Richmond Palladium (Daily), Volume 35, Number 35, 12 December 1909 — Page 18

OUR SHORT STORY"

PAOB

THE chief stood in the bow and spat into the gray -green water belo.. The sky was an angry glare to the west, and the air was hot and humid. Above, a feeble star tried to shine through a murky baze, and failed. To the east the horizon was barely visible, a clean black line against the purple of a sky that said nothing aloud, but whispered of evil things to those who read the signs of trouble at sea. In the engine room was the only sound in the ship the steady chug-chug-clank, chug-chug-clank of the two engines. The glass was down away down, although the chief knew this only by inference. Nor did he care greatly. It was the captain who was caring, and who watched the mercury dropping, dropping slow, it is true, but still dropping and who saw, with more than the usual anxiety which a falling glass has for a careful skipper, the strongly marked concavity of the surface of the murcury, which bodes ill for ships not strong of heart and stout of timber and brace. The chief stood in the bow and spat into the gray-green water below. It is a peculiar combination of circumstances which can throw a five-hundred-ton tramp into the hands of her chief and one uneducated nigger for an engineer's force, but the circumstances had occurred. The Minnie Woolworth "Woolly" for short never had but two engineers, in spite of her two compounds, for her owners were the saving kind, and two engineers instead of three saved not only salary, but "hash" for one. Nor had there ever been any occasion when the two were not ample for the work. A tramp runs on no schedule, she gets where she is going the best way she can, and whenever she can, saving coal by the lw of necessity, which loads the bunkers with only enough to get there plus ten tons margin, and which ' prescribes two knots under the possibility of the screws as a result. Beck, the chief, and Andrews, the second where was there ever a tramp, or a liner either, for that matter without a Scottish name in the engine room? stood watch and watch, and thought it little hardship. But now here was Andrews tied in a hard knot in his berth with something he called cramps (the captain was deadly afraid it was ptomaine poisoning) and as much good as a jellyfish as far as standing watch was concerned. Wherefore the Nigger had been called from the stokehole and took his place every third watch while Beck was standing eight hours with four hours below. The Nigger was lazy. H5 was a product of the West Indies, a man of immense physical strength, with the poetry of the beasts of the Jungle in his lithe strong body, his swelling muscles, and the clean clear bronze of his skin. He was a typical, happy, careless child of his race, living only for today, for the next meal, the next sleep, loving the sunlight like a cat, and hating the wet and the cold as do the transplanted children of the Line. Somewhere, somehow, he had picked up a knowledge of engines and steam. He could throttle her down if a sea made the big slow screws spin like pinwheels, could watch her water and her steam, and give orders to the stokehole with unnecessary pride, could pack a valve or oil a bearing as well as Beck himself. But he could not read or write; and, when It came to even such ordinary tasks as taking a card or setting an eccentric valve, he was as much at sea as any one who has never learned anything of engineering but by observation and absorption. Still, he was the only man in the stokehole who knew even so much, and when the captain had a despairing talk with Reddy, boss of the grimy stokers, the Irishman indicated the Nigger as the only alternative to putting into the nearest port. Perhaps it was that the Nigger was so lazy and Reddy was anxious to get his room! There were reasons why putting into port and trying to get another second was not to be thought of. There was a cargo waging the first tramp which would take It at Oyapok, and the ".Woolly's" owners were not men who loved to spend coal on a light ship and get no return for it. Captain Holroyd took a chance, and the Nigger went to the engine room. And so Beck stood in the bows and spat at the gray-green water below, and looked at the reddening afterglow, smothering up in the clouds, and smelt half a gale a-comlng, and wondered sleepily about the glass, and decided it was none of his business, and spluttered a little at his disgust of being shipmates with "a rotten, stinking nigger, who doesn't know a stuffing box from a box of sardines," and finally made his way to his bunk, where he turned In all standing. Meanwhile, Old Ocean was slowly making up its mind that something was going to happen. The afterglow faded into a ruddy smoke, then into a purple matching the east; the clean-cut horizon faded cut; the lone star was no more, and an odd little lift under the bows mingled with the slow, stately, mighty swell