The Co-Citizens Part 19

"Five hundred dollars for every sc.r.a.p of paper in this desk, and immunity for you--for turning state's evidence you know!"

"They are worth more than that," he said, taking no notice of the insult.

They bargained back and forth. Prim was really in a hurry to close the trade. He wished to be able to handle Coleman when he came in. It was five minutes to ten o'clock when they finally closed the deal.

"But I can't take a check," he objected suddenly.

"I thought as much. I've brought the money. A thousand dollars is too much. This bag isn't half full!" she exclaimed, shaking it down, drawing up the strings, and looking at it. Then she counted out the bills on the desk, every drawer of which was now empty.

Some one came up the stairs and walked briskly forward in the hall outside.

Prim had barely time to s.n.a.t.c.h the fluttering green and yellow bills before Stark Coleman entered the room, without the ceremony of knocking.

It would be difficult to say which showed the greater surprise at seeing the other, he or Susan Walton, tightly clutching her bulging laundry bag.

"Good morning, Mr. Coleman," she said, waddling rapidly toward the door.

"Good morning, Madam!" he returned.

"Fine large day!" She said this from the door as she went out.

Coleman turned angrily to Prim, who was standing reared back, feet wide apart, hands in his pockets, grinning broadly.

"What's she doing in here?" he demanded.

"Wanted me to help the cause!" he answered shamelessly.

"What'd she have in that bag?"

"Dirty linen--wash day. Taking it to the Co-Citizens' Laundry!"

"Didn't know they had one."

"Yes, they have. She's soliciting patronage!"

"Well, I'll be d.a.m.ned! You don't mean to tell me that woman was up here to get----"

"My soiled office linen," Prim obligingly finished. "She was, and I let her have every sc.r.a.p of it," he answered symbolically.

He turned, seized his collar and tie, and reached for the b.u.t.ton at the back of his neck.

"Look here, Mike, things aren't going right in this town," Coleman began, having lighted a fresh cigar without offering one to Prim, who went on adjusting his collar. "We had a meeting last night and the general opinion was that you are not holding the situation down as we expected you would."

When there was no reply from Prim, who was holding his head back and struggling to make ends meet over his front collar b.u.t.ton, he went on:

"We don't blame you, but the fact is we want to make a change."

"Good idea!" said Prim.

"Glad you feel that way. Knew you would, but the boys thought you might be willing to dispose of the records and papers that have acc.u.mulated here." Coleman looked up and caught Prim's eye fixed upon him. "They're of no value to you. And we are prepared to offer you, well, more than they are worth. We----"

"Want my memoirs, do you?" laughed Prim, seizing his coat.

"That's it, for the archives, you know. How much will you take for them?"

"I wouldn't sell them to you, Stark Coleman, for all the cash you could rake and sc.r.a.pe out of your measly little old Co-Citizens' Bank!" he answered, thrusting his arms into the sleeves of his coat, hunching it up on his shoulders, and making for the door.

Coleman could not believe his ears, and now he could not believe his eyes. The man was actually leaving the room. He took the cigar from his mouth, and lifted his hand in a commanding gesture.

"Hold on, Prim!"

"Hold on yourself if you can! I'm off! A henpecked town is no place for a _man_!" he sneered, banging the door.

Coleman stood a moment stupefied. He heard Prim thundering downstairs.

Then suddenly he returned to his senses. He rushed to the desk, and pulled out one drawer after another. Not a sc.r.a.p of paper remained in a single one of them.

"My G.o.d!" he groaned, burying his face in his hands. He had no doubt at all as to the quality of the linen in Susan Walton's laundry bag.

Meanwhile Prim was standing on the platform of the vestibule train tying his cravat. He had not taken the trouble to buy a ticket. He had actually swung on board the train as it moved slowly out of the depot along the track which ran directly behind the National Bank Building.

The Fourth of July fell on Sat.u.r.day, the day wisely chosen by the Women's Leagues for their ma.s.s meeting. Bills were posted advertising this "historical event" far and wide in every post office, and country store, in mills, gin houses, and at every crossroad in the county.

_Co-Citizens' Ma.s.s Meeting_ _Great Historical Event!_ _At Jordantown Hall, July 4th, 3:00 p. m._ _Speeches by Prominent Leaders of the Movement!_ _Announcement of Election Plans!_ _Everybody invited!_

If anything could have added to the crowds which gathered in Jordantown every year on this day, these impudent circulars were calculated to do it.

