At eleven o'clock Adj.-Gen. Amos Totten set up the cinch of his sword-belt by a couple of holes and began another tour of inspection of the State House. He considered that the parlous situation in state affairs demanded full dress. During the evening he had been going on his rounds at half-hour intervals. On each trip he had been much pleased by the strict, martial discipline and alertness displayed by his guardsmen. The alertness was especially noticeable; every soldier was tautly at 'tention when the boss warrior hove in sight. General Totten was portly and came down hard on his heels with an elderly man's slumping gait, and his sword clattered loudly and his movements were as well advertised as those of a belled cat in a country kitchen.

In the interims, between the tours of General Totten, Captain Danny Sweetsir did his best to keep his company up to duty pitch. But he was obliged to admit to himself that the boys were not taking the thing as seriously as soldiers should.

Squads were scattered all over the lower part of the great building, guarding the various entrances. While Captain Sweetsir was lecturing the tolerant listeners of one squad, he was irritably aware that the boys of the squads that were not under espionage were doing nigh about everything that a soldier on duty should not do, their diversions limited only by their lack of resources.

Therefore, when General Totten complimented him at eleven o'clock, Captain Sweetsir had no trouble at all in disguising his gratification and in assuming the approved, sour demeanor of military gravity. Even then his ears, sharpened by his indignation, caught the clicking of dice on tiles.

"Of course, there will be no actual trouble to-night," said the general, removing his cap and stroking his bald head complacently. "I have assured the boys that there will be no trouble. But this experience is excellent military training for them, and I'm pleased to note that they're thoroughly on the qui vive."

Captain Sweetsir, on his own part, did not apprehend trouble, either, but the A.-G.'s bland and unconscious encouragement of laxity was distinctly irritating, "Excuse me, sir, but I have been telling 'em right along that there will be a rumpus. I was trying to key 'em up!"

"Remember that you're a citizen as well as a soldier!" The general rebuked his subaltern sternly. "Don't defame the fair name of your city and state, sir! The guard has been called out by His Excellency, the Commander-in-Chief, merely as a precaution. The presence of troops in the State House—their mere presence here—has cleared the whole situation. Mayor Morrison agrees with me perfectly on that point."

"He does?" demanded the captain, eagerly, showing relief. "Why, I was afraid—" He checked himself.

"Of what, sir?"

"He didn't look like giving three cheers when I told him in the mill office that we had been ordered out."

"Mayor Morrison called me on the telephone in the middle of the day and I explained to him why it was thought necessary to have the State House guarded."

"And what did he say?" urged the captain, still more eagerly. Again he caught himself. He saluted. "I beg your pardon, General Totten. I have no right to put questions to my superior officer."

But General Totten was not a military martinet. He was an amiable gentleman from civil life, strong with the proletariat because he had been through the chairs in many fraternal organizations and, therefore, handy in politics; and he was strong with the Governor on account of another fraternal tie—his sister was the Governor's wife. General Totten, as a professional mixer, enjoyed a chat.

"That's all right, Captain! What did the mayor say, you ask? He courteously made no comment. Official tact! He is well gifted in that line. His manner spoke for him—signified his complete agreement. He was cordially polite! Very!"

The general put on his cap and slanted it at a jaunty angle. "And he still approves. Is very grateful for the manner in which I'm handling the situation. He called me only a few minutes ago. From his residence! I informed him that all was serene on Capitol Hill."

"And what did he say when he called you this time?"

"Nothing! Oh, nothing by way of criticism! Distinctly affable!"

Captain Sweetsir did not display the enthusiasm that General Totten seemed to expect.

"Let's see, Captain! You are employed by him?"

"Not quite that way! I'm a mill student—learning the wool business at St.
Ronan's."

"Aren't you and Mayor Morrison friendly?"

"Oh yes! Certainly, sir! But—" Captain Sweetsir appeared to be having much difficulty in completing his sentences, now that Stewart Morrison had become the topic of conversation.

"But what?"

"He didn't say anything, you tell me?"

"His cordiality spoke louder than words. And, of course, I was glad to meet him half-way. I have invited him to call at the State House, if he cares to do so, though the hour is late. And now I come to the matter of my business with you, Captain Sweetsir," stated the general, putting a degree of official sanction on his garrulity in the case of this subordinate. "If Mayor Morrison does come to the State House to-night, by any chance, you may admit him."

"Did he say anything about coming?"

"Mayor Morrison understands that I am handling everything so tactfully that an official visit by him might be considered a reflection on my capability. His politeness equals mine, Captain. Undoubtedly he will not trouble to come. If he should happen to call unofficially you will please see to it that politeness governs."

