It was some hours before definite information was to be had concerning the present condition of affairs. No one knew whether his side had won or lost, whether the M. & T. was a Weeks road or a Porter road, though in the excitement each claimed control and made immediate efforts to enforce orders relating to its conduct. Messages flew back and forth along the singing wires, and wrecking trains started almost simultaneously from Manchester and from Truesdale, with instructions to clear up the muss at Sawyerville, in order that the regular train service be resumed.

But before matters were more than fairly under way, there came a sudden suspension of action. The Weeks wreckers paused at Brushingham, and contented themselves with pulling Harvey's first capture back on the rails. That done, the conductor stuffed a bundle of somewhat contradictory but imperative orders into his pocket, and stretched himself on the little red bench on the Brushingham station platform; the engineer, after a shouted order, settled down to the nearest approach to rest known to an engineer on duty; the division car repairer and the roadmaster curled up in the caboose, for they had been routed out at an unseemly hour; the station agent amused himself reading the messages that rattled through to the South and back, telling of a muddle at headquarters. When a wrecking train is held for orders, it is safe to assume that something has happened.

Down the line there was a similar occurrence. The Truesdale repair crew was caught at Sawyerville and ordered back. But before the astonished conductor had read the message through, another came ordering him on, subject no longer to the Superintendent's orders, but to those of Colonel Wray, 3d N.G.

The Governor of the State, in the conduct of routine matters, was usually content to follow precedent, which means that the State House clerical force was let more or less severely alone to govern the community, while the executive directed the politics of his party with a view to coming elections. At times an emergency occurred, miners struck, excited citizens lynched a negro, henchmen of the other party strained the voting laws, municipal corporations endeavored to steal State privileges—in any of which cases he delayed definite action until public sentiment bayed at his heels, then he acted with shrewdness and despatch. At the time of the fight, this same noisy public was keen on the scent of the railroads. Certain street railway corporations had called out abuse by methods which were excusable only for their success, and the mass saw no reason to believe that one corporation was better than another. Discriminating freight tariffs, which had seemed to favor a neighboring State, had thoroughly antagonized the country districts—and the country districts' vote. From even the solid communities had come rumors of restlessness and discontent. Ward bosses were worried, county magnates were dodging reform committees instigated by the traditionally conscientious minority, and the Governor knew that certain bills which awaited his signature were not likely to increase his following.

So it was that the great man was watching, watching and waiting, for the opportunity to strike a blow which should swing public sentiment around in his favor. Up to the present the whole State had been quiet. The miners were as orderly as the Sunday-school over which he presided when in his native town. The great labor organizations he was so eager to conciliate perversely gave him no opportunity.

And so it was that when messages came pouring in upon him from bosses and chairmen and advisers urging immediate interference in the M. & T. fight, when the sheriff of Malden County sent in an hysterical report, all instigated by the pungent advices from mad and muddy Senator Sporty Jones—the Governor inclined his ear. He was a shrewd man, and he knew that in order to make a distinct impression on The Public his blow must be sudden and spectacular. The longer he thought on it, the more the opportunity pleased him, and before the evening was far advanced Colonel Wray was speeding to Truesdale.

The Third was not a city regiment. It was made up of men from the middle sections of the State, a company to every few counties with battalion headquarters in three of the smaller cities, Truesdale for one. In the city regiments was a blue-stocking element which did not fit the Governor's present needs.

As soon as Colonel Wray reached Truesdale, he established himself in the inhospitable warehouse which in reports was called an armory. Before midnight the local company was collected, uniformed, and in order. Later special trains arrived, and squads and companies marched through the echoing streets, to sit dozing about the armory. At three-thirty a train came in from the southern counties bringing the second battalion, three hundred husky farm lads who glowed with responsibility as they stacked arms and awaited orders.

Then came a telephone message that McNally's relief train had left for the North. Colonel Wray waited no longer but marched over to the station, seized the telegraph office and the telephone, placed guards at each entrance and about the train shed, ordered the yard master to make up another train, levied on the station restaurant for six hundred cups of coffee, and tore fly-leaves from the news-stand books to write special orders for the waiting adjutant.

