Tim Riley's Touch

________________________________________________
Title:     Tim Riley's Touch
Author: James B. Connolly [More Titles by Connolly]

"A man outside--says his name's Riley," announced the youth who guarded the outer door. "A big husky!" he added when he saw the chairman did not look pleased.

The state chairman nodded round the table. "This is that new man the senator's been talking about." From a neat pile of letters the chairman picked out one.

"Here is what he sent in the other day. From it you can obtain an idea of the calibre of the man. Listen: 'As you ask me what I think about the crowd up here, I'll say that I think they've had their own way so long they've got to where they figure they don't have to make good. They seem to think that to be in politics is to be trying to fool everybody. They would rather--the most of them--get ten votes by faking than a hundred by straightforward work. They don't seem to see that nowadays people know more about the inside of things than they used to--that they're doing more thinking for themselves in political matters.'

"And"--the chairman reinserted the letter in the neat pile--"there's more drool of the same kind. I don't believe he ever wrote that letter. As I understand it, he's a coal-heaving sort who ought to have gone into the prize-ring and not politics; but, whether he wrote it or not, we will have to humor him because of the senator, who is of course the boss"--he shot a glance round the table--"the boss now. We'll give this fellow a little rope. A couple of the boys up where he comes from tipped me off about him--and we'll let the senator see him for what he is. I've seen these wonders before."

"And I guess you don't have to see too much of a man to be able to size him up either!" This from a faithful one on the chairman's right.

The chairman's lips kneaded shut. "Well, in political life--I don't say this in a boasting spirit, you understand, gentlemen--if a man in my position can't size a man up fairly well at a glance he might as well get out. His letter alone would tell me that he knows it all, and the word I get from the county chairman up his way is that he is one of the turbulent, fighting kind. However, we'll have him in here and look him over. Show him in, George."

And Riley stepped into the room. From the moment of his entrance not a soul there had a doubt of the chairman's prejudgment; but, that his less acute associates might judge for themselves, the chairman allowed the man by his own words to portray himself, which, after all, was the most convincing proof of all. It was the senior senator's own way of doing it.

The new man--an agile, powerful figure--had bowed with a conventional show of pleasure to each in turn as he was introduced; but, that over with, he had faced squarely toward the chairman, waiting. And the chairman began:

"I take it, Mr. Riley, that you are not the kind of man who would stand up on a platform and dodge an argument with the most excitable of opponents?"

"Dodge? What from?"

"Not from the hoots and the jeers, or vegetables--or even the half-bricks--eh?"

Riley waved a contemptuous arm. "I'd rather see half bricks coming my way than be looking down on staring empty benches, or benches emptying swiftly when a man's at the height of his speech." Riley paused by way of emphasis. "It is to try a man's soul--a frosty greeting; but, a warm-blooded opposition--that's only to stir a man up."

The state chairman waited for the new man to leap into the air, knock his heels together and yell:

"Hurroo!" The new man did not do that. He gazed steadily into the face of the chairman. However, every specimen could not be expected to meet every requirement. No doubt of it--here was the made-to-order creature for clever manipulation; and there followed then the suggestion to visit New Ireland, with artful words to whet a fighting man's appetite for that kind of job.

"And now for one last little touch before we send the poor boob to his political extinction," whispered the chairman to his next at hand. Aloud he said:

"Yes, sir--I believe in frankness, Mr. Riley. And I will tell you now that we didn't poll many votes in New Ireland last year. I don't just remember how many--I have mislaid the figures; but I wish to tell you frankly--frankly, I say--that we did not poll many. What they need there, I think, is a determined man like yourself to pile into them hammer and tongs. That would be the way, I think. And you show me, Mr. Riley, a fair Republican increase in New Ireland--fifty out of five hundred, say--and you can lay out your own itinerary for the rest of the campaign. Now isn't that fair?"

"Why, yes; that seems all right." As he said it, however, the new man, his eyes ever on the chairman's, had a feeling that it was not all right. And, as he was one of those intuitive ones with whom to feel was almost to prove, his attitude changed from the subjective to the objective. He had not liked this man a bit from the first, and he was liking him less and less; that finishing "Now isn't that fair?" was surely not meant for his benefit.

The new man left the committee-rooms with a disturbed soul, and on his way to the elevator he began to think things over. Among a dozen other things which flashed through his kindling brain he recalled the glint of what now he knew was mockery brightening the pale eyes of the chairman as the door closed behind him.

He pressed the button for the elevator; but before the upcoming car reached his floor he decided not to descend. He would have it out. He almost ran back to the committee-rooms and, brushing by the knowing but inefficient outer guard, made for the room where the leaders were. Already he could hear the laughter--yes, and the roaring at something or other; and as he placed his hand on the knob of the inner door he heard: "He's come here from the other end of the State, with a reputation for burning things up. Let him try to burn up New Ireland--and then go back to where he came from. Why, let his kind come butting in on us and soon we would all be out of jobs." The chairman's voice, that was.

Tim opened the door, and when they looked up and saw him it was as if they had all been clutched by the windpipes.

"Go to the devil--all of you!" exploded the new man. "Do you hear? Every mother's son of you!"

From out the silence some one at last said: "You mean, Mr. Riley, you are going to desert the party?"