that up to now had been as regular as a pendulum. Somewhere, off to the south and east, something was brewing. At eight bells it was as dark as pitch. The glass still sank into Itself, shrinking from the coming storm. Had the Minnie Woolworth had a wireless station she would have heard long before of storm warnings set, and of a hurricane coming up the coast; but whoever heard of a set of saving owners installing a wireless to let a tramp captain have the news? And what good would it have done him to know it? And what. Indeed, could a storm warning tell him that his own live senses and the glass bad not already shown him was happening? He did not know when, or how, or exactly where, but even a lubber could have told from the hot feel of the air, and the deadly murkiness of every thing, and the twitching, uneasy, breathing of the water, and the oily, greasy, slippery way it slapped at the bows, ran hungrily along the rati, and hissed off into the wake . . . something was going to happen. Down in the engine room the Nigger was fast asleep. He was stretched out on the seat, his head gainst a feed pipe and his feet straggling along the grating. Unlike his race, he slept lightly, and a ingle peal at the jingle would have waked him. He knew the captain wasn't coming down, he knew Beck was asleep, and he trusted to luck not to be caught. "For why I not get um sleep?" he argued with himself. "Hit foolishnuss, dis a-yere stayin' wake when nofSn for um ter do. Day ole engines runnin' erlong as smoof as er greased pole Helium wid um regulashuns. Didn't ship for no engine-eer nohow!" But he was caught. And it bears heavily on what happened, and shows that even a black man, of no education, but once removed from savagery, may have that germ of manhood in him which puts others before self, and stands to help the greatest number to their greatest good in spite of personal consequences, whether personal liking be at stake or no. For Beck caught him napping, and kicked him soundly, ana cursed him until even the Nigger's ears burned and the whites of his eyes showed, and he cowered away from the dominant white race and the '.'lazing white man's eyes. "You black hound!" said Beck, not mincing his words. "You spawn of Hell, sleeping on duty, are you? IH show you how to sleep when I sleep. Here I am taking eight hours to your four, because I can't trust you for five minutes and you, with eight hours to sleep in, and better grub than you ever had in your lazy, good-for-nothing life, have got to curl up like a cat and let my engines go to the devil while you rest your precious chalky, nigger eyes! Get out of my engine room, you loafing misbegotten son of of Oh, get out before I take a spanner to you!" By all of which it may be seen that Beck was somewhat annoyed. And Beck reported to the captain, via the tube; and the mate, at the side of the man at the wheel, and the captain came down two steps at a time, and threatened the Nigger with terrible things, among which irons for days in the hold and no water, and stringing up by the thumbs, were ftfea mildest and the only two printable threats of

the lot For this was a man's ship, and a man's job, and short hands make ugly tempers and hard work, and the thin veneer that towns and owners and papers to sign and a little money to spend smears over a seaman, of none too high a class, slips like a forgotten cloak from his back when the sea is purring threats in his ears, and danger stares over the rail with unwinking eyes, and one man's dereliction of duty may mean the lives of all. This was no time to sleep, and the captain knew it but he knew, too, the limits of a man's endurance; and should he punish the Nigger now, there would come a time when Beck could no longer keep his eyes open; when sleeping on duty would be his portion, not with, but against, his will, and then, if danger had leaped the rail and stalked among them, and if the glass had been proved a true prophet . . . then might the just punishment of one man bring death to them all. So the captain did nothing but lash with his tongue, and that he used less oaths and more big words was no comfort to the Nigger. It Is just as much of an insult to call a man something he cannot understand and to mean it, as to call him by the lowest epithets in the language with all of which he is familiar. When the captain's anger had spent itself, and something in the huge frame of the scowling negro, who could so easily have done for them both with one mighty hug of his terrible arms, raised a smile to Holroyd's face, he ended with calling him a "blasted parallelopipedonical pacbyhermatous anachronism." The Nigger's eyes flashed, and he half raised his fist then dropped it, racial subserviency too strong for his anger. It b been like this for the three days he bad

A Man In The Pride Of His Sleek, Great Strength, Standing Alone, While He Whirled The Wheels And Saved The Live s Of The Men Above.

