A Far Country, Book 2

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"Well, that's clever," he said, slowly and perplexedly, when I had
finished. "It's damned clever, but somehow it looks to me all wrong. I
can't pick it to pieces." He got up rather heavily. "I--I guess I ought
to be going. Susan doesn't know where I am."

I was exasperated. It was clear, though he did not say so, that he
thought me dishonest. The pain in his eyes had deepened.

"If you feel that way--" I said.

"Oh, God, I don't know how I feel!" he cried. "You're the oldest friend I
have, Hugh,--I can't forget that. We'll say nothing more about it." He
picked up his hat and a moment later I heard the front door close behind
him. I stood for a while stock-still, and then went into the living-room,
where Maude was sewing.

"Why, where's Tom?" she inquired, looking up.

"Oh, he went home. He said Susan didn't know where he was."

"How queer! Hugh, was there anything the matter? Is he in trouble?" she
asked anxiously.

I stood toying with a book-mark, reflecting. She must inevitably come to
suspect that something had happened, and it would be as well to fortify
her.

"The trouble is," I said after a moment, "that Perry and Tom would like
to run modern business on the principle of a charitable institution.
Unfortunately, it is not practical. They're upset because I have been
retained by a syndicate whose object is to develop some land out beyond
Maplewood Avenue. They've bought the land, and we are asking the city to
give us a right to build a line out Maplewood Avenue, which is the
obvious way to go. Perry says it will spoil the avenue. That's nonsense,
in the first place. The avenue is wide, and the tracks will be in a grass
plot in the centre. For the sake of keeping tracks off that avenue he
would deprive people of attractive homes at a small cost, of the good air
they can get beyond the heights; he would stunt the city's development."

"That does seem a little unreasonable," Maude admitted. "Is that all he
objects to?"

"No, he thinks it an outrage because, in order to get the franchise, we
have to deal with the city politicians. Well, it so happens, and always
has happened, that politics have been controlled by leaders, whom Perry
calls 'bosses,' and they are not particularly attractive men. You
wouldn't care to associate with them. My father once refused to be mayor
of the city for this reason. But they are necessities. If the people
didn't want them, they'd take enough interest in elections to throw them
out. But since the people do want them, and they are there, every time a
new street-car line or something of that sort needs to be built they have
to be consulted, because, without their influence nothing could be done.
On the other hand, these politicians cannot afford to ignore men of local
importance like Leonard Dickinson and Adolf Scherer and Miller Gorse who
represent financial substance and' responsibility. If a new
street-railroad is to be built, these are the logical ones to build it.
You have just the same situation in Elkington, on a smaller scale.

"Your family, the Hutchinses, own the mills and the street-railroads, and
any new enterprise that presents itself is done with their money, because
they are reliable and sound."

"It isn't pleasant to think that there are such people as the
politicians, is it?" said Maude, slowly.

"Unquestionably not," I agreed. "It isn't pleasant to think of some other
crude forces in the world. But they exist, and they have to be dealt
with. Suppose the United States should refuse to trade with Russia
because, from our republican point of view, we regarded her government as
tyrannical and oppressive? or to cooperate with England in some
undertaking for the world's benefit because we contended that she ruled
India with an iron hand? In such a case, our President and Senate would
be scoundrels for making and ratifying a treaty. Yet here are Perry and
Tom, and no doubt Susan and Lucia, accusing me, a lifetime friend, of
dishonesty because I happen to be counsel for a syndicate that wishes to
build a street-railroad for the convenience of the people of the city."

"Oh, no, not of dishonesty!" she exclaimed. "I can't--I won't believe
they would do that."

"Pretty near it," I said. "If I listened to them, I should have to give
up the law altogether."

"Sometimes," she answered in a low voice, "sometimes I wish you would."

"I might have expected that you would take their point of view."

As I was turning away she got up quickly and put her hand on my shoulder.

"Hugh, please don't say such things--you've no right to say them."

"And you?" I asked.

"Don't you see," she continued pleadingly, "don't you see that we are
growing apart? That's the only reason I said what I did. It isn't that I
don't trust you, that I don't want you to have your work, that I demand
all of you. I know a woman can't ask that,--can't have it. But if you
would only give me--give the children just a little, if I could feel that
we meant something to you and that this other wasn't gradually becoming
everything, wasn't absorbing you more and more, killing the best part of
you. It's poisoning our marriage, it's poisoning all your relationships."

In that appeal the real Maude, the Maude of the early days of our
marriage flashed forth again so vividly that I was taken aback. I
understood that she had had herself under control, had worn a mask--a
mask I had forced on her; and the revelation of the continued existence
of that other Maude was profoundly disturbing. Was it true, as she said,
that my absorption in the great game of modern business, in the modern
American philosophy it implied was poisoning my marriage? or was it that
my marriage had failed to satisfy and absorb me? I was touched--but
sentimentally touched: I felt that this was a situation that ought to
touch me; I didn't wish to face it, as usual: I couldn't acknowledge to
myself that anything was really wrong... I patted her on the shoulder, I
bent over and kissed her.

"A man in my position can't altogether choose just how busy he will be,"
I said smiling. "Matters are thrust upon me which I have to accept, and I
can't help thinking about some of them when I come home. But we'll go off
for a real vacation soon, Maude, to Europe--and take the children."

"Oh, I hope so," she said.