Tim whirled on him.

"No; it doesn't mean I'm going to desert the party. Did ever you know a man who was any good to desert any party or anything, good or bad, under fire?"

"I'm glad to hear that." The chairman had come to life. "And not alone because we would lose you, eloquent though you are reported to be. So many of our people have maintained that no Irishman----"

"Cut that Irishman stuff! My chance to make a living, and my children's chance after me, I owe to this country."

"But, Mr. Riley, you are of Irish blood."

"Irish blood? You may be sure I am, and so proud of it that when I speak of it I slop over; but I'm an American citizen too. However, if you don't mind, we'll leave that for private discussion and not for political trading."

The chairman recovered.

"That's all very well; but when we ask your people to make sacrifices for the principles of our party----"

"Principles of the party--slush! Save that for your platform speeches. You're in the party because there's more in it for you. I'm in it because a man who gave me a square meal when I was starving asked me to join it. And, once in a fight, I stick. I stick because I don't know how to do anything else--and I'm going to stick now. And I'm going out now to New Ireland and talk to them."

The door behind Tim opened and a smooth, carefully trained voice said: "What's this about New Ireland?"

Tim knew the voice, even before he turned to greet him. It was the tall boss, the real boss, the senior senator, the man who ordered the State committee round even as they ordered the campaign speakers.

"New Ireland?" the senator repeated. "No, Mr. Riley. I can give you something better than that. That would be a waste of time. I'll change that right now. Here----"

"Excuse me, sir; but I'm going to New Ireland. I don't know what kind of a place it is or what kind they are there, except what the name tells me, and I don't care--I'm going there. No gang of men ever picked me for an omadhaun in the morning but found out they were mistaken before night. And I'll say further"--indignation in Tim always disposed him to classic periods--"if there are those who wave the green flag to tatters at every Irish meeting, and then betray her to those who hate her, there are also those who, though they have never made a sacrifice in their lives for this country, would prevent all but their own little kind from breathing the free air of it. As for me, I've come to this city to do something; and I'll stay here until I've done it. A while ago I agreed to go to New Ireland, and to New Ireland I'm going. Good day!" And the windows rattled with the banging of the door behind him.

"A proper bull-headed Irishman, that fellow," observed the chairman presently.

"Or is it he has convictions and is not afraid to voice them?" The senator had a habit of scratching his beard with his finger-nails, and again of drawing his chin in on his chest and looking over his gold-rimmed pince-nez. He drew in his chin now, and the chairman did not like it. He never did.

"A good fighter, I should say." The tall boss scratched his beard with his finger-nails. "An encouraging thing to meet a good fighter in these fat days; but let us see." He stepped over to where a blue-and-red-spotted map of the State was hanging and laid a finger on a blue spot: "New Ireland, which we can safely call the enemy's banner town for its size in the United States. If Riley can leave his mark on that place it will be proof to me that he can make breaches all along the line."

"More likely, I think, that the place will leave its mark on him. More likely they will crack his skull, I think. He may love a fight; but New Ireland is full of men who love fighting too--and they are not with us."

"That's true--they are not." The boss drew his chin in to his neck again. "Too bad they are not. Suppose we wait, however, and see how Riley makes out. His reputation is that of a most resourceful man. And if he does make an impression on New Ireland he can have anything I can give him in this State."

II

It is a good place--a moving train--for serious meditation. Tim Riley allowed the landscape to fly by, the while he considered matters. He knew the temper of the kind of people with whom he was to battle. They were so many more like himself. As for trying to bulldoze or browbeat them, or--if he was that kind--to bribe a single one, though they were the hard-working, unsophisticated kind--whisht!--like the wind they'd go the other way. And as for scaring the tough ones, he might be the strongest and toughest and scrappiest and quickest lad on his feet that ever was, but out there in that quarrying town would be a dozen or twenty or fifty just as strong and as quick and as scrappy as himself. And that kind--which was his kind--you might set them up in a row and knock them down one after another, and just as fast as one went down another would come bouncing up for the honor of the last word.

New Ireland! Tim viewed a town of two or three hundred small, square-planned wooden houses, with one green-painted house larger than most, labelled Kearney's Hotel; another, larger than that again, with a square cupola, which he knew would be the town hall; and yet one more, largest of all, white-painted, with a surmounting gold cross, which, of course, could only be the chapel. A mile or so beyond the town, on the scarred hillsides, stuck up the derricks of the quarries, which were the town's reason for being. Beyond the quarries were foot-hills, which gradually grew up into mountains. It was autumn, and in that high land the few trees were already bare; before the high wind the bare branches swayed.

It was not the most encouraging day of the year. Tim, with a warm fire and a hot meal in view, hurried on to the little hotel. Peter Kearney was the landlord, a companionable soul, who did not see the need of a register, and who, after a time, produced a lunch; and who, further, while Tim ate, smoked and gossiped of things a travelling man would naturally be interested in.

"And what kind have you here in New Ireland? Easy to get along with?" asked Tim, after the discovery of the quarries, the settling of the town, and the last explosion had been intelligently discussed.

"To get along with? The finest, easiest ever--of course if a man don't cross them."

"I wonder do you think I'll cross them?"