"Yes, sir! But the other orders hold good, do they, politeness or no politeness?"

"For mobs and meddling politicians, certainly! I put them all in the same class in a time like this."

General Totten clucked a stuffy chuckle and clanked on his official way.

Captain Sweetsir heard a sound that was as fully exasperating as the click of dice; somebody, somewhere in the dimly lighted rotunda, was snoring. He had previously found sluggards asleep on settees; he went in search of the latest offender. But his thoughts were occupied principally by reflection on that peculiar reticence of the Morrison of St. Ronan's; Mill-student Sweetsir was assailed by doubts of the correctness of General Totten's comfortable conclusions. Mr. Sweetsir, in the line of business, had had opportunity on previous occasions to observe the reaction of the Morrison's reticence.

The adjutant-general did not bother with the elevator. He marched up the middle of the grand stairway.

The State House was only partially illuminated with discreet stint of lights. All the outside incandescents of dome, porte-cochÈre, and vestibules had been extinguished. The inside lights were limited to those in the corridors and the lobbies. The great building on Capitol Hill seemed like a cowardly giant, clumsily intent on being inconspicuous.

General Totten did not harmonize with the hush. He was distinctly an ambulatory noise in the corridor which led to the executive department. He was announced informally, therefore, to His Excellency. There was no way of announcing oneself formally to the Governor at that hour, except by rapping on the door of the private chamber. The reception-room was empty, the private secretary was not on duty, the messenger of the Governor and of the Executive Council had been informed by Governor North that his services would not be required for the rest of the evening.

Being both adjutant-general and brother-in-law, Totten did not bother to knock.

The Governor was at his broad table in the center of the room; the big chandelier above the table was ablaze, and the shadows of the grooves on North's face were accentuated. He was staring at the opening door with an expectancy that had been fully apprised as to the caller's identity, and he was not cordial. "You make a devilish noise lugging that meat-cleaver around, Amos. What's the use of all the full-dress nonsense?"

"Official example and"—the general bore down hard on the conjunction—"the absolute necessity of a civilian officer getting into uniform when he exercises authority. I know human nature!"

"All right! Maybe you do. But don't trip yourself up with that sword and fall down and break your neck," advised the Governor, satirically solicitous as one of the family. "Anything stirring down-stairs?"

"The situation is being handled perfectly. Everybody alert. It's wonderful training for the guards."

"I haven't liked the sound of reports from the city. Has any news come to you lately?"

"Nothing of special importance. Only a little disturbance, or the threat of one, in the vicinity of Senator Corson's residence. His secretary called up. I sent a few boys down there."

"A disturbance?" barked North.

"I didn't quite gather the details. The man ran his words together."
General Totten helped himself to one of his brother-in-law's cigars.

"This sounds serious. Why the infernal blazes don't you wake up?"

"An officer commanding troops mustn't be thrown off his poise by every flurry. What would happen if I didn't keep my head?"

"When was this?"

"Oh, maybe half an hour ago," replied the adjutant-general, with martial indifference to any mere rumblings of popular discontent.

"That's probably the reason why Corson hasn't got along yet. I'm expecting him. I sent for him." North twitched his nose; his eye-glasses dropped off and dangled at the end of their cord. "I have sent explicit orders to Mayor Morrison to tend to that mob that he has been coddling. He's letting 'em get away from him, if what you say is so."

"Oh, the mayor and I are in perfect accord and are handling the situation. I have just been talking with him on the telephone." Totten settled his cigar into the corner of his mouth.

"Where is he?"

"At his residence! Showing that he isn't any more worried than I am."

"Well, if he has got the thing in hand again, I hope he'll stay at his residence. If reports are anything to go by, he didn't help matters by going down-town and making speeches to that rabble."

"Politeness wins in the long run, Lawrence, whether you're talking to the mob or the masters. I make it my principle in life. Tact and diplomacy. Harmony and—"

"Hell and repeat!" stormed North. "You and Morrison are not taking this thing the way you ought to! In accord, say you! He is torching 'em up and you are grinning while the fire burns! Fine team-work! Amos, you get in accord with me and my orders. You keep away from Morrison till I can make sure that he stands clean in his party loyalty."

His Excellency was stuttering in his wrath and the general determined to be discreetly silent as to his recent tender of politeness to Morrison through the captain of the guards. Furthermore, Totten's self-complacency assured him that the mayor of Marion was leaving the affairs on Capitol Hill in the hands of the accredited commander on Capitol Hill.

Governor North pulled open a drawer of the table. He threw a bunch of keys to his brother-in-law. "I had the messenger leave these with me. Lock up all the doors of the Council Chamber. Leave only my private door unlocked."