served. Something was always wrong. He was cussed and kicked, and kicked and cussed for something left undone or something done wrong, all the time. Now it was too much steam, now not enough. Now it was a waste of oil; now it was the engines grinding themselves to splinters with none at all. Now it was a tool out of place; now all the spanners so put away they couldn't be found. And the Nigger grinned and thought little of it part of the time, and sulked and planned revenge the rest of the time. "For why dey raise such um Cain 'bout it? Didn' haf to haf me engin-eer, did dey? Tink dis a-yere nigger jus' lak dirt under um ftJt! I fix um! Some day sompum goin' happen in dis a-yere engine room! Uh! Huh!" And something did happen, but it was not the Nigger who made it happen, nor the Nigger's idea of revenge. That it was revenge at all ... but let the sea work out the story. At eight bells, midnight, the Nigger woke up, from habit, and was frightened. There was a horrible sinking feeling to the ship as she let down between two hollows and staggered up a slope again, a horrible murky dripping nastiness to tbe air, a feeling of oppression and closeness about him. The Nigger was frightened. He crept along, holding tight, until he got to the engine room. "Wha what's a-gwlne happen, Massa Beck?" he said. "God knows!" said Beck shortly. "Nothing but a gale. I reckon. What you scared at? Want to come in and go to sleep again, you good-for-nothing cur?" "Ain" gwine sleep no mo', Massa Beck; jest want ter stay an' git wahm!" "Get warm! Get warm! Why, you lying skulker, you're dripping with sweat now! Get warm, indeed! You're scared!" And Beck turned his back. And then it happened. With a howl as of ten thousand devils in agony, with a screeching, yowling smother of noise that blotted out speech and clank of engines and chug of pumps as a passing train blots out a baby's lisp, the wind was upon the "Woolly." And ahead of the wind, or with it. or behind it, came a wave not a swell, not a comber, but a hundred-foot elevation of water, stirred up mayhap by the hurricane, perhaps by some subterranean volcano . . . but there, anyway. A tidal wave by itself Is enough to strike terror to . men's souls at any time. A real South Atlantic coast hurricane is enough for a big ship with a full crew to handle and live it out . . . But both together! Holroyd saw the wave just a second too late. He rammed his helm hard down and called for all the speed there was in the port engine, and Beck jumped clean over the high-pressure cylinder to get to the throttle. The Nigger fell on his face and dug his bare toes and his hands into the grating, and held on for dear life. But the effort that the Minnie made was not enough. It saved her from utter destruction. At a slant she took the wave and began to climb, but a good part of its force took her on the beam. And It was as if a million tons of weight had been attached to her keel. A million tiny, devilish hands dragged and pulled at her, and a million million drops of water, each falling with its fraction of an ounce of force, pushed her back on her haunches and made her make sternway with both screws going like mad, deep under water. A shriek from the stokehole, barely heard In the din of water

told of some poor devil thrown against hot iron. The air was full of water In the wheelhouse, every glass in splinters on the floor, the water washed the blood of the cut hands and faces away before it fell. Overhead was nothing but flying spume and wind and water; the line of demarcation between sea and air was lost, and the two joined in a smotRer of hellich white water that seethed and hissed and bubbled and came on board and tore things loose and carried them away. All the boats went . . . the after deckhouse was In splinters and a mile away; there was wreckage everywhere. Then the starboard rail went, and carried the vangs of the big derrick with it; the boom swung twice from side to side, then tore away, splintered the starboard side of the engine room, snapped the shrouds of the mast like threads, and it, too went by the board. Now none of these things were vital ... all could be remedied, and with a mast or without it, the engines should do the trick. Holroyd thought this like a flash and was comforted, even while his hair raise I as he sensed, rather than saw, the following wave cf the monster that was now beneath him. But Holroyd didn't know that the crash of the boom in the engine room had split the floor grating, and that poor Beck had dropped through it where it broke and opened, and that it closed on him and crushed him as he went through, and that his life went out with a choked-oft snarling scream, too quick for the sudden agony to reach full speech. And in the engineer's shoes stood the Nigger . . . the worthless "spawn of hell." The Nigger was dazed. Things had happened too quickly for him. There at his feet, his head and shoulders above the grating, his feet and body below, was Beck, the

