IX weeks later the election came off.

It was no “walk-over” for Carson. Wiggin seemed only more desperately spurred on by every exposition of his underhand chicanery. He died hard. He fought with his nose in the mire, but, throwing honor to the winds, he fought. Carson Dwight's stand on the negro question was Wiggin's strongest weapon. It was a torch with which the candidate could inflame the breasts of a certain class of men at a moment's notice. He was a crude but powerful speaker, and wherever he went he left smouldering or raging fires. Pledged to him were the lowest order of men, and they fought for him and worked for him like bandits in the dark. Over these men he wielded a sword of fear. Carson Dwight's intention in getting to the legislature was to make laws against lynching, and every man who had ever protected his home and fireside by summary justice to the black brutes would be ferreted out and imprisoned for life. But Dwight's more gentle and saner reasoning, backed by his heroic conduct of the past, held sway. He was elected. He was not only elected, but, as the exponent of a new issue, the news of his election was telegraphed all over the South. He had written some articles for Wade Tingle's paper which had been widely copied and commented on, and his political course was watched by many conservative thinkers, who prophesied a remarkable career for him. He was a fearless man, with a new voice, who had taken a radical stand based on humanitarian and Christian principles. Family history was simply repeating itself. His ancestors had stood for the humane treatment of the slaves thrust upon them by circumstances, and he, in the same hereditary spirit, was standing for kind, just treatment of those ex-slaves and their descendants. No man who knew him would have accused him of believing in the social equality of the races any more than they would earlier have brought the same charge against his ancestors.

On the night the returns were brought in and it was known that he had triumphed, “the gang” had arranged a big pine torch-light procession, and it passed with its blaze and din through every street of the town. Carson was at home when they lined themselves, in all their tooting of horns, beating of drums, and general clatter, along the front fence. The town brass-band did its best, and every sort of transparency that the inventive mind of Wade Tingle could devise was borne, as if by the smoke and heat of the torches themselves, above the long procession.

Garner separated himself from the throng, and, clad in a new and costly suit of clothes, a tribute to his engagement to Miss Tarpley—a fine black frock-coat, broadcloth trousers, and a silk hat—he made his way into the house and up the stairs to the veranda above, where Carson and his mother and father were standing.

“The boys want a speech,” he said to Carson, “and you've got to give them the best in your shop. By George, they deserve it.” Carson was demurring, but his mother pressed him to comply, and Garner, with his stateliest strut, his coat buttoned so tightly at the waist that, the tails spread out as if inviting him to sit down, and his hat held on a level with his left shoulder, advanced to the balustrade, and in his happiest mood introduced the man who, he declared, was the broadest-minded, the most conscientious and fearless candidate that ever trod the boards of a political platform. They were to receive the expression of gratitude and appreciation of a man whose name was written upon every heart present. Garner had the distinguished honor and pride to introduce his law partner and close friend, the Hon. Carson Dwight.

Carson never spoke better in his life. What he said was from a boyish heart overflowing with content and good-will. When he had finished Mrs. Dwight rose from her chair and proudly stood by his side. The cheers at her appearance rent the air. Then Garner pushed old Dwight forward from the shadow of a column where he was standing, and as the old gentleman awkwardly bowed his greeting, the cheers broke out afresh. Bob Smith, who was a sort of drum-major, with a ribbon-wound walking-cane for a baton, struck up, “For he's a jolly good fellow,” and as the crowd sang it to the spluttering and jangling accompaniment of the band the procession moved down the street.

At this juncture Major Warren came up to offer his congratulations. Carson was standing a few minutes later talking to Garner. He was trying to hear what his partner was saying in his bubbling and enthusiastic way about his engagement to Miss Tarpley, but he found it difficult to listen, for the conversation between his mother and Major Warren had fixed his attention.

“I tried to get her to come over to hear the speech, but she wouldn't,” the Major was saying. “I can't make her out here lately, Mrs. Dwight. She used to be so different in anything concerning Carson. She is now actually hiding behind the vines on the veranda.”

“Perhaps she is so much in love with Mr. Sanders that she—”

“That's the very point,” the Major broke in. “She won't talk about Sanders, and she—well, really, I think the two have quit writing to each other.”

“Perhaps she—oh, do you think, Major, that—” Carson heard no more; his father had come forward and was talking to Garner.

Carson slipped away. He glided down the stairs and out at the door on the side next to Warren's and rapidly strode across the grass. Passing through the little gateway, he reached the veranda and the vines concealing the spot where the hammock was hanging. He saw no one at first and heard no sound. Then he called out: “Helen!”

“What is it?” a timid, even startled voice from the vines answered, and Helen looked out.

“Why didn't you come over with your father?” Carson asked. “He said he wanted you to, but you preferred to stay here.”

“I did want to congratulate you,” Helen, said, as he came up the steps and they stood face to face. “I'm so happy over it, Carson, that really I was afraid I'd show it too much.”

“I'm glad you feel that way,” he said, awkwardly. “It was a hard fight, and I thought several times I was beaten.”

“What did you ever touch that wasn't hard?” she said, with a sweet, reminiscent laugh.

They were silent for a moment and then he said: “I'm not quite satisfied with your reason for not coming over with your father just now—really, you see, it is in a line with your actions for the last six weeks. Helen, you actually have avoided me.”

“On the contrary,” she said, “you have made it a point to stay away from me.”

“Well,” he sighed, “considering, you know, Sanders and his claims, I really thought I'd better keep my place.”

“Oh!” Helen exclaimed, and then she sank deeper into the vines.

For one instant he stood trembling before her, and then he asked, boldly: “Helen, tell me, are you engaged to him?”

She made no answer for a moment, and then in the moonlight he saw her flushed face against the vines and caught an almost startled glance from her wonderful eyes. She looked straight at him.

“No, I'm not, and I never have been,” she said.

“You never have been?” he repeated. “Oh, Helen—” But he went no further. For a moment he hung fire, then he said: “Don't you care for him, Helen? Are you and I good enough friends for me to dare to ask that?”

“I thought once that I might love him, in time” she faltered; “but when I came home and found—and found how deeply I had misunderstood and wronged you, I—I—” She broke off, her face buried in the leaves of the vines.

“Oh, Helen!” he cried; “do you realize what you are saying to me? You know my whole life is wrapped up in you. Don't raise my hopes to-night unless there is at least some chance of my winning. If there is one little chance, I'll struggle for it all the rest of my life.”

“Do you remember,” she asked, looking at him, one side of her flushed face pressed against the vines—“do you remember the night you told me in the garden about that awful trouble of yours, and I promised to bear it with you?”

“Yes,” he said, wonderingly.

“Well,” she went on, “I went straight to my room after I left you and wrote to Mr. Sanders. I told him exactly how I felt. I simply couldn't keep up a correspondence with him after—Carson, I knew that night when I left you there in your gloom and sorrow that I loved you with all my soul and body. Oh, Carson, when I heard your voice in your glorious speech just now, and knew that you have loved me all this time, I was so glad that I cried. I'm the happiest, proudest girl on earth.”

And as they stood hand in hand, too joyful for utterance, the glow of his triumph lit the sky and the din and clatter, the song and shouts of those who loved him were borne to him on the breeze.

THE END