The Way of the Strong Part 60

It would throw itself into the necessary work, and, after a while, its powers would contrive a means whereby the world's work would still go forward. On the other hand, if the great minds, the thinking minds of those who represent capital, were wiped out, after a brief spell of chaos, the vitality of the body would recreate a guiding system, and things would become the same as they were before. There would again be capital and labor, with its endless problem. All that we can humanly demand is equality and brotherhood for the human race in their various conditions of life. If a man works his best he must be able to enjoy life as he sees life. The rest belongs to a Divine Power over which we can have no control. The world's goods must be proportionately divided, according to all requirements. Nor do we all need the same, because of that unequal distribution by divine hand of the power to do. Oh, maybe I cannot make it plain. But I can see it all, if only man will work in a common interest, as I feel sure he was intended to do. It is a government of common good we need. One that will provide as well for the laborer as the thinker. They are two portions of one whole, without either of which the other cannot exist. Sever them, destroy either, and the lot of the other is to be deplored."

Frank waited with flushed face and anxious eyes for the other's reply.

Leyburn's cynical eyes looked up from the stained tablecloth on which the remains of the meal were still scattered.

"And in the meantime?" he inquired.

"What do you mean?"

"How are you going to achieve this government, this good and merciful government that is going to provide for us, each according to our needs? By sitting down and submitting to the sweaters who rule the lives of the present-day laboring world, making its condition just what their own quality of selfishness demands, just because the Divine Hand has bestowed upon them a greater power to think than It has upon the worker? I tell you, boy, we are fighting for all that which you have outlined; and we are fighting--which is the only way. I said that this was an age of grab--and, as far as I can see, it is a pestilential influence that must remain for years to come. The brain must be forced to yield up its selfish desires by the body; it will never be persuaded. You used the a.n.a.logy. I will use it, too. As you say, the brain represents the thinkers. In human life the brain thinks, it is selfish in its desires, and its desires grow. They frequently grow beyond the endurance of the body, and finally it submits the body to such conditions of disease that at last the poor stricken thing rebels.

Harmony and well-being cannot endure in human life with the domination of any one part of it. Capital is dominating labor now, so that the disease of hopelessness has spread to every section. Life is a burden.

Therefore labor has rebelled, is rebelling, will continue to rebel, until capital is abolished and the harmony of equality is restored.

Believe me, I am only viewing your ideals through practical eyes. Come, my boy, we must to work again. There is that case of tyranny to be looked into. The discharge of that fireman for drinking when off duty on the North Saskatchewan Railroad. There is also the question of colored agricultural workers to be considered. You, my friend, are young. You are enthusiastic and idealistic, and I like you for it. But you will soon see that that which a long experience has taught me is right."

Leyburn rose from his seat and beckoned the waiter. He settled the bill, while Frank picked up his hat. The youngster had no longer need to press it down to his ears. His hair was rapidly growing to that luxuriant, wavy ma.s.s, which had always been Monica's pride.

At the door of the restaurant, Leyburn turned to him with his peculiarly ungracious smile, and sniffed the sickening atmosphere of hot food.

"We've satisfied our appet.i.tes, and now we hate the smell," he said, with a laugh. "Human nature is ungrateful. By the way, you'd best go on to the Saskatchewan Railroad offices and ask for that report they promised to send me. I'll go back to the office." Then, as an afterthought: "Say," he added, with a laugh, "I'm going to send you up West later. Along the line. To do some--talking. But you'll need to cut all that stuff right out. I mean the ideal racket. So long."

He turned sharply away, and hurried down the heat-laden street.

Left alone, Frank looked after him. He shook his head.

"He's a good feller," he said to himself. "But he's wrong--dead wrong--in some things."

At that moment somebody b.u.mped into him, and he turned to apologize.

Seeing it was a woman, he raised his hat. Then an exclamation, half joyous, half of dismay, broke from him.

"Phyl!" he cried. "You? In Toronto?"

In her turn the girl started and stared.

"Frank!" she cried incredulously. Then, regardless of the pa.s.sers-by: "Thank G.o.d, I've found you! Oh, Frank, I'm so--so glad. We have been hunting Toronto these weeks; and now--now----"

"We?"

The girl's delight and evident love almost seemed to have pa.s.sed Frank by. With a rush all the old pain of parting from her, all the dreary heartache he had endured when writing his farewell to her, was with him once more, as his troubled eyes searched the sweet face looking so radiantly up into his.