Meanwhile Porter was feverish. He tried to bulldoze the sergeant in the telegraph office only to be hustled off by a corporal's guard. He finally reached the Colonel's ear, but was heard in courteous silence. He made an effort to call up the Oakwood Club to send a message to McNally, but the sunburned young fellow in the 'phone box leaned on his rifle and shook his head. The same thing happened when he tried to get out of the building—“Sorry, sir. Captain's orders”—and the baffled magnate paced up and down the waiting room between long files of light-hearted boys in blue. It was humiliating to consider that he had subscribed heavily toward fitting up the Truesdale armory, that half the officers knew him and feared his influence.

While he was racking his brain sudden orders were shouted through the building. The lounging groups came up with a jerk, there was a rattle of arms, and in ten seconds the farm boys had resolved into a machine, a set of rigid blue lines that reached the length of the waiting room. There was another order, and one after another the companies broke into columns of twos and swung through the glass doors, which were held open by a couple of scared but admiring waiters.

Porter followed the last company and stood in the doorway behind two crossed rifles watching the troops climb into the cars. The Colonel stood at the track gate as the men marched through, talking with his aids. Porter thought for a moment of calling to him, but realized the futility of it after the treatment he had just received. Besides, even a railroad president could hardly keep his dignity with those ridiculous guns under his nose. So he turned and walked slowly to his temporary headquarters in the station agent's office, but to find that the young captain left in command by Colonel Wray had made himself at home and was issuing orders to a snub-nosed lieutenant.

Porter took a chair and looked out of the window. For a moment he was too weary to be aggressive. Worry and loss of sleep had lined his face, and the absence of news from McNally kept his nerves strung. As he sat there gripping the arms of the chair, face a little flushed, hair disarranged, collar dusty, he looked ten years past his age. It was a critical moment in the fight, and he knew it, but cornered as he was, absolutely uninformed as to his position in the struggle, or the meaning of the military display, a sense of helplessness almost unnerved him. Heretofore his fights had been largely conducted through deferential employees. He was accustomed to bows and scrapes, to men who feared him, who watched his every move in awe, and to find himself utterly at the mercy of these tin soldiers was disgusting. It was twenty-four hours since he had had a wink of sleep and eighteen since he had eaten a full meal—facts which in no small measure lessened the stability of his mental poise. And there he sat waiting through the darkness and the dawn.

The reds and golds in the eastern sky spread and paled. The little green-clad city stretched down the gentle hill, now indistinct in the haze. An early electric car whirred and jangled past the station, and Porter was half conscious of the noise. He got up, straightened his stiff joints, and went to the lunch counter, where he had to jostle between two gawky privates before he could order a cup of smoky cereal coffee and a sandwich. After getting a place he could not eat, so he returned to the office. Now that some sort of routine was established, the Captain showed a willingness to meet him civilly.

“See here,” said Porter, after a few commonplaces had been exchanged, “how long is this going to keep up? There is no sense in holding me here.”

“Sorry, sir. I have no desire to inconvenience you, but my orders are to let no one out and no one in. And you know what orders are for.”

“Oh, that's all right,”—Porter leaned back in his chair and looked out the window,—“but there's such a thing as going to extremes. Sometimes common sense supersedes orders.”

“You forget, Mr. Porter, that you are here for the purpose of conducting a raid, and we are here to stop that raid. Under the circumstances it is my duty to hold you and every one connected with the affair until I am otherwise ordered.”

“But I am not a thief, man.”

“No, perhaps not.” The Captain turned to some papers on the desk, and Porter continued to look out, wearily, with a sudden dull ache above his eyes.

A corporal appeared in the doorway, saluting.

“There's a young lady, sir, says she's got to see Mr. Porter.”

“Who is she?”

“Don't know, but she sticks to it.”