man who had cursed him, dead of a fearful death. The terrific motion of the ship made his head swing back and forth, a horrible sight, and the Nigger could fairly hear him saying "You spawn of hell! you spawn of hell!" with every sickening roll and nod of the head. Slowly the blood left his face, his knees shook beneath him. and a nasty pasty pallor replaced the bronze of his clear black skin. The Nigger was terrorized. Sharp across his terror-crazed brain rang the tube bell. Habit was stronger than fear. "Aye aye sir." he called. "Full speed starboard," came the word. The Nigger turned slowly, the terror still on him. Then, perhaps it was merely latent manhood, perhaps it was some atavistic memory of great savage ancestors who fought to the last ditch and fought again while they died, who never gave up to any odds, and who looked at death with a laugh, end at torture with a song . . . perhaps it was merely obedience to the great impulse in all humanity to do the best we can for those whose lives are in our hands. 4 The Nigger responded. The "spawn of hell' grabbed at the wheels and spun them, and the Minnie began to turn. Then began a long, long fight. The mast and the boom were over the side and tailed along as a drogue at the wrong end, pulling the vessel around and making her starboard engine work double tides. Men were hacking with axes at the wreckage. . . . It cleared with a jerk. The starboard engine raced at that moment and the port nearly threw her beam to the seas. Those seas might not have done much, but the wind would have torn her to ribbons and put her so deep with Davy Jones that not even her name would remain! Like a flash the Nigger shut off steam on one and turned on more at the other. He seemed alert and alive and vital. The fear was gone. His color was back, his knees no longer shook. "Think um sea gwine make us 'fraid. huh?" He talked to himself. "Helium wid um sea. No. ole sea nor win' ever blow gwine mak dese a-yere engines go back on um." Every two or three minutes one engine would race. The Nigger had to stop it. and stop it quick. "Lose um screw and we all git helium shore enuf." he whispered. "Would, would yer?" This to the port engine, racing her vitals out. Whirl went the throttle, off went the steam, and a sighing sob from the cylinders told of the fact. Then, the next minute, on went the steam, the cylinder heads pounded with the blow, and off went the engine again. Thus for three hours. On. off. On ... off. ... . And then the final act. in this scene of death and destruction, the last unpretty touch to an unpretty tale. Strained beyond endurance by the racking, and possibly weakened by the blow of the boom, a joint in the main steam pipe gave way not utterly, but enough to flood the engine room with steam. Do you know what that means? It means. If it is bad enough, that the men in the engine room cook to death; the most horribly agonizing death a man can die. and ft is a death a man cannot run away from; for while life lasts the engineer must stick to his wheels, that the ship may live. - - - Tb steam came not with a rush, but with a whisper, aud it filled the room slowly. 1 not hotter

and hotter. And its force Just missed the throttle on the port engine. Had an angel passed, he mlgni have heard a Nigger's prayer; he would have hearu a Nigger's moan. Had Davy Jones, who seeks a sailor's soul for the watery inferno he inhabits. JooKeo in. be would have slunk ashamed at the " man in the pride of his sleek, great strength, tanding alone, and cooking alive, while he whirled tne wheels and shut off and on the steam that saved tne screws and the lives of the men above. And every time he throttled down, the steam came harder through the break, filling the room, vicious, seething, cruelly killing. ... Half an hour later the wind fell as it had "- The captain staggered, rather than walked, to the engine room to see how Beck fared. As he 'poea into the cloud of steam which came through tne open door, the engines gave a shuddering sigh, and stopped. The Eteam was gone. Without waiting to inquire why, Holroyd had a drag rigged, and hove to on the sea, now getting up mountain high. When he got back to the engine room, the steam was gone. Beck, shriveled, crisped, showed halt above the grating. The black hound, the spawn of hell, the Nigger, stood upright, his eyeless sockets looking straight at the bell, the ring of which he would never hear. One hand was upon one throttle, one hand upon the other. Holroyd's face was a face of suet as he gazed. Then, as if he had waited for the captain to see that he had done his duty, the enormous frame tumbled, sank to the floor, and his half-flesh-less arms encircled the head of the man who had cursed him for a cur. "God God God!" said the Captain. . . . be Nigger!"

