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CHAPTER XIV

When Mrs. McMahon, Mrs. Schmidt and Miss Ferguson were ushered into the drawing-room of the Hamilton house, Cicily was there, ready to welcome her guests warmly.

"And how is Madam President of our club?" she said with a delightful assumption of deference to Mrs. McMahon, who bridled and simpered in proud happiness over this recognition of the honor she enjoyed.

"Indeed, she's as proud as a peacock, that she is," she avowed candidly. "And, if you noticed, Mrs. Hamilton, I didn't so much as say how do you do to the man at the door, as I always have before, nor even so much as look at him… For such is the high-society way of it, they're after telling me."

Cicily smiled, and then addressed Sadie with a like cordiality.

"Everything is shipshape, Miss Secretary?" she inquired.

"This club could go ten rounds without turning a hair," was the spirited reply. Then, the ambitious girl recalled her most esteemed author, and paraphrased her statement: "I mean, every thing is really quite splendid."

Mrs. Schmidt, too, smiled in appreciation, although without committing herself to words, when she was addressed as Madam Vice-President. Then, after all were seated, the Irishwoman delivered herself of a message of gratitude.

"Mrs. Hamilton," she said, and her great, round face was very kindly, "we want to thank you here and now for that last cheque. You'll be glad to know that Murphy's babies are fine and dandy; and those Dagos – you know, the ones in the sixth floor front in Sadie's house – faith, the wife come home from the hospital last night looking just grand."

"And say, Mrs. Hamilton," Sadie interrupted enthusiastically, again forgetful of niceties in diction by reason of her excess of feeling, "maybe you ain't in strong with that bunch! They were all singing and praying for you all last night to beat the band. They made so much fuss Pop had to go up with a club, and threaten to bust some heads in before anybody could get to sleep in the house. Of course, father didn't understand. He heard them say something about Hamilton, and guessed they might be some sort of poor connection of the boss."

Cicily, pleased by this information as to the gratitude of those whom she had sought to serve, yet tried to change the subject for modesty's sake.

"You, Mrs. McMahon," she directed briskly, "must be in charge. You must let me know about the sick ones and the hungry ones, and then I'll see what can be done."

"'Deed, and I will that," was the eager response. Then, the Irishwoman shook her huge head admiringly. "Sure, when the women get the votes, you'll be elected alderman from the ward." But, as Cicily would have laughingly protested against this arrant flattery, a sudden thought came to the President of the new club, and she spoke with an increase of seriousness: "And, oh, I was forgetting one thing! What do you think now, Mrs. Hamilton? Carrington's men have been around!" In answer to her hostess's look of bewildered inquiry, she explained the significance of the fact: "Yes, Carrington – bad luck to him! – is getting ready to start another factory, they say; and, so, he wanted to see how many of the boys he could get." Cicily uttered an exclamation of astonishment, mingled with alarm, at the news. "Yes, ma'am. I was talking to Mike McMahon, and telling him that, after all, I thought Mr. Hamilton was on the level, and that it would be a good thing to take the cut for a little while. And, then, he got mad, and he blurted out the whole thing to me. It's Tim Doolin, him what used to work in the Hamilton factory, and was discharged, and so went over to Carrington's. He's come around as a sounder. He's been advancing the boys a little on the side, and promising them good jobs and steady wages, if they'll hold out until Carrington is ready to use them at his place." The Amazon, who had raced through her narrative, paused, panting for breath.

Cicily was tense in her chair, with her cheeks flaming indignation, her golden eyes darkened with excitement.

"So," she exclaimed fiercely, "that's the way they are fighting! Shameful!"

Cicily was in the throes of a righteous wrath. Unaccustomed to the sharp practices that are endured almost without rebuke in the world of business affairs, this revelation of trickery on the part of her husband's enemies filled her with a disgusted horror. There was in the girl-wife a strong quality of the protecting maternal love in her attitude toward her husband. It was in obedience to its impelling force that she had followed so steadfastly her ambition to help him in his business, to be his partner. It was the dominance of this feeling that had caused her to stay on in her husband's house to comfort him, and if possible to save him, in the time of his tribulation. So, now, this phase of character caused her to resent as something unspeakably vile the machinations just revealed to her. There and then, she uttered a silent vow to worst these sinister foes by fair means or by foul. Her will commanded their undoing, no matter how unscrupulous the method; and conscience voiced no protest.

