Reginald Wright Kauffman

“ He saw the surprise in the president's face; but he only laid his packet of papers on the arm of the desk and tapped them with a lean forefinger. “I've been over these,” he said.
Marbury's bushy eyebrows raised to the low mass of his grey hair.
“The Railway Commission case, Mr. Warner?”
“Yes.”
“How'd you find it?”
Joel looked straight into the other's eyes.
“I found it all right,” he said. “It is so clear a case at law that anybody could present it and that even an antagonistic committee wouldn't dare to go against it. I shouldn't deserve credit for success.” ”

“ They were to dine with some friends in the suburbs, and, as they sat in the G. P. & F. train, bound thither, he finished his narrative with a look about the heavily crowded car, which seemed to anticipate part ownership.
Jean looked at him, smiling somewhat in amusement at his return to a forgotten boyish enthusiasm and somewhat in her joy that the return could be made, and in the cause of it all.
“Joel,” she said, “do you know why I love you most?”
Warner laughed lightly.
“Because,” he asked, “I am the luckiest man in the world?”
“No; because you are the bravest.” ”

“ Marbury, even if we lose the legislature, we are sure to win in the Supreme Court.”
The president's gray brows rushed together.
“It must never get so far,” he snapped. “Understand that right now, Mr. Warner: it must never get so far. These socialistic green-horns and know-nothings at the capital are howling at what they call our cheap grade of rails—as if they could tell a rail from an air-brake! ”

“ Any other man would have been discouraged; any other man would have given up; any other man would have looked for a rich wife, Joel, during all these years that you just worked on and hoped on—or else any other man would have squandered his love, recklessly, casually. ”

“ Warner bowed.
“Mr. Gordon says you will find the whole case, properly blocked out, in the top drawer of his safe. He depends, largely, upon the Act of 1870, which he says—” The president drew his glasses by their long tape and set them athwart his bulbous nose, the better to read a broad railroad-telegraph form that lay on the desk before him—“which he says, according to his construction, makes the present bill wholly unconstitutional.” ”

“ Warner? Aren't you aware that we'll make adequate settlement for these lives that have unfortunately been lost? Aren't—”
“Adequate settlement, Mr. Marbury?”
“Don't interrupt, sir! Aren't you cognizant of the fact that we are a public concern with great public duties, with money invested by widows and orphans, which we mustn't jeopardize; and finally, don't you see what this course will cost you?”
“I loved you all those long, long years, because I thought you were so brave”
“I see that,” said Joel, “better than you suppose—better than you can. ”

“ The good man was offering him a minor partnership. Warner smiled as he read it. He remembered how any sort of partnership with this man, whom he still revered and loved, had once been the star of his ambition. But now—now its “certainty of at least two thousand a year, with the chance of eight thousand by the time you are fifty”—how paltry the sums sounded!
Warner put that letter aside for answer with the rest of his correspondence next morning and turned to the matter of the Railway Commission Bill. ”

“ You take care of this man.” Her voice bore authority.
Warner obeyed. He led the laborer to a knot of people near by—some train-men, a sweating surgeon and many wounded and a few dead passengers. Jean's rescuer was unhurt but kept babbling of the cheap rails; and a man on a blanket—the engineer, with a bloody bandage about his head—confirmed the babbling.
“He's right,” said the engineer. “I've been expectin' this ever since them rails was re-laid.”
Warner, returning to Jean, found several of the crew helping her into a farm-wagon that had been impressed as an ambulance. ”

“ Warner found his victory prepared for him.
He had no time for more than a hasty toilet. He even indulged in the luxury of a taxi-cab through the falling snow to the dingy boarding-house on a side-street where he had an appointment. Soon he would own a car like Cooper's. Soon, he reflected; he would—
Joel saw that the burden was Jean
A tall, graceful woman came running into the meanly furnished parlor into which he had been shown—a woman of thirty, with a broad, low forehead, coils of rich brown hair, and clear-seeing eyes of gray. ”

“ Cooper would undertake the task.”
“That,” said the president, “is what we all assumed; but we didn't calculate on the fact that our First Assistant General Counsel is the sort of automobilist that drives his own car. This morning Mr. Cooper had a smash-up and broke his leg. I needn't tell you that it would be against the policy of this road to call upon outside talent—not medical, for Mr. Cooper, but legal, for ourselves. The case must therefore be taken before the committee by one of the men remaining in our own offices.”
The president paused, but Warner dared not trust his voice to reply. ”

“ Marbury, I'll do my best.”
The great man rose, and Warner, at the signal, rose also. The big hand of the elder was laid heavily upon the shoulder of his employee.
“Mr. Warner,” he concluded, “I suppose I should add to you that, in my private opinion, Mr. Gordon will never return from Florida alive. This case is your opportunity, young man.”
Warner trod the clouds. He did not think of Gordon's death; he thought only of his own prospective elevation. Gordon would not come back; Cooper would be made General Counsel, and he, Joel Warner, would get Cooper's place. ”

“ He liked it—he couldn't help liking it—but he felt that a deprecating dissent was the demand of a proper modesty. “I've never done a brave thing in my life.”
She would not hear of that.
“Yes, you have,” she insisted. “You are the bravest man in the world. ”

“ As for the widows and orphans, they would be, I fancy, the least sufferers; but they had better suffer than thrive on blood-money: there would be fewer new widows and orphans in the future.” He rose and went to the door. “Good morning,” he concluded. “I shall send up my resignation immediately.”
Marbury tried to speak again; but the door, for the first time in his life, was shut upon his speech. He sent Lovett to overtake the fugitive ”

“ If that commission came into existence, the first thing it would do would be to stop our entire construction of the Conestoga Valley Branch, and the next would be a move to make us lay new rails along the entire main passenger-line. The cheaper rails have never yet been proved unsafe, and we've only just got over the bills for laying them. ”