Part 36 (1/2)

”They've got a new scheme now. They've set Mary after you. They figure that if the girl can land you they'll get a chance at what I have made out of the process that way. I told him you was too smart to be caught like that. But you've got to watch them. They'll do anything.”

In spite of his pity for his father, John Ward drew from him, overcome by a feeling of disgust and shame which he could not wholly control.

Adam, unconscious of his son's emotions, went on. ”I've made it all in spite of them, John, but I've had to watch them. They'll be after you now that I have turned things over to you, just as they have been after me. They'll never get it, though. They'll never get a penny of it. I'll destroy the Mill and everything before I'll give up a dollar of what I've made.”

John Ward could not speak. It was too monstrous--too horrible. As one in a hideous dream, he listened. What was back of it all? Why did his father in his spells of nervous excitement always rave so about the patented process? Why did he hate Pete Martin so bitterly? What was this secret thing that was driving Adam Ward insane?

Thinking to find an answer to these perplexing questions, if there was any answer other than the Mill owner's mental condition, John forced himself to the pretense of sharing his father's fears. He agreed with Adam's arraignment of Pete, echoed his father's expression of hatred for the old workman, thanked Adam for warning him, boasted of his own ability to see through their tricks and schemes and to protect the property his father had acc.u.mulated.

In this vein they talked in confidential whispers until John felt that he could venture the question, ”Just what is it about the process that they are after, father? If I knew the exact history of the thing I would be in a much better position to handle the situation as you want, wouldn't I?”

Adam Ward's manner changed instantly. With a look of sly cunning he studied John's face. ”There is nothing about the process, son,” he said, steadily. ”You know all there is to know about it now.”

But when John, thinking that his father had regained his self-control, urged him to go back to his bed, Adam's painful agitation returned.

For some moments he paced to and fro as if in nervous indecision, then, going close to John, he said in a low, half whisper, ”John, there is something else I wanted to ask you. You have been to college and over there in the war, you must have seen a lot of men die--” He paused.

”Yes, yes, you must have been close to death a good many times. Tell me, John, do you believe that there is anything after--I mean anything beyond this life? Does a man's conscious existence go on when he is dead?”

”Yes,” said John, wondering at this apparent change in his father's thought. ”I believe in a life beyond this. You believe in it, too, don't you, father?”

”Of course,” returned Adam. ”We can't know, though, for sure, can we?

But, anyway, a man would be foolish to risk it, wouldn't he?”

”To risk what, father?”

”To risk the chance of there being no h.e.l.l,” came the startling answer.

”My folks raised me to believe in h.e.l.l, and the preachers all teach it.

And if there should be such a place of eternal torment a man would be a fool not to fix up some way to get out of it, wouldn't he?”

John did not know what to say.

Adam Ward leaned closer to his son and with an air of secrecy whispered, ”That's exactly what I've done, John--I've worked out a scheme to tie G.o.d up in a contract that will force Him to save me. The old Interpreter gave me the idea. You see if it should turn out that there is no h.e.l.l my plan can't do any harm and if there is a h.e.l.l it makes me safe anyway.”

He chuckled with insane satisfaction. ”They say that G.o.d knows everything--that n.o.body can figure out a way to beat Him, but I have--I have worked out a deal with G.o.d that is bound to give me the best of it. I've got Him tied up so tight that He'll be bound to save me. Some people think I'm crazy, but you wait, my boy--they'll find out how crazy I am. They'll never get me into h.e.l.l. I have been figuring on this ever since the Interpreter told me I had better make a contract with G.o.d. And after Pete left this morning I got it all settled. A man can't afford to take any chances with G.o.d and so I made this deal with Him. h.e.l.l or no h.e.l.l, I'm safe. G.o.d don't get the best of me,--And you are safe, too, son, with the new process, if you look after your own interests, as I have done, and don't overlook any opportunities. I wanted to tell you about this so you wouldn't worry about me. I'll go back to bed now. Don't tell mother and Helen what we have been talking about. No use to worry them--they couldn't understand anyway. And don't forget, John, what Pete told me about Mary. Their scheme won't work of course. I know you are too smart for them. But just the same you've got to be on your guard against her all the time. Never take any unnecessary chances. Don't talk over a deal with a man when any one can hear. If you are careful to have no witnesses when you arrange a deal you are absolutely safe. It is what you can slip into the written contract that counts--once you get your man's signature. That's always been my way. And now I have even put one over on G.o.d.”

He stole cautiously out of the room and back to his own apartment.

Outside his father's door John waited, listening, until he was convinced that sleep had at last come to the exhausted man.

Late that same Sunday evening, when the street meeting held by Jake Vodell was over, there was another meeting in the room back of the pool hall. The men who sat around that table with the agitator were not criminals--they were workmen. Sam Whaley and two others were men with families. They were all American citizens, but they were under the spell of their leader's power. They had been prepared for that leaders.h.i.+p by the industrial policies of McIver and Adam Ward.

This meeting of that inner circle was in no way authorized by the unions. The things they said Sam Whaley would not have dared to say openly in the Mill workers' organization. The plans they proposed to carry out in the name of the unions they were compelled to make in secret. In their mad, fanatical acceptance of the dreams that Vodell wrought for them; in their blind obedience to the leaders.h.i.+p he had so cleverly established; in their reckless disregard of the consequences under the spell of his promised protection, they were as insane, in fact, as the owner of the Mill himself.

The supreme, incredible, pitiful tragedy of it all was this: That these workmen committed themselves to the plans of Jake Vodell in the name of their country's workmen.

CHAPTER XXIV