A movement of expectancy among the three visitors aroused Cicily from the fit of abstraction into which she had fallen, and on which the others had not ventured to obtrude themselves. She looked up, and then, following the direction of her guests' gaze, turned to see her husband, standing motionless just within the doorway of the drawing-room. He was staring with obvious amazement at the trio of women in his wife's company. Moreover, it was easy to judge from the expression on his face, with the brows drawn and the mouth set sternly, that his amazement was not builded on pleasure… Cicily immediately rose, forgetful for the moment of her plans for vengeance against the plotters, and went forward with a pleased smile. She was well aware that her husband would not regard this visitation with equanimity, but she hoped to prevent any overt act on his part that might fatally antagonize these women, whose good will she had struggled so hard to regain for his sake. So, she faced him with an air of happy self-confidence, and spoke with the most musical cadences of her voice, the while the caress of her eyes sought to beguile the frown from his face.

"Charles, you know Mrs. McMahon, and Mrs. Schmidt, and Miss Ferguson."

"Yes, I know them," came the uncompromising answer. The grimness of his face did not relax. He had had a day of tedious worries, and the sight of the women here in his own home exasperated him almost beyond the point of endurance. "An unexpected pleasure!" he added, with an inflection that was unmistakable.

"Oh, we didn't come to see you, Mr. Hamilton," Sadie declared resentfully, in answer to that inflection. "We came to see your wife."

"These are the officers of our new woman's club," Cicily interposed, hastily. "Do sit down for a moment, Charles." She returned to her own chair; but Hamilton made no movement to obey her request. Instead, he addressed the visitors in a tone even more unpleasant than that which he had used hitherto.

"Oh, you came to get something from Mrs. Hamilton," he sneered.

"Indeed, and we did not!" the Irishwoman retorted roughly, furious at the insinuation. But her anger melted as she caught Cicily's pleading eyes. There was a grateful softness in the brogue as she added: "Sure, she's given too much already, and that's the truth."

There was no hint of relaxing in the tense severity of Hamilton's face, as he replied, without a glance toward his wife:

"So, Mrs. Hamilton has been helping the wives of the men?"

"'Tis that same she's been doing – the saints preserve her!" Mrs. McMahon answered, with pious fervor. "Faith, if the women could vote, it's president they'd make her, so it is."

Cicily could not resist a temptation to appeal.

"Charles," she urged, "if only you'll have a little patience, you'll find that they can be of service – of great service!"

Still, Hamilton ignored his wife utterly, while he addressed the three women impersonally.

"I did not know that the men were in the habit of using their wives in a strike like this." His manner was designedly offensive.

Again, it was Sadie who was first to retort, which she did with a manner that aped his own insolence.

"Well, if Mrs. Hamilton can butt into it, it's a cinch we can!"

The man's face darkened with wrath. His voice, when he spoke, sounded dangerously low and controlled.

"Mrs. Hamilton has nothing whatever to do with my business affairs," he declared, explicitly. "She has nothing whatever to do with this strike. If you women come from the men, go back and tell them that I'm not dealing with women – neither now nor in the future. If they want anything at any time, let them come for it themselves."

"Can you beat it?" Sadie demanded wonderingly, of the universe at large.

But the Irishwoman took it on herself to answer, with an explicitness equal to Hamilton's own:

"Faith, and we didn't come to see you, as you know very well, I'm thinking. If it wasn't for Mrs. Hamilton – God bless her – we wouldn't be here at all… And 'tis sorry I am we are."

"Then, you'd better go, and relieve your feelings," was the tart rejoinder. "And you will please remember one thing: Mrs. Hamilton has absolutely no influence of any kind in this strike. I do not know in the least what she may have been doing; but, whatever it is, it's entirely apart from me."