"Yes, 'we,' dear."

Phyllis, her pretty face wreathed in a happy, confident little smile, was studying him closely.

"Well?" she cried, as the great fellow stared back at her, rather like a simple babe.

Frank tried to pull himself together. It was like the ponderous shake of a St. Bernard dog, rousing himself to activity.

"I don't know what to say or do." The man's dilemma was struggling with the joy of this unexpected reunion. "Why have you come here? Oh, Phyl, it is so hard. It has been so terribly hard. I tried to explain it all in my letter, I never thought----"

The girl nodded. Not for a moment did she permit any other emotion than her delight at seeing him again, appear in her smiling eyes. She tilted her head slightly on one side, so that the shadow of her wide-brimmed hat was removed from her face. Frank became aware of the movement, also of the hat. He also became aware of the smartly tailored costume she was wearing, even the pointed toes of her exquisite shoes, and the white kid gloves upon her hands. She intended him to notice these things.

"Oh, Frank," she cried, deliberately ignoring his protest, "Toronto's just the loveliest place ever to buy dress fixings. Mrs. Hendrie has just made me buy and buy, till--well, till I don't know how much she's spent on me. You see," she went on navely, "she said I just couldn't get hunting my beau in Toronto with hayseed sticking all over my hair.

Don't you think I--I look better this way?"

This strange child from a "way-off" western farm had her own methods of campaign. She was playing for a big stake, the biggest she could think of--the man she loved.

Frank breathed a deep sigh.

"You--you just look wonderful, Phyl," he cried, for a moment all else smothered in the background.

"True? Sure?"

"True? Say, you just couldn't look more lovely," the boy cried.

Phyllis laughed.

"Then come right along. See, we're b.u.mping folks, standing here. I'm going to take you to where your--where Mrs. Hendrie is waiting for you.

The----"

But the mention of Monica left Frank once more alive to realities.

"No, no, Phyl," he cried. "It is useless. Don't you understand? I love my--I love Mon as dearly as ever son loved a mother, but--the barrier has been set up between us, and can never be removed. Oh, believe me, it is no resentment, or bitterness against her. She just belongs to a different world from mine--now. It would give her pain. I know what she would say--and I know what I must say."

In spite of all his protests, Frank was walking beside Phyllis, moving unquestioningly in the direction she selected.

The girl looked round laughingly. Phyllis had never perhaps smiled so joyously, so sweetly as she was smiling now. But every look, every word she spoke, was full of definite purpose.

"I haven't recovered from the shock you handed me--in that--that letter," she said, without a shadow of distress in her smiling eyes. "I haven't, true as true. Say, I just kind of wonder if you've got half a notion how it feels for a girl to be thrown over by letter? Say, I just won't be thrown over by--by letter. That's why I've come here to Toronto. I've come right here so you can tell me with your own two very determined lips, I'm not wanted. When you've told me that I'm not wanted, that you just don't love me any more, then I'm going right away to Gleber, and get on with my plowing. I'll just pack up all the elegant suits Mrs. Hendrie's bought me, and never see them again. Then I'll fix myself up in black and bugles--whatever they are--and be a widow woman for the rest of my life. Now, truth! You don't love me--any more; and you don't want me?"

Just for a moment the girl's mask was dropped as she made her final demand.

It was only for a moment, but long enough for Frank to see the depth of her love for him s.h.i.+ning in her dark eyes. The desire then and there to take her in his arms, and throw every resolution to the winds, was well-nigh overpowering, but he put it from him, and the effort left him speechless.

"Frank?" she urged.

But still the man remained silent.

"Do you know, dear, you'd have been more merciful if you'd brutally struck me in the face with your great big fist, instead of sending me that letter. You see, you'd sure have left me senseless."

The subtle appeal was too much for the man. His face flushed with a shame that swept through his heart.

"But what could I do, Phyl? I had to tell you. I had to give you--your freedom. You could never marry a--convict."

Phyllis's mask of lightness returned to her face. She meant to hit this man she loved, hard. It took all her courage to do it, and the only possible chance she had was to laugh with it.

"A convict?" she cried. "Oh, Frank, I could marry a convict far, far easier than a--present-day Socialist."

The thrust drove straight home, and, witnessing the havoc she had wrought, the girl consoled herself with the thought that hers had been the plunging of the surgeon's knife that the healing of this man might be the surer, the more complete.