In the Arena | Page 8

or perhaps a little earlier,
as I lay tossing about, unable to sleep because I was too much disturbed
in my mind--too angry with myself--when there came a loud, startling
ring at the front-door bell. I got up at once and threw open a window
over the door, calling out to know what was wanted.
"It's I," said a voice I didn't know--a queer, hoarse voice. "Come
down."

"Who's 'I'?" I asked.
"Farwell Knowles," said the voice. "Let me in!"
I started, and looked down.
He was standing on the steps where the light of a street-lamp fell on
him, and I saw even by the poor glimmer that something was wrong; he
was white as a dead man. There was something wild in his attitude; he
had no hat, and looked all mixed-up and disarranged.
"Come down--come down!" he begged thickly, beckoning me with his
arm.
I got on some clothes, slipped downstairs without wakening my wife,
lit the hall light, and took him into the library. He dropped in a chair
with a quick breath like a sob, and when I turned from lighting the gas I
was shocked by the change in him since afternoon. I never saw such a
look before. It was like a rat you've seen running along the gutter side
of the curbstone with a terrier after it.
"What's the matter, Farwell?" I asked.
"Oh, my God!" he whispered.
"What's happened?"
"It's hard to tell you," said he. "Oh, but it's hard to tell."
"Want some whiskey?" I asked, reaching for a decanter that stood
handy. He nodded and I gave him good allowance.
"Now," said I, when he'd gulped it down, "let's hear what's turned up."
He looked at me kind of dimly, and I'll be shot if two tears didn't well
up in his eyes and run down his cheeks. "I've come to ask you," he said
slowly and brokenly, "to ask you--if you won't intercede with Gorgett
for me; to ask you if you won't beg him to--to grant me--an interview
before to-morrow noon."

"_What!_"
"Will you do it?"
"Certainly. Have you asked for an interview with him yourself?"
He struck the back of his hand across his forehead--struck hard, too.
"Have I tried? I've been following him like a dog since five o'clock this
afternoon, beseeching him to give me twenty minutes' talk in private.
He laughed at me! He isn't a man; he's an iron-hearted devil! Then I
went to his house and waited three hours for him. When he came, all he
would say was that you were supposed to be running this campaign for
me, and I'd better consult with you. Then he turned me out of his
house!"
"You seem to have altered a little since this afternoon." I couldn't resist
that.
"This afternoon!" he shuddered. "I think that was a thousand years
ago!"
"What do you want to see him for?"
"What for? To see if there isn't a little human pity in him for a
fellow-being in agony--to end my suspense and know whether or not he
means to ruin me and my happiness and my home forever!"
Farwell didn't seem to be regarding me so much in the light of a
character as usual; still, one thing puzzled me, and I asked him how he
happened to come to me.
"Because I thought if anyone in the world could do anything with
Gorgett, you'd be the one," he answered. "Because it seemed to me he'd
listen to you, and because I thought--in my wild clutching at the
remotest hope--that he meant to make my humiliation more awful by
sending me to you to ask you to go back to him for me."
"Well, well," I said, "I guess if you want me to be of any use you'll

have to tell me what it's all about."
"I suppose so," he said, and choked, with a kind of despairing sound; "I
don't see any way out of it."
"Go ahead," I told him. "I reckon I'm old enough to keep my counsel.
Let it go, Farwell."
"Do you know," he began, with a sharp, grinding of his teeth, "that
dishonourable scoundrel has had me _watched_, ever since there was
talk of me for the fusion candidate? He's had me followed, _shadowed_,
till he knows more about me than I do myself."
I saw right there that I'd never really measured Gorgett for as tall as he
really was. "Have a cigar?" I asked Knowles, and lit one myself. But he
shook his head and went on:
"You remember my taking you to call on General Buskirk's daughter?"
"Quite well," said I, puffing pretty hard.
"An angel! A white angel! And this beast, this boodler has the mud in
his hands to desecrate her white garments!"
"Oh,"