Part 21 (2/2)

”I don't believe they'll work any too hard. It's taken too long to get under way. If the amendment pa.s.ses, you see they'll only have the advantage of six weeks of fair compet.i.tion. I mean, Henry'd lose only six weeks of his _un_fair compet.i.tion. And then we've got to see about getting new quarters for the League, when our Masonic Hall lease runs out, and--”

”But our advertising'll be running just the same, and the League'll still have its public meetings, and all. And everywhere I go I hear the same thing; the people really want this pa.s.sed. And _any_body can find us a new hall. I'll appoint somebody. No, you're just as unselfish as you can be, but we'll be back in time. Truly, Theodore, didn't you guess?”

Much of the jauntiness had gone out of Mr. Mix, but he consoled himself with the certainty that in another two months, he would be in a position to become masterful. The week in Chicago would bore him excessively, but after all, it was only a small part of a lifetime. He reflected that to any prisoner, the last few days before release, and freedom, are probably the hardest.

”How could I, my dear?”

”No, you must have thought I'd want you to traipse off on some perfectly aimless, nonsensical trip like a pair of sentimental idiots.”

”Oh, you know me better than that,” he murmured.

”Yes, but I didn't know how well you knew _me_. Sometimes I've been afraid you think I'm too--gus.h.i.+ng.”

”Oh, Mirabelle!”

”Just because I chatter along to you as any innocent young girl might--”

She continued to chatter for some minutes, but Mr. Mix was absent-minded.

He had chewed the cud of his own virtue for too long a time, and it had given him a sour stomach. He was thinking that if her gift to him were in money (and from her hints he rather expected it) he might even manage to find, in Chicago, a type of unascetic diversion which would remove the taste of the convention from his spirit. But it was better to be safe than sorry, and therefore Mr. Mix decided to make a flying trip to New York, for his bachelor celebration.

To Mirabelle he said that he was going to confer with his friend, the head of the Watch-and-Ward Society. Mirabelle promptly volunteered to go along too, but Mr. Mix told her, as delicately as he could, that it wouldn't look proper, and Mirabelle, who wors.h.i.+pped propriety as all G.o.ds in one, withdrew the suggestion.

”But before you go,” she said, ”You've _got_ to do something about the state-wide campaign. You've got to write the literature, anyway.”

Mr. Mix felt that he was protected by the calendar, and promised.

Before he went to New York, he wrote three pamphlets which were marvels of circ.u.mlocution, as far as reform was concerned, and masterpieces of political writing, as far as his own interests were concerned. He had borrowed freely, and without credit, from the speeches of every orator from Everett to Choate, and when he delivered the ma.n.u.scripts to Mirabelle, and went off on his solitary junket, he was convinced that he had helped his own personal cause, and satisfied the League, without risking the smallest part of his reputation.

On his return, he stopped first at the Citizens Club, and when he came into the great living-room he was aware that several members looked up at him and smiled. Over in a corner, Henry Devereux and Judge Barklay had been conversing in undertones; but they, too, had glanced up, and their smiles were among the broadest.

Mr. Mix had an uncomfortable intuition that something had blown. Could he have been spotted, in New York, by any one from home?

”What's the joke?” he inquired of the nearest member.

”Got a new name for you--Pitchfork Mix.” Mr. Mix spread a thin smile over his lips. ”Supposed to be funny, is it?”

”Some folks think so.”

”Where'd it originate? Let me in on the joke.”

”Where _would_ it originate? You're some strenuous author--aren't you?

Didn't know you had that much acid in your system.”

”Author? Author?”

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