"And what would your business be that you'd be crossing 'em?" the landlord asked.

"I'm the Republican campaign speaker that's selected to address them to-night."

"Oh-h! Well, d'y'know, when I didn't see a sample case with you I had my suspicions; but when you said--or did you say your name was Riley?"

"I did. And it is. R-i-l-e-y--Riley, Timothy J. And there's any number of Republicans with names as good."

"I dare say, but not in New Ireland--nor likely to be while so many of your party put us down for a tribe of savages."

"Have patience, Mr. Kearney. There's a new order of things under way. Have patience. And tell me now how many Republicans should you estimate there are in New Ireland?"

"Estimate? Sure, and that's a large word for them. There's Grimmer, the cashier and chief clerk o' the savin's-bank. There's Handy, who keeps the real-estate office. And did ever ye notice, Mr. Riley, how, when a man has a soft-payin', easy-workin' job, 'tis ten to one he's a Republican?"

"I've spoken of it so often myself, Mr. Kearney, merely by way of humorous observation, that my party loyalty has been doubted. If you would never have your loyalty suspected, Mr. Kearney, you must never let on that you possess intelligence; but have patience and we'll have that changed some day--maybe. So those two are the leaders, are they?"

"Leaders, man! That's all of 'em."

"Two? Two out of nigh five hundred! Well, glory be, what kind are those two? The fighting kind?"

"Har-rdly the fightin' kind, Mr. Riley. They couldn't well be that in New Ireland, bein' Republican, and remain whole. Har-rdly! No, not if they were John L. Sullivans, the pair of 'em. Among five hundred quarrymen, d'y'see, Mr. Riley, and they mostly young men, there's always plenty of what a man might call loose energy lyin' round--specially after hours and Sundays and holidays; surely too much for any two, or two dozen, disputatious individuals to contend against. And yet, as I said, the easiest, quietest people living here----"

"Yes, yes; I'll bet a leprechaun's leap against a banshee's wail I know what peaceable kind they are. And I think I know now why I was--No matter about that though. Could you, Mr. Kearney, get somebody to pass the word to the quarries that the Republican speaker is here according to announcement, and that his name is Riley?"

"I'll send me boy. Dinnie!" called the landlord. No answer. "Dinnie!" No answer. The landlord opened his lungs and roared: "Dinnie!!" Then he looked out of the dining-room window. "H-m! I thought as much. Look at him peltin' it on his bi-sigh-cle for the quarries! He heard you say Republican and 'twas enough. No fear now--not a soul in New Ireland but will know it before dark. And--but excuse me one minute, Mr. Riley."

The landlord stood up to greet a forlorn-looking old woman, who, with a man's overcoat wrapped round her, had appeared at the dining-room door.

"How are you to-day, Mrs. Nolan? About as usual? Well, don't be worryin'. Yes, you'll find Delia in the kitchen. Go in."

Tim nodded after the old woman as she went in.

"And who is she, Mr. Kearney?"

"A poor old creature who comes here once or twice in the week to have a cup o' tea and maybe a little to go with it, with the cook. A poor old soul dependin' on charity, and yet she won't take it from every one."

"Poor woman! Will you give her that?--not now, but when she goes out, Mr. Kearney." He slipped a silver dollar into the landlord's hand. "No need to tell her where it came from. I'll be going along now, I think, to have a look at the town. I'll be back for supper."

"Good luck to you!"

Tim had not left the hotel a hundred yards behind him when he met a Catholic priest.

"Good afternoon, Father," said Tim, and raised his hat.

"Good afternoon, sir. And is it"--the cane was shifted from the right hand to the left, and the hand thus freed extended to Tim--"Mr. Riley--isn't it?"

"It is; but how did you know, Father?"

"Oh, if Peter Kearney's long-legged Dinnie hasn't told half the quarries before this of your name and business 'twill be because he's burst a tire or broke his neck rolling down the steep hills. And so you're to speak to us to-night?"

"God willing, I am."

"And you're not discouraged?"

"And why should I be discouraged?"

"Why? You must be a stranger to these parts."

"I am."

"And no one told you of what happened to the last man your party sent here?"

"They did not. And what happened?"

"He was rode out of town on a rail."

"Well, well, Father. And what did he do, the poor man?"

"Oh, he only hinted at first that we were a lot of ignorant foreigners who were Democrats because we didn't know any better; but he warmed up as he went along. I don't know wherever they got him from. In the middle of it Buck Malone gave them what they call his high sign--his right forefinger raised so--and every man in the hall got up and walked out. A few of them came back later and took him off. They didn't hurt him--no bones broken or anything like that; but they do say he never waited for the train when they turned him loose, but legged the thirty miles back to the city without a single stop!"

"He did? Well, it's fine exercise, Father--running; though thirty miles in one bite, to be sure, is a bit too much for good digestion, I'd say. This Buck Malone--he's the boss here, Father?"

"He is. And a famous one for surprising folks."

"Thank you for the information, Father."

"It's no information. The very babies here know of the last man here. If you see the children in the street smiling slylike when you pass, that will be why."

Tim pulled his lower lip with thumb and forefinger.

"And yet they'd laugh all the louder if I was to go away without speaking, Father. What kind is Buck Malone to look at and where does he hang out?"