"Charles, please – " Cicily would have protested. It seemed to her a vicious violation of good taste thus to air their marital disagreements in the presence of others. There was a perilous fire in the golden eyes; but Hamilton had no heed just now for niceties of conduct. He went on speaking, ruthlessly breaking in on his wife's attempted plea:

"Whatever Mrs. Hamilton has accomplished has been done without my consent and with her own money – entirely apart from me… Good-day!"

Now, at last, Hamilton moved from the position he had steadily maintained before the doorway. He stepped to one side, and bowed formally to the three women, who rose promptly as they realized the significance of his action. Cicily, too, stood up, wordless in her suffering. For the moment, at least, her indomitable spirit was overwhelmed by this crowning misfortune, and she felt all her ambition hopelessly baffled. Through this last catastrophe, her benevolent scheming must be brought to nought. It was impossible for her to believe that these women, on whose support she had relied for so much that was vital to her plans, could remain loyal to her after the gross insult to which they had been subjected in her own house. She realized that, deprived of their aid, she could not hope to cope with the situation that threatened ruin to the man whom she loved. In that instant of disaster, she hated her husband as much as she loved him, for his folly had destroyed all the structure of safety that her devotion had builded. So, she stood silent, watching the discarded guests as they walked toward the door. Her slender form was drawn to its full height; the scarlet lips were set tensely; the clear gold of her eyes burned with the fires of bitter resentment against this man whose blundering had wrought calamity.

CHAPTER XV

Even as the three outraged women moved forward slowly toward the door with that slowness which their dignity demanded of them under the circumstances, there came an interruption.

A servant appeared in the doorway, and then stood aside to usher in three newcomers. These were no others than Mr. McMahon, Mr. Schmidt and Mr. Ferguson, who halted in astonishment on the threshold, at beholding their wives thus unexpectedly bearing down on them in the house of the enemy. In their turn, the women came to an abrupt standstill, regarding the men with round eyes. For a few seconds, the six remained thus facing one another, too dumfounded by the encounter for speech.

Then, presently, the German uttered a guttural ejaculation in his own tongue, which seemed to relieve the general paralysis.

"Caught with the goods!" Ferguson exclaimed sardonically, with a scowl of rebuke directed toward his daughter.

At the same moment, McMahon fairly shouted an indignant question at his wife as to her presence in this house. But that Amazonian female did not shrivel before the blistering growl of her husband.

"Sure, I'll trouble you, Mike McMahon," she declared fiercely, "if it's endearing terms you're about to use, to wait till we get home." Under the spell of this admonition, the Irishman contented himself with subterranean mutterings, to which his wife discreetly paid no attention.

"But what's it all about?" Ferguson inquired sharply, of his daughter.

"Ah, forget it!" came the unfilial retort. Then, recalling the Vere De Vere, she amended her statement: "I mean, father dear, do not make a scene, I beg of you."

"A scene!" Ferguson exclaimed, savagely. "Why, I'll – "

What the irate Yankee might have done was never revealed, for he was interrupted by Cicily, who had now recovered her poise, so that she spoke pleasantly, favoring the tumultuous parent with her sweetest smile.

"Sadie and the other ladies came to call on me, Mr. Ferguson," she exclaimed, well aware that this announcement left the mystery of the women's presence as it had been before.

Mrs. McMahon, however, shed a ray of light on the puzzle.

"Faith, and 'tis that," she agreed, glibly. "We just dropped in for a cup of tea with a member of our club."

It was Hamilton who now interrupted further questions by the three husbands. He had been nervously fidgeting where he stood, and at last his impatience found vent in words.

"I'm not interested in these domestic affairs," he snapped. "If you men have anything to say to your wives and daughters, take them home, and say it to them there. This is not the place for it. There's only one thing that I have time to listen to from you."

Schmidt waddled forward a pace beyond his fellows, and addressed his former employer with the dignity born of constituted authority.

"Well, Mr. Hamilton," he said ponderously, with his accent more pronounced than usual by reason of the emotion under which he labored, "I speak as the chairman of the committee. So, sir, you will listen to us right here and now." He paused for a moment to wipe the perspiration from his forehead with an adequately huge handkerchief.

Ferguson seized on the opportunity thus given to voice the rancor that was in his heart.

