An American Politician

F >> F. Marion Crawford >> An American Politician

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He thought of Joe sometimes, wondering rather vaguely why she had acted as
she had, and whether any other motive than pure sympathy with his work had
made her resent so violently Vancouver's position towards him. It was odd,
he thought, that an English girl should find such extreme interest in
American political doings, and then the scene in the dim sitting-room
during the ball came vividly back to his memory. It was not in his nature
to fancy that every woman who was taken with a fit of coughing was in love
with him, but the conviction formed itself in his mind that he might
possibly have fallen in love with Joe if things had been different. As it
was, he had put away such childish things, and meant to live out his years
of work, with their failure or success, without love and without a wife.
He would always be grateful to Joe, but that would be all, and he would be
glad to see her whenever an opportunity offered, just as he would be glad
to see any other friend. In this frame of mind he arrived in Newport on
the morning of the wedding, and reached the little church among the trees
just in time to witness the ceremony.

It was not different from other weddings, excepting perhaps that the place
where the High Church portion of Newport elects to worship is probably
smaller than any other consecrated building in the world. Every seat was
crowded, and it was with difficulty that John could find standing room
just within the door. The heat was intense, and the horses that stood
waiting in the avenue, sweated in the sun as they fought the flies, and
pawed the hard road in an agony of impatience.

Sybil was exquisitely lovely as she went by on old Mr. Sherwood's arm. The
old gentleman had consented to assume a civilized garb for once in his
life, and looked pleased with his aged self, as well he might be, seeing
that the engagement had been made under his roof. Then Ronald passed,
paler than usual, but certainly the handsomest man present, carrying
himself with a new dignity, as though he knew himself a better man than
ever in being found worthy of his beautiful bride. It was soon over, and
the crowd streamed out after the bride and bridegroom.

"Hallo, Harrington, how are you?" said Vancouver, overtaking John as he
turned into the road. "You had better get in with me and drive out. I have
not seen you for an age."

John stood still and surveyed Vancouver with a curiously calm air of
absolute superiority.

"Thank you very much," he answered civilly. "I have hired a carriage to
take me there. I dare say we shall meet. Good-morning."

John had been to Sherwood some years before, but he was surprised at the
change that had been wrought in honor of the marriage. The place looked
inhabited, the windows were all open, and the paths had been weeded,
though Sybil had not allowed the wild shrubbery to be pruned nor the box
hedges to be trimmed. She loved the pathless confusion of the old grounds,
and most of all she loved the dilapidated summer-house.

John shook hands with many people that he knew. Mrs. Wyndham led him aside
a little way.

"Is it not just perfectly splendid?" she exclaimed. "They are so exactly
suited to each other. I feel as if I had done it all. You are not at all
enthusiastic."

"On the contrary," said John, "I am very enthusiastic. It is the best
thing that could possibly have happened."

"Then go and do likewise," returned Mrs. Sam, laughing. Then she changed
her tone. "There is a young lady here who will be very glad to see you. Go
and try and cheer her up a little, can't you?"

"Who is that?"

"A young lady over there--close to Sybil-dressed in white with roses.
Don't you see? How stupid you are! There--the second on the left."

"Do you mean to say that is Miss Thorn?" exclaimed John in much surprise,
and looking where Mrs. Sam directed him. "Good Heavens! How she has
changed!"

"Yes, she has changed a good deal," said Mrs. Wyndham, looking at John's
face.

"I hardly think I should have known her," said John. "She must have been
very ill; what has been the matter?"

"The matter? Well, perhaps if you will go and speak to her, you will see
what the matter is," answered Mrs. Sam, enigmatically.

"What do you mean?" John looked at his companion in astonishment.

"I mean just exactly what I say. Go and talk to her, and cheer her up a
little." She dropped her voice, and spoke close to Harrington's ear--"No
one else in the world can," she added.

John's impulse was to answer Mrs. Wyndham sharply. What possible right
could she have to say such things? It was extremely bad taste, if it was
nothing worse, even with an old friend like John. But he checked the words
on his lips and spoke coldly.

"It is not fair to say things like that about any girl," he answered. "I
will certainly go and speak to her at once, and if you will be good enough
to watch, you will see that I am the most indifferent of persons in her
eyes."