The priest poked the end of his cane at Tim's chest.

"Is it fighting you'd be at, Mr. Riley?"

"It is not. I'm not for fighting--unless, of course, I have to. Isn't it only natural to want to know what kind your opponent is?"

"So it is--so it is. Well, then, about this time o' day you'll find him in that cigar-store with the sign out--below there. He's a contractor himself, who furnishes labor for the quarries. A man about your height and breadth he'll be, but a trifle fuller in the waist. A stout, strong man, and not many able to look him down. An eye in his head, has Buck! I wouldn't want to see the pair of ye at it."

"Thank you, Father. And look--d'y'see that old woman coming out of the hotel? What's her story, Father?"

"The widow Nolan. A sad history, Mr. Riley, if you could get it out of her; but it's few she'll talk to."

"Poor woman! Would you give her this--a couple of dollars--Father, after I'm gone?"

"I will. And it's good of you. And you're bound to speak to-night?"

"I'll speak. And I'd like you to come, Father."

"Not I, Mr. Riley. Priests are better out of politics. Good day and God speed you!"

Tim strolled toward the cigar-store; and drawing near he picked out, standing near the glass case, a tall, powerfully built man, with intelligently heavy features and the unwavering eyes of a fighting man. As Tim entered this man was speaking. Before ten words had been said, Tim knew that his entrance had been forecasted and that this was Buck Malone.

"And he'll be up there on that platform all alone--not a soul with him, because these two dubs that ought to be standing by him, they've got cold feet already. And he'll be up there all alone, except for a pitcher of cold water and a glass, and a table and a chair; and he'll begin to spout. I dunno whether he c'n talk or not; but we'll let him run on for maybe ten minutes, and about the time he thinks he's making a hit I'll start up and I'll raise my forefinger like that--see? And that'll mean everybody get up and go out. No hurry, mind you--nor no hustlin'; but everybody just stand up and walk out and leave him talkin' to that picture o' that dago, or whoever he is, discoverin' the Mississippi on the back wall.

"And now you"--Malone turned leisurely to a stocky-looking young fellow in seedy clothes standing wistfully off to one side--"you go on and pass the word to 'em as they come out o' the quarries."

"All right," answered the stocky one in a hoarse voice, but without moving.

A meagre-looking man stood behind the cigar-case.

"Will you let me have," said Tim to him, "three good cigars?"

The man behind the cigar-case looked slyly at Malone.

"How good?" he asked.

"Oh, pretty fair--three for a dollar or so."

"Three for a--I got nothing like that here. Fifteen cents straight's the best I got."

"All right; they'll do."

The boss had not been smoking when Tim entered; but now he turned to look better at Tim, and he pulled a cigar from his vest-pocket, bit off the end, scratched a match, and leisurely lit it--all without taking his eyes off Tim.

Tim also leisurely bit the end off a cigar. The proprietor pushed three or four matches across the case. Tim, ignoring them, stepped close to the boss.

"Would you let me have a light?" he inquired politely.

"H-ff! h-ff!" The boss swallowed quite a little smoke, but recovered and passed over his cigar. Tim took his light from it, said "Thanks!" briefly, and--puff-puff--contemplated the boss's stout henchman in the rusty clothes, who was still standing irresolutely at one side.

"Smoke?" inquired Tim suddenly, and thrust a cigar at him.

"Wh-h--" stuttered the henchman, and then almost snatched it from Tim's hand.

"You gettin' hard o' hearin'? Thought I told you to get along!" snapped Malone.

"I am goin' along," returned the husky voice, "soon's I light up." In the curling of the smoke from the corner of his mouth, in the whoofing of it toward the ceiling, in the squaring of the thick shoulders as he passed out--there was a hint of rebellion.

"You may be the boss," thought Tim, "but your grip isn't too sure." And turning squarely on Malone he observed genially: "Fine day."

"H-p-p--" Malone stared fixedly at Tim. Tim stared back. Tim was rapidly developing a feeling of respect for the man. Tim knew the kind. A few years back he had been such an uncompromising one himself, who would have whipped off his coat, as no doubt Malone would now, and battled on the spot in preference to verbal argument.

"It is a fine day," responded Malone slowly; "but accordin' to my dope it ain't goin' to be half so fine a night."

From behind the cigar-case came a giggle, and from the boss himself came an after-chuckle and a pleased little smile.

"Why, it's not going to rain, is it?" asked Tim, and with an appropriately innocent manner he stepped to the door to look at the sky; and in looking he saw not the sky, but the widow Nolan, with some odds and ends of firewood, making her halting way against the wind.

"The poor creature!" murmured Tim; and while pitying her the plan came to him. "Gentlemen," he said over his shoulder, "I have to be off; but before going I cordially invite you and all your friends to the town hall to-night, to discuss the issues of the campaign. Good day, gentlemen."

And through the door, before it closed after him, he could hear the cackle of the man behind the cigar-case: "Is it going to rain! Say, Buck, you won't do a thing to him to-night, will yuh?"

III

With his greeting of "Good afternoon to you, Mrs. Nolan!" Tim stowed the widow's little bundle under his left arm.