I The Corruption Fund. I By O. W. OODEV. (Copyright 1909, by Benj. B. Hampton.) SENOR VALGAS. editor of El Regidor, was small of the foot, like a woman, but large of the waist, and tapering, like a Holland cask. Bald was the head of Senor Valgas calbo, if you please, as it falls from the tongue less rudely calbo, and bearded, with small rolls of fat beneath his bright, spectacled eyes. El Regidor had been an inspiration. Regidor, alderman. When the paper was founded it was tbe Indention of its editor to make of it a lever to lift him into that place of quick emoluments and nothing said. But, had not El Regidor grown? And was its editor not more powerful now than any single alderman perhaps than any board of aldermen could ever hope to be? Just so; blen. Flavored to the palate was El Regidor, tte moral and political guide of the 2,000 Mexican-Americans who represented the balance of power on election day. Yes. beyond doubt Senor Valgas held In his hands much power. Many papers in the measured poetry of the Castilian tongue had blown in like gulls from the sea to the old Texas city, and blown out again like harried leaves on the winds which rose and fell, but El Regidor stood like the walls of Guadalupe, and Its editor slept the siesta all of the afternoons. Why should he not sleep, indeed, whose son slept not at all, nl day ni night, it seemed; whose son sought the anuncias. the advertisements, unceasingly, and wrote philosophy equal to that of Savands himself? Pues bien. It was the season of election, Andy Gallagher again for the seventh time being up for mayor on the side of the spoilers, always triumphant. For vears Senor Valgas had received from the central committee of Gallagher's party five hundred dollars for publishing the ticket headed by Gallagher, on the front paste of El Reg! lor for five weeks running, with such editorial encouragement as he thought the bargain demanded. It was a shrewd little deal Senor ValgaB had himself put through at the beginning, and never had he intrusted the diplomatic task of renewing the arrangement to the hands of another not even the capable Pedro, who never slept, and whose philosophy was equal to that of Savanda himself. So it came that he visited Mayor Gallagher on the customary date to receive from his hands the copy and the check. Many years in office, during which a contract for a new city ball had been let to the highest bidder, and many other public Improvements had been carried out on the same equitable scale, had made Gallagher corpulently confident He had been transformed from the unrivaled mixer to the blunt-headed dictator. He held a peculiar contempt, which at election time yielded to a patronizing tolerance, for every brand of humanity neither Irish nor of his party. The great candidate met the smiling eyes of Senor Valgas coldly, as he met all who came to subtract and not add in his municipal school of arithmetic. With adroit compliments, which caused the peerless Gallagher to yawn. Senor Valgas led up to the matter of the advertisement. "No," said Gallagher, "we're not throwing away any money this year what's the use? Here the committee's been payln you year in an' year out to run the ticket an give us a boost in Mexican, then we've had to go out an' buy them rotten greasers just the same. No, as long as we've got to buy 'em anyhow, Valgas, we'd just as well add your little ole five hundred to the fund." The pulse of Senor Valgas indicated low pressure at the fountain head. "But. El Regidor is powerful." he protested. "Much better for the party It is that it have tbe friendship rather than tbe enmity of the powerful periodico. El Reg'dor." "our pipe's out." cut In Gallagher. "Look a-here. Valgas, we've got $6,000 to buy them 2.000 greasers votes: savey? All right, then; what do you reckon you could say in Mexican to a greaser that'd look bigger than three dollars?" Senor Valgas left 'in a mighty passion. His face was tbe hue of a ripe fig when he reached the office of El Regidor, where he sat down to his desk and wrote many minutes without once looking in tbe direction of Pedro, who. being wise, said nothing. At length he whirled in his chair, holding a sheet of copy paper at arm's length, saying: This Gallagher, the hog that is mayor by grace of El Regidor. insults me!" "Just so. padre." answered the mild Pedro, pausing in the driving of his typewriter. "1 am refused $500 to print the ticket, I am Insulted. I am turned out." panted the padre, handing his copy to the son. "but I shall prove to this Gallagher that El Regidor is a burr under the saddle, a thorn in the foot that will lose for him the run. 