"Very well, I will watch," said Mrs. Wyndham, not in the least
disconcerted. "Only take care."

John smiled quietly, and made his way through the crowd of gaily-dressed,
laughing people to here Joe was standing. She had not yet caught sight of
him, but she knew he was in the room, and she felt very nervous. She
intended to treat him with friendly coolness, as a protest against her
conduct in former days.

Poor Joe! she was very miserable, but she had made a brave effort. Her
pale cheeks and darkened eyes contrasted painfully with the roses she
wore, and her short nervous remarks to those who spoke to her sounded very
unlike her former self.

"How do you do, Miss Thorn?" John said, very quietly. "It is a long time
since we met."

Joe put her small cold hand in his, and it trembled so much that John
noticed it. She turned her head a little away from him, frightened now
that he was at last come.

"Yes," she said in a low voice, "it is a long time." She felt herself turn
red and then pale, and as she looked away from John she met Mrs. Wyndham's
black eyes turned full upon her in an inquiring way. She started as though
she had been caught in some wrong thing; but she was naturally brave, and
after the first shock she spoke to John more naturally.

"We seem destined for festivities, Mr. Harrington," she said, trying to
laugh. "We parted at a ball, and we meet again at a wedding."

"It is always more gay to meet than to part," answered John. "I think this
is altogether one of the gayest things I ever saw. What a splendid fellow
your cousin is. It does one good to see men like that."

"Yes, Ronald is very good-looking," said Joe. "I am so very glad, you do
not know; and he is so happy."

"Any man ought to be who marries such a woman," said John. "By the bye,"
he added with a smile, "Vancouver takes it all very comfortably, does he
not? I would like to know what he really feels."

"I am sure that whatever it is, it is something bad," said Joe.

"How you hate him!" exclaimed John with a laugh.

"I--I do not hate him. But you ought to, Mr. Harrington. I simply despise
him, that is all."

"No, I do not hate him either," answered John. "I would not disturb my
peace of mind for the sake of hating any one. It is not worth while."

Some one came and spoke to Joe, and John moved away in the crowd, more
disturbed in mind than he cared to acknowledge. He had gone to Joe's side
in the firm conviction that Mrs. Wyndham was only making an untimely jest,
and that Joe would greet him indifferently. Instead she had blushed,
turned paler, hesitated in her speech, and had shown every sign of
confusion and embarrassment. He knew that Mrs. Wyndham was right, after
all, and he avoided her, not wishing to give a fresh opportunity for
making remarks upon Joe's manner.

The breakfast progressed, and the people wandered out into the garden from
the hot rooms, seeking some coolness in the shady walks. By some chain of
circumstances which John could not explain, he found himself left alone
with Joe an hour after he had first met her in the house. A little knot of
acquaintances had gone out to the end of one of the walks, where there was
a shady old bower, and presently they had paired off and moved away in
various directions, leaving John and Joe together. The excitement had
brought the faint color to the girl's face at last, and she was more than
usually inclined to talk, partly from nervous embarrassment, and partly
from the enlivening effect of so many faces she had not seen for so long.

"Tell me," she said, pulling a leaf from the creepers and twisting it in
her fingers--"tell me, how long was it before you forgot your
disappointment about the election? Or did you think it was not worth while
to disturb your peace of mind for anything so trivial?"

"I suppose I could not help it," said John. "I was dreadfully depressed at
first. I told you so, do you remember?"

"Of course you were, and I was very sorry for you. I told you you would
lose it, long before, but you do not seem to care in the least now. I do
not understand you at all."

"I soon got over it," said John. "I left Boston on the day after I saw
you, and went straight to London. And then I found that a friend of mine
was dead, and I had so much to do that I forgot everything that had gone
before."

Joe gave a little sigh, short and sharp, and quickly checked.

"You have a great many friends, have you not?" she said.

"Yes, very many. A man cannot have too many of the right sort."

"I do not think you and I mean the same thing by friendship," said Joe. "I
should say one cannot have too few."

"I mean friends who will help you at the right moment, that is, when you
ask help. Surely it must be good to have many."