"And good afternoon to you, sir; but you'll be sp'iling your fine clothes, sir!"

"And if I do it's small loss." He gripped her right elbow. "It's the hard walking it is, Mrs. Nolan--what with the wind and the steep hill and an old lady of your age."

"Oh, yeh, it is--coming on to seventy-five."

"Seventy-five? And you still hopping about active as a grasshopper! A great age that. 'Tis little, I'm afraid, many of us young ones will be thinking of climbing steep hillsides when we're coming on to seventy-five. 'Tis you was the active one in your young days, I'll wager."

"'Tis me that was, sir; but oh, I'm not that now."

"It's sad it must be to be looking back on the bright dancin' days o' youth, Mrs. Nolan."

"Sure and it is, sir; but why--the fine bouncin' lad ye are--why should you be sayin' it?"

"Ah, sure, youth has its trials and tribulations too, ma'am, sometimes. And is this your little place?"

"It is. An' will you come in, sir?"

"I will and thank ye kindly, ma'am. 'Tisn't every day a lady invites me into her place."

"Whisht! There are ladies enough to be pleasant to a fine strappin' lad like you, with nothing on earth to be botherin' you."

Tim laughed as he sat down.

"Nothing? Oh, ma'am----"

"And what is it can be worryin' you, sir?"

"What is it? Well, if you had my job, Mrs. Nolan, I'm thinkin' you'd be worrying, too; even if 'twas big and strong and a man you were, and but thirty years of age. I'm the Republican speaker, ma'am, that has been sent to ye here. And for why? To convert ye, ma'am."

"And so you're a Republican, sir? Well, well--but, savin' your presence, you don't look it or talk it. Sure, you're as Irish as myself!"

"I'm that Irish, ma'am, that if you were to take the Irish from out of me it's faded and limp as a mornin'-glory at two in the afternoon I'd be."

"And what's your name, may I ask?"

"Riley, ma'am. Timothy Joseph Riley, to be exact."

"Riley--Tim Riley! Well, you're the first Riley ever I knew was a Republican. That thin-necked one in the bank, and that other one, the fat-necked one in the real-estate place--sure, you don't favor them no more than--Yet there must be good men Republicans, too. Will you have a cuppeen o' tea? 'Tisn't much; but 'twill war-rm you, maybe, on the chill day."

"Thank you; and 'twill taste fine--a cup o' tea on a chill day like this. And like to be chiller, Mrs. Nolan."

"True for ye. And gen'rally I feels it; but not so to-day, sir. Mr. Kearney gave me a dollar, sayin' it was from a stranger and I wasn't to mention it--and I won't; but"--she shot a quick, warm glance at Tim--"God guard the kind heart of him, whoever he is. To-morrow I'll be orderin' some beautiful groceries with it. Tis a gran' sinsation to be goin' into a store and orderin' things."

She stooped for her little bundle of fagots, but Tim forestalled her. He undid them, arranged them craftily in the stove with rolls of old newspaper beneath, and touched a match to the fire.

"There, ma'am."

"We'll have the little kittle b'ilin' in a minute now, sir."

"And what will you do against the cold winter comin', ma'am?"

"Oh, yeh! I'll do, no doubt, what I've done every winter since I come here--live through it."

"With the cold wind coming through the wide cracks and the snow piling high on the wintry mornings, it won't be the tightest place in the world, ma'am."

"Thanks be to God I have it--the same little cabin!"

"Thank God you have! Whisht, ma'am"--- Tim laid a restraining hand on hers as she spooned the tea out of the can--"you won't be leaving yourself any at all."

"Sure, there's enough for the breakfast. And if we could always be sure of our breakfast it's little we'd have to complain of. And now let me get out my cups and saucers. I have two of each, thank God!"

"Let me, Mrs. Nolan--I see them."

"Well, well--but 'tis the spry lad ye are! Sure, you're across the floor in one leap--like a stag just."

"Oh, sure; my legs are young. And one spoonful o' sugar is it, ma'am?"

"One--yes. And now sit down. And so it's a Republican ye are? And an Irishman, too? Well, well--they do be queer happenin's in the world!"

"Queer enough. And from what part of Ireland are ye, ma'am?"

"Galway."

"A fine place, ma'am. I know it."

"Do ye now? But you're not Galway?"

"I wouldn't lie to ye, ma'am, though I'm tempted--I'm not; but I had an uncle, as fine a man as ever lived, who died there. I went to see him there once, and a grand time I had with salmon-fishin' in the loch and fishin' with the Claddagh men in the bay--and on a Saturday night the little boys singin' the old Irish songs in the streets and before Mrs. Mack's hotel door. And was it in Galway the last of your people died?"

"It wasn't. And they didn't die--they were killed, God rest their souls!"

"Amen!"

The sticks in the little stove crackled; the water in the little kettle spluttered; a gaunt black cat crowded his way through the poorly fastened door and rubbed himself against Tim's legs, whereat the widow threw a stick of wood at him.

"Out o' that, you with your mud on you from the quarry pools sp'ilin' the gentleman's fine clothes!"

"Small harm he'll do, ma'am."

"It's better manners he ought to be havin', though 'tis fine to see a man like yourself hasn't too much conceit of his clothes. But now have your tea, avic."

