Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 52, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 March 1913 — CALEB CONOVER, RAILROADER [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

CALEB CONOVER, RAILROADER

BY ALBERT PAYSON TERHUNE

AaMcf "Syri. fan ihe SkMk" StanMe** Ets. CwiiWa. IW.

CHAPTER XV. Anice Intervenes. Ixr wrote them? You wrote i 1 them?” muttered Standish, 3h over and over, stupid, dazed, refusing to believe, or understand. "Yes,” she said, ”1 wrote them. And I Wrote one to Mr. Ansel. He was wiser than you. He tried to profit by what I—’’ “And I —l, thought it might be Gerald Conover.” “Gerald? He never knew any of the more secret details of the campaign. His father couldn’t trust him.” “And he did trupt you.”

Clive had not meant to say it He was sorry before the words had passed his lips. Yet it was the first lucid thought that came to him as his mind cleared from the first shock of Anice’s revelation. He knew how fully Conover believed in this pretty secretary of his; how wholly the Railroader had, in her case, departed from his life rule of universal suspicion. That she should thus, coldbloodedly, calculating!/, have betrayed the trust of even such an employer as Caleb was monstrous. He could not reconcile it with anything in his own long knowledge of her. The revelation turned him sick.

“You despise me, don’t you?” she asked. There was no shame, no faltaring in her clear young voice. "I have no right to —to judge anyone,” he stammered. "I —” "You despise me.” And now it waa a statement, not a query. "No,” he said, slowly, trying to gauge his own tangled emotions, “I don’t I don’t know why I don’t, but I don’t I should think anyone else that did such a thing was lower than the beasts. But you—why, you are yourself. And the queen can do no wrong. I’ve known you nearly all your life. If it had been possible foi you to harbor a mean or dishonest Impulse I’d have been the first person on earth to guess it Because no one else would have cared as I did. As I do. I don’t understand it at all And just at first it bowled me over, and a whole rush of disloyal thoughts and doubts came over me. But 1 know now it’s all right somehow, for it’s you." # "You moan,” exclaimed the girl, wonderingly, "that after what I’ve told you, you trust me?” "Why, bf course.” "And you don’t even ask me to explain?" "If there was anything I had a right to know—that yoq, wanted me to know —you’d have explained of your own accord."

She looked at him long, searchingly. Her face was as inscrutable as the Sphinx’s, yet when she spoke it waa of a totally different theme. "What are you going to do?” she Inquired. "Do?” he repeated, perplexed. "Yes, about the campaign.”

"There’s nothing to do. I am beaten. When the convention meets, tn half an hour, Conover will be nominated. Only my two blocks of dele gates will be left to oppose him, against all that whole—" "Yes; yes, I know that,” she interposed, "but what then?" "That is the end, I suppose. Per haps by the next gubernatorial campaign—"

"The next? This campaign hasn’t fairly begun yet Do you mean to say you are going to sit by with folded hands and accept defeat?" "What else is left?”

"Everything is left You have tried to fight an all-powerful machine, ta fight it on its own ground, along its own Ums, yet refusing to um its own waqpoM 9r to guard

Ing of further defeat What Conover has already done in muzzling the press am* using other crooked tactics, he will continue to do. My speeches r wdn’t be allowed to circulate. My meetings be broken up. More Conover men will register than can be found on the census list. And on Election Day there will be the usual ballot frauds. All the voting machinery is in Conover’s hands. Even if I won I would be counted out at the polbs. No—” "Wait! If I can clear the way for you. if I can insure you a fair chance, if I can prevent any frauds and force Mr. Conover to leave the issue honestly to the people of the Mountain State —if I can do all this, then will you declare yourself an independent candidate. and —?” “But how can you—a girl—do all this?”

—‘•l'H -eaEplalh that -to you afterward. But it won’t be in any unfair or underhand yay. You said Just now you trusted me. Can’t you trust me in this, too?” * “You know I can.” “And you’ll do as I ask?” “Yes."

“Good!” “It’s worth trial. I’ll do ft" “Then I shall be the first to congratulate the future Governor.” “Anice!” —the old-time boyish impetuosity 1 ’ she so well remembered flashing into one of its rare occurrences -“if I win this fight— if I am elected Governor—l shall have something worth while at last to offer you. If I come to you the day I am elected^—”

“I shall congratulate you only as I would any other friend." 2 His lips tightened as at a blow. For a moment neither spoke. It was Clive Who broke the silence. “I have said it awkwardly,” he began. “If it had been less to me I might have found more eloquence, I love you. I think I have always loved you. You know that A woman always knows. I love you, I loved you in the old days, when I was too poor to have the right to speak. What little I am—what little I may have achieved —is for you. I have not made much of myself. But that I’ve made anything at all is due to you. In everything I have done, your eyes and your smile have been before me. Ag heart, I’ve laid every success at your feet. At heart I’ve asked your faith and your pardon for each of my failures. And, whether you or not, it will always be the same. That one dear ambition will spur me on to make the very best of myself. My victories shall be your victories whether you wish it or not Perhaps that seems to you presumptuous or foolish?" “No.” There was no perceptible emotion <n the half-whispered word. From it Clive could glean nothing. Presently he went on: “I think whenever you see a man trying to make the most of all that is in him, and wearing out his very soul in this breakneck American race for livelihood, you’ll find there is some woman behind it all. It is for her, not for his own selfish ambition, that ne is fighting. Sometimes she crowns his victory. Sometimes-fee-wins only the thorn-crown. But the glory of the work and the warning are hers. Not nls. Now you know why I entered this Governorship fight, and why I am willing to keep it up. Oh, sweetheart, I love you so. You must understand, now, why I longed to come to you in my hour of triumph and —” “You would have come too late,” she said in that same enigmatic undertone. "Anice.” * There was a world of pain in his appeal, yet she disregarded it; and, with face averted, hurried on: “Would you care for—for the love as a girl who made you wait until you could buy her with fame and an income? Do I care for the love of a man who holds that love so cheaply he must accompany its gift with a Governorship title —?” “Atfd now,” she observed, some minates later, as she strove to rearrange her tumbled crown of rust-colored hair before the tiny patch of office mirror, "and now, if you can be sensible for Just a little while, we’ll go back to the convention. And •I’ll explain to you about those letters. The anonymous ones.” "It’s all right I don’t have to be told. I—’’ “But I have to tell you. That’s the worst of being a girt” And* You have failed. The real fight begins now.” “What do you mean?” "I mean you must call on the people at large to hep you. You have aroused them. Already there is sc much discontent against Boss rule that Mr. Conover is troubled. You have no right to abandon the Cause now that you’ve interested others in it. Put yourself in the people’s hands.” “You mean to —?” "To declare yourself an independent candidate.” "‘Bolt* the Democratic ticket? "It is against custom, but good men have done it In this battle, as I understand it. there is no question of party issues. It is the people against the Machine. Can’t you see?” “Yes,” he replied, after a moment of hesitation. "1 see. And you are right. But it means only the court(To Be Continued.)

"And he did trust you.”