"Everything that you do and say always turns to one and the same end,"
said Joe, a little impatiently. "The one thing you live for is power and
the hope of power. Is there nothing in the world worth while save that?"

"Power itself is worth nothing. It is the thing one means to get with it
that is the real test."

"Of course. But tell me, is anything you can obtain by all the power the
world holds better than the simple happiness of natural people, who are
born and live good lives, and--fall in love, and marry, and that sort of
thing, and are happy, and die?" Joe looked down and turned the leaf she
held in her fingers, as she stated her proposition.

John Harrington paused before he answered. A moment earlier he had been as
calm and cold as he was wont to be; now, he suddenly hesitated. The strong
blood rushed to his brain and beat furiously in his temples, and then sank
heavily back to his heart, leaving his face very pale. His fingers wrung
each other fiercely for a moment. He looked away at the trees; he turned
to Josephine Thorn; and then once more he gazed at the dark foliage,
motionless in the hot air of the summer's afternoon.

"Yes," he said, "I think there are things much better than those in the
world." But his voice shook strangely, and there was no true ring in it.

Joe sighed again.

In the distance she could see Ronald and Sybil, as they stood under the
porch shaking hands with the departing guests. She looked at them, so
radiant and beautiful with the fulfilled joy of a perfect love, and she
looked at the stern, strong man by her side, whose commanding face bore
already the lines of care and trouble, and who, he said, had found
something better than the happiness of yonder bride and bridegroom.

She sighed, and she said in her woman's heart that they were right, and
that John Harrington was wrong.

"Come," she said, rising, and her words had a bitter tone, "let us go in;
it is late." John did not move. He sat like a stone, paler than death,
and said no word in answer. Joe turned and looked at him, as though
wondering why he did not follow her. She was terrified at the expression
in his face.

"Are you not coming?" she asked, suddenly going close to him and looking
into his eyes.

CHAPTER XXII.

Joe was frightened; she stood and looked into Harrington's eyes, doubting
what she should do, not understanding what was occurring. He looked so
pale and strange as he sat there, that she was terrified. She came a step
nearer to him, and tried to speak.

"What is the matter, Mr. Harrington?" she stammered. "Speak--you frighten
me!"

Harrington looked at her for one moment more, and then, without speaking,
buried his face in his hands. Joe clasped her hands to her side in a
sudden pain; her heart beat as though it would break, and the scene swam
round before her in the hot air. She tried to move another step towards
the bench, and her strength almost failed her; she caught at the lattice
of the old summer-house, still pressing one hand to her breast. The rotten
slabs of the wood-work cracked under her light weight. She breathed hard,
and her face was as pale as the shadows on driven snow; in another moment
she sank down upon the bench beside John, and sat there, staring vacantly
out at the sunlight. Harrington felt her gentle presence close to him and
at last looked up; every feature of his strong face seemed changed in the
convulsive fight that rent his heart and soul to their very depths; the
enormous strength of his cold and dominant nature rose with tremendous
force to meet and quell the tempest of his passion, and could not; dark
circles made heavy shadows under his deep-set eyes, and his even lips,
left colorless and white, were strained upon his clenched teeth.

"God help me--I love you."

That was all he said, but in his words the deep agony of a mortal struggle
rang strangely--the knell of the old life and the birth-chime of the new.
One by one, the words he had never thought to speak fell from his lips,
distinctly; the oracle of the heart answered the great question of fate in
its own way.

Josephine Thorn sat by his side, her hands lying idly in her lap, her thin
white face pressing against the old brown lattice, while a spray of the
sweet honeysuckle that climbed over the wood-work just touched her bright
brown hair. As John spoke she tried to lift her head and struggled to put
out her hand, but could not.

As the shadows steal at evening over the earth, softly closing the flowers
and touching them to sleep, silently and lovingly, in the promise of a
bright waking--so, as she sat there, her eyelids drooped and the light
faded gently from her face, her lips parted a very little, and with a
soft-breathed sigh she sank into unconsciousness.

John Harrington was in no state to be surprised or startled by anything
that happened. He saw, indeed, that she had fainted, but with the unerring
instinct of a great love he understood. With the tenderness of his
strength he put one arm about her, and drew her to him till her fair head
rested upon his shoulder, and he looked into her face.