"I will. Ah-h! and the fine tea, it is, too. And isn't it a queer thing now, Mrs. Nolan, that I can go to the finest hotels in the land and not get the like o' this for tea? The finest of hotels--yes; and here in a little cabin, with the wind blowing through the cracks, I'm havin' tea that for its equal I'd have to go--well, to China itself, I'm thinking. But tell me, Mrs. Nolan--it's as a friend I ask--what misfortune was it brought you to be living in a little shebeen on this rocky hillside?"

The old woman made no response, except to add three or four little sticks of wood from her pile to freshen the fire. It was still chilly and outside it was windy, and Tim drew the man's worn coat about her shoulders and made her sit closer to the fire. And by and by she told him.

When she had done the twilight was on them and the fire long gone out. Through the one little window of the cabin they could see the increasing lights in the town below, and from the road they could hear the tramping of heavy-booted men.

"They'll be hurrying home from the quarries now. And 'tis not a lonesome home they will be finding."

"True, ma'am."

And Tim sat there smoking the last of the three cigars he had bought that afternoon, and thinking--thinking--sometimes of the evening's work before him, but mostly of the old woman's story.

"Oh, yeh; if it was but a stone I had to put on their two graves in the cemetery below!" she said after a long silence.

"And why shouldn't you have the stone to put over them?" Tim jumped up and patted her white, straggling hair. "And you will have it, Nanna. Come with me to-night and I'll guarantee you'll have it."

"And where will I go?"

"With me and have a fine, hot supper at Kearney's--and then to the town hall to hear me speak."

"Indeed and I'd like that fine, Mr. Riley; but they don't be invitin' women--old women--to any rallies."

"Tis me is giving the rally, and I'll invite whom I please--I mean, if you're not afraid of the rioting when they don't like, maybe, what I'm going to say to them."

"Me afraid? Of what? Sure and they could be liftin' the roof itself from the town hall and a lone woman like myself would be safe among them. But why should you be wanting me there?"

"Why? I'll tell you, Nanna, and you must take it for the true reason until I can give you a better. And who knows it isn't the true reason? I'm that vain, Nanna, that I want some one soul there that isn't against me--some one that, before ever I begin, I know will hear me out. If you're there I know whose heart will be warm to me while I'm speaking. For 'tis terrible discouraging to see nothing but cold faces staring up from the benches and your heart bursting to tell them what's in it."

"Sure and it must be, avic. The cold heart--'tis an awful thing. A bony black cat itself is more company in the house than one of ourselves when the heart is ice. But whisper"--she leaned doubtfully toward him--"d'y' think there'd be hope of you turnin' Dimicrat?"

"I'm afraid I'm fixed where I am. I'm not easily turned, Nanna."

"Oh, yeh! Well, well--in one minute, Timmie avic, I'll be along with you."

And she dusted the hearth and gathered up her cups and saucers, which, as she washed, Tim dried. And presently he was guiding her halting steps down the hill.

IV

At eight o'clock that night Tim was facing his audience, and a fine, large audience it was--not a hand's width in a single bench vacant; from the front row, where sat Buck Malone, almost smiling, to the back wall, where De Soto with some Indians and mailed companions was discovering the Mississippi--from stage to entrance, not a vacant seat. What hopes for a man in a fighting audience like that if he could but win them to him!

Tim was alone on the stage.

"Gentlemen," he began, "the Republican party in New Ireland seems to be very busy to-night. One-half of it has to attend a conference of bank cashiers over in Rocktown; and Rocktown, it appears, is four miles in a buggy over a rough road. That rough road and the buggy are, of course, an incontrovertible argument, gentlemen. And the other half has a rich prospective customer for a couple of town lots--also over in Rocktown. A busy little place that Rocktown must be! I don't wonder you're smiling. I smiled myself when they told me.

"But if they are not here, gentlemen, to accredit me, I am here to speak for myself. And, as you see, there is the table, the chair, the ice-water pitcher, the empty glass, all as"--he smiled down at the boss in the front row--"as Mr. Malone said it would be. 'Twas this very afternoon Mr. Malone spoke of it; and, myself happening to hear him, I would not for a lord lieutenant's income disappoint him. 'Twas my good old mother--God rest her soul!--who used to say--and many's the time she said it: 'Timmie dear, don't never disappoint people if you can help it.' And I never do--especially when it don't cost me anything; for water is the only thing I had to bring into the hall to-night--and water, gentlemen, is cheap."

"Yes, an' talk's cheap, too!"

Tim bowed to the voice and smiled with the laugh that followed.

"God knows it is cheap. If it wasn't 'tisn't the likes o' me could afford to be handing it out to you to-night, and no charge for admission at the door."

"Say, Buck, his ten minutes'll be used up before ever he gets started!" came a voice from midway of the hall.

"True for you, boy. And so I'll be introducing myself. My history is short. Riley is my name, Timothy Joseph Riley--baptized by Father Kiley, in the parish of Ballymallow--and I'm a Republican."

"And there's what we'd like to have you tell us, Misther Riley--how came you to be a Republican?"

"Yes, you blarneyin' turncoat--how came ye?"

