To Martin, it seemed that justice and mercy were always doomed to be thwarted and destroyed by something euphemistically called reason. It seemed strange to him that when something so obviously outrageous occurred that even the most stupid man must admit it required righting, there was a great deal of talk about law and trespassing, due process and respect for the rights of the strong, and the unjust. Law and reason, he was coming to believe, were continually being invoked to protect the haves against the have-nots, the robbers against their victims. He returned to Windsor in a state of much confusion and helpless wrath.
He went to see Father Dominick, less to seek advice than to find comfort. He did not know that the priest knew his brother, so attached little importance to the former’s cryptic remark “that perhaps something could be done.” So, he went to Washington in a last desperate hope that perhaps his wife’s uncle might give him some encouragement.
In the meantime, Father Dominick visited Ernest at his office. Ernest received him with great, if wary, cordiality. He pressed cigars on him, inquired as to his health, laughed and joked with him, treating him in every way as a welcome visitor. Nothing could have been blander than the priest’s expression, but he missed nothing of Ernest’s gray stoniness of complexion, the light and unmoving implacability of his eyes, the grim wide mouth and strong short nose, the harshness behind the geniality. “Warmth rests uneasily on him,” he thought.
He approached his object leisurely. He did not want Mr. Barbour to think he was intruding, but Mr. Martin Barbour had come to him in a state of much distress. He, of course, knew all about the whole matter; it was much to be regretted. Misunderstandings and enmity between kinsmen were an abomination in the sight of our Lord. He came today to Mr. Barbour more as a peacemaker than one impudently offering advice or suggestion. After all, Mr. Martin was a communicant of the Church, and entitled, therefore, to her protection and assistance. What he, the priest, had in mind, therefore, was a little—just a little—forbearance. He would not attempt to question the justice or injustice of the quarrel. He was interested only in peace, in an amicable settlement that would give both sides of the quarrel satisfaction. Now, Mr. Martin told him that Barbour & Bouchard had refused him permission to send a doctor within the gates of the Kinsolving works, had refused to send the sick to his hospital. This was very distressing.
There was a pause. Ernest said nothing. He had merely fixed his eyes upon the priest, and he still waited, utterly without facial expression. Father Dominick cleared his throat. And now, he pleaded with a smile, he really must be forgiven for offering a suggestion. Mr. Martin had the resolution and inexorable determination of a righteous and single-minded man. He would never give up; he would never relinquish what he had in mind. He would, like all his prototypes, eventually move mountains. And the movement of mountains, the priest pointed out delicately, is never accomplished without a great many casualties and other unpleasantnesses. There was nothing the just man would stop at to bring about what he considered justice. Carnage was an item to him: The eruptions of volcanoes were puffs of smoke. Heaven and earth might roll up like a scroll, but he would not see it; all he would see were his object and his simplicity of purpose. Simplicity of purpose, Father Dominick again pointed out, was a terrible thing. It was like the force of armies fused into one sword, that was irresistible. Nothing could withstand it. The end was inevitable: Martin would secure at least part of what he desired. It was the better, the more graceful, the quieter, the easier thing, for Ernest to concede a little. He had, said the priest, come out with the spoils, after all. If Ernest would concede the point of allowing his brother to care for the sick and injured of the Kinsolving works, and the other factories, he would not only secure the esteem of his fellow citizens, but would also be doing himself a benefit. Half-sick and injured workmen were notorious time-and-money wasters.
Ernest was still silent, but there was a faint and satirical smile on his mouth.
Father Dominick became momentarily interested in a hangnail. There were, he went on, more people to be considered than just Ernest and his brother. An increase in enmity, more uproar, more threats and struggle, would be very distressing to many others. Weren’t their wives cousins? Hadn’t he and Martin the same mother, the same sisters? Women, especially, the delicate and sensitive creatures! must be dealt with gently. And how they deplore quarrels between their men! It veritably breaks their hearts. And now the priest looked at him blandly, waiting.