'We have no money to throw away on you, said he; we have 56.000 to buy 2.000 greaser votes.' Oh, very well. Read this, then have it set in type so large that even the blind can hear it, even if they cannot see!" Pedro read: " THE CORRUPTION FUND! " "Much shame and disgrace has been discovered! The Gallagher party has cried out the boast that it will win the election, but not by honest votes. No! Wben has the Gallagher party been honest? As in the past, it will again cheat honest men of their rights by spreading money like the seeds of plague! "Gallagher boasts that his party has $20,000 to spend in buying 2.000 Mexican votes. Ten dollars a vote! What disgrace is deep enough for the proud Mexican-American who will betray bis dear brave country for ten dollars! "LET NO MAN DO THIS! "Ten dollars for your votes! "THE CORRUPTION FUND! "THIEVES AND RASCALS! "DOWN WITH GALLAGHER! DOWN WITH GALLAGHER !"

Pedro smiled. It was something to win a smile from the sabio Pedro, and Senor Valgas. bis round little body too sleek and tight tor the seeds of diecontent to And a wrinkle In which to sprout and take root, stretched his stubby legs and laughed. "We shall cause them to ray Instead of three dol lars for a vote, ten dollars." said he. "On. hljo mio. es para relr!" Gallagher laughed over It the first week. The see ond week, when the headlines were In broader type, tbe thing began to get under his hide. "Send a good man around to see old Valgas and offer htm $2S to cut that out." said he to the chairman of the city committee. Valgas Ignored the emissary. When be persisted, the editor ceiled bis pressman and cocsnositor and ordered them to throw man. check, and all into tbe street. Then Gallagher went. Senor Valgas was not In the office. Pedro, the Placid the Invincible, sat dreaming over a cigarette and the keyboard of his typewriter machine. Gallagher blustered in like a courier In a war drama, covered with dust. The Calle Dolores was not immaculate, and the sleepless wind made no distinction between alcalde and peon. "Where's the old man?" he demanded. "I am sorry, senor. but my father Is asleep he always sleeps between the hours of one and three la the afternoon. If you will call after three o'clock you will find him at your service." Pedro answered, flashing a gleam of white teeth. "Well, see here." peremptorily ordered the mayor, sitting in the editorial chair; "you go and call him. Here, wiggle this under his nose; It makes a noise like easy money; ItH help wake him up." Pedro glanced at the check, depreciating Indifference In every line of his face, "My father's custom is long established. I cannot wake him. even tor you. Mr. Mayor." said he. The mayor flared a greasy purple, leaned over, tapped the check with a vehement finger as It spread In his absorbent palm. "You're the works here, ain't you? You're the brains, alnt you? Well, look a-here. my suitcase-colored friend, yon fellers cut out that 'corruption fund' stuff, will you? It you want to do It and be decent about It. here's your five hundred. It's the easiest money I ever seen, and Fve seen some easy money In my time, but well stand for It If you fellersll be as near white as you can be. an shut up." He pushed the check toward Pedro, "Here, go an' tell the old man I want to see him." Pedro turned to his typewriter, struck a key, looked over his shoulder at the mayor, sweeping entirely above the check. "Not for merely $500." said he politely, with an artistic shading of regret for the necessity of refusing a request; "I would not think of breaking ay father's siesta for merely $500." "That's the limit," snorted Gallagher, "and your .bluff dont go." As his buggy whirled him out of sight In the cramped vista of the Call Dolores, Senor Valgas burst from the composing room. "Well done, my general." he felicitated, patting Pedro's head; "we shall now see who It la that has the power. El Regidor or the king of pigs. The entire first page this week and the next shall tall the Mexican voters that the price of rotes m this city has advanced." It was near three o'clock on election day and the race was close, mighty close. Ward captains reported great difficulty In getting