“It's my daughter,” said Porter, with an effort to rise. “Where is she?”

“Wait,” the Captain said; “I'll speak to her,” and he followed the soldier.

Porter sat still. After a little he heard voices in the waiting room, and Katherine entered the office. At the sight of his worn, haggard face her annoyed expression vanished, and she drew the Captain's chair beside her father's and laid her hand upon his forehead.

“You are sick,” she said gently.

“Nonsense”—he made a feeble effort to shake off her hand—“I asked you not to come back. I'm tired, that's all.”

Katherine rose and looked about.

“Come into the waiting room, dad, and lie down. You must have some sleep or you won't be good for anything.”

“You must go back,” said Porter, shaking his head. “This is no place for you.”

Katherine looked quietly into his eyes. It was not the first time that the strain of his busy life had told upon her father's nerves, and she knew what was the matter.

“Come, dad,” she said. “Get a little sleep, and I'll stay by and wake you if there is any news.”

Porter scowled, then slowly rose. The Captain, who had been hesitating in the doorway, came forward to assist. Porter turned on him savagely. “Let me alone. I can walk, I guess.” But at a glance from Katherine the Captain took an arm, and Porter submitted, seemingly unconscious of his inconsistency.

Along the walls of the waiting room were benches, and on one of these they tried to make Porter comfortable. When she saw that his head must rest on the wooden seat, Katherine hesitated and looked at the Captain, who was following her with his eyes.

“I wish there was something for a pillow,” she said. “Perhaps”—she stood erect and looked slowly about the waiting room, then stepped to the door of the office, returning with a pretty frown. “I wonder”—she met the Captain's gaze smiling frankly—“if you would let me take your coat.”

He was not an old officer, and he was not a hermit, so with but slight hesitation he unbuckled his belt, removed the coat, rolled it up, and as Katherine raised her father's head he slipped it underneath.

“Will you send one of your men to a drug store for some camphor?” said Katherine, fumbling in the purse that hung from her belt.

The Captain beckoned to one of the soldiers who were clustered about the door, and placed him at Katherine's disposal. When he returned she soaked her handkerchief with the camphor and laid it on her father's forehead. He was already asleep.

“He'll be better as soon as he has had a little rest,” Katherine said. “You are very good to help us.” The Captain bowed with the expression of a man who has just been promoted, but said nothing.

For an hour Porter slept, and during that time Katherine stayed by him, moistening the folded handkerchief and chafing his wrists. The Captain, his importance and self-command oozing away a bit at a time as he watched the cool, quiet girl, hovered near as often as his dignity would permit with offers of assistance, most of which Katherine accepted. He put her horses and trap in charge of a militiaman, he brought out a rocking-chair for her, and when, a little after eight o'clock, Porter showed signs of waking, he sent out for some breakfast.

On Porter, the touch of sleep, the welcome cup of coffee, and more than anything else his daughter's soothing presence, seemed to have a marked effect. He sat up, leaning back heavily, and with a struggle collected his thoughts. Katherine joked with him, and fussed over him with a maternal solicitude that made the Captain smile.

At eight-thirty, as Porter was sipping another cup of coffee, the corporal appeared.

“A man says he's got to see Mr. Porter, sir. A Mr. McNally.”

“McNally,” cried Porter, starting up only to sink back, breathing heavily. “Bring him here. I've got to see him.”

The Captain hesitated.

“Did he state his business?”

“No, sir. But he has a pass through the lines at Sawyerville, signed by Colonel Wray.”

“Um—let him come in.”

It was not the Mr. McNally who had played for Katherine two nights before. That had been a well-groomed, self-possessed man of the world; this was a muddy, unshaven, angry man, who spoke in a loud voice and smothered an oath just too late to keep it from her ear.

He recovered somewhat, but even McNally could not lose sleep and temper for so many hours without a more or less immediate result. As she looked at him with a cool bow, Katherine thought of Harvey, and something caught in her throat.

“Well,” said Porter, “what about it? What's happened? Who's running this road?”