The adjutant-general caught the keys. "But you certainly don't expect any trouble up here, with my guards—"

"It's plenty enough of a job for a cat to watch one rat-hole! Lock up, I tell you!"

XIII

THE LINE-UP FORMS IN THE PEOPLE'S HOUSE

While General Totten was bruising his dignity in the menial work of a turnkey, Governor North received two visitors. They were furred gentlemen who entered abruptly by the private door—the before-mentioned rat-hole—but the waiting cat did not pounce. On the contrary, one of the furred intruders did the pouncing. It was Senator Corson and he was furiously angry.

"What kind of a damnable fool has been giving off orders to those soldiers? I have been tramping around outside this State House from door to door, held up everywhere and insulted by those young whelps."

"I don't see how that could happen," protested the Governor.

"Who gave off such orders?"

"There were no orders, not in your case. I didn't think it was necessary to specify anything in regard to you, Senator. Do you mean to tell me that there's a man down there who didn't recognize you—who refused to allow you to pass without question?"

"They all know me! Of course they know me. And that's the whole trouble.
They made that the reason why they wouldn't let me in here."

"How in the devil's name could that be?" The Governor's anger that promised punishment for the offenders served Senator Corson in lieu of apology.

"I was informed that there were strict orders not to admit politicians. According to those lunkheads at the doors I came under that classification." The Senator threw off his coat. "And Daunt, here, was penalized on account of the company he was keeping. Find out who gave those orders."

General Totten had locked the doors and was nervously jangling the keys.

"Amos, what kind of a fool have you been making yourself with your orders?" the Governor demanded.

"I—I think some instructions of mine in regard to admitting any of those persons whose seats are in dispute—probably those orders were misconstrued. My guards are very zealous—very alert," affirmed the adjutant-general, putting as good a face on the matter as was possible. He fully realized that this was no time to mention that exception in favor of Mayor Morrison, or to explain that he had intended to have Captain Sweetsir accept humorously instead of literally the more recent statement about politicians.

"There are two of those alert patriots who have had their zeal dulled for the time being," stated the Senator, showing his teeth with a grim smile. "I stood the impertinence as long as I could and then I cuffed the ears of the fools and walked in."

"We did issue strict instructions, as Amos has intimated," the Governor pleaded. "Some of those Socialists and Progressives who are claiming their seats have hired counsel and they proposed to force their way into the House and Senate chambers and make a test case, inviting forcible expulsion. I'm reckoning that my plan of forcible exclusion leaves us in cleaner shape."

"I'm not sure just how clean the whole thing is going to leave us, North." The Senator tossed his coat upon a huge divan at one side of the chamber and invited Daunt to dispose of his own coat in like fashion. Corson came to the table and sat sidewise on one corner of it. "You know how I feel about your pressing the election statutes to the extent you have. But we've got the old nag right in the middle of the river, and we've got to attend to swimming instead of swapping. I think, in spite of all their howling, the other crowd will take their medicine, as the courts hand it to them, when the election cases go up for adjudication. But there's a gang in every community that always takes advantage of any signs of a mix-up in high authority. My house got merry hell from a mob a little while ago. There's no political significance in the matter, however!"

The Governor queried anxiously for details and Corson gave them. He bitterly arraigned Morrison's stand.

North came to his feet and banged his fist on the table. "What? Take that attitude toward a mob in his own city? Strike hands with a ringleader of a riot—do it under a violated roof? Do it after what he promised me in the way of co-operation for law and order? Has he completely lost his mind, Senator Corson?"

"I think so," stated the Senator, with sardonic venom. "I'll admit that the thing isn't exactly clear to me—what he's trying to do—what he's thinking. A crazy man's actions and whims seldom are understandable by a sane man. But, so I gather, after showing us, as he has this evening, a sample of his work in running municipal government, he now proposes to take full charge of state matters."

"What?" yelled the Governor.

"Yes! Promised the ringleader of the mob to come up here and run everything on Capitol Hill. In behalf of the people—as the people's protector!" The Senator's irony rasped like a file on metal.

Banker Daunt was provoked to add his evidence. "It's exactly as my friend Corson says, Governor. I have been hearing some fine soviet doctrines from the mouth of Morrison this evening. Not at all stingy about giving his help to all those who need it! Gave his pledge of assistance to the fellow in the ballroom, as Corson says. Understood him to say that he is coming up here to help you, too!"

"I rather expected to find him here," pursued the Senator. "He went away in a great hurry to go somewhere. But after my experience with your alert soldiers down-stairs, Totten, I'm afraid our generous savior is going to be bothered about getting in."