A man in the front row stood up to say that last, a rugged-looking man, who looked as if he would like mighty well to jump up on the stage and haul Tim down off it. Toward him Tim stepped, leaning over the edge of the stage so that the belligerent one would not miss a syllable.

"I'll tell how I came to be a Republican. When I landed in this country and before I was fairly out of Castle Garden some thief of a pickpocket or worse stole the few little dollars I had to keep me until I could get a job. I was a seventeen-year-old boy, and that shy I couldn't beg. For two days not a morsel of food went into my mouth. And there I was, jumping sideways with the hunger, when a man comes along and saw me and brought me into a grand restaurant, 'And how'll I ever pay you?' I asks when I'd eaten my fill. He was a butcherman, with a white smock on him. And he laughs and says: 'You can't now; but by and by, when you get a vote, be sure and vote the Republican ticket.' And I says: 'Why the Republican ticket?' And he says: 'Oh, just by way o' variety--just to show that you people don't all go one way.'

"And"--Tim straightened up--"I took his hand, and 'Sir, I will!' I said. He was joking, maybe; but I wasn't. And I did vote the Republican ticket; and I'm still voting the Republican ticket. And I'm saying to you all to-night--the one Republican among five hundred of ye--that I'm not apologizing to any man in this hall or any other hall for it. And I'm saying to you"--in the face of the inquiring man in the front row, in the face of Buck Malone, in the face of the whole hall, Tim clinched his fist--"I'm saying that the man of Irish blood who ever forgets the promise that he's made to the one that befriended him--I say to ye all, and I don't care whether ye like it or not--his blood's been crossed somewhere; he's no Irish in him! No--nor fit to be called a man at all!"

Tim stepped back to pour out a glass of water; a form rose up midway of the hall, and a voice roared out:

"Say, you Riley man, your politics are the divil's own, but you're Irish all right. Go on!"

Tim held the glass toward the speaker.

"And, ma bouchal, 'tis you has the Irish heart in you, too. Here's to you! You stubborn, unconverted, hereditary Democrat, here's to you!" He drained the glass.

"Go on! Tell us more!"

"Yes; go on--talk up!"

"You'll get a show here. Go on!"

Tim glanced down at Buck Malone, swept the benches for the sight of a more cheerful face and caught the friendly eyes of Peter Kearney. Also he suddenly recognized the face of Malone's henchman--the man to whom he had given the cigar. He was wagging his head encouragingly.

"Gentlemen, I will go on--and thank you for the chance. And, with your permission, gentlemen, I'll speak of something besides politics. It is of charity. Gentlemen, a great quality is charity. Only because of the spirit of charity in you, gentlemen, am I allowed to speak to you here to-night; but it's another phase of charity I'd like to speak of. I will put it in the form of a story--and, gentlemen, not too long a story.

"There was an old lady in the old country, who received a letter from her oldest son, John, with passage-money for her second son, Pat, to come over and join him. She gave her consent. Why wouldn't she--when the living was so hard? Pat went, leaving his mother of nigh seventy and the last of his brothers with her. One son had already gone to South America and another to Australia; and now only a boy was left to her--and him with one leg gone in a railroad accident, for which they'd never got a farthing."

At this point Tim heard the side door softly open and close. He took a quick backward peek. Dinnie and old Nanna Nolan were waiting in the wings. Tim signed to them to remain there. He stepped to the front of the stage then, just in time to see Malone, whose every move he was watching, uncross his legs and half rise in his seat. Tim looked at him steadily and waited. Malone did not move farther, and Tim resumed:

"Well, the two sons in America, strong and willing, worked side by side, earning their dollar and a quarter and their dollar and a half a day, with now and again a day's or a week's layoff to set them back, but managing always between them to save four dollars in the week and send it over every month to the old mother--until by and by, she scrimping and saving, too, there was passage-money for herself and the lad to come to America. They took the steamer at Queenstown; and 'twas like a grand dream to them--until one day there came a great storm and the ship leaped and jumped, and the poor, helpless, crippled boy was thrown down an iron ladder; and when some one thought to help the poor mother pick him up he was dead. Well--But, gentlemen, maybe I'm trying your patience?"

"Go on!" came a voice, and "Go on!" came another; and then three, four, a dozen voices called for him to continue.

"Thank you. Well, gentlemen, a tempest in the great ocean, with its tremendous winds and mountains of seas, must be a terrible sight; but surely a more terrible sight is to see that same ocean, as smooth as oil, and the blue heavens smiling down, while the body of one that's dear to you is lowered into it! So it was. With loose, wide stitches they'd sewed the boy into canvas; and to the one foot of him they tied a piece of an old grate-bar, and dropped him into that great ocean."

Tim saw Malone shoot a furtive glance sideways to learn how they were taking it in the front row. Plainly he was not liking it, for he stood up straight then and surveyed the rows of voters behind him. Tim waited, and every man there knew why he waited. There was an indrawing of breaths all over the hall. Malone, without showing the ordering forefinger, sat down again.

Tim bowed to him. "Thank you, Mr. Malone, for that fighting chance," which remark brought out a quick burst of applause.