McNally looked curiously at the Captain before he replied. That officer, at an appealing glance from Katherine, left the group.

“The Governor is running it. He's played a game that knocks us silly. He's come down on us and cinched things for the senatorship at one crack.”

“What do you mean?” In his excitement Porter sat erect.

“The Old Man has declared the M. & T. under military rule until the courts choose to settle it to suit themselves. That throws us out, throws Weeks out, and the devil take the hindmost.”

“Has there been trouble?”

“They smashed into us at Sawyerville”—he suddenly remembered Katherine—“Excuse me, Miss Porter, I must see your father alone.”

“He cannot be excited, Mr. McNally.”

“There is no time to waste—”

Katherine turned abruptly and went into the office.

“Yes,” said McNally, “they ripped into us at Sawyerville and we had the hell of a time till Wray's guards came up and stopped it. Wray let me through,—it was just after daylight,—and I picked up a horse from a farmer and rode down. But we got West though, damn him!—caught him sneaking through the bushes.”

“Be careful, McNally, we've got to be careful. It's no time to get mixed up in a thing like that—we—we can't afford—”

“That's all right, Porter. We don't know where he is—I don't know, you don't know—and before we find out he'll be loose again.”

“But—Jim—Weeks don't forget that kind of thing, McNally—Jim Weeks—”

“Oh, damn Jim Weeks! I'll take care of him.”

Porter paused to drink at a gulp what was left of his coffee.

“Remember, McNally, I can't back you if you get careless—I can't back you, you know.”

“God, man! you've got to back me! You've got to back me through everything, or you'll go down with me. I tell you, Porter, we're too far in to back out, and it's nerve that's going to win. If you don't back me, if you don't draw on every cent you've got to shove it through, you'll be the one to be hit—not me.” He paced the floor. “Yes, sir. It's you if it's anybody.” Suddenly he stopped. He looked hard at Porter, then he turned quickly and strode into the office. Katherine was standing at the window.

“Miss Katherine—”

“Mr. McNally, my name is Miss Porter.”

“Miss—Miss Porter, I met a friend of yours this morning. I met him under peculiar circumstances. We had some words, I regret to say, and he left this with me.” The plump, dirty hand drew a blue envelope from McNally's coat pocket. “It has seemed to me that where your father's honor was as seriously involved as in this matter, you should have followed some other course than that of traitor.”

In his excitement, McNally misunderstood Katherine's silence.

“You have deliberately drawn out your father and me that you might aid our opponents. I have watched you—I have seen it—it is not your fault that we are not ruined—and for the sake of a man that I caught spying on us this morning, sneaking through the bushes in the dark—”

There was a groan from the doorway. Porter stood there with one hand over his eyes. Katherine looked for an instant, then she brushed past McNally, and with one arm about her father she called to the Captain, who stood at the other side of the waiting room. He came at once.

“Captain,” she said, “I must ask you to take care of my father. Please telephone for a doctor and a closed carriage, and see that he is sent home at once. I shall drive there in the trap to prepare for him. Don't let this man”—she turned contemptuously toward McNally—“speak to him or excite him in any way. Will you do this?” As she spoke her face softened, and she held out her hand. The Captain took it.

“Yes, Miss Porter, I will take care of him.”

Katherine, without looking again at McNally, walked to the door and called for her trap. As she waited on the steps, a newsboy came running down the walk, crying:—

“Nine o'clock Extry! All 'bout M. & T. riot!”

Katherine stopped him and bought a paper. The black headings told the story tersely, but one item stood out with vivid distinctness. She read, “Harvey West Disappears—Supposed that He Was Kidnapped—His Followers Swear Vengeance—Rumored that He Is Hidden Near The Oakwood Club.” For a moment the blood left her face, and her nerves tightened, but when the trap was pulled up she was herself, and the smile she gave the soldier in charge brought forth an earnest but amateurish salute.

Then Katherine drove home—it was her duty to go home. But, her duty done, she would drive straight to the Oakwood Club.