject, you'll end in believing it. ”

“ Sometimes he stared out of the window at the deserted barnyard, but sparrows were the only living things he ever saw. A cow or a chicken would have been balm to his strained eyesight. He had never noticed sparrows before—these Bolsheviki of the birds. ”

“ They hypnotize themselves into the belief that part of the world rests upon their shoulders, when, as a matter of fact, they are in Washington for two very simple reasons, greatness or fitness having nothing to do with it. ”

“ Either they have “put up” for several mayoralty campaigns and have to be squared, or they are putting the local boss on the anxious seat and he considers them safer in Washington than back home.
For years now the Senator had worn the toga solemnly and with circumspection. He had reached that point—and a good many Senators reach it—where he considered it was a life job and that nobody back home had the slightest interest in his political shoes. It follows naturally that the shadow he cast on Pennsylvania Avenue wasn't nearly so big as he thought it was. ”

“ At length he curled up his six feet two inches on the cot and fell asleep.
The odor of frying bacon eventually percolated through his dreams, and he awoke. It was dark. He struck a match and looked at his watch. It was ten minutes after six. He had slept for hours. He lit a candle and went over to the cupboard. Besides the evening meal, there was a corn-cob pipe and a cannister of tobacco. When the meal was over, he filled the pipe and began smoking. He was ready; let the rogues come forward with their proposition. ”

“ You will be liberated when we are ready to liberate you. The windows are unlocked, but the bars are unbreakable. When the odor from the oil burner gets too strong, open a window. Be careful with the matches. You will be more or less alone during the day: and if you should accidentally start a fire, we could not help you. This is an abandoned farm, thirty-odd miles out of town, seven from the nearest railway and two from the nearest occupied farm. The door is reinforced by sheet iron. Open the cupboard between nine and nine-thirty in the morning, six and six-thirty at night. You will find food. ”

“ Already he had been secretly stirred by the valor of the British. France had saved the democracies of the world, but the British had saved France. Dull indeed would be the man who could not see that. Again, that I am able to approach these cogitations of the Senator is due to the single fact that I am repeating only what I was told by the man who at that moment was watching the Senator through a peephole in the wall. ”

“ He saw the Kaiser for what he was. Conjointly, he saw the Senator, the tail-twister, the Fourth of July spouter, the standpatter for what he was.
“Pompous ass!”
The labor and patience back of this collection! Some pro-German of the most worshipful type had gathered it. A shrine; and no doubt the block had kowtowed every time he had entered this room. Kultur! Superior people! Windbags! The Senator was drawn closely to the wall at last. There were some photographs too small to see distinctly from where he stood. ”

“ After awhile, of course, what had originally been indignation became habit; and after habit has attached itself to you, you never give it close scrutiny unless some untoward event jars you into doing so.
Here in the east we Americans have been able to rid ourselves of a good deal of that antipathy. Contact. We understand now; it is an historical, a biological and a physiological fact that blood-relations are always rowing and quarreling and hair-pulling. ”

“ The stove was new. There was a cot, too. It had been slept in.
On the cupboard shelf was a substantial breakfast, and after a short interval ef inspection the prisoner carried it to the table. He heard a sound. It was the cupboard door closing by some mechanical agency.
After breakfast, he lighted the oil burner, and took out his cigar case. Six cigars. Oh, well, the affair would be over before these were gone. Still, he wished he had his pipe. A clear Havana was satisfying only when you were physically and mentally comfortable. ”