From this time on, as may be supposed, our intercourse with both the
Blackwoods began to grow less frequent, although Maude continued to see a
great deal of Lucia; and when we did dine in their company, or they with
us, it was quite noticeable that their former raillery was suppressed.
Even Tom had ceased to refer to me as the young Napoleon of the Law: he
clung to me, but he too kept silent on the subject of business. Maude of
course must have noticed this, must have sensed the change of atmosphere,
have known that the Blackwoods, at least, were maintaining appearances
for her sake. She did not speak to me of the change, nor I to her; but
when I thought of her silence, it was to suspect that she was weighing
the question which had led up to the difference between Perry and me, and
I had a suspicion that the fact that I was her husband would not affect
her ultimate decision. This faculty of hers of thinking things out
instead of accepting my views and decisions was, as the saying goes,
getting a little "on my nerves": that she of all women should have
developed it was a recurring and unpleasant surprise. I began at times to
pity myself a little, to feel the need of sympathetic companionship
--feminine companionship....

I shall not go into the details of the procurement of what became known
as the Riverside Franchise. In spite of the Maplewood residents, of the
City Improvement League and individual protests, we obtained it with
absurd ease. Indeed Perry Blackwood himself appeared before the Public
Utilities Committee of the Board of Aldermen, and was listened to with
deference and gravity while he discoursed on the defacement of a
beautiful boulevard to satisfy the greed of certain private individuals.
Mr. Otto Bitter and myself, who appeared for the petitioners, had a
similar reception. That struggle was a tempest in a tea-pot. The reformer
raged, but he was feeble in those days, and the great public believed
what it read in the respectable newspapers. In Mr. Judah B. Tallant's
newspaper, for instance, the Morning Era, there were semi-playful
editorials about "obstructionists." Mr. Perry Blackwood was a
well-meaning, able gentleman of an old family, etc., but with a sentiment
for horse-cars. The Era published also the resolutions which (with
interesting spontaneity!) had been passed by our Board of Trade and
Chamber of Commerce and other influential bodies in favour of the
franchise; the idea--unknown to the public--of Mr. Hugh Paret, who wrote
drafts of the resolutions and suggested privately to Mr. Leonard
Dickinson that a little enthusiasm from these organizations might be
helpful. Mr. Dickinson accepted the suggestion eagerly, wondering why he
hadn't thought of it himself. The resolutions carried some weight with a
public that did not know its right hand from its left.

After fitting deliberation, one evening in February the Board of Aldermen
met and granted the franchise. Not unanimously, oh, no! Mr. Jason was not
so simple as that! No further visits to Monahan's saloon on my part, in
this connection were necessary; but Mr. Otto Bitter met me one day in the
hotel with a significant message from the boss.

"It's all fixed," he informed me. "Murphy and Scott and Ottheimer and
Grady and Loth are the decoys. You understand?"

"I think I gather your meaning," I said.

Mr. Bitter smiled by pulling down one corner of a crooked mouth.

"They'll vote against it on principle, you know," he added. "We get a
little something from the Maple Avenue residents."

I've forgotten what the Riverside Franchise cost. The sum was paid in a
lump sum to Mr. Bitter as his "fee,"--so, to their chagrin, a grand jury
discovered in later years, when they were barking around Mr. Jason's hole
with an eager district attorney snapping his whip over them. I remember
the cartoon. The municipal geese were gone, but it was impossible to
prove that this particular fox had used his enlightened reason in their
procurement. Mr. Bitter was a legally authorized fox, and could take
fees. How Mr. Jason was to be rewarded by the land company's left-hand,
unknown, to the land company's right hand, became a problem worthy of a
genius. The genius was found, but modesty forbids me to mention his name,
and the problem was solved, to wit: the land company bought a piece of
downtown property from--Mr. Ryerson, who was Mr. Grierson's real estate
man and the agent for the land company, for a consideration of thirty
thousand dollars. An unconfirmed rumour had it that Mr. Ryerson turned
over the thirty thousand to Mr. Jason. Then the Riverside Company issued
a secret deed of the same property back to Mr. Ryerson, and this deed was
not recorded until some years later.

Such are the elaborate transactions progress and prosperity demand.
Nature is the great teacher, and we know that her ways are at times
complicated and clumsy. Likewise, under the "natural" laws of economics,
new enterprises are not born without travail, without the aid of legal
physicians well versed in financial obstetrics. One hundred and fifty to
two hundred thousand, let us say, for the right to build tracks on
Maplewood Avenue, and we sold nearly two million dollars worth of the
securities back to the public whose aldermen had sold us the franchise.
Is there a man so dead as not to feel a thrill at this achievement? And
let no one who declares that literary talent and imagination are
nonexistent in America pronounce final judgment until he reads that
prospectus, in which was combined the best of realism and symbolism, for
the labours of Alonzo Cheyne were not to be wasted, after all. Mr.
Dickinson, who was a director in the Maplewood line, got a handsome
underwriting percentage, and Mr. Berringer, also a director, on the bonds
and preferred stock he sold. Mr. Paret, who entered both companies on the
ground floor, likewise got fees. Everybody was satisfied except the
trouble makers, who were ignored. In short, the episode of the Riverside
Franchise is a triumphant proof of the contention that business men are
the best fitted to conduct the politics of their country.

We had learned to pursue our happiness in packs, we knew that the Happy
Hunting-Grounds are here and now, while the Reverend Carey Heddon
continued to assure the maimed, the halt and the blind that their kingdom
was not of this world, that their time was coming later. Could there have
been a more idyl arrangement! Everybody should have been satisfied, but
everybody was not. Otherwise these pages would never have been written.