"Yes, yes," he cried excitedly, "you want to understand that we're men! We're striking – yes! But we're fighting you in the open, like men. And we've come to tell you that we're not going to stand for the way you fight… Is that plain enough for you, Mr. Hamilton?"

The amazement of Hamilton over the charge thus brought against him was undoubtedly genuine. He stepped forward as if to strike, but checked himself almost instantly. There was no longer any look of boyishness in the drawn fare, with the chin thrust forward belligerently, the brows drawn low, the eyes blazing.

"The way I fight!" he repeated challengingly, menacingly.

Schmidt, having restored the handkerchief to its pocket, took up the accusation.

"Yes," he declared, with surly spitefulness. "I have been in a dozen strikes, and this is the first time any employer ever attacked me in my affections – through my Frieda." The German's narrow eyes were alight with venomous resentment, as he glowered at Hamilton.

Astounded by this attack, Hamilton forgot rage in stark bewilderment.

"What on earth do you – can you – mean?" he stormed.

"It is not right," was the stolid asseveration of the German. "The home is sacred." The speaker's tone was so malevolent that Hamilton was impressed, in spite of himself. And then, suddenly, a suspicion upreared itself in his brain – a suspicion so monstrous, so absurd, so baseless, so extravagantly impossible, that he would have laughed aloud, but for the sincerity of the feeling manifested in the faces of the men before him. His eyes roved from Schmidt to the faded woman who was the man's wife. He saw her shrinking behind the ample bulk of Mrs. McMahon, her mouth opening and closing soundlessly, as if in a wordless soliloquy. Then, again, his eyes returned to the man who had just uttered the preposterous accusation, and he beheld the usually jocund face distorted by a spasm of jealous fury, the insensate fury of the male in the loathed presence of a rival. No, here was no room for laughter. However ludicrous the mistake in its essence, its fruits were too serious for mirth. He turned his gaze on McMahon, and saw there the like virile detestation of himself. He ventured a glance toward the Amazon, who loomed over-buxom and stalwart. Again, he was tempted to amusement; but, again, a look toward the husband checked any inclination toward lightness of mood. Finally, he regarded Ferguson, and there, too, he beheld a passionate reproach. He did not trouble to stare at the girl. He remembered perfectly her cheap prettiness, her mincing manner, her flamboyant smartness of apparel from Grand Street emporiums of fashion. The strain of a false situation gripped him evilly, so that for the moment he faltered before it, uncertain as to his course. Denial, he felt, must be almost hopeless, since how could men capable of such crude stupidity digest reason? He hesitated visibly, and in that hesitation his accusers read guilt.

It was evident from a sudden, flaming red that suffused Mrs. McMahon's expansive countenance that she was beginning to grasp the purport of the accusations against Hamilton. She started toward her husband with a demeanor that augured ill for peaceful conference, when she was stayed by Cicily's grasp on her arm.

"Wait!" came the command, in a soothing voice. "Let me speak to these foolish men. You'll only stir them up, and make them worse." The Amazon yielded reluctantly, for she loved as well as honored the woman who had won her friendship by so much endeavor; but there was dire warning of things to come in the gaze she fixed on her suspicious husband.

"I'll not listen to this foolishness any longer," Cicily declared, dearly, in a cold voice that held the attention of all. "You men are too utterly absurd. There's no love lost between your wives and my husband, I assure you. If you had chanced in a few minutes earlier, you would have been well aware of the fact." Her statement was corroborated by the vehement nods of the women and the glances of disdainful aversion that they cast on the master of the house at this reference as to the status of their mutual affection. "Your wives and daughters," Cicily concluded haughtily, with a level look at the three husbands, which was not wanting in its effect, "are my friends."

But Ferguson was not dismayed by the reproof.