Ernest’s face had darkened, become heavy and sullen. He played with his watch chain and stared through the window. Finally he said slowly: “There is much in what you say. As for myself, enmity between my brother and me is an old story. I wouldn’t care what happened between us. But, as you said, there are—others.” He laughed shortly. “Yes, I can see your point in many ways.
“You may inform my brother, if you wish, that I will no longer object to my men being treated by his doctors either in their houses or in his hospital, and that once a week any doctor chosen by him may enter our grounds.”
The two men regarded each other kindly. But the priest read the question in Ernest’s eyes: I wonder, you crafty priest! how much you know? Father Dominick smiled to himself with more than a little irony.
Father Dominick called upon the Martin Barbours, and was disappointed when Amy informed him that Martin had gone to Washington. He was, however, too triumphant, too pleased, to retain his news, so he told it to Amy. He sat before the pleasant living-room fire, with the sun streaming in a broad path through the high windows, a baby on each knee, and beamed paternally upon Amy, who had acquired a deep affection for him. The babies crawled over him, tugging at his collar, thrusting fingers into his eyes and nose, clutching his hair, exploring his pockets. Between the fat scrambling legs and arms his face peered out good-humoredly at Amy, a round red moon shining with laughter.
Amy was delighted. Her eyes sparkled through tears. How pleased dear Martin would be! She confessed that she did not share his passion for social justice and all the other things he was so intense about, but she understood what he meant; she understood how he felt. He was so good, so truly noble. Her love for him made her sweet face luminous, and the color in her lips grew warmer.
Father Dominick began to talk of Ernest. At the mention of that name a faint and subtle change came into Amy’s expression.
“In all my life,” said the priest genially, “I have never met a truly godless man before. There was always just a little spark—Mr. Barbour is a revelation to me, though I have read of his kind. A truly godless man. A man utterly without God. And yet,” he added, catching a twin deftly as it was about to dive to the floor, “I like him! I do not really know why but I like him!”
CHAPTER XLI
Martin arrived in Washington late in the afternoon. The train was late, and none too clean. Consequently he was tired and covered with soot and grit. He was also hungry. He had no intention of bursting in upon Senator Sessions demanding supper and sleeping accommodations, for he had the uneasy reserve of the shy man who is afraid to ask favors for himself. So he discovered a small and shabby hotel near the station, rented a dusty room, washed away the greasy soot as best he could, and had a supper served to him. He found the cold smoked ham surprisingly good, the sweet jams delectable, the chicken hot and fried and delicious, and the coffee quite exceptional. He had not been too hopeful on the train, but the food fortified him, and he felt his new sense of power flowing back.
He had no particular curiosity about Washington. It was a small city, he knew, not much larger than Windsor, and very beautiful. Perhaps it was the ashen airlessness of the early winter day, he thought, which seemed to give the rumor of beauty the lie, for so far he had seen only deadness and dinginess, few people, and uninspiring streets. But the amount of negroes surprised him. They were freemen, he knew, but not at all like the humble, servile, childlike and grateful wretches he had saved and shipped to Canada. These negroes were impudent and slovenly. His own particular waiter snif
fed audibly at Martin’s tip, though Martin had considered it exceedingly generous. He asked the waiter to call a cab for him, and when the man had been gone an unreasonable length of time, he was forced to put on his hat and coat and go downstairs to look for a cab, himself. He found his waiter lounging in the hallway talking amorously to a mulatto maid. At Martin’s angry glance he did no more than stare insolently, finish the sentence he had begun, then drag himself reluctantly to the outer door. He opened it an inch and announced indifferently that it seemed like there was no cabs around this evenin’, no sir! Martin went out himself. There was a light rain falling, and a vivid light, lying on the dingy poor buildings along the street, gave an air of desolution to the scene. A cab trundled dolorously toward Martin, drawn by one disconsolate horse, and he hailed it. As the door of the hotel closed behind him, he heard the negro say something about that “damned Yankee.”
This incident agitated Martin out of all proportion to its importance. He felt unnerved, almost wounded. When he heard his own breath, hurried and short, he had to smile, though a little sadly.