"Well, gentlemen, that poor old woman landed in the strange country. Grief-stricken she was, but not yet utterly discouraged. The son Pat was to meet her at the dock. He was not there. Well, she could see a good reason for that. They could not leave their work--sometimes the bosses were strict--they had often written so in their letters. No matter. With not much left of her little savings, she bought a ticket and took the train for the town where her two sons were working. Well, neither was Pat at the station to greet her--but by and by she learned why.

"There had been a premature explosion in the quarries, and a fall of rock had knocked Pat senseless; and as he lay there, unconscious, a second blast came and killed him. Well, that was an awful thing; but still there was the son John. And they had then to tell her of John. Well, while Pat lay there helpless, another man had run in to carry him out of danger. He was a brave man, that second man, for the flame of the second fuse was then almost to the charge; but he ran in and he had the injured man in his arms when the second explosion came. They were killed together. That second man was her other son, John."

Tim paused; but he no longer had to ask their leave to speak. He was in full swing; and out there, beyond the ends of his nervous, spreading fingers, they were swinging with him. Sitting up straight and still they were--or leaning forward, bent and eager.

A potent gift, the orator's. A writer may never hope to achieve instantly his great intention. He is limited to monotonous-looking black words on a blank page. But a speaker! Added to the words are eyes, lips, hands, head, body, and the immeasurable force of personality. Tim's voice softened and deepened, halted and quickened, rounded and trembled; the ruddy cheek took on a ruddier color; his deep-set eyes grew deeper and darker, and by and by they flamed. He grew taller; his body expanded. He spread his hands--fine, shapely hands, with nervous, expressive fingers--and as he gestured he quivered to his very finger-tips, and down there on the benches they quivered with him. The cold words--he warmed and revivified them. Under the caress of his beautiful, barely perceptible brogue the commonest, harshest lines took on smoothness and roundness; and from out his mouth the fine, tender words bloomed like summer flowers; and the larger, colorful words flashed like gems.

Tim, in short, was an orator. And when he said: "There, gentlemen, you have the story--and you know whose story it is. Poor old Nanna Nolan's--yes:" when he had said that, with arms and hands no longer gesturing, but drooping straight and motionless by his side, no one stirred--but a great sigh went up.

And not till that moment did Malone wake up to it that he had waited too long; but that moment he desperately chose to take his position at the end of the aisle and face his hitherto unbroken constituency; and while Malone was doing that Tim was motioning to Dinnie in the wings; and now Dinnie was leading her out--old Nanna Nolan, halting and bewildered, blinking at the audience--as Tim held up one hand for a last word.

"Here she is! I've tried to tell you her story, gentlemen; but there's only one living person can tell that story right, and I'm not that one. If you could have heard her telling it--she in her little cabin on that windy hillside, before her little stove, with the dark coming down and the lights beginning to shine through----"

And that instant, while Tim's arm was across her poor thin shoulders, covered as ever with the worn man's coat--that instant Malone, whose back was to the stage, chose to raise his fateful forefinger.

And Tim waited. And Malone waited.

Not a man left the hall.

Malone turned and faced Tim.

"You win," he said; "but that two-faced chairman of yours--and he ain't any friend of yours--he never tipped me off you could fight any way except with your hands. Speak the rest of your piece. You win!"

* * * * *

Back at headquarters the state chairman had been for an hour trying to extract a little comfort from the newspaper story of the New Ireland upheaval when the tall boss came in. To the boss, of course, he had to make some comment, and he made it.

"This man Riley," he began cautiously, "I've been trying to discover whether he's a Republican or a Democrat by what he says here."

"How's that?"

"He says: 'Take your leaders: and if they don't carry out your will fire 'em out! If the men you have set on high betray you,' he puts it, 'lasso 'em off their pedestals and set 'em on the street level again!' If that isn't----"

"--government by the people?"

"I wasn't going to say that, sir."

"Why not? Isn't that what it amounts to? Let me see your paper, please. H-m! I don't see what there is here to object to. He is not against a party government; in fact, he's all for party. Only make sure the party leaders are honest, he says, in politics, religion, business--in everything; and if they do not live up to their promises read them their lesson. Well, why not? I think he's right. The people know more than they did and we might as well reckon with that new knowledge. The men who don't do that might as well give up the leadership!"

There was a whole page of it in the New Ireland Record about Tim. The senator read it all. When he at last looked up he murmured:

"Raised twelve hundred and odd dollars for the widow Nolan. That was surely well done! Two hundred and fifty votes pledged to him before he left the hall. He surely has the touch! And Malone says he's going to stick to his contracting hereafter. Good idea!"

The senator read on: "And Malone also says--also says--H-m!"

The chairman was startled out of his silence.

"I set Malone on to Riley--to fool him."

"You did!" The senator scratched his beard with his finger-nails, drew his chin in to his neck and looked over his pince-nez at the chairman. "Too bad he misunderstood you--wasn't it? It would be so nice if we could give you the credit; but I'm afraid we'll have to hand it to Riley."

It was not said loudly; but the tone and the glint of the eyes--and the cultured boss stirred into using slang! The chairman knew that he might as well pick up his hat and go.

And he did; after he wrote out his resignation with the big boss dictating it over his shoulder.

[The end]
James B. Connolly's short story: Tim Riley's Touch

________________________________________________



GO TO TOP OF SCREEN