The Ancient Law Part 23

"To tell the truth I can't quite size him up," he concluded confidentially. "He don't seem to hev' come either to sell or to buy an'

thar's precious little else that ever brings a body to Tappahannock."

"Please add that I wish particularly to see him in private," said Ordway.

Without turning his head the proprietor beckoned, by a movement of his thumb delivered backward over his left shoulder, to a Negro boy, who sat surrept.i.tiously eating peanuts out of a paper bag in his pocket.

"Tell the gentleman in number eighteen, Sol, that Mr. Smith, the people's candidate for Mayor, would like to have a little talk with him in private. I'm mighty glad to see you out in the race, suh," he added, turning again to Ordway, as the Negro disappeared up the staircase.

"Thank you," replied Ordway, with a start, which brought him back from his approaching interview with Gus Wherry to the recollection that he was fighting to become the Mayor of Tappahannock.

"Thar's obleeged to be a scrummage, I reckon," resumed the loquacious little man, when he had received Ordway's acknowledgments--"but I s'pose thar ain't any doubt as to who'll come off with the scalps in the end."

His manner changed abruptly, and he looked round with a lurking curiosity in his watery eyes. "You knew Mr. Brown, didn't you say, suh?--before you came here?"

Ordway glanced up quickly.

"Did you tell me he got here yesterday?" he asked.

"Last night on the eight-forty-five, which came in two hours after time."

"An accident on the road, wasn't it?"

"Wreck of a freight--now, Mr. Brown, as I was saying----"

At this instant, to Ordway's relief, the messenger landed with a bound on the floor of the hall, and picking himself up, announced with a cheerful grin, that "the gentleman would be powerful pleased to see Mr.

Smith upstairs in his room."

Nodding to the proprietor, Ordway followed the Negro up to the first landing, and knocked at a half open door at the end of the long, dark hall.

CHAPTER VII

SHOWS THAT POLITENESS, LIKE CHARITY, IS AN ELASTIC MANTLE

When Ordway entered the room, he turned and closed the door carefully behind him, before he advanced to where Wherry stood awaiting him with outstretched hand.

"I can't begin to tell you how I appreciate the honour, Mr. Smith. I didn't expect it--upon my word, I didn't," exclaimed Wherry, with the effusive amiability which made Ordway bite his lip in anger.

"I don't know that I mean it for an honour, but I hope we can get straight to business," returned Ordway shortly.

"Ah, then there's business?" repeated the other, as if in surprise. "I had hoped that you were paying me merely a friendly call. To tell the truth I've the very worst head in the world for business, you know, and I always manage to dodge it whenever I get half a chance."

"Well, you can't dodge it this time, so we may as well have it out."

"Then since you insist upon that awful word 'business,' I suppose you mean that you've come formally to ratify the treaty?" asked Wherry, smiling.

"The treaty? I made no treaty," returned Ordway gravely.

Laughing pleasantly, Wherry invited his visitor to be seated. Then turning away for an instant, he flung himself into a chair beside a little marble topped table upon which stood a half-emptied bottle of rye whiskey and a pitcher of iced water on a metal tray.

"Do you mean to tell me you've forgotten our conversation in that beastly road?" he demanded, "and the prodigal? Surely you haven't forgotten the prodigal? Why, I never heard anything in my life that impressed me more."

"You told me then distinctly that you had no intention of remaining in Tappahannock."

"I'll tell you so again if you'd like to hear it. Will you have a drink?"

Ordway shook his head with an angry gesture.

"What I want to know," he insisted bluntly, "is why you are here at all?"

Wherry poured out a drink of whiskey, and adding a dash of iced water, tossed it down at a swallow.

"I thought I told you then," he answered, "that I have a little private business in the town. As it's purely personal I hope you'll have no objection to my transacting it."

"You said that afternoon that your presence was, in some way, connected with Jasper Trend's cotton mills."

Wherry gave a low whistle. "Did I?" he asked politely, "well, perhaps, I did. I can't remember."

"I was fool enough to believe that you wanted an honest job," said Ordway; "it did not enter my head that your designs were upon Trend's daughter."

"Didn't it?" inquired Wherry with a smile in which his white teeth flashed brilliantly. "Well, it might have, for I was honest enough about it. Didn't I tell you that a woman was at the bottom of every mess I was ever in?"

"Where is your wife?" asked Ordway.

"Dead," replied Wherry, in a solemn voice.

"If I am not mistaken, you had not less than three at the time of your trial."

"All dead," rejoined Wherry in the same solemn tone, while he drew out his pocket handkerchief and wiped his eyes with a flourish, "there ain't many men that have supported such a treble affliction on the same day."

"I may as well inform you that I don't believe a word you utter."

"It's true all the same. I'll take my oath on the biggest Bible you can find in town."

"Your oath? Pshaw!"

"Well, I always said my word was better," observed Wherry, without the slightest appearance of offence. He wore a pink s.h.i.+rt which set off his fine colouring to advantage, and as he turned aside to pour out a second drink of whiskey, Ordway noticed that his fair hair was brushed carefully across the bald spot in the centre of his head.

"Whether they are dead or alive," responded Ordway, "I want you to understand plainly that you are to give up your designs upon Milly Trend or her money."

"So you've had your eye on her yourself?" exclaimed Wherry. "I declare I'm deuced sorry. Why, in thunder, didn't you tell me so last June?"

A mental nausea that was almost like a physical spasm seized Ordway suddenly, and crossing to the window, he stood looking through the half-closed shutters down into the street below, where a covered wagon rolled slowly downhill, the driver following on foot as he offered a bunch of fowls to the shop-keepers upon the sidewalk. Then the hot, stale, tobacco impregnated air came up to his nostrils, and he turned away with a sensation of disgust.

"If you'd only warned me in time--hang it--I'd have cut out and given you the field," declared Wherry in such apparent sincerity that Ordway resisted an impulse to kick him out into the hall. "That's my way. I always like to play fair and square when I get the chance."