The cab rolled leisurely down Pennsylvania Avenue. Martin was interested at the breadth of the street, the vague flash of white buildings illumined by flickering street lamps, the long wide streets radiating off the avenue. The rain had become a drizzling pall; when a few red beams of the setting sun thrust themselves through twisted dark skies, they lay on the wet roofs of houses, so that the roofs seemed to run with fire. Hardly a soul was to be seen anywhere, except an occasional languid negro carrying baskets. Then the rain came down again with renewed chill fury, and the windows of the cab streamed with gray rivers. The dankness penetrated into the vehicle, causing cold threads to run up and down Martin’s legs. The horse clop-clopped through the deserted streets, splashing up showers of muddy water.
The cab stopped before a tall narrow brick house with grilled balconies, grilled lower windows and tall narrow stone steps. There was a glimmer of rosy firelight on the stiff white curtains at the bay windows, and the light of a lonely street lamp glittered on the polished brass knocker on the door. Martin knocked on the door, and up and down the quiet, rain-running street the echo boomed with a faint and hollow sound.
The manservant who opened the door and took Martin’s card informed him that Senator Sessions was at dinner with two guests. Martin said he would not interrupt, and was conducted to the library, a narrow lofty room, dark and chill, with a red fire lurking behind polished fenders. He sat down in a black leather chair near the fire, and looked about him timidly. It was a typical bachelor’s room, without imagination or beauty, all black walnut and leather, gloomy books in gloomy tall bookcases, dark rugs and narrow windows, heavy sombre tables with claw feet, and brass lamps with round china globes painted with dim purple flags. A foreboding of defeat came to Martin, and he sighed heavily. He thought to himself: I am frustrated everywhere. Everywhere I am regarded as a fool, or worse. At the best, I get vague promises. Men are dying and suffering and being cheated, and I am advised to have patience, or to walk softer—softer! Rome, they say to me, wasn’t built in a day. But it takes less than an hour, sometimes, for a man to die.
From somewhere across the damp cold hall outside came the faint boom of men’s voices and laughter, the distant clink of silver on china, the short bark of a dog. Martin became more and more apprehensive. He stirred the fire vigorously, but the coals merely glowed without much warmth. He surveyed the result with discouragement.
He realized with bitter clarity, now, how silly this whole expedition might seem to the Senator. Nicholas Sessions, though vaguely fond of Amy, liked her less than his cousin May. He had seen more of May than of Amy; besides, his niece was not the type to appeal to him. Martin was the kind he could deceive very easily, but Amy was not. May, too, read him without delusions, but she had such a whimsical and indulgent way of reading him that he felt no offense, but rather enjoyed her mischievous penetration. But Amy had a manner of looking at him with her clear and steadfast eyes that made him resentfully uncomfortable. May had also been his hostess for two years in Washington, and he had been gratified by the comments made on her by his friends and colleagues. He felt uncomfortable with Amy, and though he always treated her with avuncular affection, was generous as to her dowry, answered her letters with more or less promptness, and presented each of her babies with a golden christening cup, he was not inclined to regard her affairs with real concern. Martin he recalled on rare occasions, with a slight pleasure which had more than a little to do with the young man’s apparent acceptance of him as a crusader for the rights of the oppressed. Martin was more than a little aware of Nicholas’ vagueness and real indifference with regard to him and to Amy, and he was not relying at all on the relationship to secure any assistance. In fact, he thought heavily, he would have felt easier if Senator Sessions were a mere acquaintance.
A door was opened across the hall; light streamed out from it, warm and smoking. Voices and laughter boomed like an explosion into the dank coldness. Three men crossed the hall and entered the library. The butler scurried into the room, lit another lamp or two, set down a tray with a decanter of brandy on it and four glasses.