In a few moments he had passed completely from the old life to a life
which he had never believed possible, but which had nevertheless been long
present with him. He knew it and felt it, quickly realizing that for the
first time since he could remember he was wholly and perfectly happy. He
was a man who had dreamed of all that is noble and great for man to do,
who had consecrated his every hour and minute to the attainment of his
end; and though his aim was in itself a good one, the undivided
concentration which the pursuit of it required had driven him into a state
outwardly resembling extreme egotism. He had loved his own purposes as he
had loved nothing else, and as he had been persuaded that he could love
nothing else, in the whole world. Now, suddenly, he knew his own heart.

There is something beyond mere greatness, beyond the pursuit of even the
highest worldly aims; there is something which is not a means to the
attainment of happiness, which is happiness itself. It is an inner
sympathy of hearts and souls and minds, a perfect union of all that is
most worthy in the natures of man and woman; it is a plant so sensitive
that a breath of unkindness will hurt it and blight its beauty, and yet it
is a tree so strong that neither time nor tempest can overthrow it when it
has taken root; and if you would tear it out and destroy it, the place
where it grew is as deep and as wide as a grave. It is a bond that is as
soft as silk and as strong as death, binding hearts, not hands; so long as
it is not strained a man will hardly know that he is bound, but if he
would break it he will spend his strength in vain and suffer the pains of
hell, for it is the very essence and nature of a true love that it cannot
be broken.

With such men as John Harrington love at first sight is an utter
impossibility. The strong dominant aspirations that lead them are a light
too brilliant to be outshone by any sudden flash of hot passion. Love,
when it comes to them, is of slow growth, but enduring in the same
proportion as it is slow; identifying itself, by degrees so small that a
man himself is unconscious of it, with the deepest feelings of the heart
and the highest workings of the intellect. It steals silently into the
soul in the guise of friendship, asking nothing but loyal friendship in
return; in the appearance of kindness which asks but a little gratitude;
in the semblance of a calm and passionless trustfulness, demanding only a
like trust as its equivalent pledge, a like faith as a gauge for its own,
an equal measure of charity for an equal; and so love builds himself a
temple of faith and charity, and trust and kindness, and honest
friendship, and rejoices exceedingly in the whole goodness and strength
and beauty of the place where he will presently worship. When that day
comes he stands in the midst and kindles a strong clear flame upon the
altar, and the fire burns and leaps and illuminates the whole temple of
love, which is indeed the holy of holies of the temple of life.

John Harrington, through five and thirty years of his life, had believed
that the patient labor of a powerful intellect could suffice to a man, in
its results, for the attainment of all that humanity most honors, even for
the wise and unerring government of humanity itself. To that end and in
that belief he had honestly given every energy he possessed, and had
sternly choked down every tendency he felt in his inner nature toward a
life less intellectual and more full of sympathy for the affairs of
individual mankind. With him to be strong was to be cold--to be warm was
to be weak and subject to error; a supreme devotion to his career and a
supreme disdain of all personal affections were the conditions of success
which he deemed foremostly necessary, and he had come to an almost
superstitious belief in the idea that the love of woman is the destruction
of the intellectual man. Himself ready to sacrifice all he possessed, and
to spend his last strength in the struggle for an ideal, he had
nevertheless so identified his own person with the object he strove to
attain that he regarded all the means he could possibly control with as
much jealousy as though he had been the most selfish of men. Friends he
looked upon as tools for his trade, and he valued them not only in
proportion to their honesty and loyalty of heart, but also in the degree
of their power and intelligence. He sought no friendships which could not
help him, and relinquished none that could be of service in the future.

But the world is not ruled by intellect, though it is sometimes governed
by brute force and yet more brutal passions. The dominant power in the
affairs of men is the heart. Humanity is moved far more by what it feels
than by what it knows, and those who would be rulers of men must before
all things be men themselves, and not merely highly finished intellectual
machines.

The guests were gone, no one had missed Harrington and Joe, and Ronald and
Sybil had gone into the house. They sat side by side in the little bower
at the end of the long walk--Joe's fair head resting in her
unconsciousness upon John's shoulder. Presently she stirred, and opening
her eyes, looked up into his face. She drew gently away from him, and a
warm blush spread quickly over her pale cheek; she glanced down at her
small white hands and they clasped each other convulsively.