The adjutant-general pulled off his cap and scrubbed his palm nervously over the glossy surface that was revealed.

"You might give some special orders to admit him," suggested Corson.
"He'll be a great help in an emergency."

"This settles it with me as to Morrison and his conception of law and order," affirmed Governor North. "I have been depending on him to handle his city. I'd as soon depend on Lenin and the kind of government he's running in Russia."

"According to the samples furnished by both, I think Lenin would rank higher as help," said the Senator. "At least he has shown that he knows how to handle a mob. But we may as well calm down, North, and attend to our own business. We are making altogether too much account of a silly nincompoop. Daunt and I let our feelings get away from us this evening on the same subject. But we woke up promptly. Morrison was in a position to help his friends and to amount to something as an aid in that line. Now that he is running with the rabble, for some purpose of his own, he can be ignored. He amounts to nothing—to that!" He snapped a derogatory finger into his palm. "We can handle that rabble, Morrison included." He turned to the adjutant-general. "Your men seem to be alert enough in keeping out gentlemen who ought to be let in. Do you think you can depend on them to keep out real intruders?"

"Oh yes!" faltered Totten, absent-mindedly. He was trying to clear his troubled thoughts in regard to the matter of Morrison, who was now presented in a light where politeness might not be allowed to govern the situation.

"Have they been put to any test of their courage and reliability? Have they been up against any actual threats from the outside, this evening?"

"No, but I can depend on them to the limit, Senator Corson. I have been on regular tours of inspection. They are a cool and nervy set of young men and I have impressed on them a sense of what a soldier on duty should be."

"Very well, Totten! Nevertheless, let us hope that the mob fools have gone home to bed, including our friend Morrison. He needs his sleep; I believe he still follows the family rule of being in his mill at seven in the morning. He's a good millman, even if he isn't much of a politician."

"And I don't look for any trouble, anyway," declared General Totten, adding in his thoughts, for his further consolation, the assurance that, at half past eleven, so the clock on the wall revealed to his gaze, such an early riser as Morrison must be abed and asleep; therefore, the exception for the sake of politeness did not threaten to complicate affairs!

But at that instant something else did threaten.

Through the arches and corridors of the State House rang the sounds of tumult, breaking on the hush with terrifying suddenness. One voice, shouting with frenzied violence, prefaced the general uproar; there was the crashing of shattered wood.

The rifles barked angrily.

"My God, North! I've been afraid of it!" Corson lamented. "You have crowded 'em too hard!"

"I'm going by the law, Corson! The election law! The statute law! And the riot laws of this state! The law says a mob must be put down!"

An immediate and reassuring silence suggested that the law had prevailed and that a mob had been put down in this instance. Corson, whose face was white and whose eyes were distended, voiced that conviction. "If a gang had been able to get in they'd be howling their heads off. But it was quick over!"

The men in the Executive Chamber stood in their tracks and exchanged troubled glances in silence.

"Amos, what are you waiting for?" demanded His Excellency.

"For a report—an official report on the matter," mumbled the adjutant-general, steadying his trembling hands by shoving them inside his sword-belt.

"Go down and find out what it all means."

"I can save time by telephoning to the watchman's room," demurred Totten.

"Incidentally saving your skin!" the Governor rapped back. "But I don't care how you get the information, if only you get it and get it sudden!"

Totten went to the house telephone in the private secretary's room and called and waited; he called again and waited.

"Nobody is on his job in this State House to-night!" His Excellency's fears had wire-edged his temper. "By gad! you go down there and tend to yours, as I have told you to do, Amos, or I'll take that sword and race you along the corridor on the point of it!"

"We must be informed on what this means," insisted the Senator.

There was a rap on the private door. Again the men in the Executive Chamber swapped uneasy glances. Corson's demeanor invited the Governor to assume the responsibility. His Excellency was manifestly shirking. He looked over his shoulder in the direction of the fireplace, as if he felt an impulse to arm himself with the ornamental poker and tongs.

"May I come in?" The voice was that of the mayor of Marion. The voice was deprecatory.

"Come in!" invited North.

Morrison entered. He greeted them with a wide smile that did not fit the seriousness of the situation, as they viewed it. There was humor behind the smile; it suggested suppressed hilarity; it hinted that he had something funny to tell them.

But their grim countenances did not encourage him.

"If I am intruding on important business——"

"Shut the door behind you! What is it? What happened?" demanded North.

Before shutting the door Morrison reached into the gloom behind him and pulled in a soldier.

