A Woman for Mayor | Page 5

had already half pledged himself to their cause.
"I suppose you'll call a meeting of the committee to consider their plan?" asked Morgan. "If they are really in earnest, these women are a factor to be seriously considered, whether for or against."
"Oh, yes, I suppose so," answered Allingham, turning back to his desk. "But I was brought up to believe a woman's place was at home with her husband and children."
"So was I," said Morgan, who was a privileged friend as well as secretary. "But the teachings of twenty years ago are out of place today. Indeed, they are as old-fashioned as they were a hundred years before. Miss Van Deusen is a magnificent woman,--the fit daughter of the old Senator."
"You know her?" said Allingham, irrelevantly.
"Well, no, not exactly. I've met her. But my cousins know her well, and she must be,--from all I hear, a thoroughly womanly woman. And, they all say, will marry Armstrong."
"Let her keep out of politics, then," growled Allingham. "Look here. A woman like that, according to my mind, would better get down on her knees and scrub her own front stairs than try to clean out City Hall. And she's not the woman for either job."
He chewed his moustache savagely, and strode out of the room, knocking over his chair in the process and causing his stenographer considerable alarm as he banged the door together on his way out. Morgan looked after him and smiled.
CHAPTER III
Learning the Ropes
The next morning's newspapers were embellished with scare-head-lines, all more or less complimentary to the women's candidate.
"WOMEN TAKE MATTERS IN THEIR OWN HANDS."
"SENATOR'S DAUGHTER RUNS FOR MAYOR."
"MEN TO BE LAID ON THE POLITICAL SHELF."
"SENATOR VAN DEUSEN WILL TURN IN HIS GRAVE IF DAUGHTER ACCEPTS NOMINATION."
were some of the head-lines which Roma editors had produced by late use of midnight oil, and the articles that followed them were incredulous, mildly tolerant, openly snobbish or given over to ridicule, according to the policy of their several papers.
One of them read:
"It is both a disgrace and a menace to this fair city that city politics have sunk to such a level that our best men will have nothing to do with them, and that no one with the ideals of good government, other than a handful of women, will undertake the improvement of our municipal government. With all deference to the ladies,--and who knows their many charming qualities better than we?--it is inevitable that, 'trained to keep silence in the churches'--(and the City Hall as well)--our women are without the large-minded grasp of affairs,--the broad and liberal judgment, necessary to cope with these affairs. Neither can we as self- respecting husbands and fathers, consent to see them so belittle their own dignity and influence as to step out into the arena of public life. The election of a woman,--no matter how able and high-minded she might be,--would be a step downward for our city. It can never be."
Another editor said:
"The late Senator Van Deusen was one of the most distinguished jurists in the country. He had a mind singularly open to the best interests of his native town; his constituents always knew where to find him on questions of law and polity. He did not favor woman suffrage, nor giving important offices to the 'weaker sex'; although personally he was distinguished by a gentle courtesy for and towards women. What, then, would he say to this wild proposition of a few so-called 'progressive' women to put his daughter in the mayoral chair of Roma? Verily he would turn in his grave. Neither can we believe that this movement has the sanction of one who was so near and dear to the late senator's heart, nor that Miss Van Deusen herself has given her consent to let her name be used as candidate for the highest office in the city."
A third paper announced:
"It is not to be wondered at that the women of Roma, casting around them to view the kind of men who occupy high seats in Roma politics, should say 'we will have none of them' and should desire to enforce a little petticoat government themselves. Roma has long been proud of its homes, its wives, its mothers and its housekeepers. Perhaps it would be for the public good, were we to set a few of these model housewives to cleaning up City Hall. Let them go ahead and elect a woman-mayor. Then let her proceed to eject the money-changers from the temple. Perhaps the women can do it. Certainly we men cannot,--or do not."
Gertrude Van Deusen read these articles during the hour after breakfast when a woman loves to "drop down" for a little in her library, with her feet to the fire, as if to gather her forces for the day.
"It is what I must expect, I suppose,"