"Yes, Mrs. Hamilton," he answered, with bitter emphasis, "you're the one – we know that! You're the cat's-paw, with your clubs and your benefits." He turned to Hamilton, and went on speaking with even greater virulence. "It's through her that you're fighting; it's through her that you're attacking us in our homes; it's through her that you're turning our wives and our daughters against us until our lives are miserable with them, morning, noon and night. They're forever talking against the strike, trying to make us come back to you, and to take the cut. And it ain't fair, I tell you! No honest employer would fight that way from behind a woman's petticoats. Women haven't got any place in business, according to our way of thinking. We didn't mind your wife's butting in with bath-tubs and gymnasiums and libraries, and such foolish truck as that; but, when it comes to mixing up in the strike, and organizing our wives and daughters against us, why, we kick. That's the long and the short of it, Mr. Hamilton. No real man would stoop to that sort of work. It's a woman's trick, that's what it is – and women have no place in business." Schmidt and McMahon, almost in unison, rumbled assent.

At last, the badgered employer felt himself sure of his ground.

"You're right, Ferguson," he declared, with intense conviction. "Women have no place in business. You don't need to argue to convince me of that fact. If you doubt my sentiments in that respect, just ask my wife – she knows what my ideas on the subject are. But I knew nothing of all this. Mrs. Hamilton has mixed herself up with this affair entirely without my knowledge or consent. She has nothing whatever to do with my business affairs. As for the future, you may rest assured – "

"You may rest assured," Cicily interpolated, "that Mrs. Hamilton will continue to do precisely as she pleases."

"But, Cicily – " Hamilton would have protested.

"Precisely as she pleases," came the repetition, with an added emphasis, which, Hamilton knew from experience, it would be useless to combat.

"Faith," exclaimed McMahon, in humorous appreciation of the scene, "the filly has the bit in her teeth and is running away."

Cicily, however, was not to be diverted from a frank exposition of her position. Now, she faced the men, and made clear her attitude:

"Let me tell you that Mrs. Hamilton is proud to be merely a member of the club which you have heard referred to and certainly she is not going to resign her membership in it. You men have your union. There's no reason why we women should not have our club as well. You say that I've been helping them. Very well, what of it? Yes, I have been helping them. Why shouldn't the women take money from me, I'd like to know. For that matter, it's nothing like what you men have been doing – taking money from Carrington and Morton… And you talk about fighting fair!"

At the final statement made by his wife, Hamilton whirled on the men.

"What's that?" he fairly barked. "Are Morton and Carrington supplying you fellows with money to prolong the strike?"

"Yes," Cicily replied, as the men maintained a sullen silence. "And these men of yours have been listening to their lying promises about starting a new factory, as soon as you are down and out for keeps." She eyed the men scornfully, as she continued: "Haven't you the sense to see that it's merely a plan to ruin Mr. Hamilton completely? They want to kill him off for good and all. Then, when he's out of the way, you'll have to work for any sort of wages they are willing to give you. Good gracious, the scheme is plain enough! Why can't you see it as it is – a plot to do him up through you? A woman can see the inside of it easily enough!"

But her sensible argument was wasted on the men, who already had their opinions formed, and were not likely to change them readily at a word.

"Women have no place in business," Schmidt reiterated, heavily. "We have proved that. Now, Mr. Hamilton, you just keep your wife to yourself. We don't want her meddling around in our concerns. And we'll keep our wives to ourselves. They don't want you!" he added significantly; and McMahon and Ferguson endorsed the sentiment by vigorous nods of assent. "So," the German concluded, "we will settle this strike ourselves, like men, without any more woman's interference. Am I right?"

"That's exactly what I want you to do," Hamilton replied. "And any time you want to come back with the cut, let me know."

"I hope you won't hold your breath while you're waiting," the Irishman advised grimly.

"And I hope you won't be hungry," Hamilton retorted.

With this exchange of civilities, the meeting between the men and their former employer came to an abrupt end. Without any further farewells than a series of curt nods, the men filed from the room.

"I'm thinking that it's a pleasant talk we'll be having together, this night," Mrs. McMahon remarked judicially, after the departure of the committee. "So, it's thinking I am that we'd better start early, and then we'll have time a plenty to thrash it out with the boys. Good-by, Mrs. Hamilton… And please to remember that the next meeting of the club is to be on the Thursday."

"I'll surely be there," Cicily promised.

The adieux were quickly spoken, and the women took their departure, leaving husband and wife alone together, standing silently.