out the Mexican vote. The greasers wouldn't look at the money they'd got some tool notion that the price had advanced from the established scale of three dollars to ten dollars. They were sulky and silent beyond this fixed demand. Tally sheets In Gallagher headquarters showed that the champion of the people was In dark waters, with the bulk of the business vote which always went against him to coma. "Jump into my auto and go after Valgas." ha commanded a lieutenant. "Bring him here. If you have to chloroform him to do it." The Mexican vote was out. In a way. That to. it was out on the streets, assembled as near the polling places as the law allowed, waiting for the money. Flying from precinct to precinct m a busy automobile, with the advertisement of El Regidor on a big banner on each side, was the eminent editor, Valgas.' and when his machine drew up to a crowd of patriotic voters be bussed among them like a whiskered bullet, hat off. handkerchief sponging his streaming face, every spiky hair on his bald fringe an aggressive protest against Gallagher: "Now. my brave boys, be firm: stand by your rights as American citizens; demand the full price. Gallagher Is offering you less than ten dollars, because he wants to keep the rest of your money himself. It Is your money; stand for It. demand It. refuse to vote without it. Down with Gallagher If he does not produce the other seven pesos! Hold out Ilk men two hours longer, and then If Gallagher refuses to pav the price, vote for Townley." They pressed close, pushing eager faces near him. to hear bis words of wisdom. He was the sabto, tbe wise man of the world. "Old Valgas Is out workln like twenty men against us," reported the Gallagher lieutenant. "He says youll have to go to him If you want to see him; he'll be In his office at four o'clock. Valgas was firm, alarmingly firm. A thousand dollars he spurned. "Keep your money to buy fools." said he. "It is the patriotism that moves the forces of El Regidor!" It was a heated parley, and brief. "You've got the Influence with the greasers, all right, old top." Gallagher admitted. "You've proved that, I take off my katy to you. You're beat m at my own game, and I want to tell you you're a devilish smart man." Senor Valgas bowed, thus hiding the contempt his face pictured. "Name." said Gallagher, "your terms." "Just so," said Valgas. "Place In my hands this fund of corruption, this $6,000 you bar for buying the despised greaser votes." Gallagher was winded. "All of It? Well, not on your life!" said he. "Then you will be defeated." More bluster from Gallagher, then surrender. A curt order by telephone brought a pen tins: man with a valise full of currency, which was left In the office of El Regidor. - "Call in your ward captains." ordered Valgas. "t want no man to interfere. I will attend to this." Out again in his busy auto, spinning from precinct to precinct, group to group, and at each voting place where his countrymen awaited him he said: "I have seen this Gallagher. He refuses to pay you ten dollars for your votes. He despises, curses you. Now. muchacbos. the hour Is late. Soon the polls will close. It remsins time yet to rebuke this Gal agher. Vote, then, like men. for Townley. I hart Just come from Townley. and to me he has said these words: Tell your brave muchacbos that If I am elected I shall order all wtges In this city to be doubled, i-nd all rents cut In half. He also directs me to pay to every brave man who will vote for him two dollars. That Is not so much as ten dollars, true, but consider what you will gain by having your wages doubled and your rent cut In half when Townley is mayor." - . And so. from place to place, delegating brisk nochachos to spread the good word and currency, sped the graduate politician. Senor Valgas. It was late when he reached his office and embraced Pedro In the joy of Gallagher's complete defeat. "And there remains of the fund of corruption something more than $2,000," said he. "It Is evil money; we shall return it to Gallagher." -Yes. padre." assented Pedro, looking up with serious face. "Evil money, this fund of corruption." mused Vallas. "Oh. assuredly, we shall return It to Galla

gher.' i 1- ' ...- father and son. leenfnr back In their swivel chairs, stuck out their stubby legs, clasped their sides with their hands, and laughed, the little Tails with the evil money m K squatting on th floor between thm-