Stewart had put off his evening garb. He wore a business suit of the shaggy gray mixture that was one of the staples among the products of St. Ronan's mill. His matter-of-fact attire was not the only element that set him out in sharp contrast among the claw-hammers and uniforms in the room; he was bubbling with undisguised merriment; Corson, Daunt, and the Governor were sullenly anxious; even the young soldier looked flustered and frightened.

"I have brought along Paul Duchesne so that you may have it from his own mouth! Go ahead, Duchesne! Let 'em in on the joke! Gentlemen, get ready for a laugh!" Stewart set an example for them by a suggestive chuckle.

"Your arrival in the State House seems to have been attended by considerable of a demonstration," commented Senator Corson, recovering himself sufficiently to indulge in his animosity. "Judging from your success in starting other riots this evening, I ought to have guessed that you were in the neighborhood."

"My arrival had nothing whatever to do with the demonstration, Senator. Go on, Duchesne!"

"I jomped myself," stammered the soldier, a particularly crestfallen
Canuck.

"I see you don't grasp the idea," Morrison hastened to put in. "We mustn't have the flavor of the joke spoiled. I know Paul, here. He works in my mill. He has a little affliction that's rather common among French Canadians. He's a jumper." He suddenly clapped the youth on the shoulder and yelled "Hi!" so loudly that all the auditors leaped in trepidation. The soldier leaped the highest, flung his arms about wildly, and let out a resounding yelp.

"That's the idea!" explained Stewart. "A congenital nervous trouble.
Jumpers, they are called!"

"What the devil is this all about?" raged the Governor.

"Tell 'em, Paul. Hurry up!"

"I gone off on de nap on a settee," muttered Duchesne, twisting his fingers together.

General Totten winced.

"Dere ban whole lot o' dem gone off on de nap, too," asserted the guard, offering defense for himself.

"By way of showing alertness, Totten!" growled the Senator.

"So I ban dream somet'ing! Ba gar! I dream dat t'ree or two bobcat he come—"

"Never mind the details of the dream, Paul!" interposed Morrison. "These gentlemen have business! Get 'em to the laugh, quick!"

"Ma big button on ma belt she caught on de crack between de slat of dat settee. And when I fight all dat bobcat dat jomp on maself, ba gee! it was de settee dat fall on me and I fight dat all over de floor. Dat's all! Oh yes! Dey all wake up and shoot!"

"And nobody hurt!" stated Morrison. He gazed at the sour faces of the listeners. "Great Scott! Doesn't Duchesne's battle to the death with a settee get even a grin? What's the matter with all of you?"

"We seem to be quite all right—in our normal senses," returned the Senator, icily. "I believe there are persons who gibber and giggle at mishaps to others—but I also believe that such a peculiar sense of humor is confined largely to institutions for the refuge of the feeble-minded."

"You may go back to your nap, Duchesne!" The mayor turned on the soldier and spoke sharply. He followed the young man to the door and closed it behind Duchesne.

He marched across the chamber and faced the surly Governor. "I brought the boy here, Your Excellency, so that you might get the thing straight. I hope you believe him, even if you don't take much stock in me!" Morrison's face matched the others in gravity. There was an incisive snap in his tone. "I happened to be in the rotunda when the—"

"How did you happen to be in the rotunda, sir—past the guards?"

"I walked in."

"By whose permission?"

"Why, I reckoned it must have been yours," returned Stewart, calmly.

"I gave no such permission."

"Well, at any rate, I was informed by the guards that a special exception had been made in my case. Furthermore, Governor North, you told me this evening that if I needed any specific information I could find you at the State House."

"By telephone, sir! By telephone! I distinctly stipulated that!"

"I'm sorry! I was considerably engrossed by other matters just then. Perhaps I didn't get you straight. However, telephone conferences are apt to be unsatisfactory for both parties. I'm glad I came up. I assure you it's no personal inconvenience to me, sir!"

"There's a fine system of military guard here, and a fine bunch to enforce it. That's what I've got on my mind to say!" whipped out the Senator. "If one man and a settee can show up your soldiers in that fashion, Totten, what will a real affair do to them?"

"Nobody sent for you, Mayor Morrison. Nobody understands why you're here," stated Governor North. "You're not needed."

The intruder hesitated for a few moments. His eyes found no welcome in any of the faces in the Executive Chamber. He swapped a whimsical smile for their frowns.

"Well, at all events, I'm here," he said, mildly.

He was carrying his overcoat on his arm, his hat in his hand. He went across the room and laid the garment carefully on the divan, smoothing its folds. His manner indicated that he felt that the coat might be lying there for some little time, and consideration for good cloth was ingrained in a Morrison.