"Election plans! by gad!" exclaimed Squire Deal when he found one of the obnoxious bills posted on the door of the little courtroom in Possum Trot. "Who said there was going to be an election, I'd like to know.

Darndest piece of impudence I ever saw in my life!"

"Maybe they'll tell us what their rickrack political platform is, too!"

said another farmer.

Nevertheless, they all went to Jordantown on the appointed day. It was their custom to go, and they were determined that this woman foolishness should not interfere with their long-established habit of celebrating the Fourth.

The sun rose blistering hot. Clouds of dust rolled above every highway to the town, and out of it moved a long procession of vehicles, buggies, wagons, even ox carts, all filled with men, women, and children.

Jordantown was doing its best to look glorious. It had thrown off for a moment the lethargy of business depression. Flags waved, the Town Hall was literally swathed in yellow bunting, with a great white canvas stretched across the top of the doors, upon which was printed in black letters a foot long:

_Co-Citizens' Ma.s.s Meeting!_ _3:00 p. m._ _Don't Miss It!_

The square teamed with life and glory. Mules brayed, horses neighed, dogs yelped, man hailed his fellowman. Matrons in calico frocks and sunbonnets walked side by side with their daughters in white muslin and pink sashes, with gala hats on their young heads. The avenue was a sight and a scandal. Strings ran across from house to house high above the heads of the throng, upon which little yellow flags with "Votes for Women" hung thick as waving goldenrod upon October hills, alternating with the red, white, and blue larkspur of the national colours. The Women's Cooperative Store was a seething beehive of activity. There was a cake and lemonade stand stretching across the entire front, where, for the first time in the history of glorious Fourths, you got your lemonade and gluttonous wedges of cake free of charge. This may or may not have accounted for the fact that, as the day advanced, the avenue outdid the square in popularity. The latter was barely able to hold its own by means of a very tall greased pole with a ten-dollar bill sticking on top of it, which was to be had by any boy climbing the pole. The crowd yelled itself hoa.r.s.e as urchin after urchin slid back to defeat. Finally a little fellow, who had surrept.i.tiously smeared the inside of his breeches with pitch, reached the top and seized the prize. The crowd went wild, threw its hats high in the air over this performance, then, with the fickleness of its nature, it turned again toward the avenue and the free lemonade dispensed by the fairest maidens in Jordantown. But before the stream could turn the corner, a long-legged black pig greased with the lard of its forbears was turned loose--to become the property of any man who could catch and hold him. A wild scramble ensued. The pig darted this way and that, slipped nimbly through detaining hands, until, by much handling, his grease was rubbed off, and he was held, a squealing trophy, by a young farmer. One after another the attractions of the square failed, and the crowd surged into the avenue, where it was fed to repletion--all free of charge. The stomach of man is singularly elemental in its cravings, and not subject to political or any other influence which fails to meet this demand.

Long before three o'clock in the afternoon the Town Hall was filled and jammed to its doors with men and women. The farmers were in such high good humour that, laying all masculine prejudice aside, they were determined to witness the last feature of the day's entertainment, or rather they would indulge in the humour of gratifying their masculine prejudices at the ma.s.s meeting. They stamped their feet, they hooted, they looked at the still empty stage and demanded to know where were the leaders of the "Crinoline Campaign." They whispered and nudged each other and shouted ribald laughter.

At ten minutes to three o'clock a line of women filed on the rostrum and took their chairs at the back of it. They were the representatives of the Co-Citizens' County Leagues. There were twenty-five of them, and they ranged in age and dignity all the way from Granny White, who was seventy, to the youngest bride from Apple Valley. Granny White looked like a crooked letter of the female alphabet in a peroda waist frock with a very full skirt, and a black silk sunbonnet upon her old palsied head, which wagged incessantly. The bride wore her wedding dress, which was now a trifle too tight for her. She looked like a pale young Madonna scarcely able to bear the weighty honour which had been thrust upon her.

Some of the other women were enormously fat, some were pathetically lean, but they all faced the jeering crowd below with amazing a.s.surance. They represented the harvest of all the virtues and sorrows and sacrifices of women for centuries, and all unconsciously they showed it with a calm accusing majesty.