John looked at her; suddenly his gray eyes grew dark and deep, and the
mighty passion took all his strength into its own, so that he trembled and
turned pale again. But the words failed him no longer now. He knew in a
moment all that he had to say, and he said it.

"You must not be angry with me, Miss Thorn," he began, "you must not think
I am losing my head. Let me tell you now--perhaps you will listen to me.
God knows, I am not worthy to say such things to you, but I will try to
be. It is soon said. I love you; I can no more help loving you than I can
help breathing. You have utterly changed me, and saved me, and made a life
for me out of what was not life at all. Do not think it is sudden--what is
really to last forever must take some time in growing. I never knew till
to-day-I honored you and would have done everything in the world for you,
and I was more grateful to you than I ever was to any human being. But I
thought when we met we should be friends just as we always were, and
instead of that I know that this is the great day of my life, and that my
life with all that it holds is yours now, for always, to do with as you
will. Pray hear me out, do not be afraid; no man ever honored you as I
honor you."

Joe glanced quickly at him and then again looked down; but the surging
blood came and went in her face, coursing madly in her pulses, every beat
of her heart crying gladness.

"It is little enough I have to offer you," said John, his voice growing
unsteady in the great effort to speak calmly. There was something almost
terrible in the strength of his rising passion. "It is little enough--my
poor life, with its wretched struggles after what is perhaps far too great
for me. But such as it is I offer it to you. Take it if you will. Be my
wife, and give me the right to do all I do for your sake, and for your
sake only." He stretched out his hand and took hers, very gently, but the
strained sinews of his wrist trembled violently. Josephine made no
resistance, but she still looked down and said nothing.

"Use me as you will," he continued almost in a whisper. "I will be all to
you that man ever was to a living woman. Do not say I have no right to ask
you for as much. I have this right, that I love you beyond the love of
other men, so truly and wholly I love you; I will serve you so faithfully,
I will honor you so loyally that you will love me too. Say the word, my
beloved, say that it is not impossible! I will wait--I will work--I will
strive to be worthy of you." He pressed his white lips to her white hand,
and tried to look into her eyes, but she turned away from him. "Will you
not speak to me? Will you not give to me some word--some hope? I can never
love you less, whatever you may answer me--yes or no--but oh, if you knew
the difference to me!"

Pale as death, John looked at Joe. She turned to him, very white, and
gazed into the dark gray depths of his eyes, where the raging force of a
transcendent passion played so wildly; but she felt no fear, only a mad
longing to speak.

"Tell me--for God's sake tell me," John said in low, trembling tones,
"have I hurt you? Is it too much that I ask?"

For one moment there was silence as they gazed at each other. Then with a
passionate impulse Josephine buried her face in her hands upon John's
shoulder.

"No, it is not that!" she sobbed. "I love you so much--I have loved you so
long!"

CHAPTER XXIII.

John Harrington and Josephine Thorn were married in the autumn of that
year, and six months later John was elected to the Senate. With
characteristic patience he determined to await a favorable opportunity
before speaking at any length in the Capitol. He loved his new life, and
the instinct to take a leading part was strong in him, but he knew too
well the importance of the first impression made by a long speech to
thrust himself forward until the right moment came.

It chanced that the presidential election took place in that year, just a
twelvemonth after John's marriage, and the unusual occurrences that
attended the struggle gave him the chance he desired. Three candidates
were supported nearly equally by the East, the West, and the South, and on
opening the sealed documents in the presence of the two houses, it was
found that no one of the three had obtained the majority necessary to
elect him. The country was in a state of unparalleled agitation. The
imminent danger was that the non-election of the candidate from the West
would produce a secession of the Western States from the Union, in the
same way that a revolution was nearly brought about in 1876, during the
contest between Mr. Hayes and Mr. Tilden.

In this position of affairs, the electors being unable to agree upon any
one of the three candidates, the election was thrown into the hands of
Congress, in accordance with the clause of the Constitution which provides
that in such cases the House of Representatives shall elect a president,
each State having but one vote.

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