“My dear Martin!” exclaimed the Senator affectionately, as he advanced toward Martin with warm, outstretched hand. “What a pleasant surprise! Why did you not let me know? How long are you remaining in our fair city? Is Amy with you? No? You are looking splendid!” He shook Martin’s hand vigorously, clapped him on the shoulder, assumed the heartiest and most paternal of expressions. He put his arm about the embarrassed young man, and turned to two strange gentlemen. The color rushed suddenly into Martin’s face. One of the gentlemen was Mr. Stanton, whom he had met at the gates of the Kinsolving works. Mr. Stanton bowed with an assumption of indulgent irony, but he was exceedingly uneasy as he greeted Martin after Nicholas’ introduction. The other gentleman, an ungainly, shabby-looking man of indeterminate age, with an ugly but striking bearded face and extraordinarily penetrating eyes, looked at Martin attentively while Nicholas performed the introductions.
“Mr. Lincoln,” boomed the Senator, “is almost certain to be our next President, Martin. Martin,” he added to Mr. Lincoln, “is much interested in the slavery question, also. Gives a great deal of money to an abolitionist society. And that,” he added grinning, “is the best and only real test of a man’s sincerity.”
“I am sure, then, my dear Senator,” said Mr. Lincoln genially, “that your sincerity has been put to the proof.”
Nicholas laughed loudly, but his smiling face was exceedingly red. “Sit down, gentlemen, sit down! Brandy, gentlemen, of course? A gentleman, as you know, brags about only two things: his liquor and his horses. So, when I tell you that this brandy has not its equal anywhere, you dare not accuse me of vulgarity.”
“Nor question your always unimpeachable veracity,” added Mr. Lincoln. And again Nicholas laughed loudly, the color congesting in his face. Then for the first time Martin noticed his eye, and was startled at the steady baleful gleam of it. It was most evident that he hated Mr. Lincoln. As for Mr. Stanton, he merely listened to everything, smiled with a flash of small white teeth through his bearded lips, murmured polite inaudibilities, and saw everything. He looked steadily from Nicholas to Mr. Lincoln and back again all the time, as though he were a trainer calculating which of two powerful horses would win the race, and trying to determine which to ride.
Mr. Lincoln, who was unusually tall and lanky, settled his long body into a chair at the opposite side of the fire. He was a fluent talker, and his voice had a pleasant timbre for all its back-country flavoring. His clothes were badly cut, and looked sadly in need of brushing and pressing; his cravat was tied carelessly, and as he talked he had a farmerish habit of rubbing his right ear. His ugliness, Martin decided, was almost grotesque, but at times there was a flash and a gleam in it, a smile, that made it beautiful in a strange and compelling way. He had not been attracted to Mr. Lincoln, for he thought him too acid, for all his smi
les, and he was afraid of people who could smile and thrust at the same time. It was, to him, like treading on treacherous ground. But now he saw, with surprise and confusion, that Mr. Lincoln’s eyes were both sad and immeasurably kind, and that when he turned to Martin for his embarrassed comments on a remark of Nicholas’, he listened with the sweetest of courtesy and gentleness. The eyes, Martin decided suddenly, belonged to a man who would never be cruel or brutal, exigent or ferocious. He had almost decided with a rare impulsiveness to mention the object of his visit to Mr. Lincoln, when Mr. Stanton abruptly reminded that gentleman that they had an engagement with Senator somebody-or-other in twenty minutes.
When the door had closed after the visitors, Nicholas said, as he helped himself to more brandy: “What do you think of Mr. Abraham Lincoln, Martin? As I said, he is almost certain to be our next President. I can smell the way the wind blows.”
Martin, who had heard May confidently assert, dozens of times, that Nicholas would be the next President, asked naïvely: “But I thought you were to be, sir?”
Nicholas laughed, the florid coloring deepening in his broad face. “Sometimes it is best not to be President, Martin. I wouldn’t take the job if I were drafted for it. Not for ten years, I wouldn’t! As I said, I can smell something in the wind, and I don’t like it. Let Mr. Lincoln, or anyone else, go polecat hunting. Not me!” Over the glass of brandy, he grinned at Martin. It was a fixed grin, and Martin, all at once, saw that it was cunning and unfriendly. And worst of all, he felt with abrupt sharpness, the unfriendliness was directed at him. He was alarmed.
Dynasty of Death Page 46