The Angel of Lonesome Hill | Page 5

the other end of the line."
Without stopping the pen, he discussed matters with one statesman after another, his lips snapping with metallic positiveness.
A member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations protested against the course pursued in Santo Domingo.
"If I were making a world, Senator, I'd try to get along without putting in any Santo Domingos, but as things stand, we must make her be decent or let somebody else do it."
Another brings up the question of taxing incomes and inheritances.
"I favor them both," declared the President. "They are taxes on good luck; bad luck is its own tax."
A statesman from the Pacific slope protests against Federal interference in the school question.
"It is a local matter as you say, Senator, and yours is a 'Sovereign State'--they all are till they get into trouble. If we should have war with Japan, your State would speedily become an integral part of the Union."
A group of gentlemen now object to an aspirant for a Federal judgeship on the ground that he has not a "judicial temperament."
"As I understand it," the President begins, "judicial temperament is largely a fragrance rising from the recollection of corporate employment; it is the ability to throw a comma under the wheels of progress and upset public welfare; I am glad to learn that Mr. L---- has not a 'judicial temperament'; I shall send his name to the Senate to-day."
The gentlemen retired. "Come, Mr. Dale, let us go."
This President had been accused of a lack of dignity. Is it a less valuable trait which puts the John Dales of our land at instant ease in the "State Dining-Room" of the White House?
"Well, sir, no man ever had a better friend than Judge Long," said the President when they were seated. "'Ves' Long, I mean," he added with a smile.
"I met him in the West; he had a ranch; mine was near it. We saw much of each other; we hunted together--and that's where you learn a man's mettle. He never complained of dogs, luck, or weather. We saw rough times; it was glorious. We'd wake up with snow on the bed, and when 'Ves' introduced me at Point Elizabeth in my first campaign he said we often found rabbit tracks on the quilts--but then 'Ves' had a remarkable eye.
"Some say, 'blood is thicker than water.' That depends somewhat on the quality of the water; I like him; there's nothing I wouldn't do for him!"
Dale grew suddenly sick at heart. If Long had only come! Recalling his discouraging words, a shadow crept over the old man's mind. Could it be possible he had not tried the month before?
Such misgivings soon vanished. "This is a trying office, Mr. Dale. With all my feelings I had to hold in abeyance the only favor he ever asked; it was about a pardon in a murder case over thirty-five years ago. He said it was the most cruel case of circumstantial evidence in the books--possibly you may know about the case."
The old man struggled back in his chair, then arose, his rough hand brushing thin locks back from a temple where the veins seemed swelling to the danger point. He was unable to summon more than a whisper from his shrunken throat.
"Yes, Mr. President, I do--he's my boy!"
"Your--boy! Yes--that's the name--how stupid of me--I beg your pardon, Mr. Dale--a thousand times."
They stared a long while at each other and Dale felt the fears which had fled before his gracious reception returning to grip him by the heart; the speech he had prepared had fled; it had all happened so differently.
At last the President spoke: "Congress is just going out; it's the busy season, but I'll go through the papers to-night myself."
Dale walked to the window; perspiration was on his face, but he was very cold. He stood with locked brain, and into his eyes came filmy clouds; then through these he saw, with sudden strangeness, a cabin far away, and a woman with pallid cheeks looked straight at him.
The President gazed intently as the old man wiped the window pane, nodded his head, and turned to face the table.
He cleared his throat, then opened a flannel collar, already loose, and his eyes glistened.
"You're sick!" exclaimed the President rising. "Waiter--some brandy!"
"No--just a little dizzy.
"Mr. President," he slowly began, "this is a case that all the papers in the world can't tell--nor all the men--there's none just like it.
"It's not for the boy--it's not for me. I took her from her folks against their will, and I've not panned out lucky--but that's not to the point. She's sick; the doctor can't help her--nobody can but you--I wish you might have seen her from the window yonder."
The half-finished luncheon was disregarded; the President had sunk into his chair, and the keen discrimination of a king of affairs